Flying an unmeasured space between the earth and the clouds, and seeing the little balls roll glittering past her on all sides, she would have returned hopelessly, had she not remarked under her, in a green field, on the grass and flowers, a thousand lustrous pearls. She thought they were some of those she had lost, and began diligently to collect them into the casket she held in her hand. The box was nearly filled, when Titania's lovely servant remarked that they were not pearls, the tears of the ocean, but dew, the tears of the flowers.
Still she went on seeking the lost treasure. Seeing tears hanging from a mother's eye, who bent over her dying child, she collected them—these were tears of love. Going on, she found many other weeping eyes; so many tears that I can not give names to them all. Ah, how many tears are shed on earth! Out of men's eyes spring a wondrous stream—its source is the heart. Against this, pain, melancholy, repentance, and sometimes also joy, must knock, and then the stream flows. It is a powerful talisman; it has a most potent charm. That man's heart must be hard indeed when even a stranger's tears fail to move him.
Though people contradict this, and say, I have no pity for those tears, they are deserved; but this is very false, for they are tears still; and perhaps come from the heart which has been most severely pierced. Well, our little fairy collected them, and holding the casket firm under her arm, she swept on high to the clouds. The little box became heavier and heavier—for tears do not weigh light—and lo! when she opened it, all the imaginary pearls liquified: and hopelessly she fled from cloud to cloud—for these loved her—and she poured her complaint into their ear. The clouds sent their rain down to the earth to fetch the lost. It streamed and flowed, and trees and leaves bent themselves, and the dew was wiped up, but the ocean's pearls were not found again.
Puck the wag, saw the poor little fairy's pain which he had caused, and it troubled him—for he liked to laugh at her, but not to give her pain. Down he dipped into the lap of earth, and fetched, by means of his friends the goblins and gnomes, gay, glittering ore, and shining spangles.
"There you have all your trash again," said he; "or, rather, better and more shining."
The little fairy rejoiced, and the clouds left off raining. But when she looked nearer to the gift, it was nothing better than glittering trumpery; and angrily she took the shell wherein it lay, and threw it afar off, making a wide, radiant circle over the whole horizon. That was the first rainbow.
Often since that time, when the clouds weep, Puck fetches his spangles, and the comedy is repeated.
Beautiful is the rainbow; we all rejoice to see it, and so does man. But it is a vain, deceitful object—a gift of the gnomes—a production of Puck, the wag. People know this quite well, because when they run after it, it disappears before their faces. And where does it go? It has fallen into the sea, say the children, the water-nymphs make their gay dresses of it. Well, it happened, as I say, by accident; but Puck repeated it intentionally, for he passed over with the remaining spangles, and so formed a second rainbow. This is why this brilliant appearance presents itself twice in the horizon at the same time.
The fairy continued to sit sadly on the cloud, and could not rejoice at the first rainbow. Presently Titania came by. Fortunately at that time the splenetic queen was in a good humor. Perhaps she could the more easily forget her loss because an ocean sprite, whose heart she had won, gave her the promise of another set. For the great are generous, even with tears.