Part 28 (1/2)
7. Lastly, peace is proclaimed for ever and a day, beginning to-morrow.
(Signed) His Majesty King Reynard CI.
His Imperial Majesty the Emperor Choo Hoo.
B. (for Sir Bevis).
Sec, the stoat (Treasurer).
Ah Kurroo Khan (Commander-in-Chief).
Ess, the owl (Chief Secretary of State).
Cloctaw, the jackdaw (Grand Chamberlain).
Raoul, the rat (Lieutenant-Governor of the Coasts).
Phu, the starling.
Tc.h.i.n.k, the chaffinch.
Te-te, the tomt.i.t.
Ulu, the hare.
Eric, the missel-thrush.
Tchack-tchack, the magpie, etc., etc., etc.
Every one in fact signed it but the weasel, who was still lying sullenly _perdu_. The B. was for Bevis; the fox, who excelled in the art of paying delicate compliments, insisted upon Bevis signing next to the high contracting parties. So taking the quill, Bevis printed a good big B, a little staggering, but plain and legible. Directly this business was concluded, Ah Kurroo withdrew his legions; Choo Hoo sallied forth from the camp, and returning the way he had come, in about an hour was met by his son Tu Kiu at the head of enormous reinforcements. Delighted at the treaty, and the impunity they now enjoyed, the vast barbarian horde, divided into foraging parties of from one hundred to a thousand, spread over a tract of country thirty miles wide, rolled like a devastating tidal wave in resistless course southwards, driving the independent princes before them, plundering, ravaging, and destroying, and leaving famine behind. Part of the plunder indeed, of the provinces recently attached to Kapchack's kingdom, and now declared independent, furnished the first instalment of the war indemnity the barbarians had engaged to pay.
Meantime, in the copse, preparations were made for the coronation of the king, who had a.s.sumed, in accordance with well-known precedents, that all his ancestors, whether acknowledged or not, had reigned, and called himself King Reynard the Hundred and First. The procession having been formed, and all the ceremonies completed, Bevis banged off his cannon-stick as a salute, and the fox, taking the crown, proceeded to put it on his head, remarking as he did so that thus they might see how when rogues fall out honest folk come by their own.
CHAPTER XVII.
SIR BEVIS AND THE WIND.
Some two or three days after peace was concluded, it happened that one morning the waggon was going up on the hills to bring down a load of straw, purchased from the very old gentleman who in his anger shot King Kapchack. When Bevis saw the horses brought out of the stable, and learnt that they were to travel along the road that led towards the s.h.i.+ps (though but three miles out of the sixty), nothing would do but he must go with them. As his papa and the bailiff were on this particular occasion to accompany the waggon, Bevis had his own way as usual.
The road pa.s.sed not far from the copse, and Bevis heard the woodp.e.c.k.e.r say something, but he was too busy touching up the horses with the carter's long whip to pay any heed. If he had been permitted he would have lashed them into a sharp trot. Every now and then Bevis turned round to give the bailiff a sly flick with the whip; the bailiff sat at the tail and dangled his legs over behind, so that his broad back was a capital thing to hit. By-and-by, the carter left the highway and took the waggon along a lane where the ruts were white with chalk, and which wound round at the foot of the downs. Then after surmounting a steep hill, where the lane had worn a deep hollow, they found a plain with hills all round it, and here, close to the sward, was the straw-rick from which they were to load.
Bevis insisted upon building the load, that is putting the straw in its place when it was thrown up; but in three minutes he said he hated it, it was so hot and scratchy, so out he jumped. Then he ran a little way up the green sward of the hill, and lying down rolled over and over to the bottom. Next he wandered along the low hedge dividing the stubble from the sward, so low that he could jump over it, but as he could not find anything he came back, and at last so teased and worried his papa to let him go up to the top of the hill, that he consented, on Bevis promising in the most solemn manner that he would not go one single inch beyond the summit, where there was an ancient earthwork. Bevis promised, and his eyes looked so clear and truthful, and his cheek so rosy and innocent, and his lips so red and pouting, that no one could choose but believe him.
Away he ran thirty yards up the hill at a burst, but it soon became so steep he had to stay and climb slowly. Five minutes afterwards he began to find it very hard work indeed, though it looked so easy from below, and stopped to rest. He turned round and looked down; he could see over the waggon and the straw-rick, over the ash-trees in the hedges, over the plain (all yellow with stubble) across to the hills on the other side, and there, through a gap in them, it seemed as if the land suddenly ceased, or dropped down, and beyond was a dark blue expanse which ended in the sky where the sky came down to touch it.
By his feet was a rounded boulder-stone, brown and smooth, a hard sa.r.s.en; this he tried to move, but it was so heavy that he could but just stir it. But the more difficult a thing was, or the more he was resisted, the more determined Bevis always became. He would stamp and shout with rage, rather than let a thing alone quietly. When he did this sometimes Pan, the spaniel, would look at him in amazement, and wonder why he did not leave it and go on and do something else, as the world was so big, and there were very many easy things that could be done without any trouble. That was not Bevis's idea, however, at all; he never quitted a thing till he had done it. And so he tugged and strained and struggled with the stone till he got it out of its bed and on the sloping sward.
Then he pushed and heaved at it, till it began to roll, and giving it a final thrust with his foot, away it went, at first rumbling and rolling slowly, and then faster and with a thumping, till presently it bounded and leaped ten yards at a time, and at the bottom of the hill sprang over the hedge like a hunter, and did not stop till it had gone twenty yards out into the stubble towards the straw-rick. Bevis laughed and shouted, though a little disappointed that it had not smashed the waggon, or at least jumped over it. Then, waving his hat, away he went again, now picking up a flint to fling as far down as he could, now kicking over a white round puff ball--always up, up, till he grew hot, and his breath came in quick deep pants.
But still as determined as ever, he pushed on, and presently stood on the summit, on the edge of the fosse. He looked down; the waggon seemed under his feet; the plain, the hills beyond, the blue distant valley on one side, on the other the ridge he had mounted stretched away, and beyond it still more ridges, till he could see no further. He went into the fosse, and there it seemed so pleasant that he sat down, and in a minute lay extended at full length in his favourite position, looking up at the sky. It was much more blue than he had ever seen it before, and it seemed only just over his head; the gra.s.shoppers called in the gra.s.s at his side, and he could hear a lark sing, singing far away, but on a level with him. First he thought he would talk to the gra.s.shopper, or call to one of the swallows, but he had now got over the effort of climbing, and he could not sit still.
Up he jumped, ran up the rampart, and then down again into the fosse. He liked the trench best, and ran along it in the hollow, picking up stray flints and throwing them as far as he could. The trench wound round the hill, and presently when he saw a low hawthorn-bush just outside the broad green ditch, and scrambled up to it, the waggon was gone and the plain, for he had reached the other side of the camp. There the top of the hill was level and broad: a beautiful place for a walk.
Bevis went a little way out upon it, and the turf was so soft, and seemed to push up his foot so, that he must go on, and when he had got a little farther, he heard another gra.s.shopper, and thought he would run and catch him; but the gra.s.shopper, who had heard of his tricks, stopped singing, and hid in a bunch, so that Bevis could not see him.