Fairy Circles / Tales and Legends of Giants, Dwarfs, Fairies, Water-Sprites, and Hobgoblins

The Flower of Iceland.

ASUBSTANTIAL farm-house stood many, many years ago on the slope of a hill in bleak and frozen Iceland. The owner, who had spent his youth as a sailor in distant climes, had at last obeyed his dying father's summons, and exchanged the palms and orange groves of southern lands for the feeble sunlight and cold lava-fields of his native island. But as a living souvenir of those happy regions he brought home a young and beautiful wife, whose dark and eloquent eyes still shone in the memory of all who had beheld them, long after they had been closed in the last sleep.

"Marietta," her husband had said before the priest had joined their hands in marriage, "have you considered well what you are renouncing when you promise to follow me as my wife? Here in your country an eternal spring reigns, sweet with the fragrance of flowers and musical with the warbling of birds, while the Italian sky shines in never-fading blue. On my island you will find none of these things. A pale sun, a grey sky overhead, and all around barren heaths and ice—ice and snow wherever you look; none but the Icelander can think this island beautiful."

"But you will be there," answered Marietta; "and could I wish for any home but yours?"

So she had gone with him to the far north.

They had one child, a lovely little girl, who bore the name of Helga; she must be a true daughter of Iceland, and to this even her name must witness. But her foreign descent was not to be hid; true, she had the fair skin and beautiful flaxen hair of a northern girl, but her eyes were as dark and mysterious as her mother's.

The Icelanders have no flowers; they know of their beauty only by the tales of their countrymen who have seen them on their travels; but every one who looked into little Helga's beautiful face thought that flowers must look like that, and thus she was called "the Flower of Iceland."

Fair Helga loved her grave father, but she loved still more her beautiful and gentle mother, by whose side she spent most of her time.

Every spring the father set out for the coast with a few servants to get fish for the year's household provisions; for though he dearly loved Marietta and his home, the sea still exercised the old spell on his heart. In summer and autumn he was accustomed to go to the distant trading places along the coast, there to exchange the wool of his large and well-conditioned flocks for the valuable products of foreign lands, with which he loved to please and adorn his dear ones.

At such times Helga would sit at her mother's feet, listening as she told in the soft, sweet sounds of her native tongue about the blue sky and the warm golden sunlight of Italy, of the beautiful flowers and evergreen woods, and of the fine mild nights when the young girls would dance in the moonlight to the sound of the mandoline, and pleasure and melody reigned over land and sea.

Ah! how beautiful that country must be; and here everything was so different. No dance, no song, either from human lips or from the throat of a bird. Helga had never even heard the sheep give a cheerful bleat; everything was stupid and grave; the silence of death was Nature's language here.

Then Helga's dark eye would wander away over Iceland's wide and desert heaths, over the lava-fields that stretched for miles, and which had buried the freshness of nature under their stiff mantle of mourning. She gazed on those giant ice-mountains, untrod by human foot, which rise like monuments of death, with thick mist-veils about their brow. Even when a sunbeam happens to pierce the cloudy covering, the colossal piles of ice shine in the pale light like sarcophagi in a vault. Then Helga would shudder and think with ardent longing on her dear mother's native land.

And she? Ah, her husband had been right. In spite of her love for him, she pined for the sunny valleys of her childhood, all the more as she never told her husband of the grief that gnawed at her heart, for he placed his Iceland before all the paradises of the world. Ten years had scarcely gone by till Marietta's warm heart lay still beneath the sod.

Helga thought her heart would break when they carried her loved mother out towards the hill, whence she had so often looked longingly out over the sea, watching the blue waves as they hastened towards the beautiful but distant south.

"When you bury me," said the dying woman to her husband, "lay me so that my face may look towards Italy." And they did as she wished.

Helga often sat now on the grave, herself the only flower that brightened it; and along with her dear mother's image those distant countries came vividly before her mind, as she had heard them described as long as she could remember.

A distant relation now came to take charge of the housekeeping. She had willingly left her home, bringing with her her only son, in compliance with her rich cousin's request. The stern old woman had no sympathy with Helga's longings, and counted her descriptions of distant lands as fairy tales; nothing, she thought, could be more beautiful than Iceland. But Olaffson, her boy, who was only a few years older than the little orphan, became Helga's eager listener. With equal delight he looked on her beautiful face and listened to her stories; the grave blue eyes, which were usually as cold as the glaciers of his native island, would kindle as she went on, and when Helga stopped he would say, "I will be a sailor, and travel to those countries to see if they are really so beautiful!"

"But you will take me with you?"

"Oh yes, of course."

Thus the years went by, and the time drew quickly on when the tree, the seed of which had been sown by Helga's hand, bore fruit. Olaffson was no longer a boy, and he decided on going to sea. The head of the house willingly gave his consent, and the time of parting came.

Fair Helga's cheek was pale. Olaffson fancied that it was the separation that troubled her so deeply, and that thought sweetened the bitter hour to him. But ah! it was only her grief at having to stay at home on the cold and barren island, and at not being allowed to see the countries to which, as she thought, she had a much better right than Olaffson.

Another year had gone. Olaffson had come home and given an account of all that he had seen. The hour of parting again drew near. Early next morning he was to set out on a second and longer journey, and in spite of Helga's tears and entreaties to be allowed to go, her father and Olaffson had only shaken their heads and laughed at her childishness.

It was evening. She went with Olaffson to the grave on the hill, there to hear once more about the wonders of foreign lands. Hour after hour flew by; she could not tire of the delightful theme.

"Well, Helga," Olaffson at last concluded, "it is indeed as beautiful in those countries as your mother used to tell you; almost more beautiful—yes, much more beautiful; still, it is not Iceland. There is no place so beautiful as our native land—no place."

Helga looked at him incredulously.

"You may believe me, Helga," he said. "Look; it is now midnight. In those countries there has been night, deep night for hours; the sun has long ago forsaken them, but it loves our island better, for it lingers longer with us. Just look over yonder. It has just sunk into the sea, and on the rosy western sky it paints in silvery outline the beautiful leafy forests which are denied to our soil. Only look how they nod their gleaming heads; does it not seem as if you could hear a mysterious rustling among their branches? And are not the white clouds above like eagles circling over their summits? And now look at the clear light around you! The nights there are as dark as the consciences of criminals; our nights are like the heart of a pious child—light, clear, and still."

"But it is so cold here—so cold that my very heart freezes within me," said Helga complainingly.

"But the cold is bracing," said Olaffson. "There, I found men weak, cowardly, and effeminate. I could tell you many a sad story to show this. Now look at your own land, Flower of Iceland, for you belong to us; we are honest, brave, and strong as our fathers were, and our sons will be after us, and that we owe to Iceland and its glaciers, its cold but strengthening climate. I tell you, fair Helga, there is but one Iceland, as there is but one flower in it."

Early next morning Olaffson was to set out. Helga's father said he would go down to the coast also with his servants, for it was the time of the yearly fishing, so that they might as well travel together so far.

The farewell was short and silent. Helga struggled to keep back her tears when she saw how merrily they all sprang into the saddle, and when she thought of Olaffson's words about Iceland's brave people; for she must show herself worthy of her race. But her dark eyes rested so longingly on her father's face that he knew what was passing in her heart.

"Come, Helga," said he, stooping down from his horse, "you may go with us as far as the hill where the lava-fields begin." Then he took her up before him on the saddle, and soon the horses were off at a canter. Soon they reached the hill at the foot of which the lava-fields began, whose dark lines stretched for miles along the horizon.

Helga could no longer restrain her tears. She threw her arms sobbing round her father's neck and said, "Don't stay long away, dear father; it is so dreary at home when you are both away."

"I will come back in a few weeks, my Helga," said her father, soothingly; "meantime be a good girl, and help your cousin with the housekeeping."

He kissed her snow-white brow silently, but tenderly, lifted her down from the horse, and after one more pressure of the hand the little band set out again.

Helga watched them till a sinking of the road hid them from view; then she went back towards the hill, leant against the side of a rock, and looked into the distance, shading her eyes with her hand. Then they came into sight again, but so far away that Helga's farewell could not reach their ear. A fleeting sunbeam rested on them a moment, making horses and riders shine out clearly from the desert plain over which they were moving. Then a mist, such as only Iceland's mountains could send forth, fell around them, and Helga saw them no more.

She leaned her head sobbing against the rock, closed her eyes, and wept hot tears of grief and loneliness. Then a voice of wondrous sweetness sounded suddenly in her ear, "Why does fair Helga weep?"

Helga opened her eyes in astonishment. No one was there; she could see nothing but the mist in the distance and the bare lava-fields at her feet. She closed her eyes again.

"Helga, fair Helga, why are you so sad?" said the voice again; it seemed as if it came from the sky.

A slight shudder passed through Helga's frame; she did not venture to stir, but she timidly opened her eyes and looked up. But what did she see? Was the azure Italian sky, of which she had so often dreamt, coming here to meet her? Right before her, on the summit of the hill, stood a form of majestic beauty, which must surely belong to some happier clime. Eyes of deep and mysterious blue shone down on Helga from the kingly countenance, and hair lovelier than her own, golden as the stars of the summer night, flowed down over the robe of purple velvet in which the stranger was clad.

"Why does fair Helga weep?" he asked tenderly.

Helga tried to regain her composure. "How do you know me, O stranger?" she asked shyly.

"Who does not know the Flower of Iceland?" answered he with a smile. "Shall I tell you some things about yourself that will prove to you how long I have known you, and how well I am acquainted with your history? Shall I tell you how often I have seen you sitting on your mother's grave, and what images there passed before your mind? Shall I say what longing a moment ago stirred your soul—how you wished to be permitted to travel with Olaffson, that you might see those rich and wondrously beautiful lands? But no such journey is necessary to the fulfilment of your wish. Your mother's paradise is here—here close beside you."

Helga's eyes shone, half in doubt, half in delight.

"Here, here?" she asked, incredulously. "How can that be?"

"Just come a few steps with me to the other side of the hill, and then you will see that I speak the truth."

Helga took his proffered hand. The stranger who had known her so long and so well was no longer a stranger to her, and he could not be an enemy who was about to fulfil her heart's dearest wish. So she went fearlessly with him to the other side of the hill.

The stranger placed his hand against the rock, which immediately opened, and allowed Helga and her guide to enter. She stood spell-bound with astonishment. Then she passed her hand over her brow, and tried to think if this could be a dream. But no, it was reality. There lay before her a wondrous region, more beautiful than her mother's native land or than all her childish dreams.

Through the crystal dome that stretched above this paradise the sun sent beams bright and warm such as the children of Iceland never see or feel. Their golden light trembled among the green foliage of the majestic trees, played with the flashing fountain jet, and flamed in the cups of the transparent flowers.

In the distance the ocean rolled its deep blue waves round wooded islands, and amid the fragrance of the flowers and the brilliant colours of the lovely scene hovered sweet and magic music, which floated to the shore of the sea, whose waves bore it in soft echo to the happy isles.

Helga looked round with delight such as she had never felt before. Had earth really such beauties, and was she permitted to gaze on them?

She stooped to examine the wonderful flowers, gently stroked the velvet of their leaves with her white hand, and pressed her lips into their fragrant cups. Then her delighted eye watched the fountain, as its waters rose in a line of light almost to the crystal dome, then fell in a graceful curve far beyond its basin, so that the shrubs and flowers bent beneath its shining dew.

Then she turned towards the lofty trees, pressed her face gently against their smooth stems, and looked up at their shining foliage, which rustled softly in the breeze. Snow-white birds hopped from branch to branch, and threw friendly glances at Helga as at an old acquaintance. Was it these feathered songsters that made the sweet music which floated with the sunbeams and the soft spring air all through this lovely place? Or did the tall trees or the distant sea give forth the sweet sounds that soothed with soft caress Helga's heart and mind, bearing away on their melodious waves the past and its memories?

Hours had flown by in this fairy kingdom, and to Helga they seemed but as one moment. At last she turned to the stranger, who had followed her every movement with loving eyes, and had noticed her delight.

"Oh, how shall I thank you," she said, grasping his hand, "for bringing me here and satisfying the longing of years? But tell me where I am; for Iceland's cold hills hide no such paradise."

"You are in my kingdom, fair Helga," answered the stranger in a gentle voice; "and I am the fairy king of Iceland."

Helga looked at him in astonishment. No lips save her mother's had ever told her of such things, and she knew nothing of Iceland's spirit kingdom. Therefore Helga felt neither terror nor anxiety.

"Ah! if I could only stay here always," she cried earnestly.

"I wish for nothing better," said the king; "and why should you not?"

"Ah! my dear, good father—he has no one but me," said Helga, thinking for a moment of her home.

"But he is now far away," said the fairy king persuasively; "and you can stay at least till he comes back."

"So I can," cried Helga in delight. So she stayed with the fairy king.

One day in this paradise was just like the next, as it will perhaps be in heaven, where there is nothing to remind the blessed of the flight of time, where it is all one gloriously happy present, because they have no past to look back on with sad memory, and the future has nothing more beautiful to excite their longings.

Helga moved with happy heart by the side of the fairy king through this paradise. The white birds flitted around her, now and then settling on her hand or shoulder. The sea with the blue waves gave a sound of pleasant greeting when Helga and the fairy king drew near its shores. Then when he seized her hand and they stepped together on one of the little waves, this fairy boat carried them gently and swiftly over to the happy islands.

At midnight, when Iceland's sun spread its crimson mantle along the horizon, its reflection streamed through the crystal dome, glowed like roses in the fountain and on the birds' white feathers, while the sea rolled to the shore in violet waves.

Then Helga knew that she must close her eyes, in order to strengthen herself for a new day of happiness. She lay down on the soft moss, while the fairy king sat near her and took his harp. From its strings streamed forth magic music which banished memory from Helga's soul. The sweet sounds lulled her to sleep, and carefully guarded the gates of her heart, permitting no dream to knock there which could remind her of the past and its claims. But, once, the chord which nature has placed between the hearts of parent and child, and which never breaks even though seas lie between, sounded with a startling thrill.

Helga's father had come home, and his grief and lamentation at the loss of his beloved child were so violent that Helga's slumbering heart awoke.

"My father!" she said suddenly one day as she stood beside the sea, and drew back the foot which she was just on the point of placing on the wave that stood bowing its blue head before her. "My father! I think I hear you lamenting my loss. Is it not my duty to leave all these beautiful things here and return to him?"

A shadow fell on the fairy king's face. He silently seized his harp and drew from it strains more beautiful, more heart-enthralling than Helga had ever heard before. They floated away over the sea till the waves sank into silence, unwilling to disturb the sweet melodies. And in Helga's heart memory ceased to thrill, and the visions of the past faded from her mind.

Then the fairy king told her how he had chosen her years ago as the queen of this kingdom, and had watched over her since her childhood; that he had prepared all these beautiful things only for her, with the hope that she would some day be his wife, and thus gain for him that for which his soul had yearned during long centuries—an immortal soul, a boon which is denied to the poor fairies in every land.

HELGA IN THE FAIRY KING'S PALACE.
F. C., p. 154.

"Will you be my wife now, fair Helga?" he asked in conclusion. "I will love you with a faithful love such as you would seek in vain among your degenerate race. You shall never regret having given to the poor fairy king the desire of his heart."

"I will, I will!" said she, seizing his hands with childish frankness. "I will always stay with you."

The king's eyes shone with joy.

"But, fair Helga, the laws of our kingdom are strict; we hold the vows of faithfulness more sacred than you do, although we look for no eternal reward. If you become my wife, and by uniting your soul to mine impart to me your immortality, then you belong henceforth to me, and to me alone. Your father and your home have no longer any claim on you, and if you ever return to them, then I must hold you guilty of robbing me of my soul, and our kingdom will demand your life as the penalty. Canst thou keep such faith as this with me, O Flower of Iceland?"

Fair Helga leaned forward. "Look into my eyes," she said; "do you think me so ungrateful? I will be your wife, and you shall gain through me a never-dying soul. Do you think I could disappoint your hopes of immortality?"

So fair Helga, the Flower of Iceland, was married to the fairy king.

A year had gone by. The sun shone once more through the crystal dome, and fair Helga's fairy kingdom still bloomed in unfaded beauty; but the Flower of Iceland was pale and sorrowful, and a tear trembled on her lowered eyelashes.

Was the fairy king's wife not happy? Oh yes, she was happy, almost too happy. Beauty and love surrounded her on every side; but undisturbed blessedness never lasts long on earth.

Her husband was far away. The laws of the fairy kingdom compelled him to go every year across the sea to give account of his government to the supreme lord of the fairy race, whose throne stood in the rocky mountains of Norway. He had promised to return in a week, and now three weeks had gone by, and he had not come home. This thought gnawed at fair Helga's heart, and made her blind to all the beauty around her. In vain did the white birds flit around her head, stroking her cheeks with their soft wings. Helga's soul was sunk in sorrow, and the magic music with its soothing power lay asleep in the harp. At last she rose.

"Ah! I must be disobedient, my husband; forgive me, forgive me! But anxiety will kill me, if I do not go out to look if I can see you in the distance."

She sprang up and went to the door in the rock. The birds fluttered anxiously around her, but she frightened them away with her hand, and touched the wall through which she had entered a year ago. The rock, not daring to refuse obedience to its mistress, opened, and fair Helga stepped out on the barren soil of Iceland. But after being so long accustomed to the warm summer air, she shuddered as she felt the icy breath of her old home, and with hurried steps she went to the point of the rock. Here she stopped, turned her beautiful face, and looked over her left shoulder towards the south-east.

Before the power of this magic glance the veil of the distance vanished. Her look pierced through Iceland's fogs, flew over the eastern mountains, and swam on the Atlantic waves to the steep rock-bound coast of Norway. She saw the mysterious inhabitants of the mountains, and the mighty fairy king seated on his diamond throne, over which thousands of years had passed, leaving it still unshaken. Around him stood his people in their unfading youth and beauty, bowing in lowly reverence. But her husband's noble form was not among them; she could not meet the glance of his deep blue eye, though she anxiously examined every countenance. At last she looked sadly away, and turned to go back to her lonely kingdom.

But when she went round the corner of the rock she saw a tall, manly form standing in the very place whence she had once watched her father and Olaffson as they rode away over the lava-fields. With a cry of joy she ran to the spot. Could it be that her husband had been so near, while she believed him far away? But the man, hearing her light footstep, turned his head, and she looked not on her husband's youthful beauty, but on the careworn face of her long-forgotten father.

"Helga, Helga!" The words fell on her ear with a strange thrill. "My child, you are still alive, you are still on earth?" and he stretched out his arms towards her, and pressed her to his breast, while the hot tears fell on her brow.

The long-silenced chords now sounded loudly in Helga's heart, memory awoke, and the fairy king's harp was not near to lull it to sleep again.

"My dear, good father," she said, thinking now of none but him, "weep not. Your Helga lives and is happy; but how old you have grown, and how white your hair is!"

"Yes, Helga, I had lost you, my only child; but now that I have found you my youthful vigour will return. Come home quickly, my daughter. How glad Olaffson will be."

At these words Helga's heart trembled. "My dear, dear father," she said, gently stroking the furrowed cheeks, "I cannot go with you; I belong now to another world." Then she told her astonished father all that had happened to her since the hour when she said good-bye to him at the edge of the lava-field.

"I have given my word," she concluded, "and, hard as it seems not to go with you, I dare not, I dare not."

"Alas, my child, my poor unhappy child!" said the father sorrowfully; "into what hands have you fallen?"

"Into the best and tenderest, my father," said Helga, soothingly. "Would that my husband were at home, that you might see him; but I will show you my kingdom, that your mind may be set at rest."

She took her father's hand and led him towards the side of the rock which concealed the entrance into the fairy land. She touched it, but the door remained closed; again and again she passed her hand over the hard stone, but there was no movement.

Helga's heart throbbed as though it would break, and she sank down on the hard ground, begging with bitter tears for admission to her kingdom; but all was still, dead, and motionless.

Poor Helga! Without knowing it, she had transgressed the laws of the fairies by speaking to a mortal of the mysteries of the spirit-world, and now its gates were barred against her. With bitter regret she now remembered her husband's parting command—not to return to the outer world, to which she had no longer any right. Soon, she thought, will the other awful threat be fulfilled, and she sank unconscious into her father's arms.

He was rejoiced to see the fairy kingdom closed against his daughter, and with a lightened heart he bore the precious burden back to her childhood's home.

After long hours and days of darkness, Helga's youthful strength triumphed, and she opened her eyes in full consciousness. Her first glance fell on her father, who sat at her bedside.

"You here, my dear father? Then my meeting with you was not a dream? But now let me get up and go to my husband; he must have come home long before this, and he will believe me when I tell him that I did not intend to leave him."

"My child, look round you," said the father, soothingly. "Let those feverish fancies die. See, you are where you have always been, at home with your old father. All through your long illness you have raved about a fairy king and his paradise, of your marriage and your promises. But these were only fancies, my Helga, such as fever often causes."

Helga looked at him in trembling astonishment.

"That is impossible," she said at last in a faltering voice. "Bring out my clothes, and see whether Iceland has such splendid garments as those."

"Splendid garments?" repeated her father as if in surprise. Then he rose and brought Helga's dress, a garment such as she had always been accustomed to wear.

Helga examined it doubtfully, then she passed her hand over her brow, looked up at her father, and said in a low voice, "I cannot understand it. Can one then dream such things as those?"

"Certainly, my child; it is always so in fever. When I went to the coast a few weeks ago, taking you with me as far as the lava-field, you must have climbed the rock to watch us and fallen asleep there. Then the cold mountain mist crept round you, and almost prevented you from ever awaking. When your cousin thought you were staying too long, she set out with the servants to look for you; there they found you lying on the rock in a state of unconsciousness, and brought you home. A messenger was sent after us, and we returned as quickly as possible. I left my fishing, and Olaffson gave up thoughts of his voyage, that we might be near at hand to watch and care for you."

Helga sighed. Her father had never told her an untruth, so she felt compelled to believe him, though her heart rebelled against his words with bitter grief.

Ah! she little suspected that her father, in the hope of keeping his dear child beside him and hindering her return to fairyland, had invented this story, and carefully taught it to every one about the house.

Helga's bodily strength increased day by day, but over her spirit rested a cloud of melancholy, and she pined in secret for the paradise of her "feverish dreams."

She was at last almost convinced that such they had indeed been, for when she spoke to any of the servants about her lost fairy kingdom, they always smiled and said, "Those were mere fancies; we were about you all the time and heard you rave about them."

As for the voyage round the world which Olaffson had completed since she went away, of that she heard nothing, nor was she aware that the world's history had advanced a year while she tarried in fairyland. The farm-houses in Iceland are separated from each other by long distances, so that it was but seldom that Helga came in contact with any of the neighbours; and if a chance stranger came to claim the rights of hospitality, the father or Olaffson took care to warn him beforehand not to disturb Helga's delusion.

But the precaution was almost unnecessary; for the Flower of Iceland, once so cheerful and talkative, who used to greet the arrival of a stranger as a joyous event, and was never tired of asking questions about the wonders of foreign lands, the same Helga sat silent and listless, and left the room as soon as the conversation turned on beautiful scenery. For the visions of her lost paradise came back to her mind, and it needed a conflict of hours to still her restless heart. "Ah! it was only a dream."

Olaffson had given up his seafaring life, and now busied himself about the farm. Helga's father loved him as a son, and intended making him the heir of his valuable property. But he had hopes of giving him something better still. He was only waiting till Helga should be once more the joyous Helga, till the Flower of Iceland should raise its drooping head. But this time seemed far distant.

"Perhaps she will be better when she is married," said the father to himself, as he looked anxiously at Helga. She was leaning against the grassy ditch that enclosed the farm, and gazing into the glow of the evening sky. He stepped softly up to her.

"What is my Helga thinking of?" he asked tenderly.

"Of the evening rays that are now falling through the crystal dome, of the little waves crowned with the roses of the sunset sky, and of the sweet music of the harp," she answered dreamily.

"Helga," said the old man reproachfully, "will you never shake off these delusions. You have heard from every tongue that they were fever fancies; but you want to vex my heart."

"Oh, no, no, dear father. Do not think so ill of your Helga," she said quickly, as she turned and stroked his cheeks caressingly. "I know very well that they were only dreams, but you cannot believe how deeply they are burnt into my heart. It seems like faithlessness to tear them away."

"That is a remnant of the fever," said the old man. "Ah, Helga, how happy should I be if you were yourself again!"

"And I too, dear father," said Helga, with a gentle sigh.

"I know one way of curing you, and if you love me you will try it."

"That I will, father."

"Do you promise it, my Helga?"

"Yes, dear father," she answered unhesitatingly.

"Then listen: Olaffson is good and brave, is he not?" Helga nodded. "He loves you dearly, and my most cherished wish is that you should become his wife, and that you should live under my roof, brightening my old age with the sight of your happiness."

Helga grew deadly pale.

"Ah, father, dear father, I cannot."

"Why not, Helga? Have you anything against him? Is he not young, handsome, and strong? Is he not brave and good? Could you find me a better son, or yourself a more loving husband? Tell me, are you influenced in this matter by those foolish dreams, the wild images of your brain? Tell the truth, Helga."

She looked at him in trembling entreaty.

"Ah, my father, forgive me."

"If you want to make your old father happy, say Yes, and become Olaffson's wife; if you wish to poison my last days with sorrow, then leave my wish unfulfilled."

With these words the old man turned away in anxious grief, and moved towards the house.

Helga hastened after him.

"Do not be angry, my father," she begged; "I will fulfil your wish, come what will."

"I thank you, my good child; but what do you fear? What could come of it but a father's blessing, with its fruits of happiness and peace?"

So Helga became Olaffson's wife.

Did the Flower of Iceland now regain its freshness and bloom? Alas! no. In spite of her father's tenderness and her husband's love, she still remained sorrowful and pale; deeper, if anything, was the shadow that oppressed her soul. To longing was now added remorse, the bitterest feeling that can disturb a human heart, for it is the only one for which time has no balm.

"How could I ever rob you of your claim to immortality?" she had once said to the poor fairy king; and even though the words had been only spoken in a dream, yet they burned into her soul, and when she consented to be Olaffson's wife, it seemed to her as if she had really shut out that poor spirit from the heavenly paradise.

The short summer passed, and Helga shuddered more than ever under the icy breath of the northern winter; but it too went by, and spring came at last across the ocean to Iceland's snowy plains. The roads were once more passable, and the first sacrament of the year was to be solemnised in the church of the parish to which the farm held by Helga's father belonged. Olaffson asked his wife to partake with him of the sacred symbols, and she gladly consented. Perhaps she thought this feast of reconciliation might bring back her long-lost peace.

She went about her work with more energy than she had shown for many months, so anxious was she to have everything in readiness for the morrow, for they would have to set out early in order to reach the distant church in time for the service. She was just laying the table for supper when she saw her husband passing the window, and by his side a stranger of tall and manly form.

"See, Helga," said Olaffson as they entered, "I bring an honoured guest; set out your best provisions, for he has travelled far, and is in need of refreshment."

Helga looked at the stranger. His face was handsome, but over his youthful features sorrow had passed with heavy hand. But when he raised his deep blue eyes to Helga, and asked in soft and melodious tones—"Will the Flower of Iceland permit a stranger to rest beneath her roof?" a shudder passed through her frame, and the old conflict began in her soul more wildly and perplexingly than ever.

These eyes, this voice, could they have spoken to her only in a feverish dream? And if she had been deceived—what then? The thought threatened to rob her of reason; but Olaffson stepped up to her and said—

"Our guest must be tired and hungry, my Helga; will you not grant him the welcome which the stranger has always met beneath this roof?"

Helga recovered herself by a great effort, and went out to prepare a room for the mysterious guest, while the latter sat down at table with the others. Then she slipped softly back, took a seat in a dark corner, and gazed with mingled anxiety and longing on the stranger's face.

"Look here, sir," said Helga's father, pointing to the sky, "do you ever see anything like that in your native land? Do you not acknowledge Iceland to be the most beautiful country in the world?"

"Yes," said the stranger, "your land is indeed beautiful; but your home and mine are not so very far distant from one another."

He glanced at Helga—of whose presence the others were not aware—then he described the land in which he lived, the same land that Helga was said to have seen only in the delirium of fever.

She listened with breathless attention. It seemed to her as if the splendour of fairyland once more surrounded her. She saw the blue waves rolling at her feet, and felt herself, as in days gone by, rocking on their gleaming crests. She ran merrily to the side of the fountain and caught at the water, that she might sprinkle it in sport on the birds; and she saw the transparent flowers bending their fragrant cups in friendly greeting. Every moment she expected to see the stranger throw aside his disguise, and, standing before her in royal purple, touch the long-disused strings of his golden harp.

Alas! her father had then deceived her that he might keep her at home; her heart had told her the truth, and she, instead of listening to its entreaties, had weakly yielded to persuasion, and broken her sacred promise. And now? Too late, too late—all was over. Full of grief and despair, she hastened out of the house to pour out her heart in bitter weeping amid the stillness of the night.

Next morning, when all was ready for the journey, when the horses were stamping impatiently before the door, the family all assembled to conform to an old Icelandic custom. In that island, before any family partake of the sacrament, each member asks forgiveness of all the rest for wrongs consciously or unconsciously committed. Helga took her father's hand and her husband's. "Forgive me for all the anxiety I have caused you," she begged in a low voice; then she added the mysterious words, "and also for the sorrow that I am about to bring upon you."

"You must also ask forgiveness of our guest, Helga, in case you have offended him," said Olaffson. "You were not to be found yesterday when he wanted to bid you good-night."

She shuddered, cast a farewell glance on her father's face, and moved towards the stranger's room.

Yes, it was as she felt and knew. The dark garment of yesterday had disappeared; before her stood the fairy king in radiant beauty, with his golden hair flowing down over his purple robe.

She clasped her hands in silent entreaty, and her beautiful eyes looked up with love and humility to the face of her beloved but deeply-wronged husband.

"Helga, Helga," said he gravely, "is this how you have been faithful to your love and your promise?"

"Oh, do not be angry with me," begged Helga; "to your spirit-eye nothing has been hidden; you know how it all came about—how my anxiety for you drove me to seek you—how my father found me, and how I was going to show him our kingdom in order to set his mind at rest. You know that the gates were closed against me, and that I was borne back unconscious to my old home—that they kept me there by cleverly-invented stories, and that at last my father's entreaties forced me to the last and hardest step. But you know also that I have loved only you, that my heart is yours alone."

"Be judged by thine own words, O Flower of Iceland!" replied the fairy king quietly. "Why didst thou not listen to the voice of thy heart? We fairies know nothing of human weakness, therefore we cannot forgive it. Dost thou know the fate that now awaits thee, Helga?"

"I know it well," answered Helga firmly, "and if my mouth has been unfaithful, my heart has been true. I welcome death, for it will reunite me to you!"

Then a happy smile passed over the fairy king's noble countenance; he stretched out his arms, and pressed Helga dying to his heart.

Finding that his wife did not come back, Olaffson hastened with his father-in-law to the stranger's room. They found fair Helga in the fairy king's arms. Both were cold and dead; in the same moment both hearts had broken. Olaffson tried to take Helga away from the stranger's arms, but in vain. What life had robbed him of, he held in death with a grasp that could not be loosed.

"Leave them, my son," said the old grief-stricken father; "she is his by right. What has all our prudence done for us? Worse than nothing! The fairy king has reclaimed his own in spite of us."

They laid them in the same coffin, and next morning the soil of Iceland was to receive them into its cold lap. But in the night that followed this eventful day, sleep fell more heavily than usual on the eyes of the mourners. They did not hear the whispering of gentle voices or the hasty tread of many feet. They did not see the multitude of fairies who had assembled from all parts of the island to show the last honour to their beloved king. Noiselessly the spirits lifted the coffin, carried it out of the house, and away to the rock where fair Helga had begged in vain for admission.

To-day it was not denied her. The magic gates sprang open as the coffin approached. With drooping wings the white birds hovered round, and mourned the royal pair in notes of soft lamentation.

At the shore of the beautiful blue sea the faithful spirits lowered their burden. There Helga and her fairy husband rest beneath the flowers of this paradise, and beside the gentle murmur of the waves. On the branches of the cypress that grows on their grave hangs the fairy king's harp. The hand is cold that once touched its chords; but when the morning breeze sweeps through them, they sound as of old in magic melody. The sweet notes float on the sunbeams through the evergreen paradise, pierce the hard rock, and hover as beautiful and undying legends over Iceland's heaths and snow-clad hills.

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