They float about here, they float about there,
In a way that strange habits expresses;
They smile at each other, they shake their heads,
The youth the maid thus addresses:
“My handsome maiden, tell me why
“Thy hand so icy cold is?
“And tell me why thy snow-white dress
“So moist in every fold is?
“I knew thee at once, at the very first sight,
“By thy bantering salutation;
“Thou art no mortal child of man,
“But the water-nymph, my relation.”
The fiddles are silent, and finish’d the dance,
They part like sister and brother,
They know each other only too well,
And shun now the sight of each other.
23. KING HAROLD HARFAGAR.
The great King Harold Harfagar
In ocean’s depths is sitting,
Beside his lovely water-fay;
The years are over him flitting.
By water-sprite’s magical arts chain’d down,
He is neither living nor dead now,
And while in this state of baneful bliss
Two hundred years have sped now.
The head of the king is laid on the lap
Of the beautiful woman, and ever
He yearningly gazes up tow’rd her eyes,
And looks away from her never.
His golden hair is silver grey,
His cheekbones (of time’s march a token)
Project like a ghost’s from his yellow face,
His body is wither’d and broken.
And many a time from his sweet dream of love
He suddenly is waking,
For over him wildly rages the flood,
The castle of glass rudely shaking.