This forest makes every mortal weary that passes through it. Oh! very, very weary. It teaches you so much too; more than the most brilliant ball-room or entertainment or anything that the gay world can give. It is a magical forest, you know. When the dust falls from the flowers Silence says, “Were not those pretty little baubles? Anywhere but in the Dark Path they would have won a first-class prize for brilliancy and colour.” And then Silence laughs as the dust flickers down. “The world would build a hot-house for one of these posies, and pay a thousand guineas down if it were fashion. Ah! but you are in the Dark Path and must travel on. We stand no whims, we who govern here. Though your feet ache and your ankles are weary you must still go on or the black leaves will stifle you. Do you hear the gurgle of the Stream? It’s Pain, you know. Silence and Pain. Twin sisters. Gurgle, gurgle. Your father has trod it all before. How his feet ached too! Poor father!”
Oh! this stream is a very teaching stream. It makes men feel to the very marrow of the bone. It stings to the core so that brilliant lights flash from your aching, feverish eyes, and the world laughs and says, “Ah! that was very good.” Not knowing what a sepulchre it laughs at.
Now let us go back to the Spirit, standing there in the forest.
It isn’t an angel, and not even a Spirit of Paradise, not in the accepted sense; but it is so familiar to Deborah that she rubs her eyes and looks again, and can make nothing of it.
“It’s Dante out of one of the pictures,” says she; but even that did not solve the riddle, not at all.
“It is that being who guided him.” But no.
It was indeed hard to describe this spirit, for it was so transparent and yet so real. You could see the trees through the graceful robe quite plainly, yea, and something more. You could see other black paths in the forest which had hitherto been hidden. For this place was all magical, and the spirit was magical too. It had the power of explaining the key to life, or rather lives, and no sooner did you look through it than the whole forest became peopled with poor drudges in the shape of men. And it made you irresistibly sad. Here you saw a man struggling on, his feet all drenched with the red stream that to him looked black. He had fallen, and the black leaves smirched with blood clung to his poor lean ribs. Now he staggered. Good God! Would he fall again? Oh, yes. Hark! The bitter cry! And outside in the world a shrill laugh went up, for as he fell he kicked out somewhat with his heels and the devil translated it onto a comic canvas, and made it appear too funny for words. He is still now. The black leaves cover him. What was his last living thought? God’s secret and his own.
And lo! There is another path, and along it crawls a woman, all alone—there are no pairs in the Forest of Failure, Silence will see to that. There is the red dye again, that to her looks black.
It is a very fragile woman, with a lovely face, which the gloom hides. She has very tender feet, and there are so many flinty stones along the path. The black leaves cling to her skirts like millstones.
There! Another fall! No upward struggle here. There is a golden hoop of a wedding-ring that slips off the skeleton finger into the thin stream. It is dyed blood red. And there is another little plaything in her hand, a baby’s rattle, red too. Why, you know, it is only the failure of domestic love; and when she falls there is no cry in the accepted sense; a childish sob that speaks more than words, and in the outside world the shout of drunken revelry has drowned it. That’s how it is the tears and sighs of the mighty forest are never heard.