On these mountains few feet have
passed; each man strikes out a path for himself. He goes at his own peril:
my voice he hears no more. I may follow after him, but cannot go before
him."
Then Knowledge vanished.
And the hunter turned. He went to his cage, and with his hands broke down
the bars, and the jagged iron tore his flesh. It is sometimes easier to
build than to break.
One by one he took his plumed birds and let them fly. But when he came to
his dark-plumed bird he held it, and looked into its beautiful eyes, and
the bird uttered its low, deep cry--"Immortality!"
And he said quickly: "I cannot part with it. It is not heavy; it eats no
food. I will hide it in my breast; I will take it with me." And he buried
it there and covered it over with his cloak.
But the thing he had hidden grew heavier, heavier, heavier--till it lay on
his breast like lead. He could not move with it. He could not leave those
valleys with it. Then again he took it out and looked at it.
"Oh, my beautiful! my heart's own!" he cried, "may I not keep you?"
He opened his hands sadly.
"Go!" he said. "It may happen that in Truth's song one note is like yours;
but I shall never hear it."
Sadly he opened his hand, and the bird flew from him forever.
Then from the shuttle of Imagination he took the thread of his wishes, and
threw it on the ground; and the empty shuttle he put into his breast, for
the thread was made in those valleys, but the shuttle came from an unknown
country.
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