Accordingly, I Started
For The Station In A Spirit Which, For A Tourist Who
Sometimes Had Prided Himself On His Unfailing Supply
Of Sentiment, Was Shockingly Perfunctory.
"For tasks in hours of insight willed
May be in hours of gloom fulfilled."
I remembered these lines of Matthew Arnold (written,
apparently, in an hour of gloom), and carried out the
idea, as I went, by hoping that with the return of in-
sight I should be glad to have seen Vaucluse. Light
has descended upon me since then, and I declare that
the excursion is in every way to be recommended.
The place makes a great impression, quite apart from
Petrarch and Laura.
There was no rain; there was only, all the after-
noon, a mild, moist wind, and a sky magnificently
black, which made a _repoussoir_ for the paler cliffs of
the fountain. The road, by train, crosses a flat, ex-
pressionless country, toward the range of arid hills
which lie to the east of Avignon, and which spring
(says Murray) from the mass of the Mont-Ventoux. At
Isle-sur-Sorgues, at the end of about an hour, the fore-
ground becomes much more animated and the distance
much more (or perhaps I should say much less) actual.
I descended from the train, and ascended to the top
of an omnibus which was to convey me into the re-
cesses of the hills. It had not been among my pre-
visions that I should be indebted to a vehicle of that
kind for an opportunity to commune with the spirit of
Petrarch; and I had to borrow what consolation I
could from the fact that at least I had the omnibus to
myself.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 244 of 276
Words from 66780 to 67063
of 75796
