"Is it thou? Is it thou, love? Again art thou near!
My own royal Serpent, so faithful and dear!
Again dare I hope a fond husband I see?
Oh, what have I suffer'd since parted from thee!"
The serpent replied as follows:—
"To hearts that love truly, to part is a pain,
With Hope e'en to whisper of meeting again;
In Pluto's dark regions what torture above
Our absence for ever from those whom we love?"
Magotine was not one of those fairies who occasionally sleep. The desire to do mischief kept her continually awake. She did not fail to overhear the conversation between the Serpent-King and his wife. She flew to interrupt it like a fury. "Aha!" said she; "you amuse yourselves with tagging rhymes, do you? and complain in heroics of your destiny? Truly, I am delighted to hear it. Proserpine, who is my best friend, has begged me to send her a poet on hire. Not that there is a dearth of poets below; but because she wants more. Green-Serpent! I command thee to go finish thy penance in the Shades, and to give my compliments to the gentle Proserpine."
The unfortunate serpent departed, uttering prolonged hisses, leaving the Queen in the deepest affliction. She felt she had no longer anything to care for. In her passion she exclaimed, "By what crime have we offended thee, Magotine? I was scarcely born when thy fiendish malediction robbed me of my beauty and rendered me horrible. Canst thou accuse me of any crime, when I had not at that time attained the use of reason? when I did not know myself? I am convinced that the unhappy King, whom thou hast just consigned to the infernal regions, is as innocent as I was. But finish thy work. Give me instant death. It is the only favour I ask of thee." "Thou wouldst be too happy if I granted thy prayer," said Magotine. "Thou must first draw water for me from the bottomless spring."
As soon as the ships had reached the kingdom of puppets, the cruel Magotine took a millstone, and tied it round the Queen's neck, ordering her to ascend with it to the summit of a mountain which soared high above the clouds. When there, she was to gather four-leaved trefoils enough to fill a basket, and then she was to descend into the depths of the
