Thyrsis pondered for a moment. “Did you ever read Mrs. Browning’s poem, ‘A Musical Instrument’?” he asked.
“It’s a most beautiful poem,” he said; “and it’s hardly ever quoted or read, that I can find. It tells how the great god Pan came down by the river-bank, and cut one of the reeds to make himself a pipe. He sat there and played his music upon it--
‘Sweet, sweet, sweet, O Pan! Piercing sweet by the river! Blinding sweet, O great god Pan! The sun on the hill forgot to die, And the lilies reviv’d, and the dragon-fly Came back to dream on the river.
‘Yet half a beast is the great god Pan, To laugh as he sits by the river, Making a poet out of a man. The true gods sigh for the cost and pain,-- For the reed which grows nevermore again As a reed with the reeds in the river.’”
Thyrsis paused. “Do you see what it means?” he asked.
“‘Making a poet out of a man!’ That is one of the finest lines I know. And that’s the way I feel about it--I have given up all other duties in the world. If I can write one book, or even one poem, that will be an inspiration to men in the future--why, then I have done far more than I could do by a lifetime given to helping people around me.”
“I never understood before,” said Corydon.
“That is the idea the minstrel tries to voice to the princess. At first he pours out his soul to her; but then, when he finds that she loves him, he is afraid, and tries to persuade her not to come with him. He tells her how lonely and stern his life is; and she has been born to a gentle life--she has her station and her duty in the world. But the more he pleads the hardness of his life, the more she sees she must go with him. Even if the end be death to her, still she will be an inspiration to him, and give wings to his music. ‘Be silent,’ she tells him--‘let me fling myself away for a song! To do one deed that the world remembers, to utter one word that lives forever--that is worth all the failure and the agony that can come to one woman in her lifetime!’”
Corydon sat with her hands clasped. “Yes,” she said, “that is the way she would feel!”
“I’m glad to hear you say that,” remarked the other. “I must make it real; and I’ve been afraid about it. Would she really go with him?”