A very old man, whose face was almost as fleshless as the foot of a
bird, sat meditating upon the rocky shore of the flat and hazel-covered
isle which fills the widest part of the Lough Gill. A russet-faced boy
of seventeen years sat by his side, watching the swallows dipping for
flies in the still water. The old man was dressed in threadbare blue
velvet, and the boy wore a frieze coat and a blue cap, and had about his
neck a rosary of blue beads. Behind the two, and half hidden by trees,
was a little monastery. It had been burned down a long while before by
sacrilegious men of the Queen's party, but had been roofed anew with
rushes by the boy, that the old man might find shelter in his last days.
He had not set his spade, however, into the garden about it, and the
lilies and the roses of the monks had spread out until their confused
luxuriancy met and mingled with the narrowing circle of the fern. Beyond
the lilies and the roses the ferns were so deep that a child walking
among them would be hidden from sight, even though he stood upon his
toes; and beyond the fern rose many hazels and small oak trees.
'Master,' said the boy, 'this long fasting, and the labour of beckoning
after nightfall with your rod of quicken wood to the beings who dwell
in the waters and among the hazels and oak-trees, is too much for your
strength. Rest from all this labour for a little, for your hand seemed
more heavy upon my shoulder and your feet less steady under you to-day
than I have known them. Men say that you are older than the eagles,
and yet you will not seek the rest that belongs to age.' He spoke in an
eager, impulsive way, as though his heart were in the words and thoughts
of the moment; and the old man answered slowly and deliberately, as
though his heart were in distant days and distant deeds.
'I will tell you why I have not been able to rest,' he said. 'It is
right that you should know, for you have served me faithfully these five
years and more, and even with affection, taking away thereby a little of
the doom of loneliness which always falls upon the wise. Now, too, that
the end of my labour and the triumph of my hopes is at hand, it is the
more needful for you to have this knowledge.'
'Master, do not think that I would question you. It is for me to keep
the fire alight, and the thatch close against the rain, and strong, lest
the wind blow it among the trees; and it is for me to take the heavy
books from the shelves, and to lift from its corner the great painted
roll with the names of the Sidhe, and to possess the while an incurious
and reverent heart, for right well I know that God has made out of His
abundance a separate wisdom for everything which lives, and to do these
things is my wisdom.'
'You are afraid,' said the old man, and his eyes shone with a momentary
anger.
'Sometimes at night,' said the boy, 'when you are reading, with the
rod of quicken wood in your hand, I look out of the door and see, now
a great grey man driving swine among the hazels, and now many little
people in red caps who come out of the lake driving little white cows
before them. I do not fear these little people so much as the grey man;
for, when they come near the house, they milk the cows, and they drink
the frothing milk, and begin to dance; and I know there is good in the
heart that loves dancing; but I fear them for all that. And I fear the
tall white-armed ladies who come out of the air, and move slowly hither
and thither, crowning themselves with the roses or with the lilies, and
shaking about their living hair, which moves, for so I have heard them
tell each other, with the motion of their thoughts, now spreading out
and now gathering close to their heads. They have mild, beautiful faces,
but, Aengus, son of Forbis, I fear all these beings, I fear the people
of Sidhe, and I fear the art which draws them about us.'
'Why,' said the old man, 'do you fear the ancient gods who made the
spears of your father's fathers to be stout in battle, and the little
people who came at night from the depth of the lakes and sang among the
crickets upon their hearths? And in our evil day they still watch over
the loveliness of the earth. But I must tell you why I have fasted and
laboured when others would sink into the sleep of age, for without your
help once more I shall have fasted and laboured to no good end. When you
have done for me this last thing, you may go and build your cottage and
till your fields, and take some girl to wife, and forget the ancient
gods. I have saved all the gold and silver pieces that were given to me
by earls and knights and squires for keeping them from the evil eye
and from the love-weaving enchantments of witches, and by earls' and
knights' and squires' ladies for keeping the people of the Sidhe from
making the udders of their cattle fall dry, and taking the butter from
their churns. I have saved it all for the day when my work should be at
an end, and now that the end is at hand you shall not lack for gold and
silver pieces enough to make strong the roof-tree of your cottage and to
keep cellar and larder full. I have sought through all my life to find
the secret of life. I was not happy in my youth, for I knew that it
would pass; and I was not happy in my manhood, for I knew that age
was coming; and so I gave myself, in youth and manhood and age, to the
search for the Great Secret. I longed for a life whose abundance
would fill centuries, I scorned the life of fourscore winters. I would
be--nay, I _will_ be!--like the Ancient Gods of the land. I read in my
youth, in a Hebrew manuscript I found in a Spanish monastery, that there
is a moment after the Sun has entered the Ram and before he has passed
the Lion, which trembles with the Song of the Immortal Powers, and that
whosoever finds this moment and listens to the Song shall become like
the Immortal Powers themselves; I came back to Ireland and asked the
fairy men, and the cow-doctors, if they knew when this moment was; but
though all had heard of it, there was none could find the moment upon
the hour-glass. So I gave myself to magic, and spent my life in fasting
and in labour that I might bring the Gods and the Fairies to my side;
and now at last one of the Fairies has told me that the moment is at
hand. One, who wore a red cap and whose lips were white with the froth
of the new milk, whispered it into my ear. Tomorrow, a little before the
close of the first hour after dawn, I shall find the moment, and then
I will go away to a southern land and build myself a palace of white
marble amid orange trees, and gather the brave and the beautiful about
me, and enter into the eternal kingdom of my youth. But, that I may hear
the whole Song, I was told by the little fellow with the froth of the
new milk on his lips, that you must bring great masses of green boughs
and pile them about the door and the window of my room; and you must put
fresh green rushes upon the floor, and cover the table and the rushes
with the roses and the lilies of the monks. You must do this to-night,
and in the morning at the end of the first hour after dawn, you must
come and find me.'
'Will you be quite young then?' said the boy.
'I will be as young then as you are, but now I am still old and tired,
and you must help me to my chair and to my books.'
When the boy had left Aengus son of Forbis in his room, and had lighted
the lamp which, by some contrivance of the wizard's, gave forth a sweet
odour as of strange flowers, he went into the wood and began cutting
green boughs from the hazels, and great bundles of rushes from the
western border of the isle, where the small rocks gave place to gently
sloping sand and clay. It was nightfall before he had cut enough for his
purpose, and well-nigh midnight before he had carried the last bundle
to its place, and gone back for the roses and the lilies. It was one of
those warm, beautiful nights when everything seems carved of precious
stones. Sleuth Wood away to the south looked as though cut out of green
beryl, and the waters that mirrored them shone like pale opal. The roses
he was gathering were like glowing rubies, and the lilies had the dull
lustre of pearl. Everything had taken upon itself the look of something
imperishable, except a glow-worm, whose faint flame burnt on steadily
among the shadows, moving slowly hither and thither, the only thing that
seemed alive, the only thing that seemed perishable as mortal hope.
The boy gathered a great armful of roses and lilies, and thrusting the
glow-worm among their pearl and ruby, carried them into the room, where
the old man sat in a half-slumber. He laid armful after armful upon
the floor and above the table, and then, gently closing the door, threw
himself upon his bed of rushes, to dream of a peaceful manhood with his
chosen wife at his side, and the laughter of children in his ears.
At dawn he rose, and went down to the edge of the lake, taking the
hour-glass with him. He put some bread and a flask of wine in the boat,
that his master might not lack food at the outset of his journey, and
then sat down to wait until the hour from dawn had gone by. Gradually
the birds began to sing, and when the last grains of sand were falling,
everything suddenly seemed to overflow with their music. It was the
most beautiful and living moment of the year; one could listen to the
spring's heart beating in it. He got up and went to find his master.
The green boughs filled the door, and he had to make a way through them.
When he entered the room the sunlight was falling in flickering circles
on floor and walls and table, and everything was full of soft green
shadows. But the old man sat clasping a mass of roses and lilies in his
arms, and with his head sunk upon his breast. On the table, at his left
hand, was a leathern wallet full of gold and silver pieces, as for a
journey, and at his right hand was a long staff. The boy touched him and
he did not move. He lifted the hands but they were quite cold, and they
fell heavily.
'It were better for him,' said the lad, 'to have told his beads and
said his prayers like another, and not to have spent his days in seeking
amongst the Immortal Powers what he could have found in his own deeds
and days had he willed. Ah, yes, it were better to have said his prayers
and kissed his beads!' He looked at the threadbare blue velvet, and
he saw it was covered with the pollen of the flowers, and while he was
looking at it a thrush, who had alighted among the boughs that were
piled against the window, began to sing.