Watership Down (16 page)

       
"Rabscuttle did so and soon afterward he began to moan and thrash about. He kicked in convulsions and rolled his eyes. He gnawed at the floor and frothed at the mouth.

       
" 'He is very ill,' said El-ahrairah. 'He must have got an exceptionally bad one. Or else, which is more probable, the infection is particularly deadly to rabbits. But, in any event, let us be thankful it was not Your Majesty. Well, he has served our purpose. Throw him out! I would strongly advise Your Majesty,' went on El-ahrairah, 'not to leave the lettuces where they are, for they will shoot and flower and seed. The infection will spread. I know it is disappointing, but you must get rid of them.'

       
"At that moment, as luck would have it, in came the captain of the guard, with Yona the hedgehog.

       
" 'Your Majesty,' he cried, 'this creature returns from the marshes of Kelfazin. The people of El-ahrairah are mustering for war. They say they are coming to attack Your Majesty's garden and steal the royal lettuces. May I have Your Majesty's order to take out the soldiers and destroy them?'

       
" 'Aha!' said the King. 'I have thought of a trick worth two of that. "Particularly deadly to rabbits." Well! Well! Let them have all the lettuces they want. In fact, you are to take a thousand down to the marshes of Kelfazin and leave them there. Ho! Ho! What a joke! I feel all the better for it!'

       
" 'Ah, what deadly cunning!' said El-ahrairah. 'No wonder Your Majesty is ruler of a great people. I believe you are already recovering. As with many illnesses, the cure is simple, once perceived. No, no, I will accept no reward. In any case, there is nothing here that would be thought of value in the shining land beyond the golden river of Frith. I have done as Prince Rainbow required. It is sufficient. Perhaps you will be so good as to tell your guards to accompany me to the foot of the hill?' He bowed, and left the palace.

       
"Later that evening, as El-ahrairah was urging his rabbits to growl more fiercely and run up and down in the marshes of Kelfazin, Prince Rainbow came over the river.

       
" 'El-ahrairah,' he called, 'am I bewitched?'

       
" 'It is quite possible,' said El-ahrairah. 'The dreaded Lousepedoodle--'

       
" 'There are a thousand lettuces in a pile at the top of the marsh. Who put them there?'

       
" 'I told you
 
they
 
were
 
being delivered,' said
 
El-ahrairah. 'You could hardly expect my people, weak and hungry as they are, to carry them all the way from King Darzin's garden. However, they will soon recover now, under the treatment that I shall prescribe. I am a physician, I may say, and if you have not heard as much, Prince Rainbow, you may take it that you soon will, from another quarter. Rabscuttle, go out and collect the lettuces.'

       
"Then Prince Rainbow saw that El-ahrairah had been as good as his word, and that he himself must keep his promise, too. He let the rabbits out of the marshes of Kelfazin and they multiplied everywhere. And from that day to this, no power on earth can keep a rabbit out of a vegetable garden, for El-ahrairah prompts them with a thousand tricks, the best in the world."

16.
   
Silverweed

He said, "Dance for me" and he said,

"You are too beautiful for the wind

To pick at, or the sun to burn." He said,

"I'm a poor tattered thing, but not unkind

To the sad dancer and the dancing dead."

Sidney Keyes,
Four Postures of Death

"Well done," said Hazel, as Dandelion ended.

       
"He's very good, isn't he?" said Silver. "We're lucky to have him with us. It raises your spirits just to hear him."

       
"That's put their ears flat for them," whispered Bigwig. "Let's just see them find a storyteller to beat him."

       
They were all in no doubt that Dandelion had done them credit. Ever since their arrival most of them had felt out of their depth among these magnificent, well-fed strangers, with their detached manners, their Shapes on the wall, their elegance, their adroit evasion of almost all questions--above all, their fits of un-rabbitlike melancholy. Now, their own storyteller had shown that they were no mere bunch of tramps. Certainly, no reasonable rabbit could withhold admiration. They waited to be told as much, but after a few moments realized with surprise that their hosts were evidently less enthusiastic.

       
"Very nice," said Cowslip. He seemed to be searching for something more to say, but then repeated, "Yes, very nice. An unusual tale."

       
"But he must know it, surely?" muttered Blackberry to Hazel.

       
"I always think these traditional stories retain a lot of charm," said another of the rabbits, "especially when they're told in the real, old-fashioned spirit."

       
"Yes," said Strawberry. "Conviction, that's what it needs. You really have to
believe
in El-ahrairah and Prince Rainbow, don't you? Then all the rest follows."

       
"Don't say anything, Bigwig," whispered Hazel: for Bigwig was scuffling his paws indignantly. "You can't force them to like it if they don't. Let's wait and see what they can do themselves." Aloud, he said, "Our stories haven't changed in generations, you know. After all, we haven't changed ourselves. Our lives have been the same as our fathers' and their fathers' before them. Things are different here. We realize that, and we think your new ideas and ways are very exciting. We're all wondering what kind of things
you
tell stories about."

       
"Well, we don't tell the old stories very much," said Cowslip. "Our stories and poems are mostly about our own lives here. Of course, that Shape of Laburnum that you saw--that's old-fashioned now. El-ahrairah doesn't really mean much to us. Not that your friend's story wasn't very charming," he added hastily.

       
"El-ahrairah is a trickster," said Buckthorn, "and rabbits will always need tricks."

       
"No," said a new voice from the further end of the hall, beyond Cowslip. "Rabbits need dignity and, above all, the will to accept their fate."

       
"We think Silverweed is one of the best poets we've had for many months," said Cowslip. "His ideas have a great following. Would you like to hear him now?"

       
"Yes, yes," said voices from all sides. "Silverweed!"

       
"Hazel," said Fiver suddenly, "I want to get a clear idea of this Silverweed, but I daren't go closer by myself. Will you come with me?"

       
"Why, Fiver, whatever do you mean? What is there to be afraid of?"

       
"Oh, Frith help me!" said Fiver, trembling. "I can smell him from here. He terrifies me."

       
"Oh, Fiver, don't be absurd! He just smells the same as the rest of them."

       
"He smells like barley rained down and left to rot in the fields. He smells like a wounded mole that can't get underground."

       
"He smells like a big, fat rabbit to me, with a lot of carrots inside. But I'll come with you."

       
When they had edged their way through the crowd to the far end of the burrow, Hazel was surprised to realize that Silverweed was a mere youngster. In the Sandleford warren no rabbit of his age would have been asked to tell a story, except perhaps to a few friends alone. He had a wild, desperate air and his ears twitched continually. As he began to speak, he seemed to grow less and less aware of his audience and continually turned his head, as though listening to some sound, audible only to himself, from the entrance tunnel behind him. But there was an arresting fascination in his voice, like the movement of wind and light on a meadow, and as its rhythm entered into his hearers the whole burrow became silent.

       
The wind is blowing, blowing over the grass.

       
It shakes the willow catkins; the leaves shine silver.

       
Where are you going, wind? Far, far away

       
Over the hills, over the edge of the world.

       
Take me with you, wind, high over the sky.

       
I will go with you, I will be rabbit-of-the-wind,

       
Into the sky, the feathery sky and the rabbit.

       
The stream is running, running over the gravel,

       
Through the brooklime, the kingcups, the blue and gold of spring.

       
Where are you going, stream? Far, far away

       
Beyond the heather, sliding away all night.

       
Take me with you, stream, away in the starlight.

       
I will go with you, I will be rabbit-of-the-stream,

       
Down through the water, the green water and the rabbit.

       
In autumn the leaves come blowing, yellow and brown.

       
They rustle in the ditches, they tug and hang on the hedge.

       
Where are you going leaves? Far, far away

       
Into the earth we go, with the rain and the berries.

       
Take me, leaves, O take me on your dark journey.

       
I will go with you, I will be rabbit-of-the-leaves,

       
In the deep places of the earth, the earth and the rabbit.

       
Frith lies in the evening sky. The clouds are red about him.

       
I am here, Lord Frith, I am running through the long grass.

       
O take me with you, dropping behind the woods,

       
Far away, to the heart of light, the silence.

       
For I am ready to give you my breath, my life,

       
The shining circle of the sun, the sun and the rabbit.

       
Fiver, as he listened, had shown a mixture of intense absorption and incredulous horror. At one and the same time he seemed to accept every word and yet to be stricken with fear. Once he drew in his breath, as though startled to recognize his own half-known thoughts: and when the poem was ended he seemed to be struggling to come to himself. He bared his teeth and licked his lips, as Blackberry had done before the dead hedgehog on the road.

       
A rabbit in fear of an enemy will sometimes crouch stock still, either fascinated or else trusting to its natural inconspicuousness to remain unnoticed. But then, unless the fascination is too powerful, there comes the point when keeping still is discarded and the rabbit, as though breaking a spell, turns in an instant to its other resource--flight. So it seemed to be with Fiver now. Suddenly he leaped up and began to push his way violently across the great burrow. Several rabbits were jostled and turned angrily on him, but he took no notice. Then he came to a place where he could not push between two heavy warren bucks. He became hysterical, kicking and scuffling, and Hazel, who was behind him, had difficulty in preventing a fight.

       
"My brother's a sort of poet, too, you know," he said to the bristling strangers. "Things affect him very strongly sometimes and he doesn't always know why."

       
One of the rabbits seemed to accept what Hazel had said, but the other replied, "Oh, another poet? Let's hear him, then. That'll be some return for my shoulder, anyway. He's scratched a great tuft of fur out."

       
Fiver was already beyond them and thrusting toward the further entrance tunnel. Hazel felt that he must follow him. But after all the trouble that he himself had taken to be friendly, he felt so cross at the way in which Fiver had antagonized their new friends that as he passed Bigwig, he said, "Come and help me to get some sense into him. The last thing we want is a fight now." He felt that Fiver really deserved a short touch of Bigwig.

       
They followed Fiver up the run and overtook him at the entrance. Before either of them could say a word, he turned and began to speak as though they had asked him a question.

       
"You felt it, then? And you want to know whether I did? Of course I did. That's the worst part of it. There isn't any trick. He speaks the truth. So as long as he speaks the truth it can't be folly--that's what you're going to say, isn't it? I'm not blaming you, Hazel. I felt myself moving toward him like one cloud drifting into another. But then at the last moment I drifted wide. Who knows why? It wasn't my own will; it was an accident. There was just some little part of me that carried me wide of him. Did I say the roof of that hall was made of bones? No! It's like a great mist of folly that covers the whole sky: and we shall never see to go by Frith's light any more. Oh, what will become of us? A thing can be true and still be desperate folly, Hazel."