II. Dreaming when Dawn's Left Hand was in the Sky I heard a Voice within the Tavern cry, "Awake, my Little ones, and fill the Cup Before Life's Liquor in its Cup be dry."


LI. The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.


XXXV. I think the Vessel, that with fugitive Articulation answer'd, once did live, And merry make; and the cold Lip I kiss'd How many Kisses might it take  and give.


LXII. Another said  "Why, ne'er a peevish Boy Would break the Bowl from which he drank in Joy; Shall He that made the Vessel in pure Love And Fansy, in an after Rage destroy!" LXIII. None answer'd this; but after Silence spake A Vessel of a more ungainly Make: "They sneer at me for leaning all awry; What?


LXI. Then said another  "Surely not in vain My substance from the common Earth was ta'en, That He who subtly wrought me into Shape Should stamp me back to common Earth again."


VI. And David's Lips are lock't; but in divine High piping Pelevi, with "Wine! Wine! Wine! Red Wine!"  the Nightingale cries to the Rose That yellow Cheek of hers to'incarnadine.


XLIII. The Grape that can with Logic absolute The Two and Seventy jarring Sects confute: The subtle Alchemist that in a Trice Life's leaden Metal into Gold transmute. XLIV. The mighty Mahmud, the victorious Lord, That all the misbelieving and black Horde Of Fears and Sorrows that infest the Soul Scatters and slays with his enchanted Sword.


XLVIX. 'Tis all a Chequer board of Nights and Days Where Destiny with Men for Pieces plays: Hither and thither moves, and mates, and slays, And one by one back in the Closet lays.


LXVIII. That ev'n my buried Ashes such a Snare Of Perfume shall fling up into the Air, As not a True Believer passing by But shall be overtaken unaware.


Moral speeches are undoubtedly his leading article, and of these, it must be owned, he has an inexhaustible stock. He is as chock full of noble sentiments as a bladder is of wind.


The early Christian martyrs were sinful and worldly compared with an Adelphi gallery.


or the police attempt to run him in. Then two villains, three extra hired ruffians and four detectives are about his fighting weight. If he knocks down less than three men with one blow, he fears that he must be ill, and wonders "Why this strange weakness?"


He soon gives up trying it at all, and prefers to eke out an uncertain existence by sponging upon good natured old Irish women and generous but weak minded young artisans who have left their native village to follow him and enjoy the advantage of his company and conversation.


Then he gets suddenly let in, generally by the comic man. It always happens so. Yet the villain is always intensely surprised each time. He never seems to learn anything from experience.


In nine cases out of ten you would get off scot free but for this idiotic custom of yours. Do keep away from the place. Go abroad or to the sea side when the last act begins and stop there till it is over. You will be safe then.


The maid or friend does not waste time in simile or in metaphor. She calls him a black hearted scoundrel and clumps him over the head.


If there were any other crimes he could commit to win her affection, he would, for her sweet sake, commit them cheerfully. But he doesn't know any others  at all events, he is not well up in any others  and she still does not care for him, and what is he to do?


It is quite a fine night before she comes on the scene: the moment she appears it begins to snow. It snows heavily all the while she remains about, and the instant she goes it clears up again and keeps dry for the rest of the evening.


No, our advice to the stage heroine is to get rid of the hero as soon as possible, marry the villain, and go and live abroad somewhere where the comic man won't come fooling around. She will be much happier.


Middle class people and others on the stage who are short of purses have to content themselves with throwing about rolls of bank notes and tipping servants with five pound checks. Very stingy people on the stage have been known to be so cussed mean as to give away mere sovereigns.


As we have said, he is not a rich man and he never seems to earn any money. Sometimes he keeps a shop, and in the way he manages business it must be an expensive thing to keep, for he never charges anybody for anything, he is so generous.


How can any one with a human heart beneath his bosom suggest that people like that should pay for their rest and washing?


He does it all in such a genial, light hearted spirit that it is not in one's heart to feel angry with him.


On the eldest daughter's birthday, when there is a big party on, is his favorite time. He comes in about midnight and tells them just as they are going down to supper.


In stage literature of a frivolous nature the lawyer is a very different individual. In comedy he is young, he possesses chambers, and he is married (there is no doubt about this latter fact); and his wife and his mother in law spend most of the day in his office and make the dull old place quite lively for him.


She has grit and go in her. She is alive. She can do something to help herself besides calling for "George."


They all go with her in a body when she calls on her young man, and it is as much as she can do to persuade them to go into the next room even for five minutes, and give her a chance.


She seems a smart business woman, and she would probably get on very well if it were not for her friends and relations. Friends and relations are a trying class of people even in real life, as we all know, but the friends and relations of the stage adventuress are a particularly irritating lot.


All attempts to kill this young man ought really to be given up now. The job has been tried over and over again by villains and bad people of all kinds, but no one has ever succeeded.


the innocent joy of the pure hearted boy long ere the demoralizing influence of our vaunted civilization has dragged him down into the depths of the short clay. But behind the cigarette on the stage lurks ever black hearted villainy and abandoned womanhood.


You can waste your time on earthquakes and shipwrecks, volcanic eruptions, floods, explosions, railway accidents, and such like sort of things, if you are foolish enough to do so; but it is no good your imagining that anything of the kind can hurt him, because it can't.


It always means sudden death!" To return to our adventuress.


It is the dissipation of the Y.


We took the letter to our own solicitors and explained the circumstances to them. They said it seemed to be a very sad case, but advised us to pay the 50 pounds, and we borrowed the money and did so. Since then we have lost faith, somehow, in the British drama as a guide to the conduct of life.


We felt this was the time to begin. We skipped between her and the door. We held our hat in front of us, cocked our head on one side, and said: "Don't go! don't go!" The girl seemed alarmed. We began to get a little nervous ourselves, but we had begun it and we meant to go through with it.


The stage child does not wear a hole in the seat of its knickerbockers and have to have a patch let in. The stage child comes downstairs on its feet.


We asked him if he would like to try any other place of amusement, but he said "No." He said that when you came to think of it, it seemed a waste of money for a man with eleven children of his own to go about to places of entertainment nowadays.


The hall was densely crowded, and we had great difficulty in forcing our way to our seats. We reached them at length, and then turned our eyes toward the orchestra. "The marvelous boy pianist  only ten years old!" was giving a recital. Then our friend rose and said he thought he would give it up and go home.


After that it runs amuck up and down the whole play and makes everybody sit up all round.


It asks eminently respectable old maids if they wouldn't like to have a baby; and it wants to know why bald headed old men have left off wearing hair, and why other old gentlemen have red noses and if they were always that color.


We assured him that he would really see a grown up person if he waited a bit, so he sat out the boys and also their little sister on a bicycle and waited for the next item. It turned out to be an infant phenomenon who sang and danced in fourteen different costumes, and we once more fled.


A stage child does not ask twenty complicated questions a minute about things that you don't understand, and then wind up by asking why you don't seem to know anything, and why wouldn't anybody teach you anything when you were a little boy.


He wanted to forget that there were such things as children in the world. We got up to the Strand and dropped into the first theater we came to.


As for Trafalgar Square, the hero always chooses that spot when he wants to get away from the busy crowd and commune in solitude with his own bitter thoughts; and the good old lawyer leaves his office and goes there to discuss any very delicate business over which he particularly does not wish to be disturbed.


So, too, with the maiden. Most girls of fifteen off the stage, so our experience goes, know as much as there is any actual necessity for them to know, Mr. Gilbert notwithstanding; but when we see a young lady of fifteen on the stage we wonder where her cradle is.


How it has managed to get blocked we cannot say. It has the whole road to itself, and is, in fact, itself the only traffic for miles round. Yet there it sticks for hours. The police make no attempt to move it on and the passengers seem quite contented.


The comic lovers' mission in life is to serve as a sort of "relief" to the misery caused the audience by the other characters in the play; and all that is wanted now is something that will be a relief to the comic lovers.


The stage peasantry like to do their love making as much in public as possible.


They are very sympathetic, are stage peasants. They never seem to have any affairs of their own to think about, but they make up for this by taking a three hundred horse power interest in things in which they have no earthly concern. What particularly rouses them is the heroine's love affairs. They could listen to them all day.


When the good old man is a trustee for any one he can battle against adversity much longer. He is a plucky old fellow, and while that trust money lasts he keeps a brave heart and fights on boldly.


In the center of the poster he was having a friendly fight with seventeen ladies and gentlemen. Judging from the costumes, the affair appeared to be a wedding. A few of the guests had already been killed and lay dead about the floor. The survivors, however, were enjoying themselves immensely, and of all that gay group he was the gayest.


We have seen railway trains rushing into each other at the rate of sixty miles an hour. We have seen houses blown up by dynamite two hundred feet into the air. We have seen the defeat of the Spanish Armada, the destruction of Pompeii, and the return of the British army from Egypt in one "set" each.


We have seen the hero holding the villain up high above his head, and throwing him about that carelessly that we have felt afraid he would break something with him.


He is very poor, but scrupulously honest.


This comes from the habit people on the stage have of recognizing their friends, not by their faces and voices, but by their cloaks and hats.


Sadly the slow acts pass away until one day, as it is getting near closing time, she puts on the blue ulster and the red bonnet again and comes in at the old original door. Then he recognizes her and asks her where she has been all these cruel years.


The detective comes in to their secret councils, with his hat drawn down over his eyes, and followed by the hero speaking in a squeaky voice; and the villains mistake them for members of the band and tell them all their plans.


But it is only in his very busy moments that he has to work to this extent; most of his time is occupied in chatting with the captain.


And I thought I had the folk within: I had the sound of a violin; I had a glimpse through curtain laces Of youthful forms and youthful faces. I had such company outward bound. I went till there were no cottages found.


Good Hours I HAD for my winter evening walk   No one at all with whom to talk, But I had the cottages in a row Up to their shining eyes in snow.


He is very, very like me, from the heels up to the head; And I see him jump before me, when I jump into my bed.


The Chinese plate looked very blue,And wailed, "Oh, dear! what shall we do!"


How public  like a Frog   To tell your name  the livelong June   To an admiring Bog!


I made a boat, I made a town, I searched the caverns up and down, And named them one and all.


Alas! and as my home I neared, How very big my nurse appeared, How great and cool the rooms!


The Owl looked up to the stars above,And sang to a small guitar,"O lovely Pussy! O Pussy, my love,What a beautiful Pussy you are, you are, you are,What a beautiful Pussy you are."


"He hasn't got any hind legs!" he called out. "Fancy a rabbit without any hind legs!" And he began to laugh. "I have!" cried the little Rabbit. "I have got hind legs! I am sitting on them!"


And a tear, a real tear, trickled down his little shabby velvet nose and fell to the ground.


And about his little soft nose and his round black eyes there was something familiar, so that the Boy thought to himself: "Why, he looks just like my old Bunny that was lost when I had scarlet fever!"


But there was no answer, only the little ants ran to and fro, and the bracken swayed gently where the two strangers had passed. The Velveteen Rabbit was all alone.


"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."


And when the Boy dropped off to sleep, the Rabbit would snuggle down close under his little warm chin and dream, with the Boy's hands clasped close round him all night long.


It was light now, for the moon had risen. All the forest was beautiful, and the fronds of the bracken shone like frosted silver.


He thought of those long sunlit hours in the garden how happy they were and a great sadness came over him.


That night, and for many nights after, the Velveteen Rabbit slept in the Boy's bed.


It was a bright, sunny morning, and the windows stood wide open. They had carried the Boy out on to the balcony, wrapped in a shawl, and the little Rabbit lay tangled up among the bedclothes, thinking.


"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept.


They must have been very well made, for their seams didn't show at all, and they changed shape in a queer way when they moved; one minute they were long and thin and the next minute fat and bunchy, instead of always staying the same like he did.


He was wet through with the dew and quite earthy from diving into the burrows the Boy had made for him in the flower bed, and Nana grumbled as she rubbed him off with a corner of her apron. Spring Time "You must have your old Bunny!" she said.


Their feet padded softly on the ground, and they crept quite close to him, twitching their noses, while the Rabbit stared hard to see which side the clockwork stuck out, for he knew that people who jump generally have something to wind them up. But he couldn't see it.


But he snuggled down patiently, and looked forward to the time when the Boy should be well again, and they would go out in the garden amongst the flowers and the butterflies and play splendid games in the raspberry thicket like they used to.


He was Real. The Boy himself had said it. That night he was almost too happy to sleep, and so much love stirred in his little sawdust heart that it almost burst.


[Illustration] AT THE SEASIDE When I was down beside the sea, A wooden spade they gave to me To dig the sandy shore. My holes were hollow like a cup, In every hole the sea came up, Till it could hold no more.


19:139:015 My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. 19:139:016 Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them.


or whither shall I flee from thy presence? 19:139:008 If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.


That is why the stage, with all its efforts, can never be as artificial as life; even in an Ibsen drama one must reveal to the audience things that one would suppress before the children or servants.


After all, life teems with things that have no earthly reason. And whenever the characters could think of nothing brilliant to say about marriage or the War Office, they could open a window and listen to the howling of the wolves. But that would be very seldom."


She began with a dancing bear, and you know Agatha doesn't approve of dancing, except at Buckingham Palace under proper supervision. And then she got up on the piano and gave them an organ monkey; I gather she went in for realism rather than a Maeterlinckian treatment of the subject.


Well, they were getting along quite happily, and their married life was one continuous exchange of picture postcards; and then one day they were thrown together on some neutral ground where foursomes and washerwomen overlapped, and discovered that they were hopelessly divided on the Fiscal Question.


That isn't where the indelicacy comes in. She went out riding with me, which was entirely her own suggestion, and as we were coming home through some meadows she made a quite unnecessary attempt to see if her pony would jump a rather messy sort of brook that was there.


It wouldn't. It went with her as far as the water's edge, and from that point Mrs. Nicorax went on alone.


I didn't like to question him on the subject  that showed my delicacy. Mrs. Nicorax says I have no delicacy; she hasn't forgiven me about the mice.


I hate travelling on Boxing Day, but one must occasionally do things that one dislikes.


A young lady with a confidential voice favoured us with a long recitation about a little girl who died or did something equally hackneyed, and then the Major gave us a graphic account of a struggle he had with a wounded bear.


The Duchess objected to the Amen, which I thought gave an air of forgiveness and _chose jugee_ to the whole thing; also she said it wasn't Persian enough, as though I were trying to sell her a kitten whose mother had married for love rather than pedigree.


Dear Agatha gave me the album, and she would be mortified to the quick"   I said I didn't believe Agatha had a quick, and we got quite heated in arguing the matter.


I never can remember which Party Irene discourages with her support, but I shan't forget an occasion when I was staying at her place and she gave me a pamphlet to leave at the house of a doubtful voter, and some grapes and things for a woman who was suffering from a chill on the top of a patent medicine.


She megaphoned back two minutes later, 'You promised you would never mention it; don't you ever keep a promise?'


To be disagreeably exact, I fancy she missed him by about two inches  over anxiousness, probably  but she likes to think she hit him. I've felt that way with a partridge which I always imagine keeps on flying strong, out of false pride, till it's the other side of the hedge.


There was only a sort of mistiness over their minds like the smoky air of an early autumn night.


After a thoughtful moment or two, David drew a long breath and stood upright.


A wide and stiff ruff encircled her neck, a cap of the finest muslin, though rather dingy, covered her head; and her nose was bestridden by a pair of gold bowed spectacles with enormous glasses.


Sometimes they stood stock still, with their hands over their brows to shade their sight from the moonbeams.


Among other things equally probable, she was wont to assert that all the inhabitants of this village (at certain intervals, but whether of twenty five or fifty years, or a whole century, remained a disputable point) were subject to a simultaneous slumber, continuing one hour's space.


He is antichrist, that denieth the Father and the Son. 2:23 Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father: he that acknowledgeth the Son hath the Father also.


And hereby we know that he abideth in us, by the Spirit which he hath given us. 4:1 Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.


3:1 Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not.


5:6 This is he that came by water and blood, even Jesus Christ; not by water only, but by water and blood.


I have written unto you, young men, because ye are strong, and the word of God abideth in you, and ye have overcome the wicked one. 2:15 Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.


These will I sing, and if one of you linger Over my pages in the Long, Long Night, And on some lone line lay a calloused finger, Saying: "It's human true  it hits me right"; Then will I count this loving toil well spent; Then will I dream awhile  content, content.


But I jeered at him, and then there came the Sailor Swede to me, And he said: "I dreamed of my sister's son, who croaked at the age of three.


You can see it gleam in a golden stream in the solitudes of night. And it's mine, all mine  and say! if you have a hundred plunks to spare, I'll let you have the chance of your life, I'll sell you a quarter share. You turn it down?


Some say that the Northern Lights are the glare of the Arctic ice and snow; And some that it's electricity, and nobody seems to know.


And a gorge sheered up in granite walls, and the moose trail crept betwixt; 'Twas as if the earth had gaped too far and her stony jaws were fixt.


Wining meant more than mining then, and life was a dizzy whirl, Gambling and dropping chunks of gold down the neck of a dance hall girl; Till we went clean mad, it seems to me, and we squandered our last poke, And we sold our claim, and we found ourselves one bitter morning  broke.


And a gorge sheered up in granite walls, and the moose trail crept betwixt; 'Twas as if the earth had gaped too far and her stony jaws were fixt. Then the winter fell with a sudden swoop, and the heavy clouds sagged low, And earth and sky were blotted out in a whirl of driving snow.


A bird sang for the joy of spring, so piercing sweet and frail; And blinding bright the land was dight in gay and glittering mail; And with a wondrous black fox skin a man slid down the trail.


"I was sick, soul sick, of the futile chase, and there and then I swore The foul fiend fox might scathless go, for I would hunt no more; Then I rubbed mine eyes in a vast surprise  it stood by my cabin door.


She slipped away as still he lay, she clutched the wondrous fur; Her pulses beat, her foot was fleet, her fear was as a spur; She laughed with glee, she did not see him rise and follow her.


"For look ye, the skin  it's as smooth as sin, and black as the core of the Pit.


Swift came the Big Cold, and opal and gold the lights of the witches arose; The frost tyrant clinched, and the valley was cinched by the stark and cadaverous snows.


By day and by night I strove in men's sight to gather him into the fold, With precept and prayer, with hope and despair, in hunger and hardship and cold.


I loaded my gun at the rise of the sun; to his cabin so softly I slunk.


I only could peer and shudder and fear  'twas ever so ghastly and still; But I knew over there in his lonely despair he was plotting me terrible ill. I knew that he nursed a malice accurst, like the blast of a winnowing flame; I pleaded aloud for a shield, for a shroud  Oh, God! then calamity came. Mad!


Then, wonder wise, I rubbed my eyes and I woke from a horrid dream. The moon rode high in the naked sky, and something bobbed in the stream.


I don't attempt your high falutin' flights; I am more or less uncertain on the key; But I tell you, boys, there's lots and lots of nights When you've taken mighty comfort out of me.


Graybeards and striplings and women, good men and bad men and bold, Leaving our homes and our loved ones, crying exultantly  "Gold!"


"Farewell!" we cried to the humdrum and the yoke of the hireling years; Just like a pack of school boys, and the big crowd cheered us good bye. Never were hearts so uplifted, never were hopes so high.


Spring! and the hillsides flourished, vivid in jewelled green; Spring! and our hearts' blood nourished envy and hatred and spleen.


Gold! We sprang from our stools. Gold! We wheeled in the furrow, fired with the faith of fools.


Our eyes were strained to the summit; the weaklings dropped to the rear, Falling in heaps by the trail side, heart broken, limp and wan; But the gaps closed up in an instant, and heedless the chain went on.


Then, like a rumble of thunder, heard we a canorous roar.


Partner with partner wrangled, each one claiming his due; Wrangled and halved their outfits, sawing their boats in two.


We tightened our girths and our pack straps; we linked on the Human Chain, Struggling up to the summit, where every step was a pain. Gone was the joy of our faces, grim and haggard and pale; The heedless mirth of the shipboard was changed to the care of the trail.


He hinted of a hidden trove, and when I made so bold To question his veracity, this is the tale he told.


"I rose at dawn; I wandered on. 'Tis somewhat fine and grand To be alone and hold your own in God's vast awesome land; Come woe or weal, 'tis fine to feel a hundred miles between The trails you dare and pathways where the feet of men have been.


Personally, I disagree with their ideas.


This wallpaper has a kind of sub pattern in a different shade, a particularly irritating one, for you can only see it in certain lights, and not clearly then.


The paint and paper look as if a boys' school had used it. It is stripped off—the paper—in great patches all around the head of my bed, about as far as I can reach, and in a great place on the other side of the room low down. I never saw a worse paper in my life.


I really have discovered something at last. Through watching so much at night, when it changes so, I have finally found out. The front pattern does move—and no wonder!


There are only two more days to get this paper off, and I believe John is beginning to notice. I don't like the look in his eyes. And I heard him ask Jennie a lot of professional questions about me. She had a very good report to give. She said I slept a good deal in the daytime.


The whole thing goes horizontally, too, at least it seems so, and I exhaust myself in trying to distinguish the order of its going in that direction. They have used a horizontal breadth for a frieze, and that adds wonderfully to the confusion.


But, on the other hand, they connect diagonally, and the sprawling outlines run off in great slanting waves of optic horror, like a lot of wallowing seaweeds in full chase. The whole thing goes horizontally, too, at least it seems so, and I exhaust myself in trying to distinguish the order of its going in that direction.


It used to disturb me at first. I thought seriously of burning the house—to reach the smell. But now I am used to it. The only thing I can think of that it is like is the color of the paper! A yellow smell.


He said there was only one window and not room for two beds, and no near room for him if he took another.


"Better in body perhaps"—I began, and stopped short, for he sat up straight and looked at me with such a stern, reproachful look that I could not say another word. "My darling," said he, "I beg of you, for my sake and for our child's sake, as well as for your own, that you will never for one instant let that idea enter your mind!


I even said so to John one moonlight evening, but he said what I felt was a draught, and shut the window. I get unreasonably angry with John sometimes. I'm sure I never used to be so sensitive. I think it is due to this nervous condition.


But there is something else about that paper—the smell! I noticed it the moment we came into the room, but with so much air and sun it was not bad. Now we have had a week of fog and rain, and whether the windows are open or not, the smell is here. It creeps all over the house.


Then the Count arrived on the scene, and threatened the populace with a switch which he held in his hand.


The Queen espied him from a distance By his right side rode a damsel of noble bearing, and before them, on a hack, came a dwarf carrying in his hand a knotted scourge.


The sword even reaches the skull and cuts a bone of his head, but without penetrating the brain. He stumbles and totters, and while he staggers, Erec pushes him over, so that he falls upon his right side.


Erec wished to delay no longer; so off he starts with the host's daughter by his side, followed by the gentleman and his lady.


I wish my lady, the Queen, to dress her in her best dress of satin and scarlet cloth." (Vv. 1353 1478.) There was a maiden near at hand, very honourable, prudent, and virtuous. She was seated on a bench beside the maid with the white shift, and was her own cousin the niece of my lord the Count.


So weeping she turned back. The tears came to her eyes and ran down her cheeks. When the Queen sees her damsel wounded, she is sorely grieved and angered and knows not what to do.


The Queen remains in the wood, where now the King had come up with the Stag. The King himself outstripped the others at the death. Thus they killed and took the White Stag, and all returned, carrying the Stag, till they came again to Cardigan.


To morrow morning we shall all gaily go to hunt the White Stag in the forest of adventure. And very delightful this hunt will be."


The King makes answer: "That is no lie; and upon her, if there is no remonstrance, I shall bestow the honour of the White Stag."


"Lady, because I have seen a knight errant armed coming upon a grey horse, and if my eyes have not deceived me, I saw a damsel with him; and it seems to me that with him comes the dwarf, who still holds the scourge from which Erec received his lashing."


Then she dons the tunic, and girds herself, binding on tightly a golden belt, and afterwards puts on the mantle.


As soon as Erec arrived, more than a score of squires ran quickly to remove his arms. Any one who was present in that house could have witnessed a happy scene. Erec went first and took his seat; then all the others in order sit down upon the couches, the cushions, and benches.


They strove as best they might to adorn her in such wise that no fault should be found with her attire.


Erec received her joyfully, and now has all he desired. Now they are all happy there: the father is greatly delighted, and the mother weeps for joy.


Gentle lady, consider the matter now and see what need she has of a fine becoming gown." And the Queen at once replies: "You have done quite right; it is fitting that she should have one of my gowns, and I will give her straightway a rich, fair gown, both fresh and new."


In the morning, when the dawn was bright, Erec prepares to start, commanding his horses to be saddled. His fair sweetheart, too, awakes, dresses, and makes ready. The vavasor and his wife rise too, and every knight and lady there prepares to escort the damsel and the knight.


Closely shaving his white coif, the sword descends, cleaving the shield through to the buckle, and cutting more than a span from the side of his hauberk. Then he must have been well stunned, as the cold steel penetrated to the flesh on his thigh. May God protect him now!


But I promise you and vow that if you will fit me out with arms, and will give me your daughter to morrow when I strive for the hawk, I will take her to my country, if God grant me the victory, and I will give her a crown to wear, and she shall be queen of three cities."


All could see how gay she was, and throughout the house there was great rejoicing for the happiness of the maid they loved. (Vv. 1320 1352.) Erec thus addressed the vavasor: "Fair host, fair friend, fair sire!


A child can ride him, for he is neither skittish nor balky, nor does he bite nor kick nor become unmanageable.


So at parting many a tear was shed, as weeping they commend one another to God, and thus separate without more delay. (Vv. 1479 1690.) Erec quit his host; for he was very anxious to reach the royal court.


But tell me now, so help thee God, what is thy name?" And he replies: "Lady, my name is Yder, son of Nut."


I bring you myself, my damsel, and my dwarf to do with us as you please."


"Lady," said he, "you were in the right, and those who blame me do so with reason. And now at once prepare yourself to take the road. Rise up from here, and dress yourself in your richest robe, and order your saddle to be put on your best palfrey."


"Ah!" said she, "poor fool! I was too happy, for there lacked me nothing.


Hear how he kept his covenant: for he sent him now five sumpter mules, strong and sleek, loaded with dresses and clothes, buckrams and scarlets, marks of gold and silver plate, furs both vair and grey, skins of sable, purple stuffs, and silks.


She was so gentle and honourable, of wise speech and affable, of pleasing character and kindly mien.


I have told you that once, and I say it again. This once again I will pardon you; but another time restrain yourself, and do not again turn around to watch me: for in doing so you would be very foolish. I do not relish your words."


"Alas," quoth he, "how grieved I am to see you in such humble state! I am sorry and feel great distress. But if you would believe my word, you could have honour and great advantage, and much wealth would accrue to you. Such beauty as yours is entitled to great honour and distinction.


Weeping, they kiss and embrace him, and are almost beside themselves with grief. I think they would not have been more sad if they had seen him dead or wounded.


She makes answer: "I will never do so, fair sire, if it be your will." Then they ride on, and she holds her peace.


In front of the gate of the town the strife began again between those within and those without.


About this man I can tell you the truth: that he was very small of stature, but very courageous of heart.


No one spoke any ill of her, for no one could do so. In the realm or empire there was no lady of such good manners.


Now the horses are saddled, and the lady summoned the host. Erec has armed and dressed himself, and into his presence came the host.


On either side the ranks tremble, and a roar rises from the fight. The shock of the lances is very great.


The lady was seated about two spear lengths away from him. And the Count took his seat close beside her on a low stool. Prudent and courteous, the lady turned toward him.


They both sat down side by side upon a soft white couch, where they chat with each other. The Count makes him an offer and urges him to consent to accept from him a guarantee for the payment of his expenses in the town. But Erec does not deign to accept, saying he is well supplied with money, and has no need to accept aught from him.


Erec replies: "I, too, can boast that I am a noble man. My name is Erec, son of King Lac.


Never shall he receive harm through me if I can in any way prevent it. I command you all to retrace your steps." Back they go disconsolate, carrying the lifeless seneschal on the shield reversed.


When he sees Erec cross the bridge, he comes down quickly from his tower, and on a great sorrel steed of his he causes a saddle to be placed, which showed portrayed a golden lion.


You must choose another course, so that you may silence this reproach and regain your former fame; for I have heard too much of this reproach, and yet I did not dare to disclose it to you.


When the third week began, all together by common consent agreed to hold a tournament. On the one side, my lord Gawain offered himself as surety that it would take place between Evroic and Tenebroc: and Meliz and Meliadoc were guarantors on the other side.


Each party wished the other joy: the King makes much of Erec, but all at once breaks off to turn to Enide. On all sides he is in clover: he embraces and kisses them both, and knows not which of the two pleases him the more.


Never was there seen such a blow. They rush together with shields, arms, and horses. But neither girth nor rein nor breast strap could prevent the king from coming to earth. So he flew from his steed, carrying with him saddle and stirrup, and even the reins of his bridle in his hand.


The hunted stag which pants for thirst does not so long for the spring, nor does the hungry sparrow hawk return so quickly when he is called, as did these two come to hold each other in close embrace.


Now Erec is in great peril, and does not know that he must be on his guard. The Count's intentions are very base in planning to steal away his wife and kill him when he is without defence.


What did I come here to seek? The earth ought by right to swallow me up when the best knight, the most hardy, brave, fair, and courteous that ever was a count or king, has completely abjured all his deeds of chivalry because of me.


I well deserved this woe, and now it has come upon me. How abominably disloyal and treacherous I was in my madness! Never was there a better knight born of mother than he.


Then the court separated. (Vv. 2135 2292.) A month after Pentecost the tournament assembled, and the jousting began in the plain below Tenebroc. Many an ensign of red, blue, and white, many a veil and many a sleeve were bestowed as tokens of love.


Erec replies that he has a long road and a full day before him, and therefore he has made ready to set out, having it much upon his mind; and he added: "Sire, you have nor yet handed me any statement of my expenses. You have received me with honour and kindness, and therein great merit redounds to you.


"Ah, sire," says she, "I crave your pardon. Rise quickly now, for you are betrayed beyond all doubt, though guiltless and free from any crime. The Count is a proven traitor, and if he can but catch you here, you will never get away without his having cut you in pieces.


No one could ever be so watchful as to detect in her any folly, or sign of evil or villainy. She had been so schooled in good manners that she had learned all virtues which any lady can possess, as well as generosity and knowledge.


In the great hall there was much merry making, each one contributing what he could to the entertainment: one jumps, another tumbles, another does magic; there is story telling, singing, whistling, playing from notes; they play on the harp, the rote, the fiddle, the violin, the flute, and pipe.


She had been so schooled in good manners that she had learned all virtues which any lady can possess, as well as generosity and knowledge. All loved her for her open heart, and whoever could do her any service was glad and esteemed himself the more. No one spoke any ill of her, for no one could do so.


If thou hast undertaken to fight some knight in single combat, yet shouldst thou not for that reason fail to take a part of thy knights with thee to betoken thy wealth and lordship. A king's son ought not to fare alone.


There was no lack of counts and dukes, but of kings there were still more. Garras of Cork, a doughty king, was there with five hundred knights clad in mantles, hose, and tunics of brocade and silk.


He must needs die, for the blade had drunk of his life's blood. Then one of the other two rushes forward, leaving his companion behind, and spurs toward Erec, threatening him. Erec firmly grasps his shield, and attacks him with a stout heart.


He wished to win them by himself, and would fain attack him first, if they would give him leave: and they willingly gave consent. Then he leaves them and rides ahead on a good and nimble steed. Erec saw him, but made pretence that he did not yet notice him.


Erec replies: "You say well; yet will I not go thither for anything. You know not what my business is: I must yet farther pursue my way. Now let me go; too long I stay. There is still some daylight left."


She makes answer courteously: "Sire, I should have no cause for grief, were I not in great distress for my lord; but as it is, I am in dismay, for he has hardly a limb without a wound."


Behold now Guivret, with lance outstretched, who espied him from afar. They did not recognise each other, for the moon had gone behind the shadow of a dark cloud.


Come Death, and kill me hastily!" With these words she faints upon his body.


"You must be mad to stop me thus," says Erec; "you shall not know that just now."


And Guivret, who treats them kindly, had a high, long bed constructed of quilted coverlids, laid upon grass and reed, which they found in abundance.


He was well kept and well served, and everything that he wished was willingly done. But the damsels cheerfully and gladly showed such devotion in caring for him that by the end of a fortnight he felt no hurt or pain.


Four times or more each day they made him eat and drink, allowing him, however, no garlic or pepper. But whoever might go in or out Enide was always with him, being more than any one else concerned.


"Keep silence, all." the Count replies; "the dame is mine and I am hers, and I will do with her as I please."


The hall is full, the crowd is dense. Each one is anxious to inquire what is this trouble, what marvel here. Meanwhile the Count takes counsel with his barons privily.


And she with prudence makes reply: "Sire, by right you have won us both. Yours we should be, to serve and honour. But who could ever repay half the debt we owe you?"


"Vassal," they say, "what business is this of yours? You must be mad to make any demand of us.


I fear not thy blows, nor yet thy threats. Beat me and strike me, as thou wilt. I shall never heed thy power so much as to do thy bidding more or less, even were thou with thy hands fight now to snatch out my eyes or flay me alive."


"Vassal," they say, "what business is this of yours? You must be mad to make any demand of us. If you do not like it, try and improve matters." Erec replies: "Indeed, I like it not, and you shall not lead him away so easily.


Between the two colours there was a line, greener than a grape vine leaf, which separated the white from the black.


"Vassal," says he, "so help me God, that horse is not mine. Rather does it belong to that knight in whom dwells the greatest prowess in the world, my lord Gawain the Bold.


Grant it to me, whatever it be, if you are in control of it." "In truth, fair friend."


As he was descending a hill he fell suddenly over upon his horse's neck. As he tried to straighten up, he lost his saddle and stirrups, falling, as if lifeless, in a faint.


But the greater the wonder and the more perilous the adventure, the more he covets it and yearns for it, saying: "Sire, I can tell you that I find you a worthy and a loyal man, and I can put no blame on you.


Right there, upon the spot, they took off Erec's armour; and when they saw his wounds, their joy turned to sadness. The King draws a deep sigh at the sight of them, and has a plaster brought which Morgan, his sister, had made.


One was of a dark purple colour, and the other striped, sent to him as a present by a cousin of his from Scotland. Enide had the purple gown trimmed with ermine, which was very precious, while Erec had the striped stuff with the fur, which was no less valuable.


And all around, beneath this wall, ran a very deep stream, roaring rushing like a storm.


But great was his grief and great his woe when he heard the voice of his wife. He stepped to the floor from off the dais and quickly drew his sword. Wrath and the love he bore his wife gave him courage.


When they had bathed, dried, and bound up his wounds, the King leads him and Enide into his own royal tent, saying that he intends, out of love for Erec, to tarry in the forest a full fortnight, until he be completely restored to health.


Unless I am captured or detained, I do not expect to tarry anywhere until I reach the court of King Arthur, whom I hope to find either at Robais or Carduel." To which Guivret makes prompt reply, "Sire, you shall not go off alone!


So gentle and courteous is the King that he has given notice to all his townsmen, appealing to their love for him, that any gentleman from afar should not find lodging in their houses, so that he himself may do honour to all gentlemen who may wish to tarry here."


If you do not like it, try and improve matters." Erec replies: "Indeed, I like it not, and you shall not lead him away so easily. Since you have left the matter in my hands, I say whoever can get possession of him let him keep him. Take your positions.


There is no one so bold as to offer resistance; for they did not believe it could be a man who had thus expelled them, but a devil or some enemy who had entered the dead body. Erec pursues them as they flee, and finds outside in the castle yard a stable boy in the act of leading his steed to the watering place, all equipped with bridle and saddle.


But sorrow is not seemly in a king, nor does it become a king to mourn.


Such was the work of the first fairy.


Enide again is in distress, very sad and ill at ease; all night she is greatly disquieted with the solicitude and fear which she felt for her lord, who is about to expose himself to great peril.


The fur lining that was sewed within, belonged to some strange beasts whose heads are all white, and whose necks are as black as mulberries, and which have red backs and green bellies, and dark blue tail.


"Nay," quoth he, "so help me God! know that you shall have the battle, for I defy and challenge you."


Then the King causes silence to be made, and appeals to Erec and asks news of his adventures. When the noise had ceased, Erec began his story, telling him of his adventures, without forgetting any detail. Do you think now that I shall tell you what motive he had had in starting out?


He was very handsome and attractive. There we had an understanding between us that pleased us both. I never had any wish but his, until at last he began to love me and promised and swore to me that he would always be my lover, and that he would bring me here; that pleased us both alike.


So comfort yourself, and let it be! I cannot longer tarry here, nor can you go along with me; for, as the King has ordered, I must not take you beyond this point."


There is no one who does not gladly offer to do his service. Three whole days the Joy lasted, before Erec could get away.


He falls over upon his face against Erec's breast, and has not strength to rise again.


I could not help myself, unless I were willing to be false and recreant and disloyal. Now I have told you the truth, and be assured that it is no small honour which you have gained.


The news spreads through the country that thus the affair has turned out. Then there was no holding back from coming to the court. All the people hasten thither in confusion, some on foot and some on horse, without waiting for each other.


God save the most blessed man whom God has ever brought into being!"


So God me help, said Sir Tristram, I fear not to tell you my name.


Wit ye well I am King Meliodas' son, and my mother is King Mark's sister, and my name is Sir Tristram de Liones, and King Mark is mine uncle.


Sir, said Bleoberis, I would wit of whence ye be, and of whom ye be come, and what is your name? So God me help, said Sir Tristram, I fear not to tell you my name.


Then they avoided their horses, and lashed together eagerly with swords, and mightily, now tracing and traversing on the right hand and on the left hand more than two hours.


"Thought in the mind hath made us, What we are By thought was wrought and built. If a man's mind Hath evil thoughts, pain comes on him as comes The wheel the ox behind.... ..If one endure In purity of thought, joy follows him As his own shadow  sure."


Even at birth the soul comes to its own and through every step of its earthly pilgrimage it attracts those combinations of conditions which reveal itself, which are the reflections of its own purity and, impurity, its strength and weakness.


Possessed of such knowledge, he will then know, looking back upon his past ignorance and blindness, that his life is, and always was, justly ordered, and that all his past experiences, good and bad, were the equitable outworking of his evolving, yet unevolved self.


That circumstances grow out of thought every man knows who has for any length of time practised self control and self purification, for he will have noticed that the alteration in his circumstances has been in exact ratio with his altered mental condition.


Just as a gardener cultivates his plot, keeping it free from weeds, and growing the flowers and fruits which he requires, so may a man tend the garden of his mind, weeding out all the wrong, useless, and impure thoughts, and cultivating toward perfection the flowers and fruits of right, useful, and pure thoughts.


This is as true of earthly as of heavenly things. Even the man whose sole object is to acquire wealth must be prepared to make great personal sacrifices before he can accomplish his object; and how much more so he who would realize a strong and well poised life?


Not what he wishes and prays for does a man get, but what he justly earns. His wishes and prayers are only gratified and answered when they harmonize with his thoughts and actions.


Such cases could be multiplied and varied almost indefinitely, but this is not necessary, as the reader can, if he so resolves, trace the action of the laws of thought in his own mind and life, and until this is done, mere external facts cannot serve as a ground of reasoning.


Change of diet will not help a man who will not change his thoughts. When a man makes his thoughts pure, he no longer desires impure food.


He who has conquered doubt and fear has conquered failure. His every thought is allied with power, and all difficulties are bravely met and wisely overcome. His purposes are seasonably planted, and they bloom and bring forth fruit, which does not fall prematurely to the ground.


Thoughts of doubt and fear never accomplished anything, and never can. They always lead to failure. Purpose, energy, power to do, and all strong thoughts cease when doubt and fear creep in.


Only in this way can the thoughts be gathered and focussed, and resolution and energy be developed, which being done, there is nothing which may not be accomplished.


All achievements, whether in the business, intellectual, or spiritual world, are the result of definitely directed thought, are governed by the same law and are of the same method; the only difference lies in _the object of attainment.


Your circumstances may be uncongenial, but they shall not long remain so if you but perceive an Ideal and strive to reach it.


Halfway up the scarp was a dark horizontal line of bushes, something like a hedge. Apparently there was a ledge or shelf there, and he decided to climb up to it before he returned home.


"Oh, Phoenix!" David threw his arms around the bird's neck and then, unable to restrain himself any longer, turned a somersault on the grass. "But for the present, it seems to be getting late," said the Phoenix. "We shall talk it over some other time and decide."


There was no need to pinch himself to see if he were dreaming: he was perfectly wide awake. Everything else around him was behaving in a normal way. The mountain was solid beneath him, the sunlight streamed down as before.


They hesitated, not quite sure how to begin. "I trust," said the bird at last, "that you are not of a scientific turn of mind?" "I don't know," said David. "I'm interested in things, if that's what you mean." "No, it is not.


"Well, Phoenix, I was just thinking," David stammered. "It's too bad  I mean, couldn't you  it would be nice if we  Well, do you really _have_ to go to South America? It would be nice if you'd stay a while, until the Scientist shows up, anyway  and I like talking with you...." His face burned. It seemed like a lot to ask.


in a firm tone, looked carefully the other way, and began once more. "_Vivo, vives, vive_  quite correct so far. Ah  _vi_  ah  Oh, dear, these verbs! Where was I? Oh, yes. _Vivo_  " David's head reeled as he watched this amazing performance.


It seemed like a lot to ask. The Phoenix harrumphed several times in its throat and shuffled its feet. "Really, I cannot tell you how  how much you  well, really  such a delightful request! Ah  harrumph! Perhaps it can be arranged."


"I am never frightened. I do not know the meaning of the word." "What I mean is," David said quickly, "that you frightened _me_."


"Each looks like the others, my boy, except that some are bigger and some are smaller. But to continue: Sea Monsters, Leprechauns, Rocs, Gnomes, Elves, Basilisks, Nymphs  ah  and many others.


"I'm glad you like them," David said politely. "And now, my boy," continued the Phoenix, as it settled back comfortably, "I have been thinking. Yesterday you showed an intelligent interest in my problems and asked intelligent questions. You did not scoff, as others might have done. You have very rare qualities."


"Oh," said David weakly, "on your  on your back. Are you sure that  isn't there some other  I mean, can you do it?" The Phoenix drew itself up to its full height. "I am hurt  yes, deeply hurt  by your lack of faith.


"Yes. Your education will  " "Oh, Phoenix, Phoenix!" David jumped up and began to caper, while the Phoenix beamed. But suddenly he stopped. "How are we going to travel, Phoenix?" "I have wings, my boy." "Yes, but I don't." "Do not be so dense, my dear fellow. I shall carry you on my back, of course."


Oaf! Boor!" "A _very_ annoying animal," said David angrily. "I agree, my boy. But the Gryffins are different, I assure you. Now, let me see. Where should we look  " "There they come!" David cried suddenly. "Look!" And indeed, a number of winged creatures were loping down a hillside toward them.


Within half an hour they had run into a heavy overcast, and for a long time it was like flying through very wet, cold cotton.


"Phoenix," the lady continued coaxingly, "I'm awfully bored. Won't you race me? Please?"


The world was falling away, and everything on it was growing smaller by the second. The valley could be cradled in two hands; the mountains on either side looked like wrinkles in gray cloth. Now he could see plains in the distance, and little silver threads of rivers.


Its claws were shabby and split, and numerous black flies were crawling over its haunches. The bush trembled with its snoring. "Bah! We are wasting our time here, my boy. This is a Gryffen. A disgusting brute, isn't it?" And the Phoenix sniffed disapprovingly.


"So it isn't Saturday?" "No," said David. "What we want to know is  " "Not Saturday," said the Gryffen, sinking down to the ground with a huge sigh of relief. "Ah! Come back on Saturday. Saturday afternoon. I generally get up on Saturday ... in the ... afternoon...." The words faded into a snore.


They flopped on the sand, panting. And David, suddenly feeling very faint, closed his eyes and put his head between his knees.


"Where are you going, Phoenix?" David asked. "Some business to attend to, my boy." Muttering under its breath something that sounded like "tail feathers, indeed!"


You have also heard, of course, of the penalty for breaking the Rule, which you must suffer along with this human boy?" "Now, one moment, my dear Gryffon! I  ah  " "Death!" The Phoenix quailed, and David's legs went limp under him. But they had no chance to plead with the Gryffons.


(I never saw a Witch who was a good loser.) And I  well, the fact is, my boy, that I am not as young as I used to be. I simply _crawled_ home."


"Phoenix," he whispered, "wake up. Here's your  " The Phoenix awoke with a violent start and stared wildly around the room.


Weak with relief, David snapped on the bedside light. The Phoenix presented a shocking sight. Its face was drawn with fatigue, and it looked rather draggled.


_ "David here spends all his time up on the mountain," his father said. "Maybe he's seen it." The guest turned his big, pale, unpleasant eyes on David. "Well, David," he said, "maybe you can help me.


"What a night, my boy, _what_ a night!" it sighed weakly, closing its eyes. "Oh, Phoenix, what happened? Can I do anything for you?" David whispered.


Its back sagged, its wings drooped to the floor, and it walked with a limp. [Illustration] "Oh, Phoenix, Phoenix!" David whispered. He jumped to support the bird before it collapsed entirely. "Ah, thank you, my boy," the Phoenix murmured. "Your bed, I presume? May I? Thank you."


"David, dear," said Mother with an awkward laugh, "I think you'd better go upstairs and wash and change." When David came into the living room again, the guest was talking excitedly. "... completely unknown to man," he was saying. "It's the discovery of the age. My name will be famous if I succeed in my plans."


"Your bed, I presume? May I? Thank you." The springs creaked under its weight as the Phoenix gingerly lay down.


"There you are  I had to win, for both of us. Now, as I wended my weary way homeward, I realized that I should be too tired to go traveling tomorrow. So I decided to tell you, in case you should want to do something else during the day. But I did not know which house was yours. I had to pick one at random.


It avoided me in a very clever way, and it avoided my traps also. Uncanny!


It was a maddening wait. The Scientist's voice went on and on like the drone of an electric fan, interrupted only by an occasional murmur from Mother or Dad. For a while David sat in bed twisting the sheets in his hands; then he got up and paced the room in his bare feet.


Gradually the house calmed down. Beckie stopped wailing, Dad put away his gun, good nights were said, the lights were turned off. David knew that it would be at least an hour before he dared to move again, and he would have to be doubly careful this time.


"I _think_ you were telling me what happened to you tonight," David said. "Ah, yes, quite so! Well, I raced the Witch, to put it quite simply." "Oh, Phoenix! Did you win?"


Mother said in a horrified voice. "Your poor back! What _happened_ to you?" [Illustration] David felt himself. The back of his shirt was ripped to tatters, and there were three lines of caked blood across his shoulders.


No, his money is all tied up in Arabian oil speculation. Aha! Why didn't I think of that before? The Sea Monster, of course!"


"Monster, old chap, old friend, you were never one to let a boon companion down. If I have said it once, I have said it a hundred times: 'The Sea Monster,' I have said, 'the Sea Monster is the helpful sort.


The Sea Monster was not interested in the treasure, but kept glancing nervously out to sea. At last the Phoenix said, "Well, my boy, I think we had better make our choice. Three or four coins should do it."


It had huge seal like flippers, and its polished brown hide was made up of scales as big as dinner plates. "Wake up, Monster!" The Phoenix cried. "We  " The next instant they were lost in a cloud of flying sand and spray, through which could be heard a prodigious splash.


At last the Phoenix said, "Well, my boy, I think we had better make our choice. Three or four coins should do it." The Sea Monster gave a relieved sigh. "Let's get the rest of it underground right away. You have no idea what trouble it can cause."


And search they did, atoll after atoll, until at the end of an hour they were rewarded. David suddenly spotted a dark object stretched out on the beach of a lagoon, and at the same time the Phoenix said "Aha!" triumphantly. They began to spiral down.


"There," David whispered, pointing. Thirty feet offshore, an ear was being thrust cautiously above the rippled surface. It twitched once or twice, then pointed quiveringly in their direction.


The choice was difficult. There were so many coins, all of them with queer writing and heads of unknown gods and kings.


"Come out, Monster!" the Phoenix shouted. "It is I, the Phoenix." The Sea Monster's head appeared slowly, followed by several yards of neck. It peered at them short sightedly, weaving its head from side to side to get a better view.


"Of course, my boy. Curiosity, if nothing else, will bring it up again. In the meantime, we might as well sit down and wait." They sat down and waited. David took off his jacket. For fifteen minutes they heard nothing but the murmuring of the surf and the rustling clatter of palm fronds. At last there was a slight splashing noise from the lagoon.


David suddenly remembered what they had come for, and the excitement rushed back into his heart.


said the Sea Monster hesitantly, pointing one ear at David. "This," said the Phoenix, "is David. He is getting an education.


Suddenly it happened. There was a terrific burst of blue light, a sharp squawk from the Phoenix, and a shower of sparks. Another blue flash blazed up.


"I think they're open till six," said David, shaking the sand out of his shoes. "Are we going to buy something?"


The Phoenix took the screw driver in one claw and flew up to the top of the pole. David could hear the creak of the lines under the Phoenix's weight and the rattling of the screw driver against the porcelain insulators.


If you climb the mountainside in the dark, you may unwittingly fall into our own snare. It is far easier for me to come down than it is for you to go up, and under cover of darkness I can do it quite safely.


And what was the rope for? And the hatchet? The more he puzzled over it the more confused he became, and finally he just gave up. There was only one thing he was sure about: whatever the Plan was, they would have to carry it out as soon as possible. Two days had passed since the Scientist had shown up.


"Defeat and confusion to the enemy!" the Phoenix shouted, giving the special squawk which was its battle cry. The Banshee received her gold. The Phoenix told David for goodness sake not to drop the box or let the lid pop open, or they would regret it to their dying day.


Then the Banshee caught sight of David and hobbled over to him, peering into his frightened eyes.


My tail was still on fire when I landed, too. I fully expected to be burned to a crisp." A large tear rolled down the Phoenix's beak. David murmured soothing words and continued to chafe the Phoenix's foot. "Does it feel any better now?"


The Phoenix plunged in, and David nervously followed. The cave turned out to be a long passageway which led, after several turns, into a chamber. From the ceiling of this rocky vault hung an electric light bulb, which glared feebly through drifts of smoke.


"Nonsense, my boy," said the Phoenix. "A head so stuffed with scientific fact cannot be injured. He will come to in a short while." The Phoenix lifted the Scientist's sun helmet and examined the back of his head.


David murmured soothing words and continued to chafe the Phoenix's foot. "Does it feel any better now?" "The feeling is coming back, my boy," said the Phoenix, gritting its beak. "Ouch! All pins and needles." It flexed its toes gingerly. "Rub a bit more, please. Gently."


One ruby drop of fluid fell into the bottle. It darted forth rays of light as it fell, and tinkled like a silver coin rolling down flights of marble steps. [Illustration] The Banshee corked the bottle and held it up proudly to the light.


"Quite right, my boy," the Phoenix mumbled, with its mouth full. "Have a sandwich  spoils of war  peanut butter  very nourishing.


8: _In Which David and the Phoenix Visit a Banshee, and a Surprise Is Planted in the Enemy's Camp_ [Illustration] Next day Mother asked David to help her straighten out the garden, which had been trampled by the repair men; so he could not go to see the Phoenix until after lunch.


it took some quick dodging to escape the horns of the angry rams. They left the goats alone, because of their sharper horns and the wicked look in their eyes.


"No," said David. "I wish I could, though." "The educational value of dancing is practically nil," the Phoenix began severely. "I advise  " "Sure you can dance," said the Faun. "Listen." He brought the pipes to his lips and began to play.


"Do I have one too?" "Of course, my boy. We all do." David was glad of that. He did not know exactly what a destiny was, however, and he tried to think of how one would look.


Above them flew birds and butterflies and beetles and bats in swirling clouds. Full voiced, the glorious pipes sang.


The piping grew fainter in the distance, its magic weakened. The enchanted dancers diminished into specks, the valley fell away until it was only a green splash nestled among the jagged peaks. And David burst into tears


It was almost as good as flying, except that you got jolted off sooner or later. Then watch out!  it took some quick dodging to escape the horns of the angry rams.


It was an even race until they reached the pedestal, but there David tried to turn without slowing down, slipped on the grass, and went sprawling on his hands and knees.


run ... run...." "Phoenix!"


Dimly, through his tears, David saw the Phoenix pluck the longest, bluest feather from its tail, and he felt it being pressed into his hand.


"Well, my boy  well, the fact _is_  yes, I do know. It came to me this morning while I was constructing the  ah  nest, here. I am afraid it will be a bit hard to explain. The cinnamon  ah  the cinnamon  well, cinnamon _branches_ are what I should really have...."


"This, my boy, is a pyre. A bit untidy around the edges, but nonetheless a pyre." "Oh," said David. "What's that?" "Well  a _pyre_, you know  a sort of fire, as it were." "Oh, _fire_. I thought you said  oh, yes. Fire. Isn't it awfully _warm_ for a fire?"


"Precisely, my boy. But he will have something to keep him busy when he returns. I took the liberty of destroying his blind. _That_ will hold him."


"But there was something else," David said. "Something ... Didn't somebody say, 'Follow, before it is too late,' or something like that?


There he was spied by a Hawk, who pounced down on him and seized him in his talons. The Frog was unable to loose the knot which bound him to the Mouse, and thus was carried off along with him and eaten by the Hawk.


In order that they might never be separated, the Frog tied himself and the Mouse together by the leg with a piece of thread.


Says it is to call it by when I want it to come. I said it was superfluous, then. The word evidently raised me in its respect; and indeed it is a large, good word, and will bear repetition.


It says it is not an It, it is a She. This is probably doubtful; yet it is all one to me; what she is were nothing to me if she would but go by herself and not talk.


Went over in a tub—still not satisfactory. Swam the Whirlpool and the Rapids in a fig leaf suit. It got much damaged. Hence, tedious complaints about my extravagance. I am too much hampered here. What I need is change of scene.


She used to carry the young tigers around so, and play with them, before we lost our property; but it was only play; she never took on about them like this when their dinner disagreed with them.


Found me out, and has named the place Tonawanda—says it looks like that. In fact, I was not sorry she came, for there are but meagre pickings here, and she brought some of those apples. I was obliged to eat them, I was so hungry.


I knew what it meant—Eve had eaten that fruit, and death was come into the world….


"Yes. But they're accustomed to the Venus hotland marshes; it's been dry weather for the last two weeks, all over the northeastern section of the Northern Continent. I'll be able to hear it, long before it gets close to me. And I'll be wearing an electric headlamp. When I snap that on, it'll be dazzled, for a moment."


"Elapsed years since the birth of some religious leader," Verkan Vall explained. "And did you find out about my rifle?" "Oh, yes. It's reproduction of something that's called a Sharp's Model '37 .235 Ultraspeed Express. Made on an adjoining paratime belt by a company that went out of business sixty seven years ago, elapsed time, on your line of operation.


The nighthound had winded him as he had driven up the old railroad grade, and had followed. Its best running speed had been just good enough to keep it a hundred or so feet behind the jeep, and the motor noise had covered the padding of its feet.


The claw wounds were still smarting vexatiously. A hot bath, and a night's sleep  He took another drink, lit his pipe, picked up his rifle and started across the yard to the house.


With scarcely room enough to turn around in they had been compelled to pay five dollars and a half a month in advance.


So I have thought best to adhere to the original word. The Sutras of Patanjali are as closely knit together, as dependent on each other, as the propositions of Euclid, and can no more be taken out of their proper setting.


Not only has each Sutra a definite place in the system, but further, taken out of this place, it will be almost meaningless, and will by no means be self evident. So I have thought best to adhere to the original word.


This is, indeed, salvation, the purpose of all true religion, in all times. Patanjali has in mind the spiritual man, to be born from the psychical.


12. The control of these psychic activities comes through the right use of the will, and through ceasing from self indulgence.


In order to gain a true understanding of this teaching, study must be supplemented by devoted practice, faith by works. The reading of the words will not avail. There must be a real effort to stand as the Soul, a real ceasing from self indulgence.


Here, as before, the mental power is explained in terms of mind images, which are the material of which the psychic world is built, Therefore the sages teach that the world of our perception, which is indeed a world of mind images, is but the wraith or shadow of the real and everlasting world.


It can only be entered where the conditions are present: purity of heart, and strong aspiration, and the resolute conquest of each sin.


Trustworthy testimony, the sharing of one soul in the wisdom of another, rests on the ultimate oneness of all souls. 8. Unsound intellection is false understanding, not resting on a perception of the true nature of things.


As we climbed down hill for our pleasure, so must we climb up again for our purification and restoration to our former high estate. The process is painful, perhaps, yet indispensable.


We are still considering external, visible objects. Such perception as is here described is of the nature of that penetrating vision whereby Newton, intending his mind on things, made his discoveries, or that whereby a really great portrait painter pierces to the soul of him whom he paints, and makes that soul live on canvas.


The poet, the wise philosopher and the saint not only reach a wide and luminous consciousness, but they gain certain knowledge of substantial reality.


This is a fuller expression of the last Sutra, and is so lucid that comment can hardly add to it. Everything is either perceiver, perceiving, or the thing perceived; or, as we might say, consciousness, force, or matter.


Or the purging of self indulgence from the psychic nature.


In reality, on this latter foundation the life of the spiritual man can never be built; nor, indeed, anything but a psychic counterfeit, a dangerous delusion.


In other words, we cannot cure the pains of life by laying on them any balm. We must cut the root, absorption in the psychical self. So it is said, there is no cure for the misery of longing, but to fix the heart upon the eternal.


Then, as seventh, freed from these potencies, the spiritual man stands forth in his own nature as purity and light. Happy is the spiritual man who beholds this seven fold illumination in its ascending stages.


The fear that arises through the sense of separate, warring selves is to be stilled by the realization of the One Self, the one soul in all. This realization is the perfect love that casts out fear. The hindrances are said to have become subtle when, by initial efforts, they have been located and recognized in the psychic nature.


The aim of fervour, spiritual reading and obedience to the Master, is, to bring soulvision, and to wear away hindrances.


This true discernment, carried out constantly, makes for liberation. 27. His illuminations is sevenfold, rising In successive stages.


All life is but the mirror wherein the Soul learns to know its own face. 24. The cause of this association is the darkness of unwisdom.


The spiritual man is enduring, pure, full of joy, the real Self. The darkness of unwisdom is, therefore, the self absorption of the psychical, personal man, to the exclusion of the spiritual man.


39. Where there is firm conquest of covetousness, he who has conquered it awakes to the how and why of life.


Here are the causes of sin: greed, wrath, infatuation, with their effects, ignorance and pain. The causes are to be cured by better wisdom, by a truer understanding of the Self, of Life.


The commentator thus explains: If he who has attained should say to a man, Become righteous!


The deeper truth is, that he who in every least thing is wholly honest with the spirit of Life, finds Life supporting him in all things, and gains admittance to the treasure house of Life, the spiritual universe.


Exactly the same doctrine was taught by the Master who said to his disciples: Receive ye the Holy Ghost: whose soever sins ye remit they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained.


32. The Rules are these: purity, serenity fervent aspiration, spiritual reading, and per feet obedience to the Master.


Let the sin be forced out by positive growth in the true direction, not by direct opposition. Turn away from the sin and go forward courageously, constructively, creatively, in well doing.


Thereupon follows perfect mastery over the powers.


Only thus can the golden gates be reached and entered. Only thus can we attain to that pure world wherein the spiritual man lives, and moves, and has his being.


14. Every object has its characteristics which are already quiescent, those which are active, and those which are not yet definable.


Unity is the reality; separateness the illusion. The nearer we come to reality, the nearer we come to unity of heart. Sympathy, compassion, kindness are modes of this unity of heart, whereby we rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep.


27. By perfectly concentrated Meditation on the moon comes a knowledge of the lunar mansions.


When the truth concerning fear is thoroughly mastered, through spiritual insight into the immortal, fearless life, then this force is perfectly controlled; there is no more fear, just as, through the control of the psychic power which works through the nerve centre in the throat, there comes a cessation of "hunger and thirst."


But this is possible only for the spiritual man, after the Commandments and the Rules have been kept; for until this is done, the thronging storms of psychical thoughts dissipate and distract the attention, so that it will not remain fixed on spiritual things.


There is a higher stage, where the beam of consciousness is turned back upon itself, and the individual consciousness enters into, and knows, the All consciousness.


Thus the consciousness of the spiritual man, who lives above our narrow barriers of separateness, is in intimate touch with the consciousness of the great Companions, and can draw on that vast reservoir for all real needs.


48. Thence comes the power swift as thought, independent of instruments, and the mastery over matter.


47. Mastery over the powers of perception and action comes through perfectly concentrated Meditation on their fivefold forms; namely, their power to grasp their distinctive nature, the element of self consciousness in them, their inherence, and their purposiveness.


It has been said that he who would tread the path of power must look for a home in the air, and afterwards in the ether.


The transfer of the sense of individuality to this finer consciousness, and thus to the spiritual man, then becomes a matter of recollection, of attention; primarily, a matter of taking a deeper interest in the life and doings of the spiritual man, than in the pleasures or occupations of the personality.


The pull of gravitation travels, it would seem "as quick as thought"; so it may well be that, in thought transference or telepathy, the thoughts travel by the same way, carried by the same "thought swift" medium.


These are the endowments of the spiritual man. Further, the spiritual body is unassailable.


INTRODUCTION TO BOOK IV The third book of the Sutras has fairly completed the history of the birth and growth of the spiritual man, and the enumeration of his powers; at least so far as concerns that first epoch in his immortal life, which immediately succeeds, and supersedes, the life of the natural man.


The last part of the last book needs little introduction.


Here, again, God gives the increase. The divine Self puts forth, for the manifestation of its powers, a new and finer vesture, the body of the spiritual man.


34. Pure spiritual life is, therefore, the inverse resolution of the potencies of Nature, which have emptied themselves of their value for the Spiritual man; or it is the return of the power of pure Consciousness to its essential form.


Every mental state is either good, or passional, or inert. So, whether subjective or objective, latent or manifest, all things that present themselves to the perceiving consciousness are compounded of these three. This is a fundamental doctrine of the Sankhya system.


This is the psychic man, lord of delusive and bewildering psychic powers.


The impulse is beginningless, since it comes from the Self, which is from everlasting. Desire is not to cease; it is to turn to the Eternal, and so become aspiration.


It has been said that, at the beginning of the way, we must kill out ambition, the great curse, the giant weed which grows as strongly in the heart of the devoted disciple as in the man of desire. The remedy is sacrifice of self, obedience, humility; that purity of heart which gives the vision of God.


So, when the vibrations of the object and those of the perceptive power are in the same phase, the external manifestation of the object takes place.


With the psychic, the alternation between prize and penalty is swifter. Hope has its shadow of fear, or it is no hope. Exclusive love is tortured by jealousy. Pleasure passes through deadness into pain. Pain's surcease brings pleasure back again.


In like manner, the same over ruling selective power, which is a ray of the Higher Self, gathers together from different births and times and places those mind images which are conformable, and may be grouped in the frame of a single life or a single event.


Nor could the Mind at the same time know itself and things external to it. The truth is that the "mind" knows neither external things nor itself. Its measuring and analyzing, its hoping and fearing, hating and desiring, never give it a true measure of life, nor any sense of real values.


Therefore those who study the wise philosopher, be they naturalist or idealist, have no excuse to linger over dialectic subtleties or disputes.


Let us think of a man, with murderous intent in his heart, striking with a dagger at his enemy. He makes a red wound in his victim's breast; at the same instant he paints, in his own mind, a picture of that wound: a picture dynamic with all the fierce will power he has put into his murderous blow.


So the man will be born maimed, or with the predisposition to some mortal injury; he is unguarded at that point, and any trifling accidental blow will pierce the broken Joints of his psychic armour.


There was a quiet and orderly mien about the deck and among the watch, that spoke of the silent yet potent arm of authority. The men spoke to each other now and then, but it was in an under tone, and there was no open levity.


There were none there but real able bodied seamen  sea dogs, who had roughed it in all weather, and on all sorts of allowance. There was a quiet and orderly mien about the deck and among the watch, that spoke of the silent yet potent arm of authority.


There is true poetry in such a scene as this, beauty fit to move the heart of an anchorite. No wonder the sailor loves his ship like a mistress; no wonder he discourses of her charms with the eloquence of true love and confiding trust; no landsman can be more enamored of his promised bride.


Suddenly the mizzen royal disappeared, followed by the top gallant sail, topsail, and cross jack courses, seeming to melt away under the eye like a misty veil, while, almost in a moment of time, there appeared a spanker, gaff topsail and gaff top gallantsail in their place, while the vessel still held on her course.


"Any rig becomes the 'Sea Witch,'" answered the officer, with evident pride. "That is true," returned the captain. "Luff, sir, luff a bit, so, well," he continued to the man at the helm; "we will have all of her weatherly points that site will give."


He wore a glazed tarpaulin hat of coarse texture, and his dress was of little better material than that of the crew he commanded, but it set it somehow quite jauntily upon his fine, well developed form, and there was an unmistakable air of conscious authority about him that showed him to be no stranger to control, or the position which he filled.


"I shipped for six months, that's all I know, and no questions asked. I understand very well that Captain Ratlin wouldn't ship me where he wouldn't go himself."


"He handles a ship as prettily as ever a true blue did yet," said one of the forecastle group, in replying to some remark of a comrade concerning the commander.


"Scud while you can, Mr. Faulkner, it's a true nautical rule. Some men will always heave a ship to if there is a cap fill of  " "Double reef the mainsail!" shouted the captain, interrupting himself, to give an order that he saw was imperative. "  Wind, but I believe in scudding, if you can," he added.


Another foresail was now bent, and this time double reefed, the foretopsail, too, was bent, close reefed and furled, while the fore and aft foresail was once more stowed, leaving the "Sea Witch" to scud under double reefed foresail.


A coarse but honest servant, Leonard Hust, who had been born on the estate, and whose father before him had been a servant in Sir Robert's household, came stealthily to Charles's side and busied himself in helping him to arrange his clothes and dry them, while he smoothed the boy's hair and wiped his face.


Cousin Helen, still panting from the exertion of the play, looked thoughtfully into the almost transparent water, and involuntarily heaved a sigh that did not escape her companion's notice.


Robert was jealous, irritable and revengeful; Charles was open hearted, mild and forgiving. Robert was cruel to both servants and animals; Charles was kind to all, and a favorite with all; even the dumb animals avoided one and adhered to the other, instinctively knowing a friend.


This was too much, even for his forbearing spirit, and the injured and outraged boy, smarting under the previous injury he had endured, rose quickly to his feet, and with one blow knocked Robert heavily upon the ground. The blow had been a severe one, and the boy was faint and unable to stand for a moment.


"A subject who sues for a favor at court, Miss Huntington, if he is unsuccessful, thinks himself at least entitled to know the reason why he is denied." "But suppose the Court declines to give him a reason," said the lady, still coolly.


"You are altogether mistaken in your premises," she said, coolly, as she tossed her fragrant fan of sandal wood, perfuming the soft atmosphere about them.


The declining pecuniary fortune of his father's house, to which we have before alluded, had led him early to seek employment in the navy, and by dint of influence and attention to his profession, he had gradually risen to the position in which we have found him, as a commander in her majesty's service on the India station.


Beneath a gentlemanly exterior, that other, whom we have seen depart from her side under such peculiar circumstances, hid a spirit of petty meanness and violence of temper, a soul that hardly merited the name, and which made him enemies everywhere, friends nowhere.


THE NAVAL OFFICER. THE reader will think that seven league boots  the storyteller's prerogative  are in special demand as it regards our story, for once more we must return through a period of years to the date, or thereabouts, on which our story opens.


With heartfelt gratitude the mother and child accepted their protection and awaited the crisis; but not without solemnly kneeling together upon the cabin floor and committing themselves to the care of Divine Providence.


Prayers were said, and all tried to compose their minds as far as possible to meet that death which seemed to be fast approaching them, when suddenly the cry ran, fore and aft that the captain was lost overboard!


It was the middle of a fine afternoon that there was observed a singular phenomenon in the wind which appeared to come from half a dozen points at the same moment.


The worst had not yet come, however, for the ship was sound still in her hull, and save that she was now wallowing in the trough of the sea, she was comparatively safe; she had sprung no leak, but her heavy freight tested her powers fearfully, and the captain was fain to acknowledge that there was nought to be done but abide the raging of the storm until it was over.


"Ahem! madam!" hesitated the young officer, "we are, that is, yes, we are on a trading voyage to the coast  just at the present time."


"Heave, heave clear of all," shouted a stern, manly voice from the quarter deck of the ship at this moment; "heave with a will."


"Is it customary for traders upon these seas to go so thoroughly armed, Captain Ratlin?"


It was early morning upon the day succeeding that auspicious night for the party in the boat, that Miss Huntington and her mother made their appearance upon the quarter deck, and tendered their thanks for the service rendered.


As the boat drifted for a moment astern of the vessel before the party were taken on board, the mate rend her name on the stern in golden letters, "The Sea Witch."


But his story in this particular was unfortunately spoiled, when Captain Ratlin told him positively that he was at that moment on board the very craft which he had designated as the Flying Dutchman.


Not a word, look, or sign between them betrayed the least token of any understanding or peculiar confidence as existing between the commander and the Quadroon.


It was a novel idea to him to realize that so fair and gentle a creature could entertain such sufficient interest in him, a rough sailor, to strive and mould his conduct for good.


There seemed to be little restraint exercised about the place; the slaves were looked at in the light of prisoners of war, and did not attempt escape. They seemed to be quite indifferent themselves as to their fate, and were very happy, with good food to eat, and a plenty of it.


That they were English was at once observable, by the flag that floated from the graceful craft that had now rounded to and come to an anchor within blank cartridge shot of the factory or barracoons.


"This fellow is the evil one himself," whispered the surgeon to his principal. "Come, let us on board, if he should insist upon at second shot, we should be obliged to give him the chance, since he did not fire at you, and he would drop you spite of fate."


"I have known him about twice as long as you, Captain Bramble," replied Miss Huntington, calmly, "and I have not only formed a very different opinion of him, but have good reasons to feel satisfied of the correctness of my judgment."


At the same moment there shot out from a little nook or bay in the rear of the barracoons, a light skiff propelled by a single oarsman, who rowed his bark in true seamen style, cross handed, while a second party sat in the stern.


The call would have to go through the school exchange, and he had a suspicion that Whitburn kept a check on outside calls. That might not hurt any, he thought, dialing a number. "Attorney Weill's office," the girl who answered said.


Doctor Chalmers, if this were the first incident of the kind it would be bad enough, but it isn't. You've done things like this before, and I've warned you before. I assumed, then, that you were merely showing the effects of overwork, and I offered you a vacation, which you refused to take.


The colleague, old Pottgeiter, Medieval History, was emerging in a rush; short, rotund, gray bearded, his arms full of books and papers, oblivious, as usual, to anything that had happened since the Battle of Bosworth or the Fall of Constantinople.


Who, even today, can guess what the history of the world would have been had Zangarra not missed Franklin Roosevelt in 1932? There's always that if." He went on talking safe generalities as he glanced covertly at his watch.


He looked at the calendar. October 16, 1973. At very most, the Arab statesman had two and a half months to live. Would there be any possible way in which he could give a credible warning?


He undressed, put on his pajamas, poured himself a drink, and went to bed. Three hours later, still awake, he got up, and poured himself another, bigger, drink. Somehow, eventually, he fell asleep.


"Ed, have you been talking about this to anybody else?" Weill asked. "You're the first person I've mentioned it to. It's not the sort of thing you'd bring up casually, in a conversation."


That evening, too, he cooked dinner for himself at his apartment, and laid out his class work for the next day.


I don't think you'll have any more trouble with him. If you can keep your own nose clean, that is. Can you do that?"


Not willingly, of course, but because he'll know that that's the only way he can cover for himself. I don't think you'll have any more trouble with him. If you can keep your own nose clean, that is.


"And yet, you can't explain how you can have real knowledge of a thing before it happens. Before it exists," Weill said. "I really don't need to. I'm satisfied with knowing that I know.


and if the court decides against you, you can see the position all of us will be in." "What do you think I should have done? Given him my resignation when he demanded it?


"At least, this'll be the end of that silly flap about what happened a month ago in Modern Four. This is modern history, now; I can talk about it without a lot of fools yelling their heads off." She was staring at him wide eyed. No doubt horrified at his cold blooded attitude toward what was really a shocking and senseless crime.


That evening, too, he stayed at home, preparing for his various classes for the rest of the week and making copious notes on what he would talk about to each. He needed more whiskey to get to sleep that night.


He managed to conduct his classes without further incidents, and spent his evenings trying, not always successfully, to avoid drifting into "memories" of the future....


"No, no; if you say you haven't talked about it to the _Valley Times_, that's enough," he said hastily. "But somebody did. A reporter was here not twenty minutes ago; he refused to say who had given him the story, but he wanted to question me about it." "What did you tell him?"


"Unusual, I'll admit. But the fact remains that I did. I should, of course, have been more careful, and not confused future with past events. The students didn't understand...."


Whitburn didn't take the hint. Instead, he paced back and forth, storming about the reporter, the newspaper owner, whoever had given the story to the paper, and finally Chalmers himself.


He advised me to give the thing the widest possible publicity; he thought that would advance the recognition and study of parapsychology. A case like this can't be ignored; it will demand serious study...."


Whitburn half turned, stopping short. "My God, man! You _are_ crazy!" he cried, horrified.


It happens that extrasensory perception means as much to me as history does to you. I've believed in it ever since I read about Rhine's work, when I was a kid. I worked in ESP for a long time.


fanatic, identified as an Egyptian named Mohammed Noureed ... old American submachine gun ... two guards killed and a third seriously wounded ... seized by infuriated mob and stoned to death on the spot....


Just like that; expected him to walk right out of his class. He was protesting as he entered the president's office.


That was all he allowed them to get out of him. They spent another few minutes being polite to one another; he invited them to lunch at the Faculty Club, and learned that they were lunching there as Fitch's guests. They went away trying to hide their disappointment.


* * * * * He didn't dare go home where the reporters would be sure to find him. He simply left the college, at the end of the school day, and walked without conscious direction until darkness gathered.


The halls were free of reporters, at least, and when it was over he hurried to the Library, going to the faculty reading room in the rear, where he could smoke. There was nobody there but old Max Pottgeiter, smoking a cigar, his head bent over a book. The Medieval History professor looked up.


There was a television screen over the combination bar and lunch counter. Some kind of a comedy programme, at which an invisible studio audience was laughing immoderately and without apparent cause. The roughly dressed customers along the counter didn't seem to see any more humor in it than he did.


"There! See what I told you!" "...


"These gentlemen have a substantial interest in this, Doctor Whitburn," he said. "If they're here as representatives of the college faculty, they have every right to be present."


Chalmers rose. "Yes, it is. And the next day, I was called into this room by Doctor Whitburn, who demanded my resignation from the faculty of this college because of it.


They all entered together, after a brief and guardedly polite exchange of greetings. There were voices raised in argument inside when they came to Whitburn's office. The college president was trying to keep Handley, Tom Smith, and Max Pottgeiter from entering his private room in the rear.


"Here's a tabulated summary of the boys' statements. All agreed on the first point, the fact of the assassination. All agreed that the time was sometime this year. Twenty out of twenty three agreed on Basra as the place.


"Doctor Fitch acted as any scientist should, in making public what he believed to be an important scientific discovery," the elder of the two Parapsychology men said.


Dacre resented a slur upon his son; he and the others were interested in Blanley College as an institution, almost an abstraction. And the major in mufti was probably worrying about the consequences to military security of having a prophet at large.


Why, I have a list of a dozen occasions when he's done something just as bad, only he didn't have a lucky coincidence to back him up. Trying to get books that don't exist out of the library, and then insisting that they're standard textbooks.


He turned quickly to Weill. "Didn't you say you had to go to Reno in a day or so?" he asked.


* * * * * The room was a pleasant, warmly colored, place. There was a desk, much like the ones in the classrooms, and six or seven wicker armchairs. A lot of apparatus had been pushed back along the walls; the dust covers were gay cretonne. There was a couch, with more apparatus, similarly covered, beside it.


Finally, Hauserman said: "Would you mind telling me just why you felt it advisable to request a psychiatric examination, Professor?" "I didn't request it. But when the suggestion was made, by one of my friends, in reply to some aspersions of my sanity, I agreed to it."


He got it from his pocket and gave it to Pottgeiter, with instructions. "Everything in the filing cabinet on the left of my desk. And don't let anybody else see any of it. Keep it safe for me." The large young man in the white coat entered.


You know, when you consider it, the Islamic Caliphate was inevitable; the surprising thing is that it was created by a man like Khalid...."


"For how long, I don't know. Maybe a year or so." "You mean to Northern State Mental?"


"All right. I'm saying, now, that in a few days there'll be a bad explosion at Reno, Nevada. Watch the papers and the telecast for it. If it happens, that ought to prove it.


"Sorry he couldn't stay. Can I see Max Pottgeiter alone?" "Yes, of course, Professor." Old Pottgeiter came in, his face anguished.


"I didn't know they still resorted to surgery, in mental cases," he added, trying to cover his break. "Oh, no; all that sort of thing is as irrevocably discarded as the whips and shackles of Bedlam.


The Plane tree interrupted him with indignation. "You ungrateful creature!" it cried: "you come and take shelter under me from the scorching sun, and then, in the very act of enjoying the cool shade of my foliage, you abuse me and call me good for nothing!"


Coming presently to a Plane tree, they joyfully turned aside to shelter from the burning rays of the sun in the deep shade of its spreading branches.


"And then," said Tip to himself, with a laugh, "she'll squeal louder than the brown pig does when I pull her tail, and shiver with fright worse than I did last year when I had the ague!"


For the body he stripped a sheet of thick bark from around a big tree, and with much labor fashioned it into a cylinder of about the right size, pinning the edges together with wooden pegs.


Angrily she raised her stick to smash in the grinning pumpkin head of the dummy; but a sudden thought made her pause, the uplifted stick left motionless in the air.


They entered the house. It was a round, domeshaped structure, as are nearly all the farm houses in the Land of Oz. Mombi bade the boy light a candle, while she put her basket in a cupboard and hung her cloak on a peg.


"That's it, exactly", declared Tip, jumping up. "So let us be off." "Where are we going?"


"I don't like to leave Jack Pumpkinhead to the tender mercies of old Mombi," he muttered. "And Jack belongs to me, for I made him even if the old witch did bring him to life." He retraced his steps to the cow stable and opened the door of the stall where the pumpkin headed man had been left.