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 Python for Data Analysis
Download from Wow! eBook <www.wowebook.com>

Wes McKinney

Beijing • Cambridge • Farnham • Köln • Sebastopol • Tokyo

Python for Data Analysis
by Wes McKinney

Copyright © 2013 Wes McKinney. All rights reserved.

Printed in the United States of America.

Published by O’Reilly Media, Inc., 1005 Gravenstein Highway North, Sebastopol, CA 95472.

O’Reilly books may be purchased for educational, business, or sales promotional use. Online editions
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October 2012: First Edition.

Revision History for the First Edition:

2012-10-05 First release
See http://oreilly.com/catalog/errata.csp?isbn=9781449319793 for release details.

Nutshell Handbook, the Nutshell Handbook logo, and the O’Reilly logo are registered trademarks of
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While every precaution has been taken in the preparation of this book, the publisher and author assume
no responsibility for errors or omissions, or for damages resulting from the use of the information con-
tained herein.

ISBN: 978-1-449-31979-3

[LSI]

1349356084
 Table of Contents

Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi

1. Preliminaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
What Is This Book About? 1
Why Python for Data Analysis? 2
Python as Glue 2
Solving the “Two-Language” Problem 2
Why Not Python? 3
Essential Python Libraries 3
NumPy 4
pandas 4
matplotlib 5
IPython 5
SciPy 6
Installation and Setup 6
Windows 7
Apple OS X 9
GNU/Linux 10
Python 2 and Python 3 11
Integrated Development Environments (IDEs) 11
Community and Conferences 12
Navigating This Book 12
Code Examples 13
Data for Examples 13
Import Conventions 13
Jargon 13
Acknowledgements 14

2. Introductory Examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
1.usa.gov data from bit.ly 17
Counting Time Zones in Pure Python 19

iii
 Counting Time Zones with pandas 21
MovieLens 1M Data Set 26
Measuring rating disagreement 30
US Baby Names 1880-2010 32
Analyzing Naming Trends 36
Conclusions and The Path Ahead 43

3. IPython: An Interactive Computing and Development Environment . . . . . . . . . . . . 45

IPython Basics 46
Tab Completion 47
Introspection 48
The %run Command 49
Executing Code from the Clipboard 50
Keyboard Shortcuts 52
Exceptions and Tracebacks 53
Magic Commands 54
Qt-based Rich GUI Console 55
Matplotlib Integration and Pylab Mode 56
Using the Command History 58
Searching and Reusing the Command History 58
Input and Output Variables 58
Logging the Input and Output 59
Interacting with the Operating System 60
Shell Commands and Aliases 60
Directory Bookmark System 62
Software Development Tools 62
Interactive Debugger 62
Timing Code: %time and %timeit 67
Basic Profiling: %prun and %run -p 68
Profiling a Function Line-by-Line 70
IPython HTML Notebook 72
Tips for Productive Code Development Using IPython 72
Reloading Module Dependencies 74
Code Design Tips 74
Advanced IPython Features 76
Making Your Own Classes IPython-friendly 76
Profiles and Configuration 77
Credits 78

4. NumPy Basics: Arrays and Vectorized Computation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79

The NumPy ndarray: A Multidimensional Array Object 80
Creating ndarrays 81
Data Types for ndarrays 83

iv | Table of Contents
 Operations between Arrays and Scalars 85
Basic Indexing and Slicing 86
Boolean Indexing 89
Fancy Indexing 92
Transposing Arrays and Swapping Axes 93
Universal Functions: Fast Element-wise Array Functions 95
Data Processing Using Arrays 97
Expressing Conditional Logic as Array Operations 98
Mathematical and Statistical Methods 100
Methods for Boolean Arrays 101
Sorting 101
Unique and Other Set Logic 102
File Input and Output with Arrays 103
Storing Arrays on Disk in Binary Format 103
Saving and Loading Text Files 104
Linear Algebra 105
Random Number Generation 106
Example: Random Walks 108
Simulating Many Random Walks at Once 109

5. Getting Started with pandas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111

Introduction to pandas Data Structures 112
Series 112
DataFrame 115
Index Objects 120
Essential Functionality 122
Reindexing 122
Dropping entries from an axis 125
Indexing, selection, and filtering 125
Arithmetic and data alignment 128
Function application and mapping 132
Sorting and ranking 133
Axis indexes with duplicate values 136
Summarizing and Computing Descriptive Statistics 137
Correlation and Covariance 139
Unique Values, Value Counts, and Membership 141
Handling Missing Data 142
Filtering Out Missing Data 143
Filling in Missing Data 145
Hierarchical Indexing 147
Reordering and Sorting Levels 149
Summary Statistics by Level 150
Using a DataFrame’s Columns 150

Table of Contents | v
 Other pandas Topics 151
Integer Indexing 151
Panel Data 152

6. Data Loading, Storage, and File Formats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155

Reading and Writing Data in Text Format 155
Reading Text Files in Pieces 160
Writing Data Out to Text Format 162
Manually Working with Delimited Formats 163
JSON Data 165
XML and HTML: Web Scraping 166
Binary Data Formats 171
Using HDF5 Format 171
Reading Microsoft Excel Files 172
Interacting with HTML and Web APIs 173
Interacting with Databases 174
Storing and Loading Data in MongoDB 176

7. Data Wrangling: Clean, Transform, Merge, Reshape . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177

Combining and Merging Data Sets 177
Database-style DataFrame Merges 178
Merging on Index 182
Concatenating Along an Axis 185
Combining Data with Overlap 188
Reshaping and Pivoting 189
Reshaping with Hierarchical Indexing 190
Pivoting “long” to “wide” Format 192
Data Transformation 194
Removing Duplicates 194
Transforming Data Using a Function or Mapping 195
Replacing Values 196
Renaming Axis Indexes 197
Discretization and Binning 199
Detecting and Filtering Outliers 201
Permutation and Random Sampling 202
Computing Indicator/Dummy Variables 203
String Manipulation 205
String Object Methods 206
Regular expressions 207
Vectorized string functions in pandas 210
Example: USDA Food Database 212

vi | Table of Contents
8. Plotting and Visualization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
A Brief matplotlib API Primer 219
Figures and Subplots 220
Colors, Markers, and Line Styles 224
Ticks, Labels, and Legends 225
Annotations and Drawing on a Subplot 228
Saving Plots to File 231
matplotlib Configuration 231
Plotting Functions in pandas 232
Line Plots 232
Bar Plots 235
Histograms and Density Plots 238
Scatter Plots 239
Plotting Maps: Visualizing Haiti Earthquake Crisis Data 241
Python Visualization Tool Ecosystem 247
Chaco 248
mayavi 248
Other Packages 248
The Future of Visualization Tools? 249

9. Data Aggregation and Group Operations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251

GroupBy Mechanics 252
Iterating Over Groups 255
Selecting a Column or Subset of Columns 256
Grouping with Dicts and Series 257
Grouping with Functions 258
Grouping by Index Levels 259
Data Aggregation 259
Column-wise and Multiple Function Application 262
Returning Aggregated Data in “unindexed” Form 264
Group-wise Operations and Transformations 264
Apply: General split-apply-combine 266
Quantile and Bucket Analysis 268
Example: Filling Missing Values with Group-specific Values 270
Example: Random Sampling and Permutation 271
Example: Group Weighted Average and Correlation 273
Example: Group-wise Linear Regression 274
Pivot Tables and Cross-Tabulation 275
Cross-Tabulations: Crosstab 277
Example: 2012 Federal Election Commission Database 278
Donation Statistics by Occupation and Employer 280
Bucketing Donation Amounts 283
Donation Statistics by State 285

Table of Contents | vii

 10. Time Series . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 289
Date and Time Data Types and Tools 290
Converting between string and datetime 291
Time Series Basics 293
Indexing, Selection, Subsetting 294
Time Series with Duplicate Indices 296
Date Ranges, Frequencies, and Shifting 297
Generating Date Ranges 298
Frequencies and Date Offsets 299
Shifting (Leading and Lagging) Data 301
Time Zone Handling 303
Localization and Conversion 304
Operations with Time Zone−aware Timestamp Objects 305
Operations between Different Time Zones 306
Periods and Period Arithmetic 307
Period Frequency Conversion 308
Quarterly Period Frequencies 309
Converting Timestamps to Periods (and Back) 311
Creating a PeriodIndex from Arrays 312
Resampling and Frequency Conversion 312
Downsampling 314
Upsampling and Interpolation 316
Resampling with Periods 318
Time Series Plotting 319
Moving Window Functions 320
Exponentially-weighted functions 324
Binary Moving Window Functions 324
User-Defined Moving Window Functions 326
Performance and Memory Usage Notes 327

11. Financial and Economic Data Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329

Data Munging Topics 329
Time Series and Cross-Section Alignment 330
Operations with Time Series of Different Frequencies 332
Time of Day and “as of” Data Selection 334
Splicing Together Data Sources 336
Return Indexes and Cumulative Returns 338
Group Transforms and Analysis 340
Group Factor Exposures 342
Decile and Quartile Analysis 343
More Example Applications 345
Signal Frontier Analysis 345
Future Contract Rolling 347

viii | Table of Contents

 Rolling Correlation and Linear Regression 350

12. Advanced NumPy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 353

ndarray Object Internals 353
NumPy dtype Hierarchy 354
Advanced Array Manipulation 355
Reshaping Arrays 355
C versus Fortran Order 356
Concatenating and Splitting Arrays 357
Repeating Elements: Tile and Repeat 360
Fancy Indexing Equivalents: Take and Put 361
Broadcasting 362
Broadcasting Over Other Axes 364
Setting Array Values by Broadcasting 367
Advanced ufunc Usage 367
ufunc Instance Methods 368
Custom ufuncs 370
Structured and Record Arrays 370
Nested dtypes and Multidimensional Fields 371
Why Use Structured Arrays? 372
Structured Array Manipulations: numpy.lib.recfunctions 372
More About Sorting 373
Indirect Sorts: argsort and lexsort 374
Alternate Sort Algorithms 375
numpy.searchsorted: Finding elements in a Sorted Array 376
NumPy Matrix Class 377
Advanced Array Input and Output 379
Memory-mapped Files 379
HDF5 and Other Array Storage Options 380
Performance Tips 380
The Importance of Contiguous Memory 381
Other Speed Options: Cython, f2py, C 382

Appendix: Python Language Essentials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 385

Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 433

Table of Contents | ix
 Preface

The scientific Python ecosystem of open source libraries has grown substantially over
the last 10 years. By late 2011, I had long felt that the lack of centralized learning
resources for data analysis and statistical applications was a stumbling block for new
Python programmers engaged in such work. Key projects for data analysis (especially
NumPy, IPython, matplotlib, and pandas) had also matured enough that a book written
about them would likely not go out-of-date very quickly. Thus, I mustered the nerve
to embark on this writing project. This is the book that I wish existed when I started
using Python for data analysis in 2007. I hope you find it useful and are able to apply
these tools productively in your work.

Conventions Used in This Book

The following typographical conventions are used in this book:
Italic
Indicates new terms, URLs, email addresses, filenames, and file extensions.
Constant width
Used for program listings, as well as within paragraphs to refer to program elements
such as variable or function names, databases, data types, environment variables,
statements, and keywords.
Constant width bold
Shows commands or other text that should be typed literally by the user.
Constant width italic
Shows text that should be replaced with user-supplied values or by values deter-
mined by context.

This icon signifies a tip, suggestion, or general note.

xi
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Using Code Examples

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Preface | xiii
Other documents randomly have
different content
suffering? I do not know. I live on, stupid and inert beneath a
burden which crushes me, without killing me." Another letter read:
"At last, to-day, at four o'clock, when almost hopeless, I have
received your reply. I have read and reread it a thousand times, to
find between your words the inexpressible—what you could not
express—your soul's secret, something more alive and sweeter than
the words written on the soulless paper. I am possessed with a
terrible desire for you."
So the love-letters cried and groaned, on the table covered with
a table-cloth, and loaded with rustic cups in which an innocent
infusion peacefully steamed.
"You remember," said Hippolyte. "It was the first time that I left
Rome, and only for fifteen days."
George was absorbed in the memories of his mad infatuation;
he sought to revive it within him, and to understand it. But the
environing comfort was unfavorable for internal effort.
The sensation of this comfort imprisoned his soul, enveloping it
loosely. The veiled sunlight, the hot drink, the perfume of the violets,
the contact of Hippolyte, benumbed him. "Am I, then, so far from
the ardor of former days?" he thought. "No, because during her last
absence my anguish was not less cruel." But he did not succeed in
filling the interval between the I of long ago and the I of to-day.
In spite of all, he could no longer identify himself with the same
man of whom those written phrases attested such consternation and
despair; he felt that these effusions of his love had become
strangers to him, and he also felt all the emptiness of the words.
These letters resembled the epitaphs which one reads in cemeteries.
Just as the epitaphs give a coarse, false idea of the dead, so these
letters represented inaccurately the divers conditions of the soul
through which his love had passed. He knew well the singular fever
which seizes a lover when writing a love-letter. In the heat of this
fever, all the different waves of sentiment are agitated and mixed in
a confused turmoil. The lover does not know precisely what he
wishes to express, and he is embarrassed by the material
insufficiency of the terms of endearment; so he gives up trying to
describe his internal passion such as it is, and attempts to express
its intensity by the exaggeration of the phrases and by the
employment of vulgar rhetorical effects. This is the reason why all
amorous correspondences resemble each other, and why the
language of the most exalted passion is almost as poor as jargon.
"In these letters," thought George, "all is violence, excess,
convulsion. But where are my delicate feelings? Where my exquisite
and complex melancholies? Where my profound and sinuous
sorrows, in which my soul went astray as in an inextricable
labyrinth?" He now had the regret to perceive that his letters lacked
the rarest qualities of his mind—those which he had always
cultivated with the greatest care. In the course of his reading, he
began to skip the long passages of pure eloquence, and sought
instead the indication of particulars—the details of events that had
occurred—the allusions to memorable episodes.
He found in one letter: "Towards six o'clock I entered
mechanically the usual place, the Morteo Garden, where I had seen
you so many evenings. The thirty-five minutes that preceded the
exact hour of your departure were a torture for me. You left, yes,
you left without my having been able to bid you good-by, to cover
your face with kisses, to repeat to you once more, 'Don't forget!
don't forget!' Towards eleven o'clock a kind of instinct made me turn
round. Your husband entered with his friend, and the lady who
usually accompanies them. Without any doubt, they had come back
from seeing you home. I had then such a cruel spasm of pain that I
was soon forced to rise and go out. The presence of these three
persons, who spoke and laughed as on other evenings, as if nothing
new had happened, exasperated me. Their presence was for me the
visible and indubitable proof that you were gone, irremissibly gone."
He thought over more of the summer evenings, when he had
seen Hippolyte seated at a table, between her husband and a
captain of infantry, opposite to a little, insignificant woman. He did
not know any of these three persons, but he suffered at each of
their gestures, at each of their attitudes, and at all that was vulgar in
their appearance; and in imagination he pictured to himself the
imbecility of the talk to which his refined mistress appeared to pay
sustained attention.
In another letter he found: "I am in doubt. To-day I feel hostile
towards you; I am filled with a dull anger."
"That," said Hippolyte, "was the time when I was at Rimini:
August and September—what tempestuous months they were! Do
you remember when you finally arrived on the Don Juan?"
"Here is a letter written on board ship: 'To-day at two o'clock we
have anchored at Ancona, having sailed from Porto San Giorgio. Your
prayers and wishes have sent us a favorable wind. Marvellous
sailing, which I will recount to you. At the break of day we shall
again make the offing. The Don Juan is the king of coasters. Your
flag floats from the mast-head. Addio—maybe till to-morrow.
September 2d.'"
 "We saw one another again; but what days of suffering! Do you
remember? We were watched incessantly. Oh, that good sister! Do
you recall our visit to the Temple of the Malatestas? Do you
remember our pilgrimage to the Church of San Giuliano, the evening
before your departure?"
"Here is another from Venice."
They read it together, with equal palpitation.
"Since the ninth, I am at Venice, sadder than ever. Venice
stupefies me. The most radiant of dreams does not equal in
magnificence this dream of marble which emerges from the waves
and blossoms in an illusionary sky. I am dying of melancholy and
desire. Why are you not here? Oh! if you had come! If you had only
executed your former project! Maybe we should have been able to
steal one hour from espionage; and in the treasury of our souvenirs
we should have counted one more, the most divine amongst them
all." On another leaf they read again: "I have a strange thought,
which, from time to time, pierces my soul like a lightning flash, and
disturbs my whole being; a foolish thought—a dream. I think that
you could come here, suddenly, alone, to be entirely mine!" Further
on again: "The beauty of Venice is the natural frame of your beauty.
The colors of your complexion, so rich and warm—all pale amber
and dull gold, in which are mixed possibly several shades of
drooping rose—are the ideal colors which harmonize the most
happily with the Venetian air. I do not know how Catherine Cornaro,
Queen of Cyprus, looked; but, I do not know why, I imagine she
resembled you."
"You see," said Hippolyte, "it was a continual seduction, refined
and irresistible. I suffered more than you can imagine. Instead of
sleeping, I passed nights in seeking a means of going out alone,
without awakening the suspicions of my guests. I was a prodigy of
cleverness. I no longer know what I did. When I found myself alone
with you in the gondola, on the Grand Canal, that September dawn,
I did not believe that it was real. Do you recollect? I burst into sobs,
unable to say a word to you."
"But I—I was waiting for you. I was sure that you would come,
at any cost."
"And that was the first of our great imprudences."
"It is true."
"What does it matter?" murmured the young woman. "Was it
not better so? Was it not better so, now that I belong to you
entirely? For my part, I regret nothing."
George kissed her on the temple. She spoke for a long time of
this episode, which was one of the most pleasant and extraordinary
among their souvenirs. They lived over again, minute by minute, the
two days of their secret stay at the Hotel Danieli—two days of
oblivion, supreme intoxication, in which it seemed as if they had
both lost all notion of the world, and all consciousness of their
previous being.
Those days had marked the commencement of Hippolyte's ruin.
The letters which followed alluded to her first trials. "When I think
that I am the initial cause of your sufferings and of all your domestic
troubles, an inexpressible remorse torments me; and in order to
obtain pardon for the ill of which I am the cause, I want you to
know the entire depth of my passion. Do you know my passion? Are
you sure that my love will be able to repay you for your long
anguish? Are you sure of it—certain—deeply convinced of it?" The
ardor went on increasing page by page. Then, from April to July,
there was an obscure interval without documents. It was during
these four months that the catastrophe happened. The husband, too
weak, not having found any means of conquering Hippolyte's open
and obstinate rebellion, had, so to say, taken flight, and left behind
him very much involved business affairs, in which he had sunk the
greater part of his fortune. Hippolyte had sought refuge with her
mother, then with her sister at Caronno, in a country-house. And
then a terrible malady from which she had already suffered in her
infancy—a nervous malady analogous to epilepsy—seized upon her.
The letters dated in August spoke of it: "No, you could never
conceive the fright that my mind is in. What tortures me above all is
the implacable lucidity of my imaginary vision. I see you writhing—I
see your face become distorted and pallid—I see your eyes roll
hopelessly beneath their lids; I see your hands shrivelled and
shrunk, and between your fingers the curl of torn-out hair; and,
whatever effort I make, I cannot succeed in dispelling the terrible
vision. And then, I hear you call me; I have actually in my ears the
sound of your voice—a hoarse and lamentable sound—the voice of a
person who calls for help without the hope of being helped." A little
way further on: "You write me: 'If this illness should seize me when I
am in your arms! No, no, I will not see you again! I do not wish to
see you again!' Were you mad when you wrote that? Did you think
of what you wrote? It is as if you had taken my life, as if I could no
longer breathe. Quick, another letter! Tell me you will recover, that
you still hope, that you want to see me again. You must recover. Do
you hear, Hippolyte? You must recover."
 During the convalescence, the letters were gentle and playful. "I
send you a flower gathered on the sands. It is a species of wild lily,
marvellous when growing, and of an odor so penetrating that I often
find at the bottom of the chalice an insect in a swoon of intoxication.
The whole coast is covered with these passionate lilies, which,
beneath the torrid sun, on the broiling sand, flower in one minute,
and only live a few hours. See how charming this flower is, even
when dead! See how delicate it is, and fine, and feminine!"
Up to the month of November the letters followed one another
without interruption; but, little by little, they became bitter, full of
suspicions, doubts, reproaches.
"How far you have gone from me! I am tortured by something
else than the chagrin of mere material separation. It seems to me
that your soul has also left and abandoned me. Your fragrance
makes others happy. To look at you, to hear you, is not that—to
enjoy you? Write to me; tell me that you belong entirely to me, in all
your acts, in all your thoughts, and that you desire me, and that you
regret me, and that, separated from me, you find no beauty in any
instant of life." Further on: "I think, I think, and my thought goads
me; and the sting of this thought causes in me an abominable
suffering. At times I am seized with a frenzied desire to pluck from
my throbbing temples this impalpable thing, which is, however,
stronger and more inflexible than a dart. To breathe is an
insupportable fatigue for me, and the throbbing of my arteries goes
through me as would the sound of hammer blows that I might be
condemned to hear. Is that love? Oh, no. It is a kind of monstrous
infirmity which can blossom only in me, for my joy and my
martyrdom. I please myself by believing that no other human
creature has ever felt as I do." Further on: "Never, no, never, shall I
have complete peace and complete security. I could be content only
on one condition—that I absorbed all, all your being; that you and I
no longer were more than a single being; that I lived your life; that I
thought your thoughts. Or, at least, I would wish that your senses
were closed to all sensations that did not originate in me. I am a
poor, ill patient. My days are but a long agony. I have rarely desired
them to end, as much as I desire and pray for it now. The sun is
about to set, and the night which descends on my soul envelops me
in a thousand horrors. The shadows issue from every corner of my
room and advance towards me as would a live person whose
footsteps and breathing I could hear, whose hostile attitude I 'could
see.'"
To await Hippolyte's return, George had returned to Rome in the
first days of November; and the letters dated at that time alluded to
a very unhappy and dismal episode. "You wrote me: 'I have had
great difficulty in remaining true to you!' What do you mean by that?
What were the terrible events which have upset you? My God! How
you are changed! It makes me suffer inexpressibly, and my pride is
irritated at my suffering. Between my eyebrows is a furrow, deep as
the cleft of a wound, in which is heaped my repressed anger, in
which gathers all the bitterness of my doubts, my suspicions, my
disgusts. I believe that even your kisses would not suffice to rid me
of it. Your letters, trembling with desires, disturb me. I am not
grateful to you for them. For two or three days, I have something
against you in my heart. I do not know what it is. Perhaps a
presentiment? Perhaps a divination?"
 While he read, George suffered as from a wound reopened.
Hippolyte would have liked to stop him from continuing. She
remembered that evening when her husband had called
unexpectedly at the house in Caronno, with a cold, calm face, but
with the look of a madman, declaring that he had come to take her
back; she recalled the moment when she was alone with him, face
to face, in an out-of-the-way room, the window curtains of which
were blown about by the wind—in which the light abruptly flared up
and then decreased—to which the moaning of the trees was borne
up from below; she remembered the silent, savage fight sustained
then against that man who had suddenly clasped her—horror!—in
order to take her by force.
"Enough! enough!" she said, drawing George's head to her.
"Enough! Don't let us read any more."
But he wanted to continue. "I cannot understand the
reappearance of that man, and I cannot prevent a feeling of anger
which is directed even at you, too. But, to spare you pain, I will
abstain from writing you my thoughts on this subject. They are bitter
and gloomy thoughts. I feel that my affection is poisoned for some
time. It were better, I think, if you never saw me again. If you wish
to avoid useless pain, do not return now. Now I am not in a good
frame of mind. My soul loves you to adoration; but my thought
rends and sullies you. It is a contrast which recommences
incessantly, and which will never end." In the next day's letter he
wrote: "A pain, an atrocious pain, intolerable, never felt before! O
Hippolyte, come back! come back! I want to see you, to speak to
you, to caress you. I love you more than ever. Yet, spare me the
sight of your bruises. I am incapable of thinking of them without fear
and without anger. I feel that, if I saw the marks impressed in your
flesh by the hands of that man, my heart would break. It is
horrible!"
"Enough, George! don't let us read anymore!" begged Hippolyte
again, taking the loved one's head between her hands, and kissing
his eyes. "Please, George!"
She succeeded in drawing him away from the table. He smiled
that indefinable smile, which sometimes invalids have when they
yield to the entreaties of others, knowing full well that the remedy is
late and useless.

CHAPTER VII.

On Good Friday evening they started on their return to Rome.

Before their departure, about five o'clock, they took tea. They
were taciturn. The simple existence they had led in this old house
appeared extraordinarily beautiful and desirable to them, now it was
about to end. The intimacy of the modest lodging seemed sweeter
and more profound to them. The places where they had
promenaded their melancholy and their tenderness were illuminated
by ideal lights. It was, then, still another fragment of their love and
of their being that fell, annihilated, into the abyss of time.
"That, too, is past," said George.
"What can I do?" said Hippolyte. "It seems to me as if I could
no longer sleep anywhere than on your heart!"
 They looked into each other's eyes, communicating each other's
emotion, feeling the rising wave choking their throats. They
remained silent; they listened to the regular and monotonous sound
made by the pavers beating the pavement. But the irritating noise
augmented their uneasiness.
"That is insupportable," said George, rising.
The measured blows revived in him the sentiment of the flight
of time, which he had already so strongly felt; they inspired in him
that sort of anxious terror which he had already often experienced
when listening to the oscillations of a pendulum. And yet, on the
preceding days, had not the same noise lulled him into a vague state
of comfort? He thought: "In two or three hours we shall separate. I
shall recommence my usual life, which is only a series of petty
miseries. My habitual illness will inevitably seize upon me again.
Moreover, I know the troubles that Spring revives in me. I shall
suffer without cease. And I have already a premonition that one of
my most pitiless tormentors will be the idea that Exili has put in my
head. If Hippolyte wished to cure me, could she? Maybe, at least
partly. Why should she not come with me to some lonely place, not
for a week, but for a very long time? She is adorable in intimacy, full
of trifling kind attentions and of childish graces. Maybe, by her
constant presence, she would succeed in curing me, or at least in
making me take life more lightly."
He stopped before Hippolyte, took her two hands in his, and
asked: "Have you been very happy during these few days? Answer
me."
His voice was agitated and persuasive. "I was never so happy
before," she replied.
 Feeling a deep sincerity in this answer, George pressed her
hands with force, and continued: "Will it be possible for you to go
back to your every-day existence?"
"I do not know," she answered; "I do not look before me. You
know all is lost."
She lowered her eyes. George seized her in his arms,
passionately.
"You love me, do you not? I am the only aim of your existence;
you see only me in your future."
With an unexpected smile, which raised her long eyelashes, she
said: "Yes, you know it."
He added once more in a low voice, his face bowed down: "You
know my malady."
She seemed to have guessed her lover's thought. As if in
confidence, in a whispering voice which seemed to draw closer the
circle in which they breathed and palpitated together, she asked,
"What can I do to cure you?"
They were silent, clasped in each other's arms. But in the
silence their two souls dwelt and decided upon the same thing.
"Come with me," he cried, at length. "Let us go to some
unknown country; let us stay there all Spring, all Summer, as long as
we can—that will cure me."
Without hesitation she replied: "I am ready. I belong to you."
They disengaged themselves, comforted. The hour of departure
had come; they strapped the last valise. Hippolyte gathered all her
flowers, already withered in the glasses: the violets of the Villa
Cesarini, the cyclamens, the anemones, and the periwinkles of the
Chigi Park, the simple roses of the Castel-Gandolfo, a branch of an
almond-tree gathered in the neighborhood of Diana's Baths, on their
way home from the Emissary. These flowers could have told all their
idylls. Oh, the frolicsome course in the park, in descending a steep
incline, on the dry leaves in which their feet sank to the ankles! She
shouted and laughed, pricked on the legs by the sharp nettles
through the fine stockings: and then, before her, George beat down
the sharp stems with blows of his cane, so that she could trample
upon them without danger. Very green and innumerable nettles
adorned the Diana's Baths, the mysterious cave in which favorable
echoes were transformed into the music of slowly dropping water.
And, from the depths of the humid shadow, they saw the country all
covered with almond-trees and silver-and-pink peach trees, infinitely
delightful beneath the light-green pallor of the limpid waters. So
many flowers, so many souvenirs!
"See," she said, showing George a ticket, "it is the ticket for
Segni-Paliano! I shall keep it."
Pancrazio knocked at the door. He brought George the receipted
bill. In the emotion produced by the signor's generosity, he was all
confused in his expressions of thanks and good wishes. Finally, he
drew two visiting-cards from his pocket, and offered them to the
signor and signora to recall to them his humble name, begging to be
excused for his boldness.
Scarcely had he retired than the false newly wed couple began
to laugh. The cards bore, in pompous letters, PANCRAZIO
PETRELLA.
"I will keep them too as a remembrance," said Hippolyte.
Pancrazio knocked a second time at the door. He brought
signora a gift—four or five magnificent oranges. His eyes sparkled in
his rubicund visage. He warned them, "It is time to go down."
In descending the staircase the two lovers felt a certain sadness
and a sort of fear fall upon them, as if on leaving this peaceful
asylum they were about to face some unknown peril. The old hotel-
keeper took leave of them at the door, saying with regret, "I had
such beautiful larks for this evening."
George answered, with a contraction of his lips: "We will come
again soon—we will come again soon."
While they proceeded to the station the sun sank below the sea,
at the extreme horizon of the Roman campagna fiery-colored amidst
the thick mists. At Cecchina it began to drizzle. When they
separated, Rome, on that Good Friday evening, humid and foggy,
appeared to them like a city in which one could only die.

II.

THE PATERNAL ROOF.

CHAPTER I.

About the end of April, Hippolyte left for Milan where her sister,
whose mother-in-law was dying, had called her. George Aurispa had
arranged to leave also, in search of a new and unfrequented place.
Towards the middle of May they were to meet again.
 But, just at that time, George received an alarming letter from
his mother. She was unhappy, almost in despair. In consequence, he
could no longer defer his return to the paternal house.
When he became convinced that his duty urged him to hasten
at once where there was real sorrow, he was seized by feelings of
anguish which overcame by degrees his first sentiment of filial piety,
and he felt rise within him a sharp irritation which increased in
acuteness as the scenes of the coming conflict, clearer and more
numerous, surged through his conscience. And this irritation soon
became so acute that it dominated him entirely, persistently
nourished by the material annoyances of the departure, by the
heart-breaking farewells.
The separation was more cruel than ever. George passed
through a period of the most intense sensibility; the exasperation of
all his nerves kept him in a constant state of uneasiness. He
appeared to no longer believe in the promised happiness, the future
peace. When Hippolyte bade him good-by, he asked:
"Shall we meet again?"
When he kissed her lips for the last time, as she passed through
the door, he noticed that she lowered a black veil over the kiss, and
this insignificant trifle caused him profound distress, assumed in his
imagination the importance of a sinister presentiment.
On arriving at Guardiagrele, at his birthplace, under the paternal
roof, he was so exhausted that, when he embraced his mother, he
began to cry like a child. But neither the embrace nor his tears
comforted him. It seemed to him that he was a stranger in his own
home—that he was visiting a family which was not his own. This
singular sensation of isolation, already experienced under other
circumstances connected with his kin, returned now more vivid and
more importunate than ever. A thousand little particulars of the
family life irritated him, hurt him. During lunch, during dinner, certain
silences, during which only the sounds of the forks were heard,
made him feel horribly uncomfortable. Certain refinements, to which
he was accustomed, received every moment a sudden and painful
shock. The air of discord, hostility, and open warfare which weighed
heavily on this household almost choked him.
The very evening of his arrival, his mother had taken him aside
to recount her troubles and her ailments, to tell him about the bad
behavior and dissoluteness of her husband. In a voice trembling with
anger, looking at him with tears in her eyes, she had said to him:
"Your father is an infamous man!"
Her eyelids were somewhat swollen, reddened by the large
tears; her cheeks were hollow; her whole person bore the signs of
long-endured suffering.
"He is an infamous man! A wretch!"
As he went upstairs to his bedroom, George still had the sound
of her voice in his ears; he saw before him his mother's attitude; he
continued to hear the ignominious accusations against the man
whose blood ran in his veins. And his heart was so heavy that he
believed he could carry it no longer. But, suddenly, a furious rapture
created a diversion, carried his thoughts back to his absent mistress;
and he felt that he owed his mother no thanks for reciting to him all
those woes—he felt he would have liked much better not to know of,
or in any way to occupy himself with, anything but his love, to suffer
from nothing but his love.
 He entered his room, and locked himself in. The May moon
illuminated the windows of the balconies. Thirsty for the night air, he
opened the windows, leaned on the balustrade, drank in with deep
breaths the cool air of the night. An infinite peace reigned below in
the valley; and the Majella, still all white with snow, seemed to
deepen the azure by the solemn simplicity of its outlines.
Guardiagrele, like a flock of sheep, slept around the Santa Maria
Maggiore. A single window lit up, in the house opposite, made a spot
of yellowish light.
He forgot his recent wound. Before the splendor of the night he
had but one single thought—"This is a night lost to happiness!"
He began to listen. Amidst the silence, he heard the stamping of
a horse in a neighboring stable, then a feeble tinkling of small bells.
His eyes wandered to the lighted window; and in the rectangle of
light he saw shadows flit, as of persons in active motion within. He
listened intently. He believed he heard a light knock at his door. He
went to open it, although not sure.
It was his aunt Joconda. She entered.
"Have you forgotten me?" she said, kissing him.
In fact, not having seen her when he arrived, he had not
thought of her. He excused himself, took her hand, made her sit
down, spoke to her in an affectionate tone.
Aunt Joconda, his father's eldest sister, was almost sixty. She
limped as the result of a fall, and she was rather short, but an
unhealthy stoutness, flabby, pallid. Given entirely to religious
practices, she lived by herself in her room, on the top floor of the
house, without having almost any connection with the family,
neglected, but little loved, considered as being weak-minded. Her
little world was full of consecrated images, relics, emblems, symbols;
she did nothing else but follow religious exercises, doze in the
monotony of her prayers, endure the cruel tortures caused by her
gormandizing. She had a greedy passion for confectionery, and all
other nourishment she had no taste for. But often she lacked
sweets; and George was her favorite, because, each time he came
to Guardiagrele, he brought her a box of bon-bons and a box of
rossolis.
"So," she said in a mumbling voice from between her almost
empty gums, "so you have come back—eh! eh! You have come back
——"
She regarded him with a sort of timidity, finding nothing else to
say; but a manifest expectancy showed in her eyes. And George felt
his heart contract with anxious pity. "This miserable creature,"
thought he, "has sunk to the lowest degradations of human nature;
I am bound to this poor bigoted gormand by ties of blood; I am of
her race!"
A visible uneasiness had taken possession of Aunt Joconda; a
look that was almost impudent came into her eyes. She repeated:
"So—so."
"Oh! forgive me, Aunt Joconda," he said at last, with a painful
effort. "I forgot to bring you some candy."
The old woman changed countenance, as if she were on the
point of fainting; her eyes became dim; she stuttered: "It doesn't
matter——"
"But to-morrow I will get you some," added George consolingly,
yet with a sinking heart. "I will write——"
 The old woman became livelier. She said very rapidly: "You
know, at the Ursulines ... it's to be had."
A silence followed, during which Aunt Joconda had, without
doubt, a foretaste of the morrow's delicacies; because her toothless
mouth gave forth the little sound that one makes in re-swallowing
the superabundant saliva.
"My poor George! Ah! if I had not my George! You see, what
has occurred in this house is a punishment from heaven. But go,
boy, go out on the balcony and look at the vases. I—I am the only
one who waters them; I always think of George; formerly, I had
Demetrius, but now I have no one but you."
She rose, took her nephew by the hand, and led him to one of
the balconies. She showed him the flowering vases; she plucked a
bergamot leaf and held it out to him. She stooped down to feel if the
earth were dry.
"Wait!" she said.
"Where are you going, Aunt Joconda?"
"Wait!"
She went off with her limping gait, left the room, returned a
minute later with a pitcher full of water which she could scarcely
carry.
"But, aunt, why do you do this work? Why give yourself this
trouble?"
"The vases require to be watered. If I did not think of them,
who would?"
She sprinkled the vases. Her respiration was heavy, and the
hoarse panting of her senile chest distressed the young man.
 "That will do! That will do!" he said, taking the pitcher from her
hands.
They stayed on the balcony, while the water from the vases
dropped into the street with a light splash.
"What is that lighted window?" asked George, to break the
silence.
"Oh," replied the old woman. "It is Don Defendente Scioli, who
is dying."
And both watched the moving shadows in the rectangle of
yellow light. The old woman began to shiver in the cold night air.
"Come! Go to bed, Aunt Joconda."
He wanted to escort her to her room, on the floor above. While
following a lobby, they met something which was dragging itself
heavily along the floor. It was a tortoise. The old woman stopped to
say: "It is as old as you are—twenty-five; and it has become lame
like myself. Your father, with a blow of his heel——"
He remembered the plucked turtle-dove and Aunt Jane, and
certain hours spent at Albano.
They arrived at the threshold of her chamber. A disgusting odor
of sickness emanated from the interior. By the feeble light of a lamp,
one could see the walls covered with madonnas and crosses, a torn
screen, an arm-chair showing the stuffing and the springs.
"Will you come in?"
"No, thanks, Aunt Joconda; go to bed."
She entered quickly, then came back to the door with a paper
packet, which she opened before George, and emptied a little sugar
on the palm of her hand.
"You see? It is all I have left."
 "To-morrow, aunt; come, go to bed. Good night!"
And he left her, his courage exhausted, his stomach upset, his
heart saddened.
He returned to his balcony.
The full moon was suspended in the middle of the sky. The
Majella, inert and glacial, resembled one of those selenious
promontories which the telescope has brought close to the earth.
Guardiagrele slumbered at the foot of the mountain. The bergamots
filled the air with fragrance.
"Hippolyte! Hippolyte!"
At that hour of supreme anguish, all his soul went out towards
the loved one, demanding assistance.
Suddenly, from the lighted window, a cry arose in the silence,
the cry of a woman. Other cries followed; then there was a
continued sobbing, which rose and fell like a rhythmic chant. The
agony had ended; a soul had dissolved itself into the serene and
funereal night.
 CHAPTER II.

"You must help me," said his mother. "You must speak to him; you
must make him listen to you. You are his first-born. Yes, George, it is
essential."
She continued to enumerate her husband's faults, to lay bare
before the son the shame of the father. This father had for a
concubine a chamber-maid, formerly in the service of the family, a
degraded and very mercenary woman; it was for her and the
children born in adultery that he dissipated all his fortune, without
regard for anybody—careless of his affairs, neglecting his property,
selling his crops at a sacrifice to the first comer, in order to obtain
money. And he went so far that, sometimes, through his fault, the
house lacked necessities; and he refused to give a dowry to his
younger sister, although she had been engaged for a long time; and
if any observation was made to him, he responded by cries, insults,
sometimes even by the most brutal violence.
"You live far from us, and do not know in what a hell we live.
You cannot even imagine the smallest part of our sufferings. But you
are the eldest. You must speak to him. Yes, George, you must."
His eyes cast down, George remained silent; and to repress the
exasperation of all his nerves in the presence of this unhappiness,
which disclosed itself to him in so brutal a manner, he required a
prodigious effort. What? Was this his mother? That contorted mouth,
so full of bitterness, which was contracted so sharply when she
uttered coarse words, was that his mother's mouth? Had misery and
anger changed her so much? He raised his eyes and looked at her,
to see if traces of the old-time gentleness still lingered on the
maternal visage. How gentle he had always known this mother to be
formerly! What a beautiful and tender creature she always was! And
how tenderly he had loved her in his childhood, in his adolescence.
In those days Donna Silveria was tall and svelte, pale and delicate;
her hair was almost blond, her eyes black; all her person bore the
stamp of a noble race, for she descended from that Spina family
which, like the Aurispas, has its armorial bearings sculptured
beneath the portal of the Santa Maria Maggiore. What an
affectionate being she used to be! Why, therefore, this great
change? The son was distressed by all his mother's abrupt gestures,
at the bitterness of her words, at all the ravages which a rancorous
hate had made in her features; and he was distressed also to see his
father covered with so much ignominy, to find such a terrible abyss
yawning between the two beings to whom he owed his existence.
And what an existence!
"You understand, George!" insisted his mother. "You must be
energetic. When will you speak to him? Make up your mind."
He heard her, and he felt at the bottom of his entrails the shock
of a thrill of horror; and he said to himself: "Oh! mother, demand of
me everything, ask of me the most atrocious of sacrifices; but spare
me this step, do not compel me to do that. I am a coward." At the
thought that he must face his father, that he must accomplish an act
of vigor, and of his own will, an unconquerable repugnance arose
from the very roots of his being. He would prefer to have a hand cut
off.
 "Very well, mother," he replied gloomily. "I will speak to him. I
will wait for a favorable opportunity."
He took her in his arms and kissed her cheeks as if to tacitly
demand forgiveness for the lie; for he said to himself: "I shall not
find a favorable opportunity. I shall not say anything."
They stayed in the embrasure of the window. The mother
opened the shutters, saying:
"They are about to take away Don Defendente Scioli's body."
They leaned on the balcony, side by side. Then, looking up at
the sky, she added:
"What a day this has been!"
Guardiagrele, the city of stone, shone resplendent in the
serenity of May. A fresh breeze agitated the grasses on the
gargoyles. In every crevice, from the base to the summit, Santa
Maria Maggiore was adorned with minute, delicate plants, bloomed
with innumerable violet flowers, and as the old cathedral reared its
head in the azure sky it seemed clad in a double mantle of marble
flowers and of living flowers.
"I will not see Hippolyte again," thought George. "I have dark
forebodings. I know that, in five or six days, I shall go to seek the
hermitage of our dreams; but, at the same time, I know that it will
be in vain, that I shall achieve nothing, that I shall hurl myself
against an unknown obstacle! How strange and indefinable are my
feelings! It is not I who know; but some one in me knows that all is
about to end."
He thought: "She does not write to me any more. Since I am
here I have received from her only two short telegrams—one from
Pallanza, the other from Bellagio. I never felt so far away from her.
Perhaps at this moment another man pleases her. Is it possible that
love falls out of a woman's heart all at once? Why not? Her heart is
tired; at Albano, warmed anew by buried memories, it palpitated for
perhaps the last time. I was mistaken. But certain incidents, for him
who knows how to consider them under their ideal forms, bear in
themselves secret significance, precise and independent of
appearances. Well! when I examine in thought all the little incidents
constituting our life at Albano, they assume an unquestionable
significance and an evident character; they are final. On the evening
of Good Friday, when we arrived at the station at Rome, and when
we said good-by, and the cab carried her off in the fog, did it not
seem to me that I had just lost her forever? Had I not the innate
conviction that all was at an end?" His imagination presented to him
the gesture with which Hippolyte had lowered her black veil after the
last kiss. And the sun, the azure, the flowers, the general joyousness
of nature, suggested to him only this reflection: "Without her, life for
me is impossible."
At this moment his mother leaned over the balustrade, looked
towards the porch of the cathedral, and said:
"The procession is leaving the church."
The funereal brotherhood left the porch with its insignia. Four
men in cowled robes carried the coffin on their shoulders. Two long
files of men, also in cowled robes, marched behind with lighted
tapers, only their eyes being visible through the two holes in their
hoods. From time to time the breeze made the tiny and almost
invisible flames flicker, and even extinguished some of them; and the
candles consumed themselves in tears. Each cowled man had at his
side a barefooted child, who collected the melted wax in the hollow
of his two hands.
When the whole cortège had spread out in the street, musicians
dressed in red with white facings struck up a funeral march. The
undertaker's assistants regulated their steps to the time of the
music; the brass instruments glittered in the sun.
"What sadness and ridicule in the honors rendered to the dead!"
thought George. He saw himself in a coffin, imprisoned between the
boards, carried by that masquerade of people, escorted by those
candles and that horrible noise of trumpets; and the idea filled him
with disgust. Then his attention was attracted to the ragged urchins
who strove to collect the waxen tears, walking unevenly, painfully,
the body bent, their eyes fixed on the flickering flames.
"Poor Don Defendente!" murmured the mother, watching the
cortège as it disappeared in the distance.
Then, immediately, as if she were addressing herself and not
her son, she added wearily:
"Why poor? He is at peace now; it is we who are to be pitied."
George looked at her. Their eyes met; and she smiled at him,
but a smile so faint that not a line of her face was moved. It was like
a very light veil, scarcely visible, which had spread over this face
ever stamped with sorrow. But the imperceptible gleam of this smile
had the same effect on George as some sudden great illumination;
and then, for the first time, he saw distinctly on the maternal face
the irremediable work of a great grief.
Confronted with the terrible revelation which came to him from
this smile, an impetuous wave of tenderness welled up in his bosom.
His mother, his own mother, could no longer smile but in that way—
only in that way. Henceforth the stigmas of suffering would be
indelible on the dear face which he had seen bent over him so often,
and with such affection, in sickness and in affliction! His mother, his
own mother, was killing herself little by little, was wearing herself out
day by day, was drifting slowly to the inevitable tomb! And what
caused his own suffering just now, while his mother was breathing
out her distress, was not the maternal sorrow so much as the wound
inflicted on his egotism, the shock given his unstrung nerves by the
unvarnished expression of this sorrow.
"Oh! mother," he stammered, suffocated by tears.
And he took her hands and drew her into the room.
"What's the matter, George? What's the matter, my child?"
asked the mother, frightened at seeing his face all bathed in tears.
"What's the matter? Tell me."
Ah, now he had found the dear voice again, that unique,
unforgettable voice, which touched his soul to its very bottom; that
voice of consolation, of forgiveness, of good advice, of infinite
goodness, which he had heard in his darkest days—he had found it
again, he had found it! In short, he recognized the tender creature
of long ago, the adored one.
"Oh! mother, mother!"
And he pressed her in his arms, sobbing, wetting her with
burning tears; kissing her cheeks, her eyes, her forehead, in a wild
transport.
"My poor mother!"
He made her sit down, knelt before her, and looked at her. He
looked at her for a long time, as if it were the first time he had seen
her after a long separation. She, her mouth contracted, with a sob
but badly concealed which choked her, asked:
"Have I pained you very much?"
She dried her son's tears and caressed his hair. Then, in a voice
interspersed with convulsive starts, she said:
"No, George. No! It is not for you to suffer. God has kept you far
away from this house. It is not for you to suffer. All my life, since
your birth, all my life, always, always, I have sought to spare you a
single pain, a moment's unhappiness. Oh! why did I not have the
strength to remain silent this time? I should have said nothing; I
should not have told you. Forgive me, George. I did not think I
should cause you so much unhappiness. Don't cry any more, I
entreat you. George, I entreat you, don't cry any more. I cannot
bear to see you cry."
She was on the point of breaking down, overcome by anguish.
"See," he said, "I am not crying now."
He leaned his head on his mother's knees, and beneath the
caress of the maternal fingers soon became calm. From time to time
a sob shook his body. Through his mind, in the form of vague
sensations, passed once more the distant afflictions of his
adolescence. He heard the twittering of the swallows, the grating of
the scissors grinder's wheel, the shrill cries on the streets—familiar
sounds, heard in the afternoons of long ago, which used to make his
heart grow faint. After the crisis, his soul found itself in a state of
indefinable fluctuation. But the image of Hippolyte reappeared; and
he felt within him a new upheaval, so tumultuous that the young
man gave vent to a sigh on his mother's knees.
 "How you sigh!" she murmured, bending over him. Without
raising his eyelids, he smiled; but an immense prostration came over
him—a desolate lassitude, a desperate desire to withdraw from this
truceless struggle.
The desire to live left him little by little, as the heat gradually
leaves a corpse.
Of the recent emotion nothing remained; his mother had once
more become a stranger to him. "What could he do for her? Save
her? Restore peace to her? Restore to her health and happiness? But
was not the disaster irreparable? Henceforth, was not this woman's
existence forever poisoned? His mother could no longer be a refuge
for him as in the days of his childhood, in the bygone years. She
could neither understand, console, nor cure him. Their souls, their
lives, were too different. She could only offer him the spectacle of
his own torture!"
He arose, embraced her, disengaged himself, went out,
ascended to his room, and leaned on the balcony. He saw the
Majella all pink in the twilight, enormous and delicate, against a
greenish sky. The deafening cries of the swallows which were
whirling around drove him in. He went to lie down on his bed.
As he lay on his back, he thought to himself: "Good; I live, I
breathe. But what is the substance of my life? To what forces is it
subjected? What laws govern it? I do not belong to myself—I escape
from myself. The sensation I have of my being resembles that of a
man who, condemned to hold himself upright on a surface
constantly in oscillation and never in equilibrium, feels support
constantly lacking, no matter where he places his foot. I am in a
perpetual anguish, and even this anguish is not well defined. Is it
the anguish of the fugitive who feels someone at his heels? Is it the
anguish of the follower who can never reach his aim? Perhaps it is
both."
The swallows twittered as they passed and repassed in flocks,
like black arrows, before the pale rectangle formed by the balcony.
"What do I lack? What is the lacuna of my moral being? What is
the cause of my impotency? I have the most ardent desire to live, to
give all my faculties a rhythmic development, to feel myself complete
and harmonious. And, on the contrary, I secretly destroy myself
every day; each day my life goes out by invisible and innumerable
fissures; I am like a half-emptied bladder, which becomes misshapen
in a thousand different ways at every agitation of the liquid it
contains. All my strength does not serve me more than to enable me
to drag, with immense fatigue, a little grain of dust to which my
imagination gives the weight of a gigantic rock. A perpetual conflict
confuses all my thoughts and renders them sterile. What is it I lack?
Who is it holds in his power that portion of my being which eludes
my consciousness and yet which, I feel sure, is indispensable for the
continuance of my life? Or rather, is not this portion of my existence
already dead, so that only death will enable me to regain it? Yes,
that is it. In fact, death attracts me."
The bells of Santa Maria Maggiore tolled for vespers. Again he
saw the funeral convoy, the coffin, the cowled men, and the ragged
children who strove to collect the waxen tears, walking unevenly,
painfully, the body bent, their eyes fixed on the flickering flames.
These children greatly preoccupied him. Later, when he wrote to
his mistress, he developed the secret allegory which his mind,
interested in such studies, had confusedly perceived:
 "One of them, sickly, yellowish, leaning with one arm on a
crutch and collecting the wax in the hollow of his disengaged hand,
dragged himself along by the side of a species of giant with a hood,
whose enormous fist brutally grasped the taper. I still see them both,
and I shall not forget them. Perhaps there is something in myself
which makes me resemble that child. My real life is in the power of
some one, a mysterious and unknowable being who holds it in a
grasp of iron; and I see it being consumed, and I drag myself after
it, and I tire myself trying to collect at least a few drops, and every
drop that falls burns my poor hand."

CHAPTER III.

On the table, in a vase, there was a bunch of fresh roses, May roses,
which Camille, his younger sister, had gathered in the garden.
Around the table were seated the father, the mother, the brother
Diego, Albert—Camille's fiancé, invited to dinner—and the elder
sister Christine, with her husband and child, a blond boy with a
snowy-white complexion, fragile as a blooming lily.
George was seated between his father and mother. Christine's
husband, Don Bartolomeo Celaia, Baron of Palleaura, was speaking
of municipal intrigues in an irritating tone. He was a man
approaching fifty, dried up, bald at the top of his head, as if
tonsured, his face clean shaven. The almost insolent acrimony of his
gestures and manners contrasted strangely with his ecclesiastic
aspect.