Two Roman pifferari came on to the Place and began to play an
extraordinary and most exciting melody that almost drew me out of the
window; it seemed to have no particular form, no beginning or middle or
end; it went soaring higher and higher, like the song of a lark, with
never a pause for breath, to the time of a maddening jig--a tarantella,
perhaps--always on the strain and stress, always getting nearer and
nearer to some shrill climax of ecstasy quite high up and away, beyond
the scope of earthly music; while the persistent drone kept buzzing of
the earth and the impossibility to escape. All so gay, so sad, there is
no name for it!
Two little deformed and discarded-looking dwarfs, beggars, brother and
sister, with large toothless gaps for mouths and no upper lip, began to
dance; and the crowd laughed and applauded. Higher and higher, nearer
and nearer to the impossible, rose the quick, piercing notes of the
piffero. Heaven seemed almost within reach--the nirvana of music after
its quick madness--the region of the ultra-treble that lies beyond
the ken of ordinary human ears!
[Illustration]
A carriage and four, with postilions and "guides," came clattering
royally down the road from the palace, and dispersed the crowd as it
bowled on its way to the bridge. In it were two ladies and two
gentlemen. One of the ladies was the young Empress of the French; the
other looked up at my window--for a moment, as in a soft flash of summer
lightning, her face seemed ablaze with friendly recognition--with a
sweet glance of kindness and interest and surprise--a glance that
pierced me like a sudden shaft of light from heaven.
It was the Duchess of Towers!
I felt as though the bagpipes had been leading up to this! In a moment
more the carriage was out of sight, the sun had quite gone down, the
pifferari had ceased to play and were walking round with the hat, and
all was over.
I dined, and made my way back to Paris on foot through the Bois de
Boulogne, and by the Mare d'Auteuil, and saw my old friend the water-rat
swim across it, trailing the gleam of his wake after him like a silver
comet's tail.
"Allons-nous-en, gens de la nous!
Allons-nous-en chacun chez nous!"
So sang a festive wedding-party as it went merrily
arm in arm through the long high street of Passy,
with a gleeful trust that would have filled the heart
with envy but for sad experience of the vanity of
human wishes.
_Chacun chez nous!_ How charming it sounds!
Was each so sure that when he reached his home
he would find his heart's desire? Was the bridegroom
himself so very sure?
[Illustration: THE OLD WATER-RAT.]
The heart's desire--the heart's regret! I flattered
myself that I had pretty well sounded the uttermost
depths of both on that eventful Sunday!