ALLADINE.

How long have we been here?

PALOMIDES.

I have no idea....  I made no effort till I heard thee speak....

ALLADINE.

I do not know how this took place.  I was asleep in the room where thou didst find me; and when I waked, my eyes were bound across, and both my hands were pinioned in my girdle....

PALOMIDES.

I too was sleeping.  I heard nothing, and I had a band across my eyes ere I could open them.  I struggled in the darkness; but they were stronger than I....  I must have passed under deep vaults, for I felt the cold fall on my shoulders; and I went down so far I could not count the steps....  Did no one speak to thee?

ALLADINE.

No; no one spoke.  I heard some one weeping as he walked; and then I fainted....

PALOMIDES (kissing her).

Alladine!

ALLADINE.

How gravely thou dost kiss me!...

PALOMIDES.

Close not thine eyes when I do kiss thee so....  I would see the kisses trembling in thy heart, and all the dew that rises in thy soul....  We shall not find such kisses any more....

ALLADINE.

Always, always!

PALOMIDES.

No, no; there is no kissing twice upon the heart of death....  How fair thou art so!...  It is the first time I have seen thee near....  It is strange, we think that we have seen each other because we have gone by two steps apart; but everything changes the moment the lips touch....  There, thou must be let to have thy will....  I stretch my arms wide to admire thee, as if thou wert no longer mine; and then I draw them nearer till I touch thy kisses and perceive only eternal bliss....  There needed us this supernatural light!... [He kisses her again.] Ah!  What hast thou done?  Take care! we are upon a crest of rock that overhangs the water that gives us light.  Do not step back.  It was time....  Do not turn too abruptly.  I was dazzled....

ALLADINE.

[Turning and looking at the blue water that illuminates them.] Oh!...

PALOMIDES.

It is as if the sky had flowed hither....

ALLADINE.

It is full of moveless flowers....

PALOMIDES.

It is full of moveless flowers and strange....  Hast thou seen the largest there that blooms beneath the others?  It seems to live a cadenced life....  And the water ...  Is it water?...  It seems more beautiful, more pure, more blue than all the water in the world....

ALLADINE.

I dare not look upon it longer....

PALOMIDES.

See how about us all is luminous....  The light dares hesitate no longer, and we kiss each other in the vestibules of heaven....  Seest thou the precious stones that gem the vaults, drunken with life, that seem to smile on us; and the thousands and thousands of glowing blue roses that climb along the pillars?...