THE WERWOLF IN FRANCE
In no country has the werwolf flourished as in France, where it is known
as the _loup garou_; where it has existed in all parts, in every age,
and where it is even yet to be found in the more remote districts. Hence
one could fill a dozen volumes with the stories, many of them well
authenticated, of French werwolves. As far back as the sixth century we
hear of them infesting the woods and valleys of Brittany and Burgundy,
the Landes, and the mountainous regions of the Cote d'Or and the
Cevennes.
Occasionally a werwolf would break into a convent and make its meal off
the defenceless nuns; occasionally it would select for its repast some
nice fat abbot waddling unsuspectingly home to his monastery.
Not all these werwolves were evilly disposed people; many, on the
contrary, were exceedingly virtuous, and owed their metamorphosis to
the vengeance of witch or wizard. When this was the case their piety
sometimes prevailed to such an extent that not even metamorphosis into
wolfish form could render it ineffective; and there are instances where
werwolves of this type have not only refrained from taking human life,
but have actually gone out of their way to protect it. Of such
instances, well authenticated, probably none would be more remarkable
than those I am about to narrate.
THE CASE OF THE ABBOT GILBERT, OF THE ARC MONASTERY, ON THE BANKS OF THE
LOIRE
Gilbert had been to a village fair, where the good vintage and hot sun
combined had proved so trying that on his way home, through a dense and
lonely forest, he had gone to sleep and been thrown from his horse. In
falling he had bruised and cut himself so prodigiously that the blood
from his wounds attracted to the spot a number of big wild cats. Taken
at a strong disadvantage, and without any weapons to defend himself,
Gilbert would soon have fallen a victim to the ferocity of these savage
creatures had it not been for the opportune arrival of a werwolf. A
desperate battle at once ensued, in which the werwolf eventually gained
the victory, though not without being severely lacerated.
Despite Gilbert's protestations, for he was loath to be seen in such
strange company, the werwolf accompanied him back to the monastery,
where, upon hearing the Abbot's story, it was enthusiastically welcomed
and its wounds attended to. At dawn it was restored to its natural
shape, and the monks, one and all, were startled out of their senses to
find themselves in the presence of a stern and awesome dignitary of the
Church, who immediately began to lecture the Abbot for his unseemly
conduct the previous day, ordering him to undergo such penance as
eventually, robbing him of half his size and all his self-importance,
led to his resignation.
THE CASE OF ROLAND BERTIN
Andre Bonivon, the hero of the other incident, was eminently a man of
war. He commanded a schooner called the "Bonaventure," which was engaged
in harassing the Huguenot settlements along the shores of the Gulf of
Lions, during the reign of Louis XIV. On one of his marauding
expeditions Bonivon sailed up an estuary of the Rhone rather further
than he had intended, and having no pilot on board, ran ashore in the
darkness. A thunderstorm came on; a general panic ensued; and Bonivon
soon found himself struggling in a whirlpool. Powerful swimmer though he
was, he would most certainly have been drowned had not some one come to
his assistance, and, freeing him from the heavy clothes which weighed
him down, dragged him on dry land. The moment Bonivon got on _terra
firma_, sailor-like, he extended his hand to grip that of his rescuer,
when, to his dismay and terror, instead of a hand he grasped a huge
hairy paw.
Convinced that he was in the presence of the Devil, who doubtless highly
approved of the thousand and one atrocities he had perpetrated on the
helpless Huguenots, he threw himself on his knees and implored the
forgiveness of Heaven.
His rescuer waited awhile in grim silence, and then, lifting him gently
to his feet, led him some considerable distance inland till they arrived
at a house on the outskirts of a small town.
Here Bonivon's conductor halted, and, opening the door, signed to the
captain to enter. All within was dark and silent, and the air was
tainted with a sickly, pungent odour that filled Bonivon with the
gravest apprehensions. Dragging him along, Bonivon's guide took him into
a room, and leaving him there for some seconds, reappeared carrying a
lantern. Bonivon now saw for the first time the face of his
conductor--it was that of a werwolf. With a shriek of terror Bonivon
turned to run, but, catching his foot on a mat, fell sprawling on the
floor.
Here he remained sobbing and shaking with fear till he was once more
taken by the werwolf and set gently on his feet.
To Bonivon's surprise a tray full of eatables was standing on the table,
and the werwolf, motioning to him to sit down, signed to him to eat.
Being ravenously hungry, Bonivon "fell to," and, despite his fears--for
being by nature alive to, and, by reason of his calling, forced to guard
against the treachery of his fellow creatures, he more than half
suspected some subtle design underlying this act of kindness--demolished
every particle of food. The meal thus concluded, Bonivon's benefactor
retired, locking the door after him.
No sooner had the sound of his steps in the stone hall ceased than
Bonivon ran to the window, hoping thereby to make his escape. But the
iron bars were too firmly fixed--no matter how hard he pulled, tugged
and wrenched, they remained as immovable as ever. Then his heart began
to palpitate, his hair to bristle up, and his knees to totter; his
thoughts were full of speculations as to how he would be killed and what
it would feel like to be eaten alive. His conscience, too, rising up in
judgment against him, added its own paroxysms of dismay, paroxysms which
were still further augmented by the finding of the dead body of a woman,
nude and horribly mutilated, lying doubled up and partly concealed by a
curtain. Such a discovery could not fail to fill his heart with
unspeakable horror; for he concluded that he himself, unless saved by a
miracle--a favour he could hardly hope for, considering his past
conduct--would undergo the same fate before morning. At a loss to know
what else to do, he sat upon the corner of the table, resting his chin
on the palms of his hands, and engaged in anticipations of the most
frightful nature.
Shortly after dawn he heard the sound of footsteps approaching the room;
the door slowly began to open: a little wider and a little wider, and
then, when Bonivon's heart was on the point of bursting, it suddenly
swung open wide, and the cold, grey dawn falling on the threshold
revealed not a werwolf, but--a human being: a man in the unmistakable
garb of a Huguenot minister!
The reaction was so great that Bonivon rolled off the table and went
into paroxysms of ungovernable laughter.
At length, when he had sobered down, the Huguenot, laying a hand on his
shoulder, said: "Do you know now where you are? Do you recognize this
room? No! Well, I will explain. You are in the house of Roland Bertin,
and the body lying over yonder is that of my wife, whom your crew
barbarously murdered yesterday when they sacked this village. They took
me with them, and it was your intention to have me tortured and then
drowned as soon as you got to sea. Do you know me now?"
Bonivon nodded--he could not have spoken to save his life.
"Bien!" the minister went on. "I am a werwolf--I was bewitched some
years ago by the woman Grenier, Mere Grenier, who lives in the forest at
the back of our village. As soon as it was dark I metamorphosed; then
the ship ran ashore, and every one leaped overboard. I saw you drowning.
I saved you."
The captain again made a fruitless effort to speak, and the Huguenot
continued:--
"Why did I save you?--you, who had been instrumental in murdering my
wife and ruining my home! Why? I do not know! Had I preferred for you a
less pleasant death than drowning, I could have taken you ashore and
killed you. Yet--I did not, because it is not in my nature to destroy
anything. I have never in my life killed an animal, nor, to my
knowledge, an insect; I love all life--animal life and vegetable
life--everything that breathes and grows. Yet I am a Huguenot!--one of
the race you hate and despise and are paid to exterminate. Assassin, I
have spared you. Be not ungenerous. Spare others."
The captain was moved. Still speechless, he seized the minister's hands
and wrung them. And from that hour to the day of his death--which was
not for many years afterwards--the Huguenots had no truer friend than
Andre Bonivon.
WERWOLVES AND WITCHES
Other instances of werwolves of a benignant nature are to be found in
the "Bisclaveret" in Marie de France's poem, composed in 1200 A.D.; and
in the hero of "William and the Werwolf" (translated from the French
about 1350).
To inflict the evil property of werwolfery upon those against whom
they--or some other--bore a grudge was, in the Middle Ages, a method of
revenge frequently resorted to by witches; and countless knights and
ladies were thus victimized. Nor were such practices confined to ancient
times; for as late as the eighteenth century a case of this kind of
witchcraft is reported to have happened in the vicinity of Blois.
In a village some three miles from Blois, on the outskirts of a forest,
dwelt an innkeeper called Antonio Cellini, who, as the name suggests,
was of Italian origin. Antonio had only one child, Beatrice, a very
pretty girl, who at the time of this story was about nineteen years of
age. As might be expected, Beatrice had many admirers; but none were so
passionately attached to her as Herbert Poyer, a handsome youth, and one
Henri Sangfeu, an extremely plain youth. Beatrice--and one can scarcely
blame her for it--preferred Herbert, and with the whole-hearted approval
of her father consented to marry him. Sangfeu was not unnaturally upset;
but, in all probability, he would have eventually resigned himself to
the inevitable, had it not been for a village wag, who in an idle moment
wrote a poem and entitled it
"_Sansfeu the Ugly; or, Love Unrequited._"
The poem, which was illustrated with several clever caricatures of the
unfortunate Henri and contained much caustic wit, took like wildfire in
the village; and Henri, in consequence, had a very bad time. Eventually
it was shown to Beatrice, and it was then that the climax was reached.
Although Henri was present at the moment, unable to restrain herself,
she went into peals of laughter at the drawings, saying over and over
again: "How like him--how very like! His nose to a nicety! It is
certainly correct to style him Sansfeu--for no one could call him
Sansnez!"
Her mirth was infectious; every one joined in; only Henri slunk away,
crimson with rage and mortification. He hated Beatrice now as much as he
had loved her before; and he thirsted only for revenge.
Some distance from the village and in the heart of the forest lived an
old woman known as Mere Maxim, who was said to be a witch, and,
therefore, shunned by every one. All sorts of unsavoury stories were
told of her, and she was held responsible for several outbreaks of
epidemics--hitherto unknown in the neighbourhood--many accidents, and
more than one death.
The spot where she lived was carefully avoided. Those who ventured far
in the forest after nightfall either never came back at all or returned
half imbecile with terror, and afterwards poured out to their affrighted
friends incoherent stories of the strange lights and terrible forms they
had encountered, moving about amid the trees. Up to the present Henri
had been just as scared by these tales as the rest of the villagers; but
so intense was his longing for revenge that he at length resolved to
visit Mere Maxim and solicit her assistance. Choosing a morning when the
sun was shining brightly, he screwed up his courage, and after many bad
scares finally succeeded in reaching her dwelling--or, I might say, her
shanty, for by a more appropriate term than the latter such a
queer-looking untidy habitation could not be described. To his
astonishment Mere Maxim was by no means so unprepossessing as he had
imagined. On the contrary, she was more than passably good-looking, with
black hair, rosy cheeks, and exceedingly white teeth. What he did not
altogether like were her eyes--which, though large and well shaped, had
in them an occasional glitter--and her hands, which, though remarkably
white and slender, had very long and curved nails, that to his mind
suggested all sorts of unpleasant ideas. She was becomingly dressed in
brown--brown woolly garments, with a brown fur cap, brown stockings, and
brown shoes ornamented with very bright silver buckles. Altogether she
was decidedly chic; and if a little incongruous in her surroundings,
such incongruity only made her the more alluring; and as far as Henri
was concerned rather added to her charms.
At all events, he needed no second invitation to seat himself by her
side in the chimney-corner, and his heart thumped as it had never
thumped before when she encouraged him to put his arm round her waist
and kiss her. It was the first time a woman had ever suffered him to
kiss her without violent protestations and avowals of disgust.
"You are not very handsome, it is true," Mere Maxim remarked, "but you
are fat--and I like fat young men," and she pinched his cheeks playfully
and patted his hands. "Are you sure no one knows you have come to see
me?" she asked.
"Certain!" Henri replied; "I haven't confided in a soul; I haven't even
so much as dropped a hint that I intended seeing you."
"That is good!" Mere Maxim said. "Tell no one, otherwise I shall not be
able to help you. Also, on no account let the girl Beatrice think you
bear her animosity. Be civil and friendly to her whenever you meet; then
give her, as a wedding present, this belt and box of bonbons." So
saying, she handed him a beautiful belt composed of the skin of some
wild animal and fastened with a gold buckle, and a box of delicious pink
and white sugarplums. "Do not give her these things till the marriage
eve," she added, "and directly you have given them come and see
me--always observing the greatest secrecy." She then kissed him, and he
went away brimming over with passion for her, and longing feverishly for
the hour to arrive when he could be with her again.
All day and all night he thought of her--of her gay and sparkling
beauty, of her kisses and caresses, and the delightful coolness of her
thin and supple hands. His mad infatuation for her made him oblivious
to the taunts and jeers of the villagers, who seldom saw him without
making ribald allusion to the poem.
"There goes Sansfeu! alias Monsieur Grosnez!" they called out. "Why
don't you cut off your nose for a present to mademoiselle? She would
then have no need to buy a kitchen poker. Ha! ha! ha!" But their coarse
wit fell flat. Henri hardly heard it--all his thoughts, his burning
love, his unquenchable passion, were centred in Mere Maxim: in spirit he
was with her, alone with her, in the innermost recesses of the grim,
silent forest.
The marriage eve came; he handed Beatrice the presents, and ere she had
time to thank him--for the magnificence of the belt rendered her
momentarily speechless--he had flown from the house, and was hurrying as
fast as his legs could carry him to his tryst. The shadows of night were
already on the forest when he entered it; and the silence and solitude
of the place, the indistinct images of the trees, and their dismal
sighing, that seemed to foretell a storm, all combined to disturb his
fancy and raise strange spectres in his imagination. The shrill hooting
of an owl, as it rustled overhead, caused him an unprecedented shock,
and the great rush of blood to his head made him stagger and clutch
hold of the nearest object for support. He had barely recovered from
this alarm when his eyes almost started out of their sockets with fright
as he caught sight of a queer shape gliding silently from tree to tree;
and shortly afterwards he was again terrified--this time by a pale face,
whether of a human being or animal he could not say, peering down at him
from the gnarled and fantastic branches of a gigantic oak. He was now so
frightened that he ran, and queer--indefinably queer footsteps ran after
him, and followed him persistently until he reached the shanty, when he
heard them turn and leap lightly away.
On this occasion, the occurrence of Henri's second visit, Mere Maxim was
more captivating than ever. She was dressed with wonderful effect all in
white. She wore sparkling jewels at her throat and waist, buckles of
burnished gold on her shoes; her teeth flashed like polished ivory, and
her nails like agates. Henri was enraptured. He fell on his knees before
her, he caught her hands and covered them with kisses.
"How nice you look to-day, my sweetheart," she said; "and how fat! It
does my heart good to see you. Come in, and sit close to me, and tell me
how you have fared."
She led him in, and after locking and barring the door, conducted him
to the chimney-corner. And there he lay in her arms. She fondled him;
she pressed her lips on his, and gleefully felt his cheeks and arms. And
after a time, when, intoxicated with the joy of it all, he lay still and
quiet, wishing only to remain like that for eternity, she stooped down,
and, fetching a knot of cord from under the seat, began laughingly to
bind his hands and feet. And at each turn and twist of the rope she
laughed the louder. And when she had finished binding his arms and legs
she made him lie on his back, and lashed him so tightly to the seat
that, had he possessed the strength of six men, he could not have freed
himself.
Then she sat beside him, and moving aside the clothes that covered his
chest and throat, said:--
"By this time Beatrice--pretty Beatrice, vain and sensual Beatrice, the
Beatrice you once loved and admired so much--will have worn the belt,
will have eaten the sweets. She is now a werwolf. Every night at twelve
o'clock she will creep out of bed and glide about the house and village
in search of human prey, some bonny babe, or weak, defenceless woman,
but always some one fat, tender, and juicy--some one like you." And
bending low over him, she bared her teeth, and dug her cruel nails deep
into his flesh. A flame from the wood fire suddenly shot up. It
flickered oddly on the figure of Mere Maxim--so oddly that Henri
received a shock. He realized with an awful thrill that the face into
which he peered was no longer that of a human being; it was--but he
could no longer think--he could only gaze.