With one bound the stag cleared the narrow pool, and with head erect,
his branching antlers resting upon his back, fled onward; swifter than
the wind that, in winter’s dreary reign, under the stars of cold
December, drives fierce and cutting through the gorge which, in the
farthest north, divides the granite hills sheer to their base, while the
song poured thickening upon his rear—sounds of victory and pursuit.
Thus, with nostrils wide distended and smoking flanks, he led his foes
through many a double and straight reach, now holding to the cover of
the wood, and with sure eye, passing beneath gnarled oaks, and through
hanging vines, and boughs interlocked blacker than night, and now,
seeking the open plain, where the sea rolled inward to find its limit.
There the voice of his pursuers no longer urged him on, or was lost in
that greater voice to which he had fled as to a refuge; and he rested,
trembling, upon the rim of the ocean, his fetlocks laved by its flaky
foam, and looking out upon it, sobbing, in search of a safety which the
water as the land denied. So, in the race of life, the unfortunate,
hunted by its ills, with hope crushed out, stand upon its utmost verge,
gazing, and find no joy beyond, till death strikes them through, to
perish and be forgotten.
Short time was given, for Erix and Zella, side by side, keeping ever,
like fate, to their fixed end, soon issued from the wood, and with voice
and gesture urged their prey to a new flight. The game, now driven to
his last shift, stilled his coward heart, turned and stood at bay; but
Zella, unwilling thus to close the morning’s sport, drew an arrow to its
head, and sent the weapon whirring, to glance and fall far out at sea.
Enraged with such acts, the stag sprang forward, striking on either
side; and as Erix, yielding, strove to take him by the horns, leaped as
far as Apollo’s horses leaped, in that great story told by the Greek
whose song civilized the world. Like a bolt, winged, he sped through the
whistling air, when Zella, quick turning, with a shaft more fleet, smote
him, mid-way, quite through his bursting heart. Upon a scented bank,
deep within the wood, mossy, curling over the stream which there,
trickling, smooth, and quiet, hastened to kiss the sea, the poor beast
fell, and groaned his life away; and the warm sun danced and flickered,
as if in very joy of the beauty it had made, through the tall trees, and
around the climbing vines, and across the green leaves, and upon the
silent water, mocking at death, and laughing at the spoil which changes
but to create again.