returning to the palace that the Queen, coming into their chamber,
found the two beds empty; and just as she had turned away to search for
them elsewhere, she heard a noise of wings and saw the two young herons
come flying in through the window. Then she saw them take off their
feather-skins and hang them up in the closet, and after that go and lie
down in their beds so as to look as if they had been there all night.
The Queen struck her hands together with horror at the sight, but she
crept away softly, so that they did not know they had been found out.
But as soon as they were out of their beds and at play in another part
of the palace, the Queen went to the closet, and setting fire to the two
heron-skins where they hung, burnt them till not a feather of them was
left, and only a heap of grey ashes remained to tell what had become of
them.
At night, when the Feather-pates went to their cupboards and found their
skins gone, and saw what had become of them, their grief knew no bounds.
They trembled with fear and rage, and tears rained out of their eyes as
they beheld themselves deprived of their bird bodies and made into real
persons for good and all.
“We won’t be real persons!” they cried. But for all their crying they
knew no way out of it. They made themselves quite ill with grief; and
that night, for the first time since they had found their way to the
closet, they stayed where their nurses had put them, and did not even
stand up in their beds to go to sleep. There they lay with gasping mouth,
and big bird-like eyes all languid with grief, and hollow grey cheeks.
Presently their father and mother came seeking for them, wondering why
they had not come down to the fish-pond as they were wont. “Where are
you, my children?” cried the heron-Princess, putting her head in through
the window.
“Here we are, both at death’s door!” they cried. “Come and see us die!
Our wicked granddam has burnt our feather-skins and made us into real
persons for ever and ever, Amen. But we will die rather!”
The parent herons, when they heard that, flew in through the window and
bent down over the little ones’ beds.
The two children reached up their arms. “Give us your feathers!” they
cried. “We shall die if you don’t! We _will_ die if you don’t! O, do!”
But still the parent birds hesitated, nor knew what to do.
“Bend down, and let me whisper something!” said the boy to his father:
and “Bend down, and whisper!” cried the girl to her mother. And father
and mother bent down over the faces of their sick children. Then these,
both together, caught hold of them, and crying, “Human heart, and
human form, exchange with the grey heron!” pulled off their parents’
feather-skins, and put them upon themselves.
And there once more stood Prince Heron and the Princess in human shape,
while the two children had turned into herons in their place.
The young herons laughed and shouted and clapped their wings for joy.
“Are you not happy now?” cried they. And when their parents saw the joy,
not only in their children’s eyes, but in each other’s, and felt their
hearts growing glad in the bodies they had regained, then they owned
that the Feather-pates had been wise in their generation, and done well
according to their lights.
So it came about that the Prince and the Princess lived happily ever
after, and the two young herons lived happily also, and were the
best-hearted birds the world ever saw.
In course of time the Prince and Princess had other children, who pleased
the old King better than the first had done. But the parents loved
none better than the two who lived as herons by the great fish-pond in
the wood; nor could there be greater love than was found between these
and their younger brothers and sisters, whose nature it was to be real
persons.
SYRINGA
_TO_
DORA
[Illustration]
SYRINGA
A great many years ago there lived a King who spent his days in
travelling about to find the woman he could love and take to be his wife.
Though the richest and most beautiful princesses offered him their hands
in marriage, for none of them could he entertain the smallest affection.
“It seems that I have had a dream,” he said. “Somewhere my Love is, but I
have not found her yet!”
In those days the country over which he was lord had two Kings, one
reigned and the other ruled; and as long as this was so, since his
brother-King who ruled was married, his councillors allowed him who
merely reigned to wander about at will in pursuit of his strange fancy.
When, however, the King who ruled died without leaving an heir, then
those same councillors said, “This will not do; the State can wait no
longer. Princes are born, and Kings die; love or no love, for your
people’s sake you must marry!”
“Then why does he not marry me?” said the Queen-widow of the King that
ruled.
The King that reigned said, “Rather than marry her I would marry my
scullery-maid!” He became so terrified at the thought of her proposal
that he took horse secretly by night, and rode away into the most
secluded and uninhabited parts of his dominion.
Now here, as he rode along over many miles of barren moor and hill, one
day, crossing a high ridge, he met the wind coming softly up out of the
valley below him, and its breath upon his face was full of the perfume of
some sweet flower. At that his heart, which had been so long listless and
sad, seemed to awake within him. “Flower of my dream!” he cried; and soon
saw below him, nestling in a corner of the valley, a small garden half
hidden in the embrace of tall girdling trees.
Down he went joyfully, following the fragrant call till he came to the
entrance of the place; and there, dismounting from his horse, he entered
its green ways. A natural lawn mounted and hollowed before him in glossy
sweeps, flowering shrubs dotted its heights, for the summer of the year
was begun; but the scent which had taken hold of his heart came from a
great bush of white bloom in the centre of all.
Under the bush lay a young and beautiful girl, and the blossoms were
sprinkling down, one by one, like dropped kisses upon her dear face. So
soon as the King saw her he knew that his search was at an end, and that
his dream of years had come true.
Their glad eyes met softly through the flowers; and he said, “You had but
to breathe for me, and I came!” For all her face and breath smelt to him
of the blossoms she lay under.
She answered, “Three years I have lain with my ear upon the ground, and
heard you going and coming, searching the world through; and now at last
you are come!” She rose up to the King’s embrace, and they were to each
other like old lovers long parted and at last met, so long had they
known of love in their dreams.
Twilight was beginning as they turned and went out of the garden. The
King said, “What is your name all these years?”
And she answered him with a voice like a bird singing, “Syringa my name
was, Syringa my name is, and will be while life lasts.”
When they left the valley and went mounting the side of the hill, a sweet
wind rose and rose, and came following them. All the way, as they rode,
white blossoms came showering behind them, falling upon their faces and
their hair, and whitening the track at their feet. Up to the city gates,
where all the King’s court and his councillors stood watching and waiting
for his return, the blossoms kept following them, like little scented
moths fluttering round them in the darkness.
When the gates were opened, the whole city became full of the scent of
the bride’s name.
So the marriage of the King who reigned was celebrated with all the joy
and noise imaginable; for all the people laughed and shouted and clapped
their hands when their eyes saw the beauty of the new Queen. But the
dowager Queen, the widow of the King who ruled, put on yellow weeds, and
shut herself up in a corner of the palace, eating unleavened bread and
bitter herb sandwiches till all the rejoicings were over.
In a little while, however, she appeared to forget her grief, and,
concealing her jealousy, made friends with the King who reigned, and with
his Queen; and the King was glad in his great happiness to think that no
heart in all the kingdom remained under a cloud.
For nearly a year the happiness of the King and Queen lasted and grew
perfect. Every day that they lived together they loved each other more
and more. But the Queen-widow waited and watched till an opportunity for
her evil working should come in.
Presently people who looked at Syringa’s beauty began to say, “Is not
such beauty more than human? Where does it come from, and what keeps it
alive?” And though many in course of time learned to talk like this,
no one ever seemed to know from whom such talk first came. Later, folk
began to whisper instead of to talk. “We have heard,” they said, “one
way by which such beauty can be kept alive, yet only one.” Then others
were heard saying, “Have you heard that this man’s wife lost her child
before it was a week old, and knows not where it can be gone; and that
that man’s wife lost hers in the same way a week before? And who will
lose hers this week that’s coming, if we don’t know yet, we soon shall
know!” And shortly, sure enough, all through the city there were mothers
mourning for the loss of their children, who had gone, none knew where,
before they were even a week old; and more and more the crowd was taught
to say, “Look how beautiful the Queen grows!” whenever she walked or rode.
The Queen-widow listened to all this, and laughed. In her own chamber she
had a cage filled with little blue birds, who cried lamentably all day
long.
Now, just when all the city-talk and the dark looks of the people had
grown to a head, Queen Syringa gave birth to a little son; and the King’s
joy was beyond all bounds. “Now,” thought the Queen-widow, “now or never!
Now I will ruin her or die!”
She watched her opportunity, till one day she found Syringa lying alone
upon her couch with the child asleep between her arms.
The wicked Queen saw that Syringa also was asleep. She stooped down over
the child, whispering a spell, and as she clapped her hands it started
from between its mother’s arms and flew away in the form of a little blue
bird.
The Queen-widow did her best to catch the bird, but could not; then she
took blood, and, smearing the Queen’s hands and face with it, left her
lying there asleep.
So Syringa was found; and the noise of it went through the city how she
had killed her own child in order to keep alive her wondrous beauty. The
King tried with heart and soul not to believe so wicked a story against
the wife he loved, but the evidence was too strong. When asked, the Queen
could explain nothing. “When I went to sleep,” she said, “my child was in
my arms, and when I awoke it was gone!”
Outside the palace all the people were crying for her to be put to death.
“Give back to their mothers the babies that you have eaten!” they cried.
The King sent for his foster-brother, and told him to take the Queen away
to some lonely and desolate place, and there to make an end of her. “She
is too beautiful,” he said, “and I loved her too much. Let her be very
far away from me when she dies!”
So that night the King’s foster-brother took the Queen, and set out in
the direction of the waste places and the hills. All the day following
they journeyed, till toward evening they came to the head of a valley,
where a wind came to them carrying the rich scent of flowers. The Queen
lifted her head and took in a deep breath; then she said, “If I have to
die, let me die under the scent of those flowers!”
They went on till they came to a little garden lying in a curl of the
valley. There in the centre of a lawn stood the great bush white with
bloom, and a sweet fragrance blew out of it, filling all that space.
“If I must die,” said the Queen again, “let me lie down and drink in the
scent of those flowers; afterwards I shall not complain.” So the King’s
foster-brother gave her leave to go and lie down under the tree, and sat
down close at hand to keep watch, so that she should not escape.
A small blue bird came and perched upon the bush over her head.
“Syringa, Syringa!” cried the bird, and two white blossoms fell off like
kisses upon the Queen’s face. She lifted her hands and threw kisses up to
the flowers, and more and more they came down and settled upon her face.
“Syringa, Syringa!” sang the bird; and, hearing it, the King’s
foster-brother’s heart became ready to break for grief.
The twilight deepened in the air around. All through the hours the bird
sang on, and the flowers dropped down like pale tired moths in the dusk
of the summer’s night, till where the Queen lay became white with a mass
of blossoms that never stirred.
The heart of the King’s foster-brother grew heavier; “What if, after all,
she be not wicked but good! To-morrow at sunrise I must kill her.”
“Syringa, Syringa!” cried the bird.
Towards dawn he saw the tree all blossomless, only a great heap of
petals, like a snow-covered grave, showed where the Queen lay; and the
song of the bird had stopped.
“If she sleeps now,” thought the King’s foster-brother, “it will be
merciful.” He drew out his sharp hunting-knife, and went softly up to the
spot to carry out the King’s command.
So covered was she with blossoms, he could not tell which way lay her
head; the heaviness of their dying scent almost made him swoon. Softly
with his hand he brushed the petals apart to find a place where he might
strike.
How deeply they lay! They seemed to be without end here in the centre of
all. Presently his hand came upon green grass bent with the weight of
blossoms, and dank with dew. He shut his eyes and started away, for the
colour and the touch made a strange sorrow in his heart, and he knew that
the Queen was not there.
He went away to the furthest part of the garden, and returned, and again
searched, and still she was not there; only blossoms in a pile, and under
them green grass.
“Syringa, Syringa!” sang the bird; and now there was a sort of triumph in
its note.
The King’s foster-brother turned and went back to the city. All the way
the blossoms drifted and blew after him along the track; till at evening
he stood at the palace door in a wind of syringa scent, and dead flowers
blew over his feet as he crossed the threshold.
Then he told the King all that he had seen and heard, and the King knew
surely that his Queen, who had died so gentle and beloved a death, had
been innocent of the crime laid to her charge. So great was his grief he
could not rest; that very night he rose and journeyed till he came by day
to the little garden; there he found the tree blossomless, and in the
top of it he heard the blue bird crying, “Syringa, Syringa,” sadly and
without ceasing.
But to the King there came no sign or sound of his love. He laid his head
upon the ground at the foot of the tree, sighing, “My love, you lay three
years with your ear to the ground listening for my feet; now I will lie
and listen for yours!”
All the grass became wet with the tears of sorrow that the King shed;
the tree waved and grew more green. In three days new blossoms looked
out among the leaves; at night they fell upon his face, and he dreamed
that Syringa’s lips were laid to his ear, and the tale of her betrayal
whispered to him.
Then, knowing all, but determined for a time to let the truth lie buried
in his heart, he caused the tree to be lifted from the ground and carried
back and set secretly in the palace garden. And of all this, and of what
he knew, he said nothing to the Queen-widow.
To the little blue bird that had followed the tree, and perched in its
boughs, he said, “Be silent, little blue bird, and do not sing that name
here.” At his word the little blue bird became silent as death, and sat
motionless in the heart of the tree, never once breathing Syringa’s name.
At night the Prince would come and press his lips to the leaves of the
tree and whisper, “Ah, love, how long is my heart to stay broken? And
when will forgiveness blossom?”
But to the Queen-widow it appeared that the Prince was recovering from
his grief; and when a year had gone round she began wooing him by
stealth, seeming to pity him for the sorrow that the wickedness of his
dead Queen had caused him.
Little by little he seemed to listen and open his heart to her; once he
said, “All my grief would go if one whom I love could know that my heart,
which once turned from her, has become wholly hers again.”
When the Queen-widow heard that said, she thought, “Surely now, in a
short time, all my schemes are to be brought to a good end.”
One day as they walked and talked together in the gardens of the palace,
they came upon a tree white and covered with blossom. “How I love that
flower!” said the King; but the Queen-widow as soon as she smelt the
scent of it turned pale and trembled. Up among the branches sat a little
blue bird silently.
“Come here, and sit under this tree,” said the King, “and let me speak
freely, for I am in sore want of a wife!” He drew her close under the
leaves of the tree. “Here,” he thought, “I will make her speak; she shall
confess all!” Over them a bough leaned down.
One of its blossoms touched the Queen-widow on the throat. “It has bitten
me!” she shrieked. The branch sprang away, the whole tree opened and
waved. Out of it the blossoms flew like a white swarm of angry bees.
“Syringa, Syringa!” cried the bird.
The Queen-widow caught herself by the throat and moaned, and lay down
upon the grass to die.
As soon as her breath was gone, all the blossoms rose up again like a
white column of cloud; down into their midst flew the blue bird.
Then, this way and that, the blossoms cast themselves loose into the
wind, and out of their midst came Syringa herself, carrying her child in
her arms. At her feet the Queen-widow lay quite dead, with her hand upon
her throat. The little blue birds in the palace had broken out of their
cage and were calling for their mothers with childish voices and laughter.
But the King knelt down before Syringa’s feet, pale and trembling,
seeking pardon for having ever believed in her guilt. Swiftly Queen
Syringa bent down, and in token of forgiveness held her child’s lips to
his. Over them both her face and breath were fragrant as a garden full of
sunshine.
When the King had kissed the child’s lips, she gave him her own.
THE TRAVELLER’S SHOES
_TO_
MARY AND EMILY
[Illustration]
THE TRAVELLER’S SHOES
A long while ago there lived a young cobbler named Lubin, who, when his
father died, was left with only the shop and the shoe-leather out of
which to make his fortune. From morning to night he toiled, making and
mending the shoes of the poor village folk; but his earnings were small,
and he seemed never able to get more than three days ahead of poverty.
One day, as he sat working at his window-bench, the door opened, and in
came a traveller. He had on a pair of long red shoes with pointed ends;
but of one the seams had split, so that all his toes were coming out of
it.
The stranger, putting up one foot after the other, took off both shoes,
and giving that one which wanted cobbling to Lubin, he said: “To-night
I shall be sleeping here at the inn; have this ready in good time
to-morrow, for I am in haste to go on!” And having said this he put the
other shoe into his pocket, and went out of the door barefoot.
“What a funny fellow,” thought Lubin, “not to make the most of one shoe
when he has it!” But without stopping to puzzle himself he took up the
to-be-mended shoe and set to work. When it was finished he threw it down
on the floor behind him, and went on working at his other jobs. He meant
to work late, for he had not enough money yet to get himself his Sunday’s
dinner; so when darkness shut in he lighted a rushlight and cobbled away,
thinking to himself all the while of the roast meat that was to be his
reward.
It came close on midnight, and he was just putting on the last heel of
the last pair of shoes when he was aware of a noise on the floor behind
him. He looked round, and there was the red shoe with the pointed toe,
cutting capers and prancing about by itself in the middle of the room.
“Peace on earth!” exclaimed Lubin. “I never saw a shoe do a thing so
tipsy before!” He went up and passed his hand over it and under it, but
there was nothing to account for its caperings; on it went, up and down,
toeing and heeling, skipping and sliding, as if for a very wager. Lubin
could even tell himself the name of the reel and the tune that it was
dancing to, for all that the other foot was missing. Presently the shoe
tripped and toppled, falling heel up upon the floor; nor, although Lubin
watched it for a full hour, did it ever start upon a fresh jig.
Soon after daybreak, when Lubin had but just opened his shutters and sat
himself down to work, in came the traveller, limping upon bare feet, with
the shoe’s fellow pointing its red toe out of his pocket. “Oh, so,” he
said, seeing the other shoe ready mended and waiting for him, “how much
am I owing you for the job?”
“Just a gold piece,” said Lubin, carelessly, carrying on at his work.
“A gold piece for the mere mending of a shoe!” cried the stranger. “You
must be either a rogue or a funny fellow.”
“Neither!” said Lubin, “and for mending a shoe my charge is only a penny;
but for mending _that_ shoe, and for all the worry and temptation to
make it my own and run off with it—a gold piece!”
“To be sure, you are an honest fellow,” said the traveller, “and honesty
is a rare gift; though, had you made off with it, I should have soon
caught you. Still, you were not so wise as to know that, so here’s your
gold piece for you.” He pulled out a big bag of gold as he spoke, pouring
its contents out on to the window bench.
“That is a lot of money for a lonely man to carry about,” said Lubin.
“Are you not afraid?”
“Why, no,” answered the man. “I have a way, so that I can always follow
it up even if I lose it.” He took two of the gold pieces, and dropped one
into the sole of each shoe as he was putting them on. “There!” said he,
“now, if any man steal my money, I need only wait till it is midnight;
and then I have but to say to my shoes ‘Seek!’ and up they jump, with
me in them, and carry me to where my stolen property is, were it to the
world’s end. It is as if they had the nose and sagacity of a pair of
bloodhounds. Ah, son of a cobbler, had you run off with the one I should
have very soon caught you with the other; for if one walks the other is
bound to follow. But, as you were honest, we part friends; and I trust
God may bring you to fortune.” Then the traveller did up his bag of gold,
nodded to the cobbler from the doorway, and was gone.
Lubin laid down his work, and went off to the inn. “Did anything happen
here last night?” he asked.
“Nothing of much note,” answered the innkeeper. “Three travelling
fiddlers were here, and afterwards a man came in barefoot, but with a red
shoe sticking out of his pocket. I thought of turning the fellow away,
till he let me see the colour of his gold. Presently the fiddlers started
to play and the other man to drink. At first when they called on him to
dance he excused himself for his feet’s sake; but presently, what with
the music and the liquor, he got so lively in his head that he pulled on
his one shoe and danced like three ordinary men put together.”
“What time was that?” asked Lubin.
“Getting on for midnight,” answered the innkeeper.
“Ah!” said Lubin, and went home thinking much on the way.
Towards evening he found that he had run out of leather, and must go into
the town, ten miles off, to buy more. “Now my gold piece comes in handy,”
thought he; so he locked up the house, put the key in his pocket, and set
out.
Though it was the season of long days it was growing dark when he came to
a part of the road that led through the wood; but being so poor a man he
had no fear, nor thought at all about the robbers who were said to be in
those parts. But as he went, he saw all at once by the side of the road
two red spikes sticking up out of a ditch, their bright colour making
them plain to the eye. He came quite near and saw that they were two red
shoes with pointed toes; and then he saw more clearly that along with
them lay the traveller, his wallet empty and with a dagger stuck through
his heart.
The cobbler’s son was as sorry as he could be. “Alas, poor soul,” thought
he, “what good are the shoes to you now? Now that thieves have killed you
and taken away your gold, surely I do no harm if I give an honest man
your shoes!” He stooped down, and was about taking them off when he saw
the eyes of the dead man open. The eyes looked at him as if they would
remind him of something; and at once, when he loosed hold of the shoes,
they seemed satisfied. Then he remembered, and thought to himself, “The
world has many marvels in it; I will wait till midnight and see.”