"I guess 't was frightful there to see
A lady so richly clad as she—
Beautiful exceedingly!"
For, in truth, it was a lady that Paul saw standing before him at midnight hour beneath the light of the stars in the depth of the Dalmatian forest; and, like the lady of the poem, she was both richly dressed and marvellously beautiful—lovely as the soft beauty of a southern night; with raven hair, and dusky eyes that seemed the mirrors of a sweet melancholy. She wore a long Dalmatian capote with the hood drawn over her head. The capote being partly open revealed a costume of the richest silk. Decorated with curious gold brocade, and with a wealth of chain-work and gems, this dress, though it might have been pronounced bizarre by the more sober taste of Western ladies, harmonized in Paul's judgment with the wild oriental beauty of the wearer.
"Pardon me if I have startled you. Which way does Zara lie?"
And the astounded Paul, usually full of assurance in the presence of women, could do nothing on the present occasion but simply stammer forth, while pointing to the north,—
"That is the road to Zara."
"I thank you, signor."
With a stately inclination of her head she drew her capote more closely around her, and walked away in the direction indicated by Paul as quietly and confidently as if the lonely forest-road were the Boulevard des Italiens, and the distant Zara a pretty toy-shop a few yards ahead!
Different people, different customs. Was it the habit of young Dalmatian women to take solitary midnight walks through bear-haunted forests?