George and His Magic Mirror

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George couldn't help feeling the rush of excitement with them. The sheep looked up at George , admiring him in his suit. George thought the sheep looked at him like their son, and it almost appeared as if they were smiling at him.

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George was glad that he could be there with the sheep. Everything seemed like a dream.

George pinched himself a couple of times, just to make sure he wasn't sleeping. Each pinch hurt, so he knew that he was awake. The train finally reached the station, and the Queen stepped off the train. Sam asked George a most confusing question, "Isn't she the most beautiful Swan Queen you've ever seen? George was surprised to see that the Queen was a Swan, but then he thought, "I shouldn't be surprised! After all, the sheep are speaking to me just like humans.

He didn't tell them that she was the only Swan Queen he'd ever seen. He didn't think that would be a good thing to say. The sheep and George were standing just a few feet away from the Swan Queen. George could see her beautiful white feathers, golden bill, and emerald stoned crown. The Swan Queen spoke to George graciously, asking, "How long have you been waiting for the train?

I hope your trip has been pleasant so far.

Chapter 13

The Swan Queen told him that he was chosen today because she thought he was the perfect boy. George was curious as he looked at Sam, "What does she mean by the perfect boy? The perfect boy for what? A beautiful gold coach pulled by two white horses drove up next to the Queen. The Queen reached out one of her feathered wings.

George reached his hand out, and touched her wing to assist her into the coach. George got on the coach, and sat facing the Swan Queen in the seat across from her. He couldn't help but admire the beautiful, satin-lined coach. He truly thought that she was one of the most beautiful Swans he had ever seen. George was amazed when the coachman opened the door to let them out. They had just entered the coach, and it was already time for them to get out.

They were on the drawbridge in front of the Queen's castle. George thought, How could this be? Then he thought that there was no reason to question how things could happen, since everything seemed to be different from home. George decided he was going to see all kinds of strange things he had never seen before, but that was what was making this whole trip so exciting.

The huge wooden door opened by itself as they approached the castle. Once they entered the castle, George could see a long hallway with several doors. The Queen immediately asked George to go to the door that was marked "Honor. George walked down the hallway, and when he found the door marked just as she said, he entered. Inside the closet-sized room there was a full-length mirror and a shelf with a king's crown sitting on it. George looked at the Swan Queen in surprise.

The Queen asked George to be King for the day. She explained that she would be honored to have him serve as King for just one day.

George and His Magic Mirror

George looked into the mirror at his own reflection, thinking, I know I have to go back home, but I'm not ready to go just yet. George looked at the Queen, and said, "I'm the one that would be honored. I have never been asked to serve as King for the day. The Swan Queen took the crown, and placed it on George's head. George looked in the mirror thinking that he couldn't believe this was happening to him. All of a sudden, there was a bolt of lightning, then a loud thunder roaring from the sky.

George and His Magic Mirror

Everyone ran inside the castle for cover. As George was admiring his crown, he heard a cry coming from outside. My son is caught in the tree and I'm afraid the lightning will hurt him. George ran out and pulled the bear down to safety. As everyone crowded into the back of the castle, the little bear came forward with his mother.

The little bear ran to George to hug him, saying, "Thank you for saving my life. George hugged him back, saying, "You're welcome! Remember to stay close to your mother next time when there is a bad storm. At length, after she had lain down as usual one evening, her eyes fell upon some paintings with which Cosmo had just finished adorning the walls.

She rose, and to his great delight, walked across the room, and proceeded to examine them carefully, testifying much pleasure in her looks as she did so. But again the sorrowful, tearful expression returned, and again she buried her face in the pillows of her couch. Gradually, however, her countenance had grown more composed; much of the suffering manifest on her first appearance had vanished, and a kind of quiet, hopeful expression had taken its place; which, however, frequently gave way to an anxious, troubled look, mingled with something of sympathetic pity.

Meantime, how fared Cosmo? As might be expected in one of his temperament, his interest had blossomed into love, and his love--shall I call it ripened , or-- withered into passion. He could not come near her, could not speak to her, could not hear a sound from those sweet lips, to which his longing eyes would cling like bees to their honey-founts. Ever and anon he sang to himself:. And the more he did for her, the more he loved her; and he hoped that, although she never appeared to see him, yet she was pleased to think that one unknown would give his life to her.

He tried to comfort himself over his separation from her, by thinking that perhaps some day she would see him and make signs to him, and that would satisfy him; "for," thought he, "is not this all that a loving soul can do to enter into communion with another? Nay, how many who love never come nearer than to behold each other as in a mirror; seem to know and yet never know the inward life; never enter the other soul; and part at last, with but the vaguest notion of the universe on the borders of which they have been hovering for years?

If I could but speak to her, and knew that she heard me, I should be satisfied. One evening, as he stood gazing on his treasure, he thought he saw a faint expression of self-consciousness on her countenance, as if she surmised that passionate eyes were fixed upon her. This grew; till at last the red blood rose over her neck, and cheek, and brow. Cosmo's longing to approach her became almost delirious.

This night she was dressed in an evening costume, resplendent with diamonds. This could add nothing to her beauty, but it presented it in a new aspect; enabled her loveliness to make a new manifestation of itself in a new embodiment. For essential beauty is infinite; and, as the soul of Nature needs an endless succession of varied forms to embody her loveliness, countless faces of beauty springing forth, not any two the same, at any one of her heart-throbs; so the individual form needs an infinite change of its environments, to enable it to uncover all the phases of its loveliness.

Diamonds glittered from amidst her hair, half hidden in its luxuriance, like stars through dark rain-clouds; and the bracelets on her white arms flashed all the colours of a rainbow of lightnings, as she lifted her snowy hands to cover her burning face. But her beauty shone down all its adornment.

Nor did he know that there are two ways out of her enchanted house. But, suddenly, as if the pang had been driven into his heart from without, revealing itself first in pain, and afterwards in definite form, the thought darted into his mind, "She has a lover somewhere. Remembered words of his bring the colour on her face now. I am nowhere to her.

She lives in another world all day, and all night, after she leaves me. Why does she come and make me love her, till I, a strong man, am too faint to look upon her more? A sorrowful compassion seemed to rebuke the glitter of the restless jewels, and the slow tears rose in her eyes. She left her room sooner this evening than was her wont. Cosmo remained alone, with a feeling as if his bosom had been suddenly left empty and hollow, and the weight of the whole world was crushing in its walls. The next evening, for the first time since she began to come, she came not.

And now Cosmo was in wretched plight. Since the thought of a rival had occurred to him, he could not rest for a moment. More than ever he longed to see the lady face to face. He persuaded himself that if he but knew the worst he would be satisfied; for then he could abandon Prague, and find that relief in constant motion, which is the hope of all active minds when invaded by distress. Meantime he waited with unspeakable anxiety for the next night, hoping she would return: And now he fell really ill. Rallied by his fellow students on his wretched looks, he ceased to attend the lectures.

His engagements were neglected. He cared for nothing, The sky, with the great sun in it, was to him a heartless, burning desert. The men and women in the streets were mere puppets, without motives in themselves, or interest to him. He saw them all as on the ever-changing field of a camera obscura.

She--she alone and altogether--was his universe, his well of life, his incarnate good. For six evenings she came not. Let his absorbing passion, and the slow fever that was consuming his brain, be his excuse for the resolution which he had taken and begun to execute, before that time had expired. Reasoning with himself, that it must be by some enchantment connected with the mirror, that the form of the lady was to be seen in it, he determined to attempt to turn to account what he had hitherto studied principally from curiosity.

If I do her wrong, let love be my excuse. I want only to know my doom from her own lips. He opened his secret drawer, took out his books of magic, lighted his lamp, and read and made notes from midnight till three in the morning, for three successive nights. Then he replaced his books; and the next night went out in quest of the materials necessary for the conjuration. These were not easy to find; for, in love-charms and all incantations of this nature, ingredients are employed scarcely fit to be mentioned, and for the thought even of which, in connexion with her, he could only excuse himself on the score of his bitter need.

At length he succeeded in procuring all he required; and on the seventh evening from that on which she had last appeared, he found himself prepared for the exercise of unlawful and tyrannical power. He cleared the centre of the room; stooped and drew a circle of red on the floor, around the spot where he stood; wrote in the four quarters mystical signs, and numbers which were all powers of seven or nine; examined the whole ring carefully, to see that no smallest break had occurred in the circumference; and then rose from his bending posture.

As he rose, the church clock struck seven; and, just as she had appeared the first time, reluctant, slow, and stately, glided in the lady. Cosmo trembled; and when, turning, she revealed a countenance worn and wan, as with sickness or inward trouble, he grew faint, and felt as if he dared not proceed. But as he gazed on the face and form, which now possessed his whole soul, to the exclusion of all other joys and griefs, the longing to speak to her, to know that she heard him, to hear from her one word in return, became so unendurable, that he suddenly and hastily resumed his preparations.

Stepping carefully from the circle, he put a small brazier into its centre. He then set fire to its contents of charcoal, and while it burned up, opened his window and seated himself, waiting, beside it. It was a sultry evening. The air was full of thunder.

A sense of luxurious depression filled the brain. The sky seemed to have grown heavy, and to compress the air beneath it. A kind of purplish tinge pervaded the atmosphere, and through the open window came the scents of the distant fields, which all the vapours of the city could not quench. Soon the charcoal glowed. Cosmo sprinkled upon it the incense and other substances which he had compounded, and, stepping within the circle, turned his face from the brazier and towards the mirror.

Then, fixing his eyes upon the face of the lady, he began with a trembling voice to repeat a powerful incantation. He had not gone far, before the lady grew pale; and then, like a returning wave, the blood washed all its banks with its crimson tide, and she hid her face in her hands. Then he passed to a conjuration stronger yet. The lady rose and walked uneasily to and fro in her room. Another spell; and she seemed seeking with her eyes for some object on which they wished to rest.

At length it seemed as if she suddenly espied him; for her eyes fixed themselves full and wide upon his, and she drew gradually, and somewhat unwillingly, close to her side of the mirror, just as if his eyes had fascinated her. Cosmo had never seen her so near before. Now at least, eyes met eyes; but he could not quite understand the expression of hers. They were full of tender entreaty, but there was something more that he could not interpret. Though his heart seemed to labour in his throat, he would allow no delight or agitation to turn him from his task.

Looking still in her face, he passed on to the mightiest charm he knew. Suddenly the lady turned and walked out of the door of her reflected chamber. A moment after she entered his room with veritable presence; and, forgetting all his precautions, he sprang from the charmed circle, and knelt before her. There she stood, the living lady of his passionate visions, alone beside him, in a thundery twilight, and the glow of a magic fire.

I am but a slave, while that mirror exists. But do not think it was the power of thy spells that drew me; it was thy longing desire to see me, that beat at the door of my heart, till I was forced to yield. It were indeed a joy too great, to lay my head on thy bosom and weep to death; for I think thou lovest me, though I do not know;--but". A fierce struggle arose in Cosmo's bosom. Now she was in his power. She did not dislike him at least; and he could see her when he would. To break the mirror would be to destroy his very life to banish out of his universe the only glory it possessed.

The whole world would be but a prison, if he annihilated the one window that looked into the paradise of love.

Not yet pure in love, he hesitated. With a wail of sorrow the lady rose to her feet. I care more for his love than even for the freedom I ask. Meantime it had grown very dark; only the embers cast a red glow through the room. He seized the sword by the steel scabbard, and stood before the mirror; but as he heaved a great blow at it with the heavy pommel, the blade slipped half-way out of the scabbard, and the pommel struck the wall above the mirror.

At that moment, a terrible clap of thunder seemed to burst in the very room beside them; and ere Cosmo could repeat the blow, he fell senseless on the hearth. When he came to himself, he found that the lady and the mirror had both disappeared. He was seized with a brain fever, which kept him to his couch for weeks.

When he recovered his reason, he began to think what could have become of the mirror. For the lady, he hoped she had found her way back as she came; but as the mirror involved her fate with its own, he was more immediately anxious about that. He could not think she had carried it away. It was much too heavy, even if it had not been too firmly fixed in the wall, for her to remove it. Then again, he remembered the thunder; which made him believe that it was not the lightning, but some other blow that had struck him down. He concluded that, either by supernatural agency, he having exposed himself to the vengeance of the demons in leaving the circle of safety, or in some other mode, the mirror had probably found its way back to its former owner; and, horrible to think of, might have been by this time once more disposed of, delivering up the lady into the power of another man; who, if he used his power no worse than he himself had done, might yet give Cosmo abundant cause to curse the selfish indecision which prevented him from shattering the mirror at once.

Indeed, to think that she whom he loved, and who had prayed to him for freedom, should be still at the mercy, in some degree, of the possessor of the mirror, and was at least exposed to his constant observation, was in itself enough to madden a chary lover.

Anxiety to be well retarded his recovery; but at length he was able to creep abroad. The twists and turns continue, and Mr. Brown strikes in the place we are least expecting. Jane Finn is recovered, and her story leads to many incredible discoveries. Dark times loom ahead as the trail goes cold, and the light leading them to Tommy gets dimmer and dimmer. As I was do Tuppence enters domestic service, as the Young Adventurers continue their search for Jane Finn.

This week marks the year anniversary of The Classic Tales Podcast. For those of you who have become supporters in any way along thi Tommy and Tuppence are two old friends who are having some hard luck after the war. In an aging bric-a-brac shop, a certain crystal egg has suddenly become so important, the shop owner has declared it not for sale. For, only he knows the crystal egg's mystifying secret. Wells, today on The Classic Tales Podcast. Jack London delivers two stories. One of psychology, the other of murder, today on The Classic Tales Podcast.

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