face was silver and shadows to the moon; the river, in its soft grey,
shaking golden sequins among the folds of its shadows, fell open like a
garment before him, to reveal the white moon-glitter brilliant as living
flesh. Mechanically, overcast with the reality of the moonlight, he took
his seat in the train, and watched the moving of things. He was in a
kind of trance, his consciousness seeming suspended. The train slid out
amongst lights and dark places. Siegmund watched the endless movement,
fascinated.

This was one of the crises of his life. For years he had suppressed his
soul, in a kind of mechanical despair doing his duty and enduring the
rest. Then his soul had been softly enticed from its bondage. Now he was
going to break free altogether, to have at least a few days purely for
his own joy. This, to a man of his integrity, meant a breaking of bonds,
a severing of blood-ties, a sort of new birth. In the excitement of this
last night his life passed out of his control, and he sat at the
carriage-window, motionless, watching things move.

He felt busy within him a strong activity which he could not help.
Slowly the body of his past, the womb which had nourished him in one
fashion for so many years, was casting him forth. He was trembling in
all his being, though he knew not with what. All he could do now was to
watch the lights go by, and to let the translation of himself continue.

When at last the train ran out into the full, luminous night, and
Siegmund saw the meadows deep in moonlight, he quivered with a low
anticipation. The elms, great grey shadows, seemed to loiter in their
cloaks across the pale fields. He had not seen them so before. The world
was changing.