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The Sword of Welleran and Other Stories
Paperback
FantasyClassic FictionGeneral Fiction
Publisher: Millers Print
Published: Sep 3 2026
Pages: 68
Weight: 0.23
Height: 0.14 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English
he north wind was blowing, and red and golden the last days of Au-
tumn were streaming hence. Solemn and cold over the marshes arose
the evening.
It became very still.
Then the last pigeon went home to the trees on the dry land in the distance,
whose shapes already had taken upon themselves a mystery in the haze.
Then all was still again.
As the light faded and the haze deepened, mystery crept nearer from every
side.
Then the green plover came in crying, and all alighted.
And again it became still, save when one of the plover arose and flew a little
way uttering the cry of the waste. And hushed and silent became the earth,
expecting the first star. Then the duck came in, and the widgeon, company
by company: and all the light of day faded out of the sky saving one red band
of light. Across the light appeared, black and huge, the wings of a flock of
3 LORD DUNSANY
geese beating up wind to the marshes. These, too, went down among the
rushes.
Then the stars appeared and shone in the stillness, and there was silence in
the great spaces of the night.
Suddenly the bells of the cathedral in the marshes broke out, calling to even-
song.
Eight centuries ago on the edge of the marsh men had built the huge cathe-
dral, or it may have been seven centuries ago, or perhaps nine-it was all one
to the Wild Things.
So evensong was held, and candles lighted, and the lights through the win-
dows shone red and green in the water, and the sound of the organ went
roaring over the marshes. But from the deep and perilous places, edged with
bright mosses, the Wild Things came leaping up to dance on the reflection
of the stars, and over their heads as they danced the marsh-lights rose and
fell.
The Wild Things are somewhat human in appearance, only all brown of
skin and barely two feet high. Their ears are pointed like the squirrel's, only
far larger, and they leap to prodigious heights. They live all day under deep
pools in the loneliest marshes, but at night they come up and dance. Each
Wild Thing has over its head a marsh-light, which moves as the Wild Thing
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