What had come over her?
What was the meaning of this glaring eye, this gasping breath, this awful expression in her face, this convulsive action of her hands?
Was she mad?
And what did she mean by "Nothingness, nothingness..." repeated in a sort of hollow cry?
Terrified beyond bearing she laid her hand on Dalnia's shoulder, saying: "Mother, mother! wake up! What do you mean by saying 'nothingness, nothingness' in that dreadful way ?" Dainia collected her scattered wits, shivered with cold and then said, dully at first, but with a growing cheerfulness that made Gorgo's blood run cold: "Did I say 'nothingness'?
Did I speak of the great void, my child?
You are quick of hearing.

Nothingness--well, you have learnt to think; are you capable of defining the meaning of the word--a monster that has neither head nor tail, neither front nor back--can you, I say, define the idea of nothingness ?" "What do you mean, mother ?" said Gorgo with growing alarm.
"No, she does not know, she does not understand," muttered the old woman with a dreary smile.

"And yet Melampus told me, only yesterday, that you understood his lesson on conic sections better than many men.

Aye, aye, child; I, too, learnt mathematics once, and I still go through various calculations every night in my observatory; but to this day I find it difficult to conceive of a mathematical point.

It is nothing and yet it is something.