16
Chapter
OF THE SPREADING OF THE BUTTERFLY-
NET; WITH A DELECTABLE DISCOURSE
CONCERNING DIVERS ORDERS OF BEING;
AND OF THE STATE OF THE LADY ILIEL,
AND HER DESIRES, AND OF THE SECOND
VISION THAT SHE HAD IN WAKING.
A GREAT peace brooded on the Villa. Daily sun gathered the strength; and
the west wind told the flowers that a little bird had whispered to him that the
spring was coming.
The results of the magical invocations began to peep through the veil of
matter, like early crocuses. The atmosphere of house and garden was languid
and romantic, so that a stranger could not have failed to feel it; yet with this
was a timid yet vigorous purity, a concentration of the longing of the
magicians.
The physical signs were equally unmistakable. By night a faint blue
luminosity radiated from the whole enclosure, visible to the natural eye; and
to one seated in the garden, darting scintillations, star-sparkles, would appear,
flitting from flower to flower, or tree to stone, if he kept as still and sensitive
as one should in such a garden. And on the rightly tuned and tempered ear
might fall, now and again, vague snatches of some far-off music. Then there
were pallid perfumes in the air, like suggestions of things cool, and
voluptuous, and chaste and delicate, and lazy, of those soft tropical loves
which satisfy themselves with dreams. [215]
All these phenomena were of a peculiar quality. It will be well to recite the
fact, and to suggest an explanation.
These sights and sounds are conveyed clearly enough; but they disappear
the moment the full attention is turned upon them. They will not bear