The Last Wolf by Michael Morpurgo
We decided almost at once – at Miya’s suggestion – that we should find Burnside Farm and finish what we had begun. We would see for ourselves the place where Robbie McLeod had chosen to settle. We would stand by the stream where he had last seen Charlie.
It was autumn and the trees were ablaze with glorious colour just as Robbie had described them. After many days of searching, we discovered Burnside Farm, just outside Reading in Vermont. There’s a modern farmhouse there now, high on the hill, and across the dirt road from it, a newly built milking parlour that flies the Stars and Stripes from its roof. There are Jersey cows grazing in the fields, a few sheep amongst them, and a herd of beautiful Morgan horses galloping through the meadows. We explained ourselves to the old farmer, who stuffed his hands deep in the pockets of his dungarees and spat a great deal. We asked him where the original farmhouse might have been, and whether we might have a look. He directed us back down the hill towards the stream. He’d never heard of Robbie McLeod, he said, and he didn’t seem to be much interested either, not in Robbie McLeod, nor in the old farmstead. There wasn’t much left of it any more, ‘just a bunch of old ruins,’ he said. But before we left him, he did manage to persuade us to buy a couple of bottles of his best maple syrup. ‘Made it myself. Best in Vermont. Best in the whole US of A,’ he told us.
‘Do you still have wolves around here?’ Miya asked him.
‘Never seen one,’ he replied. ‘But I reckon I heard one once, when I was a kid. Too many folks around here these days. They like it wild.You have a good day now, y’hear.’ And with that he sent us on our way.
The farmer was right. We found the place without difficulty. Very little of the old farmhouse remained at all, just a few stone walls, no more than head high anywhere, a fireplace, and a crumbling chimney stack. Mature maple trees grew now within the ruined walls of the old house. There wasn’t much more to see, so we walked down towards the stream, and stood on the spot where we thought Robbie McLeod might last have seen Charlie. We stayed as long as we could, not wanting to leave at all. It was coming on to dusk, when quite by chance, Miya came across the grave, a great slab of slate, now cracked and crooked. Crouching down, she brushed away the leaves. The words were still just legible in the last glow of day.
Here lie Robbie McLeod
and Fiona McLeod beloved father and mother
of Alan
Resting in Peace
We stood over them for a few moments, then left them to their peace and went away.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
As writer-in-residence at Tate Britain recently, I was asked to write a story suggested by one of the pictures in the gallery. I chose a drawing by Henri Gaudier-Breska of a wolf in London Zoo. The inspiration for the story itself came from other sources. Ever since I first read Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson, I have been fascinated and horrified by the story of Bonnie Prince Charlie and his Jacobite rebellion of 1745. I think that’s why I have always wanted to write a story set in these turbulent times.
The opportunity came when a friend of mine told me of an extraordinary discovery he had made way up in the north of Scotland. It seems he came across a stone on which was written: ‘Near this spot was killed the last wolf in Scotland’. I later found out that there at least six other places in Scotland that claim the same thing. What we know for certain is that the last wild wolf did indeed disappear from Scotland either in the 17th or 18th centuries. Wolves were hunted down and wiped out, in much the same way, I thought, as the rebels who fought for Bonnie Prince Charlie against the Redcoats. I called my idea for the story The Last Wolf – it’s not often I find a title before I write the story – did some historical research about the rebellion and its aftermath, and then began to weave my tale.
Some historical background: in 1688, the last of the Stuart kings, James II, was forced off the throne of England. His grandson, Bonnie Prince Charlie, returned to reclaim the throne in 1745. He landed on the remote coast of North-West Scotland where he was greeted enthusiastically by his followers. These supporters of his cause were called ‘Jacobites’ – Jacobus being the Latin for James.
Bonnie Prince Charlie moved down through Scotland gathering an army as he went. He reached Edinburgh where he was fêted for a month as King, and then he moved south into England. But before long his army began to wither away. He got almost as far as Derby, but his army was now in serious disarray and he had to retreat north again to Scotland. Here at Culloden Moor his army of Highlanders and other Jacobite supporters was routed by the Redcoat Hanoverian forces of King George II of England, led by the Duke of Cumberland, or ‘Butcher’ Cumberland. He was known as ‘Butcher’ Cumberland because he sent out his Redcoats to hunt down all the rebels, their sympathizers and their families. Massacring and burning as they went, their cruelty was terrible.
As a result, many Scottish people fled their country, and some took refuge in Canada and in America. At this time both Canada and America were still British colonies, and therefore garrisoned by British Redcoats who defended the territory from the French.
As for Bonnie Prince Charlie, he escaped from Culloden Moor, helped on his way to France by Flora MacDonald – but that’s another story, or another legend.
About the Author
Michael Morpurgo is one of Britain’s best-loved writers for children and has won many prizes, including the Whitbread Prize, the Red House Children’s Book Award and the Blue Peter Book Award. From 2003 to 2005 he was the Children’s Laureate, a role which took him all over the UK to promote literacy and reading, and in 2005 he was named the Booksellers Association Author of the Year. In 2007 he was Writer in Residence at the Savoy Hotel in London.
Also by Michael Morpurgo:
Tom’s Sausage Lion
Illustrated by Michael Foreman
Black Queen
Illustrated by Tony Ross
The Silver Swan
Illustrated by Christian Birmingham
THE LAST WOLF
AN RHCP DIGITAL EBOOK 978 1 409 01229 0
Published in Great Britain by RHCP Digital,
an imprint of Random House Children’s Publishers UK
A Random House Group Company
This ebook edition published 2012
Copyright © Michael Morpurgo, 2003
Illustrations copyright © Michael Foreman, 2003
First Published in Great Britain
Yearling 9780440865070 2003
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Michael Morpurgo, The Last Wolf