Puck of Pook's Hill Trivia Quiz

Answer: By acting out "Midsummer Night's Dream", on Midsummer Eve

"'...what on Human Earth made you act out "Midsummer Night's Dream" three times over, on Midsummer Eve, in the middle of a Ring, and under - right under one of my oldest hills in Old England?'
...
'We - we didn't mean to,' said Una".

As in all the best children's stories, the magic happens quite by accident. The ancient amulet and the enchanted library book come from quite different books altogether, and of course many wonderful things - such as a Psammead and a Neolithic man - have come from quarries, in their time.

Answer: Cuts out a square of turf from the Ring, one for each of them

"'It's an old custom the people had when they bought and sold land. They used to cut out a clod and hand it over to the buyer, and you weren't lawfully seized of your land - it didn't really belong to you - til the other fellow had actually given you a piece of it - like this.'"

The spell the children had inadvertently cast had broken the Hills. However, the People of the Hills are all gone; only Puck is left - the oldest Old Thing in England. Since now he can't let them into the Hills, he instead will show them "something out of the common".

Answer: A sword

Weland had been a fierce god, thousands of years ago. By now, however, ('now' being a bit before the Norman Conquest) he is reduced to plying his trade as a smith at Weland's Ford (Willingford Bridge, to the children). He is obliged to stay until some human being truly wishes him well.

Hugh, who never really was cut out to be a monk, forces an ungrateful farmer to thank Weland, and thanks him himself. Weland makes him a wonderful sword, and lays it at his side in the dormitory where he is sleeping. Then "Weland strode as far as he dared into the Chapel and threw down all his shoeing-tools - his hammer and pincers, and rasps - to show that he had done with them for ever. It sounded like suits of armour falling..." Hugh, along with the other monks, runs in "waving his sword and shouting Saxon battle-cries".
"The Abbot shook his head at first, and then he laughed and said to the novice: 'Son Hugh, it needed no sign from a heathen God to show me that you will never be a monk. Take your sword, and keep your sword, and go with your sword...'"

We hear quite a bit more of this sword, later on.

Answer: Oak, Ash and Thorn

The first time, Puck gives the children leaves to chew, but later he finds more subtle ways to introduce the Oak, Ash and Thorn to enchant their memories.

Answer: Not to set foot in the Great Hall until she summons him there

Richard came over from France with William of Normandy - "...with thirty men-at-arms out of my father's house and a new sword, I set out to conquer England three days after I was made knight. I did not then know that England would conquer me..."

At the end of the battle at Santlache, he stays aside, and comes upon a single Saxon - none other than Hugh, the former novice, whom Richard had known at school in France. They end up back at Hugh's manor, where Aeluva, his sister, swears that if the wounded Hugh dies, so will die Richard. The next day, De Aquila, the Norman lord, sets Richard free and awards him the manor - if he can keep it. Richard is already in love with the proud Lady, and does indeed marry her, in the end.

Answer: Gorillas

I loved this story, though I admit the fight with the gorillas, in reality mild fruit eating apes, is a bit over-the-top.

I loved the Danish ship sailing all the way to Africa.

I loved the Chinese navigator, with his "Evil Spirit" - "a blue bowl with red marks on the rim, and within the bowl, hanging from a fine thread, was a piece of iron no thicker than that grass stem". In that iron lived a spirit which strove to return south to his home "and therefore, look you, the iron needle pointed continually to the South". It was, of course, an early compass, and, as Dan and Sir Richard soon realize when Dan brings out his own compass, a straight needle points both north and south.

I loved the furtive (because "gold changes men, altogether") scuttle back north, with the dried head of a Devil on the prow.

This was exactly the kind of adventure my ten-year-old heart longed for - this is what I'd signed up for, when I learned to read.

Answer: In a hidden well in the walls of De Aquila's castle

"'Have a care,' (De Aquila) said, laughing, 'lest I use it to make myself Pope. Trust me not, but return!'"

Later, it is this very well that they dangle Fulke down, in order to find out the details of his plot. Treason averted, and England saved. It's interesting, at this point, to see that De Aquila, and Richard with him, no longer consider themselves Norman, but English.

Answer: Kept back at his Latin lesson

"'Dan said the plural of 'dominus' was 'dominoes' and when Miss Blake said it wasn't he said he supposed it was 'backgammon' and so he had to write it out twice - for cheek, you know.'"

Parnesius is a young British-born Roman, who is sent up to Hadrian's Wall for his first command, in the waning days of Rome in Britain.

Answer: Taking Heather

Allo, the horse trader, who is a man of some stature among his people, is their friend and guide. A single Roman north of the Wall not under the protection of a Pict, with a sprig of heather worn conspicuously, would be quickly killed, if he did not drown in a bog.

It is while taking Heather with Allo that Parnesius and Pertinax first see the Winged Hats, off the western coast. On this same journey they meet Maximus, on the east coast, and he tells them that they will be Captains on the Wall - a Wall greatly reduced in strength. Maximus needs the troops for his assault on Gaul, in his bid to be Emperor. He asks only that they hold the Picts and Winged Hats out of Britain for three years.

Answer: Parnesius recognizes his medal, and spares his life, as they worship the same god

"'As I stooped, I saw he wore such a medal as I wear.' Parnesius raised his hand to his neck. 'Therefore, when he could speak, I addressed him a certain Question which can only be answered in a certain manner. He answered with the necessary Word...'" Parnesius lets him go, and later the man sends him a necklace, as a token.

This idea comes up again in Kipling's writing, of course, in "The Man Who Would Be King". As an ardent Freemason, Kipling had an attraction to the idea of an ancient brotherhood that stretched across geographical and cultural boundaries.

Answer: A request that they join up, and plunder Britain together

"'I bring an order - a message - from the Winged Hats that you join them with your men, and march South to plunder Britain.'
'It grieves me,' said Pertinax, 'but we are stationed here to stop that thing.'
'If I carry back such an answer they will kill me,' said Allo. 'I always promised the Winged Hats that you would rise when Maximus fell. I - I did not think he could fall.'"

So it comes to a doomed last battle - the Wall with only a third as many men as needed to defend it, and Britain empty of soldiers behind them. "By the end of the second month we were deep in the War as a man is deep in a snowdrift, or in a dream. I think we fought in our sleep. At least I know I have gone on the Wall and come off again remembering nothing between, though my throat was harsh with giving orders, and my sword, I could see, had been used." In the end, Theodosius, the Emperor, sends troops, and the Wall, and Britain, are safe. For a while.

Answer: no

At the height of his powers as an architect and draftsman in Tudor England, Hal is sent back to his home parish by his mentor, to mend the old church. Oddly enough, the local people are less than helpful.

Answer: Cannon

Young Mister Cabot (Sebastian) has been having the same problems as Hal - the cannon he was sent to get forged always seem to have some flaw, or something happens to keep them from delivery. When they put their heads together, they realize the townspeople are together in the plot - the whole district has been engaged in a little gun-running. Sebastian's cannon have been going to the Scottish pirate, Andrew Barton, and waiting out their storage time in old St. Barnabas' church. The "devil" was Ticehurst Will, in a cowhide.

With the help of Sir John and a few of his men, Hal and Sebastian load the cannon and off they go with them - after all, does Sebastian not have an order from the King?

Answer: Pharisees

This story is told in the oast house after hop picking, by Hobden's old friend Tom - or is it? He lets slip enough clues, that the children guess he is really Puck, in disguise.

Answer: Rewards and Fairies

"Puck" was published in 1906, and "Rewards and Fairies" in 1920. As a child, I didn't like the stories in the second book as much - none of them had the sweep of high adventure, the way the tales of Sir Richard or Parnesius did.

I came across "Puck of Pook's Hill" fairly late - I was probably about eleven, and had been reading Kipling for a few years. I'd seen the book in the library, of course, but hadn't thought the title promising, nor the picture on the cover (one of the original H R Millar illustrations). Once I finally took it out, though, I was hooked by about page ten. Re-reading it for this quiz, I see that the "half-understood" quality, which as a child I thought was due to my own ignorance, was deliberately intended by Kipling. He always was a master at the mysterious hint, the flavour of secrets only partly revealed.

This is an uneven book - not every story is wonderful - but even so it's one of the great childhood books. If you know a ten year old who doesn't mind trying something a little different, you could do worse than suggest it.