No More Learning

'Are any of you ever born into mortal life? ' 'Yes. ' 'Do
I know any who were among your people before birth? ' 'You do. ' 'Who are
they? ' 'It would not be lawful for you to know. ' I then asked whether
she and her people were not 'dramatizations of our moods'? 'She does
not understand,' said my friend, 'but says that her people are much
like human beings, and do most of the things human beings do. ' I asked
her other questions, as to her nature, and her purpose in the universe,
but only seemed to puzzle her. At last she appeared to lose patience,
for she wrote this message for me upon the sands--the sands of vision,
not the grating sands under our feet--'Be careful, and do not seek to
know too much about us. ' Seeing that I had offended her, I thanked her
for what she had shown and told, and let her depart again into her
cave. In a little while the young girl awoke out of her trance, and
felt again the cold wind of the world, and began to shiver.

I tell these things as accurately as I can, and with no theories to
blur the history. Theories are poor things at the best, and the bulk of
mine have perished long ago. I love better than any theory the sound
of the Gate of Ivory, turning upon its hinges, and hold that he alone
who has passed the rose-strewn threshold can catch the far glimmer of
the Gate of Horn.
It were perhaps well for us all if we would but raise
the cry Lilly the astrologer raised in Windsor Forest, 'Regina, Regina
Pigmeorum, Veni,' and remember with him, that God visiteth His children
in dreams. Tall, glimmering queen, come near, and let me see again the
shadowy blossom of thy dim hair.

FOOTNOTE:

[F] The people and faeries in Ireland are sometimes as big as we are,
sometimes bigger, and sometimes, as I have been told, about three feet
high. The old Mayo woman I so often quote, thinks that it is something
in our eyes that makes them seem big or little.




'AND FAIR, FIERCE WOMEN'


ONE day a woman that I know came face to face with heroic beauty, that
highest beauty which Blake says changes least from youth to age, a
beauty which has been fading out of the arts, since that decadence we
call progress, set voluptuous beauty in its place. She was standing at
the window, looking over to Knocknarea where Queen Maive is thought to
be buried, when she saw, as she told me, 'the finest woman you ever saw
travelling right across from the mountain and straight to her. ' The
woman had a sword by her side, and a dagger lifted up in her hand, and
was dressed in white, with bare arms and feet. She looked 'very strong,
but not wicked,' that is, not cruel. The old woman had seen the Irish
giant, and 'though he was a fine man,' he was nothing to this woman,
'for he was round, and could not have stepped out so soldierly'; 'she
was like Mrs. ----' a stately lady of the neighbourhood, 'but she had
no stomach on her, and was slight and broad in the shoulders, and was
handsomer than any one you ever saw; she looked about thirty. ' The old
woman covered her eyes with her hands, and when she uncovered them
the apparition had vanished. The neighbours were 'wild with her,' she
told me, because she did not wait to find out if there was a message,
for they were sure it was Queen Maive, who often shows herself to
the pilots. I asked the old woman if she had seen others like Queen
Maive, and she said, 'Some of them have their hair down, but they
look quite different, like the sleepy-looking ladies one sees in the
papers. Those with their hair up are like this one. The others have
long white dresses, but those with their hair up have short dresses,
so that you can see their legs right up to the calf. ' After some
careful questioning I found that they wore what might very well be
a kind of buskin; she went on, 'They are fine and dashing looking,
like the men one sees riding their horses in twos and threes on the
slopes of the mountains with their swords swinging.