In the meantime, overhead, the Stalactite Cave is set, and I hear the feet of the ballet dancers skimming over the floor. I get into the outskirts of the Cave by means of the stairs again, meeting a mortal on the way, eating a substantial Spitzenberg, and that Nemesis, the call-boy, in search of some of the Immortals, to find the Water Lily Ballet in full operation. There are no signs of weariness or dejection now. Every face is full of expression. Every limb is posed in elegance. There is pleasure for pain; smiles for dejection; fascination for weariness; coquetry for listlessness; and the Westmael, who looked so sad and weary, is flashing across the stage like a will o' the wisp, compelling, with her wonderful steps upon her toes, her pirouettes and postures, round upon round of applause from the audience, which comes to me behind the scenes like the pattering of rain upon the shingles, what time her rival, Venturola, already dressed for her solo in the Fish Ballet of the next act, is standing near me, closely scrutinizing, with her keen black eyes and nervous manner, every step of her great rival. Westmael comes off, panting like a deer in the chase. All the smiles and fascinations have gone, and in their place the weariness and sadness return to her face, and even Venturola regards her with pity, and the other dancers speak to her in low tones. She passes slowly, almost feebly, to her dressing-room, dropping the bouquet upon the floor which a frantic young man in front, with crimson face, has tossed to her. Will it comfort that frantic young man to know that an Amazon picks up the emblem of his devotion at the shrine of Terpsichore, and that she will probably convey it to her home on Archer Avenue, where it will waste its sweetness on the desert air? I would not ruthlessly turn iconoclast to his aspirations by intimating that all his bouquets have gone to Amazonian abodes on that avenue. I would let him down easily from the heights of aspiration and the stars of devotion to the depths of content and the earth of common regard. His bouquet has helped to swell the triumph, to set the seal of success. That ends its little mission. It will hardly be preserved in wax for an eternity of memory. Its delicate beauty will not long survive in the warlike abodes of the Amazons. But the ballet is over, and Undine and the good Knight, Sir Hubert, mount the triumphal car, which has just arrived from the bottom of the Rhine, and commence going to Heaven, with which ascent the men in the wilderness of ropes, up in the roof-tree, have some mysterious connection. The audience desiring a second view, the vehicle kindly pauses in its upward flight for a minute, and the curtain falls.