"Allons," said I, and in a few minutes I was seated in the stage-box of the handsomest theatre in the world.
What strange events—what unexpected meetings and sudden separations are sailors liable to—what sudden transitions from grief to joy, from joy to grief, from want to affluence, from affluence to want! All this the history of my life, for the last six months, will fully illustrate.
Chapter XXVI
You will proceed in pleasure and in pride,
Beloved, and loving many; all is o'er
For me on earth, except some years to hide
My shame and sorrow deep in my heart's core.
Don Juan.
I paid little attention to the performance; for the moment I came to the house, my eyes were rivetted on an object from which I found it impossible to remove them. "It is," said I, "and yet it cannot be; and yet why should it not?" A young lady sat in one of the boxes; she was elegantly attired, and seemed to occupy the united attentions of many Frenchmen, who eagerly caught her smiles.
"Either that is Eugenia," thought I, "or I have fallen asleep in the ruins of St Jago, and am dreaming of her. That is Eugenia, or I am not Frank. It is her, or it is her ghost." Still I had not that moral certainty of the identity, as to enable me to go at once to her, and address her. Indeed, had I been certain, all things considered, the situation we were in would have rendered such a step highly improper.
"If that be Eugenia," thought I, again, "she has improved both in manner and person. She has a becoming embonpoint, and an air de bon societé which, when we parted, she had not."
The more intensely I gazed, the more convinced was I that I was right; the immovable devotion of my eyes attracted the attention of a French officer, who sat near me.
"C'est une jolie femme, n'est-ce pas, monsieur?"