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ARIADNE: THE STORY OF A DREAM.
CHAPTER I.

"IT is an Ariadne; of course it is an Ariadne. A Bacchus?--pooh!" I said over and over again to myself, sitting before it in the drowsy noon, all by myself in the warm summer weather; for the porter in the hall yonder was a friend of mine, and often let me in when the place was closed to the public, knowing that I was more likely to worship the marbles than to harm them.

It was intensely still.

Outside the sun was broad and bright upon the old moss-grown terraces and steps, and not a bough was stirring in the soft gloom of drooping cedar and of spreading pine. There was one of the lattice casements open. I could see the long lush grass full of flowers, the heavy ilex shadows crossing one another, and the white shapes of the cattle asleep in that fragrance and darkness of green leaves. The birds had ceased to sing, and even the lizards were quiet in these deep mossy Faunus-haunted ways of beautiful Borghese, where Raffaelle used to wander at sunrise, coming out from his little bedchamber that he had painted so prettily with his playing gleeful Loves, and flower-hidden gods, and nymphs with their vases of roses, and the medallions of his Fornarina.

"It is an Ariadne," I said, sitting in the Cæsars' Gallery,--that long, light, most lovely chamber, with its wide grated casements open to the woodland greenness, and the gleam of the brown lily-laden waters, and the leaf-tempered glory of the golden sunlight.

Do you know the bust I mean?--the one in bronze on a | | 6 plinth of flowered alabaster, with a crown of thickly-woven ivy-leaves on its clustered hair? It is not called an Ariadne here in Villa Borghese: it is called a young Bacchus; but that is absurd. It might be Persephone or Libera, but to my thinking it is an Ariadne.

It has a likeness to her of the Capitol, only it is without her heaviness of cheek and chin, and with something of extreme youth, of faith, of hope, of inspiration, which are very beautiful and are all its own. Go you, traveler, and see it where it stands, with all the bestial, bloated, porphyry emperors around it, and the baby Hercules in his lion-skin hood in front of it, and you will see that I am right: only it is an Ariadne, mind you, before the abandonment on Naxos.

There is a Bacchus here,--nay, there are many,--but there is one in this Gallery of the Cæsars that is perhaps the most beautiful ideal of the Homeric Dionysos in the world, and it stands here, too, in this room of the Cæsars. Do not confound him with the Bacchus of the Vestibule: that is a finer statue, may-be, since more famous; but a far lower deity; indeed, no deity at all, for anything that his eyes say of soul, or that his mouth breathes of creation; but this Bacchus, younger also, is all a god,--the true Dionysos ere the Asiatic and Latin adulterations corroded the Greek conception of his person and his office. He is the incarnation of youth, beneath whose footfall all flowers of passion and of fancy arise, but youth with all the surprise of genius in it, and all its strength,--its strength, and not its weakness, for he is divine, not human; he rejoices, but he reigns. Looking at him, one knows how far sweeter it must have been to have been old when the world was young, than it is now to be young when the world is old. " You Greeks are forever boys," said the Egyptian to Solon. But now "nous vieillards nées d'hier" is the bitterest and truest epithet for us.

Then there was childhood even in the highest godhead.

Now the very children are never young.

This Bacchus and my Ariadne stand close to one another, ever near, yet never meeting, like lovers parted by irrevocable wrong.

I sat and looked at them for the hundredth time; and I thought if only the old myths could but have been kept pure they had never been bettered since Pan's pipe was broken. | | 7 One could wish Euhemerus had never been born: it was he who spoilt them first.

"It is an Ariadne,--certainly an Ariadne," I said to myself. Maryx, the great sculptor, had laughed at me for saying so, but he had gone into some other of the chambers, and had left me of the same opinion still.

The warmth was great; the stillness perfect; the air was sweet with the smell of the woods and of the cattle's breath.

I had slept but little that night, having found a fragment of a book which I thought bore marks of the press of Aldus, and sitting until near dawn over my treasure in effort to verify it with a dear and learned monk I knew. I had been still up when with the first light on the earth the nightingales ceased a little, and the thrushes and merles took up the story and began a riot of song above me in the woods on the hill of Janus.

So now I was drowsy as the day was.

Noon is the midnight of the South. Deep dreams and peace fall upon all creation. The restless lizard pauses and basks, and even that noisiest denizen of summer sunshine, the cicala, is ashamed to make such an endless self-glorification with that old rattle which he carries in his stomach, and is almost quiet in the trees, only creaking a little now and then to assure mankind that he has not forgotten them; for every cicala, like each of us, believes himself the pivot of the world.

It was all so still, so warm and yet so cool, so full of sweet smells and of balmy quietude, here in Borghese, that a sort of slumber overtook me, and yet I was conscious in it all the while, as the mind in day-sleep often is of the pleasant passage of the west wind through the opened lattice, and of the noisy chimes that were ringing in the city and only echoed faintly and softly here through all the woodland thickness of green leaves.

Through half-closed eyes I saw the open window and the iron grating, and the bronze of the ilex boughs dark almost to blackness, and the high grass wherein the cattle were lying, and the broad blue skies that Raffaelle loved; and before me I saw the white god and the ivy-crowned head of my Ariadne.

"Yes, yes, surely it is an Ariadne," I muttered to myself, for there is such pleasure in one's own opinions. "Of course an Ariadne: how can they be so blind? There is dawning womanhood in every line. But she knows nothing about Naxos."

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And as I looked she seemed to change and hear; the bronze lips parted a while, and seemed to smile and answer me, "Yes, I am Ariadne. But how do you know,--you, an old man sitting all day long at a street-corner far from all converse with the gods?"

And then a great change passed over all the bust, and a quiver and glow of life seemed to me to run through all the bronze and alabaster; the Egyptian stone of the column seemed to melt, and fold and unfold as a flower unfolds itself, and became delicate and transparent raiment through which one saw the rosy flesh and the rounded lines of a girl's limbs and body; the metal in which the sculptor had imprisoned his thoughts seemed to dissolve, and grow warm and living, and become flesh, till breast and throat and cheek and brow blushed into sudden life.

The eyes grew liquid and lustrous like lake-waters in starlight; the ivy-leaves grew green and fresh with dew; the clustered curls took brighter hues of gold and stirred as with the breeze; she grew alive and looked on all these white and silent gods.

"I am Ariadne," she said, sadly. "Yes. I knew Naxos. What woman escapes it that loves well? I am on earth once more, to my great woe. I prayed to Aidoneus to remain, lost in the dark, and with Persephone. But she said, 'Nay, go upward into light, though into pain. Wept not Achilles here, and wished to be the meanest thing that lived and labored upon earth rather than king among immortal shades? For better is it to see the sun, though toiling in the dust; and sweeter is it to be kissed on the mouth, though stabbed to the heart, than to abide in endless night and windless quiet:--go.' What did she mean? She said the gods would tell me. Tell me now. For of life I have forgotten as the dead forget. Only I forget not Naxos."

The gods were silent.

The lewd Caesars hung their heads, and dared not lift their impure glances on hers.

Her own betrayer spoke first, and smiled with a smile that was at once pitiful yet cruel. What was Naxos to him, save as a dull spot that he had left gladly, leaving the dead behind him, to pass across the summer seas in his flower-garlanded vessel?

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"Theseus and I gave you passion dear: without it you could not see the sun nor feel the knife. Be thankful to us."

Then he touched the marble floor with his thyrsus, and on its barren whiteness a purple passion-flower bloomed, and an asp ate its starry heart.

The child Hercules cast from his head downward at her feet the lion's skin.

"The strong alone know passion. Perhaps their pain is better than the peace of the feeble."

And his curved and rosy mouth grew sorrowful: he seemed to be foreseeing his own shame when he should sit and spin, and think a woman's lightest laugh of scorn more worth than smile of Zeus, or Olympus's praise.

The white cow lying sleeping beneath the ilex boughs rose from her bed in the grasses, and came and looked with lustrous weary eyes through the iron bars of the casement.

"Once men called me Io," she said, with wistful gaze. "But the gadfly in my flesh left me no peace till I sank content into the beast. It will be so with her when the purple passion-flower fades. The solitude of Naxos kills,--if not the body, then the soul."

But Apollo, hearing where he stood in all his white glory in the halls within, came with the sun's rays about his perfect head, and answered for her:

"No. Had you had ears for my songs, Io, never could you have been changed into the brute, to browse and graze. The souls my sibyls keep are strong."

Daphne--whom her lover had left alone in her agony--Daphne followed, with the boughs of the bay springing from her slender feet and from her beating bosom, and her floating hair becoming twisted leaves of bay.

"Your sibyls are too strong for mortals, and there is no wisdom I see but Love!" she cried, in her torment. "Gods and men begrudge us the laurel, but when the laurel grows from the breast of a woman,--ah, heaven! it hurts!"

Apollo smiled.

"Of Love you would have nothing. Your wisdom comes too late. Is the bay bitter? That is not my fault."

Artemis came and looked,--she who ever slew the too audacious or too forgetful mortal with her slender and unerring shaft.

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"My sister Persephone has been more cruel than I," she said, with a smile. "Does she send you back to your isles of Dia again? And where was your father in that darksome world where he judges, that he lets you come hither to brave me once more? Oh, fair fool of too much love and too much wisdom! Why have lifted the sword? Why have found the clue? The gods ever punish the mortal too daring and too excelling."

"Eros is more cruel than you or Persephone, O my sovereign of the Silver Bow!" said Dionysos, and smiled. He knew, had he not betrayed, not even the sacred Huntress could have slain her.

Anacreon and Alcæus came from the central chambers and stood by: they had become immortals also.

They murmured low one to another,--

"When gods and men speak of Love, they wrong him: it is seldom he that reigns: it is only Philotès, who takes his likeness."

Among the deities from the upper chamber a mortal came,--the light lewd woman who had bared her charms to live forever here in marble, in counterfeit of the Venus Pandemos.

"There is no Naxos for women who love Love and not one lover," she said, with a wanton laugh. "Gods and men alike are faithful only to the faithless. She who worships the beauty of her own body and its joys is strong; she only: Aphrodite, who made me, taught me that."

Bacchus touched her in reproof, and the imperial harlot fled.

"Aphrodite's bond is hard," he said. "My sister Helen knew: serving her once, she served forever; and day and night she drank Lethe, and drank in vain."

The Roman woman lying in a farther chamber on her marble bier, with the poppy-flowers of eternal sleep in her folded hands, glided as a shade glides from the asphodel meadows of the dead.

"If not the temple of Lubentina,--then Death," she said. "There is no middle path between the two. Return to Orcus and Dis-Pater."

And she held out to Ariadne the poppies red as war, which yet are symbols of the sole sure Peace.

But Psyche playing with Eros in a niche where the motes | | 11 of the sun were dancing to the sound of a satyr's syrinx flew in on her rosy wings that are like the leaves of a pomegranate-blossom, and caught the butterfly that always hovers above her own head and would have given with it immortal life.

But Love coming after her, the dancing sunbeams in his curls stayed her hand.

"Nay; if this be Ariadne, she knows full well if I abide not with her she needs death, not life."

"Then stay," said Ariadne's traitor, with his sweet and cruel smile.

Love shook his head and sighed.

"You and men after you have forbidden me rest. The passion-flower blossoms but a single day and night, and I can lie no longer in one breast."

Anacreon said,--

"Of old you had no wings, Eros. You were worthier of worship then."

Alcæus said,--

"The laurel grew even as a high wall betwixt me and Sappho, but it was no fence betwixt her and the grave in the sea."

Love laughed, for he is often cruel.

"I am stronger than all the gods, for, even being dead, you cannot forget me. Anacreon, all your songs were as the dumb beside one murmur of mine. Alcæus, all your verses and all your valor could not save you from one death-blow that I dealt."

Anacreon and Alcæus were silent.

They knew that Love was stronger than men, fiercer than flame, and as the waves and the winds faithless.

Ariadne stood silent and irresolute, the purple passion-flower lifted to her bosom, and at her feet the strong and bitter laurel, and the poppies that give death. Her hand hovered now over one, now over the other, like a poised bird that doubts between the east and west.

Love chose for her, and lifted up the red flower of death.

"Be wise. When I shall leave you, eat of this and sleep."

I awoke. It had been but a dream: there were no gods near; only statues that gleamed in a faint whiteness in the | | 12 dark, for the people of the place had come in to close the casements, and were shutting out the golden sun.

My Ariadne was but bronze once more. Io was lying in the grass without. Psyche and Love and all were gone. Bacchus still, only, seemed to smile.

My friend the sculptor was coming in to the gallery from his study of the frieze of the Labors of Hercules.

"Still before your Ariadne? And it is not an Ariadne," said Maryx. "And if it be, who cares for her? The true Ariadne is in the Capitol. Let us go home: it is too warm, and I am tired. I was at work at four this morning, whilst my nightingales still were singing. Come and have your noonday wine with me."

We went away out of the emperors' room into the dusky dreamful glades, where all artists love to wander and think of Raffaelle coming out through the morning dews, under the everlasting oaks.

"One is always glad to come here," said Maryx; "no habit dulls the charm of these old gardens: and no length of time dulls one's regret for Raffaelle's pavilion,--destroyed in our own generation, yet we speak evil of the Huns and Visigoths, and revile the Greeks for casting down the statues of the Mausoleum! These woods must have suited Raffaelle so well; I dare say his dear violinist played to him here of a spring-day morning, where the violets grew thickest. It is a pity there was no better nymph for him than the Fornarina: those little, hard, leering, cunning eyes of hers never could have cared for the violets, or for anything except the bracelets on her arms and the ducats in her purse. Are you dreaming of your Ariadne still? It is not of much value, and it is no Ariadne. I went by chance into the room of the Pauline Venus: my mouth will taste bitter all day. How venal and gaudy and vile she is, with her gilded upholstery! It is the most hateful thing that ever wasted marble. It is not even sensual; for sensuality may have its force to burn, its imagery to madden; but Canova's Venus says nothing,--unless, indeed, it says what fools men are, and what artificial wantons they have cared for ever since the Roman matrons bought false hair and paint in the Sacred Way. How one loves Canova the man, and how one execrates Canova the artist! Surely never was a great repute achieved by so false a talent and so perfect a character! | | 13 One would think he had been born and bred in Versailles instead of Treviso. He is called a naturalist! Look at his Graces! He is always Coysevox and Coustou at heart,--never purely classic, never frankly modern. Louis XIV. would have loved him better than Bernini."

We went out of the gates into the broad blaze of light; then away across the white piazza, where scarce a soul was stirring, and there was not a sound save of the rushing of the water from the lions' mouths at the base of the sun-pillar of Heliopolis, that was rising like a sword of flame against the dazzling radiance of the air.

I loved and honored Maryx; he was a great man, and good, and lived the life of the men of old, where his nightingales sang under his studio windows, among his myrtles and his marbles, on the side of the Sabine hill.

But I refused to go on across the water and make my noonday meal with him; I was too full of dreams, and stupid still with sleep. I let him go home alone, and stopped at my own place by the corner of the street that leads to the bridge of Sextus, where the water gushes from the wall in the fountain that Fontana made for Pope Paul.