"Amaryllis, Amaryllis! where art thou?"
Julian putting forth all his strength pushed the girl away, his heart
overflowed with pain and hatred, and crying, "Let me go, let me go!"
snatched himself free and fled.
Deaf and heedless he escaped from the house through the vineyards and
the cypress wood; nor halted till he reached the temple of Aphrodite.
Now and again he heard his name called, and the gay voice of Diophane,
announcing that the cakes of gingerbread were ready; but he made no
reply. Search was made for him. He lay in hiding in the thicket of
laurels at the feet of Eros. Accustomed to his fits of moroseness,
they gave up the search, satisfied that he had returned to Macellum.
When all around was restored again to silence, Julian came out from
his hiding-place and gazed at the temple of the goddess of love,
lodged upon a gentle hill, and bare to view on all sides. The Ionic
marble columns, flooded with sunshine, were softly steeped in the
warmth of azure, receiving its ardent embraces with the cold purity of
snow.
Each corner of the façade was surmounted by pedestalled griffins, with
lifted talons, beaks gaping, and woman-shaped breasts, standing out,
proud and austere, against the deep blue of the sky.
Julian went up the steps into the portico, pushed open the bronze
doors and penetrated the interior of the temple up to the very shrine,
the _naos_.
Silence and coolness surrounded him. The setting sun overhead still
fell on the capitals of the columns, and their fine illumined
scroll-work, contrasted with the penumbral shadow on the floor of the
temple, seemed soft and bright as tresses of gold. A tripod, still
burning, diffused the odour of myrrh.
Julian, leaning against the wall, lifted his eyes in fear, restraining
his breath till it almost died upon his lips.
She, the goddess herself, was before him. Under the open sky, in the
midst of the temple, stood, cold and white, new-born of the sea-foam,
Aphrodite Anadyomene. With a smile she contemplated the heavens and
the sea, wondering at their charm; as if unwitting still that their
beauty was her own beauty, glassed in the eternal mirrors of the azure
and the waters. No raiment profaned her divine body. Naked and chaste
she rose, as the clear sky soaring above her.
Julian gazed on with an insatiate gaze, and felt quick thrills of
adoration sweep over his frame. The child, in his black monkish habit,
knelt before Aphrodite, his face upturned, his hands pressed to his
palpitating little heart.
Then still aloof, still timorous, he sat at the foot of the column. He
leant his cheek against the marble. Peace sank slowly into his soul.
He fell asleep.
But, even through that slumber, he was conscious of her presence.
She came down towards him, nearer, nearer.... Her delicate white hands
stole round his neck. The boy with a smile submitted to these
passionless endearments; the cold of the marble chilled his very
heart. That divine embrace bore no likeness to the wild clasp of
Amaryllis. The soul of Julian, freeing itself from earthly love,
entered depths of repose, as into some ambrosial night of Homer, or
the sweet rest of the dead.
* * * * *
When Julian awoke it was night. Over the roofless quadrilateral stars
were shining, and the crescent moon shedding her silver upon the head
of the statue. Julian arose. Olympiodorus must have meanwhile been
tending the temple, although he had either not observed or had
refrained from waking the child; for now, on the bronze tripod, fresh
charcoal was glowing, and a fillet of odorous smoke arising towards
the goddess.
Julian smiling approached, and from the chrysolite cup, between the
feet of the tripod, took a few grains of incense and flung them on the
coals. Smoke rose more thickly, and the ruddy glow of the fire, like a
pale flush of life, came over the face of the statue, contending with
the soft new-born shine of the moon.
Julian bowed down and kissed the marble feet, and watered them with
his tears, exclaiming--
"Aphrodite! Aphrodite! thou shalt be my everlasting love!"