Page:Prophets of dissent essays on Maeterlinck, Strindberg, Nietzsche and Tolstoy (1918).djvu/55

 woods—what can have become of him? From moment to moment the deserted, helpless band grows more fearstricken. The slightest sound becomes the carrier of evil forebodings: the rustling of the foliage, the flapping of a bird's wings, the swelling roar of the nearby sea in its dash against the shore. The bell strikes twelve—they wonder is it noon or night? Then questions, eager and calamitous, pass in whispers among them: Has the leader lost his way? Will he never come back? Has the dam burst apart and will they all be swallowed by the ocean? The pathos is greatly heightened by an extremely delicate yet sure individuation of the figures, as when at the mention of Heaven those not sightless from birth raise their countenance to the sky. And where in the meanwhile is the lost leader? He is seated right in their midst, but smitten by death. They learn it at last through the actions of the dog; besides whom — in striking parallel to "Princess Maleine" — the only other creature able to see is a little child. The horror-stricken unfortunates realize that they can never get home, and that they must perish in the woods.

In Les Sept Princesses ("The Seven Princesses"), (1891), although it is one of