After the scorching pavement of Paris, after the eager struggling of the day and the degrading spectacles of the night, how reposeful was that far-spreading silence, that faint bluish radiance, that endless unrolling of plains, steeped in refreshing gloom and dreaming of fructification by the morrow's sun!

There came a series of sounds at the pavilion entrance, where a litter was set down on marble pavement and a eunuch's shrill voice criticized the slow unrolling of a carpet.

But not alone dost thou unroll The mountains, fields, and seas, A mighty, wonder-painted scroll, Like the Patmos mysteries; Thou mediator 'twixt my soul And higher things than these.