arked the form of the silk-haired and graceful capella, with its
wreathing horn and bright grey eye--which, still beneath Ausonian skies,
recalls the eclogues of Maro, browsing half-way up the hills; and the
grapes, already purple with the smiles of the deepening summer, glowed
out from the arched festoons, which hung pendent from tree to tree.
Above them, light clouds floated in the serene heavens, sweeping so
slowly athwart the firmament that they scarcely seemed to stir; while,
on their right, they caught, ever and anon, glimpses of the waveless
sea, with some light bark skimming its surface; and the sunlight
breaking over the deep in those countless and softest hues so peculiar
to that delicious sea.

'How beautiful!' said Glaucus, in a half-whispered tone, 'is that
expression by which we call Earth our Mother! With what a kindly equal
love she pours her blessings upon her children! and even to those
sterile spots to which Nature has denied beauty, she yet contrives to
dispense her smiles: witness the arbutus and the vine, which she
wreathes over the arid and burning soil of yon extinct volcano. Ah! in
such an hour and scene as this, well might we imagine that the Faun
should peep forth from those green festoons; or, that we might trace the
steps of the Mountain Nymph through the thickest mazes of the glade.
But the Nymphs ceased, beautiful Ione, when thou wert created!'

There is no tongue that flatters like a lover's; and yet, in the
exaggeration of his feelings, flattery seems to him commonplace. Strange
and prodigal exuberance, which soon exhausts itself by overflowing!

They arrived at the ruins; they examined them with that fondness with
which we trace the hallowed and household vestiges of our own
ancestry--they lingered there till Hesperus appeared in the rosy
heavens; and then returning homeward in the twilight, they were more
silent than they had been; for in the shadow and beneath the stars they
felt more oppressively their mutual love.

It was at this time that the storm which the Egyptian had predicted
began to creep visibly over them. At first, a low and distant thunder
gave warning of the approaching conflict of the elements; and then
rapidly rushed above the dark ranks of the serried clouds. The
suddenness of storms in that climate is something almost preternatural,
and might well suggest to early superstition the notion of a divine
agency--a few large drops broke heavily among the boughs that