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THE SHADOWS. |
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Then he tried again the next night, and the next, and the next; and he tempted another Shadow to try it with him. But at last their awful fate overtook them; for, instead of continuing to be Shadows, they began to cast shadows, as foolish men say; and so they thickened and thickened till they vanished out of our world. They are now condemned to walk the earth a man and a woman, with death behind them, and memories within them. Ah, brother Shades ! let us love one another, for we shall soon forget. We are not men, but Shadows."
The king turned away, and pitied the poor Shadows far more than they pitied men.
"Oh! how we played with a musician one night," exclaimed a Shadow in another group, to which the king had first directed a passing thought, an*I then had stopped to listen.—" Up and down we went, like the hammers and dampers on his |
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