Lewiston teller. [volume] (Lewiston, North Idaho) 1878-1900, 1890-07-24

-.- after dinner, while
smoking his cigar.
Possessor of q great name and col
lossal fortune, related to the most
ancient families of Roman practici-
ate, the count had made marriage
otlove. He had espoused, five years
previously, the daughter of Prince
Cinella-superb and placid as a
Raphael blonde and stately as u
Titan. A cultivated man-elegant,
young. handsome, loving and beloved
the count could not be other than
perfectly happy, ADD he was. During
eight months of the year, from No
vember to June, he dwelt in Florence,
the city o: palaces and pleasures. At
the periods of intense heat he came
to Casamiccola and installed himself
in q coquettish, vine clad little villa,
hung on the tanks OF the mountain.
by the side the sea, between the blue
of the water and the blue ofthe sky
a corner made tor reading love sto-
ries and for loving. He lived here
during the summer, enjoying with
his wife the solitude deux, drinking
in long draughus OF love, enchanted
with the sunlight-a spoiled child of
fortune.
One suffocating evening toward
the last of July, the count accord.
ing to his custom, shortly after din
ner kissed his wife and went out. 1t
was about eight o'clock. The air
was sultry and oppressive; not a
breath OF wind stirred among the
leaves of the fig and orange trees,
white with dust. The sea, OF an
azure Opaque and profound, stretched
away toward the horizon smooth as
a sea of oil, and the sky, saturated
with heat, was OF a blue SO intense
and implacahle as to appear stone
gray. Along the winding streets,
peasants, seated on the doors,eps,
were drinking Sicilian wine from the
wide mouthed, leathern bottles, and
groups of beautiful young girls,
brown MS the Florentine bronzes.
flung back and forth, amid peals of
laughter, flowers less red than the
coral of their lips. Barefooted ur-
chins with eyes of jet. were driving
the white goats slowly homeward;
long after they had passed, the tink-
ling of the little bells, hung round
their necks, could be heard.
This charming spectacle, always
the same, yet always new, never
wearied the count. He reached the
top OF the hill and passed rapidly
out to the quay. The night had
come, superb, and the stars appear
ed. one by one, like eyes ofgold look
ing down on the slumbering island.
Suddenly, in second, in less time
than it takes the lightning to fash,
the earth trembled as if shaken by
the march of invisible armies-armies
of giants. The sea, chopping and
agitated, hurled it's waves together
in wild confusion; the heavens yelled
themselves in black; a sulphurous
wind, like n blast from a furnace.
breathed devastation, and in awful
darkness, the count, terrified, recon-
mending his soul to God in that su-
preme instant of lucidity which al
ways precedes n dreadful death, was
thrown violently forward on his face
The first thing which Count Jeppi
saw on regaining consciousness was
n star looking down at him, then
two, then three, and all the beautiful
cortege of the silent sky. He re-
manned motionless n few moments,
uncertain what had happened to
him, then he arose and walked n few
steps, he was not wounded. What,
then, had taken place? What for
midable power had thrown him, I'M
resisting. to the ground? The
Gus sea was washing the beach with
it's silvery waves, the heavens were
clear as the eyes Of n bride, gentle
breeze was stirring-all was calm!
Yet strange circumstance, he no
longer recognized the country about
him, the horizon seemed to him moro
even and more level than before.
Suddenly, hecomprehended oil, the
frightful truth-the earthquake!