At last their awful fate overtook them; and, instead of
being Shadows any longer, they began to have shadows sticking to them;
and they thickened and thickened till they vanished out of our world;
and they are now condemned to walk the earth, a man and a woman, with
death behind them, and memories within them. Ah, brother Shades! let us
love one another, for we shall soon forget. We are not men, but
Shadows.'
"The king turned away, and pitied the poor Shadows far more than they
pitied men.
"'Oh! how we played with a musician one night!' exclaimed one of another
group, to which the king had directed a passing thought. He stopped to
listen.--'Up and down we went, like the hammers and dampers on his
piano. But he took his revenge on us. For after he had watched us for
half an hour in the twilight, he rose and went to his instrument, and
played a shadow-dance that fixed us all in sound for ever. Each could
tell the very notes meant for him; and as long as he played, we could
not stop, but went on dancing and dancing after the music, just as the
magician--I mean the musician--pleased. And he punished us well; for he
nearly danced us all off our legs and out of shape, into tired heaps of
collapsed and palpitating darkness. We wont go near him for some time
again, if we can only remember it. He had been very miserable all day,
he was so poor; and we could not think of any way of comforting him
except making him laugh.
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