Far above singing; after you were gone

I grew acquainted with my heart, and searched

What stirred it so! Alas! I found it love."

CHAPTER IX. A TALK ON THE STAIRS.

No! I will not describe that scene; nor how pale the stately lady sat

on the border of the green, sunny meadow! The hearts of some women

tremble like leaves at every breath of love which reaches them, and

then are still again. Others, like the ocean, are moved only by the

breath of a storm, and not so easily lulled to rest. And such was the

proud heart of Mary Ashburton. It had remained unmoved by the presence

of this stranger; and the sound of his footsteps and his voice excited

in it no emotion. He had deceived himself! Silently they walked

homeward through the green meadow. The very sunshine was sad; and the

rising wind, through the old ruin above them, sounded in his ears like

a hollow laugh!

Flemming went straight to his chamber. On the way, he passed the walnut

trees under which he had first seen the face of Mary Ashburton.

Involuntarily he closed his eyes. They were full of tears. O, there are

places in this fair world, which we never wish to see again, however

dear they may be to us! The towers of the old Franciscan convent never

looked so gloomily as then, though the bright summer sun was shining

full upon them.

In his chamber he found Berkley. He was looking out of the window,

whistling.

"This evening I leave Interlachen forever," said Flemming, rather

abruptly. Berkley stared.

"Indeed! Pray what is the matter? You look as pale as a ghost!"

"And have good reason to look pale," replied Flemming bitterly.

"Hoffmann says, in one of his note-books, that, on the eleventh of

March, at half past eight o'clock, precisely, he was an ass. That is

what I was this morning at half past ten o'clock, precisely, and am

now, and I suppose always shall be."

He tried to laugh, but could not. He then related to Berkley the whole

story, from beginning to end.

"This is a miserable piece of business!" exclaimed Berkley, when he had

finished. "Strange enough! And yet I have long ceased to marvel at the

caprices of women. Did not Pan captivate the chaste Diana? Did not

Titania love Nick Bottom, with his ass's head? Do you think that

maidens' eyes are no longer touched with the juice of love-in-idleness!

Take my word for it, she is in love with somebody else. There must be

some reason for this. No; women never have any reasons, except their

will. But never mind. Keep a stout heart. Care killed a cat. After

all,--what is she? Who is she? Only a--"

"Hush! hush," exclaimed Flemming, in great excitement. "Not one word

more, I beseech you. Do not think to console me, by depreciating her.

She is very dear to me still; a beautiful, high-minded, noble woman."

"Yes," answered Berkley; "that is the waywith you all, you young men.

You see a sweet face, or a something, you know not what, and flickering

reason says, Good night; amen to common sense. The imagination invests

the beloved object with a thousand superlative charms; furnishes her

with all the purple and fine linen, all the rich apparel and furniture,

of human nature. I did the same when I was young. I was once as

desperately in love as you are now; and went through all the

'Delicious deaths, soft exhalations

Of soul; dear and divine annihilations,

A thousand unknown rites

Of joys, and rarified delights.'

I adored and was rejected. 'You are in love with certain attributes,'

said the lady. 'Damn your attributes, Madam,' said I; 'I know nothing

of attributes.' 'Sir,' said she, with dignity, 'you have been

drinking.' So we parted. She was married afterwards to another, who

knew something about attributes, I suppose. I have seen her once since,

and only once. She had a baby in a yellow gown. I hate a baby in a

yellow gown. How glad I am she did not marry me. One of these days, you

will be glad you have been rejected. Take my word for it."

"All that does not prevent my lot from being a very melancholy one!"

said Flemming sadly.

"O, never mind the lot," cried Berkley laughing, "so long as you don't

get Lot's wife. If the cucumber is bitter, throw it away, as the

philosopher Marcus Antoninus says, in his Meditations. Forget her, and

all will be as if you had not known her."

"I shall never forget her," replied Flemming, rather solemnly. "Not my

pride, but my affections, are wounded; and the wound is too deep ever

to heal. I shall carry it with me always. I enter no more into the

world, but will dwell only in the world of my own thoughts. All great

and unusual occurrences, whether of joy or sorrow, lift us above this

earth; and we should do well always to preserve this elevation.

Hitherto I have not done so. But now I will no more descend; I will sit

apart and above the world, with my mournful, yet holy thoughts."

"Whew! You had better go into society; the whirl and delirium will cure

you in a week. If you find a lady, who pleases you very much, and you

wish to marry her, and she will not listen to such a horrid thing, I

see but one remedy, which is to find another, who pleases you more, and

who will listen to it."

"No, my friend; you do not understand my character," said Flemming,

shaking his head. "I love this woman with a deep, and lasting

affection. I shall never cease to love her. This may be madness in me;

but so it is. Alas and alas! Paracelsus of old wasted life in trying to

discover its elixir, which after all turned out to be alcohol; and

instead of being made immortal upon earth, he died drunk on the floor

of a tavern. The like happens to many of us. We waste our best years in

distilling the sweetest flowers of life into love-potions, which after

all do not immortalize, butonly intoxicate us. By Heaven! we are all of

us mad."

"But are you sure the case is utterly hopeless?"

"Utterly! utterly!"

"And yet I perceive you have not laid aside all hope. You still flatter

yourself, that the lady's heart may change. The great secret of

happiness consists not in enjoying, but in renouncing. But it is hard,

very hard. Hope has as many lives as a cat or a king. I dare say you

have heard the old Italian proverb, 'The King never dies.' But perhaps

you have never heard, that, at the court of Naples, where the dead body

of a monarch lies in state, his dinner is carried up to him as usual,

and the court physician tastes it, to see that it be not poisoned, and

then the servants bear it out again, saying 'The King does not dine

to-day.' Hope in our souls is King; and we also say, 'The King never

dies.' Even when in reality he lies dead within us, in a kind of solemn

mockery we offer him his accustomed food, but are constrainedto say,

'The King does not dine to-day.' It must be an evil day, indeed, when a

king of Naples has no heart for his dinner! but you yourself are a

proof, that the King never dies. You are feeding your King, although

you say he is dead."

"To show you, that I do not wish to cherish hope," replied Flemming, I

shall leave Interlachen to-morrow morning. I am going to the Tyrol."

"You are right," said Berkley; "there is nothing so good for sorrow as

rapid motion in the open air. I shall go with you; though probably your

conversation will not be very various; nothing but Edward and

Kunigunde."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Go to Berlin, and you will find out. However, jesting apart, I will do

all I can to cheer you, and make you forget the Dark Ladie, and this

untoward accident."

"Accident!" said Flemming. "This is no accident, but God's Providence,

which brought us together, to punish me for my sins."

"O, my friend," interrupted Berkley, "if you see the finger of

Providence so distinctly in every act of your life, you will end by

thinking yourself an Apostle and Envoy Extraordinary. I see nothing so

very uncommon in what has happened to you."

"What! not when our souls are so akin to each other! When we seemed so

formed to be together,--to be one!"

"I have often observed," replied Berkley coldly, "that those who are of

kindred souls, rarely wed together; almost as rarely as those who are

akin by blood. There seems, indeed, to be such a thing as spiritual

incest. Therefore, mad lover, do not think to persuade thyself and thy

scornful lady, that you have kindred souls; but rather the contrary;

that you are much unlike; and each wanting in those qualities which

most mark and distinguish the other. Trust me, thy courtship will then

be more prosperous. But good morning. I must prepare for this sudden

journey."

On the following morning, Flemming and Berkleystarted on their way to

Innsbruck, like Huon of Bordeaux and Scherasmin on their way to

Babylon. Berkley's self-assumed duty was to console his companion; a

duty which he performed like an old Spanish Matadora, a woman whose

business was to attend the sick, and put her elbow into the stomach of

the dying to shorten their agony.

BOOK IV.

Epigraph

"Mortal, they softly say,

Peace to thy heart!

We too, yes, mortal,

Have been as thou art;

Hope-lifted, doubt-depressed,

Seeing in part,

Tried, troubled, tempted,--

Sustained,--as thou art."

CHAPTER I. A MISERERE.

In the Orlando Innamorato, Malagigi, the necromancer, puts all the

company to sleep by reading to them from a book. Some books have this

power of themselves and need no necromancer. Fearing, gentle reader,

that mine may be of this kind, I have provided these introductory

chapters, from time to time, like stalls or Misereres in a church, with

flowery canopies and poppy-heads over them, where thou mayest sit down

and sleep.

No,--the figure is not a bad one. This book does somewhat resemble a

minster, in the Romanesque style, with pinnacles, and flying

buttresses, and roofs,

"Gargoyled with greyhounds, and with many lions

Made of fine gold, with divers sundry dragons."

You step into its shade and coolness out of the hot streets of life; a

mysterious light streams through the painted glass of the marigold

windows, staining the cusps and crumpled leaves of the window-shafts,

and the cherubs and holy-water-stoups below. Here and there is an image

of the Virgin Mary; and other images, "in divers vestures, called

weepers, stand in housings made about the tomb"; and, above all, swells

the vast dome of heaven, with its star-mouldings, and the flaming

constellations, like the mosaics in the dome of St. Peter's. Have you

not heard funeral psalms from the chauntry? Have you not heard the

sound of church-bells, as I promised; mysterious sounds from the Past

and Future, as from the belfries outside the cathedral; even such a

mournful, mellow, watery peal of bells, as is heard sometimes at sea,

from cities afar off below the horizon?

I know not how this Romanesque, and at times flamboyant, style of

architecture may please thecritics. They may wish, perhaps, that I had

omitted some of my many ornaments, my arabesques, and roses, and

fantastic spouts, and Holy-Roods and Gallilee-steeples. But would it

then have been Romanesque?

But perhaps, gentle reader, thou art one of those, who think the days

of Romance gone forever. Believe it not! O, believe it not! Thou hast

at this moment in thy heart as sweet a romance as was ever written.

Thou art not less a woman, because thou dost not sit aloft in a tower,

with a tassel-gentle on thy wrist! Thou art not less a man, because

thou wearest no hauberk, nor mail-sark, and goest not on horseback

after foolish adventures! Nay, nay! Every one has a Romance in his own

heart. All that has blessed or awed the world lies there; and

"The oracle within him, that which lives,

He must invoke and question,--not dead books,

Not ordinances, not mould-rotten papers."

Sooner or later some passages of every one's romance must be written,

either in words or actions. They will proclaim the truth; for Truth is

thought, which has assumed its appropriate garments, either of words or

actions; while Falsehood is thought, which, disguised in words or

actions not its own, comes before the blind old world, as Jacob came

before the patriarch Isaac, clothed in the goodly raiment of his

brother Esau. And the world, like the patriarch, is often deceived;

for, though the voice is Jacob's voice, yet the hands are the hands of

Esau, and the False takes away the birth-right and the blessing from

the True. Hence it is, that the world so often lifts up its voice and

weeps.

That very pleasing and fanciful Chinese Romance, the Shadow in the

Water, ends with the hero's marrying both the heroines. I hope my

gentle reader feels curious to know the end of this Romance, which is a

shadow upon the earth; and see whether there be any marriage at all in

it.

That is the very point I am now thinking of, as I sit here at my

pleasant chamber window, and enjoy the balmy air of a bright summer

morning, and watch the motions of the golden robin, that sits on its

swinging nest on the outermost, pendulous branch of yonder elm. The

broad meadows and the steel-blue river remind me of the meadows of

Unterseen, and the river Aar; and beyond them rise magnificent

snow-white clouds, piled up like Alps. Thus the shades of Washington

and William Tell seem to walk together on these Elysian Fields; for it

was here, that in days long gone, our great Patriot dwelt; and yonder

clouds so much resemble the snowy Alps, that they remind me

irresistibly of the Swiss. Noble examples of a high purpose and a fixed

will! Do they not move, Hyperion-like on high? Were they not, likewise,

sons of Heaven and Earth?

Nothing can be more lovely than these summer mornings; nor than the

southern window at which I sit and write, in this old mansion, which is

like an Italian Villa. But O, this lassitude,--thisweariness,--when all

around me is so bright! I have this morning a singular longing for

flowers; a wish to stroll among the roses and carnations, and inhale

their breath, as if it would revive me. I wish I knew the man, who

called flowers "the fugitive poetry of Nature." From this distance,

from these scholastic shades,--from this leafy, blossoming, and

beautiful Cambridge, I stretch forth my hand to grasp his, as the hand

of a poet!--Yes; this morning I would rather stroll with him among the

gay flowers, than sit here and write. I feel so weary!

Old men with their staves, says the Spanish poet, are ever knocking at

the door of the grave. But I am not old. The Spanish poet might have

included the young also.--No matter! Courage, and forward! The Romance

must be finished; and finished soon.

O thou poor authorling! Reach a little deeper into the human heart!

Touch those strings,--touch those deeper strings, and more boldly, or

the notes will die away like whispers, and no earshall hear them, save

thine own! And, to cheer thy solitary labor, remember, that the secret

studies of an author are the sunken piers upon which is to rest the

bridge of his fame, spanning the dark waters of Oblivion. They are out

of sight; but without them no superstructure can stand secure!

And now, Reader, since the sermon is over, and we are still sitting

here in this Miserere, let us read aloud a page from the old parchment

manuscript on the lettern before us; let us sing it through these dusky

aisles, like a Gregorian Chant, and startle the sleeping congregation!

"I have read of the great river Euripus, which ebbeth and floweth seven

times a day, and with such violence, that it carrieth ships upon it

with full sail, directly against the wind. Seven times in an hour

ebbeth and floweth rash opinion, in the torrent of indiscreet and

troublesome apprehensions; carrying critic calumny and squint-eyed

detraction mainly against the wind of wisdom and judgment."

In secula seculorum! Amen!

CHAPTER II. CURFEW BELLS.

Welcome Disappointment! Thy hand is cold and hard, but it is the hand

of a friend! Thy voice is stern and harsh, but it is the voice of a

friend! O, there is something sublime in calm endurance, something

sublime in the resolute, fixed purpose of suffering without

complaining, which makes disappointment oftentimes better than success!

The emperor Isaac Angelus made a treaty with Saladin, and tried to

purchase the Holy Sepulchre with gold. Richard Lion-heart scorned such

alliance, and sought to recover it by battle. Thus do weak minds make

treaties with the passions they cannot overcome, and try to purchase

happiness at the expense of principle. But the resolute will of a

strong man scorns such means; and struggles nobly with his foe, to

achieve great deeds. Therefore, whosoever thou art that sufferest, try

not to dissipate thy sorrow by the breath of the world, nor drown its

voice in thoughtless merriment. It is a treacherous peace that is

purchased by indulgence. Rather take this sorrow to thy heart, and make

it a part of thee, and it shall nourish thee till thou art strong

again.

The shadows of the mind are like those of the body. In the morning of

life they all lie behind us; at noon, we trample them under foot; and

in the evening they stretch long, broad, and deepening before us. Are

not, then, the sorrows of childhood as dark as those of age? Are not

the morning shadows of life as deep and broad as those of its evening?

Yes; but morning shadows soon fade away, while those of evening reach

forward into the night and mingle with the coming darkness. Man is

begotten in delight and born in pain; and in these are the rapture and

labor of his life fore-shadowed from the beginning. But thelife of man

upon this fair earth is made up for the most part of little pains and

little pleasures. The great wonder-flowers bloom but once in a

lifetime.

A week had already elapsed since the events recorded in the last

chapter. Paul Flemming went his way, a melancholy man, "drinking the

sweet wormwood of his sorrow." He did not rail at Providence and call

it fate, but suffered and was silent. It is a beautiful trait in the

lover's character, that he thinks no evil of the object loved. What he

suffered was no swift storm of feeling, that passes away with a noise,

and leaves the heart clearer; but a dark phantom had risen up in the

clear night, and, like that of Adamastor, hid the stars; and if it ever

vanished away for a season, still the deep sound of the moaning main

would be heard afar, through many a dark and lonely hour. And thus he

journeyed on, wrapped in desponding gloom, and mainly heedless of all

things around him. His mind was distempered. That one face was always

before him; that one voice forever saying;

"You are not the Magician."

Painful, indeed, it is to be misunderstood and undervalued by those we

love. But this, too, in our life, must we learn to bear without a

murmur; for it is a tale often repeated.

There are persons in this world to whom all local associations are

naught. The genius of the place speaks not to them. Even on

battle-fields, where the voice of this genius is wont to be loudest,

they hear only the sound of their own voices; they meet there only

their own dull and pedantic thoughts, as the old grammarian Brunetto

Latini met on the plain of Roncesvalles a poor student riding on a bay

mule. This was not always the case with Paul Flemming, but it had

become so now. He felt no interest in the scenery around him. He hardly

looked at it. Even the difficult mountain-passes, where, from his rocky

eyrie the eagle-eyed Tyrolese peasant had watched his foe, and the

roaring, turbid torrent underneath, which had swallowed up the bloody

corse, that fell from the rocks like a crushed worm, awakened no lively

emotion in his breast. All around him seemed dreamy and vague; all

within dim, as in a sun's eclipse. As the moon, whether visible or

invisible, has power over the tides of the ocean, so the face of that

lady, whether present or absent, had power over the tides of his soul;

both by day and night, both waking and sleeping. In every pale face and

dark eye he saw a resemblance to her; and what the day denied him in

reality, the night gave him in dreams.

"This is a strange, fantastic world," said Berkley, after a very long

silence, during which the two travellers had been sitting each in his

corner of the travelling carriage, wrapped in his own reflections. "A

very strange, fantastic world; where each one pursues his own golden

bubble, and laughs at his neighbour for doing the same. I have been

thinking how a moral Linnæus would classify our race. I think he would

divide it, not as Lord Byron did, into two great classes, the bores and

those who are bored, but into three, namely; Happy Men, Lucky Dogs, and

Miserable Wretches. This is more true and philosophical, though perhaps

not quite so comprehensive. He is the Happy Man, who, blessed with

modest ease, a wife and children,--sits enthroned in the hearts of his

family, and knows no other ambition, than that of making those around

him happy. But the Lucky Dog is he, who, free from all domestic cares,

saunters up and down his room, in morning gown and slippers; drums on

the window of a rainy day; and, as he stirs his evening fire, snaps his

fingers at the world, and says, 'I have no wife nor children, good or

bad, to provide for.' I had a friend, who is now no more. He was taken

away in the bloom of life, by a very rapid--widow. He was by birth and

by profession a beau,--born with a quizzing-glass and a cane. Cock of

the walk, he flapped his wings, and crowed among the feathered tribe.

But alas! a fair, white partlet has torn his crest out, and he shall

crow no more. You will generally find him of a morning, smelling round

a beef-cart, with domestic felicity written in every line of his

countenance; and sometimes meet him in a cross-street at noon, hurrying

homeward, with a beef-steak on a wooden skewer, or a fresh fish, with a

piece of tarred twine run through its gills. In the evening he rocks

the cradle, and gets up in the night when the child cries. Like a Goth,

of the Dark Ages, he consults his wife on all mighty matters, and looks

upon her as a being of more than human goodness and wisdom. In short,

the ladies all say he is a very domestic man, and makes a good husband;

which, under the rose, is only a more polite way of saying he is

hen-pecked. He is a Happy Man. I have another dear friend, who is a

sexagenary bachelor. He has one of those well-oiled dispositions, which

turn upon the hinges of the world without creaking. The hey-day of life

is over with him; but his old age is sunny and chirping; and a merry

heart still nestles in his tottering frame, like a swallow that builds

in a tumble-down chimney. He is a professed Squire of Dames. The rustle

of a silk gown is music to his ears, and his imagination is

continuallylantern-led by some will-with-a-wisp in the shape of a

lady's stomacher. In his devotion to the fair sex,--the muslin, as he

calls it,--he is the gentle flower of chivalry. It is amusing to see

how quick he strikes into the scent of a lady's handkerchief. When once

fairly in pursuit, there is no such thing as throwing him out. His

heart looks out at his eye; and his inward delight tingles down to the

tail of his coat. He loves to bask in the sunshine of a smile; when he

can breathe the sweet atmosphere of kid gloves and cambric

handkerchiefs, his soul is in its element; and his supreme delight is

to pass the morning, to use his own quaint language, 'in making dodging

calls, and wiggling round among the ladies!' He is a lucky dog!"

"And as a specimen of the class of Miserable Wretches, I suppose you

will take me," said Flemming, making an effort to enter into his

friend's humor. "Certainly I am wretched enough. You may make me the

stuffed bear,--the specimen of this class."

"By no means," replied Berkley; "you are not reduced so low. He only is

utterly wretched, who is the slave of his own passions, or those of

others. This, I trust, will never be your condition. Why so wan and

pale, fond lover? Do you remember Sir John Suckling's Song?

'Why so wan and pale, fond lover;

Pr'ythee why so pale?

Will, if looking well can't move her,

Looking ill prevail?

Pr'ythee why so pale?

'Why so dull and mute, young sinner;

Pr'ythee why so mute?

Will, if speaking well can't win her,

Saying nothing do 't?

Pr'ythee why so mute?

'Quit, quit, for shame! this cannot move,

This cannot take her!

If of herself she do not love,

Nothing will make her!

The devil take her!'

How do you like that?"

"To you I say quit, quit for shame;" replied Flemming. "Why quote the

songs of that witty and licentious age? Have you no better consolation

to offer me? How many, many times must I tell you, that I bear the lady

no ill-will. I do not blame her for not loving me. I desire her

happiness, even at the sacrifice of my own."

"That is generous in you, and deserves a better fate. But you are so

figurative in all you say, that a stranger would think you had no real

feeling,--and only fancied yourself in love."

"Expression of feeling is different with different minds. It is not

always simple. Some minds, when excited, naturally speak in figures and

similitudes. They do not on that account feel less deeply. This is

obvious in our commonest modes of speech. It depends upon the

individual."

"Kyrie Eleëson!"

"Well, abuse my figures of speech as much as you please. What I insist

upon is, that you shall not abuse the lady. When did you ever hear me

breathe a whisper against her?"

"Oho! Now you speak like Launce to his dog!"

Their conversation, which had begun so merrily, was here suddenly

interrupted by a rattling peal of thunder, that announced a

near-approaching storm. It was late in the afternoon, and the whole

heaven black with low, trailing clouds. Still blacker the storm came

sailing up majestically from the southwest, with almost unbroken

volleys of distant thunder. The wind seemed to be storming a cloud

redoubt; and marched onward with dust, and the green banners of the

trees flapping in the air, and heavy cannonading, and occasionally an

explosion, like the blowing up of a powder-wagon. Mingled with this was

the sound of thunder-bells from a village not far off. They were all

ringing dolefully to ward off the thunderbolt. At the entrance of the

village stood a large wooden crucifix; around which was a crowd of

priests and peasants, kneeling in the wet grass, by the roadside, with

their hands and eyes lifted toheaven, and praying for rain. Their

prayer was soon answered.

The travellers drove on with the driving wind and rain. They had come

from Landeck, and hoped to reach Innsbruck before midnight. Night

closed in, and Flemming fell asleep with the loud storm overhead, and

at his feet the roaring Inn, a mountain torrent leaping onward as wild

and restless, as when it first sprang from its cradle in the solitudes

of Engaddin; meet emblem of himself, thus rushing through the night.

His slumber was long, but broken; and at length he awoke in terror; for

he heard a voice pronounce in his ear distinctly these words;

"They have brought the dead body."

They were driving by a churchyard at the entrance of a town; and among

the tombs a dim lamp was burning before an image of the Virgin. It had

a most unearthly appearance. Flemming almost feared to see the

congregation of the dead go into the church and sing their midnight

mass. He spoke to Berkley; but received no answer; he was in a deep

sleep.

"Then it was only a dream," said he to himself; "yet how distinct the

voice was! O, if we had spiritual organs, to see and hear things now

invisible and inaudible to us, we should behold the whole air filled

with the departing souls of that vast multitude which every moment

dies,--should behold them streaming up like thin vapors heaven-ward,

and hear the startling blast of the archangel's trump sounding

incessant through the universe and proclaiming the awful judgment day.

Truly the soul departs not alone on its last journey, but spirits of

its kind attend it, when not ministering angels; and they go in

families to the unknown land! Neither in life nor in death are we

alone."

He slept again at intervals; and at length, though long after midnight,

reached Innsbruck between sleeping and waking; his mind filled with dim

recollections of the unspeakably dismal night-journey;--the climbing of

hills, and plunging into dark ravines;--the momentary rattling of the

wheels over paved streets of towns, and the succeeding hollow rolling

and tramping on the wetearth;--the blackness of the night;--the thunder

and lightning and rain; the roar of waters, leaping through deep chasms

by the road-side, and the wind through the mountain-passes, sounding

loud and long, like the irrepressible laughter of the gods.

The travellers on the morrow lingered not long in Innsbruck. They did

not fail, however, to visit the tomb of Maximilian in the Franciscan

Church of the Holy Cross, and gaze with some admiration upon the

twenty-eight gigantic bronze statues of Godfrey of Bouillon, and King

Arthur and Ernest the Iron-man, and Frederick of the Empty Pockets,

kings and heroes, and others, which stand leaning on their swords

between the columns of the church, as if guarding the tomb of the dead.

These statues reminded Flemming of the bronze giants, which strike the

hours on the belfry of San Basso, in Venice, and of the flail-armed

monsters, that guarded the gateway of Angulaffer's castle in Oberon.

After gazing awhile at these motionless sentinels, they went forth, and

strolled throughthe public gardens, with the jagged mountains right

over their heads, and all around them tall, melancholy pines, like

Tyrolese peasants, with shaggy hair; and at their feet the mad torrent

of the Inn, sweeping with turbid waves through the midst of the town.

In the afternoon they drove on towards Salzburg through the magnificent

mountain-passes of Waidering and Unken.

CHAPTER III. SHADOWS ON THE WALL.

On the following morning Flemming awoke in a chamber of the Golden Ship

at Salzburg, just as the clock in the Dome-church opposite was striking

ten. The window-shutters were closed, and the room nearly dark. He was

lying on his back, with his hands crossed upon his breast, and his eyes

looking up at the white curtains overhead. He thought them the white

marble canopy of a tomb, and himself the marble statue, lying beneath.

When the clock ceased striking, the eight and twenty gigantic bronze

statues from the Church of Holy Rood in Innsbruck stalked into the

chamber, and arranged themselves along the walls, which spread into

dimly-lighted aisles and arches. On the painted windows he saw

Interlachen, withits Franciscan cloister, and the Square Tower of the

ruins. In a pendent, overhead, stood the German student, as Saint

Vitus; and on a lavatory, or basin of holy-water, below, sat a cherub,

with the form and features of Berkley. Then the organ-pipes began to

blow, and he heard the voices of an invisible choir chanting. And anon

the gilded gates in the bronze screen before the chancel opened, and a

bridal procession passed through. The bride was clothed in the garb of

the Middle Ages; and held a book in her hand, with velvet covers, and

golden clasps. It was Mary Ashburton. She looked at him as she passed.

Her face was pale; and there were tears in her sweet eyes. Then the

gates closed again; and one of the oaken poppy-heads over a carved

stall, in the shape of an owl, flapped its broad wings, and hooted,

"Towhit! to-whoo!" Then the whole scene changed; and he thought himself

a monk's-head on a gutterspout; and it rained dismally; and Berkley was

standing under with an umbrella, laughing!

In other words, Flemming was in a ragingfever, and delirious. He

remained in this state for a week. The first thing he was conscious of

was hearing the doctor say to Berkley;

"The crisis is passed. I now consider him out of danger."

He then fell into a sweet sleep; the wild fever had swept away like an

angry, red cloud, and the refreshing summer rain began to fall like dew

upon the parched earth. Still another week; and Flemming was, "sitting

clothed, and in his right mind." Berkley had been reading to him; and

still held the book in his hand, with his fore-finger between the

leaves. It was a volume of Hoffmann's writings.

"How very strange it is," said he, "that you can hardly open the

biography of any German author, but you will find it begin with an

account of his grandfather. It will tell you how the venerable old man

walked up and down the garden among the gay flowers, wrapped in his

morning gown, which is likewise covered with flowers, and perhaps

wearing on his head a little velvet cap. Oryou will find him sitting by

the chimney-corner in the great chair, smoking his ancestral pipe, with

shaggy eyebrows and eyes like birdsnests under the eaves of a house,

and a mouth like a Nuremberg nutcracker's. The future poet climbs upon

the old man's knees. His genius is not recognised yet. He is thought

for the most part a dull boy. His father is an austere man, or perhaps

dead. But the mother is still there, a sickly, saint-like woman, with

knitting-work, and an elder sister, who has already been in love, and

wears rings on her fingers;--

'Death's heads, and such mementos,

Her grandmother and worm-eaten aunts left to her,

To tell her what her beauty must arrive at.' "

"But this is not the case with the life of Hoffmann, if I recollect

right."

"No, not precisely. Instead of the grandfather we have the grandmother,

a stately dame, who has long since shaken hands with the vanities of

life. The mother, separated from her husband, is sick in mind and body,

and flits to and fro, like a shadow. Then there is an affectionate

maiden aunt; and an uncle, a retired judge, the terror of little

boys,--the Giant Despair of this Doubting Castle in Koenigsberg; and

occasionally the benign countenance of a venerable grand-uncle, whom

Lamotte Fouqué called a hero of the olden time in morning gown and

slippers, looks in at the door and smiles. In the upper story of the

same house lived a poor boy with his mother, who was so far crazed as

to believe herself to be the Virgin Mary, and her son the Saviour of

the world. Wild fancies, likewise, were to sweep through the brain of

that child. He was to meet Hoffmann elsewhere and be his friend in

after years, though as yet they knew nothing of each other. This was

Werner, who has made some noise in German literature as the author of

many wild Destiny-Dramas."

"Hoffmann died, I believe, in Berlin."

"Yes. He left Koenigsberg at twenty years of age, and passed the next

eight years of his life in the Prussian-Polish Provinces, where he held

some petty office under government; and took to himselfmany bad habits

and a Polish wife. After this he was Music-Director at various German

theatres, and led a wandering, wretched life for ten years. He then

went to Berlin as Clerk of the Exchange, and there remained till his

death, which took place some seven or eight years afterward."

"Did you ever see him?"

"I was in Berlin during his lifetime, and saw him frequently. I shall

never forget the first time. It was at one of the æsthetic Teas, given

by a literary lady Unter den Linden, where the lions were fed with

convenient food, from tea and bread and butter, up to oysters and

Rhine-wine. During the evening my attention was arrested by the

entrance of a strange little figure, with a wild head of brown hair.

His eyes were bright gray; and his thin lips closely pressed together

with an expression of not unpleasing irony. This strangelooking

personage began to bow his way through the crowd, with quick, nervous,

hinge-like motions, much resembling those of a marionette. He had a

hoarse voice, and such a rapid utterance, that although I understood

German well enough for ordinary purposes, I could not understand one

half he said. Ere long he had seated himself at the piano-forte, and

was improvising such wild, sweet fancies, that the music of one's

dreams is not more sweet and wild. Then suddenly some painful thought

seemed to pass over his mind, as if he imagined, that he was there to

amuse the company. He rose from the piano-forte, and seated himself in

another part of the room; where he began to make grimaces, and talk

loud while others were singing. Finally he disappeared, like a

hobgoblin, laughing, 'Ho! ho! ho!' I asked a person beside me who this

strange being was. 'That was Hoffmann,' was the answer. 'The Devil!'

said I. 'Yes,' continued my informant; 'and if you should follow him

now, you would see him plunge into an obscure and unfrequented

wine-cellar, and there, amid boon companions, with wine and

tobacco-smoke, and quirks and quibbles, and quaint, witty sayings, turn

the dim night into glorious day.' "

"What a strange being!"

"I once saw him at one of his night-carouses. He was sitting in his

glory, at the head of the table; not stupidly drunk, but warmed with

wine, which made him madly eloquent, as the Devil's Elixir did the Monk

Medardus. There, in the full tide of witty discourse, or, if silent,

his gray, hawk eye flashing from beneath his matted hair, and taking

note of all that was grotesque in the company round him, sat this

unfortunate genius, till the day began to dawn. Then he found his way

homeward, having, like the souls of the envious in Purgatory, his

eyelids sewed together with iron wire;--though his was from champagne

bottles. At such hours he wrote his wild, fantastic tales. To his

excited fancy everything assumed a spectral look. The shadows of

familiar things about him stalked like ghosts through the haunted

chambers of his soul; and the old portraits on the walls winked at him,

and seemed stepping down from their frames; till, aghast at the

spectral throng about him, he would call his wife from her bed, to sit

by him while he wrote."

"No wonder he died in the prime of life!"

"No. The only wonder is, that he could have followed this course of

life for six years. I am astonished that it did not kill him sooner."

"But death came at last in an appalling shape."

"Yes; his forty-sixth birth day found him sitting at home in his

arm-chair, with his friends around him. But the rare old wine,--he

always drank the best,--touched not the sick-man's lips that night. His

wonted humor was gone. Of all his 'jibes, his gambols, his songs, his

flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the table on a roar, not

one now, to mock his own grinning!--quite chap-fallen.'--The

conversation was of death and the grave. And when one of his friends

said, that life was not the highest good, Hoffmann interrupted him,

exclaiming with a startling earnestness; 'No, no! Life, life, only

life! on any condition whatsoever!' Five months after this he had

ceased to suffer, because he had ceased to live. He died piecemeal. His

feet and hands, his legs and arms, gradually, and in succession, became

motionless, dead. But his spirit was not dead, nor motionless; and,

through the solitary day or sleepless night, lying in his bed, he

dictated to an amanuensis his last stories. Strange stories, indeed,

were they for a dying man to write! Yet such delight did he take in

dictating them, that he said to his friend Hitzig, that, upon the

whole, he was willing to give up forever the use of his hands, if he

could but preserve the power of writing by dictation. Such was his love

of life,--of what he called the sweet habitude of being!"

"Was it not he, who in his last hours expressed such a longing to

behold the green fields once more; and exclaimed; 'Heaven! it is

already summer, and I have not yet seen a single green tree!' "

"Yes, that was Hoffmann. Soon afterwards he died. The closing scene was

striking. He gradually lost all sensation, though his mind remained

vigorous. Feeling no more pain, he said to his physician; 'It will soon

be over now. I feel no more pain.' He thought himself well again; but

the physician knew that he was dying, and said; 'Yes, it will soon be

over!' The next morning he called his wife to his bed-side; and begged

her to fold his motionless hands together. Then, as he raised his eyes

to heaven, she heard him say, 'We must, then, think of God, also!' More

sorrowful words than these have seldom fallen from the lips of man.

Shortly afterwards the flame of life glared up within him; he said he

was well again; that in the evening he should go on with the story he

was writing; and wished that the last sentence might be read over to

him. Shortly after this they turned his face to the wall, and he died."

"And thus passed to its account a human soul, after much self-inflicted

suffering. Let us tread lightly upon the poet's ashes. For my part, I

confess, that I have not the heart to take him from the general crowd

of erring, sinful men, and judge him harshly. The little I have seen of

the world, and know of the history of mankind, teaches me to look upon

the errors of others in sorrow, not inanger. When I take the history of

one poor heart that has sinned and suffered, and represent to myself

the struggles and temptations it has passed,--the brief pulsations of

joy,--the feverish inquie-tude of hope and fear,--the tears of

regret,--the feebleness of purpose,--the pressure of want,--the

desertion of friends,--the scorn of a world that has little

charity,--the desolation of the soul's sanctuary,--and threatening

voices within,--health gone,--happiness gone,--even hope, that stays

longest with us, gone,--I have little heart for aught else than

thankfulness, that it is not so with me, and would fain leave the

erring soul of my fellow-man with Him, from whose hands it came,

'even as a little child,

Weeping and laughing in its childish sport.' "

"You are right. And it is worth a student's while to observe calmly how

tobacco, wine, and midnight did their work like fiends upon the

delicate frame of Hoffmann; and no less thoroughly upon his delicate

mind. He who drinks beer, thinks beer; and he who drinks wine, thinks

wine;--and he who drinks midnight, thinks midnight. He was a man of

rare intellect. He was endowed with racy humor and sarcastic wit, and a

glorious imagination. But the fire of his genius burned not peacefully,

and with a steady flame, upon the hearth of his home. It was a glaring

and irregular flame;--for the branches that he fed it with, were not

branches from the Tree of Life,--but from another tree that grew in

Paradise,--and they were wet with the unhealthy dews of night, and more

unhealthy wine; and thus, amid smoke and ashes the fire burned

fitfully, and went out with a glare, which leaves the beholder blind."

"This fire within him was a Meleager's fire-brand; and, when it burned

out, he died. And, as you say, marks of all this are clearly visible in

Hoffmann's writings. Indeed, when I read his strange fancies, it is

with me, as when in the summer night I hear the rising wind among the

trees, and the branches bow, and beckon with their long fingers, and

voices go gibbering and mockingthrough the air. A feeling of awe and

mysterious dread comes over me. I wish to hear the sound of living

voice or footstep near me,--to see a friendly and familiar face. In

truth, if it be late at night, the reader as well as the writer of

these unearthly fancies, would fain have a patient, meek-eyed wife,

with her knitting-work, at his elbow."

Berkley smiled; but Flemming continued without noticing the smile,

though he knew what was passing in the mind of his friend;

"The life and writings of this singular being interest me in a high

degree. Oftentimes one may learn more from a man's errors, than from

his virtues. Moreover, from the common sympathies of our nature, souls

that have struggled and suffered are dear to me. Willingly do I

recognise their brotherhood. Scars upon their foreheads do not so

deform them, that they cease to interest. They are always signs of

struggle; though alas! too often, likewise, of defeat. Seasons of

unhealthy, dreamy, vague delight, are followed by seasons ofweariness

and darkness. Where are then the bright fancies, that, amid the great

stillness of the night, arise like stars in the firmament of our souls?

The morning dawns, the light of common day shines in upon us, and the

heavens are without a star! From the lives of such men we learn, that

mere pleasant sensations are not happiness;--that sensual pleasures are

to be drunk sparingly, and, as it were, from the palm of the hand; and

that those who bow down upon their knees to drink of these bright

streams that water life, are not chosen of God either to overthrow or

to overcome!"

"I think you are very lenient in your judgment. This is not the usual

defect of critics. Like Shakspeare's samphire-gatherer, they have a

dreadful trade! and, to make the simile complete, they ought to hang

for it!"

"Methinks it would be hard to hang a man for the sake of a simile. But

which of Hoffmann's works is it, that you have in your hand?"

"His Phatasy-Pieces in Callot's manner. Who was this Callot?"

"He was a Lorrain painter of the seventeenth century, celebrated for

his wild and grotesque conceptions. These sketches of Hoffmann are

imitations of his style. They are full of humor, poetry, and brilliant

imagination."

"And which of them shall I read to you? The Ritter Glück; or the

Musical Sufferings of John Kreisler; or that very exquisite story of

the Golden Jar, wherein is depicted the life of Poesy, in this

common-place world of ours?"

"Read the shortest. Read Kreisler. That will amuse me. It is a picture

of his own sufferings at the æsthetic Teas in Berlin, supposed to be

written in pencil on the blank leaves of a music-book."

Thereupon Berkley leaned back in his easychair, and read as follows.

CHAPTER IV. MUSICAL SUFFERINGS OF JOHN KREISLER.

"They are all gone! I might have known it by the whispering, shuffling,

coughing, buzzing through all the notes of the gamut. It was a true

swarm of bees, leaving the old hive. Gottlieb has lighted fresh candles

for me, and placed a bottle of Burgundy on the piano-forte. I can play

no more, I am perfectly exhausted. My glorious old friend here on the

music-stand is to blame for that. Again he has borne me away through

the air, as Mephistopheles did Faust, and so high, that I took not the

slightest notice of the little men under me, though I dare say they

made noise enough. A rascally, worthless, wasted evening! But now I am

well and merry! However, while I was playing, I took out my pencil, and

on pagesixty-three, under the last system, noted down a couple of good

flourishes in cipher with my right hand, while the left was struggling

away in the torrent of sweet sounds. Upon the blank page at the end I

go on writing. I leave all ciphers and sweet tones, and with true

delight, like a sick man restored to health, who can never stop

relating what he has suffered, I note down here circumstantially the

dire agonies of this evening's tea-party. And not for myself alone, but

likewise for all those who from time to time may amuse and edify

themselves with my copy of John Sebastian Bach's Variations for the

Piano-forte, published by Nägeli in Zürich, and who find my marks at

the end of the thirtieth variation, and, led on by the great Latin

Verte, (I will write it down the moment I get through this doleful

statement of grievances,) turn over the leaf and read.

"They will at once see the connexion. They know, that the Geheimerath

Rödelein's house is a charming house to visit in, and that he has two

daughters, of whom the whole fashionable world proclaims with

enthusiasm, that they dance like goddesses, speak French like angels,

and play and sing and draw like the Muses. The Geheimerath Rödelein is

a rich man. At his quarterly dinners he brings on the most delicious

wines and richest dishes. All is established on a footing of the

greatest elegance; and whoever at his tea-parties does not amuse

himself heavenly, has no ton, no esprit, and particularly no taste for

the fine arts. It is with an eye to these, that, with the tea, punch,

wine, ice-creams, etc., a little music is always served up, which, like

the other refreshments, is very quietly swallowed by the fashionable

world.

"The arrangements are as follows.--After every guest has had time

enough to drink as many cups of tea as he may wish, and punch and ices

have been handed round twice, the servants wheel out the card-tables

for the elder and more solid part of the company, who had rather play

cards than any musical instrument; and, to tell the truth, this kind of

playing does not make such a useless noise as others, and you hear only

the clink of money.

"This is a hint for the younger part of the company to pounce upon the

Misses Rödelein. A great tumult ensues; in the midst of which you can

distinguish these words,--

"'Schönes Fräulein! do not refuse us the gratification of your heavenly

talent! O, sing something! that's a good dear!--impossible,--bad

cold,--the last ball! have not practised anything,--oh, do, do, we beg

of you,' etc.

"Meanwhile Gottlieb has opened the piano-forte, and placed the

well-known music-book on the stand; and from the card-table cries the

respectable mamma,--

" 'Chantez donc, mes enfans!'

"That is the cue of my part. I place myself at the piano-forte, and the

Rödeleins are led up to the instrument in triumph.

"And now another difficulty arises. Neither wishes to sing first.

"'You know, dear Nanette, how dreadful hoarse I am.'

"'Why, my dear Marie, I am as hoarse as you are.'

"'I sing so badly!--'

"'O, my dear child; do begin!'

"My suggestion, (I always make the same!) that they should both begin

together with a duet, is loudly applauded;--the music-book is thumbed

over, and the leaf, carefully folded down, is at length found, and away

we go with Dolce dell' anima, etc.

"To tell the truth, the talent of the Misses Rödelein is not the

smallest. I have been an instructer here only five years, and little

short of two years in the Rödelein family. In this short time, Fräulein

Nanette has made such progress, that a tune, which she has heard at the

theatre only ten times, and has played on the piano-forte, at farthest,

ten times more, she will sing right off, so that you know in a moment

what it is. Fräulein Marie catches it at the eighth time; and if she is

sometimes a quarter of a note lower than the piano-forte, after all it

is very tolerable, considering her pretty little doll-face, and very

passable rosy-lips.

"After the duet, a universal chorus of applause! And now arriettas and

duettinos succeed each other, and right merrily I hammer away at the

thousand-times-repeated accompaniment. During the singing, the

Finanzräthin Eberstein, by coughing and humming, has given to

understand that she also sings. Fräulein Nanette says;

"'But, my dear Finanzräthin, now you must let us hear your exquisite

voice.'

"A new tumult arises. She has a bad cold in her head,--she does not

know anything by heart! Gottlieb brings straightway two armfuls of

music-books; and the leaves are turned over again and again. First she

thinks she will sing Der Hölle Rache, etc., then Hebe sich, etc., then

Ach, Ich liebte, etc. In this embarrassment, I propose, Ein Veilchen

auf der Wiese, etc. But she is for the heroic style; she wants to make

a display, and finally selects the aria in Constantia.

"O scream, squeak, mew, gurgle, groan, agonize, quiver, quaver, just as

much as you please, Madam,--I have my foot on the fortissimo pedal, and

thunder myself deaf! O Satan, Satan! which of thy goblins damned has

got into this throat, pinching, and kicking, and cuffing the tones

about so! Four strings have snapped already, and one hammer is lamed

for life. My ears ring again,--my head hums,--my nerves tremble! Have

all the harsh notes from the cracked trumpet of a strolling-player been

imprisoned in this little throat! (But this excites me,--I must drink a

glass of Burgundy.)

"The applause was unbounded; and some one observed, that the

Finanzräthin and Mozart had put me quite in a blaze. I smiled with

downcast eyes, very stupidly. I could but acknowledge it. And now all

talents, which hitherto had bloomed unseen, were in motion, wildly

flitting to and fro. They were bent upon a surfeit of music; tuttis,

finales, choruses must be performed. The Canonicus Kratzer sings, you

know, a heavenly bass, as was observed by the gentleman yonder, with

the head of Titus Andronicus, who modestly remarked also, that he

himself was properly only a second-ratetenor; but, though he said it,

who should not say it, was nevertheless member of several academies of

music. Forthwith preparations are made for the first chorus in the

opera of Titus. It went off gloriously. The Canonicus, standing close

behind me, thundered out the bass over my head, as if he were singing

with bass-drums and trumpet obbligato in a cathedral. He struck the

notes gloriously; but in his hurry he got the tempo just about twice

too slow. However, he was true to himself at least in this, that

through the whole piece he dragged along just half a beat behind the

rest. The others showed a most decided penchant for the ancient Greek

music, which, as is well known, having nothing to do with harmony, ran

on in unison or monotone. They all sang treble, with slight variations,

caused by accidental rising and falling of the voice, say some quarter

of a note.

"This somewhat noisy affair produced a universal tragic state of

feeling, namely a kind of terror, even at the card-tables, which for

the momentcould no longer, as before, chime in melodramatic, by weaving

into the music sundry exclamations; as, for instance;

" 'O! I loved,--eight and forty,--was so happy,--I pass,--then I knew

not,--whist,--pangs of love,--follow suit,' etc.--It has a very pretty

effect. (I fill my glass.)

"That was the highest point of the musical exhibition this evening.

'Now it is all over,' thought I to myself. I shut the book, and got up

from the piano-forte. But the baron, my ancient tenor, came up to me,

and said;

" 'My dear Herr Capellmeister, they say you play the most exquisite

voluntaries! Now do play us one; only a short one, I entreat you!'

"I answered very drily, that to-day my fantasies had all gone a

wool-gathering; and, while we are talking about it, a devil, in the

shape of a dandy, with two waistcoats, had smelt out Bach's Variations,

which were lying under my hat in the next room. He thinks they are

merely little variations, such as Nel cor mio non più sento, or Ah,

vous dirai-je, maman, etc., and insists upon it, that I shall play

them. I try to excuse myself, but they all attack me. So then, 'Listen,

and burst with ennui,' think I to myself,--and begin to work away.

"When I had got to variation number three, several ladies departed,

followed by the gentleman with the Titus-Andronicus head. The

Rödeleins, as their teacher was playing, stood it out, though not

without difficulty, to number twelve. Number fifteen made the man with

two waistcoats take to his heels. Out of most excessive politeness, the

Baron stayed till number thirty, and drank up all the punch, which

Gottlieb placed on the piano-forte for me.

"I should have brought all to a happy conclusion, but, alas! this

number thirty,--the theme,--tore me irresistibly away. Suddenly the

quarto leaves spread out to a gigantic folio, on which a thousand

imitations and developments of the theme stood written, and I could not

choose but play them. The notes became alive, and glimmered and hopped

all round about me,--an electric firestreamed through the tips of my

fingers into the keys,--the spirit, from which it gushed forth, spread

his broad wings over my soul, the whole room was filled with a thick

mist, in which the candles burned dim,--and through which peered forth

now a nose, and anon a pair of eyes, and then suddenly vanished away

again. And thus it came to pass, that I was left alone with my

Sebastian Bach, by Gottlieb attended, as by a familiar spirit. (Your

good health, Sir.)

"Is an honest musician to be tormented with music, as I have been

to-day, and am so often tormented? Verily, no art is so damnably

abused, as this same glorious, holy Musica, who, in her delicate being,

is so easily desecrated. Have you real talent,--real feeling for art?

Then study music;--do something worthy of the art,--and dedicate your

whole soul to the beloved saint. If without this you have a fancy for

quavers and demi-semi-quavers, practise for yourself and by yourself,

and torment not therewith the Capellmeister Kreisler and others.

"Well, now I might go home, and put the finishing touch to my sonata

for the piano-forte; but it is not yet eleven o'clock, and, withal, a

beautiful summer night. I will lay any wager, that, at my next-door

neighbour's, (the Oberjägermeister,) the young ladies are sitting at

the window, screaming down into the street, for the twentieth time,

with harsh, sharp, piercing voices, 'When thine eye is beaming

love,'--but only the first stanza, over and over again. Obliquely

across the way, some one is murdering the flute, and has, moreover,

lungs like Rameau's nephew; and, in notes of 'linked sweetness long

drawn out,' his neighbour is trying acoustic experiments on the French

horn. The numerous dogs of the neighbourhood are growing unquiet, and

my landlord's cat, inspired by that sweet duet, is making close by my

window (for, of course, my musico-poetic laboratory is an attic,)

certain tender confessions,--upward through the whole chromatic scale,

soft complaining, to the neighbour's puss, with whom he has been in

love since March last! Till this is all fairly over, II think will sit

quietly here. Besides, there is still blank paper and Burgundy left, of

which I forthwith take a sip.

"There is, as I have heard, an ancient law, forbidding those, who

followed any noisy handicraft, from living near literary men. Should

not then musical composers, poor, and hard beset, and who, moreover,

are forced to coin their inspiration into gold, to spin out the thread

of life withal, be allowed to apply this law to themselves, and banish

out of the neighbourhood all ballad-singers and bagpipers? What would a

painter say, while transferring to his canvass a form of ideal beauty,

if you should hold up before him all manner of wild faces and ugly

masks? He might shut his eyes, and in this way, at least, quietly

follow out the images of fancy. Cotton, in one's ears, is of no use;

one still hears the dreadful massacre. And then the idea,--the bare

idea, 'Now they are going to sing,--now the horn strikes up,'--is

enough to send one's sublimest conceptions to the very devil."

CHAPTER V. SAINT GILGEN.

It was a bright Sunday morning when Flemming and Berkley left behind

them the cloud-capped hills of Salzburg, and journeyed eastward towards

the lakes. The landscape around them was one to attune their souls to

holy musings. Field, forest, hill and vale, fresh air, and the perfume

of clover-fields and new-mown hay, birds singing, and the sound of

village bells, and the moving breeze among the branches,--no laborers

in the fields, but peasants on their way to church, coming across the

green pastures, with roses in their hats,--the beauty and quiet of the

holy day of rest,--all, all in earth and air, breathed upon the soul

like a benediction.

They stopped to change horses at Hof, a handfulof houses on the brow of

a breezy hill, the church and tavern standing opposite to each other,

and nothing between them but the dusty road, and the churchyard, with

its iron crosses, and the fluttering tinsel of the funeral garlands. In

the churchyard and at the tavern-door, were groups of peasants, waiting

for divine service to begin. They were clothed in their holiday

dresses. The men wore breeches and long boots, and frock-coats with

large metal buttons; the women, straw hats, and gay calico gowns, with

short waists and scant folds. They were adorned with a profusion of

great, trumpery ornaments, and reminded Flemming of the Indians in the

frontier villages of America. Near the churchyard-gate was a booth,

filled with flaunting calicos; and opposite sat an old woman behind a

table, which was loaded with ginger-bread. She had a roulette at her

elbow, where the peasants risked a kreutzer for a cake. On other

tables, cases of knives, scythes, reaping-hooks, and other implements

of husbandry were offered for sale.

The travellers continued their journey, without stopping to hear mass.

In the course of the forenoon they came suddenly in sight of the

beautiful Lake of Saint Wolfgang, lying deep beneath them in the

valley. On its shore, under them, sat the white village of Saint

Gilgen, like a swan upon its reedy nest. They seemed to have taken it

unawares, and as it were clapped their hands upon it in its sleep, and

almost expected to see it spread its broad, snow-white wings, and fly

away. The whole scene was one of surpassing beauty.

They drove leisurely down the steep hill, and stopped at the village

inn. Before the door was a magnificent, broad-armed tree, with benches

and tables beneath its shadow. On the front of the house was written in

large letters, "Post-Tavern by Franz Schoendorfer"; and over this was a

large sun-dial, and a half-effaced painting of a bear-hunt, covering

the whole side of the house, and mostly red. Just as they drove up, a

procession of priests with banners, and peasants with their hats in

their hands, passed by towards the church. They were singing a solemn

psalm. At the same moment, a smart servant girl, with a black straw

hat, set coquettishly on her flaxen hair, and a large silver spoon

stuck in her girdle, came out of the tavern, and asked Flemming what he

would please to order for breakfast.

Breakfast was soon ready, and was served up at the head of the stairs,

on an old-fashioned oaken table in the great hall, into which the

chambers opened. Berkley ordered at the same time a tub of cold water,

in which he seated himself, with his coat on, and a bed-quilt thrown

round his knees. Thus he sat for an hour; ate his breakfast, and smoked

a pipe, and laughed a good deal. He then went to bed and slept till

dinner time. Meanwhile Flemming sat in his chamber and read. It was a

large room in the front of the house, looking upon the village and the

lake. The windows were latticed, with small panes, and the window-sills

filled with fragrant flowers.

At length the heat of the noon was over. Day, like a weary pilgrim, had

reached the westerngate of Heaven, and Evening stooped down to unloose

the latchets of his sandal-shoon. Flemming and Berkley sallied forth to

ramble by the borders of the lake. Down the cool, green glades and

alleys, beneath the illuminated leaves of the forest, over the rising

grounds, in the glimmering fretwork of sunshine and leaf-shadow,--an

exhilarating walk! The cool evening air by the lake was like a bath.

They drank the freshness of the hour in thirsty draughts, and their

breasts heaved rejoicing and revived, after the feverish, long

confinement of the sultry summer day. And there, too, lay the lake, so

beautiful and still! Did it not recall, think ye, the lake of Thun?

On their return homeward they passed near the village churchyard.

"Let us go in and see how the dead rest," said Flemming, as they passed

beneath the belfry of the church; and they went in, and lingered among

the tombs and the evening shadows.

How peaceful is the dwelling-place of those who inhabit the green

hamlets, and populous cities of the dead! They need no antidote for

care,--nor armour against fate. No morning sun shines in at the closed

windows, and awakens them, nor shall until the last great day. At most

a straggling sunbeam creeps in through the crumbling wall of an old

neglected tomb,--a strange visiter, that stays not long. And there they

all sleep, the holy ones, with their arms crossed upon their breasts,

or lying motionless by their sides,--not carved in marble by the hand

of man, but formed in dust, by the hand of God. God's peace be with

them. No one comes to them now, to hold them by the hand, and with

delicate fingers smooth their hair. They heed no more the blandishments

of earthly friendship. They need us not, however much we may need them.

And yet they silently await our coming.

Beautiful is that season of life, when we can say, in the language of

Scripture, "Thou hast the dew of thy youth." But of these flowers Death

gathers many. He places them upon his bosom, and his form becomes

transformed into somethingless terrific than before. We learn to gaze

and shudder not; for he carries in his arms the sweet blossoms of our

earthly hopes. We shall see them all again, blooming in a happier land.

Yes, Death brings us again to our friends. They are waiting for us, and

we shall not live long. They have gone before us, and are like the

angels in heaven. They stand upon the borders of the grave to welcome

us, with the countenance of affection, which they wore on earth; yet

more lovely, more radiant, more spiritual! O, he spake well who said,

that graves are the foot-prints of angels.

Death has taken thee, too, and thou hast the dew of thy youth. He has

placed thee upon his bosom, and his stern countenance wears a smile.

The far country, toward which we journey, seems nearer to us, and the

way less dark; for thou hast gone before, passing so quietly to thy

rest, that day itself dies not more calmly!

It was in an hour of blessed communion with the souls of the departed,

that the sweet poet Henry Vaughan wrote those few lines, whichhave made

death lovely, and his own name immortal!

"They are all gone into a world of light,

And I alone sit lingering here!

Their very memory is fair and bright,

And my sad thoughts doth clear.

"It glows and glitters in my cloudy breast,

Like stars upon some gloomy grove,

Or those faint beams in which the hill is dressed,

After the sun's remove.

"I see them walking in an air of glory,

Whose light doth trample on my days,

My days, which are at best but dull and hoary,

Mere glimmerings and decays.

"O holy hope, and high humility,

High as the heavens above!

These are your walks, and ye have showed them me,

To kindle my cold love.

"Dear, beauteous Death! the jewel of the just!

Shining nowhere but in the dark!

What mysteries do lie beyond thy dust,

Could man outlook that mark!

"He that hath found some fledged bird's nest, may know,

At first sight, if the bird be flown;

But what fair field or grove he sings in now,

That is to him unknown.

"And yet as angels, in some brighter dreams,

Call to the soul, when man doth sleep,

So some strange thoughts transcend our wonted themes,

And into glory peep!"

Such were Flemming's thoughts, as he stood among the tombs at evening

in the churchyard of Saint Gilgen. A holy calm stole over him. The

fever of his heart was allayed. He had a moment's rest from pain; and

went back to his chamber in peace. Whence came this holy calm, this

long-desired tranquillity? He knew not; yet the place seemed

consecrated. He resolved to linger there, beside the lake, which was a

Pool of Bethesda for him; and let Berkley go on alone to the baths of

Ischel. He would wait for him there in the solitude of Saint Gilgen.

Long after they had parted for the night, he sat in his chamber, and

thought of what he had suffered, and enjoyedthe silence within and

without. Hour after hour, slipped by unheeded, as he sat lost in his

reverie. At length, his candle sank in its socket, gave one flickering

gleam, and expired with a sob. This aroused him.

He went to the window, and peered out into the dark night. It was very

late. Twice already since midnight had the great pulpit-orator Time,

like a preacher in the days of the Puritans, turned the hour-glass on

his high pulpit, the church belfry, and still went on with his sermon,

thundering downward to the congregation in the churchyard and in the

village. But they heard him not. They were all asleep in their narrow

pews, namely, in their beds and in their graves. Soon afterward the

cock crew; and the cloudy heaven, like the apostle, who denied his

Lord, wept bitterly.

CHAPTER VI. SAINT WOLFGANG.

The morning is lovely beyond expression. The heat of the sun is great;

but a gentle wind cools the air. Birds never sang more loud and clear.

The flowers, too, on the window-sill, and on the table, rose, geranium,

and the delicate crimson cactus, are all so beautiful, that we think

the German poet right, when he calls the flowers "stars in the

firmament of the earth." Out of doors all is quiet. Opposite the window

stands the village schoolhouse. There are two parasite trees, with

their outspread branches nailed against the white walls, like the wings

of culprit kites. There the rods grow. Under them, on a bench at the

door, sit school-girls; and barefoot urchins in breeches are spelling

out their lessons. The clock strikestwelve, and one by one they

disappear, and go into the hive, like bees at the sound of a brass pan.

At the door of the next house sits a poor woman, knitting in the shade;

and in front of her is an aqueduct pouring its cool, clear water into a

rough wooden trough. A travelling carriage without horses, stands at

the inn-door, and a postilion in red jacket is talking with a

blacksmith, who wears blue woollen stockings and a leather apron.

Beyond is a stable, and still further a cluster of houses and the

village church. They are repairing the belfry and the bulbous steeple.

A little farther, over the roofs of the houses, you can see Saint

Wolfgang's Lake. Water so bright and beautiful hardly flows elsewhere.

Green, and blue, and silver-white run into each other, with almost

imperceptible change, like the streaks on the sides of a mackerel. And

above are the pinnacles of the mountains; some bald, and rocky, and

cone-shaped, and others bold, and broad, and dark with pines.

Such was the scene, which Paul Flemming beheldfrom his window a few

mornings after Berkley's departure. The quiet of the place had soothed

him. He had become more calm. His heart complained less loudly in the

holy village silence, as we are wont to lower our voices when those

around us speak in whispers. He began to feel at times an interest in

the lowly things around him. The face of the landscape pleased him, but

more than this the face of the poor woman who sat knitting in the

shade. It was a pale, meek countenance, with more delicacy in its

features than is usual among peasantry. It wore also an expression of

patient suffering. As he was looking at her, a deformed child came out

of the door and hung upon her knees. She caressed him affectionately.

It was her child; in whom she beheld her own fair features distorted

and hardly to be recognised, as one sometimes sees his face reflected

from the bowl of a spoon.

The child's deformity and the mother's tenderness interested the

feelings of Flemming. The landlady told him something of the poor

woman's history. She was the widow of a blacksmith, who had died soon

after their marriage. But she survived to become a mother, just as, in

oaks, immediately after fecundation, the male flower fades and falls,

while the female continues and ripens into perfect fruit. Alas! her

child was deformed. Yet she looked upon him with eyes of maternal

fondness and pity, loving him still more for his deformity. And in her

heart she said, as the Mexicans say to their new-born offspring,

"Child, thou art come into the world to suffer. Endure, and hold thy

peace." Though poor, she was not entirely destitute; for her husband

had left her, beside the deformed child, a life estate in a tomb in the

churchyard of Saint Gilgen. During the week she labored for other

people, and on Sundays for herself, by going to church and reading the

Bible. On one of the blank leaves she had recorded the day of her

birth, and that of her child's, likewise her marriage and her husband's

death. Thus she lived, poor, patient and resigned. Her heart was a

passion-flower, bearing within it the crown of thorns and the cross of

Christ. Her ideas of Heaven were few and simple. She rejected the

doctrine that it was a place of constant activity, and not of repose,

and believed, that, when she at length reached it, she should work no

more, but sit always in a clean white apron, and sing psalms.

As Flemming sat meditating on these things, he paid new homage in his

heart to the beauty and excellence of the female character. He thought

of the absent and the dead; and said, with tears in his eyes;

"Shall I thank God for the green Summer, and the mild air, and the

flowers, and the stars, and all that makes this world so beautiful, and

not for the good and beautiful beings I have known in it? Has not their

presence been sweeter to me than flowers? Are they not higher and

holier than the stars? Are they not more to me than all things else?"

Thus the morning passed away in musings; andin the afternoon, when

Flemming was preparing to go down to the lake, as his custom was, a

carriage drew up before the door, and, to his great astonishment, out

jumped Berkley. The first thing he did was to give the Postmaster, who

stood near the door, a smart cut with his whip. The sufferer gently

expostulated, saying,

"Pray, Sir, don't; I am lame."

Whereupon Berkley desisted, and began instead to shake the Postmaster's

wife by the shoulders, and order his dinner in English. But all this

was done so good-naturedly, and with such a rosy, laughing face, that

no offence was taken.

"So you have returned much sooner than you intended;" said Flemming,

after the first friendly salutations.

"Yes," replied Berkley; "I got tired of Ischel,--very tired. I did not

find the friends there, whom I expected. Now I am going back to

Salzburg, and then to Gastein. There I shall certainly find them. You

must go with me."

Flemming declined the invitation; and proposedto Berkley, that he

should join him in his excursion on the lake.

"You shall hear the grand echo of the Falkenstein," said he, "and

behold the scene of the Bridal Tragedy; and then we will go on as far

as the village of Saint Wolfgang, which you have not yet seen, except

across the lake."

"Well, this afternoon I devote to you; for to-morrow we part once more,

and who knows when we shall meet again?"

They went down to the water's side without farther delay; and, taking a

boat with two oars, struck across an elbow of the lake towards a barren

rock by the eastern shore, from which a small white monument shone in

the sun.

"That monument," said one of the boatmen, a stout young lad in leather

breeches, "was built by a butcher, to the glory of Saint Wolfgang, who

saved him from drowning. He was one day riding an ox to market along

the opposite bank; when the animal taking fright, sprang into the

water, and swam over to this place, with the butcher on his back."

"And do you think he could have done this," asked Berkley; "if Saint

Wolfgang had not helped him?"

"Of course not!" answered leather-breeches; and the Englishman laughed.

From this point they rowed along under the shore to a low promontory,

upon which stood another monument, commemorating a more tragical event.

"This is the place I was speaking of," said Flemming, as the boatmen

rested on their oars. "The melancholy and singular event it

commemorates happened more than two centuries ago. There was a bridal

party here upon the ice one winter; and in the midst of the dance the

ice broke, and the whole merry company were drowned together, except

the fiddlers, who were sitting on the shore."

They looked in silence at the monument, and at the blue quiet water,

under which the bones of the dancers lay buried, hand in hand. The

monument is of stone, painted white, with an over-hangingroof to

shelter it from storms. In a niche in front is a small image of the

Saviour, in a sitting posture; and an inscription, upon a marble tablet

below, says that it was placed there by Longinus Walther and his wife

Barbara Juliana von Hainberg; themselves long since peacefully crumbled

to dust, side by side in some churchyard.

"That was breaking the ice with a vengeance!" said Berkley, as they

pushed out into the lake again; and ere long they were floating beneath

the mighty precipice of Falkenstein; a steep wall of rock, crowned with

a chapel and a hermitage, where in days of old lived the holy Saint

Wolfgang. It is now haunted only by an echo, so distinct and loud, that

one might imagine the ghost of the departed saint to be sitting there,

and repeating the voices from below, not word by word, but sentence by

sentence, as if he were passing them up to the recording angel.

"Ho! ho! ho!" shouted Berkley; and the sound seemed to strike the wall

of stone, like the flapping of steel plates; "Ho! ho! ho! How areyou

to-day, Saint Wolfgang! You infernal old rascal! How is the Frau von

Wolfgang!--God save great George the King! Damn your eyes! Hold your

tongue! Ho! ho! ha! ha! hi!"

And the words were recorded above; and a voice repeated them with awful

distinctness in the blue depths overhead, and Flemming felt in his

inmost soul the contrast between the holy heavens, and the mockery of

laughter, and the idle words, which fall back from the sky above us and

soil not its purity.

In half an hour they were at the village of Saint Wolfgang, threading a

narrow street, above which the roofs of quaint, picturesque old houses

almost met. It led them to a Gothic church; a magnificent one for a

village;--in front of which was a small court, shut in by

Italian-looking houses, with balconies, and flowers at the windows.

Here a bronze fountain of elaborate workmanship was playing in the

shade. On its summit stood an image of the patron Saint of the village;

and, running round the under lip of the water-basin below, they read

this inscription in old German rhymes;

"I am in the honor of Saint Wolfgang raised. Abbot Wolfgang Habel of

Emensee, he hath made me for the use and delight of poor pilgrim wight.

Neither gold nor wine hath he; at this water shall he merry be. In the

year of the Lord fifteen hundred and fifteen, hath the work completed

been. God be praised!"

As they were deciphering the rude characters of this pious inscription,

a village priest came down a high flight of steps from the parsonage

near the church, and courteously saluted the strangers. After returning

the salutation, the mad Englishman, without preface, asked him how many

natural children were annually born in the parish. The question seemed

to astonish the good father, but he answered it civilly, as he did

several other questions, which Flemming thought rather indiscreet, to

say the least.

"You will excuse our curiosity," said he to the priest, by way of

apology. "We are strangersfrom distant countries. My friend is an

Englishman and I an American."

Berkley, however, was not so easily silenced. After a few moments'

conversation he broke out into most audacious Latin, in which the only

words clearly intelligible were;

"Plurimum reverende, in Christo religiosissime, ac clarissime Domine,

necnon et amice observandissime! Petrus sic est locutus; 'Nec argentum

mihi, nec aurum est; sed quod habeo, hoc tibi do; surge et ambula.' "

He seemed to be speaking of the fountain. The priest answered meekly,

"Non intellexi, Domine!"

But Berkley continued with great volubility to speak of his being a

stranger in the land, and all men being strangers upon earth, and

hoping to meet the good priest hereafter in the kingdom of Heaven. The

priest seemed confounded, and abashed. Through the mist of a strange

pronunciation he could recognise only here and there afamiliar word. He

took out his snuff-box; and tried to quote a passage from Saint Paul;

"Ut dixit Sanctus Paulus; qui bene facit--"

Here his memory failed him, or, as the French say, he was at the end of

his Latin, and, stretching forth his long forefinger, he concluded in

German;

"Yes;--I don't--so clearly remember--what he did say."

The Englishman helped him through with a moral phrase; and then pulling

off his hat, exclaimed very solemnly;

"Vale, domine doctissime et reverendissime!"

And the Dominie, as if pursued by a demon, made a sudden and

precipitate retreat down a flight of steps into the street.

"There!" said Berkley laughing, "I beat him at his own weapons. What do

you say of my Latin?"

"I say of it," replied Flemming, "what Holophernes said of Sir

Nathaniel's; 'Priscian a little scratched; 't will serve.' I think I

have heardbetter. But what a whim! I thought I should have laughed

aloud."

They were still sitting by the bronze fountain when the priest

returned, accompanied by a short man, with large feet, and a long blue

surtout, so greasy, that it reminded one of Polilla's in the Spanish

play, which was lined with slices of pork. His countenance was broad

and placid, but his blue eyes gleamed with a wild, mysterious,

sorrowful expression. Flemming thought the Latin contest was to be

renewed, with more powder and heavier guns. He was mistaken. The

stranger saluted him in German, and said, that, having heard he was

from America, he had come to question him about that distant country,

for which he was on the point of embarking. There was nothing peculiar

in his manner, nor in the questions he asked, nor the remarks he made.

They were the usual questions and remarks about cities and climate, and

sailing the sea. At length Flemming asked him the object of his journey

to America. Thestranger came close up to him, and lowering his voice,

said very solemnly;

"That holy man, Frederick Baraga, missionary among the Indians at

Lacroix, on Lake Superior, has returned to his father-land, Krain; and

I am chosen by Heaven to go forth as Minister Extraordinary of Christ,

to unite all nations and people in one church!"

Flemming almost started at the singular earnestness, with which he

uttered these words; and looked at him attentively, thinking to see the

face of a madman. But the modest, unassuming look of that placid

countenance was unchanged; only in the eyes burned a mysterious light,

as if candles had been lighted in the brain, to magnify the daylight

there.

"It is truly a high vocation," said he in reply. "But are you sure,

that this is no hallucination? Are you certain, that you have been

chosen by Heaven for this great work?"

"I am certain," replied the German, in a tone of great calmness and

sincerity; "and, if Saint Peter and Saint Paul should come down from

Heaven to assure me of it, my faith would be no stronger than it now

is. It has been declared to me by many signs and wonders. I can no

longer doubt, nor hesitate. I have already heard the voice of the

Spirit, speaking to me at night; and I know that I am an apostle; and

chosen for this work."

Such was the calm enthusiasm with which he spoke, that Flemming could

not choose but listen. He felt interested in this strange being. There

was something awe-inspiring in the spirit that possessed him. After a

short pause he continued;

"If you wish to know who I am, I can tell you in few words. I think you

will not find the story without interest."

He then went on to relate the circumstances recorded in the following

chapter.

CHAPTER VII. THE STORY OF BROTHER BERNARDUS.

"I was born in the city of Stein, in the land of Krain. My pious mother

Gertrude sang me psalms and spiritual songs in childhood; and often,

when I awoke in the night, I saw her still sitting, patiently at her

work by the stove, and heard her singing those hymns of heaven, or

praying in the midnight darkness when her work was done. It was for me

she prayed. Thus, from my earliest childhood, I breathed the breath of

pious aspirations. Afterwards I went to Laybach as a student of

theology; and after the usual course of study, was ordained a priest. I

went forth to the care of souls; my own soul filled with the faith,

that ere long all people would be united in one church. Yet attimes my

heart was heavy, to behold how many nations there are who have not

heard of Christ; and how those, who are called Christians, are divided

into numberless sects, and how among these are many who are Christians

in name only. I determined to devote myself to the great work of the

one church universal; and for this purpose, to give myself wholly up to

the study of the Evangelists and the Fathers. I retired to the

Benedictine cloister of Saint Paul in the valley of Lavant. The

father-confessor in the nunnery of Laak, where I then lived,

strengthened me in this resolve. I had long walked with this angel of

God in a human form, and his parting benediction sank deep into my

soul. The Prince-Abbot Berthold, of blessed memory, was then head of

the Benedictine convent. He received me kindly, and led me to the

library; where I gazed with secret rapture on the vast folios of the

Christian Fathers, from which, as from an arsenal, I was to draw the

weapons of holy warfare. In the study of these, the year of my

noviciate passed. I becamea Franciscan friar; and took the name of

Brother Bernardus. Yet my course of life remained unchanged. I seldom

left the cloister; but sat in my cell, and pored over those tomes of

holy wisdom. About this time the aged confessor in Laak departed this

life. His death was made known to me in a dream. It must have been

after midnight, when I thought that I came into the church, which was

brilliantly lighted up. The dead body of the venerable saint was

brought in, attended by a great crowd. It seemed to me, that I must go

up into the pulpit and pronounce his funeral oration; and, as I

ascended the stairs, the words of my text came into my mind; 'Blessed

in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.' My funeral sermon

ended in a strain of exultation; and I awoke with 'Amen!' upon my lips.

A few days afterwards, I heard that on that night the old man died.

After this event I became restless and melancholy. I strove in vain to

drive from me my gloomy thoughts. I could no longer study. I was no

longer contented in the cloister. I even thought of leaving it.

"One night I had gone to bed early, according to my custom, and had

fallen asleep. Suddenly I was awakened by a bright and wonderful light,

which shone all about me, and filled me with heavenly rapture. Shortly

after I heard a voice, which pronounced distinctly these words, in the

Sclavonian tongue; 'Remain in the cloister!' It was the voice of my

departed mother. I was fully awake; yet saw nothing but the bright

light, which disappeared, when the words had been spoken. Still it was

broad daylight in my chamber. I thought I had slept beyond my usual

hour. I looked at my watch. It was just one o'clock after midnight.

Suddenly the daylight vanished, and it was dark. In the morning I

arose, as if new-born, through the wonderful light, and the words of my

mother's voice. It was no dream. I knew it was the will of God that I

should stay; and I could again give myself up to quiet study. I read

the whole Bible through once more in theoriginal text; and went on with

the Fathers, in chronological order. Often, after the apparition of the

light, I awoke at the same hour; and though I heard no voice and saw no

light, yet was refreshed with heavenly consolation.

"Not long after this an important event happened in the cloister. In

the absence of the deacon of the Abbey, I was to preach the

Thanksgiving sermon of Harvest-home. During the week the Prince-Abbot

Berthold gave up the ghost; and my sermon became at once a

Thanks-giving and Funeral Sermon. Perhaps it may not be unworthy of

notice, that I was thus called to pronounce the burial discourse over

the body of the last reigning, spiritual Prince Abbot in Germany. He

was a man of God, and worthy of this honor.

"One year after this event, I was appointed Professor of Biblical

Hermeneutics in Klagenfurt, and left the Abbey forever. In Klagenfurt I

remained ten years, dwelling in the same house, and eating at the same

table, with seventeen other professors. Their conversation naturally

suggestednew topics of study, and brought to my notice books, which I

had never before seen. One day I heard at table, that Maurus

Cappellari, a monk of Camaldoli, had been elected Pope, under the name

of Gregory Sixteenth. He was spoken of as a very learned man, who had

written many books. At this time I was a firm believer in the Pope's

infallibility; and when I heard these books mentioned, there arose in

me an irresistible longing to read them. I inquired for them; but they

were nowhere to be had. At length I heard, that his most important

work, The Triumph of the Holy See, and of the Church, had been

translated into German and published in Augsburg. Ere long the precious

volume was in my hands. I began to read it with the profoundest awe.

The farther I read, the more my wonder grew. The subject was of the

deepest interest to me. I could not lay the book out of my hand, till I

had read it through with the closest attention. Now at length my eyes

were opened. I saw before me a monk, who had been educated in an

Italian cloister; who, indeed, had read much, and yet only what was

calculated to strengthen him in the prejudices of his childhood; and

who had entirely neglected those studies upon which a bishop should

most rely, in order to work out the salvation of man. I perceived at

the same time, that this was the strongest instrument for battering

down the walls, which separate Christian from Christian. I saw, though

as yet dimly, the way in which the union of Christians in the one true

church was to be accomplished. I knew not whether to be most astonished

at my own blindness, that, in all my previous studies, I had not

perceived, what the reading of this single book made manifest to me; or

at the blindness of the Pope, who had undertaken to justify such

follies, without perceiving that at the same moment he was himself

lying in fatal error. But since I have learned more thoroughly the ways

of the Lord, I am now no more astonished at this, but pray only to

Divine providence, who so mysteriously prepares all people to be united

in one true church. I no longer believed in the Pope's infallibility;

nay, I believed even, that, to the great injury of humanity, he lay in

fatal error. I felt, moreover, that now the time had fully come, when I

should publicly show myself, and found in America a parish and a

school, and become the spiritual guide of men, and the schoolmaster of

children.

"It was then, and on that account, that I wrote in the Latin tongue my

great work on Biblical Hermeneutics. But in Germany it cannot be

published. The Austrian censor of the press cannot find time to read

it, though I think, that if I have spent so many laborious days and

sleepless nights in writing it, this man ought likewise to find time

enough not only to read it, but to examine all the grounds of my

reasoning, and point out to me any errors, if he can find any.

Notwithstanding, the Spirit gave me no repose, but urged me ever

mightily on to the perfection of my great work.

"One morning I sat writing, under peculiar influences of the Spirit,

upon the Confusion of Tongues, the Division of the People, and the

importance ofthe study of Comparative Philology, in reference to their

union in one church. So wrapped was I in the thought, that I came late

into my lecture-room; and after lecture returned to my chamber, where I

wrote till the clock struck twelve. At dinner, one of the Professors

asked if any one had seen the star, about which so much was said. The

Professor of Physics, said, that the student Johannes Schminke had come

to him in the greatest haste, and besought him to go out and see the

wonderful star; but, being incredulous about it, he made no haste, and,

when they came into the street, the star had disappeared. When I heard

the star spoken of, my soul was filled with rapture; and a voice within

me seemed to say, 'The great time is approaching; labor unweariedly in

thy work.' I sought out the student; and like Herod, inquired

diligently what time the star appeared. He informed me, that, just as

the clock was striking eight, in the morning, he went out of his house

to go to the college, and saw on the square a crowd looking at a bright

star. It was the veryhour, when I was writing alone in my chamber on

the importance of Comparative Philology in bringing about the union of

all nations. I felt, that my hour had come. Strangely moved, I walked

up and down my chamber. The evening twilight came on. I lighted my

lamp, and drew the green curtains before the windows, and sat down to

read. But hardly had I taken the book into my hand, when the Spirit

began to move me, and urge me then to make my last decision and

resolve. I made a secret vow, that I would undertake the voyage to

America. Suddenly my troubled thoughts were still. An unwonted rapture

filled my heart. I sat and read till the supper bell rang. They were

speaking at table of a red glaring meteor, which had just been seen in

the air, southeast from Klagenfurt; and had suddenly disappeared with a

dull, hollow sound. It was the very moment at which I had taken my

final resolution to leave my native land. Every great purpose and event

of my life, seemed heralded and attended by divine messengers; the

voices of thedead; the bright morning star, shining in the clear

sunshine; and the red meteor in the evening twilight.

"I now began seriously to prepare for my departure. The chamber I

occupied, had once been the library of a Franciscan convent. Only a

thick wall separated it from the church. In this wall was a niche, with

heavy folding-doors, which had served the Franciscans as a repository

for prohibited books. Here also I kept my papers, and my great work on

Biblical Hermeneutics. The inside of the doors was covered with

horrible caricatures of Luther, Melancthon, Calvin, and other great

men. I used often to look at them with the deepest melancholy, when I

thought that these great men likewise had labored upon earth, and

fought with Satan in the church. But they were persecuted, denounced,

condemned to die. So perhaps will it be with me. I thought of this

often; and armed myself against the fear of death. I was in constant

apprehension, lest the police should search my chamber during my

absence, and, by examining my papers, discover my doctrine and designs.

But the Spirit said to me; 'Be of good cheer; I will so blind the eyes

of thy enemies, that it shall not once occur to them to think of thy

writings.'

"At length, after many difficulties and temptations of the Devil, I am

on my way to America. Yesterday I took leave of my dearest friend,

Gregory Kuscher, in Hallstadt. He seemed filled with the Spirit of God,

and has wonderfully strengthened me in my purpose. All the hosts of

heaven looked on, and were glad. The old man kissed me at parting; and

I ascended the mountain as if angels bore me up in their arms. Near the

summit, lay a newly fallen avalanche, over which, as yet, no footsteps

had passed. This was my last temptation. 'Ha!' cried I aloud, 'Satan

has prepared a snare for me; but I will conquer him with godly

weapons.' I sprang over the treacherous snow, with greater faith than

St. Peter walked the waters of the Lake of Galilee; and came down the

valley, while the mountain peaks yetshone in the setting sun. God

smiles upon me. I go forth, full of hopeful courage. On Christmas next,

I shall excommunicate the Pope."

Saying these words, he slowly and solemnly took his leave, like one

conscious of the great events which await him, and withdrew with the

other priest into the church. Flemming could not smile as Berkley did;

for in the solitary, singular enthusiast, who had just left them, he

saw only another melancholy victim to solitude and over-labor of the

brain; and felt how painful a thing it is, thus to become unconsciously

the alms-man of other men's sympathies, a kind of blind beggar for the

charity of a good wish or a prayer.

The sun was now setting. Silently they floated back to Saint Gilgen,

amid the cool evening shadows. The village clock struck nine as they

landed; and as Berkley was to depart early in the morning, he went to

bed betimes. On bidding Flemming good night he said;

"I shall not see you in the morning; so good bye, and God bless you.

Remember my partingwords. Never mind trifles. In this world a man must

either be anvil or hammer. Care killed a cat!"

"I have heard you say that so often," replied Flemming, laughing, "that

I begin to believe it is true. But I wonder if Care shaved his left

eyebrow, after doing the deed, as the ancient Egyptians used to do!"

"Aha! now you are sweeping cobwebs from the sky! Good night! Good

night!"

A sorrowful event happened in the neighbourhood that night. The widow's

child died suddenly. "Woe is me!"--thus mourns the childless mother in

one of the funeral songs of Greenland; "Woe is me, that I should gaze

upon thy place and find it vacant! In vain for thee thy mother dries

the sea-drenched garments!" Not in these words, but in thoughts like

these, did the poor mother bewail the death of her child, thinking

mostly of the vacant place, and the daily cares and solicitudes of

maternal love. Flemming saw a light in her chamber, and shadows moving

toand fro, as he stood by the window, gazing into the starry, silent

sky. But he little thought of the awful domestic tragedy, which was

even then enacted behind those thin curtains!

CHAPTER VIII. FOOT-PRINTS OF ANGELS.

It was Sunday morning; and the church bells were all ringing together.

From all the neighbouring villages, came the solemn, joyful sounds,

floating through the sunny air, mellow and faint and low,--all mingling

into one harmonious chime, like the sound of some distant organ in

heaven. Anon they ceased; and the woods, and the clouds, and the whole

village, and the very air itself seemed to pray, so silent was it

everywhere.

Two venerable old men,--high priests and patriarchs were they in the

land,--went up the pulpit stairs, as Moses and Aaron went up Mount Hor,

in the sight of all the congregation,--for the pulpit stairs were in

front, and very high.

Paul Flemming will never forget the sermon he heard that day,--no, not

even if he should live to be as old as he who preached it. The text

was, "I know that my Redeemer liveth." It was meant to console the

pious, poor widow, who sat right below him at the foot of the pulpit

stairs, all in black, and her heart breaking. He said nothing of the

terrors of death, nor of the gloom of the narrow house, but, looking

beyond these things, as mere circumstances to which the imagination

mainly gives importance, he told his hearers of the innocence of

childhood upon earth, and the holiness of childhood in heaven, and how

the beautiful Lord Jesus was once a little child, and now in heaven the

spirits of little children walked with him, and gathered flowers in the

fields of Paradise. Good old man! In behalf of humanity, I thank thee

for these benignant words! And, still more than I, the bereaved mother

thanked thee, and from that hour, though she wept in secret for her

child, yet

"She knew he was with Jesus,

And she asked him not again."

After the sermon, Paul Flemming walked forth alone into the churchyard.

There was no one there, save a little boy, who was fishing with a pin

hook in a grave half full of water. But a few moments afterward,

through the arched gateway under the belfry, came a funeral procession.

At its head walked a priest in white surplice, chanting. Peasants, old

and young, followed him, with burning tapers in their hands. A young

girl carried in her arms a dead child, wrapped in its little winding

sheet. The grave was close under the wall, by the church door. A vase

of holy water stood beside it. The sexton took the child from the

girl's arms, and put it into a coffin; and, as he placed it in the

grave, the girl held over it a cross, wreathed with roses, and the

priest and peasants sang a funeral hymn. When this was over, the priest

sprinkled the grave and the crowd with holy water; and then they all

went into the church, each one stopping as he passed the grave to throw

a handful of earth into it, and sprinkle it with holy water.

A few moments afterwards, the voice of the priest was heard saying mass

in the church, and Flemming saw the toothless old sexton treading the

fresh earth into the grave of the little child, with his clouted shoes.

He approached him, and asked the age of the deceased. The sexton leaned

a moment on his spade, and shrugging his shoulders replied;

"Only an hour or two. It was born in the night, and died this morning

early?"

"A brief existence," said Flemming. "The child seems to have been born

only to be buried, and have its name recorded on a wooden tombstone."

The sexton went on with his work, and made no reply. Flemming still

lingered among the graves, gazing with wonder at the strange devices,

by which man has rendered death horrible and the grave loathsome.

In the Temple of Juno at Elis, Sleep and his twin-brother Death were

represented as children reposing in the arms of Night. On various

funeral monuments of the ancients the Genius of Death issculptured as a

beautiful youth, leaning on an inverted torch, in the attitude of

repose, his wings folded and his feet crossed. In such peaceful and

attractive forms, did the imagination of ancient poets and sculptors

represent death. And these were men in whose souls the religion of

Nature was like the light of stars, beautiful, but faint and cold!

Strange, that in later days, this angel of God, which leads us with a

gentle hand, into the "Land of the great departed, into the silent

Land," should have been transformed into a monstrous and terrific

thing! Such is the spectral rider on the white horse;--such the ghastly

skeleton with scythe and hour-glass;--the Reaper, whose name is Death!

One of the most popular themes of poetry and painting in the Middle

Ages, and continuing down even into modern times, was the Dance of

Death. In almost all languages is it written,--the apparition of the

grim spectre, putting a sudden stop to all business, and leading men

away into the "remarkable retirement" of the grave. Itis written in an

ancient Spanish Poem, and painted on a wooden bridge in Switzerland.

The designs of Holbein are well known. The most striking among them is

that, where, from a group of children sitting round a cottage hearth,

Death has taken one by the hand, and is leading it out of the door.

Quietly and unresisting goes the little child, and in its countenance

no grief, but wonder only; while the other children are weeping and

stretching forth their hands in vain towards their departing brother. A

beautiful design it is, in all save the skeleton. An angel had been

better, with folded wings, and torch inverted!

And now the sun was growing high and warm. A little chapel, whose door

stood open, seemed to invite Flemming to enter and enjoy the grateful

coolness. He went in. There was no one there. The walls were covered

with paintings and sculpture of the rudest kind, and with a few funeral

tablets. There was nothing there to move the heart to devotion; but in

that hour the heart of Flemming was weak,--weak as a child's. He bowed

hisstubborn knees, and wept. And oh! how many disappointed hopes, how

many bitter recollections, how much of wounded pride, and unrequited

love, were in those tears, through which he read on a marble tablet in

the chapel wall opposite, this singular inscription;

"Look not mournfully into the Past. It comes not back again. Wisely

improve the Present. It is thine. Go forth to meet the shadowy Future,

without fear, and with a manly heart."

It seemed to him, as if the unknown tenant of that grave had opened his

lips of dust, and spoken to him the words of consolation, which his

soul needed, and which no friend had yet spoken. In a moment the

anguish of his thoughts was still. The stone was rolled away from the

door of his heart; death was no longer there, but an angel clothed in

white. He stood up, and his eyes were no more bleared with tears; and,

looking into the bright, morning heaven, he said;

"I will be strong!"

Men sometimes go down into tombs, with painfullongings to behold once

more the faces of their departed friends; and as they gaze upon them,

lying there so peacefully with the semblance, that they wore on earth,

the sweet breath of heaven touches them, and the features crumble and

fall together, and are but dust. So did his soul then descend for the

last time into the great tomb of the Past, with painful longings to

behold once more the dear faces of those he had loved; and the sweet

breath of heaven touched them, and they would not stay, but crumbled

away and perished as he gazed. They, too, were dust. And thus,

far-sounding, he heard the great gate of the Past shut behind him as

the Divine Poet did the gate of Paradise, when the angel pointed him

the way up the Holy Mountain; and to him likewise was it forbidden to

look back.

In the life of every man, there are sudden transitions of feeling,

which seem almost miraculous. At once, as if some magician had touched

the heavens and the earth, the dark clouds melt into the air, the wind

falls, and serenity succeedsthe storm. The causes which produce these

sudden changes may have been long at work within us, but the changes

themselves are instantaneous, and apparently without sufficient cause.

It was so with Flemming; and from that hour forth he resolved, that he

would no longer veer with every shifting wind of circumstance; no

longer be a child's plaything in the hands of Fate, which we ourselves

do make or mar. He resolved henceforward not to lean on others; but to

walk self-confident and self-possessed; no longer to waste his years in

vain regrets, nor wait the fulfilment of boundless hopes and indiscreet

desires; but to live in the Present wisely, alike forgetful of the

Past, and careless of what the mysterious Future might bring. And from

that moment he was calm, and strong; he was reconciled with himself!

His thoughts turned to his distant home beyond the sea. An

indescribable, sweet feeling rose within him.

"Thither will I turn my wandering footsteps," said he; "and be a man

among men, and no longer a dreamer among shadows. Henceforth bemine a

life of action and reality! I will work in my own sphere, nor wish it

other than it is. This alone is health and happiness. This alone is

Life;

'Life that shall send

A challenge to its end,

And when it comes, say, Welcome, friend!'

Why have I not made these sage reflections, this wise resolve, sooner?

Can such a simple result spring only from the long and intricate

process of experience? Alas! it is not till Time, with reckless hand,

has torn out half the leaves from the Book of Human Life, to light the

fires of passion with, from day to day, that Man begins to see, that

the leaves which remain are few in number, and to remember, faintly at

first, and then more clearly, that, upon the earlier pages of that

book, was written a story of happy innocence, which he would fain read

over again. Then come listless irresolution, and the inevitable

inaction of despair; or else the firm resolve to record upon the leaves

that still remain, a more noble history, than the child's story, with

which the book began."

CHAPTER IX. THE LAST PANG.

"Farewell to thee, Saint Gilgen!" said Flemming, as he turned on the

brow of the hill, to take his last look at the lake and the village

below, and felt that this was one of the few spots on the wide earth to

which he could say farewell with regret. "Thy majestic hills have

impressed themselves upon my soul, as a seal upon wax. The quiet beauty

of thy lake shall be to me forever an image of peace and purity and

stillness, and that inscription in thy little churchyard, a sentence of

wisdom for my after life."

Before the setting of the same sun, which then shone on that fair

landscape, he was far on his way towards Munich. He had left far behind

him the mountains of the Tyrol; and beheld themfor the last time in the

soft evening twilight, their bases green with forest trees, and here

and there, a sharp rocky spire, and a rounded summit capped with snow.

There they lay, their backs, like the backs of camels; a mighty

caravan, reposing at evening in its march across the desert.

From Munich he passed through Augsburg and Ulm, on his way to

Stuttgard. At the entrances of towns and villages, he saw large

crucifixes; and on the fronts of many houses, coarse paintings and

images of saints. In Gunzburg three priests in black were slowly

passing down the street, and women fell on their knees to receive their

blessing. There were many beggars, too, in the streets; and an old man

who was making hay in a field by the road-side, when he saw the

carriage approaching, threw down his rake, and came tumbling over the

ditch, with his hat held out in both hands, uttering the most dismal

wail. The next day, the bright yellow jackets of the postilions, and

the two great tassels of their bugle-horns, dangling down their backs,

like two cauliflowers, told him he was in Würtemberg; and, late in the

evening, he stopped at a hotel in Stuttgard; and from his

chamber-window, saw, in the bright moonlight, the old Gothic cathedral,

with its narrow, lancet windows and jutting buttresses, right in front

of him. Ere long he had forgotten all his cares and sorrows in sleep,

and with them his hopes, and wishes, and good resolves.

He was still sitting at breakfast in his chamber, the next morning,

when the great bell of the cathedral opposite began to ring, and

reminded him that it was Sunday. Ere long the organ answered from

within, and from its golden lips breathed forth a psalm. The

congregation began to assemble, and Flemming went up with them to the

house of the Lord. In the body of the church he found the pews all

filled or locked; they seemed to belong to families. He went up into

the gallery, and looked over the psalm-book of a peasant, while the

congregation sang the sublime old hymn of Martin Luther,

"Our God, he is a tower of strength,

A trusty shield and weapon."

During the singing, a fat clergyman, clad in black, with a white

surplice thrown loosely about him, came pacing along one of the aisles,

from beneath the organ-loft and ascended the pulpit. After the hymn, he

read a portion of Scripture, and then said;

"Let us unite in silent prayer."

And turning round, he knelt in the pulpit, while the congregation

remained standing. For a while there was a breathless silence in the

church, which to Flemming was more solemnly impressive than any audible

prayer. The clergyman then arose, and began his sermon. His theme was

the Reformation; and he attempted to prove how much easier it was to

enter the kingdom of Heaven through the gateways of the Reformed

Evangelical Dutch church, than by the aisles and penitential

stair-cases of Saint Peter's. He then gave a history of the

Reformation; and, when Flemming thought he was near the end, he heard

him say, that he should divide his discourse into four heads. This

reminded him of the sturdy old Puritan, Cotton Mather, who after

preaching an hour, would coolly turn the hour-glass on the pulpit, and

say; "Now, my beloved hearers, let us take another glass." He stole out

into the silent, deserted street, and went to visit the veteran

sculptor Dannecker. He found him in his parlour, sitting alone, with

his psalm-book, and the reminiscences of a life of eighty years. As

Flemming entered, he arose from the sofa, and tottered towards him; a

venerable old man, of low stature, and dressed in a loose white jacket,

with a face like Franklin's, his white hair flowing over his shoulders,

and a pale, blue eye.

"So you are from America," said he. "But you have a German name. Paul

Flemming was one of our old poets. I have never been in America, and

never shall go there. I am now too old. I have been in Paris and in

Rome. But that was long ago. I am now eight and seventy years old."

Here he took Flemming by the hand, and made him sit down by his side,

on the sofa. And Flemmingfelt a mysterious awe creep over him, on

touching the hand of the good old man, who sat so serenely amid the

gathering shade of years, and listened to life's curfew-bell, telling,

with eight and seventy solemn strokes, that the hour had come, when the

fires of all earthly passion must be quenched within, and man must

prepare to lie down and rest till the morning.

"You see," he continued, in a melancholy tone, "my hands are cold;

colder than yours. They were warmer once. I am now an old man."

"Yet these are the hands," answered Flemming, "that sculptured the

beauteous Ariadne and the Panther. The soul never grows old."

"Nor does Nature," said the old man, pleased with this allusion to his

great work, and pointing to the green trees before his window. "This

pleasure I have left to me. My sight is still good. I can even

distinguish objects on the side of yonder mountain. My hearing is also

unimpaired. For all which, I thank God."

Then, directing Flemming's attention to a fine engraving, which hung on

the opposite wall of the room, he continued;

"That is an engraving of Canova's Religion. I love to sit here and look

at it, for hours together. It is beautiful. He made the statue for his

native town, where they had no church, until he built them one. He

placed the statue in it. This engraving he sent me as a present. Ah, he

was a dear, good man. The name of his native town I have forgotten. My

memory fails me. I cannot remember names."

Fearful that he had disturbed the old man in his morning devotions,

Flemming did not remain long, but took his leave with regret. There was

something impressive in the scene he had witnessed;--this beautiful old

age of the artist; sitting by the open window, in the bright summer

morning,--the labor of life accomplished, the horizon reached, where

heaven and earth meet,--thinking it was angel's music, when he heard

the church-bells ring; himself too old to go. As he walked back to his

chamber, he thought within himself, whether he likewise might not

accomplish something, which should live after him;--might not bring

something permanent out of this fast-fleeting life of man, and then sit

down, like the artist, in serene old age, and fold his hands in

silence. He wondered how a man felt when he grew so old, that he could

no longer go to church, but must sit at home and read the bible in

large print. His heart was full of indefinite longings, mingled with

regrets; longings to accomplish something worthy of life; regret, that

as yet he had accomplished nothing, but had felt and dreamed only. Thus

the warm days in spring bring forth passion-flowers and forget-menots.

It is only after mid-summer, when the days grow shorter and hotter,

that fruit begins to appear. Then, the heat of the day brings forward

the harvest, and after the harvest, the leaves fall, and there is a

gray frost. Much meditating upon these things, Paul Flemming reached

his hotel. At that moment a person clad in green came down the

church-steps, and crossed the street. It was the German student, of

Interlachen. Flemming started as if a green snake had suddenly crossed

his path. He took refuge in his chamber.

That night as he was sitting alone in his chamber, having made his

preparation to depart the following morning, his attention was arrested

by the sound of a female voice in the next room. A thin partition, with

a door, separated it from his own. He had not before observed that the

room was occupied. But, in the stillness of the night, the tones of

that voice struck his ear. He listened. It was a lady, reading the

prayers of the English Church. The tones were familiar; and awakened at

once a thousand painfully sweet recollections. It was the voice of Mary

Ashburton! His heart could not be deceived; and all its wounds began to

bleed afresh, like those of a murdered man, when the murderer

approaches. His first impulse was of affection only, boundless,

irrepressible, delirious, as of old in the green valley of Interlachen.

He waited for the voice to cease; that he might go to her, and behold

her face once more. And then his pride rose up within him, and rebuked

this weakness. He remembered his firm resolve; and blushed to find

himself so feeble. And the voice ceased; and yet he did not go. Pride

had so far gained the mastery over affection. He lay down upon his bed,

like a child as he was. All about him was silence, and the silence was

holy, for she was near; so near that he could almost hear the beating

of her heart. He knew now for the first time how weak he was, and how

strong his passion for that woman. His heart was like the altar of the

Israelites of old; and, though drenched with tears, as with rain, it

was kindled at once by the holy fire from heaven!

Towards morning he fell asleep, exhausted with the strong excitement;

and, in that hour when, sleep being "nigh unto the soul," visions are

deemed prophetic, he dreamed. O blessed visionof the morning, stay!

thou wert so fair! He stood again on the green sunny meadow, beneath

the ruined towers; and she was by his side, with her pale, speaking

countenance and holy eyes; and he kissed her fair forehead; and she

turned her face towards him beaming with affection and said, "I confess

it now; you are the Magician!" and pressed him in a meek embrace, that

he, "might rather feel than see the swelling of her heart." And then

she faded away from his arms, and her face became transfigured, and her

voice like the voice of an angel in heaven;--and he awoke, and was

alone!

It was broad daylight; and he heard the postilion, and the stamping of

horses' hoofs on the pavement at the door. At the same moment his

servant came in, with coffee, and told him all was ready. He did not

dare to stay. But, throwing himself into the carriage, he cast one look

towards the window of the Dark Ladie, and a moment afterwards had left

her forever! He had drunk thelast drop of the bitter cup, and now laid

the golden goblet gently down, knowing that he should behold it no

more!

No more! O how majestically mournful are those words! They sound like

the roar of the wind through a forest of pines!