The Singing Mouse Stories | Page 5

How naturally the wooded hill slopes back beyond the mill! And how, with the same old sleepy curves, the river winds on back. How green the trees--how very green! Ah, Singing Mouse, they do not mix that color now. And nowhere do wide bottom-lands wave and sing in such seemly grace, so decked with yellow flowers, with odd sweet william and the small wild rose. And nowhere now on earth, I know, is there any stream to murmur so sweetly and so comfortably, to say such words to any dreaming boy, to babble of a work well done, of conscience clear and of a success and happiness to come. All that was in the river. If I listen very hard, and imagine very high and very deep, I can almost pretend to hear them now, those old words, heard when I was young. The voices are there, I doubt not, and there are other boys. God keep them boys always, and may they dream not backward, but ahead!
This lazy pool beneath the far wing of the dam, how smooth it looks! Yet well we know the sunken log upon its farther side. We have festooned it full oft with a big hook and hempen line. And from that pool how many fatuous fishes have we not hauled forth. Here we came often, when we were boys; and once did not certain bold souls sleep here all night, curled up along the bank, waking the next morning, each with a sore throat, 'tis true, but with heart full proud at such high deed of valor!
And there is the long wooden bridge. What a feat of engineering that bridge once seemed to our untraveled souls! Behold it now, as it was then, lying in the level rays of the rising moon, a brilliant causeway leading over into a land of mystery, to glory, perhaps; perhaps to failure, forgetfulness, oblivion and rest. And there, I declare, at the other end of this great roadway--swimming up, I declare, in the same old way--is the great round moon whose light served us when we stayed late at the dam in the summer evenings. And the shadows of the bridge timbers are just as long and black; and the ripples over the rocks at the middle span are just as beautiful and white. And here, right at our feet again, the moon is playing its old tricks of painting faces in the water....
There are too many faces in the water, Singing Mouse; and I beg you, cease repeating the words about the Corpus Delicti! You would make one shudder. Let us look no more at the faces in the water.
[Illustration]
But still you bide by the waters tonight, wizard; for here is a picture of the sea. It is the sea, and it is talking, as it always does. There are some who think the sea speaks only of sorrow, but this is not wholly true. If you will listen thoughtfully enough, you will find that it is not all of troubles that the sea is whispering. Nor does it speak always of restlessness and change. Some find a stimulus beside the sea, and say it brings forgetfulness. Rather let us call it exaltation. Much more than of a petty excitement, fit to blot a man's momentary woes, it speaks in a sterner and a stronger note. It throbs with the pulse of a further shore. It speaks of a quiet tide making out to the Fortunate Islands, and tells of a way of following gales, and of a new Atlantis, somewhere on beyond. How dear this dream of a different land, this story of Atlantis, pathetically sought! Certainly, Atlantis is there, out beyond, somewhere in the sea; and truly there are those who have discovered it, and those who still may do so. I know it, Singing Mouse, for I can read it written in the hollow of this tiny shell of pink you have found here by the shore--borne across to us, we may not doubt, by an understanding tide from a place happily attained by those who wrote the message and sought to let us know.
"Long time upon the mast our brown sail flapped; Our keel plowed bitter salt, and everywhere The ominous sky in sullen mystery wrapped, What side we looked on, either here or there, The welcome sight of land long sadly sought; And that Atlantis, hid within the sea, The land with all our hope and promise fraught, We saw not yet, nor wist where it might be.
"But as we sailed as manful as we might, And counted not the sail more fit than oar, Lo! o'er the wave there burst a vision bright Of wood, and winding stream, and easy shore. Then by the lofty light which shone above, We