The World’s Tragedy

PROLOGUE THE GARDEN OF EROS See, in a glade of green moss, watered by a spring, a merry company languidly playing. Flutes, and harps, and panpipes are there ; and on wonderful chased silver, figured with the loves of the gods, are cups of beaded wine, and fruits, and honey, and cates of divers sort. It is night, but the moon is exceeding bright ; and the stars shine in the self-luminous blue of the vault. Around the glade are many trees ; the ground is a mass of flowers, and gathe- red roses cover the white limbs of many of the players. One girl is standing, and a full nightingale song trills from her ivory throst. Upon a tall tree of massy foliage sits, hidden from the players, a vulture vast and vague in his black night of shadow. His face is human, of the ovine type, as that of a low-class Jew. He watches the scene throughout in silence, but with intense envy disguised as disgust. DORIS Praise the wine wittily ! Praise the wine well ! Footing it prettily Down through the dell.