296

IN MAREMMA 335

UNDER TWO FLAGS 363

STRATHMORE 417

FRIENDSHIP 427

WANDA 452

_ARIADNE._

One grows to love the Roman fountains as sea-born men the sea. Go where
you will there is the water; whether it foams by Trevi, where the green
moss grows in it like ocean weed about the feet of the ocean god, or
whether it rushes reddened by the evening light, from the mouth of an
old lion that once saw Cleopatra; whether it leaps high in air, trying
to reach the gold cross on St. Peter's or pours its triple cascade over
the Pauline granite; whether it spouts out of a great barrel in a wall
in old Trastevere, or throws up into the air a gossamer as fine as
Arachne's web in a green garden way where the lizards run, or in a
crowded corner where the fruit-sellers sit against the wall;--in all its
shapes one grows to love the water that fills Rome with an unchanging
melody all through the year.

* * *

And indeed I do believe all things and all traditions. History is like
that old stag that Charles of France found out hunting in the woods
once, with the bronze collar round its neck on which was written, "Caesar
mihi hoc donavit." How one's fancy loves to linger about that old stag,
and what a crowd of mighty shades come thronging at the very thought of
him! How wonderful it is to think of--that quiet grey beast leading his
lovely life under the shadows of the woods, with his hinds and their
fawns about him, whilst Caesar after Caesar fell and generation on
generation passed away and perished! But the sciolist taps you on the
arm. "Deer average fifty years of life; it was some mere court trick of
course--how easy to have such a collar made!" Well, what have we gained?
The stag was better than the sciolist.

* * *

Life costs but little on these sunny, silent shores; four walls of loose
stones, a roof of furze and brambles, a fare of fish and fruit and
millet-bread, a fire of driftwood easily gathered--and all is told. For
a feast pluck the violet cactus; for a holiday push the old red boat to
sea, and set the brown sail square against the sun--nothing ca