Alice Lorraine: A Tale of the South Downs

								

but for his descendants; until his frame began to waste, and his great
dark eyes grew pale with it.

CHAPTER VII.
THE LEGEND CONCLUDED.

Artemise, and all around the prince, had been alarmed of late by many
little symptoms. He always had been rashly given to take no heed of his
food or clothes; but now he went beyond all that, and would have no one
take heed for him, or dare to speak of the matter much. Hence, without
listening to any nonsense, all the women were sure of one thing--the
prince was wearing himself away.
The country people who knew him, and loved him with a little mystery,
said it was no wonder that he should worry himself, for being so long
away from home, in manners, and in places also. “Sure it must be a
trial for him; out all night in the damp and fog; and he no sense of
breeches!”
There was much of truth in this, no doubt, as well as much outside it.
Yet none of them could enter into his peculiar state of mind. So that
he often reproached himself for having been rude, but could not help
it. Every one made allowance for him, as Englishmen do for a foreigner,
as being of a somewhat lower order, in many ways, in creation. Yet with
a mixture of mind about it, they admired him more and more.
The largeness of his nature still was very conspicuous in this,--he
never brought his telescope to bear on his own planet. His heart was
reaching so far forward into future ages, that he strove to follow
downwards nine or ten entails of stars. To know what was to become of
all that were to be descended from him; a highly interesting, but also
a deeply exhausting question. This perpetual effort told very hard
upon his constitution, for nothing less than fatal worry could have so
impaired his native grace and lofty courtesy.
Yet before his sudden end, a softer and more genial star was culminant
one evening. When one’s time comes to be certain--whether by earthly
senses, or by influence of heaven--of the buoyant balance turning,
and the slender span outspun, tender thinkings, and kind wishes,
flow to the good side of us. Through this power, the petty troubles,
and the crooked views of life, and the ambition to make others
better than we care to be, and every other little turn of wholesome
self-deception--these drop off, and leave us sinking into a sense of
having lived, and made a humble thing of it.
Whether this be so or not, upon the 18th day of June in the year 1611,
Prince Agasicles came home rather hot, and very tired, and fain for
a little sleep, if such there were, to wear out weariness. But still
he had heavy work left for that night; as a mighty comet had lately
appeared, and scared the earth abundantly; yet now he had two or three
hours to spare, and they might as well be happy ones. Therefore he sent
for his daughter to come, and see to his food and such like, and then
to sit with him some few minutes, and to watch the sunset.
Artemise, still young and lovely, knew of course, from Eastern wisdom,