“He played--in view of the festive occasion--a joyous melody. And, as he played, the air seemed full of sunlight, and the smell of wine vats and the hum of bees round ripe fruit. The guests could not keep still in their places, and at last the Count gave orders for a general dance. The hall was cleared, and soon all the guests were breathlessly dancing to the divine lilt of the fiddler’s melody. All except Elisinde who, when her betrothed came forward to lead her to the dance, pleaded fatigue, and remained seated in her chair, pale and distraught, and staring at the fiddler. This did not, to tell the truth, displease her betrothed, who was a clumsy dancer and had no ear for music. Breathless at last with exhaustion the guests begged the untiring fiddler to pause while they rested for a moment to get their breath. “And while they were resting the fiddler played another tune. This time it was a sad tune: a low, soft tune, liquid and lovely as a human voice. A great hush came on the company. It seemed as if after the heat and splendour of a summer’s day the calm of evening had fallen; the quiet of the dusk, when the moon rises in the sky, still faintly yellow in the west with the ebb of sunset, and pours on the stiff cornfields its cool, silvery frost; and the trees quiver, as though they felt the freshness and were relieved, and a breeze comes, almost imperceptible and not strong enough to shake the boughs, from the sea; and a bird, hidden somewhere in the leaves, sings a throbbing song. “Everyone was spellbound, but none so much as Elisinde. The music seemed to be speaking straight to her, to pierce the very core of her heart. It was an inarticulate language which she understood better than any words. She heard a lonely spirit crying out to her, that it understood her sorrow and shared her pain. And large tears poured down her cheeks. “The fiddler stopped playing, and for a moment or two no one spoke. At last Elisinde’s betrothed gave a great yawn, and the spell was broken. “‘You play very well--very well, indeed,’ said the Count. “‘But that sad music is, I think, rather out of place to-day,’ said the Countess. “‘Yes, let us have another cheerful tune,’ said the Count. “The fiddler struck up once more and played another dance. This time there was an almost elfish magic in his melody. It took you captive; it was irresistible; it called and commanded and compelled; you longed to follow, follow, anywhere, over the hills, over the sea, to the end of the world.