A Little Boy Lost: Chapter 15

Chapter 15

MARTIN'S EYES ARE OPENED

One morning when they went up into a wild rocky place very high up
on the hillside a number of big birds were seen coming over the
mountain at a great height in the air, travelling in a northerly
direction. They were big hawks almost as big as eagles, with very
broad rounded wings, and instead of travelling straight like other
birds they moved in wide circles, so that they progressed very slowly.

They sat down on a stone to watch the birds, and whenever one flying
lower than the others came pretty near them Martin gazed delightedly
at it, and wished it would come still nearer so that he might see it
better. Then the woman stood up on the stone, and, gazing skywards
and throwing up her arms, she uttered a long call, and the birds
began to come lower and lower down, still sweeping round in wide
circles, and by and by one came quite down and pitched on a stone a
few yards from them. Then another came and lighted on another stone,
then another, and others followed, until they were all round him in
scores, sitting on the rocks, great brown birds with black bars on
their wings and tails, and buff-coloured breasts with rust-red spots
and stripes. It was a wonderful sight, those eagle-like hawks, with
their blue hooked beaks and deep-set dark piercing eyes, sitting in
numbers on the rocks, and others and still others dropping down from
the sky to increase the gathering.

Then the woman sat down by Martin's side, and after a while one of
the hawks spread his great wings and rose up into the air to resume
his flight. After an interval of a minute or so another rose, then
another, but it was an hour before they were all gone.

"O the dear birds--they are all gone!" cried Martin. "Mother, where
are they going?"

She told him of a far-away land in the south, from which, when
autumn comes, the birds migrate north to a warmer country hundreds
of leagues away, and that birds of all kinds were now travelling
north, and would be travelling through the sky above them for many
days to come.

Martin looked up at the sky, and said he could see no birds now that
the buzzards were all gone.

"I can see them," she returned, looking up and glancing about the sky.

"O mother, I wish I could see them!" he cried. "Why can't I see them
when you can?"

"Because your eyes are not like mine. Look, can you see this?" and
she held up a small stone phial which she took from her bosom.

He took it in his hand and unstopped and smelt at it. "Is it honey?
Can I taste it?" he asked.

She laughed. "It is better than honey, but you can't eat it!" she
said. "Do you remember how the honey made you feel like a snake?
This would make you see what I see if I put some of it on your eyes."
He begged her to do so, and she consenting poured a little into the
palm of her hand. It was thick and white as milk; then taking some
on her finger tip, she made him hold his eyes wide open while she
rubbed it on the eye-balls. It made his eyes smart, and everything
at first looked like a blue mist when he tried to see; then slowly
the mist faded away and the air had a new marvellous clearness, and
when he looked away over the plain beneath them he shouted for joy,
so far could he see and so distinct did distant objects appear. At
one point where nothing but the grey haze that obscured the distance
had been visible, a herd of wild cattle now appeared, scattered about,
some grazing, others lying down ruminating, and in the midst of the
herd a very noble-looking, tawny-coloured bull was standing.

"O mother, do you see that bull?" cried Martin in delight.

"Yes, I see him," she returned. "Sometimes he brings his herd to
feed on the hillside, and when I see him here another time I shall
take you to him, and put you on his back. But look now at the sky,
Martin."

He looked up, and was astonished to see numbers of great birds
flying north, where no birds had appeared before. They were miles
high, and invisible to ordinary sight, but he could see them so
distinctly, their shape and colours, that all the birds he knew were
easily recognized. There were swans, shining white, with black heads
and necks, flying in wedge-shaped flocks, and rose-coloured
spoonbills, and flamingoes with scarlet wings tipped with black, and
ibises, and ducks of different colours, and many other birds, both
water and land, appeared, flock after flock, all flying as fast as
their wings could bear them towards the north.

He continued watching them until it was past noon, and then he saw
fewer and fewer, only very big birds, appearing; and then these were
seen less and less until there were none. Then he turned his eyes on
the plain and tried to find the herd of wild cattle, but they were
no longer visible; it was as he had seen it in the morning with the
pale blue haze over all the distant earth. He was told that the
power to see all distant things with a vision equal to his mother's
was now exhausted, and when he grieved at the loss she comforted him
with the promise that it would be renewed at some other time.

Now one day when they were out together Martin was greatly surprised
and disturbed at a change in his mother. When he spoke to her she
was silent; and byand-by, drawing a little away, he looked at her
with a fear which increased to a kind of terror, so strangely
altered did she seem, standing motionless, gazing fixedly with
wide-open eyes at the plain beneath them, her whole face white and
drawn with a look of rage. He had an impulse to fly from her and
hide himself in some hole in the rocks from the sight of that pale,
wrathful face, but when he looked round him he was afraid to move
from her, for the hill itself seemed changed, and now looked black
and angry even as she did. The ground he stood on, the grey old
stones covered with silvery-white and yellow lichen and pretty
flowery, creeping plants, so beautiful to look at in the bright
sunlight a few moments ago, now were covered with a dull mist which
appeared to be rising from them, making the air around them dark and
strange. And the air, too, had become sultry and close, and the sky
was growing dark above them. Then suddenly remembering all her love
and kindness he flew to her, and clinging to her dress sobbed out,
"O mother, mother, what is it?"

She put her hand on him, then drew him up to her side, with his feet
on the stone she was standing by. "Would you like to see what I see,
Martin?" she asked, and taking the phial from her bosom she rubbed
the white thick liquid on his eye-balls, and in a little while, when
the mistiness passed off, she pointed with her hand and told him to
look there.

He looked, and as on the former occasion, all distant things were
clearly visible, for although that mist and blackness given off by
the hill had wrapped them round so that they seemed to be standing
in the midst of a black cloud, yet away on the plain beneath the sun
was shining brightly, and all that was there could be seen by him.
Where he had once seen a herd of wild cattle he now saw mounted men,
to the number of about a dozen, slowly riding towards the hill, and
though they were miles away he could see them very distinctly. They
were dark, black-bearded men, strangely dressed, some with
fawn-coloured cloaks with broad stripes, others in a scarlet uniform,
and they wore cone-shaped scarlet caps. Some carried lances, others
carbines; and they all wore swords--he could see the steel scabbards
shining in the sun. As he watched them they drew rein and some of
them got off their horses, and they stood for some time as if
talking excitedly, pointing towards the hill and using emphatic
gestures.

What were they talking about so excitedly? thought Martin. He wanted
to know, and he would have asked her, but when he looked up at her
she was still gazing fixedly at them with the same pale face and
terrible stern expression, and he could but dimly see her face in
that black cloud which had closed around them. He trembled with fear
and could only murmur, "Mother! mother!" Then her arm was put round
him, and she drew him close against her side, and at that moment--O
how terrible it was!--the black cloud and the whole universe was lit
up with a sudden flash that seemed to blind and scorch him, and the
hill and the world was shaken and seemed to be shattered by an awful
thunder crash. It was more than he could endure: he ceased to feel
or know anything, and was like one dead, and when he came to himself
and opened his eyes he was lying in her lap with her face smiling
very tenderly, bending over him.

"O, poor little Martin," she said, "what a poor, weak little boy you
are to lose your senses at the lightning and thunder! I was angry
when I saw them coming to the hill, for they are wicked, cruel men,
stained with blood, and I made the storm to drive them away. They
are gone, and the storm is over now, and it is late--come, let us go
to our cave;" and she took him up and carried him in her arms.

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