THREE SONGS AND A STORY

THIS being no tale of love, we are not so much concerned with the swift and ingenuous romance of Sir Jasper and his honourable lady, as challenged by the result of their common passion. Nor can we dwell overmuch upon the less emotional love-making of George Pipkin, who, before he had resided a week at Dragonsville, was resolutely courting Sally Slater and winning the affection of her sons.

Sir Jasper now found himself at odds between love and duty, yet opposed the one against the other with diminishing zest, for as time passed, he could not fail to observe that the maiden of his adoration was by no means impatient of his company. The knight’s cheek grew lean, and his blue eyes became anxious. He had little intelligence, but a conscience of almost morbid activity, and at first he suspected the whole business to be enchantment—a possible wile of the Lavender Dragon to detain him indefinitely, fog his senses and deaden his soul to the clarion of duty. But though enchanting, there was nothing in the attitude of Petronell to suggest that she played a part, endeavoured to enchain Sir Jasper, or come between him and his appointed task. Indeed she delighted to hear of his modest achievements and gave it as her opinion that his career had only just begun. His aspirations were her own, for now she openly longed to be of use in the world and carry the lessons learned at Dragonsville to Devonshire at some future time.

“To do good is an art,” she declared, “and needs as much practising as any other. It is, indeed, because the beginner often makes such a mess of it that many are choked off well-doing altogether and turn to other and easier pursuits.

“It is understood,” she continued, “that so long as L.D. shall live, I do not leave him; and much I wish, dear knight, you found it possible to make the same promise. To think of the world without him, is to think of a very sad thing; but he is rarely mistaken, and in his opinion he will pass during the spring of next year. Then such as desire to stay and proceed with their lives after his fashion, will do so; but not a few of the rising generation propose to explore the world. Whether their discoveries will turn their feet hither again, who can say? For my part I was in a mind to stop among those I love and cherish here; but after your astounding information, it is clearly my duty to go home, reveal my birth-mark and claim my parentage.”

“I agree with you, Camilla,” declared Sir Jasper, for it was a Sunday on which these words were spoken, and the knight and the lady returned, side by side, to the Castle from Morning Prayer.

“It is our Lavender Dragon’s own wish that I should do so,” she continued. “Indeed, since he has learned the truth about me, he has even raised the question whether I do well to tarry at all. But my father and mother have waited so many years that it cannot harm them to bide still longer in ignorance; and I will never leave L.D. while he lives. I owe him the little wisdom I possess, and I shall strive to plan my future life by his precepts wherever I may spend it.”

A vision of amazing beauty stole into the thoughts of Sir Jasper. He pictured himself returning to the West country with a bride; he saw the great houses of Tracey and Pomeroy gloriously united; he pictured the joy of all concerned, the rejoicings, the largesse flying in silver showers, even the red Devon ox, roasted whole, and the morris dances, cudgel play, bull baiting and other delights of Merrie England proper to such an occasion. Incidentally he saw a ring fence round the two manors.

But he kept these dreams to himself. He had reached a stage at which the next step must be a declaration of marriage, or speedy departure, and he suspected that the lady was of the same opinion. But still he hesitated, until it wanted but three days before the month was ended and his undertaking to remain at Dragonsville absolved. He felt in dire need of another opinion at this juncture, for spiritual uneasiness overtook him in the night watches and he doubted whether these earthly ambitions much became him. To consult George Pipkin was idle. The squire had already become affianced to Sally Slater, and the folk congratulated both man and woman, for George, a resourceful person and quick to respond to friendship, became a favourite from the first. He knew Sir Jasper’s plight very well indeed, for his master could not conceal it. In truth everybody was alive to the situation and when, finally, the lovesick fellow determined to lay the matter before L.D. himself, his host showed no surprise. They spoke together after knight and dragon had bathed side by side in the great central fountain, before breakfast on a cloudless morning of July; and while the rising sun glittered over the rose and azure scales of the larger animal and quickly dried them, Sir Jasper, having resumed his garments, explained the problem and humbly invited comments and a solution.

“I, of course, am an ‘intellectual’ and apologise for it,” answered L.D. “It is comparatively easy to write, or lecture, eat hay, drink water and tell everybody else what they ought to do. This rule of life gives those who practise it enormous satisfaction and induces them to suppose that they are the only people who really much matter to the cosmic scheme. But as I find that to devour red meat, drink red wine and do things, instead of telling other people to do them, is much more difficult, my admiration has always been reserved for such as themselves attempt to advance the work of the world. To pull down is easier than to build up, and I am entirely on the side of those who would build, even if their building be faulty; while they who snap and snarl and spew opposition on everybody who is honestly seeking to help distracted humanity, leave me cold—even for the cold-blooded reptile, which I happen to be. In a word it may be said that the heart of man seeks to build, while the brain of him is chiefly concerned to destroy the existing order. Both are right and both are vital; and when they work together in the light of reason, good things must happen. But when will they?

“Now, you are of the thick-headed, but warm-hearted, order of men who want to get on with it. And you have fallen in love with a maiden suited to you in every possible way. She belongs to your own order, though that matters nothing; but what does matter is that she also belongs to your own sort of intelligence. She prays to the same God, as far as it can be said that any two people have the same idea of what their Maker means; she enjoys the same humanist outlook; she resents the same wrongs and evils; she is quite as determined as yourself to leave the world better than she finds it. What more seemly and fitting, then, than that you twain should wed and presently go forth, nerved and heartened each by the other, in the glory of a shared love, a shared trust, and a shared duty to the world? She has already made you happier than she found you, though at present you do not look it; and you have brought into her delightful life a deep and mysterious quickening and wakened her noblest emotions. Thus you have both made the world happier than you found it already, and what is worrying you is a chimera, a vague and futile echo of that melancholy hoot, a vanished order of Christians raised from their burrows, caves and catacombs. The idea of these estimable, but mistaken, cenobites you will recollect. They held no happiness seemly in this life, and accounted human love the invention of the Devil. They did their best to depopulate the earth; but their claim and clamour were alike unavailing in the face of Nature, and to-day we all, I think, admit that it is a very seemly and blessed thing for a healthy man to marry the right woman and to take a hand in the next generation. But that is a subject not likely to interest you for the moment. Therefore place your heart at Petronell’s feet, and if she prove willing to pick it up, wed her, stay with me, as she intends to do, until I go underground—somewhere about the breaking of the leaf next year—and then seek your relations together, and go on doing your duty to the best of your united powers.”

“You have greatly heartened me, my noble friend,” answered Sir Jasper. “It is almost beyond the dreams of ambition that such a maiden can stoop to such a man; but I will at least summon courage to approach her; and if the answer doom me to everlasting sorrow, you will not take it amiss that I mount my steed, don my armour and go hence.”

“Certainly not,” replied the devious dragon, who already knew that Petronell loved the lad with devotion. “If she say you nay, I shall be the first to speed the parting guest.”

Within a week, however, the young people were betrothed, much to their own delight and the satisfaction of the entire community. The Lavender Dragon, who never lost an occasion to bring his friends together, proclaimed a banquet and entertainment of unexampled splendour to celebrate this engagement, and it was swiftly planned that both Sir Jasper and his squire should be wedded in the same hour, upon a day after the harvest had been reaped.

Nicholas Warrender, the dragon’s old seneschal, was master of the ceremonies on the occasion of this public entertainment; all Dragonsville came to L.D.’s revel, and features of the joyful event were certain performances which followed a great midday meal. There was dancing; there was singing; there were athletic sports and trials of strength and dexterity. But the special attraction, and that most vividly remembered, remained to the credit of Sir Jasper and his bride, George Pipkin and the Lavender Dragon himself.

The knight, his lady and his squire each obliged with a song; while L.D. told the people a new story.

Sir Jasper’s betrothed sang first, and accompanied herself upon a lute. The lyric had been composed for that instrument, and Petronell sang with great charm and natural feeling, though, as she confessed, there was nothing to admire in either the words, or the music. Yet it happened that this was the only song she knew: her foster-mother had taught it to her in childhood.

SONG FOR A LUTE

Everybody applauded Petronell’s singing and refrained from criticising the song; but Sir Jasper held the accompaniment to be very beautiful, and the dragon, who used an ear-trumpet on special occasions, declared the melody tuneful, and hoped that the lady would sing it many times to him, so that he might better appreciate it; for of music he knew nothing.

Then Sir Jasper, having indicated to Petronell the tune which she must play upon her lute to accompany his song, made ready.

“I will give you ‘The Charm,’” he said, “and, though it is long since I had occasion to sing and I am much out of practice, I will do my best.”

He proceeded in a not unmusical baritone.

THE CHARM

“An excellent song with an excellent moral,” declared Nicholas Warrender. “But rather monotonous.”

“That is my fault,” confessed Sir Jasper. “If I had sung it better, I think that you would have liked it better.”

“Or if I had played it better,” added the musician.

Then spoke Sally Slater, who was going to marry Master Pipkin.

“If you please, dear L.D., I don’t think you will like George’s song, and it may be better if he is silent.”

“Why, Sally?” asked the dragon kindly. “I do not think that George would sing anything unfit for our ears.”

“That’s just what he’s going to do,” declared Sally, whose face was red and whose eyes were anxious.

“Explain before you proceed, George,” suggested Sir Jasper.

“It’s like this,” said the squire. “I’m not wishful to sing if none is wishful to hear. To be honest, the song is about a louse—and why not?”

“There’s not a louse in Dragonsville,” declared the seneschal with conviction.

“Nevertheless, there are many elsewhere,” replied George, “and God made them for His own dark purposes.”

The dragon spoke.

“Numerous creatures are quite familiar to us,” he said, “and not a few seek the hospitality of our homes and persons, whether we cold-shoulder them or no. They have their own methods of circumventing our hostility, and the black-beetle persists from generation to generation; the rat survives, with a determined resistance, despite all that we do against him; the wolf still makes shift to rear his family and trouble our shepherds; while many lesser things cling closer than a brother and will not be denied. Let us by all means pursue our warfare against them; but let us be just to our enemies, and if some human poet has struck his lyre to the body-louse, that is his affair. I see no objection to hearing what he has to say upon the subject with an open mind.”

Thus encouraged, George stood forth; but Petronell did not offer to accompany him.

“The song is in two parts, if you please,” explained Pipkin. “The first part is the louse talking to his Maker.”

He then sang these words in a deep and sonorous bass, which the dragon had no difficulty in hearing.

A CHAT

The singer here broke off and addressed the Lavender Dragon. He felt conscious that the audience was against him.

“That’s what the creature said to the Creator, your honour; and now, whether they like it or no, I’m going to sing what he got for his answer.”

“Certainly, George; one side is only good till we hear the other,” answered L.D. courteously, and Pipkin finished thus:

There was an ominous silence and nobody applauded.

“I told you they’d hate it,” said Sally.

“A painful theme, George,” declared the dragon. “Nevertheless I am glad to have heard the song. There is truth in it; but like so many other true things—— You might write the words from George’s dictation, Petronell, then I will consider them in private. Do not, however, sing it again. Sally will teach you some sunnier ditties. Your voice is admirable.”

After further conversation upon this subject, during which George found the sense of the company against him and learned, to his confusion, from Father Lazarus, that his performance approached, if it did not actually attain blasphemy, the seneschal called for silence and the dragon made a few remarks before telling his story.

“As you know,” he said, “all my stories have a moral, and the story that dares to convey a moral must be extra good, or young people naturally scorn it and grown-up people decline to hear it. A time is fast coming when no story will be permitted any moral whatever, and those who attempt stories with morals will be derided for their pains; but I belong to the old guard in this matter, and the adventure of a mighty monarch I am now about to relate, cannot be denied its conclusions. Understand, however, that I do not draw them. I leave them entirely to the listener, who shall apply or ignore them as he may prefer.”

The dragon then told his tale, slowly and solemnly. He was himself so impressed by its moral implications, that he quite failed to see the funny side, or if he did see it, he pretended not to do so.

Sesostris

This was the name given by the Greeks to that very distinguished King of Egypt, more generally known as Rameses II, and I shall tell you a pleasing incident in his career, which reveals this great man to have possessed an element of common sense rarely met with among early potentates, who possessed supreme power and held life and death in their hands. Sesostris enjoyed a plenitude of might and glory sufficient to turn the head of any lesser king, nor did he deny himself a certain amount of barbaric licence, or decline to accept what passed for pleasure in those remote times.

For example, consider the chariot that he used upon great occasions of State, and, what is still more wonderful to tell, the animals that drew it. The vehicle itself was constructed of gold and ivory and composed entirely of the fruits won from victorious invasions. It had been encrusted with magnificent gems—ruby, sapphire, and diamond—and cunningly wrought to flash its splendour even on a dull day. Sesostris himself drove his coach and four and he never failed to attract a multitude of shouting admirers, for not horse or ass, zebu or zebra, ostrich or cameleopard drew him. Four captive kings strained at the harness; and though Sesostris swung and cracked a formidable whip behind these fallen rulers, in justice to a great man we record that he never touched his team with it. Such an equipage was not contrived for speed, but arrogant pomp alone.

Never the stars in all their courses had witnessed any such tremendous sight as these royal slaves dragging Sesostris about the streets of Thebes, or Luxor. Tyrants were they, made prisoners in war, and even their own old subjects would sometimes travel to see this astounding turn-out, and tremble to witness their monarchs transformed into beasts of burden.

Of these four rulers condemned to this appalling penalty for unsuccess, one was a Syrian of ripe age. He occupied the near off position, and upon an occasion when Sesostris proceeded to offer sacrifice for a good Nile at the temple of Apis, the royal driver observed this chieftain cast repeated back glances of extraordinary interest and awe at the golden wheel of the chariot immediately behind him.

“O King,” enquired Sesostris, pulling up, “do you find anything amiss?”

“Not so, Glory of the Earth, and Life of your People,” answered the Syrian humbly.

“Then what are you staring at?” asked the ruler of Egypt.

“Sire,” replied the elder. “It happens that we may live a great part of our lives with some familiar, necessary object and then, suddenly, at chance prompting of the intellect, or flash of intuition, perceive in the everyday thing a fresh meaning, an added significance, that lifts our homely invention to new and notable seriousness, if not solemnity.”

“There is nothing in the least solemn about a chariot wheel, though, seeing that the spokes were fashioned out of the tusks of your late herd of white elephants, they doubtless turn your thoughts to gravity,” replied Sesostris.

“They do indeed,” confessed his royal slave. “But it is the operation rather than construction of these ivory spokes that gives me my great thought. Herein I find a parable of enormous significance, and only wonder how the mightiest brain on the earth at this moment has failed to note it.”

“You refer to me, no doubt,” replied Sesostris, “and you may rest assured that I have not missed the meaning of the wheel in our affairs. Surely the wheel of the potter and the wheel of the vehicle are landmarks in all human history.”

“There is even more than that I have discerned,” answered the Syrian, “for behold, as the wheel turns round, how the spoke now nighest earth slowly ascends until it is above all the other spokes and pointing heavenwards; but even in the moment of its highest ascension, steadily and certainly, as the wheel comes full circle, it sinks and sinks, until it is upon the earth again, while another has taken its pride of place aloft. O, Glory of the Universe and Topmost Spoke in the Wheel of the Children of Men, does not this formidable spectacle appal your heart and chill the purple blood in your most honourable veins?”

Doubtless a lesser man might have resented such a sermon at such a time and commanded the preacher to lay hold and get on with his task; but Sesostris, if his mind was not of that majestic dimension his oriental flatterer pretended, had none the less a very keen wit, and the parable was well calculated to challenge his practical wisdom and sense of reality. For a moment he remained silent, weighing the measure of the thing spoken; and then, with a certain impulsive and honest habit of mind peculiar to him, he spoke.

“Hear us, my people, and you, our steeds, also give ear. The thing that this learned tyrant of the East has imparted to us, we find to be rich with great meaning; and since the grass is never allowed to grow beneath our royal feet, we determine from this moment to change our mode of traction, and travel henceforth in a manner more fitted to human reason and kingly decorum. Greater is that monarch who walks afoot than he who subjects any fellow man to the indignity of the shafts.”

Amazed all listened, and then Sesostris turned to his captives and spoke with a swift and regal generosity.

“Kings,” said he, “we had permitted ourselves to overlook the way of fate and the immutable vicissitude of every human lot. This grey-haired Syrian is exceedingly right, even though he has proved us to be exceedingly wrong. Depart in peace, free men—all four of you! Return to your nations, that you may govern them with justice and mercy; and take along with you from our treasure houses, wondrous gifts for each wife and child, together with rations for your journeys and an escort worthy of the occasion and its demands. And never more, in this, or little and uncertain life, let warfare and hatred arise between us to mar our future friendship.”

He descended from his chariot, embraced each bewildered monarch and kissed the aged Syrian on both cheeks. Then, raising his hand to stay the shout of applause lifted around him by the younger generation of his people, for his counsellors were rather quiet, he spoke again.

“Henceforward, Egypt, when our chariot passes in affairs demanding circumstance and glory, it shall be drawn by two grey donkeys, in token of that common sense which is at the root of all progress honestly to be described as royal. And may they never find any need to talk to us!”

This ended the story of the Lavender Dragon, and the company streamed out over the Castle grounds, to enjoy dancing, archery, quarterstaff and other diversions. L.D. himself presented the prizes—a bunch of flowers for each maiden, a wreath of oak leaves for the men.