A synod
of wise men and women sat upon the woman of timber, and she was finally
ordered to be devoured by fire, and that in the open air. A fire was
soon made, and into it the elfin sculpture was tossed from the prongs
of two pairs of pitchforks. The blaze that arose was awful to behold;
and hissings, and burstings, and loud cracklings, and strange noises,
were heard in the midst of the flame; and when the whole sank into ashes,
a drinking-cup of some precious metal was found; and this cup,
fashioned no doubt by elfin skill, but rendered harmless by the
purification with fire, the sons and daughters of Sandie Macharg and
his wife drink out of to this very day. Bless all bold men, say I, and
obedient wives!"
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
A RAFT THAT NO MAN MADE.
BY ROBERT T.S. LOWELL.
I am a soldier: but my tale, this time, is not of war.
The man of whom the Muse talked to the blind bard of old had grown wise
in wayfaring. He had seen such men and cities as the sun shines on,
and the great wonders of land and sea; and he had visited the farther
countries, whose indwellers, having been once at home in the green
fields and under the sky and roofs of the cheery earth, were now gone
forth and forward into a dim and shadowed land, from which they found
no backward path to these old haunts, and their old loves:--
[Greek: Eeri kai nephelei kekalummenoi: oude pot' autous
Helios phaethon kataderketai aktinessin.
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