"Why should you complain?"
"Because I loved the old songs and you have forgotten them."
Sylvie warbled a few notes of a grand air from a modern opera.... She phrased!
We turned away from the lakeside and approached the green bordered with lime-trees and elms, where we had so often danced. I had the conceit to describe the old Carlovingian walls and to decipher the armorial bearings of the House of Este.
"And you! How much more you have read than I, and how learned you have become!" said Sylvie. I was vexed by her tone of reproach, as I had all the way been seeking a favourable opportunity to resume the tender confidences of the morning, but what could I say, accompanied by a donkey and a very wide-awake lad who pressed nearer and nearer for the pleasure of hearing a Parisian talk? Then I displayed my lack of tact, by relating the vision of Chaâlis which I recalled so vividly. I led Sylvie into the very hall of the castle where I had heard Adrienne sing. "Oh, let me hear you!" I besought her; "let your loved voice ring out beneath these arches and put to flight the spirit that torments me, be it angel or demon!" She repeated the words and sang after me:
"Anges, descendez promptement
au fond du purgatoire...."
(Angels descend without delay
To dread abyss of purgatory.)
"It is very sad!" she cried.
"It is sublime! An air from Porpora, I think, with words translated in the present century."
"I do not know," she replied.