Latest / Last Days of Pompeii / 030 - Book 4 Chapter II
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- 0:00Speaker 1: Book four, chapter two of Last Days of Pompeii. This
- 0:04Speaker 1: is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the
- 0:07Speaker 1: public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit
- 0:10Speaker 1: LibriVox dot org. Recording by Christine Blashford. Last Days of
- 0:14Speaker 1: Pompeii by Edward G. Bulwer lytton book four, chapter two,
- 0:19Speaker 1: A classic host cook and kitchen a Pcodes seeks Ione
- 0:23Speaker 1: their conversation. It was then that the day for Diomed's banquet.
- 0:27Speaker 1: To the most select of his friends. The graceful Glaucus,
- 0:30Speaker 1: the beautiful Ione, the official Panzer, the high born Clodius,
- 0:34Speaker 1: the immortal Fulvius, the exquisite Lipidus, the Epicurean Sallust were
- 0:39Speaker 1: not the only honorers of his festival. He expected also
- 0:43Speaker 1: an invalid senator from Rome, a man of considerable repute
- 0:47Speaker 1: and favor at court, and a great warrior from Herculaneum,
- 0:50Speaker 1: who had fought with Titus against the Jews, and having
- 0:53Speaker 1: enriched himself prodigiously in the wars, was always told by
- 0:56Speaker 1: his friends that his country was eternally indebted to his
- 0:59Speaker 1: distinaceed exertions. The party, however, extended to a yet greater
- 1:04Speaker 1: number for although critically speaking, it was at one time
- 1:07Speaker 1: thought inelegant among the Romans to entertain less than three
- 1:11Speaker 1: or more than nine at their banquets, yet this rule
- 1:14Speaker 1: was easily disregarded by the ostentatious, and we are told,
- 1:17Speaker 1: indeed in history, that one of the most splendid of
- 1:20Speaker 1: these entertainers usually feasted a select party of three hundred. Diomed, however,
- 1:26Speaker 1: more modest, contented himself with doubling the number of the muses.
- 1:29Speaker 1: His party consisted of eighteen, no unfashionable number in the
- 1:33Speaker 1: present day. It was the morning of Diomed's banquet, and
- 1:36Speaker 1: Diomed himself, though he greatly affected the gentleman and the scholar,
- 1:40Speaker 1: retained enough of his mercantile experience to know that a
- 1:42Speaker 1: master design makes a ready servant. Accordingly, with his tunic
- 1:46Speaker 1: ungirdled on his portly stomach, his easy slippers on his feet,
- 1:50Speaker 1: a small one in his hand, wherewith he now directed
- 1:52Speaker 1: the gaze, and now corrected the back of some duller menial,
- 1:56Speaker 1: he went from chamber to chamber of his costly villa.
- 1:59Speaker 1: He did not disdain even a visit to that sacred
- 2:01Speaker 1: apartment in which the priests of the festival prepare their offerings.
- 2:04Speaker 1: On entering the kitchen, his ears were agreeably stunned by
- 2:07Speaker 1: the noise of dishes and pans, of oaths and commands.
- 2:10Speaker 1: Small as this indispensable chamber seems to have been in
- 2:13Speaker 1: all the houses of Pompeii, it was nevertheless usually fitted
- 2:17Speaker 1: up with all that amazing variety of stoves and shapes,
- 2:20Speaker 1: stewpans and saucepans, cutters and molds, without which a cook
- 2:23Speaker 1: of spirit, no matter whether he be an ancient or
- 2:26Speaker 1: a modern, declares it utterly impossible that he can give
- 2:29Speaker 1: you anything to eat. And as fuel was then as
- 2:32Speaker 1: now deer and scarce in those regions, great seems to
- 2:35Speaker 1: have been the dexterity exercised in preparing as many things
- 2:38Speaker 1: as possible with as little fire. An admirable contrivance of
- 2:41Speaker 1: this nature may be still seen in the Neapolitan Museum viz.
- 2:45Speaker 1: A portable kitchen about the size of a folio volume,
- 2:48Speaker 1: containing stoves for four dishes and an apparatus for heating
- 2:51Speaker 1: water or other beverages. Across the small kitchen flitted many
- 2:55Speaker 1: forms which the quickeye of the master did not recognize.
- 2:58Speaker 1: Oh Oh, grumbled heat to himself, that cursed Congrio hath
- 3:02Speaker 1: invited a whole legion of cooks to assist him. They
- 3:04Speaker 1: won't serve for nothing. And this is another item in
- 3:07Speaker 1: the total of my day's expenses. By Bacchus thrice lucky
- 3:10Speaker 1: shall I be if the slaves do not help themselves
- 3:12Speaker 1: to some of the drinking vessels ready alas are their
- 3:15Speaker 1: hands capacious? Are their tunics me miserum. The cooks, however,
- 3:20Speaker 1: worked on seemingly heedless of the apparition of diomed Ho. Eucleio.
- 3:24Speaker 1: Your eggpan? What is this the largest? It only holds
- 3:27Speaker 1: thirty three eggs? In the houses I usually serve. The
- 3:29Speaker 1: smallest eggpan holds fifty if need be. The unconscionable rogue
- 3:33Speaker 1: thought diomed He talks of eggs as if they were
- 3:35Speaker 1: as Cestaircha a hundred by Mercury cried a pert little
- 3:39Speaker 1: culinary disciple scarce in his novitiates. Whoever saw such antique
- 3:43Speaker 1: sweatmeat shapes as these? It is impossible to do credit
- 3:46Speaker 1: to one's art with such rude materials. Why Sallust's commonest
- 3:49Speaker 1: sweetmeat shape represents the whole siege of Troy, Hector and
- 3:53Speaker 1: Paris and Helen with little Astianis and the wooden horse
- 3:56Speaker 1: into the bargain. Silence, fools, said Congrio, the cook of
- 3:59Speaker 1: the house, who seem to leave the chief part of
- 4:01Speaker 1: the battle to his allies. My master Diomed is not
- 4:04Speaker 1: one of those expensive good for naughts who must have
- 4:06Speaker 1: the last fashion, cost what it will thou liest base slave,
- 4:10Speaker 1: cried Diomed in a great passion. And thou costest me
- 4:13Speaker 1: already enough to have ruined Lucullus himself. Come out of
- 4:16Speaker 1: thy den. I want to talk to thee. The slave,
- 4:18Speaker 1: with a sly wink at his confederates, obeyed the command
- 4:22Speaker 1: man of three letters, said Diomed, with his face of
- 4:24Speaker 1: solemn anger. How didst thou dare to invite all those
- 4:27Speaker 1: rascals into my house? I see thief written in every
- 4:30Speaker 1: line of their faces. Yet I assure you, Master that
- 4:33Speaker 1: they are men of most respectable character, the best cooks
- 4:35Speaker 1: of their place. It is a great favor to get them.
- 4:38Speaker 1: But for my sake, thy sake and happy Congrio, interrupted Diomed.
- 4:42Speaker 1: And by what purloined monies of mine, by what reserved
- 4:45Speaker 1: filchings from marketing, by what goodly meats converted into Greece
- 4:48Speaker 1: and sold in the suburbs by what false charges for
- 4:51Speaker 1: bronzes marred and earthenware broken. Hast thou been enabled to
- 4:54Speaker 1: make them serve THEE for thy sakenay, master, do not
- 4:57Speaker 1: impeach my honesty. May the gods desert me if swear
- 5:00Speaker 1: not again interrupted the choleric diomed, For then the gods
- 5:03Speaker 1: will smite THEE for a perjurer, and I shall lose
- 5:05Speaker 1: my cook on the eve of dinner. But enough of
- 5:07Speaker 1: this at present. Keep a sharp eye on thy ill
- 5:09Speaker 1: favored assistance, and tell me no tales tomorrow of vases
- 5:13Speaker 1: broken and cups miraculously vanished, or thy wold back shall
- 5:16Speaker 1: be one pain and hark thee. Thou knowest thou hast
- 5:19Speaker 1: made me pay for those Phrygian attachments enough by Hercules
- 5:22Speaker 1: to have feasted a sober man for a year together,
- 5:24Speaker 1: See that they be not one iota over roasted. The
- 5:27Speaker 1: last time, O congrio, that I gave a banquet to
- 5:30Speaker 1: my friends, when thy vanity did so boldly undertake the
- 5:33Speaker 1: becoming appearance of a Melian crane, thou knowest it came
- 5:36Speaker 1: up like a stone from aetna, as if all the
- 5:38Speaker 1: fires of Flegiathon had been scorching out its juices, be
- 5:41Speaker 1: modest this time, Congrio, wary and modest. Modesty is the
- 5:45Speaker 1: nurse of great actions. And in all other things, as
- 5:47Speaker 1: in this, if thou wilt not spare thy master's purse,
- 5:50Speaker 1: at least consult thy master's glory, there shall not be
- 5:53Speaker 1: such a choen as seen at Pompei since the days
- 5:55Speaker 1: of Hercules. Softly, softly, thy curse at boasting again. But
- 5:59Speaker 1: I say, Congrio, Yon homanculis yon pygmy assailant of my cranes,
- 6:03Speaker 1: yon per hunged neophyte of the kitchen, was there aught
- 6:06Speaker 1: but insolence on his tongue when he maligned the comeliness
- 6:09Speaker 1: of my sweetmeat shapes. I would not be out of
- 6:11Speaker 1: the fashion, Congrio. It is but the custom of us cooks,
- 6:15Speaker 1: replied Congrio gravely to undervalue our tools in order to
- 6:18Speaker 1: increase the effect of our art. The sweetmeat shape is
- 6:21Speaker 1: a fair shape and a lovely But I would recommend
- 6:23Speaker 1: my master at the first occasion to purchase some new
- 6:26Speaker 1: ones of a that will suffice, exclaimed Diomed, who seemed
- 6:29Speaker 1: resolved never to allow his slaves to finish his sentences.
- 6:32Speaker 1: Now resume thy charge, shine eclipse thyself. Let men envy
- 6:36Speaker 1: Diomed his cook. Let the slaves of Pompey style thee
- 6:39Speaker 1: congrio the great go, yet stay thou hast not spent
- 6:42Speaker 1: all the moneys I gave thee for the marketing, all
- 6:45Speaker 1: alas the nightingale's tongues, and the Roman temacula, and the
- 6:48Speaker 1: oysters from Britain and sundry. Other things too numerous now
- 6:52Speaker 1: to recite, are yet left unpaid for. But what matter? Everyone?
- 6:55Speaker 1: Trust the Archimaedorus of Diomed, the wealthy, oh unconscionable podigal,
- 7:00Speaker 1: what waste? What profusion? I am ruined? But go hasten, inspect, taste, perform,
- 7:05Speaker 1: surpass thyself. Let the Roman senator not despise the poor
- 7:08Speaker 1: Pompeian away slave, and remember the Phrygian atogens. The chief
- 7:13Speaker 1: disappeared within his natural domain, and Diomed rolled back his
- 7:16Speaker 1: portly presence to the more courtly chambers. All was to
- 7:19Speaker 1: his liking. The flowers were fresh, the fountains played briskly,
- 7:22Speaker 1: the mosaic pavements were as smooth as mirrors. Where is
- 7:25Speaker 1: my daughter Julia? He asked at the bath ah that
- 7:29Speaker 1: reminds me time wanes and I must Bathe also Our
- 7:32Speaker 1: story returns to episodes. On awaking that day from the
- 7:35Speaker 1: broken and feverish sleep which had followed his adoption of
- 7:38Speaker 1: a faith so strikingly and sternly at variance with that
- 7:42Speaker 1: in which his youth had been nurtured, the young priest
- 7:44Speaker 1: could scarcely imagine that he was not yet in a dream.
- 7:47Speaker 1: He had crossed the fatal river. The past was henceforth
- 7:49Speaker 1: to have no sympathy with the future. The two worlds
- 7:52Speaker 1: were distinct and separate, that which had been from that
- 7:55Speaker 1: which was to be. To what a bold and adventurous
- 7:58Speaker 1: enterprise he had pledged his life to unveil the mysteries
- 8:01Speaker 1: in which he had participated, to desecrate the altars he
- 8:04Speaker 1: had served to denounce the goddess whose ministering robe he wore.
- 8:08Speaker 1: Slowly he became sensible of the hatred and the horror
- 8:10Speaker 1: he should provoke amongst the pious, even if successful, If
- 8:14Speaker 1: frustrated in his daring attempt, what penalties might he not
- 8:17Speaker 1: incur for an offense hitherto unheard of, for which no
- 8:20Speaker 1: specific law derived from experience was prepared, and which for
- 8:24Speaker 1: that very reason precedents dragged from the sharpest armory of
- 8:27Speaker 1: obsolete and inapplicable legislation would probably be distorted to meet
- 8:32Speaker 1: his friends, the sister of his youth, could he expect justice,
- 8:35Speaker 1: though he might receive compassion from them, This brave and
- 8:38Speaker 1: heroic act would, by their heathen eyes, be regarded, perhaps
- 8:41Speaker 1: as a heenious apostasy, at the best, as a pitiable madness.
- 8:46Speaker 1: He dared he renounced everything in this world in the
- 8:49Speaker 1: hope of securing that eternity in the next, which had
- 8:51Speaker 1: so suddenly been revealed to him. While these thoughts, on
- 8:54Speaker 1: the one hand invaded his breast, on the other hand,
- 8:57Speaker 1: his pride, his courage, and his virtue, mingled with renas,
- 9:00Speaker 1: reminiscences of revenge for deceit, of indignant disgust at fraud,
- 9:04Speaker 1: conspired to raise and to support him. The conflict was
- 9:07Speaker 1: sharp and keen, but his new feelings triumphed over his old,
- 9:10Speaker 1: and a mighty argument in favor of wrestling with the
- 9:13Speaker 1: sanctities of old opinions and hereditary forms might be found
- 9:16Speaker 1: in the conquest over both achieved by that humble priest.
- 9:20Speaker 1: Had the early Christians been more controlled by the solemn
- 9:22Speaker 1: plausibilities of custom, less of democrats in the pure and
- 9:26Speaker 1: lofty acceptation of that perverted word, Christianity would have perished
- 9:30Speaker 1: in its cradle. As each priest in succession slept several
- 9:33Speaker 1: nights together in the chambers of the temple, the term
- 9:36Speaker 1: imposed on Episodes was not yet completed. And when he
- 9:38Speaker 1: had risen from his couch, attired himself as usual in
- 9:41Speaker 1: his robes, and left his narrow chamber, he found himself
- 9:45Speaker 1: before the altars of the temple. In the exhaustion of
- 9:48Speaker 1: his late emotions. He had slept far into the morning,
- 9:51Speaker 1: and the vertical sun already poured its fervid beams over
- 9:54Speaker 1: the sacred place. Salvee Episodes, said a voice, whose natural
- 9:58Speaker 1: asperity was smooth by long artifice into an almost displeasing
- 10:02Speaker 1: softness of tone. Thou art late abroad? Has the goddess
- 10:05Speaker 1: revealed herself to thee in visions? Could she reveal her
- 10:09Speaker 1: true self to the people? Callanus? How insenseless would be
- 10:12Speaker 1: These altars that replied Calenus may possibly be true, But
- 10:16Speaker 1: the deity is wise enough to hold commune with none
- 10:18Speaker 1: but priests. A time may come when she will be
- 10:21Speaker 1: unveiled without her own acquiescence. It is not likely she
- 10:25Speaker 1: has triumphed for countless ages, and that which has so
- 10:28Speaker 1: long stood the test of time rarely succumbs to the
- 10:30Speaker 1: lust of novelty. But hark ye, young brother, these sayings
- 10:33Speaker 1: are indiscreet. It is not for THEE to silence them, replied,
- 10:36Speaker 1: Episodes haughtily so hot. Yet I will not quarrel with THEE.
- 10:41Speaker 1: Why my epicodes? Has not the Egyptian convinced THEE of
- 10:44Speaker 1: the necessity of our dwelling together in unity? Has he
- 10:46Speaker 1: not convinced THEE of the wisdom of deluding the people
- 10:49Speaker 1: and enjoying ourselves? If not, o, brother, he is not
- 10:52Speaker 1: that great magician, he is esteemed. Thou then hast shared
- 10:56Speaker 1: his lessons, said episodes with a hollow smile. Aye, But
- 10:59Speaker 1: I stood less in need of them than thou. Nature
- 11:01Speaker 1: had already gifted me with the love of pleasure and
- 11:04Speaker 1: the desire of gain and power. Long is the way
- 11:06Speaker 1: that leads the voluptory to the severities of life. But
- 11:09Speaker 1: it is only one step from pleasant sin to sheltering hypocrisy.
- 11:13Speaker 1: Beware the vengeance of the Goddess. If the shortness of
- 11:15Speaker 1: that step be disclosed. Beware thou the hour when the
- 11:19Speaker 1: tomb shall be rent and the rottenness exposed, returned Apiicodes
- 11:22Speaker 1: solemnly valet with these words, he left the flamen to
- 11:25Speaker 1: his meditations. When he got a few paces from the temple,
- 11:28Speaker 1: he turned to look back. Calanus had already disappeared in
- 11:31Speaker 1: the entry room of the priests, for it now approached
- 11:34Speaker 1: the hour of that repast, which called prandium by the
- 11:36Speaker 1: ancients answers in point of date to the breakfast of
- 11:39Speaker 1: the moderns. The white and graceful fane gleamed brightly in
- 11:43Speaker 1: the sun upon the altars. Before it rose the incense
- 11:45Speaker 1: and bloomed the garlands. The priest gazed long and wistfully
- 11:49Speaker 1: upon the scene. It was the last time that it
- 11:51Speaker 1: was ever beheld by him. He then turned and pursued
- 11:54Speaker 1: his way slowly towards the house of Ione, for before
- 11:57Speaker 1: possibly the last tie that united them was cut in twain,
- 12:00Speaker 1: before the uncertain peril of the next day was incurred,
- 12:02Speaker 1: he was anxious to see his last surviving relative, his
- 12:05Speaker 1: fondest as his earliest friend. He arrived at her house
- 12:08Speaker 1: and found her in the garden with nydia. This is
- 12:11Speaker 1: kind Epiesidase, said Ione joyfully, and how eagerly have I
- 12:14Speaker 1: wished to see THEE? What thanks do I not owe THEE?
- 12:17Speaker 1: How cherlish hast thou been to answer none of my letters,
- 12:20Speaker 1: to abstain from coming hither to receive the expressions of
- 12:22Speaker 1: my gratitude? Oh thou hast desisted to preserve thy sister
- 12:26Speaker 1: from Dishonor what what can she say to thank THEE?
- 12:29Speaker 1: Now thou art come at last, My sweet Ione, thou
- 12:32Speaker 1: owest me no gratitude, for thy cause was mine. Let
- 12:35Speaker 1: us avoid that subject. Let us recur not to that
- 12:37Speaker 1: impious man, how hateful to both of us. I may
- 12:40Speaker 1: have a speedy opportunity to teach the world the nature
- 12:43Speaker 1: of his pretended wisdom and hypocritical severity. But let us
- 12:47Speaker 1: sit down, my sister, I am wearied with the heat
- 12:49Speaker 1: of the sun. Let us sit in yonder shade, and
- 12:52Speaker 1: for a little while longer be to each other what
- 12:54Speaker 1: we have been. Beneath a wide plane tree, with the
- 12:57Speaker 1: sisters and the arbutus clustering round them, the living fountain
- 13:00Speaker 1: before the greenswood beneath their feet, the gay cicada, once
- 13:04Speaker 1: so dear to Athens, rising merrily ever, and anon amidst
- 13:07Speaker 1: the grass, the butterfly, beautiful emblem of the Soul, dedicated
- 13:11Speaker 1: to Psyche, and which has continued to furnish illustrations to
- 13:14Speaker 1: the Christian bard rich in the glowing colors caught from
- 13:17Speaker 1: Sicilian skies, hovering about the sunny flowers itself like a
- 13:21Speaker 1: winged flower. In this spot and this scene, the brother
- 13:24Speaker 1: and the sisters sat together for the last time on earth.
- 13:27Speaker 1: You may tread now on the same place. But the
- 13:29Speaker 1: garden is no more. The columns are shattered, the fountain
- 13:31Speaker 1: has ceased to play. Let the travelers search amongst the
- 13:34Speaker 1: ruins of Pompeii for the House of Ione. Its remains
- 13:37Speaker 1: are yet visible, But I will not betray them to
- 13:39Speaker 1: the gaze of commonplace tourists. He who is more sensitive
- 13:42Speaker 1: than the herd, will discover them easily. When he has
- 13:44Speaker 1: done so, let him keep the secret. They sat down,
- 13:48Speaker 1: and Nydia, glad to be alone, retired to the farther
- 13:50Speaker 1: end of the garden. Ione, my sister said, the young convert.
- 13:54Speaker 1: Place your hand upon my brow. Let me feel your
- 13:57Speaker 1: cool touch. Speak to me too, for your gentle voe,
- 14:00Speaker 1: like a breeze that hath freshness as well as music.
- 14:03Speaker 1: Speak to me, but forbear to bless me utter not
- 14:05Speaker 1: one word of those forms of speech which our childhood
- 14:08Speaker 1: was taught to consider sacred alas, And what then shall
- 14:11Speaker 1: I say? Our language of affection is so woven with
- 14:14Speaker 1: that of worship that the words grow chilled and trite.
- 14:17Speaker 1: If I banish from them allusion to our gods are
- 14:19Speaker 1: gods murmured episodes with a shudder, Thou slightest my request?
- 14:23Speaker 1: Already Shall I speak then to THEE? Only of isis
- 14:27Speaker 1: the evil spirit? No? Rather be dumb forever, unless at
- 14:30Speaker 1: least thou canst but away away this talk. Not now
- 14:33Speaker 1: will we dispute and cavil. Not now will we judge
- 14:36Speaker 1: harshly of each other, thou regarding me as an apostate,
- 14:40Speaker 1: and I all sorrow and shame for THEE as an idolator. No,
- 14:43Speaker 1: my sister, let us avoid such topics and such thoughts.
- 14:47Speaker 1: In thy sweet presence. A calm falls over my spirit
- 14:50Speaker 1: for a little while I forget, as I thus lay
- 14:52Speaker 1: my temples on thy bosom. As I thus feel thy
- 14:55Speaker 1: gentle arm embrace me. I think that we are children
- 14:58Speaker 1: once more, and that the heaven smiles eat equally upon both.
- 15:01Speaker 1: For oh, if hereafter I escape, no matter what peril,
- 15:04Speaker 1: and it be permitted me to address THEE on one's
- 15:06Speaker 1: sacred and awful subject. Should I find thine ear closed
- 15:10Speaker 1: and thy heart hardened, what hope for myself could countervail
- 15:13Speaker 1: the despair for THEE? In THEE, my sister, I behold
- 15:15Speaker 1: a likeness made beautiful, made noble of myself. Shall the
- 15:19Speaker 1: mirror live forever, and the form itself be broken? As
- 15:22Speaker 1: the potters clay Ah, No, no thou wilt listen to me.
- 15:25Speaker 1: Yet dost thou remember how we went into the fields
- 15:28Speaker 1: by bay, hand in hand together to pluck the flowers
- 15:31Speaker 1: of spring. Even so hand in hand shall we enter
- 15:33Speaker 1: the eternal garden and crown ourselves with imperishable as Fodal
- 15:38Speaker 1: Wondering and bewildered by words she could not comprehend, but
- 15:41Speaker 1: excited even to tears by the plaintiveness of their tone,
- 15:44Speaker 1: I only listened to these outpourings of a full and
- 15:46Speaker 1: oppressed heart. In truth episodes, himself was softened much beyond
- 15:50Speaker 1: his ordinary mood, which, to outward seeming was usually either
- 15:53Speaker 1: sullen or impetuous. For the noblest desires are of a
- 15:56Speaker 1: jealous nature. They engross, they absorb the soul, and often
- 16:00Speaker 1: leave the splenetic humors, stagnant and unheeded at the surface,
- 16:04Speaker 1: unheeding the petty things around us. We are deemed morose,
- 16:07Speaker 1: impatient at earthly interruption to the diviner dreams. We are
- 16:10Speaker 1: thought irritable and churlish. For as there is no chimera
- 16:13Speaker 1: vainer than the hope that one human heart shall find
- 16:15Speaker 1: sympathy in another, so none ever interrupts us with justice,
- 16:19Speaker 1: and none, no, not our nearest and our dearest ties,
- 16:22Speaker 1: forbear with us in mercy. When we are dead and
- 16:25Speaker 1: repentance comes too late, both friend and foe may wonder
- 16:28Speaker 1: to think how little there was in us to forgive.
- 16:30Speaker 1: I will talk to THEE then, of our early years,
- 16:32Speaker 1: said Ione, shall yon blind girls sing to THEE of
- 16:35Speaker 1: the days of childhood. Her voice is sweet and musical,
- 16:38Speaker 1: and she hath a song on that theme which contains
- 16:40Speaker 1: none of those illusions it pains THEE to hear. Dost
- 16:43Speaker 1: thou remember the words? My sister asked a piece of
- 16:45Speaker 1: des methinks yes, for the tune which is simple, fixed
- 16:49Speaker 1: them on my memory. Sing to me then thyself. My
- 16:52Speaker 1: ear is not in unison with unfamiliar voices, and thine Ione,
- 16:55Speaker 1: full of household associations has ever been to me more
- 16:58Speaker 1: sweet than all the hiirling melodies of Lycia or of
- 17:00Speaker 1: crete sing to me Ione beckoned to a slave that
- 17:04Speaker 1: stood in the portico, and sending for her lute, sang
- 17:07Speaker 1: when it arrived to a tender and simple air. The
- 17:10Speaker 1: following verses regrets for childhood. It is not that our
- 17:14Speaker 1: earlier heaven escapes its april showers, or that to childhood's
- 17:18Speaker 1: heart is given no snake amidst the flowers are twined
- 17:21Speaker 1: with grief. Each brightest leaf that's wreathed us by the
- 17:25Speaker 1: hours young. Though we be the past may sting, the
- 17:29Speaker 1: present feed its sorrow, but hope shines bright on everything
- 17:32Speaker 1: that waits us with the morrow, like sunlight glades the
- 17:36Speaker 1: dimmest shades, some rosy beam can borrow. It is not
- 17:39Speaker 1: that our later years of cares are woven holy, but
- 17:43Speaker 1: smiles less swiftly chase. The tears and wounds are healed
- 17:46Speaker 1: more slowly, and memories vow to lost ones now makes
- 17:49Speaker 1: joys too bright and holy, and ever fled the iris
- 17:53Speaker 1: bow that smiled when clouds were o'er us. If storms
- 17:56Speaker 1: should burst and cheered, we go a drearia waste before us,
- 17:59Speaker 1: and with the toys of childish joys, we've broke the
- 18:02Speaker 1: staff that bore us. Wisely and delicately had Ione chosen
- 18:07Speaker 1: that song sad, though its burthen seemed, For when we
- 18:10Speaker 1: are deeply mournful, discordant above all others is the voice
- 18:13Speaker 1: of mirth. The fittest spell is that borrowed from melancholy itself.
- 18:16Speaker 1: For dark thoughts can be softened down when they cannot
- 18:18Speaker 1: be brightened, and so they lose the precise and rigid
- 18:21Speaker 1: outline of their truth, and their colors melt into the ideal.
- 18:25Speaker 1: As the leech applies in remedy to the internal sore,
- 18:28Speaker 1: some outward irritation, which by a gentler wound draws away
- 18:31Speaker 1: the venom of that which is more deadly. Thus, in
- 18:33Speaker 1: the rankling festus of the mind, our art is to
- 18:36Speaker 1: divert to a milder sadness on the surface, the pain
- 18:39Speaker 1: that gnawth at the core. And so, with epiece ofdes
- 18:42Speaker 1: yielding to the influence of the silver voice that reminded
- 18:45Speaker 1: him of the past, and told but of half the
- 18:47Speaker 1: sorrow born to the present, he forgot his more immediate
- 18:50Speaker 1: and fiery sources of anxious thoughts. He spent hours in
- 18:53Speaker 1: making Ione alternately sing to and converse with him, And
- 18:57Speaker 1: when he rose to leave her, it was with a
- 18:59Speaker 1: calm and lulled mind, Ione said he as he pressed
- 19:02Speaker 1: her hand. Should you hear my name blackened and maligned?
- 19:05Speaker 1: Will you credit the aspersion? Never, my brother, Never, dost
- 19:09Speaker 1: thou not imagine, according to thy belief, that the evil
- 19:11Speaker 1: doer is punished hereafter and the good rewarded? Can you
- 19:15Speaker 1: doubt it? Dost thou think then, that he who is
- 19:18Speaker 1: truly good should sacrifice every selfish interest in his zeal
- 19:21Speaker 1: for virtue. He who doth so is the equal of
- 19:24Speaker 1: the gods. And thou believest that, according to the purity
- 19:28Speaker 1: and courage with which he thus acts, shall be his
- 19:30Speaker 1: portion of bliss beyond the grave. So we are taught
- 19:33Speaker 1: to hope. Kiss me, my sister. One question more, thou
- 19:37Speaker 1: art to be wedded to Glaucus? Perchance that marriage may
- 19:39Speaker 1: separate us more hopelessly. But not of this speak. I
- 19:42Speaker 1: now thou art to be married to Glaucus. Dost thou
- 19:45Speaker 1: love him? Nay, my sister, answer me by words, yes,
- 19:49Speaker 1: murmured Ione, blushing, dost thou feel that for his sake,
- 19:52Speaker 1: thou couldst renounce pride, brave, dishonor, and in her death.
- 19:56Speaker 1: I have heard that when women really love, it is
- 19:58Speaker 1: to that excess, my brother. All this I could do
- 20:01Speaker 1: for Glaucus and feel that it were not a sacrifice.
- 20:04Speaker 1: There is no sacrifice to those who love in what
- 20:06Speaker 1: is born. For the one we love enough shall woman
- 20:09Speaker 1: feel thus for man, and man feel less devotion to
- 20:12Speaker 1: his God. He spoke no more. His whole countenance seemed
- 20:15Speaker 1: instinct and inspired with a divine life. His chest swelled proudly,
- 20:19Speaker 1: his eyes glowed. On his forehead was writ the majesty
- 20:22Speaker 1: of a man who can dare to be noble. He
- 20:24Speaker 1: turned to meet the eyes of Ione, earnest, wistful, fearful.
- 20:27Speaker 1: He kissed her fondly, strained her warmly to his breast,
- 20:30Speaker 1: and in a moment more he had left the house.
- 20:33Speaker 1: Long did Ione remain in the same place, mute and thoughtful.
- 20:36Speaker 1: The maidens again and again came to warn her of
- 20:39Speaker 1: the deepening noon and her engagement to Diomed's banquet. At length,
- 20:43Speaker 1: she awoke from her reverie and prepared, not with the
- 20:45Speaker 1: pride of beauty, but listless and melancholy for the festival.
- 20:49Speaker 1: One thought alone reconciled her to the promised visit. She
- 20:51Speaker 1: should meet Glaucus. She could confide to him her alarm
- 20:54Speaker 1: and uneasiness for her brother. End of Chapter two.