Chapter VI: The Shepherd of Pendle Hill

'Ingleborough, Pendle and Pen-y-Ghent Are the highest hills 'twixt Scotland and Trent.' So sing I, the Shepherd of Pendle, to myself, and so have I sung, on summer days, these many years, lying out atop of old Pendle Hill, keeping watch over my flock.

In good sooth, a shepherd's life is a hard one, on our Lancashire fells, for nine months out of the twelve. The nights begin to be sharp with frost towards the back-end of the year, for all the days are sunny and warm at times. Bitter cold it is in winter and worse in spring, albeit the daylight is longer.

'As the day lengthens, so the cold strengthens,' runs the rhyme, and well do men know the truth of it in these parts. Many a time a man must be ready to give his own life for his sheep, aye and do it too, to save them in a snow-drift or from the biting frost. It is an anxious season for the shepherd, until he sees the lambs safely at play and able to stand upon their weak legs and run after their mothers. But it is not until the dams are clipped that a shepherd has an easy mind and can let his thoughts dwell on other things. Then, at last, in the summer, his time runs gently for a while; and I, for one, was always ready to enjoy myself, when once the bitter weather was over.

So there I was, one day many years ago, nigh upon Midsummer, lying out on the grassy slopes atop of old Pendle Hill, and singing to myself--

'Ingleborough, Pendle and Pen-y-Ghent
Are the highest hills 'twixt Scotland and Trent.'

But for all I sang of the hills, my thoughts were in the valleys. I lay there, watching till the sun should catch the steep roof of a certain cot I know. It stands by the side of a stream, so hidden among the bushes that even my eye cannot find it, unless the sunlight finds it first, and flashes back at me from roof and window-pane. That was the cot I had never lived in then, but I hoped to live in it before the summer was over, and to bring the bonniest lass in all yon broad Yorkshire there with me as my bride. That was to be if things went well with me and with the sheep; for my master had promised to give me a full wage (seeing I had now reached man's estate), if so be I came through the spring and early summer without losing a single lamb. Thinking of these things, and dreaming dreams as a lad will, the hours trod swiftly over Pendle Hill that day; for all the sun was going down the sky but slowly, seeing it was Midsummer-tide.

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.

When I came back to him once more, there he was, still standing on the very top of the hill, where I had left him. But now his head was raised, the breeze lifted his hair. A kind of glory was on him. It was light from the sunset sky, I thought at first; but it was brighter far than that; for the sunset sky looked dull and dim beside it. His eyes were roaming far and wide over the valleys and hills, even as my eyes had wandered, when I was gathering my sheep. But his eyes wandered further, and further far, till they reached the utmost line of the Irish Sea to westward and covered all the country that lay between. Then he turned himself around to the east again. A strong man he was and a tall, and the glory was still on his face, though now he had the sunset sky at his back. And he opened his mouth and spake. Strange were his words:

'If but one man,' said he, 'but one man or woman, were raised by the Lord's Power to stand and live in the same Spirit that the Apostles and Prophets were in, he or she should shake all this country for miles round.' Shake all the country! He had uttered a fearsome thing. 'Nay, Master Stranger, bethink ye,' I said, going up to him, 'how may that be? What would happen to me and the sheep were these fells to shake? Even now, though they stand steady, you have seen that wayward lambs like Periwinkle will fall over and do themselves a mischief.' So I spake, being but a witless lad. But my words might have been the wind passing by him, so little he heeded them. I doubt if he even heard or knew that I was there although I stood close at his side. For again his eyes were resting on the Irish Sea, and on the country that lay shining in the sun towards Furness, and on the wide, glistening sands round Morecambe Bay. And then he turned himself round to the north where lie the high mountains that can at times be seen, or guessed, in the glow of the setting sun. Thus, as he gazed on all that fair land, the Stranger spoke. Again he uttered strange words.

At first his voice was low and what he said reached me not, save only the words: 'A great people, a great people to be gathered.'

Whereat I, being, as I say, but a lad then, full of my own notions and mighty sure of myself as young lads are, plucked at his sleeve, having heard but the last words, and supposing that he had watched me gathering my flock for the fold.

'Not people, Master Stranger,' I interrupted. ''Tis my business to gather sheep. Sheep and silly, heedless lambs like Periwinkle, 'tis them I must gather for my master's fold.'

He saw and heard me then, full surely.

'Aye,' he said, and his voice, though deep, had music in it, while his eyes pierced me yet again, but more gently this time, so that I made sure he had seen me tending Periwinkle and knew that I had done the best I could. 'Aye, verily thou dost well. Shepherd of Pendle, to gather lambs and silly sheep for their master's fold. I, too....' But there again he broke off and fell once more into silence.

Thus I left him, still standing atop of the hill; but as I turned to go I heard his voice yet again, and though I looked not round, the sound of it was as if a man were speaking to his friend, for all I knew that he stood there, atop of the hill, alone:

'I thank thee, Lord, that Thou hast let me see this day in what places Thou hast a great people, a great people to be gathered.'

Thereat I partly understood, yet turned not back again, nor sought to enquire further of his meaning; for the daylight was fast fading and I had need of all my skill in getting home my sheep.