To the two human listeners it seemed as familiar as a tale read, in childhood long ago, and only half forgotten. They always knew a little of what was coming next. Yet it spread so much further than mere childhood memories, for its golden atmosphere included all countries and all times. It rose and sang and sparkled, lighting up strange deep recesses of their unconscious and half-realised life, and almost revealing the tiny silver links that joined them on to the universe at large. The golden ladders from the Milky Way were all let down. They climbed up silvery ropes into the Moon.... 'It's not my own idea,' he said; 'I'm convinced of that. It's all flocked into me from some other mind that thought it long ago, but could not write it, perhaps. No thought is lost, you see--never can be lost. Like this, somehow, I feel it:-- Now sinks to sleep the clamour of the day, And, million-footed, from the Milky Way, Falls shyly on my heart the world's lost Thought-- Shower of primrose dust the stars have taught To haunt each sleeping mind, Till it may find A garden in some eager, passionate brain That, rich in loving-kindness as in pain, Shall harvest it, then scatter forth again It's garnered loveliness from heaven caught. Oh, every yearning thought that holds a tear, Yet finds no mission, And lies untold, Waits, guarded in that labyrinth of gold,-- To reappear Upon some perfect night, Deathless--not old-- But sweet with time and distance, And clothed as in a vision Of starry brilliance For the world's delight.' In the pauses, from time to time, they heard the distant thunder of the Areuse as it churned and tumbled over the Val de Travers boulders. The Colombier bells, as the hours passed, strung the sentences together; moonlight wove in and out of every adventure as they listened; stars threaded little chapters each to each with their eternal golden fastenings. The words seemed written down in dew, but the dew crystallised into fairy patterns that instantly flew about the world upon their mission of deliverance. In this ancient Network of the Stars the universe lay fluttering; and they lay with it, all prisoners in Fairyland.