[FULL-SIZE] -- [Medium-Size]
[FULL-SIZE] -- [Medium-Size]
“It was in the shade of such smiling quarters, prepared by the Great Spirit, that we stopped to repose ourselves. When the winds come down from heaven to rock the great cedar, when the aerial castles built upon its brandies undulate with the birds and the travellers sleeping beneath its shelter, when thousands of sighs pass through the corridors of the waving edifice, there is nothing amongst the wonders of the ancient world to be compared with this monument of the desert.
“Every evening we lighted a large fire and built a travelling hut of bark raised upon four stakes. When I had killed a wild turkey, a pigeon, or a wood-pheasant, we attached it to the end of a pole before a pile of burning oak, and left the care of turning the hunter’s prey to the caprices of the wind. We used to eat a kind of moss called rock-tripe, sweetened bark, and May-apples, that tasted of the peach and the raspberry. The black-walnut-tree, the maple-tree, and the sumach furnished our table with wine. Sometimes I went and fetched from amongst the reeds a plant whose flower, in the form of an elongated cup, contained a glass of the purest dew. We blessed Heaven for having placed this limpid spring upon the stalk of a flower, in the midst of the corrupted marshes, just as it has placed hope at the bottom of hearts ulcerated by grief; just also as it has caused virtue to well up from the bosom of the miseries of life!
“I soon discovered, alas! that I had deceived myself as to the apparent calm of my beloved Atala. The farther we advanced the sadder she became. She frequently shuddered without a cause, and turned her head aside hurriedly. I sometimes caught her regarding me with a passionate look, which she at once cast towards the sky with a profound melancholy. What alarmed me above all was a secret thought concealed in the bottom of her soul, but which I read in her eyes. Constantly drawing me towards her and then pushing me away, re-animating my hopes, and then destroying them when I thought I had made some progress in her heart, I found myself still at the same point. How many times she said to me, ‘O my young sweetheart! I love you like the shade of the woods at mid-day!’ You are as beautiful as the desert with all its flowers and all its breezes. If I incline towards you, I tremble: when my hand falls upon yours, it seems to me as though I were about to die. The other day the wind blew your hair upon my face as you were reposing yourself upon my bosom, and I fancied I felt the light touch of the invisible spirits. Yes, I have seen the young kids of the mountain of Occona; I have listened to the language of men ripe with years; but the mildness of goats and the wisdom of old men are less agreeable and less powerful than your words. Ah, my poor Chactas! I shall never be your spouse!’
“The constant struggle between Atala’s love and religion, her tender freedom and the chastity of her conduct, the pride of her character and her profound sensitiveness, the elevation of her soul in great things, her susceptibility about trifles, rendered her, in my opinion, an incomprehensible being. Atala could not hold a weak empire over a man. Full of passion, she was full of power. She must either be adored or hated.