,
there--I was trying to recollect a quotation (as _I_ think) of Stael's,
from some Teutonic sophist about architecture. "Architecture," says this
Macoronico Tedescho, "reminds me of frozen music." It is somewhere--but
where?--the demon of perplexity must know and won't tell. I asked M.,
and he said it was not in her: but Puysegur said it must be _hers_, it
was so _like_. H. laughed, as he does at all "_De l'Allemagne_"--in
which, however, I think he goes a little too far. B., I hear, contemns
it too. But there are fine passages;--and, after all, what is a
work--any--or every work--but a desert with fountains, and, perhaps, a
grove or two, every day's journey? To be sure, in Madame, what we often
mistake, and "pant for," as the "cooling stream," turns out to be the
"_mirage_" (critice _verbiage_); but we do, at last, get to something
like the temple of Jove Ammon, and then the waste we have passed is only
remembered to gladden the contrast.
Called on C--, to explain----. She is very beautiful, to my taste, at
least; for on coming home from abroad, I recollect being unable to look
at any woman but her--they were so fair, and unmeaning, and _blonde_.
The darkness and regularity of her features reminded me of my "Jannat al
Aden." But this impression wore off; and now I can look at a fair woman,
without longing for a Houri. She was very good-tempered, and every thing
was explained.
To-day, great news--"the Dutch have taken Holland,"--which, I suppose,
will be succeeded by the actual explosion of the Thames.
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