As she went with Smain farther into the recesses of the garden the voice
of the waterfall died away. No birds were singing. Domini thought that
perhaps they dared not sing lest they might wake the sun from its golden
reveries, but afterwards, when she knew the garden better, she often
heard them twittering with a subdued, yet happy, languor, as if joining
in a nocturn upon the edge of sleep. Under the trees the sand was
yellow, of a shade so voluptuously beautiful that she longed to touch
it with her bare feet like Smain. Here and there it rose in symmetrical
little pyramids, which hinted at absent gardeners, perhaps enjoying a
siesta.
Never before had she fully understood the enchantment of green, quite
realised how happy a choice was made on that day of Creation when it was
showered prodigally over the world. But now, as she walked secretly over
the yellow sand between the rills, following the floating green robe of
Smain, she rested her eyes, and her soul, on countless mingling shades
of the delicious colour; rough, furry green of geranium leaves, silver
green of olives, black green of distant palms from which the sun held
aloof, faded green of the eucalyptus, rich, emerald green of fan-shaped,
sunlit palms, hot, sultry green of bamboos, dull, drowsy green of
mulberry trees and brooding chestnuts.
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