Part 3

The third company had no time to watch the others, for some wolves had winded their sheep, and the young men had to run to fight them off. Some of them chased the skulking gray thieves for some distance and came back with the news that the wolves had led them southward to a rocky height, where they could look over the tops of the trees below and see an uncommonly fine place for the colony. This was as plain a sign as one could ask for, and the whole party, in great satisfaction and relief, went on to the home that the wolves had found for them. The wolf was another of the beasts of Mars. This settlement took the name of the Herpini, the Wolf People.

All three of the Sabine colonies prospered and grew strong, and although they had little to do with each other they lived in peace with relatives and neighbors. There came to be many villages on the slopes of the Apennines in which the Sabine language was spoken. This was the last time that they were forced to keep a Sacred Year, for the Umbrian war parties left them alone, and perhaps did not even know where they were; and the mountain land was pleasant and fertile, out of the way of floods. There was no reason in the world why the brave young couples who founded their homes here, and worked and played and kept holiday, and loved the green earth as all their forefathers had loved it, should not be prosperous and happy, and they were, for many a long year.

IV

THE BANDITTI

When the Sabines came to the western side of the mountain range, they did not try to plow much land at first. They had to find out what the land was like.

People who lived by pasturing their cattle and sheep wherever it was convenient hardly ever settled in the same place for good, because the pasture differs from year to year even in the same neighborhood. A hillside which is rich and green in a wet year may be barren and dry when there are long months with no rain. A valley that is rich in long juicy grass in spring may be under water later in the summer. Herdsmen need to range over a wide country, and especially they need this if they keep sheep. The sheep nibble the grass down to the roots, and when they have finished with a field there is nothing on it for any other animal that year. But the true farmer, who uses his land for a great many different purposes, can shift his crops and his pasturage around so that he can have a home, and this was what the Sabines wished to do.

For a farm of this kind, a place between mountain and plain is best, with a variety of soil and good water supply. In such a mountain valley as the Herpini chose, with wooded heights above it, the roots of the trees bind the earth together and keep the wet of the winter rains from drying up, so that there is not often either flood or drought, and almost always good grass is found somewhere in the neighborhood. The people began by raising beans and peas to dry for winter, and herbs for flavoring, and in the summer they had kale and other fresh vegetables. Now and then, for a holiday, they killed a sheep or a young goat or a calf and had a feast. The heart and inner organs were burned on the altar for an offering to the gods; the flesh was served out to the people, cooked with certain herbs used according to old rules. For vineyards and grain fields, which needed a certain kind of soil, they chose, after awhile, exactly the ground which suited them, and plowed their common land, and sowed their corn and planted their vines.

Most of the farm land was worked by all the people in common. This was a very old custom. There were good reasons for it. In farming, the work has to be done when the weather is suitable. The planting or haying or harvesting cannot be put off. By working in company the men saved time and labor, and if one happened to be ill the land was taken care of all the same, and nothing was lost. Also, in this way all of the land suitable for a certain crop was used for that crop. Nobody was wasting time and strength trying to make rocky or barren soil feed his family, while his strength and skill were needed on good ground. The third and perhaps the best reason was, that in this way the houses were not scattered, but close together, so that no enemy could attack any one in the village without fighting all. The village was clean and wholesome, because no animals were kept there except as pets. The flocks and herds were taken care of by men and boys trained to that work. Each man had for his own the land around his own house, and every year he was allowed a part of the common land for his especial use, but he did not own it as he owned his house and lot,—the _heredium_, as it was called.

Everything connected with the cultivation of the land was in the hands of twelve men chosen for it, called the Arval Brethren, or the Brethren of the Field. It was their work to see that all was done according to the well-proved rules and customs, that the gods received due respect, and that the festivals in their honor were held in proper form.

In a society where people have to depend upon each other in this way, there is no room for a person who will not fit in, and who expects to be taken care of without doing his share of the work. Here and there, in one village and another, a boy grew up who shirked his work, took more good things than his share and made trouble generally. Sometimes he got over it as he grew older, but sometimes he did not; and if he could not live peaceably at home, he had to be driven out to get his living where he could. There was no place in a village ruled by the gods for any one who did not respect and obey the laws.

These outlaws did not starve, for they could get a kind of living by fishing and hunting, and they stole from the ignorant country people and from travelers. They were known after awhile as _banditti_, the banished men, the men who had been driven out of civilized society. Some of them left their own country altogether and went down to the seashore, or into the strange land across the yellow river. The people in the villages did not know much about them. They were very busy with their own concerns.

There were two great festivals in the year, to do honor to the gods of the land. One was in the shortest days of the year, early in winter. This was the feast of Saturn. He was the god who filled the storehouses, who sent water to drench the earth and feed the crops, who looked after the silent world of the roots and underground growing things generally. When his feast was held, the harvest was all in, the wine was made, and it was time to choose the animals to be killed for food and not kept through the winter. For four or five days there was a general jollification. No work was done except what was necessary. There was feasting and singing and story telling, and some of the wilder youths usually dressed up in fantastic costumes like earth spirits, and wound up the holiday with dancing and songs and shouting and all sorts of antics. Sometimes a clever singer made new songs to the old tunes, with jokes and puns about well-known people of the place. These songs were always done in a certain style, and this style of verse came to be known later as Saturnian poetry, and the sly personal fun in them was called satirical. It was part of the joke that the singer should keep a perfectly grave face.

The other festival came in the spring, when the grass was green and the leaves were fresh and bright, and flowers were wreathing shrubs and hillsides like dropped garlands. It was in honor of the beautiful open-handed goddess called Dea Dia, or sometimes Maia. One spring morning the children of the village could hear the blowing of the horn in the public square, and then they all understood that the priest was about to give out the announcement of the festival of Maia. They crowded up to hear, even more excited and joyous than the older people.

There were no books or written records; not even a written language was known to the villagers. The priest of the village, who kept account of the days when ceremonies were due, and the changes of the moon, gave out the news, each month, of the things which were to happen. The months were not all the same length, and no two villages had just the same calendar. The year was counted from the founding of the city, whenever that was, and naturally it was not the same in different places. The people gathered in the public square, waiting to hear what Emilius the priest had to tell them.

He was a tall and noble-looking man, generally beloved because he always tried to deal justly and kindly with his neighbors, and was so wise that he usually succeeded. The person who paid him the deepest and most reverent attention was little Emilia, his daughter, who believed him to be the wisest and best of men. She stood with her mother in a little group directly in front of him, looking up at him with her deep, serious blue eyes, in happy pride.

Emilia was six and a half years old. This would be her first May festival, to remember, for she had been ill the year before when it came, and one’s memory is not very good before one is five years old. Her bright gold-brown hair curled a little and looked like waves of sunshine all over her graceful small head. It was tied with a white fillet to keep it out of her eyes, and in the fillet, like a great purple jewel, was thrust an anemone from a wreath her mother had been making. Her mother dressed her in the finest and softest of undyed wool, bleached white as snow. She wore a little tunic with a braided girdle, and over her shoulders a square of the same soft cloth as a mantle; it looked like the wings of a white bird as it shone in the morning sun. On her feet were sandals of kidskin, and around her neck was a necklace of red beads that had come from far away. A trader brought them from the place by the seashore where such things were made. From this necklace hung a round ball of hammered copper, made to open in two halves, and inside it was a little charm to keep off bad spirits. The charm was made of the same red stone and looked like the head of a little goat.

Emilia had never in her life known what it was to be afraid of any one, or to see any one’s eyes rest upon her unkindly. The world was very interesting to her. It was filled with wonderful and beautiful things, especially just now. Each day she saw some new flower or bird or plant or animal she had never seen before. Spring in those mountains was very lovely. It hardly seemed as if it could be the real world.

The people were all rather fine-looking and strong and active. They worked and played in the open air and led healthy lives, and being well and full of spirits, there was really no reason why they should be ugly.

Emilius told them when the feast of Maia would take place. The moon, which was called the measurer, was all they had to go by in reckoning the year. The feast was to be the day after it changed. Emilius repeated the names of the Brethren of the Field, and mentioned things that should be done to prepare for the feast, and that was all.

Far up on the heights of the mountain above, in among the rocks where nothing grew except wind-stunted trees and patches of moss and fern, there was another settlement of which the village people knew nothing. Two of its men happened to be farther down the mountain than usual, hunting, when this announcement was made. They got up on a rock overgrown with bushes, where they could look down into the village, and lay watching what went on. They were not beautiful or happy. They looked as they lay on the rock, spying over the edge with their hard, greedy eyes under shaggy unkempt locks, rather like wild beasts.

One was a runaway from this very place, and he knew it was nearly time for the May festival. His name was Gubbo, and he had been cast out of the village because he was cruel. He liked to torment animals and children; he liked to compel others to give him what he wanted. When finally he had been caught slashing at the favorite ox of a man he had had a quarrel with, he had been beaten and kicked out and told never to come back. He had wandered about for some years, and then joined the banditti on the mountain.

These banditti came from many towns; some were even of another race, of the strange people beyond the river. There were not very many of them, but there were enough to surprise and beat down a much larger number if circumstances favored. Their usual plan was not to fight in the open, but creep up near a place where stores or treasure happened to be kept, when the most skillful thieves would get in and carry off the plunder to the hiding-place of the others, who stood ready to fight or to act as porters, whichever might be necessary. If they were chased, the best runners drew off the pursuers after them and joined the rest of the band later.

They did not spend all or even very much of their time in their mountain den. They had picked this country as their headquarters because it was largely wilderness above the farming belt. The rocks held many caves and good strongholds. Often they went off and were gone for perhaps a month at a time, prowling about distant settlements, or haunting the roads the traders traveled. Many a luckless merchant had been knocked on the head from behind, or dragged out of his boat and drowned, by these thieves, with no one to tell the tale.

They had found the Sabines here when they came, and it had not seemed worth while—yet—to quarrel with them. The scattered country folk, who went in deadly fear of the robbers and did whatever they were told, said that the farmers could fight, and kept watch over what they had, and had very little but their animals and food stores. There was no use in provoking a war with them. The better plan would be to terrify them so thoroughly that they would give the bandits anything they asked, to keep the peace.

There was no use in upsetting these quiet folk so that they could not work. They could be told that unless they brought to a certain place, at certain times, grain, cattle and other provision, and left them for the outlaws, something terrible would happen to them. They certainly could not hunt the mountains over for the band, and they could not know how many or how few there were. This plan worked well in other places, and it would do very well here.

The leader, the oldest of the robbers, had once been a slave, and he knew all the things that are done to slaves who resist their masters. The others were afraid of him, and there were very few other things in the world of which they were afraid. He listened to the report of Gubbo and his companion, and sent them back to watch the village during the time of the festival, see who the chief men were, how well off the people seemed to be, how many fighting men they had, and where they kept their grain and other stores.

For five days one or the other of the bandits was always watching from the edge of the rock. If they had been the kind of men to understand beauty, they must have owned that the festival of Maia was a beautiful sight. But it only made them angry and bitter to think that they could not have all the comforts these people had. Often they did not have enough to eat, and then there would be a raid on some village, and all the men would eat far more than was comfortable, and drink more than was at all wise, and the feast usually ended in a fight. This festival in the village was not at all like that.

The young girls had a great part in the dancing and singing and processions of Maia. A tall pillar, decorated with garlands and strips of colored cloth, had been set up, and a circle of white-robed little maidens, with wreaths of flowers on their heads, danced around it. Little Emilia sat sedately in the center, wand in hand, and directed the dancing. There were stately processions, and marching and countermarching of white figures bearing garlands; the oxen appeared with their horns wreathed in flowers; blossoms were strewn all over the public square as the day passed. The blessing of Maia was asked upon the springing grain, now standing like a multitude of fairy sword blades above the brown soil; upon the bean and pea vines climbing as fast as ever they could up the poles set for them; upon the vineyards, every vine of which was tended like a child; and upon the orchards, all one drift of warm white petals blowing on the wind. The chestnut trees were a-bloom and looked like huge tents with great candelabra set here and there over them; and the steady hum of the bees was like the drone of a chanter.

When the day was over, and all the people were asleep, the spies went back to the den in the rocks and told what they had seen.

The chief decided that these people were to be let alone all through the summer and early fall, until all their stores of wine and grain and fat beasts were in, and they went afield to get nuts in the forest. That would be the time to strike. The child of the head priest could be carried off, perhaps, or the son of the chief man of the village. Then one of the country people would be sent to tell the villagers that unless they agreed to furnish provisions at certain times and places, the child would be killed. That would bring them to heel.

So the summer passed, and the unconscious, happy people prayed for a good harvest.

V

THE WOLF CUB

The new moon was rising above a wet waste of marsh and tussock and tasseled reeds. A man and two boys climbed hastily up a hill. Before them they drove a bleating, cold, rain-wet, bewildered flock. As any shepherd will admit, sheep are among the silliest creatures in the world, and if there is any way for them to get themselves into trouble they will do it. Even so small a flock as this had proved it abundantly.

A dry time, when all the grass in the usual pastures was burned brown or eaten down to the roots, had been followed by a rainy fall and winter. The shepherd and his two foster sons—his wife had long been dead—left their hillside pastures by the river and went with their flock wherever they could find any grass. They meandered about for some time on the great plain that was usually too wet for sheep; that grass was rank and sometimes unwholesome, but it was better than nothing. When the wet weather began, they were on the other side, and they edged up among the foothills of the mountains that stood around it, wherever they could without getting into trouble with people who had cattle there. They would have had more difficulty than they did if it had not been for the wolf cub which the taller of the two boys had tamed. He was named Pincho, and he seemed to be everywhere at once. No sheep ever delayed for an instant in obeying him.

For hours they herded the tired flock up and down, among hills and gullies, until they came on a little hollow among bushes, out of the way of the water, where they could stop and get a little sleep. The man and the boys were all three wet, cold and hungry, even hungrier than the sheep were, for they could not eat grass; hungrier than Pincho, who now and then caught some sort of wild creature and ate it on the spot. They ate what little they had left, and then one kept watch while the others slept, by turns, in the driest place that could be found.

When it was light enough to see, they looked about to find out where they were. Farther down the slope and to one side of them was a village, and the people there kept sheep and also cattle. Nobody seemed to be doing much work, for half the men were standing about talking, and the shrill note of a flute player came up the hill as if it were a signal.

The boys did not know what this meant, for they had never been near a village on a holiday,—and not often at any time. But the shepherd knew; he knew that it must be a feast day, and he told the boys that if they wished to go to the village and see what was going on, he would look after the sheep. They must not try to go in unless they were asked, and they ought not to take Pincho; some one might see him and kill him for a wolf, not knowing that he was tame.

But Pincho had something to say about that. He had no intention of being left behind, and the shepherd had to cut a thong off his sheepskin cloak to tie up the determined beast. Then when the boys were about two-thirds of the way to the village, something came sniffing at their heels, and there was Pincho, with the thong trailing after him; he had gnawed it in two.

His young master only laughed. “Here, Pincho!” he said good-humoredly, and as the young wolf came and licked his hand he made a loop of the trailing end and thrust his strong brown fingers into it. And so they came up to the edge of the village where the people were making ready the feast,—two boys and a wolf.

The lads were both rather tall for their years, and moved with the wild grace of creatures that constantly use every muscle and never get stiff or lazy. They wore only the shepherd’s tunic of sheepskin with the wool outward, and a braided leather girdle to hold a knife and a leather pouch. In his left hand each held a crook, with a sharp flint point at the other end so that it could be used as a spear if a weapon were needed. The taller led the wolf, which fawned and licked his bare feet; the other, who was not quite so dark of hair and eye, was playing on a reed pipe, taking up the call of the pipers and weaving it into a simple melody. For a moment the people did not know who they could be. All the shepherd boys in that neighborhood were known. Surely only gods come out of the forest would be accompanied by a wolf.

They did not enter the village. They halted on the outside where they could look into the square and see what was going on, and they stared in silent wonder, like animals.

The fact was that they were so hungry that if they had dared, they would have rushed on the tables and seized the bread and meat and honey cakes, and run away into the forest to devour them as if they were wolves themselves. As it was, the intelligent nose of Pincho caught the maddening odor of meat, and it was all his master could do to hold him.

Whoever they were, it was proper at this time to offer food to strangers, and if they were gods or wood spirits this was the way to find it out. The wife of Emilius the priest, a tall and gracious woman, took up a flat basket-work tray and filled it with portions of the various good things on the nearest table. By the way they took the food and ate it, she saw that they were probably only hungry boys. Pincho got the bones, but only when it was certain they were not mutton bones. He had never been allowed to find out what the flesh of a sheep was like. This was a portion of a yearling calf.

The matron’s little daughter, a straight, slender, bright-haired child, came with her, and when Pincho sniffed curiously at her little sandalled feet she did not draw back, but stooped and patted his head. The boy with the reed pipe, when he had finished his share of the food, sidled away toward the musicians, but the other one stayed where he was, his arm round the shaggy neck of the young wolf, and they asked him questions. He explained, when they were able to make out what he said—for he spoke in a thick voice as the peasants did—that he and his brother lived with a shepherd on the other side of the great plain. The shepherd had told them to ask whether they might let their sheep graze here awhile, until the water had gone down so that they could get back. Emilius the priest and some of the other men were there by this time, and they said that this would be allowed.

“Why do you stay away from your own village on a holiday?” asked the child straightforwardly.

“We have no village,” the boy answered. “We live by ourselves.”