"You shall repeat them two days hence, if you will," she said; "now these soft words but mock me." The carriages of Corinne's party arrived at the close of day, just as the sea-breeze refreshed the air, inviting man to the contemplation of nature. They went first to Virgil's tomb. It overlooks the bay of Naples; and such is the magnificent repose of this spot, that one is tempted to believe the bard himself must have selected it. These simple words from his Georgies might have served him for epitaph:---- "Illo Virgilium me tempore dulcis alebat Parthenope." "Then did the soft Parthenope receive me." His ashes here repose, and attract universal homage--all, all that man on earth can steal from death. Petrarch set a laurel beside them--like its planter, it is dead. He alone was worthy to have left a lasting trace near such a grave. One feels disgust at the crowd of ignoble names traced by strangers on the walls about the urn; they trouble the peace of this classic solitude. Its present visitants left it in silence, musing over the images immortalized by the Mantuan. Blest intercourse between the past and future! which the art of writing perpetually renews. Shadow of death, what art thou? Man's thoughts survive; can he then be no more? Such contradiction is impossible. "Oswald," said Corinne, "these impressions are strange preparatives for a fête; yet," she added, with wild sublimity, "how many fêtes are held thus near the grave!"--"My life," he said, "whence all this secret dread? Confide in me; for six months have I owed you everything; perhaps have shed some pleasure over your path. Who then can err so impiously against happiness as to dash down the supreme bliss of soothing such a soul? it is much to feel one's self of use to the most humble mortal; but Corinne! to be her comfort! trust me, is a glory too delicious to renounce."--"I believe your promises," she said; "yet there are moments when something strange and new seizes the heart, and hurries it thus sadly." They passed through the Grotto of Pausilipo by torchlight, as indeed would have been the case at noon; for it extends nearly a quarter of a league beneath the mountain; and in the centre, the light of day, admitted at either extremity, is scarcely visible. In this long vault the tramp of steeds and cries of their drivers resound so stunningly that they deaden all thought in the brain. Corinne's horses drew her carriage with astonishing rapidity; yet did she say: "Dear Nevil, how slowly we advance! pray hasten them."--"Why thus impatient?" he asked; "formerly, while we were together, you sought not to expedite time, but to enjoy it."--"Yet now," she said, "all must be decision; everything must come to an end; and I would hasten it, were it my death." On leaving the grotto, you feel a lively sensation at regaining daylight and the open country; such a country, too! What are so often missed in Italy, fine trees, here flourish in abundance.