and longer every evening after sunset it gleamed with rays of the departed sun.
And many mourned for Pan while the builders built; many reviled him. Some called the builders to cease and to weep for Pan and others called them to leave no memorial at all of so infamous a god. But the builders built on steadily.
And one day all was finished, and the tomb stood there like a steep sea-cliff. And Pan was carved thereon with humbled head and the feet of angels pressed upon his neck. And when the tomb was finished the sun had already set, but the afterglow was rosy on the huge bulk of Pan.
And presently all the enlightened people came, and saw the tomb and remembered Pan who was dead, and all deplored him and his wicked age. But a few wept apart because of the death of Pan.
But at evening as he stole out of the forest, and slipped like a shadow softly along the hills, Pan saw the tomb and laughed.
The Poet Speaks with Earth2
Returning late one night from roaming amongst the stars I came on Mother Earth sitting all dark in Space, murmuring tales of her children.
“Dreams and battles,” she said. “Dreams and battles.” I heard her say nothing more.
I said to her: “O Mother, your sons have done marvellous things.” I told her of all our machinery, politics, science; the famous inventions of Man.
Of all these things she had remembered nothing.
“But Steam!” I said. “And Electricity.”
No, she remembered nothing, but muttered of poets and heroes. Not even mention of our Parliament moved her.
“Dreams and battles,” she said. “Dreams and battles,” and fell to muttering poems and crooning of ancient wars.
Mother, Mother, you shall remember us.
Endnotes
-
This story was not included in the original British edition. —S.E. Editor ↩
-
This story was not included in the original American edition. —S.E. Editor ↩
Colophon
Fifty-One Tales
was published in 1915 by
Lord Dunsany.
This ebook was produced for
Standard Ebooks
by
Alex Cabal,
and is based on a transcription produced in 2005 by
Anne Reshnyk, Suzanne L. Shell, Charles Franks, and The Online Distributed Proofreading Team
for
Project Gutenberg
and on digital scans from the
Internet Archive.
The cover page is adapted from
Stronghold,
a painting completed in 1912 by
Amadeo de Souza Cardoso.
The cover and title pages feature the
League Spartan and Sorts Mill Goudy
typefaces created in 2014 and 2009 by
The League of Moveable Type.
The first edition of this ebook was released on
July 20, 2022, 8:09 p.m.
You can check for updates to this ebook, view its revision history, or download it for different ereading systems at
standardebooks.org/ebooks/lord-dunsany/fifty-one-tales.
The volunteer-driven Standard Ebooks project relies on readers like you to submit typos, corrections, and other improvements. Anyone can contribute at standardebooks.org.
Uncopyright
May you do good and not evil.
May you find forgiveness for yourself and forgive others.
May you share freely, never taking more than you give.
Copyright pages exist to tell you that you can’t do something. Unlike them, this Uncopyright page exists to tell you that the writing and artwork in this ebook are believed to be in the United States public domain; that is, they are believed to be free of copyright restrictions in the United States. The United States public domain represents our collective cultural heritage, and items in it are free for anyone in the United States to do almost anything at all with, without having to get permission.
Copyright laws are different all over the world, and the source text or artwork in this ebook may still be copyrighted in other countries. If you’re not located in the United States, you must check your local laws before using this ebook. Standard Ebooks makes no representations regarding the copyright status of the source text or artwork in this ebook in any country other than the United States.
Non-authorship activities performed on items that are in the public domain—so-called “sweat of the brow” work—don’t create a new copyright. That means that nobody can claim a new copyright on an item that is in the public domain for, among other things, work like digitization, markup, or typography. Regardless, the contributors to this ebook release their contributions under the terms in the CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication, thus dedicating to the worldwide public domain all of the work they’ve done on this ebook, including but not limited to metadata, the titlepage, imprint, colophon, this Uncopyright, and any changes or enhancements to, or markup on, the original text and artwork. This dedication doesn’t change the copyright status of the source text or artwork. We make this dedication in the interest of enriching our global cultural heritage, to promote free and libre culture around the world, and to give back to the unrestricted culture that has given all of us so much.
