And as you wend up these away from the valley
You think of the sea and the great world it washes;
But through two you may pass not, the shattered rocks shut them. 
And up through the third there windeth a highway,
And its gorge is fulfilled by a black wood of yew-trees. 
And I know that beyond, though mine eyes have not seen it,
A city of merchants beside the sea lieth.——­
I adjure thee, my fosterer, by the hand of my father,
By thy faith without stain, by the days unforgotten,
When I dwelt in thy house ere the troubles’ beginning,
By thy fair wife long dead and thy sword-smitten children,
By thy life without blame and thy love without blemish,
Tell me how, tell me when, that fair land I may come to! 
Hide it not for my help, for my honour, but tell me,
Lest my time and thy time be lost days and confusion!

MASTER OLIVER

O many such lands!—­O my master, what ails thee? 
Tell me again, for I may not remember. 
—­I prayed God give thee speech, and lo God hath given it—­
May God give me death! if I dream not this evil.

KING PHARAMOND

Said I not when thou knew’st it, all courage should fail thee? 
But me—­my heart fails not, I am Pharamond as ever. 
I shall seek and shall find—­come help me, my fosterer! 
—­Yet if thou shouldst ask for a sign from that country
What have I to show thee—­I plucked a blue milk-wort
From amidst of the field where she wandered fair-footed—­
It was gone when I wakened—­and once in my wallet
I set some grey stones from the way through the forest—­
These were gone when I wakened—­and once as I wandered
A lock of white wool from a thorn-bush I gathered;
It was gone when I wakened—­the name of that country—­
Nay, how should I know it?—­but ever meseemeth
’Twas not in the southlands, for sharp in the sunset
And sunrise the air is, and whiles I have seen it
Amid white drift of snow—­ah, look up, foster-father!

MASTER OLIVER

O woe, woe is me that I may not awaken! 
Or else, art thou verily Pharamond my fosterling,
The Freed and the Freer, the Wise, the World’s Wonder?

KING PHARAMOND

Why fainteth thy great heart? nay, Oliver, hearken,
E’en such as I am now these five years I have been. 
Through five years of striving this dreamer and dotard
Has reaped glory from ruin, drawn peace from destruction.

MASTER OLIVER

Woe’s me! wit hath failed me, and all the wise counsel
I was treasuring up down the wind is a-drifting—­
Yet what wouldst thou have there if ever thou find it? 
Are the gates of heaven there? is Death bound there and helpless?