That Naples of mine is like a soiled coronet of white gems, sparkling only from far away.

But I love it altogether, near or far, and my heart would have leaped to return to it for its own sake, but to come to it as we did, knowing that the only lady in the world was there....

Again, this is one of those things I possess no knowledge how to tell, and that those who know do know.

How I had longed for the time to come, how I had feared it, how I had made pictures of it! Yet I feared not so much as my friend, for he had a dim, small hope, and I had none.

How could I have?
I--a man whose head had been painted?
I--for whom her great heart had sorrowed as for the thin, beaten cab-horses of Paris! Hope?
All I could hope was that she might never know, and I be left with some little shred of dignity in her eyes! Who cannot see that it was for my friend to fear?
At times, with him, it was despair, but of that brave kind one loves to see--never a quiver of the lip, no winking of the eyes to keep tears back.