It was early in the afternoon, and just at dinner-time, when the
three joyous travellers reached Villeneuve. After dinner, the miller
placed himself in the arm-chair, smoked his pipe, and had a little
nap. The bridal pair went arm-in-arm out through the town and along
the high road, at the foot of the wood-covered rocks, and by the deep,
blue lake.
The gray walls, and the heavy clumsy-looking towers of the
gloomy castle of Chillon, were reflected in the clear flood. The
little island, on which grew the three acacias, lay at a short
distance, looking like a bouquet rising from the lake. "How delightful
it must be to live there," said Babette, who again felt the greatest
wish to visit the island; and an opportunity offered to gratify her
wish at once, for on the shore lay a boat, and the rope by which it
was moored could be very easily loosened. They saw no one near, so
they took possession of it without asking permission of any one, and
Rudy could row very well. The oars divided the pliant water like the
fins of a fish--that water which, with all its yielding softness, is
so strong to bear and to carry, so mild and smiling when at rest,
and yet so terrible in its destroying power. A white streak of foam
followed in the wake of the boat, which, in a few minutes, carried
them both to the little island, where they went on shore; but there
was only just room enough for two to dance. Rudy swung Babette round
two or three times; and then, hand-in-hand, they sat down on a
little bench under the drooping acacia-tree, and looked into each
other's eyes, while everything around them glowed in the rays of the
setting sun.
The fir-tree forests on the mountains were covered with a purple
hue like the heather bloom; and where the woods terminated, and the
rocks became prominent, they looked almost transparent in the rich
crimson glow of the evening sky. The surface of the lake was like a
bed of pink rose-leaves.
As the evening advanced, the shadows fell upon the snow-capped
mountains of Savoy painting them in colors of deep blue, while their
topmost peaks glowed like red lava; and for a moment this light was
reflected on the cultivated parts of the mountains, making them appear
as if newly risen from the lap of earth, and giving to the
snow-crested peak of the Dent du Midi the appearance of the full
moon as it rises above the horizon.
Rudy and Babette felt that they had never seen the Alpine glow
in such perfection before. "How very beautiful it is, and what
happiness to be here!" exclaimed Babette.
"Earth has nothing more to bestow upon me," said Rudy; "an evening
like this is worth a whole life. Often have I realized my good
fortune, but never more than in this moment. I feel that if my
existence were to end now, I should still have lived a happy life.
What a glorious world this is; one day ends, and another begins even
more beautiful than the last. How infinitely good God is, Babette!"
"I have such complete happiness in my heart," said she.
"Earth has no more to bestow," answered Rudy. And then came the
sound of the evening bells, borne upon the breeze over the mountains
of Switzerland and Savoy, while still, in the golden splendor of the
west, stood the dark blue mountains of Jura.
"God grant you all that is brightest and best!" exclaimed Babette.
"He will," said Rudy. "He will to-morrow. To-morrow you will be
wholly mine, my own sweet wife."
"The boat!" cried Babette, suddenly. The boat in which they were
to return had broken loose, and was floating away from the island.
"I will fetch it back," said Rudy; throwing off his coat and
boots, he sprang into the lake, and swam with strong efforts towards
it.
The dark-blue water, from the glaciers of the mountains, was icy
cold and very deep. Rudy gave but one glance into the water beneath;
but in that one glance he saw a gold ring rolling, glittering, and
sparkling before him. His engaged ring came into his mind; but this
was larger, and spread into a glittering circle, in which appeared a
clear glacier. Deep chasms yawned around it, the water-drops glittered
as if lighted with blue flame, and tinkled like the chiming of
church bells. In one moment he saw what would require many words to
describe. Young hunters, and young maidens--men and women who had sunk
in the deep chasms of the glaciers--stood before him here in
lifelike forms, with eyes open and smiles on their lips; and far
beneath them could be heard the chiming of the church bells of
buried villages, where the villagers knelt beneath the vaulted
arches of churches in which ice-blocks formed the organ pipes, and the
mountain stream the music.
On the clear, transparent ground sat the Ice Maiden. She raised
herself towards Rudy, and kissed his feet; and instantly a cold,
deathly chill, like an electric shock, passed through his limbs. Ice
or fire! It was impossible to tell, the shock was so instantaneous.
"Mine! mine!" sounded around him, and within him; "I kissed thee
when thou wert a little child. I once kissed thee on the mouth, and
now I have kissed thee from heel to toe; thou art wholly mine." And
then he disappeared in the clear, blue water.
All was still. The church bells were silent; the last tone floated
away with the last red glimmer on the evening clouds. "Thou art mine,"
sounded from the depths below: but from the heights above, from the
eternal world, also sounded the words, "Thou art mine!" Happy was he
thus to pass from life to life, from earth to heaven. A chord was
loosened, and tones of sorrow burst forth. The icy kiss of death had
overcome the perishable body; it was but the prelude before life's
real drama could begin, the discord which was quickly lost in harmony.
Do you think this a sad story? Poor Babette! for her it was
unspeakable anguish.
The boat drifted farther and farther away. No one on the
opposite shore knew that the betrothed pair had gone over to the
little island. The clouds sunk as the evening drew on, and it became
dark. Alone, in despair, she waited and trembled. The weather became
fearful; flash after flash lighted up the mountains of Jura, Savoy,
and Switzerland, while peals of thunder, that lasted for many minutes,
rolled over her head. The lightning was so vivid that every single
vine stem could be seen for a moment as distinctly as in the
sunlight at noon-day; and then all was veiled in darkness. It
flashed across the lake in winding, zigzag lines, lighting it up on
all sides; while the echoes of the thunder grew louder and stronger.
On land, the boats were all carefully drawn up on the beach, every
living thing sought shelter, and at length the rain poured down in
torrents.
"Where can Rudy and Babette be in this awful weather?" said the
miller.
Poor Babette sat with her hands clasped, and her head bowed
down, dumb with grief; she had ceased to weep and cry for help.
"In the deep water!" she said to herself; "far down he lies, as if
beneath a glacier."
Deep in her heart rested the memory of what Rudy had told her of
the death of his mother, and of his own recovery, even after he had
been taken up as dead from the cleft in the glacier.
"Ah," she thought, "the Ice Maiden has him at last."
Suddenly there came a flash of lightning, as dazzling as the
rays of the sun on the white snow. The lake rose for a moment like a
shining glacier; and before Babette stood the pallid, glittering,
majestic form of the Ice Maiden, and at her feet lay Rudy's corpse.
"Mine!" she cried, and again all was darkness around the heaving
water.
"How cruel," murmured Babette; "why should he die just as the
day of happiness drew near? Merciful God, enlighten my understanding,
shed light upon my heart; for I cannot comprehend the arrangements
of Thy providence, even while I bow to the decree of Thy almighty
wisdom and power." And God did enlighten her heart.
A sudden flash of thought, like a ray of mercy, recalled her dream
of the preceding night; all was vividly represented before her. She
remembered the words and wishes she had then expressed, that what
was best for her and for Rudy she might piously submit to.
"Woe is me," she said; "was the germ of sin really in my heart?
was my dream a glimpse into the course of my future life, whose thread
must be violently broken to rescue me from sin? Oh, miserable creature
that I am!"
Thus she sat lamenting in the dark night, while through the deep
stillness the last words of Rudy seemed to ring in her ears. "This
earth has nothing more to bestow." Words, uttered in the fulness of
joy, were again heard amid the depths of sorrow.
Years have passed since this sad event happened. The shores of the
peaceful lake still smile in beauty. The vines are full of luscious
grapes. Steamboats, with waving flags, pass swiftly by.
Pleasure-boats, with their swelling sails, skim lightly over the
watery mirror, like white butterflies. The railway is opened beyond
Chillon, and goes far into the deep valley of the Rhone. At every
station strangers alight with red-bound guide-books in their hands, in
which they read of every place worth seeing. They visit Chillon, and
observe on the lake the little island with the three acacias, and then
read in their guide-book the story of the bridal pair who, in the year
1856, rowed over to it. They read that the two were missing till the
next morning, when some people on the shore heard the despairing cries
of the bride, and went to her assistance, and by her were told of
the bridegroom's fate.
But the guide-book does not speak of Babette's quiet life
afterwards with her father, not at the mill--strangers dwell there
now--but in a pretty house in a row near the station. On many an
evening she sits at her window, and looks out over the chestnut-trees
to the snow-capped mountains on which Rudy once roamed. She looks at
the Alpine glow in the evening sky, which is caused by the children
of the sun retiring to rest on the mountain-tops; and again they
breathe their song of the traveller whom the whirlwind could deprive
of his cloak but not of his life. There is a rosy tint on the mountain
snow, and there are rosy gleams in each heart in which dwells the
thought, "God permits nothing to happen, which is not the best for
us." But this is not often revealed to all, as it was revealed to
Babette in her wonderful dream.