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LETTER III.
May 12.
FAIRIES and Genii hover over my steps, or the most lively
imagination influences my senses, and fills my heart. All
Paradise is before me. Here is a fountain, to which I am attached
by a form of enchantment, like Melusina and her sisters. It is a
spring of pure and clear water, which gushes from the rock, in a
cave at the bottom of one of the hills; about twenty steps lead
to it; the high trees which hang over it, the cool refreshing air
of the place, every thing is agreeable, interesting, striking. I
never fail to go to it every day, and generally pass an hour
there. The young girls come from the town to fetch water from it
-- innocent and necessary employment, and formerly the occupation
of kings daughters. The time of the patriarchs presents itself to
my imagination. I see our ances- {7} tors concluding treaties and
making alliances by the side of fountains, propitious angels
bearing witness. Whoever does not enter into these sensations, my
dear friend, has never really enjoyed cool repose by the side of
a spring, after a long summer's walk.
