southwest,--there the landscape before him lay flat and bare in
the beamy lustre of the moon. The soil was sandy and heavy to the
tread,--moreover it was an excessively hot night,--too hot to walk
fast. He glanced at his watch,--it was a few minutes past ten
o'clock. Keeping up the moderate pace the heat enforced, it was
possible he might reach the mysterious field about half-past
eleven, . . perhaps earlier. And now his nerves began to quiver with
strong excitement, . . had he yielded to the promptings of his own
feverish impatience, he would most probably have run all the way
in spite of the sultriness of the air,--but he restrained this
impulse, and walked leisurely on purpose, reproaching himself as
he went along for the utter absurdity of his expectations.

"Was ever madman more mad than I!" he murmured with some self-
contempt--"What logical human being in his right mind would be
guilty of such egregious folly! But am I logical? Certainly not!
Am I in my right mind? I think I am,--yet I may be wrong. The
question remains, ... what IS logic? ... and what IS being in
one's right mind? No one can absolutely decide! Let me see if I
can review calmly my ridiculous position. It comes to this,--I
insist on being mesmerized ... I have a dream, ... and I see a
woman in the dream"--here he suddenly corrected himself ... "a
woman did I say? No! ... she was something far more than that! A
lovely phantom--a dazzling creature of my own imagination ... an
exquisite ideal whom I will one day immortalize ... yes!--
IMMORTALIZE in song!"

He raised his eyes as he spoke to the dusky firmament thickly
studded with stars, and just then caught sight of a fleecy silver-
rimmed cloud passing swiftly beneath the moon and floating