There, like a mass of fruit and flowers
in a red gold bowl, Sorrento lay in the basin of the surrounding
mountains, all gilded above and full of rich shadows below. Over all,
the great Santangelo raised his misty head against the pale green
eastern sky, gazing down at the life below, at the living land and the
living sea, and remembering, perhaps, the silent days before life was,
or looking forward to the night to come in which there will be no life
left any more. For who shall tell me that the earth herself may not be a
living, thinking, feeling being, on whose not unkindly bosom we wear out
our little lives, but whose high loves are with the stars, beyond our
sight, and her voice too deep and musical for ears used to our shrill
human speech? Who shall say surely that she is not conscious of our
presence, of some of our doings when we tear her breast and lay burdens
upon her neck and plough up her fair skin with our hideous works, or
when we touch her kindly and love her, and plant sweet flowers in soft
places? Who shall know and teach us that the summer breeze is not her
breath, the storm the sobbing of her passion, the rain her woman's
tears--that she is not alive, loving and suffering, as we all have been,
are, or would be, but greater than we as the star she loves somewhere is
greater and stronger than herself? And we live upon her, and feed on her
and all die and are taken back into her whence we came, wondering much
of the truth that is hidden, learning perhaps at last the great secret
she keeps so well.
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