Part 19

What was to be done next? The flowers could bear the most severe cold without injury; he knew that. Perhaps drought and a hot sun would be worse for them. He determined to go at once to the desert of Sahara, where no plant can live. Over land and sea, in cars and ships, he hastened to Africa, and made his way into the wilderness as fast as he could. When the camels saw his ring of flowers, they dashed madly up to feed on them. But they only bit the empty air, and looked so disappointed and astonished that the student would have laughed heartily if he had felt inclined to be merry. The Bedouins, too, gathered around the stranger, staring in wonder at the magnificent flowers on the burning yellow sand, where they had never seen even a blade of grass or a tiny green leaf. Then they threw themselves in the dust before him, believing that he must be some great magician. They invited him into their tents, entertained him with milk and dates, and made him understand that they wanted him to be their chief.

The flowers throve in the heat of the desert just as well as in the ice at the pole. The student soon saw this. But here they attracted flattering notice, and instead of making him miserable brought him dignity and honor. He became accustomed to the thought of spending his life among the Bedouins as their lord and ruler. Under such pleasant circumstances his flower prison did not trouble him, and he snapped his fingers at the Flower Queen. It was hard to give up his home; but he was still young, and who could tell what might happen.

But his comfort did not last long. The former ruler, whom the Bedouins had removed on his account, plotted to ruin his successor. He persuaded the oldest men of the tribe to ask the Father of the Flowers, as they called the student, for a perpetually flowing spring and frequent rain for their oasis. They followed the crafty Bedouin’s advice. The student, though he could not understand a word of Arabic, knew very well what they wanted, and replied that he could not fulfil their wish. They did not believe it, for a magician who could make a thick, fresh hedge of flowers grow out of the sand of the desert must surely be able to give them a spring and rain if he only would. His refusal was nothing but sheer malice, for which they would punish him. They agreed to kill him in the night. A Bedouin woman, who pitied the young foreigner, warned him in time, and with her help he escaped in the twilight.

The glory of ruling and the pleasant life were again over. In despair he returned to Europe, and when he reached the coast of the Mediterranean, he asked himself whether it would not be the wisest thing he could do to jump into the sea and end his imprisonment by death. But when he was preparing for this wicked act, a secret voice said: “Perhaps I can soothe the Flower Queen. She looked so young and lovely. She cannot be pitiless.”

He summoned fresh courage and again travelled day and night, over sea and land, until he reached Switzerland and the foot of the mountain chain, where the misfortune had overtaken him. Still surrounded by the circle of flowers, he climbed with his knapsack to the pine-wood and the pasture up above the clouds to the steep hillside, saw the projecting rock, with the dense growth of edelweiss, and with a throbbing heart climbed across the narrow ridge to the overhanging boulder. He had scarcely stepped on it when the Flower Queen stood before him, looked sternly at him, and exclaimed, “Are you here again?”

At the same moment his ring of blossoms scattered, all the flowers hastened to their Queen, surrounding and nestling closely to her, and for the first time in many months he was free from his prison, even in the open air.

Kneeling before the Flower Queen, he raised his hands beseechingly and said humbly: “Fair Queen, be content with my punishment. Forgive the crime I committed against you and your flowers, and which I deeply repent.”

She was silent a short time, and then replied, “Repentance is not enough; I demand atonement.”

“What shall I do to atone?” he asked anxiously.

“Look at this slope below us. It resembled a gay carpet. Now it is wholly green, not a single blossom adorns it. You must plant it with flowers again. When you have made it as gay as it was before, the punishment shall be taken from you.”

The student wanted to ask her how he should set to work, but she disappeared, and his flower prison, which had separated, once more closed around him. He went back to the field, sat down on the grass, and wondered how he should begin to plant flowers here. Suddenly a thought darted through his brain. He started up and stretched his hand toward the circle of flowers. Lo!—it did not move back, his hand did not grasp the air, but seized a beautiful clump of Alpine violets, which quietly allowed him to hold them. He pulled gently—the violets, with all their delicate roots, remained in his hand. True, there was no gap in the ring, another flower sprang up in the place of the clump of violets. Digging a hole in the ground with his penknife and his fingers, he planted the violets and moved away several steps. His ring of flowers followed, but the violets remained.

Now he knew enough. He hurried down to the little city, bought, amid the stares of the people, gardening tools and provisions enough to last for some time, and went back to the field above the clouds. From dawn till twilight he worked with the greatest industry, dug hole after hole, took flower after flower from his ring, planted them, watered them abundantly from a neighboring spring, and scarcely allowed himself fifteen minutes rest for his scanty meals.

Three or four weeks passed, a large portion of the field was again gay with beautiful flowers growing thickly together, when to his intense joy he noticed that the flowers which he still drew from his ring were no longer replaced with others. The circular hedge first grew narrower, then gaps appeared, then one-quarter, one-half, three-quarters vanished, and one day he put the last blossom in the earth, and there was nothing more left of the ring. He knelt again and called aloud, “Oh, Queen, are you satisfied with my work?”

But the Flower Queen did not appear, only a strange movement ran through the countless blossoms in the field, as though they were all nodding their lovely little heads.

The student picked up his knapsack and went down to the valley. He cast stolen glances around him on the way, but no flower followed. He was really free from his prison of blossoms, and could again live with other men.

But while planting the Alpine meadow he had gained such a taste for gardening that he resolved to devote himself to this profession. So he became a very famous florist, and several beautiful varieties of flowers, which he introduced from foreign countries, still bear his name.

LIFE AND DEATH

At the foot of a giant mountain, with a snow-capped head, lay a quiet valley, through which flowed a swift little stream. Its waves bathed the roots of an ancient oak, which was reflected in the water. Under the shadow of the tree grew masses of blue gentians and other flowers, and in its top a very wise old raven had built a nest.

It was a midsummer day, the gentians were in bloom, and their petals began to droop in the heat. Then one blossom, whose neighbor had already lost half its leaves, began to complain: “How miserable we poor flowers are, and what a sad fate we have! We enjoy our lives only during one short spring. A few kisses from the sun, a few beautiful nights under the dew and the moonbeams, a few caresses from the evening breeze, a few visits from the moths and pretty gold beetles, a few bird songs, then all the pleasure is over, and it never comes back again. Before we fairly have time to enjoy our lives, they are ended. How much happier is this oak, whose branches rustle above us! It has seen thousands of generations of gentians bloom and fade away, yet it still lives and perhaps will enjoy the pleasures of spring a thousand years more.”

She paused and hung her little head sorrowfully. But a roaring noise passed through the boughs of the old oak, and the tree in a dry, grating voice answered:—

“Little fool, you talk as you understand. Yes, I live longer than you do. But you are very much mistaken if you imagine that I am to be envied on that account. The spring sun kisses you awake, as a mother rouses her child. You grow without any troubles, and your life is all pleasure. You know nothing except the joy of spring and the happiness of summer, you do not have to bear the sorrows of autumn. You have no enemies, you don’t know what it is to struggle and to suffer, you see nothing in the world except beauty and pleasure. But I—all through my youth I had to defend myself against numberless enemies who wanted to take my life. I was attacked by grubs and worms, caterpillars and beetles, the greedy teeth of grazing animals, and the poison of tiny fungi. After I had escaped all these perils and grew up, what was my fate? Storms vented their fury on me, tossed me about, and even broke my branches. The lightning tore my bark in long strips from my body, and gave me cruel wounds. Look at me—I am completely covered with scars.

“Autumn plucked off all my leaves every year, and winter pierced me to my inmost heart with cold. Long after you were sunning yourselves happily in the spring, I was scarcely thawed out, and still felt the pricking of the sap as it began to ascend into the frozen boughs. Even during the few pleasant weeks that my scanty blossoms adorned me, I could not help thinking anxiously of the coming winter and its tortures. So what do I gain by living longer than you? I have already been here a thousand years, and when I look back, it seems but a single day. The moments of happiness were rare, and all the rest was trouble, toil, and suffering. If I loved a bird that built its nest in my branches, or a flower that grew at my foot, I saw them disappear and had to mourn them. Now I am old, my trunk is hollow, worms are gnawing my roots, my branches are dying. Bit by bit my mouldering body will fall into ruin, until pitiless time has entirely destroyed me. I envy you the unvarying beauty and happiness of your life and its swift, easy end. If we must die, it makes no difference whether it is a little sooner or a little later. Ah, if we never grew old, if we could live forever like the mountain giant above us! If you wish a different lot, wish for his, not mine.”

All was still for a time, then the mountain shook with rumbling, groaning noises, and in deep, yawning sounds it spoke slowly, in short sentences, interrupted by long pauses:—

“Oak, oak, have you no more sense than the blue thing yonder, the little gentian? Nonsense about my eternity. I, too, shall some day perish. Nothing in the world is eternal. The earth itself is not—nor the sun. The air and the water both gnaw at me. They wear me away continually. You are growing. I am constantly becoming smaller. Some day there will be nothing left. Then it will be as if I never had existed, even though I have lasted so long. True, I feel no sorrow over it. What does it matter whether I live a long or a short time? There is no pleasure in my existence. Here I stand year after year, staring out into the world. Everything is the same to me, summer and winter, day and night. Nothing stirs within me. I feel nothing. I hope for nothing. I am afraid of nothing. I do not grow as you do. I do not draw up joyously, with thirsty roots, the juices of the earth. I put forth no leaves and blossoms. I ripen no fruits. No descendants spring up around me. I experience nothing pleasant, and nothing unpleasant.

“I think little, I dream dully, am terribly bored, and scarcely notice what is going on around me. Everything is stupid and uninteresting. How gladly I would change places with you! Or even with the gentians that live only one summer. You feel something. I—nothing.”

At this moment the raven in the top of the tree croaked loudly. “Look there!” he called to the mountain, the oak, and the flowers, pointing with his beak and wings to the brook which rippled through the valley. Above the little stream rose countless tiny, winged creatures, which hovered over it like a thick cloud. It was a swarm of ephemeræ. They spread their delicate, transparent wings, breathed the fresh air, bathed their dainty bodies in the warm sunbeams. Intoxicated by the light and the warmth, the sweet air, thrilling in every nerve with joy and excitement, they began to dance: singly, in couples, in bands. They darted to and fro, swung in circles, whirled around hither and thither, up and down, with twitching legs and beating wings. Their eyes shone with pleasure. Their shrill buzzing expressed the greatest joy. They felt neither hunger nor thirst, but feasted on the air and sunshine. They did not think of what might be before them. They did not puzzle their brains about what might happen after. The present hour was theirs, and that was enough. They were alive now, they were enjoying all the pleasures of the summer world, they were perfectly happy.

The sun reached his noonday height and sank toward the west, but the ephemeræ did not heed it. They went on dancing, absorbed in their wild whirl, rejoicing in their mutual happiness, until the day was nearly over and the evening shadows began to gather in the valley. Then a delightful weariness stole over them, a pleasant, drowsy feeling destroyed their joy in dancing and dulled their senses. They drew up their legs, folded their wings, and sank down from the air upon the brook. The wonderful memories of the happy day, which filled their little heads, grew less distinct, everything around them became misty, and they fell asleep sweetly, like children who have played until they are tired. But they were not asleep. They were dead.

When their little bodies covered the surface of the stream, the wise raven said to the mountain, the oak, and the gentian: “A long life, a short life, matters nothing. A beautiful life. That is happiness.”