None moved beside, except the Chevalier, who, with a gaze that was as of one suddenly blinded, followed Anastase instantaneously. We remained as we stood, in a suspense that I, for one, could never have broken. Poor Florimond's violin lay shattered upon the floor, the strings shivered, and yet shuddering; the rose lay also low. None gathered either up, none stirred, nor any brought us word. I believe I should never have moved again if Delemann, in his living kindness, had not sped from us at last. He, too, was long away,--long, long to return; nor did he, in returning, re-enter the orchestra. He beckoned to me from the screen of the antechamber. I met him amidst the glorious garlands, but I made way to him I know not how. That room was deserted also, and all who had been there had gone. Whither? Oh! where might they now remain? Franz whispered to me, and of his few, sad words--half hope, half fear, all anguish--I cannot repeat the echo. But it is sufficient for all to remind myself how soon the hope had faded, after few, not many days; how the fear passed with it, but not alone. Yet, whatever passed, whatever faded, left us love forever,--love, with its dear regrets, its infinite expectations! FOOTNOTE: [6] The Bacchus of Music. CHAPTER IX. Twelve years of after-life cannot but weigh lighter in the balance of recollection than half that number in very early youth. I think this now, pondering upon the threshold of middle age with an enthusiasm fixed and deepened by every change; but I did not think so the day to which I shall defer my particular remembrances,--the day I had left Germany forever,--except in dreams. There were other things I might have left behind that now I carried to my home,--things themselves all dreams, yet containing in their reminiscences the symbols of my every reality. Eternity alone could contain the substance of those shadows; that shore we deem itself to shadow, alone contains the resolution into glory of all our longings, into peace of all our pain. Such feelings, engendered by loneliness, took me by the very hand and led me forwards that dreary December evening when I landed in England last, having obtained all that was absolutely necessary to be made my own abroad.