The winds disperse before me, the forests fall away and become a wide track with corpses here and there. The travellers meet with too many corpses for some time, with garrulous corpses. THE RED-HAIRED MONK I don't want to work any more, I want to dream and pray. He sleeps, his face turned to the sky, on the road bordered with willows of the color of mist. The night had come with the moonlight. Croniamantal saw the monks bent over the nonchalant bodies of their brothers. Then he heard a little plaint, a feeble cry that died in a last sigh. And slowly they passed in Indian file before Croniamantal, who was hidden behind a clump of willows. THE GLORIDE FOREST I should love to send this man astray amid the spectres that float among the bubbles. But he flees toward the times that come, and whither he is already arrived. The banging of distant doors changes into the sound of trains in motion. A large, grassy track, barred by trunks and fenced with enormous joined stones. Life commits suicide. A path that people follow. They never tire. Subways where the air is poisoned. Corpses. Voices call Croniamantal. He runs, he runs, he descends. * * * In the lovely woods, Tristouse promenaded meditating. TRISTOUSE My heart is sad without thee, Croniamantal. I loved thee without knowing it. All is green. All is green above my head and beneath my feet. I have lost him whom I loved. I must search this way and that way, here and yonder. And among them all I shall surely find someone who will please me. Returned from other times, Croniamantal cried out at sight of Tristouse and the fountain again: CRONIAMANTAL Goddess! who art thou? Where is thine eternal form? TRISTOUSE Oh, there he is again, handsomer than ever... Listen, o poet. I belong to thee, henceforth. Without looking at Tristouse, Croniamantal bent over the pool. CRONIAMANTAL I love fountains, they are beautiful symbols of immortality when they never run dry. This one has never run dry. And I seek a divinity, but I desire her to appear eternal to me. And my fountain has never run dry. He knelt and prayed to the fountain, while Tristouse, all in tears, lamented. O poet, adorest thou the fountain? O Lord, return my lover to me! Come to me! I know such lovely songs. CRONIAMANTAL The fountain hath its murmur. TRISTOUSE Very well, then! Sleep with thy cold lover, let her drown thee! But if thou livest, thou belongest to me and thou shalt obey me. She was gone, and throughout the forest of twittering birds, the fountain flowed and murmured, while there arose the voice of Croniamantal who wept and whose tears mingled with the worshipped flood. CRONIAMANTAL