The Argosy — page 51: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

38 THE CRUISE OF THE RESERVE SQUADRON. By CHARLES W. Woop, AUTHOR OF THROUGH HOLLAND,” “IN THE BLAcK FoREsT,” ETC. WE passed into another world. ‘The moon, “ round as a shield,” was rolling upwards in splendour, like a ball of liquid silver suspended in the dark blue sky, lighting a scene with magic beauty and softness that surely had scarcely a parallel on the earth. Not only the present, visible charm influences the gazer. ‘There is all its antiquity and bygone history; all the vicissitudes and dangers through which the Alhambra has passed—seared it may be, but, like the face of a veteran who has well served his country, more loved for its scars. A halo of veneration surrounds it with such an atmosphere as that wherein the pilgrim views his favourite shrine. A glow of romance and contemplation takes you back in spirit to the days of the Moors; that people rich in energy and enterprise and ambition, in refinement and good taste, in Eastern imagery and pomp and splendour. The mind is full of retrospective thought and dreamy remembrance. Events of centuries seem to crowd upon the brain and rehearse themselves in the space of a few moments and with panoramic vividness, on finding yourself within this won- derful structure, face to face with a life-haunted vision, a wish long dreamed of and at length fulfilled. . The door opened noiselessly. When it had closed upon us, the guardian spirit of the place stood exposed in the shape of an at- tendant, holding a lantern that shed a feeble light wherewith to guide our steps. He might have been Diogenes, and must at least have been the good genius of the place. Surely nothing evil could here found existence and a foothold? The small corridor was in truth his local habitation. His rooms were above ; a gilded cage hung in celestial regions, wherein prob- ably he kept a sweet singing nightingale in the shape of a wife; though, as birds do not always agree in their nests, it is quite possible that she occasionally varied the laughing hours by a Wagnerian demonstration of sound. At the end of the corridor, a table held the book in which visitors are supposed to record their names— but we had nothing to do with that to-night. The gloom enshrouding the corridor only served more clearly to define the outlines of the small arches and slender pillars, through which you gain admittance to the Court of the Myrtles, or of the Bath, or of the Blessing—as it has been indifferently called. In the corridor we were in shadow, but the court beyond was flooded with the most brilliant moonlight it is possible to conceive. CORNIEMIOOKS. © im