en some dozen of girls came
rushing towards me.

But before I had time to inquire into the cause of their excitement, or
to observe them more closely, a gray-haired woman, with a pale,
terror-stricken face, seized hold of my hand, crying:

"The Madonna be praised, he has a violin! Hasten, hasten! Follow us or
she will die!"

And then the girls, beckoning and gesticulating, laid hold of my arm, my
coat, my hand, some pulling, some pushing me along, all jabbering and
crying together, and repeating more and more urgently the only words
that I could make out--"Musica! Musica!"

But while I stared at them in blank amazement, thinking they must all
have lost their wits together, I was unconsciously being dragged and
pulled along till we came to a kind of ruined marble staircase, down
which they hurried me into something still resembling a spacious
chamber; for though the wild fig-tree and cactus pushed their fantastic
branches through gaps in the walls, these stood partly upright as yet,
discovering in places the dull red glow of weather-stained
wall-paintings.

The floor, too, was better preserved than any I had seen; though cracked
and in part overrun by ivy, it showed portions of the original white and
black tessellated work.

On this floor, with her head pillowed on a shattered capital, lay a
prostrate figure without life or motion, and with limbs rigidly extended
as in death.

The old woman, throwing herself on her knees before this lifeless
figure, loosened the handkerchief round her neck, and then, as though to
feel whether life yet lingered, she put her hand on the heart of the
unconscious girl, when, suddenly jumping up again, she ran to me,
panting:--

"O sir, good sir, play, play for the love of the Madonna!" And the
others all echoed as with one voice, "Musica! Musica!"

"Is this a time to make music?" cried I, in angry bewilderment. "The
girl seems dying or dead. Run quick for a doctor--or stay, if you will
tell me where he lives I will go myself and bring him hither with
all speed."

For all answer the gray-haired woman, who was evidently the girl's
mother, fell at my feet, and clasping my knees, cried in a voice broken
by sobs, "O good sir, kind sir, my girl has been bitten by the
tarantula! Nothing in the world can save her but you, if with your
playing you can make her rise up and dance!"

Then darting back once more to the girl, who lay as motionless as
before, she screamed in shrill despair,