like a great block of stone on the top of which there was an object
which neither of them could see distinctly.
Taking hands they moved backwards a few steps, and again looked up.
The silver-green moonlight, streaming in from some window high above
their heads, fell full upon the face, and part of the body of a marble
horse.
The statue aloft upon its pedestal looked very grand and majestic. But,
as even in the dim light, the children could see, it was only after all
a _fragment_ of a statue.
“What a lovely horse. But he’s broken,” exclaimed Diana, still in a low
voice. “Isn’t it a pity? There’s only his face and a piece of his body
left. I wonder how he got broken?”
Before she had finished speaking, Rachel suddenly squeezed her friend’s
hand with a tight clasp.
“Look! Look!” she whispered, scarcely able to speak for excitement. For
the strangest thing was happening. A kind of pearly mist was gathering
to form the missing body of the horse, and presently out of the mist,
his face, no longer a marble one, but quivering with life, looked out.
He shook his head and the metal curb in his mouth rattled as he fixed
his great dark liquid eyes upon the children.
“He’s coming down,” cried Diana, half excited, half afraid.
Quickly she leapt back to make room for him, dragging Rachel with her.
In less than a second, with a bound so rapid that they could scarcely
see how he left the pedestal, a graceful, beautiful white horse stood
on the pavement before them, gently pawing the ground, and moving his
head slowly from side to side.
And then, marvel of marvels, he _spoke_.
“Have no fear, O little ones,” they heard, in a tone soft, yet
distinct. “I am here at the bidding of your friend, Sheshà—greatest of
magicians.”
Rachel glanced triumphantly at Diana, as if to say, “I told you so.”
And the beautiful steed went on:
“For this one night I am your slave. Command me. What is it you wish to
know, or to see?”
Diana pinched Rachel’s wrist as a sign for her to speak, and after a
moment she said timidly:
“We would like to know about _you_ first. Why were you on that
pedestal? And all broken? Where do you come from?”
“Something of my history, little maidens, you shall hear later. For the
present, be content to know that you behold in me a horse as famous as
he is beautiful.”
This was said very simply, and the children could well believe its
truth, for never had they seen such a lovely creature as that now
standing before them.
His coat, smooth and soft as ivory satin, gleamed in the moonlight.
His limbs were strong, yet formed with perfect grace, and his dark,
lovely eyes shone in a face that was at the same time gentle and full
of intelligence.
“I don’t wonder that someone made a statue of you,” exclaimed Diana.
“But what a pity it’s so broken. How did it get broken?”
“Many things get broken in the course of two thousand years and more,
little one. Since I was first carved in marble, much that was beautiful
has been destroyed, either by man, by earthquake, by fire, or other
calamities.”
He sighed and turned his head restlessly as he glanced right and left
about the great hall. Rachel and Diana, who till now had been too
engrossed by his marvellous and sudden appearance to pay attention to
anything else, now followed his gaze, and saw that the hall in which
they stood was filled with fragments of buildings, with broken statues,
broken columns, stone or marble lions and other wild animals, all more
or less damaged.
“Behold!” exclaimed their strange companion, after a moment. With a
movement of his head, he indicated something which stood on a massive
block near him, and the moonlight was so bright that the children saw
the object plainly.
“It’s a big wheel!” cried Diana. “What is it?”
“One wheel of the chariot to which my statue was harnessed ages and
ages ago!”
“But where? Why? _Do_ explain all about it,” cried Rachel, eagerly.
“Would you see the monument itself of which these columns, these
statues, these poor broken things are but the fragments?”
“Oh, _yes_!” returned the children, both together. They glanced at one
another rapturously, for evidently this adventure was to be continued.
“Your wish shall be granted,” said the lovely creature. “But first,
that you may gaze upon one of the Wonders of the World with greater
interest, look round you and behold, here, where you stand, the poor
scattered remains of its beauty.... Take note of those statues facing
you, for defaced, disfigured as they are, they represent a famous king
and queen.”
The children looked up obediently at two gigantic statues of a man and
a woman, both clad in robes beautifully draped, who stood side by side
on a great block of stone. Scarcely anything was left of the woman’s
face, though the head of the man was almost perfect.
“You behold Queen Artemisia and King Mausolus,” said their new friend.
“Now turn and regard that pillar behind you.”
The children looked in the required direction and saw, flooded in
moonlight, a tall, beautifully fluted column, to which was attached a
piece of broken ceiling.
“That was once part of the monument you shall presently see as it
looked in its first beauty,” he continued. “Come, mount upon my back.
We tarry too long in this narrow place where there is scarce room to
move, encumbered as it is by these fragments of the past. Let us away
to sunshine and blue sky!”
[Illustration: THEY HAD A GLIMPSE OF THE CITY]
Very gently and carefully, so that he did not touch any of the objects
close to him, the snow-white horse knelt down, and, with a shake of his
bridle, invited the little girls to climb on his back. They glanced
at one another, rather afraid, but Rachel, after a moment’s hesitation,
went boldly up to him and, holding tight to his mane, scrambled on to
his back.
“Come along!” she called to Diana. “It’s always all right when Sheshà
manages anything, and he’s managing this.”
Taking courage, Diana followed, and, in a moment, both children were
seated.
“Well done!” exclaimed their steed. “Have no fear, little maidens. You
are safe. No harm shall befall you.”
With the last words he began to rise from the pavement, floating slowly
upwards.
“Oh! we shall bump against the ceiling!” began Diana, in alarm.
“No. Look! look!! There isn’t any ceiling!” cried Rachel. “It’s all
melted away, and there are the stars....”
In another second they were out in the open air, seated as comfortably
on the back of the white horse as though they were on the schoolroom
sofa, and feeling quite as safe. Below them lay the roof of the British
Museum, and beyond it, stretching for miles and miles, all the crowded
roofs, the spires, the domes and the lights of London. For a moment
they had a glimpse of the wonderful city lying silent under the moonlit
sky, and then they soared upwards so high that all sight of it was lost.
“We’re going awfully fast,” whispered Rachel. “Isn’t it perfectly
lovely?”
And Diana sighed in perfect content. For, indeed, it was beyond all
words wonderful to be rushing through soft, warm air under the moon,
and to feel the gentle rocking motion of the horse’s body under them.
Faster and faster they flew through the ocean of air, and the children
screamed with delight when now and again their giant shadows were
thrown for a second upon a white cloud as they shot past in their
flight.
On and on fled their magic steed, moving his limbs in the sea of air
as a swimmer moves in water, his beautiful mane streaming like a white
mist behind him.... Gradually the moonlight faded, and, for a time,
only the stars shone in the dark blue sky.
“We’re flying over the sea now. I can hear it!” whispered Rachel
presently, for they had dropped lower by this time, and a deep murmur
and even every now and then the gentle splash of waves could be
distinctly heard.
“It’s getting light,” answered Diana, in a sleepy voice.
There was silence for some time, and perhaps both children fell asleep,
for, almost at once as it seemed, instead of a grey gleam of dawn, they
saw that the sky was all flushed with rosy light, and everything was
now clearly visible.
“Look! Look!! We’re quite close to the land!” cried Rachel, pointing to
where rocky mountains stood up against the sky. “Oh, Diana, isn’t it
beautiful?”
[Illustration]
By this time they were hovering above a white-roofed city, curving
round a beautiful blue bay.
“Where are we?” begged Rachel, leaning forward to speak to their flying
steed, who was now moving slowly.
“This land, O child, is Asia Minor, and the part of it you now see was
called long ago, when I was young, Caria. The city just below us is
Halicarnassus.”
“Then the sea is the Mediterranean, I suppose?” said Rachel. “And we
are not so far from Rhodes?”
“Yonder is the island of Rhodes,” he answered, turning his head in its
direction. “You can see it, a dim shape on the horizon—not so very
far, as you say, from the city of Halicarnassus.”
“Oh! what is _that_?” exclaimed Diana, suddenly catching sight of
something gleaming white through a grove of trees at a little distance.
[Illustration]
“The very monument I have brought you to behold. A Wonder of the World.
The place where, carved in marble, my image once stood beside the
statues of a king and queen. Come, let us approach it.”
Turning a little aside from the city itself, the horse dropped
gradually lower, and, after just skimming the ground for a moment,
allowed his hoofs to touch it, and finally stood motionless in front of
a lovely building.
A stately flight of steps, whose balustrade was guarded by marble
lions, led up to a square tower, and higher still to a cluster of
beautiful columns. Above this was a sort of pyramid, with steps
mounting yet again to a chariot of marble in which stood two figures,
a man and a woman. The chariot was drawn by magnificent horses, and
as the children looked at these, they cried out together, pointing to
them, eagerly:
“Why, they’re all of them—_you_!” exclaimed Diana. In her excitement
she let herself slip easily to the ground. Rachel followed her example,
and both stared up at the group of horses on the summit of the building.
“What we saw in the Museum before you turned into a real horse is just
one head of you!” cried Rachel. “Then those people in the chariot must
be the broken statues that are also in the Museum—I mean before they
were broken?” she went on.
The steed bowed his head. “You are now beholding the statues of Queen
Artemisia and King Mausolus as they appeared soon after the sculptors
had finished their work. There also you see _my_ image as it, too,
appeared nearly three thousand years ago. Or, rather, my image four
times repeated in each of the four horses.”
The children were at first silent, for amazement and admiration held
them spellbound. The sun was rising, and bathed in its light, the
building was more lovely than tongue can tell.
“It’s like a tower in a fairy tale. The kind of tower a magician
builds, you know!” declared Rachel, at last.
“But what is it for?” added Diana, after a moment.
“It is a tomb, little maid.”
“A tomb?” echoed Diana. “All that great big beautiful place only for a
tomb?”
“The great Pyramid was a tomb,” Rachel told her in an aside, “and
that’s bigger, you know. Whose tomb is it?” she went on.
“Would you hear the whole story? I am here to tell it, if that should
be your wish. Let us then rest in the shade of these cypress trees
while you listen.”
Their guide lay down and stretched his beautiful body at full length on
the soft turf, while the children, with their hands clasped round their
knees, sat facing him, eagerly waiting for him to speak.
[Illustration]
“I cannot, O little maidens,” he began, “relate to you the history of
this magnificent tomb without telling you something of my own story,
which is in a way bound up with it. Already it must be clear to you
that I am no ordinary horse. The time has now arrived when I may reveal
my name. Know, then, that I am no other than _Bucephalus_, the famous
steed of the greatest conqueror in the world, Alexander the Great.
“I was born in Greece, but when I was still very young, I was sent as
a gift to the King of Macedonia, a country bordering upon my native
land. As yet, no man had ridden me, and being young and untried, I was
so impatient of control that when the king would have mounted upon my
back, I reared and plunged, lashing out with my hind legs in a fashion
so dangerous and unseemly that no one might approach me.
“Full of anger at my fierce behaviour, the king was ordering me to be
sent back whence I came, when his son, the young Prince Alexander,
cried out, ‘This is a noble horse! Will you lose him for lack of a
little skill and courage? Give me leave, my father, to make trial of
him.’
“At first the king, afraid for his son’s life, refused, but, the
entreaties of Alexander at last prevailing, he gave consent for the
prince to approach me.
“At once the noble boy drew near, and boldly seizing me by the bridle,
turned me about so that my face was to the sun. For he had the wisdom
to perceive that what had terrified my foolish young heart was nothing
but my own shadow. This, now that the sun was not at my back, I could
no longer see, and gradually, as I felt the prince’s kind hand patting
my neck and stroking my glossy hide, I ceased to tremble. But, even
so, such was my folly and youthful pride I would not have allowed him
to mount if he had not with great skill taken me by surprise. As it
was, before I had time to consider, I felt him already on my back,
and, bounding forward in anger, I began to run like the wind. Far from
making any endeavour to check my speed, the prince, without touching me
with whip or spur, urged me on with ringing shouts of encouragement,
and not till I was worn out did he draw rein. By that time I was his
slave. His voice, his gentle touch had tamed me, and with delight I
accepted him as my master. Never shall I forget how the king and his
courtiers who had been struck dumb with fear while I raced like a mad
thing, Alexander upon my back, now gathered round, praising us both.
“The king, embracing the prince, exclaimed, as I remember: ‘My son,
seek a kingdom more worthy of thee, for Macedonia is not sufficient for
thy merits!’
“This advice as perhaps I need not remind you, Alexander was not slow
to take, for a few years later, when his father died and he became King
of Macedonia, he began those conquests which have made him for ever
famous. Soon nearly all the world that was then known owned his sway.
In all his victories I, Bucephalus, had my share, for I carried him
into every battle. No one but my dear master would I allow to mount me,
and, in order that he might do this the more easily, it was my custom
to kneel down upon my forefeet as soon as he was ready to bestride
me—just as some little while ago I knelt down for _you_, little
maidens.
[Illustration]
“Ah! those were happy days when we went out to conquer, and great was
my joy in battle. I felt no fatigue when I carried Alexander into the
fight, and no horse ever loved a master so well as I loved mine. No
master on the other hand was more devoted to a steed than Alexander to
his. What other horse, I pray you, has given his name to a city? Yet
of me this may be said, for where at last, worn out in his service,
I died, Alexander built a city where he buried me, and called it
_Bucephalia_.”
The beautiful creature sighed, but a moment later recovered himself.
“You will wonder,” he went on, “when I am coming to the story of the
noble tomb before you, and what it has to do either with me or with
Alexander. This I will now relate. About the time when Alexander became
King of Macedonia, there was a Persian king reigning here in this city
of Halicarnassus. His name was Mausolus, and he had a beautiful wife
called Artemisia, who loved him devotedly.
“You, O little ones, who live in modern days in a grey city, where
people go clothed in sad colours and walk in dingy streets, have no
idea (except from your fairy tales) of the manner in which a Persian
king and queen kept their court nearly three thousand years ago.
“Ah, the beauty and luxury I have seen in those Persian palaces!”
exclaimed Bucephalus, as though to himself. “The marble courtyards with
their springing fountains, the jewelled thrones, the silken robes, men
and women alike blazing with precious stones—and over all the glorious
blue sky and the splendid sun!” He sighed again, and for a while seemed
lost in thought.
“Those days are gone for ever,” he went on at last. “But it was amidst
such scenes, in such pomp and luxury as this, that Mausolus and his
queen Artemisia dwelt in the city of Halicarnassus. Some years they
lived together in great happiness, and then, to the terrible grief of
his queen, King Mausolus died. In her despair and misery, Artemisia
could think of no other means of distraction than that of building to
the memory of her husband so beautiful a tomb that it should be famous
throughout the world, and for ever preserve the name of Mausolus.
“She had vast riches, and because she was a learned and enlightened
queen, she knew that it was to Greece she must turn to spend her
wealth. For in Greece dwelt all the great artists, whether sculptors,
architects or poets.
“This tomb raised to the memory of her husband, Mausolus, was to be the
Wonder of the World. Not content with one Greek architect, therefore,
she employed no less than four to design and beautify the building you
see before you, which faces north, south, east and west. Scopas it was
who built the eastern side, Leochares the west, Bruxis the north, and
Timotheus the south. These were famous men in my day, and even when
they had finished their labour, and even when the tomb of Mausolus was
surrounded by colonnades, supported by beautiful pillars, and lined
with magnificent statues, the queen was not satisfied. The tomb must
be still more wonderful, still more stately. So she sent for Pythios,
a great sculptor, and ordered him to erect above the temple-like tomb,
a pyramid. On the top of the pyramid he was to place a group in marble
which should represent herself and Mausolus, standing side by side, in
a chariot drawn by four horses.
“Now Pythios was anxious to find as a model for these horses the most
beautiful steed in the world. And where, said everyone, could he find a
creature more beautiful than the famous Bucephalus of Alexander?
“So Pythios came to our court and sought of my master permission to
make drawings of me in varying attitudes as I reared or ran. This
being granted, I became the model for all four of the marble steeds
who drew the chariot of King Mausolus and his queen Artemisia. Behold
them! For in magic fashion you see them as they appeared long, long
ago, when this tomb was first completed. Greatly favoured are you,
little children, for other mortals now living must be content to gaze
only upon those broken fragments of the tomb, which, in recent days,
have been drawn from the earth. Long, long ago, was this magnificent
monument destroyed, and were it not for my company and the magic of
Sheshà, who has called me to this earth once more, you would be looking
upon nothing but ruin and destruction here in this place. See how
splendidly white and dazzling appears that noble group against the
deep blue of the sky! And then contrast it with the battered figures,
the one chariot wheel, the broken horse’s head, which is all that now
remains. Still more wonderful that such fragments should at last have
found their way to your grey city of London—thousands of miles away.”
Bucephalus paused once more, wrapped in earnest thought, which the
children scarcely dared to disturb, though they were longing to ask
questions.
“You will ask,” he continued presently, “how I, who at the time when
this tomb was built dwelt far from Halicarnassus, know all that I have
related. Let me explain.
“Though Pythios had taken me as a model for those famous horses of his,
I never thought to behold them, and when I have completed the story of
Queen Artemisia, I will relate how it chanced that I _did_ at last look
upon them with my own eyes.
“The great tomb, so marvellous, so beautiful that it became one of
the Seven Wonders of the World, was at length finished—as you see
it. A miracle in marble, with the queen herself and her dearly loved
husband standing together to endure as she thought for ever. Her task
completed, and with nothing else to live for, the queen pined away, and
a year later died. The monument she raised, as you know, is shattered
to fragments, but, after all, Artemisia’s wish was fulfilled, for the
name of her husband, at least in a fashion, yet lives. Ever since her
day, every splendid tomb, such as that in which kings or great heroes
are buried, has been called a _Mausoleum_. And when people of the
present age speak that word, though they may not be aware of it, they
are uttering the name of Mausolus, so dear to Artemisia.
“And now to return to my own history.
“Fourteen years after the death of this unhappy queen, I bore my
master, Alexander, into yonder city of Halicarnassus, as a conqueror.
He had fought and defeated the sovereign then reigning in Caria, and
all the inhabitants of this country did him homage. How well I remember
the morning he rode out to see with his own eyes this very tomb of
which he had heard so much.
“It was a morning such as this. The sun, just as you see it now, had
newly risen, and then, as now, the marble pillars, the chariot group,
the statues stood out white as sea-foam against a sky, every whit as
deep and blue as you behold.
“Alexander stood transfixed with admiration, and I could not refrain
from a glance of pride at my own image, four times repeated on the
summit of the building.
“‘Ah!’ thought I, ‘when she ordered those marble horses to be carved
by the greatest sculptor of her time, little did Queen Artemisia guess
that the model from which they were designed would one day gallop
proudly into her city, bearing upon his back the conqueror of her
kingdom.’ It was a sad and overwhelming reflection, and, as I gazed
upwards at the statue of Artemisia herself, I half expected her to
descend in wrath from her chariot to punish my insolence. But, after
all, it was Alexander, not I, who had taken Halicarnassus, as I made
haste to assure myself, and I turned my head to look in the face of my
beloved master. He was gazing sadly at the tomb, and I fancied that,
conqueror though he was, he thought with sorrow and pity of the unhappy
queen. For as generous as brave was my dear master, Alexander the
Great.”
* * * * *
Quite a long silence followed the last words, and it was a silence
which somehow the children had no wish to break, for they both felt a
little dreamy and disinclined to speak.
“Presently,” thought Rachel, “we’ll ask him to let us go up that
splendid staircase and get inside the temple where Mausolus is buried.
There must be all sorts of lovely things there.” But at the moment she
felt it was enough just to sit still and gaze at the outside of the
tomb, at the burning blue of the sky behind it, at the sparkling bay
beyond, about which the flat-roofed white houses of the city clustered.
“It will be awfully interesting to walk about in Halicarnassus,” she
reflected. “I wonder whether we shall see Queen Artemisia? We _might_.
Anything of course could happen. And it’s all just as real as—as
though it _was_ real,” she added, at a loss how to put it to herself.
It was just when she had made this half-dreamy reflection that she saw
the tomb of Mausolus beginning to totter. It swayed for a moment right
and left before her eyes—and then was gone. So also was the city. She
had a flashing glimpse of mounds of earth, and of a plain scattered
over with stones, before Grayson stood putting a can of hot water upon
the wash-stand.
“Time to get up, Miss Rachel,” she observed, cheerfully.
* * * * *
Never had Rachel so longed to see Diana as now. If Diana knew nothing
about this adventure—then it was only a dream, and that would be too
dreadful.
She could scarcely wait till the afternoon, when her friend was to come
round to go for a walk with her. One glance, however, at Diana’s face
when at last she came, reassured her. Their eyes met, and Diana’s were
sparkling and full of mystery. You may imagine what they talked about
in Kensington Gardens that afternoon when they ran on together in front
of Miss Moore.
[Illustration]
SIXTH WONDER
[Illustration: THE LIGHTHOUSE OF ALEXANDRIA]