I entered the door and started at first with my old astonishment1, with which I had woke up, so strange and beautiful did this interior seem to me, though it was but a pothouse parlour. A quaintly-carved side board held an array of bright pewter pots and dishes and wooden and earthen bowls; a stout2 oak table went up and down the room, and a carved oak chair stood by the chimney-corner, now filled by a very old man dim-eyed and white-bearded. That, except the rough stools and benches on which the company sat, was all the furniture. The walls were panelled roughly enough with oak boards to about six feet from the floor, and about three feet of plaster above that was wrought3 in a pattern of a rose stem running all round the room, freely and roughly done, but with (as it seemed to my unused eyes) wonderful skill and spirit. On the hood4 of the great chimney a huge rose was wrought in the plaster and brightly painted in its proper colours. There were a dozen or more of the men I had seen coming along the street sitting there, some eating and all drinking; their cased bows leaned against the wall, their quivers hung on pegs5 in the panelling, and in a corner of the room I saw half-a-dozen bill-hooks that looked made more for war than for hedge-shearing, with ashen6 handles some seven foot long. Three or four children were running about among the legs of the men, heeding7 them mighty9 little in their bold play, and the men seemed little troubled by it, although they were talking earnestly and seriously too. A well-made comely10 girl leaned up against the chimney close to the gaffer’s chair, and seemed to be in waiting on the company: she was clad in a close-fitting gown of bright blue cloth, with a broad silver girdle daintily wrought, round her loins, a rose wreath was on her head and her hair hung down unbound; the gaffer grumbled11 a few words to her from time to time, so that I judged he was her grandfather.
The men all looked up as we came into the room, my mate leading me by the hand, and he called out in his rough, good-tempered voice, “Here, my masters, I bring you tidings and a tale; give it meat and drink that it may be strong and sweet.”
“Whence are thy tidings, Will Green?” said one.
My mate grinned again with the pleasure of making his joke once more in a bigger company: “It seemeth from heaven, since this good old lad hath no master,” said he.
“The more fool he to come here,” said a thin man with a grizzled beard, amidst the laughter that followed, “unless he had the choice given him between hell and England.”
“Nay,” said I, “I come not from heaven, but from Essex.”
As I said the word a great shout sprang from all mouths at once, as clear and sudden as a shot from a gun. For I must tell you that I knew somehow, but I know not how, that the men of Essex were gathering12 to rise against the poll-groat bailiffs and the lords that would turn them all into villeins again, as their grandfathers had been. And the people was weak and the lords were poor; for many a mother’s son had fallen in the war in France in the old king’s time, and the Black Death had slain13 a many; so that the lords had bethought them: “We are growing poorer, and these upland-bred villeins are growing richer, and the guilds14 of craft are waxing in the towns, and soon what will there be left for us who cannot weave and will not dig? Good it were if we fell on all who are not guildsmen or men of free land, if we fell on soccage tenants15 and others, and brought both the law and the strong hand on them, and made them all villeins in deed as they are now in name; for now these rascals16 make more than their bellies17 need of bread, and their backs of homespun, and the overplus they keep to themselves; and we are more worthy18 of it than they. So let us get the collar on their necks again, and make their day’s work longer and their bever-time shorter, as the good statute19 of the old king bade. And good it were if the Holy Church were to look to it (and the Lollards might help herein) that all these naughty and wearisome holidays were done away with; or that it should be unlawful for any man below the degree of a squire20 to keep the holy days of the church, except in the heart and the spirit only, and let the body labour meanwhile; for does not the Apostle say, ‘If a man work not, neither should he eat’? And if such things were done, and such an estate of noble rich men and worthy poor men upholden for ever, then would it be good times in England, and life were worth the living.”
All this were the lords at work on, and such talk I knew was common not only among the lords themselves, but also among their sergeants21 and very serving-men. But the people would not abide23 it; therefore, as I said, in Essex they were on the point of rising, and word had gone how that at St. Albans they were wellnigh at blows with the Lord Abbot’s soldiers; that north away at Norwich John Litster was wiping the woad from his arms, as who would have to stain them red again, but not with grain or madder; and that the valiant24 tiler of Dartford had smitten25 a poll-groat bailiff to death with his lath-rending axe26 for mishandling a young maid, his daughter; and that the men of Kent were on the move.
Now, knowing all this I was not astonished that they shouted at the thought of their fellows the men of Essex, but rather that they said little more about it; only Will Green saying quietly, “Well, the tidings shall be told when our fellowship is greater; fall-to now on the meat, brother, that we may the sooner have thy tale.” As he spoke27 the blue-clad damsel bestirred herself and brought me a clean trencher — that is, a square piece of thin oak board scraped clean — and a pewter pot of liquor. So without more ado, and as one used to it, I drew my knife out of my girdle and cut myself what I would of the flesh and bread on the table. But Will Green mocked at me as I cut, and said, “Certes, brother, thou hast not been a lord’s carver, though but for thy word thou mightest have been his reader. Hast thou seen Oxford28, scholar?”
A vision of grey-roofed houses and a long winding29 street and the sound of many bells came over me at that word as I nodded “Yes” to him, my mouth full of salt pork and rye-bread; and then I lifted my pot and we made the clattering30 mugs kiss and I drank, and the fire of the good Kentish mead31 ran through my veins32 and deepened my dream of things past, present, and to come, as I said: “Now hearken a tale, since ye will have it so. For last autumn I was in Suffolk at the good town of Dunwich, and thither33 came the keels from Iceland, and on them were some men of Iceland, and many a tale they had on their tongues; and with these men I foregathered, for I am in sooth a gatherer of tales, and this that is now at my tongue’s end is one of them.”
So such a tale I told them, long familiar to me; but as I told it the words seemed to quicken and grow, so that I knew not the sound of my own voice, and they ran almost into rhyme and measure as I told it; and when I had done there was silence awhile, till one man spake, but not loudly:
“Yea, in that land was the summer short and the winter long; but men lived both summer and winter; and if the trees grew ill and the corn throve not, yet did the plant called man thrive and do well. God send us such men even here.”
“Nay,” said another, “such men have been and will be, and belike are not far from this same door even now.”
“Yea,” said a third, “hearken a stave of Robin34 Hood; maybe that shall hasten the coming of one I wot of.” And he fell to singing in a clear voice, for he was a young man, and to a sweet wild melody, one of those ballads35 which in an incomplete and degraded form you have read perhaps. My heart rose high as I heard him, for it was concerning the struggle against tyranny for the freedom of life, how that the wildwood and the heath, despite of wind and weather, were better for a free man than the court and the cheaping-town; of the taking from the rich to give to the poor; of the life of a man doing his own will and not the will of another man commanding him for the commandment’s sake. The men all listened eagerly, and at whiles took up as a refrain a couplet at the end of a stanza37 with their strong and rough, but not unmusical voices. As they sang, a picture of the wild-woods passed by me, as they were indeed, no park-like dainty glades38 and lawns, but rough and tangled39 thicket40 and bare waste and heath, solemn under the morning sun, and dreary41 with the rising of the evening wind and the drift of the night-long rain.
When he had done, another began in something of the same strain, but singing more of a song than a story ballad36; and thus much I remember of it:
The Sheriff is made a mighty lord,
Of goodly gold he hath enow,
And many a sergeant22 girt with sword;
But forth42 will we and bend the bow.
We shall bend the bow on the lily lea
Betwixt the thorn and the oaken tree.
With stone and lime is the burg wall built,
And pit and prison are stark43 and strong,
And many a true man there is spilt,
And many a right man doomed44 by wrong.
So forth shall we and bend the bow
And the king’s writ45 never the road shall know.
And heed8 ye the houses where ye go,
For as fair and as fine as they may be,
Lest behind your heels the door clap to.
Fare forth with the bow to the lily lea
Betwixt the thorn and the oaken tree.
Now bills and bows I and out a-gate!
And turn about on the lily lea!
And though their company be great
The grey-goose wing shall set us free.
Now bent47 is the bow in the green abode48
And the king’s writ knoweth not the road.
So over the mead and over the hithe,
And away to the wild-wood wend we forth;
There dwell we yeomen bold and blithe49
Where the Sheriff’s word is nought50 of worth.
Bent is the bow on the lily lea
Betwixt the thorn and the oaken tree.
But here the song dropped suddenly, and one of the men held up his hand as who would say, Hist! Then through the open window came the sound of another song, gradually swelling51 as though sung by men on the march. This time the melody was a piece of the plain-song of the church, familiar enough to me to bring back to my mind the great arches of some cathedral in France and the canons singing in the choir52.
All leapt up and hurried to take their bows from wall and corner; and some had bucklers withal, circles of leather, boiled and then moulded into shape and hardened: these were some two hand-breadths across, with iron or brass53 bosses in the centre. Will Green went to the corner where the bills leaned against the wall and handed them round to the first-comers as far as they would go, and out we all went gravely and quietly into the village street and the fair sunlight of the calm afternoon, now beginning to turn towards evening. None had said anything since we first heard the new-come singing, save that as we went out of the door the ballad-singer clapped me on the shoulder and said: “Was it not sooth that I said, brother, that Robin Hood should bring us John Ball?”
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1
astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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wrought
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| v.引起；以…原料制作；运转；adj.制造的 | |
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hood
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| n.头巾，兜帽，覆盖；v.罩上，以头巾覆盖 | |
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pegs
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| n.衣夹( peg的名词复数 )；挂钉；系帐篷的桩；弦钮v.用夹子或钉子固定( peg的第三人称单数 )；使固定在某水平 | |
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ashen
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| adj.灰的 | |
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heeding
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| v.听某人的劝告，听从( heed的现在分词 ) | |
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8
heed
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| v.注意，留意；n.注意，留心 | |
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mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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comely
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| adj.漂亮的，合宜的 | |
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grumbled
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| 抱怨( grumble的过去式和过去分词 )； 发牢骚； 咕哝； 发哼声 | |
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gathering
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| n.集会，聚会，聚集 | |
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slain
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| 杀死，宰杀，杀戮( slay的过去分词 )； (slay的过去分词) | |
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guilds
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| 行会，同业公会，协会( guild的名词复数 ) | |
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tenants
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| n.房客( tenant的名词复数 )；佃户；占用者；占有者 | |
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rascals
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| 流氓( rascal的名词复数 )； 无赖； （开玩笑说法）淘气的人（尤指小孩）； 恶作剧的人 | |
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bellies
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| n.肚子( belly的名词复数 )；腹部；（物体的）圆形或凸起部份；腹部…形的 | |
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worthy
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| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
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statute
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| n.成文法，法令，法规；章程，规则，条例 | |
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squire
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| n.护卫, 侍从, 乡绅 | |
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21
sergeants
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| 警官( sergeant的名词复数 )； （美国警察）警佐； （英国警察）巡佐； 陆军（或空军）中士 | |
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sergeant
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| n.警官，中士 | |
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abide
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| vi.遵守；坚持；vt.忍受 | |
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valiant
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| adj.勇敢的，英勇的；n.勇士，勇敢的人 | |
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25
smitten
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| 猛打，重击，打击( smite的过去分词 ) | |
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26
axe
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| n.斧子；v.用斧头砍，削减 | |
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spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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Oxford
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| n.牛津（英国城市） | |
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29
winding
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| n.绕，缠，绕组，线圈 | |
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30
clattering
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| 发出咔哒声（clatter的现在分词形式） | |
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31
mead
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| n.蜂蜜酒 | |
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32
veins
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| n.纹理；矿脉( vein的名词复数 )；静脉；叶脉；纹理 | |
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33
thither
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| adv.向那里；adj.在那边的，对岸的 | |
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34
robin
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| n.知更鸟，红襟鸟 | |
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35
ballads
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| 民歌，民谣，特别指叙述故事的歌( ballad的名词复数 )； 讴 | |
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ballad
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| n.歌谣，民谣，流行爱情歌曲 | |
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stanza
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| n.（诗）节，段 | |
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38
glades
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| n.林中空地( glade的名词复数 ) | |
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39
tangled
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| adj. 纠缠的，紊乱的 动词tangle的过去式和过去分词 | |
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40
thicket
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| n.灌木丛，树林 | |
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41
dreary
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| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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42
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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stark
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| adj.荒凉的；严酷的；完全的；adv.完全地 | |
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44
doomed
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| 命定的 | |
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45
writ
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| n.命令状，书面命令 | |
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warily
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| adv.留心地 | |
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47
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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48
abode
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| n.住处，住所 | |
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49
blithe
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| adj.快乐的，无忧无虑的 | |
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50
nought
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| n.／adj.无，零 | |
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swelling
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| n.肿胀 | |
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52
choir
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| n.唱诗班，唱诗班的席位，合唱团，舞蹈团；v.合唱 | |
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53
brass
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| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
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