A central aisle of
waters, paved by the golden rays of a lyric sun high overhead, was
embellished on either side by the marmoreal splendours of stately
palaces. An ilex inclined its graceful head to its liquid image; men
moved the blocks that made famous in the mouth of the world Queen Dido's
Carthage. Clouds of pearl-coloured smoke encircled the enchanting
picture. And the galleys came and went in this symphonic, glittering
spectacle.
"Turner would have died of envy," said Gerald aloud. There was a
remarkable vibration of life, not as he had seen it in mechanical
bioscopes, but the vivid life of earth and sunshine.
The scenes that succeeded were many: episodes from profane and sacred
histories; simulacra of the great saints. A war between giants and
pygmies was shown with all its accompanying horrors. The firmament
dripped crimson. The four cryptic creatures of Ezekiel's vision came out
of the north, a great cloud of "infolding fire" and the colour was
amber. A cyclopean and dazzling staircase thronged by moving angelic
shapes, harping mute harps, stretched from sea to sky, melting into the
milky way like the tail of a starry serpent.
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