The dome-
like roof of this hall was of marble variously colored, and the floor
tessellated and mosaicked in grotesque and graceful figures of Vesuvian
lavas and painted porcelain.
The tables, couches, chairs, and _vis-a-vis_ in this hall were of plain
pattern and neutral dead colors, not to overpower or fade the pictures on
the walls, or the gold and Parian service of the cedar tables.
But the chief beauty of this unequalled supper-room was an immense bronze
candelabrum, which rose in the centre from a column of black marble. It
was the figure of an Italian elm, slender and of thin foliage, embraced,
almost enveloped, in a vine, which reached out and supported itself in
hanging from all the branches; the twigs bearing fruit, not of grapes, but
of a hundred little spheres of crimson, violet, and golden light, whose
combination produced a soft atmosphere of no certain color.
Neither Honoria, Dalton, nor myself remained long in the gallery. We
retired with a select few, and were served in an antechamber, separated
from the grand reception-room by an arch, through which, by putting aside
a silk curtain, Honoria could see, at a distance, any that entered, as
they passed in from the hall.
My own position was such that I could look over her shoulder and see as
she saw. _Vis-a-vis_ with her, and consequently with myself, was Adonais,
a celebrated author, and person of the _beau monde_.
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