That is the world's bane.'

And he went on climbing the hill, and left the rath, and there came
to his mind some of the old poems that told of lovers, good and bad,
and of some that were awakened from the sleep of the grave itself by
the strength of one another's love, and brought away to a life in
some shadowy place, where they are waiting for the judgment and
banished from the face of God.

And at last, at the fall of day, he came to the Steep Gap of the
Strangers, and there he laid himself down along a ridge of rock, and
looked into the valley, that was full of grey mist spreading from
mountain to mountain.

And it seemed to him as he looked that the mist changed to shapes of
shadowy men and women, and his heart began to beat with the fear and
the joy of the sight. And his hands, that were always restless, began
to pluck off the leaves of the roses on the little branch, and he
watched them as they went floating down into the valley in a little
fluttering troop.

Suddenly he heard a faint music, a music that had more laughter in it
and more crying than all the music of this world. And his heart rose
when he heard that, and he began to laugh out loud, for he knew that
music was made by some who had a beauty and a greatness beyond the
people of this world. And it seemed to him that the little soft rose
leaves as they went fluttering down into the valley began to change
their shape till they looked like a troop of men and women far off in
the mist, with the colour of the roses on them. And then that colour
changed to many colours, and what he saw was a long line of tall