ruins and overgrown with evil weeds, he sighed deeply, and with tears in his eyes he sought to recall the glories of that fallen palace. Round about the place he went, not once nor twice: he searched in every room, in every corner for some vestige of the past; he searched the stable in which he had found his steed, and then he went down into the cellar, the entrance to which was choked up by fallen rubbish.
Here and there and everywhere he searched about, and now his long white beard reached below his knee, and his eyelids were so heavy that he had to raise them on high with his hands, and he found he could scarce totter along. All he found there was a huge old coffer which he opened, but inside it there was nothing. Yet he lifted up the cover, and then a voice spoke to him out of the depths of the coffer and said: "Welcome, for hadst thou kept me waiting much longer, I also would have perished."
Then his Death, who was already shrivelled up like a withered leaf at the bottom of the coffer, rose up and laid his hand upon him, and Boy Beautiful instantly fell dead to the ground and crumbled into dust. But had he remained away but a little time longer his Death would have died, and he himself would have been living now. And so I mount my nag and utter an "Our Father" ere I go.
THE END
