es plates, les coups et les abeilles...._

That brought tranquillity back to me. I found another poem--his
"Amsterdam."

_Les maisons pointues ont l'air de pencher. On dirait
Qu'elles tombent. Les mats des vaisseaux qui s'embrouillent
Dans le ciel sont penches comme des branches seches
Au milieu de verdure, de raye, de rouille,
De harengs saurs, de peaux de moutons et de bouille._

_Robinson Crusoe passa par Amsterdam
(Je crois du moins qu'il y passa) en revenant
De l'ile ombreuse et verte aux noix de coco fraiches.
Quelle emotion il dut avoir quand il vit luire
Les portes enormes, aux lourds marteaux, de cette ville!..._

_Regardait-il curieusement les entresols
Ou les commis ecrivent les livres de comptes?
Eut-il envie de pleurer en resongeant
A son cher perroquet, a son lourd parasol,
Qui l'abritait dans l'ile attristee et clemente?..._

I was asleep; my eyes closed; the book fell from my hand. Some one
near me seemed to repeat in the air the words:

_Robinson Crusoe passa par Amsterdam
(Je crois, du moins, qu'il y passa) en revenant
De l'ile ombreuse....
"De l'ile ombreuse" ... "Robinson Crusoe passa" ..._

I was rocked in the hot golden air. I slept heavily, deeply, without
dreams....

I was awakened by a cold fierce apprehension of terror. I sat up,
stared slowly around me with the sure, certain conviction that some
dreadful thing had occurred. The orchard was as it had been--the sun,
lower now, shone through the green branches. All was still and even,
as I listened I heard the sharp crack of the ball upon the bat
breaking the evening air. My heart had simply ceased to beat. I
remember that with a hand that trembled I picked up the book that was
lying open on the grass and read, without understanding them, the
words. I remember that I said, out aloud: "Something's happened," then
turning saw Semyonov's face.

I realised nothing save his face with its pale square beard and red
lips, framed there by the shining green and blue. He stood there,
without moving, staring at me, and the memory of his eyes even now as
I write of it hurts me physically so that my own eyes close.

That was perhaps the worst moment of my life, that confrontation of
Semyonov. He stood there as though carved in stone (his figure had
always the stiff clear outline of stone or wood). I realised nothing
of his body--I simply saw his eyes, that were starin