(Or, with eyes fixed upon the gravestones, they murmur to the dead:—)
"Be at peace, beloved! and suffer not! I have brought thee wine and meats!"
A Widow. "Here is pultis, made by my own hands, as he used to like it, with plenty of eggs and a double measure of flour! We are going to eat it together as in other days, are we not?"
(She lifts a little piece to her lips, and suddenly bursts into an extravagant and frenzied laugh.
The others also nibble a little bit as she does and drink a mouthful of wine.
They recount to each other the stories of their martyrs; grief becomes exalted! libations redouble. Their tear-swimming eyes are fixed upon each other's faces. They stammer with intoxication and grief; gradually hands touch hands, lips join themselves to lips, and they seek each other upon the tombs, between the cups and the torches.
The sky begins to whiten. The fog makes damp their garments; and, without appearing even to know one another, they depart by different ways and seek their homes.
The sun shines; the weeds and the grass have grown higher; the face of the plain is changed.
And Anthony, looking between tall bamboos, sees distinctly a forest of columns, of bluish-grey color. These are tree-trunks, all originating from one vast trunk. From each branch of the colossal tree descend other branches which may bury themselves in the soil; and the aspect of all these horizontal and perpendicular lines, indefinitely multiplied, would closely resemble a monstrous timber-work, were it not that they have small figs[7] growing upon them here and there, and a blackish foliage, like that of the sycamore.
He perceives in the forkings of their branches, hanging bunches of yellow flowers, violet flowers also, and ferns that resemble the plumes of splendid birds.