At the shore of the beautiful blue sea the faithful spirits lowered their burden. There Helga and her fairy husband rest beneath the flowers of this paradise, and beside the gentle murmur of the waves. On the branches of the cypress that grows on their grave hangs the fairy king's harp. The hand is cold that once touched its chords; but when the morning breeze sweeps through them, they sound as of old in magic melody. The sweet notes float on the sunbeams through the evergreen paradise, pierce the hard rock, and hover as beautiful and undying legends over Iceland's heaths and snow-clad hills.
[THE SEA-FAIRY.]
THE evening sun was sinking in a glow of colour on the waters of the North Atlantic and on the rocky coast of Norway as a youth wandered alone by the edge of one of its numerous fiords.
He was alone in the world; father and mother, brothers and sisters, were all dead, and he strove to still the longings of his heart by the wonders of foreign lands.
He had seen the midnight sun from the cliffs of the North Cape, and his eye now rested in astonished admiration on the firmament and the ocean, which shone in a splendour unknown to other zones. He stepped close up to the edge of the sea, and looked down at the waves, which here broke in gold-sparkling foam. But from yon rock but a few yards distant he would be better able to enjoy the ever-changing play of the waves; so he went up to it, and laid his hand on one of its jagged projections to aid him in climbing. Then he saw something white and golden gleaming at his feet, and when he leant forward to observe it more closely he saw that it was the form of a young woman who was sitting in solitude on this uninhabited strand. Over her garment, white as spring blossoms, down to the purple hem, fell hair golden as the waves at her feet, and her tender hands lay clasped upon her knee, while she, dreamy and motionless, looked out upon the sea.
The young man scarcely ventured to breathe lest he should frighten her; but a stone loosened beneath his hand and rolled rattling to the ground. She looked up and turned her head, and now his glance met a face of unimagined beauty.
"Who art thou?" she asked, in gentle astonishment; "and what seekest thou here on this world-forsaken shore?"
"I wished to see the beauties of Norway," he gathered courage to answer, "and I found them greater than I expected. But who art thou, wondrous being, who venturest to stay alone in this solitude, with none save the ocean and yon stern rocks to bear thee company?"