The Complete Short Works of Georg Ebers Part 14

"Alciphron's son a 'stranger' on the estates of his ancestors!"

exclaimed Semestre. "What don't we hear? But I must go to work to prepare the best possible reception for Leonax, that he may feel from the first he is no stranger here, but perfectly at home. Now go, if you choose, and offer sacrifices to Aphrodite, that she may join the hearts of Xanthe and Phaon. I'll stick to my spit."

"Then you'll be in the right place," cried Jason, "but you're not yet turning it for Leonax's wedding-feast."

"And I promise you I'll prepare the roast for Phaon's," retorted Semestre, "but not until the sacrifice of an animal I'm fattening myself induces the foam-born G.o.ddess to kindle in Xanthe's heart sweet love for Leonax."

CHAPTER II.

XANTHE.

"Xanthe, Xanthe!" called Semestre, a short time after. "Xanthe! Where is the girl?"

The old woman had gone into the garden. Knowing how to use time to advantage, and liking to do two things at once, while looking for her nursling and repeatedly shouting the girl's name, she was gathering vegetables and herbs, on which the dew of early morning still glittered brightly.

While thus occupied, she was thinking far more of her favorite's son and the roast meats, cakes, and sauces to be prepared for him, than of Xanthe.

She wanted to provide for Leonax all the dishes his father had specially liked when a child, for what a father relishes, she considered, will please his children.

Twenty times she had stooped to pluck fresh lavender, green lettuce, and young, red turnips, and each time, while straightening herself again by her myrtle-staff, as well as a back bent by age would allow, called "Xanthe, Xanthe!"

Though she at last threw her head back so far that the sun shone into her open mouth, and the power of her lungs was not small, no answer came. This did not make her uneasy, for the girl could not be far away, and Semestre was used to calling her name more than once before she obeyed.

True, to-day the answer was delayed longer than usual. The maiden heard the old woman's shrill, resounding voice very clearly, but heeded it no more than the cackling of the hens, the screams of the peac.o.c.ks, and the cooing of the doves in the court-yard.

The house-keeper, she knew, was calling her to breakfast, and the bit of dry bread she had taken with her was amply sufficient to satisfy her hunger. Nay, if Semestre had tempted her with the sweetest cakes, she would not have left her favorite nook by the spring now.

This spring gushed from the highest rock on her father's estate. She often went there, especially when her heart was stirred, and it was a lovely spot.

The sparkling water rushed from a cleft in the rocks, and, on the left of the little bench, where Xanthe sat, formed a clear, transparent pool, whose edges were inclosed by exquisitely-polished, white-marble blocks.

Every reddish pebble, every smooth bit of snowy quartz, every point and furrow and stripe on the pretty sh.e.l.ls on its sandy bottom, was as distinctly visible as if held before the eyes on the palm of the hand, and yet the water was so deep that the gold circlet sparkling above the elbow on Xanthe's round arm, nay, even the gems confining her peplum on the shoulder, would have been wet had she tried to touch the bottom of the basin with the tips of her fingers.

The water was green and clear as crystal, into which, while molten, bits of emeralds had been cast to change them into liquid drops.

Farther on it flowed through a channel choked with all kinds of plants.

Close by the edges of the rivulet, which rushed swiftly down to the valley, drooped delicate vines, that threw their tendrils over the stones and flourished luxuriantly in the rocks amid thick, moist clumps of moss. Dainty green plants, swayed to and fro by the plas.h.i.+ng water, grew everywhere on the bottom of the brook, and, wherever on its course it could flow more smoothly, ferns, nodding gracefully, surrounded it like ostrich-feathers waving about the cradle of a royal babe.

Xanthe liked to watch the stream disappear in the myrtle-grove.

When, sitting in her favorite nook, she turned her eyes downward, she overlooked the broad gardens and fields of her father and uncle, stretching on the right and left of the stream along the gentle slope of the mountain, and the narrow plain by the sea.

The whole scene resembled a thick woolen carpet, whose green surface was embroidered with white and yellow spots, or one of the baskets young maidens bear on their heads at the feast of Demeter, and in which, piled high above the edge, light and dark-hued fruit gleams forth from leaves of every tint.

Groves of young pomegranate and myrtletrees, with vigorous shoots, stood forth in strong relief against the silvery gray-green foliage of the gnarled olive-trees.

Fragrant roses, glowing with a scarlet hue, as if the sun's fiery kiss had called them to life, adorned bushes and hedges, while, blus.h.i.+ng faintly, as if a child's lips had waked them from slumber, the blossoms of the peach and almond glimmered on the branches of the trees.

Tiny young green leaves were growing from the oddly-interwoven branches of the fig-trees, to which clung the swelling pouches of the fruit.

Golden lemons glittered amid their strong, brilliant foliage, which had survived the winter season; and long rows of blackish-green cypresses rose straight and tall, like the grave voices of the chorus amid the joyous revel. To Xanthe, gazing downward, her father's pine-wood seemed like a camp full of arched, round tents, and, if she allowed her eyes to wander farther, she beheld the motionless sea, whose broad surface, on this pleasant morning, sparkled like polished sapphire, and everywhere seemed striving to surpa.s.s with its own blue the color of the clear sky.

Ever and anon, like a tiny silver cloud floating across the firmament, white sails glided by.

Pleasant green hills framed this lovely view. On their well-cultivated slopes appeared here the white, glimmering walls of a temple; yonder villages, houses, and cottages, like the herds and single sheep that he half concealed by dense foliage.

Garlands of flowers surround the heads of happy mortals, and here the house of every wealthy land-owner was inclosed by a hedge or garden.

Behind the hills rose the sharply-cut outlines of the naked cliffs of the lofty, distant mountains, and the snowy head of sleeping Mount Etna gleamed brightly through the mist.

Now, in the early morning, sea and garden, hills and distant mountains were covered with a delicate veil of indescribable hue. It seemed as if the sea had furnished the warp of this fabric, and the golden sun the woof.

The scene was wondrously beautiful, but Xanthe had not gone to the spring to gaze at the landscape; nay, she scarcely knew that it was lovely.

When the sea shone with the hue of the sky and lay motionless, as it did to-day, she thought Glaucus, the G.o.d of the blue sea, was sunning himself in pleasant slumber.

On other bright days when the waves and surges swelled, white foam crowned their crests, and a never-ending succession of breakers dashed upon the sh.o.r.e, she believed the fifty daughters of Nereus were pursuing their sports under the clear water.

They were all lovely women, and full of exuberant gayety.

Some rocked quietly on the gleaming waves, others boldly swung themselves on the backs of the bearded Tritons, and merrily urged them through the flood.

When the surf beat roaring on the strand, Xanthe thought she could hear these creatures guiding their course with their scaly tails and blowing into sh.e.l.ls, and many a glimmering foam-crest on a deep-blue wave was no transparent bubble-no, the girl distinctly saw that it was the white neck, the gleaming arm, or the snowy foot of one of Nereus's daughters.

She believed that she clearly distinguished them sporting joyously up and down through the azure water, now plunging into the depths with their feet, and now with their heads foremost, anon floating gently on the surface of the waves. One held out her hand to another, and in so doing their beautiful, rounded arms often gleamed beneath the crest of a surge.

Every day they practised new games, as the sea never looks precisely the same; each hour it changed its hue, here, there, and everywhere, Light streaks, like transparent bluish-green gauze, often ran through the darker surface, which resembled a purplish-blue mantle of some costly Phoenician stuff; the waves could flash black as the eye of night, and white as Leucothea's neck.

Then Amphitrite appeared, with floating hair and resonant voice, and beside her Poseidon with his four steeds.

Frowning sullenly, he struck them sharply with his lash, which whistled through the air, and angrily thrust his trident deep into the sea.

Instantly the waves took hues of lighter brown, deeper yellow, and cloudy gray, and the sea wore the aspect of a shallow pond with muddy bottom, into which workmen hurl blocks of stone. The purity of the water was sadly dimmed, and the billows dashed foaming toward the sky, threatening in their violent a.s.sault to shatter the marble dike erected along the sh.o.r.e. The Nereids, trembling, took refuge in the ever-calm depths, the Tritons no longer used their hollow sh.e.l.ls to blow gentle harmonies; nay, they sent forth cras.h.i.+ng war-songs, as if some hostile citadel were to be a.s.sailed; while Amphitrite thrust both hands into her long, fluttering hair, and with out-stretched head uttered her furious roar.

But to-day the sea was calm, and when Xanthe had reached the spring the edges of the milk-white, light, fleecy clouds, towering one above another on the summits of the loftier mountains, were still glowing with a rosy light. It was the edge of the garment of the vanis.h.i.+ng Eos, the leaves of the blossoms scattered by the Hours in the pathway of the four steeds of Helios, as they rose from the waves.

To day and at this hour the morning sunlight fell serenely on the tall cypresses upon the hill, the trees in the garden swayed in the soft breath of the morning breeze, and Xanthe nodded to them, for she thought the beautiful Dryads living in the trees were greeting each other.

Often, with a brief prayer, she laid flowers or a round cake on the altar that stood beside her seat, and which her ancestor had erected to the nymph of the spring--but today she had not come for this.

Then what brought her to the hill so early? Did she visit the spring to admire her own image in its mirror-like surface?

At home she was rarely permitted such an indulgence, for, whenever she looked in the polished metal-disk, Semestre used to say:

"If a girl often peers into such useless things, she'll certainly see a fool's image in them."

Forbidden things are charming, yet Xanthe rarely looked into this liquid mirror, though she might have enjoyed gazing at it frequently, for her figure was tall and slender as the trunk of a cypress, her thick fair hair glittered like gold, the oval of her face was exquisitely rounded, long lashes shaded the large blue eyes that could conceal no emotion which stirred her soul, and when she was alone seemed to ask: "What have the G.o.ds allotted for my future?" Yet in their gaze might often be read the answer "Something delightful, surely."

And yet Xanthe did not come to the spring to paint pictures of her future; on the contrary, she came to be sad, and shed tears unrebuked.

She did not weep pa.s.sionately, but the big salt drops welled slowly from her eyes and ran down her young cheeks, as drop after drop of s.h.i.+ning sap flows down the trunk of a wounded birch-tree.