House of the Wolfings: The William Morris Book that Inspired J. R. R. Tolkiena *s The Lord of the Rings (11 page)

But as those three fellows, of whose talk of
yesterday the tale has told, drew near and beheld what the old
carle did (for they were riding together this day also) the Beaming
man laid his hand on Wolfkettle’s rein and said:

“Lo you, neighbour, if thy Vala hath seen
nought, yet hath this old man seen somewhat, and that somewhat even
as the little lad saw it. Many a mother’s son shall fall before the
Welshmen.”

But Wolfkettle shook his rein free, and his
face reddened as of one who is angry, yet he kept silence, while
the Elking said:

“Let be, Toti! for he that lives shall tell
the tale to the foreseers, and shall make them wiser than they are
to-day.”

Then laughed Toti, as one who would not be
thought to be too heedful of the morrow. But Wolfkettle brake out
into speech and rhyme, and said:

O warriors, the Wolfing kindred shall live
or it shall die;

And alive it shall be as the oak-tree when
the summer storm goes by;

But dead it shall be as its bole, that they
hew for the corner-post

Of some fair and mighty folk-hall, and the
roof of a war-fain host.

So therewith they rode their ways past the
abode of the Daylings.

Straight to the wood went all the host, and
so into it by a wide way cleft through the thicket, and in some
thirty minutes they came thereby into a great wood-lawn cleared
amidst of it by the work of men’s hands. There already was much of
the host gathered, sitting or standing in a great ring round about
a space bare of men, where amidmost rose a great mound raised by
men’s hands and wrought into steps to be the sitting-places of the
chosen elders and chief men of the kindred; and atop the mound was
flat and smooth save for a turf bench or seat that went athwart it
whereon ten men might sit.

All the wains save the banner-wains had been
left behind at the Dayling abode, nor was any beast there save the
holy beasts who drew the banner-wains and twenty white horses, that
stood wreathed about with flowers within the ring of warriors, and
these were for the burnt offering to be given to the Gods for a
happy day of battle. Even the war-horses of the host they must
leave in the wood without the wood-lawn, and all men were afoot who
were there.

For this was the Thing-stead of the
Upper-mark, and the holiest place of the Markmen, and no beast,
either neat, sheep, or horse might pasture there, but was
straightway slain and burned if he wandered there; nor might any
man eat therein save at the holy feasts when offerings were made to
the Gods.

So the Wolfings took their place there in
the ring of men with the Elkings on their right hand and the
Beamings on their left. And in the midst of the Wolfing array stood
Thiodolf clad in the dwarf-wrought hauberk: but his head was bare;
for he had sworn over the Cup of Renown that he would fight
unhelmed throughout all that trouble, and would bear no shield in
any battle thereof however fierce the onset might be.

Short, and curling close to his head was his
black hair, a little grizzled, so that it looked like rings of hard
dark iron: his forehead was high and smooth, his lips full and red,
his eyes steady and wide-open, and all his face joyous with the
thought of the fame of his deeds, and the coming battle with a
foeman whom the Markmen knew not yet.

He was tall and wide-shouldered, but so
exceeding well fashioned of all his limbs and body that he looked
no huge man. He was a man well beloved of women, and children would
mostly run to him gladly and play with him. A most fell warrior was
he, whose deeds no man of the Mark could equal, but blithe of
speech even when he was sorrowful of mood, a man that knew not
bitterness of heart: and for all his exceeding might and valiancy,
he was proud and high to no man; so that the very thralls loved
him.

He was not abounding in words in the field;
nor did he use much the custom of those days in reviling and
defying with words the foe that was to be smitten with swords.

There were those who had seen him in the
field for the first time who deemed him slack at the work: for he
would not always press on with the foremost, but would hold him a
little aback, and while the battle was young he forbore to smite,
and would do nothing but help a kinsman who was hard pressed, or
succour the wounded. So that if men were dealing with no very hard
matter, and their hearts were high and overweening, he would come
home at whiles with unbloodied blade. But no man blamed him save
those who knew him not: for his intent was that the younger men
should win themselves fame, and so raise their courage, and become
high-hearted and stout.

But when the stour was hard, and the battle
was broken, and the hearts of men began to fail them, and doubt
fell upon the Markmen, then was he another man to see: wise, but
swift and dangerous, rushing on as if shot out by some mighty
engine: heedful of all, on either side and in front; running hither
and thither as the fight failed and the fire of battle faltered;
his sword so swift and deadly that it was as if he wielded the very
lightening of the heavens: for with the sword it was ever his wont
to fight.

But it must be said that when the foemen
turned their backs, and the chase began, then Thiodolf would nowise
withhold his might as in the early battle, but ever led the chase,
and smote on the right hand and on the left, sparing none, and
crying out to the men of the kindred not to weary in their work,
but to fulfil all the hours of their day.

For thuswise would he say and this was a
word of his:

Let us rest to-morrow, fellows, since to-day
we have fought amain!

Let not these men we have smitten come aback
on our hands again,

And say ‘Ye Wolfing warriors, ye have done
your work but ill,

Fall to now and do it again, like the
craftsman who learneth his skill.’

Such then was Thiodolf, and ever was he the
chosen leader of the Wolfings and often the War-duke of the whole
Folk.

By his side stood the other chosen leader,
whose name was Heriulf; a man well stricken in years, but very
mighty and valiant; wise in war and well renowned; of few words
save in battle, and therein a singer of songs, a laugher, a joyous
man, a merry companion. He was a much bigger man than Thiodolf; and
indeed so huge was his stature, that he seemed to be of the kindred
of the Mountain Giants; and his bodily might went with his stature,
so that no one man might deal with him body to body. His face was
big; his cheek-bones high; his nose like an eagle’s neb, his mouth
wide, his chin square and big; his eyes light-grey and fierce under
shaggy eyebrows: his hair white and long.

Such were his raiment and weapons, that he
wore a coat of fence of dark iron scales sewn on to horse-hide, and
a dark iron helm fashioned above his brow into the similitude of
the Wolf’s head with gaping jaws; and this he had wrought for
himself with his own hands, for he was a good smith. A round
buckler he bore and a huge twibill, which no man of the kindred
could well wield save himself; and it was done both blade and shaft
with knots and runes in gold; and he loved that twibill well, and
called it the Wolf’s Sister.

There then stood Heriulf, looking no less
than one of the forefathers of the kindred come back again to the
battle of the Wolfings.

He was well-beloved for his wondrous might,
and he was no hard man, though so fell a warrior, and though of few
words, as aforesaid, was a blithe companion to old and young. In
numberless battles had he fought, and men deemed it a wonder that
Odin had not taken to him a man so much after his own heart; and
they said it was neighbourly done of the Father of the Slain to
forbear his company so long, and showed how well he loved the
Wolfing House.

For a good while yet came other bands of
Markmen into the Thing-stead; but at last there was an end of their
coming. Then the ring of men opened, and ten warriors of the
Daylings made their way through it, and one of them, the oldest,
bore in his hand the War-horn of the Daylings; for this kindred had
charge of the Thing-stead, and of all appertaining to it. So while
his nine fellows stood round about the Speech-Hill, the old warrior
clomb up to the topmost of it, and blew a blast on the horn.
Thereon they who were sitting rose up, and they who were talking
each to each held their peace, and the whole ring drew nigher to
the hill, so that there was a clear space behind them ’twixt them
and the wood, and a space before them between them and the hill,
wherein were those nine warriors, and the horses for the
burnt-offering, and the altar of the Gods; and now were all well
within ear-shot of a man speaking amidst the silence in a clear
voice.

But there were gathered of the Markmen to
that place some four thousand men, all chosen warriors and doughty
men; and of the thralls and aliens dwelling with them they were
leading two thousand. But not all of the freemen of the Upper-mark
could be at the Thing; for needs must there be some guard to the
passes of the wood toward the south and the hills of the herdsmen,
whereas it was no wise impassable to a wisely led host: so five
hundred men, what of freemen, what of thralls, abode there to guard
the wild-wood; and these looked to have some helping from the
hill-men.

Now came an ancient warrior into the space
between the men and the wild-wood holding in his hand a kindled
torch; and first he faced due south by the sun, then, turning, he
slowly paced the whole circle going from east to west, and so on
till he had reached the place he started from: then he dashed the
torch to the ground and quenched the fire, and so went his ways to
his own company again.

Then the old Dayling warrior on the
mound-top drew his sword, and waved it flashing in the sun toward
the four quarters of the heavens; and thereafter blew again a blast
on the War-horn. Then fell utter silence on the whole assembly, and
the wood was still around them, save here and there the stamping of
a war-horse or the sound of his tugging at the woodland grass; for
there was little resort of birds to the depths of the thicket, and
the summer morning was windless.

Chapter 8

The Folk-mote of the Markmen

So the Dayling warrior lifted up his voice
and said:

O kindreds of the Markmen, hearken the words
I say;

For no chancehap assembly is gathered here
to-day.

The fire hath gone around us in the hands of
our very kin,

And twice the horn hath sounded, and the
Thing is hallowed in.

Will ye hear or forbear to hearken the tale
there is to tell?

There are many mouths to tell it, and a many
know it well.

And the tale is this, that the foemen
against our kindreds fare

Who eat the meadows desert, and burn the
desert bare.

Then sat he down on the turf seat; but there
arose a murmur in the assembly as of men eager to hearken; and
without more ado came a man out of a company of the Upper-mark, and
clomb up to the top of the Speech-Hill, and spoke in a loud
voice:

“I am Bork, a man of the Geirings of the
Upper-mark: two days ago I and five others were in the wild-wood
a-hunting, and we wended through the thicket, and came into the
land of the hill-folk; and after we had gone a while we came to a
long dale with a brook running through it, and yew-trees scattered
about it and a hazel copse at one end; and by the copse was a band
of men who had women and children with them, and a few neat, and
fewer horses; but sheep were feeding up and down the dale; and they
had made them booths of turf and boughs, and were making ready
their cooking fires, for it was evening. So when they saw us, they
ran to their arms, but we cried out to them in the tongue of the
Goths and bade them peace. Then they came up the bent to us and
spake to us in the Gothic tongue, albeit a little diversely from
us; and when we had told them what and whence we were, they were
glad of us, and bade us to them, and we went, and they entreated us
kindly, and made us such cheer as they might, and gave us mutton to
eat, and we gave them venison of the wild-wood which we had taken,
and we abode with them there that night.

“But they told us that they were a house of
the folk of the herdsmen, and that there was war in the land, and
that the people thereof were fleeing before the cruelty of a host
of warriors, men of a mighty folk, such as the earth hath not heard
of, who dwell in great cities far to the south; and how that this
host had crossed the mountains, and the Great Water that runneth
from them, and had fallen upon their kindred, and overcome their
fighting-men, and burned their dwellings, slain their elders, and
driven their neat and their sheep, yea, and their women and
children in no better wise than their neat and sheep.

“And they said that they had fled away thus
far from their old habitations, which were a long way to the south,
and were now at point to build them dwellings there in that Dale of
the Hazels, and to trust to it that these Welshmen, whom they
called Romans, would not follow so far, and that if they did, they
might betake them to the wild-wood, and let the thicket cover them,
they being so nigh to it.

“Thus they told us; wherefore we sent back
one of our fellowship, Birsti of the Geirings, to tell the tale;
and one of the herdsmen folk went with him, but we ourselves went
onward to hear more of these Romans; for the folk when we asked
them, said that they had been in battle against them, but had fled
away for fear of their rumour only. Therefore we went on, and a
young man of this kindred, who named themselves the Hrutings of the
Fell-folk, went along with us. But the others were sore afeard, for
all they had weapons.

“So as we went up the land we found they had
told us the very sooth, and we met divers Houses, and bands, and
broken men, who were fleeing from this trouble, and many of them
poor and in misery, having lost their flocks and herds as well as
their roofs; and this last be but little loss to them, as their
dwellings are but poor, and for the most part they have no tillage.
Now of these men, we met not a few who had been in battle with the
Roman host, and much they told us of their might not to be dealt
with, and their mishandling of those whom they took, both men and
women; and at the last we heard true tidings how they had raised
them a garth, and made a stronghold in the midst of the land, as
men who meant abiding there, so that neither might the winter drive
them aback, and that they might be succoured by their people on the
other side of the Great River; to which end they have made other
garths, though not so great, on the road to that water, and all
these well and wisely warded by tried men. For as to the Folks on
the other side of the Water, all these lie under their hand
already, what by fraud what by force, and their warriors go with
them to the battle and help them; of whom we met bands now and
again, and fought with them, and took men of them, who told us all
this and much more, over long to tell of here.”