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our game upon the lawn, scattering the pigeons, whose
beautiful, iridescent bodies (shaped like hearts and, sure-
ly, the lilacs of the feathered kingdom) took refuge as in so
many sanctuaries, one on the great basin of stone, on which
its beak, as it disappeared below the rim, conferred the part,
assigned the purpose of offering to the bird in abundance
the fruit or grain at which it appeared to be pecking, anoth-
er on the head of the statue, which it seemed to crown with
one of those enamelled objects whose polychrome varies in
certain classical works the monotony of the stone, and with
an attribute which, when the goddess bears it, entitles her to
a particular epithet and makes of her, as a different Chris-
tian name makes of a mortal, a fresh divinity.
On one of these sunny days which had not realised my
hopes, I had not the courage to conceal my disappointment
from Gilberte.
‘I had ever so many things to ask you,’ I said to her; ‘I
thought that to-day was going to mean so much in our
friendship. And no sooner have you come than you go away!
Try to come early to-morrow, so that I can talk to you.’
Her face lighted up and she jumped for joy as she an-
swered: ‘Tomorrow, you may make up your mind, my dear
friend, I sha’n’t come!
‘First of all I’ve a big luncheon-party; then in the after-
noon I am going to a friend’s house to see King Theodosius
arrive from her windows; won’t that be splendid?—and
then, next day, I’m going to Michel Strogoff, and after that
it will soon be Christmas, and the New Year holidays! Per-
haps they’ll take me south, to the Riviera; won’t that be

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