THE BOY WHO RODE INTO THE SUNSET

: A Book For Kids

Once upon a time--it was not so very long ago, either--a little boy,

named Neville, lived with his people in a house which was almost in

the country. That is to say, it was just at the edge of the city; and

at the back of the house was a rather large hill, which was quite

bald.



Neville, who was fond of playing by himself, would often wander to the

top of the bald hill; and if he stood right on top of it a d looked

one way, toward the East, he could see right over the city, with all

its tall buildings and domes and spires and smoking chimneys. But

looking the other way, to the West, he could see for miles over the

beautiful country, with its green fields and orchards and white roads

and little farm houses.



One evening Neville was playing alone on the top of the hill when he

noticed that one of the very finest sunsets he had ever seen was just

coming on. The sky in the West, away over the broad country lands, was

filled with little clouds of all sorts and shapes, and they were just

beginning to take on the most wonderful colours.



Neville had often before amused himself with watching clouds and the

strange shapes into which they changed themselves--sometimes like

great mountain ranges, sometimes like sea-waves, and very often like

elephants and lions and seals and all manner of interesting things of

that sort. But never before had he been able to make out so many

animal shapes in the clouds. The sky was almost as good as a Zoo.

There were kangaroos and elephants and a hen with chickens and

wallabies and rabbits and a funny man with large ears and all sorts of

other peculiar shapes.



The sun was sinking behind a distant range of hills, where a golden

light shone out as if through a gateway. It was so much like a great

golden gateway that Neville fell to wondering what might be found on

the other side of it.



Suddenly, right in the middle of all the coloured clouds, he saw one

little cloud which was perfectly white, and, as he watched it, he

noticed that it seemed to be shaped like a small horse. A very small

horse it seemed at that distance; but, as Neville gazed, it grew

bigger and bigger, just as if it were coming toward him very fast, and

he was almost certain he could see its legs moving.



That startled him a little, and so he rubbed his eyes to make sure

that they were not playing him tricks.



When he looked again he was more startled than ever; for the little

white cloud was no longer a cloud, but a little white horse in real

earnest. Besides, it had just left the sky and was galloping down the

mountain range which he could see away in the West.



In two minutes it had left the range, and was coming across the fields

towards him, jumping the fences, dodging under the trees, and racing

across the plain with its white mane and tail tossing as it came. It

seemed to be making straight for him.



He was not really frightened--you must not think that about him--but

he was just beginning to wonder if it were not nearly time to go home

to dinner, when he noticed that the white horse had stopped, just at

the foot of the bald hill. It was looking up at him, tossing its head

and pawing the ground--the most beautiful white horse that he had ever

seen, even in a circus. Then it appeared to get over its excitement

and began to trot quietly up the hill toward him.



I do not think anyone would have blamed Neville if he had decided then

to go home to dinner at once. But he was rather a brave boy, and he

was certainly very curious, so he just stood still and waited.



And here is where the most wonderful part of the story begins. The

white horse trotted up to Neville and spoke to him. That would

surprise most people; and Neville was certainly as much surprised as

anyone else would have been.



"What are you frightened of?" asked the white horse in a loud voice.



Now, Neville WAS just a little frightened by this time; but he was not

going to show it, so he just said, "Who's frightened?"



"YOU'RE frightened," said the white horse, louder than ever. "You're

only a timid little boy. I thought when I saw you in the distance that

you were one of the plucky ones; but I was mistaken. You're just a

little cowardly-custard."



"You'd better be careful who you're talking to," said Neville,

suddenly losing his fear. (Little boys do not always talk good

grammar; otherwise he would have said "whom" not "who.") He hated to

be called a "cowardly-custard." "You'd better be careful, or I'll give

you a bang!"



"Ah ha!" cried the white horse. "Very brave all at once, aren't you?

All the same, you're afraid to come near and stroke me."



"But I don't want to stroke you," said Neville.



"I thought not," replied the white horse. "I thought not, the moment I

got close to you. You're one of the frightened ones, and I've been

wasting my time."



"Who's frightened?" said Neville again.



"You asked that before," replied the white horse, "and I told you. If

you're not frightened, come along and stroke me. There's nothing to be

afraid of."



So Neville walked right up to the white horse and stroked his

shoulder. And at once he felt that he had been foolish to hold back.

For of all the smooth, soft, silky coats he had ever stroked, that of

the white horse was certainly the smoothest, and the softest, and the

silkiest. He felt that he could go on stroking it for hours.



"There now," said the white horse in a voice as soft and silky as his

coat. "There was nothing to be afraid of, was there? And I think that

perhaps I was mistaken about you. I rather think you might be one of

those daring boys that one reads about in stories. What about jumping

on my back for a little ride?"



Neville ceased to stroke the white horse and drew back a little.



"I'm afraid they'll be expecting me home for dinner," he said. "I'm

very pleased indeed to have met you." Neville was always a polite

little boy.



"The very thing!" cried the white horse. "Jump on my back and I'll

take you home. You liked stroking me, didn't you? Well that's nothing

to the ride you will enjoy--simply nothing. Why, all the boldest

riders in the world would give their ears just for one little ride on

my back. Now then! One, two, three, and up you go!"



Then before Neville quite knew what he was doing, he made a little run

and leapt up astride of the white horse.



"I live just over there," said Neville, pointing towards his home.



But before he could say "knife", or even "scissors" (supposing he had

wished to say either of these words), the white horse laughed a nasty

hollow laugh, sprang upwards from the ground, and was soaring through

the air toward the dying sunset, right away from home and dinner.



Neville clung on tightly, for he was so high above the earth that to

fall off would mean the end of him. And far beneath him he saw the

green fields and the white road, which now seemed like a mere thread.



"That's not fair! Whoa back! Whoa back!" he shouted to the white

horse; but the white horse made no reply. Indeed, he seemed suddenly

not so much like a white horse as like a white cloud shaped like a

horse, and Neville saw that he no longer sat upon the horse's silky

coat, but upon something soft and downy like a white fleece, and it

was slightly damp. Then he knew that he was riding upon a cloud; and,

as it was quite absurd to go on talking to a cloud, he ceased to cry

out. He just sat tight and wondered what would happen next.



He was high over a farm-house now: one that he used to see from the

bald hill. He knew it by the tall pine-trees that grew round it; and

down in the farm-yard he saw a man with a bucket going out to feed the

calves. Neville called loudly to him, but the man did not even look

up. Now he was far beyond that farm-house and above an orchard, where

he saw the fruit-trees standing in straight rows; and a few seconds

later the mountain range was beneath him, and Neville knew that the

cloud that looked like a horse was making straight for the golden

gateway, which was now glowing dully in a grey sky. He was riding into

the sunset.



Swiftly as the wind that drove it, the Cloud Horse drifted over the

mountain range. There was a sudden glow of golden light all about him,

and then a flash of colour so wonderful that Neville could not bear to

look. He closed his eyes, and, as he did so, he felt that the Cloud

Horse had come to a halt at last.



So Neville sat upon the cloud, not daring to open his eyes for quite a

long time. When at last he did look again he almost fainted with the

wonder of it. He was inside the sunset.



But scarcely had he begun to enjoy the wonderful sight, when he was

startled by the sound of a funny, shrill little voice close by his

side. Looking down, he saw a strange little man, no taller than a

walking-stick, and dressed from top to toe in golden-yellow clothes.

"My stars!" said the wee yellow man. "How did YOU manage to get in

here? Don't you know this is private?"



"I'm very sorry," said Neville, "but I couldn't help it. The Cloud

Horse brought me, you know."



"Ah!" said the wee yellow man. "He tricked you, did he? He's much too

playful, that Cloud Horse; and, I must say, he's put you in a pretty

fix."



"Excuse me," said Neville, "but do you mind telling me who you are?"



"I?" cried the little yellow man. "Why, I'm the Last Sunbeam, of

course. I thought you knew that. My job, you know, is to shut up the

show when the sunset is over. And it's pretty hard work, I can tell

you, because I've got to keep on doing it all round the earth every

few minutes or so. And it gets very tiresome at times. Would you

believe it? I've never seen a dawn or a bright mid-day in all my

life--just sunsets all the time. Sunsets for breakfast, sunsets for

dinner, sunsets for supper. And if I make the tiniest little slip, the

head scene-shifter is down on me like a ton of bricks."



"Goodness me!" said Neville. "I didn't know you had scene-shifters

here." Neville had been to see pantomimes, and therefore knew what a

scene-shifter was.



"Then how do you think we shift the scenes?" cried the wee yellow man

rather crossly. Then he suddenly became very busy about nothing, as he

whispered, "Look out! Here's the head scene-shifter coming now."



Looking back, Neville saw, coming towards them, a man with very large

ears. He was not a nice-looking man, and he was extremely like the

cloud man that Neville had sometimes seen in the sky when he went to

look at the sunset from the bald hill.



"Now then! Now then!" roared the man with the large ears. "Move

yourself there, Goldie! We shut up the show here in a few minutes, and

open at once on the next range. See that you have that curtain down on

time."



"Certainly, sir," replied the little yellow man very humbly.



Then the man with the large ears noticed Neville for the first time.

He frowned darkly, and his big ears seemed to flap with annoyance.



"Who is this on our Cloud Horse?" he roared in his great angry voice.



"Just a little boy," said the yellow man--for Neville was far too

frightened to speak. "Just a little boy that the Cloud Horse has been

playing tricks on. I think he'd like to be getting home--just over by

the bald hill, if you don't mind, sir."



"Certainly not!" shouted the man with the large ears. "The Cloud Horse

is not to go out there again to-night, nor the silly little boy

either. I'm not going to have the sunset upset by any such silly

nonsense. You mind what I say and attend to your work."



And, without another glance at Neville, the man with the large ears

strode off to arrange for the sunset on the next range, miles and

miles away.



Neville gazed at the wee yellow man hopelessly, and the wee yellow man

gazed at Neville, and neither spoke a word until the man with the

large ears was well out of the way. Then the Last Sunbeam grew quite

cheerful again.



"Well," said he, "you heard what the head scene-shifter said. You

certainly can't go home by the way you came. The only thing for you to

do is to go round. You'll just about have time to do it, if you

hurry."



"Go round?" repeated Neville in a puzzled voice. "Go round what, round

where?"



"Round the world, of course," replied the little yellow man.



"Round the world?" cried Neville. "Why you must be making fun of me,

and I think that is very unkind."



"Not a bit of it," laughed the little yellow man. "You need not make

such as fuss about it. Why, I go round the world once every day with

the sunset. You have only to go a bit faster so as to do it in a few

minutes, and with the Cloud Horse to help you that's easily managed.

Don't you worry about the Cloud Horse. He has got to do just whatever I

tell him. Now, excuse me for one moment and I'll give you full

directions."



With that the wee yellow man went behind a pink cloud and came

back with a beautiful blue flower in his hand.



"This," he said, handing the flower to Neville, "is a Sky Flower. It

is made entirely out of a genuine piece of sky, and it is a

talisman--that's a longer word for charm, you know--which takes you

free round the world. The one thing you have to remember is that you

mustn't, on any account, lose that flower until you get home again.

Now, just exactly what you have to do is to travel West and race round

the world until you catch up with this evening again. It is quite

simple."



"Simple!" cried Neville. "Why I don't understand it at all."



"Dear me!" said the wee yellow man rather impatiently, "you are very

dense. Now listen carefully. The world, you know, turns round from

West to East, and that makes it seem as if the sun is going round the

world from East to West. Very well. So what you have to do is to ride

West upon the Cloud horse much faster than the sun appears to travel,

and catch him up again before he gets well away from here. The Cloud

horse is in good condition, and you should easily do it in a few

minutes."



"A few minutes!" gasped Neville.



"Keep quiet and listen," snapped the wee yellow man. "A few miles West

from here you will come into broad daylight. That will be afternoon.

After that you will meet mid-day, and, passing that, you will reach

the place where it is only dawn. That's about half-way round the

earth. Show the Sky Flower to the porter of the Dawn, and he will let

you through. Then you get to the half of the world where it is night,

and you must race round that till you reach the place where it is only

evening. That will be THIS evening, somewhere about here, for you will

have taken only a few minutes altogether. And when you see your own

home or the bald hill again, grasp the Sky Flower tightly in your

hand, jump off the Cloud horse, and you will float gracefully down to

the earth. It won't hurt you. Then you can go home, and I hope you

will not be late for dinner."



"But," began Neville, "I can't understand--"



"My time is valuable," said the wee yellow man, as he shook hands.

"Good-bye, and a pleasant journey." With that he smacked the Cloud

Horse smartly on the flank, and in a moment it was racing into the

West at a most terrific pace.



Of course, now that aeroplanes have been invented, flying is not

thought so wonderful as once it was. But loafing along through the air

in a biplane or a monoplane at eighty or a hundred miles an hour is a

very tame business when you compare it with racing the day round the

world on a Cloud horse. And Neville is very probably the only person

who has ever done that yet.



Almost before he knew what had happened, he had left evening far

behind and was riding in broad daylight. The cloud Horse had ridden

high in the air, and Neville saw the broad country, with plains and

hills and forest lands, stretched far beneath him. An instant later,

and the land was no longer below him, but the wide sea, sparkling in

brilliant sunlight.



Before he had time to notice very much he had reached mid-day, high

over a strange foreign land, and was racing through the morning toward

the dawn. So quickly did he go that there was little chance of seeing

anything clearly; but he had glimpses of many strange sights. Many

ships he saw upon the sea--small ships and stately steamers crawling

over the ocean like strange water-beetles. Once, as the Cloud Horse

drifted low, Neville saw a beautiful sailing-ship, with all sails set,

and strange-looking men upon the deck. They looked very like pirates,

and perhaps they were; but Neville had no time to make sure, for the

very next minute he was over a wild land where he saw a horde of black

men, with spears and clubs, hunting an elephant through a clearing in

a great jungle. As he looked, the elephant turned to charge the

hunters; but what happened then Neville did not see, for in a moment

more he was above a great city with crowds of people in the

streets--people dressed in strange, bright-coloured clothes--and there

were bells ringing and whistles blowing. Then a great desert spread

beneath him, with no living thing in sight but a great tawny lion

prowling over the sand. Then came the sea again, and more ships; and

the light began to grow dim, for he was nearly half-way round the

earth, and was approaching the dawn.



Dimmer grew the light, and dimmer yet, just as though evening were

coming--and before him, Neville saw the dawn like a silvery gateway in

the sky. Straight toward it the Cloud Horse rushed, and stopped so

suddenly that Neville almost fell off.



"What's all this? What's all this?" cried a small voice; and Neville

saw beside the silver gateway, a little man dressed from top to toe in

silver grey. It was the Porter of the Dawn, sometimes called the First

Sunbeam.



Before Neville could answer, the little grey man had caught sight of

the Sky Flower.



"Ah, you have the talisman," said he. "Pass in! and don't stop to

gossip, because I'm very busy this morning. A pleasant journey," he

added as he smacked the cloud horse on the shoulder; and in an instant

Neville had passed through the dawn and plunged into the night.



It was a dark night, with no moon, for the sky was overcast with dense

clouds. Above these the Cloud horse flew, and overhead Neville saw the

rushing stars, and below only the blackness of heavy clouds. But more

often the Cloud horse flew low, and then there was little to be seen.

By the lights of moving ships Neville knew that sometimes he was above

the sea. Sometimes twinkling lights in towns or solitary farms, or the

sudden blaze of a great city told him that the land was beneath him.

Once, through the blackness, he saw a great forest fire upon an

island, and the light of it lit up the sea, and showed the natives

crowded upon the beach and in the shallows, and some making off in

canoes.



Then darkness swallowed the Cloud Horse again, and the blazing island

was left far behind.



After that, Neville began to feel a little drowsy. Perhaps he did

sleep a little, for the next thing he saw was a faint light in the sky

before him, as though the dawn were coming. But he knew it must be the

evening, because he was coming back to the place from which he had

started, and was catching up with the sun. You see, he had only been

gone a few minutes.



The Cloud Horse flew very low now; and rapidly the darkness grew less.

Then, long before he expected it, Neville saw the roof of his own home

below him. He could see the garden in the twilight and his own dog

sniffing about among the trees as though in search of him.



Neville began to think about jumping now, and he was rather nervous.

He might land softly and he might not. He only had the wee yellow

man's word for that.



Then, to his horror, he saw that they had passed his home and were

over the bald hill. There was no time to lose. The Cloud Horse was

taking him into the sunset again, and, if he did, what would the head

scene-shifter say then?



So, grasping the Sky Flower very tightly, Neville closed his eyes and

jumped. He half expected to fall quickly and be dashed to pieces upon

the earth; but, instead, he floated in the air like a feather, swaying

and drifting, and slowly sinking all the time towards the ground. It

was a very pleasant sensation indeed.



The bald hill was beneath him as he came slowly down, down, down.



He could see the Cloud Horse--now little more than a small white

speck--rushing on to catch the sunset. And still he sank down ever so

slowly towards the top of the bald hill.



His little dog had caught sight of him now, and came rushing out the

gate and up the bald hill, barking loudly. And he kept on sinking

nearer to the earth, down, down, nearer and nearer--and then, quite

suddenly, he seemed to forget everything.



The next thing Neville remembered was feeling something wet and warm

upon his cheek. He opened his eyes and saw that the little dog was

licking his face. Sitting up, he looked about him. He was in the grass

on the top of the bald hill; night was very near, and the first star

was just beginning to twinkle.



Then, quite suddenly, Neville remembered the Cloud horse and the

little yellow man and the little silver man and the head scene-shifter

and the wonderful journey and all the rest of it.



"Well, what a remarkable dream," said Neville, stretching his arms.

And, as he did so, the Sky Flower fell from his hand.



So it was not a dream after all; for, if it was, how could he explain

that Sky Flower? He picked it up and carried it very tenderly, as he

set off home to dinner, his little dog trotting at his heels.



"What a beautiful flower!" said Neville's mother when he got home.

"Where ever did you get it?"



"It is a piece of the genuine sky," said Neville proudly, as he gave

it to her.



His mother smiled at him as she said, "That is a very nice thing to

say, and it certainly does look like a little piece of the sky. But,

of course, it couldn't possibly be a real piece."



Then Neville knew that if he were to tell the story of his wonderful

ride, and tried to explain that he had been right around the world

since since he went out to play, his parents would find it very, very

hard to believe. So he said nothing, but ate a very good dinner.



But Neville's mother put the flower in a vase upon the mantel; and to

this day it is still there, as fresh and bright as ever. It will not

fade. Neville's mother thinks that is a very strange and wonderful

thing. And so it is.



Since that day, when Neville goes to the top of the bald hill to watch

a sunset, he is almost sure that, just as the golden light is fading,

he can see a little yellow man by the gateway; and it seems to him

that the little yellow man waves a cheery greeting. But, whether this

is so or not, Neville always waves back; and he feels very happy to

think that he has a good friend inside the sunset.