chinks of the marble; while from the mouth of the lion, whence formerly the water-jets had spurted, a huge crimson clove now shot out so vigorously that the decrepit beast seemed to be spouting blood.  Near by, the principal piece of ornamental water, a lake, on whose surface swans had glided, had now become a thicket of lilacs, beneath whose shade stocks and verbenas and day-lilies screened their delicate tints, and dozed away, all redolent of perfume.

‘But we haven’t seen half the flowers yet,’ said Albine, proudly.  ’Over yonder there are such huge ones that I can quite bury myself amongst them like a partridge in a corn-field.’

They went thither.  They tripped down some broad steps, from whose fallen urns still flickered the violet fires of the iris.  All down the steps streamed gilliflowers, like liquid gold.  The sides were flanked with thistles, that shot up like candelabra, of green bronze, twisted and curved into the semblance of birds’ heads, with all the fantastic elegance of Chinese incense-burners.  Between the broken balustrades drooped tresses of stonecrop, light greenish locks, spotted as with mouldiness.  Then at the foot of the steps another parterre spread out, dotted over with box-trees that were vigorous as oaks; box-trees which had once been carefully pruned and clipped into balls and pyramids and octagonal columns, but which were now revelling in unrestrained freedom of untidiness, breaking out into ragged masses of greenery, through which blue patches of sky were visible.

And Albine led Serge straight on to a spot that seemed to be the graveyard of the flower-garden.  There the scabious mourned, and processions of poppies stretched out in line, with deathly odour, unfolding heavy blooms of feverish brilliance.  Sad anemones clustered in weary throngs, pallid as if infected by some epidemic.  Thick-set daturas spread out purplish horns, from which insects, weary of life, sucked fatal poison.  Marigolds buried with choking foliage their writhing starry flowers, that already reeked of putrefaction.  And there were other melancholy flowers also:  fleshy ranunculi with rusty tints, hyacinths and tuberoses that exhaled asphyxia and died from their own perfume.  But the cinerarias were most conspicuous, crowding thickly in half-mourning robes of violet and white.  In the middle of this gloomy spot a mutilated marble Cupid still remained standing, smiling beneath the lichens which overspread his youthful nakedness, while the arm with which he had once held his bow lay low amongst the nettles.

Then Albine and Serge passed on through a rank growth of peonies, reaching to their waists.  The white flowers fell to pieces as they passed, with a rain of snowy petals which was as refreshing to their hands as the heavy drops of a thunder shower.  And the red ones grinned with apoplectical faces which perturbed them.  Next they passed through a field of fuchsias, forming dense, vigorous shrubs that delighted them