On the edge of the water, overhanging a harbor, rises the castle of some erstwhile pasha. This castle is round, copper-colored, classic in design, beautifully situated. The blue water reflects its pale image, and we often slow down for the mere pleasure of admiring it. Victor Hugo would have loved this stronghold, whence pirates used to surge forth, and the village where the booty was brought together; his lines would have celebrated the pasha-corsair, the beauty of his odalisks, and the romance of their jeweled retreat. These lovely walls, however, conceal tragedies of Islam. They brood over the sea paths, and their silence is that of a beaten vulture. I prefer to forget that sinister grandeur. I prefer this empty silhouette, artistically placed here in a happy setting for the brief delectation of a few passing sailors. These are empty pleasures, perhaps, but we have no others. Perfect hours await us at sea, off Corfu, Paxo and Cephalonia. When the twilight unfolds its pageant of air and light, we get a sense of joy and confidence that sustains us in our exile. The sun sinks in a procession of purple clouds, shading away to a faint heliotrope in the sky overhead. From mid-heaven hang sheafs of eglantine and geranium, beneath which blossom red carnations, tulips and poppies. The sun feeds all this floral fire. Under the iridescent play of color the sea has disappeared. Its liquid surface has merged with the luminous air, and the cruiser, rose-colored, moves through myriad rainbows. Everything about the suspended ship is changed to silence and fantasy. The shadows of twilight succeed the colors that glow and disappear. Air and sun create marvels that are not of our world. The light falls on us like a blessing which penetrates our hearts and thoughts with an inexpressible ecstasy. At last the sun rests on the horizon, which slowly swallows it. Our sad thoughts are drawn toward the West, towards France. For some of us that sun is gilding the faces of loved ones and caressing the windows of our homes; for others it is glimmering in the tearful eyes of a sweetheart. From our lips, like a messenger of feelings that cannot be written, its beams carry our kisses to lay on other lips.... But it also sweeps over fields bathed in the pure blood of our soldiers--and the thoughts of these “vagabonds” it bears onward toward their spoil. Certain evenings, while the glorious sun is thus bearing away our dreams, the moon, languorous and discolored, rises laboriously over the Ionian Isles, and offers us her pale rays. But we do not look at her. For her sickly light, her capricious form, her pilgrimage among the shadows--all serve to remind us too painfully of the obscurity of our own labor, the uncertainty of our thoughts and the memory which our work will leave behind us to the ages. _Strait of Otranto, 18 October._