rom the deep wells, and perhaps from the
prisons by the Bridge of Sighs, rise the accents of woe, as at the
time when the tambourine was heard in the gay gondolas, and the golden
ring was cast from the _Bucentaur_ to Adria, the queen of the seas.
Adria! shroud thyself in mists; let the veil of thy widowhood shroud
thy form, and clothe in the weeds of woe the mausoleum of thy
bridegroom--the marble, spectral Venice."

EIGHTEENTH EVENING.

"I looked down upon a great theatre," said the Moon. "The house was
crowded, for a new actor was to make his first appearance that night.
My rays glided over a little window in the wall, and I saw a painted
face with the forehead pressed against the panes. It was the hero of
the evening. The knightly beard curled crisply about the chin; but
there were tears in the man's eyes, for he had been hissed off, and
indeed with reason. The poor Incapable! But Incapables cannot be
admitted into the empire of Art. He had deep feeling, and loved his
art enthusiastically, but the art loved not him. The prompter's bell
sounded; '_the hero enters with a determined air_,' so ran the stage
direction in his part, and he had to appear before an audience who
turned him into ridicule. When the piece was over, I saw a form
wrapped in a mantle, creeping down the steps: it was the vanquished
knight of the evening. The scene-shifters whispered to one another,
and I followed the poor fellow home to his room. To hang one's self is
to die a mean death, and poison is not always at hand, I know; but he
thought of both. I saw how he looked at his pale face in the glass,
with eyes half closed, to see if he should look well as a corpse. A
man may be very unhappy, and yet exceedingly affected. He thought of
death, of suicide; I believe he pitied himself, for he wept bitterly,
and when a man has had his cry out he doesn't kill himself.

"Since that time a year had rolled by. Again a play was to be acted,
but in a little theatre, and by a poor strolling company. Again I saw
the well-remembered face, with the painted cheeks and the crisp beard.
He looked up at me and smiled; and yet he had been hissed off only a
minute before--hissed off from a wretched theatre, by a miserable
audience. And to-night a shabby hearse rolled out of the town-gate. It
was a suicide--our painted, despised hero. The driver of the hearse
was the only person present, for no one followed except my beams. In a
corner of the churchyard the corpse