The King of Elfland’s Daughter quotes

The young man thought of her beauty and crown of ice, and the sweetness that fabulous runes had told was hers.

Songs were sung of her on wild hills where tiny strawberries grew, at dusk and by early starlight, and if one sought the singer no man was there.

Sometimes only her name was sung softly over and over. Her name was Lirazel.

Songs were sung of her on wild hills where tiny strawberries grew, at dusk and by early starlight, and if one sought the singer no man was there.

Sometimes only her name was sung softly over and over. Her name was Lirazel.

She was a princess of the magic line.

She cried “Alas!” to Alveric, but at that moment the scent of briar roses came drifting to them from the fields we know.

Alveric knew not fatigue for he was young, nor she for she was ageless.

They rushed forward, he taking her hand;

Alveric knew them also, but all were older; and he saw that quite ten years must have passed away during that one blue day he had spent in Elfland.

Who does not know that this is the way of Elfland? And yet who would not be surprised if they saw it happen as Alveric saw it now?

He turned to Lirazel and told her how ten or twelve years were gone. But it was as though a humble man who had wed an earthly princess should tell her he had lost sixpence;

“Well,” said the witch, “did the sword bring you fortune?”

“Who knows,” said Alveric, “what brings fortune, since we cannot see the end?”

And he spoke wearily, for he was weary with age, and never knew how many years had gone over him on the day he travelled to Elfland; far more it seemed than had passed on that same day over Erl.

Was it not enough that he had come? Must she needs understand the curious things folk did? Must she never dance in the road, never speak to goats, never laugh at funerals, never sing at night?

Why! What was joy for if it must be hidden? Must merriment bow to dullness in these strange fields she had come to?

And then one day she saw how a woman of Erl looked less fair than she had looked a year ago. Little enough was the change, but her swift eye saw it surely.

And then, though he was king of all that land, that had its everlasting calm from him, he wept and all Elfland shivered.

It shivered as placid water shivers here if something suddenly touches it from our fields.

Then the King turned and left his balcony and went in great haste down his brazen steps.

Presently he saw rising up all white over the flowers a fox that was facing him with his white chest and chin, and watching the troll as it went. The troll went near to him and took a look.

And the fox went on watching him, for the fox watches all things.

He had come back lately to those dewy fields from slinking by night along the boundary of twilight that lies between here and Elfland. He even prowls inside the very boundary, walking amongst the twilight;

The fox moved his whiskers by slightly wrinkling his lip.

Like all liars he reflected before he spoke, and sometimes even let wise silences do better than speech.

“Men live here and men live there,” said the fox.

“But for what?” said the troll.

“But for their poultry.” And he fell into a grave silence.

“Goodbye, Noman’s Dog,” said the troll and turned head-over-heels, and was off on his way to Erl.

“Why not?” said the troll.

“Mother made a jam roll this morning,” said the child. And she walked on gravely home.

Had it not been for that chance jam roll she had gone to Elfland.

And Ziroonderel all mournfully shook her head.

“The way of the leaves,” she said. “The way of all beauty.”

But Alveric did not stay to hear her say more than her first five words;

and pointing to one particular rock, the most noticeable and near, said, hoping for definite news of a definite thing, “How long has that rock been there?”

And the answer came to his hopes like hail to apple-blossom: “It is there and we must make the best of it.”

The unexpectedness of the answer dazed Alveric; and when he saw that reasonable questions about definite things brought him no logical answer he despaired of getting practical information to guide his fantastic journey.

And, unheeding any words of Orion then, he held on with the brief tale that he had come to tell, and told how Elfland was gone.

“But that cannot be,” said Orion, “for I hear the horns of Elfland every day.”

“You can hear them?” Alveric said.

she wept and said that there would be more things lost by his going than ever folk guessed in Erl.

But Alveric took him away: many go thus.

And one morning six horses heaped and hung with provisions all round their saddles waited at Alveric’s gateway, with the five men that were to roam with him as far as the world’s edge.

and Niv served him well till a day that was far thence, and the moonstruck man stood by Niv, and all were content to do the bidding of Niv, and all honoured Alveric’s quest.

And many men in numerous lands do saner things with less harmony.

They came to the uplands and rode over the fields, and rode till they came to the furthest hedges of men, and to the houses that they have built at the verge, beyond which even their thoughts refuse to fare.

Not a wonder in that wood, not a grim hint of magic, but brought back the past to her as though it had scarcely gone.

It was, she felt, but yesterday morning that she had gone away; and it was yesterday morning still.

As she passed through the wood the gashes of Alveric’s sword were yet fresh and white on the trees.

and like the wind with the smoke, night with the dreams, warmth with the sunset, all Elfland drifted with them.

All Elfland drifted with them and left the desolate plain, the dreary deserted region, the unenchanted land.

So swiftly that spell was uttered, so suddenly Elfland obeyed, that many a little song, old memory, garden or May tree of remembered years, was swept but a little way by the drift and heave of Elfland, swaying too slowly eastwards till the elfin lawns …

and laid its influence over all his dominions, for the good and welfare of Elfland; for he had what all our troubled world with all its changes seeks, and finds so rarely and must at once cast it away.

He had found content and held it.

And in that calm that settled down upon Elfland there passed ten years over the fields we know.

… on those white downs, where the eye could follow each step of their treble claws, till suddenly on each side of the track would appear three little scars where the tips of their longest feathers had flicked the snow, and there the track faded utterly.

They were like some popular cry, some vehement fancy, that comes down on a page of history for a day, and passes, leaving no other record at all except those lines on one page.

And amongst all these records left of the story of night Orion would choose the track of some great stag not too long gone, and would follow it with his hounds away over the downs until even the sound of his horn could be heard …

but all he asked for was provender, and this he bought when they brought it. So they went on.

Like legendary things they passed along the backs of the houses, putting up their grey shapeless tent in the grey evenings.

They came as quietly as rain, and went away like mists drifting. There were jests about them and songs. And the songs outlasted the jests. At last they became a legend, which haunted those farms forever:

but all he asked for was provender, and this he bought when they brought it. So they went on. Like legendary things they passed along the backs of the houses, putting up their grey shapeless tent in the grey evenings.

They came as quietly as rain, and went away like mists drifting.

There were jests about them and songs. And the songs outlasted the jests. At last they became a legend, which haunted those farms forever:

but his fathers had followed the chase age after age, as his mother’s line had timelessly followed magic; and the call towards magic was strong while he looked on magical things, and the old earthly line was as strong to beckon him to the chase.

The beautiful boundary of twilight had drawn his desires towards Elfland, next moment his hounds had turned him another way: it is hard for any of us to avoid the grip of external things.

For some moments Orion stood thinking among his hounds, trying to decide which way to turn, trying to weigh the easy lazy ages, that hung over untroubled lawns and the listless glories of Elfland, with the good brown plough and the pasture and the little …

And much more than this they said, till they became incoherent. Orion left them and went to the house of the third. It was the same here.

The elders had desired magic for Erl, but the actual touch of it, or the mere thought of it, perturbed the folk in their cottages.

None would spare their sons to go whither they knew not, to have dealings with things that rumour, like a large and sinister shadow, had so grimly magnified in the hamlet of Erl.

“Nearly twelve,” said Orion. “And you?”

“It is still today” said the troll.

And Orion would not speak any more of time, for he cared not for the discussion of a subject of which he appeared to know less than a common troll.

“It is still today” said the troll.

And Orion would not speak any more of time, for he cared not for the discussion of a subject of which he appeared to know less than a common troll.

“Will you carry a whip,” he said, “and run with my hounds when we hunt the unicorn over the fields we know.”

Lurulu looked searchingly at the hounds, watching their brown eyes: the hounds turned doubtful noses towards the troll and sniffed enquiringly.

“They are dogs,” said the troll, as though that were against them. “Yet they have pleasant thoughts.”

“You will carry the whip then,” said Orion.

Change and nothing abiding. He thought of the age-old calm that held the beauty of Elfland. And then he thought of the tribe of trolls he had left, wondering what they would think of the ways of Earth.

And the pigeons were suddenly terrified by wild peals of Lurulu’s laughter.

As the day wore on and still Orion slept heavily, and even the hounds lay silent in their kennels a little way off, and the coming and going of men and carts below had nothing to do with the troll, Lurulu began to feel lonely.

So thick are the brown trolls in the dells they inhabit that none feels lonely there.

They sit there silent, enjoying the beauty of Elfland or their own impudent thoughts, or at rare moments when Elfland is stirred from its deep natural calm their laughter floods the dells. They were no more lonely there than rabbits are.

They sit there silent, enjoying the beauty of Elfland or their own impudent thoughts, or at rare moments when Elfland is stirred from its deep natural calm their laughter floods the dells. They were no more lonely there than rabbits are.

But in all the fields of Earth there was only one troll; and that troll felt lonely.

The door of the pigeon loft was open some ten feet from the door of the hayloft, and some six feet higher. A ladder led to the hayloft, clamped to the wall with iron;

He liked the age-old ease of the sleepy loft, and the huge spiders-webs that draped the corners, holding years and years of dust.

He did not know what cobwebs were, never having seen them in Elfland, but he admired their workmanship.

The age of the pigeon-loft that had filled the corners with cobwebs, and broken patches of plaster away from the wall, showing ruddy bricks beneath, and laid bare the laths in the roof and even the slates beyond, gave to the dreamy place an air …

To the pigeons on the roof that would not come home he listened long, not trying to interpret what they were saying, yet satisfied with the case as the pigeons put it; feeling that they told the story of life, and that all was well.

And he felt as he listened to the low talk of the pigeons that Earth must have been going on for a long time.

Beyond the roofs the tall trees rose up, leafless except for evergreen oaks and some laurels and pines and yews, and the ivy that climbed up trunks, but the buds of the beech were getting ready to burst:

He knew nothing of rat-talk; but it is a curious thing that when any two folk are after the same thing, each somehow knows what the other is after, at once, as soon as he sees him.

We are all partially blind to other folks’ occupations, but when we meet anyone engaged in our own pursuit then somehow we soon seem to know without being told.

And the moment that Lurulu saw the rat in the shed he seemed to know that it was looking for food. So he followed the rat quietly.

“Is it not today?” he said. “But there they call it today, yet none knows what it is: come back through the border again to look at it and it is gone.

Time is raging there, like the dogs that stray over our frontier, barking, frightened and angry and wild to be home.

”

And Lurulu who had sat angry all this while to hear that weighty troll speak ill of Earth, where he would have them come, to astonish them with its quaintness, spoke now in defence of Heaven.

“Heaven is a good place,” he blurted hotly, though any tales he had heard of it were few.

“All the blessed are there,” the grizzled troll replied, “and it is full of angels. What chance would a troll have there? The angels would catch him, for they say on Earth that the angels all have wings;

What chance would a troll have there? The angels would catch him, for they say on Earth that the angels all have wings; they would catch a troll and smack him forever and ever.”

And all the brown trolls in the forest wept.

“We are not so easily caught,” Lurulu said.

And Lurulu argued no more. It was not a time for argument, for the trolls were too sad for reason. So he spoke gravely to them of solemn things, uttering learned words and standing in reverend attitude.

Now nothing rejoices the trolls as learning does and solemnity, and they will laugh for hours at a reverend attitude or any semblance of gravity.

Thus he won them back again to the levity that is their natural mood. And when this was accomplished he spoke again of Earth, telling whimsical stories of the ways of man.

Thus he won them back again to the levity that is their natural mood. And when this was accomplished he spoke again of Earth, telling whimsical stories of the ways of man.

I do not wish to write the things that Lurulu said of man, lest I should hurt my reader’s self-esteem, and thereby injure him or her whom I seek only to entertain

; but all the forest rippled and squealed with laughter.

“Is it not enough?” he said in his strange rich magical voice, and pointed across his wide lands with the fingers that summoned wonder.

She sighed: it was not enough.

And sorrow came upon that enchanted King: he had only his daughter, and she sighed for Earth. There had been once a queen that had reigned with him over Elfland; but she was mortal, and being mortal died.

He asked her what she was doing there, on the heath with her broom in the evening.

“Sweeping the world,” she said.

And Alveric wondered what rejected things she was sweeping away from the world, with grey dust mournfully turning over and over as it drifted across our fields, going slowly into the darkness that was gathering beyond our coasts.

“Why are you sweeping the world, Mother Witch?” he said.

“There’s things in the world that ought not to be here,” said she.

He looked wistfully then at the rolling grey clouds from her broom that were all drifting towards Elfland.

“Wroth!” said Ziroonderel. “Wroth?

He will rage with a most exceeding fury, beyond the power of tigers.

”

“I would not bring that on you, Mother Witch,” said Alveric.

“Ha!” said Ziroonderel. “What care I?”

Night was advancing now, and the moor and the air growing black like the witch’s cloak. She was laughing now and merging into the darkness. And soon the night was all blackness and laughter; but he could see no witch.

Night was advancing now, and the moor and the air growing black like the witch’s cloak. She was laughing now and merging into the darkness.

And soon the night was all blackness and laughter; but he could see no witch.

Then Alveric made his way back to his rocky camp by the light of its lonely fire.

Perhaps even they, whose gravest thoughts were just under the surface of laughter, even they were a little awed by the strangeness and nearness of man sleeping there in his hamlet with all his smoke about him.

Though awe in these light minds rested no longer than does the squirrel on the thin extremest twigs.

In a while they lifted their eyes up from the valley, and there was the western sky still shining above the last of the gloaming, a little strip of colour and dying light, so lovely that they believed that another elfland lay the other side …

as conies in rocky altitudes know the peril of the sheer cliff, so they that dwell near Earth’s border knew well the danger of time. And yet they came. The wonder and lure of Earth had been overstrong for them.

Does not many a young man squander youth as they squandered immortality?

And Lurulu showed them how to hold off time for a while, which otherwise would make them older and older each moment and whirl them on with Earth’s restlessness all night long. Then he curled up his knees and shut his eyes and lay still.

Now it is far from my intention to write anything detrimental to will-o’-the-wisps, or anything that may be construed as being a slight upon them: no such construction should be put upon my writings.

But it is well known that the people of the marshes lure travellers to their doom, and have delighted to follow that avocation for centuries, and I may be permitted to mention this in no spirit of disapproval.

The will-o’-the-wisps then that were about this traveller redoubled their efforts with fury;

In Erl that had sighed for magic there was indeed magic now.

The pigeon-loft and old lumber-lofts over stables were all full of trolls, the ways were full of their antics, and lights bobbed up and down the street at night long after traffic was home.

and nothing was sounding, not a noise was astir; yet Orion stood there called by things beyond mortal hearing. “It is too late now,” said Threl.

And that was the fear of all.

Then Guhic rose slowly up and stood by that table. And trolls were gibbering like bats away in their loft, and the pale marsh-lights were flickering, and shapes prowled in the dark:

“Overmuch?” she said. “Overmuch magic!

As though magic were not the spice and essence of life, its ornament and its splendour.

By my broom,” said she, “I give you no spell against magic.”

“No spell indeed!” she hissed. “No spell indeed! By broom and stars and night-riding! Would you rob Earth of her heirloom that has come from the olden time? Would you take her treasure and leave her bare to the scorn of her comrade planets?

Poor indeed were we without magic, whereof we are well stored to the envy of darkness and Space.

” She leaned forward from where she sat and stamped her stick, looking up in Narl’s face with her fierce unwavering eyes.

“

Cursed be brooms that leave their place by the hearth. Cursed be witches and all manner of witcheries.

“Cursed be toadstool rings and whatever dances within them.

“

Cursed be toadstool rings and whatever dances within them.

And all strange lights, strange songs, strange shadows, or rumours that hint of them, and all doubtful things of the dusk, and the things that ill-instructed children fear, and old wives’ tales and things done o’ midsummer nights;

… went by, she knew that Alveric wandered, knew that Orion lived and grew and changed, and that both, if Earth’s legend were true, would soon be lost to her forever and ever, when the gates of Heaven would shut on both with a golden thud.

For between Elfland and Heaven is no path, no flight, no way; and neither sends ambassador to the other.

She yearned to the bells of Earth and the English cowslips, but would not forsake again her mighty father nor the world that his mind had made. And Alveric came not, nor her boy Orion;

And that was true, and the impossible wish lies on the verge of laughter, and for her was only and wholly a matter for tears.

Impossible? Was it impossible? We have to do with magic.

She besought a rune of her father, kneeling upon the magic floor in the midmost centre of Elfland; and around her arose the pillars, of which only song may say, whose misty bulk was disturbed and troubled by Lirazel’s sorrow.

And his thoughts went into the future all alone, peering far down the years.

More gladly had a traveller at night in lonely ways given up his lantern than had this elvish king now used his last great spell, and so cast it away, and gone without it into those dubious years

; whose dim forms he saw and many of their events, but not to the end. Easily had she asked for that dread spell, which should appease the only need she had, easily might he have granted it were he but human;

Thus he reasoned with her rather than commanded, though he was the founder and King of all those lands, and all that wandered in them and of the light in which they shone.

And reason in Elfland was no daily thing, but an exotic wonder.

With this he sought to soothe her earthward fancies.

So that when the folk came running over their fields to that queer grey tent from which they heard Alveric’s cries, they found Niv and Zend posed in a calm that they had much practised, while Alveric told of his thwarted quest of Elfland.

Now by many men all quests are considered mad, as the cunning of Niv knew.

Alveric found no help here.

Had the army been there Niv was sane. Had the world accepted that an army was there, even though only Alveric and Zend followed his curious steps, still he was sane.

But the lonely fancy that had not fact to feed on, nor the fancy of any other for fellowship, was for its loneliness mad.

Zend watched Alveric all the while, as they marched behind Niv; for their mutual jealousy of the wonders of Elfland bound Niv and Zend together to work as with one wild whim.

When he told this secretly one evening to Zend, Zend listened gravely but gave no opinion, merely saying “The moon knows.” Nevertheless he followed Niv, who led this curious caravan always in that direction from which his dreams of the valley of Erl came soonest.

And this queer leadership brought them nearer to Erl, as often happens where men follow leaders that are crazy or blind or deceived; they reach some port or other though they stray down the years with little foresight enough: were it otherwise what would become of us?

And one day the upper parts of the towers of Erl looked at them out of blue distance, shining in early sunlight above a curve of the downs.

But Alveric sought no help. Silent he stood and heard the others talking, but his thoughts were far in the past and their voices were only sounds to him. And Vand enquired of them if they had found Elfland.

But he spoke as one asks of children if their toy boat has been to the Happy Isles.

He had had for many years to do with sheep, and had come to know their needs and their price, and the need men have of them;

And Alveric heard with despair, for Lirazel dwelt not only over the border but even, as he saw now, beyond human belief; so that all at once she seemed remoter than ever, and he still lonelier.

“I sought for it once,” said Vand, “but no, there’s no Elfland.”

“No,” said Niv, and only Zend wondered.

They saw it too, a shimmering line of silver, or a little blue like steel, flickering and changing with the reflection of strange passing colours.

And before it, very faint like threatening breezes breathing before a storm, came the soft sound of very old songs.

It caught, as they all stood gazing, one of Vand’s furthest sheep; and instantly its fleece was that pure gold that is told of in old romance; and the shining line came on and the sheep disappeared altogether.