{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_38005/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_38005","id":"gutenberg_38005","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/38005","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Category: Novels","Dutch fiction -- Translations into English","Fairy tales"],"text":"Produced by Jeroen Hellingman and the Online Distributed\nProofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net/ for Project\nGutenberg (This file was produced from images generously\nmade available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n                                 PSYCHE\n\n                                   By\n\n                             LOUIS COUPERUS\n\n                       Translated from the Dutch,\n                     with the author's permission,\n\n                                   By\n\n                         B. S. Berrington, B.A.\n\n           With Twelve Illustrations by Dion Clayton Calthrop\n\n\n\n                      London: Alston Rivers, Ltd.\n                   Brooke Street, Holborn Bars, E.C.\n                                  1908\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n              \"Cry no more now and go to sleep, and if you cannot sleep,\n               I will tell you a story, a pretty story of flowers and\n               gems and birds, of a young prince and a little princess.\n               ... For in the world there is nothing more than a story.\"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nPSYCHE\n\nCHAPTER I\n\n\nGigantically massive, with three hundred towers, on the summit of a\nrocky mountain, rose the king's castle high into the clouds.\n\nBut the summit was broad, and flat as a plateau, and the castle spread\nfar out, for miles and miles, with ramparts and walls and pinnacles.\n\nAnd everywhere rose up the towers, lost in the clouds, and the castle\nwas like a city, built upon a lofty rock of basalt.\n\nRound the castle and far away lay the valleys of the kingdom, receding\ninto the horizon, one after the other, and ever and ever.\n\nEver changing was the horizon: now pink, then silver; now blue, then\ngolden; now grey, then white and misty, and gradually fading away,\nand never could the last be seen.\n\nIn clear weather there loomed behind the horizon always another\nhorizon. They circled one another endlessly, they were lost in the\ndissolving mists, and suddenly their silhouette became more sharply\ndefined.\n\nOver the lofty towers stretched away at times an expanse of variegated\nclouds, but below rushed a torrent, which fell like a cataract into\na fathomless abyss, that made one dizzy to look at.\n\nSo it seemed as if the castle rose up to the highest stars and went\ndown to the central nave of the earth.\n\nAlong the battlements, higher than a man, Psyche often wandered,\nwandered round the castle from tower to tower, from wall to wall,\nwith a dreamy smile on her face, then she looked up and stretched out\nher hands to the stars, or gazed below at the dashing water, with\nall the colours of the rainbow, till her head grew dizzy, and she\ndrew back and placed her little hands before her eyes. And long she\nwould sit in the corner of an embrasure, her eyes looking far away,\na smile on her face, her knees drawn up and her arms entwining them,\nand her tiny wings spread out against the mossy stone-work, like a\nbutterfly that sat motionless.\n\nAnd she gazed at the horizon, and however much she gazed, she always\nsaw more.\n\nClose by were the green valleys, dotted with grazing sheep, soft\nmeadows with fat cattle, waving corn-fields, canals covered with ships,\nand the cottage roofs of a village. Farther away were lines of woods,\nhill-tops, mountain-ridges, or a mass of angular, rough-hewn basalt.\n\nStill farther off, misty towers with minarets and domes, cupolas and\nspires, smoking chimneys, and the outline of a broad river. Beyond,\nthe horizon became milk-white, or like an opal, but not a line more\nwas there, only tint, the reflection of the last glow of the sun,\nas if lakes were mirrored there; islands rose, low, in the air,\naerial paradises, watery streaks of blue sea, oceans of ether and\nlight quivering nothingness!...\n\nAnd Psyche gazed and mused.... She was the third princess, the\nyoungest daughter of the old king, monarch of the Kingdom of the\nPast.... She was always very lonely. Her sisters she seldom saw,\nher father only for a moment in the evening, before she went to bed;\nand when she had the chance she fled from the mumbling old nurse, and\nwandered along the battlements and dreamed, with her eyes far away,\ngazing at the vast kingdom, beyond which was nothingness....\n\nOh, how she longed to go farther than the castle, to the meadows,\nthe woods, the towns--to go to the shining lakes, the opal islands,\nthe oceans of ether, and then to that far, far-off nothingness, that\nquivered so, like a pale, pale light!... Would she ever be able to pass\nout of the gates?--Oh, how she longed to wander, to seek, to fly!... To\nfly, oh! to fly, to fly as the sparrows, the doves, the eagles!\n\nAnd she flapped her weak, little wings.\n\nOn her tender shoulders there were two wings, like those of a very\nlarge butterfly, transparent membranes, covered with crimson and soft,\nyellow dust, streaked with azure and pink, where they were joined to\nher back. And on each wing glowed two eyes, like those on a peacock's\ntail, but more beautiful in colour and glistening like jewels, fine\nsapphires and emeralds on velvet, and the velvet eye set four times\nin the glittering texture of the wings.\n\nHer wings she flapped, but with them she could not fly.\n\nThat, that was her great grief--that, that made her think, what were\nthey for, those wings on her shoulders? And she shook them and flapped\nthem, but could not rise above the ground; her delicate form did not\nascend into the air, her naked foot remained firm on the ground, and\nonly her thin, fine veil, that trailed a little round her snow-white\nlimbs, was slightly raised by the gentle fluttering of her wings.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\n\nTo fly! oh, to fly!\n\nShe was so fond of birds. How she envied them! She enticed them with\ncrumbs of bread, with grains of corn, and once she had rescued a dove\nfrom an eagle. The dove she had hidden under her veil, pressed close\nto her bosom, and the eagle she had courageously driven off with her\nhand, when in his flight he overshadowed her with his broad wings,\ncalling out to him to go away and leave her dove unhurt.\n\nOh, to seek! to seek!\n\nFor she was so fond of flowers, and gladly in the woods and meadows,\nor farther away still, would she have sought for those that were\nunknown. But she cultivated them within the walls, on the rocky ground,\nand she had made herself a garden; the buds opened when she looked\nat them, the stems grew when she stroked them, and when she kissed\na faded flower it became as fresh again as ever.\n\n\n\nTo wander, oh, to wander!\n\nThen she wandered along the battlements, down the steps, over the\ncourt-yards and the ramparts, but at the gates stood the guards,\nrough and bearded and clad in mail, with loud-sounding horns round\ntheir shoulders.\n\nThen she could go no farther and wandered back into the vaults\nand crypts, where sacred spiders wove their webs; and then, if she\nbecame frightened, she hurried away, farther, farther, farther, along\nendless galleries, between rows of motionless knights in armour,\ntill she came again to her nurse, who sat ever at her spinning-wheel.\n\nOh! to glide through the air!\n\nTo glide in a steady wind, to the farthest horizon, to the milk-white\nand opal region, which she saw in her dreams, to the uttermost parts\nof the earth!\n\nTo glide to the seas, and the islands, which yonder, so far, far\naway and so unsubstantial, changed every moment, as if a breeze\ncould alter their form, their tint; so unfirm, that no foot could\ntread them, but only a winged being like herself, a bird, a fairy,\ncould gently hover over them, to see all that beautiful landscape,\nto enjoy that atmosphere, that dream of Paradise....\n\nOh! to fly, to seek, to wander, to soar!...\n\nAnd for hours together she sat dreaming in an embrasure, her eyes\nfar off, her arms round her knees, and her wings spread out, like a\nlittle butterfly that sat motionless.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\n\nEmeralda, that was the name of her eldest sister. Surpassingly\nbeautiful was Emeralda, dazzling fair as no woman in the kingdom, no\nprincess in other kingdoms. Exceedingly tall she was, and majestic in\nstature; erect she walked, stately and proudly; she was very proud,\nfor after the death of the king she was to reign on the throne of the\nKingdom of the Past. Jealous of all the power which would be hers,\nshe rejected all the princes who sued for her hand. She never spoke\nbut to command, and only to her father did she bow. She always wore\nheavy brocade, silver or gold, studded with jewels, and long mantles\nof rustling silk, fringed with broad ermine; a diadem of the finest\njewels always glittered on her red golden hair and her eyes also were\njewels; two magnificent green emeralds, in which a black carbuncle\nwas the pupil; and people whispered secretly that her heart was cut\nout of one single, gigantic ruby.\n\nOh, Psyche was so afraid of her!\n\nWhen Psyche wandered through the castle and suddenly saw\nEmeralda coming, preceded by pages, torches, shield-bearers, and\nmaids-in-waiting, who bore her train, and a score of halberdiers,\nthen she was struck with fear, and hastily concealed herself behind a\ndoor, a curtain, no matter where, and then Emeralda rustled by with a\ngreat noise of satin and gold and all the trampling of her retinue, and\nPsyche's heart beat loudly like a clock, tick! tick! tick! tick! till\nshe thought she would faint....\n\nThen she shut her eyes so as not to see the cold, proud look of\nEmeralda's green emeralds, which pierced through the curtains, and\nsaw Psyche well enough, though she pretended not to see her. And\nwhen Emeralda was gone, then Psyche fled upstairs, high up on to the\nbattlements, fetched a deep breath, pressed her hands to her bosom,\nand long afterwards her little wings trembled from fear.\n\nAstra, that was the name of the second princess. She wore a living\nstar upon her head; she was very wise and learned; she knew much more\nthan all the philosophers and learned men in the kingdom, who came\nto her for counsel.\n\nShe lived in the highest tower of the castle, and sometimes, along\nthe bars of her window, she saw clouds pass by, like spirits of\nthe mist. She never left the tower. She sat, surrounded by rolls of\nparchment, gigantic globes, which she turned with a pressure of her\nfinger; and after hours of contemplation she described, with great\ncompasses, on a slab of black marble, circle after circle, or reckoned\nout long sums, with numbers so great that no one could pronounce them.\n\nSometimes she sat surrounded by the sages of the land, and the king\nhimself came and listened to his daughter, as in a low, firm voice\nshe explained things. But because she possessed all the wisdom of\nthe earth, she despised all the world, and she had had constructed on\nthe terrace of her tower a telescope, miles long, through which she\ncould look to every part of the illimitable firmament. And when the\nsages were gone, and she was alone, then she went on to the terrace\nand peered through the giant, which she turned to all the points of\nthe compass. Through the diamond lenses, cut without facets, she saw\nnew stars, unknown to men, and gave them names.\n\nThrough the diamond lenses she saw sun systems, spirals of fire,\nshrivel up through the illimitableness of the universe.... But she\nkept gazing, for behind those sun systems, she knew, were other\nspheres, other heavens, and there farther still, illimitably far,\nwas the Mystic Rose, which she could never see....\n\nSometimes, when Psyche wandered round the castle, she knocked\nnervously, inquisitively at Astra's door, who graciously allowed her to\nenter. When Astra stood before the board and reckoned out long sums,\nPsyche looked very earnestly at her sister's star, which glistened\non her head, in her coal-black hair. Or she went on to the terrace\nand peeped through the telescope, but she saw nothing but very bright\nlight, which made her eyes ache....\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\n\nIn the evening, before she went to sleep, Psyche sought the king.\n\nA good hundred years old he was, his beard hung down to his girdle,\nand generally he sat reading the historical scrolls of the kingdom,\nwhich his ministers brought him every day.\n\nBut in the evening Psyche climbed on to his knees and nestled in\nhis beard, or sat at his feet in the folds of his tabard, and the\nscroll fell to the ground, and crumpled up, and the withered hand of\nthe mighty monarch stroked the head of his third child, the princess\nwith the little wings.\n\n\"Father, dear,\" asked Psyche once; \"why have I wings, and cannot fly?\"\n\n\"You need not fly, child; you are much safer with me than if you were\na little bird in the air.\"\n\n\"But why then have I wings?\"\n\n\"I don't quite know, my child....\"\n\n\"Why have I wings, and Astra a living star upon her head, and Emeralda\neyes of jewels?\"\n\n\"Because you are princesses; they are different from other girls.\"\n\n\"And why, dear father,\" whispered Psyche, secretly, \"has Emeralda a\nheart of ruby?...\"\n\n\"No child, that she has not. She has, it is true, eyes of emerald,\nbecause she is a princess--as Astra has a star and you two pretty\nwings--but she has a human heart.\"\n\n\"No, father, dear, she has a heart of stone.\"\n\n\"But who says so, my child?\"\n\n\"The nurse does, father, her own pages, the guards at the gates,\nand the wise men who come to Astra.\"\n\nThe king was very sad. He and his daughter looked deep into each\nother's eyes, and embraced each other, for the king was sad, on\naccount of what he saw in the future, and Psyche was frightened:\nshe always trembled when she thought of Emeralda.\n\n\"Little Psyche,\" said her old father, \"will you now promise me\nsomething?\"\n\n\"Yes, father, dear.\"\n\n\"Will you always stay with me, little Psyche? You are safe here,\nare you not? and the world is so great, the world is so wicked. The\nworld is full of temptation and mystery. Winged horses soar through\nthe air; gigantic sphinxes lurk in the deserts; devilish fauns roam\nthrough the forests.... In the world, tears are shed, which form\nbrooks, and in the world people give away their noblest right for the\nlowest pleasure.... Stay with me, Psyche, never wander too far away,\nfor under our castle glows the Nether-world!... And life is like a\nprincess, a cruel princess with a heart of stone....\"\n\nOf precious stone, like Emeralda, thought Psyche to herself. Who rides\nin triumph with her victorious chariot over the tenderest and dearest,\nand presses them stone-dead into the deepest furrows of the earth....\n\n\"Oh, Psyche, little Psyche, promise me always to stay here in this\nhigh and safe castle: always to stay with your father!\"\n\nShe did not understand him.\n\nHis eyes, very large and animated, looked over her into space, with\ninexpressible sadness. Then she longed to console him, and threw her\nwhite arms round his neck; she hid herself, as it were, in his beard,\nand she whispered playfully:\n\n\"I will always stay with you, father dear....\"\n\nThen he pressed her to his heart, and thought that he would soon\ndie....\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\n\nPsyche was often very lonely, but yet she had much: she had the\nflowers, the birds; she had the butterflies, which thought that she\nwas a bigger sister; she had the lizards, with which she played,\nand which, like little things of emerald, she held against her veil;\nshe had the swans in the deep castle moats, which followed her when\nshe walked on the ramparts; she had the clouds, which came floating\nfrom distant islands and paradises beyond; she had the wind, which\nsang her ballads; the rain, which fell down wet upon her and covered\nher wings with pearls. She would gladly have played with the pages in\nthe halls, have laughed with the shield-bearers in the armoury, have\nlistened to the martial tales of the bearded halberdiers at the gates,\nbut she was a princess and knew she could not do that, and she always\nwalked past them with great dignity, maidenly modest in her fine, thin\nveil, which left her tender limbs half exposed. That was the noble\nNakedness, which was her privilege as a princess, a privilege given\nher at her cradle, together with her wings by the Fairy of Births,\nas to Emeralda was given the Jewel and to Astra the Star. For never\nmight Psyche wear Jewel or Star, and never might Emeralda or Astra go\nnaked. Each princess had her own privilege, her birthright. Adorable\nwas Psyche as, unconscious of her maidenly, tender purity, she was seen\nwith her crimson glittering wings, naked in the folds of her veil,\nwalking past the armour-bearers and soldiers, who presented their\nswords or halberds as the princess, nymph-white, stepped past them.\n\nPsyche was often very lonely, for her nurse was old and mumbled\nover her spinning-wheel; playmates Psyche had not, because she was\na princess, and she would not get court-ladies till she was older\nand more dignified. But with the birds and the clouds and the wind\nPsyche could speak and laugh, and she was seldom dull, although she\nsometimes wished she were no longer Princess of Nakedness with the\nwings, but one of those very ordinary peasant-girls whom she had\nseen milking the cows, or plucking the thick bunches of grapes in\nthe vineyard at harvest-time, whilst the pressers, handsome brown\nlads with sturdy arms, encircled the girls and danced.\n\nBut Psyche wandered along the ramparts; she looked at the clouds\nand spoke with the wind, and she asked the wind to give flight to\nher wings, so that she could fly far off to the opal landscapes that\nkept shifting and changing. But the wind rushed away with a flapping\nnoise of wings that Psyche envied, and her own wings flapped a little,\nbut in vain.\n\nPsyche looked at the clouds. They floated along so stately in all\nkinds of forms--in the forms of sheep, swans, horses--and the form\nnever remained: the seeming forms, thick-white in the blue ether,\nwere constantly changing. Now she saw three swans which were drawing\na boat, in which stood three women, who guided the swans; then she\nsaw the women become a tower, the swans a dragon; and from far,\nfar away came a knight, sitting on a winged horse. But now slowly\nthe scene changed into a flock of little silver-fleeced, downy sheep,\nwhich were browsing far off in the sunshine as in a golden meadow. The\nknight disappeared, but the horse glided nearer and flew on his wings,\nhigh over the castle, towards the sheep.\n\nThen Psyche dreamed at night of the swans, the tower, the dragon,\nthe knight, the horse; but the horse she liked best, because it had\nstrong wings. And next morning she gazed from the battlements to see\nif the horse would come again.\n\nBut then the sky was either gloomy from the rain or blue from the\nabsence of clouds, or covered with white peacock's feathers, splendid\nplumes, but motionless, far, far away in the air. The wind changed,\nwhen she said: \"Away! blow now from the East again! Begone, North\nwind, with your dark perils, begone! Begone, West wind, with your\nrain-urns! Begone, South wind, with your peacock's feathers! Come\nnow, wind from the East, with your treasures of luxurious visions,\nye dragons, ye horses, ye girls with swans!...\" Then the clouds began\nto shift, the winds to blow, and play an opera high up in the air,\nand Psyche, enchanted, sat and gazed.\n\nThen after weeks, after she had missed it for weeks, came again the\nwinged horse.\n\nAnd she beckoned to it to approach, to descend to her; but it flew past\nover the castle. Then she missed it again for many days, and, angry,\nshe looked at the sky and scolded the wind. But then the horse came\nagain, and, laughing, she beckoned to it. The horse ascended high,\nits wings expanded in the air, and oh, wonder! it beckoned to her\nto come up, up to it. She gave a sign that she could not, shook her\nlittle shoulders helplessly, and, trembling, flapped her wings and\nspread her arms wide out to say that she could not. And the horse\nsped away on the breath of the wind from the East.\n\nThen Psyche wept, and, sad at heart, sat looking at the far, far-off\nlandscapes which she would never reach.\n\nBut weeks afterwards the treasure-bringing wind blew again, and again\nappeared the horse in the horizon, and it flew near and beckoned to\nPsyche, her heart heavy with hope and fear.... The horse mounted up;\nit beckoned to her.... She gave a sign that she could not; and oh! she\nfeared that it would speed away again, the horse with the strong wings.\n\nNo ... no ... the horse descended! Then Psyche uttered a joyful cry,\nsprang up, danced with delight and clapped her little hands. From the\nlofty, lofty sky the horse came down, gliding on its broad wings. It\ncame down.\n\nAnd Psyche, the little, joyful, excited Psyche, saw it coming, coming\ndown to her. It descended--it approached. Oh, what a beautiful horse\nit was! Greater than the greatest horses, and then with wings! Fair it\nwas, fair as the sun, with a long curly mane and long flowing tail,\nlike a streamer of sunny gold. The noble head on its arched neck\nproudly raised and its eyes shone like fire, and a stream of breath\ncame from its expanded nostrils, cloud after cloud. Big, powerful,\nmuscular, its wings were stretched out like silvery quills, as\nPsyche had never seen in a bird before. And its golden hoofs struck\nthe clouds and made them thunder; and sparks of fire shot forth in\nthe pure, clear daylight. Enraptured Psyche had never seen such a\nbeautiful horse before, never a bird so beautiful; and breathless,\nwith her head raised, she waited till it should descend, descend on the\nterrace.... At last there it stood before her. Its nostrils steamed,\nand its hoofs struck sparks from the basalt rock, and it waved its\nmane and switched its tail.\n\n\"Splendid, beautiful horse,\" said Psyche, \"who are you?\"\n\n\"I am the Chimera,\" answered the horse, and his voice sounded deep\nas the clang of a brazen clock.\n\n\"Can you really speak?\" asked Psyche, astonished. \"And fly? Oh,\nhow happy you must be!!\"\n\n\"Why have you called me, little princess?\" said the Chimera.\n\n\"I wanted to see you quite near,\" replied Psyche. \"I only saw you dart\nlike winged lightning through the air, so soon were you away again;\nand I was always sorry when I could not see you any more. Then I\nbecame, oh, so sad!\"\n\n\"And why did you want to see me quite near, little princess with\nthe wings?\"\n\n\"I find you so beautiful. I have never seen anything so beautiful;\nI did not know that anything so beautiful existed. What are you? A\nhorse you are not. Nor a dragon either, nor a man. What are you?\"\n\n\"I am the Chimera.\"\n\n\"Where do you come from?\"\n\n\"From far away. From the lands which are beyond the lands, from the\nworlds beyond the worlds, from the heavens beyond the heavens.\"\n\n\"Where are you going?\"\n\n\"Very far. Do you see those distant regions yonder, of silver\nand opal? Well, thousands of times so far I am going.... I go from\nillimitableness to illimitableness; I come from nothingness and I am\ngoing to nothingness.\"\n\n\"What is nothingness?\"\n\n\"Everything. Nothingness is as far as your brains can think, my little\nprincess; and then still farther, and nothingness is more than all\nthat you see from this high tower....\"\n\n\"Are you never tired?\"\n\n\"No, my wings are strong; I can bear all mankind on my back, and I\ncould carry them away to the stars behind the stars.\"\n\n\"If Astra knew that!\"\n\n\"Astra knows it. But she does not want me. She reckons out the stars\nwith figures.\"\n\n\"Why do you fly from one end to the other, O splendid Chimera? What\nis your object? What are you for?\"\n\n\"What is your own object, little Psyche? What are you yourself for? For\nwhat are flowers, men, the stars? Who knows?\"\n\n\"Astra....\"\n\n\"No, Astra knows nothing. Her knowledge is founded on a fundamental\nerror. All her knowledge is like a tower, which will fall down.\"\n\n\"I should like to know much. I should like to know more. I should\nlike to seek far through the universe. I long for what is most\nbeautiful.... But I do not know what it is. Perhaps you yourself are\nwhat is most beautiful, Chimera.... But why are you now spreading\nout your wings?\"\n\n\"I must go.\"\n\n\"So soon? Whence? Oh, why are you going so soon, splendid Chimera?\"\n\n\"I must. I must traverse illimitableness. I have already stayed here\ntoo long.\"\n\n\"Stay a little longer....\"\n\n\"I cannot. I may not.\"\n\n\"Who compels you, O powerful horse, quick as lightning?...\"\n\n\"Power.\"\n\n\"What is power?\"\n\n\"God....\"\n\n\"Who is God? Oh, tell me more! Tell me more! Don't go away yet! I want\nto ask you so much, to hear so much. I am so stupid. I have longed\nso for you. Now you have come, and now you want to go away again.\"\n\n\"Do not ask me for wisdom; I have none. Ask the Sphinx for wisdom;\nask me for flight.\"\n\n\"Oh, stay a little longer! Don't flap so with your flaming wings! Who\nis the Sphinx? O Chimera, do not give me wisdom, but flight!\"\n\n\"Not now....\"\n\n\"When, then?\"\n\n\"Later....\"\n\n\"When is that?\"\n\n\"Farewell.\"\n\n\"O Chimera, Chimera...!\"\n\nThe horse had already spread out his wings broad. He was ascending. But\nPsyche suddenly threw both her arms round his neck and hung on to\nhis mane.\n\n\"Let me go, little princess!\" cried the horse. \"I ascend quickly,\nand you will fall, to be dashed to pieces on the rock! Loose me!\"\n\nAnd slowly he ascended....\n\nPsyche was afraid; she let go her arms; she became dizzy, fell against\nthe pinnacle, and bruised one of her wings. That pained her ... but\nshe heeded it not; the horse was already high in the air, and she\nfollowed his track with her eyes....\n\n\"He is gone,\" thought she. \"Will he come again? Or have I seen him\nfor the first and last time?\"\n\n\"As a dream he came from far-off regions, and to still farther\nregions he has gone.... Oh, how dull the world seems! How dead is\nthe horizon! And how dizzy I feel.... My wing pains me....\"\n\nWith her hand she smoothed the wrinkle out of her wing; she stroked\nit till it was smooth again, and tears ran down her cheeks.\n\n\"Horrid wings! They cannot fly, they cannot follow the strong\nChimera! I'm in such trouble, such trouble!! But ... no.... Is that\ntrouble? Is that happiness? I know not.... I am very happy...! I am\nso sorrowful.... How beautiful he was! how strong, how sleek, how\nsplendid, how quick, how wise, how noble, how broad his wings! how\nbroad his wings!! How weak I am compared to him.... A child, a weak\nchild; a weak, naked child with little wings.... O Chimera, my Chimera,\nO Chimera of my desire, come back! Come back!! Come back!! I cannot\nlive without you; and if you do not come again, Chimera, then I will\nnot live any longer lonely in this high castle. I will throw myself\ninto the cataract....\"\n\nShe stood up, her eyes looking eagerly into the empty air. She\npressed her hands to her bosom, she wept, and her wings trembled as\nif from fever.\n\nThen suddenly she saw the king, her father, sitting at the bow-window\nof his room. He did not see her, he was reading a scroll. But anxious\nlest he should see her trouble, her despair, and longing desire,\nshe fled, along the battlements, the ramparts, through the passages\nand halls of the castle, till she came to the tower, where her nurse\nsat at her spinning-wheel, and then she fell down at the feet of the\nold woman and sobbed aloud.\n\n\"What is it, darling?\" asked the old crone, frightened. \"Princess,\nwhat is it?\"\n\n\"I have hurt my wing!\" sobbed Psyche.\n\nAnd she showed the nurse the wrinkle in her wing, which was not yet\nquite gone.\n\nThen, with soothing voice and wrinkled hand, the old nurse slowly\nstroked the painful wing till it became smooth.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\n\nThe old king, assisted by pages, sat down slowly on his throne;\nhis ministers and courtiers gathered round him. Then there was a\ngreat rustling of satin and gold, and in came Emeralda, the Princess\nRoyal, the Princess of the Jewel, as her title ran: first pages,\nlife-guards, and then she herself, glittering with splendour, in\nher dress of silver-coloured silk; her bosom blazed with emeralds,\na tiara of emeralds adorned her temples; her red-golden tresses,\nintertwined with emeralds, fell in three-fold plaits down each side\nof her face, from which the eyes of emerald looked proud, soulless,\nice-cold, and arrogant. Court-ladies bore her train. A great retinue of\nhalberdiers surrounded her jewelled majesty, and as she passed along,\nthe trembling courtiers bowed lower to her than they did to the king,\nbecause they were in deadly fear of her.\n\nAstra, with dragging step, followed her. She wore a dress of azure\ncovered with stars, a white mantle full of stars, and her living star\nsparkled in her coal-black hair.\n\nThe sages of the country surrounded her: grey-haired men in\nvelvet tabards, with very long silver beards, dim eyes, and wise,\nclose-pressed lips.\n\nThe two princesses sat down on either side of the throne.\n\nAnd for a moment the middle space of the hall between the waiting\ncrowd remained empty. But then appeared Psyche, the third daughter,\nthe Princess of Nakedness with the wings! Shyly she approached, looking\nright and left, with the laugh of a child. She was naked: only a golden\nveil was tied in a fold round her hips. Her wings were spread out\nlike a butterfly's. She had no retinue: only her old nurse followed\nher; and she was so pretty and charming that people forgot to bow as\nshe passed along, that the courtiers smiled and whispered, full of\nadmiration, because she was so beautiful in her pure chastity. Slowly\nshe walked along, shy and laughing a little; then close to the throne,\nwhere her father saw her approaching hesitatingly, her bare foot got\nentangled in her trailing golden veil, and to ascend the steps she\nlifted it up, knelt down, and kissed the king's hand.\n\nThen calmly she sat down on a cushion at his feet, and was no longer\nshy. She looked round inquisitively and nodded a greeting here and\nthere, child as she was, till all at once, to the right of the throne,\nshe met the emerald look of Emeralda, and started and shivered;\na cold thrill shot through her limbs, and she hid herself in the\nermine of her father's mantle to be safe and warm.\n\nThen there was a flourish of trumpets, and at the door of the Hall\nheralds announced Prince Eros, the youthful monarch of the Present. He\ncame in all alone. He was as beautiful as a god, with light-brown\nhair and light-brown eyes. He wore a white suit of armour over a\nsilver shirt of mail, and his whole presence portrayed simplicity\nand intelligence.\n\nThe courtiers were astonished at his coming without a suite; Emeralda\nlaughed scornfully aside with one of her court-ladies. She did not\nfind him a king, that plain youth in his plain dress. But Eros had\nnow approached and bowed low before the mighty monarch, and the latter\nbade him welcome with fatherly condescension.\n\nThen spoke the prince:\n\n\"Mighty Majesty of the Past, accept my respectful thanks for your\nwelcome. Diffident I come to your throne, for I am young in years,\nhave little wisdom, little power. You reign over an extensive kingdom,\nthe horizon of which is lost in illimitableness. I reign over a\ncountry that is not larger than a garden. From my humble palace,\nthat is like a country-house, I can survey all my territory. Your\nMajesty possesses lands and deserts, which you do not know. I know\nevery flower in my beds. And that your Majesty, in spite of my poverty\nand insignificance, receives me with much honour and acknowledges me\nas sovereign in my kingdom, fills my heart with joy. Will your Majesty\npermit me to kneel and pay my homage to you as an obedient vassal?\"\n\nThen the old king nodded to Psyche, and the princess rose, because\nEros was about to kneel.\n\nThen said the king: \"Amiable Eros, I love you as a son. Tell me,\nhave you any wish that I can satisfy? If so, then it is granted you.\"\n\nThen said Eros: \"Your Majesty makes my heart rejoice by saying that you\nlove me as a son. Well, then, my greatest joy would be to marry one\nof the noble princesses, who are your Majesty's daughters. But I am\na poor prince, and whilst confessing to your Majesty my bold desire,\nI fear that you may think me too arrogant in presuming to cherish a\nwish that aims so high....\"\n\n\"Noble prince,\" said the king, \"you are poor, but of high birth and\ndivine origin, higher and more divine than we. You are descended from\nthe god Eros; we from his beloved Psyche. The history of the gods is\nto be read in the historical rolls of our kingdom. It would make my\nheart rejoice if you found a spouse in one of my princesses. But they\nare free in their choice, and you will have to win their love. Permit\nme, therefore, first of all to present to you my eldest daughter,\nthe Princess Royal, Princess of the Jewel: Emeralda....\"\n\nEmeralda rose, and bowed with a scornful sneer.\n\n\"And,\" continued the monarch, \"in the second place, to my wise Astra,\nPrincess of the Star....\"\n\nAstra rose and bowed, her look far away, as if lost in contemplation.\n\n\"And would Emeralda permit me to sue for her love and her hand?\" asked\nthe prince.\n\n\"Majesty of the Present,\" replied Emeralda, \"my father says that you\nare of more divine origin than we. I, your humble slave, consider\nit therefore too great an honour that you should be willing to\nraise me to your side upon your throne. And I accept your homage,\nbut on one condition. That condition is: That you seek for me the\nAll-Sacred Jewel, Jewel of Mystery, the name of which may not be\nuttered, the noble stone of Supremacy. The legends respecting this\njewel are innumerable, inexplicable and contradictory. But the Jewel\nexists. Tell me, ye wise men of the land--tell me, Astra, my sister,\ndoes the Jewel exist?\"\n\n\"It exists!\" said Astra.\n\n\"It exists!\" said all the wise men after her.\n\n\"It exists!\" repeated Emeralda. \"Prince, I dare ask much of you, but I\nask you the greatest thing that our soul and ambition can think of. If\nyou find me beautiful and love me, then seek, and bring me the Jewel,\nand I will be your wife, and together we shall be the most powerful\nmonarchs in the world.\"\n\nThe prince bowed, and with imperceptible irony said:\n\n\"Royal Highness of the Jewel, your words breathe the splendour of\nyourself, and I will weigh them in my mind. Your beauty is dazzling,\nand to reign with you over the united kingdoms of the Past and the\nPresent, appears to me indeed a divine happiness....\"\n\n\"For other kingdoms exist not,\" added Astra, and the wise men repeated\nher words.\n\n\"Yes,\" murmured the king. \"There is another kingdom....\"\n\n\"What kingdom?\" asked all.\n\n\"The kingdom of the Future,\" said the king, in a low tone.\n\nEmeralda laughed scornfully. Astra looked compassionately. The wise\nmen glanced at each other; the courtiers shook their heads.\n\n\"The king is getting old,\" they whispered. \"The mind of His Majesty\noften wanders,\" muttered the ministers.\n\n\"Our monarch has always had much imagination,\" said the wise men. \"He\nis a poet....\"\n\nBut then spoke the prince.\n\n\"And you, wise Astra, Royal Highness of the Star, will you, like\nEmeralda, allow me to sue for your hand and heart?\"\n\n\"Most willingly, Prince Eros!\" said Astra, with a far-off look and\nin a vague tone. \"But I have conditions to make as well as Emeralda,\nthe Princess Royal. Will you hear them? Then listen. If you see any\nchance of lengthening my telescope, of strengthening the lenses, that\nI can see through them to the confines of the universe, to the last\nsun-system, to the Mystic Rose, to the Godhead Himself, then I will\nbe your wife, and together we shall be the most powerful beings of the\nworld, because then we are omniscient. For the universe is limited....\"\n\n\"The universe is limited!\" said the wise men, after her.\n\n\"Endless is the universe!\" said the king, in a subdued voice.\n\nThe people laughed and shook their heads. \"The king is getting very\nold,\" was repeated everywhere.\n\n\"The king will soon die,\" prophesied the wise men, in a low tone. \"He\nspeaks like an old man, without reason; he will soon die....\"\n\n\"Royal Highness of the Star,\" said the prince, \"your words, pregnant\nwith wisdom, I will also consider. For to be omniscient must indeed\nbe the greatest power. But your Majesty has a third princess,\" he\ncontinued, addressing the king. \"Where is she?\"\n\n\"She is here,\" said the king. \"She is the Princess of Nakedness with\nthe wings. But she is still a child, Prince....\"\n\nPsyche blushed and bowed.\n\nThe prince looked long at her. Then he said to her, gently: \"Your\nHighness is called Psyche? You have the name of the ancestress of your\nrace, as I have the name of the god who begot mine. Is it not true?\"\n\n\"I believe so,\" murmured Psyche, embarrassed.\n\n\"She is still a child, prince--forgive her!\" repeated the king.\n\n\"Will your Majesty not permit me to ask for the hand and heart of\nyour third daughter, the princess?\"\n\n\"Certainly, prince; but she is still so young.... If she leaves me I\nshall be very sad. But if she loves you, then I will give her up to\nyou, for then she will be happy....\"\n\n\"Tell me, Psyche, will you be my wife?\"\n\nPsyche blushed exceedingly. Her naked limbs blushed, her wings blushed.\n\n\"Prince,\" said she hesitatingly and looked bashfully at her father,\n\"you do me much honour. But my sisters are more beautiful and wiser\nthan I. And my father would miss me if I went with you to the kingdom\nof the Present.\"\n\n\"But tell me, Psyche, what conditions do you impose upon me?\"\n\nPsyche hesitated. She was about to exclaim joyfully: \"Catch me the\nChimera, bind him in a meadow to graze, and give me power over him,\nthat I may mount his back and fly through the air as I like.\"\n\nBut she durst not before the whole court and her father. And so she\nonly stammered: \"None, prince....\"\n\n\"Could you love me?\"\n\n\"I don't know, prince....\"\n\nPsyche was shy. She kept blushing, and all at once began to tremble\nand weep.\n\nAnd she looked round to the king, fled to his arms, hid her face in\nhis beard and sobbed.\n\n\"Prince Eros,\" said the king, \"forgive her. You see she is a\nchild. Seek for Emeralda's Jewel, or seek for Astra the Glass which\nwill bring to view the confines of the universe; but leave me my\nyoungest child.\"\n\nThen the prince bowed. An indescribable sadness rose in his soul,\nlike a sea. And pale he stammered, \"I obey your Majesty.\"\n\nThen the king descended from his throne and embraced the prince. And\nwhilst the fanfares sounded, he put his arm through the arm of Eros,\ntook Psyche by the hand, and conducted his guest to the banquet,\nthe princesses following, surrounded by the whole court.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\n\nFor days had Psyche watched in vain, and all hope died out of her\nheart.\n\nBut one windy morning--the thick white clouds were speeding through\nthe air--she saw the desire of her heart again. Far away appeared a\ncloud, but as it drew nearer it became a horse: it was the Chimera.\n\nShe beckoned to it, and the Chimera came down.\n\n\"What do you want, little Psyche?\"\n\nShe clasped her hands imploringly. \"Take me with you....\"\n\n\"You will become dizzy....\"\n\n\"No, no....\"\n\nHe descended, stamping on the basalt rock; the terrace shook, sparks\nflew up, and the steam of his breath shot out in clouds.\n\n\"Take me with you,\" she implored.\n\n\"Where do you wish to go?\"\n\n\"To the islands of opal and silver.\"\n\n\"They are too far away.\"\n\n\"Take me, then, nearer to them; take me with you where you will.\"\n\n\"Are you not afraid?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Will you hold fast to my neck?\"\n\n\"Yes, oh yes!\"\n\n\"Come, then....\"\n\nShe uttered a cry of joy. He bent his knees, and she got up with a\nbeating, thumping heart. Between his flaming wings, on his broad,\nbroad back, she sat almost as safe as in a nest of silver feathers.\n\n\"Trust not to my wings,\" he warned her; \"I move them at every\nstroke. They open and shut, open and shut. Hold fast on to my\nneck. Clasp my mane. If you are not frightened and do not become giddy\nand sick, you will not fall, however high I go. Do you dare, Psyche?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\nShe fastened his mane round her waist, as if it were strong rope of\ngolden flax. She put her arms round his neck.\n\n\"I am ready,\" she said courageously.\n\nHe ascended, very slowly, with his broad wings. Under him, under her,\nthe terrace sank away.\n\nShe shut her eyes, she held her breath, and the blood left her\nheart. Under her the castle sank away.\n\n\"Stop!\" she implored. \"I am dying....\"\n\n\"I thought so, Psyche. You are much too weak. You cannot go up\nwith me....\"\n\nShe opened her eyes slightly. She sat on his back in the silver\ndown, where his quills clave to his light-gold loins. And round her,\ncircles of light revolved, one after the other, and made her dizzy.\n\n\"Descend!\" she implored. \"Oh, descend! I cannot endure it. I have no\nbreath; I am dying.\"\n\nHe descended.... He stood on the terrace. She slid along his wing to\nthe ground. She put her hands before her face, and when she opened\nher eyes she was alone.\n\nThen she was very, very sad. But next day, he appeared again. And,\nmore courageous, she wished to mount him again. He let her do as she\ndesired, and she got on his back. She shut her eyes, but smiled. He\nwent higher and higher with her, without her saying \"Descend.\" She\ntravelled for a time high up in the air, she opened her eyes and kept\nsmiling; she got accustomed to the rarefied air. The third time he\nsoared away with her; she saw, far below, the royal castle, small\nas a toy, towers, ramparts; and then she realised for the first time\nthat she had left the castle.\n\nShe thought of the king.\n\n\"Take me back!\" she said to the horse commandingly.\n\nHe obeyed her. He took her back. But as soon as he was gone, she\nlonged again for him and the lofty air. And she had but one thought,\nthe Chimera. She no longer cared for the flowers which she had planted\nbetween the walls, and the flowers withered. She no longer cared for\nthe swans, and the swans, neglected, followed her in vain, in the\ngreen moats; she forgot to crumble bread for them. And she looked\nat the clouds and she gazed at the wind, thinking only of him, the\nlight-gold horse with the silver wings, because he came on the wind,\non the clouds, which thundered when he struck with his hoofs.\n\nOn the day that he did not come, her fair Chimera, she sat pale and\nlonely, gazing from the battlements, her eyes far away, her arms round\nher knees. In the evening she nestled in the king's beard, in the\nfolds of his tabard, but she durst not tell him that she had ridden\na wondrous winged horse and flown with him through the air. But on\nthe days that her beloved horse had come and taken her away with him,\ncarefully flapping his wings, her face shone with golden happiness in\nthe apotheosis of her soul, and through the gloomy halls, where sacred\nspiders, which were never disturbed, wove their webs, rang Psyche's\nhigh voice, and from the faded gobelin the low vault and the motionless\niron knights strangely re-echoed the words of her joyous song.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\n\n\"Psyche, where do you wish to go?\"\n\n\"To the opal islands, to the seas of light, to the far-off luminous\nstreaks....\"\n\n\"Take a deep breath; hold fast on to my neck; twist my mane more\ntightly round your hand, then we will begin our journey.\"\n\nThe clouds sent forth a rumbling sound of thunder; the Chimera's\nhoofs shot fire; his wings expanded and shut, and his strong feathers\nrustled in the air.\n\nPsyche uttered a cry.\n\nShe had ascended higher than ever before, and under them sank away\nthe castle, the meadows, the woods, the cities, and the river; under\nthem, like a map, lay stretched out province after province, desert\nafter desert, the whole Kingdom of the Past. How great it was! how\ngreat it was! The frontiers receded from view again and again;\nfar down below rose up town after town; river after river meandered\nalong, mountain-ranges rose up one after the other, now only slightly\nelevated, then rising arabesquely through the plains. Then there were\ngreat waters like oceans, and Psyche saw nothing but white foaming\nsea. But on the other side of it began again the strand, the land,\nthe wood, the meadows, the mountains, and so on endlessly....\n\n\"How much farther away are the opal islands, the streaks of light I\nsee in the distance, my beloved Chimera?\"\n\n\"We have already passed them....\"\n\nShe raised her head, bent over his streaming neck, and gazed about her.\n\n\"But I do not see them any longer!\" she said, astonished. \"I see\nwood and meadow, towns and mountains.... Is the world, then, the same\neverywhere? Where are the opal islands?\"\n\n\"Behind us....\"\n\n\"But I do not see them.... Have we passed them without my seeing\nthem? O naughty Chimera, you did not tell me!\"\n\n\"And where are the luminous streaks of the far-off land?\"\n\n\"We are going through them....\"\n\n\"I see nothing.... Below, land; around, clouds, as everywhere. But\nno lands of light.... And yet there, in the distance, very far\naway--what is that, Chimera? I see, as it were, a purple desert on\na sea of golden water, with winding borders of soft mother-of-pearl;\nin the desert are oases like pale emerald, palms with silvery waving\ntops, azure bananas; and over the purple desert trills ether of light\ncrimson, with streaks of topaz.... Chimera, Chimera, what is that\ncountry? What is that beautiful country? The golden sea with its foam\nforms a pearly fringe along the shore; the palms wave their tops to\na rhythm of aerial music, and the bananas, blue, pink, glow in the\nether till all is light there...! Chimera, is that the rainbow?\"\n\n\"No....\"\n\n\"Chimera, is that the land of happiness? Is that the kingdom of\nhappiness? Chimera, are you king there?\"\n\n\"Yes, that is my country. And I am king there.\"\n\n\"Are we going thither?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Do you remain there, Chimera? Do we remain there together?\"\n\n\"No....\"\n\n\"Why not?\"\n\n\"As soon as I have reached my purple land, I must go farther ... and\nthen back again.\"\n\n\"O Chimera, I will not go back! I will forget everything--my father,\nmy country. I will remain there with you!\"\n\n\"I cannot.... But now pay great attention; we are approaching my\nkingdom, little Psyche. Look! now we are going over the sea, now we\nare approaching the shore, lined with soft mother-of-pearl.\"\n\n\"The sea is a dirty green, like an ordinary sea; the borders are\nsand.... You are deceiving me, Chimera! As soon as we approach,\nthen you charm away everything that I saw beautiful.\"\n\n\"Now, under us is the purple desert; under us are the oases of pale\nemerald.\"\n\n\"You are deceiving me, Chimera! The desert glows in the strong sun,\nthe oases fade away to nothing, like a meteor.... Chimera!\"\n\n\"What, Psyche?\"\n\n\"Where are you going?\"\n\n\"To the land, as far off as you can see....\"\n\n\"I care not about it! You always deceive me! You carry me away through\nendless space, and everything beautiful that I see disappears from\nmy view. But yet ... there, behind the horizon, behind the sand of\nthe desert, is a dazzling scene.... Are those silver grottos on a\nsea of light? Does the light there wave like water? Are those groves\nof light, cities of light, in a land of light? Tell me, Chimera,\ndo people of light live there? Is that Paradise?\"\n\n\"Yes, will you go thither?\"\n\n\"Yes, oh yes, Chimera. There is happiness, the highest happiness,\nand there I will remain with you...!\"\n\n\"We are now approaching it....\"\n\n\"Let that land of light now stay, the paradise of glowing sunshine;\ndo not charm away the land of happiness, O naughty Chimera: go to it\nnow with me, and descend with me....\"\n\n\"We are there....\"\n\n\"Descend....\"\n\nHe descended.\n\n\"Have we not yet reached the ground of light?\"\n\n\"Look below: can you see nothing...?\"\n\nShe looked along his wing.\n\n\"I see nothing...! It is night.... It is dark.... Chimera!!!\"\n\n\"What, little Psyche?\"\n\n\"Where is the land of silver light, the land of the people of\nlight? Where is it gone?\"\n\n\"Do you not see it?\"\n\n\"No....\"\n\n\"Then it is gone....\"\n\n\"Whither?\"\n\n\"Behind us, under us....\"\n\n\"Why did you not descend sooner?\"\n\n\"My flight was too quick, and I could not, Psyche....\"\n\n\"You are deceiving me! You could have done so. You would not.... Now\n... now it is night, pitch dark, starless night.... There is an icy\ncoldness in the air.... O Chimera, take me back...!!\"\n\nHe turned with a swing of his powerful wings. And as he turned,\nthe lightning broke forth and darted zigzag through the air, like\nsmooth-bright electric swords; the black clouds parted asunder with\na violent peal of thunder like the clapping of cymbals, a storm of\nwind arose, the rain fell down in torrents...!\n\n\"O Chimera, take me back!\"\n\nShe threw herself on to his neck; she hid her face in his mane,\nand through the bursting storm, whilst at every blow of his hoofs it\nlightened round them, he winged his way, back with her to her country:\nthe Kingdom of the Past, inky there, in the inky night....\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\n\nThe old king was dead.\n\nBlack flags hung from the three hundred towers, and cast their dark\nshadows below.\n\nA dim light fell through the bow-windows into the castle, for the\nthree hundred flags obscured the sun.\n\nWith funeral music, that made the heart feel sad, the procession,\nwith long flickering torches, followed the king's coffin down the\nsteps to the deep vaults below.\n\nThe priests, in black, prayed in Latin; the court, in black, sang\nthe litany; and the princesses, in black, sang alternately a long\nLatin sentence....\n\nBehind the coffin walked, first, Emeralda; behind her, Astra her\nsister; and then little Psyche, wrapped in her black veil. Emeralda\nsang with a voice of crystal; Astra, distracted, was too late in\nanswering; and Psyche's voice trembled when she had to sing alone\nthe long monotonous sentence....\n\nThere, in the deepest vault, they placed the coffin, next to the coffin\nof the king's father, and kneeling round it, they prayed. The low Roman\nvaults receded in impenetrable darkness. They sang and prayed the whole\nlive-long day, and Psyche was very tired; and whilst she was kneeling,\nher little knees quite stiff, she fell asleep against the coffin of\nher father. Her last thought had been to kiss the dear old face for the\nlast time, but she felt nothing but the goldsmith's work, and the great\nround jewels that were in it hurt her head.... Then she fell asleep....\n\nAnd when the court had prayed, and all went up the steps again, there\nabove, to do homage to Emeralda, as queen of the Kingdom of the Past,\nthey all forgot Psyche.\n\nLong, long she slept....\n\nAnd when she awoke, she did not know at first where she was.\n\nThen by the light of the long torches she espied the coffin.\n\nAnd through the crystal of the sarcophagus she saw the dead face of\nthe king, and pressed a kiss upon the glass.\n\n\"Dear father!\" she whispered, trembling, \"why have you gone? I am\nnow quite alone! Of Emeralda I am afraid, and Astra does not think\nof me; she only thinks of the stars. Father, dear, forgive me! I\nhave deceived you. I have travelled through the air on the back\nof the flying horse. But father, dear, the horse is beautiful,\nand I love the Chimera! O father dear, I have deceived you, and\nnow I am alone, and I have nobody who cares for me! You are dead,\nfather, and embalmed, and shut up in gold and crystal and jewels,\nand do not hear your little Psyche. You do not think of your little\ndaughter. Alone! alone! Awe-inspiring is the castle; three hundred\ntowers rise high up in the air. I have never been in all the three\nhundred, however much I have wandered. O father, father, why have\nyou left me? Who is there to love me now? who to protect me now in\nthe world? Father, farewell! I will not stay here; I will go away! I\nwill leave the castle. Great is the world and wicked, but Emeralda\nis powerful and I am afraid of her. If I remain, she will drive me\naway with her look and shut me up all my life, and my wings I shall\nbreak against the unbreakable lattice.\n\n\"Father, farewell! I will not remain here. I will\nflee! Whither? Whither shall I flee? I do not know. O father, dear,\nalone your child remains in the great, unsafe world! Alone! alone! O\nfather, farewell, farewell! and forever!\"\n\nShe rose, she shivered. The dark vaults receded more and more. By the\nlight of the long torches she saw the sacred spiders, which wove web\nafter web; they were never disturbed.\n\n\"Sacred spider!\" said Psyche to a big fat one, with a cross on its\nback, \"tell me where I must go.\"\n\n\"You cannot flee,\" replied the spider, high up in the dark vault, in\nthe middle of its web. \"Everything is as it is; everything becomes as\nit was; happens as it happens; all goes to dust. Every day sinks into\nthe deep vaults of the dark pits under us; under us everything becomes\nthe Past, and everything comes into the power of Emeralda. As soon as\nanything is, it has been, and is in the power of Emeralda. Seek not\nto flee--that is vanity; submit to your lot. The best thing is that\nyou become one of us, a sacred spider, and weave your web. For our\nweb is sacred; our web is indisturbable; and with all our webs, one\nfor the other, we serve the princess and protect her treasures--the\ntreasures of the Past, which behind our weaving go to dust.\"\n\n\"But if they go to dust, of what value are they?\"\n\n\"Foolish child, dust is everything. The Past is dust; remembrance\nis dust. Everything becomes dust; love, jewels--all becomes dust,\nand the sacred dust we watch over behind our webs. Become a spider\nlike us, weave your web, and be wise.\"\n\n\"But I live. I am young, I desire, I love, and I cannot bury myself\nin dust.... Oh, tell me whither I must flee!\"\n\nThe spider laughed scornfully, and moved its eight legs with great\nimpatience.\n\n\"Ask me not about the places of the world--the regions of the\nwind. I sit here and spin. I am holy. I watch over the treasure of\nthe throne. Disturb me no more with your frivolity, and let not your\nwings get entangled in the rays of my web, although you are not a moth,\nbut princess of the Kingdom of the Past....\"\n\nPsyche was frightened. The spider reverenced her because she was\na princess, but coveted with his wicked instinct.... And she drew\nback. She cast a last look at the dead face of her father, and fled up\nthe hundred steps. In every corner sat the sacred spiders and moved\ntheir legs. Shuddering, she fled on. Whither? She thought of her\nlove, the light-gold Chimera, but nowhere could he be with her for\never. She glided with him through the air, and he brought her back\nto the castle. His lot was to fly restlessly through the air. Oh,\nwere she but a Chimera like him, had she but two strong wings instead\nof princesses' wings, she would have gone with him everywhere...!\n\nWhither? Above, from the enthronement-hall, came the sounds of joyful\nmusic. There Emeralda was being crowned. Whither?? She fled to the\nterrace.... Oh, if Emeralda missed her, how angry she would be! She\nwould think that Psyche refused to do her homage. She could never\nreturn. Farewell, flowers, swans, doves!\n\nThe three hundred flags obscured the light. She would never be able to\nsee the Chimera coming. Oh, if he came and she did not see him, and\ndid not beckon to him, and he flew past! He was her only safety! If\nneeds be, she would wait for days together on the battlements. But\nif Emeralda sent to search for her! Oh, if she did, then there was\nthe cataract; then she would throw herself headlong down, for ever,\nfor ever, into the rushing water with its rainbow colours!\n\nA wind arose. That was the wind that brought her beloved. The flags\nflapped and impeded her view. And although she saw nothing, she\nbeckoned as in despair, and called out:\n\n\"Chimera, Chimera!\"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\n\nIt lightened. It thundered. Suddenly between the black flags the\nhorse descended.\n\n\"What is it, little Psyche?\"\n\n\"Take me with you.\"\n\n\"Where?\"\n\n\"Where you like. Take me somewhere. My father is dead. Emeralda\nreigns. I dare not stay here any longer.\"\n\n\"Get up....\"\n\nShe got up. He flew away with her. He flew with her the whole day. The\nsun set; the stars glistened in the dark firmament; and he flew\nback. Again they approached the castle. The day began to dawn.\n\n\"Fly past!\" she entreated.\n\nHe flew on. Under her she could just see the castle, small as a toy;\nthe three hundred towers, where green flags now fluttered because\nEmeralda reigned. He flew on.\n\n\"Chimera!\" she cried. \"I love you; you are the most beautiful, most\nglorious creature that I have ever beheld. Safe I lie upon your back,\ntied to your mane, my arms round your neck. But I am tired. I am\ndizzy. I am cold. Put me down somewhere.... Can you not rest with\nme in a beautiful valley, amongst flowers, near a brook? Are you\nnot thirsty? Are you not tired, and never dizzy and cold? Will you\nnot graze and lie in a meadow? Do you never, never rest? Chimera,\nI love you so! But why this restless flying from East to West, from\nWest to East?\"\n\n\"I must do it, little Psyche.\"\n\n\"Chimera, descend somewhere. Stay somewhere with me. I am tired,\nI am cold. I want to go to sleep on a bed of moss, under the shade\nof trees; sleep there with me.\"\n\n\"I cannot. My lot is to fly through the air, apparently without an\nobject, but yet with an object; and what that is, I do not know.\"\n\n\"But what then does the Power want? You fly through the air; the spider\nspins its web; Emeralda reigns over dust; everything is as it is. Oh,\nlife is comfortless! Chimera, I can hold out no longer! I love you\nwith all my soul, but if you do not descend, then I will loose the\nknots of your mane, I will let go my arms that are so tired, and then\nI shall fall down into nothingness....\"\n\n\"Hold out a little longer. Yonder is the purple desert....\"\n\n\"Oh, that is beautiful!\" she exclaimed. \"But you fly past it, always\npast it...!\"\n\n\"Do you want to rest, Psyche?\"\n\n\"Oh, yes....\"\n\n\"Then I will descend.... Hold out a little longer.\" She held him tight,\nand looked about. He plied his wings with a rapidity that made her\ndizzy; they blew a wind round Psyche....\n\nIn the air there loomed the purple sands on the golden sea, with a\npearly border of foam; the azure bananas, which waved their tops in\nthe light-pink ether....\n\nPsyche held her breath.... \"Would he descend there...?\"\n\nYes, indeed, he was descending ... he was descending. The purple,\nshe thought, grew pale as soon as he descended; the sea was no longer\ngolden, the foliage no longer blue.... But yet, yet it was beautiful,\na dream-conceit, an enchanted land, and he was descending. With his\nbroad wings he glided down. Now he stood still, snorting his breath\nin a cloud of steam. She glided gently down his back on to the sand,\nand laughed, and gave a sigh of relief!\n\n\"Rest now, here, Psyche!\" said he dejectedly, and the quiver in his\nbronze-sounding voice startled her; she laughed no more.\n\n\"Rest now. Look! here are dates, and there is a spring. The soft\nviolet night is rapidly spreading over the sky and cooling the too warm\nair. A few pale stars are already glistening. Now quench your thirst;\nnow refresh yourself and rest.... This is a pleasant oasis. Now sleep,\nlittle Psyche. To-morrow will soon be here.... Farewell!\"\n\nShe looked at him with wondering eyes. She threw herself on his broad,\npowerful, heaving breast, and round his arched neck she threw her\ntrembling arms.\n\n\"What...? What do you say, Chimera?\" she asked, pale with fear. \"What\nare you going to do? What do you mean? Surely you will rest here with\nme in the soft violet night and amongst the blue flowers? With me you\nwill refresh yourself with dates and water? You will let me sleep in\nthe shadow of your wings, and watch over me during the dreadful night?\"\n\n\"No, little Psyche. I am going farther and farther, and then I will\nreturn. Then after weeks ... after months, perhaps, you will see me\nagain in the air....\"\n\n\"You will forsake me? Here in the desert?\"\n\n\"Take courage, little Psyche: you are now too tired to fly farther\nwith me through the air. You would slip from my back and fall into\nnothingness. Here is a pleasant oasis; here are dates and a murmuring\nstream....\"\n\nShe uttered a cry; her sobs choked her. She uttered a second, which\nfrightened the hyenas far away in the desert and made them prick up\ntheir ears. She uttered a third, which rent the night-air, and the\nstars quivered from sympathy.\n\n\"Alone!\" she cried, and wrung her hands. \"Alone! O Chimera, you will\nleave me alone with dates and brook! and I thought ... and still hoped,\nthat you would stay with me, king in your country of the rainbow!\n\n\"Alone! you will leave me alone in a sandy desert, in nothing but sand,\nsand in the night, with a single tree and a handful of water! Alone! O\nChimera, you cannot do that...! For I love you; I adore you with all\nmy soul, and shall die of grief and tears, Chimera, if you fly away\nfrom me! I love you; I worship your golden eyes, your voice of bronze,\nyour steaming breath, your panting flanks, your mane, to which I bound\nmyself, your flaming wings, which carried me far, farther and farther\n... to this place...! O Chimera, lay down your smoking limbs in the\nshadow of the night; lay your noble head in my arms and my bosom, and\ntogether we will rest, and to-morrow fly away farther, united forever!\"\n\n\"I cannot, O little Psyche. I too love you, sweet burden which lay\nbetween my wings--little butterfly with weak wings, that lent strength\nto my flight; but now....\"\n\n\"But now--O Chimera, but now...?\"\n\n\"But now I must go, continue my lonely journey to and fro, without\nknowing why.... Farewell, little Psyche, hope in life, hope in the\nmorrow....\"\n\nHe spread his wings, his limbs quivered, he ascended into the air.\n\nShe wrung her arms, her hands. She sobbed, she sobbed....\n\n\"Have pity!!\" she implored. \"Pity, pity! What have I done? Why do you\npunish me so? My God, what have I done? I have trusted, hoped, given\nmy soul in happiness.... Is happiness then punished? Is it not good\nto hope, to trust, and to love? Ought I then to have mistrusted and\nhated? What do I ask? He no longer hears me! What do I care for the\nproblems of life! Him I love, and in me is nothing but my love and\ndespair, and round me is the desert and the night, and now ... now\nI must die!\"\n\nShe sobbed, and her tears flowed. She was alone. Around her loomed\nthe night, around her stretched the sands as far as the perceptible\nhorizon. And above her glistened the stars.\n\nAnd she wept. Her grief was too great for her little soul. She wept.\n\n\"Alone!\" she sobbed. \"Alone...! I will not quench my thirst, I will\nnot refresh myself, nor will I sleep. I am tired, but I will go on....\"\n\nOn she went, and wept. In the night she walked on through the sand,\nand she wept. She wept from fear and despair. And she wept so, her\ntears flowed so many down her cheeks that they fell, her tears, like\ndrops, great and warm, deep into the sand. Her tears flowed down into\nthe sand. And she wept, she kept weeping, and as she went along ... her\ntears did not stop. Then in the sand, her tears so warm and so great,\nformed little lakes. And as she went and kept going on and weeping,\nthe little lakes flowed into one another, and behind her flowed a\nstream of tears. Meandering after her flowed her tears. And on she\nwent in the night and wept.... After her, meandered faithfully the\nstream of her tears.... And she thought of her lost happiness.... He\nhad forsaken her.... Why...? She had loved him so, still loved him\nso.... Oh, she would always love him so--always, always!\n\nAnd in her love she did not scold him. For she loved him and scolded\nnot. She longed for no revenge, for she loved him....\n\n\"That was fate,\" she thought, weeping. \"He could not do anything\nelse. He was obliged....\"\n\nShe wept. And oh! she was so tired, so tired of the wide sky, so tired\nof the wide sand! Then she thought she could go no farther, and should\nfall into the stream of her tears.... But before her a lofty shadow\nfell with gloomy darkness on the violet night. She looked up, and\nhad to strain her neck to see to the top of the shadow. The shadow\nwas round above, and then tapered off behind.... But she wept so,\nthat she did not see.... Then with her hand she wiped away the tears\nfrom her eyes, and gazed.... The shadow was awful, like that of an\nawfully great beast. And she kept wiping away her tears, which formed\na pool around her, and gazed....\n\nThen she saw. She saw, squatting in the sand, a terribly great beast\nlike a lion, immovable. The beast was as great as a castle, high as a\ntower; its head reached to the stars. But its head was the head of a\nwoman, slender, enveloped in a basalt veil, which fell down, right and\nleft, along her shoulders. And the woman's head stood on the breast\nof a woman, two breasts of a gigantic woman, of basalt. But the body,\nthat squatted down in the sand, was a lion, and the forepaws protruded\nlike walls.\n\nThe night shone. The sultry night shone with diamonds over the\nhorizonless desert. And in the starlight night the beast, terrible,\nrested there, half-woman, half-lion, squatting in the sand, its\npaws extended and its breasts and woman's head protruding, gigantic,\nreaching to the stars. Her basalt eyes stared straight before her. Her\nmouth was shut and so were the basalt lips, which would never speak.\n\nPsyche stood before the beast. Around her was the night; around her was\nthe sand; above her the diamond, shining stars. Silently shuddering\nand full of awe, stood Psyche. Then she thought: \"It must be she,\nthe Sphinx....\"\n\nShe wept. Her tears flowed; she stood in the stream of her tears,\nwhich, winding along, followed her. And weeping, she lifted up her\nvoice, small in the night--the voice of a child that speaks in the\nillimitable.\n\n\"Awful Sphinx,\" she said, \"make me wise. You know the problem of\nlife. I pray you solve it to me, and let me no longer weep....\"\n\nThe Sphinx was silent.\n\n\"Sphinx,\" continued Psyche, \"open your stony lips. Speak! Tell me the\nriddle of life. I was born a princess, naked, with wings; I cannot\nfly. The light-gold Chimera, the splendid horse with the silver wings,\ncame down to me, took me away with him in wanderings through the air,\nand I loved him. He has left me--me, a child--alone in the desert,\nalone in the night. Tell me why? If I know, I shall--perhaps--weep no\nmore. Sphinx, I am tired. I am tired of the air, tired of the sand,\ntired from crying. And I cannot stop; I keep on crying. If you do\nnot speak to me, Sphinx, then I will drown you, gigantic as you are,\nin my tears. Look at them flowing around me; look at them rippling at\nyour feet like a sea. Sphinx, they will rise above your head. Sphinx,\nspeak!\"\n\nThe Sphinx was silent.\n\nThe Sphinx, with stony eyes, looked away into the night of diamond\nstars. Her basalt lips remained closed.\n\nAnd Psyche wept. Then she cast a look at the stars.\n\n\"Sacred Stars,\" she murmured, \"I am alone. My father is dead. The\nChimera has gone. The Sphinx is silent. I am alone, and afraid and\ntired. Sacred Stars, watch over me. See my tears no longer flow;\nfor this night they are exhausted.... I can cry no more. I will go\nto sleep, here, between the feet of the Sphinx. She speaks not, it\nis true; but--perhaps she is not angry, and if she wants to crush me\nwith her foot, I care not. But yet I will go to sleep between her\npowerful feet. In your looks of living diamond, I feel compassion\nthrill.... Sacred Stars, I will go to sleep; watch over me....\"\n\nShe lay down between the feet of the Sphinx, against the breast of\nthe Sphinx. And she was so little and the Sphinx so great, that she\nwas like a butterfly sitting near a tower.\n\nThen she fell asleep.\n\nThe night was very still. Far, far away in the boundless desert, a mist\ndrifted horizonlessly along, and lit up the darkness. The stream of\nPsyche's tears meandered, like a silver thread, far away from whence\nshe had come. She herself slept. The Sphinx, with staring eyes and\nclosed mouth, looked out high into the night. The stars twinkled\nand watched.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\n\nWithout a cloud arose on the horizon the first dawn of day, the round,\nrosy-coloured morning glimmer. And in the dawn appeared the horizon,\nand bordered the sandy plain.\n\nIn the rosy light, gigantic, towered the gloomy Sphinx. Psyche\nslept. But through her weary eyelids, the light softly sent its\nrays, coral-red, and suddenly she awoke. She opened her eyes, but\ndid not move.\n\nShe remained in her slumbering attitude, but her eyes looked about. She\nsaw the desert, without an oasis, only the brooklet of tears that\nmeandered far away from whence she had come. It was like a silver\nthread in the rosy light of the dawn, and she followed its windings\nwith her eye as long as she could. And when she thus looked, she\nbegan to weep again. The tears fell on the feet of the Sphinx, and\nPsyche wept, in her slumbering position. There was a mist before her\neyes, and through the mist glimmered the rosy desert and the little\nglistening stream.\n\nBut now she wiped away her tears, which trickled through her fingers,\nfor she thought she saw ... and that was so improbable. She wiped\nher eyes again, and saw. She thought she saw ... and it was so\nimprobable.... But yet it was so: she saw. She saw someone coming;\nalong every winding of the brook, she saw someone approaching.... Who\nwas it coming there? She knew not.... He came nearer and nearer. Was\nshe dreaming? No, she was awake. He came, whoever he was. He was\napproaching....\n\nShe remained sitting in the same attitude. And he came nearer\nand nearer, following the briny track, till he stood before the\nSphinx. The Sphinx was so great and Psyche so little, that at first\nhe did not see her. But because she was so white, with crimson wings,\nhe saw her, a little thing red and white!\n\nHe approached between the feet of the Sphinx till he stood right\nbefore her.\n\nHe approached reverentially, because she had wept so much. When he\nwas quite close, he knelt down and folded his hands.\n\nThrough her tears she did not recognise him.\n\n\"Who are you?\" she asked in a faint voice.\n\nHe stood up and approached still closer, and then she recognised\nhim. He was Prince Eros, the King of the Present.\n\n\"I know who you are,\" said Psyche. \"You are Prince Eros, who was to\nhave married Emeralda, or Astra.\"\n\nHe smiled, and she said:\n\n\"Why do you come here in the desert? Are you seeking here for the\nJewel, or the Glass that magnifies?\"\n\nHe smiled and shook his head.\n\n\"No, Psyche,\" he said gently. \"I have never sought for the Jewel nor\nfor the Glass.\n\n\"But first tell me: why are you here and sleeping by the Sphinx?\"\n\nShe told him. She spoke of her father who was dead, of the light-gold\nChimera, of the purple desert and the sorrowful night. She told him\nof her tears.\n\n\"I have followed them, O Psyche!\" he replied. \"I have come ever since\nI saw you before your father's throne--a day never to be forgotten!\n\n\"I have come here every day. Every day I leave my garden of the\nPresent, to ask the awful Sphinx for the solution of my problem.\"\n\n\"What problem, Prince Eros?\"\n\n\"The problem of my grief. For I am grieved about you, Psyche, because\nyou would not follow me and stayed with your father.... Now I know\nwhy. You loved the Chimera....\"\n\nShe blushed, and hid her face in her hands.\n\n\"Who could see the Chimera and not love him more than me?\" said Eros\ngently. \"Who could love him, and not weep over him?\" he whispered\nstill more gently; but she did not hear him.\n\nThen he spoke louder.\n\n\"Every morning, Psyche, I come to ask the Sphinx how long I must\nstill suffer, and why I must suffer. And still much more, O Psyche,\nI ask the Sphinx, that I will not tell you now, because....\"\n\n\"Because...?\"\n\n\"Because it would perhaps pain you to hear the question of my heart. So\nI came now, O Psyche, and then I espied a brooklet meandering through\nthe sand. I did not know it; I was thirsty, for I am always thirsty. I\nstooped down and scooped up the clear water in my hand. It tasted salt,\nPsyche: they were tears.\"\n\n\"My tears ...\" she said, and wept.\n\n\"Psyche, I drank them. Tell me, do you forgive me for that?\"\n\n\"Yes....\"\n\n\"I followed the brook, and now I have found you here.\"\n\nShe was silent; she looked at him. He knelt down by her.\n\n\"Psyche,\" said he gently, \"I love you. Because I saw you little and\nnaked and winged, standing amongst your proud sisters--Psyche, I love\nyou. I love you so much, that I would weep all your tears for you,\nand would give you ... the Chimera.\"\n\n\"You can't do that,\" she said sadly.\n\n\"No, Psyche,\" answered he, \"that cannot, alas! be done. I can only\nweep for myself; and the Chimera ... nobody can catch him.\"\n\n\"He flies too fast,\" she said, \"and he is much too strong; but it is\nvery kind of you, Prince Eros....\"\n\nShe stretched out her hand, and he kissed it reverentially.\n\nThen he looked at her for a long time.\n\n\"Psyche,\" said he, gently, \"will the Sphinx give me an answer to my\nquestion this morning?\"\n\nShe cast down her eyes.\n\n\"Psyche,\" he went on, \"I have drunk your tears; I respect your\ngrief, too great for your little heart. But may I suffer it with\nyou? O Psyche, little Psyche, little, in the great desert, now your\nfather is dead, now the Chimera is away, now you are all alone.... O\nPsyche, now come with me! Oh, let me now love you! O Psyche, come now\nwith me! Psyche, alone in the desert, a little butterfly in a sandy\nplain--Psyche, oh, come with me! I will give you a summer-house to\nlive in, a garden to play in, and all my love to comfort you. Don't\ndespise them. All that I have will I give! Small is my palace and\nsmall my garden round it, but greater than the desert and the sky\nis my great love. O Psyche, come with me now! Then you will suffer\ncold and hunger and thirst no more, and the grief that your heart\nnow suffers, Psyche, ... we will bear together.\"\n\nHe stretched out his arms. She smiled, tired and pale from weeping,\nslid from the foot of the Sphinx, and nestled to his heart.\n\n\"Eros,\" she murmured, \"I suffer. I pine. I weep. I gave away all that\nI had. I have nothing more than my grief. Can grief ... be happiness\nin the Present?\"\n\nHe smiled.\n\n\"From grief ... comes happiness,\" he answered. \"From grief will come\nhappiness, not in the Present, but ... in the Future!\"\n\nShe looked at him inquiringly.\n\n\"What is that?\" she asked. \"Future...! It is a very sweet word.... I do\nnot know what it is, but I have heard it before.... Father sometimes\nspoke of it with an affected voice.... It seems to be something\nfar away, far, far away.... From grief will come ... in the Future\n... happiness!\n\n\"Far behind me lies the Past.... Then I was a child. Now I am a\nwoman.... A woman.... Now I am, Eros, a woman, a woman, who has wept\nand suffered, and asked of the silent Sphinx.... Now I am no longer\na princess, but a woman, a queen ... of the Present....!\"\n\nShe fell against his shoulder and fainted. He gave a sign, and out\nof the air flew a glittering golden chariot, drawn by two panting\ngriffons. He lifted her into the chariot. He held her tight in his\narm, and pressed her to his heart. With his other hand he guided his\ntwo dragon-winged lions through the glowing air of the desert.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\n\n\nWhen Psyche opened her eyes, she heard the soft music of two pipes. And\nshe awoke from her swoon with a smile. She lay still and did not move,\nbut looked about her. She was reclining upon a soft bed of purple,\non a couch of ivory. She lay in a crystal palace; round the palace\nwere pillars of crystal and a round crystal gallery. The pillars were\nentwined with roses, yellow, white, and pink, and they perfumed the\nsunny spring morning. Through the gallery of pillars, through the walls\nof crystal, she saw round her a pleasant meadow, like a round valley,\na valley like a garden, through which ran a murmuring brook between\nbeds of flowers. Quite near appeared the horizon of a low hill-slope,\nand the cloudless sky was like a chalice of turquoise.\n\nThe pipes changed their music. Psyche raised herself a little higher,\nleaning on her arm; she laughed and looked about. In the middle of the\ncrystal palace was a basin of white marble, full of water, and doves\nwere hopping about it or drinking. Sitting at the gate of crystal\npillars, Psyche saw two girls; with their fingers they raised the\nflutes to their mouth and played. Psyche laughed and listened. Then\nshe fell back on the bed again, happy, but tired, full of rest and\ncontentment, and she raised her head and looked up!...\n\nThrough a crocus-coloured curtain fell the tempered spring sunshine,\nquiet and soft, joyous and still.\n\nPsyche breathed more freely, and a sigh escaped from her heart. She put\nher arms under her head; her wings lay stretched out right and left\non either side of her, and when she heard the music of the flutes,\nher thoughts drifted away like an aimless dream, like rose-leaves\nupon water.\n\nShe dreamed and she listened.... She no longer felt tired, and her\neyes, which had shed a brook of tears, felt moist and fresh, cooled\nby an invisible hand, with invisible care. Her breathing was regular,\nand her soul felt safe.... And she smiled continually....\n\nThe pipes ceased playing....\n\nThe two girls, seeing that the queen had awaked, rose up and approached\nher bed with a basket of red-blushing fruit, which they set down\nnear her. Then they made a deep reverence, but spoke not, and sat\ndown again by the pillars and blew their pipes anew; but to another\ntune, somewhat louder, like a voice calling, and both in unison. The\npipes sounded jubilant in the morning, and outside, high in the air,\nthe lark answered joyously....\n\nPsyche smiled, stretched out her hand and took a peach, a pear,\na bunch of blue grapes.... The pipes played merrily together, and\nhigher and higher and higher soared the lark and sang. Then Psyche\nheard the brook babbling gently; the doves answered one another,\nand round her the morning sang her welcome.\n\nThen footsteps light approached her softly; the pipes ceased playing;\nthe girls rose and made a deep reverence. And between the pillars of\ncrystal appeared Prince Eros, the King of the Present.\n\nThe girls withdrew, and Eros approached and knelt before Psyche.\n\nHe said nothing, but looked at her.\n\n\"Eros,\" said Psyche, \"I thank you.... I have rested; my eyes cease\nto burn; my hunger is appeased.... I have heard sweet music, and\neverything appeared kind and to love me.\"\n\n\"Everything in my kingdom is glad that the queen has come. Everything\nis glad that the queen has awaked.\"\n\n\"The Queen of the Present,\" murmured Psyche.\n\nThen she put her arm round his neck, and leant her head against his\nshoulder. \"Eros,\" said she gently, \"I love you.... How shall I express\nmy love to you! You have walked in the track of my tears, my salt\ntears you have drunk; out of the desert, from the breast of the awful\nSphinx, you lifted me in your chariot, drawn by swift griffons.... In\nmy swoon I felt myself going through the air, not with the speed of\nthe fair Chimera, whose hoofs struck lightning and made the thunder\nroll high in the ether ... but smoothly and evenly on wheels, over\nthe clouds delicately tinted with the glowing dawn. How long did we\ntravel...? How long have I slept? Eros, how shall I express my love\nto you! My love is deep gratitude, inexpressible, because you rescued\nme. My love is heart-felt thankfulness, because you have cared for\nand refreshed me. My love is....\"\n\nShe paused for a moment, and rose from the bed.\n\n\"What, Psyche?\" said he gently, and stood up.\n\n\"My love is deep, submissive respect, O Eros, because you wanted to\nweep my tears and give me the wish of my heart, which, had it been\nfulfilled, would have caused you the most poignant grief.\"\n\nShe sank upon her knees and took his hand in hers and kissed it\nlong. He lifted her up and pressed her to his breast.\n\n\"My gentle Psyche!\" said he. \"My child and my wife and my tender\nprincess! Kneel not to me. In love it is sweet to give and to\nsuffer. Love gives, and love suffers....\"\n\n\"I have only suffered, but not given,\" said Psyche, in a low tone.\n\n\"To suffer is to give most. To give to one we love the suffering of his\nsuffering soul, is the greatest gift that can be given, my child and\nmy princess! Try, with the remembrance sacred to Suffering and Love,\nendured and loved, to be happy in the Present. Oh, let the Past be\na remembrance, a sacred remembrance, a golden remembrance; but now\nlook to the Present. Oh, let the Present comfort you--the Present,\nlittle, humble, and poor. Look! this is all. This cupola is my palace,\nthis garden is my kingdom; these flowers and these birds, they are all\nmy treasures--roses and doves and the singing lark. More I have not;\nbut I have still my love--my love, great as the heaven and wide as the\nuniverse. But he who lives in love so great, needs no greater palace\nand no greater kingdom to rule over. For the treasures of Emeralda I\nwould not exchange my kingdom and my love.... Psyche, my queen, yet\nI have ornaments for you. The Princess of Nakedness with the wings\nmay never wear jewels of precious stones, and jewels I have not. But\npearls, Psyche, I have pearls which Emeralda despises. Pearls, Psyche,\nI found in your tears of yesterday. See! I strung them together,\nthey were a crown for you. Pearls may adorn you, tears may adorn\nyou, my child of suffering, my wife of love, queen of my soul and of\nmy kingdom....\"\n\nThen he took a little crown of twelve great pearls and put it on her\nhead. Then he hung a necklace of pearls round her neck. And as she\nstood before him naked, so immaculately delicate in her princessly\nnakedness, he threw around her loins a light, thin veil, richly\nadorned with pearls, and which she fastened in a knot. Then he gave\nher a mirror, and she beheld herself very beautiful, crowned like a\nqueen, and smiled with contentment.\n\n\"Am I a queen?\" she said softly. \"Am I happy? Eros, do you love me? Is\nthis the happiness of the Present? Eros, do I love you out of gratitude\nand respect, my husband and my king...?\"\n\nHe led her gently away, through the porticos, down the crystal\nsteps. Cupids hovered about them, the lark sang high in the heavens,\nthe roses perfumed the air, the brook murmured gently. The spring\nrejoiced to welcome them, and behind the shrubs the pipes played\na duet. The hill-slope of the horizon was peaceful, and above, the\nheaven, arched like a turquoise chalice.\n\nEverything sang, everything was fragrant; in the grass buzzed thousands\nof insects; about the flowers fluttered butterflies; and where Psyche,\non her husband's arm, walked along the flower-beds, all the flowers\nbowed to her in homage--the white slender lilies, the violets with\nlaughing eyes, tall flowers and short flowers, on long and short\nstems--and all gave forth their fragrance.\n\nEros pointed around.\n\n\"This is the Present, Psyche,\" said he, and pressed her to his heart.\n\n\"And this is happiness, that is as a lily and a violet ...\" she\nwhispered, with her lips to his.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII\n\n\nThe pleasant days followed each other like a row of laughing\nhouris.... Eros and Psyche tended the flowers, which did not fade when\nPsyche stroked the stems or gently kissed the calyces. They wandered\nalong the brook, and, if the days were warm, sought coolness under\nthe crocus-coloured awning, in the crystal palace, where the doves\ncooed round the basin. The flutes played, or Eros himself took a lyre\nand sang, at Psyche's feet, the stories of days gone by.\n\nIt was one of the pleasures of the flower-laughing Present.\n\nBetween the shrubs, where May strewed fragrant snow-blossom, naked,\nchubby cupids with tender wings played or romped, hovering like little\nclouds in the air.\n\nThe sweet nights followed the pleasant days; the diamond stars, the\nsame which Psyche had entreated to watch over her in the desert,\nglittered in the heavens. Under the roses, close to one another,\nslumbered the fair-winged children, tired out with play, their little\nmouths open and their chubby legs all folds. The air was heavy with\nthe breath of lilac and jasmine; it was spring, it was the Present,\nit was night...!\n\nAnd while Psyche lay with her head against Eros' shoulder and he wound\nhis arm round her waist, while Psyche looked up at the stars, sacred\nin the violet night, the nightingale broke out into melody. The bird\nsang, and sang alone; everything was still. The bird sang, and let\nher notes fall in the air like drops of sprinkled sound, like the\nharmonious falling of water from a playing fountain. The bird sang,\nand Psyche closed her eyes, and felt on her lips Eros' kiss.\n\nThe days followed the nights. It was always the sweet pleasure of\nflowers and birds, of spring and love, cupids and roses, music and\ndance. The flowers were more beautiful, and did not fade; the fruits\nwere sweeter and of richer colour; the spring air was lighter, and\nlife was happier than a golden day. It was day which lasted days and\nnights; it was the Present.\n\nIf Psyche were alone she longed for Eros, and when she saw him again\nshe spread out her arms, and they loved each other. If Psyche were\nalone, she wandered about in the rosy spring morning; the flowers\nbowed down to her; the brook flowed cool over her feet; she played\nwith the winged cherubs, who flew about her head like butterflies; she\nsat down in the moss full of violets; she bade the children take off\nher crown, loosen the plaits of her long hair, untie the knots of the\ndrapery round her loins, and she lay down on the bank of the brook;\nher hand played with the clear cold water, and, naked in the shade\nof flowery shrubs, she fell asleep and the cupids round her. Then\nthe step of the king awoke her; the children awoke; they dressed her,\nand she went to meet her husband, and received him with open arms. It\nwas the sweet delight of the Present.\n\nOne day she was sleeping naked under the shrubs, the boys round about\nher; on the moss lay her crown and her veil, and the brooklet flowed\non, gently murmuring. The day was very still, heavy with warmth. A\nstorm was brewing, but the sky was still blue. In the far-off distance,\nwhere the horizon was like waves of the sea, clouds pregnant with\nstorm curled up gloomily like ostrich feathers. And once there was\nlightning, but no thunder.\n\nThen above the ridge of the hill something dark appeared to rise\nagainst the stormy clouds. It was round like a head, like a black\nhead. From the black head leered two eyes, black as jet, and nothing\nmore appeared. Long leered the eyes; then from the palace a voice\ncried.\n\n\"Psyche, Psyche!\"\n\nPsyche awoke, and the cupids with her. Eros approached and led her\naway. The air grew dark, and the next moment the summer storm burst\nforth, dark sky, lightning, rain, and thunder rapidly rolling on. It\nlasted only for a time; then the sky became blue again, the flowers\nrecovered their breath and raised their drooping heads, shaking with\nfresh rain.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV\n\n\nNext day, when Psyche was sleeping again by the brook, the dark head\nwith the leering eyes of jet appeared again on the horizon. For a long\ntime the eyes leered, full of lust. Then the head rose up higher like\na dark sun, behind the hill-slope in the sky.\n\nIt was a face tanned by the sun, with coal-black hair; round the\ntemples a wreath of vine leaves, and from the wreath protruded two\nhorns like those of a young goat.\n\nThe eyes looked lustful and young, as though they were jet and\ngold. The lips laughed in the curly beard, and the sharp teeth were\ndazzling white; the pointed ears stood up.\n\nThen the dark face became perfectly visible in the light; the shoulders\nrose brown and naked, and two brown hands with long fingers lifted to\nthe lips a pipe of short and long reeds. The pipe played a fanfare,\na march of very quick notes. Then it stopped, and the gold-jet eyes\nleered. Psyche moved in her sleep. Then the pipe sounded again,\nand Psyche opened her eyes. Astonished, she listened to the notes\nof the pipe, as they rose and fell so as she had never heard before,\nlively and wanton, quick and playful. She sat up, leant on her arm,\nand looked....\n\nShe started. There, on the horizon, like a dark sun, she saw the brown\nface and the lips in the curly beard blowing the reeds, short and\nlong. Psyche started and looked on trembling. Then the pipe stopped\nagain, and roguishly the head nodded to her. Psyche was frightened; she\nwoke the boys. She fled away. From the palace Eros came to meet her.\n\nAt first she meant to speak, but he kissed her; and why, she did\nnot know, but she spoke not. Then she made up her mind to tell Eros\nthat night, but in her husband's arms she lacked the courage to\nspeak. She did not tell him. The next morning she resolved not to\nrepose again in the moss by the brook. But that afternoon she played\nwith the cupids, and tired, fell asleep in the same place. The pipe\nawoke her; on the horizon, the brown face stood out against the sun,\nand roguishly nodded to her.\n\nPsyche, indignant, looked up.\n\nThe head rose, the shoulders rose, and the whole form then rose up:\na sunburnt youth, with the legs of a goat, rough-haired and cloven\nhoofs. There he stood, his dark shadow reflected in the golden rays\nof the setting sun. He blew his reeds; he piped lustily and merrily,\nroguishly and joyously and as well as he could, to please Psyche. She\nlistened--about her the boys were sleeping--and she smiled. He saw\nher smile and smiled too. Then proudly she pointed with her finger\nfor him to go. He went, but the next day he was there again. Then she\nsaw him every day. He stood in the sun, which was going down, and blew\nhis reeds, laughed and nodded to her roguishly. Sometimes Psyche bade\nhim be gone; sometimes she pretended not to see who was playing there;\nsometimes she listened graciously. When she heard the king call:\n\n\"Psyche! Psyche!\" she woke the cupids, who dressed her in a moment,\nand went to meet her husband. She kissed him, and wished to tell him\nthat every day a young man with goats' legs stood on the hill and\nplayed upon his pipe. But because she had kept silence so long, she\nwas silent again, and could not open her lips. It made her sad, and\nEros saw her sadness, and often asked her what it was that disturbed\nthe equanimity of her soul. She said \"Nothing,\" and embraced him\nand declared that she was happy. But when the lark warbled and the\nnightingale's sweet notes were heard, when Eros sang to the lyre and\nthe brook murmured gently, Psyche always heard, between the pleasant\nsounds, the impudent tunes of the reeds, short and long. She tried not\nto hear, but she always heard them. They sounded saucily and merrily,\nlike the sounds of a little bird in a wood calling something to her\nfrom afar; she heard, but did not yet understand what.\n\nOne day, when he stood in the same place blowing lustily with\npuffed-out cheeks, Psyche, indignant, rose with her lips closely\npressed together. She put her veil on and wound it tightly round\nher loins, without waking the boys. Then, with a firm step and\ninnocently, she crossed a little slope, and came into a valley, a\nvalley of grass; there the brook flowed away between multitudes of\nirises and narcissi. The goat, leering and laughing, tripped nimbly\ndown the hill on his hoofs to meet her.\n\n\"Who are you?\" said Psyche haughtily.\n\n\"I am the Satyr,\" said he deferentially. \"And now will you just see\nme dance?\"\n\nHe piped a waltz, and danced for her to the measure of his tripping\nmusic. He turned out his feet, spun round and round, and underneath,\non his back, she saw his tiny tail wagging. She laughed, and found\nhim amusing, with his tail, and feet, and horns. Then he turned a\nsomersault, and finished his dance with a bow.\n\n\"You may not come here,\" said Psyche severely. \"This is the Kingdom\nof the Present, and I am the queen, and my husband is Eros, the\nking of this kingdom. You dance indeed nicely, and you play rather\npretty tunes, but you may not come here. We have here the lark and\nthe nightingale, and my husband sings to the lyre.\"\n\n\"That is classical music,\" said the Satyr.\n\n\"I don't know what you mean by classical music. But you may not come\nhere and pipe, and disturb me in my afternoon slumber. If my husband\nknew it, he would be very angry, and have you torn to pieces by two\nraging griffons.\"\n\n\"I am not afraid of that,\" said the Satyr. \"Why, I tame panthers,\nand they are much more dangerous.\"\n\n\"I had pity on you,\" continued Psyche severely, raising her head in\nqueenly dignity, \"and have not yet said anything to the king. But if\nyou come again to-morrow, I will tell him.\"\n\n\"No, you won't!\" said the Satyr saucily.\n\n\"You are an ill-mannered boy!\" said Psyche, angry and offended. \"You\nmust not speak so to a princess. I ought not to condescend to speak\nto you. I can see very well that you don't know how people behave\nat court, and that you come from the wood. And you are ugly, too,\nwith your hairy feet and your tail.\"\n\nThe Satyr looked at her astonished.\n\n\"I think you very pretty!\" he whispered admiringly. \"Oh, I think you\nso pretty! You have such pretty eyes, and such golden hair, and such\na white skin! Only, I don't like your wings. The nymphs haven't any.\"\n\n\"You may not speak to me like that!\" said Psyche vexed. \"I am the\nqueen. How dare you? Go away now, else I will call the wild beasts\nhere.\"\n\n\"Well, don't be angry!\" said the Satyr in a low, imploring\ntone. \"That is my way of speaking. We all speak like that in the\nwood. The Bacchantes, too, are not particular what they say. We are\nunacquainted with your court language. And we don't know anything of\nclassical music. But we are always very merry and sociable together;\nbut you must come once....\"\n\n\"Are you going?\" said Psyche imperiously, and red with passion,\nand with her finger she pointed to him to be gone. He crouched down\nsuddenly in the reeds of the brook among the irises and narcissi,\nand she saw him stealing away through the high grass. When she turned\nround she beheld the cupids; they were bringing her her crown.\n\n\"The king is looking for you, Psyche!\" they cried out in the distance,\nand like a cloud they hovered round her.\n\nShe went back with them and threw herself into the arms of her husband.\n\n\"Don't roam so far away, my little Psyche!\" said Eros. \"In the wood\nbehind the hills are wild beasts....\"\n\nNight came on; Eros sang, the nightingale filled the air with her\nsweet notes.\n\n\"Classical music!\" thought Psyche.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XV\n\n\nPsyche had a secret. Why did she not tell it? She did not know. She\ncould not, after having once kept silent. She knew that she was not\ndoing right by being silent, and yet she did not speak. But she was\nvery sad about it, and felt dissatisfied. Then she wanted to speak with\nEros; but because she had said nothing at first, she was afraid. And\nthen she said to herself: \"The Satyr does nothing wrong by standing\nthere and piping a little, and it is not worth while thinking much\nabout it....\"\n\nAnd yet she did think about it, and in her ears she always heard his\nsaucy voice, his coarse words, countrified and funny.\n\nThen she laughed about it all.\n\n\"But what does he do--what is he? a Satyr? What is a Satyr? What are\nBacchantes? And what are nymphs? Panthers, too, I have never seen. I\nshould like to see them. What is their life there in the wood? There\nare many lives in the world, and most of them are a secret. I only\nknow the courtiers of the Kingdom of the Past.... Here there are the\ntwo girls that play on the pipe and the winged children. I should\nlike to see all that there is in the world, and experience all that\nis in life. There must be strange things, which I never see.... The\nChimera was glorious, and deep in my soul I always long for him; but\nin other respects everything is the same.... No wonders take place\nin this garden.... Eros is a young prince; then there are the doves,\nthe griffons, the cupids.... That is all so commonplace.... Oh,\nto seek, to wander! The world is so great! the universe is awful,\nalthough it has limits. My father said it had no limits.... Oh, if it\nhad no limits...! Oh, to seek, to wander, to soar in the air!... I\nshall never see the Chimera again. Never shall I soar in the air\nagain.... He conjured up visions for me, and then let them pass\naway.... Oh, to soar through the air! When shall I see him again,\nand when shall I soar again...? Eros I love--he is my husband; but he\nhas no wings. The Chimera had powerful wings of silver feathers. He\nhas left me for ever....\"\n\nSo, alone with her thought, she wandered in the garden. The cupids she\ndrove away, and, crying, they hid themselves among the roses. When\nthe Satyr appeared, she went to meet him in the valley, where the\nirises were blooming.\n\n\"So, you are there again!\"\n\n\"Yes! won't you just see me dance again?\"\n\nHe danced and frisked his tail.\n\n\"I have already told you more than once that you may not come here,\"\nsaid Psyche severely.\n\nHe winked roguishly; he knew very well that his presence was not\ndisagreeable to her.\n\n\"You are so beautiful!\" he said, in his most flattering tone; \"much\nmore beautiful than any of the nymphs.\"\n\n\"And the Bacchantes, then?\" said Psyche.\n\n\"Much more beautiful than the Bacchantes!\" he answered. \"But they\nare also very nice. Tell me, wouldn't you like to see them?\"\n\nPsyche was very inquisitive, and he noticed it.\n\n\"Won't you just see them?\" he repeated temptingly.\n\n\"Where?\" said Psyche.\n\n\"Look ... there!\" He pointed in the distance with his finger.\n\nOn the hill Psyche saw forms madly whirling round in a dance.\n\n\"Those are the Bacchantes!\" said the Satyr. Psyche laughed.\n\n\"How madly they whirl round!\" she exclaimed. \"Are they always so\nmerry?\"\n\n\"Oh, we are always dancing,\" said the Satyr. \"In the wood it is always\npleasure. We play at tag with one another, we drink the juice of the\ngrapes, and we dance till nightfall.\"\n\n\"Psyche! Psyche!\" called a voice.\n\nIt was her husband. The Satyr fled through the flags, and Psyche\nhastened back.\n\nShe threw herself into Eros' arms, who asked her where she had\nbeen. And without answering him, she began to cry and hid her face\nin his breast.\n\n\"What is it, little Psyche?\" asked Eros. \"Are you in trouble? Amongst\nthe roses the boys cry, and by the brook the queen cries. Is there\nthen sadness in my kingdom? Does not Psyche feel happy?\"\n\nShe wept and shrugged her shoulders, as if to say that she did not\nknow. And she hid her face in his breast.\n\n\"Tell me, Psyche, what is the matter?\"\n\nShe would have liked to tell him, but she could not; a stronger power\nkept her back.\n\n\"Does not Psyche feel happy? Does she long for the Chimera?\"\n\nShe laid her little hand upon his lips.\n\n\"Don't speak about him. I am not worthy of him. I am not worthy of\nyou, Eros.\"\n\nHe kissed her very gently.\n\n\"What does my Psyche think about? May I not leave her any more,\nalone by the brook?\"\n\n\"No, no!\" said she hastily, and drew his arms round her.... \"No,\"\nshe continued quickly. \"Don't leave me alone any more. Always stay\nby me. Protect me from myself, O Eros...!\"\n\n\"Is little Psyche ill?\"\n\nShe nodded in the affirmative, and laid her burning head upon his\nbreast; she nestled against him and shut her feverish eyes.\n\nHe stayed by her, and all around was still, and the cupids appeared\nfluttering in the air. That night she slept in Eros' arms. She awoke\nfor a moment out of her sleep; far away in the distance through the\ncrystal of the palace she heard the sound of pipes. She raised her\nhead and listened. But she would not hear any more, and hid herself\nin Eros' arms and fell asleep on his heart.\n\nThe next day he stayed by her, and they wandered to the brook. Sadness\nhung over the garden, the flowers drooped. In the afternoon Psyche\nbecame uneasy; she heard the pipe, and in the distance caught a\nglimpse of vague forms dancing.\n\n\"Do you see nothing?\" she asked Eros.\n\n\"No....\"\n\n\"Do you hear nothing?\" she said again.\n\n\"No,\" he answered. \"Poor Psyche is ill. And the flowers are ill too,\nbecause she is. Oh, let Eros cure you...!\"\n\nThe following night, in the arms of her husband, she heard the pipe. It\nplayed saucy, short, lively tunes. \"Come, come, now dance with us;\nwe are drinking the grapes. Come ... come...!\"\n\nShe could resist no longer. Trembling, she loosed herself from her\nhusband's arms, who was asleep. She got up, stole out of the palace,\nfled through the garden to the alluring voice.\n\nThe flowers in the brook seemed to entreat her: \"Oh, go not away! Oh,\ngo not away!\" The nightingale uttered a cry, and she thought it was\nan owl.\n\nShe hurried on to the valley, where the irises were in blossom. There,\nnear the brook, in the light of the moon, stood the Satyr, tripping\nto the sound of his pipe, and round him, hand in hand, madly danced\nthe Bacchantes, naked, a panther's skin cast about them, their wild\nstreaming hair encircled with vine-leaves. They danced like drunken\nspectres in the pale moonlight night; they waved their thyrsus, and\npelted each other with grapes, which smashed to juice upon their faces.\n\n\"Come, come!\" they cried triumphantly.\n\nPsyche was startled by their voices, rough and hoarse. But they opened\ntheir circle, two stretched their hand out to Psyche, and they danced\nround with her. The wild dance excited her; she had never known till\nthen what dancing was, and she danced with sparkling eyes. She waved\na thyrsus, and pressed the grapes to her mouth.... Then suddenly the\nSatyr caught hold of her and kissed her passionately, pressing the\ngrapes to her lips....\n\n\"Psyche! Psyche!\"\n\nShe started and stood still. The Bacchantes, the Satyr, fled.\n\nPsyche hastened back; with her hand she wiped her contaminated,\nburning lips.\n\n\"... Psyche!\"\n\nShe ran to meet Eros, but when she saw him, godlike and beautiful as an\nimage, spotlessly pure in the moonlight, with his noble countenance,\nhis deep brown eyes full of love, she was so disgusted with herself\nthat she fell at his feet in a swoon.\n\nHe lifted her up and laid her on the bed.\n\nHe watched while she slumbered.\n\nThe whole night he watched by her....\n\nAnd it seemed as if she were wandering in her mind....\n\nHer face glowed with fever, and ever and anon she wiped her lips.\n\nOutside in the garden the flowers drooped in sorrow. The lark was\nsilent, and the little angels sat together with their wings drawn\nin. The sky was ash-coloured and gloomy.\n\nThat night Psyche slept in Eros' arms, and afar off the pipe allured\nher....\n\nShe extracted herself from Eros' embrace and got up....\n\nShe wanted to kiss him for the last time, but durst not, for fear of\nwaking him.\n\n\"Farewell!\" she whispered very gently. \"Noble Eros, beloved\nhusband, farewell! I am unworthy of you. The Satyr's kiss is still\nburning on my lips; my mouth is on fire from the juice of the\ngrapes. Farewell...! And if you can, forgive me!\"\n\nShe went.\n\nThe night was sultry and heavy with thunder; the flowers, exhausted,\nhung their heads; the nightingale uttered a cry, and she thought it\nwas an owl. Bats flitted about with flapping wings.\n\nShe walked with a firm step. She followed the brook to where it\nflowed into the valley. Yonder ... with the Satyr in their midst,\ndanced the Bacchantes.\n\n\"Hurrah! Hurrah!\" they cried out, rough and hoarse, and threw at her\na bunch of grapes.\n\nShe hesitated a moment.... She raised her eyes. Through the gloomy\nnight a single star glistened like a cold, proud eye.\n\n\"Sacred star!\" said Psyche, \"you who watched over me before, and now\nleave me for ever ... tell him that I am unworthy of him and beg him\nto forgive me!\"\n\nThe star hid itself in the darkness.\n\n\"Come!\" cried the Bacchantes.\n\nPsyche took a step forward....\n\n\"Brook!\" she then cried, \"little stream of the land of the Present,\nbabbling pure and peacefully, in which I never more may cool myself\n... oh, tell him that I am unworthy of him and beg him to forgive me!\"\n\nThe brook went murmuring over the stones, and muttered: \"No, no....\"\n\n\"Come, come!\" cried the Bacchantes.\n\nThen Psyche plucked a single violet, white as a maiden's face.\n\n\"Sweet violet!\" said she, \"humble flower, don't be proud. Your queen,\nwho is forsaking her kingdom, entreats the star and brook in vain. She\nis no longer a queen. She is no longer obeyed. Sweet violet, hear\nthe prayer of Psyche, who, unworthy, is forsaking the Present....\"\n\n\"Stay, Psyche!\" implored the flower in her hand.\n\n\"Dear little flower!\" said Psyche, \"born in the moss, withering when\nyou are plucked, what do you know of gods and mortals? What do you\nknow of soul and life and power? Psyche can no longer stay. But beg\nLove to forgive her...! Oh, give him my last message!\"\n\nShe kissed the flower and laid it in the moss.\n\n\"Psyche! Psyche! Come!\" cried the Bacchantes.\n\nShe sprang forward into the midst of the dance.\n\n\"Here I am!\" she cried wildly. And they dragged her away with them\nto the wood.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVI\n\n\nWhen Eros awoke that morning, he found not Psyche by his side. He\ngot up, thinking that she was in the garden, and went out.\n\nThe sky was dull and lowering, a mist hung over the hills. The lark\nhad not sung, the cupids were not fluttering about.\n\n\"Psyche!\" cried he, \"Psyche!\"\n\nNo answer was returned. No sigh rustled in the leaves of the trees;\nno insect hummed in the grass; the flowers hung down withered on\ntheir limp stems. A deathly chilliness reigned around. A fearful\npresentiment took possession of Eros. He walked along the flower-beds,\nalong the brook.\n\n\"Oh! where is Psyche?\" he cried. \"Oh, tell me, water, flowers, birds,\nwhere is Psyche!!\"\n\nNo answer was returned. The brook flowed on murkily and noiselessly,\nthe flowers lay across the path; no bird sang among the leaves. He\nwrung his hands and hastened on. Then he came to the spot where Psyche\nwas wont to rest in the moss by the brook, in the shade of the shrubs.\n\n\"Who will tell me where Psyche is?\" he exclaimed in despair, and\nthrew himself on the moss and sobbed.\n\n\"Eros!\" cried a weak voice.\n\n\"Who speaks there?\"\n\n\"I, a white violet, which Psyche plucked.... Hear me quickly, for\nI feel I am dying, and my elfin voice is scarcely audible to your\near. Listen to me ... I am lying close to you. Take me in your\nhand....\"\n\nEros took the flower.\n\n\"Psyche has been enticed by the Satyr into the wood. The Bacchantes\nhave taken her away. This was her last word: that she was unworthy of\nyou, and went away praying for forgiveness.... She could not remain,\nshe said; she went...! Eros, forgive her!\"\n\nThe flower shrivelled up in his hand. Eros rose and tottered; he too\nfelt that he was dying.\n\nSad at heart walked Eros, and all along his path the flowers now lay\nshrivelled. The brook was dry. The lark lay dead before his feet. The\ncupids lay dead in the withered roses.\n\nEros went into the castle and fell upon the purple bed.\n\nA single dove was expiring at the marble basin.\n\nThe strings of the lyre were all broken....\n\nEros too felt that his life was leaving his body.\n\nHe raised his eyes, over which the film of death was stealing, and\nlooked about the castle; the crystal crumbled off and split from the\ntop to the bottom.\n\n\"Sacred powers!\" prayed he, \"forgive her as I forgive her, and love\nher till the End, as I shall and for ever. Let her find what she seeks;\nlet her wanderings once come to an end; let her soar through the air,\nif she must, till she comes to the purest sphere....\" This sphere was\nthe earth, the sweet Present, the little resting-point on which she\ncould not wander, and thus felt within her the irresistible desire....\n\n\"Sacred powers, let her one day find what her happiness is. Then,\nif it is not I.... Let her find....\"\n\nHis voice failed, his eyes opened as in a vision, and he whispered\nand finished his prayer: \"... find ... in the Future...!\"\n\nThat sacred word was his last. He died.\n\nIn the Kingdom of the Present, that once had been as a smiling garden,\neverything was now dead....\n\n\n\nThen ... in the mist, which hung over the ridge of the mountains,\nsomething seemed to be creeping near, something with feet that could\nonly move slowly. From many sides, over the hill-top, the strange\ncreeping came nearer.... Gigantic, hairy feet of monstrous spiders\nwere walking over it; they came nearer and nearer; they were spiders\nwith big, swollen bodies and feet always in motion....\n\nThey were the sacred spiders of Emeralda, Princess of the Past. Eagerly\nthey ran to the dead garden of the Present....\n\nThey surrounded the garden and threw out their filaments to the crystal\nroof of the palace. Then they wove over the Present, that lay dead,\none single gigantic web....\n\nAnd whilst they wove, the dead Present went to dust.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVII\n\n\nIn the wood, in the autumn sun, Autumn was keeping festival.\n\nThe foliage shone resplendent in yellow, bronze, purple, golden-red,\nand pink; the sulphur-coloured moss looked like antique velvet. With\ngusts of wind, the branches, madly arrogant, shook off their exuberance\nof sere and yellow leaves, as if they were strewing the paths with\nsilver and gold and rustling notes.\n\nLoudly laughing danced the dryads through the whirling leaves.\n\nOut of the foaming stream between moss-covered rocks, rose the white,\nnaked nymphs.\n\n\"Where is she? Where is she?\" cried they inquisitively.\n\n\"There she comes! there she comes!\" shouted the mad dryads, and in\nhandfuls they cast the leaves into the air, which whirled over the\nnymphs and fell down on the water.\n\nThe dryads danced past, and the nymphs looked out inquisitively. They\nstood, a naked group, in their rocky bath; their arms were\nclasped round one another; green was their hair and white as\npearls were their bosoms. The sere and yellow leaves kept whirling\nabout. Trampling feet were approaching and were heard amongst the\nrustling leaves. Merry-makers were drawing near; the golden foliage\nquivered like a curtain of thin, fine, gold lace....\n\n\"There she comes! there she comes!\" exclaimed the nymphs with joy.\n\nThe branches cracked, the leaves whirled about, the tender sprays\nrecoiled from the noisy merry-makers, who were advancing.\n\nNearer they came with the sound of pipe and cymbal. Drunken Bacchantes\ndanced before them, waving the thyrsus, hand in hand with fauns and\nsatyrs; they encircled a triumphal car, drawn by spotted lynxes.\n\nHigh on the car sat a youth, beardless, with a wreath of vine-leaves\nround his forehead, full of laughter and animal spirits, with blue\neyes that showed his love of pleasure. Naked were his godlike limbs,\nchubbily formed like the tender flesh of a boy, and his legs were\nlong and slender, his arms rounded like those of a woman. He was the\nprince of the wood, of divine origin: Prince Bacchus was his name.\n\nAnd next to him on the triumphal car, sat little Psyche enthroned. She\ntoo was naked, with nothing on but her veil, and her wings were\nso strikingly beautiful, crimson and soft yellow and with four\npeacock's-feather eyes. Round the car, close together as a bunch of\ngrapes, sported madly a number of wine-gods, tumbling over one another,\ngrape-drunken children.\n\nIn triumph the procession rushed on through the golden wood. The\nBacchantes and satyrs sang and danced; two satyrs drove the lynxes,\nwhich, spiteful as cats, spat at them; the wine-gods entwined the\nvine and bore great heavy bunches of grapes.\n\nHigh up, like a butterfly, which was a goddess, sat Psyche, and\nlaughed with glistening eyes and glowing cheeks, waving to the nymphs.\n\n\"Live! long live Psyche--Psyche with the splendid wings!\" shouted\nthe nymphs.\n\nThe wind blew, the leaves whirled about; the procession swept past as\nthough hurried along by the gale. A little wine-god had fallen and lay\nin the yellow leaves, playing with his chubby legs, purple-red from\nthe juice of grapes; he was crying because he had been left behind;\nthen he succeeded in getting on to his feet, and tottered after the\nprocession....\n\nThe nymphs laughed loudly at the little wine-god; they dived under\nand beneath the rocks.\n\nThe wind blew, the yellow leaves whirled about.\n\nAnd the wood became still and lonely.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVIII\n\n\n\"Psyche, stay!\" said Bacchus entreatingly.\n\n\"No, no, let me alone!\"\n\n\"With you goes all joy from the feast; Psyche, stay!\"\n\n\"I will not always sing, dance, drink. No, no, let me alone!\"\n\nShe pushed him away from her; she pushed the satyrs away from her;\nshe broke the round dance of the Bacchantes, who, drunken, shouted\nwith drunken eyes and wide-open, screaming mouths.\n\n\"Psyche! Psyche!\" screamed all.\n\nShe laughed loudly and coquettishly, like a spoilt child.\n\n\"I will come back to-morrow, when you are sober!\" she said with a\nmocking laugh. \"Your voices are hoarse, your song is out of tune,\nyour last grapes were sour! I will only have the sweet of your feast,\nand the bitter I will leave to you. Spread out your panther skins;\ngo and sleep off your drunkenness. If your feast has to last till\nwinter, you need rest--rest for your hoarse throats, rest for your\ndrunken legs, rest for your heads, muddled with wine.... I will come\nback to-morrow, when you are sober!\"\n\nShe gave a loud, mocking laugh, and rushed into the wood. It was\na moonlight night; in the pale moonbeams she left the wild feast\nbehind. The jealous Bacchantes danced round Bacchus, and embraced him.\n\nPsyche hastened on. Her temples throbbed, her heart beat, and her\nbosom heaved. When she was far enough away, she stopped, pressed both\nher hands to her bosom, and gave a deep sigh. More slowly she went\non to the stream. Fresh was the autumn night, but burning were her\nnaked limbs!\n\nThe wood was still, save that in the top-most branches the wind\nmoaned. Like a silvery ship the moon sailed forth from the luminous,\nethereal sea, and the rushing mountain-stream foamed like snow on the\nrocks. With a longing desire for coolness and water, Psyche stepped\ndown to the flags on the bank; with her hands she put aside the irises,\nand made her way through the ferns and plunged her foot into the water.\n\nThen the nymphs dived up.\n\n\"Psyche! Psyche!\" cried they joyously, \"Psyche with the splendid\nwings!\"\n\nPsyche smiled. She threw herself into the water, and the snow-white\nfoam dashed up.\n\n\"Let me be with you a moment,\" entreated Psyche. \"Let me cool myself\nin your stream.\"\n\nThe nymphs pressed round her and carried her on their arms. She lay\ndown at full length.\n\n\"Cool my forehead, cool my cheeks, cool my heart!\" she cried\nimploringly. \"Dear nymphs, oh, cool my soul! Everything burns on me\nand in me; fire scorches my lips, fire scorches my brain.... O dear\nnymphs, cool me!\"\n\nThe nymphs sprinkled water on her; Psyche put her arm round the neck\nof one of them.\n\n\"Your water-drops hiss on my forehead as on burning metal. Your\nflakes of foam evaporate on the fire in my breast. And on my soul,\nO dear nymphs, you cannot sprinkle your coolness!\"\n\nThe nymphs filled their stream-urns and poured them over Psyche.\n\n\"Pour them all out! Pour them all out!\" cried Psyche entreatingly. \"But\nalthough my hair is dripping, and my wings and my limbs too,\nmy lips are scorched, my poor forehead burns, and within me, O\nnymphs...! within me, my soul is consumed as in hell-fire...!\"\n\nThe nymphs took her gently in their arms; they dived with her below,\nthey came up again; they kept diving up and down.\n\n\"Oh, bathe me, bathe me!\" cried Psyche imploringly. \"Benevolent nymphs,\nbathe me! Some coolness still hangs about my body ... but my soul,\noh, my soul you can never cool!\" She wept, and the nymphs caught up\nher tears in mother-of-pearl shells.\n\n\"Are you collecting my tears? Oh, no, they are not worth it. Once\nI wept a brook full; once they were drunk, drunk by Love; once they\nwere pearls, and Love crowned me with them! Now, now they are like\ndrops of wine, drops of fire, and though they should congeal and\nbecome rubies or topazes, they may never crown me more. Henceforth\nmy tears I shall always shed ... for Emeralda!\"\n\nIn the shells the nymphs saw glistening pearls, and they understood\nnot.... But all their urns they poured out upon Psyche's eyes.\n\n\"My eyes are getting cool, O beloved nymphs; many tears I shall never\nshed again; never again shall I weep a brook full.... But cool my soul,\nextinguish deep within me the burning flames!\"\n\n\"We cannot, Psyche....\"\n\n\"No, no, you cannot, O nymphs! Let me lie still, then, still in your\narms. Let me rock quietly to and fro on your white-foaming water, then\nlet me sleep quietly.... But in my sleep my soul keeps burning; in\nmy dreams I see it flame up, high up as out of a hole in hell.... Oh!\"\n\nShe uttered a cry, as of pain.... The nymphs rocked her in their\nentwined arms, as in a cradle of lilies, and softly sang a song....\n\n\"Nymphs, nymphs....! This is the fire that nothing can extinguish--no,\nnever.... This is remorse....\"\n\nThe nymphs understood her not; they rocked her and sang in a low,\nsoft voice.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIX\n\n\nThat morning she wandered about in the rosy autumn dawn--a mist between\nthe trees stripped of leaves. Along the path she trod; on a skin she\nfound a satyr and a Bacchante lying in a drunken sleep, tight in each\nother's arms; a cup lay on the ground, a broken thyrsus, pressed-out\ngrapes. She hastened on and sought the most lonely spots. The foliage\nbecame scantier, the trees grew farther apart, the wood ended in a\nplain and, violet misty, a perspective of very low hills.\n\nPsyche walked on over the plain and climbed the hills.\n\nThe autumn wind blew and howled between shrubs and bushes, and sang\nthe approach of winter. But Psyche felt not the cold, for her naked\nlimbs glowed: her soul was all on fire.\n\nOn the highest hill-top she looked out, her hand above her eyes,\ngazing into the violet mist.... Unconscious to herself, she hoped\nfor something vague and impossible: that she might see Eros, that\nhe would come to her, that she would fall at his feet, that he would\nforgive her tenderly, and take her away with him. Impossible. \"What\nwas impossible? Could not everything be possible? Had he not followed\nthe track of her tears? had he not found her in the arms of the\nSphinx?\" Oh, she hoped, she hoped, she hoped more definitely! Her\nremorse-burned soul longed for the balsam of his love in the palace\nof crystal, for the sounds of his lyre, for the tender words in the\ngarden of the Present.\n\nShe hoped, she gazed....\n\nIn the pale glow of the morning sun, the violet mist cleared up,\nand parted like violet curtains....\n\nShe gazed: there was the Present....\n\nThere Eros would be, mourning for his naughty Psyche!\n\nThere he would presently forgive her....\n\nOh, how she hoped, how she longed!.... She longed; she stretched out\nher arms and dared cry in a plaintive voice:\n\n\"Eros!\"\n\nThe wind blew through bush and shrub and sang the approach of\nwinter. The violet curtains of mist were drawn aside. The sad autumn\nmorning appeared. There, now visible, lay the Present....\n\nAnd Psyche gazed, screening her eyes with her hand....\n\nThere she saw her happiness of days gone by, destroyed. In a dead,\nwithered garden, a ruin: crystal pillars crumbling to pieces. And\nbetween the pillars, spiders' webs; all over the garden spiders'\nwebs, web upon web, and in them spiders with bloated bodies and\nlazy-moving feet....\n\nThen she saw that Emeralda was reigning!\n\nThen she felt that Eros was dead!\n\nShe had murdered him!\n\nOh, how her limbs glowed, how her soul burned! Oh, the burning pain\nwithin her, deep within--a pain which no grape-juice could allay,\nwhich no mad dance could deaden and the nymphs could not cool, though\nthey poured over her all their urns! Oh, that hell in her soul, for\nthe irretrievable desolation, for the murdered one, past recall! Oh,\nthat suffering, not for herself, but for him--for another! that\nrepentance, that burning remorse!....\n\nShe fell to the ground and sobbed.\n\nThe pale sunbeams faded away, thick grey clouds came sweeping along,\na shower of hail rattled down, flinging handfuls of icy-cold stones....\n\nShe felt a touch on her shoulder. She looked up.\n\nIt was the Satyr who had allured her with his pipe, there, on that\nvery spot.\n\n\"Psyche!\" said he, \"what are you doing here, so far away from all\nof us? Winter is coming, Psyche; listen to the whistling winds, feel\nthe rattling hail; the last leaves are being blown away. We are going\nto the South, and Prince Bacchus is seeking for you.... What are you\ndoing here, and why are you crouching down and weeping?\n\n\"We are having a feast and are fleeing the winter; come!\"\n\n\"I feel no cold; I am burning.... Let me stay here, and weep,\nand die....\"\n\n\"Why should you die, O Psyche, Psyche, so pretty and so gay--Psyche,\nthe prettiest and gayest, who can dance the maddest, who can dance\nout all the Bacchantes? Come!....\"\n\nShe laughed through her tears, a laugh like a piercing shriek.\n\n\"But Psyche, do you know what it is?\" said the Satyr, whispering\nconfidentially. \"Do you know what it is that prevents you from being\nhappy, and why you are not like all of us? I told you before, Psyche:\nit is on account of your wings. Your wings prevent you from putting\na beast's skin round you, and entwining your hair with vine. The\nnymphs find your wings pretty, but what do you want with things\nthat are pretty, yet of no use whatever? If you could only fly with\nthose wings!\"\n\n... \"If I could only fly with those wings!\" said Psyche, sighing. \"No,\nI have never been able to fly with them, my poor, weak wings!\"\n\n\"The nymphs think your wings pretty, but the nymphs are\nsentimental. The Bacchantes think them ugly, and laugh at you in\nsecret. Prince Bacchus does not like wings either; he cannot embrace\nyou well with those things on your back. Psyche, dear Psyche, listen:\nshall I tell you something....? You must let me cut those wings off\nwith a pair of grape-scissors. For when you have got rid of your wings,\nthen you can throw a panther's skin round you, and put a vine-wreath\nround your hair, and you will be altogether one of us....\"\n\nThe wind blew, the hail rattled down: winter was coming on.\n\n... \"Eros is dead!\" murmured Psyche, \"Spring is past, the Present is\nwithered, Emeralda reigns.... 'What are you doing with things that\nare pretty, and have no use at all...?'\n\n\"If I cannot possibly get cool, if I keep burning deep within me\n... it is better, perhaps, to renounce my princess's rights, to go\nnaked no longer, to have no wings....\"\n\n\"Tell me, Psyche, may I cut them off?\"\n\n\"Yes, clip them! Cut them right off, my wings, which are only\npretty!\" she cried fiercely. \"Cut them off!!\"\n\nHis eyes glowed jet and gold, his breath came quickly from joy. He\nproduced his sharp scissors....\n\nAnd whilst she knelt, he cut off both her wings.\n\nThey fell on the ground and shrivelled up.\n\n\"Oh, that pains, that pains!... Oh, that pains!\" cried Psyche.\n\n\"It is a little wound, it will soon heal,\" said the Satyr soothingly,\nbut grinning with pleasure.\n\nThen he threw a panther's skin round her, put a wreath of vine-leaves\non her head, and she was like a fair Bacchante still very young and\ntender, with her white skin, with her tender eyes of soul-innocence,\nin which, deep down, dejection reigned.\n\n\"Psyche!\" cried he delighted, \"Psyche! How pretty you are!\"\n\nShe uttered her shrill laugh, her laugh of bitter irony. He led\nher away down the hills. She looked about: yonder lay the Present,\nreduced to dust and spider-webs. She looked about: in the wind,\nwhich was blowing, her wings whirled away, shrivelled up, whirled\naway like dry leaves.\n\nShe laughed and put her arm round his neck, and they hastened back\nto the wood.\n\nThe wind blew; the first snowflakes fell.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XX\n\n\nSlowly followed the seasons--winter, spring, summer, autumn....\n\nWinter, spring, summer, autumn, fell in turn, like dust, into the\ncaves of Emeralda.\n\nWinter, spring, summer, autumn, were the Present for a moment, and\nsank into the Past.\n\nAnd again it was spring....\n\nIn the grassy plains, the shepherds drove out their flocks, and they\nsang because the sky was blue, because the world trilled with hope,\nin the new and tempered sunshine.\n\nWhat did the shepherds know of Emeralda? They had never seen her. They\nsang, they sang; they filled the air with their song. As a reed,\ntheir song remained quivering and hanging in the air. In the wood\nand in the mountains, over the meadows and in the air, Echo sang with\nthem their song. They sang because the sky was blue....\n\nEmeralda they did not know....\n\nBlue, blue ... blue was the air! Hope quivered in the sunshine,\nand love in their hearts....\n\nInto the grassy plains the shepherds drove their flocks, and they\nsang because the sky was blue.\n\n\n\nOn the border of the wood, where endless plains extended, there lived\nin a grotto between rocks, a holy hermit who was a hundred years old.\n\nHow many seasons had he seen sink into the pits of the Past...!\n\nHow many times had he heard the Lenten song of the shepherds! Wrapped\nin contemplation, he heard them singing. They sang because the sky was\nblue. The lark was soaring because the world trilled with hope.... They\nsang because fleecy lambs were sporting again in the meadows. They\nsang because they were young and loved the shepherdesses. They sang\nof blue sky, of hope, of lambs, and love....\n\nThe hermit continued deep in thought....\n\nEvery spring it was the same song, and he had never sung with\nthem. Never had he known the Present, the spring Present of the\nshepherds.\n\nThe hermit continued deep in thought; he dreamed that Satan was\ntempting him, but his pious mind resisted. He dreamed that he had\ndied in prayer, and his soul, purified, ascended into heaven.\n\nFar off in the grassy plains was heard the bleating of the lambs,\nthe voices of the shepherds.\n\nThe hermit heard a step. He looked up.\n\nHe saw a little form, as of a naked girl with no covering but her\nhair. And he thought it was really Satan, and he muttered an exorcism;\nhe knit his brow, he crossed his arms.\n\nThe little form approached and knelt down.\n\n\"Holy father!\" said she, in a low, trembling voice, \"don't drive\nme away. I am poor and unhappy. I am a sinner, and come to you for\nhelp. I am not shameless, holy father, and I am ashamed that I appear\nbefore you naked. I asked the shepherdesses for something to cover me,\nbut they laughed at me, drove me away and threw stones at me. Father,\nO father, men are merciless, they all drive me away.... I come from\nthe wood, and the wild beasts are not so cruel as men. In the wood the\nbeasts spared me. A lion licked the wounds on my feet, and a tigress\nlet me rest in the lair of her whelps. Holy father, the wild beasts\nhad pity!\"\n\n\"Then why don't you remain in the wood, devil, she-devil?\"\n\n\"Because I must fulfill a duty among men.\"\n\n\"Who lays the task upon you, witch, devil?\"\n\n\"In my dream, soft voices have spoken to me, the voice of my\nfather, and of him whom I loved, and they said: 'Go among men, do\npenance.'... But naked I cannot go among men, for they throw stones at\nme. And therefore, O father, I come to you, and entreat you: give me\nsomething to cover me! I have only my hair to hide me, and under my\nhair I am naked. O father, give me something to cover me! O father,\ngive me your oldest mantle for my penance garb!\"\n\nThe hermit looked up at her, as she knelt in her fair hair, and he\nsaw that she was weeping. Her tears were blood-red rubies.\n\n\"He who weeps rubies has committed great sin; he who weeps rubies\nhas a soul crimson with sin!\"\n\nThe penitent sobbed and bowed her head to the ground.\n\n\"Here,\" said the hermit sternly, but compassionately. \"Here is a\nmantle. Here is a cord for your loins. And here is a mat to sleep\non. And here is bread, here is the water-pitcher. Eat, drink, cover\nyourself, and rest.\"\n\n\"Thanks, holy father. But I am not tired, I am not hungry and\nthirsty. I am only naked, and I thank you for your mantle and your\ncord.\"\n\nShe put on the mantle as a penance-garb, and whilst, red with shame,\nshe covered herself, the hermit saw on her shoulder-blades two\nblood-red scar-stripes.\n\n\"Are you wounded?\"\n\n\"I was, long ago....\"\n\n\"Your eyes glow: have you a fever?\"\n\n\"I do not know men's fever, but my soul is always burning like a cave\nin hell.\"\n\n\"Who are you?\"\n\n\"One heavy burdened with sin.\"\n\n\"What is your name?\"\n\n\"I have no name now, holy father.... Oh! ask no more.... And let\nme go.\"\n\n\"Whither are you going?\"\n\n\"Far, along the way of thistles, to the royal castle. To the Princess\nEmeralda.\"\n\n\"She is proud.\"\n\n\"She is the Princess of the Jewel, and I weep jewels. I shed them\nfor her. Once there was a time ... that I wept pearls.... O father,\nlet me go!\"\n\n\"Go, then.... And do penance.\"\n\n\"Thanks, father.... Oh, give me your blessing!\"\n\nThe hermit blessed her. She went then as a pilgrim in her\npenance-garb. The path was steep and covered with thistles.\n\nIn the distance was heard the song of the shepherds.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXI\n\n\nThe path was steep, and covered with cactus and thistles. It was a\nnarrow path, hewn out of the rocks, winding up the basalt mountain,\nwhere, high on the top, stood the castle. The castle had three\nhundred towers, which rose to the sky; along them swept the clouds. In\nthe path were many steps hewn out of stone. Heavy masses of cactus\ngrew on the side of the precipice, and over the leaves, prickly and\nround, Psyche saw the grassy valleys of the Kingdom of the Past,\nthe villages, the towns, the river: a broad silver streak, and there,\nbehind it, opal-like views, lakes in the sky, and quivering lines of\nether. Higher and higher she went up the steps, up the path, in the\ngloomy, chilly shadow, whilst the sun shone over the meadows. She\nclimbed up, and below she saw the shepherds with their sheep, and\ntheir song, quite faint, came up to her.\n\nIn the coppice she broke a strong stick for a staff. A lappet of her\nmantle she had drawn over her head as a hood. And with her staff and\nher hood, she looked like a pious pilgrim.\n\nThe solitary countryman who was coming down the rocky path, did not\nthrow stones at her, but greeted her reverently.\n\nShe kept climbing up.\n\nHigh in the air lay the castle, gloomy and inaccessible, a town of\ntowers, a Babel of pinnacles; along it swept the clouds. As an innocent\nchild, as a naked princess with wings, Psyche had lived there like\na butterfly on a rock, had wandered along the dreadful parapets,\nhad longed and hoped and dreamed. Oh! her longings of innocence,\nher hope to fly through the air to the opal islands, her dreams,\npure as the doves that flew round about her...!\n\nShe had wandered through clouds, through desert and wood, from the\nNorth to the South. She had loved the Chimera, had put questions to the\nSphinx; she had been Queen of the Present and the beloved of Bacchus,\nand now ... now she came back, wingless, with a soul that burned her\ncontinually, like a scarlet child of hell; now she came back up the\nsteep path....\n\nHer penance-garb she had borrowed. But the thistles tore her foot,\nand pale from pain and suffering, from wounded feet, and ever-smarting\nshoulders, and a soul that burned continually, was her face, that\npeeped out from under her wide hood.\n\nUp, up, she went, supporting herself with her staff....\n\nOh, the voice of her father, of Eros, in her dream, when the\ngrape-dance was over! Then repentance had begun. Then she had fled\nthrough the wood, through the wild beasts. And the lion had licked\nher foot, and the tigress had allowed her to rest in the warm lair\nof her whelps....\n\nThen she went on, climbing higher and higher....\n\nWould she never get to the top? Would the castle, the Babel of\npinnacles, the town of towers remain ever inaccessibly high in\nthe clouds?\n\nHer step left blood behind on the rocky stone.\n\nBut she did not rest. Rest did not help her.\n\nShe preferred to go on, to climb. If she walked, if she climbed,\nthe sooner would she reach the castle.\n\nStep by step she advanced. Oh, she was no longer afraid of\nEmeralda! What could Emeralda do to her to make her afraid? What\ngreater suffering could her sister inflict upon her than the pain of\nremorse, that was ever with her wherever she went!\n\nAnd on she climbed, and the thistles tore her feet, and the solitary\nman who was coming down the rocky path greeted her reverently, when\nhe saw the blood of her footstep.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXII\n\n\nThe night was pitch dark, when she stood before the awful gate and\nasked admittance.\n\nAnd the guards let her in because she wore a holy dress. The\nhalberdiers took her to the hall, where they slept or kept watch,\nand invited her to rest.\n\nShe sat down on a rude bench, she ate their brown soldier's bread,\nshe drank a drop of their wine.\n\nThen she offered them a ruby for their hospitality and evening meal.\n\nAnd while they wondered that a pilgrim possessed such a beautiful\njewel, she said in her strange voice, weak, tired, and yet commanding:\n\n\"I have still more topazes and rubies and dark purple carbuncles. Tell\nthe princess that I have come to do her homage and give her my jewels.\"\n\nThe message was sent to Emeralda, and the queen asked the pilgrim to\ncome. She sent pages to conduct her to the throne where she sat.\n\nAnd Psyche understood that Emeralda was afraid of treachery, afraid\nof the approach of soul, and therefore was so surrounded by armed men.\n\nShe passed between the pages, up the steps, over passages; then iron\ngates were opened, and a curtain was drawn aside.\n\nAnd Psyche stepped into the golden hall of the tower.\n\nThere sat Emeralda in the light of a thousand candles, on a throne,\nunder a canopy, surrounded by a great retinue.\n\n\"Holy pilgrim!\" said Emeralda, \"be welcome! You have come to bring\nme jewels?\"\n\nA cold shiver ran like a serpent over Psyche's limbs, when she heard\nEmeralda's voice. She had not thought that she would be afraid any\nmore of her proud sister, but now when she saw her and heard her voice,\nshe almost fainted from fear.\n\nFor her look was most terrible.\n\nEmeralda had grown older, but she was still beautiful. Yet her beauty\nwas horrible. In the hall, lit up with thousands of candles, a hall of\ngold and enamel, sat Emeralda like an idol on her throne of agate, in\na niche of jasper. There was nothing more human about her; she was like\na great jewel. She had become petrified, as it were, into a jewel. Her\neyes of sharp emerald looked out from her face, that was ivory white,\nlike chalcedony; from her crown of beryl there hung down her face six\nred plaits of hair, as inflexible as gold-wire, and stiffly interwoven\nwith emeralds. Her mouth was a split ruby, her teeth glittered like\nbrilliants. Her voice sounded harsh and creaking, like the noise of\na machine. Her hands and inflexible fingers, stiff with rings, were\nopal-white, with blue veins such as run through the opal. Her bosom,\nopal, chalcedonic, was enclosed in a bodice of violet amethyst--and\nover the bodice she wore a tunic of precious stones. Her dress was no\nlonger brocade, but composed of jewels. All the arabesque was jewels;\nher mantle was jewelled so stiffly that the stuff could not bend,\nbut hung straight down from her shoulders like a long jewelled clock.\n\nAnd she was beautiful, but beautiful as a monster, preciously beautiful\nas a work of art--made by one, both jeweller and artist, barbarously\nbeautiful, in the incrustations of her crown, the facets of her eyes,\nthe lapis lazuli of her stiffly folded under-garments, and all the\ngems and cameos which bordered her mantle and dress.\n\nIn the light of thousands of candles she glistened, a barbarous\nidol, and shot forth rays like a rainbow, representing every colour;\ndazzling, fear-inspiring was her look, pitiless and soulless.\n\nProud she sat and motionless, glistening with lustre, oppressed by\nthe weight of her splendour; and covetous, her grating voice said\nagain eagerly:\n\n\"Holy pilgrim, welcome! You have come to bring me jewels?\"\n\nPsyche gained courage.\n\n\"Yes,\" she said in a firm voice. \"Powerful Majesty of the Past,\nI come to do you homage and bring you jewels. But I beg that we may\nbe left alone.\"\n\nEmeralda hesitated; but when Psyche remained silent, her cupidity\ngot the better of her fear and she gave a sign. She raised her stiff\nhand. And by that single movement she cracked and creaked with grating\njewels, and shot forth rays like the sun, which, like a nimbus,\nstreamed around her.\n\nHer suite disappeared through side-doors. The shield-bearers\nwithdrew. Psyche stood alone before her sister. And then Psyche\nunfastened the cord round her waist and took off her mantle; her\nlong hair fell about her, and she was naked. Naked she stood before\nEmeralda, and said:\n\n\"Emeralda, don't you recognise me? I am Psyche, your sister!\"\n\nA cry escaped the princess. She rose up; she creaked; her splendour\nand pomp grated, and she glittered so, that Psyche was dazzled.\n\n\"Wretched Psyche!\" she exclaimed. \"Yes, I know you! I have always\nhated you, hated as I hate everything that is gentle, as I hate doves,\nchildren, flowers! So you have deceived me, intruder! you bring me\nno jewels!\"\n\nPsyche knelt down and showed her open hand.\n\n\"Emeralda, I offer you the homage which I once refused you. I present\nyou with topazes, rubies, and dark purple carbuncles. I kneel in\nhumility before you. I offer you my tears, which have turned into\nstone, and I ask you humbly: punish me and give me a penance to\ndo. Look! I have lost my wings. I may not go naked any longer. I\nhave committed sin. Emeralda, make me do penance! Inflict on me the\nheaviest that you can think of. If I can do it, I will do it. Lay a\nheavy task upon my wingless shoulders.\"\n\nEmeralda looked down at kneeling Psyche. The princess approached\nher sister, took the jewels, examined them attentively, held them\nup to the light of the candles, and then dropped them into an open\ncasket. Thoughtfully she continued gazing at Psyche. And she seemed to\nPsyche like a gigantic jewel-spider, watching from the midst of her\nglittering web the rays of her own splendour. But whatever she were,\nprincess, sun, spider, or jewel, a woman she was not, a human being she\nwas not, and through the opal of her bosom gleamed her heart of ruby.\n\nPsyche, kneeling penitent, spoke not, awaiting her fate, and Emeralda\nwatched her.\n\nThoughts, mechanical as wheels, rolled through her brain. She thought\nas a machine. She was inexorable, because she had no feeling; she\nthought inhumanly because she had no soul. Soulless she was and hard\nas stone, but she was powerful, the mightiest ruler of the world. She\nruled with a movement, she condemned with a look, she could kill\nwith a smile; if she spoke a word, it was terrible; if she appeared\nin public there was disaster; and if she rode through her kingdom in\na triumphal chariot, then everything was scorched by her lustre and\ncrushed under her triumph.\n\nAt last she spoke, motionless like a spider in her web of glittering\nrays, and her voice sounded like an oracle in a screeching incantation.\n\n\"Psyche, fled from her father's house, fallen from all princely\ndignity, dethroned Princess of the Present, immoral Bacchante,\ncorrupt and wingless, weeping tears of scarlet sin--listen!\n\n\"Psyche, who wandered frivolously to purple streaks of sky, who\nlonged for the nothingness of azure and of light, who loved a horse,\nwho forsook her husband, who wandered and sought and asked, in desert\nand in wood--wander, seek, and ask!\n\n\"Wander, seek, and ask, till you find!\n\n\"Wander along the flaming caves, seek in the fire-vomiting mouths of\nmonsters, ask of the martyred spirits, who roll upon the inky sea.\n\n\"Descend to the Nether-world! Seek the Mystic Jewel, the Philosopher's\nStone that gives the highest omnipotence; seek the Mystic Jewel,\nthe rays of which reach to eternity and penetrate to the Godhead.\n\n\"Descend, wander, ask, seek, and find!\"\n\nHer voice grew terrible, and, screeching, she stepped nearer, and\nwith a look at the casket, said pitilessly:\n\n\"Or ... weep for it ... suffer for it. I care not how much.\"\n\nShe paused, and then in a voice of horrible hypocrisy, continued:\n\n\"And then, if you bring me the Sacred Jewel, the name of which may\nnot be uttered....\" She drew still nearer.\n\n... \"Then be blessed, Psyche, and share with me, Emeralda, your sister,\nthe divine omnipotence!\"\n\nLike an oracle sounded her hypocritical voice. She felt in Psyche\nan unknown power; she feared for her soul, and wished to gain that\npower for herself, to make sure of the two-fold omnipotence of the\nworld, both soul and body. And in the horrible penance which she laid\nupon Psyche, she feigned tender love. Creaking and cracking, she drew\nnearer, and in her web of rays shed a sunbeam over her kneeling sister,\nand with her stiff opal fingers stroked the bent head with its fair,\nlong tresses.\n\nAn ice-cold shiver ran through Psyche, as if her burning soul were\nbeing frozen.\n\n\"I obey,\" she murmured.\n\nAnd she rose up, intoxicated from splendour, stiff from icy\ncoldness. She tottered and shut her eyes. When she opened them,\nshe was in a gloomy ante-chamber, clad in her coarse mantle; and the\nshield-bearers approached with torches.\n\n\"Conduct me to Astra!\" she commanded.\n\nThere was something strange in her voice which made them obey,\nthe voice of a princess, the soft voice of command, which appealed\nstrangely to the men, as if they had heard it when they were pages.\n\nThey conducted Psyche through halls, over passages, up steps, to\nanother tower. They opened low doors, and, through silent vaults,\nguided the strange pilgrim, rich in rubies.\n\n\"Who comes there?\" asked a voice, tired, weak, and faint.\n\nThen the men left Psyche alone, and she was with Astra, and she saw her\nsister in the twilight on the terrace, sitting before her telescope,\nsurrounded by globes and rolls of heavy parchment spread out. And\nPsyche saw Astra, looking very old, with thin grey hair, which\nhung down her wax-white face, from which two dull eyes stared out;\nher white dress hung down limp on her sunken shoulders, her withered\nbreast, and attenuated limbs. Bitter dejection was in her dull eyes;\nher thin hand hung down powerless, tired, and incapable of work,\nand her voice, faint and weak, said:\n\n\"Who comes there?\"\n\n\"I, Psyche, your little sister, come back, O Astra, as a penitent...!\"\n\n\"As a penitent?\"\n\n\"Yes, I fled, committed sin, and now I will do penance....\"\n\nAstra mused.\n\n\"It is true,\" she murmured. \"I remember, little Psyche. Come\nnearer. Take my hand, I cannot see you.\"\n\n\"The night is dark, Astra: there are few stars in the sky, and the\ntorches are not yet lit....\"\n\n\"No? Is it dark about me? That does not matter, Psyche, for I cannot\nsee, I am blind....\"\n\nPsyche gave a cry.\n\n\"Astra! Poor sister, are you blind? Oh! you who could see so well! are\nyou blind?\"\n\n\"Yes, I have gazed myself blind!! I have turned my telescope from\nleft to right, to all the points of the universe. I thought to become\nthe centre, the kernel of science, the focus of brilliant knowledge;\nnow I am blind, now I see nothing more, now I know nothing more. The\ncolossal numbers have become confused in my brain since the living\nStar on my head faded. Do you still see its faint splendour between\nmy grey hair? Ah! now I have your hand.\n\n\"What is that, child? What round things are falling over my fingers?\"\n\n\"My tears, Astra, poor Astra!\"\n\n\"How hard they are and cold! What hard, cold tears, Psyche!... Sit\ndown here at my feet. Is the night dark? Are the torches not yet\nlit? Well, let it be dark, for I see nothing; but I feel you, I feel\nyour hair; now I stroke your head, round and small. I feel along\nyour shoulders, Psyche, little child with wings.... But your wings\nI do not feel.... Have you none now? Have they been cut off? My star\nhas faded, and your wings are cut; Emeralda triumphs alone! Her gift\nfrom the fairy has brought her prosperity. Her heart of ruby feels\nno pain; she is clad in the majesty of precious jewels. She is hard\nand beautiful, hard as a stone, beautiful as a jewel.... Psyche,\ncreep close to me.... We can do nothing against her, child. My star\nis faded, your wings clipt; we have lost our noble rights.... I am\nold, but you--are you still young? You feel so young, indestructibly\nyoung.... You have suffered so, asked and wandered.... not appreciated\nyour happiness, and murdered Eros! Poor child, you a murderess...! You\nweep rubies ... you will do penance. You are strong, Psyche, and\nalways young.... You will do penance after all your sins! Emeralda\nhas laid penance on you.... To seek the Philosopher's Stone in the\ncaverns of flaming hell!! O Psyche, the Stone does not exist. The\nunutterable name is a legend. The Jewel exists only in the pride of\nman. The universe is limited, the Godhead is not limited; no rays from\nprecious stones can reach the Godhead and rule over God. No looking\nthrough lenses of diamond can penetrate the Godhead. It is all pride\nand vanity. Psyche, there is nothing but resignation. Emeralda is\npowerful, but more powerful she cannot become....\n\n\"In vain will you seek.\"\n\n\"Yet I will seek, Astra, although it be in vain.... And do you also,\nsister, lay penance on me.... Let me do penance for Astra, as I do\nfor Emeralda.\"\n\n\"No, child, I know no penance. There is nothing but resignation. There\nis nothing but to wait. Everything else is vanity and pride. But do\npenance, little Psyche. Penance is illusion, yet illusion is pleasant:\nillusion ennobles. Believe, poor child, in your penance, believe in\nyour illusion. I have never known it. I have always calculated. The\ncolossal numbers roll through my dull and hazy brain in endless\nseries of figures. However you count, you never come to the sum of\nthe endless.... The stars cannot be counted. The farthest sun is\nincomputable, the divine is limitless. Even the nearest frontier\nof the Future is beyond computation. There is a sea of unfathomable\nlight.... O Psyche, I am tired, I am blind, and I shall soon die. In\nthis place, here I will stay. Psyche, look through the telescope. Is\nthe night too dark? Do you see anything?\"\n\n\"The stars give a dim light.\"\n\n\"Look through the telescope. What do you see? Tell me, what do\nyou see?\"\n\n\"In the glass, right at the top, I see a dark spot, which emits a\nfew rays. Is that a black star?\"\n\n\"No, Psyche, that is a spider. Emeralda has sent a spider. The spider\nhas crawled to the top, along the smooth diamond; there the spider\nweaves his web. And the diamond ... is crumbling to pieces....[\"]\n\n\"Astra...!!\"\n\n\"Psyche, creep closer to me.... Let me feel your little round head,\nyour wingless shoulders....\"\n\n\"Astra, everything is black; clouds are drifting past the stars!\"\n\n\"Sleep thus in my mantle, sleep thus at my feet. Sleep, my little\nchild, and cover yourself for the night.... Psyche, your old nurse\nis dead. Psyche, now I am your nurse.... Sleep now by blind Astra....\"\n\nFeeling for Psyche, she threw her mantle round her. The night was\ndark. Astra's powerless hand dropped over Psyche. Psyche fell asleep.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIII\n\n\nIt was still dark when Psyche awoke. She looked up at Astra, who sat\nsleeping, her grey head on her breast; faintly shone her star. Very\ngently, so as not to wake her, Psyche rose, and left the terrace. She\nknew the way. She went through the halls and passages, down the steps,\nthe endless steps. In the corners sat the sacred spiders, and wove....\n\nPsyche went lower down, to the vaults. There burnt the everlasting\nlamps. She went among the royal tombs, crystal sarcophagi, and found\nher father's coffin. By the lamp, which was always kept burning,\nshe recognised his embalmed, rigid face. The eyes were closed. He\nknew nothing about her: that she had gone away and come back. Death\nwas between them, and severed them forever.\n\nShe kissed the glass, and her tears, round, hard, and red, clattered\non the crystal.\n\nShe knelt down and tried to pray. In a corner of the vault a black\nspot moved. It was a big spider with a white cross on its body.\n\n\"So, you have come back again.... I knew that you would come. We can\nescape from nothing. Everything happens as it happens. Everything\nis as it is. Everything goes to dust; into the pits of the Past,\ninto the power of Emeralda.... Now become a spider like us, weave\nyour web, and be wise....\"\n\nPsyche got up.\n\n\"No...!\" she exclaimed, \"I will not become a spider, I will weave no\nweb. I have sinned, but I will weave no web; I have sinned and will\ndo penance. The world is awful--desert and wood and space; life is\nawful--love and pain, joy and despair, sin and punishment. And if fate\nis as it is, it is in vain to weave a web and to heap up treasures of\ndust. Spider, were it not more human to love, to live, and even to sin,\nthan to weave web upon web? Spider, I envy you not your sacredness...!\"\n\nThe spider puffed itself out maliciously.\n\n\"You seem to be still proud of your murder and your immorality and\nshamelessness! Your princely name you have dragged through the mire,\nyour wings you have given up for a panther's skin and a grape-wreath,\nand know not yet what repentance is. If you had been wise and become\na spider, you would have served Emeralda, and there would have been\nno need to go down to the Under-world!\"\n\nBut Psyche was no longer afraid. She had come to kiss her father's\ncoffin; she left her jewelled tears in the treasure, which the spiders\nwatched over, and ascended the hundreds of steps and came on to the\nterrace of the battlements.\n\nThere as a child she had wandered and gazed, a child with wings,\nand innocent, her soul full of dreams. Now she wandered again along\nthe ramparts and battlements high as a man; the doves fluttered about\nher, the swans looked up at her ... and full of dejection for former\ninnocence and youth, she wept and wept: no longer a brook, but topazes,\nrubies, tears of sin, that, rattling down, frightened the doves and\nthe swans, which, indignant, thought that she was pelting them with\nstones. The doves flew away, and the swans, offended, turned their\nbacks on her. Then she sat down in an embrasure--no wings now lay\nagainst the stone-work--and she folded her arms round her knees. She\nlooked towards the horizon; behind it loomed other horizons, first\npink, then silver; blue, then gold; behind the grey, pale and misty,\nand then fading away. Then beyond, the horizon became milk-white, like\nan opal, and in the reflection of the last rays of the setting sun,\nit seemed as if lakes were mirrored there; islands rose in the air,\naerial paradises, watery streaks of blue sea, oceans of ether and\nlight-quivering nothingness.\n\nAnd Psyche bowed her head, full of sadness, and sobbed.\n\nThe world was not changed, but more beautiful than ever; gloriously\nbeautiful loomed the ever-changing horizon. Yet Psyche sobbed, full\nof sadness. She knew that the horizons were pure delusions, and that\nbehind them was the desert with the Sphinx. Oh! if she could once more\nbelieve in the aerial paradises, the purple seas, the golden regions\nwith people of light, who lived under rosy bananas! Alas! had she not\ntrod a paradise, the sweet Present, the adorable garden of a moment,\nso little and so short in duration? It was past, it was past! Oh,\nhow her soul scorched, how her shoulders pained, how her eyes burned!\n\nShe wept and she sobbed, and hid her face in her hands. She did not\nnotice that the wind was rising, that the horizon quivered, that\nclouds were speeding through the air, white colossi like towers and\ndragons, riders and horses. She did not see the changes in the sky;\nshe did not see the going up and down of wings, of flaming wings in\nthe silver lightning, that flashed from the sky; she did not hear\nthe warning thunder, nor did she see the clouds emitting sparks. But\nsuddenly she distinctly heard a voice:\n\n\"Psyche! Psyche!\"\n\nShe looked up. Before her, she saw descending on broad wings a steed\nof pure light and flame. And she uttered a cry, that sounded in the\nair like an endless shout of gladness:\n\n\"Chimera!\"\n\nIt was he. He descended. The basalt terrace trembled, as though shaken\nby an earthquake; under his hoofs the stone shot sparks, and he stood\nbefore her resplendent and beautiful.\n\n\"Chimera!\" she cried, and folded her hands and sank down before him\non her knees.\n\nShe could say nothing else. She was dazzled, and it seemed as though\nher soul ascended heavenward in the pure delight of love.\n\n\"Psyche!\" sounded his voice of bronze, \"I have come down, for I love\nyou. But I may not bear you any more on my back through the delusive\nregions of air, because you have committed sin. Psyche, it is your\nbounden duty to obey Emeralda's command. Go down to Hell and seek\nthe Jewel.\"\n\n\"Chimera, adored one, delight of my soul, oh, your splendour fills\nmy eyes! Your word gives strength to my weakness! I feel it! You\nmay not bear me away; I am unworthy of your wings. But I adore and\nbless you for coming! Chimera, Chimera, your splendour has beamed\nonce more upon me! your voice has inspired me, and I will do what you\nsay.... You let the light of hope break in upon me; new strength flows\nthrough my limbs. Chimera, I hope, I hope! I will go down into Hell;\nI will seek.... Shall I find? I know not.... But I hope! The horizon\nis quivering with hope and ether and the Future!\n\n\"Psyche!\" sounded his voice again like bronze, \"be strong! Take\nheart! Descend! Do penance! Seek...! Once more you will see me....\"\n\n\"Once more!\"\n\n\"Be strong, take heart, do penance!\"\n\nHe ascended, whilst Psyche remained kneeling. When he was high\nin the air, there came a peal of thunder, as if the heavens would\nburst asunder. The sky was dark, but lit up by the lightning. In the\nblack sky, in the lightning flame, rose fearfully the three hundred\ntowers. And the thunder-claps rumbled on, one after the other, as if\nthe Past were perishing in the last day....\n\nWith a joyful cry, Psyche hastened along the terraces, the battlements,\nramparts, entered the castle, and went down the steps. Lower and lower\nshe descended, lower than the vaults; and as she passed them, she\nthrew a kiss in the direction where the old king lay buried.... She\ndescended still lower, and yet she heard the thunder pealing above,\nand the castle seemed to tremble to its very foundations.\n\nShe descended still lower: she descended very deep pits, built like\ntowers reversed to the central nave of the earth. She descended step\nafter step, thousands of steps, groping in the darkness. She walked\nwith unerring foot, that felt for the next step, that detected the\nslippery stone; she felt and never hesitated. Another step and then\nanother; again a pit, pit after pit, all the pits of the Past. Bats\nflew up and flapped their wings, spiders she felt crawling over her,\nan icy dampness fell like a chill wind upon her shoulders.\n\nDeeper down she went, and deeper. It was pitch dark, and above she\nheard nothing more; she heard only the flapping of the gigantic bats,\nthe droning of the envious spiders. But she defended herself with\nher little hand; as she descended, she beat about her, beat the bats\naway, seized a vampire, held it tightly by the neck, and strangled\nit. Her foot glided over toads, she slipped over snakes, but she got\nup again and beat the bats and fought with the vampires. The Chimera\nhad so inspired her with strength, that she felt strong as a giant,\nyoung and courageous; he had filled her eyes with such light that\nshe saw him in the darkness.\n\nIn the pitchy darkness his flaming wings were distinctly visible. And\non she went descending; thick clouds of dust, the deepest shadows of\nEmeralda's transitoriness, rose up, but she kept breathing, never\nhesitating, and her foot felt instinctively the next step, and she\nstruck at the bats and fought with the vampires. When she throttled\nthem, a human cry was heard, and the echo sounded a thousand times\nlike the anxious cry of a murder. But she was not afraid. She kept\non descending....\n\nShe kept descending. At last she felt no more steps but voidness\nunder her feet, and she sank ... like a feather, through heavier air;\nshe sank, she sank deeper and deeper, deeper and deeper.... A black\ndraught of air, an invisible wind, damp and chill, made her feel\nthat she had passed all the pits, that she was sinking outside them\nin the open air, invisible and black, thick as ink. Then she began\nto sink more slowly, and ... her feet touched ground.\n\nSounds soft and low, like the plaintive strains of a viol, rose up\nfrom afar, like music of the sea, the plaint of a thousand voices\nwhich never became melody.\n\nThe far-off sound continued quivering as an accompaniment of wind, of a\nblack wind which blew, and overpowered the music of the sea. Sometimes\nit went a little higher, sometimes a little lower, and always remained\nthe vague and distant incomprehensible harmony.\n\nFrom where the wind came, from where the plaintive murmuring arose,\nthither would Psyche go. And with her foot she kept feeling, and with\nher outstretched hands, and on she went....\n\nLong, long she went in the darkness, till the darkness became less\nopaque and lit up with phosphoric flickerings; and she saw:\n\nThat she was ascending a path between two inky seas.\n\nBlack as ink were the waves.\n\nThen she heard them roaring; then she saw their crests lit up with\na blue phosphorescent glow.\n\nThen she heard the soft, low sounds, the plaintive viols swell,\ntill they became a dull, continuous soughing.\n\nThe black wind rose as with a gigantic sail, and suddenly blew the\nhurricane.\n\nIn the pitch-dark air, the lightning flashed blue.\n\nAnd between the two inky seas, Psyche went slowly on, against the\ngusts of wind.\n\nThen she uttered a cry, as though she were calling....\n\nThe hurricane took her cry for help over the endless sea of\nHell.... And from all sides dived up the gruesome frights--leviathan\nmonsters. They opened their jaws at Psyche, and the water streamed\nout. Their scaly tortuous bodies wound along over the black surface\nof the ocean, and on the horizon, lit up with phosphorous blue, their\ntails meandered. They came from the horizon, they dived up and down,\nand the ocean dived with them. Storm-flood, waterfall--storm-flood,\nwaterfall.... They spread out their dragon wings, and caught up the\nboisterous wind; they shot up waterspouts like towering fountains,\nof a blue and yellowish hue. Their round squinting eyes stood out\nwatchful, like green and yellow signals; they lifted their red-lobed\njaws, abysses of red-slimy desires, bubbling with foamy slaver.\n\n\"Monsters of the sea of pain, where shall I find the Jewel for\nEmeralda?\"\n\nPsyche asked the question in a high, musical key, and her voice rang\nout clearly in the hurricane and plaintive moanings of the sea. Her\nhigh soprano sounded above all the roaring of the elements and\nplaintive cries; and three times she repeated the question:\n\n\"Monsters of the sea of pain, where shall I find the Jewel for\nEmeralda?\"\n\nThe leviathans pressed together along the path that Psyche trod. But\namidst the noise of their tossing and snorting and spouting, she\nheard the plaintive sea swelling, the sea of plaintive voices; and\nthen in the blue phosphorescent glow between the monsters, she saw\nthe drowned shades heaving to and fro, always writhing in fear, always\ndrowning in the inky sea; the everlasting wailing of the plaintive sea,\nthe cry of souls in pain; the gigantic plaintive viol, with strings\never playing....\n\n\"Vanity, vanity!\"\n\nDid she hear aright?\n\nIt was one single sound, like a note repeated again and again. \"Vanity,\nvanity!\" was the inexorable answer, first vague as a dream, mystic as\na thought, sounding more distinctly as an admonition against worldly\npride. And so distinct did the sound become, that Psyche, brave Psyche,\nwho feared neither vampire nor monster of the deep ... that courageous\nPsyche hesitated and felt all her strength giving way....\n\n\"If it were vanity to seek, to ask for the Jewel, how much farther\nshould she go?\"\n\n\"Should she go back?\"\n\nShe looked round.\n\nBut she saw what made her soul sink within her.\n\nShe saw that behind her step, the seas immediately closed till they\nbecame one single sea of ink; she saw that the only path for her\nstretched across the seas, that behind her it immediately sank away.\n\nShe could not go back, she must go on.\n\nAnd she buoyed up her sinking soul; she went on, and in a high soprano\nvoice repeated again and again her question:\n\n\"Spirits in the sea of pain, where shall I find the Jewel for\nEmeralda?\"\n\n\"Vanity, vanity!\"\n\nThe plaintive viol kept trembling, and the same sound sounded ever,\nthe unchangeable answer. The hurricane was no longer chill, but warm,\nsultry, strangely sultry; more and more sultry blew the everlasting\ncyclone.\n\nThe sea-monsters kept back; they dived again below; the sea\nsank with them, the shades swayed to and fro in storm-flood,\nwaterfall--storm-flood, waterfall, and many-headed hydras came\nsinuously up. The sea no longer shone with phosphorescent glow, but\nwas quite black, pitch black, black as boiling pitch, without foam\nand without light, and kept sending up a discharge of miry, vaporous\nmatter. In the boiling pitch, the hydras, with their thousand snaky\nheads, kept diving up, tortoise-scaled; swayed to and fro, to and fro\nthe pale faces of the shades, but ever sounded the plaintive viol,\nand ever rang forth the same note, the unchangeable answer to Psyche's\nshrill question:\n\n\"Hydras of the sea of pain, spirits in the sea of pain, where shall\nI find the Jewel for Emeralda...??\"\n\n\"Vanity, vanity...!\"\n\nThe pitch seethed and hissed and steamed.\n\nIt was no longer a sea of water, no longer a sea of pitch;\n\nIt was a sea of nothing but flame, pitch-black flame, a sea of\njet-black fire, fire and flame, that waved from the horizon, where a\nsingle streak of pale light appeared. In the black flames burned the\nshades, in the black flames wound the hydras in and out; the thick\nsmoke shot up into the clouds, and the clouds sent it back again....\n\n\"Spirits in the pitch-black flames, where shall I find the Jewel\nfor Emeralda...???\"\n\n\"Vanity, vanity...!\"\n\nThe hurricane kept blowing, the plaintive viol kept trembling, and\never sounded the same note, the unchangeable answer. But scorchingly,\nmore scorchingly blew the wind, like a tempest from a sun for ever\ndoomed. The black night now assumed a dark-purple aspect, like purple\nsteam; the clouds drove a bloody vapour into the heavens.\n\nAnd on either side of Psyche's path suddenly shot out the flaming\nhurricane of the sun, gigantic purple tongues of fire, scarlet and\norange. The lower clouds drove them back, and when Psyche looked round,\nshe stood in a flaming fire. The flaming hurricane seethed round her;\nbehind her feet the path was on fire. The air was fire. But Psyche,\nwhose own soul was on fire, in her own scorching fire of remorse,\nfelt not the glowing heat, and she saw,\n\nOut of the living scarlet craters, the orange caves, the hellish\nchimeras working up their sinuous way like glowing spirals: half\narabesque, half beast; half dragon, half tail; flaming sea-horses. They\nspat and fanned the glowing fire, and, riding aloft on the burning\nhurricane, the shades swept past Psyche.\n\n\"Spirits in the scarlet flames....\"\n\n\"Vanity, vanity!\"\n\nThis was the only answer, that sounded afar off in her ears, the\nanswer of the tortured, angry spirits, which in the strength of their\nsin and passion came flying up from the craters.\n\nOn she went....\n\nShe went on along the path that unfolded before her.\n\nHow confidently she went on, how calmly! Why was she not\nafraid? Oh! she knew too much to be afraid and not to go\non in confidence. Was the answer not always more distinct and\nunchangeable? Psyche's soul breathed freely, and in the fire around her\nher own fire seemed to diminish. For when the fire round her became\nyellower, sulphur-yellow, pure yellow, the pure golden yellow of the\nsun, then she uttered a cry of joy, as though she knew the answer:\n\n\"Spirits in the sulphur flames, spirits in the sun's flames...!\"\n\nShe smiled.... Smiling, she hastened on, with joyful voice, with winged\nstep; and so rapidly did she flee along the path smoothed out small\nfor her foot, that behind her the answer could scarcely reach her.\n\n\"Vanity, vanity!\"\n\nOh! it was always the plaintive viol, but the too poignant grief\nwas tempered with melancholy; the plaintive sea became like a sea\nof melancholy; the thousands of voices were full of melancholy. And\nwhen the flames became less dense and lighter, when they changed\nfrom sulphur yellow to soft azure, a flaming sea of azure, in the\nsilent dawning moonlight scenery, high, broad, blue flaming tongues\nthat shot from the moon--when the hellish hurricane no longer raged,\nbut gave away to a more benign breeze--then Psyche asked no more in\nso shrill a key, but knowing all, her voice murmured dejectedly:\n\n\"Spirits in the azure flames, where shall I find the Jewel for\nEmeralda?\"\n\nThe melancholy viol vibrated more gently; the spirits rocking to and\nfro in the thin blue fire sang more softly:\n\n\"That is vanity, Psyche; that is vanity....\"\n\nShe uttered her jubilant cry, and hastened on with uplifted arms\nthrough the azure moon-flames. The firmament spread out in higher\ncircles and formed wider spheres;\n\nThe flames became clearer and clearer; more benignly blew the breeze;\n\nAnd pale, the spirits flitted to and fro: pale shades with melancholy\neyes, singing their song of painful remembrances....\n\nAnd the spirits looked at Psyche--the spirits smiled benignly on her,\nastonished that she was still alive.\n\nThey pointed for her to go on farther and farther; they nodded to her,\n\"On! on!\"\n\nAnd she gave a loud cry of joy and hastened on....\n\nShe sped through the flames and shades;\n\nTill the flames were still, and high and white;\n\nHigh, still, white flames, like sacrificial flames, like altar flames,\nhigh in the sky, the lofty sky, the wide sky; the wide expanse full\nof white flame, still, white, ascending, purifying flames, refined\nand clear, over the whole wide expanse, the wide refining expanse....\n\nOnce more she asked the pale shades, who swarmed about between the\nflames, hand in hand, who swayed continually to and fro between\nthe flames:\n\n\"Spirits in the white flames, pure white, in the white flames, where\nshall I find the Jewel for Emeralda?\"\n\n\"Vanity, vanity!\" sang the shades softly and quietly, and in the\nanswer, calm and assuring, of the expectant penitents, vibrated the\ngreat viol with a sound like a soft jubilant trill.\n\nPsyche asked no more. She slackened her speed and began to walk,\nher arms raised, her head erect, through the silvery flames. Oh, the\ndear, tender flames, the adorable purifying flames! how they cooled,\nin their snow-white glow, the burning remorse of her soul!\n\nHow freely Psyche breathed, in the innocently white glowing fire! Like\nlilies were the tongues of flame, fragrant and soothing as balsam,\ncool and fresh as snow ... cold as water, as foam. The white flames\nfoamed and rippled like a sea, lower and smoother, quieter and more\nserene; they rippled like a sea of lilies, like a sea of silver\nsnow.... They became moisture and water and foaming ocean, the tender\nelement of gentle compulsion, carrying along as an irresistible dream,\nwhite as paradise, and, as slightly rippling waves of foam, they bore\nPsyche away.\n\nOn the foaming waves Psyche drifted along, all white in the golden\nboat of her fair hair. So gently did they rock her, the foaming,\nrippling waves, that Psyche shut her eyes. Sleep was stealing over\nher. Her lips smiled with inward peace.\n\nThe waves bore her away, the sea washed her ashore. She awoke from\nher slumber, pearl-white she rose from the foam, amidst the joyful\ndolphins.\n\nShe stepped out of the sea on to the land. She felt quite cool, and\nher soul was calm and peaceful, full of reassuring, holy knowledge. But\nwithin her was a great desire.\n\nSmiling, she stretched out her arms. She yearned for the desire of\nher heart....\n\n\"Not yet ... not yet,\" was whispered tenderly to her cool and peaceful\nsoul. \"Wait, wait....\" sounded the echo.\n\nIn the silent joy of her soul, she wept. She lifted her hand to her\neyes; wet were her tears, and in her hand ... lay a pearl...!\n\nThen she looked round. She recognised the sea-shore with its many bays,\nthe shore of the Kingdom of the Past. There, on the opal-blue horizon,\nloomed a town of minarets and pinnacles, of cupolas and obelisks,\nsurrounded with golden walls.\n\nThat was the capital of the kingdom. Thither she would repair.\n\nThere, proud and peaceful, still and cool, she would say to Emeralda,\nher powerful sister,\n\nThat her Jewel was vanity. That the gem did not exist.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIV\n\n\nWhen Psyche approached the capital, she heard at the gates the excited\ncries of festive merry-makers. Outside the gates flocked the noisy\ncrowd, dressed in all the colours of the rainbow, and bedecked with\nflowers, singing and dancing, but not knowing why. Everywhere was\nbustle and commotion; on the roadside sat hundreds of hucksters,\nand women extolling their wares--glasses with jewels and fruit,\ncooling drinks, dresses and flowers. In a shrill key they praised\ntheir wares; they spread out their stuffs with much ado, and offered\nthe people flowers, and poured them out wine, and held up strings of\nglass pearls and cheap necklaces of coins.\n\nPsyche was naked, and she veiled herself in her hair; she spread over\nthe marks on her shoulders her golden mantle of hair, and as many of\nthe dancing girls, some half naked and others quite, danced round,\nhand in hand, people thought that she was naked, only because she was\nso fair--Psyche, so pearl-white in her golden hair. She was not wont\nto be ashamed of nakedness, which was once her right, her privilege\nas a princess; but now under the eyes of the people she blushed, and\nwalked with downcast eyes. Then she turned to a saleswoman and asked:\n\n\"What is the feast for?\"\n\n\"Where do you come from? 'What is the feast for!' Don't you know\nanything about it?\"\n\n\"I come from the other side of the sea....\"\n\n\"'What is the feast for!' It is the great festival: it is the Festival,\nthe Jubilee-festival, of Emeralda. It is the Triumphal Procession of\nthe Queen!!\"\n\n.... \"It is the Triumphal Procession of the Queen!\" resounded on all\nsides. They danced and sang:\n\n.... \"It is the Triumphal Procession of the Queen!\"\n\nThey were drunk with joy, dizzy from strange joy; but Psyche suddenly\nsaw that they were deadly pale and frightened, deadly pale under\npaint and flowers, and frightened whilst they danced round in a ring.\n\n\"I have no dress for the occasion; give me that veil of golden\ngauze!\" said Psyche to the saleswoman.\n\n\"That is very dear!\"\n\n\"I will pay you for it with this pearl.\"\n\n.... \"With that pearl! Are you a princess, then!\"\n\nPsyche then took the veil, and she bound it round her loins, just as\nshe used to do before.\n\n\"I will give you a wreath of fresh roses as well!\" said the woman,\npleased, and put the flowers on her head.\n\nShe smiled, and it suddenly occurred to her that she was decked out\nwith those flowers as a victim for the altar; that all the people\nwho were making merry and dancing were bedecked as victims. She went\non. Through the round gold gate she entered the city; the squares\nwere seen in the distance, connected with very broad streets; square\npalaces of marble and bronze, of jasper and malachite, round cupolas\nand finely pointed minarets, glistered in the sun as if conjured up by\nmagic. They stretched far away, and right behind the blue mountains\nrose the royal castle, a Babel of pinnacles and towers innumerable,\nalmost indiscernible in the distance, with square ramparts and walls,\nand lofty summits lost in the rising mist. And along the squares, over\npalaces, and on the minarets, hung the thick festoons of flowers,\nas though the towns were decked out for an offering. Close up to\nthe castle, Babel of pinnacles, the festoons of flowers seemed to\nreach. And in the squares the dancers threw flowers into the air,\nand it seemed as if white roses were raining down from heaven. To the\nsound of tabour and cymbals, the people danced madly round, and ever\nwas heard the same cry:\n\n\"It is the Triumphal Procession of the Queen!\"\n\nThen Psyche, in the secret depths of her heart, saw clearly and\nindubitably what it all meant. As she went along with the dense crowds\nof noisy, shouting merry-makers, she saw all the people in the town\ntrembling with fear, which made the blood congeal in their veins.\n\nTheir eyes, through fear, were ready to start out of their sockets;\ntheir teeth chattered; their limbs, bedecked with flowers, trembled;\nthe sun was shining, but everyone was shivering with cold.\n\nBut no one spoke of his trembling, and they danced, madly drunk with\nfoolish joy, and they kept shouting the same thing:\n\n\"It is the Triumphal Procession of the Queen!!!\"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXV\n\n\nA great commotion was going on in the direction of the castle. In\nthat direction all eyes were turned, and the dancing girls forgot to\ndance. From fear, the crowd stood still, as if petrified, and forgot\nto conceal the anxiety of their minds. The palaces seemed to tremble;\nthe air-atoms quivered audibly. Something dreadful was about to happen.\n\nThe royal castle shone with a strange lustre; a sun seemed to send\nforth a halo; an ominous aureola appeared in the distance. The fearful\nrays of the Sun of Consternation outshone the day, outshone the sun:\nfrom their centre, they penetrated through houses and people.\n\nAnd everything shone, softened by the glow of piercing sunbeams. The\nrays quivered everywhere in the air, and the aureola filled the world.\n\nThe cause of consternation came rattling on with the rapidity of\nan arrow.\n\nAll hearts stood still, all breath was taken away, all dancing was\nstopped, all rejoicing ceased.\n\nFrom the castle, over the triumphal way, a triumphal chariot rattled\nalong with the speed of an arrow. On the top, a living jewel, stood\nEmeralda, and guided the four and twenty steeds. It was her splendour\nand her aureola which appeared in the air. It was her rays which\ncaused the houses to shine with splendour and pierced the people with\nflashes. She stood immovable, clad in the strength of precious stones,\nin a tunic of sapphire, in a robe of brilliants, with deep flounces\nof gems and white cameos; her mantle was like a bell, with folds of\npurple carbuncle, lined with enamelled ermine. From her crown of\nberyl, from her heart of ruby, the rays shot forth, shone out her\nfear-inspiring aureola and streamed over the town and in the air,\neclipsing the sun, which turned pale. Her eyes of emerald, stars\nin her opal face, chalcedonic, looked inexorable, and her bosom of\nprecious stones heaved not. Only her heart of ruby beat regularly,\nand then her lustre grew alternately dim and bright....\n\nShe stood immovable and guided her horses, her four and twenty foaming\nstallions, rearing greys, which drew her triumphal car, like a broad\nenamelled shell on innumerable wheels, on cutting wheels so numerous,\nthat they seemed to run into one another--a turning confusion of\nspokes.\n\nThe dazzling, fear-inspiring chariot rattled on with the rapidity of\nan arrow. And suddenly, awaking from their stupefaction, the people\nmadly danced again and shouted the same jubilant cry. The tabours\nsounded, the white roses rained down, and before the queen the people\nprostrated themselves and paved her path with their bodies. The grey\nstallions foamed and reared; they came on, they came on, they trampled\nover the first bodies--men and women, girls and children, dressed for a\nfestival and bedecked with flowers.... Over her people rode Emeralda;\nthe innumerable wheels rattled, a confusion of spokes, revolving,\ncutting furrows in flesh and blood, reducing blood and human flesh\nto a muddy mass. But farther up they danced, farther up they sang,\nbefore casting themselves down for her Triumph....\n\nThen Emeralda, looking over her triumphal way, saw, with the keen\nglance of her black carbuncle pupil, a little form, naked and fair,\nwho lifted up her small, child's hand.\n\nAnd fiercer and fiercer gleamed her heart of ruby, for she had\nrecognised the form.\n\nAnd the desire flamed up in her: the thirst for more power and to\nbecome like a god.\n\nEmeralda recognised Psyche. And she reined in her twelve pair\nof horses, she drove them more slowly, and under the less quickly\nrevolving wheels she heard the jubilant cry of the dying people. The\nblood dropped from the wheels, but the roses rained down and covered\nthe horrible sight. On the bloody, muddy mass, the roses rained down,\nwhite, from the balconies of the palaces.\n\nEmeralda stopped.\n\nUnder her, death was silent.\n\nAround, the town was silent. She alone reigned and shot out her\nterrible fan of rays, which scorched the houses and pierced the air.\n\nAnd before her, at a little distance, stood Psyche, proud, pearl-white,\ncrowned with roses, in a veil of gold.\n\nAnd the silent crowd recognised in her the third princess of the\nkingdom.\n\n\"Psyche!\" said Emeralda, and her voice sounded loud through the town\nfrom the focus of her rays, \"have you come to bring me the unutterable\nJewel, the Gem of Power, the Bestower of Universal Power, the sacred\nStone of Mysticism? Have you found the Mystery of the Godhead, and,\n\n\"--Do you rule with me the Universe and God?\"\n\nThe town shuddered and quivered. The people were stupefied.\n\nThe air-atoms trembled audibly.\n\nThen Psyche's voice sounded clearly, silver-clearly, from the\nconsciousness of the wisdom and sacred knowledge which she possessed.\n\n\"Emeralda, for you I have gone through Hell along the black seas,\noceans of pitch, along the horrible sloughs of flaming hurricanes,\nalong the craters and caverns scarlet and yellow, along the azure fires\nand through the white and lilac glow. Give heed to what I say. Hell\nanswered 'Vanity!' when I asked for the Jewel; the leviathans roared\n'Vanity!'; the chimeras hissed 'Vanity!'; the spirits cried 'Vanity!';\nand the whole plaintive viol trilled:\n\n\"'Vanity!'\n\n\"Do you understand me, Emeralda? Your wish was Vanity, for the mystic\nJewel that bestows godlike power is Vanity, and.... Does not Exist.\"\n\nThen it was terrible. The queen, a living idol, burned with rage,\nblazed with rage; her heart was inflamed with rage.\n\nAround her, decked out for sacrifice, in festive garb, in the\nsunshine and her own dazzling splendour, her people trembled with\nfear. And cruelty gleamed in her fixed face; her emerald eyes started\nso revengefully from their sockets as though blinded by their own\nsplendour, and she pulled at the numerous reins....\n\nThe horses reared, the white roses fell down, the people screamed\nwith joy and the fear of death, and the triumphal chariot rattled on.\n\nSwift as an arrow it thundered on over the people, who paved the way\nin ecstacy, and Psyche saw the maddened horses approaching, snorting,\nfoaming, panting, trampling, pulling, their eyes round and mad....\n\nFor a moment she stood firm, proud, tall, pearl-white in the sacred\nknowledge she possessed; then the angry hoofs struck her down, and the\nhorses trampled her as a flower. Emeralda's chariot rattled over her,\nwith its many cutting wheels, and whilst she died like a crushed lily,\ntrampled in her own lily-whiteness, she thought of her old father,\nand how she had crept to his breast and hidden her face in his beard,\nbefore she went to sleep at night....\n\nShe died.... But while she lay trampled to death in the mud of human\nflesh and blood, and the sacrificial roses kept falling down over\nher corpse unrecognisable----\n\nShe returned to life, hovering through the air, and felt so light\nand unencumbered, and was whiter than ever and naked.\n\nAnd on her tender shoulders she felt two new wings quivering...!\n\nShe hovered over her own body into a drifting cloud, a mist of\nfragrance, which farther on she lost sight of; and light, white,\nand rarefied, she looked wonderingly at her trampled body and\nlaughed. Strange, clear, and childlike sounded her laugh in the cloud\nand vapoury fragrance....\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVI\n\n\nThe triumphal chariot rattled on madly. Emeralda stretched out her\nsceptre, on the top of which glowed a star of destroying rays. When\nshe stretched out the sceptre and directed the rays, she scorched\nmonuments, palaces, and parks to a white ash, and, for her cruel\njubilant procession, she cut down everything that came in her way. The\nthick white ashes flew up like dust; the jubilant multitude were\nscorched; the palaces of jaspar and malachite shrivelled up like\nburnt paper; the breath of the horses blew away, like ash, the white\nburnt gardens. And right over everything went Emeralda, scorching\nas she went. Powerful, foolish, arrogant, and proud she was, and\nmore unfeeling than ever, spiteful and cruel, hurt in her pride;\nand she scorched, and made the way smooth before her. Behind her\nlay all the town, and she drove through her kingdom, filling the air\nwith her rays. She drove through valleys and burnt up the harvest;\nshe reduced villages to dust; she dried up rivers; and before her,\nthe mountains split asunder.\n\nHer sceptre made a way for her, and no law of nature resisted her\npower. The air was grey with the clouds of ash, which rained down\nupon the earth.\n\nShe went along as swiftly as an arrow, swiftly as lightning, swiftly\nas light, swiftly as thought. She went so swiftly, that in a single\nhour she had gone all round her wide kingdom intoxicated with the\npride of annihilation, and she drove her maddened horses through\nendless plains of sand.\n\nDesert after desert she consumed; the lions fled before her; she\novertook them in a moment; clouds of sand she sent up into the air....\n\nBut then she relaxed her speed. She stopped.\n\nBefore her, grey and high through the clouds of sand and falling ash,\nthere loomed a most dreadful shadow.\n\nThe shadow was like a gigantic beast, squatting in the sand,\nwith a woman's head in a stiff basalt veil. The woman's head had\na woman's breast, two basalt breasts of a gigantic woman. But the\nbody that squatted in the sand was a lion, and the paws stuck out\nlike walls. And so great was the shadow, so monstrous the beast,\nthat even the triumphal chariot of Emeralda appeared small.\n\n\"Sphinx!\" said Emeralda, \"I will know. I am powerful, but there is\npower above me. There are spheres above mine, and there are gods\nabove my divinity. There are laws of nature which my sceptre cannot\nalter. Sphinx, tell me the riddle. Reveal to me the place where the\nJewel lies hidden, which gives almighty power over the world and God,\nso that I may find it and become the mightiest of all gods. Sphinx,\nanswer me, I say! Open your stony lips and let your voice once\nmore be heard, that shall make the world tremble with wonder. For\ncenturies you have not spoken. Sphinx, speak now! For if you do not\nspeak, Sphinx, and reveal to me where the Jewel lies hidden, then,\ngreat and terrible as you are, I will scorch you to a white ash and\ngo over you in triumph. Sphinx, speak!\"\n\nThe Sphinx was silent. The Sphinx looked with stony eyes at the clouds\nof sand and raining ash. Her basalt lips remained shut.\n\n\"Sphinx, speak!!\" said Emeralda, threateningly and red with rage.\n\nThe Sphinx spoke not and looked.\n\nEmeralda stretched out her sceptre and directed the destroying rays.\n\nThe rays split on the basalt with crackling sparks like flashes of\nforked lightning. Emeralda uttered a cry, hoarse and terrible. She\nthrew away her broken sceptre. But of her greater power she did not\ndoubt, and for the last time she threatened.\n\n\"Terrible Sphinx, tremble! I am more terrible than you!! Speak,\nSphinx!!\"\n\nThe Sphinx was silent.\n\nThen Emeralda tugged at the reins.\n\nThe maddened horses reared, snorting, foaming, panting, trampling,\npulling, and dashed against the Sphinx.\n\nBut the foremost horses were dashed to pieces against the god-like\nbasalt.\n\nThen Emeralda uttered cry after cry, one hoarse cry after another,\nwhich resounded through the desert. She tugged at the reins; the\nhorses, despairing of their attack against the immovable, drove\nat the Sphinx, and fell back crushed, falling over one another and\ntrampling one another to death; the triumphal chariot split, and the\nsplinters of sparkling jewels flew up like cracking fireworks, and\nEmeralda fell between the still revolving wheels. And her heart of\nruby broke. All her dazzling splendour suddenly faded. The terrifying\nfan-like aureola suddenly grew dim, and the desert was grey and gloomy,\nwith a gentle rain of thick white ash falling down.\n\nThe Sphinx was silent, and looked on....\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVII\n\n\nPsyche was alive again, soaring through the air, and felt so light\nand ethereal; pearl-whiter she was than ever, and naked.\n\nAnd on her tender shoulders she felt two new wings fluttering...!\n\nShe hovered away over her own dead body into a drifting cloud,\na fragrant mist, which farther on she lost sight of; and light,\nwhite, and ethereal, she looked with wonder at her trampled corpse\nand laughed....\n\nStrange, clear, and childlike sounded her laugh in the cloud and\nvapoury fragrance....\n\n\"Psyche!\"\n\nShe heard her name, but so dazzled and astonished was she, that\nshe did not see. Then the wind blew about her; the cloud moved,\nthe fragrance ascended like incense, and she saw many like herself,\nrestored to life, hovering in the fragrant cloud, and round her she\ndistinguished the outlines of well-known faces.\n\n\"Psyche!\"\n\nShe recognised the voice, deep bronze, but yet strange. And the wind\nblew about her and she saw a bright light before her, and recognised\nthe Chimera!\n\n\"You promised me: once more!\" exclaimed Psyche joyfully.\n\nShe threw herself on to his back, she clung to his mane, and he\nsoared aloft.\n\n\"Where am I?\" said Psyche. \"Who am I? What has happened? And what is\ngoing on around me? Am I dead, or do I live? Chimera, how rarefied\nis the air! how high you ascend! Are you going to ascend higher,\nhigher still? Why is everything so dazzlingly bright about us? Is\nthat water, or air, or light? What strange element is this? Who are\ngoing up with us--ethereal faces, ethereal forms? And what is the\nviol that is playing?\n\n\"I heard that once before. Then it sounded plaintively; now it has\na joyous sound!\n\n\"Chimera, why is the air so full of joy here...? Look! below us is\nthe Kingdom of the Past.\n\n\"It lies in a little circle, and the castle is a black dot. Chimera,\nwhere are you going so high? We have never been so high\nbefore. Chimera, what are those circles all round us, the splendour\nof which makes me giddy? Are those spheres? Do they get wider and\nwider? Oh, how wide they get, Chimera, how wide! How high it is here,\nhow wide, how rarefied and how light is the air! I feel myself also so\nlight, so ethereal! Am I dead...? Chimera, look! I have two new wings,\nand I shine pearl-white all over. Do I not shine like a light? It\nis true I have been very sinful. But I was what I had to be! Is it\ngood to be what we have to be? I do not know, Chimera: I have thought\nof neither good nor bad; I was only what I was. But tell me, who am\nI now, and what am I? And where are you taking me to, Chimera? You\ncarry me so quietly, so safely; up and down go your wings, up and\ndown. The stars are twinkling round us; around us whirl the spheres,\nand wider and wider they become...! How light, how ethereal! What is\nthat I see on the horizon? Or is it not the horizon? Opal islands,\naerial oceans.... O Chimera!!!! I see purple sands wrinkling far, far\naway, and round them foams a golden sea.... We saw that once before,\nbut not as it is now! For then it was delusion, and now...! The\nsands are growing more distinct; I see the ripple of the golden\nsea.... Chimera! What land is that? Is that the rainbow? Is that the\nland of happiness, and are you the king?\"\n\n\"No, Psyche, I am not a king, and that Land....\"\n\n\"--And that Land...?\"\n\n\"Is ... the Kingdom of the Future!\"\n\n\"The Future! the Future!! O Chimera, where are you taking me to? Will\nthe Future not prove to be a delusion...?\"\n\n\"No, here is the Future. Here is the Land. Look at it well\n... well....\"\n\n\"It is wider than the widest sphere, wider than anything I can think\nof. Where are the limits?\"\n\n\"Nowhere.\"\n\n\"How far and how wide is the widest sphere?\"\n\n\"Immeasurably far, indescribably wide....\"\n\n\"And what stretches away round the widest sphere?\"\n\n\"The unutterable, and the All, All! The....\"\n\n\"The...?\"\n\n\"I know no names! On earth things are called by names; here not....\"\n\n\"Chimera...! On the purple strand I see a town of light, palaces of\nlight, gates of light.... Do beings of light dwell there...? Are these\nthe fore-spheres of the farthest sphere...? Is that the way through\ncircles to ... the....? Chimera, I see forms, I see the people of\nlight!! O Chimera! Chimera!! They are beckoning us, they are waving\nto us! I see two of them: a form of majesty, and another, near him,\nof love! O Chimera! I know them!! That is my father, and that ... O\njoy, O joy! ... that is Eros! Eros! Quicker, Chimera--annihilate\nthe space which separates us; speed on, ply your wings faster--away,\naway! Oh, faster, Chimera! Can you not go faster? You fly too slowly\nfor me! You fly too slowly!! I can fly faster than you.\"\n\nShe spread out her tender, light, butterfly wings; she rose above\nthe breathless, winged horse, and ... she flew...!\n\nShe glided over the Chimera's head toward the strand, toward the city,\ntoward the blessed spirits. There she saw her father, there she saw\nEros--Eros, godlike and naked, with shining wings!\n\nRound her the viol of joy played its joyous notes, as if all the\nspheres rejoiced together. In the divine light, the faces of the\ncherubim began to blossom like winged roses....\n\nShe glided swiftly through the air to her father and Eros, and embraced\nthem. She laughed when she saw the flaming Chimera approaching,\nbecause she could fly faster than he!\n\n\"Come!\" cried Eros joyfully. And he wanted to take her to the gate,\nfrom whence sunbeams issued like a path of sunny gold: a path along\nwhich enraptured souls were going hand in hand....\n\nBut the kingly shade stopped them for a moment, when they, Eros and\nPsyche, intoxicated with love, embraced each other....\n\n\"Look!\" said the shade. \"Look down below....\"\n\n\n\nThey saw the Kingdom of the Past, with their glorified minds, lying\nvisible, deep in the funnel of the spheres. They saw the castle, fallen\nto ruins, with a single tower still standing. They saw Astra, old,\ngrey, and blind, sitting before her telescope, and gazing in vain. They\nsaw her star flicker up for a moment with a bright and final light.\n\nThen they saw Astra's blind eyes ... see! Astra looked and beheld\nthe land of light, and the little band of happy, loving, dear ones\nin their shining raiment. Then they heard Astra murmur: \"There! there\n... the Land...! The ... Kingdom ... of ... the ... Future!!!\"\n\nAnd they saw her star extinguish:\n\nShe fell back dead....\n\nThe viol of gladness trilled.","title":"Psyche","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":33740}