As he prayed, Prince Zaphir saw all his life in the past, from the day he could first remember till even then as he was, face to face with the Giant. There was not an unworthy thought that he had ever had, not a cross word he had ever spoken, not an angry look that had ever given another pain, that did not come back to his mind. It grieved him much that there were so many; for they crowded on so thick and fast that he was amazed at their very number.
It is ever thus that the things which we do wrong—although they may seem little at the time, and though from the hardness of our hearts we pass them lightly by—come back to us with bitterness, when danger makes us think how little we have done to deserve help, and how much to deserve punishment.
Prince Zaphir’s heart was purified by repentance for all wrongs done in the past, and by high resolves to be good in the future; and when his humble prayer was finished, he rose up, and he felt in his arms a strength that he wot not of. He knew that it was not his own strength, but that he was the humble instrument of saving his beloved people; and in his heart he was very thankful.
The Giant saw presently the glitter of the golden armour, and knew that another enemy had come anigh him.
He gave a great roar of rage and anger, that sounded like the echo of a thunder-clap. On the distant hills it echoed, and it rolled through the far-off valleys, and sunk into mutterings and low growlings, as of wild beasts, in the caves and the mountain fastnesses.
With such sound the Giant ever began his fighting, that so he might terrify his enemies; but the brave heart of the Prince shook not with fear. He became braver than ever as he heard the sound; for he knew that there was the more need for courage, lest his people, and even the King his father, and Bluebell, should fall into the power of the Giant.
Whilst amongst the rocks and forests the footsteps of the Giant crashed, and whilst there uprose around his feet the dust of the desolation which he made, Prince Zaphir gathered from the brook some round pebbles.
He fitted one in the sling which he carried.
As he lifted his arm to whirl the sling round his head, the Giant saw him, and laughed, and pointed in scorn at him with his great hands, which were more savage than tiger’s claws. The laugh which the Giant thundered forth was so terrible—so harsh and grim and dreadful, that the living things that had raised their timid eyes to watch the fray buried their heads in the dust again, and quaked with fear.
But even as he laughed his enemy to scorn, the Giant’s doom was spoken.
Round Prince Zaphir’s head swung the sling, and the whistling pebble flew. It struck the Giant fair in the temple; and even with the scornful laughter on his lips, and with his outstretched hand pointing in derision, he fell prone.
As he fell he gave a single cry, but a cry so loud that it rolled away over the hills and valleys like a peal of thunder. At the sound the living things cowered again, and sagged with fear.
Afar off the people in the City heard the mighty sound; but they knew not what it meant.
As the Giant’s great body fell prone, the earth trembled with the shock for many a mile around; and as his great club dropped from his hand, it laid many tall trees of the forest low.
Then Prince Zaphir fell on his knees and prayed with fervent thankfulness for his victory.
Quickly he arose, and, as he knew of the bitter anxiety of the King and people, he never stopped to gather up his armour, but fled fast to the City to bring the joyful tidings.
The night had now fallen and the way was dark; but Prince Zaphir had trust, and he went onward into the darkness with a brave and hopeful heart.
Soon the living things that were noble came around him in their gratitude; and all they that could followed him closely. Many noble animals there were,—lions and tigers and bears, as well as tamer beasts; and their great fiery eyes seemed like lamps, and helped him on his way.
However, as they drew near to the City the wild animals began to stop, for though they trusted Zaphir they feared other men. They growled a low growl of regret and stopped; and Prince Zaphir went on alone.
All night long the city had been awake. In the court King Mago and Princess Bluebell waited and watched together hand in hand. The people in the streets sat around their watch-fires, and they only dared to talk in whispers.
So the long night wore away.
At last the eastern sky began to pale; and then a streak of red fire shot up over the horizon; and the sun rose in his glory; and it was day. The people, when they saw the light and heard the fresh singing of the birds, had hope; and they looked anxiously for the coming of the Prince.
Neither King Mago nor Princess Bluebell dared to go aloft to the tower, but waited patiently in the hall; and their faces were pale as death.
The watchmen of the city and those who joined them looked down the long roadway, expecting ever and anon to see Prince Zaphir’s golden armour shining in the bright morning light, and his great white plume, that they knew so well, nodding in the breeze. They knew that they could see it afar off, and so they only glanced now and again into the distance.
Suddenly there was a shout from all the people—and then a sudden stillness.
They rose to their feet, and with one accord waited for the news.
For oh, joy! there among them—shorn of his bright armour and his nodding plume, but hale—stood their beloved Prince.
VICTORY was in his look.
He smiled on them, raising his hands as if blessing; and pointed to the King’s palace, as though to say:
“Our king! his is the right to hear the earliest tidings.”
He passed into the hall, all the people following him.
When King Mago and Princess Bluebell heard the shout and felt the stillness that followed, their hearts began to beat, and they waited in great dread.
Princess Bluebell shuddered and cried a little, and drew closer to the King, and leaned her face on his breast.
As she leaned with her face hidden, she felt the King start. She looked up quickly, and there—oh, joy of joys!—was her own beloved Zaphir entering the hall, with all the people following him.
The King stepped down from his throne and took him in his arms, and kissed him; and Bluebell, too, put her arms round him, and kissed him on the mouth.
Prince Zaphir spoke and said:
“Oh King my Father, and oh People!—God has been good to us, and His arm has given us the victory. Lo, the Giant has fallen in the pride of his strength!”
Then such a shout went up from the people that the roof rang again; and the noise went out over the City on the wings of the wind. The glad multitude shouted again and again, till the sound rolled in waves over the whole Dominion, and Under the Sunset that hour there was naught but joy. The King called Zaphir his Brave Son; and Princess Bluebell kissed him again, and called him her Hero.
At that very time, far away in the forest, the Giant lay fallen in the pride of his strength—the foulest thing in all the land—and over his dead body ran the foxes and the stoats. The snakes crawled around his body; and thither, too, crept all the meaner living things that had fled from him when he lived.
From afar off gathered the vultures for their prey.
Close to the slain Giant, shining in the light, lay the golden armour. The great white plume rose from the helmet and even now nodded in the breeze.
When the people came out to see the dead Giant, they found that rank weeds had grown up already where his blood had fallen, but that round the armour that the Prince had doffed had grown a ring of lovely flowers. Fairest of all was a rose tree in bloom, for the rose that Princess Bluebell had given him had taken root, and had blossomed afresh and made a crown of living roses round the helmet and lay against the stem of the plume.
Then the people took reverently home the golden armour; but Prince Zaphir said that not such armour, but a true heart was the best protection, and that he would not dare to put it on again.
So they hung it up in the Cathedral amongst the grand old flags and the helmet
s of the old knights, as a memorial of the victory over the Giant.
Prince Zaphir took from the helmet the feather that the King his father had given him of old and he wore it again in his cap. The rose that had blossomed was planted in the centre of the palace garden; and it grew so great that many people could sit under it, and be sheltered from the sun by its wealth of flowers.
When Prince Zaphir’s birthday came, the people had made in secret a great preparation.
When he rose in the morning to go to the Cathedral, the whole people had assembled and lined the way on every side. Each person, old and young, held one rose. Those who had many roses brought them for those who had none; and each person had only one that all might be equal in the sight of the Prince whom they loved. They had taken off all the thorns from the stems that the Prince’s feet might not be hurt. As he passed they threw their roses in the way, till all the long street was a mass of flowers.
As the Prince went by, they stooped and gathered up the roses that his feet had touched; and they treasured them very dearly.
At each birthday of the Prince they did the same for all their lives long. When Zaphir and Bluebell were married, they strewed their path with roses in the same way, for the people loved them much.
Long and happily lived THE ROSE PRINCE—for so they called him—and his beautiful wife Princess Bluebell.
When in the fulness of time King Mago died—as all men must—they ruled as King and Queen. They ruled well and unselfishly, ever denying themselves and striving to make others good and happy.
They were blessed with peace.
THE INVISIBLE GIANT
Time goes on in the Country Under the Sunset much as it does here.
Many years passed away; and they wrought much change. And now we find a time when the people that lived in good King Mago’s time would hardly have known their beautiful Land if they had seen it again.
It had sadly changed indeed. No longer was there the same love or the same reverence towards the king—no longer was there perfect peace. People had become more selfish and more greedy, and had tried to grasp all they could for themselves. There were some very rich and there were many poor. Most of the beautiful gardens were laid waste. Houses had grown up close round the palace; and in some of these dwelt many persons who could only afford to pay for part of a house.
All the beautiful Country was sadly changed, and changed was the life of the dwellers in it. The people had almost forgotten Prince Zaphir, who was dead many, many years ago; and no more roses were spread on the pathways. Those who lived now in the Country Under the Sunset laughed at the idea of more Giants, and they did not fear them because they did not see them. Some of them said,
“Tush! what can there be to fear? Even if there over were giants there are none now.”
And so the people sang and danced and feasted as before, and thought only of themselves. The Spirits that guarded the Land were very, very sad. Their great white shadowy wings drooped as they stood at their posts at the Portals of the Land. They hid their faces, and their eyes were dim with continuous weeping, so that they heeded not if any evil thing went by them. They tried to make the people think of their evil-doing; but they could not leave their posts, and the people heard their moaning in the night season and said,
“Listen to the sighing of the breeze; how sweet it is!”
So is it ever with us also, that when we hear the wind sighing and moaning and sobbing round our houses in the lonely nights, we do not think our Angels may be sorrowing for our misdeeds, but only that there is a storm coming. The Angels wept evermore, and they felt the sorrow of dumbness—for though they could speak, those they spoke to would not hear.
Whilst the people laughed at the idea of Giants, there was one old man who shook his head, and made answer to them, when he heard them, and said:
“Death has many children, and there are Giants in the marshes still. You may not see them, perhaps—but they are there, and the only bulwark of safety is in a land of patient, faithful hearts.”
The name of this good old man was Knoal, and he lived in a house built of great blocks of stone, in the middle of a wild place far from the city.
In the city there were many great old houses, storey upon storey high; and in these houses lived many poor people. The higher you went up the great steep stairs the poorer were the people that lived there, so that in the garrets were some so poor that when the morning came they did not know whether they should have anything to eat the whole long day. This was very, very sad, and gentle children would have wept if they had seen their pain.
In one of these garrets there lived all alone a little maiden called Zaya. She was an orphan, for her father had died many years before, and her poor mother, who had toiled long and wearily for her dear little daughter—her only child—had died also not long since.
Poor little Zaya had wept so bitterly when she saw her dear mother lying dead, and she had been so sad and sorry for a long time, that she quite forgot that she had no means of living. However, the poor people who lived in the house had given her part of their own food, so that she did not starve.
Then after awhile she had tried to work for herself and earn her own living. Her mother had taught her to make flowers out of paper; so that she made a lot of flowers, and when she had a full basket she took them into the street and sold them. She made flowers of many kinds, roses and lilies, and violets, and snowdrops, and primroses, and mignonette, and many beautiful sweet flowers that only grow in the Country Under the Sunset. Some of them she could make without any pattern, but others she could not, so when she wanted a pattern she took her basket of paper and scissors, and paste, and brushes, and all the things she used, and went into the garden which a kind lady owned, where there grew many beautiful flowers. There she sat down and worked away, looking at the flowers she wanted.
Sometimes she was very sad, and her tears fell thick and fast as she thought of her dear dead mother. Often she seemed to feel that her mother was looking down at her, and to see her tender smile in the sunshine on the water; then her heart was glad, and she sang so sweetly that the birds came around her and stopped their own singing to listen to her.
She and the birds grew great friends, and sometimes when she had sung a song they would all cry out together, as they sat round her in a ring, in a few notes that seemed to say quite plainly:
“Sing to us again. Sing to us again.”
So she would sing again. Then she would ask them to sing, and they would sing till there was quite a concert. After a while the birds knew her so well that they would come into her room, and they even built their nests there, and they followed her wherever she went. The people used to say:
“Look at the girl with the birds; she must be half a bird herself, for see how the birds know and love her.” From so many people coming to say things like this, some silly people actually believed that she was partly a bird, and they shook their heads when wise people laughed at them, and said:
“Indeed she must be; listen to her singing; her voice is sweeter even than the birds.”
So a nickname was applied to her, and naughty boys called it after her in the street, and the nickname was “Big Bird”. But Zaya did not mind the name; and although often naughty boys said it to her, meaning to cause her pain, she did not dislike it, but the contrary, for she so gloried in the love and trust of her little sweet-voiced pets that she wished to be thought like them.
Indeed it would be well for some naughty little boys and girls if they were as good and harmless as the little birds that work all day long for their helpless baby birds, building nests and bringing food, and sitting so patiently hatching their little speckled eggs.
One evening Zaya sat alone in her garret very sad and lonely. It was a lovely summer’s evening, and she sat in the window looking out over the city. She could see over the many streets towards the great cathedral whose spire towered aloft into the sky higher by far even than the great tower of the king’s palace. There was hard
ly a breath of wind, and the smoke went up straight from the chimneys, getting further and fainter till it was lost altogether.
Zaya was very sad. For the first time for many days her birds were all away from her at once, and she did not know where they had gone. It seemed to her as if they had deserted her, and she was so lonely, poor little maid, that she wept bitter tears. She was thinking of the story which long ago her dead mother had told her, how Prince Zaphir had slain the Giant, and she wondered what the prince was like, and thought how happy the people must have been when Zaphir and Bluebell were king and queen. Then she wondered if there were any hungry children in those good days, and if, indeed, as the people said, there were no more Giants. So she went on with her work before the open window.
Presently she looked up from her work and gazed across the city. There she saw a terrible thing—something so terrible that she gave a low cry of fear and wonder, and leaned out of the window, shading her eyes with her hands to see more clearly.
In the sky beyond the city she saw a vast shadowy Form with its arms raised. It was shrouded in a great misty robe that covered it, fading away into air so that she could only see the face and the grim, spectral hands.
The Form was so mighty that the city below it seemed like a child’s toy. It was still far off the city.
The little maid’s heart seemed to stand still with fear as she thought to herself, “The Giants, then, are not dead. This is another of them.”
Quickly she ran down the high stairs and out into the street. There she saw some people, and cried to them,
“Look! look! the Giant, the Giant!” and pointed towards the Form which she still saw moving onwards to the city.
The people looked up, but they could not see anything, and they laughed and said,
“The child is mad.”
Then poor little Zaya was more than ever frightened, and ran down the street crying out still,
“Look, look! the Giant, the Giant!” But no one heeded her, and all said, “The child is mad,” and they went on their own ways.
The Bram Stoker Megapack Page 73
