Chapter II: Part 2

Then the King and Queen passed into the palace, and the tiring-maids led the little beggar-maid into a great chamber hung with tapestries and furnished with many mirrors, and they took from off her white body the tattered gown she had worn in the forest, and robed her in perfumed linen and cloth of gold, and set jewels at her throat and in her hair; and at evening in the cathedral, before the high altar, in the presence of all the people, the King placed a sapphire beautiful as the evening star upon her finger, and the twain became man and wife; and the moon rose and the little beggar-maid was a Queen and lay in a great King's arms.

On the morrow the King summoned a famous worker in metals attached to his court, and commanded him to make a beautiful coffer of beaten gold, in which to place the little ragged robe of his beggar-maid; for it was very sacred to him because of his great love. After due time the coffer was finished, and it was acclaimed the masterpiece of the great artificer who had made it. About its sides was embossed the story of the King's love. On one side was the pool with the water-lilies and the beggar-maid braiding her hair on its brink. And on another she was riding on horseback with the King through the forest. And on another she was standing by his side on the steps of the palace before all the people. And on the fourth side she was kneeling by the King's side before the high altar in the cathedral.

The King placed the coffer in a secret gallery attached to the royal apartments, and very tenderly he placed therein the little tattered gown and the lute with which his Queen was wont to wander from village to village and town to town, singing her little songs.

Often at evening, when his heart brimmed over with the tenderness of his love, he would persuade his Queen to doff her beautiful royal garments and clothe herself again in that little tattered gown, through the rents of which her white body showed whiter than any water-lilies. And, however rich or exquisite the other garments she wore, it was in those beloved rags, the King declared, that she looked most beautiful. In them he loved her best.

But this had been a while ago, and though, as has been said, the King's love was still hers as when he had met her that strange morning in the forest, and though every day he brought her a new and priceless jewel to hang about her neck, or wear upon her moonbeam hands, or to shine in the fragrant night of her hair, it was many months since he had asked her to wear for him the little tattered gown.

Was the miracle of their love beginning to lose a little of its wonder for him, too; was it beginning to take its place among the accepted realities of life?

Sometimes the Queen fancied that he seemed a little impatient with her elfin bird-like ways, as though, in his heart, he was beginning to wish that she was more in harmony with the folk around her, more like the worldly court ladies, with their great manners and artificial smiles. For, though she had now been a Queen a long while, she had never changed. She was still the wild gipsy-hearted child the King had found braiding her hair that morning by the lilied pool.

Often she would steal away by herself and enter that secret gallery, and lift the lid of the golden coffer, and look wistfully at the little tattered robe, and run her hands over the cracked strings of her little lute.

There was a long window in the gallery, from which, far away, she could see the great green cloud of the forest; and as the days went by she often found herself seated at this window, gazing in its direction, with vague unformed feelings of sadness in her heart.

One day, as she sat there at the window, an impulse came over her that she could not resist, and swiftly she slipped off her beautiful garments, and taking the little robe from the coffer, clothed herself in the rags that the King had loved. And she took the old lute in her hands, and sang low to herself her old wandering songs. And she danced, too, an elfin dance, all alone there in the still gallery, danced as the apple-blossoms dance on the spring winds, or the autumn leaves dance in the depths of the forest.

Suddenly she ceased in alarm. The King had entered the gallery unperceived, and was watching her with sad eyes.

"Are you weary of being a Queen?" said he, sadly.

For answer she threw herself on his breast and wept bitterly, she knew not why.

"Oh, I love you! I love you," she sobbed, "but this life is not real."

And the King went from her with a heavy heart.

And from day to day an unspoken sorrow lay between them; and from day to day the King's words haunted the Queen with a more insistent refrain:

"Are you weary of being a Queen?"

Was she weary of being a Queen?

And so the days went by.

* * * * *

One day as the Queen passed down the palace steps she came upon a beautiful girl, clothed in tatters as she had once been, seated on the lowest step, selling flowers--water-lilies.

The Queen stopped.

"Where did you gather your water-lilies, child?" she asked.

"I gathered them from a pool in the great forest yonder," answered the girl, with a curtsey.

"Give me one of them," said the Queen, with a sob in her voice, and she slipped a piece of gold into the girl's hand, and fled back into the palace.

That night, as she lay awake by her sleeping King, she rose silently and stole into the secret gallery. There, with tears running down her cheeks, she dressed herself in the little tattered gown and took the lute in her hand, and then stole back and pressed a last kiss on the brow of her sleeping King, who still slept on.

But at sunrise the King awoke, with a sudden fear in his heart, and lo! where his Queen had lain was only a white water-lily.

And at that moment, in the depths of the forest, a beggar-maid was braiding her hair, with a pool of water-lilies for her mirror.

THE WIFE FROM FAIRY-LAND

Her talk was of all woodland things,
Of little lives that pass
Away in one green afternoon,
Deep in the haunted grass.

For she had come from fairy-land,
The morning of a day
When the world that still was April
Was turning into May.

Green leaves and silence and two eyes--
'Twas so she seemed to me;
A silver shadow of the woods,--
Whisper and mystery.

I looked into her woodland eyes,
And all my heart was hers;
And then I led her by the hand
Home up my marble stairs.

And all my granite and my gold
Was hers for her green eyes,
And all my sinful heart was hers,
From sunset to sunrise.

I gave her all delight and ease
That God had given to me,
I listened to fulfil her dreams,
Rapt with expectancy.

But all I gave and all I did
Brought but a weary smile
Of gratitude upon her face--
As though, a little while,

She loitered in magnificence
Of marble and of gold,
And waited to be home again,
When the dull tale was told.

Sometimes, in the chill galleries,
Unseen, she deemed, unheard,
I found her dancing like a leaf,
And singing like a bird.

So lone a thing I never saw
In lonely earth and sky;
So merry and so sad a thing--
One sad, one laughing, eye.

There came a day when on her heart
A wild-wood blossom lay,
And the world that still was April
Was turning into May.

In her green eyes I saw a smile
That turned my heart to stone,--
My wife that came from fairy-land
No longer was alone.

For there had come a little hand
To show the green way home,
Home through the leaves, home through the dew,
Home through the greenwood--home.

THE BUYER OF SORROWS

On an evening of singular sunset, about the rich beginning of May, the little market-town of Beethorpe was startled by the sound of a trumpet.

Beethorpe was an ancient town, mysteriously sown, centuries ago, like a wandering thistle-down of human life, amid the silence and the nibbling sheep of the great chalk downs. It stood in a hollow of the long smooth billows of pale pasture that suavely melted into the sky on every side. The evening was so still that the little river running across the threshold of the town, and encircling what remained of its old walls, was the noisiest thing to be heard, dominating with its talkative murmur the bedtime hum of the High Street.

Suddenly, as the flamboyance of the sky was on the edge of fading, and the world beginning to wear a forlorn, forgotten look, a trumpet sounded from the western heights above the town, as though the sunset itself had spoken; and the people in Beethorpe, looking up, saw three horsemen against the lurid sky.

Three times the trumpet blew.

And the simple folk of Beethorpe, tumbling out into the street at the summons, and looking to the west with sleepy bewilderment, asked themselves: Was it the last trumpet? Or was it the long-threatened invasion of the King of France?

Again the trumpet blew, and then the braver of the young men of the town hastened up the hill to learn its meaning.

As they approached the horsemen, they perceived that the center of the three was a young man of great nobility of bearing, richly but somberly dressed, and with a dark, beautiful face filled with a proud melancholy. He kept his eyes on the fading sunset, sitting motionless upon his horse, apparently oblivious of the commotion his arrival had caused. The horseman on his right hand was clad after the manner of a herald, and the horseman on his left hand was clad after the manner of a steward. And the three horsemen sat motionless, awaiting the bewildered ambassadors of Beethorpe.

When these had approached near enough the herald once more set the trumpet to his lips and blew; and then, unfolding a parchment scroll, read in a loud voice:

"To the Folk of Beethorpe--Greeting from the High and Mighty Lord, Mortimer of the Marches:

"Whereas our heart had gone out toward the sorrows of our people in the counties and towns and villages of our domain, we hereby issue proclamation that whosoever hath a sorrow, let him or her bring it forth; and we, out of our private purse, will purchase the said sorrow, according to its value--that the hearts of our people be lightened of their burdens."

And when the herald had finished reading he blew again upon the trumpet three times; and the villagers looked at one another in bewilderment--but some ran down the hill to tell their neighbors of the strange proposal of their lord. Thus, presently, nearly all the village of Beethorpe was making its way up the hill to where those three horsemen loomed against the evening sky.

Never was such a sorrowful company. Up the hill they came, carrying their sorrows in their hands--sorrows for which, in excited haste, they had rummaged old drawers and forgotten cupboards, and even ran hurriedly into the churchyard.

Lord Mortimer of the Marches sat his horse with the same austere indifference, his melancholy profile against the fading sky. Only those who stood near to him noted a kindly ironic flicker of a smile in his eyes, as he saw, apparently seeing nothing, the poor little raked-up sorrows of his village of Beethorpe.

He was a fantastic young lord of many sorrows. His heart had been broken in a very strange way. Death and Pity were his closest friends. He was so sad himself that he had come to realize that sorrow is the only sincerity of life. Thus sorrow had become a kind of passion with him, even a kind of connoisseurship; and he had come, so to say, to be a collector of sorrows. It was partly pity and partly an odd form of dilettanteism--for his own sad heart made him pitiful for and companionable with any other sad heart; but the sincerity of his sorrow made him jealous of the sanctity of sorrow, and at the same time sternly critical of, and sadly amused by, the hypocrisies of sorrow.

So, as he sat his horse and gazed at the sunset, he smiled sadly to himself as he heard, without seeming to hear, the small, insincere sorrows of his village of Beethorpe--sorrows forgotten long ago, but suddenly rediscovered in old drawers and unopened cupboards, at the sound of his lordship's trumpet and the promise of his strange proclamation.

Was there a sorrow in the world that no money could buy?

It was to find such a sorrow that Lord Mortimer thus fantastically rode from village to village of his estates, with herald and steward.

The unpurchasable sorrow--the sorrow no gold can gild, no jewel can buy!

Far and wide he had ridden over his estates, seeking so rare a sorrow; but as yet he had found no sorrow that could not be bought with a little bag of gold and silver coins.

So he sat his horse, while the villagers of Beethorpe were paid out of a great leathern bag by the steward--for the steward understood the mind of his master, and, without troubling him, paid each weeping and whimpering peasant as he thought fit.

In another great bag the steward had collected the sorrows of the Village of Beethorpe; and, by this, the moon was rising, and, with another blast of trumpet by way of farewell, the three horsemen took the road again to Lord Mortimer's castle.

When, out of the great leathern bag, in Lord Mortimer's cabinet they poured upon the table the sorrows of Beethorpe, the young lord smiled to himself, turning over one sorrow after the other, as though they had been precious stones--for there was not one genuine sorrow among them.

But, later, there came news to him that there was one real sorrow in Beethorpe; and he rode alone on horseback to the village, and found a beautiful girl laying flowers on a grave. She was so beautiful that he forgot his ancient grief, and he thought that all his castles would be but a poor exchange for her face.

"Maiden," said he, "let me buy your sorrow--with three counties and seven castles."

And the girl looked up at him from the grave, with eyes of forget-me-not, and said: "My lord, you mistake. This is not sorrow. It is my only joy."

THE PRINCESS'S MIRROR

The sun was scarcely risen, but the young princess was already seated by her window. Never did window open upon a scene of such enchantment. Never has the dawn risen over so fair a land. Meadows so fresh and grass so green, rivers of such mystic silver and far mountains so majestically purple, no eye has seen outside of Paradise; and over all was now outspread the fairy-land of the morning sky.

Even a princess might rise early to behold so magic a spectacle.

Yet, strangely enough, it was not upon this miracle that the eyes of the princess were gazing. In fact, she seemed entirely oblivious of it all--oblivious of all that was passing in the sky, and of all the dewy awakening of the earth.

Her eyes were lost in a trance over what she deemed a rarer beauty, a stranger marvel. The princess was gazing at her own face in a golden mirror.

And indeed it was a beautiful face that she saw there, so beautiful that the princess might well be pardoned for thinking it the most beautiful face in the world. So fascinated had she become by her own beauty that she carried her mirror ever at her girdle, and gazed at it night and day. Whenever she saw another beautiful thing she looked in her mirror and smiled to herself.

She had looked at the most beautiful rose in the world, and then she had looked in her mirror and said, "I am more beautiful."

She had looked at the morning star, and then she had looked in her mirror and said, "I am more beautiful."

She had looked at the rising moon, and then she had looked in her mirror and still she said, "I am more beautiful."

Whenever she heard of a beautiful face in her kingdom she caused it to be brought before her, and then she looked in her mirror, and always she smiled to herself and said, "I am more beautiful."

Thus it had come about that her only care was to gaze all day at her own face. So enamored had she become of it, that she hated even to sleep; but not even in sleep did she lose the beautiful face she loved, for it was still there in the mirror of dreams. Yet often she would wake in the night to gaze at it, and always she arose at dawn that, with the first rays of the sun, she might look into her mirror. Thus, from the rising sun to the setting moon, she would sit at her window, and never take her eyes from those beautiful eyes that looked back at her, and the longest day in the year was not long enough to return their gaze.

This particular morning was a morning in May--all bloom and song, and crowding leaves and thickening grass. The valley was a mist of blossom, and the air thrilled with the warbling of innumerable birds. Soft dewy scents floated hither and thither on the wandering breeze. But the princess took no note of these things, lost in the dream of her face, and saw the changes of the dawn only as they were reflected in her mirror and suffused her beauty with their rainbow tints. So rapt in her dream was she that, when a bird alighted near at hand and broke into sudden song, she was so startled that--the mirror slipped from her hand.

Now the princess's window was in the wall of an old castle built high above the valley, and beneath it the ground sloped precipitately, covered with underbrush and thick grasses, to a highroad winding far beneath. As the mirror slipped from the hand of the princess it fell among this underbrush and rolled, glittering, down the slope, till the princess finally lost sight of it in a belt of wild flowers overhanging the highroad.

As it finally disappeared, she screamed so loudly that the ladies-in-waiting ran to her in alarm, and servants were instantly sent forth to search for the lost mirror. It was a very beautiful mirror, the work of a goldsmith famous for his fantastic masterpieces in the precious metals. The fancy he had skilfully embodied was that of beauty as the candle attracting the moths. The handle of the mirror, which was of ivory, represented the candle, the golden flame of which swept round in a circle to hold the crystal. Wrought here and there, on the golden back of the mirror, were moths with wings of enamel and precious stones. It was a marvel of the goldsmith's art, and as such was beyond price. Yet it was not merely for this, as we know, that the princess loved it, but because it had been so long the intimate of her beauty. For this reason it had become sacred in her eyes, and, as she watched it roll down the hillside, she realized that it had gained for her also a superstitious value. It almost seemed as if to lose it would be to lose her beauty too. She ran to another mirror in panic. No! her beauty still remained. But no other mirror could ever be to her like the mirror she had lost. So, forgetting her beauty for a moment, she wept and tore her hair and beat her tiring-maids in her misery; and when the men returned from their searching without the mirror, she gave orders to have them soundly flogged for their failure.

Meanwhile the mirror rested peacefully among the wild flowers and the humming of bees.

A short while after the serving-men had been flogged and the tiring-maids had been beaten, there came along the white road at the foot of the castle a tired minstrel. He was singing to himself out of the sadness of his heart. He was forty years old, and the exchange that life had given him for his dreams had not seemed to him a fair equivalent. He had even grown weary of his own songs.

He sat, dejected, amid the green grasses, and looked up at the ancient heaven--and thought to himself. Then suddenly he turned his tired eyes again to earth, and saw the daisies growing there, and the butterflies flitting from flower to flower. And the road, as he looked at it, seemed long--longer than ever. He took his old lute in his hand--wondering to himself if they could play another tune. They were so in love with each other--and so tired of each other.

He played one of his old songs, of which he was heartily weary, and, as he played, the butterflies flitted about him and filled his old hair with blue wings.

He was forty years old and very weary. He was alone. His last nightingale had ceased singing. The time had come for him when one thinks, and even dreams, of the fireside, the hearth, and the beautiful old memories.

He had, in short, arrived at that period of life when one begins to perceive the beauty of money.

As a boy he had never given a thought to gold or silver. A butterfly had seemed more valuable to him than a gold piece. But he was growing old, and, as I have said, he was beginning to perceive the beauty of money.

The daisies were all around him, and the lark was singing up there in the sky. But how could he cash a daisy or negotiate a lark?

Dreams, after all, were dreams.... He was saying this to himself, when suddenly his eye fell upon the princess's mirror, lying there in the grass--so covered with butterflies, looking at themselves, that no wonder the serving-men had been unable to find it.

The mirror of the princess, as I have said, was made of gold and ivory, and wonderful crystal and many precious stones.

So, when the minstrel took it in his hands out of the grass, he thought--well, that he might at least buy a breakfast at the next town. For he was very hungry.

Well, he caught up the mirror and hid it in his faded doublet, and took his way to a wood of living green, and when he was alone--that is, alone with a few flowers and a bird or two, and a million leaves, and the soft singing of a little river hiding its music under many boughs--he took out the mirror from his doublet.

Shame upon him! he, a poet of the rainbow, had only one thought as he took up the mirror--the gold and ivory and the precious stones. He was merely thinking of them and his breakfast.

But when he looked into the mirror, expecting to see his own ancient face--what did he see? He saw something so beautiful that, just like the princess, he dropped the mirror. Have you ever seen the wild rose as it opens its heart to the morning sky; have you ever seen the hawthorn holding in its fragrant arms its innumerable blooms; have you seen the rising of the moon, or looked in the face of the morning star?

The minstrel looked in the mirror and saw something far more wonderful than all these wonderful things.

He saw the face of the princess--eternally reflected there; for her love of her own beautiful face had turned the mirror into a magic glass. To worship oneself is the only way to make a beautiful face.

And as the minstrel looked into the mirror he sadly realized that he could never bring himself to sell it--and that he must go without his breakfast. The moon had fallen into his hand out of the sky. Could he, a poet, exchange this celestial windfall for a meal and a new doublet? As the minstrel gazed and gazed at the beautiful face, he understood that he could no more sell the mirror than he could sell his own soul--and, in his pilgrimage through the world, he had received many offers for his soul. Also, many kings and captains had vainly tried to buy from him his gift of courage.

But the minstrel had sold neither. And now had fallen out of the sky one more precious thing to guard--the most beautiful face in the world. So, as he gazed in the mirror, he forgot his hunger, forgot his faded doublet, forgot the long sorrow of his days--and at length there came the setting sun. Suddenly the minstrel awoke from his dream at the sound of horsemen in the valley. The princess was sending heralds into every corner of her dominions to proclaim the loss of the mirror, and for its return a beautiful reward--a lock of her strange hair.

The minstrel hid himself, with his treasure, amid the fern, and, when the trumpets had faded in the distance, found the highroad again and went upon his way.

Now it chanced that a scullery-maid of the castle, as she was polishing a copper saucepan, had lifted her eyes from her work, and, looking down toward the highroad, had seen the minstrel pick up the mirror. He was a very well known minstrel. All the scullery-maids and all the princesses had his songs by heart.

Even the birds were fabled to sing his songs, as they flitted to and fro on their airy business.

Thus, through the little scullery-maid, it became known to the princess that the mirror had been found by the wandering minstrel, and so his life became a life of peril. Bandits, hoping for the reward of that lock of strange hair, hunted him through the woodland, across the marshes, and over the moors.

Jews with great money-bags came to buy from him--the beautiful face. Sometimes he had to climb up into trees to look at it in the sunrise, the woods were so filled with the voices of his pursuers.

But neither hunger, nor poverty, nor small ferocious enemies were able to take from him the beautiful face. It never left his heart. All night long and all the watching day it was pressed close to his side.

Meanwhile the princess was in despair. More and more the fancy possessed her that with the lost mirror her beauty too was lost. In her unhappiness, like all sad people, she took strange ways of escape. She consulted the stars, and empirics from the four winds settled down upon her castle. Each, of course, had his own invaluable nostrum; and all went their way. For not one of these understood the heart of a poet.

However, at last there came to the aid of the princess a reverend old man of ninety years, a famous seer, deeply and gently and pitifully learned in the hearts of men. His was that wisdom which comes of great goodness. He understood the princess, and he understood the minstrel; for, having lived so long alone with the Infinite, he understood the Finite.

To him the princess was as a little child, and his old wise heart went out to her.

And, as I have said, his heart understood the minstrel too.

Therefore he said to the princess: "I know the hearts of poets. In seven days I will bring you back your mirror."

And the old man went, and at length found the poet eating wild berries in the middle of the wood.

"That is a beautiful mirror you have by your side," said the old man.

"This mirror," answered the poet, "holds in its deeps the most beautiful face in the world."

"It is true," said the wise old man. "I have seen the beautiful face ... but I too possess a mirror. Will you look into it?"

And the poet took the mirror from the old man and looked; and, as he looked, the mirror of the princess fell neglected in the grass....

"Why," said the wise old man, "do you let fall the princess's mirror?"

But the poet made no answer--for his eyes were lost in the strange mirror which the wise old man had brought him.

"What do you see in the mirror," said the old man, "that you gaze so earnestly in it?"

"I see," answered the minstrel, "the infinite miracle of the universe, I see the august and lonely elements, I see the solitary stars and the untiring sea, I see the everlasting hills--and, as a crocus raises its rainbow head from the black earth in springtime, I see the young moon growing like a slender flower out of the mountains...."

"Yet, look again," said the old man, "into this other mirror, the mirror of the princess. Look again."

And the poet looked--taking the two mirrors in his hands, and looking from one to the other.

"At last," he said, gazing into the face he had fought so long to keep--"at last I understand that this is but a fleeting phantom of beauty, a fluttering flower of a face--just one beautiful flower in the innumerable meadows of the Infinite--but here...."

And he turned to the other mirror--

"Here is the Eternal Beauty, the Divine Harmony, the Sacred Unfathomable All.... Would a man be content with one rose, when all the roses of all the rose-gardens of the world were his?..."

"You mean," said the wise old man, smiling to himself, "that I may take the mirror back to the princess.... Are you really willing to exchange her face for the face of the sky?"

"I am," answered the minstrel.

"I knew you were a poet," said the sage.

"And I know that you are very wise," answered the minstrel.

* * * * *

Yet, after all, the princess was not so happy to have her mirror back again as she had expected to be; for had not a wandering poet found something more beautiful than her face!

THE PINE LADY

O have you seen the Pine Lady,
Or heard her how she sings?
Have you heard her play
Your soul away
On a harp with moonbeam strings?
In a palace all of the night-black pine
She hides like a queen all day,
Till a moonbeam knocks
On her secret tree,
And she opens her door
With a silver key,
While the village clocks
Are striking bed
Nine times sleepily.

O come and hear the Pine Lady
Up in the haunted wood!
The stars are rising, the moths are flitting,
The owls are calling,
The dew is falling;
And, high in the boughs
Of her haunted house,
The moon and she are sitting.

Out on the moor the night-jar drones
Rough-throated love,
The beetle comes
With his sudden drums,
And many a silent unseen thing
Frightens your cheek with its ghostly wing;
While there above,
In a palace builded of needles and cones,
The pine is telling the moon her love,
Telling her love on the moonbeam strings--
O have you seen the Pine Lady,
Or heard her how she sings?

THE KING ON HIS WAY TO BE CROWNED

In a green outlying corner of the kingdom of Bohemia, one summer afternoon, the Grand Duke Stanislaus was busy in his garden, swarming a hive of bees. He was a tall, middle-aged man of a scholarly, almost priest-like, type, a gentle-mannered recluse, living only in his books and his garden, and much loved by the country-folk for the simple kindness of his heart. He had the most winning of smiles, and a playful wisdom radiated from his wise, rather weary eyes. No man had ever heard him utter a harsh word; and, indeed, life passed so tranquilly in that green corner of Bohemia that even less peaceful natures found it hard to be angry. There was so little to be angry about.

Therefore, it was all the stranger to see the good duke suddenly lose his temper this summer afternoon.

"Preposterous!" he exclaimed; "was there ever anything quite so preposterous! To think of interrupting me, at such a moment, with such news!"

He spoke from inside a veil of gauze twisted about his head, after the manner of beekeepers; and was, indeed, just at that moment, engaged in the delicate operation of transferring a new swarm to another hive.

The necessity of keeping his mind on his task somewhat restored his calm.

"Give the messenger refreshment," he said, "and send for Father Scholasticus."

Father Scholasticus was the priest of the village, and the duke's very dear friend.

The reason for this explosion was the news, brought by swiftest courier, that Duke Stanislaus' brother was dead, and that he himself was thus become King of Bohemia.

By the time Father Scholasticus arrived, the bees were housed in their new home, and the duke was seated in his library, among the books that he loved no less than his bees, with various important-looking parchments spread out before him: despatches of state brought to him by the courier, which he had been scanning with great impatience.

"I warn you, my friend," he said, looking up as the good father entered, "that you will find me in a very bad temper. Ferdinand is dead--can you imagine anything more unreasonable of him? He was always the most inconsiderate of mortals; and now, without the least warning, he shuffles his responsibilities upon my shoulders."

The priest knew his friend and the way of his thought, and he could not help smiling at his quaint petulance.

"Which means that you are King of Bohemia ... sire!" said he, with a half-whimsical reverence. Where on earth--he was wondering--was there another man who would be so put out at being made a king?

"Exactly," answered the duke. "Do you wonder that I am out of temper? You must give me your advice. There must be some way out of it. What--what am I to do?"

"I am afraid there is nothing for you to do but--reign ... your Majesty," answered the priest. "I agree with you that it is a great hardship."

"Do you really understand how great a hardship it is?" retorted the king to his friend. "Will you share it with me?"

"Share it with you?" asked the priest.

"Yes! as it appears that I must consent to be Head of the World Temporal--will you consent to be the Head of the World Spiritual? In short, will you consent to be Archbishop of Bohemia?"

"Leave the little church that I love, and the kind, simple hearts in my care, given into my keeping by the goodness of God...." asked the priest.

"To be the spiritual shepherd," answered the king, not without irony, "of the sad flocks of souls that wander, without pastor, the strange streets of lost cities...."

The king paused, and added, with his sad, understanding smile, "and to sit on a gold throne, in a great cathedral, filled with incense and colored windows."

And the priest smiled back; for the king and the priest were old friends and understood and loved each other.

At that moment there came a sound of trumpets through the quiet boughs, and the priest, rising and looking through the window, saw a procession of gilded carriages, from the first of which stepped out a dignified man with white hair and many years, and robed in purple and ermine.

"It is your Prime Minister, and your court," answered the priest to the mute question of the king. And again they smiled together; but the smile on the face of the king was weary beyond all human words: because of all the perils that beset a man, the one peril he had feared was the peril of being made a king, of all the sorrows that sorrow, of all the foolishness that foolishness; for vanity had long since passed away from his heart, and the bees and the blossoms of his garden seemed just as worthy of his care as that swarming hive of ambitious human wasps and earwigs over which he was thus summoned by sound of trumpet, that happy summer afternoon--to be the king. Think of being the king of so foul a kingdom--when one might be the king--of a garden.

But in spite of his reluctance, the good duke at length admitted the truth urged upon him by the good priest--that there are sacred duties inherited by those born in high places and to noble destinies from which there is no honorable escape, and, on the priest agreeing to be the Archbishop of Bohemia, he resigned himself to being its king. Thereupon he received all the various dignitaries and functionaries that could so little have understood his heart--having in the interval recovered his lost temper--with all the graciousness for which he was famous, and appointed a day--as far off as possible--when he would set out, with all his train, for his coronation in the capital, a journey of many leagues.

However, when the day came, and, in fact, at the very moment of the starting out of the long and glittering cortège, all the gilded carriages were suddenly brought to a halt by news coming to the duke of the sickness and imminent death of a much loved dependent of his, an old shepherd with whom as a boy he was wont to wander the hills, and listen eagerly to the lore of times and seasons, of rising and setting stars, and of the ways of the winds, which are hidden in the hearts of tanned and withered old men, who have spent their lives out-of-doors under sun and rain.

But, to the great impatience of the court ladies and the great bewigged and powdered gentlemen, the old shepherd lived on for several days, during which time the duke was constantly at his side. At last, however, the old shepherd went to his rest, and the procession, which he, humble soul, would not have believed that he could have delayed, started on its magnificent way again, with flutter of pennant and feather and song of trumpet and ladies' laughter.

But it had traveled only a few leagues when it was again brought to a standstill by the duke--who was thus progressing to his coronation--catching sight from his carriage window, as it flitted past, of an extremely lovely and uncommon butterfly. The duke had, all his days, been a passionate entomologist, and this particular butterfly was the one that so far he had been unable to add to his collection. Therefore he commanded the trumpets to call a halt, and had his butterfly-net brought to him; and he and several of his gentlemen went in pursuit of the flitting painted thing; but not that day, nor the next, was it captured in the royal net, not, in fact, till a whole week had gone by; and meanwhile the carriages stood idly in the stables, and the postilions kicked their heels, and the great ladies and gentlemen fumed at their enforced exile amid country ways and country freshness, pining to be back once more in that artificial world where alone they could breathe.

"To think of a man chasing a butterfly--with a king's crown awaiting him--and even perhaps a kingdom at stake!" said many a tongue--for rumors came on the wind that a half-brother of the dead king was meditating usurpation of the throne, and was already gathering a large following about him. Urgent despatches were said to have come from the imperial city begging that his Majesty, for the good of his loyal subjects, continue his journey with all possible expedition. His kingdom was at stake!

The good duke smiled on the messenger and said, "Yes! but look at my butterfly--" and no one but his friend the priest, of course, had understood. Murmurs began to arise, indeed, among the courtiers, and hints of plots even, as the duke pursued his leisurely journey, turning aside for each wayward fancy.

One day it would be a turtle crossing the road, with her little ones, which would bring to a respectful halt all those beautiful gold coaches and caracoling horses. Tenderly would the good duke step from his carriage and watch her with his gentle smile--not, doubtless, without sly laughter in his heart, and an understanding glance from the priest, that so humble and helpless a creature should for once have it in its power thus to delay so much worldly pomp and vanity.

On another occasion, when they had journeyed for a whole day without any such fanciful interruptions, and the courtiers began to think that they would reach the imperial city at last, the duke decided to turn aside several long leagues out of their course, to visit the grave of a great poet whose songs were one of the chief glories of his land.

"I may have no other opportunity to do him honor," said the duke.

And when his advisers ventured to protest, and even to murmur, urging the increasing jeopardy of his crown, he gently admonished them:

"Poets are greater than kings," he said, "and what is my poor crown compared with that crown of laurel which he wears forever among the immortals?"

There was no one found to agree with this except the good priest, and one other, a poor poet who had somehow been included in the train, but whom few regarded. The priest kept his thoughts to himself, but the poet created some amusement by openly agreeing with the duke.

But, of course, the royal will had to be accepted with such grace as the courtiers could find to hide their discontented--and even, in the case of some, their disaffected--hearts; for some of them, at this new whimsy of the duke's, secretly sent messengers to the would-be usurper promising him their allegiance and support.

So, at length, after a day's journey, the peaceful valley was reached where the poet lay at rest among the simple peasants whom he had loved--kindly folk who still carried his songs in their hearts, and sang them at evening to their babies and sweethearts, and each day brought flowers to his green, bird-haunted grave.

When the duke came and bowed his head in that quiet place, carrying in his hands a wreath of laurel, his heart was much moved by their simple flowers lying there, fresh and glittering, as with new-shed tears; and, as he reverently knelt and placed the wreath upon the sleeping mound, he said aloud, in the humility of his great heart:

"What is such an offering as mine, compared with these?"

And a picture came to him of the peaceful valley he had left behind, and of the simple folk he loved who were his friends, and more and more his heart missed them, and less and less it rejoiced at the journey still before him, and still more foolish seemed his crown.

So, with a great sigh, he rose from the poet's grave, and gave word for the carriages once more to move along the leafy lanes.

And, to the great satisfaction of the courtiers, the duke delayed them no more, for his heart grew heavier within him, and he sat with his head on his breast, speaking little even to his dear friend the priest, who rode with him, and scarcely looking out of the windows of his carriage, for any wonder of the way.

At length the broad walls and towers of the city came in sight,--a city set in a fair land of meadow and stream. The morning sun shone bright over it, and the priest, looking up, perceived how it glittered upon a great building of many white towers, whose gilt pinnacles gleamed like so many crowns of gold.

"Look, your Majesty," he said, with a sad attempt at gaiety, "yonder is your palace."

And the duke looked up from a deep reverie, and saw his palace, and groaned aloud.

But presently there came a sad twinkle in his sad eyes, as he descried another building of many peaks and pinnacles glittering in the sun.

"Look up, my Lord Archbishop," he said, turning to his friend, "yonder is _your_ palace."

And as the good priest looked, his face was all sorrow, and the tears overflowed his eyes, as he thought of the simple souls once in his keeping, in his parish far away.

But presently the king, looking again toward the palace, descried a flag floating from one of the towers, covered with heraldic devices.

As he looked, it seemed that ten years of weariness fell from his face, and a great joy returned.

"Look," he said, almost in a whisper, to the priest, "those are not my arms!..."

The priest looked, and then looked again into the duke's eyes, and ten years of weariness fell from his face also, and a great joy returned.

"Thank God! we are saved," the duke and the priest exclaimed together, and fell laughing upon each other's shoulders. For the arms floating from the tower of the palace were the arms of the usurper, and the king that cared not to be a king had lost his kingdom.

And, while they were still rejoicing together, there came the sound of many horsemen from the direction of the city, a cavalcade of many glittering spears. The duke halted his train to await their coming, and when they had arrived where the duke was, a herald in cloth of gold broke from their ranks and read aloud from a great parchment many sounding words--the meaning of which was that the good Duke Stanislaus had been deposed from his kingdom, and that the High and Mighty Prince, the usurper, reigned in his stead.

When the herald had concluded the duke's voice was heard in reply:

"It is well--it is very well!" he said. "Gather yonder white flower and take it back to your master, and say that it is the white flower of peace betwixt him and me."

And astonishment fell on all, and no one, of course, except the priest, understood. All thought that the good duke had lost his wits, which, indeed, had been the growing belief of his courtiers for some time.

But the herald gathered the white flower and carried it back to the city, with sound of many trumpets. Need one say that the usurper least of all understood?

With the herald went all the gilded coaches and the fine ladies and gentlemen, complaining sadly that they had had such a long and tedious journey to no purpose, and hastening with all speed to take their allegiance to the new king.

The duke's own people alone remained with him, and, when all the rest had gone, the duke gave orders for the horses' heads to be turned homeward, to the green valley in which alone he cared to be a king.

"Back to the bees and the books and the kind country hearts," cried the duke to his friend.

"Back to the little church among the quiet trees," added the priest, who had cared as little for an archbishop's miter as the duke for a kingly crown.

Since then the duke had been left to hive his bees in peace, and it may be added that he has never been known to lose his temper again.

THE STOLEN DREAM

The sun was setting, and slanting long lanes of golden light through the trees, as an old man, borne done by a heavy pack, came wearily through the wood, and at last, as if worn out with the day's travel, unshouldered his burden and threw himself down to rest at the foot of a great oak-tree. He was very old, older far he seemed than the tree under whose gnarled boughs he was resting, though that looked as if it had been growing since the beginning of the world. His back was bent as with the weight of years, though really it had become so from the weight of the pack that he carried; his cheeks were furrowed like the bark of a tree, and far down upon his breast fell a beard as white as snow. But his deep-set eyes were still bright and keen, though sly and cruel, and his long nose was like the beak of a hawk. His hands were like roots strong and knotted, and his fingers ended in talon-like nails. In repose, even, they seemed to be clutching something, something they loved to touch, and would never let go. His clothes were in rags and his shoes scarce held to his feet. He seemed as abjectly poor as he was abjectly old.

Presently, when he had rested awhile, he turned to his pack, and, furtively glancing with his keen eyes up and down the wood, to make sure that he was alone, he drew from it a sack of leather which was evidently of great weight. Its mouth was fastened by sliding thongs, which he loosened with tremulous, eager hands. First he took from the bag a square of some purple silk stuff, which he spread out on the turf beside him, and then, his eyes gleaming with a wild light, he carefully poured out the contents of the bag on to the purple square, a torrent of gold and silver coins and precious stones flashing like rainbows--a king's treasure. The setting sun flashed on the glittering heap, turning it into a dazzle of many-colored fire. The treasure seemed to light up the wood far and near, and the gaudy summer flowers, that a moment before had seemed so bright and splendid, fell into shadow before its radiance.

The old man bathed his claw-like hands in the treasure with a ghoulish ecstasy, and let the gold and silver pour through his fingers over and over again, streams of jeweled light gleaming and flashing in the level rays of the sun. As he did so, he murmured inarticulately to himself, gloating and gurgling with a lonely, hideous joy.

Suddenly a look of fear came over his face; he seemed to hear voices coming up the wood, and, huddling his treasure swiftly back again into the leathern bag, and the bag into the folds of his pack, he rose and sought some bushes near by to hide himself from the sight of whomsoever it was that approached. But, as he shouldered his pack, he half staggered, for the pack was of great weight and he heaved a deep sigh.

"It grows heavier and heavier," he muttered. "I cannot carry it much longer. I shall never be able to carry it with me to the grave."

As he disappeared among the bushes, a young man and a young woman, with arms twined round each other, came slowly up the glade and presently sat down at the foot of the tree where the old man had been resting a moment or two before.

"Why, what is this?" presently exclaimed the young girl, picking up something bright out of the grass. It was a gold coin, which, in his haste, the old man had let slip through his fingers.

"Gold!" they both exclaimed together.

"It will buy you a new silk gown," said the lover. "Who ever heard of such luck?" And then he sighed.

"Ah! dear heart," he said, "if only we had more like that! Then we could fulfil our dream."

As the sun poured its last rays over them there at the foot of the oak, it was to be seen that they were very poor. Their clothes were old and weather-stained, and they had no shoes to their feet; but the white feet of the girl shone like ivory flowers in the grass, and her hair was a sheaf of ruddy gold. Nor was there a jewel in all the old man's treasure as blue as her eyes. And the young man, in his manly fashion, was no less brave and fair to look upon.

In a little while they turned to a poor wallet at the young man's side. "Let us eat our supper," they said.

But there was little more than a crust or two, a few morsels of cheese, and a mouthful or two of sour wine. Still, they were accustomed to being hungry, and the thought of the gold coin cheered their hearts. So they grew content, and after a while they nestled close into each other's arms and fell asleep, while slowly and softly through the woods came the light of the moon.