A DREAMER'S TALES

BY

LORD DUNSANY

AUTHOR OF "THE SWORD OF WELLERAN "TIME AND THE GODS," ETC.

LONDON: GEORGE ALLEN & SONS

44 & 45 RATHBONE PLACE

[All rights reserved]

PR

6001

Printed by BALLANTYNR, HANSON .V Co. At the Ballantyne Press, Edinburgh

PREFACE

I HOPE for this book that it may come into the hands of those that were kind to my others and that it may not dis- appoint them.

To the Editor of the Saturday Kev lew my thanks are due for permission to republish here those of the fol- lowing tales which have appeared in his columns, and, more than that, for the opportunity afforded me by his review of reaching a wider public than my books have attained to yet.

CONTENTS

PAGE

POLTARNEES, BEHOLDER OF OCEAN . I

BLAGDAROSS 31

THE MADNESS OF ANDELSPRUTZ . . 43

WHERE THE TIDES EBB AND FLOW . 53

BETHMOORA 66

IDLE DAYS ON THE YANN ... 77 THE SWORD AND THE IDOL . . .122

THE IDLE CITY 137

THE HASHISH MAN 151

POOR OLD BILL 165

THE BEGGARS 179

CARCASSONNE 187

IN ZACCARATH 218

THE FIELD 226

THE DAY OF THE POLL . . . .235

THE UNHAPPY BODY 243

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

ROMANCE COMES DOWN • OUT OF /

HILLY WOODLANDS. . . To face page 4

* • :" > . WE WOULD GALLOP THROUGH ..

AFRICA . . ." ' - , , . . , . - ,, " 40

THE SOUL OF ANDELSPRUTZ . ,, 48

THE TERRIBLE'" MUD , . . ., ,} -54

BIRD OF THE RIVER ... . „ 76

THE GATE OF YANN, . * . •. „ 118

THE SILE:NCE OF GED .' . . v ,, 132

THUBA MLEEN •'. . . . ,, 160

LITTLE COTTAGES . .' . WHOSE LOOKS

WE DID NOT LIKE 1 66

A DREAMER'S TALES

POLTARNEES, BEHOLDER OF OCEAN

TOLDEES, Mondath, Arizini, these are the Inner Lands, the lands whose sentinels upon their borders do not behold the sea. Beyond them to the east there lies a desert, for ever untroubled by man : all yellow it is, and spotted with shadows of stones, and Death is in it, like a leopard lying in the sun. To the south they are bounded by magic, to the west by a moun- tain, and to the north by the voice and anger of the Polar wind. Like a great wall is the mountain to the west. It comes up out of the distance and goes

2 A DREAMER'S TALES

down into the distance again, and it is named Poltarnees, Beholder of Ocean. To the northward red rocks, smooth and bare of soil, and without any speck of moss or herbage, slope up to the very lips of the Polar wind, and there is nothing else there but the noise of his anger. Very peaceful are the Inner Lands, and very fair are their cities, and there is no war among them, but quiet and ease. And they have no enemy but age, for thirst and fever lie sunning themselves out in the mid-desert, and never prowl into the Inner Lands. And the ghouls and ghosts, whose highway is the night, are kept in the south by the boundary of magic. And very small are all their pleasant cities, and all men are known to one another therein, and bless one another by name as they meet in the streets. And they have a broad, green

POLTARNEES 3

way in every city that comes in out of some vale or wood or downland, and wanders in and out about the city between the houses and across the streets ; and the people walk along it never at all, but every year at her appointed time Spring walks along it from the flowery lands, causing the anemone to bloom on the green way and all the early joys of hidden woods, or deep, secluded vales, or triumph- ant downlands, whose heads lift up so proudly, far up aloof from cities.

Sometimes waggoners or shepherds walk along this way, they that have come into the city from over cloudy ridges, and the townsmen hinder them not, for there is a tread that troubleth the grass and a tread that troubleth it not, and each man in his own heart knoweth which tread he hath. And in the sunlit spaces of the weald and in the wold's dark places, afar

4 A DREAMER'S TALES

from the music of cities and from the dance of the cities afar, they make there the music of the country places and dance the country dance. Amiable, near and friendly appears to these men the sun, and as he is genial to them and tends their younger vines, so they are kind to the little woodland things and any rumour of the fairies or old legend. And when the light of some little distant city makes a slight flush upon the edge of the sky, and the happy golden windows of the homesteads stare gleaming into the dark, then the old and holy figure of Romance, cloaked even to the face, comes down out of hilly woodlands and bids dark shadows to rise up and dance, and sends the forest creatures forth to prowl, and lights in a moment in her bower of qrass

o o

the little glow-worm's lamp, and brings a hush down over the grey lands, and

ROMANCE COMES D

T OF HTLLY WOODLANDS

POLTARNEES 5

out of it rises faintly on far-off hills the voice of a lute. There are not in the world lands more prosperous and happy than Toldees, Mondath, Arizim.

From these three little kingdoms that are named the Inner Lands the young men stole constantly away. One by one they went, and no one knew why they went save that they had a longing to behold the Sea. Of this longing they spoke little, but a young man would become silent for a few days, and then, one morning very early, he would slip away and slowly climb Poltarnees's difficult slope, and hav- ing attained the top pass over and never return. A few stayed behind in the Inner Lands and became old men, but none that had ever climbed Poltarnees from the very earliest times had ever come back again. Many had gone up Poltarnees sworn to return. Once a king sent all his courtiers,

6 A DREAMER'S TALES

one by one, to report the mystery to him, and then went himself; none ever returned. Now, it was the wont of the folk of the Inner Lands to worship rumours and legends of the Sea, and all that their prophets discovered of the Sea was writ in a sacred book, and with deep devotion on days of festival or mourning read in the temples by the priests. Now, all their temples lay open to the west, resting upon pillars, that the breeze from the Sea might enter them, and they lay open on pillars to the east that the breezes of the Sea might not be hindered but pass on- ward wherever the Sea list. And this is the legend that they had of the Sea, whom none in the Inner Lands had ever beholden. They say that the Sea is a river heading towards Hercules, and they say that he touches against the edge of the world, and that Poltarnees looks upon him. They

POLTARNEES 7

say that all the worlds of heaven go bobbing on this river and are swept down with the stream, and that Infinity is thick and furry with forests through which the river in his course sweeps on with all the worlds of heaven. Among the colossal trunks of those dark trees, the smallest fronds of whose branches are many nights, there walk the gods. And whenever its thirst, glowing in space like a great sun, comes upon the beast, the tiger of the gods creeps down to the river to drink. And the tiger of the gods drinks his fill loudly, whelming worlds the while, and the level of the river sinks between its banks ere the beast's thirst is quenched and ceases to glow like a sun. And many worlds thereby are heaped up dry and stranded, and the gods walk not among them ever- more, because they are hard to their feet. These are the worlds that have no destiny,

8 A DREAMER'S TALES

whose people know no god. And the river sweeps onwards ever. And the name of the river is Oriathon, but men call it Ocean. This is the Lower Faith of the Inner Lands. And there is a Higher Faith which is not told to all. According to the Higher Faith of the Inner Lands the river Oriathon sweeps on through the forests of Infinity and all at once falls roaring over an Edge, whence Time has long ago recalled his hours to fight in his war with the gods ; and falls unlit by the flash of nights and days, with his flood unmeasured by miles, into the deeps of nothing.

Now as the centuries went by and the one way by which a man could climb Pol- tarnees became worn with feet, more and more men surmounted it, not to return. And still they knew not in the Inner Lands upon what mystery Poltarnees

POLTARNEES 9

looked. For on a still day and windless, while men walked happily about their beautiful streets or tended flocks in the country, suddenly the west wind would bestir himself and come in from the Sea. And he would come cloaked and grey and mournful and carry to someone the hungry cry of the Sea calling out for bones of men. And he that heard it would move restlessly for some hours, and at last would rise suddenly, irresistibly up, setting his face to Poltarnees, and would say, as is the custom of those lands when men part briefly, "Till a man's heart remembereth," which means "Fare- well for a while " ; but those that loved him, seeing his eyes on Poltarnees, would answer sadly, " Till the gods forget," which means " Farewell."

Now the King of Arizim had a daughter who played with the wild wood flowers,

io A DREAMER'S TALES

and with the fountains in her father's court, and with the little blue heaven- birds that came to her doorway in the winter to shelter from the snow. And she was more beautiful than the wild wood flowers, or than all the fountains in her father's court, or than the blue heaven- birds in their full winter plumage when they shelter from the snow. The old wise kings of Mondath and of Toldees saw her once as she went lightly down the little paths of her garden, and, turning their gaze into the mists of thought, pondered the destiny of their Inner Lands. And they watched her closely by the stately flowers, and standing alone in the sunlight, and passing and repassing the strutting purple birds that the king's fowlers had brought from Asagehon. When she was of the age of fifteen years the King of Mondath called a council of

POLTARNEES n

kings. And there met with him the kings of Toldees and Arizim. And the King of Mondath in his Council said :

" The call of the unappeased and hungry Sea (and at the word ' Sea ' the three kings bowed their heads) lures every year out of our happy kingdoms more and more of our men, and still we know not the mystery of the Sea, and no devised oath has brought one man back. Now thy daughter, Arizim, is lovelier than the sunlight, and lovelier than those stately flowers of thine that stand so tall in her garden, and hath more grace and beauty than those strange birds that the venturous fowlers bring in creaking waggons out of Asage"hon, whose feathers are alternate purple and white. Now, he that shall love thy daughter Hilnaric, whoever he shall be, is the man to climb Poltarnees and return, as none

12 A DREAMER'S TALES

hath ever before, and tell us upon what Poltarnees looks ; for it may be that thy daughter is more beautiful than the Sea." Then from his Seat of Council arose the King of Arizim. He said : "I fear that thou hast spoken blasphemy against the Sea, and I have a dread that ill will come of it. Indeed I had not thought she was so fair. It is such a short while ago that she was quite a small child with her hair still unkempt and not yet attired in the manner of princesses, and she would go up into the wild woods unattended and come back with her robes unseemly and all torn, and would not take reproof with humble spirit, but made grimaces even in my marble court all set about with fountains."

Then said the King of Toldees : " Let us watch more closely and let us see the Princess Hilnaric in the season

POLTARNEES 13

of the orchard-bloom when the great birds go by that know the Sea, to rest in our inland places ; and if she be more beauti- ful than the sunrise over our folded king- doms when all the orchards bloom, it may be that she is more beautiful than the Sea." And the King of Arizim said : " I fear this is terrible blasphemy, yet will I do as you have decided in council."

And the season of the orchard-bloom appeared. One night the King of Arizim called his daughter forth on to his outer balcony of marble. And the moon was rising huge and round and holy over dark woods, and all the fountains were singing to the night. And the moon touched the marble palace gables, and they glowed in the land. And the moon touched the heads of all the fountains, and the grey columns broke into fairy lights. And the moon left the dark ways of the forest and

i4 A DREAMER'S TALES

lit the whole white palace and its fountains and shone on the forehead of the Princess, and the palace of Arizim glowed afar, and the fountains became columns of gleaming jewels and song. And the moon made a music at his rising, but it fell a little short of mortal ears. And Hilnaric stood there wondering, clad in white, with the moon- light shining on her forehead ; and watch- ing her from the shadows on the terrace stood the kings of Mondath and Toldees. They said :

" She is more beautiful than the moon- rise."

And on another day the King of Arizim bade his daughter forth at dawn, and they stood again upon the balcony. And the sun came up over a world of orchards, and the sea-mists went back over Poltarnees to the Sea ; little wild voices arose in all the thickets, the voices of the fountains

POLTARNEES 15

began to die, and the song arose, in all the marble temples, of the birds that are sacred to the Sea. And Hilnaric stood there, still glowing with dreams of heaven.

" She is more beautiful," said the kings, " than morning."

Yet one more trial they made of Hil- naric's beauty, for they watched her on the terraces at sunset ere yet the petals of the orchards had fallen, and all along the edge of neighbouring woods the rhodo- dendron was blooming with the azalea. And the sun went down under craggy Poltarnees, and the sea-mist poured over his summit inland. And the marble temples stood up clear in the evening, but films of twilight were drawn be- tween the mountain and the city. Then from the Temple ledges and eaves of palaces the bats fell headlong downwards, then spread their wings and floated up

16 A DREAMER'S TALES

and down through darkening ways ; lights came blinking out in golden windows, men cloaked themselves against the grey sea-mist, the sound of small songs arose, and the face of Hilnaric became a resting- place for mysteries and dreams.

" Than all these things," said the kings, " she is more lovely : but who can say whether she is lovelier than the Sea ? "

Prone in a rhododendron thicket at the edge of the palace lawns a hunter had waited since the sun went down. Near to him was a deep pool where the hyacinths grew and strange flowers floated upon it with broad leaves, and there the great bull gariachs came down to drink by starlight, and, waiting there for the gariachs to come, he saw the white form of the Princess leaning on her balcony. Before the stars shone out or the bulls came down to drink he left his lurking-place

POLTARNEES 17

and moved closer to the palace to see more nearly the Princess. The palace lawns were full of untrodden dew, and everything was still when he came across them, holding his great spear. In the farthest corner of the terraces the three old kings were discussing the beauty of Hilnaric and the destiny of the Inner Lands. Moving lightly, with a hunter's tread, the watcher by the pool came very near, even in the still evening, before the Princess saw him. When he saw her closely he exclaimed suddenly :

" She must be more beautiful than the Sea."

When the Princess turned and saw his garb and his great spear she knew that he was a hunter of gariachs.

When the three kings heard the young man exclaim they said softly to one

another :

B

i8 A DREAMER'S TALES

" This must be the man."

Then they revealed themselves to him, and spoke to him to try him. They said :

" Sir, you have spoken blasphemy against the Sea."

And the young man muttered :

" She is more beautiful than the Sea."

And the kings said :

" We are older than you and wiser, and know that nothing is more beautiful than the Sea."

And the young man took off the gear of his head, and became downcast, and knew that he spake with kings, yet he answered :

" By this spear, she is more beautiful than the Sea."

And all the while the Princess stared at him, knowing him to be a hunter of gariachs.

POLTARNEES 19

Then the King of Arizim said to the watcher by the pool :

"If thou wilt go up Poltarnees and come back, as none have come, and report to us what lure or magic is in the Sea, we will pardon thy blasphemy, and thou shalt have the Princess to wife and sit among the Council of the Kings."

And gladly thereunto the young man consented. And the Princess spoke to him, and asked him his name. And he told her that his name was Athelvok, and great joy arose in him at the sound of her voice. And to the three kings he promised to set out on the third day to scale the slope of Poltarnees and to return again, and this was the oath by which they bound him to return :

" I swear by the Sea that bears the worlds away, by the river of Oriathon, which men call Ocean, and by the gods

20 A DREAMER'S TALES

and their tiger, and by the doom of the worlds, that I will return again to the Inner Lands, having beheld the Sea."

And that oath he swore with solemnity that very night in one of the temples of the Sea, but the three kings trusted more to the beauty of Hilnaric even than to the power of the oath.

The next day Athelvok came to the palace of Arizim with the morning, over the fields to the East and out of the country of Toldees, and Hilnaric came out along her balcony and met him on the terraces. And she asked him if he had ever slain a gariach, and he said that he had slain three, and then he told her how he had killed his first down by the pool in the wood. For he had taken his father's spear and gone down to the edge of the pool, and had lain under the azaleas there waiting for the stars to shine,

POLTARNEES 21

by whose first light the gariachs go to the pools to drink ; and he had gone too early and had had long to wait, and the passing hours seemed longer than they were. And all the birds came in that home at night, and the bat was abroad, and the hour of the duck went by, and still no gariach came down to the pool ; and Athelvok felt sure that none would come. And just as this grew to a cer- tainty in his mind the thicket parted noise- lessly and a huge bull gariach stood facing him on the edge of the water, and his great horns swept out sideways from his head, and at the ends curved upwards, and were four strides in width from tip to tip. And he had not seen Athelvok, for the great bull was on the far side of the little pool, and Athelvok could not creep round to him for fear of meeting the wind (for the gariachs, who can see

22 A DREAMER'S TALES

little in the dark forests, rely on hearing and smell). But he devised swiftly in his mind while the bull stood there with head erect just twenty strides from him across the water. And the bull sniffed the wind cautiously and listened, then lowered its great head down to the pool and drank. At that instant Athelvok leapt into the water and shot forward through its weedy depths among the stems of the strange flowers that floated upon broad leaves on the surface. And Athelvok kept his spear out straight be- fore him, and the fingers of his left hand he held rigid and straight, not pointing upwards, and so did not come to the surface, but was carried onward by the strength of his spring and passed unen- tangled through the stems of the flowers. When Athelvok jumped into the water the bull must have thrown his head up,

POLTARNEES 23

startled at the splash, then he would have listened and have sniffed the air, and neither hearing nor scenting any danger he must have remained rigid for some moments, for it was in that attitude that Athelvok found him as he emerged breath- less at his feet. And, striking at once, Athelvok drove the spear into his throat before the head and the terrible horns came down. But Athelvok had clung to one of the great horns, and had been carried at terrible speed though the rhodo- dendron bushes until the gariach fell, but rose at once again, and died standing up, still struggling, drowned in its own blood.

But to Hilnaric listening it was as though one of the heroes of old time had come back again in the full glory of his legendary youth.

And long time they went up and down

24 A DREAMER'S TALES

the terraces, saying those things which were said before and since, and which lips shall yet be made to say again. And above them stood Poltarnees beholding the Sea.

And the day came when Athelvok should go. And Hilnaric said to him :

" Will you not indeed most surely come back agai^n, having just looked over the summit of Poltarnees ? "

Athelvok answered : "I will indeed come back, for thy voice is more beauti- ful than the hymn of the priests when they chant and praise the Sea, and though many tributary seas ran down into Oriathon and he and all the others poured their beauty into one pool below me, yet would I return swearing that thou wert fairer than they."

And Hilnaric answered :

" The wisdom of my heart tells me,

POLTARNEES 25

or old knowledge or prophecy, or some strange lore, that I shall never hear thy voice again. And for this I give thee my forgiveness."

But he, repeating the oath that he had sworn, set out, looking often backwards until the slope became too steep and his face was set to the rock. It was in the morning that he started, and he climbed all the day with little rest, where every foothole was smooth with many feet. Before he reached the top the sun dis- appeared from him, and darker and darker grew the Inner Lands. Then he pushed on so as to see before dark whatever thing Poltarnees had to show. The dusk was deep over the Inner Lands, and the lights of cities twinkled through the sea- mist when he came to Poltarnees's summit, and the sun before him was not yet gone from the sky.

26 A DREAMER'S TALES

And there below him was the old wrinkled Sea, smiling and murmuring song. And he nursed little ships with gleaming sails, and in his hands were old regretted wrecks, and masts all studded over with golden nails that he had rent in anger out of beautiful galleons. And the glory of the sun was among the surges as they brought driftwood out of isles of spice, tossing their golden heads. And the grey currents crept away to the south like companionless serpents that love something afar with a restless, deadly love. And the whole plain of water glittering with late sunlight, and the surges and the currents and the white sails of ships were all together like the face of a strange new god that has looked a man for the first time in the eyes at the moment of his death ; and Athelvok, look- ing on the wonderful Sea, knew why it was

POLTARNEES 27

that the dead never return, for there is something that the dead feel and know, and the living would never understand even though the dead should come and speak to them about it. And there was the Sea smiling at him, glad with the glory of the sun. And there was a haven there for homing ships, and a sunlit city stood upon its marge, and people walked about the streets of it clad in the un- imagined merchandise of far sea-border- ing lands.

An easy slope of loose crumbled rock went from the top of Poltarnees to the shore of the Sea.

For a long while Athelvok stood there regretfully, knowing that there had come something into his soul that no one in the Inner Lands could understand, where the thoughts of their minds had gone no farther than the three little kingdoms.

28 A DREAMER'S TALES

Then, looking long upon the wandering ships, and the marvellous merchandise from alien lands, and the unknown colour that wreathed the brows of the Sea, he turned his face to the darkness and the Inner Lands.

At that moment the Sea sang a dirge at sunset for all the harm that he had done in anger and all the ruin wrought on adventurous ships ; and there were tears in the voice of the tyrannous Sea, for he had loved the galleons that he had over- whelmed, and he called all men to him and all living things that he might make amends, because he had loved the bones that he had strewn afar. And Athelvok turned and set one foot upon the crumbled slope, and then another, and walked a little way to be nearer to the Sea, and then a dream came upon him and he felt that men had wronged the lovely Sea because

POLTARNEES 29

he had been angry a little, because he had been sometimes cruel ; he felt that there was trouble among the tides of the Sea because he had loved the galleons who were dead. Still he walked on and the crumbled stones rolled with him, and just as the twilight faded and a star appeared he came to the golden shore, and walked on till the surges were about his knees, and he heard the prayer-like blessings of the Sea. Long he stood thus, while the stars came out above him and shone again in the surges ; more stars came wheeling in their courses up from the Sea, lights twinkled out through all the haven city, lanterns were slung from the ships, the purple night burned on ; and Earth, to the eyes of the gods as they sat afar, glowed as with one flame. Then Athelvok went into the haven city ; there he met many who had left the Inner

30 A DREAMER'S TALES

Lands before him ; none of them wished to return to the people who had not seen the Sea ; many of them had forgotten the three little kingdoms, and it was rumoured that one man, who had once tried to return, had found the shifting, crumbled slope impossible to climb.

Hilnaric never married. But her dowry was set aside to build a temple wherein men curse the ocean.

Once every year, with solemn rite and ceremony, they curse the tides of the Sea ; and the moon looks in and hates them.

BLAGDAROSS

ON a waste place strewn with bricks in the outskirts of a town twilight was falling. A star or two appeared over the smoke, and distant windows lit mysterious lights. The stillness deepened and the loneliness. Then all the outcast things that are silent by day found voices.

An old cork spoke first. He said : " I grew in Andalusian woods, but never listened to the idle songs of Spain. I only grew strong in the sunlight waiting for my destiny. One day the merchants came and took us all away and carried us all along the shore of the sea, piled high on the backs of donkeys, and in a town by the sea they made me into the shape that

32 A DREAMER'S TALES

I am now. One day they sent me north- ward to Provence, and there I fulfilled my destiny. For they set me as a guard over the bubbling wine, and I faithfully stood sentinel for twenty years. For the first few years in the bottle that I guarded the wine slept, dreaming of Provence ; but as the years went on he grew stronger and stronger, until at last whenever a man went by the wine would put out all his might against me, saying : ' Let me go free ; let me go free ! ' And every year his strength increased, and he grew more clamorous when men went by, but never availed to hurl me from my post. But when I had powerfully held him for twenty years they brought him to the banquet and took me from my post, and the wine arose rejoicing and leapt through the veins of men and exalted their souls within them till they stood up in their places and sang

BLAGDAROSS 33

Provencal songs. But me they cast away — me that had been sentinel for twenty years, and was still as strong and staunch as when first I went on guard. Now I am an outcast in a cold northern city, who once have known the Andalusian skies and guarded long ago Provengal suns that swam in the heart of the rejoicing wine."

An unstruck match that somebody had dropped spoke next. " I am a child of the sun," he said, "and an enemy of cities ; there is more in my heart than you know of. I am a brother of Etna and Stromboli ; I have fires lurking in me that will one day rise up beautiful and strong. We will not go into servitude on any hearth nor work machines for our food, but we will take our own food where we find it on that day when we are strong. There are wonderful children in my heart whose faces shall be more lovely than the

34 A DREAMER'S TALES

rainbow ; they shall make a compact with the North wind, and he shall lead them forth ; all shall be black behind them and black above them, and there shall be noth- ing beautiful in the world but them ; they shall seize upon the earth and it shall be theirs, and nothing shall stop them but our old enemy the sea."

Then an old broken kettle spoke, and said : "I am the friend of cities. I sit among the slaves upon the hearth, the little flames that have been fed with coal. When the slaves dance behind the iron bars I sit in the middle of the dance and sing and make our masters glad. And I make songs about the comfort of the cat, and about the malice that is towards her in the heart of the dog, and about the crawling of the baby, and about the ease that is in the lord of the house when we brew the good brown tea ; and sometimes

BLAGDAROSS 35

when the house is very warm and slaves and masters are glad, I rebuke the hostile winds that prowl about the world."

And then there spoke the piece of an old cord. "I was made in a place of doom, and doomed men made my fibres, working without hope. Therefore there came a grimness into my heart, so that I never let anything go free when once I was set to bind it. Many a thing have I bound relentlessly for months and for years ; for I used to come coiling into warehouses where the great boxes lay all open to the air, and one of them would be suddenly closed up, and my fearful strength would be set on him like a curse, and if his timbers groaned when first I seized them, or if they creaked aloud in the lonely night, thinking of woodlands out of which they came, then I only gripped them tighter still, for the poor

36 A DREAMER'S TALES

useless hate is in my soul of those that made me in the place of doom. Yet, for all the things that my prison-clutch has held, the last work that I did was to set something free. I lay idle one night in the gloom on the warehouse floor. Nothing stirred there, and even the spider slept. Towards midnight a great flock of echoes suddenly leapt up from the wooden planks and circled round the roof. A man was coming towards me all alone. And as he came his soul was reproaching him, and I saw that there was a great trouble between the man and his soul, for his soul would not let him be, but went on reproaching him.

" Then the man saw me and said, 'This at least will not fail me.' When I heard him say this about me, I deter- mined that whatever he might require of me it should be done to the uttermost.

BLAGDAROSS 37

And as I made this determination in my unaltering heart, he picked me up and stood on an empty box that I should have bound on the morrow, and tied one end of me to a dark rafter ; and the knot was carelessly tied, because his soul was reproaching him all the while continually and giving him no ease. Then he made the other end of me into a noose, but when the man's soul saw this it stopped reproaching the man, and cried out to him hurriedly, and besought him to be at peace with it and to do nothing sudden ; but the man went on with his work, and put the noose down over his face and underneath his chin, and the soul screamed horribly.

" Then the man kicked the box away with his foot, and the moment he did this I knew that my strength was not great enough to hold him ; but I remembered

38 A DREAMER'S TALES

that he had said I would not fail him, and I put all my grim vigour into my fibres and held him by sheer will. Then the soul shouted to me to give way, but I said :

" ' No ; you vexed the man.'

" Then it screamed to me to leave go of the rafter, and already I was slipping, for I only held on to it by a careless knot, but I gripped with my prison grip and said :

" ' You vexed the man.'

"And very swiftly it said other things to me, but I answered not ; and at last the soul that vexed the man that had trusted me flew away and left him at peace. I was never able to bind things any more, for every one of my fibres was worn and wrenched, and even my relent- less heart was weakened by the struggle. Very soon afterwards I was thrown out here. I have done my work."

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So they spoke among themselves, but all the while there loomed above them the form of an old rocking-horse complaining bitterly. He said : "I am Blagdaross. Woe is me that I should lie now an out- cast among these worthy but little people. Alas ! for the days that are gathered, and alas for the Great One that was a master and a soul to me, whose spirit is now shrunken and can never know me again, and no more ride abroad on knightly quests. I was Bucephalus when he was Alexander, and carried him victorious as far as Ind. I encountered dragons with him when he was St. George, I was the horse of Roland fighting for Christendom, and was often Rosinante. I fought in tournays and went errant upon quests, and met Ulysses and the heroes and the fairies. Or late in the evening, just before the lamps in the nursery were put out, he

40 A DREAMER'S TALES

would suddenly mount me, and we would gallop through Africa. There we would pass by night through tropic forests, and come upon dark rivers sweeping by, all gleaming with the eyes of crocodiles, where the hippopotamus floated down with the stream, and mysterious craft loomed suddenly out of the dark and furtively passed away. And when we had passed through the forest lit by the fireflies we would come to the open plains, and gallop onwards with scarlet flamin- goes flying along beside us through the lands of dusky kings, with golden crowns upon their heads and sceptres in their hands, who came running out of their palaces to see us pass. Then I would wheel suddenly, and the dust flew up from my four hoofs as I turned and we gal- loped home again, and my master was put to bed. And again he would ride

WE WOULD GALLOP THROUGH AFRICA

BLAGDAROSS 41

abroad on another day till we came to magical fortresses guarded by wizardry and overthrew the dragons at the gate, and ever came back with a princess fairer than the sea.

" But my master began to grow larger in his body and smaller in his soul, and then he rode more seldom upon quests. At last he saw gold and never came again, and I was cast out here among these little people."

But while the rocking-horse was speak- ing two boys stole away, unnoticed by their parents, from a house on the edge of the waste place, and were coming across it looking for adventures. One of them carried a broom, and when he saw the rocking-horse he said nothing, but broke off the handle from the broom and thrust it between his braces and his shirt on the left side. Then he mounted the

42 A DREAMER'S TALES

rocking-horse, and drawing forth the broomstick, which was sharp and spiky at the end, said, "Saladin is in this desert with all his paynims, and I am Cceur de Lion." After a while the other boy said : "Now let me kill Saladin too." But Blagdaross in his wooden heart, that exulted with thoughts of battle, said : " I am Blagdaross yet ! "

THE MADNESS OF ANDEL- SPRUTZ

I FIRST saw the city of Andelsprutz on an afternoon in spring. The day was full of sunshine as I came by the way of the fields, and all that morning I had said, " There will be sunlight on it when I see for the first time the beautiful con- quered city whose fame has so often made for me lovely dreams." Suddenly I saw its fortifications lifting out of the fields, and behind them stood its belfries. I went in by a gate and saw its houses and streets, and a great disappointment came upon me. For there is an air about a city, and it has a way with it, whereby a man may recognise one from another

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