<SPAN name="startofbook"></SPAN>
<h2>The Singing Mouse Stories</h2>
<h4><i>By</i><br/>
EMERSON HOUGH</h4>
<h6>Author of The Purchase Price, 54-40 or Fight, Etc.</h6>
<p> </p>
<h6>With Decorations by</h6>
<h4>Mayo Bunker</h4>
<p class = "illustration">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic202.gif" width = "202" height = "114" alt = "crescent moon"></p>
<h6>NEW YORK<br/>
HURST & COMPANY<br/>
PUBLISHERS</h6>
<hr class = "mid">
<h5 class = "smallcaps">Copyright 1910<br/>
By Emerson Hough</h5>
<p class = "illustration">
<ANTIMG src = "images/copyright.gif" width = "145" height = "278" alt = "sword"></p>
<hr class = "mid">
<span class = "pagenum">vii</span>
<h4>CONTENTS</h4>
<div class = "center">
<table class = "toc" summary = "table of contents">
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#land_1">
The Land of the Singing Mouse</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#land_1"><i>Page</i> 11</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#burden_1">
The Burden of a Song</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#burden_1">19</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#river_1">
The Little River</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#river_1">31</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#waters_1">
What the Waters Said</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#waters_1">41</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#lake_1">
Lake Belle-Marie</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#lake_1">55</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#skull_1">
The Skull and the Rose</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#skull_1">67</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#man_1">
The Man of the Mountain</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#man_1">77</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#oaks_1">
At the Place of the Oaks</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#oaks_1">83</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#hours_1">
The Birth of the Hours</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#hours_1">99</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#stone_1">
The Stone That Had No Thought</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#stone_1">107</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#tear_1">
The Tear and the Smile</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#tear_1">113</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#plains_1">
How the Mountains Ate Up the Plains</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#plains_1">123</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#savage_1">
The Savage and Its Heart</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#savage_1">131</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#beast_1">
The Beast Terrible</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#beast_1">137</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#passing_1">
The Passing of Men</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#passing_1">155</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#truth_1">
The House of Truth</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#truth_1">167</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#city_1">
Where the City Went</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#city_1">181</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#bell_1">
The Bell and the Shadows</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#bell_1">193</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#sorrow_1">
Of the Greatest Sorrow</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#sorrow_1">205</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#shoes_1">
The Shoes of the Princess</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#shoes_1">215</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#moths_1">
Of White Moths</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#moths_1">225</SPAN></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "smallcaps">
<p><SPAN href = "#dreams_1">
The House of Dreams</SPAN></p>
</td>
<td class = "number"><SPAN href = "#dreams_1">231</SPAN></td>
</tr>
</table></div>
<hr class = "mid">
<span class = "pagenum">ix</span>
<h4>THE SINGING MOUSE STORIES</h4>
<p class = "illustration">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic236.gif" width = "138" height = "152" alt = "stump of candle in candlestick"></p>
<hr class = "mid">
<div class = "maintext">
<span class = "pagenum">11</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="land_1" id = "land_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic11.gif" width = "377" height = "524" alt = "The Land of the Singing Mouse" title = "The Land of the Singing Mouse"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">13</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#land_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="land_2" id = "land_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg13"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td class = "bottom">
<h4>The Land of the<br/>
Singing Mouse</h4>
</td>
<td width = "50px" height = "159px"> </td>
</tr>
</table>
<span class = "firstletter">T</span>
<p class = "float right">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic13b.gif" width = "38" height = "148" alt = "decorative border"></p>
<p class = "float right">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic13c.gif" width = "107" height = "182" alt = "decorative border"></p>
<p class = "float right">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic13d.gif" width = "305" height = "140" alt = "decorative border"></p>
<p><span class = "hidden">T</span><span class = "firstword">his</span>
is my room. I live here; and my friends come here sometimes, such as I
have left. There is little to offer them, but they are welcome to what
there is. There is the table. There is the fire. There are not any
keys.</p>
<p>That is my coat upon the wall. It is worn, a little. The barrels of
the old gun are worn; and the stock of the rifle, broken in the
mountains long ago, is mended but rudely; and the tip of the old rod is
broken, and the silk is fraying in the lashings, and upon the hand-grasp
the cord is loose. The silver cord will loosen and break in the best of
men in time; wherefore, I beseech you, mock
<span class = "pagenum">14</span>
not at these belongings, though your own may far surpass them. You are
welcome to anything there is here....</p>
<p>But the Singing Mouse will not come out, not while you are here.
True, after you have gone, after the fire has burned down and the room
is all still—usually near midnight, as I sit and muse alone over
the dead or dying fire—true, then the Singing Mouse comes out and
asks for its bit of bread; and then it folds its tiny paws and sits up,
and turning its bright red eye upon me, half in power and half in
beseeching, as of some fading memory of the past—why, it sings,
I say to you; it sings! And I listen.... During such singing the
fire blazes up. The walls are rich in art. My rod is new and trig. There
is work, but there is no worry.... I am rich, rich! I have the
Singing Mouse. And so
<span class = "pagenum">15</span>
strange, so wondrous, so real are the things it sings; so bewitching is
the song, so sweeter than that of any siren’s; so broad and fine
are the countries; so strong and true are the friendships; so brave and
kind are the men I meet—so beautiful the whole world of the
Singing Mouse, that when it is over, and in a chill I start up,
I scarce can bear the shrinking in of the walls, and the grayness
of the once red fire, and my gold turned to earthenware, and my pictures
turned to splotches. In my hand everything I touch feels awkward.
A pen—a pen—to talk of that? If one could use it while
in the land of the Singing Mouse—then it might do. I think
the pens there are not of wood and iron, stiff things of torture to
reader and writer. I have a notion—though I have not examined
the pens there—that they are made from plumes of an angel’s
<span class = "pagenum">16</span>
wing; and that if they chose they could talk, and say things which would
make you and me ashamed and afraid. Pens such as these we do not
have.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic16.gif" width = "359" height = "468" alt = "angel"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">19</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="burden_1" id = "burden_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic19.gif" width = "359" height = "580" alt = "The Burden of A Song" title = "The Burden of A Song"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">21</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#burden_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="burden_2" id = "burden_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg21"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td width = "36px" height = "170px"> </td>
<td class = "bottom">
<h4>The Burden<br/>
of a Song</h4>
</td>
<td width = "71px"> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td> </td>
<td colspan = "2">
<span class = "firstletter">T</span>
<p class = "float right">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic21c.gif" width = "71" height = "267" alt = "decorative border"></p>
<p class = "float right">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic21d.gif" width = "146" height = "132" alt = "decorative border"></p>
<p><span class = "hidden">T</span><span class = "firstword">he</span>
Singing Mouse came out. Quaintly and sweetly and with wondrous clearness
it began an old, old song I first heard long ago. And as it sang, back
with red electric thrill came the fine blood of youth, and beat in pulse
with the song:</p>
<div class = "verse">
<p>“When all the world is young, lad,</p>
<p class = "inset">And all the trees are green,</p>
<p>And every goose a swan, lad,</p>
<p class = "inset">And every lass a queen.</p>
</div>
<div class = "verse">
<p>“Then hey! for boot and saddle, lad,</p>
<p class = "inset">And round the world away!</p>
<p>Young blood must have its course, lad,</p>
<p class = "inset">And every dog his day!”</p>
</div>
<p><span class = "pagenum">22</span>
And young blood began its course anew. Booted and spurred, into the
saddle again! Face toward the West! And off for round the world
away!</p>
<p>“There are green fields in Thrace,” sighs the gladiator
as he dies. And here were green fields in the land before us. Only,
these were the inimitable and illimitable fields of Nature. Sheets and
waves and billows and tumbles of green; oceans unswum, continents
untracked, of thousandfold green. Then, on beyond, the gray, the
gray-brown, the purple-gray of the higher plains; nearer than that,
a broad slash of great golden yellow, a band of the sturdy
prairie sunflowers; and nearer than that, swimming on the surface of the
mysterious wave which constantly passes but is never past on the
prairies, bright red roses, and strong larkspur, and at the bottom of
this ever-shifting
<span class = "pagenum">23</span>
sea, jewels in God’s best blue enamel. You can not find this
enamel in the windows. One must send for it to the land of the unswum
sea.</p>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<p class = "space">
A little higher and stronger piped the compelling melody. Why, here are
the mountains! God bless them! Nay, brother, God has blessed them;
blessed them with unbounded calm, with boundless strength, with
unspeakable peace. You can take your troubles to the mountains. If you
are Pueblo, Aztec, you can select some big mountain and pray to it, as
its top shows the red sentience of the on-coming day. You can take your
troubles to the sea; but the sea has troubles of its own, and frets.
There is commerce on the sea, and the people who live near it are
fretful, greedy, grasping. The mountains have no troubles; they have
<span class = "pagenum">24</span>
no commerce. The dwellers of the mountains are calm and unfretted.</p>
<p>And on the broad shoulders of the mountains once more was cast the
burden of the young man’s troubles, and once more he walked deep
into the peace of the big hills. And the mountains smiled not, neither
wept, but gravely and kindly folded over, about, behind, the gray mantle
of the cañon walls, and locked fast doors of adamant against all
following, and swept a pitying hand of shadow, and breathed that
wondrous unsyllabled voice of comfort which any mountain-goer knows. Ay!
the goodness of such strength! Up by the clean snow; over the big rocks;
by the lace-work stream where the trout are—why, it’s all
come again! That was the clink made by a passing deer. That was the
touch of the green balsam—smell it,
<span class = "pagenum">25</span>
now! And there comes the mist, folding down the top; and there is the
crash of the thunder; and this is the rush of the rain; and this is the
warm yellow sun over it all—O, Singing Mouse, Singing
Mouse!...</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic25.gif" width = "227" height = "97" alt = "flowers"></p>
<p>Back again, now, by some impulse of the dog which hasn’t had
any day. It is winter now, I remember, Singing Mouse, and I am
walking by the shore of the great Inland Seas. There is snow on the
ground. The trees look black in contrast as you gaze up from the beach
against the high bank. It is cold. It is dark. There is a shiver in the
air. There are icicles in the sky. Something is flying through the
trees, but silent as if it came out of a grave. I have been
walking, I know. I have walked a million miles, and I’m
tired. My legs are stiff, and my legging has frozen fast
<span class = "pagenum">26</span>
to my overshoe; I remember that. And so I sit down—right
here, you know—and look out over the lake—just over there,
you see. The ice reaches out from the shore into the lake a long way;
and it is covered with snow, and looks white. I can follow that
white glimmer in a long, long curve to the right—twenty miles or
more, maybe. Yes, it is cold. But ah! what is that out there, and what
is it doing? It is setting all the long white curves of ice afire. It is
throwing down hammered silver in a broad path, out there on the water.
Those are not ripples. That is silver! There will be angels walking on
that pathway before long! That is not the moon coming up over the lake!
It is the swinging open, by some careless angel’s mischance, of
the door of the White City of Rest!...</p>
<p>How old, how sore a man climbed up
<span class = "pagenum">27</span>
the steep bank! There were white fields. In the distance a dog barked.
Away across the fields a bright and cheery light shone out from a
window, and as the moon rose higher, it showed the house which held the
light. It was not a large house, but it seemed to be a home.
Home!—what is that? I wondered; and I remember that I pulled
at the frozen legging, and moved, with pain, the limbs grown tired and
sore. And, as one looked at that twinkling, comfortable light, how
plainly the rest of the old song came back:</p>
<div class = "verse">
<p>“When all the world is old, lad,</p>
<p class = "inset">And all the trees are brown,</p>
<p>And all the sports are stale, lad,</p>
<p class = "inset">And all the wheels run down,</p>
</div>
<div class = "verse">
<p>“Creep home and take your place there,</p>
<p class = "inset">The sick and maimed among.</p>
<p>God grant you find one face there,</p>
<p class = "inset">You loved when you were young.”</p>
</div>
<p><span class = "pagenum">28</span>
The light in the little house went out. I think it was a happy home. May
yours be so, always.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic28.gif" width = "331" height = "431" alt = "bearded face"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">31</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="river_1" id = "river_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic31.gif" width = "374" height = "560" alt = "The Little River" title = "The Little River"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">33</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#river_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="river_2" id = "river_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg33"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td width = "50px" height = "200px"> </td>
<td class = "bottom">
<h4>The Little<br/>
River</h4>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td> </td>
<td><p><span class = "firstletter">T</span><span class =
"firstword">he</span> Singing Mouse came out and sat upon my knee. It
fixed its small red eye upon me, and lifted its tiny paws, so thin the
fire shone through them. And it sang.... Like the voice of some
night-wandering bird of melody, hid high in the upper realms of
darkness, came faint sweet notes falling softly down. It was as if from
the deep air above, and from the wide air around, there were dropping
and drifting small links of silken steel, gentle but strong, so that one
were helpless even had one wished to move. To listen was also
to see.</p>
<p><span class = "pagenum">34</span>
There were low rolling hills, covered and crowned with a thick growth of
hazel thickets and short oaks. Between these hills ran long strips of
green, strung on tiny bands of silver. And as these bands moved and
thickened and braided themselves together, I seemed to see a
procession of the trees. The cottonwoods halted in their march. The
box-elders, and maples, and water-elms, and walnuts and such big trees
swept grandly in with waving banners, and wound on and on in long
procession, even down to two blue distant hills set at the edge of the
world, unpassed guardians of a land of dreams. Ah, well-a-day!
I look back at those two hills now, and the land of dreams lies
still beyond them, it is true; but it is now upon the side whence I
first gazed. It is back there, where one can not go again; back there,
along that
<span class = "pagenum">35</span>
crystal, murmuring mystery of the little stream one knew when one was
young!</p>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic35.gif" width = "242" height = "99" alt = "flying geese"></p>
<!-- also used on 189 -->
<p>Ah, little river, little river, but I am coming back again. Once more
I push away the long grass and the swinging boughs, and look into your
face. Again I dabble my bare feet, and scoop up my straw hat full, and
watch the tiny streams run down. Again I stand, bare and small and
trembling, wondering if I can swim across. And—listen, little
river—again at the same old place I shall cut me the willow wand,
and down the long slope to the certain place I knew I am going to hurry,
running the last quarter of a mile in sheer expectation, but forgetting
not the binding on of the tough linen line. And now I cast my gaudy
float on that same swinging, wimpling, dimpling eddy, and let it swim in
beneath the bank. And—No! Can it
<span class = "pagenum">36</span>
be? Have I here, now, again, plainly in my hands, the strange and
wonderful creature, the gift of the little stream? Is this its form,
utterly lovable? Is this its coat, wrought of cloth of gold and silver?
Are these diamonds its eyes?... Oh, little river, little river, give me
back this gift to keep for ever! Why take such things from us?... All I
have I will give to you, if you will but give back to me, to have by me
all the time, this little fish from the pool beneath the boughs.
I have hunted well for him, believe me, hard and faithfully in many
a place, but he is no longer there. I find him no longer, even in
the remotest spots I search.... But this is he! This, in my hands, here
in actual sight, is my first, my glorious, iridescent, radiant prize!
Pray you, behold the glittering!</p>
<table class = "background pg39"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td width = "56px"> </td>
<td>
<p>But along this little river there were
<span class = "pagenum">37</span>
other things when the leaves grew brown. In those low, easy hills
strange creatures dwelt. Birds of brown plumage and wondrous,
soul-startling burst of wing. Large gray creatures, a foot long or
longer, with light tread on the leaves, and long ears that went a-peak
when you whistled to them. Were ever such beings before in any land? For
the pursuit of these, it seems, one must have boots with copper toes,
made waterproof by abundant tallow. There must be a vast
game-bag—a world too large for a boyish form—and
strange things to eat therein, such as one sees no longer; for on a
chase calling for such daring-do it may be needful that one walk far,
across the hills, along the little river, almost to the Delectable
Mountains themselves. Again I see it all. Again I follow through the
hills that same tall, tireless figure with
<span class = "pagenum">38</span>
the grave and kindly face. Again I wonder at the uncomprehended skill
which brought whirling down ten out of the dozen of those brown
lightning balls. Again I rejoice, beyond all count or measure, over the
first leporine murder committed by myself, the same furthered by means
of a rest on a forked tree. It seems to me I groan secretly again at the
weight of that great gun before the night has come. I almost wince
again at the pulling off of those copper-toed boots at night, there by
the kitchen stove, after the chase is done. But, ah! how happy I am
again, holding up for the gaze of a kind pair of eyes this great, gray
creature with the lopping ears.</p>
<p class = "space">
Now, as we walk by the banks of this magic river, I would that it might
be always as it was in the earliest days. I
<span class = "pagenum">39</span>
like best to think myself mistaken when I suspect a greater stoop in
this once familiar form which knew these hills and woods so well. It can
not be that the quick eye has grown less bright. Yet why was the last
mallard missed? And tell me, is not the old dog ranging as widely as
once he did? Can it be that he keeps closer at heel? Does he look up
once in a while, mournfully, with a dimmer eye, at an eye becoming also
dimmer—does he walk more slowly, by a step now not so fast? Does
he look up—My God!—is there melancholy in a dog’s
eye, too?</p>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td colspan = "2" height = "240px"> </td>
</tr>
</table>
<span class = "pagenum">41</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="waters_1" id = "waters_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic41.gif" width = "385" height = "586" alt = "What the Waters Said" title = "What the Waters Said"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">43</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#waters_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="waters_2" id = "waters_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg43"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td> </td>
<td class = "bottom">
<h4>What the<br/>
Waters Said</h4>
</td>
<td width = "90px" height = "155px"> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "background pg43b"> </td>
<td>
<p><span class = "firstletter">T</span><span class =
"firstword">he</span> fire was flickering fitfully and painting ghostly
shadows on the wall. It was winter, and late in winter; indeed, the
season was now at length drawing near to the end of winter, and
approaching that dear time of spring which, beyond doubt, will be the
eventful front and closing of the circle in the land where winter will
not come.</p>
<p>I had drawn the little pine table close to the heap of failing
embers, and aided by what light the sulky candle gave, was bending over
and trying to arrange a patch on my old hunting-coat. It was an old, old
hunting-coat, far gone in the sere and yellow leaf. It was old-fashioned
<span class = "pagenum">44</span>
now, though once of proper cut and comeliness. It was disfigured,
stained and worn. The pockets were torn down. The bindings were worn
out. It was quite willing to be left alone now, hung by upon a forgotten
nail, and subject to no further requisition. Nevertheless, if its owner
wished, it could still do a day or two. I knew that; and something
in the sturdy texture of its oft-tried nature excited more than half my
admiration, and all my love.</p>
</td>
<td> </td>
</tr>
</table>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic43c.gif" width = "423" height = "134" alt = "lonely rock and distant boat"></p>
<p>Walpurgis on the ceiling, gray coming on in the embers, symptoms of
death in the candle, a blotch of tallow on the Shakespeare, and the
coat not half done. It must have been about then, I think, that the
thin-edged sweetness of the Singing Mouse’s voice pierced keenly
through the air. I was right glad when the little creature came and
sat on my
<span class = "pagenum">45</span>
knee, and in its affectionate way began to nibble at my finger-tips. It
sat erect, its thin paws waving with a tiny, measured swing, and in its
mystic voice, so infinitely small, so sweet and yet so majestically
strong, began a song which no pen can transcribe. Knowing that the
awakening must come, but unwilling to lose a moment of the dream,
I, who with one finger could have crushed the little thing, sat
prizing it more and more, as more and more its voice swept, and swelled,
and rang; rang, till the fire burst high in noble pyramids of flame;
rang, till the candle flashed in a thousand crystals; swelled, till the
walls fell silently apart, and showed that all this time I had been
sitting ignorant of, but yet within a grand and stately hall, whose
polished sides bore speaking canvas and noble marbles; swept up and
around, till
<span class = "pagenum">46</span>
every stately niche, and every tapestried corner, and every lofty dome
rang gently back in mellow music—all for the Singing Mouse
and me....</p>
<p>Small wizard, it was fell cunning of ye so to paint upon the wall
this picture of the old mill-dam. How naturally the wooded hill slopes
back beyond the mill! And how, with the same old sleepy curves, the
river winds on back. How green the trees—how very green! Ah,
Singing Mouse, they do not mix that color now. And nowhere do wide
bottom-lands wave and sing in such seemly grace, so decked with yellow
flowers, with odd sweet william and the small wild rose. And nowhere now
on earth, I know, is there any stream to murmur so sweetly and so
comfortably, to say such words to any dreaming boy, to babble of a work
<span class = "pagenum">47</span>
well done, of conscience clear and of a success and happiness to come.
All that was in the river. If I listen very hard, and imagine very high
and very deep, I can almost pretend to hear them now, those old
words, heard when I was young. The voices are there, I doubt not,
and there are other boys. God keep them boys always, and may they dream
not backward, but ahead!</p>
<p>This lazy pool beneath the far wing of the dam, how smooth it looks!
Yet well we know the sunken log upon its farther side. We have festooned
it full oft with a big hook and hempen line. And from that pool how many
fatuous fishes have we not hauled forth. Here we came often, when we
were boys; and once did not certain bold souls sleep here all night,
curled up along the bank, waking the
<span class = "pagenum">48</span>
next morning, each with a sore throat, ’tis true, but with heart
full proud at such high deed of valor!</p>
<p>And there is the long wooden bridge. What a feat of engineering that
bridge once seemed to our untraveled souls! Behold it now, as it was
then, lying in the level rays of the rising moon, a brilliant
causeway leading over into a land of mystery, to glory, perhaps; perhaps
to failure, forgetfulness, oblivion and rest. And there, I declare,
at the other end of this great roadway—swimming up,
I declare, in the same old way—is the great round moon whose
light served us when we stayed late at the dam in the summer evenings.
And the shadows of the bridge timbers are just as long and black; and
the ripples over the rocks at the middle span are just as beautiful and
white. And here, right at our feet again,
<span class = "pagenum">49</span>
the moon is playing its old tricks of painting faces in the
water....</p>
<p class = "background pg49">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic49.gif" width = "88" height = "538" alt = "decorative plant"></p>
<!-- also used on 151, 221 -->
<p>There are too many faces in the water, Singing Mouse; and I beg you,
cease repeating the words about the <i>Corpus Delicti</i>! You would
make one shudder. Let us look no more at the faces in the water.</p>
<p class = "space">
But still you bide by the waters tonight, wizard; for here is a picture
of the sea. It is the sea, and it is talking, as it always does. There
are some who think the sea speaks only of sorrow, but this is not wholly
true. If you will listen thoughtfully enough, you will find that it is
not all of troubles that the sea is whispering. Nor does it speak always
of restlessness and change. Some find a stimulus beside the sea, and say
it brings forgetfulness. Rather let us call it exaltation.
<span class = "pagenum">50</span>
Much more than of a petty excitement, fit to blot a man’s
momentary woes, it speaks in a sterner and a stronger note. It throbs
with the pulse of a further shore. It speaks of a quiet tide making out
to the Fortunate Islands, and tells of a way of following gales, and of
a new Atlantis, somewhere on beyond. How dear this dream of a different
land, this story of Atlantis, pathetically sought! Certainly, Atlantis
is there, out beyond, somewhere in the sea; and truly there are those
who have discovered it, and those who still may do so. I know it,
Singing Mouse, for I can read it written in the hollow of this tiny
shell of pink you have found here by the shore—borne across to us,
we may not doubt, by an understanding tide from a place happily attained
by those who wrote the message and sought to let us know.</p>
<div class = "verse">
<span class = "pagenum">51</span>
<p>“Long time upon the mast our brown sail flapped;</p>
<p class = "inset">Our keel plowed bitter salt, and everywhere</p>
<p>The ominous sky in sullen mystery wrapped,</p>
<p class = "inset">What side we looked on, either here or there,</p>
<p>The welcome sight of land long sadly sought;</p>
<p class = "inset">And that Atlantis, hid within the sea,</p>
<p>The land with all our hope and promise fraught,</p>
<p class = "inset">We saw not yet, nor wist where it might be.</p>
</div>
<div class = "verse">
<p>“But as we sailed as manful as we might,</p>
<p class = "inset">And counted not the sail more fit than oar,</p>
<p>Lo! o’er the wave there burst a vision bright</p>
<p class = "inset">Of wood, and winding stream, and easy shore.</p>
<p>Then by the lofty light which shone above,</p>
<p class = "inset">We knew at last our voyage sad was o’er,</p>
<span class = "pagenum">52</span>
<p>And we hard by the haven for which we strove,</p>
<p class = "inset">And soon all past the need to wander more.</p>
</div>
<div class = "verse">
<p>“Then as our craft made safely on the strand,</p>
<p class = "inset">And we all well our weary brown sail furled,</p>
<p>We gazed as strangers might at that fair land,</p>
<p class = "inset">And hardly knew if it might be our world;</p>
<p>Till One took gently every weary hand,</p>
<p class = "inset">And led us on to where still waters be,</p>
<p>And whispered softly, ‘Lo! it hath been planned</p>
<p class = "inset">That thou at last this pleasant place shouldst
see.’</p>
</div>
<div class = "verse">
<p>“And as those dreaming so awakened we,</p>
<p class = "inset">And looked with eyes unhurt on that fair sky,</p>
<p>And whispered, hand in hand and eye to eye,</p>
<p class = "inset">‘’Tis our Atlantis, risen from the
sea—</p>
<p>’Tis our Atlantis, from the bitten sea!</p>
<p class = "inset">’Tis our Atlantis, come again, oh, friend, to
thee and me!’”</p>
</div>
<span class = "pagenum">55</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="lake_1" id = "lake_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic55.gif" width = "389" height = "565" alt = "Lake Belle-Marie" title = "Lake Belle-Marie"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">57</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#lake_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="lake_2" id = "lake_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg57"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td> </td>
<td class = "bottom" height = "166px">
<h4>Lake<br/>
Belle-Marie</h4>
</td>
<td width = "83px"> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "background pg57b"> </td>
<td>
<p><span class = "firstletter">L</span><span class =
"firstword">ake</span> Belle-Marie lies far away. Beyond the forest the
mountains are white. Beyond the mountains the sky rises blue, high up
into the infinite Unknown.</p>
<p>I do not know where the Singing Mouse lives. No man can tell what
journeys it may make such times as it is absent from the room that holds
the pine table, and the book, and the candle, and the open fire. But
last night when the faint, shrill sweetness of its little voice grew
apart from the lonely silence of the room, and I turned and saw the
Singing Mouse sitting on the corner of the book, the light of the candle
shining pink
<span class = "pagenum">58</span>
through its tiny paws, almost the first word it said was of the far-off
Lake of Belle-Marie.</p>
<p>“Do you see it?” asked the Singing Mouse.</p>
<p>“You mean—”</p>
<p>“The moon there through the window? Do you see the moon and the
stars? Do you know where they are shining to-night? Do you see them,
there, deep in the water? Do you know where that is? Do you know the
water? I know. It is Lake Belle-Marie.”</p>
</td>
<td class = "background pg57c"> </td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>And all I could do was to sit speechless. For the fire was gone, and
the wall was open, and the room was not a room. The voice of the Singing
Mouse, shrill and sweet, droned on a thousand miles away in smallness,
but every word a crystal of regret and joy.</p>
<p>“A thousand feet deep, or more, or
<span class = "pagenum">59</span>
bottomless, lies Lake Belle-Marie, for no man has ever fathomed it. But
no matter how deep, the moon lies to-night at the bottom, and you can
see it shining there, deep down in the blue. The stars are smaller, so
they stay up and sparkle on the surface. The forest is very black
to-night, is it not? and the shadow of the pines on the point looks like
a mass of actual substance. Wait! Did you see that silver creature leap
from the quiet water? You may know the shadow is but a shadow, for you
can see the chasing ripples pass through it and break it up into a
crinkled fabric of the night.</p>
<table class = "background pg61"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td>
<p>“Do you see the pines waving, away up there in their tops, and
do you hear them talking? They are always talking. To-night they are
saying: ‘Hush, Belle-Marie; slumber, Belle-Marie; we will watch,
we will watch, hush, hush, hush<ins class = "correction"
title = "single close quote missing">!’</ins>
<span class = "pagenum">60</span>
Didn’t you ever know what the pines said? They wish no one ever to
come near Lake Belle-Marie. Well for you that you only sat and looked at
the face of Belle-Marie, and cast no line nor fired untimely shot around
such shores! The pines would have been angry and would have crushed you.
You do not know how they live, seeking only to keep Belle-Marie from the
world, standing close and sturdy together and threatening any who
approach. It would break their hearts to have her hiding-place found
out. You do not know how they love her. The pines are old, old, old,
many of them, but they told me that no footprint of man was ever seen
upon those shores, that no boat ever rested on that little sea, neither
did ever a treacherous line wrinkle even the smallest portion of its
smoothest coves. Believe me, to have
<span class = "pagenum">61</span>
Belle-Marie known would break the hearts of the pines. They told me they
lived all the time only that they might every night sing Belle-Marie to
sleep, and every morning look upon her face, innocent, pure, unknown and
unknowing, therefore good, sincere and utterly trustworthy. That is why
the pines live. That is what they are talking about. In many places I
know the hearts of the pines are broken, and they grieve continually.
That is because there are too many people. In this valley the pines do
not grieve. They only talk among themselves. In the morning they will
wave their hands quite gaily and will say: ‘Waken, waken,
Belle-Marie! Sweet is the day, sweet is the day, God hath given, given,
given!’ That is what the pines say in the morning.</p>
</td>
<td> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td> </td>
<td width = "90px" height = "95px"> </td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>“The white mountains yonder are very
<span class = "pagenum">62</span>
old. How strong and quiet they are, and how sure of themselves! To be
quiet and strong one needs to be old, for small things do not matter
then. Do you know what the mountains think, as they stand there shoulder
to shoulder—for they live only to shield and protect the forest,
here in the valley. They told me they were thinking of the smallness and
the quickness of the days. ‘Age unto age!’ is what the
mountains whisper. ’Æon unto æon! Strong, strong,
strong is Time!’</p>
<p>“And yet I knew these mighty pillars stood only to shield the
forest which shielded Belle-Marie. So I stood upon the last mountain and
looked upon the great blue of the sky, and there again I saw the face of
Lake Belle-Marie; and the circle was complete, and I sought no more, for
I knew that from the abode of
<span class = "pagenum">63</span>
perfect, unhurt nature it is but a step up to the perfect peace and rest
of the land where lives that Time whose name the mountains voice in
awe.</p>
<p>“And now, do you see what is happening on Lake Belle-Marie?
Through the cleft in the forest the pink of the early day is showing,
and light shines through the spaces of the pines. And down the pebbles
of the beach, knee-deep into the shining flood, steps a noble creature,
antlered, beautiful, admirable. Do you see him drink, and do you see him
raise his head and look about with gentle and fearless eye? This
creature is of the place, and no hand must harm him.</p>
<p>“Let the thin, blue smoke die down. Attempt no foot farther on.
Disturb not this spot. Return. But before you go, take one more look
upon the Lake of Belle-Marie!”</p>
<p><span class = "pagenum">64</span>
So again I gazed upon the face of the lake, which seemed innocent, and
sincere, and trustworthy, and deserving of the protection of the league
of the pines, and the army of the mountains, and the canopy of the
unshamed sky. And then the voice of the Singing Mouse, employed in some
song whose language I do not yet fully understand, faded and sank away;
and even as it passed the walls came back and the ashes lay gray upon
the hearth.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic64.gif" width = "318" height = "209" alt = "flying goose against the moon"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">67</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="skull_1" id = "skull_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic67.gif" width = "366" height = "470" alt = "The Skull and the Rose" title = "The Skull and the Rose"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">69</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#skull_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="skull_2" id = "skull_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg69"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td width = "28px" height = "180px"> </td>
<td class = "bottom">
<h4>The Skull and<br/>
the Rose</h4>
</td>
<td class = "background pg69b" width = "63px" rowspan = "2"> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td> </td>
<td>
<p><span class = "firstletter">T</span><span class =
"firstword">he</span> Singing Mouse peeped out from the hollow orbit of
the white skull which lies upon the table next to the volume of
Shakespeare. It reached down a tiny pink paw and touched a leaf of the
brave red rose which every day lies before the skull. It plucked the
leaf, which made a buckler for its small throbbing breast. It spoke:</p>
<p>“The rose is bold and red,” said the Singing Mouse.
“Blood is red. A skull is white. The rose and the skull love
one another. They understand. We do not understand.</p>
<p>“As I sat by the skull I saw a dream
<span class = "pagenum">70</span>
of the past go by. It was as you see it now.</p>
<p>“Do you see the waving grasses of the valleys? Do you see the
unmoving front of the white old mountains? Do you see the red roses
growing down among the grasses?</p>
<p>“It is peace upon the land. I can see one who has seen the
lands. He smiles, but he is sad. He crosses the wide sea, but cares not.
He travels upon rails of iron, and he smiles, but still is sad, because
he thinks; and he who thinks must weep. He leaves the ship and the iron
rail, and his road is narrower and slower, for he travels now by wheels
of wood. He sees the valleys, and his smile has more of peace. His trail
becomes narrower yet. He goes by saddle, and the mountains hem him in,
but now he smiles the more. Now he must leave even the
<span class = "pagenum">71</span>
saddle, and the trail is dim and hard. See, the trail is gone! Here,
where no foot has trod, where the mountains close about, where the trees
whisper, he sits and looks about him. Do you see the red rose on his
breast? Always the rose is there. Do you see him look up at the
mountains, about him at the trees? Do you see him lay his head upon the
earth? Do you still see his smile, the smile which is weary and yet not
afraid? Do you hear him sigh? And what is this he whispers, here at the
end of the long and narrowing way—’I know not if this be the
end or the beginning!’ Ah, what does this man mean who whispers to
himself in riddles?</p>
</td>
<!-- <td></td> -->
</tr>
</table>
<p>“Look! It is the time of war. There is music. The blood stings.
The heart leaps. The eye flames. The soul exults. Flickering of light on
steel, the flash of
<span class = "pagenum">72</span>
servant forces used to slay, the reverberant growl of engines made for
death, the passing of men in cloth and men in blankets, the tramp of
hurrying hoofs, the falling of men who die—can you see
this—can you catch the horror, the exultation, the joy of this,
I say? They come, they go; they run their race, and it is all.</p>
<p>“Here are those who ride against those who slay. Do you know
this one who rides at the head, smiling, swinging his sword well and
smiling all the time? It is he who said in the mountains that riddle of
the end and the beginning—who knew that to the heart of nature we
must come, for either the end or the beginning of this, our life. Do you
see upon his breast the red rose? I think he rides to battle with
the rose, knowing what fate will come.</p>
<p><span class = "pagenum">73</span>
“You know of this biting whistle in the air—this small thing
that smites unseen? Do you know the mowing of the death scythes? Hark!
I hear the singing of this unseen thing. See! he of the rose is
bitten. He has fallen. Ay! ay! He was so brave and strong! His horse has
gone. He is alone. The grass here was so green. It is red. The rose upon
his breast is red. His face is white, but still the smile is there; and
now it is calmer and more sweet, though still he whispers, ‘I know
not if it be the end or the beginning!’</p>
<p>“He is alone with Nature again. The heavens weep for him. The
grasses and leaves begin with busy fingers to cover him up. The earth
pillows him. He sleeps. It is all. It is done. It is the way of life. It
is the end and the beginning.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic73.gif" width = "187" height = "106" alt = "decoration"></p>
<p>“He loved the valley, the mountain,
<span class = "pagenum">74</span>
the grass, the rose. Now, since he cherished the rose so well, see, the
rose will not leave him. Out of the dust it rises, it grows, it blooms.
Against his lips it presses. It is the beginning! He loved, he thought,
he knew. He is not dead He is with Nature. It is but the beginning!</p>
<p>“Let the rose press against his lips in an eternal, pure
caress. There is no end. They understand. We do not yet
understand.”</p>
<p class = "space">
The pink flame of the unreal light died away. The pageant of the hills,
the panorama of the battle, faded and were gone. The table and the books
came back. Wondering at these words, I scarce could tell when the
Singing Mouse went away, leaving me staring at the barren walls and at
the white skull by my hand.
<span class = "pagenum">75</span>
... For a moment it nearly seemed to me the hollow eyes had light and
spoke to me. For a moment almost it seemed to me that the rose stirred
deep down among its petals, and that a wider perfume floated out upon
the air.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic75.gif" width = "278" height = "277" alt = "knight's helmet surrounded by wreath"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">77</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="man_1" id = "man_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic77.gif" width = "385" height = "647" alt = "The Man of the Mountain" title = "The Man of the Mountain"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">79</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#man_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="man_2" id = "man_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg79"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td width = "44px" height = "154px"> </td>
<td class = "bottom">
<h4>The Man of the<br/>
Mountain</h4>
</td>
<td width = "79px"> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td> </td>
<td colspan = "2">
<span class = "firstletter">“O</span>
<p class = "float right">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic79b.gif" width = "79" height = "210" alt = "decorative border"></p>
<p class = "float right">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic79c.gif" width = "198" height = "139" alt = "decorative border"></p>
<p><span class = "hidden">“O</span><span class =
"firstword">nce</span>
there was a man,” said the Singing Mouse, “who loved to go
into the mountains. He would go alone, far into the mountains, and climb
up to the tops of the tallest peaks. Nothing pleased him so much as to
climb to the top of some mountain where no other man had ever been. No
one ever knew what he said to the mountains, or what the mountains said
to him, but that they understood each other very well was sure, for he
could go among the mountains where other men dared not go. At the tops
of the high mountains he would sit and look out over the country that
lay beyond. He would not say what he saw,
<span class = "pagenum">80</span>
for he said he could not tell, and that, moreover, the people would not
understand it, for they did not know the way the mountains thought.</p>
<p>“One time this man climbed to the top of a very high mountain
peak in a distant country. This peak looked out over a wide land, and
the man knew that from its summit he could see many things.</p>
<p>“The man was now growing old, so when he got to the top of this
mountain he sat down to rest. When he sat down, he put his chin in his
hand, and his arm upon his knee; and so he looked out over the land,
seeing many things.</p>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>“The sun came up, but the man did not move, but sat and
thought. The moon came, but still he did not move. He only looked, and
thought and smiled.</p>
<p>“After many days it was seen that this man would not come down
from the
<span class = "pagenum">81</span>
mountain. The mountain made him part of itself, and turned him into
stone, as he sat there, with his chin in his hand. He is there to-day,
looking out over many things. He never moves, for he is now of stone.
I have seen that place myself. Once I thought I heard this man
whisper of the things he saw. He sits there to-day.”</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic81.gif" width = "113" height = "200" alt = "hourglass"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">83</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="oaks_1" id = "oaks_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic83.gif" width = "413" height = "537" alt = "At the Place of the Oaks ..." title = "At the Place of the Oaks ..."></p>
<span class = "pagenum">85</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#oaks_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="oaks_2" id = "oaks_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg85"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td width = "46px" height = "178px"> </td>
<td class = "bottom">
<h4>At the Place<br/>
of the Oaks</h4>
</td>
<td width = "60px"> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "background pg85b"> </td>
<td>
<p><span class = "firstletter">“D</span><span class =
"firstword">o</span> you know what the oak says?” asked the
Singing Mouse, as it sat upon my knee. It had needed to nibble again at
my fingers before it could waken me from the dream into which I had
fallen, gazing at the fading fire. “Do you know what the oak
says?” it repeated. “Do you hear it? Do you hear the talking
of the leaves?...</p>
<p class = "background pg85c">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic85c.gif" width = "95" height = "107" alt = "stars"></p>
<p>“I know what the oak says,” said the Singing Mouse.
“When the wind is soft, the oak says: ‘Peace! Peace!’
When the breeze is sharp it sighs and says: ‘Pity! Pity!
Pity!’ And when the storm has fallen, the oak sobs and cries:
‘Woe! Woe! Woe.’</p>
<p><span class = "pagenum">86</span>
“Do you see the oaks?” asked the Singing Mouse. “Do
you see the little lake? Do you know this place of the oaks? Behold it
now!” It waved a tiny hand.</p>
<p>I gazed at the naked, cheerless wall, seamed and rent with cracks
along its sallow width. And as I gazed the seams and scars blended and
composed into the lines of a map of a noble country. And as I gazed more
intently the map took on color, and narrowed its semblance to that of a
certain region. And as I gazed yet more eagerly the map faded quite
away, and there lay in its stead the smiling face of an enchanted
land.</p>
</td>
<td> </td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>There was the little silver lake, rippling on its shore of rushes.
Around rose the long curved hills, swelling back from the shore. The
baby river babbled on at
<span class = "pagenum">87</span>
the mouth of the lake, kissing its mother a continual farewell. The
small springs tinkled metallically cold into the silver of the lake. The
tender green of the gentle glades rolled softly back, dividing the two
hills in peaceful separation. And there were the oaks. At the
water’s edge, near the lesser spring, the wild apple trees
twisted, but upon the hills and over the great glades stood the
reserved, mysterious oaks, tall and strong.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic87.gif" width = "199" height = "99" alt = "rabbit"></p>
<!-- also used on 144 (145) -->
<p>One oak, a mighty one, now resolved itself more prominently forth.
Did I not know it well? Could one forget the tortured but noble soul of
this oak? Could one forget the strong arm of comfort it extended over
this most precious spot of all the glade? One must suffer before one may
comfort. The oak had suffered somewhere. We do not know all things. But
over this spot the great tree reached
<span class = "pagenum">88</span>
out sheltering hands, and certainly from its hands dropped benedictions
plenteously down.</p>
<p>Under the arm of the oak I saw a tiny house of white—neat,
well-ordered, full of cheerfulness. Through the wall of canvas—for
it now seemed to be after dusk—there shone a faint pink gleam of
light, the soul of the white house, its pure spirit of content. As it
shone, it scarce seemed lit by mortal hand.</p>
<p>Near the small house of white, and under the oak’s protecting
arm, there burned a little flame, of small compass save in the vast
shadows it set dancing among the trees. Those who built this fire here,
so many times, so many years, each time first craved pardon of the green
grass of that happy glade, for they would not harm the grass. But the
grass said yea to all they asked, this was sure, for
<span class = "pagenum">89</span>
each year the tiny hearth spot was greener than any other spot, because
it remembered what the fire had said and done. And each year the oak
dropped down food enough for the little fire. The oak took pay in the
vast shadows the fire made for it. That was the way the oak saw the
spirits of the Past, and when it saw them it sighed; but still it
welcomed the shadows of the Past. So the fire, and the grass, and the
oak, and the shadows of the Past were friends, and each year they met
here. It had been thus for many years. Each year, for many years, the
same hand had laid the little fire, in the same place, and so given back
to the oak its Past. Now, the Past is a very sad but tender thing.</p>
<p>Near by the little fire I saw a small table formed of straight-laid
boughs, and at either side of this were seats made cunningly
<span class = "pagenum">90</span>
in the workshop of the woods. There were two forms at this small table.
I saw them both. One was gray and bowed somewhat, stooped as the
oaks are, silvered as the oaks are in the winter days. The other was
younger and more erect. Once the younger looked to the older for
counsel, but now it seemed to me the bowed figure turned to the one that
had become more strong.</p>
<p>I saw the savory vapors rise. Even, it seemed to me, I could note a
faint, clear odor of innocent potency. I saw the table laid, not
with gleam of snow and silver, but with plain vessels which,
nevertheless, seemed now to have a radiance of their own. I knew
all this. It was as though there actually lay at hand these pleasant
scenes, as though there actually arose the appealing fragrance of the
evening meal.</p>
<p><span class = "pagenum">91</span>
Now as I looked, the gray figure bowed its head, there, under the arm of
the oak, and asked on the humble board the blessing of the God who made
the oak, and gave the fire and spread the pleasant waters on the land.
Every mealtime, every year, for many years, it had been thus. Ever, the
oak knew, the gray figure would first bow and ask the blessing of God.
And each time at the close the oak with rustling leaves pronounced
distinct Amen! Let those jest who will. I do not know. I think
perhaps the oak knows or it would not thus for years have whispered
reverently its distinct Amen! I will not scoff. It is perhaps we
who are ignorant. We do not know all things.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic91.gif" width = "161" height = "93" alt = "squirrel"></p>
<p>I ask not what nor who were these two who had come each year to this
place of the oaks, but surely they were friends.
<span class = "pagenum">92</span>
In shadow, I could hear them talk. In shadow, I could see them
smile.</p>
<p>These friends sat by the little fire a time before they went to rest
in the tiny house of white. After they had gone, the fire did strange
things. All men know that, though you see the fire burned down, when you
go into the tent you will some time in the night see the walls lit up by
a sudden flash or so, now and then, from the fire which was thought to
be dead.</p>
<p>That is the business of the fire, and of the oaks and of the shadows.
I know that the shadows dance strangely, and hover and come near at
hand, in those late hours of the night; but what then occurs I do not
know. These two friends never questioned this. They knew it was the
secret of the night, and gave the oak its own request, in pay for
<span class = "pagenum">93</span>
its protection and consent. They gave the oak its union with the sacred
Past.</p>
<p>In the night I have heard the oak sob. Yet in the morning, when the
sun was silvering the wake of all the leaping fishes, the oak was always
gentle, and it said, “Wake, wake! God is wise. Waken, waken! God
is good!”</p>
<p class = "space">
As pure shining beads upon a thread of gold I saw this small, dear
picture, reiterant and unchanged, year after year, always with the same
calm and pure surroundings. Only as year added itself to year, slipping
forward on the golden string, I saw the gray figure grow more gray,
more bowed, more feeble. Alas! it seemed to me I saw the silver coming
upon the head of the younger man, and his eyes growing weary, as of one
who looks at the earth too closely (which it is
<span class = "pagenum">94</span>
not wise to do). Yet the years came, to the oaks and to the grasses
and to the friends.</p>
<p>The grass dies every year, but it is born again. The oak dies in
centuries, but it is born again. Man dies in three score years and ten;
but he, too, is born again.</p>
<p class = "background pg95">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic95.gif" width = "89" height = "545" alt = "decorative thistle plant"></p>
<!-- also used on 161 -->
<p>As I looked, I could see the passing of the years. In all but the
unaltering fire of friendship I could see change creeping on. Grayer,
grayer, more bent, more feeble—is it not so, Singing Mouse? And
now, this time, what was this gentle warning that the oak tried to
whisper softly down? Perhaps the grayer friend heard it, as he sat
musing by the fire. He rose and looked about him, as one who had dreamed
and was content. He looked up at the solemn stars unafraid, and so
murmured to himself. “Day unto day
<span class = "pagenum">95</span>
uttereth speech,” he said; “Night unto night showeth
knowledge.”</p>
<p>Day unto day, Singing Mouse. Day unto day.</p>
<p class = "space">
Woe is me, Singing Mouse, and these are bitter tears for that which you
have shown I see it all again, the oaks, the glade, the tiny house of
white, the small pleasant fire. Here again is the little table, and here
is the evening meal. The table is still spread for two. A double
portion is served as was wont before. Yet why? For all is not the same.
At this table there is but one form now. The younger man is there,
although now he has grown gray and stooped. Year unto year, day unto
day, the beads have slipped along the string. Once young, now old, he
keeps the camp alone!</p>
<p>But is he then alone? Hush! The
<span class = "pagenum">96</span>
squirrels have grown still, and even the oak is silent. What is that
opposite, across the table, at the seat long years held only by the
elder of these two? Tell me, Singing Mouse, is it not true that I see
there, sitting as of old at the table, the same sturdy form, the same
simple, innocent and believing face? It is the gray ghost of one grown
gray in goodness. It is the shadow of a shadow, the apparition of a
soul!</p>
<p>The one at the table pauses, as was the wont before the beginning of
a meal. He looks across the table to the shadow, as if the shadow were
his friend. The shadow bows its head. The living man bows also his head
at the board. The shadow moves its lips. Doubt not those words are heard
this day.</p>
<p>See, the sun rises through the trees. The glorious day sets on once
more.
<span class = "pagenum">97</span>
Doubt not, fear not, sorrow not, ye two. Bow the head still, ye two, and
let not my picture perish. Whisper again the benediction of the years,
and let me hear once more the murmur of the oak’s Amen!</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic97.gif" width = "103" height = "101" alt = "owl"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">99</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="hours_1" id = "hours_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic99.gif" width = "382" height = "467" alt = "The Birth of the Hours" title = "The Birth of the Hours"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">101</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#hours_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="hours_2" id = "hours_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg101"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td width = "48px" height = "180px"> </td>
<td class = "bottom" width = "280px">
<h4>The Birth of<br/>
the Hours</h4>
</td>
<td> </td>
<td width = "48px"> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td rowspan = "2"> </td>
<td colspan = "2" rowspan = "2">
<p><span class = "firstletter">“D</span><span class =
"firstword">o</span> you know the story of the Wedding of the
Times?” said the Singing Mouse. “You know, all life is a
wedding. The flowers love, and the grasses, and the trees; and the
circle of the wedding ring is the circle of life and the sign of
eternity. Death and life, not life and then death, is the order and the
law.</p>
<p>“The hours are born of parents, as are the flowers. The hours
of the day are born of the wedding of Night and Morning. It is the way
of Life. Come with me.”</p>
<p>So with the Singing Mouse I went into a place where I was once long
before. I could see it very well. It was in the deep
<span class = "pagenum">102</span>
woods, far away. Near by there were tall, sweet grasses. I could
hear the faint tinkle of a falling stream. Other than that, it was
silent in the deep woods. Overhead the sky was clear and filled with
stars. The stars trembled and twinkled and shone radiantly fair. So now
all at once I knew they were the jewels on the veil of Night. And the
far shadows were the drapery of the Night, and the greater light of the
heavens was the star upon her coronal.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic101b.gif" width = "413" height = "132" alt = "decoration"></p>
<p>When I first looked forth, the Night was a babe, but as I gazed it
grew. The Night is full of change and charm. Those who live within the
walls do not see these things. When I saw them, I could not sleep,
for the Night in all her changes seemed to speak.</p>
</td>
<td class = "background pg101c"> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<!-- <td></td><td></td>-->
<td> </td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>The Night grew older, drawing about her her more ornate garb of
witchery.
<span class = "pagenum">103</span>
Across her bosom fell a wondrous tissue, trembling with exuberance of
unprismed light. These were the gems in thousands of the skies, all fair
against the blackness of the robes of Night, and I knew that the
blackness of the one was as lovely as the radiance of the other. Nor
could one separate one from the other, for there arose a thin mist of
light, so that one saw form or features only dimly, as through a cloth
of silver lace, such as the spiders weave upon a morning.</p>
<p>The Night grew on, changing at every moment, for change is the law.
There were small frowns of clouds which were replaced by smiles of
light. Did never you hear the laughter of the Night? It is a strange
thing. Not all men have heard it. The Singing Mouse told me of this.</p>
<p>Now as I lay and looked at this glorious apparition, there came still
another
<span class = "pagenum">104</span>
change, and one most wonderful. In the heart of the Night there came a
tremulous exultation. Upon the face of the Night appeared a roseate
tinge of joyous perturbation. So then I knew the lover of the Night was
coming, and knew, too, whence we have derived the signs of love as among
human beings we see it indicated. I saw the flush upon the cheek of
Night flame slowly and faintly up, until it touched her very forehead.
This is the way of Love. But the Night went on, for this is the way of
Life. Love and Life, these are ever and for ever. We mock at them and
understand them not, but they are ever and for ever.</p>
<p>And now the Night, I know not whether startled or in joy, whether
ashamed of her dark garb, or unconscious of it in the proud sureness of
her beauty, dropped loose a portion of the
<span class = "pagenum">105</span>
shadows of her robe, and stood forth radiant, clad with the dazzling
beauty of her stars. Then she raised her hand and laid it on her
heart.</p>
<p>And so the Morning came and took her in his arms and kissed her on
the brow. So here was Love again. And of this wedding there were born
the hours.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic105.gif" width = "242" height = "170" alt = "running man in silhouette"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">107</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="stone_1" id = "stone_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic107.gif" width = "375" height = "555" alt = "The Stone that Had no Thought" title = "The Stone that Had no Thought"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">109</span>
<h4>The Stone that<br/>
Had no Thought</h4>
<p><span class = "firstletter">“O</span><span class =
"firstword">nce</span>,” said the Singing Mouse, “while many
men hurried into the city, as, each day, they do, they saw many other
men standing about a place where a large building was growing. There
were those who raised stones on long arms of steel, and swung them
about, high up into the wall. Others remained upon the earth to place
these stones upon the long arms of steel. Now a stone had fallen, and
beneath it lay what had been a man; and around this many stood.</p>
<p>“The long arm reached out after stones, and so this stone again
was taken and raised into the air. That which had
<span class = "pagenum">110</span>
been a man lay broken, never again to rise and smile and walk. Near to
it stood a woman, not weeping, being still too sad for weeping. Above
her arose the stone once more, heavy and without thought. It rose above
the woman and above this that had been a man, and as it swung high and
slow above her the woman looked up at it, as though to ask of it mercy.
But the stone passed slowly on, heavy and without thought. It is in the
wall to-day, heavy and without thought. Some say that is a temple,
others that there is a God in it. But no God replies. And the stone is
in the wall, heavy, without thought.”</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic110.gif" width = "275" height = "145" alt = "tomb"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">113</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="tear_1" id = "tear_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic113.gif" width = "311" height = "612" alt = "The Tear and the Smile" title = "The Tear and the Smile"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">115</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#tear_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="tear_2" id = "tear_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg115"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td width = "48px" height = "150px"> </td>
<td class = "bottom">
<h4>The Tear<br/>
and the Smile</h4>
</td>
<td width = "60px"> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td> </td>
<td>
<p><span class = "firstletter">T</span><span class =
"firstword">he</span> Singing Mouse came and sat near by. Undoubtedly
the room was dingy to the last degree. The dust lay thick upon the
corner of the table. It crusted the window ledge and hung upon the
sallow wall. What was the use, things being as they were, to disturb the
dust? Let it lie in all its bitterness. And let the charred ends of the
fagots roll out upon the floor. And let the fire die down to ashes. Dust
to dust. Ashes to ashes. It was very fit.</p>
<p class = "background pg115b">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic115b.gif" width = "123" height = "111" alt = "rose"></p>
<p>But the Singing Mouse came and sat near by. I could hear it patter
among the dead leaves of the flowers that lay upon the table.
I turned my head and saw it
<span class = "pagenum">116</span>
sitting close by my fallen hand. Its tiny paws were waving. I could
see its breast, for which a rose leaf would have been a giant buckler,
pulsing and beating above its throbbing heart. Its eyes were shining....
A rhythm came into the swing of the pink-tinted paws. And then, so
high and thin and sweet that at first I looked above to trace the sound,
there came the singing of the Singing Mouse.... Dreams fell upon my
eyes.</p>
<p>I heard that sweet sound of the woods, the tinkle of falling water,
which is so full of change, now keen, clear and metallically musical,
now soft, slurred and full of sleep. I could not see the little
stream, but knew it ran down there beneath the talking pines. But very
well one could see the hill where the small white house had stood among
the trees. The white house was gone now, though the grass
<span class = "pagenum">117</span>
pressed down by the blankets had not yet fully arisen. The smoke of the
camp-fire still wavered up. It followed one, with long, out-reaching
arms of vapor. With its fingers it beckoned and begged for its old
companions yet a while. Did never one look back at the smoke of the
camp-fire that one leaves? Always, the heart of the fire will stir at
this time of parting. A little blaze will burst out among the
embers, and the smoke will reach out and beckon one to stay. It is very
hard to leave such a fire.</p>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>Certainly there must be strange things, of which we know but little.
Surely there was a figure in the wreath of smoke. I could see the
drapery shape itself about a form. I could see the outstretched
arms. I could see the face, the gravely smiling lips.</p>
<p>“There are many things in the land of
<span class = "pagenum">118</span>
the Singing Mouse,” murmured my small magician. “It is only
there that one sees clearly.” So I looked and listened to the
figure which was in the smoke of the little fire.</p>
<p>“Believe me,” said the figure in the smoke, “the
ashes and the dust are not so bitter as you think them. The tears rain
on them, and they go back into the earth and are born again. Look around
you, as here you may look, unhindered by any confining walls. Do you not
see the flowers smiling bravely? Yet every blossom is a tear. Do you not
see the strong forest trees? Yet every tree grows on the ashes of the
past. We know not what you mean by grief. With us, all things point to
Hope. I have swum above a thousand forests. Ask this forest, the
youngest of them all, whether it whispers of dread and of grief. Rather
it
<span class = "pagenum">119</span>
whispers of wonder and of joy. Come to it, and it may tell you of its
comfort. Turn your eyes up to the blue sky, and put your hands out upon
this grass, which is but dust renewed, and at your eyes and at your
fingers you shall drink peace and knowledge. The shape of a room and of
a grave is square and cruel, but the shape of the earth and of the great
sky is that of the perpetual circle, and it is kind. Come to these. Come
to me. I will wave my hands above you, and you shall sleep. When
you awaken the flowers will be blooming; and upon the lid of each you
shall see the tear, but upon the lips of each shall rest a
smile.”</p>
<p>So now the figure in the smoke waved, and nodded, and smiled and
beckoned, until I said to the Singing Mouse it seemed scarce like things
we ordinarily know.</p>
<p><span class = "pagenum">120</span>
“Lie down and sleep,” said the Singing Mouse.</p>
<p>So I lay down and slept. And when I awoke there were some small
flowers not far away; and when I looked I saw it was as had been said.
Each flower had a tiny tear hidden away beneath its lid, but upon the
lips of each there rested a brave smile. And from among the flowers
there arose a sweet odor.</p>
<p>“This,” said the Singing Mouse, when it saw me note the
fragrance, “this is a Memory. It belongs to you. See how soft and
sweet it is.”</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic120.gif" width = "336" height = "201" alt = "wreath and flowers"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">123</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="plains_1" id = "plains_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic123.gif" width = "364" height = "523" alt = "How the Mountains Ate up the Plains" title = "How the Mountains Ate up the Plains"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">125</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#plains_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="plains_2" id = "plains_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg125"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td width = "32px" height = "140px"> </td>
<td> </td>
<td class = "bottom" width = "341px">
<h4>How the Mountains<br/>
Ate up the Plains</h4>
</td>
<td width = "60px"> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "background pg125b"> </td>
<td colspan = "2">
<p><span class = "firstletter">“I</span> once knew a man,”
said the Singing Mouse, “who had seen the mountains in the winter
time, when they were covered deep in snow. It is the belief of most men
that the mountains are then asleep, but this man said that they are not
asleep, but that they have only drawn over their heads the white
council-robes, for then they are sitting in council. Now the mountains
are very old and wise. This man told me he heard strange sounds coming
from under the council-robes of the mountains then, voices not
distinctly heard, but wonderful
<span class = "pagenum">126</span>
and strong and of a sort to make one fear.</p>
<p>“This man told me that once he heard the mountains tell of a
time when they ate up the plains. ‘Once man was a dweller of the
plains,’ sang the mountains in a great song; ‘there man dug
and strove. Never he lifted up the eye, but at his feet, at his feet,
there he still gazed down. The clouds bore not up his gaze, neither did
the hills comfort him. Things false, of no worth, these man sought and
prized. Though we whispered to him, still he made deaf his ear. Then we,
the mountains, we the strong, the just, the wise, we rose, we set
together our shoulders and so marched on. Thus we ate up the plain. Now
we stand where once man was, for man lifted not up his eyes. Therefore,
now let man look up, let him not make small his gaze. We the
<span class = "pagenum">127</span>
strong, we the just, the wise, we shall eat up the plain. For on our
brows sits the light, about our heads is the calm. That which is high
shall in the days prevail. We the strong, the just, the wise, this we
have said!’</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic125c.gif" width = "324" height = "62" alt = "mountains"></p>
</td>
<td> </td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>“This man told me that he could not hear all the song that the
mountains chanted, nor all they whispered among themselves. But he
thought they said that they had swallowed up and consumed one race of
beings who became fixed only upon the winning of what they called
wealth, and had crushed out this wealth and burned up their precious
things. This may be true, for to-day men visit the mountains to dig
there for wealth, and this which they call gold is found much scattered,
as though it had been crumbled and burned and blown wide over the earth
upon the four winds.
<span class = "pagenum">128</span>
For these reasons this man thought that the mountains had once eaten up
the plains; and that perhaps at some time they might do this
again.”</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic128.gif" width = "185" height = "287" alt = "decoration"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">131</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="savage_1" id = "savage_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic131.gif" width = "317" height = "453" alt = "The Savage and its Heart" title = "The Savage and its Heart"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">133</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#savage_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="savage_2" id = "savage_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg133"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td width = "42px" height = "124px"> </td>
<td class = "bottom">
<h4>The Savage and<br/>
Its Heart</h4>
</td>
<td width = "82px"> </td>
</tr>
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<td rowspan = "2">
<p><span class = "firstletter">“O</span><span class =
"firstword">nce</span>,” said the Singing Mouse, “I knew a
man who found a little dog, starved, beneath a building where it had
been left. He took it and fed it; and each time he held out his hand to
give it food, it bit his hand, knowing not that he was its friend. Many
times he fed it, and always it bit his hand. It was a long time before
it learned that the man was its friend. It was but a savage. He fed it
patiently, and so after a time the dog bit him no more, having learned
that he was its friend. When it had ceased to be savage, it loved him.
The man gave it neither blow nor unkindness, and fed it, knowing that he
was older and more
<span class = "pagenum">134</span>
wise and that in time it might love him. So at last it did; and this may
often happen for those who wait, large and kind and patient; and so
often friends are made.”</p>
</td>
<td class = "background pg133b" rowspan = "2"> </td>
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<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic134.gif" width = "196" height = "273" alt = "thistle and heart"></p>
<!-- also used as halftitle 1 -->
<span class = "pagenum">137</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="beast_1" id = "beast_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic137.gif" width = "342" height = "513" alt = "The Beast Terrible" title = "The Beast Terrible"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">139</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#beast_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="beast_2" id = "beast_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg139"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td>
<p><ANTIMG src = "images/pic139a.gif" width = "97" height = "97" alt = "moon"></p> <!-- not centered -->
<h4>The Beast<br/>
Terrible</h4>
<p><span class = "firstletter">T</span><span class =
"firstword">he</span> little room was resplendent one night with a fire
which flamed and flickered gloriously. It set in motion many shadows
which had their home in the corners of the walls, and bade them cease
their sullenness and come forth to dance in the riot of the hour. And so
each shadow found its partner in a ray of firelight, and there they
danced. They danced about the tangled front of the big bison’s
head which hung upon the wall. They crossed the grinning skull of the
gray wolf. They softened the eyes of the antelope’s head, and made
dark lines behind the long-tined antlers of the elk and of the deer.
They brought forth to
<span class = "pagenum">140</span>
view in alternate eclipse and definition the great, grim bear’s
head which hung above the mantel. Every trophy gathered in years of the
chase, once perhaps prized, now perhaps forgotten, was brought into
evidence, nor could one escape noting each one, and giving to each, for
this one night more, the story which belonged to it. I sat and
looked upon them all, and so there passed a panorama of the years.</p>
</td>
<td width = "100px"> </td>
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<tr>
<td height = "100px" colspan = "2"> </td>
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</table>
<p>“There,” thought I, “is the stag which once fell
far in the pine woods of the North. This antelope takes me back to the
hard, white Plains. These huge antlers could grow only amid the forests
of the Rockies. That wolf—how many of the hounds he mangled,
I remember; and the giant bear, it was a good fight he made,
perhaps dangerous, had the old rifle there been less sure. Yes, yes, of
<span class = "pagenum">141</span>
course, I could recall each incident. Of course, they all were
thrilling, exciting, delightful, glorious, all those things. Of course,
the heart must have leaped in those days. The blood must have surged, in
those moments. The pulse must have grown hard, the mouth must have been
dry with the ardor of the chase, at those times. But now? But why? Does
the heart leap to-night, do the veins fill with the rush of the blood,
tumultuous in the joy of stimulus or danger? Why does not the old
eagerness come back? Which of these trophies is the one to bring this
back again? To which of these grim, silent heads belongs the keenest
story?”</p>
<p>“I know,” said the Singing Mouse, which unknown to me had
come and placed itself upon the table. “I know.” And it
climbed upon my arm which lay across the table. The fire shone fair
<span class = "pagenum">142</span>
upon its little form, so that in silhouette its outline was delicate and
keen as an image cut from the fiery heart of a noble opal stone.</p>
<p>“And what is it that you know?” I asked. “Maker of
dreams, tell me what you know to-night.”</p>
<p>The Singing Mouse balanced and moved itself in harmony with the beat
of the fire’s rays. I looked at it so closely that a dream
came upon my eyes, so that the voice of the Singing Mouse sounded far
away and faint, though it was still clear and resonant in its own
peculiar way and very fine and sweet.</p>
<p>“I will tell you which trophy you most prize,” it said.
“I will show you your <i>Iliad</i> of the chase. Do you not
remember, do you not see this, the most eventful hunting of all your
life?”</p>
<p>And so I gazed where the Singing
<span class = "pagenum">143</span>
Mouse pointed, quite beyond the dusty walls, and there I saw as it had
said. I heard not the thunder of the hoofs of buffalo, nor the
faint crack of the twig beneath the panther’s foot. I saw not
the lurching gallop of the long-jawed wolf, nor the high, elastic
bounding of the deer. The level swinging speed of the antelope, the
slinking of the lynx, the crashing flight of the wapiti—no, it was
none of these that came to mind; nor did the mountains nor the plains,
nor the wilderness of the pines. But when the Singing Mouse whispered,
“Do you see?” I murmured in reply, “I see it
all again!”</p>
<p>I saw the small, low hills, well covered with short oaks and hazel
bushes, which rolled on away from the village, far out, almost to the
Delectable Mountains, which are well known to be upon the
<span class = "pagenum">144</span>
edge of the world. Through these low hills a winding road led on,
a road whose end no man had ever reached, but which went to places
where, no doubt, many wonders were—perhaps even to the Delectable
Mountains; for so a wise man once had said, his words harkened to with
awe. This was a pleasant road, lined with brave sumacs, with bushes of
the wild blackberry, and with small hazel trees which soon would offer
fruit for the regular harvest of the fall, this same to be spread for
drying on the woodshed roof. It was perhaps wise curiosity as to the
crop of nuts which had brought thus far from home these two
figures—an enormous distance, perhaps at least a mile beyond what
heretofore had been the utmost limit of their wanderings. It was not,
perhaps, safe to venture so far. There were known to be
<span class = "pagenum">145</span>
strange creatures in these woods, one knew not what. It was therefore
well that the younger boy should clasp tightly the hand of the older,
him who bore with such confidence the bow and arrows, potent weapons of
those days gone by!</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic87.gif" width = "199" height = "99" alt = "rabbit"></p>
<p>It was half with fear and half with curiosity that these two wandered
on, along this mysterious road, through this wild and unknown
wilderness, so far from any habitation of mankind. The zeal of the
explorer held them fast. They scarce dared fare farther on, but yet
would not turn back. The noises of the woods thrilled them. The sudden
clanging note of the jay near by caused them to stop, heart in mouth for
the moment. Strange rustlings in the leaves made them cross the road,
and step more quickly. Yet the cawing of a crow across the woods seemed
friendly, and a small brown bird
<span class = "pagenum">146</span>
which hopped ahead along the road was intimate and kind, and thus
touched the founts of bravery in the two venturous hearts. Certainly
they would go on. It was no matter about the sun. This was the valley of
Ajalon, perhaps, of which one had heard in the class at Sabbath-school.
And surely this was a good, droning, yellow-bodied bee—where did
the bees go to when they rose up straight into the air? And this little
mouse, what became of it in winter? And—ah! What was
that—that awful burst of sound? Clutch closer, little brother,
though both be pale! How should either of you yet know the thunderous
flight of the wild grouse, this great bird which whirled away through
the brown leaves of the oaks? Father must be asked about this
tremendous, startling bird. Meantime, the heart having begun to beat
<span class = "pagenum">147</span>
again, let the two adventurers press yet a little farther on.</p>
<p>And so, with fears and tremblings, with doubts and joys, through
briers and flowers, through hindrances and recompenses, along this
crooked, winding, unknown road which led on out into the Unknown, they
wandered, as in life we all are wandering to-day.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic147.gif" width = "139" height = "94" alt = "butterfly"></p>
<p>But hush! Listen! What is it, this sound, approaching, coming
directly toward the road? Surely, it must be the footfall of some large
animal, this cadenced rustling on the leaves! It comes—it will
cross near—there, it has turned, it is near the road! Look! There
it is, a great animal, half the length of one’s arm, with
bushy, long red tail arched high for easier running, its grayish coat
showing in the bars of sunlight, its eyes bright and black and keen. Had
it not
<span class = "pagenum">148</span>
been said there were wild animals in these woods?</p>
<p>Each heart now thumped hard with the surging blood it bore; but it
was now the blood of hunters and not of boys. Fear vanished at the sight
of the quarry, and the only thought remaining was that of battle and of
victory. Well for the animal that it ran—ill for it that it ran
down the road and not back into the cover. The bow twanged, the arrow
flew—blunt, but keenly sped. Down went the smitten prey!
Pæan! Forward! Victory!</p>
<p>But ho! the creature rallies—recovers! It gathers its forces,
it flies! Pursuit then, but pursuit apparently useless, for the animal
has found refuge deep in this hollow stump, beyond the reach of longest
mortal arm!</p>
<p>Rustle now, ye leaves, and threaten
<span class = "pagenum">149</span>
now, all ye boughs with menacings. Roar, grouse, and clamor on, all ye
jangling jays. No longer can ye strike terror into these two souls,
small though they be. The heart of the hunter has now been born for
each. Fear and defeat are known no longer in the compass of their
thoughts. Follow, follow, follow! So spake the good old savagery of the
natural man. Better for this creature had it never disturbed these two
with its footfalls approaching among the leaves. Out of its refuge now
must it come. Yea, though one lost a thousand suppers that night, and
though a thousand stones lay waiting in the dark along the road to hurt
bare, unprotected toes.</p>
<p>The sun forgot its part, and sank red, though reluctant, beyond the
Delectable Mountains. Thou moon, this is Ajalon! Be kindly, for by
moonlight one still may
<span class = "pagenum">150</span>
labor, and here is labor to be done. Every blade in the Barlow knives is
broken. The hole in the stump yields not to slashings, nor to attempts
to pry it open. The prey is still unreached. What is to be done?</p>
<p class = "background pg49">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic49.gif" width = "88" height = "538" alt = "decorative plant"></p>
<p>The elder hunter bethinks him of a solution for this problem. The
broken blade will do to gnaw off this bough, and it will serve to make a
split in the end of it. And if one be fortunate, and if this split
bestride the tail of the concealed animal, and if the stick be
twisted—</p>
<p>“I’ve got him!” cried this philosopher for his
“Eureka.” And then there was twisting and pulling, and
scratching and squeaking, and bitten fingers and tears; but after all
was over, there lay the squirrel vanquished, at the feet of these young
barbarians who had wandered out from home into the unknown lands of
earth. Cruel barbarians, thoughtless,
<span class = "pagenum">151</span>
relentless! But how much has the world changed?</p>
<p>The moon was over Ajalon when these two hunters, after all the perils
of the long, black road, marched up into the dooryard, bearing on a pole
between them their quarry, well suspended by the gambrels. “My
boys, I feared that you were lost!” exclaims the tearful
mother who stands waiting in the door. But the silent father, standing
back of her in the glow of the lamplight, sees what the pole is bearing,
and in his eye there is a smile. After that, motherly reproach, fatherly
inquiry, plenteous bread and milk, many eager explanations and much
descriptive narrative simultaneously uttered by two mouths eager both to
eat and to talk.</p>
<p class = "space">
“I see it all,” I said to the Singing Mouse. “It all
comes back again. No
<span class = "pagenum">152</span>
chase was ever or will ever be so great as this one—back there,
near the Delectable Mountains, in those days gone by, those incomparable
days of youth! I thank you, Singing Mouse; but I beg you do not go
for yet a time. The heads upon the wall grin much, and the dust lies
thick upon them all.”</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic152.gif" width = "141" height = "152" alt = "boy's head"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">155</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="passing_1" id = "passing_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic155.gif" width = "386" height = "574" alt = "The Passing of Men" title = "The Passing of Men"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">157</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#passing_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="passing_2" id = "passing_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg157"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td class = "background pg157a bottom" colspan = "2">
<h4>The Passing<br/>
of Men</h4>
</td>
<td width = "92px" height = "114px"> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td width = "60px"> </td>
<td>
<p><span class = "firstletter">O</span><span class =
"firstword">ne</span>
night the moon was shining brightly upon the curtain, which had been
drawn tight across the window. Within the room the light was dim, so
that there could be seen clearly the pictures which the moon was drawing
on the curtain, figures which marched, advanced, receded. One might
almost have thought these the shadows of some moving boughs, had one not
known the ways the moon has at certain times.</p>
<p>It chanced that high up in the curtain there was a tiny hole, and
through this opening the moonlight streamed, falling upon the table in a
small, silvery ellipse,
<span class = "pagenum">158</span>
of a size which one might cover ten times with one’s hand. It was
natural that in this little well of pale and dreamlike radiance the
Singing Mouse should find it fit to manifest itself. I knew not
when it came, but as I looked, the spot had found a tenant. The small,
transparent paws of the Singing Mouse displayed no shadow as they waved
and swung across this pencil of the pale, mysterious light. Yet its eyes
shone opaline and brilliant as it sat, so that I could hardly gaze
without a shiver of surprise akin to fear, fascinated as though I looked
upon a thing unreal. Thus surrounded, almost one might say thus
penetrated, by the translucent shaft of radiance which came through the
window, the Singing Mouse told me of the figures on the curtain, which
now began to have more distinct semblances.</p>
</td>
<td> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td></td>
<td></td>
<td height = "80px"> </td>
</table>
<p><span class = "pagenum">159</span>
“Do you see the figures there?” said the Singing Mouse.
“Do you see the marching men? Have you never heard the hoofs ring
on the roof when the wind blows high? Have you not seen their ranks
sweep swift across the sky when storms arise? Have you never seen them
marching through the long aisles of the wood at night? These are the
warriors of the past. Now earth has always loved the
warriors.”</p>
<p>I looked, and indeed it was the truth. There was a panorama on the
curtain. History had unrolled her scroll. The warriors of the nations
and the times were passing.</p>
<p>I saw the men of Babylon, and those who came out of Egypt. Dark were
these of hair and visage, and their arms were the ancient bow and spear.
And there were those who rode light and cast
<span class = "pagenum">160</span>
back their rapid archery. These faded, and in their stead marched men
close-knit in solid phalanx, with long spears offering impenetrable
front. In turn these passed away, and there came men with haughty brow,
who bore short spears and swords. Near by these were wild, huge men of
yellow hair, whose shields were leather and whose swords were broad and
long. And as I gazed at all of these, my blood thrilling strangely at
the sight, the figures blended and formed into a splendid procession of
a martial day gone by. I saw them—a long stream of
mounted men, who rode in helmet and cuirass, and bore each aloft a
long-beamed spear. In front rode one whose mien was high and stern, and
who might well have been commander. High aloft he tossed his great sword
as he rode, and sang the time a song of
<span class = "pagenum">161</span>
<span class = "float95">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic95.gif" width = "89" height = "545" alt = "decorative thistle plant">
</span>
war; and as he sang, the thousands of deep throats behind him made
chorus terrible but stirring in its chesty melody, for ictus to the song
each warrior smiting sword on shield in a mighty unison whose high,
sonorous note thrilled like the voice of actual war. Steady the strong
eyes gleamed out and onward as they rode. From the steel-clad breast of
each there shone forward a glancing ray of light, as though it came
direct from the heart, untamed even by a thousand years of death. My
heart leaped to see them ride, so straight and stern and fearless, so
goodly, so glorious to look upon. Came the rattle of chain, the clang of
arms, the jangle of belt and spur; and still the brave procession
passed, in tens, in hundreds, in thousands, in a long wave of stately
men, whose eyes shone each in all the bold delight of
<span class = "pagenum">162</span>
war. Stooped front, hooked hand and avaricious eye—these were as
absent as the glow of gold or silver. It was the glorious age of
steel.</p>
<p>Still on they passed, always arising the hoarse swell of the
fighters’ chorus. I heard the rumble of the many hoofs,
thrilling even the impassive earth. The spear points shone. The harness
rattled. The pennants fluttered stiffly in the breeze. And then afar I
heard a sweet, compelling melody, the invitation of the bugle, that
dearest mistress of the heart of man. My blood leaped. I started
up. I started forward. The sweep of the ranks drew me on and in
irresistibly. I would have raised my voice. I sought to stay,
if for but one instant, this army of brave men, this panorama of exalted
war, this incomparable pageant of a day
<span class = "pagenum">163</span>
gone by! It was the Singing Mouse that checked me; for I heard it
sigh:</p>
<p>“Alas!”</p>
<p>And yet again the scene was changed. Across the view streamed yet a
long line of warriors. The hair of these did not float yellow from
beneath loosened casque, nor indeed did these know aught of armor, nor
did they march with banners beckoning, nor to the wooing of the
trumpet’s voice. The skins of these were red, and their hair was
raven-black. Arms they had, and horses, though rude the one and
ill-caparisoned the other. Leather and wood, and flint and sinew served
them for material. Ill-armed they were; but as they rode, with naked
breasts and painted faces, and tall feathers nodding in their plaited
hair, out of the eye of each there shone the soul
<span class = "pagenum">164</span>
of the fighting man, the warrior, beloved since ever earth began. Not
less than the men of Babylon were these, nor than they of the ancient
bow and spear, nor than they of the steel-clad breast; and as I saw them
naked, clad only in the armor of a man’s fearlessness, the word of
commendation was as ready as that of pity.</p>
<p>“They are late, Singing Mouse,” said I, “late in
the day of war.”</p>
<p>“Yes,” said the Singing Mouse, with sadness, “they
are late, and they must pass away. But they are warriors of proof, as
much as any of those who have passed. Did you not see the melancholy of
each face as it looked forward? Their fate was known, yet they rode
forward to meet it fearlessly, as brave as any fighting men of all the
years. In time, they too shall have their story, and with
<span class = "pagenum">165</span>
the other warriors of the earth shall march again upon the page of
history.”</p>
<p>As I looked, the figures of these men grew dimmer. The tinkling of
beaded garments and the shuffling of the ponies’ hoofs became less
and less distinct, and the dust cloud of their traveling became fainter
and fainter, and finally faded and melted away. The curtain was bare.
I heard the sighing of the wind.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic165.gif" width = "243" height = "172" alt = "cannon overgrown with plants"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">167</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="truth_1" id = "truth_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic167.gif" width = "426" height = "611" alt = "The House of Truth" title = "The House of Truth"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">169</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#truth_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="truth_2" id = "truth_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg169"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td class = "bottom">
<h4>The House<br/>
of Truth</h4>
</td>
<td width = "91px" height = "137px"> </td>
</tr>
</table>
<span class = "firstletter">O</span>
<p class = "float right">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic169b.gif" width = "91" height = "375" alt = "decorative border"></p>
<p class = "float right">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic169c.gif" width = "120" height = "53" alt = "decorative border"></p>
<p class = "float right">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic169d.gif" width = "227" height = "70" alt = "decorative border"></p>
<p><span class = "hidden">O</span><span class = "firstword">ne</span>
morning I lay upon my bed in the little room which I call my home. Now,
among the eaves which rise opposite to my window there are many sparrows
which have also made their homes. In the morning, before the sun has
arisen, and at the time when the dawn is making the city gray and leaden
in color instead of somber and black, these sparrows begin to chatter
and chirp and sing in discordant notes, and by this I know the day has
come. Upon this morning it seemed to me the sparrows chattered with an
unusual commotion; and as I listened I heard from another window near
mine the voice of
<span class = "pagenum">170</span>
grief and lamentation. Then I knew that one who had long been sick had
passed away. As the gray morning came on, this spirit, this spark of
life, had gone out from its accustomed place. As the day came on, the
sounds of lamentation arose. The friends of that one wept. So I asked
the sparrows, and the sun, and the gray sky why these friends wept. What
is grief? I asked of them. Why should these weep? What has happened
when one dies? Where has the spark of life gone? Did it fall to these
sodden pavements, for ever done, or did it go on up, to meet the kiss of
the rising sun? And the sparrows, which fall to the ground, answered
not. The sun rose calm and passionless, but dumb. The sky folded in,
large but inscrutable. None the less arose the voice of lamentation and
of woe.</p>
<p><span class = "pagenum">171</span>
“I ask you, Singing Mouse,” said I, one night as we sat
alone, “what is the Truth? How do we reach it? How shall we know
it? Tell me of this spark that has gone out. Tell me, what is life, and
where does it go? There are many words. Tell me, what is the
Truth?”</p>
<p>The Singing Mouse gazed at me in its way of pity, so I knew I had
asked that which could not be. Yet even as I saw this look appear it
changed and vanished. And as the Singing Mouse waved its tiny paw I
forbore reflection and looked only on the scene which now was spread
before me. It seemed a picture of actual colors, and I could see it
plainly.</p>
<p>I saw a youth who stood with one older and of austere garb. By the
vestments of this older man I knew he was of those who teach people in
spiritual things. To him the young man had come
<span class = "pagenum">172</span>
in anguish of heart. Then the older man of priestly garb taught the
young man in the teachings that had come down to him. But the youth
bowed his head in trouble, nor was the cloud cleared upon his heart.
I heard him murmur, “Alas! what is the Truth?”</p>
<p>So I saw this same youth pass on, in various stages of this picture,
and before him I saw drawn, as though in another picture,
a panorama of the edifices and institutions of the religions of all
lands.</p>
<p>But the years passed, and the panorama of beliefs swept by, and no
one could tell this man what was the Truth.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic172.gif" width = "190" height = "102" alt = "decoration"></p>
<p>Yet after this young man had ceased to query and had closed his
books, he one day entered alone into one of the great edifices built for
the sake of that which he could not understand. In the picture I could
see all this. I saw the young
<span class = "pagenum">173</span>
man cast himself face down among the cushions of a seat, and there he
lay and listened to the music. This, too, I could hear.
I could hear the peal of the organ arise like voices of the
spirits, going up, up, whispering, appealing, promising, assuring.
Then—for I could see and hear with him—there came to that
young man when he ceased to seek, the very exaltation he had longed to
know.</p>
<p class = "space">
“Ah! yes, Singing Mouse,” I said, “it was very
beautiful. But music is not final. Music is not the Truth. Tell me of
these things.”</p>
<p>The Singing Mouse again seemed to hesitate. “It may be,”
said the Singing Mouse slowly, “that the Truth will never be found
between the covers of any book, no matter how wise. It may be that it
never will be found by any who search
<span class = "pagenum">174</span>
for it always within walls built by human hands. It may be that no man
can convey to another that which is the Truth to him. It may be that the
Truth can never be grasped, never be weighed or formulated.</p>
<p>“The ways of Nature are always the same, but Nature does not
ask exactness of form. Why, then, shall we ask exactness of faith? The
true faith is nothing final, not more than are final the carved stones
of the church which offers it so strenuously. The stones crumble and
decay, but new churches rise. New faiths will rise. But were not all
well?”</p>
<p>At these things I wondered, and over them I thought for a time, but
yet I did not understand all that the Singing Mouse had said. As if it
knew my thought, the Singing Mouse said to me:</p>
<p>“Your vision is too narrow. You seek
<span class = "pagenum">175</span>
the great truths in small places, and wonder that you do not find them.
Come with me.”</p>
<p>The Singing Mouse waved its hand, as was its wont, and as in a dream
and as though I were now the young man whom we had lately seen,
I was transported, by what means I could not tell, into a place far
distant. At first it seemed to me there was a figure in vestments,
speaking I scarce knew of what. Again there was a church or a cathedral.
I could see the rafters as I lay. I could hear the solemn and
exalted peal of the organ. I could hear voices that sang up and up,
thrilling, compelling.</p>
<p>The sense of the confinement of the building ceased. Insensibly I
seemed to see the hewn stones of the walls assume their primeval and
untouched state beneath the grasses of the hills. I could feel
<span class = "pagenum">176</span>
the rafters vanishing and going back into the bodies of the oaks in
which they originally grew. The voice of the organ remained with me, but
it might have been the roll of the waves upon the shore. I was in
the Temple. In the Temple, one needs not seek for names.</p>
<p>It was night. I lay upon a bank of sweet-smelling grasses, and about
me were the great oaks. The organ, or the waves, spoke on. I looked
up, up, into the great circle of the sky, so far, so blue, so kind in
its bending over, so pitying it seemed to me, yet so high in its
up-reaching. I looked upon the glorious pageant of the stars.</p>
<p>“That star,” thought I, “shone over the grave of
some ancestor of mine; back, back in the unmirrored past, some father of
some father of mine. He is gone, like a fly. He is dust. I may be
<span class = "pagenum">177</span>
lying on his grave. Soon, like a fly, I, too, shall be dead, gone,
turned into dust. But the star will still shine on. Small as that
father’s dust may be, that dust still lives. It is about me. This
grass, these trees, may hold it. He has lived again in the cycle of
natural forces. My dust, when I am dead, will in turn make part of this
world, one of an unknown sea of stars. Small then, as I am, I am
kin to that star. The stars go on. Nature goes on. Then shall
man—shall I—”</p>
<p>“Ah,” said the Singing Mouse, its voice sounding I knew
not whence; “from this place can you see?”</p>
<p>So now I thought I began to see what I had not seen before. And since
this was in the land of the Singing Mouse, I sought to find no name
for what I saw, nor tried to measure it. What one man sees is not what
another sees. Shall
<span class = "pagenum">178</span>
one claim wisdom beyond his neighbor? Are not the stars his also, and
the trees his, to talk with him? Are not the doors always open? Does not
the music of the organ ever roll, do not the voices always rise?</p>
<p>Had it not been for the Singing Mouse I should not have thought these
things.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic178.gif" width = "328" height = "228" alt = "face reflected in water"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">181</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="city_1" id = "city_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic181.gif" width = "386" height = "568" alt = "Where the City Went" title = "Where the City Went"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">183</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#city_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="city_2" id = "city_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg183"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td>
<p><ANTIMG src = "images/pic183a.gif" width = "156" height = "108" alt = "moon"></p> <!-- not centered -->
<h4>Where the<br/>
City Went</h4>
<p><span class = "firstletter">O</span><span class =
"firstword">ne</span> day there was a white frost that fell upon the
city, lasting for many hours, so that a strange thing happened, at which
men wondered very much. The city put aside its colors of black and brown
and gray, and dressed itself in silvery white. No stone nor brick was
seen except in this silvern frosty color. All the spires were glittering
in silver, and all the columns bore traceries as though the hands of
spirits had labored long and delicately and had seen their tender
fretwork frozen softly but for ever into silver. The gross city had put
aside corporeal things, and for once its spirit shone fair and radiant;
so that
<span class = "pagenum">184</span>
men said no such thing had ever been before.</p>
<p>That evening the frost still remained, and as the night came on a
mist fell upon the city. From the windows men looked out, and lo! the
beautiful city so made spiritual was vanishing. One by one the great
buildings, the tall spires, the lofty columns had faded into a white
dream, dimmer, fainter, less and less perceptible, seen through a gentle
envelope of whitening haze. This thing was of a sort almost to make one
tremble as he looked upon it, for the city which had been silver had
turned to mist, and the mist seemed fair to turn into a dream. There are
those who say it did become a dream, and afterward descended. For
wanderers in desert countries tell that at times they have seen some far
city of
<span class = "pagenum">185</span>
dreams, alluringly beautiful, but evanescent, intangible, unattainable,
trembling and floating upon the wavering air.</p>
</td>
<td width = "92px"> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td height = "120px" colspan = "2"> </td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>Now when I saw the city thus fade away and disappear, I sat down at
my table, and, as many men did that night, I wondered much at what
I had seen. For surely the soul of the city had arisen. Then the Singing
Mouse came and gazed into my face.</p>
<p>“What you have seen is true,” said the Singing Mouse.
“There is no city now. It has gone. You have seen it disappear.
Its soul has arisen. This does not often happen, yet it can be, for even
the city has a soul if you can find it.</p>
<p>“But if I say the city has gone, I mean only that it has left
the place where once it was. That which once was, is always, corporate
or not corporate. We err only
<span class = "pagenum">186</span>
when we ask to see all with our eyes, to balance all within our hands.
Come with me, and I will show you where the city went.”</p>
<p>So now the Singing Mouse waved its hands, and I saw, though I knew
not where I looked.</p>
<p>I saw a country where the trees grew big and where the wild-fowl
came. It was where the trees had never been felled, nor had the stones
ever been hewn. The sky was blue, and the water was blue, except where
it played and laughed, and there it was white.</p>
<p>There was a small house, of a sort one has never seen, for none in
the cities is like it. The blue smoke curling from the chimney named it
none the less a home. I hardly knew what time or place we had come
upon, for the Singing Mouse, whose voice seemed high and
<span class = "pagenum">187</span>
exalted, spoke as though much was in the past.</p>
<p>“This is a Home,” said the Singing Mouse. “Once
there were no homes. In those days there was only one fire, and it was
red. By this man sat. He sought not to see.</p>
<p>“Once a man sat at night and looked up at the heavens, seeking
to know what the stars were saying. He besought the stars, praying to
them and asking them to listen to the voice of the water, and to the
voice of the oaks and to the whispers of the grasses, and to tell him
why the fire of earth was red, while the fire of the stars was
white.</p>
<p>“Now, while this man besought the stars, to him a strange thing
happened. As he looked up he saw falling from the heavens above him a
ray of the white light of the stars. It fell near to him
<span class = "pagenum">188</span>
and lay shining like a jewel in the grass. To this the man ran at once,
gladly, and took up the white light, and put it in his bosom, that the
winds might not harm it. Always this man kept the white light in his
bosom after that. And by its light he saw many things which till that
time men had never known. This man found that this new light, with the
red light that had been known, filled all his house with a great
radiance, so that small strifes were not so many, and so that life
became plain and sweet. This then that you see is that Home.</p>
<p>“This that you see around you,” it continued slowly,
“the large trees and the green grass, and the blue sky and the
smiling waters, all this is wealth; wealth not corporate, wealth
valuable, wealth that belongs to every man ever born upon the earth, and
which can not of
<span class = "pagenum">189</span>
right ever be taken away from him. Shorn of that, he is poor indeed,
though not so poor as he who shore him. Unshorn of this, he is rich. In
our land our hearts ache to see these terms misused, and that called
wealth which is so far from worth the having. But here, where I have
brought you, you shall see humanity undwarfed, and you shall see peace
and largeness in the life which you once thought small and
sordid.”</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic35.gif" width = "242" height = "99" alt = "flying geese"></p>
<p>Then as I looked, there stepped from the house a man, or one whom I
took to be a man. This man stood in the cool, fresh morning, and gazed
at the sun, now rising above the tops of the great trees. He smiled
gently, and taking in each hand a little water from a tiny stream that
flowed near by, he raised his hands, and still smiling, offered tribute
of the water to the sun. I saw the water falling
<span class = "pagenum">190</span>
down from his hands in a small stream of silver drops, shining brightly.
It was the way of the land, the Singing Mouse said; for they thought
that as the water came from the sky and returned to it, so did man and
the thoughts of man, and the fruits of his progress; never to be
destroyed.</p>
<p>At all this I looked almost in fear, for the thought came that
perhaps this was not Man as we knew him, but the successor of Man.
“Where is this land,” I asked of the Singing Mouse,
“and what is this time upon which we have come?”</p>
<p>The Singing Mouse looked at the green trees, and at the kind sun, and
at the blue sky and the pleasant waters, and it said to me slowly:
“There was once a city where these trees now stand.”</p>
<span class = "pagenum">193</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="bell_1" id = "bell_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic193.gif" width = "386" height = "549" alt = "The Bell and the Shadows" title = "The Bell and the Shadows"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">195</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#bell_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="bell_2" id = "bell_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg195"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td class = "background pg195a bottom" colspan = "2">
<h4>The Bell and<br/>
the Shadows</h4>
</td>
<td height = "170px"> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "background pg195b" width = "38px"> </td>
<td>
<p><span class = "firstletter">M</span><span class =
"firstword">elody</span> unformulate, music immaterial, such was the
voice of the Singing Mouse; faint, small and clear, a piping of
fifes so fine, a touching of strings so delicate, that it seemed to
come from instruments of beryl and of diamond, a phantom music,
impossible to fetter with staff or bar, and past the hope of compassing
in words.</p>
<p>It was the last night of the year, and the bell upon the church near
by had made many strokes the last time it had been heard; many heavy
strokes which throbbed sullenly, mournfully on the air. The presence of
passing Time was at hand. The year soon would join the
<span class = "pagenum">196</span>
years gone by. Regret, remorse, despair, abandonment, the hopelessness
of humanity—was it the breath of these which arose and burdened
heavily the note of the chronicling bell? Where were the chimes
of joy?</p>
</td>
<td></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td></td>
<td></td>
<td width = "92px" height = "110px"> </td>
</tr>
</table>
<p class = "space">
“These shadows that you see are not upon the wall,” said the
Singing Mouse. “They are very much beyond the windows. If only we
will look out from our windows, there are always great pictures waiting
for us—pictures in pearl and opal, in liquid argent, in crimson
and gold. But always there must be the shadows. Without these, there can
be no picture anywhere.</p>
<p>“Have you not seen what the shadows do? Have you not seen them
trooping through the oak forest in the evening, through the pine forest
in open day,
<span class = "pagenum">197</span>
across the prairies under the moon at night, legions of them, armies of
them? Have you never seen them march across the grass-lands in the
daytime, cohort after cohort, hurrying to the call of the unseen
trumpets? In the woods, have you never heard strange sounds, when you
put your ear to the ground—sounds untraceable to any animate life?
Have you never heard vague voices in the trees? Have you not heard
distant, mysterious noises in the forest, whose cause you could never
learn, seek no matter how you might? These were the voices of the
shadows, the people who live there. Who else should it be to whisper and
sing to you and make you happy when you are there? Without these people,
what would be the woods, the prairies, the waters, the sky, the
world?</p>
<p>“Without the shadows, too, what
<span class = "pagenum">198</span>
would be our lives? Thoughts, thoughts and remembrances, what have we
that is sweeter than these? Have you never seen the smile upon the lips
of those who have died? They say they are looking upon the Future.
Perhaps they look also upon the Past, and therefore smile in happiness,
seeing again Youth, and Hope, and Faith, and Trust; which are tender and
beautiful things. Life has no actuality of its own, and in material
sense is only a continual change. But the shadows of thought and of
remembrance do not change. It is only the shadows that are
real.”</p>
<p>As I pondered upon this, there passed by many pleasant pictures upon
the wall, after the way the Singing Mouse had; many pictures of days
gone by, which made me think that perhaps what the Singing Mouse had
said was true.</p>
<p><span class = "pagenum">199</span>
I could see the boy, sitting idle and a-dream, watching the shadows
drifting across the clover fields where the big bees came. I saw
the youth wandering in the woods where the squirrels lived, loitering
and looking, peering into corners full of the secrets of the wild
creatures, unraveling the delicious mysteries which Nature ever offers
to those not yet grown old. It was a comfortable picture, full of the
brilliant greens of springtime, the mellow tints of summer, the red and
russet of autumn days, the blue and white of winter. I could hear,
also, sounds intimately associated with the scenes before me; the bleat
of little lambs, the low of cattle, the neighing of a distant horse.</p>
<p>And then both sound and scene progressed, and once more as the woods
and hills grew bolder and more wild, I
<span class = "pagenum">200</span>
could hear clearly the rifle’s thin report, could note the whisper
of the secret-loving paddle, the slipping of the snow-shoe on the snow,
the clatter of the hoofs of horses, the baying of the bell-mouthed
hounds. The delights of it all came back again, and in this varied
phantom chase among the keen joys of the past, I saw as plainly and
exultantly as ever in my life, the panorama of the brown woods, and the
gray plains, and the purple hills—saw it distinctly, with all the
old vibrant joy of youth—line for line, sound for sound, shadow
for shadow, joy for joy!</p>
<p>And then the Singing Mouse, without wish of mine, caused these scenes
to change into others of more quiet sort, which told not of the fields,
but of the home. In the shadows of evening, I seemed to see a
pleasant place, well surrounded by trees and flowers, the leaves
<span class = "pagenum">201</span>
of which were stirred softly in the breath of a faint summer breeze,
strong enough only to carry aloft in its hands the odor of the blooming
rose. This picture faded slowly. There were shadows in the spaces
between the trees. There were shadows in the dark-growing vine which
draped a column. One could only guess if he caught sight of garb or of
the outline of a form among the shadows. He could only guess, too,
whether he heard music, faint as the breeze, faint as the incense of the
flowers. He could only guess if he had seen the image of the House
Beautiful, that temple known as Home.</p>
<p class = "space">
“Thoughts,” said the Singing Mouse softly. “Thoughts
and remembrances. These are the things that live for ever. It is only
the shadows that are real!”</p>
<p><span class = "pagenum">202</span>
The solemn note of the bell struck in. It counted twelve. The new year
had come. The chimes of joy arose. But still the faint music from the
Past had not died away, and still the shadows waved and beckoned on the
wall, strong and beautiful, and enduring, and not like the fading of a
dream. So then I knew that what the Singing Mouse had said was true, and
that it is, indeed, only the shadows that are real.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic202.gif" width = "202" height = "114" alt = "crescent moon"></p>
<!-- also used for title page -->
<span class = "pagenum">205</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="sorrow_1" id = "sorrow_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic205.gif" width = "326" height = "609" alt = "Of the Greatest Sorrow..." title = "Of the Greatest Sorrow..."></p>
<span class = "pagenum">207</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#sorrow_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="sorrow_2" id = "sorrow_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg207"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td class = "bottom">
<h4>Of the Greatest<br/>
Sorrow</h4>
</td>
<td width = "79px"> </td>
</tr>
</table>
<span class = "firstletter">A</span>
<p class = "float right">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic207b.gif" width = "79" height = "313" alt = "decorative border"></p>
<p class = "float right">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic207c.gif" width = "94" height = "47" alt = "decorative border"></p>
<p class = "float right">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic207d.gif" width = "304" height = "124" alt = "decorative border"></p>
<p><span class = "hidden">A</span> thousand times in the night I reach
out (it seems to me), and touch her hair as it lies spread and dark.
A thousand times in the night I gaze upon her face, her eyes
shielded, her lips gently closed and curved. A thousand times in
the night (it seems to me), I bend above her and whisper,
“I love you!” And she, though asleep and myriads of miles
away among the stars, hears me always and stirs just faintly, and still
sleeping whispers through lips that barely part, “I know!”
It is perhaps that thing called Love which causes me to do this, because
I always whisper, “I love you;” though no word quite is
<span class = "pagenum">208</span>
wide and deep and soft and kind enough to say what is in the soul at
certain times.</p>
<p class = "space">
Now in lives there are ways. Some have few sorrows and many things of
fortune taken lightly, the things wished coming easily. Again, others
gain only by pain and suffering and long effort and hard denyings. As it
is decreed by chance, the way with most is to gain all things hardly,
and to know always denial, and always to have longing. That is the way
with most. Of these things I spoke with the Singing Mouse, and told of
many things that came as sorrows and griefs and denials, saying that,
since this was decreed by chance, there was naught that a man ought not
to receive without murmur; and the Singing Mouse said that this was
true, that many things were denied, and that many knew great sorrows.
<span class = "pagenum">209</span>
This was the reason we came to speak of sorrows. I named very many
sorrows that I had known, and many that friends of mine had known, some
of these far greater than my own; as is most often the case when one
comes to see deeply into these things.</p>
<p>“All sorrows,” said the Singing Mouse, “come to us,
and we must bear them, though some are very hard to bear; as when
friends do not know we love them, and think us ill-formed and crooked,
small and mean, when in truth in soul we are tall and comely, large and
strong. Or when we are thought to have done a bad action when in truth
we have done a good one; or when hunger and thirst come and we have
little comforts; or when sickness and weakness come to us when we wish
our strength; or when those die whom we have loved. All, all
<span class = "pagenum">210</span>
these sorrows, and very many others, come to us; and each sorrow must be
borne, for that is the way of life.”</p>
<p>“What,” I asked of the Singing Mouse, “is the
greatest sorrow?”</p>
<p>“That,” said the Singing Mouse, “is a thing hard to
tell; for each man thinks that the sorrow that he has is the greatest
sorrow for him or for the world; though perhaps in truth it is not
large. What to you,” asked the Singing Mouse, “is the
greatest sorrow of those which have not yet come to you?”</p>
<p>... “A thousand times in the night, Singing Mouse,” said
I, “I reach out and touch her hair, as it lies spread and dark.
I whisper to her, though she be myriads of miles away among the
stars; and she hears; and she answers! This is because of that thing
called Love. Now, this sorrow has not yet come to me; that when
<span class = "pagenum">211</span>
I reach out my hand in the night I shall not touch her hair; that when I
bend to kiss her sleeping she shall not be there any more; that when I
whisper to her she may no longer answer to me, seeing that this thing
called Love can be no more between us. That,” said I to the
Singing Mouse, “I could not endure.”</p>
<p>Indeed, at the thought of this, so sharp an agony came to me that I
arose and cried out loud. “I can not endure it, I can not
endure it!” I cried (although this sorrow had not yet come
to me).</p>
<p>“Ah!” said the Singing Mouse, “how idle and weak is
the human mind in the country where you live. Have you not said but now
that, though she be myriads of miles away among the stars, she answers
you when you whisper? Does she not hear? Do not her lips move in speech
as you whisper?”</p>
<p><span class = "pagenum">212</span>
“That is true,” said I. “And will she always
hear?”</p>
<p>“She will always hear,” said the Singing Mouse. “So
this sorrow will not come as you fear.”</p>
<p>“And shall I reach out and touch her hair as it lies spread and
dark?” This I asked of the Singing Mouse.</p>
<p>“You shall touch it, spread and dark, and fragrant as when you
were young,” said the Singing Mouse, “if so you
wish.”</p>
<p>So then it seemed that perhaps all sorrows, even very great ones, are
a part of life. Although I know that, if I could no longer know the
fragrance of her hair, or hear the whisper of her answer, then that
sorrow would be more than I could bear.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic212.gif" width = "254" height = "107" alt = "heart, roses and thorns"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">215</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="shoes_1" id = "shoes_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic215.gif" width = "353" height = "571" alt = "The Shoes of the Princess" title = "The Shoes of the Princess"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">217</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#shoes_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="shoes_2" id = "shoes_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg217"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td></td>
<td width = "87px" height = "88px"> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>
<h4>The Shoes of the<br/>
Princess</h4>
<p><span class = "firstletter">O</span><span class =
"firstword">nce</span> I was in a place where there were those who had
opened many tombs, and had taken from the tombs, that had been in Egypt,
and were very old, many things that had been placed there for silence
and repose thousands of years ago. There were grave-clothes and
grave-caskets, the one embroidered, the other graven; and the colors of
both were as they were thousands of years ago. There were signs over
which men pondered, not knowing their own writing, and their own
thoughts, and their own fate. There were also, a sad thing to see,
the bodies of those that had died long ago, that had lain down for rest
<span class = "pagenum">218</span>
and silence; and of these some were called kings, and some were called
queens and others princesses; and all had once been young, and some had
once been beautiful. For here, after thousands of years, was praise of
their beauty, and love and care for it. So I pondered very long and
sadly. But most I looked at two little golden shoes.</p>
<p>These little shoes had once been the shoes of one who lay here,
a princess, dead thousands of years, and once very beautiful, as
these carven symbols told. They were small and dainty and threaded with
fine gold, and laced across with care about the feet of her who was once
a woman and a princess and owner of much beauty, and who was in her life
beloved, and in her death mourned; as these graven symbols said.
A thousand years this love reached out its arms to
<span class = "pagenum">219</span>
her to-day; although for a thousand years Death had enfolded her in his
grasp, that does not yield. She who had lain down for rest and silence
was still here, withal at rest in her grave-garb, and silent in her
sleep; but those who had done these things had removed the
grave-clothing so that these small shoes could be seen, still upon the
feet of the princess that had slept a thousand years, enfolded in
love.</p>
</td>
<td></td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>For a price these might have sold the shoes of the princess, for
there were those cruel enough to strip her of that which she had worn
when she lay down to be alone. But this I could not do. I did not
carry away the shoes in my hands, but in some way it seemed to me that I
took them; for that night, as I sat at the little table in my room, with
the dim light falling as is its wont at those hours, I saw upon the
table before me
<span class = "pagenum">220</span>
these same shoes of the princess of thousands of years ago, small and
golden; things to make one weep, so sad their story, disturbed thus
after they had been placed away for silence. I gazed at them for a
time, and presently I saw appear upon the table beside them, the form of
the Singing Mouse, as tall perhaps as the fronts of these golden
shoes.</p>
<p>“See,” said the Singing Mouse, “here are her shoes,
those of the princess who has been resting. They crossed the paved
floors of palaces. They knew the steps of a throne. They were made by
love for love and given in love to rest and silence. She was as one you
have known, as many whom others know now. Tell me, is she not
beautiful?”</p>
<p>I saw standing before me the figure of the princess, tall and slender
and very beautiful. And now the grave garments
<span class = "pagenum">221</span>
were not seen, for her robe was of silk, new and soft and shapely like
to herself, and her arms were round and soft, and her eyes were full and
dark, and her hair was as deep shadows. A band of gold was about
her brow, and her cheek was red and tender in its bloom. Her neck was
white and round, and her hands were white, and her slender fingers
curved slightly as her arms hung down by her sides. Her feet were small
and straight, and all, all of her was beautiful, and she was a
princess.</p>
<p class = "background pg49">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic49.gif" width = "88" height = "538" alt = "decorative plant"></p>
<p>Now as I gazed, I saw the face and saw that it was one I knew, and
had known long; so then I knew that the princess who was placed away for
rest and silence had never died; for did she not stand here before me,
and had I not long known her thus? Ah, beautiful!</p>
<p>I took up these small golden shoes in
<span class = "pagenum">222</span>
my hands and held them out to her. “Take these little
shoes,” I said, “wrought as cunning as man may know.
Place them upon thy feet for me, and may never thorn assail thee in all
thy going. Wear them and tread the steps of thrones, years and years,
ages and ages, Princess, beloved! See, they are wrought in
love.”</p>
<p>Now I saw upon the lips of the princess who had lain down thousands
of years ago, but who lives in a place I know to-day, a smile, very
faint and far away. So as the Singing Mouse told me, it was to be seen
that she did not die. Even as she faded away from the wall against which
she stood, I knew, though I wept, that the princess was not dead
and would not die. She was beautiful, she was beloved; and these things
have not died. “Ah, beautiful!” I said to the
<span class = "pagenum">223</span>
Singing Mouse. “But alas! for a princess there should be a palace,
and here is none!”</p>
<p>“Look about you,” said the Singing Mouse. “See, for
the time this is a palace.”</p>
<p>I looked about me, and it was as the Singing Mouse said. For the time
my room was a palace. I saw standing there again the princess, upon
her feet small golden shoes.</p>
<p>“What is this?” I asked. “And who am I?” But
as I turned, I saw that the Singing Mouse was gone. But this I
knew, and so may you know: that love does not die; and here was proof
of it.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic223.gif" width = "271" height = "121" alt = "light sandals"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">225</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="moths_1" id = "moths_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic225.gif" width = "368" height = "541" alt = "Of White Moths" title = "Of White Moths"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">227</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#moths_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="moths_2" id = "moths_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg227"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td width = "36px" height = "144px"> </td>
<td class = "bottom">
<h4>Of White<br/>
Moths</h4>
</td>
<td> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td></td>
<td>
<p><span class = "firstletter">“O</span><span class =
"firstword">nce</span>,” said the Singing Mouse, “I was at
the side of a little stream. Grasses grew all about, and small plants
and flowers. Beyond the shores of the little stream arose a forest, wide
and dark, into which the eye could reach but a little way.</p>
<p>“As I stood near the little stream, there arose from the grass
and flowers two small moths, soft and dainty, beautiful, and very white,
covered also with a white dust or powder which was so light that did
they but receive a touch they must lose some of this soft white powder
<span class = "pagenum">228</span>
and so be injured, so gentle and tender were they.</p>
</td>
<td class = "background pg227b" width = "68px" height =
"46px"> </td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>“These two moths, soft and white and silent, arose in the air
and circled one about the other, rising for a time, then falling, but
ever circling one about the other. It seemed that perhaps they spoke one
to the other, but if that were true it was in speech so small that not
even I could hear it. They passed over the tops of the grasses and
flowers, up and up, until they reached the tops of the trees, where they
seemed very small.</p>
<p>“I do not know why these moths no longer cared for the grasses
and flowers. But I saw them, circling, cross over the little stream,
high in the air, and then pass on directly into the wide dark forest.
For a moment they appeared, a small spot of white, against the
black shadows of the forest across the stream; then they went
<span class = "pagenum">229</span>
on, straight into the shadows, until I could no longer see this small
spot of white they made.</p>
<p>“It is in this way,” said the Singing Mouse, “that
human souls pass through life. To me, who can see them, they look small
and delicate and white; and they circle one about another; and they pass
on, into the deep forest.”</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic229.gif" width = "236" height = "149" alt = "decoration"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">231</span>
<p class = "illustration title">
<SPAN name="dreams_1" id = "dreams_1"> </SPAN>
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic231.gif" width = "352" height = "562" alt = "The House of Dreams" title = "The House of Dreams"></p>
<span class = "pagenum">233</span>
<span class = "thumbnail"><SPAN href = "#dreams_2_thumb">
Thumbnail</SPAN></span>
<SPAN name="dreams_2" id = "dreams_2"> </SPAN>
<table class = "background pg233"
summary = "illustration interlocks with text">
<tr>
<td width = "68px" height = "127px"> </td>
<td class = "bottom">
<h4>The House<br/>
of Dreams</h4>
</td>
<td width = "90px"> </td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td class = "background pg233b"> </td>
<td colspan = "2">
<span class = "firstletter">“U</span>
<p class = "float right">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic233c.gif" width = "89" height = "377" alt = "decorative border"></p>
<p class = "float right">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic207d.gif" width = "232" height = "120" alt = "decorative border"></p>
<p><span class = "hidden">U</span><span class = "firstword">pon</span>
what couch,” I asked the Singing Mouse, “may one have the
most noble dreams?”</p>
<p>The Singing Mouse sat for a time and looked at me with its bright
eye, and it seemed to me that the walls opened and widened. I saw
that I was within a great palace, whose walls were hung in tapestries,
and whose doors were of golden panelings, and whose windows were of
curious crystals, and whose furnishings were rich and wonderful, and
around whose stately limits swam wide gardens of strange flowers, full
of deep perfumes. I heard soft voices of birds
<span class = "pagenum">234</span>
and the music also of gentle human voices singing, and tenderly played
instruments of silken and silvern strings. It seemed to me that I lay
upon a great couch of thrice-piled down, and touched hands with delights
in all manners that one could think. But alas! I did not dream as I
lay upon this couch.</p>
<p>Then I saw these walls fade away in turn, and in their stead arose a
vast cathedral of the woods. A music was in the trees, and a solemn
mountain stood as orator to the sky for me. My couch was that of the
earth and the leaves, and my jewels were upon the grasses all about.
I touched hands with delights; and so I dreamed, and was very happy
and content.</p>
<p>Again the place changed, and I lay in my own small room, with naked
walls and little cheer or comfort, as you may
<span class = "pagenum">235</span>
see. The couch was hard and narrow, and that which covered it over was
worn and threadbare, and by no means cloth of woven silk and golden
tracery. But it seemed to me that upon the walls were pictures. And here
and there were shadows of things which I had wished—many things,
very sweet and precious. Upon this couch, as upon that of the earth, it
seemed to me that I dreamed....</p>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>“There were once some leaves and grasses in this couch,”
said the Singing Mouse, “and that is why you dreamed. Around this
manner of resting-place often arises the House of Dreams, and not, as
many have supposed, about the couch of down and silken tapestries.
Always, near a House of Dreams, must be a mountain or a sea, and trees,
and grasses, with the sky also, and the stars, which are the candles of
our dream
<span class = "pagenum">236</span>
houses. See, you had not noticed it, but there is a star in your
candle.”</p>
<p>I looked, and it was as the Singing Mouse had said. A star was at the
candle top. By its light I could dream nobly, and many things seemed
true which have not yet come true when the star in the candle does not
shine. But they are true in the land of the Singing Mouse. In that
country it is not palaces alone that are Houses of Dreams. I know
this thing is true. Wherefore, all ye who have come hither, let your
hope and your joy be strong; and by no means despair, for better than
despair are hope and joy.</p>
<p class = "illustration inline">
<ANTIMG src = "images/pic236.gif" width = "138" height = "152" alt = "stump of candle in candlestick"></p>
<!-- also used as halftitle 2 --></div>
<div class = "mynote">
<h4><SPAN name="thumbs" id = "thumbs">Thumbnails</SPAN></h4>
<div class = "center">
<table class = "thumbs" summary = "title-page thumbnails">
<tr>
<td>
<SPAN name="land_2_thumb" id = "land_2_thumb" href = "#land_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page13thumb.jpg" width = "146" height = "229" alt = "page 13 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#land_2">The Land of the Singing Mouse</SPAN>
</td>
<td>
<SPAN name="burden_2_thumb" id = "burden_2_thumb" href = "#burden_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page21thumb.jpg" width = "141" height = "228" alt = "page 21 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#burden_2">The Burden of a Song</SPAN>
</td>
<td>
<SPAN name="river_2_thumb" id = "river_2_thumb" href = "#river_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page33thumb.jpg" width = "141" height = "228" alt = "page 33 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#river_2">The Little River</SPAN>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>
<SPAN name="waters_2_thumb" id = "waters_2_thumb" href = "#waters_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page43thumb.jpg" width = "141" height = "228" alt = "page 43 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#waters_2">What the Waters Said</SPAN>
</td>
<td>
<SPAN name="lake_2_thumb" id = "lake_2_thumb" href = "#lake_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page57thumb.jpg" width = "141" height = "228" alt = "page 57 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#lake_2">Lake Belle-Marie</SPAN>
</td>
<td>
<SPAN name="skull_2_thumb" id = "skull_2_thumb" href = "#skull_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page69thumb.jpg" width = "141" height = "228" alt = "page 69 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#skull_2">The Skull and the Rose</SPAN>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>
<SPAN name="man_2_thumb" id = "man_2_thumb" href = "#man_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page79thumb.jpg" width = "142" height = "229" alt = "page 79 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#man_2">The Man of the Mountain</SPAN>
</td>
<td>
<SPAN name="oaks_2_thumb" id = "oaks_2_thumb" href = "#oaks_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page85thumb.jpg" width = "141" height = "228" alt = "page 85 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#oaks_2">At the Place of the Oaks</SPAN>
</td>
<td>
<SPAN name="hours_2_thumb" id = "hours_2_thumb" href = "#hours_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page101thumb.jpg" width = "141" height = "228" alt = "page 101 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#hours_2">The Birth of the Hours</SPAN>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>
<SPAN name="tear_2_thumb" id = "tear_2_thumb" href = "#tear_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page115thumb.jpg" width = "142" height = "229" alt = "page 115 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#tear_2">The Tear and the Smile</SPAN>
</td>
<td>
<SPAN name="plains_2_thumb" id = "plains_2_thumb" href = "#plains_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page125thumb.jpg" width = "142" height = "229" alt = "page 125 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#plains_2">How the Mountains Ate Up the Plains</SPAN>
</td>
<td>
<SPAN name="savage_2_thumb" id = "savage_2_thumb" href = "#savage_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page133thumb.jpg" width = "142" height = "229" alt = "page 133 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#savage_2">The Savage and Its Heart</SPAN>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>
<SPAN name="beast_2_thumb" id = "beast_2_thumb" href = "#beast_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page139thumb.jpg" width = "142" height = "229" alt = "page 139 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#beast_2">The Beast Terrible</SPAN>
</td>
<td>
<SPAN name="passing_2_thumb" id = "passing_2_thumb" href = "#passing_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page157thumb.jpg" width = "142" height = "229" alt = "page 157 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#passing_2">The Passing of Men</SPAN>
</td>
<td>
<SPAN name="truth_2_thumb" id = "truth_2_thumb" href = "#truth_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page169thumb.jpg" width = "142" height = "229" alt = "page 169 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#truth_2">The House of Truth</SPAN>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>
<SPAN name="city_2_thumb" id = "city_2_thumb" href = "#city_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page183thumb.jpg" width = "142" height = "229" alt = "page 183 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#city_2">Where the City Went</SPAN>
</td>
<td>
<SPAN name="bell_2_thumb" id = "bell_2_thumb" href = "#bell_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page195thumb.jpg" width = "142" height = "229" alt = "page 195 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#bell_2">The Bell and the Shadows</SPAN>
</td>
<td>
<SPAN name="sorrow_2_thumb" id = "sorrow_2_thumb" href = "#sorrow_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page207thumb.jpg" width = "142" height = "229" alt = "page 207 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#sorrow_2">Of the Greatest Sorrow</SPAN>
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>
<SPAN name="shoes_2_thumb" id = "shoes_2_thumb" href = "#shoes_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page217thumb.jpg" width = "142" height = "229" alt = "page 217 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#shoes_2">The Shoes of the Princess</SPAN>
</td>
<td>
<SPAN name="moths_2_thumb" id = "moths_2_thumb" href = "#moths_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page227thumb.jpg" width = "142" height = "229" alt = "page 227 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#moths_2">Of White Moths</SPAN>
</td>
<td>
<SPAN name="dreams_2_thumb" id = "dreams_2_thumb" href = "#dreams_2">
<ANTIMG src = "images/page233thumb.jpg" width = "142" height = "229" alt = "page 233 thumbnail"></SPAN><br/>
<SPAN href = "#dreams_2">The House of Dreams</SPAN>
</td>
</tr>
</table></div>
</div>
<SPAN name="endofbook"></SPAN>
<div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />