but that day they were to pass through other shadows, to know other fears.
henceforth the tragic meaning of life filled both their minds, and they tried in vain to banish the physical sadness which from moment to moment made their spirits more clear yet more disturbed. they clasped each other's hand, as if they were groping in dark, dangerous places. they spoke little, but often they gazed into each other's eyes, and the look of the one poured into that of the other a wave of confused emotion, the mingling of their love and horror. but it did not calm their hearts.
"shall we go farther?"
"yes, let us go on."
still they clasped each other's hand closely, as if they were about to go through some strange test, and were resolved to experiment as to what depths could be reached by the combined force of their melancholy. at the dolo, the wheels made the chestnut-leaves rustle and crackle beneath them, and the tall changing trees flamed over their heads like crimson draperies on fire. at a distance was the villa barbariga, silent, deserted, of a reddish hue in its denuded garden, showing vestiges of old paintings in the cracks of its fa?ade, like streaks of rouge on the wrinkled cheeks of an old woman. and, at every glance, the distances of the landscape seemed fainter and bluer, like things slowly submerged.
"here is strà."
they alighted before the villa pisani, and, accompanied by its guardian, they visited the deserted apartments. they heard the sound of their own footsteps on the marble that reflected them, the echoes in the historic arches, the creaking of the doors, the tiresome voice of the keeper awakening the memories of the place. the rooms were vast, hung with faded draperies and furnished in the style of the empire, with napoleonic emblems. the walls of one room were covered with portraits of the pisani, procurators of san marco; of another, with marble medallions of all the doges; of a third, with a series of flowers painted in water-colors and mounted in delicate frames, pale as the dry flowers that are laid under glass, in memory of love or death.
as la foscarina entered one room, she said:
"in time! here, too!"
there, on a bracket, stood a transformation into marble of la vecchia by francesco torbido, made even more repulsive by the relief, by the subtle skill of the sculptor, to bring out with his chisel each tendon, wrinkle, and hollow place in the old woman's face. and at the doors of this room seemed to appear the ghosts of the crowned women that had hidden their unhappiness and their decay in that vast dwelling, at once like a palace and a monastery.
"maria luisa di parma, in eighteen hundred and seventeen," continued the monotonous voice.
"ah, the queen of spain, wife of charles the fourth, and mistress of manuel godo?," said stelio. "she attracts me more than all the others. she came here when they were in exile. do you know whether she stayed here with the king and the favorite!"
but the guardian knew only that name and the date.
"why does she attract you?" la foscarina asked. "i know nothing of her history."
"her end, the last years of her life of exile, after so much struggle and passion, are extraordinarily full of poetry."
and he described that violent and tenacious character, the weak, credulous king, the handsome adventurer who had enjoyed the smiles of the queen, and had been dragged through the streets by the infuriated mob; the agitations of the three lives bound together by fate, and swept before napoleon's will like leaves in a whirlwind; the tumult at aranjuez, the abdication, the exile.
"and godo?—the prince of peace, as the king called him—faithfully followed the sovereigns into exile; he remained faithful to his royal mistress, and she to him. they all lived together under the same roof thenceforth, and charles never doubted the virtue of maria luisa. even to the day of his death, he lavished all manner of kindness on the two lovers. imagine their life in this place; imagine here such a love coming safely through a storm so terrible. all was broken down, overthrown, reduced to powder by the destroyer. bonaparte had passed that way, but had not smothered that love, already old, beneath the ruins. the faithfulness of those two violent natures moves my heart not less than the credulity of the kindly king. thus they grew old. imagine it! the queen died first, then the king; and the favorite, who was younger than they, lived a wandering life a few years more."
"this is the emperor's room," said the guardian solemnly, flinging open a door.
the great shade seemed omnipresent in the villa of the doge alvise. the imperial eagle, symbol of his power, dominated all the faded relics. but in the yellow room, the shade seemed to occupy the vast bed, to rest under the canopy, surrounded by the four bedposts ornamented at the top with golden flames. the formidable sigla inscribed within the laurel crown shone upon the polished side of the bed. and this species of funereal couch seemed to be prolonged in the dim mirror hanging between the two figures of victory that supported the candelabra.
"did the emperor sleep in this bed?" inquired the young man of the custodian, who pointed out to him on the wall the portrait of the great condottiere mantled in ermine, wearing a crown of laurel and holding a scepter, as he appeared at the coronation blessed by pius vii. "is it certain?"
he was surprised at himself at not feeling the emotion experienced by ambitious spirits at the sight of the traces of heroes—that strong throb he knew so well.
he lifted the edge of the yellow counterpane, and let it fall as suddenly as if the pillow under it had been full of vermin.
"let us go away from this place; let us go!" said la foscarina, who had been looking through the windows at the park, where the golden bars of the setting sun alternated with bluish-green zones of shade. "we cannot breathe here," she added.
the air, in truth, was like that of a vault.
"now we pass into the room of maximilian of austria," said the droning voice, "he took the dressing-room of amélie de beauharnais for his bedroom."
they crossed this apartment in a flood of crimson light. the sunlight struck on a crimson couch, flashed rainbows from a frail chandelier with crystal drops that hung from the ceiling and kindled perpendicular red lines on the wall. stelio stopped on the threshold, evoking in his fancy as he did so, the pensive figure of the young archduke, with blue eyes, that fair flower of hapsburg fallen in a barbaric land one summer morning!
"let us go!" begged la foscarina again, seeing him still delay.
she hastened through the immense salon, painted in fresco by tiepolo; the corinthian bronze gate closing behind her gave forth a clang as resonant as the stroke of a bell, sending prolonged vibrations through space. she flew along, terrified, as if the whole palace were about to crumble and fall, and the light to fail, and she dreaded lest she should find herself alone among the shadows with these phantoms of unhappiness and death. as stelio followed, through the space wherein the air was moved by her flight, between those walls enclosing relics, behind the famous actress who had simulated the fury of deadly passions, the desperate efforts of will and of desire, and the violent conflict of splendid destines on the stage of all lands, the warm blood in his veins grew chill, as if he were passing through a freezing atmosphere; he felt his heart grow cold, his courage flag; his reason for being lost its hold on his mind, and the magnificent illusions with which he had fed his soul, that it might surpass itself and his destiny, wavered and were dispersed.
"are we still living?" he asked, when they found themselves in the air without, in the park, far from the unwholesome odor.
he took la foscarina's hand, shook her gently, gazed into her eyes and tried to smile; then he drew her into the sunlight in the middle of the green meadow.
"what heat! do you feel it? how sweet the grass is!"
he half-closed his eyes, that he might feel the sun's rays on his eyelids, and was once more filled with the joy of living. the woman imitated him, calmed by the pleasure her beloved showed; and she looked from under her half-closed eyelids at his fresh, sensuous mouth. they sat thus for some time, hand-in-hand, their feet resting on the warm grass. her thoughts turned back to the eugenean hills, which he had described, to the villages pink as the buried shells, to the first drops of rain on the tender leaves, petrarch's fountain, to all things fair and pleasant.
"life might still be sweet!" she sighed, in a voice wherein was the miracle of hope born anew.
the heart of her beloved became like a fruit suddenly ripened by a miraculous ray. joy, delight, and tenderness spread through his whole being. once more he reveled in the joy of the moment, as if it were the last of life. love was exalted above destiny.
"do you love me? tell me?"
she made no answer, but she opened wide her eyes, and the vastness of the universe was within the circle of those pupils. never was boundless love more powerfully signified by mortal woman.
"ah, life with thee is sweet, sweet—yesterday as well as to-morrow!"
he seemed intoxicated with her, with the sunlight, the grass, the divine sky, as with something never before seen or possessed. the prisoner leaving his stifling cell, the convalescent who beholds the sea after looking death in the face, are not more intoxicated.
"would you like to go now? shall we leave our melancholy behind us? would you like to go to a country where there is no autumn?"
—the autumn is in myself, and i carry it everywhere—she thought; but she smiled the slight smile with which she veiled her sadness.—it is i—it is i that must go away alone; i will disappear; i will go far-away and die, my love, o my love!—
during this moment of respite, she had not succeeded either in conquering her sadness or reviving her hope; but her anguish was softened, and she had lost all bitterness and rancor.
"do you wish to go away?"
—to go away, always to be going away, to wander throughout the world, to go long distances!—thought the nomad woman.—never to stop, never to rest! the anxiety of the journey is not over yet, but already the truce has expired. you wish to comfort me, my friend, and, to console me, you propose that i should go far-away once more, although i returned to my home, as it were, but yesterday.—
suddenly her eyes looked like two sparkling springs.
"leave me in my home a little while longer. and remain here, too, if that is possible. later, you will be free, you will be happy. you have so long a time before you! you are young. you will win what you deserve. they will not lose you, even if they must wait for you."
her eyes had two crystal masks before them; they glittered in the sunshine, and seemed almost fixed in her fevered face.
"ah, always the same shadow!" stelio exclaimed, with an impatience he could not conceal. "but what are you thinking of? what do you fear? why not tell me what it is that troubles you? explain yourself. who is it that must wait for me?"
she trembled with terror at that question, which seemed new and unexpected, although he only repeated her own last words. she trembled to find herself so near danger, as if, in walking across this fair meadow, a precipice had suddenly opened under her feet.
and suddenly, in that unfamiliar place, on that beautiful grass, at the end of the day, after all those specters, sanguinary or bloodless, rose a living image of will and desire, which filled her with far greater terror. suddenly, above all the figures of the past, arose the figure of the future, and again the aspect of her life was changed; and the sweetness of the respite was already lost, and the fair meadow with its sweet grass was worth nothing.
"yes, let us talk, if you wish."
but she was obliged to lift her face a little to keep her tears from falling.
"do not be sad!" pleaded the young man, whose soul was suspended on those eyelids, whence the tears would not fall. "you hold my heart in your hand. i never will fail you. then why torment yourself? i am wholly yours."
for him, too, the image of donatella was there, with her rounded figure, her body as robust and agile as a wingless victory, armed with the glory of maidenhood, attractive yet hostile, ready to struggle, and then to yield. but his soul was suspended from the eyelids of the other woman, like the tears that veiled the eyes in which he had seen the vastness of the universe, the infinity of love.
"foscarina!"
at last the warm tears fell, but she did not let them course down her cheeks. with one of those movements that sometimes sprang from her sadness with the swift grace of a freed wing, she checked them, moistened her finger-tips with them, and touched her temples without drying them. and, while she still kept her tears upon herself, she tried to smile.
"forgive me, stelio. i am so weak!"
"ah, dear fingers—beautiful as sofia's! let me kiss them as they are, still wet."
within his caressing arm, he drew her across the field to a zone of golden green. lightly, with his arm supporting hers, he kissed her finger-tips, one after another, more delicate than the buds of the tuberose. she startled, and he felt her tremble at each touch of his lips.
"they are salt!"
"take care, stelio! some one may see us."
"no one is here."
"perhaps down there, in the hothouses."
"there is not a sound. hark!"
"what a strange silence! it is ecstasy."
"we might hear the falling of a leaf."
"and the keeper?"
"he has gone to meet some other visitor."
"does anyone ever come here?"
"the other day richard wagner came here with daniela von bülow."
"ah, yes, the niece of the countess agoult, of 'daniel stern.'"
"and, among all those phantoms, with which did that great stricken heart converse?"
"who can tell?"
"only with himself, perhaps."
"perhaps."
"look at the glass windows and walls of the conservatories—how they sparkle! they appear iridescent. rain, sunshine and time have painted it in that way. does it not seem to reflect a distant twilight? perhaps you have sometimes stopped on the pesaro quay, to look at the beautiful pentafore window of the evangelists. if you raised your eyes, you could see the windows of the palace marvelously painted by the changes of weather."
"you know all the secrets of venice!"
"not all yet."
"how warm it is here! see how tall those cedars are. there is a swallow's nest hanging on that limb."
"the swallows went away very late this year."
"will you really take me to the euganean hills in the spring?"
"yes, foscarina, i should like to do so."
"spring is so far-away!"
"life can still be sweet."
"we are living in a dream."
"look at orpheus with his lyre, all dressed in lichens."
"ah, what a land of dreams! no one comes here any more. grass, grass everywhere! there is not a single human footstep."
"deucalion with his stones, ganymede with his eagle, diana with her stag—all the gods of mythology."
"how many statues! but these, at least, are not in exile. the ancient hornbeams still protect them."
"here strolled maria luisa di parma, between the king and the favorite. from time to time she would pause to listen to the click of the blades that cut the hornbeams to form arches. she would let fall her handkerchief, perfumed with jessamine, and don manuel godo? would pick it up with a graceful gesture, hiding the pain he suffered when he stooped—a souvenir of the outrages he had endured at the hands of the mob in the streets of aranjuez. how warm the sun was, and how excellent the snuff in its enameled box, when the king said with a smile: 'certainly, our dear bonaparte is not so well off at saint helena as we are here.' but the demon of power, of struggle, and of passion was still alive in the queen's heart. look at those red roses!"
"they fairly burn. one would think each had a live coal at its heart. yes, they seem actually to burn."
"the sun is growing red. this is the hour for the chioggia sails on the lagoon."
"gather a rose for me."
"here is one."
"oh, but its leaves are falling."
"well, here is another."
"these leaves are falling too."
"they are all at the point of death. perhaps this one is not."
"do not break it off."
"look! these seem to be redder still. bonifazio's velvet—do you remember it? it has the same strength."
"'the inmost flower of the flame.'"
"what a memory!"
"listen! they are closing the doors of the conservatories."
"it is time to go," said stelio, abruptly yet gently.
"the air is beginning to be cooler."
"do you feel cold?"
"no, not yet."
"did you leave your cloak in the carriage?"
"yes."
"we will wait at dolo for the train, and return to venice by the railway."
"yes."
"we still have time to spare."
"what is this? look!"
"i don't know."
"what a bitter odor! it is a sort of shrubbery of box and hornbeams."
"ah, it is the labyrinth!"
a rusty iron gate barred the entrance to the labyrinth between two columns that bore two cupids riding on stone dolphins. nothing was to be seen on the other side of the gate, except the beginning of the path, and a kind of solidly built and intricate thicket, dark and mysterious. in the center of the maze rose a tower, at the summit of which stood the statue of a warrior, as if reconnoitering from that point.
"have you ever been in a labyrinth?" stelio inquired.
"no, never," she replied.
they lingered to examine the entrance to the deceptive playground, composed by an ingenious gardener for the amusement of ladies and their cavaliers in the days of hoops and flowered waistcoats. but age and neglect had rendered it mournful and wild, had deprived it of all appearance of grace and regularity, and had changed it into thick yellowish-brown woodland, full of inextricable turns through which the slanting rays of the setting sun shone so red that some of the shrubs looked like smokeless fire.
"it is open," said stelio, feeling the gate yield as he leaned on it. "do you see?"
he pushed back the rusty iron gate, took a step forward, and crossed the threshold.
"where are you going?" asked his companion, with instinctive fear, putting out a hand to detain him.
"do you not wish to go in?"
she was perplexed. but the labyrinth attracted them with its mystery, illumined by deep flames.
"suppose we should lose ourselves?"
"you can see for yourself that it is very small. we can easily find the gate again."
"and suppose we don't find it?"
he laughed at this childish fear.
"we might remain in there through all eternity!" he said.
"no, no! no one is anywhere near. let us go away."
she tried to draw him back, but he defended himself, stepping backward toward the path. suddenly he disappeared, laughing.
"stelio! stelio!"
she could see him no longer, but she heard his ringing laughter in the midst of the wild thicket.
"come back! come back!"
"no, no! come in and find me."
"stelio, come back! you will be lost," she called.
"i shall find ariadne."
at that name, she felt her heart throb suddenly, then contract, then palpitate confusedly. was not that the name he had called donatella, that first night? had he not called her ariadne down there, in the gondola, while seated at the young girl's feet? she even remembered his words: "ariadne possesses a divine gift, whereby her power transcends all limits." she recalled his accent, his attitude, his look.
tumultuous anguish seized upon her, obscured her reason, prevented her from realizing the spontaneity of the happening, and the simple careless jest in her friend's speech. the terror that lay hidden in the depths of her love rose in rebellion, mastered her, blinded her with misery. the trifling little accident assumed an appearance of cruelty and derision. she could still hear that laugh ringing from the melancholy maze.
"stelio!"
in her frantic hallucination, she cried out as if she had seen him embraced by the other woman, torn from her arms forever.
"stelio!"
"come and find me!" he answered laughing, still invisible.
she rushed into the labyrinth to find him, and advanced straight toward the voice and the laugh, guided by her impulse. but the path turned; a wall of bushes rose before her, impenetrable, and stopped her. she followed the winding, deceiving path; but one turning followed another, and all looked alike, and the circle seemed to have no end.
"look for me!" cried the voice from a distance, through the living hedges.
"where are you? where are you? can you see me?"
she looked about for some opening in the hedge through which she might see. but all she saw was thick, interlacing branches, and the redness of the setting sun which lighted them on one side, while shadows darkened them on the other. the box-bushes and the hornbeams were so closely mingled that they increased momentarily the bewilderment of the breathless woman.
"i am losing myself! come and meet me!"
again that boyish laugh came from the maze.
"ariadne, ariadne! the thread!"
now the words came from the opposite side, striking her heart as if with a blow.
"ariadne!"
she turned back, ran, turned again, tried to break through the hedge, to see through the undergrowth, to break the branches. she saw nothing but the maze, always the same in every direction. at last she heard a step, so close that she thought it must be just behind her, and she started. but she was deceived. again she explored her green prison; she listened, waited; she could hear no sound but her own breathing and the beating of her heart. the silence had become absolute. she gazed at the clear sky, curving in its immensity over the two green walls that held her prisoner. she felt that that immensity and narrowness were the only things in the world. and she could not succeed in separating in her thoughts the reality of that place from the image of her mental torture, the natural aspect of things from that kind of living allegory created by her own anguish.
"stelio, where are you?"
no reply. she listened and waited in vain. the seconds seemed like hours.
"where are you? i am afraid!"
no reply. but where was he, then? had he found the way out? had he left her there all alone? would he continue to play this cruel game?
a mad desire to scream, to sob, to throw herself on the ground, to hurt herself, to make herself ill, to die, assailed the distracted woman. again she raised her eyes to the silent sky. the tops of the tall hornbeams were reddened, like logs when they have ceased to blaze and are about to fall in ashes.
"i can see you!" suddenly said a laughing voice, in the deep shadows, very near her.
"where are you?"
he laughed among the leaves, but without revealing himself, like a faun in hiding. this game excited him; his body grew warm and supple by this exercise of his agility; and the wild mystery, the contact with the earth, the odor of autumn, the strangeness of this unexpected adventure, the woman's bewilderment, even the presence of the marble deities mingled with his physical pleasure an illusion of antique poetry and grace.
"where are you? oh, do not play any more! do not laugh in that way! enough!"
he had crept, bareheaded, into the bushes on his hands and knees. he felt the dead leaves, the soft moss. and as he breathed among the branches, and felt his heart throb with the strange delight of the situation, with the communion between his own life and the vegetable life around him, the spell of his fancy renewed among those winding ways the industry of the first maker of wings, the myth of the monster that was born of pasipha? and the bull, the attic legend of theseus in crete. all that ancient world became real to him. in that glowing autumn evening, he was transfigured, according to the instincts of his blood and the recollections of his mind, into one of those ambiguous forms, half animal and half divine, one of those glittering genii whose throats were swollen with the same gland that hangs from the neck of the goat. a joyous voluptuousness suggested strange surprises to him, suggested the swiftness of pursuit, of flight, capture, and a fleeting embrace in the shadows of the wood. then he desired some one like himself, fresh youthfulness that could share his laughter, two light feet to fly before him, two arms to resist him, a prize to capture at last. donatella with her curved figure recurred to his mental vision.
"enough, stelio! i cannot run any more. i shall fall."
la foscarina uttered a scream on feeling her skirt pulled by a hand that had reached through the shrubbery. she bent down, and saw in the shadows the face of a laughing faun. the laughter struck her ear without calming her distress, without breaking the sense of suffering that overpowered her. as she looked at his boyish face, she saw at the same instant the face of the singer, who seemed to be stooping with her, imitating her movement as if she were a shadow. her mind became more confused, and she could not distinguish between illusion and reality. the other woman seemed to overthrow her, oppress her, suffocate her.
"leave me! leave me! it is not i whom you seek!"
her voice was so changed that stelio broke off his laughter and his sport, withdrew his arm, and rose to his feet. she could not see him; the leafy, impenetrable wall was between them again.
"take me away from this place. i cannot bear any more. my strength is gone. i suffer."
he could find no words to comfort her. the simultaneous coincidence of his recent thought of donatella, and her sudden divination of it, impressed him deeply.
"wait a little! i will try to find the way out. i will call some one."
"are you going away?"
"don't be afraid! there is no danger."
but while he spoke thus to reassure her, he felt the inaneness of his words—the incongruity between that laughable adventure and the obscure emotion born of a far different cause. and now he too felt the strange ambiguity whereby the trifling event appeared in two confusing aspects: a suppressed desire to laugh persisted under his concern for her, so that his perturbation was new to him, like wild agitations born of extravagant dreams.
"do not go away!" she implored, a prey to her hallucinations. "perhaps we can meet there at the next turning. let us try. take my hands."
through an opening, he took her hands; he started on touching them; they were icy cold.
"foscarina, what is the matter? are you really ill? wait! i will try to break through."
he attempted to break down the hedge, and snapped off a few twigs, but its thickness resisted him, and he scratched his hands uselessly.
"no, it is impossible."
"cry out! call some one."
he cried aloud in the silence.
the top of the hedge had lost its deep color, but a red light now spread over the sky above them. a triangle of wild ducks passed in sweeping flight.
"let me go, foscarina. i shall find the tower easily, and will call from there. some one will be sure to hear me."
"no! no!"
but she heard him move away, followed the sound of his steps, and was once more bewildered by the maze, once more alone and lost. she stopped, waited, listened, and looked at the sky. she lost all sense of time; the seconds seemed hours.
"stelio! stelio!"
she was no longer capable of an effort to control her disordered and exasperated mind. she felt the approach of a crisis of mad fear, as one feels the approach of a whirlwind.
he watched the woman turning and running like a mad creature along the dark, delusive paths
from an original drawing by arthur h. ewer
"stelio!"
he heard that cry full of anguish, and hastened his search along the winding paths that first seemed to lead him toward the tower and then away from it. the laughter had frozen in his heart. his whole soul shook to its foundation every time his name reached him, uttered by that invisible agony. and the gradual lessening of the light brought up an image of blood that is flowing away, of slowly fading life.
"i am here! i am here!"
one of the paths brought him at last to the open space where the tower stood. he ran furiously up the winding stairs, felt dizzy when he reached the top, closed his eyes while grasping the railing, opened them again, and saw a long zone of fire on the horizon, the disk of the rayless moon, the gray plain, and the labyrinth below him, black and spotted with box-bush and horn-beam, narrow in its endless convolutions, looking like a dismantled edifice covered with wild vines.
"stop! stop! do not run like that! some one has heard me. a man is coming. i can see him coming. wait! stop!"
he watched the woman turning and running like a mad creature along the dark, delusive paths, like something condemned to vain torture, to some useless but eternal fatigue, like a sister of the fabulous martyrs.
"stop!"
it seemed that she did not hear him, or that she could not control her fatal agitation, and that he could not rescue her, but must always remain there, a witness of that terrible chastisement.
"here he is!"
one of the keepers had heard their cries, had approached them, and now entered by the gateway. stelio met him at the foot of the tower, and together they hastened to find the lost woman. the man knew the secret of the labyrinth, and stelio prevented any chatter and jests by surprising him with his generosity.
"has she lost consciousness—has she fallen?" the darkness and the silence were sinister, and he felt alarmed. she did not answer when he called her, and he could not hear her footsteps. night had already fallen on the place, and a damp veil was descending from the purple sky.
"shall i find her in a swoon upon the ground," he thought.
he started at seeing a mysterious figure appear at a turning, with a pale face that attracted all the last rays of daylight, white as a pearl, with large, fixed eyes, and lips closely compressed.
they turned back toward the dolo, taking the same route beside the brenta. she never spoke, never opened her lips, never answered, as if she could not unclose her teeth. she lay in the bottom of the carriage, wrapped in her cloak, and now and then she shook with a deep shudder, as one attacked by malarial fever. her friend tried to take her hands in his to warm them, but in vain—they were inert and lifeless. and as they drove along, the statues passed and passed beside them.
the river flowed black between its banks, under the purple and silver sky; the moon was rising. a black boat came down the stream, towed by two gray horses with heavy hoofs, led by a man who whistled cheerfully, and the funnel smoked on the deck like a chimney on a hut. the yellow light of a lantern flashed, and the odor of supper floated on the air; and here and there, as they drove along, the statues passed and passed beside them.
it was like a stygian landscape, like a vision of hades, a region of shadows, mist, and water. everything grew misty and vanished like spirits. the moon enchanted and attracted the plain, as it enchants and attracts the water, absorbing the vapors of earth with insatiable, silent thirst. solitary pools shone everywhere; small, silvery canals were visible, glittering at uncertain distances. earth seemed to be gradually losing its solidity, and the sky seemed to regard its own melancholy reflected in innumerable placid mirrors.
and here and there, along the banks of the stream, like the ghosts of a people disappeared, the statues passed and passed!
