The night was black, and a thin rain falling when at last I emerged

from the interminable maze of lanes into which the wood-road had led

me. And glad I was to descry what seemed by the many lights shining

from its windows to be a populous village. A gay village also, for

song came wafted on the night air, rustic and convivial.

Hereabouts I overtook a figure on foot, who, when I addressed him,

turned on me as sharply as if he supposed the elms above him were

thick with robbers, or that mine was a voice out of the unearthly

hailing him.

I asked him the name of the village we were approaching. With small

dark eyes searching my face in the black shadow of night, he answered

in a voice so strange and guttural that I failed to understand a word.

He shook his fingers in the air; pointed with the cudgel he carried

under his arm now to the gloom behind us, now to the homely galaxy

before us, and gabbled on so fast and so earnestly that I began to

suppose he was a little crazed.

One word, however, I caught at last from all this jargon, and that

often repeated with a little bow to me, and an uneasy smile on his

white face--"Mishrush, Mishrush!" But whether by this he meant to

convey to me his habitual mood, or his own name, I did not learn till

afterwards. I stopped in the heavy road and raised my hand.

"An inn," I cried in his ear, "I want lodging, supper--a tavern, an

inn!" as if addressing a child or a natural.

He began gesticulating again, evidently vain of having fully

understood me. Indeed, he twisted his little head upon his shoulders

to observe Rosinante gauntly labouring on. "'Ame!--'ame!" he cried

with a great effort.

I nodded.

"Ah!" he cried piteously.

He led me, after a few minutes' journey, into the cobbled yard of a

bright-painted inn, on whose signboard a rising sun glimmered faintly

gold, and these letters standing close above it--"The World's End."

Mr. "Mishrush" seemed not a little relieved at nearing company after

his lonely walk; triumphant, too, at having guided me hither so

cunningly. He lifted his nimble cudgel in the air and waved it

conceitedly to and fro in time to the song that rose beyond the

window. "Fau'ow er Wur'!--Fau'ow er Wur'!" he cried delightedly again

and again in my ear, eager apparently for my approval. So we stood,

then, beneath the starless sky, listening to the rich _choragium_ of

the "World's End." They sang in unison, sang with a kind of forlorn

heat and enthusiasm. And when the song was ended, and the roar of

applause over, Night, like a darkened water whelmed silently in,

engulfed it to the echo:

Follow the World--

She bursts the grape,

And dandles man

In her green lap;

She moulds her Creature

From the clay,

And crumbles him

To dust away:

Follow the World!

One Draught, one Feast,

One Wench, one Tomb;

And thou must straight

To ashes come:

Drink, eat, and sleep;

Why fret and pine?

Death can but snatch

What ne'er was thine:

Follow the World!

It died away, I say, and an ostler softly appeared out of the shadow.

Into his charge, then, I surrendered Rosinante, and followed my

inarticulate acquaintance into the noise and heat and lustre of the

Inn.

It was a numerous company there assembled. But their voices fell to a

man on the entry of a stranger. They scrutinised me, not uncivilly,

but closely, seeking my badge, as it were by which to recognise and

judge me ever after.

Mr. Mistrust, as I presently discovered my guide's name indeed to be,

was volubly explaining how I came into his company. They listened

intently to what, so far as I could gather, might be Houyhnhnmish or

Double-Dutch. And then, as if to show me to my place forthwith, a

great fleshy fellow that sat close beside the hearth this summer

evening continued in a loud voice the conversation I had interrupted.

Whereupon Mr. Mistrust with no little confidence commended me in dumb

show to the landlady of the Inn, a Mrs. Nature, if I understood him

aright. This person was still comely, though of uncertain age, wore

cherry ribbons, smiled rather vacantly from vague, wonderful,

indescribable eyes that seemed to change colour, like the chameleon,

according to that they dwelt on.

I am afraid, as much to my amusement as wonder, I discovered that this

landlady of so much apparent _bonhomie_ was a deaf-mute. If victuals,

or drink, or bed were required, one must chalk it down on a little

slate she carried at her girdle for the purpose. Indeed, the absence

of two of her three chief senses had marvellously sharpened the

remaining one. Her eyes were on all, vaguely dwelling, lightly gone,

inscrutable, strangely fascinating. She moved easily and soundlessly

(as fat women may), and I doubt if ever mug or pot of any of that

talkative throng remained long empty, except at the tippler's

reiterated request.

She laid before me an excellent supper on a little table somewhat

removed beside a curtained window. And while I ate I watched, and

listened, not at all displeased with my entertainment.

The room in which we sat was low-ceiled and cheerful, but rather

close after the rainy night-air. Gay pictures beautified the walls.

Here a bottle, a cheese, grapes, a hare, a goblet--in a clear brown

light that made the guest's mouth water to admire. Here a fine

gentleman toasting a simpering chambermaid. Above the chimney-piece a

bloated old man in vineleaves that might be Silenus. And over against

the door of the parlour what I took to be a picture of Potiphar's wife,

she looked out of the paint so bold and beauteous and craftily. Birds

and fishes in cases stared glassily,--owl and kestrel, jack and eel

and gudgeon. All was clean and comfortable as a hospitable inn can be.

But they who frequented it interested me much more--as various and

animated a gathering as any I have seen. Yet in some peculiar manner

they seemed one and all not to the last tittle quite of this world.

They were, so to speak, more earthy, too definite, too true to the

mould, like figures in a bleak, bright light viewed out of darkness.

Certainly not one of them was at first blush prepossessing. Yet who

finds much amiss with the fox at last, though all he seems to have be

cunning?

Near beside me, however, sat retired a man a little younger and more

at his ease than most of the many there, and as busy with his eyes and

ears as I. His name, I learned presently, was Reverie; and from him I

gathered not a little information regarding the persons who talked and

sipped around us.

He told me at whiles that his house was not in the village, but in a

valley some few miles distant across the meadows; that he sat out

these bouts of argument and slander for the sheer delight he had in

gathering the myriad strands of that strange rope Opinion; that he

lived (heart, soul, and hope) well-nigh alone; that he deeply

mistrusted this place, and the company we were in, yet not for its

mistress's sake, who was at least faithful to her instincts, candid to

the candid, made no favourites, and, eventually, compelled order. He

told me also that if friends he had, he deemed it wiser not to name

them, since the least sibilant of the sound of the voice incites to

treachery; and in conclusion, that of all men he was acquainted with,

one at least never failed to right his humour; and that one was yonder

flabby, pallid fellow with the velvet collar to his coat, and the

rings on his fingers, and the gold hair, named Pliable, who sat beside

Mr. Stubborn on the settle by the fire.

When, then, I had finished my supper, I drew in my chair a little

closer to Mr. Reverie's and, having scribbled my wants on the

Landlady's slate, turned my attention to the talk.

At the moment when I first began to listen attentively they seemed to

be in heated dispute concerning the personal property of a certain Mr.

Christian, who was either dead or had inexplicably disappeared. Mr.

Obstinate, I gathered, had taken as his right this Christian's

"easy-chair"; a gentleman named Smoothman most of his other goods for

a debt; while a Parson Decorum had appropriated as heretical his

books and various peculiar MSS.

But there now remained in question a trifling sum of money which a Mr.

Liar loudly demanded in payment of an "affair of honour." This,

however, he seemed little likely to obtain, seeing that an elderly

uncle by marriage of Christian's, whose name was Office, was as eager

and affable and frank about the sum as he was bent on keeping it; and

rattled the contents of his breeches' pocket in sheer bravado of his

means to go to law for it.

"He left a bare pittance, the merest pittance," he said. "What could

there be of any account? Christian despised money, professed to

despise it. That alone would prove my wretched nephew queer in the

head--despised _money_!

"Tush, friend!" cried Obstinate from his corner. "Whether the money is

yours, or neighbour Liar's--and it is as likely as not neither's--that

talk about despising money's what but a silly lie? 'Twas all sour

grapes--sour grapes. He had cunning enough for envy, and pride enough

for shame; and at last there was naught but cunning left wherewith to

patch up a clout for him and his shame to be gone in. I watched him

set out on his pestilent pilgrimage, crazed and stubborn, and not a

groat to call his own."

"Yet I have heard say he came of a moneyed stock," said Pliable. "The

Sects of Privy Opinion were rare wealthy people, and they, so 'tis

said, were his kinsmen. Truth is, for aught I know, Christian must

have been in some degree a very liberal rascal, with all his faults."

He tittered.

"Oh! he was liberal enough," said Mr. Malice suavely: "why, even on

setting out, he emptied his wife's purse into a blind beggar's

hat!--his that used to bleat, 'Cast thy bread--cast thy bread upon the

waters!' whensoever he spied Christian stepping along the street. They

say," he added, burying his clever face in his mug, "the Heavenly

Jerusalem lieth down by the weir."

"But we must not contemn a man for his poverty, neighbours," said

Liar, gravely composing his hairless face. "Christian's was a

character of beautiful simplicity--beautiful! _How_ many rickety

children did he leave behind him?"

A shrill voice called somewhat I could not quite distinguish, for at

that moment a youth rose abruptly near by, and went hastily out.

Obstinate stared roundly. "Thou hast a piercing voice, friend Liar!"

"I did but seek the truth," said Liar.

"But whether or no, Christian believed in it--verily he seemed to

believe in it. Was it not so, neighbour Obstinate?" enquired Pliable,

stroking his leg.

"Believed in what, my friend?" said Obstinate, in a dull voice.

"About Mount Zion, and the Crowns of Glory, and the Harps of Gold, and

such like," said Pliable uneasily--"at least, it is said so; so 'tis said."

"Believed!" retorted a smooth young man who seemed to feel the heat,

and sat by the staircase door. "That's an easy task--to believe, sir.

Ask any pretty minikin!"

"And I'd make bold to enquire of yonder Liveloose," said a thick,

monotonous voice (a Mr. Dull's, so Reverie informed me), "if mebbe he

be referring to one of his own, or that fellow Sloth's devilish fairy

tales? I know one yet he'll eat again some day."

At which remark all laughed consumedly, save Dull.

"Well, one thing Christian had, and none can deny it," said Pliable, a

little hotly, "and that was Imagination? _I_ shan't forget the tales

he was wont to tell: what say you, Superstition?"

Mr. Superstition lifted dark, rather vacant eyes on Pliable. "Yes,

yes," he said: "Flame, and sigh, and lamentation. My God, my God,

gentlemen!"

"Oo-ay, Oo-ay," yelped the voice of Mistrust, startled out of silence.

"Oo-ay," whistled Malice, under his breath.

"Tush, tush!" broke in Obstinate again, and snapped his fingers in the

air. "And what is this precious Imagination? Whither doth it conduct a

man, but to beggary, infamy, and the mad-house? Look ye to it, friend

Pliable! 'Tis a devouring flame; give it but wind and leisure, the

fairest house is ashes."

"Ashes; ashes!" mocked one called Cruelty, who had more than once

taken my attention with his peculiar contortions--"talking of ashes,

what of Love-the-log Faithful, Master Tongue-stump? What of

Love-the-log Faithful?"

At which Liveloose was so extremely amused, the tears stood in his

eyes for laughing.

I looked round for Mistrust, and easily recognised my friend by his

hare-like face, and the rage in his little active eyes. But

unfortunately, as I turned to enquire somewhat of Reverie, Liveloose

suddenly paused in his merriment with open mouth; and the whole

company heard my question, "But who was Love-the-log Faithful?"

I was at once again the centre of attention, and Mr. Obstinate rose

very laboriously from his settle and held out a great hand to me.

"I'm pleased to meet thee," he said, with a heavy bow. "There's a dear

heart with my good neighbour Superstition yonder who will present a

very fair account of that misguided young man. Madam Wanton, here's a

young gentleman that never heard tell of our old friend Love-the-log."

A shrill peal of laughter greeted this sally.

"Why, Faithful was a young gentleman, sir," explained the woman

civilly enough, "who preferred his supper hot."

"Oh, Madam Wanton, my dear, my dear!" cried a long-nosed woman nearly

helpless with amusement.

I saw Superstition gazing darkly at me. He shook his head as I was

about to reply, so I changed my retort. "Who, then, was Mr.

Christian?" I enquired simply.

At that the house shook with the roar of laughter that went up.

X

... _Large draughts of intellectual day._

--RICHARD CRASHAW.

"Believe me, neighbours," said Malice softly, when this uproar was a

little abated, "there is nought so strange in the question. It meaneth

only that this young gentleman hath not enjoyed the pleasure of your

company before. Will it amaze you to learn, my friends, that Christian

is like to be immortal only because you _talk_ him out of the grave?

One brief epitaph, gentlemen, would let him rot."

"Nay, but I'll tell the gentleman who Christian was, and with

pleasure," cried a lucid, rather sallow little man that had sat

quietly smiling and listening. "My name, let me tell you, is Atheist,

sir; and Christian was formerly a very near neighbour of an old friend

of my family's--Mr. Sceptic. They lived, sir--at least in those

days--opposite to one another."

"He is a great talker," whispered Reverie in my ear. But the company

evidently found his talk to their taste. They sat as still and

attentive around him, as though before an extemporary preacher.

"Well, sir," continued Atheist, "being, in a sense, neighbours,

Christian in his youth would often confide in my friend; though,

assuredly, Sceptic never sought his confidences. And it seemeth he

began to be perturbed and troubled over the discovery that it is

impossible--at least in this plain world--to eat your cake, yet have

it. And by some ill chance he happened at this time on a mouldy old

folio in my friend's house that had been the property of his maternal

grandmother--the subtlest old tome you ever set eyes on, though

somewhat too dark and extravagant and heady for a sober man of the

world like me. 'Twas called the Bible, sir--a collection of legends

and fables of all times, tongues, and countries threaded together,

mighty ingeniously I grant, and in as plausible a style as any I

know, if a little lax and flowery in parts.

"Well, Christian borroweth the book of my friend--never to return it.

And being feeble and credulous, partly by reason of his simple wits,

and partly by reason of the sad condition a froward youth had reduced

him to, he accepts the whole book--from Apple to Vials--for truth. In

fact, 'he ate the little book,' as one of the legendary kings it

celebrates had done before him."

"Ay," broke in Cruelty wildly, "and has ever since gotten the gripes."

Atheist inclined his head. "Putting it coarsely, gentlemen, such was

the case," he said. "And away at his wit's end he hasteneth, waning

and shivering, to a great bog or quagmire--that my friend Pliable will

answer to--and plungeth in. 'Tis the same story repeated. He could be

temperate in nought. _I_ knew the bog well; but I knew the

stepping-stones better. Believe me, I have traversed the narrow way

this same Christian took, seeking the harps and pearls and the _elixir

vitæ_, these many years past. The book inciteth ye to it. It sets a

man's heart on fire--that's weak enough to read it--with its pomp, and

rhetoric, and far-away promises, and lofty counsels. Oh, fine words,

who is not their puppet! I climbed 'Difficulty.' I snapped my fingers

at the grinning Lions. I passed cautiously through the 'Valley of the

Shadow'--wild scenery, sir! I visited that prince of bubbles also,

Giant Despair, in his draughty castle. And--though boasting be far

from me!--fetched Liveloose's half-brother out of a certain

charnel-house near by.

"_Thus far_, sir, I went. But I have not yet found the world so barren

of literature as to write a book about it. I have not yet found the

world so barren of ingratitude as to seek happiness by stabbing in the

back every friend I ever had. I have not yet forsaken wife and

children; neighbours and kinsmen; home, ease, and tenderness, for a

whim, a dream, a passing qualm. No, sir; 'tis this Christian's

ignorant hardness-of-heart that is his bane. Knowing little, he

prateth much. He would pinch and contract the Universe to his own

fantastical pattern. He is tedious, he is pragmatical, and--I affirm

it in all sympathy and sorrow--he is crazed. Malice, haply, is a

little sharp at times. And neighbour Obstinate dealeth full weight

with his opinions. But this Christian Flown-to-Glory, as the urchins

say, pinks with a bludgeon. He cannot endure an honest doubt. He

distorteth a mere difference of opinion into a roaring Tophet. And

because he is helpless, solitary, despised in the world; because he is

impotent to refute, and too stubborn to hear and suffer people a

little higher and weightier, a leetle wiser than he--why, beyond the

grave he must set his hope in vengeance. Beyond the grave--bliss for

his own shade; fire and brimstone, eternal woe for theirs. Ay, and

'tis not but for a season will he vex us, but for ever, and for ever,

and for ever--if he knoweth in the least what he meaneth by the

phrase. And this he calls 'Charity.'

"Yes, sirs, beyond the grave he would condemn us, beyond the grave--a

place of peace whereto I deem there are not many here but will be

content at length to come; and I not least content, when my duty is

done, my children provided for, and my last suspicion of fear and

folly suppressed.

"To conclude, sir--and beshrew me, gentlemen, how time doth fly in

talk!--this Christian goeth his way. We, each in accord with his

caprice and conscience, go ours. We envy him not his vapours, his

terrors, or his shameless greed of reward. Why, then, doth he envy us

our wealth, our success, our gaiety, our content? He raves. He is

haunted. What is man but as grass, and the flower of grass? Come the

sickle, he is clean gone. I can but repeat it, sir, our poor neighbour

was crazed: 'tis Christian in a word."

A sigh, a murmur of satisfaction and relief, rose from the company, as

if one and all had escaped by Mr. Atheist's lucidity out of a very

real peril.

I thanked him for his courtesy, and in some confusion turned to

Reverie with the remark that I thought I now recollected to have heard

Christian's name, but understood he had indeed arrived, at last, at

the Celestial City for which he had set out.

"Celestial twaddle, sir!" cried Mr. Obstinate hoarsely. "He went

stark, staring mad, and now is dust, as we shall soon all be, that's

certain."

Then Cruelty rose out of his chair and elbowed his way to the door. He

opened it and looked out.

"I would," he said, "I had known of this Christian before he started.

Step you down to Vanity Fair, Sir Stranger, if the mood take you; and

we'll show you as pretty a persuasion against pilgrimage as ever you

saw." He opened his mouth where he stood between me and the stars.

"... There's many more!" he added with difficulty, as if his rage was

too much for him. He spat into the air and went out.

Presently after Liveloose rose up, smiling softly, and groped after

him.

A little silence followed their departure.

"You must tell your friend, Mr. Reverie," said Atheist

good-humouredly, "that Mr. Cruelty says more than he means. To my mind

he is mistaken--too energetic; but his intentions are good."

"He's a staunch, dependable fellow," said Obstinate, patting down the

wide cuffs he wore.

But even at that moment a stranger softly entered the inn out of the

night. His face was of the grey of ashes, and he looked once round on

us all with a still, appalling glance that silenced the words on my

lips.

We sat without speech--Obstinate yawning, Atheist smiling lightly,

Superstition nibbling his nails, Reverie with chin drawn a little

back, Pliable bolt upright, like a green and white wand, Mistrust

blinking his little thin lids; but all with eyes fixed on this

stranger, who deemed himself, it seemed, among friends.

He turned his back on us and sipped his drink under the heedless,

deep, untroubled gaze of Mrs. Nature, and passed out softly and

harmlessly as he had come in.

Reverie stood up like a man surprised and ill at ease. He turned to

me. "I know him only by repute, by hearsay," he said with an effort.

"He is a stranger to us all, indeed, sir--to all."

Obstinate, with a very flushed face, thrust his hand into his

breeches' pocket. "Nay, sir," he said, "my purse is yet here. What

more would you have?"

At which Pliable laughed, turning to the women.

I put on my hat and followed Reverie to the door.

"Excuse me, sir," I said, "but I have no desire to stay in this house

over-night. And if you would kindly direct me to the nearest way out

of the village, I will have my horse saddled now and be off."

And then I noticed that Superstition stood in the light of the doorway

looking down on us.

"There's Christian's way," he said, as if involuntarily....

"Lodge with me to-night," Reverie answered, "and in the morning you

shall choose which way to go you will."

I thanked him heartily and turned in to find Rosinante.

The night was now fine, but moist and sultry, and misty in the

distance. It was late, too, for few candles gleamed beneath the

moonlight from the windows round about the smooth village-green. Even

as we set out, I leading Rosinante by her bridle, and Superstition on

my left hand, out of heavenly Leo a bright star wheeled, fading as it

fell. And soon high hedges hid utterly the "World's End" behind us,

out of sight and sound.

I observed when the trees had laid their burdened branches overhead,

and the thick-flowered bushes begun to straiten our way, that this Mr.

Superstition who had desired to accompany us was of a very different

courage from that his manner at the inn seemed to profess.

He walked with almost as much caution and ungainliness as Mistrust,

his deep and shining eyes busily searching the gloom to left and right

of him. Indeed, those same dark eyes of his reminded me not a little

of Mrs. Nature's, they were so full of what they could not tell.

He was on foot; my new friend Reverie, like myself, led his horse, a

pale, lovely creature with delicate nostrils and deep-smouldering

eyes.

"You must think me very bold to force my company on you," said

Superstition awkwardly, turning to Reverie, "but my house is never so

mute with horror as in these moody summer nights when thunder is in

the air. See there!" he cried.

As if the distant sky had opened, the large, bright, harmless

lightning quivered and was gone, revealing on the opposing hills

forest above forest unutterably dark and still.

"Surely," I said, "that is not the way Christian took?"

"They say," Reverie answered, "the Valley of the Shadow of Death lies

between those hills."

"But Atheist," I said, "_that_ acid little man, did he indeed walk

there alone?"

"I have heard," muttered Superstition, putting out his hand, "'tis

fear only that maketh afraid. Atheist has no fear."

"But what of Cruelty," I said, "and Liveloose?"

"Why," answered Superstition, "Cruelty works cunningest when he is

afraid; and Liveloose never talks about himself. None the less there's

not a tree but casts a shadow. I met once an earnest yet very popular

young gentleman of the name of Science, who explained almost

everything on earth to me so clearly, and patiently, and fatherly, I

thought I should evermore sleep in peace. But we met at noon. Believe

me, sir, I would have followed Christian and his friend Hopeful very

willingly long since; for as for Cruelty and Obstinate and all that

clumsy rabble, I heed them not. Indeed my cousin Mistrust _did_ go,

and as you see returned with a caution; and a poor young school-fellow

of mine, Jack Ignorance, came to an awful end. But it is because I owe

partly to Christian and not all to myself this horrible solitude in

which I walk that I dare not risk a deeper. It would be, I feel sure.

And so I very willingly beheld Faithful burned; it restored my

confidence. And here, sir," he added, almost with gaiety, "lives my

friend Mrs. Simple, a widow. She enjoys my company and my old fables,

and we keep the blinds down against these mountains, and candles

burning against the brighter lightnings."

So saying, Superstition bade us good-night and passed down a little

by-lane on our left towards a country cottage, like a dreaming bower

of roses beneath the moon.

But Reverie and I continued on as if the moon herself as patiently

pursued us. And by-and-by we came to a house called Gloom, whose

gardens slope down with plashing fountains and glimmering banks of

flowers into the shadow and stillness of a broad valley, named beneath

the hills of Silence, Peace.

XI

_His soul shall taste the sadness of her might,

And be among her cloudy trophies hung._

--JOHN KEATS.

Even as we entered the gates of Mr. Reverie's house beneath embowering

chestnuts, there advanced across the moonlit spaces to meet us a

figure on foot like ourselves, leading his horse. He was in armour,

yet unarmed. His steel glittered cold and blue; his fingers hung

ungauntleted; and on his pale face dwelt a look never happy warrior

wore yet. He seemed a man Mars lends to Venus out of war to unhappy

idleness. The disillusionment of age was in his face: yet he was

youthful, I suppose; scarce older than Mercutio, and once, perhaps, as

light of wit.

He took my hand in a grasp cold and listless, and smiled from

mirthless eyes.

Yet there was something strangely taking in this solitary

knight-at-arms. She for whom he does not fight, I thought, must have

somewhat of the immortals to grace her warrior with. And if it were

only shadows that beset him and obscured his finer heart, shadows they

were of myrtle and rhododendron, with voices shrill and small as the

sparrows', and eyes of the next-to-morning stars.

Indeed, these gardens whispered, and the wind at play in the air

seemed to bear far-away music, dying and falling.

We entered the house and sat down to supper in a low room open to the

night. Reverie recounted our evening's talk. "I wish," he said,

turning to his friend, "you would accompany Mr. Brocken and me one

night to the 'World's End' to hear these fellows talk. Such arrogance,

such assurance, such bigotry and blindness and foxiness!--yet, on my

word, a kind of gravity with it all, as if the scarecrows had some

real interest in the devil's tares they guard. Come now, let it be a

bargain between us, and leave this endless search awhile."

But the solitary knight shook his head. "They would jeer me out of

knowledge," he said. "Why, Reverie, the children cease their play

when I pass, and draw their tops and marbles out of the dust, and gaze

till I am hid from sight."

"It is fancy, only fancy," replied Reverie; "children stare at all

things new to them in the world. How else could they recognise and

learn again--how else forget? But as for this rabble's mockery, there

is a she-bear left called Oblivion which is their mistress, and will

some day silence every jeer."

The solitary knight shook his head again, eyeing me solemnly as if in

hope to discern in my face the sorcery that held himself in thrall.

The few wax tapers gave but light enough to find the way from goblet

to mouth. As for Reverie's wine, I ask no other, for it had the

poppy's scarlet, and overcame weariness so subtly I almost forgot

these were the hours of sleep we spent in waking; forgot, too, as if

of the lotus, all thought of effort and hope.

After all, thought I as I sipped, effort is the flaw that proves men

mortal; while as for hope, who would seek a seed that floats on every

wind and smothers the world with weeds that bear no fruit? It was, in

fact, fare very different from the ale and cheese of the "World's End."

"But you yourself," I said to Mr. Reverie presently; "in all the talk

at the inn you kept a very scrupulous silence--discreet enough, I own.

But now, what truly _was_ this Christian of whom we heard so much? and

why, may I ask, do his neighbours slander the dead? You yourselves,

did you ever meet with him?" I turned from one to the other of my

companions as they glanced uneasily each at each.

"Well, sir," said Reverie rather deliberately, "I have met him and

talked with him. I often think of him, in spite of myself. Yet he was

a man of little charm. He certainly had a remarkable gift for

estranging his friends. He was a foe to the most innocent compromise.

For myself, I found not much humour in him, no eye for grace or art,

and a limited imagination that was yet his absolute master.

Nevertheless, as you hint, these fellows, no more than I, can forget

him. Nor you?" He turned to the other.

"Christian," he replied, "I remember him. We were friends a little

while. Faithful I knew also. Faithful was to the last my friend. Ah!

Reverie, then--how many years ago!--there was a child we loved, all

three: do you remember? I see the low, green wall, cool from how many

a summer's shadows, the clusters of green apples on the bough. And in

the early morning we would go, carrying torn-off branches, and

shouting our songs through the fields, till we came to the shadow and

the hush of the woods. Ay, Reverie, and we would burst in on silence,

each his heart beating, and play there. And perhaps it was Hopeful who

would steal away from us, and the others play on; or perhaps you into

the sunlight that maddened the sheltered bird to flit and sing in the

orchard where the little child we loved played--not yet sad, but how

much beloved; not yet weary of passing shadows, and simple creatures,

and boy's rough gifts and cold hands. But I--with me it was ever

evening, when the blackbird bursts harshly away. Then it was so still

in the orchard, and in the curved bough so solitary, that the

nightingale, cowering, would almost for fear begin to sing, and stoop

to the bending of the bough, her sidelong eyes in shade; while the

stars began to stand in the stations above us, ever bright, and all

the night was peace. Then would I dream on--dream of the face I loved,

Innocence, O Innocence!"

It was a strange outburst. His voice rose almost to a chant, full of a

forlorn music. But even as he ceased, we heard in the following

silence, above the plashing of the restless fountains, beyond, far and

faint, a wild and stranger music welling. And I saw from the porch

that looks out from the house called Gloom, "La belle Dame sans Merci"

pass riding with her train, who rides in beauty beneath the huntress,

heedless of disguise. Across from far away, like leaves of autumn,

skirred the dappled deer. The music grew, timbrel and pipe and tabor,

as beneath the glances of the moon the little company sped, transient

as a rainbow, elusive as a dream. I saw her maidens bound and

sandalled, with all their everlasting flowers; and advancing

soundless, unreal, the silver wheels of that unearthly chariot amid

the Fauns. On, on they gamboled, hoof in yielding turf, blowing reed

melodies, mocking water, their lips laid sidelong, their eyes aleer

along the smoothness of their flutes.

And when I turned again to my companions, with I know not what old

folly in my eyes, I know not what unanswerable cry in my heart,

Reverie alone was at my side. I seemed to see the long fringes of the

lake, the sedge withered, the grey waters restless in the bonds of the

wind, tuneless and chill; all these happy gardens swept bare and

flowerless; and the far hills silent in the unattainable dawn.

"She pipes, he follows," said Reverie; "she sets the tune, he dances.

Yet, sir, on my soul, I believe it is the childish face of that same

Innocence we kept tryst with long ago he pursues on and on, through

what sad labyrinths we, who dream not so wildly, cannot by taking

thought come to guess."

* * * * *

The next two days passed serenely and quietly at Reverie's. We read

together, rode, walked, and talked together, and listened in the

evening to music. For a sister of Reverie's lived not far distant, who

visited him while I was there, and took supper with us, delighting us

with her wit and spirit and her youthful voice.

But though Reverie more than once suggested it, I could not bring

myself to return to the "World's End" and its garrulous company.

Whether it was the moist, grey face of Mr. Cruelty I most abhorred, or

Stubborn's slug-like eye, or the tongue-stump of my afflicted guide, I

cannot say.

Moreover, I had begun to feel a very keen curiosity to see the way

that had lured Christian on with such graceless obstinacy. They had

spoken of remorse, poverty, pride, world-failure, even insanity, even

vice: but these appeared to me only such things as might fret a man to

set violently out on, not to persist in such a course; or likelier

yet, to abandon hope, to turn back from heights that trouble or

confusion set so far, and made seem dreams.

How could I help, too, being amused to think how vastly strange these

fellows considered a man's venturing whither his star beckoned; though

that star were only power, only fame, only beauty, only peace? What

wonder they were many?

Not far from this place, Reverie informed me, were pitched the booths

of Vanity Fair. This, by his account, was a place one ought to visit,

if only for the satisfaction of leaving it behind. But I have heard

more animated accounts of it elsewhere.

As for Reverie himself, he seemed only desirous to contemplate; never

to taste, to win, or to handle. He needed but refuse reality to what

shocked or teased him, to find it harmless and entertaining. He was a

dreamer whom the heat and shout of battle could not offend.

Perhaps he perceived my restlessness to be gone, for he himself

suggested that I should stay till the next morning, and then, if I so

pleased, he would see me a mile or two on my way.

"For the Pitiless Lady," he said, smiling, "takes many disguises,

sometimes of the sun, sometimes of evening, sometimes of night; and I

would at least save you from the fate that has made my poor friend a

phantom before he is a shade."

XII

_The many men, so beautiful!

And they all dead did lie._

--S.T. Coleridge.

So Reverie, as he had promised, rode out with me a few miles to see me

on my way. Above the gloom and stillness of the valley the scene began

to change again. I was glad as I could be to view once more the

tossing cornfields and the wind at play with shadow. Near and far,

woods and pastures smoked beneath the sun. I know not through how many

arches of the elms and green folds of the meadows I kept watch on the

chimneys of a farmhouse above its trees.

But Reverie, the further we journeyed, the less he said. I almost

chafed to see his heedless eyes turned upon some inward dream, while

here, like life itself, stood cloud and oak, warbled bird and brook

beneath the burning sun. I saw again in memory the silver twilight of

the moon, and the crazy face of Love's Warrior, haunter of shade. Let

him but venture into the open, I thought, hear again the distant

lowing of the oxen, the rooks cawing in the elms, see again the flocks

upon the hillside!

I suppose this was her home my heart had turned to. This was my dust;

night's was his. For me the wild rose and the fields of harvest; for

him closed petals, the chantry of the night wind, phantom lutes and

voices. And, as if he had overheard my thoughts, Reverie turned at the

cross-ways.

"You will come back again," he said. "They tell me in distant lands

men worship Time, set up a shrine to him in every street, and treasure

his emblem next their hearts. There, they say, even the lover babbles

of hours, and the dreamer measures sleep with a pendulum. Well, my

house is secluded, and the world is far; and to me Time is naught.

Return, sir, then, when it pleases you. Besides," he added, smiling

faintly, "there is always company at the World's End."

The crisp sunbeams rained upon his pale and delicate horse, its

equal-plaited mane, on the darkness of his cloak, that dream-delighted

face. Here smouldered gold, here flushed crimson, and here the curved

damaskening of his bridle glistened and gleamed. He was a strange

visitant to the open day, between the green hedges, beneath the

enormous branching of the elms. And there I bade him farewell.

Some day, perhaps, I shall return as he has foretold, for it is ever

easy to find again the house of Reverie--to them who have learned the

way.

On I journeyed, then, following as I had been directed the main road

to Vanity Fair. But whether it is that the Fair is more difficult to

arrive at than to depart from, or is really a hard day's journey even

from the gay parlour of the World's End, it already began to be

evening, and yet no sign of bunting or booth or clamour or smoke.

And it was at length to a noiseless Fair, far from all vanity, that I

came at sunset--the cypresses of a solitary graveyard. I was tired out

and desired only rest; so dismounting and leading Rosinante, I turned

aside willingly into its peace.

It seemed I had entered a new earth. The lane above had wandered on in

the gloaming of its hedges and over-arching trees. Here, all the

clouds of sunset stood, caught up in burning gold. Even as I paused,

dazzled a moment by the sudden radiance, from height to height the

wild bright rose of evening ran. Not a tottering stone, black,

well-nigh shapeless with age, not a green bush, but seemed to dwell

unconsumed in its own fire above this desolate ground. The trees that

grew around me--willow and yew, thorn and poplar--were but flaming

cages for the wild birds that perched in their branches.

Above these sound-dulled mansions trod lightly, as if of thought,

Rosinante's gilded shoes. I wandered on in a strange elation of mind,

filled with a desperate desire ever to remember how flamed this rose

between earth and sky, how throbbed this jargon of delight. And

turning as if in hope to share my enthusiasm, a childish peal of

laughter showed me I was not alone.

Beneath a canopy of holly branches and yew two children sat playing.

The nearer child's hair was golden, glistening round his face of

roses, and he it was who had laughed, tumbling on the sward. But the

face of the further child was white almost as crystal, and the dark

hair that encircled his head with its curved lines seemed as it were

the shadow of the gold it showed beside. These children, it was plain,

had been running and playing across the tombs; but now they were

stooping together at some earnest sport. To me, even if they had seen

me, they as yet paid no heed.

I passed slowly towards them, deeming them at first of solitude's

creation, my eyes dazzled so with the sun. But as I approached, so the

branches beneath which they played gradually disparted, and I saw not

far distant from them one sitting who evidently had these jocund boys

in charge.

I could not but hesitate awhile as I surveyed them. These were no

mortal children playing naked amid the rose of evening: nor she who

sat veiled and beautiful beneath the ruinous tombs. I turned with

sudden dismay to depart from their presence unobserved as I had

entered; but the children had now espied me, and came running, filled

with wonder of Rosinante and the stranger beside her.

They stayed at a little distance from us with dwelling eyes and parted

lips. Then the fairer and, as it seemed to me, elder of the brothers

stooped and plucked a few blades of grass and proffered them, half

fearfully, to the beast that amazed him. But the other gave less heed

to Rosinante, fixed the filmy lustre of his eyes on me, his wonderful

young face veiled with that wisdom which is in all children, and of an

immutable gravity.

But by this time, she who it seemed had the charge of these children

had followed them with her eyes. To her then, leaving Rosinante in an

ecstasy of timidity before such god-like boys, I addressed myself.

So might a traveller lost beneath strange stars address unanswering

Night. She, however, raised a compassionate face to me and listened

with happy seriousness as to a child returned in safety at evening

from some foolhardy venture. Yet there seemed only a deeper

youthfulness in her face for all its eternity of brooding on her

beauteous children. Narrow leaves of olive formed her chaplet. The

darker wine-colours of the sea changed in her eyes. There was no sense

of gloom or sorrowfulness in her company. I began to see how the same

still breast might bear celestial children so diverse as these, whose

names, she told me presently, were Sleep and Death.

I looked at the two children at play, "Ah! now," I said, almost

involuntarily "the golden boy who has caught my horse's bridle in his

hand, is not he Sleep? and he who considers his brother's

boldness--that one is Death?"

She smiled with lovely vanity, and told me how strange of heart young

children are. How they will alter and vary, never the same for long

together, but led by indiscoverable caprices and obedient to some

further will. She smiled and said how that sometimes, when the birds

hush suddenly from song, Sleep would creep tenderly and sadly to her

knees, and Death clasp her roguishly, as if in some secret with the

beams of morning. So would they change, one to the likeness of the

other. But Sleep was, perhaps, of the gentler disposition; a little

obstinate and headstrong; at times, indeed, beyond all cajolery; yet

very sweet of impulse and ardent to make amends. But Death's caprices

baffled even her. He seemed now so pitiless and unlovely of heart; and

now, as if possessed, passionate and swift; and now would break away

burning from her arms in an infinite tenderness.

But best she loved them when there came a transient peace to both; and

looking upon them laid embraced in the shadow-casting moonbeam, not

even she could undoubtingly touch the brow of each beneath their

likened hair, and say this is the elder, and this the dreamless

younger of the boys.

Seeing, too, my eyes cast upon the undecipherable letters of the tomb

by which we sat, she told me how that once, near before dawn, she had

awoke in the twilight to find their places empty where the children

had lain at her side, and had sought on, at last to find them even

here, weeping and quarrelling, and red with anger. Little by little,

and with many tears, she had gleaned the cause of their quarrel--how

that, like very children, they had run a race at cockcrow, and all

these stones and the slender bones and ashes beneath to be the prize;

and how that, running, both had come together to the goal set, and

both had claimed the victory.

"Yet both seem happy now to share it," I said, "or how else were they

comforted?" Nor did I consider before she told me that they will run

again when they be grown men, Sleep and Death, in just such a thick

darkness before dawn; and one called Love will then run with them, who

is very vehement and fleet of foot, and never turns aside, nor

falters. He who then shall win may ask a different prize. For truth to

tell, she said, only children can find delight for long in dust and

ruin.

At that moment Death himself came hastening to his mother, and, taking

her hand, turned to the enormous picture of the skies as if in some

faint apprehension. But Sleep saw nothing amiss, lay at full length

among the "cool-rooted flowers," while Rosinante grazed beside him.

I told her also, in turn, of my journey; and that although transient,

or everlasting, solace of all restlessness and sorrow and too-wild

happiness may be found in them, yet men think not often on these

divine children.

"As for this one," I said, looking down into the pathless beauty of

Death's grey eyes, "some fear, some mock, some despise him; some

violently, some without complaint pursue; most men would altogether

dismiss, and forget him. He is but a child, no older than the sea, no

stranger than the mountains, pure and cold as the water-springs. Yet

to the bolster of fever his vision flits; and pain drags a heavy net

to snare him; and silence is his echoing gallery; and the gold of

Sleep his final veil. They shall play on; and see, lady, flame has

left the clouds; the birds are at rest. The earth breathes in, and it

is day; and exhales her breath, and it is night. Let them then play

secret and innocent between her breasts, comfort her with silence

above the tempest of her heart.... But I!--what am I?--a traveller,

footsore and far."

And then it was that I became conscious of a warm, sly, youthful hand

in mine, and turned, half in dread, to see only happy Sleep laughing

under his glistening hair into my eyes. I strove in vain against his

sorcery; rolled foolish orbs on that pure, starry face; and then I

smelled as it were rain, and heard as it were tempestuous

forest-trees--fell asleep among the tombs.

XIII

_I warmed both hands before the fire of life._

--WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR.

Surely some hueless poppy blossomed in the darkness of those ruins, or

the soulless ashes of the dead breathe out a drowsy influence. Never

have I slept so heavily, yet never perhaps beneath so cold a tester.

Sunbeams streaming between the crests of the cypresses awoke me. I

leapt up as if a hundred sentinels had shouted--where none kept

visible watch.

An odour of a languid sweetness pervaded the air. There was no wind to

stir the dew-besprinkled trees. The old, scarred gravestones stood in

a thick sunshine, afloat with bees. But Rosinante had preferred to

survey sunshine out of shade. In lush grass I found her, the picture

of age, foot crook'd, and head dejected.

Yet she followed me uncomplaining along these narrow avenues of

silence, and without more ado turned her trivial tail on Death and his

dim flocks, and well-nigh scampered me off into the vivid morning.

Soon afterwards, with Hunger in the saddle, we began to climb a road

almost precipitous, and stony in the extreme. Often enough we breathed

ourselves as best we could in the still, sultry air, and rested on the

sun-dappled slopes. But at length we came out upon the crest, and

surveyed in the first splendour of day a region of extraordinary

grandeur.

Beneath a clear sky to the east stood a range of mountains, cold and

changeless beneath their snows. At my feet a great river flowed,

broken here and there with isles in the bright flood. The dark

champaign that flanked its shores was of an unusual verdure. Mystery

and peril brooded on those distant ravines, the vapours of their

far-descending cataracts. In such abysmal fastnesses as these the

Hyrcan tiger might hide his surly generations. This was an air for the

sun-disdaining eagle, a country of transcendent brightness, its

flowers strangely pure and perfect, its waters more limpid, its

grazing herds, its birds, its cedar trees, the masters of their kind.

Yet not on these nearer glories my eyes found rest. But, with a kind

of heartache, I gazed, as it were towards home, upon the distant

waters of the sea. Here, on the crest of this green hill, was silence.

There, too, was profounder silence on the sea's untrampled floor.

Whence comes that angel out of nought whispering into the ear strange

syllables? I know not; but so seemed I to stand--a shattered

instrument in the world, past all true music, o'er which none the less

the invisible lute-master stooped. Could I but catch, could I but in

words express the music his bent fingers intended, the mystery, the

peace--well; then I should indeed journey solitary on the face of the

earth, a changeling in its cities.

I half feared to descend into a country so diverse from any I had yet

seen. Hitherto at least I had encountered little else than

friendliness. But here--doves in eyries! I stood, twisting my fingers

in Rosinante's mane, debating and debating. And she turned her face to

me, and looked with age into my eyes: and I know not how woke courage

in me again.

"On then?" I said, on the height. And the gentle beast leaned forward

and coughed into the valley what might indeed be "Yea!"

So we began to descend. Down we went, alone, yet not unhappy, until in

a while I discovered, about a hundred yards in advance of me, another

traveller on the road, ambling easily along at an equal pace with

mine. I know not how far I followed in his track debating whether to

overtake and to accost him, or to follow on till a more favourable

chance offered.

But Chance--avenger of all shilly-shally--settled the matter offhand.

For my traveller, after casting one comprehensive glance towards the

skies, suddenly whisked off at a canter that quickly carried him out

of sight.

A chill wind had begun to blow, lifting in gusts dust into the air and

whitening the tree-tops. As suddenly, calm succeeded. A cloud of

flies droned fretfully about my ears. And I watched advancing,

league-high, transfigured with sunbeams, the enormous gloom of storm.

The sun smote from a silvery haze upon its peaks and gorges. Wind, far

above the earth, moaned, and fell; only to sound once more in the

distance in a mournful trumpeting. Lightnings played along the

desolate hills. The sun was darkened. A vast flight of snowy,

arrow-winged birds streamed voiceless beneath his place. And day

withdrew its boundaries, spread to the nearer forests a bright

amphitheatre, fitful with light, whereof it seemed to me Rosinante

with her poor burden was the centre and the butt. I confess I began to

dread lest even my mere surmise of danger should engage the piercing

lightnings; as if in the mystery of life storm and a timorous thought

might yet be of a kin.

We hastened on at the most pathetic of gallops. Nor seemed indeed the

beauteous lightning to regard at all that restless mote upon the

cirque of its entranced fairness. In an instantaneous silence I heard

a tiny beat of hoofs; in instantaneous gloom recognised almost with

astonishment my own shape bowed upon the saddle. It was a majestic

entry into a kingdom so far-famed.

The storm showed no abatement when at last I found shelter. From far

away I had espied in the immeasurable glare a country barn beneath

trees. Arrived there, I almost fell off my horse into as incongruous

and lighthearted a company as ever was seen.

In the midst of the floor of the barn, upon a heap of hay, sat a fool

in motley blowing with all his wind into a pipe. It was a cunning tune

he played too, rich and heady. And so seemed the company to find it,

dancers--some thirty or more--capering round him with all the abandon

heart can feel and heel can answer to. As for pose, he whose horse now

stood smoking beside my own first drew my attention--a smooth,

small-bearded, solemn man, a little beyond his prime. He lifted his

toes with such inimitable agility, postured his fingers so daintily,

conducted his melon-belly with so much elegance, and exhaled such a

warm joy in the sport that I could look at nothing else at first for

delight in him.

But there were slim maids too among the plumper and ruddier, like

crocuses, like lilac, like whey, with all their fragrance and

freshness and lightness. Such eyes adazzle dancing with mine, such

nimble and discreet ankles, such gimp English middles, and such a gay

delight in the mere grace of the lilting and tripping beneath rafters

ringing loud with thunder, that Pan himself might skip across a

hundred furrows for sheer envy to witness.

As for the jolly rustics that were jogging their wits away with such

delightful gravity, but little time was given me to admire them ere I

also was snatched into the ring, and found brown eyes dwelling with

mine, and a hand like lettuces in the dog-days. Round and about we

skipped in the golden straw, amidst treasuries of hay, puffing and

spinning. And the quiet lightnings quivered between the beams, and

the monstrous "Ah!" of the thunder submerged the pipe's sweetness.

Till at last all began to gasp and blow indeed, and the nodding Fool

to sip, and sip, as if _in extremis_ over his mouthpiece. Then we

rested awhile, with a medley of shrill laughter and guffaws, while the

rain streamed lightning-lit upon the trees and tore the clouds to

tatters.

With some little circumstance my traveller picked his way to me, and

with a grave civility bowed me a sort of general welcome. Whereupon

ensued such wit and banter as made me thankful when the opening

impudence of a kind of jig set the heels and the petticoats of the

company tossing once more. We danced the lightning out, and piped the

thunder from the skies. And by then I was so faint with fasting, and

so deep in love with at least five young country faces, that I

scarcely knew head from heels; still less, when a long draught of a

kind of thin, sweet ale had mounted to its sphere.

Away we all trooped over the flashing fields, noisy as jays in the

fresh, sweet air, some to their mowing, some to their milking, but

more, indeed, I truly suspect, to that exquisite _Nirvana_ from which

the tempest's travail had aroused them. I waved my hand, striving in

vain to keep my eyes on one blest, beguiling face of all that glanced

behind them. But, she gone, I turned into the rainy lane once more

with my new acquaintance, discreeter, but not less giddy, it seemed,

than I.

We had not far to go--past a meadow or two, a low green wall, a black

fish-pool--and soon the tumbledown gables of a house came into view.

My companion waved his open fingers at the crooked casements and

peered into my face.

"Ah!" he said, "we will talk, we will talk, you and I: I view it in

your eye, sir--clear and full and profound--such ever goes with

eloquence. 'Tis my delight. What are we else than beasts?--beasts that

perish? I never tire; I never weary;--give me to dance and to sing,

but ever to talk: then am I at ease. Heaven is just. Enter,

sir--enter!"

He led me by a shady alley into his orchard, and thence to a stable,

where we left Rosinante at hob-a-nob with his mare over a friendly

bottle of hay. And we ourselves passed into the house, and ascended a

staircase into an upper chamber. This chamber was raftered, its walls

hung with an obscure tapestry, its floor strewn with sand, and its

lozenged casement partly shuttered against the blaze of sunshine that

flowed across the forests far away to the west.

My friend eyed me brightly and busily as a starling. "You danced fine,

sir," he said. "Oh! it is a _pleasure_ to me. Ay, and now I come to

consider it, methought I did hear hoofs behind me that might yet be

echo. No, but I did _not_ think: 'twas but my ear cried to his

dreaming master. Ever dreaming; God help at last the awakening! But

well met, well met, I say again. I am cheered. And you but just in

time! Nay, I would not have missed him for a ransom. So--so--this leg,

that leg; up now--hands over down we go! Lackaday, I am old bones for

such freaks. Once!... '_Memento mori_!' say I, and smell the shower

the sweeter for it. Be seated, sir, bench or stool, wheresoever you'd

be. You're looking peaked. That burden rings in my skull like a

bagpipe. Toot-a-tootie, toot-a-toot! Och, sad days!"

We devoured our meal of cold meats and pickled fish, fruit and junket

and a kind of harsh cheese, as if in contest for a wager. And copious

was the thin spicy wine with which we swam it home. Ever and again my

host would desist, to whistle, or croon (with a packed mouth) in the

dismallest of tenors, a stave or two of the tune we had danced to,

bobbing head and foot in sternest time. Then a great vacancy would

overspread his face turned to the window, as suddenly to gather to a

cheerful smile, and light, irradiated, once more on me. Then down

would drop his chin over his plate, and away go finger and spoon among

his victuals in a dance as brisk and whole-hearted as the other.

He took me out again into his garden after supper, and we walked

beneath the trees.

"'Tis bliss to be a bachelor, sir," he said, gazing on the resinous

trunk of an old damson tree. "I gorge, I guzzle; I am merry, am

melancholy; studious, harmonical, drowsy,--and none to scold

or deny me. For the rest, why, youth is vain: yet youth had

pleasure--innocence and delight. I chew the cud of many a peaceful

acre. Ay, I have nibbled roses in my time. But now, what now? I have

lived so long far from courts and courtesy, grace and fashion, and am

so much my own close and indifferent friend--Why! he is happy who has

solitude for housemate, company for guest. I say it, I say it; I marry

daily wives of memory's fashioning, and dream at peace."

It seemed an old bone he picked with Destiny.

"There's much to be said," I replied as profoundly as I could.

The air he now lulled youth asleep with was a very cheerless

threnody, but he brightened once more at praise of his delightful

orchard.

"You like it, sir? You speak kindly, sir. It is my all; root and

branch: how many a summer's moons have I seen shine hereon! I know

it--there is bliss to come;--miraculous Paradise for men even dull as

I. Yet 'twill be strange to me--without my house and orchard. Age

tends to earth, sir, till even an odour may awake the dead--a branch

in the air call with its fluttering a face beyond Time to vanquish

dear. 'Soul, soul,' I cry, 'forget thy dust, forget thy vaunting

ashes!'--and speak in vain. So's life!"

And when we had gone in again, and candles had been lit in his fresh

and narrow chamber, seeing a viol upon a chest, I begged a little

music.

He quite eagerly, with a boyish peal of laughter, complied; and sat

down with a very solemn face, his brows uplifted, and sang between the

candles to a pathetic air this doggerel:--

There's a dark tree and a sad tree,

Where sweet Alice waits, unheeded,

For her lover long-time absent,

Plucking rushes by the river.

Let the bird sing, let the buck sport,

Let the sun sink to his setting;

Not one star that stands in darkness

Shines upon her absent lover.

But his stone lies 'neath the dark tree,

Cold to bosom, deaf to weeping;

And 'tis gathering moss she touches,

Where the locks lay of her lover.

"A dolesome thing," he said; "but my mother was wont to sing it to the

virginals. 'Cold to bosom,'" he reiterated with a plangent cadence; "I

remember them all, sir; from the cradle I had a gift for music." And

then, with an ample flirt of his bow, he broke, all beams and smiles,

into this ingenuous ditty:

The goodman said,

"'Tis time for bed,

Come, mistress, get us quick to pray;

Call in the maids

From out the glades

Where they with lovers stray,

With love, and love do stray."

"Nay, master mine,

The night is fine,

And time's enough all dark to pray;

'Tis April buds

Bedeck the woods

Where simple maids away

With love, and love do stray.

"Now we are old,

And nigh the mould,

'Tis meet on feeble knees to pray;

When once we'd roam,

'Twas else cried, 'Come,

And sigh the dusk away,

With love, and love to stray.'"

So they gat in

To pray till nine;

Then called, "Come maids, true maids, away!

Kiss and begone,

Ha' done, ha' done,

Until another day

With love, and love to stray!"

Oh, it were best

If so to rest

Went man and maid in peace away!

The throes a heart

May make to smart

Unless love have his way,

In April woods to stray!--

In April woods to stray!

And that finished with another burst of laughter, he set very adroitly

to the mimicry of beasts and birds upon his frets. Never have I seen

a face so consummately the action's. His every fibre answered to the

call; his eyebrows twitched like an orator's; his very nose was

plastic.

"Hst!" he cried softly; "hither struts chanticleer!"

"Cock-a-diddle-doo!" crowed the wire. "Now, prithee, Dame Partlett!"

and down bustled a hen from an egg like cinnamon. A cat with kittens

mewed along the string, anxious and tender.

"A woodpecker," he cried, directing momentarily a sedulous, clear eye

on me. And lo, "inviolable quietness" and the smooth beech-boughs!

"And thus," he said, sitting closer, "the martlets were wont to

whimper about the walls of the castle of Inverness, the castle of

Macbeth."

"Macbeth!" I repeated--"Macbeth!"

"Ay," he said, "it was his seat while yet a simple soldier--flocks and

flocks of them, wheeling hither, thither, in the evening air, crying

and calling."

I listened in a kind of confusion. "... And Duncan," I said....

He eyed me with immense pleasure, and nodded with brilliant eyes on

mine.

"What looking man was he?" I said at last as carelessly as I dared.

"... The King, you mean,--of Scotland."

He magnanimously ignored my confusion, and paused to build his

sentence.

"'Duncan'?" he said. "The question calls him straight to mind. A

lean-locked, womanish countenance; sickly, yet never sick; timid, yet

most obdurate; more sly than politic. An _ignis fatuus_, sir, in a

world of soldiers." His eye wandered.... "'Twas a marvellous sanative

air, crisp and pure; but for him, one draught and outer darkness. I

myself viewed his royal entry from the gallery--pacing urbane to

slaughter; and I uttered a sigh to see him. 'Why, sir, do you sigh to

see the king?' cried one softly that stood by. 'I sigh, my lord,' I

answered to the instant, 'at sight of a monarch even Duncan's match!'"

He looked his wildest astonishment at me.

"Not, I'd have you remember--not that 'twas blood I did foresee.... To

kill in blood a man, and he a king, so near to natural death ...

foul, foul!"

"And Macbeth?" I said presently--"Macbeth...?"

He laid down his viol with prolonged care.

"His was a soul, sir, nobler than his fate. I followed him not without

love from boyhood--a youth almost too fine of spirit; shrinking

from all violence, over-nicely; eloquent, yet chary of speech,

and of a dark profundity of thought. The questions he would

patter!--unanswerable, searching earth and heaven through.... And who

now was it told me the traitor Judas's hair was red?--yet not red his,

but of a reddish chestnut, fine and bushy. Children have played their

harmless hands at hide-and-seek therein. O sea of many winds!

"For come gloom on the hills, floods, discolouring mist; breathe but

some grandam's tale of darkness and blood and doubleness in his

hearing: all changed. Flame kindled; a fevered unrest drove him out;

and Ambition, that spotted hound of hell, strained at the leash

towards the Pit.

"So runs the world--the ardent and the lofty. We are beyond earth's

story as 'tis told, sir. All's shallower than the heart of man....

Indeed, 'twas one more shattered altar to Hymen."

"'Hymen!'" I said.

He brooded long and silently, clipping his small beard. And while he

was so brooding, a mouse, a moth, dust--I know not what, stirred the

listening strings of his viol to sound, and woke him with a start.

"I vowed, sir, then, to dismiss all memory of such unhappy deeds from

mind--never to speak again that broken lady's name. Oh! I have seen

sad ends--pride abased, splendour dismantled, courage to terror come,

guilt to a crying guilelessness."

"'Guilelessness?'" I said. "Lady Macbeth at least was past all

changing."

The doctor stood up and cast a deep scrutiny on me, which yet,

perhaps, was partly on himself.

"Perceive, sir," he said, "this table--broader, longer, splendidly

burdened; and all adown both sides the board, thanes and their

ladies, lords, and gentlemen, guests bidden to a royal banquet. 'Twas

then in that bleak and dismal country--the Palace of Forres. Torches

flared in the hall; to every man a servant or two: we sat in pomp."

He paused again, and gravely withdrew behind the tapestry.

"And presently," he cried therefrom, suiting his action to the word,

"to the blast of hautboys enters the king in state thus, with his

attendant lords. And with all that rich and familiar courtesy of which

he was master in his easier moods he passed from one to another,

greeting with supple dignity on his way, till he came at last softly

to the place prepared for him at table. And suddenly--shall I ever

forget, it, sir?--it seemed silence ran like a flame from mouth to

mouth as there he stood, thus, marble-still, his eyes fixed in a

leaden glare. And he raised his face and looked once round on us all

with a forlorn astonishment and wrath, like one with a death-wound--I

never saw the like of such a face.

"Whereat, beseeching us to be calm, and pay no heed, the queen laid

her hand on his and called him. And his orbs rolled down once more

upon the empty place, and stuck as if at grapple with some horror seen

within. He muttered aloud in peevish altercation--once more to heave

up his frame, to sigh and shake himself, and lo!--"

The viol-strings rang to his "lo!"

"Lo, sir, the Unseen had conquered. His lip sagged into his beard, he

babbled with open mouth, and leaned on his lady with such an impotent

and slavish regard as I hope never to see again man pay to woman....

We thought no more of supper after that....

"But what do I--?" The doctor laid a cautioning finger on his mouth.

"The company was dispersed, the palace gloomy with night (and they

were black nights at Forres!), and on the walls I heard the sentinel's

replying.... In the wood's last glow I entered and stood in his

self-same station before the empty stool. And even as I stood thus, my

hair creeping, my will concentred, gazing with every cord at stretch,

fell a light, light footfall behind me." He glanced whitely over his

shoulder.

"Sir, it was the queen come softly out of slumber on my own unquiet

errand."

The doctor strode to the door, and peered out like a man suspicious or

guilty of treachery. It was indeed a house of broken silences. And

there, in the doorway, he seemed to be addressing his own saddened

conscience.

"With all my skill, and all a leal man's gentleness, I solaced and

persuaded, and made an oath, and conducted her back to her own chamber

unperceived. How weak is sleep!... It was a habit, sir, contracted in

childhood, long dormant, that Evil had woke again. The Past awaits us

all. So run Time's sands, till mercy's globe is empty and ..."

He stooped and whispered it across to me: "... A child, a comparative

child, shrunk to an anatomy, her beauty changed, ghostly of youth and

all its sadness, baffled by a word, slave to a doctor's nod! None

knew but I, and, at the last, one of her ladies--a gentle, faithful,

and fearful creature. Nor she till far beyond all mischief....

"Wild deeds are done. But to have blood on the hands, a cry in the

ears, and one same glassy face eye to eye, that nothing can dim, nor

even slumber pacify--dreams, dreams, intangible, enorm! Forefend them,

God, from me!"

He stood a moment as if he were listening; then turned, smiling

irresolutely, and eyed me aimlessly. He seemed afraid of his own

house, askance at his own furniture. Yet, though I scarce know why, I

felt he had not told me the whole truth. Something fidelity had yet

withheld from vanity. I longed to enquire further. I put aside how

many burning questions awhile!

XIV

_And if we gang to sea, master,

I fear we'll come to harm._

--OLD BALLAD.

By and by less anxious talk soothed him. Indeed it was he who

suggested one last bright draught of air beneath his trees before

retiring. Down we went again with some unnecessary clatter. And here

were stars between the fruited boughs, silvery Capella and the Twins,

and low on the sky's moonlit border Venus excellently bright.

He asked me whither I proposed going, if I needs must go; besought

there and then in the ambrosial night-air the history of my

wanderings--a mere nine days' wonder; and told me how he himself much

feared and hated the sea.

He questioned me also with not a little subtilty (and double-dealing

too, I fancied,) regarding my own country, and of things present, and

things real. In fact nothing, I think, so much flattered his

vanity--unless it was my wonder at Dame Partlett's clucking on his

viol-strings--as to learn himself was famous even so far as to ages

yet unborn. He gazed on the simple moon with limpid, amiable eyes, and

caught my fingers in his.

How, then, could I even so much as hint to enquire which century

indeed was his, who had no need of any? How could I abash that kindly

vanity of his by adding also that, however famous, he must needs be to

all eternity--nameless?

We conversed long and earnestly in the coolness. He very frankly

counselled me not to venture unconducted further into this country.

The land of Tragedy was broad. And though on this side it lay adjacent

to the naïve and civil people of Comedy; on the further, in the shadow

of those bleak, unfooted mountains, lurked unnatural horror and

desolation, and cruelty beyond all telling.

He very kindly offered me too, if I was indeed bent on seeking the

sea, an old boat, still seaworthy, that lay in a creek in the river

near by, from which he was wont to fish. As for Rosinante, he supposed

a rest would be by no means unwelcome to so faithful a friend. He

himself rode little, being indolent, and a happier host than guest;

and when I returned here, she should be stuffed with dainties awaiting

me.

To this I cordially and gratefully agreed; and also even more

cordially to remain with him the next day; and the next night after

that to take my watery departure.

So it was. And a courteous, versatile, and vivacious companion I found

him. Rare tales he told me, too, of better days than these, and rarest

of his own never-more-returning youth. He loved his childhood, talked

on of it with an artless zeal, his eyes a nest of singing-birds. How

contrite he was for spirit lost, and daring withheld, and hope

discomfited! How simple and urbane concerning his present lowly

demands on life, on love, and on futurity! All this, too, with such

packed winks and mirth and mourning, that I truly said good-night for

the second time to him with a rather melancholy warmth, since

to-morrow ... who can face unmoved that viewless sphinx? Moreover, the

sea is wide, has fishes in plenty, but never too many coraled grottoes

once poor mariners.

XV

_'Tis now full tide 'tween night and day._

--JOHN WEBSTER.

On the stroke of two next morning the doctor conducted me down to the

creek in the river-bank where he kept his boat. There was little light

but of the stars in the sky; nothing stirring. She floated dim and

monstrous on the softly-running water, a navy in germ, and could have

sat without danger thirty men like me. We stood on the bank, side by

side, eyeing her vacancy. And (I can answer for myself) night-thoughts

rose up in us at sight of her. Was it indeed only wind in the reeds

that sighed around us? only the restless water insistently whispering

and calling? only of darkness were these forbidding shadows?

I looked up sharply at the doctor from such pensive embroidery, and

found him as far away as I. He nodded and smiled, and we shook hands

on the bank in the thick mist.

"There's biscuits and a little meat, wine, and fruit," he said in an

undertone. "God be with you, sir! I sadly mistrust the future. ...

'Tis ever my way, at parting."

We said good-bye again, to the dream-cry of some little fluttering

creature of the rushes. And well before dawn I was floating midstream,

my friend a memory, Rosinante in clover, and my travels, so far as

this brief narrative will tell, nearly ended.

I saw nothing but a few long-haired, grazing cattle on my voyage, that

eyed me but cursorily. I passed unmolested among the waterfowl,

between the never-silent rushes, beneath a sky refreshed and sweetened

with storm. The boat was enormously heavy and made slow progress. When

too the tide began to flow I must needs push close in to the bank and

await the ebb. But towards evening of the third day I began to

approach the sea.

I listened to the wailing of its long-winged gulls; snuffed with how

broad-nostrilled a gusto that savour not even pinewoods can match,

nor any wild flower disguise; and heard at last the sound that stirs

beneath all music--the deep's loud-falling billow.

I pushed ashore, climbed the sandy bank, and moored my boat to an ash

tree at the waterside. And after scrambling some little distance over

dunes yet warm with the sun, I came out at length, and stood like a

Greek before the sea.

Here my bright river disembogued in noise and foam. Far to either side

of me stretched the faint gold horns of a bay; and beyond me, almost

violet in the shadow of its waves, the shipless sea.

I looked on the breaking water with a divided heart. Its light, salt

airs, its solitary beauty, its illimitable reaches seemed tidings of a

region I could remember only as one who, remembering that he has

dreamed, remembers nothing more. Larks rose, singing, behind me. In a

calm, golden light my eager river quarrelled with its peace. Here

indeed was solitude!

It was in searching sea and cliff for the least sign of life that I

thought I descried on the furthest extremity of the nearer of the

horns of the bay the spires and smouldering domes of a little city. If

I gazed intently, they seemed to vanish away, yet still to shine above

the azure if, raising my eyes, I looked again.

So, caring not how far I must go so long as my path lay beside these

breaking waters, I set out on the firm, white sands to prove this city

the mirage I deemed it.

What wonder, then, my senses fell asleep in that vast lullaby! And out

of a daydream almost as deep as that in which I first set out, I was

suddenly aroused by a light tapping sound, distinct and regular

between the roaring breakers.

I lifted my eyes to find the city I was seeking evanished away indeed.

But nearer at hand a child was playing upon the beach, whose spade

among the pebbles had caused the birdlike noise I had heard.

So engrossed was she with her building in the sand that she had not

heard me approaching. She laboured on at the margin of the cliff's

shadow where the sea-birds cried, answering Echo in the rocks. So

solitary and yet so intent, so sedate and yet so eager a little figure

she seemed in the long motionlessness of the shore, by the dark

heedlessness of the sea, I hesitated to disturb her.

Who of all Time's children could this be playing uncompanioned by the

sea? And at a little distance betwixt me and her in the softly-mounded

sand her spade had already scrawled in large, ungainly capitals, the

answer--"Annabel Lee." The little flounced black frock, the tresses of

black hair, the small, beautiful dark face--this then was Annabel Lee;

and that bright, phantom city I had seen--that was the vanishing

mockery of her kingdom.

I called her from where I stood--"Annabel Lee!" She lifted her head

and shook back her hair, and gazed at me startled and intent. I went

nearer.

"You are a very lonely little girl," I said.

"I am building in the sand," she answered.

"A castle?"

She shook her head.

"It was in dreams," she said, flushing darkly.

"What kind of dream was it in then?"

"Oh! I often dream it; and I build it in the sand. But there's never

time: the sea comes back."

"Was the tide quite high when you began?" I asked; for now it was low.

"Just that much from the stones," she said; "I waited for it ever so

long."

"It has a long way to come yet," I said; "you will finish it _this_

time, I dare say."

She shook her head and lifted her spade.

"Oh no; it is much bigger, more than twice. And I haven't the seaweed,

or the shells, and it comes back very, very quickly."

"But where is the little boy you play with down here by the sea?"

She glanced at me swiftly and surely; and shook her head again.

"He would help you."

"He didn't in my dream," she said doubtfully. She raised long,

stealthy eyes to mine, and spoke softly and deliberately. "Besides,

there isn't any little boy."

"None, Annabel Lee?" I said.

"Why," she answered, "I have played here years and years and years,

and there are only the gulls and terns and cormorants, and that!" She

pointed with her spade towards the broken water.

"You know all their names then?" I said.

"Some I know," she answered with a little frown, and looked far out to

sea. Then, turning her eyes, she gazed long at me, searchingly,

forlornly on a stranger. "I am going home now," she said.

I looked at the house of sand and smiled. But she shook her head once

more.

"It never _could_ be finished," she said firmly, "though I tried and

tried, unless the sea would keep quite still just once all day,

without going to and fro. And then," she added with a flash of

anger--"then I would not build."

"Well," said I, "when it is nearly finished, and the water washes up,

and up, and washes it away, here is a flower that came from

Fairyland. And that, dear heart, is none so far away."

She took the purple flower I had plucked in Ennui's garden in her

slim, cold hand.

"It's amaranth," she said; and I have never seen so old a little look

in a child's eyes.

"And all the flowers' names too?" I said.

She frowned again. "It's amaranth," she said, and ran off lightly and

so deftly among the rocks and in the shadow that was advancing now

even upon the foam of the sea, that she had vanished before I had time

to deter, or to pursue her. I sought her awhile, until the dark rack

of sunset obscured the light, and the sea's voice changed; then I

desisted.

It was useless to remain longer beneath the looming caves, among the

stones of so inhospitable a shore. I was a stranger to the tides. And

it was clear high-water would submerge the narrow sands whereon I

stood.

Yet I cannot describe how loth I was to leave to night's desolation

the shapeless house of a child. What fate was this that had set her

to such profitless labour on the uttermost shores of "Tragedy"? What

history lay behind, past, or, as it were, never to come? What gladness

too high for earth had nearly once been hers? Her sea-mound took

strange shapes in the gloom--light foliage of stone, dark heaviness of

granite, wherein rumour played of all that restless rustling; small

cries, vast murmurings from those green meadows, old as night.

I turned, even ran away, at last. I found my boat in the gloaming

where I had left her, safe and sound, except that all the doctor's

good things had been nosed and tumbled by some hungry beast in my

absence. I stood and thought vacantly of Crusoe, and pig, and guns.

But what use to delay? I got in.

If it were true, as the excellent doctor had informed me, that seamen

reported islands not far distant from these shores, chance might bear

me blissfully to one of these. And if not true ... I turned a rather

startled face to the water, and made haste not to think. Fortune

pierces deep, and baits her hooks with sceptics. Away I went, bobbing

mightily over the waves that leapt and wrestled where sea and river

met. These safely navigated, I rowed the great creature straight

forward across the sea, my face towards dwindling land, my prow to

Scorpio.

XVI

_Art thou pale for weariness._

--PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY.

The constellations of summer wheeled above me; and thus between water

and starry sky I tossed solitary in my boat. The faint lustre of the

sultry night hung like a mist from heaven to earth. Far away above the

countries I had left perhaps for ever, the quiet lightnings played

innocently in the heights.

I rowed steadily on, guiding myself by some much ruddier star on the

horizon. The pale phosphorescence on the wave, the simple sounds as of

fish stirring in the water--the beauty and wonder of Night's

dwelling-place seemed beyond content of mortality.

I leaned on my oars in the midst of the deep sea, and seemed to hear,

as it were, the mighty shout of Space. Faint and enormous beams of

light trembled through the sky. And once I surprised a shadow as of

wings sweeping darkly across, star on to glittering star, shaking the

air, stilling the sea with the cold dews of night.

So rowing, so resting, I passed the mark of midnight. Weariness began

to steal over me. Between sleep and wake I heard strange cries across

the deep. The thin silver of the old moon ebbed into the east. A chill

mist welled out of the water and shrouded me in faintest gloom.

Wherefore, battling no more against such influences, I shipped my

oars, made my prayer in the midst of this dark womb of Life, and

screening myself as best I could from the airs that soon would be

moving before dawn, I lay down in the bottom of the boat and fell

asleep.

I slept apparently without dream, and woke as it seemed to the sound

of voices singing some old music of the sea. A scent of a fragrance

unknown to me was eddying in the wind. I raised my head, and saw with

eyes half-dazed with light an island of cypress and poplar, green and

still above the pure glass of its encircling waters. Straight before

me, beyond green-bearded rocks dripping with foam, a little stone

house, or temple, with columns and balconies of marble, stood hushed

upon the cliff by the waterside.

All now was soundless. They that sang, whether Nereids or Sirens, had

descended to dimmer courts. The seamews floated on the water; the

white dove strutted on the ledge; only the nightingales sang on in the

thick arbours.

I pushed my boat between the rocks towards the island. Bright and

burning though the beams of the sun were, here seemed everlasting

shadow. And though at my gradual intrusion, at splash or grating of

keel, the startled cormorant cried in the air, and with one cry woke

many, yet here too seemed perpetual stillness.

How could I know what eyes might not be regarding me from bowers as

thick and secluded as these? Yet this seemed an isle in some vague

fashion familiar to me. To these same watery steps of stone, to this

same mooring-ring surely I had voyaged before in dream or other life?

I glanced into the water and saw my own fantastic image beneath the

reflected gloom of cypresses, and knew at least, though I a shadow

might be, this also was an island in a sea of shadows. Far from all

land its marbles might be reared, yet they were warm to my touch, and

these were nightingales, and those strutting doves beneath the little

arches.

So very gradually, and glancing to and fro into these unstirring

groves, I came presently to the entrance court of the solitary villa

on the cliff-side. Here a thread-like fountain plashed in its basin,

the one thing astir in this cool retreat. Here, too, grew orange

trees, with their unripe fruit upon them.

But I continued, and venturing out upon the terrace overlooking the

sea, saw again with a kind of astonishment the doctor's green,

unwieldy boat beneath me and the emerald of the nearer waters tossing

above the yellow sands.

Here I had sat awhile lost in ease when I heard a footstep approaching

and the rhythmical rustling of drapery, and knew eyes were now

regarding me that I feared, yet much desired to meet.

"Oh me!" said a clear yet almost languid voice. "How comes any man so

softly?"

Turning, I looked in the face of one how long a shade!

I strove in vain to hide my confusion. This lady only smiled the

deeper out of her baffling eyes.

"If you could guess," she said presently, "how my heart leapt in me,

as if, poor creature, any oars of earth could bring it ease, you would

think me indeed as desolate as I am. To hear the bird scream,

Traveller! I hastened from the gardens as if the black ships of the

Greeks were come to take me. But such is long ago. Tell me, now, is

the world yet harsh with men and sad with women? Burns yet that

madness mirth calls Life? or truly does the puny, busy-tongued race

sleep at last, nodding no more at me?"

I told as best I could how chance had fetched me; told, too, that

earth was yet pestered with men, and heavenly with women. "And the

madness mirth calls Life flickers yet," I said; "and the little race

tosses on in nightmare."

"Ah!" she replied, "so ever run travellers' tales. I too once trusted

to seem indifferent. But you, if shadow deceives me not, may yet

return: I, only to the shades whence earth draws me. Meanwhile," she

said, looking softly at the fountain playing in the clear gloom

beyond, "rest and grow weary again, for there flock more questions to

my tongue than spines on the blackthorn. The gardens are green with

flowers, Traveller; let us talk where rosemary blows."

Following her, I thought of the mysterious beauty of her eyes, her

pallor, her slimness, and that faint smile which hovered between

ecstasy and indifference, and away went my mind to one whom the

shrewdest and tenderest of my own countrymen called once Criseyde.

She led me into a garden all of faint-hued flowers. There bloomed no

scarlet here, nor blue, nor yellow; but white and lavender and purest

purple. Here, also, like torches of the sun, stood poplars each by

each in the windless air, and the impenetrable darkness of cypresses

beneath them.

Here too was a fountain whose waters leapt no more, mossy and

time-worn. I could not but think of those other gardens of my

journey--Jane's, Ennui's, Dianeme's; and yet none like this for the

shingley murmur of the sea, and the calmness of morning.

"But, surely," I said, "this must be very far from Troy."

"Far indeed," she said.

"Far also from the hollow ships."

"Far also from the hollow ships," she replied.

"Yet," said I, "in the country whence I come is a saying: Where the

treasure is--"

"Alack! _there_ gloats the miser!" said Criseyde; "but I, Traveller,

have no treasure, only a patchwork memory, and that's a great grief."

"Well, then, forget! Why try in vain?" I said.

She smiled and seated herself, leaning a little forward, looking upon

the ground.

"Soothfastness _must_,"' she said very gravely, raising her long black

eyebrows; "yet truly it must be a forlorn thing to be remembered by

one who so lightly forgets. So then I say, to teach myself to be

true--'Look now, Criseyde, yonder fine, many-hearted poplar--that is

Paris; and all that bank of marriage-ivy--that is marriageable Helen,

green and cold; and the waterless fountain--that truly is Diomed; and

the faded flower that nods in shadow, why, that must be me, even me,

Criseyde!'"

"And this thick rosemary-bush that smells of exile, who, then, is

that?" I said.

She looked deep into the shadow of the cypresses. "That," she said, "I

think I have forgot again."

"But," I said, "Diomed, now, was he quite so silent--not one trickle

of persuasion?"

"Why," she said, "I think 'twas the fountain was Diomed: I know not.

And as for persuasion; he was a man forked, vain, and absolute as all.

Let the waterless stone be sudden Diomed--you will confuse my wits,

Mariner; where, then, were I?" She smiled, stooping lower. "You have

voyaged far?" she said.

"From childhood to this side regret," I answered rather sadly.

"'Tis a sad end to a sweet tale," she said, "were it but truly told.

But yet, and yet, and yet--you may return, and life heals every, every

wound. _I_ must look on the ground and make amends. 'Tis this same

making amends men now call 'Purgatory,' they tell me."

"'Amends,'" I said; "to whom? for what?"

"Welaway," said she, with a narrow fork between her brows; "to most

men and to all women, for being that Criseyde." She gazed half

solemnly at some picture of reverie.

"But which Criseyde?" I said. "She who was every wind's, or but one

perfect summer's?"

She glanced strangely at me. "Ask of the night that burns so many

stars," she said. "All's done; all passes. Yet my poor busy Uncle

Pandar had no such changes, nor Hector, nor ... Men change not: they

love and love again--one same tune of a myriad verses."

"All?" I said.

She tossed lightly a little dust from her hand.

"Nay--all," she replied; "but what is that to me? Mine only to see

Charon on the wave pass light over and return. Man of the green world,

prithee die not yet awhile! 'Tis dull being a shade. See these cold

palms! Yet my heart beats on."

"For what?" I said.

Criseyde folded her hands and leaned her cheek sidelong upon the

stone.

"For what?" I repeated.

"For what but idle questions?" she said; "for a traveller's vanity

that deems looking love-boys into a woman's eyes her sweeter

entertainment than all the heroes of Troy. Oh, for a house of nought

to be at peace in! Oh, gooseish swan! Oh, brittle vows! Tell me,

Voyager, is it not so?--that men are merely angry boys with beards;

and women--repeat not, ye who know! Never yet set I these steadfast

eyes on a man that would not steal the moon for taper--would she but

come down." She turned an arch face to me: "And what is to be

faithful?"

"I?" said I--"'to be faithful?'"

"It is," she said, "to rise and never set, O sun of utter weariness!

It is to kindle and never be quenched, O fretting fire of midsummer!

It is to be snared and always sing, O shrilling bird of dulness! It is

to come, not go; smile, not sigh; wake, never sleep. Couldst _thou_

love so many nots to a silk string?"

"What, then, is to change,... to be fickle?" I said.

"Ah! to be fickle," she said, "is showers after drought, seas after

sand; to cry, unechoed; to be thirsty, the pitcher broken. And--ask

now this pitiless darkness of the eyes!--to be remembered though

Lethe flows between. Nay, you shall watch even hope away ere another

comes like me to mope and sigh, and play at swords with Memory."

She rose to her feet and drew her hands across her face, and smiling,

sighed deeply. And I saw how inscrutable and lovely she must ever seem

to eyes scornful of mean men's idolatries.

"And you will embark again," she said softly; "and in how small a ship

on seas so mighty! And whither next will fate entice you, to what new

sorrows?"

"Who knows?" I said. "And to what further peace?"

She laughed lightly. "Speak not of mockeries," she said, and fell

silent.

She seemed to be thinking quickly and deeply; for even though I did

not turn to her, I could see in imagination the restless sparkling of

her eyes, the stillness of her ringless hands. Then suddenly she

turned.

"Stranger," she said, drawing her finger softly along the cold stone

of the bench, "there yet remain a few bright hours to morning. Who

knows, seeing that felicity is with the bold, did I cast off into the

sea--who knows whereto I'd come! 'Tis but a little way to being

happy--a touch of the hand, a lifting of the brows, a shuddering

silence. Had I but man's courage! Yet this is a solitary place, and

the gods are revengeful."

I cannot say how artlessly ran that voice in this still garden, by

some strange power persuading me on, turning all doubt aside, calming

all suspicion.

"There is honeycomb here, and the fruit is plenteous. Yes," she said,

"and all travellers are violent men--catch and kill meat--that I know,

however doleful. 'Tis but a little sigh from day to day in these cool

gardens; and rest is welcome when the heart pines not. Listen, now; I

will go down and you shall show me--did one have the wit to learn, and

courage to remember--show me how sails your wonderful little ship;

tell me, too, where on the sea's horizon to one in exile earth lies,

with all its pleasant things--yet thinks so bitterly of a woman!"

"Tell me," I said; "tell me but one thing of a thousand. Whom would

_you_ seek, did a traveller direct you, and a boat were at your need?"

She looked at me, pondering, weaving her webs about me, lulling doubt,

and banishing fear.

"One could not miss--a hero!" she said, flaming.

"That, then, shall be our bargain," I replied with wrath at my own

folly. "Tell me this precious hero's name, and though all the dogs of

the underworld come to course me, you shall take my boat, and leave me

here--only this hero's name, a pedlar's bargain!"

She lowered her lids. "It must be Diomed," she said with the least

sigh.

"It must be," I said.

"Nay, then, Antenor, or truly Thersites," she said happily, "the

silver-tongued!"

"Good-bye, then," I said.

"Good-bye," she replied very gently. "Why, how could there be a vow

between us? I go, and return. You await me--me, Criseyde, Traveller,

the lonely-hearted. That is the little all, O much-surrendering

Stranger! Would that long-ago were now--before all chaffering!"

Again a thousand questions rose to my tongue. She looked sidelong at

the dry fountain, and one and all fell silent.

"It is harsh, endless labour beneath the burning sun; storms and

whirlwinds go about the sea, and the deep heaves with monsters."

"Oh, sweet danger!" she said, mocking me.

I turned from her without a word, like an angry child, and made my way

to the steps into the sea, pulled round my boat into a little haven

beside them, and shewed her oars and tackle and tiller; all the toil,

and peril, the wild chances."

"Why," she cried, while I was yet full of the theme, "I will go then

at once, and to-morrow Troy will come."

I looked long at her in silence; her slim beauty, the answerless

riddle of her eyes, the age-long subtilty of her mouth, and gave no

more thought to all life else.

Day was already waning. I filled the water-keg with fresh water, put

fruit and honeycomb and a pillow of leaves into the boat, proffered a

trembling hand, and led her down.

The sun's beams slanted on the foamless sea, glowed in a flame of

crimson on marble and rock and cypress. The birds sang endlessly on of

evening, endlessly, too, it seemed to me, of dangers my heart had no

surmise of.

Criseyde turned from the dark green waves. "Truly, it is a solitary

country; pathless," she said, "to one unpiloted;" and stood listening

to the hollow voices of the water. And suddenly, as if at the

consummation of her thoughts, she lifted her eyes on me, darkly, with

unimaginable entreaty.

"What do you seek else?" I cried in a voice I scarcely recognised.

"Oh, you speak in riddles!"

I sprang into the boat and seized the heavy oars. Something like

laughter, or, as it were, the clapper of a scarer of birds, echoed

among the rocks at the rattling of the rowlocks. As if invisible hands

withdrew it from me, the island floated back.

I turned my prow towards the last splendour of the sun. A chill breeze

played over the sea: a shadow crossed my eyes.

Buoyant was my boat; how light her cargo!--an oozing honeycomb, ashy

fruits, a few branches of drooping leaves, closing flowers; and

solitary on the thwart the wraith of life's unquiet dream.

So fell night once more, and made all dim. And only the cold light of

the firmament lit thoughts in me restless as the sea on which I

tossed, whose moon was dark, yet walked in heaven beneath the distant

stars.

Printed and bound by Hazell, Watson & Viney, Ld., London and

Aylesbury