Page:The cream of the jest; a comedy of evasions (IA creamofjestcomed00caberich).pdf/253

 *less as lambs' wools. It was like a horrible bird-*claw.

("But then I have the advantage of remembering the twentieth century," he thought, fleetingly, "and all my contemporaries are superstitious ignorant folk. It is strange, but in this dream I appear to be an old man. That never happened before.")

A remote music resounded in his ears, and cloying perfumes were about him

"I want to be happy. And that is impossible, because there is no happiness anywhere in the world. I, a great king, say this—I, who am known in unmapped lands, and before whom nations tremble. For there are but three desirable things in life—love and power and wisdom: and I, the king, have sounded the depths of these, and in none is happiness."

Despairing words came to him now, and welled to his lips, in a sort of chaunt:

"I am sad to-night, for I remember that I once loved a woman. She was white as the moon; her hair was a gold cloud; she had untroubled eyes. She was so fair that I longed for