Читать книгу The King Of No-Land - B. L. Farjeon - Страница 4

Table of Contents

KING SASSAFRAS reigned over the kingdom of No-land. He was crowned in the snow season; and one of the leading papers of the capital, in its enthusiastic comments upon the imposing ceremony, poetically remarked that the soft flakes of snow which floated dreamily in the air and kissed the earth during the day, were white-winged heralds of welcome sent expressly from heaven to greet the Lord's elect. They were sure indications also, it was said, that the reign of the new King would be a reign of purity and love. A copy of these sentiments, printed upon white satin in letters of gold, was presented to the King, and he read them with a certain kind of pleasure, although he seemed at the same time to be inwardly disturbed by the extravagant praise which was lavished upon his personal virtues and qualifications—being doubtful, perhaps, whether it was deserved. But the sentiments expressed and the similes drawn were decidedly pretty and graceful, and as the writer was satisfied with his work, it is to be hoped his readers also were.

As no further reference will be made to the ceremony of the coronation, let it be here briefly stated that, gorgeous and solemn as it was, the King's thoughts frequently wandered from the brilliant scene of which he was the principal figure. The myriad facets of light, the silks, the laces, the thousands of eyes that gazed worshipfully upon his person, faded from his sight as utterly as if they had no existence, and in their place there came:

A white-robed wood, bathed in sweet air. A cottage in the distance, covered with ivy, whose every snow-rimmed leaf, with its feathery tip, was a marvel of beauty. Nests in the chimneys, with birds peeping out—gratefully, for good store of food was theirs. A modest and beautiful young maid; a grave-visaged man; an old woman with white hair; and, strangest of all, three little girls, armed with violins and bows, playing quaint old tunes with wonderful grace.

Clang! The trumpet's blast blew these fancies into nothingness, and precious stones and silks and laces reigned again.

No-land was a vast territory, and its inhabitants numbered maul millions. Sassafras was the first! king of that name, and he came to the throne when he was twenty years of age. There were substantial rejoicings, of course, upon the occasion, and in all the towns and cities and even villages of No-land the new King's subjects made merry and feasted for a week. All the subjects, that is, except those who did not believe in kings and queens; but even they assembled in their way and in their places, and extracted grim satisfaction from the feast of the future, which they painted in colours hard and fast and warranted to wash. Generally, however, the people, being worked into a state of enthusiasm, were red-hot with excitement; guns and cannon were in the same condition; triumphal arches were erected; loyal dinners were loyally eaten; loyal speeches were loyally spoken; mayors, lord mayors, and councillors were in their glory, and each frog thought himself an ox; children were dressed in their Sunday clothes and taken out to sec the sights; the theatres were thrown open free to the people, who behaved as the people generally do on such occasions, with much gentleness; and at night the streets were flooded with light. Just before that time the doctors of No-land had been complaining that things were very bad, and were shaking their heads at each other with ominous looks, being depressed by the healthfulness of the people. But the feasting indulged in by the new King's subjects on his accession to the throne brought on dyspepsia and other ailments, and for many weeks after that event the doctors' pockets were filled with guineas. Then they had hopes of their country, and with cheerful looks declared that the reign of the first Sassafras had commenced most auspiciously.

The father of Sassafras had been a hypochondriacal valetudinarian, and being entirely wrapped up in himself (as most such characters are, whether high or low in station), bestowed no care and but little thought upon his son. Losing his health in the pursuit of pleasure, in which all his intellect was engaged and all his moral and religious affections were buried, he hobbled for years after his lost treasure in precisely the very places where it was not to be found, and growing year after year more querulous and infirm and selfish, he often for months together forgot that he had a child. His forgetfulness was a gain to Sassafras who, being given into the charge of a number of tutors and time-servers, found life more pleasant than it would have been to him had he been doomed to endure the caprices of his royal father. With this retinue he passed his time until the arrival of the day when the people went into mourning for the death of the King, and wept, and wore crape, and gazed dolefully at each other, because a ruler who had many vices and no virtues had passed away from among them. At the time of the King's death—the immediate symptoms preceding which were so sudden that he was maddened and confounded when he was told he had but a few hours to live—the heir-apparent was abroad, travelling by command of the King; but the news came to him by wire and courier, and he hastened home, shortly after reaching which he was crowned and made king, to every one's satisfaction apparently but his own. Those who were about him at that period were glad to be relieved of an awkward responsibility, for they found him difficult to manage. This is not surprising, for even during his calm-hood his tutors and time-servers had had no easy time of it. Young as he was, he had a mind of his own, in which, by some means, notions and ideas not exactly in accordance with his royal station found place. Gentle he was by nature, but he was also rebellious of restraint. Being a very exalted baby, the greatest possible fuss had been made with him from his birth; but even as a baby he seemed to wonder at the oppressive attention which was bestowed upon him. As he grew, this wonder changed into inward rebellion; and from the time that he began to think of things, he chafed and fretted at not being let alone. On one memorable occasion during his boyhood he entered a vigorous protest against this.

He had planned a truant run into the woods, being animated by an eager desire to climb one particular old elm-tree, through the branches of which, in the summer, the clouds could be seen sailing like fairy ships on a white and blue sea, and among which the birds built their nests and flitted merrily in the sunlight. In the winter the fairy ships sped swiftly onwards before the driving wind, and the birds made themselves warm and snug in their nests. The Prince longed to sit among the higher branches of this tree, with his back against the trunk, and watch the clouds and the birds, and idly muse upon goodness knows what. On a fine summer morning he escaped from the palace as he had designed, and he ran into the forest; but just as he was about to climb the old elm, having selected the particular branches in which he would sit and be enthroned, his tutors and time-servers came running after him, and he had not time to get out of their reach. He was desperately angry.

"Hands off!" he cried, shaking himself free from them.

They stood about him, almost breathless with the run they had had.

"Why," exclaimed the Prince, "should I be surrounded in this manner, and be dogged and watched as if I were a slave? Am I a slave?"

They raised their hands in astonishment, and their voices also.

"A slave, your Royal Highness!" they cried. "You! It is we who are slaves—your slaves, ready to lay down our lives for you."

"Then," demanded the Prince, "why don't you go away and let me climb this tree? See there! Those two branches with their arms folded, looking down upon us. If you look attentively at them, you will see two queer brown faces bending towards us. They are like twin brothers embracing. You don't see anything of the sort? No, that is because you don't care to. But you can't help seeing in what fantastic fashion their twisted limbs are made into the shape of an S, the initial of my name. Nature might have made the symbol for me—nay, nature has! See those peeps of the sun, and that bright cloud which dyes with heaven's light the feathers of the birds flying beneath it. See how the sunbeams are laughing. I want to climb into those branches and make my throne there. Why don't you go away and let me, if you are my slaves?"

"Your Royal Highness," they answered, in piteous tones, "you must not—you must not! You might break one of your royal limbs—"

"No, I won't; you watch now!" And Prince Sassafras darted from among them. But before his lithe body could embrace the trunk, his tutors and time-servers threw their arms about him, and besought him to be reasonable. As they formed a circle around him, his breast heaved with passion, and his eyes were filled with indignant tears.

"You mock me!" he cried. "Who is the slave—you or I? I can't move; I am tied down! Other boys climb trees, and don't break their limbs!"

Forward came the Court Statistician, all the wrinkles in whose face formed figures of =, and produced a book from which he read how many boys in the kingdom of No-land climbed trees annually, how many met with accidents, and what the percentage of the one to the other was.

"Bother!" exclaimed the Prince, putting his fingers in his ears. "I don't want to hear it—I won't hear it! I want to climb this tree."

"The hopes of the nation are centred in you—" they pleaded.

"I don't believe it," he exclaimed, interrupting them.

"The eyes of the world are upon you—"

"Why don't they turn their eyes away, then? What is it to them? I don't want them to stare at me so; I want to be let alone. The eyes of the world won't see me climb the tree, if you will let me."

"We dare not allow your Royal Highness to run the risk."

"O," he said, with sarcastic emphasis; "you dare not allow me And I am not a slave!"

"You are our most gracious prince and master." And they bowed and fussed about him most obsequiously.

"O, I am, am I? Well, one day you shall see"—they inclined their heads eagerly; he gave them a queer look—"Well, you shall see what you shall see!"

And the Prince laughed at their eager air, and then grew thoughtful, and returned with them to the palace.

Being endowed with the delicate cunning which is often a special attribute of sensitive young natures, and of quiet shy women as well, he was not to be so easily thwarted as they imagined; and, pitting his wit against theirs, he proved himself more than a match for the wily old courtiers, deeply steeped as they were in world wisdom. They kept a strict watch upon him, and he knew it; and they did not know that he knew it. He bided his time patiently; and one day he was missing. They hunted for him here and there, but although they thought they were acquainted with every nook and corner in the woods and palace, they could not find him. They searched for him under the beds and in the cupboards, and up the trees and in the summerhouses, and in every place where it was possible for him to hide himself; they turned the palace inside out, to speak figuratively, and the grounds about the palace outside in; they questioned the sentries and the cooks and the gardeners; they locked up one old woman and three small boys for not giving satisfactory replies to unintelligible questions; and all to no avail. In a certain corner in a certain closet they might have found the suit of clothes the Prince had worn the day before—for he had taken the precaution to array himself in the plainest garments he could get together—but they certainly would not have found him. Where was he?

He had made his way, by devious paths, so that he might not be tracked, to a quiet hollow near the base of a flower-clad hill, in the crown of which a pretty stream had birth, the silver water-threads of which danced down the sides most unmathematically and erratically. Once or twice he had lingered on the road, to listen to the whisper of the corn which was ripening in the fields, and to watch the bees as, with their dusky belts of burnished gold, they flew, honey-laden, to their hives, humming hymns of gladness in praise of bounteous nature. Summer's sweetest breath was here, and the wondrous colours of a myriad delicate flowers were made more beautiful by contrast with the tufts of bright green moss which dotted the course of the silver stream, and drew life from its laughing spray. Here the water-beads ran swiftly; here they stole slyly; here they flashed merrily: as if they were being pursued, and were fearful lest they should be caught; or as if they were stealing to where their lovers were sleeping; or as if, with their glistening eyes, they were speeding to the embrace of beloved companions; or as if, with their fresh lips bubbling with joyous delight, they were running to kiss the wild flowers that grew at the foot of the hill, and to breathe new life and beauty into them. In this retired spot there were no trees; but there were masses of wild forget-me-nots and other flowers as beautiful, to charm the senses of the truant Prince. Roaming about this lovely retreat—now stooping to kiss his own lips in the sparkling stream, and to taste its sweet waters; now pausing to listen to the melody of the birds; now gazing with heart-worship at the light and colour which surrounded him, and with full soul drinking in the beauty of nature's most wondrous works—the Prince came suddenly upon a lad of about the same age as himself, Robin was this lad's name; poorly-clad was he; with a sunburnt face, and with eyes afire with light caught from nature's smiles.

"Hallo!" cried Robin.

"Hallo!" responded the Prince; and sat him down, and looked at the exquisite tints of the leaves and petals, and then looked up at the skies, and wondered whether the flowers drew their colour from the clouds. The lads fell into conversation, and the Prince, who was a cunning questioner, learned in a very short time a great deal concerning Robin.

"So your father is a woodman?" said the Prince, stretching himself lazily on the ground, and peering into a tangle of wild forget-me-nots, whose thousand blue eyes peered up into his own.

"Yes," answered Robin; "he cuts wood for the King."

"Has he got a large house?"

"It ain't a house; it's a cottage. But it's large enough, and better than some. There's a garden, and plenty of beans and taters; and mother's a good tin t And there's a litter of pigs."

"Ah," said the Prince, with a sudden and unaccountable interest in the litter of pigs, "and what do they do?"

"They squeak, they do—except the big uns."

"And they?"

"They grunt, they do!" And Robin laughed at his own wit.

The Prince reflected upon this information, and not finding the subject profitable, dismissed the pigs from the conversation.

"Have you got woods and grounds?"

"Yes, surely; all, these." And Robin made a comprehensive sweep with his arm, as though all the hills and woods were as good as his.

"Is your father happy?"

"There's something 'd make him happier."

"What's that?"

"Two shillin' a week more."

"If he had that, he'd be quite happy?"

"Ay, as happy as the day is long."

"And you—you are not watched and surrounded and dogged by spies, are you?"

"No, indeed!" said Robin, with a stare. I should like to catch "em at it!"

"And if you want to climb a tree, you can, eh?"

"I should think so! I say, did you ever go birds'-nesting?"

"No," replied the Prince; "is it nice?"

Robin's blithe laughter ran along the hill, and met the dancing water-beads, which rippled into the stream with it.

"Nice There ain't nothing in the world like it. But you've got to be careful, you know, sometimes. Some places you mustn't go into; and they're the best! Some trees you mustn't climb; and they're the best! Then you've got to look about you. Such fun!"

"And go elsewhere, eh?"

"Not a bit of it," chuckled Robin. "Can't get such fun out of elsewhere. No; go into them places that you mustn't go into—when nobody's looking! Climb them trees that you mustn't climb—when nobody's looking. Get them birds'-nests—when nobody's looking! And run home with them—when nobody's looking!"

And Robin rubbed his hands, and looked about him blithely, as though he were doing all these delightful things.

"And to whom do those trees belong, Robin?"

"They're in the King's ground, but the King he don't mind a bit. He ain't mean enough!"

Prince Sassafras laughed at the idea of this common boy outwitting the attendants, who were always on the watch with dogs and guns; but his laughter changed to sighs as he thought, "O, if I might do this! If I might go birds'-nesting in one of my own trees!"

Said Robin, "Never went birds'-nesting! Ho, ho! Did you ever hear the larks sing when they get up of a morning?"

"No," sighed the Prince, "I am not out of bed early enough.. It must be beautiful!"

"It's just jolly, that's what it is. Did you ever go nutting?"

"No," sighed the Prince.

"Nor blackberrying?"

"No," sighed the Prince.

Robin stared at the Prince with a mixed feeling of pity and contempt; and the Prince, keenly alive to his own shame, hung his head. Robin gave him one more chance.

"Did you ever get up in the night and steal the pickles and the jam?"

"No," murmured the Prince, tears of humiliation coming into his eyes.

Robin, with a disdainful shrug of his shoulders, fell-to upon his work, with the evident conviction that further conversation would be wasted upon such a creature as Prince Sassafras. He was making a basket of reeds and grasses, and was twining wild flowers about it to give it variety of colour, and the Prince, desirous of redeeming his character, suggested certain alterations in the arrangement of the flowers. He had a good eye for colour and harmony of design, and Robin condescended to profit by his suggestions. The basket being finished, Robin held it out at arm's length to admire it. The Prince asked whom it was for.

"It's for Bluebell," replied Robin.

And, inspired by the name, be sang, "Bluebell! Bluebell!" to many kinds of airs, sweet and rough; and whistled, "Bluebell! Bluebell!" to the birds and the trees and the dancing stream.

"Bluebell!" echoed the Prince inquiringly.

"My little sister. Mother says she's the darlingest darling as ever drawed breath, and father says she's the prettiest pretty as ever opened a pair of blue eyes. And I say, Bluebell! Bluebell!" And he sang and whistled again.

"She is the same as you are, I suppose?" said the Prince.

"What do you mean?"

"Why, her clothes, now—something like yours?"

"Something like," was the reply.

"Hm!" said the Prince reflectively, and with no intention of giving pain. "Bluebell can't be very well dressed, then."

Robin, who was more familiarly known as Ragged Robin, for the reason that he was always tearing his clothes among the briers and brambles, looked down upon his common jacket and trousers, and for a moment a shadow of discontent rested on his face; but a sunbeam saw it, darted down, caught it in its embrace, and dissolved it. The Prince saw the shadow appear and disappear; and be said aloud, but in a musing tone, as though he were speaking to himself.

"Ah, now I know what sunbeams live on."

"On what?" inquired Robin.

"On shadows," replied the Prince.

Robin laughed.

"Why do you laugh?" continued the Prince. "Because sunbeams live on shadows? I saw a sunbeam just now swallow a shadow from off your very face."

"I didn't see it," grinned Robin.

"I daresay not," observed the Prince philosophically; "we often don't see what's right under our noses."

From right under the Prince's nose Robin plucked a flower.

"Look here," he cried; "what is this?"

It was a small flower, with a green cup, and with its inner covering shaped like a wheel; but its petals were glowing with the loveliest dyes of the loveliest sunset. Prince Sassafras was enchanted with its rare beauty.

"What is it?" repeated Robin.

"A flower," replied the Prince, in a helpless tone, for he knew that that was not the answer expected from him.

"Any numskull could see that," exclaimed Robin. "But what is its name, and what is it good for?"

"I don't know," stammered Prince Sassafras.

"Don't know your poor relations!" (Which reproach, as botanists will know, had a deeper significance than either Sassafras or even Robin was aware of.) "The pretty pimpernel! Why, this is the poor man's weather-glass! In the morning, when it is going to rain, it folds itself up in its green cup, and you can't see a bit of its golden colour. Don't know the pimpernel! You're a wiseacre, you are, with your shadows!"

The Prince felt the justice of Robin's rebuke, and acknowledged the wit of the retort.

"You are wiser than I am," he murmured.

"You're a queer one," said Robin, perplexed by these variable moods. But, his thoughts reverting to a subject which had given him pain, he cast envious eyes upon the Prince's clothes, which, although they were the commonest the Prince could find, were grand in comparison with those of his companion. Then Robin looked down upon his own hobnails and corduroys. "But your clothes are fine," he sighed.

The Prince was inspired by a whimsical idea.

"Shall we change?" he suggested.

"I don't mind," said Ragged Robin, with sparkling eyes.

"And, without more ado, the boys stripped to the skin.

"I think I'm as fine as you," said Robin, "without the clothes."

"Finer," assented the Prince, comparing himself with Robin critically. "You are better shaped, and stronger too. I wish I had such a chest as yours."

"And I'm as white as you are!"

"Quite as white—except your hands and face."

"Blame the sun for that," remarked Robin sententiously,

Then they donned each the other's clothes, and each went his way. Prince Sassafras walked straight to the old elm-tree, and climbed it, and clapped his hands in triumph as he sat on his throne. When he clapped his hands, the birds flew out of their nests in sudden alarm, and perched themselves on far-off branches. The old birds solemnly watched him, with their heads set rakishly on one side, and he, sitting very still, watched them. Then, without moving his limbs, he began to whistle and chirrup softly; and the birds, after much listening, questioned each other in melodious notes, and, deciding that he was not an enemy, returned to their homes, and peeped at him through lacework of moss and twig. All this was very delightful to the Prince; never in his life had he spent so pleasant a day. The earth, the air, the clouds, the tree in which he sat, were filled with marvels, and his mind became attuned to the grand works by which he was surrounded. The day grew drowsy, and the hum of insect life sounded in his ears like a hymn. Suddenly his reverie was disturbed by a great commotion below. He looked down, and beheld a number of his attendants and timeservers in anxious consultation. They were dirty and dusty, and their faces had lengthened considerably during the last few hours. Altogether they were in a sad plight.

"They have been looking for me," said the Prince, chuckling.

As they stood debating and stretching out their fingers in all directions, one of the party who was especially obnoxious to the Prince, and who, being much heated, was wiping his bald head, suddenly shrieked very loudly, and clapped his hand to his head. The others thought he had been attacked by an idea, and they waited for him to deliver, holding out their arms and inclining their bodies, in the attitude of persons who expected to catch a prize. But something more tangible had caused his alarm. The Prince, finding a marble in the pocket of Robin's trousers, had dropped it on to the tune-server's bald pate. The unfortunate attendant looked down for the cause, and then looked up to heaven, and in this way the Prince was discovered.

"Come down," they cried wrathfully, "Come down, you young ruffian! How dare you sit in the Prince's tree?"

For so they had dubbed it from the day he had first tried to climb it. He had, in a measure, made it sacred in their eyes by his notice, and they had even debated the advisability of hedging it round with gilt palings, as being immeasurably superior to the other trees, and as being a kind of historical landmark.

"Go away, you old stupids!" the Prince called out in reply, making his voice very rough, so that they should not recognise it. "Don't you see that I am enjoying myself!"

They shook their fists at him, and he shook his at them. He was prodigiously elated. The birds hopped out of their nests, and observed the disturbance. They chattered about it, and gave opinions. The younger ones, with youthful enthusiasm, would have sided with the Prince, as their sympathies were with him, but the older and wiser birds said, "No; let us stand aside and arbitrate."

"If you don't come down," bawled the attendants, "we'll put you in the stocks!"

"If I don't come down," bawled the Prince, "I can't for the life of me see how you will manage it."

They gasped at him, and at each other, and one bolder than the rest commenced to climb the tree. Prince Sassafras broke wood from the branches, and threw the pieces at him so vigorously, and with such good aim, that he was glad to get safe to earth again.

"Ha! ha! ha!" laughed the Prince; and a scaly old jackdaw, who had not laughed for ever so many years, flew out of his nest, and echoed feebly, 'Ha! ha ha!' after the fashion of doddering old lunatics who strive to ape youth.

The attendants were more and more furious.

"Read the Riot Act!" they cried.

In accordance with that wisdom for which they were celebrated, and which provided for the fitness of all things, the time-server with the weakest voice read the Riot Act elaborately. That part of it which impressed his hearers most powerfully was contained in the word Whereas. Whenever he came to that magic word, he piped it out with a mighty effort at the top of his voice, and those who surrounded him—who had always suspected that Whereas was the fount of justice, and now were sure of it—bowed their heads worshipfully as to a talisman which contained the pith of all law. Prince Sassafras listened with profound attention until the reading was completed.

"Hear, hear," he said, clapping his hands in applause. "Now I will come down. The moral force that lies in Whereas has conquered me, and I'm getting very hungry."

Down he scrambled, hand under hand, as active as a squirrel, and as though he had been accustomed to climb trees all his life. Down he plumped in the midst of his attendants, and raised such a dust that they ran a few paces away to save their eyes. He leaned his back against the tree, and looked at them jauntily. As they advanced towards him with wrath in their countenances, with the intention of seizing him and treating him roughly mayhap, he spoke to them in his natural tones, and bade them be careful, for he was rather tired.

"It is the Prince!" they cried, in amazement.

Their manner was so comical that the Prince laughed long and blithely, and the doddering old jackdaw made such an effort to renew its youth that it shed its last feather, and almost shook itself into a fit.

"And in these clothes!" they exclaimed, as they surrounded him. "He has been waylaid and robbed!"

The Prince held up his hobnailed boots for inspection, and then walked slowly up and down among them, to give them the opportunity of admiring the easy fit of his corduroys. There were no bounds to their indignation.

"Where is the robber?" they shouted. "Can your Royal Highness describe his person?" They glared about in such a state of excitement, that one might have fancied they were going to lay violent hands on one another.

"It was a nut," said the Prince.

"A nut!"

"A nut, that fell upon my head as I was walking along. It hurt me, too."

"Surely, your Royal Highness," said the attendant upon whose bald pate the Prince had let the marble fall, "surely they drop about to-day. It must have been a nut that fell upon my head." He rubbed the sore place as he spoke.

"Thank your stars it was not such a nut as mine. Listen." And the Prince illustrated his words with appropriate action. "Down dropped the nut. I picked it up, and cracked it—you know how fond I am of nuts! But when the cracked shell was between my teeth, I felt that something living was inside. I spat it out quickly, and the kernel rolled from the shell, and looked at me, in the shape and likeness of a man. And as it gazed at me I became fascinated by its beauty, and it grew and grew until it was as high as my knee; and there it stopped growing. It was dressed in the brightest green and scarlet, and its eyes were rimmed with purple. It claimed a distant kinship with me, and said, indeed, that it was one of my neglected poor relations—which I could scarcely credit, so far as regards the plea of poverty, when I looked at the creature's beautiful clothing. But these things want searching into, my lords; and it saddens me to think that many of us die, and have been blind through all our lives. It told me so many wise things, and taught me so many strange lessons, that I was as one entranced. I remember no more about it except its name, which some of you may know. It was Pimpernel."

"Pimpernel! Pimpernel!" they mused, and questioned one another, but no one had heard of such a creature. "One of your Royal Highness's poor relations, indeed! Are they not all provided for? This Pimpernel is a beggar—an impostor! But we will find him. Call out the guards, and let the woods be searched."

"Shut up the bell-shaped flowers!" shouted the Prince, mimicking them. "Place a sentinel at every tree, and build a fence of forget-me-nots around the forest."

Some were actually about to see to the carrying out of these orders, when he called to them.

"Hold! I was but jesting! As you love me, do not make a fuss."

They clustered about him at this adjuration. As they loved him! Two Grand Old Sticks, with white heads, giggled with delight, like a couple of foolish schoolgirls, at the ecstatic honour of being thus appealed to.

"Do not heed what I have said. No one is to blame but I, I give you my honour, so let no word be said. Regard this as a freak, and let it be a close secret between you and me. Do you understand? Mum! If you break my confidence," he added, with a malicious twinkle, "I'll cut down all your salaries when I am King. Now, then, let us pledge each other. Take the word from me. Mum!"

They stood before him with their fingers on their lips, and took the oath. Mum!

"'Tis well," said the Prince, quoting from the last original drama; "let me rest a while."

His back was still against the tree, and he looked about him with regret that so glorious a day was nearly at an end. Directly in front of him, but at some distance on an eminence, was the west wing of the palace, behind a fretwork of trees. The sun was setting, and massed troops of fiery shadows were invading the palace, and as they passed the windows glared out with threatening eyes.

"How beautiful!" sighed the Prince.

His attendants urged him to depart.

"We are ashamed to see your Royal Highness in such mean attire."

"And yet I enjoy," he said. "Look above you at the clouds. What lovely fancies dwell in them! Here are an angel's wings, stretched forth beneficently, blessing mankind in fustian and silk. See their feathery tips, and the pale purple folds that hide the body of the glorious being. Here is a great hill, with a many-turreted castle built on its peak. The landscape opens—the hill grows smaller, the castle larger. A forest of pollards rises up beyond it, overshadows it, dissolves it. The airy trees and land melt into a lake, on the bosom of which are reflected the colours of a myriad sapphires and rubies, and the soft glow of many-tinted pearls which lie beneath. See—night is coming; the shadows creep into the lake's breast. Weeping willows rise on either bank—rise and overlap the water. They bend towards each other, from the opposite banks, with melancholy gracefulness. Is it not beautiful?"

They gazed above and around, and then at one another. They saw none of these things. Their unsympathising looks chilled the Prince.

"There go my fancies," he said bitterly, pointing to some butterflies that were flying home. "And here is a troop of caterpillars, creeping, O, so slowly and lazily up the old elm. Come, let us creep to the palace, caterpillar-like!"