Page:Celtic Stories by Edward Thomas.djvu/125



day Maxen the Roman Emperor, handsomest of men and wisest of emperors, held a council of kings and said to them: 'To-morrow I will hunt.' With two and thirty crowned kings who were his vassals he hunted along the river until mid-day. Then he slept in the great heat and men stood round him and kept off the sun with their shields. In his sleep he had a dream.

Riding along the valley of the river, he came to the highest mountain in the world, and from the summit he saw mighty rivers descending to the sea. Towards the mouths of the rivers he travelled over the fairest of plains. At length his road followed one of these rivers, the broadest he had ever seen, and at its mouth he came to a great city and a castle with many towers of different coloured stone. A fleet, the largest ever seen, was anchored in the river. To the largest and fairest of the ships led a bridge of whalebone, and he went over it into the ship. A sail of the ship was hoisted and he sailed over sea and ocean to the shore of the fairest island of the whole world. He landed and traversed the island to the furthest shore. He saw high mountains and deep valleys and terrible precipices, such as he had never seen before. From the top of one mountain he saw another island and a river flowing from the mountain into the sea. At the mouth of this river was a castle, the fairest that man ever saw, and the gate was open and he went in.

The hall was beautiful, having a roof of gold and walls of glittering gems, and doors also of gold. The tables were silver, the seats of gold. At one of the tables two