They sit on a stone seat. The little man in the green coat of a colonel of Chasseurs, and the lady, beautiful as a satin seedpod, and as pale. The house has memories. The satin seedpod holds his germs of Empire. We will stay here, under the blue sky and the turreted white clouds. She draws him; he feels her faded loveliness urge him to replenish it. Her soft transparent texture woos his nervous fingering. He speaks to her of debts, of resignation; of her children, and his; he promises that she shall see the King of Rome; he says some harsh things and some pleasant. But she is there, close to him, rose toned to amber, white shot with violet, pungent to his nostrils as embalmed rose-leaves in a twilit room. Suddenly the Emperor calls his carriage and rolls away across the looping Seine. VI Crystal-blue brightness over the glass-houses. Crystal-blue streaks and ripples over the lake. A macaw on a gilded perch screams; they have forgotten to take out his dinner. The windows shake. Boom! Boom! It is the rumbling of Prussian cannon beyond Pecq. Roses bloom at Malmaison. Roses! Roses! Swimming above their leaves, rotting beneath them. Fallen flowers strew the unraked walks. Fallen flowers for a fallen Emperor! The General in charge of him draws back and watches. Snatches of music—snarling, sneering music of bagpipes. They say a Scotch regiment is besieging St. Denis. The Emperor wipes his face, or is it his eyes? His tired eyes which see nowhere the grace they long for. Josephine! Somebody asks him a question, he does not answer, somebody else does that. There are voices, but one voice he does not hear, and yet he hears it all the time. Josephine! The Emperor puts up his hand to screen his face. The white light of a bright cloud spears sharply through the linden trees. “Vive l’Empereur!” There are troops passing beyond the wall, troops which sing and call. Boom! A pink rose is jarred off its stem and falls at the Emperor’s feet. “Very well. I go.” Where! Does it matter? There is no sword to clatter. Nothing but soft brushing gravel and a gate which shuts with a click. “Quick, fellow, don’t spare your horses.” A whip cracks, wheels turn, why burn one’s eyes following a fleck of dust. VII Over the slate roof tall clouds, like ships of the line, pass along the sky. The glass-houses glitter splotchily, for many of their lights are broken. Roses bloom, fiery cinders quenching under damp weeds. Wreckage and misery, and a trailing of petty deeds smearing over old recollections. The musty rooms are empty and their shutters are closed, only in the gallery there is a stuffed black swan, covered with dust. When you touch it the feathers come off and float softly to the ground. Through a chink in the shutters one can see the stately clouds crossing the sky toward the Roman arches of the Marley Aqueduct. The Philosopher