Part 4

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

And he turned to the other mirror--

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

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

"I am," answered the minstrel.

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

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

* * * * *

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

THE PINE LADY

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

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

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

THE KING ON HIS WAY TO BE CROWNED

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

"Share it with you?" asked the priest.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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