biggest drafts and the longest dampers before he began to wash his
face and give dainty care to his hands. In fact, he did this all day
long and sat up half the night trying to think how he could be as
exquisitely neat as the little princess. And at last when daylight came
and he had put coal in the kitchen ranges and had left the drafts right
and had taken another bath after, he dressed himself in his poor best
which he had most carefully brushed, and he ran straight back up the
stair and into the king’s library.
The Princess Vista was not there. But it was very, very early this time
and the sun was still playing about outside, and so he set himself to
wait, looking up at the window-seat where he had first seen her. As
soon as the sun began to slant in the latticed windows in earnest, the
door opened and the princess entered, her waving hair falling on her
blue gown, and the little blue slippers peeping.
When she saw Hazen, she stood still and spoke most _freezing_ cold.
“Didn’t I tell you on no ’count to come here this morning?” she wished
to know.
Generations of kings for ages back bowed in a body in little Hazen.
“Did your Highness not know that I would come?” he asked simply.
“Yes,” said the princess to that, and sat down on the window-seat. “I
will punish you,” said she, “but you bow so nicely that I will help you
first. Why do you wish to be wise?”
“I thought that I had another reason,” said Hazen, “but it is because
you are wise.”
“I’m not so very wise,” said the princess, modestly. “But I could make
you as wise as I am,” she suggested graciously. “What do you want to
know?”
There was so much that he wanted to know! Down in the dark furnace room
he had been forever wondering about the fires that he kindled, about
the light that he did not have, about everything. He threw out his arms.
“I want to know about the whole world!” he cried.
The princess considered.
“Perhaps they haven’t teached me everything yet,” she said. “What do
you want to know about the world?”
Hazen looked out the window and across the palace garden, lying all
golden-green in the slow opening light, with fountains and flowers and
parks and goldfish everywhere.
“What makes it get day?” he asked. For since he had been a furnace boy,
Hazen had been taught nothing at all.
“Why, the sun comes,” answered the princess.
“Is it the same sun every day?” Hazen asked.
“I don’t think so,” said the princess. “No--sometimes it is a red sun.
Sometimes it is a hot sun. Sometimes it is big, big, when it goes
down. Oh, no. I am quite sure a different sun comes up every day.”
“Where do they get ’em all?” Hazen asked wonderingly.
“Well,” the princess said thoughtfully, “suns must be like cwort (she
never could say “court”) processions. I think they always have them
ready somewheres. What else do you want to know about?”
“About the Spring,” said Hazen. “Where does that come from? Where do
they get it?”
“They never teached me that,” said the princess, “but _I_ think Summer
is the mother, and Winter the father, and Autumn is the noisy little
boy, and Spring is the little girl, with violets on.”
“Of course,” cried Hazen, joyfully. “I never thought of that. Why can’t
they talk?” he asked.
“They ’most can,” said the princess. “Some day maybe I can teach you
what they say. What else do you want to know?”
“About people,” said Hazen. “Why are some folks good and some folks
bad? Why is the king kind and the cook cross?”
“Oh, they never teached me that!” the princess cried, impatiently.
“What a lot of things you ask!”
“One more question, your Highness,” said Hazen, instantly. “Why are you
so beautiful?”
The princess smiled. “Now I’ll teach you my picture-book through,” she
said.
She opened the picture-book and showed him pictures of castles and
beasts and lawns and towers and ladies and mountains and bright birds
and pillars and cataracts and wild white horses and, last, a picture of
a prince setting forth on a quest. “Prince Living sets out to make his
fortune,” it said under the picture, and Hazen stared at it.
“Why shouldn’t I set out to make _my_ fortune?” he cried.
The princess laughed.
“You are a furnace boy,” she explained. “_They_ don’t make fortunes.
Who would mind the furnace if they did?”
Hazen sprang to his feet.
“That can’t be the way the world is!” he cried. “Not when it’s so
pretty and all stuck full of goldfish and fountains and flowers and
parks. If I went, I _would_ make my fortune!”
The princess crossed her little slippered feet and looked at him. And
when he met her eyes, he was ashamed of his anger, though not of his
earnestness, and he bowed again; and all the kings of all the courts of
his ancestors were in the bow.
“After all,” said the princess, “we don’t have the furnace in Summer.
And you bow so nicely that I b’lieve I will help you to make your
fortune. _Anyhow_, I can help you to set out.”
Hazen was in the greatest joy. The princess bade him wait where he was,
and she ran away and found somewhere a cast-off page boy’s dress and
a cap with a plume and a little silver horn and a wallet, with some
bread. These she brought to Hazen just as footsteps sounded on the
stairs, and nursery governesses and chamberlains and foot-pages and
many whose names are as dust came running pell-mell down the stairs,
all looking for the princess.
“Hide in that alcove,” said the princess, “till I am gone. Then put on
this dress and go out at the east gate which no one can lock. And as
you go by the east wing, do not look up at my window or I will wave my
hand and somebody may see you going. Now good-bye.”
But at that Hazen was suddenly wretched.
“I can’t leave _you_!” he said. “How can I leave _you_?”
“People always leave people,” said the princess, with superiority.
“Play that’s one of the things I teached you.”
At this Hazen suddenly dropped on one knee--the kings, his fathers,
did that for him too--and kissed the princess’s little hand. And as
suddenly she wished very much that she had something to give him.
“Here,” she said, “here’s my picture-book. Take it with you and learn
it through. _Now_ good-bye.”
And Hazen had just time to slip in the alcove when all the n. g.’s,
c.’s, f. p.’s, and l.’s, whom there wasn’t time to spell out, as well
as all those whose names are now dust, burst in the room.
“I was just coming,” said the princess, and went.
Hazen dressed himself in the foot-page’s livery and fastened the
wallet at one side and the little silver horn at the other, and put on
the cap with a plume; and he stole into the king’s garden, with the
picture-book of the princess fast in his hand.
He had not been in a garden since he had left his father’s garden,
which he could just remember, and to be outdoors now seemed as
wonderful as bathing in the ocean, or standing on a high mountain,
or seeing the dawn. He hastened along between the flowering shrubs
and hollyhocks; he heard the fountains plashing and the song-sparrows
singing and the village bells faintly sounding; he saw the goldfish and
the water-lilies gleam in the pool and the horses cantering about the
paddock. And all at once it seemed that the day was his, to do with
what he would, and he felt as if already that were a kind of fortune in
his hand. So he hurried round the east wing of the palace and looked
up eagerly toward the princess’s window. And there stood the Princess
Vista, watching, with her hair partly brushed.
When she saw him, she leaned far out.
“I told you not to look,” she said. “Somebody will see you going.”
“I don’t care if anyone does,” cried Hazen. “I _had_ to!”
“How fine you look now,” the princess could not help saying.
“You are beautiful as the whole picture-book!” he could not help saying
back.
“_Now_, good-bye!” she called softly, and waved her hand.
“Good-bye--oh, good-bye!” he cried, and waved his plumed cap.
And then he left her, looking after him with her hair partly brushed,
and he ran out the east gate which was never locked, and fared as fast
as he could along the king’s highway, in all haste to grow wise and
_really_ good and loved and beautiful.
Hazen went a day’s journey in the dust of the highway, and toward
nightfall he came to a deep wood. To him the wood seemed like a great
hospitable house, with open doors between the trees and many rooms
through which he might wander at will, the whole fair in the light of
the setting sun. And he entered the gloom as he might have entered a
palace, expecting to meet someone.
Immediately he was aware of an old man seated under a plane tree, and
the old man addressed him with:--
“Good even, little lad. Do you travel far?”
“Not very, sir,” Hazen replied. “I am only going to find my fortune and
to become wise, _really_ good, beautiful, and loved.”
“So!” said the old man. “Rest here a little and let us talk about it.”
Hazen sat beside him and they talked about it. Now, I wish very much
that I might tell you all that they said, but the old man was so old
and wise that his thoughts came chiefly as pictures, or in other form
without words, so that it was not so much what he said that held his
meaning as what he made Hazen feel by merely being with him. Indeed, I
do not know whether he talked about the stars or the earth or the ways
of men, but he made little Hazen somehow know fascinating things about
them all. And when time had passed and the dusk was nearly upon them,
the old man lightly touched Hazen’s forehead:--
“Little lad,” he said, “have you ever looked in there?”
“In my own head?” said Hazen, staring.
“Even so,” said the old man. “No? But that might well be a pleasant
thing to do. Will you not do that, for a little while?”
This was the strangest thing that ever Hazen had heard. But next
moment, under the old man’s guidance, he found himself, as it were,
turned about and seeing things that he had never seen, and looking
back into his own head as if there were a window that way. And he did
it with no great surprise, for it seemed quite natural to him, and he
wondered why he had never done it before.
Of the actual construction of things in there Hazen was not more
conscious than he would have been of the bricks and mortar of a palace
filled with wonderful music and voices and with all sorts of surprises.
Here there were both surprises and voices. For instantly he could see
a company of little people, _every one of whom looked almost like
himself_. And it was as it is when one stands between two mirrors set
opposite, and the reflections reflect the reflections until one is
dizzy; only now it was as if all the reflections were suddenly to be
free of the mirror and be little living selves, ready to say different
things.
One little Self had just made a small opening in things, and several
Selves were peering into it. Hazen looked too, and he saw to his
amazement that it was a kind of picture of his plans for making his
fortune. There were cities, seas, ships, men, forests, water-falls,
leaping animals, glittering things, all the adventures that he had
been imagining. And the Selves were talking it over.
“Consider the work it will be,” one was distinctly grumbling, “before
we can get anything. _Is_ it worth it?”
He was a discouraged, discontented-looking Self, and though he had
Hazen’s mouth, it was drooping, and though he had Hazen’s forehead, it
was frowning.
A breezy little Self, all merry and fluffy and light as lace,
answered:--
“O-o-o-o!” it breathed. “I think it will be fun. That’s all I care
about it--it will be fun and _nothing else_.”
Then a strange, fascinating Self, from whom Hazen could not easily look
away, spoke, half singing.
“Remember the beauty that we shall see as we go--as we go,” he chanted.
“We can live for the beauty everywhere and for _nothing else_.”
“Think of the things we shall learn!” cried another Self.
“Knowledge--knowledge all the way--and _nothing else_.”
Then a soft voice spoke, which was sweeter than any voice that Hazen
had ever heard, and the Self to whom it belonged looked like Hazen
when he was asleep.
“Nay,” it said sighing, “there are many dangers. But to meet dangers
bravely and to overcome them finely is the way to grow strong.”
At this a little voice laughed and cracked as it laughed, so that it
sounded like something being broken which could never be mended.
“Being strong and wise don’t mean making one’s fortune,” it said. “Just
one thing means fortune, and that is being rich. To be rich--rich!
That’s what we want and it is all we want. And I am ready to fight with
everyone of you to get riches.”
Hazen looked where the voice sounded, and to his horror he saw a little
Self made in his own image, but hideously bent and distorted, so that
he knew exactly how he would look if he were a dwarf.
“Not me!” cried the breezy little Fun Self then. “You wouldn’t fight
me!”
“Yes, I would,” said the dwarf. “I’d fight everybody, and when we were
rich, you’d thank me for it.”
“Ah, no,” said the Knowledge Self. “I am the only proper ruler in this
fortune affair. Knowledge is enough for us to have. Knowledge is what
we want.”
“Beauty is all you need!” cried the fascinating Beauty Self. “I am the
one who should rule you all.”
“Well, rich, rich, rich! Do I not say so? Will not riches bring beauty
and fun and leisure for knowledge?” said the dwarf. “Riches do it all.
Do as I say. Take me for your guide.”
“Strength is the thing!” said a great voice, suddenly. “We want to be
big and strong and _nothing else_. I am going to rule in this.” And the
voice of the Strong Self seemed to be everywhere.
“Not without me ... not without me!” said the Wise Self. But it spoke
faintly, and could hardly be heard in the clamour of all the others who
now all began talking at once, with the little Fun Self dancing among
them and crying, “I’m the one--you all want me to rule, _really_, but
you don’t know it.”
And suddenly, in the midst of all this, Hazen began to see strange
little shadows appearing and lurking about, somewhat slyly, and often
running away, but always coming back. They were tiny and faintly
outlined--less like reflections in a mirror than like reflections
which had not yet found a mirror for their home. And they spoke in thin
little voices which Hazen could hear, and said:--
“We’ll help you, Rich! We’ll help you, Strength! We’ll help you, Fun!
Only let us be one of you and we’ll help you win, and you shall reign.
Here are Envy Self and Lying Self and Hate Self and Cruel Self--we’ll
help, if you’ll let us in!”
And when he heard this, Hazen suddenly called out, with all his might:--
“Stop!” he cried, “I’m the ruler here! I’m Hazen!”
And of course he was the ruler--because it was the inside of his own
head.
Instantly there was complete silence there, as when a bell is suddenly
struck in the midst of whisperings. And all the Selves shrank back.
“Hazen!” they said, “we didn’t know you were listening. You be king.
We’ll help--we’ll help.”
“As long as I live,” said little Hazen then, “not one of you shall rule
in here without me. I shall want many of you to help me, but only as
much as I tell you to, and no more. I’m only a furnace boy, but I tell
you that I am king of the inside of my own head, and I’m going to rule
here and nobody else!”
Then, nearer than any of the rest--and he could not tell just where it
came from, but he knew how near it was--another voice spoke to him. And
somewhat it was like the Thought that had spoken to him in the king’s
kitchen and bidden him go up to the king’s library--but yet it was
nearer than that had been.
“Bravely done, Hazen,” it said. “Be king--be king, even as you have
said!”
With the voice came everywhere sweet music, sounding all about Hazen
and in him and through him; and everywhere was air of dreams--he
could hardly tell whether he was watching these or was really among
them. There were sweet voices, dim figures, gestures of dancing,
soft colours, lights, wavy, wonderful lines, little stars suddenly
appearing, flowers, kindly faces, and then one face--the exquisite,
watching face of the Princess Vista at the window, with her hair partly
brushed ... and then darkness....
... When he woke, it was early morning. The sun was pricking through
the leaves of the forest, the birds were singing so sweetly and
swiftly that it was as if their notes overlapped and made one sound on
which everything was threaded like curious and beautiful beads on a
silver cord. The old man was gone; and before Hazen, the way, empty and
green, led on with promise of surprise.
And now as he went forward, eating his bread and gathering berries,
Hazen had never felt so able to make his future. It was as if he were
not one boy but many boys in one, and they all ready to do his bidding.
Surely, he thought, his fortune must lie at the first turn of the path!
But at the first turn of the path he met a little lad no older than
himself, who was drawing a handcart filled with something covered, and
he was singing merrily.
“Hello,” said the Merry Lad. “Where are _you_ going?”
“Nowhere in particular,” said Hazen. And though he had readily confided
to the old man what he was hoping to find, someway Hazen felt that if
he told the Merry Lad, he would laugh at him. And that no one likes,
though it is never a thing to fear.
“Come on with me,” said the Merry Lad. “I am going in the town to sell
my images. There will be great sport.”
And, without stopping to think whether his fortune lay that way, Hazen,
whose blood leapt at the idea of the town and its sports, turned and
went with him.
The Merry Lad was very merry. He told Hazen more games and riddles
than ever he had heard. He sang him songs, did little dances for him
in the open glades, raced with him, and when they reached the dusty
highway, got him in happy talk with the other wayfarers. And by the
time they gained the town, they were a gay little company. There the
Merry Lad took his images to the market-place and spread them under a
tree--little figures made to represent Mirth, Merriment, Laughter, Fun,
Fellowship, and Delight--no end there was to the variety and charm of
the little images, and no end to all that the Merry Lad did to attract
the people to them. He sang and danced and whistled and even stood on
his head, and everyone crowded about him and was charmed.
“Pass my cap about,” he said, while he danced, to Hazen. “They will
give us money.”
So Hazen passed the Merry Lad’s cap, and the people gave them money.
They filled the cap, indeed, with clinking coins, and went away
carrying the images. And by nightfall the Merry Lad and Hazen had more
money than they knew how to use.
“Oh,” the Merry Lad cried, “we shall have a glorious time. Come!”
Now Hazen had never been in the town at night, and he had never been
in any town at any time without some of the king’s servants for whom
he had had to fetch and carry. To him the streets were strange and
wonderful, blazing with lights, filled with gayly dressed folk, and
sounding now and again to strains of music. But the Merry Lad seemed
wholly at home, and he went here and there like a painted moth,
belonging to the night and a part of it. They feasted and jested and
joyed, and most of all they spent the money that they had earned, and
they spent it on themselves. I cannot tell you the things that they
bought. They bought a wonderful, tropical, talking bird; they bought a
little pony on which they both could ride, with the bird on the pony’s
neck; they bought a tiny trick monkey and a suit of Indian clothes with
fringed leggings and head-feathers; and a music-box that played like
a whole band. And when the evening with its lights and pantomimes was
over, they pitched their tent on the edge of the town, picketed the
pony outside, brought the other things safely within, and lay down to
sleep.
Now, since they had no pillows, Hazen took the picture-book which
the princess had given him and made his pillow of that. And as soon
as everything was quiet, and the Merry Lad and the talking bird
were asleep and the pony was dozing at its picket, the princess’s
picture-book began to talk to Hazen. I do not mean that it said
words--it is a great mistake to think that everything that is said must
be said in words--but it talked to him none the less, and better than
with words. It showed him the princess in her blue gown sitting in the
window-seat with her little blue slippers crossed. It showed him her
face as she taught him about the sun and the world, and taught him
her picture-book through. It reminded him that his page-boy’s dress
was worn because, in his heart, he was her page. It brought back the
picture of her standing at the window, with her hair partly brushed,
to wave him a good-bye--“_Now_, good-bye,” he could hear her little
voice. He remembered now that he had started out to find his fortune
and to become wise, _really_ good, loved, and beautiful. And lo, all
this that he had done all day with the Merry Lad--was it helping him to
any of these?
As soon as he knew this, he rose softly and, emptying his pockets of
his share of the money earned that day, he laid it near the Merry Lad’s
pillow, took the picture-book, and slipped away.
The Merry Lad did not wake, but the talking bird stirred on his perch
and called after him: “Stay where you are! Stay where you are!” And
the words seemed to echo in Hazen’s head and were repeated there as if
another voice had said them, and while he hesitated at the door of the
tent, he knew what that other voice was: It was within his head indeed,
and it was the voice of that breezy little Self, all merry and fluffy
and light as lace--the Fun Self itself!
And then he knew that all day long that was the voice that he had been
obeying when he went with the Merry Lad, and all day long that Self had
been guiding him, and had been his ruler. And he himself had not been
king of the Selves at all!
Hazen slipped out into the night and ran as fast as he could. Nearly
all that night he travelled without stopping, lest when day came the
Merry Lad should overtake him. And when day did come, Hazen found
himself far away, and passing the gate of a garden where, in the dawn,
a youth was walking, reading a book. Him Hazen asked if he might come
in the garden and rest for a little.
This Bookman, who was pleasant and gentle and seemed half dreaming,
welcomed him in, and gave him fruit to eat, and Hazen fell asleep in
the arbour. When he awoke, the Bookman sat beside him, still reading,
and seeing that the boy was awake, he began reading to him.
He read a wonderful story about the elements of which everything
in the world is made. He read that they are a great family of more
than seventy, and so magically arranged that they make a music, done
in octaves like the white keys of a piano. So that a man, if he is
skilful, can play with these octaves as he might with octaves of sound,
and with a thousand variations can make what he will, and almost play
for himself a strain of the heavenly harmony in which things began. You
see what wonderful music that would be? Hazen saw, and he could not
listen enough.
Until dark he was in the garden, eating fruit and listening; and the
Bookman, seeing how he loved to listen, asked him if he would not stay
on in the garden, and live there awhile. And without stopping to think
whether his fortune lay that way, Hazen said that he would stay.
Everything that the Bookman read to him was like magic, and it taught
Hazen to do wonderful things. For example, he learned marvellous ways
with sentences and with words. The Bookman showed him how to get inside
of words, as if they had doors, so that Hazen could look from out the
words that were spoken almost as if they had been little boxes, and he
inside. The Bookman showed him how to look behind the words on a page
and to see how different they seemed that way. He would say a sentence,
and instantly it would become solid, and he would set it up, and Hazen
could hang to it, or turn upon it like a turning-bar. It was all great
sport. For sentences were not the only things with which he could
juggle. He showed Hazen how to think a thing and have _that_ become
solid in the air, too. Just as one might think, “Now I will plant my
garden,” and presently there the garden is, solid; or, “Now I will get
my lesson,” and presently, sure enough, there the lesson _is_, in one’s
head, _so_ the Bookman taught Hazen to do with nearly all his thoughts,
making many and many of them into actions or else into a solid, so that
it could be handled as a garden can.
And at last, one night, Hazen thought of the Princess Vista, hoping
that that thought would become solid too, and that the princess would
be there before him, for he wished very much to see her. But it did not
do so, and he asked the Bookman the reason.
“Why does not my thought about the Princess Vista become solid, and the
princess be here beside me?” he asked wistfully.