Chapter VI · (continued 2)

“But the thing he had hidden grew heavier, heavier, heavier,—till it lay on his breast like lead. He could not move with it. He could not leave those valleys with it. Then again he took it out, and looked at it.

“‘Oh, my beautiful, my heart’s own!’ he cried, ‘may I not keep you?’

“He opened his hands sadly.

“‘Go,’ he said. ‘It may happen that in Truth’s song one note is like to yours; but I shall never hear it.’

“Sadly he opened his hand, and the bird flew from him forever.

“Then from the Shuttle of Imagination he took the thread of his Wishes and threw it on the ground, and the empty shuttle he put into his breast; for the thread was made in those valleys, but the shuttle came from an unknown country. He turned to go; but now the people came about him, howling.

“‘Fool, hound, demented lunatic!’ they cried. ‘How dared you break your cage and let the birds fly?’

“The hunter spoke; but they would not hear him.

“‘Truth! who is she? Can you eat her? Can you drink her? Who has ever seen her? Your birds were real; all could hear them sing. Oh, fool, vile reptile, atheist!’ they cried, ‘you pollute the air.’

“‘Come, let us take up stones and stone him!’ cried some.

“‘What affair is it of ours?’ said others. ‘Let the idiot go!’ and went away. But the rest gathered up stones and mud, and threw at him. At last, when he was bruised and cut, the hunter crept away into the woods. And it was evening about him.”

At every word the stranger spoke the fellow’s eyes flashed back on him,—yes, and yes, and yes. The stranger smiled. It was almost worth the trouble of exerting oneself, even on a lazy afternoon, to win those passionate flashes, more thirsty and desiring than the love-glances of a woman.

“He wandered on and on,” said the stranger, “and the shade grew deeper. He was on the borders now of the land where it is always night. Then he stepped into it, and there was no light there. With his hands he groped; but each branch, as he touched it, broke off, and the earth was covered with cinders. At every step his foot sank in, and a fine cloud of impalpable ashes flew up into his face; and it was dark. So he sat down upon a stone, and buried his face in his hands, to wait in that land of Negation and Denial till the light came.

“And it was night in his heart also.

“Then from the marshes to his right and left cold mists arose, and closed about him. A fine imperceptible rain fell in the dark, and great drops gathered on his hair and clothes. His heart beat slowly, and a numbness crept through all his limbs. Then, looking up, two merry whisp lights came dancing. He lifted his head to look at them. Nearer, nearer, they came. So warm, so bright, they danced like stars of fire. They stood before him at last. From the centre of the radiating flame in one looked out a woman’s face, laughing, dimpled, with streaming yellow hair. In the centre of the other were merry laughing ripples, like the bubbles on a glass of wine. They danced before him.

“‘Who are you,’ asked the hunter, ‘who alone come to me in my solitude and darkness?’

“‘We are the twins Sensuality!’ they cried. ‘Our father’s name is Human-Nature, and our mother’s name is Excess. We are as old as the hills and rivers,—as old as the first man; but we never die,’ they laughed.

“‘Oh, let me wrap my arms about you!’ cried the first; ‘they are soft and warm. Your heart is frozen now, but I will make it beat. Oh, come to me!’

“‘I will pour my hot life into you,’ said the second; ‘your brain is numb, and your limbs are dead now, but they shall live with a fierce free fire. Oh, let me pour it in!’

“‘Oh, follow us!’ they cried, ‘and live with us. Nobler hearts than yours have sat here in this darkness to wait; and they have come to us and we to them, and they have never left us,—never. All else is a delusion; but we are real, we are real. Truth is a shadow; the valleys of Superstition are a farce; the earth is of ashes, the trees all rotten; but we—feel us—we live! You cannot doubt us. Feel us, how warm we are! Oh, come to us! come to us!’

“Nearer and nearer round his head they hovered, and the cold drops melted on his forehead. The bright light shot into his eyes, dazzling him, and the frozen blood began to run. And he said,——

“‘Yes; why should I die here in this awful darkness? They are warm, they melt my frozen blood!’ and he stretched out his hands to take them.

“Then in a moment there arose before him the image of the thing he had loved, and his hand dropped to his side.

“‘Oh, come to us!’ they cried.

“But he buried his face.

“‘You dazzle my eyes,’ he cried, ‘you make my heart warm; but you cannot give me what I desire. I will wait here,—wait till I die. Go!’

“He covered his face with his hands, and would not listen; and when he looked up again they were two twinkling stars, that vanished in the distance.

“And the long, long night rolled on.

“All who leave the valley of Superstition pass through that dark land; but some go through it in a few days, some linger there for months, some for years, and some die there.

The boy had crept closer; his hot breath almost touched the stranger’s hand; a mystic wonder filled his eyes.

“At last for the hunter a faint light played along the horizon, and he rose to follow it; and he reached that light at last, and stepped into the broad sunshine. Then before him rose the almighty mountains of Dry-facts and Realities. The clear sunshine played on them, and the tops were lost in the clouds. At the foot many paths ran up. An exultant cry burst from the hunter. He chose the straightest, and began to climb; and the rocks and ridges resounded with his song. They had exaggerated; after all, it was not so high, nor was the road so steep! A few days, a few weeks, a few months at most, and then the top! Not one feather only would he pick up; he would gather all that other men had found,—weave the net,—capture Truth,—hold her fast,—touch her with his hands,—clasp her!

“He laughed in the merry sunshine, and sang loud. Victory was very near. Nevertheless after a while the path grew steeper. He needed all his breath for climbing, and the singing died away. On the right and left rose huge rocks, devoid of lichen or moss, and in the lava-like earth chasms yawned. Here and there he saw a sheen of white bones. Now too the path began to grow less and less marked; then it became a mere trace, with a foot-mark here and there; then it ceased altogether. He sang no more, but struck forth a path for himself, until he reached a mighty wall of rock, smooth and without break, stretching as far as the eye could see. ‘I will rear a stair against it; and, once this wall climbed, I shall be almost there,’ he said bravely; and worked. With his Shuttle of Imagination he dug out stones; but half of them would not fit, and half a month’s work would roll down because those below were ill-chosen. But the hunter worked on, saying always to himself, ‘Once this wall climbed, I shall be almost there. This great work ended!’

“At last he came out upon the top, and he looked about him. Far below rolled the white mist over the valleys of Superstition, and above him towered the mountains. They had seemed low before; they were of an immeasurable height now, from crown to foundation surrounded by walls of rock, that rose tier above tier in mighty circles. Upon them played the eternal sunshine. He uttered a wild cry. He bowed himself on to the earth, and when he rose his face was white. In absolute silence he walked on. He was very silent now. In those high regions the rarefied air is hard to breathe by those born in the valleys; every breath he drew hurt him, and the blood oozed out from the tips of his fingers. Before the next wall of rock he began to work. The height of this seemed infinite, and he said nothing. The sound of his tool rang night and day upon the iron rocks into which he cut steps. Years passed over him, yet he worked on; but the wall towered up always above him to heaven. Sometimes he prayed that a little moss or lichen might spring up on those bare walls to be a companion to him; but it never came.” The stranger watched the boy’s face.

“And the years rolled on; he counted them by the steps he had cut—a few for a year—only a few. He sang no more; he said no more, ‘I will do this or that’—he only worked. And at night when the twilight settled down, there looked out at him from the holes and crevices in the rocks strange wild faces.

“‘Stop your work, you lonely man, and speak to us,’ they cried.

“‘My salvation is in work. If I should stop but for one moment, you would creep down upon me,’ he replied. And they put out their long necks farther.

“‘Look down into the crevices at your feet,’ they said. ‘See what lies there,—white bones! As brave and strong a man as you climbed to these rocks. And he looked up. He saw there was no use in striving; he would never hold Truth, never see her, never find her. So he lay down here, for he was very tired. He went to sleep forever. He put himself to sleep. Sleep is very tranquil. You are not lonely when you are asleep, neither do your hands ache, nor your heart.’ And the hunter laughed between his teeth.

“‘Have I torn from my heart all that was dearest; have I wandered alone in the land of night; have I resisted temptation; have I dwelt where the voice of my kind is never heard, and labored alone, to lie down and be food for you, ye harpies?’

“He laughed fiercely; and the echoes of Despair slunk away, for the laugh of a brave, strong heart is as a death-blow to them.

“Nevertheless they crept out again, and looked at him.

“‘Do you know that your hair is white?’ they said, ‘that your hands begin to tremble like a child’s. Do you see that the point of your Shuttle is gone? It is cracked already. If you should ever climb this stair,’ they said, ‘it will be your last. You will never climb another.’

“And he answered, ‘I know it!’ and worked on.

“The old, thin hands cut the stones ill and jaggedly, for the fingers were stiff and bent. The beauty and the strength of the man was gone.

“At last an old, wizened, shrunken face looked out above the rocks. It saw the eternal mountains rise with walls to the white clouds; but its work was done.

“The old hunter folded his tired hands, and lay down by the precipice where he had worked away his life. It was the sleeping time at last. Below him over the valleys rolled the thick white mist. Once it broke; and through the gap the dying eyes looked down on the trees and fields of their childhood. From afar seemed born to him the cry of his own wild birds, and he heard the noise of people singing as they danced. And he thought he heard among them the voices of his old comrades; and he saw far off the sunlight shine on his early home. And great tears gathered in the hunter’s eyes.

“‘Ah! they who die there do not die alone,’ he cried.

“Then the mists rolled together again, and he turned his eyes away.

“‘I have sought,’ he said, ‘for long years I have labored; but I have not found her. I have not rested, I have not ripened, and I have not seen her; now my strength is gone. Where I lie down worn out, other men will stand, young and fresh. By the steps that I have cut they will climb; by the stairs that I have built they will mount. They will never know the name of the man who made them. At the clumsy work they will laugh; when the stones roll, they will curse me. But they will mount, and on my work; they will climb, and by my stair. They will find her, and through me. And no man liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself.’

“The tears rolled from beneath the shrivelled eyelids. If Truth had appeared above him in the clouds now, he could not have seen her; the mist of death was in his eyes.

“‘My soul hears their glad step coming,’ he said; ‘and they shall mount! they shall mount!’ He raised his shrivelled hand to his eyes.

“Then slowly from the white sky above, through the still air, came something falling, falling, falling. Softly it fluttered down, and dropped on to the breast of the dying man. He felt it with his hands. It was a feather. He died holding it.”

Olive Schreiner, The Story of an African Farm.

A Parable for Philanthropists

Christopher and I were motoring through the Adirondacks; and, on the morning in question, were traversing an unusually long stretch of unbroken wilderness. For ten or fifteen miles we had passed not a cottage, not a camp, not even a trail. Nothing but forest on both sides of the road—wild, tangled forest, beautiful, fragrant, and infinitely lonely. Its silence had fallen upon us. We felt as if we had escaped forever from the troubled haunts of men, and could never again be confronted with human problems. We drove slowly, with only a half apprehensive eye on the gray sky, which threatened rain.

I was just thinking that it was strange we saw so little evidence of the wild animal life with which the woods must abound, when suddenly, like an answer to my mental challenge, there came a little stir in the bushes ahead of us. A tiny, discreet stir. No suggestion of a bear or a deer. Perhaps a hedgehog, however. As we passed, I looked closely and, to my astonishment, saw, not a hedgehog, not even a rabbit or a squirrel, but—of all things, in that uninhabited wilderness—a shrinking, small gray kitten. I could hardly have been more surprised by the appearance of a woodchuck on Fifth Avenue.

Christopher saw it as soon as I did, and he slid into neutral and stopped the car. An indignant and disdainful look crept about his mouth. I knew what he was thinking. We live in a summer-resorted valley ourselves,—and we have had incredulously disgusting experience with people who abandon pet cats when they close their cottages. But not out in the wilderness like this, at the mercy of all kinds of dangers, and so little and helpless, its mother’s milk scarcely dry on its mouth. I was so angry that I could not speak, as I got out of the car and went back along the road.

“I don’t know what in the world we’ll do with it,” said Christopher.

The point was well taken. We were planning to spend the night in a hotel. Neither of us hesitated, however. Our duty seemed clear.

“I suppose we can leave it at some camp or farmhouse,” I suggested.

“And pay them for taking care of it!” Christopher added, ironically.

The kitten remained just where we had discovered it until we were near enough to look it in the eye. It had evidently been a pet. Its fur was sleek and its face wore the open, candid expression peculiar to well-bred cats. It seemed glad to see us. Steadfastly it returned our gaze, and its pink mouth opened in a plaintive meow.

“Kitty!” I murmured. I’m fond of cats, and this one quite went to my heart. “Pick her up for me, Christopher. I’ll hold her while you drive.”

So Christopher went to pick her up, and for the next hour and a half he continued to repeat the motion.

Who could have believed it would be so hard to make connections with a pet kitten? She was not afraid of us. On the contrary, the minute we let her alone, she came stealing back to the side of the road where she could see us and call to us. But she simply could not make up her mind to let us rescue her.

First Christopher tried, with a confident method which left him staring rather foolishly at his unexpectedly empty hand. Then I tried.

“That’s not the way. Evidently, she’s been out here long enough to get frightened. Poor little thing! We must coax her into confidence.”

So Christopher sat down on a rock and lighted a cigarette while, slowly, slowly, discoursing, “Poor kitty! nice kitty!” in my most mellifluous accents. I crossed the road and approached the spot where the kitten crouched. It took me at least ten minutes, and, in the end, she slipped from beneath my very fingers. My discomfiture was worse than Christopher’s, for the retreating ball of fur turned and spat at me.

“Hard luck!” said Christopher, sympathetically, if also a little critically, “when you so nearly had her. I’ll try again next; but we’d better sit still for a while till she gets over her scare.”

As we sat waiting, it became evident that it really was going to rain. In fact, already a fine mist was in the air.

“Those bushes will soon be nice and wet,” remarked Christopher.

“Well,” I replied, much subdued, “she’s near the edge now. Go and get her, and get it over with.”

Three minutes later, after a slow approach followed by a plunge on Christopher’s part, the kitten was in the heart of the forest.

“Oh, I say!” cried Christopher. “This is hopeless. We might stay here all day and all night and all another day. Don’t you think we’d better conclude that we’ve done our best? After all, there are plenty of mice and grass-hoppers in the woods.”

I recognized this as sound, sensible masculine advice, and I longed to accept it. The prospect of spending indefinite hours dodging about tangled bushes in the rain was not exhilarating. Moreover, the next inn was leagues ahead, and we were hungry. But the sentiment of my sex was too much for me.

“I’m afraid I could never look Shem in the face again,” I murmured.

Shem is our yellow cat at home.

Christopher was admirable. He always is, but on this occasion he outdid himself. He said nothing further, but took off his hat and coat, turned up his trousers, and went to work. For nearly an hour he pursued that kitten, trying every method he could think of or I could suggest. He stalked and coaxed, he waited and plunged, he withdrew, he circumvented and headed off. The rain fell steadily, and the bushes more than fulfilled their promise of wetness. I was very unhappy. After all, I care more about Christopher than about kittens. But something of the kitten’s perversity had infected me. As she could not bring herself to be caught, so I could not bring myself to abandon her.

“Well,” said Christopher finally (he spoke carefully; for the last half hour when he had said anything at all, he had said it carefully), “I’m going to make one more effort, and then——”

It was a thorough effort. He made a wide détour about the kitten’s position, entering a part of the forest which he had not penetrated before, and was about to close in on the maddening outcast, when, to my perplexity, he suddenly desisted from the whole undertaking and returned to the road, shaking the rain from his hair and turning down his trousers with as dark an air of disgust as I have ever seen. I wanted to ask, “What in the world is the matter?” but I thought I’d better not.

He told me, however, presently. The situation was one which just had to be shared. “There’s a trail over there,” he said concisely, “leading to an occupied camp. We’ve spent the morning trying to kidnap that kitten.”

Perhaps there is nothing more to be said. Certainly Christopher and I said nothing for many miles. I was too humbly chastened, and he was too—well, let us call it considerate. But we did some thinking; and, after a most opportunely good dinner at an unexpected wayside inn, I was relieved to hear Christopher begin to meditate aloud.

“It wasn’t crying at all,” he reflected. “It was just saying, as its mother had taught it, ‘Welcome to our mountain home.’ How embarrassed it must have been!”

“And frightened,” I added. “No wonder I thought it looked scared. Several times we nearly had it.”

“Well,” Christopher concluded, with a grave glance at me, “philanthropy’s a ticklish business.”

By kind permission of The Atlantic Monthly.

The Tadpole and the Frog

“Be ashamed of yourself,” said the frog. “When I was a tadpole, I had no tail.”

“Just what I thought!” said the tadpole. “You never were a tadpole.”

Robert Louis Stevenson. Fables. By permission of Charles Scribner’s Sons, the authorized publishers.

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY OF FAIRY TALES, ALLEGORIES, PARABLES, AND FABLES

The editors have found the additional selections very useful in teaching these forms of narrative:

Andersen, Hans Christian. Fairy Tales.

Æsop. Fables.

Frazer, Lady. Leaves from the Golden Bough. The Macmillan Company.

La Fontaine. Fables.

Schreiner, Olive. Dreams.

Stephens, James. Irish Fairy Tales. The Macmillan Company.

Stevenson, Robert Louis. Fables, particularly The Cart Horse and Saddle Horse and The Sinking Ship. Charles Scribner’s Sons.