The Sword of Welleran and Other Stories - Lord Dunsany
And the ringing fight went on till Leothric's armour lay all round
him on the floor and the marble was splashed with his blood, and the
sword of Gaznak was notched like a saw from meeting the blade of
Sacnoth. Still Gaznak stood unwounded and smiling still.
At last Leothric looked at the throat of Gaznak and aimed with
Sacnoth, and again Gaznak lifted his head by the hair; but not at
his throat flew Sacnoth, for Leothric struck instead at the lifted
hand, and through the wrist of it went Sacnoth whirring, as a scythe
goes through the stem of a single flower.
And bleeding, the severed hand fell to the floor; and at once blood
spurted from the shoulders of Gaznak and dripped from the fallen
head, and the tall pinnacles went down into the earth, and the wide
fair terraces all rolled away, and the court was gone like the dew,
and a wind came and the colonnades drifted thence, and all the
colossal halls of Gaznak fell. And the abysses closed up suddenly as
the mouth of a man who, having told a tale, will for ever speak no
more.
Then Leothric looked around him in the marshes where the night mist
was passing away, and there was no fortress nor sound of dragon or
mortal, only beside him lay an old man, wizened and evil and dead,
whose head and hand were severed from his body.
And gradually over the wide lands the dawn was coming up, and ever
growing in beauty as it came, like to the peal of an organ played by
a master's hand, growing louder and lovelier as the soul of the
master warms, and at last giving praise with all its mighty voice.
Then the birds sang, and Leothric went homeward, and left the
marshes and came to the dark wood, and the light of the dawn
ascending lit him upon his way. And into Allathurion he came ere
noon, and with him brought the evil wizened head, and the people
rejoiced, and their nights of trouble ceased.
* * * * * * *
This is the tale of the vanquishing of The Fortress Unvanquishable,
Save For Sacnoth, and of its passing away, as it is told and
believed by those who love the mystic days of old.
Others have said, and vainly claim to prove, that a fever came to
Allathurion, and went away; and that this same fever drove Leothric
into the marshes by night, and made him dream there and act
violently with a sword.
And others again say that there hath been no town of Allathurion,
and that Leothric never lived.
Peace to them. The gardener hath gathered up this autumn's leaves.
Who shall see them again, or who wot of them? And who shall say what
hath befallen in the days of long ago?
The Lord of Cities
I came one day upon a road that wandered so aimlessly that it was
suited to my mood, so I followed it, and it led me presently among
deep woods. Somewhere in the midst of them Autumn held his court,
sitting wreathed with gorgeous garlands; and it was the day before
his annual festival of the Dance of Leaves, the courtly festival
upon which hungry Winter rushes mob-like, and there arise the
furious cries of the North Wind triumphing, and all the splendour
and grace of the woods is gone, and Autumn flees away, discrowned
and forgotten, and never again returns. Other Autumns arise, other
Autumns, and fall before other Winters. A road led away to the left,
but my road went straight on. The road to the left had a trodden
appearance; there were wheel tracks on it, and it seemed the correct
way to take. It looked as if no one could have any business with the
road that led straight on and up the hill. Therefore I went straight
on and up the hill; and here and there on the road grew blades of
grass undisturbed in the repose and hush that the road had earned
from going up and down the world; for you can go by this road, as
you can go by all roads, to London, to Lincoln, to the North of
Scotland, to the West of Wales, and to Wrellisford where roads end.
Presently the woods ended, and I came to the open fields and at the
same moment to the top of the hill, and saw the high places of
Somerset and the downs of Wilts spread out along the horizon.
Suddenly I saw underneath me the village of Wrellisford, with no
sound in its street but the voice of the Wrellis roaring as he
tumbled over a weir above the village. So I followed my road down
over the crest of the hill, and the road became more languid as I
descended, and less and less concerned with the cares of a highway.
Here a spring broke out in the middle of it, and here another. The
road never heeded. A stream ran right across it, still it straggled
on. Suddenly it gave up the minimum property that a road should
possess, and, renouncing its connection with High Streets, its
lineage of Piccadilly, shrank to one side and became an
unpretentious footpath. Then it led me to the old bridge over the
stream, and thus I came to Wrellisford, and found after travelling
in many lands a village with no wheel tracks in its street. On the
other side of the bridge, my friend the road struggled a few yards
up a grassy slope, and there ceased. Over all the village hung a
great stillness, with the roar of the Wrellis cutting right across
it, and there came occasionally the bark of a dog that kept watch
over the broken stillness and over the sanctity of that untravelled
road. That terrible and wasting fever that, unlike so many plagues,
comes not from the East but from the West, the fever of hurry, had
not come here--only the Wrellis hurried on his eternal quest, but it
was a calm and placid hurry that gave one time for song. It was in
the early afternoon, and nobody was about. Either they worked beyond
the mysterious valley that nursed Wrellisford and hid it from the
world, or else they secluded themselves within their old-time houses
that were roofed with tiles of stone. I sat down upon the old stone
bridge and watched the Wrellis, who seemed to me to be the only
traveller that came from far away into this village where roads end,
and passed on beyond it. And yet the Wrellis comes singing out of
eternity, and tarries for a very little while in the village where
roads end, and passes on into eternity again; and so surely do all
that dwell in Wrellisford. I wondered as I leaned upon the bridge in
what place the Wrellis would first find the sea, whether as he
wound idly through meadows on his long quest he would suddenly
behold him, and, leaping down over some rocky cliff, take to him at
once the message of the hills. Or whether, widening slowly into some
grand and tidal estuary, he would take his waste of waters to
the sea and the might of the river should meet with the might of the
waves, like to two Emperors clad in gleaming mail meeting midway
between two hosts of war; and the little Wrellis would become a
haven for returning ships and a setting-out place for adventurous
men.
A little beyond the bridge there stood an old mill with a ruined
roof, and a small branch of the Wrellis rushed through its emptiness
shouting, like a boy playing alone in a corridor of some desolate
house. The mill-wheel was gone, but there lay there still great bars
and wheels and cogs, the bones of some dead industry. I know not
what industry was once lord in that house, I know not what retinue
of workers mourns him now; I only know who is lord there today in
all those empty chambers. For as soon as I entered, I saw a whole
wall draped with his marvellous black tapestry, without price
because inimitable and too delicate to pass from hand to hand among
merchants. I looked at the wonderful complexity of its infinite
threads, my finger sank into it for more than an inch without
feeling the touch; so black it was and so carefully wrought,
sombrely covering the whole of the wall, that it might have been
worked to commemorate the deaths of all that ever lived there, as
indeed it was. I looked through a hole in the wall into an inner
chamber where a worn-out driving band went among many wheels, and
there this priceless inimitable stuff not merely clothed the walls
but hung from bars and ceiling in beautiful draperies, in marvellous
festoons. Nothing was ugly in this desolate house, for the busy
artist's soul of its present lord had beautified everything in its
desolation. It was the unmistakable work of the spider, in whose
house I was, and the house was utterly desolate but for him, and
silent but for the roar of the Wrellis and the shout of the little
stream. Then I turned homewards; and as I went up and over the hill
and lost the sight of the village, I saw the road whiten and harden
and gradually broaden out till the tracks of wheels appeared; and it
went afar to take the young men of Wrellisford into the wide ways of
the earth--to the new West and the mysterious East, and into the
troubled South.
And that night, when the house was still and sleep
was far off, hushing hamlets and giving ease to cities, my fancy
wandered up that aimless road and came suddenly to Wrellisford. And
it seemed to me that the travelling of so many people for so many
years between Wrellisford and John o' Groat's, talking to one
another as they went or muttering alone, had given the road a voice.
And it seemed to me that night that the road spoke to the river by
Wrellisford bridge, speaking with the voice of many pilgrims. And
the road said to the river: 'I rest here. How is it with you?'
And the river, who is always speaking, said: 'I rest nowhere from
doing the Work of the World. I carry the murmur of inner lands to
the sea, and to the abysses voices of the hills.'
'It is I,' said the road, 'that do the Work of the World, and take
from city to city the rumour of each. There is nothing higher than
Man and the making of cities. What do you do for Man?'
And the river said: 'Beauty and song are higher than Man. I carry
the news seaward of the first song of the thrush after the furious
retreat of winter northward, and the first timid anemone learns from
me that she is safe and that spring has truly come. Oh but the song
of all the birds in spring is more beautiful than Man, and the first
coming of the hyacinth more delectable than his face! When spring is
fallen upon the days of summer, I carry away with mournful joy at
night petal by petal the rhododendron's bloom. No lit procession of
purple kings is nigh so fair as that. No beautiful death of
well-beloved men hath such a glory of forlornness. And I bear far
away the pink and white petals of the apple-blossom's youth when the
laborious time comes for his work in the world and for the bearing
of apples. And I am robed each day and every night anew with the
beauty of heaven, and I make lovely visions of the trees. But Man!
What is Man? In the ancient parliament of the elder hills, when the
grey ones speak together, they say nought of Man, but concern
themselves only with their brethren the stars. Or when they wrap
themselves in purple cloaks at evening, they lament some old
irreparable wrong, or, uttering some mountain hymn, all mourn the
set of sun.'
'Your beauty,' said the road, 'and the beauty of the sky, and of the
rhododendron blossom and of spring, live only in the mind of Man,
and except in the mind of Man the mountains have no voices. Nothing
is beautiful that has not been seen by Man's eye. Or if your
rhododendron blossom was beautiful for a moment, it soon withered
and was drowned, and spring soon passes away; beauty can only live
on in the mind of Man. I bring thought into the mind of Man swiftly
from distant places every day. I know the Telegraph--I know him
well; he and I have walked for hundreds of miles together. There is
no work in the world except for Man and the making of his cities. I
take wares to and fro from city to city.'
'My little stream in the field there,' said the river, 'used to make
wares in that house for awhile once.'
'Ah,' said the road, 'I remember, but I brought cheaper ones from
distant cities. Nothing is of any importance but making cities for
Man.'
'I know so little about him,' said the river, 'but I have a great
deal of work to do--I have all this water to send down to the sea;
and then tomorrow or next day all the leaves of Autumn will be
coming this way. It will be very beautiful. The sea is a very, very
wonderful place. I know all about it; I have heard shepherd boys
singing of it, and sometimes before a storm the gulls come up. It is
a place all blue and shining and full of pearls, and has in it coral
islands and isles of spice, and storms and galleons and the bones of
Drake. The sea is much greater than Man. When I come to the sea, he
will know that I have worked well for him. But I must hurry, for I
have much to do. This bridge delays me a little; some day I will
carry it away.'
'Oh, you must not do that,' said the road.
'Oh, not for a long time,' said the river. 'Some centuries
perhaps--and I have much to do besides. There is my song to sing, for
instance, and that alone is more beautiful than any noise that Man
makes.'
'All work is for Man,' said the road, 'and for the building of
cities. There is no beauty or romance or mystery in the sea except
for the men that sail abroad upon it, and for those that stay at
home and dream of them. As for your song, it rings night and
morning, year in, year out, in the ears of men that are born in
Wrellisford; at night it is part of their dreams, at morning it is
the voice of day, and so it becomes part of their souls. But the
song is not beautiful in itself. I take these men with your song in
their souls up over the edge of the valley and a long way off
beyond, and I am a strong and dusty road up there, and they go with
your song in their souls and turn it into music and gladden cities.
But nothing is the Work of the World except work for Man.'
'I wish I was quite sure about the Work of the World,' said the
stream; 'I wish I knew for certain for whom we work. I feel almost
sure that it is for the sea. He is very great and beautiful. I think
that there can be no greater master than the sea. I think that some
day he may be so full of romance and mystery and sound of sheep
bells and murmur of mist-hidden hills, which we streams shall have
brought him, that there will be no more music or beauty left in the
world, and all the world will end; and perhaps the streams shall
gather at the last, we all together, to the sea. Or perhaps the sea
will give us at the last unto each one his own again, giving back
all that he has garnered in the years--the little petals of the
apple-blossom and the mourned ones of the rhododendron, and our old
visions of the trees and sky; so many memories have left the hills.
But who may say? For who knows the tides of the sea?'
'Be sure that it is all for Man,' said the road. 'For Man and the
making of cities.'
Something had come near on utterly silent feet.
'Peace, peace!' it said. 'You disturb the queenly night, who, having
come into this valley, is a guest in my dark halls. Let us have an
end to this discussion.'
It was the spider who spoke.
'The Work of the World is the making of cities and palaces. But it
is not for Man. What is Man? He only prepares my cities for me, and
mellows them. All his works are ugly, his richest tapestries are
coarse and clumsy. He is a noisy idler. He only protects me from
mine enemy the wind; and the beautiful work in my cities, the
curving outlines and the delicate weavings, is all mine. Ten years
to a hundred it takes to build a city, for five or six hundred more
it mellows, and is prepared for me; then I inhabit it, and hide away
all that is ugly, and draw beautiful lines about it to and fro.
There is nothing so beautiful as cities and palaces; they are the
loveliest places in the world, because they are the stillest, and so
most like the stars. They are noisy at first, for a little, before I
come to them; they have ugly corners not yet rounded off, and coarse
tapestries, and then they become ready for me and my exquisite work,
and are quite silent and beautiful. And there I entertain the regal
nights when they come there jewelled with stars, and all their train
of silence, and regale them with costly dust. Already nods, in a
city that I wot of, a lonely sentinel whose lords are dead, who
grows too old and sleepy to drive away the gathering silence that
infests the streets; tomorrow I go to see if he be still at his
post. For me Babylon was built, and rocky Tyre; and still men build
my cities! All the Work of the World is the making of cities, and
all of them I inherit.'
The Doom of La Traviata
Evening stole up out of mysterious lands and came down on the
streets of Paris, and the things of the day withdrew themselves and
hid away, and the beautiful city was strangely altered, and with it
the hearts of men. And with lights and music, and in silence and in
the dark, the other life arose, the life that knows the night, and
dark cats crept from the houses and moved to silent places, and dim
streets became haunted with dusk shapes. At this hour in a mean
house, near to the Moulin Rouge, La Traviata died; and her death was
brought to her by her own sins, and not by the years of God. But the
soul of La Traviata drifted blindly about the streets where she had
sinned till it struck against the wall of Notre Dame de Paris.
Thence it rushed upwards, as the sea mist when it beats against a
cliff, and streamed away to Paradise, and was there judged. And it
seemed to me, as I watched from my place of dreaming, when La
Traviata came and stood before the seat of judgment, that clouds
came rushing up from the far Paradisal hills and gathered together
over the head of God, and became one black cloud; and the clouds
moved swiftly as shadows of the night when a lantern is swung in the
hand, and more and more clouds rushed up, and ever more and more,
and, as they gathered, the cloud a little above the head of God
became no larger, but only grew blacker and blacker. And the halos
of the saints settled lower upon their heads and narrowed and became
pale, and the singing of the choirs of the seraphim faltered and
sunk low, and the converse of the blessed suddenly ceased. Then a
stern look came into the face of God, so that the seraphim turned
away and left Him, and the saints. Then God commanded, and seven
great angels rose up slowly through the clouds that carpet Paradise,
and there was pity on their faces, and their eyes were closed. Then
God pronounced judgment, and the lights of Paradise went out, and
the azure crystal windows that look towards the world, and the
windows rouge and verd, became dark and colourless, and I saw no
more. Presently the seven great angels came out by one of Heaven's
gates and set their faces Hellwards, and four of them carried the
young soul of La Traviata, and one of them went on before and one of
them followed behind. These six trod with mighty strides the long and
dusty road that is named the Way of the Damned. But the seventh flew
above them all the way, and the light of the fires of Hell that was
hidden from the six by the dust of that dreadful road flared on the
feathers of his breast.
Presently the seven angels, as they swept Hellwards, uttered speech.
'She is very young,' they said; and 'She is very beautiful,' they
said; and they looked long at the soul of La Traviata, looking not
at the stains of sin, but at that portion of her soul wherewith she
had loved her sister a long while dead, who flitted now about an
orchard on one of Heaven's hills with a low sunlight ever on her
face, who communed daily with the saints when they passed that way
going to bless the dead from Heaven's utmost edge. And as they
looked long at the beauty of all that remained beautiful in her soul
they said: 'It is but a young soul;' and they would have taken her
to one of Heaven's hills, and would there have given her a cymbal
and a dulcimer, but they knew that the Paradisal gates were clamped
and barred against La Traviata. And they would have taken her to a
valley in the world where there were a great many flowers and a loud
sound of streams, where birds were singing always and church bells
rang on Sabbaths, only this they durst not do. So they swept onwards
nearer and nearer Hell. But when they were come quite close and the
glare was on their faces, and they saw the gates already divide and
prepare to open outwards, they said: 'Hell is a terrible city, and
she is tired of cities;' then suddenly they dropped her by the side
of the road, and wheeled and flew away. But into a great pink flower
that was horrible and lovely grew the soul of La Traviata; and it
had in it two eyes but no eyelids, and it stared constantly into the
faces of all the passers-by that went along the dusty road to Hell;
and the flower grew in the glare of the lights of Hell, and withered
but could not die; only, one petal turned back towards the heavenly
hills as an ivy leaf turns outwards to the day, and in the soft and
silvery light of Paradise it withered not nor faded, but heard at
times the commune of the saints coming murmuring from the distance,
and sometimes caught the scent of orchards wafted from the heavenly
hills, and felt a faint breeze cool it every evening at the hour
when the saints to Heaven's edge went forth to bless the dead.
But the Lord arose with His sword, and scattered His disobedient
angels as a thresher scatters chaff.
On The Dry Land
Over the marshes hung the gorgeous night with all his wandering
bands of nomad stars, and his whole host of still ones blinked and
watched.
Over the safe dry land to eastward, grey and cold, the first clear
pallor of dawn was coming up above the heads of the immortal gods.
Then, as they neared at last the safety of the dry land, Love looked
at the man whom he had led for so long through the marshes, and saw
that his hair was white, for it was shining in the pallor of the
dawn.
Then they stepped together on to the land, and the old man sat down
weary on the grass, for they had wandered in the marshes for many
years; and the light of the grey dawn widened above the heads of the
gods.
And Love said to the old man, 'I will leave you now.'
And the old man made no answer, but wept softly.
Then Love was grieved in his little careless heart, and he said:
'You must not be sorry that I go, nor yet regret me, nor care for me
at all.
'I am a very foolish child, and was never kind to you, nor friendly.
I never cared for your great thoughts, or for what was good in you,
but perplexed you by leading you up and down the perilous marshes.
And I was so heartless that, had you perished where I led you, it
would have been nought to me, and I only stayed with you because you
were good to play with.
'And I am cruel and altogether worthless and not such a one as any
should be sorry for when I go, or one to be regretted, or even cared
for at all.'
And still the old man spoke not, but wept softly; and Love grieved
bitterly in his kindly heart.
And Love said: 'Because I am so small my strength has been concealed
from you, and the evil that I have done. But my strength is great,
and I have used it unjustly. Often I pushed you from the causeway
through the marshes, and cared not if you drowned. Often I mocked
you, and caused others to mock you. And often I led you among those
that hated me, and laughed when they revenged themselves upon you.
'So weep not, for there is no kindness in my heart, but only murder
and foolishness, and I am no companion for one so wise as you, but
am so frivolous and silly that I laughed at your noble dreams and
hindered all your deeds. See now, you have found me out, and now you
will send me away, and here you will live at ease, and, undisturbed,
have noble dreams of the immortal gods.
'See now, here is dawn and safety, and _there_ is darkness and peril.'
Still the old man wept softly.
Then Love said: 'Is it thus with you?' and his voice was grave now
and quiet. 'Are you so troubled? Old friend of so many years, there
is grief in my heart for you. Old friend of perilous ventures, I
must leave you now. But I will send my brother soon to you--my
little brother Death. And he will come up out of the marshes to you,
and will not forsake you, but will be true to you as I have not been
true.'
And dawn grew brighter over the immortal gods, and the old man
smiled through his tears, which glistened wondrously in the
increasing light. But Love went down to the night and to the
marshes, looking backward over his shoulder as he went, and smiling
beautifully about his eyes. And in the marshes whereunto he went, in
the midst of the gorgeous night, and under the wandering bands of
nomad stars, rose shouts of laughter and the sounds of the dance.
And after a while, with his face towards the morning, Death out of
the marshes came up tall and beautiful, and with a faint smile
shadowy on his lips, and lifted in his arms the lonely man, being
gentle with him, and, murmuring with his low deep voice an ancient
song, carried him to the morning to the gods.