He described to her the silver olive groves that yet clad the banks of Ilyssus, and the temples, already despoiled of half their glories--but how beautiful in decay! He looked back on the melancholy city of Harmodius the free, and Pericles the magnificent, from the height of that distant memory, which mellowed into one hazy light all the ruder and darker shades.

He had seen the land of poetry chiefly in the poetical age of early youth; and the associations of patriotism were blended with those of the flush and spring of life.
And Ione listened to him, absorbed and mute; dearer were those accents, and those descriptions, than all the prodigal adulation of her numberless adorers.

Was it a sin to love her countryman?
she loved Athens in him--the gods of her race, the land of her dreams, spoke to her in his voice! From that time they daily saw each other.

At the cool of the evening they made excursions on the placid sea.

By night they met again in Ione's porticoes and halls.