Rudyard Kipling

“ Here art thou, Richard, less than two days confirmed in thy Manor, and already thou hast risen against thy overlord. What shall we do to him, Sir Hugh?"
"'I am a swordless man," said Hugh. "Do not jest with me," and he laid his head on his knees and groaned.
"'The greater fool thou," said De Aquila, and all his voice changed; "for I have given thee the Manor of Dallington up the hill this half-hour since," and he yerked at Hugh with his scabbard across the straw.
"'To me?" said Hugh. "I am a Saxon, and, except that I love Richard here, I have not sworn fealty to any Norman." ”

“ I am troubled about the Men of the North." He squatted like a hare in the heather, and looked over his shoulder.
"'I also," said Maximus, "or I should not be here."
"'Listen," said Allo. "Long and long ago the Winged Hats"—he meant the Northmen—"came to our beaches and said, 'Rome falls! Push her down!' We fought you. You sent men. We were beaten. After that we said to the Winged Hats, 'You are liars! Make our men alive that Rome killed, and we will believe you.' They went away ashamed. Now they come back bold, and they tell the old tale, which we begin to believe—that Rome falls!" ”

“ About noon I heard horses in the valley, and the three men loosed my ropes and fled out, and De Aquila's men rode up. Gilbert de Aquila came with them, for it was his boast that, like his father, he forgot no man that served him. He was little, like his father, but terrible, with a nose like an eagle's nose and yellow eyes like an eagle. He rode tall warhorses—roans, which he bred himself—and he could never abide to be helped into the saddle. He saw the rope hanging from the beam and laughed, and his men laughed, for I was too stiff to rise. ”

“ A huge grey horse, whose tail-hairs crinkled the glassy water, was drinking in the pool, and the ripples about his muzzle flashed like melted gold. On his back sat an old, white-haired man dressed in a loose glimmery gown of chain-mail. He was bare-headed, and a nut-shaped iron helmet hung at his saddle-bow. His reins were of red leather five or six inches deep, scalloped at the edges, and his high padded saddle with its red girths was held fore and aft by a red leather breastband and crupper.
'Look!' said Una, as though Dan were not staring his very eyes out. ”

“ Then the doors were shut.
'"These are your men," said Maximus to the General, who propped his eye-corners open with his gouty fingers, and stared at us like a fish.
'"I shall know them again, Cæsar," said Rutilianus.
"Very good," said Maximus. "Now hear! You are not to move man or shield on the Wall except as these boys shall tell you. You will do nothing, except eat, without their permission. They are the head and arms. You are the belly!"
'"As Cæsar pleases," the old man grunted. "If my pay and profits are not cut, you may make my Ancestors' Oracle my master. Rome has been! Rome has been!" ”

“ The rider turned towards them, and his thin, long face was just as sweet and gentle as that of the knight who carries the children in that picture.
‘They should be here now, Sir Richard,’ said Puck’s deep voice among the willow-herb.
‘They are here,’ the knight said, and he smiled at Dan with the string of trouts in his hand. ‘There seems no great change in boys since mine fished this water.’
[pg 35] ‘If your horse has drunk, we shall be more at ease in the Ring,’ said Puck; and he nodded to the children as though he had never magicked away their memories the week before. ”

“ We are the Little Folk—we! Too little to love or to hate. Leave us alone and you'll see How we can drag down the Great! We are the worm in the wood! We are the rot at the root! We are the germ in the blood! We are the thorn in the foot!
Mistletoe killing an oak— Rats gnawing cables in two— Moths making holes in a cloak— How they must love what they do! Yes—and we Little Folk too, We are as busy as they— Working our works out of view— Watch, and you'll see it some day!
No indeed! We are not strong, But we know Peoples that are. ”

“ All people can be wise by reading of books.’
‘But are the books true?’ Sir Richard frowned. ‘I like not all this reading and writing.’
‘Ye-es,’ said Puck, holding the naked dandelion head at arm’s length. ‘But if we hang all fellows who write falsely, why did De Aquila not begin with Gilbert, the Clerk? He was false enough.’
‘Poor false Gilbert. Yet in his fashion, he was bold,’ said Sir Richard.
‘What did he do?’ said Dan.
‘He wrote,’ said Sir Richard. ‘Is the tale meet for children, think you?’ He looked at Puck; but, ‘Tell us! Tell us!’ cried Dan and Una together. ”

“ Farewell! Hold the Manor and live. Lose the Manor and hang," he said, and spurred out, his shield-straps squeaking behind him.
'So, children, here was I, little more than a boy, and Santlache fight not two days old, left alone with my thirty men-at-arms, in a land I knew not, among a people whose tongue I could not speak, to hold down the land which I had taken from them.'
'And that was here at home?' said Una. ”

“ And as soon as they had scrambled through their gap where Oak, Ash and Thorn grew, that was all they remembered.
A Song to Mithras
Mithras, God of the Morning, our trumpets waken the Wall!
'Rome is above the Nations, but Thou art over all!'
Now as the names are answered, and the guards are marched away,
Mithras, also a soldier, give us strength for the day!
Mithras, God of the Noontide, the heather swims in the heat,
Our helmets scorch our foreheads, our sandals burn our feet. ”

“ Now the ramparts are partly pulled down and built over, from end to end of the Wall; making a thin town eighty miles long. Think of it! One roaring, rioting, cockfighting, wolf-baiting, horse-racing town, from Ituna on the West to Segedunum on the cold eastern beach! On one side heather, woods and ruins where Picts hide, and on the other, a vast town—long like a snake, and wicked like a snake. Yes, a snake basking beside a warm wall!
‘My Cohort, I was told, lay at Hunno, where the Great North Road runs through the Wall into the Province of Valentia.’ Parnesius laughed scornfully. ”

“ Said De Aquila, at the window of our chamber: "How did I tell you? Here comes Fulke himself to spy out his new lands which our King hath promised him if he can bring proof of my treason."
"'How dost thou know?" said Hugh.
"'Because that is what I would do if I were Fulke, but I should have brought more men. My roan horse to your old shoes," said he, "Fulke brings me the King's Summons to leave Pevensey and join the war." He sucked in his cheeks and drummed on the edge of the well-shaft, where the water sounded all hollow. ”

“ In the naked hills beyond the naked houses, where the shadows of the clouds play like cavalry charging, you see puffs of black smoke from the mines. The hard road goes on and on—and the wind sings through your helmet-plume—past altars to Legions and Generals forgotten, and broken statues of Gods and Heroes, and thousands of graves where the mountain foxes and hares peep at you. Red-hot in summer, freezing in winter, is that big, purple heather country of broken stone. ”

“ Nothing can stand against them. He left us our catapults at last, but he took a Caesar's half of our men without pity. We were a shell when he rolled up the lists!
"'Hail, Caesar! We, about to die, salute you!" said Pertinax, laughing. "If any enemy even leans against the Wall now, it will tumble."
"'Give me the three years Allo spoke of," he answered, "and you shall have twenty thousand men of your own choosing up here. But now it is a gamble—a game played against the Gods, and the stakes are Britain, Gaul, and perhaps Rome. You play on my side?" ”

“ But if you never grieve your Bees,
Your Bees'll never grieve you!
Just at dusk, a soft September rain began to fall on the hop-pickers. The mothers wheeled the bouncing perambulators out of the gardens; bins were put away, and tally-books made up. The young couples strolled home, two to each umbrella, and the single men walked behind them laughing. Dan and Una, who had been picking after their lessons, marched off to roast potatoes at the oast-house, where old Hobden, with Blue-eyed Bess, his lurcher dog, lived all the month through, drying the hops. ”

“ I have given thee this Manor, which is a Saxon hornets' nest, and I think thou wilt be slain in a month—as my father was slain. Yet if thou canst keep the roof on the hall, the thatch on the barn, and the plough in the furrow till I come back, thou shalt hold the Manor from me; for the Duke has promised our Earl Mortain all the lands by Pevensey, and Mortain will give me of them what he would have given my father. God knows if thou or I shall live till England is won ”

“ I can do that for a century at a time.’
‘Ah, but you are a fairy,’ said Dan.
‘Have you ever heard me use that word yet?’ said Puck, quickly.
‘No. You talk about “the People of the Hills,” but you never say “fairies,”’ said Una. ‘I was wondering at that. Don’t you like it?’
‘How would you like to be called “mortal” or “human being” all the time?’ said Puck; ‘or “son of Adam” or “daughter of Eve”?’
‘I shouldn’t like it at all,’ said Dan. ”

“ I began.
"'In War it is as it is in Love," said Pertinax. "Whether she be good or bad, one gives one's best once, to one only. That given, there remains no second worth giving or taking."
"'That is true," said Ambrosius. "I was with Maximus before he died. He warned Theodosius that you would never serve him, and frankly I say I am sorry for my Emperor."
"'He has Rome to console him," said Pertinax. ”

“ We stooped to the gold and threw it back over our shoulders, one hand on our swords and one eye on the tree, which nigh overhung us.
‘I know not how the Devils leaped down, or how the fight began. I heard Hugh cry: “Out! out!” as though he were at Santlache again; I saw Thorkild’s steel cap smitten off his head by a great hairy hand, and I felt an arrow from the ship whistle past my ear. They say that till Witta took his sword to the rowers he could not bring his ship in shore; and each one of the four archers said afterwards that he alone had pierced the Devil that fought me. I do not know. ”

“ But Rome is merciful! You may come up.’ And up they three all scrambled.
‘What was the song you were singing just now?’ said Una, as soon as she had settled herself.
‘That? Oh, Rimini. It’s one of the tunes that are always being born somewhere in the Empire. They run like a pestilence for six months or a year, till another one pleases the Legions, and then they march to that.’
‘Tell them about the marching, Parnesius. Few people nowadays walk from end to end of this country,’ said Puck.
‘The greater their loss. I know nothing better than the Long March when your feet are hardened. ”

“ If the Barons gain the upper hand Robert will send another army into England for sure, and this time I think he will land here—where his father, the Conqueror, landed. Ye have brought your pigs to a pretty market! Half England alight, and gold enough on the ground"—he stamped on the bars beneath the table—"to set every sword in Christendom fighting."
"'What is to do?" said Hugh. "I have no keep at Dallington; and if we buried it, whom could we trust?" "'Me," said De Aquila. "Pevensey walls are strong. No man but jehan, who is my dog, knows what is between them." ”

“ But you shoot us Picts when we come to borrow a little iron from the Iron Ditch; you burn our heather, which is all our crop; you trouble us with your great catapults. Then you hide behind the Wall, and scorch us with Greek fire. How can I keep my young men from listening to the Winged Hats—in winter especially, when we are hungry? My young men will say, ‘Rome can neither fight nor rule. She is taking her men out of Britain. The Winged Hats will help us to push down the Wall. Let us show them the secret roads across the bogs.’ Do I want that? ”

“ Don't you know?'
'I know we have, but I didn't know other people had them too,' said Una. 'Tell me about all your family, please.'
'Good families are very much alike. Mother would sit spinning of evenings while Aglaia read in her corner, and Father did accounts, and we four romped about the passages. When our noise grew too loud the Pater would say, "Less tumult! Less tumult! Have you never heard of a Father's right over his children? He can slay them, my loves—slay them dead, and the Gods highly approve of the action!" ”

“ There were icicles hanging from her deck and the oars were glazed over with ice, and there was ice on Weland's lips. When he saw me he began a long chant in his own tongue, telling me how he was going to rule England, and how I should smell the smoke of his altars from Lincolnshire to the Isle of Wight. I didn't care! I'd seen too many Gods charging into Old England to be upset about it. ”