T. White - The Once and Future King

The Wart heard the spar-hawk on his left giving nervous coughs at this, but the peregrine paid no attention.

‘Merlin of the Forest Sauvage,’ said the peregrine, ‘what is a Beast of the Foot?’

‘A Beast of the Foot,’ replied the Walt, blessing his stars that Sir Ector had chosen to give him a First Rate Eddication, ‘is a horse, or a hound, or a hawk.’

‘Why are these called beasts of the foot?’

‘Because these beasts depend upon the powers of their feet, so that, by law, any damage to the feet of hawk, hound or horse, is reckoned as damage to its life. A lamed horse is a murdered horse.’

‘Good,’ said the peregrine. ‘What are your most important members?’

‘My wings,’ said the Wart after a moment, guessing because he did not know.

At this there was a simultaneous tintinnabulation of all the bells, as each graven image lowered its raised foot in distress. They stood on both feet now, disturbed.

‘Your what?’ called the peregrine sharply.

‘He said his damned wings,’ said Colonel Cully from his private enclosure. ‘And damned be he who first cries Hold, enough!’

‘But even a thrush has wings!’ cried the kestrel, speaking for the first time in his sharp-beaked alarm.

‘Think!’ whispered Balan, under his breath.

The Wart thought feverishly.

A thrush had wings, tail, eyes, legs – apparently everything.

‘My talons!’

‘It will do,’ said the peregrine kindly, after one of her dreadful pauses. ‘The answer ought to be Feet, just as it is to all the other questions, but Talons will do.’

All the hawks, and of course we are using the term loosely, for some were hawks and some were falcons, raised their belled feet again and sat at ease.

‘What is the first law of the foot?’

(‘Think,’ said friendly little Balan, behind his false primary.)

The Wart thought, and thought right.

‘Never to let go,’ he said.

‘Last question,’ said the peregrine. ‘How would you, as a Merlin, kill a pigeon bigger than yourself?’

Wart was lucky in this one, for he had heard Hob giving a description of how Balan did it one afternoon, and he answered warily, ‘I should strangle her with my foot.’

‘Good!’ said the peregrine.

‘Bravo!’ cried the others, raising their feathers.

‘Ninety per cent,’ said the spar-hawk after a quick sum. ‘That is if you give him a half for the talons.’

‘The devil damn me black!’

‘Colonel, please!’

Balan whispered to the Wart, ‘Colonel Cully is not quite right in his wits. It is his liver, we believe, but the kestrel says it is the constant strain of living up to her ladyship’s standard. He says that her ladyship spoke to him from her full social station once, cavalry to infantry, you know, and that he just closed his eyes and got the vertigo. He has never been the same since.’

‘Captain Balan,’ said the peregrine, ‘it is rude to whisper. We will proceed to swear the new officer in. Now, padre, if you please.’

The poor spar-hawk, who had been getting more and more nervous for some time, blushed deeply and began faltering out a complicated oath about varvels, jesses and hoods. ‘With this varvel,’ the Wart heard, ‘I thee endow … love, honour and obey … till jess us do part.’

But before the padre had got to the end of it, he broke down altogether and sobbed out, ‘Oh, please, your ladyship. I beg your pardon, but I have forgotten to keep my tirings.’

(‘Tirings are bones and things,’ explained Balan, ‘and of course you have to swear on bones.’)

‘Forgotten to keep any tirings?’ But it is your duty to keep tirings.’

‘I – I know.’

‘What have you done with them?’

The spar-hawk’s voice broke at the enormity of his confession. ‘I – I ate ’em,’ wept the unfortunate priest.

Nobody said anything. The dereliction of duty was too terrible for words. All stood on two feet and turned their blind heads toward the culprit. Not a word of reproach was spoken. Only, during an utter silence of five minutes, they could hear the incontinent priest snivelling and hiccoughing to himself.

‘Well,’ said the peregrine at last, ‘the initiation will have to be put off till tomorrow.’

‘If you will excuse me, Madam,’ said Balin, ‘perhaps we could manage the ordeal tonight? I believe the candidate is loose, for I did not hear him being tied up.’

At the mention of an ordeal the Wart trembled within himself and privately determined that Balin should have not one feather of Balan’s sparrow next day.

‘Thank you, Captain Balin. I was reflecting upon that subject myself.’

Balin shut up.

‘Are you loose, candidate?’

‘Oh, Madam, yes, I am, if you please; but I do not think I want an ordeal.’

‘The ordeal is customary.’

‘Let me see,’ continued the honorary colonel reflectively. ‘What was the last ordeal we had? Can you remember, Captain Balan?’

‘The ordeal, Ma’am,’ said the friendly merlin, ‘was to hang by my jesses during the third watch.’

‘If he is loose he cannot do that.’

‘You could strike him yourself, Ma’am,’ said the kestrel, ‘judiciously, you know.’

‘Send him over to stand by Colonel Cully while we ring three times,’ said the other merlin.

‘Oh, no!’ cried the crazy colonel in an agony out of his remoter darkness. ‘Oh no, your ladyship. I beg of you not to do that. I am such a damned villain, your ladyship, that I do not answer for the consequences. Spare the poor boy, your ladyship, and lead us not into temptation.’

‘Colonel, control yourself. That ordeal will do very well.’

‘Oh, Madam, I was warned not to stand by Colonel Cully.’

‘Warned? And by whom?’

The poor Wart realized that now he must choose between confessing himself a human, and learning no more of their secrets, or going through with this ordeal to earn his education. He did not want to be a coward.

‘I will stand by the Colonel, Madam,’ he said, immediately noticing that his voice sounded insulting.

The peregrine falcon paid no attention to the tone.

‘It is well,’ she said. ‘But first we must have a hymn. Now, padre, if you have not eaten your hymns as well as your tirings, will you be so kind as to lead us in Ancient but not Modern No. 23? The Ordeal Hymn.

‘And you, Mr Kee,’ she added to the kestrel, ‘you had better keep quiet, for you are always too high.’

The hawks stood still in the moonlight, while the spar-hawk counted, ‘One, Two, Three.’ Then all those curved or toothed beaks opened in their hoods to a brazen unison, and this is what they chanted:

Life is blood, shed and offered .

The eagle’s eye can face this dree .

To beasts of chase the lie is proffered:

TIMOR MORTIS CONTURBAT ME.

The beast of foot sings Holdfast only ,

For flesh is bruckle and foot is slee .

Strength to the strong and the lordly and lonely .

TIMOR MORTIS EXULTAT ME.

Shame to the slothful and woe to the weak one .

Death to the dreadful who turn to flee .

Blood to the tearing, the talon’d, the beaked one .

TIMOR MORTIS are We .

‘Very nice,’ said the peregrine. ‘Captain Balan. I think you were a little off on the top C. And now, candidate, you will go over and stand next to Colonel Cully’s enclosure, while we ring our bells thrice. On the third ring you may move as quickly as you like.’

‘Very good, Madam,’ said the Wart, quite fearless with resentment. He flipped his wings and was sitting on the extreme end of the screen perch, next to Cully’s enclosure of string netting.