at last the Neck
resolved to go and visit him. So he took his harp, and taking also the
form of a boy with long fair hair and a crimson cap, he appeared in
the hermit's cell. There he found the old man stretched upon his
pallet, for lie was dying. When he saw the Neck he was glad, and said,
"I have desired to see thee, for I repent myself that I did not
according to thy wishes. Yet is the desire of life stronger in the
human breast than thou canst understand. Nevertheless I am sorry, and
I am sorry also that, as I am sick unto death, my life will no longer
avail thee. But when I am dead, do thou take all that belongs to me,
and dress thyself in my robe, and go out into the world, and do works
of mercy, and perchance some one whom thou hast benefited will be
found willing to die with thee, that thou mayst obtain a soul."

"Now indeed I thank thee!" cried the Neck. "But yet one word
more--what are these works of which thou speakest?"

"The corporal works of mercy are seven," gasped the hermit, raising
himself on his arm. "To feed the hungry and give the thirsty drink, to
visit the sick, to redeem captives, to clothe the naked, to shelter
the stranger and the houseless, to visit the widow and fatherless, and
to bury the dead." Then even as he spoke the last words the hermit
died. And the Neck clothed himself in his robe, and, not to delay in
following the directions given to him, he buried the hermit with pious
care, and planted flowers upon his grave. After which he went forth
into the world.

Now for three hundred years did the Neck go about doing acts of mercy
and charity towards men. And amongst the hungry, and the naked, and
the sick, and the poor, and the captives, there were not a few who
seemed to be weary of this life of many sorrows. But when he had fed
the hungry, and clothed the naked, and relieved the sick, and made
the poor rich, and set the captive free, life was too dear to all of
them to be given up. Therefore he betook himself to the most miserable
amongst men, and offering nothing but an easy death in a good cause,
he hoped to find some aged and want-worn creature who would do him the
kindness he desired. But of those who must look forward to the fewest
days and to the most misery there was not one but, like the fabled
woodcutter, chose to trudge out to the end his miserable span.

So when three hundred years were past, the Neck's heart failed him,
and he said, "All this avails nothing. Wherefore I w