Free One of Cleopatra's Nights by Théophile Gautier

dying, to watch by unknown corpses, and ever bear about with one
the black soutane as a garb of mourning for one's self, so that your
very dress might serve as a pall for your coffin.
    And I felt life rising within me like a subterranean lake, expanding and
overflowing; my blood leaped fiercely through my arteries; my
long-restrained youth suddenly burst into active being, like the aloe
which blooms but once in a hundred years, and then bursts into blossom
with a clap of thunder.
    What could I do in order to see Clarimonde once more? I had no pretext
to offer for desiring to leave the seminary, not knowing any person in
the city. I would not even be able to remain there but a short time, and
was only waiting my assignment to the curacy which I must thereafter
occupy. I tried to remove the bars of the window; but it was at a
fearful height from the ground, and I found that as I had no ladder it
would be useless to think of escaping thus. And, furthermore, I could
descend thence only by night in any event, and afterward how should I be
able to find my way through the inextricable labyrinth of streets? All
these difficulties, which to many would have appeared altogether
insignificant, were gigantic to me, a poor seminarist who had fallen in
love only the day before for the first time, without experience, without
money, without attire.
    "Ah!" cried I to myself in my blindness, "were I not a priest I could
have seen her every day; I might have been her lover, her spouse.
Instead of being wrapped in this dismal shroud of mine I would have had
garments of silk and velvet, golden chains, a sword, and fair plumes
like other handsome young cavaliers. My hair, instead of being
dishonored by the tonsure, would flow down upon my neck in waving curls;
I would have a fine waxed mustache; I would be a gallant." But one hour
passed before an altar, a few hastily articulated words, had forever cut
me off from the number of the living, and I had myself sealed down the
stone of my own tomb; I had with my own hand bolted the gate of my
prison! I went to the window. The sky was beautifully blue; the trees
had donned their spring robes; nature seemed to be making parade of an
ironical joy. The
Place
was filled with people, some going, others
coming; young beaux and young beauties were sauntering in couples toward
the groves and gardens; merry youths passed by, cheerily trolling
refrains of drinking songs—it was all a picture of vivacity, life,
animation, gayety, which formed a bitter contrast with my mourning and
my solitude. On the steps of the gate sat a young mother playing with
her child. She kissed its little rosy mouth still impearled with drops
of milk, and performed, in order to amuse it, a thousand divine little
puerilities such as only mothers know how to invent. The father standing
at a little distance smiled gently upon the charming group, and with
folded arms seemed to hug his joy to his heart. I could not endure that
spectacle. I closed the window with violence, and flung myself on my
bed, my heart filled with frightful hate and jealousy, and gnawed my
fingers and my bedcovers like a tiger that has passed ten days without
food.
    I know not how long I remained in this condition, but at last, while
writhing on the bed in a fit of spasmodic fury, I suddenly perceived the
Abbé Sérapion, who was standing erect in the centre of the room,
watching me attentively. Filled with shame of myself, I let my head fall
upon my breast and covered my face with my hands.
    "Romuald, my friend, something very extraordinary is transpiring within
you," observed Sérapion, after a few moments' silence; "your conduct is
altogether inexplicable. You—always so quiet, so pious, so gentle—you
to rage in your cell like a wild beast! Take heed, brother—do not
listen to the suggestions of the devil. The Evil Spirit, furious that
you have consecrated yourself forever to the Lord, is prowling around
you like a ravening wolf and making a last effort to obtain