—Paris, May 11, 1880
————— * The reference is to an instruction received by her four years previously, but not in sleep, and not from Apollonius, though from a source no less transcendental. (Ed.)
*** Remembering, on being told this dream, that "Eliphas Levi," in his Haute Magic, had described an interview with the phantom of Apollonius, which he had evoked, I referred to the book, and found that he also saw him with a smooth-shaven face, but wearing a shroud (linceul). (Ed.)
XVII. The Three Kings
The time was drawing towards dawn in a wild and desolate region. And I stood with my genius at the foot of a mountain the summit of which was hidden in mist. At a few paces from me stood three persons, clad in splendid robes and wearing crowns on their heads. Each personage carried a casket and a key: the three caskets differed from one another, but the keys were all alike. And my genius said to me, "These are the three kings of the East, and they journey hither over the river that is dried up, to go up into the mountain of Sion and rebuild the Temple of the Lord God." Then I looked more closely at the three royalties, and I saw that the one who stood nearest to me on the left hand was a man, and the color of his skin was dark like that of an Indian. And the second was in form like a woman, and her complexion was fair: and the third had the wings of an Angel, and carried a staff of gold. And I heard them say one to another, "Brother, what hast thou in thy casket?" And the first answered, " I am the Stonelayer, and I carry the implements of my craft; also a bundle of myrrh for thee and for me." And the king who bore the aspect of a woman, answered, "I am the Carpenter, and I bear the instruments of my craft; also a box of frankincense for thee and for me." And the Angel-king answered, "I am the Measurer, and I carry the secrets of the living God, and the rod of gold to measure your work withal." Then the first said, "Therefore let us go up into the hill of the Lord and build the walls of Jerusalem. And they turned to ascend the mountain. But they had not taken the first step when the king, whose name was Stonelayer, said to him who was called the Carpenter, "Give me first the implements of thy craft, and the plan of thy building, that I may know after what sort thou buildest, and may fashion thereto my masonry." And the other asked him, "What buildest thou, brother?" And he answered, "I build the Outer Court." Then the Carpenter unlocked his casket and gave him a scroll written over in silver, and a crystal rule, and a carpenter's plane and a saw. And the other took them and put them into his casket. Then the Carpenter said to the Stonelayer, "Brother, give me also the plan of thy building, and the tools of thy craft. For I build the Inner Place, and must needs fit my designing to thy foundation." But the other answered, "Nay, my brother, for I have promised the laborers. Build thou alone. It is enough that I know thy secrets; ask not mine of me." And the Carpenter answered, "How then shall the Temple of the Lord be builded? Are we not of three Ages, and is the temple yet perfected?" Then the Angel spoke, and said to the Stonelayer, "Fear not, brother: freely hast thou received; freely give. For except thine elder brother had been first a Stonelayer, he could not now be a Carpenter. Art thou not of Solomon, and he of Christ? Therefore he hath already handled thy tools, and is of thy craft. And I also, the Measurer, I know the work of both. But now is that time when the end cometh, and that which hath been spoken in the ear in closets, the same shall be proclaimed on the housetops." Then the first king unlocked his casket, and gave to the Carpenter a scroll written in red, and a compass and a trowel. But the Carpenter answered him: "It is enough. I have seen, and I remember. For this is the writing King Solomon gave into my hands when I also was a Stonelayer, and when thou wert of the company of them that labor. For I also am thy Brother, and that thou knowest I know also." Then the third king, the Angel, spoke again and said, "Now is the knowledge perfected and the bond fulfilled. For neither can the Stonelayer build alone, nor the Carpenter construct apart. Therefore, until this day, is the Temple of the Lord unbuilt. But now is the time come, and Salem shall have her habitation on the Hill of the Lord."
And there came down a mist from the mountain, and out of the mist a star. And my Genius said, "Thou shalt yet see more on this wise." But I saw then only the mist, which filled the valley, and moistened my hair and my dress; and so I awoke.
—London, April 30, 1882
————— ** For the full comprehension of the above dream, it is necessary to be profoundly versed at once in the esoteric signification of the Scriptures and in the mysteries of Freemasonry. It was the dreamer's great regret that she neither knew, nor could know, the latter, women being excluded from initiation. (Ed.)
XVIII. The Armed Goddess
I dreamed that I sat reading in my study, with books lying about all round me. Suddenly a voice, marvellously clear and silvery, called me by name. Starting up and turning, I saw behind me a long vista of white marble columns, Greek in architecture, flanking on either side a gallery of white marble. At the end of this gallery stood a shape of exceeding brilliancy, the shape of a woman above mortal height, clad from head to foot in shining mail armour. In her right hand was a spear, on her left arm a shield. Her brow was hidden by a helmet, and the aspect of her face was stern,— severe even, I thought. I approached her, and as I went, my body was lifted up from the earth, and I was aware of that strange sensation of floating above the surface of the ground, which is so common with me in sleep that at times I can scarce persuade myself after waking that it has not been a real experience. When I alighted at the end of the long gallery before the armed woman, she said to me:
"Take off the night-dress thou wearest."
I looked at my attire and was about to answer— "This is not a night-dress," when she added, as though perceiving my thought:—
"The woman's garb is a night-dress; it is a garment made to sleep in.The man's garb is the dress for the day. Look eastward!"
I raised my eyes and, behind the mail-clad shape, I saw the dawn breaking, blood-red, and with great clouds like pillars of smoke rolling up on either side of the place where the sun was about to rise. But as yet the sun was not visible. And as I looked, she cried aloud, and her voice rang through the air like the clash of steel:—
"Listen!"
And she struck her spear on the marble pavement. At the same moment there came from afar off, a confused sound of battle. Cries, and human voices in conflict, and the stir as of a vast multitude, the distant clang of arms and a noise of the galloping of many horses rushing furiously over the ground. And then, sudden silence.
Again she smote the pavement, and again the sounds arose, nearer now, and more tumultuous. Once more they ceased, and a third time she struck the marble with her spear. Then the noises arose all about and around the very spot where we stood, and the clang of the arms was so close that it shook and thrilled the very columns beside me. And the neighing and snorting of horses, and the thud of their ponderous hoofs flying over the earth made, as it were, a wind in my ears, so that it seemed as though a furious battle were raging all around us. But I could see nothing. Only the sounds increased, and became so violent that they awoke me, and even after waking I still seemed to catch the commotion of them in the air. *
—Paris, February 15, 1883.
————— * This dream was shortly followed by Mrs Kingsford's antivivisection expedition to Switzerland, the fierce conflict of which amply fulfilled any predictive significance it may have had. —————-
XIX. The Game of Cards: A Parable
I dreamed I was playing at cards with three persons, the two opposed to me being a man and a woman with hoods pulled over their heads, and cloaks covering their persons. I did not particularly observe them. My partner was an old man without hood or cloak, and there was about him this peculiarity, that he did not from one minute to another appear to remain the same. Sometimes he looked like a very young man, the features not appearing to change in order to produce this effect, but an aspect of youth and even of mirth coming into the face as though the features were lighted up from within. Behind me stood a personage whom I could not see, for his hand and arm only appeared, handing me a pack of cards. So far as I discerned, it was a man's figure, habited in black. Shortly after the dream began, my partner addressed me, saying,
"Do you play by luck or by skill?"
I answered: "I play by luck chiefly; I don't know how to play by skill. But I have generally been lucky." In fact, I had already, lying by me, several "tricks" I had taken. He answered me:—
"To play by luck is to trust to without; to play by skill is to trust to within. In this game, Within goes further than Without."
"What are trumps?" I asked.
"Diamonds are trumps," he answered.
I looked at the cards in my hand and said to him:—"I have more clubs than anything else."
At this he laughed, and seemed all at once quite a youth. "Clubs are strong cards, after all," he said. "Don't despise the black suits. I have known some of the best games ever played won by players holding more clubs than you have."
I examined the cards and found something very odd about them. There were the four suits, diamonds, hearts, clubs, and spades. But the picture cards in my hand seemed different altogether from any I had ever seen before. One was queen of Clubs, and her face altered as I looked at it. First it was dark,—almost dusky,—with the imperial crown on the head; then it seemed quite fair, the crown changing to a smaller one of English aspect, and the dress also transforming itself. There was a queen of Hearts, too, in an antique peasant's gown, with brown hair, and presently this melted into a suit of armor which shone as if reflecting firelight in its burnished scales. The other cards seemed alive likewise, even the ordinary ones, just like the court-cards. There seemed to be pictures moving inside the emblems on their faces. The clubs in my hand ran into higher figures than the spades; these came next in number, and diamonds next. I had no picture-cards of diamonds, but I had the Ace. And this was so bright I could not look at it. Except the two queens of Clubs and Hearts I think I had no picture-cards in my hand, and very few red cards of any kind. There were high figures in the spades. It was the personage behind my chair who dealt the cards always. I said to my partner:—"It is difficult to play at all, whether by luck or by skill, for I get such a bad hand dealt me each time."
"That is your fault," he said. "Play your best with what you have, and next time you will get better cards."
"How can that be?" I asked.
"Because after each game, the `tricks' you take are added to the bottom of the pack which the dealer holds, and you get the `honors' you have taken up from the table. Play well and take all you can. But you must put more head into it. You trust too much to fortune. Don't blame the dealer; he can't see."
"I shall lose this game," I said presently, for the two persons playing against us seemed to be taking up all the cards quickly, and the "lead" never came to my turn.
"It is because you don't count your points before putting down a card," my partner said. "If they play high numbers, you must play higher."
"But they have all the trumps," I said.
"No," he answered, "you have the highest trump of all in your own hand. It is the first and the last. You may take every card they have with that, for it is the chief of the whole series. But you have spades too, and high ones." (He seemed to know what I had.)
"Diamonds are better than spades," I answered. "And nearly all my cards are black ones. Besides, I can't count, it wants so much thinking. Can't you come over here and play for me?"
He shook his head, and I thought that again he laughed." No," he replied, "that is against the law of the game. You must play for yourself. Think it out."
He uttered these words very emphatically and with so strange an intonation that they dissipated the rest of the dream, and I remember no more of it. But I did "think it out;" and I found it was a parable; of Karma.
—Atcham, Dec. 7, 1883
XX. The Panic-Struck Pack-Horse
Out of a veil of palpitating mist there arose before me in my sleep the image of a colossal and precipitous cliff; standing sheer up against a sky of cloud and sea-mist, the tops of the granite peaks being merged and hidden in the vapor. At the foot of the precipice beat a wild sea, tossing and flecked with foam; and out of the flying spray rose sharp splinters of granite, standing like spearheads about the base of the solid rock. As I looked, something stirred far off in the distance, like a fly crawling over the smooth crag. Fixing my gaze upon it I became aware that there was at a great height above the sea, midway between sky and water, a narrow unprotected footpath winding up and down irregularly along the side of the mighty cliff;—a slender, sloping path, horrible to look at, like a rope or a thread stretched mid-air, hanging between heaven and the hungry foam. One by one, came towards me along this awful path a procession of horses, drawing tall narrow carts filled with bales of merchandise. The horses moved along the edge of the crag as though they clung to it, their bodies aslant towards the wall of granite on their right, their legs moving with the precision of creatures feeling and grasping every step. Like deer they moved,— not like horses, and as they advanced, the carts they drew swayed behind them, and I thought every jolt would hurl them over the precipice. Fascinated I watched,—I could not choose but watch. At length came a grey horse, not drawing a cart, but carrying something on his back,—on a pack-saddle apparently. Like the rest he came on stealthily, sniffing every inch of the terrible way, until, just at the worst and giddiest point he paused, hesitated, and seemed about to turn.—-I saw him back himself in a crouching attitude against the wall of rock behind him, lowering his haunches, and rearing his head in a strange manner. The idea flashed on me that he would certainly turn, and then—what could happen? More horses were advancing, and two beasts could not possibly pass each other on that narrow ledge! But I was totally unprepared for the ghastly thing that actually did happen. The miserable horse had been seized with the awful mountain-madness that sometimes overtakes men on stupendous heights,—the madness of suicide. With a frightful scream, that sounded partly like a cry of supreme desperation, partly like one of furious and frenzied joy, the horse reared himself to his full height on the horrible ledge, shook his head wildly, and— leaped with a frantic spring into the air, sheer over the precipice, and into the foam beneath. His eyes glared as he shot into the void, a great dark living mass against the white mist. Was he speared on those terrible shafts of rock below, or was his life dashed out in horrible crimson splashes against the cliffside? Or did he sink into the reeling swirl of the foaming waters, and die more mercifully in their steel-dark depths? I could not see. I saw only the flying form dart through the mist like an arrow from a bow. I heard only the appalling cry, like nothing earthly ever heard before; and I woke in a panic, with hands tightly clasped, and my body damp with moisture. It was but a dream—this awful picture; it was gone as an image from a mirror, and I was awake, and gazing only upon blank darkness.
—Atcham, Sept. 15, 1884
XXI. The Haunted Inn
I seemed in my vision to be on a long and wearisome journey, and to have arrived at an Inn, in which I was offered shelter and rest. The apartment given me consisted of a bedroom and parlour, communicating, and furnished in an antique manner, everything in the rooms appearing to be worm-eaten, dusty and out of date. The walls were bare and dingy; there was not a picture or an ornament in the apartment. An extremely dim light prevailed in the scene; indeed, I do not clearly remember, whether, with the exception of the fire and a nightlamp, the rooms were illumined at all. I seated myself in a chair, by the hearth; it was late, and I thought only of rest. But, presently, I became aware of strange things going on about me. On a table in a corner lay some papers and a pencil. With a feeling of indescribable horror I saw this pencil assume an erect position and begin of itself to write on the paper, precisely as though an invisible hand held and guided it. At the same time, small detonations sounded in different parts of the room; tiny bright sparks appeared, burst, and immediately expired in smoke. The pencil having ceased to write, laid itself gently down, and taking the paper in my hand I found on it a quantity of writing which at first appeared to me to be in cipher, but I presently perceived that the words composing it were written backwards, from right to left, exactly as one sees writing reflected on a looking glass. What was written made a considerable impression on me at the time, but I cannot now recall it. I know, however, that the dominant feeling I experienced was one of horror.
I called the owners of the inn and related to them what had taken place. They received my statement with perfect equanimity, and told me that in their house this was the normal state of things, of which, in fact, they were extremely proud; and they ended by congratulating me as a visitor much favored by the invisible agencies of the place.
"We call them our Lights," they said.
"It is true," I observed, "that I saw lights in the air about the room, but they went out instantaneously, and left only smoke behind them. And why do they write backwards? Who are They?"
As I asked this last question, the pencil on the table rose again, and wrote thus on the paper:—
".ksatonoD"
Again horror seized on me, and the air becoming full of smoke I found it impossible to breathe. "Let me out!" I cried, "I am stifled here,—the air is full of smoke!"
"Outside," the people of the house answered, "you will lose your way; it is quite dark, and we have no other rooms to let. And, besides, it is the same in all the other apartments of the inn."
"But the place is haunted!" I cried; and I pushed past them, and burst out of the house.
Before the doorway stood a tall veiled figure, like translucent silver. A sense of reverence overcame me. The night was balmy, and bright almost as day with resplendent starlight. The stars seemed to lean out of heaven; they looked down on me like living eyes, full of a strange immeasurable sympathy. I crossed the threshold, and stood in the open plain, breathing with rapture and relief the pure warm air of that delicious night. How restful, calm, and glorious was the dark landscape, outlined in purple against the luminous sky! And what a consciousness of vastness and immensity above and around me! "Where am I?" I cried. The silver figure stood beside me, and lifted its veil. It was Pallas Athena.
"Under the Stars of the East," she answered me, "the true eternalLights of the World."
After I was awake, a text in the Gospels was vividly brought to my mind:—"There was no room for then in the Inn." What is this Inn, I wondered, all the rooms of which are haunted, and in which the Christ cannot be born? And this open country under the eastern night,—is it not the same in which they were "abiding," to whom that Birth was first angelically announced?
—Atcham, Nov. 5, 1885
————— ** The solution of the enigma was afterwards recognised in an instruction, also imparted in sleep, in which it was said, "If Occultism were all, and held the key of heaven, there would be no need of Christ." (Ed.)
XXII. An Eastern Apologue
The following was read by me during sleep, in an old book printed in archaic type. As with many other things similarly read by me, I do not know whether it is to be found in any book:—
"After Buddha had been ten years in retirement, certain sages sent their disciples to him, asking him,—'What dost thou claim to be, Gotama?'
"Buddha answered them, 'I claim to be nothing.'
"Ten years afterwards they sent again to him, asking the same question, and again Buddha answered:—'I claim to be nothing.'
"Then after yet another ten years had passed, they sent a third time, asking, 'What dost thou claim to be, Gotama?'
"And Buddha replied, 'I claim to be the utterance of the most high God.'
"Then they said to him: 'How is this, that hitherto thou hast proclaimed thyself to be nothing, and now thou declarest thyself to be the very utterance of God?'
"Buddha answered: `Either I am nothing, or I am the very utterance of God, for between these two all is silence."'
—Atcham, March 5, 1885
XXIII. A Haunted House Indeed!
I dreamt that during a tour on the Continent with my friend C. we stayed in a town wherein there was an ancient house of horrible reputation, concerning which we received the following account. At the top of the house was a suite of rooms, from which no one who entered at night ever again emerged. No corpse was ever found; but it was said by some that the victims were absorbed bodily by the walls; by others that there were in the rooms a number of pictures in frames, one frame, however, containing a blank canvas, which had the dreadful power, first, of fascinating the beholder, and next of drawing him towards it, so that he was compelled to approach and gaze at it. Then, by the same hideous enchantment, he was forced to touch it, and the touch was fatal. For the canvas seized him as a devil-fish seizes its prey, and sucked him in, so that he perished without leaving a trace of himself, or of the manner of his death. The legend said further that if any person could succeed in passing a night in these rooms and in resisting their deadly influence, the spell would for ever be broken, and no one would thenceforth be sacrificed.
Hearing all this, and being somewhat of the knight-errant order, C. and I determined to face the danger, and, if possible, deliver the town from the enchantment. We were assured that the attempt would be vain, for that it had already been many times made, and the Devils of the place were always triumphant. They had the power, we were told, of hallucinating the senses of their victims; we should be subjected to some illusion, and be fatally deceived. Nevertheless, we were resolved to try what we could do, and in order to acquaint ourselves with the scene of the ordeal, we visited the place in the daytime. It was a gloomy-looking building, consisting of several vast rooms, filled with lumber of old furniture, worm-eaten and decaying; scaffoldings, which seemed to have been erected for the sake of making repairs and then left; the windows were curtainless, the floors bare, and rats ran hither and thither among the rubbish accumulated in the corners. Nothing could possibly look more desolate and gruesome. We saw no pictures; but as we did not explore every part of the rooms, they may have been there without our seeing them.
We were further informed by the people of the town that in order to visit the rooms at night it was necessary to wear a special costume, and that without it we should have no chance whatever of issuing from them alive. This costume was of black and white, and each of us was to carry a black stave. So we put on this attire,—which somewhat resembled the garb of an ecclesiastical order,—and when the appointed time came, repaired to the haunted house, where, after toiling up the great staircase in the darkness, we reached the door of the haunted apartments to find it closed. But light was plainly visible beneath it, and within was the sound of voices. This greatly surprised us; but after a short conference we knocked. The door was presently opened by a servant, dressed as a modern indoor footman usually is, who civilly asked us to walk in. On entering we found the place altogether different from what we expected to find, and had found on our daylight visit. It was brightly lighted, had decorated walls, pretty ornaments, carpets, and every kind of modern garnishment, and, in short, bore all the appearance of an ordinary well-appointed private "flat." While we stood in the corridor, astonished, a gentleman in evening dress advanced towards us from one of the reception rooms. As he looked interrogatively at us, we thought it best to explain the intrusion, adding that we presumed we had either entered the wrong house, or stopped at the wrong apartment.
He laughed pleasantly at our tale, and said, "I don't know anything about haunted rooms, and, in fact, don't believe in anything of the kind. As for these rooms, they have for a long time been let for two or three nights every week to our Society for the purpose of social reunion. We are members of a musical and literary association, and are in the habit of holding conversaziones in these rooms on certain evenings, during which we entertain ourselves with dancing, singing, charades, and literary gossip. The rooms are spacious and lofty, and exactly adapted to our requirements. As you are here, I may say, in the name of the rest of the members, that we shall be happy if you will join us." At this I glanced at our dresses in some confusion, which being observed by the gentleman, he hastened to say: "You need be under no anxiety about your appearance, for this is a costume night, and the greater number of our guests are in travesty." As he spoke he threw open the door of a large drawing-room and invited us in. On entering we found a company of men and women, well-dressed, some in ordinary evening attire and some costumed. The room was brilliantly lighted and beautifully furnished and decorated. At one end was a grand piano, round which several persons were grouped; others were seated on ottomans taking tea or coffee; and others strolled about, talking. Our host, who appeared to be master of the ceremonies, introduced us to several persons, and we soon became deeply interested in a conversation on literary subjects. So the evening wore on pleasantly, but I never ceased to wonder how we could have mistaken the house or the staircase after the precaution we had taken of visiting it in the daytime in order to avoid the possibility of error.
Presently, being tired of conversation, I wandered away from the group with which C. was still engaged, to look at the beautiful decorations of the great salon, the walls of which were covered with artistic designs in fresco. Between each couple of panels, the whole length of the salon, was a beautiful painting, representing a landscape or a sea-piece. I passed from one to the other, admiring each, till I had reached the extreme end, and was far away from the rest of the company, where the lights were not so many or so bright as in the centre. The last fresco in the series then caught my attention. At first it appeared to me to be unfinished; and then I observed that there was upon its background no picture at all, but only a background of merging tints which seemed to change, and to be now sky, now sea, now green grass. This empty picture had, moreover, an odd metallic coloring which fascinated me; and saying to myself "Is there really any painting on it?" I mechanically put out my hand and touched it. On this I was instantly seized by a frightful sensation, a shock that ran from the tips of my fingers to my brain, and steeped my whole being. Simultaneously I was aware of an overwhelming sense of sucking and dragging, which, from my hand and arm, and, as it were, through them, seemed to possess and envelop my whole person. Face, hair, eyes, bosom, limbs, every portion of my body was locked in an awful embrace which, like the vortex of a whirlpool, drew me irresistibly towards the picture. I felt the hideous impulse clinging over me and sucking me forwards into the wall. I strove in vain to resist it. My efforts were more futile than the flutter of gossamer wings. And then there rushed upon my mind the consciousness that all we had been told about the haunted rooms was true; that a strong delusion had been cast over us; that all this brilliant throng of modern ladies and gentlemen were fiends masquerading, prepared beforehand for our coming; that all the beauty and splendor of our surroundings were mere glamor; and that in reality the rooms were those we had seen in the daytime, filled with lumber and rot and vermin. As I realised all this, and was thrilled with the certainty of it, a sudden access of strength came to me, and I was impelled, as a last desperate effort, to turn my back on the awful fresco, and at least to save my face from coming into contact with it and being glued to its surface. With a shriek of anguish I wrenched myself round and fell prostrate on the ground, face downwards, with my back to the wall, feeling as though the flesh had been torn from my hand and arm. Whether I was saved or not I knew not. My whole being was over-powered by the realisation of the deception to which I had succumbed. I had looked for something so different,—darkness, vacant, deserted rooms, and perhaps a tall, white, empty canvas in a frame, against which I should have been on my guard. Who could have anticipated or suspected this cheerful welcome, these entertaining literati, these innocent-looking frescoes? Who could have foreseen so deadly a horror in such a guise? Was I doomed? Should I, too, be sucked in and absorbed, and perhaps C. after me, knowing nothing of my fate? I had no voice; I could not warn him; all my force seemed to have been spent on the single shriek I had uttered as I turned my back on the wall. I lay prone upon the floor, and knew that I had swooned.
And thus, on seeking me, C. would doubtless have found me, lying insensible among the rubbish, with the rooms restored to the condition in which we had seen them by day, my success in withdrawing myself having dissolved the spell and destroyed the enchantment. But as it was, I awoke from my swoon only to find that I had been dreaming.
XXIV. The Square in the Hand
The foregoing dream was almost immediately succeeded by another, in which I dreamt that I was concerned in a very prominent way in a political struggle in France for liberty and the people's rights. My part in this struggle was, indeed, the leading one, but my friend C. had been drawn into it at my instance, and was implicated in a secondary manner only. The government sought our arrest, and, for a time, we evaded all attempts to take us, but at last we were surprised and driven under escort in a private carriage to a military station, where we were to be detained for examination. With us was arrested a man popularly known as "Fou," a poor weakling whom I much pitied. When we arrived at the station which was our destination, "Fou" gave some trouble to the officials. I think he fainted, but at all events his conveyance from the carriage to the caserne needed the conjoined efforts of our escort, and some commotion was caused by his appearance among the crowd assembled to see us. Clearly the crowd was sympathetic with us and hostile to the military. I particularly noticed one woman who pressed forward as "Fou" was being carried into the station, and who loudly called on all present to note his feeble condition and the barbarity of arresting a witless creature such as he. At that moment C. laid his hand on my arm and whispered: "Now is our time; the guards are all occupied with 'Fou;' we are left alone for a minute; let us jump out of the carriage and run!" As he said this he opened the carriage door on the side opposite to the caserne and alighted in the street. I instantly followed, and the people favoring us, we pressed through them and fled at the top of our speed down the road. As we ran I espied a pathway winding up a hillside away from the town, and cried, "Let us go up there; let us get away from the street!" C. answered, "No, no; they would see us there immediately at that height, the path is too conspicuous. Our best safety is to lose ourselves in the town. We may throw them off our track by winding in and out of the streets." Just then a little child, playing in the road, got in our way, and nearly threw us down as we ran. We had to pause a moment to recover ourselves. "That child may have cost us our lives," whispered C., breathlessly. A second afterwards we reached the bottom of the street which branched off right and left. I hesitated a moment; then we both turned to the right. As we did so— in the twinkling of an eye—we found ourselves in the midst of a group of soldiers coming round the corner. I ran straight into the arms of one of them, who the same instant knew me and seized me by throat and waist with a grip of iron. This was a horrible moment! The iron grasp was sudden and solid as the grip of a vice; the man's arm held my waist like a bar of steel. "I arrest you!" he cried, and the soldiers immediately closed round us. At once I realised the hopelessness of the situation,—the utter futility of resistance. "Vous n'avez pas besoin de me tenir ainsi," I said to the officer; "j irai tranquillement" He loosened his hold and we were then marched off to another military station, in a different part of the town from that whence we had escaped. The man who had arrested me was a sergeant or some officer in petty command. He took me alone with him into the guardroom, and placed before me on a wooden table some papers which he told me to fill in and sign. Then he sat down opposite to me and I looked through the papers. They were forms, with blanks left for descriptions specifying the name, occupation, age, address and so forth of arrested persons. I signed these, and pushing them across the table to the man, asked him what was to be done with us. "You will be shot," he replied, quickly and decisively. "Both of us?" I asked. "Both," he replied. "But," said I, "my companion has done nothing to deserve death. He was drawn into this struggle entirely by me. Consider, too, his advanced age. His hair is white; he stoops, and, had it not been for the difficulty with which he moves his limbs, both of us would probably be at this moment in a place of safety. What can you gain by shooting an old man such as he?" The officer was silent. He neither favored nor discouraged me by his manner. While I sat awaiting his reply, I glanced at the hand with which I had just signed the papers, and a sudden idea flashed into my mind. "At least," I said, "grant me one request. If my companion must die, let me die first." Now I made this request for the following reason. In my right hand, the line of life broke abruptly halfway in its length, indicating a sudden and violent death. But the point at which it broke was terminated by a perfectly marked square, extraordinarily clear-cut and distinct. Such a square, occurring at the end of a broken line means rescue, salvation. I had long been aware of this strange figuration in my hand, and had often wondered what it presaged. But now, as once more I looked at it, it came upon me with sudden conviction that in some way I was destined to be delivered from death at the last moment, and I thought that if this be so it would be horrible should C. have been killed first. If I were to be saved I should certainly save him also, for my pardon would involve the pardon of both, or my rescue the rescue of both. Therefore it was important to provide for his safety until after my fate was decided. The officer seemed to take this last request into more serious consideration than the first. He said shortly: "I may be able to manage that for you," and then at once rose and took up the papers I had signed. "When are we to be shot?" I asked him. "Tomorrow morning," he replied, as promptly as before. Then he went out, turning the key of the guardroom upon me.
The dawn of the next day broke darkly. It was a terribly stormy day; great black lurid thunderclouds lay piled along the horizon, and came up slowly and awfully against the wind. I looked upon them with terror; they seemed so near the earth, and so like living, watching things. They hung out of the sky, extending long ghostly arms downwards, and their gloom and density seemed supernatural. The soldiers took us out, our hands bound behind us, into a quadrangle at the back of their barracks. The scene is sharply impressed on my mind. A palisade of two sides of a square, made of wooden planks, ran round the quadrangle. Behind this palisade, and pressed up close against it, was a mob of men and women—the people of the town—come to see the execution. But their faces were sympathetic; an unmistakable look of mingled grief and rage, not unmixed with desperation—for they were a down-trodden folk—shone in the hundreds of eyes turned towards us. I was the only woman among the condemned. C. was there, and poor "Fou," looking bewildered, and one or two other prisoners. On the third and fourth sides of the quadrangle was a high wall, and in a certain place was a niche partly enclosing the trunk of a tree, cut off at the top. An iron ring was driven into the trunk midway, evidently for the purpose of securing condemned persons for execution. I guessed it would be used for that now. In the centre of the square piece of ground stood a file of soldiers, armed with carbines, and an officer with a drawn sabre. The palisade was guarded by a row of soldiers somewhat sparsely distributed, ertainly not more than a dozen in all. A Catholic priest in a black cassock walked beside me, and as we were conducted into the enclosure, he turned to me and offered religious consolation. I declined his ministrations, but asked him anxiously if he knew which of us was to die first. "You," he replied; "the officer in charge of you said you wished it, and he has been able to accede to your request." Even then I felt a singular joy at hearing this, though I had no longer any expectation of release. Death was, I thought, far too near at hand for that. Just then a soldier approached us, and led me, bare-headed, to the tree trunk, where he placed me with my back against it, and made fast my hands behind me with a rope to the iron ring. No bandage was put over my eyes. I stood thus, facing the file of soldiers in the middle of the quadrangle, and noticed that the officer with the drawn sabre placed himself at the extremity of the line, composed of six men. In that supreme moment I also noticed that their uniform was bright with steel accoutrements. Their helmets were of steel, and their carbines, as they raised them and pointed them at me, ready cocked, glittered in a fitful gleam of sunlight with the same burnished metal. There was an instant's stillness and hush while the men took aim; then I saw the officer raise his bared sabre as the signal to fire. It flashed in the air; then, with a suddenness impossible to convey, the whole quadrangle blazed with an awful light,—a light so vivid, so intense, so blinding, so indescribable that everything was blotted out and devoured by it. It crossed my brain with instantaneous conviction that this amazing glare was the physical effect of being shot, and that the bullets had pierced my brain or heart, and caused this frightful sense of all-pervading flame. Vaguely I remembered having read or having been told that such was the result produced on the nervous system of a victim to death from firearms. "It is over," I said, "that was the bullets." But presently there forced itself on my dazed senses a sound—a confusion of sounds—darkness succeeding the white flash—then steadying itself into gloomy daylight; a tumult; a heap of stricken, tumbled men lying stone-still before me; a fearful horror upon every living face; and then . . . it all burst on me with distinct conviction. The storm which had been gathering all the morning had culminated in its blackest and most electric point immediately overhead. The file of soldiers appointed to shoot us stood exactly under it. Sparkling with bright steel on head and breast and carbines, they stood shoulder to shoulder, a complete lightning conductor, and at the end of the chain they formed, their officer, at the critical moment, raised his shining, naked blade towards the sky. Instantaneously heaven opened, and the lightning fell, attracted by the burnished steel. From blade to carbine, from helmet to breastplate it ran, smiting every man dead as he stood.
They fell like a row of ninepins, blackened in face and hand in an instant,—in the twinkling of an eye. Dead. The electric flame licked the life out of seven men in that second; not one moved a muscle or a finger again. Then followed a wild scene. The crowd, stupefied for a minute by the thunderbolt and the horror of the devastation it had wrought, presently recovered sense, and with a mighty shout hurled itself against the palisade, burst it, leapt over it and swarmed into the quadrangle, easily overpowering the unnerved guards. I was surrounded; eager hands unbound mine; arms were thrown about me; the people roared, and wept, and triumphed, and fell about me on their knees praising Heaven. I think rain fell, my face was wet with drops, and my hair,—but I knew no more, for I swooned and lay unconscious in the arms of the crowd. My rescue had indeed come, and from the very Heavens!
—Rome, April 12, 1887
Dream-Verses
"Through the Ages"
Wake, thou that sleepest! Soul, awake!Thy light is come, arise and shine!For darkness melts, and dawn divineDoth from the holy Orient break;
Swift-darting down the shadowy waysAnd misty deeps of unborn Time,God's Light, God's Day, whose perfect primeIs as the light of seven days.
Wake, prophet-soul, the time draws near,"The God who knows" within thee stirsAnd speaks, for His thou art, and HersWho bears the mystic shield and spear.
The hidden secrets of their shrineWhere thou, initiate, didst adore,Their quickening finger shall restoreAnd make its glories newly thine.
A touch divine shall thrill thy brain,Thy soul shall leap to life, and lo!What she has known, again shall know;What she has seen, shall see again;
The ancient Past through which she came,—A cloud across a sunset sky,—A cactus flower of scarlet dye,—A bird with throat and wings of flame;—
A red wild roe, whose mountain bedNor ever hound or hunter knew,Whose flying footprint dashed the dewIn nameless forests, long since dead.
And ever thus in ceaseless rollThe wheels of Destiny and TimeThrough changing form and age and climeBear onward the undying Soul:
Till now a Sense, confused and dim,Dawns in a shape of nobler mould,Less beast, scarce human; uncontrolled,With free fierce life in every limb;
A savage youth, in painted gear,Foot fleeter than the summer wind;Scant speech for scanty needs designed,Content with sweetheart, spoil and spear
And, passing thence, with burning breath,A fiery Soul that knows no fear,The armed hosts of Odin hearHer voice amid the ranks of death;
There, where the sounds of war are shrill,And clarion shrieks, and battle roars,Once more set free, she leaps and soarsA Soul of flame, aspiring still!
Till last, in fairer shape she standsWhere lotus-scented waters glide,A Theban Priestess, dusky-eyed,Barefooted on the golden sands;
Or, prostrate, in the Temple-halls,When Spirits wake, and mortals sleep,She hears what mighty Voices sweepLike winds along the columned walls.
A Princess then beneath the palmsWhich wave o'er Afric's burning plains,The blood of Afric in thy veins,A golden circlet on thine arms.
By sacred Ganges' sultry tide,With dreamy gaze and clasped handsThou walkst a Seeress in the landsWhere holy Buddha lived and died.
Anon, a sea-bleached mountain caveMakes shelter for thee, grave and wan,Thou solemn, solitary Man,Who, nightly, by the star-lit wave
Invokest with illumined eyesThe steadfast Lords who rule and waitBeyond the heavens and Time and fate,Until the perfect Dawn shall rise,
And oracles, through ages dumb,Shall wake, and holy forms shall shineOn mountain peaks in light divine,When mortals bid God's kingdom come
So turns the wheel of thy [keen] soul;From birth to birth her ruling stars,Swift Mercury and fiery Mars,In ever changing orbits roll!
—Paris, May, 1880
Fragment
A jarring note, a chord amiss—The music's sweeter after,Like wrangling ended with a kiss,Or tears, with silver laughter.
The high gods have no joys like these,So sweet in human story;No tempest rends their tranquil seasBeyond the sunset glory.
The whirling wheels of Time and Fate
Fragment*
I thank Thee, Lord, who hast through devious waysLed me to know Thy Praise,And to this WildernesseHast brought me out, Thine Israel to blesse.
If I should faint with Thirst, or weary, sink,To these my Soule is Drink,To these the Majick RodIs Life, and mine is hid with Christ in God.
————— * These are not properly dream-verses, having been suddenly presented to the waking vision one day in Paris while gazing at the bright sky. (Ed.)
Signs of the Times
Eyes of the dawning in heaven?Sparks from the opening of hell?Gleams from the altar-lamps seven?Can you tell?
Is it the glare of a fire?Is it the breaking of day?Birth lights, or funeral pyre?Who shall say?
—April 19, 1886.
With the Gods
Sweet lengths of shore with sea between,Sweet gleams of tender blue and green,Sweet wind caressive and unseen,Soft breathing from the deep;
What joy have I in all sweet things;How clear and bright my spirit sings;Rising aloft on mystic wings;While sense and body sleep.
In some such dream of grace and light,My soul shall pass into the sightOf the dear Gods who in the heightOf inward being dwell;
And joyful at Her perfect feetWhom most of all I long to greet,My soul shall lie in meadow sweetAll white with asphodel.
—August 31, 1887.