"I cannot endure algebra,"
said he; "it is an abomination to me. I want something that speaks
more to the heart."
The sage Eben Bonabben shook his dry head at the words. "Here is
an end to philosophy," thought he. "The prince has discovered he has a
heart!" He now kept anxious watch upon his pupil, and saw that the
latent tenderness of his nature was in activity, and only wanted an
object. He wandered about the gardens of the Generalife in an
intoxication of feelings of which he knew not the cause. Sometimes
he would sit plunged in a delicious reverie; then he would seize his
lute, and draw from it the most touching notes, and then throw it
aside, and break forth into sighs and ejaculations.
By degrees this loving disposition began to extend to inanimate
objects; he had his favorite flowers, which he cherished with tender
assiduity; then he became attached to various trees, and there was one
in particular, of a graceful form and drooping foliage, on which he
lavished his amorous devotion, carving his name on its bark, hanging
garlands on its branches, and singing couplets in its praise, to the
accompaniment of his lute.
Eben Bonabben was alarmed at this excited state of his pupil. He saw
him on the very brink of forbidden knowledge- the least hint might
reveal to him the fatal secret. Trembling for the safety of the prince
and the security of his own head, he hastened to draw him from the
seductions of the garden, and shut him up in the highest tower of
the Generalife.
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