The Legend of Ulenspiegel Volume Ii Part 41

BOOK IV

I

Being at Heyst, upon the dunes, Ulenspiegel and Lamme see, coming from Ostend, from Blanckenberghe, from Knokke, many fis.h.i.+ng boats full of armed men, adherents of the Beggars of Zealand, who wear in their headgear the silver crescent with this inscription: "Better to serve the Turk than the Pope."

Ulenspiegel is glad; he whistles like the lark; from all sides answers the warlike clarion of the c.o.c.k.

The boats, sailing or fis.h.i.+ng and selling their fish, come to land, one after the other, at Emden. There William of Blois is detained, who is equipping a s.h.i.+p under commission from the Prince of Orange.

Tres-Long, having been at Emden for eleven weeks, was bitterly sick of waiting. He went from his s.h.i.+p to land and from the land to his s.h.i.+p, like a bear on a chain.

Ulenspiegel and Lamme, wandering about on the quays, saw there a lord of a jovial visage, somewhat melancholy and at a loss to heave up one of the paving-stones of the quay with a pikestaff. Not succeeding in this he still bent every effort to carry out his undertaking, while a dog gnawed at a bone behind him.

Ulenspiegel came to the dog and pretended to want to rob him of his bone. The dog growls; Ulenspiegel does not stop: the dog makes a great uproar of doggish wrath.

The lord, turning at the noise, said to Ulenspiegel:

"What good does it do thee to torment this beast?"

"What good does it do you, Messire, to torment this pavement?"

"It is not the same thing at all," said the lord.

"The difference is not extreme," replied Ulenspiegel; "if the dog sets store by his bone and wants to keep it, this pavement holds to its quay and is fain to remain on it. And it is the very least that folk like us may do, turning to busy ourselves about a dog when folk like you busy yourselves about a paving stone."

Lamme remained behind Ulenspiegel, not daring to speak.

"Who art thou?" asked the lord.

"I am Thyl Ulenspiegel, the son of Claes, who died in the flames for his faith."

And he whistled like the lark and the lord crowed like the c.o.c.k.

"I am Admiral Tres-Long," said he; "what wouldst thou with me?"

Ulenspiegel narrated to him his adventures, and gave him five hundred carolus.

"Who is this big man?" asked Tres-Long, pointing a finger at Lamme.

"My comrade and friend," replied Ulenspiegel: "he desires, like myself, to sing on your s.h.i.+p, with the fine voice of a musket, the song of deliverance for the land of our fathers."

"Ye are brave men both," said Tres-Long, "and ye shall go on my s.h.i.+p."

They were then in the month of February; sharp was the wind, keen the frost. After three weeks of grudging waiting Tres-Long left Emden under protest. Thinking to enter the Texel, he went out from Vlie, but was forced to go in to Wieringen, where his s.h.i.+p was locked up in the ice.

Soon there was a merry spectacle all about: sledges and skaters all in velvet; women skating in jackets and skirts broidered with gold, pearl, scarlet, azure; lads and la.s.ses went, came, glided, laughed, following one another in line, or two by two, in pairs, singing the song of love upon the ice, or going to eat and drink in booths decked out with flags, brandy, oranges, figs, peperkoek, schols, eggs, hot vegetables, and eete-koeken, which are pancakes and pickled vegetables, while all about them sleds and sailing sleighs made the ice cry out under their runners.

Lamme, seeking his wife, went wandering on skates like the jolly men and women, but he fell often.

Meanwhile, Ulenspiegel went to drink and to feed in a small inn on the quay where he had not to pay too dear for his daily rations; and he liked to talk with the old baesine.

One Sunday about nine he went in there asking them to give him his dinner.

"But," said he to a pretty woman coming forward to serve him, "baesine rejuvenated, what hast thou done with thy old wrinkles? Thy mouth hath all its teeth, white and girlish, and its lips are red as cherries. Is it for me, that soft and cunning smile?"

"No, no," said she; "but what must I give you?"

"Thyself," said he.

The woman answered:

"That would be too much for a starveling like you; would you not like other meat?"

Ulenspiegel making no reply:

"What have you done," she said, "with that handsome, well-made, corpulent man whom I often saw with you?"

"Lamme?" said he.

"What have you done with him?" she said.

Ulenspiegel replied:

"He eats, in the booths, hard eggs, smoked eels, salt fish, zuertjes, and all that he can put under his tooth; and all to look for his wife. Why art thou not his wife, pretty one? Wouldst thou like fifty florins? Wouldst thou like a gold necklace?"

But she, crossing herself:

"I am not to buy or to take," said she.

"Dost thou love naught?" said he.

"I love thee as my neighbour, but I love above all my Lord Christ and Madame the Virgin, who bid me live a chaste life. Hard and heavy are its duties, but G.o.d is our helper, we poor women. Yet there are some that succ.u.mb. Is thy big friend happy?"

Ulenspiegel replied:

"He is gay when he is eating, sad when fasting, and always pensive. But thou, art thou happy or sad?"

"We women," said she, "are slaves of that that rules us!"

"The moon?" said he.

"Aye," said she.

"I am going to tell Lamme to come to see thee."