d the pepper-caster turrets of the Palais de Justice, the
small, murky tenements of the Quai de l'Horloge showed as far as the
clump of trees midway across the Pont-Neuf; then, as they went farther
on, other quays emerged from the mist, in the far distance: the Quai
Voltaire, the Quai Malaquais, the dome of the Institute of France, the
square pile of the Mint, a long grey line of frontages of which they
could not even distinguish the windows, a promontory of roofs, which,
with their stacks of chimney-pots, looked like some rugged cliff,
dipping down into a phosphorescent sea. In front, however, the Pavillon
de Flore lost its dreamy aspect, and became solidified in the final sun
blaze. Then right and left, on either bank of the river, came the long
vistas of the Boulevard de Sebastopol and the Boulevard du Palais;
the handsome new buildings of the Quai de la Megisserie, with the new
Prefecture of Police across the water; and the old Pont-Neuf, with
its statue of Henri IV. looking like a splash of ink. The Louvre, the
Tuileries followed, and beyond Grenelle there was a far-stretching
panorama of the slopes of Sevres, the country steeped in a stream of
sun rays. Claude never went farther. Christine always made him stop just
before they reached the Pont Royal, near the fine trees beside Vigier's
swimming baths; and when they turned round to shake hands once more in
the golden sunset now flushing into crimson, they looked back and, on
the horizon, espied the Isle Saint Louis, whence they had come, the
indistinct distance of the city upon which night was already descending
from the slate-hued eastern sky.

Ah! what splendid sunsets they beheld during those weekly strolls.
The sun accompanied them, as it were, amid the throbbing gaiety of the
quays, the river life, the dancing ripples of the currents; amid the
attractions of the shops, as warm as conservatories, the flowers sold by
the seed merchants, and the noisy cages of the bird fanciers; amid all
the din of sound and wealth of colour which ever make a city's waterside
its youthful part. As they proceeded, the ardent blaze of the western
sky turned to purple on their left, above the dark line of houses, and
the orb of day seemed to wait for them, falling gradually lower, slowly
rolling towards the distant roofs when once they had passed the Pont
Notre-Dame in front of the widening stream. In no ancient forest, on no
mountain road, beyond no grassy plain will there ever be s