ead the sky was radiant with arrowy bolts which
clove their way to the zenith, paused, curved gracefully downward, then
burst into brilliant fountain-sprays of richly colored sparks. The red
fires died slowly down, within the Castle, and presently the shell grew
nearly black outside; the angry glare that shone out through the broken
arches and innumerable sashless windows, now, reproduced the aspect
which the Castle must have borne in the old time when the French
spoilers saw the monster bonfire which they had made there fading and
spoiling toward extinction.

While we still gazed and enjoyed, the ruin was suddenly enveloped in
rolling and rumbling volumes of vaporous green fire; then in dazzling
purple ones; then a mixture of many colors followed, then drowned the
great fabric in its blended splendors. Meantime the nearest bridge had
been illuminated, and from several rafts anchored in the river, meteor
showers of rockets, Roman candles, bombs, serpents, and Catharine wheels
were being discharged in wasteful profusion into the sky--a marvelous
sight indeed to a person as little used to such spectacles as I was. For
a while the whole region about us seemed as bright as day, and yet the
rain was falling in torrents all the time. The evening's entertainment
presently closed, and we joined the innumerable caravan of half-drowned
strangers, and waded home again.

The Castle grounds are very ample and very beautiful; and as they joined
the Hotel grounds, with no fences to climb, but only some nobly shaded
stone stairways to descend, we spent a part of nearly every day in
idling through their smooth walks and leafy groves. There was an
attractive spot among the trees where were a great many wooden tables
and benches; and there one could sit in the shade and pretend to sip at
his foamy beaker of beer while he inspected the crowd. I say pretend,
because I only pretended to sip, without really sipping. That is the
polite way; but when you are ready to go, you empty the beaker at a
draught. There was a brass band, and it furnished excellent music every
afternoon. Sometimes so many people came that every seat was occupied,
every table filled. And never a rough in the assemblage--all nicely
dressed fathers and mothers, young gentlemen and ladies and children;
and plenty of university students and glittering officers; with here and
there a gray professor, or a peaceful old lady with her knitting; and
always a sprinkling of gawky fo