And the gold orange through dark foliage glows?
A soft wind flutters through the deep blue sky,
The myrtle blooms, and towers the laurel high,
Knowest thou it well?
Knowest thou it well? O there with thee!
O that I might, my own beloved one, flee.”
It was La Niña—the pet name of the young musician—that came as a special providence to clear up a question that seemed to be growing more difficult the longer it was pondered. The effect was magical, and all doubt and hesitation disappeared forthwith. La Niña, as if inspired, had, without in the least suspecting it, indicated the land of the heart’s desire. Yes, the writer would leave, and leave at once, the region of cloud and frost and chilling blast, and seek the land of flowers and sunshine, the land of “soft wind” and “blue sky,” “the land where the pale citron grows,” where “the gold orange glows.” It would not, however, be the land of which Mignon sang and which she so yearned to see again. Lovely, charming Italy, with its manifold attractions of every kind, must for once yield to the sun-land of another clime far away, and in another hemisphere.
A few days afterwards the writer, with a few friends, had taken his place in a through Pullman car bound for the Land of Easter—the land of Ponce de Leon. They found every berth in the car occupied by people like themselves hastening away from the rigors of winter and betaking themselves to where
“Trees bloom throughout the year, soft breezes blow,
And fragrant Flora wears a lasting smile.”