Away went the rabbit. The dog was a little astonished at the temerity of the poor creature; but on hearing that the fox was to be present, willingly consented to repair to the place of conflict. This readiness the rabbit did not at all relish; he went very slowly to the field, and seeing no fox there, his heart misgave him; and while the dog was putting his nose to the ground to try if he could track the coming of the fox, the rabbit slipped into a burrow, and left the dog to walk back again.
Meanwhile the fox was already at the rock; he walked very soft-footedly, and looked about with extreme caution, for he had a vague notion that a griffin-papa would not be very civil to foxes.
Now there were two holes in the rock,—one below, one above, an upper story and an under; and while the fox was peering about, he saw a great claw from the upper rock beckoning to him.
“Ah, ah!” said the fox, “that’s the wanton young griffiness, I’ll swear.”
He approached, and a voice said,—
“Charming Mr. Reynard, do you not think you could deliver an unfortunate griffiness from a barbarous confinement in this rock?”
“Oh, heavens!” cried the fox, tenderly, “what a beautiful voice! and, ah, my poor heart, what a lovely claw! Is it possible that I hear the daughter of my lord, the great griffin?”
“Hush, flatterer! not so loud, if you please. My father is taking an evening stroll, and is very quick of hearing. He has tied me up by my poor wings in the cavern, for he is mightily afraid of some beast running away with me. You know I have all my fortune settled on myself.”
“Talk not of fortune,” said the fox; “but how can I deliver you? Shall I enter and gnaw the cord?”
“Alas!” answered the griffiness, “it is an immense chain I am bound with. However, you may come in and talk more at your ease.”
The fox peeped cautiously all round, and seeing no sign of the griffin, he entered the lower cave and stole upstairs to the upper story; but as he went on, he saw immense piles of jewels and gold, and all sorts of treasure, so that the old griffin might well have laughed at the poor cat being called an heiress. The fox was greatly pleased at such indisputable signs of wealth, and he entered the upper cave, resolved to be transported with the charms of the griffiness.
There was, however, a great chasm between the landing-place and the spot where the young lady was chained, and he found it impossible to pass; the cavern was very dark, but he saw enough of the figure of the griffiness to perceive, in spite of her petticoat, that she was the image of her father, and the most hideous heiress that the earth ever saw!
However, he swallowed his disgust, and poured forth such a heap of compliments that the griffiness appeared entirely won.
He implored her to fly with him the first moment she was unchained.
“That is impossible,” said she; “for my father never unchains me except in his presence, and then I cannot stir out of his sight.”
“The wretch!” cried Reynard, “what is to be done?”
“Why, there is only one thing I know of,” answered the griffiness, “which is this: I always make his soup for him, and if I could mix something in it that would put him fast to sleep before he had time to chain me up again I might slip down and carry off all the treasure below on my back.”
“Charming!” exclaimed Reynard; “what invention! what wit! I will go and get some poppies directly.”
“Alas!” said the griffiness, “poppies have no effect upon griffins. The only thing that can ever put my father fast to sleep is a nice young cat boiled up in his soup; it is astonishing what a charm that has upon him! But where to get a cat?—it must be a maiden cat too!”
Reynard was a little startled at so singular an opiate. “But,” thought he, “griffins are not like the rest of the world, and so rich an heiress is not to be won by ordinary means.”
“I do know a cat,—a maiden cat,” said he, after a short pause; “but I feel a little repugnance at the thought of having her boiled in the griffin’s soup. Would not a dog do as well?”
“Ah, base thing!” said the griffiness, appearing to weep; “you are in love with the cat, I see it; go and marry her, poor dwarf that she is, and leave me to die of grief.”
In vain the fox protested that he did not care a straw for the cat; nothing could now appease the griffiness but his positive assurance that come what would poor puss should be brought to the cave and boiled for the griffin’s soup.
“But how will you get her here?” said the griffiness.
“Ah, leave that to me,” said Reynard. “Only put a basket out of the window and draw it up by a cord; the moment it arrives at the window, be sure to clap your claw on the cat at once, for she is terribly active.”
“Tush!” answered the heiress; “a pretty griffiness I should be if I did not know how to catch a cat!”
“But this must be when your father is out?” said Reynard.
“Certainly; he takes a stroll every evening at sunset.”
“Let it be to-morrow, then,” said Reynard, impatient for the treasure.
This being arranged, Reynard thought it time to decamp. He stole down the stairs again, and tried to filch some of the treasure by the way; but it was too heavy for him to carry, and he was forced to acknowledge to himself that it was impossible to get the treasure without taking the griffiness (whose back seemed prodigiously strong) into the bargain.
He returned home to the cat, and when he entered her house, and saw how ordinary everything looked after the jewels in the griffin’s cave, he quite wondered how he had ever thought the cat had the least pretensions to good looks. However, he concealed his wicked design, and his mistress thought he had never appeared so amiable.
“Only guess,” said he, “where I have been!—to our new neighbour the griffin; a most charming person, thoroughly affable, and quite the air of the court. As for that silly magpie, the griffin saw her character at once; and it was all a hoax about his daughter,—he has no daughter at all. You know, my dear, hoaxing is a fashionable amusement among the great. He says he has heard of nothing but your beauty, and on my telling him we were going to be married, he has insisted upon giving a great ball and supper in honour of the event. In fact, he is a gallant old fellow, and dying to see you. Of course, I was obliged to accept the invitation.”
“You could not do otherwise,” said the unsuspecting young creature, who, as I before said, was very susceptible to flattery.
“And only think how delicate his attentions are,” said the fox. “As he is very badly lodged for a beast of his rank, and his treasure takes up the whole of the ground floor, he is forced to give the fete in the upper story, so he hangs out a basket for his guests, and draws them up with his own claw. How condescending! But the great are so amiable!”
The cat, brought up in seclusion, was all delight at the idea of seeing such high life, and the lovers talked of nothing else all the next day,—when Reynard, towards evening, putting his head out of the window, saw his old friend the dog lying as usual and watching him very grimly. “Ah, that cursed creature! I had quite forgotten him; what is to be done now? He would make no bones of me if he once saw me set foot out of doors.”
With that, the fox began to cast in his head how he should get rid of his rival, and at length he resolved on a very notable project; he desired the cat to set out first, and wait for him at a turn in the road a little way off. “For,” said he, “if we go together we shall certainly be insulted by the dog; and he will know that in the presence of a lady, the custom of a beast of my fashion will not suffer me to avenge the affront. But when I am alone, the creature is such a coward that he will not dare say his soul’s his own; leave the door open and I’ll follow immediately.”
The cat’s mind was so completely poisoned against her cousin that she implicitly believed this account of his character; and accordingly, with many recommendations to her lover not to sully his dignity by getting into any sort of quarrel with the dog, she set off first.
The dog went up to her very humbly, and begged her to allow him to say a few words to her; but she received him so haughtily, that his spirit was up; and he walked back to the tree more than ever enraged against his rival. But what was his joy when he saw that the cat had left the door open! “Now, wretch,” thought he, “you cannot escape me!” So he walked briskly in at the back door. He was greatly surprised to find Reynard lying down in the straw, panting as if his heart would break, and rolling his eyes in the pangs of death.
“Ah, friend,” said the fox, with a faltering voice, “you are avenged, my hour is come; I am just going to give up the ghost: put your paw upon mine, and say you forgive me.”
Despite his anger, the generous dog could not set tooth on a dying foe.
“You have served me a shabby trick,” said he; “you have left me to starve in a hole, and you have evidently maligned me with my cousin: certainly I meant to be avenged on you; but if you are really dying, that alters the affair.”
“Oh, oh!” groaned the fox, very bitterly; “I am past help; the poor cat is gone for Doctor Ape, but he’ll never come in time. What a thing it is to have a bad conscience on one’s death-bed! But wait till the cat returns, and I’ll do you full justice with her before I die.”
The good-natured dog was much moved at seeing his mortal enemy in such a state, and endeavoured as well as he could to console him.
“Oh, oh!” said the fox; “I am so parched in the throat, I am burning;” and he hung his tongue out of his mouth, and rolled his eyes more fearfully than ever.
“Is there no water here?” said the dog, looking round.
“Alas, no!—yet stay! yes, now I think of it, there is some in that little hole in the wall; but how to get at it! It is so high that I can’t, in my poor weak state, climb up to it; and I dare not ask such a favour of one I have injured so much.”
“Don’t talk of it,” said the dog: “but the hole’s very small, I could not put my nose through it.”
“No; but if you just climb up on that stone, and thrust your paw into the hole, you can dip it into the water, and so cool my poor parched mouth. Oh, what a thing it is to have a bad conscience!”
The dog sprang upon the stone, and, getting on his hind legs, thrust his front paw into the hole; when suddenly Reynard pulled a string that he had concealed under the straw, and the dog found his paw caught tight to the wall in a running noose.
“Ah, rascal!” said he, turning round; but the fox leaped up gayly from the straw, and fastening the string with his teeth to a nail in the other end of the wall, walked out, crying, “Good-by, my dear friend; have a care how you believe hereafter in sudden conversions!” So he left the dog on his hind legs to take care of the house.
Reynard found the cat waiting for him where he had appointed, and they walked lovingly together till they came to the cave. It was now dark, and they saw the basket waiting below; the fox assisted the poor cat into it. “There is only room for one,” said he, “you must go first!” Up rose the basket; the fox heard a piteous mew, and no more.
“So much for the griffin’s soup!” thought he.
He waited patiently for some time, when the griffiness, waving her claw from the window, said cheerfully, “All’s right, my dear Reynard; my papa has finished his soup, and sleeps as sound as a rock! All the noise in the world would not wake him now, till he has slept off the boiled cat, which won’t be these twelve hours. Come and assist me in packing up the treasure; I should be sorry to leave a single diamond behind.”
“So should I,” quoth the fox. “Stay, I’ll come round by the lower hole: why, the door’s shut! pray, beautiful griffiness, open it to thy impatient adorer.”
“Alas, my father has hid the key! I never know where he places it. You must come up by the basket; see, I will lower it for you.”
The fox was a little loth to trust himself in the same conveyance that had taken his mistress to be boiled; but the most cautious grow rash when money’s to be gained, and avarice can trap even a fox. So he put himself as comfortably as he could into the basket, and up he went in an instant. It rested, however, just before it reached the window, and the fox felt, with a slight shudder, the claw of the griffiness stroking his back.
“Oh, what a beautiful coat!” quoth she, caressingly.
“You are too kind,” said the fox; “but you can feel it more at your leisure when I am once up. Make haste, I beseech you.”
“Oh, what a beautiful bushy tail! Never did I feel such a tail.”
“It is entirely at your service, sweet griffiness,” said the fox; “but pray let me in. Why lose an instant?”
“No, never did I feel such a tail! No wonder you are so successful with the ladies.”
“Ah, beloved griffiness, my tail is yours to eternity, but you pinch it a little too hard.”
Scarcely had he said this, when down dropped the basket, but not with the fox in it; he found himself caught by the tail, and dangling half way down the rock, by the help of the very same sort of pulley wherewith he had snared the dog. I leave you to guess his consternation; he yelped out as loud as he could,—for it hurts a fox exceedingly to be hanged by his tail with his head downwards,—when the door of the rock opened, and out stalked the griffin himself, smoking his pipe, with a vast crowd of all the fashionable beasts in the neighbourhood.
“Oho, brother,” said the bear, laughing fit to kill himself; “who ever saw a fox hanged by the tail before?”
“You’ll have need of a physician,” quoth Doctor Ape.
“A pretty match, indeed; a griffiness for such a creature as you!” said the goat, strutting by him.
The fox grinned with pain, and said nothing. But that which hurt him most was the compassion of a dull fool of a donkey, who assured him with great gravity that he saw nothing at all to laugh at in his situation!
“At all events,” said the fox, at last, “cheated, gulled, betrayed as I am, I have played the same trick to the dog. Go and laugh at him, gentlemen; he deserves it as much as I can, I assure you.”
“Pardon me,” said the griffin, taking the pipe out of his mouth; “one never laughs at the honest.”
“And see,” said the bear, “here he is.”
And indeed the dog had, after much effort, gnawed the string in two, and extricated his paw; the scent of the fox had enabled him to track his footsteps, and here he arrived, burning for vengeance and finding himself already avenged.
But his first thought was for his dear cousin. “Ah, where is she?” he cried movingly; “without doubt that villain Reynard has served her some scurvy trick.”
“I fear so indeed, my old friend,” answered the griffin; “but don’t grieve,—after all, she was nothing particular. You shall marry my daughter the griffiness, and succeed to all the treasure; ay, and all the bones that you once guarded so faithfully.”
“Talk not to me,” said the faithful dog. “I want none of your treasure; and, though I don’t mean to be rude, your griffiness may go to the devil. I will run over the world, but I will find my dear cousin.”
“See her then,” said the griffin; and the beautiful cat, more beautiful than ever, rushed out of the cavern, and threw herself into the dog’s paws.
A pleasant scene this for the fox! He had skill enough in the female heart to know that it may excuse many little infidelities, but to be boiled alive for a griffin’s soup—no, the offence was inexpiable.
“You understand me, Mr. Reynard,” said the griffin, “I have no daughter, and it was me you made love to. Knowing what sort of a creature a magpie is, I amused myself with hoaxing her,—the fashionable amusement at court, you know.”
The fox made a mighty struggle, and leaped on the ground, leaving his tail behind him. It did not grow again in a hurry.
“See,” said the griffin, as the beasts all laughed at the figure Reynard made running into the wood, “the dog beats the fox with the ladies, after all; and cunning as he is in everything else, the fox is the last creature that should ever think of making love!”
“Charming!” cried Nymphalin, clasping her hands; “it is just the sort of story I like.”
“And I suppose, sir,” said Nip, pertly, “that the dog and the cat lived very happily ever afterwards? Indeed the nuptial felicity of a dog and cat is proverbial!”
“I dare say they lived much the same as any other married couple,” answered the prince.
CHAPTER XIII. THE TOMB OF A FATHER OF MANY CHILDREN
THE feast being now ended, as well as the story, the fairies wound their way homeward by a different path, till at length a red steady light glowed through the long basaltic arches upon them, like the Demon Hunters’ fires in the Forest of Pines.
The prince sobered in his pace. “You approach,” said he, in a grave tone, “the greatest of our temples; you will witness the tomb of a mighty founder of our race!” An awe crept over the queen, in spite of herself. Tracking the fires in silence, they came to a vast space, in the midst of which was a long gray block of stone, such as the traveller finds amidst the dread silence of Egyptian Thebes.
And on this stone lay the gigantic figure of a man,—dead, but not death-like, for invisible spells had preserved the flesh and the long hair for untold ages; and beside him lay a rude instrument of music, and at his feet was a sword and a hunter’s spear; and above, the rock wound, hollowed and roofless, to the upper air, and daylight came through, sickened and pale, beneath red fires that burned everlastingly around him, on such simple altars as belong to a savage race. But the place was not solitary, for many motionless but not lifeless shapes sat on large blocks of stone beside the tomb. There was the wizard, wrapped in his long black mantle, and his face covered with his hands; there was the uncouth and deformed dwarf, gibbering to himself; there sat the household elf; there glowered from a gloomy rent in the wall, with glittering eyes and shining scale, the enormous dragon of the North. An aged crone in rags, leaning on a staff, and gazing malignantly on the visitors, with bleared but fiery eyes, stood opposite the tomb of the gigantic dead. And now the fairies themselves completed the group! But all was dumb and unutterably silent,—the silence that floats over some antique city of the desert, when, for the first time for a hundred centuries, a living foot enters its desolate remains; the silence that belongs to the dust of eld,—deep, solemn, palpable, and sinking into the heart with a leaden and death-like weight. Even the English fairy spoke not; she held her breath, and gazing on the tomb, she saw, in rude vast characters,—
THE TEUTON
“We are all that remain of his religion!” said the prince, as they turned from the dread temple.
CHAPTER XIV. THE FAIRY’S CAVE, AND THE FAIRY’S WISH
IT was evening; and the fairies were dancing beneath the twilight star
“And why art thou sad, my violet?” said the prince; “for thine eyes seek the ground!”
“Now that I have found thee,” answered the queen, “and now that I feel what happy love is to a fairy, I sigh over that love which I have lately witnessed among mortals, but the bud of whose happiness already conceals the worm. For well didst thou say, my prince, that we are linked with a mysterious affinity to mankind, and whatever is pure and gentle amongst them speaks at once to our sympathy, and commands our vigils.”
“And most of all,” said the German fairy, “are they who love under our watch; for love is the golden chain that binds all in the universe: love lights up alike the star and the glow-worm; and wherever there is love in men’s lot, lies the secret affinity with men, and with things divine.”
“But with the human race,” said Nymphalin, “there is no love that outlasts the hour, for either death ends, or custom alters. When the blossom comes to fruit, it is plucked and seen no more; and therefore, when I behold true love sentenced to an early grave, I comfort myself that I shall not at least behold the beauty dimmed, and the softness of the heart hardened into stone. Yet, my prince, while still the pulse can beat, and the warm blood flow, in that beautiful form which I have watched over of late, let me not desert her; still let my influence keep the sky fair, and the breezes pure; still let me drive the vapour from the moon, and the clouds from the faces of the stars; still let me fill her dreams with tender and brilliant images, and glass in the mirror of sleep the happiest visions of fairy-land; still let me pour over her eyes that magic, which suffers them to see no fault in one in whom she has garnered up her soul! And as death comes slowly on, still let me rob the spectre of its terror, and the grave of its sting; so that, all gently and unconscious to herself, life may glide into the Great Ocean where the shadows lie, and the spirit without guile may be severed from its mansion without pain!”
The wish of the fairy was fulfilled.