Page:A Picture-book without Pictures and Other Stories (1848).djvu/153

 it, you poets! The evening is beautiful; the stars twinkle. There is a girl lovely enough for sculpture, in the public-house at Cisterna; look at her, you poets! And sing about the fire-lily of the marshes!

The Post-horses.—Now do go a little cautiously! not galloping in that way! There is a carriage driving before us, which we are not to pass on the road. Did not you yourself hear that there are German ladies in that carriage, who have no gentlemen with them, and they have, therefore, besought us that they may travel in company with us because they are afraid of banditti! It is not safe here! A year and a day ago we heard the balls hissing past us at this spot.

Pegasus.—The rain falls in torrents! Everything around us stands in water. The huts of reeds seem as if they were about to swim away from the green inundated island. Let us tear away! The road is even. There lies a splendid monastery, but the monks are all gone; the fogs of the marshes have driven