Page:The poems of Emma Lazarus volume 1.djvu/48

34 zest of enjoyment, that pure desire and delight of the eyes, which are the prerogative of the poet,—and Emma Lazarus was a poet. The beauty of the world,—what a rapture and intoxication it is, and how it bursts upon her in the very land of beauty, &quot; where Dante and where Petrarch trod! &quot; A magic glow colors it all; no mere blues and greens any more, but a splendor of purple and scarlet and emerald; &quot; each tower, castle, and village shining like a jewel; the olive, the fig, and at your feet the roses, growing in mid-December.&quot; A day in Pisa seems like a week, so crowded is it with sensations and unforgettable pictures. Then a month in Florence, which is still more entrancing with its inexhaustible treasures of beauty and art ; and finally Rome, the climax of it all,—

&quot; wiping out all other places and impressions, and opening a whole new world of sensations. I am wild with the excitement of this tremendous place. I have been here a week, and have seen the Vatican and the Capitoline Museums, and the Sistine Chapel, and St. Peter s, besides the ruins on the streets and on the hills, and the graves of Shelley and Keats. &quot;It is all heart-breaking. I don’t only mean those beautiful graves overgrown with acanthus and violets, but the mutilated arches and columns and dumb appealing fragments looming up in the glowing sunshine under the Roman blue sky.

True to her old attractions, it is pagan Rome that appeals to her most strongly,—