Souci, where sorrow is not allowed to enter. In the daytime I
played with my companions in the garden, and in the evening I led
the dance in the Great Hall. Round the garden ran a very lofty
wall, but I never cared to ask what lay beyond it, everything about
me was so beautiful. My courtiers called me the Happy Prince, and
happy indeed I was, if pleasure be happiness. So I lived, and so I
died. And now that I am dead they have set me up here so high that
I can see all the ugliness and all the misery of my city, and
though my heart is made of lead yet I cannot chose but weep."

"What! is he not solid gold?" said the Swallow to himself. He was
too polite to make any personal remarks out loud.

"Far away," continued the statue in a low musical voice, "far away
in a little street there is a poor house. One of the windows is
open, and through it I can see a woman seated at a table. Her face
is thin and worn, and she has coarse, red hands, all pricked by the
needle, for she is a seamstress. She is embroidering passion-
flowers on a satin gown for the loveliest of the Queen's maids-of-
honour to wear at the next Court-ball. In a bed in the corner of
the room her little boy is lying ill. He has a fever, and is
asking for oranges. His mother has nothing to give him but river
water, so he is crying. Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow, will you
not bring her the ruby out of my sword-hilt? My feet are fastened
to this pedestal and I cannot move."

"I am waited for in Egypt," said the Swallow. "My friends are
flying up and down the Nile, and talking to the large lotus-
flowers. Soon they will go to sleep in the tomb of the great King.
The King is there himself in his painted coffin. He is wrapped in