ORPHEUS IN MAYFAIR AND OTHER STORIES AND SKETCHES

BY

MAURICE BARING

TO ETHEL SMYTH

NOTE

Most of the stories and sketches in this book have appeared in the_Morning Post_. One of them was published in the _Westminster Gazette_. I have to thank the editors and proprietors concerned for their kindnessin allowing me to republish them. 

CONTENTS

 Orpheus in Mayfair The Cricket Match The Shadow of a Midnight Jean Francois The Flute of Chang Liang "What is Truth?" A Luncheon-Party Fete Galante The Garland The Spider's Web Edward II. At Berkeley Castle The Island The Man Who Gave Good Advice Russalka The Old Woman Dr. Faust's Last Day The Flute-Player's Story A Chinaman on Oxford Venus The Fire The Conqueror The Ikon The Thief The Star Chun Wa

ORPHEUS IN MAYFAIR

Heraclius Themistocles Margaritis was a professional musician. He was asinger and a composer of songs; he wrote poetry in Romaic, and composedtunes to suit rhymes. But it was not thus that he earned his dailybread, and he was poor, very poor. To earn his livelihood he gavelessons, music lessons during the day, and in the evening lessons inGreek, ancient and modern, to such people (and these were rare) whowished to learn these languages. He was a young man, only twenty-four, and he had married, before he came of age, an Italian girl called Tina. They had come to England in order to make their fortune. They lived inapartments in the Hereford Road, Bayswater. 

They had two children, a little girl and a little boy; they were verymuch in love with each other, as happy as birds, and as poor as churchmice. For Heraclius Themistocles got but few pupils, and although hehad sung in public at one or two concerts, and had not been receivedunfavourably, he failed to obtain engagements to sing in private houses, which was his ambition. He hoped by this means to become well known, andthen to be able to give recitals of his own where he would reveal to theworld those tunes in which he knew the spirit of Hellas breathed. Thewhole desire of his life was to bring back and to give to the worldthe forgotten but undying Song of Greece. In spite of this, the modestadvertisement which was to be found at concert agencies announcing thatMr. Heraclius Themistocles Margaritis was willing to attend eveningparties and to give an exhibition of Greek music, ancient and modern, had as yet met with no response. After he had been a year in Englandthe only steps towards making a fortune were two public performancesat charity matinees, one or two pupils in pianoforte playing, and anoccasional but rare engagement for stray pupils at a school of modernlanguages. 

It was in the middle of the second summer after his arrival that anincident occurred which proved to be the turning point of his career. ALondon hostess was giving a party in honour of a foreign Personage. It had been intimated that some kind of music would be expected. The hostess had neither the means nor the desire to secure for herentertainment stars of the first magnitude, but she gathered togethersome lesser lights--a violinist, a pianist, and a singer of Frenchdrawing-room melodies. On the morning of the day on which her concertwas to be given, the hostess received a telegram from the singer ofFrench drawing-room melodies to say that she had got a bad cold, andcould not possibly sing that night. The hostess was in despair, but amusical friend of hers came to the rescue, and promised to obtain forher an excellent substitute, a man who sang Greek songs. 

* * * * *

When Margaritis received the telegram from Arkwright's Agency thathe was to sing that night at A---- House, he was overjoyed, and couldscarcely believe his eyes. He at once communicated the news to Tina, andthey spent hours in discussing what songs he should sing, who the goodfairy could have been who recommended him, and in building castles inthe air with regard to the result of this engagement. He would becomefamous; they would have enough money to go to Italy for a holiday; hewould give concerts; he would reveal to the modern world the music ofHellas. 

About half-past four in the afternoon Margaritis went out to buyhimself some respectable evening studs from a large emporium in theneighbourhood. When he returned, singing and whistling on the stairs forjoy, he was met by Tina, who to his astonishment was quite pale, and hesaw at a glance that something had happened. 

"They've put me off!" he said. "Or it was a mistake. I knew it was toogood to be true. "

"It's not that, " said Tina, "it's Carlo!" Carlo was their little boy, who was nearly four years old. 

"What?" said Margaritis. 

Tina dragged him into their little sitting-room. "He is ill, " she said, "very ill, and I don't know what's the matter with him. "

Margaritis turned pale. "Let me see him, " he said. "We must get adoctor. "

"The doctor is coming: I went for him at once, " she said. And then theywalked on tiptoe into the bedroom where Carlo was lying in his cot, tossing about, and evidently in a raging fever. Half an hour laterthe doctor came. Margaritis and Tina waited, silent and trembling withanxiety, while he examined the child. At last he came from the bedroomwith a grave face. He said that the child was very seriously ill, butthat if he got through the night he would very probably recover. 

"I must send a telegram, " said Margaritis to Tina. "I cannot possiblygo. " Tina squeezed his hand, and then with a brave smile she went backto the sick-room. 

Margaritis took a telegraph form out of a shabby leather portfolio, satdown before the dining-table on which the cloth had been laid for tea(for the sitting-room was the dining-room also), and wrote out thetelegram. And as he wrote his tears fell on the writing and smudged it. His grief overcame him, and he buried his face in his hands and sobbed. "What the Fates give with one hand, " he thought to himself, "they takeaway with another!" Then he heard himself, he knew not why, invoking thegods of Greece, the ancient gods of Olympus, to help him. And at thatmoment the whole room seemed to be filled with a strange light, andhe saw the wonderful figure of a man with a shining face and eyes thatseemed infinitely sad and at the same time infinitely luminous. Thefigure held a lyre, and said to him in Greek:--

"It is well. All will be well. I will take your place at the concert!"

When the vision had vanished, the half written telegram on his table haddisappeared also. 

* * * * *

The party at A---- House that night was brilliant rather than large. Inone of the drawing-rooms there was a piano, in front of which were sixor seven rows of gilt chairs. The other rooms were filled with shiftinggroups of beautiful women, and men wearing orders and medals. There wasa continuous buzz of conversation, except in the room where the musicwas going on; and even there in the background there was a subduedwhispering. The violinist was playing some elaborate nothings, anddisplaying astounding facility, but the audience did not seem to be muchinterested, for when he stopped, after some faint applause, conversationbroke loose like a torrent. 

"I do hope, " said some one to the lady next him, "that the music will beover soon. One gets wedged in here, one doesn't dare move, and one hadto put up with having one's conversation spoilt and interrupted. "

"It's an extraordinary thing, " answered the lady, "that nobody daresgive a party in London without some kind of entertainment. It _is_ sucha mistake!"

At that moment the fourth and last item on the programme began, whichwas called "Greek Songs by Heraclius Themistocles Margaritis. "

"He certainly looks like a Greek, " said the lady who had been talking;"in fact if his hair was cut he would be quite good-looking. "

"It's not my idea of a Greek, " whispered her neighbour. "He is too fair. I thought Greeks were dark. "

"Hush!" said the lady, and the first song began. It was a strange threadof sound that came upon the ears of the listeners, rather high andpiercing, and the accompaniment (Margaritis accompanied himself) wastwanging and monotonous like the sound of an Indian tom-tom. The samephrase was repeated two or three times over, the melody seemed toconsist of only a very few notes, and to come over and over again withextraordinary persistence. Then the music rose into a high shrill calland ended abruptly. 

"What has happened?" asked the lady. "Has he forgotten the words?"

"I think the song is over, " said the man. "That's one comfort at anyrate. I hate songs which I can't understand. "

But their comments were stopped by the beginning of another song. Thesecond song was soft and very low, and seemed to be almost entirely onone note. It was still shorter than the first one, and ended still moreabruptly. 

"I don't believe he's a Greek at all, " said the man. "His songs are justlike the noise of bagpipes. "

"I daresay he's a Scotch, " said the lady. "Scotchmen are very clever. But I must say his songs are short. "

An indignant "Hush!" from a musician with long hair who was sitting notfar off heralded the beginning of the third song. It began on a highnote, clear and loud, so that the audience was startled, and for amoment or two there was not a whisper to be heard in the drawing-room. Then it died away in a piteous wail like the scream of a sea-bird, andthe high insistent note came back once more, and this process seemedto be repeated several times till the sad scream prevailed, and stoppedsuddenly. A little desultory clapping was heard, but it was instantlysuppressed when the audience became aware that the song was not over. 

"He's going on again, " whispered the man. A low, long note was heardlike the drone of a bee, which went on, sometimes rising and sometimesgetting lower, like a strange throbbing sob; and then once more itceased. The audience hesitated a moment, being not quite certain whetherthe music was really finished or not. Then when they saw Margaritis risefrom the piano, some meagre well-bred applause was heard, and an immensesigh of relief. The people streamed into the other rooms, and theconversation became loud and general. 

The lady who had talked went quickly into the next room to find out whatwas the right thing to say about the music, and if possible to get theopinion of a musician. 

Sir Anthony Holdsworth, who had translated Pindar, was talking to RalphEnderby, who had written a book on "Modern Greek Folk Lore. "

"It hurts me, " said Sir Anthony, "to hear ancient Greek pronounced likethat. It is impossible to distinguish the words; besides which its wrongto pronounce ancient Greek like modern Greek. Did you understand it?"

"No, " said Ralph Enderby, "I did not. If it is modern Greek it wascertainly wrongly pronounced. I think the man must be singing some kindof Asiatic dialect--unless he's a fraud. "

Hard by there was another group discussing the music: Blythe, themusical critic, and Lawson, who had the reputation of being a greatconnoisseur. 

"He's distinctly clever, " Blythe was saying; "the songs are amusing'pastiches' of Eastern folk song. "

"Yes, I think he's clever, " said Lawson, "but there's nothing originalin it, and besides, as I expect you noticed, two of the songs were grossplagiarisms of De Bussy. "

"Clever, but not original, " said the lady to herself. "That's it. " Andtwo hostesses who had overheard this conversation made up their mindsto get Margaritis for their parties, for they scented the fact that hewould ultimately be talked about. But most of the people did not discussthe music at all. 

As soon as the music had stopped, James Reddaway, who was a Member ofParliament, left the house and went home. He was engrossed in politics, and had little time at his disposal for anything else. As soon as he gothome he went up to his wife's bedroom; she had not been able to go tothe party owing to a sudden attack of neuralgia. She asked him to tellher all about it. 

"Well, " he said, "there were the usual people there, and there was somemusic: some violin and piano playing, to which I didn't listen. Afterthat a man sang some Greek songs, and a curious thing happened to me. When it began I felt my head swimming, and then I entirely lost accountof my surroundings. I forgot the party, the drawing-room and the people, and I seemed to be sitting on the rocks of a cliff near a small bay; infront of me was the sea: it was a kind of blue green, but far more blueor at least of quite a different kind of blue than any I have seen. Itwas transparent, and the sky above it was like a turquoise. Behindme the cliff merged into a hill which was covered with red and whiteflowers, as bright as a Persian carpet. On the beach in front, a tallman was standing, wading in the water, little bright waves sparklinground his feet. He was tall and dark, and he was spearing a lot oflittle silver fish which were lying on the sand with a small woodentrident; and somewhere behind me a voice was singing. I could not seewhere it came from, but it was wonderfully soft and delicious, and alot of wild bees came swarming over the flowers, and a green lizard cameright up close to me, and the air was burning hot, and there was asmell of thyme and mint in it. And then the song stopped, and I cameto myself, and I was back again in the drawing-room. Then when the manbegan to sing again, I again lost consciousness, and I seemed to be ina dark orchard on a breathless summer night. And somewhere near me therewas a low white house with an opening which might have been a window, shrouded by creepers and growing things. And in it there was a faintlight. And from the house came the sound of a sad love-song; andalthough I had never heard the song before I understood it, and it wasabout the moon and the Pleiads having set, and the hour passing, andthe voice sang, 'But I sleep alone!' And this was repeated over and overagain, and it was the saddest and most beautiful thing I had ever heard. And again it stopped, and I was back again in the drawing-room. Thenwhen the singer began his third song I felt cold all over, and at thesame time half suffocated, as people say they feel when they are nearlydrowning. I realised that I was in a huge, dark, empty space, and roundme and far off in front of me were vague shadowy forms; and in thedistance there was something which looked like two tall thrones, pillared and dim. And on one of the thrones there was the dark form ofa man, and on the other a woman like a queen, pale as marble, and unrealas a ghost, with great grey eyes that shone like moons. In front of themwas another form, and he was singing a song, and the song was so sad andso beautiful that tears rolled down the shadowy cheeks of the ghostsin front of me. And all at once the singer gave a great cry of joy, andsomething white and blinding flashed past me and disappeared, and hewith it. But I remained in the same place with the dark ghosts far offin front of me. And I seemed to be there an eternity till I heard a cryof desperate pain and anguish, and the white form flashed past me oncemore, and vanished, and with it the whole thing, and I was back again inthe drawing-room, and I felt faint and giddy, and could not stay thereany longer. "

THE CRICKET MATCH AN INCIDENT AT A PRIVATE SCHOOL

To Winston Churchill

It was a Saturday afternoon in June. St. James's School was playing acricket match against Chippenfield's. The whole school, which consistedof forty boys, with the exception of the eleven who were playing in thematch, were gathered together near the pavilion on the steep, grassybank which faced the cricket ground. It was a swelteringly hot day. Oneof the masters was scoring in the pavilion; two of the boys sat underthe post and board where the score was recorded in big white figurespainted on the black squares. Most of the boys were sitting on the grassin front of the pavilion. 

St. James's won the toss and went in first. After scoring 5 for thefirst wicket they collapsed; in an hour and five minutes their lastwicket fell. They had only made 27 runs. Fortune was against St. James'sthat day. Hitchens, their captain, in whom the school confidentlytrusted, was caught out in his first over. And Wormald and Bell minor, their two best men, both failed to score. 

Then Chippenfield's went in. St. James's fast bowlers, Blundell andAnderson minor, seemed unable to do anything against the Chippenfield'sbatsmen. The first wicket went down at 70. 

The boys who were looking on grew listless: three of them, Gordon, Smith, and Hart minor, wandered off from the pavilion further up theslope of the hill, where there was a kind of wooden scaffolding raisedfor letting off fireworks on the 5th of November. The headmaster, whowas a fanatical Conservative, used to burn on that anniversary effigiesof Liberal politicians such as Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Chamberlain, who was at that time a Radical; while the boys whose politics wereConservative, and who formed the vast majority, cheered, and kicked theLiberals, of whom there were only eight. 

Smith, Gordon, and Hart minor, three little boys aged about eleven, werein the third division of the school. They were not in the eleven, norhad they any hopes of ever attaining that glory, which conferred theprivilege of wearing white flannel instead of grey flannel trousers, anda white flannel cap with a red Maltese cross on it. To tell the truth, the spectacle of this seemingly endless game, in which they did nothave even the satisfaction of seeing their own side victorious, began toweigh on their spirits. 

They climbed up on to the wooden scaffolding and organised a game oftheir own, an utterly childish game, which consisted of one boy throwingsome dried horse chestnuts from the top of the scaffolding into themouth of the boy at the bottom. They soon became engrossed in theiroccupation, and were thoroughly enjoying themselves, when one of themasters, Mr. Whitehead by name, came towards them with a face likethunder, biting his knuckles, a thing which he did when he was veryangry. 

"Go indoors at once, " he said. "Go up to the third division school-roomand do two hours' work. You can copy out the Greek irregular verbs. "

The boys, taken completely by surprise, but accepting this decree asthey accepted everything else, because it never occurred to themit could be otherwise, trotted off, not very disconsolate, to theschool-room. It was very hot out of doors; it was cool in the thirddivision school-room. 

They got out their steel pens, their double-lined copy books, and beganmechanically copying out the Greek irregular verbs, with which they wereso superficially familiar, and from which they were so fundamentallydivorced. 

"Whitey, " said Gordon, "was in an awful wax!"

"I don't care, " said Smith. "I'd just as soon sit here as look on atthat beastly match. "

"But why, " said Hart, "have we got to do two hours' work?"

"Oh, " said Gordon, "he's just in a wax, that's all. "

And the matter was not further discussed. At six o'clock the boyshad tea. The cricket match had, of course, resulted in a crushing andoverwhelming defeat for St. James's. The rival eleven had been asked totea; there were cherries for tea in their honour. 

When Gordon, Smith, and Hart minor entered the dining-room they at onceperceived that an atmosphere of gloom and menacing storm was overhangingthe school. Their spirits had hitherto been unflagging; they sat next toeach other at the tea-table, but no sooner had they sat down than theywere seized by that terrible, uncomfortable feeling so familiar toschoolboys, that something unpleasant was impending, some crime, someaccusation; some doom, the nature of which they could not guess, was lying in ambush. This was written on the headmaster's face. Theheadmaster sat at a square table in the centre of the dining-room. Theboys sat round on the further side of three tables which formed thethree sides of the square room. 

The meal passed in gloomy silence. Gordon, Smith and Hart began a fitfulconversation, but a message was immediately passed up to them from Mr. Whitehead, who sat at the bottom of one of the tables, to stop talking. At the end of tea the guests filed out of the room. 

The headmaster stood up and rapped on his table with a knife. 

"The whole school, " he said, "will come to the library in ten minutes'time. "

The boys left the dining-room. They began to whisper to one another withbated breath. "What's the matter?" And the boys of the second divisionshook their heads ominously, and pointing to Gordon, Smith, and Hart, said: "You're in for it this time!" The boys of the first division weretoo important to take any notice of the rest of the school, and retiredto the first division school-room in dignified silence. 

Ten minutes later the whole school was assembled in the library, fromwhich one flight of stairs led to the upper storeys. The staircase wasshrouded from view by a dark curtain hanging from a Gothic arch; it wasthrough this curtain that the headmaster used dramatically to appear onimportant occasions, and it was up this staircase that boys guilty ofcardinal offences were led off to corporal punishment. 

The boys waited in breathless silence. Acute suspense was felt by thewhole school, but by none so keenly as by Gordon, Smith, and Hart minor. These three little boys felt perfectly sick with fear of the unknown andthe terror of having in some unknown way made themselves responsible forthe calamity which would perhaps vitally affect the whole school. 

Presently a rustle was heard, and the headmaster swept down thestaircase and through the curtain, robed in the black silk gown of anLL. D. He stood at a high desk which was placed opposite the staircase infront of the boys, who sat, in the order of their divisions, on rows ofchairs. The three assistant masters walked in from a side door, also intheir gowns, and took seats to the right and left of the headmaster'sdesk. There was a breathless silence. 

The headmaster began to speak in grave and icily cold tones; his facewas contracted by a permanent frown. 

"I had thought, " he said, "that there were in this school some boyswho had a notion of gentlemanly behaviour, manly conduct, and commondecency. I see that I was mistaken. The behaviour of certain of youto-day--I will not mention them because of their exceeding shame, butyou will all know whom I mean. . . . " At this moment all the boys turnedround and looked hard at Gordon, Smith, and Hart minor, who blushedscarlet, and whose eyes filled with tears. . . . "The less said aboutthe matter the better, " continued the headmaster, "but I confess that itis difficult for me to understand how any one, however young, can be sohardened and so wanton as to behave in the callous and indecent way inwhich certain of you--I need not mention who--have behaved to-day. Youhave disgraced the school in the eyes of strangers; you have violatedthe laws of hospitality and courtesy; you have shown that in St. James'sthere is not a gleam of patriotism, not a spark of interest in theschool, not a touch of that ordinary common English manliness, thatsense for the interests of the school and the community which makesEnglishmen what they are. The boys who have been most guilty in thismatter have already been punished, and I do not propose to punish themfurther; but I had intended to take the whole school for an expeditionto the New Forest next week. That expedition will be put off: in factit will never take place. Only the eleven shall go, and I trust thatanother time the miserable idlers and loafers who have brought thisshame, this disgrace on the school, who have no self-respect and noself-control, who do not know how to behave like gentlemen, who areidle, vulgar and depraved, will learn by this lesson to mend their waysand to behave better in the future. But I am sorry to say that it isnot only the chief offenders, who, as I have already said, have beenpunished, who are guilty in the matter. Many of the other boys, althoughthey did not descend to the depths of vulgar behaviour reached by theculprits I have mentioned, showed a considerable lack of patriotism bytheir apathy and their lack of attention while the cricket match wasproceeding this afternoon. I can only hope this may be a lesson toyou all; but while I trust the chief offenders will feel speciallyuncomfortable, I wish to impress upon you that you are all, with theexception of the eleven, in a sense guilty. "

With these words the headmaster swept out of the room. 

The boys dispersed in whispering groups. Gordon, Smith, and Hart minor, when they attempted to speak, were met with stony silence; they wereboycotted and cut by the remaining boys. 

Gordon and Smith slept in two adjoining cubicles, and in a thirdadjoining cubicle was an upper division boy called Worthing. That night, after they had gone to bed, Gordon asked Worthing whether, among all theguilty, one just man had not been found. 

"Surely, " he said, "Campbell minor, who put up the score during thecricket match, was attentive right through the game, and wouldn't he beallowed to go to the New Forest with the eleven?"

"No, " said Worthing, "he whistled twice. "

"Oh!" said Gordon, "I didn't know that. Of course, he can't go!"

THE SHADOW OF A MIDNIGHT A GHOST STORY

It was nine o'clock in the evening. Sasha, the maid, had brought in thesamovar and placed it at the head of the long table. Marie Nikolaevna, our hostess, poured out the tea. Her husband was playing Vindt with hisdaughter, the doctor, and his son-in-law in another corner of the room. And Jameson, who had just finished his Russian lesson--he was workingfor the Civil Service examination--was reading the last number of the_Rouskoe Slovo_. 

"Have you found anything interesting, Frantz Frantzovitch?" said MarieNikolaevna to Jameson, as she handed him a glass of tea. 

"Yes, I have, " answered the Englishman, looking up. His eyes had aclear dreaminess about them, which generally belongs only to fanatics orvisionaries, and I had no reason to believe that Jameson, who seemed tobe common sense personified, was either one or the other. "At least, " hecontinued, "it interests me. And it's odd--very odd. "

"What is it?" asked Marie Nikolaevna. 

"Well, to tell you what it is would mean a long story which you wouldn'tbelieve, " said Jameson; "only it's odd--very odd. "

"Tell us the story, " I said. 

"As you won't believe a word of it, " Jameson repeated, "it's not muchuse my telling it. "

We insisted on hearing the story, so Jameson lit a cigarette, andbegan:--

"Two years ago, " he said, "I was at Heidelberg, at the University, and Imade friends with a young fellow called Braun. His parents were German, but he had lived five or six years in America, and he was practically anAmerican. I made his acquaintance by chance at a lecture, when I firstarrived, and he helped me in a number of ways. He was an energetic andkind-hearted fellow, and we became great friends. He was a student, buthe did not belong to any _Korps_ or _Bursenschaft_, he was working hardthen. Afterwards he became an engineer. When the summer _Semester_ cameto an end, we both stayed on at Heidelberg. One day Braun suggested thatwe should go for a walking tour and explore the country. I was onlytoo pleased, and we started. It was glorious weather, and we enjoyedourselves hugely. On the third night after we had started we arrived ata village called Salzheim. It was a picturesque little place, and therewas a curious old church in it with some interesting tombs and relics ofthe Thirty Years War. But the inn where we put up for the night was evenmore picturesque than the church. It had been a convent for nuns, onlythe greater part of it had been burnt, and only a quaint gabled house, and a kind of tower covered with ivy, which I suppose had once been thebelfry, remained. We had an excellent supper and went to bed early. Wehad been given two bedrooms, which were airy and clean, and altogetherwe were satisfied. My bedroom opened into Braun's, which was beyond it, and had no other door of its own. It was a hot night in July, and Braunasked me to leave the door open. I did--we opened both the windows. Braun went to bed and fell asleep almost directly, for very soon I heardhis snores. 

"I had imagined that I was longing for sleep, but no sooner had I gotinto bed than all my sleepiness left me. This was odd, because we hadwalked a good many miles, and it had been a blazing hot day, and up tillthen I had slept like a log the moment I got into bed. I lit a candleand began reading a small volume of Heine I carried with me. I heard theclock strike ten, and then eleven, and still I felt that sleep was outof the question. I said to myself: 'I will read till twelve and then Iwill stop. ' My watch was on a chair by my bedside, and when the clockstruck eleven I noticed that it was five minutes slow, and set it right. I could see the church tower from my window, and every time the clockstruck--and it struck the quarters--the noise boomed through the room. 

"When the clock struck a quarter to twelve I yawned for the first time, and I felt thankful that sleep seemed at last to be coming to me. I leftoff reading, and taking my watch in my hand I waited for midnight tostrike. This quarter of an hour seemed an eternity. At last the handsof my watch showed that it was one minute to twelve. I put out my candleand began counting sixty, waiting for the clock to strike. I had counteda hundred and sixty, and still the clock had not struck. I counted up tofour hundred; then I thought I must have made a mistake. I lit my candleagain, and looked at my watch: it was two minutes past twelve. And stillthe clock had not struck!

"A curious uncomfortable feeling came over me, and I sat up in bedwith my watch in my hand and longed to call Braun, who was peacefullysnoring, but I did not like to. I sat like this till a quarter pasttwelve; the clock struck the quarter as usual. I made up my mind thatthe clock must have struck twelve, and that I must have slept fora minute--at the same time I knew I had not slept--and I put out mycandle. I must have fallen asleep almost directly. 

"The next thing I remember was waking with a start. It seemed to me thatsome one had shut the door between my room and Braun's. I felt forthe matches. The match-box was empty. Up to that moment--I cannot tellwhy--something--an unaccountable dread--had prevented me looking at thedoor. I made an effort and looked. It was shut, and through the cracksand through the keyhole I saw the glimmer of a light. Braun had lit hiscandle. I called him, not very loudly: there was no answer. I calledagain more loudly: there was still no answer. 

"Then I got out of bed and walked to the door. As I went, it was gentlyand slightly opened, just enough to show me a thin streak of light. At that moment I felt that some one was looking at me. Then it wasinstantly shut once more, as softly as it had been opened. There was nota sound to be heard. I walked on tiptoe towards the door, but it seemedto me that I had taken a hundred years to cross the room. And whenat last I reached the door I felt I could not open it. I was simplyparalysed with fear. And still I saw the glimmer through the key-holeand the cracks. 

"Suddenly, as I was standing transfixed with fright in front of thedoor, I heard sounds coming from Braun's room, a shuffle of footsteps, and voices talking low but distinctly in a language I could notunderstand. It was not Italian, Spanish, nor French. The voices grew allat once louder; I heard the noise of a struggle and a cry which endedin a stifled groan, very painful and horrible to hear. Then, whetherI regained my self-control, or whether it was excess of fright whichprompted me, I don't know, but I flew to the door and tried to open it. Some one or something was pressing with all its might against it. ThenI screamed at the top of my voice, and as I screamed I heard the cockcrow. 

"The door gave, and I almost fell into Braun's room. It was quite dark. But Braun was waked by my screams and quietly lit a match. He asked megently what on earth was the matter. The room was empty and everythingwas in its place. Outside the first greyness of dawn was in the sky. 

"I said I had had a nightmare, and asked him if he had not had one aswell; but Braun said he had never slept better in his life. 

"The next day we went on with our walking tour, and when we got back toHeidelberg Braun sailed for America. I never saw him again, althoughwe corresponded frequently, and only last week I had a letter from him, dated Nijni Novgorod, saying he would be at Moscow before the end of themonth. 

"And now I suppose you are all wondering what this can have to do withanything that's in the newspaper. Well, listen, " and he read out thefollowing paragraph from the _Rouskoe Slovo_:--

 "Samara, II, ix. In the centre of the town, in the Hotel --, a band of armed swindlers attacked a German engineer named Braun and demanded money. On his refusal one of the robbers stabbed Braun with a knife. The robbers, taking the money which was on him, amounting to 500 roubles, got away. Braun called for assistance, but died of his wounds in the night. It appears that he had met the swindlers at a restaurant. "

"Since I have been in Russia, " Jameson added, "I have often thought thatI knew what language it was that was talked behind the door that nightin the inn at Salzheim, but now I know it was Russian. "

JEAN FRANCOIS

Jean Francois was a vagabond by nature, a balladmonger by profession. Like many poets in many times, he found that the business of writingverse was more amusing than lucrative; and he was constrained tosupplement the earnings of his pen and his guitar by other and moreprofitable work. He had run away from what had been his home at the ageof seven (he was a foundling, and his adopted father was a shoe-maker), without having learnt a trade. When the necessity arose he decidedto supplement the art of balladmongering by that of stealing. He wasskilful in both arts: he wrote verse, sang ballads, picked pockets (inthe city), and stole horses (in the country) with equal facility andsuccess. Some of his verse has reached posterity, for instance the"Ballads du Paradis Peint, " which he wrote on white vellum, andillustrated himself with illuminations in red, blue and gold, for theDauphin. It ends thus in the English version of a Balliol scholar:--

 Prince, do not let your nose, your Royal nose, Your large Imperial nose get out of joint; Forbear to criticise my perfect prose-- Painting on vellum is my weakest point. 

Again, the _ballade_ of which the "Envoi" runs:--

 Prince, when you light your pipe with radium spills, Especially invented for the King-- Remember this, the worst of human ills: Life without matches is a dismal thing, is, in reality, only a feeble adaptation of his "Priez pour feu le vraitresor de vie. "

But although Jean Francois was not unknown during his lifetime, andalthough, as his verse testifies, he knew his name would live amongthose of the enduring poets after his death, his life was one of roughhardship, brief pleasures, long anxieties, and constant uncertainty. Sometimes for a few days at a time he would live in riotous luxury, but these rare epochs would immediately be succeeded by periods of wantbordering on starvation. Besides which he was nearly always in perilof his life; the shadow of the gallows darkened his merriment, and thethought of the wheel made bitter his joy. Yet in spite of this hazardousand harassing life, in spite of the sharp and sudden transitions in hiscareer, in spite of the menace of doom, the hint of the wheel and thegallows, his fund of joy remained undiminished, and this we see inhis verse, which reflects with equal vividness his alternate moods ofinfinite enjoyment and unmitigated despair. For instance, the only twotriolets which have survived from his "Trente deux Triolets joyeux andtristes" are an example of his twofold temperament. They run thus in theliteral and exact translations of them made by an eminent official:--

 I wish I was dead, And lay deep in the grave. I've a pain in my head, I wish I was dead. In a coffin of lead-- With the Wise and the Brave-- I wish I was dead, And lay deep in the grave. 

This passionate utterance immediately preceded, in the original text, the following verses in which his buoyant spirits rise once more to thesurface:--

 Thank God I'm alive In the light of the Sun! It's a quarter to five; Thank God I'm alive! Now the hum of the hive Of the world has begun, Thank God I'm alive In the light of the Sun!

A more plaintive, in fact a positively wistful note, which is almostincongruous amongst the definite and sharply defined moods of JeanFrancois, is struck in the sonnet of which only the first line hasreached us: "I wish I had a hundred thousand pounds. " ("Voulentiersserais pauvre avec dix mille escus. ") But in nearly all his verse, whether joyous as in the "Chant de vin et vie, " or gloomy as in the"Ballade des Treize Pendus, " there is a curious recurrent aspirationtowards a warm fire, a sure and plentiful supper, a clean bed, and along, long sleep. Whether Jean Francois moped or made merry, and inspite of the fact that he enjoyed his roving career and would not haveexchanged it for the throne of an Emperor or the money-bags of Croesus, there is no doubt that he experienced the burden of an immense fatigue. He was never quite warm enough; always a little hungry; and never gotas much sleep as he desired. A place where he could sleep his fillrepresented the highest joys of Heaven to him; and he looked forwardto Death as a traveller looks forward to a warm inn where (its terriblethreshold once passed), a man can sleep the clock round. Witness thesonnet which ends (the translation is mine):--

 For thou has never turned A stranger from thy gates or hast denied, O hospitable Death, a place to rest. 

And it is of his death and not of his life or works which I wish totell, for it was singular. He died on Christmas Eve, 1432. The winterthat year in the north of France was, as is well known, terrible for itssevere cold. The rich stayed at home, the poor died, and the unfortunatethird estate of gipsies, balladmongers, tinkers, tumblers, and thieveshad no chance of displaying their dexterity. In fact, they starved. Eversince the 1st of December Jean Francois had been unable to make a silverpenny either by his song or his sleight of hand. Christmas was drawingnear, and he was starving; and this was especially bitter to him, as itwas his custom (for he was not only a lover of good cheer, but a goodCatholic and a strict observer of fasts and feasts) to keep the greatday of Christendom fittingly. This year he had nothing to keep it with. Luck seemed to be against him; for three days before Christmas he met ina dark side street of the town the rich and stingy Sieur de Ranquet. Hepicked the pocket of that nobleman, but owing to the extreme cold hisfingers faltered, and he was discovered. He ran like a hare and managedeasily enough to outstrip the miser, and to conceal himself in a denwhere he was well known. But unfortunately the matter did not end there. The Sieur de Ranquet was influential at Court; he was implacable as wellas avaricious, and his disposition positively forbade him to forgive anyone who had nearly picked his pocket. Besides which he knew thatJean had often stolen his horses. He made a formal complaint at highquarters, and a warrant was issued against Jean, offering a large sum insilver coin to the man who should bring him, alive or dead, to justice. 

Now the police were keenly anxious to make an end of Jean. They knewhe was guilty of a hundred thefts, but such was his skill that they hadnever been able to convict him; he had often been put in prison, but hehad always been released for want of evidence. This time no mistake waspossible. So Jean, aware of the danger, fled from the city and sought agipsy encampment in a neighbouring forest, where he had friends. Thesegipsy friends of his were robbers, outlaws, murderers and horse-stealersall of them, and hardened criminals; they called themselves gipsies, butit was merely a courtesy title. 

On Christmas Eve--it was snowing hard--Jean was walking through theforest towards the town, ready for a desperate venture, for in thecamp they were starving, and he was sick almost to death of his hunted, miserable life. As he plunged through the snow he heard a moan, and hesaw a child sitting at the roots of a tall tree crying. He askedwhat was the matter. The child--it was a little boy about five yearsold--said that it had run away from home because its nurse had beatenit, and had lost its way. 

"Where do you live?" asked Jean. 

"My father is the Sieur de Ranquet, " said the child. 

At that moment Jean heard the shouts of his companions in the distance. 

"I want to go home, " said the little boy quietly. "You must take mehome, " and he put his hand into Jean's hand and looked up at him andsmiled. 

Jean thought for a moment. The boy was richly dressed; he had a largeruby cross hanging from a golden collar worth many hundred gold pieces. Jean knew well what would happen if his gipsy companions came across thechild. They would kill it instantly. 

"All right, " said Jean, "climb on my back. "

The little boy climbed on to his back, and Jean trudged through thesnow. In an hour's time they reached the Sieur de Ranquet's castle; theplace was alive with bustling men and flaring torches, for the Sieur'sheir had been missed. 

The Sieur looked at Jean and recognised him immediately. Jean was apublic character, and especially well known to the Sieur de Ranquet. A few words were whispered. The child was sent to bed, and the archerscivilly lead Jean to his dungeon. Jean was tired and sleepy. He fellasleep at once on the straw. They told him he would have to get up earlythe next morning, in time for a long, cold journey. The gallows, theyadded, would be ready. 

But in the night Jean dreamed a dream: he saw a child in glitteringclothes and with a shining face who came into the dungeon and broke thebars. 

The child said: "I am little St. Nicholas, the children's friend, and Ithink you are tired, so I'm going to take you to a quiet place. "

Jean followed the child, who led him by the hand till they came to anice inn, very high up on the top of huge mountains. There was a blazinglog fire in the room, a clean warm bed, and the windows opened on arange of snowy mountains, bright as diamonds. And the stars twinkled inthe sky like the candles of a Christmas tree. 

"You can go to bed here, " said St. Nicholas, "nobody will disturb you, and when you do wake you will be quite happy and rested. Good-night, Jean. " And he went away. 

* * * * *

The next day in the dawn, when the archers came to fetch Jean, theyfound he was fast asleep. They thought it was almost a pity to wake him, because he looked so happy and contented in his sleep; but when theytried they found it was impossible. 

THE FLUTE OF CHANG LIANG

To P. Kershaw

The village was called Moe-tung. It was on the edge of the big main roadwhich leads from Liao-yang to Ta-shi-chiao. It consisted of a few bakedmud-houses, a dilapidated temple, a wall, a clump of willows, and apond. One of the houses I knew well; in its square open yard, in whichthe rude furniture of toil lay strewn about, I had halted more than oncefor my midday meal, when riding from Liao-yang to the South. I had beenentertained there by the owner of the house, a brawny husbandman and hisfat brown children, and they had given me eggs and Indian corn. Now itwas empty; the house was deserted; the owner, his wife and his children, had all gone, to the city probably, to seek shelter. We occupied thehouse; and the Cossacks at once made a fire with the front door and anyfragments of wood they could find. The house was converted into a stableand a kitchen, and the officers' quarters were established in anothersmaller building across the road, on the edge of a great plain, whichwas bright green with the standing giant millet. 

This smaller cottage had an uncultivated garden in front of it, anda kind of natural summer-house made by the twining of a pumpkin plantwhich spread its broad leaves over some stakes. We lay down to restin this garden. About five miles to the north of us was the town ofLiao-yang; to the east in the distance was a range of pale blue hills, and immediately in front of us to the south, and scarcely a mile off, was the big hill of Sho-shantze. It was five o'clock in the afternoon, and we had been on the move since two o'clock in the morning. TheCossacks brought us tea and pancakes, and presently news came from thetown that the big battle would be fought the next day: the big battle;the real battle, which had been expected for so long and which hadbeen constantly put off. There was a complete stillness everywhere. Theofficers unpacked their valises and their camp-beds. Every one arrangedhis bed and his goods in his chosen place, and it seemed as if we hadmerely begun once more to settle down for a further period of siesta inthe long picnic which had been going on for the last two months. Nobodywas convinced in spite of the authentic news which we had received, thatthe Japanese would attack the next day. 

The sunset faded into a twilight of delicious summer calm. 

From the hills in the east came the noise of a few shots fired bythe batteries there, and a captive balloon soared slowly, like asoap-bubble, into the eastern sky. I walked into the village; hereand there fires were burning, and I was attracted by the sight of thedeserted temple in which the wooden painted gods were grinning, bereftof their priest and of their accustomed dues. I sat down on the mossysteps of the little wooden temple, and somewhere, either from one of theknolls hard by or from one of the houses, came the sound of a flute, orrather of some primitive wooden pipe, which repeated over and over againa monotonous and piercingly sad little tune. I wondered whether it wasone of the soldiers playing, but I decided this could not be the case, as the tune was more eastern than any Russian tune. On the other hand, it seemed strange that any Chinaman should be about. The tune continuedto break the perfect stillness with its iterated sadness, and a vaguerecollection came into my mind of a Chinese legend or poem I had readlong ago in London, about a flute-player called Chang Liang. But I couldnot bring my memory to work; its tired wheels all seemed to be buzzingfeebly in different directions, and my thoughts came like thistledownand seemed to elude all efforts of concentration. And so I capitulatedutterly to my drowsiness, and fell asleep as I sat on the steps of thetemple. 

I thought I had been sleeping for a long time and had woken before thedawn: the earth was misty, although the moon was shining; and I was nolonger in the temple, but back once more at the edge of the plain. "Theymust have fetched me back while I slept, " I thought to myself. But whenI looked round I saw no trace of the officers, nor of the Cossacks, norof the small house and the garden, and, stranger still, the millet hadbeen reaped and the plain was covered with low stubble, and on itwere pitched some curiously-shaped tents, which I saw were guarded bysoldiers. But these soldiers were Chinamen, and yet unlike any ChinamenI had ever seen; for some of them carried halberds, the double-armedhalberds of the period of Charles I. , and others, halberds with acrescent on one side, like those which were used in the days of HenryVII. And I then noticed that a whole multitude of soldiers were lyingasleep on the ground, armed with two-edged swords and bows and arrows. And their clothes seemed unfamiliar and brighter than the clothes whichChinese soldiers wear nowadays. 

As I wondered what all this meant, a note of music came stealing throughthe night, and at first it seemed to be the same tune as I heard in thetemple before I dropped off to sleep; but presently I was sure that thiswas a mistake, for the sound was richer and more mellow, and like thatof a bell, only of an enchanted bell, such as that which is fabled tosound beneath the ocean. And the music seemed to rise and fall, to growclear and full, and just as it was floating nearer and nearer, it diedaway in a sigh: but as it did so the distant hills seemed to catch itand to send it back in the company of a thousand echoes, till the wholenight was filled and trembling with an unearthly chorus. The sleepingsoldiers gradually stirred and sat listening spellbound to the music. And in the eyes of the sentries, who were standing as motionless asbronze statues in front of the tents, I could see the tears glistening. And the whole of the sleeping army awoke from its slumber and listenedto the strange sound. From the tents came men in glittering silks (theGenerals, I supposed) and listened also. The soldiers looked at eachother and said no word. And then all at once, as though obeying somesilent word of command given by some unseen captain, one by one theywalked away over the plain, leaving their tents behind them. They allmarched off into the east, as if they were following the music intothe heart of the hills, and soon, of all that great army which had beengathered together on the plain, not one man was left. Then the musicchanged and seemed to grow different and more familiar, and with astart I became aware that I had been asleep and dreaming, and that I wassitting on the temple steps once more in the twilight, and that not faroff, round a fire, some soldiers were singing. It was a dream, and mysleep could not have been a long one, for it was still twilight and thedarkness had not yet come. 

Fully awake now, I remembered clearly the old legend which had hauntedme, and had taken shape in my dream. It was that of an army which onthe night before the battle had heard the flute of Chang Liang. By hisplaying he had brought before the rude soldiers the far-off scenes oftheir childhood, which they had not looked upon for years--the sightsand sounds of their homes, the faces and the spots which were familiarto them and dear. And they, as they heard this music, and felt thesememories well up in their hearts, were seized with a longing and adesire for home so potent and so imperative that one by one they leftthe battlefield in silence, and when the enemy came at the dawn, theyfound the plain deserted and empty, for in one minute the flute of ChangLiang had stolen the hearts of eight thousand men. 

And I felt certain that I had heard the flute of Chang Liang this nightand that the soldiers had heard it too; for now round a fire a group ofthem were listening to the song of one of their comrades, a man from thesouth, who was singing of the quiet waters of the Don, and of a Cossackwho had come back to his native land after many days and found his truelove wedded to another. I felt it was the flute of Chang Liang which hadprompted the southerner to sing, and without doubt the men saw beforethem the great moon shining over the broad village street in the darkJuly and August nights, and heard the noise of dancing and song and thecheerful rhythmic accompaniment of the concertina. Or (if they came fromthe south) they saw the smiling thatched farms, whitewashed, or paintedin light green distemper, with vines growing on their walls; or again, they felt the smell of the beanfields in June, and saw in their minds'eye the panorama of the melting snows, when at a fairy touch the longwinter is defeated, the meadows are flooded, and the trees seem to floatabout in the shining water like shapes invoked by a wizard. They sawthese things and yearned towards them with all their hearts, here inthis uncouth country where they were to fight a strange people for someunaccountable reason. But Chang Liang had played his flute to them invain. It was in vain that he had tried to lure them back to their homes, and in vain that he had melted their hearts with the memories of theirchildhood. For the battle began at dawn the next morning, and when theenemy attacked they found an army there to meet them; and the battlelasted for two days on this very spot; and many of the men to whom ChangLiang had brought back through his flute the sights and the sounds oftheir childhood, were fated never to hear again those familiar sounds, nor to see the land and the faces which they loved. 

"WHAT IS TRUTH?"

To E. I. Huber

Sitting opposite me in the second-class carriage of the express trainwhich was crawling at a leisurely pace from Moscow to the south was alittle girl who looked as if she were about twelve years old, with hermother. The mother was a large fair-haired person, with a good-naturedexpression. They had a dog with them, and the little girl, whose wholeface twitched every now and then from St. Vitus' dance, got out atnearly every station to buy food for the dog. On the same side of thecarriage, in the opposite corner, another lady (thin, fair, and wearinga pince-nez) was reading the newspaper. She and the mother of the childsoon made friends over the dog. That is to say, the dog made friendswith the strange lady and was reproved by its mistress, and the strangelady said: "Please don't scold him. He is not in the least in my way, and I like dogs. " They then began to talk. 

The large lady was going to the country. She and her daughter had beenordered to go there by the doctor. She had spent six weeks in Moscowunder medical treatment, and they had now been told to finish this curewith a thorough rest in the country air. The thin lady asked her thename of her doctor, and before ascertaining what was the disease inquestion, recommended another doctor who had cured a friend of hers, almost as though by miracle, of heart disease. The large lady seemedinterested and wrote down the direction of the marvellous physician. She was herself suffering, she said, from a nervous illness, and herdaughter had St. Vitus' dance. They were so far quite satisfied withtheir doctor. They talked for some time exclusively about medicalmatters, comparing notes about doctors, diseases, and remedies. The thinlady said she had been cured of all her ills by aspirin and cinnamon. 

In the course of the conversation the stout lady mentioned her husband, who, it turned out, was the head of the gendarmerie in a town inSiberia, not far from Irkutsk. This seemed to interest the thin ladyimmensely. She at once asked what were his political views, and what sheherself thought about politics. 

The large lady seemed to be reluctant to talk politics and evaded thequestions for some time, but after much desultory conversation, whichalways came back to the same point, she said:--

"My husband is a Conservative; they call him a 'Black Hundred, ' but it'smost unfair and untrue, because he is a very good man and very just. He has his own opinions and he is sincere. He does not believe in therevolution or in the revolutionaries. He took the oath to serve theEmperor when everything went quietly and well, and now, although I haveoften begged him to leave the Service, he says it would be very wrongto leave just because it is dangerous. 'I have taken the oath, ' he says, 'and I must keep it. '"

Here she stopped, but after some further questions on the part of thethin lady, she said: "I never had time or leisure to think of thesequestions. I was married when I was sixteen. I have had eight children, and they all died one after the other except this one, who was theeldest. I used to see political exiles and prisoners, and I used tofeel sympathy for them. I used to hear about people being sent here andthere, and sometimes I used to go down on my knees to my husband todo what he could for them, but I never thought about there being anyparticular idea at the back of all this. " Then after a short pause sheadded: "It first dawned on me at Moscow. It was after the big strike, and I was on my way home. I had been staying with some friends in thecountry, and I happened by chance to see the funeral of that man Bauman, the doctor, who was killed. I was very much impressed when I saw thathuge procession go past, all the men singing the funeral march, andI understood that Bauman himself had nothing to do with it. Who caredabout Bauman? But I understood that he was a symbol. I saw that theremust be a big idea which moves all these people to give up everything, to go to prison, to kill, and be killed. I understood this for the firsttime at that funeral. I cried when the crowd went past. I understoodthere was a big idea, a great cause behind it all. Then I went home. 

"There were disorders in Siberia: you know in Siberia we are much freerthan you are. There is only one society. The officials, the politicalpeople, revolutionaries, exiles, everybody, in fact, all meetconstantly. I used to go to political meetings, and to see and talk withthe Liberal and revolutionary leaders. Then I began to be disappointedbecause what had always struck me as unjust was that one man, justbecause he happened to be, say, Ivan Pavlovitch, should be able to ruleover another man who happened to be, say, Ivan Ivanovitch. And nowthat these Republics were being made, it seemed that the same thing wasbeginning all over again--that all the places of authority were beingseized and dealt out amongst another lot of people who were behavingexactly like those who had authority before. The arbitrary authority wasthere just the same, only it had changed hands, and this puzzled me verymuch, and I began to ask myself, 'Where is the truth?'"

"What did your husband think?" asked the thin lady. 

"My husband did not like to talk about these things, " she answered. "Hesays, 'I am in the Service, and I have to serve. It is not my businessto have opinions. '"

"But all those Republics didn't last very long, " rejoined the thin lady. 

"No, " continued the other; "we never had a Republic, and after a timethey arrested the chief agitator, who was the soul of the revolutionarymovement in our town, a wonderful orator. I had heard him speak severaltimes and been carried away. When he was arrested I saw him taken toprison, and he said 'Good-bye' to the people, and bowed to them in thestreet in such an exaggerated theatrical way that I was astonished andfelt uncomfortable. Here, I thought, is a man who can sacrifice himselffor an idea, and who seemed to be thoroughly sincere, and yet he behavestheatrically and poses as if he were not sincere. I felt more puzzledthan ever, and I asked my husband to let me go and see him in prison. Ithought that perhaps after talking to him I could solve the riddle, andfind out once for all who was right and who was wrong. My husband let mego, and I was admitted into his cell. 

"'You know who I am, ' I said, 'since I am here, and I am admittedinside these locked doors?' He nodded. Then I asked him whether I couldbe of any use to him. He said that he had all that he wanted; and likethis the ice was broken, and I asked him presently if he believed inthe whole movement. He said that until the 17th of October, when theManifesto had been issued, he had believed with all his soul in it; butthe events of the last months had caused him to change his mind. He nowthought that the work of his party, and, in fact, the whole movement, which had been going on for over fifty years, had really been in vain. 'We shall have, ' he said, 'to begin again from the very beginning, because the Russian people are not ready for us yet, and probablyanother fifty years will have to go by before they are ready. '

"I left him very much perplexed. He was set free not long afterwards, invirtue of some manifesto, and because there had been no disorders in ourtown and he had not been the cause of any bloodshed. Soon after he cameout of prison my husband met him, and he said to my husband: 'I supposeyou will not shake hands with me?' And my husband replied: 'Becauseour views are different there is no reason why both of us should not behonest men, ' and he shook hands with him. "

The conversation now became a discussion about the various ideals ofvarious people and parties holding different political views. The largelady kept on expressing the puzzled state of mind in which she was. 

The whole conversation, of which I have given a very condensed report, was spread over a long time, and often interrupted. Later they reachedthe subject of political assassination, and the large lady said:--

"About two months after I came home that year, one day when I was outdriving with my daughter in a sledge the revolutionaries fired six shotsat us from revolvers. We were not hit, but one bullet went through thecoachman's cap. Ever since then I have had nervous fits and my daughterhas had St. Vitus' dance. We have to go to Moscow every year to betreated. And it is so difficult. I don't know how to manage. When I amat home I feel as if I ought to go, and when I am away I never have amoment's peace, because I cannot help thinking the whole time that myhusband is in danger. A few weeks after they shot at us I met some ofthe revolutionary party at a meeting, and I asked them why they had shotat myself and my daughter. I could have understood it if they had shotat my husband. But why at us? He said: 'When the wood is cut down, thechips fly about. '[*] And now I don't know what to think about it all. 

 [*] A Russian proverb. 

"Sometimes I think it is all a mistake, and I feel that therevolutionaries are posing and playing a part, and that so soon as theyget the upper hand they will be as bad as what we have now; and thenI say to myself, all the same they are acting in a cause, and it is agreat cause, and they are working for liberty and for the people. And, then, would the people be better off if they had their way? The more Ithink of it the more puzzled I am. Who is right? Is my husband right?Are they right? Is it a great cause? How can they be wrong if they areimprisoned and killed for what they believe? Where is the truth, andwhat is truth?"

A LUNCHEON-PARTY

I

Mrs. Bergmann was a widow. She was American by birth and marriage, andEnglish by education and habits. She was a fair, beautiful woman, withlarge eyes and a white complexion. Her weak point was ambition, andambition with her took the form of luncheon-parties. 

It was one summer afternoon that she was seized with the great idea ofher life. It consisted in giving a luncheon-party which should be moreoriginal and amusing than any other which had ever been given in London. The idea became a mania. It left her no peace. It possessed her likevenom or like madness. She could think of nothing else. She racked herbrains in imagining how it could be done. But the more she was harassedby this aim the further off its realisation appeared to her to be. Atlast it began to weigh upon her. She lost her spirits and her appetite;her friends began to remark with anxiety on the change in her behaviourand in her looks. She herself felt that the situation was intolerable, and that success or suicide lay before her. 

One evening towards the end of June, as she was sitting in her lovelydrawing-room in her house in Mayfair, in front of her tea-table, on which the tea stood untasted, brooding over the question whichunceasingly tormented her, she cried out, half aloud:--

"I'd sell my soul to the devil if he would give me what I wish. "

At that moment the footman entered the room and said there was agentleman downstairs who wished to speak with her. 

"What is his name?" asked Mrs. Bergmann. 

The footman said he had not caught the gentleman's name, and he handedher a card on a tray. 

She took the card. On it was written:--

 MR. NICHOLAS L. SATAN, I, Pandemonium Terrace, BURNING MARLE, HELL. Telephone, No. I Central. 

"Show him up, " said Mrs. Bergmann, quite naturally, as though she hadbeen expecting the visitor. She wondered at her own behaviour, andseemed to herself to be acting inevitably, as one does in dreams. 

Mr. Satan was shown in. He had a professional air about him, but notof the kind that suggests needy or even learned professionalism. He wasdark; his features were sharp and regular, his eyes keen, his complexionpale, his mouth vigorous, and his chin prominent. He was well dressed ina frock coat, black tie, and patent leather boots. He would never havebeen taken for a conjurer or a shop-walker, but he might have been takenfor a slightly depraved Art-photographer who had known better days. Hesat down near the tea-table opposite Mrs. Bergmann, holding his top hat, which had a slight mourning band round it, in his hand. 

"I understand, madam, " he spoke with an even American intonation, "you wish to be supplied with a guest who will make all otherluncheon-parties look, so to speak, like thirty cents. "

"Yes, that is just what I want, " answered Mrs. Bergmann, who continuedto be surprised at herself. 

"Well, I reckon there's no one living who'd suit, " said Mr. Satan, "andI'd better supply you with a celebrity of _a_ former generation. " Hethen took out a small pocket-book from his coat pocket, and quicklyturning over its leaves he asked in a monotonous tone: "Would you like aPhilosopher? Anaxagoras, Aristotle, Aurelius, M. ?"

"Oh! no, " answered Mrs. Bergmann with decision, "they would ruin anyluncheon. "

"A Saint?" suggested Mr. Satan, "Antony, Ditto of Padua, Athanasius, Augustine, Anselm?"

"Good heavens, no, " said Mrs. Bergmann. 

"A Theologian, good arguer?" asked Mr. Satan, "Aquinas, T?"

"No, " interrupted Mrs. Bergmann, "for heaven's sake don't always giveme the A's, or we shall never get on to anything. You'll be offering meAdam and Abel next. "

"I beg your pardon, " said Mr. Satan, "Latimer, Laud--Historic Interest, Church and Politics combined, " he added quickly. 

"I don't want a clergyman, " said Mrs. Bergmann. 

"Artist?" said Mr. Satan, "Andrea del Sarto, Angelo, M. , Apelles?"

"You're going back to the A's, " interrupted Mrs. Bergmann. 

"Bellini, Benvenuto Cellini, Botticelli?" he continued imperturbably. 

"What's the use of them when I can get Sargent every day?" asked Mrs. Bergmann. 

"A man of action, perhaps? Alexander, Bonaparte, Caesar, J. , Cromwell, O. , Hannibal?"

"Too heavy for luncheon, " she answered, "they would do for _dinner_. "

"Plain statesman? Bismarck, Count; Chatham, Lord; Franklin, B;Richelieu, Cardinal. "

"That would make the members of the Cabinet feel uncomfortable, " shesaid. 

"A Monarch? Alfred; beg pardon, he's an A. Richard III. , Peter theGreat, Louis XI. , Nero?"

"No, " said Mrs. Bergmann. "I can't have a Royalty. It would make it toostiff. "

"I have it, " said Mr. Satan, "a highwayman: Dick Turpin; or ahousebreaker: Jack Sheppard or Charles Peace?"

"Oh! no, " said Mrs. Bergmann, "they might steal the Sevres. "

"A musician? Bach or Beethoven?" he suggested. 

"He's getting into the B's now, " thought Mrs. Bergmann. "No, " she addedaloud, "we should have to ask him to play, and he can't play Wagner, Isuppose, and musicians are so touchy. "

"I think I have it, " said Mr. Satan, "a wit: Dr. Johnson, Sheridan, Sidney Smith?"

"We should probably find their jokes dull _now_, " said Mrs. Bergmann, thoughtfully. 

"Miscellaneous?" inquired Mr. Satan, and turning over several leaves ofhis notebook, he rattled out the following names: "Alcibiades, kindof statesman; Beau Brummel, fop; Cagliostro, conjurer; Robespierre, politician; Charles Stuart, Pretender; Warwick, King-maker; Borgia, A. , Pope; Ditto, C. , toxicologist; Wallenstein, mercenary; Bacon, Roger, man of science; Ditto, F. , dishonest official; Tell, W. , patriot; Jones, Paul, pirate; Lucullus, glutton; Simon Stylites, eccentric; Casanova, loose liver; Casabianca, cabin-boy; Chicot, jester; Sayers, T. , prize-fighter; Cook, Captain, tourist; Nebuchadnezzar, food-faddist;Juan, D. , lover; Froissart, war correspondent; Julian, apostate?"

"Don't you see, " said Mrs. Bergmann, "we must have some one everybodyhas heard of?"

"David Garrick, actor and wit?" suggested Mr. Satan. 

"It's no good having an actor nobody has seen act, " said Mrs. Bergmann. 

"What about a poet?" asked Mr. Satan, "Homer, Virgil, Dante, Byron, Shakespeare?"

"Shakespeare!" she cried out, "the very thing. Everybody has heard ofShakespeare, more or less, and I expect he'd get on with everybody, andwouldn't feel offended if I asked Alfred Austin or some other poet tomeet him. Can you get me Shakespeare?"

"Certainly, " said Mr. Satan, "day and date?"

"It must be Thursday fortnight, " said Mrs. Bergmann. "And what, ah--er--your terms?"

"The usual terms, " he answered. "In return for supernatural servicerendered you during your lifetime, your soul reverts to me at yourdeath. "

Mrs. Bergmann's brain began to work quickly. She was above all things apractical woman, and she immediately felt she was being defrauded. 

"I cannot consent to such terms, " she said. "Surely you recognise thefundamental difference between this proposed contract and those whichyou concluded with others--with Faust, for instance? They sold the fullcontrol of their soul after death on condition of your putting yourselfat their entire disposal during the whole of their lifetime, whereasyou ask me to do the same thing in return for a few hours' service. Theproposal is preposterous. "

Mr. Satan rose from his chair. "In that case, madam, " he said, "I havethe honour to wish you a good afternoon. "

"Stop a moment, " said Mrs. Bergmann, "I don't see why we shouldn'tarrive at a compromise. I am perfectly willing that you should have thecontrol over my soul for a limited number of years--I believe there areprecedents for such a course--let us say a million years. "

"Ten million, " said Mr. Satan, quietly but firmly. 

"In that case, " answered Mrs. Bergmann, "we will take no notice of leapyear, and we will count 365 days in every year. "

"Certainly, " said Mr. Satan, with an expression of somewhat ruffleddignity, "we always allow leap year, but, of course, thirteen years willcount as twelve. "

"Of course, " said Mrs. Bergmann with equal dignity. 

"Then perhaps you will not mind signing the contract at once, " said Mr. Satan, drawing from his pocket a type-written page. 

Mrs. Bergmann walked to the writing-table and took the paper from hishand. 

"Over the stamp, please, " said Mr. Satan. 

"Must I--er--sign it in blood?" asked Mrs. Bergmann, hesitatingly. 

"You can if you like, " said Mr. Satan, "but I prefer red ink; it isquicker and more convenient. "

He handed her a stylograph pen. 

"Must it be witnessed?" she asked. 

"No, " he replied, "these kind of documents don't need a witness. "

In a firm, bold handwriting Mrs. Bergmann signed her name in red inkacross the sixpenny stamp. She half expected to hear a clap of thunderand to see Mr. Satan disappear, but nothing of the kind occurred. Mr. Satan took the document, folded it, placed it in his pocket-book, tookup his hat and gloves, and said:

"Mr. William Shakespeare will call to luncheon on Thursday week. At whathour is the luncheon to be?"

"One-thirty, " said Mrs. Bergmann. 

"He may be a few minutes late, " answered Mr. Satan. "Good afternoon, madam, " and he bowed and withdrew. 

Mrs. Bergmann chuckled to herself when she was alone. "I have donehim, " she thought to herself, "because ten million years in eternityis nothing. He might just as well have said one second as ten millionyears, since anything less than eternity in eternity is nothing. It iscurious how stupid the devil is in spite of all his experience. Now Imust think about my invitations. "

II

The morning of Mrs. Bergmann's luncheon had arrived. She had askedthirteen men and nine women. 

But an hour before luncheon an incident happened which nearly drove Mrs. Bergmann distracted. One of her guests, who was also one of her mostintimate friends, Mrs. Lockton, telephoned to her saying she had quiteforgotten, but she had asked on that day a man to luncheon whom she didnot know, and who had been sent to her by Walford, the famous professor. She ended the message by saying she would bring the stranger with her. 

"What is his name?" asked Mrs. Bergmann, not without intense irritation, meaning to put a veto on the suggestion. 

"His name is----" and at that moment the telephone communication wasinterrupted, and in spite of desperate efforts Mrs. Bergmann was unableto get on to Mrs. Lockton again. She reflected that it was quite uselessfor her to send a message saying that she had no room at her table, because Angela Lockton would probably bring the stranger all the same. Then she further reflected that in the excitement caused by the presenceof Shakespeare it would not really much matter whether there was astranger there or not. A little before half-past one the guests began toarrive. Lord Pantry of Assouan, the famous soldier, was the firstcomer. He was soon followed by Professor Morgan, an authority on Greekliterature; Mr. Peebles, the ex-Prime Minister; Mrs. Hubert Baldwin, theimmensely popular novelist; the fascinating Mrs. Rupert Duncan, who waslending her genius to one of Ibsen's heroines at that moment; MissMedea Tring, one of the latest American beauties; Corporal, theportrait-painter; Richard Giles, critic and man of letters; HerewardBlenheim, a young and rising politician, who before the age of thirtyhad already risen higher than most men of sixty; Sir Horace Silvester, K. C. M. G. , the brilliant financier, with his beautiful wife Lady Irene;Professor Leo Newcastle, the eminent man of science; Lady HyacinthGloucester, and Mrs. Milden, who were well known for their beauty andcharm; Osmond Hall, the paradoxical playwright; Monsieur Faubourg, thepsychological novelist; Count Sciarra, an Italian nobleman, about fiftyyears old, who had written a history of the Popes, and who was nowstaying in London; Lady Herman, the beauty of a former generation, stillextremely handsome; and Willmott, the successful actor-manager. Theywere all assembled in the drawing-room upstairs, talking in knotsand groups, and pervaded by a feeling of pleasurable excitement andexpectation, so much so that conversation was intermittent, and nearlyeverybody was talking about the weather. The Right Hon. John Lockton, the eminent lawyer, was the last guest to arrive. 

"Angela will be here in a moment, " he explained; "she asked me to comeon first. "

Mrs. Bergmann grew restless. It was half-past one, and no Shakespeare. She tried to make her guests talk, with indifferent success. Theexpectation was too great. Everybody was absorbed by the thought of whatwas going to happen next. Ten minutes passed thus, and Mrs. Bergmanngrew more and more anxious. 

At last the bell rang, and soon Mrs. Lockton walked upstairs, leadingwith her a quite insignificant, ordinary-looking, middle-aged, ratherportly man with shiny black hair, bald on the top of his head, and ablank, good-natured expression. 

"I'm so sorry to be so late, Louise, dear, " she said. "Let me introduceMr. ---- to you. " And whether she had forgotten the name or not, Mrs. Bergmann did not know or care at the time, but it was mumbled in sucha manner that it was impossible to catch it. Mrs. Bergmann shook handswith him absent-mindedly, and, looking at the clock, saw that it was tenminutes to two. 

"I have been deceived, " she thought to herself, and anger rose in herbreast like a wave. At the same time she felt the one thing necessarywas not to lose her head, or let anything damp the spirits of herguests. 

"We'll go down to luncheon directly, " she said. "I'm expecting someone else, but he probably won't come till later. " She led the wayand everybody trooped downstairs to the dining-room, feeling thatdisappointment was in store for them. Mrs. Bergmann left the place onher right vacant; she did not dare fill it up, because in her heart ofhearts she felt certain Shakespeare would arrive, and she looked forwardto a _coup de theatre_, which would be quite spoilt if his place wasoccupied. On her left sat Count Sciarra; the unknown friend of AngelaLockton sat at the end of the table next to Willmott. 

The luncheon started haltingly. Angela Lockton's friend was heard sayingin a clear voice that the dust in London was very trying. 

"Have you come from the country?" asked M. Faubourg. "I myself am justreturned from Oxford, where I once more admired your admirable Englishlawns--_vos pelouses seculaires_. "

"Yes, " said the stranger, "I only came up to town to-day, because itseems indeed a waste and a pity to spend the finest time of the year inLondon. "

Count Sciarra, who had not uttered a word since he had entered thehouse, turned to his hostess and asked her whom she considered, afterherself, to be the most beautiful woman in the room, Lady Irene, LadyHyacinth, or Mrs. Milden?

"Mrs. Milden, " he went on, "has the smile of La Gioconda, and hands andhair for Leonardo to paint. Lady Gloucester, " he continued, leavingout the Christian name, "is English, like one of Shakespeare's women, Desdemona or Imogen; and Lady Irene has no nationality, she belongs tothe dream worlds of Shelley and D'Annunzio: she is the guardian Lady ofShelley's 'Sensitiva, ' the vision of the lily. 'Quale un vaso liturgicod'argento. ' And you, madame, you take away all my sense of criticism. 'Vous me troublez trop pour que je definisse votre genre de beaute. '"

Mrs. Milden was soon engaged in a deep tete-a-tete with Mr. Peebles, who was heard every now and then to say, "Quite, quite, " Miss Tring washolding forth to Silvester on French sculpture, and Silvester now andagain said: "Oh! really!" in the tone of intense interest which hisfriends knew indicated that he was being acutely bored. Lady Hyacinthwas discussing Socialism with Osmond Hall, Lady Herman was discussingthe theory of evolution with Professor Newcastle, Mrs. Lockton, the question of the French Church, with Faubourg; and Blenheim wasdischarging molten fragments of embryo exordiums and perorations on thesubject of the stage to Willmott; in fact, there was a general buzz ofconversation. 

"Have you been to see Antony and Cleopatra?" asked Willmott of thestranger. 

"Yes, " said the neighbour, "I went last night; many authors havetreated the subject, and the version I saw last night was very pretty. Icouldn't get a programme so I didn't see who----"

"I think my version, " interrupted Willmott, with pride, "is admitted tobe the best. "

"Ah! it is your version!" said the stranger. "I beg your pardon, I thinkyou treated the subject very well. "

"Yes, " said Willmott, "it is ungrateful material, but I think I madesomething fine of it. "

"No doubt, no doubt, " said the stranger. 

"Do tell us, " Mrs. Baldwin was heard to ask M. Faubourg across thetable, "what the young generation are doing in France? Who are the youngnovelists?"

"There are no young novelists worth mentioning, " answered M. Faubourg. 

Miss Tring broke in and said she considered "Le Visage Emerveille, " bythe Comtesse de Noailles, to be the most beautiful book of the century, with the exception, perhaps, of the "Tagebuch einer Verlorenen. "

But from the end of the table Blenheim's utterance was heardpreponderating over that of his neighbours. He was making a finespeech on the modern stage, comparing an actor-manager to Napoleon, andcommenting on the campaigns of the latter in detail. 

Quite heedless of this Mr. Willmott was carrying on an equallyimpassioned but much slower monologue on his conception of the characterof Cyrano de Bergerac, which he said he intended to produce. "Cyrano, "he said, "has been maligned by Coquelin. Coquelin is a great artist, but he did not understand Cyrano. Cyrano is a dreamer, a poet; he is amartyr of thought like Tolstoi, a sacrifice to wasted, useless action, like Hamlet; he is a Moliere come too soon, a Bayard come too late, aJohn the Baptist of the stage, calling out in vain in the wilderness--ofbricks and mortar; he is misunderstood;--an enigma, an anachronism, apremature herald, a false dawn. "

Count Sciarra was engaged in a third monologue at the head of the table. He was talking at the same time to Mrs. Bergmann, Lady Irene, and LadyHyacinth about the devil. "Ah que j'aime le diable!" he was saying inlow, tender tones. "The devil who creates your beauty to lure us todestruction, the devil who puts honey into the voice of the siren, thedolce sirena--

"Che i marinari in mezzo il mar dismaga"

(and he hummed this line in a sing-song two or three times over)--"thedevil who makes us dream and doubt, and who made life interesting bypersuading Eve to eat the silver apple--what would life have been ifshe had not eaten the apple? We should all be in the silly trees of theGarden of Eden, and I should be sitting next to you" (he said to Mrs. Bergmann), "without knowing that you were beautiful; que vous etes belleet que vous etes desirable; que vous etes puissante et caline, que jefais naufrage dans une mer d'amour--e il naufragio m'e dolce in questomare--en un mot, que je vous aime. "

"Life outside the garden of Eden has many drawbacks, " said Mrs. Bergmann, who, although she was inwardly pleased by Count Sciarra'sremarks, saw by Lady Irene's expression that she thought he was mad. 

"Aucun 'drawback, '" answered Sciarra, "n'egalerait celui de comtemplerles divins contours feminins sans un frisson. Pensez donc si MadameBergmann----"

"Count Sciarra, " interrupted Mrs. Bergmann, terrified of what was comingnext, "do tell me about the book you are writing on Venice. "

Mrs. Lockton was at that moment discussing portraiture in novels with M. Faubourg, and during a pause Miss Tring was heard to make the followingremark: "And is it true M. Faubourg, that 'Cecile' in 'La MauvaiseBonte' is a portrait of some one you once loved and who treated you verybadly?"

M. Faubourg, a little embarrassed, said that a creative artist made acharacter out of many originals. 

Then, seeing that nobody was saying a word to his neighbour, he turnedround and asked him if he had been to the Academy. 

"Yes, " answered the stranger; "it gets worse every year doesn't it?"

"But Mr. Corporal's pictures are always worth seeing, " said Faubourg. 

"I think he paints men better than women, " said the stranger; "hedoesn't flatter people, but of course his pictures are very clever. "

At this moment the attention of the whole table was monopolised byOsmond Hall, who began to discuss the scenario of a new play he waswriting. "My play, " he began, "is going to be called 'The King of theNorth Pole. ' I have never been to the North Pole, and I don't mean togo there. It's not necessary to have first-hand knowledge of technicalsubjects in order to write a play. People say that Shakespeare musthave studied the law, because his allusions to the law are frequent andaccurate. That does not prove that he knew law any more than the factthat he put a sea in Bohemia proves that he did not know geography. It proves he was a dramatist. He wanted a sea in Bohemia. He wantedlawyer's 'shop. ' I should do just the same thing myself. I wrote a playabout doctors, knowing nothing about medicine: I asked a friend to giveme the necessary information. Shakespeare, I expect, asked his friendsto give him the legal information he required. "

Every allusion to Shakespeare was a stab to Mrs. Bergmann. 

"Shakespeare's knowledge of the law is very thorough, " broke in Lockton. 

"Not so thorough as the knowledge of medicine which is revealed in myplay, " said Hall. 

"Shakespeare knew law by intuition, " murmured Willmott, "but he did notguess what the modern stage would make of his plays. "

"Let us hope not, " said Giles. 

"Shakespeare, " said Faubourg, "was a psychologue; he had the power, Icannot say it in English, de deviner ce qu'il ne savait pas en puisantdans le fond et le trefond de son ame. "

"Gammon!" said Hall; "he had the power of asking his friends for theinformation he required. "

"Do you really think, " asked Giles, "that before he wrote 'Time delvesthe parallel on beauty's brow, ' he consulted his lawyer as to a legalmetaphor suitable for a sonnet?"

"And do you think, " asked Mrs. Duncan, "that he asked his femalerelations what it would feel like to be jealous of Octavia if onehappened to be Cleopatra?"

"Shakespeare was a married man, " said Hall, "and if his wife found theMSS. Of his sonnets lying about he must have known a jealous woman. "

"Shakespeare evidently didn't trouble his friends for information onnatural history, not for a playwright, " said Hall. "I myself should notmind what liberty I took with the cuckoo, the bee, or even the basilisk. I should not trouble you for accurate information on the subject; Ishould not even mind saying the cuckoo lays eggs in its own nest if itsuited the dramatic situation. "

The whole of this conversation was torture to Mrs. Bergmann. 

"Shakespeare, " said Lady Hyacinth, "had a universal nature; one can'thelp thinking he was almost like God. "

"That's what people will say of me a hundred years hence, " said Hall;"only it is to be hoped they'll leave out the 'almost. '"

"Shakespeare understood love, " said Lady Herman, in a loud voice; "heknew how a man makes love to a woman. If Richard III. Had made love tome as Shakespeare describes him doing it, I'm not sure that I could haveresisted him. But the finest of all Shakespeare's men is Othello. That'sa real man. Desdemona was a fool. It's not wonderful that Othello didn'tsee through Iago; but Desdemona ought to have seen through him. Thestupidest woman can see through a clever man like him; but, of course, Othello was a fool too. "

"Yes, " broke in Mrs. Lockton, "if Napoleon had married Desdemona hewould have made Iago marry one of his sisters. "

"I think Desdemona is the most pathetic of Shakespeare's heroines, " saidLady Hyacinth; "don't you think so, Mr. Hall?"

"It's easy enough to make a figure pathetic, who is strangled by anigger, " answered Hall. "Now if Desdemona had been a negress Shakespearewould have started fair. "

"If only Shakespeare had lived later, " sighed Willmott, "and understoodthe condition of the modern stage, he would have written quitedifferently. "

"If Shakespeare had lived now he would have written novels, " saidFaubourg. 

"Yes, " said Mrs. Baldwin, "I feel sure you are right there. "

"If Shakespeare had lived now, " said Sciarra to Mrs. Bergmann, "weshouldn't notice his existence; he would be just un monsieur comme toutle monde--like that monsieur sitting next to Faubourg, " he added in alow voice. 

"The problem about Shakespeare, " broke in Hall, "is not how he wrotehis plays. I could teach a poodle to do that in half an hour. But theproblem is--What made him leave off writing just when he was beginningto know how to do it? It is as if I had left off writing plays ten yearsago. "

"Perhaps, " said the stranger, hesitatingly and modestly, "he had madeenough money by writing plays to retire on his earnings and live in thecountry. "

Nobody took any notice of this remark. 

"If Bacon was really the playwright, " said Lockton, "the problem is avery different one. "

"If Bacon had written Shakespeare's plays, " said Silvester, "theywouldn't have been so bad. "

"There seems to me to be only one argument, " said Professor Morgan, "infavour of the Bacon theory, and that is that the range of mind displayedin Shakespeare's plays is so great that it would have been child's playfor the man who wrote Shakespeare's plays to have written the works ofBacon. "

"Yes, " said Hall, "but because it would be child's play for the manwho wrote my plays to have written your works and those of ProfessorNewcastle--which it would--it doesn't prove that you wrote my plays. "

"Bacon was a philosopher, " said Willmott, "and Shakespeare was a poet--adramatic poet; but Shakespeare was also an actor, an actor-manager, andonly an actor-manager could have written the plays. "

"What do you think of the Bacon theory?" asked Faubourg of the stranger. 

"I think, " said the stranger, "that we shall soon have to say eggs andShakespeare instead of eggs and Bacon. "

This remark caused a slight shudder to pass through all the guests, andMrs. Bergmann felt sorry that she had not taken decisive measures toprevent the stranger's intrusion. 

"Shakespeare wrote his own plays, " said Sciarra, "and I don't know if heknew law, but he knew _le coeur de la femme_. Cleopatra bids her slavefind out the colour of Octavia's hair; that is just what my wife, myAngelica, would do if I were to marry some one in London while she wasat Rome. "

"Mr. Gladstone used to say, " broke in Lockton, "that Dante was inferiorto Shakespeare, because he was too great an optimist. "

"Dante was not an optimist, " said Sciarra, "about the future life ofpoliticians. But I think they were both of them pessimists about man andboth optimists about God. "

"Shakespeare, " began Blenheim; but he was interrupted by Mrs. Duncan whocried out:--

"I wish he were alive now and would write me a part, a real woman'spart. The women have so little to do in Shakespeare's plays. There'sJuliet; but one can't play Juliet till one's forty, and then one's tooold to look fourteen. There's Lady Macbeth; but she's got nothing todo except walk in her sleep and say, 'Out, damned spot!' There were notactresses in his days, and of course it was no use writing a woman'spart for a boy. "

"You should have been born in France, " said Faubourg, "Racine's womenare created for you to play. "

"Ah! you've got Sarah, " said Mrs. Duncan, "you don't want anyone else. "

"I think Racine's boring, " said Mrs. Lockton, "he's so artificial. "

"Oh! don't say that, " said Giles, "Racine is the most exquisite ofpoets, so sensitive, so acute, and so harmonious. "

"I like Rostand better, " said Mrs. Lockton. 

"Rostand!" exclaimed Miss Tring, in disgust, "he writes such badverses--du caoutchouc--he's so vulgar. "

"It is true, " said Willmott, "he's an amateur. He has never writtenprofessionally for his bread but only for his pleasure. "

"But in that sense, " said Giles, "God is an amateur. "

"I confess, " said Peebles, "that I cannot appreciate French poetry. I can read Rousseau with pleasure, and Bossuet; but I cannot admireCorneille and Racine. "

"Everybody writes plays now, " said Faubourg, with a sigh. 

"I have never written a play, " said Lord Pantry. 

"Nor I, " said Lockton. 

"But nearly everyone at this table has, " said Faubourg. "Mrs. Baldwinhas written 'Matilda, ' Mr. Giles has written a tragedy called 'QueenSwaflod, ' I wrote a play in my youth, my 'Le Menetrier de Parme';I'm sure Corporal has written a play. Count Sciarra must have writtenseveral; have you ever written a play?" he said, turning to hisneighbour, the stranger. 

"Yes, " answered the stranger, "I once wrote a play called 'Hamlet. '"

"You were courageous with such an original before you, " said Faubourg, severely. 

"Yes, " said the stranger, "the original was very good, but I think, " headded modestly, "that I improved upon it. "

"Encore un faiseur de paradoxes!" murmured Faubourg to himself indisgust. 

In the meantime Willmott was giving Professor Morgan the benefit ofhis views on Greek art, punctuated with allusions to Tariff Reform anddevolution for the benefit of Blenheim. 

Luncheon was over and cigarettes were lighted. Mrs. Bergmann had quitemade up her mind that she had been cheated, and there was only one thingfor which she consoled herself, and that was that she had not waited forluncheon but had gone down immediately, since so far all her guests hadkept up a continuous stream of conversation, which had every now andthen become general, though they still every now and then glanced atthe empty chair and wondered what the coming attraction was going to be. Mrs. Milden had carried on two almost interrupted tete-a-tetes, firstwith one of her neighbours, then with the other. In fact everybody hadtalked, except the stranger, who had hardly spoken, and since Faubourghad turned away from him in disgust, nobody had taken any further noticeof him. 

Mrs. Baldwin, remarking this, good-naturedly leant across the table andasked him if he had come to London for the Wagner cycle. 

"No, " he answered, "I came for the Horse Show at Olympia. "

At this moment Count Sciarra, having finished his third cigarette, turned to his hostess and thanked her for having allowed him to meet themost beautiful women of London in the most beautiful house in London, and in the house of the most beautiful hostess in London. 

"J'ai vu chez vous, " he said, "le lys argente et la rose blanche, maisvous etes la rose ecarlate, la rose d'amour dont le parfum vivra dansmon coeur comme un poison dore (and here he hummed in a sing-song):--

'Io son, cantava, Io son, dolce sirena' Addio, dolce sirena. "

Then he suddenly and abruptly got up, kissed his hostess's handvehemently three times, and said he was very sorry, but he must hastento keep a pressing engagement. He then left the room. 

Mrs. Bergmann got up and said, "Let us go upstairs. " But the men hadmost of them to go, some to the House of Commons, others to fulfilvarious engagements. 

The stranger thanked Mrs. Bergmann for her kind hospitality and left. And the remaining guests, seeing that it was obvious that no furtherattraction was to be expected, now took their leave reluctantly andwent, feeling that they had been cheated. 

Angela Lockton stayed a moment. 

"Who were you expecting, Louise, dear?" she asked. 

"Only an old friend, " said Mrs. Bergmann, "whom you would all havebeen very glad to see. Only as he doesn't want anybody to know he's inLondon, I couldn't tell you all who he was. "

"But tell me now, " said Mrs. Lockton; "you know how discreet I am. "

"I promised not to, dearest Angela, " she answered; "and, by the way, what was the name of the man you brought with you?"

"Didn't I tell you? How stupid of me!" said Mrs. Lockton. "It's a veryeasy name to remember: Shakespeare, William Shakespeare. "

FETE GALANTE

To Cecilia Fisher

"The King said that nobody had ever danced as I danced to-night, " saidColumbine. "He said it was more than dancing, it was magic. "

"It is true, " said Harlequin, "you never danced like that before. "

But Pierrot paid no heed to their remarks, and stared vacantly at thesky. They were sitting on the deserted stage of the grass amphitheatrewhere they had been playing. Behind them were the clumps of cypresstrees which framed a vista of endless wooden garden and formed theirdrop scene. They were sitting immediately beneath the wooden frameworkmade of two upright beams and one horizontal, which formed the primitiveproscenium, and from which little coloured lights had hung during theperformance. The King and Queen and their lords and ladies who hadlooked on at the living puppet show had all left the amphitheatre; theyhad put on their masks and their dominoes, and were now dancing on thelawns, whispering in the alleys and the avenues, or sitting in groupsunder the tall dark trees. Some of them were in boats on the lake, andeverywhere one went, from the dark boscages, came sounds of music, thin, tinkling tunes played on guitars by skilled hands, and the bird-liketwittering and whistling of flageolets. 

"The King said I looked like a moon fairy, " said Columbine to Pierrot. Pierrot only stared in the sky and laughed inanely. "If you persist inslighting me like this, " she whispered in his ear, in a whisper whichwas like a hiss, "I will abandon you for ever. I will give my heart toHarlequin, and you shall never see me again. " But Pierrot continued tostare at the sky, and laughed once more inanely. Then Columbine got up, her eyes flashing with rage; taking Harlequin by the arm she draggedhim swiftly away. They danced across the grass semi-circle of theamphitheatre and up the steps away into the alleys. Pierrot was leftalone with Pantaloon, who was asleep, for he was old and clowningfatigued him. Then Pierrot left the amphitheatre also, and puttinga black mask on his face he joined the revellers who were everywheredancing, whispering, talking, and making music in subdued tones. Hesought out a long lonely avenue, in one side of which there nestled, almost entirely concealed by bushes and undergrowth, a round open Greektemple. Right at the end of the avenue a foaming waterfall splashed downinto a large marble basin, from which a tall fountain rose, white andghostly, and made a sobbing noise. Pierrot went towards the temple, thenhe turned back and walked right into the undergrowth through the bushes, and lay down on the grass, and listened to the singing of the night-jar. The whole garden that night seemed to be sighing and whispering;there was a soft warm wind, and a smell of mown hay in the air, and anintoxicating sweetness came from the bushes of syringa. Columbine andHarlequin also joined the revellers. They passed from group to group, with aimless curiosity, pausing sometimes by the artificial ponds andsometimes by the dainty groups of dancers, whose satin and whose pearlsglimmered faintly in the shifting moonlight, for the night was cloudy. At last they too were tired of the revel, they wandered towards a moresecluded place and made for the avenue which Pierrot had sought. Ontheir way they passed through a narrow grass walk between two rows ofclosely cropped yew hedges. There on a marble seat a tall man in a blackdomino was sitting, his head resting on his hands; and between the loosefolds of his satin cloak, one caught the glint of precious stones. Whenthey had passed him Columbine whispered to Harlequin: "That is the King. I caught sight of his jewelled collar. " They presently found themselvesin the long avenue at the end of which were the waterfall and thefountain. They wandered on till they reached the Greek temple, and theresuddenly Columbine put her finger on her lips. Then she led Harlequinback a little way and took him round through the undergrowth to the backof the temple, and, crouching down in the bushes, bade him look. In themiddle of the temple there was a statue of Eros holding a torch in hishands. Standing close beside the statue were two figures, a man dressedas a Pierrot, and a beautiful lady who wore a grey satin domino. Shehad taken off her mask and pushed back the hood from her hair, which wasencircled by a diadem made of something shining and silvery, and a rayof moonlight fell on her face, which was as delicate as the petal of aflower. Pierrot was masked; he was holding her hand and looking into hereyes, which were turned upwards towards his. 

"It is the Queen!" whispered Columbine to Harlequin. And once moreputting her finger on her lips, she deftly led him by the hand andnoiselessly threaded her way through the bushes and back into theavenue, and without saying a word ran swiftly with him to the placewhere they had seen the King. He was still there, alone, his headresting upon his hands. 

* * * * *

In the temple the Queen was upbraiding her lover for his temerityin having crossed the frontier into the land from which he had beenbanished for ever, and for having dared to appear at the court reveldisguised as Pierrot. "Remember, " she was saying, "the enemies thatsurround us, the dreadful peril, and the doom that awaits us. " And herlover said: "What is doom, and what is death? You whispered to the nightand I heard. You sighed and I am here!" He tore the mask from his face, and the Queen looked at him and smiled. At that moment a rustlewas heard in the undergrowth, and the Queen started back from him, whispering: "We are betrayed! Fly!" And her lover put on his mask anddarted through the undergrowth, following a path which he and no oneelse knew, till he came to an open space where his squire awaited himwith horses, and they galloped away safe from all pursuit. 

Then the King walked into the temple and led the Queen back to thepalace without saying a word; but the whole avenue was full of darkmen bearing torches and armed with swords, who were searching theundergrowth. And presently they found Pierrot who, ignorant of all thathad happened, had been listening all night to the song of the night-jar. He was dragged to the palace and cast into a dungeon, and the Kingwas told. But the revel did not cease, and the dancing and the musiccontinued softly as before. The King sent for Columbine and told her sheshould have speech with Pierrot in his prison, for haply he mighthave something to confess to her. And Columbine was taken to Pierrot'sdungeon, and the King followed her without her knowing it, and concealedhimself behind the door, which he set ajar. 

Columbine upbraided Pierrot and said: "All this was my work. I havealways known that you loved the Queen. And yet for the sake of pastdays, tell me the truth. Was it love or a joke, such as those you loveto play?"

Pierrot laughed inanely. "It was a joke, " he said. "It is my trade tomake jokes. What else can I do?"

"You love the Queen nevertheless, " said Columbine, "of that I am sure, and for that I have had my revenge. "

"It was a joke, " said Pierrot, and he laughed again. 

And though she talked and raved and wept, she could get no other answerfrom him. Then she left him, and the King entered the dungeon. 

"I have heard what you said, " said the King, "but to me you must tellthe truth. I do not believe it was you who met the Queen in the temple;tell me the truth, and your life shall be spared. "

"It was a joke, " said Pierrot, and he laughed. Then the King grew fierceand stormed and threatened. But his rage and threats were in vain! forPierrot only laughed. Then the King appealed to him as man to man andimplored him to tell him the truth; for he would have given his kingdomto believe that it was the real Pierrot who had met the Queen and thatthe adventure had been a joke. Pierrot only repeated what he had said, and laughed and giggled inanely. 

At dawn the prison door was opened and three masked men led Pierrot outthrough the courtyard into the garden. The revellers had gone home, buthere and there lights still twinkled and flickered and a stray note ortwo of music was still heard. Some of the latest of the revellers weregoing home. The dawn was grey and chilly; they led Pierrot through thealleys to the grass amphitheatre, and they hanged him on the horizontalbeam which formed part of the primitive proscenium where he andColumbine had danced so wildly in the night. They hanged him and hiswhite figure dangled from the beam as though he were still dancing;and the new Pierrot, who was appointed the next day, was told that suchwould be the fate of all mummers who went too far, and whose jokes andpranks overstepped the limits of decency and good breeding. 

THE GARLAND

The _Referendarius_ had three junior clerks to carry on the business ofhis department, and they in their turn were assisted by two scribes, whodid most of the copying and kept the records. The work of the Departmentconsisted in filing and annotating the petitions and cases whichwere referred from the lower Courts, through the channel of the_Referendarius_, to the Emperor. 

The three clerks and their two scribes occupied a high marble room inthe spacious office. It was as yet early in April, but, nevertheless, the sun out of doors was almost fierce. The high marble rooms of theoffice were cool and stuffy at the same time, and the spring sunshinewithout, the soft breeze from the sea, the call of the flower-sellers inthe street, and the lazy murmur of the town had, in these shaded, musty, and parchment-smelling halls, diffused an atmosphere of laziness whichinspired the clerks in question with an overwhelming desire to donothing. 

There was, indeed, no pressing work on hand. Only from time to time the_Referendarius_, who occupied a room to himself next door to theirs, would communicate with them through a hole in the wall, demandinginformation on some point or asking to be supplied with certaindocuments. Then the clerks would make a momentary pretence of beingbusy, and ultimately the scribes would find either the documents or theinformation which were required. 

As it was, the clerks were all of them engaged in occupations which wereremote from official work. The eldest of them, Cephalus by name--a manwho was distinguished from the others by a certain refined sobriety bothin his dark dress and in his quiet demeanour--was reading a treatise onalgebra; the second, Theophilus, a musician, whose tunic was as brightas his flaming hair, was mending a small organ; and the third, Rufinus, a rather pale, short-sighted, and untidy youth, was scribbling on atablet. The scribes were busy sorting old records and putting them awayin their permanent places. 

Presently an official strolled in from another department. He was amiddle-aged, corpulent, and cheerful-looking man, dressed in gaudycoloured tissue, on which all manner of strange birds were depicted. Hewas bursting with news. 

"Phocas is going to win, " he said. "It is certain. "

Cephalus looked vaguely up from his book and said: "Oh!"

Theophilus and Rufinus paid no attention to the remark. 

"Well, " continued the new-comer cheerfully, "Who will come to the raceswith me?"

As soon as he heard the word races, Rufinus looked up from hisscribbling. "I will come, " he said, "if I can get leave. "

"I did not know you cared for that sort of thing, " said Cephalus. 

Rufinus blushed and murmured something about going every now and then. He walked out of the room, and sought the _Referendarius_ in the nextroom. This official was reading a document. He did not look up whenRufinus entered, but went on with his reading. At last, after aprolonged interval, he turned round and said: "What is it?"

"May I go to the races?" asked Rufinus. 

"Well, " said the high official, "what about your work?"

"We've finished everything, " said the clerk. 

The Head of the Department assumed an air of mystery and coughed. 

"I don't think I can very well see my way to letting you go, " he said. "I am very sorry, " he added quickly, "and if it depended on me youshould go at once. But He, " he added--he always alluded to the Head ofthe Office as He--"does not like it. He may come in at any moment andfind you gone. No; I'm afraid I can't let you go to-day. Now, if it hadbeen yesterday you could have gone. "

"I should only be away an hour, " said Rufinus, tentatively. 

"He might choose just that hour to come round. If it depended only on meyou should go at once, " and he laughed and slapped Rufinus on the back, jocularly. 

The clerk did not press the point further. 

"You'd better get on with that index, " said the high official as Rufinuswithdrew. 

He told the result of his interview to his sporting friend, who startedout by himself to the Hippodrome. 

Rufinus settled down to his index. But he soon fell into a mood ofabstraction. The races and the games did not interest him in the least. It was something else which attracted him. And, as he sat musing, thevision of the Hippodrome as he had last seen it rose clearly before him. He saw the seaweed-coloured marble; the glistening porticoes, adorned with the masterpieces of Greece, crowded with women in gemmedembroideries and men in white tunics hemmed with broad purple; he sawthe Generals with their barbaric officers--Bulgarians, Persians, Arabs, Slavs--the long line of savage-looking prisoners in their chains, andthe golden breastplates of the standard-bearers. He saw the immense silk_velum_ floating in the azure air over that rippling sea of men, thosehundreds of thousands who swarmed on the marble steps of the Hippodrome. He saw the Emperor in his high-pillared box, on his circular throne ofdull gold, surrounded by slaves fanning him with jewel-coloured plumes, and fenced round with golden swords. 

And opposite him, on the other side of the Stadium, the Empress, mantledin a stiff pontifical robe, laden with heavy embroidered stuffs, her little head framed like a portrait in a square crown of gold anddiamonds, whence chains of emeralds hung down to her breast; motionlessas an idol, impassive as a gilded mummy. 

He saw the crowd of gorgeous women, grouped like Eastern flowers aroundher: he saw one woman. He saw one form as fresh as a lily of the valley, all white amidst that hard metallic splendour; frail as a dewy anemone, slender as the moist narcissus. He saw one face like the chalice of arose, and amidst all those fiery jewels two large eyes as soft as darkviolets. And the sumptuous Court, the plumes, the swords, the standards, the hot, vari-coloured crowd melted away and disappeared, so that whenthe Emperor rose and made the sign of the Cross over his people, firstto the right, and then to the left, and thirdly over the half-circlebehind him, and the singers of Saint Sofia and the Church of the HolyApostles mingled their bass chant with the shrill trebles of the chorusof the Hippodrome, to the sound of silver organs, he thought that thegreat hymn of praise was rising to her and to her alone; and that menhad come from the uttermost parts of the earth to pay homage to her, to sing her praise, to kneel to her--to her, the wondrous, the verybeautiful: peerless, radiant, perfect. 

A voice, followed by a cough, called from the hole in the wall; butRufinus paid no heed, so deeply sunk was he in his vision. 

"Rufinus, the Chief is calling you, " said Cephalus. 

Rufinus started, and hurried to the hole in the wall. The Head of theDepartment gave him a message for an official in another department. 

Rufinus hurried with the message downstairs and delivered it. On his wayback he passed the main portico on the ground floor. He walked out intothe street: it was empty. Everybody was at the games. 

A dark-skinned country girl passed him singing a song about the swallowand the spring. She was bearing a basket full of anemones, violets, narcissi, wild roses, and lilies of the valley. 

"Will you sell me your flowers?" he asked, and he held out a silvercoin. 

"You are welcome to them, " said the girl. "I do not need your money. "

He took the flowers and returned to the room upstairs. The flowersfilled the stuffy place with an unwonted and wonderful fragrance. 

Then he sat down and appeared to be once more busily engrossed in hisindex. But side by side with the index he had a small tablet, and onthis, every now and then, he added or erased a word to a short poem. Thesense of it was something like this:--

 Rhodocleia, flowers of spring I have woven in a ring; Take this wreath, my offering, Rhodocleia. 

 Here's the lily, here the rose Her full chalice shall disclose; Here's narcissus wet with dew, Windflower and the violet blue. Wear the garland I have made; Crowned with it, put pride away; For the wreath that blooms must fade; Thou thyself must fade some day, Rhodocleia. 

THE SPIDER'S WEB

To K. L. 

He heard the bell of the Badia sound hour after hour, and still sleeprefused its solace. He got up and looked through the narrow window. Thesky in the East was soft with that luminous intensity, as of a meltedsapphire, that comes just before the dawn. One large star was shiningnext to the paling moon. He watched the sky as it grew more and moretransparent, and a fresh breeze blew from the hills. It was the secondnight that he had spent without sleeping, but the weariness of his bodywas as nothing compared with the aching emptiness which possessed hisspirit. Only three days ago the world had seemed to him starred andgemmed like the Celestial City--an enchanted kingdom, waiting like asleeping Princess for the kiss of the adventurous conqueror; and now thecolours had faded, the dream had vanished, the sun seemed to be deprivedof his glory, and the summer had lost its sweetness. 

His eye fell upon some papers which were lying loose upon his table. There was an unfinished sonnet which he had begun three days ago. Theoctet was finished and the first two lines of the sestet. He would neverfinish it now. It had no longer any reason to be; for it was a cryto ears which were now deaf, a question, an appeal, which demanded ananswering smile, a consenting echo; and the lips, the only lips whichcould frame that answer, were dumb. He remembered that Casella, themusician, had asked him a week ago for the text of a _canzone_ whichhe had repeated to him one day. He had promised to let him have it. The promise had entirely gone out of his mind. Then he reflected thatbecause the ship of his hopes and dreams had been wrecked there was noreason why he should neglect his obligations to his fellow-travellers onthe uncertain sea. 

He sat down and transcribed by the light of the dawn in his exquisitehandwriting the stanzas which had been the fruit of a brighter day. Andthe memory of this dead joy was exceedingly bitter to him, so that hesat musing for some time on the unutterable sadness which the ghosts ofperished joys bring to man in his misery, and a line of Virgil buzzedin his brain; but not, as of yore, did it afford him the luxury ofcauseless melancholy, but like a cruel finger it touched his open wound. The ancients, he thought, knew how to bear misfortune. 

 Levius fit patientia Quidquid corrigere est nefas. 

As the words occurred to him he thought how much better equipped he wasfor the bitter trial, since had he not the certain hope of another life, and of meeting his beloved in the spaces of endless felicity? Surelythen he should be able to bear his sorrow with as great a fortitude asthe pagan poets, who looked forward to nothing but the dust; to whom thefabled dim country beyond the Styx was a cheerless dream, and to whom aliving dog upon the earth was more worthy of envy than the King of allElysium. He must learn of the ancients. 

The magic of the lemon-coloured dawn had vanished now before the swiftdaylight. Many bells were ringing in the city, and the first signs oflife were stirring in the streets. He searched for a little book, and read of the consolation which Cicero gave to Laelius in the _DeAmicitia_. But he had not read many lines before he closed the book. Hiswound was too fresh for the balm of reason and philosophy. 

"Later, " he thought, "this will strengthen and help me, but notto-day; to-day my wound must bleed and be allowed to bleed, for all thephilosophy in the world cannot lessen the fact that yesterday she wasand to-day she is not. "

He felt a desire to escape from his room, which had been the chapel ofsuch holy prayers, the shrine where so many fervent tapers of hope hadburnt, where so sweet an incense of dream had risen. He left his roomand hurried down the narrow stone stairs into the street. As he leftthe house he turned to his right and walked on till he reached Or SanMichele; there he turned to his right again and walked straight on tillhe reached the churches of Santa Reparata and San Giovanni. He enteredSan Giovanni and said a brief prayer; then he took the nearest street, east of Santa Reparata, to the Porta a ballo, and found himself beyondthe walls of the city. He walked towards Fiesole. 

The glory of the sunrise was still in the sky, the fragrance of thedawning summer (it was the 11th of June) was in the air. He walkedtowards the East. The corn on the hills was green, and pink wild rosesfringed every plot of wheat. The grass was wet with dew. The cityglittered in the plain beneath, clean and fresh in the dazzling air;it seemed a part of the pageant of summer, an unreal piece of imagery, distinct and clear-cut, yet miraculous, like a mirage seen in mid-ocean. "Truly, " he thought, "this is the city of the flower, and the lily isits fitting emblem. "

But while his heart went out towards his native town he felt a sharppang as he remembered that the flower of flowers, the queen of thelilies, had been mowed down by the scythe, and the city which to him hadheretofore been an altar was now a tomb. The lovely Virgilian dirge, Manibus date lilia plenis . . . His saltem accumulem donis et fungar inani Munere, rang in his ears, and he thought that he too must bring a gift andscatter lilies on her grave; handfuls of lilies; but they must beunfading flowers, wet with immortal tears. He pondered on this gift. It must be a gift of song, a temple built in verse. But he was stillunsatisfied. No dirge, however tender and solemn; no elegy, however softand majestic; no song, however piteous, could be a sufficient offeringfor the glorious being who had died in her youth and beauty. But whatcould he fashion or build? He thought with envy of Arnolfo and ofGiotto: the one with his bricks could have built a tomb which wouldprove to be one of the wonders of the world, and the other with hisbrush could have fixed her features for ever, for the wonder of futuregenerations. And yet was not his instrument the most potent of all, hisvehicle the most enduring? Stones decayed, and colours faded, but verseremained, outliving bronze and marble. Yes, his monument should be morelasting than all the masterpieces of Giotto, than all the proud designsof Arnolfo; but how should it be?

He had reached a narrow lane at the foot of a steep hill covered withcorn and dotted with olives. He lay down under a hedge in the shade. The sun was shining on two large bramble bushes which grew on the hedgeopposite him. Above him, on his right, was a tall cypress tree standingby itself, and the corn plots stretched up behind him till they reachedthe rocky summits tufted with firs. Between the two bramble bushesa spider had spun a large web, and he was sitting in the midst of itawaiting his prey. But the bramble and the web were still wet with themorning dew, whose little drops glistened in the sunshine like diamonds. Every tiny thread and filament of the web was dewy and lit by thenewly-awakened sun. He lay on his back in the shade and pondered on theshape and nature of his gift of song, and on the deathless flowers thathe must grow and gather and lay upon her tomb. 

The spider's web caught his eye, and from where he lay the sight wasmarvellous. The spider seemed like a small globe of fire in the midst ofa number of concentric silvery lines studded with dewy gems; it was likea miniature sun in the midst of a system of gleaming stars. The delicateweb with its shining films and dewdrops seemed to him as he lay thereto be a vision of the whole universe, with all its worlds and starsrevolving around the central orb of light. It was as though a veil hadbeen torn away and he were looking on the naked glory of the spheres, the heart of Heaven, the very home of God. 

He looked and looked, his whole spirit filled with ineffable awe andbreathless humility. He lay gazing on the chance miracle of nature tilla passing cloud obscured the sun, and the spider's web wore once moreits ordinary appearance. Then he arose with tears in his eyes and gave agreat sigh of thankfulness. 

"I have found it, " he thought, "I will say of her what has never yetbeen said of any woman. I will paint all Hell, all Purgatory, and allthat is in them, to make more glorious the glory of her abode, and Iwill reveal to man that glory. I will show her in the circle of spotlessflame, among the rivers and rings of eternal light, which revolve aroundthe inmost heart, the fiery rose, and move obedient to the Love whichmoves the sun. " And his thought shaped itself into verse and he murmuredto himself:

 L'amor che muove il sole e l'altre stelle. 

EDWARD II. AT BERKELEY CASTLE BY AN EYE-WITNESS (With apologies to Mr. H. Belloc)

The King had not slept for three nights. He looked at his face in themuddy pool of water which had settled in the worn flagstones of hisprison floor, and noticed that his beard was of a week's growth. Beadsof sweat stood on his forehead, and his eyes were bloodshot. In the roomnext door, which was the canteen, the soldiers were playing on a drum. Over the tall hills the dawn was ruffling the clouds. There was a faintglimmer on the waters of the river. The footsteps of the gaolers wereheard on the outer rampart. At seven o'clock they brought the King agood dinner: they allowed him burgundy from France, and yellow mead, andwhite bread baked in the ovens of the Abbey, although he was constrainedto drink out of pewter, and plates were forbidden him. Eustace, hispage, timidly offered him music. The King bade him sing the "Lay of theSussex Lass, " which begins thus:

 Triumphant, oh! triumphant now she stands, Above my Sussex, and above my sea! She stretches out her thin ulterior hands Across the morning . . . 

But the King, to whom memories were portentous, called for another songand Eustace sang a stave of that ballad which was made on the Pyrenees, and which is still unfinished (for the modern world has no need ofthese things), telling of how Lord Raymond drank in a little tent withCharlemagne:

 Enormous through the morning the tall battalions run: The men who fought with Charlemagne are very dearly done; The wine is dark beneath the night, the stars are in the sky, The hammer's in the blacksmith's hand in case he wants to try. We'll ride to Fontarabia, we'll storm the stubborn wall, And I call. 

 And Uriel and his Seraphim are hammering a shield; And twice along the valley has the horn of Roland pealed; And Cleopatra on the Nile, Iseult in Brittany, And Lancelot in Camelot, and Drake upon the sea; And behind the young Republic are the fellows with the flag, And I brag!

The King listlessly opened his eyes and said that he had no stomach forsuch song, and from the next door came the mutter of the drums. For onthat night--which was Candlemas--Thursday, or as we should now call it"Friday"--the gaolers were keeping holiday, and drinking English beerbrewed in Sussex; for the beer of West England was not to their liking, as any one who has walked down the old Roman Road through Daglingworth, Brimpsfield, and Birdlip towards Cardigan on a warm summer's day canknow. For a man may tramp that road and stop and ask for drink at aninn, and receive nothing but Imperialist whisky, and drinks that annoyrather than satisfy the great thirst of a Christian. 

Outside, a little breeze had crept out of the West. The morning star waspaling over the Quantock Hills, and the King was mortally weary. "Thisday three years ago, " he thought, "I was spurred and harnessed for thelists in a tunic of mail, with an emerald on my shoulder-strap, and Iwas tilting with my lord of Cleremont before Queen Isabella of France. The birds were singing in Touraine, and the sun was beating on thelists; and the minstrels of Val-es-Dunes were chanting the song of themen who died for the Faith when they stormed Jerusalem. What is the liltof that song, " said the King, "which the singers of Val-es-Dunes sang?"And Eustace pondered, for his memory was weak and he was overwrought bynights of watching and days of vigilance; but presently he touched hisstrings and sang:

 The captains came from Normandy In clamorous ships across the sea; And from the trees in Gascony The masts were cloven, tall and free. And Turpin swung the helm and sang; And stars like all the bells at Brie From cloudy steeples rang. 

 The rotten leaves are whirling down Dishevelled from September's crown; The Emperors have left the town; The Weald of Sussex, burnt and brown, Is trampled by the kings. And Harmuth gallops up the Down, And, as he rides, he sings. 

 He sings of battles and of wine, Of boats that leap the bellowing brine, Of April eyes that smile and shine, Of Raymond and Lord Catiline And Carthage by the sea, Of saints, and of the Muses Nine That dwell in Gascony. 

And to the King, as he heard this stave, came visions of his youth; ofhow he had galloped from Woodstock to Stonesfield on a night of Junewithin eleven hours, with a company of minstrels, and of how during thatlong feast at Arundel he made a song in the vernacular in praise of St. Anselm. And he remembered that he owed a candle to that saint. Forhe had vowed that if the wife of Westermain should meet him after thetournament he would burn a tall candle at Canterbury before Michaelmas. But this had escaped his mind, for it had been tossed hither and thitherduring days of conflict which had come later, and he was not loth tobelieve that the neglect of this service and the idle vow had beencorner-stone of his misfortunes, and had helped to bring about hismiserable plight. 

While these threads of memory glimmered in his mind the small tallowrush-light which lit the dungeon flickered and went out. The chapelclock struck six. The King made a gesture which meant that the time ofmusic was over, and Eustace went back to the canteen, where the men ofthe guard were playing at dice by the light of smoky rush-lights. TheKing lay down on his wooden pallet, whose linen was delicate and oflawn, embroidered with his own cipher and crown. The pillow, which wasstuffed with scented rushes, was delicious to the cheek, and yielding. 

* * * * *

All that night in London Queen Isabella had been waiting for the newsfrom France. A storm was blowing across the Channel, and the ships(their pilots were Germans, and bungled in reading the stars) making forthe port turned back towards Dunquerque. It was a storm such as, if youare in a small boat, turns you back from Broughty Ferry to the GoodwinSands. The Queen, who took counsel of no one, was in two minds as to herdaring deed, and her hostage trembled in an uncertain grasp. In Saxonythe banished favourites talked wildly, cursing the counsels of London;but Saxony was heedless and unmoved. And Piers Gaveston spoke heatedwords in vain. 

The King, who was in that lethargic state of slumber, between sleep andwaking, heard a shuffle of steps beyond the door; a cold sweat brokeonce more on his forehead, and he waved his left hand listlessly. Outside the sun had risen, and a broad daylight flooded the wet meadowsand the brimming tide of the Severn, catching the sails of the boatsthat were heeling and trembling on the ripple of the water, which wasstirred by the South wind. The King looked towards the window withweariness, expecting, as far as his lethargy allowed, the advent ofanother monotonous day. 

The door opened. The faces he saw by the gaoler's torch were notthose he expected. The King, I say, looked towards them, and his handstrembled, and the moisture on them glistened. They were dark, and one ofthem was concealed by a silken mask. 

Three men entered the dungeon. In the hands of the foremost of the threeglowed a red-hot iron, which was to be the manner of his doom. 

THE ISLAND

"Perhaps we had better not land after all, " said Lewis as he wasstepping into the boat; "we can explore this island on our way home. "

"We had much better land now, " said Stewart; "we shall get to Teneriffeto-morrow in any case. Besides, an island that's not on the chart is tooexciting a thing to wait for. "

Lewis gave in to his younger companion, and the two ornithologists, whowere on their way to the Canary Islands in search of eggs, were rowed toshore. 

"They had better fetch us at sunset, " said Lewis as they landed. 

"Perhaps we shall stay the night, " responded Stewart. 

"I don't think so, " said Lewis; but after a pause he told the sailorsthat if they should be more than half an hour late they were not towait, but to come back in the morning at ten. Lewis and Stewart walkedfrom the sandy bay up a steep basaltic cliff which sloped right down tothe beach. 

"The island is volcanic, " said Stewart. 

"All the islands about here are volcanic, " said Lewis. "We shan't beable to climb much in this heat, " he added. 

"It will be all right when we get to the trees, " said Stewart. Presentlythey reached the top of the cliff. The basaltic rock ceased and an opengrassy incline was before them covered with myrtle and cactus bushes;and further off a thick wood, to the east of which rose a hill sparselydotted with olive trees. They sat down on the grass, panting. The sunbeat down on the dry rock; there was not a cloud in the sky nor a rippleon the emerald sea. In the air there was a strange aromatic scent; andthe stillness was heavy. 

"I don't think it can be inhabited, " said Lewis. 

"Perhaps it's merely a volcanic island cast up by a sea disturbance, "suggested Stewart. 

"Look at those trees, " said Lewis, pointing to the wood in the distance. 

"What about them?" asked Stewart. 

"They are oak trees, " said Lewis. "Do you know why I didn't want toland?" he asked abruptly. "I am not superstitious, you know, but as Igot into the boat I distinctly heard a voice calling out: 'Don't land!'"

Stewart laughed. "I think it was a good thing to land, " he said. "Let'sgo on now. "

They walked towards the wood, and the nearer they got to it the moretheir surprise increased. It was a thick wood of large oak trees whichmust certainly have been a hundred years old. When they had got quiteclose to it they paused. 

"Before we explore the wood, " said Lewis, "let us climb the hill and seeif we can get a general view of the island. "

Stewart agreed, and they climbed the hill in silence. When they reachedthe top they found it was not the highest point of the island, but onlyone of several hills, so that they obtained only a limited view. Thevalleys seemed to be densely wooded, and the oak wood was larger thanthey had imagined. They laid down and rested and lit their pipes. 

"No birds, " remarked Lewis gloomily. 

"I haven't seen one--the island is extraordinarily still, " said Stewart. The further they had penetrated inland the more oppressive and sultrythe air had become; and the pungent aroma they had noticed directlywas stronger. It was like that of mint, and yet it was not mint; andalthough sweet it was not agreeable. The heat seemed to weigh even onStewart's buoyant spirits, for he sat smoking in silence, and no longerurged Lewis to continue their exploration. 

"I think the island is inhabited, " said Lewis, "and that the housesare on the other side. There are some sheep and some goats on that hillopposite. Do you see?"

"Yes, " said Stewart, "I think they are mouflon, but I don't think theisland is inhabited all the same. " No sooner were the words out of hismouth than he started, and rising to his feet, cried: "Look there!" andhe pointed to a thin wreath of smoke which was rising from the wood. Their languor seemed to leave them, and they ran down the hill andreached the wood once more. Just as they were about to enter it Lewisstooped and pointed to a small plant with white flowers and threeoval-shaped leaves rising from the root. 

"What's that?" he asked Stewart, who was the better botanist of the two. The flowers were quite white, and each had six pointed petals. 

"It's a kind of garlic, I think, " said Stewart. Lewis bent down over it. "It doesn't smell, " he said. "It's not unlike moly (_Allium flavum_), only it's white instead of yellow, and the flowers are larger. I'm goingto take it with me. " He began scooping away the earth with a knife so asto take out the plant by the roots. After he had been working for someminutes he exclaimed: "This is the toughest plant I've ever seen; Ican't get it out. " He was at last successful, but as he pulled the roothe gave a cry of surprise. 

"There's no bulb, " he said. "Look! Only a black root. "

Stewart examined the plant. "I can't make it out, " he said. 

Lewis wrapped the plant in his handkerchief and put it in his pocket. They entered the wood. The air was still more sultry here than outside, and the stillness even more oppressive. There were no birds and not avestige of bird life. 

"This exploration is evidently a waste of time as far as birds areconcerned, " remarked Lewis. At that moment there was a rustle in theundergrowth, and five pigs crossed their path and disappeared, grunting. Lewis started, and for some reason he could not account for, shuddered;he looked at Stewart, who appeared unconcerned. 

"They are not wild, " said Stewart. They walked on in silence. The placeand its heavy atmosphere had again affected their spirits. When theyspoke it was almost in a whisper. Lewis wished they had not landed, buthe could give no reason to himself for his wish. After they had beenwalking for about twenty minutes they suddenly came on an open space anda low white house. They stopped and looked at each other. 

"It's got no chimney!" cried Lewis, who was the first to speak. It wasa one-storeyed building, with large windows (which had no glass in them)reaching to the ground, wider at the bottom than at the top. The housewas overgrown with creepers; the roof was flat. They entered in silenceby the large open doorway and found themselves in a low hall. There wasno furniture and the floor was mossy. 

"It's rather like an Egyptian tomb, " said Stewart, and he shivered. Thehall led into a further room, which was open in the centre to the sky, like the _impluvium_ of a Roman house. It also contained a square basinof water, which was filled by water bubbling from a lion's mouth carvedin stone. Beyond the _impluvium_ there were two smaller rooms, in oneof which there was a kind of raised stone platform. The house wascompletely deserted and empty. Lewis and Stewart said little; theyexamined the house in silent amazement. 

"Look, " said Lewis, pointing to one of the walls. Stewart examinedthe wall and noticed that there were traces on it of a faded painteddecoration. 

"It's like the wall paintings at Pompeii, " he said. 

"I think the house is modern, " remarked Lewis. "It was probably built bysome eccentric at the beginning of the nineteenth century, who did it upin Empire style. "

"Do you know what time it is?" said Stewart, suddenly. "The sun has setand it's growing dark. "

"We must go at once, " said Lewis, "we'll come back here to-morrow. " Theywalked on in silence. The wood was dim in the twilight, a fitful breezemade the trees rustle now and again, but the air was just as sultry asever. The shapes of the trees seemed fantastic and almost threatening inthe dimness, and the rustle of the leaves was like a human moan. Once ortwice they seemed to hear the grunting of pigs in the undergrowth and tocatch sight of bristly backs. 

"We don't seem to be getting any nearer the end, " said Stewart aftera time. "I think we've taken the wrong path. " They stopped. "I rememberthat tree, " said Stewart, pointing to a twisted oak; "we must gostraight on from there to the left. " They walked on and in ten minutes'time found themselves once more at the back of the house. It was nowquite dark. 

"We shall never find the way now, " said Lewis. "We had better sleep inthe house. " They walked through the house into one of the furthest roomsand settled themselves on the mossy platform. The night was warm andstarry, the house deathly still except for the splashing of the water inthe basin. 

"We shan't get any food, " Lewis said. 

"I'm not hungry, " said Stewart, and Lewis knew that he could not haveeaten anything to save his life. He felt utterly exhausted and yet notat all sleepy. Stewart, on the other hand, was overcome with drowsiness. He lay down on the mossy platform and fell asleep almost instantly. Lewis lit a pipe; the vague forebodings he had felt in the morninghad returned to him, only increased tenfold. He felt an unaccountablephysical discomfort, an inexplicable sensation of uneasiness. Then herealised what it was. He felt there was someone in the house besidesthemselves, someone or something that was always behind him, moving whenhe moved and watching him. He walked into the _impluvium_, but heardnothing and saw nothing. There were none of the thousand little sounds, such as the barking of a dog, or the hoot of a night-bird, whichgenerally complete the silence of a summer night. Everything wasuncannily still. He returned to the room. He would have given anythingto be back on the yacht, for besides the physical sensation ofdiscomfort and of the something watching him he also felt theunmistakable feeling of impending danger that had been with him nearlyall day. 

He lay down and at last fell into a doze. As he dozed he heard a subduednoise, a kind of buzzing, such as is made by a spinning wheel or ashuttle on a loom, and more strongly than ever he felt that he was beingwatched. Then all at once his body seemed to grow stiff with fright. Hesaw someone enter the room from the _impluvium_. It was a dim, veiledfigure, the figure of a woman. He could not distinguish her features, but he had the impression that she was strangely beautiful; she wasbearing a cup in her hands, and she walked towards Stewart and bent overhim, offering him the cup. 

Something in Lewis prompted him to cry out with all his might: "Don'tdrink! Don't drink!" He heard the words echoing in the air, just as hehad heard the voice in the boat; he felt that it was imperative to callout, and yet he could not: he was paralysed; the words would not come. He formed them with his lips, but no sound came. He tried with all hismight to rise and scream, and he could not move. Then a sudden coldfaintness came upon him, and he remembered no more till he woke andfound the sun shining brightly. Stewart was lying with his eyes closed, moaning loudly in his sleep. 

Lewis tried to wake him. He opened his eyes and stared with a fixed, meaningless stare. Lewis tried to lift him from the platform, and then ahorrible thing happened. Stewart struggled violently and made a snarlingnoise, which froze the blood in Lewis's veins. He ran out of the housewith cold beads of sweat on his forehead. He ran through the wood tothe shore, and there he found the boat. He rowed back to the yacht andfetched some quinine. Then, together with the skipper, the steward, and some other sailors, he returned to the ominous house. They found itempty. There was no trace of Stewart. They shouted in the wood till theywere hoarse, but no answer broke the heavy stillness. 

Then sending for the rest of the crew, Lewis organised a regular searchover the whole island. This lasted till sunset, and they returned in theevening without having found any trace of Stewart or of any other humanbeing. In the night a high wind rose, which soon became a gale; theywere obliged to weigh anchor so as not to be dashed against the island, and for twenty-four hours they underwent a terrific tossing. Then thestorm subsided as quickly as it had come. 

They made for the island once more and reached the spot where they hadanchored three days before. There was no trace of the island. It hadcompletely disappeared. 

When they reached Teneriffe the next day they found that everybody wastalking of the great tidal wave which had caused such great damage anddestruction in the islands. 

THE MAN WHO GAVE GOOD ADVICE

To Henry Cust

When he was a child his baby brother came to him one day and said thattheir elder brother, who was grown up, had got a beautiful small ship inhis room. Should he ask him for it? The child who gave good advice said:"No, if you ask him for it he will say you are a spoilt child; but goand play in his room with it before he gets up in the morning, and hewill give it to you. " The baby brother followed this advice, and sureenough two days afterwards he appeared triumphant in the nursery withthe ship in his hands, saying: "He said I might choose, the ship orthe picture-book. " Now the picture-book was a coloured edition of BaronMunchausen's adventures; the boy who gave good advice had seen it andhankered for it. As the baby brother had refused it there could be noharm in asking for it, so the next time his elder brother sent him on anerrand (it was to fetch a pin-cushion from his room) judging the momentto be propitious, he said to him: "May I have the picture-book that babywouldn't have?" "I don't like little boys who ask, " answered the bigbrother, and there the matter ended. 

The child who gave good advice went to school. There was a rage for stagbeetles at the school; the boys painted them and made them run races ona chessboard. They imagined--rightly or wrongly--that some stag beetleswere much faster than others. A little boy called Bell possessed thestag beetle which was the favourite for the coming races. Another boycalled Mason was consumed with longing for this stag beetle; and Bellhad said he would give it to him in exchange for Mason's catapult, whichwas famous in the school for the unique straightness of its two prongs. Mason went to the boy who gave good advice and asked him for hisopinion. "Don't swap it for your catty, " said the boy who gave goodadvice, "because Bell's stag beetle may not win after all; and even ifit does stag beetles won't be the rage for very long; but a catty isalways a catty, and yours is the best in the school. " Mason took theadvice. When the races came off, the stag beetles were so erratic thatno prize was awarded, and they immediately ceased to be the rage. Therage for stag beetles was succeeded by a rage for secret alphabets. Oneboy invented a secret alphabet made of simple hieroglyphics, whichwas imparted only to a select few, who spent their spare time incorresponding with each other by these cryptic signs. The boy who gavegood advice was not of those initiated into the mystery of the cypher, and he longed to be. He made several overtures, but they were allrejected, the reason being that boys of the second division could notlet a "third division squit" into their secret. At last the boy whogave good advice offered to one of the initiated the whole of his stampcollection in return for the secret of the alphabet. This offer wasaccepted. The boy took the stamp collection, but the boy who gavegood advice received in return not the true alphabet but a shamone especially manufactured for him. This he found out later; butrecriminations were useless; besides which the rage for secret alphabetssoon died out and was replaced by a rage for aquariums, newts, andnatterjack toads. 

The boy went to a public school. He was a fag. His fag-master had twofags. One morning the other fag came to the boy who gave good advice andsaid: "Clarke (he was the fag-master) told me three days ago to cleanhis football boots. He's been 'staying out' and hasn't used them, andI forgot. He'll want them to-day, and now there isn't time. I shallpretend I did clean them. "

"No, don't do that, " said the boy who gave good advice, "because ifyou say you have cleaned them he will lick you twice as much for havingcleaned them badly--say you forgot. " The advice was taken, and thefag-master merely said: "Don't forget again. " A little later thefag-master had some friends to tea, and told the boy who gave goodadvice to boil him six eggs for not more than three minutes and a half. The boy who gave good advice, while they were on the fire, took part ina rag that which was going on in the passage; the result was that theeggs remained seven minutes in boiling water. They were hard. When thefag-master pointed this out and asked his fag what he meant by it, theboy who gave good advice persisted in his statement that they had beenexactly three minutes and a half in the saucepan, and that he had timedthem by his watch. So the fag-master caned him for telling lies. 

The boy who gave good advice grew into a man and went to the university. There he made friends with a man called Crawley, who went to aneighbouring race meeting one day and lost two or three hundred pounds. 

"I must raise the money from a money-lender somehow, " said Crawley tothe man who gave good advice, "and on no account must the Master hear ofit or he would send me down; or write home, which would be worse. "

"On the contrary, " said the man who gave good advice, "you must gostraight to the Master and tell him all about it. He will like you twiceas much for ever afterwards; he never minds people getting into scrapeswhen he happens to like them, and he likes you and believes you have agreat career before you. "

Crawley went to the Master of the college and made a clean breast of it. The Master told him he had been foolish--very foolish; but he arrangedthe whole matter in such a manner that it never came to the ears ofCrawley's extremely violent-tempered and puritanical father. 

The man who gave good advice got a "First" in Mods, and everyone feltconfident he would get a first in Greats; he did brilliantly in nearlyall his papers; but during the Latin unseen a temporary and sudden lapseof memory came over him and he forgot the English for _manubioe_, whichthe day before he had known quite well means prize-money. In fact theword was written on the first page of his note-book. The word was in hisbrain, but a small shutter had closed on it for the moment and he couldnot recall it. He looked over his neighbour's shoulder. His neighbourhad translated it "booty. " He copied the word mechanically, knowingit was wrong. As he did so he was detected and accused of cribbing. He denied the charge, the matter was investigated, the papers werecompared, and the man who gave good advice was disqualified. In all hisother papers he had done incomparably better than anyone else. 

When he left Oxford the man who gave good advice went into a Governmentoffice. He had not been in it long before he perceived that by certainsimple reforms the work of the office could be done twice as effectuallyand half as expensively. He embodied these reforms in a memorandum andthey were not long afterwards adopted. He became private secretary toSnipe, a rising politician and persuaded him to change his party and hispolitics. Snipe, owing to this advice, became a Cabinet Minister, andthe man who gave good advice, having inherited some money, stood forParliament himself. He stood as a Conservative at a General Election andspoke eloquently to enthusiastic meetings. The wire-pullers propheciedan overwhelming majority, when shortly before the poll, at one of hismeetings, he suddenly declared himself to be an Independent, and made aspeech violently in favour of Home Rule and conscription. The result wasthat the Liberal Imperialist got in by a huge majority, and the man whogave good advice was pelted with rotten eggs. 

After this the man who gave good advice abandoned politics and took tofinance; in this branch of human affairs he made the fortune of severalof his friends, preventing some from putting their money in alluringSouth African schemes, and advising others to risk theirs on eventswhich seemed to him certain, such as the election of a President orthe short-lived nature of a revolution; events which he foresaw withintuition amounting to second-sight. At the same time he lost nearlyall his own money by investing it in a company which professed tohave discovered a manner--cheap and rapid--of transforming copperinto platinum. He made the fortune of a publisher by insisting on thepublication of a novel which six intelligent men had declared to beunreadable. It was called "The Conscience of John Digby, " and whenpublished it sold by thousands and tens of thousands. But he lost thehandsome reward he received for this service by publishing at his ownexpense, on magnificent paper, an edition of Rabelais' works in theiroriginal tongue. He frequently spotted winners for his friends and forhimself, but any money that he won at a race meeting he invariably lostcoming home in the train on the Three Card Trick. 

Nor did he lose touch with politicians, and this brought about the finalcatastrophe. A great friend of his, the eminent John Brooke, had thechance of becoming Prime Minister. Parties were at that time in a stateof confusion. The question was, should his friend ally himself with orsever himself for ever from Mr. Capax Nissy, the leader of the LiberalAristocracy Party, who seemed to have a large following? His friend, John Brooke, gave a small dinner to his most intimate friends in orderto talk over the matter. The man who gave good advice was so eloquent, so cogent in his reasoning, so acute in his perception, that hepersuaded Brooke to sever himself for ever from Capax Nissy. Hepersuaded all who were present, with the exception of Mr. Short-Sight, a pig-headed man who reasoned falsely. So annoyed did the man who gavegood advice become with Short-Sight, and so excited in his vexation, that he finally lost his self-control, and hit him as hard as he couldon the head--after Short-Sight had repeated a groundless assertion forthe seventh time--with the poker. 

Short-Sight died, and the man who gave good advice was convicted ofwilful murder. He gave admirable advice to his counsel, but threw awayhis own case as soon as he entered the box himself, which he insistedon doing. He was hanged in gaol at Reading. Many people whom he hadbenefited in various ways visited him in prison, among others JohnBrooke, the Prime Minister. It is said that he would certainly have beenreprieved but for the intemperate and inexcusable letters he wrote tothe Home Secretary from prison. 

"It's a great tragedy--he was a clever man, " said Brooke after dinnerwhen they were discussing the misfortune at Downing Street; "a veryclever man, but he had no judgment. "

"No, " said Snipe, the man whose private secretary the man who gavegood advice had been, "That's it. It's an awful thing--but he had nojudgment. "

RUSSALKA

Peter, or Petrushka, which was the name he was known by, was thecarpenter's mate; his hair was like light straw, and his eyes were mildand blue. He was good at his trade; a quiet and sober youth; thoughtful, too, for he knew how to read and had read several books when he wasstill a boy. A translation of "Monte Cristo" once fell into his hands, and this story had kindled his imagination and stirred in him the desireto travel, to see new countries and strange people. He had made up hismind to leave the village and to try his luck in one of the big towns, when, before he was eighteen, something happened to him which entirelychanged the colour of his thoughts and the range of his desires. It wasan ordinary experience enough: he fell in love. He fell in love withTatiana, who worked in the starch factory. Tatiana's eyes were grey, hercomplexion was white, her features small and delicate, and her haira beautiful dark brown with gold lights and black shadows in it; hermovements were quick and her glance keen; she was like a swallow. 

It happened when the snows melted and the meadows were flooded; thefirst fine day in April. The larks were singing over the plains, whichwere beginning to show themselves once more under the melting snow; thesun shone on the large patches of water, and turned the flooded meadowsin the valley into a fantastic vision. It was on a Sunday after churchthat this new thing happened. He had often seen Tatiana before: that dayshe was different and new to him. It was as if a bandage had been takenfrom his eyes, and at the same moment he realised that Tatiana was a newTatiana. He also knew that the old world in which he had lived hithertohad crumbled to pieces; and that a new world, far brighter and morewonderful, had been created for him. As for Tatiana, she loved him atonce. There was no delay, no hesitation, no misunderstandings, no doubt:and at the first not much speech; but first love came to them straightand swift, with the first sunshine of the spring, as it does to thebirds. 

All the spring and summer they kept company and walked out together inthe evenings. When the snows entirely melted and the true spring came, it came with a rush; in a fortnight's time all the trees except the ashwere green, and the bees boomed round the thick clusters of pear-blossomand apple-blossom, which shone like snow against the bright azure. During that time Petrushka and Tatiana walked in the apple orchardin the evening and they talked to each other in the divinest of alllanguages, the language of first love, which is no language at all but aconfused medley and murmur of broken phrases, whisperings, twitterings, pauses, and silences--a language so wonderful that it cannot be putdown into speech or words, although Shakespeare and the very great poetstranslate the spirit of it into music, and the great musicians catch theecho of it in their song. Then a fortnight later, when the woods werecarpeted and thick with lilies of the valley, Petrushka and Tatianawalked in the woods and picked the last white violets, and later againthey sought the alleys of the landlord's property, where the lilacbushes were a mass of blossom and fragrance, and there they listened tothe nightingale, the bird of spring. Then came the summer, the fragranceof the beanfields, and the ripening of corn and the wonderful longtwilights, and July, when the corn, ripe and tall and stiff, changed theplains into a vast rippling ocean of gold. 

After the harvest, at the very beginning of autumn, they were to bemarried. There had been a slight difficulty about money. Tatiana'sfather had insisted that Petrushka should produce a certain not verylarge sum; but the difficulty had been overcome and the money had beenfound. There were no more obstacles, everything was smooth and settled. Petrushka no longer thought of travels in foreign lands; he hadforgotten the old dreams which "Monte Cristo" had once kindled in him. 

It was in the middle of August that the carpenter received instructionsfrom the landowner to make some wooden steps and a small raft and to fixthem up on the banks of the river for the convenience of bathers. It didnot take the carpenter and Petrushka long to make these things, and oneafternoon Petrushka drove down to the river to fix them in their place. The river was broad, the banks were wooded with willow trees, and theundergrowth was thick, for the woods reached to the river bank, whichwas flat, but which ended sheer above the water over a slope of mud androots, so that a bather needed steps or a raft or a springboard, so asto dive or to enter and leave the water with comfort. 

Petrushka put the steps in their place--which was where the woodended--and made fast the floating raft to them. Not far from the bankthe ground was marshy and the spot was suspected by some people of beinghaunted by malaria. It was a still, sultry day. The river was like oil, the sky clouded but not entirely overclouded, and among the high banksof grey cloud there were patches of blue. 

When Petrushka had finished the job, he sat on the wooden steps, androlling some tobacco into a primitive cigarette, contemplated thegrey, oily water and the willow trees. It was too late in the year, hethought, to make a bathing place. He dipped his hand in the water: itwas cold, but not too cold. Yet in a fortnight's time it would not bepleasant to bathe. However, people had their whims, and he mused on thescheme of the universe which ordained that certain people should havewhims, and that others should humour those whims whether they liked itor not. Many people--many of his fellow-workers--talked of the daywhen the universal levelling would take place and when all men could beequal. Petrushka did not much believe in the advent of that day; he wasnot quite sure whether he ardently desired it; in any case, he was veryhappy as he was. 

At that moment he heard two sharp short sounds, less musical than a pipeand not so loud or harsh as a scream. He looked up. A kingfisher hadflown across the oily water. Petrushka shouted; and the kingfisherskimmed over the water once more and disappeared in the trees on theother side of the river. Petrushka rolled and lit another cigarette. Presently he heard the two sharp sounds once more, and the kingfisherdarted again across the water: a bit of fish was in its beak. Itdisappeared into the bank of the river on the same side on whichPetrushka was sitting, only lower down. 

"Its nest must be there, " thought Petrushka, and he remembered thathe had heard it said that no one had ever been able to carry off akingfisher's nest intact. Why should he not be the first person to doso? He was skilful with his fingers, his touch was sure and light. Itwas evidently a carpenter's job, and few carpenters had the leisure oropportunity to look for kingfishers' nests. What a rare present it wouldbe for Tatiana--a whole kingfisher's nest with every bone in it intact. 

He walked stealthily through the bushes down the bank of the river, making as little noise as possible. He thought he had marked thespot where the kingfisher had dived into the bank. As he walked, theundergrowth grew thicker and the path darker, for he had reached thewood, on the outskirts and end of which was the spot where he hadmade the steps. He walked on and on without thinking, oblivious ofhis surroundings, until he suddenly realised that he had gone too far. Moreover, he must have been walking for some time, for it was gettingdark, or was it a thunder-shower? The air, too, was unbearably sultry;he stopped and wiped his forehead with a big print handkerchief. It wasimpossible to reach the bank from the place where he now stood, as hewas separated from it by a wide ditch of stagnant water. He thereforeretraced his footsteps through the wood. It grew darker and darker; itmust be, he thought, the evening deepening and no storm. 

All at once he started; he had heard a sound, a high pipe. Was it thekingfisher? He paused and listened. Distinctly, and not far off in theundergrowth, he heard a laugh, a woman's laugh. It flashed across hismind that it might be Tatiana, but it was not her laugh. Somethingrustled in the bushes to the left of him; he followed the rustling andit led him through the bushes--he had now passed the ditch--to the riverbank. The sun had set behind the woods from which he had just emerged;the sky was as grey as the water, and there was no reflection of thesunset in the east. Except the water and the trees he saw nothing; therewas not a sound to be heard, not a ripple on the river, not a whisperfrom the woods. 

Then all at once the stillness was broken again by quick rippling laughsimmediately behind him. He turned sharply round, and saw a woman in thebushes: her eyes were large and green and sad; her hair straggling anddishevelled; she was dressed in reeds and leaves; she was very pale. Shestared at him fixedly, and smiled, showing gleaming teeth, and when shesmiled there was no light nor laughter in her eyes, which remained sadand green and glazed like those of a drowned person. She laughed againand ran into the bushes. Petrushka ran after her, but although he wasquite close to her he lost all trace of her immediately. It was as ifshe had vanished under the earth or into the air. 

"It's a Russalka, " thought Petrushka, and he shivered. Then he addedto himself, with the pride of the new scepticism he had learnt fromthe factory hands: "There is no such thing; only women believe in suchthings. It was some drunken woman. "

Petrushka walked quickly back to the edge of the wood, where he had lefthis cart, and drove home. The next day was Sunday, and Tatiana noticedthat he was different--moody, melancholy, and absent-minded. She askedhim what was the matter; he said his head ached. Towards five o'clock hetold her--they were standing outside her cottage--that he was obliged togo to the river to work. 

"To-day is holiday, " she said quietly. 

"I left something there yesterday: one of my tools. I must fetch it, " heexplained. 

Tatiana looked at him, and her intuition told her, firstly, that thiswas not true, and, secondly, that it was not well for Petrushka to go tothe river. She begged him not to go. Petrushka laughed and said he wouldbe back quickly. Tatiana cried, and implored him on her knees not to go. Then Petrushka grew irritable and almost rough, and told her not to vexhim with foolishness. Reluctantly and sadly she gave in at last. 

Petrushka went to the river, and Tatiana watched him go with a heavyheart. She felt quite certain some disaster was about to happen. 

At seven o'clock Petrushka had not yet returned, and he did not returnthat night. The next morning the carpenter and two others went tothe river to look for him. They found his body in the shallow water, entangled in the ropes of the raft he had made. He had been drowned, nodoubt, in setting the raft straight. 

During all that Sunday night, Tatiana had said no word, nor had shemoved from her doorstep: it was only when they brought back the drippingbody to the village that she stirred, and when she saw it she laugheda dreadful laugh, and the spirit went from her eyes, leaving a fixedstare. 

THE OLD WOMAN

The old woman was spinning at her wheel near a fire of myrtle boughswhich burnt fragrantly in the open yard. Through the stone columns thesea was visible, smooth, dark, and blue; the low sun bathed the brownhills of the coast in a golden mist. It was December. The shepherds weredriving home their flocks, the work of the day was done, and a noise oflight laughter and rippling talk came from the Slaves' quarter. 

In the middle of the stone-flagged yard two little boys were playing atquoits. Their eyes and hair were as dark as their brown skin, which hadbeen tanned by the sun. In one of the corners of the yard a fair-haired, blue-eyed girl was nursing a kitten and singing it to sleep. The oldwoman was singing too, or rather humming a tune to herself as she turnedher wheel. She was very old: her hair was white and silvery, and herface was furrowed by a hundred wrinkles. Her eyes were blue as the sky, and perhaps they had once been full of fire and laughter, but all thathad been quenched and washed out long ago, and Time, with his noiselesschisel, had sharpened her delicate features and hollowed out her cheeks, which were as white as ivory. But her hands as they twisted the woodwere the hands of a young woman, and seemed as though they had beenfashioned by a rare craftsman, so perfect were they in shape andproportion, as firm as carved marble, as delicate as flowers. 

The sun sank behind the hills of the coast, and a flood of scarlet lightspread along the West just above them, melting higher up into orange, and still higher into a luminous blue, which turned to green later asthe evening deepened. The air was cool and sharp, and the little boys, who had finished their game, drew near to the fire. 

"Tell us a story, " said the elder of the two boys, as they curledthemselves up at the feet of the old woman. 

"You know all my stories, " she said. 

"That doesn't matter, " said the boy. "You can tell us an old one. "

"Well, " said the old woman, "I suppose I must. There was once upon atime a King and a Queen who had three sons and one daughter. " At thesound of these words the little girl ran up and nestled in the folds ofthe old woman's long cloak. 

"No, not that one, " one of the little boys interrupted, "tell us aboutthe Queen without a heart. " So the old woman began and said:--

"There was once upon a time a King and a Queen who had one daughter, andthey invited all the gods and goddesses to the feast which they gave inhonour of the birth of their child. The gods and goddesses came andgave the child every gift they could think of; she was to be the mostbeautiful woman in the whole world, she was to dance like the West wind, to laugh like the stream, and to sing like the lark. Her hair should bemade of sunshine, and her eyes should be as the sea in midsummer. Sheshould excel in all things, in knowledge, in wit, and in skill; sheshould be fleet of foot, a cunning harp-player, adept at all manner ofwoman-like crafts, and deft with the needle and the spinning-wheel, andat the loom. Zeus himself gave her stateliness and majesty, the Lordof the Sun gave a voice as of a golden flute; Poseidon gave her thelaughter of all the waves of the sea, the King of the Underworld gaveher a red ruby to wear on her breast more precious than all the gemsof the world. Artemis gave her swiftness and radiance, Persephone thefragrance and the freshness of all the flowers of spring; Pallas Athenegave her curious knowledge and pleasant speech; and, lastly, the SeabornGoddess breathed upon her and gave her the beauty of the rose, thepearl, the dew, and the shells and the foam of the sea. But, alas! theKing and Queen had forgotten to ask one guest. The Goddess of Envy andDiscord had been left out, and she came unbidden, and when all the godsand goddesses had given their gifts, she said: 'I too have a gift togive, a gift that will be more precious to her than any. I will giveher a heart that shall be proof against all the onsets of the world. 'So saying the Goddess of Envy took away the child's heart and put in itsplace a heart of stone, hard as adamant, bright and glittering as a gem. And the Goddess of Envy went her way mocking. The King and Queen weregreatly concerned, and they asked the gods and goddesses whether theirdaughter would ever recover her human heart. They were told that theGoddess of Envy would be obliged to give back the child's heart to theman who loved her enough to seek and to find it, and this would surelyhappen; but when and how it was forbidden to them to reveal. 

"The child grew up and became the wonder of the world. She was marriedto a powerful King, and they lived in peace and plenty until the Goddessof Envy once more troubled the child's life. For owing to her subtleplanning a Prince was promised for wife the fairest woman in the world, and he took the wife of the powerful King and carried her away to Asiato the six-gated city. The King prepared a host of ships and armed menand sailed to Asia to win back his wife. And he and his army fought forten years until the six-gated city was taken, and he brought his wifehome once more. Now during all the time the war lasted, although thewhole world was filled with the fame of the King's wife and of herbeauty, there was not found one man who was willing to seek for herheart and to find it, for some gave no credence to the tale, and others, believing it, reasoned that the quest might last a life-time, and thatby the time they accomplished it the King's wife would be an old woman, and there would be fairer women in the world. Others, again, could notbelieve that in so perfect a woman there could be any fault; they vowedher heart must be one with her matchless beauty, and they said that evenif the tale were true, they preferred to worship her as she was, andthey would not have her be otherwise or changed by a hair's breadth forall the world. Some, indeed, did set out upon the quest, but abandonedit soon from weariness and returned to bask in the beauty of the greatQueen. 

"The years went by. The Queen journeyed to Egypt, to the mountains ofthe South, and the cities of the desert; to the Pillars of Hercules andto the islands of the West. Wherever she went her fame spread like fire, and men fought and died for a glimpse of her marvellous beauty; andwherever she passed she left behind her strife and sorrow like a burningtrail. After many voyages she returned home and lived prosperously. The King her husband died, her children grew up and married and borechildren themselves, and she continued to live peacefully in her palace. Her fame and her glory brought her neither joy nor sorrow, nor did sheheed the spell that she cast on the hearts of men. 

"One day a harp-player came to her palace and sang and played beforeher; he made music so ravishing and so sad that all who heard him weptsave the Queen, who listened and smiled, listless and indifferent. Buther smile filled him with such a passion of wonder and worship that heresolved to rest no more until he had found her heart, for he knew thetale. So he sought the whole world over in vain; and for years and yearshe roamed the world fruitlessly. At last one day in a far country hefound a little bird in a trap and he set it free, and in return the birdpromised him that he should find the Queen's heart. All he had to do wasto go home and to seek the Queen's palace. So the harper went home tothe Queen's palace, and when he reached it he found the Queen had grownold; her hair was grey and there were lines on her cheek. But she smiledon him, and he knelt down before her, for he loved her more than ever, and to him she was as beautiful as ever she had been. At that moment, for the first time in her life the Queen's eyes filled with tears, forher heart had been given back to her. And that is all the story. "

"And what happened to the harper?" asked one of the little boys. 

"He lived in the palace and played to the Queen till he died. "

"And is the story true?" asked the other little boy. 

"Yes, " said the old woman, "quite true. "

The boys jumped up and kissed the old woman, and the elder of them, growing pensive, said:--

"Grandmother, were you ever young yourself?"

"Yes, my child, " said the old woman, smiling, "I was once young--a verylong time ago. "

She got up, for the twilight had come and it was almost dark. She walkedinto the house, and as she rose she was neither bowed nor bent, butshe trod the ground with a straightness which was not stiff but fullof grace, and she moved royally like a goddess. As she walked past thesmoking flames the children noticed that large tears were welling fromher eyes and trickling down her faded cheek. 

DR. FAUST'S LAST DAY

The Doctor got up at dawn, as was his wont, and as soon as he wasdressed he sat down at his desk in his library overlooking the sea, and immersed himself in the studies which were the lodestar of hisexistence. His hours were mapped out with rigid regularity like those ofa school-boy, and his methodical life worked as though by clockwork. Herose at dawn and read without interruption until eight o'clock. He thenpartook of some light food (he was a strict vegetarian), after which hewalked in the garden of his house, overlooking the Bay of Naples, untilten. From ten to twelve he received sick people, peasants from thevillage, or any visitors that needed his advice or his company. Attwelve he ate a frugal meal. From one o'clock until three he enjoyeda siesta. At three he resumed his studies, which continued withoutinterruption until six when he partook of a second meal. At seven hetook another stroll in the village or by the seashore and remained outof doors until nine. He then withdrew into his study, and at midnightwent to bed. 

It was, perhaps, the extreme regularity of his life, combined with thestrict diet which he observed, that accounted for his good health. Thisday was his seventieth birthday, and his body was as vigorous and hismind as alert as they had been in his fortieth year. His thick hair andbeard were scarcely grey, and the wrinkles on his white, thoughtfulface were rare. Yet the Doctor, when questioned as to the secret of hisyouthfulness, being like many learned men fond of a paradox, used toreply that diet and regularity had nothing to do with it, and thatthe Southern sun and the climate of the Neapolitan coast, which he hadchosen among all places to be the abode of his old age, were in realityresponsible for his excellent health. 

"I lead a regular life, " he used to say, "not in order to keep well, but in order to get through my work. Unless my hours were mapped outregularly I should be the prey of every idler in the place and I shouldnever get any work done at all. "

On this day, as it was his seventieth birthday, the Doctor had askeda few friends to share his mid-day meal, and when he returned fromhis morning stroll he sent for his housekeeper to give her a few finalinstructions. The housekeeper, who was a voluble Italian peasant-woman, after receiving his orders, handed him a piece of paper on which a fewwords were scrawled in reddish-brown ink, saying it had been left by aSignore. 

"What Signore?" asked the Doctor, as he perused the document, whichconsisted of words in the German tongue to the effect that the writerregretted his absence from the Doctor's feast, but would call atmidnight. It was not signed. 

"He was a Signore, like all Signores, " said the housekeeper; "he justleft the letter and went away. "

The Doctor was puzzled, and in spite of much cross-examination he wasunable to extract anything more beyond the fact that he was a "Signore. "

"Shall I lay one place less?" asked the housekeeper. 

"Certainly not, " said the Doctor. "All my guests will be present. " Andhe threw the piece of paper on the table. 

The housekeeper left the room, but she had not been gone many minutesbefore she returned and said that Maria, the wife of the late Giovanni, the baker, wished to speak to him. The Doctor nodded, and Maria burstinto the room, sobbing. 

When her tears had somewhat subsided she told her story in brokensentences. Her daughter, Margherita, who was seventeen years old, hadbeen allowed to spend the summer at Sorrento with her late father'ssister. There, it appeared, she had met a "Signore, " who had given herjewels, made love to her, promised her marriage, and held clandestinemeetings with her. Her aunt professed now to have been unaware of this;but Maria assured the Doctor that her sister-in-law, who had theevil eye and had more than once trafficked with Satan, must have hadknowledge of the business, even if she were not directly responsible, which was highly probable. In the meantime Margherita's brother Anselmohad returned from the wars in the North, and, discovering the truth, hadsworn to kill the Signore unless he married Margherita. 

"And what do you wish me to do?" asked the Doctor, after he had listenedto the story. 

"Anything, anything, " she answered, "only calm my son Anselmo or elsethere will be a disaster. "

"Who is the Signore?" asked the Doctor. 

"The Conte Guido da Siena, " she answered. 

The Doctor reflected a moment, and then said: "I will see what can bedone. The matter can be arranged. Send your son to me later. " And then, after scolding Maria for not having taken proper care of her daughter, he sent her away. 

As he did so he caught sight of the dirty piece of paper on his table. For one second he had the impression that the letters on it were writtenin blood, and he shivered, but the momentary hallucination and sense ofdiscomfort passed immediately. 

At mid-day the guests arrived. They consisted of Dr. Cornelius, Vienna'smost learned scholar; Taddeo Mainardi, the painter; a Danish studentfrom the University of Wittenberg; a young English nobleman, who wastravelling in Italy; and Guido da Siena, philosopher and poet, who wassaid to be the handsomest man in Italy. The Doctor set before his guestsa precious wine from Cyprus, in which he toasted them, although asa rule he drank only water. The meal was served in the cool loggiaoverlooking the bay, and the talk, which was of the men and books ofmany climes, flowed like a rippling stream on which the sunshine oflaughter lightly played. 

The student asked the Doctor whether in Italy men of taste took anyinterest in the recent experiments of a French Huguenot, who professedto be able to send people into a trance. Moreover, the patient when inthe trance, so it was alleged, was able to act as a bridge between thematerial and the spiritual worlds, and the dead could be summoned andmade to speak through the unconscious patient. 

"We take no thought of such things here, " said the Doctor. "In my youth, when I studied in the North, experiments of that nature exercised apowerful sway over my mind. I dabbled in alchemy; I tried and indeedconsidered that I succeeded in raising spirits and visions; but twothings are necessary for such a study: youth, and the mists of theNorthern country. Here the generous sun kills such phantasies. There areno phantoms here. Moreover, I am convinced that in all such experimentssuccess depends on the state of mind of the inquirer, which not onlypersuades, but indeed compels itself by a strange magnetic quality tosee the vision it desires. In my youth I considered that I had evokedvisions of Satan and Helen of Troy, and what not--such things are fitfor the young. We greybeards have more serious things to occupy us, andwhen a man has one foot in the grave, he has no time to waste. "

"To my mind, " said the painter, "this world has sufficient beauty andmystery to satisfy the most ardent inquirer. "

"But, " said the Englishman, "is not this world a phantom and a dream asinsubstantial as the visions of the ardent mind?"

"Men and women are the only study fit for a man, " interrupted Guido, "and as for the philosopher's stone I have found it. I found it somemonths ago in a garden at Sorrento. It is a pearl radiant with all thehues of the rainbow. "

"With regard to that matter, " said the Doctor, "we will have some talklater. The wench's brother has returned from the war. We must find her ahusband. "

"You misunderstand me, " said Guido. "You do not think I am going tothrow my precious pearl to the swine? I have sworn to wed Margherita, and wed her I shall, and that swiftly. "

"Such an act of folly would only lead, " said the Doctor, "to yourunhappiness and to hers. It is the selfish act of a fool. You must notthink of it. "

"Ah!" said Guido, "you are young at seventy, Doctor, but you were old attwenty-five, and you cannot know what these things mean. "

"I was young in my day, " said the Doctor, "and I found many such pearls;believe me, they are all very well in their native shell. To move themis to destroy their beauty. "

"You do not understand, " said Guido. "I have loved countless times; butshe is different. You never felt the revelation of the real, true thingthat is different from all the rest and transforms a man's life. "

"No, " said the Doctor, "I confess that to me it was always the samething. " And for the second time that day the Doctor shivered, he knewnot why. 

Soon after the meal was over the guests departed, and although theDoctor detained Guido and endeavoured to persuade him to listen to thevoice of reason and commonsense, his efforts were in vain. Guido haddetermined to wed Margherita. 

"Besides which, if I left her now, I should bring shame and ruin onher, " he said. 

The Doctor started--a familiar voice seemed to whisper in his ear: "Sheis not the first one. " A strange shudder passed through him, and hedistinctly heard a mocking voice laughing. "Go your way, " he said, "butdo not come and complain to me if you bring unhappiness on yourself andher. "

Guido departed and the Doctor retired to enjoy his siesta. 

For the first time during all the years he had lived at Naples theDoctor was not able to sleep. "This and the hallucinations I havesuffered from to-day come from drinking that Cyprus wine, " he said tohimself. 

He lay in the darkened room tossing uneasily on his bed and sleep wouldnot come to him. Stranger still, before his eyes fiery letters seemedto dance before him in the air. At seven o'clock he went out into thegarden. Never had he beheld a more glorious evening. He strolled downtowards the seashore and watched the sunset. Mount Vesuvius seemedto have dissolved into a rosy haze; the waves of the sea werephosphorescent. A fisherman was singing in his boat. The sky was anapocalypse of glory and peace. 

The Doctor sighed and watched the pageant of light until it faded andthe stars lit up the magical blue darkness. Then out of the night cameanother song--a song which seemed familiar to the Doctor, although forthe moment he could not place it, about a King in the Northern Countrywho was faithful to the grave and to whom his dying mistress a goldenbeaker gave. 

"Strange, " thought the Doctor, "it must come from some Northern fishingsmack, " and he went home. 

He sat reading in his study until midnight, and for the first time inthirty years he could not fix his mind on his book. For the visionof the sunset and the song of the Northern fisherman, which in someunaccountable way brought back to him the days of his youth, kept onsurging up in his mind. 

Twelve o'clock struck. He rose to go to bed, and as he did so he heard aloud knock at the door. 

"Come in, " said the Doctor, but his voice faltered ("the Cyprus wineagain!" he thought), and his heart beat loudly. 

The door opened and an icy draught blew into the room. The visitorbeckoned, but spoke no word, and Doctor Faust rose and followed him intothe outer darkness. 

THE FLUTE-PLAYER'S STORY

There is a village in the South of England not far from the sea, whichpossesses a curious inn called "The Green Tower. " Why it is called thus, nobody knows. This inn must in days gone by have been the dwellingof some well-to-do squire, but nothing now remains of its formerprosperity, except the square grey tower, partially covered with ivy, from which it takes its name. The inn stands on the roadside, on thebrow of a hill, and at the top of the tower there is a room with fourlarge windows, whence you can see all over the wooded country. Theex-Prime Minister of a foreign state, who had been driven from officeand home by a revolution, happening to pass the night in the inn andbeing of an eccentric disposition, was so much struck with this roomthat he secured it, together with two bedrooms, permanently for himself. He determined to spend the rest of his life here, and as he was withincertain limits not unsociable, he invited his friends to come and staywith him on any Saturday they pleased, without giving him notice. 

Thus it happened that of a Saturday and Sunday there was nearly alwaysa mixed gathering of men at "The Green Tower", and after they had dinedthey would sit in the tower room and drink old Southern wines from theex-Prime Minister's country, and talk, or tell each other stories. Butthe ex-Prime Minister made it a stringent rule that at least one guestshould tell one story during his stay, for while he had been PrimeMinister a Court official had been in his service whose only duty itwas to tell him a story every evening, and this was the only thing heregretted of all his former privileges. 

On this particular Sunday, besides myself, the clerk, the flute-player, the wine merchant (the friends of the ex-Prime Minister were exceedinglyvarious), and the scholar were present. They were smoking in the towerroom. It was summer, and the windows were wide open. Every inch of wallwhich was not occupied by the windows was crowded with books. The clerkwas turning over the leaves of the ex-Prime Minister's stamp collection(which was magnificent), the flute-player was reading the score ofHandel's flute sonatas (which was rare), the scholar was reading atranslation in Latin hexameters of the "Ring and the Book" (whichthe ex-Prime Minister has written in his spare moments), and the winemerchant was drinking generously of a curious red wine, which was veryold. 

"I think, " said the ex-Prime Minister, "that the flute-player has neveryet told us a story. "

The guests knew that this hint was imperative, and so putting away thescore, the flute-player said: "My story is called, 'The Fiddler. '" Andhe began:--

"This happened a long time ago in one of the German-speaking countriesof the Holy Roman Empire. There was a Count who lived in a large castle. He was rich, powerful, and the owner of large lands. He had a wife, andone daughter, who was dazzlingly beautiful, and she was betrothed to theeldest son of a neighbouring lord. When I say betrothed, I mean thather parents had arranged the marriage. She herself--her name wasElisinde--had had no voice in the matter, and she disliked, or ratherloathed, her future husband, who was boorish, sullen, and ill-tempered;he cared for nothing except hunting and deep drinking, and had nothingto recommend him but his ducats and his land. But it was quite uselessfor Elisinde to cry or protest. Her parents had settled the marriage andit was to be. She understood this herself very well. 

"All the necessary preparations for the wedding, which was to be held ona splendid scale, were made. There was to be a whole week of feasting;and tumblers and musicians came from distant parts of the country totake part in the festivities and merry-making. In the village, which wasclose to the castle, a fair was held, and the musicians, tumblers, andmountebanks, who had thronged to it, performed in front of the castlewalls for the amusement of the Count's guests. 

"Among these strolling vagabonds was a fiddler who far excelled all theothers in skill. He drew the most ravishing tones from his instrument, which seemed to speak in trills as liquid as those of the nightingale, and in accents as plaintive as those of a human voice. And one of theinmates of the castle was so much struck by the performance of thisfiddler that he told the Count of it, and the fiddler was commanded tocome and play at the Castle, after the banquet which was to be heldon the eve of the wedding. The banquet took place in great pomp andsolemnity, and lasted for many hours. When it was over the fiddlerwas summoned to the large hall and bidden to play before the Lords andLadies. 

"The fiddler was a strange looking, tall fellow with unkempt fair hair, and eyes that glittered like gold; but as he was dressed in tattereduncouth rags (and they were his best too) he cut an extraordinary andalmost ridiculous figure amongst that splendid jewelled gathering. Theguests tittered when they saw him. But as soon as he began to play, their tittering ceased, for never had they heard such music. 

"He played--in view of the festive occasion--a joyous melody. And, as heplayed, the air seemed full of sunlight, and the smell of wine vats andthe hum of bees round ripe fruit. The guests could not keep still intheir places, and at last the Count gave orders for a general dance. Thehall was cleared, and soon all the guests were breathlessly dancing tothe divine lilt of the fiddler's melody. All except Elisinde who, whenher betrothed came forward to lead her to the dance, pleaded fatigue, and remained seated in her chair, pale and distraught, and staring atthe fiddler. This did not, to tell the truth, displease her betrothed, who was a clumsy dancer and had no ear for music. Breathless at lastwith exhaustion the guests begged the untiring fiddler to pause whilethey rested for a moment to get their breath. 

"And while they were resting the fiddler played another tune. This timeit was a sad tune: a low, soft tune, liquid and lovely as a human voice. A great hush came on the company. It seemed as if after the heat andsplendour of a summer's day the calm of evening had fallen; the quietof the dusk, when the moon rises in the sky, still faintly yellow in thewest with the ebb of sunset, and pours on the stiff cornfields its cool, silvery frost; and the trees quiver, as though they felt the freshnessand were relieved, and a breeze comes, almost imperceptible and notstrong enough to shake the boughs, from the sea; and a bird, hiddensomewhere in the leaves, sings a throbbing song. 

"Everyone was spellbound, but none so much as Elisinde. The music seemedto be speaking straight to her, to pierce the very core of her heart. Itwas an inarticulate language which she understood better than any words. She heard a lonely spirit crying out to her, that it understood hersorrow and shared her pain. And large tears poured down her cheeks. 

"The fiddler stopped playing, and for a moment or two no one spoke. Atlast Elisinde's betrothed gave a great yawn, and the spell was broken. 

"'You play very well--very well, indeed, ' said the Count. 

"'But that sad music is, I think, rather out of place to-day, ' said theCountess. 

"'Yes, let us have another cheerful tune, ' said the Count. 

"The fiddler struck up once more and played another dance. This timethere was an almost elfish magic in his melody. It took you captive; itwas irresistible; it called and commanded and compelled; you longed tofollow, follow, anywhere, over the hills, over the sea, to the end ofthe world. 

"Elisinde rose from her chair as though the spirit of the music beckonedher, but looking round she saw no partner to her taste. She sat downagain and stared at the fiddler. His eyes were fixed on her, and as shelooked at him his squalor and rags seemed to fade away and his blue eyesthat glittered like gold seemed to grow larger, and his hair to growbrighter till it shone like fire. And he seemed to be caught in a rosycloud of light: tall, splendid, young, and glowing like a god. 

"After this dance was over the Count rose, and he and his guests retiredto rest. The fiddler was given a purse full of money, and the Count gaveorders that he should be served refreshment in the kitchen. 

"Elisinde went up to her bedroom, which overlooked the garden. She threwthe window wide open and looked out into the starry darkness. It was abreathless summer night. The air was full of warm scents. Lightsstill twinkled in the village; now and again a dog barked, otherwiseeverything was still. She leant out of the window, and cried bitterlybecause her lot was loathsome to her, and she had not a friend in theworld to whom she could confide her sorrow. 

"While she was thus sobbing she heard a rustling in the bushes beneath;she looked down and she saw a face looking up towards her, a beautifulface, glistening in the moonlight. It was the fiddler. 

"'Elisinde, ' he called to her in a low voice, 'if you want to escape Ihave the means. Come with me; I love you, and I will save you from yourdoom. '

"'I would come with you to the end of the world, ' she said, 'but howcan I get away from this castle?'

"He threw a rope ladder up to her. 'Make it fast to the bar, ' he said, 'and let yourself down. '

"She let herself down into the garden. 'We can easily climb the wallwith this, ' he said; 'but before you come I must tell you that if youwill be my bride your life will be hard and full of misery. Think beforeyou come. '

"'Rather all the misery in the world, ' she said, 'than the awful doomthat awaits me here. Besides which I love you, and we shall be veryhappy. '

"They scaled the wall, and on the other side of it the fiddler had twohorses, waiting tied to the gate. They galloped through many villages, and by the dawn they had reached a village far beyond the Count's lands. Here they stopped at an inn, and they were married by the priest thatday. But they did not stop in this village; they sought a furthercountry, beyond reach of all pursuit. They settled in a village, andthe fiddler earned his bread by his fiddling, and Elisinde kept theircottage neat and clean. For awhile they were as happy as the day waslong; the fiddler found favour everywhere by his fiddling, and Elisindeingratiated herself by her gentle ways. But one day when Elisinde waslying in bed and the fiddler had lulled her to sleep with his music, some neighbours, attracted by the sound, passed the cottage and lookedin at the window. And to their astonishment they saw the fiddler sittingby a bed on which lay what seemed to them to be a sleeping princess;and the whole cottage was full of dazzling light, and the fiddler's faceshone, and his hair and his eyes glittered like gold. They went awaymuch frightened, and told the whole village the news. 

"Now there were already not a few of the villagers who looked askanceon the fiddler; and this incident set all the evil and envious tongueswagging. When the fiddler went to play the next day at the inn menturned away from him, and a child in the street threw a stone at him. Presently he was warned that he had better swiftly fly or else he wouldbe drowned as a sorcerer. 

"So he and Elisinde fled in the night to a neighbouring village. Butsoon the dark rumours followed them, and they were forced to flee oncemore. This happened again and again, till at last in the whole countrythere was not a village which would receive them, and one night theywere obliged to take refuge in a barn, for Elisinde was expecting thebirth of her child. That night their child was born, a beautiful littleboy, and an hour afterwards Elisinde smiled and died. 

"All that night the villagers heard from afar a piteous wailing music, infinitely sad and beautiful, and those that heard it shuddered andcrossed themselves. 

"The next day the villagers sought the barn, for they had resolved todrown the sorcerer; but he was not there. All they found was the deadbody of Elisinde, and a little baby lying on some straw. The bodyof Elisinde was covered with roses. And this was strange, for it wasmidwinter. The fiddler had disappeared and was never heard of again, andan old wood-cutter, who was too old to know any better, took charge ofthe baby. 

"I will tell you what happened to it another day. "

* * * * *

"We wish to hear the end of your story, " said the ex-Prime Minister tothe flute-player. 

"Yes, " said the scholar, "and I want to know who the fiddler was. "

This conversation took place at the Green Tower two weeks after thegathering I have already described. The same people were present;but there was another guest, namely, the musician, who, unlike theflute-player, was not an amateur. 

"The child of Elisinde and the fiddler, " began the flute-player, "was, as I have already told you, a boy. The woodcutter who took pity on himwas old and childless. He brought the baby to his hut, and gave it overto the care of his wife. At first she pretended to be angry, and saidthat nothing would persuade her to have anything to do with the child, and that it was all they could do to feed themselves without picking upwaifs in the gutter; but she ended by looking after the baby with theutmost tenderness and care, and by loving it as much as if it had beenher own child. The baby was christened Franz. As soon as he was able towalk and talk there were two things about him which were remarkable. Thefirst was his hair, which glittered like sunlight; the second was hisfondness for all musical sounds. When he was four years old he had madehimself a flute out of a reed, and on this he played all day, imitatingthe song of the birds. He was in his sixth year when an event happenedwhich changed his life. He was sitting in front of the woodcutter'scottage one day, when a bright cavalcade passed him. It was a noblemanfrom a neighbouring castle, who was travelling to the city with hisretainers. Among these was a Kapellmeister, who organised the music ofthis nobleman's household. The moment he caught sight of Franz and heardhis piping, he stopped, and asked who he was. 

"The woodcutter's wife told him the story of the finding of the waif, to which both the nobleman and himself listened with great interest. TheKapellmeister said that they should take the child with them; that heshould be attached to the nobleman's house and trained as a member ofhis choir or his string band, according to his capacities. The nobleman, who was passionately fond of music, and extremely particular with regardto the manner of its performance, was delighted with the idea. The offerwas made to the woodcutter and his wife, and although she cried agood deal they were both forced to recognise that they had no right tointerfere with the child's good fortune. Moreover, the gift of a pursefull of gold (which the nobleman gave them) did not make the matter moredistasteful. 

"Finally it was settled that the child should go with the nobleman thenand there; and Franz took leave of his adopted parents, not without manyand bitter tears being shed on both sides. 

"Franz travelled with the nobleman to a large city, and he became amember--the youngest--of the nobleman's household. He was taught hisletters, which he learnt with ease, and the rudiments of music, which heabsorbed with such astounding rapidity, that the Kapellmeister said thatit seemed as if he already knew everything that was taught him. When hewas seven years old, he could not only play several instruments, but hecomposed fugues and sonatas. When the nobleman invited the magnates ofthe place to listen to his musicians, Franz, the prodigy, was the centreof interest, and very soon he became the talk of the town. At the age often he was an accomplished organ player, and he played with skill on theflute and the clavichord. 

"He grew up a tall and handsome lad, with clear, dreamy eyes, and hairthat continued to glitter like sunlight. He was happy in the nobleman'shousehold, for the nobleman and his wife were kind people; like thewoodcutter they were childless and came to look upon him as their ownchild. He was a quiet youth, and so deeply engrossed in his music andhis studies that he seemed to be quite unaware of the outside world andits inhabitants and its doings. But although he led a retired, studiouslife, his fame had got abroad and had even reached the Emperor's ears. 

"When Franz was seventeen years old it happened that the Court was inneed of an organist. The Emperor's curiosity had been aroused by what hehad heard of Franz, and one fine day the youth was summoned to Courtto play before his Majesty. This he did with such success that he wasappointed organist of the Court on the spot. 

"He was sad at leaving the nobleman, but there was nothing to be done. The Emperor's wish was law. He became Court organist and he played theorgan in the Imperial chapel during Mass on Sundays. As before, he spentall his leisure time in composing music. 

"Now the Emperor had a daughter called Kunigmunde, who was beautiful andwildly romantic. She was immediately spellbound by Franz's music, andhe became the lodestar of her dreams. Often in the afternoon she wouldsteal up to the organ loft, where he was playing alone, and sit forhours listening to his improvisations. They did not speak to each othermuch, but ever since Franz had set eyes on her something new had enteredinto his soul and spoke in his music, something tremulous and strangeand wonderful. 

"For a year Franz's life ran placidly and smoothly. He was made much of, praised and petted; but now, as before, he seemed quite unaware of theoutside world and its doings, and he moved in a world of his own, onlyhe was no longer alone in his secret habitation, it was inhabited byanother shape, the beautiful dark-haired Princess Kunigmunde, and inher honour he composed songs, minuets, sonatas, hymns, and triumphalmarches. As was only natural, there were not wanting at Court personswho were envious of Franz, his talent, and his good fortune. Andamong them there was a musician, a tenor in the Imperial choir, calledAlbrecht, who hated Franz with his whole heart. He was a dark-eyed, dark-haired creature, slightly deformed; he limped, and he had asinister look as though of a satyr. Nevertheless he was highly giftedand composed music of his own which, although it was not radiantlike that of Franz, was full of brilliance and not without a certaincompelling power. Albrecht revolved in his mind how he might ruin Franz. He tried to excite the envy of the courtiers against him, but Franz wassuch a modest fellow, so kindly and good-natured, that it was not easyto make people dislike him. Nevertheless there were many who weretired of hearing him praised, and many who were secretly tired of theperpetual beauty and radiance of Franz's music, and wished for somethingnew even though it should be ugly. 

"An opportunity soon presented itself for Albrecht to carry out his eviland envious designs. The Court Kapellmeister died, and not long afterthis event a great feast was to be held at Court to celebrate PrincessKunigmunde's birthday. The Emperor had offered a prize, a wreath of giltlaurels, as well as the post of Court Kapellmeister to him who shouldcompose the most beautiful piece of music in his daughter's honour. Franz seemed so certain of success that nobody even dared to competewith him except Albrecht. 

"When the hour of the contest came--it took place in the greatthrone-room before the Emperor, the Empress, their sons, theirdaughters, and the whole court after the banquet--Franz was the firstto display his work. He sat down at the clavichord and sang what he hadcomposed in honour of the Princess. He had made three little songs forher. Franz had not much voice, but it had a peculiar wail in it, and hesang, like the born and trained musician that he was, with that absolutemastery over his means, that certain perfection of utterance, that powerof conveying, to the shade of a shade, the inmost spirit and meaningof the music which only belong to those great and rare artists whoseperfect art is alive with the inspiration that cannot be learnt. 

"The first song he sang was the call of a home-going shepherd tohis flock on the hills at sunset, and when he sang it he brought thelargeness of the dying evening and the solemn hills into the elegantthrone-room. The second song was the cry of a lonely fisherman on theriver at midnight, and as he sang it he brought the mystery of broadstarlit waters into the taper-lit, gilded hall. The third song was thesong of the happy lover in the orchard at dawn. And when he sang ithe brought the smell of dewy leaves and grass, the soaring radianceof spring and early morning, to that powdered and silken assembly. TheCourt applauded him, but they were astonished and slightly disappointed, for they had expected something grand and complicated, and notthree simple tunes. But the nobleman who had educated Franz, and hisKapellmeister, who were among the guests, wept tears in silence. 

"Albrecht followed him. The swarthy singer sat down to the instrumentand struck a ringing chord. He had a pure and infinitely powerful tenorvoice, clear as crystal, loud as a clarion, strong, rich, and rippling. He sang a love-song he had composed himself. He called it 'The Homage ofKing Pan to the Princess. ' It was voluptuous and vehement and sweetas honey, full of bold conceits and audacious turns and trills, whichstartled the audience and took their breath away. He sang his song withalmost devilish skill and power; and his warm, captivating voice rangthrough the room and shook the tall window-panes, and finally died awaylike the vibrations of a great bell. The whole Court shouted, deliriouswith applause, and unanimously declared him to be the victor. A wittycourtier said that Marsyas had avenged himself on Apollo; but thenobleman and his Kapellmeister snorted and sniffed and said nothing. Albrecht was given the prize and appointed Kapellmeister to the Courtwithout further discussion. 

"When the ceremony was over, Franz, who was indifferent to his defeat, went to the chapel of the palace, and lighting a candle, walked up intothe organ loft. There he played to himself another song, a hymn he hadcomposed in honour of Princess Kunigmunde. It was filled with raptureand a breathless wonder, and in it his inmost soul spoke its unutteredlove. He had not sung this song in public, it was too sacred. Ashe played and sang to himself in a low voice he was aware of a softfootstep. He started and looked round, and there was the Princess, bright in silk and jewels, with a pink rose in her powdered hair. Shetook this rose and laid it lightly on the black keys. 

"'That is the prize, ' she said. 'You won it, and I want to thank you. Inever knew music could be so beautiful. '

"Franz looked at her, and said 'Thank you. ' He had risen from hisseat and was about to go, but the light of his candle caught PrincessKunigmunde's brown eyes (which were wet with tears), and somethingrose like fire in his breast and made him forget his bashfulness, hisrespect, and his sense of decorum. 

"'Come with me, ' he said, in a broken voice. 'Let us fly from thisCourt to the hills and be happy. '

"But the Princess shook her head sadly, and said: 'Alas! It isimpossible. I am betrothed to the King of the Two Sicilies. '

"Then Franz mastered himself once more, and said: 'Of course, it isimpossible. I was mad. '

"The Princess kissed her hand to him and fled. 

"At that moment Franz heard a noise in the nave of the chapel; he lookedover the gallery of the organ loft, and saw sidling away in the darknessthe dim figure of a deformed man. 

"That night Princess Kunigmunde had a strange dream. She thought she wastransported into a beautiful southern country where the azure sky seemedto scintillate with the dust of myriads and myriads of diamonds, and tosparkle with sunlight like dancing wine. The low blue hills were bareand sparsely clothed with delicate trees, and the fields, sprinkledwith innumerable red, yellow, white and purple flowers, were bright asfabulous Persian carpets. On a grassy knoll before her the rosy columnsof a temple shone in the gleaming dust of the atmosphere. Beside herthere was a running stream, on the bank of which grew a bay-tree. There was a chirping of grasshoppers in the air, a noise of bees, and adelicious warm smell of burnt grass and thyme and mint. 

"Near the stream a man was standing; he was an ordinary man, and yet heseemed to tower above the landscape without being unusually tall; hishair was bright as gold, and his eyes, more lustrous still, reflectedthe silvery blue sky and shone like opals. In his hands he held agolden lyre, and around him a warm golden cloud seemed to rise, on atransparent aura of light, like the glow of the sunset. In front of himthere stood a creature of the woods, a satyr, with pointed ears, clovenhoofs, and human eyes, in his hairy hands holding a flute made out of areed. 

"Presently the satyr breathed on his flute and a wonderful note trembledin the air, soft, low, and liquid. The note was followed by others, anda stillness fell upon Nature; the birds ceased to sing, the grasshopperswere still, the bees paused. All Nature was listening and the Princesswas conscious in her dream that there were others besides herselflistening, unseen shapes and sightless phantoms; a crowd, a multitude ofattentive ghosts, that were hidden from her sight. The melody rose andswelled in stillness; it was melting and ravishing and bold with a humanaudacity. As she listened it reminded her of something; she felt she hadheard such sounds before, though she could not remember where and when. But suddenly it flashed across her that the music resembled Albrecht'ssong; it was Albrecht's song, only transfigured as it were, and athousand times more beautiful in her dream than in reality. Morebeautiful, and at the same time as though it belonged to the daysof youth and spring which Albrecht had never known. The satyr ceasedplaying and the pleasant noises of the world began once more. Theshining figure who stood before him looked on the satyr with divinescorn and smiled a radiant, merciless smile. Then he struck his lyre andNature once more was dumb. 

"But this time the magic was of another kind and a thousand times moremighty; a song rose into the air which leapt and soared like a flame, imperious as the flashing of a sword, triumphant as the waving of abanner, wonderful as the dawn and fresh as the laughing sea. And oncemore Princess Kunigmunde was aware that the music was familiar to her. She had heard something like it in the chapel that evening, when in thedarkness Franz had played and sung the hymn that he had composed in herhonour. Only now it was more than human, unearthly and divine. As soonas he ceased an eclipse seemed to darken the world, a thick cloud ofrolling darkness; there was a crash of thunder, a flash of lightning, and out of the blackness came a piteous, human cry, the cry of acreature in anguish, and then a faint moaning. 

"Presently all was still, but the dark cloud remained, and she heard amocking laugh and the accents of a clear, scornful voice (she recognisedthe voice, it was the voice of Albrecht), and the voice said: 'Thou hastconquered, Apollo, and cruelly hast thou used thy victory; and cruellyhas thou punished me for daring to challenge thy divine skill. It wasmad indeed to compete with a god; and yet shall I avenge my wrong andthy harshness shall recoil on thee. For not even gods can be unjust withimpunity, and the Fates are above us all. And I shall be avenged; forall thy sons shall suffer what I have suffered; and there is not one ofthem that shall escape the doom and not share the fate of Marsyas theSatyr, whom thou didst cruelly slay. The music and the skill which shallbe their inheritance shall be the cause to them of sorrow and griefunending and pitiless pain and misery. Their life shall be as bitter tothem as my death has been to me. Their music shall fill the world withsweetness and ravish the ears of listening nations, but to them it shallbring no joy; for life like a cruel blade shall flay and lay bare theirhearts, and sorrow like a searching wind shall play upon their soulsand make them tremble, even as the scabbard of my body trembled in thebreeze; and just as from that trembling husk of what was once myselfthere came forth sweet sounds, so shall it be with their souls, shivering and trembling in the cold wind of life. Music shall come fromthem, but this music shall be born of agony; nor shall they utter asingle note that is not begotten of sorrow or pain. And so shall thechildren of Apollo suffer and share the pain of Marsyas. 

"The voice died away, and a pitiful wail was heard as of a wind blowingthrough the reeds of a river. And the Princess awoke, trembling withfear of some unknown and impending disaster. 

"The next morning Franz, as he walked into the chapel to practice onthe organ, was met by two soldiers, who bade him follow them, and he wasshut up in the prison of the palace. No word of explanation was givenhim; nor had he any idea what the crime might be of which he wasaccused, or of his ultimate fate. But in the evening, when the gaoler'sdaughter brought him his food, she made him a sign, and he found in hisloaf of bread a rose, a file, and a tiny scroll, on which the followingwords were written; 'Albrecht denounced you. Fly for your life. K. 'Later, when the gaolers had gone to sleep, the gaoler's daughter stoleto his cell. She brought him a rope, and a purse full of silver. Hefiled the bars and let himself down into a narrow street of the city. 

"By the time the sun rose he had left the city far behind him. Hejourneyed on and on till he passed the frontier of the Emperor'sdominions and reached a neighbouring State. By the time he came toa city he had spent his money, and he was in rags and tatters;nevertheless, he managed to earn his bread by making music in thestreets, and after a time a well-to-do citizen who noticed him took himinto his house and entrusted him with the task of teaching music to hissons and of playing him to sleep in the evening. Franz spent his leisurehours in composing an opera called 'The Death of Adonis, ' into whichhe poured all the music of his soul, all his love, his sorrow, and hisinfinite desire. He lived for this only, and during all the hours hespent when he was not working at his opera he was like a man in adream, unconscious of the realities around him. In a year his opera wasfinished. He took it to the Intendant of the Ducal Theatre in the cityand played it to him, and the Intendant, greatly pleased, determined tohave it performed without delay. The best singers were allotted partsin it, and it was performed before the Arch-Duke and his Court, and amultitude of people. 

"The music told the story of Franz's love; it was bright with all hisdreams, and sorrowful with his great despair. Never had such music beenheard; so sweet, so sunlit in its joys, so radiant in its sadness. Butthe Arch-Duke and his Court, startled by the new accent of this music, and influenced by the local and established musicians, who were enviousof this newcomer, listened in frigid silence, so that the common peoplein the gallery dared not show signs of their delight. In fact, the operawas a complete failure. Public opinion followed the Court, and found nowords, bad or strong enough to condemn what they called the new-fangledrubbish. Among those who blamed the new work there was none so bitteras the citizen whose children Franz had been teaching. For this manconsidered himself to be a genius, and was inordinately vain, and hisignorance was equal to his conceit. He dismissed Franz from his service. All doors were now closed to him, and being on the verge of starvationhe was reduced to earning his bread in the streets by playing his pipe. This also proved unsuccessful, and it was with difficulty that he earneda few pence every day. 

"At last he burnt all his manuscripts, and went into the hills; the hillpeople welcomed him, but their kindness came too late; his heart wasbroken, and when sickness came to him with the winter snow, he had nolonger any strength to resist it. The peasants found him one day lyingcold and stiff in his hut. They buried him on the hill-side. The nightof his funeral a strange fiddler with a shining face was seen standingbeside his grave and playing the most lovely tunes on a violin. 

"The name of Franz was soon forgotten, but although he died obscure andpenniless he left a rich legacy. For he taught the hill-people threesongs, the songs he had sung at Court in honour of Princess Kunigmunde, and they never died. They spread from the hills to the plains, from theplains to the river, from the river to the woods, and indeed you canstill hear them on the hills of the north, on the great broad rivers ofthe east, and in the orchards of the south. "

A CHINAMAN ON OXFORD

"Yes, I am a student, " said the Chinaman, "And I came here to study theEnglish manners and customs. "

We were seated on the top of the electric tram which goes to HamptonCourt. It was a bitterly cold spring day. The suburbs of London were notlooking their best. 

"I spent three days at Oxford last week, " he said. 

"It's a beautiful place, is it not?" I remarked. 

The Chinaman smiled. "The country which you see from the windows of therailway carriages, " he said, "on the way from Oxford to London strikesme as being beautiful. It reminded me of the Chinese Plain, only it isprettier. But the houses at Oxford are hideous: there is no symmetryabout them. The houses in this country are like blots on the landscape. In China the houses are made to harmonise with the landscape just astrees do. "

"What did you see at Oxford?" I asked. 

"I saw boat races, " he said, "and a great many ignorant old men. "

"What did you think of that?"

"I think, " he said, "the young people seemed to enjoy it, and if theyenjoy it they are quite right to do it. But the way the older men talkabout these things struck me as being foolish. They talk as if thesegames and these sports were a solemn affair, a moral or religiousquestion; they said the virtues and the prowess of the English race werefounded on these things. They said that competition was the mainspringof life; they seemed to think exercise was the goal of existence. A manwhom I saw there and who, I learnt, had been chosen to teach the youngon account of his wisdom, told me that competition trained the man tosharpen his faculties; and that the tension which it provoked isin itself a useful training. I do not believe this. A cat or a boaconstrictor will lie absolutely idle until it perceives an object worthyof its appetite; it will then catch it and swallow it, and once morerelapse into repose without thinking of keeping itself 'in training. 'But it will lie dormant and rise to the occasion when it occurs. Thesepeople who talked of games seem to me to undervalue repose. They forgetthat repose is the mother of action, and exercise only a frittering awayof the same. "

"What did you think, " I asked, "of the education that the students atOxford receive?"

"I think, " said the Chinaman, "that inasmuch as the young men wastetheir time in idleness they do well; for the wise men who are chosen toinstruct the young at your places of learning, are not always wise. Ivisited a professor of Oriental languages. His servant asked me to wait, and after I had waited three quarters of an hour, he sent word to saythat he had tried everywhere to find the professor in the University whospoke French, but that he had not been able to find him. And so he askedme to call another day. I had dinner in a college hall. I found that theprofessors talked of many things in such a way as would be impossible tochildren of five and six in our country. They are quite ignorant ofthe manners and customs of the people of other European countries. Theypronounce Greek and Latin and even French in the same way as English. Imentioned to one of them that I had been employed for some time in theChinese Legation; he asked me if I had had much work to do. I said yes, the work had been heavy. 'But, ' he observed, 'I suppose a great deal ofthe work is carried on directly between the Governments and not throughthe Ambassadors. ' I cannot conceive what he meant or how such a thingcould be possible, or what he considered the use and function ofEmbassies and Legations to be. They most of them seemed to take forgranted that I could not speak English: some of them addressed me in akind of baby language; one of them spoke French. The professor who spoketo me in this language told me that the French possessed no poeticalliterature, and he said the reason of this was that the French languagewas a bastard language; that it was, in fact, a kind of pidgin Latin. He said when a Frenchman says a girl is 'beaucoup belle, ' he is usingpidgin Latin. The courtesy due to a host prevented me from suggestingthat if a Frenchman said 'beaucoup belle' he would be talking pidginFrench. 

"Another professor said to me that China would soon develop if sheadopted a large Imperial ideal, and that in time the Chinese mightattain to a great position in the world, such as the English now held. He said the best means of bringing this about would be to introducecricket and football into China. I told him that I thought this wasimprobable, because if the Chinese play games, they do not care whois the winner; the fun of the game is to us the improvisation of it asopposed to the organisation which appeals to the people here. Upon whichhe said that cricket was like a symphony of music. In a symphony everyinstrument plays its part in obedience to one central will, not for itsindividual advantage, but in order to make a beautiful whole. 'So it iswith our games, ' he said, 'every man plays his part not for the sake ofpersonal advantage, but so that his side may win; and thus the citizenis taught to sink his own interests in those of the community. ' Itold him the Chinese did not like symphonies, and Western music wasintolerable to them for this very reason. Western musicians seem tous to take a musical idea which is only worthy of a penny whistle (andwould be very good indeed if played on a penny whistle!); and theysit down and make a score of it twenty yards broad, and set a hundredhighly-trained and highly-paid musicians to play it. It is the contrastbetween the tremendous apparatus and waste of energy on one side, andthe light and playful character of the business itself on theother which makes me, a Chinaman, as incapable of appreciating yourcomplicated games as I am of appreciating the complicated symphonies ofthe Germans or the elaborate rules which their students make withregard to the drinking of beer. We like a man for taking his fun andnot missing a joke when he finds it by chance on his way, but we cannotunderstand his going out of his way to prepare a joke and to makearrangements for having some fun at a certain fixed date. This is whywe consider a wayside song, a tune that is heard wandering in the summerdarkness, to be better than twenty concerts. "

"What did that professor say?" I asked. 

"He said that if I were to stay long enough in England and go to acourse of concerts at the Chelsea Town Hall, I would soon learn tothink differently. And that if cricket and football were introducedinto China, the Chinese would soon emerge out of their backwardness andbarbarism and take a high place among the enlightened nations of theworld. I thought to myself as he said this that your games are nodoubt an excellent substitute for drill, but if we were to submit to socomplicated an organisation it would be with a purpose: in order to turnthe Europeans out of China, for instance; but that organisation withouta purpose would always seem to us to be stupid, and we should no moredream of organising our play than of organising a stroll in the twilightto see the Evening Star, or the chase of a butterfly in the spring. Ifwe were to decide on drill it would be drill with a vengeance and with adefinite aim; but we should not therefore and thereby destroy our play. Play cannot exist for us without fun, and for us the open air, thefields, and the meadows are like wine: if we feel inclined, we roam andjump about in them, but we should never submit to standing to attentionfor hours lest a ball should escape us. Besides which, we invented thefoundations of all our games many thousand of years ago. We invented andplayed at 'Diabolo' when the Britons were painted blue and lived inthe woods. The English knew how to play once, in the days of QueenElizabeth; then they had masques and madrigals and Morris dancesand music. A gentleman was ashamed if he did not speak six or sevenlanguages, handle the sword with a deadly dexterity, play chess, andwrite good sonnets. Men were broken on the wheel for an idea: they werebrave, cultivated, and gay; they fought, they played, and they wroteexcellent verse. Now they organise games and lay claim to a specialmorality and to a special mission; they send out missionaries tocivilise us savages; and if our people resent having an alien creedstuffed down their throats, they take our hand and burn our homes inthe name of Charity, Progress, and Civilisation. They seek for onething--gold; they preach competition, but competition for what? Forthis: who shall possess the most, who shall most successfully 'do' hisneighbour. These ideals and aims do not tempt us. The quality of thelife is to us more important than the quantity of what is done andachieved. We live, as we play, for the sake of living. I did not saythis to the professors because we have a proverb that when you are in aman's country you should not speak ill of it. I say it to you because Isee you have an inquiring mind, and you will feel it more insulting tobe served with meaningless phrases and empty civilities than with thetruth, however bitter. For those who have once looked the truth in theface cannot afterwards be put off with false semblances. "

"You speak true words, " I said, "but what do you like best in England?"

"The gardens, " he answered, "and the little yellow flowers that aresprinkled like stars on your green grass. "

"And what do you like least in England?"

"The horrible smells, " he said. 

"Have you no smells in China?" I asked. 

"Yes, " he replied, "we have natural smells, but not the smell of gas andsmoke and coal which sickens me here. It is strange to me that peoplecan find the smell of human beings disgusting and be able to stand thefoul stenches of a London street. This very road along which we are nowtravelling (we were passing through one of the less beautiful portionsof the tramway line) makes me homesick for my country. I long to see aChinese village once more built of mud and fenced with mud, muddy-roadedand muddy-baked, with a muddy little stream to be waded across orpassed by stepping on stones; with a delicate one-storeyed temple on thewater-eaten bank, and green poppy fields round it; and the women in darkblue standing at the doorways, smoking their pipes; and the children, with three small budding pigtails on the head of each, clinging to them;and the river fringed with a thousand masts: the boats, the houseboats, the barges and the ships in the calm, wide estuaries, each with a pairof huge eyes painted on the front bow. And the people: the men workingat their looms and whistling a happy tune out of the gladness of theirhearts. And everywhere the sense of leisure, the absence of hurry andbustle and confusion; the dignity of manners and the grace of expressionand of address. And, above all, the smell of life everywhere. "

"I admit, " I said, "that our streets smell horribly of smoke and coal, but surely our people are clean?"

"Yes, " he said, "no doubt; but you forget that to us there is nothing sointolerably nasty as the smell of a clean white man!"

VENUS

John Fletcher was an overworked minor official in a Government office. He lived a lonely life, and had done so ever since he had been a boy. Atschool he had mixed little with his fellow school-boys, and he took nointerest in the things that interested them, that is to say, games. Onthe other hand, although he was what is called "good at work, " and didhis lessons with facility and ease, he was not a literary boy, and didnot care for books. He was drawn towards machinery of all kinds, and spent his spare time in dabbling in scientific experiments or inwatching trains go by on the Great Western line. Once he blew off hiseyebrows while making some experiment with explosive chemicals; hishands were always smudged with dark, mysterious stains, and his room waslike that of a mediaeval alchemist, littered with retorts, bottles, and test-glasses. Before leaving school he invented a flying machine(heavier than air), and an unsuccessful attempt to start it on the highroad caused him to be the victim of much chaff and ridicule. 

When he left school he went to Oxford. His life there was as lonelyas it had been at school. The dirty, untidy, ink-stained, andchemical-stained little boy grew up into a tall, lank, slovenly-dressedman, who kept entirely to himself, not because he cherished any dislikeor disdain for his fellow-creatures, but because he seemed to beentirely absorbed in his own thoughts and isolated from the world by abarrier of dreams. 

He did well at Oxford, and when he went down he passed high into theCivil Service and became a clerk in a Government office. There he keptas much to himself as ever. He did his work rapidly and well, for thisman, who seemed so slovenly in his person, had an accurate mind, and waswhat was called a good clerk, although his incurable absent-mindednessonce or twice caused him to forget certain matters of importance. 

His fellow clerks treated him as a crank and as a joke, but none ofthem, try as they would, could get to know him or win his confidence. They used to wonder what Fletcher did with his spare time, what werehis pursuits, what were his hobbies, if he had any. They suspected thatFletcher had some hobby of an engrossing kind, since in everyday life heconveyed the impression of a man who is walking in his sleep, who actsmechanically and automatically. Somewhere else, they thought, in someother circumstances, he must surely wake up and take a living interestin somebody or in something. 

Yet had they followed him home to his small room in Canterbury-mansionsthey would have been astonished. For when he returned from the officeafter a hard day's work he would do nothing more engrossing than slowlyto turn over the leaves of a book in which there were elaborate drawingsand diagrams of locomotives and other kinds of engines. And on Sunday hewould take a train to one of the large junctions and spend the wholeday in watching express trains go past, and in the evening would returnagain to London. 

One day after he had returned from the office somewhat earlier thanusual, he was telephoned for. He had no telephone in his own room, buthe could use a public telephone which was attached to the building. Hewent into the small box, but found on reaching the telephone that he hadbeen cut off by the exchange. He imagined that he had been rung up bythe office, so he asked to be given their number. As he did so his eyecaught an advertisement which was hung just over the telephone. It wasan elaborate design in black and white, pointing out the merits of aparticular kind of soap called the Venus: a classical lady, holdinga looking-glass in one hand and a cake of this invaluable soap in theother, was standing in a sphere surrounded by pointed rays, which was nodoubt intended to represent the most brilliant of the planets. 

Fletcher sat down on the stool and took the receiver in his hand. As hedid so he had for one second the impression that the floor underneathhim gave way and that he was falling down a precipice. But before he hadtime to realise what was happening the sensation of falling left him; heshook himself as though he had been asleep, and for one moment a faintrecollection as though of the dreams of the night twinkled in his mind, and vanished beyond all possibility of recall. He said to himself thathe had had a long and curious dream, and he knew that it was too late toremember what it had been about. Then he opened his eyes wide and lookedround him. 

He was standing on the slope of a hill. At his feet there was a kind ofgreen moss, very soft to tread on. It was sprinkled here and there withlight red, wax-like flowers such as he had never seen before. He wasstanding in an open space; beneath him there was a plain covered withwhat seemed to be gigantic mushrooms, much taller than a man. Abovehim rose a mass of vegetation, and over all this was a dense, heavy, streaming cloud faintly glimmering with a white, silvery light whichseemed to be beyond it. 

He walked towards the vegetation, and soon found himself in the middleof a wood, or rather of a jungle. Tangled plants grew on every side;large hanging creepers with great blue flowers hung downwards. There wasa profound stillness in this wood; there were no birds singing andhe heard not the slightest rustle in the rich undergrowth. It wasoppressively hot and the air was full of a pungent, aromatic sweetness. He felt as though he were in a hot-house full of gardenias andstephanotis. At the same time the atmosphere of the place was pleasantto him. It was neither strange nor disagreeable. He felt at home in thisgreen shimmering jungle and in this hot, aromatic twilight, as though hehad lived there all his life. 

He walked mechanically onwards as if he were going to a definite spot ofwhich he knew. He walked fast, but in spite of the oppressive atmosphereand the thickness of the growth he grew neither hot nor out of breath;on the contrary, he took pleasure in the motion, and the stifling, sweet air seemed to invigorate him. He walked steadily on for over threehours, choosing his way nicely, avoiding certain places and seekingothers, following a definite path and making for a definite goal. Duringall this time the stillness continued unbroken, nor did he meet a singleliving thing, either bird or beast. 

After he had been walking for what seemed to him several hours, thevegetation grew thinner, the jungle less dense, and from a more or lessopen space in it he seemed to discern what might have been a mountainentirely submerged in a multitude of heavy grey clouds. He sat down onthe green stuff which was like grass and yet was not grass, at the edgeof the open space whence he got this view, and quite naturally he pickedfrom the boughs of an overhanging tree a large red, juicy fruit, andate it. Then he said to himself, he knew not why, that he must not wastetime, but must be moving on. 

He took a path to the right of him and descended the sloping jungle withbig, buoyant strides, almost running; he knew the way as though he hadbeen down that path a thousand times. He knew that in a few moments hewould reach a whole hanging garden of red flowers, and he knew thatwhen he had reached this he must again turn to the right. It was as hethought: the red flowers soon came to view. He turned sharply, and thenthrough the thinning greenery he caught sight of an open plain wheremore mushrooms grew. But the plain was as yet a great way off, and themushrooms seemed quite small. 

"I shall get there in time, " he said to himself, and walked steadily on, looking neither to the right nor to the left. It was evening by thetime he reached the edge of the plain: everything was growing dark. Theendless vapours and the high banks of cloud in which the whole of thisworld was sunk grew dimmer and dimmer. In front of him was an emptylevel space, and about two miles further on the huge mushrooms stoodout, tall and wide like the monuments of some prehistoric age. Andunderneath them on the soft carpet there seemed to move a myriad vagueand shadowy forms. 

"I shall get there in time, " he thought. He walked on for another halfhour, and by this time the tall mushrooms were quite close to him, and he could see moving underneath them, distinctly now, green, livingcreatures like huge caterpillars, with glowing eyes. They moved slowlyand did not seem to interfere with each other in any way. Further off, and beyond them, there was a broad and endless plain of high greenstalks like ears of green wheat or millet, only taller and thinner. 

He ran on, and now at his very feet, right in front of him, the greencaterpillars were moving. They were as big as leopards. As he drewnearer they seemed to make way for him, and to gather themselves intogroups under the thick stems of the mushrooms. He walked along thepathway they made for him, under the shadow of the broad, sunshade-likeroofs of these gigantic growths. It was almost dark now, yet he had nodoubt or difficulty as to finding his way. He was making for the greenplain beyond. The ground was dense with caterpillars; they were asplentiful as ants in an ant's nest, and yet they never seemed tointerfere with each other or with him; they instinctively made wayfor him, nor did they appear to notice him in any way. He felt neithersurprise nor wonder at their presence. 

It grew quite dark; the only lights which were in this world came fromthe twinkling eyes of the moving figures, which shone like little stars. The night was no whit cooler than the day. The atmosphere was as steamy, as dense and as aromatic as before. He walked on and on, feeling notrace of fatigue or hunger, and every now and then he said to himself:"I shall be there in time. " The plain was flat and level, and coveredthe whole way with the mushrooms, whose roofs met and shut out from himthe sight of the dark sky. 

At last he came to the end of the plain of mushrooms and reached thehigh green stalks he had been making for. Beyond the dark clouds asilver glimmer had begun once more to show itself. "I am just in time, "he said to himself, "the night is over, the sun is rising. "

At that moment there was a great whirr in the air, and from out ofthe green stalks rose a flight of millions and millions of enormousbroad-winged butterflies of every hue and description--silver, gold, purple, brown and blue. Some with dark and velvety wings like thePurple Emperor, or the Red Admiral, others diaphanous and iridescent asdragon-flies. Others again like vast soft and silvery moths. They rosefrom every part of that green plain of stalks, they filled the sky, andthen soared upwards and disappeared into the silvery cloudland. 

Fletcher was about to leap forward when he heard a voice in his earsaying--

"Are you 6493 Victoria? You are talking to the Home Office. "

* * * * *

As soon as Fletcher heard the voice of the office messenger throughthe telephone he instantly realised his surroundings, and the strangeexperience he had just gone through, which had seemed so long and whichin reality had been so brief, left little more impression on him thanthat which remains with a man who has been immersed in a brown study orwho has been staring at something, say a poster in the street, and hasnot noticed the passage of time. 

The next day he returned to his work at the office, and hisfellow-clerks, during the whole of the next week, noticed that he wasmore zealous and more painstaking than ever. On the other hand, hisperiodical fits of abstraction grew more frequent and more pronounced. On one occasion he took a paper to the head of the department forsignature, and after it had been signed, instead of removing it fromthe table, he remained staring in front of him, and it was not until thehead of the department had called him three times loudly by name that hetook any notice and regained possession of his faculties. As thesefits of absent-mindedness grew to be somewhat severely commented on, heconsulted a doctor, who told him that what he needed was change ofair, and advised him to spend his Sundays at Brighton or at some otherbracing and exhilarating spot. Fletcher did not take the doctor'sadvice, but continued spending his spare time as he did before, that isto say, in going to some big junction and watching the express trains goby all day long. 

One day while he was thus employed--it was Sunday, in August of19--, when the Egyptian Exhibition was attracting great crowds ofvisitors--and sitting, as was his habit, on a bench on the centreplatform of Slough Station, he noticed an Indian pacing up and down theplatform, who every now and then stopped and regarded him with peculiarinterest, hesitating as though he wished to speak to him. Presently theIndian came and sat down on the same bench, and after having sat therein silence for some minutes he at last made a remark about the heat. 

"Yes, " said Fletcher, "it is trying, especially for people like myself, who have to remain in London during these months. "

"You are in an office, no doubt, " said the Indian. 

"Yes, " said Fletcher. 

"And you are no doubt hard worked. "

"Our hours are not long, " Fletcher replied, "and I should not complainof overwork if I did not happen to suffer from--well, I don't know whatit is, but I suppose they would call it nerves. "

"Yes, " said the Indian, "I could see that by your eyes. "

"I am a prey to sudden fits of abstraction, " said Fletcher, "they aregrowing upon me. Sometimes in the office I forget where I am altogetherfor a space of about two or three minutes; people are beginning tonotice it and to talk about it. I have been to a doctor, and he said Ineeded change of air. I shall have my leave in about a month's time, andthen perhaps I shall get some change of air, but I doubt if it willdo me any good. But these fits are annoying, and once something quiteuncanny seemed to happen to me. "

The Indian showed great interest and asked for further detailsconcerning this strange experience, and Fletcher told him all thathe could recall--for the memory of it was already dimmed--of what hadhappened when he had telephoned that night. 

The Indian was thoughtful for a while after hearing this tale. Atlast he said: "I am not a doctor, I am not even what you call a quackdoctor--I am a mere conjurer, and I gain my living by conjuring tricksand fortune-telling at the Exhibition which is going on in London. Butalthough I am a poor man and an ignorant man, I have an inkling, a fewsparks in me of ancient knowledge, and I know what is the matter withyou. "

"What is it?" asked Fletcher. 

"You have the power, or something has the power, " said the Indian, "ofdetaching you from your actual body, and your astral body has been intoanother planet. By your description I think it must be the planet Venus. It may happen to you again, and for a longer period--for a very muchlonger period. "

"Is there anything I can do to prevent it?" asked Fletcher. 

"Nothing, " said the Indian. "You can try change of air if you like, but, " he said with a smile, "I do not think it will do you much good. "

At that moment a train came in, and the Indian said good-bye and jumpedinto it. 

On the next day, which was Monday, when Fletcher got to the office itwas necessary for him to use the telephone with regard to some business. No sooner had he taken the receiver off the telephone than he vividlyrecalled the minute details of the evening he had telephoned, when thestrange experience had come to him. The advertisement of Venus Soap thathad hung in the telephone box in his house appeared distinctly beforehim, and as he thought of that he once more experienced a fallingsensation which lasted only a fraction of a second, and rubbing his eyeshe awoke to find himself in the tepid atmosphere of a green and humidworld. 

This time he was not near the wood, but on the sea-shore. In front ofhim was a grey sea, smooth as oil and clouded with steaming vapours, and behind him the wide green plain stretched into a cloudy distance. He could discern, faint on the far-off horizon, the shadowy forms of thegigantic mushrooms which he knew, and on the level plain which reachedthe sea beach, but not so far off as the mushrooms, he could plainly seethe huge green caterpillars moving slowly and lazily in an endless herd. The sea was breaking on the sand with a faint moan. But almost at oncehe became aware of another sound, which came he knew not whence, andwhich was familiar to him. It was a low whistling noise, and it seemedto come from the sky. 

At that moment Fletcher was seized by an unaccountable panic. He wasafraid of something; he did not know what it was, but he knew, he feltabsolutely certain, that some danger, no vague calamity, no distantmisfortune, but some definite physical danger was hanging over him andquite close to him--something from which it would be necessary to runaway, and to run fast in order to save his life. And yet there was nosign of danger visible, for in front of him was the motionless oily sea, and behind him was the empty and silent plain. It was then he noticedthat the caterpillars were fast disappearing, as if into the earth: hewas too far off to make out how. 

He began to run along the coast. He ran as fast as he could, but hedared not look round. He ran back from the coast to the plain, fromwhich a white mist was rising. By this time every single caterpillar haddisappeared. The whistling noise continued and grew louder. 

At last he reached the wood and bounded on, trampling down long trailinggrasses and tangled weeds through the thick, muggy gloom of thoseendless aisles of jungle. He came to a somewhat open space where therewas the trunk of a tree larger than the others; it stood by itself anddisappeared into the tangle of creepers above. He thought he would climbthe tree, but the trunk was too wide, and his efforts failed. He stoodby the tree trembling and panting with fear. He could not hear a sound, but he felt that the danger, whatever it was, was at hand. 

It grew darker and darker. It was night in the forest. He stoodparalysed with terror; he felt as though bound hand and foot, but therewas nothing to be done except to wait until his invisible enemy shouldchoose to inflict his will on him and achieve his doom. And yet theagony of this suspense was so terrible that he felt that if it lastedmuch longer something must inevitably break inside him . . . And just ashe was thinking that eternity could not be so long as the moments he waspassing through, a blessed unconsciousness came over him. He wokefrom this state to find himself face to face with one of the officemessengers, who said to him that he had been given his number two orthree times but had taken no notice of it. 

Fletcher executed his commission and then went upstairs to his office. His fellow-clerks at once asked what had happened to him, for he waslooking white. He said that he had a headache and was not feeling quitehimself, but made no further explanations. 

This last experience changed the whole tenor of his life. When fits ofabstraction had occurred to him before he had not troubled aboutthem, and after his first strange experience he had felt only vaguelyinterested; but now it was a different matter. He was consumed withdread lest the thing should occur again. He did not want to get backto that green world and that oily sea; he did not want to hear thewhistling noise, and to be pursued by an invisible enemy. So much didthe dread of this weigh on him that he refused to go to the telephonelest the act of telephoning should set alight in his mind the train ofassociations and bring his thoughts back to his dreadful experience. 

Shortly after this he went for leave, and following the doctor's advicehe spent it by the sea. During all this time he was perfectly well, andwas not once troubled by his curious fits. He returned to London in theautumn refreshed and well. 

On the first day that he went to the office a friend of his telephonedto him. When he was told that the line was being held for him hehesitated, but at last he went down to the telephone office. 

He remained away twenty minutes. Finally his prolonged absence wasnoticed, and he was sent for. He was found in the telephone room stiffand unconscious, having fallen forward on the telephone desk. His facewas quite white, and his eyes wide open and glazed with an expressionof piteous and harrowing terror. When they tried to revive him theirefforts were in vain. A doctor was sent for, and he said that Fletcherhad died of heart disease. 

THE FIRE

Before the bell had time to sound the alarm a huge pillar of smokeand flame, leaping high in the breathless August night, told the wholevillage the news of the fire. Men, women, and children hurried to theburning place. The firemen galloped down the rutty road with theirbarrels of water and hand-pumps, yelling. The bell rang, with hurried, throbbing beats. The fire, which was further off than it seemed to beat first sight, was in the middle of the village. Two houses wereburning--a house built of bricks and a wooden cottage. The flame wasprodigious: it soared into the sky like the eruption of a volcano, andthe wooden cottage, with its flat logs and blazing roof, looked like asacrificial pyre consuming the body of some warrior or Viking. In thelight of the flames the soft sky, which was starless and flooded withstillness by the large full moon, had turned from blue to green. A densecrowd had gathered round the burning houses. 

The firemen, working like bees, were doing what they could to extinguishthe flames and to prevent the fire spreading. Volunteers from the crowdhelped them. One man climbed up on the edge of the wooden house, wherethe flames had been overcome, and shovelled earth from the roof on thelittle flames, which were leaping like earth spirits from the ground. His wife stood below and called on him in forcible language to descendfrom such a dangerous place. The crowd jeered at her fears, and shespoke her mind to them in frank and unvarnished terms. It was St. Johnthe Baptist's Day. Some of the men had been celebrating the feast bydrinking. One of them, out of the fulness of his heart, cried out:"Oh, how happy I am! I'm drunk, and there's a fire, and all at the sametime!" But most of the crowd--they looked like black shadows againstthe glare--looked on quietly, every now and then making comments on thesituation. One of the peasants tried to knock down the burning housewith an axe. He failed. Someone not far off was playing an accordion andsinging a monotonous rhythmical song. 

Amidst the shifting crowd of shadows I noticed a strange figure, whobeckoned to me. "I see you are short-sighted, " he said, "let me lend youa glass. " His voice sounded thin and distant, and he handed me a pieceof glass which seemed to be more opaque than transparent. I lookedthrough it and I noticed a difference in things:

The cottages had disappeared; in their place were great high buildingswith lofty porticos, broad columns and carved friezes, but flames wereleaping round them, intenser and greater than before, and the noise ofthe fire had increased. In front of me was an open court, in the centreof which was an altar, and to the right of this altar stood an oldbay-tree. An old man and a grey-haired woman were clinging to thisaltar; it was drenched with blood, and on the steps of it lay severalbodies of young men clothed in armour, but squalid with dust and blood. 

I had scarcely become aware of the scene before a great cloud of smokepassed through the court, and when it rose I saw there had been anotherchange: in that few moments' space the fire seemed to have wroughtincredible havoc. Nothing was left of all the tall pillared buildings, the friezes and the porticos, the altar, the bay-tree and thebodies--nothing but the pile of logs which vomited a rolling cloud offlame and smoke into the sky. The moon was still shining calmly, and thesky was softer and greener. On the ground there were hundreds of deadand dying men; the dying were groaning in their agony. Far away on thehorizon there was a thin line of light, a faint trembling thread asthough of foam, and I seemed to hear the moaning of the sea. 

All at once a woman walked in front of the burning pile. She was tall, and silken folds clothed the perfect lines of her body and fell straightto the ground. She walked royally, and when she moved her gestures werelike the rhythm of majestic music. The firelight shone on her hair, which was bound with a narrow golden band. Her hair was like a cloud ofspun sunshine, and it seemed brighter than the flames. She was walkingwith downcast eyes, but presently she looked up. Her face was calm, andfaultless as skilfully-hewn marble, and it seemed to be made of somesubstance different from the clay which goes to the making of men andwomen. It was not an angel's face; it was not a divine face; neither wasit a wicked face, nor had it anything cruel, nor anything of the sirenor the witch. Love and pleasure seemed to have moulded the flower-likelips; but an infinite carelessness shone in the still blue eyes. Theyseemed like two seas that had never known what winds and tempestsmean, but which bask for ever under unruffled skies lulled by aslumber-scented breeze. 

She looked up at the fire and smiled, and at that smile one thought theheavens must open and the stars break into song, so marvellous was itsloveliness, so infinitely radiant the glory of it. She was a woman, andyet more than a woman, a creature of the earth, yet fashioned of pearlsand dew and the petals of flowers: delicate as a gossamer, and yetradiant with the flush of life, soft as the twilight, and glowing withthe blood of the ruby; and, above all things, serene, calm, aloof, andunruffled like the silver moon. When the dying men saw her smile theyraised their eyes towards her, and one could see that there shone inthem a strange and wonderful happiness. And when they had looked theyfell back and died. 

Then a cloud of smoke blinded me. When it rose the full moon was stillshining in a sky even bluer and softer than it had yet been. The firewas further off, but it had spread. The whole village was on fire; butthe village had grown; it seemed endless, and covered several hills. Right in front of me was a grove of cypresses, dark against the intenseglow of the flames, which leapt all round in the distance: a huge circleof light, a chain of fiery tongues and dancing lightnings. 

We were on the top of a hill, and we looked down into a place where tallbuildings and temples stood, where the fire had not penetrated. Thisplace was crowded with men, women and children. It was the same shiftingcrowd of shadows: some shouting, some gesticulating, some looking onindifferent. And straight in front of me was a short, dark, and ratherfat man with a low forehead, deep-set eyes, and a heavy jaw. He wascrowned with a golden wreath, and he was twanging a kind of harp. Inthe distance suddenly the cypress trees became alive with huge flaringtorches, which lit the garden like Bengal lights. The man threw down hisharp and clapped his hands in ecstasy at the bright fireworks. Again acloud of smoke obscured everything. 

When it lifted I was in the village once more, and once more it wasdifferent. It was on fire, and it seemed infinitely larger and morestraggling than when I had arrived. The moon was still in the sky, butthe air had a chilly touch. Instead of one church there was an infinitenumber of churches, for in the glare countless minarets and smallcupolas were visible. There was no crowd, no voices, and no shouting;only a long line of low, blazing wooden houses. The place was desertedand silent save for the crackling blaze. Then down the street a short, fat man on horseback rode towards us. He was riding a white horse. Hewore a grey overcoat and a cocked hat. I became aware of a rhythmicaltramping: a noise of hundreds and hundreds of hoofs, a champing ofbits, and the tramp of innumerable feet and the rumble of guns. In thedistance there was a hill with crenelated battlements round it; it wascrowned with the domes and minarets of several churches, taller andgreater than all the other churches in sight. These minarets shone outclean-cut and distinct against the ruddy sky. 

The short man on horseback looked back for a moment at this hill. Hetook a pinch of snuff. 

THE CONQUEROR

When the ancient gods were turned out of Olympus, and the groan of dyingPan shook the world like an earthquake, none of the fallen deities wasso disconsolate as Proserpine. She wandered across the world, assumingnow this shape and now that, but nowhere could she find a resting-placeor a home. In the Southern country which she regarded as her own, whatever shape or disguise she assumed, whether that of a gleaner or ofan old woman begging for alms, the country people would scent somethinguncanny about her and chase her from the place. Thus it was that sheleft the Southern country, which she loved; she said farewell to theazure skies, the hills covered with corn and fringed everywhere withrose bushes, the white oxen, the cypress, the olive, the vine, thecroaking frogs, and the million fireflies; and she sought the greenpastures and the woods of a Northern country. 

One evening, not long after her arrival (it was Midsummer Eve), asshe was wandering in a thick wood, she noticed that the trees and theunder-growth were twinkling with a myriad soft flames which reminded herof the fireflies of her own country, and presently she perceived thatthese flames were stars which, soft as dew and bright as moonbeams, formed the diadems crowning the hair of unearthly shapes. These shapeswere like those of men and maidens, transfigured and rendered strangeand delicate, as light as foam, and radiant as dragonflies hovering overa pool. They were rimmed with rainbow-coloured films, and sometimesthey flew and sometimes they danced, but they rarely seemed to touchthe ground. And as Proserpine approached them, in the sad majesty ofher fallen divinity, they gathered round her in a circle and bowed downbefore her. And one of them, taller than the rest, advanced towards herand said:--

"We are the Fairies, and for a long time we have been mournful, for wehave lost our Queen, our beautiful Queen. She loved a mortal, and onthis account she was banished from Fairyland, nor may she ever revisitthe haunt and the kingdom that were hers. But Merlin, the oldest and thewisest of the wizards, told us we should find another Queen, and that weshould know her by the poppies in her hair, the whiteness of her brow, and the stillness of her eyes, and with or without such tokens we shouldknow, as soon as we set eyes on her, that it was she and no other whowas to be our Queen. And now we know that it was you and no other. Therefore shall you be our Queen and rule over us until he comes who, Merlin said, shall conquer your kingdom and deliver its secrets to themortal world. Then shall you abandon the kingdom of the Fairies--theeverlasting Limbo shall receive you. "

* * * * *

It was one summer's day a long time ago, many and many years afterProserpine had become Queen of the Fairies, that a butcher's apprenticecalled William was enjoying a holiday, and strolling in the woods withno other purpose than to stroll and enjoy the fresh air and the coolleaves and the song of the birds. William loved the sights and soundsof the country; unlike many boys of his age, he was not deeply versedin the habits of birds and beasts, but devoted his spare time to readingsuch books as he could borrow from the village schoolmaster whose schoolhe had lately left to go into trade, or to taking part in the games ofhis companions, for he loved human fellowship and the talk and laughterof his fellow-creatures. 

The day was hot--it was Midsummer Day--and William, having stumbled on aconvenient mound, fell asleep. And he dreamt a curious dream. He thoughthe saw a beautiful maiden walking towards him. She was tall, and clothedin dark draperies, and her hair was bound with a coronal of scarletflowers, her face was pale and lustrous, and he could not see her eyesbecause they were veiled. She approached him and said:--

"You are he who has been chosen to try to conquer my kingdom, which isfaery, and to possess it: if, indeed, you are able to endure thefierce ordeal and to perform the three dreadful tasks which have beenappointed. If he who sets out to conquer my kingdom should fail in anyone of the three tasks he dies, and the world hears of him no more. Manyhave tried and failed. "

And William said he would try with all his might to conquer the faerykingdom, and he asked what the three tasks might be. 

The maiden, who was none other than Proserpine, Queen of the Fairies, told him that the first task was to pluck the crystal apple from thelaughing tree, and second to pluck the blood-red rose from the fieryrose tree, and the third to cull the white poppy from the quiet fields. William asked her how he was to set about these tasks. Proserpine toldhim that he had but to accept the quest and all would be made clear. Sohe accepted the quest without further talk. 

Immediately Proserpine vanished, and William found himself in a largegreen garden of fruit trees, and in the distance he heard the noise ofrippling laughter. He walked along many paths to the place whence hethought the laughter came, until he found a large fruit tree which grewby itself. It was laden with fruit, and from one of its boughs hung acrystal apple which shone with all the colours of the rainbow. 

But the tree was guarded by a hideous old hag, covered with sores andleprous scales, loathsome to behold. And a laughing voice came fromthe tree saying: "He who would pluck the crystal apple must embrace itsguardian. " And William looked at her and felt no loathing but rather adeep pity, so that tears welled in his eyes and dropped on her, and hetook her face in his hands to embrace her, and as he did so she changedinto a beautiful maiden with veiled eyes, who plucked the crystal applefrom the tree and gave it to him and vanished. 

Then the garden changed its semblance, and all around him there seemedto be a hedge of smoking thorns and before him a fiery tree on whichblood-red roses shone like rubies. The tree was guarded by a maidenwith long grey eyes and flowing hair, and of spun moonshine, beautifulexceedingly, and a moaning voice came from the tree, saying: "He whowould pluck the rose must slay its guardian. " On the grass beneath thetree lay an unsheathed sword. William took the sword in his hands, butthe maiden looked at him piteously and wept, so that he hesitated; then, hardening himself, he plunged the sword into her heart and a great moanwas heard, and the fire disappeared, and only a withered rose-tree stoodbefore him. Then he heard the voice say that he must pierce his ownheart with a thorn from the tree and let the blood fall upon its roots. This he did, and as he did so he felt the sharpness of Death, as thoughthe last dreadful moment had come; but as the drops of blood fell onthe roots the beautiful maiden with veiled eyes, whom he had seen beforestood before him and gave him the blood-red rose, and she touched hiswound and straightway it was healed. 

Then the garden vanished altogether, and he stood before a dark porchand a gate beyond which he caught a pale glimmer. And by the porch stooda terrible shape: a hooded skeleton bearing a scythe, with white socketsof fire which had no eyes in them but which were so terrible that nomortal could look on them and live. And here he heard a voice saying:"He who would cull the white poppy must look into the eyes of itsguardian and take the scythe from the bony hands. " And William seizedthe scythe and an icy darkness descended upon him, and he felt dizzyand faint; yet he persisted and wrestled with the skeleton, although thedarkness seemed to be overwhelming him. He tore the hood from the bonyhead and looked boldly into the fiery sockets. 

Then with a crash of thunder the skeleton vanished, and the maiden withveiled eyes led him through the gate into the quiet fields, and therehe culled the white poppy. Then the maiden turned to him and unveiledherself, and it was Proserpine, the Queen of the Fairies. 

"You have conquered, " she said, "and the faery kingdom is yours forever, and you shall visit it and dwell in it whenever you desire, andreveal its sounds and its sights to the mortals of the world: and in mykingdom you shall see, as though in a mirror, the pageant of mankind, the scroll of history, and the story of man which is writ in brave, golden and glowing letters, of blood and tears and fire. And there isnothing in the soul of man that shall be hid from you; and you shallspeak the secrets of my kingdom to mortal men with a voice of gold andof honey. And when you grow weary of life you shall withdraw for everinto the island of faery voices which lies in the heart of my kingdom. And as for me I go to the everlasting Limbo. "

Then Proserpine vanished, and William awoke from his dream, and wenthome to his butcher's shop. 

Soon after this he left his native village and went to London, where hebecame well known; although how his surname shall be spelt is a matterof dispute, some spelling it Shakespeare, some Shakespere, and someShaksper. 

THE IKON

Ferroll was an intellectual, and he prided himself on the fact. AtCambridge he had narrowly missed being a Senior Wrangler, and hisprincipal study there had been Lunar Theory. But when he went down fromCambridge for good, being a man of some means, he travelled. For ayear he was an honorary Attache at one of the big Embassies. He finallysettled in London with a vague idea of some day writing a _magnum opus_about the stupidity of mankind; for he had come to the conclusion by theage of twenty-five that all men were stupid, irreclaimably, irredeemablystupid; that everything was wrong; that all literature was really bad, all art much overrated, and all music tedious in the long run. 

The years slipped by and he never began his _magnum opus_; he joineda literary club instead and discussed the current topic of the day. Sometimes he wrote a short article; never in the daily Press, which hedespised, nor in the reviews (for he never wrote anything as long as amagazine article), but in a literary weekly he would express in wearyand polished phrases the unemphatic boredom or the mitigated approvalwith which the works of his fellow-men inspired him. He was the kind ofman who had nothing in him you could positively dislike, but to whomyou could not talk for five minutes without having a vague sensation ofblight. Things seemed to shrivel up in his presence as though they hadbeen touched by an insidious east wind, a subtle frost, a secret chill. He never praised anything, though he sometimes condescended to approve. The faint puffs of blame in which he more generally indulged were neversharp or heavy, but were like the smoke rings of a cigarette which a manindolently smoking blows from time to time up to the ceiling. 

He lived in rooms in the Temple. They were comfortably, not luxuriouslyfurnished; a great many French books--French was the only modernlanguage worth reading he used to say--a few modern German etchings, alow Turkish divan, and some Egyptian antiquities, made up the furnitureof his two sitting-rooms. Above all things he despised Greek art;it was, he said decadent. The Egyptians and the Germans were, in hisopinion, the only people who knew anything about the plastic arts, whereas the only music he could endure was that of the modern FrenchSchool. Over his chimney-piece there was a large German landscapein oils, called "Im Walde"; it represented a wood at twilight in theautumn, and if you looked at it carefully and for a long time you sawthat the objects depicted were meant to be trees from which the leaveswere falling; but if you looked at the picture carelessly and from adistance, it looked like a man-of-war on a rough sea, for which it wasfrequently taken, much to Ferrol's annoyance. 

One day an artist friend of his presented him with a small Chinese godmade of crystal; he put this on his chimney-piece. It was on the eveningof the day on which he received this gift that he dined, together with afriend named Sledge who had travelled much in Eastern countries, at hisclub. After dinner they went to Ferrol's rooms to smoke and to talk. Hewanted to show Sledge his antiquities, which consisted of three largeEgyptian statuettes, a small green Egyptian god, and the Chinese idolwhich he had lately been given. Sledge, who was a middle-aged, beardedman, frank and unconventional, examined the antiquities with care, pronounced them to be genuine, and singled out for special praise thecrystal god. 

"Your things are very good, " he said, "very good. But don't you reallymind having all these things about you?"

"Why should I mind?" asked Ferrol. 

"Well, you have travelled a good deal, haven't you?"

"Yes, " said Ferrol, "I have travelled; I have been as far east asNijni-Novgorod to see the Fair, and as far west as Lisbon. "

"I suppose, " said Sledge, "you were a long time in Greece and Italy?"

"No, " said Ferrol, "I have never been to Greece. Greek art distressesme. All classical art is a mistake and a superstition. "

"Talking of superstition, " said Sledge, "you have never been to the FarEast, have you?"

"No, " Ferrol answered, "Egypt is Eastern enough for me, and cannot bebettered. "

"Well, " said Sledge, "I have been in the Far East. I have lived theremany years. I am not a superstitious man; but there is one thing Iwould not do in any circumstances whatsoever, and that is to keep in mysitting-room the things you have got there. "

"But why?" asked Ferrol. 

"Well, " said Sledge, "nearly all of them have come from the tombs of thedead, and some of them are gods. Such things may have attached to themheaven knows what spooks and spirits. "

Ferrol shut his eyes and smiled, a faint, seraphic smile. "My dear boy, "he said, "you forget. This is the Twentieth Century. "

"And you, " answered Sledge, "forget that the things you have here weremade before the Twentieth Century. B. C. "

"You don't seriously mean, " said Ferrol, "that you attach any importanceto these--" he hesitated. 

"Children's stories?" suggested Sledge. 

Ferrol nodded. 

"I have lived long enough in the East, " said Sledge, "to know that thesooner you learn to believe children's stories the better. "

"I am afraid, then, " said Ferrol, with civil tolerance, "that our pointsof view are too different for us to discuss the matter. " And they talkedof other things until late into the night. 

Just as Sledge was leaving Ferrol's rooms and had said "Good-night, " hepaused by the chimney-piece, and, pointing to the tiny Ikon which waslying on it, asked: "What is that?"

"Oh, that's nothing, " said Ferrol, "only a small Ikon I bought fortwopence at the Fair of Nijni-Novgorod. "

Sledge said "Good-night" again, but when he was on the stairs he calledback: "In any case remember one thing, that East is East and West isWest. Don't mix your deities. "

Ferrol had not the slightest idea what he was alluding to, nor did hecare. He dismissed the matter from his mind. 

The next day he spent in the country, returning to London late in theevening. As he entered his rooms the first thing which met his eye wasthat his great picture, "Im Walde, " which he considered to be one of thefew products of modern art that a man who respected himself could lookat without positive pain in the eyes, had fallen from its place overthe chimney-piece to the floor in front of the fender, and the glass wasshattered into a thousand fragments. He was much vexed. He sought thecause of the accident. The nail was a strong one, and it was still inits place. The picture had been hung by a wire; the wire seemed strongalso and was not broken. He concluded that the picture must have beenbadly balanced and that a sudden shock such a door banging had thrownit over. He had no servant in his rooms, and when he had gone out thatmorning he had locked the door, so no one could have entered his roomsduring his absence. 

Next morning he sent for a framemaker and told him to mend the frame assoon as possible, to make the wire strong, and to see that the picturewas firmly fixed on the wall. In two or three days' time the picturereturned and was once more hung on the wall over the chimney-pieceimmediately above the little crystal Chinese god. Ferrol supervised thehanging of the picture in person. He saw that the nail was strong, andfirmly fixed in the wall; he took care that the wire left nothing to bedesired and was properly attached to the rings of the picture. 

The picture was hung early one morning. That day he went to play golf. He returned at five o'clock, and again the first thing which met his eyewas the picture. It had again fallen down, and this time it had broughtwith it in its fall the small Chinese god, which was broken in two. The glass had again been shattered to bits, and the picture itself wassomewhat damaged. Everything else on the chimney-piece, that is to say, a few matchboxes and two candle-sticks, had also been thrown to theground--everything with the exception of the little Ikon he had boughtat Nijni-Novgorod, a small object about two inches square on which twoSaints were pictured. This still rested in its place against the wall. 

Ferrol investigated the disaster. The nail was in its place in the wall;the wire at the back of the picture was not broken or damaged in anyway. The accident seemed to him quite inexplicable. He was greatlyannoyed. The Chinese god was a valuable thing. He stood in front of thechimney-piece contemplating the damage with a sense of great irritation. 

"To think that everything should have been broken except this beastlylittle Ikon!" he said to himself. "I wonder whether that was what Sledgemeant when he said I should not mix my deities. "

Next morning he sent again for the framemaker, and abused him roundly. The framemaker said he could not understand how the accident hadhappened. The nail was an excellent nail, the picture, Mr. Ferrol mustadmit, had been hung with great care before his very eyes and under hisown direct and personal supervision. What more could be done?

"It's something to do with the balance, " said Ferrol. "I told you thatbefore. The picture is half spoiled now. "

The framemaker said the damage would not show once the glass wasrepaired, and took the picture away again to mend it. A few days laterit was brought back. Two men came to fix it this time; steps werebrought and the hanging lasted about twenty minutes. Nails were putunder the picture; it was hung by a double wire. All accidents in thefuture seemed guarded against. 

The following morning Ferrol telephoned to Sledge and asked him to dinewith him. Sledge was engaged to dine out that evening, but said that hewould look in at the Temple late after dinner. 

Ferrol dined alone at the Club; he reached his rooms about half-pastnine; he made up a blazing fire and drew an armchair near it. He lit acigarette, made some Turkish coffee, and took down a French novel. Everynow and then he looked up at his picture. No damage was visible; itlooked, he thought, as well as ever. In the place of the Chinese idolhe had put his little green Egyptian god on the chimney-piece. Thecandlesticks and the Ikon were still in their places. 

"After all, " thought Ferrol, "I did wrong to have any Chinese art in theplace at all. Egyptian things are the only things worth having. It is alesson to me not to dabble with things out of my period. "

After he had read for about a quarter of an hour he fell into a doze. 

* * * * *

Sledge arrived at the rooms about half-past ten, and an ugly sight methis eyes. There had been an accident. The picture over the chimney-piecehad fallen down right on Ferrol. His face was badly cut. They put Ferrolto bed, and his wounds were seen to and everything that was necessarywas done. A nurse was sent for to look after him, and Sledge decided tostay in the house all night. After all the arrangements had been made, the doctor, before he went away, said to Sledge: "He will recover allright, he is not in the slightest danger; but I don't know who is tobreak the news to him. "

"What is that?" asked Sledge. 

"He will be quite blind, " said the doctor. 

Then the doctor went away, and Sledge sat down in front of the fire. The broken glass had been swept up. The picture had been placed on theOriental divan, and as Sledge looked at the chimney-piece he noticedthat the little Ikon was still in its place. Something caught his eyejust under the low fender in front of the fireplace. He bent forward andpicked up the object. 

It was Ferrol's green Egyptian god, which had been broken into twopieces. 

THE THIEF

To Jack Gordon

Hart Minor and Smith were behind-hand with their sums. It was HartMinor's first term: Smith had already been one term at school. They werein the fourth division at St. James's. A certain number of sums in shortdivision had to be finished. Hart Minor and Smith got up early to finishthese sums before breakfast, which was at half-past seven. Hart Minordivided slowly, and Smith reckoned quickly. Smith finished his sums withease. When half-past seven struck, Hart Minor had finished four of themand there was still a fifth left: 3888 had to be divided by 36; shortdivision had to be employed. Hart Minor was busily trying to divide 3888by 4 and by 9; he had got as far as saying, "Four's into 38 will go sixtimes and two over; four's into twenty-eight go seven times; four'sinto eight go twice. " He was beginning to divide 672 by 9, an impossibletask, when the breakfast bell rang, and Smith said to him: "Come on!"

"I can't, " said Hart Minor, "I haven't finished my sum. "

Smith glanced at his page and said: "Oh that's all right, don't you see?The answer's 108. "

Hart Minor wrote down 108 and put a large R next to the sum, which meantRight. 

The boys went in to breakfast. After breakfast they returned tothe fourth division schoolroom, where they were to be instructed inarithmetic for an hour by Mr. Whitehead. Mr. Whitehead called forthe sums. He glanced through Smith's and found them correct, and thenthrough Hart Minor's. His attention was arrested by the last division. 

"What's this?" he demanded. "Four's into thirty-eight don't go sixtimes. You've got the right answer and the wrong working. What does thismean?" And Mr. Whitehead bit his knuckles savagely. "Somebody, " he said, "has been helping you. "

Hart Minor owned that he had received help from Smith. Mr. Whiteheadshook him violently, and said, "Do you know what this means?"

Hart Minor had no sort of idea as to the inner significance of his act, except that he had finished his sums. 

"It means, " said Mr. Whitehead, "that you're a cheat and a thief: you'vebeen stealing marks. For the present you can stand on the stool ofpenitence and I'll see what is to be done with you later. "

The stool of penitence was a high, three-cornered stool, very narrow atthe top. When boys in this division misbehaved themselves they had tostand on it during the rest of the lesson in the middle of the room. 

Hart Minor fetched the stool of penitence and climbed up on it. Itwobbled horribly. 

After the lesson, which was punctuated throughout by Mr. Whitehead withbitter comments on the enormity of theft, the boys went to chapel. Smithand Hart were in the choir: they wore white surplices which were put onin the vestry. Hart Minor, who knew that he was in for a terrific row ofsome kind, thought he observed something unusual in the conduct of themasters who were assembled in the vestry. They were all tittering. Mr. Whitehead seemed to be convulsed with uncontrollable laughter. The choirwalked up the aisle. Hart Minor noticed that all the boys in the school, and the servants who sat behind them, and the master's wife who sat infront, and the organist who played the harmonium, were all staring athim with unwonted interest; the boys were nudging each other: he couldnot understand why. 

When the service, which lasted twenty minutes, was over, and the boyscame out of chapel, Hart Minor was the centre of a jeering crowd ofboys. He asked Smith what the cause of this was, and Smith confessed tohim that before going into chapel Mr. Whitehead had pinned on his back alarge sheet of paper with "Cheat" written on it, and had only removedit just before the procession walked up the aisle, hence the interestaroused. But, contrary to his expectation, nothing further occurred;none of the masters alluded to his misdemeanour, and Hart Minor almostthought that the incident was closed--almost, and yet really not at all;he tried to delude himself into thinking the affair would blow over, butall the while at the bottom of his heart sat a horrible misgiving. 

Every Monday there was in this school what was called "reading over. "The boys all assembled in the library and the Head Master, standing infront of his tall desk, summoned each division before him in turn. Themarks of the week were read out and the boys took places, moving eitherup or down according to their marks; so that a boy who was at the topof his division one week might find himself at the bottom the next week, and vice versa. 

On the Sunday after the incident recorded, the boys of the fourthdivision were sitting in their schoolroom before luncheon, in order towrite their weekly letter home. This was the rule of the school. Mr. Whitehead sat at his desk and talked in a friendly manner to the boys. He was writing his weekly report in the large black report book that wasused for reading over. Mr. Whitehead was talking in a chaffing way as towho was his favourite boy. 

"You can tell your people, " he said to Hart Minor, "that my favouriteis old Polly. " Polly was Hart Minor's nickname, which was given to himowing to his resemblance to a parrot. Hart Minor was much pleased atthis friendly attitude, and began to think that the unpleasant incidentof the week had been really forgotten and that the misgiving whichhaunted him night and day was a foolish delusion. 

"We shall soon be writing the half-term reports, " said Mr. Whitehead. "You've all been doing well, especially old Polly: you can put that inyour letter, " he said to Hart Minor. "I'm very much pleased with you, "and he chuckled. 

On Monday morning at eleven o'clock was reading over. When the fourthdivision were called up, the Head Master paused, looked down the page, then at the boys, then at the book once more; then he frowned. There wasa second pause, then he read out in icy tones:--

"I'm sorry to say that Smith and Hart Minor have been found guilty ofgross dishonesty; they combined--in fact they entered into a conspiracy, to cheat, to steal marks and obtain by unfair means, a higher place andan advantage which was not due to them. "

The Head Master paused. "Hart Minor and Smith, " he continued, "go to thebottom of the division. Smith, " he added, "I'm astounded at you. Yourconduct in this affair is inexplicable. If it were not for your previousrecord and good conduct, I should have you severely flogged; and if HartMinor were not a new boy, I should treat him in the same way and havehim turned out of the choir. (The choir had special privileges. ) As itis, you shall lose, each of you, 200 marks, and I shall report thewhole matter in detail to your parents in your half-term report, and ifanything of the sort ever occurs again, you shall be severely punished. You have been guilty of an act for which, were you not schoolboys, butgrown up, you would be put in prison. It is this kind of thing thatleads people to penal servitude. "

After the reading over was finished and the lessons that followedimmediately on it, and the boys went out to wash their hands forluncheon, the boys of the second division crowded round Hart Minorand asked him how he could have perpetrated such a horrible and daringcrime. The matter, however, was soon forgotten by the boys, but HartMinor had not heard the last of it. On the following Sunday in chapel, at the evening service, the Head Master preached a sermon. He chose ashis text "Thou shalt not steal!" The eyes of the whole school were fixedon Smith and Hart Minor. The Head Master pointed out in his discoursethat one might think at first sight that boys at a school might not havethe opportunity to violate the tremendous Commandments; but, he said, this was not so. The Commandments were as much a living actuality inschool life as they were in the larger world. Coming events cast theirshadows before them; the child was the father of the man; what a boywas at school, such would he be in after life. Theft, the boys perhapsthought, was not a sin which immediately concerned them. But there werethings which were morally the same if not worse than the actual theftof material and tangible objects--dishonesty in the matter of marks, forinstance, and cheating in order to gain an undue advantage over one'sfellow-schoolboys. A boy who was guilty of such an act at school wouldprobably end by being a criminal when he went out into the larger world. The seeds of depravity were already sown; the tree whose early shootswere thus blemished would probably be found to be rotten when it grewup; and for such trees and for such noxious growths there could only beone fate--to be cut down and cast into the unquenchable fire!

In Hart Minor's half-term report, which was sent home to his parents, it was stated that he had been found guilty of the meanest and grossestdishonesty, and that should it occur again he would be first punishedand finally expelled. 

THE STAR

He had long ago retired from public life, and in his Tuscan villa, wherehe now lived quite alone, seldom seeing his friends, he never regrettedthe strenuous days of his activity. He had done his work well; he hadbeen more than a competent public servant; as Pro-Consul he proved apillar of strength to the State, a man whose name at one time was onmen's lips as having left plenty where he had found dearth, and orderand justice where corruption, oppression, and anarchy, had once runriot. His retirement had been somewhat of a surprise to his friends, foralthough he was ripe in years, his mental powers were undiminished andhis body was active and vigorous. But his withdrawal from public lifewas due not so much to fatigue or to a longing for leisure as to a lackof sympathy, which he felt to be growing stronger and stronger as theyears went by, with the manners and customs, the mode of thought, andthe manner of living of the new world and the new generation which wasgrowing up around him. Nurtured as he had been in the old school and thestrong traditions which taught an austere simplicity of life, a contemptfor luxury and show, he was bewildered and saddened by the rapid growthof riches, the shameless worship of wealth, the unrestrained passionfor amusement at all costs, the thirst for new sensations, and theostentatious airs of the youth of the day, who seemed to be borndisillusioned and whose palates were jaded before they knew the tasteof food. He found much to console him in literature, not only in theliterature of the past but in the literature of his day, but here againhe was beset with misgivings and haunted by forebodings. He feltthat the State had reached its zenith both in material prosperity andintellectual achievement, and that all the future held in reserve wasdecline and decay. This thought was ever present with him; in the vastextension of empire he foresaw the inevitable disintegration, and hewondered in a melancholy fashion what would be the fate of mankindwhen the Empire, dismembered and rotten, should become the prey of theBarbarians. 

It was in the winter of the second year after his retirement that hismelancholy increased to a pitch of almost intolerable heaviness. Thatwinter was an extraordinarily mild one, and even during the coldestmonth he strolled every evening after he had supped on the terrace walkwhich was before the portico. He was strolling one night on the terracepondering on the fate of mankind, and more especially on the life--ifthere was such a thing--beyond the grave. He was not a superstitiousman, but, saturated with tradition, he was a scrupulous observer ofreligious feast, custom, and ritual. He had lately been disturbed bywhat he considered to be an ill-favoured omen. One night--it was twelvenights ago he reckoned--the statues of Pan and Apollo, standing in hisdining-room, which was at the end of the portico, had fallen to theground without any apparent cause and had been shattered into fragments. And it had seemed to him that the crash of this accident was immediatelyfollowed by a low and prolonged wail, which appeared to come fromnowhere in particular and yet to fill the world; the noise of the moanhad seemed to be quite close to him, and as it died away its echohad seemed to be miles and miles distant. He thought it had been ahallucination, but that same night a still stranger thing happened. After the accident, which had wakened the whole household, he had beenunable to go to sleep again and he had gone from his sleeping chamberinto an adjoining room, and, lighting a lamp, had taken down and readout of the "Iliad" of Homer. After he had been reading for about halfan hour he heard a voice calling him very distinctly by his name, butas soon as the sound had ceased he was not quite certain whether he hadheard it or not. At that moment one of his slaves, who had been born inthe East, entered the room and asked him what he required, saying thathe had heard his master calling loudly. What these signs and portentssignified he had no idea; perhaps, he mused, they mean my owndeath, which is of no consequence; or perhaps--which may the Fatesforfend--some disaster to an absent friend or even to the State. Butso far--and twelve days had passed since he had seen these strangemanifestations--he had received no news which confirmed his fears. 

As he was thus musing he looked up at the sky, and he noticed thepresence of a new and unfamiliar star, which he had never seen before. He was a close observer of the heavens and learned in astronomy, andhe felt quite certain that he had never seen this star before. It wasa star of peculiar radiance, large and white--almost blue in itswhiteness--it shone in the East, and seemed to put all the other starsto shame by its overwhelming radiance and purity. While he was thusgazing at the star it seemed to him as though a great darkness hadcome upon the world. He heard a low muttering sound as of a distantearthquake, and this was quickly followed by the tramping of innumerablearmies. He knew that the end had come. It is the Barbarians, he thought, who have already conquered the world. Rome has fallen never to riseagain; Rome has shared the fate of Troy and Carthage, of Babylon, and Memphis; Rome is a name in an old wife's tale; and little savagechildren shall be given our holy trophies for playthings, and shall useour ruined temples and our overthrown palaces as their playground. Andso sharp was the vividness of his vision that he wondered what wouldhappen to his villa, and whether or no the Barbarians would destroy theimage of Ceres on the terrace, which he especially cherished, notfor its beauty but because it had belonged to his father and to hisgrandfather before him. 

An eternity seemed to pass, and the tramp, tramp, tramp of the armies ofthose untrained hordes which were coming from the North and overrunningthe world seemed to get nearer and nearer. He wondered what they woulddo with him; he had no place for fear in his heart, but he rememberedthat on the portico in the morning his freedman's child had been playingwith the pieces of a broken jar, a copper coin, and a dog made ofterra-cotta. He remembered the child's brown eyes and curly hair, itssmile, its laughter, and lisping talk--it was a piece of earth andsun--and he thought of the spears of the Barbarians, and then shiftedhis thoughts because they sickened him. 

Then, just when he thought the heavy footsteps had reached the approachof his villa, the vision changed. The noise of tramping ceased, andthrough the thick darkness there pierced the radiance of the star: thestrange star he had seen that night. The world seemed to awake from adark slumber. The ruins rose from the dust and took once more a statelyshape, even lordlier than before. Rome had risen from the dead, and oncemore she dominated the world like a starry diadem. Before him he seemedto see the pillars and the portals of a huge temple, more splendid andgorgeous than the Temples of Caesar. The gates were wide open, andfrom within came a blare of trumpets. He saw a kneeling multitude; andsoldiers with shining breastplates, far taller than the legionaries ofCaesar, were keeping a way through the dense crowd, while the figure ofan aged man--was it the Pontifex Maximus, he wondered?--was borne aloftin a chair over their heads. 

Then once more the vision changed. At least the temple seemed to growwider, higher, and lighter; the crowd vanished; it seemed to himas though a long corridor of light was opening on some ultimateand mysterious doorway. At last this doorway was opened, and he sawdistinctly before him a dark and low manger where oxen and asses werestalled. It was littered with straw. He could hear the peaceful beastsmunching their food. 

In the corner lay a woman, and in her arms was a child and his faceshone like the sun and lit up the whole place, in which there wereneither torches nor lamps. The door of the manger was ajar, and throughit he saw the sky and the strange star still shining brightly. He hearda voice, the same voice which he had heard twelve nights before; but thevoice was not calling him, it was singing a song, and the song was as itwere a part of a larger music, a symphony of clear voices, more joyousand different from anything he had ever heard. 

The vision vanished altogether; he was standing once more under theportico amongst the surroundings which were familiar to him. Thestrange star was still shining in the sky. He went back through thefolding-doors of the piazza into the dining-room. His gloom and hisperplexity had been lifted from him; he felt quite happy; he could nothave explained why. He called his slave and told him to get plenty ofprovisions on the morrow, for he expected friends to dinner. He addedthat he wanted nothing further and that the slaves could go to bed. 

CHUN WA

To Henry de C. Ward

His name was Chun Wa; possibly there was some more of it, but that isall I can remember. He was about four or five years old, and I madehis acquaintance the day we arrived at the temple. It was at the end ofSeptember. We had left Mukden in order to take part in what they saidwas going to be a great battle. I don't know what the village was calledat which we arrived on the second day of our march. I can only rememberthat it was a beautiful and deliciously quiet spot, and that weestablished ourselves in a temple; that is to say not actually in thetemple itself, but in the house of the priest. He was a Buddhist wholooked after the deities of the place, which were made of carved andpainted wood, and lived in a small pagoda. The building consisted ofthree quadrangles surrounded by a high stone wall. The first of thesequadrangles, which you entered from the road, reminded me of the yardin front of any farm. There was a good deal of straw lying about, somebroken ploughshares, buckets, wooden bowls, spades, and other implementsof toil. A few hens hurried about searching for grains here and there; adog was sleeping in the sun. At the further end of the yard a yellow catseemed to have set aside a space for its exclusive use. This farmyardwas separated from the next quadrangle by the house of the priest, whichoccupied the whole of the second enclosure; that is to say the livingrooms extended right round the quadrangle, leaving a square and openspace in the centre. The part of the house which separated the secondquadrangle from the next consisted solely of a roof supported bypillars, making an open verandah, through which from the secondenclosure you saw into the third. The third enclosure was a garden, consisting of a square grass plot and some cypress trees. At the furtherend of the garden was the temple itself. 

We arrived in the afternoon. We were met by an elderly man, the priest, who put the place at our disposal and established us in the roomssituated in the second quadrangle to the east and west. He himself andhis family lived in the part of the house which lay between the farmyardand the second enclosure. The Cossacks of the battery with which I wasliving encamped in a field on the other side of the farmyard, but thetreasure chest was placed in the farmyard itself, and a sentry stoodnear it with a drawn sword. 

The owner of the house had two sons. One of them, aged about thirteen, had something to do with the temple services, and wore a kind of tunicmade of white silk. The second was Chun Wa. It was when the sentry wenton guard that we first made the acquaintance of Chun Wa. His cheeks wereround and fat, and his face seemed to bulge out towards the base. Hislittle eyes were soft and brown and twinkled like onyxes. His tinylittle hands were most beautifully shaped, and this child moved aboutthe farmyard with the dignity of an Emperor and the serenity of agreat Pontiff. Gravely and without a smile he watched the Cossacksunharnessing their horses, lighting a fire and arranging the officers'kit. 

He walked up to the sentry who was standing near the treasure chest, a big, grey-eyed Cossack with a great tuft of fair hair, and theexpression of a faithful retriever, and in a tone of indescribablecontempt, Chun Wa said "Ping!" "Ping" in Chinese means soldier-man, andif you wish to express your contempt for a man there is no word inthe whole of the Chinese language which expresses it so fully and soemphatically as the word "Ping. "

The Cossack smiled on Chun Wa and called him by a long list of endearingdiminutives, but Chun Wa took no notice, and retired into the inner partof the house as if he had determined to pay no more attention to thebarbarous intruders. The next day, however, curiosity got the betterof him, and he could not resist inspecting the yard, and observing thedoings of the foreign devils. And one of the Cossacks--his name wasLieskov and he looked after my mule--made friends with Chun Wa. He madefriends with him by playing with the dog. The dog, like most Chinesedogs, was dirty, distrustful, and not used to being played with; heslunk away if you called him, and if you took any notice of him heevidently expected to be beaten, kicked, or to have stones thrown athim. He was too thin to be eaten. But Lieskov tamed the dog and taughthim how to play, and the big Cossack used to roll on the ground whilethe dog pretended to bite him, until Chun Wa forgot his dignity, hiscontempt, and his superior culture, and smiled. I remember coming homethat very afternoon from a short stroll with one of the officers, and wefound Lieskov lying fast asleep in the farmyard right across the stepsof the door through which we wanted to go, and Chun Wa and the dog weresitting beside him. We woke him up and the officer asked him why he hadgone to sleep. 

"I was playing with the dog, your honour, " he said, "and I played sohard that I was exhausted and fell asleep. "

After that Chun Wa made friends with everybody, officers and men, andhe ruled the battery like an autocrat. He ruled by charm and a thousandwinning ways. But his special friend was Lieskov, who carried the childabout on his back, performed many droll antics to amuse him, and taughthim words of pidgin Russian. Among other things he made him a kite--alarge and beautiful kite--out of an old piece of yellow silk, shapedlike a butterfly. And Chun Wa's brother flew this kite with wonderfulskill, so that it looked like a glittering golden bird hovering in theair. 

I forget how long we stayed at this temple, whether it was three days orfour days; possibly it was not so long, but it seemed like many months, or rather it seemed at the same time very long and very short, like apleasant dream. The weather was so soft and so fine, the sunshine sobright, the air so still, that had not the nights been chilly we shouldnever have dreamt that it was autumn. It seemed rather as though thespring had been unburied and had returned to the earth by mistake. Andall this time fighting was going on to the east of us. The battle ofSha-Ho had begun, but we were in the reserve, in what they called thedeepest reserve, and we heard no sound of firing, neither did we receiveany news of it. We seemed to be sheltered from the world in an island ofdreamy lotus-eating; and the only noise that reached us was the sound ofthe tinkling gongs of the temple. We lived a life of absolute indolence, getting up with the sun, eating, playing cards, strolling about on theplains where the millet had now been reaped, eating again and going tobed about nine o'clock in the evening. Our chief amusement was to talkwith Chun Wa and to watch the way in which he treated the Cossacks, whohad become his humble slaves. I am sure there was not one of the men whowould not have died gladly for Chun Wa. 

One afternoon, just as we were finishing our midday meal, we receivedorders to start. We were no longer in the reserve; we were neededfurther on. Everything was packed up in a hurry, and by half-past twothe whole battery was on the march, and we left the lovely calm temple, the cypress trees, the chiming gongs, and Chun Wa. The idyll was over, the reality was about to begin. As we left the place Chun Wa stood bythe gate, dignified, and grave as usual. In one hand he held his kite, and in the other a paper flower, and he gave this flower to Lieskov. 

Next day we arrived at another village, and from there we were sentstill further on, to a place whence, from the hills, all the fightingthat was going on in the centre of that big battle was visible. Fromhalf-past six in the morning until sunset the noise of the artillerynever ceased, and all night long there was a rattle of rifle firing. Thetroops which were in front drew each day nearer to us. Another twodays passed; the battery took part in the action, some of the menwere killed, and some of the men and the officers were wounded, and weretreated to the River Sha-Ho. Then just as we thought a final retreatwas about to take place, a retreat right back to Mukden, we recrossedthe river, took part in another action, and then a great stillness came. The battle was practically over. The advance of the enemy had ceased, and we were ordered to go to a certain place. 

We started, and on our way we passed through the village where we hadlived before the battle began. The place was scarcely recognisable. It was quite deserted; some of the houses looked like empty shells orhusks, as though the place had suffered from earthquake. A dead horselay across the road just outside the farmyard. 

One of the officers and myself had the curiosity to go into the templebuildings where we had enjoyed such pleasant days. They were deserted. Part of the inner courtyard was all scorched and crumbled as if therehad been a fire. The straw was still lying about in the yard, and theimplements of toil. The actual temple itself at the end of the grassyplot remained untouched, and the grinning gods inside it were intact;but the dwelling rooms of our host were destroyed, and the rooms wherewe had lived ourselves were a mass of broken fragments, rubbish, anddust. The place had evidently been heavily shelled. There was not atrace of any human being, save that in the only room which remainedundestroyed, on the matting of the hard _Khang_--that is the divanwhich stretches like a platform across three-quarters of every Chineseroom--lay the dead body of a Chinese coolie. The dog, the cat, and thehens had all gone. 

We only remained a moment or two in the place, and as we left it theofficer pulled my sleeve and pointed to a heap of rubbish near thegate. There, amidst some broken furniture, a mass of refuse, burned andsplintered wood, lay the tattered remains of a golden kite.