Little Poems in Prose

tries; this pang of curiosity; it is a land which resembles you, where all is beautiful, rich, quiet, straightforward; where Fancy has built and adorned a Western China; where life may be softly breathed, where happiness is wedded to silence. It is there that we much go and live, it is there that we must go and die. Yes, it is there that we must go and breathe, dream, make long the hours by rea- son of the infinity of sensations that they hold; a musician has written, “Will you dance with me?”; who will compose “Will you come with me?” That one may offer it to the beloved one, the soul’s sister! Yes, it is in this atmosphere that life is good—down there, where the slower hours contain more thoughts, where the clocks strike happiness with a deeper, a more meaning so- lemnity. Upon glittering panels or upon gilded leather, darkly rich, live pictures; pictures blesséd, calm and deep as the souls of the art- ists which created them. The setting suns which so richly colour the dining-room or the ‘drawing-room are sifted by fair stuffs or by high windows of stained glass; the furniture is vast, curious, bizarre, weaponed with locks and with secrets, like refined souls. Mirrors, metals, stuffs, jewelry, porcelain, play a silent and