City of the Sun

“ The city itself is indescribably and peculiarly beautiful. From its front upward and throughout its extent there is a sort of diffusion of color resembling the tints of a fading rainbow. Now a passing cloud partly obscures the sun, and the tints deepen into positive color. ”

“ Even the smell of age was in the air. Silver moonlight from the two moons filtered through clear air down upon the ruins. The city lay now in darkness, dead and still, waiting for morning so it could lie dead and still in the sun. ”

“ Blue and pink and red and light yellow are spread over their high walls, and have been so washed and chastened by the rain and sun, that the whole city has taken on the faint, soft tints of a once brilliant water-color. The streets themselves are unpeopled, empty and strangely silent. Their silence is as impressive as their beauty. ”

“ There's a barrel-organ carolling across a golden street
In the City as the sun sinks low;
Though the music's only Verdi there's a world to make it sweet
Just as yonder yellow sunset where the earth and heaven meet
Mellows all the sooty City! Hark, a hundred thousand feet
Are marching on to glory through the poppies and the wheat
In the land where the dead dreams go. ”

“ As the sun rose higher, the effulgence of the City died away, the light of the same great orb which brings the dawn to you, covered with its rays the white and glorious City, the music seemed again revived, and from the doorways of the houses I could see forms issuing, while far off the Hill of the Phosphori raised its glass domes in the air, where the homogeneous tide of spirit was undergoing differentiation, as we might say, into separate cognizable, discreet beings. ”

“ As the sun is moving westward, the whole air around becomes flooded with a luminousness which seems to transfuse itself with pervading presence through every part of the city, and make all its ruinous and mossy age bright and living. ”

“ And crystal fountains kept the air pure and fresh, and great birds with gold and silver wings flew lazily from tree to tree, and one could not tell whether the city was more beautiful by day, when the sun shone down upon it and brightened the marble roofs and charming gardens, or by night, when the moon and stars were reflected in the lakes and rivers, and when the fountains glistened white in the moonlight, and the great squares and lofty palaces were illumined with a million crystal lamps. ”

“ The pink sky cast a glow on the city, its roofs, and its walls. A flush of light enveloped the awakened world, like a caress from the rising sun, and the glimmer of dawn kindled new hope in the breast of the vicomte. ”

“ In the city people know in a general way that the sun is the source of heat and light, and that he adds to their comfort and convenience, as do the electric light and the fire on the hearth; but they hardly realize that his rays are necessary for their existence, to say nothing of their comfort, for even a week. But when a traveller in the morning sees all animated Nature stirring and rejoicing with the throbbings of warmed and rejuvenated life ”

“ In some of the famous old gardens of the South that still survive, echoes of their former glory, the sun-dial yet holds its accustomed place. In the very heart of New York city there is to-day a sun-dial; not one person in a hundred that passes knows that it is there, nor would scarcely one person in fifty know what it was. ”

“ The sun—the bright sun, that brings back, not light alone, but new life, and hope, and freshness to man—burst upon the crowded city in clear and radiant glory. Through costly-coloured glass and paper-mended window, through cathedral dome and rotten crevice, it shed its equal ray. ”

“ Now every individual, from the rich aristocrat who lolls in his carriage to the humble laborer who wields a broom in the streets, reads the Sun; nor can even a boy be found in New York City or the neighboring country who will not know in the course of the day what is promulgated in the Sun in the morning. ”

“ It was one of those rare and beautiful days in winter when England remembers that there is a sun. The star of day, pale but nevertheless still splendid, was setting in the horizon, glorifying at once the heavens and the sea with bands of fire, and casting upon the towers and the old houses of the city a last ray of gold which made the windows sparkle like the reflection of a conflagration. ”

“ And if you wish to receive of the ancient city an impression with which the modern one can no longer furnish you, climb—on the morning of some grand festival, beneath the rising sun of Easter or of Pentecost—climb upon some elevated point, whence you command the entire capital; and be present at the wakening of the chimes. Behold, at a signal given from heaven, for it is the sun which gives it, all those churches quiver simultaneously. First come scattered strokes, running from one church to another, as when musicians give warning that they are about to begin. ”

“ Within the city the air is close and relaxing, the skies are brilliant, the sun intensely hot, the streets narrow and densely packed with houses. This was designed to keep out the heat, but also keeps out air and light. ”

“ The lamp-lighter snapped back a little door on the f-shaped electric-light pole, turned a switch and a blue glamour daubed the flowing beards; a crowd circulated about them; the night deepened into a starriness of Heaven and Earth, the City flashing back to the sky a luminous Milky Way; the great City, a zone of glow, busy with black human gnats. Peace lay on the Earth soft as light ”

“ The city is squalid and sinister, With the silver-barred street in the midst, Slow-moving, A river leading nowhere. Opposite my window, The moon cuts, Clear and round, Through the plum-coloured night. She cannot light the city; It is too bright. It has white lamps, And glitters coldly. I stand in the window and watch the moon. She is thin and lustreless, But I love her. I know the moon, And this is an alien city. ”

“ We approached Nanking in the small hours of the morn, and as I sat on deck watching the grayness of the early dawn give way to the upward slanting pinkish beams of the orb of day I beheld a glorious sight—the water at my feet, then the curving shore, beyond to the eastward the graceful towers and pagodas of the city, and in the distance the peaceful gray and bluish hills, along the sculptured heights of which the first gleams of a sun, that would soon be altogether dazzling, were silently but swiftly stealing. ”

“ The sun and the air are God's free gifts to all we say, but are they so? In yonder city's dingy alleys the sun shines not, and the air is foul. Oh, man, how dost thou forget and obstruct thy brother man, and say, "Give us this day our daily bread," when he has none! Oh, would that men would leave the city, its splendour and its tumult and its gold, and return to wood and field and simple, honest living! Then would their children grow stately as noble trees, and their thoughts sweet and pure as wayside flowers. ”

“ I fancy that this sound—which, seeming to be more distinct at this hour than at any other time, might be called one of the civic voices of the night—has certain urbane suggestions, not unpleasant to those born and bred in large cities. The moon, round and full, gradually usurps the twinkling lights of the city, that one by one seem to fade away and be absorbed in her superior lustre. ”

“ The night is clear as glass and the city rises in a great semicircle, pierced by and outlined in twinkling lights, right up to the ring of forts crowning the hills, where the sky begins—a sky smothered in stars. ”

“ Beyond, the plain lay calm and still, wrapped in dark shadows, save where the moonbeams fall in patches and glints of silvery light. Of the great city which spreads itself beyond, not a vestige is to be seen. ”

“ The lanterns, gaily painted, are of all forms, sizes, and colors, and as night falls and the full moon slowly rises, the lights begin to glimmer, and in half an hour, the low, mean, sordid city is changed into an almost indescribable scene of brilliant, twinkling, glittering light and beauty. ”

“ The roar and clatter of the great city reach his window but fitfully, as the sounds are hurried hither and thither on the wings of wayward breezes, the while great stretches of urban landscape are plunged into purple shadow or bathed in golden sunlight as the fleeting clouds chase one another across the great dome of sky. ”

“ As you have seen from a hill the winking lights of a city disappear at daybreak, so, one by one, the stars went out. Masses of angry clouds reared themselves in ominous, fantastic forms against a sullen sky. ”

“ Long streams of light, which in power and brilliancy excelled even the great electric suns with which the city was lighted, shot down out of the skies, flashing hither and thither, and sweeping the earth below it in vast curves of radiance. ”

“ There is little to be seen after sunset in this unlighted city. Although the principal streets are lighted with gas, many of the streets depend upon the moon and stars and so on cloudy nights are left in utter darkness. ”

“ The night was hot and heavy, and the single lamp sufficient; the great flare of the lighted city, rising high, spending itself afar, played up from the Boulevard and, through the vague vista of the successive rooms, brought objects into view and added to their dignity. ”

“ The stars are shining in heaven, but there are thousands of earthly stars glittering in the city there spread before us: and as we look into any small space of that wondrous illumination, we can trace long lines of light losing themselves in the general splendor of the distance, and we can see dim shapes of mighty buildings afar off, showing their dark masses amidst the glowing atmosphere that hangs over the capital for miles, with the edges of flickering clouds gilded as if they were touched by the first sunlight. This is a spectacle that men look not upon, because it is common ”

“ When all the lamps in all the streets are thus sending forth their rays, the combined effect is positively glorious. The City seems, as it were, clothed in light; soft and delicate; and yet so clear as to bring to richer beauty everything it touches. Houses and gardens, clearly seen, are yet dream-like in their loveliness. ”

“ At a signal from Enterprise the Fairy turned her wheel, Venus threw her golden ball of opportunity, and lo! out of the foam of the sea rose a Venus city with the round sea-bubbles resting on the roofs.
One day a man appeared on the hill-top o'er-looking this wondrous city, and by his magic power, being filled with music, with color-music, he cast a spell, [6] and behold a pastel city by the sea—such an one as only those who dream could think of; a city glowing with warmth of color, with a softness and mystical charm such as only the brain of Jules Guerin could produce. ”

“ Once the bright days of summer pass by, a city takes on the sombre garb of grey, wrapped in which it goes about its labors during the long winter. Its endless buildings look grey, its sky and its streets assume a sombre hue; the scattered, leafless trees and wind-blown dust and paper but add to the general solemnity of color. ”

“ By night, the same city is a rich and beautiful courtesan, crowned with flowers, decked with bright jewels, murmuring, with winsome voice, quaint melodies and songs of love-in-idleness, and plying, with little reticence, her voluptuous trade, under the shadow of the dark. ”

“ The spires shoot up into the sky—the domes tranquilly rest there—all the roofs glitter as with diamonds, all the white walls are lustrous, save where, here and there, some loftier range of buildings hangs its steadfast shadow o'er square or street, magnifying the city, by means of separate multitudes of structures, each town-like in itself, and the whole gathered together by the outward eye, and the inward imagination, worthy indeed of the name of Metropolis. ”

“ By the gates of the City of Rest,
The City whose exquisite towers
I see thro’ the sunny long hours
If but from my window I lean;
Yea, dearest! thy threshold of stone,
Thine ivy-grown door and my own
Have naught save the river between.
Thine on that heavenly height
Are beauty, and warmth, and delight;
And long as our parting shall be,
Live there in thy summer! nor know
How near lie the frost and the snow
On hearts that are breaking for thee. ”

“ When our drinks are finished, the head of Venus says they have come to take us to their Council Building.
It is warm, for the recent rain combined with the heat which is about eighty, makes the atmosphere stifling; but we are the only ones who seem to notice it. As we ride through the streets towards our destination, the buildings and the layout of the city resemble a fairyland description of beauty and perfection. Everything is so spotlessly clean that it seems to sparkle. ”

“ FROM A CITY WINDOW The dust is thick on the city street, The smoke on the city sky Hangs dense and gray at the close of day— And the city crowds surge by With heavy feet through the summer heat Like a sluggish sullen tide;... But hand in hand through a magic land We are wandering side by side. ”

“ There was the glamour of night on the big city, mighty buildings silhouetted against a sky of dark luminous blue, towers that divided the stars, and far below in the street the ruby and topaz lights of the road-menders, with the glowing brazier of the night-watchman. And then dawn came with its chilling wind and its grey cheerless light that discovered, without love or pity, the sordid things of town—the dirty canal, the barges, the heaps of timber, the ugly money-making warehouses and factories. ”

“ So you sit, like Jupiter upon Olympus, and look down from afar upon men’s life. The city is as silent as a city of the dead: from all its humming thoroughfares, not a voice, not a footfall, reaches you upon the hill. ”