Puck of Pook's Hill: Ch. 10: The Treasure and the Law

Ch. 10: The Treasure and the Law

Song of the Fifth River

When first by Eden Tree
The Four Great Rivers ran,
To each was appointed a Man
Her Prince and Ruler to be.
But after this was ordained,
(The ancient legends tell),
There came dark Israel,
For whom no River remained.
Then He That is Wholly Just
Said to him:  'Fling on the ground
A handful of yellow dust,
And a Fifth Great River shall run,
Mightier than these four,
In secret the Earth around;
And Her secret evermore
Shall be shown to thee and thy Race.
So it was said and done.
And, deep in the veins of Earth,
And, fed by a thousand springs
That comfort the market-place,
Or sap the power of Kings,
The Fifth Great River had birth,
Even as it was foretold -
The Secret River of Gold!
And Israel laid down
His sceptre and his crown,
To brood on that River bank,
Where the waters flashed and sank,
And burrowed in earth and fell,
And bided a season below;
For reason that none might know,
Save only Israel.
He is Lord of the Last -
The Fifth, most wonderful, Flood.
He hears Her thunder past
And Her song is in his blood.
He can foresay:  'She will fall,'
For he knows which fountain dries
Behind which desert-belt
A thousand leagues to the South.
He can foresay:  'She will rise.'
He knows what far snows melt
Along what mountain-wall
A thousand leagues to the North.
He snuffs the coming drouth
As he snuffs the coming rain,
He knows what each will bring forth,
And turns it to his gain.
A Prince without a Sword,
A Ruler without a Throne;
Israel follows his quest.
In every land a guest,
Of many lands a lord,
In no land King is he.
But the Fifth Great River keeps
The secret of Her deeps
For Israel alone,
As it was ordered to be.

Now it was the third week in November, and the woods
rang with the noise of pheasant-shooting. No one hunted
that steep, cramped country except the village beagles,
who, as often as not, escaped from their kennels and
made a day of their own. Dan and Una found a couple of
them towling round the kitchen-garden after the laundry
cat. The little brutes were only too pleased to go rabbiting,
so the children ran them all along the brook pastures
and into Little Lindens farm-yard, where the old sow
vanquished them - and up to the quarry-hole, where
they started a fox. He headed for Far Wood, and there
they frightened out all the Pheasants, who were sheltering
from a big beat across the valley. Then the cruel guns
began again, and they grabbed the beagles lest they
should stray and get hurt.

'I wouldn't be a pheasant - in November - for a lot,'
Dan panted, as he caught Folly by the neck. 'Why did you
laugh that horrid way?'

'I didn't,' said Una, sitting on Flora, the fat lady-dog.
'Oh, look! The silly birds are going back to their own
woods instead of ours, where they would be safe.'

'Safe till it pleased you to kill them.' An old man, so tall
he was almost a giant, stepped from behind the clump of
hollies by Volaterrae. The children jumped, and the dogs
dropped like setters. He wore a sweeping gown of dark
thick stuff, lined and edged with yellowish fur, and he
bowed a bent-down bow that made them feel both proud
and ashamed. Then he looked at them steadily, and they
stared back without doubt or fear.

'You are not afraid?' he said, running his hands
through his splendid grey beard. 'Not afraid that those
men yonder' - he jerked his head towards the incessant
POP-POP of the guns from the lower woods -'will do you hurt?'

'We-ell'- Dan liked to be accurate, especially when he
was shy -'old Hobd - a friend of mine told me that one of
the beaters got peppered last week - hit in the leg, I
mean. You see, Mr Meyer will fire at rabbits. But he gave
Waxy Garnett a quid - sovereign, I mean - and Waxy told
Hobden he'd have stood both barrels for half the money.'

'He doesn't understand,'Una cried, watching the pale,
troubled face. 'Oh, I wish -'

She had scarcely said it when Puck rustled out of the
hollies and spoke to the man quickly in foreign words.
Puck wore a long cloak too - the afternoon was just frosting
down - and it changed his appearance altogether.

'Nay, nay!'he said at last. 'You did not understand the
boy. A freeman was a little hurt, by pure mischance, at
the hunting.'

'I know that mischance! What did his lord do? Laugh
and ride over him?' the old man sneered.

'It was one of your own people did the hurt, Kadmiel.'
Puck's eyes twinkled maliciously. 'So he gave the freeman
a piece of gold, and no more was said.'

'A Jew drew blood from a Christian and no more was
said?' Kadmiel cried. 'Never! When did they torture him?'

'No man may be bound, or fined, or slain till he has
been judged by his peers,' Puck insisted. 'There is but
one Law in Old England for Jew or Christian - the Law
that was signed at Runnymede.'

'Why, that's Magna Charta!' Dan whispered. It was
one of the few history dates that he could remember.

Kadmiel turned on him with a sweep and a whirr of his
spicy-scented gown.

'Dost thou know of that, babe?' he cried, and lifted his
hands in wonder.

'Yes,' said Dan firmly.

'Magna Charta was signed by John,
That Henry the Third put his heel upon.

And old Hobden says that if it hadn't been for her (he calls
everything "her", you know), the keepers would have
him clapped in Lewes jail all the year round.'

Again Puck translated to Kadmiel in the strange,
solemn-sounding language, and at last Kadmiel laughed.

'Out of the mouths of babes do we learn,' said he. 'But
tell me now, and I will not call you a babe but a Rabbi, why
did the King sign the roll of the New Law at Runnymede?
For he was a King.'

Dan looked sideways at his sister. It was her turn.

'Because he jolly well had to,' said Una softly. 'The
Barons made him.'
'Nay,' Kadmiel answered, shaking his head. 'You
Christians always forget that gold does more than the
sword. Our good King signed because he could not
borrow more money from us bad Jews.' He curved his
shoulders as he spoke. 'A King without gold is a snake
with a broken back, and' - his nose sneered up and his
eyebrows frowned down -'it is a good deed to break a
snake's back. That was my work,' he cried, triumphantly,
to Puck. 'Spirit of Earth, bear witness that that was my
work!' He shot up to his full towering height, and his
words rang like a trumpet. He had a voice that changed
its tone almost as an opal changes colour - sometimes
deep and thundery, sometimes thin and waily, but
always it made you listen.

'Many people can bear witness to that,' Puck
answered. 'Tell these babes how it was done. Remember,
Master, they do not know Doubt or Fear.'

'So I saw in their faces when we met,' said Kadmiel.
'Yet surely, surely they are taught to spit upon Jews?'

'Are they?' said Dan, much interested. 'Where at?'

Puck fell back a pace, laughing. 'Kadmiel is thinking of
King John's reign,' he explained. 'His people were badly
treated then.'

'Oh, we know that.' they answered, and (it was very
rude of them, but they could not help it) they stared
straight at Kadmiel's mouth to see if his teeth were all
there. It stuck in their lesson-memory that King John
used to pull out Jews' teeth to make them lend him money.

Kadmiel understood the look and smiled bitterly.

'No. Your King never drew my teeth: I think, perhaps,
I drew his. Listen! I was not born among Christians, but
among Moors - in Spain - in a little white town under the
mountains. Yes, the Moors are cruel, but at least their
learned men dare to think. It was prophesied of me at my
birth that I should be a Lawgiver to a People of a strange
speech and a hard language. We Jews are always looking
for the Prince and the Lawgiver to come. Why not? My
people in the town (we were very few) set me apart as a
child of the prophecy - the Chosen of the Chosen. We
Jews dream so many dreams. You would never guess it to
see us slink about the rubbish-heaps in our quarter; but at
the day's end - doors shut, candles lit - aha! then we
became the Chosen again.'

He paced back and forth through the wood as he
talked. The rattle of the shot-guns never ceased, and the
dogs whimpered a little and lay flat on the leaves.
'I was a Prince. Yes! Think of a little Prince who had
never known rough words in his own house handed over
to shouting, bearded Rabbis, who pulled his ears and
filliped his nose, all that he might learn - learn - learn to
be King when his time came. He! Such a little Prince it
was! One eye he kept on the stone-throwing Moorish
boys, and the other it roved about the streets looking for
his Kingdom. Yes, and he learned to cry softly when he
was hunted up and down those streets. He learned to do
all things without noise. He played beneath his father's
table when the Great Candle was lit, and he listened as
children listen to the talk of his father's friends above the
table. They came across the mountains, from out of all the
world, for my Prince's father was their counsellor. They
came from behind the armies of Sala-ud-Din: from
Rome: from Venice: from England. They stole down our
alley, they tapped secretly at our door, they took off their
rags, they arrayed themselves, and they talked to my
father at the wine. All over the world the heathen fought
each other. They brought news of these wars, and while
he played beneath the table, my Prince heard these
meanly dressed ones decide between themselves how, and when, and
for how long King should draw sword against King, and People
rise up against People. Why not? There can be no war without
gold, and we Jews know how the earth's gold moves with the
seasons, and the crops, and the winds; circling and
looping and rising and sinking away like a river -
a wonderful underground river. How should the
foolish Kings know that while they fight and steal and kill?'

The children's faces showed that they knew nothing at
all as, with open eyes, they trotted and turned beside the
long-striding old man. He twitched his gown over his
shoulders, and a square plate of gold, studded with
jewels, gleamed for an instant through the fur, like a star
through flying snow.

'No matter,' he said. 'But, credit me, my Prince saw
peace or war decided not once, but many times, by the
fall of a coin spun between a Jew from Bury and a Jewess
from Alexandria, in his father's house, when the Great
Candle was lit. Such power had we Jews among the
Gentiles. Ah, my little Prince! Do you wonder that he
learned quickly? Why not?' He muttered to himself and
went on:

'My trade was that of a physician. When I had learned
it in Spain I went to the East to find my Kingdom. Why
not? A Jew is as free as a sparrow - or a dog. He goes
where he is hunted. In the East I found libraries where
men dared to think - schools of medicine where they
dared to learn. I was diligent in my business. Therefore I
stood before Kings. I have been a brother to Princes and a
companion to beggars, and I have walked between the
living and the dead. There was no profit in it. I did not
find my Kingdom. So, in the tenth year of my travels,
when I had reached the Uttermost Eastern Sea, I returned
to my father's house. God had wonderfully preserved
my people. None had been slain, none even wounded,
and only a few scourged. I became once more a son in my
father's house. Again the Great Candle was lit; again the
meanly apparelled ones tapped on our door after dusk;
and again I heard them weigh out peace and war, as they
weighed out the gold on the table. But I was not rich - not
very rich. Therefore, when those that had power and
knowledge and wealth talked together, I sat in the
shadow. Why not?

'Yet all my wanderings had shown me one sure thing,
which is, that a King without money is like a spear
without a head. He cannot do much harm. I said, therefore,
to Elias of Bury, a great one among our people:
"Why do our people lend any more to the Kings that
oppress us?" "Because," said Elias, "if we refuse they stir
up their people against us, and the People are tenfold
more cruel than Kings. If thou doubtest, come with me to
Bury in England and live as I live."

'I saw my mother's face across the candle flame, and I
said, "I will come with thee to Bury. Maybe my Kingdom
shall be there."

'So I sailed with Elias to the darkness and the cruelty of
Bury in England, where there are no learned men. How
can a man be wise if he hate? At Bury I kept his accounts
for Elias, and I saw men kill Jews there by the tower. No -
none laid hands on Elias. He lent money to the King, and
the King's favour was about him. A King will not take the
life so long as there is any gold. This King - yes, John -
oppressed his people bitterly because they would not
give him money. Yet his land was a good land. If he had
only given it rest he might have cropped it as a Christian
crops his beard. But even that little he did not know, for
God had deprived him of all understanding, and had
multiplied pestilence, and famine, and despair upon the
people. Therefore his people turned against us Jews,
who are all people's dogs. Why not? Lastly the Barons
and the people rose together against the King because of
his cruelties. Nay - nay - the Barons did not love the
people, but they saw that if the King cut up and destroyed
the common people, he would presently destroy
the Barons. They joined then, as cats and pigs will join to
slay a snake. I kept the accounts, and I watched all these
things, for I remembered the Prophecy.

'A great gathering of Barons (to most of whom we had
lent money) came to Bury, and there, after much talk and
a thousand runnings-about, they made a roll of the New
Laws that they would force on the King. If he swore to
keep those Laws, they would allow him a little money.
That was the King's God - Money - to waste. They
showed us the roll of the New Laws. Why not? We had
lent them money. We knew all their counsels - we Jews
shivering behind our doors in Bury.' He threw out his
hands suddenly. 'We did not seek to be paid all in money.
We sought Power- Power- Power! That is our God in our
captivity. Power to use!

'I said to Elias: "These New Laws are good. Lend no
more money to the King: so long as he has money he will
lie and slay the people."

"'Nay," said Elias. "I know this people. They are
madly cruel. Better one King than a thousand butchers. I
have lent a little money to the Barons, or they would
torture us, but my most I will lend to the King. He hath
promised me a place near him at Court, where my wife
and I shall be safe."

"'But if the King be made to keep these New Laws," I
said, "the land will have peace, and our trade will grow.
If we lend he will fight again."

"'Who made thee a Lawgiver in England?" said Elias.
"I know this people. Let the dogs tear one another! I will
lend the King ten thousand pieces of gold, and he can
fight the Barons at his pleasure."

"'There are not two thousand pieces of gold in all
England this summer," I said, for I kept the accounts,
and I knew how the earth's gold moved - that wonderful
underground river. Elias barred home the windows,
and, his hands about his mouth, he told me how, when
he was trading with small wares in a French ship, he had
come to the Castle of Pevensey.'

'Oh!' said Dan. 'Pevensey again!' and looked at Una,
who nodded and skipped.

'There, after they had scattered his pack up and down
the Great Hall, some young knights carried him to an
upper room, and dropped him into a well in a wall, that
rose and fell with the tide. They called him Joseph, and
threw torches at his wet head. Why not?'

'Why, of course!'cried Dan. 'Didn't you know it was -'
Puck held up his hand to stop him, and Kadmiel, who
never noticed, went on.

'When the tide dropped he thought he stood on old
armour, but feeling with his toes, he raked up bar on bar
of soft gold. Some wicked treasure of the old days put
away, and the secret cut off by the sword. I have heard
the like before.'

'So have we,' Una whispered. 'But it wasn't wicked a bit.'

'Elias took a little of the stuff with him, and thrice
yearly he would return to Pevensey as a chapman, selling
at no price or profit, till they suffered him to sleep in the
empty room, where he would plumb and grope, and
steal away a few bars. The great store of it still remained,
and by long brooding he had come to look on it as his
own. Yet when we thought how we should lift and
convey it, we saw no way. This was before the Word of
the Lord had come to me. A walled fortress possessed by
Normans; in the midst a forty-foot tide-well out of
which to remove secretly many horse-loads of gold!
Hopeless! So Elias wept. Adah, his wife, wept too. She
had hoped to stand beside the Queen's Christian
tiring-maids at Court when the King should give
them that place at Court which he had promised.
Why not? She was born in England - an odious woman.

'The present evil to us was that Elias, out of his strong
folly, had, as it were, promised the King that he would
arm him with more gold. Wherefore the King in his camp
stopped his ears against the Barons and the people.
Wherefore men died daily. Adah so desired her place at
Court, she besought Elias to tell the King where the
treasure lay, that the King might take it by force, and -
they would trust in his gratitude. Why not? This Elias
refused to do, for he looked on the gold as his own. They
quarrelled, and they wept at the evening meal, and late in
the night came one Langton - a priest, almost learned - to
borrow more money for the Barons. Elias and Adah went
to their chamber.'

Kadmiel laughed scornfully in his beard. The shots
across the valley stopped as the shooting party changed
their ground for the last beat.

'So it was I, not Elias,' he went on quietly, 'that made
terms with Langton touching the fortieth of the New Laws.'

'What terms?' said Puck quickly. 'The Fortieth of the
Great Charter says: "To none will we sell, refuse, or delay
right or justice."'

'True, but the Barons had written first: To no free man. It
cost me two hundred broad pieces of gold to change
those narrow words. Langton, the priest, understood.
"Jew though thou art," said he, "the change is just, and if
ever Christian and Jew came to be equal in England thy
people may thank thee." Then he went out stealthily, as
men do who deal with Israel by night. I think he spent my
gift upon his altar. Why not? I have spoken with Langton.
He was such a man as I might have been if - if we
Jews had been a people. But yet, in many things, a child.

'I heard Elias and Adah abovestairs quarrel, and,
knowing the woman was the stronger, I saw that Elias
would tell the King of the gold and that the King would
continue in his stubbornness. Therefore I saw that the
gold must be put away from the reach of any man. Of a
sudden, the Word of the Lord came to me saying,
"The Morning is come, O thou that dwellest in the land."'

Kadmiel halted, all black against the pale green sky
beyond the wood - a huge robed figure, like the Moses in
the picture-Bible.
'I rose. I went out, and as I shut the door on that House
of Foolishness, the woman looked from the window and
whispered, "I have prevailed on my husband to tell the
King!" I answered: "There is no need. The Lord is with me."

'In that hour the Lord gave me full understanding of all
that I must do; and His Hand covered me in my ways.
First I went to London, to a physician of our people, who
sold me certain drugs that I needed. You shall see why.
Thence I went swiftly to Pevensey. Men fought all
around me, for there were neither rulers nor judges in the
abominable land. Yet when I walked by them they cried
out that I was one Ahasuerus, a Jew, condemned, as they
believe, to live for ever, and they fled from me every-
ways. Thus the Lord saved me for my work, and at
Pevensey I bought me a little boat and moored it on the
mud beneath the Marsh-gate of the Castle. That also God
showed me.'

He was as calm as though he were speaking of some
stranger, and his voice filled the little bare wood with
rolling music.

'I cast' - his hand went to his breast, and again the
strange jewel gleamed - 'I cast the drugs which I had
prepared into the common well of the Castle. Nay, I did
no harm. The more we physicians know, the less do we
do. Only the fool says: "I dare." I caused a blotched and
itching rash to break out upon their skins, but I knew it
would fade in fifteen days. I did not stretch out my hand
against their life. They in the Castle thought it was the
Plague, and they ran out, taking with them their very dogs.

'A Christian physician, seeing that I was a Jew and a
stranger, vowed that I had brought the sickness from
London. This is the one time I have ever heard a Christian
leech speak truth of any disease. Thereupon the people
beat me, but a merciful woman said: "Do not kill him
now. Push him into our Castle with his Plague, and if, as
he says, it will abate on the fifteenth day, we can kill him
then." Why not? They drove me across the drawbridge of
the Castle, and fled back to their booths. Thus I came to
be alone with the treasure.'

'But did you know this was all going to happen just
right?' said Una.

'My Prophecy was that I should be a Lawgiver to a
People of a strange land and a hard speech. I knew I
should not die. I washed my cuts. I found the tide-well in
the wall, and from Sabbath to Sabbath I dove and dug
there in that empty, Christian-smelling fortress. He! I
spoiled the Egyptians! He! If they had only known! I
drew up many good loads of gold, which I loaded by
night into my boat. There had been gold dust too, but
that had been washed out by the tides.'

'Didn't you ever wonder who had put it there?' said
Dan, stealing a glance at Puck's calm, dark face under the
hood of his gown. Puck shook his head and pursed his lips.

'Often; for the gold was new to me,' Kadmiel replied. 'I
know the Golds. I can judge them in the dark; but this
was heavier and redder than any we deal in. Perhaps it
was the very gold of Parvaim. Eh, why not? It went to my
heart to heave it on to the mud, but I saw well that if the
evil thing remained, or if even the hope of finding it
remained, the King would not sign the New Laws, and
the land would perish.'

'Oh, Marvel!' said Puck, beneath his breath, rustling in
the dead leaves.

'When the boat was loaded I washed my hands seven
times, and pared beneath my nails, for I would not keep
one grain. I went out by the little gate where the Castle's
refuse is thrown. I dared not hoist sail lest men should
see me; but the Lord commanded the tide to bear me
carefully, and I was far from land before the morning.'

'Weren't you afraid?' said Una.

'Why? There were no Christians in the boat. At sunrise
I made my prayer, and cast the gold - all - all that gold -
into the deep sea! A King's ransom - no, the ransom of a
People! When I had loosed hold of the last bar, the Lord
commanded the tide to return me to a haven at the mouth
of a river, and thence I walked across a wilderness to
Lewes, where I have brethren. They opened the door to
me, and they say - I had not eaten for two days - they say
that I fell across the threshold, crying: "I have sunk an
army with horsemen in the sea!"'

'But you hadn't,' said Una. 'Oh, yes! I see! You meant
that King John might have spent it on that?'

'Even so,' said Kadmiel.

The firing broke out again close behind them. The
pheasants poured over the top of a belt of tall firs. They
could see young Mr Meyer, in his new yellow gaiters,
very busy and excited at the end of the line, and they
could hear the thud of the falling birds.

'But what did Elias of Bury do?' Puck demanded. 'He
had promised money to the King.'

Kadmiel smiled grimly. 'I sent him word from London
that the Lord was on my side. When he heard that the
Plague had broken out in Pevensey, and that a Jew had
been thrust into the Castle to cure it, he understood my
word was true. He and Adah hurried to Lewes and asked
me for an accounting. He still looked on the gold as his
own. I told them where I had laid it, and I gave them full
leave to pick it up ... Eh, well! The curses of a fool and
the dust of a journey are two things no wise man can
escape ... But I pitied Elias! The King was wroth with
him because he could not lend; the Barons were wroth
too because they heard that he would have lent to the
King; and Adah was wroth with him because she was an
odious woman. They took ship from Lewes to Spain.
That was wise!'

'And you? Did you see the signing of the Law at
Runnymede?' said Puck, as Kadmiel laughed noiselessly.

'Nay. Who am I to meddle with things too high for me?
I returned to Bury, and lent money on the autumn crops.
Why not?'

There was a crackle overhead. A cock-pheasant that
had sheered aside after being hit spattered down almost
on top of them, driving up the dry leaves like a shell. Flora
and Folly threw themselves at it; the children rushed
forward, and when they had beaten them off and
smoothed down the plumage Kadmiel had disappeared.

'Well,' said Puck calmly, 'what did you think of it?
Weland gave the Sword! The Sword gave the Treasure,
and the Treasure gave the Law. It's as natural as an oak growing.'

'I don't understand. Didn't he know it was Sir
Richard's old treasure?' said Dan. 'And why did Sir
Richard and Brother Hugh leave it lying about? And - and -'

'Never mind,' said Una politely. 'He'll let us come
and go and look and know another time. Won't you, Puck?'
'Another time maybe,' Puck answered. 'Brr! It's cold -
and late. I'll race you towards home!'

They hurried down into the sheltered valley. The sun
had almost sunk behind Cherry Clack, the trodden
ground by the cattle-gates was freezing at the edges, and
the new-waked north wind blew the night on them from
over the hills. They picked up their feet and flew across
the browned pastures, and when they halted, panting in
the steam of their own breath, the dead leaves whirled up
behind them. There was Oak and Ash and Thorn enough
in that year-end shower to magic away a thousand
memories.

So they trotted to the brook at the bottom of the lawn,
wondering why Flora and Folly had missed the quarry-hole fox.

Old Hobden was just finishing some hedge-work.
They saw his white smock glimmer in the twilight where
he faggoted the rubbish.

'Winter, he's come, I reckon, Mus' Dan,' he called.
'Hard times now till Heffle Cuckoo Fair. Yes, we'll all be
glad to see the Old Woman let the Cuckoo out o' the
basket for to start lawful Spring in England.'

They heard a crash, and a stamp and a splash of water
as though a heavy old cow were crossing almost under
their noses.

Hobden ran forward angrily to the ford.

'Gleason's bull again, playin' Robin all over the Farm!
Oh, look, Mus' Dan - his great footmark as big as a
trencher. No bounds to his impidence! He might count
himself to be a man or - or Somebody -'

A voice the other side of the brook boomed:

'I wonder who his cloak would turn
When Puck had led him round,
Or where those walking fires would burn -'

Then the children went in singing 'Farewell, Rewards
and Fairies' at the tops of their voices. They had forgotten
that they had not even said good-night to Puck.

The Children's Song

Land of our Birth, we pledge to thee
Our love and toil in the years to be;
When we are grown and take our place
As men and women with our race.
Father in Heaven Who lovest all,
Oh, help Thy children when they call;
That they may build from age to age
An undefiled heritage.
Teach us to bear the yoke in youth,
With steadfastness and careful truth;
That, in our time, Thy Grace may give
The Truth whereby the Nations live.
Teach us to rule ourselves alway,
Controlled and cleanly night and day;
That we may bring, if need arise,
No maimed or worthless sacrifice.
Teach us to look in all our ends,
On Thee for judge, and not our friends;
That we, with Thee, may walk uncowed
By fear or favour of the crowd.
Teach us the Strength that cannot seek,
By deed or thought, to hurt the weak;
That, under Thee, we may possess
Man's strength to comfort man's distress.
Teach us Delight in simple things,
And Mirth that has no bitter springs;
Forgiveness free of evil done,
And Love to all men 'neath the sun!
Land of our Birth, our faith, our pride,
For whose dear sake our fathers died;
O Motherland, we pledge to thee
Head, heart and hand through the years to be!

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