PHANTASTES

A FAERIE ROMANCE FOR MEN AND WOMEN

By George Macdonald

A new Edition, with thirty-three new Illustrations by Arthur Hughes;edited by Greville MacDonald

 "In good sooth, my masters, this is no door. Yet is it a little window, that looketh upon a great world. "

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

 THE MEETING OF SIR GALAHAD AND SIX PERCIVALE SUDDENLY THERE STOOD ON THE THRESHOLD A TINY WOMAN-FORM THE BRANCHES AND LEAVES ON THE CURTAINS OF MY BED WERE IN MOTION I SAW A COUNTRY MAIDEN COMING TOWARDS ME TAILPIECE TO CHAPTER III HEADPIECE TO CHAPTER IV TWO LARGE SOFT ARMS WERE THROWN AROUND ME FROM BEHIND I GAZED AFTER HER IN A KIND OF DESPAIR I FOUND MYSELF IN A LITTLE CAVE THE ASH SHUDDERED AND GROANED TAILPIECE TO CHAPTER VI I COULD HARDLY BELIEVE THAT THERE WAS A FAIRY LAND I DID NOT BELIEVE IN FAIRY LAND A RUNNER WITH GHOSTLY FEET THE MAIDEN CAME ALONG, SINGING AND DANCING, HAPPY AS A CHILD THE GOBLINS PERFORMED THE MOST ANTIC HOMAGE THE FAIRY PALACE IN THE MOONLIGHT TOO DAZZLING FOR EARTHLY EYES IN THE WOODS AND ALONG THE RIVER BANKS DO THE MAIDENS GO LOOKING FOR CHILDREN SHE LAY WITH CLOSED EYES, WHENCE TWO TEARS WERE FAST WELLING HEADPIECE TO CHAPTER XIV I SPRANG TO HER, AND LAID MY HAND ON THE HARP A WHITE FIGURE GLEAMED PAST ME, WRINGING HER HANDS THEY ALL RUSHED UPON ME, AND HELD ME TIGHT A WINTRY SEA, BARE, AND WASTE, AND GRAY SHOW ME THE CHILD THOU CALLEST MINE THE TIME PASSED AWAY IN WORK AND SONG HEADPIECE TO CHAPTER XXI WE REACHED THE PALACE OF THE KING I SAW, LEANING AGAINST THE TREE, A BEAUTIFUL WOMAN FASTENED TO THE SADDLE, WAS THE BODY OF A GREAT DRAGON I WAS DEAD, AND RIGHT CONTENT A VALLEY LAY BENEATH ME

PREFACE

For offering this new edition of my father's Phantastes, my reasonsare three. The first is to rescue the work from an edition illustratedwithout the author's sanction, and so unsuitably that all lovers of thebook must have experienced some real grief in turning its pages. Withthe copyright I secured also the whole of that edition and turned itinto pulp. 

My second reason is to pay a small tribute to my father by way ofpersonal gratitude for this, his first prose work, which was publishednearly fifty years ago. Though unknown to many lovers of his greaterwritings, none of these has exceeded it in imaginative insight and powerof expression. To me it rings with the dominant chord of his life'spurpose and work. 

My third reason is that wider knowledge and love of the book shouldbe made possible. To this end I have been most happy in the help of myfather's old friend, who has illustrated the book. I know of no otherliving artist who is capable of portraying the spirit of Phantastes;and every reader of this edition will, I believe, feel that theillustrations are a part of the romance, and will gain through themsome perception of the brotherhood between George MacDonald and ArthurHughes. 

GREVILLE MACDONALD. 

September 1905. 

PHANTASTES A FAERIE ROMANCE

 "Phantastes from 'their fount all shapes deriving, In new habiliments can quickly dight. " FLETCHER'S Purple Island

 "Es lassen sich Erzahlungen ohne Zusammenhang, jedoch mit Association, wie Traume dengkeennohgneedizhusamdimenhang; jedoeh mit und voll schoner Worte sind, aber auch ohne allen Sinn und Zusammenhang, hochstens einzelne Strophen verstandlich, wie Bruchstucke aus den verjschledenartigsten Dingen, Diese svahre Poesie kann Wlrkung, wie Musik haben. Darum ist die Natur so rein poetisch wle die Stube eines Zauberers, eines Physikers, eine Kinderstube elne Polterund Vorrathskammer

 "Ein Mahrchen ist wie ein Traumbild ohne Zusammenhang. Ein Ensemble wunderbarer Dinge und Begebenheiten, z. B. Eine dMusNkalische Pbantasie, die harmonischen Folgen einer Aeolsharfe, die Natur slebst. .. . 

 "In einem echten Mahrchen muss ailes wunderbar, geheimnissvoll undzusammenhangendsein; alles belebt, jeder auf eineandereArt Die ganze Natur muss wunderlich mit der ganzen Geisterwelt gemiseht sein; hier tritt die Zeit der Anarehie, der Gesetzlosigkeit Frelheit, der Naturstand der Natur, die Zeit von der Welt ein entgegengesetztes und eben daruel'ndiehr Weld der Wahrheit durehaus Chaos der vollendeten Sehopfung ahnlich ist. "--NOVALIS. 

CHAPTER I

 "A spirit . . . . . . . . . The undulating and silent well, And rippling rivulet, and evening gloom, Now deepening the dark shades, for speech assuming, Held commune with him; as if he and it Were all that was. " SHELLEY'S Alastor. 

I awoke one morning with the usual perplexity of mind which accompaniesthe return of consciousness. As I lay and looked through the easternwindow of my room, a faint streak of peach-colour, dividing a cloud thatjust rose above the low swell of the horizon, announced the approach ofthe sun. As my thoughts, which a deep and apparently dreamless sleep haddissolved, began again to assume crystalline forms, the strange eventsof the foregoing night presented themselves anew to my wonderingconsciousness. The day before had been my one-and-twentieth birthday. Among other ceremonies investing me with my legal rights, the keys of anold secretary, in which my father had kept his private papers, had beendelivered up to me. As soon as I was left alone, I ordered lights in thechamber where the secretary stood, the first lights that had been therefor many a year; for, since my father's death, the room had been leftundisturbed. But, as if the darkness had been too long an inmate tobe easily expelled, and had dyed with blackness the walls to which, bat-like, it had clung, these tapers served but ill to light up thegloomy hangings, and seemed to throw yet darker shadows into the hollowsof the deep-wrought cornice. All the further portions of the room layshrouded in a mystery whose deepest folds were gathered around the darkoak cabinet which I now approached with a strange mingling of reverenceand curiosity. Perhaps, like a geologist, I was about to turn up tothe light some of the buried strata of the human world, with its fossilremains charred by passion and petrified by tears. Perhaps I was tolearn how my father, whose personal history was unknown to me, had wovenhis web of story; how he had found the world, and how the world had lefthim. Perhaps I was to find only the records of lands and moneys, howgotten and how secured; coming down from strange men, and throughtroublous times, to me, who knew little or nothing of them all. To solvemy speculations, and to dispel the awe which was fast gathering aroundme as if the dead were drawing near, I approached the secretary; andhaving found the key that fitted the upper portion, I opened it withsome difficulty, drew near it a heavy high-backed chair, and sat downbefore a multitude of little drawers and slides and pigeon-holes. Butthe door of a little cupboard in the centre especially attracted myinterest, as if there lay the secret of this long-hidden world. Its keyI found. 

One of the rusty hinges cracked and broke as I opened the door: itrevealed a number of small pigeon-holes. These, however, being butshallow compared with the depth of those around the little cupboard, theouter ones reaching to the back of the desk, I concluded that theremust be some accessible space behind; and found, indeed, that they wereformed in a separate framework, which admitted of the whole being pulledout in one piece. Behind, I found a sort of flexible portcullis of smallbars of wood laid close together horizontally. After long search, andtrying many ways to move it, I discovered at last a scarcely projectingpoint of steel on one side. I pressed this repeatedly and hard withthe point of an old tool that was lying near, till at length ityielded inwards; and the little slide, flying up suddenly, disclosed achamber--empty, except that in one corner lay a little heap of witheredrose-leaves, whose long-lived scent had long since departed; and, inanother, a small packet of papers, tied with a bit of ribbon, whosecolour had gone with the rose-scent. Almost fearing to touch them, theywitnessed so mutely to the law of oblivion, I leaned back in my chair, and regarded them for a moment; when suddenly there stood on thethreshold of the little chamber, as though she had just emerged from itsdepth, a tiny woman-form, as perfect in shape as if she had been a smallGreek statuette roused to life and motion. Her dress was of a kind thatcould never grow old-fashioned, because it was simply natural: a robeplaited in a band around the neck, and confined by a belt about thewaist, descended to her feet. It was only afterwards, however, that Itook notice of her dress, although my surprise was by no means of sooverpowering a degree as such an apparition might naturally be expectedto excite. Seeing, however, as I suppose, some astonishment in mycountenance, she came forward within a yard of me, and said, in a voicethat strangely recalled a sensation of twilight, and reedy river banks, and a low wind, even in this deathly room:--

"Anodos, you never saw such a little creature before, did you?"

"No, " said I; "and indeed I hardly believe I do now. "

"Ah! that is always the way with you men; you believe nothing the firsttime; and it is foolish enough to let mere repetition convince you ofwhat you consider in itself unbelievable. I am not going to argue withyou, however, but to grant you a wish. "

 Here I could not help interrupting her with the foolish speech, of which, however, I had no cause to repent--

"How can such a very little creature as you grant or refuse anything?"

"Is that all the philosophy you have gained in one-and-twenty years?"said she. "Form is much, but size is nothing. It is a mere matter ofrelation. I suppose your six-foot lordship does not feel altogetherinsignificant, though to others you do look small beside your old UncleRalph, who rises above you a great half-foot at least. But size is of solittle consequence with old me, that I may as well accommodate myself toyour foolish prejudices. "

So saying, she leapt from the desk upon the floor, where she stood atall, gracious lady, with pale face and large blue eyes. Her dark hairflowed behind, wavy but uncurled, down to her waist, and against it herform stood clear in its robe of white. 

"Now, " said she, "you will believe me. "

Overcome with the presence of a beauty which I could now perceive, anddrawn towards her by an attraction irresistible as incomprehensible, Isuppose I stretched out my arms towards her, for she drew back a step ortwo, and said--

"Foolish boy, if you could touch me, I should hurt you. Besides, I wastwo hundred and thirty-seven years old, last Midsummer eve; and a manmust not fall in love with his grandmother, you know. "

"But you are not my grandmother, " said I. 

"How do you know that?" she retorted. "I dare say you know something ofyour great-grandfathers a good deal further back than that; but you knowvery little about your great-grandmothers on either side. Now, to thepoint. Your little sister was reading a fairy-tale to you last night. "

"She was. "

"When she had finished, she said, as she closed the book, 'Is there afairy-country, brother?' You replied with a sigh, 'I suppose there is, if one could find the way into it. '"

"I did; but I meant something quite different from what you seem tothink. "

"Never mind what I seem to think. You shall find the way into Fairy Landto-morrow. Now look in my eyes. "

Eagerly I did so. They filled me with an unknown longing. I rememberedsomehow that my mother died when I was a baby. I looked deeper anddeeper, till they spread around me like seas, and I sank in theirwaters. I forgot all the rest, till I found myself at the window, whosegloomy curtains were withdrawn, and where I stood gazing on a wholeheaven of stars, small and sparkling in the moonlight. Below lay a sea, still as death and hoary in the moon, sweeping into bays and aroundcapes and islands, away, away, I knew not whither. Alas! it was nosea, but a low bog burnished by the moon. "Surely there is such a seasomewhere!" said I to myself. A low sweet voice beside me replied--

"In Fairy Land, Anodos. "

I turned, but saw no one. I closed the secretary, and went to my ownroom, and to bed. 

All this I recalled as I lay with half-closed eyes. I was soon to findthe truth of the lady's promise, that this day I should discover theroad into Fairy Land. 

CHAPTER II

 "'Where is the stream?' cried he, with tears. 'Seest thou its not in blue waves above us?' He looked up, and lo! the blue stream was flowing gently over their heads. " --NOVALIS, Heinrich von Ofterdingen. 

While these strange events were passing through my mind, I suddenly, asone awakes to the consciousness that the sea has been moaning by him forhours, or that the storm has been howling about his window all night, became aware of the sound of running water near me; and, looking out ofbed, I saw that a large green marble basin, in which I was wont to wash, and which stood on a low pedestal of the same material in a corner ofmy room, was overflowing like a spring; and that a stream of clear waterwas running over the carpet, all the length of the room, finding itsoutlet I knew not where. And, stranger still, where this carpet, whichI had myself designed to imitate a field of grass and daisies, borderedthe course of the little stream, the grass-blades and daisies seemed towave in a tiny breeze that followed the water's flow; while under therivulet they bent and swayed with every motion of the changeful current, as if they were about to dissolve with it, and, forsaking their fixedform, become fluent as the waters. 

My dressing-table was an old-fashioned piece of furniture of blackoak, with drawers all down the front. These were elaborately carvedin foliage, of which ivy formed the chief part. The nearer end of thistable remained just as it had been, but on the further end a singularchange had commenced. I happened to fix my eye on a little cluster ofivy-leaves. The first of these was evidently the work of the carver; thenext looked curious; the third was unmistakable ivy; and just beyond ita tendril of clematis had twined itself about the gilt handle of one ofthe drawers. Hearing next a slight motion above me, I looked up, and sawthat the branches and leaves designed upon the curtains of my bed wereslightly in motion. Not knowing what change might follow next, I thoughtit high time to get up; and, springing from the bed, my bare feetalighted upon a cool green sward; and although I dressed in all haste, I found myself completing my toilet under the boughs of a greattree, whose top waved in the golden stream of the sunrise with manyinterchanging lights, and with shadows of leaf and branch gliding overleaf and branch, as the cool morning wind swung it to and fro, like asinking sea-wave. 

After washing as well as I could in the clear stream, I rose and lookedaround me. The tree under which I seemed to have lain all night was oneof the advanced guard of a dense forest, towards which the rivulet ran. Faint traces of a footpath, much overgrown with grass and moss, and withhere and there a pimpernel even, were discernible along the right bank. "This, " thought I, "must surely be the path into Fairy Land, whichthe lady of last night promised I should so soon find. " I crossed therivulet, and accompanied it, keeping the footpath on its right bank, until it led me, as I expected, into the wood. Here I left it, withoutany good reason: and with a vague feeling that I ought to have followedits course, I took a more southerly direction. 

CHAPTER III

 "Man doth usurp all space, Stares thee, in rock, bush, river, in the face. Never thine eyes behold a tree; 'Tis no sea thou seest in the sea, 'Tis but a disguised humanity. To avoid thy fellow, vain thy plan; All that interests a man, is man. " HENRY SUTTON. 

The trees, which were far apart where I entered, giving free passageto the level rays of the sun, closed rapidly as I advanced, so that erelong their crowded stems barred the sunlight out, forming as it were athick grating between me and the East. I seemed to be advancing towardsa second midnight. In the midst of the intervening twilight, however, before I entered what appeared to be the darkest portion of the forest, I saw a country maiden coming towards me from its very depths. She didnot seem to observe me, for she was apparently intent upon a bunch ofwild flowers which she carried in her hand. I could hardly see her face;for, though she came direct towards me, she never looked up. But when wemet, instead of passing, she turned and walked alongside of me for a fewyards, still keeping her face downwards, and busied with her flowers. She spoke rapidly, however, all the time, in a low tone, as if talkingto herself, but evidently addressing the purport of her words to me. 

She seemed afraid of being observed by some lurking foe. "Trust theOak, " said she; "trust the Oak, and the Elm, and the great Beech. Takecare of the Birch, for though she is honest, she is too young not to bechangeable. But shun the Ash and the Alder; for the Ash is an ogre, --youwill know him by his thick fingers; and the Alder will smother you withher web of hair, if you let her near you at night. " All this was utteredwithout pause or alteration of tone. Then she turned suddenly and leftme, walking still with the same unchanging gait. I could not conjecturewhat she meant, but satisfied myself with thinking that it would be timeenough to find out her meaning when there was need to make use of herwarning, and that the occasion would reveal the admonition. I concludedfrom the flowers that she carried, that the forest could not beeverywhere so dense as it appeared from where I was now walking; and Iwas right in this conclusion. For soon I came to a more open part, andby-and-by crossed a wide grassy glade, on which were several circles ofbrighter green. But even here I was struck with the utter stillness. Nobird sang. No insect hummed. Not a living creature crossed my way. Yetsomehow the whole environment seemed only asleep, and to wear even insleep an air of expectation. The trees seemed all to have an expressionof conscious mystery, as if they said to themselves, "we could, an' ifwe would. " They had all a meaning look about them. Then I rememberedthat night is the fairies' day, and the moon their sun; and Ithought--Everything sleeps and dreams now: when the night comes, it willbe different. At the same time I, being a man and a child of the day, felt some anxiety as to how I should fare among the elves and otherchildren of the night who wake when mortals dream, and find their commonlife in those wondrous hours that flow noiselessly over the movelessdeath-like forms of men and women and children, lying strewn and partedbeneath the weight of the heavy waves of night, which flow on and beatthem down, and hold them drowned and senseless, until the ebbtide comes, and the waves sink away, back into the ocean of the dark. But I tookcourage and went on. Soon, however, I became again anxious, though fromanother cause. I had eaten nothing that day, and for an hour past hadbeen feeling the want of food. So I grew afraid lest I should findnothing to meet my human necessities in this strange place; but oncemore I comforted myself with hope and went on. 

Before noon, I fancied I saw a thin blue smoke rising amongst the stemsof larger trees in front of me; and soon I came to an open spot ofground in which stood a little cottage, so built that the stems of fourgreat trees formed its corners, while their branches met and intertwinedover its roof, heaping a great cloud of leaves over it, up towards theheavens. I wondered at finding a human dwelling in this neighbourhood;and yet it did not look altogether human, though sufficiently so toencourage me to expect to find some sort of food. Seeing no door, I wentround to the other side, and there I found one, wide open. A woman satbeside it, preparing some vegetables for dinner. This was homely andcomforting. As I came near, she looked up, and seeing me, showed nosurprise, but bent her head again over her work, and said in a low tone:

"Did you see my daughter?"

"I believe I did, " said I. "Can you give me something to eat, for I amvery hungry?" "With pleasure, " she replied, in the same tone; "but donot say anything more, till you come into the house, for the Ash iswatching us. "

Having said this, she rose and led the way into the cottage; which, Inow saw, was built of the stems of small trees set closely together, andwas furnished with rough chairs and tables, from which even the bark hadnot been removed. As soon as she had shut the door and set a chair--

"You have fairy blood in you, " said she, looking hard at me. 

"How do you know that?"

"You could not have got so far into this wood if it were not so; and Iam trying to find out some trace of it in your countenance. I think Isee it. "

"What do you see?"

"Oh, never mind: I may be mistaken in that. "

"But how then do you come to live here?"

"Because I too have fairy blood in me. "

Here I, in my turn, looked hard at her, and thought I could perceive, notwithstanding the coarseness of her features, and especially theheaviness of her eyebrows, a something unusual--I could hardly call itgrace, and yet it was an expression that strangely contrasted withthe form of her features. I noticed too that her hands were delicatelyformed, though brown with work and exposure. 

"I should be ill, " she continued, "if I did not live on the borders ofthe fairies' country, and now and then eat of their food. And I see byyour eyes that you are not quite free of the same need; though, fromyour education and the activity of your mind, you have felt it less thanI. You may be further removed too from the fairy race. "

I remembered what the lady had said about my grandmothers. 

Here she placed some bread and some milk before me, with a kindlyapology for the homeliness of the fare, with which, however, I was in nohumour to quarrel. I now thought it time to try to get some explanationof the strange words both of her daughter and herself. 

"What did you mean by speaking so about the Ash?"

She rose and looked out of the little window. My eyes followed her; butas the window was too small to allow anything to be seen from where Iwas sitting, I rose and looked over her shoulder. I had just time tosee, across the open space, on the edge of the denser forest, a singlelarge ash-tree, whose foliage showed bluish, amidst the truer green ofthe other trees around it; when she pushed me back with an expressionof impatience and terror, and then almost shut out the light from thewindow by setting up a large old book in it. 

"In general, " said she, recovering her composure, "there is no danger inthe daytime, for then he is sound asleep; but there is something unusualgoing on in the woods; there must be some solemnity among the fairiesto-night, for all the trees are restless, and although they cannot comeawake, they see and hear in their sleep. "

"But what danger is to be dreaded from him?"

Instead of answering the question, she went again to the window andlooked out, saying she feared the fairies would be interrupted by foulweather, for a storm was brewing in the west. 

"And the sooner it grows dark, the sooner the Ash will be awake, " addedshe. 

I asked her how she knew that there was any unusual excitement in thewoods. She replied--

"Besides the look of the trees, the dog there is unhappy; and the eyesand ears of the white rabbit are redder than usual, and he frisks aboutas if he expected some fun. If the cat were at home, she would haveher back up; for the young fairies pull the sparks out of her tail withbramble thorns, and she knows when they are coming. So do I, in anotherway. "

 At this instant, a grey cat rushed in like a demon, anddisappeared in a hole in the wall. 

"There, I told you!" said the woman. 

 "But what of the ash-tree?" said I, returning once more to thesubject. Here, however, the young woman, whom I had met in the morning, entered. A smile passed between the mother and daughter; and then thelatter began to help her mother in little household duties. 

"I should like to stay here till the evening, " I said; "and then go onmy journey, if you will allow me. "

"You are welcome to do as you please; only it might be better to stayall night, than risk the dangers of the wood then. Where are you going?"

"Nay, that I do not know, " I replied, "but I wish to see all that is tobe seen, and therefore I should like to start just at sundown. " "You area bold youth, if you have any idea of what you are daring; but a rashone, if you know nothing about it; and, excuse me, you do not seem verywell informed about the country and its manners. However, no one comeshere but for some reason, either known to himself or to those who havecharge of him; so you shall do just as you wish. "

Accordingly I sat down, and feeling rather tired, and disinclined forfurther talk, I asked leave to look at the old book which still screenedthe window. The woman brought it to me directly, but not before takinganother look towards the forest, and then drawing a white blind overthe window. I sat down opposite to it by the table, on which I laid thegreat old volume, and read. It contained many wondrous tales of FairyLand, and olden times, and the Knights of King Arthur's table. I readon and on, till the shades of the afternoon began to deepen; for inthe midst of the forest it gloomed earlier than in the open country. Atlength I came to this passage--

"Here it chanced, that upon their quest, Sir Galahad and Sir Percivalerencountered in the depths of a great forest. Now, Sir Galahad was dightall in harness of silver, clear and shining; the which is a delightto look upon, but full hasty to tarnish, and withouten the labour of aready squire, uneath to be kept fair and clean. And yet withouten squireor page, Sir Galahad's armour shone like the moon. And he rode a greatwhite mare, whose bases and other housings were black, but all besprentwith fair lilys of silver sheen. Whereas Sir Percivale bestrode a redhorse, with a tawny mane and tail; whose trappings were all to-smirchedwith mud and mire; and his armour was wondrous rosty to behold, ne couldhe by any art furbish it again; so that as the sun in his going downshone twixt the bare trunks of the trees, full upon the knights twain, the one did seem all shining with light, and the other all to glow withruddy fire. Now it came about in this wise. For Sir Percivale, after hisescape from the demon lady, whenas the cross on the handle of his swordsmote him to the heart, and he rove himself through the thigh, andescaped away, he came to a great wood; and, in nowise cured of hisfault, yet bemoaning the same, the damosel of the alder tree encounteredhim, right fair to see; and with her fair words and false countenanceshe comforted him and beguiled him, until he followed her where she ledhim to a---"

Here a low hurried cry from my hostess caused me to look up from thebook, and I read no more. 

"Look there!" she said; "look at his fingers!"

Just as I had been reading in the book, the setting sun was shiningthrough a cleft in the clouds piled up in the west; and a shadow as of alarge distorted hand, with thick knobs and humps on the fingers, so thatit was much wider across the fingers than across the undivided partof the hand, passed slowly over the little blind, and then as slowlyreturned in the opposite direction. 

"He is almost awake, mother; and greedier than usual to-night. "

"Hush, child; you need not make him more angry with us than he is; foryou do not know how soon something may happen to oblige us to be in theforest after nightfall. "

"But you are in the forest, " said I; "how is it that you are safe here?"

"He dares not come nearer than he is now, " she replied; "for any ofthose four oaks, at the corners of our cottage, would tear him topieces; they are our friends. But he stands there and makes awful facesat us sometimes, and stretches out his long arms and fingers, and triesto kill us with fright; for, indeed, that is his favourite way of doing. Pray, keep out of his way to-night. "

"Shall I be able to see these things?" said I. 

"That I cannot tell yet, not knowing how much of the fairy nature thereis in you. But we shall soon see whether you can discern the fairies inmy little garden, and that will be some guide to us. "

"Are the trees fairies too, as well as the flowers?" I asked. 

"They are of the same race, " she replied; "though those you call fairiesin your country are chiefly the young children of the flower fairies. They are very fond of having fun with the thick people, as they callyou; for, like most children, they like fun better than anything else. "

"Why do you have flowers so near you then? Do they not annoy you?"

"Oh, no, they are very amusing, with their mimicries of grown people, and mock solemnities. Sometimes they will act a whole play throughbefore my eyes, with perfect composure and assurance, for they are notafraid of me. Only, as soon as they have done, they burst into pealsof tiny laughter, as if it was such a joke to have been serious overanything. These I speak of, however, are the fairies of the garden. They are more staid and educated than those of the fields and woods. Of course they have near relations amongst the wild flowers, but theypatronise them, and treat them as country cousins, who know nothingof life, and very little of manners. Now and then, however, they arecompelled to envy the grace and simplicity of the natural flowers. "

"Do they live IN the flowers?" I said. 

"I cannot tell, " she replied. "There is something in it I do notunderstand. Sometimes they disappear altogether, even from me, thoughI know they are near. They seem to die always with the flowers theyresemble, and by whose names they are called; but whether they return tolife with the fresh flowers, or, whether it be new flowers, new fairies, I cannot tell. They have as many sorts of dispositions as men and women, while their moods are yet more variable; twenty different expressionswill cross their little faces in half a minute. I often amuse myselfwith watching them, but I have never been able to make personalacquaintance with any of them. If I speak to one, he or she looks up inmy face, as if I were not worth heeding, gives a little laugh, and runsaway. " Here the woman started, as if suddenly recollecting herself, andsaid in a low voice to her daughter, "Make haste--go and watch him, andsee in what direction he goes. "

I may as well mention here, that the conclusion I arrived at from theobservations I was afterwards able to make, was, that the flowers diebecause the fairies go away; not that the fairies disappear becausethe flowers die. The flowers seem a sort of houses for them, or outerbodies, which they can put on or off when they please. Just as you couldform some idea of the nature of a man from the kind of house he built, if he followed his own taste, so you could, without seeing the fairies, tell what any one of them is like, by looking at the flower till youfeel that you understand it. For just what the flower says to you, wouldthe face and form of the fairy say; only so much more plainly as a faceand human figure can express more than a flower. For the house or theclothes, though like the inhabitant or the wearer, cannot be wroughtinto an equal power of utterance. Yet you would see a strangeresemblance, almost oneness, between the flower and the fairy, which youcould not describe, but which described itself to you. Whether all theflowers have fairies, I cannot determine, any more than I can be surewhether all men and women have souls. 

The woman and I continued the conversation for a few minutes longer. Iwas much interested by the information she gave me, and astonishedat the language in which she was able to convey it. It seemed thatintercourse with the fairies was no bad education in itself. But now thedaughter returned with the news, that the Ash had just gone away in asouth-westerly direction; and, as my course seemed to lie eastward, shehoped I should be in no danger of meeting him if I departed at once. I looked out of the little window, and there stood the ash-tree, to myeyes the same as before; but I believed that they knew better than Idid, and prepared to go. I pulled out my purse, but to my dismay therewas nothing in it. The woman with a smile begged me not to troublemyself, for money was not of the slightest use there; and as I mightmeet with people in my journeys whom I could not recognise to befairies, it was well I had no money to offer, for nothing offended themso much. 

"They would think, " she added, "that you were making game of them; andthat is their peculiar privilege with regard to us. " So we went togetherinto the little garden which sloped down towards a lower part of thewood. 

Here, to my great pleasure, all was life and bustle. There was stilllight enough from the day to see a little; and the pale half-moon, halfway to the zenith, was reviving every moment. The whole gardenwas like a carnival, with tiny, gaily decorated forms, in groups, assemblies, processions, pairs or trios, moving stately on, runningabout wildly, or sauntering hither or thither. From the cups or bells oftall flowers, as from balconies, some looked down on the masses below, now bursting with laughter, now grave as owls; but even in their deepestsolemnity, seeming only to be waiting for the arrival of the next laugh. Some were launched on a little marshy stream at the bottom, in boatschosen from the heaps of last year's leaves that lay about, curled andwithered. These soon sank with them; whereupon they swam ashore and gotothers. Those who took fresh rose-leaves for their boats floated thelongest; but for these they had to fight; for the fairy of the rose-treecomplained bitterly that they were stealing her clothes, and defendedher property bravely. 

"You can't wear half you've got, " said some. 

"Never you mind; I don't choose you to have them: they are my property. "

"All for the good of the community!" said one, and ran off with a greathollow leaf. But the rose-fairy sprang after him (what a beauty she was!only too like a drawing-room young lady), knocked him heels-over-head ashe ran, and recovered her great red leaf. But in the meantime twenty hadhurried off in different directions with others just as good; and thelittle creature sat down and cried, and then, in a pet, sent a perfectpink snowstorm of petals from her tree, leaping from branch to branch, and stamping and shaking and pulling. At last, after another good cry, she chose the biggest she could find, and ran away laughing, to launchher boat amongst the rest. 

But my attention was first and chiefly attracted by a group of fairiesnear the cottage, who were talking together around what seemed alast dying primrose. They talked singing, and their talk made a song, something like this:

 "Sister Snowdrop died Before we were born. " "She came like a bride In a snowy morn. " "What's a bride?" "What is snow? "Never tried. " "Do not know. " "Who told you about her?" "Little Primrose there Cannot do without her. " "Oh, so sweetly fair!" "Never fear, She will come, Primrose dear. " "Is she dumb?"

 "She'll come by-and-by. " "You will never see her. " "She went home to dies, "Till the new year. " "Snowdrop!" "'Tis no good To invite her. " "Primrose is very rude, "I will bite her. "

 "Oh, you naughty Pocket! "Look, she drops her head. " "She deserved it, Rocket, "And she was nearly dead. " "To your hammock--off with you!" "And swing alone. " "No one will laugh with you. " "No, not one. "

 "Now let us moan. " "And cover her o'er. " "Primrose is gone. " "All but the flower. " "Here is a leaf. " "Lay her upon it. " "Follow in grief. " "Pocket has done it. "

 "Deeper, poor creature! Winter may come. " "He cannot reach her-- That is a hum. " "She is buried, the beauty!" "Now she is done. " "That was the duty. " "Now for the fun. "

And with a wild laugh they sprang away, most of them towards thecottage. During the latter part of the song-talk, they had formedthemselves into a funeral procession, two of them bearing poor Primrose, whose death Pocket had hastened by biting her stalk, upon one of herown great leaves. They bore her solemnly along some distance, andthen buried her under a tree. Although I say HER I saw nothing butthe withered primrose-flower on its long stalk. Pocket, who had beenexpelled from the company by common consent, went sulkily away towardsher hammock, for she was the fairy of the calceolaria, and looked ratherwicked. When she reached its stem, she stopped and looked round. I couldnot help speaking to her, for I stood near her. I said, "Pocket, howcould you be so naughty?"

"I am never naughty, " she said, half-crossly, half-defiantly; "only ifyou come near my hammock, I will bite you, and then you will go away. "

"Why did you bite poor Primrose?"

"Because she said we should never see Snowdrop; as if we were not goodenough to look at her, and she was, the proud thing!--served her right!"

"Oh, Pocket, Pocket, " said I; but by this time the party which hadgone towards the house, rushed out again, shouting and screaming withlaughter. Half of them were on the cat's back, and half held on by herfur and tail, or ran beside her; till, more coming to their help, thefurious cat was held fast; and they proceeded to pick the sparks outof her with thorns and pins, which they handled like harpoons. Indeed, there were more instruments at work about her than there could havebeen sparks in her. One little fellow who held on hard by the tip ofthe tail, with his feet planted on the ground at an angle of forty-fivedegrees, helping to keep her fast, administered a continuous flow ofadmonitions to Pussy. 

"Now, Pussy, be patient. You know quite well it is all for your good. You cannot be comfortable with all those sparks in you; and, indeed, Iam charitably disposed to believe" (here he became very pompous) "thatthey are the cause of all your bad temper; so we must have them all out, every one; else we shall be reduced to the painful necessity of cuttingyour claws, and pulling out your eye-teeth. Quiet! Pussy, quiet!"

But with a perfect hurricane of feline curses, the poor animal brokeloose, and dashed across the garden and through the hedge, faster thaneven the fairies could follow. "Never mind, never mind, we shall findher again; and by that time she will have laid in a fresh stock ofsparks. Hooray!" And off they set, after some new mischief. 

But I will not linger to enlarge on the amusing display of thesefrolicsome creatures. Their manners and habits are now so well known tothe world, having been so often described by eyewitnesses, that it wouldbe only indulging self-conceit, to add my account in full to the rest. I cannot help wishing, however, that my readers could see them forthemselves. Especially do I desire that they should see the fairy of thedaisy; a little, chubby, round-eyed child, with such innocent trust inhis look! Even the most mischievous of the fairies would not tease him, although he did not belong to their set at all, but was quite a littlecountry bumpkin. He wandered about alone, and looked at everything, withhis hands in his little pockets, and a white night-cap on, the darling!He was not so beautiful as many other wild flowers I saw afterwards, butso dear and loving in his looks and little confident ways. 

CHAPTER IV

 "When bale is att hyest, boote is nyest. " Ballad of Sir Aldingar. 

By this time, my hostess was quite anxious that I should be gone. So, with warm thanks for their hospitality, I took my leave, and went my waythrough the little garden towards the forest. Some of the garden flowershad wandered into the wood, and were growing here and there alongthe path, but the trees soon became too thick and shadowy for them. Iparticularly noticed some tall lilies, which grew on both sides ofthe way, with large dazzlingly white flowers, set off by the universalgreen. It was now dark enough for me to see that every flower wasshining with a light of its own. Indeed it was by this light that Isaw them, an internal, peculiar light, proceeding from each, and notreflected from a common source of light as in the daytime. This lightsufficed only for the plant itself, and was not strong enough to castany but the faintest shadows around it, or to illuminate any of theneighbouring objects with other than the faintest tinge of its ownindividual hue. From the lilies above mentioned, from the campanulas, from the foxgloves, and every bell-shaped flower, curious little figuresshot up their heads, peeped at me, and drew back. They seemed to inhabitthem, as snails their shells but I was sure some of them were intruders, and belonged to the gnomes or goblin-fairies, who inhabit the groundand earthy creeping plants. From the cups of Arum lilies, creatures withgreat heads and grotesque faces shot up like Jack-in-the-box, and madegrimaces at me; or rose slowly and slily over the edge of the cup, and spouted water at me, slipping suddenly back, like those littlesoldier-crabs that inhabit the shells of sea-snails. Passing a row oftall thistles, I saw them crowded with little faces, which peeped everyone from behind its flower, and drew back as quickly; and I heard themsaying to each other, evidently intending me to hear, but the speakeralways hiding behind his tuft, when I looked in his direction, "Look athim! Look at him! He has begun a story without a beginning, and it willnever have any end. He! he! he! Look at him!"

But as I went further into the wood, these sights and sounds becamefewer, giving way to others of a different character. A little forestof wild hyacinths was alive with exquisite creatures, who stood nearlymotionless, with drooping necks, holding each by the stem of her flower, and swaying gently with it, whenever a low breath of wind swung thecrowded floral belfry. In like manner, though differing of coursein form and meaning, stood a group of harebells, like little angelswaiting, ready, till they were wanted to go on some yet unknown message. In darker nooks, by the mossy roots of the trees, or in little tuftsof grass, each dwelling in a globe of its own green light, weaving anetwork of grass and its shadows, glowed the glowworms. 

They were just like the glowworms of our own land, for they are fairieseverywhere; worms in the day, and glowworms at night, when their own canappear, and they can be themselves to others as well as themselves. But they had their enemies here. For I saw great strong-armed beetles, hurrying about with most unwieldy haste, awkward as elephant-calves, looking apparently for glowworms; for the moment a beetle espied one, through what to it was a forest of grass, or an underwood of moss, itpounced upon it, and bore it away, in spite of its feeble resistance. Wondering what their object could be, I watched one of the beetles, and then I discovered a thing I could not account for. But it is no usetrying to account for things in Fairy Land; and one who travels theresoon learns to forget the very idea of doing so, and takes everything asit comes; like a child, who, being in a chronic condition of wonder, issurprised at nothing. What I saw was this. Everywhere, here and thereover the ground, lay little, dark-looking lumps of something more likeearth than anything else, and about the size of a chestnut. The beetleshunted in couples for these; and having found one, one of them stayedto watch it, while the other hurried to find a glowworm. By signals, Ipresume, between them, the latter soon found his companion again: theythen took the glowworm and held its luminous tail to the dark earthlypellet; when lo, it shot up into the air like a sky-rocket, seldom, however, reaching the height of the highest tree. Just like a rockettoo, it burst in the air, and fell in a shower of the most gorgeouslycoloured sparks of every variety of hue; golden and red, and purple andgreen, and blue and rosy fires crossed and inter-crossed each other, beneath the shadowy heads, and between the columnar stems of the foresttrees. They never used the same glowworm twice, I observed; but let himgo, apparently uninjured by the use they had made of him. 

In other parts, the whole of the immediately surrounding foliage wasilluminated by the interwoven dances in the air of splendidly colouredfire-flies, which sped hither and thither, turned, twisted, crossed, andrecrossed, entwining every complexity of intervolved motion. Here andthere, whole mighty trees glowed with an emitted phosphorescent light. You could trace the very course of the great roots in the earth by thefaint light that came through; and every twig, and every vein on everyleaf was a streak of pale fire. 

All this time, as I went through the wood, I was haunted with thefeeling that other shapes, more like my own size and mien, were movingabout at a little distance on all sides of me. But as yet I coulddiscern none of them, although the moon was high enough to send a greatmany of her rays down between the trees, and these rays were unusuallybright, and sight-giving, notwithstanding she was only a half-moon. Iconstantly imagined, however, that forms were visible in all directionsexcept that to which my gaze was turned; and that they only becameinvisible, or resolved themselves into other woodland shapes, the momentmy looks were directed towards them. However this may have been, exceptfor this feeling of presence, the woods seemed utterly bare of anythinglike human companionship, although my glance often fell on some objectwhich I fancied to be a human form; for I soon found that I was quitedeceived; as, the moment I fixed my regard on it, it showed plainly thatit was a bush, or a tree, or a rock. 

Soon a vague sense of discomfort possessed me. With variations ofrelief, this gradually increased; as if some evil thing were wanderingabout in my neighbourhood, sometimes nearer and sometimes further off, but still approaching. The feeling continued and deepened, until all mypleasure in the shows of various kinds that everywhere betokened thepresence of the merry fairies vanished by degrees, and left me fullof anxiety and fear, which I was unable to associate with any definiteobject whatever. At length the thought crossed my mind with horror: "Canit be possible that the Ash is looking for me? or that, in his nightlywanderings, his path is gradually verging towards mine?" I comfortedmyself, however, by remembering that he had started quite in anotherdirection; one that would lead him, if he kept it, far apart from me;especially as, for the last two or three hours, I had been diligentlyjourneying eastward. I kept on my way, therefore, striving by directeffort of the will against the encroaching fear; and to this endoccupying my mind, as much as I could, with other thoughts. I was so farsuccessful that, although I was conscious, if I yielded for a moment, Ishould be almost overwhelmed with horror, I was yet able to walk righton for an hour or more. What I feared I could not tell. Indeed, I wasleft in a state of the vaguest uncertainty as regarded the nature of myenemy, and knew not the mode or object of his attacks; for, somehow orother, none of my questions had succeeded in drawing a definite answerfrom the dame in the cottage. How then to defend myself I knew not; noreven by what sign I might with certainty recognise the presence of myfoe; for as yet this vague though powerful fear was all the indicationof danger I had. To add to my distress, the clouds in the west had risennearly to the top of the skies, and they and the moon were travellingslowly towards each other. Indeed, some of their advanced guard hadalready met her, and she had begun to wade through a filmy vapour thatgradually deepened. 

At length she was for a moment almost entirely obscured. When she shoneout again, with a brilliancy increased by the contrast, I saw plainlyon the path before me--from around which at this spot the trees receded, leaving a small space of green sward--the shadow of a large hand, withknotty joints and protuberances here and there. Especially I remarked, even in the midst of my fear, the bulbous points of the fingers. Ilooked hurriedly all around, but could see nothing from which sucha shadow should fall. Now, however, that I had a direction, howeverundetermined, in which to project my apprehension, the very sense ofdanger and need of action overcame that stifling which is the worstproperty of fear. I reflected in a moment, that if this were indeed ashadow, it was useless to look for the object that cast it in any otherdirection than between the shadow and the moon. I looked, and peered, and intensified my vision, all to no purpose. I could see nothing ofthat kind, not even an ash-tree in the neighbourhood. Still the shadowremained; not steady, but moving to and fro, and once I saw the fingersclose, and grind themselves close, like the claws of a wild animal, asif in uncontrollable longing for some anticipated prey. There seemedbut one mode left of discovering the substance of this shadow. I wentforward boldly, though with an inward shudder which I would not heed, tothe spot where the shadow lay, threw myself on the ground, laid my headwithin the form of the hand, and turned my eyes towards the moon Goodheavens! what did I see? I wonder that ever I arose, and that the veryshadow of the hand did not hold me where I lay until fear had frozen mybrain. I saw the strangest figure; vague, shadowy, almost transparent, in the central parts, and gradually deepening in substance towards theoutside, until it ended in extremities capable of casting such a shadowas fell from the hand, through the awful fingers of which I now saw themoon. The hand was uplifted in the attitude of a paw about to strikeits prey. But the face, which throbbed with fluctuating and pulsatoryvisibility--not from changes in the light it reflected, but from changesin its own conditions of reflecting power, the alterations being fromwithin, not from without--it was horrible. I do not know how to describeit. It caused a new sensation. Just as one cannot translate a horribleodour, or a ghastly pain, or a fearful sound, into words, so I cannotdescribe this new form of awful hideousness. I can only try to describesomething that is not it, but seems somewhat parallel to it; or at leastis suggested by it. It reminded me of what I had heard of vampires; forthe face resembled that of a corpse more than anything else I canthink of; especially when I can conceive such a face in motion, butnot suggesting any life as the source of the motion. The features wererather handsome than otherwise, except the mouth, which had scarcely acurve in it. The lips were of equal thickness; but the thickness wasnot at all remarkable, even although they looked slightly swollen. Theyseemed fixedly open, but were not wide apart. Of course I did not REMARKthese lineaments at the time: I was too horrified for that. I noted themafterwards, when the form returned on my inward sight with a vividnesstoo intense to admit of my doubting the accuracy of the reflex. But themost awful of the features were the eyes. These were alive, yet not withlife. 

They seemed lighted up with an infinite greed. A gnawing voracity, whichdevoured the devourer, seemed to be the indwelling and propelling powerof the whole ghostly apparition. I lay for a few moments simply imbrutedwith terror; when another cloud, obscuring the moon, delivered me fromthe immediately paralysing effects of the presence to the vision of theobject of horror, while it added the force of imagination to the powerof fear within me; inasmuch as, knowing far worse cause for apprehensionthan before, I remained equally ignorant from what I had to defendmyself, or how to take any precautions: he might be upon me in thedarkness any moment. I sprang to my feet, and sped I knew not whither, only away from the spectre. I thought no longer of the path, and oftennarrowly escaped dashing myself against a tree, in my headlong flight offear. 

Great drops of rain began to patter on the leaves. Thunder began tomutter, then growl in the distance. I ran on. The rain fell heavier. Atlength the thick leaves could hold it up no longer; and, like a secondfirmament, they poured their torrents on the earth. I was soon drenched, but that was nothing. I came to a small swollen stream that rushedthrough the woods. I had a vague hope that if I crossed this stream, Ishould be in safety from my pursuer; but I soon found that my hope wasas false as it was vague. I dashed across the stream, ascended a risingground, and reached a more open space, where stood only great trees. Through them I directed my way, holding eastward as nearly as I couldguess, but not at all certain that I was not moving in an oppositedirection. My mind was just reviving a little from its extreme terror, when, suddenly, a flash of lightning, or rather a cataract of successiveflashes, behind me, seemed to throw on the ground in front of me, butfar more faintly than before, from the extent of the source of thelight, the shadow of the same horrible hand. I sprang forward, stungto yet wilder speed; but had not run many steps before my foot slipped, and, vainly attempting to recover myself, I fell at the foot of oneof the large trees. Half-stunned, I yet raised myself, and almostinvoluntarily looked back. All I saw was the hand within three feetof my face. But, at the same moment, I felt two large soft arms thrownround me from behind; and a voice like a woman's said: "Do not fear thegoblin; he dares not hurt you now. " With that, the hand was suddenlywithdrawn as from a fire, and disappeared in the darkness and the rain. Overcome with the mingling of terror and joy, I lay for some time almostinsensible. The first thing I remember is the sound of a voice above me, full and low, and strangely reminding me of the sound of a gentle windamidst the leaves of a great tree. It murmured over and over again:"I may love him, I may love him; for he is a man, and I am only abeech-tree. " I found I was seated on the ground, leaning against a humanform, and supported still by the arms around me, which I knew to bethose of a woman who must be rather above the human size, and largelyproportioned. I turned my head, but without moving otherwise, for Ifeared lest the arms should untwine themselves; and clear, somewhatmournful eyes met mine. At least that is how they impressed me; but Icould see very little of colour or outline as we sat in the dark andrainy shadow of the tree. The face seemed very lovely, and solemn fromits stillness; with the aspect of one who is quite content, but waitingfor something. I saw my conjecture from her arms was correct: she wasabove the human scale throughout, but not greatly. 

"Why do you call yourself a beech-tree?" I said. 

"Because I am one, " she replied, in the same low, musical, murmuringvoice. 

"You are a woman, " I returned. 

"Do you think so? Am I very like a woman then?"

"You are a very beautiful woman. Is it possible you should not know it?"

"I am very glad you think so. I fancy I feel like a woman sometimes. Ido so to-night--and always when the rain drips from my hair. For thereis an old prophecy in our woods that one day we shall all be men andwomen like you. Do you know anything about it in your region? Shall Ibe very happy when I am a woman? I fear not, for it is always in nightslike these that I feel like one. But I long to be a woman for all that. "

I had let her talk on, for her voice was like a solution of all musicalsounds. I now told her that I could hardly say whether women were happyor not. I knew one who had not been happy; and for my part, I had oftenlonged for Fairy Land, as she now longed for the world of men. But thenneither of us had lived long, and perhaps people grew happier as theygrew older. Only I doubted it. 

I could not help sighing. She felt the sigh, for her arms were stillround me. She asked me how old I was. 

"Twenty-one, " said I. 

"Why, you baby!" said she, and kissed me with the sweetest kiss of windsand odours. There was a cool faithfulness in the kiss that revived myheart wonderfully. I felt that I feared the dreadful Ash no more. 

"What did the horrible Ash want with me?" I said. 

"I am not quite sure, but I think he wants to bury you at the foot ofhis tree. But he shall not touch you, my child. "

"Are all the ash-trees as dreadful as he?"

"Oh, no. They are all disagreeable selfish creatures--(what horrid menthey will make, if it be true!)--but this one has a hole in his heartthat nobody knows of but one or two; and he is always trying to fill itup, but he cannot. That must be what he wanted you for. I wonder if hewill ever be a man. If he is, I hope they will kill him. "

"How kind of you to save me from him!"

"I will take care that he shall not come near you again. But there aresome in the wood more like me, from whom, alas! I cannot protect you. Only if you see any of them very beautiful, try to walk round them. "

"What then?"

"I cannot tell you more. But now I must tie some of my hair about you, and then the Ash will not touch you. Here, cut some off. You men havestrange cutting things about you. "

She shook her long hair loose over me, never moving her arms. 

"I cannot cut your beautiful hair. It would be a shame. "

"Not cut my hair! It will have grown long enough before any is wantedagain in this wild forest. Perhaps it may never be of any use again--nottill I am a woman. " And she sighed. 

As gently as I could, I cut with a knife a long tress of flowing, darkhair, she hanging her beautiful head over me. When I had finished, sheshuddered and breathed deep, as one does when an acute pain, steadfastlyendured without sign of suffering, is at length relaxed. She then tookthe hair and tied it round me, singing a strange, sweet song, which Icould not understand, but which left in me a feeling like this--

 "I saw thee ne'er before; I see thee never more; But love, and help, and pain, beautiful one, Have made thee mine, till all my years are done. "

I cannot put more of it into words. She closed her arms about me again, and went on singing. The rain in the leaves, and a light wind that hadarisen, kept her song company. I was wrapt in a trance of still delight. It told me the secret of the woods, and the flowers, and the birds. Atone time I felt as if I was wandering in childhood through sunny springforests, over carpets of primroses, anemones, and little white starrythings--I had almost said creatures, and finding new wonderful flowersat every turn. At another, I lay half dreaming in the hot summer noon, with a book of old tales beside me, beneath a great beech; or, inautumn, grew sad because I trod on the leaves that had sheltered me, and received their last blessing in the sweet odours of decay; or, ina winter evening, frozen still, looked up, as I went home to a warmfireside, through the netted boughs and twigs to the cold, snowy moon, with her opal zone around her. At last I had fallen asleep; for Iknow nothing more that passed till I found myself lying under a superbbeech-tree, in the clear light of the morning, just before sunrise. Around me was a girdle of fresh beech-leaves. Alas! I brought nothingwith me out of Fairy Land, but memories--memories. The great boughs ofthe beech hung drooping around me. At my head rose its smooth stem, withits great sweeps of curving surface that swelled like undeveloped limbs. The leaves and branches above kept on the song which had sung me asleep;only now, to my mind, it sounded like a farewell and a speedwell. I sata long time, unwilling to go; but my unfinished story urged me on. Imust act and wander. With the sun well risen, I rose, and put my arms asfar as they would reach around the beech-tree, and kissed it, and saidgood-bye. A trembling went through the leaves; a few of the last dropsof the night's rain fell from off them at my feet; and as I walkedslowly away, I seemed to hear in a whisper once more the words: "I maylove him, I may love him; for he is a man, and I am only a beech-tree. "

CHAPTER V

 "And she was smooth and full, as if one gush Of life had washed her, or as if a sleep Lay on her eyelid, easier to sweep Than bee from daisy. " BEDDOIS' Pygmalion. 

 "Sche was as whyt as lylye yn May, Or snow that sneweth yn wynterys day. " Romance of Sir Launfal. 

I walked on, in the fresh morning air, as if new-born. The only thingthat damped my pleasure was a cloud of something between sorrow anddelight that crossed my mind with the frequently returning thought of mylast night's hostess. "But then, " thought I, "if she is sorry, I couldnot help it; and she has all the pleasures she ever had. Such a day asthis is surely a joy to her, as much at least as to me. And her lifewill perhaps be the richer, for holding now within it the memory of whatcame, but could not stay. And if ever she is a woman, who knows butwe may meet somewhere? there is plenty of room for meeting in theuniverse. " Comforting myself thus, yet with a vague compunction, as ifI ought not to have left her, I went on. There was little to distinguishthe woods to-day from those of my own land; except that all the wildthings, rabbits, birds, squirrels, mice, and the numberless otherinhabitants, were very tame; that is, they did not run away from me, butgazed at me as I passed, frequently coming nearer, as if to examineme more closely. Whether this came from utter ignorance, or fromfamiliarity with the human appearance of beings who never hurt them, Icould not tell. As I stood once, looking up to the splendid flower ofa parasite, which hung from the branch of a tree over my head, a largewhite rabbit cantered slowly up, put one of its little feet on one ofmine, and looked up at me with its red eyes, just as I had beenlooking up at the flower above me. I stooped and stroked it; but whenI attempted to lift it, it banged the ground with its hind feet andscampered off at a great rate, turning, however, to look at me severaltimes before I lost sight of it. Now and then, too, a dim human figurewould appear and disappear, at some distance, amongst the trees, movinglike a sleep-walker. But no one ever came near me. 

This day I found plenty of food in the forest--strange nuts and fruitsI had never seen before. I hesitated to eat them; but argued that, ifI could live on the air of Fairy Land, I could live on its food also. Ifound my reasoning correct, and the result was better than I had hoped;for it not only satisfied my hunger, but operated in such a way upon mysenses that I was brought into far more complete relationship with thethings around me. The human forms appeared much more dense and defined;more tangibly visible, if I may say so. I seemed to know better whichdirection to choose when any doubt arose. I began to feel in some degreewhat the birds meant in their songs, though I could not express it inwords, any more than you can some landscapes. At times, to my surprise, I found myself listening attentively, and as if it were no unusualthing with me, to a conversation between two squirrels or monkeys. The subjects were not very interesting, except as associated with theindividual life and necessities of the little creatures: where the bestnuts were to be found in the neighbourhood, and who could crack thembest, or who had most laid up for the winter, and such like; only theynever said where the store was. There was no great difference in kindbetween their talk and our ordinary human conversation. Some of thecreatures I never heard speak at all, and believe they never do so, except under the impulse of some great excitement. The mice talked; butthe hedgehogs seemed very phlegmatic; and though I met a couple of molesabove ground several times, they never said a word to each other in myhearing. There were no wild beasts in the forest; at least, I did notsee one larger than a wild cat. There were plenty of snakes, however, and I do not think they were all harmless; but none ever bit me. 

Soon after mid-day I arrived at a bare rocky hill, of no great size, butvery steep; and having no trees--scarcely even a bush--upon it, entirelyexposed to the heat of the sun. Over this my way seemed to lie, andI immediately began the ascent. On reaching the top, hot and weary, Ilooked around me, and saw that the forest still stretched as far as thesight could reach on every side of me. I observed that the trees, in thedirection in which I was about to descend, did not come so near thefoot of the hill as on the other side, and was especially regretting theunexpected postponement of shelter, because this side of the hill seemedmore difficult to descend than the other had been to climb, when my eyecaught the appearance of a natural path, winding down through brokenrocks and along the course of a tiny stream, which I hoped would leadme more easily to the foot. I tried it, and found the descent not at alllaborious; nevertheless, when I reached the bottom, I was very tired andexhausted with the heat. But just where the path seemed to end, rosea great rock, quite overgrown with shrubs and creeping plants, some ofthem in full and splendid blossom: these almost concealed an opening inthe rock, into which the path appeared to lead. I entered, thirsting forthe shade which it promised. What was my delight to find a rockycell, all the angles rounded away with rich moss, and every ledge andprojection crowded with lovely ferns, the variety of whose forms, andgroupings, and shades wrought in me like a poem; for such a harmonycould not exist, except they all consented to some one end! A littlewell of the clearest water filled a mossy hollow in one corner. I drank, and felt as if I knew what the elixir of life must be; then threw myselfon a mossy mound that lay like a couch along the inner end. Here I layin a delicious reverie for some time; during which all lovely forms, andcolours, and sounds seemed to use my brain as a common hall, where theycould come and go, unbidden and unexcused. I had never imagined thatsuch capacity for simple happiness lay in me, as was now awakened bythis assembly of forms and spiritual sensations, which yet were far toovague to admit of being translated into any shape common to my own andanother mind. I had lain for an hour, I should suppose, though it mayhave been far longer, when, the harmonious tumult in my mind havingsomewhat relaxed, I became aware that my eyes were fixed on a strange, time-worn bas-relief on the rock opposite to me. This, after somepondering, I concluded to represent Pygmalion, as he awaited thequickening of his statue. The sculptor sat more rigid than the figure towhich his eyes were turned. That seemed about to step from its pedestaland embrace the man, who waited rather than expected. 

"A lovely story, " I said to myself. "This cave, now, with the bushes cutaway from the entrance to let the light in, might be such a place as hewould choose, withdrawn from the notice of men, to set up his block ofmarble, and mould into a visible body the thought already clothed withform in the unseen hall of the sculptor's brain. And, indeed, if Imistake not, " I said, starting up, as a sudden ray of light arrivedat that moment through a crevice in the roof, and lighted up a smallportion of the rock, bare of vegetation, "this very rock is marble, white enough and delicate enough for any statue, even if destined tobecome an ideal woman in the arms of the sculptor. "

I took my knife and removed the moss from a part of the block on whichI had been lying; when, to my surprise, I found it more like alabasterthan ordinary marble, and soft to the edge of the knife. In fact, itwas alabaster. By an inexplicable, though by no means unusual kind ofimpulse, I went on removing the moss from the surface of the stone;and soon saw that it was polished, or at least smooth, throughout. Icontinued my labour; and after clearing a space of about a couple ofsquare feet, I observed what caused me to prosecute the work with moreinterest and care than before. For the ray of sunlight had now reachedthe spot I had cleared, and under its lustre the alabaster revealedits usual slight transparency when polished, except where my knife hadscratched the surface; and I observed that the transparency seemed tohave a definite limit, and to end upon an opaque body like the moresolid, white marble. I was careful to scratch no more. And first, avague anticipation gave way to a startling sense of possibility; then, as I proceeded, one revelation after another produced the entrancingconviction, that under the crust of alabaster lay a dimly visible formin marble, but whether of man or woman I could not yet tell. I worked onas rapidly as the necessary care would permit; and when I had uncoveredthe whole mass, and rising from my knees, had retreated a little way, so that the effect of the whole might fall on me, I saw before mewith sufficient plainness--though at the same time with considerableindistinctness, arising from the limited amount of light the placeadmitted, as well as from the nature of the object itself--a block ofpure alabaster enclosing the form, apparently in marble, of a reposingwoman. She lay on one side, with her hand under her cheek, and her facetowards me; but her hair had fallen partly over her face, so that Icould not see the expression of the whole. What I did see appeared tome perfectly lovely; more near the face that had been born with me inmy soul, than anything I had seen before in nature or art. The actualoutlines of the rest of the form were so indistinct, that the more thansemi-opacity of the alabaster seemed insufficient to account forthe fact; and I conjectured that a light robe added its obscurity. Numberless histories passed through my mind of change of substance fromenchantment and other causes, and of imprisonments such as this beforeme. I thought of the Prince of the Enchanted City, half marble and halfa man; of Ariel; of Niobe; of the Sleeping Beauty in the Wood; of thebleeding trees; and many other histories. Even my adventure of thepreceding evening with the lady of the beech-tree contributed to arousethe wild hope, that by some means life might be given to this form also, and that, breaking from her alabaster tomb, she might glorify my eyeswith her presence. "For, " I argued, "who can tell but this cave may bethe home of Marble, and this, essential Marble--that spirit of marblewhich, present throughout, makes it capable of being moulded into anyform? Then if she should awake! But how to awake her? A kiss awokethe Sleeping Beauty! a kiss cannot reach her through the incrustingalabaster. " I kneeled, however, and kissed the pale coffin; but sheslept on. I bethought me of Orpheus, and the following stones--thattrees should follow his music seemed nothing surprising now. Might not asong awake this form, that the glory of motion might for a time displacethe loveliness of rest? Sweet sounds can go where kisses may not enter. I sat and thought. Now, although always delighting in music, I had neverbeen gifted with the power of song, until I entered the fairy forest. Ihad a voice, and I had a true sense of sound; but when I tried to sing, the one would not content the other, and so I remained silent. Thismorning, however, I had found myself, ere I was aware, rejoicing in asong; but whether it was before or after I had eaten of the fruitsof the forest, I could not satisfy myself. I concluded it was after, however; and that the increased impulse to sing I now felt, was in partowing to having drunk of the little well, which shone like a brillianteye in a corner of the cave. It saw down on the ground by the "antenataltomb, " leaned upon it with my face towards the head of the figurewithin, and sang--the words and tones coming together, and inseparablyconnected, as if word and tone formed one thing; or, as if each wordcould be uttered only in that tone, and was incapable of distinctionfrom it, except in idea, by an acute analysis. I sang something likethis: but the words are only a dull representation of a state whosevery elevation precluded the possibility of remembrance; and in which Ipresume the words really employed were as far above these, as that statetranscended this wherein I recall it:

 "Marble woman, vainly sleeping In the very death of dreams! Wilt thou--slumber from thee sweeping, All but what with vision teems-- Hear my voice come through the golden Mist of memory and hope; And with shadowy smile embolden Me with primal Death to cope?

 "Thee the sculptors all pursuing, Have embodied but their own; Round their visions, form enduring, Marble vestments thou hast thrown; But thyself, in silence winding, Thou hast kept eternally; Thee they found not, many finding-- I have found thee: wake for me. "

As I sang, I looked earnestly at the face so vaguely revealed before me. I fancied, yet believed it to be but fancy, that through the dim veilof the alabaster, I saw a motion of the head as if caused by a sinkingsigh. I gazed more earnestly, and concluded that it was but fancy. Neverthless I could not help singing again--

 "Rest is now filled full of beauty, And can give thee up, I ween; Come thou forth, for other duty Motion pineth for her queen. 

 "Or, if needing years to wake thee From thy slumbrous solitudes, Come, sleep-walking, and betake thee To the friendly, sleeping woods. 

 Sweeter dreams are in the forest, Round thee storms would never rave; And when need of rest is sorest, Glide thou then into thy cave. 

 "Or, if still thou choosest rather Marble, be its spell on me; Let thy slumber round me gather, Let another dream with thee!"

Again I paused, and gazed through the stony shroud, as if, by very forceof penetrative sight, I would clear every lineament of the lovely face. And now I thought the hand that had lain under the cheek, had slippeda little downward. But then I could not be sure that I had at firstobserved its position accurately. So I sang again; for the longing hadgrown into a passionate need of seeing her alive--

 "Or art thou Death, O woman? for since I Have set me singing by thy side, Life hath forsook the upper sky, And all the outer world hath died. 

 "Yea, I am dead; for thou hast drawn My life all downward unto thee. Dead moon of love! let twilight dawn: Awake! and let the darkness flee. 

 "Cold lady of the lovely stone! Awake! or I shall perish here; And thou be never more alone, My form and I for ages near. 

 "But words are vain; reject them all-- They utter but a feeble part: Hear thou the depths from which they call, The voiceless longing of my heart. "

There arose a slightly crashing sound. Like a sudden apparition thatcomes and is gone, a white form, veiled in a light robe of whiteness, burst upwards from the stone, stood, glided forth, and gleamed awaytowards the woods. For I followed to the mouth of the cave, as soonas the amazement and concentration of delight permitted the nerves ofmotion again to act; and saw the white form amidst the trees, as itcrossed a little glade on the edge of the forest where the sunlight fellfull, seeming to gather with intenser radiance on the one object thatfloated rather than flitted through its lake of beams. I gazed after herin a kind of despair; found, freed, lost! It seemed useless to follow, yet follow I must. I marked the direction she took; and without oncelooking round to the forsaken cave, I hastened towards the forest. 

CHAPTER VI

 "Ah, let a man beware, when his wishes, fulfilled, rain down upon him, and his happiness is unbounded. "

 "Thy red lips, like worms, Travel over my cheek. " --MOTHERWELL. 

But as I crossed the space between the foot of the hill and the forest, a vision of another kind delayed my steps. Through an opening tothe westward flowed, like a stream, the rays of the setting sun, andoverflowed with a ruddy splendour the open space where I was. And ridingas it were down this stream towards me, came a horseman in what appearedred armour. From frontlet to tail, the horse likewise shone red in thesunset. I felt as if I must have seen the knight before; but as he drewnear, I could recall no feature of his countenance. Ere he came upto me, however, I remembered the legend of Sir Percival in the rustyarmour, which I had left unfinished in the old book in the cottage: itwas of Sir Percival that he reminded me. And no wonder; for when he cameclose up to me, I saw that, from crest to heel, the whole surface of hisarmour was covered with a light rust. The golden spurs shone, but theiron greaves glowed in the sunlight. The MORNING STAR, which hung fromhis wrist, glittered and glowed with its silver and bronze. His wholeappearance was terrible; but his face did not answer to this appearance. It was sad, even to gloominess; and something of shame seemed to coverit. Yet it was noble and high, though thus beclouded; and the formlooked lofty, although the head drooped, and the whole frame was bowedas with an inward grief. The horse seemed to share in his master'sdejection, and walked spiritless and slow. I noticed, too, that thewhite plume on his helmet was discoloured and drooping. "He has fallenin a joust with spears, " I said to myself; "yet it becomes not a nobleknight to be conquered in spirit because his body hath fallen. " Heappeared not to observe me, for he was riding past without looking up, and started into a warlike attitude the moment the first sound of myvoice reached him. Then a flush, as of shame, covered all of his facethat the lifted beaver disclosed. He returned my greeting with distantcourtesy, and passed on. But suddenly, he reined up, sat a moment still, and then turning his horse, rode back to where I stood looking afterhim. 

"I am ashamed, " he said, "to appear a knight, and in such a guise; butit behoves me to tell you to take warning from me, lest the same evil, in his kind, overtake the singer that has befallen the knight. Hast thouever read the story of Sir Percival and the"--(here he shuddered, thathis armour rang)--"Maiden of the Alder-tree?"

"In part, I have, " said I; "for yesterday, at the entrance of thisforest, I found in a cottage the volume wherein it is recorded. " "Thentake heed, " he rejoined; "for, see my armour--I put it off; and as itbefell to him, so has it befallen to me. I that was proud am humble now. Yet is she terribly beautiful--beware. Never, " he added, raising hishead, "shall this armour be furbished, but by the blows of knightlyencounter, until the last speck has disappeared from every spot wherethe battle-axe and sword of evil-doers, or noble foes, might fall; whenI shall again lift my head, and say to my squire, 'Do thy duty oncemore, and make this armour shine. '"

Before I could inquire further, he had struck spurs into his horse andgalloped away, shrouded from my voice in the noise of his armour. For Icalled after him, anxious to know more about this fearful enchantress;but in vain--he heard me not. "Yet, " I said to myself, "I have nowbeen often warned; surely I shall be well on my guard; and I am fullyresolved I shall not be ensnared by any beauty, however beautiful. Doubtless, some one man may escape, and I shall be he. " So I went oninto the wood, still hoping to find, in some one of its mysteriousrecesses, my lost lady of the marble. The sunny afternoon died intothe loveliest twilight. Great bats began to flit about with their ownnoiseless flight, seemingly purposeless, because its objects are unseen. The monotonous music of the owl issued from all unexpected quarters inthe half-darkness around me. The glow-worm was alight here and there, burning out into the great universe. The night-hawk heightened all theharmony and stillness with his oft-recurring, discordant jar. Numberless unknown sounds came out of the unknown dusk; but all were oftwilight-kind, oppressing the heart as with a condensed atmosphere ofdreamy undefined love and longing. The odours of night arose, and bathedme in that luxurious mournfulness peculiar to them, as if the plantswhence they floated had been watered with bygone tears. Earth drew metowards her bosom; I felt as if I could fall down and kiss her. I forgotI was in Fairy Land, and seemed to be walking in a perfect night ofour own old nursing earth. Great stems rose about me, uplifting a thickmultitudinous roof above me of branches, and twigs, and leaves--the birdand insect world uplifted over mine, with its own landscapes, its ownthickets, and paths, and glades, and dwellings; its own bird-ways andinsect-delights. Great boughs crossed my path; great roots based thetree-columns, and mightily clasped the earth, strong to lift and strongto uphold. It seemed an old, old forest, perfect in forest ways andpleasures. And when, in the midst of this ecstacy, I remembered thatunder some close canopy of leaves, by some giant stem, or in some mossycave, or beside some leafy well, sat the lady of the marble, whom mysongs had called forth into the outer world, waiting (might it notbe?) to meet and thank her deliverer in a twilight which would veil herconfusion, the whole night became one dream-realm of joy, the centralform of which was everywhere present, although unbeheld. Then, remembering how my songs seemed to have called her from the marble, piercing through the pearly shroud of alabaster--"Why, " thought I, "should not my voice reach her now, through the ebon night thatinwraps her. " My voice burst into song so spontaneously that it seemedinvoluntarily. 

 "Not a sound But, echoing in me, Vibrates all around With a blind delight, Till it breaks on Thee, Queen of Night!

 Every tree, O'ershadowing with gloom, Seems to cover thee Secret, dark, love-still'd, In a holy room Silence-filled. 

 "Let no moon Creep up the heaven to-night; I in darksome noon Walking hopefully, Seek my shrouded light-- Grope for thee!

 "Darker grow The borders of the dark! Through the branches glow, From the roof above, Star and diamond-sparks Light for love. "

Scarcely had the last sounds floated away from the hearing of my ownears, when I heard instead a low delicious laugh near me. It was not thelaugh of one who would not be heard, but the laugh of one who has justreceived something long and patiently desired--a laugh that ends ina low musical moan. I started, and, turning sideways, saw a dim whitefigure seated beside an intertwining thicket of smaller trees andunderwood. 

"It is my white lady!" I said, and flung myself on the ground besideher; striving, through the gathering darkness, to get a glimpse of theform which had broken its marble prison at my call. 

"It is your white lady!" said the sweetest voice, in reply, sending athrill of speechless delight through a heart which all the love-charmsof the preceding day and evening had been tempering for this culminatinghour. Yet, if I would have confessed it, there was something either inthe sound of the voice, although it seemed sweetness itself, or else inthis yielding which awaited no gradation of gentle approaches, that didnot vibrate harmoniously with the beat of my inward music. And likewise, when, taking her hand in mine, I drew closer to her, looking for thebeauty of her face, which, indeed, I found too plenteously, a coldshiver ran through me; but "it is the marble, " I said to myself, andheeded it not. 

She withdrew her hand from mine, and after that would scarce allow me totouch her. It seemed strange, after the fulness of her first greeting, that she could not trust me to come close to her. Though her wordswere those of a lover, she kept herself withdrawn as if a mile of spaceinterposed between us. 

"Why did you run away from me when you woke in the cave?" I said. 

"Did I?" she returned. "That was very unkind of me; but I did not knowbetter. "

"I wish I could see you. The night is very dark. "

"So it is. Come to my grotto. There is light there. "

"Have you another cave, then?"

"Come and see. "

But she did not move until I rose first, and then she was on her feetbefore I could offer my hand to help her. She came close to my side, andconducted me through the wood. But once or twice, when, involuntarilyalmost, I was about to put my arm around her as we walked on through thewarm gloom, she sprang away several paces, always keeping her face fulltowards me, and then stood looking at me, slightly stooping, in theattitude of one who fears some half-seen enemy. It was too dark todiscern the expression of her face. Then she would return and walk closebeside me again, as if nothing had happened. I thought this strange;but, besides that I had almost, as I said before, given up the attemptto account for appearances in Fairy Land, I judged that it would be veryunfair to expect from one who had slept so long and had been so suddenlyawakened, a behaviour correspondent to what I might unreflectingly lookfor. I knew not what she might have been dreaming about. Besides, it waspossible that, while her words were free, her sense of touch might beexquisitely delicate. 

At length, after walking a long way in the woods, we arrived at anotherthicket, through the intertexture of which was glimmering a pale rosylight. 

 "Push aside the branches, " she said, "and make room for us toenter. "

I did as she told me. 

"Go in, " she said; "I will follow you. "

I did as she desired, and found myself in a little cave, not very unlikethe marble cave. It was festooned and draperied with all kinds ofgreen that cling to shady rocks. In the furthest corner, half-hidden inleaves, through which it glowed, mingling lovely shadows between them, burned a bright rosy flame on a little earthen lamp. The lady glidedround by the wall from behind me, still keeping her face towards me, andseated herself in the furthest corner, with her back to the lamp, whichshe hid completely from my view. I then saw indeed a form of perfectloveliness before me. Almost it seemed as if the light of the rose-lampshone through her (for it could not be reflected from her); such adelicate shade of pink seemed to shadow what in itself must be a marblywhiteness of hue. I discovered afterwards, however, that there was onething in it I did not like; which was, that the white part of the eyewas tinged with the same slight roseate hue as the rest of the form. Itis strange that I cannot recall her features; but they, as well as hersomewhat girlish figure, left on me simply and only the impression ofintense loveliness. I lay down at her feet, and gazed up into her faceas I lay. She began, and told me a strange tale, which, likewise, Icannot recollect; but which, at every turn and every pause, somehow orother fixed my eyes and thoughts upon her extreme beauty; seeming alwaysto culminate in something that had a relation, revealed or hidden, butalways operative, with her own loveliness. I lay entranced. It was atale which brings back a feeling as of snows and tempests; torrentsand water-sprites; lovers parted for long, and meeting at last; with agorgeous summer night to close up the whole. I listened till she and Iwere blended with the tale; till she and I were the whole history. Andwe had met at last in this same cave of greenery, while the summer nighthung round us heavy with love, and the odours that crept through thesilence from the sleeping woods were the only signs of an outer worldthat invaded our solitude. What followed I cannot clearly remember. Thesucceeding horror almost obliterated it. I woke as a grey dawn stoleinto the cave. The damsel had disappeared; but in the shrubbery, at themouth of the cave, stood a strange horrible object. It looked like anopen coffin set up on one end; only that the part for the head andneck was defined from the shoulder-part. In fact, it was a roughrepresentation of the human frame, only hollow, as if made of decayingbark torn from a tree. 

It had arms, which were only slightly seamed, down from theshoulder-blade by the elbow, as if the bark had healed again from thecut of a knife. But the arms moved, and the hand and the fingers weretearing asunder a long silky tress of hair. The thing turned round--ithad for a face and front those of my enchantress, but now of a palegreenish hue in the light of the morning, and with dead lustreless eyes. In the horror of the moment, another fear invaded me. I put my hand tomy waist, and found indeed that my girdle of beech-leaves was gone. Hair again in her hands, she was tearing it fiercely. Once more, as sheturned, she laughed a low laugh, but now full of scorn and derision; andthen she said, as if to a companion with whom she had been talking whileI slept, "There he is; you can take him now. " I lay still, petrifiedwith dismay and fear; for I now saw another figure beside her, which, although vague and indistinct, I yet recognised but too well. It was theAsh-tree. My beauty was the Maid of the Alder! and she was givingme, spoiled of my only availing defence, into the hands of bent hisGorgon-head, and entered the cave. I could not stir. He drew near me. His ghoul-eyes and his ghastly face fascinated me. He came stooping, with the hideous hand outstretched, like a beast of prey. I had givenmyself up to a death of unfathomable horror, when, suddenly, and just ashe was on the point of seizing me, the dull, heavy blow of an axeechoed through the wood, followed by others in quick repetition. TheAsh shuddered and groaned, withdrew the outstretched hand, retreatedbackwards to the mouth of the cave, then turned and disappeared amongstthe trees. The other walking Death looked at me once, with a carelessdislike on her beautifully moulded features; then, heedless any moreto conceal her hollow deformity, turned her frightful back and likewisevanished amid the green obscurity without. I lay and wept. The Maid ofthe Alder-tree had befooled me--nearly slain me--in spite of all thewarnings I had received from those who knew my danger. 

CHAPTER VII

 "Fight on, my men, Sir Andrew sayes, A little Ime hurt, but yett not slaine; He but lye downe and bleede awhile, And then Ile rise and fight againe. " Ballad of Sir Andrew Barton. 

But I could not remain where I was any longer, though the daylight washateful to me, and the thought of the great, innocent, bold sunriseunendurable. Here there was no well to cool my face, smarting with thebitterness of my own tears. Nor would I have washed in the well ofthat grotto, had it flowed clear as the rivers of Paradise. I rose, andfeebly left the sepulchral cave. I took my way I knew not whither, butstill towards the sunrise. The birds were singing; but not for me. Allthe creatures spoke a language of their own, with which I had nothing todo, and to which I cared not to find the key any more. 

I walked listlessly along. What distressed me most--more even than myown folly--was the perplexing question, How can beauty and uglinessdwell so near? Even with her altered complexion and her face of dislike;disenchanted of the belief that clung around her; known for aliving, walking sepulchre, faithless, deluding, traitorous; I feltnotwithstanding all this, that she was beautiful. Upon this I ponderedwith undiminished perplexity, though not without some gain. Then I beganto make surmises as to the mode of my deliverance; and concluded thatsome hero, wandering in search of adventure, had heard how the forestwas infested; and, knowing it was useless to attack the evil thing inperson, had assailed with his battle-axe the body in which he dwelt, andon which he was dependent for his power of mischief in the wood. "Verylikely, " I thought, "the repentant-knight, who warned me of the evilwhich has befallen me, was busy retrieving his lost honour, while I wassinking into the same sorrow with himself; and, hearing of the dangerousand mysterious being, arrived at his tree in time to save me from beingdragged to its roots, and buried like carrion, to nourish him foryet deeper insatiableness. " I found afterwards that my conjecture wascorrect. I wondered how he had fared when his blows recalled the Ashhimself, and that too I learned afterwards. 

I walked on the whole day, with intervals of rest, but without food; forI could not have eaten, had any been offered me; till, in the afternoon, I seemed to approach the outskirts of the forest, and at length arrivedat a farm-house. An unspeakable joy arose in my heart at beholding anabode of human beings once more, and I hastened up to the door, andknocked. A kind-looking, matronly woman, still handsome, made herappearance; who, as soon as she saw me, said kindly, "Ah, my poor boy, you have come from the wood! Were you in it last night?"

I should have ill endured, the day before, to be called BOY; but now themotherly kindness of the word went to my heart; and, like a boy indeed, I burst into tears. She soothed me right gently; and, leading me intoa room, made me lie down on a settle, while she went to find me somerefreshment. She soon returned with food, but I could not eat. Shealmost compelled me to swallow some wine, when I revived sufficiently tobe able to answer some of her questions. I told her the whole story. 

"It is just as I feared, " she said; "but you are now for the nightbeyond the reach of any of these dreadful creatures. It is no wonderthey could delude a child like you. But I must beg you, when my husbandcomes in, not to say a word about these things; for he thinks me evenhalf crazy for believing anything of the sort. But I must believe mysenses, as he cannot believe beyond his, which give him no intimationsof this kind. I think he could spend the whole of Midsummer-eve inthe wood and come back with the report that he saw nothing worse thanhimself. Indeed, good man, he would hardly find anything better thanhimself, if he had seven more senses given him. "

"But tell me how it is that she could be so beautiful without any heartat all--without any place even for a heart to live in. "

"I cannot quite tell, " she said; "but I am sure she would not look sobeautiful if she did not take means to make herself look more beautifulthan she is. And then, you know, you began by being in love withher before you saw her beauty, mistaking her for the lady of themarble--another kind altogether, I should think. But the chief thingthat makes her beautiful is this: that, although she loves no man, sheloves the love of any man; and when she finds one in her power, herdesire to bewitch him and gain his love (not for the sake of his loveeither, but that she may be conscious anew of her own beauty, through the admiration he manifests), makes her very lovely--with aself-destructive beauty, though; for it is that which is constantlywearing her away within, till, at last, the decay will reach her face, and her whole front, when all the lovely mask of nothing will fall topieces, and she be vanished for ever. So a wise man, whom she met inthe wood some years ago, and who, I think, for all his wisdom, fared nobetter than you, told me, when, like you, he spent the next night here, and recounted to me his adventures. "

I thanked her very warmly for her solution, though it was but partial;wondering much that in her, as in woman I met on my first entering theforest, there should be such superiority to her apparent condition. Hereshe left me to take some rest; though, indeed, I was too much agitatedto rest in any other way than by simply ceasing to move. 

In half an hour, I heard a heavy step approach and enter the house. Ajolly voice, whose slight huskiness appeared to proceed from overmuchlaughter, called out "Betsy, the pigs' trough is quite empty, and thatis a pity. Let them swill, lass! They're of no use but to get fat. Ha!ha! ha! Gluttony is not forbidden in their commandments. Ha! ha! ha!"The very voice, kind and jovial, seemed to disrobe the room of thestrange look which all new places wear--to disenchant it out of therealm of the ideal into that of the actual. It began to look as if Ihad known every corner of it for twenty years; and when, soon after, thedame came and fetched me to partake of their early supper, the grasp ofhis great hand, and the harvest-moon of his benevolent face, which wasneeded to light up the rotundity of the globe beneath it, produced sucha reaction in me, that, for a moment, I could hardly believe that therewas a Fairy Land; and that all I had passed through since I left home, had not been the wandering dream of a diseased imagination, operating ona too mobile frame, not merely causing me indeed to travel, but peoplingfor me with vague phantoms the regions through which my actual stepshad led me. But the next moment my eye fell upon a little girl who wassitting in the chimney-corner, with a little book open on her knee, fromwhich she had apparently just looked up to fix great inquiring eyes uponme. I believed in Fairy Land again. She went on with her reading, assoon as she saw that I observed her looking at me. I went near, andpeeping over her shoulder, saw that she was reading "The History ofGraciosa and Percinet. "

"Very improving book, sir, " remarked the old farmer, with agood-humoured laugh. "We are in the very hottest corner of Fairy Landhere. Ha! ha! Stormy night, last night, sir. "

"Was it, indeed?" I rejoined. "It was not so with me. A lovelier night Inever saw. " "Indeed! Where were you last night?"

"I spent it in the forest. I had lost my way. "

"Ah! then, perhaps, you will be able to convince my good woman, thatthere is nothing very remarkable about the forest; for, to tell thetruth, it bears but a bad name in these parts. I dare say you sawnothing worse than yourself there?"

"I hope I did, " was my inward reply; but, for an audible one, Icontented myself with saying, "Why, I certainly did see some appearancesI could hardly account for; but that is nothing to be wondered at in anunknown wild forest, and with the uncertain light of the moon alone togo by. "

"Very true! you speak like a sensible man, sir. We have but few sensiblefolks round about us. Now, you would hardly credit it, but my wifebelieves every fairy-tale that ever was written. I cannot account forit. She is a most sensible woman in everything else. "

"But should not that make you treat her belief with something ofrespect, though you cannot share in it yourself?"

"Yes, that is all very well in theory; but when you come to liveevery day in the midst of absurdity, it is far less easy to behaverespectfully to it. Why, my wife actually believes the story of the'White Cat. ' You know it, I dare say. "

"I read all these tales when a child, and know that one especiallywell. "

"But, father, " interposed the little girl in the chimney-corner, "youknow quite well that mother is descended from that very princess who waschanged by the wicked fairy into a white cat. Mother has told me so amany times, and you ought to believe everything she says. "

"I can easily believe that, " rejoined the farmer, with another fit oflaughter; "for, the other night, a mouse came gnawing and scratchingbeneath the floor, and would not let us go to sleep. Your mother sprangout of bed, and going as near it as she could, mewed so infernally likea great cat, that the noise ceased instantly. I believe the poor mousedied of the fright, for we have never heard it again. Ha! ha! ha!"

The son, an ill-looking youth, who had entered during the conversation, joined in his father's laugh; but his laugh was very different from theold man's: it was polluted with a sneer. I watched him, and saw that, as soon as it was over, he looked scared, as if he dreaded some evilconsequences to follow his presumption. The woman stood near, waitingtill we should seat ourselves at the table, and listening to it allwith an amused air, which had something in it of the look with which onelistens to the sententious remarks of a pompous child. We sat down tosupper, and I ate heartily. My bygone distresses began already to lookfar off. 

"In what direction are you going?" asked the old man. 

"Eastward, " I replied; nor could I have given a more definite answer. "Does the forest extend much further in that direction?"

"Oh! for miles and miles; I do not know how far. For although I havelived on the borders of it all my life, I have been too busy to makejourneys of discovery into it. Nor do I see what I could discover. Itis only trees and trees, till one is sick of them. By the way, if youfollow the eastward track from here, you will pass close to what thechildren say is the very house of the ogre that Hop-o'-my-Thumb visited, and ate his little daughters with the crowns of gold. "

"Oh, father! ate his little daughters! No; he only changed their goldcrowns for nightcaps; and the great long-toothed ogre killed them inmistake; but I do not think even he ate them, for you know they were hisown little ogresses. "

"Well, well, child; you know all about it a great deal better than I do. However, the house has, of course, in such a foolish neighbourhood asthis, a bad enough name; and I must confess there is a woman livingin it, with teeth long enough, and white enough too, for the linealdescendant of the greatest ogre that ever was made. I think you hadbetter not go near her. "

In such talk as this the night wore on. When supper was finished, whichlasted some time, my hostess conducted me to my chamber. 

"If you had not had enough of it already, " she said, "I would have putyou in another room, which looks towards the forest; and where youwould most likely have seen something more of its inhabitants. For theyfrequently pass the window, and even enter the room sometimes. Strangecreatures spend whole nights in it, at certain seasons of the year. I amused to it, and do not mind it. No more does my little girl, who sleepsin it always. But this room looks southward towards the open country, and they never show themselves here; at least I never saw any. "

I was somewhat sorry not to gather any experience that I might have, ofthe inhabitants of Fairy Land; but the effect of the farmer's company, and of my own later adventures, was such, that I chose rather anundisturbed night in my more human quarters; which, with their cleanwhite curtains and white linen, were very inviting to my weariness. 

In the morning I awoke refreshed, after a profound and dreamless sleep. The sun was high, when I looked out of the window, shining over a wide, undulating, cultivated country. Various garden-vegetables were growingbeneath my window. Everything was radiant with clear sunlight. Thedew-drops were sparkling their busiest; the cows in a near-by field wereeating as if they had not been at it all day yesterday; the maids weresinging at their work as they passed to and fro between the out-houses:I did not believe in Fairy Land. I went down, and found the familyalready at breakfast. But before I entered the room where they sat, thelittle girl came to me, and looked up in my face, as though she wantedto say something to me. I stooped towards her; she put her arms round myneck, and her mouth to my ear, and whispered--

"A white lady has been flitting about the house all night. "

"No whispering behind doors!" cried the farmer; and we entered together. "Well, how have you slept? No bogies, eh?"

"Not one, thank you; I slept uncommonly well. "

"I am glad to hear it. Come and breakfast. "

After breakfast, the farmer and his son went out; and I was left alonewith the mother and daughter. 

"When I looked out of the window this morning, " I said, "I felt almostcertain that Fairy Land was all a delusion of my brain; but whenever Icome near you or your little daughter, I feel differently. Yet I couldpersuade myself, after my last adventures, to go back, and have nothingmore to do with such strange beings. "

"How will you go back?" said the woman. 

"Nay, that I do not know. "

"Because I have heard, that, for those who enter Fairy Land, there is noway of going back. They must go on, and go through it. How, I do not inthe least know. "

"That is quite the impression on my own mind. Something compels me to goon, as if my only path was onward, but I feel less inclined this morningto continue my adventures. "

"Will you come and see my little child's room? She sleeps in the one Itold you of, looking towards the forest. "

"Willingly, " I said. 

So we went together, the little girl running before to open the door forus. It was a large room, full of old-fashioned furniture, that seemed tohave once belonged to some great house. 

The window was built with a low arch, and filled with lozenge-shapedpanes. The wall was very thick, and built of solid stone. I could seethat part of the house had been erected against the remains of some oldcastle or abbey, or other great building; the fallen stones of whichhad probably served to complete it. But as soon as I looked out of thewindow, a gush of wonderment and longing flowed over my soul like thetide of a great sea. Fairy Land lay before me, and drew me towards itwith an irresistible attraction. The trees bathed their great heads inthe waves of the morning, while their roots were planted deep in gloom;save where on the borders the sunshine broke against their stems, orswept in long streams through their avenues, washing with brighter hueall the leaves over which it flowed; revealing the rich brown of thedecayed leaves and fallen pine-cones, and the delicate greens of thelong grasses and tiny forests of moss that covered the channel overwhich it passed in motionless rivers of light. I turned hurriedly to bidmy hostess farewell without further delay. She smiled at my haste, butwith an anxious look. 

"You had better not go near the house of the ogre, I think. My son willshow you into another path, which will join the first beyond it. "

Not wishing to be headstrong or too confident any more, I agreed;and having taken leave of my kind entertainers, went into the wood, accompanied by the youth. He scarcely spoke as we went along; but he ledme through the trees till we struck upon a path. He told me to followit, and, with a muttered "good morning" left me. 

CHAPTER VIII

 "I am a part of the part, which at first was the whole. " GOETHE. --Mephistopheles in Faust. 

My spirits rose as I went deeper; into the forest; but I could notregain my former elasticity of mind. I found cheerfulness to be likelife itself--not to be created by any argument. Afterwards I learned, that the best way to manage some kinds of pain fill thoughts, is to darethem to do their worst; to let them lie and gnaw at your heart till theyare tired; and you find you still have a residue of life they cannotkill. So, better and worse, I went on, till I came to a little clearingin the forest. In the middle of this clearing stood a long, low hut, built with one end against a single tall cypress, which rose like aspire to the building. A vague misgiving crossed my mind when I saw it;but I must needs go closer, and look through a little half-open door, near the opposite end from the cypress. Window I saw none. On peepingin, and looking towards the further end, I saw a lamp burning, witha dim, reddish flame, and the head of a woman, bent downwards, as ifreading by its light. I could see nothing more for a few moments. Atlength, as my eyes got used to the dimness of the place, I saw that thepart of the rude building near me was used for household purposes;for several rough utensils lay here and there, and a bed stood in thecorner. 

An irresistible attraction caused me to enter. The woman never raisedher face, the upper part of which alone I could see distinctly; but, assoon as I stepped within the threshold, she began to read aloud, in alow and not altogether unpleasing voice, from an ancient little volumewhich she held open with one hand on the table upon which stood thelamp. What she read was something like this:

"So, then, as darkness had no beginning, neither will it ever havean end. So, then, is it eternal. The negation of aught else, is itsaffirmation. Where the light cannot come, there abideth the darkness. The light doth but hollow a mine out of the infinite extension of thedarkness. And ever upon the steps of the light treadeth the darkness;yea, springeth in fountains and wells amidst it, from the secretchannels of its mighty sea. Truly, man is but a passing flame, movingunquietly amid the surrounding rest of night; without which he yet couldnot be, and whereof he is in part compounded. "

As I drew nearer, and she read on, she moved a little to turn a leafof the dark old volume, and I saw that her face was sallow and slightlyforbidding. Her forehead was high, and her black eyes repressedly quiet. But she took no notice of me. This end of the cottage, if cottage itcould be called, was destitute of furniture, except the table with thelamp, and the chair on which the woman sat. In one corner was a door, apparently of a cupboard in the wall, but which might lead to a roombeyond. Still the irresistible desire which had made me enter thebuilding urged me: I must open that door, and see what was beyond it. I approached, and laid my hand on the rude latch. Then the woman spoke, but without lifting her head or looking at me: "You had better not openthat door. " This was uttered quite quietly; and she went on with herreading, partly in silence, partly aloud; but both modes seemed equallyintended for herself alone. The prohibition, however, only increased mydesire to see; and as she took no further notice, I gently opened thedoor to its full width, and looked in. At first, I saw nothing worthyof attention. It seemed a common closet, with shelves on each hand, onwhich stood various little necessaries for the humble uses of a cottage. In one corner stood one or two brooms, in another a hatchet and othercommon tools; showing that it was in use every hour of the day forhousehold purposes. But, as I looked, I saw that there were no shelvesat the back, and that an empty space went in further; its terminationappearing to be a faintly glimmering wall or curtain, somewhat less, however, than the width and height of the doorway where I stood. But, as I continued looking, for a few seconds, towards this faintly luminouslimit, my eyes came into true relation with their object. All at once, with such a shiver as when one is suddenly conscious of the presence ofanother in a room where he has, for hours, considered himself alone, Isaw that the seemingly luminous extremity was a sky, as of night, beheldthrough the long perspective of a narrow, dark passage, through what, orbuilt of what, I could not tell. As I gazed, I clearly discerned two orthree stars glimmering faintly in the distant blue. But, suddenly, andas if it had been running fast from a far distance for this very point, and had turned the corner without abating its swiftness, a dark figuresped into and along the passage from the blue opening at the remote end. I started back and shuddered, but kept looking, for I could not help it. On and on it came, with a speedy approach but delayed arrival; till, atlast, through the many gradations of approach, it seemed to come withinthe sphere of myself, rushed up to me, and passed me into the cottage. All I could tell of its appearance was, that it seemed to be a darkhuman figure. Its motion was entirely noiseless, and might be called agliding, were it not that it appeared that of a runner, but with ghostlyfeet. I had moved back yet a little to let him pass me, and looked roundafter him instantly. I could not see him. 

"Where is he?" I said, in some alarm, to the woman, who still satreading. 

"There, on the floor, behind you, " she said, pointing with her armhalf-outstretched, but not lifting her eyes. I turned and looked, butsaw nothing. Then with a feeling that there was yet something behind me, I looked round over my shoulder; and there, on the ground, lay a blackshadow, the size of a man. It was so dark, that I could see it in thedim light of the lamp, which shone full upon it, apparently withoutthinning at all the intensity of its hue. 

"I told you, " said the woman, "you had better not look into thatcloset. "

"What is it?" I said, with a growing sense of horror. 

"It is only your shadow that has found you, " she replied. "Everybody'sshadow is ranging up and down looking for him. I believe you call it bya different name in your world: yours has found you, as every person'sis almost certain to do who looks into that closet, especially aftermeeting one in the forest, whom I dare say you have met. "

Here, for the first time, she lifted her head, and looked full at me:her mouth was full of long, white, shining teeth; and I knew that I wasin the house of the ogre. I could not speak, but turned and left thehouse, with the shadow at my heels. "A nice sort of valet to have, " Isaid to myself bitterly, as I stepped into the sunshine, and, lookingover my shoulder, saw that it lay yet blacker in the full blaze of thesunlight. Indeed, only when I stood between it and the sun, was theblackness at all diminished. I was so bewildered--stunned--both by theevent itself and its suddenness, that I could not at all realise tomyself what it would be to have such a constant and strange attendance;but with a dim conviction that my present dislike would soon grow toloathing, I took my dreary way through the wood. 

CHAPTER IX

 "O lady! we receive but what we give, And in our life alone does nature live: Ours is her wedding garments ours her shrorwd! . . . . . Ah! from the soul itself must issue forth, A light, a glory, a fair luminous cloud, Enveloping the Earth-- And from the soul itself must there be sent A sweet and potent voice of its own birth, Of all sweet sounds the life and element!" COLERIDGE. 

From this time, until I arrived at the palace of Fairy Land, I canattempt no consecutive account of my wanderings and adventures. Everything, henceforward, existed for me in its relation to myattendant. What influence he exercised upon everything into contact withwhich I was brought, may be understood from a few detached instances. Tobegin with this very day on which he first joined me: after I had walkedheartlessly along for two or three hours, I was very weary, and laydown to rest in a most delightful part of the forest, carpeted with wildflowers. I lay for half an hour in a dull repose, and then got up topursue my way. The flowers on the spot where I had lain were crushed tothe earth: but I saw that they would soon lift their heads and rejoiceagain in the sun and air. Not so those on which my shadow had lain. Thevery outline of it could be traced in the withered lifeless grass, and the scorched and shrivelled flowers which stood there, dead, andhopeless of any resurrection. I shuddered, and hastened away with sadforebodings. 

In a few days, I had reason to dread an extension of its balefulinfluences from the fact, that it was no longer confined to one positionin regard to myself. Hitherto, when seized with an irresistible desireto look on my evil demon (which longing would unaccountably seize me atany moment, returning at longer or shorter intervals, sometimes everyminute), I had to turn my head backwards, and look over my shoulder; inwhich position, as long as I could retain it, I was fascinated. But oneday, having come out on a clear grassy hill, which commanded a gloriousprospect, though of what I cannot now tell, my shadow moved round, andcame in front of me. And, presently, a new manifestation increasedmy distress. For it began to coruscate, and shoot out on all sides aradiation of dim shadow. These rays of gloom issued from the centralshadow as from a black sun, lengthening and shortening with continualchange. But wherever a ray struck, that part of earth, or sea, orsky, became void, and desert, and sad to my heart. On this, the firstdevelopment of its new power, one ray shot out beyond the rest, seemingto lengthen infinitely, until it smote the great sun on the face, whichwithered and darkened beneath the blow. I turned away and went on. Theshadow retreated to its former position; and when I looked again, ithad drawn in all its spears of darkness, and followed like a dog at myheels. 

Once, as I passed by a cottage, there came out a lovely fairy child, with two wondrous toys, one in each hand. The one was the tube throughwhich the fairy-gifted poet looks when he beholds the same thingeverywhere; the other that through which he looks when he combines intonew forms of loveliness those images of beauty which his own choice hasgathered from all regions wherein he has travelled. Round the child'shead was an aureole of emanating rays. As I looked at him in wonder anddelight, round crept from behind me the something dark, and the childstood in my shadow. Straightway he was a commonplace boy, with a roughbroad-brimmed straw hat, through which brim the sun shone from behind. The toys he carried were a multiplying-glass and a kaleidoscope. Isighed and departed. 

One evening, as a great silent flood of western gold flowed through anavenue in the woods, down the stream, just as when I saw him first, camethe sad knight, riding on his chestnut steed. 

But his armour did not shine half so red as when I saw him first. 

Many a blow of mighty sword and axe, turned aside by the strength ofhis mail, and glancing adown the surface, had swept from its path thefretted rust, and the glorious steel had answered the kindly blow withthe thanks of returning light. These streaks and spots made his armourlook like the floor of a forest in the sunlight. His forehead was higherthan before, for the contracting wrinkles were nearly gone; and thesadness that remained on his face was the sadness of a dewy summertwilight, not that of a frosty autumn morn. He, too, had met theAlder-maiden as I, but he had plunged into the torrent of mighty deeds, and the stain was nearly washed away. No shadow followed him. He hadnot entered the dark house; he had not had time to open the closet door. "Will he ever look in?" I said to myself. "MUST his shadow find him someday?" But I could not answer my own questions. 

We travelled together for two days, and I began to love him. It wasplain that he suspected my story in some degree; and I saw him once ortwice looking curiously and anxiously at my attendant gloom, which allthis time had remained very obsequiously behind me; but I offered noexplanation, and he asked none. Shame at my neglect of his warning, anda horror which shrunk from even alluding to its cause, kept me silent;till, on the evening of the second day, some noble words from mycompanion roused all my heart; and I was at the point of falling onhis neck, and telling him the whole story; seeking, if not forhelpful advice, for of that I was hopeless, yet for the comfort ofsympathy--when round slid the shadow and inwrapt my friend; and I couldnot trust him. 

The glory of his brow vanished; the light of his eye grew cold; and Iheld my peace. The next morning we parted. 

But the most dreadful thing of all was, that I now began to feelsomething like satisfaction in the presence of the shadow. I began tobe rather vain of my attendant, saying to myself, "In a land like this, with so many illusions everywhere, I need his aid to disenchant thethings around me. He does away with all appearances, and shows me thingsin their true colour and form. And I am not one to be fooled with thevanities of the common crowd. I will not see beauty where there isnone. I will dare to behold things as they are. And if I live in a wasteinstead of a paradise, I will live knowing where I live. " But of thisa certain exercise of his power which soon followed quite cured me, turning my feelings towards him once more into loathing and distrust. Itwas thus:

One bright noon, a little maiden joined me, coming through the wood ina direction at right angles to my path. She came along singing anddancing, happy as a child, though she seemed almost a woman. In herhands--now in one, now in another--she carried a small globe, bright andclear as the purest crystal. This seemed at once her plaything and hergreatest treasure. At one moment, you would have thought her utterlycareless of it, and at another, overwhelmed with anxiety for its safety. But I believe she was taking care of it all the time, perhaps not leastwhen least occupied about it. She stopped by me with a smile, and bademe good day with the sweetest voice. I felt a wonderful liking to thechild--for she produced on me more the impression of a child, though myunderstanding told me differently. We talked a little, and then walkedon together in the direction I had been pursuing. I asked her about theglobe she carried, but getting no definite answer, I held out my handto take it. She drew back, and said, but smiling almost invitingly thewhile, "You must not touch it;"--then, after a moment's pause--"Or ifyou do, it must be very gently. " I touched it with a finger. A slightvibratory motion arose in it, accompanied, or perhaps manifested, bya faint sweet sound. I touched it again, and the sound increased. Itouched it the third time: a tiny torrent of harmony rolled out of thelittle globe. She would not let me touch it any more. 

We travelled on together all that day. She left me when twilight cameon; but next day, at noon, she met me as before, and again we travelledtill evening. The third day she came once more at noon, and we walked ontogether. Now, though we had talked about a great many things connectedwith Fairy Land, and the life she had led hitherto, I had never beenable to learn anything about the globe. This day, however, as we wenton, the shadow glided round and inwrapt the maiden. It could not changeher. But my desire to know about the globe, which in his gloom began towaver as with an inward light, and to shoot out flashes of many-colouredflame, grew irresistible. I put out both my hands and laid hold of it. It began to sound as before. The sound rapidly increased, till it grewa low tempest of harmony, and the globe trembled, and quivered, andthrobbed between my hands. I had not the heart to pull it away from themaiden, though I held it in spite of her attempts to take it from me;yes, I shame to say, in spite of her prayers, and, at last, her tears. The music went on growing in, intensity and complication of tones, andthe globe vibrated and heaved; till at last it burst in our hands, anda black vapour broke upwards from out of it; then turned, as if blownsideways, and enveloped the maiden, hiding even the shadow in itsblackness. She held fast the fragments, which I abandoned, and fled fromme into the forest in the direction whence she had come, wailing likea child, and crying, "You have broken my globe; my globe is broken--myglobe is broken!" I followed her, in the hope of comforting her; buthad not pursued her far, before a sudden cold gust of wind bowed thetree-tops above us, and swept through their stems around us; a greatcloud overspread the day, and a fierce tempest came on, in which I lostsight of her. It lies heavy on my heart to this hour. At night, ere Ifall asleep, often, whatever I may be thinking about, I suddenly hearher voice, crying out, "You have broken my globe; my globe is broken;ah, my globe!"

Here I will mention one more strange thing; but whether this peculiaritywas owing to my shadow at all, I am not able to assure myself. I cameto a village, the inhabitants of which could not at first sight bedistinguished from the dwellers in our land. They rather avoided thansought my company, though they were very pleasant when I addressed them. But at last I observed, that whenever I came within a certain distanceof any one of them, which distance, however, varied with differentindividuals, the whole appearance of the person began to change; andthis change increased in degree as I approached. When I receded to theformer distance, the former appearance was restored. The nature of thechange was grotesque, following no fixed rule. The nearest resemblanceto it that I know, is the distortion produced in your countenance whenyou look at it as reflected in a concave or convex surface--say, eitherside of a bright spoon. Of this phenomenon I first became aware inrather a ludicrous way. My host's daughter was a very pleasant prettygirl, who made herself more agreeable to me than most of those about me. For some days my companion-shadow had been less obtrusive than usual;and such was the reaction of spirits occasioned by the simple mitigationof torment, that, although I had cause enough besides to be gloomy, Ifelt light and comparatively happy. My impression is, that she was quiteaware of the law of appearances that existed between the people of theplace and myself, and had resolved to amuse herself at my expense; forone evening, after some jesting and raillery, she, somehow or other, provoked me to attempt to kiss her. But she was well defended fromany assault of the kind. Her countenance became, of a sudden, absurdlyhideous; the pretty mouth was elongated and otherwise amplifiedsufficiently to have allowed of six simultaneous kisses. I started backin bewildered dismay; she burst into the merriest fit of laughter, andran from the room. I soon found that the same undefinable law of changeoperated between me and all the other villagers; and that, to feel I wasin pleasant company, it was absolutely necessary for me to discover andobserve the right focal distance between myself and each one with whomI had to do. This done, all went pleasantly enough. Whether, when Ihappened to neglect this precaution, I presented to them an equallyridiculous appearance, I did not ascertain; but I presume that thealteration was common to the approximating parties. I was likewiseunable to determine whether I was a necessary party to the production ofthis strange transformation, or whether it took place as well, under thegiven circumstances, between the inhabitants themselves. 

CHAPTER X

 "From Eden's bowers the full-fed rivers flow, To guide the outcasts to the land of woe: Our Earth one little toiling streamlet yields. To guide the wanderers to the happy fields. "

 After leaving this village, where I had rested for nearly aweek, I travelled through a desert region of dry sand and glitteringrocks, peopled principally by goblin-fairies. When I first entered theirdomains, and, indeed, whenever I fell in with another tribe of them, they began mocking me with offered handfuls of gold and jewels, makinghideous grimaces at me, and performing the most antic homage, as if theythought I expected reverence, and meant to humour me like a maniac. Butever, as soon as one cast his eyes on the shadow behind me, he made awry face, partly of pity, partly of contempt, and looked ashamed, asif he had been caught doing something inhuman; then, throwing down hishandful of gold, and ceasing all his grimaces, he stood aside to let mepass in peace, and made signs to his companions to do the like. I had noinclination to observe them much, for the shadow was in my heart as wellas at my heels. I walked listlessly and almost hopelessly along, till Iarrived one day at a small spring; which, bursting cool from the heartof a sun-heated rock, flowed somewhat southwards from the direction Ihad been taking. I drank of this spring, and found myself wonderfullyrefreshed. A kind of love to the cheerful little stream arose in myheart. It was born in a desert; but it seemed to say to itself, "I willflow, and sing, and lave my banks, till I make my desert a paradise. "I thought I could not do better than follow it, and see what it madeof it. So down with the stream I went, over rocky lands, burning withsunbeams. But the rivulet flowed not far, before a few blades ofgrass appeared on its banks, and then, here and there, a stunted bush. Sometimes it disappeared altogether under ground; and after I hadwandered some distance, as near as I could guess, in the direction itseemed to take, I would suddenly hear it again, singing, sometimes faraway to my right or left, amongst new rocks, over which it made newcataracts of watery melodies. The verdure on its banks increased as itflowed; other streams joined it; and at last, after many days' travel, I found myself, one gorgeous summer evening, resting by the side of abroad river, with a glorious horse-chestnut tree towering above me, anddropping its blossoms, milk-white and rosy-red, all about me. As I sat, a gush of joy sprang forth in my heart, and over flowed at my eyes. 

Through my tears, the whole landscape glimmered in such bewilderingloveliness, that I felt as if I were entering Fairy Land for the firsttime, and some loving hand were waiting to cool my head, and a lovingword to warm my heart. Roses, wild roses, everywhere! So plentiful werethey, they not only perfumed the air, they seemed to dye it a faintrose-hue. The colour floated abroad with the scent, and clomb, andspread, until the whole west blushed and glowed with the gatheredincense of roses. And my heart fainted with longing in my bosom. 

Could I but see the Spirit of the Earth, as I saw once the in dwellingwoman of the beech-tree, and my beauty of the pale marble, I should becontent. Content!--Oh, how gladly would I die of the light of her eyes!Yea, I would cease to be, if that would bring me one word of love fromthe one mouth. The twilight sank around, and infolded me with sleep. Islept as I had not slept for months. I did not awake till late in themorning; when, refreshed in body and mind, I rose as from the death thatwipes out the sadness of life, and then dies itself in the new morrow. Again I followed the stream; now climbing a steep rocky bank that hemmedit in; now wading through long grasses and wild flowers in its path; nowthrough meadows; and anon through woods that crowded down to the verylip of the water. 

At length, in a nook of the river, gloomy with the weight of overhangingfoliage, and still and deep as a soul in which the torrent eddies ofpain have hollowed a great gulf, and then, subsiding in violence, haveleft it full of a motionless, fathomless sorrow--I saw a little boatlying. So still was the water here, that the boat needed no fastening. It lay as if some one had just stepped ashore, and would in a momentreturn. But as there were no signs of presence, and no track through thethick bushes; and, moreover, as I was in Fairy Land where one does verymuch as he pleases, I forced my way to the brink, stepped into the boat, pushed it, with the help of the tree-branches, out into the stream, lay down in the bottom, and let my boat and me float whither the streamwould carry us. I seemed to lose myself in the great flow of sky aboveme unbroken in its infinitude, except when now and then, coming nearerthe shore at a bend in the river, a tree would sweep its mighty headsilently above mine, and glide away back into the past, never more tofling its shadow over me. I fell asleep in this cradle, in which motherNature was rocking her weary child; and while I slept, the sun sleptnot, but went round his arched way. When I awoke, he slept in thewaters, and I went on my silent path beneath a round silvery moon. Anda pale moon looked up from the floor of the great blue cave that lay inthe abysmal silence beneath. 

Why are all reflections lovelier than what we call the reality?--notso grand or so strong, it may be, but always lovelier? Fair as is thegliding sloop on the shining sea, the wavering, trembling, unrestingsail below is fairer still. Yea, the reflecting ocean itself, reflectedin the mirror, has a wondrousness about its waters that somewhatvanishes when I turn towards itself. All mirrors are magic mirrors. Thecommonest room is a room in a poem when I turn to the glass. (And thisreminds me, while I write, of a strange story which I read in the fairypalace, and of which I will try to make a feeble memorial in its place. )In whatever way it may be accounted for, of one thing we may be sure, that this feeling is no cheat; for there is no cheating in nature andthe simple unsought feelings of the soul. There must be a truth involvedin it, though we may but in part lay hold of the meaning. Even thememories of past pain are beautiful; and past delights, though beheldonly through clefts in the grey clouds of sorrow, are lovely as FairyLand. But how have I wandered into the deeper fairyland of the soul, while as yet I only float towards the fairy palace of Fairy Land! Themoon, which is the lovelier memory or reflex of the down-gone sun, thejoyous day seen in the faint mirror of the brooding night, had rapt meaway. 

I sat up in the boat. Gigantic forest trees were about me; throughwhich, like a silver snake, twisted and twined the great river. Thelittle waves, when I moved in the boat, heaved and fell with a plashas of molten silver, breaking the image of the moon into a thousandmorsels, fusing again into one, as the ripples of laughter die into thestill face of joy. The sleeping woods, in undefined massiveness; thewater that flowed in its sleep; and, above all, the enchantress moon, which had cast them all, with her pale eye, into the charmed slumber, sank into my soul, and I felt as if I had died in a dream, and shouldnever more awake. 

From this I was partly aroused by a glimmering of white, that, throughthe trees on the left, vaguely crossed my vision, as I gazed upwards. But the trees again hid the object; and at the moment, some strangemelodious bird took up its song, and sang, not an ordinary bird-song, with constant repetitions of the same melody, but what sounded likea continuous strain, in which one thought was expressed, deepening inintensity as evolved in progress. It sounded like a welcome alreadyovershadowed with the coming farewell. As in all sweetest music, a tingeof sadness was in every note. Nor do we know how much of the pleasureseven of life we owe to the intermingled sorrows. Joy cannot unfoldthe deepest truths, although deepest truth must be deepest joy. Comethwhite-robed Sorrow, stooping and wan, and flingeth wide the doors shemay not enter. Almost we linger with Sorrow for very love. 

As the song concluded the stream bore my little boat with a gentle sweepround a bend of the river; and lo! on a broad lawn, which rose from thewater's edge with a long green slope to a clear elevation from which thetrees receded on all sides, stood a stately palace glimmering ghostly inthe moonshine: it seemed to be built throughout of the whitest marble. There was no reflection of moonlight from windows--there seemed to benone; so there was no cold glitter; only, as I said, a ghostly shimmer. Numberless shadows tempered the shine, from column and balcony andtower. For everywhere galleries ran along the face of the buildings;wings were extended in many directions; and numberless openings, throughwhich the moonbeams vanished into the interior, and which servedboth for doors and windows, had their separate balconies in front, communicating with a common gallery that rose on its own pillars. Of course, I did not discover all this from the river, and in themoonlight. But, though I was there for many days, I did not succeedin mastering the inner topography of the building, so extensive andcomplicated was it. 

Here I wished to land, but the boat had no oars on board. However, Ifound that a plank, serving for a seat, was unfastened, and with that Ibrought the boat to the bank and scrambled on shore. Deep soft turf sankbeneath my feet, as I went up the ascent towards the palace. 

When I reached it, I saw that it stood on a great platform of marble, with an ascent, by broad stairs of the same, all round it. Arrived onthe platform, I found there was an extensive outlook over the forest, which, however, was rather veiled than revealed by the moonlight. 

Entering by a wide gateway, but without gates, into an inner court, surrounded on all sides by great marble pillars supporting galleriesabove, I saw a large fountain of porphyry in the middle, throwing up alofty column of water, which fell, with a noise as of the fusion of allsweet sounds, into a basin beneath; overflowing which, it ran into asingle channel towards the interior of the building. Although the moonwas by this time so low in the west, that not a ray of her light fellinto the court, over the height of the surrounding buildings; yet wasthe court lighted by a second reflex from the sun of other lands. Forthe top of the column of water, just as it spread to fall, caught themoonbeams, and like a great pale lamp, hung high in the night air, threwa dim memory of light (as it were) over the court below. This court waspaved in diamonds of white and red marble. According to my custom sinceI entered Fairy Land, of taking for a guide whatever I first foundmoving in any direction, I followed the stream from the basin of thefountain. It led me to a great open door, beneath the ascending steps ofwhich it ran through a low arch and disappeared. Entering here, I foundmyself in a great hall, surrounded with white pillars, and paved withblack and white. This I could see by the moonlight, which, from theother side, streamed through open windows into the hall. 

Its height I could not distinctly see. As soon as I entered, I hadthe feeling so common to me in the woods, that there were othersthere besides myself, though I could see no one, and heard no sound toindicate a presence. Since my visit to the Church of Darkness, my powerof seeing the fairies of the higher orders had gradually diminished, until it had almost ceased. But I could frequently believe in theirpresence while unable to see them. Still, although I had company, anddoubtless of a safe kind, it seemed rather dreary to spend the night inan empty marble hall, however beautiful, especially as the moon was nearthe going down, and it would soon be dark. So I began at the place whereI entered, and walked round the hall, looking for some door or passagethat might lead me to a more hospitable chamber. As I walked, I wasdeliciously haunted with the feeling that behind some one of theseemingly innumerable pillars, one who loved me was waiting for me. ThenI thought she was following me from pillar to pillar as I went along;but no arms came out of the faint moonlight, and no sigh assured me ofher presence. 

At length I came to an open corridor, into which I turned;notwithstanding that, in doing so, I left the light behind. Along thisI walked with outstretched hands, groping my way, till, arriving atanother corridor, which seemed to strike off at right angles to that inwhich I was, I saw at the end a faintly glimmering light, too pale evenfor moonshine, resembling rather a stray phosphorescence. However, whereeverything was white, a little light went a great way. So I walked onto the end, and a long corridor it was. When I came up to the light, Ifound that it proceeded from what looked like silver letters upon a doorof ebony; and, to my surprise even in the home of wonder itself, theletters formed the words, THE CHAMBER OF SIR ANODOS. Although I had asyet no right to the honours of a knight, I ventured to conclude thatthe chamber was indeed intended for me; and, opening the door withouthesitation, I entered. Any doubt as to whether I was right in so doing, was soon dispelled. What to my dark eyes seemed a blaze of light, burstupon me. A fire of large pieces of some sweet-scented wood, supported bydogs of silver, was burning on the hearth, and a bright lamp stood on atable, in the midst of a plentiful meal, apparently awaiting my arrival. But what surprised me more than all, was, that the room was in everyrespect a copy of my own room, the room whence the little stream from mybasin had led me into Fairy Land. There was the very carpet of grass andmoss and daisies, which I had myself designed; the curtains of pale bluesilk, that fell like a cataract over the windows; the old-fashioned bed, with the chintz furniture, on which I had slept from boyhood. "Now Ishall sleep, " I said to myself. "My shadow dares not come here. "

I sat down to the table, and began to help myself to the good thingsbefore me with confidence. And now I found, as in many instances before, how true the fairy tales are; for I was waited on, all the time of mymeal, by invisible hands. I had scarcely to do more than look towardsanything I wanted, when it was brought me, just as if it had come to meof itself. My glass was kept filled with the wine I had chosen, untilI looked towards another bottle or decanter; when a fresh glass wassubstituted, and the other wine supplied. When I had eaten and drankmore heartily and joyfully than ever since I entered Fairy Land, thewhole was removed by several attendants, of whom some were male and somefemale, as I thought I could distinguish from the way the dishes werelifted from the table, and the motion with which they were carried outof the room. As soon as they were all taken away, I heard a sound as ofthe shutting of a door, and knew that I was left alone. I sat long bythe fire, meditating, and wondering how it would all end; and when atlength, wearied with thinking, I betook myself to my own bed, it washalf with a hope that, when I awoke in the morning, I should awake notonly in my own room, but in my own castle also; and that I should walk, out upon my own native soil, and find that Fairy Land was, after all, only a vision of the night. The sound of the falling waters of thefountain floated me into oblivion. 

CHAPTER XI

 "A wilderness of building, sinking far And self-withdrawn into a wondrous depth, Far sinking into splendour--without end: Fabric it seemed of diamond and of gold, With alabaster domes, and silver spires, And blazing terrace upon terrace, high Uplifted. " WORDSWORTH. 

But when, after a sleep, which, although dreamless, yet left behind it asense of past blessedness, I awoke in the full morning, I found, indeed, that the room was still my own; but that it looked abroad upon anunknown landscape of forest and hill and dale on the one side--and onthe other, upon the marble court, with the great fountain, the crest ofwhich now flashed glorious in the sun, and cast on the pavement beneatha shower of faint shadows from the waters that fell from it into themarble basin below. 

Agreeably to all authentic accounts of the treatment of travellers inFairy Land, I found by my bedside a complete suit of fresh clothing, just such as I was in the habit of wearing; for, though variedsufficiently from the one removed, it was yet in complete accordancewith my tastes. I dressed myself in this, and went out. The whole palaceshone like silver in the sun. The marble was partly dull and partlypolished; and every pinnacle, dome, and turret ended in a ball, or cone, or cusp of silver. It was like frost-work, and too dazzling, in the sun, for earthly eyes like mine. 

I will not attempt to describe the environs, save by saying, that allthe pleasures to be found in the most varied and artistic arrangement ofwood and river, lawn and wild forest, garden and shrubbery, rocky hilland luxurious vale; in living creatures wild and tame, in gorgeousbirds, scattered fountains, little streams, and reedy lakes--all werehere. Some parts of the palace itself I shall have occasion to describemore minutely. 

For this whole morning I never thought of my demon shadow; and not tillthe weariness which supervened on delight brought it again to mymemory, did I look round to see if it was behind me: it was scarcelydiscernible. But its presence, however faintly revealed, sent a pang tomy heart, for the pain of which, not all the beauties around me couldcompensate. It was followed, however, by the comforting reflection that, peradventure, I might here find the magic word of power to banishthe demon and set me free, so that I should no longer be a man besidemyself. The Queen of Fairy Land, thought I, must dwell here: surely shewill put forth her power to deliver me, and send me singing throughthe further gates of her country back to my own land. "Shadow of me!"I said; "which art not me, but which representest thyself to me as me;here I may find a shadow of light which will devour thee, the shadow ofdarkness! Here I may find a blessing which will fall on thee as a curse, and damn thee to the blackness whence thou hast emerged unbidden. " Isaid this, stretched at length on the slope of the lawn above the river;and as the hope arose within me, the sun came forth from a light fleecycloud that swept across his face; and hill and dale, and the great riverwinding on through the still mysterious forest, flashed back his rays aswith a silent shout of joy; all nature lived and glowed; the very earthgrew warm beneath me; a magnificent dragon-fly went past me like anarrow from a bow, and a whole concert of birds burst into choral song. 

The heat of the sun soon became too intense even for passive support. Itherefore rose, and sought the shelter of one of the arcades. Wanderingalong from one to another of these, wherever my heedless steps led me, and wondering everywhere at the simple magnificence of the building, Iarrived at another hall, the roof of which was of a pale blue, spangledwith constellations of silver stars, and supported by porphyry pillarsof a paler red than ordinary. --In this house (I may remark in passing), silver seemed everywhere preferred to gold; and such was the purity ofthe air, that it showed nowhere signs of tarnishing. --The whole of thefloor of this hall, except a narrow path behind the pillars, paved withblack, was hollowed into a huge basin, many feet deep, and filled withthe purest, most liquid and radiant water. The sides of the basin werewhite marble, and the bottom was paved with all kinds of refulgentstones, of every shape and hue. 

In their arrangement, you would have supposed, at first sight, thatthere was no design, for they seemed to lie as if cast there fromcareless and playful hands; but it was a most harmonious confusion; andas I looked at the play of their colours, especially when the waterswere in motion, I came at last to feel as if not one little pebble couldbe displaced, without injuring the effect of the whole. Beneath thisfloor of the water, lay the reflection of the blue inverted roof, fretted with its silver stars, like a second deeper sea, clasping andupholding the first. The fairy bath was probably fed from the fountainin the court. Led by an irresistible desire, I undressed, and plungedinto the water. It clothed me as with a new sense and its object both inone. The waters lay so close to me, they seemed to enter and revive myheart. I rose to the surface, shook the water from my hair, and swam asin a rainbow, amid the coruscations of the gems below seen through theagitation caused by my motion. Then, with open eyes, I dived, and swambeneath the surface. And here was a new wonder. For the basin, thusbeheld, appeared to extend on all sides like a sea, with here and theregroups as of ocean rocks, hollowed by ceaseless billows into wondrouscaves and grotesque pinnacles. Around the caves grew sea-weeds of allhues, and the corals glowed between; while far off, I saw the glimmerof what seemed to be creatures of human form at home in the waters. Ithought I had been enchanted; and that when I rose to the surface, Ishould find myself miles from land, swimming alone upon a heavingsea; but when my eyes emerged from the waters, I saw above me the bluespangled vault, and the red pillars around. I dived again, and foundmyself once more in the heart of a great sea. I then arose, and swam tothe edge, where I got out easily, for the water reached the very brim, and, as I drew near washed in tiny waves over the black marble border. Idressed, and went out, deeply refreshed. 

And now I began to discern faint, gracious forms, here and therethroughout the building. Some walked together in earnest conversation. Others strayed alone. Some stood in groups, as if looking at and talkingabout a picture or a statue. None of them heeded me. Nor were theyplainly visible to my eyes. Sometimes a group, or single individual, would fade entirely out of the realm of my vision as I gazed. Whenevening came, and the moon arose, clear as a round of a horizon-sea whenthe sun hangs over it in the west, I began to see them all moreplainly; especially when they came between me and the moon; and yet moreespecially, when I myself was in the shade. But, even then, I sometimessaw only the passing wave of a white robe; or a lovely arm or neckgleamed by in the moonshine; or white feet went walking alone over themoony sward. Nor, I grieve to say, did I ever come much nearer to theseglorious beings, or ever look upon the Queen of the Fairies herself. Mydestiny ordered otherwise. 

In this palace of marble and silver, and fountains and moonshine, Ispent many days; waited upon constantly in my room with everythingdesirable, and bathing daily in the fairy bath. All this time I waslittle troubled with my demon shadow I had a vague feeling that he wassomewhere about the palace; but it seemed as if the hope that I shouldin this place be finally freed from his hated presence, had sufficed tobanish him for a time. How and where I found him, I shall soon have torelate. 

The third day after my arrival, I found the library of the palace; andhere, all the time I remained, I spent most of the middle of the day. For it was, not to mention far greater attractions, a luxurious retreatfrom the noontide sun. During the mornings and afternoons, I wanderedabout the lovely neighbourhood, or lay, lost in delicious day-dreams, beneath some mighty tree on the open lawn. My evenings were by-and-byspent in a part of the palace, the account of which, and of myadventures in connection with it, I must yet postpone for a little. 

The library was a mighty hall, lighted from the roof, which was formedof something like glass, vaulted over in a single piece, and stainedthroughout with a great mysterious picture in gorgeous colouring. 

The walls were lined from floor to roof with books and books: most ofthem in ancient bindings, but some in strange new fashions which I hadnever seen, and which, were I to make the attempt, I could ill describe. All around the walls, in front of the books, ran galleries in rows, communicating by stairs. These galleries were built of all kinds ofcoloured stones; all sorts of marble and granite, with porphyry, jasper, lapis lazuli, agate, and various others, were ranged in wonderful melodyof successive colours. Although the material, then, of which thesegalleries and stairs were built, rendered necessary a certain degreeof massiveness in the construction, yet such was the size of the place, that they seemed to run along the walls like cords. 

Over some parts of the library, descended curtains of silk of variousdyes, none of which I ever saw lifted while I was there; and I feltsomehow that it would be presumptuous in me to venture to look withinthem. But the use of the other books seemed free; and day after day Icame to the library, threw myself on one of the many sumptuous easterncarpets, which lay here and there on the floor, and read, and read, until weary; if that can be designated as weariness, which was ratherthe faintness of rapturous delight; or until, sometimes, the failing ofthe light invited me to go abroad, in the hope that a cool gentle breezemight have arisen to bathe, with an airy invigorating bath, the limbswhich the glow of the burning spirit within had withered no less thanthe glow of the blazing sun without. 

One peculiarity of these books, or at least most of those I looked into, I must make a somewhat vain attempt to describe. 

If, for instance, it was a book of metaphysics I opened, I had scarcelyread two pages before I seemed to myself to be pondering over discoveredtruth, and constructing the intellectual machine whereby to communicatethe discovery to my fellow men. With some books, however, of thisnature, it seemed rather as if the process was removed yet a great wayfurther back; and I was trying to find the root of a manifestation, the spiritual truth whence a material vision sprang; or to combinetwo propositions, both apparently true, either at once or in differentremembered moods, and to find the point in which their invisiblyconverging lines would unite in one, revealing a truth higher thaneither and differing from both; though so far from being opposed toeither, that it was that whence each derived its life and power. Or ifthe book was one of travels, I found myself the traveller. Newlands, fresh experiences, novel customs, rose around me. I walked, Idiscovered, I fought, I suffered, I rejoiced in my success. Was it ahistory? I was the chief actor therein. I suffered my own blame; I wasglad in my own praise. With a fiction it was the same. Mine was thewhole story. For I took the place of the character who was most likemyself, and his story was mine; until, grown weary with the life ofyears condensed in an hour, or arrived at my deathbed, or the end of thevolume, I would awake, with a sudden bewilderment, to the consciousnessof my present life, recognising the walls and roof around me, andfinding I joyed or sorrowed only in a book. If the book was a poem, thewords disappeared, or took the subordinate position of an accompanimentto the succession of forms and images that rose and vanished with asoundless rhythm, and a hidden rime. 

In one, with a mystical title, which I cannot recall, I read of aworld that is not like ours. The wondrous account, in such a feeble, fragmentary way as is possible to me, I would willingly impart. Whetheror not it was all a poem, I cannot tell; but, from the impulse I felt, when I first contemplated writing it, to break into rime, to whichimpulse I shall give way if it comes upon me again, I think it must havebeen, partly at least, in verse. 

CHAPTER XII

 "Chained is the Spring. The night-wind bold Blows over the hard earth; Time is not more confused and cold, Nor keeps more wintry mirth. 

 "Yet blow, and roll the world about; Blow, Time--blow, winter's Wind! Through chinks of Time, heaven peepeth out, And Spring the frost behind. " G. E. M. 

They who believe in the influences of the stars over the fates of men, are, in feeling at least, nearer the truth than they who regard theheavenly bodies as related to them merely by a common obedience to anexternal law. All that man sees has to do with man. Worlds cannot bewithout an intermundane relationship. The community of the centre ofall creation suggests an interradiating connection and dependence ofthe parts. Else a grander idea is conceivable than that which is alreadyimbodied. The blank, which is only a forgotten life, lying behind theconsciousness, and the misty splendour, which is an undevelopedlife, lying before it, may be full of mysterious revelations of otherconnexions with the worlds around us, than those of science andpoetry. No shining belt or gleaming moon, no red and green glory in aself-encircling twin-star, but has a relation with the hidden thingsof a man's soul, and, it may be, with the secret history of his body aswell. They are portions of the living house wherein he abides. 

 Through the realms of the monarch Sun Creeps a world, whose course had begun, On a weary path with a weary pace, Before the Earth sprang forth on her race: But many a time the Earth had sped Around the path she still must tread, Ere the elder planet, on leaden wing, Once circled the court of the planet's king. 

 There, in that lonely and distant star, The seasons are not as our seasons are; But many a year hath Autumn to dress The trees in their matron loveliness; As long hath old Winter in triumph to go O'er beauties dead in his vaults below; And many a year the Spring doth wear Combing the icicles from her hair; And Summer, dear Summer, hath years of June, With large white clouds, and cool showers at noon: And a beauty that grows to a weight like grief, Till a burst of tears is the heart's relief. 

 Children, born when Winter is king, May never rejoice in the hoping Spring; Though their own heart-buds are bursting with joy, And the child hath grown to the girl or boy; But may die with cold and icy hours Watching them ever in place of flowers. And some who awake from their primal sleep, When the sighs of Summer through forests creep, Live, and love, and are loved again; Seek for pleasure, and find its pain; Sink to their last, their forsaken sleeping, With the same sweet odours around them creeping. 

Now the children, there, are not born as the children are born in worldsnearer to the sun. For they arrive no one knows how. A maiden, walkingalone, hears a cry: for even there a cry is the first utterance; andsearching about, she findeth, under an overhanging rock, or within aclump of bushes, or, it may be, betwixt gray stones on the side of ahill, or in any other sheltered and unexpected spot, a little child. This she taketh tenderly, and beareth home with joy, calling out, "Mother, mother"--if so be that her mother lives--"I have got a baby--Ihave found a child!" All the household gathers round to see;--"WHERE ISIT? WHAT IS IT LIKE? WHERE DID YOU FIND IT?" and such-like questions, abounding. And thereupon she relates the whole story of the discovery;for by the circumstances, such as season of the year, time of the day, condition of the air, and such like, and, especially, the peculiar andnever-repeated aspect of the heavens and earth at the time, and thenature of the place of shelter wherein it is found, is determined, or atleast indicated, the nature of the child thus discovered. Therefore, at certain seasons, and in certain states of the weather, according, inpart, to their own fancy, the young women go out to look for children. They generally avoid seeking them, though they cannot help sometimesfinding them, in places and with circumstances uncongenial to theirpeculiar likings. But no sooner is a child found, than its claim forprotection and nurture obliterates all feeling of choice in the matter. Chiefly, however, in the season of summer, which lasts so long, comingas it does after such long intervals; and mostly in the warm evenings, about the middle of twilight; and principally in the woods and alongthe river banks, do the maidens go looking for children just as childrenlook for flowers. And ever as the child grows, yea, more and more as headvances in years, will his face indicate to those who understand thespirit of Nature, and her utterances in the face of the world, thenature of the place of his birth, and the other circumstances thereof;whether a clear morning sun guided his mother to the nook whence issuedthe boy's low cry; or at eve the lonely maiden (for the same woman neverfinds a second, at least while the first lives) discovers the girl bythe glimmer of her white skin, lying in a nest like that of the lark, amid long encircling grasses, and the upward-gazing eyes of the lowlydaisies; whether the storm bowed the forest trees around, or the stillfrost fixed in silence the else flowing and babbling stream. 

After they grow up, the men and women are but little together. There isthis peculiar difference between them, which likewise distinguishes thewomen from those of the earth. The men alone have arms; the womenhave only wings. Resplendent wings are they, wherein they can shroudthemselves from head to foot in a panoply of glistering glory. By thesewings alone, it may frequently be judged in what seasons, and under whataspects, they were born. From those that came in winter, go great whitewings, white as snow; the edge of every feather shining like the sheenof silver, so that they flash and glitter like frost in the sun. Butunderneath, they are tinged with a faint pink or rose-colour. Those bornin spring have wings of a brilliant green, green as grass; andtowards the edges the feathers are enamelled like the surface of thegrass-blades. These again are white within. Those that are born insummer have wings of a deep rose-colour, lined with pale gold. And thoseborn in autumn have purple wings, with a rich brown on the inside. Butthese colours are modified and altered in all varieties, correspondingto the mood of the day and hour, as well as the season of the year; andsometimes I found the various colours so intermingled, that I could notdetermine even the season, though doubtless the hieroglyphic could bedeciphered by more experienced eyes. One splendour, in particular, Iremember--wings of deep carmine, with an inner down of warm gray, arounda form of brilliant whiteness. 

She had been found as the sun went down through a low sea-fog, castingcrimson along a broad sea-path into a little cave on the shore, where abathing maiden saw her lying. 

But though I speak of sun and fog, and sea and shore, the world thereis in some respects very different from the earth whereon men live. For instance, the waters reflect no forms. To the unaccustomed eye theyappear, if undisturbed, like the surface of a dark metal, only thatthe latter would reflect indistinctly, whereas they reflect not at all, except light which falls immediately upon them. This has a great effectin causing the landscapes to differ from those on the earth. Onthe stillest evening, no tall ship on the sea sends a long waveringreflection almost to the feet of him on shore; the face of no maidenbrightens at its own beauty in a still forest-well. The sun and moonalone make a glitter on the surface. The sea is like a sea of death, ready to ingulf and never to reveal: a visible shadow of oblivion. Yetthe women sport in its waters like gorgeous sea-birds. The men morerarely enter them. But, on the contrary, the sky reflects everythingbeneath it, as if it were built of water like ours. Of course, fromits concavity there is some distortion of the reflected objects; yetwondrous combinations of form are often to be seen in the overhangingdepth. And then it is not shaped so much like a round dome as the sky ofthe earth, but, more of an egg-shape, rises to a great towering heightin the middle, appearing far more lofty than the other. When the starscome out at night, it shows a mighty cupola, "fretted with goldenfires, " wherein there is room for all tempests to rush and rave. 

One evening in early summer, I stood with a group of men and women on asteep rock that overhung the sea. They were all questioning me about myworld and the ways thereof. In making reply to one of their questions, I was compelled to say that children are not born in the Earth as withthem. Upon this I was assailed with a whole battery of inquiries, whichat first I tried to avoid; but, at last, I was compelled, in the vaguestmanner I could invent, to make some approach to the subject in question. Immediately a dim notion of what I meant, seemed to dawn in the mindsof most of the women. Some of them folded their great wings all aroundthem, as they generally do when in the least offended, and stood erectand motionless. One spread out her rosy pinions, and flashed from thepromontory into the gulf at its foot. A great light shone in the eyes ofone maiden, who turned and walked slowly away, with her purple and whitewings half dispread behind her. She was found, the next morning, deadbeneath a withered tree on a bare hill-side, some miles inland. Theyburied her where she lay, as is their custom; for, before they die, they instinctively search for a spot like the place of their birth, andhaving found one that satisfies them, they lie down, fold their wingsaround them, if they be women, or cross their arms over their breasts, if they are men, just as if they were going to sleep; and so sleepindeed. The sign or cause of coming death is an indescribable longingfor something, they know not what, which seizes them, and drives theminto solitude, consuming them within, till the body fails. When a youthand a maiden look too deep into each other's eyes, this longing seizesand possesses them; but instead of drawing nearer to each other, theywander away, each alone, into solitary places, and die of their desire. But it seems to me, that thereafter they are born babes upon our earth:where, if, when grown, they find each other, it goes well with them;if not, it will seem to go ill. But of this I know nothing. When I toldthem that the women on the Earth had not wings like them, but arms, theystared, and said how bold and masculine they must look; not knowing thattheir wings, glorious as they are, are but undeveloped arms. 

But see the power of this book, that, while recounting what I can recallof its contents, I write as if myself had visited the far-off planet, learned its ways and appearances, and conversed with its men and women. And so, while writing, it seemed to me that I had. 

The book goes on with the story of a maiden, who, born at the close ofautumn, and living in a long, to her endless winter, set out at lastto find the regions of spring; for, as in our earth, the seasons aredivided over the globe. It begins something like this:

 She watched them dying for many a day, Dropping from off the old trees away, One by one; or else in a shower Crowding over the withered flower For as if they had done some grievous wrong, The sun, that had nursed them and loved them so long, Grew weary of loving, and, turning back, Hastened away on his southern track; And helplessly hung each shrivelled leaf, Faded away with an idle grief. And the gusts of wind, sad Autumn's sighs, Mournfully swept through their families; Casting away with a helpless moan All that he yet might call his own, As the child, when his bird is gone for ever, Flingeth the cage on the wandering river. And the giant trees, as bare as Death, Slowly bowed to the great Wind's breath; And groaned with trying to keep from groaning Amidst the young trees bending and moaning. And the ancient planet's mighty sea Was heaving and falling most restlessly, And the tops of the waves were broken and white, Tossing about to ease their might; And the river was striving to reach the main, And the ripple was hurrying back again. Nature lived in sadness now; Sadness lived on the maiden's brow, As she watched, with a fixed, half-conscious eye, One lonely leaf that trembled on high, Till it dropped at last from the desolate bough-- Sorrow, oh, sorrow! 'tis winter now. And her tears gushed forth, though it was but a leaf, For little will loose the swollen fountain of grief: When up to the lip the water goes, It needs but a drop, and it overflows. 

 Oh! many and many a dreary year Must pass away ere the buds appear: Many a night of darksome sorrow Yield to the light of a joyless morrow, Ere birds again, on the clothed trees, Shall fill the branches with melodies. She will dream of meadows with wakeful streams; Of wavy grass in the sunny beams; Of hidden wells that soundless spring, Hoarding their joy as a holy thing; Of founts that tell it all day long To the listening woods, with exultant song; She will dream of evenings that die into nights, Where each sense is filled with its own delights, And the soul is still as the vaulted sky, Lulled with an inner harmony;

 And the flowers give out to the dewy night, Changed into perfume, the gathered light; And the darkness sinks upon all their host, Till the sun sail up on the eastern coast-- She will wake and see the branches bare, Weaving a net in the frozen air. 

The story goes on to tell how, at last, weary with wintriness, shetravelled towards the southern regions of her globe, to meet the springon its slow way northwards; and how, after many sad adventures, manydisappointed hopes, and many tears, bitter and fruitless, she foundat last, one stormy afternoon, in a leafless forest, a single snowdropgrowing betwixt the borders of the winter and spring. She lay downbeside it and died. I almost believe that a child, pale and peaceful asa snowdrop, was born in the Earth within a fixed season from that stormyafternoon. 

CHAPTER XIII

 "I saw a ship sailing upon the sea Deeply laden as ship could be; But not so deep as in love I am For I care not whether I sink or swim. " Old Ballad. 

 "But Love is such a Mystery I cannot find it out: For when I think I'm best resols'd, I then am in most doubt. " SIR JOHN SUCKLING. 

One story I will try to reproduce. But, alas! it is like trying toreconstruct a forest out of broken branches and withered leaves. In thefairy book, everything was just as it should be, though whether in wordsor something else, I cannot tell. It glowed and flashed the thoughtsupon the soul, with such a power that the medium disappeared from theconsciousness, and it was occupied only with the things themselves. My representation of it must resemble a translation from a rich andpowerful language, capable of embodying the thoughts of a splendidlydeveloped people, into the meagre and half-articulate speech of a savagetribe. Of course, while I read it, I was Cosmo, and his historywas mine. Yet, all the time, I seemed to have a kind of doubleconsciousness, and the story a double meaning. Sometimes it seemedonly to represent a simple story of ordinary life, perhaps almost ofuniversal life; wherein two souls, loving each other and longing to comenearer, do, after all, but behold each other as in a glass darkly. 

As through the hard rock go the branching silver veins; as into thesolid land run the creeks and gulfs from the unresting sea; as thelights and influences of the upper worlds sink silently throughthe earth's atmosphere; so doth Faerie invade the world of men, andsometimes startle the common eye with an association as of cause andeffect, when between the two no connecting links can be traced. 

Cosmo von Wehrstahl was a student at the University of Prague. Thoughof a noble family, he was poor, and prided himself upon the independencethat poverty gives; for what will not a man pride himself upon, when hecannot get rid of it? A favourite with his fellow students, he yet hadno companions; and none of them had ever crossed the threshold of hislodging in the top of one of the highest houses in the old town. Indeed, the secret of much of that complaisance which recommended him to hisfellows, was the thought of his unknown retreat, whither in the eveninghe could betake himself and indulge undisturbed in his own studies andreveries. These studies, besides those subjects necessary to his courseat the University, embraced some less commonly known and approved;for in a secret drawer lay the works of Albertus Magnus and CorneliusAgrippa, along with others less read and more abstruse. As yet, however, he had followed these researches only from curiosity, and had turnedthem to no practical purpose. 

His lodging consisted of one large low-ceiled room, singularly bare offurniture; for besides a couple of wooden chairs, a couch which servedfor dreaming on both by day and night, and a great press of black oak, there was very little in the room that could be called furniture. 

But curious instruments were heaped in the corners; and in one stooda skeleton, half-leaning against the wall, half-supported by a stringabout its neck. One of its hands, all of fingers, rested on the heavypommel of a great sword that stood beside it. 

Various weapons were scattered about over the floor. The walls wereutterly bare of adornment; for the few strange things, such as a largedried bat with wings dispread, the skin of a porcupine, and a stuffedsea-mouse, could hardly be reckoned as such. But although his fancydelighted in vagaries like these, he indulged his imagination with fardifferent fare. His mind had never yet been filled with an absorbingpassion; but it lay like a still twilight open to any wind, whether thelow breath that wafts but odours, or the storm that bows the great treestill they strain and creak. He saw everything as through a rose-colouredglass. When he looked from his window on the street below, not a maidenpassed but she moved as in a story, and drew his thoughts after her tillshe disappeared in the vista. When he walked in the streets, he alwaysfelt as if reading a tale, into which he sought to weave every face ofinterest that went by; and every sweet voice swept his soul as with thewing of a passing angel. He was in fact a poet without words; the moreabsorbed and endangered, that the springing-waters were dammed backinto his soul, where, finding no utterance, they grew, and swelled, andundermined. He used to lie on his hard couch, and read a tale or a poem, till the book dropped from his hand; but he dreamed on, he knew notwhether awake or asleep, until the opposite roof grew upon his sense, and turned golden in the sunrise. Then he arose too; and the impulses ofvigorous youth kept him ever active, either in study or in sport, untilagain the close of the day left him free; and the world of night, whichhad lain drowned in the cataract of the day, rose up in his soul, withall its stars, and dim-seen phantom shapes. But this could hardly lastlong. Some one form must sooner or later step within the charmed circle, enter the house of life, and compel the bewildered magician to kneel andworship. 

One afternoon, towards dusk, he was wandering dreamily in one of theprincipal streets, when a fellow student roused him by a slap on theshoulder, and asked him to accompany him into a little back alley tolook at some old armour which he had taken a fancy to possess. Cosmo wasconsidered an authority in every matter pertaining to arms, ancient ormodern. In the use of weapons, none of the students could come near him;and his practical acquaintance with some had principally contributedto establish his authority in reference to all. He accompanied himwillingly. 

They entered a narrow alley, and thence a dirty little court, wherea low arched door admitted them into a heterogeneous assemblage ofeverything musty, and dusty, and old, that could well be imagined. His verdict on the armour was satisfactory, and his companion at onceconcluded the purchase. As they were leaving the place, Cosmo's eye wasattracted by an old mirror of an elliptical shape, which leaned againstthe wall, covered with dust. Around it was some curious carving, whichhe could see but very indistinctly by the glimmering light whichthe owner of the shop carried in his hand. It was this carving thatattracted his attention; at least so it appeared to him. He left theplace, however, with his friend, taking no further notice of it. Theywalked together to the main street, where they parted and took oppositedirections. 

No sooner was Cosmo left alone, than the thought of the curious oldmirror returned to him. A strong desire to see it more plainly arosewithin him, and he directed his steps once more towards the shop. Theowner opened the door when he knocked, as if he had expected him. Hewas a little, old, withered man, with a hooked nose, and burning eyesconstantly in a slow restless motion, and looking here and there as ifafter something that eluded them. Pretending to examine several otherarticles, Cosmo at last approached the mirror, and requested to have ittaken down. 

"Take it down yourself, master; I cannot reach it, " said the old man. 

Cosmo took it down carefully, when he saw that the carving was indeeddelicate and costly, being both of admirable design and execution;containing withal many devices which seemed to embody some meaningto which he had no clue. This, naturally, in one of his tastes andtemperament, increased the interest he felt in the old mirror; so much, indeed, that he now longed to possess it, in order to study its frame athis leisure. He pretended, however, to want it only for use; and sayinghe feared the plate could be of little service, as it was rather old, hebrushed away a little of the dust from its face, expecting to see a dullreflection within. His surprise was great when he found the reflectionbrilliant, revealing a glass not only uninjured by age, but wondrouslyclear and perfect (should the whole correspond to this part) even forone newly from the hands of the maker. He asked carelessly what theowner wanted for the thing. The old man replied by mentioning a sum ofmoney far beyond the reach of poor Cosmo, who proceeded to replace themirror where it had stood before. 

"You think the price too high?" said the old man. 

"I do not know that it is too much for you to ask, " replied Cosmo; "butit is far too much for me to give. "

The old man held up his light towards Cosmo's face. "I like your look, "said he. 

Cosmo could not return the compliment. In fact, now he looked closelyat him for the first time, he felt a kind of repugnance to him, mingledwith a strange feeling of doubt whether a man or a woman stood beforehim. 

"What is your name?" he continued. 

"Cosmo von Wehrstahl. "

"Ah, ah! I thought as much. I see your father in you. I knew your fathervery well, young sir. I dare say in some odd corners of my house, youmight find some old things with his crest and cipher upon them still. Well, I like you: you shall have the mirror at the fourth part of what Iasked for it; but upon one condition. "

"What is that?" said Cosmo; for, although the price was still a greatdeal for him to give, he could just manage it; and the desire to possessthe mirror had increased to an altogether unaccountable degree, since ithad seemed beyond his reach. 

"That if you should ever want to get rid of it again, you will let mehave the first offer. "

"Certainly, " replied Cosmo, with a smile; adding, "a moderate conditionindeed. "

"On your honour?" insisted the seller. 

"On my honour, " said the buyer; and the bargain was concluded. 

"I will carry it home for you, " said the old man, as Cosmo took it inhis hands. 

"No, no; I will carry it myself, " said he; for he had a peculiar disliketo revealing his residence to any one, and more especially to thisperson, to whom he felt every moment a greater antipathy. "Just as youplease, " said the old creature, and muttered to himself as he held hislight at the door to show him out of the court: "Sold for the sixthtime! I wonder what will be the upshot of it this time. I should thinkmy lady had enough of it by now!"

Cosmo carried his prize carefully home. But all the way he had anuncomfortable feeling that he was watched and dogged. Repeatedly helooked about, but saw nothing to justify his suspicions. Indeed, thestreets were too crowded and too ill lighted to expose very readilya careful spy, if such there should be at his heels. He reached hislodging in safety, and leaned his purchase against the wall, ratherrelieved, strong as he was, to be rid of its weight; then, lighting hispipe, threw himself on the couch, and was soon lapt in the folds of oneof his haunting dreams. 

He returned home earlier than usual the next day, and fixed the mirrorto the wall, over the hearth, at one end of his long room. 

He then carefully wiped away the dust from its face, and, clear as thewater of a sunny spring, the mirror shone out from beneath the enviouscovering. But his interest was chiefly occupied with the curious carvingof the frame. This he cleaned as well as he could with a brush; and thenhe proceeded to a minute examination of its various parts, in the hopeof discovering some index to the intention of the carver. In this, however, he was unsuccessful; and, at length, pausing with someweariness and disappointment, he gazed vacantly for a few moments intothe depth of the reflected room. But ere long he said, half aloud: "Whata strange thing a mirror is! and what a wondrous affinity exists betweenit and a man's imagination! For this room of mine, as I behold it inthe glass, is the same, and yet not the same. It is not the mererepresentation of the room I live in, but it looks just as if I werereading about it in a story I like. All its commonness has disappeared. The mirror has lifted it out of the region of fact into the realm ofart; and the very representing of it to me has clothed with interestthat which was otherwise hard and bare; just as one sees with delightupon the stage the representation of a character from which one wouldescape in life as from something unendurably wearisome. But is it notrather that art rescues nature from the weary and sated regards of oursenses, and the degrading injustice of our anxious everyday life, and, appealing to the imagination, which dwells apart, reveals Nature in somedegree as she really is, and as she represents herself to the eye of thechild, whose every-day life, fearless and unambitious, meets the trueimport of the wonder-teeming world around him, and rejoices thereinwithout questioning? That skeleton, now--I almost fear it, standingthere so still, with eyes only for the unseen, like a watch-towerlooking across all the waste of this busy world into the quiet regionsof rest beyond. And yet I know every bone and every joint in it as wellas my own fist. And that old battle-axe looks as if any moment it mightbe caught up by a mailed hand, and, borne forth by the mighty arm, gocrashing through casque, and skull, and brain, invading the Unknown withyet another bewildered ghost. I should like to live in THAT room if Icould only get into it. "

Scarcely had the half-moulded words floated from him, as he stood gazinginto the mirror, when, striking him as with a flash of amazement thatfixed him in his posture, noiseless and unannounced, glided suddenlythrough the door into the reflected room, with stately motion, yetreluctant and faltering step, the graceful form of a woman, clothed allin white. Her back only was visible as she walked slowly up to thecouch in the further end of the room, on which she laid herselfwearily, turning towards him a face of unutterable loveliness, in whichsuffering, and dislike, and a sense of compulsion, strangely mingledwith the beauty. He stood without the power of motion for some moments, with his eyes irrecoverably fixed upon her; and even after he wasconscious of the ability to move, he could not summon up courage toturn and look on her, face to face, in the veritable chamber in whichhe stood. At length, with a sudden effort, in which the exercise of thewill was so pure, that it seemed involuntary, he turned his face to thecouch. It was vacant. In bewilderment, mingled with terror, he turnedagain to the mirror: there, on the reflected couch, lay the exquisitelady-form. She lay with closed eyes, whence two large tears were justwelling from beneath the veiling lids; still as death, save for theconvulsive motion of her bosom. 

Cosmo himself could not have described what he felt. His emotions wereof a kind that destroyed consciousness, and could never be clearlyrecalled. He could not help standing yet by the mirror, and keeping hiseyes fixed on the lady, though he was painfully aware of his rudeness, and feared every moment that she would open hers, and meet his fixedregard. But he was, ere long, a little relieved; for, after a while, hereyelids slowly rose, and her eyes remained uncovered, but unemployed fora time; and when, at length, they began to wander about the room, as iflanguidly seeking to make some acquaintance with her environment, theywere never directed towards him: it seemed nothing but what was in themirror could affect her vision; and, therefore, if she saw him at all, it could only be his back, which, of necessity, was turned towards herin the glass. The two figures in the mirror could not meet face to face, except he turned and looked at her, present in his room; and, as she wasnot there, he concluded that if he were to turn towards the part in hisroom corresponding to that in which she lay, his reflection would eitherbe invisible to her altogether, or at least it must appear to her togaze vacantly towards her, and no meeting of the eyes would producethe impression of spiritual proximity. By-and-by her eyes fell upon theskeleton, and he saw her shudder and close them. She did not open themagain, but signs of repugnance continued evident on her countenance. Cosmo would have removed the obnoxious thing at once, but he feared todiscompose her yet more by the assertion of his presence which the actwould involve. So he stood and watched her. The eyelids yet shroudedthe eyes, as a costly case the jewels within; the troubled expressiongradually faded from the countenance, leaving only a faint sorrowbehind; the features settled into an unchanging expression of rest; andby these signs, and the slow regular motion of her breathing, Cosmo knewthat she slept. He could now gaze on her without embarrassment. He sawthat her figure, dressed in the simplest robe of white, was worthy ofher face; and so harmonious, that either the delicately moulded foot, orany finger of the equally delicate hand, was an index to the whole. Asshe lay, her whole form manifested the relaxation of perfect repose. Hegazed till he was weary, and at last seated himself near the new-foundshrine, and mechanically took up a book, like one who watches by asick-bed. But his eyes gathered no thoughts from the page before him. His intellect had been stunned by the bold contradiction, to its face, of all its experience, and now lay passive, without assertion, orspeculation, or even conscious astonishment; while his imagination sentone wild dream of blessedness after another coursing through his soul. How long he sat he knew not; but at length he roused himself, rose, and, trembling in every portion of his frame, looked again into the mirror. She was gone. The mirror reflected faithfully what his room presented, and nothing more. It stood there like a golden setting whence thecentral jewel has been stolen away--like a night-sky without the gloryof its stars. She had carried with her all the strangeness of thereflected room. It had sunk to the level of the one without. 

But when the first pangs of his disappointment had passed, Cosmo beganto comfort himself with the hope that she might return, perhaps the nextevening, at the same hour. Resolving that if she did, she should notat least be scared by the hateful skeleton, he removed that and severalother articles of questionable appearance into a recess by the side ofthe hearth, whence they could not possibly cast any reflection into themirror; and having made his poor room as tidy as he could, sought thesolace of the open sky and of a night wind that had begun to blow, forhe could not rest where he was. When he returned, somewhat composed, hecould hardly prevail with himself to lie down on his bed; for he couldnot help feeling as if she had lain upon it; and for him to lie therenow would be something like sacrilege. However, weariness prevailed; andlaying himself on the couch, dressed as he was, he slept till day. 

With a beating heart, beating till he could hardly breathe, he stoodin dumb hope before the mirror, on the following evening. Again thereflected room shone as through a purple vapour in the gatheringtwilight. Everything seemed waiting like himself for a coming splendourto glorify its poor earthliness with the presence of a heavenly joy. Andjust as the room vibrated with the strokes of the neighbouring churchbell, announcing the hour of six, in glided the pale beauty, and againlaid herself on the couch. Poor Cosmo nearly lost his senses withdelight. She was there once more! Her eyes sought the corner where theskeleton had stood, and a faint gleam of satisfaction crossed her face, apparently at seeing it empty. She looked suffering still, but there wasless of discomfort expressed in her countenance than there had been thenight before. She took more notice of the things about her, and seemedto gaze with some curiosity on the strange apparatus standing here andthere in her room. At length, however, drowsiness seemed to overtakeher, and again she fell asleep. Resolved not to lose sight of her thistime, Cosmo watched the sleeping form. Her slumber was so deep andabsorbing that a fascinating repose seemed to pass contagiously from herto him as he gazed upon her; and he started as if from a dream, whenthe lady moved, and, without opening her eyes, rose, and passed from theroom with the gait of a somnambulist. 

Cosmo was now in a state of extravagant delight. Most men have a secrettreasure somewhere. The miser has his golden hoard; the virtuoso his petring; the student his rare book; the poet his favourite haunt; the loverhis secret drawer; but Cosmo had a mirror with a lovely lady in it. Andnow that he knew by the skeleton, that she was affected by the thingsaround her, he had a new object in life: he would turn the bare chamberin the mirror into a room such as no lady need disdain to call her own. This he could effect only by furnishing and adorning his. And Cosmo waspoor. Yet he possessed accomplishments that could be turned to account;although, hitherto, he had preferred living on his slender allowance, toincreasing his means by what his pride considered unworthy of his rank. He was the best swordsman in the University; and now he offered to givelessons in fencing and similar exercises, to such as chose to payhim well for the trouble. His proposal was heard with surprise by thestudents; but it was eagerly accepted by many; and soon his instructionswere not confined to the richer students, but were anxiously sought bymany of the young nobility of Prague and its neighbourhood. So that verysoon he had a good deal of money at his command. The first thing he didwas to remove his apparatus and oddities into a closet in the room. Then he placed his bed and a few other necessaries on each side of thehearth, and parted them from the rest of the room by two screens ofIndian fabric. Then he put an elegant couch for the lady to lie upon, inthe corner where his bed had formerly stood; and, by degrees, everyday adding some article of luxury, converted it, at length, into a richboudoir. 

Every night, about the same time, the lady entered. The first time shesaw the new couch, she started with a half-smile; then her face grewvery sad, the tears came to her eyes, and she laid herself upon thecouch, and pressed her face into the silken cushions, as if to hide fromeverything. She took notice of each addition and each change as the workproceeded; and a look of acknowledgment, as if she knew that someone was ministering to her, and was grateful for it, mingled with theconstant look of suffering. At length, after she had lain down as usualone evening, her eyes fell upon some paintings with which Cosmo had justfinished adorning the walls. She rose, and to his great delight, walkedacross the room, and proceeded to examine them carefully, testifyingmuch pleasure in her looks as she did so. But again the sorrowful, tearful expression returned, and again she buried her face in thepillows of her couch. Gradually, however, her countenance had grown morecomposed; much of the suffering manifest on her first appearance hadvanished, and a kind of quiet, hopeful expression had taken its place;which, however, frequently gave way to an anxious, troubled look, mingled with something of sympathetic pity. 

Meantime, how fared Cosmo? As might be expected in one of histemperament, his interest had blossomed into love, and his love--shallI call it RIPENED, or--WITHERED into passion. But, alas! he loved ashadow. He could not come near her, could not speak to her, could nothear a sound from those sweet lips, to which his longing eyes wouldcling like bees to their honey-founts. Ever and anon he sang to himself:

 "I shall die for love of the maiden;"

and ever he looked again, and died not, though his heart seemed ready tobreak with intensity of life and longing. And the more he did for her, the more he loved her; and he hoped that, although she never appearedto see him, yet she was pleased to think that one unknown would give hislife to her. He tried to comfort himself over his separation from her, by thinking that perhaps some day she would see him and make signs tohim, and that would satisfy him; "for, " thought he, "is not this allthat a loving soul can do to enter into communion with another? Nay, how many who love never come nearer than to behold each other as in amirror; seem to know and yet never know the inward life; never enterthe other soul; and part at last, with but the vaguest notion of theuniverse on the borders of which they have been hovering for years? IfI could but speak to her, and knew that she heard me, I should besatisfied. " Once he contemplated painting a picture on the wall, whichshould, of necessity, convey to the lady a thought of himself; but, though he had some skill with the pencil, he found his hand tremble somuch when he began the attempt, that he was forced to give it up. . . . . . 

 "Who lives, he dies; who dies, he is alive. "

 One evening, as he stood gazing on his treasure, he thought hesaw a faint expression of self-consciousness on her countenance, as ifshe surmised that passionate eyes were fixed upon her. This grew; tillat last the red blood rose over her neck, and cheek, and brow. Cosmo'slonging to approach her became almost delirious. This night she wasdressed in an evening costume, resplendent with diamonds. This could addnothing to her beauty, but it presented it in a new aspect; enabled herloveliness to make a new manifestation of itself in a new embodiment. For essential beauty is infinite; and, as the soul of Nature needs anendless succession of varied forms to embody her loveliness, countlessfaces of beauty springing forth, not any two the same, at any one ofher heart-throbs; so the individual form needs an infinite change of itsenvironments, to enable it to uncover all the phases of its loveliness. Diamonds glittered from amidst her hair, half hidden in its luxuriance, like stars through dark rain-clouds; and the bracelets on her white armsflashed all the colours of a rainbow of lightnings, as she lifted hersnowy hands to cover her burning face. But her beauty shone down all itsadornment. "If I might have but one of her feet to kiss, " thought Cosmo, "I should be content. " Alas! he deceived himself, for passion is nevercontent. Nor did he know that there are TWO ways out of her enchantedhouse. But, suddenly, as if the pang had been driven into his heartfrom without, revealing itself first in pain, and afterwards in definiteform, the thought darted into his mind, "She has a lover somewhere. Remembered words of his bring the colour on her face now. I am nowhereto her. She lives in another world all day, and all night, after sheleaves me. Why does she come and make me love her, till I, a strong man, am too faint to look upon her more?" He looked again, and her face waspale as a lily. A sorrowful compassion seemed to rebuke the glitter ofthe restless jewels, and the slow tears rose in her eyes. She left herroom sooner this evening than was her wont. Cosmo remained alone, with afeeling as if his bosom had been suddenly left empty and hollow, and theweight of the whole world was crushing in its walls. The next evening, for the first time since she began to come, she came not. 

And now Cosmo was in wretched plight. Since the thought of a rivalhad occurred to him, he could not rest for a moment. More than ever helonged to see the lady face to face. He persuaded himself that if he butknew the worst he would be satisfied; for then he could abandon Prague, and find that relief in constant motion, which is the hope of all activeminds when invaded by distress. Meantime he waited with unspeakableanxiety for the next night, hoping she would return: but she did notappear. And now he fell really ill. Rallied by his fellow students onhis wretched looks, he ceased to attend the lectures. His engagementswere neglected. He cared for nothing, The sky, with the great sun in it, was to him a heartless, burning desert. The men and women in the streetswere mere puppets, without motives in themselves, or interest to him. Hesaw them all as on the ever-changing field of a camera obscura. She--shealone and altogether--was his universe, his well of life, his incarnategood. For six evenings she came not. Let his absorbing passion, andthe slow fever that was consuming his brain, be his excuse for theresolution which he had taken and begun to execute, before that time hadexpired. 

Reasoning with himself, that it must be by some enchantment connectedwith the mirror, that the form of the lady was to be seen in it, hedetermined to attempt to turn to account what he had hitherto studiedprincipally from curiosity. "For, " said he to himself, "if a spell canforce her presence in that glass (and she came unwillingly at first), may not a stronger spell, such as I know, especially with the aid ofher half-presence in the mirror, if ever she appears again, compelher living form to come to me here? If I do her wrong, let love bemy excuse. I want only to know my doom from her own lips. " He neverdoubted, all the time, that she was a real earthly woman; or, rather, that there was a woman, who, somehow or other, threw this reflection ofher form into the magic mirror. 

He opened his secret drawer, took out his books of magic, lighted hislamp, and read and made notes from midnight till three in the morning, for three successive nights. Then he replaced his books; and the nextnight went out in quest of the materials necessary for the conjuration. These were not easy to find; for, in love-charms and all incantations ofthis nature, ingredients are employed scarcely fit to be mentioned, and for the thought even of which, in connexion with her, he could onlyexcuse himself on the score of his bitter need. At length he succeededin procuring all he required; and on the seventh evening from that onwhich she had last appeared, he found himself prepared for the exerciseof unlawful and tyrannical power. 

He cleared the centre of the room; stooped and drew a circle of red onthe floor, around the spot where he stood; wrote in the four quartersmystical signs, and numbers which were all powers of seven or nine;examined the whole ring carefully, to see that no smallest break hadoccurred in the circumference; and then rose from his bending posture. As he rose, the church clock struck seven; and, just as she had appearedthe first time, reluctant, slow, and stately, glided in the lady. Cosmotrembled; and when, turning, she revealed a countenance worn and wan, aswith sickness or inward trouble, he grew faint, and felt as if he darednot proceed. But as he gazed on the face and form, which now possessedhis whole soul, to the exclusion of all other joys and griefs, thelonging to speak to her, to know that she heard him, to hear from herone word in return, became so unendurable, that he suddenly and hastilyresumed his preparations. Stepping carefully from the circle, he puta small brazier into its centre. He then set fire to its contents ofcharcoal, and while it burned up, opened his window and seated himself, waiting, beside it. 

It was a sultry evening. The air was full of thunder. A sense ofluxurious depression filled the brain. The sky seemed to have grownheavy, and to compress the air beneath it. A kind of purplish tingepervaded the atmosphere, and through the open window came the scents ofthe distant fields, which all the vapours of the city could not quench. Soon the charcoal glowed. Cosmo sprinkled upon it the incense and othersubstances which he had compounded, and, stepping within the circle, turned his face from the brazier and towards the mirror. Then, fixinghis eyes upon the face of the lady, he began with a trembling voice torepeat a powerful incantation. He had not gone far, before the lady grewpale; and then, like a returning wave, the blood washed all its bankswith its crimson tide, and she hid her face in her hands. Then he passedto a conjuration stronger yet. 

The lady rose and walked uneasily to and fro in her room. Another spell;and she seemed seeking with her eyes for some object on which theywished to rest. At length it seemed as if she suddenly espied him;for her eyes fixed themselves full and wide upon his, and she drewgradually, and somewhat unwillingly, close to her side of the mirror, just as if his eyes had fascinated her. Cosmo had never seen her so nearbefore. Now at least, eyes met eyes; but he could not quite understandthe expression of hers. They were full of tender entreaty, but there wassomething more that he could not interpret. Though his heart seemed tolabour in his throat, he would allow no delight or agitation to turn himfrom his task. Looking still in her face, he passed on to the mightiestcharm he knew. Suddenly the lady turned and walked out of the doorof her reflected chamber. A moment after she entered his room withveritable presence; and, forgetting all his precautions, he sprang fromthe charmed circle, and knelt before her. There she stood, the livinglady of his passionate visions, alone beside him, in a thunderytwilight, and the glow of a magic fire. 

"Why, " said the lady, with a trembling voice, "didst thou bring a poormaiden through the rainy streets alone?"

"Because I am dying for love of thee; but I only brought thee from themirror there. "

"Ah, the mirror!" and she looked up at it, and shuddered. "Alas! I ambut a slave, while that mirror exists. But do not think it was the powerof thy spells that drew me; it was thy longing desire to see me, thatbeat at the door of my heart, till I was forced to yield. "

"Canst thou love me then?" said Cosmo, in a voice calm as death, butalmost inarticulate with emotion. 

"I do not know, " she replied sadly; "that I cannot tell, so long as I ambewildered with enchantments. It were indeed a joy too great, to lay myhead on thy bosom and weep to death; for I think thou lovest me, thoughI do not know;--but----"

Cosmo rose from his knees. 

"I love thee as--nay, I know not what--for since I have loved thee, there is nothing else. "

He seized her hand: she withdrew it. 

"No, better not; I am in thy power, and therefore I may not. "

She burst into tears, and kneeling before him in her turn, said--

"Cosmo, if thou lovest me, set me free, even from thyself; break themirror. "

"And shall I see thyself instead?"

"That I cannot tell, I will not deceive thee; we may never meet again. "

A fierce struggle arose in Cosmo's bosom. Now she was in his power. Shedid not dislike him at least; and he could see her when he would. Tobreak the mirror would be to destroy his very life to banish out of hisuniverse the only glory it possessed. The whole world would be but aprison, if he annihilated the one window that looked into the paradiseof love. Not yet pure in love, he hesitated. 

With a wail of sorrow the lady rose to her feet. "Ah! he loves me not;he loves me not even as I love him; and alas! I care more for his lovethan even for the freedom I ask. "

"I will not wait to be willing, " cried Cosmo; and sprang to the cornerwhere the great sword stood. 

Meantime it had grown very dark; only the embers cast a red glow throughthe room. He seized the sword by the steel scabbard, and stood beforethe mirror; but as he heaved a great blow at it with the heavy pommel, the blade slipped half-way out of the scabbard, and the pommel struckthe wall above the mirror. At that moment, a terrible clap of thunderseemed to burst in the very room beside them; and ere Cosmo could repeatthe blow, he fell senseless on the hearth. When he came to himself, hefound that the lady and the mirror had both disappeared. He was seizedwith a brain fever, which kept him to his couch for weeks. 

When he recovered his reason, he began to think what could have becomeof the mirror. For the lady, he hoped she had found her way back asshe came; but as the mirror involved her fate with its own, he was moreimmediately anxious about that. He could not think she had carried itaway. It was much too heavy, even if it had not been too firmly fixed inthe wall, for her to remove it. Then again, he remembered the thunder;which made him believe that it was not the lightning, but some otherblow that had struck him down. He concluded that, either by supernaturalagency, he having exposed himself to the vengeance of the demons inleaving the circle of safety, or in some other mode, the mirror hadprobably found its way back to its former owner; and, horrible to thinkof, might have been by this time once more disposed of, delivering upthe lady into the power of another man; who, if he used his power noworse than he himself had done, might yet give Cosmo abundant cause tocurse the selfish indecision which prevented him from shattering themirror at once. Indeed, to think that she whom he loved, and who hadprayed to him for freedom, should be still at the mercy, in some degree, of the possessor of the mirror, and was at least exposed to his constantobservation, was in itself enough to madden a chary lover. 

Anxiety to be well retarded his recovery; but at length he was able tocreep abroad. He first made his way to the old broker's, pretending tobe in search of something else. A laughing sneer on the creature's faceconvinced him that he knew all about it; but he could not see it amongsthis furniture, or get any information out of him as to what had becomeof it. He expressed the utmost surprise at hearing it had been stolen, asurprise which Cosmo saw at once to be counterfeited; while, at the sametime, he fancied that the old wretch was not at all anxious to have itmistaken for genuine. Full of distress, which he concealed as well as hecould, he made many searches, but with no avail. Of course he couldask no questions; but he kept his ears awake for any remotest hint thatmight set him in a direction of search. He never went out without ashort heavy hammer of steel about him, that he might shatter the mirrorthe moment he was made happy by the sight of his lost treasure, if everthat blessed moment should arrive. Whether he should see the lady again, was now a thought altogether secondary, and postponed to the achievementof her freedom. He wandered here and there, like an anxious ghost, paleand haggard; gnawed ever at the heart, by the thought of what she mightbe suffering--all from his fault. 

One night, he mingled with a crowd that filled the rooms of one ofthe most distinguished mansions in the city; for he accepted everyinvitation, that he might lose no chance, however poor, of obtainingsome information that might expedite his discovery. Here he wanderedabout, listening to every stray word that he could catch, in the hope ofa revelation. As he approached some ladies who were talking quietly in acorner, one said to another:

"Have you heard of the strange illness of the Princess von Hohenweiss?"

"Yes; she has been ill for more than a year now. It is very sad for sofine a creature to have such a terrible malady. She was better forsome weeks lately, but within the last few days the same attacks havereturned, apparently accompanied with more suffering than ever. It isaltogether an inexplicable story. "

"Is there a story connected with her illness?"

"I have only heard imperfect reports of it; but it is said that she gaveoffence some eighteen months ago to an old woman who had held anoffice of trust in the family, and who, after some incoherent threats, disappeared. This peculiar affection followed soon after. But thestrangest part of the story is its association with the loss of anantique mirror, which stood in her dressing-room, and of which sheconstantly made use. "

Here the speaker's voice sank to a whisper; and Cosmo, although his verysoul sat listening in his ears, could hear no more. He trembled too muchto dare to address the ladies, even if it had been advisable to exposehimself to their curiosity. The name of the Princess was well known tohim, but he had never seen her; except indeed it was she, which now hehardly doubted, who had knelt before him on that dreadful night. Fearfulof attracting attention, for, from the weak state of his health, hecould not recover an appearance of calmness, he made his way to the openair, and reached his lodgings; glad in this, that he at least knew whereshe lived, although he never dreamed of approaching her openly, evenif he should be happy enough to free her from her hateful bondage. Hehoped, too, that as he had unexpectedly learned so much, the other andfar more important part might be revealed to him ere long. 

*****

"Have you seen Steinwald lately?"

"No, I have not seen him for some time. He is almost a match for me atthe rapier, and I suppose he thinks he needs no more lessons. "

"I wonder what has become of him. I want to see him very much. Let mesee; the last time I saw him he was coming out of that old broker'sden, to which, if you remember, you accompanied me once, to look at somearmour. That is fully three weeks ago. "

This hint was enough for Cosmo. Von Steinwald was a man of influence inthe court, well known for his reckless habits and fierce passions. Thevery possibility that the mirror should be in his possession was hellitself to Cosmo. But violent or hasty measures of any sort were mostunlikely to succeed. All that he wanted was an opportunity of breakingthe fatal glass; and to obtain this he must bide his time. He revolvedmany plans in his mind, but without being able to fix upon any. 

At length, one evening, as he was passing the house of Von Steinwald, hesaw the windows more than usually brilliant. He watched for a while, and seeing that company began to arrive, hastened home, and dressedas richly as he could, in the hope of mingling with the guestsunquestioned: in effecting which, there could be no difficulty for a manof his carriage. 

*****

In a lofty, silent chamber, in another part of the city, lay a form morelike marble than a living woman. The loveliness of death seemed frozenupon her face, for her lips were rigid, and her eyelids closed. Her longwhite hands were crossed over her breast, and no breathing disturbedtheir repose. Beside the dead, men speak in whispers, as if the deepestrest of all could be broken by the sound of a living voice. Just so, though the soul was evidently beyond the reach of all intimations fromthe senses, the two ladies, who sat beside her, spoke in the gentlesttones of subdued sorrow. "She has lain so for an hour. "

"This cannot last long, I fear. "

"How much thinner she has grown within the last few weeks! If she wouldonly speak, and explain what she suffers, it would be better for her. I think she has visions in her trances, but nothing can induce her torefer to them when she is awake. "

"Does she ever speak in these trances?"

"I have never heard her; but they say she walks sometimes, and once putthe whole household in a terrible fright by disappearing for a wholehour, and returning drenched with rain, and almost dead with exhaustionand fright. But even then she would give no account of what hadhappened. "

A scarce audible murmur from the yet motionless lips of the ladyhere startled her attendants. After several ineffectual attempts atarticulation, the word "COSMO!" burst from her. Then she lay still asbefore; but only for a moment. With a wild cry, she sprang from thecouch erect on the floor, flung her arms above her head, with claspedand straining hands, and, her wide eyes flashing with light, calledaloud, with a voice exultant as that of a spirit bursting from asepulchre, "I am free! I am free! I thank thee!" Then she flung herselfon the couch, and sobbed; then rose, and paced wildly up and down theroom, with gestures of mingled delight and anxiety. Then turning to hermotionless attendants--"Quick, Lisa, my cloak and hood!" Then lower--"Imust go to him. Make haste, Lisa! You may come with me, if you will. "

In another moment they were in the street, hurrying along towards oneof the bridges over the Moldau. The moon was near the zenith, and thestreets were almost empty. The Princess soon outstripped her attendant, and was half-way over the bridge, before the other reached it. 

"Are you free, lady? The mirror is broken: are you free?"

The words were spoken close beside her, as she hurried on. She turned;and there, leaning on the parapet in a recess of the bridge, stoodCosmo, in a splendid dress, but with a white and quivering face. 

"Cosmo!--I am free--and thy servant for ever. I was coming to you now. "

"And I to you, for Death made me bold; but I could get no further. HaveI atoned at all? Do I love you a little--truly?"

"Ah, I know now that you love me, my Cosmo; but what do you say aboutdeath?"

He did not reply. His hand was pressed against his side. She looked moreclosely: the blood was welling from between the fingers. She flung herarms around him with a faint bitter wail. 

When Lisa came up, she found her mistress kneeling above a wan deadface, which smiled on in the spectral moonbeams. 

 And now I will say no more about these wondrous volumes; thoughI could tell many a tale out of them, and could, perhaps, vaguelyrepresent some entrancing thoughts of a deeper kind which I found withinthem. From many a sultry noon till twilight, did I sit in that grandhall, buried and risen again in these old books. And I trust I havecarried away in my soul some of the exhalations of their undying leaves. In after hours of deserved or needful sorrow, portions of what I readthere have often come to me again, with an unexpected comforting;which was not fruitless, even though the comfort might seem in itselfgroundless and vain. 

CHAPTER XIV

 "Your gallery Ha we pass'd through, not without much content In many singularities; but we saw not That which my daughter came to look upon, The state of her mother. " Winter's Tale. 

It seemed to me strange, that all this time I had heard no music in thefairy palace. I was convinced there must be music in it, but that mysense was as yet too gross to receive the influence of those mysteriousmotions that beget sound. Sometimes I felt sure, from the way the fewfigures of which I got such transitory glimpses passed me, or glidedinto vacancy before me, that they were moving to the law of music;and, in fact, several times I fancied for a moment that I heard a fewwondrous tones coming I knew not whence. But they did not last longenough to convince me that I had heard them with the bodily sense. Suchas they were, however, they took strange liberties with me, causing meto burst suddenly into tears, of which there was no presence to makeme ashamed, or casting me into a kind of trance of speechless delight, which, passing as suddenly, left me faint and longing for more. 

Now, on an evening, before I had been a week in the palace, I waswandering through one lighted arcade and corridor after another. Atlength I arrived, through a door that closed behind me, in another vasthall of the palace. It was filled with a subdued crimson light; bywhich I saw that slender pillars of black, built close to walls of whitemarble, rose to a great height, and then, dividing into innumerabledivergent arches, supported a roof, like the walls, of white marble, upon which the arches intersected intricately, forming a fretting ofblack upon the white, like the network of a skeleton-leaf. The floor wasblack. 

Between several pairs of the pillars upon every side, the place of thewall behind was occupied by a crimson curtain of thick silk, hanging inheavy and rich folds. Behind each of these curtains burned a powerfullight, and these were the sources of the glow that filled the hall. Apeculiar delicious odour pervaded the place. As soon as I entered, theold inspiration seemed to return to me, for I felt a strong impulse tosing; or rather, it seemed as if some one else was singing a song in mysoul, which wanted to come forth at my lips, imbodied in my breath. ButI kept silence; and feeling somewhat overcome by the red light and theperfume, as well as by the emotion within me, and seeing at one end ofthe hall a great crimson chair, more like a throne than a chair, besidea table of white marble, I went to it, and, throwing myself in it, gavemyself up to a succession of images of bewildering beauty, which passedbefore my inward eye, in a long and occasionally crowded train. Here Isat for hours, I suppose; till, returning somewhat to myself, I saw thatthe red light had paled away, and felt a cool gentle breath gliding overmy forehead. I rose and left the hall with unsteady steps, finding myway with some difficulty to my own chamber, and faintly remembering, as I went, that only in the marble cave, before I found the sleepingstatue, had I ever had a similar experience. 

After this, I repaired every morning to the same hall; where I sometimessat in the chair and dreamed deliciously, and sometimes walked up anddown over the black floor. Sometimes I acted within myself a wholedrama, during one of these perambulations; sometimes walked deliberatelythrough the whole epic of a tale; sometimes ventured to sing a song, though with a shrinking fear of I knew not what. I was astonished atthe beauty of my own voice as it rang through the place, or rather creptundulating, like a serpent of sound, along the walls and roof of thissuperb music-hall. Entrancing verses arose within me as of their ownaccord, chanting themselves to their own melodies, and requiring noaddition of music to satisfy the inward sense. But, ever in the pausesof these, when the singing mood was upon me, I seemed to hear somethinglike the distant sound of multitudes of dancers, and felt as if itwas the unheard music, moving their rhythmic motion, that within meblossomed in verse and song. I felt, too, that could I but see thedance, I should, from the harmony of complicated movements, not ofthe dancers in relation to each other merely, but of each dancerindividually in the manifested plastic power that moved the consentingharmonious form, understand the whole of the music on the billows ofwhich they floated and swung. 

At length, one night, suddenly, when this feeling of dancing came uponme, I bethought me of lifting one of the crimson curtains, and lookingif, perchance, behind it there might not be hid some other mystery, which might at least remove a step further the bewilderment of thepresent one. Nor was I altogether disappointed. I walked to one of themagnificent draperies, lifted a corner, and peeped in. There, burneda great, crimson, globe-shaped light, high in the cubical centre ofanother hall, which might be larger or less than that in which I stood, for its dimensions were not easily perceived, seeing that floor and roofand walls were entirely of black marble. 

The roof was supported by the same arrangement of pillars radiating inarches, as that of the first hall; only, here, the pillars andarches were of dark red. But what absorbed my delighted gaze, was aninnumerable assembly of white marble statues, of every form, and inmultitudinous posture, filling the hall throughout. These stood, in theruddy glow of the great lamp, upon pedestals of jet black. Around thelamp shone in golden letters, plainly legible from where I stood, thetwo words--

 TOUCH NOT!

There was in all this, however, no solution to the sound of dancing; andnow I was aware that the influence on my mind had ceased. I did notgo in that evening, for I was weary and faint, but I hoarded up theexpectation of entering, as of a great coming joy. 

Next night I walked, as on the preceding, through the hall. My mind wasfilled with pictures and songs, and therewith so much absorbed, thatI did not for some time think of looking within the curtain I had lastnight lifted. When the thought of doing so occurred to me first, Ihappened to be within a few yards of it. I became conscious, at the samemoment, that the sound of dancing had been for some time in my ears. Iapproached the curtain quickly, and, lifting it, entered the black hall. Everything was still as death. I should have concluded that thesound must have proceeded from some other more distant quarter, which conclusion its faintness would, in ordinary circumstances, havenecessitated from the first; but there was a something about the statuesthat caused me still to remain in doubt. As I said, each stood perfectlystill upon its black pedestal: but there was about every one a certainair, not of motion, but as if it had just ceased from movement; as ifthe rest were not altogether of the marbly stillness of thousands ofyears. It was as if the peculiar atmosphere of each had yet a kindof invisible tremulousness; as if its agitated wavelets had notyet subsided into a perfect calm. I had the suspicion that they hadanticipated my appearance, and had sprung, each, from the living joy ofthe dance, to the death-silence and blackness of its isolated pedestal, just before I entered. I walked across the central hall to the curtainopposite the one I had lifted, and, entering there, found all theappearances similar; only that the statues were different, anddifferently grouped. Neither did they produce on my mind thatimpression--of motion just expired, which I had experienced from theothers. I found that behind every one of the crimson curtains was asimilar hall, similarly lighted, and similarly occupied. 

The next night, I did not allow my thoughts to be absorbed as beforewith inward images, but crept stealthily along to the furthest curtainin the hall, from behind which, likewise, I had formerly seemed to hearthe sound of dancing. I drew aside its edge as suddenly as I could, and, looking in, saw that the utmost stillness pervaded the vast place. Iwalked in, and passed through it to the other end. 

There I found that it communicated with a circular corridor, dividedfrom it only by two rows of red columns. This corridor, which was black, with red niches holding statues, ran entirely about the statue-halls, forming a communication between the further ends of them all; further, that is, as regards the central hall of white whence they all divergedlike radii, finding their circumference in the corridor. 

Round this corridor I now went, entering all the halls, of which therewere twelve, and finding them all similarly constructed, but filled withquite various statues, of what seemed both ancient and modern sculpture. After I had simply walked through them, I found myself sufficientlytired to long for rest, and went to my own room. 

In the night I dreamed that, walking close by one of the curtains, I wassuddenly seized with the desire to enter, and darted in. This time I wastoo quick for them. All the statues were in motion, statues no longer, but men and women--all shapes of beauty that ever sprang from the brainof the sculptor, mingled in the convolutions of a complicated dance. Passing through them to the further end, I almost started from mysleep on beholding, not taking part in the dance with the others, norseemingly endued with life like them, but standing in marble coldnessand rigidity upon a black pedestal in the extreme left corner--my ladyof the cave; the marble beauty who sprang from her tomb or her cradleat the call of my songs. While I gazed in speechless astonishment andadmiration, a dark shadow, descending from above like the curtain of astage, gradually hid her entirely from my view. I felt with a shudderthat this shadow was perchance my missing demon, whom I had not seen fordays. I awoke with a stifled cry. 

Of course, the next evening I began my journey through the halls (for Iknew not to which my dream had carried me), in the hope of proving thedream to be a true one, by discovering my marble beauty upon her blackpedestal. At length, on reaching the tenth hall, I thought Irecognised some of the forms I had seen dancing in my dream; and to mybewilderment, when I arrived at the extreme corner on the left, therestood, the only one I had yet seen, a vacant pedestal. It was exactly inthe position occupied, in my dream, by the pedestal on which the whitelady stood. Hope beat violently in my heart. 

"Now, " said I to myself, "if yet another part of the dream would butcome true, and I should succeed in surprising these forms in theirnightly dance; it might be the rest would follow, and I should see onthe pedestal my marble queen. Then surely if my songs sufficed to giveher life before, when she lay in the bonds of alabaster, much more wouldthey be sufficient then to give her volition and motion, when she aloneof assembled crowds of marble forms, would be standing rigid and cold. "

But the difficulty was, to surprise the dancers. I had found that apremeditated attempt at surprise, though executed with the utmost careand rapidity, was of no avail. And, in my dream, it was effected by asudden thought suddenly executed. I saw, therefore, that there was noplan of operation offering any probability of success, but this: toallow my mind to be occupied with other thoughts, as I wandered aroundthe great centre-hall; and so wait till the impulse to enter one of theothers should happen to arise in me just at the moment when I was closeto one of the crimson curtains. For I hoped that if I entered any one ofthe twelve halls at the right moment, that would as it were give me theright of entrance to all the others, seeing they all had communicationbehind. I would not diminish the hope of the right chance, by supposingit necessary that a desire to enter should awake within me, preciselywhen I was close to the curtains of the tenth hall. 

At first the impulses to see recurred so continually, in spite of thecrowded imagery that kept passing through my mind, that they formedtoo nearly a continuous chain, for the hope that any one of them wouldsucceed as a surprise. But as I persisted in banishing them, theyrecurred less and less often; and after two or three, at considerableintervals, had come when the spot where I happened to be was unsuitable, the hope strengthened, that soon one might arise just at the rightmoment; namely, when, in walking round the hall, I should be close toone of the curtains. 

At length the right moment and the impulse coincided. I darted into theninth hall. It was full of the most exquisite moving forms. The wholespace wavered and swam with the involutions of an intricate dance. Itseemed to break suddenly as I entered, and all made one or two boundstowards their pedestals; but, apparently on finding that they werethoroughly overtaken, they returned to their employment (for it seemedwith them earnest enough to be called such) without further heedingme. Somewhat impeded by the floating crowd, I made what haste I couldtowards the bottom of the hall; whence, entering the corridor, I turnedtowards the tenth. I soon arrived at the corner I wanted to reach, forthe corridor was comparatively empty; but, although the dancers here, after a little confusion, altogether disregarded my presence, Iwas dismayed at beholding, even yet, a vacant pedestal. But I had aconviction that she was near me. And as I looked at the pedestal, Ithought I saw upon it, vaguely revealed as if through overlapping foldsof drapery, the indistinct outlines of white feet. Yet there was nosign of drapery or concealing shadow whatever. But I remembered thedescending shadow in my dream. And I hoped still in the power of mysongs; thinking that what could dispel alabaster, might likewise becapable of dispelling what concealed my beauty now, even if it were thedemon whose darkness had overshadowed all my life. 

CHAPTER XV

 "Alexander. 'When will you finish Campaspe?' Apelles. 'Never finish: for always in absolute beauty there is somewhat above art. '" LYLY'S Campaspe. 

And now, what song should I sing to unveil my Isis, if indeed she waspresent unseen? I hurried away to the white hall of Phantasy, heedlessof the innumerable forms of beauty that crowded my way: these mightcross my eyes, but the unseen filled my brain. I wandered long, up anddown the silent space: no songs came. My soul was not still enough forsongs. Only in the silence and darkness of the soul's night, do thosestars of the inward firmament sink to its lower surface from the singingrealms beyond, and shine upon the conscious spirit. Here all effort wasunavailing. If they came not, they could not be found. 

Next night, it was just the same. I walked through the red glimmer ofthe silent hall; but lonely as there I walked, as lonely trod my soulup and down the halls of the brain. At last I entered one of thestatue-halls. The dance had just commenced, and I was delighted to findthat I was free of their assembly. I walked on till I came to the sacredcorner. There I found the pedestal just as I had left it, with the faintglimmer as of white feet still resting on the dead black. As soon as Isaw it, I seemed to feel a presence which longed to become visible; and, as it were, called to me to gift it with self-manifestation, that itmight shine on me. The power of song came to me. But the moment myvoice, though I sang low and soft, stirred the air of the hall, thedancers started; the quick interweaving crowd shook, lost its form, divided; each figure sprang to its pedestal, and stood, a self-evolvinglife no more, but a rigid, life-like, marble shape, with the whole formcomposed into the expression of a single state or act. Silence rolledlike a spiritual thunder through the grand space. My song had ceased, scared at its own influences. But I saw in the hand of one of thestatues close by me, a harp whose chords yet quivered. I rememberedthat as she bounded past me, her harp had brushed against my arm; sothe spell of the marble had not infolded it. I sprang to her, and with agesture of entreaty, laid my hand on the harp. The marble hand, probablyfrom its contact with the uncharmed harp, had strength enough to relaxits hold, and yield the harp to me. No other motion indicated life. Instinctively I struck the chords and sang. And not to break upon therecord of my song, I mention here, that as I sang the first four lines, the loveliest feet became clear upon the black pedestal; and ever as Isang, it was as if a veil were being lifted up from before the form, butan invisible veil, so that the statue appeared to grow before me, notso much by evolution, as by infinitesimal degrees of added height. And, while I sang, I did not feel that I stood by a statue, as indeed itappeared to be, but that a real woman-soul was revealing itself bysuccessive stages of imbodiment, and consequent manifestatlon andexpression. 

 Feet of beauty, firmly planting Arches white on rosy heel! Whence the life-spring, throbbing, panting, Pulses upward to reveal! Fairest things know least despising; Foot and earth meet tenderly: 'Tis the woman, resting, rising Upward to sublimity, Rise the limbs, sedately sloping, Strong and gentle, full and free; Soft and slow, like certain hoping, Drawing nigh the broad firm knee. Up to speech! As up to roses Pants the life from leaf to flower, So each blending change discloses, Nearer still, expression's power. 

 Lo! fair sweeps, white surges, twining Up and outward fearlessly! Temple columns, close combining, Lift a holy mystery. Heart of mine! what strange surprises Mount aloft on such a stair! Some great vision upward rises, Curving, bending, floating fair. 

 Bands and sweeps, and hill and hollow Lead my fascinated eye; Some apocalypse will follow, Some new world of deity. Zoned unseen, and outward swelling, With new thoughts and wonders rife, Queenly majesty foretelling, See the expanding house of life!

 Sudden heaving, unforbidden Sighs eternal, still the same-- Mounts of snow have summits hidden In the mists of uttered flame. But the spirit, dawning nearly Finds no speech for earnest pain; Finds a soundless sighing merely-- Builds its stairs, and mounts again. 

 Heart, the queen, with secret hoping, Sendeth out her waiting pair; Hands, blind hands, half blindly groping, Half inclasping visions rare; And the great arms, heartways bending; Might of Beauty, drawing home There returning, and re-blending, Where from roots of love they roam. 

 Build thy slopes of radiance beamy Spirit, fair with womanhood! Tower thy precipice, white-gleamy, Climb unto the hour of good. Dumb space will be rent asunder, Now the shining column stands Ready to be crowned with wonder By the builder's joyous hands. 

 All the lines abroad are spreading, Like a fountain's falling race. Lo, the chin, first feature, treading, Airy foot to rest the face! Speech is nigh; oh, see the blushing, Sweet approach of lip and breath! Round the mouth dim silence, hushing, Waits to die ecstatic death. 

 Span across in treble curving, Bow of promise, upper lip! Set them free, with gracious swerving; Let the wing-words float and dip. DUMB ART THOU? O Love immortal, More than words thy speech must be; Childless yet the tender portal Of the home of melody. 

 Now the nostrils open fearless, Proud in calm unconsciousness, Sure it must be something peerless That the great Pan would express! Deepens, crowds some meaning tender, In the pure, dear lady-face. Lo, a blinding burst of splendour!-- 'Tis the free soul's issuing grace. 

 Two calm lakes of molten glory Circling round unfathomed deeps! Lightning-flashes, transitory, Cross the gulfs where darkness sleeps. This the gate, at last, of gladness, To the outward striving me: In a rain of light and sadness, Out its loves and longings flee!

 With a presence I am smitten Dumb, with a foreknown surprise; Presence greater yet than written Even in the glorious eyes. Through the gulfs, with inward gazes, I may look till I am lost; Wandering deep in spirit-mazes, In a sea without a coast. 

 Windows open to the glorious! Time and space, oh, far beyond! Woman, ah! thou art victorious, And I perish, overfond. Springs aloft the yet Unspoken In the forehead's endless grace, Full of silences unbroken; Infinite, unfeatured face. 

 Domes above, the mount of wonder; Height and hollow wrapt in night; Hiding in its caverns under Woman-nations in their might. Passing forms, the highest Human Faints away to the Divine Features none, of man or woman, Can unveil the holiest shine. 

 Sideways, grooved porches only Visible to passing eye, Stand the silent, doorless, lonely Entrance-gates of melody. But all sounds fly in as boldly, Groan and song, and kiss and cry At their galleries, lifted coldly, Darkly, 'twixt the earth and sky. 

 Beauty, thou art spent, thou knowest So, in faint, half-glad despair, From the summit thou o'erflowest In a fall of torrent hair; Hiding what thou hast created In a half-transparent shroud: Thus, with glory soft-abated, Shines the moon through vapoury cloud. 

CHAPTER XVI

 "Ev'n the Styx, which ninefold her infoldeth Hems not Ceres' daughter in its flow; But she grasps the apple--ever holdeth Her, sad Orcus, down below. " SCHILLER, Das Ideal und das Leben. 

Ever as I sang, the veil was uplifted; ever as I sang, the signs of lifegrew; till, when the eyes dawned upon me, it was with that sunrise ofsplendour which my feeble song attempted to re-imbody. 

The wonder is, that I was not altogether overcome, but was able tocomplete my song as the unseen veil continued to rise. This ability camesolely from the state of mental elevation in which I found myself. Onlybecause uplifted in song, was I able to endure the blaze of the dawn. But I cannot tell whether she looked more of statue or more of woman;she seemed removed into that region of phantasy where all is intenselyvivid, but nothing clearly defined. At last, as I sang of her descendinghair, the glow of soul faded away, like a dying sunset. A lamp withinhad been extinguished, and the house of life shone blank in a wintermorn. She was a statue once more--but visible, and that was much gained. Yet the revulsion from hope and fruition was such, that, unable torestrain myself, I sprang to her, and, in defiance of the law of theplace, flung my arms around her, as if I would tear her from the graspof a visible Death, and lifted her from the pedestal down to my heart. But no sooner had her feet ceased to be in contact with the blackpedestal, than she shuddered and trembled all over; then, writhingfrom my arms, before I could tighten their hold, she sprang into thecorridor, with the reproachful cry, "You should not have touchedme!" darted behind one of the exterior pillars of the circle, anddisappeared. I followed almost as fast; but ere I could reach thepillar, the sound of a closing door, the saddest of all soundssometimes, fell on my ear; and, arriving at the spot where she hadvanished, I saw, lighted by a pale yellow lamp which hung above it, a heavy, rough door, altogether unlike any others I had seen inthe palace; for they were all of ebony, or ivory, or covered withsilver-plates, or of some odorous wood, and very ornate; whereas thisseemed of old oak, with heavy nails and iron studs. Notwithstanding theprecipitation of my pursuit, I could not help reading, in silver lettersbeneath the lamp: "NO ONE ENTERS HERE WITHOUT THE LEAVE OF THE QUEEN. "But what was the Queen to me, when I followed my white lady? I dashedthe door to the wall and sprang through. Lo! I stood on a waste windyhill. Great stones like tombstones stood all about me. No door, nopalace was to be seen. A white figure gleamed past me, wringing herhands, and crying, "Ah! you should have sung to me; you should have sungto me!" and disappeared behind one of the stones. I followed. A coldgust of wind met me from behind the stone; and when I looked, I sawnothing but a great hole in the earth, into which I could find no wayof entering. Had she fallen in? I could not tell. I must wait for thedaylight. I sat down and wept, for there was no help. 

CHAPTER XVII

 "First, I thought, almost despairing, This must crush my spirit now; Yet I bore it, and am bearing-- Only do not ask me how. " HEINE. 

When the daylight came, it brought the possibility of action, but withit little of consolation. With the first visible increase of light, I gazed into the chasm, but could not, for more than an hour, seesufficiently well to discover its nature. At last I saw it was almost aperpendicular opening, like a roughly excavated well, only very large. I could perceive no bottom; and it was not till the sun actually rose, that I discovered a sort of natural staircase, in many parts little morethan suggested, which led round and round the gulf, descending spirallyinto its abyss. I saw at once that this was my path; and without amoment's hesitation, glad to quit the sunlight, which stared at me mostheartlessly, I commenced my tortuous descent. It was very difficult. In some parts I had to cling to the rocks like a bat. In one place, Idropped from the track down upon the next returning spire of the stair;which being broad in this particular portion, and standing out from thewall at right angles, received me upon my feet safe, though somewhatstupefied by the shock. After descending a great way, I found the stairended at a narrow opening which entered the rock horizontally. Into thisI crept, and, having entered, had just room to turn round. I put my headout into the shaft by which I had come down, and surveyed the course ofmy descent. Looking up, I saw the stars; although the sun must by thistime have been high in the heavens. Looking below, I saw that the sidesof the shaft went sheer down, smooth as glass; and far beneath me, I sawthe reflection of the same stars I had seen in the heavens when I lookedup. I turned again, and crept inwards some distance, when the passagewidened, and I was at length able to stand and walk upright. Wider andloftier grew the way; new paths branched off on every side; great openhalls appeared; till at last I found myself wandering on through anunderground country, in which the sky was of rock, and instead of treesand flowers, there were only fantastic rocks and stones. And ever as Iwent, darker grew my thoughts, till at last I had no hope whatever offinding the white lady: I no longer called her to myself MY white lady. Whenever a choice was necessary, I always chose the path which seemed tolead downwards. 

At length I began to find that these regions were inhabited. From behinda rock a peal of harsh grating laughter, full of evil humour, rangthrough my ears, and, looking round, I saw a queer, goblin creature, with a great head and ridiculous features, just such as those described, in German histories and travels, as Kobolds. "What do you want with me?"I said. He pointed at me with a long forefinger, very thick at the root, and sharpened to a point, and answered, "He! he! he! what do YOUwant here?" Then, changing his tone, he continued, with mockhumility--"Honoured sir, vouchsafe to withdraw from thy slaves thelustre of thy august presence, for thy slaves cannot support itsbrightness. " A second appeared, and struck in: "You are so big, you keepthe sun from us. We can't see for you, and we're so cold. " Thereuponarose, on all sides, the most terrific uproar of laughter, from voiceslike those of children in volume, but scrannel and harsh as those ofdecrepit age, though, unfortunately, without its weakness. The wholepandemonium of fairy devils, of all varieties of fantastic ugliness, both in form and feature, and of all sizes from one to four feet, seemedto have suddenly assembled about me. At length, after a great babble oftalk among themselves, in a language unknown to me, and after seeminglyendless gesticulation, consultation, elbow-nudging, and unmitigatedpeals of laughter, they formed into a circle about one of their number, who scrambled upon a stone, and, much to my surprise, and somewhat tomy dismay, began to sing, in a voice corresponding in its nature to histalking one, from beginning to end, the song with which I had broughtthe light into the eyes of the white lady. He sang the same air too;and, all the time, maintained a face of mock entreaty and worship;accompanying the song with the travestied gestures of one playing onthe lute. The whole assembly kept silence, except at the close of everyverse, when they roared, and danced, and shouted with laughter, andflung themselves on the ground, in real or pretended convulsions ofdelight. When he had finished, the singer threw himself from the topof the stone, turning heels over head several times in his descent; andwhen he did alight, it was on the top of his head, on which he hoppedabout, making the most grotesque gesticulations with his legs in theair. Inexpressible laughter followed, which broke up in a shower oftiny stones from innumerable hands. They could not materially injure me, although they cut me on the head and face. I attempted to run away, butthey all rushed upon me, and, laying hold of every part that affordeda grasp, held me tight. Crowding about me like bees, they shouted aninsect-swarm of exasperating speeches up into my face, among which themost frequently recurring were--"You shan't have her; you shan't haveher; he! he! he! She's for a better man; how he'll kiss her! how he'llkiss her!"

The galvanic torrent of this battery of malevolence stung to life withinme a spark of nobleness, and I said aloud, "Well, if he is a better man, let him have her. "

They instantly let go their hold of me, and fell back a step or two, with a whole broadside of grunts and humphs, as of unexpected anddisappointed approbation. I made a step or two forward, and a lane wasinstantly opened for me through the midst of the grinning little antics, who bowed most politely to me on every side as I passed. After I hadgone a few yards, I looked back, and saw them all standing quite still, looking after me, like a great school of boys; till suddenly one turnedround, and with a loud whoop, rushed into the midst of the others. Inan instant, the whole was one writhing and tumbling heap of contortion, reminding me of the live pyramids of intertwined snakes of whichtravellers make report. As soon as one was worked out of the mass, hebounded off a few paces, and then, with a somersault and a run, threwhimself gyrating into the air, and descended with all his weight on thesummit of the heaving and struggling chaos of fantastic figures. I leftthem still busy at this fierce and apparently aimless amusement. And asI went, I sang--

 If a nobler waits for thee, I will weep aside; It is well that thou should'st be, Of the nobler, bride. 

 For if love builds up the home, Where the heart is free, Homeless yet the heart must roam, That has not found thee. 

 One must suffer: I, for her Yield in her my part Take her, thou art worthier-- Still I be still, my heart!

 Gift ungotten! largess high Of a frustrate will! But to yield it lovingly Is a something still. 

Then a little song arose of itself in my soul; and I felt for themoment, while it sank sadly within me, as if I was once more walking upand down the white hall of Phantasy in the Fairy Palace. But this lastedno longer than the song; as will be seen. 

 Do not vex thy violet Perfume to afford: Else no odour thou wilt get From its little hoard. 

 In thy lady's gracious eyes Look not thou too long; Else from them the glory flies, And thou dost her wrong. 

 Come not thou too near the maid, Clasp her not too wild; Else the splendour is allayed, And thy heart beguiled. 

A crash of laughter, more discordant and deriding than any I had yetheard, invaded my ears. Looking on in the direction of the sound, I sawa little elderly woman, much taller, however, than the goblins I hadjust left, seated upon a stone by the side of the path. She rose, as Idrew near, and came forward to meet me. 

She was very plain and commonplace in appearance, without beinghideously ugly. Looking up in my face with a stupid sneer, she said:"Isn't it a pity you haven't a pretty girl to walk all alone withyou through this sweet country? How different everything would look?wouldn't it? Strange that one can never have what one would like best!How the roses would bloom and all that, even in this infernal hole!wouldn't they, Anodos? Her eyes would light up the old cave, wouldn'tthey?"

"That depends on who the pretty girl should be, " replied I. 

"Not so very much matter that, " she answered; "look here. "

I had turned to go away as I gave my reply, but now I stopped and lookedat her. As a rough unsightly bud might suddenly blossom into the mostlovely flower; or rather, as a sunbeam bursts through a shapeless cloud, and transfigures the earth; so burst a face of resplendent beauty, as itwere THROUGH the unsightly visage of the woman, destroying it with lightas it dawned through it. A summer sky rose above me, gray with heat;across a shining slumberous landscape, looked from afar the peaks ofsnow-capped mountains; and down from a great rock beside me fell a sheetof water mad with its own delight. 

"Stay with me, " she said, lifting up her exquisite face, and lookingfull in mine. 

I drew back. Again the infernal laugh grated upon my ears; again therocks closed in around me, and the ugly woman looked at me with wicked, mocking hazel eyes. 

"You shall have your reward, " said she. "You shall see your white ladyagain. "

"That lies not with you, " I replied, and turned and left her. 

She followed me with shriek upon shriek of laughter, as I went on myway. 

I may mention here, that although there was always light enough to seemy path and a few yards on every side of me, I never could find out thesource of this sad sepulchral illumination. 

CHAPTER XVIII

 "In the wind's uproar, the sea's raging grim, And the sighs that are born in him. " HEINE. 

 "From dreams of bliss shall men awake One day, but not to weep: The dreams remain; they only break The mirror of the sleep. " JEAN PAUL, Hesperus. 

How I got through this dreary part of my travels, I do not know. I donot think I was upheld by the hope that any moment the light might breakin upon me; for I scarcely thought about that. I went on with a dullendurance, varied by moments of uncontrollable sadness; for more andmore the conviction grew upon me that I should never see the whitelady again. It may seem strange that one with whom I had held so littlecommunion should have so engrossed my thoughts; but benefits conferredawaken love in some minds, as surely as benefits received in others. Besides being delighted and proud that my songs had called thebeautiful creature to life, the same fact caused me to feel a tendernessunspeakable for her, accompanied with a kind of feeling of property inher; for so the goblin Selfishness would reward the angel Love. Whento all this is added, an overpowering sense of her beauty, andan unquestioning conviction that this was a true index to inwardloveliness, it may be understood how it came to pass that my imaginationfilled my whole soul with the play of its own multitudinous colours andharmonies around the form which yet stood, a gracious marble radiance, in the midst of ITS white hall of phantasy. The time passed by unheeded;for my thoughts were busy. Perhaps this was also in part the cause of myneeding no food, and never thinking how I should find any, during thissubterraneous part of my travels. How long they endured I could nottell, for I had no means of measuring time; and when I looked back, there was such a discrepancy between the decisions of my imaginationand my judgment, as to the length of time that had passed, that I wasbewildered, and gave up all attempts to arrive at any conclusion on thepoint. 

A gray mist continually gathered behind me. When I looked back towardsthe past, this mist was the medium through which my eyes had to strainfor a vision of what had gone by; and the form of the white lady hadreceded into an unknown region. At length the country of rock beganto close again around me, gradually and slowly narrowing, till I foundmyself walking in a gallery of rock once more, both sides of which Icould touch with my outstretched hands. It narrowed yet, until Iwas forced to move carefully, in order to avoid striking against theprojecting pieces of rock. The roof sank lower and lower, until I wascompelled, first to stoop, and then to creep on my hands and knees. It recalled terrible dreams of childhood; but I was not much afraid, because I felt sure that this was my path, and my only hope of leavingFairy Land, of which I was now almost weary. 

At length, on getting past an abrupt turn in the passage, throughwhich I had to force myself, I saw, a few yards ahead of me, thelong-forgotten daylight shining through a small opening, to which thepath, if path it could now be called, led me. With great difficulty Iaccomplished these last few yards, and came forth to the day. I stood onthe shore of a wintry sea, with a wintry sun just a few feet above itshorizon-edge. It was bare, and waste, and gray. Hundreds of hopelesswaves rushed constantly shorewards, falling exhausted upon a beachof great loose stones, that seemed to stretch miles and miles in bothdirections. There was nothing for the eye but mingling shades ofgray; nothing for the ear but the rush of the coming, the roar of thebreaking, and the moan of the retreating wave. No rock lifted up asheltering severity above the dreariness around; even that from which Ihad myself emerged rose scarcely a foot above the opening by which Ihad reached the dismal day, more dismal even than the tomb I had left. A cold, death-like wind swept across the shore, seeming to issue from apale mouth of cloud upon the horizon. Sign of life was nowhere visible. I wandered over the stones, up and down the beach, a human imbodiment ofthe nature around me. The wind increased; its keen waves flowed throughmy soul; the foam rushed higher up the stones; a few dead stars beganto gleam in the east; the sound of the waves grew louder and yet moredespairing. A dark curtain of cloud was lifted up, and a pale blue rentshone between its foot and the edge of the sea, out from which rushed anicy storm of frozen wind, that tore the waters into spray as it passed, and flung the billows in raving heaps upon the desolate shore. I couldbear it no longer. 

"I will not be tortured to death, " I cried; "I will meet it half-way. The life within me is yet enough to bear me up to the face of Death, andthen I die unconquered. "

Before it had grown so dark, I had observed, though without anyparticular interest, that on one part of the shore a low platform ofrock seemed to run out far into the midst of the breaking waters. 

Towards this I now went, scrambling over smooth stones, to which scarceeven a particle of sea-weed clung; and having found it, I got on it, andfollowed its direction, as near as I could guess, out into the tumblingchaos. I could hardly keep my feet against the wind and sea. The wavesrepeatedly all but swept me off my path; but I kept on my way, till Ireached the end of the low promontory, which, in the fall of the waves, rose a good many feet above the surface, and, in their rise, was coveredwith their waters. I stood one moment and gazed into the heaving abyssbeneath me; then plunged headlong into the mounting wave below. Ablessing, like the kiss of a mother, seemed to alight on my soul; acalm, deeper than that which accompanies a hope deferred, bathed myspirit. I sank far into the waters, and sought not to return. I felt asif once more the great arms of the beech-tree were around me, soothingme after the miseries I had passed through, and telling me, like alittle sick child, that I should be better to-morrow. The waters ofthemselves lifted me, as with loving arms, to the surface. I breathedagain, but did not unclose my eyes. I would not look on the wintry sea, and the pitiless gray sky. Thus I floated, till something gently touchedme. It was a little boat floating beside me. How it came there I couldnot tell; but it rose and sank on the waters, and kept touching me inits fall, as if with a human will to let me know that help was by me. Itwas a little gay-coloured boat, seemingly covered with glistering scaleslike those of a fish, all of brilliant rainbow hues. I scrambled intoit, and lay down in the bottom, with a sense of exquisite repose. 

Then I drew over me a rich, heavy, purple cloth that was beside me; and, lying still, knew, by the sound of the waters, that my little bark wasfleeting rapidly onwards. Finding, however, none of that stormy motionwhich the sea had manifested when I beheld it from the shore, I openedmy eyes; and, looking first up, saw above me the deep violet sky of awarm southern night; and then, lifting my head, saw that I was sailingfast upon a summer sea, in the last border of a southern twilight. Theaureole of the sun yet shot the extreme faint tips of its longest raysabove the horizon-waves, and withdrew them not. It was a perpetualtwilight. The stars, great and earnest, like children's eyes, bent downlovingly towards the waters; and the reflected stars within seemed tofloat up, as if longing to meet their embraces. But when I looked down, a new wonder met my view. For, vaguely revealed beneath the wave, Ifloated above my whole Past. The fields of my childhood flitted by; thehalls of my youthful labours; the streets of great cities where I haddwelt; and the assemblies of men and women wherein I had wearied myselfseeking for rest. But so indistinct were the visions, that sometimesI thought I was sailing on a shallow sea, and that strange rocks andforests of sea-plants beguiled my eye, sufficiently to be transformed, by the magic of the phantasy, into well-known objects and regions. Yet, at times, a beloved form seemed to lie close beneath me in sleep; andthe eyelids would tremble as if about to forsake the conscious eye;and the arms would heave upwards, as if in dreams they sought for asatisfying presence. But these motions might come only from the heavingof the waters between those forms and me. Soon I fell asleep, overcomewith fatigue and delight. In dreams of unspeakable joy--of restoredfriendships; of revived embraces; of love which said it had never died;of faces that had vanished long ago, yet said with smiling lips thatthey knew nothing of the grave; of pardons implored, and granted withsuch bursting floods of love, that I was almost glad I had sinned--thusI passed through this wondrous twilight. I awoke with the feeling that Ihad been kissed and loved to my heart's content; and found that my boatwas floating motionless by the grassy shore of a little island. 

CHAPTER XIX

 "In still rest, in changeless simplicity, I bear, uninterrupted, the consciousness of the whole of Humanity within me. "--SCHLEIERMACHERS, Monologen. 

 ". .. Such a sweetness, such a grace, In all thy speech appear, That what to th'eye a beauteous face, That thy tongue is to the ear. " --COWLEY. 

The water was deep to the very edge; and I sprang from the little boatupon a soft grassy turf. The island seemed rich with a profusion of allgrasses and low flowers. All delicate lowly things were most plentiful;but no trees rose skywards, not even a bush overtopped the tall grasses, except in one place near the cottage I am about to describe, where a fewplants of the gum-cistus, which drops every night all the blossoms thatthe day brings forth, formed a kind of natural arbour. The whole islandlay open to the sky and sea. It rose nowhere more than a few feet abovethe level of the waters, which flowed deep all around its border. Herethere seemed to be neither tide nor storm. A sense of persistent calmand fulness arose in the mind at the sight of the slow, pulse-like riseand fall of the deep, clear, unrippled waters against the bank of theisland, for shore it could hardly be called, being so much more likethe edge of a full, solemn river. As I walked over the grass towards thecottage, which stood at a little distance from the bank, all the flowersof childhood looked at me with perfect child-eyes out of the grass. Myheart, softened by the dreams through which it had passed, overflowedin a sad, tender love towards them. They looked to me like childrenimpregnably fortified in a helpless confidence. The sun stood half-waydown the western sky, shining very soft and golden; and there grew asecond world of shadows amidst the world of grasses and wild flowers. 

The cottage was square, with low walls, and a high pyramidal roofthatched with long reeds, of which the withered blossoms hung over allthe eaves. It is noticeable that most of the buildings I saw in FairyLand were cottages. There was no path to a door, nor, indeed, was thereany track worn by footsteps in the island. 

The cottage rose right out of the smooth turf. It had no windows that Icould see; but there was a door in the centre of the side facing me, up to which I went. I knocked, and the sweetest voice I had ever heardsaid, "Come in. " I entered. A bright fire was burning on a hearth inthe centre of the earthern floor, and the smoke found its way out at anopening in the centre of the pyramidal roof. Over the fire hung a littlepot, and over the pot bent a woman-face, the most wonderful, I thought, that I had ever beheld. For it was older than any countenance I had everlooked upon. There was not a spot in which a wrinkle could lie, where awrinkle lay not. And the skin was ancient and brown, like old parchment. The woman's form was tall and spare: and when she stood up to welcomeme, I saw that she was straight as an arrow. Could that voice ofsweetness have issued from those lips of age? Mild as they were, couldthey be the portals whence flowed such melody? But the moment I sawher eyes, I no longer wondered at her voice: they were absolutelyyoung--those of a woman of five-and-twenty, large, and of a clear gray. Wrinkles had beset them all about; the eyelids themselves were old, andheavy, and worn; but the eyes were very incarnations of soft light. Sheheld out her hand to me, and the voice of sweetness again greeted me, with the single word, "Welcome. " She set an old wooden chair for me, near the fire, and went on with her cooking. A wondrous sense of refugeand repose came upon me. I felt like a boy who has got home from school, miles across the hills, through a heavy storm of wind and snow. Almost, as I gazed on her, I sprang from my seat to kiss those old lips. Andwhen, having finished her cooking, she brought some of the dish she hadprepared, and set it on a little table by me, covered with a snow-whitecloth, I could not help laying my head on her bosom, and burstinginto happy tears. She put her arms round me, saying, "Poor child; poorchild!"

As I continued to weep, she gently disengaged herself, and, taking aspoon, put some of the food (I did not know what it was) to my lips, entreating me most endearingly to swallow it. To please her, I made aneffort, and succeeded. She went on feeding me like a baby, with one armround me, till I looked up in her face and smiled: then she gave me thespoon and told me to eat, for it would do me good. I obeyed her, andfound myself wonderfully refreshed. Then she drew near the fire anold-fashioned couch that was in the cottage, and making me lie downupon it, sat at my feet, and began to sing. Amazing store of old balladsrippled from her lips, over the pebbles of ancient tunes; and the voicethat sang was sweet as the voice of a tuneful maiden that singeth everfrom very fulness of song. The songs were almost all sad, but with asound of comfort. One I can faintly recall. It was something like this:

 Sir Aglovaile through the churchyard rode; SING, ALL ALONE I LIE: Little recked he where'er he yode, ALL ALONE, UP IN THE SKY. 

 Swerved his courser, and plunged with fear ALL ALONE I LIE: His cry might have wakened the dead men near, ALL ALONE, UP IN THE SKY. 

 The very dead that lay at his feet, Lapt in the mouldy winding-sheet. 

 But he curbed him and spurred him, until he stood Still in his place, like a horse of wood, With nostrils uplift, and eyes wide and wan; But the sweat in streams from his fetlocks ran. 

 A ghost grew out of the shadowy air, And sat in the midst of her moony hair. 

 In her gleamy hair she sat and wept; In the dreamful moon they lay and slept;

 The shadows above, and the bodies below, Lay and slept in the moonbeams slow. 

 And she sang, like the moan of an autumn wind Over the stubble left behind:

 Alas, how easily things go wrong! A sigh too much, or a kiss too long, And there follows a mist and a weeping rain, And life is never the same again. 

 Alas, how hardly things go right! 'Tis hard to watch on a summer night, For the sigh will come and the kiss will stay, And the summer night is a winter day. 

 "Oh, lovely ghosts my heart is woes To see thee weeping and wailing so. 

 Oh, lovely ghost, " said the fearless knight, "Can the sword of a warrior set it right?

 Or prayer of bedesman, praying mild, As a cup of water a feverish child, Sooth thee at last, in dreamless mood To sleep the sleep a dead lady should?

 Thine eyes they fill me with longing sore, As if I had known thee for evermore. 

 Oh, lovely ghost, I could leave the day To sit with thee in the moon away

 If thou wouldst trust me, and lay thy head To rest on a bosom that is not dead. " The lady sprang up with a strange ghost-cry, And she flung her white ghost-arms on high:

 And she laughed a laugh that was not gay, And it lengthened out till it died away;

 And the dead beneath turned and moaned, And the yew-trees above they shuddered and groaned. 

 "Will he love me twice with a love that is vain? Will he kill the poor ghost yet again?

 I thought thou wert good; but I said, and wept: 'Can I have dreamed who have not slept?'

 And I knew, alas! or ever I would, Whether I dreamed, or thou wert good. 

 When my baby died, my brain grew wild. I awoke, and found I was with my child. "

 "If thou art the ghost of my Adelaide, How is it? Thou wert but a village maid, And thou seemest an angel lady white, Though thin, and wan, and past delight. "

 The lady smiled a flickering smile, And she pressed her temples hard the while. 

 "Thou seest that Death for a woman can Do more than knighthood for a man. "

 "But show me the child thou callest mine, Is she out to-night in the ghost's sunshine?"

 "In St. Peter's Church she is playing on, At hide-and-seek, with Apostle John. 

 When the moonbeams right through the window go, Where the twelve are standing in glorious show, She says the rest of them do not stir, But one comes down to play with her. 

 Then I can go where I list, and weep, For good St. John my child will keep. "

 "Thy beauty filleth the very air, Never saw I a woman so fair. "

 "Come, if thou darest, and sit by my side; But do not touch me, or woe will betide. 

 Alas, I am weak: I might well know This gladness betokens some further woe. 

 Yet come. It will come. I will bear it. I can. For thou lovest me yet--though but as a man. "

 The knight dismounted in earnest speed; Away through the tombstones thundered the steed, And fell by the outer wall, and died. But the knight he kneeled by the lady's side;

 Kneeled beside her in wondrous bliss, Rapt in an everlasting kiss:

 Though never his lips come the lady nigh, And his eyes alone on her beauty lie. 

 All the night long, till the cock crew loud, He kneeled by the lady, lapt in her shroud. 

 And what they said, I may not say: Dead night was sweeter than living day. 

 How she made him so blissful glad Who made her and found her so ghostly sad, I may not tell; but it needs no touch To make them blessed who love so much. 

 "Come every night, my ghost, to me; And one night I will come to thee. 

 'Tis good to have a ghostly wife: She will not tremble at clang of strife;

 She will only hearken, amid the din, Behind the door, if he cometh in. "

 And this is how Sir Aglovaile Often walked in the moonlight pale. 

 And oft when the crescent but thinned the gloom, Full orbed moonlight filled his room;

 And through beneath his chamber door, Fell a ghostly gleam on the outer floor;

 And they that passed, in fear averred That murmured words they often heard. 

 'Twas then that the eastern crescent shone Through the chancel window, and good St. John

 Played with the ghost-child all the night, And the mother was free till the morning light, And sped through the dawning night, to stay With Aglovaile till the break of day. 

 And their love was a rapture, lone and high, And dumb as the moon in the topmost sky. 

 One night Sir Aglovaile, weary, slept And dreamed a dream wherein he wept. 

 A warrior he was, not often wept he, But this night he wept full bitterly. 

 He woke--beside him the ghost-girl shone Out of the dark: 'twas the eve of St. John. 

 He had dreamed a dream of a still, dark wood, Where the maiden of old beside him stood;

 But a mist came down, and caught her away, And he sought her in vain through the pathless day, Till he wept with the grief that can do no more, And thought he had dreamt the dream before. 

 From bursting heart the weeping flowed on; And lo! beside him the ghost-girl shone;

 Shone like the light on a harbour's breast, Over the sea of his dream's unrest;

 Shone like the wondrous, nameless boon, That the heart seeks ever, night or noon:

 Warnings forgotten, when needed most, He clasped to his bosom the radiant ghost. 

 She wailed aloud, and faded, and sank. With upturn'd white face, cold and blank, In his arms lay the corpse of the maiden pale, And she came no more to Sir Aglovaile. 

 Only a voice, when winds were wild, Sobbed and wailed like a chidden child. 

 Alas, how easily things go wrong! A sigh too much, or a kiss too long, And there follows a mist and a weeping rain, And life is never the same again. 

This was one of the simplest of her songs, which, perhaps, is the causeof my being able to remember it better than most of the others. Whileshe sung, I was in Elysium, with the sense of a rich soul upholding, embracing, and overhanging mine, full of all plenty and bounty. I feltas if she could give me everything I wanted; as if I should never wishto leave her, but would be content to be sung to and fed by her, dayafter day, as years rolled by. At last I fell asleep while she sang. 

When I awoke, I knew not whether it was night or day. The fire had sunkto a few red embers, which just gave light enough to show me the womanstanding a few feet from me, with her back towards me, facing thedoor by which I had entered. She was weeping, but very gently andplentifully. The tears seemed to come freely from her heart. Thus shestood for a few minutes; then, slowly turning at right angles to herformer position, she faced another of the four sides of the cottage. I now observed, for the first time, that here was a door likewise; andthat, indeed, there was one in the centre of every side of the cottage. 

When she looked towards the second door, her tears ceased to flow, butsighs took their place. She often closed her eyes as she stood; andevery time she closed her eyes, a gentle sigh seemed to be born in herheart, and to escape at her lips. But when her eyes were open, hersighs were deep and very sad, and shook her whole frame. Then she turnedtowards the third door, and a cry as of fear or suppressed pain brokefrom her; but she seemed to hearten herself against the dismay, andto front it steadily; for, although I often heard a slight cry, andsometimes a moan, yet she never moved or bent her head, and I felt surethat her eyes never closed. Then she turned to the fourth door, andI saw her shudder, and then stand still as a statue; till at last sheturned towards me and approached the fire. I saw that her face was whiteas death. But she gave one look upwards, and smiled the sweetest, mostchild-innocent smile; then heaped fresh wood on the fire, and, sittingdown by the blaze, drew her wheel near her, and began to spin. Whileshe spun, she murmured a low strange song, to which the hum of the wheelmade a kind of infinite symphony. At length she paused in her spinningand singing, and glanced towards me, like a mother who looks whetheror not her child gives signs of waking. She smiled when she saw that myeyes were open. I asked her whether it was day yet. She answered, "It isalways day here, so long as I keep my fire burning. "

I felt wonderfully refreshed; and a great desire to see more of theisland awoke within me. I rose, and saying that I wished to look aboutme, went towards the door by which I had entered. 

"Stay a moment, " said my hostess, with some trepidation in her voice. "Listen to me. You will not see what you expect when you go out of thatdoor. Only remember this: whenever you wish to come back to me, enterwherever you see this mark. "

She held up her left hand between me and the fire. Upon the palm, whichappeared almost transparent, I saw, in dark red, a mark like this -->which I took care to fix in my mind. 

She then kissed me, and bade me good-bye with a solemnity that awed me;and bewildered me too, seeing I was only going out for a little ramblein an island, which I did not believe larger than could easily becompassed in a few hours' walk at most. As I went she resumed herspinning. 

I opened the door, and stepped out. The moment my foot touched thesmooth sward, I seemed to issue from the door of an old barn on myfather's estate, where, in the hot afternoons, I used to go and lieamongst the straw, and read. It seemed to me now that I had been asleepthere. At a little distance in the field, I saw two of my brothers atplay. The moment they caught sight of me, they called out to me to comeand join them, which I did; and we played together as we had done yearsago, till the red sun went down in the west, and the gray fog beganto rise from the river. Then we went home together with a strangehappiness. As we went, we heard the continually renewed larum of alandrail in the long grass. One of my brothers and I separated to alittle distance, and each commenced running towards the part whence thesound appeared to come, in the hope of approaching the spot where thebird was, and so getting at least a sight of it, if we should not beable to capture the little creature. My father's voice recalled us fromtrampling down the rich long grass, soon to be cut down and laid asidefor the winter. I had quite forgotten all about Fairy Land, and thewonderful old woman, and the curious red mark. 

My favourite brother and I shared the same bed. Some childish disputearose between us; and our last words, ere we fell asleep, were not ofkindness, notwithstanding the pleasures of the day. When I woke in themorning, I missed him. He had risen early, and had gone to bathe in theriver. In another hour, he was brought home drowned. Alas! alas! if wehad only gone to sleep as usual, the one with his arm about the other!Amidst the horror of the moment, a strange conviction flashed across mymind, that I had gone through the very same once before. 

I rushed out of the house, I knew not why, sobbing and crying bitterly. I ran through the fields in aimless distress, till, passing the oldbarn, I caught sight of a red mark on the door. The merest triflessometimes rivet the attention in the deepest misery; the intellect hasso little to do with grief. I went up to look at this mark, which I didnot remember ever to have seen before. As I looked at it, I thought Iwould go in and lie down amongst the straw, for I was very weary withrunning about and weeping. I opened the door; and there in the cottagesat the old woman as I had left her, at her spinning-wheel. 

"I did not expect you quite so soon, " she said, as I shut the doorbehind me. I went up to the couch, and threw myself on it with thatfatigue wherewith one awakes from a feverish dream of hopeless grief. 

The old woman sang:

 The great sun, benighted, May faint from the sky; But love, once uplighted, Will never more die. 

 Form, with its brightness, From eyes will depart: It walketh, in whiteness, The halls of the heart. 

Ere she had ceased singing, my courage had returned. I started from thecouch, and, without taking leave of the old woman, opened the door ofSighs, and sprang into what should appear. 

I stood in a lordly hall, where, by a blazing fire on the hearth, sat alady, waiting, I knew, for some one long desired. A mirror was near me, but I saw that my form had no place within its depths, so I feared notthat I should be seen. The lady wonderfully resembled my marble lady, but was altogether of the daughters of men, and I could not tell whetheror not it was she. 

It was not for me she waited. The tramp of a great horse rang throughthe court without. It ceased, and the clang of armour told that hisrider alighted, and the sound of his ringing heels approached the hall. The door opened; but the lady waited, for she would meet her lord alone. He strode in: she flew like a home-bound dove into his arms, and nestledon the hard steel. It was the knight of the soiled armour. But now thearmour shone like polished glass; and strange to tell, though the mirrorreflected not my form, I saw a dim shadow of myself in the shiningsteel. 

"O my beloved, thou art come, and I am blessed. "

Her soft fingers speedily overcame the hard clasp of his helmet; one byone she undid the buckles of his armour; and she toiled under theweight of the mail, as she WOULD carry it aside. Then she unclaspedhis greaves, and unbuckled his spurs; and once more she sprang intohis arms, and laid her head where she could now feel the beating of hisheart. Then she disengaged herself from his embrace, and, moving back astep or two, gazed at him. He stood there a mighty form, crowned with anoble head, where all sadness had disappeared, or had been absorbed insolemn purpose. Yet I suppose that he looked more thoughtful thanthe lady had expected to see him, for she did not renew her caresses, although his face glowed with love, and the few words he spoke wereas mighty deeds for strength; but she led him towards the hearth, andseated him in an ancient chair, and set wine before him, and sat at hisfeet. 

"I am sad, " he said, "when I think of the youth whom I met twice in theforests of Fairy Land; and who, you say, twice, with his songs, rousedyou from the death-sleep of an evil enchantment. There was somethingnoble in him, but it was a nobleness of thought, and not of deed. He mayyet perish of vile fear. "

"Ah!" returned the lady, "you saved him once, and for that I thank you;for may I not say that I somewhat loved him? But tell me how you fared, when you struck your battle-axe into the ash-tree, and he came and foundyou; for so much of the story you had told me, when the beggar-childcame and took you away. "

"As soon as I saw him, " rejoined the knight, "I knew that earthly armsavailed not against such as he; and that my soul must meet him in itsnaked strength. So I unclasped my helm, and flung it on the ground; and, holding my good axe yet in my hand, gazed at him with steady eyes. Onhe came, a horror indeed, but I did not flinch. Endurance must conquer, where force could not reach. He came nearer and nearer, till the ghastlyface was close to mine. A shudder as of death ran through me; but Ithink I did not move, for he seemed to quail, and retreated. As soonas he gave back, I struck one more sturdy blow on the stem of his tree, that the forest rang; and then looked at him again. He writhed andgrinned with rage and apparent pain, and again approached me, butretreated sooner than before. I heeded him no more, but hewed with awill at the tree, till the trunk creaked, and the head bowed, and with acrash it fell to the earth. Then I looked up from my labour, and lo! thespectre had vanished, and I saw him no more; nor ever in my wanderingshave I heard of him again. "

"Well struck! well withstood! my hero, " said the lady. 

"But, " said the knight, somewhat troubled, "dost thou love the youthstill?"

"Ah!" she replied, "how can I help it? He woke me from worse than death;he loved me. I had never been for thee, if he had not sought me first. But I love him not as I love thee. He was but the moon of my night; thouart the sun of my clay, O beloved. "

"Thou art right, " returned the noble man. "It were hard, indeed, not tohave some love in return for such a gift as he hath given thee. I, too, owe him more than words can speak. "

Humbled before them, with an aching and desolate heart, I yet could notrestrain my words:

"Let me, then, be the moon of thy night still, O woman! And when thy dayis beclouded, as the fairest days will be, let some song of mine comfortthee, as an old, withered, half-forgotten thing, that belongs to anancient mournful hour of uncompleted birth, which yet was beautiful inits time. "

They sat silent, and I almost thought they were listening. The colour ofthe lady's eyes grew deeper and deeper; the slow tears grew, and filledthem, and overflowed. They rose, and passed, hand in hand, closeto where I stood; and each looked towards me in passing. Then theydisappeared through a door which closed behind them; but, ere it closed, I saw that the room into which it opened was a rich chamber, hung withgorgeous arras. I stood with an ocean of sighs frozen in my bosom. Icould remain no longer. She was near me, and I could not see her; nearme in the arms of one loved better than I, and I would not see her, andI would not be by her. But how to escape from the nearness of the bestbeloved? I had not this time forgotten the mark; for the fact that Icould not enter the sphere of these living beings kept me aware that, for me, I moved in a vision, while they moved in life. I looked allabout for the mark, but could see it nowhere; for I avoided lookingjust where it was. There the dull red cipher glowed, on the very door oftheir secret chamber. Struck with agony, I dashed it open, and fell atthe feet of the ancient woman, who still spun on, the whole dissolvedocean of my sighs bursting from me in a storm of tearless sobs. WhetherI fainted or slept, I do not know; but, as I returned to consciousness, before I seemed to have power to move, I heard the woman singing, andcould distinguish the words:

 O light of dead and of dying days! O Love! in thy glory go, In a rosy mist and a moony maze, O'er the pathless peaks of snow. 

 But what is left for the cold gray soul, That moans like a wounded dove? One wine is left in the broken bowl!-- 'Tis--TO LOVE, AND LOVE AND LOVE. 

 Now I could weep. When she saw me weeping, she sang:

 Better to sit at the waters' birth, Than a sea of waves to win; To live in the love that floweth forth, Than the love that cometh in. 

 Be thy heart a well of love, my child, Flowing, and free, and sure; For a cistern of love, though undefiled, Keeps not the spirit pure. 

I rose from the earth, loving the white lady as I had never loved herbefore. 

Then I walked up to the door of Dismay, and opened it, and went out. Andlo! I came forth upon a crowded street, where men and women went toand fro in multitudes. I knew it well; and, turning to one hand, walkedsadly along the pavement. Suddenly I saw approaching me, a little wayoff, a form well known to me (WELL-KNOWN!--alas, how weak the word!) inthe years when I thought my boyhood was left behind, and shortly beforeI entered the realm of Fairy Land. Wrong and Sorrow had gone together, hand-in-hand as it is well they do. 

Unchangeably dear was that face. It lay in my heart as a child lies inits own white bed; but I could not meet her. 

"Anything but that, " I said, and, turning aside, sprang up the stepsto a door, on which I fancied I saw the mystic sign. I entered--not themysterious cottage, but her home. I rushed wildly on, and stood by thedoor of her room. 

"She is out, " I said, "I will see the old room once more. "

I opened the door gently, and stood in a great solemn church. Adeep-toned bell, whose sounds throbbed and echoed and swam through theempty building, struck the hour of midnight. The moon shone throughthe windows of the clerestory, and enough of the ghostly radiance wasdiffused through the church to let me see, walking with a stately, yetsomewhat trailing and stumbling step, down the opposite aisle, for Istood in one of the transepts, a figure dressed in a white robe, whetherfor the night, or for that longer night which lies too deep for the day, I could not tell. Was it she? and was this her chamber? I crossed thechurch, and followed. The figure stopped, seemed to ascend as it werea high bed, and lay down. I reached the place where it lay, glimmeringwhite. The bed was a tomb. The light was too ghostly to see clearly, butI passed my hand over the face and the hands and the feet, which wereall bare. They were cold--they were marble, but I knew them. It grewdark. I turned to retrace my steps, but found, ere long, that I hadwandered into what seemed a little chapel. I groped about, seeking thedoor. Everything I touched belonged to the dead. My hands fell on thecold effigy of a knight who lay with his legs crossed and his swordbroken beside him. He lay in his noble rest, and I lived on in ignoblestrife. I felt for the left hand and a certain finger; I found there thering I knew: he was one of my own ancestors. I was in the chapel overthe burial-vault of my race. I called aloud: "If any of the dead aremoving here, let them take pity upon me, for I, alas! am still alive;and let some dead woman comfort me, for I am a stranger in the land ofthe dead, and see no light. " A warm kiss alighted on my lips throughthe dark. And I said, "The dead kiss well; I will not be afraid. " And agreat hand was reached out of the dark, and grasped mine for a moment, mightily and tenderly. I said to myself: "The veil between, though verydark, is very thin. "

Groping my way further, I stumbled over the heavy stone that covered theentrance of the vault: and, in stumbling, descried upon the stone themark, glowing in red fire. I caught the great ring. All my effort couldnot have moved the huge slab; but it opened the door of the cottage, andI threw myself once more, pale and speechless, on the couch beside theancient dame. She sang once more:

 Thou dreamest: on a rock thou art, High o'er the broken wave; Thou fallest with a fearful start But not into thy grave; For, waking in the morning's light, Thou smilest at the vanished night

 So wilt thou sink, all pale and dumb, Into the fainting gloom; But ere the coming terrors come, Thou wak'st--where is the tomb? Thou wak'st--the dead ones smile above, With hovering arms of sleepless love. 

 She paused; then sang again:

 We weep for gladness, weep for grief; The tears they are the same; We sigh for longing, and relief; The sighs have but one name, And mingled in the dying strife, Are moans that are not sad The pangs of death are throbs of life, Its sighs are sometimes glad. 

 The face is very strange and white: It is Earth's only spot That feebly flickers back the light The living seeth not. 

 I fell asleep, and slept a dreamless sleep, for I know not howlong. When I awoke, I found that my hostess had moved from where she hadbeen sitting, and now sat between me and the fourth door. 

I guessed that her design was to prevent my entering there. I sprangfrom the couch, and darted past her to the door. I opened it at once andwent out. All I remember is a cry of distress from the woman: "Don't gothere, my child! Don't go there!" But I was gone. 

I knew nothing more; or, if I did, I had forgot it all when I awoke toconsciousness, lying on the floor of the cottage, with my head in thelap of the woman, who was weeping over me, and stroking my hair withboth hands, talking to me as a mother might talk to a sick and sleeping, or a dead child. As soon as I looked up and saw her, she smiledthrough her tears; smiled with withered face and young eyes, till hercountenance was irradiated with the light of the smile. Then she bathedmy head and face and hands in an icy cold, colourless liquid, whichsmelt a little of damp earth. Immediately I was able to sit up. She roseand put some food before me. When I had eaten, she said: "Listen to me, my child. You must leave me directly!"

"Leave you!" I said. "I am so happy with you. I never was so happy in mylife. "

"But you must go, " she rejoined sadly. "Listen! What do you hear?"

"I hear the sound as of a great throbbing of water. "

"Ah! you do hear it? Well, I had to go through that door--the door ofthe Timeless" (and she shuddered as she pointed to the fourth door)--"tofind you; for if I had not gone, you would never have entered again;and because I went, the waters around my cottage will rise and rise, and flow and come, till they build a great firmament of waters over mydwelling. But as long as I keep my fire burning, they cannot enter. I have fuel enough for years; and after one year they will sink awayagain, and be just as they were before you came. I have not been buriedfor a hundred years now. " And she smiled and wept. 

"Alas! alas!" I cried. "I have brought this evil on the best and kindestof friends, who has filled my heart with great gifts. "

"Do not think of that, " she rejoined. "I can bear it very well. You willcome back to me some day, I know. But I beg you, for my sake, mydear child, to do one thing. In whatever sorrow you may be, howeverinconsolable and irremediable it may appear, believe me that the oldwoman in the cottage, with the young eyes" (and she smiled), "knowssomething, though she must not always tell it, that would quite satisfyyou about it, even in the worst moments of your distress. Now you mustgo. "

"But how can I go, if the waters are all about, and if the doors alllead into other regions and other worlds?"

"This is not an island, " she replied; "but is joined to the land by anarrow neck; and for the door, I will lead you myself through the rightone. "

She took my hand, and led me through the third door; whereupon I foundmyself standing in the deep grassy turf on which I had landed from thelittle boat, but upon the opposite side of the cottage. She pointed outthe direction I must take, to find the isthmus and escape the risingwaters. 

Then putting her arms around me, she held me to her bosom; and as Ikissed her, I felt as if I were leaving my mother for the first time, and could not help weeping bitterly. At length she gently pushed meaway, and with the words, "Go, my son, and do something worth doing, "turned back, and, entering the cottage, closed the door behind her. Ifelt very desolate as I went. 

CHAPTER XX

 "Thou hadst no fame; that which thou didst like good Was but thy appetite that swayed thy blood For that time to the best; for as a blast That through a house comes, usually doth cast Things out of order, yet by chance may come And blow some one thing to his proper room, So did thy appetite, and not thy zeal, Sway thee by chance to do some one thing well. " FLETCHER'S Faithful Shepherdess. 

 "The noble hart that harbours vertuous thought And is with childe of glorious great intent, Can never rest, until it forth have brought Th' eternall brood of glorie excellent. " SPENSER, The Faerie Queene. 

I had not gone very far before I felt that the turf beneath my feet wassoaked with the rising waters. But I reached the isthmus in safety. Itwas rocky, and so much higher than the level of the peninsula, that Ihad plenty of time to cross. I saw on each side of me the water risingrapidly, altogether without wind, or violent motion, or broken waves, but as if a slow strong fire were glowing beneath it. Ascending a steepacclivity, I found myself at last in an open, rocky country. Aftertravelling for some hours, as nearly in a straight line as I could, I arrived at a lonely tower, built on the top of a little hill, whichoverlooked the whole neighbouring country. As I approached, I heardthe clang of an anvil; and so rapid were the blows, that I despaired ofmaking myself heard till a pause in the work should ensue. It wassome minutes before a cessation took place; but when it did, I knockedloudly, and had not long to wait; for, a moment after, the door waspartly opened by a noble-looking youth, half-undressed, glowing withheat, and begrimed with the blackness of the forge. In one hand he helda sword, so lately from the furnace that it yet shone with a dull fire. As soon as he saw me, he threw the door wide open, and standing aside, invited me very cordially to enter. I did so; when he shut and boltedthe door most carefully, and then led the way inwards. He brought meinto a rude hall, which seemed to occupy almost the whole of the groundfloor of the little tower, and which I saw was now being used as aworkshop. A huge fire roared on the hearth, beside which was an anvil. By the anvil stood, in similar undress, and in a waiting attitude, hammer in hand, a second youth, tall as the former, but far moreslightly built. Reversing the usual course of perception in suchmeetings, I thought them, at first sight, very unlike; and at the secondglance, knew that they were brothers. The former, and apparently theelder, was muscular and dark, with curling hair, and large hazel eyes, which sometimes grew wondrously soft. The second was slender and fair, yet with a countenance like an eagle, and an eye which, though paleblue, shone with an almost fierce expression. He stood erect, as iflooking from a lofty mountain crag, over a vast plain outstretchedbelow. As soon as we entered the hall, the elder turned to me, and I sawthat a glow of satisfaction shone on both their faces. To my surpriseand great pleasure, he addressed me thus:

"Brother, will you sit by the fire and rest, till we finish this part ofour work?"

I signified my assent; and, resolved to await any disclosure they mightbe inclined to make, seated myself in silence near the hearth. 

The elder brother then laid the sword in the fire, covered it well over, and when it had attained a sufficient degree of heat, drew it out andlaid it on the anvil, moving it carefully about, while the younger, witha succession of quick smart blows, appeared either to be welding it, or hammering one part of it to a consenting shape with the rest. Havingfinished, they laid it carefully in the fire; and, when it was veryhot indeed, plunged it into a vessel full of some liquid, whence a blueflame sprang upwards, as the glowing steel entered. 

There they left it; and drawing two stools to the fire, sat down, one oneach side of me. 

"We are very glad to see you, brother. We have been expecting you forsome days, " said the dark-haired youth. 

"I am proud to be called your brother, " I rejoined; "and you will notthink I refuse the name, if I desire to know why you honour me with it?"

"Ah! then he does not know about it, " said the younger. "We thought youhad known of the bond betwixt us, and the work we have to do together. You must tell him, brother, from the first. "

So the elder began:

"Our father is king of this country. Before we were born, three giantbrothers had appeared in the land. No one knew exactly when, and no onehad the least idea whence they came. They took possession of a ruinedcastle that had stood unchanged and unoccupied within the memory of anyof the country people. The vaults of this castle had remained uninjuredby time, and these, I presume, they made use of at first. They wererarely seen, and never offered the least injury to any one; so that theywere regarded in the neighbourhood as at least perfectly harmless, ifnot rather benevolent beings. But it began to be observed, that the oldcastle had assumed somehow or other, no one knew when or how, a somewhatdifferent look from what it used to have. Not only were several breachesin the lower part of the walls built up, but actually some of thebattlements which yet stood, had been repaired, apparently to preventthem from falling into worse decay, while the more important parts werebeing restored. Of course, every one supposed the giants must have ahand in the work, but no one ever saw them engaged in it. The peasantsbecame yet more uneasy, after one, who had concealed himself, andwatched all night, in the neighbourhood of the castle, reported that hehad seen, in full moonlight, the three huge giants working with mightand main, all night long, restoring to their former position somemassive stones, formerly steps of a grand turnpike stair, a greatportion of which had long since fallen, along with part of the wallof the round tower in which it had been built. This wall they werecompleting, foot by foot, along with the stair. But the people saidthey had no just pretext for interfering: although the real reason forletting the giants alone was, that everybody was far too much afraid ofthem to interrupt them. 

"At length, with the help of a neighbouring quarry, the whole of theexternal wall of the castle was finished. And now the country folks werein greater fear than before. But for several years the giants remainedvery peaceful. The reason of this was afterwards supposed to be thefact, that they were distantly related to several good people in thecountry; for, as long as these lived, they remained quiet; but as soonas they were all dead the real nature of the giants broke out. Havingcompleted the outside of their castle, they proceeded, by spoiling thecountry houses around them, to make a quiet luxurious provision fortheir comfort within. Affairs reached such a pass, that the news oftheir robberies came to my father's ears; but he, alas! was so crippledin his resources, by a war he was carrying on with a neighbouringprince, that he could only spare a very few men, to attempt the captureof their stronghold. Upon these the giants issued in the night, and slewevery man of them. And now, grown bolder by success and impunity, theyno longer confined their depredations to property, but began to seizethe persons of their distinguished neighbours, knights and ladies, andhold them in durance, the misery of which was heightened by allmanner of indignity, until they were redeemed by their friends, at anexorbitant ransom. Many knights have adventured their overthrow, but totheir own instead; for they have all been slain, or captured, or forcedto make a hasty retreat. To crown their enormities, if any man nowattempts their destruction, they, immediately upon his defeat, put oneor more of their captives to a shameful death, on a turret in sight ofall passers-by; so that they have been much less molested of late;and we, although we have burned, for years, to attack these demonsand destroy them, dared not, for the sake of their captives, risk theadventure, before we should have reached at least our earliest manhood. Now, however, we are preparing for the attempt; and the grounds ofthis preparation are these. Having only the resolution, and not theexperience necessary for the undertaking, we went and consulted a lonelywoman of wisdom, who lives not very far from here, in the direction ofthe quarter from which you have come. She received us most kindly, andgave us what seems to us the best of advice. She first inquired whatexperience we had had in arms. We told her we had been well exercisedfrom our boyhood, and for some years had kept ourselves in constantpractice, with a view to this necessity. 

"'But you have not actually fought for life and death?' said she. 

"We were forced to confess we had not. 

"'So much the better in some respects, ' she replied. 'Now listen to me. Go first and work with an armourer, for as long time as you find needfulto obtain a knowledge of his craft; which will not be long, seeing yourhearts will be all in the work. Then go to some lonely tower, you twoalone. Receive no visits from man or woman. There forge for yourselvesevery piece of armour that you wish to wear, or to use, in your comingencounter. And keep up your exercises. As, however, two of you can be nomatch for the three giants, I will find you, if I can, a third brother, who will take on himself the third share of the fight, and thepreparation. Indeed, I have already seen one who will, I think, be thevery man for your fellowship, but it will be some time before he comesto me. He is wandering now without an aim. I will show him to you in aglass, and, when he comes, you will know him at once. If he will shareyour endeavours, you must teach him all you know, and he will repay youwell, in present song, and in future deeds. '

"She opened the door of a curious old cabinet that stood in the room. On the inside of this door was an oval convex mirror. Looking in it forsome time, we at length saw reflected the place where we stood, and theold dame seated in her chair. Our forms were not reflected. But at thefeet of the dame lay a young man, yourself, weeping. 

"'Surely this youth will not serve our ends, ' said I, 'for he weeps. '

"The old woman smiled. 'Past tears are present strength, ' said she. 

"'Oh!' said my brother, 'I saw you weep once over an eagle you shot. '

"'That was because it was so like you, brother, ' I replied; 'but indeed, this youth may have better cause for tears than that--I was wrong. '

"'Wait a while, ' said the woman; 'if I mistake not, he will make youweep till your tears are dry for ever. Tears are the only cure forweeping. And you may have need of the cure, before you go forth to fightthe giants. You must wait for him, in your tower, till he comes. '

"Now if you will join us, we will soon teach you to make your armour;and we will fight together, and work together, and love each other asnever three loved before. And you will sing to us, will you not?"

"That I will, when I can, " I answered; "but it is only at times that thepower of song comes upon me. For that I must wait; but I have a feelingthat if I work well, song will not be far off to enliven the labour. "

This was all the compact made: the brothers required nothing more, andI did not think of giving anything more. I rose, and threw off my uppergarments. 

"I know the uses of the sword, " I said. "I am ashamed of my white handsbeside yours so nobly soiled and hard; but that shame will soon be wipedaway. "

"No, no; we will not work to-day. Rest is as needful as toil. Bring thewine, brother; it is your turn to serve to-day. "

The younger brother soon covered a table with rough viands, but goodwine; and we ate and drank heartily, beside our work. Before the mealwas over, I had learned all their story. Each had something in his heartwhich made the conviction, that he would victoriously perish in thecoming conflict, a real sorrow to him. Otherwise they thought they wouldhave lived enough. The causes of their trouble were respectively these:

While they wrought with an armourer, in a city famed for workmanshipin steel and silver, the elder had fallen in love with a lady asfar beneath him in real rank, as she was above the station he hadas apprentice to an armourer. Nor did he seek to further his suit bydiscovering himself; but there was simply so much manhood about him, that no one ever thought of rank when in his company. This is what hisbrother said about it. The lady could not help loving him in return. Hetold her when he left her, that he had a perilous adventure before him, and that when it was achieved, she would either see him return to claimher, or hear that he had died with honour. The younger brother's griefarose from the fact, that, if they were both slain, his old father, theking, would be childless. His love for his father was so exceeding, thatto one unable to sympathise with it, it would have appeared extravagant. Both loved him equally at heart; but the love of the younger hadbeen more developed, because his thoughts and anxieties had not beenotherwise occupied. When at home, he had been his constant companion;and, of late, had ministered to the infirmities of his growing age. Theyouth was never weary of listening to the tales of his sire's youthfuladventures; and had not yet in the smallest degree lost the conviction, that his father was the greatest man in the world. The grandest triumphpossible to his conception was, to return to his father, laden with thespoils of one of the hated giants. But they both were in some dread, lest the thought of the loneliness of these two might occur to them, in the moment when decision was most necessary, and disturb, in somedegree, the self-possession requisite for the success of their attempt. For, as I have said, they were yet untried in actual conflict. "Now, "thought I, "I see to what the powers of my gift must minister. " For myown part, I did not dread death, for I had nothing to care to live for;but I dreaded the encounter because of the responsibility connected withit. I resolved however to work hard, and thus grow cool, and quick, andforceful. 

The time passed away in work and song, in talk and ramble, in friendlyfight and brotherly aid. I would not forge for myself armour of heavymail like theirs, for I was not so powerful as they, and depended morefor any success I might secure, upon nimbleness of motion, certainty ofeye, and ready response of hand. Therefore I began to make for myself ashirt of steel plates and rings; which work, while more troublesome, was better suited to me than the heavier labour. Much assistance did thebrothers give me, even after, by their instructions, I was able to makesome progress alone. Their work was in a moment abandoned, to render anyrequired aid to mine. As the old woman had promised, I tried to repaythem with song; and many were the tears they both shed over my balladsand dirges. The songs they liked best to hear were two which I made forthem. They were not half so good as many others I knew, especially someI had learned from the wise woman in the cottage; but what comes nearestto our needs we like the best. 

I The king sat on his throne Glowing in gold and red; The crown in his right hand shone, And the gray hairs crowned his head. 

 His only son walks in, And in walls of steel he stands: Make me, O father, strong to win, With the blessing of holy hands. "

 He knelt before his sire, Who blessed him with feeble smile His eyes shone out with a kingly fire, But his old lips quivered the while. 

 "Go to the fight, my son, Bring back the giant's head; And the crown with which my brows have done, Shall glitter on thine instead. "

 "My father, I seek no crowns, But unspoken praise from thee; For thy people's good, and thy renown, I will die to set them free. "

 The king sat down and waited there, And rose not, night nor day; Till a sound of shouting filled the air, And cries of a sore dismay. 

 Then like a king he sat once more, With the crown upon his head; And up to the throne the people bore A mighty giant dead. 

 And up to the throne the people bore A pale and lifeless boy. The king rose up like a prophet of yore, In a lofty, deathlike joy. 

 He put the crown on the chilly brow: "Thou should'st have reigned with me But Death is the king of both, and now I go to obey with thee. 

 "Surely some good in me there lay, To beget the noble one. " The old man smiled like a winter day, And fell beside his son. 

II "O lady, thy lover is dead, " they cried; "He is dead, but hath slain the foe; He hath left his name to be magnified In a song of wonder and woe. "

 "Alas! I am well repaid, " said she, "With a pain that stings like joy: For I feared, from his tenderness to me, That he was but a feeble boy. 

 "Now I shall hold my head on high, The queen among my kind; If ye hear a sound, 'tis only a sigh For a glory left behind. "

The first three times I sang these songs they both wept passionately. But after the third time, they wept no more. Their eyes shone, and theirfaces grew pale, but they never wept at any of my songs again. 

CHAPTER XXI

 "I put my life in my hands. "--The Book of Judges. 

At length, with much toil and equal delight, our armour was finished. We armed each other, and tested the strength of the defence, with manyblows of loving force. I was inferior in strength to both my brothers, but a little more agile than either; and upon this agility, joined toprecision in hitting with the point of my weapon, I grounded my hopes ofsuccess in the ensuing combat. I likewise laboured to develop yet morethe keenness of sight with which I was naturally gifted; and, from theremarks of my companions, I soon learned that my endeavours were not invain. 

The morning arrived on which we had determined to make the attempt, and succeed or perish--perhaps both. We had resolved to fight on foot;knowing that the mishap of many of the knights who had made the attempt, had resulted from the fright of their horses at the appearance of thegiants; and believing with Sir Gawain, that, though mare's sons mightbe false to us, the earth would never prove a traitor. But most of ourpreparations were, in their immediate aim at least, frustrated. 

We rose, that fatal morning, by daybreak. We had rested from all labourthe day before, and now were fresh as the lark. We bathed in coldspring water, and dressed ourselves in clean garments, with a sense ofpreparation, as for a solemn festivity. When we had broken our fast, I took an old lyre, which I had found in the tower and had myselfrepaired, and sung for the last time the two ballads of which I havesaid so much already. I followed them with this, for a closing song:

 Oh, well for him who breaks his dream With the blow that ends the strife And, waking, knows the peace that flows Around the pain of life!

 We are dead, my brothers! Our bodies clasp, As an armour, our souls about; This hand is the battle-axe I grasp, And this my hammer stout. 

 Fear not, my brothers, for we are dead; No noise can break our rest; The calm of the grave is about the head, And the heart heaves not the breast. 

 And our life we throw to our people back, To live with, a further store; We leave it them, that there be no lack In the land where we live no more. 

 Oh, well for him who breaks his dream With the blow that ends the strife And, waking, knows the peace that flows Around the noise of life!

 As the last few tones of the instrument were following, like adirge, the death of the song, we all sprang to our feet. For, throughone of the little windows of the tower, towards which I had looked asI sang, I saw, suddenly rising over the edge of the slope on which ourtower stood, three enormous heads. The brothers knew at once, by mylooks, what caused my sudden movement. We were utterly unarmed, andthere was no time to arm. 

But we seemed to adopt the same resolution simultaneously; for eachcaught up his favourite weapon, and, leaving his defence behind, sprangto the door. I snatched up a long rapier, abruptly, but very finelypointed, in my sword-hand, and in the other a sabre; the elder brotherseized his heavy battle-axe; and the younger, a great, two-handed sword, which he wielded in one hand like a feather. We had just time to getclear of the tower, embrace and say good-bye, and part to some littledistance, that we might not encumber each other's motions, ere thetriple giant-brotherhood drew near to attack us. They were about twiceour height, and armed to the teeth. Through the visors of their helmetstheir monstrous eyes shone with a horrible ferocity. I was in the middleposition, and the middle giant approached me. My eyes were busy with hisarmour, and I was not a moment in settling my mode of attack. I saw thathis body-armour was somewhat clumsily made, and that the overlappingsin the lower part had more play than necessary; and I hoped that, ina fortunate moment, some joint would open a little, in a visible andaccessible part. I stood till he came near enough to aim a blow at mewith the mace, which has been, in all ages, the favourite weapon ofgiants, when, of course, I leaped aside, and let the blow fall upon thespot where I had been standing. I expected this would strain the jointsof his armour yet more. Full of fury, he made at me again; but I kepthim busy, constantly eluding his blows, and hoping thus to fatigue him. He did not seem to fear any assault from me, and I attempted none asyet; but while I watched his motions in order to avoid his blows, I, atthe same time, kept equal watch upon those joints of his armour, throughsome one of which I hoped to reach his life. At length, as if somewhatfatigued, he paused a moment, and drew himself slightly up; I boundedforward, foot and hand, ran my rapier right through to the armour ofhis back, let go the hilt, and passing under his right arm, turned ashe fell, and flew at him with my sabre. At one happy blow I divided theband of his helmet, which fell off, and allowed me, with a second cutacross the eyes, to blind him quite; after which I clove his head, andturned, uninjured, to see how my brothers had fared. Both the giantswere down, but so were my brothers. I flew first to the one and thento the other couple. Both pairs of combatants were dead, and yet lockedtogether, as in the death-struggle. The elder had buried his battle-axein the body of his foe, and had fallen beneath him as he fell. The gianthad strangled him in his own death-agonies. The younger had nearly hewnoff the left leg of his enemy; and, grappled with in the act, had, while they rolled together on the earth, found for his dagger a passagebetwixt the gorget and cuirass of the giant, and stabbed him mortally inthe throat. The blood from the giant's throat was yet pouring over thehand of his foe, which still grasped the hilt of the dagger sheathedin the wound. They lay silent. I, the least worthy, remained the solesurvivor in the lists. 

As I stood exhausted amidst the dead, after the first worthy deed of mylife, I suddenly looked behind me, and there lay the Shadow, black inthe sunshine. I went into the lonely tower, and there lay the uselessarmour of the noble youths--supine as they. 

Ah, how sad it looked! It was a glorious death, but it was death. Mysongs could not comfort me now. I was almost ashamed that I was alive, when they, the true-hearted, were no more. And yet I breathed freer tothink that I had gone through the trial, and had not failed. And perhapsI may be forgiven, if some feelings of pride arose in my bosom, when Ilooked down on the mighty form that lay dead by my hand. 

"After all, however, " I said to myself, and my heart sank, "it was onlyskill. Your giant was but a blunderer. "

I left the bodies of friends and foes, peaceful enough when thedeath-fight was over, and, hastening to the country below, roused thepeasants. They came with shouting and gladness, bringing waggons tocarry the bodies. I resolved to take the princes home to their father, each as he lay, in the arms of his country's foe. But first I searchedthe giants, and found the keys of their castle, to which I repaired, followed by a great company of the people. It was a place of wonderfulstrength. I released the prisoners, knights and ladies, all in a sadcondition, from the cruelties and neglects of the giants. It humbled meto see them crowding round me with thanks, when in truth the gloriousbrothers, lying dead by their lonely tower, were those to whom thethanks belonged. I had but aided in carrying out the thought bornin their brain, and uttered in visible form before ever I laid holdthereupon. Yet I did count myself happy to have been chosen for theirbrother in this great dead. 

After a few hours spent in refreshing and clothing the prisoners, we allcommenced our journey towards the capital. This was slow at first; but, as the strength and spirits of the prisoners returned, it became morerapid; and in three days we reached the palace of the king. As weentered the city gates, with the huge bulks lying each on a waggon drawnby horses, and two of them inextricably intertwined with the dead bodiesof their princes, the people raised a shout and then a cry, and followedin multitudes the solemn procession. 

I will not attempt to describe the behaviour of the grand old king. Joyand pride in his sons overcame his sorrow at their loss. On me he heapedevery kindness that heart could devise or hand execute. He used to sitand question me, night after night, about everything that was in anyway connected with them and their preparations. Our mode of life, and relation to each other, during the time we spent together, was aconstant theme. He entered into the minutest details of the constructionof the armour, even to a peculiar mode of riveting some of the plates, with unwearying interest. This armour I had intended to beg of the king, as my sole memorials of the contest; but, when I saw the delight he tookin contemplating it, and the consolation it appeared to afford him inhis sorrow, I could not ask for it; but, at his request, left my own, weapons and all, to be joined with theirs in a trophy, erected in thegrand square of the palace. The king, with gorgeous ceremony, dubbed meknight with his own old hand, in which trembled the sword of his youth. 

During the short time I remained, my company was, naturally, muchcourted by the young nobles. I was in a constant round of gaiety anddiversion, notwithstanding that the court was in mourning. For thecountry was so rejoiced at the death of the giants, and so many of theirlost friends had been restored to the nobility and men of wealth, thatthe gladness surpassed the grief. "Ye have indeed left your lives toyour people, my great brothers!" I said. 

But I was ever and ever haunted by the old shadow, which I had not seenall the time that I was at work in the tower. Even in the society of theladies of the court, who seemed to think it only their duty to makemy stay there as pleasant to me as possible, I could not help beingconscious of its presence, although it might not be annoying me at thetime. At length, somewhat weary of uninterrupted pleasure, and nowisestrengthened thereby, either in body or mind, I put on a splendid suitof armour of steel inlaid with silver, which the old king had givenme, and, mounting the horse on which it had been brought to me, took myleave of the palace, to visit the distant city in which the lady dwelt, whom the elder prince had loved. I anticipated a sore task, in conveyingto her the news of his glorious fate: but this trial was spared me, in amanner as strange as anything that had happened to me in Fairy Land. 

CHAPTER XXII

 "No one has my form but the I. " Schoppe, in JEAN PAUL'S Titan. 

 "Joy's a subtil elf. I think man's happiest when he forgets himself. " CYRIL TOURNEUR, The Revenger's Tragedy. 

On the third day of my journey, I was riding gently along a road, apparently little frequented, to judge from the grass that grew uponit. I was approaching a forest. Everywhere in Fairy Land forests are theplaces where one may most certainly expect adventures. As I drew near, ayouth, unarmed, gentle, and beautiful, who had just cut a branch from ayew growing on the skirts of the wood, evidently to make himself a bow, met me, and thus accosted me:

"Sir knight, be careful as thou ridest through this forest; for it issaid to be strangely enchanted, in a sort which even those who have beenwitnesses of its enchantment can hardly describe. "

I thanked him for his advice, which I promised to follow, and rode on. But the moment I entered the wood, it seemed to me that, if enchantmentthere was, it must be of a good kind; for the Shadow, which had beenmore than usually dark and distressing, since I had set out on thisjourney, suddenly disappeared. I felt a wonderful elevation of spirits, and began to reflect on my past life, and especially on my combatwith the giants, with such satisfaction, that I had actually to remindmyself, that I had only killed one of them; and that, but for thebrothers, I should never have had the idea of attacking them, not tomention the smallest power of standing to it. Still I rejoiced, andcounted myself amongst the glorious knights of old; having even theunspeakable presumption--my shame and self-condemnation at the memoryof it are such, that I write it as the only and sorest penance I canperform--to think of myself (will the world believe it?) as side by sidewith Sir Galahad! Scarcely had the thought been born in my mind, when, approaching me from the left, through the trees, I espied a resplendentknight, of mighty size, whose armour seemed to shine of itself, withoutthe sun. When he drew near, I was astonished to see that this armour waslike my own; nay, I could trace, line for line, the correspondence ofthe inlaid silver to the device on my own. His horse, too, was like minein colour, form, and motion; save that, like his rider, he was greaterand fiercer than his counterpart. The knight rode with beaver up. As hehalted right opposite to me in the narrow path, barring my way, I sawthe reflection of my countenance in the centre plate of shining steel onhis breastplate. Above it rose the same face--his face--only, as I havesaid, larger and fiercer. I was bewildered. I could not help feelingsome admiration of him, but it was mingled with a dim conviction that hewas evil, and that I ought to fight with him. 

"Let me pass, " I said. 

"When I will, " he replied. 

Something within me said: "Spear in rest, and ride at him! else thou artfor ever a slave. "

I tried, but my arm trembled so much, that I could not couch my lance. To tell the truth, I, who had overcome the giant, shook like a cowardbefore this knight. He gave a scornful laugh, that echoed through thewood, turned his horse, and said, without looking round, "Follow me. "

I obeyed, abashed and stupefied. How long he led, and how long Ifollowed, I cannot tell. "I never knew misery before, " I said to myself. "Would that I had at least struck him, and had had my death-blow inreturn! Why, then, do I not call to him to wheel and defend himself?Alas! I know not why, but I cannot. One look from him would cow me likea beaten hound. " I followed, and was silent. 

At length we came to a dreary square tower, in the middle of a denseforest. It looked as if scarce a tree had been cut down to make room forit. Across the very door, diagonally, grew the stem of a tree, so largethat there was just room to squeeze past it in order to enter. Onemiserable square hole in the roof was the only visible suggestion of awindow. Turret or battlement, or projecting masonry of any kind, it hadnone. Clear and smooth and massy, it rose from its base, and ended witha line straight and unbroken. The roof, carried to a centre from each ofthe four walls, rose slightly to the point where the rafters met. Roundthe base lay several little heaps of either bits of broken branches, withered and peeled, or half-whitened bones; I could not distinguishwhich. As I approached, the ground sounded hollow beneath my horse'shoofs. The knight took a great key from his pocket, and reaching pastthe stem of the tree, with some difficulty opened the door. "Dismount, "he commanded. I obeyed. He turned my horse's head away from the tower, gave him a terrible blow with the flat side of his sword, and sent himmadly tearing through the forest. 

"Now, " said he, "enter, and take your companion with you. "

I looked round: knight and horse had vanished, and behind me lay thehorrible shadow. I entered, for I could not help myself; and the shadowfollowed me. I had a terrible conviction that the knight and he wereone. The door closed behind me. 

Now I was indeed in pitiful plight. There was literally nothing in thetower but my shadow and me. The walls rose right up to the roof; inwhich, as I had seen from without, there was one little square opening. This I now knew to be the only window the tower possessed. I sat down onthe floor, in listless wretchedness. I think I must have fallen asleep, and have slept for hours; for I suddenly became aware of existence, inobserving that the moon was shining through the hole in the roof. As sherose higher and higher, her light crept down the wall over me, till atlast it shone right upon my head. Instantaneously the walls of the towerseemed to vanish away like a mist. I sat beneath a beech, on the edgeof a forest, and the open country lay, in the moonlight, for miles andmiles around me, spotted with glimmering houses and spires and towers. Ithought with myself, "Oh, joy! it was only a dream; the horrible narrowwaste is gone, and I wake beneath a beech-tree, perhaps one that lovesme, and I can go where I will. " I rose, as I thought, and walked about, and did what I would, but ever kept near the tree; for always, and, ofcourse, since my meeting with the woman of the beech-tree far more thanever, I loved that tree. So the night wore on. I waited for the sun torise, before I could venture to renew my journey. But as soon as thefirst faint light of the dawn appeared, instead of shining upon mefrom the eye of the morning, it stole like a fainting ghost through thelittle square hole above my head; and the walls came out as the lightgrew, and the glorious night was swallowed up of the hateful day. Thelong dreary day passed. My shadow lay black on the floor. I felt nohunger, no need of food. The night came. The moon shone. I watched herlight slowly descending the wall, as I might have watched, adown thesky, the long, swift approach of a helping angel. Her rays touched me, and I was free. Thus night after night passed away. I should have diedbut for this. Every night the conviction returned, that I was free. Every morning I sat wretchedly disconsolate. At length, when the courseof the moon no longer permitted her beams to touch me, the night wasdreary as the day. 

When I slept, I was somewhat consoled by my dreams; but all the time Idreamed, I knew that I was only dreaming. But one night, at length, themoon, a mere shred of pallor, scattered a few thin ghostly rays upon me;and I think I fell asleep and dreamed. I sat in an autumn night beforethe vintage, on a hill overlooking my own castle. My heart sprang withjoy. Oh, to be a child again, innocent, fearless, without shame ordesire! I walked down to the castle. All were in consternation at myabsence. My sisters were weeping for my loss. They sprang up and clungto me, with incoherent cries, as I entered. My old friends came flockinground me. A gray light shone on the roof of the hall. It was thelight of the dawn shining through the square window of my tower. More earnestly than ever, I longed for freedom after this dream; moredrearily than ever, crept on the next wretched day. I measured by thesunbeams, caught through the little window in the trap of my tower, howit went by, waiting only for the dreams of the night. 

About noon, I started as if something foreign to all my senses and allmy experience, had suddenly invaded me; yet it was only the voice ofa woman singing. My whole frame quivered with joy, surprise, and thesensation of the unforeseen. Like a living soul, like an incarnation ofNature, the song entered my prison-house. Each tone folded its wings, and laid itself, like a caressing bird, upon my heart. It bathed me likea sea; inwrapt me like an odorous vapour; entered my soul like a longdraught of clear spring-water; shone upon me like essential sunlight;soothed me like a mother's voice and hand. Yet, as the clearestforest-well tastes sometimes of the bitterness of decayed leaves, so tomy weary, prisoned heart, its cheerfulness had a sting of cold, and itstenderness unmanned me with the faintness of long-departed joys. I wepthalf-bitterly, half-luxuriously; but not long. I dashed away the tears, ashamed of a weakness which I thought I had abandoned. Ere I knew, I hadwalked to the door, and seated myself with my ears against it, in orderto catch every syllable of the revelation from the unseen outer world. And now I heard each word distinctly. The singer seemed to be standingor sitting near the tower, for the sounds indicated no change of place. The song was something like this:

 The sun, like a golden knot on high, Gathers the glories of the sky, And binds them into a shining tent, Roofing the world with the firmament. And through the pavilion the rich winds blow, And through the pavilion the waters go. And the birds for joy, and the trees for prayer, Bowing their heads in the sunny air, And for thoughts, the gently talking springs, That come from the centre with secret things-- All make a music, gentle and strong, Bound by the heart into one sweet song. And amidst them all, the mother Earth Sits with the children of her birth; She tendeth them all, as a mother hen Her little ones round her, twelve or ten: Oft she sitteth, with hands on knee, Idle with love for her family. Go forth to her from the dark and the dust, And weep beside her, if weep thou must; If she may not hold thee to her breast, Like a weary infant, that cries for rest At least she will press thee to her knee, And tell a low, sweet tale to thee, Till the hue to thy cheeky and the light to thine eye, Strength to thy limbs, and courage high To thy fainting heart, return amain, And away to work thou goest again. From the narrow desert, O man of pride, Come into the house, so high and wide. 

Hardly knowing what I did, I opened the door. Why had I not done sobefore? I do not know. 

At first I could see no one; but when I had forced myself past the treewhich grew across the entrance, I saw, seated on the ground, and leaningagainst the tree, with her back to my prison, a beautiful woman. Hercountenance seemed known to me, and yet unknown. She looked at me andsmiled, when I made my appearance. 

"Ah! were you the prisoner there? I am very glad I have wiled you out. "

"Do you know me then?" "Do you not know me? But you hurt me, and that, I suppose, makes it easy for a man to forget. You broke my globe. YetI thank you. Perhaps I owe you many thanks for breaking it. I took thepieces, all black, and wet with crying over them, to the Fairy Queen. There was no music and no light in them now. But she took them from me, and laid them aside; and made me go to sleep in a great hall of white, with black pillars, and many red curtains. When I woke in the morning, I went to her, hoping to have my globe again, whole and sound; but shesent me away without it, and I have not seen it since. Nor do I care forit now. I have something so much better. I do not need the globe to playto me; for I can sing. I could not sing at all before. Now I go abouteverywhere through Fairy Land, singing till my heart is like to break, just like my globe, for very joy at my own songs. And wherever I go, mysongs do good, and deliver people. And now I have delivered you, and Iam so happy. "

She ceased, and the tears came into her eyes. 

All this time, I had been gazing at her; and now fully recognised theface of the child, glorified in the countenance of the woman. 

I was ashamed and humbled before her; but a great weight was liftedfrom my thoughts. I knelt before her, and thanked her, and begged her toforgive me. 

"Rise, rise, " she said; "I have nothing to forgive; I thank you. But nowI must be gone, for I do not know how many may be waiting for me, hereand there, through the dark forests; and they cannot come out till Icome. "

She rose, and with a smile and a farewell, turned and left me. I darednot ask her to stay; in fact, I could hardly speak to her. Betweenher and me, there was a great gulf. She was uplifted, by sorrow andwell-doing, into a region I could hardly hope ever to enter. I watchedher departure, as one watches a sunset. She went like a radiance throughthe dark wood, which was henceforth bright to me, from simply knowingthat such a creature was in it. 

She was bearing the sun to the unsunned spots. The light and the musicof her broken globe were now in her heart and her brain. As she went, she sang; and I caught these few words of her song; and the tones seemedto linger and wind about the trees after she had disappeared:

 Thou goest thine, and I go mine-- Many ways we wend; Many days, and many ways, Ending in one end. 

 Many a wrong, and its curing song; Many a road, and many an inn; Room to roam, but only one home For all the world to win. And so she vanished. With a sad heart, soothed by humility, andthe knowledge of her peace and gladness, I bethought me what now Ishould do. First, I must leave the tower far behind me, lest, in someevil moment, I might be once more caged within its horrible walls. Butit was ill walking in my heavy armour; and besides I had now no rightto the golden spurs and the resplendent mail, fitly dulled with longneglect. I might do for a squire; but I honoured knighthood too highly, to call myself any longer one of the noble brotherhood. I stripped offall my armour, piled it under the tree, just where the lady had beenseated, and took my unknown way, eastward through the woods. Of all myweapons, I carried only a short axe in my hand. 

Then first I knew the delight of being lowly; of saying to myself, "Iam what I am, nothing more. " "I have failed, " I said, "I have lostmyself--would it had been my shadow. " I looked round: the shadow wasnowhere to be seen. Ere long, I learned that it was not myself, butonly my shadow, that I had lost. I learned that it is better, athousand-fold, for a proud man to fall and be humbled, than to hold uphis head in his pride and fancied innocence. I learned that he that willbe a hero, will barely be a man; that he that will be nothing but a doerof his work, is sure of his manhood. In nothing was my ideal lowered, ordimmed, or grown less precious; I only saw it too plainly, to set myselffor a moment beside it. Indeed, my ideal soon became my life; whereas, formerly, my life had consisted in a vain attempt to behold, if not myideal in myself, at least myself in my ideal. Now, however, I took, atfirst, what perhaps was a mistaken pleasure, in despising and degradingmyself. Another self seemed to arise, like a white spirit from a deadman, from the dumb and trampled self of the past. Doubtless, this selfmust again die and be buried, and again, from its tomb, spring a wingedchild; but of this my history as yet bears not the record. 

Self will come to life even in the slaying of self; but there is eversomething deeper and stronger than it, which will emerge at last fromthe unknown abysses of the soul: will it be as a solemn gloom, burningwith eyes? or a clear morning after the rain? or a smiling child, thatfinds itself nowhere, and everywhere?

CHAPTER XXIII

 "High erected thought, seated in a heart of courtesy. " SIR PHILIP SIDNEY. 

 "A sweet attractive kinde of grace, A full assurance given by lookes, Continuall comfort in a face, The lineaments of Gospel bookes. " MATTHEW ROYDON, on Sir Philip Sidney. 

I had not gone far, for I had but just lost sight of the hated tower, when a voice of another sort, sounding near or far, as the treespermitted or intercepted its passage, reached me. It was a full, deep, manly voice, but withal clear and melodious. Now it burst on the earwith a sudden swell, and anon, dying away as suddenly, seemed to come tome across a great space. Nevertheless, it drew nearer; till, at last, Icould distinguish the words of the song, and get transient glimpses ofthe singer, between the columns of the trees. He came nearer, dawningupon me like a growing thought. He was a knight, armed from head toheel, mounted upon a strange-looking beast, whose form I could notunderstand. The words which I heard him sing were like these:

 Heart be stout, And eye be true; Good blade out! And ill shall rue. 

 Courage, horse! Thou lackst no skill; Well thy force Hath matched my will. 

 For the foe With fiery breath, At a blow, It still in death. 

 Gently, horse! Tread fearlessly; 'Tis his corse That burdens thee. 

 The sun's eye Is fierce at noon; Thou and I Will rest full soon. 

 And new strength New work will meet; Till, at length, Long rest is sweet. 

And now horse and rider had arrived near enough for me to see, fastenedby the long neck to the hinder part of the saddle, and trailing itshideous length on the ground behind, the body of a great dragon. It wasno wonder that, with such a drag at his heels, the horse could makebut slow progress, notwithstanding his evident dismay. The horrid, serpent-like head, with its black tongue, forked with red, hanging outof its jaws, dangled against the horse's side. Its neck was covered withlong blue hair, its sides with scales of green and gold. Its back was ofcorrugated skin, of a purple hue. Its belly was similar in nature, butits colour was leaden, dashed with blotches of livid blue. Its skinny, bat-like wings and its tail were of a dull gray. It was strange to seehow so many gorgeous colours, so many curving lines, and such beautifulthings as wings and hair and scales, combined to form the horriblecreature, intense in ugliness. 

The knight was passing me with a salutation; but, as I walked towardshim, he reined up, and I stood by his stirrup. When I came near him, Isaw to my surprise and pleasure likewise, although a sudden pain, likea birth of fire, sprang up in my heart, that it was the knight of thesoiled armour, whom I knew before, and whom I had seen in the vision, with the lady of the marble. But I could have thrown my arms around him, because she loved him. This discovery only strengthened the resolutionI had formed, before I recognised him, of offering myself to the knight, to wait upon him as a squire, for he seemed to be unattended. I mademy request in as few words as possible. He hesitated for a moment, andlooked at me thoughtfully. I saw that he suspected who I was, but thathe continued uncertain of his suspicion. No doubt he was soon convincedof its truth; but all the time I was with him, not a word crossed hislips with reference to what he evidently concluded I wished to leaveunnoticed, if not to keep concealed. 

"Squire and knight should be friends, " said he: "can you take me by thehand?" And he held out the great gauntleted right hand. I grasped itwillingly and strongly. Not a word more was said. The knight gave thesign to his horse, which again began his slow march, and I walked besideand a little behind. 

We had not gone very far before we arrived at a little cottage; fromwhich, as we drew near, a woman rushed out with the cry:

"My child! my child! have you found my child?"

"I have found her, " replied the knight, "but she is sorely hurt. I wasforced to leave her with the hermit, as I returned. You will find herthere, and I think she will get better. You see I have brought youa present. This wretch will not hurt you again. " And he undid thecreature's neck, and flung the frightful burden down by the cottagedoor. 

The woman was now almost out of sight in the wood; but the husband stoodat the door, with speechless thanks in his face. 

"You must bury the monster, " said the knight. "If I had arrived a momentlater, I should have been too late. But now you need not fear, for sucha creature as this very rarely appears, in the same part, twice during alifetime. "

"Will you not dismount and rest you, Sir Knight?" said the peasant, whohad, by this time, recovered himself a little. 

"That I will, thankfully, " said he; and, dismounting, he gave the reinsto me, and told me to unbridle the horse, and lead him into the shade. "You need not tie him up, " he added; "he will not run away. "

When I returned, after obeying his orders, and entered the cottage, Isaw the knight seated, without his helmet, and talking most familiarlywith the simple host. I stood at the open door for a moment, and, gazingat him, inwardly justified the white lady in preferring him to me. Anobler countenance I never saw. Loving-kindness beamed from every lineof his face. It seemed as if he would repay himself for the late arduouscombat, by indulging in all the gentleness of a womanly heart. But whenthe talk ceased for a moment, he seemed to fall into a reverie. Then theexquisite curves of the upper lip vanished. The lip was lengthened andcompressed at the same moment. You could have told that, within thelips, the teeth were firmly closed. The whole face grew stern anddetermined, all but fierce; only the eyes burned on like a holysacrifice, uplift on a granite rock. 

The woman entered, with her mangled child in her arms. She was paleas her little burden. She gazed, with a wild love and despairingtenderness, on the still, all but dead face, white and clear from lossof blood and terror. 

The knight rose. The light that had been confined to his eyes, now shonefrom his whole countenance. He took the little thing in his arms, and, with the mother's help, undressed her, and looked to her wounds. Thetears flowed down his face as he did so. With tender hands he bound themup, kissed the pale cheek, and gave her back to her mother. When he wenthome, all his tale would be of the grief and joy of the parents; whileto me, who had looked on, the gracious countenance of the armed man, beaming from the panoply of steel, over the seemingly dead child, whilethe powerful hands turned it and shifted it, and bound it, if possibleeven more gently than the mother's, formed the centre of the story. 

After we had partaken of the best they could give us, the knight tookhis leave, with a few parting instructions to the mother as to how sheshould treat the child. 

I brought the knight his steed, held the stirrup while he mounted, andthen followed him through the wood. The horse, delighted to be freeof his hideous load, bounded beneath the weight of man and armour, andcould hardly be restrained from galloping on. But the knight made himtime his powers to mine, and so we went on for an hour or two. Thenthe knight dismounted, and compelled me to get into the saddle, saying:"Knight and squire must share the labour. "

Holding by the stirrup, he walked along by my side, heavily clad as hewas, with apparent ease. As we went, he led a conversation, in which Itook what humble part my sense of my condition would permit me. 

"Somehow or other, " said he, "notwithstanding the beauty of this countryof Faerie, in which we are, there is much that is wrong in it. If thereare great splendours, there are corresponding horrors; heights anddepths; beautiful women and awful fiends; noble men and weaklings. Alla man has to do, is to better what he can. And if he will settle itwith himself, that even renown and success are in themselves of no greatvalue, and be content to be defeated, if so be that the fault is nothis; and so go to his work with a cool brain and a strong will, hewill get it done; and fare none the worse in the end, that he was notburdened with provision and precaution. "

"But he will not always come off well, " I ventured to say. 

"Perhaps not, " rejoined the knight, "in the individual act; but theresult of his lifetime will content him. "

"So it will fare with you, doubtless, " thought I; "but for me---"

Venturing to resume the conversation after a pause, I said, hesitatingly:

"May I ask for what the little beggar-girl wanted your aid, when shecame to your castle to find you?"

He looked at me for a moment in silence, and then said--

"I cannot help wondering how you know of that; but there is somethingabout you quite strange enough to entitle you to the privilege of thecountry; namely, to go unquestioned. I, however, being only a man, suchas you see me, am ready to tell you anything you like to ask me, as faras I can. The little beggar-girl came into the hall where I was sitting, and told me a very curious story, which I can only recollect veryvaguely, it was so peculiar. What I can recall is, that she was sent togather wings. As soon as she had gathered a pair of wings for herself, she was to fly away, she said, to the country she came from; but wherethat was, she could give no information. 

"She said she had to beg her wings from the butterflies and moths; andwherever she begged, no one refused her. But she needed a great many ofthe wings of butterflies and moths to make a pair for her; and so shehad to wander about day after day, looking for butterflies, and nightafter night, looking for moths; and then she begged for their wings. Butthe day before, she had come into a part of the forest, she said, wherethere were multitudes of splendid butterflies flitting about, with wingswhich were just fit to make the eyes in the shoulders of hers; and sheknew she could have as many of them as she liked for the asking; but assoon as she began to beg, there came a great creature right up to her, and threw her down, and walked over her. When she got up, she sawthe wood was full of these beings stalking about, and seeming to havenothing to do with each other. As soon as ever she began to beg, one ofthem walked over her; till at last in dismay, and in growing horror ofthe senseless creatures, she had run away to look for somebody to helpher. I asked her what they were like. She said, like great men, made ofwood, without knee-or elbow-joints, and without any noses or mouths oreyes in their faces. I laughed at the little maiden, thinking she wasmaking child's game of me; but, although she burst out laughing too, shepersisted in asserting the truth of her story. "

"'Only come, knight, come and see; I will lead you. '

"So I armed myself, to be ready for anything that might happen, andfollowed the child; for, though I could make nothing of her story, Icould see she was a little human being in need of some help or other. Asshe walked before me, I looked attentively at her. Whether or not it wasfrom being so often knocked down and walked over, I could not tell, buther clothes were very much torn, and in several places her white skinwas peeping through. I thought she was hump-backed; but on looking moreclosely, I saw, through the tatters of her frock--do not laugh at me--abunch on each shoulder, of the most gorgeous colours. Looking yet moreclosely, I saw that they were of the shape of folded wings, and weremade of all kinds of butterfly-wings and moth-wings, crowded togetherlike the feathers on the individual butterfly pinion; but, like them, most beautifully arranged, and producing a perfect harmony of colour andshade. I could now more easily believe the rest of her story; especiallyas I saw, every now and then, a certain heaving motion in the wings, as if they longed to be uplifted and outspread. But beneath her scantygarments complete wings could not be concealed, and indeed, from her ownstory, they were yet unfinished. 

"After walking for two or three hours (how the little girl found herway, I could not imagine), we came to a part of the forest, the veryair of which was quivering with the motions of multitudes of resplendentbutterflies; as gorgeous in colour, as if the eyes of peacocks' feathershad taken to flight, but of infinite variety of hue and form, only thatthe appearance of some kind of eye on each wing predominated. 'Therethey are, there they are!' cried the child, in a tone of victory mingledwith terror. Except for this tone, I should have thought she referredto the butterflies, for I could see nothing else. But at that momentan enormous butterfly, whose wings had great eyes of blue surrounded byconfused cloudy heaps of more dingy colouring, just like a break inthe clouds on a stormy day towards evening, settled near us. The childinstantly began murmuring: 'Butterfly, butterfly, give me your wings';when, the moment after, she fell to the ground, and began crying as ifhurt. I drew my sword and heaved a great blow in the direction inwhich the child had fallen. It struck something, and instantly the mostgrotesque imitation of a man became visible. You see this Fairy Land isfull of oddities and all sorts of incredibly ridiculous things, which aman is compelled to meet and treat as real existences, although all thetime he feels foolish for doing so. This being, if being it could becalled, was like a block of wood roughly hewn into the mere outlinesof a man; and hardly so, for it had but head, body, legs, and arms--thehead without a face, and the limbs utterly formless. I had hewn off oneof its legs, but the two portions moved on as best they could, quiteindependent of each other; so that I had done no good. I ran afterit, and clove it in twain from the head downwards; but it could not beconvinced that its vocation was not to walk over people; for, as soon asthe little girl began her begging again, all three parts came bustlingup; and if I had not interposed my weight between her and them, shewould have been trampled again under them. I saw that something elsemust be done. If the wood was full of the creatures, it would be anendless work to chop them so small that they could do no injury; andthen, besides, the parts would be so numerous, that the butterflieswould be in danger from the drift of flying chips. I served this oneso, however; and then told the girl to beg again, and point out thedirection in which one was coming. I was glad to find, however, thatI could now see him myself, and wondered how they could have beeninvisible before. I would not allow him to walk over the child; butwhile I kept him off, and she began begging again, another appeared; andit was all I could do, from the weight of my armour, to protect her fromthe stupid, persevering efforts of the two. But suddenly the right planoccurred to me. I tripped one of them up, and, taking him by the legs, set him up on his head, with his heels against a tree. I was delightedto find he could not move. Meantime the poor child was walked over bythe other, but it was for the last time. Whenever one appeared, Ifollowed the same plan--tripped him up and set him on his head; and sothe little beggar was able to gather her wings without any trouble, which occupation she continued for several hours in my company. "

"What became of her?" I asked. 

"I took her home with me to my castle, and she told me all her story;but it seemed to me, all the time, as if I were hearing a child talk inits sleep. I could not arrange her story in my mind at all, although itseemed to leave hers in some certain order of its own. My wife---"

Here the knight checked himself, and said no more. Neither did I urgethe conversation farther. 

Thus we journeyed for several days, resting at night in such shelteras we could get; and when no better was to be had, lying in the forestunder some tree, on a couch of old leaves. 

I loved the knight more and more. I believe never squire served hismaster with more care and joyfulness than I. I tended his horse; Icleaned his armour; my skill in the craft enabled me to repair it whennecessary; I watched his needs; and was well repaid for all by the loveitself which I bore him. 

"This, " I said to myself, "is a true man. I will serve him, and give himall worship, seeing in him the imbodiment of what I would fain become. If I cannot be noble myself, I will yet be servant to his nobleness. "He, in return, soon showed me such signs of friendship and respect, asmade my heart glad; and I felt that, after all, mine would be no lostlife, if I might wait on him to the world's end, although no smile buthis should greet me, and no one but him should say, "Well done! he wasa good servant!" at last. But I burned to do something more for him thanthe ordinary routine of a squire's duty permitted. 

One afternoon, we began to observe an appearance of roads in the wood. Branches had been cut down, and openings made, where footsteps had wornno path below. These indications increased as we passed on, till, atlength, we came into a long, narrow avenue, formed by felling the treesin its line, as the remaining roots evidenced. At some little distance, on both hands, we observed signs of similar avenues, which appeared toconverge with ours, towards one spot. Along these we indistinctly sawseveral forms moving, which seemed, with ourselves, to approach thecommon centre. Our path brought us, at last, up to a wall of yew-trees, growing close together, and intertwining their branches so, that nothingcould be seen beyond it. An opening was cut in it like a door, and allthe wall was trimmed smooth and perpendicular. The knight dismounted, and waited till I had provided for his horse's comfort; upon which weentered the place together. 

It was a great space, bare of trees, and enclosed by four walls of yew, similar to that through which we had entered. These trees grew to a verygreat height, and did not divide from each other till close to the top, where their summits formed a row of conical battlements all around thewalls. The space contained was a parallelogram of great length. Alongeach of the two longer sides of the interior, were ranged three ranksof men, in white robes, standing silent and solemn, each with a sword byhis side, although the rest of his costume and bearing was more priestlythan soldierly. For some distance inwards, the space between theseopposite rows was filled with a company of men and women and children, in holiday attire. The looks of all were directed inwards, towards thefurther end. Far beyond the crowd, in a long avenue, seeming to narrowin the distance, went the long rows of the white-robed men. On what theattention of the multitude was fixed, we could not tell, for the sun hadset before we arrived, and it was growing dark within. It grew darkerand darker. The multitude waited in silence. The stars began to shinedown into the enclosure, and they grew brighter and larger every moment. A wind arose, and swayed the pinnacles of the tree-tops; and made astrange sound, half like music, half like moaning, through the closebranches and leaves of the tree-walls. A young girl who stood beside me, clothed in the same dress as the priests, bowed her head, and grew palewith awe. 

The knight whispered to me, "How solemn it is! Surely they wait to hearthe voice of a prophet. There is something good near!"

But I, though somewhat shaken by the feeling expressed by my master, yet had an unaccountable conviction that here was something bad. So Iresolved to be keenly on the watch for what should follow. 

Suddenly a great star, like a sun, appeared high in the air over thetemple, illuminating it throughout; and a great song arose from the menin white, which went rolling round and round the building, now recedingto the end, and now approaching, down the other side, the place where westood. For some of the singers were regularly ceasing, and the nextto them as regularly taking up the song, so that it crept onwards withgradations produced by changes which could not themselves be detected, for only a few of those who were singing ceased at the same moment. Thesong paused; and I saw a company of six of the white-robed men walk upthe centre of the human avenue, surrounding a youth gorgeously attiredbeneath his robe of white, and wearing a chaplet of flowers on hishead. I followed them closely, with my keenest observation; and, byaccompanying their slow progress with my eyes, I was able to perceivemore clearly what took place when they arrived at the other end. I knewthat my sight was so much more keen than that of most people, that I hadgood reason to suppose I should see more than the rest could, at such adistance. At the farther end a throne stood upon a platform, high abovethe heads of the surrounding priests. To this platform I saw the companybegin to ascend, apparently by an inclined plane or gentle slope. Thethrone itself was elevated again, on a kind of square pedestal, to thetop of which led a flight of steps. On the throne sat a majestic-lookingfigure, whose posture seemed to indicate a mixture of pride andbenignity, as he looked down on the multitude below. The companyascended to the foot of the throne, where they all kneeled for someminutes; then they rose and passed round to the side of the pedestalupon which the throne stood. Here they crowded close behind the youth, putting him in the foremost place, and one of them opened a door in thepedestal, for the youth to enter. I was sure I saw him shrink back, andthose crowding behind pushed him in. Then, again, arose a burst of songfrom the multitude in white, which lasted some time. When it ceased, a new company of seven commenced its march up the centre. As theyadvanced, I looked up at my master: his noble countenance was full ofreverence and awe. Incapable of evil himself, he could scarcely suspectit in another, much less in a multitude such as this, and surroundedwith such appearances of solemnity. I was certain it was the reallygrand accompaniments that overcame him; that the stars overhead, thedark towering tops of the yew-trees, and the wind that, like an unseenspirit, sighed through their branches, bowed his spirit to the belief, that in all these ceremonies lay some great mystical meaning which, hishumility told him, his ignorance prevented him from understanding. 

More convinced than before, that there was evil here, I could not endurethat my master should be deceived; that one like him, so pure and noble, should respect what, if my suspicions were true, was worse than theordinary deceptions of priestcraft. I could not tell how far he might beled to countenance, and otherwise support their doings, before he shouldfind cause to repent bitterly of his error. I watched the new processionyet more keenly, if possible, than the former. This time, the centralfigure was a girl; and, at the close, I observed, yet more indubitably, the shrinking back, and the crowding push. What happened to the victims, I never learned; but I had learned enough, and I could bear it nolonger. I stooped, and whispered to the young girl who stood by me, tolend me her white garment. I wanted it, that I might not be entirelyout of keeping with the solemnity, but might have at least this help topassing unquestioned. She looked up, half-amused and half-bewildered, asif doubting whether I was in earnest or not. But in her perplexity, shepermitted me to unfasten it, and slip it down from her shoulders. 

I easily got possession of it; and, sinking down on my knees in thecrowd, I rose apparently in the habit of one of the worshippers. 

Giving my battle-axe to the girl, to hold in pledge for the return ofher stole, for I wished to test the matter unarmed, and, if it was a manthat sat upon the throne, to attack him with hands bare, as I supposedhis must be, I made my way through the crowd to the front, while thesinging yet continued, desirous of reaching the platform while it wasunoccupied by any of the priests. I was permitted to walk up the longavenue of white robes unmolested, though I saw questioning looks in manyof the faces as I passed. I presume my coolness aided my passage; forI felt quite indifferent as to my own fate; not feeling, after thelate events of my history, that I was at all worth taking care of; andenjoying, perhaps, something of an evil satisfaction, in the revengeI was thus taking upon the self which had fooled me so long. When Iarrived on the platform, the song had just ceased, and I felt as if allwere looking towards me. But instead of kneeling at its foot, I walkedright up the stairs to the throne, laid hold of a great wooden imagethat seemed to sit upon it, and tried to hurl it from its seat. In thisI failed at first, for I found it firmly fixed. But in dread lest, thefirst shock of amazement passing away, the guards would rush upon mebefore I had effected my purpose, I strained with all my might; and, with a noise as of the cracking, and breaking, and tearing of rottenwood, something gave way, and I hurled the image down the steps. Itsdisplacement revealed a great hole in the throne, like the hollow of adecayed tree, going down apparently a great way. But I had no time toexamine it, for, as I looked into it, up out of it rushed a great brute, like a wolf, but twice the size, and tumbled me headlong with itself, down the steps of the throne. As we fell, however, I caught it by thethroat, and the moment we reached the platform, a struggle commenced, inwhich I soon got uppermost, with my hand upon its throat, and knee uponits heart. But now arose a wild cry of wrath and revenge and rescue. A universal hiss of steel, as every sword was swept from its scabbard, seemed to tear the very air in shreds. I heard the rush of hundredstowards the platform on which I knelt. I only tightened my grasp of thebrute's throat. His eyes were already starting from his head, and histongue was hanging out. My anxious hope was, that, even after they hadkilled me, they would be unable to undo my gripe of his throat, beforethe monster was past breathing. I therefore threw all my will, andforce, and purpose, into the grasping hand. I remember no blow. Afaintness came over me, and my consciousness departed. 

CHAPTER XXIV

 "We are ne'er like angels till our passions die. " DEKKER. 

 "This wretched INN, where we scarce stay to bait, We call our DWELLING-PLACE: We call one STEP A RACE: But angels in their full enlightened state, Angels, who LIVE, and know what 'tis to BE, Who all the nonsense of our language see, Who speak THINGS, and our WORDS, their ill-drawn PICTURES, scorn, When we, by a foolish figure, say, BEHOLD AN OLD MAN DEAD! then they Speak properly, and cry, BEHOLD A MAN-CHILD BORN!" COWLEY. 

I was dead, and right content. I lay in my coffin, with my hands foldedin peace. The knight, and the lady I loved, wept over me. 

Her tears fell on my face. 

"Ah!" said the knight, "I rushed amongst them like a madman. I hewedthem down like brushwood. Their swords battered on me like hail, buthurt me not. I cut a lane through to my friend. He was dead. But he hadthrottled the monster, and I had to cut the handful out of its throat, before I could disengage and carry off his body. They dared not molestme as I brought him back. "

"He has died well, " said the lady. 

My spirit rejoiced. They left me to my repose. I felt as if a cool handhad been laid upon my heart, and had stilled it. My soul was like asummer evening, after a heavy fall of rain, when the drops are yetglistening on the trees in the last rays of the down-going sun, and thewind of the twilight has begun to blow. The hot fever of life had goneby, and I breathed the clear mountain-air of the land of Death. I hadnever dreamed of such blessedness. It was not that I had in any wayceased to be what I had been. The very fact that anything can die, implies the existence of something that cannot die; which must eithertake to itself another form, as when the seed that is sown dies, andarises again; or, in conscious existence, may, perhaps, continue tolead a purely spiritual life. If my passions were dead, the souls ofthe passions, those essential mysteries of the spirit which had imbodiedthemselves in the passions, and had given to them all their glory andwonderment, yet lived, yet glowed, with a pure, undying fire. They roseabove their vanishing earthly garments, and disclosed themselves angelsof light. But oh, how beautiful beyond the old form! I lay thus fora time, and lived as it were an unradiating existence; my soul amotionless lake, that received all things and gave nothing back;satisfied in still contemplation, and spiritual consciousness. 

Ere long, they bore me to my grave. Never tired child lay down in hiswhite bed, and heard the sound of his playthings being laid aside forthe night, with a more luxurious satisfaction of repose than I knew, when I felt the coffin settle on the firm earth, and heard the sound ofthe falling mould upon its lid. It has not the same hollow rattle withinthe coffin, that it sends up to the edge of the grave. They buried mein no graveyard. They loved me too much for that, I thank them; but theylaid me in the grounds of their own castle, amid many trees; where, asit was spring-time, were growing primroses, and blue-bells, and all thefamilies of the woods

Now that I lay in her bosom, the whole earth, and each of her manybirths, was as a body to me, at my will. I seemed to feel the greatheart of the mother beating into mine, and feeding me with her own life, her own essential being and nature. I heard the footsteps of my friendsabove, and they sent a thrill through my heart. I knew that the helpershad gone, and that the knight and the lady remained, and spoke low, gentle, tearful words of him who lay beneath the yet wounded sod. I roseinto a single large primrose that grew by the edge of the grave, and from the window of its humble, trusting face, looked full in thecountenance of the lady. I felt that I could manifest myself in theprimrose; that it said a part of what I wanted to say; just as in theold time, I had used to betake myself to a song for the same end. Theflower caught her eye. She stooped and plucked it, saying, "Oh, youbeautiful creature!" and, lightly kissing it, put it in her bosom. Itwas the first kiss she had ever given me. But the flower soon began towither, and I forsook it. 

It was evening. The sun was below the horizon; but his rosy beams yetilluminated a feathery cloud, that floated high above the world. Iarose, I reached the cloud; and, throwing myself upon it, floated withit in sight of the sinking sun. He sank, and the cloud grew gray; butthe grayness touched not my heart. It carried its rose-hue within;for now I could love without needing to be loved again. The moon camegliding up with all the past in her wan face. She changed my couch intoa ghostly pallor, and threw all the earth below as to the bottom of apale sea of dreams. But she could not make me sad. I knew now, that itis by loving, and not by being loved, that one can come nearest the soulof another; yea, that, where two love, it is the loving of each other, and not the being loved by each other, that originates and perfects andassures their blessedness. I knew that love gives to him that loveth, power over any soul beloved, even if that soul know him not, bringinghim inwardly close to that spirit; a power that cannot be but for good;for in proportion as selfishness intrudes, the love ceases, and thepower which springs therefrom dies. Yet all love will, one day, meetwith its return. All true love will, one day, behold its own image inthe eyes of the beloved, and be humbly glad. This is possible in therealms of lofty Death. "Ah! my friends, " thought I, "how I will tendyou, and wait upon you, and haunt you with my love. "

"My floating chariot bore me over a great city. Its faint dull soundsteamed up into the air--a sound--how composed?" How many hopelesscries, " thought I, "and how many mad shouts go to make up the tumult, here so faint where I float in eternal peace, knowing that they willone day be stilled in the surrounding calm, and that despair dies intoinfinite hope, and the seeming impossible there, is the law here!

"But, O pale-faced women, and gloomy-browed men, and forgotten children, how I will wait on you, and minister to you, and, putting my arms aboutyou in the dark, think hope into your hearts, when you fancy no one isnear! Soon as my senses have all come back, and have grown accustomed tothis new blessed life, I will be among you with the love that healeth. "

With this, a pang and a terrible shudder went through me; a writhingas of death convulsed me; and I became once again conscious of a morelimited, even a bodily and earthly life. 

CHAPTER XXV

 "Our life is no dream; but it ought to become one, and perhaps will. "--NOVALIS. 

 "And on the ground, which is my modres gate, I knocke with my staf; erlich and late, And say to hire, Leve mother, let me in. " CHAUCER, The Pardoneres Tale. 

Sinking from such a state of ideal bliss, into the world of shadowswhich again closed around and infolded me, my first dread was, notunnaturally, that my own shadow had found me again, and that my torturehad commenced anew. It was a sad revulsion of feeling. This, indeed, seemed to correspond to what we think death is, before we die. Yet Ifelt within me a power of calm endurance to which I had hitherto beena stranger. For, in truth, that I should be able if only to think suchthings as I had been thinking, was an unspeakable delight. An hour ofsuch peace made the turmoil of a lifetime worth striving through. 

I found myself lying in the open air, in the early morning, beforesunrise. Over me rose the summer heaven, expectant of the sun. Theclouds already saw him, coming from afar; and soon every dewdrop wouldrejoice in his individual presence within it. 

I lay motionless for a few minutes; and then slowly rose and lookedabout me. I was on the summit of a little hill; a valley lay beneath, and a range of mountains closed up the view upon that side. But, to myhorror, across the valley, and up the height of the opposing mountains, stretched, from my very feet, a hugely expanding shade. There it lay, long and large, dark and mighty. I turned away with a sick despair; whenlo! I beheld the sun just lifting his head above the eastern hill, and the shadow that fell from me, lay only where his beams fell not. Idanced for joy. It was only the natural shadow, that goes with every manwho walks in the sun. As he arose, higher and higher, the shadow-headsank down the side of the opposite hill, and crept in across the valleytowards my feet. 

Now that I was so joyously delivered from this fear, I saw andrecognised the country around me. In the valley below, lay my owncastle, and the haunts of my childhood were all about me hastened home. My sisters received me with unspeakable joy; but I suppose they observedsome change in me, for a kind of respect, with a slight touch of awe init, mingled with their joy, and made me ashamed. They had been in greatdistress about me. On the morning of my disappearance, they had foundthe floor of my room flooded; and, all that day, a wondrous and nearlyimpervious mist had hung about the castle and grounds. I had been gone, they told me, twenty-one days. To me it seemed twenty-one years. Norcould I yet feel quite secure in my new experiences. When, at night, Ilay down once more in my own bed, I did not feel at all sure that when Iawoke, I should not find myself in some mysterious region of Fairy Land. My dreams were incessant and perturbed; but when I did awake, I sawclearly that I was in my own home. 

My mind soon grew calm; and I began the duties of my new position, somewhat instructed, I hoped, by the adventures that had befallen me inFairy Land. Could I translate the experience of my travels there, intocommon life? This was the question. Or must I live it all over again, and learn it all over again, in the other forms that belong to the worldof men, whose experience yet runs parallel to that of Fairy Land? Thesequestions I cannot answer yet. But I fear. 

Even yet, I find myself looking round sometimes with anxiety, to seewhether my shadow falls right away from the sun or no. I have never yetdiscovered any inclination to either side. And if I am not unfrequentlysad, I yet cast no more of a shade on the earth, than most men who havelived in it as long as I. I have a strange feeling sometimes, that I ama ghost, sent into the world to minister to my fellow men, or, rather, to repair the wrongs I have already done. 

May the world be brighter for me, at least in those portions of it, where my darkness falls not. 

Thus I, who set out to find my Ideal, came back rejoicing that I hadlost my Shadow. 

When the thought of the blessedness I experienced, after my death inFairy Land, is too high for me to lay hold upon it and hope in it, I often think of the wise woman in the cottage, and of her solemnassurance that she knew something too good to be told. When I amoppressed by any sorrow or real perplexity, I often feel as if I hadonly left her cottage for a time, and would soon return out of thevision, into it again. Sometimes, on such occasions, I find myself, unconsciously almost, looking about for the mystic mark of red, withthe vague hope of entering her door, and being comforted by her wisetenderness. I then console myself by saying: "I have come through thedoor of Dismay; and the way back from the world into which that has ledme, is through my tomb. Upon that the red sign lies, and I shall find itone day, and be glad. "

I will end my story with the relation of an incident which befell me afew days ago. I had been with my reapers, and, when they ceased theirwork at noon, I had lain down under the shadow of a great, ancientbeech-tree, that stood on the edge of the field. As I lay, with my eyesclosed, I began to listen to the sound of the leaves overhead. At first, they made sweet inarticulate music alone; but, by-and-by, the soundseemed to begin to take shape, and to be gradually moulding itself intowords; till, at last, I seemed able to distinguish these, half-dissolvedin a little ocean of circumfluent tones: "A great good is coming--iscoming--is coming to thee, Anodos;" and so over and over again. Ifancied that the sound reminded me of the voice of the ancient woman, inthe cottage that was four-square. I opened my eyes, and, for a moment, almost believed that I saw her face, with its many wrinkles and itsyoung eyes, looking at me from between two hoary branches of the beechoverhead. But when I looked more keenly, I saw only twigs and leaves, and the infinite sky, in tiny spots, gazing through between. Yet I knowthat good is coming to me--that good is always coming; though few haveat all times the simplicity and the courage to believe it. What wecall evil, is the only and best shape, which, for the person and hiscondition at the time, could be assumed by the best good. And so, FAREWELL.