Phantastes: A Faerie Romance for Men and Women
dumb hope before the mirror, on the following evening. Again the
reflected room shone as through a purple vapour in the gathering
twilight. Everything seemed waiting like himself for a coming splendour
to glorify its poor earthliness with the presence of a heavenly joy.
And just as the room vibrated with the strokes of the neighbouring
church bell, announcing the hour of six, in glided the pale beauty, and
again laid herself on the couch. Poor Cosmo nearly lost his senses with
delight. She was there once more! Her eyes sought the corner where the
skeleton had stood, and a faint gleam of satisfaction crossed her face,
apparently at seeing it empty. She looked suffering still, but there
was less of discomfort expressed in her countenance than there had been
the night before. She took more notice of the things about her, and
seemed to gaze with some curiosity on the strange apparatus standing
here and there in her room. At length, however, drowsiness seemed to
overtake her, and again she fell asleep. Resolved not to lose sight of
her this time, Cosmo watched the sleeping form. Her slumber was so deep
and absorbing that a fascinating repose seemed to pass contagiously
from her to him as he gazed upon her; and he started as if from a
dream, when the lady moved, and, without opening her eyes, rose, and
passed from the room with the gait of a somnambulist.
Cosmo was now in a state of extravagant delight. Most men have a secret
treasure somewhere. The miser has his golden hoard; the virtuoso his
pet ring; the student his rare book; the poet his favourite haunt; the
lover his secret drawer; but Cosmo had a mirror with a lovely lady in
it. And now that he knew by the skeleton, that she was affected by the
things around her, he had a new object in life: he would turn the bare
chamber in the mirror into a room such as no lady need disdain to call
her own. This he could effect only by furnishing and adorning his. And
Cosmo was poor. Yet he possessed accomplishments that could be turned
to account; although, hitherto, he had preferred living on his slender
allowance, to increasing his means by what his pride considered
unworthy of his rank. He was the best swordsman in the University; and
now he offered to give lessons in fencing and similar exercises, to
such as chose to pay him well for the trouble. His proposal was heard
with surprise by the students; but it was eagerly accepted by many; and
soon his instructions were not confined to the richer students, but
were anxiously sought by many of the young nobility of Prague and its
neighbourhood. So that very soon he had a good deal of money at his
command. The first thing he did was to remove his apparatus and
oddities into a closet in the room. Then he placed his bed and a few
other necessaries on each side of the hearth, and parted them from the
rest of the room by two screens of Indian fabric. Then he put an
elegant couch for the lady to lie upon, in the corner where his bed had
formerly stood; and, by degrees, every day adding some article of
luxury, converted it, at length, into a rich boudoir.
Every night, about the same time, the lady entered. The first time she
saw the new couch, she started with a half-smile; then her face grew
very sad, the tears came to her eyes, and she laid herself upon the
couch, and pressed her face into the silken cushions, as if to hide
from everything. She took notice of each addition and each change as
the work proceeded; and a look of acknowledgment, as if she knew that
some one was ministering to her, and was grateful for it, mingled with
the constant look of suffering. At length, after she had lain down as
usual one evening, her eyes fell upon some paintings with which Cosmo
had just finished adorning the walls. She rose, and to his great
delight, walked across the room, and proceeded to examine them
carefully, testifying much pleasure in her looks as she did so. But
again the sorrowful, tearful expression returned, and again she buried
her face in the pillows of her couch. Gradually, however, her
countenance had grown more composed; much of the suffering manifest on
her first appearance had vanished, and a kind of quiet, hopeful
expression had taken its place; which, however, frequently gave way to
an anxious, troubled look, mingled with something of sympathetic pity.
Meantime, how fared Cosmo? As might be expected in one of his
temperament, his interest had blossomed into love, and his love—shall I
call it _ripened_, or—_withered_ into passion. But, alas! he loved a
shadow. He could not come near her, could not speak to her, could not
hear a sound from those sweet lips, to which his longing eyes would
cling like bees to their honey-founts. Ever and anon he sang to
himself:
“I shall die for love of the maiden;”
and ever he looked again, and died not, though his heart seemed ready
to break with intensity of life and longing. And the more he did for
her, the more he loved her; and he hoped that, although she never
appeared to see him, yet she was pleased to think that one unknown
would give his life to her. He tried to comfort himself over his
separation from her, by thinking that perhaps some day she would see
him and make signs to him, and that would satisfy him; “for,” thought
he, “is not this all that a loving soul can do to enter into communion
with another? Nay, how many who love never come nearer than to behold
each other as in a mirror; seem to know and yet never know the inward
life; never enter the other soul; and part at last, with but the
vaguest notion of the universe on the borders of which they have been
hovering for years? If I could but speak to her, and knew that she
heard me, I should be satisfied.” Once he contemplated painting a
picture on the wall, which should, of necessity, convey to the lady a
thought of himself; but, though he had some skill with the pencil, he
found his hand tremble so much when he began the attempt, that he was
forced to give it up. . . . . .
“Who lives, he dies; who dies, he is alive.”
One evening, as he stood gazing on his treasure, he thought he saw a
faint expression of self-consciousness on her countenance, as if she
surmised that passionate eyes were fixed upon her. This grew; till at
last the red blood rose over her neck, and cheek, and brow. Cosmo’s
longing to approach her became almost delirious. This night she was
dressed in an evening costume, resplendent with diamonds. This could
add nothing to her beauty, but it presented it in a new aspect; enabled
her loveliness to make a new manifestation of itself in a new
embodiment. For essential beauty is infinite; and, as the soul of
Nature needs an endless succession of varied forms to embody her
loveliness, countless faces of beauty springing forth, not any two the
same, at any one of her heart-throbs; so the individual form needs an
infinite change of its environments, to enable it to uncover all the
phases of its loveliness. Diamonds glittered from amidst her hair, half
hidden in its luxuriance, like stars through dark rain-clouds; and the
bracelets on her white arms flashed all the colours of a rainbow of
lightnings, as she lifted her snowy hands to cover her burning face.
But her beauty shone down all its adornment. “If I might have but one
of her feet to kiss,” thought Cosmo, “I should be content.” Alas! he
deceived himself, for passion is never content. Nor did he know that
there are _two_ ways out of her enchanted house. But, suddenly, as if
the pang had been driven into his heart from without, revealing itself
first in pain, and afterwards in definite form, the thought darted into
his mind, “She has a lover somewhere. Remembered words of his bring the
colour on her face now. I am nowhere to her. She lives in another world
all day, and all night, after she leaves me. Why does she come and make
me love her, till I, a strong man, am too faint to look upon her more?”
He looked again, and her face was pale as a lily. A sorrowful
compassion seemed to rebuke the glitter of the restless jewels, and the
slow tears rose in her eyes. She left her room sooner this evening than
was her wont. Cosmo remained alone, with a feeling as if his bosom had
been suddenly left empty and hollow, and the weight of the whole world
was crushing in its walls. The next evening, for the first time since
she began to come, she came not.
And now Cosmo was in wretched plight. Since the thought of a rival had
occurred to him, he could not rest for a moment. More than ever he
longed to see the lady face to face. He persuaded himself that if he
but knew the worst he would be satisfied; for then he could abandon
Prague, and find that relief in constant motion, which is the hope of
all active minds when invaded by distress. Meantime he waited with
unspeakable anxiety for the next night, hoping she would return: but
she did not appear. And now he fell really ill. Rallied by his fellow
students on his wretched looks, he ceased to attend the lectures. His
engagements were neglected. He cared for nothing. The sky, with the
great sun in it, was to him a heartless, burning desert. The men and
women in the streets were mere puppets, without motives in themselves,
or interest to him. He saw them all as on the ever-changing field of a
_camera obscura_. She—she alone and altogether—was his universe, his
well of life, his incarnate good. For six evenings she came not. Let
his absorbing passion, and the slow fever that was consuming his brain,
be his excuse for the resolution which he had taken and begun to
execute, before that time had expired.
Reasoning with himself, that it must be by some enchantment connected
with the mirror, that the form of the lady was to be seen in it, he
determined to attempt to turn to account what he had hitherto studied
principally from curiosity. “For,” said he to himself, “if a spell can
force her presence in that glass (and she came unwillingly at first),
may not a stronger spell, such as I know, especially with the aid of
her half-presence in the mirror, if ever she appears again, compel her
living form to come to me here? If I do her wrong, let love be my
excuse. I want only to know my doom from her own lips.” He never
doubted, all the time, that she was a real earthly woman; or, rather,
that there was a woman, who, somehow or other, threw this reflection of
her form into the magic mirror.
He opened his secret drawer, took out his books of magic, lighted his
lamp, and read and made notes from midnight till three in the morning,
for three successive nights. Then he replaced his books; and the next
night went out in quest of the materials necessary for the conjuration.
These were not easy to find; for, in love-charms and all incantations
of this nature, ingredients are employed scarcely fit to be mentioned,
and for the thought even of which, in connexion with her, he could only
excuse himself on the score of his bitter need. At length he succeeded
in procuring all he required; and on the seventh evening from that on
which she had last appeared, he found himself prepared for the exercise
of unlawful and tyrannical power.
He cleared the centre of the room; stooped and drew a circle of red on
the floor, around the spot where he stood; wrote in the four quarters
mystical signs, and numbers which were all powers of seven or nine;
examined the whole ring carefully, to see that no smallest break had
occurred in the circumference; and then rose from his bending posture.
As he rose, the church clock struck seven; and, just as she had
appeared the first time, reluctant, slow, and stately, glided in the
lady. Cosmo trembled; and when, turning, she revealed a countenance
worn and wan, as with sickness or inward trouble, he grew faint, and
felt as if he dared not proceed. But as he gazed on the face and form,