That night
That night Freedling came again when all was still in the palace; and now as before Rollonde had moved from his place and was standing with hishead against the window waiting to be let out. "Ah, dear Master," he said, so soon as he saw the Prince coming, "let me go this night also, and surely I will return with day."
So again the Prince opened the window, and watched him disappear, and heard from far away the neighing of the horses in Rocking-Horse Land calling to him. And in the morning with the white hair round his finger he called "Rollonde, Rollonde!" and Rollonde neighed and came back to him, dipping and dancing over the hills.
Now this same thing happened every night; and every morning the horse kissed Freedling, saying, "Ah! dear Prince and kind Master," and became stock still once more.
So a year went by, till one morning Freedling woke up to find it was his sixth birthday. And as six is to five, so were the presents he received on his sixth birthday for magnificence and multitude to the presents he had received the year before. His fairy godmother had sent him a bird, a real live bird; but when he pulled its tail it became a lizard, and when he pulled the lizard's tail it became a mouse, and when he pulled the mouse's tail it became a cat. Then he did very much want to see if the cat would eat the mouse, and not being able to have them both he got rather vexed with his fairy godmother. However, he pulled the cat's tail and the cat became a dog, and when he pulled the dog's the dog became a goat; and so it went on till he got to a cow. And he pulled the cow's tail and it became a camel, and he pulled the camel's tail and it became an elephant, and still not being contented, he pulled the elephant'stail and it became a guinea-pig. Now a guinea-pig has no tail to pull, so it remained a guinea-pig, while Prince Freedling sat down and howled at his fairy godmother.
But the best of all his presents was the one given to him by the King his father. It was a most beautiful horse, for, said the King, "You are now old enough to learn to ride."
So Freedling was put upon the horse's back, and from having ridden so long upon his rocking-horse he learned to ride perfectly in a single day, and was declared by all the courtiers to be the most perfect equestrian that was ever seen.
Now these praises and the pleasure of riding a real horse so occupied his thoughts that that night he forgot all about Rollonde, and falling fast asleep dreamed of nothing but real horses and horsemen going to battle. And so it was the next night too.
But the night after that, just as he was falling asleep, he heard someone sobbing by his bed, and a voice saying, "Ah! dear Prince and kind Master, let me go, for my heart breaks for a sight of my native land." And there stood his poor rocking-horse Rollonde, with tears falling out of his beautiful eyes on to the white coverlet.
Then the Prince, full of shame at having forgotten his friend, sprang up and threw his arms round his neck saying, "Be of good cheer, Rollonde, for now surely I will let thee go!" and he ran to the window and opened it for the horse to go through. "Ah, dear Prince and kind Master!" said Rollonde. Then he lifted his head and neighed so that thewhole palace shook, and swaying forward till his head almost touched the ground he sprang out into the night and away towards Rocking-Horse Land.
Then Prince Freedling, standing by the window, thoughtfully unloosed the white hair from his finger, and let it float away into the darkness, out of sight of his eye or reach of his hand.
"Good-bye, Rollonde," he murmured softly, "brave Rollonde, my own good Rollonde! Go and be happy in your own land, since I, your Master, was forgetting to be kind to you." And far away he heard the neighing of horses in Rocking-Horse Land.
Many years after, when Freedling had become King in his father's stead, the fifth birthday of the Prince his son came to be celebrated; and there on the morning of the day, among all the presents that covered the floor of the chamber, stood a beautiful foal rocking-horse, black, with deep-burning eyes.
No one knew how it had come there, or whose present it was, till the King himself came to look at it. And when he saw it so like the old Rollonde he had loved as a boy, he smiled, and, stroking its dark mane, said softly in its ear, "Art thou, then, the son of Rollonde?" And the foal answered him, "Ah, dear Prince and kind Master!" but never a word more.
Then the King took the little Prince his son, and told him the story of Rollonde as I have told it here; and at the end he went and searched in the foal's mane till he found one white hair, and, drawing itout, he wound it about the little Prince's finger, bidding him guard it well and be ever a kind master to Rollonde's son.
So here is my story of Rollonde come to a good ending.
THERE was once upon a time a young girl named Japonel, the daughter of a wood-cutter, and of all things that lived by the woodside, she was the most fair.
Her hair in its net was like a snared sunbeam, and her face like a spring over which roses leaned down and birds hung fluttering to drink—such being the in-dwelling presence of her eyes and her laughing lips and her cheeks.
Whenever she crossed the threshold of her home, the birds and the flowers began calling to her, "Look up, Japonel! Look down, Japonel!" for the sight of the sweet face they loved so much. The squirrel called over its bough, "Look up, Japonel!" and the rabbit from between the roots, "Japonel, look down!" And Japonel, as she went, looked up and looked down, and laughed, thinking what a sweet-sounding place the world was.
Her mother, looking at her from day to day, became afraid: she said to the wood-cutter, "Our child is too fair; she will get no good of it."
But her husband answered, "Good wife, why should it trouble you? What is there in these quiet parts that can harm her? Keep her only from the pond in the wood, lest the pond-witch see her and become envious."
"Do not go near water, or you may fall in!" said her mother one day as she saw Japonel bendingdown to look at her face in a rain-puddle by the road.
Japonel laughed softly. "O silly little mother, how can I fall into a puddle that is not large enough for my two feet to stand in?"
But the mother thought to herself, when Japonel grows older and finds the pond in the wood, she will go there to look at her face, unless she has something better to see it in at home. So from the next pedlar who came that way she bought a little mirror and gave it to Japonel, that in it she might see her face with its spring-like beauty, and so have no cause to go near the pond in the wood. The lovely girl, who had never seen a mirror in her life, took the rounded glass in her hand and gazed for a long time without speaking, wondering more and more at her own loveliness. Then she went softly away with it into her own chamber, and wishing to find a name for a thing she loved so much, she called it, "Stream's eye," and hung it on the wall beside her bed.
In the days that followed, the door of her chamber would be often shut, and her face seldom seen save of herself alone. And "Look up, Japonel! Look down, Japonel!" was a sound she no longer cared to hear as she went through the woods; for the memory of "Stream's eye" was like a dream that clung to her, and floated in soft ripples on her face.
She grew tall like an aspen, and more fair, but pale. Her mother said, "Woe is me, for now I have made her vain through showing her her great beauty." And to Japonel herself she said, "Oh, my beautiful, my bright darling, though I have made thee vain, Ipray thee to punish me not. Do not go near the pond in the wood to look in it, or an evil thing will happen to thee." And Japonel smiled dreamily amid half-thoughts, and kissing her mother, "Dear mother," she said, "does 'Stream's eye' tell me everything of my beauty, or am I in other eyes still fairer?" Then her mother answered sadly, "Nay, but I trust the open Eye of God finds in thee a better beauty than thy mirror can tell thee of."
Japonel, when she heard that answer, went away till she came to the pond in the wood. It lay down in a deep hollow, and drank light out of a clear sky, which, through a circle of dark boughs, ever looked down on it. "Perhaps," she said to herself, "it is here that God will open His Eye and show me how much fairer I am than even 'Stream's eye' can tell me." But she thought once of her mother's words, and went by.
Then she turned again, "It is only that my mother fears lest I become vain. What harm can come if I do look once? it will be in my way home." So she crept nearer and nearer to the pond, saying to herself, "To see myself once as fair as God sees me cannot be wrong. Surely that will not make me more vain." And when she came through the last trees, and stood near the brink, she saw before her a little old woman, dressed in green, kneeling by the water and looking in.
"There at least," she said to herself, "is one who looks in without any harm happening to her. I wonder what it is she sees that she stays there so still." And coming a little nearer, "Good dame," called Japonel, "what is it you have found there, that yougaze at so hard?" And the old woman, without moving or looking up, answered, "My own face; but a hundred times younger and fairer, as it was in my youth."
Then thought Japonel, "How should I look now, who am fair and in the full bloom of my youth? It is because my mother fears lest I shall become vain that she warned me." So she came quickly and knelt down by the old woman and looked in. And even as she caught sight of her face gazing up, pale and tremulous ("Quick, go away!" its lips seemed to be saying), the old woman slid down from the bank and caught hold of her reflection with green, weed-like arms, and drew it away into the pool's still depths below. Beneath Japonel's face lay nothing now but blank dark water, and far away in, a faint face gazed back beseeching, and its lips moved with an imprisoned prayer that might not make itself heard. Only three bubbles rose to the surface, and broke into three separate sighs like the shadow of her own name. Then the pond-witch stirred the mud, and all trace of that lost image went out, and Japonel was left alone.
She rose, expecting to see nothing, to be blind; but the woods were there, night shadows were gathering to their tryst under the boughs, and brighter stars had begun blotting the semi-brightness of the sky. All the way home she went feebly, not yet resolved of the evil that had come upon her. She stole quietly to her own little room in the fading light, and took down "Stream's eye" from the wall. Then she fell forward upon the bed, for all the surface of her glass was grown blank:never could she hope to look upon her own face again.
The next morning she hung her head low, for she feared all her beauty was flown from her, till she heard her father say, "Wife, each day it seems to me our Japonel grows more fair." And her mother answered, sighing, "She is too fair, I know."
Then Japonel set out once more for the pond in the wood. As she went the birds and the flowers sang to her, "Look up, Japonel; look down, Japonel!" but Japonel went on, giving them no heed. She came to the water's side, and leaning over, saw far down in a tangle of green weeds a face that looked back to hers, faint and blurred by the shimmering movement of the water. Then, weeping, she wrung her hands and cried:
"Ah! sweet face of Japonel,Beauty and grace of Japonel,Image and eyes of Japonel,'Come back!' sighs Japonel."
And bubble by bubble a faint answer was returned that broke like a sob on the water's surface:
"I am the face of Japonel,The beauty and grace of Japonel;Here under a spell, Japonel,I dwell, Japonel."
All day Japonel cried so, and was so answered. Now and again, green weeds would come skimming to the surface, and seem to listen to her reproach, and then once more sink down to their bed in thepond's depths, and lie almost still, waving long slimy fingers through the mud.
The next day Japonel came again, and cried as before:
"Ah! sweet face of Japonel,Beauty and grace of Japonel,Image and eyes of Japonel,'Come back!' cries Japonel."
And her shadow in the water made answer:
"I am the face of Japonel,The beauty and grace of Japonel;Here under a spell, Japonel,I dwell, Japonel."
Now as she sat and sorrowed she noticed that whenever a bird flew over the pond it dropped something out of its mouth into the water, and looking she saw millet-seeds lying everywhere among the weeds of its surface; one by one they were being sucked under by the pond-witch.
Japonel stayed so long by the side of the pond, that on her way home it had fallen quite dark while she was still in the middle of the wood. Then all at once she heard a bird with loud voice cry out of the darkness, "Look up, Japonel!" The cry was so sudden and so strange, coming at that place and that hour, that all through her grief she heard it, and stopped to look up. Again in the darkness she heard the bird cry, "Why do you weep, Japonel?" Japonel said, "Because the pond-witch has carried away my beautiful reflection in the water, so that I can see my own face no more."
Then the bird said, "Why have you not done as the birds do? She is greedy; so they throw in millet-seeds, and then she does not steal the reflection of their wings when they pass over." And Japonel answered, "Because I did not know that, therefore I am to-day the most miserable of things living." Then said the bird, "Come to-morrow, and you shall be the happiest."
So the next day Japonel went and sat by the pond in the wood, waiting to be made the happiest, as the bird had promised her. All day long great flocks of birds went to and fro, and the pond became covered with seeds. Japonel looked; "Why, they are poppy-seeds!" she cried. (Now poppy-seeds when they are eaten make people sleep.) Just as the sun was setting all the birds began suddenly to cry in chorus, "Look down, Japonel! Japonel, look down!" And there, on the pond's surface, lay an old woman dressed in green, fast asleep, with all the folds of her dress and the wrinkles of her face full of poppy-seeds.
Then Japonel ran fast to the pond's edge and looked down. Slowly from the depth rose the pale beautiful reflection of herself, untying itself from the thin green weeds, and drifting towards the bank. It looked up with tremulous greeting, half sadness, half pleasure, seeming so glad after that long separation to return to its sweet mistress. So as it came and settled below her own face in the water, Japonel stooped down over it and kissed it.
Then she sprang back from the brink and ran home, fast, fast in the fading light. And there, when she looked in her mirror, was once more the beautiful face she loved, a little blue and wan fromits long imprisonment under water. And so it ever remained, beautiful, but wan, to remind her of the sorrow that had come upon her when, loving this too well, she had not loved enough to listen to the cry of the birds: "Look up, Japonel!" and, "Japonel, look down!"
THERE was once upon a time a King's daughter who was about to be given in marriage to a great prince; and when the wedding-day was yet a long way off, the whole court began to concern itself as to how the bride was to be dressed. What she should wear, and how she should wear it, was the question debated by the King and his Court day and night, almost without interruption. Whatever it was to be, it must be splendid, without peer. Must it be silk, or velvet, or satin; should it be enriched with brocade, or with gems, or sewn thick with pearls?
But when they came to ask the Princess, she said, "I will have only a dress of beaten gold, light as gossamer, thin as bee's-wing, soft as swan's-down."
Then the King, calling his chief goldsmith, told him to make for the Princess the dress of beaten gold. But the goldsmith knew no way how such a dress was to be made, and his answer to the King was, "Sire, the thing is not to be done."
Then the King grew very angry, for he said, "What a Princess can find it in her head to wish, some man must find it in his wits to accomplish." So he put the chief goldsmith in prison to think about it, and summoning all the goldsmiths in the kingdom, told them of the Princess's wish, that a dress should be made for her of beaten gold. But every one of the goldsmiths went down on his kneesto the King, saying, "Sire, the thing is not to be done." Thereupon the King clapped them all into prison, promising to cut off all their heads if in three weeks' time they had not put them together to some purpose and devised a plan for making such a dress as the Princess desired.
Now just then Gammelyn was passing through the country, and when he heard of all this, he felt very sorry for the goldsmiths, who had done nothing wrong, but had told honest truth about themselves to the King. So he set his bright wits to work, and at last said, "I think I can save the goldsmiths their heads, for I have found a way of making such a dress as this fine Princess desires."
Then he went to the King and said, "I have a way for making a dress of beaten gold."
"But," said the King, "have a care, for if you fail I shall assuredly cut off your head."
All the same Gammelyn took that risk willingly and set to work. And first he asked that the Princess would tell him what style of dress it should be; and the Princess said, "Beaten gold, light as gossamer, thin as bee's-wing, soft as swan's-down, and it must be made thus." So she showed him of what fashion sleeve, and bodice, and train should be. Then Gammelyn caused to be made (for he had a palace full of workers put under him) a most lovely dress, in the fashion the Princess had named, of white cambric closely woven; and the Princess came wondering at him, saying that it was to be only of beaten gold.
"You wait a while!" said Gammelyn, for he had no liking for the Princess. Then he asked the Kingfor gold out of his treasury; but the King supplied him instead with gold from the stores of the imprisoned goldsmiths. So he put it in a sack, and carried it to a mill, and said to the miller, "Grind me this sack full of gold into flour." At first the miller stared at him for a madman, but when he saw the letter in Gammelyn's hands which the King had written, and which said, "I'll cut off your head if you don't!" then he set to with a will, and ground the gold into fine golden flour. So Gammelyn shouldered his sack and jogged back to the palace. The next thing he did was to summon all the gold-beaters in the kingdom, which he did easily enough with the King's letter; for directly they saw the words "I'll cut off your head if you don't!" and the King's signature beneath, they came running as fast as their legs could carry them, till all the streets which led up to the palace were full of them.
Then Gammelyn chose a hundred of the strongest, and took them into the chamber where the wedding-dress was in making. And the dress he took and spread out on iron tables, and, sprinkling the golden flour all over it, set the men to beat day and night for a whole week. And at the end of the week there was a splendid dress, that looked as if it were of pure gold only. But the Princess said, "My dress must beallgold, and no part cambric—this will not do." "You wait!" said Gammelyn, "it is not finished yet."
Then he made a fire of sweet spices and sandalwood, jasmine, and mignonette; and into the fire he put the wonderful dress.
The Princess screamed with grief and rage; forshe was in love with the dress, though she was so nice in holding him to the conditions of the decree. But Gammelyn persevered, and what happened was this: the fire burnt away all the threads of the cambric, but was not hot enough to melt the gold; and when all the cambric was burnt, then he drew out of the fire a dress of beaten gold, light as gossamer, thin as bee's-wing, soft as swan's-down, and fragrant as a wind when it blows through a Sultan's garden.
So all the goldsmiths were set free from prison; and the King appointed Gammelyn his chief goldsmith.
But when the Princess saw the dress, she was so beside herself with pride and pleasure that she must have also a dress made of pearl, light as gossamer, thin as bee's-wing, soft as swan's-down. And the King sent for all his jewellers, and told them that such a dress was to be made; but they all went down on their bended knees, crying with one voice, "Sire, the thing is not to be done." And all the good they got for that was that they were clapped into prison till a way for doing it should be found.
Then the King said to Gammelyn, "Since my jewellers cannot make this dress, you must do it!" But Gammelyn said, "Sire, that is not in our bargain." And the only answer the King had to that was, "I'll cut off your head if you don't."
Gammelyn sighed like a sea-shell; but determining to make the best of a bad business, he set to work.
And, as before, he made a dress in the fashionthe Princess chose, of the finest weaving. He made each part separate; the two sleeves separate, the body separate, the skirt and train separate. Then, at his desire, the King commanded that all the oysters which were dredged out of the sea should be brought to him. Out of these he selected the five finest oysters of all; each one was the size of a tea-tray. Then he put them into a large tank and inside each shell he put one part of the dress—the weaving of which was so fine that there was plenty of room for it, as well as for the oysters. And in course of time he drew out from each shell—from one the body, from one the skirt, from one the train, from one a sleeve, from another the other sleeve. Next he fastened each part together with thread, and put the whole dress back into the tank; and into the mouth of one oyster he put the joinery of body and skirt, and into the mouth of another the joinery of skirt and train, and into the mouth of two others the joinery of the two sleeves, and the fifth oyster he ate. So the oysters did their work, laying their soft inlay over the gown, just as they laid it over the inside of their shells; and after a time Gammelyn drew forth a dress bright and gleaming, and pure mother-o'-pearl. But "No," said the Princess, "it must be all pure pearl, with nothing of thread in it." But, "Wait a while!" said Gammelyn, "I have not finished yet."
So by a decree of the King he caused to be gathered together all the moths in the kingdom—millions of moths; and he put them all into a bare iron room along with the dress, and sealed thedoors and windows with red sealing-wax. The Princess wept and sighed for the dress: "It will be all eaten," said she. "Then I shall cut off his head," said the King. But for all that, Gammelyn persevered.
And when he opened the door they found that every thread had been eaten away by the moths, while the mother-o'-pearl had been left uninjured. So the dress was a perfect pearl, light as gossamer, thin as bee's-wing, soft as swan's-down; and the King made Gammelyn his chief jeweller, and set all the other jewellers free.
Then the Princess was so delighted that she wished to have one more dress also, made all of butterflies' wings. "That were easily done," said Gammelyn, "but it were cruel to ask for such a dress to be made."
Nevertheless the Princess would have it so, andheshould make it. "I'll cut off your head if you don't," said the King.
Gammelyn bumbled like a bee; but all he said was, "Many million butterflies will be wanted for such a work: you must let me have again the two dresses—the pearl, and the gold—for butterflies love bright colours that gleam and shine; and with these alone can I gather them all to one place."
So the Princess gave him the two dresses; and he went to the highest part of the palace, out on to the battlements of the great tower. There he faced towards the west, where lay a new moon, louting towards the setting sun; and he laid the two robes, one on either arm, spreading themabroad, till they looked like two wings—a gold and a pearl. And a beam of the sun came and kissed the gold wing, and a pale quivering thread of moonlight touched the pearl wing; and Gammelyn sang:
"Light of the moon,Light of the sun,Pearl of the sky,Gold from on high,Hearken to me!"Light of the moon,Pearl of the sea,Gold of the landHere in my hand,I render to thee."Butterflies come!Carry us home,Gold of the gnome,Pearl of the sea."
And as he sang, out of the east came a soft muttering of wings and a deep moving mass like a bright storm-cloud. And out of the sun ran a long gold finger, and out of the moon a pale shivering finger of pearl, and touching the gold and the pearl, these became verily wings and not millinery. Then before the Princess could scream more than once, or the King say anything about cutting off heads, the bright cloud in the east became a myriad myriad of butterflies. And drawn by the falling flashing sun, and by the faint falling moon, and fanned by the million wings of his fellow-creatures, Gammelynsprang out from the palace wall on the crest of the butterfly-wind, and flew away brighter and farther each moment; and followed by his myriad train of butterflies, he passed out of sight, and in that country was never heard of again.
OVER the sea went the birds, flying southward to their other home where the sun was. The rustle of their wings, high overhead, could be heard down on the water; and their soft, shrill twitterings, and the thirsty nibbling of their beaks; for the seas were hushed, and the winds hung away in cloud-land.
Far away from any shore, and beginning to be weary, their eyes caught sight of a white form resting between sky and sea. Nearer they came, till it seemed to be a great white bird, brooding on the calmed water; and its wings were stretched high and wide, yet it stirred not. And the wings had in themselves no motion, but stood rigidly poised over their own reflection in the water.
Then the birds came curiously, dropping from their straight course, to wonder at the white wings that went not on. And they came and settled about this great, bird-like thing, so still and so grand.
On to the deck crept a small child, for the noise of the birds had come down to him in the hold. "There is nobody at home but me," he said; for he thought the birds must have come to call, and he wished to be polite. "They are all gone but me," he went on; "all gone. I am left alone."
The birds, none of them understood him; butthey put their heads on one side and looked down on him in a friendly way, seeming to consider.
He ran down below and fetched up a pannikin of water and some biscuit. He set the water down, and breaking the biscuit sprinkled it over the white deck. Then he clapped his hands to see them all flutter and crowd round him, dipping their bright heads to the food and drink he gave them.
They might not stay long, for the water-logged ship could not help them on the way they wished to go; and by sunset they must touch land again. Away they went, on a sudden, the whole crew of them, and the sound of their voices became faint in the bright sea-air.
"I am left alone!" said the child.
Many days ago, while he was asleep in a snug corner he had found for himself, the captain and crew had taken to the boats, leaving the great ship to its fate. And forgetting him because he was so small, or thinking that he was safe in some one of the other boats, the rough sailors had gone off without him, and he was left alone. So for a whole week he had stayed with the ship, like a whisper of its vanished life amid the blues of a deep calm. And the birds came to the ship only to desert it again quickly, because it stood so still upon the sea.
Mermen
But that night the mermen came round the vessel's side, and sang; and the wind rose to their singing, and the sea grew rough. Yet the child slept with his head in dreams. The dreams camefrom the mermen's songs, and he held his breath, and his heart stayed burdened by the deep sweetness of what he saw.
Dark and strange and cold the sea-valleys opened before him; blue sea-beasts ranged there, guarded by strong-finned shepherds, and fishes like birds darted to and fro, but made no sound. And that was what burdened his heart,—that for all the beauty he saw, there was no sound, no song of a single bird to comfort him.
The mermen reached out their blue arms to him, and sang; on the top of the waves they sang, striving to make him forget the silence of the land below. They offered him the sea-life: why should he be drowned and die?
And now over him in the dark night the great wings crashed, and beat abroad in the wind, and the ship made great way. And the mermen swam fast to be with her, and ceased from their own song, for the wind overhead sang loud in the rigging and the sails. But the child lifted his head in his sleep and smiled, for his soul was eased of the mermen's song, and it seemed to him that instead he heard birds singing in a far-off land, singing of a child whose loving hand had fed them, faint and weary, in their way over the wide ocean.
In that far southern land the dawn had begun, and the birds, waking one by one, were singing their story of him to the soft-breathing tamarisk boughs. And none of them knew how they had been sent as a salvage crew to save the child's spirit from the spell of the sea-dream, andto carry it safely back to the land that loved him.
But with the child's body the white wings had flown down into the wave-buried valleys, and to a cleft of the sea-hills to rest.
ONCE upon a time there lived in a wood a brother and sister who had been forgotten by all the world. But this thing did not greatly grieve their hearts, because they themselves were all the world to each other: meeting or parting, they never forgot that. Nobody remained to tell them who they were; but she was "Little Sister," and he was "Fair Brother," and those were the only names they ever went by.
In their little wattled hut they would have been perfectly happy but for one thing which now and then they remembered and grieved over. Fair Brother was lame—not a foot could he put to the ground, nor take one step into the outside world. But he lay quiet on his bed of leaves, while Little Sister went out and in, bringing him food and drink, and the scent of flowers, and tales of the joy of earth and of the songs of birds.
One day she brought him a litter of withered birch-leaves to soften his bed and make it warmer for the approaching season of cold; and all the winter he lay on it, and sighed. Little Sister had never seen him so sad before.
In the spring, when the songs of the pairing birds began, his sorrow only grew greater. "Let me go out, let me go out," he cried; "only a little way into the bright world before I die!" She kissed his feet, and took him up in her arms and carried him. But she could only go a very littleway with her burden; presently she had to return and lay him down again on his bed of leaves.
"Have I seen all the bright world?" he asked. "Is it such a little place?"
To hide her sorrow from him, Little Sister ran out into the woods, and as she went, wondering how to comfort his grief, she could not help weeping.
All at once at the foot of a tree she saw the figure of a woman seated. It was strange, for she had never before seen anybody else in the wood but themselves. The woman said to her, "Why is it that you weep so?"
"The heart of Fair Brother is breaking," replied Little Sister. "It is because of that that I am weeping."
"Why is his heart breaking?" inquired the other.
"I do not know," answered Little Sister. "Ever since last autumn fell it has been so. Always, before, he has been happy; he has no reason not to be, only he is lame."
She had come close to the seated figure; and looking, she saw a woman with a very white skin, in a robe and hood of deep grey. Grey eyes looked back at her with just a soft touch in them of the green that comes with the young leaves of spring.
"You are beautiful," said Little Sister, drawing in her breath.
"Yes, I am beautiful," answered the other. "Why is Fair Brother lame? Has he no feet?"
"Oh, beautiful feet!" said Little Sister. "But they are like still water; they cannot run."
"If you want him to run," said the other, "I can tell you what to do. What will you give me in exchange?"
"Whatever you like to ask," answered Little Sister; "but I am poor."
"You have beautiful hair," said the woman; "will you let that go?"
Little Sister stooped down her head, and let the other cut off her hair. The wind went out of it with a sigh as it fell into the grey woman's lap. She hid it away under her robe, and said, "Listen, Little Sister, and I will tell you! To-night is the new moon. If you can hold your tongue till the moon is full, the feet of Fair Brother shall run like a stream from the hills, dancing from rock to rock."
"Only tell me what I must do!" said Little Sister.
"You see this birch-tree, with its silver skin?" said the woman. "Cut off two strips of it and weave them into shoes for Fair Brother. And when they are finished by the full moon, if you have not spoken, you have but to put them upon Fair Brother's feet, and they will outrun yours."
So Little Sister, as the other had told her, cut off two strips from the bark of the birch-tree, and ran home as fast as she could to tell her brother of the happiness which, with only a little waiting, was in store for them.
But as she came near home, over the low roof she saw the new moon hanging like a white feather in the air; and, closing her lips, she went in and kissed Fair Brother silently.
He said, "Little Sister, loose out your hair over me, and let me feel the sweet airs; and tell me how the earth sounds, for my heart is sick with sorrow and longing." She took his hand and laid it upon her heart that he might feel its happy beating, but said no word. Then she sat down at his feet and began to work at the shoes. All the birch-bark she cut into long strips fit for weaving, doing everything as the grey woman had told her.
Fair Brother fretted at her silence, and cried, calling her cruel; but she only kissed his feet, and went on working the faster. And the white birch shoes grew under her hands; and every night she watched and saw the moon growing round.
Fair Brother said, "Little Sister, what have you done with your hair in which you used to fetch home the wind? And why do you never go and bring me flowers or sing me the song of the birds?" And Little Sister looked up and nodded, but never answered or moved from her task, for her fingers were slow, and the moon was quick in its growing.
One night Fair Brother was lying asleep, and his head was filled with dreams of the outer world into which he longed to go. The full moon looked in through the open door, and Little Sister laughed in her heart as she slipped the birch shoes on to his feet. "Now run, dear feet," she whispered; "but do not outrun mine."
Up in his sleep leapt Fair Brother, for the dream of the white birch had hold of him. A lady with a dark hood and grey eyes full of the laughter of leaves beckoned him. Out he ran into the moonlight, and Little Sister laughed as she ran with him.
In a little while she called, "Do not outrun me, Fair Brother!" But he seemed not to hear her, for not a bit did he slacken the speed of his running.
Presently she cried again, "Rest with me a while, Fair Brother! Do not outrun me!" But Fair Brother's feet were fleet after their long idleness, and they only ran the faster. "Ah, ah!" she cried, all out of breath. "Come back to me when you have done running, Fair Brother." And as he disappeared among the trees, she cried after him, "How will you know the way, since you were never here before? Do not get lost in the wood, Fair Brother!"
She lay on the ground and listened, and could hear the white birch shoes carrying him away till all sound of them died.
When, next morning, he had not returned, she searched all day through the wood, calling his name.
"Where are you, Fair Brother? Where have you lost yourself?" she cried, but no voice answered her.
For a while she comforted her heart, saying, "He has not run all these years—no wonder he is still running. When he is tired he will return."
But days and weeks went by, and Fair Brother never came back to her. Every day she wandered searching for him, or sat at the door of the little wattled hut and cried.
One day she cried so much that the ground became quite wet with her tears. That night was the night of the full moon, but weary with griefshe lay down and slept soundly, though outside the woods were bright.
In the middle of the night she started up, for she thought she heard somebody go by; and, surely, feet were running away in the distance. And when she looked out, there across the doorway was the print of the birch shoes on the ground she had made wet with her tears.
"Alas, alas!" cried Little Sister. "What have I done that he comes to the very door of our home and passes by, though the moon shines in and shows it him?"
After that she searched everywhere through the forest to discover the print of the birch shoes upon the ground. Here and there after rain she thought she could see traces, but never was she able to track them far.
Once more came the night of the full moon, and once more in the middle of the night Little Sister started up and heard feet running away in the distance. She called, but no answer came back to her.
So on the third full moon she waited, sitting in the door of the hut, and would not sleep.
"If he has been twice," she said to herself, "he will come again, and I shall see him. Ah, Fair Brother, Fair Brother, I have given you feet; why have you so used me?"
Presently she heard a sound of footsteps, and there came Fair Brother running towards her. She saw his face pale and ghostlike, yet he never looked at her, but ran past and on without stopping.
"Fair Brother, Fair Brother, wait for me; do not outrun me!" cried Little Sister; and was up in haste to be after him.
He ran fast, and would not stop; but she ran fast too, for her love would not let him go. Once she nearly had him by the hair, and once she caught him by the cloak; but in her hand it shredded and crumbled like a dry leaf; and still, though there was no breath left in her, she ran on.
And now she began to wonder, for Fair Brother was running the way that she knew well—towards the tree from which she had cut the two strips of bark. Her feet were failing her; she knew that she could run no more. Just as they came together in sight of the birch-tree Little Sister stumbled and fell.
She saw Fair Brother run on and strike with his hands and feet against the tree, and cry, "Oh, White Birch, White Birch, lift the latch up, or she will catch me!" And at once the tree opened its rind, and Fair Brother ran in.
"So," said Little Sister, "you are there, are you, Brother? I know, then, what I have done to you."
She went and laid her ear to the tree, and inside she could hear Fair Brother sobbing and crying. It sounded to her as if White Birch were beating him.
"Well, well, Fair Brother, she shall not beat you for long!" said Little Sister.
She went home and waited till the next full moon had come. Then, as soon as it was dark, she went along through the wood until she cameto the place, and there she crept close to the white birch-tree and waited.
Presently she heard Fair Brother's voice come faintly out of the heart of the tree: "White Birch, it is the full moon and the hour in which Little Sister gave life to my feet. For one hour give me leave to go, that I may run home and look at her while she sleeps. I will not stop or speak, and I promise you that I will return."
Then she heard the voice of White Birch answer grudgingly: "It is her hour and I cannot hold you, therefore you may go. Only when you come again I will beat you."
Then the tree opened a little way, and Fair Brother ran out. He ran so quickly in his eager haste that Little Sister had not time to catch him, and she did not dare to call aloud. "I must make sure," she said to herself, "before he comes back. To-night White Birch will have to let him go."
So she gathered as many dry pieces of wood as she could find, and made them into a pile near at hand; and setting them alight, she soon had a brisk fire burning.
Before long she heard the sound of feet in the brushwood, and there came Fair Brother, running as hard as he could go, with the breath sobbing in and out of his body.
Little Sister sprang out to meet him, but as soon as he saw her he beat with his hands and feet against the tree, crying, "White Birch, White Birch, lift the latch up, or she will catch me!"
But before the tree could open Little Sister had caught hold of the birch shoes, and pulled them offhis feet, and running towards the fire she thrust them into the red heart of the embers.
The white birch shivered from head to foot, and broke into lamentable shrieks. The witch thrust her head out of the tree, crying, "Don't, don't! You are burning my skin! Oh, cruel! how you are burning me!"
"I have not burned you enough yet," cried Little Sister; and raking the burning sticks and faggots over the ground, she heaped them round the foot of the white birch-tree, whipping the flames to make them leap high.
The witch drew in her head, but inside she could be heard screaming. As the flames licked the white bark she cried, "Oh, my skin! You are burning my skin. My beautiful white skin will be covered with nothing but blisters. Do you know that you are ruining my complexion?"
But Little Sister said, "If I make you ugly you will not be able to show your face again to deceive the innocent, and to ruin hearts that were happy."
So she piled on sticks and faggots till the outside of the birch-tree was all black and scarred and covered with blisters, the marks of which have remained to this day. And inside, the witch could be heard dancing time to the music of the flames, and crying because of her ruined complexion.
Then Little Sister stooped and took up Fair Brother in her arms. "You cannot walk now," she whispered, "I have taken away your feet; so I will carry you."
He was so starved and thin that he was not very heavy, and all the long way home Little Sister carriedhim in her arms. How happy they were, looking in each other's eyes by the clear light of the moon!
"Can you ever be happy again in the old way?" asked Little Sister. "Shall you not want to run?"
"No," answered Fair Brother; "I shall never wish to run again. And as for the rest"—he stroked her head softly—"why, I can feel that your hair is growing—it is ever so long, and I can see the wind lifting it. White Birch has no hair of her own, but she has some that she wears, just the same colour as yours."
NOT far from a great town, in the midst of a well-wooded valley, lived a rose-gardener and his wife. All round the old home green sleepy hollows lay girdled by silver streams, long grasses bent softly in the wind, and the half fabulous murmur of woods filled the air.
Up in their rose-garden, on the valley's side facing the sun, the gardener and his wife lived contentedly sharing toil and ease. They had been young, they were not yet old; and though they had to be frugal they did not call themselves poor. A strange fortune had belonged always to the plot of ground over which they laboured; whether because the soil was so rich, or the place so sheltered from cold, or the gardener so skilled in the craft, which had come down in his family from father to son, could not be known; but certainly it was true that his rose-trees gave forth better bloom and bore earlier and later through the season than any others that were to be found in those parts.
The good couple accepted what came to them, simply and gladly, thanking God. Perhaps it was from the kindness of fortune, or perhaps because the sweet perfume of the roses had mixed itself in their blood, that her man and his wife were so sweet-tempered and gentle in their ways. The colour of the rose was in their faces, and the colour of the rose was in their hearts; to her man she was the mostbeautiful and dearest of sweethearts, to his wife he was the best and kindest of lovers.
Every morning, before it was light, her man and his wife would go into the garden and gather all the roses that were ripe for sale; then with full baskets on their backs they would set out, and get to the market just as the level sunbeams from the east were striking all the vanes and spires of the city into gold. There they would dispose of their flowers to the florists and salesmen of the town, and after that trudge home again to hoe, and dig, and weed, and water, and prune, and plant for the rest of the day. No man ever saw them the one without the other, and the thought that such a thing might some day happen was the only fear and sorrow of their lives.
That they had no children of their own was scarcely a sorrow to them. "It seems to me," said her man after they had been married for some years, "that God means that our roses are to be our children since He has made us love them so much. They will last when we are grown grey, and will support and comfort us in our old age."
All the roses they had were red, and varied little in kind, yet her man and his wife had a name for each of them; to every tree they had given a name, until it almost seemed that the trees knew, and tried to answer when they heard the voices which spoke to them.
"Jane Janet, and you ought to blossom more freely at your age!" his wife might say to one some evening as she went round and watered the flowers; and the next day, when the two came to their dark morning's gathering, Jane Janet would show ten ortwelve great blooms under the light of the lantern, every one of them the birth of a single night.
"Mary Maudlin," the gardener would say, as he washed the blight off a favourite rose, "to be sure, you are very beautiful, but did I not love you so, you were more trouble than all your sisters put together." And then all at once great dew-drops would come tumbling down out of Mary Maudlin's eyes at the tender words of his reproach. So day by day the companionable feet of the happy couple moved to and fro, always intent on the nurture and care of their children.
In their garden they had bees too, who by strange art, unlike other bees, drew all their honey from the roses, and lived in a cone-thatched hive close to the porch; and that honey was famous through all the country-side, for its flavour was like no other honey made in the world.
Sometimes his wife said to her man, "I think our garden is looked after for us by some good Spirit; perhaps it is the Saints after whom we have named our rose-children."
Her man made answer, "It is rich in years, which, like an old wine, have made it gain in flavour; it has been with us from father to son for three hundred years, and that is a great while."
"A full fairy's lifetime!" said his wife. "'Tis a pity we shall not hand it on, being childless."
"When we two die," said her man, "the roses will make us a grave and watch over us." As he spoke a whole shower of petals fell from the trees.
"Did no one pass, just then?" said his wife.
Now one morning, soon after this, in the lateseason of roses, her man had gone before his wife into the garden, gathering for the market in the grey dusk before dawn; and wherever he went moths and beetles came flocking to the light of his lantern, beating against its horn shutters and crying to get in. Out of each rose, as the light fell on it, winged things sprang up into the darkness; but all the roses were bowed and heavy as if with grief. As he picked them from the stem great showers of dew fell out of them, making pools in the hollow of his palm.
There was such a sound of tears that he stopped to listen; and, surely, from all round the garden came the "drip, drip" of falling dew. Yet the pathways under foot were all dry; there had been no rain and but little dew. Whence was it, then, that the roses so shook and sobbed? For under the stems, surely, there was something that sobbed; and suddenly the light of the lantern took hold of a beautiful small figure, about three feet high, dressed in old rose and green, that went languidly from flower to flower. She lifted up such tired hands to draw their heads down to hers; and to each one she kissed she made a weary little sound of farewell, her beautiful face broken up with grief; and now and then out of her lips ran soft chuckling laughter, as if she still meant to be glad, but could not.
The gardener broke into tears to behold a sight so pitiful; and his wife had stolen out silently to his side, and was weeping too.