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'Bring me round to the Bower, said Silas, when the bargain was closed, 'next Saturday evening, and if a sociable glass of old Jamaikey warm should meet your views, I am not the man to begrudge it. 'You are aware of my being poor company, sir, replied Mr Venus, 'but be it so. It being so, here is Saturday evening come, and here is Mr Venus come, and ringing at the Bower-gate.
The typical Venus is fined down from the full growth of human shape to fit the artist's conception of what beauty should be. Her frame is rounded; her limbs are rounded; her neck is rounded; the least possible appearance of fulness is removed; any line that is not in exact accordance with a strict canon is worked out in short, an ideal is produced, but humanity is obliterated.
"See," he said, "this is a testimonial which I have had made out for me at Venice by the Duke di Grimani, affirming that Titian's Venus is his property, and that you spent three months in his palace painting a copy of the original.
What, have you not heard, that it is a custome among men to sweare by the puissance of the Gods, and the Gods do sweare by the majesty of the river Stix? but give me thy bottle, and sodainly he tooke it, and filled it with the water of the river, and taking his flight through those cruell and horrible dragons, brought it unto Psyches: who being very joyfull thereof, presented it to Venus, who would not yet be appeased, but menacing more and more said, What, thou seemest unto me a very witch and enchauntresse, that bringest these things to passe, howbeit thou shalt do nothing more.
Here was the gayety of the period the soft wine of eyes, the songs that flurried hearts, the toasts and tie bouquets, the dances and the dinners. Here was a Venus of the hansom, cab, the Gibson girl in her glorious prime. Here was... ...here was you.
The disguise and recognition of Venus as she appears to her son, the busy scene of city-building, the sudden revelation of Æneas to the Queen, have the note of exquisite romance. The honey-sweet of the lover's tale, to use the poet's own simile, steals subtly on the graver epic.
There is a soft rustling in the twigs and blades and the pages of my book rustle and on the terrace likewise there is a rustling. A woman's dress She is there Venus but without furs No, this time it is merely the widow and yet Venus-oh, what a woman! As she stands there in her light white morning gown, looking at me, her slight figure seems full of poetry and grace.
It spoke to him of the fruitful awakening, of the eternal protest of Nature and life, Venus and Hercules, whom one may bury for centuries beneath the soil, but who, nevertheless, one day arise from it, and though one may seek to wall them up within the domineering, stubborn, immutable Vatican, reign yet even there, and rule the whole, wide world with sovereign power!
Bridges, who was within hearing distance, shrugged with an assumption of careless indifference. "It takes more 'n a little lather to scare me," he boasted. "I'm a divin' Venus and I ate it up!" "You liar!" Lucky cried. "Why, every quill on your head was standing up and you look five years older 'n you did this morning!
So that in the end, there ran such multitudes of people one after another to see her, that Antony was left post alone in the market-place, in his imperial seat to give audience: and there went a rumour in the people's mouths, that the goddess Venus was come to play with the god Bacchus, for the general good of all Asia. When Cleopatra landed, Antony sent to invite her to supper to him.
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