se the face has become too stiff, or grins repulsively from
withered wrinkles! Woe then to him whose garners are not full, whose
chambers are not stored! Ah, there must be something dismal in such a
base, impoverished old age, and the proverb is right which says: 'Those
who at morn too merry are, shall reap at night sorrow and care.'
Looking upon thee thus, oh brother of my youth, I may well feel
troubled about thee, for who knows in what altered condition I may find
thee again.'

"The knight gave the student's hand a hearty shake and cried: 'Perhaps
thou wilt be transformed when we meet again--wilt be decked out in
velvet and satin, and surpass us all!' He darted off, and in the
distance the student heard him sing a song which was then in every
mouth, and sounded something like this:

'No fairer flow'r, I vow, is known
Than that bright rose, sweet woman's lips,
With such luxuriance swelling.
Close-lock'd at first, this flow'ret keeps,
When as an infant bud 'tis shown
All bold assaults repelling.
But every flow'r is wash'd by May,
On rosy lips he plants a kiss,
And straight we see them fully blowing.
Then rosy lips should find a kiss,
And every kiss should in its day
Find lips with fondness glowing.'

"A butterfly flew up before the student. 'Is not the life of most
men,' he said, 'to be compared to the fluttering of this moth? Light
and motley he goes flaunting about, and yet how barren and short are
his joys.' He rolled about his great eyes, but only an empty
alternation of light and shade reached these dim mirrors, not the full
form, the fine colour. The wood looked on him from its green depths
with an irresistible glance. 'Suppose,' he said, 'I leave my patient
beast awhile on this grass-plot; it will not run away from me, and I
feel the warmest desire to wander there for an hour. How refreshing it
must be in the depths of the wood!'

"He turned aside from the high road by a narrow path, which, after
winding for a short distance through the tall trees, sloped down into
the wood. Soon he found himself in a perfect solitude, with a
rustling, whispering, and whining round him, while only a few single
gleams of sun-light reflected with a green hue, played about him like
ignis fatui. Sometimes he thought he heard his name called behind him
in the distance, and--he did not know why--the call appeared to him
hateful and repulsive. Then again he would take the sound to be a mer