TALES OF THE ENCHANTED ISLANDS OF THE ATLANTIC

BY

THOMAS WENTWORTH HIGGINSON

TO

General Sir George Wentworth Higginson, K. C. B. 

_Gyldernscroft, Marlow, England_

THIS BOOK IS INSCRIBED, IN TOKEN OF KINDRED AND OF OLD FAMILYFRIENDSHIPS, CORDIALLY PRESERVED INTO THE PRESENT GENERATION

THESE LEGENDS UNITE THE TWO SIDES OF THE ATLANTIC AND FORM A PART OF THECOMMON HERITAGE OF THE ENGLISH-SPEAKING RACE

Preface

Hawthorne in his _Wonder Book_ has described the beautiful Greekmyths and traditions, but no one has yet made similar use of the wondroustales that gathered for more than a thousand years about the islands ofthe Atlantic deep. Although they are a part of the mythical period ofAmerican history, these hazy legends were altogether disdained by theearlier historians; indeed, George Bancroft made it a matter of actualpride that the beginning of the American annals was bare and literal. Butin truth no national history has been less prosaic as to its earliertraditions, because every visitor had to cross the sea to reach it, andthe sea has always been, by the mystery of its horizon, the fury of itsstorms, and the variableness of the atmosphere above it, the foreordainedland of romance. 

In all ages and with all sea-going races there has always been somethingespecially fascinating about an island amid the ocean. Its very existencehas for all explorers an air of magic. An island offers to us heightsrising from depths; it exhibits that which is most fixed beside that whichis most changeable, the fertile beside the barren, and safety afterdanger. The ocean forever tends to encroach on the island, the island uponthe ocean. They exist side by side, friends yet enemies. The islandsignifies safety in calm, and yet danger in storm; in a tempest the sailorrejoices that he is not near it; even if previously bound for it, he putsabout and steers for the open sea. Often if he seeks it he cannot reachit. The present writer spent a winter on the island of Fayal, and saw in astorm a full-rigged ship drift through the harbor disabled, having losther anchors; and it was a week before she again made the port. 

There are groups of islands scattered over the tropical ocean, especially, to which might well be given Herman Melville's name, "LasEncantadas, " the Enchanted Islands. These islands, usually volcanic, haveno vegetation but cactuses or wiry bushes with strange names; noinhabitants but insects and reptiles--lizards, spiders, snakes, --with vasttortoises which seem of immemorial age, and are coated with seaweed andthe slime of the ocean. If there are any birds, it is the strange andheavy penguin, the passing albatross, or the Mother Cary's chicken, whichhas been called the humming bird of ocean, and here finds a place for itsyoung. By night these birds come for their repose; at earliest dawn theytake wing and hover over the sea, leaving the isle deserted. The only busyor beautiful life which always surrounds it is that of a myriad species offish, of all forms and shapes, and often more gorgeous than anybutterflies in gold and scarlet and yellow. 

Once set foot on such an island and you begin at once to understand thelegends of enchantment which ages have collected around such spots. Climbto its heights, you seem at the masthead of some lonely vessel, keptforever at sea. You feel as if no one but yourself had ever landed there;and yet, perhaps, even there, looking straight downward, you see below youin some crevice of the rock a mast or spar of some wrecked vessel, encrusted with all manner of shells and uncouth vegetable growth. Nomatter how distant the island or how peacefully it seems to lie upon thewater, there may be perplexing currents that ever foam and swirl about it--currents which are, at all tides and in the calmest weather, as dangerousas any tempest, and which make compass untrustworthy and helm powerless. It is to be remembered also that an island not only appears and disappearsupon the horizon in brighter or darker skies, but it varies its height andshape, doubles itself in mirage, or looks as if broken asunder, dividedinto two or three. Indeed the buccaneer, Cowley, writing of one suchisland which he had visited, says: "My fancy led me to call it Cowley'sEnchanted Isle, for we having had a sight of it upon several points of thecompass, it appeared always in so many different forms; sometimes like aruined fortification; upon another point like a great city. "

If much of this is true even now, it was far truer before the days ofColumbus, when men were constantly looking westward across the Atlantic, and wondering what was beyond. In those days, when no one knew withcertainty whether the ocean they observed was a sea or a vast lake, it wasoften called "The Sea of Darkness. " A friend of the Latin poet, Ovid, describing the first approach to this sea, says that as you sail out uponit the day itself vanishes, and the world soon ends in perpetualdarkness:--

 "Quo Ferimur? Ruit ipsa Dies, orbemque relictum Ultima perpetuis claudit natura tenebris. "

Nevertheless, it was the vague belief of many nations that the abodes ofthe blest lay somewhere beyond it--in the "other world, " a region halfearthly, half heavenly, whence the spirits of the departed could not crossthe water to return;--and so they were constantly imagining excursionsmade by favored mortals to enchanted islands. To add to the confusion, actual islands in the Atlantic were sometimes discovered and actually lostagain, as, for instance, the Canaries, which were reached and called theFortunate Isles a little before the Christian era, and were then lost tosight for thirteen centuries ere being visited again. 

The glamour of enchantment was naturally first attached by Europeans toislands within sight of their own shores--Irish, Welsh, Breton, orSpanish, --and then, as these islands became better known, men'simaginations carried the mystery further out over the unknown western sea. The line of legend gradually extended itself till it formed an imaginarychart for Columbus; the aged astronomer, Toscanelli, for instance, suggesting to him the advantage of making the supposed island of Antilliaa half-way station; just as it was proposed, long centuries after, to finda station for the ocean telegraph in the equally imaginary island ofJacquet, which has only lately disappeared from the charts. With everystep in knowledge the line of fancied stopping-places rearranged itself, the fictitious names flitting from place to place on the maps, andsometimes duplicating themselves. Where the tradition itself has vanishedwe find that the names with which it associated itself are still assigned, as in case of Brazil and the Antilles, to wholly different localities. 

The order of the tales in the present work follows roughly the order ofdevelopment, giving first the legends which kept near the European shore, and then those which, like St. Brandan's or Antillia, were assigned to theopen sea or, like Norumbega or the Isle of Demons, to the very coast ofAmerica. Every tale in this book bears reference to some actual legend, followed more or less closely, and the authorities for each will be foundcarefully given in the appendix for such readers as may care to follow thesubject farther. It must be remembered that some of these imaginaryislands actually remained on the charts of the British admiralty untilwithin a century. If even the exact science of geographers retained themthus long, surely romance should embalm them forever. 

CAMBRIDGE, MASS. 

Contents

I. The Story of Atlantis

II. Taliessin of the Radiant Brow

III. The Swan-Children of Lir

IV. Usheen in the Island of Youth

V. Bran the Blessed

VI. The Castle of the Active Door

VII. Merlin the Enchanter

VIII. Sir Lancelot of the Lake

IX. The Half-Man

X. King Arthur at Avalon

XI. Maelduin's Voyage

XII. The Voyage of St. Brandan

XIII. Kirwan's Search for Hy-Brasail

XIV. The Isle of Satan's Hand

XV. Antillia, the Island of the Seven Cities

XVI. Harald the Viking

XVII. The Search for Norumbega

XVIII. The Guardians of the St. Lawrence

XIX. The Island of Demons

XX. Bimini and the Fountain of Youth

_Notes_

I

THE STORY OF ATLANTIS

The Greek sage Socrates, when he was but a boy minding his father'sgoats, used to lie on the grass under the myrtle trees; and, while thegoats grazed around him, he loved to read over and over the story whichSolon, the law-giver and poet, wrote down for the great-grandfather ofSocrates, and which Solon had always meant to make into a poem, though hedied without doing it. But this was briefly what he wrote in prose:--

"I, Solon, was never in my life so surprised as when I went to Egypt forinstruction in my youth, and there, in the temple of Sais, saw an agedpriest who told me of the island of Atlantis, which was sunk in the seathousands of years ago. He said that in the division of the earth the godsagreed that the god Poseidon, or Neptune, should have, as his share, thisgreat island which then lay in the ocean west of the Mediterranean Sea, and was larger than all Asia. There was a mortal maiden there whomPoseidon wished to marry, and to secure her he surrounded the valley whereshe dwelt with three rings of sea and two of land so that no one couldenter; and he made underground springs, with water hot or cold, andsupplied all things needful to the life of man. Here he lived with her formany years, and they had ten sons; and these sons divided the island amongthem and had many children, who dwelt there for more than a thousandyears. They had mines of gold and silver, and pastures for elephants, andmany fragrant plants. They erected palaces and dug canals; and they builttheir temples of white, red, and black stone, and covered them with goldand silver. In these were statues of gold, especially one of the godPoseidon driving six winged horses. He was so large as to touch the roofwith his head, and had a hundred water-nymphs around him, riding ondolphins. The islanders had also baths and gardens and sea-walls, and theyhad twelve hundred ships and ten thousand chariots. All this was in theroyal city alone, and the people were friendly and good andwell-affectioned towards all. But as time went on they grew less so, andthey did not obey the laws, so that they offended heaven. In a single dayand night the island disappeared and sank beneath the sea; and this is whythe sea in that region grew so impassable and impenetrable, because thereis a quantity of shallow mud in the way, and this was caused by thesinking of a single vast island. "

"This is the tale, " said Solon, "which the old Egyptian priest told tome. " And Solon's tale was read by Socrates, the boy, as he lay in thegrass; and he told it to his friends after he grew up, as is written inhis dialogues recorded by his disciple, Plato. And though this greatisland of Atlantis has never been seen again, yet a great many smallerislands have been found in the Atlantic Ocean, and they have sometimesbeen lost to sight and found again. 

There is, also, in this ocean a vast tract of floating seaweed, called bysailors the Sargasso Sea, --covering a region as large as France, --and thishas been thought by many to mark the place of a sunken island. There arealso many islands, such as the Azores, which have been supposed atdifferent times to be fragments of Atlantis; and besides all this, theremains of the vanished island have been looked for in all parts of theworld. Some writers have thought it was in Sweden, others in Spitzbergen, others in Africa, in Palestine, in America. Since the depth of theAtlantic has been more thoroughly sounded, a few writers have maintainedthat the inequalities of its floor show some traces of the submergedAtlantis, but the general opinion of men of science is quite the otherway. The visible Atlantic islands are all, or almost all, they say, ofvolcanic origin; and though there are ridges in the bottom of the ocean, they do not connect the continents. 

At any rate, this was the original story of Atlantis, and the legendswhich follow in these pages have doubtless all grown, more or less, out ofthis first tale which Socrates told. 

II

TALIESSIN OF THE RADIANT BROW

In times past there were enchanted islands in the Atlantic Ocean, off thecoast of Wales, and even now the fishermen sometimes think they see them. On one of these there lived a man named Tegid Voel and his wife calledCardiwen. They had a son, the ugliest boy in the world, and Cardiwenformed a plan to make him more attractive by teaching him all possiblewisdom. She was a great magician and resolved to boil a large caldron fullof knowledge for her son, so that he might know all things and be able topredict all that was to happen. Then she thought people would value him inspite of his ugliness. But she knew that the caldron must burn a year anda day without ceasing, until three blessed drops of the water of knowledgewere obtained from it; and those three drops would give all the wisdom shewanted. 

So she put a boy named Gwion to stir the caldron and a blind man namedMorda to feed the fire; and made them promise never to let it ceaseboiling for a year and a day. She herself kept gathering magic herbs andputting them into it. One day when the year was nearly over, it chancedthat three drops of the liquor flew out of the caldron and fell on thefinger of Gwion. They were fiery hot, and he put his finger to his mouth, and the instant he tasted them he knew that they were the enchanted dropsfor which so much trouble had been taken. By their magic he at onceforesaw all that was to come, and especially that Cardiwen the enchantresswould never forgive him. 

Then Gwion fled. The caldron burst in two, and all the liquor flowedforth, poisoning some horses which drank it. These horses belonged to aking named Gwyddno. Cardiwen came in and saw all the toil of the wholeyear lost. Seizing a stick of wood, she struck the blind man Mordafiercely on the head, but he said, "I am innocent. It was not I who didit. " "True, " said Cardiwen; "it was the boy Gwion who robbed me;" and sherushed to pursue him. He saw her and fled, changing into a hare; but shebecame a greyhound and followed him. Running to the water, he became afish; but she became another and chased him below the waves. He turnedhimself into a bird, when she became a hawk and gave him no rest in thesky. Just as she swooped on him, he espied a pile of winnowed wheat on thefloor of a barn, and dropping upon it, he became one of the wheat-grains. Changing herself into a high-crested black hen, Cardiwen scratched him upand swallowed him, when he changed at last into a boy again and was sobeautiful that she could not kill him outright, but wrapped him in aleathern bag and cast him into the sea, committing him to the mercy ofGod. This was on the twenty-ninth of April. 

Now Gwyddno had a weir for catching fish on the sea-strand near hiscastle, and every day in May he was wont to take a hundred pounds' worthof fish. He had a son named Elphin, who was always poor and unsuccessful, but that year the father had given the son leave to draw all the fish fromthe weir, to see if good luck would ever befall him and give him somethingwith which to begin the world. 

When Elphin went next to draw the weir, the man who had charge of it saidin pity, "Thou art always unlucky; there is nothing in the weir but aleathern bag, which is caught on one of the poles. " "How do we know, " saidElphin, "that it may not contain the value of a hundred pounds?" Taking upthe bag and opening it, the man saw the forehead of the boy and said toElphin, "Behold, what a radiant brow" (Taliessin). "Let him be calledTaliessin, " said Elphin. Then he lifted the boy and placed him sorrowfullybehind him; and made his horse amble gently, that before had beentrotting, and carried him as softly as if he had been sitting in theeasiest chair in the world, and the boy of the radiant brow made a song toElphin as they went along. 

 "Never in Gwyddno's weir Was there such good luck as this night. Fair Elphin, dry thy cheeks! Being too sad will not avail, Although thou thinkest thou hast no gain. Too much grief will bring thee no good; Nor doubt the miracles of the Almighty: Although I am but little, I am highly gifted. From seas, and from mountains, And from the depths of rivers, God brings wealth to the fortunate man. Elphin of lively qualities, Thy resolution is unmanly: Thou must not be oversorrowful: Better to trust in God than to forebode ill. Weak and small as I am, On the foaming beach of the ocean, In the day of trouble I shall be Of more service to thee than three hundred salmon. Elphin of notable qualities, Be not displeased at thy misfortune: Although reclined thus weak in my bag, There lies a virtue in my tongue. While I continue thy protector Thou hast not much to fear. "

Then Elphin asked him, "Art thou man or spirit?" And in answer the boysang to him this tale of his flight from the woman:--

 "I have fled with vigor, I have fled as a frog, I have fled in the semblance of a crow scarcely finding rest; I have fled vehemently, I have fled as a chain of lightning, I have fled as a roe into an entangled thicket; I have fled as a wolf-cub, I have fled as a wolf in the wilderness, I have fled as a fox used to many swift bounds and quirks; I have fled as a martin, which did not avail; I have fled as a squirrel that vainly hides, I have fled as a stag's antler, of ruddy course, I have fled as an iron in a glowing fire, I have fled as a spear-head, of woe to such as have a wish for it; I have fled as a fierce bull bitterly fighting, I have fled as a bristly boar seen in a ravine, I have fled as a white grain of pure wheat; Into a dark leathern bag I was thrown, And on a boundless sea I was sent adrift;

 Which was to me an omen of being tenderly nursed, And the Lord God then set me at liberty. "

Then Elphin came with Taliessin to the house of his father, and Gwyddnoasked him if he had a good haul at the fish-weir. "I have something betterthan fish. " "What is that?" asked the father. "I have a bard, " saidElphin. "Alas, what will he profit thee?" said Gwyddno, to which Taliessinreplied, "He will profit him more than the weir ever profited thee. " SaidGwyddno, "Art thou able to speak, and thou so little?" Then Taliessinsaid, "I am better able to speak than thou to question me. "

From this time Elphin always prospered, and he and his wife cared forTaliessin tenderly and lovingly, and the boy dwelt with him until he wasthirteen years old, when Elphin went to make a Christmas visit to hisuncle Maelgwyn, who was a great king and held open court. There were fourand twenty bards there, and all proclaimed that no king had a wife sobeautiful as the queen, or a bard so wise as the twenty-four, who allagreed upon this decision. Elphin said, on the contrary, that it was hehimself who had the most beautiful wife and the wisest bard, and for thishe was thrown into prison. Taliessin learning this, set forth from home tovisit the palace and free his adoptive father, Elphin. 

In those days it was the custom of kings to sit in the hall and dine inroyal state with lords and bards about them who should keep proclaimingthe greatness and glory of the king and his knights. Taliessin placedhimself in a quiet corner, waiting for the four and twenty bards to pass, and as each one passed by, Taliessin made an ugly face, and gave a soundwith his finger on his lips, thus, "Blerwm, Blerwm. " Each bard went by andbowed himself before the king, but instead of beginning to chant hispraises, could only play "Blerwm, Blerwm" on the lips, as the boy haddone. The king was amazed and thought they must be intoxicated, so he sentone of his lords to them, telling them to behave themselves and rememberwhere they were. Twice and thrice he told them, but they could only repeatthe same foolishness, until at last the king ordered one of his squires togive a blow to the chief bard, and the squire struck him a blow with abroom, so that he fell back on his seat. Then he arose and knelt beforethe king, and said, "Oh, honorable king, be it known unto your grace thatit is not from too much drinking that we are dumb, but through theinfluence of a spirit which sits in the corner yonder in the form of achild. " Then the king bade a squire to bring Taliessin before him, and heasked the boy who he was. He answered:--

 "Primary chief bard I am to Elphin, And my original country is the region of the summer stars; I am a wonder whose origin is not known; I have been fostered in the land of the Deity, I have been teacher to all intelligences, I am able to instruct the whole universe. I was originally little Gwion, And at length I am Taliessin. "

Then the king and his nobles wondered much, for they had never heard thelike from a boy so young. The king then called his wisest bard to answerTaliessin, but he could only play "Blerwm" on his lips as before, andeach of the king's four and twenty bards tried in the same way and coulddo nothing more. Then the king bade Taliessin sing again, and he began:--

 "Discover thou what is The strong creature from before the flood, Without flesh, without bone, Without vein, without blood, Without head, without feet; It will neither be older nor younger Than at the beginning; Great God! how the sea whitens When first it comes! Great are its gusts When it comes from the south; Great are its evaporations When it strikes on coasts. It is in the field, it is in the wood, Without hand and without foot, Without signs of old age, It is also so wide, As the surface of the earth; And it was not born, Nor was it seen. It will cause consternation Wherever God willeth. On sea and on land

 It neither sees, nor is seen. Its course is devious, And will not come when desired. On land and on sea It is indispensable. It is without equal, It is many-sided; It is not confined, It is incomparable; It comes from four quarters; It is noxious, it is beneficial; It is yonder, it is here; It will decompose, But it will not repair the injury; It will not suffer for its doings, Seeing it is blameless. One Being has prepared it, Out of all creatures, By a tremendous blast, To wreak vengeance On Maelgwyn Gwynedd. "

And while he was thus singing his verse near the door, there camesuddenly a mighty storm of wind, so that the king and all his noblesthought the castle would fall on their heads. They saw that Taliessin hadnot merely been singing the song of the wind, but seemed to have power tocommand it. Then the king hastily ordered that Elphin should be broughtfrom his dungeon and placed before Taliessin, and the chains came loosefrom his feet, and he was set free. 

As they rode away from the court, the king and his courtiers rode withthem, and Taliessin bade Elphin propose a race with the king's horses. Four and twenty horses were chosen, and Taliessin got four and twentytwigs of holly which he had burnt black, and he ordered the youth who wasto ride Elphin's horse to let all the others set off before him, and badehim as he overtook each horse to strike him with a holly twig and throw itdown. Then he had him watch where his own horse should stumble and throwdown his cap at the place. The race being won, Taliessin brought hismaster to the spot where the cap lay; and put workmen to dig a hole there. When they had dug deeply enough they found a caldron full of gold, andTaliessin said, "Elphin, this is my payment to thee for having taken mefrom the water and reared me until now. " And on this spot stands a pool ofwater until this day. 

III

THE SWAN-CHILDREN OF LIR

King Lir of Erin had four young children who were cared for tenderly atfirst by their stepmother, the new queen; but there came a time when shegrew jealous of the love their father bore them, and resolved that shewould endure it no longer. Sometimes there was murder in her heart, butshe could not bear the thought of that wickedness, and she resolved atlast to choose another way to rid herself of them. One day she took themto drive in her chariot:--Finola, who was eight years old, with her threeyounger brothers, --Aodh, Fiacre, and little Conn, still a baby. They werebeautiful children, the legend says, with skins white and soft as swans'feathers, and with large blue eyes and very sweet voices. Reaching a lake, she told them that they might bathe in the clear water; but so soon asthey were in it she struck them with a fairy wand, --for she was of therace of the Druids, who had magical power, --and she turned them into fourbeautiful snow-white swans. But they still had human voices, and Finolasaid to her, "This wicked deed of thine shall be punished, for the doomthat awaits thee will surely be worse than ours. " Then Finola asked, "Howlong shall we be in the shape of swans?" "For three hundred years, " saidthe woman, "on smooth Lake Darvra; then three hundred years on the sea ofMoyle" (this being the sea between Ireland and Scotland); "and then threehundred years at Inis Glora, in the Great Western Sea" (this was a rockyisland in the Atlantic). "Until the Tailkenn (St. Patrick) shall come toIreland and bring the Christian faith, and until you hear the Christianbell, you shall not be freed. Neither your power nor mine can now bringyou back to human shape; but you shall keep your human reason and yourGaelic speech, and you shall sing music so sweet that all who hear itshall gladly listen. "

She left them, and ere long their father, King Lir, came to the shore andheard their singing. He asked how they came to have human voices. "We arethy four children, " said Finola, "changed into swans by our stepmother'sjealousy. " "Then come and live with me, " said her sorrowing father. "Weare not permitted to leave the lake, " she said, "or live with our peopleany more. But we are allowed to dwell together and to keep our reason andour speech, and to sing sweet music to you. " Then they sang, and the kingand all his followers were at first amazed and then lulled to sleep. 

Then King Lir returned and met the cruel stepmother at her father'spalace. When her father, King Bove, was told what she had done, he was hotwith anger. "This wicked deed, " he said, "shall bring severer punishmenton thee than on the innocent children, for their suffering shall end, butthine never shall. " Then King Bove asked her what form of existence wouldbe most terrible to her. She replied, "That of a demon of the air. " "Be itso, " said her father, who had also Druidical power. He struck her with hiswand, and she became a bat, and flew away with a scream, and the legendsays, "She is still a demon of the air and shall be a demon of the airuntil the end of time. "

After this, the people of all the races that were in Erin used to comeand encamp by the lake and listen to the swans. The happy were madehappier by the song, and those who were in grief or illness or pain forgottheir sorrows and were lulled to rest. There was peace in all that region, while war and tumult filled other lands. Vast changes took place in threecenturies--towers and castles rose and fell, villages were built anddestroyed, generations were born and died;--and still the swan-childrenlived and sang, until at the end of three hundred years they flew away, aswas decreed, to the stormy sea of Moyle; and from that time it was made alaw that no one should kill a swan in Erin. 

Beside the sea of Moyle they found no longer the peaceful and woodedshores they had known, but only steep and rocky coasts and a wild, wildsea. There came a great storm one night, and the swans knew that theycould not keep together, so they resolved that if separated they wouldmeet at a rock called Carricknarone. Finola reached there first, and tookher brothers under her wings, all wet, shivering, and exhausted. Many suchnights followed, and in one terrible winter storm, when they nestledtogether on Carricknarone, the water froze into solid ice around them, andtheir feet and wings were so frozen to the rock that when they moved theyleft the skin of their feet, the quills of their wings, and the feathersof their breasts clinging there. When the ice melted, and they swam outinto the sea, their bodies smarted with pain until the feathers grew oncemore. 

One day they saw a glittering troop of horsemen approaching along theshore and knew that they were their own kindred, though from fargenerations back, the Dedannen or Fairy Host. They greeted each other withjoy, for the Fairy Host had been sent to seek for the swans; and onreturning to their chiefs they narrated what had passed, and the chiefssaid, "We cannot help them, but we are glad they are living; and we knowthat at last the enchantment will be broken and that they will be freedfrom their sorrows. " So passed their lives until Finola sang, one day, "The Second Woe has passed--the second period of three hundred years, "when they flew out on the broad ocean, as was decreed, and went to theisland of Inis Glora. There they spent the next three hundred years, amidyet wilder storms and yet colder winds. No more the peaceful shepherds andliving neighbors were around them; but often the sailor and fisherman, inhis little coracle, saw the white gleam of their wings or heard the sweetnotes of their song and knew that the children of Lir were near. 

But the time came when the nine hundred years of banishment were ended, and they might fly back to their father's old home, Finnahà. Flying fordays above the sea, they alighted at the palace once so well known, buteverything was changed by time--even the walls of their father's palacewere crumbled and rain-washed. So sad was the sight that they remained oneday only, and flew back to Inis Glora, thinking that if they must beforever solitary, they would live where they had lived last, not wherethey had been reared. 

One May morning, as the children of Lir floated in the air around theisland of Inis Glora, they heard a faint bell sounding across the easternsea. The mist lifted, and they saw afar off, beyond the waves, a vision ofa stately white-robed priest, with attendants around him on the Irishshore. They knew that it must be St. Patrick, the Tailkenn, or TonsuredOne, who was bringing, as had been so long promised, Christianity toIreland. Sailing through the air, above the blue sea, towards their nativecoast, they heard the bell once more, now near and distinct, and they knewthat all evil spirits were fleeing away, and that their own hopes were tobe fulfilled. As they approached the land, St. Patrick stretched his handand said, "Children of Lir, you may tread your native land again. " And thesweet swan-sister, Finola, said, "If we tread our native land, it can onlybe to die, after our life of nine centuries. Baptize us while we are yetliving. " When they touched the shore, the weight of all those centuriesfell upon them; they resumed their human bodies, but they appeared old andpale and wrinkled. Then St. Patrick baptized them, and they died; but, even as he did so, a change swiftly came over them; and they lay side byside, once more children, in their white night-clothes, as when theirfather Lir, long centuries ago, had kissed them at evening and seen theirblue eyes close in sleep and had touched with gentle hand their whiteforeheads and their golden hair. Their time of sorrow was ended and theirlast swan-song was sung; but the cruel stepmother seems yet to survive inher bat-like shape, and a single glance at her weird and malicious littleface will lead us to doubt whether she has yet fully atoned for her sin. 

IV

USHEEN IN THE ISLAND OF YOUTH

The old Celtic hero and poet Usheen or Oisin, whose supposed songs areknown in English as those of Ossian, lived to a great old age, survivingall others of the race of the Feni, to which he belonged; and he was askedin his last years what had given him such length of life. This is the talehe told:--

After the fatal battle of Gavra, in which most of the Feni were killed, Usheen and his father, the king, and some of the survivors of the battlewere hunting the deer with their dogs, when they met a maiden riding on aslender white horse with hoofs of gold, and with a golden crescent betweenhis ears. The maiden's hair was of the color of citron and was gathered ina silver band; and she was clad in a white garment embroidered withstrange devices. She asked them why they rode slowly and seemed sad, andnot like other hunters; and they replied that it was because of the deathof their friends and the ruin of their race. When they asked her in turnwhence she came, and why, and whether she was married, she replied thatshe had never had a lover or a husband, but that she had crossed the seafor the love of the great hero and bard Usheen, whom she had never seen. Then Usheen was overcome with love for her, but she said that to wed herhe must follow her across the sea to the Island of Perpetual Youth. Therehe would have a hundred horses and a hundred sheep and a hundred silkenrobes, a hundred swords, a hundred bows, and a hundred youths to followhim; while she would have a hundred maidens to wait on her. But how, heasked, was he to reach this island? He was to mount her horse and ridebehind her. So he did this, and the slender white horse, not feeling hisweight, dashed across the waves of the ocean, which did not yield beneathhis tread. They galloped across the very sea, and the maiden, whose namewas Niam, sang to him as they rode, and this so enchantingly that hescarcely knew whether hours passed or days. Sometimes deer ran by themover the water, followed by red-eared hounds in full chase; sometimes amaiden holding up an apple of gold; sometimes a beautiful youth; but theythemselves rode on always westward. 

At last they drew near an island which was not, Niam said, the islandthey were seeking; but it was one where a beautiful princess was keptunder a spell until some defender should slay a cruel giant who held herunder enchantment until she should either wed him or furnish a defender. The youth Usheen, being an Irishman and not easily frightened, naturallyoffered his services as defender, and they waited three days and nights tocarry on the conflict. He had fought at home--so the legend says--withwild boars, with foreign invaders, and with enchanters, but he never hadquite so severe a contest as with this giant; but after he had cut off hisopponent's head and had been healed with precious balm by the beautifulprincess, he buried the giant's body in a deep grave and placed above it agreat stone engraved in the Ogham alphabet--in which all the letters aregiven in straight lines. 

After this he and Niam again mounted the white steed and galloped awayover the waves. Niam was again singing, when soft music began to be heardin the distance, as if in the centre of the setting sun. They drew nearerand nearer to a shore where the very trees trembled with the multitude ofbirds that sang upon them; and when they reached the shore, Niam gave onenote of song, and a band of youths and maidens came rushing towards themand embraced them with eagerness. Then they too sang, and as they did it, one brought to Usheen a harp of silver and bade him sing of earthly joys. He found himself chanting, as he thought, with peculiar spirit and melody, but as he told them of human joys they kept still and began to weep, tillat last one of them seized the silver harp and flung it away into a poolof water, saying, "It is the saddest harp in all the world. "

Then he forgot all the human joys which seemed to those happy people onlyas sorrows compared with their own; and he dwelt with them thenceforwardin perpetual youth. For a hundred years he chased the deer and wentfishing in strangely carved boats and joined in the athletic sports of theyoung men; for a hundred years the gentle Niam was his wife. 

But one day, when Usheen was by the beach, there floated to his feet whatseemed a wooden staff, and he drew it from the waves. It was the batteredfragment of a warrior's lance. The blood stains of war were still on it, and as he looked at it he recalled the old days of the Feni, the wars andtumult of his youth; and how he had outlived his tribe and all had passedaway. Niam came softly to him and rested against his shoulder, but it didnot soothe his pain, and he heard one of the young men watching him say toanother, "The human sadness has come back into his eyes. " The peoplearound stood watching him, all sharing his sorrow, and knowing that histime of happiness was over and that he would go back among men. So indeedit was; Niam and Usheen mounted the white steed again and galloped awayover the sea, but she had warned him when they mounted that he must neverdismount for an instant, for that if he once touched the earth, she andthe steed would vanish forever, that his youth too would disappear, andthat he would be left alone on earth--an old man whose whole generationhad vanished. 

They passed, as before, over the sea; the same visions hovered aroundthem, youths and maidens and animals of the chase; they passed by manyislands, and at last reached the shore of Erin again. As they travelledover its plains and among its hills, Oisin looked in vain for his oldcompanions. A little people had taken their place, --small men and women, mounted on horses as small;--and these people gazed in wonder at themighty Usheen. "We have heard, " they said, "of the hero Finn, and thepoets have written many tales of him and of his people, the Feni. We haveread in old books that he had a son Usheen who went away with a fairymaiden; but he was never seen again, and there is no race of the Fenileft. " Yet refusing to believe this, and always looking round for thepeople whom he had known and loved of old, he thought within himself thatperhaps the Feni were not to be seen because they were hunting fiercewolves by night, as they used to do in his boyhood, and that they weretherefore sleeping in the daytime; but again an old man said to him, "TheFeni are dead. " Then he remembered that it was a hundred years, and thathis very race had perished, and he turned with contempt on the little menand their little horses. Three hundred of them as he rode by were tryingto lift a vast stone, but they staggered under its weight, and at lastfell and lay beneath it; then leaning from his saddle Usheen lifted thestone with one hand and flung it five yards. But with the strain thesaddle girth broke, and Usheen came to the ground; the white steed shookhimself and neighed, then galloped away, bearing Niam with him, and Usheenlay with all his strength gone from him--a feeble old man. The Island ofYouth could only be known by those who dwelt always within it, and thosemortals who had once left it could dwell there no more. 

V

BRAN THE BLESSED

The mighty king Bran, a being of gigantic size, sat one day on the cliffsof his island in the Atlantic Ocean, near to Hades and the Gates of Night, when he saw ships sailing towards him and sent men to ask what they were. They were a fleet sent by Matholweh, the king of Ireland, who had sent toask for Branwen, Bran's sister, as his wife. Without moving from his rockBran bid the monarch land, and sent Branwen back with him as queen. 

But there came a time when Branwen was ill-treated at the palace; theysent her into the kitchen and made her cook for the court, and they causedthe butcher to come every day (after he had cut up the meat) and give hera blow on the ear. They also drew up all their boats on the shore forthree years, that she might not send for her brother. But she reared astarling in the cover of the kneading-trough, taught it to speak, and toldit how to find her brother; and then she wrote a letter describing hersorrows and bound it to the bird's wing, and it flew to the island andalighted on Bran's shoulder, "ruffling its feathers" (says the Welshlegend) "so that the letter was seen, and they knew that the bird had beenreared in a domestic manner. " Then Bran resolved to cross the sea, but hehad to wade through the water, as no ship had yet been built large enoughto hold him; and he carried all his musicians (pipers) on his shoulders. As he approached the Irish shore, men ran to the king, saying that theyhad seen a forest on the sea, where there never before had been a tree, and that they had also seen a mountain which moved. Then the king askedBranwen, the queen, what it could be. She answered, "These are the men ofthe Island of the Mighty, who have come hither to protect me. " "What isthe forest?" they asked. "The yards and masts of ships. " "What mountain isthat by the side of the ships?" "It is Bran my brother, coming to theshoal water and rising. " "What is the lofty ridge with the lake on eachside?" "That is his nose, " she said, "and the two lakes are his fierceeyes. "

Then the people were terrified: there was yet a river for Bran to pass, and they broke down the bridge which crossed it, but Bran laid himselfdown and said, "Who will be a chief, let him be a bridge. " Then his menlaid hurdles on his back, and the whole army crossed over; and that sayingof his became afterwards a proverb. Then the Irish resolved, in order toappease the mighty visitor, to build him a house, because he had neverbefore had one that would hold him; and they decided to make the houselarge enough to contain the two armies, one on each side. They accordinglybuilt this house, and there were a hundred pillars, and the builderstreacherously hung a leathern bag on each side of each pillar and put anarmed man inside of each, so that they could all rise by night and killthe sleepers. But Bran's brother, who was a suspicious man, asked thebuilders what was in the first bag. "Meal, good soul, " they answered; andhe, putting his hand in, felt a man's head and crushed it with his mightyfingers, and so with the next and the next and with the whole two hundred. After this it did not take long to bring on a quarrel between the twoarmies, and they fought all day. 

After this great fight between the men of Ireland and the men of theIsles of the Mighty there were but seven of these last who escaped, besides their king Bran, who was wounded in the foot with a poisoned dart. Then he knew that he should soon die, but he bade the seven men to cut offhis head and told them that they must always carry it with them--that itwould never decay and would always be able to speak and be pleasantcompany for them. "A long time will you be on the road, " he said. "InHarlech you will feast seven years, the birds of Rhiannon singing to youall the while. And at the Island of Gwales you will dwell for fourscoreyears, and you may remain there, bearing the head with you uncorrupted, until you open the door that looks towards the mainland; and after youhave once opened that door you can stay no longer, but must set forth toLondon to bury the head, leaving it there to look toward France. "

So they went on to Harlech and there stopped to rest, and sat down to eatand drink. And there came three birds, which began singing a certain song, and all the songs they had ever heard were unpleasant compared with it;and the songs seemed to them to be at a great distance from them, over thesea, yet the notes were heard as distinctly as if they were close by; andit is said that at this repast they continued seven years. At the close ofthis time they went forth to an island in the sea called Gwales. Therethey found a fair and regal spot overlooking the ocean and a spacious hallbuilt for them. They went into it and found two of its doors open, but thethird door, looking toward Cornwall, was closed. "See yonder, " said theirleader Manawydan; "that is the door we may not open. " And that night theyregaled themselves and were joyful. And of all they had seen of food laidbefore them, and of all they had heard said, they remembered nothing;neither of that, nor of any sorrow whatsoever. There they remainedfourscore years, unconscious of having ever spent a time more joyous andmirthful. And they were not more weary than when first they came, neitherdid they, any of them, know the time they had been there. It was not moreirksome for them to have the head with them, than if Bran the Blessed hadbeen with them himself. And because of these fourscore years, it wascalled "The Entertaining of the Noble Head. "

One day said Heilwyn the son of Gwyn, "Evil betide me, if I do not openthe door to know if that is true which is said concerning it. " So heopened the door and looked towards Cornwall. And when they had looked theywere as conscious of all the evils they had ever sustained, and of all thefriends and companions they had ever lost, and of all the misery that hadbefallen them, as if all had happened in that very spot; and especially ofthe fate of their lord. And because of their perturbation they could notrest, but journeyed forth with the head towards London. And they buriedthe head in the White Mount. 

The island called Gwales is supposed to be that now named Gresholm, eightor ten miles off the coast of Pembrokeshire; and to this day the Welshsailors on that coast talk of the Green Meadows of Enchantment lying outat sea west of them, and of men who had either landed on them or seen themsuddenly vanishing. Some of the people of Milford used to declare thatthey could sometimes see the Green Islands of the fairies quitedistinctly; and they believed that the fairies went to and fro betweentheir islands and the shore through a subterranean gallery under the sea. They used, indeed, to make purchases in the markets of Milford orLanghorne, and this they did sometimes without being seen and alwayswithout speaking, for they seemed to know the prices of the things theywished to buy and always laid down the exact sum of money needed. Andindeed, how could the seven companions of the Enchanted Head have spenteighty years of incessant feasting on an island of the sea, withoutsometimes purchasing supplies from the mainland?

VI

THE CASTLE OF THE ACTIVE DOOR

 Perfect is my chair in Caer Sidi; Plague and age hurt not who's in it-- They know, Manawydan and Pryderi. Three organs round a fire sing before it, And about its points are ocean's streams And the abundant well above it-- Sweeter than white wine the drink in it. 

Peredur, the knight, rode through the wild woods of the Enchanted Islanduntil he arrived on clear ground outside the forest. Then he beheld acastle on level ground in the middle of a meadow; and round the castleflowed a stream, and inside the castle there were large and spacious hallswith great windows. Drawing nearer the castle, he saw it to be turningmore rapidly than any wind blows. On the ramparts he saw archers shootingso vigorously that no armor would protect against them; there were alsomen blowing horns so loud that the earth appeared to tremble; and at thegates were lions, in iron chains, roaring so violently that one mightfancy that the castle and the woods were ready to be uprooted. Neither thelions nor the warriors resisted Peredur, but he found a woman sitting bythe gate, who offered to carry him on her back to the hall. This was thequeen Rhiannon, who, having been accused of having caused the death of herchild, was sentenced to remain seven years sitting by the gate, to tellher story to every one, and to offer to carry all strangers on her backinto the castle. 

But so soon as Peredur had entered it, the castle vanished away, and hefound himself standing on the bare ground. The queen Rhiannon was leftbeside him, and she remained on the island with her son Pryderi and hiswife. Queen Rhiannon married for her second husband a person namedManawydan. One day they ascended a mound called Arberth which was wellknown for its wonders, and as they sat there they heard a clap of thunder, followed by mist so thick that they could not see one another. When itgrew light again, they looked around them and found that all dwellings andanimals had vanished; there was no smoke or fire anywhere or work of humanhands; all their household had disappeared, and there were left onlyPryderi and Manawydan with their wives. Wandering from place to place, they found no human beings; but they lived by hunting, fishing, andgathering wild honey. After visiting foreign lands, they returned to theirisland home. One day when they were out hunting, a wild boar of pure whitecolor sprang from a bush, and as they saw him they retreated, and they sawalso the Turning Castle. The boar, watching his opportunity, sprang intoit, and the dogs followed, and Pryderi said, "I will go into this castleand get tidings of the dogs. " "Go not, " said Manawydan; "whoever has casta spell over this land and deprived us of our dwelling has placed thiscastle here. " But Pryderi replied, "Of a truth I cannot give up my dogs. "So he watched for the opportunity and went in. He saw neither boar nordogs, neither man nor beast; but on the centre of the castle floor he sawa fountain with marble work around it, and on the margin of the fountain agolden bowl upon a marble slab, and in the air hung chains, of which hecould see no end. He was much delighted with the beauty of the gold andthe rich workmanship of the bowl and went up to lay hold of it. The momenthe touched it, his fingers clung to the bowl, and his feet to the slab;and all his joyousness forsook him so that he could not utter a word. Andthus he stood. 

Manawydan waited for him until evening, but hearing nothing either of himor of the dogs, he returned home. When he entered, Rhiannon, who was hiswife and who was also Pryderi's mother, looked at him. "Where, " she said, "are Pryderi and the dogs?" "This is what has happened to me, " he said;and he told her. "An evil companion hast thou been, " she said, "and a goodcompanion hast thou lost. " With these words she went out and proceededtowards the Castle of the Active Door. Getting in, she saw Pryderi takinghold of the bowl, and she went towards him. "What dost thou here?" shesaid, and she took hold of the bowl for herself; and then her hands becamefast to it, and her feet to the slab, and she could not speak a word. Thencame thunder and a fall of mist; thereupon the Castle of the Active Doorvanished and never was seen again. Rhiannon and Pryderi also vanished. 

When Kigva, the wife of Pryderi, saw this, she sorrowed so that she carednot if she lived or died. No one was left on the island but Manawydan andherself. They wandered away to other lands and sought to earn theirliving; then they came back to their island, bringing with them one bag ofwheat which they planted. It throve and grew, and when the time of harvestcame it was most promising, so that Manawydan resolved to reap it on themorrow. At break of day he came back to begin; but found nothing left butstraw. Every stalk had been cut close to the ground and carried away. 

Going to another field, he found it ripe, but on coming in the morning hefound but the straw. "Some one has contrived my ruin, " he said; "I willwatch the third field to see what happens. He who stole the first willcome to steal this. "

He remained through the evening to watch the grain, and at midnight heheard loud thunder. He looked and saw coming a host of mice such as no mancould number; each mouse took a stalk of the wheat and climbed it, so thatit bent to the ground; then each mouse cut off the ear and ran away withit. They all did this, leaving the stalk bare, and there was not a singlestraw for which there was not a mouse. He struck among them, but could nomore fix his sight on any of them, the legend says, than on flies andbirds in the air, except one which seemed heavier than the rest, and movedslowly. This one he pursued and caught, put it in his glove and tied itwith a string. Taking it home, he showed it to Kigva, and told her that hewas going to hang the mouse next day. She advised against it, but hepersisted, and on the next morning took the animal to the top of the Moundof Arberth, where he placed two wooden forks in the ground, and set up asmall gallows. 

While doing this, he saw a clerk coming to him in old, threadbareclothes. It was now seven years since he had seen a human being there, except the friends he had lost and Kigva who survived them. The clerk badehim good day and said he was going back to his country from England, wherehe had been singing. Then the clerk asked Manawydan what he was doing. "Hanging a thief, " said he; and when the clerk saw that it was a mouse, heoffered a pound to release it, but Manawydan refused. Then a priest cameriding up and offered him three pounds to release the mouse; but thisoffer was declined. Then he made a noose round the mouse's neck, and whilehe did this, a bishop's whole retinue came riding towards him. The bishopseemed, like everybody else, to be very desirous of rescuing the mouse; heoffered first seven pounds, and then twenty-four, and then added all hishorses and equipages; but Manawydan still refused. The bishop finallyasked him to name any price he pleased. "The liberation of Rhiannon andPryderi, " he said. "Thou shalt have it, " said the bishop. "And the removalof the enchantment, " said Manawydan. "That also, " said the bishop, "if youwill only restore the mouse. " "Why?" said the other. "Because, " said thebishop, "she is my wife. " "Why did she come to me?" asked Manawydan. "Tosteal, " was the reply. "When it was known that you were inhabiting theisland, my household came to me, begging me to transform them into mice. The first and second nights they came alone, but the third night my wifeand the ladies of the court wished also to accompany them, and Itransformed them also; and now you have promised to let her go. " "Not so, "said the other, "except with a promise that there shall be no more suchenchantment practised, and no vengeance on Pryderi and Rhiannon, or onme. " This being promised, the bishop said, "Now wilt thou release mywife?" "No, by my faith, " said Manawydan, "not till I see Pryderi andRhiannon free before my eyes. " "Here they are coming, " said the bishop;and when they had been embraced by Manawydan, he let go the mouse; thebishop touched it with a wand, and it became the most beautiful youngwoman that ever was seen. "Now look round upon the country, " said thebishop, "and see the dwellings and the crops returned, " and theenchantment was removed. 

"The Land of Illusion and the Realm of Glamour" is the name given by theold romancers to the south-west part of Wales, and to all the islands offthe coast. Indeed, it was believed, ever since the days of the Greekwriter, Plutarch, that some peculiar magic belonged to these islands; andevery great storm that happened among them was supposed to be caused bythe death of one of the wondrous enchanters who dwelt in that region. Whenit was over, the islanders said, "Some one of the mighty has passed away. "

VII

MERLIN THE ENCHANTER

In one of the old books called Welsh Triads, in which all things areclassed by threes, there is a description of three men called "The ThreeGenerous Heroes of the Isle of Britain. " One of these--named Nud orNodens, and later called Merlin--was first brought from the sea, it isstated, with a herd of cattle consisting of 21, 000 milch cows, which aresupposed to mean those waves of the sea that the poets often describe asWhite Horses. He grew up to be a king and warrior, a magician and prophet, and on the whole the most important figure in the Celtic traditions. Hecame from the sea and at last returned to it, but meanwhile he did greatworks on land, one of which is said to have been the building ofStonehenge. 

This is the way, as the old legends tell, in which the vast stones ofStonehenge came to be placed on Salisbury Plain. It is a thing which hasalways been a puzzle to every one, inasmuch as their size and weight areenormous, and there is no stone of the same description to be found withinhundreds of miles of Salisbury Plain, where they now stand. 

The legend is that Pendragon, king of England, was led to fight a greatbattle by seeing a dragon in the air. The battle was won, but Pendragonwas killed and was buried on Salisbury Plain, where the fight had takenplace. When his brother Uther took his place, Merlin the enchanter advisedhim to paint a dragon on a flag and bear it always before him to bringgood fortune, and this he always did. Then Merlin said to him, "Wilt thoudo nothing more on the Plain of Salisbury, to honor thy brother?" The Kingsaid, "What shall be done?" Then Merlin said, "I will cause a thing to bedone that will endure to the world's end. " Then he bade Utherpendragon, ashe called the new king, to send many ships and men to Ireland, and heshowed him stones such as seemed far too large and heavy to bring, but heplaced them by his magic art upon the boats and bore them to England; andhe devised means to transport them and to set them on end, "for they shallseem fairer so than if they were lying. " And there they are to this day. 

This was the way in which Merlin would sometimes obtain the favor andadmiration of young ladies. There was a maiden of twelve named Nimiane orVivian, the daughter of King Dionas, and Merlin changed himself into theappearance of "a fair young squire, " that he might talk with her beside afountain, described in the legends as "a well, whereof the springs werefair and the water clear and the gravel so fair that it seemed of finesilver. " By degrees he made acquaintance with the child, who told him whoshe was, adding, "And what are you, fair, sweet friend?" "Damsel, " saidMerlin, "I am a travelling squire, seeking for my master, who has taughtme wonderful things. " "And what master is that?" she asked. "It is one, "he said, "who has taught me so much that I could here erect for you acastle, and I could make many people outside to attack it and inside todefend it; nay, I could go upon this water and not wet my feet, and Icould make a river where water had never been. "

"These are strange feats, " said the maiden, "and I wish that I could thusdisport myself. " "I can do yet greater things, " said Merlin, "and no onecan devise anything which I cannot do, and I can also make it to endureforever. " "Indeed, " said the girl, "I would always love you if you couldshow me some such wonders. " "For your love, " he answered, "I will show yousome of these wondrous plays, and I will ask no more of you. " Then Merlinturned and described a circle with a wand and then came and sat by heragain at the fountain. At noon she saw coming out of the forest manyladies and knights and squires, holding each other by the hand and singingin the greatest joy; then came men with timbrels and tabours and dancing, so that one could not tell one-fourth part of the sports that went on. Then Merlin caused an orchard to grow, with all manner of fruit andflowers; and the maiden cared for nothing but to listen to their singing, "Truly love begins in joy, but ends in grief. " The festival continued frommid-day to even-song; and King Dionas and his courtiers came out to seeit, and marvelled whence these strange people came. Then when the carolswere ended, the ladies and maidens sat down on the green grass and freshflowers, and the squires set up a game of tilting called quintain upon themeadows and played till even-song; and then Merlin came to the damsel andasked if he had done what he promised for her. "Fair, sweet friend, " saidshe, "you have done so much that I am all yours. " "Let me teach you, " heanswered, "and I will show you many wonders that no woman ever learned somany. "

Merlin and this young damsel always remained friends, and he taught hermany wonderful arts, one of which was (this we must regret) a spell bywhich she might put her parents to sleep whenever he visited her; whileanother lesson was (this being more unexceptionable) in the use of threewords, by saying which she might at any time keep at a distance any menwho tried to molest her. He stayed eight days near her, and in those daystaught her many of the most "wonderful things that any mortal heart couldthink of, things past and things that were done and said, and a part ofwhat was to come; and she put them in writing, and then Merlin departedfrom her and came to Benoyk, where the king, Arthur, rested, so that gladwere they when they saw Merlin. "

The relations between Merlin and Arthur are unlike those ever heldtowards a king even by an enchanter in any legend. Even in Homer there isno one described, except the gods, as having such authority over a ruler. Merlin came and went as he pleased and under any form he might please. Heforetold the result of a battle, ordered up troops, brought aid from adistance. He rebuked the bravest knights for cowardice; as when Ban, Bors, and Gawain had concealed themselves behind some bushes during a fight. "Isthis, " he said to King Arthur and Sir Bors, "the war and the help that youdo to your friends who have put themselves in adventure of death in many aneed, and ye come hither to hide for cowardice. " Then the legend says, "When the king understood the words of Merlin, he bowed his head forshame, " and the other knights acknowledged their fault. Then Merlin tookthe dragon banner which he had given them and said that he would bear ithimself; "for the banner of a king, " he said, "should not be hid inbattle, --but borne in the foremost front. " Then Merlin rode forth andcried with a loud voice, "Now shall be shown who is a knight. " And theknights, seeing Merlin, exclaimed that he was "a full noble man"; and"without fail, " says the legend, "he was full of marvellous powers andstrength of body and great and long stature; but brown he was and lean andrough of hair. " Then he rode in among the enemy on a great black horse;and the golden dragon which he had made and had attached to the bannergave out from its throat such a flaming fire that the air was black withits smoke; and all King Arthur's men began to fight again more stoutly, and Arthur himself held the bridle reins in his left hand, and so wieldedhis sword with his right as to slay two hundred men. 

There was no end to Merlin's disguises--sometimes as an old man, sometimes as a boy or a dwarf, then as a woman, then as an ignorant clown;--but the legends always give him some object to accomplish, some work todo, and there was always a certain dignity about him, even when helpingKing Arthur, as he sometimes did, to do wrong things. His fame extendedover all Britain, and also through Brittany, now a part of France, wherethe same poetic legends extended. This, for instance, is a very old Bretonsong about him:--

 MERLIN THE DIVINER

 Merlin! Merlin! where art thou going So early in the day, with thy black dog? Oi! oi! oi! oi! oi! oi! oi! oi! oi! oi! oi! Oi! oi! oi! oi! oi!

 I have come here to search the way, To find the red egg; The red egg of the marine serpent, By the seaside, in the hollow of the stone. 

 I am going to seek in the valley The green water-cress, and the golden grass, And the top branch of the oak, In the wood by the side of the fountain. 

 Merlin! Merlin! retrace your steps; Leave the branch on the oak, And the green water-cress in the valley, As well as the golden grass; And leave the red egg of the marine serpent In the foam by the hollow of the stone. Merlin! Merlin! retrace thy steps; There is no diviner but God. 

Merlin was supposed to know the past, the present, and the future, and tobe able to assume the form of any animal, and even that of a_menhir_, or huge standing stone. Before history began he ruled inBritain, then a delightful island of flowery meadows. His subjects were"small people" (fairies), and their lives were a continued festival ofsinging, playing, and enjoyment. The sage ruled them as a father, hisfamiliar servant being a tame wolf. He also possessed a kingdom, beneaththe waves, where everything was beautiful, the inhabitants being charminglittle beings, with waves of long, fair hair falling on their shoulders incurls. Fruits and milk composed the food of all, meat and fish being heldin abhorrence. The only want felt was of the full light of the sun, which, coming to them through the water, was but faint, and cast no shadow. 

Here was the famous workshop where Merlin forged the enchanted sword socelebrated by the bards, and where the stones were found by which alonethe sword could be sharpened. Three British heroes were fated to wieldthis blade in turn; viz. , Lemenisk the leaper (_Leim_, meaning leap), Utherpendragon, and his son King Arthur. By orders of this last hero, whenmortally wounded, it was flung into the sea, where it will remain till hereturns to restore the rule of his country to the faithful British race. 

The bard once amused and puzzled the court by entering the hall as ablind boy led by a greyhound, playing on his harp, and demanding asrecompense to be allowed to carry the king's banner in an approachingbattle. Being refused on account of his blindness he vanished, and theking of Brittany mentioned his suspicions that this was one of Merlin'selfin tricks. Arthur was disturbed, for he had promised to give the childanything except his honor, his kingdom, his wife, and his sword. However, while he continued to fret, there entered the hall a poor child abouteight years old, with shaved head, features of livid tint, eyes of lightgray, barefooted, barelegged, and a whip knotted over his shoulders in themanner affected by horseboys. Speaking and looking like an idiot, he askedthe king's permission to bear the royal ensign in the approaching battlewith the giant Rion. The courtiers laughed, but Arthur, suspecting a newjoke on Merlin's part, granted the demand, and then Merlin stood in hisown proper person before the company. 

He also seems to have taught people many things in real science, especially the women, who were in those days more studious than the men, or at least had less leisure. For instance, the legend says of Morgan lefay (or la fée), King Arthur's sister, "she was a noble clergesse (meaningthat she could read and write, like the clergy), and of astronomy couldshe enough, for Merlin had her taught, and she learned much of egromancy(magic or necromancy); and the best work-woman she was with her hands thatany man knew in any land, and she had the fairest head and the fairesthands under heaven, and shoulders well-shapen; and she had fair eloquenceand full debonair she was, as long as she was in her right wit; and whenshe was wroth with any man, she was evil to meet. " This lady was one ofMerlin's pupils, but the one whom he loved most and instructed the mostwas Nimiane or Vivian, already mentioned, who seems to have been to himrather a beloved younger sister than anything else, and he taught her somuch that "at last he might hold himself a fool, " the legend says, "andever she inquired of his cunning and his mysteries, each thing by itself, and he let her know all, and she wrote all that he said, as she was welllearned in clergie (reading and writing), and learned lightly all thatMerlin taught her; and when they parted, each of them commended the otherto God full tenderly. "

The form of the enchanter Merlin disappeared from view, at last--for thelegends do not admit that his life ever ended--across the sea whence hecame. 

The poet Tennyson, to be sure, describes Nimiane or Vivian--the Lady ofthe Lake--as a wicked enchantress who persuaded Merlin to betray hissecrets to her, and then shut him up in an oak tree forever. But otherlegends seem to show that Tennyson does great injustice to the Lady of theLake, that she really loved Merlin even in his age, and thereforepersuaded him to show her how to make a tower without walls, --that theymight dwell there together in peace, and address each other only asBrother and Sister. When he had told her, he fell asleep with his head inher lap, and she wove a spell nine times around his head, and the towerbecame the strongest in the world. Some of the many legends place thistower in the forest of Broceliande; while others transport it afar to amagic island, where Merlin dwells with his nine bards, and where Vivianalone can come or go through the magic walls. Some legends describe it asan enclosure "neither of iron nor steel nor timber nor of stone, but ofthe air, without any other thing but enchantment, so strong that it maynever be undone while the world endureth. " Here dwells Merlin, it is said, with nine favorite bards who took with them the thirteen treasures ofEngland. These treasures are said to have been:--

1. A sword; if any man drew it except the owner, it burst into a flamefrom the cross to the point. All who asked it received it; but because ofthis peculiarity all shunned it. 

2. A basket; if food for one man were put into it, when opened it wouldbe found to contain food for one hundred. 

3. A horn; what liquor soever was desired was found therein. 

4. A chariot; whoever sat in it would be immediately wheresoever he wished. 

5. A halter, which was in a staple below the feet of a bed; and whateverhorse one wished for in it, he would find it there. 

6. A knife, which would serve four-and twenty men at meat all at once. 

7. A caldron; if meat were put into it to boil for a coward, it wouldnever be boiled; but if meat were put in it for a brave man, it would beboiled forthwith. 

8. A whetstone; if the sword of a brave man were sharpened thereon, andany one were wounded therewith, he would be sure to die; but if it werethat of a coward that was sharpened on it, he would be none the worse. 

9. A garment; if a man of gentle birth put it on, it suited him well; butif a churl, it would not fit him. 

10, 11. A pan and a platter; whatever food was required was found therein. 

12. A chessboard; when the men were placed upon it, they would play ofthemselves. The chessboard was of gold, and the men of silver. 

13. The mantle of Arthur; whosoever was beneath it could see everything, while no one could see him. 

It is towards this tower, some legends say, that Merlin was last seen bysome Irish monks, sailing away westward, with a maiden, in a boat ofcrystal, beneath a sunset sky. 

VIII

SIR LANCELOT OF THE LAKE

Sir Lancelot, the famous knight, was the son of a king and queen againstwhom their subjects rebelled; the king was killed, the queen takencaptive, when a fairy rose in a cloud of mist and carried away the infantLancelot from where he had been left beneath a tree. The queen, afterweeping on the body of her husband, looked round and saw a lady standingby the water-side, holding the queen's child in her arms. "Fair, sweetfriend, " said the queen, "give me back my child. " The fairy made no reply, but dived into the water; and the queen was taken to an abbey, where shewas known as the Queen of Great Griefs. The Lady of the Lake took thechild to her own home, which was an island in the middle of the sea andsurrounded by impassable walls. From this the lady had her name of Dame duLac, or the Lady of the Lake (or Sea), and her foster son was calledLancelot du Lac, while the realm was called Meidelant, or the Land ofMaidens. 

Lancelot dwelt thenceforward in the castle, on the island. When he waseight years old he received a tutor who was to instruct him in allknightly knowledge; he learned to use bow and spear and to ride onhorseback, and some cousins of his were also brought thither by the Ladyof the Lake to be his comrades. When he was eighteen he wished to go toKing Arthur's court that he might be a knight. 

On the eve of St. John, as King Arthur returned from the chase, and bythe high road approached Camelot, he met a fair company. In the van wenttwo youths, leading two white mules, one freighted with a silken pavilion, the other with robes proper for a newly made knight; the mules bore twochests, holding the hauberk and the iron boots. Next came two squires, clad in white robes and mounted on white horses, carrying a silver shieldand a shining helmet; after these, two others, with a sword in a whitesheath and a white charger. Behind followed squires and servants in whitecoats, three damsels dressed in white, the two sons of King Bors; and, last of all, the fairy with the youth she loved. Her robe was of whitesamite lined with ermine; her white palfrey had a silver bit, while herbreastplate, stirrups, and saddle were of ivory, carved with figures ofladies and knights, and her white housings trailed on the ground. 

When she perceived the king, she responded to his salutation, and said, after she had lowered her wimple and displayed her face: "Sir, may Godbless the best of kings! I come to implore a boon, which it shall cost younothing to grant. " "Damsel, even it should cost me dear, you should not berefused; what is it you would have me do?" "Sir, dub this varlet a knight, and array him in the arms he bringeth, whenever he desireth. " "Your mercy, damsel! to bring me such a youth! Assuredly, I will dub him whenever hewill; but it shameth me to abandon my custom, for 'tis my wont to furnishwith garments and arms such as come thither to receive chivalry. " The ladyreplied that she desired the youth to carry the arms she had intended himto wear, and if she were refused, she would address herself elsewhere. SirEwain said that so fair a youth ought not to be denied, and the kingyielded to her entreaty. She returned thanks, and bade the varlet retainthe mules and the charger, with the two squires; and after that, sheprepared to return as she had come, in spite of the urgency of the king, who had begged her to remain in his court. "At least, " he cried, "tell usby what name are you known ?" "Sir, " she answered, "I am called the Ladyof the Lake. "

For a long way, Lancelot escorted the fairy, who said to him as she tookleave: "King's son, you are derived from lineage the most noble on earth;see to it that your worth be as great as your beauty. To-morrow you willask the king to bestow on you knighthood; when you are armed, you will nottarry in his house a single night. Abide in one place no longer than youcan help, and refrain from declaring your name until others proclaim it. Be prepared to accomplish every adventure, and never let another mancomplete a task which you yourself have undertaken. " With that, she gavehim a ring that had the property of dissolving enchantment, and commendedhim to God. 

On the morrow, Lancelot arrayed himself in his fairest robes, and suedfor knighthood, as he had been commanded to do. Sir Ewain attended him tocourt, where they dismounted in front of the palace; the king and queenadvanced to meet them; each took Sir Ewain by a hand, and seated him on acouch, while the varlet stood in their presence on the rushes that strewedthe floor. All gazed with pleasure, and the queen prayed that God mightmake him noble, for he possessed as much beauty as was possible for man tohave. 

After this he had many perilous adventures; he fought with giants andlions; he entered an enchanted castle and escaped; he went to a well inthe forest, and, striking three times on a cymbal with a hammer hung therefor the purpose, called forth a great giant, whom he slew, afterwardsmarrying his daughter. Then he went to rescue the queen of the realm, Gwenivere, from captivity. In order to reach the fortress where she wasprisoner, he had to ride in a cart with a dwarf; to follow a wheel thatrolled before him to show him the way, or a ball that took the place ofthe wheel; he had to walk on his hands and knees across a bridge made of adrawn sword; he suffered greatly. At last he rescued the queen, and laterthan this he married Elaine, the daughter of King Pelles, and her fathergave to them the castle of Blyaunt in the Joyous Island, enclosed in iron, and with a deep water all around it. There Lancelot challenged all knightsto come and contend with him, and he jousted with more than five hundred, overcoming them all, yet killing none, and at last he returned to Camelot, the place of King Arthur's court. 

One day he was called from the court to an abbey, where three nunsbrought to him a beautiful boy of fifteen, asking that he might be made aknight. This was Sir Lancelot's own son, Galahad, whom he had never seen, and did not yet know. That evening Sir Lancelot remained at the abbey withthe boy, that he might keep his vigil there, and on the morrow's dawn hewas made a knight. Sir Lancelot put on one of his spurs, and Bors, Lancelot's cousin, the other, and then Sir Lancelot said to the boy, "Fairson, attend me to the court of the king;" but the abbess said, "Sir, notnow, but we will send him when it shall be time. "

On Whitsunday, at the time called "underne, " which was nine in themorning, King Arthur and his knights sat at the Round Table, where onevery seat there was written, in letters of gold, the name of a knightwith "here ought to sit he, " or "he ought to sit here;" and thus went theinscriptions until they came to one seat (or _siège_ in French)called the "Siege Perilous, " where they found newly written letters ofgold, saying that this seat could not be occupied until four hundred andfifty years after the death of Christ; and that was this very day. Thenthere came news of a marvellous stone which had been seen above the water, with a sword sticking in it bearing the letters, "Never shall man take mehence, but only he by whose side I ought to hang, and he shall be the bestknight of the world. " Then two of the knights tried to draw the sword andfailed to draw it, and Sir Lancelot, who was thought the best knight inall the world, refused to attempt it. Then they went back to their seatsaround the table. 

Then when all the seats but the "Siege Perilous" were full, the hall wassuddenly darkened; and an old man clad in white, whom nobody knew, camein, with a young knight in red armor, wearing an empty scabbard at hisside, who said, "Peace be with you, fair knights. " The old man said, "Ibring you here a young knight that is of kings' lineage, " and the kingsaid, "Sir, ye are right heartily welcome. " Then the old man bade theyoung knight to remove his armor, and he wore a red garment, while the oldman placed on his shoulders a mantle of fine ermine, and said, "Sir, follow after. " Then the old man led him to the "Siege Perilous, " next toSir Lancelot, and lifted the cloth and read, "Here sits Sir Galahad, " andthe youth sat down. Upon this, all the knights of the Round Tablemarvelled greatly at Sir Galahad, that he dared to sit in that seat, andhe so tender of age. Then King Arthur took him by the hand and led himdown to the river to see the adventure of the stone. "Sir, " said the kingto Sir Galahad, "here is a great marvel, where right good knights havetried and failed. " "Sir, " said Sir Galahad, "that is no marvel, for theadventure was not theirs, but mine; I have brought no sword with me, forhere by my side hangs the scabbard, " and he laid his hand on the sword andlightly drew it from the stone. 

It was not until long after, and when they both had had many adventures, that Sir Lancelot discovered Galahad to be his son. Sir Lancelot once cameto the sea-strand and found a ship without sails or oars, and sailed awayupon it. Once, when he touched at an island, a young knight came on boardto whom Lancelot said, "Sir, you are welcome, " and when the young knightasked his name, told him, "My name is Sir Lancelot du Lac. " "Sir, " hesaid, "then you are welcome, for you are my father. " "Ah, " said Lancelot, "are you Sir Galahad?" Then the young knight kneeled down and asked hisblessing, and they embraced each other, and there was great joy betweenthem, and they told each other all their deeds. So dwelt Sir Lancelot andSir Galahad together within that ship for half a year, and often theyarrived at islands far from men where there were but wild beasts, and theyfound many adventures strange and perilous which they brought to an end. 

When Sir Lancelot at last died, his body was taken to Joyous-Gard, hishome, and there it lay in state in the choir, with a hundred torchesblazing above it; and while it was there, came his brother Sir Ector deMaris, who had long been seeking Lancelot. When he heard such noise andsaw such lights in the choir, he alighted and came in; and Sir Bors wenttowards him and told him that his brother Lancelot was lying dead. ThenSir Ector threw his shield and sword and helm from him, and when he lookedon Sir Lancelot's face he fell down in a swoon, and when he rose he spokethus: "Ah, Sir Lancelot, " said he, "thou wert dead of all Christenknights! And now I dare say, that, Sir Lancelot, there thou liest, thouwert never matched of none earthly knight's hands; and thou wert thecurtiest knight that ever beare shield; and thou wert the truest friend tothy lover that ever bestrood horse, and thou wert the truest lover of asinful man that ever loved woman; and thou wert the kindest man that everstrooke with sword; and thou wert the goodliest person that ever cameamong presse of knights; and thou wert the meekest man and the gentlestthat ever eate in hall among ladies; and thou wert the sternest knight tothy mortall foe that ever put speare in the rest. "

IX

THE HALF-MAN

King Arthur in his youth was fond of all manly exercises, especially ofwrestling, an art in which he found few equals. The old men who had beenthe champions of earlier days, and who still sat, in summer evenings, watching the youths who tried their skill before them, at last told himthat he had no rival in Cornwall, and that his only remaining competitorelsewhere was one who had tired out all others. 

"Where is he?" said Arthur. 

"He dwells, " an old man said, "on an island whither you will have to goand find him. He is of all wrestlers the most formidable. You will thinkhim at first so insignificant as to be hardly worth a contest; you willeasily throw him at the first trial; but after a while you will find himgrowing stronger; he seeks out all your weak points as by magic; he nevergives up; you may throw him again and again, but he will conquer you atlast. "

"His name! his name!" said Arthur. 

"His name, " they answered, "is Hanner Dyn; his home is everywhere, but onhis own island you will be likely to find him sooner or later. Keep clearof him, or he will get the best of you in the end, and make you his slaveas he makes slaves of others whom he has conquered. "

Far and wide over the ocean the young Arthur sought; he touched at islandafter island; he saw many weak men who did not dare to wrestle with him, and many strong ones whom he could always throw, until at last when he wasfar out under the western sky, he came one day to an island which he hadnever before seen and which seemed uninhabited. Presently there came outfrom beneath an arbor of flowers a little miniature man, graceful andquick-moving as an elf. Arthur, eager in his quest, said to him, "In whatisland dwells Hanner Dyn?" "In this island, " was the answer. "Where ishe?" said Arthur. "I am he, " said the laughing boy, taking hold of hishand. 

"What did they mean by calling you a wrestler?" said Arthur. 

"Oh, " said the child coaxingly, "I am a wrestler. Try me. "

The king took him and tossed him in the air with his strong arms, tillthe boy shouted with delight. He then took Arthur by the hand and led himabout the island--showed him his house and where the gardens and fieldswere. He showed him the rows of men toiling in the meadows or fellingtrees. "They all work for me, " he said carelessly. The king thought he hadnever seen a more stalwart set of laborers. Then the boy led him to thehouse, asked him what his favorite fruits were, or his favorite beverages, and seemed to have all at hand. He was an unaccountable little creature;in size and years he seemed a child; but in his activity and agility heseemed almost a man. When the king told him so, he smiled, as winningly asever, and said, "That is what they call me--Hanner Dyn, The Half-Man. "Laughing merrily, he helped Arthur into his boat and bade him farewell, urging him to come again. The King sailed away, looking back withsomething like affection on his winsome little playmate. 

It was months before Arthur came that way again. Again the merry childmet him, having grown a good deal since their earlier meeting. "How is mylittle wrestler?" said Arthur. "Try me, " said the boy; and the king tossedhim again in his arms, finding the delicate limbs firmer, and the slenderbody heavier than before, though easily manageable. The island was asgreen and more cultivated, there were more men working in the fields, andArthur noticed that their look was not cheerful, but rather as of thosewho had been discouraged and oppressed. 

It was, however, a charming sail to the island, and, as it became morefamiliar, the king often bade his steersman guide the pinnace that way. Hewas often startled with the rapid growth and increased strength of thelaughing boy, Hanner Dyn, while at other times he seemed much as beforeand appeared to have made but little progress. The youth seemed nevertired of wrestling; he always begged the king for a trial of skill, andthe king rejoiced to see how readily the young wrestler caught at thetricks of the art; so that the time had long passed when even Arthur'sstrength could toss him lightly in the air, as at first. Hanner Dyn wasgrowing with incredible rapidity into a tall young fellow, and instead ofthe weakness that often comes with rapid growth, his muscles grew everharder and harder. Still merry and smiling, he began to wrestle inearnest, and one day, in a moment of carelessness, Arthur received a backfall, perhaps on moist ground, and measured his length. Rising with aquick motion, he laughed at the angry faces of his attendants and bade theboy farewell. The men at work in the fields glanced up, attracted by thesound of voices, and he saw them exchange looks with one another. 

Yet he felt his kingly dignity a little impaired, and hastened ere longto revisit the island and teach the saucy boy another lesson. Months hadpassed, and the youth had expanded into a man of princely promise, butwith the same sunny look. His shoulders were now broad, his limbs of thefirmest mould, his eye clear, keen, penetrating. "Of all the wrestlers Ihave ever yet met, " said the king, "this younker promises to be the mostformidable. I can easily throw him now, but what will he be a few yearshence?" The youth greeted him joyously, and they began their usual match. The sullen serfs in the fields stopped to watch them, and an aged Druidpriest, whom Arthur had brought with him, to give the old man air andexercise in the boat, opened his weak eyes and closed them again. 

As they began to wrestle, the king felt, by the very grasp of the youth'sarms, by the firm set of his foot upon the turf, that this was to beunlike any previous effort. The wrestlers stood after the old Cornishfashion, breast to breast, each resting his chin on the other's shoulder. They grasped each other round the body, each setting his left hand abovethe other's right. Each tried to force the other to touch the ground withboth shoulders and one hip, or with both hips and one shoulder; or else tocompel the other to relinquish his hold for an instant--either of thesesuccesses giving the victory. Often as Arthur had tried the art, he neverhad been so matched before. The competitors swayed this way and that, writhed, struggled, half lost their footing and regained it, yet neitheryielded. All the boatmen gathered breathlessly around, King Arthur's menrefusing to believe their eyes, even when they knew their king was indanger. A stranger group was that of the sullen farm-laborers, who lefttheir ploughs and spades, and, congregating on a rising ground, watchedwithout any expression of sympathy the contest that was going on. An oldwrestler from Cornwall, whom Arthur had brought with him, was the judge;and according to the habit of the time, the contest was for the best twobouts in three. By the utmost skill and strength, Arthur compelled HannerDyn to lose his hold for one instant in the first trial, and the King waspronounced the victor. 

The second test was far more difficult; the boy, now grown to a man, andseeming to grow older and stronger before their very eyes, twice forcedArthur to the ground either with hip or shoulder, but never with both, while the crowd closed in breathlessly around; and the half-blind oldDruid, who had himself been a wrestler in his youth, and who had beenbrought ashore to witness the contest, called warningly aloud, "Savethyself, O king!" At this Arthur roused his failing strength to one finaleffort, and, griping his rival round the waist with a mighty grasp, raisedhim bodily from the ground and threw him backward till he fell flat, likea log, on both shoulders and both hips; while Arthur himself fell faintinga moment later. Nor did he recover until he found himself in the boat, hishead resting on the knees of the aged Druid, who said to him, "Neveragain, O king! must you encounter the danger you have barely escaped. Hadyou failed, you would have become subject to your opponent, whose strengthhas been maturing for years to overpower you. Had you yielded, you would, although a king, have become but as are those dark-browed men who till hisfields and do his bidding. For know you not what the name Hanner Dynmeans? It means--Habit; and the force of habit, at first weak, thengrowing constantly stronger, ends in conquering even kings!"

X

KING ARTHUR AT AVALON

In the ruined castle at Winchester, England, built by William theConqueror, there is a hall called "The Great Hall, " where Richard Coeur deLion was received by his nobles when rescued from captivity; where HenryIII. Was born; where all the Edwards held court; where Henry VIII. Entertained the emperor Charles V. ; where Queen Mary was married to PhilipII. ; where Parliament met for many years. It is now a public hall for thecounty; and at one end of it the visitor sees against the wall a vastwooden tablet on which the names of King Arthur's knights of the RoundTable are inscribed in a circle. No one knows its date or origin, thoughit is known to be more than four hundred years old, but there appear uponit the names most familiar to those who have read the legends of KingArthur, whether in Tennyson's poems or elsewhere. There are Lancelot andBedivere, Gawaine and Dagonet, Modred and Gareth, and the rest. Many bookshave been written of their deeds; but a time came when almost all thoseknights were to fall, according to the legend, in one great battle. Modred, the king's nephew, had been left in charge of the kingdom duringArthur's absence, and had betrayed him and tried to dethrone him, meaningto crown himself king. Many people joined with him, saying that underArthur they had had only war and fighting, but under Modred they wouldhave peace and bliss. Yet nothing was farther from Modred's purpose thanbliss or peace, and it was agreed at last that a great battle should befought for the kingdom. 

On the night of Trinity Sunday, King Arthur had a dream. He thought hesat in a chair, upon a scaffold, and the chair was fastened to a wheel. Hewas dressed in the richest cloth of gold that could be made, but farbeneath him he saw a pit, full of black water, in which were all manner ofserpents and floating beasts. Then the wheel began to turn, and he wentdown, down among the floating things, and they wreathed themselves abouthim till he cried, "Help! help!"

Then his knights and squires and yeomen aroused him, but he slumberedagain, not sleeping nor thoroughly waking. Then he thought he saw hisnephew, Sir Gawaine, with a number of fair ladies, and when King Arthursaw him, he said, "O fair nephew, what are these ladies who come withyou?" "Sir, " said Sir Gawaine, "these are the ladies for whose protectionI fought while I was a living man, and God has given them grace that theyshould bring me thither to you, to warn you of your death. If you fightwith Sir Modred to-morrow, you must be slain, and most of your people onboth sides. " So Sir Gawaine and all the ladies vanished, and then the kingcalled upon his knights and squires and yeomen, and summoned his lords andbishops. They agreed to propose to Sir Modred that they should have amonth's delay, and meanwhile agreed to meet him with fourteen persons oneach side, besides Arthur and Modred. 

Each of these leaders warned his army, when they met, to watch the other, and not to draw their swords until they saw a drawn sword on the otherside. In that case they were to come on fiercely. So the small party ofchosen men on each side met and drank wine together, and agreed upon amonth's delay before fighting; but while this was going on an adder cameout of a bush and stung a knight on the foot, and he drew his sword toslay it and thought of nothing farther. At the sight of that sword the twoarmies were in motion, trumpets were blown instantly, and the men of eacharmy thought that the other army had begun the fray. "Alas, this unhappyday!" cried King Arthur; and, as the old chronicle says, "nothing therewas but rushing and riding, fencing and striking, and many a grim word wasthere spoken either to other, and many a deadly stroke. "

The following is the oldest account of the battle, translated into quaintand literal English by Madden from the book called "Layamon's Brut";"Innumerable folk it came toward the host, riding and on foot, as the raindown falleth! Arthur marched to Cornwall, with an immense army. Modredheard that, and advanced against him with innumerable folk, --there weremany fated! Upon the Tambre they came together; the place hight Camelford, evermore lasted the same word. And at Camelford was assembled sixtythousand, and more thousands thereto; Modred was their chief. Thenthitherward 'gan ride Arthur the mighty, with innumerable folk, --fatedthough it were! Upon the Tambre they encountered together; elevated theirstandards; advanced together; drew their long swords; smote on the helms;fire outsprang; spears splintered; shields 'gan shiver; shafts brake inpieces. There fought all together innumerable folk! Tambre was in floodwith blood to excess; there might no man in the fight know any warrior, nor who did worse, nor who better, so was the conflict mingled! For eachslew downright, were he swain, were he knight. 

"There was Modred slain, and deprived of life-day, and all his knightsslain in the fight. There were slain all the brave, Arthur's warriors, high and low, and all the Britons of Arthur's board, and all hisdependents, of many kingdoms. And Arthur wounded with broadslaughter-spear; fifteen dreadful wounds he had; in the least one mightthrust two gloves! Then was there no more remained in the fight, of twohundred thousand men that there lay hewed in pieces, except Arthur theking alone, and two of his knights. Arthur was wounded wondrously much. There came to him a lad, who was of his kindred; he was Cador's son, theearl of Cornwall; Constantine the lad hight, he was dear to the king. Arthur looked on him, where he lay on the ground, and said these words, with sorrowful heart: 'Constantine, thou art welcome; thou wert Cador'sson. I give thee here my kingdom, and defend thou my Britons ever in thylife, and maintain them all the laws that have stood in my days, and allthe good laws that in Uther's days stood. And I will fare to Avalon, tothe fairest of all maidens, to Argante the queen, an elf most fair, andshe shall make my wounds all sound, make me all whole with healingdraughts. And afterwards I will come to my kingdom, and dwell with theBritons with mickle joy. ' Even with the words there approached from thesea that was a short boat, floating with the waves; and two women therein, wondrously formed; and they took Arthur anon, and bare him quickly, andlaid him softly down, and forth they 'gan depart. Then was it accomplishedthat Merlin whilom said, that mickle care should be of Arthur's departure. The Britons believe yet that he is alive, and dwelleth in Avalon with thefairest of all elves; and the Britons ever yet expect when Arthur shallreturn. Was never the man born, of any lady chosen, that knoweth, of thesooth, to say more of Arthur. But whilom was a sage hight Merlin; he saidwith words, --his sayings were sooth, --that an Arthur should yet come tohelp the English. "

Another traditional account which Tennyson has mainly followed in a poem, is this: The king bade Sir Bedivere take his good sword Excalibur and gowith it to the water-side and throw it into the water and return to tellwhat he saw. Then Sir Bedivere took the sword, and it was so richly andpreciously adorned that he would not throw it, and came back without it. When the king asked what had happened, Sir Bedivere said, "I saw nothingbut waves and wind, " and when Arthur did not believe him, and sent himagain, he made the same answer, and then, when sent a third time, he threwthe sword into the water, as far as he could. Then an arm and a hand roseabove the water and caught it, and shook and brandished it three times andvanished. 

Then Sir Bedivere came back to the king; he told what he had seen. "Alas, " said Arthur, "help me from hence, for I fear I have tarried overlong. " Then Sir Bedivere took King Arthur upon his back, and went with himto the water's side. And when they had reached there, a barge with manyfair ladies was lying there, with many ladies in it, and among them threequeens, and they all had black hoods, and they wept and shrieked when theysaw King Arthur. 

"Now put me in the barge, " said Arthur, and the three queens received himwith great tenderness, and King Arthur laid his head in the lap of one, and she said, "Ah, dear brother, why have ye tarried so long, until yourwound was cold?" And then they rowed away, and King Arthur said to SirBedivere, "I will go unto the valley of Avalon to heal my grievous wound, and if I never return, pray for my soul. " He was rowed away by the weepingqueens, and one of them was Arthur's sister Morgan le Fay; another was thequeen of Northgalis, and the third was the queen of Waste Lands; and itwas the belief for years in many parts of England that Arthur was notdead, but would come again to reign in England, when he had been nursedlong enough by Morgan le Fay in the island of Avalon. 

The tradition was that King Arthur lived upon this island in an enchantedcastle which had the power of a magnet, so that every one who came near itwas drawn thither and could not get away. Morgan le Fay was its ruler(called more correctly Morgan la fée, or the fairy), and her name Morganmeant sea-born. By one tradition, the queens who bore away Arthur wereaccompanied in the boat by the bard and enchanter, Merlin, who had longbeen the king's adviser, and this is the description of the island said tohave been given by Merlin to another bard, Taliessin:--

"'We came to that green and fertile island which each year is blessedwith two autumns, two springs, two summers, two gatherings of fruit, --theland where pearls are found, where the flowers spring as you gather them--that isle of orchards called the "Isle of the Blessed. " No tillage there, no coulter to tear the bosom of the earth. Without labor it affords wheatand the grape. There the lives extend beyond a century. There ninesisters, whose will is the only law, rule over those who go from us tothem. The eldest excels in the art of healing, and exceeds her sisters inbeauty. She is called Morgana, and knows the virtues of all the herbs ofthe meadow. She can change her form, and soar in the air like a bird; shecan be where she pleases in a moment, and in a moment descend on ourcoasts from the clouds. Her sister Thiten is renowned for her skill on theharp. '

"'With the prince we arrived, and Morgana received us with fittinghonour. And in her own chamber she placed the king on a bed of gold, andwith delicate touch, she uncovered the wound. Long she considered it, andat length said to him that she could heal it if he stayed long with her, and willed her to attempt her cure. Rejoiced at this news, we intrustedthe king to her care, and soon after set sail. '"

Sir Thomas Malory, who wrote the book called the "Historie of KingArthur, " or more commonly the "Morte d'Arthur, " utters these high thoughtsconcerning the memory of the great king:--

"Oh, yee mightie and pompeous lords, shining in the glory transitory ofthis unstable life, as in raigning over great realmes and mightie greatcountries, fortified with strong castles and toures, edified with many arich citie; yee also, yee fierce and mightie knights, so valiant inadventurous deeds of armes; behold, behold, see how this mightieconquerour king Arthur, whom in his humaine life all the world doubted, see also the noble queene Guenever, which sometime sat in her chaireadorned with gold, pearles, and precious stones, now lye full low inobscure fosse or pit, covered with clods of earth and clay; behold alsothis mightie champion Sir Launcelot, pearelesse of all knighthood, see nowhow hee lyeth groveling upon the cold mould, now being so feeble and faintthat sometime was so terrible. How and in what manner ought yee to bee sodesirous of worldly honour so dangerous! Therefore mee thinketh thispresent booke is right necessary often to be read, for in it shall yeefinde the most gracious, knightly, and vertuous war of the most nobleknights of the world, whereby they gat praysing continually. Also meeseemeth, by the oft reading thereof, yee shall greatly desire to accustomeyour selfe in following of those gracious knightly deedes, that is to say, to dread God, and to love righteousnesse, faithfully and couragiously toserve your soveraigne prince; and the more that God hath given you thetriumphall honour, the meeker yee ought to bee, ever feareing theunstablenesse of this deceitfull world. "

XI

MAELDUIN'S VOYAGE

An Irish knight named Maelduin set forth early in the eighth century toseek round the seas for his father's murderers. By the advice of a wizard, he was to take with him seventeen companions, neither less nor more; butat the last moment his three foster brothers, whom he had not included, begged to go with him. He refused, and they cast themselves into the seato swim after his vessel. Maelduin had pity on them and took them in, buthis disregard of the wizard's advice brought punishment; and it was onlyafter long wanderings, after visiting multitudes of unknown and oftenenchanted islands, and after the death or loss of the three fosterbrothers, that Maelduin was able to return to his native land. 

One island which they visited was divided into four parts by four fences, one of gold, one of silver, one of brass, one of crystal. In the firstdivision there dwelt kings, in the second queens, in the third warriors, and in the fourth maidens. The voyagers landed in the maidens' realm; oneof these came out in a boat and gave them food, such that every one foundin it the taste he liked best; then followed an enchanted drink, whichmade them sleep for three days and three nights. When they awakened theywere in their boat on the sea, and nothing was to be seen either of islandor maidens. 

The next island had in it a fortress with a brazen door and a bridge ofglass, on which every one who ascended it slipped and fell. A woman camefrom the fortress, pail in hand, drew water from the sea and returned, notanswering them when they spoke. When they reached at last the brazen doorand struck upon it, it made a sweet and soothing sound, and they went tosleep, for three days and nights, as before. On the fourth day a maidencame who was most beautiful; she wore garments of white silk, a whitemantle with a brooch of silver with studs of gold, and a gold band roundher hair. She greeted each man by his name, and said, "It is long that wehave expected you. " She took them into the castle and gave them every kindof food they had ever desired. Maelduin was filled with love for her andasked her for her love; but she told him that love was sin and she had noknowledge of sin; so she left him. On the morrow they found their boat, stranded on a crag, while lady and fortress and island had all vanished. 

Another island on which they landed was large and bare, with anotherfortress and a palace. There they met a lady who was kinder. She wore anembroidered purple mantle, gold embroidered gloves, and ornamentedsandals, and was just riding up to the palace door. Seventeen maidenswaited there for her. She offered to keep the strangers as guests, andthat each of them should have a wife, she herself wedding Maelduin. Shewas, it seems, the widow of the king of the island, and these were herseventeen daughters. She ruled the island and went every day to judge thepeople and direct their lives. If the strangers would stay, she said thatthey should never more know sorrow, or hardships, or old age; she herself, in spite of her large family, being young and beautiful as ever. Theystayed three months, and it seemed to all but Maelduin that the threemonths were three years. When the queen was absent, one day, the men tookthe boat and compelled Maelduin to leave the island with them; but thequeen rode after them and flung a rope, which Maelduin caught and whichclung to his hand. She drew them back to the shore; this happened thrice, and the men accused Maelduin of catching the rope on purpose; he badeanother man catch it, and his companions cut off his hand, and theyescaped at last. 

On one island the seafarers found three magic apples, and each apple gavesufficient food for forty nights; again, on another island, they found thesame apples. In another place still, a great bird like a cloud arrived, with a tree larger than an oak in its claws. After a while two eagles cameand cleaned the feathers of the larger bird. They also stripped off thered berries from the tree and threw them into the ocean until its foamgrew red. The great bird then flew into the ocean and cleaned itself. Thishappened daily for three days, when the great bird flew away with strongerwings, its youth being thus renewed. 

They came to another island where many people stood by the shore talkingand joking. They were all looking at Maelduin and his comrades, and keptgaping and laughing, but would not exchange a word with them. ThenMaelduin sent one of his foster brothers on the island; but he rangedhimself with the others and did as they did. Maelduin and his men rowedround and round the island, and whenever they passed the point where thiscomrade was, they addressed him, but he never answered, and only gaped andlaughed. They waited for him a long time and left him. This island theyfound to be called The Island of Joy. 

On another island they found sheep grazing, of enormous size; on another, birds, whose eggs when eaten caused feathers to sprout all over the bodiesof those who eat them. On another they found crimson flowers, whose mereperfume sufficed for food, and they encountered women whose only food wasapples. Through the window flew three birds: a blue one with a crimsonhead; a crimson one with a green head; a green one with a golden head. These sang heavenly music, and were sent to accompany the wanderers ontheir departing; the queen of the island gave them an emerald cup, suchthat water poured into it became wine. She asked if they knew how longthey had been there, and when they said "a day, " she told them that it wasa year, during which they had had no food. As they sailed away, the birdssang to them until both birds and island disappeared in the mist. 

They saw another island standing on a single pedestal, as if on one foot, projecting from the water. Rowing round it to seek a way into it theyfound no passage, but they saw in the base of the pedestal, under water, aclosed door with a lock--this being the only way in which the island couldbe entered. Around another island there was a fiery rampart, whichconstantly moved in a circle. In the side of that rampart was an opendoor, and as it came opposite them in its turning course, they beheldthrough it the island and all therein; and its occupants, even humanbeings, were many and beautiful, wearing rich garments, and feasting withgold vessels in their hands. The voyagers lingered long to gaze upon thismarvel. 

On another island they found many human beings, black in color andraiment, and always bewailing. Lots were cast, and another of Maelduin'sfoster brothers was sent on shore. He at once joined the weeping crowd, and did as they did. Two others were sent to bring him back, and bothshared his fate, falling under some strange spell. Then Maelduin sent fourothers, and bade them look neither at the land nor at the sky; to wraptheir mouths and noses with their garments, and not breathe the islandair; and not to take off their eyes from their comrades. In this way thetwo who followed the foster brother on shore were rescued, but he remainedbehind. 

Of another island they could see nothing but a fort, protected by a greatwhite rampart, on which nothing living was to be seen but a small cat, leaping from one to another of four stone pillars. They found brooches andornaments of gold and silver, they found white quilts and embroideredgarments hanging up, flitches of bacon were suspended, a whole ox wasroasting, and vessels stood filled with intoxicating drinks. Maelduinasked the cat if all this was for them; but the cat merely looked at himand went on playing. The seafarers dined and drank, then went to sleep. Asthey were about to depart, Maelduin's third foster brother proposed tocarry off a tempting necklace, and in spite of his leader's warningsgrasped it. Instantly the cat leaped through him like a fiery arrow, burned him so that he became ashes, and went back to its pillar. Thus allthree of the foster brothers who had disregarded the wizard's warning, andforced themselves upon the party, were either killed or left behind uponthe enchanted islands. 

Around another island there was a demon horse-race going on; the riderswere just riding in over the sea, and then the race began; the voyagerscould only dimly perceive the forms of the horses, but could hear thecries of their riders, the strokes of the whips, and the words of thespectators, "See the gray horse!" "Watch the chestnut horse!" and thevoyagers were so alarmed that they rowed away. The next island was coveredwith trees laden with golden apples, but these were being rapidly eaten bysmall, scarlet animals which they found, on coming nearer, to be all madeof fire and thus brightened in hue. Then the animals vanished, andMaelduin with his men landed, and though the ground was still hot from thefiery creatures, they brought away a boat load of the apples. Anotherisland was divided into two parts by a brass wall across the middle. Therewere two flocks of sheep, and those on one side of the wall were white, while the others were black. A large man was dividing and arranging thesheep, and threw them easily over the wall. When he threw a white sheepamong the black ones it became black, and when he threw a black sheepamong the white ones, it became white instantly. The voyagers thought oflanding, but when Maelduin saw this, he said, "Let us throw something onshore to see if it will change color. If it does, we will avoid theisland. " So they took a black branch and threw it toward the white sheep. When it fell, it grew white; and the same with a white branch on the blackside. "It is lucky for us, " said Maelduin, "that we did not land on thisisland. "

They came next to an island where there was but one man visible, veryaged, and with long, white hair. Above him were trees, covered with greatnumbers of birds. The old man told them that he like them had come in acurragh, or coracle, and had placed many green sods beneath his feet, tosteady the boat. Reaching this spot, the green sods had joined togetherand formed an island which at first gave him hardly room to stand; butevery year one foot was added to its size, and one tree grew up. He hadlived there for centuries, and those birds were the souls of his childrenand descendants, each of whom was sent there after death, and they wereall fed from heaven each day. On the next island there was a great roaringas of bellows and a sound of smiths' hammers, as if striking all togetheron an anvil, every sound seeming to come from the strokes of a dozen men. "Are they near?" asked one big voice. "Silence!" said another; and theywere evidently watching for the boat. When it rowed away, one of thesmiths flung after them a vast mass of red-hot iron, which he had graspedwith the tongs from the furnace. It fell just short, but made the wholesea to hiss and boil around them as they rowed away. 

Another island had a wall of water round it, and Maelduin and his men sawmultitudes of people driving away herds of cattle and sheep, and shouting, "There they are, they have come again;" and a woman pelted them from belowwith great nuts, which the crew gathered for eating. Then as they rowedaway they heard one man say, "Where are they now?" and another cried, "They are going away. " Still again they visited an island where a greatstream of water shot up into the air and made an arch like a rainbow thatspanned the land. 

They walked below it without getting wet, and hooked down from it manylarge salmon; besides that, many fell out above their heads, so that theyhad more than they could carry away with them. These are by no means allof the strange adventures of Maelduin and his men. 

The last island to which they came was called Raven's Stream, and thereone of the men, who had been very homesick, leaped out upon shore. As soonas he touched the land he became a heap of ashes, as if his body had lainin the earth a thousand years. This showed them for the first time duringhow vast a period they had been absent, and what a space they must havetraversed. Instead of thirty enchanted islands they had visited thricefifty, many of them twice or thrice as large as Ireland, whence thevoyagers first came. In the wonderful experiences of their long lives theyhad apparently lost sight of the search which they had undertaken, for themurderers of Maelduin's father, since of them we hear no more. The islandenchantment seems to have banished all other thoughts. 

XII

THE VOYAGE OF ST. BRANDAN

The young student Brandan was awakened in the morning by the crowing ofthe cock in the great Irish abbey where he dwelt; he rose, washed his faceand hands and dressed himself, then passed into the chapel, where heprayed and sang until the dawn of the day. "With song comes courage" wasthe motto of the abbey. It was one of those institutions like greatcolonies, --church, library, farm, workshop, college, all in one, --of whichIreland in the sixth century was full, and which existed also elsewhere. Their extent is best seen by the modern traveller in the remains of thevast buildings at Tintern in England, scattered over a wide extent ofcountry, where you keep coming upon walls and fragments of buildings whichonce formed a part of a single great institution, in which all the life ofthe community was organized, as was the case in the Spanish missions ofCalifornia. At the abbey of Bangor in Wales, for instance, there were twothousand four hundred men, --all under the direction of a comparativelysmall body of monks, who were trained to an amount of organizing skilllike that now needed for a great railway system. Some of these men wereoccupied, in various mechanic arts, some in mining, but most of them inagriculture, which they carried on with their own hands, without the aidof animals, and in total silence. 

Having thus labored in the fields until noonday, Brandan then returnedthat he might work in the library, transcribing ancient manuscripts orillustrating books of prayer. Having to observe silence, he wrote the nameof the book to give to the librarian, and if it were a Christian work, hestretched out his hand, making motions with his fingers as if turning overthe leaves; but if it were by a pagan author, the monk who asked for itwas required to scratch his ear as a dog does, to show his contempt, because, the regulations said, an unbeliever might well be compared tothat animal[1]. Taking the book, he copied it in the Scriptorium orlibrary, or took it to his cell, where he wrote all winter without a fire. It is to such monks that we owe all our knowledge of the earliest historyof England and Ireland; though doubtless the hand that wrote the historiesof Gildas and Bede grew as tired as that of Brandan, or as that of themonk who wrote in the corner of a beautiful manuscript: "He who does notknow how to write imagines it to be no labor; but though only threefingers hold the pen, the whole body grows weary. " In the same way Brandanmay have learned music and have had an organ in his monastery, or have hada school of art, painting beautiful miniatures for the holy missals. Thiswas his early life in the convent. 

[Footnote 1: _Adde ut aurem tangas digito sicut canis cum pedepruriens solet, quia nec immerito infideles tali animati comparantur_. --MARTÈNE, _De Antiq. Monach. Ritibus_, p. 289, qu. By Montalembert, Monks of the West (tr. ) VI. 190. ]

Once a day they were called to food; this consisting for them of breadand vegetables with no seasoning but salt, although better fare wasfurnished for the sick and the aged, for travellers and the poor. Theselast numbered, at Easter time, some three or four hundred, who constantlycame and went, and upon whom the monks and young disciples waited. Afterthe meal the monks spent three hours in the chapel, on their knees, stillsilent; then they confessed in turn to the abbot and then sought theirhard-earned rest. They held all things in common; no one even received agift for himself. War never reached them; it was the rarest thing for anarmed party to molest their composure; their domains were regarded as ahaven for the stormy world. Because there were so many such places inIreland, it was known as The Isle of Saints. 

Brandan was sent after a time to other abbeys, where he could pursueespecial studies, for they had six branches of learning, --grammar, rhetoric, dialectics, geometry, astronomy, and music. Thus he passed threeyears, and was then advised to go to an especial teacher in the mountains, who had particular modes of teaching certain branches. But this priest--hewas an Italian--was suffering from poverty, and could receive his guestbut for a few weeks. One day as Brandan sat studying, he saw, the legendsays, a white mouse come from a crack in the wall, a visitor which climbedupon his table and left there a grain of wheat. Then the mouse paused, looked at the student, then ran about the table, went away and reappearedwith another grain, and another, up to five. Brandan, who had at the veryinstant learned his lesson, rose from his seat, followed the mouse, andlooking through a hole in the wall, saw a great pile of wheat, stored in aconcealed apartment. On his showing this to the head of the convent, itwas pronounced a miracle; the food was distributed to the poor, and "thepeople blessed his charity while the Lord blessed his studies. "

In the course of years, Brandan became himself the head of one of thegreat abbeys, that of Clonfert, of the order of St. Benedict, where he hadunder him nearly three thousand monks. In this abbey, having one day givenhospitality to a monk named Berinthus, who had just returned from an oceanvoyage, Brandan learned from him the existence, far off in the ocean, ofan island called The Delicious Isle, to which a priest named Mernoc hadretired, with many companions of his order. Berinthus found Mernoc and theother monks living apart from one another for purposes of prayer, but whenthey came together, Mernoc said, they were like bees from differentbeehives. They met for their food and for church; their food included onlyapples, nuts, and various herbs. One day Mernoc said to Berinthus, "I willconduct you to the Promised Isle of the Saints. " So they went on board alittle ship and sailed westward through a thick fog until a great lightshone and they found themselves near an island which was large andfruitful and bore many apples. There were no herbs without blossoms, hesaid, nor trees without fruits, and there were precious stones, and theisland was traversed by a great river. Then they met a man of shiningaspect who told them that they had without knowing it passed a yearalready in the island; that they had needed neither food nor sleep. Thenthey returned to the Delicious Island, and every one knew where they hadbeen by the perfume of their garments. This was the story of Berinthus, and from this time forward nothing could keep Brandan from the purpose ofbeholding for himself these blessed islands. 

Before carrying out his plans, however, he went, about the year 560, tovisit an abbot named Enda, who lived at Arran, then called Isle of theSaints, a priest who was supposed to know more than any one concerning thefarther lands of the western sea. He knew, for instance, of the enchantedisland named Hy-Brasail, which could be seen from the coast of Irelandonly once in seven years, and which the priests had vainly tried todisenchant. Some islands, it was believed, had been already disenchantedby throwing on them a few sparks of lighted turf; but as Hy-Brasail wastoo far for this, there were repeated efforts to disenchant it by shootingfiery arrows towards it, though this had not yet been successful. ThenEnda could tell of wonderful ways to cross the sea without a boat, how hissister Fanchea had done it by spreading her own cloak upon the waves, andhow she and three other nuns were borne upon it. She found, however, thatone hem of the cloak sank below the water, because one of her companionshad brought with her, against orders, a brazen vessel from the convent;but on her throwing it away, the sinking hem rose to the level of the restand bore them safely. St. Enda himself had first crossed to Arran on alarge stone which he had ordered his followers to place on the water andwhich floated before the wind; and he told of another priest who hadwalked on the sea as on a meadow and plucked flowers as he went. Hearingsuch tales, how could St. Brandan fear to enter on his voyage?

He caused a boat to be built of a fashion which one may still see inWelsh and Irish rivers, and known as a curragh or coracle; made of anosier frame covered with tanned and oiled skins. He took with himseventeen priests, among whom was St. Malo, then a mere boy, butafterwards celebrated. They sailed to the southwest, and after being fortydays at sea they reached a rocky island furrowed with streams, where theyreceived the kindest hospitality, and took in fresh provisions. Theysailed again the next day, and found themselves entangled in contrarycurrents and perplexing winds, so that they were long in reaching anotherisland, green and fertile, watered by rivers which were full of fish, andcovered with vast herds of sheep as large as heifers. Here they renewedtheir stock of provisions, and chose a spotless lamb with which tocelebrate Easter Sunday on another island, which they saw at a shortdistance. 

This island was wholly bare, without sandy shores or wooded slopes, andthey all landed upon it to cook their lamb; but when they had arrangedtheir cooking-apparatus, and when their fire began to blaze, the islandseemed to move beneath their feet, and they ran in terror to their boat, from which Brandan had not yet landed. Their supposed island was a whale, and they rowed hastily away from it toward the island they had left, whilethe whale glided away, still showing, at a distance of two miles, the fireblazing on his back. 

The next island they visited was wooded and fertile, where they found amultitude of birds, which chanted with them the praises of the Lord, sothat they called this the Paradise of Birds. 

This was the description given of this island by an old writer namedWynkyn de Worde, in "The Golden Legend":--

"Soon after, as God would, they saw a fair island, full of flowers, herbs, and trees, whereof they thanked God of his good grace; and anonthey went on land, and when they had gone long in this, they found a fullfayre well, and thereby stood a fair tree full of boughs, and on everybough sat a fayre bird, and they sat so thick on the tree that uneath[scarcely] any leaf of the tree might be seen. The number of them was sogreat, and they sang so merrilie, that it was an heavenlie noise to hear. Whereupon St. Brandan kneeled down on his knees and wept for joy, and madehis praise devoutlie to our Lord God, to know what these birds meant. Andthen anon one of the birds flew from the tree to St. Brandan, and he withthe flickering of his wings made a full merrie noise like a fiddle, thathim seemed he never heard so joyful a melodie. And then St. Brandancommanded the foule to tell him the cause why they sat so thick on thetree and sang so merrilie. And then the foule said, some time we wereangels in heaven, but when our master, Lucifer, fell down into hell forhis high pride, and we fell with him for our offences, some higher andsome lower, after the quality of the trespasse. And because our trespasseis so little, therefore our Lord hath sent us here, out of all paine, infull great joy and mirthe, after his pleasing, here to serve him on thistree in the best manner we can. The Sundaie is a daie of rest from allworldly occupation, and therefore that day all we be made as white as anysnow, for to praise our Lorde in the best wise we may. And then all thebirds began to sing evensong so merrilie that it was an heavenlie noise tohear; and after supper St. Brandan and his fellows went to bed and sleptwell. And in the morn they arose by times, and then those foules beganmattyns, prime, and hours, and all such service as Christian men used tosing; and St. Brandan, with his fellows, abode there seven weeks, untilTrinity Sunday was passed. "

Having then embarked, they wandered for months on the ocean, beforereaching another island. That on which they finally landed was inhabitedby monks who had as their patrons St. Patrick and St. Ailbée, and theyspent Christmas there. A year passed in these voyages, and the traditionis that for six other years they made just the same circuit, alwaysspending Holy Week at the island where they found the sheep, alighting forEaster on the back of the same patient whale, visiting the Isle of Birdsat Pentecost, and reaching the island of St. Patrick and St. Ailbée intime for Christmas. 

But in the seventh year they met with wholly new perils. They wereattacked, the legend says, first by a whale, then by a griffin, and thenby a race of cyclops, or one-eyed giants. Then they came to an islandwhere the whale which had attacked them was thrown on shore, so that theycould cut him to pieces; then another island which had great fruits, andwas called The Island of the Strong Man; and lastly one where the grapesfilled the air with perfume. After this they saw an island, all cindersand flames, where the cyclops had their forges, and they sailed away inthe light of an immense fire. The next day they saw, looking northward, agreat and high mountain sending out flames at the top. Turning hastilyfrom this dreadful sight, they saw a little round island, at the top ofwhich a hermit dwelt, who gave them his benediction. Then they sailedsouthward once more, and stopped at their usual places of resort for HolyWeek, Easter, and Whitsuntide. 

It was on this trip that they had, so the legend says, that strangeinterview with Judas Iscariot, out of which Matthew Arnold has made aballad. Sailing in the wintry northern seas at Christmas time, St. Brandansaw an iceberg floating by, on which a human form rested motionless; andwhen it moved at last, he saw by its resemblance to the painted pictureshe had seen that it must be Judas Iscariot, who had died five centuriesbefore. Then as the boat floated near the iceberg, Judas spoke and toldhim his tale. After he had betrayed Jesus Christ, after he had died, andhad been consigned to the flames of hell, --which were believed in veryliterally in those days, --an angel came to him on Christmas night and saidthat he might go thence and cool himself for an hour. "Why this mercy?"asked Judas Iscariot. Then the angel said to him, "Remember the leper inJoppa, " and poor Judas recalled how once when the hot wind, called thesirocco, swept through the streets of Joppa, and he saw a naked leper bythe wayside, sitting in agony from the heat and the drifting sand, Judashad thrown his cloak over him for a shelter and received his thanks. Inreward for this, the angel now told him, he was to have, once a year, anhour's respite from his pain; he was allowed in that hour to fling himselfon an iceberg and cool his burning heat as he drifted through the northernseas. Then St. Brandan bent his head in prayer; and when he looked up, thehour was passed, and Judas had been hurried back into his torments. 

It seems to have been only after seven years of this wandering that theyat last penetrated within the obscure fogs which surrounded the Isle ofthe Saints, and came upon a shore which lay all bathed in sunny light. Itwas a vast island, sprinkled with precious stones, and covered with ripefruits; they traversed it for forty days without arriving at the end, though they reached a great river which flowed through the midst of itfrom east to west. There an angel appeared to them, and told them thatthey could go no farther, but could return to their own abode, carryingfrom the island some of those fruits and precious stones which werereserved to be distributed among the saints when all the world should bebrought to the true faith. In order to hasten that time, it appears thatSt. Malo, the youngest of the sea-faring monks, had wished, in his zeal, to baptize some one, and had therefore dug up a heathen giant who hadbeen, for some reason, buried on the blessed isle. Not only had he dug thegiant's body up, but St. Malo had brought him to life again sufficientlyfor the purpose of baptism and instruction in the true faith; after whichhe gave him the name of Mildus, and let him die once more and be reburied. Then, facing homeward and sailing beyond the fog, they touched once moreat The Island of Delights, received the benediction of the abbot of themonastery, and sailed for Ireland to tell their brethren of the wondersthey had seen. 

He used to tell them especially to his nurse Ita, under whose care he hadbeen placed until his fifth year. His monastery at Clonfert grew, as hasbeen said, to include three thousand monks; and he spent his remainingyears in peace and sanctity. The supposed islands which he visited arestill believed by many to have formed a part of the American continent, and he is still thought by some Irish scholars to have been the first todiscover this hemisphere, nearly a thousand years before Columbus, although this view has not yet made much impression on historians. TheParadise of Birds, in particular, has been placed by these scholars inMexico, and an Irish poet has written a long poem describing the delightsto be found there:--

 "Oft, in the sunny mornings, have I seen Bright yellow birds, of a rich lemon hue, Meeting in crowds upon the branches green, And sweetly singing all the morning through; And others, with their heads grayish and dark, Pressing their cinnamon cheeks to the old trees, And striking on the hard, rough, shrivelled bark, Like conscience on a bosom ill at ease. 

 "And diamond-birds chirping their single notes, Now 'mid the trumpet-flower's deep blossoms seen, Now floating brightly on with fiery throats-- Small winged emeralds of golden green; And other larger birds with orange cheeks, A many-color-painted, chattering crowd, Prattling forever with their curved beaks, And through the silent woods screaming aloud. "

XIII

KIRWAN'S SEARCH FOR HY-BRASAIL

The boy Kirwan lay on one of the steep cliffs of the Island of Innismane--one of the islands of Arran, formerly called Isles of the Saints. He waslooking across the Atlantic for a glimpse of Hy-Brasail. This was whatthey called it; it was a mysterious island which Kirwan's grandfather hadseen, or thought he had seen--and Kirwan's father also;--indeed, there wasnot one of the old people on the island who did not think he had seen it, and the older they were, the oftener it had been seen by them, and thelarger it looked. But Kirwan had never seen it, and whenever he came tothe top of the highest cliff, where he often went bird-nesting, he climbedthe great mass of granite called The Gregory, and peered out into thewest, especially at sunset, in hopes that he would at least catch aglimpse, some happy evening, of the cliffs and meadows of Hy-Brasail. Butas yet he had never espied them. All this was more than two hundred yearsago. 

He naturally went up to The Gregory at this hour, because it was thenthat he met the other boys, and caught puffins by being lowered over thecliff. The agent of the island employed the boys, and paid them a sixpencefor every dozen birds, that he might sell the feathers. The boys had arope three hundred feet long, which could reach the bottom of the cliff. One of them tied this rope around his waist, and then held it fast withboth hands, the rope being held above by four or five strong boys, wholowered the cragman, or "clifter, " as he was called, over the precipice. Kirwan was thus lowered to the rocks near the sea, where the puffins bred;and, loosening the rope, he prepared to spend the night in catching them. He had a pole with a snare on the end, which he easily clapped on theheads of the heavy and stupid birds; then tied each on a string as hecaught it, and so kept it to be hauled up in the morning. He took in thisway twenty or thirty score of the birds, besides quantities of their largeeggs, which were found in deep clefts in the rock; and these he carriedwith him when his friends came in the morning to haul him up. It was agood school of courage, for sometimes boys missed their footing and weredashed to pieces. At other times he fished in his father's boat, or drovecalves for sale on the mainland, or cured salt after high tide in thecaverns, or collected kelp for the farmers. But he was always lookingforward to a time when he might get a glimpse of the island of Hy-Brasail, and make his way to it. 

One day when all the fleet of fishing-boats was out for the herringfishery, and Kirwan among them, the fog came in closer and closer, and hewas shut apart from all others. His companion in the boat--or dory-mate, as it would be called in New England--had gone to cut bait on boardanother boat, but Kirwan could manage the boat well enough alone. Long hetoiled with his oars toward the west, where he fancied the rest of thefleet to be; and sometimes he spread his little sprit-sail, steering withan oar--a thing which was, in a heavy sea, almost as hard as rowing. Atlast the fog lifted, and he found himself alone upon the ocean. He hadlost his bearings and could not tell the points of the compass. Presentlyout of a heavy bank of fog which rose against the horizon he saw whatseemed land. It gave him new strength, and he worked hard to reach it; butit was long since he had eaten, his head was dizzy, and he lay down on thethwart of the boat, rather heedless of what might come. Growing weaker andweaker, he did not clearly know what he was doing. Suddenly he started up, for a voice hailed him from above his head. He saw above him the highstern of a small vessel, and with the aid of a sailor he was helped onboard. 

He found himself on the deck of a sloop of about seventy tons, JohnNisbet, master, with a crew of seven men. They had sailed from Killebegs(County Donegal), in Ireland, for the coast of France, laden with butter, tallow, and hides, and were now returning from France with French wines, and were befogged as Kirwan had been. The boy was at once taken on boardand rated as a seaman; and the later adventures of the trip are here givenas he reported them on his return with the ship some months later. 

The mist continued thicker and thicker for a time, and when it suddenlyfurled itself away, they found themselves on an unknown coast, with thewind driving them shoreward. There were men on board who were familiarwith the whole coast of Ireland and Scotland, but they remembered nothinglike this. Finding less than three fathoms of water, they came to anchorand sent four men ashore to find where they were; these being James Rossthe carpenter and two sailors, with the boy Kirwan. They took swords andpistols. Landing at the edge of a little wood, they walked for a milewithin a pleasant valley where cattle, horses, and sheep were feeding, andthen came in sight of a castle, small but strong, where they went to thedoor and knocked. No one answered, and they walked on, up a green hill, where there were multitudes of black rabbits; but when they had reachedthe top and looked around they could see no inhabitants, nor any house; onwhich they returned to the sloop and told their tale. After this the wholeship's company went ashore, except one left in charge, and they wanderedabout for hours, yet saw nothing more. As night came on they made a fireat the base of a fallen oak, near the shore, and lay around it, talking, and smoking the lately discovered weed, tobacco; when suddenly they heardloud noises from the direction of the castle and then all over the island, which frightened them so that they went on board the sloop and stayed allnight. 

The next morning they saw a dignified, elderly gentleman with ten unarmedfollowers coming down towards the shore. Hailing the sloop, the oldergentleman, speaking Gaelic, asked who and whence they were, and beingtold, invited them ashore as his guests. They went on shore, well armed;and he embraced them one by one, telling them that they were the happiestsight that island had seen for hundreds of years; that it was calledHy-Brasail or O-Brazile; that his ancestors had been princes of it, butFor many years it had been taken possession of by enchanters, who kept italmost always invisible, so that no ship came there; and that for the samereason he and his friends were rendered unable to answer the sailors, evenwhen they knocked at the door; and that the enchantment must remain untila fire was kindled on the island by good Christians. This had been donethe night before, and the terrible noises which they had heard were fromthe powers of darkness, which had now left the island forever. 

And indeed when the sailors were led to the castle, they saw that thechief tower had just been demolished by the powers of darkness, as theyretreated; but there were sitting within the halls men and women ofdignified appearance, who thanked them for the good service they had done. Then they were taken over the island, which proved to be some sixty mileslong and thirty wide, abounding with horses, cattle, sheep, deer, rabbits, and birds, but without any swine; it had also rich mines of silver andgold, but few people, although there were ruins of old towns and cities. The sailors, after being richly rewarded, were sent on board their vesseland furnished with sailing directions to their port. On reaching home, they showed to the minister of their town the pieces of gold and silverthat were given them at the island, these being of an ancient stamp, somewhat rusty yet of pure gold; and there was at once an eager desire onthe part of certain of the townsmen to go with them. Within a week anexpedition was fitted out, containing several godly ministers, who wishedto visit and discover the inhabitants of the island; but through somemishap of the seas this expedition was never heard of again. 

Partly for this reason and partly because none of Captain Nesbit's crewwished to return to the island, there came to be in time a feeling ofdistrust about all this rediscovery of Hy-Brasail or O-Brazile. There werenot wanting those who held that the ancient gold pieces might have beengained by piracy, such as was beginning to be known upon the Spanish main;and as for the boy Kirwan, some of his playmates did not hesitate toexpress the opinion that he had always been, as they phrased it, thegreatest liar that ever spoke. What is certain is that the island ofBrazil or Hy-Brasail had appeared on maps ever since 1367 as being nearthe coast of Ireland; that many voyages were made from Bristol to find it, a hundred years later; that it was mentioned about 1636 as often seen fromthe shore; and that it appeared as Brazil Rock on the London AdmiraltyCharts until after 1850. If many people tried to find it and failed, whyshould not Kirwan have tried and succeeded? And as to his stretching hisstory a little by throwing in a few enchanters and magic castles, therewas not a voyager of his period who was not tempted to do the same. 

XIV

THE ISLE OF SATAN'S HAND

The prosperous farmer Conall Ua Corra in the province of Connaught hadeverything to make him happy except that he and his wife had no childrento cheer their old age and inherit their estate. Conall had prayed forchildren, and one day said in his impatience that he would rather havethem sent by Satan than not have them at all. A year or two later his wifehad three sons at a birth, and when these sons came to maturity, they wereso ridiculed by other young men, as being the sons of Satan, that theysaid, "If such is really our parentage, we will do Satan's work. " So theycollected around them a few villains and began plundering and destroyingthe churches in the neighborhood and thus injuring half the churchbuildings in the country. At last they resolved to visit also the churchof Clothar, to destroy it, and to kill if necessary their mother's father, who was the leading layman of the parish. When they came to the church, they found the old man on the green in front of it, distributing meat anddrink to his tenants and the people of the parish. Seeing this, theypostponed their plans until after dark and in the meantime went home withtheir grandfather, to spend the night at his house. They went to rest, andthe eldest, Lochan, had a terrible dream in which he saw first the joys ofheaven and then the terrors of future punishment, and then he awoke indismay. Waking his brothers, he told them his dream, and that he now sawthat they had been serving evil masters and making war upon a good one. Such was his bitterness of remorse that he converted them to his views, and they agreed to go to their grandfather in the morning, renounce theirsinful ways and ask his pardon. 

This they did, and he advised them to go to a celebrated saint, Finnen ofClonard, and take him as their spiritual guide. Laying aside their armorand weapons, they went to Clonard, where all the people, dreading them andknowing their wickedness, fled for their lives, except the saint himself, who came forward to meet them. With him the three brothers undertook themost austere religious exercises, and after a year they came to St. Finnenand asked his punishment for their former crimes. "You cannot, " he said, "restore to life those you have slain, but you can at least restore thebuildings you have devastated and ruined. " So they went and repaired manychurches, after which they resolved to go on a pilgrimage upon the greatAtlantic Ocean. They built for themselves therefore a curragh or coracle, covered with hides three deep. It was capable of carrying nine persons, and they selected five out of the many who wished to join the party. Therewere a bishop, a priest, a deacon, a musician, and the man who hadmodelled the boat; and with these they pushed out to sea. 

It had happened some years before that in a quarrel about a deer hunt, the men of Ross had killed the king. It had been decided that, by way ofpunishment, sixty couples of the people of Ross should be sent out to sea, two and two, in small boats, to meet what fate they might upon the deeps. They were watched that they might not land again, and for many yearsnothing more had been heard from them. The most pious task which theserepenting pilgrims could undertake, it was thought, would be to seek thesebanished people. They resolved to spread their sail and let Providencedirect their course. They went, therefore, northwest on the Atlantic, where they visited several wonderful islands, on one of which there was agreat bird which related to them, the legend says, the whole history ofthe world, and gave them a great leaf from a tree--the leaf being as largeas an ox-hide, and being preserved for many years in one of the churchesafter their return. At the next island they heard sweet human voices, andfound that the sixty banished couples had established their homes there. 

The pilgrims then went onward in their hidebound boat until they reachedthe coast of Spain, and there they landed and dwelt for a time. The bishopbuilt a church, and the priest officiated in it, and the organist tookcharge of the music. All prospered; yet the boat-builder and the threebrothers were never quite contented, for they had roamed the seas toolong; and they longed for a new enterprise for their idle valor. Theythought they had found this when one day they found on the sea-coast agroup of women tearing their hair, and when they asked the explanation, "Señor, " said an old woman, "our sons and our husbands have again falleninto the hand of Satan. " At this the three brothers were startled, forthey remembered well how they used, in youth, to rank themselves asSatan's children. Asking farther, they learned that a shattered boat theysaw on the beach was one of a pair of boats which had been carried too farout to sea, and had come near an islet which the sailors called _Isla dela Man Satanaxio_, or The Island of Satan's Hand. It appeared that inthat region there was an islet so called, always surrounded by chillymists and water of a deadly cold; that no one had ever reached it, as itconstantly changed place; but that a demon hand sometimes uprose from it, and plucked away men and even whole boats, which, when once grasped, usually by night, were never seen again, but perished helplessly, victimsof Satan's Hand. 

When the voyagers laughed at this legend, the priest of the villageshowed them, on the early chart of Bianco, the name of "De la ManSatanagio, " and on that of Beccaria the name "Satanagio" alone, both thesebeing the titles of islands. Not alarmed at the name of Satan, as beingthat of one whom they had supposed, in their days of darkness, to be theirpatron, they pushed boldly out to sea and steered westward, a boat-load ofSpanish fishermen following in their wake. Passing island after island ofgreen and fertile look, they found themselves at last in what seemed aless favored zone--as windy as the "roaring forties, " and growing chillierevery hour. Fogs gathered quickly, so that they could scarcely see thecompanion boat, and the Spanish fishermen called out to them, "Garda da laMan do Satanaxio!" ("Look out for Satan's hand!")

As they cried, the fog became denser yet, and when it once parted for amoment, something that lifted itself high above them, like a gigantichand, showed itself an instant, and then descended with a crushing graspupon the boat of the Spanish fishermen, breaking it to pieces, anddragging some of the men below the water, while others, escaping, swamthrough the ice-cold waves, and were with difficulty taken on board thecoracle; this being all the harder because the whole surface of the waterwas boiling and seething furiously. Rowing away as they could from thisperilous neighborhood, they lay on their oars when the night came on, notknowing which way to go. Gradually the fog cleared away, the sun roseclearly at last, and wherever they looked on the deep they saw no tracesof any island, still less of the demon hand. But for the presence amongthem of the fishermen they had picked up, there was nothing to show thatany casualty had happened. 

That day they steered still farther to the west with some repining fromthe crew, and at night the same fog gathered, the same deadly chill cameon. Finding themselves in shoal water, and apparently near some island, they decided to anchor the boat; and as the man in the bow bent over toclear away the anchor, something came down upon him with the same awfulforce, and knocked him overboard. His body could not be recovered, and asthe wind came up, they drove before it until noon of the next day, seeingnothing of any land and the ocean deepening again. By noon the fogcleared, and they saw nothing, but cried with one voice that the boatshould be put about, and they should return to Spain. For two days theyrowed in peace over a summer sea; then came the fog again and they laid ontheir oars that night. All around them dim islands seemed to float, scarcely discernible in the fog; sometimes from the top of each a pointwould show itself, as of a mighty hand, and they could hear an occasionalplash and roar, as if this hand came downwards. Once they heard a cry, asif of sailors from another vessel. Then they strained their eyes to gazeinto the fog, and a whole island seemed to be turning itself upside down, its peak coming down, while its base went uppermost, and the whole waterboiled for leagues around, as if both earth and sea were upheaved. 

The sun rose upon this chaos of waters. No demon hand was anywherevisible, nor any island, but a few icebergs were in sight, and thefrightened sailors rowed away and made sail for home. It was rare to seeicebergs so far south, and this naturally added to the general dismay. Amid the superstition of the sailors, the tales grew and grew, and all theterrors became mingled. But tradition says that there were some veteranSpanish sailors along that coast, men who had sailed on longer voyages, and that these persons actually laughed at the whole story of Satan'sHand, saying that any one who had happened to see an iceberg topple overwould know all about it. It was more generally believed, however, that allthis was mere envy and jealousy; the daring fishermen remained heroes forthe rest of their days; and it was only within a century or two that theisland of Satanaxio disappeared from the charts. 

XV

ANTILLIA, THE ISLAND OF THE SEVEN CITIES

The young Spanish page, Luis de Vega, had been for some months at thecourt of Don Rodrigo, king of Spain, when he heard the old knightslamenting, as they came out of the palace at Toledo, over the king's lastand most daring whim. "He means, " said one of them in a whisper, "topenetrate the secret cave of the Gothic kings, that cave on which eachsuccessive sovereign has put a padlock, "

"Till there are now twenty-seven of them, " interrupted a still olderknight. 

"And he means, " said the first, frowning at the interruption, "to takethence the treasures of his ancestors. "

"Indeed, he must do it, " said another, "else the son of his ancestorswill have no treasure left of his own. "

"But there is a spell upon it, " said the other. "For ages Spain has beenthreatened with invasion, and it is the old tradition that the onlytalisman which can prevent it is in this cave. "

"Well, " said the scoffer, "it is only by entering the cave that he canpossess the talisman. "

"But if he penetrates to it, his power is lost. "

"A pretty talisman, " said the other. "It is only of use to anybody solong as no one sees it. Were I the king I would hold it in my hands. And Ihave counselled him to heed no graybeards, but to seize the treasure forhimself. I have offered to accompany him. "

"May it please your lordship, " said the eager Luis, "may I go with you?"

"Yes, " said Don Alonzo de Carregas, turning to the ardent boy. "Where theking goes I go, and where I go thou shalt be my companion. See, señors, "he said, turning to the others, "how the ready faith of boyhood puts yourfears to shame. To his Majesty the terrors of this goblin cave are but ajest which frightens the old and only rouses the young to courage. Theking may find the recesses of the cavern filled with gold and jewels; hewho goes with him may share them. This boy is my first recruit: whofollows?"

By this time a whole group of courtiers, young and old, had assembledabout Don Alonzo, and every man below thirty years was ready to pledgehimself to the enterprise. But the older courtiers and the archbishopOppas were beseeching the king to refrain. "Respect, O king, " they said, "the custom held sacred by twenty-seven of thy predecessors. Give us butan estimate of the sum that may, in thy kingly mind, represent the wealththat is within the cavern walls, and we will raise it on our own domains, rather than see the sacred tradition set at nought. " The king's onlyanswer was, "Follow me, " Don Alonzo hastily sending the boy Luis tocollect the younger knights who had already pledged themselves to theenterprise. A gallant troop, they made their way down the steep stepswhich led from the palace to the cave. The news had spread; the ladies hadgathered on the balconies, and the bright face of one laughing girl lookedfrom a bower window, while she tossed a rose to the happy Luis. Alas, itfell short of its mark and hit the robes of Archbishop Oppas, who stoodwith frowning face as the youngster swept by. The archbishop crushed itunwittingly in the hand that held the crosier. 

The rusty padlocks were broken, and each fell clanking on the floor, andwas brushed away by mailed heels. They passed from room to room withtorches, for the cavern extended far beneath the earth; yet they found notreasure save the jewelled table of Solomon. But for their greatexpectations, this table alone might have proved sufficient to rewardtheir act of daring. Some believed that it had been brought by the Romansfrom Solomon's temple, and from Rome by the Goths and Vandals who sackedthat city and afterwards conquered Spain; but all believed it to besacred, and now saw it to be gorgeous. Some describe it as being of gold, set with precious stones; others, as of gold and silver, making it yellowand white in hue, ornamented with a row of pearls, a row of rubies, andanother row of emeralds. It is generally agreed that it stood on threehundred and sixty feet, each made of a single emerald. Being what it was, the king did not venture to remove it, but left it where it was. Traversing chamber after chamber and finding all empty, they at last foundall passages leading to the inmost apartment, which had a marble urn inthe centre. Yet all eyes presently turned from this urn to a largepainting on the wall which displayed a troop of horsemen in full motion. Their horses were of Arab breed, their arms were scimitars and lances, with fluttering pennons; they wore turbans, and their coarse black hairfell over their shoulders; they were dressed in skins. Never had therebeen seen by the courtiers a mounted troop so wild, so eager, soformidable. Turning from them to the marble urn, the king drew from it aparchment, which said: "These are the people who, whenever this cave isentered and the spell contained in this urn is broken, shall possess thiscountry. An idle curiosity has done its work. [2]

[Footnote 2: "_Latinas letras á la margen puestas Decian:--'Cuando aquesta puerta y arca Fueran abiertas, gentes como estas Pondrán por tierra cuanto España abarca. _" --LOPE DE VEGA. ]

The rash king, covering his eyes with his hands, fled outward from thecavern; his knights followed him, but Don Alonzo lingered last except theboy Luis. "Nevertheless, my lord, " said Luis, "I should like to strike ablow at these bold barbarians. " "We may have an opportunity, " said thegloomy knight. He closed the centre gate of the cavern, and tried toreplace the broken padlocks, but it was in vain. In twenty-four hours thestory had travelled over the kingdom. 

The boy Luis little knew into what a complex plot he was drifting. In thesecret soul of his protector, Don Alonzo, there burned a great angeragainst the weak and licentious king. He and his father, Count Julian, andArchbishop Oppas, his uncle, were secretly brooding plans of wrath againstDon Rodrigo for his ill treatment of Don Alonzo's sister, Florinda. Rumorshad told them that an army of strange warriors from Africa, who hadhitherto carried all before them, were threatening to cross the straitsnot yet called Gibraltar, and descend on Spain. All the ties of fidelityheld these courtiers to the king; but they secretly hated him, and wishedfor his downfall. By the next day they had planned to betray him to theMoors. Count Julian had come to make his military report to Don Rodrigo, and on some pretext had withdrawn Florinda from the court. "When you comeagain, " said the pleasure-loving king, "bring me some hawks from thesouth, that we may again go hawking. " "I will bring you hawks enough, " wasthe answer, "and such as you never saw before. " "But Rodrigo, " says theArabian chronicler, "did not understand the full meaning of his words. "

It was a hard blow for the young Luis when he discovered what a plot wasbeing urged around him. He would gladly have been faithful to the king, worthless as he knew him to be; but Don Alonzo had been his benefactor, and he held by him. Meanwhile the conspiracy drew towards completion, andthe Arab force was drawing nearer to the straits. A single foray intoSpain had shown Musa, the Arab general, the weakness of the kingdom; thatthe cities were unfortified, the citizens unarmed, and many of the nobleslukewarm towards the king. "Hasten, " he said, "towards that country wherethe palaces are filled with gold and silver, and the men cannot fight intheir defence. " Accordingly, in the early spring of the year 711, Musasent his next in command, Tarik, to cross to Spain with an army of seventhousand men, consisting mostly of chosen cavalry. They crossed thestraits then called the Sea of Narrowness, embarking the troops at Tangierand Ceute in many merchant vessels, and landing at that famous promontorycalled thenceforth by the Arab general's name, the Rock of Tarik, Dschebel-Tarik, or, more briefly, Gibraltar. 

Luis, under Don Alonzo, was with the Spanish troops sent hastily down toresist the Arab invaders, and, as these troops were mounted, he had manyopportunities of seeing the new enemies and observing their ways. Theywere a picturesque horde; their breasts were covered with mail armor; theywore white turbans on their heads, carried their bows slung across theirbacks, and their swords suspended to their girdles, while they held theirlong spears firmly grasped in their hands. The Arabs said that theirfashion of mail armor had come to them from King David, "to whom, " theysaid, "God made iron soft, and it became in his hands as thread. " Morethan half of them were mounted on the swift horses which were peculiar totheir people; and the white, red, and black turbans and cloaks made a moststriking picture around the camp-fires. These men, too, were alreadytrained and successful soldiers, held together both by a common religionand by the hope of spoil. There were twelve thousand of them by the mostprobable estimate, --for Musa had sent reinforcements, --and they hadagainst them from five to eight times their number. But of the Spaniardsonly a small part were armed or drilled, or used to warfare, and greatmultitudes of them had to put their reliance in clubs, slings, axes, andshort scythes. The cavalry were on the wings, where Luis found himself, with Count Julian and Archbishop Oppas to command them. Soon, however, DonAlonzo and Luis were detached, with others, to act as escort to the king, Don Rodrigo. 

The battle began soon after daybreak on Sunday, July 19, 711. As theSpanish troops advanced, their trumpets sounded defiance and were answeredby Moorish horns and kettledrums. While they drew near, the shouts of theSpaniards were drowned in the _lelie_ of the Arabs, the phrase _Láilá-ha ella-llah_--there is no deity but God. As they came nearer yet, there is a tradition that Rodrigo looking on the Moslem, said, "By thefaith of the Messiah, these are the very men I saw painted on the walls ofthe cave at Toledo. " Yet he certainly bore himself like a king, and herode on the battle-field in a chariot of ivory lined with gold, having asilken awning decked with pearls and rubies, while the vehicle was drawnby three white mules abreast. He was then nearly eighty, and was dressedin a silken robe embroidered with pearls. He had brought with him in cartsand on mules his treasures in jewels and money; and he had trains of muleswhose only load consisted of ropes, to bind the arms of his captives, sosure was he of making every Arab his prisoner. Driving along the lines headdressed his troops boldly, and arriving at the centre quitted hischariot, put on a horned helmet, and mounted his white horse Orelio. 

This was before the invention of gunpowder, and all battles were hand tohand. On the first day the result was doubtful, and Tarik rode through theArab ranks, calling on them to fight for their religion and their safety. As the onset began, Tarik rode furiously at a Spanish chief whom he tookfor the king, and struck him down. For a moment it was believed to be theking whom he had killed, and from that moment new energy was given to theArabs. The line of the Spaniards wavered; and at this moment the wholewing of cavalry to which Luis belonged rode out from its place and passedon the flank of the army, avoiding both Spaniard and Arab. "What meansthis?" said Luis to the horseman by his side. "It means, " was the answer, "that Bishop Oppas is betraying the king. " At this moment Don Alonzo rodeup and cheered their march with explanations. "No more, " he said, "will weobey this imbecile old king who can neither fight nor govern. He and histroops are but so many old women; it is only these Arabs who are men. Allis arranged with Tarik, and we will save our country by joining the onlyman who can govern it. " Luis groaned in dismay; it seemed to him an act ofdespicable treachery; but those around him seemed mostly prepared for it, and he said to himself, "After all, Don Alonzo is my chief; I must hold byhim;" so he kept with the others, and the whole cavalry wing followedOppas to a knoll, whence they watched the fight. It soon became a panic;the Arabs carried all before them, and the king himself was either killedor hid himself in a convent. 

Many a Spaniard of the seceding wing of cavalry reproached himselfafterwards for what had been done; and while the archbishop had someinfluence with the conquering general and persuaded him to allow theChristians everywhere to retain a part of their churches, yet he had, after all, the reward of a traitor in contempt and self-reproach. This hecould bear no longer, and organizing an expedition from a Spanish port, heand six minor bishops, with many families of the Christians, made theirway towards Gibraltar. They did not make their escape, however, withoutattracting notice and obstruction. As they rode among the hills with theirlong train, soldiers, ecclesiastics, women, and children, they saw agalloping band of Arabs in pursuit. The archbishop bade them turninstantly into a deserted castle they were just passing, to drop theportcullis and man the walls. That they might look as numerous aspossible, he bade all the women dress themselves like men and tie theirlong hair beneath their chins to resemble beards. He then put helmets ontheir heads and lances in their hands, and thus the Arab leader saw aformidable host on the walls to be besieged. In obedience, perhaps, toorders, he rode away and after sufficient time had passed, thearchbishop's party rode onward towards their place of embarkation. Luisfound himself beside a dark-eyed maiden, who ambled along on a white mule, and when he ventured to joke her a little on her late appearance as anarmed cavalier, she said coyly, "Did you think my only weapons wereroses?" Looking eagerly at her, he recognized the laughing face which hehad once seen at a window; but ere he could speak again she had struck hermule lightly and taken refuge beside the archbishop, where Luis dared notventure. He did not recognize the maiden again till they met on board oneof the vessels which the Arabs had left at Gibraltar, and on which theyembarked for certain islands of which Oppas had heard, which lay in theSea of Darkness. Among these islands they were to find their future home. 

The voyage, at first rough, soon became serene and quiet; the skies wereclear, the moon shone; the veils of the Spanish maidens were convenient byday and useless at evening, and Luis had many a low-voiced talk on thequarter-deck with Juanita, who proved to be a young relative of thearchbishop. It was understood that she was to take the veil, and that, young as she was, she would become, by and by, the lady abbess of anunnery to be established on the islands; and as her kinsman, thoughsevere to others, was gentle to her, she had her own way a good deal--especially beneath the moon and the stars. For the rest, they had dailyservices of religion, as dignified and sonorous as could have taken placeon shore, except on those rare occasions when the chief bass voice washushed in seasickness in some cabin below. Beautiful Gregorian masses roseto heaven, and it is certain that the Pilgrim fathers, in their two monthson the Atlantic, almost a thousand years later, had no such rich melody asfloated across those summer seas. Luis was a favorite of Oppas, thearchbishop, who never seemed to recognize any danger in having anenamoured youth so near to the demure future abbess. He consulted theyouth about many plans. Their aim, it seemed, was the great island calledAntillia, as yet unexplored, but reputed to be large enough for manythousand people. Oppas was to organize the chief settlement, and heplanned to divide the island into seven dioceses, each bishop having apermanent colony. Once established, they would trade with Spain, andwhether it remained Moorish or became Christian, Oppas was sure offriendly relations. 

The priests were divided among the three vessels, and among them therewas that occasional jarring from which even holy men are not quite free. The different bishops had their partisans, but none dared openly face theimperial Oppas. His supposed favorite Luis was less formidable; he waswatched and spied upon, while his devotion to the dignified Juanita wasapparent to all. Yet he was always ready to leave her side when Oppascalled, and then they discussed together the future prospects of theparty: when they should see land, whether it would really be Antillia, whether they should have a good landfall, whether the island would befertile, whether there would be native inhabitants, and if so, whetherthey should be baptized and sent to Spain as slaves, or whether theyshould be retained on the island. It was decided, on the whole, that thislast should be done; and what with the prospect of winning souls, and thecertainty of having obedient subjects, the prospect seemed inviting. 

One morning, at sunrise, there lay before them a tropic island, soft andgraceful, with green shrubs and cocoanut trees, and rising in the distanceto mountains whose scooped tops and dark, furrowed sides spoke of extinctvolcanoes--yet not so extinct but that a faint wreath of vapor stillmounted from the utmost peak of the highest among them. Here and therewere seen huts covered with great leaves or sheaves of grass, and amongthese they saw figures moving and disappearing, watching their approach, yet always ready to disappear in the recesses of the woods. Soundingcarefully the depth of water with their imperfect tackle, they anchoredoff the main beach, and sent a boat on shore from each vessel, Luis beingin command of one. The natives at first hovered in the distance, butpresently came down to the shore to meet the visitors, some even swimmingoff to the boats in advance. They were of a yellow complexion, with goodfeatures, were naked except for goat-skins or woven palm fibres, or reedspainted in different colors; and were gay and merry, singing and dancingamong themselves. When brought on board the ships, they ate bread andfigs, but refused wine and spices; and they seemed not to know the use ofrings or of swords, when shown to them. Whatever was given to them theydivided with one another. They cultivated fruit and grain on their island, reared goats, and seemed willing to share all with their newly foundfriends. Luis, always thoughtful, and somewhat anxious in temperament, felt many doubts as to the usage which these peaceful islanders wouldreceive from the ships' company, no matter how many bishops and holy menmight be on board. 

All that day there was exploring by small companies, and on the next thearchbishop landed in solemn procession. The boats from the ships all metat early morning, near the shore, the sight bringing together a crowd ofislanders on the banks; men, women, and children, who, with an instinctthat something of importance was to happen, decked themselves withflowers, wreaths, and plumes, the number increasing constantly and thecrowd growing more and more picturesque. Forming from the boats, aprocession marched slowly up the beach, beginning with a few lay brethren, carrying tools for digging; then acolytes bearing tall crosses; and thenwhite-robed priests; the seven bishops being carried on litters, thearchbishop most conspicuously of all. Solemn chants were sung as theprocession moved through the calm water towards the placid shore, and thegentle savages joined in kneeling while a solemn mass was said, and thecrosses were uplifted which took possession of the new-found land in thename of the Church. 

These solemn services occupied much of the day; later they carried tentson shore, and some of them occupied large storehouses which the nativeshad built for drying their figs; and to the women, under direction ofJuanita, was allotted a great airy cave, with smaller caves branching fromit, where the natives had made palm baskets. Day after day they labored, transferring all their goods and provisions to the land, --tools, andhorses, and mules, clothing, and simple furniture. Most of them joinedwith pleasure in this toil, but others grew restless as they transferredall their possessions to land, and sometimes the women especially wouldclimb to high places and gaze longingly towards Spain. 

One morning a surprise came to Luis. Every night it was their custom tohave a great fire on the beach, and to meet and sing chants around it. Onenight Luis had personally put out the blaze of the fire, as it was morewindy than usual, and went to sleep in his tent. Soon after midnight hewas awakened by a glare of a great light upon his tent's thin walls, andhastily springing up, he saw their largest caravel on fire. Rushing out togive the alarm, he saw a similar flame kindled in the second vessel, andthen, after some delay, in the third. Then he saw a dark boat pullinghastily towards the shore, and going down to the beach he met their mosttrusty captain, who told him that the ships had been burnt by order of thearchbishop, in order that their return might be hopeless, and that theirstay on the island might be forever. 

There was some lamentation among the emigrants when they saw theirretreat thus cut off, but Luis when once established on shore did notshare it; to be near Juanita was enough for him, though he rarely saw her. He began sometimes to feel that the full confidence of the archbishop waswithdrawn from him, but he was still high in office, and he rode withOppas over the great island, marking it out by slow degrees into sevendivisions, that each bishop might have a diocese and a city of his own. Soon the foundations began to be laid, and houses and churches began to bebuilt, for the soft volcanic rock was easily worked, though not very solidfor building. The spot for the cathedral was selected with the unerringeye for a fine situation which the Roman Catholic Church has always shown, and the adjoining convent claimed, as it rose, the care of Juanita. Asgeneral superintendent of the works, it was the duty of Luis sometimes tobe in that neighborhood, until one unlucky day when the two lovers, lingering to watch the full moon rise, were interrupted by one of theyounger bishops, a black-browed Spaniard of stealthy ways, who had beforenow taken it upon himself to watch them. Nothing could be more innocentthan their dawning loves, yet how could any love be held innocent on thepart of a maiden who was the kinswoman of an archbishop and was hisdestined choice for the duties of an abbess? The fact that she had neveryet taken her preliminary vows or given her consent to take them, countedfor nothing in the situation; though any experienced lady-superior couldhave told the archbishop that no maiden could be wisely made an abbessuntil she had given some signs of having a vocation for a religious life. 

From that moment the youthful pair met no more for weeks. It seemedalways necessary for Luis to be occupied elsewhere than in the Cathedralcity; as the best architect on the island, he was sent here, there, andeverywhere; and the six other churches rose with more rapidity because thearchbishop preferred to look after his own. The once peaceful nativesfound themselves a shade less happy when they were required to work allday long as quarry-men or as builders, but it was something, had they butknown it, that they were not borne away as slaves, as happened later onother islands to so many of their race. To Luis they were always loyal forhis cheery ways, although there seemed a change in his spirits as timewent on. But an event happened which brought a greater change still. 

A Spanish caravel was seen one day, making towards the port and showingsignals of distress. Luis, having just then found an excuse for visitingthe Cathedral city, was the first to board her and was hailed with joy bythe captain. He was a townsman of the youth's and had given him his firstlessons in navigation. He had been bound, it seemed, for the CanaryIslands, and had put in for repairs, which needed only a few days in thequiet waters of a sheltered port. He could tell Luis of his parents, ofhis home, and that the northern part of Spain, under Arab sway, washumanely governed, and a certain proportion of Christian churches allowed. In a few days the caravel sailed again at nightfall; but it carried withit two unexpected passengers; the archbishop lost his architect, and theproposed convent lost its unwilling abbess. 

From this point both the Island of the Seven Cities and its escapinglovers disappear from all definite records. It was a period whenexpeditions of discovery came and went, and when one wondrous tale droveout another. There exist legends along the northern coast of Spain in theregion of Santander, for instance, of a youth who once eloped with ahigh-born maiden and came there to dwell, but there may have been manysuch youths and many such maidens--who knows? Of Antillia itself, or theIsland of the Seven Cities, it is well known that it appeared on the mapsof the Atlantic, sometimes under the one name and sometimes under another, six hundred years after the date assigned by the story that has here beentold. It was said by Fernando Columbus to have been revisited by aPortuguese sailor in 1447; and the name appeared on the globe of Behaim in1492. 

The geographer Toscanelli, in his famous letter to Columbus, recommendedAntillia as likely to be useful to Columbus as a way station for reachingIndia, and when the great explorer reached Hispaniola, he was supposed tohave discovered the mysterious island, whence the name of Antilles wasgiven to the group. Later, the first explorers of New Mexico thought thatthe pueblos were the Seven Cities; so that both the names of the imaginaryisland have been preserved, although those of Luis de Vega and hisfaithful Juanita have not been recorded until the telling of this tale. 

XVI

HARALD THE VIKING

Erik the Red, the most famous of all Vikings, had three sons, and oncewhen they were children the king came to visit Erik and passed through theplayground where the boys were playing. Leif and Biorn, the two oldest, were building little houses and barns and were making believe that theywere full of cattle and sheep, while Harald, who was only four years old, was sailing chips of wood in a pool. The king asked Harald what they were, and he said, "Ships of war. " King Olaf laughed and said, "The time maycome when you will command ships, my little friend. " Then he asked Biornwhat he would like best to have. "Corn-land, " he said; "ten farms. " "Thatwould yield much corn, " the king replied. Then he asked Leif the samequestion, and he answered, "Cows. " "How many?" "So many that when theywent to the lake to be watered, they would stand close round the edge, sothat not another could pass. " "That would be a large housekeeping, " saidthe king, and he asked the same question of Harald. "What would you likebest to have?" "Servants and followers, " said the child, stoutly. "Howmany would you like?" "Enough, " said the child, "to eat up all the cowsand crops of my brothers at a single meal. " Then the king laughed, andsaid to the mother of the children, "You are bringing up a king. "

As the boys grew, Leif and Harald were ever fond of roaming, while Biornwished to live on the farm at peace. Their sister Freydis went with theolder boys and urged them on. She was not gentle and amiable, but full ofenergy and courage: she was also quarrelsome and vindictive. People saidof her that even if her brothers were all killed, yet the race of Erik theRed would not end while she lived; that "she practised more of shootingand the handling of sword and shield than of sewing or embroidering, andthat as she was able, she did evil oftener than good; and that when shewas hindered she ran into the woods and slew men to get their property. "She was always urging her brothers to deeds of daring and adventure. Oneday they had been hawking, and when they let slip the falcons, Harald'sfalcon killed two blackcocks in one flight and three in another. The dogsran and brought the birds, and he said proudly to the others, "It will belong before most of you have any such success, " and they all agreed tothis. He rode home in high spirits and showed his birds to his sisterFreydis. "Did any king, " he asked, "ever make so great a capture in soshort a time?" "It is, indeed, " she said, "a good morning's hunting tohave got five blackcocks, but it was still better when in one morning aking of Norway took five kings and subdued all their kingdoms. " ThenHarald went away very humble and besought his father to let him go andserve on the Varangian Guard of King Otho at Constantinople, that he mightlearn to be a warrior. 

So Harald was brought from his Norwegian home by his father Erik the Red, in his galley called the _Sea-serpent_, and sailed with him throughthe Mediterranean Sea, and was at last made a member of the Emperor Otho'sVarangian Guard at Constantinople. This guard will be well remembered bythe readers of Scott's novel, "Count Robert of Paris, " and was maintainedby successive emperors and drawn largely from the Scandinavian races. Erikthe Red had no hesitation in leaving his son among them, as the young manwas stout and strong, very self-willed, and quite able to defend himself. The father knew also that the Varangian Guard, though hated by the people, held to one another like a band of brothers; and that any one brought upamong them would be sure of plenty of fighting and plenty of gold, --thetwo things most prized by early Norsemen. For ordinary life, Harald'schief duties would be to lounge about the palace, keeping guard, wearinghelmet and buckler and bearskin, with purple underclothes and goldenclasped hose; and bearing as armor a mighty battle-axe and a smallscimitar. Such was the life led by Harald, till one day he had a messagefrom his father, through a new recruit, calling him home to join anexpedition to the western seas. "I hear, my son, " the message said, "thatyour good emperor, whom may the gods preserve, is sorely ill and may dieany day. When he is dead, be prompt in getting your share of the plunderof the palace and come back to me. "

The emperor died, and the order was fulfilled. It was the custom of theVarangians to reward themselves in this way for their faithful services ofprotection; and the result is that, to this day, Greek and Arabic goldcrosses and chains are to be found in the houses of Norwegian peasants andmay be seen in the museums of Christiania and Copenhagen. No one wasesteemed the less for this love of spoil, if he was only generous ingiving. The Norsemen spoke contemptuously of gold as "the serpent's bed, "and called a generous man "a hater of the serpent's bed, " because such aman parts with gold as with a thing he hates. 

When the youth came to his father, he found Erik the Red directing thebuilding of one of the great Norse galleys, nearly eighty feet long andseventeen wide and only six feet deep. The boat had twenty ribs, and theframe was fastened together by withes made of roots, while the oakenplanks were held by iron rivets. The oars were twenty feet long, and wereput through oar holes, and the rudder, shaped like a large oar, was not atthe end, but was attached to a projecting beam on the starboard(originally steer-board) side. The ship was to be called a Dragon, and wasto be painted so as to look like one, having a gilded dragon's head at thebow and a gilded tail on the stern; while the moving oars would look likelegs, and the row of red and white shields, hung along the side of theboat, would resemble the scales of a dragon, and the great square sails, red and blue, would look like wings. This was the vessel which youngHarald was to command. 

He had already made trips in just such vessels with his father; hadlearned to attack the enemy with arrow and spear; also with stones throwndown from above, and with grappling-irons to clutch opposing boats. He hadlearned to swim, from early childhood, even in the icy northern waters, and he had been trained in swimming to hide his head beneath his floatingshield, so that it could not be seen. He had learned also to carry tinderin a walnut shell, enclosed in wax, so that no matter how long he had beenin the water he could strike a light on reaching shore. He had alsolearned from his father acts of escape as well as attack. Thus he had oncesailed on a return trip from Denmark after plundering a town; the shipshad been lying at anchor all night in a fog, and at sunlight in themorning lights seemed burning on the sea. But Erik the Red said, "It is afleet of Danish ships, and the sun strikes on the gilded dragon crests;furl the sail and take to the oars. " They rowed their best, yet the Danishships were overtaking them, when Erik the Red ordered his men to throwwood overboard and cover it with Danish plunder. This made some delay, asthe Danes stopped to pick it up, and in the same way Erik the Red droppedhis provisions, and finally his prisoners; and in the delay thus caused hegot away with his own men. 

But now Harald was not to go to Denmark, but to the new western world, the Wonderstrands which Leif had sought and had left without sufficientexploration. First, however, he was to call at Greenland, which his fatherhad first discovered. It was the custom of the Viking explorers, when theyreached a new country, to throw overboard their "seat posts, " or_setstokka_, --the curved part of their doorways, --and then to landwhere they floated ashore. But Erik the Red had lent his to a friend andcould not get them back, so that he sailed in search of them, and came toa new land which he called Greenland, because, as he said, people would beattracted thither if it had a good name. Then he established a colonythere, and then Leif the Lucky, as he was called, sailed still farther, and came to the Wonderstrand, or Magic Shores. These he called Vinland orWine-land, and now a rich man named Karlsefne was to send a colony thitherfrom Greenland, and the young Harald was to go with it and take command ofit. 

Now as Harald was to be presented to the rich Karlsefne, he thought hemust be gorgeously arrayed. So he wore a helmet on his head, a red shieldrichly inlaid with gold and iron, and a sharp sword with an ivory handlewound with golden thread. He had also a short spear, and wore over hiscoat a red silk short cloak on which was embroidered, both before andbehind, a yellow lion. We may well believe that the sixty men and fivewomen who composed the expedition were ready to look on him withadmiration, especially as one of the women was his own sister, Freydis, now left to his peculiar care, since Erik the Red had died. The sturdy oldhero had died still a heathen, and it was only just after his death thatChristianity was introduced into Greenland, and those numerous churcheswere built there whose ruins yet remain, even in regions from which allpopulation has gone. 

So the party of colonists sailed for Vinland, and Freydis, with the fourolder women, came in Harald's boat, and Freydis took easily the lead amongthem for strength, though not always, it must be admitted, for amiability. 

The boats of the expedition having left Greenland soon after the year1000, coasted the shore as far as they could, rarely venturing into opensea. At last, amidst fog and chilly weather, they made land at a pointwhere a river ran through a lake into the sea, and they could not enterfrom the sea except at high tide. It was once believed that this wasNarragansett Bay in Rhode Island, but this is no longer believed. Herethey landed and called the place Hóp, from the Icelandic word _hópa_, meaning an inlet from the ocean. Here they found grape-vines growing andfields of wild wheat; there were fish in the lake and wild animals in thewoods. Here they landed the cattle and the provisions which they hadbrought with them; and here they built their huts. They went in thespring, and during that summer the natives came in boats of skin to tradewith them--men described as black, and ill favored, with large eyes andbroad cheeks and with coarse hair on their heads. These, it is thought, may have been the Esquimaux. The first time they came, these visitors heldup a white shield as a sign of peace, and were so frightened by thebellowing of the bull that they ran away. Then returning, they broughtfurs to sell and wished to buy weapons, but Harald tried another plan: hebade the women bring out milk, butter, and cheese from their dairies, andwhen the Skraelings saw that, they wished for nothing else, and, thelegend says, "the Skraelings carried away their wares in their stomachs, but the Norsemen had the skins they had purchased. " This happened yetagain, but at the second visit one of the Skraelings was accidentallykilled or injured. 

The next time the Skraelings came they were armed with slings, and raisedupon a pole a great blue ball and attacked the Norsemen so furiously thatthey were running away when Erik's sister, Freydis, came out before themwith bare arms, and took up a sword, saying, "Why do you run, strong menas you are, from these miserable dwarfs whom I thought you would knockdown like cattle? Give me weapons, and I will fight better than any ofyou. " Then the rest took courage and began to fight, and the Skraelingswere driven back. Once more the strangers came, and one of them took up anaxe, a thing which he had not before seen, and struck at one of hiscompanions, killing him. Then the leader took the axe and threw it intothe water, after which the Skraelings retreated, and were not seen again. 

The winter was a mild one, and while it lasted, the Norsemen workedbusily at felling wood and house-building. They had also many amusements, in most of which Harald excelled. They used to swim in all weathers. Oneof their feats was to catch seals and sit on them while swimming; anotherwas to pull one another down and remain as long as possible under water. Harald could swim for a mile or more with his armor on, or with acompanion on his shoulder. In-doors they used to play the tug of war, dragging each other by a walrus hide across the fire. Harald was good atthis, and was also the best archer, sometimes aiming at something placedon a boy's head, the boy having a cloth tied around his head, and held bytwo men, that he might not move at all on hearing the whistling of thearrow. In this way Harald could even shoot an arrow under a nut placed onthe head, so that the nut would roll down and the head not be hurt. Hecould plant a spear in the ground and then shoot an arrow upward soskilfully that it would turn in the air and fall with the point in the endof the spear-shaft. He could also shoot a blunt arrow through the thickestox-hide from a cross-bow. He could change weapons from one hand to theother during a fencing match, or fence with either hand, or throw twospears at the same time, or catch a spear in motion. He could run so fastthat no horse could overtake him, and play the rough games with bat andball, using a ball of the hardest wood. He could race on snowshoes, orwrestle when bound by a belt to his antagonist. Then when he and hiscompanions wished a rest, they amused themselves with harp-playing orriddles or chess. The Norsemen even played chess on board their vessels, and there are still to be seen, on some of these, the little holes thatwere formerly used for the sharp ends of the chessmen, so that they shouldnot be displaced. 

They could not find that any European had ever visited this place; butsome of the Skraelings told them of a place farther south, which theycalled "the Land of the Whiteman, " or "Great Ireland. " They said that inthat place there were white men who clothed themselves in long whitegarments, carried before them poles to which white cloths were hung, andcalled with a loud voice. These, it was thought by the Norsemen, must beChristian processions, in which banners were borne and hymns were chanted. It has been thought from this that some expedition from Ireland--that ofSt. Brandan, for instance--may have left a settlement there, long before, but this has never been confirmed. The Skraelings and the Northmen weregood friends for a time; until at last one of Erik's own warriors killed aSkraeling by accident, and then all harmony was at an end. 

They saw no hope of making a lasting settlement there, and, moreover, Freydis who was very grasping, tried to deceive the other settlers and getmore than her share of everything, so that Harald himself lost patiencewith her and threatened her. It happened that one of the men of the party, Olaf, was Harald's foster-brother. They had once had a fight, and afterthe battle had agreed that they would be friends for life and always sharethe same danger. For this vow they were to walk under the turf; that is, astrip of turf was cut and held above their heads, and they stood beneathand let their blood flow upon the ground whence the turf had been cut. After this they were to own everything by halves and either must avengethe other's death. This was their brotherhood; but Freydis did not likeit; so she threatened Olaf, and tried to induce men to kill him, for shedid not wish to bring upon herself the revenge that must come if she slewhim. 

This was the reason why the whole enterprise failed, and why Olafpersuaded Harald, for the sake of peace, to return to Greenland in thespring and take a load of valuable timber to sell there, including onestick of what was called massur-wood, which was as valuable as mahogany, and may have been at some time borne by ocean currents to the beach. It ishardly possible that, as some have thought, the colonists established aregular trade in this wood for no such wood grows on the northern Atlanticshores. However this may be, the party soon returned, after one winter inVinland the Good; and on the way back Harald did one thing which made himespecially dear to his men. 

A favorite feat of the Norsemen was to toss three swords in the air andcatch each by the handle as it came down. This was called the_handsax_ game. The young men used also to try the feat of runningalong the oar-blades of the rowers as they were in motion, passing aroundthe bow of the vessel with a spring and coming round to the stern over theoars on the other side. Few could accomplish this, but no one but Haraldcould do it and play the _handsax_ game as he ran; and when he didit, they all said that he was the most skilful man at _idrottie_ everseen. That was their word for an athletic feat. But presently came a timewhen not only his courage but his fairness and justice were to be tried. 

It happened in this way. There was nothing of which the Norsemen weremore afraid than of the _teredo_, or shipworm, which gnaws the woodof ships. It was observed in Greenland and Iceland that pieces of woodoften floated on shore which were filled with holes made by this animal, and they thought that in certain places the seas were full of this worm, so that a ship would be bored and sunk in a little while. It is said thaton this return voyage Harald's vessel entered a worm-sea and presentlybegan to sink. They had, however, provided a smaller boat smeared withsea-oil, which the worms would not attack. They went into the boat, butfound that it would not hold more than half of them all. Then Harald said, "We will divide by lots, without regard to the rank; each taking hischance with the rest. " This they thought, the Norse legend says, "ahigh-minded offer. " They drew lots, and Harald was among those assigned tothe safer boat. He stepped in, and when he was there a man called from theother boat and said, "Dost thou intend, Harald, to separate from me here?"Harald answered, "So it turns out, " and the man said, "Very different wasthy promise to my father when we came from Greenland, for the promise wasthat we should share the same fate. "

Then Harald said, "It shall not be thus. Go into the boat, and I will goback into the ship, since thou art so anxious to live. " Then Harald wentback to the ship, while the man took his place in the boat, and after thatHarald was never heard of more. 

XVII

THE SEARCH FOR NORUMBEGA

Sir Humphrey Gilbert, colonel of the British forces in the Netherlands, was poring over the manuscript narrative of David Ingram, mariner. Ingramhad in 1568-69 taken the widest range of travel that had ever been takenin the new continent, of which it was still held doubtful by many whetherit was or was not a part of Asia. "Surely, " Gilbert said to hishalf-brother, Walter Raleigh, a youth of twenty-three, "this knave hathseen strange things. He hath been set ashore by John Hawkins in the Gulfof Mexico and there left behind. He hath travelled northward with two ofhis companions along Indian trails; he hath even reached Norumbega; hehath seen that famous city with its houses of crystal and silver. "

"Pine logs and hemlock bark, belike, " said Raleigh, scornfully. 

"Nay, " said Gilbert, "he hath carefully written it down. He saw kingsdecorated with rubies six inches long; and they were borne on chairs ofsilver and crystal, adorned with precious stones. He saw pearls as commonas pebbles, and the natives were laden down by their ornaments of gold andsilver. The city of Bega was three-quarters of a mile long and had manystreets wider than those of London. Some houses had massive pillars ofcrystal and silver. "

"What assurance can he give?" asked Raleigh. 

"He offers on his life to prove it. "

"A small offer, mayhap. There be many of these lying mariners whose livesare as worthless as the stories they relate. But what said he of thenatives?"

"Kindly disposed, " was the reply, "so far as he went, but those dwellingfarther north, where he did not go, were said to be cannibals with teethlike those of dogs, whereby you may know them. "

"Travellers' tales, " said Raleigh. "_Omne ignotum pro mirifico_. "

"He returned, " said Gilbert, disregarding the interruption, "in the_Gargarine_, a French vessel commanded by Captain Champagne. "

"Methinks something of the flavor represented by the good captain's namehath got into your Englishman's brain. Good ale never gives suchfantasies. Doth he perchance speak of elephants?"

"He doth, " said Sir Humphrey, hesitatingly. "Perchance he saw them not, but heard of them only. "

"What says he of them?" asked Raleigh. 

"He says that he saw in that country both elephants and ounces; and hesays that their trumpets are made of elephants' teeth. "

"But the houses, " said Raleigh; "tell me of the houses. "

"In every house, " said Gilbert, reading from the manuscript, "they havescoops, buckets, and divers vessels, all of massive silver with which theythrow out water and otherwise employ them. The women wear great plates ofgold covering their bodies, and chains of great pearls in the manner ofcurvettes; and the men wear manilions or bracelets on each arm and eachleg, some of gold and some of silver. "

"Whence come they, these gauds?"

"There are great rivers where one may find pieces of gold as big as thefist; and there are great rocks of crystal, sufficient to load many ships. "

This was all which was said on that day, but never was explorer moreeager than Gilbert. He wrote a "Discourse of a Discoverie for a NewPassage to Cathaia and the East Indies"--published without his knowledgeby George Gascoigne. In 1578 he had from Queen Elizabeth a patent ofexploration, allowing him to take possession of any uncolonized lands inNorth America, paying for these a fifth of all gold and silver found. Thenext year he sailed with Raleigh for Newfoundland, but one vessel was lostand the others returned to England. In 1583, he sailed again, taking withhim the narrative of Ingram, which he reprinted. He also took with him alearned Hungarian from Buda, named Parmenius, who went for the expresspurpose of singing the praise of Norumbega in Latin verse, but was drownedin Sir Humphrey's great flag-ship, the _Delight_. This wreck tookplace near Sable Island, and as most of the supplies for the expeditionwent down in the flag-ship, the men in the remaining vessels grew soimpatient as to compel a return. There were two vessels, the _GoldenHind_ of forty tons, and the _Squirrel_ of ten tons, this lastbeing a mere boat then called a frigate, a small vessel propelled by bothsails and oars, quite unlike the war-ship afterwards called by that name. On both these vessels the men were so distressed that they gathered on thebulwarks, pointing to their empty mouths and their ragged clothing. Theofficers of the _Golden Hind_ were unwilling to return, but consentedon Sir Humphrey's promise that they should come back in the spring; theysailed for England on the 31st of August. All wished him to return in the_Golden Hind_ as a much larger and safer vessel; the _Squirrel_, besides its smallness, being encumbered on the deck with guns, ammunition, and nettings, making it unseaworthy. But when he was begged to remove intothe larger vessel, he said, "I will not forsake my little company goinghomeward with whom I have passed so many storms and perils. " One reasonfor this was, the narrator of the voyage says, because of "hard reportsgiven of him that he was afraid of the sea, albeit this was ratherrashness than advised resolution, to prefer the wind of a vain report tothe weight of his own life. "

On the very day of sailing they caught their first glimpse of some largespecies of seal or walrus, which is thus described by the old narrator ofthe expedition:--

"So vpon Saturday in the afternoone the 31 of August, we changed ourcourse, and returned backe for England, at which very instant, euen inwinding about, there passed along betweene vs and towards the land whichwe now forsooke a very lion to our seeming, in shape, hair and colour, notswimming after the maner of a beast by moouing of his feete, but rathersliding vpon the water with his whole body (excepting the legs) in sight, neither yet in diuing vnder, and againe rising aboue the water, as themaner is, of Whales, Dolphins, Tunise, Porposes, and all other fish: butconfidently shewing himselfe aboue water without hiding: Notwithstanding, we presented our selues in open view and gesture to amase him, as allcreatures will be commonly at a sudden gaze and sight of men. Thus hepassed along turning his head to and fro, yawning and gaping wide, withougly demonstration of long teeth, and glaring eies, and to bidde vs afarewell (comming right against the Hinde) he sent forth a horrible voyce, roaring or bellowing as doeth a lion, which spectacle wee all beheld sofarre as we were able to discerne the same, as men prone to wonder ateuery strange thing, as this doubtlesse was, to see a lion in the Oceansea, or fish in shape of a lion. What opinion others had thereof, andchiefly the Generall himselfe, I forbeare to deliuer: But he tooke it forBonum Omen [a good omen], reioycing that he was to warre against such anenemie, if it were the deuill. "

When they came north of the Azores, very violent storms met them; most"outrageous seas, " the narrator says; and they saw little lights upon themainyard called then by sailors "Castor and Pollux, " and now "St. Elmo'sFire"; yet they had but one of these at a time, and this is thought a signof tempest. On September 9, in the afternoon, "the general, " as theycalled him, Sir Humphrey, was sitting abaft with a book in his hand, andcried out more than once to those in the other vessel, "We are as near toheaven by sea as by land. " And that same night about twelve o'clock, thefrigate being ahead of the _Golden Hind_, the lights of the smallervessel suddenly disappeared, and they knew that she had sunk in the sea. The event is well described in a ballad by Longfellow. 

The name of Norumbega and the tradition of its glories survived SirHumphrey Gilbert. In a French map of 1543, the town appears with castleand towers. Jean Allfonsce, who visited New England in that year, describes it as the capital of a great fur country. Students of Indiantongues defined the word as meaning "the place of a fine city"; while thelearned Grotius seized upon it as being the same as Norberga and soaffording a relic of the visits of the Northmen. As to the locality, itappeared first on the maps as a large island, then as a smaller one, andafter 1569 no longer as an island, but a part of the mainland, borderingapparently on the Penobscot River. Whittier in his poem of "Norumbega"describes a Norman knight as seeking it in vain. 

 "He turned him back, 'O master dear, We are but men misled; And thou hast sought a city here To find a grave instead. 

 * * * * *

 "'No builded wonder of these lands My weary eyes shall see; A city never made with hands Alone awaiteth me. '"

So Champlain, in 1604, could find no trace of it, and said that "no suchmarvel existed, " while Mark Lescarbot, the Parisian advocate, writing in1609, says, "If this beautiful town ever existed in nature, I would liketo know who pulled it down, for there is nothing here but huts made ofpickets and covered with the barks of trees or skins. " Yet it kept itsplace on maps till 1640, and even Heylin in his "Cosmography" (1669)speaks of "Norumbega and its fair city, " though he fears that the latternever existed. 

It is a curious fact that the late Mr. Justin Winsor, the eminenthistorian, after much inquiry among the present descendants of the Indiantribes in Maine, could never find any one who could remember to have heardthe name of Norumbega. 

XVIII

THE GUARDIANS OF THE ST. LAWRENCE

When in 1611 the Sieur de Champlain went back to France to report hiswonderful explorations in Canada, he was soon followed by a youngFrenchman named Vignan, who had spent a whole winter among the Indians, ina village where there was no other white man. This was a method oftenadopted by the French for getting more knowledge of Indian ways andcommanding their confidence. Vignan had made himself a welcome guest inthe cabins, and had brought away many of their legends, to which he addedsome of his own. In particular, he declared that he had penetrated intothe interior until he had come upon a great lake of salt water, far to thenorthwest. This was, as it happened, the very thing which the Frenchgovernment and all Europe had most hoped to find. They had always believedthat sooner or later a short cut would be discovered across the newlyfound continent, a passage leading to the Pacific Ocean and far Cathay. This was the dream of all French explorers, and of Champlain inparticular, and his interest was at once excited by anything that lookedtoward the Pacific. Now Vignan had prepared himself with just the neededinformation. He said that during his winter with the Indians he had madethe very discovery needed; that he had ascended the river Ottawa, whichled to a body of salt water so large that it seemed like an ocean; that hehad just seen on its shores the wreck of an English ship, from whicheighty men had been taken and slain by the savages, and that they had withthem an English boy whom they were keeping to present to Champlain. 

This tale about the English ship was evidently founded on the recentcalamities of Henry Hudson, of which Vignan had heard some garbledaccount, and which he used as coloring for his story. The result was thatChamplain was thoroughly interested in the tale, and that Vignan wascross-examined and tested, and was made at last to certify to the truthof it before two notaries of Rochelle. Champlain privately consulted thechancellor de Sillery, the old Marquis de Brissac, and others, who allassured him that the matter should be followed up; and he resolved to makeit the subject of an exploration without delay. He sailed in one vessel, and Vignan in another, the latter taking with him an ardent youngFrenchman, Albert de Brissac. 

M. De Vignan, talking with the young Brissac on the voyage, told himwonderful tales of monsters which were, he said, the guardians of the St. Lawrence River. There was, he said, an island in the bay of Chaleurs, nearthe mouth of that river, where a creature dwelt, having the form of awoman and called by the Indians Gougou. She was very frightful, and soenormous that the masts of the vessel could not reach her waist. She hadalready eaten many savages and constantly continued to do so, putting themfirst into a great pocket to await her hunger. Some of those who hadescaped said that this pocket was large enough to hold a whole ship. Thiscreature habitually made dreadful noises, and several savages who came onboard claimed to have heard them. A man from St. Malo in France, the Sieurde Prevert, confirmed this story, and said that he had passed so near theden of this frightful being, that all on board could hear its hissing, andall hid themselves below, lest it should carry them off. This naturallymade much impression upon the young Sieur de Brissac, and he doubtlesswished many times that he had stayed at home. On the other hand, heobserved that both M. De Vignan and M. De Prevert took the tale verycoolly and that there seemed no reason why he should distrust himself ifthey did not. Yet he was very glad when, after passing many islands andnarrow straits, the river broadened and they found themselves fairly inthe St. Lawrence and past the haunted Bay of Chaleurs. They certainlyheard a roaring and a hissing in the distance, but it may have been thewaves on the beach. 

But this was not their last glimpse of the supposed guardians of the St. Lawrence. As the ship proceeded farther up the beautiful river, they sawone morning a boat come forth from the woods, bearing three men dressed tolook like devils, wrapped in dogs' skins, white and black, their facesbesmeared as black as any coals, with horns on their heads more than ayard long, and as this boat passed the ship, one of the men made a longaddress, not looking towards them. Then they all three fell flat in theboat, when Indians rowed out to meet them and guided them to a landing. 

Then many Indians collected in the woods and began a loud talk which theycould hear on board the ships and which lasted half an hour. Then two oftheir leaders came towards the shore, holding their hands upward joinedtogether, and meanwhile carrying their hats under their upper garments andshowing great reverence. Looking upward they sometimes cried, "Jesus, Jesus, " or "Jesus Maria. " Then the captain asked them whether anything illhad happened, and they said in French, "Nenni est il bon, " meaning that itwas not good. Then they said that their god Cudraigny had spoken inHochelaga (Montreal) and had sent these three men to show to them thatthere was so much snow and ice in the country that he who went there woulddie. This made the Frenchmen laugh, saying in reply that their godCudraigny was but a fool and a noddy and knew not what he said. "Tellhim, " said a Frenchman, "that Christ will defend them from all cold, ifthey will believe in him. " The Indians then asked the captain if he hadspoken with Jesus. He answered No; but that his priests had, and they hadpromised fair weather. Hearing this, they thanked the captain and told theother Indians in the woods, who all came rushing out, seeming to be veryglad. Giving great shouts, they began to sing and dance as they had donebefore. They also began to bring to the ships great stores of fish and ofbread made of millet, casting it into the French boats so thickly that itseemed to fall from heaven. Then the Frenchmen went on shore, and thepeople came clustering about them, bringing children in their arms to betouched, as if to hallow them. Then the captain in return arranged thewomen in order and gave them beads made of tin, and other trifles, andgave knives to the men. All that night the Indians made great fires anddanced and sang along the shore. But when the Frenchmen had finallyreached the mouth of the Ottawa and had begun to ascend it, under Vignan'sguidance, they had reasons to remember the threats of the god Cudraigny. 

Ascending the Ottawa in canoes, past cataracts, boulders, and precipices, they at last, with great labor, reached the island of Allumette, at adistance of two hundred and twenty-five miles. Often it was impossible tocarry their canoes past waterfalls, because the forests were so dense, sothat they had to drag the boats by ropes, wading among rocks or climbingalong precipices. Gradually they left behind them their armor, theirprovisions, and clothing, keeping only their canoes; they lived on fishand wild fowl, and were sometimes twenty-four hours without food. Champlain himself carried three French arquebuses or short guns, threeoars, his cloak, and many smaller articles; and was harassed by denseclouds of mosquitoes all the time. Vignan, Brissac, and the rest werealmost as heavily loaded. The tribe of Indians whom they at last reachedhad chosen the spot as being inaccessible to their enemies; and thoughtthat the newcomers had fallen from the clouds. 

When Champlain inquired after the salt sea promised by Vignan, he learnedto his indignation that the whole tale was false. Vignan had spent awinter at the very village where they were, but confessed that he hadnever gone a league further north. The Indians knew of no such sea, andcraved permission to torture and kill him for his deceptions; they calledhim loudly a liar, and even the children took up the cry and jeered athim. They said, "Do you not see that he meant to cause your death? Givehim to us, and we promise you that he shall not lie any more. " Champlaindefended him from their attacks, bore it all philosophically, and theyoung Brissac went back to France, having given up hope of reaching thesalt sea, except, as Champlain himself coolly said, "in imagination. " Theguardians of the St. Lawrence had at least exerted their spell to theextent of saying, Thus far and no farther. Vignan never admitted that hehad invented the story of the Gougou, and had bribed the Indians who actedthe part of devils, --and perhaps he did not, --but it is certain thatneither the giantess nor the god Cudraigny has ever again been heard from. 

XIX

THE ISLAND OF DEMONS

Those American travellers who linger with delight among the narrow lanesand picturesque, overhanging roofs of Honfleur, do not know what a strangetragedy took place on a voyage which began in that quaint old port threecenturies and a half ago. When, in 1536, the Breton sailor Jacques Cartierreturned from his early explorations of the St. Lawrence, which he hadascended as high as Hochelaga, King Francis I. Sent for him at the loftyold house known as the House of the Salamander, in a narrow street of thequaint town of Lisieux. It now seems incredible that the most powerfulking in Europe should have dwelt in such a meagre lane, yet the housestill stands there as a witness; although a visitor must now brush awaythe rough, ready-made garments and fishermen's overalls which overhang itsdoor. Over that stairway, nevertheless, the troubadours, Pierre Ronsardand Clement Marot, used to go up and down, humming their lays or touchingtheir viols; and through that door De Lorge returned in glory, afterleaping down into the lions' den to rescue his lady's glove. The housestill derives its name from the great carved image of a reptile whichstretches down its outer wall, from garret to cellar, beside the doorway. 

In that house the great king deigned to meet the Breton sailor, who hadset up along the St. Lawrence a cross bearing the arms of France with theinscription _Franciscus Primus, Dei gratia Francorum Rex regnat_; andhad followed up the pious act by kidnapping the king Donnacona, andcarrying him back to France. This savage potentate was himself brought toLisieux to see his French fellow-sovereign; and the jovial king, eagerlyconvinced, decided to send Cartier forth again, to explore for otherwonders, and perhaps bring back other kingly brethren. Meanwhile, however, as it was getting to be an affair of royalty, he decided to send also agentleman of higher grade than a pilot, and so selected Jean François dela Roche, Sieur de Roberval, whom he commissioned as lieutenant andgovernor of Canada and Hochelaga. Roberval was a gentleman of credit andrenown in Picardy, and was sometimes jocosely called by Francis "thelittle king of Vimeu. " He was commissioned at Fontainebleau, and proceededto superintend the building of ships at St. Malo. 

Marguerite Roberval, his fair-haired and black-eyed niece, was to go withhim on the voyage, with other ladies of high birth, and also with thewidowed Madame de Noailles, her _gouvernante_. Roberval himselfremained at St. Malo to superintend the building of the ships, andMarguerite and her _gouvernante_ would sit for hours in a beautifulnook by the shipyards, where they could overlook the vessels in rapidconstruction, or else watch the wondrous swirl of the tide as it swept inand out, leaving the harbor bare at low tide, but with eight fathoms ofwater when the tide was full. The designer of the ships often came, cap inhand, to ask or answer questions--one of those frank and manly Frenchfishermen and pilots, whom the French novelists describe as "_un solidegaillard_, " or such as Victor Hugo paints in his "Les Travailleurs dela Mer. " The son of a notary, Etienne Gosselin was better educated thanmost of the young noblemen whom Marguerite knew, and only his passion forthe sea and for nautical construction had kept him a shipbuilder. Nowonder that the young Marguerite, who had led the sheltered life of theFrench maiden, was attracted by his manly look, his open face, his merryblue eyes, and curly hair. There was about her a tinge of romance, whichmade her heart an easier thing to reach for such a lover than for onewithin her own grade; and as the voyage itself was a world of romance, alittle more or less of the romantic was an easy thing to add. MeanwhileMadame de Noailles read her breviary and told her beads and took littlenaps, wholly ignorant of the drama that was beginning its perilousunfolding before her. When the Sieur de Roberval returned, the shipbuilderbecame a mere shipbuilder again. 

Three tall ships sailed from Honfleur on August 22, 1541, and on one ofthem, _La Grande Hermine_, --so called to distinguish it from asmaller boat of that name, which had previously sailed with Cartier, --werethe Sieur de Roberval, his niece, and her _gouvernante_. She also hadwith her a Huguenot nurse, who had been with her from a child, and caredfor her devotedly. Roberval naturally took with him, for future needs, thebest shipbuilder of St. Malo, Etienne Gosselin. The voyage was long, andthere is reason to think that the Sieur de Roberval was not a good sailor, while as to the _gouvernante_, she may have been as helpless as theseasick chaperon of yachting excursions. Like them, she suffered the mostimportant events to pass unobserved, and it was not till too late that shediscovered, what more censorious old ladies on board had already seen, that her young charge lingered too often and too long on the quarter-deckwhen Etienne Gosselin was planning ships for the uncle. When she found itout, she was roused to just indignation; but being, after all, but akindly dowager, with a heart softened by much reading of the interminabletales of Madame de Scudéry, she only remonstrated with Marguerite, weptover her little romance, and threatened to break the sad news to the Sieurde Roberval, yet never did so. Other ladies were less considerate; it allbroke suddenly upon the angry uncle; the youth was put in irons, andthreatened with flogging, and forbidden to approach the quarter-deckagain. But love laughs at locksmiths; Gosselin was relieved of his ironsin a day or two because he could not be spared from his work in designingthe forthcoming ship, and as both he and Marguerite were of a tolerablydetermined nature, they invoked, through the old nurse, the aid of aHuguenot minister on board, who had before sailed with Cartier to takecharge of the souls of some Protestant vagabonds on the ship, and who wasnow making a second trip for the same reason. That night, after dark, hejoined the lovers in marriage; within twenty-four hours Roberval had heardof it, and had vowed a vengeance quick and sure. 

The next morning, under his orders, the vessel lay to under the lee of arocky island, then known to the sailors as l'Isle des Demons from thefierce winds that raged round it. There was no house there, no livingperson, no tradition of any; only rocks, sands, and deep forests. Withdismay, the ship's company heard that it was the firm purpose of Robervalto put the offending bride on shore, giving her only the old nurse forcompany, and there to leave her with provisions for three months, trustingto some other vessel to take the exiled women away within that time. Thevery ladies whose love of scandal had first revealed to him the allegedfamiliarities, now besought him with many tears to abandon the thought ofa doom so terrible. Vainly Madame de Noailles implored mercy for the younggirl from a penalty such as was never imposed in any of Madame deScudéry's romances; vainly the Huguenot minister and the Catholicchaplain, who had fought steadily on questions of doctrine during thewhole voyage, now united in appeals for pardon. At least they implored himto let the offenders have a man-servant or two with them to protect themagainst wild beasts or buccaneers. He utterly refused until, at lastwearied out, his wild nature yielded to one of those sudden impulses whichwere wont to sweep over it; and he exclaimed, "Is it that they need aman-servant, then? Let this insolent caitiff, Gosselin, be relieved of hisirons and sent on shore. Let him be my niece's servant or, since aHuguenot marriage is as good as any in the presence of bears andbuccaneers, let her call the hound her husband, if she likes. I have donewith her; and the race from which she came disowns her forever. "

Thus it was done. Etienne was released from his chains and sent on shore. An arquebus and ammunition were given him; and resisting the impulse tosend his first shot through the heart of his tyrant, he landed, and thelast glimpse seen of the group as the _Grande Hermine_ sailed away, was the figure of Marguerite sobbing on his shoulder, and of the unhappynurse, now somewhat plethoric, and certainly not the person to be selectedas a pioneer, sitting upon a rock, weeping profusely. The ship's sailsfilled, the angry Roberval never looked back on his deserted niece, andthe night closed down upon the lonely Isle of Demons, now newly occupiedby three unexpected settlers, two of whom at least were happy in eachother. 

A few boxes of biscuits, a few bottles of wine, had been put on shorewith them, enough to feed them for a few weeks. They had brought flint andsteel to strike fire, and some ammunition. The chief penalty of the crimedid not lie, after all, in the cold and the starvation and the wild beastsand the possible visits of pirates; it lay in the fact that it was theIsland of Demons where they were to be left; and in that superstitious agethis meant everything that was terrible. For the first few nights of theirstay, they fancied that they heard superhuman voices in every wind thatblew, every branch that creaked against another branch; and they heard, atany rate, more substantial sounds from the nightly wolves or from thebears which ice-floes had floated to that northern isle. They watchedRoberval sail away, he rejoicing, as the old legend of Thevet says, athaving punished them without soiling his hands with their blood (_ioueuxde les auior puniz sans se souiller les mains en leurs sang_). Theybuilt as best they could a hut of boughs and strewed beds of leaves, untilthey had killed wild beasts enough to prepare their skins. Their store ofhard bread lasted them but a little while, but there were fruits aroundthem, and there was fresh water near by. "Yet it was terrible, " saysThevet's old narrative, "to hear the frightful sounds which the evilspirits made around them, and how they tried to break down their abode, and showed themselves in various forms of frightful animals; yet at last, conquered by the constancy and perseverance of these repentant Christians, the tormentors afflicted or disquieted them no more, save that often inthe night they heard cries so loud that it seemed as if more than fivethousand men were assembled together" (_plus de cent mil homes quifussent ensemble_). 

So passed many months of desolation, and alas! the husband was the firstto yield. Daily he climbed the rocks to look for vessels; each night hedescended sadder and sadder; he waked while the others slept. Feeling thatit was he who had brought distress upon the rest, he concealed hisdepression, but it soon was past concealing; he only redoubled his careand watching as his wife grew the stronger of the two; and he faded slowlyaway and died. His wife had nothing to sustain her spirits except theapproach of maternity--she would live for her child. When the child wasborn and baptized in the name of the Holy Church, though without theChurch's full ceremonies, Marguerite felt the strength of motherhood;became a better huntress, a better provider. A new sorrow came; in thesixteenth or seventeenth month of her stay, the old nurse died also, andnot long after the baby followed. Marguerite now seemed to herselfdeserted, even by Heaven itself; she was alone in that northern islandwithout comradeship; her husband, child, and nurse gone; dependent forvery food on the rapidly diminishing supply of ammunition. Her head swam;for months she saw visions almost constantly, which only strenuous prayerbanished, and only the acquired habit of the chase enabled her, almostmechanically, to secure meat to support life. Fortunately, those especialsights and sounds of demons which had haunted her imagination during thefirst days and nights on the island, did not recur; but the wild beastsgathered round her the more when there was only one gun to alarm them; andshe once shot three bears in a day, --one a white bear, of which shesecured the skin. 

What imagination can depict the terrors of those lonely days and stilllonelier nights? Most persons left as solitary tenants of an island havedwelt, like Alexander Selkirk, in regions nearer the tropics, where therewas at least a softened air, a fertile soil, and the Southern Cross abovetheir heads; but to be solitary in a prolonged winter, to be alone withthe Northern Lights, --this offered peculiar terrors. To be ice-bound, tohear the wolves in their long and dreary howl, to protect the very gravesof her beloved from being dug up, to watch the floating icebergs, notknowing what new and savage visitor might be borne by them to the island, what a complication of terror was this for Marguerite!

For two years and five months in all she dwelt upon the Isle of Demons, the last year wholly alone. Then, as she stood upon the shore, some Bretonfishing-smacks, seeking codfish, came in sight. Making signals with fireand calling for aid, she drew them nearer; but she was now dressed in fursonly, and seemed to them but one of the fancied demons of the island. Beating up slowly and watchfully toward the shore, they came withinhearing of her voice and she told her dreary tale. At last they took herin charge, and bore her back to France with the bearskins she hadprepared; and taking refuge in the village of Nautron, in a remoteprovince (Perigord), where she could escape the wrath of Roberval, shetold her story to Thevet, the explorer, to the Princess Marguerite ofNavarre (sister of Francis I. ), and to others. Thevet tells it in his"Cosmographie, " and Marguerite of Navarre in her "Cent NouvellesNouvelles. "

She told Thevet that after the first two months, the demons came to herno more, until she was left wholly alone; then they renewed their visits, but not continuously, and she felt less fear. Thevet also records of herthis touching confession, that when the time came for her to embark, inthe Breton ship, for home, there came over her a strong impulse to refusethe embarkation, but rather to die in that solitary place, as her husband, her child, and her servant had already died. This profound touch of humannature does more than anything else to confirm the tale as substantiallytrue. Certain it is that the lonely island which appeared so long on theold maps as the Isle of Demons (l'Isola de Demoni) appears differently inlater ones as the Lady's Island (l'Isle de la Demoiselle). 

The Princess Marguerite of Navarre, who died in 1549, seems also to haveknown her namesake at her retreat in Perigord, gives some variations fromThevet's story, and describes her as having been put on shore with herhusband, because of frauds which he had practised on Roberval; nor doesshe speak of the nurse or of the child. But she gives a similardescription of Marguerite's stay on the island, after his death, and says, that although she lived what might seem a bestial life as to her body, itwas a life wholly angelic as regarded her soul (_aînsî vivant, quant aucorps, de vie bestiale, et quant à l'esprit, de vie angelîcque_). Shehad, the princess also says, a mind cheerful and content, in a bodyemaciated and half dead. She was afterwards received with great honor inFrance, according to the princess, and was encouraged to establish aschool for little children, where she taught reading and writing to thedaughters of high-born families. "And by this honest industry, " says theprincess, "she supported herself during the remainder of her life, havingno other wish than to exhort every one to love and confidence towards God, offering them as an example, the great pity which he had shown for her. "

XX

BIMINI AND THE FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH

When Juan Ponce de Leon set forth from Porto Rico, March 13, 1512, toseek the island of Bimini and its Fountain of Youth, he was moved by thelove of adventure more than by that of juvenility, for he was then butabout fifty, a time when a cavalier of his day thought himself but in hisprime. He looked indeed with perpetual sorrow--as much of it as a Spaniardof those days could feel--upon his kinsman Luis Ponce, once a renownedwarrior, but on whom age had already, at sixty-five, laid its hand inearnest. There was little in this slowly moving veteran to recall one whohad shot through the lists at the tournament, and had advanced with hisshort sword at the bull fight, --who had ruled his vassals, and won thelove of high-born women. It was a vain hope of restored youth which hadbrought Don Luis from Spain to Porto Rico four years before; and, whenPonce de Leon had subdued that island, his older kinsman was foreverbeseeching him to carry his flag farther, and not stop till he had reachedBimini, and sought the Fountain of Youth. 

"For what end, " he said, "should you stay here longer and lord it overthese miserable natives? Let us go where we can bathe in those enchantedwaters and be young once more. I need it, and you will need it ere long. "

"How know we, " said his kinsman, "that there is any such place?"

"All know it, " said Luis. "Peter Martyr saith that there is in Bimini acontinual spring of running water of such marvellous virtue that the waterthereof, being drunk, perhaps with some diet, maketh old men young. " Andhe adds that an Indian grievously oppressed with old age, moved with thefame of that fountain, and allured through the love of longer life, wentto an island, near unto the country of Florida, to drink of the desiredfountain, ... And having well drunk and washed himself for many days withthe appointed remedies, by them who kept the bath, he is reported to havebrought home a manly strength, and to have used all manly exercises. "Letus therefore go thither, " he cried, "and be like him. "

They set sail with three brigantines and found without difficulty theisland of Bimini among the Lucayos (or Bahamas) islands; but when theysearched for the Fountain of Youth they were pointed farther westward toFlorida, where there was said to be a river of the same magic powers, called the Jordan. Touching at many a fair island green with trees, andoccupied by a gentle population till then undisturbed, it was not strangeif, nearing the coast of Florida, both Juan Ponce de Leon and his moreimpatient cousin expected to find the Fountain of Youth. 

They came at last to an inlet which led invitingly up among wooded banksand flowery valleys, and here the older knight said, "Let us disembarkhere and strike inland. My heart tells me that here at last will be foundthe Fountain of Youth. " "Nonsense, " said Juan, "our way lies by water. "

"Then leave me here with my men, " said Luis. He had brought with him fiveservants, mostly veterans, from his own estate in Spain. 

A fierce discussion ended in Luis obtaining his wish, and being left fora fortnight of exploration; his kinsman promising to come for him again atthe mouth of the river St. John. The men left on shore were themselvespast middle age, and the more eager for their quest. They climbed a hilland watched the brigantines disappear in the distance; then set up across, which they had brought with them, and prayed before it bareheaded. 

Sending the youngest of his men up to the top of a tree, Luis learnedfrom him that they were on an island, after all, and this cheered himmuch, as making it more likely that they should find the Fountain ofYouth. He saw that the ground was pawed up, as if in a cattle-range andthat there was a path leading to huts. Taking this path, they met fiftyIndian bowmen, who, whether large or not, seemed to them like giants. TheSpaniards gave them beads and hawk-bells, and each received in return anarrow, as a token of friendship. The Indians promised them food in themorning, and brought fish, roots, and pure water; and finding them chillyfrom the coldness of the night, carried them in their arms to their homes, first making four or five large fires on the way. At the houses there weremany fires, and the Spaniards would have been wholly comfortable, had theynot thought it just possible that they were to be offered as a sacrifice. Still fearing this, they left their Indian friends after a few days andtraversed the country, stopping at every spring or fountain to test itsquality. Alas! they all grew older and more worn in look, as time went on, and farther from the Fountain of Youth. 

After a time they came upon new tribes of Indians, and as they wentfarther from the coast these people seemed more and more friendly. Theytreated the white men as if come from heaven, --brought them food, madethem houses, carried every burden for them. Some had bows, and went uponthe hills for deer, and brought half a dozen every night for their guests;others killed hares and rabbits by arranging themselves in a circle andstriking down the game with billets of wood as it ran from one to anotherthrough the woods. All this game was brought to the visitors to bebreathed upon and blessed, and when this had to be done for severalhundred people it became troublesome. The women also brought wild fruit, and would eat nothing till the guests had seen and touched it. If thevisitors seemed offended, the natives were terrified, and apparentlythought that they should die unless they had the favor of these wise andgood men. Farther on, people did not come out into the paths to gatherround them, as the first had done, but stayed meekly in their houses, sitting with their faces turned to the wall, and with their propertyheaped in the middle of the room. From these people the travellersreceived many valuable skins, and other gifts. Wherever there was afountain, the natives readily showed it, but apparently knew nothing ofany miraculous gift; yet they themselves were in such fine physicalcondition, and seemed so young and so active, that it was as if they hadalready bathed in some magic spring. They had wonderful endurance of heatand cold, and such health that, when their bodies were pierced through andthrough by arrows, they would recover rapidly from their wounds. Thesethings convinced the Spaniards that, even if the Indians would notdisclose the source of all their bodily freshness, it must, at any rate, lie somewhere in the neighborhood. Yet a little while, no doubt, and theirvisitors would reach it. 

It was a strange journey for these gray and careworn men as they passedup the defiles and valleys along the St. John's River, beyond the spotwhere now spreads the city of Jacksonville, and even up to the woods andsprings about Magnolia and Green Cove. Yellow jasmines trailed theirfestoons above their heads; wild roses grew at their feet; the air wasfilled with the aromatic odors of pine or sweet bay; the long gray mosshung from the live-oak branches; birds and butterflies of wonderful huesfluttered around them; and strange lizards crossed their paths, or lookedwith dull and blinking eyes from the branches. They came, at last, to onespring which widened into a natural basin, and which was so deliciouslyaromatic that Luis Ponce said, on emerging: "It is enough. I have bathedin the Fountain of Youth, and henceforth I am young. " His companions triedit, and said the same: "The Fountain of Youth is found. "

No time must now be lost in proclaiming the great discovery. Theyobtained a boat from the natives, who wept at parting with the whitestrangers whom they had so loved. In this boat they proposed to reach themouth of the St. John, meet Juan Ponce de Leon, and carry back the news toSpain. But one native, whose wife and children they had cured, and who hadgrown angry at their refusal to stay longer, went down to the water's edgeand, sending an arrow from his bow, transfixed Don Luis, so that even hisforetaste of the Fountain could not save him, and he died ere reaching themouth of the river. If Don Luis ever reached what he sought, it was inanother world. But those who have ever bathed in Green Cove Spring, nearMagnolia, on the St. John's River, will be ready to testify that, had hebut stayed there longer, he would have found something to recall hisvisions of the Fountain of Youth. 

NOTES

PREFACE

A Full account of the rediscovery of the Canaries in 1341 will be foundin Major's "Life of Prince Henry of Portugal" (London, 1868), p. 138. Forthe statement as to the lingering belief in the Jacquet Island, seeWinsor's "Columbus, " p. 111. The extract from Cowley is given by HermanMelville in his picturesque paper on "The Encantadas" (_Putnam'sMagazine_, III. 319). In Harris's "Voyages" (1702) there is a mapgiving "Cowley's Inchanted Isl. " (I. 78), but there is no explanation ofthe name. The passage quoted by Melville is not to be found in Cowley's"Voyage to Magellanica and Polynesia, " given by Harris in the same volume, and must be taken from Cowley's "Voyage round the Globe, " which I have notfound in any library. 

I. ATLANTIS

For the original narrative of Socrates, see Plato's "Timaeus" and"Critias, " in each of which it is given. For further information see thechapter on the Geographical Knowledge of the Ancients by W. H. Tillinghast, in Winsor's "Narrative and Critical History of America, " I. 15. He mentions (I. 19, note) a map printed at Amsterdam in 1678 byKircher, which shows Atlantis as a large island midway between Spain andAmerica. Ignatius Donnelly's "Atlantis, the Antediluvian World" (N. Y. 1882), maintains that the evidence for the former existence of such anisland is irresistible, and his work has been very widely read, althoughit is not highly esteemed by scholars. 

II. TALIESSIN

The Taliessin legend in its late form cannot be traced back beyond theend of the sixteenth century, but the account of the transformation is tobe found in the "Book of Taliessin, " a manuscript of the thirteenthcentury, preserved in the Hengwt Collection at Peniarth. The Welsh bardhimself is supposed to have flourished in the sixth century. See AlfredNutt in "The Voyage of Bram" (London, 1897), II. 86. The traditions may befound in Lady Charlotte Guest's translation of the "Mabinogion, " 2d ed. , London, 1877, p. 471. The poems may be found in the original Welsh inSkene's "Four Ancient Books of Wales, " 2 vols. , Edinburgh, 1868; and healso gives a facsimile of the manuscript. 

III. CHILDREN OF LIR

The lovely legend of the children of Lir or Lear forms one of those threetales of the old Irish Bards which are known traditionally in Ireland as"The Three Sorrows of Story Telling. " It has been told in verse by Aubreyde Vere ("The Foray of Queen Meave, and Other Legends, " London, 1882), byJohn Todhunter ("Three Irish Bardic Tales, " London, 1896); and also inprose by various writers, among whom are Professor Eugene O'Curry, whoseversion with the Gaelic original was published in "Atlantis, " Nos. Vii. And viii. ; Gerald Griffin in "The Tales of a Jury Room"; and Dr. PatrickWeston Joyce in "Ancient Celtic Romances" (London, 1879). The oldestmanuscript copy of the tale in Gaelic is one in the British Museum, madein 1718; but there are more modern ones in different English and Irishlibraries, and the legend itself is of much older origin. ProfessorO'Curry, the highest authority, places its date before the year 1000. ("Lectures on the Manuscript Materials of Irish History, " p. 319. )

IV. USHEEN

In the original legend, Oisin or Usheen is supposed to have told his taleto St. Patrick on his arrival in Ireland; but as the ancient Feni wereidolaters, the hero bears but little goodwill to the saint. The Celtictext of a late form of the legend (1749) with a version by Brian O'Looneywill be found in the transactions of the Ossianic Society for 1856 (Vol. IV. P. 227); and still more modern and less literal renderings in P. W. Joyce's "Ancient Celtic Romances" (London, 1879), p. 385, and in W. B. Yeats's "Wanderings of Oisin, and Other Poems" (London, 1889), p. 1. Thelast is in verse and is much the best. St. Patrick, who takes part in it, regards Niam as "a demon thing. " See also the essays entitled "L'ElyséeTransatlantique, " by Eugene Beauvois, in the "Revue de L'Histoire desReligions, " VII. 273 (Paris, 1885), and "L'Eden Occidental" (same, VII. 673). As to Oisin or Usheen's identity with Ossian, see O'Curry's"Lectures on the Manuscript Materials for Ancient Irish History" (Dublin, 1861), pp. 209, 300; John Rhys's "Hibbert Lectures" (London, 1888), p. 551. The latter thinks the hero identical with Taliessin, as well as withOssian, and says that the word Ossin means "a little fawn, " from "os, ""cervus. " (See also O'Curry, p. 304. ) O'Looney represents that it was astone which Usheen threw to show his strength, and Joyce follows thisview; but another writer in the same volume of the Ossianic Societytransactions (p. 233) makes it a bag of sand, and Yeats follows thisversion. It is also to be added that the latter in later editions changesthe spelling of his hero's name from Oisin to Usheen. 

V. BRAN

The story of Bran and his sister Branwen may be found most fully given inLady Charlotte Guest's translation of the "Mabinogion, " ed. 1877, pp. 369, 384. She considers Harlech, whence Bran came, to be a locality on theWelsh seacoast still known by that name and called also Branwen's Tower. But Rhys, a much higher authority, thinks that Bran came really from theregion of Hades, and therefore from a distant island ("Arthurian Legend, "p. 250, "Hibbert Lectures, " pp. 94, 269). The name of "the Blessed" camefrom the legend of Bran's having introduced Christianity into Ireland, asstated in one of the Welsh Triads. He was the father of Caractacus, celebrated for his resistance to the Roman conquest, and carried aprisoner to Rome. Another triad speaks of King Arthur as having dug upBran's head, for the reason that he wished to hold England by his ownstrength; whence followed many disasters (Guest, p. 387). 

There were many Welsh legends in regard to Branwen or Bronwen (WhiteBosom), and what is supposed to be her grave, with an urn containing herashes, may still be seen at a place called "Ynys Bronwen, " or "the isletof Bronwen, " in Anglesea. It was discovered and visited in 1813 (Guest, p. 389). 

The White Mount in which Bran's head was deposited is supposed to havebeen the Tower of London, described by a Welsh poet of the twelfth centuryas "The White Eminence of London, a place of splendid fame" (Guest, p. 392). 

VI. THE CASTLE OF THE ACTIVE DOOR

This legend is mainly taken from different parts of Lady CharlotteGuest's translation of the "Mabinogion, " with some additions andmodifications from Rhys's "Hibbert Lectures" and "The Arthurian Legend. "

VIII. MERLIN

In later years Merlin was known mainly by a series of remarkableprophecies which were attributed to him and were often said to befulfilled by actual events in history. Thus one of the many places whereMerlin's grave was said to be was Drummelzion in Tweeddale, Scotland. Onthe east side of the churchyard a brook called the Pansayl falls into theTweed, and there was this prophecy as to their union:--

 "When Tweed and Pansayl join at Merlin's grave, Scotland and England shall one monarch have. "

Sir Walter Scott tells us, in his "Border Minstrelsy, " that on the day ofthe coronation of James VI. Of Scotland the Tweed accordingly overflowedand joined the Pansayl at the prophet's grave. It was also claimed by oneof the witnesses at the trial of Jeanne d'Arc, that there was a predictionby Merlin that France would be saved by a peasant girl from Lorraine. These prophesies have been often reprinted, and have been translated intodifferent languages, and there was published in London, in 1641, "The Lifeof Merlin, surnamed Ambrosius, His Prophesies and Predictions interpreted, and their Truth made Good by our English Annals. " Another book was alsopublished in London, in 1683, called "Merlin revived in a Discourse ofProphesies, Predictions, and their Remarkable Accomplishments. "

VIII. LANCELOT

The main sources of information concerning Lancelot are the "Morted'Arthur, " Newell's "King Arthur and the Table Round, " and thepublications of the Early English Text Society. See also Rhys's "ArthurianLegend, " pp. 127, 147, etc. 

IX. THE HALF-MAN

The symbolical legend on which this tale is founded will be found in LadyCharlotte Guest's translation of the "Mabinogion" (London, 1877), II. P. 344. It is an almost unique instance, in the imaginative literature ofthat period, of a direct and avowed allegory. There is often allegory, butit is usually contributed by modern interpreters, and would sometimesgreatly astound the original fabulists. 

X. ARTHUR

The earliest mention of the island of Avalon, or Avilion, in connectionwith the death of Arthur, is a slight one by the old English chronicler, Geoffrey of Monmouth (Book XI. C. 2), and the event is attributed by himto the year 542. Wace's French romance was an enlargement of Geoffrey; andthe narrative of Layamon (at the close of the twelfth century) anexplanation of that of Wace. Layamon's account of the actual death ofArthur, as quoted in the text, is to be found in the translation, a veryliteral one, by Madden (Madden's "Layamon's Brut, " III. Pp. 140-146). 

The earliest description of the island itself is by an anonymous authorknown as "Pseudo-Gildas, " supposed to be a thirteenth-century Bretonwriter (Meyer's "Voyage of Bram, " I. P. 237), and quoted by ArchbishopUsher in his "British Ecclesiastical Antiquities" (1637), p. 273, who thusdescribes it in Latin hexameters:--

 "Cingitur oceano memorabilis insula nullis Desolata bonis: non fur, nec praedo, nec hostis Insidiatur ibi: nec vis, nec bruma nec aestas, Immoderata furit. Pax et concordia, pubes Ver manent aeternum. Nec flos, nec lilia desunt, Nec rosa, nec violae: flores et poma sub unâ Fronde gerit pomus. Habitant sine labe cruoris Semper ibi juvenes cum virgine: nulla senectus, Nulla vis morbi, nullus dolor; omnia plena Laetitiae; nihil hic proprium, communia quaeque. 

 Regit virgo locis et rebus praesidet istis, Virginibus stipata suis, pulcherrima pulchris; Nympha decens vultu, generosis patribus orta, Consilio pollens, medicinas nobilis arte. At simul Arthurus regni diadema reliquit, Substitutique sibi regem, se transtulit illic; Anno quingeno quadragenoque secundo Post incarnatum sine patris semine natum. Immodicè laesus, Arthurus tendit ad aulam Regis Avallonis; ubi virgo regia vulnus Illius tractans, sanati membra reservat Ipsa sibi: vivuntque simul; si credere fas est. "

A translation of this passage into rhyming English follows; both of thesebeing taken from Way's "Fabliaux" (London, 1815), II. Pp. 233-235. 

 "By the main ocean's wave encompass'd, stands A memorable isle, fill'd with all good: No thief, no spoiler there, no wily foe With stratagem of wasteful war; no rage Of heat intemperate, or of winter's cold; But spring, full blown, with peace and concord reigns: Prime bliss of heart and season, fitliest join'd! Flowers fail not there: the lily and the rose, With many a knot of fragrant violets bound; And, loftier, clustering down the bended boughs, Blossom with fruit combin'd, rich apples hang. 

 "Beneath such mantling shades for ever dwell In virgin innocence and honour pure, Damsels and youths, from age and sickness free, And ignorant of woe, and fraught with joy, In choice community of all things best. 

 O'er these, and o'er the welfare of this land, Girt with her maidens, fairest among fair, Reigns a bright virgin sprung from generous sires, In counsel strong, and skill'd in med'cine's lore. Of her (Britannia's diadem consign'd To other brow), for his deep wound and wide Great Arthur sought relief: hither he sped (Nigh two and forty and five hundred years Since came the incarnate Son to save mankind), And in Avallon's princely hall repos'd. His wound the royal damsel search'd; she heal'd; And in this isle still holds him to herself In sweet society, --so fame say true!"

XI. MAELDUIN

This narrative is taken partly from Nutt's "Voyage of Bram" (I. 162) andpartly from Joyce's "Ancient Celtic Romances. " The latter, however, allowsMaelduin sixty comrades instead of seventeen, which is Nutt's version. There are copies of the original narrative in the Erse language at theBritish Museum, and in the library of Trinity College, Dublin. The voyage, which may have had some reality at its foundation, is supposed to havetaken place about the year 700 A. D. It belongs to the class known asImrama, or sea-expeditions. Another of these is the voyage of St. Brandan, and another is that of "the sons of O'Corra. " A poetical translation ofthis last has been made by T. D. Sullivan of Dublin, and published in hisvolume of poems. (Joyce, p. Xiii. ) All these voyages illustrated the widerand wider space assigned on the Atlantic ocean to the enchanted islandsuntil they were finally identified, in some cases, with the continentwhich Columbus found. 

XII. ST. BRANDAN

THE legend of St. Brandan, which was very well known in the Middle Ages, was probably first written in Latin prose near the end of the eleventhcentury, and is preserved in manuscript in many English libraries. AnEnglish metrical version, written probably about the beginning of thefourteenth century, is printed under the editorship of Thomas Wright inthe publications of the Percy Society, London, 1844 (XIV. ), and it isfollowed in the same volume by an English prose version of 1527. A partialnarrative in Latin prose, with an English version, may be found in W. J. Rees's "Lives of the Cambro-British Saints" (Llandovery, 1853), pp. 251, 575. The account of Brandan in the Acta Sanctorum of the Bollandists maybe found under May 16, the work being arranged under saints' days. Thisaccount excludes the more legendary elements. The best sketch of thesupposed island appears in the _Nouvelles Annales des Voyages_ for1845 (p. 293), by D'Avezac. Professor O'Curry places the date of thealleged voyage or voyages at about the year 560 ("Lectures on theManuscript Materials for Irish History, " p. 289). Good accounts of thelife in the great monasteries of Brandan's period may be found in Digby's"Mores Catholici" or "Ages of Faith"; in Montalembert's "Monks of theWest" (translation); in Villemarqué's "La Legende Celtique et la Poésiedes Cloistres en Irlande, en Cambrie et en Bretagne" (Paris, 1864). Thepoem on St. Brandan, stanzas from which are quoted in the text, is byDenis Florence McCarthy, and may be found in the _Dublin UniversityMagazine_ (XXXI. P. 89); and there is another poem on the subject--avery foolish burlesque--in the same magazine (LXXXIX. P. 471). MatthewArnold's poem with the same title appeared in _Fraser's Magazine_(LXII. P. 133), and may be found in the author's collected works in theform quoted below. 

The legends of St. Brandan, it will be observed, resemble so much thetales of Sindbad the Sailor and others in the "Arabian Nights"--which havealso the island-whale, the singing birds, and other features--that it isimpossible to doubt that some features of tradition were held in commonwith the Arabs of Spain. 

In later years (the twelfth century), a geographer named Honoré d'Autundeclared, in his "Image of the World, " that there was in the ocean acertain island agreeable and fertile beyond all others, now unknown tomen, once discovered by chance and then lost again, and that this islandwas the one which Brandan had visited. In several early maps, before thetime of Columbus, the Madeira Islands appear as "The Fortunate Islands ofSt. Brandan, " and on the famous globe of Martin Behaim, made in the veryyear when Columbus sailed, there is a large island much farther west thanMadeira, and near the equator, with an inscription saying that in the year565, St. Brandan arrived at this island and saw many wondrous things, returning to his own land afterwards. Columbus heard this island mentionedat Ferro, where men declared that they had seen it in the distance. Later, the chart of Ortelius, in the sixteenth century, carried it to theneighborhood of Ireland; then it was carried south again, and was supposedall the time to change its place through enchantment, and when Emanuel ofPortugal, in 1519, renounced all claim to it, he described it as "TheHidden Island. " In 1570 a Portuguese expedition was sent which claimedactually to have touched the mysterious island, indeed to have found therethe vast impression of a human foot--doubtless of the baptized giantMildus--and also a cross nailed to a tree, and three stones laid in atriangle for cooking food. Departing hastily from the island, they lefttwo sailors behind, but could never find the place again. 

Again and again expeditions were sent out in search of St. Brandan'sisland, usually from the Canaries--one in 1604 by Acosta, one in 1721 byDominguez; and several sketches of the island, as seen from a distance, were published in 1759 by a Franciscan priest in the Canary Islands, namedViere y Clarijo, including one made by himself on May 3, 1759, about 6A. M. , in presence of more than forty witnesses. All these sketches depictthe island as having its chief length from north to south, and formed oftwo unequal hills, the highest of these being at the north, they havingbetween them a depression covered with trees. The fact that this resemblesthe general form of Palma, one of the Canary Islands, has led to thebelief that it may have been an ocean mirage, reproducing the image ofthat island, just as the legends themselves reproduce, here and there, thetraditions of the "Arabian Nights. "

In a map drawn by the Florentine physician, Toscanelli, which was sent byhim to Columbus in 1474 to give his impression of the Asiatic coast, --lying, as he supposed, across the Atlantic, --there appears the island ofSt. Brandan. It is as large as all the Azores or Canary Islands or Cape deVerde Islands put together; its southern tip just touches the equator, andit lies about half-way between the Cape de Verde Islands and Zipangu orJapan, which was then believed to lie on the other side of the Atlantic. Mr. Winsor also tells us that the apparition of this island "sometimescame to sailors' eyes" as late as the last century (Winsor's "Columbus, "112). 

He also gives a reproduction of Toscanelli's map now lost, as far as canbe inferred from descriptions (Winsor, p. 110). 

The following is Matthew Arnold's poem:--

SAINT BRANDAN

 Saint Brandan sails the northern main; The brotherhoods of saints are glad. He greets them once, he sails again; So late!--such storms!--the Saint is mad!

 He heard, across the howling seas, Chime convent-bells on wintry nights; He saw, on spray-swept Hebrides, Twinkle the monastery lights;

 But north, still north, Saint Brandan steer'd-- And now no bells, no convents more! The hurtling Polar lights are near'd, The sea without a human shore. 

 At last--(it was the Christmas-night; Stars shone after a day of storm)-- He sees float past an iceberg white, And on it--Christ!--a living form. 

 That furtive mien, that scowling eye, Of hair that red and tufted fell-- It is--oh, where shall Brandan fly?-- The traitor Judas, out of hell!

 Palsied with terror, Brandan sate; The moon was bright, the iceberg near. He hears a voice sigh humbly: "Wait! By high permission I am here. 

 "One moment wait, thou holy man! On earth my crime, my death, they knew; My name is under all men's ban-- Ah, tell them of my respite, too!

 "Tell them, one blessed Christmas-night-- (It was the first after I came, Breathing self-murder, frenzy, spite, To rue my guilt in endless flame)--

 "I felt, as I in torment lay 'Mid the souls plagued by heavenly power, An angel touch my arm and say: _Go hence, and cool thyself an hour!_

 "'Ah, whence this mercy, Lord?' I said; _The Leper recollect_, said he, _Who ask'd the passers-by for aid, _ _In Joppa, and thy charity. _

 "Then I remember'd how I went, In Joppa, through the public street, One morn when the sirocco spent Its storm of dust with burning heat;

 "And in the street a leper sate, Shivering with fever, naked, old; Sand raked his sores from heel to pate, The hot wind fever'd him five-fold. 

 "He gazed upon me as I pass'd, And murmur'd: _Help me, or I die!_-- To the poor wretch my cloak I cast, Saw him look eased, and hurried by. 

 "Oh, Brandan, think what grace divine, What blessing must full goodness shower, When fragment of it small, like mine, Hath such inestimable power!

 "Well-fed, well-clothed, well-friended, I Did that chance act of good, that one! Then went my way to kill and lie-- Forgot my good as soon as done. 

 "That germ of kindness, in the womb Of mercy caught, did not expire; Outlives my guilt, outlives my doom, And friends me in this pit of fire. 

 "Once every year, when carols wake On earth the Christmas-night's repose, Arising from the sinner's lake, I journey to these healing snows. 

 "I stanch with ice my burning breast, With silence balm my whirling brain; O Brandan! to this hour of rest That Joppan leper's ease was pain. "

 Tears started to Saint Brandan's eyes; He bow'd his head, he breathed a prayer-- Then look'd, and lo, the frosty skies! The iceberg, and no Judas there!

The island of St. Brandan's was sometimes supposed to lie in the NorthernAtlantic, sometimes farther south. It often appears as the Fortunate Isleor Islands, "Insulae Fortunatae" or "Beatae. "

On some early maps (1306 to 1471) there is an inlet on the western coastof Ireland called "Lacus Fortunatus, " which is filled with FortunateIslands to the number of 358 (Humboldt, "Examen, " II. P. 159), and in onemap of 1471 both these and the supposed St. Brandan's group appear indifferent parts of the ocean under the same name. When the Canary Islandswere discovered, they were supposed to be identical with St. Brandan's, but the latter was afterwards supposed to lie southeast of them. After thediscovery of the Azores various expeditions were sent to search for St. Brandan's until about 1721. It was last reported as seen in 1759. A fullbibliography will be found in Winsor's "Narrative and Critical History, "I. P. 48, and also in Humboldt's "Examen, " II. P. 163, and early mapscontaining St. Brandan's will be found in Winsor (I. Pp. 54, 58). Thefirst of these is Pizigani's (1387), containing "Ysolae dictaeFortunatae, " and the other that of Ortelius (1587), containing "S. Brandain. "

XIII. HY-BRASAIL

"The people of Aran, with characteristic enthusiasm, fancy, that atcertain periods, they see Hy-Brasail, elevated far to the west in theirwatery horizon. This has been the universal tradition of the ancientIrish, who supposed that a great part of Ireland had been swallowed by thesea, and that the sunken part often rose and was seen hanging in thehorizon: such was the popular notion. The Hy-Brasail of the Irish isevidently a part of the Atlantis of Plato; who, in his 'Timaeus, ' saysthat that island was totally swallowed up by a prodigious earthquake. "(O'Flaherty's "Discourse on the History and Antiquities of the SouthernIslands of Aran, lying off the West Coast of Ireland, " 1824, p. 139. )

The name appeared first (1351) on the chart called the MediceanPortulana, applied to an island off the Azores. In Pizigani's map (1367)there appear three islands of this name, two off the Azores and one offIreland. From this time the name appears constantly in maps, and in 1480 aman named John Jay went out to discover the island on July 14, andreturned unsuccessful on September 18. He called it Barsyle or Brasylle;and Pedro d'Ayalo, the Spanish Ambassador, says that such voyages weremade for seven years "according to the fancies of the Genoese, meaningSebastian Cabot. " Humboldt thinks that the wood called Brazil-wood wassupposed to have come from it, as it was known before the South AmericanBrazil was discovered. 

A manuscript history of Ireland, written about 1636, in the Library ofthe Royal Irish Academy, says that Hy-Brasail was discovered by a CaptainRich, who saw its harbor but could never reach it. It is mentioned byJeremy Taylor ("Dissuasives from Popery, " 1667), and the present narrativeis founded partly on an imaginary one, printed in a pamphlet in London, 1675, and reprinted in Hardiman's "Irish Minstrelsy" (1831), II. P. 369. The French Geographer Royal, M. Tassin, thinks that the island may havebeen identical with Porcupine Bank, once above water. In Jeffrey's atlas(1776) it appears as "the imaginary island of O'Brasil. " "Brazil Rock"appears on a chart of Purdy, 1834 (Humboldt's "Examen Critique, " II. P. 163). Two rocks always associated with it, Mayda and Green Rock, appear onan atlas issued in 1866. See bibliography in Winsor's "Narrative andCritical History, " I. P. 49, where there are a number of maps depicting it(I. Pp. 54-57). The name of the island is derived by Celtic scholars from_breas_, large, and _i_, island; or, according to O'Brien's"Irish Dictionary, " its other form of O'Brasile means a large imaginaryisland (Hardiman's "Irish Minstrelsy, " I. P. 369). There are severalfamilies named Brazil in County Waterford, Ireland ("Transactions of theOssianic Society, Dublin, " 1854, I. P. 81). The following poem about theisland, by Gerald Griffin, will be found in Sparling's "Irish Minstrelsy"(1888), p. 427:--

HY-BRASAIL, THE ISLE OF THE BLEST

 On the ocean that hollows the rocks where ye dwell A shadowy land has appeared, as they tell; Men thought it a region of sunshine and rest, And they called it Hy-Brasail, the isle of the blest. From year unto year on the ocean's blue rim, The beautiful spectre showed lovely and dim; The golden clouds curtained the deep where it lay, And it looked like an Eden away, far away!

 A peasant who heard of the wonderful tale, In the breeze of the Orient loosened his sail; From Ara, the holy, he turned to the west, For though Ara was holy, Hy-Brasail was blest. He heard not the voices that called from the shore-- He heard not the rising wind's menacing roar; Home, kindred, and safety he left on that day, And he sped to Hy-Brasail, away, far away!

 Morn rose on the deep, and that shadowy isle, O'er the faint rim of distance, reflected its smile; Noon burned on the wave, and that shadowy shore Seemed lovelily distant, and faint as before; Lone evening came down on the wanderer's track, And to Ara again he looked timidly back; O far on the verge of the ocean it lay, Yet the isle of the blest was away, far away!

 Rash dreamer, return! O ye winds of the main, Bear him back to his own peaceful Ara again, Rash fool! for a vision of fanciful bliss, To barter thy calm life of labor and peace. The warning of reason was spoken in vain; He never revisited Ara again! Night fell on the deep, amidst tempest and spray, And he died on the waters, away, far away!

XIV. ISLAND OF SATAN'S HAND

The early part of this narrative is founded on Professor O'Curry'sLectures on the manuscript materials of Irish history; it being another ofthose "Imrama" or narratives of ocean expeditions to which the tale of St. Brandan belongs. The original narrative lands the three brothersultimately in Spain, and it is a curious fact that most of what we know ofthe island of Satanaxio or Satanajio--which remained so long on the maps--is taken from an Italian narrative of three other brothers, cited byFormaleoni, "Il Pellegrinaccio di tre giovanni, " by Christoforo Armeno(Gaffarel, "Les Iles Fantastiques, " p. 91). The coincidence is so peculiarthat it offered an irresistible temptation to link the two trios ofbrothers into one narrative and let the original voyagers do the work ofexploration. The explanation given by Gaffarel to the tale is the samethat I have suggested as possible. He says in "Iles Fantastiques del'Atlantaque" (p. 12), "S'il nous était permis d'aventurer une hypothèse, nous croirions voluntiers que les navigateurs de l'époque rencontrèrent, en s'aventurant dans l'Atlantique, quelques-uns de ces gigantesquesicebergs, ou montagnes de glace, arrachés aux banquises du pôle nord, etentraînés au sud par les courants, dont la rencontre, assez fréquente, est, même aujourd'hui, tellement redoutée par les capitaines. Cesicebergs, quand ils se heurtent contre un navire, le coulent à pic; etcomme ils arrivent à l'improviste, escortés par d'épais brouillards, ilsparaissent réellement sortir du sein des flots, comme sortait la main deSatan, pour précipiter au fond de l'abîme matelots et navires. " As to thename itself there has been much discussion. On the map of Bianco (1436)--reproduced in Winsor, I. P. 54--the name "Ya de Lamansatanaxio" distinctlyappears, and this was translated by both Formaleoni and Humboldt asmeaning "the Island of the Hand of Satan. " D'Avezac was the first tosuggest that the reference was to two separate islands, the one named "Dela Man" or "Danman, " and the other "Satanaxio. " He further suggests--followed by Gaffarel--that the name of the island may originally have beenSan Atanagio, thus making its baptism a tribute to St. Athanasius insteadof to Satan. This would certainly have been a curious transformation, andalmost as unexpected in its way as the original conversion of the sinfulbrothers from outlaws to missionaries. 

XV. ANTILLIA

The name Antillia appears first, but not very clearly, on the Piziganimap of 1367; then clearly on a map of 1424, preserved at Weimar, on thatof Bianco in 1436, and on the globe of Beheim in 1492, which adds in aninscription the story of the Seven Bishops. On some maps of the sixteenthand seventeenth centuries there appears near it a smaller island under thename of Sette Cidade, or Sete Ciudades, which is properly another name forthe same island. Toscanelli, in his famous letter to Columbus, recommendedAntillia as a good way-station for his voyage to India. The island is saidby tradition to have been re-discovered by a Portuguese sailor in 1447. Tradition says that this sailor went hastily to the court of Portugal toannounce the discovery, but was blamed for not having remained longer, andso fled. It was supposed to be "a large, rectangular island extending fromnorth to south, lying in the mid Atlantic about lat. 35 N. " An amplebibliography will be found in Winsor's "Narrative and Critical History, "I. P. 48, with maps containing Antillia, I. Pp. 54 (Pizigani's), 56, 58. 

After the discovery of America, Peter Martyr states (in 1493) thatHispaniola and the adjacent islands were "Antillae insulae, " meaning thatthey were identical with the group surrounding the fabled Antillia(Winsor's "Narrative and Critical History, " I. P. 49); and Schöner, in thededicatory letter of his globe of 1523, says that the king of Castile, through Columbus, has discovered _Antiglias Hispaniam Cubam quoque_. It was thus that the name Antilles came to be applied to the islandsdiscovered by Columbus; just as the name Brazil was transferred from animaginary island to the new continent, and the name Seven Cities wasapplied to the pueblos of New Mexico by those who discovered them. (See J. H. Simpson, "Coronado's March in Search of the Seven Cities of Cibola, "Smithsonian Institution, 1869, pp. 209-340. )

The sailor who re-discovered them said that the chief desire of thepeople was to know whether the Moors still held Spain (Gaffarel, "IlesFantastiques, " p. 3). In a copy of "Ptolemy" addressed to Pope Urban VI. About 1380, before the alleged visit of the Portuguese, it was stated ofthe people at Antillia that they lived in a Christian manner, and weremost prosperous, "Hie populus christianissime vivit, omnibus divitiisseculi hujus plenus" (D'Avezac, "Nouvelles Annales des voyages, " 1845, II. P. 55). 

It was afterwards held by some that the island of Antillia was identicalwith St. Michael in the Azores, where a certain cluster of stone hutsstill bears the name of Seven Cities, and the same name is associated witha small lake by which they stand. (Humboldt's "Examen Critique, " Paris, 1837, II. P. 203; Gaffarel, "Iles Fantastiques, " p. 3. )

XVI. HARALD THE VIKING

The tales of the Norse explorations of America are now accessible in manyforms, the most convenient of these being in the edition of E. L. Slafter, published by the Prince Society. As to the habits of the Vikings, the mostaccessible authorities are "The Age of the Vikings, " by Du Chaillu, and"The Sea Kings of Norway, " by Laing. The writings of the late Professor E. N. Horsford are well known, but his opinions are not yet generallyaccepted by students. His last work, "Leif's House in Vineland, " with hisdaughter's supplementary essay on "Graves of the Northmen, " is probablythe most interesting of the series (Boston, 1893). In Longfellow's "Sagaof King Olaf" (II. ), included in "Tales of a Wayside Inn, " there is adescription of the athletic sports practised by the Vikings, which aremoreover described with the greatest minuteness by Du Chaillu. 

XVII. NORUMBEGA

The narrative of Champlain's effort to find Norumbega in 1632 may befound in Otis's "Voyages of Champlain" (II. P. 38), and there is anotherversion in the _Magazine of American History_ (I. P. 321). The wholelegend of the city is well analyzed in the same magazine (I. P. 14) by Dr. De Costa under the title "The Lost City of New England. " In another volumehe recurs to the subject (IX. P. 168), and gives (IX. P. 200) a printedcopy of David Ingram's narrative, from the original in the BodleianLibrary. He also discusses the subject in Winsor's "Narrative and CriticalHistory" (IV. P. 77, etc. ), where he points out that "the insularcharacter of the Norumbega region is not purely imaginary, but is based onthe fact that the Penobscot region affords a continued watercourse to theSt. Lawrence, which was travelled by the Maine Indians. " Ramusio's map of1559 represents "Nurumbega" as a large island, well defined (Winsor, IV. P. 91); and so does that of Ruscelli (Winsor, IV. P. 92), the latterspelling it "Nurumberg. " Some geographers supposed it to extend as far asFlorida. The name was also given to a river (probably the Penobscot) andto a cape. The following is Longfellow's poem on the voyage of SirHumphrey Gilbert:--

SIR HUMPHREY GILBERT

 Southward with fleet of ice Sailed the corsair Death; Wild and fast blew the blast, And the east-wind was his breath. 

 His lordly ships of ice Glisten in the sun;

 On each side, like pennons wide, Flashing crystal streamlets run. 

 His sails of white sea-mist Dripped with silver rain; But where he passed there were cast Leaden shadows o'er the main. 

 Eastward from Campobello Sir Humphrey Gilbert sailed; Three days or more seaward he bore, Then, alas! the land-wind failed. 

 Alas! the land-wind failed, And ice-cold grew the night; And nevermore, on sea or shore, Should Sir Humphrey see the light. 

 He sat upon the deck, The Book was in his hand; "Do not fear! Heaven is as near, " He said, "by water as by land!"

 In the first watch of the night, Without a signal's sound, Out of the sea, mysteriously, The fleet of Death rose all around. 

 The moon and the evening star Were hanging in the shrouds; Every mast, as it passed, Seemed to rake the passing clouds. 

 They grappled with their prize, At midnight black and cold! As of a rock was the shock; Heavily the ground-swell rolled. 

 Southward through day and dark, They drift in close embrace, With mist and rain, o'er the open main; Yet there seems no change of place. 

 Southward, forever southward, They drift through dark and day; And like a dream, in the Gulf-Stream Sinking, vanish all away. 

XVIII. GUARDIANS OF THE ST. LAWRENCE

For authorities for this tale see "Voyages of Samuel de Champlain, "translated by Charles Pomeroy Otis, Ph. D. , with memoir by the Rev. E. F. Slafter, A. M. , Boston, 1880 (I. Pp. 116, 289, II. P. 52). The incident ofthe disguised Indians occurred, however, to the earlier explorer, JacquesCartier. (See my "Larger History of the United States, " p. 112. )

XIX. ISLAND OF DEMONS

The tale of the Isle of Demons is founded on a story told first byMarguerite of Navarre in her "Heptameron" (LXVII. Nouvelle), and thenwith much variation and amplification by the very untrustworthy travellerThevet in his "Cosmographie" (1571), Livre XXIII. C. Vi. The only copy ofthe latter work known to me is in the Carter-Brown Library at Providence, R. I. , and the passage has been transcribed for me through the kindness ofA. E. Winship, Esq. , librarian, who has also sent me a photograph of awoodcut representing the lonely woman shooting at a bear. A brieferabstract of the story is in Winsor's "Narrative and Critical History" (IV. P. 66, note), but it states, perhaps erroneously, that Thevet knewMarguerite only through the Princess of Navarre, whereas that authorclaims--though his claim is never worth much--that he had the story fromthe poor woman herself, "_La pauvre femme estant arriuvee en France ... Et venue en la ville de Nautron, pays de Perigort lors que i'y estois, mefeit le discours de toutes ses fortunes passées_. "

The Island of Demons appears on many old maps which may be found engravedin Winsor, IV. Pp. 91, 92, 93, 100, 373, etc. ; also as "Isla de demonios"in Sebastian Cabot's map (1544) reprinted in Dr. S. E. Dawson's valuable"Voyages of the Cabots, " in the Transactions of the Royal Society ofCanada for 1897. He also gives Ruysch's map (1508), in which a cluster ofislands appears in the same place, marked "Insulae daemonum. " Harrisse, in his "Notes sur la Nouvelle France" (p. 278), describes the threesufferers as having been abandoned by Roberval _à trente six lieues descôtes de Canada, dans une isle deserte qui fut depuis désignée sous le nomde l'Isle de la Demoiselle, pres de l'embouchure de la Rivière St. Paul oudes Saumons_. I have not, however, been able to identify this island. Parkman also says ("Pioneers of France, " p. 205) that Roberval's pilot, inhis _routier_, or logbook, speaks often of "Les Isles de laDemoiselle, " evidently referring to Marguerite. The brief account by thePrincess of Navarre follows:--

LXVII NOUVELLE

Une pauvre femme, pour sauver la vie de son mary, hasarda la sienne, etne l'abandonna jusqu'à la mort. 

C'est que faisant le diet Robertval un voiage sur la mer, duquel ilestoit chef par le commandement du Roy son maistre, en l'isle de Canadas;auquel lieu avoit délibéré, si l'air du païs euste esté commode, dedemourer et faire villes et chasteaulx; en quoy il fit tel commencement, que chacun peut sçavoir. Et, pour habituer le pays de Chrestiens, menaavecq luy de toutes sortes d'artisans, entre lesquelz y avoit un homme, qui fut si malheureux, qu'il trahit son maistre et le mist en dangierd'estre prins des gens du pays. Mais Dieu voulut que son entreprinse futsi tost congneue, qu'elle ne peut nuyre au cappitaine Robertval, lequelfeit prendre ce meschant traistre, le voulant pugnir comme il l'avoitmérité; ce qui eust esté faict, sans sa femme qui avoit suivy son mary parles périlz de la mer; et ne le voulut abandonner à la mort, mais avecqforce larmes feit tant, avecq le cappitaine et toute la compaignye, que, tant pour la pitié d'icelle que pour le service qu'elle leur avoit faict, luy accorda sa requeste qui fut telle, que le mary et la femme furentlaissez en une petite isle, sur la mer, où il n'habitoit que bestessaulvaiges; et leur fut permis de porter avecq eulx ce dont ilz avoientnécessité. Les pauvres gens, se trouvans tous seulz en la compaignye desbestes saulvaiges et cruelles, n'eurent recours que à Dieu seul, qui avoitesté toujours le ferme espoir de ceste pauvre femme. Et, comme celle quiavoit toute consolation en Dieu, porta pour sa saulve garde, nourriture etconsolation le Nouveau Testament, lequel elle lisoit incessamment. Et, audemourant, avecq son mary, mettoit peine d'accoustrer un petit logis lemieulx qui'l leur estoit possible; et, quand les lyons et aultres bestesen aprochoient pour les dévorer, le mary avecq sa harquebuze, et elle, avecq les pierres, se défendoient si bien, que, non suellement les bestesne les osoient approcher, mais bien souvent en tuèrent de très-bonnes àmanger; ainsy, avecq telles chairs et les herbes du païs, vesquirentquelque temps, quand le pain leur fut failly. A la longue, le mary ne peutporter telle nourriture; et, à cause des eaues qu'ilz buvoient, devint sienflé, que en peu de temps il mourut, n'aiant service ne consolation quesa femme, laquelle le servoit de médecin et de confesseur; en sorte qu'ilpassa joieusement de ce désert en la céleste patrie. Et la pauvre femme, demourée seulle, l'enterra le plus profond en terre qu'il fut possible; siest-ce que les bestes en eurent incontinent le sentyment, qui vindrentpour manger la charogne. Mais la pauvre femme, en sa petitemaisonnette, de coups de harquebuze défendoit que la chair de son maryn'eust tel sépulchre. Ainsy vivant, quant au corps, de vie bestiale, etquant à l'esperit, de vie angélicque, passoit son temps en lectures, contemplations, prières et oraisons ayant un esperit joieux et content, dedans un corps emmaigry et demy mort. Mais Celluy qui n'abandonne jamaisles siens, et qui, au désespoir des autres, monstre sa puissance, nepermist que la vertu qu'il avoit myse en ceste femme fust ignorée deshommes, mais voulut qu'elle fust congneue à sa gloire; et fiet que, aubout de quelque temps, un des navires de ceste armée passant devant cesteisle, les gens qui estoient dedans advisèrent, quelque fumée qui leur feitsouvenir de ceulx qui y avoient esté laissez, et délibérèrent d'allerveoir ce que Dieu en avoit faict. La pauvre femme, voiant approcher elnavire, se tira au bort de la mer, auquel lieu la trouvèrent à leurarrivée. Et, après en avoir rendu louange à Dieu, les mena en sa pauvremaisonnette, et leur monstra de quoy elle vivoit durant sa demeure; ce queleur eust esté incroiable, sans la congnoissance qu'ilz avoient que Dieuest puissant de nourrir en un désert ses serviteurs, comme au plus grandzfestins du monde. Et, ne pouvant demeurer en tel lieu, emmenèrent lapauvre femme avecq eulx droict à la Rochelle, où, après un navigage, ilzarrivèrent. Et quand ilz eurent faict entendre aux habitans la fidélité etpersévérance de ceste femme, elle fut receue à grand honneur de toutes lesDames, qui voluntiers luy baillèrent leurs filles pour aprendre à lire età escripre. Et, à cest honneste mestier-là, gaigna le surplus de sa vie, n'aiant autre désîr que d'exhorter un chaucun à l'amour et confiance deNostre Seigneur, se proposant pour exemple la grande miséricorde dont ilavoit usé envers elle. 

XX. BIMINI

Parkman says expressly that "Ponce de Léon found the Island of Bimini, "but it is generally mentioned as having been imaginary, and is not clearlyidentified among the three thousand islands and rocks of the Bahamas. Peter Martyr placed the Fountain of Youth in Florida, which he may haveeasily supposed to be an island. Some of the features of my descriptionare taken from the strange voyage of Cabeza da Vaca, which may be read inBuckingham Smith's translation of his narrative (Washington, D. C. , 1851), or in a more condensed form in Henry Kingsley's "Tales of Old Travel, " orin my own "Book of American Explorers" (N. Y. , Longmans, 1894).