d for joy to
God, "The marble blossoms!"

God said, "Ay, 'twas a fairy house. There has not been one like to it,
nor ever shall be. The pillars and the porticoes blossomed; and the
wine cups were as gathered flowers: on this side all the curtain was
broidered with fair designs, the stitching was of gold."

I said to God, "How came it that it fell?"

God said, "On the side of the wine-press it was dark."

And as we travelled, we came where lay a mighty ridge of sand, and a
dark river ran there; and there rose two vast mounds.

I said to God, "They are very mighty."

God said, "Ay, exceeding great."

And I listened.

God asked me what I was listening to.

And I said, "A sound of weeping, and I hear the sound of strokes, but I
cannot tell whence it comes."

God said, "It is the echo of the wine-press lingering still among the
coping-stones upon the mounds. A banquet-house stood here."

And he called me to come further.

Upon a barren hill-side, where the soil was arid, God called me to stand
still. And I looked around.

God said, "There was a feasting-house here once upon a time."

I said to God, "I see no mark of any!"

God said, "There was not left one stone upon another that has not been
thrown down." And I looked round; and on the hill-side was a lonely
grave.

I said to God, "What lies there?"

He said, "A vine truss, bruised in the wine-press!"

And at the head of the grave stood a cross, and on its foot lay a crown
of thorns.

And as I turned to go, I looked backward. The wine-press and the
banquet-house were gone; but the grave yet stood.

And when I came to the edge of a long ridge there opened out before me
a wide plain of sand. And when I looked downward I saw great stones lie
shattered; and the desert sand had half covered them over.

I said to God, "There is writing on them, but I cannot read it."

And God blew aside the desert sand, and I read the writing: "Weighed in
the balance, and found--" but the last word was wanting.

And I said to God, "It was a banquet-house?"

God said, "Ay, a banquet-house."

I said, "There was a wine-press here?"

God said, "There was a wine-press."

I asked no further question. I was very weary; I shaded my eyes with my
hand, and looked through the pink evening light.

Far off, across the sand, I saw two figures standing. With wings
upfolded high above their heads, and stern faces set, neither man nor
beast, they looked out across the desert s