IT WAS HERE
THAT ON THE SAME DAY
SHE TRIUMPHED OVER CUPID
AND PUNISHED HER FAITHLESS LOVERS.
This inscription did not afford Philax all the information he desired;
he therefore would have continued his search through the forest if
night had not overtaken him. He seated himself at the foot of a
cypress, and scarcely had been there a moment, before he heard the same
voices which had attracted his attention the previous evening. He was
not so much surprised at this as at perceiving that it was the trees
themselves which uttered these complaints, just as if they had been
human beings. The Prince arose, drew his sword, and struck with it the
cypress which was nearest to him. He was about to repeat the blow, when
the tree exclaimed, "Hold! hold! Assault not an unhappy Prince who is
no longer in a state to defend himself!" Philax stayed his hand, and
becoming accustomed to this supernatural circumstance, inquired of the
cypress by what miracle it was thus a man and a tree at the same time.
"I am willing to inform you," replied the cypress; "and as, during two
thousand years, this is the first opportunity Fate has afforded me of
relating my misfortunes, I will not lose it. All the trees you behold
in this court-yard were princes, renowned in their time for the rank
they held in the world, and for their valour. The Fairy Ceora reigned
in this country. She was beautiful, but her science rendered her more
famous than her beauty. She therefore made use of other charms to
subject us to her sway. She had become enamoured of the young Oriza, a
prince, whose admirable qualities rendered him worthy of a better fate.
I should premise to you," added the cypress, "it is the oak which you
see beside me." Philax looked at the oak, and heard it breathe a heavy
sigh, drawn from it, no doubt, by the recollection of its misfortune.
"To attract this prince to her Court," continued the cypress, "the
Fairy caused a tournament to be proclaimed. We all hastened to seize
this opportunity of acquiring glory. Oriza was one of the princes who
disputed the prize. It consisted of fairy armour which would render
the wearer invulnerable. Unfortunately, I was the conqueror. Ceora,
irritated that Fate had not favoured her inclinations, resolved to
avenge herself upon us. She enchanted the looking-glasses, with
which a gallery of her castle was entirely lined. Those who saw her
reflected but once in these fatal mirrors, could not resist feeling
for her the most violent passion. It was in this gallery she received
us the day after the tournament. We all saw her in these mirrors,
and she appeared to us so beautiful, that those amongst us who had
hitherto been indifferent to love, ceased to be so from that instant;
and those who were in love with others became as suddenly faithless.
We no longer thought of leaving the Fairy's palace: our only anxiety
was to please her. In vain did state affairs demand our presence in
our own dominions; nothing seemed of consequence to us save the hope
of being beloved by Ceora. Oriza was the only one she favoured, and
the passion of the other princes but gave the Fairy opportunities of
sacrificing them to this lover who was so dear to her, and caused the
fame of her beauty to be spread throughout the world. Love appeared for
some time to have softened the cruel nature of Ceora; but at the end
of four or five years she displayed her former ferocity. She revenged
herself on the kings, her neighbours, for the smallest slight by the
most horrible murders, and abusing the power which her enchantments
gave her over us, she made us the ministers of her cruelties. Oriza
strove in vain to prevent her injustice. She loved him; but she would
not obey him. Having returned one day from fighting and subduing a
giant whom I had challenged by her orders, I caused the arms of the
vanquished to be brought into her presence. She was alone in the
Gallery of Looking-glasses. I laid the giant's spoils at her feet, and
pleaded my passion to her with inconceivable ardour, augmented, no
doubt, by the power of the enchantment by which I was surrounded. But
far from evincing the least gratitude for the success of my combat,
or for the love I felt for her, Ceora treated me with the utmost
contempt; and, retiring into a boudoir, left me alone in the gallery,
in an indescribable state of despair and rage. I remained there some
time, not knowing what resolution to take; for the enchantments of
the Fairy did not permit us to fight with Oriza. Careful of the life
of her lover, the cruel Ceora excited our jealousy, but took from
us the natural desire to revenge ourselves on a fortunate rival. At
length, after having paced the gallery for some time, I remembered that
it was in this place I had first fallen in love with the Fairy, and
exclaimed, 'It is here that I first felt that fatal passion which now
fills me with despair; and you, wretched mirrors, who have so often
represented the unjust Ceora to me, with a beauty which has enslaved my
heart and reason, I will punish you for the crime of offering her to
my view with too great attraction.' At these words, snatching up the
giant's club, which I had brought to present to the Fairy, I dashed the
mirrors to pieces. No sooner were they broken than I felt even greater
hatred for Ceora than I had formerly felt love for her. The princes,
my rivals, felt at the same moment their charms broken, and Oriza
himself was ashamed of the love which the Fairy had for him. Ceora in
vain attempted to retain her lover by her tears; he was insensible
to her grief, and in spite of her cries, we set out all together,
determined to fly from the terrible place, but in passing through the
court-yard, the sky appeared to be on fire; a frightful clap of thunder
was heard, and we found it was impossible for us to move. The Fairy
appeared in the air, riding on a great serpent, and addressing us in
a tone of voice which betrayed her rage,--'Inconstant princes,' said
she, 'I am about to punish you, by a torture which will never end, for
the crime you have committed in breaking my chains, which were too
great an honour for you to bear; and as for you, ungrateful Oriza, I
triumph after all in the love you have felt for me. Content with this
victory, I shall visit you with the same misfortune as your rivals; and
I command,' added she, 'in memory of this adventure, that when the use
of mirrors shall be known to all the world, the breaking of these fatal
glasses shall always be a certain sign of the infidelity of a lover.'
The Fairy disappeared in the air after having pronounced these words.
We were changed into trees; but the cruel Ceora, no doubt with the idea
of increasing our suffering, left us our reason. Time has destroyed the
superb castle, which was the victim of our misfortune; and you are the
only visitor we have seen during the two thousand years that we have
been in this frightful forest."
Philax was about to reply to this speech of the cypress tree, when he
was suddenly transported into a beautiful garden; he there found a
lovely nymph, who approached him with a gracious air, saying, "If you
wish it, Philax, I will allow you in three days to see the Princess
Imis."
The Prince, transported with joy at so unexpected a proposition, threw
himself at her feet to express his gratitude. At that same moment
Pagan was in the air, concealed in a cloud with the Princess Imis: he
had told her a thousand times that Philax was unfaithful, but she had
always refused, on the word of a jealous lover, to believe it. He now
conducted her to this spot, he said, to convince her of the fickleness
of the Prince she so unjustly preferred to him. The Princess saw Philax
throw himself, with an air of extreme delight, at the feet of the
nymph; and was in despair that she could no longer deceive herself on
a point which she feared to believe more than anything in the world.
Pagan had placed her at a distance from the earth, which prevented her
hearing what Philax and the nymph said; and it was by his orders that
the latter had presented herself to him.
Pagan led Imis back to his island, where after having convinced her of
the infidelity of Philax, he found he had only redoubled the grief of
that beautiful Princess without rendering her at all more favourable to
himself.
In despair at finding this pretended infidelity, from which he had
expected so much success, was useless to him, he resolved to be
revenged on the constancy of the lovers: he was not cruel, like the
Fairy Ceora, his ancestress, so he bethought him of a different
punishment to that with which she had visited her unfortunate lovers.
He did not wish to destroy either the Princess, whom he had so tenderly
loved, nor even Philax, whom he had already made suffer so much; so,
confining his revenge to the destruction of a passion which had so
opposed his own, he erected in his island a Crystal Palace, and took
care to put into it everything that would render life agreeable but the
means of leaving it; he shut up in it nymphs and dwarfs to wait on Imis
and her lover; and, when everything was prepared for their reception,
he transported them both there. They at first thought themselves on
the summit of happiness, and blessed Pagan a thousand times for the
mildness of his anger. As for Pagan, although at first he could not
bear to see them together, he expected that this spectacle would one
day be less painful to him. But in the meanwhile, he departed from the
Crystal Palace, after having, with a stroke of his wand, engraved on it
this inscription:--
Absence, danger, pleasure, pain,
Were all employ'd, and all in vain,
Imis' and Philax' hearts to sever.
Pagan, whose power they dared defy,
Condemned them, for their constancy,
To dwell together here for ever!
They say that at the end of some years, Pagan was as much avenged as
he desired to be; and that the beautiful Imis and Philax fulfilled
the prediction of the Fairy of the Mountain, by wishing as fervently
to recover the aigrette of lilies in order to destroy the agreeable
enchantment, as they had formerly desired to preserve it as a safeguard
against the evils which had been foretold would befal them.
Until that moment a fond pair, so blest,
Had cherished in their hearts Love's constant fire:
But Pagan taught them by that fatal test,
That e'en of bliss the human heart could tire.