A Dream of John Ball; and, A King's Lesson

by William Morris

  CHAPTER XI

  HARD IT IS FOR THE OLD WORLD TO SEE THE NEW

  He held his peace awhile, and then he said: "But no man sellethhimself and his children into thraldom uncompelled; nor is any fool sogreat a fool as willingly to take the name of freeman and the life of athrall as payment for the very life of a freeman. Now would I ask theesomewhat else; and I am the readier to do so since I perceive that thouart a wondrous seer; for surely no man could of his own wit haveimagined a tale of such follies as thou hast told me. Now well I wotthat men having once shaken themselves clear of the burden ofvilleinage, as thou sayest we shall do (and I bless thee for the word),shall never bow down to this worser tyranny without sore strife in theworld; and surely so sore shall it be, before our valiant sons giveway, that maids and little lads shall take the sword and the spear, andin many a field men's blood and not water shall turn the gristmills ofEngland. But when all this is over, and the tyranny is established,because there are but few men in the land after the great war, howshall it be with you then? Will there not be many soldiers andsergeants and few workers? Surely in every parish ye shall have theconstables to see that the men work; and they shall be saying everyday, 'Such an one, hast thou yet sold thyself for this day or this weekor this year? Go to now, and get thy bargain done, or it shall be theworse for thee.' And wheresoever work is going on there shall beconstables again, and those that labour shall labour under the whiplike the Hebrews in the land of Egypt. And every man that may, willsteal as a dog snatches at a bone; and there again shall ye need moresoldiers and more constables till the land is eaten up by them; norshall the lords and the masters even be able to bear the burden of it;nor will their gains be so great, since that which each man may do in aday is not right great when all is said."

  "Friend," said I, "from thine own valiancy and high heart thouspeakest, when thou sayest that they who fall under this tyranny shallfight to the death against it. Wars indeed there shall be in theworld, great and grievous, and yet few on this score; rather shall menfight as they have been fighting in France at the bidding of some lordof the manor, or some king, or at last at the bidding of some usurerand forestaller of the market. Valiant men, forsooth, shall arise inthe beginning of these evil times, but though they shall die as yeshall, yet shall not their deaths be fruitful as yours shall be;because ye, forsooth, are fighting against villeinage which is waning,but they shall fight against usury which is waxing. And, moreover, Ihave been telling thee how it shall be when the measure of the time isfull; and we, looking at these things from afar, can see them as theyare indeed; but they who live at the beginning of those times andamidst them, shall not know what is doing around them; they shallindeed feel the plague and yet not know the remedy; by little and bylittle they shall fall from their better livelihood, and weak andhelpless shall they grow, and have no might to withstand the evil ofthis tyranny; and then again when the times mend somewhat and they havebut a little more ease, then shall it be to them like the kingdom ofheaven, and they shall have no will to withstand any tyranny, but shallthink themselves happy that they be pinched somewhat less. Alsowhereas thou sayest that there shall be for ever constables andsergeants going to and fro to drive men to work, and that they will notwork save under the lash, thou art wrong and it shall not be so; forthere shall ever be more workers than the masters may set to work, sothat men shall strive eagerly for leave to work; and when one says, Iwill sell my hours at such and such a price, then another will say, andI for so much less; so that never shall the lords lack slaves willingto work, but often the slaves shall lack lords to buy them."

  "Thou tellest marvels indeed," said he; "but how then? if all thechurls work not, shall there not be famine and lack of wares?"

  "Famine enough," said I, "yet not from lack of wares; it shall be cleancontrary. What wilt thou say when I tell thee that in the latter daysthere shall be such traffic and such speedy travel across the seas thatmost wares shall be good cheap, and bread of all things the cheapest?"

  Quoth he: "I should say that then there would be better livelihood formen, for in times of plenty it is well; for then men eat that whichtheir own hands have harvested, and need not to spend of theirsubstance in buying of others. Truly, it is well for honest men, butnot so well for forestallers and regraters;[2] but who heeds whatbefalls such foul swine, who filch the money from people's purses, anddo not one hair's turn of work to help them?"

  "Yea, friend," I said, "but in those latter days all power shall be inthe hands of these foul swine, and they shall be the rulers of all;therefore, hearken, for I tell thee that times of plenty shall in thosedays be the times of famine, and all shall pray for the prices of waresto rise, so that the forestallers and regraters may thrive, and thatsome of their well-doing may overflow on to those on whom they live."

  "I am weary of thy riddles," he said. "Yet at least I hope that theremay be fewer and fewer folk in the land; as may well be, if life isthen so foul and wretched."

  "Alas, poor man!" I said; "nor mayst thou imagine how foul and wretchedit may be for many of the folk; and yet I tell thee that men shallincrease and multiply, till where there is one man in the land now,there shall be twenty in those days--yea, in some places ten timestwenty."

  "I have but little heart to ask thee more questions," said he; "andwhen thou answerest, thy words are plain, but the things they tell of Imay scarce understand. But tell me this: in those days will men deemthat so it must be for ever, as great men even now tell us of our ills,or will they think of some remedy?"

  I looked about me. There was but a glimmer of light in the church now,but what there was, was no longer the strange light of the moon, butthe first coming of the kindly day.

  "Yea," said John Ball, "'tis the twilight of the dawn. God and St.Christopher send us a good day!"

  "John Ball," said I, "I have told thee that thy death will bring aboutthat which thy life has striven for: thinkest thou that the thing whichthou strivest for is worth the labour? or dost thou believe in the taleI have told thee of the days to come?"

  He said: "I tell thee once again that I trust thee for a seer; becauseno man could make up such a tale as thou; the things which thou tellestare too wonderful for a minstrel, the tale too grievous. And whereasthou askest as to whether I count my labour lost, I say nay; if so bethat in those latter times (and worser than ours they will be) menshall yet seek a remedy: therefore again I ask thee, is it so that theyshall?"

  "Yea," said I, "and their remedy shall be the same as thine, althoughthe days be different: for if the folk be enthralled, what remedy savethat they be set free? and if they have tried many roads towardsfreedom, and found that they led no-whither, then shall they try yetanother. Yet in the days to come they shall be slothful to try it,because their masters shall be so much mightier than thine, that theyshall not need to show the high hand, and until the days get to theirevilest, men shall be cozened into thinking that it is of their ownfree will that they must needs buy leave to labour by pawning theirlabour that is to be. Moreover, your lords and masters seem verymighty to you, each one of them, and so they are, but they are few; andthe masters of the days to come shall not each one of them seem verymighty to the men of those days, but they shall be very many, and theyshall be of one intent in these matters without knowing it; like as onesees the oars of a galley when the rowers are hidden, that rise andfall as it were with one will."

  "And yet," he said, "shall it not be the same with those that these mendevour? shall not they also have one will?"

  "Friend," I said, "they shall have the will to live, as the wretchedestthing living has: therefore shall they sell themselves that they maylive, as I told thee; and their hard need shall be their lord's easylivelihood, and because of it he shall sleep without fear, since theirneed compelleth them not to loiter by the way to lament with friend orbrother that they are pinched in their servitude, or to devise meansfor ending it. And yet indeed thou sayest it: they also shall have onewill if they but knew it: but for a long while they s
hall have but aglimmer of knowledge of it: yet doubt it not that in the end they shallcome to know it clearly, and then shall they bring about the remedy;and in those days shall it be seen that thou hast not wrought fornothing, because thou hast seen beforehand what the remedy should be,even as those of later days have seen it."

  We both sat silent a little while. The twilight was gaining on thenight, though slowly. I looked at the poppy which I still held in myhand, and bethought me of Will Green, and said:

  "Lo, how the light is spreading: now must I get me back to Will Green'shouse as I promised."

  "Go, then," said he, "if thou wilt. Yet meseems before long he shallcome to us; and then mayst thou sleep among the trees on the greengrass till the sun is high, for the host shall not be on foot veryearly; and sweet it is to sleep in shadow by the sun in the fullmorning when one has been awake and troubled through the night-tide."

  "Yet I will go now," said I; "I bid thee good-night, or rathergood-morrow."

  Therewith I half rose up; but as I did so the will to depart left me asthough I had never had it, and I sat down again, and heard the voice ofJohn Ball, at first as one speaking from far away, but little by littlegrowing nearer and more familiar to me, and as if once more it werecoming from the man himself whom I had got to know.

  [2] Forestaller, one who buys up goods when they are cheap, and soraises the price for his own benefit; forestalls the due and realdemand. Regrater, one who both buys and sells in the same market, orwithin five miles thereof; buys, say a ton of cheese at 10 A.M. andsells it at 5 P.M. a penny a pound dearer without moving from hischair. The word "monopolist" will cover both species of thief.