CHAPTER III
For a night and day Byblis traversed the mountain. She made anxious inquiries of all the deities of the woods, of the trees, of the glades and the thickets. She recounted her sorrows many times; she tremblingly implored their assistance, and wrung her little hands. But not one of them had seen Caunos.
She climbed up so high that her mother’s holy name was quite unknown to all she met, and the unconcerned nymphs did not understand her.
She wanted to retrace her steps, but she was lost. On every side she was surrounded by a confused colonnade of enormous pine-trees. There were no more paths. There was no horizon. She ran in every direction. She called out in despair.
There was not even an echo to be heard.
Then as her weary eyelids drooped lower and lower she lay down upon the ground and a passing dream told her in measured tones—
“You will never see your brother, you will never set eyes upon him again.”
She awoke with a start, with her arms outstretched and her mouth open, but she was so overwhelmed with sorrow and anguish that she had not the strength to cry out.
The moon rose red like blood behind the high black outlines of the pine-trees. Byblis could hardly see it. It seemed to her that a humid veil had been dropped over her long eyes. An eternal silence had enveloped the sleeping woods.