“Thou must not,” said Nele, “deny the potency of charms. Come, Ulenspiegel.”
The next day he asked the magistrate that a clear-sighted and trusty soldier should take his place, to guard the tower and keep watch over the country.
And with Nele he went his way to the isle of birds.
Going across fields and dykes, they beheld little green lush islets, between which ran the sea water; and upon the slopes of green sward that came down to the very dunes an immense concourse of plovers, of sea mews and sea swallows, that stayed motionless and made the islets all white with their bodies; overhead circled and flew thousands of the same. The ground was full of nests: Ulenspiegel, stooping to pick up an egg upon the way, saw a sea mew come flitting to him, uttering a cry. At his appeal there came more than a hundred others, crying with grief and fear, hovering above Ulenspiegel and over the neighbour nests, but they did not venture to come close to him.
“Ulenspiegel,” said Nele, “these birds beg grace for their eggs.”
Then falling a-tremble, she said:
“I am afeared; there is the sun setting; the sky is white, the stars awaken; ’tis the spirits’ hour. See these red exhalations, gliding along the earth; Thyl, my beloved, what monster of hell is thus opening his fiery mouth in the mist? See from the side of Philip’s land, where the butcher king twice for his cruel ambition slaughtered so many poor men, see the dancing will-o’-the-wisps: ’tis the night when the souls of poor folk slain in battle quit the cold limbo of purgatory to come and be warmed again in the soft air of the earth: ’tis the hour when thou mayst ask aught of Christ, who is the God of good magicians.”
“The ashes beat upon my heart,” said Ulenspiegel. “If Christ could show me these Seven whose ashes cast to the wind were to make Flanders and the whole world happy!”
“Man of little faith,” said Nele, “thou wilt see them by virtue of the balsam.”