Chapter 2

One of the three youths took the round black stone in his hand. "I'll bring the stone with me," said he. "We'll go into the Castle now and see what our finding there will be."

They went into the Castle. The three youths told Feet-in-the-Ashes they would help him to find what he had come to seek--the three teeth out of the head of the King of Ireland. They searched and they searched all over the Castle. At last one of them opened an iron press and there on a shelf was a silver cup and in the cup were three teeth. Feet-in-the-Ashes knew they were what he had come for. He left the cup beside him.

They took provisions from the Giant's store, put them on the table and began to eat. But first one and then another and then the third of the three youths made an excuse and left the table. Feet-in-the-Ashes went on with his breakfast. Then he left the Castle to look for the three youths that had been his companions. He did not find them. He went down to the sea-shore. He saw his boat and the sails were raised on it. In the boat were the three youths and they were making ready to put out to sea. Feet-in-the-Ashes shouted to them. Then one of the youths came to the side of the deck and spoke back to him.

"You found the Stone of Victory without knowing it," said he, "and you let us take it in our hands. Now we cannot give it back to you for our lives depend on our keeping it and bringing it away. And," said he, "we fear to stay on the land with you because you have such luck that you could take the Stone from us. The boat we came in is gone. We take your boat and we think that you have such luck that you will find another way of getting off the island. Remember that what you came for was not the Stone of Victory but the King's teeth, and we helped to find them for you."

They had hoisted the sails and now a wind came and the boat that was from his grandmother's crutch was blown out of the harbour and Feet-in-the-Ashes was left without any companion on the Island.

"Cluck, cluck, cluck," said the Hen-grouse, "he found the Stone of Victory, but what good were his findings to him when he didn't know what he had found and he let it be taken from him?"

"But if he hadn't to find it he couldn't have slain the Giant and taken the cup out of the iron cupboard--that much good the Stone of Victory did him," said the Cock-grouse.

"I'm sorry to think that that's all he got from the Stone of Victory," said the Hen-grouse.

"Well, that's all he got from it, and be quiet now till I tell you the rest of the story," said the Cock-grouse.

He went into the courtyard of the Grey Castle and he found there a great eagle that was chained to a great rock. The eagle came towards him as far as the chain would let him. "Feed me," said the eagle.

"Will you carry me to Ireland's ground if I feed you?" said Feet-in-the-Ashes.

"If you feed me every time I open my mouth, I will," said the eagle.

"That I'll try to do, good eagle," said Feet-in-the-Ashes.

He went through courtyard and pen-fold but not a sheep nor a pig nor a bullock could he find. It seemed as if he would not be able to find meat for the eagle after all. He went down to the sea-shore and he came upon a pool filled with thin bony fish called skates. He took a basket of these and put it on his back. He came back to the courtyard and he unlocked the chain that held the eagle.

"Feed me," said the eagle, and he opened his mouth.

"Close your eyes and I'll fill you mouth," said Feet-in-the-Ashes.

The eagle closed his eyes. Feet-in-the-Ashes flung a score of skates into his mouth. "Hard meat, hard meat," said the eagle, but he gulped them down. Feet-in-the-Ashes, holding the cup in his hands and carrying the basket of skates on his back, put himself between the wings of the eagle. The eagle flew up and over the Grey Castle and faced for the plain of the sea.

They travelled from the morning light until the full noontide. The eagle opened his mouth again. Feet-in-the-Ashes put nothing into it. The eagle finding nothing in his mouth dropped down to the sea.

"Close you eyes," said Feet-in-the-Ashes, "and I'll fill your mouth." The eagle closed his eyes and Feet-in-the-Ashes put another score of skates into his mouth. The eagle gulped them all down. "Whenever I open my mouth you will have to feed me," he said. Feet-in-the-Ashes did not like to hear this, for a score more of skates were all that was left.

The eagle rose up again and on and on he flew until the night was coming over the water. He opened his mouth again. Feet-in-the-Ashes put in five more skates. The eagle kept his mouth open and said "Feed me."

There was nothing to be done then but to put in the rest of the skates. Feet-in-the-Ashes flung them all in, and the eagle rose up and flew and they travelled while there was darkness on the water, and when the sun rose again Feet-in-the-Ashes saw they were flying over the land of Ireland. The eagle opened his mouth. Feet-in-the-Ashes had nothing to put into it. "Fly on, good eagle," said he, "and leave me down at the King's Castle." "Feed me," said the eagle. "I will give you what you never had before--a whole bullock--when we come to the King's Castle." "Cows far off have long horns," said the eagle mocking him. With that he flung Feet-in-the-Ashes off his back.

Sore would his fall have been if it had been on any other place but a soft bog. On the softest of soft bogs he fell. He made a hole in the ground, but no bone in his body was broken and he still held the cup in his hands. He rose up covered with the mud of the bog, and he started off for the King's Castle.

"Cluck, cluck," said the Hen-grouse, "and did he not go to see his grandmother at all?"

"If he did it's not in the story," said the Cock-grouse. "That very day, as I would have you know, the King was standing outside the gate of his Castle with his powerful captains and his strong-armed guards around him. 'A year it is to-day,' said the King, 'since the Giant came and struck me in the mouth, knocking out and taking away three of my teeth, and since that day I have had neither health nor prosperity. And you know,' said he, 'that my daughter and a quarter of my Kingdom is to go to the one who will avenge the insult and bring back my three teeth.' 'Such and such a thing prevented me from going,' said one of his Captains, 'but now that so and so is done, I can go and avenge the insult offered to you.' 'So and so kept me from going,' said another of the Captains, 'but now that such and such a thing is done I can go to-morrow and bring you back your three teeth.' 'I am tired of hearing you all talk,' said the King, 'and it's my belief that my teeth will be lost and my daughter unwedded till the day of doom.'"

It was then that Feet-in-the-Ashes appeared before them, "Good health to you, King," said he.

"Good health to you, good man," said the King, "and what, may I ask, have you come here for?"

He was covered with the feathers of the eagle and the mud of the bog, and, as you may be sure, the King and the captains and the guards looked sourly at him.

"I have come first of all, King," said he, "to give you advice."

"And what is your advice?" asked the King.

"My advice to you is that you send away all these you have around you--your captains and your guards--and that you turn them into dog-boys or horse-boys or anything else in which they would give useful service, for as they are here, they can neither serve nor guard you."

"All that may be true," said the King, "but what right have you to say it?"

Feet-in-the-Ashes said nothing but he held the cup up to the King and the King saw three teeth in it and he took them out and placed them in his mouth and the teeth went into their places and there firmly they stayed.

Then Feet-in-the-Ashes told how he had gone to the Green Island and how he had avenged the insult offered to the king and how he had got what he had gone to search for. Then he demanded the King's daughter in marriage and a quarter of the Kingdom, and both were made over to him on the spot. As for the powerful captains and the strong-armed guards, some of them were made horse-boys and some were made dog-boys and Feet-in-the-Ashes was made Captain over the new guards. When he came to rule a quarter of the Kingdom he was given a horse and made a duke and he was called by a better name than Feet-in-the-Ashes. But what that name was I don't remember now.

"Cluck, cluck, cluck," said the Hen-grouse, "and did he go to visit the grandmother at all?"

"If he did," said the Cock-grouse, "that's another story, and if it was ever told I don't remember it. Pray go to the right, my lady, for I'm hungry for the sweet buds of the heather."

The King of the Birds

The thirteen little wrens sat on the Apple-yard wall in the King's Garden and their mother was there to teach them to fly. One called them the little wrens, but really each one was as big as their mother. She had a tail, however, that was most cunningly cocked and they had no tails, and the consequence was that when they made their little flights they always went sideways. Moreover, their beaks were still yellow and wide and open and this is always a sign of the young bird.

"All I ask of you," said the mother, "is that when you go into the World you remember that you are the Children of the King of the Birds."

"Now why does our Mother call us the Children of the King of the Birds?" said one little wren to the other. "I think we're really very small. And I think our Mother is very small. And there's our Father behind that ivy-leaf and he's very small too."

"And wherever you go, be sure to conduct yourselves like the Children of the King of the Birds," said the Mother.

"It's because we were reared in such a fine nest," said another little wren. "No other birds in the world had ever a finer nest than we have had. That's the reason we're called the Children of the King of the Birds."

"Men call the Wren the King of the Birds," said the Father Wren, as he flew up on a tree, "and surely men ought to know who is the King of the Birds."

"Why do men call the Wren the King of the Birds?" said the little wrens.

"I will tell you," said the Mother. "As we fly from the wall to the tree, and from the tree back to the wall, I will tell you why men honor the wren as the King of the Birds."

She spent a whole day telling the little wrens the story and the Boy Who Knew What the Birds Said was there, and he heard the whole of it.--

* * * * *

The King of the Hither-side of the Mountain conquered the two villages of Half-a-Loaf and Windy-Gap, and the very day he conquered he ordered the two Headmen to come before him.

"You two Headmen are to see that your villages, Half-a-Loaf and Windy-Gap, send me my rightful tribute," said the King to them.

"There isn't much we can send...." said the Headman of Half-a-Loaf.

"A string of salmon," said the Headman of Windy-Gap.

"A basket of plover's eggs," said the Headman of Half-a-Loaf.

"No," said the King, "the tribute that each of your villages must send me is the King of the Birds."

The two Headmen went back to their villages, and that very day each told at the council what tribute the King had ordered them to send. "The King of the Birds," said the people of Half-a-Loaf, "that's the Eagle surely." "The King of the Birds," said the people of Windy-Gap. "What Bird might that be? We'll have to give thought to this."

The people of Windy-Gap thought about it and thought about it, but the people of Half-a-Loaf declared there was no doubt at all about it--the Eagle was the King of the Birds. And while the people of Windy-Gap were thinking and pondering the people of Half-a-Loaf were sending their young men off to catch an eagle.

But an eagle is a hard fowl to catch, and the people of Half-a-Loaf found they had to send all of their young men out and to send them out every day. And the young men climbed high hills and stony ditches, and they searched the east and they hunted the west; they went out at sunrise and they came back at sunset, but never an eagle did they bring with them.

"It may be that the Eagle is the King of the Birds," said the people of Windy-Gap, "but we had better consider it."

They thought about it from sunrise to sunset; they thought about it while they plowed their fields and sowed them, while they spun their cloth and made their coats, while they mended their nets and mended their shoes, while they thatched their roofs and planted their apple-trees.

And in Half-a-Loaf there was few left to plow the fields and sow them, to spin cloth and to make coats, to mend nets and to mend shoes, to thatch roofs and to plant apple-trees--there was few left to do these things for all the young men were out on the mountain hunting for an eagle.

"The people of Windy-Gap will be ruined," said the people of Half-a-Loaf, "they have done nothing yet to catch the Eagle. When the King gets no tribute from them he'll come down and sell them and their village. Call the young men back that have gone into the fields to work and send them up the mountain again."

At last the people of Half-a-Loaf caught their Eagle--a great golden Eagle he was. They built for him a shed and they fed him on what lambs they had that year.

"We're safe anyway," said the people of Half-a-Loaf, "but the unfortunate folk in Windy-Gap have lost their chance. They'll not have time to catch an eagle now."

The time was coming near when the two villages would have to send their tribute to the King.

"We have our Eagle," said the people of Half-a-Loaf, "But O, Bad Fortune! we have hardly a crop growing. This will be a hard year for us--we haven't lambs to grow into sheep even."

"We have our crops," said the people of Windy-Gap, "but, Bad Cess to it! What are we to do about paying our tribute to the King?"

And still they couldn't decide whether it was the Eagle or the Cuckoo or the Woodpecker that was King of the Birds. They were still considering it when the King's Messenger came to bid them come with their tribute to the King's Castle.

What were the people of Windy-Gap to do? They searched round and about but no bird at all could they find. And then as he was being marched off the Headman put his hand under the thatch of his house and took out a Wren that was sheltering there. He put the Wren under his hat and went off with the King's Messenger.

And there, before him on the way to the King's Castle was the Headman of Half-a-Loaf. The riders of the village were with him and they bore their golden Eagle most triumphantly.

"Give to my Falconer the King of the Birds," said the King.

The Headman of Half-a-Loaf presented the Eagle.

"It is well," said the King, "and where have you," said he to the Headman of Windy-Gap, "bestowed the King of the Birds?"

The Headman put his hand under his hat and handed over the Wren to the King's Falconer.

"Tush," said the King, "Why do you call this the King of the Birds?"

The Headman of Windy-Gap was going to say "Because his family is great," but he said instead "Because he flies the highest, my lord."

"If it be truth it's unknown to me," said the King, "but it shall be tried out."

Then said he to the Royal Falconer, "Let the Eagle and the Wren soar together. And when the Eagle outsoars the Wren it shall be proved that the Headman of Windy-Gap is a catiff, and his village and everyone in it will be sold to the Saracens. But if it so happens that the Wren outsoars the Eagle, the tribute sent from the village of Windy-Gap must be accepted."

The Eagle and the Wren rose from the same perch and soared up together. Up and up the Eagle went. "So far my father went, but I shall go farther," said the Eagle. Higher and higher he rose. "So far my grandfather went but I shall go farther." Farther and farther he soared. "So far went my great-grandfather, and no eagle again will fly so high." His wings were stiff and tired. "No bird will ever out-soar this flight of mine," said the Eagle.

He went to close his wings so that he might rest them as he went down. But as he did the Wren came from under his wings.

Up went the Wren, down went the Eagle. Up and up went the Wren. He had been resting while the Eagle had been flying, and now he was able to soar past the point the Eagle had reached at his dead-best.

The Eagle flew down and lighted on the Falconer's perch. "Has he flown high, Falconer?" asked the King. "No bird has flown so high," said the Falconer. "By the rime on his wings he has gone into the line of frost."

"The Eagle is King of the Birds and no one can deny it," said the King. "The village of Windy-Gap has not sent me my tribute."

"Mercy," said the Headman of Windy-Gap.

"The village and all in it shall be sold to the Saracens," said the King.

Just then the Wren came down and lighted on the perch beside the Eagle. "Where did the Wren fly to?" said the King. "By my glove," said the Falconer "he soared past the line of frost, and went into the line of snow, for what's on his feathers is a drop of snow."

"The Wren is King of the Birds," said the Headman of Windy-Gap.

"Yes, King of the Birds," said the King, "and, therefore, my lawful tribute."

And so, for ever after the villages sent to the King, not an Eagle, but a Wren as tribute. And in no village ever after were the lands unplowed and the fields unsown, the cloth unspun and the coats not made, the roofs unthatched and the apple-trees unplanted. And in every village in the hollow and on the height the people shouted for the Wren--"The Wren, the Wren, the King of all Birds."

Bloom-of-Youth and the Witch of the Elders

Bloom-of-youth was a young, young girl. But, young as she was, she would have to be married, her step-mother said. Then married she was while she was still little enough to walk through the doorway of her step-mother's hut without stooping her head.

Her husband was a hunter and he took her to live in a hut at the edge of a wood. He was out hunting the whole of the day. Now what did Bloom-of-Youth do while she had the house to herself? Little enough indeed. She swept the floor and she washed the dishes and she laid them back on their shelf. Then she went to the well for pails of water. When she went out she stayed long, for first she would look into the well at her own image and then she would make a wreath of flowers and put it on her head and look at herself again. After that, maybe, she would delay to pick berries and eat them. Then she would go without hurrying along the path, singing to herself.--

'Said when he saw Me all in blue, "Who is the maid The sky must woo?"

'Said when he saw Me all in green, "Who is the maid The grass calls queen?"'

When she would have got back to the hut the fire on the hearth would have gone out and she would have to light it again and then sweep the floor clear of the ashes that had blown upon it. After that she would have little time to do anything else except prepare a meal against the time when her husband would be back from his hunting.

One morning her husband left his coat down on the bench. "My coat is torn; sew it for me," he said. Bloom-of-Youth said she would do that. But she did no more to the coat than take it up and leave it down again on the bench.

The next day her husband said "My vest is torn too; have it and the coat sewn for me." He left the vest beside the coat and went out to his hunting.

Bloom-of-Youth did nothing to the coat and nothing to the vest, and every day for a week her husband went out without coat or vest upon him.

One day he put on his torn coat and his torn vest and went out to his hunting. When he came home that evening he had a bundle of wool with him.

"Your step-mother," said he, "sends you this bundle of wool and she bids you spin it that there may be cloth for new clothes for me." "I will spin it," said Bloom-of-Youth.

But the next day when her husband went away she did what she had always done before. She went to the well and she looked for long at her image; she put a wreath of flowers on her head and she looked at her image again; she picked berries and ate them; she went along the path without hurrying, singing to herself.--

'Said when he saw Me all in blue "Who is the maid The sky must woo?"

'Said when he saw Me all in green "Who is the maid The grass calls queen?"'

She had to light the fire again when she came in and sweep away the ashes that had gathered on the floor and after she had done all that it was time to prepare the meal for the evening. But before her husband came home she took the spinning wheel out of the corner and put it near the light of the doorway.

"I see," said her husband, "that you are going to spin the wool for my clothes."

"I am when to-morrow comes," said Bloom-of-Youth.

But the next day she did as she done every day and no wool was spun. The day after she put wool on the wheel and gave it a few turns. In a week from that evening she had one ball of thread spun.

"Your step-mother bids me ask you how much of the wool have you spun?" said her husband to her one evening. Bloom-of-Youth was so much afraid that her husband would send her to her step-mother through the dark, dark wood, that she said "I have spun many balls."

"Your step-mother bade me count the balls you have spun," said her husband.

"I will go up to the loft and throw them down to you and then you will throw them back to me and we will count them that way," said Bloom-of-Youth.

She went up to the loft and she flung down the ball she had spun.

"One," said her husband, and he threw it back to her.

She flung him the ball again.

"Two," said her husband, and he flung it back to her. Then he said "three," and then "four," and then "five," and so on until he had counted twelve. "You have done well," said he, "and now before the week is out take the twelve balls to your step-mother's house and she will weave the thread into cloth for clothes for me."

Bloom-of-Youth was greatly frightened. To her step-mother's house she would have to go with a dozen balls of thread in a few days. The next day she hurried back from the well and she sat at her wheel before the door spinning and spinning. But, do her best, she could not get a good thread spun in the long length of the day.

And while she was spinning and spinning and getting her thread knotted and broken a black and crooked woman came and stood before the door. "You're spinning hard I see," said she to Bloom-of-Youth.

Bloom-of-Youth gave her no answer but put her head against the wheel and cried and cried.

"And what would you say," said the black and crooked woman, "if I took the bundle of wool from you now and brought it back to you to-morrow spun into a dozen balls of thread?"

"It is not what I would say; it is what I should give you," said Bloom-of-Youth.

"Give me!" said the black and crooked woman. "What could you give me?" But as she said it she gave Bloom-of-Youth a baleful look from under her leafy eyebrows. "No, no, you need give me nothing for spinning the wool for you. All that I'll ask from you is that you tell me my name within a week from this day."