A Scene in the Corso

No doubt, however, the worn-out festival is still new to the youthful
and light hearted, who make the worn-out world itself as fresh as Adam
found it on his first forenoon in Paradise. It may be only age and
care that chill the life out of its grotesque and airy riot, with the
impertinence of their cold criticism.

Kenyon, though young, had care enough within his breast to render the
Carnival the emptiest of mockeries. Contrasting the stern anxiety of his
present mood with the frolic spirit of the preceding year, he fancied
that so much trouble had, at all events, brought wisdom in its train.
But there is a wisdom that looks grave, and sneers at merriment; and
again a deeper wisdom, that stoops to be gay as often as occasion
serves, and oftenest avails itself of shallow and trifling grounds of
mirth; because, if we wait for more substantial ones, we seldom can be
gay at all. Therefore, had it been possible, Kenyon would have done well
to mask himself in some wild, hairy visage, and plunge into the throng
of other maskers, as at the Carnival before. Then Donatello had danced
along the Corso in all the equipment of a Faun, doing the part with
wonderful felicity of execution, and revealing furry ears, which looked
absolutely real; and Miriam had been alternately a lady of the antique
regime, in powder and brocade, and the prettiest peasant girl of the
Campagna, in the gayest of costumes; while Hilda, sitting demurely in a
balcony, had hit the sculptor with a single rosebud,--so sweet and fresh
a bud that he knew at once whose hand had flung it.