WORLD'S BEST LITERATURE

to the storms of air and sea; and while the soul of Mozart seems to dwell on the ethereal peaks of Olympus, that of Beethoven climbs shuddering the storm-beaten sides of a Sinai. Blessed be they both! Each represents a moment of the ideal life, each does us good. Our love is due to both.

Self-interest is but the survival of the animal in us. Humanity only begins for man with self-surrender.

MAY 27TH, 1857.--Wagner's is a powerful mind endowed with strong poetical sensitiveness. His work is even more poetical than musical. The suppression of the lyrical element, and therefore of melody, is with him a systematic parti pris. No more duos or trios; monologue and the aria are alike done away with. There remains only declamation, the recitative, and the choruses. In order to avoid the conventional in singing, Wagner falls into another convention,--that of not singing at all. He subordinates the voice to articulate speech, and for fear lest the muse should take flight he clips her wings; so that his works are rather symphonic dramas than operas. The voice is brought down to the rank of an instrument, put on a level with the violins, the hautboys, and the drums, and treated instrumentally. Man is deposed from his superior position, and the centre of gravity of the work passes into the baton of the conductor. It is music depersonalized,--neo-Hegelian music,--music multiple instead of individual. If this is so, it is indeed the music of the future,--the music of the socialist democracy replacing the art which is aristocratic, heroic, or subjective.

DECEMBER 4TH, 1863.--The whole secret of remaining young in spite of years, and even of gray hairs, is to cherish enthusiasm in one's self, by poetry, by contemplation, by charity,--that is, in fewer words, by the maintenance of harmony in the soul.

APRIL 12TH, 1858.--The era of equality means the triumph of mediocrity. It is disappointing, but inevitable; for it is one of time's revenges.... Art no doubt will lose, but justice will gain. Is not universal leveling down the law of nature?... The world is striving with all its force for the destruction of what it has itself brought forth!

MARCH 1ST, 1869.--From the point of view of the ideal, humanity is triste and ugly. But if we compare it with its probable origins, we see that the human race has not altogether wasted its time. Hence there are three possible views of history: the view of the pessimist, who starts from the ideal; the view of the optimist, who compares the past with the present; and the view of the hero-worshiper, who sees that all progress whatever has cost oceans of blood and tears.

AUGUST 31ST, 1869.--I have finished Schopenhauer. My mind has been a tumult of opposing systems,--Stoicism, Quietism, Buddhism, Christianity. Shall I never be at peace with myself? If impersonality is a good, why am I not consistent in the pursuit of it? and if it is a temptation, why return to it, after having judged and conquered it?

Is happiness anything more than a conventional fiction? The deepest reason for my state of doubt is that the supreme end and aim of life seems to me a mere lure and deception. The individual is an eternal dupe, who never obtains what he seeks, and who is forever deceived by hope. My instinct is in harmony with the pessimism of Buddha and of Schopenhauer. It is a doubt which never leaves me, even in my moments of religious fervor. Nature is indeed for me a Maïa; and I look at her, as it were, with the eyes of an artist. My intelligence remains skeptical. What, then, do I believe in? I do not know. And what is it I hope for? It would be difficult to say. Folly! I believe in goodness, and I hope that good will prevail. Deep within this ironical and disappointed being of mine there is a child hidden--a frank, sad, simple creature, who believes in the ideal, in love, in holiness, and all heavenly superstitions. A whole millennium of idyls sleeps in my heart; I am a pseudo-skeptic, a pseudo-scoffer.

MARCH 17TH, 1870.--This morning the music of a brass band which had stopped under my windows moved me almost to tears. It exercised an indefinable, nostalgic power over me; it set me dreaming of another world, of infinite passion and supreme happiness. Such impressions are the echoes of Paradise in the soul; memories of ideal spheres whose sad sweetness ravishes and intoxicates the heart. O Plato! O Pythagoras! ages ago you heard these harmonies, surprised these moments of inward ecstasy,--knew these divine transports! If music thus carries us to heaven, it is because music is harmony, harmony is perfection, perfection is our dream, and our dream is heaven.

APRIL 1ST, 1870.--I am inclined to believe that for a woman love is the supreme authority,--that which judges the rest and decides what is good or evil. For a man, love is subordinate to right. It is a great passion, but it is not the source of order, the synonym of reason, the criterion of excellence. It would seem, then, that a woman places her ideal in the perfection of love, and a man in the perfection of justice.

JUNE 5TH, 1870.--The efficacy of religion lies precisely in that which is not rational, philosophic, nor eternal; its efficacy lies in the unforeseen, the miraculous, the extraordinary. Thus religion attracts more devotion in proportion as it demands more faith,--that is to say, as it becomes more incredible to the profane mind. The philosopher aspires to explain away all mysteries, to dissolve them into light. It is mystery, on the other hand, which the religious instinct demands and pursues: it is mystery which constitutes the essence of worship, the power of proselytism. When the cross became the "foolishness" of the cross, it took possession of the masses. And in our own day, those who wish to get rid of the supernatural, to enlighten religion, to economize faith, find themselves deserted, like poets who should declaim against poetry, or women who should decry love. Faith consists in the acceptance of the incomprehensible, and even in the pursuit of the impossible, and is self-intoxicated with its own sacrifices, its own repeated extravagances.

It is the forgetfulness of this psychological law which stultifies the so-called liberal Christianity. It is the realization of it which constitutes the strength of Catholicism.

Apparently, no positive religion can survive the supernatural element which is the reason for its existence. Natural religion seems to be the tomb of all historic cults. All concrete religions die eventually in the pure air of philosophy. So long then as the life of nations is in need of religion as a motive and sanction of morality, as food for faith, hope, and charity, so long will the masses turn away from pure reason and naked truth, so long will they adore mystery, so long--and rightly so--will they rest in faith, the only region where the ideal presents itself to them in an attractive form.

OCTOBER 26TH, 1870.--If ignorance and passion are the foes of popular morality, it must be confessed that moral indifference is the malady of the cultivated classes. The modern separation of enlightenment and virtue, of thought and conscience, of the intellectual aristocracy from the honest and vulgar crowd, is the greatest danger that can threaten liberty. When any society produces an increasing number of literary exquisites, of satirists, skeptics, and beaux esprits, some chemical disorganization of fabric may be inferred. Take, for example, the century of Augustus and that of Louis XV. Our cynics and railers are mere egotists, who stand aloof from the common duty, and in their indolent remoteness are of no service to society against any ill which may attack it. Their cultivation consists in having got rid of feeling. And thus they fall farther and farther away from true humanity, and approach nearer to the demoniacal nature. What was it that Mephistopheles lacked? Not intelligence, certainly, but goodness.

DECEMBER 11TH, 1875.--The ideal which the wife and mother makes for herself, the manner in which she understands duty and life, contain the fate of the community. Her faith becomes the star of the conjugal ship, and her love the animating principle that fashions the future of all belonging to her. Woman is the salvation or destruction of the family. She carries its destinies in the folds of her mantle.

JANUARY 22D, 1875.--The thirst for truth is not a French passion. In everything appearance is preferred to reality, the outside to the inside, the fashion to the material, that which shines to that which profits, opinion to conscience. That is to say, the Frenchman's centre of gravity is always outside him,--he is always thinking of others, playing to the gallery. To him individuals are so many zeros: the unit which turns them into a number must be added from outside; it may be royalty, the writer of the day, the favorite newspaper, or any other temporary master of fashion.--All this is probably the result of an exaggerated sociability, which weakens the soul's forces of resistance, destroys its capacity for investigation and personal conviction, and kills in it the worship of the ideal.

DECEMBER 9TH, 1877.--The modern haunters of Parnassus carve urns of agate and of onyx; but inside the urns what is there?--Ashes. Their work lacks feeling, seriousness, sincerity, and pathos--in a word, soul and moral life. I cannot bring myself to sympathize with such a way of understanding poetry. The talent shown is astonishing, but stuff and matter are wanting. It is an effort of the imagination to stand alone--substitute for everything else. We find metaphors, rhymes, music, color, but not man, not humanity. Poetry of this factitious kind may beguile one at twenty, but what can one make of it at fifty? It reminds me of Pergamos, of Alexandria, of all the epochs of decadence when beauty of form hid poverty of thought and exhaustion of feeling. I strongly share the repugnance which this poetical school arouses in simple people. It is as though it only cared to please the world-worn, the over-subtle, the corrupted, while it ignores all normal healthy life, virtuous habits, pure affections, steady labor, honesty, and duty. It is an affectation, and because it is an affectation the school is struck with sterility. The reader desires in the poem something better than a juggler in rhyme, or a conjurer in verse; he looks 'to find in him a painter of life, a being who thinks, loves, and has a conscience, who feels passion and repentance.

The true critic strives for a clear vision of things as they are--for justice and fairness; his effort is to get free from himself, so that he may in no way disfigure that which he wishes to understand or reproduce. His superiority to the common herd lies in this effort, even when its success is only partial. He distrusts his own senses, he sifts his own impressions, by returning upon them from different sides and at different times, by comparing, moderating, shading, distinguishing, and so endeavoring to approach more and more nearly to the formula which represents the maximum of truth.

The art which is grand and yet simple is that which presupposes the greatest elevation both in artist and in public.

MAY 19TH, 1878.--Criticism is above all a gift, an intuition, a matter of tact and flair; it cannot be taught or demonstrated,--it is an art. Critical genius means an aptitude for discerning truth under appearances or in disguises which conceal it; for discovering it in spite of the errors of testimony, the frauds of tradition, the dust of time, the loss or alteration of texts. It is the sagacity of the hunter whom nothing deceives for long, and whom no ruse can throw off the trail. It is the talent of the Juge d'Instruction who knows how to interrogate circumstances, and to extract an unknown secret from a thousand falsehoods. The true critic can understand everything, but he will be the dupe of nothing, and to no convention will he sacrifice his duty, which is to find out and proclaim truth. Competent learning, general cultivation, absolute probity, accuracy of general view, human sympathy, and technical capacity,--how many things are necessary to the critic, without reckoning grace, delicacy, savoir vivre, and the gift of happy phrasemaking!

MAY 22D, 1879 (Ascension Day).--Wonderful and delicious weather. Soft, caressing sunlight,--the air a limpid blue,--twitterings of birds; even the distant voices of the city have something young and springlike in them. It is indeed a new birth. The ascension of the Savior of men is symbolized by the expansion, this heavenward yearning of nature.... I feel myself born again; all the windows of the soul are clear. Forms, lines, tints, reflections, sounds, contrasts, and harmonies, the general play and interchange of things,--it is all enchanting!

In my courtyard the ivy is green again, the chestnut-tree is full of leaf, the Persian lilac beside the little fountain is flushed with red and just about to flower; through the wide openings to the right and left of the old College of Calvin I see the Salève above the trees of St. Antoine, the Voirons above the hill of Cologny; while the three flights of steps which, from landing to landing, lead between two high walls from the Rue Verdaine to the terrace of the Tranchées, recall to one's imagination some old city of the south, a glimpse of Perugia or of Malaga.

All the bells are ringing. It is the hour of worship. A historical and religious impression mingles with the picturesque, the musical, the poetical impressions of the scene. All the peoples of Christendom--all the churches scattered over the globe--are celebrating at this moment the glory of the Crucified.

And what are those many nations doing who have other prophets, and honor the Divinity in other ways--the Jews, the Mussulmans, the Buddhists, the Vishnuists, the Guebers? They have other sacred days, other rites, other solemnities, other beliefs. But all have some religion, some ideal end for life--all aim at raising man above the sorrows and smallnesses of the present, and of the individual existence. All have faith in something greater than themselves, all pray, all bow, all adore; all see beyond nature, Spirit, and beyond evil, Good. All bear witness to the Invisible. Here we have the link which binds all peoples together. All men are equally creatures of sorrow and desire, of hope and fear. All long to recover some lost harmony with the great order of things, and to feel themselves approved and blessed by the Author of the universe. All know what suffering is, and yearn for happiness. All know what sin is, and feel the need of pardon.

Christianity, reduced to its original simplicity, is the reconciliation of the sinner with God, by means of the certainty that God loves in spite of everything, and that he chastises because he loves. Christianity furnished a new motive and a new strength for the achievement of moral perfection. It made holiness attractive by giving to it the air of filial gratitude.

JULY 28TH, 1880.--This afternoon I have had a walk in the sunshine, and have just come back rejoicing in a renewed communion with nature. The waters of the Rhone and the Arve, the murmur of the river, the austerity of its banks, the brilliancy of the foliage, the play of the leaves, the splendor of the July sunlight, the rich fertility of the fields, the lucidity of the distant mountains, the whiteness of the glaciers under the azure serenity of the sky, the sparkle and foam of the mingling rivers, the leafy masses of the La Bâtie woods,--all and everything delighted me. It seemed to me as though the years of strength had come back to me. I was overwhelmed with sensations. I was surprised and grateful. The universal life carried me on its breast; the summer's caress went to my heart. Once more my eyes beheld the vast horizons, the soaring peaks, the blue lakes, the winding valleys, and all the free outlets of old days. And yet there was no painful sense of longing. The scene left upon me an indefinable impression, which was neither hope, nor desire, nor regret, but rather a sense of emotion, of passionate impulse, mingled with admiration and anxiety. I am conscious at once of joy and of want; beyond what I possess I see the impossible and the unattainable; I gauge my own wealth and poverty: in a word, I am and I am not--my inner state is one of contradiction, because it is one of transition.

APRIL 1OTH, 1881 [he died May 11th].--What dupes we are of our own desires!... Destiny has two ways of crushing us--by refusing our wishes and by fulfilling them. But he who only wills what God wills escapes both catastrophes. "All things work together for his good."

f the life of this lyric poet we have little exact knowledge. We know that he was an Ionian Greek, and therefore by racial type a luxury-loving, music-loving Greek, born in the city of Teos on the coast of Asia Minor. The year was probably B.C. 562. With a few fellow-citizens, it is supposed that he fled to Thrace and founded Abdera when Cyrus the Great, or his general Harpagus, was conquering the Greek cities of the coast. Abdera, however, was too new to afford luxurious living, and the singing Ionian soon found his way to more genial Samos, whither the fortunes of the world then seemed converging. Polycrates was "tyrant," in the old Greek sense of irresponsible ruler; but withal so large-minded and far-sighted a man that we may use a trite comparison and say that under him his island was, to the rest of Greece, as Florence in the time of Lorenzo the Magnificent was to the rest of Italy, or Athens in the time of Pericles to the other Hellenic States. Anacreon became his tutor, and may have been of his council; for Herodotus says that when Oroetes went to see Polycrates he found him in the men's apartment with Anacreon the Teian. Another historian says that he tempered the stern will of the ruler. Still another relates that Polycrates once presented him with five talents, but that the poet returned the sum after two nights made sleepless from thinking what he would do with his riches, saying "it was not worth the care it cost."

ANACREON

After the murder of Polycrates, Hipparchus, who ruled at Athens, sent a trireme to fetch the poet. Like his father Pisistratus, Hipparchus endeavored to further the cause of letters by calling poets to his court. Simonides of Ceos was there; and Lasus of Hermione, the teacher of Pindar; with many rhapsodists or minstrels, who edited the poems of Homer and chanted his lays at the Panathenæa, or high festival of Athena, which the people celebrated every year with devout and magnificent show. Amid this brilliant company Anacreon lived and sang until Hipparchus fell (514) by the famous conspiracy of Harmodius and Aristogeiton. He then returned to his native Teos, and according to a legend, died there at the age of eighty-five, choked by a grape-seed.

Anacreon was a lyrist of the first order. Plato's poet says of him in the 'Symposium,' "When I hear the verses of Sappho or Anacreon, I set down my cup for very shame of my own performance." He composed in Greek somewhat, to use a very free comparison, as Herrick did in English, expressing the unrefined passion and excesses which he saw, just as the Devonshire parson preserved the spirit of the country festivals of Old England in his vivid verse.

To Anacreon music and poetry were inseparable. The poet of his time recited his lines with lyre in hand, striking upon it in the measure he thought best suited to his song. Doubtless the poems of Anacreon were delivered in this way. His themes were simple,--wine, love, and the glorification of youth and poetry; but his imagination and poetic invention so animated every theme that it is the perfect rendering which we see, not the simplicity of the commonplace idea. His delicacy preserves him from grossness, and his grace from wantonness. In this respect his poems are a fair illustration of the Greek sense of self-limitation, which guided the art instincts of that people and made them the creators of permanent canons of taste.

Anacreon had no politics, no earnest interest in the affairs of life, no morals in the large meaning of that word, no aims reaching further than the merriment and grace of the moment. Loving luxury and leisure, he was the follower of a pleasure-loving court. His cares are that the bowl is empty, that age is joyless, that women tell him he is growing gray. He is closely paralleled in this by one side of Béranger; but the Frenchman's soul had a passionately earnest half which the Greek entirely lacked. Nor is there ever any outbreak of the deep yearning, the underlying melancholy, which pervades and now and then interrupts, like a skeleton at the feast, the gayest verses of Omar Khayyam.

His metres, like his matter, are simple and easy. So imitators, perhaps as brilliant as the master, have sprung up and produced a mass of songs; and at this time it remains in doubt whether any complete poem of Anacreon remains untouched. For this reason the collection is commonly termed 'Anacreontics'. Some of the poems are referred to the school of Gaza and the fourth century after Christ, and some to the secular teachings and refinement of the monks of the Middle Ages. Since the discovery and publication of the text by Henry Stephens, in 1554, poets have indulged their lighter fancies in such songs, and a small literature of delicate trifles now exists under the name of 'Anacreontics' in Italian, German, and English. Bergk's recension of the poems appeared in 1878. The standard translations, or rather imitations in English, are those of Cowley and Moore. The Irish poet was not unlike in nature to the ancient Ionian. Moore's fine voice in the London drawing-rooms echoes at times the note of Anacreon in the men's quarters of Polycrates or the symposia of Hipparchus. The joy of feasting and music, the color of wine, and the scent of roses, alike inspire the songs of each.

DRINKING

The thirsty earth soaks up the rain,
And drinks, and gapes for drink again,
The plants suck in the earth, and are
With constant drinking fresh and fair;
The sea itself (which one would think
Should have but little need of drink)
Drinks twice ten thousand rivers up,
So filled that they o'erflow the cup.
The busy Sun (and one would guess
By 's drunken fiery face no less)
Drinks up the sea, and, when he's done,
The Moon and Stars drink up the Sun:
They drink and dance by their own light;
They drink and revel all the night.
Nothing in nature's sober found,
But an eternal health goes round.
Fill up the bowl then, fill it high,
Fill all the glasses there; for why
Should every creature drink but I?
Why, man of morals, tell me why?

--Cowley's Translation.

AGE

Oft am I by the women told,
Poor Anacreon, thou grow'st old!
Look how thy hairs are falling all;
Poor Anacreon, how they fall!
Whether I grow old or no,
By th' effects I do not know;
This I know, without being told,
'Tis time to live, if I grow old;
'Tis time short pleasures now to take,
Of little life the best to make,
And manage wisely the last stake.

Cowley's Translation.

THE EPICURE

I

Fill the bowl with rosy wine!
Around our temples roses twine!
And let us cheerfully awhile,
Like the wine and roses, smile.
Crowned with roses, we contemn
Gyges' wealthy diadem.
To-day is ours, what do we fear?
To-day is ours; we have it here:
Let's treat it kindly, that it may
Wish, at least, with us to stay.
Let's banish business, banish sorrow;
To the gods belongs to-morrow.

II

Underneath this myrtle shade,
On flowery beds supinely laid,
With odorous oils my head o'erflowing,
And around it roses growing,
What should I do but drink away
The heat and troubles of the day?
In this more than kingly state
Love himself shall on me wait.
Fill to me, Love, nay fill it up;
And, mingled, cast into the cup
Wit, and mirth, and noble fires,
Vigorous health, and gay desires.
The wheel of life no less will stay
In a smooth than rugged way:
Since it equally doth flee,
Let the motion pleasant be.
Why do we precious ointments show'r?
Noble wines why do we pour?
Beauteous flowers why do we spread,
Upon the monuments of the dead?
Nothing they but dust can show,
Or bones that hasten to be so.
Crown me with roses while I live,
Now your wines and ointments give
After death I nothing crave;
Let me alive my pleasures have,
All are Stoics in the grave.

Cowley's Translation.

GOLD

A mighty pain to love it is,
And 'tis a pain that pain to miss;
But, of all pains, the greatest pain
It is to love, but love in vain.
Virtue now, nor noble blood,
Nor wit by love is understood;
Gold alone does passion move,
Gold monopolizes love;
A curse on her, and on the man
Who this traffic first began!
A curse on him who found the ore!
A curse on him who digged the store!
A curse on him who did refine it!
A curse on him who first did coin it!
A curse, all curses else above,
On him who used it first in love!
Gold begets in brethren hate;
Gold in families debate;
Gold does friendship separate;
Gold does civil wars create.
These the smallest harms of it!
Gold, alas! does love beget.

Cowley's Translation.

THE GRASSHOPPER

Happy Insect! what can be
In happiness compared to thee?
Fed with nourishment divine,
The dewy Morning's gentle wine!
Nature waits upon thee still,
And thy verdant cup does fill;
'Tis filled wherever thou dost tread,
Nature's self's thy Ganymede.
Thou dost drink, and dance, and sing;
Happier than the happiest king!
All the fields which thou dost see,
All the plants, belong to thee;
All that summer hours produce,
Fertile made with early juice.
Man for thee does sow and plow;
Farmer he, and landlord thou!
Thou dost innocently joy;
Nor does thy luxury destroy;
The shepherd gladly heareth thee,
More harmonious than he.
Thee country hinds with gladness hear,
Prophet of the ripened year!
Thee Phoebus loves, and does inspire;
Phoebus is himself thy sire.
To thee, of all things upon Earth,
Life's no longer than thy mirth.
Happy insect, happy thou!
Dost neither age nor winter know;
But, when thou'st drunk, and danced, and sung
Thy fill, the flowery leaves among,
(Voluptuous, and wise withal,
Epicurean animal!)
Sated with thy summer feast,
Thou retir'st to endless rest.

Cowley's Translation,

THE SWALLOW

Foolish prater, what dost thou
So early at my window do,
With thy tuneless serenade?
Well 't had been had Tereus made
Thee as dumb as Philomel;
There his knife had done but well.
In thy undiscovered nest
Thou dost all the winter rest,
And dreamest o'er thy summer joys,
Free from the stormy season's noise:
Free from th' ill thou'st done to me;
Who disturbs or seeks out thee?
Hadst thou all the charming notes
Of the wood's poetic throats,
All thou art could never pay
What thou hast ta'en from me away.
Cruel bird! thou'st ta'en away
A dream out of my arms to-day;
A dream that ne'er must equaled be
By all that waking eyes may see.
Thou, this damage to repair,
Nothing half so sweet or fair,
Nothing half so good, canst bring,
Though men say thou bring'st the Spring.

Cowley's Translation.

THE POET'S CHOICE

If hoarded gold possessed a power
To lengthen life's too fleeting hour,
And purchase from the hand of death
A little span, a moment's breath,
How I would love the precious ore!
And every day should swell my store;
That when the fates would send their minion,
To waft me off on shadowy pinion,
I might some hours of life obtain,
And bribe him back to hell again.
But since we ne'er can charm away
The mandate of that awful day,
Why do we vainly weep at fate,
And sigh for life's uncertain date?
The light of gold can ne'er illume
The dreary midnight of the tomb!
And why should I then pant for treasures?
Mine be the brilliant round of pleasures;
The goblet rich, the hoard of friends,
Whose flowing souls the goblet blends!

Moore's Translation.

DRINKING

I care not for the idle state
Of Persia's king, the rich, the great!
I envy not the monarch's throne,
Nor wish the treasured gold my own.
But oh! be mine the rosy braid,
The fervor of my brows to shade;
Be mine the odors, richly sighing,
Amid my hoary tresses flying.
To-day I'll haste to quaff my wine,
As if to-morrow ne'er should shine;
But if to-morrow comes, why then--
I'll haste to quaff my wine again.
And thus while all our days are bright,
Nor time has dimmed their bloomy light,
Let us the festal hours beguile
With mantling cup and cordial smile;
And shed from every bowl of wine
The richest drop on Bacchus's shrine!
For Death may come, with brow unpleasant,
May come when least we wish him present,
And beckon to the sable shore,
And grimly bid us--drink no more!

Moore's Translation.

A LOVER'S SIGH

The Phrygian rock that braves the storm
Was once a weeping matron's form;
And Procne, hapless, frantic maid,
Is now a swallow in the shade.
Oh that a mirror's form were mine,
To sparkle with that smile divine;
And like my heart I then should be,
Reflecting thee, and only thee!
Or could I be the robe which holds
That graceful form within its folds;
Or, turned into a fountain, lave
Thy beauties in my circling wave;
Or, better still, the zone that lies
Warm to thy breast, and feels its sighs!
Or like those envious pearls that show
So faintly round that neck of snow!
Yes, I would be a happy gem,
Like them to hang, to fade like them.
What more would thy Anacreon be?
Oh, anything that touches thee,
Nay, sandals for those airy feet--
Thus to be pressed by thee were sweet!

Moore's Translation.

he place of Hans Christian Andersen in literature is that of the "Children's Poet," though his best poetry is prose. He was born in the ancient Danish city of Odense, on April 2d, 1805, of poor and shiftless parents. He had little regular instruction, and few childish associates. His youthful imagination was first stimulated by La Fontaine's 'Fables' and the 'Arabian Nights,' and he showed very early a dramatic instinct, trying to act and even to imitate Shakespeare, though, as he says, "hardly able to spell a single word correctly." It was therefore natural that the visit of a dramatic company to Odense, in 1818, should fire his fancy to seek his theatrical fortune in Copenhagen; whither he went in September, 1819, with fifteen dollars in his pocket and a letter of introduction to a danseuse at the Royal Theatre, who not unnaturally took her strange visitor for a lunatic, and showed him the door. For four years he labored diligently, suffered acutely, and produced nothing of value; though he gained some influential friends, who persuaded the king to grant him a scholarship for three years, that he might prepare for the university.

Though he was neither a brilliant nor a docile pupil, he did not exhaust the generous patience of his friends, who in 1829 enabled him to publish by subscription his first book, 'A Journey on Foot from Holm Canal to the East Point of Amager' a fantastic arabesque, partly plagiarized and partly parodied from the German romanticists, but with a naïveté that might have disarmed criticism.

In 1831 there followed a volume of poems, the sentimental and rather mawkish 'Fantasies and Sketches,' product of a journey in Jutland and of a silly love affair. This book was so harshly criticized that he resolved to seek a refuge and new literary inspiration in a tour to Germany; for all through his life, traveling was Andersen's stimulus and distraction, so that he compares himself, later, to a pendulum "bound to go backward and forward, tic, toc, tic, toc, till the clock stops, and down I lie."

This German tour inspired his first worthy book, 'Silhouettes,' with some really admirable pages of description. His success encouraged him to attempt the drama again, where he failed once more, and betook himself for relief to Paris and Italy, with a brief stay in the Jura Mountains, which is delightfully described in his novel, 'O.T.'

Italy had on him much the same clarifying effect that it had on Goethe; and his next book, the novel 'Improvisatore' (1835), achieved and deserved a European recognition. Within ten years the book was translated into six languages. It bears the mark of its date in its romantic sentiments. There is indeed no firm character-drawing, here or in any of his novels; but the book still claims attention for its exquisite descriptions of Italian life and scenery.

The year 1835 saw also Andersen's first essay in the 'Wonder Stories' which were to give him his lasting title to grateful remembrance. He did not think highly of this work at the time, though his little volume contained the now-classic 'Tinderbox,' and 'Big Claus and Little Claus.' Indeed, he always chafed a little at the modest fame of a writer for children; but he continued for thirty-seven years to publish those graceful fancies, which in their little domain still hold the first rank, and certainly gave the freest scope to Andersen's qualities, while they masked his faults and limitations.

He turned again from this "sleight of hand with Fancy's golden apples," to the novel, in the 'O.T.' (1836), which marks no advance on the 'Improvisatore'; and in the next year he published his best romance, 'Only a Fiddler,' which is still charming for its autobiographical touches, its genuine humor, and its deep pathos. At the time, this book assured his European reputation; though it has less interest for us to-day than the 'Tales,' or the 'Picture Book without Pictures' (1840), where, perhaps more than anywhere else in his work, the child speaks with all the naïveté of his nature.

A journey to the East was reflected in 'A Poet's Bazaar' (1842); and these years contain also his last unsuccessful dramatic efforts, 'The King Dreams' and 'The New Lying-in Room.' In 1843 he was in Paris, in 1844 in Germany, and in the next year he extended his wanderings to Italy and England, where Mary Howitt's translations had assured him a welcome. Ten years later he revisited England as the guest of Dickens at Gadshill.

The failure of an epic, 'Ahasuerus' (1847), and of a novel, 'The Two Baronesses' (1849), made him turn with more interest to wonder tales and fairy dramas, which won a considerable success; and when the political troubles of 1848 directed his wanderings toward Sweden, he made from them 'I Sverrig' (In Sweden: 1849), his most exquisite book of travels. As Europe grew peaceful again he resumed his indefatigable wanderings, visiting Germany, France, Italy, Switzerland, Spain, Bohemia, and England; printing between 1852 and 1862 nine little volumes of stories, the mediocre but successful 'In Spain' (1860), and his last novel, 'To Be or Not To Be' (1857), which reflects the religious speculations of his later years.

He was now in comparatively easy circumstances, and passed the last fifteen years of his life unharassed by criticism, and surrounded with the 'honor, love, obedience, troops of friends,' that should accompany old age. It was not until 1866 that he made himself a home; and even at sixty-one he said the idea 'positively frightened him--he knew he should run away from it as soon as ever the first warm sunbeam struck him, like any other bird of passage.'

In 1869 he celebrated his literary jubilee. In 1872 he finished his last 'Stories.' That year he met with an accident in Innsbruck from which he never recovered. Kind friends eased his invalid years; and so general was the grief at his illness that the children of the United States collected a sum of money for his supposed necessities, which at his request took the form of books for his library. A few months later, after a brief and painless illness, he died, August 1st, 1875. His admirers had already erected a statue in his honor, and the State gave him a magnificent funeral; but his most enduring monument is that which his 'Wonder Tales' are still building all around the world.

The character of Andersen is full of curious contrasts. Like the French fabulist, La Fontaine, he was a child all his life, and often a spoiled child; yet he joined to childlike simplicity no small share of worldly wisdom. Constant travel made him a shrewd observer of detail, but his self-absorption kept him from sympathy with the broad political aspirations of his generation.

In the judgment of his friends and critics, his autobiographical 'Story of My Life' is strangely unjust, and he never understood the limitations of his genius. He was not fond of children, nor personally attractive to them, though his letters to them are charming.

In personal appearance he was limp, ungainly, awkward, and odd, with long lean limbs, broad flat hands, and feet of striking size. His eyes were small and deep-set, his nose very large, his neck very long; but he masked his defects by studied care in dress, and always fancied he looked distinguished, delighting to display his numerous decorations on his evening dress in complacent profusion.

On Andersen's style there is a remarkably acute study by his fellow-countryman Brandes, in 'Kritiker og Portraite' (Critiques and Portraits), and a useful comment in Boyesen's 'Scandinavian Literature.' When not perverted by his translators, it is perhaps better suited than any other to the comprehension of children. His syntax and rhetoric are often faulty; and in the 'Tales' he does not hesitate to take liberties even with German, if he can but catch the vivid, darting imagery of juvenile fancy, the "ohs" and "ahs" of the nursery, its changing intonations, its fears, its smiles, its personal appeals, and its venerable devices to spur attention and kindle sympathy. Action, or imitation, takes the place of description. We hear the trumpeter's taratantara and "the pattering rain on the leaves, rum dum dum, rum dum dum," The soldier "comes marching along, left, right, left, right." No one puts himself so wholly in the child's place and looks at nature so wholly with his eyes as Andersen. "If you hold one of those burdock leaves before your little body it's just like an apron, and if you put it on your head it's almost as good as an umbrella, it's so big." Or he tells you that when the sun shone on the flax, and the clouds watered it, "it was just as nice for it as it is for the little children to be washed and then get a kiss from mother: that makes them prettier; of course it does." And here, as Brandes remarks, every right-minded mamma stops and kisses the child, and their hearts are warmer for that day's tale.

The starting-point of this art is personification. To the child's fancy the doll is as much alive as the cat, the broom as the bird, and even the letters in the copy-book can stretch themselves. On this foundation he builds myths that tease by a certain semblance of rationality,--elegiac, more often sentimental, but at their best, like normal children, without strained pathos or forced sympathy.

Such personification has obvious dramatic and lyric elements; but Andersen lacked the technique of poetic and dramatic art, and marred his prose descriptions, both in novels and books of travel, by an intrusive egotism and lyric exaggeration. No doubt, therefore, the most permanent part of his work is that which popular instinct has selected, the 'Picture Book without Pictures,' the 'Tales and Stories'; and among these, those will last longest that have least of the lyric and most of the dramatic element.

Nearly all of Andersen's books are translated in ten uniform but unnumbered volumes, published by Houghton, Mifflin and Company. Of the numerous translations of the 'Tales,' Mary Howitt's (1846) and Sommer's (1893) are the best, though far from faultless.

The 'Life of Hans Christian Andersen' by R. Nisbet Bain (New York, 1895) is esteemed the best.

There were once twenty-five tin soldiers, who were all brothers, for they were cast out of one old tin spoon. They held their muskets, and their faces were turned to the enemy; red and blue, ever so fine, were the uniforms. The first thing they heard in this world, when the cover was taken from the box where they lay, were the words, "Tin soldiers!" A little boy shouted it, and clapped his hands. He had got them because it was his birthday, and now he set them up on the table. Each soldier was just like the other, only one was a little different. He had but one leg, for he had been cast last, and there was not enough tin. But he stood on his one leg just as firm as the others on two, so he was just the one to be famous.

On the table where they were set up stood a lot of other playthings; but what caught your eye was a pretty castle of paper. Through the little windows you could see right into the halls. Little trees stood in front, around a bit of looking-glass which was meant for a lake. Wax swans swam on it and were reflected in it. That was all very pretty, but still the prettiest thing was a little girl who stood right in the castle gate. She was cut out of paper too, but she had a silk dress, and a little narrow blue ribbon across her shoulders, on which was a sparkling star as big as her whole face. The little girl lifted her arms gracefully in the air, for she was a dancer; and then she lifted one leg so high that the tin soldier could not find it at all, and thought that she had only one leg, just like himself.

"That would be the wife for me," thought he, "but she is too fine for me. She lives in a castle, and I have only a box, which I have to share with twenty-four. That is no house for her. But I will see whether I can make her acquaintance." Then he lay down at full length behind a snuff-box which was on the table. From there he could watch the trig little lady who kept standing on one leg without losing her balance. When evening came, the other tin soldiers were all put in their box, and the people in the house went to bed. Then the playthings began to play, first at "visiting," then at "war" and at "dancing." The tin soldiers rattled in their box, for they would have liked to join in it, but they could not get the cover off. The nutcracker turned somersaults, and the pencil scrawled over the slate. There was such a racket that the canary-bird woke up and began to sing, and that in verses. The only ones that did not stir were the tin soldier and the little dancer. She stood straight on tiptoe and stretched up both arms; he was just as steadfast on his one leg. He did not take his eyes from her a moment.

Now it struck twelve, and bang! up went the cover of the snuff-box, but it wasn't tobacco in it: no, but a little black Troll. It was a trick box.

"Tin soldier!" said the Troll, "will you stare your eyes out?" But the tin soldier made believe he did not hear. "You wait till morning!" said the Troll.

When morning came, and the children got up, the tin soldier was put on the window ledge; and whether it was the Troll, or a gust of wind, all at once the window flew open and the tin soldier fell head first from the third story. That was an awful fall. He stretched his leg straight up, and stuck with his bayonet and cap right between the paving-stones.

The maid and the little boy came right down to hunt for him, but they couldn't see him, though they came so near that they almost trod on him. If the tin soldier had called "Here I am," they surely would have found him; but since he was in uniform he did not think it proper to call aloud.

Now it began to rain. The drops chased one another. It was a regular shower. When that was over, two street boys came along.

"Hallo!" said one, "There's a tin soldier. He must be off and sail."

Then they made a boat out of a newspaper, put the tin soldier in it, and made him sail down the gutter. Both boys ran beside it, and clapped their hands. Preserve us! What waves there were in the gutter, and what a current! It must have rained torrents. The paper boat rocked up and down, and sometimes it whirled around so that the tin soldier shivered. But he remained steadfast, did not lose color, looked straight ahead and held his musket firm.

All at once the boat plunged under a long gutter-bridge. It was as dark there as it had been in his box.

"Where am I going now?" thought he. "Yes, yes, that is the Troll's fault. Oh! if the little lady were only in the boat, I would not care if it were twice as dark."

At that instant there came a great water-rat who lived under the gutter-bridge.

"Have you a pass?" said the rat. "Show me your pass."

But the tin soldier kept still, and only held his musket the firmer. The boat rushed on, and the rat behind. Oh! how he gnashed his teeth, and called to the sticks and straws:--

"Stop him! Stop him! He has not paid toll. He has showed no pass."

But the current got stronger and stronger. Before he got to the end of the bridge the tin soldier could see daylight, but he heard also a rushing noise that might frighten a brave man's heart. Just think! at the end of the bridge the gutter emptied into a great canal, which for him was as dangerous as for us to sail down a great waterfall.

He was so near it already that he could not stop. The boat went down. The poor tin soldier held himself as straight as he could. No one should say of him that he had ever blinked his eyes. The boat whirled three or four times and filled with water. It had to sink. The tin soldier stood up to his neck in water, and deeper, deeper sank the boat. The paper grew weaker and weaker. Now the waves went over the soldier's head. Then he thought of the pretty little dancer whom he never was to see again, and there rang in the tin soldier's ears:--

Now the paper burst in two, and the tin soldier fell through,--but in that minute he was swallowed by a big fish.

Oh! wasn't it dark in there. It was worse even than under the gutter-bridge, and besides, so cramped. But the tin soldier was steadfast, and lay at full length, musket in hand.

The fish rushed around and made the most fearful jumps. At last he was quite still, and something went through him like a lightning flash. Then a bright light rushed in, and somebody called aloud, "The tin soldier!" The fish had been caught, brought to market, sold, and been taken to the kitchen, where the maid had slit it up with a big knife. She caught the soldier around the body and carried him into the parlor, where everybody wanted to see such a remarkable man who had traveled about in a fish's belly. But the tin soldier was not a bit proud. They put him on the table, and there--well! what strange things do happen in the world--the tin soldier was in the very same room that he had been in before. He saw the same children, and the same playthings were on the table, the splendid castle with the pretty little dancer; she was still standing on one leg, and had the other high in the air. She was steadfast, too. That touched the tin soldier so that he could almost have wept tin tears, but that would not have been proper. He looked at her and she looked at him, but they said nothing at all.

Suddenly one of the little boys seized the tin soldier and threw him right into the tile-stove, although he had no reason to. It was surely the Troll in the box who was to blame.

The tin soldier stood in full light and felt a fearful heat; but whether that came from the real fire, or from his glowing love, he could not tell. All the color had faded from him; but whether this had happened on the journey, or whether it came from care, no one could say. He looked at the little girl and she looked at him. He felt that he was melting, but still he stood steadfast, musket in hand. Then a door opened. A whiff of air caught the dancer, and she flew like a sylph right into the tile-stove to the tin soldier, blazed up in flame, and was gone. Then the tin soldier melted to a lump, and when the maid next day took out the ashes, she found him as a little tin heart. But of the dancer only the star was left, and that was burnt coal-black.

There was a proud Teapot, proud of being porcelain, proud of its long spout, proud of its broad handle. It had something before and behind--the spout before, the handle behind--and that was what it talked about. But it did not talk of its lid--that was cracked, it was riveted, it had faults; and one does not talk about one's faults--there are plenty of others to do that. The cups, the cream-pot, the sugar-bowl, the whole tea-service would be reminded much more of the lid's weakness, and talk about that, than of the sound handle and the remarkable spout. The Teapot knew it.

"I know you," it said within itself, "I know well enough, too, my fault; and I am well aware that in that very thing is seen my humility, my modesty. We all have faults, but then one also has a talent. The cups get a handle, the sugar-bowl a lid; I get both, and one thing besides in front which they never got,--I get a spout, and that makes me a queen on the tea-table. The sugar-bowl and cream-pot are good-looking serving maids; but I am the one who gives, yes, the one high in council. I spread abroad a blessing among thirsty mankind. In my insides the Chinese leaves are worked up in the boiling, tasteless water."

All this said the Teapot in its fresh young life. It stood on the table that was spread for tea, it was lifted by a very delicate hand; but the very delicate hand was awkward, the Teapot fell. The spout snapped off, the handle snapped off; the lid was no worse to speak of--the worst had been spoken of that. The Teapot lay in a swoon on the floor, while the boiling water ran out of it. It was a horrid shame, but the worst was that they jeered at it; they jeered at it, and not at the awkward hand.

"I never shall lose the memory of that!" said the Teapot, when it afterward talked to itself of the course of its life. "I was called an invalid, and placed in a corner, and the day after was given away to a woman who begged victuals. I fell into poverty, and stood dumb both outside and in; but there, as I stood, began my better life. One is one thing and becomes quite another. Earth was placed in me: for a Teapot that is the same as being buried, but in the earth was placed a flower bulb. Who placed it there, who gave it, I know not; given it was, and it took the place of the Chinese leaves and the boiling water, the broken handle and spout. And the bulb lay in the earth, the bulb lay in me, it became my heart, my living heart, such as I never before had. There was life in me, power and might. My pulses beat, the bulb put forth sprouts, it was the springing up of thoughts and feelings; they burst forth in flower. I saw it, I bore it, I forgot myself in its delight. Blessed is it to forget one's self in another. The bulb gave me no thanks, it did not think of me--it was admired and praised. I was so glad at that: how happy must it have been! One day I heard it said that it ought to have a better pot. I was thumped on my back--that was rather hard to bear; but the flower was put in a better pot--and I was thrown away in the yard, where I lie as an old crock. But I have the memory: that I can never lose."

It was glorious in the country. It was summer; the cornfields were yellow, the oats were green, the hay had been put up in stacks in the green meadows; and the stork went about on his long red legs, and chattered Egyptian, for this was the language he had learned from his mother. All around the fields and meadows were great woods, and in the midst of these woods deep lakes. Yes, it was right glorious in the country.

In the midst of the sunshine there lay an old farm, with deep canals about it; and from the wall down to the water grew great burdocks, so high that little children could stand upright under the tallest of them. It was just as wild there as in the deepest wood, and here sat a Duck upon her nest. She had to hatch her ducklings, but she was almost tired out before the little ones came; and she seldom had visitors. The other ducks liked better to swim about in the canals than to run up to sit under a burdock and gabble with her.

At last one egg-shell after another burst open. "Pip! pip!" each cried, and in all the eggs there were little things that stuck out their heads.

"Quack! quack!" said the Duck, and they all came quacking out as fast as they could, looking all around them under the green leaves; and the mother let them look as much as they liked, for green is good for the eye.

"How wide the world is!" said all the young ones; for they certainly had much more room now than when they were inside the eggs.

"D'ye think this is all the world?" said the mother. "That stretches far across the other side of the garden, quite into the parson's field; but I have never been there yet. I hope you are all together," and she stood up. "No, I have not all. The largest egg still lies there. How long is that to last? I am really tired of it." And so she sat down again.

"Well, how goes it?" asked an old Duck who had come to pay her a visit.

"It lasts a long time with this one egg," said the Duck who sat there. "It will not open. Now, only look at the others! They are the prettiest little ducks I ever saw. They are all like their father: the rogue, he never comes to see me."

"Let me see the egg which will not burst," said the old Duck. "You may be sure it is a turkey's egg. I was once cheated in that way, and had much care and trouble with the young ones, for they are afraid of the water. Must I say it to you? I could not make them go in. I quacked, and I clacked, but it was no use. Let me see the egg. Yes, that's a turkey's egg. Let it lie there, and do you teach the other children to swim."

"I think I will sit on it a little longer," said the Duck. "I've sat so long now that I can sit a few days more."

"Just as you please," said the old Duck; and she went away.

At last the great egg burst. "Pip! pip!" said the little one, and crept forth. He was so big and ugly. The Duck looked at him.

"It's a very large Duckling," said she. "None of the others looks like that: it really must be a turkey chick! Well, we shall soon find out. Into the water shall he go, even if I have to push him in."

The next day it was bright, beautiful weather; the sun shone on all the green burdocks. The Mother-Duck, with all her family, went down to the canal. Splash! she jumped into the water. "Quack! quack!" she said, and one duckling after another plumped in. The water closed over their heads, but they came up in an instant, and swam off finely; their legs went of themselves, and they were all in the water; even the ugly gray Duckling swam with them.

"No, it's not a turkey," said she: "look how well he uses his legs, how straight he holds himself. It is my own child! On the whole he's quite pretty, when one looks at him rightly. Quack! quack! come now with me, and I'll lead you out into the world, and present you in the duck-yard; but keep close to me all the time, so that no one may tread on you, and look out for the cats."

And so they came into the duck-yard. There was a terrible row going on in there, for two families were fighting about an eel's head, and so the cat got it.

"See, that's the way it goes in the world!" said the Mother-Duck; and she whetted her beak, for she too wanted the eel's head. "Only use your legs," she said. "See that you can bustle about, and bend your necks before the old Duck yonder. She's the grandest of all here; she's of Spanish blood--that's why she's so fat; and do you see? she has a red rag around her leg; that's something very, very fine, and the greatest mark of honor a duck can have: it means that one does not want to lose her, and that she's known by the animals and by men too. Hurry! hurry!--don't turn in your toes, a well brought-up duck turns it's toes quite out, just like father and mother,--so! Now bend your necks and say 'Quack!'"

And they did so; but the other ducks round about looked at them, and said quite boldly,--"Look there! now we're to have this crowd too! as if there were not enough of us already! And--fie!--how that Duckling yonder looks: we won't stand that!" And at once one Duck flew at him, and bit him in the neck.

"Let him alone," said the mother: "he is not doing anything to any one."

"Yes, but he's too large and odd," said the Duck who had bitten him, "and so he must be put down."

"Those are pretty children the mother has," said the old Duck with the rag round her leg. "They're all pretty but that one; that is rather unlucky. I wish she could have that one over again."

"That cannot be done, my lady," said the Mother-Duck. "He is not pretty, but he has a really good temper, and swims as well as any of the others; yes, I may even say it, a little better. I think he will grow up pretty, perhaps in time he will grow a little smaller; he lay too long in the egg, and therefore he has not quite the right shape." And she pinched him in the neck, and smoothed his feathers. "Besides, he is a drake," she said, "and so it does not matter much. I think he will be very strong: he makes his way already."

"The other ducklings are graceful enough," said the old Duck. "Make yourself at home; and if you find an eel's head, you may bring it to me."

And now they were at home. But the poor Duckling who had crept last out of the egg, and looked so ugly, was bitten and pushed and made fun of, as much by the ducks as by the chickens.

"He is too big!" they all said. And the turkey-cock, who had been born with spurs, and so thought he was an emperor, blew himself up, like a ship in full sail, and bore straight down upon him; then he gobbled and grew quite red in the face. The poor Duckling did not know where he dared stand or walk; he was quite unhappy because he looked ugly, and was the sport of the whole duck-yard.

So it went on the first day; and then it grew worse and worse. The poor Duckling was hunted about by every one; even his brothers and sisters were quite angry with him, and said, "If the cat would only catch you, you ugly creature!" And the ducks bit him, and the chickens beat him, and the girl who had to feed the poultry kicked at him with her foot.

Then he ran and flew over the fence, and the little birds in the bushes flew up in fear.

"That is because I am so ugly!" thought the Duckling; and he shut his eyes, but flew on further; and so he came out into the great moor, where the wild ducks lived. Here he lay the whole night long, he was so tired and sad.

Toward morning the wild ducks flew up, and looked at their new mate.

"What sort of a one are you?" they asked; and the Duckling turned about to each, and bowed as well as he could. "You are really very ugly!" said the Wild Ducks. "But that is all the same to us, so long as you do not marry into our family."

Poor thing! he certainly did not think of marrying, and only dared ask leave to lie among the reeds and drink some of the swamp water.

There he lay two whole days; then came thither two wild geese, or, more truly, two wild ganders. It was not long since each had crept out of an egg, and that's why they were so saucy.

"Listen, comrade," said one of them. "You're so ugly that I like you. Will you go with us, and become a bird of passage? Near here is another moor, where are a few sweet lovely wild geese, all unmarried, and all able to say 'Quack!' You've a chance of making your fortune, ugly as you are."

"Piff! paff!" sounded through the air; and both the ganders fell down dead in the reeds, and the water became blood-red. "Piff! paff!" it sounded again, and the whole flock of wild geese flew up from the reeds. And then there was another report. A great hunt was going on. The gunners lay around in the moor, and some were even sitting up in the branches of the trees, which spread far over the reeds. The blue smoke rose like clouds in among the dark trees, and hung over the water; and the hunting dogs came--splash, splash!--into the mud, and the rushes and reeds bent down on every side. That was a fright for the poor Duckling! He turned his head to put it under his wing; and at that very moment a frightful great dog stood close by the Duckling. His tongue hung far out of his mouth, and his eyes glared horribly. He put his nose close to the Duckling, showed his sharp teeth, and--splash, splash!--on he went without seizing it.

"Oh, Heaven be thanked!" sighed the Duckling. "I am so ugly that even the dog does not like to bite me!"

And so he lay quite quiet, while the shots rattled through the reeds and gun after gun was fired. At last, late in the day, all was still: but the poor little thing did not dare to rise up; he waited several hours still before he looked around, and then hurried away out of the moor as fast as he could. He ran on over field and meadow; there was a storm, so that he had hard work to get away.

Towards evening the Duckling came to a peasant's poor little hut: it was so tumbled down that it did not itself know on which side it should fall; and that's why it stood up. The storm whistled around the Duckling in such a way that he had to sit down to keep from blowing away; and the wind blew worse and worse. Then he noticed that one of the hinges of the door had given way, and the door hung so slanting that he could slip through the crack into the room; and that is what he did.

Here lived an old woman, with her Cat and her Hen. And the Cat, whom she called Sonnie, could arch his back and purr; he could even give out sparks--but for that, one had to stroke his fur the wrong way. The Hen had quite small, short legs, and therefore she was called Chickabiddy Shortshanks; she laid good eggs, and the woman loved her as her own child.

In the morning they noticed at once the strange Duckling, and the Cat began to purr and the Hen to cluck.

"What's this?" said the woman, and looked all around; but she could not see well, and therefore she thought the Duckling was a fat duck that had strayed. "This is a rare prize!" she said. "Now I shall have duck's eggs. I hope it is not a drake. We must try that."

And so the Duckling was taken on trial for three weeks, but no eggs came. And the Cat was master of the house, and the Hen was the lady, and always said "We and the world!" for they thought they were half the world, and by far the better half. It seemed to the Duckling that one might have another mind, but the Hen would not allow it.

"Can you lay eggs?"

"No."

"Then will you hold your tongue!"

And the Cat said, "Can you curve your back, and purr, and give out sparks?"

"No."

"Then you will please have no opinion of your own when sensible folks are speaking!"

And the Duckling sat in a corner and was in low spirits; then he began to think of the fresh air and the sunshine; and he was seized with such a strange longing to swim on the water, that he could not help telling the Hen of it.

"What are you thinking of?" cried the Hen. "You have nothing to do, that's why you have these fancies. Lay eggs, or purr, and they will pass over."

"But it is so charming to swim in the water," said the Duckling, "so nice to feel it go over one's head, and to dive down to the bottom!"

"Yes, that's a fine thing, truly," said the Hen. "You are clean gone crazy. Ask the Cat about it,--he's the cleverest thing I know,--ask him if he likes to swim in the water, or to dive down: I won't speak about myself. Ask our mistress herself, the old woman; no one in the world knows more than she. Do you think she wants to swim, and let the water close above her head?"

"You don't understand me," said the Duckling.

"We don't understand you! Then pray who is to understand you? You surely don't pretend to be cleverer than the Cat and the woman--I won't say anything of myself. Don't make a fool of yourself, child, and thank your Maker for all the good you have. Are you not come into a warm room, and have you not folks about you from whom you can learn something? But you are a goose, and it is not pleasant to have you about. You may believe me, I speak for your good. I tell you things you won't like, and by that one may always know one's true friends! Only take care that you learn to lay eggs, or to purr, and to give out sparks!"

"I think I will go out into the wide world," said the Duckling.

"Yes, do go," replied the Hen.

And so the Duckling went away. He swam on the water, and dived, but he was shunned by every creature because he was so ugly.

Now came the fall of the year. The leaves in the wood turned yellow and brown; the wind caught them so that they danced about, and up in the air it was very cold. The clouds hung low, heavy with hail and snow-flakes, and on the fence stood the raven, crying "Croak! croak!" for mere cold; yes, one could freeze fast if one thought about it. The poor little Duckling certainly had not a good time. One evening--the sun was just going down in fine style--there came a whole flock of great handsome birds out of the bushes; they were shining white, with long, supple necks; they were swans. They uttered a very strange cry, spread forth their glorious great wings, and flew away from that cold region to warmer lands, to fair open lakes. They mounted so high, so high! and the ugly Duckling had such a strange feeling as he saw them! He turned round and round in the water like a wheel, stretched out his neck towards them, and uttered a cry, so high, so strange, that he was frightened as he heard it.

Oh! he could not forget those beautiful, happy birds; and as soon as he could see them no longer, he dived down to the very bottom, and when he came up again, he was quite beside himself. He did not know what the birds were, nor where they were flying to; but he loved them more than he had ever loved any one. He did not envy them at all. How could he think of wishing to have such loveliness as they had? He would have been glad if only the ducks would have let him be among them--the poor, ugly creature!

And the winter grew so cold, so cold! The Duckling had to swim about in the water, to keep it from freezing over; but every night the hole in which he swam about became smaller and smaller. It froze so hard that the icy cover sounded; and the Duckling had to use his legs all the time to keep the hole from freezing tight. At last he became worn out, and lay quite still, and thus froze fast in the ice.

Early in the morning a peasant came by, and found him there; he took his wooden shoe, broke the ice to pieces, and carried the Duckling home to his wife. Then the Duckling came to himself again. The children wanted to play with him; but he thought they wanted to hurt him, and in his terror he flew up into the milk-pan, so that the milk spilled over into the room. The woman screamed and shook her hand in the air, at which the Duckling flew down into the tub where they kept the butter, and then into the meal-barrel and out again. How he looked then! The woman screamed, and struck at him with the fire tongs; the children tumbled over one another as they tried to catch the Duckling; and they laughed and they screamed!--well was it that the door stood open, and the poor creature was able to slip out between the bushes into the newly-fallen snow--there he lay quite worn out.

But it would be too sad if I were to tell all the misery and care which the Duckling had to bear in the hard winter. He lay out on the moor among the reeds, when the sun began to shine again and the larks to sing; it was a beautiful spring.

Then all at once the Duckling could flap his wings: they beat the air more strongly than before, and bore him stoutly away; and before he well knew it, he found himself in a great garden, where the elder-trees stood in flower, and bent their long green branches down to the winding canal, and the lilacs smelt sweet. Oh, here it was beautiful, fresh, and springlike! and from the thicket came three glorious white swans; they rustled their wings, and sat lightly on the water. The Duckling knew the splendid creatures, and felt a strange sadness.

"I will fly away to them, to the royal birds! and they will beat me, because I, that am so ugly, dare to come near them. But it is all the same. Better to be killed by them than to be chased by ducks, and beaten by fowls, and pushed about by the girl who takes care of the poultry yard, and to suffer hunger in winter!" And he flew out into the water, and swam toward the beautiful swans: these looked at him, and came sailing down upon him with outspread wings. "Kill me!" said the poor creature, and bent his head down upon the water, and waited for death. But what saw he in the clear water? He saw below him his own image; and lo! it was no longer a clumsy dark-gray bird, ugly and hateful to look at, but--a swan!

It matters nothing if one is born in a duck-yard, if one has only lain in a swan's egg.

He felt quite glad at all the need and hard times he had borne; now he could joy in his good luck in all the brightness that was round him. And the great swans swam round him and stroked him with their beaks.

Into the garden came little children, who threw bread and corn into the water; and the youngest cried, "There is a new one!" and the other children shouted, "Yes, a new one has come!" And they clapped their hands and danced about, and ran to their father and mother; and bread and cake were thrown into the water; and they all said, "The new one is the most beautiful of all! so young and so handsome!" and the old swans bowed their heads before him.

Then he felt quite ashamed, and hid his head under his wings, for he did not know what to do; he was so happy, and yet not at all proud, for a good heart is never proud. He thought how he had been driven about and mocked and despised; and now he heard them all saying that he was the most beautiful of all beautiful birds. And the lilacs bent their branches straight down into the water before him, and the sun shone warm and mild. Then his wings rustled, he lifted his slender neck, and cried from the depths of his heart:--

"I never dreamed of so much happiness when I was the Ugly Duckling."

"I have seen a cadet promoted to be an officer, and dressing himself for the first time in his gorgeous uniform; I have seen young girls in bridal attire, and the prince's young bride in her wedding dress: but I never saw such bliss as that of a little four-year-old girl whom I watched this evening. She had got a new blue dress, and a new pink hat. The finery was just put on, and all were calling for light, for the moonbeams that came through the window were not bright enough. They wanted very different lights from that. There stood the little girl, stiff as a doll, keeping her arms anxiously off her dress, and her fingers stretched wide apart. Oh! what happiness beamed from her eyes, from her whole face. 'To-morrow you may go to walk in the dress,' said the mother; and the little one looked up at her hat and down again at her dress, and smiled blissfully. 'Mother,' she cried, 'what will the little dogs think when they see me in all these fine clothes?'"

The Top and the Ball lay in a drawer among some other toys; and so the Top said to the Ball:--"Shall we not be lovers, since we live together in the same drawer?"

But the Ball, which had a coat of morocco leather, and thought herself as good as any fine lady, had nothing to say to such a thing. The next day came the little boy who owned the toys: he painted the Top red and yellow, and drove a brass nail into it; and the Top looked splendidly when he turned round.

"Look at me!" he cried to the Ball. "What do you say now? Shall we not be lovers? We go so nicely together? You jump and I dance! No one could be happier than we two should be."

"Indeed! Do you think so?" said the Ball. "Perhaps you do not know that my papa and my mamma were morocco slippers, and that I have a cork inside me?"

"Yes, but I am made of mahogany," said the Top; "and the mayor himself turned me. He has a turning-lathe of his own, and it amuses him greatly."

"Can I depend on that?" asked the Ball.

"May I never be whipped again if it is not true!" replied the Top.

"You talk well for yourself," said the Ball, "but I cannot do what you ask. I am as good as half engaged to a swallow: every time I leap up into the air he sticks his head out of the nest and says, 'Will you? will you?' And now I have silently said 'Yes,' and that is as good as being half engaged; but I promise I will never forget you."

"Much good that will do!" said the Top.

And they spoke no more to each other.

Next day the Ball was taken out. The Top saw how she flew high into the air, like a bird; at last one could no longer see her. Each time she came back again, but always gave a high leap when she touched the earth; and that came about either from her longing, or because she had a cork in her body. The ninth time the Ball stayed away and did not come back again; and the boy looked and looked, but she was gone.

"I know very well where she is!" sighed the Top. "She is in the Swallow's nest, and has married the Swallow!"

The more the Top thought of this, the more he longed for the Ball. Just because he could not get her, he fell more in love with her. That she had taken some one else, that was another thing. So the Top danced around and hummed, but always thought of the Ball, which grew more and more lovely in his fancy. Thus many years went by,--and now it was an old love.

And the Top was no longer young. But one day he was gilt all over; never had he looked so handsome; he was now a golden Top, and sprang till he hummed again. Yes, that was something! But all at once he sprang too high, and--he was gone!

They looked and looked, even in the cellar, but he was not to be found.

Where was he?

He had jumped into the dust-box, where all kinds of things were lying: cabbage stalks, sweepings, and gravel that had fallen down from the roof.

"Here's a nice place to lie in! The gilding will soon leave me here. And what a rabble I've come amongst!"

And then he looked askance at a long cabbage stalk that was much too near him, and at a curious round thing like an old apple; but it was not an apple--it was an old Ball, which had lain for years in the roof-gutter and was soaked through with water.

"Thank goodness, here comes one of us, with whom one can talk!" said the little Ball, and looked at the gilt Top. "I am really morocco, sewn by a girl's hands, and have a cork inside me; but no one would think it to look at me. I was very near marrying a swallow, but I fell into the gutter on the roof, and have laid there full five years, and am quite soaked through. That's a long time, you may believe me, for a young girl."

But the Top said nothing. He thought of his old love; and the more he heard, the clearer it became to him that this was she. Then came the servant-girl, and wanted to empty the dust-box. "Aha, there's a gilt top!" she cried. And so the Top was brought again to notice and honor, but nothing was heard of the Ball. And the Top spoke no more of his old love: for that dies away when the beloved has lain for five years in a gutter and got soaked through; yes, one does not know her again when one meets her in the dust-box.

Gerda was obliged to rest herself again, when just over against where she sat, a large Crow hopped over the white snow. He had sat there a long while, looking at her and shaking his head; and now he said, "Caw! caw! Good day! good day!" He could not say it better; but he meant well by the little girl, and asked her where she was going all alone out in the wide world. The word "alone" Gerda understood quite well, and felt how much lay in it; so she told the Crow her whole history, and asked if he had not seen Kay.

The Crow nodded very gravely, and said, "It may be--it may be!"

"What--do you really think so?" cried the little girl; and she nearly squeezed the Crow to death, so much did she kiss him.

"Gently, gently," said the Crow. "I think I know; I think that it may be little Kay. But now he has quite forgotten you for the Princess."

"Does he live with a princess?" asked Gerda.

"Yes,--listen," said the Crow; "but it is hard for me to speak your language. If you understand the Crow language, I can tell you better."

"No, I have not learnt it," said Gerda; "but my grandmother understands it. I wish I had learnt it."

"No matter," said the Crow: "I will tell you as well as I can; but it will be bad enough." And then he told all he knew.

"In the kingdom where we now are, there lives a princess, who is vastly clever; for she has read all the newspapers in the whole world, and has forgotten them again,--so clever is she. Some time ago, they say, she was sitting on her throne,--which is no great fun, after all,--when she began humming an old tune, and it was just 'Oh, why should I not be married?' 'Come, now, there is something in that,' said she, and so then she was bound to marry; but she would have a husband who knew how to give an answer when he was spoken to,--not one who was good for nothing but to stand and be looked at, for that is very tiresome. She then had all the ladies of the court drummed together; and when they heard what she meant to do, all were well pleased, and said, 'We are quite glad to hear it: it is the very thing we were thinking of.' You may believe every word I say," said the Crow, "for I have a tame sweetheart that hops about in the palace quite freely, and she told me all.

"The newspapers at once came out with a border of hearts and the initials of the Princess; and you could read in them that every good-looking young man was free to come to the palace and speak to the Princess; and he who spoke in such wise as showed he felt himself at home there, and talked best, that one the Princess would choose for her husband.

"Yes--yes," said the Crow, "you may believe it; it is as true as I am sitting here. People came in crowds; there was a crush and a hurry, but no one had good luck either on the first or second day. They could all talk well enough when they were out in the street; but as soon as they came inside the palace gates, and saw the guard richly dressed in silver, and the lackeys in gold, on the staircase, and the large lighted halls, then they were dumb; and when they stood before the throne on which the Princess was sitting, all they could do was to repeat the last word she had said, and she didn't care to hear that again. It was just as if the people within were under a charm, and had fallen into a trance till they came out again into the street; for then--oh, then they could chatter enough. There was a whole row of them from the town gates to the palace. I was there myself to look on," said the Crow. "They grew hungry and thirsty; but from the palace they got not so much as a glass of water. Some of the cleverest, it is true, had taken bread and butter with them; but none shared it with his neighbor, for each thought, 'Let him look hungry, and then the Princess won't have him.'"

"But Kay--little Kay," asked Gerda, "when did he come? Was he among the number?"

"Give me time! give me time! we are coming to him. It was on the third day, when a little personage, without horse or carriage, came marching right boldly up to the palace; his eyes shone like yours, he had beautiful long hair, but his clothes were very shabby."

"That was Kay," cried Gerda, with a voice of delight. "Oh, now I've found him!" and she clapped her hands.

"He had a little knapsack at his back," said the Crow.

"No, that was certainly his sled," said Gerda; "for he went away with his sled."

"That may be," said the Crow; "I did not see him close to; but I know from my tame sweetheart that when he came into the courtyard of the palace, and saw the body-guard in silver, and the lackeys on the staircase in gold, he was not in the least cast down; he nodded and said to them, 'It must be very tiresome to stand on the stairs; for my part, I shall go in.' The halls were bright with lights. Court people and fine folks were walking about on bare feet; it was all very solemn. His boots creaked, too, very loudly; but still he was not at all afraid."

"That's Kay, for certain," said Gerda. "I know he had on new boots; I have heard them creaking in grandmamma's room."

"Yes, they creaked," said the Crow. "And on he went boldly up to the Princess, who was sitting on a pearl as large as a spinning-wheel. All the ladies of the court stood about, with their maids and their maids' maids, and all the gentlemen with their servants and their servants' servants, who kept a boy; and the nearer they stood to the door, the prouder they looked. The boy of the servants' servants, who always goes in slippers, hardly looked at one, so very proudly did he stand in the doorway."

"It must have been terrible," said little Gerda. "And did Kay get the Princess?"

"Were I not a Crow, I should have taken the Princess myself, although I am engaged. It is said he spoke as well as I speak when I talk crow language; this I learned from my tame sweetheart. He was bold and nicely behaved; he had not come to woo the Princess, but only to hear her wisdom. She pleased him and he pleased her."

"Yes, yes, for certain that was Kay," said Gerda. "He was so clever; he could do sums with fractions. Oh, won't you take me to the palace?"

"That is very easily said," answered the Crow. "But how are we to manage it? I'll speak to my tame sweetheart about it; she can tell us what to do; for so much I must tell you, such a little girl as you are will never get leave to go in the common way."

"Oh, yes, I shall," said Gerda: "when Kay hears that I am here, he will come out at once to fetch me."

"Wait for me here on these steps," said the Crow. He wagged his head and flew away.

When it grew dark the Crow came back. "Caw! caw!" said he. "I bring you a great many good wishes from her; and here is a bit of bread for you. She took it out of the kitchen, where there is bread enough, and you are hungry, no doubt. It is not possible for you to enter the palace, for you are barefoot; the guards in silver and the lackeys in gold would not allow it: but do not cry, you shall come in still. My sweetheart knows a little back stair that leads to the chamber, and she knows where she can get the key of it."

And they went into the garden by the broad path, where one leaf was falling after the other; and when the lights in the palace were all put out, one after the other, the Crow led little Gerda to the back door, which stood ajar.

Oh, how Gerda's heart beat with doubt and longing! It was just as if she had been about to do something wrong; and yet she only wanted to know if little Kay was there. Yes, he must be there. She called to mind his clear eyes and his long hair so vividly, she could quite see him as he used to laugh when they were sitting under the roses at home. He would surely be glad to see her--to hear what a long way she had come for his sake; to know how unhappy all at home were when he did not come back. Oh, what a fright and what a joy it was!

Now they were on the stairs. A single lamp was burning there; and on the floor stood the tame Crow, turning her head on every side and looking at Gerda, who bowed as her grandmother had taught her to do.

"My intended has told me so much good of you, my dear young lady," said the tame Crow. "Your Life, as they call it, is very affecting. If you will take the lamp, I will go before. We will go straight on, for we shall meet no one."

"I think there is somebody just behind us," said Gerda; and it rushed past her. It was like shadows on the wall: horses with flowing manes and thin legs, huntsmen, ladies and gentlemen on horseback.

"They are only dreams," said the Crow. "They come to fetch the thoughts of the fine folk to the chase; 'tis well, for now you can see them asleep all the better. But let me find, when you come to have honor and fame, that you possess a grateful heart."

"Tut! that's not worth talking about," said the Crow from the woods.

Now they came into the first hall, which was of rose-colored satin, with painted flowers on the wall. Here the dreams were rushing past, but they hurried by so quickly that Gerda could not see the fine people. One hall was more showy than the other--well might people be abashed; and at last they came into the bed-chamber.

The ceiling of the room was like a great palm-tree, with leaves of glass, of costly glass; and in the middle of the floor, from a thick golden stalk, hung two beds, each of which was shaped like a lily. One was white, and in this lay the Princess: the other was red, and it was here that Gerda was to look for little Kay. She bent back one of the red leaves, and saw a brown neck--oh, that was Kay! She called him quite loud by name, held the lamp toward him--the dreams rushed again on horseback into the chamber--he awoke, turned his head, and--it was not little Kay!

The Prince was only like him about the neck; but he was young and handsome. And out of the white lily leaves the Princess peeped too, and asked what was the matter. Then little Gerda cried and told her whole history, and all that the Crows had done for her.

"Poor little thing!" said the Prince and the Princess, and they praised the Crows very much, and told them they were not at all angry with them, but they were not to do so again. However, they should have a reward.

"Will you fly about at liberty?" asked the Princess; "or would you like to have a steady place as court Crows with all the broken bits from the kitchen?"

And both the Crows nodded, and begged for a steady place; for they thought of their old age, and said "it was a good thing to have something for the old folks," as the saying is.

And the Prince got up and let Gerda sleep in his bed, and more than this he could not do. She folded her little hands, and thought, "How good men and animals are!" and then she shut her eyes and slept soundly. All the dreams came flying in again, and they now looked like the angels; they drew a little sled, on which Kay sat and nodded his head: but the whole was only a dream, and so it was all gone as soon as she awoke.

The next day she was dressed from top to toe in silk and velvet. They offered to let her stay at the palace, and lead a happy life; but she begged only to have a little carriage with a horse in front, and for a small pair of shoes; then, she said, she would again go forth in the wide world and look for Kay.

And she got both shoes and a muff; she was dressed very nicely, too; and when she was about to set off, a new carriage stopped before the door. It was of pure gold, and the arms of the Prince and Princess shone like a star upon it; the coachman, the footmen, and the outriders, for outriders were there too, all wore golden crowns. The Prince and Princess helped her into the carriage themselves, and wished her good luck. The Crow of the woods, who was now married, went with her for the first three miles. He sat beside Gerda, for he could not bear riding backward; the other Crow stood in the doorway, and flapped her wings; she could not go with Gerda, because she suffered from headache since she had had a steady place, and ate so much. The carriage was lined inside with sugar-plums, and in the seats were fruits and cookies.

"Good-by! good-by!" cried Prince and Princess; and little Gerda wept, and the Crows wept. Thus passed the first miles; and then the Crow said good-by, and this was the worst good-by of all. He flew into a tree, and beat his black wings as long as he could see the carriage, that shone from afar like the clear sunlight.

In China, you must know, the Emperor is a Chinaman, and all whom he has about him are Chinamen too. It happened a good many years ago, but that's just why it's worth while to hear the story before it is forgotten.

The Emperor's palace was the most splendid in the world. It was made wholly of fine porcelain, very costly, but so brittle and so hard to handle that one had to take care how one touched it. In the garden were to be seen the most wonderful flowers, and to the prettiest of them silver bells were tied, which tinkled, so that nobody should pass by without noticing the flowers.

Yes, everything in the Emperor's garden was nicely set out, and it reached so far that the gardener himself did not know where the end was. If a man went on and on, he came into a glorious forest with high trees and deep lakes. The wood went straight down to the sea, which was blue and deep; great ships could sail to and fro beneath the branches of the trees; and in the trees lived a Nightingale, which sang so finely that even the poor Fisherman, who had many other things to do, stopped still and listened, when he had gone out at night to throw out his nets, and heard the Nightingale.

"How beautiful that is!" he said; but he had to attend to his work, and so he forgot the bird. But the next night, when the bird sang again, and the Fisherman heard it, he said as before, "How beautiful that is!"

From all the countries of the world travelers came to the city of the Emperor, and admired it, and the palace, and the garden; but when they heard the Nightingale, they all said, "That is the best of all!"

And the travelers told of it when they came home; and the learned men wrote many books about the town, the palace, and the garden. But they did not forget the Nightingale; that was spoken of most of all; and all those who were poets wrote great poems about the Nightingale in the wood by the deep lake.

The books went all over the world, and a few of them once came to the Emperor. He sat in his golden chair, and read, and read; every moment he nodded his head, for it pleased him to hear the fine things that were said about the city, the palace, and the garden. "But the Nightingale is the best of all!"--it stood written there.

"What's that?" exclaimed the Emperor. "The Nightingale? I don't know that at all! Is there such a bird in my empire, and in my garden to boot? I've never heard of that. One has to read about such things."

Hereupon he called his Cavalier, who was so grand that if any one lower in rank than he dared to speak to him, or to ask him any question, he answered nothing but "P!"--and that meant nothing.

"There is said to be a strange bird here called a Nightingale!" said the Emperor. "They say it is the best thing in all my great empire. Why has no one ever told me anything about it?"

"I have never heard it named," replied the Cavalier. "It has never been presented at court."

"I command that it shall come here this evening, and sing before me," said the Emperor. "All the world knows what I have, and I do not know it myself!"

"I have never heard it mentioned," said the Cavalier. "I will seek for it. I will find it."

But where was it to be found? The Cavalier ran up and down all the stairs, through halls and passages, but no one among all those whom he met had heard talk of the Nightingale. And the Cavalier ran back to the Emperor, and said that it must be a fable made up by those who write books.

"Your Imperial Majesty must not believe what is written. It is fiction, and something that they call the black art."

"But the book in which I read this," said the Emperor, "was sent to me by the high and mighty Emperor of Japan, and so it cannot be a falsehood. I will hear the Nightingale! It must be here this evening! It has my high favor; and if it does not come, all the court shall be trampled upon after it has supped!"

"Tsing-pe!" said the Cavalier; and again he ran up and down all the stairs, and through all the halls and passages, and half the court ran with him, for the courtiers did not like being trampled upon. There was a great inquiry after the wonderful Nightingale, which all the world knew, but not the people at court.

At last they met with a poor little girl in the kitchen. She said:--

"The Nightingale? I know it well; yes, how it can sing! Every evening I get leave to carry my poor sick mother the scraps from the table. She lives down by the beach, and when I get back and am tired, and rest in the wood, then I hear the Nightingale sing. And then the tears come into my eyes, and it is just as if my mother kissed me!"

"Little Kitchen-girl," said the Cavalier, "I will get you a fixed place in the kitchen, with leave to see the Emperor dine, if you will lead us to the Nightingale, for it is promised for this evening."

So they all went out into the wood where the Nightingale was wont to sing; half the court went out. When they were on the way, a cow began to low.

"Oh!" cried the court pages, "now we have it! That shows a great power in so small a creature! We have certainly heard it before."

"No, those are cows mooing!" said the little Kitchen-girl. "We are a long way from the place yet."

Now the frogs began to croak in the marsh.

"Glorious!" said the Chinese Court Preacher. "Now I hear it--it sounds just like little church bells."

"No, those are frogs!" said the little Kitchen-maid. "But now I think we shall soon hear it."

And then the Nightingale began to sing.

"That is it!" exclaimed the little Girl. "Listen, listen! and yonder it sits."

And she pointed to a little gray bird up in the boughs.

"Is it possible?" cried the Cavalier. "I should never have thought it looked like that! How simple it looks! It must certainly have lost its color at seeing so many famous people around."

"Little Nightingale!" called the little Kitchen-maid, quite loudly, "our gracious Emperor wishes you to sing before him."

"With the greatest pleasure!" replied the Nightingale, and sang so that it was a joy to hear it.

"It sounds just like glass bells!" said the Cavalier. "And look at its little throat, how it's working! It's wonderful that we should never have heard it before. That bird will be a great success at court."

"Shall I sing once more before the Emperor?" asked the Nightingale, for it thought the Emperor was present.

"My excellent little Nightingale," said the Cavalier, "I have great pleasure in inviting you to a court festival this evening, when you shall charm his Imperial Majesty with your beautiful singing."

"My song sounds best in the greenwood!" replied the Nightingale; still it came willingly when it heard what the Emperor wished.

In the palace there was a great brushing up. The walls and the floor, which were of porcelain, shone with many thousand golden lamps. The most glorious flowers, which could ring clearly, had been placed in the halls. There was a running to and fro, and a draught of air, but all the bells rang so exactly together that one could not hear any noise.

In the midst of the great hall, where the Emperor sat, a golden perch had been placed, on which the Nightingale was to sit. The whole court was there, and the little Cook-maid had leave to stand behind the door, as she had now received the title of a real cook-maid. All were in full dress, and all looked at the little gray bird, to which the Emperor nodded.

And the Nightingale sang so gloriously that the tears came into the Emperor's eyes, and the tears ran down over his cheeks; and then the Nightingale sang still more sweetly; that went straight to the heart. The Emperor was happy, and he said the Nightingale should have his golden slipper to wear round its neck. But the Nightingale thanked him, it had already got reward enough.

"I have seen tears in the Emperor's eyes--that is the real treasure to me. An Emperor's tears have a strange power. I am paid enough!" Then it sang again with a sweet, glorious voice.

"That's the most lovely way of making love I ever saw!" said the ladies who stood round about, and then they took water in their mouths to gurgle when any one spoke to them. They thought they should be nightingales too. And the lackeys and maids let it be known that they were pleased too; and that was saying a good deal, for they are the hardest of all to please. In short, the Nightingale made a real hit.

It was now to remain at court, to have its own cage, with freedom to go out twice every day and once at night. It had twelve servants, and they all had a silken string tied to the bird's leg which they held very tight. There was really no pleasure in going out.

The whole city spoke of the wonderful bird, and when two people met, one said nothing but "Nightin," and the other said "gale"; and then they sighed, and understood one another. Eleven storekeepers' children were named after the bird, but not one of them could sing a note.

One day a large parcel came to the Emperor, on which was written "The Nightingale."

"Here we have a new book about this famous bird," said the Emperor.

But it was not a book: it was a little work of art, that lay in a box; a toy nightingale, which was to sing like a live one, but it was all covered with diamonds, rubies, and sapphires. So soon as the toy bird was wound up, he could sing one of the pieces that the real one sang, and then his tail moved up and down, and shone with silver and gold. Round his neck hung a little ribbon, and on that was written, "The Emperor of Japan's Nightingale is poor beside that of the Emperor in China."

"That is capital!" said they all, and he who had brought the toy bird at once got the title Imperial Head-Nightingale-Bringer.

"Now they must sing together: what a duet that will be!"

And so they had to sing together; but it did not sound very well, for the real Nightingale sang in its own way, and the toy bird sang waltzes.

"That's not its fault," said the Play-master: "it's quite perfect, and very much in my style."

Now the toy bird was to sing alone. It made just as much of a hit as the real one, and then it was so much more fine to look at--it shone like bracelets and breastpins.

Three-and-thirty times over did it sing the same piece, and yet was not tired. The people would gladly have heard it again, but the Emperor said that the living Nightingale ought to sing a little something. But where was it? No one had noticed that it had flown away, out of the open window, back to its green woods.

"But what is become of it?" asked the Emperor.

Then all the courtiers scolded, and thought the Nightingale was a very thankless creature.

"We have the best bird, after all," said they.

And so the toy bird had to sing again, and this was the thirty-fourth time they had listened to the same piece. For all that, they did not know it quite by heart, for it was so very difficult. And the Play-master praised the bird highly; yes, he declared that it was better than the real Nightingale, not only in its feathers and its many beautiful diamonds, but inside as well.

"For you see, ladies and gentlemen, and above all, your Imperial Majesty, with the real Nightingale one can never make sure what is coming, but in this toy bird everything is settled. It is just so, and not any other way. One can explain it; one can open it, and can show how much thought went to making it, where the waltzes come from, how they go, and how one follows another."

"Those are quite our own ideas," they all said. And the Play-master got leave to show the bird to the people on the next Sunday. The people were to hear it sing too, said the Emperor; and they did hear it, and were as much pleased as if they had all had tea, for that's quite the Chinese fashion; and they all said "Oh!" and held their forefingers up in the air and nodded. But the poor Fisherman, who had heard the real Nightingale, said:--

"It sounds pretty enough, and it's a little like, but there's something wanting, though I know not what!"

The real Nightingale was exiled from the land and empire.

The toy bird had its place on a silken cushion close to the Emperor's bed. All the presents it had received, gold and precious stones, were ranged about it. In title it had come to be High Imperial After-Dinner-Singer, and in rank it was Number One on the left hand; for the Emperor reckoned that side the most important on which the heart is placed, and even in an Emperor the heart is on the left side. And the Play-master wrote a work of five-and-twenty volumes about the toy bird: it was so learned and so long, full of the most difficult Chinese words, that all the people said they had read it and understood it, or else they would have been thought stupid, and would have had their bodies trampled on.

So a whole year went by. The Emperor, the court, and all the other Chinese knew every little twitter in the toy bird's song by heart. But just for that reason it pleased them best--they could sing with it themselves, and they did so. The street boys sang, "Tsi-tsi-tsi-glug-glug!" and the Emperor himself sang it too. Yes, that was certainly famous.

But one evening, when the toy bird was singing its best, and the Emperor lay in bed and heard it, something inside the bird said, "Svup!" Something cracked. "Whir-r-r!" All the wheels ran round, and then the music stopped.

The Emperor jumped at once out of bed, and had his own doctor called; but what could he do? Then they sent for a watchmaker, and after a good deal of talking and looking, he got the bird into some sort of order; but he said that it must be looked after a good deal, for the barrels were worn, and he could not put new ones in in such a manner that the music would go. There was a great to-do; only once in a year did they dare to let the bird sing, and that was almost too much. But then the Play-master made a little speech, full of heavy words, and said this was just as good as before--and so, of course, it was as good as before.

Five years had gone by, and a real grief came upon the whole nation. The Chinese were really fond of their Emperor, and now he was sick, and could not, it was said, live much longer. Already a new Emperor had been chosen, and the people stood out in the street and asked the Cavalier how their old Emperor did.

"P!" said he, and shook his head.

Cold and pale lay the Emperor in his great, gorgeous bed; the whole court thought him dead, and each one ran to pay respect to the new ruler. The chamberlains ran out to talk it over, and the ladies'-maids had a great coffee party. All about, in all the halls and passages, cloth had been laid down so that no one could be heard go by, and therefore it was quiet there, quite quiet. But the Emperor was not dead yet: stiff and pale he lay on the gorgeous bed with the long velvet curtains and the heavy gold tassels; high up, a window stood open, and the moon shone in upon the Emperor and the toy bird.

The poor Emperor could scarcely breathe; it was just as if something lay upon his breast. He opened his eyes, and then he saw that it was Death who sat upon his breast, and had put on his golden crown, and held in one hand the Emperor's sword, and in the other his beautiful banner. And all around, from among the folds of the splendid velvet curtains, strange heads peered forth; a few very ugly, the rest quite lovely and mild. These were all the Emperor's bad and good deeds, that stood before him now that Death sat upon his heart.

"Do you remember this?" whispered one to the other, "Do you remember that?" and then they told him so much that the sweat ran from his forehead.

"I did not know that!" said the Emperor. "Music! music! the great Chinese drum!" he cried, "so that I need not hear all they say!"

And they kept on, and Death nodded like a Chinaman to all they said.

"Music! music!" cried the Emperor. "You little precious golden bird, sing, sing! I have given you gold and costly presents; I have even hung my golden slipper around your neck--now, sing!"

But the bird stood still,--no one was there to wind him up, and he could not sing without that; but Death kept on staring at the Emperor with his great hollow eyes, and it was quiet, fearfully quiet.

Then there sounded close by the window the most lovely song. It was the little live Nightingale, that sat outside on a spray. It had heard of the Emperor's need, and had come to sing to him of trust and hope. And as it sang the spectres grew paler and paler; the blood ran more and more quickly through the Emperor's weak limbs, and Death himself listened, and said:--

"Go on, little Nightingale, go on!"

"But will you give me that splendid golden sword? Will you give me that rich banner? Will you give me the Emperor's crown?"

And Death gave up each of these treasures for a song. And the Nightingale sang on and on; it sang of the quiet churchyard where the white roses grow, where the elder-blossom smells sweet, and where the fresh grass is wet with the tears of mourners. Then Death felt a longing to see his garden, and floated out at the window in the form of a cold, white mist.

"Thanks! thanks!" said the Emperor. "You heavenly little bird! I know you well. I drove you from my land and empire, and yet you have charmed away the evil faces from my bed, and driven Death from my heart! How can I pay you?"

"You have paid me!" replied the Nightingale. "I drew tears from your eyes, the first time I sang--I shall never forget that. Those are the jewels that make a singer's heart glad. But now sleep and grow fresh and strong again. I will sing you something."

And it sang, and the Emperor fell into a sweet sleep. Ah! how mild and refreshing that sleep was! The sun shone upon him through the windows, when he awoke strong and sound. Not one of his servants had yet come back, for they all thought that he was dead; but the Nightingale still sat beside him and sang.

"You must always stay with me," said the Emperor. "You shall sing as you please; and I'll break the toy bird into a thousand pieces."

"Not so," replied the Nightingale. "It did well as long as it could; keep it as you have done till now. I cannot build my nest in the palace to dwell in it, but let me come when I feel the wish; then I will sit in the evening on the spray yonder by the window, and sing for you, so that you may be glad and thoughtful at once. I will sing of those who are happy and of those who suffer. I will sing of good and of evil that remain hidden round about you. The little singing bird flies far around, to the poor fisherman, to the peasant's roof, to every one who dwells far away from you and from your court. I love your heart more than your crown, and yet the crown has an air of sanctity about it. I will come and sing to you--but one thing you must promise me."

"Everything!" said the Emperor; and he stood there in his royal robes, which he had put on himself, and pressed the sword which was heavy with gold to his heart.

"One thing I beg of you: tell no one that you have a little bird who tells you everything. Then all will go well."

And the Nightingale flew away.

The servants came in to look on their dead Emperor, and--yes, there he stood, and the Emperor said, "Good-morning!"

If the reader was a child who lived in Odense, he would just need to say the words "St. Knud's Fair," and it would rise before him in the brightest colors, lighted by the beams of childish fancy.... Somewhere near the middle of the town, five streets meet and make a little square.... There the town crier, in striped homespun, with a yellow bandoleer, beat his drum and proclaimed from a scroll the splendid things to be seen in the town.

"He beats a good drum," said the chamberlain.

"It would delight Spontini and Rossini to hear the fellow," said William. "Really, Odense at New Year would just suit these composers. The drums and fifes are in their glory. They drum the New Year in. Seven or eight little drummers, or fifers, go from door to door, with troops of children and old women, and they beat the drum-taps and the reveille. That fetches the pennies. Then when the New Year is well drummed in the city, they go into the country and drum for meat and porridge. The drumming in of the New Year lasts until Lent."

"And then we have new sports," said the chamberlain. "The fishers come from Stege with a full band, and on their shoulders a boat with all sorts of flags.... Then they lay a board between two boats, and on this two of the youngest and spryest wrestle till one falls into the water.... But all the fun's gone now. When I was young, there was different sport going. That was a sight! the corporation procession with the banners and the harlequin atop, and at Shrovetide, when the butchers led about an ox decked with ribbons and carnival twigs, with a boy on his back with wings and a little shirt.... All that's past now, people are got so fine. St. Knud's Fair is not what it used to be."

"Well, I'm glad it isn't," said William; "but let us go into the market and look at the Jutlanders, who are sitting with their pottery amidst the hay."

Just as the various professions in the Middle Ages had each its quarter, so here the shoemakers had ranged their tables side by side, and behind them stood the skillful workman in his long coat, and with his well-brushed felt hat in his hand. Where the shoemakers' quarter ended, the hatters' began, and there one was in the midst of the great market where tents and booths formed many parallel streets. The milliners, the goldsmiths, the pastry cooks, with booths of canvas and wood, were the chief attractions. Ribbons and handkerchiefs fluttered. Noise and bustle was everywhere. The girls from the same village always went in rows, seven or eight inseparables, with hands fast clasped. It was impossible to break the chain; and if you tried to pass through, the whole band wound itself into a clump. Behind the booth was a great space with wooden shoes, pottery, turners' and saddlers' wares. Rude and rough toys were spread on tables. Around them children were trying little trumpets, or moving about the playthings. Country girls twirled and twisted the work-boxes and themselves many a time before making their bargain. The air was thick and heavy with odors that were spiced with the smell of honey-cake.

On Fair day, St. Knud's Church and all its tombs are open to the public. From whatever side you look at this fine old building it has something imposing, with its high tower and spire. The interior produces the same, perhaps a greater, effect. But its full impression is not felt on entering it, nor until you get to the main aisle. There all is grand, beautiful, light. The whole interior is bright with gilding. Up in the high vaulted roof there shine, since old time, a multitude of golden stars. On both sides, high up above the side aisles, are great gothic windows from which the light streams down. The side aisles are painted with oil portraits, whole families, women and children, all in clerical dress, with long gowns and deep ruffs. Usually the figures are ranged by ages, the eldest first and then down to the very smallest.

They all stand with folded hands, and look piously down before them, till their colors have gradually faded away in dust.

I heard on the morning of December 6th [1867] that the town was decorated, that all the schools had a holiday, because it was my festival. I felt myself as humble, meek, and poor as though I stood before my God. Every weakness or error or sin, in thought, word, and deed, was revealed to me. All stood out strangely clear in my soul, as though it were doomsday--and it was my festival. God knows how humble I felt when men exalted and honored me so.

Then came the first telegram from the Student Club. I saw that they shared and did not envy my joy. Then came a dispatch from a private club of students in Copenhagen, and from the Artisans' Club of Slagelse. You will remember that I went to school in that town, and was therefore attached to it. Soon followed messages from sympathetic friends in Aarhuus, in Stege; telegram on telegram from all around. One of these was read aloud by Privy Councillor Koch. It was from the king. The assembly burst out in applause. Every cloud and shadow in my soul vanished!

How happy I was! And yet man must not exalt himself. I was to feel that I was only a poor child of humanity, bound by the frailty of earth. I suffered from a dreadful toothache, which was increased unbearably by the heat and excitement. Yet at evening I read a Wonder Story for the little friends. Then the deputation came from the town corporations, with torches and waving banners through the street, to the guild-hall. And now the prophecy was to be fulfilled that the old woman gave when I left home as a boy. Odense was to be illuminated for me. I stepped to the open window. All was aglow with torchlight, the square was filled with people. Songs swelled up to me. I was overcome, emotionally. Physically racked with pain, I could not enjoy this crowning fruit of my life, the toothache was so intolerable. The ice-cold air that blew against me fanned the pain to an awful intensity, and, instead of enjoying the bliss of these never-to-be-repeated moments, I looked at the printed song to see how many verses had to be sung before I could step away from the torture which the cold air sent through my teeth. It was the acme of suffering. As the glow of the piled-up torches subsided, my pain subsided too. How thankful I was, though! Gentle eyes were fastened upon me all around. All wanted to speak with me, to press my hand. Tired out, I reached the bishop's house and sought rest. But I got no sleep till toward morning, so filled and overflowing was I.

On Wednesday afternoon began the Miserere in the Sixtine Chapel. My soul longed for music; in the world of melody I could find sympathy and consolation. The throng was great, even within the chapel--the foremost division was already filled with ladies. Magnificent boxes, hung with velvet and golden draperies for royal personages and foreigners from various courts, were here erected so high that they looked out beyond the richly carved railing which separated the ladies from the interior of the chapel. The papal Swiss Guards stood in their bright festal array. The officers wore light armor, and in their helmets a waving plume.... The old cardinals entered in their magnificent scarlet velvet cloaks, with their white ermine capes, and seated themselves side by side in a great half-circle within the barrier, while the priests who had carried their trains seated themselves at their feet. By the little side door of the altar the holy father now entered, in his scarlet mantle and silver tiara. He ascended his throne. Bishops swung the vessels of incense around him, while young priests, in scarlet vestments, knelt, with lighted torches in their hands, before him and the high altar.

The reading of the lessons began. But it was impossible to keep the eyes fixed on the lifeless letters of the Missal--they raised themselves, with the thoughts, to the vast universe which Michael Angelo has breathed forth in colors upon the ceiling and the walls. I contemplated his mighty sibyls and wondrously glorious prophets,--every one of them a subject for a painting. My eyes drank in the magnificent processions, the beautiful groups of angels; they were not, to me, painted pictures;--all stood living before me. The rich tree of knowledge, from which Eve gave the fruit to Adam; the Almighty God, who floated over the waters,--not borne up by angels, as the older masters had represented him--no, the company of angels rested upon him and his fluttering garments. It is true, I had seen these pictures before, but never as now had they seized upon me. My excited state of mind, the crowd of people, perhaps even the lyric of my thoughts, made me wonderfully alive to poetical impressions; and many a poet's heart has felt as mine did!

The bold foreshortenings, the determinate force with which every figure steps forward, is amazing, and carries one quite away! It is a spiritual Sermon on the Mount, in color and form. Like Raphael, we stand in astonishment before the power of Michael Angelo. Every prophet is a Moses, like that which he formed in marble. What giant forms are those which seize upon our eye and our thoughts as we enter! But when intoxicated with this view, let us turn our eyes to the background of the chapel, whose whole wall is a high altar of art and thought. The great chaotic picture, from the floor to the roof, shows itself there like a jewel, of which all the rest is only the setting. We see there the Last Judgment.

Christ stands in judgment upon the clouds, and his Mother and the Apostles stretch forth their hands beseechingly for the poor human race. The dead raise the gravestones under which they have lain; blessed spirits adoring, float upward to God, while the abyss seizes its victims. Here one of the ascending spirits seeks to save his condemned brother, whom the abyss already embraces in its snaky folds. The children of despair strike their clenched fists upon their brows, and sink into the depths! In bold foreshortenings, float and tumble whole legions between heaven and earth. The sympathy of the angels, the expression of lovers who meet, the child that at the sound of the trumpet clings to the mother's breast, are so natural and beautiful that one believes one's self to be among those who are waiting for judgment. Michael Angelo has expressed in colors what Dante saw and has sung to the generations of the earth.

The descending sun at that moment threw his last beams in through the uppermost window. Christ, and the blessed around him, were strongly lighted up; while the lower part, where the dead arose, and the demons thrust their boat laden with the damned from the shore, were almost in darkness.

Just as the sun went down the last lesson was ended, the last light which now remained was extinguished, and the whole picture world vanished in the gloom from before me; but in that same moment burst forth music and singing. That which color had bodily revealed arose now in sound; the day of judgment, with its despair and its exultation, resounded above us.

The father of the church, stripped of his papal pomp, stood before the altar, and prayed to the holy cross; and upon the wings of the trumpet resounded the trembling choir, 'Populus meus quid feci tibi?' Soft angel-tones rose above the deep song, tones which ascended not from a human breast: it was not a man's nor a woman's; it belonged to the world of spirits; it was like the weeping of angels dissolved in melody.

mong the triad of singers--Llywarch, prince and bard, Aneurin, warrior and bard, and Taliessin, bard only--who were among the followers of the heroic British chief Urien, when he bravely but unsuccessfully resisted the invasion of the victorious Angles and Saxons, Aneurin was famous both as poet and warrior. He sang of the long struggle that eventually was to turn Briton into England, and celebrated in his 'Gododin' ninety of the fallen Cymric chiefs. The notes of his life are scanty, and are drawn chiefly from his allusion to himself in his poem. He was the son of Cwm Cawlwyd, a chief of the tribe of Gododin. He seems to have been educated at St. Cadoc's College at Llancarvan, and afterwards entered the bardic order. As appears from the 'Gododin,' he was present at the battle of Cattræth both as bard and as priest. He fled, but was taken prisoner. In his poem he refers to the hardships he endured in his captivity. After his release he returned to Llancarvan, Wales, and in his old age he went north to live with his brother in Galloway. Here he was murdered; his death is referred to as one of the "three accursed hatchet-strokes of the isle of Britain." His friendship with Taliessin is commemorated by both bards.

The 'Gododin' is at once the longest and the most important composition in early Welsh literature. It has been variously interpreted, but is thought to celebrate the battle of Cattræth. This battle was fought in 570 between the Britons, who had formed a league to defend their country, and their Teutonic invaders. It "began on a Tuesday, lasted for a week, and ended with great slaughter of the Britons, who fought desperately till they perished on the field." Three hundred and sixty chieftains were slain; only three escaped by flight, among whom was Aneurin, who afterwards commemorated the slaughter in the 'Gododin,' a lament for the dead. Ninety-seven of the stanzas remain. In various measures of alliterative and assonant verse they sing the praises of ninety of the fallen chiefs, usually giving one stanza to each hero. One of these stanzas is known to readers of Gray, who translated it under the name of 'The Death of Hoel.'

Again the 'Gododin' is assumed to be, like many early epic poems whose origin is wrapped in mystery, not the commemoration of one single, particular event, but a collection of lays composed at various times, which compresses into one battle the long and disastrous period of the Anglo-Saxon invasion, ending in the subjugation of the Britons.

But whatever its history, the 'Gododin' is one of the finest monuments of Cymric literature. "In the brevity of the narrative, the careless boldness of the actors as they present themselves, the condensed energy of the action, and the fierce exultation of the slaughter, together with the recurring elegiac note, this poem (or poems if it be the work of two authors) has some of the highest epic qualities. The ideas and manners are in harmony with the age and the country to which it is referred."

Like all early songs, the poem was handed down through centuries by oral tradition. It is now preserved in the 'Book of Aneurin,' a small quarto manuscript of nineteen leaves of vellum, of the end of the thirteenth century.

The 'Gododin' has been published with an English translation and notes by the Rev. J. Williams (1852); and by the Cymmrodorion Society, with a translation by Thomas Stevens, in 1885. Interesting information covering it may be found in Skene's 'Four Ancient Books of Wales' (1866), and in the article 'Celtic Literature' in this work.

[During the battle a conference was held, at which the British leaders demanded as a condition of peace that part of the land of Gododin be restored. In reply, the Saxons killed Owain, one of the greatest of the Cymric bards. Aneurin thus pictures him:--]

A man in thought, a boy in form,
He stoutly fought, and sought the storm
Of flashing war that thundered far.
His courser, lank and swift, thick-maned,
Bore on his flank, as on he strained,
The light-brown shield, as on he sped,
With golden spur, in cloak of fur,
His blue sword gleaming. Be there said
No word of mine that does not hold thee dear!
Before thy youth had tasted bridal cheer,
The red death was thy bride! The ravens feed
On thee yet straining to the front, to lead.
Owain, the friend I loved, is dead!
Woe is it that on him the ravens feed!

THE FATE OF HOEL, SON OF THE GREAT CIAN

[From various expressions used by Aneurin in different parts of his great poem, it is evident that the warriors of whom he sang fortified themselves, before entering the field of battle, with unstinted libations of that favorite intoxicant of those days, sweet mead. He mentions the condition of the warriors as they started for the fray, and tells of Hoel's fate. This son of Cian had married the daughter of one of the Bryneish. His marriage caused no abatement of a feud existing between the tribes to which the husband and wife respectively belonged. He repudiated her family, disdained to take her away, and was sought and slain by her insulted father.]

The warriors marched to Cattræth, full of mead;
Drunken, but firm of array: great the shame,
But greater the valor no bard can defame.
The war-dogs fought fiercely, red swords seemed to bleed.
Flesh and soul, I had slain thee, myself, had I thought,
Son of Cian, my friend, that thy faith had been bought
By a bribe from the tribe of the Bryneish! But no;
He scorned to take dowry from hands of the foe,
And I, all unhurt, lost a friend in the fight,
Whom the wrath of a father felled down for the slight.

THE GIANT GWRVELING FALLS AT LAST

[The bard tells the story of Gwrveling's revelry, impulsive bravery,
and final slaughter of the foe before yielding to their prowess.]

he earliest recorded utterances of a race, whether in poetry or in prose, become to the representatives of this race in later days a treasure beyond price. The value of such monuments of the remote past is manifold. In them we first begin to become really acquainted with ancestors of the people of to-day, even though we may have read in the pages of earlier writers of alien descent much that is of great concurrent interest. Through the medium of the native saga, epic, and meagre chronicle, we see for the first time their real though dim outlines, moving in and out of the mists that obscure the dawn of history; and these outlines become more and more distinct as the literary remains of succeeding periods become more abundant and present more varied aspects of life. We come gradually to know what manner of men and women were these ancestors, what in peace and in war were their customs, what their family and social relations, their food and drink, their dress, their systems of law and government, their religion and morals, what were their art instincts, what were their ideals.

This is essential material for the construction of history in its complete sense. And this evidence, when subjected to judicious criticism, is trustworthy; for the ancient story-teller and poet reflects the customs and ideas and ideals of his own time, even though the combination of agencies and the preternatural proportions of the actors and their deeds belong to the imagination. The historian must know how to supplement and to give life and interest to the colorless succession of dates, names, and events of the chronicler, by means of these imaginative yet truth-bearing creations of the poet.

Remnants of ancient poetry and legend have again an immediate value in proportion as they exhibit a free play of fine imagination; that is, according as they possess the power of stirring to response the aesthetic feeling of subsequent ages,--as they possess the true poetic quality. This gift of imagination varies greatly among races as among individuals, and the earliest manifestations of it frequently throw a clear light upon apparently eccentric tendencies developed in a literature in later times.

For these reasons, added to a natural family pride in them, the early literary monuments of the Anglo-Saxons should be cherished by us as among the most valued possessions of the race.

The first Teutonic language to be reduced to writing was the Moeso-Gothic. Considerable portions of a translation of the Bible into that language, made by Bishop Ulfilas in the fourth century, still remain. But this cannot be called the beginning of a literature; for there is no trace of original creative impulse. The Gothic movement, too, seems to have ceased immediately after its beginning. It is elsewhere that we must seek for the rise of a real Teutonic literature. We shall not find it till after the lapse of several centuries; and we find it not among the tribes that remained in the fatherland, nor with those that had broken into and conquered parts of the Roman empire, only to be absorbed and to blend with other races into Romanic nations. The proud distinction belongs to the Low German tribes that had created an England in Britain.

The conquest of Britain by the Anglo-Saxons, begun in 449, seemed at first to promise only retrogression and the ruin of an existing civilization. These fierce barbarians found among the Celts of Britain a Roman culture, and the Christian religion exerting its influence for order and humanity. Their mission seemed to be to destroy both. In their original homes in the forests of northern Germany, they had come little if at all into contact with Roman civilization. At any rate, we may assume that they had felt no Roman influence capable of stemming their national and ethnical tendencies. We cannot yet solve the difficult problem of the extent of their mingling with the conquered Celts in Britain. In spite of learned opinions to the contrary, the evidence now available seems to point to only a small infusion of Celtic blood. The conquerors seem to have settled down to their new homes with all the heathenism and most of the barbarism they had brought from their old home, a Teutonic people still.

In these ruthless, plundering barbarians, whose very breath was battle, and who seemed for the time the very genius of disorder and ruin, there existed, nevertheless, potentialities of humanity, order, and enlightenment far exceeding those of the system they displaced. In all their barbarism there was a certain nobility; their courage was unflinching; the fidelity, even unto death, of thane to lord, repaid the open-handed generosity of lord to thane; they honored truth; and even after we allow for the exaggerated claims made for a chivalrous devotion that did not exist, we find that they held their women in higher respect than was usual even among many more enlightened peoples.

There are few more remarkable narratives in history than that of the facility and enthusiasm with which the Anglo-Saxons, a people conservative then as now to the degree of extreme obstinacy, accepted Christianity and the new learning which followed in the train of the new religion. After a few lapses into paganism in some localities, we find these people, who lately had swept Christian Britain with fire and sword, themselves became most zealous followers of Christ. Under the influence of the Roman missionaries who, under St. Augustine, had begun their work in the south in 597 among the Saxons and Jutes, and under the combined influence of Irish and Roman missionaries in the north and east among the Angles, theological and secular studies were pursued with avidity. By the end of the seventh century we find Anglo-Saxon missionaries, with St. Boniface at their head, carrying Christianity and enlightenment to the pagan German tribes on the Continent.

The torch had been passed to the Anglo-Saxon, and a new centre of learning, York,--the old Roman capital, now the chief city of the Northumbrian Angles,--became famous throughout Europe. Indeed, York seemed for a time the chief hope for preserving and advancing Christian culture; for the danger of a relapse into dense ignorance had become imminent in the rest of Europe. Bede, born about 673, a product of this Northumbrian culture, represented the highest learning of his day. He wrote a vast number of works in Latin, treating nearly all the branches of knowledge existing in his day. Alcuin, another Northumbrian, born about 735, was called by Charlemagne to be tutor for himself and his children, and to organize the educational system of his realm. Other great names might be added to show the extent and brilliancy of the new learning. It was more remarkable among the Angles; and only at a later day, when the great schools of the north had gone up in fire and smoke in the pitiless invasion of the Northmen, did the West Saxons become the leaders, almost the only representatives, of the literary impulse among the Anglo-Saxons.

It is significant that the first written English that we know of contains the first Christian English king's provision for peace and order in his kingdom. The laws of Athelbert, King of Kent, who died in 616, were written down early in the seventh century. This code, as it exists, is the oldest surviving monument of English prose. The laws of Ine, King of the West Saxons, were put into writing about 690. These collections can scarcely be said to have a literary value; but they are of the utmost importance as throwing light upon the early customs of our race, and the laws of Ine may be considered as the foundation of modern English law. Many of these laws were probably much older; but they were now first codified and systematically enforced. The language employed is direct, almost crabbed; but occasionally the Anglo-Saxon love of figure shows itself. To illustrate, I quote, after Brooke, from Earle's 'Anglo-Saxon Literature,' page 153:--

"In case any one burn a tree in a wood, and it came to light who did it, let him pay the full penalty, and give sixty shillings, because fire is a thief. If one fell in a wood ever so many trees, and it be found out afterwards, let him pay for three trees, each with thirty shillings. He is not required to pay for more of them, however many they may be, because the axe is a reporter, and not a thief." [The italicized sentences are evidently current sayings.]

But even these remains, important and interesting as they are, may not be called the beginning of a vernacular literature. It is among the Angles of Northumbria that we shall find the earliest native and truly literary awakening in England. Here we perceive the endeavor to do something more than merely to aid the memory of men in preserving necessary laws and records of important events. The imagination had become active. The impulse was felt to give expression to deep emotions, to sing the deeds and noble character of some hero embodying the loftiest ideals of the time and the race, to utter deep religious feeling. There was an effort to do this in a form showing harmony in theme and presentation. Here we find displayed a feeling for art, often crude, but still a true and native impulse. This activity produced or gave definite form to the earliest Anglo-Saxon poetry, a poetry often of a very high quality; perhaps never of the highest, but always of intense interest. We may claim even a greater distinction for the early fruit of Anglo-Saxon inspiration. Mr. Stopford Brooke says:--"With the exception of perhaps a few Welsh and Irish poems, it is the only vernacular poetry in Europe, outside of the classic tongues, which belongs to so early a time as the seventh and eighth centuries."

The oldest of these poems belong in all save their final form to the ancient days in Northern Germany. They bear evidence of transmission, with varying details, from gleeman to gleeman, till they were finally carried over to England and there edited, often with discordant interpolations and modifications, by Christian scribes. Tacitus tells us that at his time songs or poems were a marked feature in the life of the Germans; but we cannot trace the clue further. To these more ancient poems many others were added by Christian Northumbrian poets, and we find that a large body of poetry had grown up in the North before the movement was entirely arrested by the destroying Northmen. Not one of these poems, unless we except a few fragmentary verses, has come down to us in the Northumbrian dialect. Fortunately they had been transcribed by the less poetically gifted West Saxons into theirs, and it is in this form that we possess them.

This poetry shows in subject and in treatment very considerable range. We have a great poem, epic in character; poems partly narrative and partly descriptive; poems that may be classed as lyric or elegiac in character; a large body of verse containing a paraphrase of portions of the Bible; a collection of 'Riddles'; poems on animals, with morals; and others difficult to classify.

The regular verse-form was the alliterative, four-accent line, broken by a strongly marked cæsura into two half-lines, which were in early editions printed as short lines. The verse was occasionally extended to six accents. In the normal verse there were two alliterated words in the first half of the line, each of which received a strong accent; in the second half there was one accented word in alliteration with the alliterated words in the first half, and one other accented word not in alliteration. A great license was allowed as to the number of unaccented syllables, and as to their position in regard to the accented ones; and this lent great freedom and vigor to the verse. When well constructed and well read, it must have been very effective. There were of course many variations from the normal number, three, of alliterated words, as it would be impossible to find so many for every line.

Something of the quality of this verse-form may be felt in translations which aim at the same effect. Notice the result in the following from Professor Gummere's version of as election from 'Beowulf':--

In these verses it will be noted that the alliteration is complete in the first and third, and that in the second it is incomplete.

A marked feature of the Anglo-Saxon poetry is parallelism, or the repetition of an idea by means of new phrases or epithets, most frequently within the limits of a single sentence. This proceeds from the desire to emphasize attributes ascribed to the deity, or to some person or object prominent in the sentence. But while the added epithets have often a cumulative force, and are picturesque, yet it must be admitted that they sometimes do not justify their introduction. This may be best illustrated by an example. The following, in the translation of Earle, is Cædmon's first hymn, composed between 658 and 680, and the earliest piece of Anglo-Saxon poetry that we know to have had its origin in England:--

Many of the figurative expressions are exceedingly vigorous and poetic; some to our taste not so much so. Note the epithets in "the lank wolf," "the wan raven," "bird greedy for slaughter," "the dewy-winged eagle," "dusky-coated," "crooked-beaked," "horny-beaked," "the maid, fair-cheeked," "curly-locked," "elf-bright." To the Anglo-Saxon poet, much that we call metaphorical was scarcely more than literal statement. As the object pictured itself to his responsive imagination, he expressed it with what was to him a direct realism. His lines are filled with a profusion of metaphors of every degree of effectiveness. To him the sea was "the water-street," "the swan-path," "the strife of the waves," "the whale-path"; the ship was "the foamy-necked floater," "the wave-farer," "the sea-wood," "the sea-horse"; the arrow was "the battle adder"; the battle was "spear-play," "sword-play"; the prince was "the ring-giver," "the gold-friend"; the throne was "the gift-stool"; the body, "the bone-house"; the mind, "the breast-hoard."

Indeed, as it has been pointed out by many writers, the metaphor is almost the only figure of the Anglo-Saxon poetry. The more developed simile belongs to a riper and more reflective culture, and is exceedingly rare in this early native product. It has been noted that 'Beowulf,' a poem of three thousand one hundred and eighty-four lines, contains only four or five simple similes, and only one that is fully carried out. "The ship glides away likest to a bird," "The monster's eyes gleam like fire," are simple examples cited by Ten Brink, who gives also the elaborate one, "The sword-hilt melted, likened to ice, when the Father looseneth the chain of frost, and unwindeth the wave-ropes." But even this simile is almost obliterated by the crowding metaphors.

Intensity, an almost abrupt directness, a lack of explanatory detail, are more general characteristics, though in greatly varying degrees. As some critic has well said, the Anglo-Saxon poet seems to presuppose a knowledge of his subject-matter by those he addresses. Such a style is capable of great swiftness of movement, and is well suited to rapid description and narrative; but at times roughness or meagreness results.

The prevailing tone is one of sadness. In the lyric poetry, this is so decided that all the Anglo-Saxon lyrics have been called elegies. This note seems to be the echo of the struggle with an inhospitable climate, dreary with rain, ice, hail, and snow; and of the uncertainties of life, and the certainty of death. Suffering was never far off, and everything was in the hands of Fate. This is true at least of the earlier poetry, and the note is rarely absent even in the Christian lyrics. A more cheerful strain is sometimes heard, as in the 'Riddles,' but it is rather the exception; and any alleged humor is scarcely more than a suspicion. Love and sentiment, in the modern sense, are not made the subject of Anglo-Saxon poetry, and this must mean that they did not enter into the Anglo-Saxon life with the same intensity as into modern life. The absence of this beautiful motive has, to some degree, its compensation in the exceeding moral purity of the whole literature. It is doubtful whether it has its equal in this respect.

Anglo-Saxon prose displays, as a general thing, a simple, direct, and clear style. There is, of course, a considerable difference between the prose of the earlier and that of the later period, and individual writers show peculiarities. It displays throughout a marked contrast with the poetic style, in its freedom from parallelisms in thought and phrase, from inversions, archaisms, and the almost excessive wealth of metaphor and epithet. In its early stages, there is apparent perhaps a poverty of resource, a lack of flexibility; but this charge cannot be sustained against the best prose of the later period. In the translations from the Latin it shows a certain stiffness, and becomes sometimes involved, in the too conscientious effort of the translator to follow the classic original.

No attempt will be made here to notice, or even to name, all the large number of literary works of the Anglo-Saxons. It must be sufficient to examine briefly a few of the most important and characteristic productions of this really remarkable and prolific movement.

The 'Song of Widsith, the Far Traveler,' is now generally conceded to be, in part at least, the oldest existing Anglo-Saxon poem. We do not know when it assumed its present form; but it is certain that it was after the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons, since it has interpolations from the Christian scribe. The poem seems to give evidence of being a growth from an original song by a wandering scôp, or poet, who claims to have visited the Gothic king Eormanric, "the grim violator of treaties," who died in 375 or 376. But other kings are mentioned who lived in the first half of the sixth century. It is probable, then, that it was begun in the fourth century, and having been added to by successive gleemen, as it was transmitted orally, was finally completed in the earlier part of the sixth. It was then carried over to England, and there first written down in Northumbria. It possesses great interest because of its antiquity, and because of the light it throws upon the life of the professional singer in those ancient times among the Teutons. It has a long list of kings and places, partly historical, partly mythical or not identified. The poem, though narrative and descriptive, is also lyrical. We find here the strain of elegiac sadness, of regretful retrospection, so generally present in Anglo-Saxon poetry of lyric character, and usually much more pronounced than in 'Widsith.'

'Beowulf' is, in many respects, the most important poetical monument of the Anglo-Saxons. The poem is undoubtedly of heathen origin, and the evidence that it was a gradual growth, the result of grouping several distinct songs around one central figure, seems unmistakable. We may trace it, in its earliest stages, to the ancient home of the Angles in North Germany. It was transplanted to England in the migration of the tribes, and was edited in the present form by some unknown Northumbrian poet. When this occurred we do not know certainly, but there seems good reason for assuming the end of the seventh or the beginning of the eighth century as the time.

The poem is epic in cast and epic in proportion. Although, judged by the Homeric standard, it falls short in many respects of the complete form, yet it may without violence be called an epic. The central figure, Beowulf, a nobly conceived hero, possessing immense strength, unflinching courage, a never-swerving sense of honor, magnanimity, and generosity, the friend and champion of the weak against evil however terrible, is the element of unity in the whole poem. It is in itself a great honor to the race that they were able to conceive as their ideal a hero so superior in all that constitutes true nobility to the Greek ideal, Achilles. It is true that the poem consists of two parts, connected by little more than the fact that they have the same hero at different times of life; that episodes are introduced that do not blend perfectly into the unity of the poem; and that there is a lack of repose and sometimes of lucidity. Yet there is a dignity and vigor, and a large consistency in the treatment of the theme, that is epic. Ten Brink says:--"The poet's intensity is not seldom imparted to the listener.... The portrayals of battles, although much less realistic than the Homeric descriptions, are yet at times superior to them, in so far as the demoniac rage of war elicits from the Germanic fancy a crowding affluence of vigorous scenes hastily projected in glittering lights of grim half gloom." In addition to its great poetic merit, 'Beowulf' is of the greatest importance to us on account of the many fine pictures of ancient Teutonic life it presents.

In the merest outline, the argument of 'Beowulf' is as follows:--Hrothgar, King of the Gar-Danes, has built a splendid hall, called Heorot. This is the scene of royal festivity until a monster from the fen, Grendel, breaks into it by night and devours thirty of the king's thanes. From that time the hall is desolate, for no one can cope with Grendel, and Hrothgar is in despair. Beowulf, the noble hero of the Geats, in Sweden, hears of the terrible calamity, and with fourteen companions sails across the sea to undertake the adventure. Hrothgar receives him joyfully, and after a splendid banquet gives Heorot into his charge. During the following night, Beowulf is attacked by Grendel; and after one of his companions has been slain, he tears out the arm of the monster, who escapes, mortally hurt, to his fen. On the morrow all is rejoicing; but when night falls, the monster's mother attacks Heorot, and kills Hrothgar's favorite thane. The next day, Beowulf pursues her to her den under the waters of the fen, and after a terrific combat slays her. The hero returns home to Sweden laden with gifts. This ends the main thread of the first incident. In the second incident, after an interval of fifty years, we find Beowulf an old man. He has been for many years king of the Geats. A fire-breathing dragon, the guardian of a great treasure, is devastating the land. The heroic old king, accompanied by a party of thanes, attacks the dragon. All the thanes save one are cowardly; but the old hero, with the aid of the faithful one, slays the dragon, not, however, till he is fatally injured. Then follow his death and picturesque burial.

In this sketch, stirring episodes, graphic descriptions, and fine effects are all sacrificed. The poem itself is a noble one and the English people may well be proud of preserving in it the first epic production of the Teutonic race.

The 'Fight at Finnsburg' is a fine fragment of epic cast. The Finn saga is at least as old as the Beowulf poem, since the gleeman at Hrothgar's banquet makes it his theme. From the fragment and the gleeman's song we perceive that the situation here is much more complex than is usual in Anglo-Saxon poems, and involves a tragic conflict of passion. Hildeburh's brother is slain through the treachery of her husband, Finn; her son, partaking of Finn's faithlessness, falls at the hands of her brother's men; in a subsequent counterplot, her husband is slain. Besides the extraordinary vigor of the narrative, the theme has special interest in that a woman is really the central figure, though not treated as a heroine.

A favorite theme in the older lyric poems is the complaint of some wandering scôp, driven from his home by the exigencies of those perilous times. Either the singer has been bereft of his patron by death, or he has been supplanted in his favor by some successful rival; and he passes in sorrowful review his former happiness, and contrasts it with his present misery. The oldest of these lyrics are of pagan origin, though usually with Christian additions.

In the 'Wanderer,' an unknown poet pictures the exile who has fled across the sea from his home. He is utterly lonely. He must lock his sorrow in his heart. In his dream he embraces and kisses his lord, and lays his head upon his knee, as of old. He awakes, and sees nothing but the gray sea, the snow and hail, and the birds dipping their wings in the waves. And so he reflects: the world is full of care; we are all in the hands of Fate. Then comes the Christian sentiment: happy is he who seeks comfort with his Father in heaven, with whom alone all things are enduring.

Another fine poem of this class, somewhat similar to the 'Wanderer,' is the 'Seafarer.' It is, however, distinct in detail and treatment, and has its own peculiar beauty. In the 'Fortunes of Men,' the poet treats the uncertainty of all things earthly, from the point of view of the parent forecasting the ill and the good the future may bring to his sons. 'Deor's Lament' possesses a genuine lyrical quality of high order. The singer has been displaced by a rival, and finds consolation in his grief from reciting the woes that others have endured, and reflects in each instance, "That was got over, and so this may be." Other poems on other subjects might be noticed here; as 'The Husband's Message,' where the love of husband for wife is the theme, and 'The Ruin,' which contains reflections suggested by a ruined city.

It is a remarkable fact that only two of these poets are known to us by name, Cædmon and Cynewulf. We find the story of the inspiration, work, and death of Cædmon, the earlier of these, told in the pages of Bede. The date of his birth is not given, but his death fell in 680. He was a Northumbrian, and was connected in a lay capacity with the great monastery of Whitby. He was uneducated, and not endowed in his earlier life with the gift of song. One night, after he had fled in mortification from a feast where all were required to improvise and sing, he received, as he slept, the divine inspiration. The next day he made known his new gift to the authorities of the monastery. After he had triumphantly made good his claims, he was admitted to holy orders, and began his work of paraphrasing into noble verse portions of the Scriptures that were read to him. Of the body of poetry that comes down to us under his name, we cannot be sure that any is his, unless we except the short passage given here. It is certainly the work of different poets, and varies in merit. The evidence seems conclusive that he was a poet of high order, that his influence was very great, and that many others wrote in his manner. The actors and the scenery of the Cædmonian poetry are entirely Anglo-Saxon, only the names and the outline of the narrative being biblical; and the spirit of battle that breathes in some passages is the same that we find in the heathen epic.

Cynewulf was most probably a Northumbrian, though this is sometimes questioned. The dates of his birth and death are unknown. It seems established, however, that his work belongs to the eighth century. A great deal of controversy has arisen over a number of poems that have been ascribed to him and denied to him with equal persistency. But we stand upon sure ground in regard to four poems, the 'Christ,' the 'Fates of the Apostles,' 'Juliana,' and 'Elene'; for he has signed them in runes. If the runic enigma in the first of the 'Riddles' has been correctly interpreted, then they, or portions of them, are his also. But about this there is much doubt. The 'Andreas' and the 'Dream of the Rood' may be mentioned as being of exceptional interest among the poems that are almost certainly his. In the latter, he tells, in a personal strain, the story of the appearance to him of the holy cross, and of his conversion and dedication of himself to the service of Christ. The 'Elene,' generally considered the finest of his poems, is the story of the miraculous finding of the holy cross by St. Helena, the mother of the Emperor Constantine. The poet has lent great charm to the tradition in his treatment. The poem sounds a triumphant note throughout, till we reach the epilogue, where the poet speaks in his own person and in a sadder tone.

The quality of Cynewulf's poetry is unequal; but when he is at his best, he is a great poet and a great artist. His personality appears in direct subjective utterance more plainly than does that of any other Anglo-Saxon poet.

While we must pass over many fine Anglo-Saxon poems without mention, there are two that must receive some notice. 'Judith' is an epic based upon the book of Judith in the 'Apocrypha.' Only about one-fourth of it has survived. The author is still unknown, in spite of many intelligent efforts to determine to whom the honor belongs. The dates assigned to it vary from the seventh to the tenth century; here, too, uncertainty prevails: but we are at least sure that it is one of the best of the Anglo-Saxon poems. It has been said that this work shows a more definite plan and more conscious art than any other Anglo-Saxon poem. Brooke finds it sometimes conventional in the form of expression, and denies it the highest rank for that reason. But he does not seem to sustain the charge. The two principal characters, the dauntless Judith and the brutal Holofernes, stand out with remarkable distinctness, and a fine dramatic quality has been noted by several critics. The epithets and metaphors, the description of the drunken debauch, and the swift, powerful narrative of the battle and the rout of the Assyrians, are in the best Anglo-Saxon epic strain. The poem is distinctly Christian; for the Hebrew heroine, with a naïve anachronism, prays thus: "God of Creation, Spirit of Consolation, Son of the Almighty, I pray for Thy mercy to me, greatly in need of it. Glory of the Trinity."

'The Battle of Maldon' is a ballad, containing an account of a fight between the Northmen and the East Saxons under the Aldorman, Byrhtnoth. The incident is mentioned in one MS. of the Chronicle under the date of 991; in another, under the date of 993. The poem is exceedingly graphic. The poet seems filled with intense feeling, and may have been a spectator, or may indeed have taken part in the struggle. He tells how the brave old Aldorman disdains to use the advantage of his position, which bade fair to give him victory. Like a boy, he cannot take a dare, but fatuously allows the enemy to begin the battle upon an equal footing with his own men. He pays for his noble folly with his life and the defeat of his army. The devotion of the Aldorman's hearth-companions, who refuse to survive their lord, and with brave words meet their death, is finely described. But not all are true; some, who have been especially favored, ignobly flee. These are treated with the racial contempt for cowards. The poem has survived in fragmentary form, and the name of the poet is not known.

As distinguished from all poetical remains of such literature, the surviving prose of the Anglo-Saxons, though extensive, and of the greatest interest and value, is less varied in subject and manner than their poetry. It admits of brief treatment. The earliest known specimens of Anglo-Saxon prose writing have been already mentioned. These do not constitute the beginning of a literature, yet, with the rest of the extensive collection of Anglo-Saxon laws that has survived, they are of the greatest importance to students. Earle quotes Dr. Reinhold Schmid as saying, "No other Germanic nation has bequeathed to us out of its earliest experience so rich a treasure of original legal documents as the Anglo-Saxon nation has,"--only another instance of the precocity of our ancestors.

To the West Saxons belongs nearly the whole of Anglo-Saxon prose. Whatever may have existed in Northumbria perished in the inroads of the Northmen, except such parts as may have been incorporated in West Saxon writings. It will be remembered, however, that the great Northumbrian prose writers had held to the Latin as their medium. The West Saxon prose literature may be said to begin in Alfred's reign.

The most important production that we have to consider is the famous Anglo-Saxon 'Chronicle.' It covers with more or less completeness the period from 449 to 1154. This was supplemented by fanciful genealogies leading back to Woden, or even to Adam. It is not known when the practice of jotting down in the native speech notices of contemporary events began, but probably in very early times. It is believed, however, that no intelligent effort to collect and present them with order and system was made until the middle of the ninth century. In the oldest of the seven MSS. in which it has come down to us, we have the 'Chronicle' to 891, as it was written down in Alfred's time and probably under his supervision.

The meagreness of the earliest entries and the crudeness of the language, together with occasional picturesque force, indicate that many of them were drawn from current song or tradition. The style and fullness of the entries differ greatly throughout, as might be expected, since the 'Chronicle' is the work of so many hands. From mere bare notices they vary to strong, full narrative and description. Indeed, the 'Chronicle' contains some of the most effective prose produced by the Anglo-Saxons; and in one instance, under the date 937, the annalist describes the battle of Brunanburh in a poem of considerable merit. But we know the name of no single contributor.

This 'Chronicle' is the oldest and most important work of the kind produced outside of the classical languages in Europe. It is meagre in places, and its entire trustworthiness has been questioned. But it and Bede's 'Ecclesiastical History,' supplemented by other Anglo-Saxon writings, constitute the basis of early English history; and this fact alone entitles it to the highest rank in importance among ancient documents.

A large body of Anglo-Saxon prose, nearly all of it translation or adaptation of Latin works, has come down to us under the name of King Alfred. A peculiar interest attaches to these works. They belong to a period when the history of England depended more than at any other time upon the ability and devotion of one man; and that man, the most heroic and the greatest of English kings, was himself the author of them.

When Alfred became king, in 871, his throne seemed tottering to its fall. Practically all the rest of England was at the feet of the ruthless Northmen, and soon Alfred himself was little better than a fugitive. But by his military skill, which was successful if not brilliant, and by his never-wavering devotion and English persistency, he at last freed the southern part of the island from his merciless and treacherous enemies, and laid the firm foundation of West Saxon supremacy. If Alfred had failed in any respect to be the great king that he was, English history would have been changed for all time.

Although Alfred had saved his kingdom, yet it was a kingdom almost in ruins. The hopeful advance of culture had been entirely arrested. The great centres of learning had been utterly destroyed in the north, and little remained intact in the south. And even worse than this was the demoralization of all classes, and an indisposition to renewed effort. There was, moreover, a great scarcity of books.

Alfred showed himself as great in peace as in war, and at once set to work to meet all those difficulties. To supply the books that were so urgently needed, he found time in the midst of his perplexing cares to translate from the Latin into the native speech such works as he thought would supply the most pressing want. This was the more necessary from the prevailing ignorance of Latin. It is likely that portions of the works that go under his name were produced under his supervision by carefully selected co-workers. But it is certain that in a large part of them we may see the work of the great Alfred's own hand.

He has used his own judgment in these translations, omitting whatever he did not think would be immediately helpful to his people, and making such additions as he thought might be of advantage. Just these additions have the greatest interest for us. He translated, for instance, Orosius's 'History'; a work in itself of inferior worth, but as an attempt at a universal history from the Christian point of view, he thought it best suited to the needs of his people. The Anglo-Saxon version contains most interesting additions of original matter by Alfred. They consist of accounts of the voyages of Ohtere, a Norwegian, who was the first, so far as we know, to sail around the North Cape and into the White Sea, and of Wulfstan, who explored parts of the coast of the Baltic. These narratives give us our first definite information about the lands and people of these regions, and appear to have been taken down by the king directly as related by the explorers. Alfred added to this 'History' also a description of Central Europe, which Morley calls "the only authentic record of the Germanic nations written by a contemporary so early as the ninth century."

In Gregory's 'Pastoral Care' we have Alfred's closest translation. It is a presentation of "the ideal Christian pastor" (Ten Brink), and was intended for the benefit of the lax Anglo-Saxon priests. Perhaps the work that appealed most strongly to Alfred himself was Boethius's 'Consolations of Philosophy'; and in his full translation and adaptation of this book we see the hand and the heart of the good king. We shall mention one other work of Alfred's, his translation of the already frequently mentioned 'Historia Ecclesiastica Anglorum' of the Venerable Bede. This great work Alfred, with good reason, considered to be of the greatest possible value to his people; and the king has given it additional value for us.

Alfred was not a great scholar. The wonder is that, in the troublous times of his youth, he had learned even the rudiments. The language in his translations, however, though not infrequently affected for the worse by the Latin idiom of the original, is in the main free from ornament of any kind, simple and direct, and reflects in its sincerity the noble character of the great king.

The period between the death of Alfred (901) and the end of the tenth century was deficient in works of literary value, except an entry here and there in the 'Chronicle.' "Alfric's is the last great name in the story of our literature before the Conquest," says Henry Morley. He began writing about the end of the tenth century, and we do not know when his work and his life ended. This gentle priest, as he appears to us through his writings, following Alfred's example, wrote not from personal ambition, but for the betterment of his fellow-men. His style is eminently lucid, fluent, forcible, and of graceful finish. Earle observes of it:--"The English of these Homilies is splendid; indeed, we may confidently say that here English appears fully qualified to be the medium of the highest learning." This is high praise, and should be well considered by those disposed to consider the Anglo-Saxon as a rude tongue, incapable of great development in itself, and only enabled by the Norman infusion to give expression to a deep and broad culture.

Alfric's works in Anglo-Saxon--for he wrote also in Latin--were very numerous, embracing two series of homilies, theological writings of many kinds, translations of portions of the Bible, an English (Anglo-Saxon) grammar, adapted from a Latin work, a Latin dictionary, and many other things of great use in their day and of great interest in ours.

The names of other writers and of other single works might well be added here. But enough has been said, perhaps, to show that a great and hopeful development of prose took place among the West Saxons. It must be admitted that the last years of the Anglo-Saxon nationality before the coming of the Normans show a decline in literary productiveness of a high order. The causes of this are to be found chiefly in the political and ecclesiastical history of the time. Wars with the Northmen, internal dissensions, religious controversies, the greater cultivation of Latin by the priesthood, all contributed to it. But hopeful signs of a new revival were not wanting. The language had steadily developed with the enlightenment of the people, and was fast becoming fit to meet any demands that might be made upon it, when the great catastrophe of the Norman Conquest came, and with it practically the end of the historical and distinctive Anglo-Saxon literature.

[The Spear-Danes intrust the dead body of King Scyld to the sea, in a splendidly adorned ship. He had come to them mysteriously, alone in a ship, when an infant.]

At the hour that was fated
Scyld then departed to the All-Father's keeping
War-like to wend him; away then they bare him
To the flood of the current, his fond-loving comrades.
As himself he had bidden, while the friend of the Scyldings
Word-sway wielded, and the well-lovèd land prince
Long did rule them. The ring-stemmèd vessel,
Bark of the atheling, lay there at anchor,
Icy in glimmer and eager for sailing;
The beloved leader laid they down there,
Giver of rings, on the breast of the vessel,
The famed by the mainmast. A many of jewels,
Of fretted embossings, from far-lands brought over,
Was placed near at hand then; and heard I not ever
That a folk ever furnished a float more superbly
With weapons of warfare, weeds for the battle,
Bills and burnies; on his bosom sparkled
Many a jewel that with him must travel
On the flush of the flood afar on the current.
And favors no fewer they furnished him soothly,
Excellent folk-gems, than others had given him
Lone on the main, the merest of infants:
And a gold-fashioned standard they stretched under heaven
High o'er his head, let the holm-currents bear him,
Seaward consigned him: sad was their spirit,
Their mood very mournful. Men are not able
Soothly to tell us, they in halls who reside,
Heroes under heaven, to what haven he hied.

They guard the wolf-coverts,

Lands inaccessible, wind-beaten nesses,
Fearfullest fen-deeps, where a flood from the mountains
'Neath mists of the nesses netherward rattles,
The stream under earth: not far is it henceward
Measured by mile-lengths the mere-water standeth,
Which forests hang over, with frost-whiting covered,
A firm-rooted forest, the floods overshadow.
There ever at night one an ill-meaning portent,
A fire-flood may see; 'mong children of men
None liveth so wise that wot of the bottom;
Though harassed by hounds the heath-stepper seek for,
Fly to the forest, firm-antlered he-deer,
Spurred from afar, his spirit he yieldeth,
His life on the shore, ere in he will venture
To cover his head. Uncanny the place is:
Thence upward ascendeth the surging of waters,
Wan to the welkin, when the wind is stirring
The weather unpleasing, till the air groweth gloomy,
Then the heavens lower.

[Beowulf has plunged into the water of the mere in pursuit of Grendel's mother, and is a whole day in reaching the bottom. He is seized by the monster and carried to her cavern, where the combat ensues.]

The earl then discovered he was down in some cavern
Where no water whatever anywise harmed him,
And the clutch of the current could come not anear him,
Since the roofed-hall prevented; brightness a-gleaming,
Fire-light he saw, flashing resplendent.
The good one saw then the sea-bottom's monster,
The mighty mere-woman: he made a great onset
With weapon-of-battle; his hand not desisted
From striking; the war-blade struck on her head then
A battle-song greedy. The stranger perceived then
The sword would not bite, her life would not injure,
But the falchion failed the folk-prince when straitened:
Erst had it often onsets encountered,
Oft cloven the helmet, the fated one's armor;
'Twas the first time that ever the excellent jewel
Had failed of its fame. Firm-mooded after,
Not heedless of valor, but mindful of glory
Was Higelac's kinsman; the hero-chief angry
Cast then his carved-sword covered with jewels
That it lay on the earth, hard and steel-pointed;
He hoped in his strength, his hand-grapple sturdy.
So any must act whenever he thinketh
To gain him in battle glory unending,
And is reckless of living. The lord of the War-Geats
(He shrank not from battle) seized by the shoulder
The mother of Grendel; then mighty in struggle
Swung he his enemy, since his anger was kindled,
That she fell to the floor. With furious grapple
She gave him requital early thereafter,
And stretched out to grab him; the strongest of warriors
Faint-mooded stumbled, till he fell in his traces,
Foot-going champion. Then she sat on the hall-guest
And wielded her war-knife wide-bladed, flashing,
For her son would take vengeance, her one only bairn,
His breast-armor woven bode on his shoulder;
It guarded his life, the entrance defended
'Gainst sword-point and edges. Ecgtheow's son there
Had fatally journeyed, champion of Geatmen,
In the arms of the ocean, had the armor not given,
Close-woven corselet, comfort and succor,
And had God Most Holy not awarded the victory,
All-knowing lord; easily did heaven's
Ruler most righteous arrange it with justice;
Uprose he erect ready for battle.
Then he saw 'mid the war-gems a weapon of victory,
An ancient giant-sword, of edges a-doughty,
Glory of warriors: of weapons 'twas choicest,
Only 'twas larger than any man else was
Able to bear to the battle-encounter,
The good and splendid work of the giants.
He grasped then the sword-hilt, knight of the Scyldings,
Bold and battle-grim, brandished his ring-sword.
Hopeless of living, hotly he smote her,
That the fiend-woman's neck firmly it grappled,
Broke through her bone-joints, the bill fully pierced her
Fate-cursed body, she fell to the ground then:
The hand-sword was bloody, the hero exulted.

[Fifty years have elapsed. The aged Beowulf has died from the injuries received in his struggle with the Fire Drake. His body is burned, and a barrow erected.]

A folk of the Geatmen got him then ready
A pile on the earth strong for the burning,
Behung with helmets, hero-knight's targets,
And bright-shining burnies, as he begged they should have them;
Then wailing war-heroes their world-famous chieftain,
Their liege-lord beloved, laid in the middle.
Soldiers began then to make on the barrow
The largest of dead fires: dark o'er the vapor
The smoke cloud ascended; the sad-roaring fire,
Mingled with weeping (the-wind-roar subsided)
Till the building of bone it had broken to pieces,
Hot in the heart. Heavy in spirit
They mood-sad lamented the men-leader's ruin....
The men of the Weders made accordingly
A hill on the height, high and extensive,
Of sea-going sailors to be seen from a distance,
And the brave one's beacon built where the fire was,
In ten days' space, with a wall surrounded it,
As wisest of world-folk could most worthily plan it.
They placed in the barrow rings and jewels,
All such ornaments as erst in the treasure
War-mooded men had won in possession:
The earnings of earlmen to earth they intrusted,
The gold to the dust, where yet it remaineth
As useless to mortals as in foregoing eras.
'Round the dead-mound rode then the doughty-in-battle,
Bairns of all twelve of the chiefs of the people,
More would they mourn, lament for their ruler,
Speak in measure, mention him with pleasure;
Weighed his worth, and his warlike achievements
Mightily commended, as 'tis meet one praise his
Liege lord in words and love him in spirit,
When forth from his body he fares to destruction.
So lamented mourning the men of the Geats,
Fond loving vassals, the fall of their lord,
Said he was gentlest of kings under heaven,
Mildest of men and most philanthropic,
Friendliest to folk-troops and fondest of honor.

By permission of John Leslie Hall, the Translator, and D.C. Heath & Co., Publishers.

DEOR'S LAMENT

Wayland often wandered in exile,
doughty earl, ills endur'd,
had for comrades care and longing,
winter-cold wandering; woe oft found
since Nithhad brought such need upon him,--
laming wound on a lordlier man.

That pass'd over,--and this may, too!

In Beadohild's breast, her brothers' death
wrought no such ill as her own disgrace,
when she had openly understood
her maidhood vanished; she might no wise
think how the case could thrive at all.

That pass'd over,--and this may, too!

We have heard enough of Hild's disgrace;
heroes of Geat were homeless made,
and sorrow stole their sleep away.

That pass'd over,--and this may, too!

Theodoric held for thirty winters
Mæring's burg, as many have known.

That pass'd over,--and this may, too!

We have also heard of Ermanric's
wolfish mind; wide was his sway
o'er the Gothic race,--a ruler grim.
Sat many a man in misery bound,
waited but woe, and wish'd amain
that ruin might fall on the royal house.

That pass'd over,--and this may, too!

Sitteth one sighing, sunder'd from happiness;
all's dark within him; he deems forsooth
that his share of evils shall endless be.
Let such bethink him that thro' this world
mighty God sends many changes:
to earls a plenty honor he shows,
ease and bliss; to others, sorrow.

Now I will say of myself, and how
I was singer once to the sons of Heoden,
dear to my master, and Deor was my name.
Long were the winters my lord was kind,
happy my lot,--till Heorrenda now
by grace of singing has gained the land
which the "haven of heroes" erewhile gave me.

That pass'd over,--and this may, too!

Translation of F.B. Gummere in the Atlantic Monthly, February, 1891: by permission of Houghton, Mifflin and Company.

THE SEAFARER

Sooth the song that I of myself can sing,
Telling of my travels; how in troublous days,
Hours of hardship oft I've borne!
With a bitter breast-care I have been abiding;
Many seats of sorrow in my ship have known!
Frightful was the whirl of waves when it was my part
Narrow watch at night to keep on my Vessel's prow
When it rushed the rocks along. By the rigid cold
Fast my feet were pinched, fettered by the frost,
By the chains of cold. Care was sighing then
Hot my heart around; hunger rent to shreds
Courage in me, me sea-wearied! This the man knows not,
He to whom it happens, happiest on earth,
How I, carked with care, in the ice-cold sea,
Overwent the winter on my wander-ways,
All forlorn of happiness, all bereft of loving kinsmen,
Hung about with icicles; flew the hail in showers.
Nothing heard I there save the howling of the sea,
And the ice-chilled billow, 'whiles the crying of the swan.
All the glee I got me was the gannet's scream,
And the swoughing of the seal, 'stead of mirth of men;
'Stead of the mead-drinking, moaning of the sea-mew.
There the storms smote on the crags, there the swallow of the sea
Answered to them, icy-plumed; and that answer oft the earn--
Wet his wings were--barked aloud.

None of all my kinsmen

Could this sorrow-laden soul stir to any joy.
Little then does he believe who life's pleasure owns,
While he tarries in the towns, and but trifling ills,
Proud and insolent with wine--how out-wearied I
Often must outstay on the ocean path!
Sombre grew the shade of night, and it snowed from northward,
Frost the field enchained, fell the hail on earth,
Coldest of all grains.

Wherefore now then crash together

Thoughts my soul within that I should myself adventure
The high streamings of the sea, and the sport of the salt waves!
For a passion of the mind every moment pricks me on
All my life to set a faring; so that far from hence,
I may seek the shore of the strange outlanders.
Yes, so haughty of his heart is no hero on the earth,
Nor so good in all his giving, nor so generous in youth,
Nor so daring in his deed, nor so dear unto his lord,
That he has not always yearning unto his sea-faring,
To whatever work his Lord may have will to make for him.
For the harp he has no heart, nor for having of the rings,
Nor in woman is his weal, in the world he's no delight,
Nor in anything whatever save the tossing o'er the waves!
Oh, forever he has longing who is urged towards the sea.
Trees rebloom with blossoms, burghs are fair again,
Winsome are the wide plains, and the world is gay--
All doth only challenge the impassioned heart
Of his courage to the voyage, whosoever thus bethinks him,
O'er the ocean billows, far away to go.
Every cuckoo calls a warning, with his chant of sorrow!
Sings the summer's watchman, sorrow is he boding,
Bitter in the bosom's hoard. This the brave man wots not of,
Not the warrior rich in welfare--what the wanderer endures,
Who his paths of banishment, widest places on the sea.
For behold, my thought hovers now above my heart;
O'er the surging flood of sea now my spirit flies,
O'er the homeland of the whale--hovers then afar
O'er the foldings of the earth! Now again it flies to me
Full of yearning, greedy! Yells that lonely flier;
Whets upon the Whale-way irresistibly my heart,
O'er the storming of the seas!

Translation of Stopford Brooke.

THE FORTUNES OF MEN

Full often it falls out, by fortune from God,
That a man and a maiden may marry in this world,
Find cheer in the child whom they cherish and care for,
Tenderly tend it, until the time comes,
Beyond the first years, when the young limbs increasing
Grown firm with life's fullness, are formed for their work.
Fond father and mother so guide it and feed it,
Give gifts to it, clothe it: God only can know
What lot to its latter days life has to bring.
To some that make music in life's morning hour
Pining days are appointed of plaint at the close.
One the wild wolf shall eat, hoary haunter of wastes:
His mother shall mourn the small strength of a man.
One shall sharp hunger slay; one shall the storm beat down;
One be destroyed by darts, one die in war.
One shall live losing the light of his eyes,
Feel blindly with fingers; and one, lame of foot,
With sinew-wound wearily wasteth away,
Musing and mourning, with death in his mind.
One, failing feathers, shall fall from the height
Of the tall forest tree; yet he trips as though flying,
Plays proudly in air till he reaches the point
Where the woodgrowth is weak; life then whirls in his brain,
Bereft of his reason he sinks to the root,
Falls flat on the ground, his life fleeting away.
Afoot on the far-ways, his food in his hand,
One shall go grieving, and great be his need,
Press dew on the paths of the perilous lands
Where the stranger may strike, where live none to sustain.
All shun the desolate for being sad.
One the great gallows shall have in its grasp,
Stained in dark agony, till the soul's stay,
The bone-house, is bloodily all broken up;
When the harsh raven hacks eyes from the head,
The sallow-coated, slits the soulless man.
Nor can he shield from shame, scare with his hands,
Off from their eager feast prowlers of air.
Lost is his life to him, left is no breath,
Bleached on the gallows-beam bides he his doom;
Cold death-mists close round him called the Accursed.

---

One shall die by the dagger, in wrath, drenched with ale,
Wild through wine, on the mead bench, too swift with his words;
Through the hand that brings beer, through the gay boon companion,
His mouth has no measure, his mood no restraint;
Too lightly his life shall the wretched one lose,
Undergo the great ill, be left empty of joy.
When they speak of him slain by the sweetness of mead,
His comrades shall call him one killed by himself.

---

Some have good hap, and some hard days of toil;
Some glad glow of youth, and some glory in war,
Strength in the strife; some sling the stone, some shoot.

---

One shall handle the harp, at the feet of his hero
Sit and win wealth from the will of his Lord;
Still quickly contriving the throb of the cords,
The nail nimbly makes music, awakes a glad noise,
While the heart of the harper throbs, hurried by zeal.

Translation of Henry Morley.

FROM 'JUDITH'

[The Assyrian officers, obeying the commands of Holofernes, come to the carouse.]

They then at the feast proceeded to sit,
The proud to the wine-drinking, all his comrades-in-ill,
Bold mailèd-warriors. There were lofty beakers
Oft borne along the benches, also were cups and flagons
Full to the hall-sitters borne. The fated partook of them,
Brave warriors-with-shields, though the mighty weened not of it,
Awful lord of earls. Then was Holofernes,
Gold-friend of men, full of wine-joy:
He laughed and clamored, shouted and dinned,
That children of men from afar might hear
How the strong-minded both stormed and yelled,
Moody and mead-drunken, often admonished
The sitters-on-benches to bear themselves well.
Thus did the hateful one during all day
His liege-men loyal keep plying with wine,
Stout-hearted giver of treasure, until they lay in a swoon.

[Holofernes has been slain by Judith. The Hebrews, encouraged by her, surprise the drunken and sleeping Assyrians.]

Then the band of the brave was quickly prepared,
Of the bold for battle; stepped out the valiant
Men and comrades, bore their banners,
Went forth to fight straight on their way
The heroes 'neath helmets from the holy city
At the dawn itself; shields made a din,
Loudly resounded. Thereat laughed the lank
Wolf in the wood, and the raven wan,
Fowl greedy for slaughter: both of them knew
That for them the warriors thought to provide
Their fill on the fated; and flew on their track
The dewy-winged eagle eager for prey,
The dusky-coated sang his war-song,
The crooked-beaked. Stepped forth the warriors,
The heroes for battle with boards protected,
With hollow shields, who awhile before
The foreign-folk's reproach endured,
The heathens' scorn; fiercely was that
At the ash-spear's play to them all repaid,
All the Assyrians, after the Hebrews
Under their banners had boldly advanced
To the army-camps. They bravely then
Forthright let fly showers of arrows,
Of battle-adders, out from the horn-bows,
Of strongly-made shafts; stormed they aloud,
The cruel warriors, sent forth their spears
Among the brave; the heroes were angry,
The dwellers-in-land, with the loathed race;
The stern-minded stepped, the stout-in-heart,
Rudely awakened their ancient foes
Weary from mead; with hands drew forth
The men from the sheaths the brightly-marked swords
Most choice in their edges, eagerly struck
Of the host of Assyrians the battle-warriors,
The hostile-minded; not one they spared
Of the army-folk, nor low nor high
Of living men, whom they might subdue.

By consent of Ginn & Co. Translation of Garnett.

THE FIGHT AT MALDON

[The Anglo-Saxons under Byrhtnoth are drawn up on one side of Panta stream, the Northmen on the other. The herald of the Northmen demands tribute. Byrhtnoth replies.]

Then stood on the stathe, stoutly did call,
The wikings' herald, with words he spake,
Who boastfully bore from the brine-farers
An errand to th' earl, where he stood on the shore:--
"To thee me did send the seamen snell,
Bade to thee say, thou must send to them quickly
Bracelets for safety; and 'tis better for you
That ye this spear-rush with tribute buy off
Than we in so fierce a fight engage.
We need not each spill, if ye speed to this:
We will for the pay a peace confirm.
If thou that redest, who art highest in rank,
If thou to the seamen at their own pleasure
Money for peace, and take peace from us,
We will with the treasure betake us to ship,
Fare on the flood, and peace with you confirm."
Byrhtnoth replied, his buckler uplifted,
Waved his slim spear, with words he spake,
Angry and firm gave answer to him:--
"Hear'st thou, seafarer, what saith this folk?
They will for tribute spear-shafts you pay,
Poisonous points and trusty swords,
Those weapons that you in battle avail not.
Herald of seamen, hark back again,
Say to thy people much sadder words:--
Here stands not unknown an earl with his band,
Who will defend this fatherland,
Æthelred's home, mine own liege lord's,
His folk and field; ye're fated to fall,
Ye heathen, in battle. Too base it me seems
That ye with our scats to ship may go
Unfought against, so far ye now hither
Into our country have come within;
Ye shall not so gently treasure obtain;
Shall spear and sword sooner beseem us,
Grim battle-play, ere tribute we give."

[The Northmen, unable to force a passage, ask to be allowed to cross and fight it out on an equal footing. Byrhtnoth allows this.]

"Now room is allowed you, come quickly to us,
Warriors to war; wot God alone
Who this battle-field may be able to keep."
Waded the war-wolves, for water they recked not,
The wikings' band west over Panta,
O'er the clear water carried their shields,
Boatmen to bank their bucklers bore.
There facing their foes ready were standing
Byrhtnoth with warriors: with shields he bade
The war-hedgel work, and the war-band hold
Fast 'gainst the foes. Then fight was nigh,
Glory in battle; the time was come
That fated men should there now fall.
Then outcry was raised, the ravens circled,
Eagle eager for prey; on earth was uproar.
Then they let from their fists the file-hardened spears,
The darts well-ground, fiercely fly forth:
The bows were busy, board point received,
Bitter the battle-rush, warriors fell down,
On either hand the youths lay dead.

By consent of Ginn & Co. Translation of Garnett.

He [Cædmon] had remained in the secular life until the time when he was of advanced age, and he had never learned any song. For that reason oftentimes, when it was decided at a feasting that all should sing in turn to the accompaniment of the harp for the sake of entertainment, he would arise for shame from the banquet when he saw the harp approaching him, and would go home to his house. When he on a certain occasion had done this, and had left the house of feasting, and had gone to the stable of the cattle, which had been intrusted to his care for that night; and when he there, after a reasonable time, had arranged his limbs for rest, he fell asleep. And a man stood by him in a dream, and hailed him, and greeted him, and called him by name, and said: "Cædmon, sing something for me." Then he answered and said: "I cannot sing; I went out from the feast and came hither because I could not sing." Again said the one who was speaking with him: "Nevertheless, thou canst sing for me." Said Cædmon, "What shall I sing?" Said he, "Sing to me of creation."

When Cædmon received this answer, then began he soon to sing in glorification of God the Creator, verses and words that he had never before heard.

Then he arose from sleep and he had fast in his memory all those things he had sung in his sleep; and to these words he soon added many other words of song of the same measure, worthy for God.

Then came he in the morning to the town-reeve, who was his aldorman, and told him of the gift he had received. And the reeve soon led him to the abbess, and made that known to her and told her. Then bade she assemble all the very learned men, and the learners, and bade him tell the dream in their presence, and sing the song, so that by the judgment of them all it might be determined what it was, and whence it had come. Then it was seen by them all, just as it was, that the heavenly gift had been given him by the Lord himself.

Alfred's 'Bede': Translation of Robert Sharp.

Selection from the entry for the year 897

Then Alfred, the King, ordered long ships built to oppose the war-ships of the enemy. They were very nearly twice as long as the others; some had sixty oars, some more. They were both swifter and steadier, and also higher than the others; they were shaped neither on the Frisian model nor on the Danish, but as it seemed to King Alfred that they would be most useful.

Then, at a certain time in that year, came six hostile ships to Wight, and did much damage, both in Devon and elsewhere on the seaboard. Then the King ordered that nine of the new ships should proceed thither. And his ships blockaded the mouth of the passage on the outer-sea against the enemy. Then the Danes came out with three ships against the King's ships; but three of the Danish ships lay above the mouth, high and dry aground; and the men were gone off upon the shore. Then the King's men took two of the three ships outside, at the mouth, and slew the crews; but one ship escaped. On this one all the men were slain except five; these escaped because the King's ship got aground. They were aground, moreover, very inconveniently, since three were situated upon the same side of the channel with the three stranded Danish ships, and all the others were upon the other side, so that there could be no communication between the two divisions. But when the water had ebbed many furlongs from the ships, then went the Danes from their three ships to the King's three ships that had been left dry upon the same side by the ebbing of the tide, and they fought together there. Then were slain Lucumon, the King's Reeve, Wulfheard the Frisian, and Æbbe the Frisian, and Æthelhere the Frisian, and Æthelferth the King's companion, and of all the men Frisians and English, sixty-two; and of the Danes, one hundred and twenty.

But the flood came to the Danish ships before the Christians could shove theirs out, and for that reason the Danes rowed off. They were, nevertheless, so grievously wounded that they could not row around the land of the South Saxons, and the sea cast up there two of the ships upon the shore. And the men from them were led to Winchester to the King, and he commanded them to be hanged there. But the men who were in the remaining ship came to East Anglia, sorely wounded.

Translation of Robert Sharp.

n Italian poet and novelist of early promise, who has become a somewhat unique figure in contemporary literature, Gabriele d'Annunzio is a native of the Abruzzi, born in the little village of Pescara, on the Adriatic coast. Its picturesque scenery has formed the background for more than one of his stories. At the age of fifteen, while still a student at Prato, he published his first volume of poems, 'Intermezzo di Rime' (Interludes of Verse): "grand, plastic verse, of an impeccable prosody," as he maintained in their defense, but so daringly erotic that their appearance created no small scandal. Other poems followed at intervals, notably 'Il Canto Nuovo' (The New Song: Rome, 1882), 'Isotteo e la Chimera' (Isotteo and the Chimera: Rome, 1890), 'Poema Paradisiaco' and 'Odi Navali' (Marine Odes: Milan, 1893), which leave no doubt of his high rank as poet. The novel, however, is his chosen vehicle of expression, and the one which gives fullest scope to his rich and versatile genius. His first long story, 'Il Piacere' (Pleasure), appeared in 1889. As the title implies, it was pervaded with a frank, almost complacent sensuality, which its author has since been inclined to deprecate. Nevertheless, the book received merited praise for its subtle portrayal of character and incident, and its exuberance of phraseology; and more than all, for the promise which it suggested. With the publication of 'L'Innocente,' the author for the first time showed a real seriousness of purpose. His views of life had meanwhile essentially altered:--"As was just," he confessed, "I began to pay for my errors, my disorders, my excesses: I began to suffer with the same intensity with which I had formerly enjoyed myself; sorrow had made of me a new man." Accordingly his later books, while still emphatically realistic, are chastened by an underlying tone of pessimism. Passion is no longer the keynote of life, but rather, as exemplified in 'Il Trionfo della Morte,' the prelude of death. Leaving Rome, where, "like the outpouring of the sewers, a flood of base desires invaded every square and cross-road, ever more putrid and more swollen," D'Annunzio retired to Francovilla-al-Mare, a few miles from his birthplace. There he lives in seclusion, esteemed by the simple-minded, honest, and somewhat fanatical peasantry, to whose quaint and primitive manners his books owe much of their distinctive atmosphere.

In Italy, D'Annunzio's career has been watched with growing interest. Until recently, however, he was scarcely known to the world at large, when a few poems, translated into French, brought his name into immediate prominence. Within a year three Paris journals acquired rights of translation from him, and he has since occupied the attention of such authoritative French critics as Henri Rabusson, René Doumic, Edouard Rod, Eugène-Melchior de Vogüé, and, most recently, Ferdinand Brunetière, all of whom seem to have a clearer appreciation of his quality than even his critics at home. At the same time there is a small but hostile minority among the French novelists, whose literary feelings are voiced by Léon Daudet in a vehement protest under the title 'Assez d'Étrangers' (Enough of Foreigners).

It is too soon to pass final judgment on D'Annunzio's style, which has been undergoing an obvious transition, not yet accomplished. Realist and psychologist, symbolist and mystic by turns, and first and always a poet, he has been compared successively to Bourget and Maupassant, Tolstoi and Dostoïevsky, Théophile Gautier and Catulle Mendès, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and Baudelaire. Such complexity of style is the outcome of his cosmopolitan taste in literature, and his tendency to assimilate for future use whatever pleases him in each successive author. Shakespeare and Goethe, Keats and Heine, Plato and Zoroaster, figure among the names which throng his pages; while his unacknowledged and often unconscious indebtedness to writers of lesser magnitude,--notably the self-styled 'Sar' Joseph Peladan--has lately raised an outcry of plagiarism. Yet whatever leaves his pen, borrowed or original, has received the unmistakable imprint of his powerful individuality.

It is easy to trace the influences under which, successively, D'Annunzio has come. They are essentially French. He is a French writer in an Italian medium. His early short sketches, noteworthy chiefly for their morbid intensity, were modeled largely on Maupassant, whose frank, unblushing realism left a permanent imprint upon the style of his admirer, and whose later analytic tendency probably had an important share in turning his attention to the psychological school.

'Il Piacere,' though largely inspired by Paul Bourget, contains as large an element of 'Notre Coeur' and 'Bel-Ami' as of 'Le Disciple' and 'Coeur de Femme.' In this novel, Andrea Sperelli affords us the type of D'Annunzio's heroes, who, aside from differences due to age and environment, are all essentially the same,--somewhat weak, yet undeniably attractive; containing, all of them, "something of a Don Juan and a Cherubini," with the Don Juan element preponderating. The plot of 'Il Piacere' is not remarkable either for depth or for novelty, being the needlessly detailed record of Sperelli's relations with two married women, of totally opposite types.

'Giovanni Episcopo' is a brief, painful tragedy of low life, written under the influence of Russian evangelism, and full of reminiscences of Dostoïevsky's 'Crime and Punishment.' Giovanni is a poor clerk, of a weak, pusillanimous nature, completely dominated by a coarse, brutal companion, Giulio Wanzer, who makes him an abject slave, until a detected forgery compels Wanzer to flee the country. Episcopo then marries Ginevra, the pretty but unprincipled waitress at his pension, who speedily drags him down to the lowest depths of degradation, making him a mere nonentity in his own household, willing to live on the proceeds of her infamy. They have one child, a boy, Ciro, on whom Giovanni lavishes all his suppressed tenderness. After ten years of this martyrdom, the hated Wanzer reappears and installs himself as husband in the Episcopo household. Giovanni submits in helpless fury, till one day Wanzer beats Ginevra, and little Ciro intervenes to protect his mother. Wanzer turns on the child, and a spark of manhood is at last kindled in Giovanni's breast. He springs upon Wanzer, and with the pent-up rage of years stabs him.

'L'Innocente,' D'Annunzio's second long novel, also bears the stamp of Russian influence. It is a gruesome, repulsive story of domestic infidelity, in which he has handled the theory of pardon, the motive of numerous recent French novels, like Daudet's 'La Petite Paroisse' and Paul Marguerite's 'La Tourmente.'

In another extended work, 'Il Trionfo della Morte' (The Triumph of Death), D'Annunzio appears as a convert to Nietzsche's philosophy and to Wagnerianism. Ferdinand Brunetière has pronounced it unsurpassed by the naturalistic schools of England, France, or Russia. In brief, the hero, Giorgio Aurispa, a morbid sensualist, with an inherited tendency to suicide, is led by fate through a series of circumstances which keep the thought of death continually before him. They finally goad him on to fling himself from a cliff into the sea, dragging with him the woman he loves.

The 'Vergini della Rocca' (Maidens of the Crag), his last story, is more an idyllic poem than a novel. Claudio Cantelmo, sickened with the corruption of Rome, retires to his old home in the Abruzzi, where he meets the three sisters Massimilla, Anatolia, Violante: "names expressive as faces full of light and shade, and in which I seemed already to discover an infinity of grace, of passion, and of sorrow." It is inevitable that he should chose one of the three, but which? And in the dénouement the solution is only half implied.

D'Annunzio is now occupied with a new romance; and coming years will doubtless present him all the more distinctively as a writer of Italy on whom French inflences have been seed sowed in fertile ground. The place in contemporary Italian of such work as his is indisputably considerable.

All of a sudden, Albadora, the septuagenarian Cybele, she who had given life to twenty-two sons and daughters, came toiling up the narrow lane into the court, and indicating the neighboring shore, where it skirted the promontory on the left, announced breathlessly:--

"Down yonder there has been a child drowned!"

Candia made the sign of the cross. Giorgio arose and ascended to the loggia, to observe the spot designated. Upon the sand, below the promontory, in close vicinity to the chain of rocks and the tunnel, he perceived a blotch of white, presumably the sheet which hid the little body. A group of people had gathered around it.

As Ippolita had gone to mass with Elena at the chapel of the Port, he yielded to his curiosity and said to his entertainers:--

"I am going down to see."

"Why?" asked Candia. "Why do you wish to put a pain in your heart?"

Hastening down the narrow lane, he descended by a short cut to the beach, and continued along the water. Reaching the spot, somewhat out of breath, he inquired:--

"What has happened?"

The assembled peasants saluted him and made way for him. One of them answered tranquilly:--

"The son of a mother has been drowned."

Another, clad in linen, who seemed to be standing guard over the corpse, bent down and drew aside the sheet.

The inert little body was revealed, extended upon the unyielding sand. It was a lad, eight or nine years old, fair and frail, with slender limbs. His head was supported on his few humble garments, rolled up in place of pillow,--the shirt, the blue trousers, the red sash, the cap of limp felt. His face was but slightly livid, with flat nose, prominent forehead, and long, long lashes; the mouth was half open, with thick lips which were turning blue, between which the widely spaced teeth gleamed white. His neck was slender, flaccid as a wilted stem, and seamed with tiny creases. The jointure of the arms at the shoulder looked feeble. The arms themselves were fragile, and covered with a down similar to the fine plumage which clothes the bodies of newly hatched birds. The whole outline of the ribs was distinctly visible; down the middle of the breast the skin was divided by a darker line; the navel stood out, like a knot. The feet, slightly bloated, had assumed the same sallow color as the little hands, which were callous and strewn with warts, with white nails beginning to turn livid. On the left arm, on the thighs near the groin, and further down, on the knees and along the legs, appeared reddish blotches of scurf. Every detail of this wretched little body assumed, in the eyes of Giorgio, an extraordinary significance, immobile as it was and fixed forever in the rigidity of death.

"How was he drowned? Where?" he questioned, lowering his voice.

The man dressed in linen gave, with some show of impatience, the account which he had probably had to repeat too many times already. He had a brutal countenance, square-cut, with bushy brows, and a large mouth, harsh and savage. Only a little while after leading the sheep back to their stalls, the lad, taking his breakfast along with him, had gone down, together with a comrade, to bathe. He had hardly set foot in the water, when he had fallen and was drowned. At the cries of his comrade, some one from the house overhead on the bluff had hurried down, and wading in up to the knees, had dragged him from the water half dead; they had turned him upside down to make him throw up the water, they had shaken him, but to no purpose. To indicate just how far the poor little fellow had gone in, the man picked up a pebble and threw it into the sea.

"There, only to there; at three yards from the shore!"

The sea lay at rest, breathing peacefully, close to the head of the dead child. But the sun blazed fiercely down upon the sand; and something pitiless, emanating from that sky of flame and from those stolid witnesses, seemed to pass over the pallid corpse.

"Why," asked Giorgio, "do you not place him in the shade, in one of the houses, on a bed?"

"He is not to be moved," declared the man on guard, "until they hold the inquest."

"At least carry him into the shade, down there, below the embankment!"

Stubbornly the man reiterated, "He is not to be moved."

There could be no sadder sight than that frail, lifeless little being, extended on the stones, and watched over by the impassive brute who repeated his account every time in the selfsame words, and every time made the selfsame gesture, throwing a pebble into the sea:--

"There; only to there."

A woman joined the group, a hook-nosed termagant, with gray eyes and sour lips, mother of the dead boy's comrade. She manifested plainly a mistrustful restlessness, as if she anticipated some accusation against her own son. She spoke with bitterness, and seemed almost to bear a grudge against the victim.

"It was his destiny. God had said to him, 'Go into the sea and end yourself.'"

She gesticulated with vehemence. "What did he go in for, if he did not know how to swim--?"

A young lad, a stranger in the district, the son of a mariner, repeated contemptuously, "Yes, what did he go in for? We, yes, who know how to swim--" ...

Other people joined the group, gazed with cold curiosity, then lingered or passed on. A crowd occupied the railroad embankment, another gathered on the crest of the promontory, as if at a spectacle. Children, seated or kneeling, played with pebbles, tossing them into the air and catching them, now on the back and now in the hollow of their hands. They all showed the same profound indifference to the presence of other people's troubles and of death.

Another woman joined the group on her way home from mass, wearing a dress of silk and all her gold ornaments. For her also the harassed custodian repeated his account, for her also he indicated the spot in the water. She was talkative.

"I am always saying to my children, 'Don't you go into the water, or I will kill you!' The sea is the sea. Who can save himself?"

She called to mind other instances of drowning; she called to mind the case of the drowned man with the head cut off, driven by the waves all the way to San Vito, and found among the rocks by a child.

"Here, among these rocks. He came and told us, 'There is a dead man there.' We thought he was joking. But we came and we found. He had no head. They had an inquest; he was buried in a ditch; then in the night he was dug up again. His flesh was all mangled and like jelly, but he still had his boots on. The judge said, 'See, they are better than mine!' So he must have been a rich man. And it turned out that he was a dealer in cattle. They had killed him and chopped off his head, and had thrown him into the Tronto."...

She continued to talk in her shrill voice, from time to time sucking in the superfluous saliva with a slight hissing sound.

"And the mother? When is the mother coming?"

At that name there arose exclamations of compassion from all the women who had gathered.

"The mother! There comes the mother, now!"

And all of them turned around, fancying that they saw her in the far distance, along the burning strand. Some of the women could give particulars about her. Her name was Riccangela; she was a widow with seven children. She had placed this one in a farmer's family, so that he might tend the sheep, and gain a morsel of bread.

One woman said, gazing down at the corpse, "Who knows how much pains the mother has taken in raising him!" Another said, "To keep the children from going hungry she has even had to ask charity."

Another told how, only a few months before, the unfortunate child had come very near strangling to death in a courtyard in a pool of water barely six inches deep. All the women repeated, "It was his destiny. He was bound to die that way."

And the suspense of waiting rendered them restless, anxious. "The mother! There comes the mother now!"

Feeling himself grow sick at heart, Giorgio exclaimed, "Can't you take him into the shade, or into a house, so that the mother will not see him here naked on the stones, under a sun like this?"

Stubbornly the man on guard objected:--"He is not to be touched. He is not to be moved--until the inquest is held."

The bystanders gazed in surprise at the stranger,--Candia's stranger. Their number was augmenting. A few occupied the embankment shaded with acacias; others crowned the promontory rising abruptly from the rocks. Here and there, on the monstrous bowlders, a tiny boat lay sparkling like gold at the foot of the detached crag, so lofty that it gave the effect of the ruins of some Cyclopean tower, confronting the immensity of the sea.

All at once, from above on the height, a voice announced, "There she is."

Other voices followed:--"The mother! The mother!"

All turned. Some stepped down from the embankment. Those on the promontory leaned far over. All became silent, in expectation. The man on guard drew the sheet once more over the corpse. In the midst of the silence, the sea barely seemed to draw its breath, the acacias barely rustled. And then through the silence they could hear her cries as she drew near.

The mother came along the strand, beneath the sun, crying aloud. She was clad in widow's mourning. She tottered along the sand, with bowed body, calling out, "O my son! My son!"

She raised her palms to heaven, and then struck them upon her knees, calling out, "My son!"

One of her older sons, with a red handkerchief bound around his neck, to hide some sore, followed her like one demented, dashing aside his tears with the back of his hand. She advanced along the strand, beating her knees, directing her steps toward the sheet. And as she called upon her dead, there issued from her mouth sounds scarcely human, but rather like the howling of some savage dog. As she drew near, she bent over lower and lower, she placed herself almost on all fours; till, reaching him, she threw herself with a howl upon the sheet.

She arose again. With hand rough and toil-stained, hand toughened by every variety of labor, she uncovered the body. She gazed upon it a few instants, motionless as though turned to stone. Then time and time again, shrilly, with all the power of her voice, she called as if trying to awaken him, "My son! My son! My son!"

Sobs suffocated her. Kneeling beside him, she beat her sides furiously with her fists. She turned her despairing eyes around upon the circle of strangers. During a pause in her paroxysms she seemed to recollect herself. And then she began to sing. She sang her sorrow in a rhythm which rose and fell continually, like the palpitation of a heart. It was the ancient monody which from time immemorial, in the land of the Abruzzi, the women have sung over the remains of their relatives. It was the melodious eloquence of sacred sorrow, which renewed spontaneously, in the profundity of her being, this hereditary rhythm in which the mothers of bygone ages had modulated their lamentations.

She sang on and on:--"Open your eyes, arise and walk, my son! How beautiful you are! How beautiful you are!"

She sang on:--"For a morsel of bread I have drowned you, my son! For a morsel of bread I have borne you to the slaughter! For that have I raised you!"

But the irate woman with the hooked nose interrupted her:--"It was not you who drowned him; it was Destiny. It was not you who took him to the slaughter. You had placed him in the midst of bread." And making a gesture toward the hill where the house stood which had sheltered the lad, she added, "They kept him there, like a pink at the ear."

The mother continued:--"O my son, who was it sent you; who was it sent you here, to drown?"

And the irate woman:--"Who was it sent him? It was our Lord. He said to him, 'Go into the water and end yourself.'"

As Giorgio was affirming in a low tone to one of the bystanders that if succored in time the child might have been saved, and that they had killed him by turning him upside down and holding him suspended by the feet, he felt the gaze of the mother fixed upon him. "Can't you do something for him, sir?" she prayed. "Can't you do something for him?"

And she prayed:--"O Madonna of the Miracles, work a miracle for him!"

Touching the head of the dead boy, she repeated:--"My son! my son! my son! arise and walk!"

On his knees in front of her was the brother of the dead boy; he was sobbing, but without grief, and from time to time he glanced around with a face that suddenly grew indifferent. Another brother, the oldest one, remained at a little distance, seated in the shade of a bowlder; and he was making a great show of grief, hiding his face in his hands. The women, striving to console the mother, were bending over her with gestures of compassion, and accompanying her monody with an occasional lament.

And she sang on:--"Why have I sent you forth from my house? Why have I sent you to your death? I have done everything to keep my children from hunger; everything, everything, except to be a woman with a price. And for a morsel of bread I have lost you! This was the way you were to die!"

Thereupon the woman with the hawk nose raised her petticoats in an impetus of wrath, entered the water up to her knees, and cried:--"Look! He came only to here. Look! The water is like oil. It is a sign that he was bound to die that way."

With two strides she regained the shore. "Look!" she repeated, pointing to the deep imprint in the sand made by the man who recovered the body. "Look!"

The mother looked in a dull way; but it seemed as if she neither saw nor comprehended. After her first wild outbursts of grief, there came over her brief pauses, amounting to an obscurement of consciousness. She would remain silent, she would touch her foot or her leg with a mechanical gesture. Then she would wipe away her tears with the black apron. She seemed to be quieting down. Then, all of a sudden, a fresh explosion would shake her from head to foot, and prostrate her upon the corpse.

"And I cannot take you away! I cannot take you in these arms to the church! My son! My son!"

She fondled him from head to foot, she caressed him softly. Her savage anguish was softened to an infinite tenderness. Her hand--the burnt and callous hand of a hard-working woman--became infinitely gentle as she touched the eyes, the mouth, the forehead of her son.

"How beautiful you are! How beautiful you are!"

She touched his lower lip, already turned blue; and as she pressed it slightly, a whitish froth issued from the mouth. From between his lashes she brushed away some speck, very carefully, as though fearful of hurting him.

"How beautiful you are, heart of your mamma!"

His lashes were long, very long, and fair. On his temples, on his cheeks was a light bloom, pale as gold.

"Do you not hear me? Rise and walk."

She took the little well-worn cap, limp as a rag. She gazed at it and kissed it, saying:--

"I am going to make myself a charm out of this, and wear it always on my breast."

She lifted the child; a quantity of water escaped from the mouth and trickled down upon the breast.

"O Madonna of the Miracles, perform a miracle!" she prayed, raising her eyes to heaven in a supreme supplication. Then she laid softly down again the little being who had been so dear to her, and took up the worn shirt, the red sash, the cap. She rolled them up together in a little bundle, and said:--

"This shall be my pillow; on these I shall rest my head, always, at night; on these I wish to die."

She placed these humble relics on the sand, beside the head of her child, and rested her temple on them, stretching herself out, as if on a bed.

Both of them, mother and son, now lay side by side, on the hard rocks, beneath the flaming sky, close to the homicidal sea. And now she began to croon the very lullaby which in the past had diffused pure sleep over his infant cradle.

She took up the red sash and said, "I want to dress him."

The cross-grained woman, who still held her ground, assented. "Let us dress him now."

And she herself took the garments from under the head of the dead boy; she felt in the jacket pocket and found a slice of bread and a fig.

"Do you see? They had given him his food just before,--just before. They cared for him like a pink at the ear."

The mother gazed upon the little shirt, all soiled and torn, over which her tears fell rapidly, and said, "Must I put that shirt on him?"

The other woman promptly raised her voice to some one of her family, above on the bluff:--"Quick, bring one of Nufrillo's new shirts!" The new shirt was brought. The mother flung herself down beside him.

"Get up, Riccangela, get up!" solicited the women around her.

She did not heed them. "Is my son to stay like that on the stones, and I not stay there too?--like that, on the stones, my own son?"

"Get up, Riccangela, come away."

She arose. She gazed once more with terrible intensity upon the little livid face of the dead. Once again she called with all the power of her voice, "My son! My son! My son!"

Then with her own hands she covered up with the sheet the unheeding remains.

And the women gathered around her, drew her a little to one side, under shadow of a bowlder; they forced her to sit down, they lamented with her.

Little by little the spectators melted away. There remained only a few of the women comforters; there remained the man clad in linen, the impassive custodian, who was awaiting the inquest.

The dog-day sun poured down upon the strand, and lent to the funeral sheet a dazzling whiteness. Amidst the heat the promontory raised its desolate aridity straight upward from the tortuous chain of rocks. The sea, immense and green, pursued its constant, even breathing. And it seemed as if the languid hour was destined never to come to an end.

Under shadow of the bowlder, opposite the white sheet, which was raised up by the rigid form of the corpse beneath, the mother continued her monody in the rhythm rendered sacred by all the sorrows, past and present, of her race. And it seemed as if her lamentation was destined never to come to an end.

Translated by Thomas Walsh, for 'A Library of the World's Best Literature.'

rabia was opened to English readers first by Sale's translation of the 'Kuran,' in 1734; and by English versions of the 'Arabian Nights' from 1712 onward. The latter were derived from Galland's translation of the 'Thousand and One Nights,' which began to appear, in French, in 1704. Next to nothing was generally known of Oriental literature from that time until the end of the eighteenth century. The East India Company fostered the study of the classics of the extreme Orient; and the first Napoleon opened Egypt,--his savans marched in the centre of the invading squares.

The flagship of the English fleet which blockaded Napoleon's army carried an Austro-German diplomatist and scholar,--Baron von Hammer-Purgstall,--part of whose mission was to procure a complete manuscript of the 'Arabian Nights.' It was then supposed that these tales were the daily food of all Turks, Arabians, and Syrians. To the intense surprise of Von Hammer, he learned that they were never recited in the coffee-houses of Constantinople, and that they were not to be found at all outside of Egypt.

His dismay and disappointment were soon richly compensated, however, by the discovery of the Arabian romance of 'Antar,' the national classic, hitherto unknown in Europe, except for an enthusiastic notice which had fallen by chance into the hands of Sir William Jones. The entire work was soon collected. It is of interminable length in the original, being often found in thirty or forty manuscript volumes in quarto, in seventy or eighty in octavo. Portions of it have been translated into English, German, and French. English readers can consult it best in 'Antar,' a Bedouin romance, translated from the Arabic by Terrick Hamilton, in four volumes 8vo (London, 1820). Hamilton's translation, now rare, covers only a portion of the original; and a new translation, suitably abridged, is much needed.

The book purports to have been written more than a thousand years ago,--in the golden prime of the Caliph Harún-al-Rashid (786-809) and of his sons and successors, Amin (809-813) and Mamun (813-834),--by the famous As-Asmai (born 741, died about 830). It is in fact a later compilation, probably of the twelth century. (Baron von Hammer's MS. was engrossed in the year 1466.) Whatever the exact date may have been, it was probably not much later than A.D. 1200. The main outlines of Antar's life are historical. Many particulars are derived from historic accounts of the lives of other Arabian heroes (Duraid and others) and are transferred bodily to the biography of Antar. They date back to the sixth century. Most of the details must be imaginary, but they are skillfully contrived by a writer who knew the life of the desert Arab at first hand. The verses with which the volumes abound are in many cases undoubtedly Antar's. (They are printed in italics in what follows.) In any event, the book in its present form has been the delight of all Arabians for many centuries. Every wild Bedouin of the desert knew much of the tale by heart, and listened to its periods and to its poems with quivering interest. His more cultivated brothers of the cities possessed one or many of its volumes. Every coffee-house in Aleppo, Bagdad, or Constantinople had a narrator who, night after night, recited it to rapt audiences.

The unanimous opinion of the East has always placed the romance of 'Antar' at the summit of such literature. As one of their authors well says:--"'The Thousand and One Nights' is for the amusement of women and children; 'Antar' is a book for men. From it they learn lessons of eloquence, of magnanimity, of generosity, and of statecraft." Even the prophet Muhammad, well-known foe to poetry and to poets, instructed his disciples to relate to their children the traditions concerning Antar, "for these will steel their hearts harder than stone."

The book belongs among the great national classics, like the 'Shah-nameh' and the 'Nibelungen-Lied.' It has a direct relation to Western culture and opinion also. Antar was the father of knighthood. He was the preux-chevalier, the champion of the weak and oppressed, the protector of women, the impassioned lover-poet, the irresistible and magnanimous knight. European chivalry in a marked degree is the child of the chivalry of his time, which traveled along the shores of the Mediterranean Sea and passed with the Moors into Spain (710). Another current flowed from Arabia to meet and to modify the Greeks of Constantinople and the early Crusaders; and still another passed from Persia into Palestine and Europe. These fertilized Provençal poetry, the French romance, the early Italian epic. The 'Shah-nameh' of Firdausi, that model of a heroic poem, was written early in the eleventh century. 'Antar' in its present form probably preceded the romances of chivalry so common in the twelfth century in Italy and France.

Antarah ben Shedad el Absi (Antar the Lion, the Son of Shedad of the tribe of Abs), the historic Antar, was born about the middle of the sixth century of our era, and died about the year 615, forty-five years after the birth of the prophet Muhammad, and seven years before the Hijra--the Flight to Medina--with which the Muhammadan era begins. His father was a noble Absian knight. The romance makes him the son of an Abyssinian slave, who is finally discovered to be a powerful princess. His skin was black. He was despised by his father and family and set to tend their camels. His extraordinary strength and valor and his remarkable poetic faculty soon made him a marked man, in a community in which personal valor failed of its full value if it were not celebrated in brilliant verse. His love for the beautiful Ibla (Ablah in the usual modern form), the daughter of his uncle, was proved in hundreds of encounters and battles; by many adventurous excursions in search of fame and booty; by thousands of verses in her honor.

The historic Antar is the author of one of the seven "suspended poems." The common explanation of this term is that these seven poems were judged, by the assemblage of all the Arabs, worthy to be written in golden letters (whence their name of the 'golden odes'), and to be hung on high in the sacred Kaabah at Mecca. Whether this be true, is not certain. They are at any rate accepted models of Arabic style. Antar was one of the seven greatest poets of his poetic race. These "suspended poems" can now be studied in the original and in translation, by the help of a little book published in London in 1894, 'The Seven Poems,' by Captain F.E. Johnson, R.A.

The Antar of the romance is constantly breaking into verse which is passionately admired by his followers. None of its beauties of form are preserved in the translation; and indeed, this is true of the prose forms also. It speaks volumes for the manly vigor of the original that it can be transferred to an alien tongue and yet preserve great qualities. To the Arab the work is a masterpiece both in form and content. Its prose is in balanced, rhythmic sentences ending in full or partial rhymes. This "cadence of the cooing dove" is pure music to an Eastern ear. If any reader is interested in Arabic verse, he can readily satisfy his curiosity. An introduction to the subject is given in the Terminal Essay of Sir Richard Burton's 'Arabian Nights' (Lady Burton's edition, Vol. vi., page 340). The same subject is treated briefly and very clearly in the introduction to Lyall's 'Ancient Arabian Poetry'--a book well worth consulting on other accounts.

The story itself appeals to the Oriental's deepest feelings, passions, ideals:--

"To realize the impetuous feelings of the Arab," says Von Hammer, "you must have heard these tales narrated to a circle of Bedouins crowded about the orator of the desert.... It is a veritable drama, in which the spectators are the actors as well. If the hero is threatened with imminent danger, they shudder and cry aloud, 'No, no, no; Allah forbid! that cannot be!' If he is in the midst of tumult and battle, mowing down rank after rank of the enemy with his sword, they seize their own weapons and rise to fly to his rescue. If he falls into the snares of treachery, their foreheads contract with angry indignation and they exclaim, 'The curse of Allah be on the traitor!' If the hero at last sinks under the superior forces of the enemy, a long and ardent sigh escapes from their breasts, with the farewell blessing, 'Allah's compassion be with him--may he rest in peace.'... Descriptions of the beauties of nature, especially of the spring, are received with exclamations. Nothing equals the delight which sparkles in every eye when the narrator draws a picture of feminine beauty."

The question as to the exact relation of the chivalry of Europe to the earlier chivalry of Arabia and of the East is a large one, and one which must be left to scholars. It is certain that Spenser and Sir Philip Sidney owe far more to Saladin than we commonly suppose. The tales of Boccaccio (1350) show that the Italians of that day still held the Arabs to be their teachers in chivalry, and at least their equals in art, science, and civilization; and the Italy of 1300 was a century in advance of the rest of Europe. In 1268 two brothers of the King of Castile, with 800 other Spanish gentlemen, were serving under the banners of the Muslim in Tunis. The knightly ideal of both Moors and Spaniards was to be

"Like steel among swords,
Like wax among ladies."

Hospitality, generosity, magnanimity, the protection of the weak, punctilious observance of the plighted faith, pride of birth and lineage, glory in personal valor--these were the knightly virtues common to Arab and Christian warriors. Antar and his knights, Ibla and her maidens, are the Oriental counterparts of Launcelot and Arthur, of Guinevere and Iseult.

The primary duty of the early Arab was blood-revenge. An insult to himself, or an injury to the tribe, must be wiped out with the blood of the offender. Hence arose the multitude of tribal feuds. It was Muhammad who first checked the private feud by fixing "the price of blood" to be paid by the aggressor or by his tribe. In the time of Antar revenge was the foremost duty. Ideals of excellence change as circumstances alter. Virtues go out of fashion (like the magnificence of Aristotle), or acquire an entirely new importance (as veracity, since England became a trading nation). Some day we may possess a natural history of the virtues.

The service of the loved one by the early Arab was a passion completely different from the vain gallantry of the mediæval knight of Europe. He sought for the complete possession of his chosen mistress, and was eager to earn it by multitudes of chivalric deeds; but he could not have understood the sentimentalities of the Troubadours. The systematic fantasies of the "Courts of Love" would have seemed cold follies to Arab chivalry--as indeed they are, though they have led to something better. In generosity, in magnanimity, the Arab knight far surpassed his European brother. Hospitality was a point of honor to both. As to the noble Arabs of those days, when any one demanded their protection, no one ever inquired what was the matter; for if he asked any questions, it would be said of him that he was afraid. The poets have thus described them in verse:--

"They rise when any one calls out to them, and
they haste before asking any questions;
they aid him against his enemies
that seek his life, and they return
honored to their families."

The Arab was the knight of the tent and the desert. His deeds were immediately known to his fellows; discussed and weighed in every household of his tribe. The Christian knight of the Middle Ages, living isolated in his stronghold, was less immediately affected by the opinions of his class. Tribal allegiance was developed in the first case, independence in the second.

Scholars tell us that the romance of 'Antar' is priceless for faithful pictures of the times before the advent of Muhammad, which are confirmed by all that remains of the poetry of "the days of ignorance." To the general reader its charm lies in its bold and simple stories of adventure; in its childlike enjoyment of the beauty of Nature; in its pictures of the elemental passions of ambition, pride, love, hate, revenge. Antar was a poet, a lover, a warrior, a born leader. From a keeper of camels he rose to be the protector of the tribe of Abs and the pattern of chivalry, by virtue of great natural powers and in the face of every obstacle. He won possession of his Ibla and gave her the dower of a queen, by adventures the like of which were never known before. There were no Ifrits or Genii to come to his aid, as in the 'Thousand Nights and a Night.' 'Antar' is the epic of success crowning human valor; the tales in the 'Arabian Nights,' at their best, are the fond fancies of the fatalist whose best endeavor is at the mercy of every capricious Jinni.

The 'Arabian Nights' contains one tale of the early Arabs,--the story of Gharib and his brother Ajib,--which repeats some of the exploits of Antar; a tale far inferior to the romance. The excellences of the 'Arabian Nights' are of another order. We must look for them in the pompous enchantments of the City of Brass, or in the tender constancy of Aziz and Azizah, or in the tale of Hasan of Bassorah, with its lovely study of the friendship of a foster-sister, and its wonderful presentment of the magic surroundings of the country of the Jann.

To select specimens from 'Antar' is like selecting from 'Robinson Crusoe.' In the romance, Antar's adventures go on and on, and the character of the hero develops before one's eyes. It may be that the leisure of the desert is needed fully to appreciate this master-work.

Now Antar was becoming a big boy, and grew up, and used to accompany his mother, Zebeeba, to the pastures, and he watched the cattle; and this he continued to do till he increased in stature. He used to walk and run about to harden himself, till at length his muscles were strengthened, his frame altogether more robust, his bones more firm and solid, and his speech correct. His days were passed in roaming about the mountain sides; and thus he continued till he attained his tenth year.

[He now kills a wolf which had attacked his father's flocks, and breaks into verse to celebrate his victory:--]

O thou wolf, eager for death, I have left thee wallowing in dust, and spoiled of life; thou wouldst have the run of my flocks, but I have left thee dyed with blood; thou wouldst disperse my sheep, and thou knowest I am a lion that never fears. This is the way I treat thee, thou dog of the desert. Hast thou ever before seen battle and wars?

[His next adventure brought him to the notice of the chief of the tribe,--King Zoheir. A slave of Prince Shas insulted a poor, feeble woman who was tending her sheep; on which Antar "dashed him against the ground. And his length and breadth were all one mass." This deed won for Antar the hatred of Prince Shas, the friendship of the gentle Prince Malik, and the praise of the king, their father. "This valiant fellow," said the king, "has defended the honor of women."]

From that day both King Zoheir and his son Malik conceived a great affection for Antar, and as Antar returned home, the women all collected around him to ask him what had happened; among them were his aunts and his cousin, whose name was Ibla. Now Ibla was younger than Antar, and a merry lass. She was lovely as the moon at its full; and perfectly beautiful and elegant.... One day he entered the house of his uncle Malik and found his aunt combing his cousin Ibla's hair, which flowed down her back, dark as the shades of night. Antar was quite surprised; he was greatly agitated, and could pay no attention to anything; he was anxious and thoughtful, and his anguish daily became more oppressive.

[Meeting her at a feast, he addressed her in verse:--]

The lovely virgin has struck my heart with the arrow of a glance, for which there is no cure. Sometimes she wishes for a feast in the sandhills, like a fawn whose eyes are full of magic. She moves; I should say it was the branch of the Tamarisk that waves its branches to the southern breeze. She approaches; I should say it was the frightened fawn, when a calamity alarms it in the waste.

When Ibla heard from Antar this description of her charms, she was in astonishment. But Antar continued in this state for days and nights, his love and anguish ever increasing.

[Antar resolves to be either tossed upon the spear-heads or numbered among the noble; and he wanders into the plain of lions.]

As soon as Antar found himself in it, he said to himself, Perhaps I shall now find a lion, and I will slay him. Then, behold a lion appeared in the middle of the valley; he stalked about and roared aloud; wide were his nostrils, and fire flashed from his eyes; the whole valley trembled at every gnash of his fangs--he was a calamity, and his claws more dreadful than the deadliest catastrophe--thunder pealed as he roared--vast was his strength, and his force dreadful--broad were his paws, and his head immense. Just at that moment Shedad and his brothers came up. They saw Antar address the lion, and heard the verses that he repeated; he sprang forward like a hailstorm, and hissed at him like a black serpent--he met the lion as he sprang and outroared his bellow; then, giving a dreadful shriek, he seized hold of his mouth with his hand, and wrenched it open to his shoulders, and he shouted aloud--the valley and the country round echoed back the war.

[Those who were watching were astonished at his prowess, and began to fear Antar. The horsemen now set off to attack the tribe of Temeem, leaving the slaves to guard the women.]

Antar was in transports on seeing Ibla appear with the other women. She was indeed like an amorous fawn; and when Antar was attending her, he was overwhelmed in the ocean of his love, and became the slave of her sable tresses. They sat down to eat, and the wine-cups went merrily round. It was the spring of the year, when the whole land shone in all its glory; the vines hung luxuriantly in the arbors; the flowers shed around ambrosial fragrance; every hillock sparkled in the beauty of its colors; the birds in responsive melody sang sweetly from each bush, and harmony issued from their throats; the ground was covered with flowers and herbs; while the nightingales filled the air with their softest notes.

[While the maidens were singing and sporting, lo! on a sudden appeared a cloud of dust walling the horizon, and a vast clamor arose. A troop of horses and their riders, some seventy in number, rushed forth to seize the women, and made them prisoners. Antar instantly rescues Ibla from her captors and engages the enemy.]

He rushed forward to meet them, and harder than flint was his heart, and in his attack was their fate and destiny. He returned home, taking with him five-and-twenty horses, and all the women and children. Now the hatred of Semeeah (his stepmother) was converted into love and tenderness, and he became dearer to her than sleep.

[He had thenceforward a powerful ally in her, a fervent friend in Prince Malik, a wily counselor in his brother Shiboob. And Antar made great progress in Ibla's heart, from the verses that he spoke in her praise; such verses as these:--]

I love thee with the love of a noble-born hero; and I am content with thy imaginary phantom. Thou art my sovereign in my very blood; and my mistress; and in thee is all my confidence.

[Antar's astonishing valor gained him the praise of the noble Absian knights, and he was emboldened to ask his father Shedad to acknowledge him for his son, that he might become a chief among the Arabs. Shedad, enraged, drew his sword and rushed upon Antar to kill him, but was prevented by Semeeah. Antar, in the greatest agony of spirit, was ashamed that the day should dawn on him after this refusal, or that he should remain any longer in the country. He mounted his horse, put on his armor, and traveled on till he was far from the tents, and he knew not whither he was going.]

Antar had proceeded some way, when lo! a knight rushed out from the ravines in the rocks, mounted on a dark-colored colt, beautiful and compact, and of a race much prized among the Arabs; his hoofs were as flat as the beaten coin; when he neighed he seemed as if about to speak, and his ears were like quills; his sire was Wasil and his dam Hemama. When Antar cast his eye upon the horse, and observed his speed and his paces, he felt that no horse could surpass him, so his whole heart and soul longed for him. And when the knight perceived that Antar was making toward him, he spurred his horse and it fled beneath him; for this was a renowned horseman called Harith, the son of Obad, and he was a valiant hero.

[By various devices Antar became possessed of the noble horse Abjer, whose equal no prince or emperor could boast of. His mettle was soon tried in an affray with the tribe of Maan, headed by the warrior Nakid, who was ferocious as a lion.]

When Nakid saw the battle of Antar, and how alone he stood against five thousand, and was making them drink of the cup of death and perdition, he was overwhelmed with astonishment at his deeds. "Thou valiant slave," he cried, "how powerful is thine arm--how strong thy wrist!" And he rushed down upon Antar. And Antar presented himself before him, for he was all anxiety to meet him. "O thou base-born!" cried Nakid. But Antar permitted him not to finish his speech, before he assaulted him with the assault of a lion, and roared at him; he was horrified and paralyzed at the sight of Antar. Antar attacked him, thus scared and petrified, and struck him with his sword on the head, and cleft him down the back; and he fell, cut in twain, from the horse, and he was split in two as if by a balance; and as Antar dealt the blow he cried out, "Oh, by Abs! oh, by Adnan! I am ever the lover of Ibla." No sooner did the tribe of Maan behold Antar's blow, than every one was seized with fear and dismay. The whole five thousand made an attack like the attack of a single man; but Antar received them as the parched ground receives the first of the rain. His eyeballs were fiery red, and foam issued from his lips; whenever he smote he cleft the head; every warrior he assailed, he annihilated; he tore a rider from the back of his horse, he heaved him on high, and whirling him in the air he struck down another with him, and the two instantly expired. "By thine eyes, Ibla," he cried, "to-day will I destroy all this race." Thus he proceeded until he terrified the warriors, and hurled them into woe and disgrace, hewing off their arms and their joints.

[At the moment of Antar's victory his friends arrive to see his triumph. On his way back with them he celebrates his love for Ibla in verses.]

When the breezes blow from Mount Saadi, their freshness calms the fire of my love and transports.... Her throat complains of the darkness of her necklaces. Alas! the effects of that throat and that necklace! Will fortune ever, O daughter of Malik, ever bless me with thy embrace, that would cure my heart of the sorrows of love? If my eye could see her baggage camels, and her family, I would rub my cheeks on the hoofs of her camels. I will kiss the earth where thou art; mayhap the fire of my love and ecstasy may be quenched.... I am the well-known Antar, the chief of his tribe, and I shall die; but when I am gone, histories shall tell of me.

[From that day forth Antar was named Abool-fawaris, that is to say, the father of horsemen. His sword, Dhami--the trenchant--was forged from a meteor that fell from the sky; it was two cubits long and two spans wide. If it were presented to Nushirvan, King of Persia, he would exalt the giver with favors; or if it were presented to the Emperor of Europe, one would be enriched with treasures of gold and silver.]

As soon as Gheidac saw the tribe of Abs, and Antar the destroyer of horsemen, his heart was overjoyed and he cried out, "This is a glorious morning; to-day will I take my revenge." So he assailed the tribe of Abs and Adnan, and his people attacked behind him like a cloud when it pours forth water and rains. And the Knight of Abs assaulted them likewise, anxious to try his sword, the famous Dhami. And Antar fought with Gheidac, and wearied him, and shouted at him, and filled him with horror; then assailed him so that stirrup grated stirrup; and he struck him on the head with Dhami. He cleft his visor and wadding, and his sword played away between the eyes, passing through his shoulders down to the back of the horse, even down to the ground; and he and his horse made four pieces; and to the strictest observer, it would appear that he had divided them with scales. And God prospered Antar in all that he did, so that he slew all he aimed at, and overthrew all he touched.

"Nobility," said Antar, "among liberal men, is the thrust of the spear, the blow of the sword, and patience beneath the battle-dust. I am the physician of the tribe of Abs in sickness, their protector in disgrace, the defender of their wives when they are in trouble, their horseman when they are in glory, and their sword when they rush to arms."

[This was Antar's speech to Monzar, King of the Arabs, when he was in search of Ibla's dowry. He found it in the land of Irak, where the magnificent Chosroe was ready to reward him even to the half of his kingdom, for his victory over the champion of the Emperor of Europe.]

"All this grandeur, and all these gifts," said Antar, "have no value to me, no charm in my eyes. Love of my native land is the fixed passion of my soul."

"Do not imagine," said Chosroe, "that we have been able duly to recompense you. What we have given you is perishable, as everything human is, but your praises and your poems will endure forever."

[Antar's wars made him a Nocturnal Calamity to the foes of his tribe. He was its protector and the champion of its women, "for Antar was particularly solicitous in the cause of women." His generosity knew no bounds. "Antar immediately presented the whole of the spoil to his father and his uncles; and all the tribe of Abs were astonished at his noble conduct and filial love." His hospitality was universal; his magnanimity without limit. "Do not bear malice, O Shiboob. Renounce it; for no good ever came of malice. Violence is infamous; its result is ever uncertain, and no one can act justly when actuated by hatred. Let my heart support every evil, and let my patience endure till I have subdued all my foes." Time after time he won new dowries for Ibla, even bringing the treasures of Persia to her feet. Treacheries without count divided him from his promised bride. Over and over again he rescued her from the hands of the enemy; and not only her, but her father and her hostile kinsmen.

At last (in the fourth volume, on the fourteen hundred and fifty-third page) Antar makes his wedding feasts.]

"I wish to make at Ibla's wedding five separate feasts; I will feed the birds and the beasts, the men and the women, the girls and the boys, and not a single person shall remain in the whole country but shall eat at Ibla's marriage festival."

Antar was at the summit of his happiness and delight, congratulating himself on his good fortune and perfect felicity, all trouble and anxiety being now banished from his heart. Praise be to God, the dispenser of all grief from the hearts of virtuous men.

[The three hundred and sixty tribes of the Arabs were invited to the feast, and on the eighth day the assembled chiefs presented their gifts--horses, armor, slaves, perfumes, gold, velvet, camels. The number of slaves Antar received that day was five-and-twenty hundred, to each of whom he gave a damsel, a horse, and weapons. And they all mounted when he rode out, and halted when he halted.]

Now when all the Arab chiefs had presented their offerings, each according to his circumstances, Antar rose, and called out to Mocriul-Wahsh:--"O Knight of Syria," said he, "let all the he and she camels, high-priced horses, and all the various rarities I have received this day, be a present from me to you. But the perfumes of ambergris, and fragrant musk, belong to my cousin Ibla; and the slaves shall form my army and troops." And the Arab chiefs marveled at his generosity....

And now Ibla was clothed in the most magnificent garments, and superb necklaces; they placed the coronet of Chosroe on her head, and tiaras round her forehead. They lighted brilliant and scented candles before her--the perfumes were scattered--the torches blazed--and Ibla came forth in state. All present gave a shout; while the malicious and ill-natured cried aloud, "What a pity that one so beautiful and fair should be wedded to one so black!"

[The selections are from Hamilton's translation. Two long episodes in 'Antar' are especially noteworthy: the famous horse race between the champions of the tribes of Abs and Fazarah (Vol. iv., Chapter 33), and the history of Khalid and Jaida (Vol. ii., Chapter 11).]

ucius Apuleius, author of the brilliant Latin novel 'The Metamorphoses,' also called 'The [Golden] Ass,'--and more generally known under that title,--will be remembered when many greater writers shall have been forgotten. The downfall of Greek political freedom brought a period of intellectual development fertile in prose story-telling,--short fables and tales, novels philosophic and religious, historical and satiric, novels of love, novels of adventure. Yet, strange to say, while the instinct was prolific in the Hellenic domain of the Roman Empire, it was for the most part sterile in Italy, though Roman life was saturated with the influence of Greek culture. Its only two notable examples are Petronius Arbiter and Apuleius, both of whom belong to the first two centuries of the Christian epoch.

Apuleius

The suggestion of the plan of the novel familiarly known as 'The Golden Ass' was from a Greek source, Lucius of Patræ. The original version was still extant in the days of Photius, Patriarch of the Greek Church in the ninth century. Lucian, the Greek satirist, also utilized the same material in a condensed form in his 'Lucius, or the Ass.' But Apuleius greatly expanded the legend, introduced into it numerous episodes, and made it the background of a vivid picture of the manners and customs of a corrupt age. Yet underneath its lively portraiture there runs a current of mysticism at variance with the naïve rehearsal of the hero's adventures, and this has tempted critics to find a hidden meaning in the story. Bishop Warburton, in his 'Divine Legation of Moses,' professes to see in it a defense of Paganism at the expense of struggling Christianity. While this seems absurd, it is fairly evident that the mind of the author was busied with something more than the mere narration of rollicking adventure, more even than a satire on Roman life. The transformation of the hero into an ass, at the moment when he was plunging headlong into a licentious career, and the recovery of his manhood again through divine intervention, suggest a serious symbolism. The beautiful episode of 'Cupid and Psyche,' which would lend salt to a production far more corrupt, is also suggestive. Apuleius perfected this wild flower of ancient folk-lore into a perennial plant that has blossomed ever since along the paths of literature and art. The story has been accepted as a fitting embodiment of the struggle of the soul toward a higher perfection; yet, strange to say, the episode is narrated with as brutal a realism as if it were a satire of Lucian, and its style is belittled with petty affectations of rhetoric. It is the enduring beauty of the conception that has continued to fascinate. Hence we may say of 'The Golden Ass' in its entirety, that whether readers are interested in esoteric meanings to be divined, or in the author's vivid sketches of his own period, the novel has a charm which long centuries have failed to dim.

Apuleius was of African birth and of good family, his mother having come of Plutarch's blood. The second century of the Roman Empire, when he lived (he was born at Madaura about A. D. 139), was one of the most brilliant periods in history,--brilliant in its social gayety, in its intellectual activities, and in the splendor of its achievements. The stimulus of the age spurred men far in good and evil. Apuleius studied at Carthage, and afterward at Rome, both philosophy and religion, though this bias seems not to have dulled his taste for worldly pleasure. Poor in purse, he finally enriched himself by marrying a wealthy widow and inheriting her property. Her will was contested on the ground that this handsome and accomplished young literary man had exercised magic in winning his elderly bride! The successful defense of Apuleius before his judges--a most diverting composition, so jaunty and full of witty impertinences that it is evident he knew the hard-headed Roman judges would dismiss the prosecution as a farce--is still extant under the name of 'The Apology; or, Concerning Magic.' This in after days became oddly jumbled with the story of 'The Golden Ass' and its transformations, so that St. Augustine was inclined to believe Apuleius actually a species of professional wizard.

The plot of 'The Golden Ass' is very simple. Lucius of Madaura, a young man of property, sets out on his travels to sow his wild oats. He pursues this pleasant occupation with the greatest zeal according to the prevailing mode: he is no moralist. The partner of his first intrigue is the maid of a woman skilled in witchcraft. The curiosity of Lucius being greatly exercised about the sorceress and her magic, he importunes the girl to procure from her mistress a magic salve which will transform him at will into an owl. By mistake he receives the wrong salve; and instead of the bird metamorphosis which he had looked for, he undergoes an unlooked-for change into an ass. In this guise, and in the service of various masters, he has opportunities of observing the follies of men from a novel standpoint. His adventures are numerous, and he hears many strange stories, the latter being chronicled as episodes in the record of his experiences. At last the goddess Isis appears in a dream, and obligingly shows him the way to effect his second metamorphosis, by aid of the high priest of her temple, where certain mysteries are about to be celebrated. Lucius is freed from his disguise, and is initiated into the holy rites.

'The Golden Ass' is full of dramatic power and variety. The succession of incident, albeit grossly licentious at times, engages the interest without a moment's dullness. The main narrative, indeed, is no less entertaining than the episodes. The work became a model for story-writers of a much later period, even to the times of Fielding and Smollett. Boccaccio borrowed freely from it; at least one of the many humorous exploits of Cervantes's 'Don Quixote' can be attributed to an adventure of Lucius; while 'Gil Blas' abounds in reminiscences of the Latin novel. The student of folk-lore will easily detect in the tasks imposed by Venus on her unwelcome daughter-in-law, in the episode of 'Cupid and Psyche,' the possible original from which the like fairy tales of Europe drew many a suggestion. Probably Apuleius himself was indebted to still earlier Greek sources.

Scarcely any Latin production was more widely known and studied from the beginning of the Italian Renaissance to the middle of the seventeenth century. In its style, however, it is far from classic. It is full of archaisms and rhetorical conceits. In striving to say things finely, the author frequently failed to say them well. This fault, however, largely disappears in the translation; and whatever may be the literary defects of the novel, it offers rich compensation in the liveliness, humor, and variety of its substance.

In addition to 'The Golden Ass,' the extant writings of Apuleius include 'Florida' (an anthology from his own works), 'The God of Socrates,' 'The Philosophy of Plato,' and 'Concerning the World,' a treatise once attributed to Aristotle. The best modern edition of his complete works is that of Hildebrand (Leipzig, 1842); of the 'Metamorphoses,' that of Eyssenhardt (Berlin, 1869). There have been many translations into the modern languages. The best English versions are those of T. Taylor (London, 1822); of Sir G. Head, somewhat expurgated (London, 1851); and an unsigned translation published in the Bohn Library, which has been drawn on for this work, but greatly rewritten as too stiff and prolix, and in the conversations often wholly unnatural. A very pretty edition in French, with many illustrations, is that of Savalète (Paris, 1872).

I am a native of Ægina, and I travel in Thessaly, Ætolia, and Boeotia to purchase honey of Hypata, cheese, and other articles used in cookery. Having heard that at Hypata, the principal city of Thessaly, fine-flavored new cheese was for sale cheap, I made the best of my way there to buy it all up. But as usual, happening to start left foot foremost, which is unlucky, all my hopes of profit came to nothing; for a fellow named Lupus, a merchant who does things on a big scale, had bought the whole of it the day before.

Weary with my hurried journey to no purpose, I was going early in the evening to the public baths, when to my surprise I espied an old companion of mine named Socrates. He was sitting on the ground, half covered with a rag-tag cloak, and looking like somebody else, he was so miserably wan and thin,--in fact, just like a street beggar; so that though he used to be my friend and close acquaintance, I had two minds about speaking to him.

"How now, friend Socrates!" said I: "what does this mean? Why are you tricked out like this? What crime have you been guilty of? Why, you look as though your family had given you up for dead and held your funeral long ago, the probate judge had appointed guardians for your children, and your wife, disfigured by her long mourning, having cried herself almost blind, was being worried by her parents to sit up and take notice of things, and look for a new marriage. Yet now, all of a sudden, here you come before us like a wretched ghost from the dead, to turn everything upside down.'"

"O Aristomenes!" said he, "it's clear that you don't know the slippery turns, the freaks, and the never-ending tricks of fortune."

As he said this, he hid his face, crimson with shame, in his one garment of patches and tatters. I could not bear such a miserable sight, and tried to raise him from the ground. But he kept saying with his head all covered up, "Let me alone! let me alone! let Fortune have her way with me!"

However, I finally persuaded him to go with me; and at the same time pulling off one of my own garments, I speedily clothed him, or at any rate covered him. I next took him to a bath, scrubbed and oiled him myself, and laboriously rubbed the matted dirt off him. Having done all I could, though tired out myself, I supported his feeble steps, and with great difficulty brought him to my inn. There I made him lie down on a bed, gave him plenty of food, braced him up with wine, and entertained him with the news of the day. Pretty soon our conversation took a merry turn; we cracked jokes, and grew noisy as we chattered. All of a sudden, heaving a bitter sigh from the bottom of his chest, and striking his forehead violently with his right hand, he said:--

"Miserable wretch that I am, to have got into such a predicament while having a good time at a gladiatorial show! As you know, I went to Macedonia on business; it took me ten months; I was on my way home with a very neat sum of money, and had nearly reached Larissa, which I included in my route in order to see the show I mentioned, when I was attacked by robbers in a lonely valley, and only escaped after losing everything I had. In my distress I betook myself to a certain woman named Meroë, who kept a tavern (and who, though rather old, was very good-looking), and told her about my long absence, my earnest desire to reach home, and my being robbed that very day. She treated me with the greatest kindness, gave me a good supper for nothing, and then let me make love to her. But from the very moment that I was such a fool as to dally with her, my mind seemed to desert me. I even gave her the clothes which the robbers in common decency had left me, and the little earnings I made there by working as cloakmaker so long as I was in good physical condition; until at length this kind friend, and bad luck together, reduced me to the state you just now found me in."

"By Pollux, then," said I, "you deserve to suffer the very worst misfortunes (if there be anything worse than the worst), for having preferred a wrinkled old reprobate to your home and children."

"Hush! hush!" said he, putting his forefinger on his lips, and looking round with a terror-stricken face to see if we were alone. "Beware of reviling a woman skilled in the black art, for fear of doing yourself a mischief."

"Say you so?" said I. "What kind of a woman is this innkeeper, so powerful and dreadful?"

"She is a sorceress," he replied, "and possessed of magic powers; she can draw down the heavens, make the earth heave, harden the running water, dissolve mountains, raise the shades of the dead, dethrone the gods, extinguish the stars, and set the very depths of Tartarus ablaze!"

"Come, come!" said I: "end this tragic talk, fold up your theatrical drop-scenes, and let us hear your story in every-day language."

"Should you like," said he, "to hear of one or two, yes, or a great many of her performances? Why, to make not only her fellow-countrymen, but the Indians, the Ethiopians, or even the Antipodeans, love her to distraction, are only the easy lessons of her art, as it were, and mere trifles. Listen to what she has done before many witnesses. By a single word she changed a lover into a beaver, because he had gone to another flame. She changed an innkeeper, a neighbor of hers she was envious of, into a frog; and now the old fellow, swimming about in a cask of his own wine, or buried in the dregs, croaks hoarsely to his old customers,--quite in the way of business. She changed another person, a lawyer from the Forum, into a ram, because he had conducted a suit against her; to this very day that ram is always butting about. Finally, however, public indignation was aroused by so many people coming to harm through her arts; and the very next day had been fixed upon to wreak a fearful vengeance on her, by stoning her to death. She frustrated the design by her enchantments. You remember how Medea, having got Creon to allow her just one day before her departure, burned his whole palace, with himself and his daughter in it, by means of flames issuing from a garland? Well, this sorceress, having performed certain deadly incantations in a ditch (she told me so herself in a drunken fit), confined everybody in the town each in his own house for two whole days, by a secret spell of the demons. The bars could not be wrenched off, nor the doors taken off the hinges, nor even a breach made in the walls. At last, by common consent, the people all swore they would not lift a hand against her, and would come to her defense if any one else did. She then liberated the whole city. But in the middle of the night she conveyed the author of the conspiracy, with all his house, close barred as it was,--the walls, the very ground, and even the foundations,--to another city a hundred miles off, on the top of a craggy mountain, and so without water. And as the houses of the inhabitants were built so close together that there was not room for the new-comer, she threw down the house before the gate of the city and took her departure."

"You narrate marvelous things," said I, "my good Socrates; and no less terrible than marvelous. In fact, you have excited no small anxiety (indeed I may say fear) in me too; not a mere grain of apprehension, but a piercing dread for fear this old hag should come to know our conversation in the same way, by the help of some demon. Let us get to bed without delay; and when we have rested ourselves by a little sleep, let us fly as far as we possibly can before daylight."

While I was still advising him thus, the worthy Socrates, overcome by more wine than he was used to and by his fatigue, had fallen asleep and was snoring loudly. I shut the door, drew the bolts, and placing my bed close against the hinges, tossed it up well and lay down on it. I lay awake some time through fear, but closed my eyes at last a little before midnight.

I had just fallen asleep, when suddenly the door was burst open with such violence that it was evidently not done by robbers; the hinges were absolutely broken and wrenched off, and it was thrown to the ground. The small bedstead, minus one foot and rotten, was also upset by the shock; and falling upon me, who had been rolled out on the floor, it completely covered and hid me. Then I perceived that certain emotions can be excited by exactly opposite causes; for as tears often come from joy, so, in spite of my terror, I could not help laughing to see myself turned from Aristomenes into a tortoise. As I lay on the floor, completely covered by the bed, and peeping out to see what was the matter, I saw two old women, one carrying a lighted lamp and the other a sponge and a drawn sword, plant themselves on either side of Socrates, who was fast asleep.

The one with the sword said to the other:--"This, sister Panthea, is my dear Endymion, my Ganymede, who by day and by night has laughed my youth to scorn. This is he who, despising my passion, not only defames me with abusive language, but is preparing also for flight; and I forsooth, deserted through the craft of this Ulysses, like another Calypso, am to be left to lament in eternal loneliness!"

Then extending her right hand, and pointing me out to her friend Panthea:--

"And there," said she, "is his worthy counselor, Aristomenes, who was the planner of this flight, and who now, half dead, is lying flat on the ground under the bedstead and looking at all that is going on, while he fancies that he is to tell scandalous stories of me with impunity. I'll take care, however, that some day, aye, and before long, too,--this very instant, in fact,--he shall repent of his recent chatter and his present curiosity."

On hearing this I felt myself streaming with cold perspiration, and my heart began to throb so violently that even the bedstead danced on my back.

"Well, sister," said the worthy Panthea, "shall we hack him to pieces at once, like the Bacchanals, or tie his limbs and mutilate him?"

To this Meroë replied,--and I saw from what was happening, as well as from what Socrates had told, how well the name fitted her,--"Rather let him live, if only to cover the body of this wretched creature with a little earth."

Then, moving Socrates's head to one side, she plunged the sword into his throat up to the hilt, catching the blood in a small leathern bottle so carefully that not a drop of it was to be seen. All this I saw with my own eyes. The worthy Meroë--in order, I suppose, not to omit any due observance in the sacrifice of the victim--then thrust her right hand through the wound, and drew forth the heart of my unhappy companion. His windpipe being severed, he emitted a sort of indistinct gurgling noise, and poured forth his breath with his bubbling blood. Panthea then stopped the gaping wound with a sponge, exclaiming, "Beware, O sea-born sponge, how thou dost pass through a river!"

When she had said this, they lifted my bed from the ground, and dashed over me a mass of filth.

Hardly had they passed over the threshold when the door resumed its former state. The hinges settled back on the panels, the posts returned to the bars, and the bolts flew back to their sockets again. I lay prostrate on the ground in a squalid plight, terrified, naked, cold, and drenched. Indeed, I was half dead, though still alive; and pursued a train of reflections like one already in the grave, or to say the least on the way to the cross, to which I was surely destined. "What," said I, "will become of me, when this man is found in the morning with his throat cut? If I tell the truth, who will believe a word of the story? 'You ought at least,' they will say, 'to have called for help, if as strong a man as you are could not withstand a woman! Is a man's throat to be cut before your eyes, and you keep silence? Why was it that you were not assassinated too? How did the villains come to spare you, a witness of the murder? They would naturally kill you, if only to put an end to all evidence of the crime. Since your escape from death was against reason, return to it.'"

I said these things to myself over and over again, while the night was fast verging toward day. It seemed best to me, therefore, to escape on the sly before daylight and pursue my journey, though I was all in a tremble. I took up my bundle, put the key in the door, and drew back the bolts. But this good and faithful door, which had opened of its own accord in the night, would not open now till I had tried the key again and again.

"Hallo, porter!" said I, "where are you? Open the gate, I want to be off before daybreak."

The porter, who was lying on the ground behind the door, only grunted, "Why do you want to begin a journey at this time of night? Don't you know the roads are infested by robbers? You may have a mind to meet your death,--perhaps your conscience stings you for some crime you have committed; but I haven't a head like a pumpkin, that I should die for your sake!"

"It isn't very far from daybreak," said I; "and besides, what can robbers take from a traveler in utter poverty? Don't you know, you fool, that a naked man can't be stripped by ten athletes?"

The drowsy porter turned over and answered;--"And how am I to know but what you have murdered that fellow-traveler of yours that you came here with last night, and are running away to save yourself? And now I remember that I saw Tartarus through a hole in the earth just at that hour, and Cerberus looking ready to eat me up."

Then I came to the conclusion that the worthy Meroë had not spared my throat out of pity, but to reserve me for the cross. So, on returning to my chamber, I thought over some speedy method of putting an end to myself; but fortune had provided me with no weapon for self-destruction, except the bedstead. "Now, bedstead," said I, "most dear to my soul, partner with me in so many sorrows, fully conscious and a spectator of this night's events, and whom alone when accused I can adduce as a witness of my innocence--do thou supply me (who would fain hasten to the shades below) a welcome instrument of death."

Thus saying, I began to undo the bed-cord. I threw one end of it over a small beam projecting above the window, fastened it there, and made a slip-knot at the other end. Then I mounted on the bed, and thus elevated for my own destruction, put my head into the noose and kicked away my support with one foot; so that the noose, tightened about my throat by the strain of my weight, might stop my breath. But the rope, which was old and rotten, broke in two; and falling from aloft, I tumbled heavily upon Socrates, who was lying close by, and rolled with him on the floor.

Lo and behold! at that very instant the porter burst into the room, bawling out, "Where are you, you who were in such monstrous haste to be off at midnight, and now lie snoring, rolled up in the bed-clothes?"

At these words--whether awakened by my fall or by the rasping voice of the porter, I know not--Socrates was the first to start up; and he exclaimed, "Evidently travelers have good reason for detesting these hostlers. This nuisance here, breaking in without being asked,--most likely to steal something,--has waked me out of a sound sleep by his outrageous bellowing."

On hearing him speak I jumped up briskly, in an ecstasy of unhoped-for joy:--"Faithfulest of porters," I exclaimed, "my friend, my own father, and my brother,--behold him whom you, in your drunken fit, falsely accuse me of having murdered."

So saying, I embraced Socrates, and was for loading him with kisses; but he repulsed me with considerable violence. "Get out with you!" he cried. Sorely confused, I trumped up some absurd story on the spur of the moment, to give another turn to the conversation, and taking him by the right hand--

"Why not be off," said I, "and enjoy the freshness of the morning on our journey?"

So I took my bundle, and having paid the innkeeper for our night's lodging, we started on our road.

We had gone some little distance, and now, everything being illumined by the beams of the rising sun, I keenly and attentively examined that part of my companion's neck into which I had seen the sword plunged.

"Foolish man," said I to myself, "buried in your cups, you certainly have had a most absurd dream. Why, look: here's Socrates, safe, sound, and hearty. Where is the wound? Where is the sponge? Where is the scar of a gash so deep and so recent?"

Addressing myself to him, I remarked, "No wonder the doctors say that hideous and ominous dreams come only to people stuffed with food and liquor. My own case is a good instance. I went beyond moderation in my drinking last evening, and have passed a wretched night full of shocking and dreadful visions, so that I still fancy myself spattered and defiled with human gore."

"It is not gore," he replied with a smile, "that you are sprinkled with. And yet in my sleep I thought my own throat was being cut, and felt some pain in my neck, and fancied that my very heart was being plucked out. Even now I am quite faint; my knees tremble; I stagger as I go, and feel in want of some food to hearten me up."

"Look," cried I, "here is breakfast all ready for you." So saying, I lifted my wallet from my shoulders, handed him some bread and cheese, and said, "Let us sit down near that plane-tree." We did so, and I helped myself to some refreshment. While looking at him more closely, as he was eating with a voracious appetite, I saw that he was faint, and of a hue like boxwood. His natural color, in fact, had so forsaken him, that as I recalled those nocturnal furies to my frightened imagination, the very first piece of bread I put in my mouth, though exceedingly small, stuck in the middle of my throat and would pass neither downward nor upward. Besides, the number of people passing along increased my fears; for who would believe that one of two companions could meet his death except at the hands of the other?

Presently, after having gorged himself with food, he began to be impatient for some drink, for he had bolted the larger part of an excellent cheese. Not far from the roots of the plane-tree a gentle stream flowed slowly along, like a placid lake, rivaling silver or crystal.

"Look," said I: "drink your fill of the water of this stream, bright as the Milky Way."

He arose, and, wrapping himself in his cloak, with his knees doubled under him, knelt down upon the shelving bank and bent greedily toward the water. Scarcely had he touched its surface with his lips, when the wound in his throat burst open and the sponge rolled out, a few drops of blood with it; and his lifeless body would have fallen into the river had I not laid hold of one of his feet, and dragged him with great difficulty and labor to the top of the bank. There, having mourned my hapless comrade as much as there was time, I buried him in the sandy soil that bordered the stream. Then, trembling and terror-stricken, I fled through various unfrequented places; and as though guilty of homicide, abandoned my country and my home, embraced a voluntary exile, and now dwell in Ætolia, where I have married another wife.

Translated for 'A Library of the World's Best Literature.'

[The radical difference in the constituent parts of the 'Golden Ass' is startling, and is well illustrated by the selection given previously and that which follows. The story of the "drummer" comports exactly with the modern idea of realism in fiction: a vivid and unflinching picture of manners and morals, full of broad coarse humor and worldly wit. The story of Cupid and Psyche is the purest, daintiest, most poetic of fancies; in essence a fairy tale that might be told of an evening by the fire-light in the second century or the nineteenth, but embodying also a high and beautiful allegory, and treated with a delicate art which is in extreme contrast with the body of the 'Golden Ass.' The difference is almost as striking as between Gray's lampoon on "Jemmy Twitcher" and his 'Bard' or 'Elegy'; or between Aristophanes's revels in filth and his ecstatic soarings into the heavenliest regions of poetry.

The contrast is even more rasping when we remember that the tale is not put into the mouth of a girl gazing dreamily into the glowing coals on the hearth, or of some elegant reciter amusing a social group in a Roman drawing-room or garden, but of a grizzled hag who is maid of all work in a robbers' cave. She tells it to divert the mind of a lovely young bride held for ransom. It begins like a modern fairy tale, with a great king and queen who had "three daughters of remarkable beauty," the loveliest being the peerless Psyche. Even Venus becomes envious of the honors paid to Psyche's charms, and summons Cupid to wing one of his shafts which shall cause her "to be seized with the most burning love for the lowest of mankind," so as to disgrace and ruin her. Cupid undertakes the task, but instead falls in love with her himself. Meanwhile an oracle from Apollo, instigated by Venus, dooms her to be sacrificed in marriage to some unknown aërial monster, who must find her alone on a naked rock. She is so placed, awaiting her doom in terror; but the zephyrs bear her away to the palace of Love. Cupid hides her there, lest Venus wreak vengeance on them both: and there, half terrified but soon soothed, in the darkness of night she hears from Cupid that he, her husband, is no monster, but the fairest of immortals. He will not disclose his identity, however; not only so, but he tenderly warns her that she must not seek to discover it, or even to behold him, till he gives permission, unless she would bring hopeless disaster on both. Nor must she confide in her two sisters, lest their unwisdom or sudden envy cause harm.

The simple-hearted and affectionate girl, however, in her craving for sympathy, cannot resist the temptation to boast of her happiness to her sisters. She invites them to pass a day in her magnificent new home, and tells contradictory stories about her husband. Alas! they depart bitterly envious, and plotting to make her ruin her own joy out of fear and curiosity.]

"What are we to say, sister, [said one to the other] of the monstrous lies of that silly creature? At one time her husband is a young man, with the down just showing itself on his chin; at another he is of middle age, and his hair begins to be silvered with gray.... You may depend upon it, sister, either the wretch has invented these lies to deceive us, or else she does not know herself how her husband looks. Whichever is the case, she must be deprived of these riches as soon as possible. And yet, if she is really ignorant of her husband's appearance, she must no doubt have married a god, and who knows what will happen? At all events, if--which heaven forbid--she does become the mother of a divine infant, I shall instantly hang myself. Meanwhile let us return to our parents, and devise some scheme based on what we have just been saying."