A Sicilian Romance

Towards the close of day Madame de Menon arrived at a small village

situated among the mountains, where she purposed to pass the night.

The evening was remarkably fine, and the romantic beauty of the

surrounding scenery invited her to walk. She followed the windings of

a stream, which was lost at some distance amongst luxuriant groves of

chesnut. The rich colouring of evening glowed through the dark

foliage, which spreading a pensive gloom around, offered a scene

congenial to the present temper of her mind, and she entered the

shades.

Her thoughts, affected by the surrounding objects, gradually

sunk into a pleasing and complacent melancholy, and she was insensibly

led on. She still followed the course of the stream to where the deep

shades retired, and the scene again opening to day, yielded to her a

view so various and sublime, that she paused in thrilling and

delightful wonder. A group of wild and grotesque rocks rose in a

semicircular form, and their fantastic shapes exhibited Nature in her

most sublime and striking attitudes. Here her vast magnificence

elevated the mind of the beholder to enthusiasm. Fancy caught the

thrilling sensation, and at her touch the towering steeps became

shaded with unreal glooms; the caves more darkly frowned--the

projecting cliffs assumed a more terrific aspect, and the wild

overhanging shrubs waved to the gale in deeper murmurs. The scene

inspired madame with reverential awe, and her thoughts involuntarily

rose, 'from Nature up to Nature's God.' The last dying gleams of day

tinted the rocks and shone upon the waters, which retired through a

rugged channel and were lost afar among the receding cliffs. While she

listened to their distant murmur, a voice of liquid and melodious

sweetness arose from among the rocks; it sung an air, whose melancholy

expression awakened all her attention, and captivated her heart. The

tones swelled and died faintly away among the clear, yet languishing

echoes which the rocks repeated with an effect like that of

enchantment.

Madame looked around in search of the sweet warbler, and

observed at some distance a peasant girl seated on a small projection

of the rock, overshadowed by drooping sycamores. She moved slowly

towards the spot, which she had almost reached, when the sound of her

steps startled and silenced the syren, who, on perceiving a stranger,

arose in an attitude to depart. The voice of madame arrested her, and

she approached. Language cannot paint the sensation of madame, when in

the disguise of a peasant girl, she distinguished the features of

Julia, whose eyes lighted up with sudden recollection, and who sunk

into her arms overcome with joy. When their first emotions were

subsided, and Julia had received answers to her enquiries concerning

Ferdinand and Emilia, she led madame to the place of her concealment.

This was a solitary cottage, in a close valley surrounded by

mountains, whose cliffs appeared wholly inaccessible to mortal foot.