Page:Tales of humour and romance translated by Holcroft.djvu/228

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204
THE MOON.

ter the corpse of her Eugenius, and hit precisely the moment of the rising of the waning moon, and said while her tearless eye rested upon its decaying form, "wherefore can I not die?"

Indeed! wherefore canst thou not die sweet soul, since the cold earth has already sucked from all thy wounds, the hot poison wherewith the human heart is palsied? But I turn my eye from this sorrow, and look up to the glimmering moon, where Eugenius opens his eyes among smiling children, and his own dear boy falls fluttering upon his breast———How silent all is in the dusky entrance of the second world, a rainbow of light silvers over the bright fields of the first heavens, and little balls of fire hang instead of the sparkling dew around the flowers and mountains—the azure of the sky[1] swells darker over the plains of lillies, and the tones of music are in the thin atmosphere but distant echoes—Night-flowers alone send forth an odour and waver sportively around the quiet prospect—there the heart is calm—there the eye is dry—there the wish is dumb—children flutter like humming bees around


  1. The blue colour of the sky must be darker in the Moon since the air is more rarified, both of which may be proved upon a mountain.