He walked on, wrapped in his own thoughts, and an invisible power urged him forward.
The darkness was beginning to fall, and the stars twinkled merrily in the serene skies, dappled here and there with light clouds.
The air was calm and motionless.
It was the hour when the bleatings of sheep returning from the pasture grounds were wont to be heard upon the hills;—those clear, monotonous bleatings, the dying echoes of which awaken so many sweet recollections of pastoral life!
But that night nothing broke the ominous silence.
The traveler had gone a long way on his nocturnal journey when there burst suddenly upon his sight, in the dark distance, large patches of light which, scattered here and there, constantly changed into new and countless shapes. Now they widened and seemed vast; now they diminished and almost disappeared, or raised snake-like blazing columns high in the air. Then of a sudden they would stand still for a minute or two, and then, as if gaining new strength, the fiery stream would rush in another direction.
He paused, and for a few moments gazed, motionless. He could not tell what was happening. He thought that perhaps they were hay-stacks which had caught fire and were burning. But so familiar was he with all that neighborhood that he doubted his own theory. He knew that in that region hay was not mown so early in the season. He knew too well, alas, that in the bosom of the valleys, where the fire was raging so fiercely, there were numerous large and small Armenian villages.
The young man made no effort to approach any of these villages. He was in that state of suspense when one feels but ceases to reason, and all these scenes came and went before his eyes as in a dream.
He turned out of the road and climbed a hill covered with thick bushes. It was midnight. For the first time he looked up at the sky and saw that the "Cross of Tiritades"[1] stood just at the zenith. He sat down on a stone to rest awhile.
- ↑ The name of a constellation.
