of these seven great knights or lordly kings had Beyond 

 a star upon his forehead, and these were the 

 stars of the mighty constellation of the Bear 

 which the boy had seen night after night from 

 his home among the mountains by the sea. 



It was with a burning throb at his heart 

 that he recognised in the King of all these 

 kings no other than himself. 



While he looked, in amazement so great 

 that he could hear the pulse of his heart, as in 

 the silence of a wood one hears the tapping of 

 a woodpecker, he saw this mighty phantom- 

 self rise till he stood towering over all there, 

 and heard a voice as though an ocean rose and 

 fell through the eternal silences. 



"Comrades in God," it said, "the time is 

 come when that which is great shall become 

 small." 



And when the voice was ended, the mighty 

 figure faded into the blue darkness, and only 

 a great star shone where the uplifted dragon- 

 helm had brushed the roof of heaven. One 

 by one the white lords of the sky followed in 

 his mysterious way, till once more were to be 

 seen only the stars of the Bear. 



The boy -king dreamed that he fell as a 

 falling meteor, and then that he floated over 

 land and sea as a cloud, and then that he sank 

 as mist upon the hills of his own land. 



321 Y 



