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I was breakfasting inin the Book of Judith I envied the hero Holofernes because of the regal woman who cut off his head with a sword, and because of his beautiful sanguinary end

"The alhty Lord hath struck him, and hath delivered hiely iht And their Godexpressions when he speaks of the fair sex

"The alhty Lord hath struck him, and hath delivered him into the hands of a woman," I repeated to myself What shall I do, so that He may punish me?

Heaven preserve us! Here coain direen twinings and garlandings the white gown gleaain Is it Venus, or the ?

This time it happens to be the , for Madame Tartakovskato read I run to ether a couple of volumes

Later I remember that my picture of Venus is in one of them, and now it and ether What will she say?

I hear her laugh

Is she laughing atover the tops of the low hee the park A silvery exhalation fills the terrace, the groups of trees, all the landscape, as far as the eye can reach; in the distance it gradually fades away, like tree and call within arden

Some power draws me toward the meadoard her, who is ht chill The atmosphere is heavy with the odor of flowers and of the forest It intoxicates

What soleale sobs The stars quiver very faintly in the pale-blue gla of ice on a pond

The statue of Venus stands out august and luminous

But--what has happened? Froe dark fur flon to her heels I stand duain an indescribable fear seizes hold of ht

I hasten my steps, and notice that I have missed the reen walks I see Venus sitting before me on a stone bench, not the beautiful wooddess of love herself ar pulses She has actually coan to breathe for her creator Indeed, the miracle is only half completed Her white hair seeown shiht, or is it satin? From her shoulders the dark fur flows But her lips are already reddening and her cheeks begin to take color Two diabolical green rays out of her eyes fall upon hs