of all the
periods of man's mysterious existence on this queer little planet;
while the old geocentric ethics, oddly clinging on to the changed
cosmogony, would keep life clean. But all that would pall--and then
the deluge!

There was a waft of merry music from without. He rose and went
noiselessly to the window and looked out into the night. A full moon
hung in the heavens, perpendicularly and low, so that it seemed a
terrestrial object in comparison with the stars scattered above, glory
beyond glory, and in that lucent Italian atmosphere making him feel
himself of their shining company, whirling through the infinite void
on one of the innumerable spheres. A broad silver green patch of
moonlight lay on the dark water, dwindling into a string of dancing
gold pieces. Adown the canal the black gondolas clustered round a
barca lighted by gaily colored lanterns, whence the music came.
_Funiculi, Funicula_--it seemed to dance with the very spirit of
joyousness. He saw a young couple holding hands. He knew they were
English, that strange, happy, solid, conquering race. Something
vibrated in him. He thought of bridegrooms, youth, strength; but it
was as the hollow echo of a far-off regret, some vague sunrise of gold
over hills of dream. Then a beautiful tenor voice began to sing
Schubert's Serenade. It was as the very voice of hopeless passion; the
desire of the moth for the star, of man for God. Death, death, at any
cost, death to end this long ghastly creeping about the purlieus of
life. Life even for a single instant longer, life without God, seemed
intolerable. He would find peace in the bosom of that black water. He
would glide downstairs now, speaking no word.

_And the Angel of Death came and slew the slaughterer, which had
slaughtered the ox, which had drunk the water, which had extinguished
the fire, which had burnt the staff, which had smitten the dog, which
had bitten the cat, which had devoured the kid, which my father
bought for two zuzim. Chad Gadya! Chad Gadya!_

When they should find him accidentally drowned, for how could the
world understand, the world which yet had never been backward to judge
him, that a man with youth, health, wealth, and a measure of fame
should take his own life; his people would think, perhaps, that it was
a ghost that had sat at the _Seder_ table so silent and noiseless.
And, indeed, what but a ghost? One need not die to hover outside the
warm circle of life, stretching vain arms.