She led me into a garden all of faint-hued flowers. There bloomed no
scarlet here, nor blue, nor yellow; but white and lavender and purest
purple. Here, also, like torches of the sun, stood poplars each by
each in the windless air, and the impenetrable darkness of cypresses
beneath them.
Here too was a fountain whose waters leapt no more, mossy and
time-worn. I could not but think of those other gardens of my
journey--Jane's, Ennui's, Dianeme's; and yet none like this for the
shingley murmur of the sea, and the calmness of morning.
"But, surely," I said, "this must be very far from Troy."
"Far indeed," she said.
"Far also from the hollow ships."
"Far also from the hollow ships," she replied.
"Yet," said I, "in the country whence I come is a saying: Where the
treasure is--"
"Alack! _there_ gloats the miser!" said Criseyde; "but I, Traveller,
have no treasure, only a patchwork memory, and that's a great grief."
"Well, then, forget! Why try in vain?" I said.
She smiled and seated herself, leaning a little forward, looking upon
the ground.
"Soothfastness _must_,"' she said very gravely, raising her long black
eyebrows; "yet truly it must be a forlorn thing to be remembered by
one who so lightly forgets.
Pages:
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175