A Book of Quaker Saints

by L. V. Hodgkin

'DREAMING OF THE COT IN THE VALE'[ToList]

Suddenly, as I lay there looking down over the slope, I saw a strange sight, for travellers are scarce on Pendle Hill even at Midsummer. But it was a traveller surely, or was it a shepherd? At first I could not be sure; for he carried a lamb in his arms and trod warily with it, in the way that shepherds do. Yet I never met a shepherd clad in clothes like his; nor with a face like his either, as I saw it, when he came nearer. Weary he looked, and with a pale countenance, as if he had much ado to come up the hill, and in good sooth 'tis full steep just there; or else, may be, he was fasting and faint for lack of food. But all this I only thought of later. At the time, I looked not much at him, but only at the lamb he carried in his arms. How came such a man to be carrying a lamb, and carrying it full gently and carefully too, supporting one leg with both hands, although he was encumbered with a staff? Then, when he had come yet nearer, I saw that it was not only a lamb—it was one of my master's lambs, my own lambs that I was set to watch; for there on its wool was the brand carried by our flocks and by none others on all those fells. One of my lambs, lying in a stranger's arms! A careless shepherd I! I must have been asleep or dreaming ... dreaming foolish dreams about that cottage, on which the sun might shine unheeded now, I cared not for it, being full of other thoughts. No sooner did I espy the brand on the lamb than I rose to my feet, and, even as I ran nimbly down the slope towards the stranger, my eyes roamed over the hillside to discover which of my lambs had strayed:—Rosamond, Cowslip, Eglantine and Gillyflower—I could see them all safe with their dams, and many more besides. All the lambs that springtime I had named after the flowers that I hoped to plant another year in the garden of that cot beside the stream. And all the flowers I could see and name were safe beside their dams, as I leapt down the hillside. Nay, Periwinkle was missing! Periwinkle was ever a strayer, and Periwinkle's dam was bleating at the edge of the steep cliff up which the stranger toiled. It was Periwinkle and none other that he was carrying in his arms! Seeing it was Periwinkle, I halloed to him to halt. Hearing my cry, he stopped, and waited till I reached him, all the time holding the lamb carefully, tending it and speaking to it in the tone a shepherd is wont to use.

'Thanks to you, Good Stranger,' I said, as I came nearer, 'Periwinkle is ever a strayer. Did you see her fall?'

'Nay,' said the Stranger, giving the lamb tenderly into my arms, and halting upon his staff; speaking warily and weightily as I never heard a man speak before or since. 'Nay; the lambkin must have fallen before I came by. But I heard the mother bleat, and I knew, by the sound, that she was in distress. Therefore I turned towards the crag upon which she stood, and, looking down, I perceived the lamb fallen among the brambles beneath a high ledge.'

'And went down over for her yourself and brought her up again! 'Twas bravely done, Good Stranger,' I answered, and then, thinking to encourage him, I said, 'Better you could not have done it, had you been a shepherd yourself, for I see your hands are torn.'

'It is nothing,' he answered. 'A shepherd expects that.'

'Then are you a shepherd too, Master Stranger?' I asked, but he gave no answer; only fastened his eyes upon me as we climbed together up the hill. Wonderful eyes he had, not like to other men's; with a depth and yet a light in them, as when the June sun shines back reflected from the blackness of a mountain tarn. I saw them then, and still I seem to see them, for when he looked at me, although he said no word, it was as if he knew me apart from everyone else in the world, even as I know every one of my master's sheep. I felt that he knew too how I had been looking at that cot in the vale and dreaming idly, forgetful of my lambs. Therefore, though he said no word of rebuke to me, I felt my cheeks grow hot, and I hung my head and spake not. Only, when we reached the top of the hill, he turned and answered me at last. 'Thou judgest right, friend,' he said, 'I was indeed a shepherd in my young years. I am a shepherd even now, though as yet with full few sheep. But, hereafter, it may be....'

I did not wait for the end of his sentence. Now that we were come to level ground I was fain to show that I was not a careless, idle shepherd in truth. My mind was set on Periwinkle's leg; broken, I feared, for it hung down limply. I took her,—laid her on the grass beside her dam while I fashioned a rough splint, shepherd-fashion, to keep the leg steady till we reached the fold. Then, seeing the sun was low by this time and nigh to setting over beyond the sea towards Morecambe, I called my sheep and gathered them from all the fells, near and far; and a fairer flock of sheep ye shall never see 'twixt Scotland and Trent, as the song says, though I trow ye may, an ye look carefully, find steeper hills than old Pendle.

When my work was done, I took up Periwinkle in my arms once more, anxious to descend with her ere night fell. Already I was climbing carefully down the slope, when, bless me, I remembered the Stranger, and that I had left him without a word, he having gone clean out of my mind, and I not having given him so much as a 'thank ye' at parting, for all he had saved Periwinkle. But I think I must have gone clean out of his mind too.