Pictures of Sweden

Ch. 2 - The Bird Phoenix

In the garden of Paradise, under the tree of knowledge, stood a hedge

of roses. In the first rose a bird was hatched; its flight was like

that of light, its colours beautiful, its song magnificent.

But when Eve plucked the fruit of knowledge, when she and Adam were

driven from the garden of Paradise, a spark from the avenging angel's

flaming sword fell into the bird's nest and kindled it. The bird died

in the flames, but from the red egg there flew a new one--the only

one--the ever only bird Phoenix. The legend states that it takes up

its abode in Arabia; that every hundred years it burns itself up in

its nest, and that a new Phoenix, the only one in the world, flies out

from the red egg.

The bird hovers around us, rapid as the light, beautiful in colour,

glorious in song. When the mother sits by the child's cradle, it is by

the pillow, and with its wings flutters a glory around the child's

head. It flies through the chamber of contentment, and there is the

sun's radiance within:--the poor chest of drawers is odoriferous with

violets.

But the bird Phoenix is not alone Arabia's bird: it flutters in the

rays of the Northern Lights on Lapland's icy plains; it hops amongst

the yellow flowers in Greenland's short summer. Under Fahlun's copper

rocks, in England's coal mines, it flies like a powdered moth over the

hymn-book in the pious workman's hands. It sails on the lotus-leaf

down the sacred waters of the Ganges, and the eyes of the Hindoo girl

glisten on seeing it.

The bird Phoenix! Dost thou not know it? The bird of Paradise, song's

sacred swan! It sat on the car of Thespis, like a croaking raven, and

flapped its black, dregs-besmeared wings; over Iceland's minstrel-harp

glided the swan's red, sounding bill. It sat on Shakspeare's shoulder

like Odin's raven, and whispered in his ear: "Immortality!" It flew at

the minstrel competition, through Wartzburg's knightly halls.

The bird Phoenix! Dost thou not know it? It sang the Marseillaise for

thee, and thou didst kiss the plume that fell from its wing: it came

in the lustre of Paradise, and thou perhaps didst turn thyself away to

some poor sparrow that sat with merest tinsel on its wings.

The bird of Paradise! regenerated every century, bred in flames, dead

in flames; thy image set in gold hangs in the saloons of the rich,

even though thou fliest often astray and alone. "The bird Phoenix in

Arabia"--is but a legend.

In the garden of Paradise, when thou wast bred under the tree of

knowledge, in the first rose, our Lord kissed thee and gave thee thy

proper name--Poetry.