The people responded with a loud shout; but, in a dark corner of the amphitheatre, sat a trembling woman, with a sorrowful countenance, holding in her hands the Ark of the Covenant of the one true God, and groaning and sighing, she cried in the bitterness of her heart—
"Oh, Bar Noemi! Bar Noemi!"
Bar Noemi did not hear the feeble sound. The music of the glass flutes, the soft harmony of the silver trumpets, mingled in his bosom with the choruses of the children into an enchanting, intoxicating harmony, which Byssenia's voice failed to penetrate. Seductive, sylph-like forms danced before him in fluttering garments. Their dishevelled tresses waved wildly in the air. Their flashing eyes shone brighter than the sun. Who would not have lost his reason at the sight of so much beauty, so much bliss?
And again the plaintive, sobbing sound was heard—
"Oh, Bar Noemi! Bar Noemi!"
And the young man seemed to feel a light shudder run through all his limbs. What was that?
Hast thou eyes? Hast thou a heart? Where are thy senses that thou shouldst hesitate a moment? If a hundred years were thine allotted span wouldst thou not give them all away for such glances, and forfeit thy very soul's salvation in the next world for the possession of such an earthly paradise? Thousands and thousands of fairy forms dance round him in a bewitching, ensnaring circle, ever nearer, ever more lovely and more numerous; their breath fans his cheeks; their eyes burn into his very soul, their melodies take possession of his heart. It needs but one word from his lips, and he will sink into this sea of sweetness, die the most delicious of deaths, a death which is nought but a long, long kiss.
The music, the singing, grows more and more enchanting; the odours of the censers fill the air with a sweet intoxication; the snow-white arms already touch the shoulders of the deified man, when again, for the third time, and still more mournfully, still more appealingly resound the words—
"Oh, Bar Noemi! Bar Noemi!"
Suddenly he starts like one just awakened from sleep, a wondrously deep sleep which has benumbed all his limbs. He makes a snatch at his head, tears off the chaplet of roses, and, rending it in twain, throws it to the ground, exclaiming, with a threatening voice—