Rivardi looked at him curiously.
"There is no such place then ?" he asked--"It is only a legend ?" "Only a legend!" replied Aloysius, slowly--"Some travellers say it is a mirage of the desert,--others tell stories of having heard the bells in the brazen towers ring,--but no one--NO ONE," and he repeated the words with emphasis--"has ever been able to reach even the traditional environs of the place.

Our hostess," and he smiled--"is a very wonderful little person, but even she will hardly be able to discover the undiscoverable!" "Can we say that anything is undiscoverable ?" suggested Rivardi.
Don Aloysius thought a moment before replying.
"Perhaps not!"-- he said, at last--"Our life all through is a voyage of discovery wherein we have no certainty of the port of arrival.

The puzzling part of it is that we often 'discover' what has been discovered before in past ages where the discoverers seemed to make no use of their discoveries!--and so we lose ourselves in wonder--and often in weariness!" He sighed,--then added--"Had we not better go in and prepare to meet our hostess at dinner?
And Giulio!--unbend your brows!--you must not get angry with your charming benefactress! If you do not let her have HER way, she will never let you have YOURS!" Rivardi gave a resigned gesture.
"Oh, MINE! I must give up all hope--she will never think of me more than as a workman who has carried out her design.

There is something very strange about her--she seems, at certain moments, to withdraw herself from all the interests of mere humanity.

To-day, for instance, she looked down from the air-ship on the swarming crowds in the streets of Naples and said 'Poor little microbes! How sad it is to see them crawling about and festering down there! What IS the use of them! I wish I knew!' Then, when I ventured to suggest that possibly they were more than 'microbes,'-- they were human beings that loved and worked and thought and created, she looked at me with those wonderful eyes of hers and answered--'Microbes do the same--only we don't take the trouble to think about them! But if we knew their lives and intentions, I dare say we should find they are quite as clever in their own line as we are in ours!' What is one to say to a woman who argues in this way ?" Don Aloysius laughed gently.
"But she argues quite correctly after all! My son, you are like the majority of men--they grow impatient with clever women,--they prefer stupid ones.