allthe
loosened
waters
rushing
with
a
shout
of
liberty
to
join
the
sea
.
The
summer
followed
with
the
red
mountain
roses
blossoming
by
the
brooks
,
and
the
green
mountain
grasses
blowing
in
the
wind
,
with
the
music
of
the
herd‐bells
ringing
down
the
passes
,
and
the
sound
of
the
fife
and
of
the
reed‐pipe
calling
the
maidens
to
the
dance
.
In
the
midst
of
the
summer
,
one
night
,
when
all
the
stars
were
shining
above
the
valley
,
and
all
the
children
slept
under
the
roofs
with
the
swallows
,
and
not
a
soul
was
stirring
,
save
where
here
and
there
a
lover
watched
a
light
glow
in
some
lattice
underneath
the
eaves
,
a
half‐dead
woman
dragged
herself
feebly
under
the
lime‐tree
shadows
of
the
pastor’s
house
,
and
struck
with
a
faint
cry
upon
the
door
and
fell
at
her
father’s
feet
,
broken
and
senseless
.
Before
the
full
day
had
dawned
she
had
given
birth
to
a
male
child
;
and
died
as
her
son’s
eyes
opened
to
the
morning
light
.
He
inherited
no
name
,
and
they
called
him
after
his
grandsire
,
Arslàn
.
When
his
dead
daughter
lay
stretched
before
him
in
the
sunlight
,
with
her
white
large
limbs
folded
to
rest
,
and
her
noble
fair
face
calm
as
a
mask
of
marble
,
the
old
pastor
knew
little
—
nothing
—
of
what
her
life
through
these
two
brief
years
had
been
.
Her
lips
had
scarcely
breathed
a
word
since
she
had
fallen
senseless
on
his
threshold
.
That
she
had
triumph
he
knew
;
that
she
had
fallen
into
dire
necessities
he
saw
.
Whether
she
had
surrendered
art
for
the
sake
of
love
,
or
whether
she
had
lost
the
public
favour
by
some
caprice
of
the
public
,
whether
she
had
been
eminent
or
obscure
in
her
career
,
whether
it
had
abandoned
her
or
she
had
abandoned
it
,
he
could
not
tell
,
and
he
knew
too
little
of
the
world
to
be
able
to
learn
.
That
she
had
travelled
her
weary
way
homeward
to
her
native
mountains
that
her
son
might
not
perish
among
strangers
,
he
knew
;
but
no
more
.
Nor
was
more
ever
known
by
any
living
soul
.
In
life
there
are
so
many
histories
which
are
like
broken
boughs
that
strew
the
ground
after
a
storm
,
snapped
short
at
either
end
,
so
that
none
know
the
crown
of
them
nor
the
root
.
The
child
whom
she
had
left
grew
in
goodliness
and
strength
and
stature
,
until
the
people
said
that
he
was
like
that
child‐king
,
whom
their
hero
Frithiof
raised
upon
his
buckler
above
the
multitude
;
and
who
was
not
afraid
,
but
boldly
gripped
the
brazen
shield
,
and
smiled
fearlessly
at
the
noonday
sun
.
He
had
his
mother’s
golden
Scandinavian
beauty
;
the
beauty
of
sculpture
,
white
as
the
snow
,
of
unusual
height
,
and
largely
moulded
;
and
his
free
life
amidst
the
ice‐fields
and
the
pinewoods
,
and
on
the
wild
northern
seas
,
developed
both
health
and
strength
to
their
uttermost
perfection
.
The
people
admired
and
wondered
at
him
;
they
did
not
love
him
.
The
lad
was
cold
,
dauntless
,
silent
;
he
repelled
their
sympathies
and
disdained
their
pastimes
.
He
chose
rather
to
be
by
himself
than
with
them
.
He
was
never
cruel
;
but
he
was
never
tender
;
and
when
he
did
speak
he
spoke
with
a
sort
of
eloquent
scorn
and
caustic
imagery
that
seemed
to
them
extraordinary
in
one
so
young
.
But
his
grandfather
loved
him
greatly
;
and
reared
him
tenderly
and
wisely
;
and
braced
him
with
a
scholar’s
lore
and
with
a
mountaineer’s
exposure
,
so
that
both
brain
and
body
had
their
due
.
He
was
a
simple
childlike
broken
old
man
;
but
in
this
vigorous
youth
that
unfolded
itself
beside
him
his
age
seemed
to
strike
fresh
root
,
and
he
had
wisdom
and
skill
enough
to
guide
its
development
justly
.
The
desire
of
his
soul
was
that
his
grandson
should
succeed
him
in
the
spiritual
charge
of
that
tranquil
valley
,
and
thus
escaped
the
dire
perils
of
the
cities
in
which
the
mother’s
life
had
been
caught
and
consumed
like
a
moth’s
in
flame
.
But
Arslàn’s
eyes
looked
ever
across
the
ocean
with
that
look
in
them
which
had
been
in
his
mother’s
,
and
when
the
old
man
spoke
of
this
holy
and
peaceful
future
,
he
was
silent
.
Moreover
,
he
—
who
had
never
beheld
but
the
rude
paintings
on
panels
of
pine
that
decorated
the
little
red
church
under
the
firs
and
lindens
,
—
he
had
the
gift
of
art
in
him
.
He
had
few
and
rough
means
only
with
which
to
make
his
crude
and
unguided
essays
;
but
the
delirium
of
it
was
on
him
,
and
the
peasants
of
his
village
gazed
awe‐stricken
and
adoring
before
the
things
which
he
drew
on
every
piece
of
pine‐wood
,
on
every
smooth
breadth
of
sea‐worn
granite
,
on
every
bare
surface
of
lime‐washed
wall
that
he
could
find
at
liberty
for
his
usage
.
Whey
they
asked
him
what
,
in
his
manhood
,
he
would
do
,
he
said
little
.
“
I
will
never
leave
the
old
man
,
”
he
made
answer
;
and
he
kept
his
word
.
Up
to
his
twentieth
year
he
never
quitted
the
valley
.
He
studied
deeply
,
after
his
own
manner
,
but
nearly
all
his
days
were
passed
in
the
open
air
alone
;
in
the
pure
cold
air
of
the
highest
mountain
summits
,
amidst
the
thunder
of
the
furious
torrents
;
in
the
black
recesses
of
lonely
forests
,
where
none
,
save
the
wolf
and
the
bear
,
wandered
with
him
;
or
away
on
the
vast
expanse
of
the
sea
,
where
the
storm
drove
the
great
arctic
waves
like
scourged
sheep
,
and
the
huge
breakers
seized
the
shore
as
a
panther
its
prey
.
On
such
a
world
as
this
,
and
in
the
marvelous
nights
of
the
north
,
his
mind
fed
itself
and
gained
its
full
powers
.
The
feeble
life
of
the
old
man
held
him
to
this
lonely
valley
that
seemed
filled
with
the
coldness
,
the
mystery
,
the
unutterable
terror
and
majesty
of
the
arctic
pole
,
to
which
it
looked
;
but
,
unknown
to
him
,
it
thus
fettered
him
likewise
where
alone
the
genius
in
him
could
take
its
full
shape
and
full
stature
.
Unknown
to
him
,
in
these
years
it
took
the
depth
,
the
strength
,
the
patience
,
the
melancholy
,
the
virility
of
the
North
;
took
these
never
to
be
lost
again
.
In
the
twentieth
winter
of
his
life
an
avalanche
engulfed
the
pastor’s
house
,
and
the
little
church
by
which
it
stood
;
covering
both
beneath
a
mountain
of
earth
and
snow
and
rock
and
riven
trees
.
Some
of
the
timbers
withstood
the
shock
,
and
the
roof
remained
standing
uncrushed
above
their
heads
.
The
avalanche
fell
some
little
time
after
midnight
:
there
were
only
present
in
the
dwelling
himself
,
the
old
man
,
and
a
serving
woman
.
The
woman
was
killed
on
her
bed
by
the
fall
of
a
beam
upon
her
;
he
and
the
pastor
still
lived
:
lived
in
perpetual
darkness
without
food
or
fuel
,
or
any
ray
of
light
.
The
wooden
clock
stood
erect
,
uninjured
;
they
could
hear
the
hours
go
by
in
slow
succession
.
The
old
man
was
peaceful
and
even
cheerful
;
praising
God
often
;
and
praying
that
help
might
come
to
this
beloved
one
.
But
his
strength
could
not
hold
out
against
the
icy
cold
,
the
long
hunger
,
the
dreadful
blank
around
.
He
died
ere
the
first
day
had
wholly
gone
by
,
at
even‐song
;
saying
still
that
he
was
content
,
and
still
praising
God
who
had
rewarded
his
innocence
with
shame
,
and
recompensed
his
service
with
agony
.
For
two
more
days
and
nights
,
Arslàn
remained
in
his
living
tomb
,
enshrouded
in
eternal
gloom
,
alone
with
the
body
of
his
grandfather
,
stretching
out
his
hands
ever
and
again
to
meet
the
icy
touch
rather
than
be
without
companionship
.
On
the
morning
of
the
third
day
the
people
of
the
village
,
who
had
laboured
ceaselessly
,
reached
him
;
and
he
was
saved
.
As
soon
as
the
spring
broke
,
he
left
the
valley
and
passed
over
the
mountains
,
seeking
a
new
world
.
His
old
familiar
home
had
become
hateful
to
him
;
he
had
no
tie
to
it
save
two
low
graves
,
still
snow‐covered
underneath
a
knot
of
tall
stone‐pines
;
the
Norse
passion
of
wandering
was
in
his
veins
as
it
had
been
in
his
mother’s
before
him
;
he
mutely
desired
freedom
,
colour
,
knowledge
,
art
,
fame
,
as
she
had
desired
them
,
and
he
went
:
turning
his
face
from
that
lowly
green
nest
lying
like
a
lark’s
between
the
hills
.
He
did
not
go
as
youth
mostly
goes
,
blind
with
a
divine
dream
of
triumph
:
he
went
,
consciously
,
to
a
bitter
combat
as
the
sea
kings
of
old
,
whose
blood
ran
in
his
veins
,
and
whose
strength
was
in
his
limbs
,
had
gone
to
war
,
setting
their
prow
hard
against
the
sharp
salt
waves
and
in
the
teeth
of
an
adverse
wind
.
He
was
not
without
money
.
The
pastor
,
indeed
,
had
died
almost
penniless
;
he
had
been
always
poor
,
and
had
given
the
little
he
possessed
to
those
still
poorer
.
But
the
richest
landowner
in
the
village
,
the
largest
possessor
of
flocks
and
herds
,
dying
childless
,
had
bequeathed
his
farm
and
cattle
to
Arslàn
;
having
loved
the
lad’s
dead
mother
silently
and
vainly
.
The
value
of
these
realised
by
sale
gave
to
Arslàn
,
when
he
became
his
own
master
,
what
,
in
that
valley
at
least
,
was
wealth
;
and
he
went
without
care
for
the
future
on
this
score
into
the
world
of
men
;
his
mind
full
of
dreams
and
the
beautiful
myths
of
dead
ages
;
his
temper
compounded
of
poetry
and
coldness
,
of
enthusiasm
and
of
scepticism
;
his
one
passion
a
supreme
ambition
,
pure
as
snow
in
its
instinct
,
but
half
savage
in
its
intensity
.
From
that
spring
,
when
he
had
passed
away
from
his
birthplace
as
the
winter
snows
were
melting
on
the
mountain
sides
,
and
the
mountain
flowers
were
putting
forth
their
earliest
buds
under
the
pine
boughs
,
until
the
time
that
he
now
stood
solitary
,
starving
,
and
hopeless
before
the
mocking
eyes
of
his
Hermes
,
twelve
years
had
run
their
course
,
and
all
through
them
he
had
never
once
again
beheld
his
native
land
.
Like
the
Scandinavian
Regner
,
he
chose
rather
to
perish
in
the
folds
,
and
by
the
fangs
,
of
the
snakes
that
devoured
him
than
return
to
his
country
with
the
confession
of
defeat
.
And
despite
the
powers
that
were
in
him
,
his
life
had
been
a
failure
,
an
utter
failure
—
as
yet
.
In
his
early
youth
he
had
voyaged
often
,
with
men
who
went
to
the
extreme
north
in
search
of
skins
and
such
poor
trade
as
they
could
drive
with
Esquimaux
or
Koraks
;
he
had
borne
their
dangers
and
their
poverty
,
their
miseries
and
their
famine
,
for
sake
of
seeing
what
they
saw
;
—
the
pathless
oceans
of
the
ice
realm
,
the
trailing
pines
alone
in
a
white
snow
world
,
the
red
moon
fantastic
and
horrible
in
a
sky
of
steel
,
the
horned
clouds
of
reindeer
rushing
through
the
endless
night
,
the
arch
of
the
aurora
spanning
the
heavens
with
their
fire
.
He
had
passed
many
seasons
of
his
boyhood
in
the
silence
,
the
solitude
,
the
eternal
desolation
,
and
the
mute
mystery
of
that
Arctic
world
,
which
for
no
man
has
either
sympathy
or
story
;
and
in
a
way
he
had
loved
it
,
and
was
often
weary
for
it
;
in
a
way
its
spirit
remained
with
him
always
;
and
its
inexorable
coldness
,
its
pitiless
indifference
to
men’s
wants
and
weakness
,
its
loneliness
and
its
purity
,
and
its
scorn
,
were
in
all
the
works
of
his
hand
;
blended
in
a
strange
union
with
the
cruelty
,
and
the
voluptuousness
,
and
the
gorgeousness
of
colour
,
which
gave
to
everything
he
touched
the
glow
and
the
temper
of
the
east
.
Thus
,
what
he
did
pleased
none
;
being
for
one
half
the
world
too
chill
,
and
being
for
the
other
half
too
sensual
.
The
world
had
never
believed
in
him
;
and
he
found
himself
in
the
height
and
maturity
of
his
powers
condemned
to
an
absolute
obscurity
.
Not
one
man
in
a
million
knew
his
name
.
During
these
years
he
had
devoted
himself
to
the
study
of
art
with
an
undeviating
subservience
to
all
its
tyrannies
.
He
had
studied
humanity
in
all
its
phases
;
he
had
studied
form
with
all
the
rigid
care
that
it
requires
;
he
had
studied
colour
in
almost
every
land
that
lies
beneath
the
sun
;
he
had
studied
the
passions
in
all
their
deformities
,
as
well
as
in
all
their
beauties
;
he
had
spared
neither
himself
nor
others
in
pursuit
of
knowledge
.
He
had
tried
most
vices
,
he
had
seen
all
miseries
,
he
had
spared
himself
no
spectacle
,
however
loathsome
;
he
had
turned
back
from
no
license
,
however
undesired
,
that
could
give
him
insight
into
empire
over
human
raptures
and
affliction
.
Neither
did
he
spare
himself
any
labour
however
costly
,
however
exhausting
,
to
enrich
his
brain
with
that
varied
learning
,
that
multifarious
science
which
he
held
needful
to
every
artist
who
dared
to
desire
greatness
.
The
hireling
beauty
of
the
wanton
,
the
splendour
of
the
sun
and
sea
,
the
charnel
lore
of
anatomy
,
the
secrets
of
dead
tongues
and
buried
nations
,
the
horrors
of
the
lazar
wards
and
pest‐houses
,
the
glories
of
golden
deserts
and
purple
vineyards
,
the
flush
of
love
on
a
young
girl’s
cheek
,
the
rottenness
of
corruption
on
a
dead
man’s
limbs
,
the
hellish
riot
of
a
brothel
,
the
divine
calm
of
an
eastern
night
;
all
things
alike
he
studied
,
without
abhorrence
as
without
delight
,
indifferent
to
all
save
for
one
end
,
—
knowledge
and
art
.
So
entirely
and
undividedly
did
this
possess
him
that
it
seemed
to
have
left
him
without
other
passions
;
even
as
the
surgeon
dissects
the
fair
lifeless
body
of
sone
beautiful
dead
women
,
regardless
of
loveliness
or
sex
,
intent
on
the
secret
of
disease
,
the
mystery
of
formation
,
which
he
seeks
therein
,
so
did
he
study
the
physical
beauty
of
women
and
their
mortal
corruption
,
without
other
memories
than
those
of
art
.
He
would
see
the
veil
fall
from
off
the
limbs
of
a
creature
lovely
as
a
goddess
,
and
would
think
only
to
himself
—
“
How
shall
I
render
this
so
that
on
my
canvas
it
shall
live
once
more
?
”
One
night
,
in
the
hot
,
close
streets
of
Damascus
,
a
man
was
stabbed
,
—
a
young
Maronite
—
who
lay
dying
in
the
roadway
,
without
sign
or
sound
,
whilst
his
assassins
fled
;
the
silver
Syrian
moon
shining
full
on
his
white
and
scarlet
robe
,
his
calm
,
upturned
face
,
his
lean
hand
knotted
on
the
dagger
he
had
been
spared
no
time
to
use
;
a
famished
street
dog
smelling
at
his
blood
.
Arslàn
,
passing
through
the
city
,
saw
and
paused
beside
him
;
stood
still
and
motionless
,
looking
down
on
the
outstretched
figure
;
then
drew
his
tablets
out
and
sketched
the
serene
,
rigid
face
,
the
flowing
,
blood‐soaked
robes
,
the
hungry
animal
mouthing
at
the
wound
.
Another
painter
,
his
familiar
friend
,
following
on
his
steps
,
joined
him
a
little
later
,
and
started
from
his
side
in
horror
—
“
My
God
!
what
do
you
do
there
?
”
he
cried
.
“
Do
you
not
see
?
—
that
man
is
dying
!
”
Arslàn
looked
up
—
“
I
had
not
thought
of
that
,
”
he
answered
.
It
was
thus
always
with
him
.
He
was
not
cruel
.
To
animals
he
was
humane
,
to
women
gentle
,
to
men
serene
;
but
his
art
was
before
all
things
with
him
,
and
with
humanity
he
had
little
sympathy
;
and
if
had
passions
,
they
had
wakened
no
more
than
as
the
drowsy
tigress
wakes
in
the
hot
hush
of
noon
,
half
indifferent
,
half
lustful
,
to
strike
fiercely
what
comes
before
her
,
and
then
,
having
slain
,
couches
herself
and
sleeps
again
.
But
for
this
absolute
surrender
of
his
life
,
his
art
had
as
yet
recompensed
him
nothing
.
Men
did
not
believe
in
him
;
what
he
wrought
saddened
and
terrified
them
;
they
turned
aside
to
those
who
fed
them
on
simpler
and
on
sweeter
food
.
His
works
were
great
,
but
they
were
such
as
the
public
mind
deems
impious
.
They
unveiled
human
corruption
too
nakedly
,
and
they
shadowed
forth
visions
too
exalted
,
and
satires
too
unsparing
,
for
them
to
be
acceptable
to
the
multitude
.
They
were
compounded
of
an
idealism
clear
and
cold
as
crystal
,
and
of
a
reality
cruel
and
voluptuous
as
love
.
They
were
penetrated
with
an
acrid
satire
and
an
intense
despair
:
the
world
caring
only
for
a
honied
falsehood
and
a
gilded
gloss
in
every
art
,
would
have
none
of
them
.
So
far
these
twelve
long
years
his
labour
had
been
waste
,
his
efforts
fruitless
.
Those
years
had
been
costly
to
him
in
purse
;
—
travel
,
study
,
gold
flung
to
fallen
women
,
sums
spent
on
faithless
friends
,
utter
indifference
to
whosoever
robbed
him
,
so
long
as
he
was
left
in
peace
to
pursue
lofty
aims
and
high
endeavours
—
all
these
did
their
common
work
on
wealth
which
was
scanty
in
the
press
of
the
world
,
though
it
had
appeared
inexhaustible
on
the
shores
of
the
north
sea
.
His
labours
also
were
costly
,
and
they
brought
him
no
return
.
The
indifference
to
fortune
in
a
man
of
genius
looks
,
to
a
man
of
the
world
,
the
stupor
of
idiotcy
:
from
such
a
stupor
he
was
shaken
one
day
to
find
himself
face
to
face
with
beggary
.
His
works
were
seen
by
few
,
and
these
few
were
antagonstic
to
them
.
All
ways
to
fame
were
closed
to
him
,
either
by
the
envy
of
other
painters
,
or
by
the
apathies
and
the
antipathies
of
the
nations
themselves
.
In
all
lands
he
was
repulsed
;
he
roused
the
jealousy
of
his
compeers
and
the
terror
of
the
multitudes
.
They
hurled
against
him
the
old
worn‐out
cry
that
the
office
of
art
was
to
give
pleasure
,
not
pain
;
and
when
his
money
was
gone
,
so
that
he
could
no
longer
,
at
his
own
cost
,
expose
his
works
to
the
public
gaze
,
they
and
he
were
alike
obliterated
from
the
public
marts
;
they
had
always
denied
him
fame
,
and
they
at
last
thrust
him
quickly
into
oblivion
,
and
abandoned
him
to
it
without
remorse
,
and
even
with
contentment
.
He
could
,
indeed
,
with
the
facile
power
of
eye
and
touch
that
he
possessed
,
have
easily
purchased
a
temporary
ease
and
evanescent
repute
,
if
he
had
given
the
world
from
his
pencil
those
themes
for
which
it
cared
,
and
descended
to
the
common
spheres
of
common
art
.
But
he
refused
utterly
to
do
this
.
The
best
and
greatest
thing
in
him
was
his
honesty
to
the
genius
wherewith
he
was
gifted
;
he
refused
to
prostitute
it
;
he
refused
to
do
other
than
to
tell
the
truth
as
he
saw
it
.
“
This
man
blasphemes
;
this
man
is
immoral
,
”
his
enemies
had
always
hooted
against
him
.
It
is
what
the
world
always
says
of
those
who
utter
unwelcome
truths
in
its
unwilling
ears
.
So
the
words
of
the
old
Skald
by
his
own
northern
seashores
came
to
pass
;
and
at
length
,
for
the
sake
of
art
,
it
came
to
this
,
that
he
perished
for
want
of
bread
.
For
seven
days
he
had
been
without
food
,
except
the
winter
berries
which
he
broke
off
the
trees
without
,
and
such
handfuls
of
wheat
as
fell
through
the
disjointed
timbers
of
the
ceiling
,
for
whose
possession
he
disputed
with
the
rats
.
The
sheer
absolute
poverty
,
which
leaves
the
man
whom
it
has
seized
without
so
much
as
even
a
crust
wherewith
to
break
his
fast
,
is
commoner
than
the
world
in
general
ever
dreams
.
For
he
was
now
so
poor
that
for
many
months
he
had
been
unable
to
buy
fresh
canvas
on
which
to
work
,
and
had
been
driven
to
chalk
the
outlines
of
the
innumerable
fancies
that
pursued
him
upon
the
bare
smooth
grey
stone
walls
of
the
old
granary
in
which
he
dwelt
.
He
let
his
life
go
silently
away
without
complaint
,
and
without
effort
,
because
effort
had
been
so
long
unavailing
,
that
he
had
discarded
it
in
a
contemptuous
despair
.
He
accepted
his
fate
,
seeing
nothing
strange
in
it
,
and
nothing
pitiable
;
since
many
better
men
than
he
had
borne
the
like
.
He
could
not
have
altered
it
without
beggary
or
theft
,
and
he
thought
either
of
these
worse
than
itself
.
There
were
hecatombs
of
grain
,
bursting
their
sacks
,
in
the
lofts
above
;
but
when
,
once
on
each
eighth
day
,
the
maltster
owning
them
sent
his
men
to
fetch
some
from
the
store
,
Arslàn
let
the
boat
be
moored
against
the
wall
,
be
filled
with
barley
,
and
be
pushed
away
again
down
the
current
,
wihtout
saying
once
to
the
rowers
,
“
Wait
;
I
starve
!
”
And
yet
,
though
like
a
miser
,
amidst
his
gold
,
his
body
starved
amidst
the
noble
shapes
and
the
great
thoughts
that
his
brain
conceived
and
his
hand
called
into
substance
,
he
never
once
dreamed
of
abandoning
for
any
other
the
career
to
which
he
had
dedicated
himself
from
the
earliest
days
that
his
boyish
eyes
had
watched
the
fires
of
the
Arctic
lights
glow
above
the
winter
seas
.
Art
was
to
him
as
mother
,
brethren
,
mistress
,
offspring
,
religion
—
all
that
other
men
hold
dear
.
He
had
none
of
these
,
he
desired
none
of
them
;
and
his
genius
sufficed
to
him
in
their
stead
.
It
was
an
intense
and
reckless
egotism
,
made
alike
cruel
and
sublime
by
its
intensity
and
purity
,
like
the
egotism
of
a
mother
in
her
child
.
To
it
,
as
the
mother
to
her
child
,
he
would
have
sacrificed
every
living
creature
;
but
to
it
also
,
like
her
,
he
would
have
sacrificed
his
very
existence
as
unhesitatingly
.
But
it
was
an
egotism
which
,
though
merciless
in
its
tyranny
,
was
as
pure
as
snow
in
its
impersonality
;
it
was
untainted
by
any
grain
of
avarice
,
of
vanity
,
of
selfish
desire
;
it
was
independent
of
all
sympathy
;
it
was
simply
and
intensely
the
passion
for
immortality
:
—
that
sublime
selfishness
,
that
superb
madness
,
of
all
great
minds
.
Art
had
taken
him
for
its
own
,
as
Demeter
,
in
the
days
of
her
desolation
,
took
the
child
Demophoon
to
nurture
him
as
her
own
on
the
food
of
gods
,
and
to
plunge
him
through
the
flames
of
a
fire
that
would
give
him
immortal
life
.
As
the
pusillanimous
and
sordid
fears
of
the
mortal
mother
lost
to
the
child
for
evermore
the
possession
of
Olympian
joys
and
of
perpetual
youth
,
so
did
the
craven
and
earthly
cares
of
bodily
needs
hold
the
artist
back
from
the
radiance
of
the
life
of
the
soul
,
and
drag
him
from
the
purifying
fires
.
Yet
he
had
not
been
utterly
discouraged
;
he
strove
against
the
Metanira
of
circumstance
;
he
did
his
best
to
struggle
free
from
the
mortal
bonds
that
bound
him
;
and
,
as
the
child
Demophoon
mourned
for
the
great
goddess
that
had
nurtured
him
,
refusing
to
be
comforted
,
so
did
he
turn
form
the
base
consolations
of
the
sense
and
the
appetites
,
and
beheld
ever
before
his
sight
the
ineffable
majesty
of
that
Mater
Dolorosa
who
once
and
for
ever
had
anointed
him
as
her
own
.
Even
now
as
the
strength
returned
to
his
limbs
and
the
warmth
to
his
veins
,
the
old
passion
,
the
old
worship
,
returned
to
him
.
The
momentary
weakness
which
had
assailed
him
passed
away
.
He
shook
himself
with
a
bitter
impatient
scorn
for
the
feebleness
into
which
he
had
been
betrayed
;
and
glanced
around
him
still
with
a
dull
wonder
as
to
the
strange
chances
which
the
past
night
had
brought
.
He
was
incredulous
still
;
he
thought
that
his
fancy
,
heated
by
long
fasting
,
might
have
cheated
him
;
that
he
must
have
dreamed
;
and
that
the
food
and
fuel
which
he
saw
must
surely
have
been
his
own
.
Yet
reflection
told
him
that
this
could
not
be
;
he
remembered
that
for
several
weeks
his
last
coin
had
been
spent
;
that
he
had
been
glad
to
gather
the
birds’
winter
berries
to
crush
beneath
his
teeth
,
and
gather
the
dropped
corn
from
the
floor
to
quiet
the
calm
of
hunger
;
that
for
many
a
day
there
had
been
no
fire
on
the
hearth
,
and
that
only
a
frame
which
long
sunless
northern
winters
had
braced
to
such
hardihood
in
early
youth
,
had
enabled
him
to
resist
and
endure
the
cold
.
Therefore
,
it
must
be
charity
.
Charity
!
—
as
the
hateful
truth
came
home
to
him
,
he
met
the
eyes
of
the
white
,
slender
,
winged
Hermes
:
eyes
that
from
out
that
colourless
and
smiling
face
seemed
to
mock
him
with
a
cruel
contempt
.
His
was
the
old
,
old
story
—
the
rod
of
wealth
bartered
for
the
empty
shell
that
gave
forth
music
.
Hermes
seemed
to
know
it
and
to
jeer
him
.
Hermes
,
the
mischief‐monger
,
and
the
trickster
of
men
;
the
inventive
god
who
spent
his
days
in
cajoling
his
brethren
,
and
his
nights
in
the
mockery
of
mortals
;
the
messenger
of
heaven
who
gave
Pandora
to
mankind
;
Hermes
,
the
eternal
type
of
unscrupulous
Success
,
seemed
to
have
voice
and
cry
to
him
:
—
“
Oh
fool
,
fool
,
fool
!
who
listens
for
the
music
of
the
spheres
,
and
disdains
the
only
melody
that
men
have
ears
to
hear
—
the
melody
of
gold
!
”
Arslàn
turned
from
the
great
cartoon
of
the
gods
in
Pheræ
,
and
went
out
into
the
daylight
,
and
stripped
and
plunged
into
the
cold
and
turbulent
stream
.
Its
chilliness
and
the
combat
of
its
current
braced
his
nerves
and
cleared
his
brain
.
When
he
was
clad
,
he
left
the
grain‐tower
with
the
white
forms
of
its
gods
upon
its
walls
,
and
walk
slowly
down
the
banks
of
the
river
.
Since
life
had
been
forced
back
upon
him
he
knew
that
it
was
incumbent
upon
his
manhood
to
support
it
by
the
toil
of
his
hands
if
men
would
not
accept
the
labour
of
his
brain
.
Before
,
he
had
been
too
absorbed
in
his
pursuit
,
too
devoted
to
it
,
body
and
soul
,
to
seek
to
sustain
existence
by
sheer
manual
exertion
which
was
the
only
thing
that
he
had
left
untried
for
self‐maintenance
.
In
a
manner
too
he
was
too
proud
;
not
too
proud
to
labour
,
but
too
proud
to
easily
endure
to
lay
bare
his
needs
to
the
knowledge
of
others
.
But
now
,
human
charity
must
have
saved
him
;
a
charity
which
he
hated
as
the
foulest
insult
of
his
life
;
and
he
had
no
chance
save
to
accept
it
like
a
beggar
bereft
of
all
shame
,
or
to
seek
such
work
as
would
give
him
his
daily
bread
.
So
he
went
;
feebly
,
for
he
was
still
weak
from
the
length
of
his
famine
.
The
country
was
well
known
to
him
,
but
the
people
not
at
all
.
He
had
come
by
hazard
on
the
old
ruin
where
he
dwelt
,
and
had
stayed
there
full
a
year
.
These
serene
blue
skies
,
these
pale
mists
,
these
corn‐clad
slopes
,
these
fields
of
pleasant
of
plenteous
abundance
,
these
quiet
homesteads
,
these
fruit‐harvests
of
this
Norman
plain
were
in
a
contrast
intense
,
yet
soothing
,
to
all
that
his
life
had
known
.
These
old
quaint
cities
,
these
little
villages
that
seemed
always
hushed
with
the
sound
of
bells
,
these
quiet
streams
on
which
the
calm
sunlight
slept
so
peacefully
,
these
green
and
golden
lands
of
plenty
that
stretched
away
to
the
dim
grey
distant
sea
,
—
all
these
had
had
a
certain
charm
for
him
.
He
had
abided
with
them
,
partly
because
amidst
them
it
seemed
possible
to
live
on
a
handful
of
wheat
and
a
draught
of
water
,
unnoticed
and
unpitied
,
partly
because
,
having
come
hither
on
foot
through
many
lands
and
by
long
hardships
,
he
had
paused
there
weary
and
incapable
of
farther
effort
.
Whilst
the
little
gold
he
had
had
on
him
had
lasted
he
had
painted
innumerable
transcripts
of
the
ancient
buildings
,
and
of
its
summer
and
autumnal
landscapes
.
And
of
late
—
through
the
bitter
winter
—
of
late
it
had
seemed
to
him
that
it
was
as
well
to
die
here
as
elsewhere
.
When
a
man
knows
that
his
dead
limbs
will
be
huddled
into
the
common
ditch
of
the
poor
,
the
nameless
,
and
the
unclaimed
,
and
that
his
dead
brain
will
only
serve
for
soil
to
feed
some
little
rank
wayside
poisonous
weed
,
it
will
seldom
seem
of
much
moment
in
what
earth
the
ditch
be
dug
,
by
what
feet
the
sward
be
trod
.
He
went
on
his
way
seeking
work
;
he
did
not
care
what
,
he
asked
for
any
that
might
serve
to
use
such
strength
as
hunger
had
left
in
him
,
and
to
give
him
his
daily
bread
.
But
this
is
a
great
thing
to
demand
in
the
world
,
and
so
he
found
it
.
They
repulsed
him
everywhere
.
They
had
their
own
people
in
plenty
,
they
had
their
sturdy
,
tough
,
weather‐beaten
women
,
who
laboured
all
day
in
rain
,
or
snow
,
or
storm
,
for
a
pittance
,
and
they
had
these
in
larger
numbers
than
their
field‐work
needed
.
They
looked
at
him
askance
;
this
man
with
the
eyes
of
Arctic
blue
and
the
grave
gestures
of
a
king
,
who
only
asked
to
labour
as
the
lowest
amongst
them
.
He
was
a
stranger
to
them
;
he
did
not
speak
their
tongue
with
their
accent
;
he
looked
,
with
that
white
beauty
and
that
lofty
stature
,
as
though
he
could
crush
them
in
the
hollow
of
his
hand
.
They
would
have
none
of
him
.
“
He
brings
misfortune
!
”
they
said
amongst
themselves
;
and
they
would
have
none
of
him
.
He
had
an
evil
name
with
them
.
They
said
at
eventide
by
their
wood‐fires
that
strange
things
had
been
seen
since
he
had
come
to
the
granary
by
the
river
.
Once
he
had
painted
,
from
the
pretty
face
of
a
stonecutter’s
little
fair
son
,
a
study
of
the
wondrous
child
Zagreus
gazing
in
the
fatal
mirror
;
the
child
was
laughing
,
and
happy
,
and
healthful
at
noon
,
crowned
with
carnations
and
river
lilies
,
and
by
sunset
he
was
dead
—
dead
like
the
flowers
that
were
still
amongst
his
curls
.
Once
a
girl
had
hired
herself
as
a
model
to
him
for
an
Egyptian
wanton
,
half
a
singer
and
half
a
gipsy
—
handsome
,
lithe
,
fantastic
,
voluptuous
:
the
very
night
she
left
the
granary
she
was
drowned
in
crossing
a
wooden
bridge
of
the
river
,
which
gave
way
under
the
heavy
tramp
of
the
fantoccini
player
who
accompanied
her
.
Once
he
had
sketched
,
for
the
corner
of
an
oriental
study
,
a
rare‐plumaged
bird
of
the
south
,
which
was
the
idol
of
a
water‐carrier
of
the
district
,
and
the
wonder
of
all
the
children
round
:
and
from
that
date
the
bird
had
sickened
and
drooped
,
and
lost
its
colours
,
and
pined
until
it
died
.
The
boy’s
death
had
been
from
a
sudden
seizure
of
one
of
the
many
ills
of
infancy
;
the
dancing
girl’s
had
come
from
a
common
accident
due
to
the
rottenness
of
old
worn
water‐soaked
timber
;
the
mocking‐bird’s
had
arisen
from
the
cruelty
of
captivity
and
the
chills
of
northern
winds
;
all
had
been
the
result
of
simple
accident
and
natural
circumstance
.
But
they
had
sufficed
to
fill
with
horror
the
minds
of
a
peasantry
always
bigoted
and
strongly
prejudiced
against
every
stranger
;
and
it
became
to
them
a
matter
of
implicit
credence
that
whatsoever
living
thing
should
be
painted
by
the
artist
Arslàn
would
assuredly
never
survive
to
see
the
rising
of
the
morrow’s
sun
.
In
consequence
,
for
leagues
around
they
shunned
him
;
not
man
,
nor
woman
,
nor
child
would
sit
to
him
as
models
;
and
now
,
when
he
sought
the
wage
of
a
daily
labour
amongst
them
,
he
was
everywhere
repulsed
.
He
had
long
repulsed
human
sympathy
,
and
in
its
turn
it
repulsed
him
.
At
last
he
turned
and
retraced
his
steps
,
baffled
and
wearied
;
his
early
habits
had
made
him
familiar
with
all
manner
of
agricultural
toil
;
he
would
have
done
the
task
of
the
sower
,
the
herdsman
,
the
hewer
of
wood
,
or
the
charcoal‐burner
;
but
they
would
none
of
them
believe
this
of
one
with
his
glance
and
his
aspect
;
and
solicitation
was
new
to
his
lips
and
bitter
there
as
gall
.
He
took
his
way
back
along
the
line
of
the
river
;
the
beauty
of
the
dawn
had
gone
,
the
day
was
only
now
chilly
,
heavy
,
with
a
rank
moisture
from
the
steaming
soil
.
Broken
boughs
and
uprooted
bushes
were
floating
on
the
turgid
water
,
and
over
all
the
land
there
hung
a
sullen
fog
.
The
pressure
of
the
air
,
the
humidity
,
the
colourless
stillness
that
reigned
throughout
,
weighed
on
lungs
which
for
a
score
of
years
had
only
breathed
the
pure
strong
rarified
air
of
the
north
;
he
longed
with
a
sudden
passion
to
be
once
more
amidst
his
native
mountains
under
the
clear
steel‐like
skies
,
and
beside
the
rush
of
the
vast
wild
seas
.
Were
it
only
to
die
as
he
looked
on
them
,
it
were
better
to
die
there
than
here
.
He
longed
,
as
men
in
deserts
thirst
for
drink
,
for
one
breath
of
the
strong
salt
air
of
the
north
,
one
sight
of
the
bright
keen
sea‐born
sun
as
it
leapt
at
dawn
from
the
waters
.
The
crisp
cold
nights
,
the
heavens
which
shone
as
steel
,
the
forests
filled
with
the
cry
of
the
wolves
,
the
mountains
which
the
ocean
ceaselessly
assailed
,
the
mighty
waves
which
marched
erect
like
armies
,
the
bitter
Arctic
wind
which
like
a
sabre
cleft
the
darkness
;
all
these
came
back
to
him
,
beloved
and
beautiful
in
all
their
cruelty
,
desired
by
him
,
with
a
sick
longing
for
their
freshness
,
for
their
fierceness
,
for
their
freedom
.
As
he
dragged
his
tired
limbs
thought
the
grasses
and
looked
out
upon
the
sullen
stream
that
flowed
beside
him
,
an
oar
struck
the
water
,
a
flat
black
boat
drifted
beneath
the
bank
,
a
wild
swan
disturbed
rose
with
a
hiss
from
the
sedges
.
The
boat
was
laden
with
grain
;
there
was
only
one
rower
in
it
,
who
steered
by
a
string
wound
round
her
foot
.
She
did
not
lift
her
face
as
she
went
by
him
;
but
her
bent
brow
and
her
bosom
grew
red
,
and
she
cut
the
water
with
a
swifter
,
sharper
stroke
;
her
features
were
turned
from
him
by
that
movement
of
her
head
,
but
he
saw
the
eastern
outline
of
the
cheek
and
chin
,
the
embrowned
velvet
of
the
skin
,
the
half‐bare
beauty
of
the
heaving
chest
and
supple
spine
bent
back
in
the
action
of
the
oars
,
the
long
slender
and
arched
shape
of
the
naked
foot
,
round
which
the
cord
was
twined
;
—
their
contour
and
their
colour
struck
him
with
a
sudden
surprise
.
He
had
seen
such
oftentimes
,
eastwards
,
on
the
banks
of
golden
rivers
,
treading
,
with
such
feet
as
these
,
the
sands
that
were
the
dust
of
countless
nations
;
bearing
,
on
such
shoulders
as
these
earthen
water‐vases
that
might
have
served
the
feasts
of
Pharaohs
;
showing
such
limbs
as
these
against
the
curled
palm
branches
and
the
deep
blue
sky
upon
the
desert’s
edge
.
But
here
!
—
a
face
of
Asia
amongst
the
corn‐lands
of
Northern
France
?
It
seemed
to
him
strange
;
he
looked
after
her
with
wonder
.
The
boat
went
on
down
the
stream
without
any
pause
;
the
sculls
cleaving
the
heavy
tide
with
regular
and
resolute
monotony
;
the
golden
piles
of
the
grain
and
the
brown
form
of
the
bending
figure
soon
hidden
in
the
clouds
of
river‐mist
.
He
watched
her
,
only
seeing
a
beggar‐girl
rowing
a
skiff
full
of
corn
down
a
sluggish
stream
.
There
was
nothing
to
tell
him
that
he
was
looking
upon
the
saviour
of
his
body
from
the
thralls
of
death
;
if
there
had
been
,
in
his
mood
,
then
,
he
would
have
cursed
her
.
The
boat
glided
into
the
fog
which
closed
behind
it
;
a
flock
of
water‐birds
swam
out
from
the
rushes
and
darted
at
some
floating
kernels
of
wheat
that
had
fallen
over
the
vessel’s
side
;
they
fought
and
hissed
,
and
flapped
and
pecked
amongst
themselves
over
the
chance
plunder
;
a
large
rat
stole
amidst
them
unnoticed
by
them
in
their
exultation
,
and
seized
their
leader
and
bore
him
struggling
and
beating
the
air
with
blood‐stained
wings
away
to
a
hole
in
the
bank
;
a
mongrel
dog
,
prowling
on
the
shore
,
hearing
the
wild
duck’s
cries
,
splashed
into
the
sedges
,
and
swam
out
and
gripped
the
rat
by
the
neck
in
bold
sharp
fangs
,
and
bore
both
rat
and
bird
,
bleeding
and
dying
,
to
the
land
;
the
owner
of
the
mongrel
,
a
peasant
making
ready
the
ground
for
colza
in
the
low‐lying
fields
,
snatched
the
duck
from
the
dog
to
bear
it
home
for
his
own
eating
,
and
kicked
his
poor
beast
in
the
ribs
for
having
ventured
to
stray
without
leave
and
to
do
him
service
without
permission
.
“
The
dulcet
harmony
of
the
world’s
benignant
law
!
”
thought
Arslàn
,
as
he
turned
aside
to
enter
the
stone
archway
of
his
own
desolate
dwelling
.
“
To
live
one
must
slaughter
—
what
life
can
I
take
?
”
At
that
moment
the
setting
sun
pierced
the
heavy
veil
of
the
vapour
,
and
glowed
through
the
fog
.
The
boat
,
now
distant
,
glided
for
a
moment
into
the
ruddy
haze
,
and
was
visible
;
the
water
around
it
,
like
a
lake
of
flame
,
the
white
steam
above
it
,
like
the
smoke
of
a
sacrifice
fire
.
Then
the
sun
sank
,
the
mists
gathered
closely
once
more
,
all
light
faded
,
and
the
day
was
dead
.
He
felt
stifled
and
sick
at
heart
as
he
returned
along
the
reedy
shore
towards
his
dreary
home
.
He
wondered
dully
why
his
life
would
not
end
:
since
the
world
would
have
none
of
him
,
neither
the
work
of
his
brain
nor
the
work
of
his
hands
,
it
seemed
that
he
had
no
place
in
it
.
He
was
half
resolved
to
lie
down
in
the
water
there
,
amongst
the
reeds
,
and
let
it
flow
over
his
face
and
breast
,
and
kiss
him
softly
and
coldly
into
the
sleep
of
death
.
He
had
desired
this
many
times
;
what
held
him
back
from
its
indulgence
was
not
“
the
child
within
us
that
fears
death
,
”
of
which
Plato
speaks
;
he
had
no
such
misgiving
in
him
,
and
he
believed
death
to
be
a
simple
rupture
and
end
of
all
things
,
such
as
any
man
had
right
to
seek
and
summon
for
himself
;
it
was
rather
that
the
passion
of
his
art
was
too
strong
in
him
,
that
the
power
to
create
was
too
intense
in
him
,
so
that
he
could
not
willingly
consign
the
forces
and
the
fantasies
of
his
brain
to
that
annihilation
to
which
he
would
,
without
thought
or
pause
,
have
flung
his
body
.
As
he
entered
the
haunted
hall
which
served
him
as
his
painting‐room
,
he
saw
a
fresh
fire
of
logs
upon
the
hearth
,
whose
leaping
flames
lighted
the
place
with
cheerful
colour
,
and
he
saw
on
the
stone
bench
fresh
food
,
sufficient
to
last
several
days
,
and
a
brass
flagon
filled
with
wine
.
A
curious
emotion
took
possession
of
him
as
he
looked
.
It
was
less
surprise
at
the
fact
,
for
his
senses
told
him
it
was
the
work
of
some
charity
which
chose
to
hide
itself
,
than
it
was
wonder
as
to
who
,
in
this
strange
land
,
where
none
would
even
let
him
earn
his
daily
bread
,
knew
enough
or
cared
enough
to
supply
his
necessities
thus
.
And
with
this
there
arose
the
same
intolerant
bitterness
of
the
degradation
of
alms
,
the
same
ungrateful
hatred
of
the
succour
that
seemed
to
class
him
amongst
beggars
,
which
had
moved
him
when
he
had
awakened
with
the
dawn
.
He
felt
neither
tenderness
nor
gratitude
,
he
was
only
conscious
of
humiliation
.
There
were
in
him
a
certain
coldness
,
strength
,
and
indifference
to
sympathy
,
which
,
whilst
they
made
his
greatness
as
an
artist
,
made
his
callousness
as
a
man
.
It
might
have
been
sweet
to
others
to
find
themselves
remembered
and
pitied
by
another
at
an
hour
when
their
forces
were
spent
,
their
fate
friendless
,
and
their
hopes
all
dead
.
But
it
was
not
so
to
him
,
he
only
felt
like
the
desert
animal
which
,
wounded
,
repulses
every
healing
hand
,
and
only
seeks
to
die
alone
.
There
was
only
one
vulnerable
,
one
tender
nerve
in
him
,
and
this
was
the
instinct
of
his
genius
.
He
had
been
nurtured
in
hardihood
,
and
had
drawn
in
endurance
with
every
breath
of
his
native
air
;
he
would
have
borne
physical
ills
without
one
visible
pang
,
and
would
have
been
indifferent
to
all
mortal
suffering
;
but
for
the
powers
in
him
,
for
the
art
he
adored
,
he
had
a
child’s
weakness
,
a
woman’s
softness
.
He
could
not
bear
to
die
without
leaving
behind
his
life
some
work
the
world
would
cherish
.
Call
it
folly
,
call
it
madness
,
it
is
both
:
the
ivory
Zeus
that
was
to
give
its
sculptor
immortality
,
lives
but
in
tradition
;
the
bronze
Athene
,
that
was
to
guard
the
Piræus
in
eternal
liberty
,
has
long
been
levelled
with
the
dust
;
yet
with
every
age
the
artist
still
gives
life
for
fame
,
still
cries
,
“
Let
my
body
perish
,
but
make
my
work
immortal
!
”
It
was
this
in
him
now
which
stirred
his
heart
with
a
new
and
gentler
emotion
;
emotion
which
,
while
half
disgust
,
was
also
half
gladness
.
The
food
was
alms‐given
,
since
he
had
not
earned
it
,
and
yet
—
by
means
of
this
sheer
bodily
subsistence
—
it
would
be
possible
for
him
to
keep
alive
those
dreams
,
that
strength
,
by
which
he
still
believed
it
in
him
to
compel
his
fame
from
men
.
He
stood
before
the
Phœbus
in
Pheræ
,
thinking
;
it
stung
him
with
a
bitter
torment
;
it
humiliated
him
with
a
hateful
burden
—
this
debt
which
came
he
knew
not
whence
,
and
which
he
never
might
be
able
to
repay
.
And
yet
his
heart
was
strangely
moved
;
it
seemed
to
him
that
the
fate
which
thus
wantonly
,
and
with
such
curious
persistence
,
placed
life
back
into
his
hands
,
must
needs
be
one
that
would
bear
no
common
fruit
.
He
opposed
himself
no
more
to
it
.
He
bent
his
head
and
broke
bread
,
and
ate
and
drank
of
the
red
wine
:
—
he
did
not
thank
God
or
man
as
he
broke
his
fast
;
he
only
looked
in
the
mocking
eyes
of
Hermes
,
and
said
in
his
heart
:
—
“
Since
I
must
live
,
I
will
triumph
!
”
And
Hermes
smiled
:
Hermes
the
wise
,
who
had
bought
and
sold
the
generations
of
men
so
long
ago
,
in
the
golden
age
,
and
who
knew
so
well
how
they
would
barter
away
their
greatness
and
their
gladness
,
and
their
bodies
and
their
souls
,
for
one
sweet
strain
of
his
hollow
reed‐pipe
,
for
one
sweet
glance
of
his
soulless
Pandora’s
eyes
.
Hermes
—
Hermes
the
liar
,
Hermes
the
wise
,
—
knew
how
men’s
oaths
were
kept
.
BOOK
IV
.
“
The
desire
of
the
moth
for
the
star
.
”
CHAPTER
I
.
AT
the
close
of
that
day
Claudis
Flamma
discovered
that
he
had
been
robbed
—
robbed
more
than
once
:
he
swore
and
raved
and
tore
his
hair
for
loss
of
a
little
bread
and
meat
and
oil
and
a
flagon
of
red
wine
.
He
did
not
suspect
his
grand‐daughter
;
accusing
her
perpetually
of
sins
of
which
she
was
innocent
,
he
did
not
once
associate
her
in
thought
with
the
one
offence
which
she
had
committed
.
He
thought
that
the
window
of
his
store‐house
had
been
forced
from
the
exterior
;
he
made
no
doubt
that
his
spoiler
was
some
vagabond
from
one
of
the
river
barges
.
By
such
tramps
his
hen‐house
and
his
apple‐lofts
had
often
previously
been
invaded
.
She
heard
his
lamentations
and
imprecations
in
unbroken
silence
;
he
did
not
question
her
;
and
without
a
lie
she
was
able
to
keep
her
secret
.
In
her
own
sight
she
had
done
a
foul
thing
—
a
thing
that
her
own
hunger
had
never
induced
her
to
do
.
She
did
not
seek
to
reconcile
herself
to
her
action
by
any
reflection
that
she
had
only
taken
what
she
had
really
earned
a
thousand
times
over
by
her
service
;
her
mind
was
not
sufficiently
instructed
,
and
was
of
too
truthful
a
mould
to
be
capable
of
the
deft
plea
of
a
sophistry
.
She
could
dare
the
thing
;
and
do
it
,
and
hold
her
peace
about
it
,
though
she
should
be
scourged
to
speak
;
but
she
could
not
tamper
with
it
to
excuse
it
to
herself
;
for
this
she
had
neither
the
cunning
nor
the
cowardice
.
Why
had
she
done
it
?
—
done
for
a
stranger
what
no
pressure
of
need
had
made
her
do
for
her
own
wants
?
She
did
not
ask
herself
;
she
followed
her
instinct
.
He
allured
her
with
his
calm
and
kingly
beauty
,
which
was
like
nothing
else
her
eyes
had
ever
seen
;
and
she
was
drawn
by
an
irresistible
attraction
to
this
life
which
she
had
bought
at
the
price
of
her
own
from
the
gods
.
Yet
stronger
even
than
this
sudden
human
passion
which
had
entered
into
her
was
her
dread
lest
he
whom
she
had
ransomed
from
death
should
know
of
his
debt
to
her
.
Under
such
a
dread
,
she
never
opened
her
lips
to
anyone
on
this
thing
which
she
had
done
.
Silence
was
natural
to
her
;
she
spoke
so
rarely
,
that
many
in
the
province
believed
her
to
be
dumb
;
no
sympathy
had
ever
been
shown
to
her
to
woo
her
to
disclose
either
the
passions
that
burnt
latent
in
her
veins
,
or
the
tenderness
that
trembled
stifled
in
her
heart
.
Thrice
again
did
she
take
food
and
fuel
to
the
water‐tower
undetected
,
both
by
the
man
whom
she
robbed
,
and
the
man
whom
she
succoured
.
Thrice
again
did
she
find
her
way
to
the
desolate
chamber
in
its
owner’s
absence
and
refill
the
empty
platters
and
warm
afresh
the
cold
blank
hearth
.
Thrice
again
did
Claudis
Flamma
note
the
diminution
of
his
stores
,
and
burnish
afresh
his
old
rusty
fowling‐piece
,
and
watch
half
the
night
on
his
dark
staircase
,
and
prepare
with
his
own
hands
a
jar
of
poisoned
honey
and
a
bag
of
poisoned
wheat
,
which
he
placed
,
with
a
cruel
chuckle
of
grim
glee
,
to
tempt
the
eyes
of
his
spoilers
.
But
the
spoiler
,
being
of
his
own
household
,
saw
this
trap
set
,
and
was
aware
of
it
.
In
a
week
or
two
the
need
for
these
acts
which
she
hated
ceased
.
She
learned
that
the
stranger
for
whom
she
thus
risked
her
body
and
soul
,
had
found
a
boatman’s
work
upon
the
water
which
,
although
a
toil
rough
and
rude
,
and
but
poorly
paid
,
still
sufficed
to
give
him
bread
.
Through
she
was
herself
so
pressed
with
hunger
,
many
a
time
,
that
as
she
went
through
the
meadows
and
hedgerows
she
was
glad
to
crush
in
her
teeth
the
tender
shoots
of
the
briars
,
and
the
acrid
berry
of
the
brambles
,
she
never
again
,
unbidden
,
touched
so
much
as
a
mouldy
crust
thrown
out
to
be
eaten
by
the
poultry
.
Flamma
,
counting
his
possessions
greedily
night
and
morning
,
blessed
the
saints
for
the
renewed
safety
of
his
dwelling
,
and
cast
forth
the
poisoned
wheat
as
a
thank‐offering
to
the
male
birds
who
were
for
ever
flying
to
and
fro
their
nested
mates
in
the
leafless
boughs
above
the
earliest
violets
,
and
whose
little
throats
were
strangled
even
in
their
glad
flood
of
nuptial
song
,
and
whose
soft
bright
eyes
grew
dull
in
death
ere
even
they
had
looked
upon
the
springtide
sun
.
For
it
was
ever
thus
that
Folle‐Farine
saw
men
praise
God
.
She
took
their
death
to
her
own
door
,
sorrowing
and
full
of
remorse
.
“
Had
I
never
stolen
the
food
,
these
birds
might
never
have
perished
,
”
she
thought
,
as
she
say
the
rosy
throats
of
the
robins
and
bullfinches
turned
upward
in
death
on
the
turf
.
She
blamed
herself
bitterly
with
an
aching
heart
.
The
fatality
which
makes
human
crime
recoil
on
the
innocent
creatures
of
the
animal
world
oppressed
her
with
its
heavy
and
hideous
injustice
.
Their
God
was
good
,
they
said
:
yet
for
her
sin
and
her
grandsire’s
greed
the
harmless
song‐birds
died
by
the
score
in
torment
.
“
How
shall
a
God
be
good
who
is
not
just
?
”
she
thought
.
In
this
mute
young
lonely
soul
of
hers
Nature
had
sown
a
strong
passion
for
justice
,
a
strong
instinct
towards
what
was
righteous
.
As
the
germ
of
a
plant
born
in
darkness
underground
will
,
by
sheer
instinct
,
uncurl
its
colourless
tendrils
,
and
thrust
them
through
crevices
and
dust
,
and
the
close
structure
of
mortared
stones
,
until
they
reach
the
light
and
grow
green
and
strong
in
it
,
so
did
her
nature
strive
,
of
its
own
accord
,
through
the
gloom
enveloping
it
,
towards
those
moral
laws
which
in
all
ages
and
all
lands
remain
the
same
,
no
matter
what
deity
be
worshipped
,
or
what
creed
be
called
the
truth
.
He
nascent
mind
was
darkened
,
oppressed
,
bewildered
,
perplexed
,
even
like
the
plant
which
,
forcing
itself
upward
from
its
cellar
,
opens
it
leaves
not
in
pure
air
and
under
a
blue
sky
,
but
in
the
reek
and
smoke
and
fœtid
odours
of
a
city
.
Yet
,
like
the
plant
,
she
vaguely
felt
that
light
was
somewhere
;
and
as
vaguely
sought
it
.
With
most
days
she
took
her
grandsire’s
boat
to
and
fro
the
town
,
fetching
or
carrying
;
there
was
no
mode
of
transit
so
cheap
to
him
as
this
,
whose
only
cost
was
her
fatigue
.
With
each
passage
up
and
down
the
river
,
she
passed
by
the
dwelling
of
Arslàn
.
Sometimes
she
saw
him
;
once
or
twice
,
in
the
twilight
,
he
spoke
to
her
;
she
only
bent
her
head
to
hide
her
face
from
him
,
and
rowed
more
quickly
on
her
homeward
way
in
silence
.
At
other
times
,
in
his
absence
,
and
when
she
was
safe
from
any
detection
,
she
entered
the
dismal
solitudes
where
he
laboured
,
and
gazed
in
rapt
and
awed
amazement
at
the
shapes
that
were
shadowed
forth
upon
the
walls
.
The
service
by
which
he
gained
his
daily
bread
was
on
the
waters
,
and
took
him
often
leagues
away
—
simple
hardy
toil
,
amongst
fishers
and
canal‐carriers
and
bargemen
.
But
it
left
him
some
few
days
,
and
all
his
nights
,
free
for
art
;
and
never
in
all
the
years
of
his
leisure
had
his
fancy
conceived
and
his
hand
created
more
exquisite
dreams
and
more
splendid
phantasies
than
now
in
this
bitter
and
cheerless
time
,
when
he
laboured
amidst
the
poorest
for
the
bare
bread
of
life
.
“
De
belles
choses
peuvent
se
faire
dans
une
cave
;
”
and
in
truth
the
gloom
of
the
cellar
gives
birth
to
an
art
more
sublime
than
the
light
of
the
palace
can
ever
beget
.
Suffering
shortens
the
years
of
the
artist
,
and
kills
him
oftentimes
ere
his
prime
be
reached
;
but
in
suffering
alone
are
all
great
works
conceived
.
The
senses
,
the
passions
,
the
luxuries
,
the
lusts
of
the
flesh
,
the
delirium
of
the
desires
,
the
colours
,
the
melodies
,
the
fragrance
,
the
indolences
,
—
all
that
made
the
mere
“
living
of
life
”
delightful
,
all
go
to
enrich
and
to
deepen
the
human
genius
which
steeps
itself
in
them
;
but
it
is
in
exile
from
these
that
alone
it
can
rise
to
its
greatest
.
The
grass
of
the
Holy
River
gathers
perfume
from
the
marvelous
suns
,
and
the
moonless
nights
,
and
the
gorgeous
bloom
of
the
east
,
from
the
aromatic
breath
of
the
leopard
and
the
perfume
of
the
fallen
pomegranate
,
and
the
sacred
oil
that
floats
in
the
lamps
,
and
the
caress
of
the
girl‐bathers’
feet
,
and
the
myrrh‐dropping
unguents
that
glide
from
the
maidens’
bare
limbs
in
the
moonlight
,
—
the
grass
holds
and
feeds
on
them
all
.
But
not
till
the
grass
has
been
torn
from
the
roots
,
and
been
crushed
,
and
been
bruised
and
destroyed
,
can
the
full
odours
exhale
of
all
it
has
tasted
and
treasured
.
Even
the
imagination
of
man
may
be
great
,
but
it
can
never
be
at
its
greatest
until
one
serpent
,
with
merciless
fangs
,
has
bitten
it
through
and
through
,
and
impregnated
it
with
passion
and
with
poison
,
—
that
one
deathless
serpent
which
is
Memory
.
Arslàn
had
never
been
more
ceaselessly
pursued
by
innumerable
phantasies
,
and
never
had
given
to
these
a
more
terrible
force
,
a
more
perfect
utterance
,
than
now
,
when
the
despair
which
possessed
him
was
absolute
,
—
when
it
seemed
to
him
that
he
had
striven
in
his
last
strife
with
fate
,
and
been
thrown
never
to
rise
again
,
—
when
he
kept
his
body
alive
by
such
soulless
ceaseless
labour
as
that
of
the
oxen
in
the
fields
—
when
he
saw
every
hour
drift
by
,
barren
,
sullen
,
painful
,
—
when
only
some
dull
yet
staunch
instinct
of
virility
held
him
back
from
taking
his
own
life
in
the
bleak
horror
of
these
fruitless
days
,
—
when
it
seemed
to
him
that
his
oath
before
Hermes
,
to
make
men
call
him
famous
,
was
idle
as
a
sigh
of
a
desert
wind
through
the
hollow
ears
of
a
skull
bleaching
white
on
the
sand
.
Yet
he
had
never
done
greater
things
—
never
in
the
long
years
through
which
he
had
pursued
and
studied
art
.
With
the
poor
wage
that
he
earned
by
labour
he
bought
by
degrees
the
tools
and
pigments
lacking
to
him
,
and
lived
on
the
scantiest
and
simplest
food
,
that
he
might
have
wherewith
in
order
to
render
into
shape
and
colour
the
imaginations
of
his
brain
.
And
it
was
on
these
that
the
passionate
,
wondering
,
half‐blinded
eyes
of
Folle‐Farine
looked
with
awe
and
adoration
in
those
lonely
hours
when
,
in
his
absence
,
she
stole
into
his
chamber
,
and
touching
