"the Pontic sea, Whose icy current and compulsive course Ne'er feels retiring ebb, but keeps due on." The _Scherzo_, with its beautiful octave run for the piano and delicious change of harmony in the next measure,--the weird melody sketched out by the first violin, and then yielded up to the piano,--and the strange, but truly inspired, modulations which follow,--lapped my spirit in a sweet bewilderment. I forgot all the before and after of that "sad and incapable story" of human life and love which my fancy had been weaving from the coarse, vulgar threads of common rumor; and even the pictures vanished which had been evoked of the young prince, "In his blown youth blasted with ecstasy." I ceased following the modulations, interesting as they were; for often music fills the thoughts so full that the ear forgets to listen to the sweet harmonies. But I was again aroused by the fine suspension and sequence which open the last movement of the Quintette,--the _Allegro ma non troppo_. The fugued passage, the reiteration of the opening theme, and the sad close were all as tragic as the last scene in "Hamlet," the "quarry that cries on, Havoc!"-- but it was also as graceful and touching as the words of the dying prince to his friend,-- "Horatio, I am dead: Thou liv'st. Report me and my cause aright To the unsatisfied." A thousand rumors flitted about the room as the concert broke up. Madame C---- was so ill, they feared she was dying; and, strange to say, the tenor, on leaving the platform after the Lucia finale, had been seized with violent cramps and vomitings, which could not be checked, and he also was lying in a very critical state. There were dark hints and many improbable imaginings. "All was not well, they deemed; Some knew perchance, And some besides were too discreetly wise To more than hint their knowledge in surmise." About an hour after midnight I was lying on the lounge in the anteroom of the cottage. The faithful maid had taken my place by the sick-bed,--for my invalid was still sleeping. It was a long, quiet sleep; and so low and peaceful had grown those suffering, panting breaths, that they almost startled me into a hope of happier days. Could health, long absent, be returning? A state of continuous illness, if free from acute pain, would be a relief. These half-formed hopes made me restless, and, instead of taking the physical repose I needed, I rose from the lounge, and walked out on the deserted lawn in front of the cottage. The moon was at the full, and shone brighter than day's twilight. The night was warm, but not oppressive,--for there was a gentle air blowing, filled with the invigorating briny odor of the ocean; yet I felt choked and stifled. "Just for a breath from the beach," I said to myself, as I descended the steps leading down from the cliff.