timent of the
scenes he visited, while he seemed to give but little attention to the
plastic material, the picturesque frame, which did not assimilate
with the form of his art, nor belong to his more spiritualized sphere.
However, (a fact that has been often remarked in organizations such as
his,) as he was removed in time and distance from the scenes in which
emotion had obscured his senses, as the clouds from the burning incense
envelope the censer, the more vividly the forms and beauties of such
scenes stood out in his memory. In the succeeding years, he frequently
spoke of them, as though the remembrance was full of pleasure to him.
But when so entirely happy, he made no inventory of his bliss. He
enjoyed it simply, as we all do in the sweet years of childhood, when we
are deeply impressed by the scenery surrounding us without ever thinking
of its details, yet finding, long after, the exact image of each object
in our memory, though we are only able to describe its forms when we
have ceased to behold them.

Besides, why should he have tasked himself to scrutinize the beautiful
sites in Spain which formed the appropriate setting of his poetic
happiness? Could he not always find them again through the descriptions
of his inspired companion? As all objects, even the atmosphere itself,
become flame-colored when seen through a glass dyed in crimson, so he
might contemplate these delicious sites in the glowing hues cast around
them by the impassioned genius of the woman he loved. The nurse of his
sick-room--was she not also a great artist? Rare and beautiful union!
If to the depths of tenderness and devotion, in which the true and
irresistible empire of woman must commence, and deprived of which she is
only an enigma without a possible solution, nature should unite the most
brilliant gifts of genius,--the miraculous spectacle of the Greek firs
would be renewed,--the glittering flames would again sport over the
abysses of the ocean without being extinguished or submerged in the
chilling depths, adding, as the living hues were thrown upon the surging
waves, the glowing dyes of the purple fire to the celestial blue of the
heaven-reflecting sea!

Has genius ever attained that utter self-abnegation, that sublime
humility of heart which gives the power to make those strange sacrifices
of the entire Past, of the whole Future; those immolations, as
courageous as mysterious; those mystic and utter holocausts of self,
not tempora