“It’s not _a_ couple, but _the_ couple,” said he; “and after all, in spite of cheap jesting, there are some things more eloquent than speech.” For at this instant, finding themselves alone upon the jetty, the young man had taken the girl into his arms, and she had lifted a frank responsive mouth to return his kiss. Five minutes later the sea had faded into dull greys and sober browns, starved white clouds moved dispiritedly over a vacant sky, and by cricking the back of my neck I was able to follow Toumes’ black coat and the white frock of Miss Elsie until they reached Poidevin’s wine-vaults, and, turning up the Water-gate, were lost to view. Fleurs de Feu By José Maria de Hérédia of the French Academy BIEN des siècles depuis les siècles du Chaos, La flamme par torrents jaillit de ce cratère Et le panache igné du volcan solitaire Flamba encore plus haut que les Chimborazos. Nul bruit n’éveille plus la cime sans échos. Où la cendre pleuvait l’oiseau se désaltère; Le sol est immobile, et le sang de la Terre La lave, en se figeant, lui laissa le repos. Pourtant, suprême effort de l’antique incendie, A l’orle de la gueule à jamais refroidie, Éclatant a travers les rocs pulvérisés. Comme un coup de tonnerre au milieu du silence, Dans le poudroîement d’or du pollen qu’elle lance, S’épanouit la fleur des cactus embrasés. Flowers of Fire A Translation, by Ellen M. Clerke FOR ages since the age of Chaos passed, Flame shot in torrents from this crater pyre, And the red plume of the volcano’s ire Higher than Chimborazo’s crown was cast. No sound awakes the summit, voiceless, vast, The bird now sips where rained the ashes dire, The soil is moveless, and Earth’s blood on fire, The lava--hardening--gives it peace at last. But, crowning effort of the fires of old, Close by the gaping jaws, for ever cold, Gleaming ’mid rocks that crumble in the gloom, As with a thunderclap in hush profound, ’Mid golden dust of pollen hurled around, The burning cactus blazes into bloom. When I am King By Henry Harland “_Qu’y faire, mon Dieu, qu’y faire?_” I HAD wandered into a tangle of slummy streets, and began to think it time to inquire my way back to the hotel; then, turning a corner, I came out upon the quays. At one hand there was the open night, with the dim forms of many ships, and stars hanging in a web of masts and cordage; at the other, the garish illumination of a row of public-houses: _Au Bonheur du Matelot_, _Café de la Marine_, _Brasserie des Quatre Vents_, and so forth; rowdy-looking shops enough, designed for the entertainment of the forecastle. But they seemed to promise something in the nature of local colour; and I entered the _Brasserie des Quatre Vents_.