The Legend of the Glorious Adventures of Tyl Ulenspiegel in the land of Flanders Part 31

"I thought it was unwholesome, Tyl, that a man should go on a journey without a good fat goose, and a ham, and some Ghent sausages. So take them, and when you eat of them think of me."

While Ulenspiegel stood gazing at Nele, quite oblivious of the satchel which she was holding out to him, Lamme poked out his head from another hole in the hood, and began to address the girl in his turn.

"O girl most wise," he said, "O girl most prudent, if he refuses such a gift it must be from pure absence of mind. But you had much better give into my own keeping that goose of yours, that ham, and those fine sausages. I will take care of them, I promise you!"

"And who," asked Nele of her lover, "who may this red-face be?"

"A victim of the married state," Tyl told her, "that is wasting away with sorrow, and would soon, in fact, shrink away to nothing, like an overbaked apple, were it not that he recuperated his strength from time to time and all the time by taking nourishment."

"Alas, my son," sighed Lamme, "what you say is only too true."

Now it was very hot, and Nele had covered her head with her ap.r.o.n because of the sun. Ulenspiegel looked upon her, and conceived a sudden desire to be alone with her. He turned to Lamme, and pointed to a woman that was walking some way off in a field.

"Do you see that woman?" he said.

"I see her," said Lamme.

"Do you recognize her?"

"Heavens!" cried Lamme, "can it be my wife? In truth she is dressed like no common country wench!"

"Can you still be doubtful, you old mole?"

"But supposing it were not her after all?" said Lamme.

"You would be none the worse off," Ulenspiegel told him, "for over there to the left, towards the north, I know a tavern that sells most excellent bruinbier. We will join you there, and here meanwhile is some salt ham that will provide an excellent relish to your thirst."

So Lamme got down from the cart, and made off as fast as his legs would carry him in the direction of the woman in the field.

Ulenspiegel said to Nele: "Why will you not come near me?"

Then he helped her to climb up beside him on to the cart, and made her sit close by his side. He removed her ap.r.o.n from her head and the cloak from her shoulders, and then when he had kissed her a hundred times at least, he asked her:

"Where were you going to, beloved?"

She answered him nothing, but seemed carried away in a sort of ecstasy. Ulenspiegel, in like rapture, said to her:

"Anyway you are here now! And truly the wild hedgerow is dun beside the sweet pink colouring of your skin, and though you are no queen, behold I will make a crown of kisses all for you! O sweet arms of my love, so tender, so rosy, and made for nothing but to hold me in their embrace! Ah, little girl, little love, how dare I touch you? These rough hands of mine, will they not tarnish the purity of your white shoulder? Yea verily, for the lightsome b.u.t.terfly may flit to rest upon the crimson carnation, but I, clumsy b.u.mpkin that I am, how can I rest myself without tarnishing the living whiteness that is you? G.o.d is in heaven, the king is on his throne, the sun rides triumphing in the sky, but am I a G.o.d, or a king, or the sun himself that I may come so close to you? O tresses softer than silk! O Nele, I fear to touch your hair, so clumsy am I, lest I tear it, lest I shred it all to pieces. But have no fear, my love. Your foot, your sweet foot! What makes it so white? Do you bathe it in milk?"

Nele would have risen from his side, but,

"What are you afraid of?" he asked her. "It is not the sun alone that shines upon us now and paints you all gold. Do not cast down your eyes, but look straight into mine, and behold the pure fire that flames there. And listen, my love, hearken to me, dearest. Now is midday, the silent hour. The labourer is at home, eating his dinner of soup. Shall we not also feed upon our love? Oh why, oh why have I not yet a thousand years wherein to tell at your knees my rosary of Indian pearls!"

"Golden Tongue!" she said.

But my Lord the Sun blazed down upon the white hood of the cart, and a lark sang high over the clover, and Nele leant her head upon the shoulder of Ulenspiegel.

III

After a while Lamme came back to the cart, great drops of sweat pouring off him, and he, puffing and blowing like a dolphin.

"Alas!" he cried, "I was born under an evil star. For no sooner had I run and caught up with this woman than I found that she was not a woman at all, but an old hag rather, as indeed I could see at once by her face--forty-five years old at the very least! And to judge by her head-gear she had never been married. For all that, she inquired of me in a harsh voice what I was doing there, carrying my great fat belly about in the clover! I told her as politely as I could that I was looking for my wife who had lately left me, and that I had run after her by mistake.

"At that the old girl told me that the only thing for me to do was to return at once whence I came, and that if my wife had left me she had indeed done well, seeing that all men are thieves and rascals, heretics, unfaithful, poisoners, and deceivers of women; and she threatened to set her dog on me if I did not make off at once. Which in truth I did incontinently, for that I perceived a great mastiff lying there growling at her feet. When, therefore, I had reached the boundary of the field, I sat me down to rest myself and to eat a bit of ham. And I was between two clover-fields. Suddenly I heard a great noise just behind me, and turning round I saw the old girl's mastiff, no longer now in menacing mood but wagging his tail as sweetly as possible and as much as to say that he was hungry and would like a piece of my ham. I was for throwing him some small bits when all at once his mistress appeared on the scene, and shouted out fiercely:

"'Seize the man! Seize him with your fangs, my son!'

"I started to run away, the great mastiff hanging on to me by my breeks. And now he had bitten off a piece of them, together with a gobbet of my own flesh. The pain made me angry and I turned and gave him such a smart stroke with my stick upon his front paws that I must have broken one of them at least. At that he fell down, crying out in his dog language: 'Mercy! Mercy!' the which I granted him. Meanwhile his mistress, finding no stones to throw at me, had begun to threaten me with pieces of earth and bits of gra.s.s. So I made good my retreat. And is it not a sorry thing, and a thing most unjust and most cruel, that because a girl has not been good-looking enough to find some one to marry her, she must needs go and take her revenge on a poor innocent like me?"

IV

Some while after these happenings, when Nele had returned to her home with Katheline, Lamme and Ulenspiegel came to Bruges. They were at the place called Minne-Water, the Lake of Love--though the learned folk would have it to be derived from Minre-Water, that is, the Water belonging to the order of monks who are called Minims. Be this as it may, here on the bank of the lake, Lamme and Ulenspiegel sat themselves down, watching those that pa.s.sed in front of them under the trees. The green branches hung over the pathway like a vault of foliage, and below there sauntered both men and women, youths and maids, clasping each other's hands, with flowers on their heads, walking so close together and gazing so tenderly into each other's eyes that they seemed to see nothing else in all the world save themselves alone.

As he watched them, the thoughts of Ulenspiegel were far away with Nele, and his thoughts were sad thoughts. Yet his words were of another colour, bidding Lamme come off with him to the tavern for a drink. But Lamme paid no attention to what Tyl was saying, for he himself was absorbed no less by the sight of those loving pairs.

"In the old days," he said, "we too, my wife and I, were wont to go a-courting, while others, just as we are now, would watch us, alone and companionless by the lake-side."

"Come and have a drink!" said Ulenspiegel, "Belike we will find the Seven at the bottom of a pint of beer."

"That's but a drunkard's notion," answered Lamme, "for you know quite well that the Seven are giants, and taller than the roof of the Church of St. Sauver itself!"

The thoughts of Ulenspiegel were still with Nele, but none the less did he hope to find, perchance, good quarters in some inn, a good supper, and a comely hostess into the bargain. Again, therefore, did he urge his companion to come along with him and drink. But Lamme would not listen to him, gazing sadly at the tower of Notre Dame, and addressing himself in prayer to Our Lady somewhat in this wise:

"O Blessed Lady, patroness of all lawful unions, suffer me, I pray, to see yet once again the white neck, the soft and tender neck, of my love!"

"Come and drink!" cried Ulenspiegel. "Belike you will find her displaying these charms of hers to the drinkers in the tavern."

"How dare you harbour such a thought!" cried Lamme.

"Come and drink!" repeated Ulenspiegel. "Your wife has turned innkeeper without a doubt."

And thus conversing, they repaired to the Marche du Samedi, and entered into the Blauwe Lanteern--at the sign of the Blue Lantern. And there they found a right jolly-looking innkeeper.

The donkey meanwhile was unharnessed from the cart, and was put up in the stables and provided with a good feed of oats. Our travellers themselves ordered supper, and when they had eaten their fill, they went to bed and slept soundly till morning, only to wake up and eat again. And Lamme, who was wellnigh bursting with all that he had eaten, said that he could hear in his stomach a sound like the music of the spheres.

Now when the time came to pay the bill, mine host came to Lamme and told him that the total amounted to six patards.