'E compie' mia giornata innanzi sera.'
'Ah, yes, my dove, thou didst indeed finish thy day before the evening!... Ladies, sometimes it seems to me as if she smiled upon us three from heaven. Ah, Bice, Bice, mia adorata!'
He drew Lucrezia to him, and presently Cecilia rose and left them together. The 'Evening Glow' was not jealous of the 'Dawn'; from long experience she knew that soon again her turn would come. Her mandoline sounded from the next room.
And above the merry firelight, the naked cupids of Caradosso's moulding prolonged their eternal dance, laughing madly around the nails, the lance, the crown of thorns.
BOOK IX
THE SIMILITUDES—1498-1499
'I sensi sono terrestri, la ragione sta fuor di quelli, quando contempla.'
Leonardo da Vinci.
(The Senses belong to earth: Reason, when she contemplates, stands outside them.)