THE RELUCTANT DRAGON

By Kenneth Grahame

LONG ago—might have been hundreds of years ago—in a cottage half-

way between this village and yonder shoulder of the Downs up there, a
shepherd lived with his wife and their little son. Now the shepherd spent
his days—and at certain times of the year his nights too—up on the wide
ocean-bosom of the Downs, with only the sun and the stars and the sheep
for company, and the friendly chattering world of men and women far
out of sight arid hearing. But his little son, when he wasn’t helping his
father, and often when he was as well, spent much of his time buried in
big volumes that he borrowed from the affable gentry and interested
parsons of the country round about. And his parents were very fond of
him, and rather proud of him too, though they didn’t let on in his hearing,
so he was left to go his own way and read as much as he liked; and instead
of frequently getting a cuff on the side of the head, as might very well
have happened to him, he was treated more or less as an equal by his
parents, who sensibly thought it a very fair division of labour that they
should supply the practical knowledge, and he the book-learning. They
knew that book-learning often came in useful at a pinch, in spite of what
their neighbours said. What the Boy chiefly dabbled in was natural
history and fairy-tales, and he just took them as they came, in a
sandwichy sort of way, without making any distinctions; and really his
course of reading strikes one as rather sensible.
One evening the shepherd, who for some nights past had been
disturbed and preoccupied, and off his usual mental balance, came home
all of a tremble, and, sitting down at the table where his wife and son
were peacefully employed, she with her seam, he in following out the
adventures of the Giant with no Heart in his Body, exclaimed with much
agitation:
‘It’s all up with me, Maria! Never no more can I go up on them there
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Downs, was it ever so!’
‘Now don’t you take on like that,’ said his wife, who was a very sensible
woman: ‘but tell us all about it first, whatever it is as has given you this
shake-up, and then me and you and the son here, between us, we ought
to be able to get to the bottom of it!’
‘It began some nights ago,’ said the shepherd. ‘You know that cave up
there—I never liked it, somehow, and the sheep never liked it neither,
and when sheep don’t like a thing there’s generally some reason for it.
Well, for some time past there’s been faint noises coming from that
cave—noises like heavy sighings, with grunts mixed up in them; and
sometimes snoring, far away down-real snoring, yet somehow not honest
snoring, like you and me o’nights, you know!’

‘I know,’ remarked the Boy, quietly.

‘Of course I was terrible frightened,’ the shepherd went on; ‘yet
somehow I couldn’t keep away. So this very evening, before I come down,
I took a cast round by the cave, quietly. And there— O Lord! there I saw
him at last, as plain as I see you!’

‘Saw who?’ said his wife, beginning to share in her husband’s nervous
terror.

‘Why him, I’m a telling you!’ said the shepherd. ‘He was sticking half-
way out of the cave, and seemed to be enjoying of the cool of the evening
in a poetical sort of way. He was as big as four cart-horses, and all
covered with shiny scales—deep-blue scales at the top of him, shading
off to a tender sort o’ green below. As he breathed, there was that sort
of flicker over his nostrils that you see over our chalk roads on a baking
windless day in summer. He had his chin on his paws, and I should say he
was meditating about things. Oh, yes, a peaceable sort o’ beast enough,
and not ramping or carrying on or doing anything but what was quite right
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and proper. I admit all that. And yet, what am I to do? Scales, you know,
and claws, and a tail for certain, though I didn’t see that end of him—I
ain’t used to ’em, and I don’t hold with ’em, and that’s a fact!’
The Boy, who had apparently been absorbed in his book during his
father’s recital, now closed the volume, yawned, clasped his hands behind
his head, and said sleepily:

‘It’s all right, father. Don’t you worry. It’s only a dragon.’

‘Only a dragon?’ cried his father. ‘What do you mean, sitting there, you
and your dragons? Only a dragon indeed! And what do you know about it?’

"Cos it is, and ’cos I do know,’ replied the Boy, quietly. ‘Look here,
father, you know we’ve each of us got our line. You know about sheep,
and weather, and things; I know about dragons. I always said, you know,
that that cave up there was a dragon-cave. I always said it must have
belonged to a dragon some time, and ought to belong to a dragon now, if
rules count for anything. Well, now you tell me it has got a dragon, and
so that’s all right. I’m not half as much surprised as when you told me it
hadn’t got a dragon. Rules always come right if you wait quietly. Now,
please, just leave this all to me. And I’ll stroll up to-morrow morning—no,
in the morning I can’t, I’ve got a whole heap of things to do—well, perhaps
in the evening, if I’m quite free, I’ll go up and have a talk to him, and
you’ll find it’ll be all right. Only, please, don’t you go worrying round there
without me. You don’t understand ’em a bit, and they’re very sensitive,
you know!’
‘He’s quite right, father,’ said the sensible mother. ‘As he says, dragons
is his line and not ours. He’s wonderful knowing about book-beasts, as
every one allows. And to tell the truth, I’m not half happy in my own
mind, thinking of that poor animal lying alone up there, without a bit o’
hot supper or anyone to change the news with; and maybe we’ll be able

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to do something for him; and if he ain’t quite respectable our Boy’ll find
it out quick enough. He’s got a pleasant sort o’ way with him that makes
everybody tell him everything.

Next day, after he’d had his tea, the Boy strolled up the chalky track
that led to the summit of the Downs; and there, sure enough, he found
the dragon, stretched lazily on the sward in front of his cave. The view
from that point was a magnificent one. To the right and left, the bare
and willowy leagues of Downs; in front, the vale, with its clustered
homesteads, its threads of white roads running through orchards and
well- tilled acreage, and, far away, a hint of grey old cities on the horizon.
A cool breeze played over the surface of the grass and the silver
shoulder of a large moon was showing above distant junipers. No wonder
the dragon seemed in a peaceful and contented mood; indeed, as the Boy
approached he could hear the beast purring with a happy regularity.
‘Well, we live and learn!’ he said to himself. ‘None of my books ever told
me that dragons purred!’
‘Hullo, dragon!’ said the Boy, quietly, when he had got up to him.
The dragon, on hearing the approaching footsteps, made the beginning
of a courteous effort to rise. But when he saw it was a Boy, he set his
eyebrows severely.
‘Now don’t you hit me,’ he said; ‘or bung stones, or squirt water, or
anything. I won’t have it, I tell you!’
‘Not goin’ to hit you,’ said the Boy, wearily, dropping on the grass beside
the beast: ‘and don’t, for goodness’ sake, keep on saying "Don’t"; I hear
so much of it, and it’s monotonous, and makes me tired. I’ve simply looked
in to ask you how you were and all that sort of thing; but if I’m in the
way I can easily clear out. I’ve lots of friends, and no one can say I’m in
the habit of shoving myself in where I’m not wanted!’
‘No, no, don’t go off in a huff,’ said the dragon, hastily; ‘fact is,—I’m as
happy up here as the day’s long; never without an occupation, dear fellow,
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never without an occupation! And yet, between ourselves, it is a trifle
dull at times.’
The Boy bit off a stalk of grass and chewed it. ‘Going to make a long
stay here?’ he asked, politely.
‘Can’t hardly say at present,’ replied the dragon. ‘It seems a nice place
enough—but I’ve only been here a short time, and one must look about
and reflect and consider before settling down. It’s rather a serious
thing, settling down. Besides—now I’m going to tell you something! You’d
never guess it if you tried ever so!—fact is I’m such a confoundedly lazy
beggar!’
‘You surprise me,’ said the Boy, civilly.
‘It’s the sad truth,’ the dragon went on, settling down between his paws
and evidently delighted to have found a listener at last: ‘and I fancy
that’s really how I came to be here. You see all the other fellows were
so active and earnest and all that sort of thing—always rampaging, and
skirmishing, and scouring the desert sands, and pacing the margin of the
sea, and chasing knights all over the place, and devouring damsels, and
going on generally—whereas I liked to get my meals regular and then to
prop my back against a bit of rock and snooze a bit, and wake up and
think of things going on and how they kept going on just the same, you
know! So when it happened I got fairly caught.’
‘When what happened, please?’ asked the Boy.
‘That’s just what I don’t precisely know,’ said the dragon. ‘I suppose
the earth sneezed, or shook itself, or the bottom dropped out of
something. Anyhow there was a shake and a roar and a general stramash,
and I found myself miles away underground and wedged in as tight as
tight. Well, thank goodness, my wants are few, and at any rate I had
peace and quietness and wasn’t always being asked to come along and do
something. And I’ve got such an active mind—always occupied, I assure
you! But time went on, and there was a certain sameness about the life,
and at last I began to think it would be fun to work my way upstairs and
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see what you other fellows were doing. So I scratched and burrowed,
and worked this way and that way and at last I came out through this
cave here. And I like the country, and the view, and the people—what
I’ve seen of ’em—and on the whole I feel inclined to settle down here.’
‘What’s your mind always occupied about?’ asked the Boy. ‘That’s what
I want to know.’
The dragon coloured slightly and looked away. Presently he
said bashfully: ‘Did you ever—just for fun—try to make up
poetry—verses, you know?’
"Course I have,’ said the Boy. ‘Heaps of it. And some of it’s quite good,
I feel sure, only there’s no one here cares about it. Mother’s very kind
and all that, when I read it to her, and so’s father for that matter. But
somehow they don’t seem to—’
‘Exactly,’ cried the dragon; ‘my own case exactly. They don’t seem to,
and you can’t argue with ’em about it. Now you’ve got culture, you have,
I could tell it on you at once, and I should just like your candid opinion
about some little things I threw off lightly, when I was down there. I’m
awfully pleased to have met you, and I’m hoping the other neighbours will
be equally agreeable. There was a very nice old gentleman up here only
last night, but he didn’t seem to want to intrude.’
‘That was my father,’ said the Boy, ‘and he is a nice old gentleman, and
I’ll introduce you some day if you like.’
‘Can’t you two come up here and dine or something to-morrow?’ asked
the dragon, eagerly. ‘Only, of course, if you’ve got nothing better to do,’
he added politely.
‘Thanks awfully,’ said the Boy, ‘but we don’t go out anywhere without
my mother, and, to tell you the truth, I’m afraid she mightn’t quite
approve of you. You see there’s no getting over the hard fact that you’re
a dragon, is there? And when you talk of settling down, and the
neighbours, and so on, I can’t help feeling that you don’t quite realise
your position. You’re an enemy of the human race, you see!’
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 ‘Haven’t got an enemy in the world: said the dragon, cheerfully. ‘Too
lazy to make ’em, to begin with. And if I do read other fellows my poetry,
I’m always ready to listen to theirs!’
‘Oh, dear!’ cried the Boy, ‘I wish you’d try and grasp the situation
properly. When the other people find you out, they’ll come after you with
spears and swords and all sorts of things. You’ll have to be exterminated,
according to their way of looking at it! You’re a scourge, and a pest, and
a baneful monster!’
‘Not a word of truth in it,’ said the dragon, wagging his head solemnly.
‘Character’ll bear the strictest investigation. And now, there’s a little
sonnet-thing I was working on when you appeared on the scene—’
‘Oh, if you won’t be sensible: cried the Boy, getting up, ‘I’m going off
home. No, I can’t stop for sonnets; my mother’s sitting up. I’ll look you
up to-morrow, sometime or other, and do for goodness’ sake try and
realise that you’re a pestilential scourge, or you’ll find yourself in a most
awful fix. Good-night!’
The Boy found it an easy matter to set the mind of his parents at ease
about his new friend. They had always left that branch to him, and they
took his word without a murmur. The shepherd was formally introduced
and many compliments and kind inquiries were exchanged. His wife,
however, though expressing her willingness to do anything she could,—to
mend things, or set the cave to rights, or cook a little something when
the dragon had been pouring over sonnets and forgotten his meals, as
male things will do,—could not be brought to recognise him formally. The
fact that he was a dragon and ‘they didn’t know who he was’ seemed to
count for everything with her. She made no objection, however, to her
little son spending his evenings with the dragon quietly, so long as he was
home by nine o’clock: and many a pleasant night they had, sitting on the
sward, while the dragon told stories of old, old times, when dragons were
quite plentiful and the world was a livelier place than it is now, and life
was full of thrills and jumps and surprises.
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 What the Boy had feared, however, soon came to pass. The most
modest and retiring dragon in the world, if he’s as big as four cart-horses
and covered with blue scales, cannot keep altogether out of the public
view. And so in the village tavern of nights the fact that a real live dragon
sat brooding in the cave on the Downs was naturally a subject for talk.
Though the villagers were extremely frightened, they were rather proud
as well. It was a distinction to have a dragon of your own, and it was felt
to be a feather in the cap of the village. Still, all were agreed that this
sort of thing couldn’t be allowed to go on. The dreadful beast must be
exterminated, the country- side must be freed from this pest, this
terror, this destroying scourge. The fact that not even a hen-roost was
the worse for the dragon’s arrival wasn’t allowed to have anything to do
with it. He was a dragon, and he couldn’t deny it, and if he didn’t choose
to behave as such that was his own lookout. But in spite of much valiant
talk no hero was found willing to take sword and spear and free the
suffering village and win deathless fame; and each night’s heated
discussion always ended in nothing. Meanwhile the dragon, a happy
Bohemian, lolled on the turf, enjoyed the sunsets, told antediluvian
anecdotes to the Boy, and polished his old verses while meditating fresh
ones.

One day the Boy, on walking into the village, found everything wearing a
festal appearance which was not to be accounted for in the calendar.
Carpets and gay- coloured stuffs were hung out of the windows, the
church-bells clamoured noisily, the little street was flower-strewn, and
the whole population jostled each other along either side of it, chattering,
shoving, and ordering each other to stand back. The Boy saw a friend of
his own age in the crowd and hailed him.
‘What’s up?’ he cried. ‘Is it the players, or bears, or a circus,
or what?’ ‘It’s all right,’ his friend hailed back. ‘He’s a-
coming.’
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‘Who’s a-coming?’ demanded the Boy, thrusting into the throng.
‘Why, St George, of course,’ replied his friend. ‘He’s heard tell of our
dragon, and he’s comin’ on purpose to slay the deadly beast, and free us
from his horrid yoke. 0 my! won’t there be a jolly fight!’
Here was news indeed! The Boy felt that he ought to make quite sure for
himself, and he wriggled himself in between the legs of his good-natured
elders, abusing them all the time for their unmannerly habit of shoving.
Once in the front rank, he breathlessly awaited the arrival.
Presently, from the far-away end of the line came the sound of cheering.
Next, the measured tramp of a great war-horse made his heart beat
quicker, and then he found himself cheering with the rest, as, amidst
welcoming shouts, shrill cries of women, uplifting of babies and waving of
handkerchiefs, St George paced slowly up the street. The Boy’s heart
stood still and he breathed with sobs, the beauty and the grace of the
hero were so far beyond anything he had yet seen. His fluted armour was
inlaid with gold, his plumed helmet hung at his saddle-bow, and his thick
fair hair framed a face gracious and gentle beyond expression till you
caught the sternness in his eyes. He drew rein in front of the little inn,
and the villagers crowded round with greetings and thanks and voluble
statements of their wrongs and grievances and oppressions. The Boy
heard the grave gentle voice of the Saint, assuring them that all would
be well now, and that he would stand by them and see them righted and
free them from their foe; then he dismounted and passed through the
doorway and the crowd poured in after him. But the Boy made off up the
hill as fast as he could lay his legs to the ground.
‘It’s all up, dragon!’ he shouted as soon as he was within sight of the
beast. ‘He’s coming! He’s here now! You’ll have to pull yourself together
and do something at last!’ The dragon was licking his scales and rubbing
them with a
bit of house-flannel the Boy’s mother had lent him, till he shone like a
great turquoise. ‘Don’t be violent, Boy,’ he said without looking round.
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‘Sit down and get your breath, and try and remember that the noun
governs the verb, and then perhaps you’ll be good enough to tell me
who’s coming?’
‘That’s right, take it coolly,’ said the Boy. ‘Hope you’ll be half as cool when
I’ve got through with my news. It’s only St George who’s coming, that’s
all; he rode into the village half-an-hour ago. Of course you can lick him—
a great big fellow like you! But I thought I’d warn you, ’cos he’s sure to
be round early, and he’s got the longest, wickedest-looking spear you ever
did see!’ And the boy got up and began to jump round in sheer delight at
the prospect of the battle.
‘0 deary, deary me,’ moaned the dragon; ‘this is too awful. I won’t see him,
and that’s flat. I don’t want to know the fellow at all. I’m sure he’s not
nice. You must tell him to go away at once, please. Say he can write if he
likes, but I can’t give him an interview. I’m not seeing anybody at present.’
‘Now dragon, dragon;’ said the Boy, imploringly, ‘don’t be perverse and
wrongheaded. You’ve got to fight him some time or other, you know, ’cos
he’s St George and you’re the dragon. Better get it over, and then we can
go on with the sonnets. And you ought to consider other people a little,
too. If it’s been dull up here for you, think how dull it’s been for me!’
‘My dear little man,’ said the dragon, solemnly, ‘just understand, once for
all, that I can’t fight and I won’t fight. I’ve never fought in my life, and
I’m not going to begin now, just to give you a Roman holiday. In old days I
always let the other fellows—the earnest fellows—do all the fighting, and
no doubt that’s why I have the pleasure of being here now.’
‘But if you don’t fight he’ll cut your head off!’ gasped the Boy, miserable
at the prospect of losing both his fight and his friend.
‘Oh, I think not,’ said the dragon in his lazy way. ‘You’ll be able to arrange
something. I’ve every confidence in you, you’re such a manager. Just run
down, there’s a dear chap, and make it all right. I leave it entirely to you.’

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