They said:—

“She has walked in the Valley of the Shadow;” but he seemed to understand them not.

They whispered,

“She has heard the Music of the Spheres,” but still he comprehended not.

Then they spoke to him sorrowfully and said:

“She now abides in the Castle of the King.”

He looked at them eagerly, as if to ask:

“What castle? What king?”

They bowed their heads; and as they turned away weeping they murmured to him softly—

“The Castle of the King of Death.”

He spake no word; so they turned their weeping faces to him again. They found that he had risen and stood with a set purpose on his face. Then he said sweetly:

“I go to find her, that where she abideth, I too may there abide.”

They said to him:

“You cannot go. Beyond the Portal she is, and in the Land of Death.”

Set purpose shone in the Poet’s earnest, loving eyes as he answered them for the last time:

“Where she has gone, there go I too. Through the Valley of the Shadow shall I wend my way. In these ears also shall ring the Music of the Spheres. I shall seek, and I shall find my Beloved in the Halls of the Castle of the King. I shall clasp her close—even before the dread face of the King of Death.”

As they heard these words they bowed their heads again and wept, and said:

“Alas! alas!”

The poet turned and left them; and passed away. They fain would have followed; but he motioned them that they should not stir. So, alone, in his grief he went.

As he passed on he turned and waved his hand to them in farewell. Then for a while with uplifted hand he stood, and turned him slowly all around.

Suddenly his outstretched hand stopped and pointed. His friends looking with him saw, where, away beyond the Portal, the idle wilderness spread. There in the midst of desolation the mist from the marshes hung like a pall of gloom on the far off horizon.

As the Poet pointed there was a gleam of happiness—very very faint it was—in his poor sad eyes, distraught with loss, as if afar he beheld some sign or hope of the Lost One.

Swiftly and sadly the Poet fared on through the burning day.

The Rest Time came; but on he journeyed. He paused not for shade or rest. Never, even for an instant did he stop to cool his parched lips with an icy draught from the crystal springs.

The weary wayfarers resting in the cool shadows beside the fountains raised their tired heads and looked at him with sleepy eyes as he hurried. He heeded them not; but went ever onward with set purpose in his eyes, as though some gleam of hope bursting through the mists of the distant marshes urged him on.

So he fared on through all the burning day, and all the silent night. In the earliest dawn, when the promise of the still unrisen sun quickened the eastern sky into a pale light, he drew anigh the Portal. The horizon stood out blackly in the cold morning light.