“Hum--yes--pretty enough,” he grudgingly acknowledged. “But even so?” the ingrate added, as he turned away, and let himself drop back into his lounging-chair. “My dear good woman, no amount of prettiness can disguise the fundamental banality of things. Your fireflies--St. Dominic's beads, if you like--and, apropos of that, do you know what they call them in America?--they call them lightning-bugs, if you can believe me--remark the difference between southern euphuism and western bluntness--your fireflies are pretty enough, I grant. But they are tinsel pasted on the Desert of Sahara. They are condiments added to a dinner of dust and ashes. Life, trick it out as you will, is just an incubus--is just the Old Man of the Sea. Language fails me to convey to you any notion how heavily he sits on my poor shoulders. I thought I had suffered from ennui in my youth. But the malady merely plays with the green fruit; it reserves its serious ravages for the ripe. I can promise you 't is not a laughing matter. Have you ever had a fixed idea? Have you ever spent days and nights racking your brain, importuning the unanswering Powers, to learn whether there was--well, whether there was Another Man, for instance? Oh, bring me drink. Bring me Seltzer water and Vermouth. I will seek nepenthe at the bottom of the wine-cup.” Was there another man? Why should there not be? And yet was there? In her continued absence, the question came back persistently, and scarcely contributed to his peace of mind. A few days later, nothing discouraged, “Would you like to have a good laugh, Signorino?” Marietta enquired. “Yes,” he answered, apathetic. “Then do me the favour to come,” she said. She led him out of his garden, to the gate of a neighbouring meadow. A beautiful black-horned white cow stood there, her head over the bars, looking up and down the road, and now and then uttering a low distressful “moo.” “See her,” said Marietta. “I see her. Well--?” said Peter. “This morning they took her calf from her--to wean it,” said Marietta. “Did they, the cruel things? Well--?” said he. “And ever since, she has stood there by the gate, looking down the road, waiting, calling.” “The poor dear. Well--?” said he. “But do you not see, Signorino? Look at her eyes. She is weeping--weeping like a Christian.” Peter looked-and, sure enough, from the poor cow's eyes tears were falling, steadily, rapidly: big limpid tears that trickled down her cheek, her great homely hairy cheek, and dropped on the grass: tears of helpless pain, uncomprehending endurance. “Why have they done this thing to me?” they seemed dumbly to cry. “Have you ever seen a cow weep before? Is it comical, at least?” demanded Marietta, exultant. “Comical--?” Peter gasped. “Comical--!” he groaned.... But then he spoke to the cow. “Poor dear--poor dear,” he repeated. He patted her soft warm neck, and scratched her between the horns and along the dewlap. “Poor dear--poor dear.”