Tibbie Woolstockit turned her mild bright eye on the little dormouse. “Willingly I will tell you. There is not much to tell. Every spring for four and twenty years we have told that story to our lambs; but they take little heed. Daisy and Double were the twin lambs of my great grandmother, Dinah Woolstockit of Brackenthwaite, who grazed in these pastures, even where we now are feeding. The coppice has been cut thrice since then; but still the green shoots grow again from the stools, and the bluebells ring in the wood. And Wilfin Beck sings over the pebbles, year in and year out, and swirls in spring flood after the melting snow. That April when Daisy and Double played in this meadow, Wilfin was full to overflowing, as high as it is now. Take care! you thoughtless lambs, take care!

“But little heed will you take; no more than Daisy and Double, who made of the flood a playmate. For it was carrying down sticks and brown leaves and snow-broth – as the trout-fishers call the cakes of white fairy foam that float upon the flood water in early spring. Daisy and Double saw the white foam; and they thought it was fun to race with the snow-broth; they on the meadowbank and the foam upon the water; until it rushed out of sight behind this wall. Then back they raced upstream till they met more snow-broth coming down; then turned and raced back with it. But they watched the water instead of their own footsteps – splash! in tumbled Daisy. And before he could stop himself – splash! in tumbled Double; and they were whirled away in the icy cold water of Wilfin Beck. ‘Baa! baa!’ cried Daisy and Double, bobbing along amongst the snow-broth. Very sadly they bleated for their mother; but she had not seen them fall in. She was feeding quietly, by herself. Presently she missed them; and she commenced to run up and down, bleating. They had been carried far away out of sight, beyond the wall; beyond another meadow. Then Wilfin Beck grew tired of racing; the water eddied round and round in a deep pool, and laid the lambs down gently on a shore of smooth sand. They staggered onto their feet and shook their curly coats – ‘I want my mammy! baa, baa!’ sobbed Daisy. ‘I’m very cold, I want my mammy,’ bleated Double. But bleat as they might, their mother Dinah Woolstockit could not hear them.

“The bank above their heads was steep and crumbly. Green fronds of oak-fern were uncurling; primroses and wood anemones grew amongst the moss, and yellow catkins swung on the hazels. When the lambs tried to scramble up the bank – they rolled back, in danger of falling into the water. They bleated piteously. After a time there was a rustling amongst the nut bushes; someone was watching them. This person came walking slowly along the top of the bank. It wore a woolly shawl, pulled forward over its ears, and it leaned upon a stick. It seemed to be looking straight in front of it as it walked along; at least its nose did; but its eyes took such a sharp squint sideways as it passed above the lambs. ‘Burrh! burrh!’ said this seeming woolly person with a deep-voiced bleat. ‘Baa! baa! We want our mammy!’ cried Daisy and Double down below. ‘My little dears come up! burrh! burrh! come up to me!’  ‘Go away!’ cried Daisy, backing to the water’s edge. ‘You are not our mammy! Go away!’ cried Double. ‘Oh, real mammy, come to us!’

“THE WOOLLY PERSON TRIED TO CLAW HOLD OF DAISY”

Then the woolly person reached out a skinny black arm from under the shawl, and tried to claw hold of Daisy with the handle of its stick. Its eyes were sharp and yellow, and its nose was shiny black. ‘Baa, baa!’ screamed Daisy, struggling, and rolling down the bank, away from the crook. ‘Burrh! burrh! bad lambs; I’ll have you yet!’

“But what was that noise? A welcome whistle and shout – ‘Hey, Jack, good dog! go seek them out, lad!’ The wily one threw off the shawl and ran, with a long bushy tail behind him; and a big strong wall-eyed collie came bounding through the coppice, on the track of the fox. When he came to the top of the bank, he stopped and looked over at Daisy and Double with friendly barks. Then John Shepherd arrived, and came slithering down the bank between the nut bushes. He lifted up Daisy and Double, and carried them to their mother. But it is in vain that we tell this tale to our lambs from generation to generation; they are thoughtless and giddy as of old. Well for us sheep that—

“‘There’s sturdy Kent and Collie true,

They will defend the tarrie woo’!’ [52]

“Sing us the spinning song that the shepherd lasses sang, when they sat in the sun before the shieling, while they cleaned the tarry fleeces; carding and spinning—

“‘Tarrie woo’, oh tarrie woo’ – tarrie woo’ is ill to spin,

Card it weel, oh card it weel! Card it weel ere you begin.

When it’s carded, rolled, and spun, then your work is but half done,

When it’s woven, dressed, and clean, it is clothing for a queen.

“It’s up you shepherds! dance and skip! O’er the hills and valley trip!

The king that royal sceptre sways, has no sweeter holy days.

Sing to the praise of tarrie woo’!

Sing to the sheep that bare it too!

“Who’d be king? None here can tell,

When a shepherd lives so well;

Lives so well and pays his due,

With an honest heart and tarrie woo’.’”

CHAPTER X

The Sheep

The sheep lay quietly, chewing their cud. Tuppenny fidgeted, “When will Paddy Pig come back?”  “I don’t know,” said Jenny Ferret crossly, “I’m only an old body. I’m wanting my tea.”  “Ring the bell, Jenny Ferret,”said Sandy. She clanged a little hand-bell up and down. The lambs sprang away, startled; the sheep lay unconcerned. The sheep talked to one another. “A bell? Sheep bells are sweeter! Ruth Twinter, do you remember the Down ram, telling us about the Cotswold flocks? How with each flock a two-three sheep go before, wearing bells? When they lift their heads from nibbling and step forward, the bells ring – ting ting ting – tong tong tong – tinkle tinkle tinkle! Why has Mistress Heelis never given us bells? She will do anything for us sheep?”  “I know not,” answered Ruth Twinter.

“I can tell you from the wisdom of age,” said the old Blue Ewe (sixteen years gone by since first she nibbled the clover); “I can tell you. It is because we Herdwicks range singly and free upon the mountain side. We are not like the silly Southron sheep, that flock after a bell-wether. The Cotswold sheep feed on smooth sloping pastures near their shepherd.”

Said the peet ewe, [34] Blindey, “Our northern winds would blow away the sheep bells’ feeble tinkle. From the low grounds to us comes a sound that carries further – Old John calling with a voice like a bell; calling his sheep to hay across the frozen snow in winter.”

Up spoke a dark Lonscale ewe – “Each to their own! The green fields of the south for them; the high fell tops for us who use to wander, and find our way alone, through mist and trackless waste. We need no human guide to set us on our way.”

“No guide, nor star, nor compass, to set us a bee-line to Eskdale!” said the bright-eyed Allonby ewe (her that had knocked her teeth out when she tumbled down Scaw fell). “Two of you Lonscales were runaways, in spite of old John’s hay.”  “Who can langle [26] the clouds or the wind? If we want to come back – we will!”

“Where was it that they drove you, Hannah Brighteyes?” asked the little ewe, Isabel. “Nay! I did not stay to learn its place name; I came straight back to my heaf [16] on the fell! It was eight miles to Cockermouth market, and twelve beyond.”  “What short-wooled sheep could do that?”said Habbitrot, “it takes strong hemp to langle us.”  “We want no bells and collars,” said Blindey, “they would get caught on rocks and snags.”  “A sad death it must be to die fast,” said Hill Top Queenie, plaintively; “I would not like to be fast, like poor little Hoggie in the wood. He had eaten sticks and moss as far as he could reach; but he had not sense to bite through the cruel bramble that held him, twisted round his woolly ribs.”