A short story just a few pages long written by the English novelist John Buchan. First published in the January-June,1910, issue of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine.
The prose is rich and a pleasure to read. The
old half-lovely, half-ugly glory of the pagan world is painted
perfectly, and there is a simple grace in how the story fails to
make a single, certain conclusion. The Grove of Ashtaroth
The lines of poetry at the beginning of the story are from Paul Verlaine's poem, Grotesques, collected in Poèmes saturniens, published in 1866. The "their" in the first line refers to fantastic figures mocked and avoided by the wise, the foolish, and children.
C'est enfin que dans leurs prunelles
Rit et pleure-fastidieux—
L'amour des choses eternelles
Des vieux morts et des anciens dieux!
Finally, it is in their eyes
that laughs and weeps fastidiously
That love of things eternal,
of the aged dead and ancient gods!
