ot the god of
the temple that he saw in his dream; he saw a beautiful lady, she seemed
to float above him in a chariot drawn by doves, and all about her was a
crowd of chattering sparrows, and he knew that she was Aphrodite, the
Queen of Love. She was more beautiful than any woman in the world, and
she smiled as she looked at the king, and said, 'Oh, King Athamas, you
are sick for love! Now this you must do: go home and on the first night
of the new moon, climb the hills to that place where you saw the Three
Maidens. In the dawn they will come again to the river, and bathe in the
pool. Then do you creep out of the wood, and steal the clothes of her
you love, and she will not be able to fly away with the rest, and she
will be your wife.'

Then she smiled again, and her doves bore her away, and the king woke,
and remembered the dream, and thanked the lady in his heart, for he knew
that she was a goddess, the Queen of Love.

[Illustration: KING ATHAMAS STEALS NEPHELE'S CLOTHES SO THAT SHE CANNOT
FLOAT AWAY WITH HER SISTERS.]

Then he drove home, and did all that he had been told to do. On the
first night of the new moon, when she shines like a thin gold thread in
the sky, he left his palace, and climbed up through the hills, and hid
in the wood by the edge of the pool. When the dawn began to shine
silvery, he heard voices, and saw the three girls come floating through
the trees, and alight on the river bank, and undress, and run into the
water. There they bathed, and splashed each other with the water,
laughing in their play. Then he stole to the grassy bank, and seized the
clothes of the most beautiful of the three; and they heard him move, and
rushed out to their clothes. Two of them were clad in a moment, and
floated away up the glen, but the third crouched sobbing and weeping
under the thick cloak of her yellow hair. Then she prayed the king to
give her back her soft gray and rose-coloured raiment, but he would not
till she had promised to be his wife. And he told her how long he had
loved her, and how the goddess had sent him to be her husband, and at
last she promised, and took his hand, and in her shining robes went down
the hill with him to the palace. But he felt as if he walked on the air,
and she scarcely seemed to touch the ground with her feet. She told him
that her name was Nephele, which meant 'a cloud,' in their language, and
that she was one of the Cloud Fairies who bring the rain, and live on
the hillt