The Argosy — page 317: what you’re looking at

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

294 Letters from Majorca. in rose colour; all that was painful is forgotten ; that which charmed only is remembered. This is singular, for pain is a greater power than pleasure. In all pleasure there is a certain undercurrent of absolute pain. ‘‘ Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.” ‘The two are inseparable. But pain has it all its own way. It reigns paramount. It is not a divided emotion. Its consolation lies in the old Trappist motto: Memento Mori. How little I foresaw what was before me when I came out a second time to these Balearic Islands. Yet, could I have seen the end from the beginning, still I should have come. ‘There has been care and anxiety, but there has also been le revers de la médaille, with a suffi- cient compensation. And for my own part, I believe that I love more to visit familiar scenes than to tread new ground. In the latter case, no doubt, all is fresh and startling ; impressions are vivid. But all is accompanied by a certain restlessness of mind. You are ever on the alert, wondering what will come next. In the former case, there is ereater repose. It is like clasping the hand of an old friend: and you know that the hand-clasp will be returned. There will be no cold grasp to throw you back upon yourself, chilled, disillusioned : an experience as destroying to friendship as an Arctic blast to the hope of harvest. Therefore there ought to have been much repose in this second visit to Mallorca. I have seen no new ground, formed no new im- pressions, except on my first arrival at Alcudia, and in my visit to the Albufera and Pollensa: with which, after all, Alcudia is associated. But, Alcudia alone would be worth a visit to Mallorca. As I have told you, it is one of those places that leave behind them a distinctive and vivid impression: as present when you have passed away from it as when you were gazing upon its ruined walls. I have not seen Pompe for five years, yet the very lava stones of its streets, the frescoes of its walls, are before me at this moment; I still hear the echoes of our footsteps in the deserted thoroughfares. It is five years since I saw the Alhambra, yet I could close my eyes and trace for you its refined courts and archways, the chiselled devices upon its walls. I still hear the plashing of the fountain in the Court of Lyons, and see the custodian plucking for us the luscious Japanese medlars in the Garden of Lindajara. So, five years hence, if I should be running my race, I shall still see before me the ruined walls of Alcudia, and feel the insecurity of my foothold as we mounted the crumbling and decaying stairs that led us to their summit. Yet in these last days I have not been quite stationary. I have seen no new places, but I have visited old haunts. Change is necessary to all; especially so to those who pass anxious days and nights in the atmosphere of asick-room. The doctor was growing pale and fagged: and no wonder. Close confinement, hope deferred, the burden of uncertainty, these have been the sum and substance of daily ex- perience. ‘Therefore we agreed, on the first favourable morning, to CONMICLIOOKS. e© m