THE BOTTLE-NECK. 451

Out in. che garden there was a great festival. Flaming lamps
hung like garlands, and paper lamps shone transparent, like great
tulips. The evening was lovely, the weather still and clear, the
stars twinkled ; it was the time of the new moon, but in reality
the whole moon could be seen as a bluish-grey disc with a
golden rim round half its surface, which was a very beautiful
sight for those who had good eyes.

The illumination extended even to the most retired of thegarden
walks ; at least so much of it, that one could find one’s way there.
Among the leaves of the hedges stood bottles, with a light in each,
and among them was also the bottle we know, and which was
destined one day to finish its career as a bottle-neck, a bird’s
drinking-glass. Everything here appeared lovely to our bottle,
for it was once more in the green wood, amid joy and feasting,
and heard song and music, and the noise and murmur of a crowd,
especially in that part of the garden where the lamps blazed and
the paper lanterns displayed their many colours. Thus it stood,
ina distant walk certainly, but that made it the more important;
for it bore its light, and was at once ornamental and useful, and
that is as it should be: in such an hour one forgets twenty years
spent in a loft, and it is right one should do so.

There passed close to it a pair, like the pair who had walked
together so long ago in the wood, the sailor and the tanner’s
daughter; the bottle seemed to experience all that over again.
In the garden were walking not only the guests, but other people
who were allowed to view all the splendour; and among these
latter came an old maid who seemed to stand alone in the world.
She was just thinking, like the bottle, of the green wood, and of a
young betrothed pair—of a pair which concerned her very nearly,
a pair inwhich she had an interest, and of which she had been a
part in that happiest hour of her life—the hour one never forgets,
if one should become ever so old a maid. But she did not know
our bottle, nor did the bottle recognize the old maid: it is thus
we pass each other in the world, meeting again and again, as
these two met, now that they were together again in the same
town. -

From the garden the bottle was dispatched once more to the
wine merchant’s, where it was filled with wine, and sold to the
aéronaut, who was to make an ascent in his balloon on the fol-
lowing Sunday. A great crowd had been assembled to witness
the sight; military music had been provided, and many other
preparations had been made. The bottle saw everything from
a basket in which it lay next to a live rabbit, which latter was
quite bewildered because he knew he was to be taken up into
the air, and let down again in a parachute; but the bottle knew
nothing of the “up” or the “down;” it only saw the balloon
swelling up bigger and bigger, and at last, when it could swell
no more, beginning to rise, and to grow more and more restless.

20—2