changing cloud palaces of the “Fata Morgana,” into which no mortal can
enter. Eliza was still gazing at the scene, when mountains, forests, and
castles melted away, and twenty stately churches rose in their stead, with
high towers and pointed gothic windows. Eliza even fancied she could hear
the tones of the organ, but it was the music of the murmuring sea which she
heard. As they drew nearer to the churches, they also changed into a fleet of
ships, which seemed to be sailing beneath her; but as she looked again, she
found it was only a sea mist gliding over the ocean. So there continued to
pass before her eyes a constant change of scene, till at last she saw the real
land to which they were bound, with its blue mountains, its cedar forests,
and its cities and palaces. Long before the sun went down, she sat on a rock,
in front of a large cave, on the floor of which the over-grown yet delicate
green creeping plants looked like an embroidered carpet. “Now we shall
expect to hear what you dream of to-night,” said the youngest brother, as he
showed his sister her bedroom.
“Heaven grant that I may dream how to save you,” she replied. And this
thought took such hold upon her mind that she prayed earnestly to God for
help, and even in her sleep she continued to pray. Then it appeared to her as
if she were flying high in the air, towards the cloudy palace of the “Fata
Morgana,” and a fairy came out to meet her, radiant and beautiful in
appearance, and yet very much like the old woman who had given her
berries in the wood, and who had told her of the swans with golden crowns
on their heads. “Your brothers can be released,” said she, “if you have only
courage and perseverance. True, water is softer than your own delicate
hands, and yet it polishes stones into shapes; it feels no pain as your fingers
would feel, it has no soul, and cannot suffer such agony and torment as you
will have to endure. Do you see the stinging nettle which I hold in my
hand? Quantities of the same sort grow round the cave in which you sleep,
but none will be of any use to you unless they grow upon the graves in a
churchyard. These you must gather even while they burn blisters on your
hands. Break them to pieces with your hands and feet, and they will become
flax, from which you must spin and weave eleven coats with long sleeves; if
