Dreams | Page 8

is it?"
The girl said, "I know not, but that which is most good for him I wish
him to have."
The voice said, "Your prayer is answered; he shall have it."
Then she stood up. She covered her breast and held the garment tight
upon it with her hand, and ran out of the forest, and the dead leaves
fluttered under her feet. Out in the moonlight the soft air was blowing,
and the sand glittered on the beach. She ran along the smooth shore,
then suddenly she stood still. Out across the water there was something
moving. She shaded her eyes and looked. It was a boat; it was sliding
swiftly over the moonlit water out to sea. One stood upright in it; the
face the moonlight did not show, but the figure she knew. It was
passing swiftly; it seemed as if no one propelled it; the moonlight's
shimmer did not let her see clearly, and the boat was far from shore, but
it seemed almost as if there was another figure sitting in the stern.
Faster and faster it glided over the water away, away. She ran along the
shore; she came no nearer it. The garment she had held closed fluttered

open; she stretched out her arms, and the moonlight shone on her long
loose hair.
Then a voice beside her whispered, "What is it?"
She cried, "With my blood I bought the best of all gifts for him. I have
come to bring it him! He is going from me!"
The voice whispered softly, "Your prayer was answered. It has been
given him."
She cried, "What is it?"
The voice answered, "It is that he might leave you."
The girl stood still.
Far out at sea the boat was lost to sight beyond the moonlight sheen.
The voice spoke softly, "Art thou contented?"
She said, "I am contented."
At her feet the waves broke in long ripples softly on the shore.

V. THREE DREAMS IN A DESERT.
Under a Mimosa-Tree.
As I travelled across an African plain the sun shone down hotly. Then I
drew my horse up under a mimosa-tree, and I took the saddle from him
and left him to feed among the parched bushes. And all to right and to
left stretched the brown earth. And I sat down under the tree, because
the heat beat fiercely, and all along the horizon the air throbbed. And
after a while a heavy drowsiness came over me, and I laid my head
down against my saddle, and I fell asleep there. And, in my sleep, I had
a curious dream.

I thought I stood on the border of a great desert, and the sand blew
about everywhere. And I thought I saw two great figures like beasts of
burden of the desert, and one lay upon the sand with its neck stretched
out, and one stood by it. And I looked curiously at the one that lay upon
the ground, for it had a great burden on its back, and the sand was thick
about it, so that it seemed to have piled over it for centuries.
And I looked very curiously at it. And there stood one beside me
watching. And I said to him, "What is this huge creature who lies here
on the sand?"
And he said, "This is woman; she that bears men in her body."
And I said, "Why does she lie here motionless with the sand piled
round her?"
And he answered, "Listen, I will tell you! Ages and ages long she has
lain here, and the wind has blown over her. The oldest, oldest, oldest
man living has never seen her move: the oldest, oldest book records
that she lay here then, as she lies here now, with the sand about her. But
listen! Older than the oldest book, older than the oldest recorded
memory of man, on the Rocks of Language, on the hard-baked clay of
Ancient Customs, now crumbling to decay, are found the marks of her
footsteps! Side by side with his who stands beside her you may trace
them; and you know that she who now lies there once wandered free
over the rocks with him."
And I said, "Why does she lie there now?"
And he said, "I take it, ages ago the
Age-of-dominion-of-muscular-force found her, and when she stooped
low to give suck to her young, and her back was broad, he put his
burden of subjection on to it, and tied it on with the broad band of
Inevitable Necessity. Then she looked at the earth and the sky, and
knew there was no hope for her; and she lay down on the sand with the
burden she could not loosen. Ever since she has lain here. And the ages