CHAPTER XXVI. IN WHICH THE READER WILL LEARN HOW THE FAIRIES WERERECEIVED BY THE SOVEREIGNS OF THE MINES.--THE COMPLAINT OF THE LAST OFTHE FAUNS.--THE RED HUNTSMAN.--THE STORM.--DEATH.
IN the deep valley of Ehrenthal, the metal kings--the Prince of theSilver Palaces, the Gnome Monarch of the dull Lead Mine, the Presidentof the Copper United States--held a court to receive the fairy wanderersfrom the island of Nonnewerth.
The prince was there, in a gallant hunting-suit of oak leaves, inhonour to England; and wore a profusion of fairy orders, which had beeninstituted from time to time, in honour of the human poets that hadcelebrated the spiritual and ethereal tribes. Chief of these, sweetDreamer of the "Midsummer Night's Dream," was the badge crystallizedfrom the dews that rose above the whispering reeds of Avon on the nightof thy birth,--the great epoch of the intellectual world! Nor wert thou,O beloved Musaeus! nor thou, dim-dreaming Tieck! nor were ye, thewild imaginer of the bright-haired Undine, and the wayward spirit thatinvoked for the gloomy Manfred the Witch of the breathless Alps andthe spirits of earth and air!--nor were ye without the honours of fairyhomage! Your memory may fade from the heart of man, and the spells ofnew enchanters may succeed to the charm you once wove over the face ofthe common world; but still in the green knolls of the haunted valleyand the deep shade of forests, and the starred palaces of air, ye arehonoured by the beings of your dreams, as demigods and kings! Yourgraves are tended by invisible hands, and the places of your birth arehallowed by no perishable worship!
Even as I write,* far away amidst the hills of Scotland, and by theforest thou hast clothed with immortal verdure, thou, the maker of "theHarp by lone Glenfillan's spring," art passing from the earth which thouhast "painted with delight." And such are the chances of mortal fame,our children's children may raise new idols on the site of thy holyaltar, and cavil where their sires adored; but for thee the mermaid ofthe ocean shall wail in her coral caves, and the sprite that lives inthe waterfalls shall mourn! Strange shapes shall hew thy monument in therecesses of the lonely rocks! ever by moonlight shall the fairies pausefrom their roundel when some wild note of their minstrelsy reminds themof thine own,--ceasing from their revelries, to weep for the silence ofthat mighty lyre, which breathed alike a revelation of the mysteries ofspirits and of men!
* It was just at the time the author was finishing this work that the great master of his art was drawing to the close of his career.
The King of the Silver Mines sat in a cavern in the valley, throughwhich the moonlight pierced its way and slept in shadow on the soilshining with metals wrought into unnumbered shapes; and below him, on ahumbler throne, with a gray beard and downcast eye, sat the aged Kingof the Dwarfs that preside over the dull realms of lead, and inspirethe verse of -----, and the prose of -----! And there too a fantastichousehold elf was the President of the Copper Republic,--a spirit thatloves economy and the Uses, and smiles sparely on the Beautiful. But, inthe centre of the cave, upon beds of the softest mosses, the untroddengrowth of ages, reclined the fairy visitors, Nymphalin seated by herbetrothed. And round the walls of the cave were dwarf attendants onthe sovereigns of the metals, of a thousand odd shapes and fantasticgarments. On the abrupt ledges of the rocks the bats, charmed tostillness but not sleep, clustered thickly, watching the scene withfixed and amazed eyes; and one old gray owl, the favourite of the witchof the valley, sat blinking in a corner, listening with all her mightthat she might bring home the scandal to her mistress.
"And tell me, Prince of the Rhine-Island Fays," said the King of theSilver Mines, "for thou art a traveller, and a fairy that hath seenmuch, how go men's affairs in the upper world? As to ourself, we livehere in a stupid splendour, and only hear the news of the day whenour brother of lead pays a visit to the English printing-press, or thePresident of Copper goes to look at his improvements in steam-engines."
"Indeed," replied Fayzenheim, preparing to speak like AEneas in theCarthaginian court,--"indeed, your Majesty, I know not much that willinterest you in the present aspect of mortal affairs, except that youare quite as much honoured at this day as when the Roman conqueror benthis knee to you among the mountains of Taunus; and a vast number oflittle round subjects of yours are constantly carried about by the rich,and pined after with hopeless adoration by the poor. But, begging yourMajesty's pardon, may I ask what has become of your cousin, the Kingof the Golden Mines? I know very well that he has no dominion in thesevalleys, and do not therefore wonder at his absence from your court thisnight; but I see so little of his subjects on earth that I should fearhis empire was well nigh at an end, if I did not recognize everywherethe most servile homage paid to a power now become almost invisible."
The King of the Silver Mines fetched a deep sigh. "Alas, prince," saidhe, "too well do you divine the expiration of my cousin's empire. Somany of his subjects have from time to time gone forth to the world,pressed into military service and never returning, that his kingdom isnearly depopulated. And he lives far off in the distant parts of theearth, in a state of melancholy seclusion; the age of gold has passed,the age of paper has commenced."
"Paper," said Nymphalin, who was still somewhat of a_precieuse_,--"paper is a wonderful thing. What pretty books the humanpeople write upon it!"
"Ah! that's what I design to convey," said the silver king. "It is theage less of paper money than paper government: the Press is the truebank." The lord treasurer of the English fairies pricked up his earsat the word "bank;" for he was the Attwood of the fairies: he had afavourite plan of making money out of bulrushes, and had written fourlarge bees'-wings full upon the true nature of capital.
While they were thus conversing, a sudden sound as of some rustic andrude music broke along the air, and closing its wild burden, they heardthe following song:--
The Pilgrims of the Rhine Page 57