🧚 The Slave Boy · page 2

The noon hour came, the sun began its downward course.72 In the farmhouse the Smith’s mother, Dame Lokka, was sitting in sweet content.73 On her right sat Anniki, the maid of the morning, and on her left was Ilmarinen’s wife and mistress whom he had won in the far-off North Land.74 Joy beamed in every face and pulsed in every heart.75

The table was spread and the mid-day meal was served—white bread fresh from the bake-oven, choice butter and yellow cream from the dairy, tid-bits of beef and smoked salmon.76 How good was everything!77

“Praise be to Jumala for all these blessings!” said Dame Lokka, fervently.78

“Praise be to Jumala!” echoed both the daughters.79

Meanwhile the slave, Kullervo, was still sitting on his lonely hummock, keeping watch over the cattle and nursing his evil thoughts.80 The crows among the pines cawed loudly; the grasshoppers at his feet chirped mockingly.81

“Wake up, sad slave boy!82 The day is past the noon,” croaked an old crow.83

And a thrush in the thicket of bushes sang, “O orphan boy, the luncheon hour has come!84 Take the fine cake from the basket where the old cook so kindly placed it.85 Eat it.86 Feast upon it and forget your sorrow.”87

Kullervo was hungry, for his breakfast had been light.88 He picked the oak leaves from the basket and took the round, buttered cake in his hands.89 It was heavy, and he eyed it closely.90 He turned it over and examined the under side.91

“It looks good, it smells sweet,” he said.92 “But the handsomest of people are sometimes rotten at heart, and the handsomest of cakes are sometimes unfit to be eaten.”93

He took his hunting knife from the sheath that hung at his belt.94 It was but half a knife, the edge nicked deeply, the point broken off.95 But its temper was good, for it had been forged by a master smith in the days when men did honest work.96

Kullervo cut through the upper crust of the cake, he cut through the wheaten layer at the top; but when the knife struck the stone in the centre it broke short off at the hilt and only the handle remained in his grasp.97 The slave looked at it, and as the blade fell to the ground he burst out weeping.98

“Oh, sorrow upon sorrow!” he moaned.99 “This knife was my only friend.100 I had no one to love but this iron, so true, so ready to help.101 It was once my father’s knife, and well it served him in the chase and in the fight.102 And now it is broken by this cake of stone which Ilmarinen’s women have given me for food.”103

He picked up the broken blade and tried to fit it in the handle.104 It was vain; both blade and handle were useless.105 With a cry of despair he flung them far from him; with a cry of wrath he threw the stone-filled cake still farther, and it fell with a thud among the bushes.106 Then up flew a pair of ravens, one lighting upon a blasted pine and one taking shelter in a grove of oaks.107

“Caw! caw!” cried the one in the pine.108 “What can ail the wretched slave boy?”109

“He is angry,” answered the other.110 “His mistress has treated him badly.111 She has given him a stone for bread.”112

“It is thus that the rich feed the poor,” said the one in the pine.113 “But what will the slave do about it?”114

“If he is wise he will pay them well for their cruel jest,” cawed the one in the oak.115 “He will seek revenge, he will have it.116 Caw! caw! caw!”117

Kullervo leaped up and stood upon the hummock.118 He stretched out his arms and shook his clenched fists in the face of the sky.119

“Hear me, Jumala!” he cried.120 “O Jumala, friend of the friendless, help me.121 I will have revenge.122 I will pay those women well for the sorrow they have made me feel.123 The slave will whip the master, and the master shall serve the slave.”124

All the savagery that had been lurking in his blue eyes burst forth, as lightning bursts from the drifting clouds.125 He ran to the woody thicket and broke off a long branch of hemlock to serve him as a whip.126 Slashing it this way and that, he rushed hither and thither collecting his herd.127 With great ado he drove the lazy milkers far into the savage woods.128 He gathered the yearlings together and, after much shouting and cursing, chased them into the tangled thickets where the wild beasts had their lairs.129

Out of the shady places wolves leaped up, howling, snarling, snapping their teeth.130 The bears were roused from their lurking holes and came forth growling, their tongues lolling out.131 The gentle milk cows, the timid yearlings, even the stolid oxen, were overcome with fear.132 They ran together in groups, trembling and helpless.133 Instantly the wild beasts leaped upon them with bared claws and gnashing teeth.134 If any escaped the wolves, they were seized by the bears; if any fled from the bears, they were devoured by the wolves.135 The whole herd perished.136

From a safe seat in the crotch of a pine the slave boy looked on and watched the slaughter; and he laughed a wild, discordant, triumphant laugh.137 Then, clapping his hands together and knocking his knees against the trunk of the tree, he began to sing.138 He sang a wild, strange song of enchantment—a song he had learned from a witch woman in the land of mists and shadows.139 And as he sang, behold, a wonderful thing occurred: all the wolves so lately feasting were changed into sleek, fat yearlings, and all the bears so lately gorging themselves became fine milk cows with mild, soft eyes and pendent udders.140

The slave boy descended from the tree, still singing, still shouting, still working the magic spell.141 The beasts with one accord looked up to him as their master.142 One after another, they marched slowly and orderly out of the marshes and out of the woods, the false milk cows going foremost calmly chewing their cuds, and the false yearlings gambolling behind.143 The sun was now well down towards the western hills, and the evening milking time was nigh at hand.144

Homeward, over the hills and along the well-known pathways, the slave boy drove his herd.145 With noiseless steps he ran among the beasts, breathing words of magic, words of cunning in their ears.146

“Spare not the mistress when she comes out to milk you,” he whispered to one.147

“Seize the maidens when they come with pails to milk you,” he said to others.148

“Seek the old cook in the kitchen and remind her of her cake,” he muttered to still another.149

“Be bold, be fierce, be very hungry,” he counselled them all.150

The sun was still above the hills when he drove the herd into the farmyard.151 He put the milkers inside the paddock, the yearlings following after.152 Then he closed the gate without locking it and climbed up on the fence.153 From his belt he unloosed his herdsman’s whistle, a whistle carved from an ox’s horn; he put it to his lips and blew it loudly, shrilly.154 It was the signal by which the mistress and her milkmaids would know that the cows had been brought home and were ready for the milking.155

Five times—yes, six—Kullervo blew a long, piercing blast which might have been heard half-way across the sea.156 Then, as the last echoes died, he leaped nimbly to the ground and ran out of the farmyard.157 Half crouching, he slunk away behind hedges and bushes until his ungainly form was lost to sight among the evening shadows.158 Never more would his feet cross the threshold of Ilmarinen’s dwelling.159