She is still with her dying friend, and is still the same bright,
beautiful creature whose presence softens pain, and sheds happiness
around whichever way she turns. She went out yesterday with her little
sisters: I knew it, and went to meet them; and we walked together. In
about an hour and a half we returned to the town. We stopped at the
spring I am so fond of, and which is now a thousand times dearer to me
than ever. Charlotte seated herself upon the low wall, and we gathered
about her. I looked around, and recalled the time when my heart was
unoccupied and free. "Dear fountain!" I said, "since that time I have no
more come to enjoy cool repose by thy fresh stream: I have passed thee
with careless steps, and scarcely bestowed a glance upon thee." I looked
down, and observed Charlotte's little sister, Jane, coming up the
steps with a glass of water. I turned toward Charlotte, and I felt her
influence over me. Jane at the moment approached with the glass. Her
sister, Marianne, wished to take it from her. "No!" cried the child,
with the sweetest expression of face, "Charlotte must drink first."
The affection and simplicity with which this was uttered so charmed
me, that I sought to express my feelings by catching up the child and
kissing her heartily. She was frightened, and began to cry. "You should
not do that," said Charlotte: I felt perplexed. "Come, Jane," she
continued, taking her hand, and leading her down the steps again, "it
is no matter: wash yourself quickly in the fresh water." I stood and
watched them; and when I saw the little dear rubbing her cheeks with
her wet hands, in full belief that all the impurities contracted from my
ugly beard would be washed off by the miraculous water, and how, though
Charlotte said it would do, she continued still to wash with all her
might, as though she thought too much were better than too little, I
assure you, Wilhelm, I never attended a baptism with greater reverence;
and, when Charlotte came up from the well, I could have prostrated
myself as before the prophet of an Eastern nation.
In the evening I would not resist telling the story to a person who,
I thought, possessed some natural feeling, because he was a man of
understanding. But what a mistake I made. He maintained it was very
wrong of Charlotte, that we should not deceive children, that such
things occasioned countless mistakes and superstitions, from which we
were bound to protect the young. It occurred to me then, that this very
man had been baptised only a week before; so I said nothing further,
but maintained the justice of my own convictions. We should deal with
children as God deals with us, we are happiest under the influence of
innocent delusions.