House of the Wolfings: The William Morris Book that Inspired J. R. R. Tolkiena *s The Lord of the Rings (8 page)

And trotted away through the wild-wood with
her crest all laid adown.

Then came the man and sat down by the
oak-bole close unto me

And took me up nought fearful and set me on
his knee.

And his face was kind and lovely, so my
cheek to his cheek I laid

And touched his cold bright war-helm and
with his gold rings played,

And hearkened his words, though I knew not
what tale they had to tell,

Yet fain was my heart of their music, and
meseemed I loved him well.

So we fared for a while and were fain, till
he set down my feet on the grass,

And kissed me and stood up himself, and away
through the wood did he pass.

And then came back the she-wolf and with her
I played and was fain.

Lo the first thing I remember: wilt thou
have me babble again?

Spake the Carline and her face was soft and
kind:

Nay damsel, long would I hearken to thy
voice this summer day.

But how didst thou leave the wild-wood, what
people brought thee away?

Then said the Hall-Sun:

I awoke on a time in the even, and voices I
heard as I woke;

And there was I in the wild-wood by the bole
of the ancient oak,

And a ring of men was around me, and glad
was I indeed

As I looked upon their faces and the fashion
of their weed.

For I gazed on the red and the scarlet and
the beaten silver and gold,

And blithe were their noble faces and kindly
to behold,

And nought had I seen of such-like since
that hour of the other day

When that warrior came to the oak glade with
the little child to play.

And forth now he came, with the face that my
hands had fondled before,

And a battle shield wrought fairly upon his
arm he bore,

And thereon the wood-wolf’s image in ruddy
gold was done.

Then I stretched out my little arms towards
the glorious shining one

And he took me up and set me on his shoulder
for a while

And turned about to his fellows with a
blithe and joyous smile;

And they shouted aloud about me and drew
forth gleaming swords

And clashed them on their bucklers; but
nought I knew of the words

Of their shouting and rejoicing. So
thereafter was I laid

And borne forth on the warrior’s warshield,
and our way through the wood we made

’Midst the mirth and great contentment of
those fair-clad shielded men.

But no tale of the wolf and the wild-wood
abides with me since then,

And the next thing I remember is a huge and
dusky hall,

A world for my little body from ancient wall
to wall;

A world of many doings, and nought for me to
do,

A world of many noises, and known to me were
few.

Time wore, and I spoke with the Wolfings and
knew the speech of the kin,

And was strange ’neath the roof no longer,
as a lonely waif therein;

And I wrought as a child with my playmates
and every hour looked on,

Unto the next hour’s joyance till the happy
day was done.

And going and coming amidst us was a woman
tall and thin

With hair like the hoary barley and silver
streaks therein.

And kind and sad of visage, as now I
remember me,

And she sat and told us stories when we were
aweary with glee,

And many of us she fondled, but me the most
of all.

And once from my sleep she waked me and bore
me down the hall,

In the hush of the very midnight, and I was
feared thereat.

But she brought me unto the dais, and there
the warrior sat,

Who took me up and kissed me, as erst within
the wood;

And meseems in his arms I slumbered: but I
wakened again and stood

Alone with the kindly woman, and gone was
the goodly man,

And athwart the hush of the Folk-hall the
moon shone bright and wan,

And the woman dealt with a lamp hung up by a
chain aloft,

And she trimmed it and fed it with oil,
while she chanted sweet and soft

A song whose words I knew not: then she ran
it up again,

And up in the darkness above us died the
length of its wavering chain.

“Yea,” said the carline, “this woman will
have been the Hall-Sun that came before thee. What next dost thou
remember?”

Said the maiden:

Next I mind me of the hazels behind the
People’s Roof,

And the children running thither and the
magpie flitting aloof,

And my hand in the hand of the Hall-Sun, as
after the others we went,

And she soberly hearkening my prattle and
the words of my intent.

And now would I call her ‘Mother,’ and
indeed I loved her well.

So I waxed; and now of my memories the tale
were long to tell;

But as the days passed over, and I fared to
field and wood,

Alone or with my playmates, still the days
were fair and good.

But the sad and kindly Hall-Sun for my
fosterer now I knew,

And the great and glorious warrior that my
heart clung sorely to

Was but my foster-father; and I knew that I
had no kin

In the ancient House of the Wolfings, though
love was warm therein.

Then smiled the carline and said: “Yea, he
is thy foster-father, and yet a fond one.”

“Sooth is that,” said the Hall-Sun. “But
wise art thou by seeming. Hast thou come to tell me of what kindred
I am, and who is my father and who is my mother?”

Said the carline: “Art thou not also wise?
Is it not so that the Hall-Sun of the Wolfings seeth things that
are to come?”

“Yea,” she said, “yet have I seen waking or
sleeping no other father save my foster-father; yet my very mother
I have seen, as one who should meet her in the flesh one day.”

“And good is that,” said the carline; and as
she spoke her face waxed kinder, and she said:

“Tell us more of thy days in the House of
the Wolfings and how thou faredst there.”

Said the Hall-Sun:

I waxed ’neath the Roof of the Wolfings,
till now to look upon

I was of sixteen winters, and the love of
the Folk I won,

And in lovely weed they clad me like the
image of a God:

And lonely now full often the wild-wood ways
I trod,

And I feared no wild-wood creature, and my
presence scared them nought;

And I fell to know of wisdom, and within me
stirred my thought,

So that oft anights would I wander through
the mead and far away,

And swim the Mirkwood-water, and amidst his
eddies play

When earth was dark in the dawn-tide; and
over all the folk

I knew of the beasts’ desires, as though in
words they spoke.

So I saw of things that should be, were they
mighty things or small,

And upon a day as it happened came the
war-word to the hall,

And the House must wend to the warfield, and
as they sang, and played

With the strings of the harp that even, and
the mirth of the war-eve made,

Came the sight of the field to my eyes, and
the words waxed hot in me,

And I needs must show the picture of the end
of the fight to be.

Then I showed them the Red Wolf bristling
o’er the broken fleeing foe;

And the war-gear of the fleers, and their
banner did I show,

To wit the Ling-worm’s image with the maiden
in his mouth;

There I saw my foster-father ’mid the pale
blades of the South,

Till aloof swept all the handplay and the
hurry of the chase,

And he lay along by an ash-tree, no helm
about his face,

No byrny on his body; and an arrow in his
thigh,

And a broken spear in his shoulder. Then I
saw myself draw nigh

To sing the song blood-staying. Then saw I
how we twain

Went ’midst of the host triumphant in the
Wolfings’ banner-wain,

The black bulls lowing before us athwart the
warriors’ song,

As up from Mirkwood-water we went our ways
along

To the Great Roof of the Wolfings, whence
streamed the women out

And the sound of their rejoicing blent with
the warriors’ shout.

They heard me and saw the picture, and they
wotted how wise I was grown,

And they loved me, and glad were their
hearts at the tale my lips had shown;

And my body clad as an image of a God to the
field they bore,

And I held by the mast of the banner as I
looked upon their war,

And endured to see unblenching on the
wind-swept sunny plain

All the picture of my vision by the menfolk
done again.

And over my Foster-father I sang the
staunching-song,

Till the life-blood that was ebbing flowed
back to his heart the strong,

And we wended back in the war-wain ’midst
the gleanings of the fight

Unto the ancient dwelling and the Hall-Sun’s
glimmering light.

So from that day henceforward folk hung upon
my words,

For the battle of the autumn, and the
harvest of the swords;

And e’en more was I loved than
aforetime.

So wore a year away, And heavy was the
burden of the lore that on me lay.

But my fosterer the Hall-Sun took sick at
the birth of the year,

And changed her life as the year changed, as
summer drew anear.

But she knew that her life was waning, and
lying in her bed

She taught me the lore of the Hall-Sun, and
every word to be said

At the trimming in the midnight and the
feeding in the morn,

And she laid her hands upon me ere unto the
howe she was borne

With the kindred gathered about us; and they
wotted her weird and her will,

And hailed me for the Hall-Sun when at last
she lay there still.

And they did on me the garment, the holy
cloth of old,

And the neck-chain wrought for the goddess,
and the rings of the hallowed gold.

So here am I abiding, and of things to be I
tell,

Yet know not what shall befall me nor why
with the Wolfings I dwell.

Then said the carline:

What seest thou, O daughter, of the journey
of to-day?

And why wendest thou not with the war-host
on the battle-echoing way?

Said the Hall-Sun.

O mother, here dwelleth the Hall-Sun while
the kin hath a dwelling-place,

Nor ever again shall I look on the onset or
the chase,

Till the day when the Roof of the Wolfings
looketh down on the girdle of foes,

And the arrow singeth over the grass of the
kindred’s close;

Till the pillars shake with the shouting and
quivers the roof-tree dear,

When the Hall of the Wolfings garners the
harvest of the spear.

Therewith she stood on her feet and turned
her face to the Great Roof, and gazed long at it, not heeding the
crone by her side; and she muttered words of whose signification
the other knew not, though she listened intently, and gazed ever at
her as closely as might be.

Then fell the Hall-Sun utterly silent, and
the lids closed over her eyes, and her hands were clenched, and her
feet pressed hard on the daisies: her bosom heaved with sore sighs,
and great tear-drops oozed from under her eyelids and fell on to
her raiment and her feet and on to the flowery summer grass; and at
the last her mouth opened and she spake, but in a voice that was
marvellously changed from that she spake in before:

Why went ye forth, O Wolfings, from the
garth your fathers built,

And the House where sorrow dieth, and all
unloosed is guilt?

Turn back, turn back, and behold it! lest
your feet be over slow

When your shields are heavy-burdened with
the arrows of the foe;

How ye totter, how ye stumble on the rough
and corpse-strewn way!

And lo, how the eve is eating the afternoon
of day!

O why are ye abiding till the sun is sunk in
night

And the forest trees are ruddy with the
battle-kindled light?

O rest not yet, ye Wolfings, lest void be
your resting-place,

And into lands that ye know not the Wolf
must turn his face,

And ye wander and ye wander till the land in
the ocean cease,

And your battle bring no safety and your
labour no increase.

Then was she silent for a while, and her
tears ceased to flow; but presently her eyes opened once more, and
she lifted up her voice and cried aloud -

I see, I see! O Godfolk behold it from
aloof,

How the little flames steal flickering along
the ridge of the Roof!

They are small and red ’gainst the heavens
in the summer afternoon;

But when the day is dusking, white, high
shall they wave to the moon.

Lo, the fire plays now on the windows like
strips of scarlet cloth

Wind-waved! but look in the night-tide on
the onset of its wrath,

How it wraps round the ancient timbers and
hides the mighty roof

But lighteth little crannies, so lost and
far aloof,

That no man yet of the kindred hath seen
them ere to-night,

Since first the builder builded in loving
and delight!

Then again she stayed her speech with
weeping and sobbing, but after a while was still again, and then
she spoke pointing toward the roof with her right hand.

I see the fire-raisers and iron-helmed they
are,

Brown-faced about the banners that their
hands have borne afar.

And who in the garth of the kindred shall
bear adown their shield

Since the onrush of the Wolfings they caught
in the open field,

As the might of the mountain lion falls dead
in the hempen net?

O Wolfings, long have ye tarried, but the
hour abideth yet.

What life for the life of the people shall
be given once for all,

What sorrow shall stay sorrow in the
half-burnt Wolfing Hall?