When Graceful recovered his senses, the ice, clouds, and darkness had disappeared. He was lying on the ground in the midst of a charming country, covered with trees bathed in a soft light. In front of him was a beautiful castle, from which bubbled a brook that flowed into a sea as blue, calm, and transparent as the sky. Graceful looked about him; he was alone—alone with the remains of his two companions, which the waves had washed on the shore. Exhausted with suffering and excitement, he dragged himself to the brook and bent over the water to refresh his parched lips, when he shrank back with affright. It was not his face that he saw in the water, but that of an old man with silvery locks who strongly resembled him. He turned round; there was no one behind him. He again drew near the fountain; he saw the old man, or rather, doubtless, the old man was himself. "Great fairies," he cried. "I understand you. If it is my life that you wish in exchange for that of my grandmother, I joyfully accept the sacrifice." And without troubling himself further about his old age and wrinkles, he plunged his head into the water and drank eagerly.

On rising, he was astonished to see himself again as he was when he left home, only more beautiful, with blacker hair and brighter eyes than ever. He picked up his hat, which had fallen near the spring, and which a drop of water had touched by chance, when what was his surprise to see the butterfly that he had pinned to it fluttering its wings and seeking to fly. He gave it its liberty, and ran to the beach for Fido and Pensive, then plunged them both into the blessed fountain. Pensive flew upward with a joyful cry and disappeared amid the turrets of the castle. Fido, shaking the water from both ears, ran to the kennels of the palace, where he was met by magnificent watch-dogs, which, instead of barking and growling at the new-comer, welcomed him joyfully like an old friend. Graceful had at last found the Fountain of Immortality, or rather the brook that flowed from it—a brook already greatly weakened, and which only gave two or three hundred years of life to those that drank of it; but nothing prevented them from drinking anew.

Graceful filled his vial with this life-giving water and approached the palace. His heart beat, for a last trial remained. So near success, he feared the more to fail. He mounted the steps of the castle. All was closed and silent; no one was there to receive the traveler. When he had reached the last step and was about to knock at the door, a voice, rather gentle than harsh, stopped him.

"Have you loved?" said the invisible voice.

"Yes," answered Graceful; "I have loved my grandmother better than any one in the world."

The door opened a little way.

"Have you suffered for her whom you have loved?" resumed the voice.

"I have suffered," replied Graceful; "much through my own fault, doubtless, but a little for her whom I wished to save."

The door opened half-way and the child caught a glimpse of woods, waters, and a sky more beautiful than anything of which he had ever dreamed.

"Have you always done your duty?" said the voice, in a harsher tone.

"Alas! no," replied Graceful, falling on his knees; "but when I have failed I have been punished by my remorse even more than by the hard trials through which I have passed. Forgive me, and punish me as I deserve, if I have not yet expiated all my faults; but save her whom I love—save my grandmother."

The door instantly opened wide, though Graceful saw no one. Intoxicated with joy, he entered a courtyard surrounded with arbors embowered in foliage, with a fountain in the midst, spouting from a tuft of flowers larger, more beautiful, and more fragrant than any he had seen on earth. By the side of the spring stood a woman dressed in white, of noble bearing, and seemingly not more than forty years old. She advanced to meet Graceful, and smiled on him so sweetly that the child felt himself touched to the heart, and his eyes filled with tears.

"Don't you know me?" said the woman.

"Oh, grandmother! is it you?" he exclaimed. "How came you in the Castle of Life?"

"My child," said she, pressing him to her heart, "He who brought me here is an enchanter more powerful than the fairies of the woods and the waters. I shall never more return to Salerno. I shall receive my reward here for the little good I have done by tasting a happiness which time will not destroy."

"And me, grandmother!" cried Graceful, "what shall become of me? After seeing you here, how can I return to suffer alone?"

"My dear child," she replied, "no one can live on earth after he has caught a glimpse of the celestial delights of this abode. You have lived, my dear Graceful; life has nothing more to teach you. You have passed in four days through the desert where I languished eighty years, and henceforth nothing can separate us."

The door closed, and from that time nothing was heard of Graceful or his grandmother. It was in vain that search was made for the palace and enchanted fountain; they were never more discovered on earth. But if we understood the language of the stars, if we felt what their gentle rays tell us every evening, we should long ago have learned from them where to look for the Castle of Life and the Fountain of Immortality.