The Last Days of Pompeii

  Chapter V

  THE PHILTRE. ITS EFFECT.

  WHEN Glaucus arrived at his own home, he found Nydia seated under theportico of his garden. In fact, she had sought his house in the merechance that he might return at an early hour: anxious, fearful,anticipative, she resolved upon seizing the earliest opportunity ofavailing herself of the love-charm, while at the same time she halfhoped the opportunity might be deferred.

  It was then, in that fearful burning mood, her heart beating, her cheekflushing, that Nydia awaited the possibility of Glaucus's return beforethe night. He crossed the portico just as the first stars began torise, and the heaven above had assumed its most purple robe.

  'Ho, my child, wait you for me?'

  'Nay, I have been tending the flowers, and did but linger a little whileto rest myself.'

  'It has been warm,' said Glaucus, placing himself also on one of theseats beneath the colonnade.

  'Very.'

  'Wilt thou summon Davus? The wine I have drunk heats me, and I long forsome cooling drink.'

  Here at once, suddenly and unexpectedly, the very opportunity that Nydiaawaited presented itself; of himself, at his own free choice, heafforded to her that occasion. She breathed quick--'I will prepare foryou myself,' said she, 'the summer draught that Ione loves--of honey andweak wine cooled in snow.'

  'Thanks,' said the unconscious Glaucus. 'If Ione love it, enough; itwould be grateful were it poison.'

  Nydia frowned, and then smiled; she withdrew for a few moments, andreturned with the cup containing the beverage. Glaucus took it from herhand. What would not Nydia have given then for one hour's prerogativeof sight, to have watched her hopes ripening to effect--to have seen thefirst dawn of the imagined love--to have worshipped with more thanPersian adoration the rising of that sun which her credulous soulbelieved was to break upon her dreary night! Far different, as shestood then and there, were the thoughts, the emotions of the blind girl,from those of the vain Pompeian under a similar suspense. In the last,what poor and frivolous passions had made up the daring whole! Whatpetty pique, what small revenge, what expectation of a paltry triumph,had swelled the attributes of that sentiment she dignified with the nameof love! but in the wild heart of the Thessalian all was pure,uncontrolled, unmodified passion--erring, unwomanly, frenzied, butdebased by no elements of a more sordid feeling. Filled with love aswith life itself, how could she resist the occasion of winning love inreturn!

  She leaned for support against the wall, and her face, before soflushed, was now white as snow, and with her delicate hands claspedconvulsively together, her lips apart, her eyes on the ground, shewaited the next words Glaucus should utter.

  Glaucus had raised the cup to his lips, he had already drained about afourth of its contents, when his eye suddenly glancing upon the face ofNydia, he was so forcibly struck by its alteration, by its intense, andpainful, and strange expression, that he paused abruptly, and stillholding the cup near his lips, exclaimed:

  'Why, Nydia! Nydia! I say, art thou ill or in pain? Nay, thy facespeaks for thee. What ails my poor child?' As he spoke, he put downthe cup and rose from his seat to approach her, when a sudden pang shotcoldly to his heart, and was followed by a wild, confused, dizzysensation at the brain. The floor seemed to glide from under him--hisfeet seemed to move on air--a mighty and unearthly gladness rushed uponhis spirit--he felt too buoyant for the earth--he longed for wings, nay,it seemed in the buoyancy of his new existence, as if he possessed them.He burst involuntarily into a loud and thrilling laugh. He clapped hishands--he bounded aloft--he was as a Pythoness inspired; suddenly as itcame this preternatural transport passed, though only partially, away.He now felt his blood rushing loudly and rapidly through his veins; itseemed to swell, to exult, to leap along, as a stream that has burst itsbounds, and hurries to the ocean. It throbbed in his ear with a mightysound, he felt it mount to his brow, he felt the veins in the templesstretch and swell as if they could no longer contain the violent andincreasing tide--then a kind of darkness fell over his eyes--darkness,but not entire; for through the dim shade he saw the opposite walls glowout, and the figures painted thereon seemed, ghost-like, to creep andglide. What was most strange, he did not feel himself ill--he did notsink or quail beneath the dread frenzy that was gathering over him. Thenovelty of the feelings seemed bright and vivid--he felt as if a youngerhealth had been infused into his frame. He was gliding on tomadness--and he knew it not!

  Nydia had not answered his first question--she had not been able toreply--his wild and fearful laugh had roused her from her passionatesuspense: she could not see his fierce gesture--she could not mark hisreeling and unsteady step as he paced unconsciously to and fro; but sheheard the words, broken, incoherent, insane, that gushed from his lips.She became terrified and appalled--she hastened to him, feeling with herarms until she touched his knees, and then falling on the ground sheembraced them, weeping with terror and excitement.

  'Oh, speak to me! speak! you do not hate me?--speak, speak!'

  'By the bright goddess, a beautiful land this Cyprus! Ho! how they fillus with wine instead of blood! now they open the veins of the Faunyonder, to show how the tide within bubbles and sparkles. Come hither,jolly old god! thou ridest on a goat, eh?--what long silky hair he has!He is worth all the coursers of Parthia. But a word with thee--thiswine of thine is too strong for us mortals. Oh! beautiful! the boughsare at rest! the green waves of the forest have caught the Zephyr anddrowned him! Not a breath stirs the leaves--and I view the Dreamssleeping with folded wings upon the motionless elm; and I look beyond,and I see a blue stream sparkle in the silent noon; a fountain--afountain springing aloft! Ah! my fount, thou wilt not put out rays ofmy Grecian sun, though thou triest ever so hard with thy nimble andsilver arms. And now, what form steals yonder through the boughs? sheglides like a moonbeam!--she has a garland of oak-leaves on her head.In her hand is a vase upturned, from which she pours pink and tinyshells and sparkling water. Oh! look on yon face! Man never before sawits like. See! we are alone; only I and she in the wide forest. Thereis no smile upon her lips--she moves, grave and sweetly sad. Ha! fly,it is a nymph!--it is one of the wild Napaeae! Whoever sees her becomesmad-fly! see, she discovers me!'

  'Oh! Glaucus! Glaucus! do you not know me? Rave not so wildly, or thouwilt kill me with a word!'

  A new change seemed now to operate upon the jarring and disordered mindof the unfortunate Athenian. He put his hand upon Nydia's silken hair;he smoothed the locks--he looked wistfully upon her face, and then, asin the broken chain of thought one or two links were yet unsevered, itseemed that her countenance brought its associations of Ione; and withthat remembrance his madness became yet more powerful, and it swayed andtinged by passion, as he burst forth:

  'I swear by Venus, by Diana, and by Juno, that though I have now theworld on my shoulders, as my countryman Hercules (ah, dull Rome! whoeverwas truly great was of Greece; why, you would be godless if it were notfor us!)--I say, as my countryman Hercules had before me, I would let itfall into chaos for one smile from Ione. Ah, Beautiful,--Adored,' headded, in a voice inexpressibly fond and plaintive, 'thou lovest me not.Thou art unkind to me. The Egyptian hath belied me to thee--thouknowest not what hours I have spent beneath thy casement--thou knowestnot how I have outwatched the stars, thinking thou, my sun, wouldst riseat last--and thou lovest me not, thou forsakest me! Oh! do not leave menow! I feel that my life will not be long; let me gaze on thee at leastunto the last. I am of the bright land of thy fathers--I have trod theheights of Phyle--I have gathered the hyacinth and rose amidst theolive-groves of Ilyssus. Thou shouldst not desert me, for thy fatherswere brothers to my own. And they say this land is lovely, and theseclimes serene, but I will bear thee with me--Ho! dark form, why risestthou like a cloud between me and mine? Death sits calmly dread upon thybrow--on thy lip is the smile that slays: thy name is Orcus, but onearth men call thee Arbaces. See, I know thee! fly, dim shadow, thyspells avail not!'

  'Glaucus! Glaucus!
' murmured Nydia, releasing her hold and falling,beneath the excitement of her dismay, remorse, and anguish, insensibleon the floor.

  'Who calls?' said he in a loud voice. 'Ione, it is she! they have borneher off--we will save her--where is my stilus? Ha, I have it! I come,Ione, to thy rescue! I come! I come!'

  So saying, the Athenian with one bound passed the portico, he traversedthe house, and rushed with swift but vacillating steps, and mutteringaudibly to himself, down the starlit streets. The direful potion burntlike fire in his veins, for its effect was made, perhaps, still moresudden from the wine he had drunk previously. Used to the excesses ofnocturnal revellers, the citizens, with smiles and winks, gave way tohis reeling steps; they naturally imagined him under the influence ofthe Bromian god, not vainly worshipped at Pompeii; but they who lookedtwice upon his face started in a nameless fear, and the smile witheredfrom their lips. He passed the more populous streets; and, pursuingmechanically the way to Ione's house, he traversed a more desertedquarter, and entered now the lonely grove of Cybele, in which Apaecideshad held his interview with Olinthus.