Nothing could be more immense than the difference, more wild than the
incongruity between them. It was sickness hand-in-hand with health;
pain marshalled face to face with enjoyment; darkness ranged in
monstrous discordance by the very side of light.
The next instant--just as the astonished senator was endeavouring to
frame a suitable answer to the solemn adjuration that had been addressed
to him--Ulpius seized his arm, and opening a door at the inner extremity
of the apartment, led him up some stairs that conducted to the interior
of the house.
They passed the hall, on the floor of which still lay the fragments of
the broken lute, dimly distinguishable in the soft light of daybreak;
and ascending another staircase, paused at a little door at the top,
which Ulpius cautiously opened, and in a moment afterwards Vetranio was
admitted into Antonina's bed-chamber.
The room was of no great extent; its scanty furniture was of the most
ordinary description; no ornaments glittered on its walls; no frescoes
adorned its ceiling; and yet there was a simple elegance in its
appearance, an unobtrusive propriety in its minutest details, which made
it at once interesting and attractive to the eye.
Pages:
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260