E-text prepared by Bryan Ness, C. St. Charleskindt,
and the
Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
()
The scene of this fantasy is an island, hitherto inhabited byLutherans, in a remote but temperate province of Northern Europe.The persons are the Gods of Ancient Greece. The time is early inthe Twentieth Century.
[A terrace high above the sea, which is seen far below, throughvast masses of woodland. Steps lead down towards the water, fromthe centre of the scene. To the left, a large, low country-house,of unpretentious character, in the style of the late eighteenthcentury. Gardens belonging to the same period, and now somewhatneglected and overgrown, stretch on either side. The edge of theterrace is marked by a stone balustrade, with a stone seat runninground it within. At the top of steps, ascending, appear Aphroditeand Eros.]
Aphrodite.
A moment, Eros. Let us sit here. What can this flutter at my girdlebe? I[Pg 4]breathe with difficulty. Oh! Eros, can this be death?
Eros.
Death? Ah! no; you have roses in your cheeks, mother. Your lips arelike blood.
Aphrodite.
It must be weariness. Ever these new sensations, these odd,exciting apprehensions! This must be mortality. I never breathedthe faster as I rose from terrace to terrace in Cythera.
Eros.
Yet this is like Cythera—a little like it. [Looking round.] Itis not the least like it. These round billowy woods, that greystrip of sea far below, the long smooth land with square yellowfields and pointed brown fields, and the wild grey[Pg 5]sky above. No;it would be impossible for anything to be less like Cythera.
Aphrodite.
Yet it is like it. [Gazing round.] How strange ... to be whereeverything is not azure and gold and white—white land, gold housesand blue sky and sea. What are these woods, Eros?
Eros.
Are they beech-woods?
Aphrodite.
I did not think that I could ever be happy again. I am not happy.But I am not miserable. Now that my heart is quiet again, I am notmiserable. Oh! that sick tossing on the black sea, the nausea, theaching, the dulness; that I, who sprang from the waves, could come to[Pg 6]hate them so. We will neve