The Last Days of Pompeii, page 289 by Edward Bulwer-Lytton
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ght scarcely makes a bridge between them. One moment of darker purple in the sky--of a thousand rose-hues in the water--of shade half victorious over light; and then burst forth at once the countless stars--the moon is up--night has resumed her reign!
Brightly then, and softly bright, fell the moonbeams over the antique grove consecrated to Cybele--the stately trees, whose date went beyond tradition, cast their long shadows over the soil, while through the openings in their boughs the stars shone, still and frequent. The whiteness of the small sacellum in the centre of the grove, amidst the dark foliage, had in it something abrupt and startling; it recalled at once the purpose to which the wood was consecrated--its holiness and solemnity.
With a swift and stealthy pace, Calenus, gliding under the shade of the trees, reached the chapel, and gently putting back the boughs that completely closed around its rear, settled himself in his concealment; a concealment so complete, what with the fane in front and the trees behind, that no unsuspicious passenger could possibly have detected him. Again, all was apparently solitary in the grove: afar off you heard faintly the voices of some noisy revellers or the music that played cheerily to the groups that then, as now in those climates, during the nights of summer, lingered in the streets, and enjoyed, in the fresh air and the liquid moonlight, a milder day.
From the height on which the grove was placed, you saw through the intervals of the trees the broad and purple sea, rippling in the distance, the white villas of Stabiae in the curving shore, and the dim Lectiarian hills mingling with the delicious sky. Presently the tall figure of Arbaces, in his way to the house of Diomed, entered the extreme end of the grove; and at the same instant Apaecides, also bound to his appointment with Olinthus, crossed the Egyptian's path.
'Hem! Apaecides,' said Arbaces, recognizing the priest at a glance; 'when last we met, you were my foe. I have wished since t