We rushed from the mountain,
    The streamlet and I,
  Restless, unquiet,
    We scarcely knew why,—­
  Till we met a dear maiden,
    Whose beauty divine
  Stilled with great quiet
    This wild heart of mine;
  And awed and astonished
    To peacefulness sweet,
  The fierce mountain-torrent
    Lay still at her feet.”

“A right rare power for beauty to possess!” laughed Haguna.  “Are you so restless that you need this soothing, fair Sir?”

A deep, sweet smile gushed out from his eyes and illumined his face.  He stretched out his arms lovingly into the warm air, as if he thus infolded some rich joy, and answered, musingly,—­

“In ordinary action, thought, and feeling,—­we are too conscious of ourselves, we are perplexed with the miserable little ‘I,’ that, by claiming deed and thought for its own work, makes it little and mean.  But the wondrous Beautiful comes to us entirely from outside; our very contemplation of it does not belong to us; we are overpowered and conquered by the vast idea that broods over us.  And so that contemplation is pure happiness.”

Haguna laughed a little, and a little wondered what he meant; then observed, lightly,—­

“You must value yourself very modestly, to consider your greatest happiness to consist in losing your self-consciousness,—­unless, indeed, like Polycrates, you hope to insure future prosperity by sacrificing your most valuable possession.”

“If so, I, like Polycrates, am the gainer by my own precaution; for, in your presence, dear lady, do I first truly find my right consciousness.”

She clapped her hands gleefully, wilfully misunderstanding his meaning.

“Most complimentary of monarchs!  So I am the haggard old fisherman who replaced the lost bawble in the royal treasury!  Pray, Sire, remember the pension with which I should be rewarded!” And she bowed low, in mock courtesy to her companion.

“Nay,” rejoined Anthrops, vexed that his earnest compliment should be so mishandled,—­“blame your own perversity for such an interpretation.  At your side I forget that I live for any other purpose than to look at you, and lavish my whole soul in an intensity of gazing; and then the presumptuous thought, that you like to have me near you, nay, are sometimes even pleased to talk to me, gives my poor self a value in my own eyes, for the kindness you show me.”

“I know all that well enough,” said Haguna, quietly.  “But in the mean while, dear Anthrops, you must remember that it is really impolite to stare so much.”