When the thought of doing
so occurred to me first, I happened to be within a few yards of
it. I became conscious, at the same moment, that the sound of
dancing had been for some time in my ears. I approached the
curtain quickly, and, lifting it, entered the black hall.
Everything was still as death. I should have concluded that the
sound must have proceeded from some other more distant quarter,
which conclusion its faintness would, in ordinary circumstances,
have necessitated from the first; but there was a something about
the statues that caused me still to remain in doubt. As I said,
each stood perfectly still upon its black pedestal: but there was
about every one a certain air, not of motion, but as if it had
just ceased from movement; as if the rest were not altogether of
the marbly stillness of thousands of years. It was as if the
peculiar atmosphere of each had yet a kind of invisible
tremulousness; as if its agitated wavelets had not yet subsided
into a perfect calm. I had the suspicion that they had
anticipated my appearance, and had sprung, each, from the living
joy of the dance, to the death-silence and blackness of its
isolated pedestal, just before I entered. I walked across the
central hall to the curtain opposite the one I had lifted, and,
entering there, found all the appearances similar; only that the
statues were different, and differently grouped.
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