The Legend of the Glorious Adventures of Tyl Ulenspiegel in the land of Flanders Part 2

"Whatever is the matter, my good woman?" he asked.

"Alas!" she cried, catching her breath, "behold! This night the ghosts are mowing men down like gra.s.s. Little girls are being buried alive. The executioner is dancing on the body of the dead. And broken, this night, is that Stone which has been sweating blood these nine months past and more!"

"Mercy on us!" groaned Soetkin. "Mercy on us, O Lord! This is a black omen indeed for the land of Flanders."

"Do you see these things with your own eyes wide awake, or perchance in a dream?" Claes asked her.

"With my own eyes," Katheline told him. And then all pale and tearful, she continued in these words:

"To-night two children are born: the one in Spain--the infant Philip--and the other in this land of Flanders--the son of Claes, he that later on shall be known by the name of Ulenspiegel. Philip will grow up to be a common hangman, being the child of the Emperor Charles the Fifth, the destroyer of our country. But Ulenspiegel will be a master of the merry words and frolics of youth, yet good of heart withal, having for his father Claes, the brave working man that knows how to earn his own living with courage, honesty, and gentleness. Charles the Emperor and Philip the King will go riding their way through life, doing evil by battle, extortion, and other crimes. But Claes, working hard all the week, living according to right and according to law, and laughing at his laborious lot instead of being cast down thereby, will be the model of all the good workpeople of Flanders. Ulenspiegel, young and immortal, will ramble over the world and never settle in one place. And he will be peasant, n.o.bleman, painter, sculptor, all in one. And he will continue his wanderings. .h.i.ther and thither, lauding things beautiful and good, and laughing stupidity to scorn. Claes, then, O n.o.ble people of Flanders, is your courage; Soetkin your valiant motherhood; Ulenspiegel your soul. A sweet and gentle maiden, lover of Ulenspiegel and immortal like him, shall be your heart; and Lamme Goedzak, with his pot-belly, shall be your stomach. And up aloft shall stand the devourers of the people; and beneath them their victims. On high the thieving hornets; and below the busy bees. While in heaven bleed for evermore the wounds of Christ."

And when she had thus spoken, Katheline, the kindly sorceress, went to sleep.

VI

One day Claes caught a large salmon, and on the Sunday he and Soetkin and Katheline and the little Ulenspiegel had it for their dinner. But Katheline only ate enough to satisfy a sparrow.

"How now, mother?" said Claes. "What has happened to the air of Flanders? Has it suddenly grown solid, so that to breathe it is as nouris.h.i.+ng as a plate of beef? Why, if such were the case, I suppose you will be telling me that the rain is as good as soup, and the hail like beans, and the snow some sort of celestial frica.s.see, fit cheer for a poor traveller?"

But Katheline shook her head, and said not a word.

"Dear me," said Claes, "our mother is in the dumps it seems! What can it be that grieves her so?"

But Katheline spake as follows, in a voice that was like a breath of wind:

"The wicked night falls blackly. He tells of his coming from afar, screaming like the sea-eagle. I tremble, and pray to Our Lady--all in vain. For the Night knows neither walls nor hedges, neither doors nor windows. Everywhere, like a spirit, he finds a way in. The ladder creaks. The Night has entered into the loft where I am sleeping. The Night seizes me in arms that are cold and hard as marble. His face is frozen, and his kisses like damp snow. The whole cottage seems to be tossed about over the earth, riding like a s.h.i.+p at sea...."

Claes said: "I would counsel you to go every morning to Ma.s.s, that our Lord Christ may give you strength to chase away this phantom from h.e.l.l."

"He is so beautiful!" said Katheline.

VII

Ulenspiegel was weaned, and began to grow like a young poplar. And soon Claes gave up caressing him, but loved him in a roughish manner, fearing to make a milksop of him. And when Ulenspiegel came home complaining that he had got the worst of it in some boyish affray, Claes would give him a beating because, forsooth, he had not beaten the others. And with such an education Ulenspiegel grew up as valiant as a young lion.

When Claes was from home, Ulenspiegel would ask his mother to give him a liard with which he might go out and amuse himself. Soetkin would grow angry, and ask why he wanted to go out for amus.e.m.e.nt--he would do better to stay at home and tie up f.a.ggots. And when he saw that she was not going to give him anything, the boy would start yelling like an eagle, while Soetkin made a great clatter with the pots and pans that she was was.h.i.+ng in the wooden tub, pretending that she did not hear his noise. Then Ulenspiegel would fall to weeping, and the gentle mother would stop her pretence at harshness, and would come and kiss him.

"Will a denier be enough for you?" she would say.

Now it should be noted that a denier is equal to six liards.

Thus did his mother dote on Ulenspiegel even to excess; and when Claes was not there, he was king in the house.

VIII

One morning Soetkin saw Claes pacing up and down the kitchen with head bent, like a man lost in thought.

"Whatever is the matter with you, my man?" she asked him. "You are pale, and you look angry and distracted."

Claes answered her in a low voice, like a dog growling.

"The Emperor is about to reissue those cursed placards. Death once again is hovering over the land of Flanders. The Informers are to have one half of the property of their victims, if so be that such property does not exceed the value of one hundred florins."

"We are poor," Soetkin said.

"Not poor enough," Claes answered. "Evil folk there are--crows and corpse-devouring vultures--who would as readily denounce us to the Emperor for half a sackful of coal as for half a sackful of florins. What had she, poor old Widow Tanneken that was wife to Sis the tailor, she that was buried alive at Heyst? Nothing but a Latin Bible, three gold florins, and a few household utensils of English pewter. But they were coveted by a neighbour. Then there was Joanna Martens whom they burnt as a witch after she had been thrown into the water, for her body did not sink and they held it for a sign of sorcery. She had a few miserable pieces of furniture and seven gold pieces in a bag, and the Informer wanted his half of them. Alas! I could go on till to-morrow morning giving you instances of the same kind. But to cut a long story short, Mother, life's no longer worth living in Flanders, and all on account of these placards. Soon every night-time the death-cart will be pa.s.sing through the town, and we shall hear the arid click of bones as the skeletons shake in the wind."

Soetkin said: "You ought not to try and frighten me, my man. The Emperor is the father of Flanders and Brabant, and as such he is endowed with long-suffering, gentleness, patience, and pity."

"He would be obliged to renounce too much if he were all that,"

Claes answered, "for he has inherited a great amount of confiscated property."

At that very moment the sound of a trumpet was heard, and the clash of the Heralds' cymbals. Claes and Soetkin, carrying Ulenspiegel in their arms by turns, rushed out towards where the sound came from, and with them went a great concourse of people. They came to the Town Hall, in front of which stood the Heralds on horseback, blowing their trumpets and sounding their cymbals, and the Provost with his staff of justice, and the Town Proctor, also on horseback and holding in his hands the Imperial Edict which he was preparing to read out to the a.s.sembled mult.i.tude.

Claes heard every word, how "that it was once again forbidden to all and sundry to print, read, to possess or to defend, the writings, books or doctrines of Martin Luther, of John Wycliffe, John Hus, Marcilius de Padua, aecolampadius, Ulricus Zwynglius, Philip Melancthon, Franciscus Lambertus, Joannes Pomera.n.u.s, Otto Brunselsius, Justus Jonas, Joannes Puperis, and Gorciamus; as well as any copies of the New Testament printed by Adrien de Berghes, Christophe de Remonda, and Joannes Xel, which books were full of Lutheran and other kinds of heresy, and had been condemned and rejected by the Doctors of Theology at the University of Louvain.

"Likewise and in the same manner it was forbidden to paint, portray or cause to be painted or portrayed any opprobrious paintings or figures of G.o.d, or of the Blessed Virgin Mary, or of the saints; or to break, destroy or deface the images or pictures made to the honour, remembrance or recollection of G.o.d, the Virgin Mary, or of the saints recognized by the Church.

"Furthermore," said the placard, "no one, whatever his position in life, should presume to discuss or dispute concerning Holy Writ, even in regard to matters admittedly doubtful, unless he were a theologian, well known and approved by some established university.

"His Sacred Majesty decreed, among other penalties, that suspected persons should not be allowed to carry on any honourable occupation. And as for men who had fallen again into error, or who were obstinate in the same, they should be condemned to be burnt by fire, slow or fast, either in a covering of straw, or else bound to a stake, according to the discretion of the judge. Others, if they were men of n.o.ble or of gentle birth, were to be executed at the point of the sword, while working people were to be hung, and the women buried alive. Afterwards their heads were to be fixed on the top of poles for an example. The property of all the aforesaid, in so far as it was situate in places subject to confiscation, was to be made over to the benefit of the Emperor.

"To the Informers His Sacred Majesty gave one half of all the property of the dead, provided that such property did not exceed, on any one occasion, a hundred pounds gross in Flemish money. As for the half that went to the Emperor, he would reserve it for works of piety and mercy, as was done in the case of the confiscations at Rome."

And Claes went away sadly, with Soetkin and Ulenspiegel.