that happens now and then in this world also.

But there was something in that star-world that there is not here. There
was a thick wood: where the trees grew closest, and the stems were
interlocked, and the summer sun never shone, there stood a shrine. In the
day all was quiet, but at night, when the stars shone or the moon glinted
on the tree-tops, and all was quiet below, if one crept here quite alone
and knelt on the steps of the stone altar, and uncovering one's breast, so
wounded it that the blood fell down on the altar steps, then whatever he
who knelt there wished for was granted him. And all this happens, as I
said, because it is a far-off world, and things often happen there as they
do not happen here.

Now, the man and woman walked together; and the woman wished well to the
man. One night when the moon was shining so that the leaves of all the
trees glinted, and the waves of the sea were silvery, the woman walked
alone to the forest. It was dark there; the moonlight fell only in little
flecks on the dead leaves under her feet, and the branches were knotted
tight overhead. Farther in it got darker, not even a fleck of moonlight
shone. Then she came to the shrine; she knelt down before it and prayed;
there came no answer. Then she uncovered her breast; with a sharp two-
edged stone that lay there she wounded it. The drops dripped slowly down
on to the stone, and a voice cried, "What do you seek?"

She answered, "There is a man; I hold him nearer than anything. I would
give him the best of all blessings."

The voice said, "What is it?"

The girl said, "I know not, but that which is most good for him I wish him