THE KING OF ELFLAND’S DAUGHTER
ways, and looked for a new thing. But the old lord sent a word to his eldest son, bidding him come before him.
And very soon the young man stood before him, in that same carven chair from which he had not moved, where light, growing late, from high windows, showed the aged eyes looking far into the future beyond that old lord’s time. And seated there he gave his son his commandment.
“Go forth,” he said, “before these days of mine are over, and therefore go in haste, and go from here eastwards and pass the fields we know, till you see the lands that clearly pertain to Faery; and cross their boundary, which is made of twilight, and come to that palace that is only told of in song.”
“It is far from here,” said the young man Alveric.
“Yes,” answered he, “it is far.”
“And further still,” the young man said, “to return. For distances in those fields are not as here.”
“Even so,” said his father.
“What do you bid me do,” said the son, “when I come to that palace?”
And his father said: “To wed the King of Elfland’s daughter.”
The young man thought of her beauty and crown of ice, and the sweetness that fabulous runes had told was hers. Songs were sung of her on wild hills where tiny strawberries grew, at dusk and by early starlight, and if one sought the singer no man was there.
