Tales Before Tolkien (18 page)

So wore the time and the night was so late, that had it been summer-tide, it had been no night but early day. And the king looked up from the board and those two old folk, and beheld the hall, that there were few folk therein, save those that lay along by the walls of the aisles, so swiftly had the night gone and all folk were departed or asleep. Then was he like a man newly wakened from a dream, and he turned about to the two ancients almost looking to see their places empty. But they abode there yet beside him on the right hand and on the left; so he said: “Guests, I give you all thanks for your company and the good words and noble tales wherewith ye have beguiled this night of winter, and surely tomorrow shall I rise up wiser than I was yesterday. And now meseemeth ye are old and doubtless weary with the travel and the noisy mirth of the feast-hall, nor may I ask you to abide bedless any longer, though it be great joy to me to hearken to your speech. Come then to the bower aloft and I will show you the best of beds and the soft and kind place to abide the uprising of tomorrow's sun; and late will he arise, for this is now the very midwinter, and the darkest of all days in the year.”

Then answered the old man: “I thank thee, O son of the Kindred; but so it is that we have further to wend than thou mightest deem; yea, back to the land whence we came many a week of years ago and before the building of houses in the land, between the mountain and the sea. Wherefore if thou wouldest do aught to honour us, come thou a little way on the road and see us off in the open country without the walls of thy Burg: then shall we depart in such wise that we shall be dear friends as long as we live, thou and thine, and I and mine.”

“This is not so great an asking,” said the king, “but that I would do more for thee; yet let it be as thou wilt.”

And he arose from table and they with him, and they went down the hall amidst the sleeping folk and the benches that had erst been so noisy and merry, and out a-doors they went all three and into the street of the Burg. Open were the Burg-gates and none watched there, for there was none to break the Yule-tide peace; so the king went forth clad in his feasting-raiment, and those twain went, one on either side of him. The mid-winter frost was hard upon the earth, so that few waters were running, and all the face of the world was laid under snow: high was the moon and great and round in a cloudless sky, so that the stars looked but little.

The king set his face toward the mountains and strode with great strides over the white highway betwixt the hidden fruitfulness of the acres, and he was as one wending on an errand which he may not forego; but at last he said: “Whither wend we and how far?” Then spake the old man: “Whither should we wend save to the Mountain Door, and the entrance to the land whence the folk came forth, when great were its warriors and little was the tale of them.”

Then the king spake no more, but it seemed to him as if his feet sped on faster than their wont was, and as if those twain bore him up so that his feet were but light on the face of the earth.

Thuswise they passed the plain and the white-clad ridges at the mountain feet in no long while, and were come before the yawning gap and strait way into the heart of the mountains, and there was no other way thereinto save this; for otherwhere, the cliffs rose like a wall from the plain-country. Grim was that pass, and high were the sides of it beneath the snow, which lay heaped up high, so now there were smooth white slopes on either side of the narrow road of the pass; while the wind had whistled the said road in most places well nigh clear of snow, which even now went whirling and drifting about beneath the broad moon. For the wind yet blew though the night was old, and the sound of it in the clefts of the rocks and the windings of the pass was like the rolling of the summer thunder.

Up the pass they went till it widened, and there was a wide space before them, the going up whereto was as by stairs, and also the going up from it to the higher pass; and all around it the rocks were high and sheer, so that there was no way over them save for the fowl flying; and were it not winter there had been a trickling stream running round about the eastern side of the cliff wall which lost itself in the hollow places of the rocks at the lower end of that round hall of the mountain, unroofed and unpillared. Amidmost the place the snow was piled up high; for there in summer was a grassy mound amidst of a little round meadow of sweet grass, treeless, bestrewn here and there with blocks that had been borne down thitherward by the waters from the upper mountain; and for ages beyond what the memory of men might tell of this had been the Holy place and Motestead of the Folk of the Door.

Now all three went up on to the snow-covered mound, and those two turned about and faced the king and he saw their faces clearly, so bright as the moon was, and now it was so that they were no more wrinkled and hollow-cheeked and sunken-eyed, though scarce might a man say that they looked young, but exceeding fair they were, and they looked on him with eyes of love, and the carle said: “Lord of the Folk of the Door, father of the son new born whom the Folk this night have taken for their father, and the image of those that have been, we have brought thee to the Holy Place that we might say a word to thee and give thee a warning of the days to come, so that if it may be thou mightest eschew the evil and ensue the good. For thou art our dear son, and thy son is yet dearer to us, since his days shall be longer if weird will so have it. Hearken to this by the token that under the grass, beneath this snow, lieth the first of the Folk of the Door of those that come on the earth and go thence; and this was my very son begotten on this woman that here standeth. For wot thou that I am Host-lord of the Ancient Days, and from me is all the blood of you come; and dear is the blood of my sons and my name even as that which I have seen spilt on field and in fold, on grass and in grange, without the walls of the watches and about the lone wells of the desert places. Hearken then, Host-lord the Father of Host-lord, for we have looked into the life of thy son; and this we say is the weird of him; childless shall he be unless he wed as his will is; for of all his kindred none is wilfuller than he. Who then shall he wed, and where is the House that is lawful to him that thou hast not heard of? For as to wedding with his will in the House whereof thou wottest, and the Line of the Sea-dwellers, look not for it. Where then is the House of his wedding, lest the Folk of the Door lose their Chieftain and become the servants of those that are worser than they? I may not tell thee; and if I did, it would help thee nought. But this I will tell thee, when thy fair son is of fifteen winters, until the time that he is twenty winters and two, evil waylayeth on him: evil of the sword, evil of the cord, evil of the shaft, evil of the draught, evil of the cave, evil of the wave. O Son and father of my son, heed my word and let him be so watched that while as none hath been watched and warded of all thy kindred who have gone before, lest when his time come and he depart from this land he wander about the further side of the bridge that goeth to the Hall of the Gods, for very fear of shaming amongst the bold warriors and begetters of kindred and fathers of the sons that I love, that shall one day sit and play at the golden tables in the Plains of Ida.”

So he spake, but the king spake: “O Host-lord of the Ancients I had a deeming of what thou wert, and that thou hadst a word for me. Wilt thou now tell me one thing more? In what wise shall I ward our son from the evil till his soul is strengthened, and the Wise-wights and the Ancients are become his friends, and the life of the warrior is in his hands and the days of a chieftain of our folk?”

Then the carle smiled on him and sang:

Wide is the land

Where the houses stand,

There bale and bane

Ye scarce shall chain;

There the sword is ground

And wounds abound;

And women fair

Weave the love-nets there.

Merry hearts in the Mountain

Dales shepherd-men keep,

And about the Fair Fountain

Need more than their sheep.

Of the Dale of the Tower

Where springeth the well

In the sun-slaying hour

They talk and they tell;

And often they wonder

Whence cometh the name

And what tale lies thereunder

For honour or shame.

For beside the fount welling

No castle now is;

Yet seldom foretelling

Of weird wends amiss.

Quoth the king, “I have heard tell of the Fair Fountain and the Dale of the Tower; though I have never set eyes thereon, and I deem it will be hard to find. But dost thou mean that our son who is born the Father of the Folk shall dwell there during that while of peril?”

Again sang the carle:

Good men and true,

They deal and do

In the grassy dales

Of that land of the tales;

Where dale and down

Yet wears the crown

Of the flower and fruit

From our kinship's root.

There little man sweateth

In trouble and toil,

And in joy he forgetteth

The feud and the foil.

The weapon he wendeth

Achasing the deer,

And in peace the moon endeth

That endeth the year.

Yet there dwell our brothers,

And should they but know

They thy stem of all others

Were planted to grow

Beside the Fair Fountain,

How fain were those men

Of the God of the Mountain

So come back again.

Then the king said: “Shall I fulfill the weird and build a Tower in the Dale for our Son? And deemest thou he shall dwell there happily till the time of peril is overpast?”

But the carle cried out, “Look, look! Who is the shining one who cometh up the pass?”

And the king turned hastily and drew his sword, but beheld neither man nor mare in the mountain, and when he turned back again to those twain, lo! they were clean gone, and there was nought in the pass save the snow and the wind, and the long shadows cast by the sinking moon. So he turned about again and went down the pass; and by then he was come into the first of the plain-country once more, the moon was down and the stars shone bright and big; but even in the dead mid-winter there was a scent abroad of the coming of the dawn. So went the king as speedily as he might back to the Burg and his High House; and he was glad in his inmost heart that he had seen the God and Father of his Folk.

Black Heart and White Heart:
A Zulu Idyll

by H. Rider Haggard

Tolkien was born of En- glish parents in Bloemfontein, South Africa, where his father was a bank manager. As a small child Tolkien was briefly stolen by the houseboy, who wanted to show off a white baby to his native kraal. At the age of three, Tolkien, with his mother and his younger brother, traveled to England, and during this visit his father died in South Africa. Tolkien never returned, but the country of his birth held a fascination for him, as did the romances of H. Rider Haggard, many of which have an African setting and some of which, like “Black Heart and White Heart,” deal with native South African traditions and history. Roger Lancelyn Green, who was a student of Tolkien's in the 1940s and who became a close friend of C. S. Lewis, has recalled that Tolkien, like C. S. Lewis and Green himself, ranked Haggard very highly. Green was pleased to be able to lend Tolkien at least one Haggard novel he had never read. Various writers on Tolkien have seen in Haggard's two most famous novels,
She
and
King Solomon's Mines,
some direct influences on Tolkien.

“Black Heart and White Heart” has a historical setting—it is set in Zulu territory in 1878, just prior to the Zulu massacre of British troops at Isandhlwana (a few hundred miles to the east of Bloemfontein) in January of the following year. It was first published in the
African Review
in January 1896 and included in
Black Heart and White Heart and Other Stories
(1900).

CHAPTER I

Philip Hadden and King Cetywayo

At the date of our introduction to him, Philip Hadden was a transport-rider and trader in “the Zulu.” Still on the right side of forty, in appearance he was singularly handsome; tall, dark, upright, with keen eyes, short-pointed beard, curling hair and clear-cut features. His life had been varied, and there were passages in it which he did not narrate even to his most intimate friends. He was of gentle birth, however, and it was said that he had received a public school and university education in England. At any rate he could quote the classics with aptitude on occasion, an accomplishment which, coupled with his refined voice and a bearing not altogether common in the wild places of the world, had earned for him among his rough companions the
soubriquet
of “The Prince.”

However these things may have been, it is certain that he had emigrated to Natal under a cloud, and equally certain that his relatives at home were content to take no further interest in his fortunes. During the fifteen or sixteen years which he had spent in or about the colony, Hadden followed many trades, and did no good at any of them. A clever man, of agreeable and prepossessing manner, he always found it easy to form friendships and to secure a fresh start in life. But, by degrees, the friends were seized with a vague distrust of him; and, after a period of more or less application, he himself would close the opening that he had made by a sudden disappearance from the locality, leaving behind him a doubtful reputation and some bad debts.

Before the beginning of this story of the most remarkable episodes in his life, Philip Hadden was engaged for several years in transport-riding—that is, in carrying goods on ox waggons from Durban or Maritzburg to various points in the interior. A difficulty such as had more than once confronted him in the course of his career, led to his temporary abandonment of this means of earning a livelihood. On arriving at the little frontier town of Utrecht in the Transvaal, in charge of two waggon loads of mixed goods consigned to a storekeeper there, it was discovered that out of six cases of brandy five were missing from his waggon. Hadden explained the matter by throwing the blame upon his Kaffir “boys,” but the storekeeper, a rough-tongued man, openly called him a thief and refused to pay the freight on any of the load. From words the two men came to blows, knives were drawn, and before anybody could interfere the storekeeper received a nasty wound in his side. That night, without waiting till the matter could be inquired into by the landdrost or magistrate, Hadden slipped away, and trekked back into Natal as quickly as his oxen would travel. Feeling that even here he was not safe, he left one of his waggons at Newcastle, loaded up the other with Kaffir goods—such as blankets, calico, and hardware—and crossed into Zululand, where in those days no sheriff's officer would be likely to follow him.

Being well acquainted with the language and customs of the natives, he did good trade with them, and soon found himself possessed of some cash and a small herd of cattle, which he received in exchange for his wares. Meanwhile news reached him that the man whom he had injured still vowed vengeance against him, and was in communication with the authorities in Natal. These reasons making his return to civilisation undesirable for the moment, and further business being impossible until he could receive a fresh supply of trade stuff, Hadden like a wise man turned his thoughts to pleasure. Sending his cattle and waggon over the border to be left in charge of a native headman with whom he was friendly, he went on foot to Ulundi to obtain permission from the king, Cetywayo, to hunt game in his country. Somewhat to his surprise, the Indunas or headmen, received him courteously—for Hadden's visit took place within a few months of the outbreak of the Zulu war in 1878, when Cetywayo was already showing unfriendliness to the English traders and others, though why the king did so they knew not.

On the occasion of his first and last interview with Cetywayo, Hadden got a hint of the reason. It happened thus. On the second morning after his arrival at the royal kraal, a messenger came to inform him that “the Elephant whose tread shook the earth” had signified that it was his pleasure to see him. Accordingly he was led through the thousands of huts and across the Great Place to the little enclosure where Cetywayo, a royal-looking Zulu seated on a stool, and wearing a kaross of leopard skins, was holding an
indaba,
or conference, surrounded by his counsellors. The Induna who had conducted him to the august presence went down upon his hands and knees, and, uttering the royal salute of
Bayéte,
crawled forward to announce that the white man was waiting.

“Let him wait,” said the king angrily; and, turning, he continued the discussion with his counsellors.

Now, as has been said, Hadden thoroughly understood Zulu; and, when from time to time the king raised his voice, some of the words he spoke reached his ear.

“What!” Cetywayo said, to a wizened and aged man who seemed to be pleading with him earnestly; “am I a dog that these white hyenas should hunt me thus? Is not the land mine, and was it not my father's before me? Are not the people mine to save or to slay? I tell you that I will stamp out these little white men; my
impis
shall eat them up. I have said!”

Again the withered aged man interposed, evidently in the character of a peacemaker. Hadden could not hear his talk, but he rose and pointed towards the sea, while from his expressive gestures and sorrowful mien, he seemed to be prophesying disaster should a certain course of action be followed.

For a while the king listened to him, then he sprang from his seat, his eyes literally ablaze with rage.

“Hearken,” he cried to the counsellor; “I have guessed it for long, and now I am sure of it. You are a traitor. You are Sompseu's* dog, and the dog of the Natal Government, and I will not keep another man's dog to bite me in my own house. Take him away!”

   

A slight involuntary murmur rose from the ring of
indunas,
but the old man never flinched, not even when the soldiers, who presently would murder him, came and seized him roughly. For a few seconds, perhaps five, he covered his face with the corner of the kaross he wore, then he looked up and spoke to the king in a clear voice.

“O King,” he said, “I am a very old man; as a youth I served under Chaka the Lion, and I heard his dying prophecy of the coming of the white man. Then the white men came, and I fought for Dingaan at the battle of the Blood River. They slew Dingaan, and for many years I was the counsellor of Panda, your father. I stood by you, O King, at the battle of the Tugela, when its grey waters were turned to red with the blood of Umbulazi your brother, and of the tens of thousands of his people. Afterwards I became your counsellor, O King, and I was with you when Sompseu set the crown upon your head and you made promises to Sompseu—promises that you have not kept. Now you are weary of me, and it is well; for I am very old, and doubtless my talk is foolish, as it chances to the old. Yet I think that the prophecy of Chaka, your great-uncle, will come true, and that the white men will prevail against you and that through them you shall find your death. I would that I might have stood in one more battle and fought for you, O King, since fight you will, but the end which you choose is for me the best end. Sleep in peace, O King, and farewell.
Bayéte!
”*

For a space there was silence, a silence of expectation while men waited to hear the tyrant reverse his judgment. But it did not please him to be merciful, or the needs of policy outweighed his pity.

“Take him away,” he repeated. Then, with a slow smile on his face and one word, “Good-night,” upon his lips, supported by the arm of a soldier, the old warrior and statesman shuffled forth to the place of death.

Hadden watched and listened in amazement not unmixed with fear. “If he treats his own servants like this, what will happen to me?” he reflected. “We English must have fallen out of favour since I left Natal. I wonder whether he means to make war on us or what? If so, this isn't my place.”

Just then the king, who had been gazing moodily at the ground, chanced to look up. “Bring the stranger here,” he said.

Hadden heard him, and coming forward offered Cetywayo his hand in as cool and nonchalant a manner as he could command.

Somewhat to his surprise it was accepted. “At least, White Man,” said the king, glancing at his visitor's tall spare form and cleanly cut face, “you are no
'umfagozan'
(low fellow); you are of the blood of chiefs.”

“Yes, King,” answered Hadden, with a little sigh, “I am of the blood of chiefs.”

“What do you want in my country, White Man?”

“Very little, King. I have been trading here, as I daresay you have heard, and have sold all my goods. Now I ask your leave to hunt buffalo, and other big game, for a while before I return to Natal.”

“I cannot grant it,” answered Cetywayo, “you are a spy sent by Sompseu, or by the Queen's Induna in Natal. Get you gone.”

“Indeed,” said Hadden, with a shrug of his shoulders; “then I hope that Sompseu, or the Queen's Induna, or both of them, will pay me when I return to my own country. Meanwhile I will obey you because I must, but I should first like to make you a present.”

“What present?” asked the king. “I want no presents. We are rich here, White Man.”

“So be it, King. It was nothing worthy of your taking, only a rifle.”

“A rifle, White Man? Where is it?”

“Without. I would have brought it, but your servants told me that it is death to come armed before the ‘Elephant who shakes the Earth.' ”

Cetywayo frowned, for the note of sarcasm did not escape his quick ear.

“Let this white man's offering be brought; I will consider the thing.”

Instantly the Induna who had accompanied Hadden darted to the gateway, running with his body bent so low that it seemed as though at every step he must fall upon his face. Presently he returned with the weapon in his hand and presented it to the king, holding it so that the muzzle was pointed straight at the royal breast.

“I crave leave to say, O Elephant,” remarked Hadden in a drawling voice, “that it might be well to command your servant to lift the mouth of that gun from your heart.”

“Why?” asked the king.

“Only because it is loaded, and at full cock, O Elephant, who probably desires to continue to shake the Earth.”

At these words the “Elephant” uttered a sharp exclamation, and rolled from his stool in a most unkingly manner, whilst the terrified Induna, springing backwards, contrived to touch the trigger of the rifle and discharge a bullet through the exact spot that a second before had been occupied by his monarch's head.

“Let him be taken away,” shouted the incensed king from the ground, but long before the words had passed his lips the Induna, with a cry that the gun was bewitched, had cast it down and fled at full speed through the gate.

“He has already taken himself away,” suggested Hadden, while the audience tittered. “No, King, do not touch it rashly; it is a repeating rifle. Look——” and lifting the Winchester, he fired the four remaining shots in quick succession into the air, striking the top of a tree at which he aimed with every one of them.

“
Wow,
it is wonderful!” said the company in astonishment.

“Has the thing finished?” asked the king.

“For the present it has,” answered Hadden. “Look at it.”

Cetywayo took the repeater in his hand, and examined it with caution, swinging the muzzle horizontally in an exact line with the stomachs of some of his most eminent Indunas, who shrank to this side and that as the barrel was brought to bear on them.

“See what cowards they are, White Man,” said the king with indignation; “they fear lest there should be another bullet in this gun.”

“Yes,” answered Hadden, “they are cowards indeed. I believe that if they were seated on stools they would tumble off them just as it chanced to your Majesty to do just now.”

“Do you understand the making of guns, White Man?” asked the king hastily, while the Indunas one and all turned their heads, and contemplated the fence behind them.

“No, King, I cannot make guns, but I can mend them.”

“If I paid you well, White Man, would you stop here at my kraal, and mend guns for me?” asked Cetywayo anxiously.