Walpurgis Night

“ It required but small aid from fancy to believe that the blast of a horn startling the midnight air would summon to these crags beings as wild and unearthly as ever crowded the haunted Brocken on a Walpurgis-night. No more appropriate scene could be imagined for the revelry of demons and witches. ”

“ In Central Europe it was apparently on Walpurgis Night, the Eve of May Day, above all other times that the baleful powers of the witches were exerted to the fullest extent; nothing therefore could be more natural than that men should be on their guard against them at that season, and that, not content with merely standing on their defence, they should boldly have sought to carry the war into the enemy's quarters by attacking and forcibly expelling the uncanny crew. ”

“ So this night was called Walpurgis Night, when evil beings were abroad, and with them human worshippers who still guarded the old faith in secret.
This is very like the occasion of November Eve, which shared with May first Celtic manifestations of evil. Witches complete the list of supernatural beings which are out on Hallowe'en. All are to be met at crossroads, with harm to the beholders. A superstition goes, that if one wishes to see witches, he must put on his clothes wrong side out, and creep backward to a crossroads, or wear wild radish, on May Eve. ”

“ Walpurgis Night, when, according to the belief of millions of people, the devil was abroad—when the graves were opened and the dead came forth and walked. When all evil things of earth and air and water held revel. This very place the driver had specially shunned. This was the depopulated village of centuries ago. This was where the suicide lay; and this was the place where I was alone—unmanned, shivering with cold in a shroud of snow with a wild storm gathering again upon me! ”

“ As a safeguard, persons are recommended to make a magic circle, in the centre of which they should stand with elder-berries gathered on St. John's Night. By so doing the mystic fern seed may be obtained, which possesses the strength of thirty or forty men. In Germany, too, a species of wild radish is said to reveal witches, as also is the ivy, and saxifrage enables its bearer to see witches on Walpurgis Night. ”

“ Three crosses are chalked up on every door, and little birch-trees fastened over the house-door, because the witches must count every leaf on the tree before they can cross the threshold, and while they are still counting, the day breaks and their power is gone. On that evening the cattle are especially exposed to the attacks of the witches, and prudent farmers resort to many expedients for the sake of protecting the animals from the wiles of these malignant beings. No wise man would sell milk or butter on Walpurgis Night ”

“ The cave became a place of pilgrimage, and a fine church was built over the spot. Walpurgis is commemorated at various times, but principally on the 1st of May, her day taking the place of an earlier heathen festival which was characterized by various rites marking the beginning of summer. She is regarded as the protectress against magic arts (cf. the Walpurgis-Nacht dance in Goethe's Faust) . In art she is represented with a crozier, and bearing in her hand a flask of balsam.
Her life was written by the presbyter Wolfhard and dedicated to Erkenbald, bishop of Eichstatt (884–916) . ”

“ We find Horace Walpole in February 1777 complaining that it absorbed the whole of the evening: “Everything is changed; as always must happen when one grows old and is prejudiced to one’s old ways. I do not like dining at nearly six, nor beginning the evening at ten at night. If one does not conform one must live alone.” ”

“ And from the induction of that first terrible evening Peter stepped into a blind terror that gave the promised deliverance of that approaching Easter Wednesday an air of blind necessity. Also about the house the dust and neglect crept and increased as though it had been, in its menace and evil omen, a veritable beast of prey. Doors were off their hinges, windows screamed to their clanging shutters, the grime lay, like sand, about the sills and corners of the rooms. At night the house was astir with sound but with no human voices. ”

“ For answer, Jack passed over the sheet of paper.
"Faraday is held a prisoner," it ran, "and says the Black Star is with you. Keep this to yourself, and meet me, with the Star to-morrow night, nine o'clock, at Day's Corner. Attempt no treachery, or it will be the worse for your friend—and yourself. It is the only way. Your failure to turn up as stated or any trickery will be the end of Faraday.—Lazare."
"Whew! Is this a joke?" asked Silver. "And who the dickens is Lazare?" ”

“ The night-sounds were strangely musical. Cries that were discordant in the day mingled now with the running of distant water, the last notes of some bird before it slept, the measured harmony of a far-away bell, the gentle rustle of some arrival in the thickets; the voice that could not be heard in the noisy chatter of the day rose softly now in a little song of the night and the dark trees and the silver firelight of the stars.
And it was all very romantic, of course. Harry Trojan had flung his cares behind him and stepped over the soft turf of the lawns, a free adventurer. ”

“ When she came to her own room and thought about her invitation she wished, with a sudden change of mood, that she had a pretty frock or two. She would have loved to have been grand to-night, and now the best that she could do was to add her coral necklace and a little gold brooch that years ago her father had given her, to the black dress that she was already wearing. She realised, with a strange little pang of loneliness, that she had not had one evening's fun since her arrival in London—no, not one—and she would not have captured to-night had Aunt Anne been able to prevent it. ”

“ Photographs of various articles in the drawing-room, which had no connection whatever with the Wallypug, were reproduced with the most extraordinary and absolutely untrue stories attached to them. Dick and Mrs. Mehetable Murchison appeared as “The Wallypug’s favourite cat and dog,” while pathetic stories were told of how the dog had on several occasions saved his royal master from an untimely and watery grave, while the cat had prevented him from being burned to death while reading in bed by gently scratching his nose when he had fallen asleep, and the candle had set fire to the bed curtains. ”

“ The sun descended as they pursued their journey, when, perceiving a house not far distant, Castruccio's companion drew in his mule, and pointing to it, asked if they should not remain there for a night? "Nay," replied Castruccio, "the moon will be up in half an hour, and being but just past its full, we may, I think, proceed safely."
"Do not trust to the moon," said his companion; "its shadows are deep and fearful, and its light not less dangerous ”

“ The night was very still, and on such nights, when the traffic thins away, the walker becomes conscious of the moon in the street, as if the curtains of the sky had been drawn apart, and the heaven lay bare, as it does in the country. The air was softly cool, so that people who had been sitting talking in a crowd found it pleasant to walk a little before deciding to stop an omnibus or encounter light again in an underground railway. Sandys, who was a barrister with a philosophic tendency, took out his pipe, lit it, murmured “hum” and “ha,” and was silent. ”

“ I can have supper all day and supper all night. Come along. You shall take me down in style. I put my arm through yours like that—see? No, the right. Now we lead the way. Who’s coming down to supper?”
His pride and his happiness! Who shall describe them? His back was so straight as they walked down the stairs that he almost fell backwards. The supper-room was a clatter of noise, but he was not so proud but that he was suddenly hungry—wildly, savagely hungry. She piled his plate with things, watching him, laughing at him.
“Nobody’s cut the cake yet,” she cried. “You shall cut it, Jeremy!” ”

“ Behind the town the woods had swayed and creaked, funeral black against the grey thick sky. Across the folds the rain fell in slanting sheets with the sibilant hiss of relentless power and resolve.
After luncheon, on this day the 13th, Maggie disappeared into the upper part of the house and Grace settled down on the drawing-room sofa to a nice little nap. She fell asleep to the comforting patter of rain upon the windows and the howling of the storm down the chimney. She dreamt, as she often did, about food. ”

“ Wilkins had recognised its shape, it was approaching him in the distance—as, in fact, it is approaching all of us at this very time; you, reader, I, writer, have each our great sorrow bearing down upon us. It may be yet beyond the dimmest point of our horizon, but in the stillness of the night our hearts shrink at the sound of its coming footstep. Well is it for those who fall into the hands of the Lord rather than into the hands of men ”

“ His greatest [133] sacrifice in life has been the abandonment of tribal ceremonies. From his house below the mesa can be seen the famous Walpi dance-ledge, like a miniature stage high in the thin air, thronged on pagan festal days with multi-colored costumes, where faintly sound the chanting and the drums. But he never attends these feasts of rhythm and song, save at the biennial Walpi Snake Dance, when he joyfully receives a dispensation from the Agent to go as an official of the Government, he being a Judge and the authorized Crier. ”

“ For some time past I have been the guest of his Majesty the Wallypug at his palace in the mysterious kingdom of Why—a country so remarkable that even now I am only just beginning to get used to my strange surroundings and stranger neighbors. Imagine, if you can, a place where all of the animals not only talk, but take an [14] active part in the government of the land, a place where one is as likely as not to receive an invitation to an evening party from an ostrich, or is expected to escort an elderly rhinoceros in to dinner ”

“ When the Wallypug, the Doctor-in-Law, A. Fish, Esq., and the Rhymester, were seated, there was no room left for the boy and myself, so we followed behind in a modest dog-cart, which was hurriedly procured from the livery stable. Many were the wondering glances bestowed upon the carriage, with its [Pg 30] somewhat remarkable burden, as we drove along through Kensington to the Gardens. And everywhere our appearance was hailed with enthusiasm, people being evidently under the impression that the Wallypug was one of the royal guests invited to the Jubilee festivities. Who could he be? ”

“ He was alone; he must fight for his own hand. He would—from that moment, seated there beneath the window, Ernest Henry Wilberforce challenged the terrors of this world, and found them sawdust—he would say "damn" as often as he pleased. "Damn, damn, damn, damn," he whispered, and marked again, with meditative eye, the space from wall to screen.
After this, greatly cheered, he bethought him of the Square. Last night his friend had said to him that when he wished to think of him, and go back for a time to the other world, a peep into the Square would assist him. ”

“ Mehetable Murchison. These members of my household were duly presented to the Wallypug. Mrs. Putchy made her curtsey with great dignity, but General Mary Jane was so overcome at the thought of being presented to royalty that she fell flat on her hands and knees in her humility, while Mrs. Mehetable Murchison, realizing, no doubt, the truth of the old saying that “a cat may look at a king,” went up and sharpened her claws on the Wallypug’s legs in the most friendly manner possible. ”

“ Its sparks, having grazed their way into the night, surrender to it, dark descends, pours over the outlines of houses and towers; bleak hillsides soften and fall in. But though they are gone, the night is full of them; robbed of colour, blank of windows, they exist more ponderously, give out what the frank daylight fails to transmit—the trouble and suspense of things conglomerated there in the darkness ”

“ The smart night is a Saturday, and then, if you go, you will see, in the little horse-boxes close to the arena, beautiful women in jewellery and powder, and young officers, and fat merchants in priceless Shubas. But to-night was not a Saturday, and therefore the audience was very democratic, screaming cat-calls from the misty distances of the gallery, and showering sunflower seeds upon the heads of the bourgeoisie, who were, for the most part, of the smaller shopkeeper kind. ”

“ In the afternoon the fog became of an impenetrable thickness, and beyond the shop it seemed that there was pandemonium. Some fire, blazing at some street corner, flared as though it were the beating heart of all that darkness, and the cries of men and the slow, clumsy passing of the traffic filled the bookshop with sound.
No customers came; Herr Gottfried worked away at his desk, the brass clock ticked, Peter sat listening, waiting. ”

“ There we hung, dangling and bobbing about in front of each other in the most ridiculous way, the dear Wallypug still clinging to his carpet-bag with one hand, while in the other he clutched a half-eaten sandwich. I shall never forget his Majesty’s surprised expression when he found himself hanging up the air in this unexpected way.
“Like being a bird, isn’t it?” he remarked when at last he found a voice.
“H’m, not much,” I replied. “I feel more like a fish at the end of this line. I wish some one would come and help us off. ”