Night on bleak downs; a high grass-grown trench runs athwart the slope. The earthwork is manned by warriors clad in hides. Two warriors, BRYS and GAST, talking.

Gast. This puts a tall heart in me, and a tune Of great glad blood flowing brave in my flesh, To see thee, after all these moons, returned, My Brys. If there's no rust in thy shoulder-joints, That battle-wrath of thine, and thy good throwing, Will be more help for us than if the dyke Were higher by a span.—Ha! there was howling Down in the thicket; they come soon, for sure.

Brys. Has there been hunger in the forest long?

Gast. I think, not only hunger makes them fierce: They broke not long since into a village yonder, A huge throng of them; all through the night we heard The feasting they kept up. And that has made The wolves blood-thirsty, I believe.

Brys. O fools To keep so slack a waking on their dykes! Now have they made a sleepless winter for us. Every night we must look, lest the down-slope Between us and the woods turn suddenly To a grey onrush full of small green candles, The charging pack with eyes flaming for flesh. And well for us then if there's no more mist Than the white panting of the wolfish hunger.

Gast. They'll come to-night. Three of us hunting went Among the trees below: not long we stayed. All the wolves of the world are in the forest, And man's the meat they're after.

Brys. Ay, it must be Blood-thirst is in them, if they come to-night, Such clear and starry weather.—What dost thou make, Gast, of the stars?

Gast. Brother, they're horrible. I always keep my head as much as I may Bent so they cannot look me in the eyes.

Brys. I never had this awe. The fear I have Is not a load I crouch beneath, but something Proud and wonderful, that lifteth my heart. Yea, I look on a night of stars with fear That comes close against glee. 'Tis like the fear I have for the wolves, that maketh me joy-mad To drive the yellow flint-edge through their shags. So when I gaze on stars, they speak high fear Into my soul; and strangely I think they mean The fear must prompt me to some unknown war.

Gast. Be thou well ware of this. I have not told thee How the stars, with their perilous overlooking, Have raught away from all his manhood Gwat, Our fiercest strength. For when the conquering wolves Into that village won, we in our huts Lay hearkening to their rejoicing hunger; But Gwat stayed out in the stars all night long. I peered at him as much as that whipt dog, My heart, had daring for; and he stood stiff, With all his senses aiming at the noise. Some strong bad eagerness kept tightly rigged The cordage of his body, till his nerves Loosed on a sudden. He yelled, "What do we here, High up among bleak winds, always afraid Of murder from the wolves? I will be man No more; the grey four-footed fellows have The good meats of the world, and the best lodging, Forest and weald." And then he wolfish howled, And hurled off towards the snarling and the baying. And now his soul wears the strength and fury Of a huge dun-pelted wolf; he's the wolves' king; And the fiends have learnt from him to laugh at our flints. Now always in the assaults there's one great beast, With yellow eyes and hackles like a mane, That plays the captain, first to reach the dyke; And I have heard that when he stands upright To ramp against the bulwarks, in his throat Are chattering yelps half tongued to grisly words. Doubtless to-night thou'lt see him, leading his pack, And with his jaws savagely tampering With our earth-builded safety.—But now, Brys, Is it not certain that the stars have done This evil to Gwat's heart, and curdled all The manhood in him?

Brys. When I was wanderer, I came upon a lake, set in a land Which has no fear of wolves. A fisher folk Live there in houses stilted over the water, And the stars walk like spectres of white fire Upon the misty waters of the mere. Ay, if they have no wolves, they have the fear All as thou hast; the sedges in the night Shudder, and out of the reeds there comes a cry Half chuckling, half bewailing; but, as I think, It is the mallard calling. Now among This haunted folk, I markt a man who went With shining eyes, and a joy in his face, about His needs of living. Clear it was to me He knew of some sweet race in his daily wont Which blest him wonderly. I lived with him, And from him learnt marvels. Yea, for he gave me A wit to see in our earth more than fear. Brother, how shall I tell thee, who hast still Fear-poisoned nerves, that like a priest he brewed My heart keen drink from out the look of earth?— Gast, is it nothing to thee that all in green The wolds go heaping up against the blue? And is it only fear to thee that night Is thatched with stars?—Ah, but I took his wit Further than he e'er did; in women I found The same amazement for my wakened eyes As in the hills and waters. Ay, gape at me, And think me bitten by some evil tooth; But as a quiet stream at the cliff's edge Breaks its smooth habit into a loud white force, So this delight the earth pours over me Leaps out of women with such excellence, It seems as I must brace my sinews to it,— The comely fashion of their limbs, their eyes, Their gait, and the way they use their arms. And now My eyes have a message to my heart from them Such as thou only through a blind skin hast. Therefore I came back here;—I scarce know why, But now that women are to me not only The sacred friends of hidden Awe, not only Mistresses of the world's unseen foison, Ay, and not only ease for throbbing groins, But things mine eyes enjoy as mine ears take songs, Vision that beats a timbrel in my blood, Dreams for my sleeping sight, that move aired round With wonder, as trembling covers a hearth,— It seems I must be fighting for them, must Run through some danger to them now before Delighting in them. I am here to fight Wolves for the joy of the world, marvellous women!

Gast. Star-madden'd! What is this in earth and women That pricks thee into wrath against the wolves? Do I not fight for women too? But I For what is certain in them, not for madness.

Brys. I make my fierceness of a mind to set My spirit high up in the winds of joy, Before I tumble down into the darkness. Not thus thy women send thee to thy fighting: All fear thy battle-courage is, fear-bred Thine anger. Thou heavily drudgest women, But yet thou art afraid of them.

Gast. Ay, truly; For look how from their wondrous bodies comes Increase: who knoweth where such power ends? They are in league with the great Motherhood Who brings the seasons forth in the open world; And if to them She hands, unseen by us, Their marvellous bringing forth of children, what Spirit of Her great dreadful mountain-spell, Wherein the rocks have purpose against us, Sealed up in watchful quiet stone, may not Pass on to their dark minds, that seem so mild, Yet are so strange; or what charm'd word from out Her forests whispering endless dangerous things, Wherefrom our hunters often have run crazed To hear the trees devising for their souls; What secret share of Her earth's monstrous power May She not also grant to women's lives? Yea, wise is our fear of women; but we fight For more than fear; we give them liking too. Who but the women can deliver us From this continual siege of the wolves' hunger? High above comfort, on the shrugging backs Of downland, where the winds parch our skins, and frost Kneads through our flesh until his fingers clamp The aching bones, our scanty families Hold out against the ravin of the wolves, Fended by earthwork, fighting them with flint. But if we keep the favour of our women, They will breed sons to us so many and strong We shall have numbers that will make us dare Invade the weather-shelter'd woods, and build Villages where now only wolves are denn'd; Yea, to the beasts shall the man-folk become Malice that haunts their ways, even as now Our leaguer'd tribes must lurk and crouch afraid Of wolfish malice always baying near. And fires, stackt hugely high with timber, shall With nightlong blaze make friendly the dark and cold, Cheer our bodies, and roast great feasts of flesh,— Ah, to burn trunks of trees, not bracken and ling! This is what women are to me,—a fear Lest the earth-hidden Awe, who unseen gives The childing to their flesh, should make their minds As darkly able as their wombs, with power To think sorceries over us; and hope That with their breeding they will dispossess The beasts of the good lowlands, until man, No longer fled to the hills, inhabit all The comfort of the earth.

Brys. These are mine too, But as great rivers own the brook's young speed. For in my soul, the women do not dwell A torch going through darkness, with a troop Of shadows gesturing after; but as the sun Upon his height of golden blaze at noon, With all the size of the blue air about him. Fear that in women the unseen is seen And the unknown power sits beside us known,— This fear is good, but better is than this Their beauty, and the wells of joy in women. I speak dumb words to thee; but know thou, Gast, My soul is looking at the time to come, And seeing it not as a cavern lit With smoky burning brandons of thy fear, But as a day shining with my new joy. Thou canst not fight with me for the coming heart Of man,—fear cannot fight with joy. And I Am setting such a war of joy against thee, It shall be as man's heart became a god Murdering thy mind of weakling darkness. All the hot happiness of being wroth And seeing a stroke leave behind it wound, The pleasures of wily hunting, and a feast After long famine, and the dancing stored Within the must of berries,—these, and all Gladdenings that make thrill the being of man Shall pour, mixt with an unknown rage of glee, Into the meaning men shall find in women. And if we have at all a fear of them, It shall not be the old ignorant dismay, But of their very potency to delight, The way their looks make Will an enemy Hating itself, shall men become afraid. Women shall cause men know for why they have Being in the earth;—not to be quailing slack As if the whole world were a threat, but tuned Ready for joy as harp-strings for the player. And great desire of beauty and to be glad Shall prompt our courages. Ha, what are those Breaking from out the thickets?

Gast. Wolves! They come! Brothers, the fiends are on us: have good hearts! Ho for the women and their sacred wombs!

Brys. Ho for the women, their beauty and my pleasure!