The Knife and the Naked Chalk
The children went to the seaside for a month, and lived in a flintvillage on the bare windy chalk Downs, quite thirty miles away fromhome. They made friends with an old shepherd, called Mr Dudeney, who hadknown their Father when their Father was little. He did not talk liketheir own people in the Weald of Sussex, and he used different names forfarm things, but he understood how they felt, and let them go with him.He had a tiny cottage about half a mile from the village, where his wifemade mead from thyme honey, and nursed sick lambs in front of a coalfire, while Old Jim, who was Mr Dudeney's sheep-dog's father, lay atthe door. They brought up beef bones for Old Jim (you must never givea sheep-dog mutton bones), and if Mr Dudeney happened to be far in theDowns, Mrs Dudeney would tell the dog to take them to him, and he did.
One August afternoon when the village water-cart had made the streetsmell specially townified, they went to look for their shepherd asusual, and, as usual, Old Jim crawled over the doorstep and took themin charge. The sun was hot, the dry grass was very slippery, and thedistances were very distant.
'It's Just like the sea,' said Una, when Old Jim halted in the shadeof a lonely flint barn on a bare rise. 'You see where you're going,and--you go there, and there's nothing between.'
Dan slipped off his shoes. 'When we get home I shall sit in the woodsall day,' he said.
'Whuff!' said Old Jim, to show he was ready, and struck across a longrolling stretch of turf. Presently he asked for his beefbone.
'Not yet,' said Dan. 'Where's Mr Dudeney? Where's Master?' Old Jimlooked as if he thought they were mad, and asked again.
'Don't you give it him,' Una cried. 'I'm not going to be left howling ina desert.'
'Show, boy! Show!' said Dan, for the Downs seemed as bare as the palm ofyour hand.
Old Jim sighed, and trotted forward. Soon they spied the blob of MrDudeney's hat against the sky a long way off.
'Right! All right!' said Dan. Old Jim wheeled round, took his bonecarefully between his blunted teeth, and returned to the shadow of theold barn, looking just like a wolf. The children went on. Two kestrelshung bivvering and squealing above them. A gull flapped lazily along thewhite edge of the cliffs. The curves of the Downs shook a little in theheat, and so did Mr Dudeney's distant head.
They walked toward it very slowly and found themselves staring intoa horseshoe-shaped hollow a hundred feet deep, whose steep sides werelaced with tangled sheep-tracks. The flock grazed on the flat at thebottom, under charge of Young Jim. Mr Dudeney sat comfortably knittingon the edge of the slope, his crook between his knees. They told himwhat Old Jim had done.
'Ah, he thought you could see my head as soon as he did. The closeteryou be to the turf the more you see things. You look warm-like,'said MrDudeney.
'We be,' said Una, flopping down. 'And tired.'
'Set beside o' me here. The shadow'll begin to stretch out in a littlewhile, and a heat-shake o' wind will come up with it that'll overlayyour eyes like so much wool.'
'We don't want to sleep,' said Una indignantly; but she settled herselfas she spoke, in the first strip of early afternoon shade.
'O' course not. You come to talk with me same as your father used. Hedidn't need no dog to guide him to Norton Pit.'
'Well, he belonged here,' said Dan, and laid himself down at length onthe turf.
'He did. And what beats me is why he went off to live among them messytrees in the Weald, when he might ha' stayed here and looked all abouthim. There's no profit to trees. They draw the lightning, and sheepshelter under 'em, and so, like as not, you'll lose a half-score ewesstruck dead in one storm. Tck! Your father knew that.'
'Trees aren't messy.' Una rose on her elbow. 'And what about firewood? Idon't like coal.'
'Eh? You lie a piece more uphill and you'll lie more natural,' said MrDudeney, with his provoking deaf smile. 'Now press your face down andsmell to the turf. That's Southdown thyme which makes our Southdownmutton beyond compare, and, my mother told me, 'twill cure anythingexcept broken necks, or hearts. I forget which.'
They sniffed, and somehow forgot to lift their cheeks from the softthymy cushions.
'You don't get nothing like that in the Weald. Watercress, maybe?' saidMr Dudeney.
'But we've water--brooks full of it--where you paddle in hot weather,'Una replied, watching a yellow-and-violet-banded snail-shell close toher eye.
'Brooks flood. Then you must shift your sheep--let alone foot-rotafterward. I put more dependence on a dew-pond any day.'
'How's a dew-pond made?' said Dan, and tilted his hat over his eyes. MrDudeney explained.
The air trembled a little as though it could not make up its mindwhether to slide into the Pit or move across the open. But it seemedeasiest to go downhill, and the children felt one soft puff afteranother slip and sidle down the slope in fragrant breaths that baffed ontheir eyelids. The little whisper of the sea by the cliffs joined withthe whisper of the wind over the grass, the hum of insects in the thyme,the ruffle and rustle of the flock below, and a thickish mutter deep inthe very chalk beneath them. Mr Dudeney stopped explaining, and wenton with his knitting. They were roused by voices. The shadow had crepthalfway down the steep side of Norton Pit, and on the edge of it, hisback to them, Puck sat beside a half-naked man who seemed busy at somework. The wind had dropped, and in that funnel of ground every leastnoise and movement reached them like whispers up a water-Pipe.
'That is clever,' said Puck, leaning over. 'How truly you shape it!'
'Yes, but what does The Beast care for a brittle flint tip? Bah!' Theman flicked something contemptuously over his shoulder. It fell betweenDan and Una--a beautiful dark-blue flint arrow-head still hot from themaker's hand.
The man reached for another stone, and worked away like a thrush with asnail-shell.
'Flint work is fool's work,' he said at last. 'One does it because onealways did it; but when it comes to dealing with The Beast--no good!' Heshook his shaggy head. 'The Beast was dealt with long ago. He has gone,'said Puck.
'He'll be back at lambing time. I know him.' He chipped very carefully,and the flints squeaked.
'Not he. Children can lie out on the Chalk now all day through and gohome safe.'
'Can they? Well, call The Beast by his True Name, and I'll believe it,'the man replied. 'Surely!' Puck leaped to his feet, curved his handsround his mouth and shouted: 'Wolf! Wolf!'
Norton Pit threw back the echo from its dry sides--'Wuff!' Wuff!' likeYoung jim's bark.
'You see? You hear?' said Puck. 'Nobody answers. Grey Shepherd is gone.Feet-in-the-Night has run off. There are no more wolves.'
'Wonderful!' The man wiped his forehead as though he were hot. 'Whodrove him away? You?'
'Many men through many years, each working in his own country. Were youone of them?' Puck answered.
The man slid his sheepskin cloak to his waist, and without a wordpointed to his side, which was all seamed and blotched with scars.His arms, too, were dimpled from shoulder to elbow with horrible whitedimples.
'I see,' said Puck. 'It is The Beast's mark. What did you use againsthim?' 'Hand, hammer, and spear, as our fathers did before us.'
'So? Then how'--Puck twitched aside the man's dark-brown cloak--'how dida Flint-worker come by that? Show, man, show!' He held out his littlehand.
The man slipped a long dark iron knife, almost a short sword, from hisbelt, and after breathing on it, handed it hilt-first to Puck, who tookit with his head on one side, as you should when you look at the worksof a watch, squinted down the dark blade, and very delicately rubbed hisforefinger from the point to the hilt.
'Good!' said he, in a surprised tone.
'It should be. The Children of the Night made it,' the man answered.
'So I see by the iron. What might it have cost you?'
'This!' The man raised his hand to his cheek. Puck whistled like a Wealdstarling.
'By the Great Rings of the Chalk!' he cried. 'Was that your price? Turnsunward that I may see better, and sh
ut your eye.' He slipped his handbeneath the man's chin and swung him till he faced the children up theslope. They saw that his right eye was gone, and the eyelid lay shrunk.Quickly Puck turned him round again, and the two sat down.
'It was for the sheep. The sheep are the people,' said the man, in anashamed voice. 'What else could I have done? You know, Old One.'
Puck sighed a little fluttering sigh. 'Take the knife. I listen.' Theman bowed his head, drove the knife into the turf, and while it stillquivered said: 'This is witness between us that I speak the thing thathas been. Before my Knife and the Naked Chalk I speak. Touch!'
Puck laid a hand on the hilt. It stopped shaking. The children wriggleda little nearer.
'I am of the People of the Worked Flint. I am the one son of thePriestess who sells the Winds to the Men of the Sea. I am the Buyerof the Knife--the Keeper of the People,' the man began, in a sort ofsinging shout. 'These are my names in this country of the Naked Chalk,between the Trees and the Sea.'
'Yours was a great country. Your names are great too,' said Puck.
'One cannot feed some things on names and songs.' The man hit himselfon the chest. 'It is better--always better--to count one's children saferound the fire, their Mother among them.'
'Ahai!' said Puck. 'I think this will be a very old tale.' 'I warmmyself and eat at any fire that I choose, but there is no one to lightme a fire or cook my meat. I sold all that when I bought the Magic Knifefor my people. It was not right that The Beast should master man. Whatelse could I have done?'
'I hear. I know. I listen,' said Puck.
'When I was old enough to take my place in the Sheepguard, The Beastgnawed all our country like a bone between his teeth. He came in behindthe flocks at watering-time, and watched them round the Dew-ponds; heleaped into the folds between our knees at the shearing; he walked outalongside the grazing flocks, and chose his meat on the hoof while ourboys threw flints at him; he crept by night 'into the huts, and lickedthe babe from between the mother's hands; he called his companions andpulled down men in broad daylight on the Naked Chalk. No--not always didhe do so! This was his cunning! He would go away for a while to let usforget him. A year--two years perhaps--we neither smelt, nor heard, norsaw him. When our flocks had increased; when our men did not alwayslook behind them; when children strayed from the fenced places; when ourwomen walked alone to draw water--back, back, back came the Curse ofthe Chalk, Grey Shepherd, Feet-in-the-Night--The Beast, The Beast, TheBeast!
'He laughed at our little brittle arrows and our poor blunt spears. Helearned to run in under the stroke of the hammer. I think he knew whenthere was a flaw in the flint. Often it does not show till you bring itdown on his snout. Then--Pouf!---the false flint falls all to flinders,and you are left with the hammer-handle in your fist, and his teeth inyour flank! I have felt them. At evening, too, in the dew, or when ithas misted and rained, your spear-head lashings slack off, though youhave kept them beneath your cloak all day. You are alone--but so closeto the home ponds that you stop to tighten the sinews with hands, teeth,and a piece of driftwood. You bend over and pull--so! That is the minutefor which he has followed you since the stars went out. "Aarh!" he"Wurr-aarh!" he says.' (Norton Pit gave back the growl like a pack ofreal wolves.) 'Then he is on your right shoulder feeling for the veinin your neck, and--perhaps your sheep run on without you. To fightThe Beast is nothing, but to be despised by The Beast when he fightsyou--that is like his teeth in the heart! Old One, why is it that mendesire so greatly, and can do so little?'
'I do not know. Did you desire so much?' said Puck.
'I desired to master The Beast. It is not right that The Beast shouldmaster man. But my people were afraid. Even, my Mother, the Priestess,was afraid when I told her what I desired. We were accustomed to beafraid of The Beast. When I was made a man, and a maiden--she was aPriestess--waited for me at the Dew-ponds, The Beast flitted from offthe Chalk. Perhaps it was a sickness; perhaps he had gone to his Gods tolearn how to do us new harm. But he went, and we breathed more freely.The women sang again; the children were not so much guarded; our flocksgrazed far out. I took mine yonder'--he pointed inland to the hazyline of the Weald--'where the new grass was best. They grazed north. Ifollowed till we were close to the Trees'--he lowered his voice--'closethere where the Children of the Night live.' He pointed north again.
'Ah, now I remember a thing,' said Puck. 'Tell me, why did your peoplefear the Trees so extremely?'
'Because the Gods hate the Trees and strike them with lightning. We cansee them burning for days all along the Chalk's edge. Besides, all theChalk knows that the Children of the Night, though they worship ourGods, are magicians. When a man goes into their country, they change hisspirit; they put words into his mouth; they make him like talking water.But a voice in my heart told me to go toward the north. While I watchedmy sheep there I saw three Beasts chasing a man, who ran toward theTrees. By this I knew he was a Child of the Night. We Flint-workers fearthe Trees more than we fear The Beast. He had no hammer. He carried aknife like this one. A Beast leaped at him. He stretched out his knife.The Beast fell dead. The other Beasts ran away howling, which they wouldnever have done from a Flint-worker. The man went in among the Trees. Ilooked for the dead Beast. He had been killed in a new way--by a singledeep, clean cut, without bruise or tear, which had split his bad heart.Wonderful! So I saw that the man's knife was magic, and I thought how toget it,--thought strongly how to get it.
'When I brought the flocks to the shearing, my Mother the Priestessasked me, "What is the new thing which you have seen and I see in yourface?" I said, "It is a sorrow to me"; and she answered, "All new thingsare sorrow. Sit in my place, and eat sorrow." I sat down in her place bythe fire, where she talks to the ghosts in winter, and two voices spokein my heart. One voice said, "Ask the Children of the Night for theMagic Knife. It is not fit that The Beast should master man." I listenedto that voice.
'One voice said, "If you go among the Trees, the Children of the Nightwill change your spirit. Eat and sleep here." The other voice said, "Askfor the Knife." I listened to that voice.
'I said to my Mother in the morning, "I go away to find a thing for thepeople, but I do not know whether I shall return in my own shape." Sheanswered, "Whether you live or die, or are made different, I am yourMother."
'True,' said Puck. 'The Old Ones themselves cannot change men's motherseven if they would.'
'Let us thank the Old Ones! I spoke to my Maiden, the Priestess whowaited for me at the Dew-ponds. She promised fine things too.' The manlaughed. 'I went away to that place where I had seen the magician withthe knife. I lay out two days on the short grass before I ventured amongthe Trees. I felt my way before me with a stick. I was afraid of theterrible talking Trees. I was afraid of the ghosts in the branches; ofthe soft ground underfoot; of the red and black waters. I was afraid,above all, of the Change. It came!'
They saw him wipe his forehead once again, and his strong back-musclesquivered till he laid his hand on the knife-hilt.
'A fire without a flame burned in my head; an evil taste grew in mymouth; my eyelids shut hot over my eyes; my breath was hot between myteeth, and my hands were like the hands of a stranger. I was made tosing songs and to mock the Trees, though I was afraid of them. At thesame time I saw myself laughing, and I was very sad for this fine youngman, who was myself. Ah! The Children of the Night know magic.'
'I think that is done by the Spirits of the Mist. They change a man, ifhe sleeps among them,' said Puck. 'Had you slept in any mists?'
'Yes--but I know it was the Children of the Night. After three days Isaw a red light behind the Trees, and I heard a heavy noise. I saw theChildren of the Night dig red stones from a hole, and lay them in fires.The stones melted like tallow, and the men beat the soft stuff withhammers. I wished to speak to these men, but the words were changed inmy mouth, and all I could say was, "Do not make that noise. It hurts myhead." By this I knew that I was bewitched, and I clung to the Trees,and prayed the Children of the Night to take off th
eir spells. They werecruel. They asked me many questions which they would never allow me toanswer. They changed my words between my teeth till I wept. Then theyled me into a hut and covered the floor with hot stones and dashed wateron the stones, and sang charms till the sweat poured off me likewater. I slept. When I waked, my own spirit--not the strange, shoutingthing--was back in my body, and I was like a cool bright stone on theshingle between the sea and the sunshine. The magicians came to hearme--women and men--each wearing a Magic Knife. Their Priestess was theirEars and their Mouth.
'I spoke. I spoke many words that went smoothly along like sheep inorder when their shepherd, standing on a mound, can count those coming,and those far off getting ready to come. I asked for Magic Knives for mypeople. I said that my people would bring meat, and milk, and wool, andlay them in the short grass outside the Trees, if the Children of theNight would leave Magic Knives for our people to take away. Theywere pleased. Their Priestess said, "For whose sake have you come?" Ianswered, "The sheep are the people. If The Beast kills our sheep, ourpeople die. So I come for a Magic Knife to kill The Beast."
'She said, "We do not know if our God will let us trade with the peopleof the Naked Chalk. Wait till we have asked."
'When they came back from the Question-place (their Gods are our Gods),their Priestess said, "The God needs a proof that your words are true."I said, "What is the proof?" She said, "The God says that if you havecome for the sake of your people you will give him your right eye to beput out; but if you have come for any other reason you will not give it.This proof is between you and the God. We ourselves are sorry."
'I said, "This is a hard proof. Is there no other road?"
'She said, "Yes. You can go back to your people with your two eyes inyour head if you choose. But then you will not get any Magic Knives foryour people."
'I said, "It would be easier if I knew that I were to be killed."
'She said, "Perhaps the God knew this too. See! I have made my knifehot."
'I said, "Be quick, then!" With her knife heated in the flame she putout my right eye. She herself did it. I am the son of a Priestess. Shewas a Priestess. It was not work for any common man.'
'True! Most true,' said Puck. 'No common man's work that. And,afterwards?'
'Afterwards I did not see out of that eye any more. I found also that aone eye does not tell you truly where things are. Try it!'
At this Dan put his hand over one eye, and reached for the flintarrow-head on the grass. He missed it by inches. 'It's true,' hewhispered to Una. 'You can't judge distances a bit with only one eye.'
Puck was evidently making the same experiment, for the man laughed athim.
'I know it is so,' said he. 'Even now I am not always sure of my blow.I stayed with the Children of the Night till my eye healed. They said Iwas the son of Tyr, the God who put his right hand in a Beast's mouth.They showed me how they melted their red stone and made the Magic Knivesof it. They told me the charms they sang over the fires and at thebeatings. I can sing many charms.' Then he began to laugh like a boy.
'I was thinking of my journey home,' he said, 'and of the surprisedBeast. He had come back to the Chalk. I saw him--I smelt his lairs assoon as ever I left the Trees. He did not know I had the Magic Knife--Ihid it under my cloak--the Knife that the Priestess gave me. Ho! Ho!That happy day was too short! See! A Beast would wind me. "Wow!" hewould say. "Here is my Flint-worker!" He would come leaping, tailin air; he would roll; he would lay his head between his paws out ofmerriness of heart at his warm, waiting meal. He would leap--and, oh,his eye in mid-leap when he saw--when he saw the knife held ready forhim! It pierced his hide as a rush pierces curdled milk. Often he had notime to howl. I did not trouble to flay any beasts I killed. SometimesI missed my blow. Then I took my little flint hammer and beat out hisbrains as he cowered. He made no fight. He knew the Knife! But The Beastis very cunning. Before evening all The Beasts had smelt the blood on myknife, and were running from me like hares. They knew! Then I walked asa man should--the Master of The Beast!
'So came I back to my Mother's house. There was a lamb to be killed.I cut it in two halves with my knife, and I told her all my tale. Shesaid, "This is the work of a God." I kissed her and laughed. I went tomy Maiden who waited for me at the Dew-ponds. There was a lamb to bekilled. I cut it in two halves with my knife, and told her all my tale.She said, "It is the work of a God." I laughed, but she pushed me away,and being on my blind side, ran off before I could kiss her. I wentto the Men of the Sheepguard at watering-time. There was a sheep to bekilled for their meat. I cut it in two halves with my knife, and toldthem all my tale. They said, "It is the work of a God." I said, "We talktoo much about Gods. Let us eat and be happy, and tomorrow I will takeyou to the Children of the Night, and each man will find a Magic Knife."
'I was glad to smell our sheep again; to see the broad sky from edge toedge, and to hear the sea. I slept beneath the stars in my cloak. Themen talked among themselves.
'I led them, the next day, to the Trees, taking with me meat, wool, andcurdled milk, as I had promised. We found the Magic Knives laid out onthe grass, as the Children of the Night had promised. They watched usfrom among the Trees. Their Priestess called to me and said, "How is itwith your people?" I said "Their hearts are changed. I cannot see theirhearts as I used to." She said, "That is because you have only one eye.Come to me and I will be both your eyes." But I said, "I must show mypeople how to use their knives against The Beast, as you showed me howto use my knife." I said this because the Magic Knife does not balancelike the flint. She said, "What you have done, you have done for thesake of a woman, and not for the sake of your people." I asked of her,"Then why did the God accept my right eye, and why are you so angry?"She answered, "Because any man can lie to a God, but no man can lie toa woman. And I am not angry with you. I am only very sorrowful for you.Wait a little, and you will see out of your one eye why I am sorry." Soshe hid herself.
'I went back with my people, each one carrying his Knife, and makingit sing in the air--tssee-sssse. The Flint never sings. Itmutters--ump-ump. The Beast heard. The Beast saw. He knew! Everywherehe ran away from us. We all laughed. As we walked over the grass myMother's brother--the Chief on the Men's Side--he took off his Chief'snecklace of yellow sea-stones.'
'How? Eh? Oh, I remember! Amber,' said Puck.
'And would have put them on my neck. I said, "No, I am content. Whatdoes my one eye matter if my other eye sees fat sheep and fat childrenrunning about safely?" My Mother's brother said to them, "I told you hewould never take such things." Then they began to sing a song in the OldTongue--The Song of Tyr. I sang with them, but my Mother's brother said,"This is your song, O Buyer of the Knife. Let us sing it, Tyr."
'Even then I did not understand, till I saw that--that no man steppedon my shadow; and I knew that they thought me to be a God, like the GodTyr, who gave his right hand to conquer a Great Beast.'
'By the Fire in the Belly of the Flint was that so?' Puck rapped out.
'By my Knife and the Naked Chalk, so it was! They made way for my shadowas though it had been a Priestess walking to the Barrows of the Dead.I was afraid. I said to myself, "My Mother and my Maiden will know I amnot Tyr." But still I was afraid, with the fear of a man who falls intoa steep flint-pit while he runs, and feels that it will be hard to climbout.
'When we came to the Dew-ponds all our people were there. The men showedtheir knives and told their tale. The sheep guards also had seenThe Beast flying from us. The Beast went west across the river inpacks--howling! He knew the Knife had come to the Naked Chalk atlast--at last! He knew! So my work was done. I looked for my Maidenamong the Priestesses. She looked at me, but she did not smile. She madethe sign to me that our Priestesses must make when they sacrifice to theOld Dead in the Barrows. I would have spoken, but my Mother's brothermade himself my Mouth, as though I had been one of the Old Dead in theBarrows for whom our Priests speak to the people on Midsummer Mornings.'
'I remember. Well I remember those Midsummer M
ornings!' said Puck.
'Then I went away angrily to my Mother's house. She would have kneltbefore me. Then I was more angry, but she said, "Only a God would havespoken to me thus, a Priestess. A man would have feared the punishmentof the Gods." I looked at her and I laughed. I could not stop my unhappylaughing. They called me from the door by the name of Tyr himself. Ayoung man with whom I had watched my first flocks, and chipped my firstarrow, and fought my first Beast, called me by that name in the OldTongue. He asked my leave to take my Maiden. His eyes were lowered, hishands were on his forehead. He was full of the fear of a God, but of me,a man, he had no fear when he asked. I did not kill him. I said, "Callthe maiden." She came also without fear--this very one that had waitedfor me, that had talked with me, by our Dew-ponds. Being a Priestess,she lifted her eyes to me. As I look on a hill or a cloud, so she lookedat me. She spoke in the Old Tongue which Priestesses use when they makeprayers to the Old Dead in the Barrows. She asked leave that she mightlight the fire in my companion's house--and that I should bless theirchildren. I did not kill her. I heard my own voice, little and cold,say, "Let it be as you desire," and they went away hand in hand. Myheart grew little and cold; a wind shouted in my ears; my eye darkened.I said to my Mother, "Can a God die?" I heard her say, "What is it? Whatis it, my son?" and I fell into darkness full of hammer-noises. I wasnot.'
'Oh, poor--poor God!' said Puck. 'And your wise Mother?'
'She knew. As soon as I dropped she knew. When my spirit came backI heard her whisper in my ear, "Whether you live or die, or are madedifferent, I am your Mother." That was good--better even than the watershe gave me and the going away of the sickness. Though I was ashamed tohave fallen down, yet I was very glad. She was glad too. Neither of uswished to lose the other. There is only the one Mother for the one son.I heaped the fire for her, and barred the doors, and sat at her feet asbefore I went away, and she combed my hair, and sang.
'I said at last, "What is to be done to the people who say that I amTyr?"
'She said, "He who has done a God-like thing must bear himself like aGod. I see no way out of it. The people are now your sheep till you die.You cannot drive them off."
'I said, "This is a heavier sheep than I can lift." She said, "In timeit will grow easy. In time perhaps you will not lay it down for anymaiden anywhere. Be wise--be very wise, my son, for nothing is left youexcept the words, and the songs, and the worship of a God."
'Oh, poor God!' said Puck. 'But those are not altogether bad things.'
'I know they are not; but I would sell them all--all--all for one smallchild of my own, smearing himself with the ashes of our own house-fire.'
He wrenched his knife from the turf, thrust it into his belt and stoodup.
'And yet, what else could I have done?' he said. 'The sheep are thepeople.'
'It is a very old tale,' Puck answered. 'I have heard the like of it notonly on the Naked Chalk, but also among the Trees--under Oak, and Ash,and Thorn.'
The afternoon shadows filled all the quiet emptiness of Norton Pit. Thechildren heard the sheep-bells and Young jim's busy bark above them, andthey scrambled up the slope to the level.
'We let you have your sleep out,' said Mr Dudeney, as the flockscattered before them. 'It's making for tea-time now.'
'Look what I've found, said Dan, and held up a little blue flintarrow-head as fresh as though it had been chipped that very day.
'Oh,' said Mr Dudeney, 'the closeter you be to the turf the more you'reapt to see things. I've found 'em often. Some says the fairies made 'em,but I says they was made by folks like ourselves--only a goodish timeback. They're lucky to keep. Now, you couldn't ever have slept--not toany profit--among your father's trees same as you've laid out on NakedChalk--could you?'
'One doesn't want to sleep in the woods,' said Una.
'Then what's the good of 'em?' said Mr Dudeney. 'Might as well set inthe barn all day. Fetch 'em 'long, Jim boy!'
The Downs, that looked so bare and hot when they came, were full ofdelicious little shadow-dimples; the smell of the thyme and the saltmixed together on the south-west drift from the still sea; their eyesdazzled with the low sun, and the long grass under it looked golden. Thesheep knew where their fold was, so Young Jim came back to his master,and they all four strolled home, the scabious-heads swishing about theirankles, and their shadows streaking behind them like the shadows ofgiants.