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Madame Steynlin, a
spectator by necessity if not deliberate choice of these patriarchal
frolics, disdained to controvert certain frivolous folk who resorted to
the same beach to gratify a morbid curiosity, under the pretext that it
was a delectable entertainment and one of the sights of Nepenthe. She
disdained, nowadays. It had not ever been thus. Things were different
before Peter the Great came upon the scene. In those unregenerate times
her Lutheran upbringing condemned, in no measured terms, this frank
exhibition of animal nature. A warm friendship with the good-looking
apostle had now opened her eyes to the mystic sense of what went on.
Earthly love had given an unearthly tinge to her mind. The veil had
fallen; she saw through external appearances into the Symbolic Beyond.
Deeply penetrated of its inner meaning, she would say that the
spectacle called up visions of the Age of Innocence, when the world was
young. . . .
An elegant rowing-boat suddenly swept into Mr. Heard's field of vision.


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