Flemish Legends

“Ah,” cried Hessels, “why am I not free!”

“Alas, yes! why are you not free!” answered Smetse, “you would give me to some little butcher among your friends who would cut me up freely into slices like a ham, under your learned instruction, for you are, as I know well, a doctor of torment. But are you not being well tormented in turn by my stick? Alas, yes! why are you not free! You would hoist me up on some blessed gallows, and every one would see me hanging in the air, and freely would Master Hessels laugh. And so he would have his revenge on me for this excellent drubbing which I am giving him with such freedom. For nothing in this world is so free as a free stick falling freely on an unfree councillor. Alas, yes! why are you not free! You would free my head from my body, as you did with such satisfaction to my masters of Egmont and Hoorn. Alas, yes! why are you not free! then we should see Smetse in some good little fire, which would roast him freely, as was done to the poor maids of the reformed faith; and Smetse, like them, would be heard singing with a free soul to the God of free believers, and with a free conscience stronger than the flame, while Master Hessels drank bruinbier and said that it frothed nicely.”

“Oh,” said the devil, “why beat me so cruelly, without pity for my white hairs?”

“As for thy white hair,” said Smetse, “’tis the hair of an old tiger who ate up our country. For this reason it gives me sweet pleasure to beat thee with this oaken stick; and also in order that thou mayst give me permission to stay another seven years on this earth, where I find myself so well content, if it so please thee.”

“Seven years!” said the devil, “do not count on that; I would rather bleed under thy stick.”

“Ah,” said Smetse, “I see that your skin is fond of good blows. These are tasty ones, it is true. But the best of cheer is unwholesome if taken in excess. So when you have had enough of them, be so good as to tell me. I will put a stop to this feast, but for that I must have the seven years.”

“Never,” said Hessels; and lifting his snout into the air like a baying dog, he cried out: “Devils to the rescue!” But this he did so loudly, and in such screeching wise, that at the sound of his cracked voice blaring out like a trumpet, all the workmen came to see what it was about.

“You do not shout loud enough,” said Smetse, “I will help you.” And he beat him the harder, so that the devil cried the louder.

“See,” said Smetse, “how well this stick makes the little nightingale sing in my plum-tree. He is saying over his lied of love to call hither his fair mate. She will come by and by, my lord; but come down, I pray you, and await her below, for they say that the night dew is deadly at a height from the ground.”

“Baes,” said certain workmen, “is it not my lord Jacob Hessels, the Bloody Councillor, who is perched up there in thy plum-tree?”

“Yes, lads,” answered Smetse, “’tis indeed that worthy man. He seeks high places now as he did all his life, and so also at the end of it, when he swung in the air, putting out his tongue at the passers-by. For that which is of the gallows returns to the gallows, and the rope will take back its own. ’Tis written.”

“Baes,” said they, “can we not help to bring him down?”

“Yes,” said he. And the workmen went off to the smithy.

Meanwhile the devil said nothing, trying all the time to get his seat away from the branch. And he struggled, wriggled about, twisted himself a hundred different ways, and used as levers, to lift himself up, feet, hands, and head, but all in vain.

And Smetse, belabouring him well, said to him: “My lord Councillor, you are fast stuck, it seems, to the saddle; but I will have you out of it, have you out as fast as I can, for if I do not so, beating you with all my strength, you will tear up out of the ground the tree and its roots, and the good folk will see you walking along, dragging a plum-tree from your seat like a tail, which would be a piteous and laughable spectacle for such a noble devil as yourself to make. Give me rather the seven years.”

“Baes,” said the workmen, who had returned from the smithy with hammers and iron bars, “here we are at your orders; what shall we do?”

“Well,” said Smetse, “since I have combed him down with oaken staves we will now louse him with hammers and bars.”

“Mercy, Smetse, mercy!” cried the devil; hammers and bars, this is too much; thou hast the seven years, smith.”

“Make haste,” said Smetse, “and write me the quittance.”

“Here it is,” said he.

The smith took it, saw that it was in good order, and said: “I desire that thou come down.”

But the devil was so weak and enfeebled by the blows he had had that when he tried to leap he fell on his back. And he went off limping, shaking his fist at Smetse, and saying: “I await thee, in seven years, in hell, smith.”

“So you may,” said Smetse.

XI. Wherein the workmen hold fair speech with Smetse

While the devil was making off, Smetse, watching his workmen, saw that they were looking at one another strangely, spoke together in low voices, and seemed awkward in their manner, like people who would speak out, but dare not.

And he said to himself: “Are they going to denounce me to the priests?”

Suddenly Flipke the Bear came up to him. “Baes,” said he, “we know well enough that this ghost of Hessels was sent to thee by him who is lord below; thou hast made a pact with the devil and art rich only by his money. We have guessed as much for some time. But so that thou should not be vexed, none of us have spoken of it in the town, and none will so speak. We would tell thee this to put thy mind at rest. And so now, baes, good night and quiet sleep to thee.”

“Thank you, lads,” said Smetse, greatly softened.

And they went their several ways.

XII. How that Smetse would not give his secret into his wife’s tongue’s keeping

In the kitchen Smetse found his wife on her knees beating her breast, weeping, sighing, sobbing, and saying: “Jesus Lord God, he has made a pact with the devil; but ’tis not with my consent, I swear. And you also, Madam the Virgin, you know it, and you also, all my masters the saints. Ah, I am indeed wretched, not on my own account, but for my poor man, who for the sake of some miserable gold sold his soul to the devil! Alas, yes, sell it he did! Ah, my saintly masters, who are yourselves so happy and in such glory, pray the very good God for him, and deign to consider that if, as I dare hope, I die a Christian death and go to paradise, I shall be all alone there, eating my rice pudding with silver spoons, while my poor man is burning in hell, crying out in thirst and hunger, and I not able to give him either meat or drink… Alas, that will make me so unhappy! Ah, my good masters the saints, Madam the Virgin, My Lord Jesus, he sinned but this once, and was all the rest of his life a good man, a good Christian, kind to the poor and soft of heart. Save him from the fires which burn for ever, and do not separate above those who were so long united below. Pray for him, pray for me, alas!”

“Wife,” said Smetse, “thou art very wretched, it seems.”

“Ah, wicked man,” said she, “now I know all. ’Twas hell fire which came bursting into the house and lit up the forge; those master-bakers, brewers, and vintners were devils, all of them, and devil also that ugly man who showed thee the treasure and gave me so grievous a buffet. Who will dare to live peaceably in this house from now on? Alas, our food is the devil’s, our drink also; devil’s meat, loaves, and cheeses, devil’s money, house, and all. Whoever should dig under this dwelling would see the fires of hell gush out incontinent. There are all the devils, I see them above, below, on the right hand, on the left, awaiting their prey with dropped jaws, like tigers. Ah, what a fine sight ’twill be to see my poor man torn into a hundred pieces by all these devils, and that in seven years, for he said, as I heard well enough, that he would come back in seven years.”

“Weep not, wife,” said Smetse, “in seven years I may again be master as I was to-day.”

“But,” said she, “if he had not gone up into the plum-tree, what wouldst thou have done, poor beggar-man? And what if he will not let himself fall a second time into thy snare as he did to-day?”

“Wife,” said Smetse, “he will so fall, for my snares are from heaven, and the things which are from God can always get the better of devils.”

“Art not lying again?” she said. “And wilt tell me what they are?”

“That I cannot,” said he, “for devils have sharp ears and would hear me telling thee, no matter how low I spoke; and then I should be taken off to hell without mercy.”

“Ah,” said she, “then I will not ask, though ’tis not pleasant for me to live here in ignorance of everything, like a stranger. Nevertheless I would rather have thee silent and saved than talking and damned.”

“Wife,” he said, “thou art wise when thou speakest so.”

“I will pray,” she said, “every day for thy deliverance, and have a good mass said for thee at St. Bavon.”

“But,” said he, “is it with devil’s money thou wilt pay for this mass?”

“Have no care for that,” said she, “when this money enters the church coffers ’twill become suddenly holy.”

“Do as thou wilt, wife,” said Smetse.

“Ah,” said she, “My Lord Jesus shall have a stout candle each day, and Madam the Virgin likewise.”

“Do not forget my master St. Joseph,” said Smetse, “for we owe him much.”

XIII. Of the Bloody Duke

The end of the seventh year came again in its turn, and on the last evening there crossed the threshold of Smetse Smee’s dwelling a man with a sharp and haughty Spanish face, a nose like a hawk’s beak, hard and staring eyes, and a white beard, long and pointed. For the rest he was dressed in armour finely worked and most richly gilt; decorated with the illustrious order of the Fleece; wore a fine red sash; rested his left hand on the hilt of his sword, and held in his right the seven years’ pact and a marshal’s wand.

Coming into the forge he walked straight towards Smetse, holding his head loftily and without deigning to notice any of the workmen.

The smith was standing in a corner, wondering how he could make the devil who was sent for him sit down in the arm-chair, when Flipke ran quickly up to him and said in his ear: “Baes, the Bloody Duke is coming, take care!”

“Woe!” said Smetse, speaking to himself, “’tis all up with me, if d’Alva has come to fetch me.”

Meanwhile the devil approached the smith, showed him the pact, and took him by the arm without a word to lead him off.

“My Lord,” said Smetse in a most sorrowful manner, “whither would you take me? To hell. I follow you. ’Tis too great honour for one so mean as I to be ordered by so noble a devil as yourself. But is it yet the appointed time? I think it is not, and your highness has too upright a soul to take me off before the time written in the deed. In the meantime I beg your highness to be seated: Flipke, a chair for My Lord; the best in my poor dwelling, the large, well-padded arm-chair which stands in my kitchen, beside the press, near the chimney, beneath the picture of my master St. Joseph. Wipe it well, lad, so that no dust may be left on it; and quick, for the noble duke is standing.”

Flipke ran into the kitchen and came back, saying: “Baes, I cannot lift that arm-chair alone, ’tis so heavy.”

Then Smetse feigned great anger and said to his workmen: “Do ye not hear? He cannot lift it alone. Go and help him, and if it takes ten of you let ten go. And quick now. Fie! the blockheads, can ye ’not see that the noble duke is standing?”

Nine workmen ran to obey him and brought the chair into the forge, though not without difficulty. Smetse said: “Put it there, behind My Lord. Is there any dust on it? By Artevelde! they have not touched this corner. I will do it myself. Now ’tis as clean as new-washed glass. Will your highness deign to be seated?”

This the devil did, and then looked round him with great haughtiness and disdain. But of a sudden the smith fell at his feet, and said with mocking laughter: “Sir duke, you see before you the most humble of your servants, a poor man living like a Christian, serving God, honouring princes, and anxious, if such is your lordly pleasure, to continue in this way of life seven years more.”

“Thou shalt not have one minute,” said the devil, “come, Fleming, come with me.”

And he tried to rise from the chair, but could not. And while he was struggling with might and main, making a thousand vain efforts, the good smith cried joyously: “Would your highness get up? Ah, ’tis too soon! Let your highness wait, he is not yet rested after his long journey; long, I make bold to say, for it must be a good hundred leagues from hell to my smithy, and that is a long way for such noble feet, by dusty roads. Ah, My Lord, let yourself rest a little in this good chair. Nevertheless, if you are in great haste to be off, grant me the seven years and I will give you in return your noble leave and a full flask of Spanish wine.”

“I care nothing for thy wine,” answered the devil.

“Baes,” said Flipke, “offer him blood, he will drink then.”

“My lad,” said Smetse, “thou knowest well enough we have no such thing as blood in our cellars hereabouts, for that is no Flemish drink, but one that we leave to Spain. Therefore his highness must be so good as to excuse me. Nevertheless, I think he is thirsty, not for blood, but for blows, and of those I will give him his illustrious fill, since he will not grant me the seven years.”

“Smith,” said the devil, looking at Smetse with great contempt, “thou wouldst not dare beat me, I think?”

“Yes, My Lord,” said the good man. “You would have me dead. For my part I hold to my skin, and this not without good reason, for it has always been faithful to me and well fastened. Would it not be a criminal act to break off in this sudden fashion so close a partnership? And besides, you would take me off with you to hell, where the air is filled with the stench of the divers cookeries for damned souls which are set up there. Ah, rather than go thither I would beat your highness for seven years.”

“Fleming,” said the devil, “thou speakest without respect.”

“Yes, My Lord,” said Smetse, “but I will hit you with veneration.”

And so saying he gave him with his clenched fist a terrible great blow on the nose, whereat the devil seemed astonished, dazed, and angry, like a powerful king struck by a low-born servant. And he tried to leap upon the smith, clenched his fists, ground his teeth, and shot out blood from his nose, his mouth, his eyes, and his ears, so angry was he.

“Ah,” said Smetse, “you seem angry, My Lord. But deign to consider that since you will not listen to my words, I must speak to you by blows. By this argument am I not doing my best to soften your heart to my piteous case? Alas, deign to consider that my humble fist is making its supplication as best it can to your illustrious eyes, begs seven years from your noble nose, implores them from your ducal jaw. Do not these respectful taps tell your lordly cheeks how happy, joyous, and well-liking I should be during those seven years? Ah, let yourself be convinced. But, I see, I must speak to you in another fashion, with the words of iron bars, the prayers of tongs, and the supplications of sledge-hammers. Lads,” said the smith to his workmen, “will you be pleased to hold converse with My Lord?”

“Yes, baes,” said they.

And together with Smetse they chose their tools. But it was the oldest who picked the heaviest ones, and were the hottest with rage, because it was they who in former days had lost, through the duke’s doing, many friends and relatives by steel, by stake, and by live burial, and they cried: “God is on our side, he has delivered the enemy into our hands. Out upon the Bloody Duke, the master-butcher, the lord of the axe!”

And all of them, young and old, cursed the devil with a thunder of cries; and they came up to him menacingly, surrounding the chair and raising their tools to strike.

But Smetse stopped them and spoke again to the devil. “If your highness,” he said, “is minded to hold to his noble bones, let him deign to grant me the seven years, for the time for laughter is past, let me tell you.”

“Baes,” said the workmen, “whence comes to thee this kindness beyond measure? Why hold so long and fair parley with this fellow? Let us first break him up, and then he will offer thee the seven years of his own accord.”

“Seven years!” said the devil, “seven years! he shall not have so much as the shadow of a minute. Strike, men of Ghent, the lion is in the net; ye who could not find a hole deep enough to hide yourselves in when he was free and showed his fangs. Flemish cowards, see what I think of you and your threats.” And he spat on them.

At this spittle the bars, hammers, and other tools fell on him thick as hail, breaking his bones and the plates of his armour, and Smetse and his workmen said as they beat to their hearts’ content:

“Cowards were we, who wished to worship God in the sincerity of our hearts; valiant was he who prevented us with steel, stake, and live burial.

“Cowards were we for having always laughed readily and drunk joyously, like men who, having done what they had to do, make light of the rest: valiant was this dark personage when he had poor men of the people arrested in the midst of their merrymaking at Kermis-time and put death where had been laughter.

“Cowards were the eighteen thousand eight hundred persons who died for the glory of God; cowards those numberless others who by the rapine, brutality and insolence of the fighting men, lost their lives in these lands and others. Valiant was he who ordained their sufferings, and more valiant still when he celebrated his own evil deeds by a banquet.

“Cowards were we always, we who, after a battle, treated our prisoners like brothers; valiant was he who, after the defeat in Friesland, had his own men slaughtered.

“Cowards were we, who laboured without ceasing, spreading abroad over the whole world the work of our hands; valiant was he when, under the cloak of religion, he slew the richer among us without distinction between Romans and Reformers, and robbed us by pillage and extortion of thirty-six million florins. For the world is turned upside down; cowardly is the busy bee who makes the honey, and valiant the idle drone who steals it away. Spit, noble duke, on these Flemish cowards.”

But the duke could neither spit nor cough, for from the roughness of the blows they had given him he had altogether lost the shape of a man, so mingled and beaten together were bones, flesh, and steel. But there was no blood to be seen, which was a marvellous thing. Suddenly, while the workmen, wearied with beating, were taking breath, a weak voice came out from this hotch-potch of bones, flesh, and steel, saying:

“Thou hast the seven years, Smetse.”

“Very well then, My Lord,” said he, “sign the quittance.”

This the devil did.

“And now,” said Smetse, “will your highness please to get up.”

At these words, by great marvel, the devil regained his shape. But while he was walking away, holding up his head with great haughtiness and not deigning to look at his feet, he tripped over a sledge lying on the ground, and fell on his nose with great indignity, thereby giving much occasion for laughter to the workmen, who did not fail to make use of it. Picking himself up he threatened them with his fist, but they burst out laughing more loudly than ever. He came at them, grinding his teeth; they hooted him. He tried to strike with his sword a short and sturdy little workman; but the man seized the sword from his hands and broke it in three pieces. He struck another in the face with his fist, but the man gave him so good and valiant a kick as to send him sprawling on the quay with his legs in the air. There, flushing with shame, he melted into red smoke, like a vapour of blood, and the workmen heard a thousand joyous and merry voices, saying: “Beaten is the Bloody Duke, shamed is the lord of the axe, inglorious the prince of butchers! Vlaenderland tot eeuwigheid! Flanders for ever!” And a thousand pairs of hands beat applause all together. And the dawn broke.

XIV. Of the great fears and pains of Smetse’s wife

Smetse, going to look for his wife, found her in the kitchen on her knees before the picture of St. Joseph. “Well, mother,” said he, “what didst think of our dance? Was it not a merry one? Ah, henceforth they will call our house the House of Beaten Devils.”

“Yes,” said his wife, wagging her head, “yes, and also the house of Smetse who was carried away to hell. For that is where thou wilt go; I know it, I feel it, I foretell it. This devil’s coming all accoutred for war presages evil. He will come back, no longer alone, but with a hundred thousand devils armed like himself. Ah, my poor man! They will carry lances, swords, pikes, hooked axes, and arquebuses. They will drag behind them canon which they will fire at us; and everything will be ground to pieces, thou, I, the smithy, and the workmen. Alas, everything will be levelled to the ground! And where our smithy now stands will be nothing but a sorry heap of dust. And the folk walking past along the quay will say when they see this dust: ‘There lies the house of Smetse, the fool who sold his soul to the devil.’ And I, after dying in this fashion, shall go to Paradise, as I dare to hope. But thee, my man, oh, woe unspeakable! they will take away with them and drag through fire, smoke, brimstone, pitch, boiling oil, to that terrible place where those are punished who, wishing to break a pact made with the devil, have no special help from God or his holy saints. Poor little man, my good comrade, dost know what there is in store for thee? Ho, a gulf as deep as the heavens are high, and studded all down its terrible sides with jutting points of rock, iron spikes, horrid spears, and a thousand dreadful pikes. And dost know what manner of gulf this is, my man? ’Tis a gulf wherein a man may keep falling always – dost understand me, always, always – gashed by the rocks, cut about by the spears, torn open by the pikes, always, always, down all the long length of eternity.”

“But, wife,” said Smetse, “hast ever seen this gulf whereof thou speakest?”

“Nay,” said she, “but I know what manner of place it is, for I have often heard tell of it in the church of St. Bavon. And the good canon predicant would not lie.”

“Ah, no,” said Smetse.

XV. Of the Bloody King

When the last night of the seventh year was come Smetse was in his smithy, looking at the enchanted sack, and asking himself with much anxiety how he could make the devil get into it.

While he was wondering, the smithy suddenly became filled with an evil stench of the most putrid, offensive and filthy kind. Innumerable lice swarmed over the threshold, ceiling, anvils, sledges, bars and bellows, Smetse and his men, who were all as if blinded, for these lice were as thick in the smithy as smoke, cloud, or fog.

And a melancholy but imperative voice spoke, saying: “Smetse, come with me; the seven years have struck.”

And Smetse and his workmen, looking as well as they could in the direction whence the voice came, saw a man coming towards them with a royal crown on his head, and on his back a cloak of cloth-of-gold. But beneath the cloak the man was naked, and on his breast were four great abscesses, which formed together a single wide sore, and from this came the stench which filled the smithy, and the clouds of lice which swarmed round about. And he had on his right leg another abscess, more filthy, rank, and offensive than the rest. The man himself was white-faced, auburn-haired, red-bearded, with lips a little drawn, and mouth open somewhat. In his grey eyes were melancholy, envy, dissimulation, hypocrisy, harshness, and evil rancour.

When the older workmen saw him they cried out in a voice like thunder: “Smetse, the Bloody King is here, take care!”

“Silence,” cried the smith, “peace there, silence and veneration! Let every man doff his bonnet to the greatest king that ever lived, Philip II by name, King of Castile, Leon, and Aragon, Count of Flanders, Duke of Burgundy and Brabant, Palatine of Holland and Zeeland, most illustrious of all illustrious princes, great among the great, victorious among victors. Sire,” said he to the devil, “you do me unparalleled honour to come hither in person to lead me to hell, but my humble Ghentish lowness makes bold to suggest to your Royal and Palatine Highness that the appointed hour has not yet struck. Therefore if it pleases your Majesty I will pass on earth the brief time which is still left to me to live.”