{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_75624/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_75624","id":"gutenberg_75624","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/75624","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Category: Science-Fiction & Fantasy","English fiction -- 19th century","Fairy tales","Short stories, English"],"text":"THE HOUSE OF JOY\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration:\n\n                                THE HOUSE\n                                  OF JOY\n\n                               BY LAURENCE\n                                 HOUSMAN\n\n                                   1895\n\n                            LONDON: KEGAN PAUL\n                           TRENCH TR\u00dcBNER & CO.]\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\n  THE PRINCE WITH THE NINE SORROWS   _Page_ 1\n\n  THE LUCK OF THE ROSES                    23\n\n  THE WHITE KING                           35\n\n  THE STORY OF THE HERONS                  51\n\n  SYRINGA                                  85\n\n  THE TRAVELLER\u2019S SHOES                   101\n\n  THE MOON-FLOWER                         135\n\n  HAPPY RETURNS                           169\n\n\n\n\nTHE PRINCE WITH THE NINE SORROWS\n\n  _TO_\n  CLARE AND IDA\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\nTHE PRINCE WITH THE NINE SORROWS\n\n    _Eight-white peahens went down to the gate:_\n    _\u201cWait!\u201d they said, \u201clittle sister, wait!\u201d_\n    _They covered her up with feathers so fine;_\n    _And none went out, when there went back nine._\n\nA long time ago there lived a King and a Queen, who had an only son. As\nsoon as he was born his mother gave him to the forester\u2019s wife to be\nnursed; for she herself had to wear her crown all day and had no time for\nnursing. The forester\u2019s wife had just given birth to a little daughter\nof her own; but she loved both children equally and nursed them together\nlike twins.\n\nOne night the Queen had a dream that made the half of her hair turn\ngrey. She dreamed that she saw the Prince her son at the age of twenty\nlying dead with a wound over the place of his heart; and near him his\nfoster-sister was standing, with a royal crown on her head, and his heart\nbleeding between her hands.\n\nThe next morning the Queen sent in great haste for the family Fairy, and\ntold her of the dream. The Fairy said, \u201cThis can have but one meaning,\nand it is an evil one. There is some danger that threatens your son\u2019s\nlife in his twentieth year, and his foster-sister is to be the cause of\nit; also, it seems she is to make herself Queen. But leave her to me, and\nI will avert the evil chance; for the dream coming beforehand shows that\nthe Fates mean that he should be saved.\u201d\n\nThe Queen said, \u201cDo anything; only do not destroy the forester\u2019s wife\u2019s\nchild, for as yet at least, she has done no wrong. Let her only be\ncarried away to a safe place and made secure and treated well. I will not\nhave my son\u2019s happiness grow out of another one\u2019s grave.\u201d\n\nThe Fairy said, \u201cNothing is so safe as a grave when the Fates are awake.\nStill, I think I can make everything quite safe within reason, and leave\nyou a clean as well as a quiet conscience.\u201d\n\nThe little Prince and the forester\u2019s daughter grew up together till they\nwere a year old; then, one day, when their nurse came to look for them,\nthe Prince was found, but his foster-sister was lost; and though the\nsearch for her was long, she was never seen again, nor could any trace of\nher be found.\n\nThe baby Prince pined and pined, and was so sorrowful over her loss that\nthey feared for a time that he was going to die. But his foster-mother,\nin spite of her grief over her own child\u2019s disappearance, nursed him so\nwell and loved him so much that after a while he recovered his strength.\n\nThen the forester\u2019s wife gave birth to another daughter, as if to console\nherself for the loss of the first. But the same night that the child was\nborn the Queen had just the same dream over again. She dreamed that she\nsaw her son lying dead at the age of twenty; and there was the wound in\nhis breast, and the forester\u2019s daughter was standing by with his heart in\nher hand and a royal crown upon her head.\n\nThe poor Queen\u2019s hair had gone quite white when she sent again for the\nfamily Fairy, and told her how the dream had repeated itself. The Fairy\ngave her the same advice as before, quieting her fears, and assuring her\nthat however persistent the Fates might be in threatening the Prince\u2019s\nlife, all in the end should be well.\n\nBefore another year was passed the second of the forester\u2019s daughters had\ndisappeared; and the Prince and his foster-mother cried themselves ill\nover a loss that had been so cruelly renewed. The Queen, seeing how great\nwere the sorrow and the love that the Prince bore for his foster-sisters,\nbegan to doubt in her heart and say, \u201cWhat have I done? Have I saved my\nson\u2019s life by taking away his heart?\u201d\n\nNow every year the same thing took place, the forester\u2019s wife giving\nbirth to a daughter, and the Queen on the same night having the same\nfearful dream of the fate that threatened her son in his twentieth\nyear; and afterwards the family Fairy would come, and then one day the\nforester\u2019s wife\u2019s child would disappear, and be heard of no more.\n\nAt last when nine daughters in all had been born to the forester\u2019s wife\nand lost to her when they were but a year old, the Queen fell very ill.\nEvery day she grew weaker and weaker, and the little Prince came and\nsat by her, holding her hand and looking at her with a sorrowful face.\nAt last one night (it was just a year after the last of the forester\u2019s\nchildren had disappeared) she woke suddenly, stretching out her arms and\ncrying. \u201cOh, Fairy,\u201d she cried, \u201cthe dream, the dream!\u201d And covering her\nface with her hands, she died.\n\nThe little Prince was now more than ten years old, and the very saddest\nof mortals. He said that there were nine sorrows hidden in his heart, of\nwhich it could not get rid; and that at night, when all the birds went\nhome to roost, he heard cries of lamentation and pain; but whether these\ncame from very far away, or out of his own heart he could not tell.\n\nYet he grew slenderly and well, and had such grace and tenderness in his\nnature that all who saw him loved him. His foster-mother, when he spoke\nto her of his nine sorrows, tried to comfort him, calling him her own\nnine joys; and, indeed, he was all the joy left in life for her.\n\nWhen the Prince neared his twentieth year, the King his father felt that\nhe himself was becoming old and weary of life. \u201cI shall not live much\nlonger,\u201d he thought: \u201cvery soon my son will be left alone in the world.\nIt is right, therefore, now that he should know what is the danger that\nthreatens his life.\u201d For till then the Prince had not known anything;\nall had been kept a secret between the Queen and the King and the family\nFairy.\n\nThe old King knew of the Prince\u2019s nine sorrows, and often he tried to\nbelieve that they came by chance, and had nothing to do with the secret\nthat sat at the root of his son\u2019s life. But now he feared more and more\nto tell the Prince the story of those nine dreams, lest the knowledge\nshould indeed serve but as the crowning point of his sorrows, and\naltogether break his heart for him.\n\nYet there was so much danger in leaving the thing untold that at last he\nsummoned the Prince to his bedside, meaning to tell him all. The King had\nworn himself so ill with anxiety and grief in thinking over the matter,\nthat now to tell all was the only means of saving his life.\n\nThe Prince came and knelt down, and leaned his head on his father\u2019s\npillow; and the King whispered into his ear the story of the dreams, and\nof how for his sake all the Prince\u2019s foster-sisters had been spirited\naway.\n\nBefore his tale was done he could no longer bear to look into his son\u2019s\nface, but closed his eyes, and, with long silences between, spoke as one\nwho prayed.\n\nWhen he had ended he lay quite still, and the Prince kissed his closed\neyelids and went softly out of the room.\n\n\u201cNow I know,\u201d he said to himself; \u201cnow at last!\u201d And he came through the\nwood and knocked at his foster-mother\u2019s door. \u201cOther mother,\u201d he said to\nher, \u201cgive me a kiss for each of my sisters, for now I am going out into\nthe world to find them, to be rid of the sorrows in my heart.\u201d\n\n\u201cThey can never be found!\u201d she cried, but she kissed him nine times.\n\u201cAnd this,\u201d she said, \u201cwas Monica, and this was Ponica, and this was\nVeronica,\u201d and so she went over every name. \u201cBut now they are only\nnames!\u201d she wept, as she let him go.\n\nHe went along, and he went along, and he went along. \u201cWhere may you be\ngoing to, fair sir?\u201d asked an old peasant at whose cabin the Prince\nsought shelter when night came to the first day of his wanderings.\n\u201cTruly,\u201d answered the Prince, \u201cI do not know how far or whither I need to\ngo; but I have a finger-post in my heart that keeps pointing me.\u201d\n\nSo that night he stayed there, and the next day he went on.\n\n\u201cWhere to so fast?\u201d asked a wood-cutter when the second night found him\nin the thickest and loneliest parts of the forest. \u201cHere the night is so\ndark and the way so dangerous, one like you should not go alone.\u201d\n\n\u201cNay, I know nothing,\u201d said the Prince, \u201conly I feel like a weather-cock\nin a wind that keeps turning me to its will!\u201d\n\nAfter many days he came to a small long valley rich in woods and\nwater-courses, but no road ran through it. More and more it seemed like\nthe world\u2019s end, a place unknown, or forgotten of its old inhabitants.\nJust at the end of the valley, where the woods opened into clear slopes\nand hollows toward the west, he saw before him, low and overgrown, the\nwalls of a little tumble-down grange. \u201cThere,\u201d he said to himself when\nhe saw it, \u201cI can find shelter for to-night. Never have I felt so tired\nbefore, or such a pain at my heart!\u201d\n\nBefore long he came to a little gate and a winding path that led in\namong lawns and trees to the door of an old house. The house seemed as\nif it had been once lived in, but there was no sign of any life about it\nnow. He pushed open the door, and suddenly there was a sharp rustling of\nfeathers, and nine white peahens rose up from the ground and flew out of\nthe window into the garden.\n\nThe Prince searched the whole house over, and found it a mere ruin; the\nonly signs of life to be seen were the white feathers that lifted and\nblew about over the floors.\n\nOutside, the garden was gathering itself together in the dusk, and the\npeahens were stepping daintily about the lawns, picking here and there\nbetween the blades of grass. They seemed to suit the gentle sadness of\nthe place, which had an air of grief that has grown at ease with itself.\n\nThe Prince went out into the garden, and walked about among the quietly\nstepping birds; but they took no heed of him. They came picking up their\nfood between his very feet, as though he were not there. Silence held all\nthe air, and in the cleft of the valley the day drooped to its end.\n\nJust before it grew dark, the nine white peahens gathered together at the\nfoot of a great elm, and lifting up their throats they wailed in chorus.\nTheir lamentable cry touched the Prince\u2019s heart; \u201cwhere,\u201d he asked\nhimself, \u201chave I heard such sorrow before?\u201d Then all with one accord the\nbirds sprang rustling up to the lowest boughs of the elm, and settled\nthemselves to roost.\n\nThe Prince went back to the house, to find some corner amid its\nhalf-ruined rooms to sleep in. But there the air was close, and an\nunpleasant smell of moisture came from the floor and walls: so, the night\nbeing warm, he returned to the garden, and folding himself in his cloak\nlay down under the tree where the nine peahens were at roost.\n\nFor a long time he tried to sleep, but could not, there was so much pain\nand sorrow in his heart.\n\nPresently when it was close upon midnight, over his head one of the\nbirds stirred and ruffled through all its feathers; and he heard a soft\nvoice say:\n\n\u201cSisters, are you awake?\u201d\n\nAll the other peahens lifted their heads, and turned toward the one that\nspoke, saying, \u201cYes, sister, we are awake.\u201d\n\nThen the first one said again, \u201cOur brother is here.\u201d\n\nThey all said, \u201cHe is our enemy; it is for him that we endure this\nsorrow.\u201d\n\n\u201cTo-night,\u201d said the first, \u201cwe may all be free.\u201d\n\nThey answered, \u201cYes, we may all be free! Who will go down and peck out\nhis heart? Then we shall be free.\u201d\n\nAnd the first who had spoken said, \u201cI will go down!\u201d\n\n\u201cDo not fail, sister!\u201d said all the others. \u201cFor if you fail you can\nspeak to us no more.\u201d\n\nThe first peahen answered, \u201cDo not fear that I shall fail!\u201d And she began\nstepping down the long boughs of the elm.\n\nThe Prince lying below heard all that was said. \u201cAh! poor sisters,\u201d he\nthought, \u201chave I found you at last; and are all these sorrows brought\nupon you for me?\u201d And he unloosed his doublet, and opened his vest,\nmaking his breast bare for the peahen to come and peck out his heart.\n\nHe lay quite still with his eyes shut, and when she reached the ground\nthe peahen found him lying there, as it seemed to her fast asleep, with\nhis white breast bare for the stroke of her beak.\n\nThen so fair he looked to her, and so gentle in his youth, that she had\npity on him, and stood weeping by his side, and laying her head against\nhis, whispered, \u201cO, brother, once we lay as babes together and were\nnursed at the same breast! How can I peck out your heart?\u201d\n\nThen she stole softly back into the tree, and crouched down again by her\ncompanions. They said to her, \u201cOur minute of midnight is nearly gone. Is\nthere blood on your beak! Have you our brother\u2019s heart for us?\u201d But the\nother answered never a word.\n\nIn the morning the peahens came rustling down out of the elm, and went\nsearching for fat carnation buds and anemone seeds among the flower-beds\nin the garden. To the Prince they showed no sign either of hatred or\nfear, but went to and fro carelessly, pecking at the ground about his\nfeet. Only one came with drooping head and wings, and sleeked itself to\nhis caress, and the Prince, stooping down, whispered in her ear, \u201cO,\nsister, why did you not peck out my heart.\u201d\n\nAt night, as before, the peahens all cried in chorus as they went up into\nthe elm; and the Prince came and wrapped himself in his cloak, and lay\ndown at the foot of it to watch.\n\nAt midnight the eight peahens lifted their heads, and said, \u201cSister, why\ndid you fail last night?\u201d But their sister gave them not a word.\n\n\u201cAlas!\u201d they said, \u201cnow she has failed, unless one of us succeed we shall\nnever hear her speak with her human voice again. Why is it that you weep\nso,\u201d they said again, \u201cnow when deliverance is so near?\u201d For the poor\npeahen was shaken with weeping, and her tears fell down in loud drops\nupon the ground.\n\nThen the next sister said, \u201cI will go down! He is asleep. Be certain,\nI will not fail!\u201d So she climbed softly down the tree, and the Prince\nopened his shirt and laid his breast bare for her to come and take out\nhis heart.\n\nPresently she stood by his side, and when she saw him, she too had pity\non him for the youth and kindness of his face. And once she shut her\neyes, and lifted her head for the stroke; but then weakness seized her,\nand she laid her head softly upon his heart and said, \u201cOnce the breast\nthat gave me milk gave milk also to you. You were my sister\u2019s brother,\nand she spared you: so how can I peck out your heart?\u201d And having said\nthis she went softly back into the tree, and crouched down again among\nher sisters.\n\nThey said to her, \u201cHave you blood upon your beak? Is his heart ours?\u201d But\nshe answered them no word.\n\nThe next day the two sisters, who because their hearts betrayed them had\nbecome mute, followed the Prince wherever he went, and stretched up their\nheads to his caress. But the others went and came indifferently, careless\nexcept for food; for until midnight their human hearts were asleep; only\nnow the two sisters who had given their voices away had regained their\nhuman hearts perpetually.\n\nThat night the same thing happened as before. \u201cSisters,\u201d said the\nyoungest, \u201cto-night I will go down, since the two eldest of us have\nfailed. My wrong is fresher in my heart than theirs! Be sure I shall not\nfail!\u201d So the youngest peahen came down from the tree, and the Prince\nlaid his heart bare for her beak, but the bird could not find the will\nto peck it out. And so it was the next night, and the next, until eight\nnights were gone.\n\nSo at last only one peahen was left. At midnight she raised her head,\nsaying, \u201cSisters, are you awake?\u201d\n\nThey all turned, and gazed at her weeping, but could say no word.\n\nThen she said, \u201cYou have all failed, having all tried but me. Now if I\nfail we shall remain mute and captive for ever, more undone by the loss\nof our last remaining gift of speech than we were at first. But I tell\nyou, dear sisters, I will not fail; for the happiness of you all lies\nwith me now!\u201d\n\nThen she went softly down the tree; and one by one they all went\nfollowing her, and weeping, to see what the end would be.\n\nThey stood some way apart, watching with upturned heads, and their poor\nthroats began catching back a wish to cry as the little peahen, the last\nof the sisters, came and stood by the Prince.\n\nThen she, too, looked in his face, and saw the white breast made bare\nfor her beak; and the love of him went deep down into her heart. And she\ntried and tried to shut her eyes and deal the stroke, but could not.\n\nShe trembled and sighed, and turned to look at her sisters, where they\nall stood weeping silently together. \u201cThey have spared him,\u201d she said to\nherself: \u201cwhy should not I?\u201d\n\nBut the Prince, seeing that she, too, was about to fail like the rest of\nthem, turned and said, as if in his sleep, \u201cCome, come, little peahen,\nand peck out my heart!\u201d\n\nAt that she turned back again to him, and laid her head down upon his\nheart and cried more sadly than them all.\n\nThen he said, \u201cYou have eight sisters, and a mother who cries for her\nchildren to return!\u201d Yet still she thought he was dreaming, and speaking\nonly in his sleep. The other peahens came no nearer, but stood weeping\nsilently. She looked from him to them. \u201cO,\u201d she cried, \u201cI have a wicked\nheart, to let one stand in the way of nine!\u201d Then she threw up her neck\nand cried lamentably with her peafowl\u2019s voice, wishing that the Prince\nwould wake up and see her, and so escape. And at that all the other\npeahens lifted up their heads and wailed with her: but the Prince never\nturned, nor lifted a finger, nor uttered a sound.\n\nThen she drew in a deep breath, and closed her eyes fast. \u201cLet my sisters\ngo, but let me be as I am!\u201d she cried; and with that she stooped down,\nand pecked out his heart.\n\nAll her sisters shrieked as their human shapes returned to them. \u201cO,\nsister! O, wicked little sister!\u201d they cried, \u201cWhat have you done!\u201d\n\nThe little white peahen crouched close down to the side of the dead\nPrince. \u201cI loved him more than you all!\u201d she tried to say: but she only\nlifted her head, and wailed again and again the peafowl\u2019s cry.\n\nThe Prince\u2019s heart lay beating at her feet, so glad to be rid of its nine\nsorrows that mere joy made it live on, though all the rest of the body\nlay cold.\n\nThe peahen leaned down upon the Prince\u2019s breast, and there wailed without\nceasing: till suddenly, piercing with her beak her own breast, she drew\nout her own living heart and laid it in the place where his had been.\n\nAnd, as she did so, the wound where she had pierced him closed and became\nhealed; and her heart was, as it were, buried in the Prince\u2019s breast. In\nher death agony she could feel it there, her own heart leaping within his\nbreast for joy.\n\nThe Prince, who had seemed to be dead, flushed from head to foot as the\nwarmth of life came back to him; with one deep breath he woke, and found\nthe little white peahen lying as if dead between his arms.\n\nThen he laughed softly and rose (his goodness making him wise), and\ntaking up his own still beating heart he laid it into the place of hers.\nAt the first beat of it within her breast, the peahen became transformed\nas all her sisters had been, and her own maiden form came back to her.\nAnd the pain and the wound in her breast grew healed together, so that\nshe stood up alive and well in the Prince\u2019s arms.\n\n\u201cDear heart!\u201d said he: and \u201cDear, dear heart!\u201d said she; but whether\nthey were speaking of their own hearts or of each other\u2019s, who can tell?\nfor which was which they themselves did not know.\n\nThen all round was so much embracing and happiness that it is out of\nreach for tongue or pen to describe. For truly the Prince and his\nfoster-sisters loved each other dearly, and could put no bounds upon\ntheir present contentment. As for the Prince and the one who had plucked\nout his heart, of no two was the saying ever more truly told, that they\nhad lost their hearts to each other; nor was ever love in the world known\nbefore that carried with it such harmony as theirs.\n\nAnd so it all came about according to the Queen\u2019s dream that the\nforester\u2019s daughter wore the royal crown upon her head, and held the\nPrince\u2019s heart in her hand.\n\nLong before he died the old King was made happy because the dream\nthat he had feared so much had become true: and the forester\u2019s wife\nwas happy before she died: and as for the Prince and his wife and his\nfoster-sisters, they were all rather happy: and none of them is dead\nyet.\n\n\n\n\nTHE LUCK OF THE ROSES\n\n  _TO_\n  CLEMENCE\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\nTHE LUCK OF THE ROSES\n\nNot far from a great town, in the midst of a well-wooded valley, lived a\nrose-gardener and his wife. All round the old home green sleepy hollows\nlay girdled by silver streams, long grasses bent softly in the wind, and\nthe half fabulous murmur of woods filled the air.\n\nUp in their rose-garden, on the valley\u2019s side facing the sun, the\ngardener and his wife lived contentedly sharing toil and ease. They had\nbeen young, they were not yet old; and though they had to be frugal they\ndid not call themselves poor. A strange fortune had belonged always to\nthe plot of ground over which they laboured; whether because the soil was\nso rich, or the place so sheltered from cold, or the gardener so skilled\nin the craft, which had come down in his family from father to son,\ncould not be known; but certainly it was true that his rose-trees gave\nforth better bloom and bore earlier and later through the season than any\nothers that were to be found in those parts.\n\nThe good couple accepted what came to them, simply and gladly, thanking\nGod. Perhaps it was from the kindness of fortune, or perhaps because the\nsweet perfume of the roses had mixed itself in their blood, that her man\nand his wife were so sweet-tempered and gentle in their ways. The colour\nof the roses was in their faces, and the colour of the rose was in their\nhearts; to her man she was the most beautiful and dearest of sweethearts,\nto his wife he was the best and kindest of lovers.\n\nEvery morning, before it was light, her man and his wife would go into\nthe garden and gather all the roses that were ripe for sale; then with\nfull baskets on their backs they would set out, and get to the market\njust as the level sunbeams from the east were striking all the vanes and\nspires of the city into gold. There they would dispose of their flowers\nto the florists and salesmen of the town, and after that trudge home\nagain to hoe, and dig, and weed, and water, and prune, and plant for the\nrest of the day. No man ever saw them the one without the other, and the\nthought that such a thing might some day happen was the only fear and\nsorrow of their lives.\n\nThat they had no children of their own was scarcely a sorrow to them. \u201cIt\nseems to me,\u201d said her man after they had been married for some years,\n\u201cthat God means that our roses are to be our children since He has made\nus love them so much. They will last when we are grown grey, and will\nsupport and comfort us in our old age.\u201d\n\nAll the roses they had were red, and varied little in kind, yet her man\nand his wife had a name for each of them; to every tree they had given\na name, until it almost seemed that the trees knew, and tried to answer\nwhen they heard the voices which spoke to them.\n\n\u201cJane Janet, and you ought to blossom more freely at your age!\u201d his wife\nmight say to one some evening as she went round and watered the flowers;\nand the next day, when the two came to their dark morning\u2019s gathering,\nJane Janet would show ten or twelve great blooms under the light of the\nlantern, every one of them the birth of a single night.\n\n\u201cMary Maudlin,\u201d the gardener would say, as he washed the blight off a\nfavourite rose, \u201cto be sure, you are very beautiful, but did I not love\nyou so, you were more trouble than all your sisters put together.\u201d And\nthen all at once great dew-drops would come tumbling down out of Mary\nMaudlin\u2019s eyes at the tender words of his reproach. So day by day the\ncompanionable feet of the happy couple moved to and fro, always intent on\nthe tender nurturing of their children.\n\nIn their garden they had bees too, who drew all their honey from the\nroses, and lived in a cone-thatched hive close under the porch; and that\nhoney was famous through all the country-side, for its flavour was like\nno other honey made in the world.\n\nSometimes his wife said to her man, \u201cI think our garden is looked after\nfor us by some good Spirit; perhaps it is the Saints after whom we have\nnamed our rose-children.\u201d\n\nHer man made answer, \u201cIt is rich in years, which, like an old wine, have\nmade it gain in flavour; it has been with us from father to son for\nthree hundred years, and that is a great while.\u201d\n\n\u201cA full fairy\u2019s lifetime!\u201d said his wife. \u201c\u2019Tis a pity we shall not hand\nit on, being childless.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhen we two die,\u201d said her man, \u201cthe roses will make us a grave and\nwatch over us.\u201d As he spoke a whole shower of petals fell from the trees.\n\n\u201cDid no one pass, just then?\u201d said his wife.\n\nNow one morning, soon after this, in the late season of roses, her man\nhad gone before his wife into the garden, gathering for the market in\nthe grey dusk before dawn; and wherever he went moths and beetles came\nflocking to the light of his lantern, beating against its horn shutters\nand crying to get in. Out of each rose, as the light fell on it, winged\nthings sprang up into the darkness; but all the roses were bowed and\nheavy as if with grief. As he picked them from the stem great showers of\ndew fell out of them, making pools in the hollow of his palm.\n\nThere was such a sound of tears that he stopped to listen, and, surely,\nfrom all round the garden came the \u201cdrip, drip\u201d of falling dew. Yet\nthe pathways under foot were all dry: there had been no rain and but\nlittle dew. Whence was it, then, that the roses so shook and sobbed? For\nunder the stems, surely, there was something that sobbed; and suddenly\nthe light of the lantern took hold of a beautiful small figure, about\nthree feet high, dressed in old rose and green, that went languidly from\nflower to flower. She lifted up such tired hands to draw their heads\ndown to hers; and to each one she kissed she made a weary little sound\nof farewell, her beautiful face broken up with grief; and now and then\nout of her lips ran soft chuckling laughter, as if she still meant to be\nglad, but could not.\n\nThe gardener broke into tears to behold a sight so pitiful; and his wife\nhad stolen out silently to his side, and was weeping too.\n\n\u201cDrip, drip\u201d went the roses: wherever she came and kissed, they all began\nweeping. The gardener and his wife knelt down and watched her; in and\nout, in and out, not a rose-blossom did she miss. She came nearer and\nnearer, and at last was standing before them. She seemed hardly able to\ndraw limb after limb, so weak was she; and her filmy garments hung heavy\nas chains.\n\nA little voice said in their ears, \u201cKiss me, I am dying!\u201d\n\nThey tasted her breath of rose.\n\n\u201cDo not die!\u201d they said simply.\n\n\u201cI have lived three hundred years,\u201d she answered. \u201cNow I must die. I am\nthe Luck of the Roses, but I must leave them and die.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhen must you die?\u201d said her man and his wife.\n\nThe little lady said: \u201cBefore the last roses are over; the chills of\nnight take me, the first frost will kill me. Soon I must die. Now I must\ndwindle and dwindle, for little life is left to me, and only so can I\nkeep warm. As life and heat grow less, so must I, till presently I am no\nmore.\u201d\n\nShe was a little thing already\u2014not old, she did not seem old, but\ndelicate as a snowflake, and so weary. She laid her head in the hand of\nthe gardener\u2019s wife and sobbed hard.\n\n\u201cYou dear people, who belong so much to me too, I have watched over you.\u201d\n\n\u201cLet us watch over you!\u201d said they. They lifted her like a\nfeather-weight, and carried her into the house. There, in the\ningle-nook, she sat and shivered, while they brought rose-leaves and\npiled round her; but every hour she grew less and less.\n\nPresently the sun shone full upon her from the doorway: its light went\nthrough her as through coloured glass; and her man and his wife saw, over\nthe ingle behind her, shadows fluttering as of falling rose-petals: it\nwas the dying rose of her life, falling without end.\n\nAll day long she dwindled and grew more weak and frail. Before sunset she\nwas smaller than a small child when it first comes into the world. They\nset honey before her to taste, but she was too weary to uncurl her tiny\nhands: they lay like two white petals in the green lap of her dress. The\nhalf-filled panniers of roses stood where they had been set down in the\nporch: the good couple had taken nothing to the market that day. The luck\nof the house lay dying, for all their care; they could but sit and watch.\n\nWhen the sun had set, she faded away fast: now she was as small as a\nyoung wren. The gardener\u2019s wife took her and held her for warmth in the\nhollow of her hand. Presently she seemed no more than a grasshopper:\nthe tiny chirrup of her voice was heard, about the middle of the night,\nasking them to take her and lay her among the roses, in the heart of one\nof the red roses, that there at last she might die and pass into nothing.\n\nThey went together into the dark night, and felt their way among the\nroses; presently they quite lost her tiny form: she had slipped away into\nthe heart of a Jane Janet rose.\n\nThe gardener and his wife went back into the house and sat waiting; they\ndid not know for what, but they were too sad at heart to think just then\nof sleep.\n\nSoon the first greys of morning began to steal over the world; pale\nshivers ran across the sky, and one bird chirped in its sleep among the\ntrees.\n\nAll at once there rang a soft sound of lamentation among the roses in the\nrose-garden; again and again, like the cry of many gentle wounded things\nin pain. The gardener and his wife went and opened the door: they had to\ntell the bees of the fairy\u2019s death. They looked out under the twilight,\ninto the garden they loved. \u201cDrip,\u201d \u201cdrip,\u201d \u201cdrip\u201d came the sound of\nsteady weeping under the leaves. Peering out through the shadows they saw\nall the rose-trees rocking themselves softly for grief.\n\n\u201cSnow?\u201d said his wife to her man.\n\nBut it was not snow.\n\nUnder the dawn all the roses in the garden had turned white; for they\nknew that the fairy was dead.\n\nThe gardener and his wife woke the bees, and told them of the fairy\u2019s\ndeath; then they looked in each other\u2019s faces, and saw that they, too,\nhad become white and grey.\n\nWith gentle eyes the old couple took hands, and went down into the garden\nto gather white roses for the market.\n\n\n\n\nTHE WHITE KING\n\n  _TO_\n  KATE\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\nTHE WHITE KING\n\nLong years ago there was living a Queen who could not keep count of the\ncountries over which she ruled. Her wealth and her wonderful beauty\nmade her an apple of discord to all the kings who lived round about her\nborders. For love of her they waged perpetual war upon one another, and\nevery king who proved victorious made a gift to the Queen of the country\nof the one whom he had conquered, in the hopes of thereby strengthening\nhis claim to her favour. Thus it came about that she could no longer keep\ncount of the lands which had fallen under her rule; yet still of all her\nsuitors she chose none.\n\nNow at this time there was one King, and only one, who had not succeeded\nin losing his heart to the Queen\u2019s majesty, in spite of her wealth and\npower, and all her wonderful beauty. And so, during a long time, since\nhis fancy was thus free, he was left in undisturbed peace and prosperity,\nwhile other kings fought out their jealous battles, and stole away each\nother\u2019s lands. And because his reign was so quiet and his country in such\nrest, his people, for a pet-name and for their pride in him, named him\n\u201cthe White King.\u201d\n\nNow after a time the Queen took it as an insult that any one should be\nso indifferent to the power of her charms, and she began to threaten him\nwith war for this reason and for that, wishing thereby to cajole him into\nbecoming her suitor. But the White King saw through all the disguises\nwith which she covered her meaning, and understood the arrogance of her\nclaim; so one day he sent to her as a gift a statue of himself with his\nsword sheathed, and all his armour covered over with the cloak of peace.\nRound the base of it was written\n\n    \u201cWhen a heart in stone doth move,\n    Then your lover I may prove;\n    But until the marvel\u2019s done,\n    Fruitlessly your wars are won.\u201d\n\nThe Queen looked once at the statue, and for a long time after never\nlooked away; and when at last she did her heart had been taken captive.\nThen she looked at the words beneath, and the red flush that rose to her\nface was not gone when the last of her army passed out of the city gates\nto carry war into the country of the man who had dared thus to speak\nscorn of her.\n\nFor a whole year the White King fought with the forces she sent against\nhim; but when all the other kings came to her aid, then, stronghold by\nstronghold, all his cities were taken, and his lands were laid waste and\ntheir villages burnt, and nothing but defeat and ruin remained.\n\nYet in the last battle, when his enemies thought to have him a safe\nprisoner, all of a sudden they found that the White King had disappeared.\n\nBack came the Queen\u2019s armies in triumph with their allies, and the\nconquered territory was added as one more to the many that formed her\nrealm. But the Queen sighed as she looked at the White King\u2019s statue, and\nher triumph grew bitter to her. Day by day, as she looked at the calm\nmarble face, her love for it increased, and she owned sadly to herself,\n\u201cHe whom I have conquered has conquered me!\u201d\n\nOf the lost King himself no tidings could be learned, though search was\nmade far and wide. Minstrels came to the court, and sang of his great\ndeeds in fighting against odds, but of his end they sang variously. Some\nsang that he lay buried beneath the thickest of the slain; others that\nfrom his last battle he had been carried by good fairies, and that after\nhe had been healed of his wounds, he would return in a hundred years and\nrecover his kingdom.\n\nOne minstrel came to stay at the court, who sang of ruined homes and\nwasted fields, and a happy land laid desolate, and how its King wandered\nfriendless and unknown through the world, hiding himself in disguise,\nsometimes in the cottages of the poor, and sometimes in the dwellings of\nthe rich. But from no one could the Queen learn any news that satisfied\nher, or gave hope that he would at last bend down his pride, and come and\nsue to her for forgiveness.\n\nWishing to have a hiding place for her grief, she caused the statue to\nbe set up in a green glade in the most lonely part of the gardens; and\nthere often she would go and gaze on the calm noble face (whose closed\neyes seemed even now to disdain her love), and would wonder how long a\nqueen\u2019s heart took to break.\n\nBut after a time she thought, \u201cThough I may never win the love of the\nWhite King for my own, is there no way by which my passion can assuage\nitself, when by lifting my finger I can summon half fairyland to my aid?\u201d\n\nSo she called to her the most powerful Fairy she knew, and taking her\ninto the green glade, began sighing and weeping in front of the White\nKing\u2019s statue. \u201cThis,\u201d she said, \u201cis the image of the only man on earth\nI can love! But the man himself is lost, gone I know not where; and my\nheart is breaking for grief! Give this statue a life and a heart, and\nteach it to love me, else soon I shall surely be dead!\u201d\n\nThe Fairy said to her, \u201cAll the might of fairyland could not do so much;\nbut a little of it I can do; and if Fate is kind to you, Fate may bring\nthe rest of it to pass.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow much can you do?\u201d asked the Queen.\n\n\u201cThis only,\u201d said the Fairy, \u201cbut even that you must do for yourself: I\ncan but show you the way. Stone is stone, and out of stone I cannot make\na heart; but a heart may grow into it, and this is the way to compass it.\n\n\u201cYou must find first a man who is loved, but does not love (for if he\nloves, the statue\u2019s heart when it wakes will turn from you); and him you\nmust kill with your own hand, and take out his heart and bury it beneath\nthe feet of the statue. Then I will work my charms, and gradually, as a\nflower draws its life out of the ground, so the statue will draw life out\nof the human heart buried below. And after a little time you will see it\nmove, and in a little time more its senses will come, and it will be able\nto hear, and see, and speak. But full life will not come to it until it\nhas learned to love. Then, so soon as it learns to love, it will become\nno longer stone, but a human being.\u201d\n\nBut the Queen said, \u201cSupposing its love were to turn from me to another,\nwhere should I be then?\u201d\n\n\u201cSurely,\u201d said the Fairy, \u201cthe secret will be your own, and the watching\nof its life as it grows will be yours. Your voice it will hear, your\nface it will see; whom, then, will it learn to love more than you?\u201d\n\n\u201cWait, then, till I have found the man,\u201d said the Queen, \u201cand we will do\nthis thing between us!\u201d\n\nShe searched long among her court for some man whose heart was whole, but\nwho was himself loved. Generally, however, she found it was all the other\nway. There was not a man at the court who was not in love, or did not\nthink himself so; and if there were one who had no thought of love, he\nwas too poor and mean for the love of any woman to be his.\n\nBut one day the Queen heard a minstrel in the palace court-yard singing\nand making merry against love. It was that same minstrel who sang only\nsad songs of the White King\u2019s lands laid waste and himself a wanderer:\na fellow with a dark sunburnt face, and thick hair hanging over his\neyes. And as he sang and rattled his jests at the courtiers who stood by\nto listen, the Queen noticed one of her waiting-women looking out of a\nsmall lattice, who, as she watched the singer\u2019s face, and listened to his\nwords, had tears running fast down out of her eyes.\n\n\u201cIs this a case,\u201d thought the Queen, \u201cof a man who is loved but who does\nnot love?\u201d\n\nShe sent for the minstrel, and said to him, when he stood bending his\nhead before her, \u201cIs this pretty scorn that you cast on love earnest or\njest?\u201d\n\n\u201cNay,\u201d he answered, \u201cI jest in good earnest; for to speak of love in\nearnest is to jest about it.\u201d\n\n\u201cSo,\u201d said the Queen, \u201cyou are heart-whole?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy,\u201d said the minstrel, \u201cI doubt if a mouse could find its way in; and\nif I am heart-whole in your presence, I ought to be safe from all the\nworld!\u201d\n\n\u201cNow,\u201d thought the Queen, \u201cif only my waiting-woman answers the test,\nhere is the heart I will have out!\u201d\n\nThen she bade the minstrel follow her to where stood the White King\u2019s\nstatue, bidding him sit down under it and sing her more of his rhymes\nabout love.\n\nSo the minstrel crossed his legs in the long grass and sang. His song\nbecame bitter to the Queen\u2019s ears, for he took the words that were round\nthe statue, and rhymed them and chimed them, and threw them laughing in\nthe Queen\u2019s face. She hated him so that she could have poisoned him; but\nshe remembered that his life was necessary for her experiment to reach\nits end. So she sent instead for a sleepy wine, which she gave him to\ndrink, and presently his voice grew thick and his head dropped down upon\nhis breast, and his legs slid out and brought him down level with the\ngrass. When night came on she left him soundly sleeping with his head\nbetween the feet of the White King\u2019s statue.\n\nThen she sent for the waiting-woman and said, \u201cGo down to the White\nKing\u2019s statue, and find for me my handkerchief which I have dropped\nthere.\u201d But as the girl went, the Queen stole secretly after her, and\nwatched her come to where the minstrel lay asleep.\n\nAnd when the waiting-maid saw him lying so, with his face thrown back,\nshe knelt down in the grass by his side, and putting her arms softly\nabout him, kissed him upon the lips over and over again as though she\ncould never come to an end, and her tears dropped down on to his face,\nand, as if her mind were gone mad for love of him, the Queen heard her\nsighing, \u201cOh, White King, my White King, my Beloved, whom I love, but\nwho loves me not!\u201d\n\nAs soon as the waiting-maid was gone, the Queen came softly to the place,\nand with a sharp knife she cut out the minstrel\u2019s heart and buried it at\nthe base of the statue.\n\nIn the morning the minstrel was found lying dead, with his heart gone;\nand when they washed the dead face and put back the hair that covered the\neyes, they found that it was the White King himself.\n\nThat day, and for many days after, there were two women weeping in the\npalace: one was the Queen and the other was the waiting-woman. But the\nbody of the White King they buried close by the statue in the green glade.\n\nNow presently, when the first violence of her grief was over, the Queen\ncame to look at the place; and, sure enough, the Fairy had been there\nwith her spells. When the wind blew the statue swayed gently like a tree\nin the wind.\n\nThe Queen caused gates and barriers to be put up so that no one should\nenter the glade but herself; only Love found a way, and at night, when\nall the world was asleep, the waiting-woman crept through a loose pale\nin the barriers, and came to moan over the place where her lover had been\nslain.\n\nAll night she would lie with her arms round the feet of the White King\u2019s\nstatue, and dream of the dead minstrel whom she had loved and known\nthrough all his disguise. And all night long her lips would murmur his\nname, and whisper over and over again the sad story of her love.\n\nAnd presently, as the statue drew life from the heart buried beneath its\nfeet, its ears were opened and it heard.\n\nIn the daytime the Queen would come and sit before it and whisper to it\nof love, offering it all the gifts of riches and power that are in the\nhands of kings to give; but at night came the waiting-woman and offered\nit only love.\n\nOut of the ground the Queen saw grow a small plant, that began to creep\nupwards and to wind itself round the base of the statue; and when she saw\nthat its flower was the deadly nightshade, her heart trembled and her\nconscience made her afraid.\n\nBut the waiting-maid, when she saw it, picked the sad blossoms and made a\ncrown for the statue\u2019s head as of pale amethyst and gold: for she said to\nherself, \u201cDown below my dear lies dead, and the roots of this flower are\nin his hair.\u201d\n\nOne day as the Queen came into the glade, she heard the dead minstrel\u2019s\nvoice, and her heart shook with terror as she saw the statue open its\nwhite lips and sing, and recognised the tune and the words as those which\nhad made her heart feel so bitter against him; for she thought, \u201cWhat if\nhe knows that it is I who have slain him?\u201d\n\nNow that she saw that the stone had its five senses, and could see and\nspeak and hear, she pleaded to it all day out of the greatness of her\ngrief and her love. But the statue never returned her word.\n\nAt night, lying with her face bowed between the White King\u2019s statue\u2019s\nfeet, the waiting-woman knew nothing of all this change; only the statue\nheard and saw and knew. And at last one day as her tears dropped on them,\nshe felt the feet grow warm between her hands; and a voice over her head\nthat she remembered and loved, said, \u201cLittle heart, why are you weeping\nso?\u201d\n\nIn the morning the Queen came and found the statue gone. There on the\npedestal was only the print of his feet, half covered by the deadly\nnightshade which had climbed up to his knees and fallen. There it lay\nheavy and half-withered, clasping the hollows where his feet had been.\n\nThe Queen knelt down and caught the bare stone pedestal in her arms. \u201cOh,\nLove,\u201d she cried, \u201chave you left me? Oh, White King, my White King, have\nyou betrayed me?\u201d And as she clung there weeping, her lips touched the\ndeadly nightshade; and the nightshade thrilled, and felt joy give new\nlife down into its roots.\n\nIt reached up and laid its arms about the Queen, about her throat, and\nabout her feet and about her waist. \u201cDearly, dearly we love each other,\u201d\nsaid the nightshade, \u201cdo we not?\u201d\n\nAt night the courtiers came, and found only a dead Queen lying, and the\nstatue gone.\n\nBut the White King had gone home to his own land to marry the\nwaiting-woman.\n\n\n\n\nTHE STORY OF THE HERONS\n\n  _TO_\n  AUDREY AND VERONICA\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\nTHE STORY OF THE HERONS\n\nA long time ago there lived a King and a Queen who loved each other\ndearly. They had both fallen in love at first sight; and as their love\nbegan so it went on through all their life. Yet this, which was the cause\nof all their happiness, was the cause also of all their misfortunes.\n\nIn his youth, when he was a beautiful young bachelor, the King had had\nthe ill-luck to attract the heart of a jealous and powerful Fairy; and\nthough he never gave her the least hope or encouragement, when she heard\nthat his love had been won at first sight by a mere mortal, her rage and\nresentment knew no bounds. She said nothing, however, but bided her time.\n\nAfter they had been married a year the Queen presented her husband with a\nlittle daughter; before she was yet a day old she was the most beautiful\nobject in the world, and life seemed to promise her nothing but fortune\nand happiness.\n\nThe family Fairy came to the blessing of the new-born; and she, looking\nat it as it lay beautifully asleep in its cradle, and seeing that it had\nalready as much beauty and health as the heart could desire, promised it\nlove as the next best gift it was within her power to offer. The Queen,\nwho knew how much happiness her own love had brought her, was kissing the\ngood Fairy with all the warmth of gratitude, when a black kite came and\nperched upon the window-sill crying: \u201cAnd I will give her love at first\nsight! The first living thing that she sets eyes on she shall love to\ndistraction, whether it be man or monster, prince or pauper, bird, beast\nor reptile.\u201d And as the wicked Fairy spoke she clapped her wings, and\nup through the boards of the floor, and out from under the bed, and in\nthrough the window, came a crowd of all the ugliest shapes in the world.\nThick and fast they came, gathering about the cradle and lifting their\nheads over the edge of it, waiting for the poor little Princess to wake\nup and fall in love at first sight with one of them.\n\nLuckily the child was asleep; and the good Fairy, after driving away the\nblack kite and the crowd of beasts it had called to its aid, wrapped\nthe Princess up in a shawl and carried her away to a dark room where no\nglimmer of light could get in.\n\nShe said to the Queen: \u201cTill I can devise a better way, you must keep her\nin the dark; and when you take her into the open air you must blindfold\nher eyes. Some day, when she is of a fit age, I will bring a handsome\nPrince for her; and only to him shall you unblindfold her at last, and\nmake love safe for her.\u201d\n\nShe went, leaving the King and Queen deeply stricken with grief over the\nharm which had befallen their daughter. They did not dare to present\neven themselves before her eyes lest love for them, fatal and consuming,\nshould drive her to distraction. In utter darkness the Queen would sit\nand cherish her daughter, clasping her to her breast, and calling her by\nall sweet names; but the little face, except by stealth when it was sound\nasleep, she never dared to see, nor did the baby-Princess know the face\nof the mother who loved her.\n\nBy and by, however, the family Fairy came again, saying: \u201cNow, I have a\nplan by which your child may enjoy the delights of seeing, and no ill\ncome of it.\u201d And she caused to be made a large chamber, the whole of one\nside of which was a mirror. High up in the opposite wall were windows so\nscreened that from below no one could look out of them, but across on\nto the mirror came all the sweet sights of the world, glimpses of wood\nand field, and the sun and the moon and the stars, and of every bird as\nit flew by. So the little Princess was brought and set in a screened\nplace looking towards the mirror, and there her eyes learned gradually\nall the beautiful things of the world. Over the screen, in the glass\nbefore her, she learned to know her mother\u2019s face, and to love it dearly\nin a gentle child-like fashion; and when she could talk she became very\nwise, understanding all that was told her about the danger of looking at\nanything alive, except by its reflection in the glass.\n\nWhen she went out into the open air for her health, she always wore a\nbandage over her eyes, lest she should look, and love something too\nwell: but in the chamber of the mirror her eyes were free to see whatever\nthey could. The good Fairy, making herself invisible, came and taught\nher to read and make music, and draw; so that before she was fifteen she\nwas the most charming and accomplished, as well as the most beautiful\nPrincess of her day.\n\nAt last the Fairy said that the time was come for her world of\nreflections to be made real, and she went away to fetch the ideal Prince\nthat the Princess might at first sight fall in love with him.\n\nThe very day after she was gone, as the morning was fine, the Princess\nwent out with one of her maids for a walk through the woods. Over her\npatient eyes she wore a bandage of green silk, through which she felt the\nsunlight fall pleasantly.\n\nOut of doors the Princess knew most things by their sounds. She passed\nunder rustling leaves, and along by the side of running water; and at\nlast she heard the silence of the water, and knew that she was standing\nby the great fish-pond in the middle of the wood. Then she said to her\nwaiting-woman, \u201cIs there not some great bird fishing out there, for I\nhear the dipping of his bill, and the water falling off it as he draws\nout the fish?\u201d\n\nAnd just as she was saying that, the wicked Fairy, who had long bided her\ntime, coming softly up from behind, pushed the waiting-woman off the bank\ninto the deep water of the pond. Then she snatched away the silk bandage,\nand before the Princess had time to think or close her eyes, she had lost\nher heart to a great heron, that was standing half-way up to his feathers\nfishing among the reeds.\n\nThe Princess, with her eyes set free, laughed for joy at the sight of\nhim. She stretched out her arms from the bank and cried most musically\nfor the bird to come to her; and he came in grave stately fashion, with\ntrailing legs, and slow sobbing creak of his wings, and settled down on\nthe bank beside her. She drew his slender neck against her white throat,\nand laughed and cried with her arms round him, loving him so that she\nforgot all in the world beside. And the heron looked gravely at her with\nkind eyes, and, bird-like, gave her all the love he could, but not more;\nand so, presently, casting his grey wings abroad, lifted himself and\nsailed slowly back to his fishing among the reeds.\n\nThe waiting-woman had got herself out of the water, and stood wringing\nher clothes and her hands beside the Princess. \u201cO, sweet mistress,\u201d she\ncried, with lamentation, \u201cnow is all the evil come about which it was our\nwhole aim to avoid! And what, and what will the Queen your mother say?\u201d\n\nBut the Princess answered, smiling, \u201cFoolish girl, I had no thought of\nwhat happiness meant till now! See you where my love is gone? and did\nyou notice the bend of his neck, and the exceeding length of his legs,\nand the stretch of his grey wings as he flew? This pond is his hall of\nmirrors, wherein he sees the reflection of all his world. Surely I, from\nmy hall of mirrors, am the true mate for him!\u201d\n\nHer maid, seeing how far the evil had gone, and that no worse could now\nhappen, ran back to the palace and curdled all the court\u2019s blood with\nher news. The King and the Queen and all their nobility rushed down,\nand there they found the Princess with the heron once more in her arms,\nkissing and fondling it with all the marks of a sweet and maidenly\npassion. \u201cDear mother,\u201d she said, as soon as she saw the Queen, \u201cthe\nhappiness, which you feared would be sorrow, has come; and it is such\nhappiness I have no name for it! And the evil that you so dreaded, see\nhow sweet it is! And how sweet it is to see all the world with my own\neyes and you also at last!\u201d And for the first time in her life she kissed\nher mother\u2019s face in the full light of day.\n\nBut her mother hung sobbing upon her neck, \u201cO, my darling, my beautiful,\u201d\nshe wept, \u201cdoes your heart belong for ever to this grey bird?\u201d\n\nHer daughter answered, \u201cHe is more than all the world to me! Is he not\ngoodly to look upon? Have you considered the bend of his neck, the length\nof his legs, and the waving of his wings; his skill also when he fishes:\nwhat imagination, what presence of mind!\u201d\n\n\u201cAlas, alas,\u201d sorrowed the Queen, \u201cdear daughter, is this all true to\nyou?\u201d\n\n\u201cMother,\u201d cried the Princess, clinging to her with entreaty, \u201cis all the\nworld blind but me?\u201d\n\nThe heron had become quite fond of the Princess; wherever she went it\nfollowed her, and, indeed, without it nowhere would she go. Whenever it\nwas near her, the Princess laughed and sang, and when it was out of her\nsight she became sad as night. All the courtiers wept to see her in such\nbondage. \u201cAh,\u201d said she, \u201cyour eyes have been worn out with looking at\nthings so long; mine have been kept for me in a mirror.\u201d\n\nWhen the good family Fairy came (for she was at once sent for by the\nQueen, and told of all that had happened), she said, \u201cDear Madam, there\nare but two things you can do: either you can wring the heron\u2019s neck, and\nleave the Princess to die of grief; or you can make the Princess happy in\nher own way, by\u2014\u2014\u201d Her voice dropped, and she looked from the King to the\nQueen before she went on. \u201cAt her birth I gave your daughter love for my\ngift; now it is hers, will you let her keep it?\u201d\n\nThe King and the Queen looked softly at each other. \u201cDo not take love\nfrom her,\u201d said they, \u201clet her keep it!\u201d\n\n\u201cThere is but one way,\u201d answered the Fairy.\n\n\u201cDo not tell me the way,\u201d said the Queen weeping, \u201conly let the way be!\u201d\n\nSo they went with the Fairy down to the great pond, and there sat the\nPrincess, with the grey heron against her heart. She smiled as she saw\nthem come. \u201cI see good in your hearts toward me!\u201d she cried. \u201cDear\ngodmother, give me the thing that I want, that my love may be happy!\u201d\n\nThen the Fairy stroked her but once with her wand, and two grey herons\nsuddenly rose up from the bank, and sailed away to a hiding-place in the\nreeds.\n\nThe Fairy said to the Queen, \u201cYou have made your daughter happy; and\nstill she will have her voice and her human heart, and will remember you\nwith love and gratitude; but her greatest love will be to the grey heron,\nand her home among the reeds.\u201d\n\nSo the changed life of the Princess began; every day her mother went down\nto the pool and called, and the Princess came rising up out of the reeds,\nand folded her grey wings over her mother\u2019s heart. Every day her mother\nsaid, \u201cDaughter of mine, are you happy?\u201d\n\nAnd the Princess answered her, \u201cYes, for I love and am loved.\u201d\n\nYet each time the mother heard more and more of a note of sadness come\ninto her daughter\u2019s voice; and at last one day she said, \u201cAnswer me\ntruly, as the mother who brought you into the world, whether you be happy\nin your heart of hearts or no?\u201d\n\nThen the heron-Princess laid her head on the Queen\u2019s heart, and said,\n\u201cMother, my heart is breaking with love!\u201d\n\n\u201cFor whom, then?\u201d asked the Queen astonished.\n\n\u201cFor my grey heron, whom I love, and who loves me so much. And yet it is\nlove that divides us, for I am still troubled with a human heart, and\noften it aches with sorrow because all the love in it can never be fully\nunderstood or shared by my heron; and I have my human voice left, and\nthat gives me a hundred things to say all day, for which there is no word\nin herons\u2019 language, and so he cannot understand them. Therefore these\nthings only make a gulf between him and me. For all the other grey herons\nin the pools there is happiness, but not for me who have too big a heart\nbetween my wings.\u201d\n\nHer mother said softly, \u201cWait, wait, little heron-daughter, and it shall\nbe well with you!\u201d Then she went to the Fairy and said, \u201cMy daughter\u2019s\nheart is lonely among the reeds, for the grey heron\u2019s love covers but\nhalf of it. Give her some companions of her own kind that her hours may\nbecome merry again!\u201d\n\nSo the Fairy took and turned five of the Princess\u2019s lady\u2019s-maids into\nherons, and sent them down to the pool.\n\nThe five herons stood each on one leg in the shallows of the pool,\nand cried all day long; and their tears fell down into the water and\nfrightened away the fish that came their way. For they had human hearts\nthat cried out to be let go. \u201cO, cruel, cruel,\u201d they wept, whenever the\nheron-Princess approached, \u201csee what we suffer because of you, and what\nthey have made of us for your sake!\u201d\n\nThe Princess came to her mother and said, \u201cDear mother, take them away,\nfor their cry wearies me, and the pool is bitter with their tears! They\nonly awake the human part of my heart that wants to sleep; presently, may\nbe, if it is let alone, it will forget itself.\u201d\n\nHer mother said, \u201cIt is my coming every day also that keeps it awake.\u201d\nThe Princess answered, \u201cThis sorrow belongs to my birthright; you must\nstill come; but for the others, let the Fairy take them away.\u201d\n\nSo the Fairy came and released the five lady\u2019s-maids whom she had changed\ninto herons. And they came up out of the water, stripping themselves of\ntheir grey feather-skins and throwing them back into the pool. The Fairy\nsaid, \u201cYou foolish maids, you have thrown away a gift that you should\nhave valued; these skins you could have kept and held as heirlooms in\nyour family.\u201d\n\nThe five maids answered, \u201cWe want to forget that there are such things as\nherons in the world!\u201d\n\nAfter much thought the Queen said to the Fairy, \u201cYou have changed a\nPrincess into a heron, and five maids into herons and back again; cannot\nyou change one heron into a Prince?\u201d But the Fairy answered sadly, \u201cOur\npower has limits; we can bring down, but we cannot bring up, if there be\nno heart to answer our call. The five maids only followed their hearts,\nthat were human, when I called them back; but a heron has only a heron\u2019s\nheart, and unless his heart become too great for a bird and he earn a\nhuman one, I cannot change him to a higher form.\u201d \u201cHow can he earn a\nhuman one?\u201d asked the Queen. \u201cOnly if he love the Princess so well that\nhis love for her becomes stronger than his life,\u201d answered the Fairy.\n\u201cThen he will have earned a human body, and then I can give him the form\nthat his heart suits best. There may be a chance, if we wait for it and\nare patient, for the Princess\u2019s love is great and may work miracles.\u201d\n\nA little while after this, the Queen watching, saw that the two herons\nwere making a nest among the reeds. \u201cWhat have you there?\u201d said\nthe mother to her daughter. \u201cA little hollow place,\u201d answered the\nheron-Princess, \u201cand in it the moon lies.\u201d A little while after she said\nagain, \u201cWhat have you there, now, little daughter?\u201d And her daughter\nanswered, \u201cOnly a small hollow space; but in it two moons lie.\u201d\n\nThe Queen told the family Fairy how in a hollow of the reeds lay two\nmoons. \u201cNow,\u201d said the Fairy, \u201cwe will wait no longer. If your daughter\u2019s\nlove has touched the heron\u2019s heart and made it grow larger than a bird\u2019s,\nI can help them both to happiness; but if not, then birds they must\nstill remain.\u201d\n\nAmong the reeds the heron said in bird language to his wife, \u201cGo and\nstretch your wings for a little while over the water; it is weary work\nto wait here so long in the reeds.\u201d The heron-Princess looked at him\nwith her bird\u2019s eyes, and all the human love in her heart strove, like a\nfountain that could not get free, to make itself known through them; also\nher tongue was full of the longing to utter sweet words, but she kept\nthem back, knowing they were beyond the heron\u2019s power to understand. So\nshe answered merely in heron\u2019s language, \u201cCome with me, and I will come!\u201d\n\nThey rose, wing beating beside wing; and the reflection of their grey\nbreasts slid out under them over the mirror of the pool.\n\nHigher they went and higher, passing over the tree tops, and keeping time\ntogether as they flew. All at once the wings of the grey heron flagged,\nthen took a deep beat; he cried to the heron-Princess, \u201cTurn, and come\nhome, yonder there is danger flying to meet us!\u201d Before them hung a\nbrown blot in the air, that winged and grew large. The two herons turned\nand flew back. \u201cRise,\u201d cried the grey heron, \u201cwe must rise!\u201d and the\nPrincess knew what was behind, and struggled with the whole strength of\nher wings for escape.\n\nThe grey heron was bearing ahead on stronger wing. \u201cWith me, with me!\u201d he\ncried. \u201cIf it gets above us, one of us is dead!\u201d But the falcon had fixed\nhis eye on the Princess for his quarry, and flew she fast, or flew she\nslow, there was little chance for her now. Up and up she strained, but\nstill she was behind her mate, and still the falcon gained.\n\nThe heron swung back to her side; she saw the anguish and fear of his\ndownward glance as his head ranged by hers. Past her the falcon went,\ntowering for the final swoop.\n\nThe Princess cried in heron\u2019s language, \u201cFarewell, dear mate, and\nfarewell, two little moons among the reeds!\u201d But the grey heron only kept\ncloser to her side.\n\nOverhead the falcon closed in its wings and fell like a dead weight out\nof the clouds. \u201cDrop!\u201d cried the grey heron to his mate.\n\nAt his word she dropped; but he stayed, stretching up his wings, and,\npassing between the descending falcon and its prey, caught in his own\nbody the death-blow from its beak. Drops of his blood fell upon the\nheron-Princess.\n\nHe stricken in body, she in soul, together they fell down to the margin\nof the pool. The falcon still clung fleshing its beak in the neck of its\nprey. The heron-Princess threw back her head, and, darting furiously,\nstruck her own sharp bill deep into the falcon\u2019s breast. The bird threw\nout its wings with a hoarse cry and fell back dead, with a little tuft of\nthe grey heron\u2019s feathers still upon its beak.\n\nThe heron-Princess crouched down, and covered with her wings the dying\nform of her mate; in her sorrow she spoke to him in her own tongue,\nforgetting her bird\u2019s language. The grey heron lifted his head, and,\ngazing tenderly, answered her with a human voice:\n\n\u201cDear wife,\u201d he said, \u201cat last I have the happiness so long denied to\nme of giving utterance in the speech that is your own to the love that\nyou have put into my heart. Often I have heard you speak and have not\nunderstood; now something has touched my heart, and changed it, so that I\ncan both speak and understand.\u201d\n\n\u201cO, beloved!\u201d She laid her head down by his. \u201cThe ends of the world\nbelong to us now. Lie down, and die gently by my side, and I will die\nwith you, breaking my heart with happiness.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said the grey heron, \u201cdo not die yet! Remember the two little moons\nthat lie in the hollow among the reeds.\u201d Then he laid his head down by\nhers, being too weak to say more.\n\nThey folded their wings over each other, and closed their eyes; nor did\nthey know that the Fairy was standing by them, till she stroked them both\nsoftly with her wand, saying to each of them the same words:\n\n\u201cHuman heart, and human form, come out of the grey heron!\u201d\n\nAnd out of the grey heron-skins came two human forms; the one was the\nPrincess restored again to her own shape, but the other was a beautiful\nyouth, with a bird-like look about the eyes, and long slender limbs. The\nPrincess, as she gazed on him, found hardly any change, for love remained\nthe same, binding him close to her heart; and, grey heron or beautiful\nyouth, he was all one to her now.\n\nThen came the Queen, weeping for joy, and embracing them both, and after\nthem, the Fairy. \u201cO, how good an ending,\u201d she cried, \u201chas come to that\nterrible dream! Let it never be remembered or mentioned between us more!\u201d\nAnd she began to lead the way back to the palace.\n\nBut the youth, to whom the Fairy gave the name of Prince Heron, turned\nand took up the two heron-skins which he and his wife had let fall, and\nfollowed, carrying them upon his arm. And as they came past the bed of\nreeds, the Princess went aside, and, stooping down in a certain place\ndrew out from thence something which she came carrying, softly wrapped in\nthe folds of her gown.\n\nWith what rejoicing the Princess and her husband were welcomed by the\nKing and all the Court needs not to be told. For a whole month the\nfestivities continued; and whenever she showed herself, there was the\nPrincess sitting with two eggs in her lap, and her hands over them to\nkeep them warm. The King was impatient. \u201cWhy cannot you send them down to\nthe poultry yard to be hatched?\u201d he said.\n\nBut the Princess replied smiling, \u201cMy moons are my own, and I will keep\nthem to myself.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo you hear?\u201d she said one day, at last; and everybody who listened\ncould hear something going \u201ctap, tap,\u201d inside the shells. Presently the\neggs cracked, and out of each, at the same moment, came a little grey\nheron.\n\nWhen she saw that they were herons, the Queen wrung her hands. \u201cO,\nFairy,\u201d she cried, \u201cwhat a disappointment is this! I had hoped two\nbeautiful babies would have come out of those shells.\u201d\n\nBut the Fairy said, \u201cIt is no matter. Half of their hearts are human\nalready; birds\u2019 hearts do not beat so. If you wish it, I can change\nthem.\u201d So she stroked them softly with her wand, saying to each, \u201cHuman\nheart, and human form, come out of the grey heron!\u201d\n\nYet she had to stroke them three times before they would turn; and she\nsaid to the Princess, \u201cMy dear, you were too satisfied with your lot when\nyou laid these eggs. I doubt if more than a quarter of them is human.\u201d\n\n\u201cI was very satisfied,\u201d said the Princess, and she laughed across to her\nhusband.\n\nAt last, however, on the third stroke of the wand, the heron\u2019s skins\ndropped off, and they changed into a pair of very small babies, a boy\nand a girl. But the difference between them and other children was, that\ninstead of hair, their heads were covered with a fluff of downy grey\nfeathers; also they had queer, round, bird-like eyes, and were able to\nsleep standing.\n\nNow, after this the happiness of the Princess was great; but the Fairy\nsaid to her, \u201cDo not let your husband see the heron-skins again for some\nwhile, lest with the memory a longing for his old life should return to\nhim and take him away from you. Only by exchange with another can he ever\nget back his human form again, if he surrenders it of his own free will.\nAnd who is there so poor that he would willingly give up his human form\nto become a bird?\u201d\n\nSo the Princess took the four coats of feather\u2014her own and her husband\u2019s\nand her two children\u2019s\u2014and hid them away in a closet of which she alone\nkept the key. It was a little gold key, and to make it safe she hung it\nabout her neck, and wore it night and day.\n\nThe Prince said to her, \u201cWhat is that little key that you wear always\nhung round your neck?\u201d\n\nShe answered him, \u201cIt is the key to your happiness and mine. Do not ask\nmore than that!\u201d At that there was a look in his face that made her say,\n\u201cYou _are_ happy, are you not?\u201d\n\nHe kissed her, saying, \u201cHappy indeed! Have I not you to make me so?\u201d Yet\nthough, indeed, he told no untruth, and was happy whenever she was with\nhim, there were times when a restlessness and a longing for wings took\nhold of him; for, as yet, the life of a man was new and half strange to\nhim, and a taint of his old life still mixed itself with his blood. But\nto her he was ashamed to say what might seem a complaint against his\ngreat fortune; so when she said \u201chappiness,\u201d he thought, \u201cIs it just the\nturning of that key that I want before my happiness can be perfect?\u201d\n\nTherefore, one night when the early season of spring made his longing\nstrong in him, he took the key from the Princess while she slept, and\nopened the little closet in which hung the four feather coats. And when\nhe saw his own, all at once he remembered the great pools of water,\nand how they lay in the shine and shadow of the moonlight, while the\nfish rose in rings upon their surface. And at that so great a longing\ncame into him to revisit his old haunts that he reached out his hand and\ntook down the heron-skin from its nail and put it over himself; so that\nimmediately his old life took hold of him, and he flew out of the window\nin the form of a grey heron.\n\nIn the morning the Princess found the key gone from her neck, and her\nhusband\u2019s place empty. She went in haste to the closet, and there stood\nthe door wide with the key in it, and only three heron-skins hanging\nwhere four had used to be.\n\nThen she came crying to the family Fairy, \u201cMy husband has taken his\nheron-skin and is gone! Tell me what I can do!\u201d\n\nThe Fairy pitied her with all her heart, but could do nothing. \u201cOnly by\nexchange,\u201d said she, \u201ccan he get back his human shape; and who is there\nso poor that he would willingly lose his own form to become a bird? Only\nyour children, who are but half human, can put their heron-skins on and\noff as they like and when they like.\u201d\n\nIn deep grief the Princess went to look for her husband down by the pools\nin the wood. But now his shame and sorrow at having deceived her were so\ngreat that as soon as he heard her voice he hid himself among the reeds,\nfor he knew now that, having put on his heron-skin again, he could not\ntake it off unless some one gave him a human form in exchange.\n\nAt last, however, so pitiful was the cry of the Princess for him, that he\ncould bear to hear it no more; but rising up from the reeds came trailing\nto her sadly over the water. \u201cAh, dear love!\u201d she said when he was come\nto her, \u201cif I had not distrusted you, you would not have deceived me:\nthus, for my fault we are punished.\u201d So she sorrowed, and he answered her:\n\n\u201cNay, dear love, for if I had not deceived you, you would not have\ndistrusted me. I thought I was not happy, yet I feared to tell it you.\u201d\nThus they sorrowed together, both laying on themselves the blame and the\nburden.\n\nThen she said to him: \u201cBe here for me to-night, for now I must go; but\nthen I shall return.\u201d\n\nShe went back to the palace, and told her mother of all that had\nhappened. \u201cAnd now,\u201d she said, \u201cyou who know where my happiness lies will\nnot forbid me from following it; for my heart is again with the grey\nheron.\u201d And the Queen wept, but would not say her no.\n\nSo that night the Princess went and kissed her children as they slept\nstanding up in their beds, with their funny feather-pates to one side;\nand then she took down her skin of feathers and put it on, and became\nchanged once more into a grey heron. And again she went up to the two in\ntheir cots, and kissed their birdish heads saying: \u201cThey who can change\nat will, being but half human, they will come and visit us in the great\npool by the wood, and bring back word of us here.\u201d\n\nIn the morning the Princess was gone, and the two children when they woke\nlooked at each other and said: \u201cDid we dream last night?\u201d\n\nThey both answered each other \u201cYes, first we dreamed that our mother\ncame and kissed us; and we liked that. And then we dreamed that a grey\nheron came and kissed us, and we liked that better still!\u201d They waved\ntheir arms up and down. \u201cWhy have we not wings?\u201d they kept asking. All\nday long they did this, playing that they were birds. If a window were\nopened, it was with the greatest difficulty that they were kept from\ntrying to fly through.\n\nIn the Court they were known as the \u201cFeather-pates\u201d; nothing could they\nbe taught at all. When they were rebuked they would stand on one leg and\nsigh with their heads on one side; but no one ever saw tears come out of\ntheir birdish eyes.\n\nNow at night they would dream that two grey herons came and stood by\ntheir bedsides, kissing them; \u201cAnd where in the world,\u201d they said when\nthey woke, \u201c_are_ our wings?\u201d\n\nOne day, wandering about in the palace, they came upon the closet in\nwhich hung the two little feather coats. \u201cO!!!\u201d they cried, and opened\nhard bright eyes at each other, nodding, for now they knew what they\nwould do. \u201cIf we told, they would be taken off us,\u201d they said; and they\nwaited till it was night. Then they crept back and took the two little\ncoats from their pegs, and, putting them on, were turned into two young\nherons.\n\nThrough the window they flew, away down to the great fish-pond in the\nwood. Their father and mother saw them coming, and clapped their wings\nfor joy. \u201cSee,\u201d they said, \u201cour children come to visit us, and our hearts\nare left to us to love with. What further happiness can we want?\u201d But\nwhen they were not looking at each other they sighed.\n\nAll night long the two young herons stayed with their parents; they\nbathed, and fished, and flew, till they were weary. Then the Princess\nshowed them the nest among the reeds, and told them all the story of\ntheir lives.\n\n\u201cBut it is much nicer to be herons than to be real people,\u201d said the\nyoung ones, sadly, and became very sorrowful when dawn drew on, and their\nmother told them to go back to the palace and hang up the feather coats\nagain, and be as they had been the day before.\n\nLong, long the day now seemed to them; they hardly waited till it was\nnight before they took down their feather-skins, and, putting them on,\nflew out and away to the fish-pond in the wood.\n\nSo every night they went, when all in the palace were asleep; and in the\nmorning came back before anyone was astir, and were found by their nurses\nlying demurely between the sheets, just as they had been left the night\nbefore.\n\nOne day the Queen when she went to see her daughter said to her, \u201cMy\nchild, your two children are growing less like human beings and more\nlike birds every day. Nothing will they learn or do, but stand all day\nflapping their arms up and down, and saying, \u2018Where are our wings, where\nare our wings?\u2019 The idea of one of them ever coming to the throne makes\nyour father\u2019s hair stand on end under his crown.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, mother,\u201d said the heron-Princess, \u201cI have made a sad bed for you and\nmy father to lie on!\u201d\n\nOne day the two children said to each other, \u201cOur father and mother\nare sad, because they want to be real persons again, instead of having\nwings and catching fish the way we like to do. Let us give up being real\npersons, which is all so much trouble, and such a want of exercise, and\nmake them exchange with us!\u201d But when the two young herons went down to\nthe pond and proposed it to them, their parents said, \u201cYou are young;\nyou do not know what you would be giving up.\u201d Nor would they consent to\nit at all.\n\nNow one morning it happened that the Feather-pates were so late in\nreturning to the palace that the Queen, coming into their chamber,\nfound the two beds empty; and just as she had turned away to search for\nthem elsewhere, she heard a noise of wings and saw the two young herons\ncome flying in through the window. Then she saw them take off their\nfeather-skins and hang them up in the closet, and after that go and lie\ndown in their beds so as to look as if they had been there all night.\n\nThe Queen struck her hands together with horror at the sight, but she\ncrept away softly, so that they did not know they had been found out.\nBut as soon as they were out of their beds and at play in another part\nof the palace, the Queen went to the closet, and setting fire to the two\nheron-skins where they hung, burnt them till not a feather of them was\nleft, and only a heap of grey ashes remained to tell what had become of\nthem.\n\nAt night, when the Feather-pates went to their cupboards and found their\nskins gone, and saw what had become of them, their grief knew no bounds.\nThey trembled with fear and rage, and tears rained out of their eyes as\nthey beheld themselves deprived of their bird bodies and made into real\npersons for good and all.\n\n\u201cWe won\u2019t be real persons!\u201d they cried. But for all their crying they\nknew no way out of it. They made themselves quite ill with grief; and\nthat night, for the first time since they had found their way to the\ncloset, they stayed where their nurses had put them, and did not even\nstand up in their beds to go to sleep. There they lay with gasping mouth,\nand big bird-like eyes all languid with grief, and hollow grey cheeks.\n\nPresently their father and mother came seeking for them, wondering why\nthey had not come down to the fish-pond as they were wont. \u201cWhere are\nyou, my children?\u201d cried the heron-Princess, putting her head in through\nthe window.\n\n\u201cHere we are, both at death\u2019s door!\u201d they cried. \u201cCome and see us die!\nOur wicked granddam has burnt our feather-skins and made us into real\npersons for ever and ever, Amen. But we will die rather!\u201d\n\nThe parent herons, when they heard that, flew in through the window and\nbent down over the little ones\u2019 beds.\n\nThe two children reached up their arms. \u201cGive us your feathers!\u201d they\ncried. \u201cWe shall die if you don\u2019t! We _will_ die if you don\u2019t! O, do!\u201d\nBut still the parent birds hesitated, nor knew what to do.\n\n\u201cBend down, and let me whisper something!\u201d said the boy to his father:\nand \u201cBend down, and whisper!\u201d cried the girl to her mother. And father\nand mother bent down over the faces of their sick children. Then these,\nboth together, caught hold of them, and crying, \u201cHuman heart, and\nhuman form, exchange with the grey heron!\u201d pulled off their parents\u2019\nfeather-skins, and put them upon themselves.\n\nAnd there once more stood Prince Heron and the Princess in human shape,\nwhile the two children had turned into herons in their place.\n\nThe young herons laughed and shouted and clapped their wings for joy.\n\u201cAre you not happy now?\u201d cried they. And when their parents saw the joy,\nnot only in their children\u2019s eyes, but in each other\u2019s, and felt their\nhearts growing glad in the bodies they had regained, then they owned\nthat the Feather-pates had been wise in their generation, and done well\naccording to their lights.\n\nSo it came about that the Prince and the Princess lived happily ever\nafter, and the two young herons lived happily also, and were the\nbest-hearted birds the world ever saw.\n\nIn course of time the Prince and Princess had other children, who pleased\nthe old King better than the first had done. But the parents loved\nnone better than the two who lived as herons by the great fish-pond in\nthe wood; nor could there be greater love than was found between these\nand their younger brothers and sisters, whose nature it was to be real\npersons.\n\n\n\n\nSYRINGA\n\n  _TO_\n  DORA\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\nSYRINGA\n\nA great many years ago there lived a King who spent his days in\ntravelling about to find the woman he could love and take to be his wife.\nThough the richest and most beautiful princesses offered him their hands\nin marriage, for none of them could he entertain the smallest affection.\n\u201cIt seems that I have had a dream,\u201d he said. \u201cSomewhere my Love is, but I\nhave not found her yet!\u201d\n\nIn those days the country over which he was lord had two Kings, one\nreigned and the other ruled; and as long as this was so, since his\nbrother-King who ruled was married, his councillors allowed him who\nmerely reigned to wander about at will in pursuit of his strange fancy.\n\nWhen, however, the King who ruled died without leaving an heir, then\nthose same councillors said, \u201cThis will not do; the State can wait no\nlonger. Princes are born, and Kings die; love or no love, for your\npeople\u2019s sake you must marry!\u201d\n\n\u201cThen why does he not marry me?\u201d said the Queen-widow of the King that\nruled.\n\nThe King that reigned said, \u201cRather than marry her I would marry my\nscullery-maid!\u201d He became so terrified at the thought of her proposal\nthat he took horse secretly by night, and rode away into the most\nsecluded and uninhabited parts of his dominion.\n\nNow here, as he rode along over many miles of barren moor and hill, one\nday, crossing a high ridge, he met the wind coming softly up out of the\nvalley below him, and its breath upon his face was full of the perfume of\nsome sweet flower. At that his heart, which had been so long listless and\nsad, seemed to awake within him. \u201cFlower of my dream!\u201d he cried; and soon\nsaw below him, nestling in a corner of the valley, a small garden half\nhidden in the embrace of tall girdling trees.\n\nDown he went joyfully, following the fragrant call till he came to the\nentrance of the place; and there, dismounting from his horse, he entered\nits green ways. A natural lawn mounted and hollowed before him in glossy\nsweeps, flowering shrubs dotted its heights, for the summer of the year\nwas begun; but the scent which had taken hold of his heart came from a\ngreat bush of white bloom in the centre of all.\n\nUnder the bush lay a young and beautiful girl, and the blossoms were\nsprinkling down, one by one, like dropped kisses upon her dear face. So\nsoon as the King saw her he knew that his search was at an end, and that\nhis dream of years had come true.\n\nTheir glad eyes met softly through the flowers; and he said, \u201cYou had but\nto breathe for me, and I came!\u201d For all her face and breath smelt to him\nof the blossoms she lay under.\n\nShe answered, \u201cThree years I have lain with my ear upon the ground, and\nheard you going and coming, searching the world through; and now at last\nyou are come!\u201d She rose up to the King\u2019s embrace, and they were to each\nother like old lovers long parted and at last met, so long had they\nknown of love in their dreams.\n\nTwilight was beginning as they turned and went out of the garden. The\nKing said, \u201cWhat is your name all these years?\u201d\n\nAnd she answered him with a voice like a bird singing, \u201cSyringa my name\nwas, Syringa my name is, and will be while life lasts.\u201d\n\nWhen they left the valley and went mounting the side of the hill, a sweet\nwind rose and rose, and came following them. All the way, as they rode,\nwhite blossoms came showering behind them, falling upon their faces and\ntheir hair, and whitening the track at their feet. Up to the city gates,\nwhere all the King\u2019s court and his councillors stood watching and waiting\nfor his return, the blossoms kept following them, like little scented\nmoths fluttering round them in the darkness.\n\nWhen the gates were opened, the whole city became full of the scent of\nthe bride\u2019s name.\n\nSo the marriage of the King who reigned was celebrated with all the joy\nand noise imaginable; for all the people laughed and shouted and clapped\ntheir hands when their eyes saw the beauty of the new Queen. But the\ndowager Queen, the widow of the King who ruled, put on yellow weeds, and\nshut herself up in a corner of the palace, eating unleavened bread and\nbitter herb sandwiches till all the rejoicings were over.\n\nIn a little while, however, she appeared to forget her grief, and,\nconcealing her jealousy, made friends with the King who reigned, and with\nhis Queen; and the King was glad in his great happiness to think that no\nheart in all the kingdom remained under a cloud.\n\nFor nearly a year the happiness of the King and Queen lasted and grew\nperfect. Every day that they lived together they loved each other more\nand more. But the Queen-widow waited and watched till an opportunity for\nher evil working should come in.\n\nPresently people who looked at Syringa\u2019s beauty began to say, \u201cIs not\nsuch beauty more than human? Where does it come from, and what keeps it\nalive?\u201d And though many in course of time learned to talk like this,\nno one ever seemed to know from whom such talk first came. Later, folk\nbegan to whisper instead of to talk. \u201cWe have heard,\u201d they said, \u201cone\nway by which such beauty can be kept alive, yet only one.\u201d Then others\nwere heard saying, \u201cHave you heard that this man\u2019s wife lost her child\nbefore it was a week old, and knows not where it can be gone; and that\nthat man\u2019s wife lost hers in the same way a week before? And who will\nlose hers this week that\u2019s coming, if we don\u2019t know yet, we soon shall\nknow!\u201d And shortly, sure enough, all through the city there were mothers\nmourning for the loss of their children, who had gone, none knew where,\nbefore they were even a week old; and more and more the crowd was taught\nto say, \u201cLook how beautiful the Queen grows!\u201d whenever she walked or rode.\n\nThe Queen-widow listened to all this, and laughed. In her own chamber she\nhad a cage filled with little blue birds, who cried lamentably all day\nlong.\n\nNow, just when all the city-talk and the dark looks of the people had\ngrown to a head, Queen Syringa gave birth to a little son; and the King\u2019s\njoy was beyond all bounds. \u201cNow,\u201d thought the Queen-widow, \u201cnow or never!\nNow I will ruin her or die!\u201d\n\nShe watched her opportunity, till one day she found Syringa lying alone\nupon her couch with the child asleep between her arms.\n\nThe wicked Queen saw that Syringa also was asleep. She stooped down over\nthe child, whispering a spell, and as she clapped her hands it started\nfrom between its mother\u2019s arms and flew away in the form of a little blue\nbird.\n\nThe Queen-widow did her best to catch the bird, but could not; then she\ntook blood, and, smearing the Queen\u2019s hands and face with it, left her\nlying there asleep.\n\nSo Syringa was found; and the noise of it went through the city how she\nhad killed her own child in order to keep alive her wondrous beauty. The\nKing tried with heart and soul not to believe so wicked a story against\nthe wife he loved, but the evidence was too strong. When asked, the Queen\ncould explain nothing. \u201cWhen I went to sleep,\u201d she said, \u201cmy child was in\nmy arms, and when I awoke it was gone!\u201d\n\nOutside the palace all the people were crying for her to be put to death.\n\u201cGive back to their mothers the babies that you have eaten!\u201d they cried.\n\nThe King sent for his foster-brother, and told him to take the Queen away\nto some lonely and desolate place, and there to make an end of her. \u201cShe\nis too beautiful,\u201d he said, \u201cand I loved her too much. Let her be very\nfar away from me when she dies!\u201d\n\nSo that night the King\u2019s foster-brother took the Queen, and set out in\nthe direction of the waste places and the hills. All the day following\nthey journeyed, till toward evening they came to the head of a valley,\nwhere a wind came to them carrying the rich scent of flowers. The Queen\nlifted her head and took in a deep breath; then she said, \u201cIf I have to\ndie, let me die under the scent of those flowers!\u201d\n\nThey went on till they came to a little garden lying in a curl of the\nvalley. There in the centre of a lawn stood the great bush white with\nbloom, and a sweet fragrance blew out of it, filling all that space.\n\n\u201cIf I must die,\u201d said the Queen again, \u201clet me lie down and drink in the\nscent of those flowers; afterwards I shall not complain.\u201d So the King\u2019s\nfoster-brother gave her leave to go and lie down under the tree, and sat\ndown close at hand to keep watch, so that she should not escape.\n\nA small blue bird came and perched upon the bush over her head.\n\n\u201cSyringa, Syringa!\u201d cried the bird, and two white blossoms fell off like\nkisses upon the Queen\u2019s face. She lifted her hands and threw kisses up to\nthe flowers, and more and more they came down and settled upon her face.\n\n\u201cSyringa, Syringa!\u201d sang the bird; and, hearing it, the King\u2019s\nfoster-brother\u2019s heart became ready to break for grief.\n\nThe twilight deepened in the air around. All through the hours the bird\nsang on, and the flowers dropped down like pale tired moths in the dusk\nof the summer\u2019s night, till where the Queen lay became white with a mass\nof blossoms that never stirred.\n\nThe heart of the King\u2019s foster-brother grew heavier; \u201cWhat if, after all,\nshe be not wicked but good! To-morrow at sunrise I must kill her.\u201d\n\n\u201cSyringa, Syringa!\u201d cried the bird.\n\nTowards dawn he saw the tree all blossomless, only a great heap of\npetals, like a snow-covered grave, showed where the Queen lay; and the\nsong of the bird had stopped.\n\n\u201cIf she sleeps now,\u201d thought the King\u2019s foster-brother, \u201cit will be\nmerciful.\u201d He drew out his sharp hunting-knife, and went softly up to the\nspot to carry out the King\u2019s command.\n\nSo covered was she with blossoms, he could not tell which way lay her\nhead; the heaviness of their dying scent almost made him swoon. Softly\nwith his hand he brushed the petals apart to find a place where he might\nstrike.\n\nHow deeply they lay! They seemed to be without end here in the centre of\nall. Presently his hand came upon green grass bent with the weight of\nblossoms, and dank with dew. He shut his eyes and started away, for the\ncolour and the touch made a strange sorrow in his heart, and he knew that\nthe Queen was not there.\n\nHe went away to the furthest part of the garden, and returned, and again\nsearched, and still she was not there; only blossoms in a pile, and under\nthem green grass.\n\n\u201cSyringa, Syringa!\u201d sang the bird; and now there was a sort of triumph in\nits note.\n\nThe King\u2019s foster-brother turned and went back to the city. All the way\nthe blossoms drifted and blew after him along the track; till at evening\nhe stood at the palace door in a wind of syringa scent, and dead flowers\nblew over his feet as he crossed the threshold.\n\nThen he told the King all that he had seen and heard, and the King knew\nsurely that his Queen, who had died so gentle and beloved a death, had\nbeen innocent of the crime laid to her charge. So great was his grief he\ncould not rest; that very night he rose and journeyed till he came by day\nto the little garden; there he found the tree blossomless, and in the\ntop of it he heard the blue bird crying, \u201cSyringa, Syringa,\u201d sadly and\nwithout ceasing.\n\nBut to the King there came no sign or sound of his love. He laid his head\nupon the ground at the foot of the tree, sighing, \u201cMy love, you lay three\nyears with your ear to the ground listening for my feet; now I will lie\nand listen for yours!\u201d\n\nAll the grass became wet with the tears of sorrow that the King shed;\nthe tree waved and grew more green. In three days new blossoms looked\nout among the leaves; at night they fell upon his face, and he dreamed\nthat Syringa\u2019s lips were laid to his ear, and the tale of her betrayal\nwhispered to him.\n\nThen, knowing all, but determined for a time to let the truth lie buried\nin his heart, he caused the tree to be lifted from the ground and carried\nback and set secretly in the palace garden. And of all this, and of what\nhe knew, he said nothing to the Queen-widow.\n\nTo the little blue bird that had followed the tree, and perched in its\nboughs, he said, \u201cBe silent, little blue bird, and do not sing that name\nhere.\u201d At his word the little blue bird became silent as death, and sat\nmotionless in the heart of the tree, never once breathing Syringa\u2019s name.\n\nAt night the Prince would come and press his lips to the leaves of the\ntree and whisper, \u201cAh, love, how long is my heart to stay broken? And\nwhen will forgiveness blossom?\u201d\n\nBut to the Queen-widow it appeared that the Prince was recovering from\nhis grief; and when a year had gone round she began wooing him by\nstealth, seeming to pity him for the sorrow that the wickedness of his\ndead Queen had caused him.\n\nLittle by little he seemed to listen and open his heart to her; once he\nsaid, \u201cAll my grief would go if one whom I love could know that my heart,\nwhich once turned from her, has become wholly hers again.\u201d\n\nWhen the Queen-widow heard that said, she thought, \u201cSurely now, in a\nshort time, all my schemes are to be brought to a good end.\u201d\n\nOne day as they walked and talked together in the gardens of the palace,\nthey came upon a tree white and covered with blossom. \u201cHow I love that\nflower!\u201d said the King; but the Queen-widow as soon as she smelt the\nscent of it turned pale and trembled. Up among the branches sat a little\nblue bird silently.\n\n\u201cCome here, and sit under this tree,\u201d said the King, \u201cand let me speak\nfreely, for I am in sore want of a wife!\u201d He drew her close under the\nleaves of the tree. \u201cHere,\u201d he thought, \u201cI will make her speak; she shall\nconfess all!\u201d Over them a bough leaned down.\n\nOne of its blossoms touched the Queen-widow on the throat. \u201cIt has bitten\nme!\u201d she shrieked. The branch sprang away, the whole tree opened and\nwaved. Out of it the blossoms flew like a white swarm of angry bees.\n\n\u201cSyringa, Syringa!\u201d cried the bird.\n\nThe Queen-widow caught herself by the throat and moaned, and lay down\nupon the grass to die.\n\nAs soon as her breath was gone, all the blossoms rose up again like a\nwhite column of cloud; down into their midst flew the blue bird.\n\nThen, this way and that, the blossoms cast themselves loose into the\nwind, and out of their midst came Syringa herself, carrying her child in\nher arms. At her feet the Queen-widow lay quite dead, with her hand upon\nher throat. The little blue birds in the palace had broken out of their\ncage and were calling for their mothers with childish voices and laughter.\n\nBut the King knelt down before Syringa\u2019s feet, pale and trembling,\nseeking pardon for having ever believed in her guilt. Swiftly Queen\nSyringa bent down, and in token of forgiveness held her child\u2019s lips to\nhis. Over them both her face and breath were fragrant as a garden full of\nsunshine.\n\nWhen the King had kissed the child\u2019s lips, she gave him her own.\n\n\n\n\nTHE TRAVELLER\u2019S SHOES\n\n  _TO_\n  MARY AND EMILY\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\nTHE TRAVELLER\u2019S SHOES\n\nA long while ago there lived a young cobbler named Lubin, who, when his\nfather died, was left with only the shop and the shoe-leather out of\nwhich to make his fortune. From morning to night he toiled, making and\nmending the shoes of the poor village folk; but his earnings were small,\nand he seemed never able to get more than three days ahead of poverty.\n\nOne day, as he sat working at his window-bench, the door opened, and in\ncame a traveller. He had on a pair of long red shoes with pointed ends;\nbut of one the seams had split, so that all his toes were coming out of\nit.\n\nThe stranger, putting up one foot after the other, took off both shoes,\nand giving that one which wanted cobbling to Lubin, he said: \u201cTo-night\nI shall be sleeping here at the inn; have this ready in good time\nto-morrow, for I am in haste to go on!\u201d And having said this he put the\nother shoe into his pocket, and went out of the door barefoot.\n\n\u201cWhat a funny fellow,\u201d thought Lubin, \u201cnot to make the most of one shoe\nwhen he has it!\u201d But without stopping to puzzle himself he took up the\nto-be-mended shoe and set to work. When it was finished he threw it down\non the floor behind him, and went on working at his other jobs. He meant\nto work late, for he had not enough money yet to get himself his Sunday\u2019s\ndinner; so when darkness shut in he lighted a rushlight and cobbled away,\nthinking to himself all the while of the roast meat that was to be his\nreward.\n\nIt came close on midnight, and he was just putting on the last heel of\nthe last pair of shoes when he was aware of a noise on the floor behind\nhim. He looked round, and there was the red shoe with the pointed toe,\ncutting capers and prancing about by itself in the middle of the room.\n\n\u201cPeace on earth!\u201d exclaimed Lubin. \u201cI never saw a shoe do a thing so\ntipsy before!\u201d He went up and passed his hand over it and under it, but\nthere was nothing to account for its caperings; on it went, up and down,\ntoeing and heeling, skipping and sliding, as if for a very wager. Lubin\ncould even tell himself the name of the reel and the tune that it was\ndancing to, for all that the other foot was missing. Presently the shoe\ntripped and toppled, falling heel up upon the floor; nor, although Lubin\nwatched it for a full hour, did it ever start upon a fresh jig.\n\nSoon after daybreak, when Lubin had but just opened his shutters and sat\nhimself down to work, in came the traveller, limping upon bare feet, with\nthe shoe\u2019s fellow pointing its red toe out of his pocket. \u201cOh, so,\u201d he\nsaid, seeing the other shoe ready mended and waiting for him, \u201chow much\nam I owing you for the job?\u201d\n\n\u201cJust a gold piece,\u201d said Lubin, carelessly, carrying on at his work.\n\n\u201cA gold piece for the mere mending of a shoe!\u201d cried the stranger. \u201cYou\nmust be either a rogue or a funny fellow.\u201d\n\n\u201cNeither!\u201d said Lubin, \u201cand for mending a shoe my charge is only a penny;\nbut for mending _that_ shoe, and for all the worry and temptation to\nmake it my own and run off with it\u2014a gold piece!\u201d\n\n\u201cTo be sure, you are an honest fellow,\u201d said the traveller, \u201cand honesty\nis a rare gift; though, had you made off with it, I should have soon\ncaught you. Still, you were not so wise as to know that, so here\u2019s your\ngold piece for you.\u201d He pulled out a big bag of gold as he spoke, pouring\nits contents out on to the window bench.\n\n\u201cThat is a lot of money for a lonely man to carry about,\u201d said Lubin.\n\u201cAre you not afraid?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, no,\u201d answered the man. \u201cI have a way, so that I can always follow\nit up even if I lose it.\u201d He took two of the gold pieces, and dropped one\ninto the sole of each shoe as he was putting them on. \u201cThere!\u201d said he,\n\u201cnow, if any man steal my money, I need only wait till it is midnight;\nand then I have but to say to my shoes \u2018Seek!\u2019 and up they jump, with\nme in them, and carry me to where my stolen property is, were it to the\nworld\u2019s end. It is as if they had the nose and sagacity of a pair of\nbloodhounds. Ah, son of a cobbler, had you run off with the one I should\nhave very soon caught you with the other; for if one walks the other is\nbound to follow. But, as you were honest, we part friends; and I trust\nGod may bring you to fortune.\u201d Then the traveller did up his bag of gold,\nnodded to the cobbler from the doorway, and was gone.\n\nLubin laid down his work, and went off to the inn. \u201cDid anything happen\nhere last night?\u201d he asked.\n\n\u201cNothing of much note,\u201d answered the innkeeper. \u201cThree travelling\nfiddlers were here, and afterwards a man came in barefoot, but with a red\nshoe sticking out of his pocket. I thought of turning the fellow away,\ntill he let me see the colour of his gold. Presently the fiddlers started\nto play and the other man to drink. At first when they called on him to\ndance he excused himself for his feet\u2019s sake; but presently, what with\nthe music and the liquor, he got so lively in his head that he pulled on\nhis one shoe and danced like three ordinary men put together.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat time was that?\u201d asked Lubin.\n\n\u201cGetting on for midnight,\u201d answered the innkeeper.\n\n\u201cAh!\u201d said Lubin, and went home thinking much on the way.\n\nTowards evening he found that he had run out of leather, and must go into\nthe town, ten miles off, to buy more. \u201cNow my gold piece comes in handy,\u201d\nthought he; so he locked up the house, put the key in his pocket, and set\nout.\n\nThough it was the season of long days it was growing dark when he came to\na part of the road that led through the wood; but being so poor a man he\nhad no fear, nor thought at all about the robbers who were said to be in\nthose parts. But as he went, he saw all at once by the side of the road\ntwo red spikes sticking up out of a ditch, their bright colour making\nthem plain to the eye. He came quite near and saw that they were two red\nshoes with pointed toes; and then he saw more clearly that along with\nthem lay the traveller, his wallet empty and with a dagger stuck through\nhis heart.\n\nThe cobbler\u2019s son was as sorry as he could be. \u201cAlas, poor soul,\u201d thought\nhe, \u201cwhat good are the shoes to you now? Now that thieves have killed you\nand taken away your gold, surely I do no harm if I give an honest man\nyour shoes!\u201d He stooped down, and was about taking them off when he saw\nthe eyes of the dead man open. The eyes looked at him as if they would\nremind him of something; and at once, when he loosed hold of the shoes,\nthey seemed satisfied. Then he remembered, and thought to himself, \u201cThe\nworld has many marvels in it; I will wait till midnight and see.\u201d\n\nFor over three hours he kept watch by the dead man\u2019s side. \u201cOnly last\nnight,\u201d he said to himself, \u201cthis poor fellow was dancing as merry a\nmeasure as ever I saw, for the half of it surely I saw; and now!\u201d Then\nhe judged that midnight must be come, so he bent over the shoes and\nwhispered to them but one word.\n\nThe dead man stood up in his shoes and began running. Lubin followed\nclose, keeping an eye on him, for the shoes made no sound on the earth.\nThey ran on for two hours, till they had come to the thickest part of the\nforest; then some way before them Lubin began to see a light shining. It\ncame from a small square house in a court-yard, and round the court-yard\nlay a deep moat; only one narrow plank led over and up to the entrance.\n\nThe red shoes, carrying the dead man, walked over, and Lubin followed\nthem. When they were at the other side they turned, facing toward the\nplank that they had crossed, and Lubin seemed to read in the dead man\u2019s\neye what he was to do.\n\nThen he turned and lifted the plank away from over the moat, so that\nthere was no longer any entrance or exit to the place. Through the window\nof the house he could see the three fiddlers quarrelling over the dead\nman\u2019s gold.\n\nThe red shoes went on, carrying their dead owner, till they got to the\nthreshold, and there stopped. Then Lubin came and clicked up the latch,\nand pushed open the door, and in walked the dead man with the dagger\nsticking out of his heart.\n\nThe three fiddlers, when they saw that sight, dropped their gold and\nleapt out of the window; and as they fled, shrieking, thinking to cross\nthe moat by the plank-bridge that was no longer there, one after the\nother they fell into the water, and, clutching each other by the throat,\nwere drowned.\n\nBut the red shoes stayed where they were, and, tilting up his feet, let\nthe traveller go gently upon the ground; and when Lubin held down the\nlantern to his face, on it lay a good smile, to tell him that the dead\nman thanked him for all he had done.\n\nSo in the morning Lubin went and fetched a priest to pray for the repose\nof the traveller\u2019s soul, and to give him good burial; and to him he gave\nall the dead man\u2019s money, but for himself he took the red shoes with the\npointed toes, and set out to make his fortune in the world.\n\nWalking along he found that however far he went he never grew tired. When\nhe had gone on for more than a hundred miles, he came to the capital\nwhere the King lived with his Court.\n\nAll the flags of the city were at half-mast, and all the people were in\nhalf mourning. Lubin asked at the first inn where he stopped what it all\nmeant.\n\n\u201cYou must indeed be a stranger,\u201d said his host, \u201cnot to know, for \u2019tis\nnow nearly a year since this trouble began; and this very night more\ncause for mourning becomes due.\u201d\n\n\u201cTell me of it, then,\u201d said Lubin, \u201cfor I know nothing at all.\u201d\n\n\u201cAt least,\u201d returned the innkeeper, \u201cyou will know how, a little more\nthan a year ago, the Queen, who was the most beautiful woman in the\nworld, died, leaving the King with twelve daughters, who, after her,\nwere reckoned the fairest women on earth, though the King says that all\ntheir beauty rolled into one would not equal that of his dead wife; and,\nindeed, poor man, there is no doubt that he loved her devotedly during\nher life, and mourns for her continually now she is dead.\u201d\n\n\u201cOnly a small part of all this have I known,\u201d said Lubin.\n\n\u201cWell, but at least,\u201d said the innkeeper, \u201cyou will have heard how the\nPrincesses were famed for their hair; so beautiful it was, so golden, and\nso long! And now, at every full moon, one of them goes bald in a night;\nand bald her head stays as a stone, for never an inch of hair grows on\nit again; and with her hair all her beauty goes pale, so that she is but\nthe shadow of her former self\u2014a thin-blooded thing, as if a vampire had\ncome and sucked out half her life. Yes; ten months this has happened, and\nten of the Princesses have lost their looks and their hair as well; and\nnow only the Princess Royal and the youngest of all remain untouched; and\ndoubtless one of them is to lose her crop to-night.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut how does it happen?\u201d cried Lubin, \u201cIs no one put to keep watch, to\nguard them from the thing being done?\u201d\n\n\u201cAh! you talk, you talk!\u201d said the innkeeper. \u201cHow? The King has offered\nhalf his kingdom to anyone who can tell him how the mischief is done; and\nthe other half to the man who will put an end to it. To put it shortly,\nif you believe yourself a clever enough man, you may have the King for\nyour father-in-law, with the pick of his daughters for your bride, and be\nhis heir and lord of all when he dies!\u201d\n\n\u201cFor such a reward,\u201d said Lubin, \u201chas no man made the attempt?\u201d\n\n\u201cAye, one a month; every time there has been some man fool enough to\nthink himself so clever; and he has been turned out of the palace next\nday with his ears cropped.\u201d\n\n\u201cI will risk having my ears cropped,\u201d said Lubin; for his heart was sorry\nfor the young Princesses, and the vanishing of their beauty. So he went\nup and knocked at the gates of the palace.\n\nThey went and told the King that a new man had come willing and wanting\nto have his ears cropped on the morrow. \u201cWell, well,\u201d said the King,\n\u201clet the poor fool in!\u201d for indeed he had given up all hope. From the\nKing Lubin heard the whole story over again. The old man sighed so, it\ntook him whole hours to tell it.\n\n\u201cI would be glad to be your son,\u201d said Lubin, when the King had ended;\n\u201cbut I would like better to make you rid of your sorrow.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat is kind of you,\u201d said the King. \u201cPerhaps I will only crop one of\nyour ears to-morrow.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhen may one see the Princesses?\u201d asked Lubin.\n\n\u201cThey will be down to supper, presently,\u201d answered the King; \u201cthen you\nshall see them, what there is left of them.\u201d\n\nThough it was reckoned that the next day Lubin would have to be drummed\nout of the palace with his ears cropped short, on this day he was to be\ntreated like an honoured guest. When they went in to supper the King made\nhim sit upon his right hand.\n\nThe twelve Princesses came in, their heads bowed down with weeping; all\nwere fair, but ten of them were thin and pale, and wore white wimples\nover their heads like nuns; only the Princess Royal, who was the eldest,\nand Princess Lyneth, who was the youngest, had gold hair down to their\nfeet, and were both so shiningly beautiful that the poor cobbler was\naltogether dazzled by the sight of them.\n\nThe King looked out of the window and said: \u201cHeigho! There is the full\nmoon beginning to rise.\u201d Then they all said grace, and sat down.\n\nBut when the viands were handed round, all the Princesses sat weeping\ninto their plates, and seemed unable to eat anything. For the pale and\nthin ones said: \u201cTo-night another of our sisters will lose her golden\nhair and her good looks, and be like us!\u201d Therefore they wept.\n\nAnd Lyneth said: \u201cTo-night, either my dear sister or myself will fall\nunder the spell!\u201d Therefore she wept more than the other ten. But the\nPrincess Royal sat trembling, and crying:\n\n\u201cTo-night I know that the curse is to fall upon me, and me only!\u201d\nTherefore she wept more than all.\n\nLubin sat, and watched, and listened, with his head bent down over his\ngolden plate. \u201cWhich of these two shall I try most to save?\u201d he thought.\n\u201cHow shall I test them, so as to know? If I could only tell which of them\nwas to lose her hair to-night, then I might do something.\u201d\n\nHe saw that the youngest sister cried so much that she could eat nothing;\nbut the Princess Royal, between her bursts of grief, picked up a morsel\nnow and again from her plate, and ate it as though courage or despair\nreminded her that she must yet strive to live.\n\nWhen the meat-courses were over, the King said to the Princesses: \u201cI wish\nyou would try to eat a little pudding! Here is a very promising youth,\nwho is determined by all that is in him that harm shall happen to none of\nyou to-night.\u201d\n\n\u201cTo-morrow he will be sent away with his ears cut short!\u201d said Princess\nLyneth; and her tears, as she spoke, ran down over the edge of her plate\non to the cloth.\n\nWhen supper was over the Princess Royal came up to Lubin, and said: \u201cDo\nnot be angry with my sister for what she said! It has only been too true\nof many who came before; to-night, unless you do better than them all, I\nshall lose my hair. It has been a wonder to me how I have been spared\nso long, seeing that I am the eldest, and, as some will have it, the\nfairest. Will you keep a good guard over me to-night, as though you knew\nfor certain that I am to be the one this time to suffer?\u201d\n\n\u201cI will guard you as my own life,\u201d said Lubin, \u201cif you will but do as I\nask you.\u201d\n\n\u201cPledge yourself to me, then, in this cup!\u201d said she, and lifted to his\nlips a bowl of red wine. Over the edge of it her eyes shone beautifully;\nhe drank, gazing into their clear depth.\n\n\u201cWhere am I to be for the night,\u201d he asked of the King, \u201cso that I may\nwatch over the two Princesses?\u201d\n\nThe King took him to a chamber with two further doors that opened out\nof it. \u201cHere,\u201d said the King, \u201cyou are to sleep, and in the inner rooms\nsleep the Princess Royal and the Princess Lyneth. There is no entrance\nor exit to them but through this; therefore, when you are here with your\ndoor bolted, one would suppose that you had them safe. Alas! ten other\nmen have tried like you to ward off the harm, and have failed; and so\nto-day I have ten daughters with no looks left to them, and no hair upon\ntheir heads.\u201d\n\nAs they were speaking, the two Princesses, with their sisters, came up\nto bed. And the pale ones, wearing their white wimples, came and kissed\nthe golden hair of the other two, crying over it, and saying, \u201cTo one of\nyou we are saying good-bye; to-morrow one of you will be like us!\u201d Then\nthey went away to their sleeping-place, and the Princess Royal and Lyneth\nkissed each other, and parted weeping, each into her own chamber.\n\n\u201cWatch well over us!\u201d said Lyneth to Lubin, as she passed through. \u201cWatch\nover me!\u201d said the Princess Royal. And then the two doors were closed.\n\nLubin said to the King, \u201cCould I now see the two Princesses, without\nbeing seen by them, it would help me to know what to do.\u201d\n\n\u201cCome down to my cabinet,\u201d said the King. \u201cI have an invisible cap there,\nthat I can lend you if you think you can do any good with it.\u201d So they\nwent; and the King reached down the cap from the wall and gave it to\nLubin.\n\n\u201cNow, good-night, your Majesty,\u201d said Lubin; \u201cI will do for you all I\ncan.\u201d\n\nThe King answered, \u201cEither you shall be my son-in-law to-morrow, or you\nshall have no ears. My wishes are with you that the former state may be\nyours.\u201d\n\nLubin went into his chamber and closed and bolted the door; then he put\nthe bed up against it. \u201cNow, at least,\u201d he thought, \u201cthere are three of\nus, and no more!\u201d He put on his invisible cap, and going softly to the\nPrincess Royal\u2019s door, opened it and peeped in.\n\nShe stood up before her glass, combing out her long gold hair, and\nsmiling proudly because of its beauty. She gathered it up by all its ends\nand kissed it; then, letting it fall, she went on combing as before.\n\nLubin went out, closing the door again; then he took off his cap and\nknocked, and presently he heard the Princess Royal saying, \u201cCome in!\u201d She\nwas lying down upon the bed, squeezing her eyes with her hands.\n\n\u201cPrincess,\u201d he said, \u201cI will watch over you like my own life, if you will\ndo what I bid you. I am but a poor man, and the best that I can do is but\npoor; but I think, if you will, I can save your head from becoming as\nbare as a billiard ball.\u201d\n\nThe Princess asked him how.\n\n\u201cYou know,\u201d said he, \u201cthat to-night something is to happen to one of you\u201d\n(\u201cTo me?\u201d said the Princess), \u201cand all your hair will be stolen in such a\nway that nothing will ever make it grow again. See, here I have a pair of\ncommon scissors; let me but cut your hair close off all over your head,\nand then who can steal it? For a few months you will be a fright, but it\ncan grow again.\u201d\n\n\u201cI think you are a silly fellow!\u201d said the Princess. \u201cBetter for you to\nget to bed, and have your ears cropped quietly in the morning! After all,\nit may be my sister\u2019s turn to lose her hair, not mine. I shall not make\nmyself a fright for a year of my life in order to save you.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf you think so poorly of my offer,\u201d said Lubin, \u201cI had better go to bed\nand sleep, and not trouble the Princess Lyneth at all with it.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, indeed!\u201d said the Princess Royal. \u201cGo to bed and sleep, poor fool!\u201d\nAnd, in truth, Lubin was feeling so sleepy that he could hardly keep open\nhis eyes.\n\nThen he left her, and, pulling the invisible cap once more over his head,\ncrept softly into Princess Lyneth\u2019s chamber.\n\nShe was standing before her glass with all her beautiful hair flowing\ndown from shoulders to feet; and tears were falling fast out of her eyes\nas she kept drawing her hair together in her hands, kissing and moaning\nover it.\n\nThen Lubin went out again, and, taking off his cap, knocked softly at the\ndoor.\n\n\u201cCome in!\u201d said the Princess; and when he went in she was still standing\nbefore the glass weeping and moaning for her beautiful hair, that might\nnever see another day. On the bed was lying a white wimple, ready for her\nto put on when her head was become bald.\n\n\u201cPrincess,\u201d said Lubin, very humbly, \u201cwill you help me to save your\nbeautiful hair, by doing what I ask?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat is it that you ask?\u201d said she.\n\n\u201cOnly this,\u201d he answered; \u201cI am a poor man, and cannot do much for you,\nbut only my best. To-night you or your sister must lose your hair; and we\nknow that afterwards, if that happen, it can never grow again. Now, come,\nhere I have a common pair of scissors; if I could cut your hair quite\nshort, in a few months it will grow again, and there will be nothing\nto-night that the Fates can steal. Will you let me do this for you in\ntrue service?\u201d\n\nThe Princess looked at him, and looked at her glass. \u201cOh, my hair, my\nhair!\u201d she moaned. Then she said, \u201cWhat matters it? You mean to be good\nto me, and a month is the most that my fortune can last. If I do not lose\nit to-night, I lose it at the next full moon!\u201d Then she shut her eyes and\nbade him take off all he wished. When he had finished, she picked up the\nwimple and covered her head with it; but Lubin took up the long coil of\ngold hair and wound it round his heart.\n\nHe knelt down at her feet. \u201cPrincess,\u201d he said, \u201cbe sure now that I can\nsave you! Only I have one other request to make.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat is that?\u201d asked the Princess.\n\nHe took off one of his red shoes with the pointed toes. \u201cWill you, for a\nstrange thing, put on this shoe and wear it all to-night in your sleep?\nAnd in the morning I will ask you for it again.\u201d\n\nThe Princess promised faithfully that she would do so. Even before he had\nleft the room she had put foot in it, promising that only he should take\nit off again.\n\nLubin\u2019s eyes were shut down with sleep as he groped his way to bed; he\nlay down with the other red shoe upon his foot. \u201cWatch for your fellow!\u201d\nhe said to it; and then his senses left him and he was fast asleep.\n\nIn the middle of the night, while he was deep in slumber, the red shoe\ncaught him by the foot and yanked him out of bed; he woke up to find\nhimself standing in the middle of the room, and there before him stood\nthe two doors of the inner chambers open; through that of the Princess\nRoyal came a light. He heard the Princess Lyneth getting very softly out\nof her bed, and presently she stood in the doorway, with her hands out\nand her eyes fast shut; and the red shoe was on one foot, and the white\nwimple on her head. Little tears were running down from under her closed\nlids; and she sighed continually in her sleep. \u201cHave pity on me!\u201d she\nsaid.\n\nShe crossed slowly from one door to the other; and Lubin, putting on\nhis invisible cap, crept softly after her. The Princess Royal\u2019s chamber\nwas empty, but her glass was opened away from the wall like a door, and\nbeyond lay a passage and steps. At the top of the steps was another door,\nand through it light came, and the sound of a soft voice singing.\n\nPrincess Lyneth, knowing nothing in her sleep, passed along the passage\nand up the steps till she came to the further doorway. Looking over her\nshoulder Lubin saw the Princess Royal sitting before a loom. In it lay a\ngreat cloth of gold, like a bride\u2019s mantle, into which she was weaving\nthe last threads of her skein. Close to her side lay a pair of great\nshears that shone like blue fire; and while she sang they opened and\nsnapped, keeping time to the music she made.\n\nWithout ever turning her head the Princess Royal sat passing her fingers\nalong the woof and crying:\n\n    \u201cSister, sister, bring me your hair,\n    Of our Mother\u2019s beauty give me your share.\n    You must grow pale, while I must grow fair!\u201d\n\nAnd while she was so singing, Lyneth drew nearer and nearer, with her\neyes fast shut, and the white wimple over her head. \u201cHave pity on me!\u201d\nshe said, speaking in her sleep.\n\nAs soon as the Princess Royal heard that she laughed for joy, and\ncatching up the great flaming shears, turned herself round to where\nLyneth was standing. Then she opened the shears, and took hold of the\nwimple, and pulled it down.\n\nAll in a moment she was choking with rage, for horrible was the sight\nthat met her eye. \u201cAh! cobbler\u2019s son,\u201d cried she, \u201cyou shall die for\nthis! To-morrow not only shall you have your two ears cropped, but you\nshall die: do not be afraid!\u201d\n\nLubin looked at her and smiled, knowing how little she thought that he\nheard her words. \u201cAh! Princess Royal,\u201d he said to himself, \u201cthere is\nanother who should now be afraid, but is not.\u201d\n\nThen for very spite the Princess began slapping her sister\u2019s face. \u201cAh!\nwicked little sister,\u201d she cried, \u201cyou have cheated me this time! But go\nback and wait till your hair has grown, and then my gown of gold shall be\nfinished, although this once you have been too sly!\u201d She threw down the\nshears, and drove her sister back by stair and passage, and through the\nlooking-glass door at the other end.\n\nLubin following, stayed first to watch how by a secret spring the\nPrincess Royal closed the mirror back into the wall; then he slipped on\nbefore, and taking off his cap, lay down on his bed pretending to be fast\nasleep. He heard Princess Lyneth return to her couch, and then came the\nPrincess Royal and ground her teeth at him in the darkness.\n\nPresently she, too, returned to her bed and lay down; and an hour after\nLubin got up very softly and went into her chamber. There she lay asleep,\nwith her beautiful hair all spread out upon the pillow; but Lubin had\nPrincess Lyneth\u2019s hair wound round his heart. He touched the secret\nspring, so that the mirror opened to him, and he passed through toward\nthe little chamber where stood the loom.\n\nThere hung the cloth of gold, all but finished; beside it the shears\nopened and snapped, giving out a blue light. He took up the shears in\nhis hand, and pulled down the gold web from the loom, and back he went,\nclosing the mirror behind him.\n\nThen he came to the Princess Royal as she lay asleep; and first he laid\nthe cloth of gold over her, and saw how at once she became ten times more\nfair than she was by rights, as fair almost as her dead mother, lacking\none part only. But her beauty did not win him to have pity on her.\n\n\u201cThere can be thieves, it seems, in high places!\u201d he said; and with that\nhe opened the shears over her head and let them snap: then all her long\nhair came out by the roots, and she lay white and withered before his\neyes, and as bald as a stone.\n\nHe gathered up all her hair with one hand, and the cloth of gold with the\nother, and went quietly away. Then, hiding the shears in a safe place,\nfirst he burnt the Princess Royal\u2019s hair, till it became only a little\nheap of frizzled cinders; and after that he went to the chamber of the\nten Princesses, whose hair and whose sweet youth had been stolen from\nthem. There they lay all in a row in ten beds, with pale, gentle faces,\nasleep under their white wimples.\n\nHe went to the first, and, laying the cloth of hair over her, cried:\n\n    \u201cSister, sister, I bring you your hair,\n    Of your Mother\u2019s beauty I give you your share.\n    One must grow pale, but you must grow fair!\u201d\n\nAnd as he said the words one part of the cloth unwove itself from the\nrest, and ran in ripples up the coverlet, and on to the pillow where the\nPrincess\u2019s head lay. There it coiled itself under the wimple, a great\nmass of shining gold, and the face of the Princess flushed warm and\nlovely in her sleep.\n\nLubin passed on to the next bed, and there uttered the same words;\nand again one part of the web came loose, and wound itself about the\nsleeper\u2019s face, that grew warm and lovely at its touch. So he went from\nbed to bed, and when he came to the end there was no more of the web left.\n\nHe went back into his own chamber, laughing in his heart for joy, and\nthere he dropped himself between the sheets and fell into a sound slumber.\n\nHe was wakened in the morning by the King knocking and trying to get into\nthe room. Lubin pulled back the bed, and in came the King with a mournful\ncountenance.\n\n\u201cWhich of them is it?\u201d said he.\n\n\u201cGo and ask them!\u201d said Lubin.\n\nThe King went over and knocked at the Princess Royal\u2019s door; the knocking\nopened her eyes. Lubin heard her suddenly utter a yell. \u201cAh! now she has\nlooked at herself in the glass,\u201d thought he.\n\n\u201cWhat is the matter?\u201d called the King. \u201cCome out and let me look at you!\u201d\nBut the Princess Royal would not come out. She ran quick to her mirror,\nand touched the secret spring. \u201cAt least,\u201d she thought, \u201cthough fiends\nhave robbed me of all my beauty, I can get it back by wearing the cloth\nwoven from my sisters\u2019 hair!\u201d She skipped along the passage and up the\nsteps to the little chamber where the loom was.\n\nThe King, getting no answer, went across and knocked at Lyneth\u2019s door;\nshe came out, all fresh in her beauty, but wearing upon her head the\nwimple. \u201cAh!\u201d said the King dolorously; and he snipped his fingers at\nLubin.\n\nLubin laughed out. \u201cBut look at her face!\u201d he said. \u201cSurely she is\nbeautiful enough?\u201d\n\nThe Princess lifted up her wimple, and showed the King her hair all short\nbeneath. \u201cThat was my doing,\u201d said Lubin; \u201c\u2019twas the way of saving it.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat a Dutchman\u2019s remedy!\u201d cried the King; and just then the Princess\nRoyal\u2019s door flew open.\n\nShe came out tearing herself to pieces with rage; her face was pale and\nthin, and her head was as bare as a billiard ball. \u201cHave that clown of\na cobbler killed!\u201d she cried in a passion. \u201cThat fool, that numbskull,\nthat cheat! Have him beheaded, I say!\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, no, I am only to have one of my ears cropped off!\u201d said Lubin,\nlooking hard at her all the time.\n\n\u201cI am not at all sure,\u201d said the King. \u201cYou have done foolishly and\nbadly, for not only have you let the disease go on, but your very remedy\nis as bad. Two heads of hair gone in one night! You had better have kept\naway. If the Princesses wish it, certainly I will have you put to death.\u201d\n\n\u201cWill you not see the other Princesses too?\u201d asked Lubin. \u201cLet them\ndecide between them whether I am to live or die!\u201d\n\nThe King was just going to call for them, when suddenly the ten\nPrincesses opened the door of their chamber, and stood before him shining\nlike stars, with all their golden hair running down to their feet.\n\n\u201cNow put me to death!\u201d said Lubin; and all the time he kept his eye upon\nthe Princess Royal, who turned flame-coloured with rage.\n\n\u201cNo, indeed!\u201d cried the King. \u201cNow you must be more than pardoned! You\nsee, my dears,\u201d he said to Lyneth and the Princess Royal, \u201cthough you\nhave suffered, your sisters have recovered all that they lost. They are\nten to two; and I can\u2019t go back on arithmetic; I am bound to do even more\nthan pardon him for this.\u201d\n\n\u201cIndeed and indeed yes!\u201d replied the Princess Lyneth. \u201cHe has done ten\ntimes more than we thought of asking him!\u201d And she went from one to\nanother of her recovered sisters, kissing their beautiful long hair for\npure gladness of heart. But when she came to the Princess Royal, she\nkissed her many times, and stooped down her face upon her shoulder, and\ncried over her.\n\n\u201cTell me now,\u201d said the King to Lubin, \u201cfor you are a very wonderful\nfellow, how did it all happen?\u201d\n\nLubin looked at the Princess Royal; after all he could not betray a\nlady\u2019s secret. \u201cI cannot tell you,\u201d he said; \u201cif I did, there would be a\ndeath in the family.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said the King, \u201chowever you may have done it, I own that you\nhave earned your reward. You have only to choose now with which of my\ndaughters you will become my son-in-law. From this day you shall be known\nas my heir.\u201d He ranged all the Princesses in line, according to their\nages. \u201cNow choose,\u201d said the King, \u201cand choose well!\u201d\n\nLubin went up to the Princess Royal. \u201cI won\u2019t have you!\u201d he said, looking\nvery hard at her; and the Princess Royal dropped her eyes. Then he went\non to the next. \u201cSweet lady,\u201d he said, \u201cI dare not ask one with such\nbeautiful hair as yours to marry me, who am a poor cobbler\u2019s son.\u201d But\nall the while he had the Princess Lyneth\u2019s hair bound round his heart.\n\nHe went on from one to another, and of each he kissed the hand, saying\nthat she was too fair to marry him.\n\nHe came to Lyneth, and knelt down at her feet. \u201cLyneth,\u201d he said, \u201cwill\nyou give the poor cobbler back his shoe?\u201d\n\nLyneth, looking in his eyes, saw all that he meant. \u201cAnd myself in it,\u201d\nshe said, \u201cfor you love me dearly!\u201d She put her arms round his neck, and\nwhispered, \u201cYou marry me because I am a fright, and have no hair!\u201d\n\nBut Lubin said, \u201cI have your hair all wound round my heart, making it\nwarm!\u201d\n\nSo they were married, and lived together more happily than cobbler and\nprincess ever lived in the world before. And the cobbler dropped mending\nshoes: only his wife\u2019s shoes he always mended. Very soon Lyneth\u2019s hair\ngrew again, more shining and beautiful than before; but the Princess\nRoyal remained pale, and thin, and was bald to the day of her death.\n\n\n\n\nTHE MOON FLOWER\n\n  _TO_\n  EVA AND KATIE\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\nTHE MOON-FLOWER\n\nPrincess Berenice sat by a window of her father\u2019s palace, looking out of\nthe Moon. In her hand she held a great white pearl, and smiled, for it\nwas her mother\u2019s birthday gift. The chamber in which she sat was of pure\nsilver, and in the floor was a small window by which she could see out of\nthe Moon and right down on to the Earth, where the moonbeams were going.\nThere it lay like a great green emerald; and wherever the clouds parted\nto let the moonbeams go through, she could see the tops of the trees, and\nbroad fields with streams running by.\n\n\u201cYonder is the land of the coloured stones,\u201d she said to herself, \u201cthat\nthe merchants go down the moonbeams and bring home and sell.\u201d And as she\nbent lower and lower and gazed with curious eyes, the great pearl rolled\nfrom her hand and fell out of the Moon, and went slipping and sliding\ndown a moonbeam, never stopping till it got to the Earth.\n\n\u201cMy mother\u2019s pearl!\u201d cried the Princess, \u201cthe most beautiful of all her\npearls that she gave me. I must run down and bring it back; for if I wait\nit will be lost. And as to-night is the full-moon down there upon Earth,\nI can return before anyone finds out that I am gone.\u201d\n\nThe Earth was sparkling a brighter green under the approach of night.\n\u201cOh, land of the coloured stones!\u201d cried the Princess; and, slipping\nthrough the window, she stepped out of the Moon, and went running down\nthe same moonbeam by which the pearl had fallen.\n\nNight came; and the Earth and the Moon lay looking at each other in the\nmidst of heaven, like an emerald and a pearl; but through the palace,\nand within, over all its gardens and terraces there began to be callings\non the Princess Berenice; and presently there were heart-searchings\nand fear, for they found the empty room with its open window: and the\nPrincess Berenice was not there.\n\nNow, not long before this, upon our own Earth there had lived and died\na King who had four sons, but only three kingdoms. So when he came to\ndie he gave to each of his three eldest sons a kingdom apiece; but to\nthe youngest, having nothing else left to give, he gave only a pair of\ntravelling shoes, and said: \u201cWear these, and some day they will take you\nto fortune!\u201d\n\nSo, when the King was dead, the young Prince wore the shoes night and\nday, hoping that some time or another they would take him to fortune. His\nbrothers laughed at him, and said: \u201cOur father was wise to play those old\nshoes off upon you! If it had been either of us we would have gone and\nbought ourselves an army and fought for a just share in the inheritance.\nBut you seem pleased, so we ought to be.\u201d\n\nNow one day the Prince went out hunting in the forest, and there, having\nbecome separated from all his friends, he thoroughly lost his way.\nWherever he turned the wood seemed to grow denser, the thickets higher,\nand the solitude more than he ever remembered before. Night came on,\nand, there being nothing else that he could do, he lay down and wrapped\nhimself in his cloak and slept.\n\nWhen he awoke it was day, but the woods were as still as death; no bird\nsang, and not a cricket chirped among the grass. As he sat up he noticed\nthat the shoe was gone from his left foot, nor could he see it anywhere\nnear. \u201cTis the half of my inheritance gone!\u201d he said to himself, and got\nup to search about him. But still no shoe could he find. At last he gave\nup the search as useless, and set off walking without it. Then as it\nseemed to him so ridiculous to go limping along with only one shoe on, he\ntook off the remaining one, and threw it away, saying: \u201cGo, stupid, and\nfind your fellow!\u201d\n\nTo the Prince\u2019s great astonishment, it set off at a rapid pace through\nthe wood, all of its own accord. The Prince, barefoot except for his\nstockings, began to run after it.\n\nPresently he found that he was losing his breath. \u201cHie, hie!\u201d he called\nout, \u201cnot quite so fast, little leather-skins!\u201d But the shoe paid him no\nheed and went on as before. It skipped through the grass and brushwood,\nas if a young girl\u2019s foot were dancing inside it; and whenever it came to\na fallen tree, or a boulder of rock, it was up and over with a jump like\na grasshopper.\n\nBefore long the Prince\u2019s stockings were in nothing but holes and tatters;\nas he ran they fluttered from his legs like ribbons. He had lost his hat,\nand his cloak was torn into patterns, and he felt from head to foot like\na house all doors and windows. He was almost on his last gasp when he saw\nthat the shoe was making straight for a strange little house of green\nbronze, shut in by a high wall, and showing no windows; and in the middle\nof the wall was a bronze door shut fast. As he came near he found that\noutside, on the doorstep, stood his other shoe as if waiting to be let\nin. \u201cSo it was worth running for!\u201d thought he; and then, putting on both\nshoes again, he began knocking at the door.\n\nAs he knocked the door opened. It opened in such a curious way, flat down\nlike a swing-bridge or like the lid of a box. For some time he was half\nafraid to walk in on the top of it. Presently, however, he summoned up\nhis courage and stepped across it.\n\nThe door closed behind him like a trap, and he found himself in a\nbeautiful house; all its walls were hung with gold and precious stones,\nbut everywhere was the emptiness and the silence of death.\n\nHe went from room to room seeking for any that lived there, but could see\nno one. In one place he found thrown down a fan of white feathers and\npearl; and in another flowers, fresh plucked, lying close by a cushion\ndinted and hollowed, as though the weight of a head or arm had rested\nthere. But beyond these there was no sign of a living thing to be found.\n\nThrough the windows he saw deep bowery gardens hemmed in by high walls,\nwithin which grew flowers of the loveliest kinds. All the paths were of\nsmooth grass, and everywhere were the traces of gentle handiwork; but\nstill not a soul was to be seen.\n\nIt seemed to the Prince now and then that there was something in the\ngarden which moved, distinct from the flowers, and shifting with a will\nof its own. Though the sun shone full down, casting clear shadows across\nthe lawns, this that he saw was altogether misty and faint. Now it\nseemed like a feather blown to and fro in the wind, and now like broken\ngossamer threads, or like filmy edges of clouds melting away in the heat.\nWhere it went the flowers moved as though to make way for it, swaying\napart and falling together again as it passed.\n\nThe Prince watched and watched. He tired his eyes with watching, yet he\ncould see no more; and no way could he find to the garden, for all the\ndoors leading to it were locked fast and barred.\n\nThere was another strange thing he noticed which seemed to him to have\nno meaning. All over the garden, between the trees and the sky, was\nstretched a silver net, so fine that it showed only as a faint film\nagainst the blue; but a net for all that. Here and there, the light of\nthe sun catching it, hung sparkling in its silver meshes. It was like the\nnet that a gardener throws over strawberry beds or currant bushes to keep\noff the birds from the fruit. So was it with this net; through it no bird\ncould enter the garden, and no bird that was in the garden could leave it.\n\nAll day the Prince had these two things before his eyes to wonder about,\ntill the sun went down and it began to get dusk.\n\nAt the moment when the sun sank below the earth there was a sound of\nopening doors all over the house. The Prince ran and found one of the\ndoors leading into the garden wide open, and through it he could see the\nstir of leaves, and the deep colours of the flowers growing deeper in the\ndusk; only the evening primroses were lighting their soft lamps.\n\nFrom a distant part of the garden came the sound of falling water, and a\nvoice singing. As he approached he saw something shining against the dark\nleaves higher than the heads of the flowers; and before he well knew what\nhe saw, he found before his eyes the most lovely woman that the mind of\nman could believe in.\n\nIn her hand hung a watering-can, with the water falling from it in sprays\non to the flower beds beneath. Her head was bent far down, yet how she\nlooked slender and tall! She was very pale, yet a soft light seemed to\ngrow from her, the light of a new moon upon a twilight sky. And now the\nPrince heard clearly the sweet voice, and the words that she was singing:\n\n    \u201cListen, listen, listen,\n      O heart of the sea!\n    I am the Pearl of pearls,\n    I am the Mother of pearls,\n      And the Mother of thee.\n    Glisten, glisten, glisten,\n      O bed of the sea!\n    Lost is the Pearl of pearls,\n    And all the divers for pearls\n      Are drowning for me.\u201d\n\nHe stood enchanted to hear her; but the words of the song ended suddenly\nin a deep sigh. The singer lifted her head; her eyes moved like grey\nmoths in the dusk, amid the whiteness of her face. At sight of him they\ngrew still and large, widening with a quiet wonder. Then the beautiful\nface broke into smiles, and the Princess stretched out her hands to him\nand laughed.\n\n\u201cHave you come,\u201d she said, \u201cto set me free?\u201d\n\n\u201cTo set you free?\u201d asked the Prince.\n\n\u201cI am a prisoner,\u201d she told him.\n\n\u201cAlas, then!\u201d answered the Prince, \u201cI am a prisoner also, and can free no\none; but were I now free to go wherever I would, I should be a prisoner\nstill, for I have seen the face of the loveliest heart on earth!\u201d\n\n\u201cO,\u201d she sighed, \u201cand can you not set me free?\u201d\n\n\u201cTell me,\u201d he said, \u201cwhat makes you a prisoner here?\u201d\n\nShe pointed to the net over their heads, to the walls that stood on all\nsides of them, and to the ground beneath their feet. \u201cThat,\u201d she said,\n\u201cand that, and this.\u201d\n\n\u201cWho are you?\u201d he asked, \u201cand where do you come from? and whose power is\nit that now holds you captive?\u201d\n\nShe led him on to a terrace, from which they could see out towards the\nwest; and there lay the new Moon, low down in the sky. \u201cYonder,\u201d she\nsaid, pointing to it, \u201cis my home!\u201d She wept. \u201cShall I ever return to it?\u201d\n\nThe Prince, gazing at her in wonder, cried, \u201cAre you one of a Fairy race?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, oh, no!\u201d she sighed, \u201cI am but mortal like yourself; only my home\nis there, while yours is here. We, who dwell in the Moon, are as you\nare, but the sun has greater power over us; the light of it falling on\nus makes us pale and unsubstantial, so that we weigh not so much as a\ngossamer and become transparent as thin fleeces of cloud. Then we can go\nwhere you cannot go, treading the light as it flies; but at sunset we\nregain our strength, and our bodies come to us again; and we are as you\nsee me now\u2014no different from yourselves, the inhabitants of the Earth.\u201d\n\n\u201cTell me,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cof yourself, and the dwellers in the Moon!\nIs it not cold there, and barren?\u201d\n\nShe answered smiling, for the memory of her home was sweet to her,\n\u201cOutside, the Moon is cold and barren; but within it is very warm and\nrich and fertile; more beautiful than any place I have seen on Earth. It\nis there we live; and we have flocks, and herds, and woods, and rivers,\nand harbours, and seas. Also we have great cities built inside the Moon\u2019s\ncrust, for the Moon is a great hollow shell, and we walk upon its inner\nsurface and are warm. The sunlight comes to us through craters and clefts\nin the ground; and the beams of it are like solid pillars of gold that\nquiver and sway as they shoot upwards into the opal twilight of our\nworld; and the shine and the warmth of it come to us, and colour the air\nabove our heads; but we are safe from its full light falling on us, for\nthe ground is between us and it. Only when we pass through to the outer\nside do we become pale and faint, a mere whisper of our former selves.\nAnd then we are so light that if we step upon a moonbeam it will bear our\nweight; and the moonbeam carries us swiftly as its own light travels,\ntill it reaches the Earth: so we come. But to return there is another\nway.\u201d\n\nAnd when the Prince asked her, she told him of the other way back into\nthe Moon.\n\n\u201cWhen we wish to return,\u201d she went on \u201c(for the falling light of a\nmoonbeam cannot carry us back), we must go where there is a pool of still\nwater, and wait for the reflection of the Moon to fall on it; and when\nthe Moon is full, and throws its image into the water, then we dive down,\nand with our lips touch the reflection of its face, crying, \u2018Open, open\nto me, for I am a Moon-child!\u2019 And the Moon will open her face like a\ndoor of pearl, and let us pass in; and when she draws her reflection out\nof the pool, we find ourselves once again among our own people and in our\nown land. Many of us have so come and so returned,\u201d she sighed deeply,\n\u201cbut I fear that I shall never again return.\u201d\n\nThen the Prince asked her further whose power it was that held her\ncaptive; and she told him how she had dropped the pearl that her mother\nhad given her, and had come down seeking it. Then she said, \u201cIn the\nMoon we have many jewels, for we have opals and onyxes, and pearls and\nmoonstones, but we have no rubies, or emeralds, or sapphires, or stones\nof a single colour, such as you have. Therefore, we have a passion for\nthese things, and our merchants come down and bring them back to us at a\ngreat price.\n\n\u201cNow it chanced that in my search I came upon a gnome who had dealings\nwith our merchants and had many jewels to sell, and he, seeming to be\nkind, helped me until my pearl was found. Then he took me to see his\nown treasures, and, alas, while my eyes were feasting on the colours of\nthe stones he showed to me, my poor beauty inflamed the avarice of his\nevil heart, and the desire to have me for his wife became great. So when\nI asked him the price of his jewels, he vowed that the only price at\nwhich he would let them go was that of my own hand in marriage. Alas, I\nam young and innocent, and without subtlety, nor did I know how great\nwas his power and wickedness. As I laughed at his request his face\ngrew dark with rage, and I saw that I had incurred the undying enmity\nof his cruel heart. And now for a whole year he has held me in his\nenchantment, striving to break me to his will by the length and weariness\nof my captivity; and lest search or any help should come for me from my\nfather\u2019s people, he has covered me in with a net, and surrounded me with\nwalls; and here there is no pool into which the full Moon may fall, and\nat the mere touch of my lips upon its face, open and draw me free from\nmy enchantment, and back into the heart of my own land. Only yonder, in\nthe corner of the garden is a deep well, where the Moon never shines; so\nthere is no way here left for me by which I may get free.\u201d\n\n\u201cDoes not the gnome ever come to see you in your captivity?\u201d asked the\nPrince. \u201cIf so, I may by some means be able to entrap him, and force him\nto let you go.\u201d\n\n\u201cTwice in the year he has visited me,\u201d answered the Princess. \u201cHe comes\nup out of the ground in the form of a Red Mole; but he looks at me\nwickedly and cunningly with the eyes of a man, seeming to say, \u2018Will you\nhave me yet?\u2019 And when I shake my head he burrows under again, and is\ngone till another six months shall be past.\u201d\n\nThe Prince thought for a while and said, \u201cI do not know whether I have\nthe power or the wit to make you free; if love only were needed for the\nwork, to-morrow would see you as free as a bird.\u201d\n\nThe Princess, between smiles and sighs, said, \u201cI have been most lonely\nhere; already you make my imprisonment seem less.\u201d Then she led him\nwithin doors, from room to room, showing him the splendours of her\nprison. Wherever they went, out of the floor before them rose burning\njewels that hung hovering over their heads to light them as they passed;\nand when she struck her hands together, up from the ground rose a table\ncovered with fruit and dainties of all sorts; and when she and the Prince\nhad eaten, she clapped her hands again, and they disappeared by the same\nway that they had come.\n\nThe Prince was struck with admiration at the delicacy of these marvels.\n\u201cWhen I think of the Red Mole, they sicken me!\u201d said the Moon-Princess.\nThe good youth used all his arts to cheer her, promising to devote\nhimself, and if need be his life, to the task of setting her free. And\nnow and then she laughed and was almost merry again, forgetting the walls\nthat still held her spell-bound from her own people and her own land.\n\nShe showed the Prince a chamber where he might sleep; and so soft and\nwarm was the couch after his last hard night on the ground, that it was\nfull day before he awoke. The Princess Berenice appeared before him misty\nand faint, for the sunlight threw a veil upon her beauty; but still as he\nlooked at her he did not love her less, and it still seemed to him that\nhers was the face of the loveliest heart on earth.\n\nAll day he watched her drifting about the garden, seeming to feed herself\non the scent of the flowers. In the evening, when the sun set, her body\ngrew strong and her face shone out to him like the new Moon upon a\ntwilight sky.\n\nThen he drew water for her from the well, and watched her as she watered\nthe flowers which were her only delight. Presently he said, \u201cThere is\nmuch water in the well, for the rope goes down into it many fathoms; and\nyet I find no bottom.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d answered the Princess, \u201cI doubt not that the well is deep.\u201d\n\n\u201cBefore many days are over,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cthe well shall become a\npool.\u201d\n\nThe Princess wondered to hear him. \u201cIs there,\u201d he went on, \u201cno such thing\nas a spade for me to dig with?\u201d Then she led him to a shed, where lay all\nthe needed implements for gardening. So his eyes brightened, while he\ncried, \u201cO, beautiful Princess Berenice, as I love you, before many weeks\nare over you shall be free!\u201d\n\nThe next morning he arose very early, and in the centre of the garden,\nwhere the ground hollowed somewhat, he marked out a space and set to work\nto dig.\n\nAll day the Princess went to and fro, faint and pale as a mist, watching\nhim at his work. At dusk her beauty shone full upon him, and she said,\n\u201cWhat is this that you are doing?\u201d He answered, \u201cWhat I am making shall\npresently become a pool; then when the pool is full, and the full Moon\ncomes and shines on it, you shall go down into the water, and shall\nkiss the face of its reflection with your lips, and be free from your\nenchantment.\u201d\n\nPrincess Berenice looked long at him, and her eyes clung to his like\nsoft moths in the gloom. \u201cBut you?\u201d she said, \u201cYou are no Moon-child, and\nthis will never set you free.\u201d\n\n\u201cEver since I saw you,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cI have not thought of freedom;\nmy dearest wish is but to set you free.\u201d\n\nThe Princess gave him her hand. \u201cAnd mine,\u201d she said, \u201cmy dearest wish\nhenceforth is to set you free also. Yet I know but one way, and I cannot\nname it.\u201d She smiled tenderly on him, and bowed her face into the shadow\nof her hair.\n\nThe Prince caught her in his arms, \u201cOne way is my way!\u201d he cried. \u201cYour\nway,\u201d she said, \u201cis my way.\u201d Then, when he had finished kissing her, she\nsaid, \u201cLook, on my finger is a ring; this ring is for him to whom I give\nmyself in marriage. Surely, it opens to him the heart of my own people,\nand he becomes one of us, a child of the Moon.\u201d She showed him an opal\nring, full of fires. \u201cIf your way is my way,\u201d she said, \u201cdraw this off my\nfinger, and put it upon your own, and take me to be your wife!\u201d\n\nSo the Prince drew off the ring from her finger, and set it upon his own;\nand as he did so he felt indeed the heart of the Moon-people become his\nown, and the love of the Moon strike root in him. Yet did the love of the\nEarth remain his as well, making it seem as if all the love in his heart\nhad but doubled itself.\n\nSo he and the most beautiful Berenice were married there by the light of\nthe new Moon, and all thought of sorrow or danger from the encirclement\nthat bound them was lost in their great joy.\n\nDuring the whole of the next day the Prince went on with his digging,\nmaking a broad shallow in the ground. \u201cBefore the full Moon comes,\u201d he\nsaid, \u201cI will make it deep.\u201d And he worked on, refusing to take any rest.\n\nThe Princess loved him more and more as she watched him; and his love for\nher daily increased, for every day, while the Moon grew full, her beauty\nshone in greater perfection and splendour. \u201cHere,\u201d she said to him, \u201cthe\ncoming of the full Moon is like the coming of Spring to me: I feel it in\nmy blood. After the full Moon my beauty will wane and grow paler. But\nin my own land I do not feel these changes, for there it is always the\nfull Moon.\u201d The Prince answered her, \u201cTo me your beauty, though it grows\nmore, will not ever grow less.\u201d\n\nAt last, on the day before that of the full Moon, the pit which he had\ndug was broad and deep; then he began to fill it with water from the\nwell. \u201cTo-morrow,\u201d he said to his wife, when the pool was nearly full, as\nshe came and stood by his side at sunset in the full blaze of her beauty,\n\u201cto-morrow we shall be free; and you will carry me away with you into\nyour own land.\u201d\n\n\u201cI do not know,\u201d said the Princess, \u201cI begin to be afraid!\u201d and she\nsighed heavily. \u201cAny day the Red Mole may come: one day is not too soon\nfor him to be here.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut why need you fear him now?\u201d asked the Prince. \u201cSince you are married\nto me, you cannot be married to him.\u201d\n\n\u201cAs to that,\u201d said she, \u201cI fear that to have outwitted him will but make\nhis malice all the greater against us!\u201d Then she walked softly among the\nmoonbeams, bathing her hands in them, and letting them fall upon the\nloveliness of her face; and as she stood in their light, tears rained\ndown out of her eyes.\n\nIn the morning it seemed as if her happiness had returned. The Prince,\nas he toiled under the blazing sun, carrying water from the well to the\npool, felt her moving by his side, and heard her light shadowy laughter\nwhen, just before sunset, the water flowed level to the pool\u2019s brink.\nAnd when dusk rose out of the grass, there she stood glowing with the\nfull Moon of her beauty, and leaning in all the light of her loveliness\ntowards him.\n\nThe happy night drew round them; out of the East came the glow of the\nfull Moon as it rose; soon, soon it would cross the tops of the trees\nand rest its face upon the quiet waters of the pool. They clung in each\nother\u2019s arms, entranced. \u201cMy beautiful,\u201d said the Prince, \u201cshall we not\ntake to your mother some of those jewels she loves\u2014the green, and the\nred, and the blue, and the pearl which was hers, the quest of which has\ncost you so much?\u201d He ran into one of the jewelled chambers where lay\nthe pearl, and caught from the walls the largest stones he could find.\nQuickly he went and returned, for the Moon was now fast cresting the\navenues of the garden. He came bearing the jewels in his hands.\n\nPrincess Berenice stood no longer by the brink of the pool, though\ntherein lay the image of the Moon\u2019s face, a circle of pale gold upon\nthe water. \u201cBerenice,\u201d called the Prince, and ran through the garden,\nsearching for her. \u201cBerenice!\u201d he cried by the well; but she was not\nthere. \u201cBerenice!\u201d His voice grew trembling and weak, and quick fear took\nhold of him. \u201cO, my beautiful, my beloved, where are you?\u201d\n\nOnly the silence stood up to answer him. Under his feet ran a Red Mole.\n\nIt scampered across the grass, and disappeared through a burrow in the\nground. Then the Prince knew that the worst had surely come, and that his\nPrincess had been taken away from him. Where she was he could not know;\nwithin her former prison she was nowhere to be seen.\n\nAll night the Prince lay weeping by the brink of the pool, where she had\nlast stood before his sight; the print of her dear feet still lay on the\nlawn where she had stayed waiting with him so long. \u201cO, miserable wretch\nthat I am!\u201d he cried, kissing the trodden grass. \u201cNow never again may I\nhope to behold you, or hear your dear voice!\u201d\n\nAll the day following he wandered like a ghost from place to place,\nfilling the empty garden with memories of her presence, and sighing over\nand over again the music of her name. All the flowers glowed round him in\ntheir accustomed beauty; new buds came into life, and full blooms broke\nand fell; not a thing seemed to sorrow for her loss except himself. As\nfor the flowers, he paid them little heed.\n\nIn his sleep that night a dream came to him, a dream as of something\nthat whispered and laughed in his ear. Over and over again it seemed to\nbe saying, \u201cThe Red Mole came, and the full Moon came, and the Princess\njumped down into the water!\u201d Then his heart knocked so loud for joy that\nhe started awake, and saw the Red Mole scuffling away to its burrow in\nthe ground.\n\nThen he feared that the dream was but a thing devised to cheat his fancy,\nand get rid of him by making him go away and search for his Princess in\nthe land of the Moon, by the way that she had told him. But he thought\nto himself, \u201cIf the Red Mole wants so much to get me away, it means that\nmy beloved is somewhere near at hand. Is she in the well?\u201d he began\nwondering; and as soon as it was light he went to where lay the well in\nits corner under the shadow of the wall. But though he searched long and\ndiligently, there was no trace of her that he could find.\n\nYet every time he came near to the well sorrow seemed to take hold of\nhim, and, mixed with it, a kind of joy, as though indeed the heart of his\nbeloved beat in this place. Near to the well stood a tall flower with\nbowed head. It seemed to him the only one in the whole garden that had\nany share in his sorrow: he wondered if the flower had grown up to mark\nthe sad place of her burial.\n\n\u201cO, my beloved Berenice, art thou near me now?\u201d he murmured,\nheart-broken, one day as he passed by: then it seemed to him that all\nat once the flower stirred. He turned to look at it; it was like a\nsunflower, but white even to its centre, and its head kept drooping as if\nfor pure grief. \u201cBerenice, Berenice!\u201d he wept, passing it.\n\nAt dusk he returned again; and now the flower\u2019s head was lifted up, and\nshone with a strange lustre. The Prince, as he went by on his way to the\nwell, saw the flower turn its head, bending its face ever towards where\nhe was. Then grief and joy stirred in his heart. \u201cThe flower knows where\nshe is!\u201d he said.\n\nSo he bent, whispering, \u201cWhere, then, is Berenice?\u201d and the flower lifted\nits head, and hung quite still, looking at him.\n\nThen the Prince whispered again, \u201cThe Red Mole came, and the full Moon\ncame, and the Princess jumped down into the water?\u201d\n\nBut the flower swayed its head from side to side, and the Prince found\nthat it had answered \u201cNo.\u201d\n\nThen he had it in his mind to ask of it further things; but, as he was\nabout to speak, he beheld its face all brimming over with tears, that\nsuddenly broke and fell down in a shower over its leaves.\n\nAt that his heart leaped, and his voice choked as he cried, \u201cArt _thou_\nmy beloved, my Berenice?\u201d And all at once the flower swayed down, and\nleaned, and fell weeping against his breast.\n\nSo at last he knew! And joy and grief struggled together in him for\nmastery.\n\nAll that night he knelt with the flower\u2019s head upon his heart, stroking\nits soft leaves, and letting it rest between his hands; till, towards\ndawn, it seemed to him that peace was upon it and sleep.\n\nAll through the day it hung faint upon its stem; but when evening came it\nlifted its head and shone in moon-like beauty; and so deep for it was the\nPrince\u2019s love and compassion that he could hardly bear to be absent from\nits side one moment of the day or night.\n\nAnd, when he was very weary, he lay down under its shadow to sleep; and\nthe Moon-flower bent down and rested its head upon his face.\n\nAll night long in dreams Berenice came back to him. He seemed to hear how\nthe Red Mole had come, and changed her to a rooted shape, lest the full\nMoon in the water should carry her away from him back into her own land.\nYet it was only a dream, and the Prince could learn nothing there of the\nway by which he might set her free.\n\nA month went by, and he said to his Flower, \u201cTo-night is the night of\nthe full Moon: now, if I drew you from the ground, and carried you down,\nand called for the Moon\u2019s face to open to us, would you not be free from\nthe enchantment, when you were come again to your own people?\u201d But\nthe Moon-flower shook its head, as if to bid him still wait and watch\npatiently.\n\nNow, as the Prince came and went day by day, he began to notice that\nthe Moon-flower had its roots in a small green mound, no bigger than a\nmole-hill; and he thought to himself, \u201csurely that mound was not there at\nfirst: the Red Mole must be down below at work!\u201d So he watched it from\nday to day; and at last he knew for certain that, as time went on, the\nmound grew larger.\n\nMonth by month the mound upon which the Moon-flower had root increased in\nsize; yet the Flower thrived, and its beauty shone brighter as each full\nMoon approached, so that at last the Prince\u2019s fear lest the Red Mole were\nworking mischief against its life, passed away.\n\nOnce, on the night of a full Moon, as the Prince lay with his head upon\nEarth, and the Moon-flower bowed over his face, he heard under the mound\na peal of silvery laughter; and at the sound of it the Moon-flower\nstarted, and stood erect, and a stir of delight seemed to take hold of\nits leaves. Again the laughter came, and the soft earth moved at the\nsound of it.\n\nThe Prince started up, and ran and fetched a spade, and struck it down\nunder the loose soil of the mound. When he lifted up the earth, out\nsprang a tiny child like a lobe of quicksilver, laughing merrily with\nits first leap into the light. But even then its laughter changed into a\ncry; for out after it darted the Red Mole, with fury in its whiskers, and\nwrath flashing out of its eyes.\n\nThe quicksilver child sprang away, and went shrilling over the grass\ntoward the margin of the pool. There lay the full Moon\u2019s image upon the\nclear stillness of the water; and the child leapt down the bank, and\nlaughed as it sprang safely away. Then there followed a tiny splash; and\nthe Prince, amid the rings upon the water\u2019s surface, saw, like a door of\npearl, the Moon\u2019s face open and close again. And the Red Mole went down\ninto the earth gnashing its teeth for rage.\n\nThe Prince ran back to the Moon-flower, and found it bent forwards\nand trembling with fear. Then he drew its head towards his heart, and\nwhispered \u201cThe Red Mole came, and the full Moon came, and the silver\nchild jumped down into the water!\u201d And at that the Flower lifted its\nhead and began clapping its leaves for joy.\n\nA month went by, and the green mound had disappeared from beneath the\nMoon-flower\u2019s roots; and still every night the Prince lay down under the\nshadow of its leaves; and the Flower bent over him, and laid its head\nagainst his face.\n\nAs he lay so, one night, and watched the full Moon travelling high\noverhead, he saw a shadow begin to cross over it; and he knew that it was\nthe eclipse, which is the shadow of the Earth passing over the face of\nthe Moon; then he rose softly, leaving the Moon-flower asleep, and went\nand stood by the brink of the pool.\n\nUp in the Moon the silver child felt the shadow of the Earth fall upon\nthe face of the Moon; and he came and touched the Earth\u2019s shadow with\nhis lips, crying, \u201cOpen, open to me, for I am an Earth-child!\u201d Then the\nEarth\u2019s shadow that was upon the Moon opened, and the silver child sprang\nthrough.\n\nThe Prince, watching the veiled image of the Moon\u2019s face in the water,\nsaw the Earth\u2019s shadow open like a door, so that for an instant the\nbrightness of the Moon shone through, and out sprang the quicksilver\nchild, up to the surface of the pool.\n\nHe leapt laughing up the bank, and went running over the grass to where\nthe Moon-flower was standing. He reached up his arms, and caught the\nFlower by the head:\n\n\u201cO mother, mother, mother!\u201d he cried as he kissed it.\n\nAnd at the touch of his lips the Moon-flower opened and changed, growing\nwondrously tall and fair; and the flower turned into a face, and the\nleaves disappeared, till it was the beautiful Princess Berenice herself,\nwho stooped down and took the quicksilver child up into her arms.\n\nShe cried, fondling him, \u201cDid they give you your name?\u201d\n\nAnd the child laughed. \u201cThey call me Gammelyn,\u201d he said.\n\nThe Prince caught them both together in his arms. \u201cCome, come!\u201d he\nshouted and laughed, \u201cfor yonder is the full Moon waiting for us!\u201d And,\nlifting them up, he ran with them to the borders of the pool.\n\nAnd the Red Mole came, and the full Moon came; and the Prince, and the\nPrincess, and the silver child jumped down into the water.\n\nThen the Prince laid his lips against the reflection of the Earth\u2019s\nshadow, crying, \u201cOpen, open to me, for I am a child of the Earth!\u201d And\nthe shadow opened like a door to let them pass through. Then they pressed\ntheir lips against the reflection of the Moon\u2019s face crying, \u201cOpen, open\nto us, for we are Moon-children!\u201d And the Moon opened her face like a\ndoor of pearl, so that they sprang through together, and were safe.\n\nAnd when the Moon drew its reflection out of the pool, they found\nthemselves in the land of the Moon, in the silver chamber with the round\nwindow, in the palace of Princess Berenice\u2019s father.\n\nLooking out through the window, down at the end of a long moonbeam they\nsaw the Red Mole gnashing his whiskers for rage. Then the Prince took off\nhis shoes, and threw them with all his might down the moonbeam at the\nMole.\n\nAs the shoes fell, they went faster, and faster, and faster, till they\ncame to earth; and they struck the Mole so hard upon the head that he\ndied.\n\nNow as for Gammelyn and the shoes we may hear of them again elsewhere;\nbut as for the Prince and his beautiful Princess Berenice, the happiness\nin which they lived for the rest of their days is too great even to be\ntold of.\n\n\n\n\nHAPPY RETURNS\n\n  _TO_\n  JEANNIE\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\nHAPPY RETURNS\n\nBy the side of a great river, whose stream formed the boundary to two\ncountries, lived an old ferryman and his wife. All the day, while she\nminded the house, he sat in his boat by the ferry, waiting to carry\ntravellers across; or, when no travellers came, and he had his boat free,\nhe would cast drag-nets along the bed of the river for fish. But for the\nfood which he was able thus to procure at times, he and his wife might\nwell have starved, for travellers were often few and far between, and\noften they grudged him the few pence he asked for ferrying them; and now\nhe had grown so old and feeble that when the river was in flood he could\nscarcely ferry the boat across; and continually he feared lest a younger\nand stronger man should come and take his place, and the bread from his\nmouth.\n\nBut he had trust in Providence. \u201cWill not God,\u201d he said, \u201cwho has\ngiven us no happiness in this life, save in each other\u2019s help and\ncompanionship, allow us to end our days in peace?\u201d\n\nAnd his wife answered, \u201cYes, surely, if we trust Him enough He will.\u201d\n\nOne morning, it being the first day of the year, the ferryman going down\nto his boat, found that during the night it had been loosed from its\nmoorings and taken across the river, where it now lay fastened to the\nfurther bank.\n\n\u201cWife,\u201d said he, \u201cI can remember this same thing happening a year ago,\nand the year before also. Who is this traveller who comes once a year,\nlike a thief in the night, and crosses without asking me to ferry him\nover?\u201d\n\n\u201cPerhaps it is the good folk,\u201d said his wife. \u201cGo over and see if they\nhave left no coin behind them in the boat.\u201d\n\nThe old man got on to a log and poled himself across, and found, down in\nthe keel of the boat, the mark of a man\u2019s bare foot driven deep into the\nwood; but there was no coin or other trace to show who it might be.\n\nTime went on; the old ferryman was all bowed down with age, and his body\nwas racked with pains. So slow was he now in making the passage of the\nstream, that all travellers who knew those parts took a road higher up\nthe bank, where a stronger ferryman plied.\n\nWinter came; and hunger and want pressed hard at the old man\u2019s door. One\nday while he drew his net along the stream, he felt the shock of a great\nfish striking against the meshes down below, and presently, as the net\ncame in, he saw a shape like living silver, leaping and darting to and\nfro to find some way of escape. Up to the bank he landed it, a great\ngasping fish.\n\nWhen he was about to kill it, he saw, to his astonishment, tears running\nout of its eyes, that gazed at him and seemed to reproach him for his\ncruelty. As he drew back, the Fish said: \u201cWhy should you kill me, who\nwish to live?\u201d\n\nThe old man, altogether bewildered at hearing himself thus addressed,\nanswered: \u201cSince I and my wife are hungry, and God gave you to be eaten,\nI have good reason for killing you.\u201d\n\n\u201cI could give you something worth far more than a meal,\u201d said the Fish,\n\u201cif you would spare my life.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe are old,\u201d said the ferryman, \u201cand want only to end our days in peace.\nTo-day we are hungry; what can be more good for us than a meal which will\ngive us strength for the morrow, which is the new year?\u201d\n\nThe Fish said: \u201cTo-night some one will come and unfasten your boat, and\nferry himself over, and you know nothing of it till the morning, when you\nsee the craft moored out yonder by the further bank.\u201d\n\nThe old man remembered how the thing had happened in previous years,\ndirectly the Fish spoke. \u201cAh, you know that then! How is it?\u201d he asked.\n\n\u201cWhen you go back to your hut at night to sleep, I am here in the water,\u201d\nsaid the Fish. \u201cI see what goes on.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat goes on, then?\u201d asked the old man, very curious to know who the\nstrange traveller might be.\n\n\u201cAh,\u201d said the Fish, \u201cif you could only catch him in your boat, he could\ngive you something you might wish for! I tell you this: do you and your\nwife keep watch in the boat all night, and when he comes, and you have\nferried him into mid-stream, where he cannot escape, then throw your net\nover him and hold him till he pays you for all your ferryings.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow shall he pay me? All my ferryings of a lifetime!\u201d\n\n\u201cMake him take you to the land of Returning Time. There, at least, you\ncan end your days in peace.\u201d\n\nThe old man said: \u201cYou have told me a strange thing; and since I mean to\nact on it, I suppose I must let you go. If you have deceived me, I trust\nyou may yet die a cruel death.\u201d\n\nThe Fish answered: \u201cDo as I tell you, and you shall die a happy one.\u201d\nAnd, saying this, he slipped down into the water and disappeared.\n\nThe ferryman went back to his wife supperless, and said to her: \u201cWife,\nbring a net, and come down into the boat!\u201d And he told her the story of\nthe Fish and of the yearly traveller.\n\nThey sat long together under the dark bank, looking out over the quiet\nand cold moonlit waters, till the midnight hour. The air was chill, and\nto keep themselves warm they covered themselves over with the net and lay\ndown in the bottom of the boat. It was the very hour when the old year\ndies and the new year is born.\n\nBefore they well knew that they had been asleep, they started to feel the\nrocking of the boat, and found themselves out upon the broad waters of\nthe river. And there in the fore-part of the boat, clear and sparkling in\nthe moonlight, stood a naked man of shining silver. He was bending upon\nthe pole of the boat, and his long hair fell over it right down into the\nwater.\n\nThe old couple rose up quietly, and unwinding themselves from the net,\nthrew it over the Silver Man, over his head and hands and feet, and\ndragged him down into the bottom of the boat.\n\nThe old man caught the ferry pole, and heaved the boat still into the\nmiddle of the stream. As he did so a gentle shock came to the heart of\neach; feebly it fluttered and sank low. \u201cOh, wife!\u201d sighed the old man,\nand reached out his hand for hers.\n\nThe Silver Man lay still in the folds of the net, and looked at them with\na wise and quiet gaze. \u201cWhat would you have of me?\u201d he said, and his\nvoice was far off and low.\n\nThey said, \u201cBring us into the land of Returning Time.\u201d\n\nThe Silver Man said: \u201cOnly once can you go there, and once return.\u201d\n\nThey both answered \u201cWe wish once to go there, and once return.\u201d\n\nSo he promised them that they should have the whole of their request; and\nthey unloosed him from the net, and landed all together on the further\nbank.\n\nUp the hill they went, following the track of the Silver Man. Presently\nthey reached its crest; and there before them lay all the howling winter\nof the world.\n\nThe Silver Man turned his face and looked back; and looking back it\nbecame all young, and ruddy, and bright. The ferryman and his wife gazed\nat him, both speechless at the wonderful change. He took their hands,\nmaking them turn the way by which they had come; below their feet was\na deep black gulf, and beyond and away lay nothing but a dark starless\nhollow of air.\n\n\u201cNow,\u201d said their guide, \u201cyou have but to step forward one step, and you\nshall be in the land of Returning Time.\u201d\n\nThey loosed hold of his hands, joined clasp, husband with wife, and at\none step upon what seemed gulf beneath their feet, found themselves in\na green and flowery land. There were perfumed valleys and grassy hills,\nwhose crops stretched down before the breeze; thick fleecy clouds crossed\ntheir tops, and overhead, amid a blue air rang the shrill trilling\nof birds. Behind lay, fading mistily as a dream, the bare world they\nhad left; and fast on his forward road, growing small to them from a\ndistance, went the Silver Man, a shining point on the horizon.\n\nThe ferryman and his wife looked, and saw youth in each other\u2019s faces\nbeginning to peep out through the furrows of age; each step they took\nmade them grow younger and stronger; years fell from them like worn-out\nrags as they went down into the valleys of the land of Returning Time.\n\nHow fast Time returned! Each step made the change of a day, and every\nmile brought them five years back toward youth. When they came down to\nthe streams that ran in the bed of each valley, the ferryman and his\nwife felt their prime return to them. He saw the gold come back into her\nlocks, and she the brown into his. Their lips became open to laughter and\nsong. \u201cOh, how good,\u201d they cried, \u201cto have lived all our lives poor, to\ncome at last to this!\u201d\n\nThey drank water out of the streams, and tasted the fruit from the trees\nthat grew over them; till presently, being tired for mere joy, they lay\ndown in the grass to rest. They slept hand within hand and cheek against\ncheek, and, when they woke, found themselves quite young again, just at\nthe age when they were first married in the years gone by.\n\nThe ferryman started up and felt the desire of life strong in his blood.\n\u201cCome!\u201d he said to his wife, \u201cor we shall become too young with lingering\nhere. Now we have regained our youth, let us go back into the world once\nmore!\u201d\n\nHis wife hung upon his hand, \u201cAre we not happy enough,\u201d she asked, \u201cas it\nis? Why should we return?\u201d\n\n\u201cBut,\u201d he cried, \u201cwe shall grow too young; now we have youth and life at\nits best let us return! Time goes too fast with us; we are in danger of\nit carrying us away.\u201d\n\nShe said no further word, but followed up toward the way by which they\nhad entered. And yet, in spite of her wish to remain, as she went her\nyoung blood frisked. Presently coming to the top of a hill, they set off\nrunning and racing; at the bottom they looked at each other, and saw\nthemselves boy and girl once more.\n\n\u201cWe have stayed here too long!\u201d said the ferryman, and pressed on.\n\n\u201cOh, the birds,\u201d sighed she, \u201cand the flowers, and the grassy hills to\nrun on, we are leaving behind!\u201d But still the boy had the wish for a\nman\u2019s life again, and urged her on; and still with every step they grew\nyounger and younger. At length, two small children, they came to the\nborder of that enchanted land, and saw beyond the world bleak and wintry\nand without leaf. Only a further step was wanted to bring them face to\nface once more with the hard battle of life.\n\nTears rose in the child-wife\u2019s eyes: \u201cIf we go,\u201d she said, \u201cwe can never\nreturn!\u201d Her husband looked long at her wistful face; he, too, was more\nof a child now, and was forgetting his wish to be a man again.\n\nHe took hold of her hand and turned round with her, and together they\nfaced once more the flowery orchards, and the happy watered valleys.\n\nAway down there light streams tinkled, and birds called. Downwards they\nwent, slowly at first, then with dancing feet, as with shoutings and\nlaughter they ran.\n\nDown into the level fields they ran; their running was turned to a\ntoddling; their toddling to a tumbling; their tumbling to a slow crawl\nupon hands and feet among the high grass and flowers; till at last they\nwere lying side by side, curled up into a cuddly ball, chuckling and\ndimpling and crowing to the insects and birds that passed over them.\n\nThen they heard the sweet laughter of Father Time; and over the hill he\ncame, young, ruddy, and shining, and gathered them up sound asleep on the\nold boat by the ferry.\n\n                   Printed by BALLANTYNE, HANSON & CO.\n                            London & Edinburgh","title":"The house of joy","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":32569}