Siebel
appeared; tall, easy, dignified, and walking like a wave; modest, fair,
noble, great, dreamy, and, above all, divinely sad; the soul of womanhood
and music poured from her honey lips; she conquered all my senses: I felt
something like a bolt of ice run down my back. I ought to have jumped up
and fled the theater. I wish I had. But I never do. I am incurable. The
charm deepened; and when she had sung 'Le Parlate d'Amor' as no mortal
ever sung and looked it, she left the stage and carried my heart and soul
away with her. What chance had I? Here shone all the beauties that adorn
the body, all the virtues and graces that embellish the soul; they were
wedded to poetry and ravishing music, and gave and took enchantment. I
saw my paragon glide away, like a goddess, past the scenery, and I did
not see her meet her lover at the next step--a fellow with a wash-leather
face, greasy locks in a sausage roll, and his hair shaved off his
forehead--and snatch a pot of porter from his hands, and drain it to the
dregs, and say, 'It is all right, Harry: _that_ fetched 'em.' But I know,
by experience, she did; so _sauve qui peut._ Dear friend and
fellow-lunatic, for my sake and yours, leave Frankfort with me
to-morrow.
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