Puck of Pook's Hill

by Rudyard Kipling

the noise of the Mill at work sounded like bare feet running on hard ground.

Everything else was a sort of thick, sleepy stillness smelling of meadow-sweet and dry grass.

The bushes parted. In the very spot where Dan had stood as Puck they saw a small, brown, broad-shouldered, pointy-eared person with a snub nose, slanting blue eyes, and a grin that ran right across his freckled face.

in a voice as deep as Three Cows asking to be milked,

'What, a play toward? I'll be auditor; An actor, too, perhaps, if I see cause.'

what on Human Earth made you act Midsummer Night's Dream three times over, on Midsummer Eve, in the middle of a Ring, and under—right under one of my oldest hills in Old England? Pook's Hill—Puck's Hill—Puck's Hill—Pook's Hill! It's as plain as the nose on my face.'

'If this had happened a few hundred years ago you'd have had all the People of the Hills out like bees in June!'

'We—we didn't mean to,' said Una. 'Of course you didn't! That's just why you did it.

Unluckily the Hills are empty now, and all the People of the Hills are gone. I'm the only one left. I'm Puck, the oldest Old Thing in England, very much at your service

Some of us'—he went on, with his mouth full—'couldn't abide Salt, or Horse-shoes over a door, or Mountain-ash berries, or Running Water, or Cold Iron, or the sound of Church Bells. But I'm Puck!'

'We always said, Dan and I,' Una stammered, 'that if it ever happened we'd know ex-actly what to do; but—but now it seems all different somehow.'

'And then there's the verse about the rings,' said Dan. 'When I was little it always made me feel unhappy in my inside.'

I may be able to show you something out of the common here on Human Earth. You certainly deserve it.'

You shall see What you shall see and you shall hear What you shall hear, though It shall have happened three thousand year; and you shall know neither Doubt nor Fear. Fast! Hold fast all I give you.'

'How would you like to be called "mortal" or "human being" all the time?' said Puck; 'or "son of Adam" or "daughter of Eve"?'

'Can you wonder that the People of the Hills don't care to be confused with that painty-winged, wand-waving, sugar-and-shake-your-head set of impostors?

"You may remember that I was not a gentle God in my Day and my Time and my Power. I shall never be released till some human being truly wishes me well."

he meant. The old man spun him a wonderful tale about fairies and goblins and witches; and I know he hadn't seen a thing except rabbits and red deer all that night. (The People of the Hills are like otters—they don't show except when they choose.)

"That's less than a Christian would have charged," said the novice. "I hope you threw a 'Thank you' into the bargain." "No," said the farmer; "Wayland-Smith's a heathen." "Heathen or no heathen," said the novice, "you took his help, and where you get help there you must give thanks." "What?" said the farmer—he was in a furious temper because I was walking the old horse in circles all this time—"What, you young jackanapes?" said he. "Then by your reasoning I ought to say 'Thank you' to Satan if he helped me?"

'Bite these,' said he. 'Otherwise you might be talking at home of what you've seen and heard, and—if I know human beings—they'd send for the doctor. Bite!'

'There seems no great change in boys since mine fished this water.'

He came over with William the Conqueror, and he wants to see you particularly.' 'What for?' said Una. 'On account of your great wisdom and learning,' Puck replied, without a twinkle. 'Us?' said Una. 'Why, I don't know my Nine Times—not to say it dodging, and Dan makes the most awful mess of fractions.

'It is you that must tell me, for I hear the youngest child in our England today is as wise as our wisest clerk.'

such a fight as never christened man fought.

they sat them down by the fire to wait word whether Hugh lived or died. They cracked nuts with their knife-hilts the while.' 'And how did you feel?' said Dan. 'Very weary; but I did heartily pray for my schoolmate Hugh his health.

a false fellow from Picardy—a sutler that sold wine in the Duke's camp—with a dead knight's shield on his arm, a stolen horse under him, and some ten or twelve wastrels at his tail,

'after a year of striving and contriving and some little driving,

Yes, he sat on the straw like an eagle ruffled in her feathers, his yellow eyes rolling above the cup, and he pounced in his talk like an eagle, swooping from one thing to another,

he would speak in parables and tales, and if at once we saw not his meaning he would yerk us in the ribs with his scabbarded sword.

"I am born out of my due time. Five hundred years ago I would have made all England such an England as neither Dane, Saxon, nor Norman should have conquered. Five hundred years hence I should have been such a counsellor to Kings as the world hath never dreamed of. 'Tis all here," said he, tapping his big head, "but it hath no play in this black age.

He had made his voice harsh and croaking, ...

'"In God's good time, which because of my sins I shall not live to see,

Anon a churl stole up to me—he was one of the three I had not hanged a year ago—and he bellowed—which is the Saxon for whispering—that

'"Over Gods, forbid that I should ever belt blade like that," said De Aquila. "What does it foretell?" '"The Gods that made it may know.

As for my Father in his tower, Asking news of my ship at sea; He will remember his own hour— Tell him England hath taken me! As for my Mother in her bower, That rules my Father so cunningly; She will remember a maiden's power— Tell her England hath taken me!

Howso great man's strength be reckoned, There are two things he cannot flee; Love is the first, and Death is the second— And Love, in England, hath taken me!

Ah, what is a Woman that you forsake her, And the hearth-fire and the home-acre, To go with the old grey Widow-maker?

the brook rose a fraction of an inch against all the wet pebbles, and they watched the slow draw and shiver of a breath of air through the tree-tops. Then the little voices of the slipping water began again. 'It's like the shadows talking, isn't it?'

Here they all spoke together, screaming like gulls,

He was yellow—not from sickness, but by nature—yellow as honey, and his eyes stood endwise in his head.'

Dan fished out his old brass pocket-compass, that generally lived with his knife and key-ring. 'The glass has got cracked, but the needle waggles all right, sir.'

I lay under the deck with the Talking Bird, and cared not whether I lived or died. There is a sickness of the sea which for three days is pure death!

A ship is heavier care than a wife or cattle."

At sea, look you, a man is but a spurless rider on a bridleless horse.

and to join two ropes end to end, so that even Witta could scarcely see where they had been married.

We followed the winding channels between the trees, and where we could not row we laid hold of the crusted roots and hauled ourselves along. The water was foul, and great glittering flies tormented us. Morning and evening a blue mist covered the mud, which bred fevers.

'A Devil!' said Dan, delightfully horrified.

No man is hasty to his hanging!

One must believe one's father, and not one's children.

Were our Devils only nest-building apes? Is there no sorcery left in the world?'