Louis Lambert — Honoré de Balzac, trans. Katharine Prescott Wormeley

‘Go from me!’ cried Seraphitus; ‘‘I can give nothing that you want. Your love is too gross for me. Why do you not love Wilfrid? Wilfrid is a man, a man tested by passion, who will clasp you in his sinewy arms, and make you feel his broad, strong hand. He has fine black hair, eyes full of human feeling, a heart that fires the words of his lips with a lava torrent. He will crush you with caresses. He will be your lover, your husband. Go to Wilfrid!”

Minna was crying bitterly.

‘‘Dare you tell me that you do not love him?’’ he added in a voice that pierced her like a dagger.

‘*Merey! Mercy! My Seraphitus!’’

‘Love him, poor child of earth, to which fate irrevocably said the terrible Seraphitus, seizing the girl with such force as dragged her to the brink of the seter, rivets you,”’

whence the prospect was so extensive that a young creature full of enthusiasm might easily fancy that she was above the world. ‘‘I wanted a companion to go with me to the realm of light; I thought to show her this ball of clay, and T find you still cling to it. Adieu! Remain as you are, enjoy through your senses, obey your nature; turn pale with pale men, blush with women, play with children, pray with sinners, look up ‘to heaven when you are stricken; tremble, hope, yearn; you will have a comrade, you still may laugh and weep, give and receive.—For me—I am an exile far from heaven; like a monster, far from earth! My heart beats for none; I live in myself, for myself alone. I feel through my spirit, I breathe by my brain, I see by my mind, I am dying of impatience and longing. No one herep. 30 below can satisfy my wishes or soothe my eagerness; and I have forgotten how to weep. Iam alone.—I am resigned, and can wait.”’

Seraphitus looked at the flowery knoll on which he had placed Minna, and then turned toward the frowning summits, round whose peaks heavy clouds had gathered, into which he seemed to fling his next thoughts.

“Do you-hear that delightful music, Minna?’’ said he, in his dovelike tones, for the eagle had ended his ery. ‘‘Might one not fancy that it was the harmony of those Kolian harps which poets imagine in the midst of forests and mountains? Do you see the shadowy forms moving _ among those clouds? Do you discern the winged feet of those who deck the sky with such hangings? Those sounds refresh the soul; Heaven will erelong shed the blossoms of spring, a flash blazes up from the Pole. Let us fly—it is time!’’

In an instant they had replaced their snow-shoes and were descending the Falberg by the steep slopes down to the valley of the Sieg. Some miraculous intelligence guided their steps—or rather their flight. When a crevasse covered with snow lay before them, Seraphitus seized Minna, and with a swift rush dashed, scarce the weight of a bird, across the frail bridge that covered a chasm. Many a time, by just pushing his companion, he deviated slightly to avoid a cliff or tree, a block of stone which he seemed to see through the snow, as certain mariners, accustomed to the sea, discern a shoal by the color, the eddy, and the recoil of the water.

When they had reached the roads of the Siegdahl, and they could proceed without hesitation in a straight line down to the ice on the fiord, Seraphitus spoke.

p. 81

“You have nothing more to say to me?’’ he asked
Minna.

‘“T fancied,’’ replied the girl respectfully, ‘‘that you wished to think in silence.”’