THE BOOK OF WERE-WOLVES.
CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTORY.
I SHALL never forget the walk I took one night in Vienne, after having
accomplished the examination of an unknown Druidical relic, the Pierre labie,
at La Rondelle, near Champigni. I had learned of the existence of this cromlech
only on my arrival at Champigni in the afternoon, and I had started to visit
the curiosity without calculating the time it would take me to reach it and to
return. Suffice it to say that I discovered the venerable pile of grey stones
as the sun set, and that I expended the last lights of evening in planning and
sketching. I then turned my face homeward. My
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walk of about ten miles had wearied me, coming at the end of a long
day's posting, and I had lamed myself in scrambling over some stones to the
Gaulish relic.
A small hamlet was at no great distance, and I betook myself thither, in
the hopes of hiring a trap to convey me to the posthouse, but I was
disappointed. Few in the place could speak French, and the priest, when I
applied to him, assured me that he believed there was no better conveyance in
the place than a common charrue with its solid wooden wheels; nor was a riding
horse to be procured. The good man offered to house me for the night; but I was
obliged to decline, as my family intended starting early on the following
morning.
Out spake then the mayor--"Monsieur can never go back to-night
across the flats, because of the--the--" and his voice dropped; "the
loups-garoux."
"He says that he must return!" replied the priest in patois.
"But who will go with him?"
"Ah, ha,! M. le Curé. It is all very well for one of us to
accompany him, but think of the coming back alone!"
"Then two must go with him," said the priest, and you can take
care of each other as you return."
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"Picou tells me that he saw the were-wolf only this day
se'nnight," said a peasant; "he was down by the hedge of his
buckwheat field, and the sun had set, and he was thinking of coming home, when
he heard a rustle on the far side of the hedge. He looked over, and there stood
the wolf as big as a calf against the horizon, its tongue out, and its eyes
glaring like marsh-fires. Mon Dieu! catch me going over the marais to-night.
Why, what could two men do if they were attacked by that wolf-fiend?"
"It is tempting Providence," said one of the elders of the
village;" no man must expect the help of God if he throws himself wilfully
in the way of danger. Is it not so, M. le Curé? I heard you say as much from
the pulpit on the first Sunday in Lent, preaching from the Gospel."
"That is true," observed several, shaking their heads.
"His tongue hanging out, and his eyes glaring like
marsh-fires!" said the confidant of Picou.
"Mon Dieu! if I met the monster, I should run," quoth another.
"I quite believe you, Cortrez; I can answer for it that you
would," said the mayor.
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"As big as a calf," threw in Picou's friend.
"If the loup-garou were only a natural wolf, why then, you
see"--the mayor cleared his throat--"you see we should think nothing
of it; but, M. le Curé, it is a fiend, a worse than fiend, a man-fiend,--a
worse than man-fiend, a man-wolf-fiend."
"But what is the young monsieur to do?" asked the priest,
looking from one to another.
"Never mind," said I, who had been quietly listening to their
patois, which I understood. "Never mind; I will walk back by myself, and
if I meet the loup-garou I will crop his ears and tail, and send them to M. le
Maire with my compliments."
A sigh of relief from the assembly, as they found themselves clear of
the difficulty.
"Il est Anglais," said the mayor, shaking his head, as though
he meant that an Englishman might face the devil with impunity.
A melancholy flat was the marais, looking desolate enough by day, but
now, in the gloaming, tenfold as desolate. The sky was perfectly clear, and of
a soft, blue-grey tinge; illumined by the new moon, a curve of light
approaching its western bed. To the horizon reached a fen, blacked with pools
of stagnant water,
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from which the frogs kept up an incessant trill through the summer
night. Heath and fern covered the ground, but near the water grew dense masses
of flag and bulrush, amongst which the light wind sighed wearily. Here and
there stood a sandy knoll, capped with firs, looking like black splashes
against the grey sky; not a sign of habitation anywhere; the only trace of men
being the white, straight road extending for miles across the fen.
That this district harboured wolves is not improbable, and I confess
that I armed myself with a strong stick at the first clump of trees through
which the road dived.
This was my first introduction to were-wolves, and the circumstance of
finding the superstition still so prevalent, first gave me the idea of
investigating the history and the habits of these mythical creatures.
I must acknowledge that I have been quite unsuccessful in obtaining a
specimen of the animal, but I have found its traces in all directions. And just
as the palæontologist has constructed the labyrinthodon out of its foot-prints
in marl, and one splinter of bone, so may this monograph be complete and
accurate, although I have no chained were-wolf before me which I may sketch and
describe from the life.
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The traces left are indeed numerous enough, and though perhaps like the
dodo or the dinormis, the werewolf may have become extinct in our age, yet he
has left his stamp on classic antiquity, he has trodden deep in Northern snows.
has ridden rough-shod over the mediævals, and has howled amongst Oriental
sepulchres. He belonged to a bad breed, and we are quite content to be freed
from him and his kindred, the vampire and the ghoul. Yet who knows! We may be a
little too hasty in concluding that he is extinct. He may still prowl in
Abyssinian forests, range still over Asiatic steppes, and be found howling
dismally in some padded room of a Hanwell or a Bedlam.
In the following pages I design to investigate the notices of
were-wolves to be found in the ancient writers of classic antiquity, those
contained in the Northern Sagas, and, lastly, the numerous details afforded by
the mediæval authors. In connection with this I shall give a sketch of modern
folklore relating to Lycanthropy.
It will then be seen that under the veil of mythology lies a solid
reality, that a floating superstition holds in solution a positive truth.
This I shall show to be an innate craving for blood implanted in certain
natures, restrained under ordinary
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circumstances, but breaking forth occasionally, accompanied with
hallucination, leading in most cases to cannibalism. I shall then give instances
of persons thus afflicted, who were believed by others, and who believed
themselves, to be transformed into beasts, and who, in the paroxysms of their
madness, committed numerous murders, and devoured their victims.
I shall next give instances of persons suffering from the same passion
for blood, who murdered for the mere gratification of their natural cruelty,
but who were not subject to hallucinations, nor were addicted to cannibalism.
I shall also give instances of persons filled with the same propensities
who murdered and ate their victims, but who were perfectly free from
hallucination.
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