Part 7

"Shall I go?" she said, without moving her lips.

"Go," said Courage, "for you all pains are past; you will gaze into the world indifferently, a fearful enemy to Sin."

Sorrow swept her hair from off her marble brow, and tried to collect herself. As memory stirred, her eyes began to flash again; but their light died down almost immediately. Yes, she had grown terrible, as terrible as Pain had desired in his fierce vengeance, as terrible as she needed to be to put a curb on Sin. Poor little Sorrow!

_HEAVENLY GIFTS._

Heavenly Gifts.

The forest gorge was full of the sound of trickling and running waters. A streamlet skipped from rock to rock. Through the dense foliage a sunbeam crept here and there, and changed into a rainbow in the embraces of the waters. Here and there dark little pools formed, upon whose surface floated a withered leaf, until it came too close to the current and vanished, whirling over the nearest waterfall. Huge tree trunks had fallen across the gorge. They were used as bridges by the mosses and climbing plants that overgrew them with exuberant vitality, and hung down from their sides as though they would drink of the waters that murmured beneath. There of a sudden a wondrously white arm stretched forth from out of the climbing plants. In its delicate hand it held a staff of rock crystal with a diamond knob, that flashed and glistened strangely, as though the sun had stepped down to behold itself in the mountain stream. Then fair curls came to view over the confusion of plants that covered the tree trunk; then a rosy face, with large dreamy eyes, now black, now dark blue in color, according to the thoughts that swayed under the cover of its curls. Anon the charming being knelt, and one could see the golden girdle that held the soft garment which clung about her tender form, and her other hand that held a spindle cut from a single emerald, which she twirled in the air as though she would that it outshine the green of the beech leaves.

"Oh, Märchen,[2] Märchen," the brook began to sing, "will you not bathe to-day? Put by your staff and spindle and dip down to me. I have not kissed you to-day."

The fair head peeped down and looked into the wood. No, there was no one there, not even a deer. So Märchen laid distaff and spindle among the moss of the tree trunk, twisted her hair into a knot, let fall her linen garment, and, seizing hold of two twigs, let herself glide down to the surface of the brook, and then began to swing merrily to and fro, her feet touching the water as she swung. But the brook did not cease from singing, and from imploring her to come down into him. Then she let go the twigs, and fell, like a shower of spring blossoms, into its wavelets.

Far from here was a lonely gorge. Rock towered upon rock, and a torrent forced its way through with difficulty. There a grave man leaned and looked down into the waterfall. His brow was thoughtful; the hand that rested upon the stones was delicate, almost suffering. A pencil had fallen from its grasp. Suddenly there sounded a wondrous singing from out the waterfall, and the man's brow grew clearer as he listened. That was the moment when Märchen had touched the waters, and it sang and sounded and was full of lovely forms and sweet songs and many fair things that attracted that lonely man. He listened enraptured, and his soul expanded with the things he heard. The brook itself hardly knew what it babbled; it still trembled from having felt Märchen's touch, and it sang for sheer joy. The lonely man departed with lightened brow and airy steps as though the air bore him. He had not long gone before Märchen appeared upon one of the highest rocks, swung her distaff in the air, and filled it with gossamer that glistened in the dew. Then she skipped down, broke a branch from a blossoming wild rose-bush and encircled the distaff with it in lieu of a ribbon, put it into her belt, and, jumping from stone to stone, crossed the brook and went far into the forest. The birds flew about her and chirped to her news of the east and west, the north and south. Squirrels slid out of the trees, seated themselves at her feet, looked at her with their sage eyes, and recounted all that had happened in the wood. The deer and does came about her; even the blind worms reared their heads and chattered with their sharp tongues. Märchen stood still and listened; and from time to time she touched her distaff as though she would say, "Remember."

The forest grew ever denser, the flowers that sent out their scent to Märchen more luxurious. At last she had to bend the branches apart in order to penetrate further. There stood a dream-like castle with tall gabled windows, into which grew the tree branches, and from out which tumbled creeping plants. Roof and walls had vanished beneath the roses that grew over all things, and out of the castle sounded a thousand songs of birds. Märchen stepped to the open door and entered the wide hall, whose floor and walls were of jewels, and in whose midst a tall fountain played. Round about stood hundreds of Kobolds. They had brought with them little stools of pure gold, and waited to see if their sweet queen be content. She smiled approvingly, and thanked her friends. In midst of all this shimmering splendor fair Märchen stood like a reviving sunbeam.

"See how I have filled my distaff to-day," she said, genially. "I believe a magnet lives in your crystal, to which all things fly. Will you not fill it yet fuller?"

The Kobolds frowned, which made them look very comic, and one said--

"We have resolved to tell you nothing more, because you let it flow from you like the water that tumbles yonder. We have watched you. When you go forth at eve, you go to our enemies, the mortals--those wretched thieves that rob our treasures, and you tell them our secrets."

"No," said Märchen, "I do not go to all mortals; only to some--your friends, who love you as I do; and I only tell them as much as they deserve. Will you not go on trusting me?"

They pushed a golden stool near to the fountain and began to recount to Märchen, whose eyes gleamed like the ocean. When she had heard enough, and given it to the distaff to guard, she nodded to her little guests, who hurried away. She then passed into the nearest chamber. There stood such a wealth of flowers that one could not tell where first to rest one's eyes. The walls were covered with all the wonders of the tropics; from the ceiling hung orchids; the floor was overgrown with soft green moss, from which peeped crocuses, hyacinths, violets, primroses, and lilies of the valley. Hummingbirds and nightingales greeted their queen joyously, while from the flower crowns elves uprose and stretched out their arms in love.

Märchen seated herself on the grass and let them talk to her, toyed with the fair flower-children and began to sing in unison with the birds. Then she entered the next room, whose walls were pure rock crystal, that reflected Märchen many hundred times. In its center, under mighty palm fans, was a large basin, studded with rubies, into which foamed a waterfall. The nixes lay around it upon couches, and waited for the beauty whom as yet they had not seen that day. But Märchen wanted to hear no more; she had, like a true queen, given ear to so many that she was overpowered with fatigue, and craved rest. So she passed into the next room, that was a single little bower of rushes and bindweeds; the ground was strewn with poppy flowers, and in its midst stood the fairest couch eye has seen--one single, large rose--into which Märchen laid herself, and that closed its leaves above her.

Now the rushes began to rustle like an echo of distant singing, and the bindweeds tolled their bells, and the poppies gave forth their faint odor, and Märchen slumbered deep and sweet until the evening.

When the sun was sinking, and gazed like a large, glowing eye between the trunks of the forest, so that all the leaves looked golden, Märchen awoke, placed her distaff in her girdle, put the spindle beside it, and stepped outside.

Twilight was creeping up mysteriously and dreamily and spreading its wings over the forest. The birds grew still; only the toads in the watery gorge began their one-toned song. A gentle murmur ran through the leaves and across the parched grass, for all wanted to look on Märchen and aspired towards her. Now the moon rose and threw bright lights hither and thither and haunted the trees. He wanted to kiss Märchen and entice her forth to play upon the forest meadow.

"The elves await you," he called after Märchen, who would not listen, but floated on airily, as though the evening breezes bore her. A mill stood beside the brook in the shadow of the beeches. A fire gleamed within it, around which people sat gathered. Märchen entered, and called the children. They flew towards her and drew her to the fireside, brought her a stool to sit upon, and gazed with large, eager eyes at her full distaff.

Märchen caressed the dear, fair heads, drew forth the spindle, knotted the yarn, and began to spin. And while the spindle floated up and down, swirling, she told them what she beheld in the yarn, until from sheer listening the children's eyes fell to, and they never knew next day whether they had really seen Märchen or only in their sleep. She herself slipped out and glided between the trees till she came to a meadow shimmering in evening mist. Hundreds of butterflies hung upon the myriad flowers, two and three on one blossom, and slept so deep and sound that the heads of the sleepy flowers hung deep down under the weight of so many guests. Only the large night-moth floated about darkly and watched over the whole.

"I wonder if the butterflies dream," thought Märchen, as she knelt down beside the flowers and approached her ear.

Yes, they dreamed of the journeys they had taken that day; they dreamed they had gained far fairer colors: just such green, blue, and red hues like the flowers and leaves. Even the plainest gray one dreamt of colors brighter than the gayest parrot. The flowers dreamt that a warm wind touched them, and gave to them far sweeter scents than they had ever owned--quite intoxicatingly luscious. It was Märchen's breath which they had felt in their sleep.

Soon Märchen came to a pretty house beside a gurgling stream. The water formed a quiet little pool, in which the moon and the ivy-grown house were reflected. The beeches dipped the tips of their branches into it, and a nightingale sang lonesomely into the night. Up in the house burnt a solitary light, like to a glowworm. Märchen entered the house as though it were most familiar to her, opened a door softly, and stepped within a little room. In a deep armchair, beside a writing-table, sat a handsome, pale, agitated man. His head was sunk in his palm, and he gazed with lightless eyes across the table, on which Sorrow was resting both her hands.

"See," he said, "this morning, beside the mountain stream, I was glad for a moment. Pictures filled my brain, but now all is empty and dead, and I am so weary--so weary. I wish to die. I cannot forgive my body that it still lives on, and yet a heavenly gift dwells within me that keeps me alive and makes me believe I could still create. But I do nothing more. Fatigue has grown stronger than aught else in this ugly world. Would that I had never been born, for I am a man who must reflect the whole world in its pain and suffering and falsehood. I love men too much, and therefore they have no faces for me. I only see their souls, and these are beautiful notwithstanding all wickedness and misery. Now I grow miserable with them. I should like to hide before my own eyes, for I am worth nothing--nothing. All that I do is vain, and will vanish unheard; all I think others know much better. A fire burns in me that consumes me in lieu of warming my fellow-men. I feel like one that is drowning, to whom no saving hand is extended. I should be a man and save myself, but my strength is at an end. I have lived too much. I have lived through all that which others have felt, and borne my own woes besides. Now it is too much, do you see--too much; and I can no longer give to the world what I fain would have given it--all the new, great, lovely things that dwell in my brain. But it had no time to listen to me. And perhaps there is, after all, no value in these things, though to my small mind they seemed so great. Yet they cannot bear the light. I am weary. I want to die."

Sorrow listened, and never took her eyes from him; but her pitying gaze made him yet more irritable and desperate. Suddenly Märchen stood before him, with glittering distaff, with shining teeth and beaming eyes; dimples in her cheeks, and the distaff of promise in her hands. He looked at her and was dazzled.

"I wanted to help," said Sorrow, "but he grew ever worse."

"_You_ help him!"

Märchen laughed.

"Go your ways and leave him to me; I will manage him. I know all. You are once more weary of the world and want to die, and have no talent, and men are all bad, very wicked indeed, and faithless, and have deserted you, and do not believe in you. Oh, you poor, poor human soul! Why do you not become a butterfly and sleep on a flower? He knows that he has wings, and that his flower has scent, and that his meadow is quite full of blossoms. What does he care whether the others see it since he sees it! And now look here; I have come back, although you scarcely deserve it, you doubter. Look at this heavy laden distaff, that is for you, only for you, if you will listen to me."

And Märchen began to spin and sing and narrate all night long, and her friend wrote and wrote, without knowing that his pencil moved; he thought he had only heard and listened. He wrote down thoughts and songs and poems; they streamed like living fire from under his hand. And what he wrote moved the world. Men thought his thoughts after him, and sang his songs, and wept over his stories, and knew not that the poet who had given them all these things was sad unto death, misunderstood of all, and that Sorrow visited him far oftener than Märchen.

They called him a child of the gods and a genius, and knew not that he was a man for whose soul Sorrow and Märchen struggled ceaselessly, and who had suffered so much grief and seen so many wonders that his strength was broken. Ay, the children of the gods must suffer much on earth, and Märchen only visits those that have been proved, and ever departs from them if they have made themselves unworthy of her. Once she told at parting the tale which follows:--

[Footnote 2: I have been forced to keep the German word, as no English one covers that peculiar type of German fanciful stories that are known under this appellation. _Märchen_ are something more than fairy tales; something deeper, wider, richer, and more varied. The queen calls the present book a cycle of _Märchen_.--TRANSLATOR.]

_THE TREASURE SEEKERS._

The Treasure Seekers.

The Philosopher and the Poet set out together on a pilgrimage, to seek after the hidden treasure of cognition[1] and to raise it. They had been told that it lay buried there where the rainbow touches the earth, and that it was quite easy to find. The Philosopher dragged instruments with him, and began accurate measurements, and as often as he saw a rainbow he carefully measured the distance, determined the spot with mathematical accuracy, hurried thither and began to dig. The Poet, meanwhile, laid himself in the grass and laughed and toyed with the sunbeams. They played about his happy brow, they told to him bright fairy tales of dreamland, and showed him the life and working of nature. He grew familiar with all plants and creatures, he learnt to know their speech, and he became versed in their secret whisperings and sighs. Ay, all created things came to have faces for him, from the tenderest plant and the most insignificant beast, and before his eyes were unrolled deeds full of woe and joy.

When at last the Philosopher, with solemn look, torn hands, and weary back, rose from his shaft back into daylight, laden with some new stones, he marveled when he saw the Poet's face radiant, as though he had heard wonders.

"How transfigured you are, you lazy one!" he said angrily.

"Who tells you that I am lazy?"

"You always remain here on the surface while I go into the depths."

"Perhaps the surface, too, offers some solutions, and perchance I read these."

"What can the surface offer? One must penetrate into the depths. I have as yet not found the right spot in which the promised treasure lies, but I have made some most important discoveries, though never yet the right ones, those that I apprehend."

"Let us seek further," said the Poet.

Suddenly he held his friend by the arm, and pointed with breathless delight.

"Another rainbow!" cried the Philosopher, and began his measurements.

But the Poet had seen behind the sun-glittering rainbow a wondrous form with black hair and large, sad eyes. She seemed to wait for him; then she turned away slowly. As though demented, the Poet rushed after her; he forgot the aim of his pilgrimage, forgot his friend, who had descended into a new shaft. He only hurried after that wondrous being whose eyes had sunk into his soul. Over hill and dale, from house to house he followed the fair form. He saw the world and its agonies, wherever he looked he beheld woe, for in his own heart dwelt the greatest woe, the gnawing pangs of love. He ever thought he must attain to his enchantress, who stepped in front of him so calmly, through the fallen autumn leaves, across the soft snow, in the bitter north wind--north, south, east, and west, ever unapproachable. Once or twice she looked round after him, and her gaze only increased his yearning.

At last Spring neared on the wings of the wind. At the spot whence the Poet had set out the fair form halted. Now he should reach it. But at that moment a hurricane broke loose that shook the world. Forests were uprooted, and all the sluices of heaven seemed opened. The Poet crossed the foaming mountain stream at the peril of his life, and came up to her who stood calm amid all this uproar, and only gazed at him. He seized her hand.

"You are mistaken in me," she said, sadly. "I wanted to flee from you because I love you, for I bring you no happiness. I am Sorrow, and must leave you a heavy heart and serious thoughts. Farewell! You have found your treasure; now you need me no longer."

So speaking she vanished.

The hurricane had changed into a fine, drizzling rain, through which the Spring sunbeams pierced to the Poet. At that moment the Philosopher rose out of the earth richly laden. He let all his burden fall, folded his hands, and cried--"Why, you lucky wight, you stand in the very midst of the rainbow, straight upon the treasure."

"Who? I?" said the Poet, waking from his stupor. Then he threw himself to earth and wept aloud and cried--

"Oh that I had never been born! I suffer unspeakable torture."

The Philosopher shrugged his shoulders and began to dig anew.

"There stands one right upon his treasure," he said, "and does not know it; and when I tell him he weeps. Oh these poets!"

[Footnote 3: _Erkenntniss_ is the German word. The tree of knowledge of good and evil is called in German "der baum der Erkenntniss." The clumsy philosophical term "cognition" alone seems to me to embrace all the author would include in her meaning.--TRANSLATOR.]

_A LIFE._

A Life.

I wanted to find Truth. Then Sorrow took me by the hand, and said--

"Come with me, I will lead you to Truth, but you must not faint or fear by the way."

"I! I fear nothing; and I am so strong I could carry mountains."

Sorrow looked at me pityingly, and gave no answer, but led me into a hall that was vast and high and airy, filled with wondrous strains of music, glorious pictures, and statues. I wandered among them bewildered. There was nothing to fear here.

"See," said Sorrow, "here live the Arts; you may choose one of them. But of your own accord you must select that which suits you; and it will help you on the road to Truth."

Then I laid my hand on an instrument--

"Music tempts me," I said; "I will sing and play like a god, and it cost me my life and my happiness."

With what ardor, what fire did I begin to play! I followed music like an adored mistress. I besought her to lead me to Truth. But she ever went too fast or soared above my head, while I played till my hands failed me. Song sounded weak and small in my throat, instead of sobbing and storming. Then I ran into the Wood in my distress, and it comforted me.

One day Sorrow touched my shoulder.

"You still play badly, you still sing feebly; let us go further: you are no artist."

I laid aside my instrument and wept.

"Hush!" said Sorrow; "you wanted to carry a mountain."

And she led me into a large, solemn, dimly lit room, that was full of books from floor to ceiling.

"Here is food for your spirit," said Sorrow; "seek, seek; in Science lives Truth."

I seated myself in a tall, worn armchair, and began to learn. But I could only study slowly, for ever my thoughts would wander their own ways. Now the fire burned too brightly and told me fairy tales; now the wind howled round the old house, so that I thought I must away, and the letters grew dim to my eyes. I strove to check this hapless fantasy that held me back on the road to Truth; but it was stronger than I. Sometimes it pressed a pencil into my hand, and then I wrote secretly poor little verses, which I hid from the very books, from the very air of the room. At last I threw myself back in the chair and cried--

"Wisdom, too, is not for me. She seems to me dead and dusty, and I--I desire to live."

"Do you want that?" said Sorrow. "But then you must not fear."

"I do not fear, I want to live."

Then I stood beside a sick bed, where a lovely gifted boy struggled with Death. His sufferings exceeded the measure of the endurable, yet Sorrow would not quit him. But Courage, too, remained at his side. Two years the terrible struggle lasted, and I asked--

"Where is Truth? Is this to live?"

When he died I trembled, for the first time, for fear. Then Sorrow took me from one deathbed to another. How many fair maiden flowers that had grown up beside and with me did I see fade! And I wept till my eyes were dim.

"Is this to live?" I asked again.

Then Sorrow took me with her on long journeys to the North, South, East, and West. I saw all men, all arts, all treasures, the mighty sea, and the petty towns, till I grew homesick for the old house in which I had seen so many die, in which my father had now closed his eyes. For when I came back I found his armchair empty. Then I was ready to die of grief.

"What," said Sorrow, "die already? And you could carry a mountain? Why, you have not lived yet, for you have not loved."

While she said this she laid her hand on my heart, and like a mighty stream love entered in with song and rejoicing. Only the Wood saw it, and it rejoiced with me, and yet more secretly I wrote now and again a little poem.

But Truth was not in love, neither was it in renunciation, for I murmured and knew not why I should renounce. Sorrow's hand lay heavy on my arm, and for a long time my steps were weak and slow. I no longer sought after Truth. But at last I seemed to see that she must lie in Work, in great, rich Work. When Sorrow heard me say this, she raised my drooping head and pointed before me.

"Here stands a good man, and waits for you. Will you love him your life long? Here is your path, it is rough and stony, and leads past precipices to steep heights. Will you walk on it? And there lies work for you, mountains high. Will you carry it?"

"I will," I said.