"And yet," said Theodore, "our friend has discreetly thrown a veil over a great many things, and has passed so rapidly over others, that his story has merely caused us a passing feeling of the eery and shuddery--for which we are duly grateful to him. I remember very well having read this story in an old book, where everything was told with the most prolix enumeration of all the details; and the old woman's atrocities in particular were set forth in all their minutiæ, truly con amore, so that the whole affair produced, and left behind it, a most repulsive impression, which it took a long while to get over. I was delighted when I had forgotten the horrible thing, and Cyprian ought not to have recalled it to my memory; although I must admit that he has acted in accordance with the principles of our patron saint Serapion, and caused us a sufficient thrill of horror, particularly towards the end. It made us all turn pale, particularly the narrator himself!"
"We cannot hurry away too quickly from this gruesome picture," Ottmar said. "And it will not serve as a dark background (as Vincenz expected it would), because the figures of it are in too glaring colours. Allow me, by way of a grand change of subject--a sort of sideways spring away from the hell-broth which Cyprian has served up to us--to say a word or two (merely to give Vincenz time to clear his throat, as I hear him doing) concerning a certain aesthetic tea society, which was brought to my memory by a little paper which accidentally came into my hand to-day. Have I your permission, Vincenz?"
"Strictly speaking," said Vincenz, "it is a breach of all Serapiontic rule to keep chattering in this sort of style; and not only that, but, moreover, without any especial motive or inducement, the most unseemly things about gruesome vampires, and other such matters, are brought forward, so that I am obliged to shut my mouth just as I have got it opened. But go on, my Ottmar. The hours are flying, and I shall have the last word, like a quarrelsome woman, in spite of you. So go on, my Ottmar, go on."
"Chance," began Ottmar, "or rather, a kindly-intentioned introduction, brought me into the aesthetic tea society which I mentioned; and there were circumstances which induced me, or rendered it incumbent on me, to attend its meetings regularly for a time, although heaven knows they were tedious and wearisome enough. It greatly vexed me that, on an occasion when a really talented man read something which was full of true wit, and admirably appropriate to the occasion, all the people yawned, and grew impatient of it; whilst they were charmed and delighted by the marrowless, spiritless trash of a conceited young poetaster. This latter was all in the line of the gushing and the exuberant, but he also thought very highly of his epigrams. As what they were chiefly remarkable for was the absence of the sting in their tails, he always gave the signal for the laugh himself by beginning it at the proper time; and everybody then joined in it. One evening I asked, modestly, if I might be allowed to read out a few little verses which had occurred to me in moments of a certain amount of inspiration. And as people were good enough to credit me with the possession of a certain amount of brains, my request was received with a good deal of applause. I took out my manuscript and read, with great solemnity--
"'ITALY'S MARVELS.
'When tow'rds the orient heav'n my gaze I bend,
The western sun shines warm upon my back;
Whilst, when I turn me to the beauteous west,
The golden glory strikes upon mine eyeballs.
Oh, sacred land! where nature thus displays