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 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924026173736 
 
GOOD-FOR-NOTHING 
 
LEAVES FROM THE LIFE 
 
 OF A 
 
 GOOD-FOR-NOTHING 
 
 TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN OF 
 
 JOSEPH FREIHERR VON EICHENDORFF 
 
 BY 
 
 MRS. A. L. WISTER 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS BY 
 PHILIPP GROT JOHANN AND PROFESSOR EDMUND KANOLDT 
 
 PHILADELPHIA 
 
 J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY 
 1889 
 
 Ulx' IV (:(;;; fir 
 I; V ■ 
 
Mi 
 
 Copyright, 1888, by J. B. Lippooott Company. 
 
CHAPTEE I. 
 
 The wheel of my father's mill was once more 
 
 turning and whirring merrily, the melting snow 
 
 trickled steadily from the roof, the sparrows chirped 
 
 and hopped about, as I, taking great delight in the warm 
 
 sunshine, sat on the door-step and rubbed my eyes to rid them of 
 
 sleep. Then my father made his appearance; he had been busy in the 
 
 mill since "daybreak, and his nightcap was all aAvry as he said to me,— 
 
" You Good-for-nothing ! There you sit sunning yourself, and 
 stretching yourself, till your bones crack, leaving me to do all the 
 work alone. I can keep you here no longer. Spring is at hand : Off 
 with you into the world and earn your own bread !" 
 
 " Well," said I, " all right ; if I am a Good-for-nothing, I will go 
 forth into the world and make my fortune." In fact, I was very glad 
 -to have my father speak thus, for I myself had been thinking of 
 starting on my travels; the yellow-hammer, which all through the 
 autumn and winter had been chirping sadly at our window, " Farmer, 
 hire me ; farmer, hire me," was, now that the lovely spring weather 
 had set in, once more piping cheerily from the old tree, " Farmer, 
 nobody wants your work." So I went into the house and took down 
 from the wall my fiddle, on which I could play quite skilfully ; my 
 father gave me a few pieces of money to set me on my way ; and I 
 sauntered off along the village street. I was filled with secret joy 
 as I saw all my old acquaintances and comrades right and left going 
 to their work digging and ploughing, just as they had done yester- 
 day and the day before, and so on, whilst I was roaming out into 
 the wide world. I called out ' Good-bye !' to the poor people on all 
 sides, but no one took much notice of me. A perpetual Sabbath 
 seemed to reign in my soul, and when I got out among the fields I 
 took out my dear fiddle and played and sang, as I walked along the 
 country road, — 
 
 " The favoured ones, the loved of Heaven, 
 God sends to roam the world at will ; 
 His wonders to their gaze are given 
 By field and forest, stream and hill. 
 
 " The dullards who at home are staying 
 Are not refreshed by morning's ray ; 
 They grovel, earth-born calls obeying, 
 And petty cares beset their day. 
 
 10 
 
" The little brooks o'er rooks are springing, 
 The lark's gay cajot fill*. ^e air : 
 Why should not I with them be singing 
 A joyous anthem free from care? 
 
 " I wander on, in God confiding, 
 
 For all are His, wood, field, and fell ; 
 O'er earth and skies He still presiding, 
 For me will order all things well." 
 
 As I was looking around, a fine travelling-carriage drove along 
 very near me; it had probably been just behind me for some time 
 without my perceiving it, so filled with melody had I been, for it was 
 going quite slowly, and two elegant ladies had their heads out of the 
 window, listening. One was especially beautiful, and younger than 
 the other, but both pleased me extremely. When I stopped singing 
 the elder ordered the coachman to stop his horses, and accosted me 
 with great condescension, " Aha, my merry lad, you know how to 
 sing very pretty songs." I, nothing loath, replied, " Please your Grace, 
 I know some far prettier." " And where are you going tso early in 
 the morning ?" she asked. I was ashamed to confess that I did not 
 myself know, and so I said, boldly, " To Vienna." The two ladies 
 then talked together in a strange tongue which I did not understand. 
 The younger shook her head several times, but the other only laughed, 
 and finally called to me, " Jump up behind ; we too are going to 
 Vienna." Who more ready than I ! I made my best bow, and sprang 
 up behind the carriage, the coachman cracked his whip, and away 
 we bowled along the smooth road so swiftly that the wind whistled 
 in my ears. 
 
 Behind me vanished my native village with its gardens and church- 
 tower, before me appeared fresh villages, castles, and mountains, be- 
 neath me on either side the meadows in the tender green of spring 
 
 11 
 
flew past, and above me countless larks were soaring in the blue 
 air. I was ashamed to shout aloud, but I exulted inwardly, and shuffled 
 about so on the foot-board behind the carriage that I wellnigh lost 
 my fiddle from under my arm. But when the sun rose higher in the 
 sky, while heavy, white, noonday clouds gathered on the horizon, and 
 the air hung sultry and still above the gently- waving grain, I could not 
 but remember my village and my father, and our mill, and how cool 
 and comfortable it was beside the shady mill-pool, and how far, far 
 away from me it all was. And the most curious sensation overcame 
 me : I felt as if I must turn and run back ; but I stuck my fiddle be- 
 tween my coat and my vest, settled myself on the foot-board, and 
 went to sleep. 
 
 When I opened my eyes again, the carriage was standing be- 
 neath tall linden-trees, on the other side of which a broad flight of 
 steps led between columns into a magnificent castle. Through the 
 trees beyond I saw the towers of Vienna. The ladies, it appeared, 
 had left the carriage, and the horses had been unharnessed. I 
 was startled to find myself alone, and I hurried into the castle. As 
 I did so I heard some one at a window above laughing. 
 
 An odd time I had in this castle. First, as soon as I found myself 
 in the cool, spacious vestibule, some one tapped me on the shoulder 
 with a stick. I turned quickly about, and there stood a tall gentleman 
 in state apparel, with a broad bandolier of silk and gold crossing his 
 breast from his shoulder to his hip, a staff in his hand, gilded at the 
 top, and an extraordinarily large Roman nose ; he strutted up to me, 
 swelling like a ruffled-up turkey-cock, and asked me what I wanted 
 there. I was taken entirely aback, and in my confusion was unable to 
 utter a word. Several servants passed, going up and down the stair- 
 case ; they said nothing, but eyed me superciliously. Then a lady's- 
 maid appeared ; she came up to me, declared that I was a charming 
 
 12 
 
young fellow, and that her mistress had sent to ask me if I did not 
 want a place as gardener's boy. I put my hand in my pocket, — the 
 few coins I had possessed were gone. They must have been jerked out 
 by my shuffling on the foot-board behind the carriage. I had nothing 
 to depend upon save my skill with the fiddle, for which the gentleman 
 with the staff, as he informed me in passing, would not give a farthing. 
 Therefore, in my distress, I said ' yes' to the maid, keeping my eyes 
 fixed the while upon the portentous figure pacing the hall to and fro 
 like the pendulum of a clock in a church-tower, appearing from the 
 background with imposing majesty and with unfailing regularity. At 
 last a gardener came, muttering something about boors and vagabonds, 
 and led me off to the garden, preaching me a long sermon on the way 
 about my being diligent and industrious and never loitering about the 
 world any more, and how, if I would give up all my idle and foolish 
 ways, I might come to some gdod'iii'thfe end. There was a great deal 
 of exhortation in this strain, very good and useful, but I have since 
 forgotten it nearly all. In fact, I really hardly know how it all came 
 about ; I went on saying ' yes' to everything, and I felt like a bird with 
 its wings clipped. But, thank God, in the end I was earning my 
 living ! 
 
 I found life delightful in that garden. I had a hot dinner every 
 day and plenty of it, and more money than I needed for my glass of 
 wine, only, unfortunately, I had quite a deal to do. The pavilions, and 
 arbours, and long green walks delighted me, if I could only have 
 sauntered about and talked pleasantly like the gentlemen and ladies 
 who came there every day. Whenever the gardener was away and I 
 was alone, I took out my short tobacco-pipe, sat down, and thought of 
 all the beautiful, polite things with which I could have entertained that 
 lovely young lady who had brought me to the castle, had I been a 
 cavalier walking beside her. Or on sultry afternoons I lay on my 
 
 13 
 
back on the grass, when all was so quiet that you could hear the bees 
 humming, and. I gazed up at the clouds sailing away towards nay 
 native village,' and around me at the waving grass and flowers, and 
 thought of the lovely l^dy; an4 it sometimes chanced that I really saw 
 her in tli,e distance walking in the garden, with her guitar or a book, 
 tall and beautiful 'as an angel, and I was only half conscioiis whether 
 I were awake or dreaming. 
 
 Thus, once as I was passing a summer-house on my way to work, 
 I was singing to myself, — 
 
 " I gaze around me, going 
 
 By forest, dale, and lea, 
 O'er heights where streams are flowing, 
 My every thought bestowing. 
 
 Ah, Lady fair, on thee.'' 
 
 when, through the half-opened lattice of the cool, dark summer- 
 house buried amid flowers, I saw the sparkle of a pair of beautiful, 
 youthful eyes. I was so startled that I could not finish my song, but 
 passed on to my work without looking round. 
 
 In the evening — it was Saturday, and, in joyous anticipation of the 
 coming Sunday, I was standing, fiddle in hand, at the window of the 
 gardener's house, still thinking of the sparkling eyes — the lady's- 
 maid came tripping through the twilight, — " The gracious Lady fair 
 sends you this to drink her health, and a ' Good-Night' besides !" And 
 in a twinkling she put a flask of wine on the window-sill and vanished 
 among the flowers and shrubs like a lizard. 
 
 I stood looking at the wonderful flask for a long time, not know- 
 ing what to think. And if before I played the fiddle merrily, I now 
 played it ten times more so, and I sang the song of the Lady fair all 
 through, and all the other songs that I knew, until the nightingales 
 
 14 
 
wakened outside and tlie moon and stars lit up the garden. Ah, that 
 was a lovely night ! 
 
 No cradle-song tells the child's future ; a blnid hen finds many 
 a grain of wheat ; he laughs best who laughs last ; the unexpected 
 often happens; man proposes, God disposes: thus did I meditate the 
 next day, sitting in the garden with my pipe, and as I looked down at 
 myself I seemed to myself to be a downright dunce. Contrary to all 
 my habits hitherto, I now rose betnnes every day, before the gardener 
 and the other assistants Avere stirruig. It was most beautiful then in 
 
 15 
 
the garden. The flowers, the fountains, the rose-bushes, the whole 
 place, glittered in the morning sunshine like pure gold and jewels. 
 And in, the avenues of huge beeches it was as quiet, cool, and. solemn 
 as a church, only the little birds fluttered around and pecked in the 
 gravel paths. In front of the castle, just under the windows, there 
 was a large bush in full bloom. Thither I used to go in the early- 
 morning, and crouch down beneath the branches where I could 
 watch the windows, for I had not the coura^ge to appear in the 
 open. Thence I sometimes saw the Lady fair in a snow-white robe 
 come, still drowsy and warm, to the open window.. She would stand 
 there braiding her dark-brown hair, gazing abroad over the garden 
 and shrubbery, or she would tend and water the flowers upon her 
 window-sill, or would rest her guitar upon her white arm and sing 
 out into the clear air so wondrously that to this' day my heart faints 
 • with sadness when one of her songs recurs to me. And ah, it was 
 all so long ago ! 
 
 So my life passed for a week and more. But once, — she was 
 standing at the window and all was quiet around, — a confounded 
 fly flew directly up my nose, and I was seized with an interminable 
 fit of sneezing. She leaned far out of the window and discovered 
 me cowering in the shrubbery. I was overcome with mortification 
 and did not go there again for many a day. 
 
 At last I ventured to return to my post, but the window remained 
 closed. I hid in the bushes for four, five, six mornings, but she did not 
 appear. Then I grew tired of my hiding-place and came out boldly, 
 and every morning promenaded bravely beneath all the windows of 
 the castle. But the lovely Lady fair was not to be seen. At a window 
 a little farther on I saw the other lady standing ; I had never before 
 seen her so distinctly. She had a fine rosy face, and was plump, and as 
 gorgeously attired as a tulip. I always made her a low bow, and she 
 
 16 
 
acknowledged it, and her eyes twinkled very kindly and courteously. 
 Once only, I thought I saw the Lady fair standing behind the curtain 
 at her Avindow, peeping out. 
 
 Many days passed and I did not see her, either in the garden or 
 
 17 
 
at the window. The gardener scolded me for laziness; I was out 
 of humour, tired of myself and of all about me. 
 
 I was lying on the grass one Sunday afternoon, watching the 
 blue wreaths of smoke from my pipe, and fretting because I had not 
 chosen some other trade which would not have bored me so day after 
 day. The other fellows had all gone off to the dance in the neigh- 
 bouring village. Every one was strolling about in Sunday attire, the 
 houses were gay, and there was melody in the very air. But I walked 
 off and sat solitary, like a bittern among the reeds, by a lonely pond 
 in the garden, rocking myself in a little skiff tied there, while the 
 vesper bells sounded faintly from the town and the swans glided to 
 and fro on the placid water. A sadness as of death possessed me. 
 
 On a sudden I heard, in the distance, voices talking gaily, and 
 bursts of merry laughter. They sounded nearer and nearer, and red 
 and white kerchiefs and hats and. feathers were visible through the 
 shrubbery. A party of gentlemen and ladies were coming from the 
 castle, across the meadow, directly towards me, and my two ladies 
 among them. I stood up and was about to retire, when the elder per- 
 ceived me. "Aha, you are just what we want," she called to me, 
 smiling. " Eow us across the pond to the other side." The ladies 
 cautiously took their seats in the boat, assisted by the gentlemen, who 
 made quite a parade of their familiarity with the water. When all 
 the ladies were seated, I pushed off from the shore. One of the young 
 gentlemen who stood in the prow began, unperceived, to rock the 
 boat. The ladies looked frightened, and one or two screamed. The 
 Lady fair, who had a lily in her hand, and was sitting well in the centre 
 of the skiff, looked down with a quiet smile into the clear water, 
 touching the surface of the pond now and then with the lily, her 
 image, amid the reflections of the clouds and trees, appearing like 
 an angel soaring gently through the deep blue skies. 
 
 IS 
 
As I was gazing at her, the other of my two ladies, the plump, 
 merry one, suddenly took it into her head that I must sing as we 
 glided along. A very elegant young gentleman with an eye-glass, who 
 sat beside her, instantly turned to her, and, as he kissed her hand, 
 said, " Thanks for the poetic idea ! A folk-song sung by one of the 
 people in the open air is an Alpine rose, upon the very Alps, — the 
 Alpine horns are nothing but herbaria, — the soul of the national con- 
 sciousness." But I said I did not know anything fine enough to sing 
 to such great people. Then the pert lady's-maid, who was beside me 
 with a basket of cups and bottles, and whom I had not perceived 
 before, said, " He knows a very pretty little song about a lady 
 fair." " Yes, yes, sing that one !" the lady exclaimed. I felt hot 
 all over, and the Lady fair lifted her eyes from the water and gave 
 me a look that went to my very soul. So I did not hesitate any 
 longer, but took heart and sang with all my might, — 
 
 " I gaze around me, going 
 By forest, dale, and lea. 
 O'er heights where streams are flowing, 
 My every thought hestowing. 
 Ah, Lady fair, on thee. 
 
 " And in my garden, finding 
 Bright flowers fresh and rare. 
 While many a wreath I'm binding. 
 Sweet thoughts therein I'm winding 
 Of thee, my Lady fair. 
 
 " For me 'twould be too daring 
 To lay them at her feet. 
 They'll soon away be wearing, 
 But love beyond comparing 
 Is thine, my Lady sweet. 
 
 19 
 
" In eai'l)' morning waking, 
 
 I toil with ready smile, 
 And though my heart be breaking, 
 I'll sing to hide its aching, 
 
 And dig my grave the while." 
 
 The boat touched the shore, and all the party got out ; many of 
 the young gentlemen, as I had perceived, had made game of me in 
 whispers to the ladies while I was singing. The gentleman with the 
 eye-glass took my hand as he left the boat, and said something to 
 me, I do not remember what, and the elder of my two ladies gave me 
 a kindly glance. The Lady fair had never raised her eyes all the time 
 I was singing, and ,she went away without a word. As for me, before 
 my song was ended the tears stood in my eyes ; my heart seemed like 
 to burst with shame and misery. I understood now for the first time 
 how beautiful she was, and how poor and despised and forsaken I, and 
 when they had all disappeared behind the bushes I could contain mv- 
 self no longer, but threw myself down on the grass and wept bitterly. 
 
 20 
 
rsr 
 
 CHAPTER 11. 
 
 The high-road was close on one side of the castle garden, and 
 separated from it only by a high wall. A very pretty little toll-house 
 with a red-tiled roof stood near, with a gay little flower-garden en- 
 closed by a picket-fence behind it. A breach in the wall connected this 
 garden with the most secluded and shady part of the castle garden 
 itself. The toll-gate keeper who occupied the cottage died suddenly, 
 and early one morning, when I was still sound asleep, the Secretary 
 from the castle waked me in a great hurry and bade me come 
 immediately to the Bailiff. I dressed myself as quickly as I could, 
 
 21 
 
and followed the brisk Secretary, who, as we went, plucked a flower'^ 
 here and there and stuck it into his button-hole, made scientific 
 lunges in the air with his cane, and talked steadily to me all the while, 
 although my eyes and ears were so filled with sleep that I could not 
 understand anything he said. When we reached the office, where as 
 yet it was hardly light, the Bailifl', behind a huge inkstand, and piles of 
 books and papers, looked at me from out of his huge wig like an owl 
 from out its nest, and began : " What's your name ? Where do you 
 come from ? Can you read, write, and cipher ?" And when I assented, 
 he went on, " Well, her Grace, in consideration of your good manners 
 and extraordinary merit, appoints you to the vacant post of Receiver 
 of Toll." I hurriedly passed in mental review the conduct and 
 manners that had hitherto distinguished me, and was forced to 
 admit that the Bailiff was right. And so, before I knew it, I was 
 Eeceiver of Toll. 
 
 I took possession of my dwelling, and was soon comfortably estab- 
 lished there. The deceased toll-gate keeper had left behind him for 
 his successor various articles, which I appropriated, among others a 
 magnificent scarlet dressing-gown dotted with yellow, a pair of green 
 slippers, a tasselled nightcap, and several long-stemmed pipes. I had 
 often wished for these things at home, where I used to see our village 
 pastor thus comfortably provided. All day long, therefore, — I had 
 nothing else to do, — I sat on the bench before my house in dressing- 
 gown and nightcap, smoking the longest pipe from the late toll-gate 
 keeper's collection, and looking at the people walking, driving, and 
 riding on the high-road. I only wished that some of the folks from 
 our village, who had always said that I never would be worth any- 
 thing, might happen to pass by and see me thus. The dressing-gown 
 became my complexion, and suited me extremely well. So I sat there 
 and pondered many things, — the difficulty of all beginnings, the great 
 
 22 
 
advantages of an easier mode of existence, for example, — and privately 
 resolved to give up travel for the future, save money like other 
 people, and in time do something really great in the world. Mean- 
 while, with all my resolves, anxieties, and occupations, I in no wise 
 forgot the Lady fair. 
 
 I dug up and threw out of my little garden all the potatoes and 
 other vegetables that I found there, and planted it instead with the 
 choicest flowers, which proceeding caused the Porter from the castle 
 with the big Roman nose — who since I had been made Keceiver often 
 came to see me, and had become my intimate friend — to eye me askance 
 as a person crazed by sudden good fortune. But that did not deter 
 me. For from my little garden I could often hear feminine voices 
 not far off in the castle garden, and among them I thought I could 
 distinguish the voice of my Lady fair, although, because of the 
 thick shrubbery, I could see nobody. And so every day I plucked 
 a nosegay of my finest flowers, and when it was dark in the even- 
 ing, I climbed over the wall and laid it upon a marble table in an 
 arbour near by, and every time that I brought a fresh nosegay the 
 old one was gone from the table. 
 
 One evening all the castle inmates were away hunting; the sun 
 was just setting, flooding the landscape with flame and colour, the 
 Danube wound towards the horizon like a band of gold and fire, and 
 the viae-dressers on all the hills throughout the country were glad 
 and gay. I was sitting with the Porter on the bench before my 
 cottage, enjoying the mild air and the gradual fading to twilight of 
 the brilliant day. Suddenly the horns of the returning hunting-party 
 sounded on the air ; the notes were tossed from hill to hill by the 
 echoes. My soul delighted in it all, and I sprang up and exclaimed, 
 in an intoxication of joy, " That is what I ought to follow in life, 
 the huntsman's noble calling !" But the Porter quietly knocked the 
 
 23 
 
ashes out of his pipe and said, " You only think so ; I've tried it. 
 You hardly earn the shoes you wear out, and you're never without 
 a cough, or a cold from perpetually getting your feet wet." I cannot 
 tell how it was, but upon hearing him speak thus, I was seized with 
 such a fit of foolish rage that I fairly trembled. On a sudden the 
 entire fellow, with his bedizened coat, his big feet, his snuff, his big 
 nose, and everything about him, became odious to me. Quite beside 
 myself, I seized him by the breast of his coat and said, '"' Home with 
 you. Porter, on the instant, or I'll send you there in a way you won't 
 like !" At these words the Porter was more than ever convinced that 
 I was crazy. He gazed at me with evident fear, extricated himself 
 from my grasp, and went without a word, looking reproachfully back 
 at me, and striding towards the castle, where he reported me as stark, 
 staring mad. 
 
 But after all I burst into a hearty laugh, glad in fact to be rid 
 of the pompous fellow, for it was just the hour when I was wont to 
 carry my nosegay to the arbour. I clambered over the wall, and was 
 just about to place the flowers on the marble table, when I heard the 
 sound of a horse's hoofs at some distance. There was no time for 
 escape; my Lady fair was riding slowly along the avenue in a 
 green hunting-habit, apparently lost in thought. All that I had 
 read in an old book of my father's about the beautiful Magelona came 
 into my head, — how she used to appear among the tall forest-trees 
 when horns were echoing and evening shadows were flitting through 
 the glades. I could not stir from the spot. She started when she 
 perceived me and paused involuntarily. I was as if intoxicated with 
 intense joy, dread, and the throbbing of my heart, and when I saw 
 that she actually wore at her breast the flowers I had left yester- 
 day, I could no longer keep silent, but said in a rapture, " Fairest 
 Lady fair, accept these flowers too, and all the flowers in my garden, 
 
 24 
 
and everything I have ! Ah, if I could only brave some danger 
 for you !" At first she had looked at me so gravely, almost angrily,, 
 that I shivered, but then she cast down her eyes, and did not lift 
 them while I was speaking. At that moment voices and the tramp 
 of horses were heard in the distance. She snatched the flowers from 
 my hand, and without saying a word, swiftly vanished at the end, of 
 the avenue. 
 
 After this evening I had neither rest nor peace. I felt continually, 
 as I had always felt when spring was at hand, restless and merry, 
 and as if some great good fortune or something extraordinary were 
 about to befall me. My wretched accounts in especial never would 
 come right, and when the sunshine, playing among the chestnut 
 boughs before my window, cast golden-green gleams upon my 
 figures, illuminating " Bro't over" and " Total," my addition grew 
 sometimes so confused that I actually could not count three. The 
 figure ' eight ' always looked to me like my stout, tightly-laced lady 
 with the gay head-dress, and the provoking ' seven ' like a finger-post 
 pointing the wrong way, or a gallows. The ' nine ' was the queerest, 
 suddenly, before I knew what it was about, standing on its head to 
 look like 'six,' whilst 'two' would turn into a pert interrogation- 
 point, as if to ask me, "What in the world is to become of you, you 
 poor zero ? Without the others, the slender ' one ' and all the rest, you 
 never can come to anything !" 
 
 I had no longer any ease in sitting before my door. I took out a 
 stool to make myself more comfortable, and put my feet upon it ; I 
 patched up an old parasol, and held it over me like a Chinese pleasure- 
 dome. But all would not do. As I sat smoking and speculating, my 
 legs seemed to stretch to twice their size from weariness, and my nose 
 lengthened visibly as I looked down at it for hours. And when 
 sometimes, before daybreak, an express drove up, and I went out, 
 
 25 
 
half asleep-, into the cool air, and a pretty face, but dimly seen in the 
 dawning except for its sparkling eyes, looked out at me from the 
 coach window and kindly bade me good-morning, while from the 
 villages around the cock's clear crow echoed across the fields of gently- 
 , and an early lark, high in the skies among the flushes 
 
 wavma; gram 
 
 of morning, soared here and there, and the Postilion wound his horn 
 
 and blew, and blew, — as the coach drove off, I would stand lookins; 
 after it, feeling as if I could not but start off with it on the instant 
 into the wide, wide world. 
 
 I still took my flowers every day, when the sun had set, to the 
 marble table in the dim arbour. But since that evening all had been 
 over. Not a soul took any notice of them, and when I went to look 
 after them early the next morning, there they lay as I had left them, 
 
 26 
 
gazing sadly at me witli their heads hanging, and the dew-drops 
 glistening upon their fading petals as if they were weeping. This 
 distressed me, and I plucked no more flowers. I let the weeds grow 
 in my garden as they pleased, and the flowers stayed on their stalks 
 until the wind blew them away. Within me there were the same 
 desolation and neglect. 
 
 In this critical state of afiairs it happened once that, as I was 
 leaning out of my window gazing dully into vacancy, the lady's-maid 
 from the castle came tripping across the road. When she saw me 
 she came and stood just outside the window. " His Grace returned 
 from his travels yesterday," she remarked, hurriedly. "Indeed?" I 
 said, surprised, for I had taken no interest in anything for several 
 weeks, and did not even know that his Grace had been travelling. 
 " Then his lovely daughter will be very glad." The maid looked at 
 me with a strange expression of face, so that I began to wonder 
 whether I had said anything especially stupid. " He knows absolutely 
 nothing !" she said at last, turning up her little nose. " Well," she 
 resumed, "there is to be a ball and masquerade this evening at the 
 castle in honour of his Grace. My lady, is to be dressed as a flower- 
 girl, — understand, as a flower-girl. And she has noticed that you have 
 particularly pretty flowers in your garden." " That's strange," I 
 thought to myself; " there is hardly a flower to be seen there for the 
 weeds !" But she continued : " And since my lady needs perfectly 
 fresh flowers for her costume, you are to bring her some this evening, 
 and wait under the big pear-tree in the castle garden when it is dark 
 until she comes for the flowers herself." ,.i,' 
 
 I was completely dazed with joy at this intelligence, and in my 
 rapture I leaped out of the window and ran after the maid. 
 
 " Ugh, what an ugly dressing-gown !" she exclaimed, when she 
 saw me with my fluttering robe in the open air. This vexed me, 
 
 27 
 
but, not to be behindhand in gallantry, I capered gaily after her to 
 give her a kiss. Unluckily, my feet became entangled in my dressing- 
 gown, which was much too long for me, and I fell flat on the ground. 
 When I had picked myself up the maid was gone, and I heard her 
 in the distance laughing fit to kill herself. 
 
 Now I had delightful food for my reflections. After all, she still 
 remembered me and my flowers ! I went into my garden and hastily 
 tore up all the weeds from the beds, throwing them high above my 
 head into the sunlit air, as if with the roots I were eradicating all 
 melancholy and annoyance from my life. Once more the roses were 
 like her lips, the sky-blue convolvulus was like her eyes, the snowy 
 lily with its pensive, drooping head was her very image. I put them 
 all tenderly in a little basket ; the evening was calm and lovely, not 
 a speck of a cloud in the sky. Here and there a star appeared ; the 
 murmur of the Danube was heard afar over the meadows; in the 
 tall trees of the castle garden countless birds were twittering to one 
 another merrily. Ah, I was so happy ! 
 
 When at last night came I took my basket on my arm and set 
 out for the large garden. The flowers in the little basket looked so 
 gay, white, red, blue, and smelled so sweet, that my very heart 
 laughed when I peeped in at them. 
 
 Filled with joyous thoughts, I walked in the lovely moonlight 
 over the trim paths strewn with gravel, across the little white bridge, 
 beneath which the swans were sleeping on the bosom of the water, 
 and past the pretty arbours and ■ summer-houses. I soon found the 
 big pear-tree ; it was the same under which, while I was gardener's 
 boy, I used to lie on sultry afternoons. 
 
 All around me here was dark and lonely. A tall aspen quivered 
 and kept whispering with its silver leaves. The music from the castle 
 was heard at intervals, and now and then there were voices in the 
 
 28 
 
gaa'deu ; sometimes they passed quite near me, ami tlieii all would Ijo 
 still again. 
 
 My heart beat fast. I had a strange uncomfortable sensation as 
 if I Avere a robber. I stood for a lontr time stock-still, leanine; a<j;ainst 
 
 the tree and listening; but when no one appeared I could bear it no 
 longer. I hung my basket on my arm and clambered up into the 
 }iear-tree to breathe a purer air. 
 
 29 
 
The music of the dance floated up to ipie over the tree-tops. I 
 overlooked tke entire garden and gazed dii-ectly into the brilliantly- 
 illuminated windows of the castle. Chandeliers glittered there like 
 galaxies of stars ; a multitude of gayly-dressed gentlemen and ladies 
 wandered and waltzed and whirled about unrecognizable, like the 
 gay figures of "a magic-lantern; at times some of them .leaned out 
 of the windows and looked down into the garden. In front of the 
 castle the brilliant light gilded the grass, the shrubbery, and the 
 trees, so that the flowers and " the birds seemed to be aroused by 
 it. All around and below me, however, the garden lay black and 
 still. 
 
 " She is dancing there now," I thought to myself up in the tree, 
 " and has long since forgotten you and your flowers. All are gay ; 
 not a human being cares for you in the least. And thus it is with 
 me, always and everywhere. Every one has his little nook marked^ 
 out for him on this earth, his warm hearth, his cup of coffee, his 
 wife, his glass of wine in the evening, and is perfectly happy ; even 
 the Porter with his big nose is content. For me there is no place, 
 I seem to be just too late everywhere; the world has not a bit of 
 need of me." 
 
 As I was philosophizing thus, I suddenly heard something rustle 
 on the grass below me. Two soft voices were speaking together in 
 a low tone. In a moment the foliage of the shrubbery was parted, and 
 the lady's-maid's little face appeared among the leaves, peering about 
 on all sides. The moonlight sparkled in her saucy eyes as they peqped 
 out. I held my breath and stared down at her. Before long the 
 flower-girl did actually appear among the trees, just as the maid had 
 described her to me yesterday. My heart throbbed as if it would 
 burst. She had on a mask, and seemed to be gazing around in 
 surprise. Somehow she did not look to me as slender and graceful- 
 
 30 
 
as she had been. At last she reached the tree, and took off her mask. 
 It was the other, — the elder lady ! 
 
 How glad I was, when I had recovered from the first shock, that 
 I was up here 
 in safety ! How 
 in the world 
 diii she chance 
 to come here ? 
 If the dear, 
 lovely Lady 
 fair should hap- 
 pen to come 
 at this instant 
 for her flowers, 
 there would be 
 a fine to-do ! I 
 could have cried 
 for vexation at the 
 whole affair. 
 
 Meanwhile the dis- 
 
 beneath 
 "It is so stiflingly 
 hot in the ball-room, I had to 
 come out to cool myself in this 
 lovely open air." Thereupon 
 she fanned herself with her 
 mask and puffed and blew. In the bright moonlight I could plainly 
 see how swollen were the cords of her neck ; she looked very angry 
 and quite scarlet in the face. The lady's-maid was all the while 
 searching behind every bush, as if she were looking for a lost pin. 
 
 guised 
 
 flower-girl 
 
 me began 
 
 31 
 
" I do so need more fresh flowers for my character," the flower- 
 girl continued. " Where can he be ?" The maid went on searching, 
 and kept chuckling to herself. " "What did you say, Rosetta ?" the 
 flower-girl asked, shrewishly. " I say what I always have said," the 
 maid replied, putting on a very serious, honest face: "the Receiver is 
 a lazy fellow; of course he is lying behind some bush sound asleep." 
 
 My blood tingled with longing to jump down and defend my 
 reputation, when on a sudden a burst of music and loud shouts were 
 heard from the castle. 
 
 The flower-girl could stay no longer. " The people are cheering 
 his Grace," she said, passionately. "Come, we shall be missed!" 
 And she clapped on her mask in a hurry, and ran in a rage with 
 the maid towards the castle. The trees and bushes seemed to point 
 after her with long, derisive fingers, the moonlight danced nimbly up 
 and down over her stout figure as though over the key-board of a 
 piano, and thus to the sound of trumpets and kettle-drums she made 
 her exit, like many a singer whom I have seen upon the stage. 
 
 I, seated above in my tree, was downright bewildered, and gazed 
 fixedly at the castle; a circle of tall torches upon the steps of the 
 entrance cast a strange glare upon the glittering windows and deep 
 into the garden ; the assembled servants were to serenade their mas- 
 ter. In the midst of them stood the gorgeous Porter, like a minister 
 of state, before a music-stand, working away busily at a bassoon. 
 
 Just as I had settled myself to listen to the beautiful serenade, the 
 folding-doors leading to the balcony above the entrance parted. A 
 tall gentleman, very handsome and dignified, in uniform and glitter- 
 ing with orders, stepped out on the balcony, leading by the hand the 
 lovely young Lady fair, dressed in white like a lily in the night, or 
 like the moon in the clear skies. 
 
 I could not take my eyes from her, and garden, trees, and fields 
 
 32 
 
disappeared before me, as she stood there tall and slender, so won- 
 drously illuminated by the torch-light, now speaking with such grace 
 to the young officer, and now nodding down kindly to the musicians. 
 The people below were beside themselves with delight, and at last I 
 too could restrain myself no longer, and joined in the cheers with 
 all my might. 
 
 But when, soon after, she disappeared from the balcony, one after 
 another the torches below were extinguished and the music-stands 
 cleared away, and the garden around was once more dark, and the 
 trees rustled as before, — then it all became clear to me: I saw that 
 it was really only the aunt who had ordered the flowers of me, thati 
 the Lady fair never thought of me and had been married long agoj 
 and that I myself was a big fool. 
 
 All this plunged me into an abyss of reflection. I rolled myself 
 round like a hedgehog on the prickles of my own thoughts. Snatches 
 of music still reached me now and then from the ball-room, — the 
 clouds floated lonely away above the dim garden. And there I sat, 
 all through the night, up in the tree, like a night-owl, amid the ruins 
 of my happiness. 
 
 The cool breeze of morning aroused me at last from my dreamings. 
 I was startled as I looked about me. The music and dancing had 
 long since ceased, and everything around the castle and on the lawn, 
 and the marble steps and columns, all looked quiet, cool, and solemn ; 
 the fountain alone plashed on before the entrance. Here and there in 
 the boughs near me the birds were awaking, shaking their bright 
 feathers, and as they stretched their little wings, peering curiously and 
 amazed at their strange fellow-sleeper. The joyous rays of morning 
 flashed across my breast and over the garden. 
 
 I stood erect in my tree, and for the first time for a long while 
 looked far abroad over the country, to where the ships glided down 
 
 33 
 
the Danube among the vineyards, and the high-roads, still deserted, 
 stretched like bridges across the gleaming landscape, and far over the 
 distant hills and valleys. 
 
 I cannot tell how it was, but all at once my former love of travel 
 took possession of me, all the old melancholy, and delight, and ardent 
 expectation. And at the same moment I thought of the Lady fair 
 over in the castle sleeping among flowers, beneath silken coverlets, 
 with an angel surely keeping watch beside her bed in the silence of 
 the dawn. " No !" I cried aloud. " I must go away from here, far, 
 far away, — as far as the sky stretches its blue arch !" 
 
 As I uttered the words I tossed my basket high into the air, so 
 that it was beautiful to see how the flowers fell among the branches 
 and lay in gay colours on the green sod below. Then I got down as 
 quickly as possible, and went through the quiet garden to my dwell- 
 ing. I paused many times at spots where I had seen her pass, or 
 where I had lain in the shade and thought of her. 
 
 In and about my cottage all was just as I had left it the day 
 before. The garden was torn up and laid waste, the big account- 
 book lay open on the table in my room, my fiddle, which I had 
 almost clean forgotten, hung dusty on the wall; a ray of morning 
 light glittered upon the strings. It struck a chord in my heart. 
 " Yes," I said, " come here, thou faithful instrument ! Our king- 
 dom is not of this world !" 
 
 So I took the fiddle from the wall, and leaving behind me the 
 account-book, dressing-gown, slippers, pipes, and parasol, I walked 
 out of my cottage, as poor as when I entered it, and down along 
 the gleaming high-road. 
 
 I looked back often and often; I felt very strange, sad, and yet 
 merry, like a bird escaping from his cage. And when I had walked 
 some distance I took out my fiddle and sang, — 
 
 34 
 
'I wamlor on, in God confiding, 
 
 For all are His, wood, field, and fell ; 
 O'er earth and skies He still presiding. 
 For me will order all things well." 
 
 The castle, the garden, and the spires of Vienna vanished beliind 
 me in the morning mists; far above me countless larks exulted in 
 the air ; thus, past gay villages and hamlets and over green hills, 
 I wandered on towards Italy. 
 
 35 
 
Here was a puzzle ! It had never occurred to me that I did not 
 know my way. Not a human being was to be seen in the quiet early 
 morning whom I could question, and right before me the road divided 
 into many roads, which went on far, far over the highest mountains, 
 as though to the very end of the world, — so that I actually grew 
 giddy as I looked along them. 
 
 At last a peasant appeared, going to church I fancy, as it was 
 Sunday, in an old-fashioned coat with large silver buttons, and swing- 
 ing a long malacca cane with a massive silver head, which sparkled 
 from afar in the sunlight. I immediately asked him very politely, 
 
 36 
 
"Oau you tell me which is the road to Italy?" The fellow stood 
 still, stared at me, thrust out his under lip reflectively, and stared 
 at me again. I began once more '"'"To Italy, where oranges grow." 
 " What do I care for your oranges !" said the peasant, and walked 
 on sturdily. I should have credited the fellow with more politeness, 
 for he really looked very fine. 
 
 What was to be done ? Turn round and go back to my native 
 village ? Why, the folks would have jeered me, and the boys would 
 have run after me crying, " Oh, indeed ! you're welcome back from 
 'out in the world.' How does it look 'out in the world'? Haven't 
 you brought us some ginger-nuts from ' out in the world' ?" The 
 Porter with the high Roman nose, who certainly was familiar with 
 Universal History, used often to say to me, "Eespected Herr Re- 
 ceiver, Italy is a beautiful country ; the dear God takes care of every 
 one there. You can lie on your back in the sunshine and raisins 
 drop into your mouth ; and if a tarantula bites you, you dance with 
 the greatest ease, although you never in your life before learned to 
 dance." "Ay, to Italy ! to Italy !" I shouted with delight, and, heed- 
 less of any choice of roads, hurried on along the first that came. 
 
 After I had gone a little way I saw on the right a most beautiful 
 orchard, with the morning sun shimmering on the trunks and through 
 the tree-tops so brilliantly that it looked as if the ground were spread 
 with golden rugs. As no one was in sight, I clambered over the low 
 fence and lay down comfortably on the grass under an apple-tree ; 
 all my limbs were still aching from camping out in the tree on the 
 previous night. From where I lay I could see far abroad over the 
 country, and as it was Sunday the sound of the church-bells from 
 the far distance came to me over the quiet fields, and gaily-dressed 
 peasants were walking across the meadows and along the lanes to 
 church. I was glad at heart ; the birds sang in the tree overhead ; I 
 
 37 
 
thought of my father's mill, and of the garden of the lovely Lady fair, 
 and of how far, far away it all was, — until I fell sound asleep. I 
 dreamed that the Lady fair came walking, or rather slowly flying, to- 
 wards me from the lovely landscape to the music of the church-bells, 
 in long white robes that waved in the rosy morning. Then again it 
 seemed that we were not in a strange country, but in my native 
 village, in the deep shade beside the mill. But everything was still 
 and deserted, as it is when the people are aU gone to church, and 
 only the solemn sounds of the organ wafted down through the trees 
 break the stillness; I was oppressed with melancholy. But the 
 Lady fair was very kind and gentle, and put her hand in mine and 
 walked along with me, and sang, amid this solitude, the beautiful 
 song that she used to sing to her guitar early in the morning at her 
 Of en window, and in the placid mill-pool I saw her image, lovelier 
 even than herself, except that the eyes were wondrous large and 
 looked at me so strangely that I was almost afraid. Then suddenly 
 the mill-wheel began to turn, at first slowly, then faster and more 
 noisily; the pool became dark and troubled, the Lady fair turned 
 very pale, and heit robes grew longer and longer, and fluttered wildly 
 in long strips like pennons of mist up towards the skies ; the roaring 
 of the mill-wheel sounded ever louder, and it seemed as though it 
 were the Porter blowing upon his bassoon, so that I waked up with 
 my heart throbbing violently. 
 
 In fact, a breeze had arisen, which was gently stirring the 
 leaves of the apple-tree above me; but the noise and roaring came 
 neither from the mill nor from the Porter's bassoon, but from the 
 same peasant who had before refused to show me the way to Italy. 
 He had taken off his Sunday coat and put on a white smock-frock. 
 " Oho !" he said, as I rubbed my sleepy eyes, " do you want to pick 
 your oranges here, that you trample down all my grass instead of 
 
 38 
 
going to church, you lazy lout, you?" I was vexed that the boor 
 should have waked me, and I started up and cried, " Hold your 
 tongue ! I have been a better gardener than you will ever be, and 
 a Receiver, and if you had been driving to town, you would have had 
 to take off your dirty cap to me, sitting at my door in my yellow- 
 dotted, red dressing-gown — " But the fellow was nothing daunted, 
 and, putting his arms akimbo, merely said, " What do yon want here ? 
 eh! eh!" I saw that he was a short, stubbed, bow-legged fellow, 
 with protruding goggle-eyes, and a red, rather crooked nose. And 
 when he went on saying nothing but 'Eh! eh!' and kept advancing 
 towards me step by step, I was suddenly seized with so curious a 
 sensation of disgust that I hastily jumped to my feet, leaped over 
 the fence, and, without looking round, ran across country until my 
 fiddle in my pocket twanged again. 
 
 When at last I stopped to take breath, the orchard and the whole 
 jralley were out of sight and I was in a beautiful forest. But I took 
 little "note of it, for I was downright provoked at the peasant's im- 
 pertinence, and I fumed for a long time, to myself. I walked on 
 quickly, going farther and farther from the high-road and in among 
 the mountains. The plank-roadway which I had been following 
 ceased, and before me was only a narrow, unfrequented foot-path. 
 Not a soul was to be seen anywhere, and no sound was to be heard. 
 But it was very pleasant walking, the trees rustled and the birds 
 sang sweetly. I resigned myself to the guidance of heaven, and, 
 taking out my violin, played all my favourite airs. Very joyous they 
 sounded in the lonely forest. 
 
 I grew tired of playing after a while, for I stumbled every 
 minute over the tiresome roots of the trees, and I began to grow 
 very hungry, while the wood seemed endless. Thus I wandered for 
 the entire day, until the sun's rays came aslant through the trunks 
 
 39 
 
' of the trees, when at last I emerged on a little grassy vale shut in 
 by the mountains and gay with red and yellow flowers, above which 
 myriads of butterflies were fluttering in the golden light of the set- 
 ting sun. It was as secluded here as though the world had been 
 hundreds of miles away. The crickets chirped, and a shepherd lad 
 lying among the tall grasses blew so melancholy an air upon his 
 horn that it was enough to break one's heart. " Yes," thought I 
 to myself, "who has as happy a lot as a lazy lout! Some of us, 
 though, have to wander about among strangers, and be always on 
 the go." As a lovely, clear stream separated me from him, I called 
 to him to ask where the nearest village was. But he did not disturb 
 himself to reply, — only stretched his head a little out of the grass, 
 pointed with his horn to the opposite wood, and coolly resumed his 
 piping. 
 
 I marched on briskly, for twilight was at hand. The birds, which 
 had made a great clatter while the sun was disappearing on the 
 horizon, suddenly fell silent, and I began to feel almost afraid, so 
 solemn was the perpetual rustling of the lonely forest. At last I 
 heard dogs barking in the distance. I walked more quickly, the 
 forest grew less and less dense, and in a little while I saw through 
 the last trees a beautiful village-green, where a crowd of children 
 were frolicking, and capering around a huge linden in the centre. 
 Opposite me was an inn, and at a table before it were seated some 
 peasants playing cards and smoking. On one side a number of lads 
 and lasses were gathered in a group, the girls with their arms rolled 
 in their aprons, and all gossiping together in the cool of the evening. 
 
 I took very little time for consideration, but, drawing my fiddle 
 from my pocket, I played a merry waltz as I came out from the 
 forest. The girls were surprised, and the old folks laughed so that 
 the woods re-echoed with their merriment. But when I reached the 
 
 40 
 
linden, and, leaning my back against it, went on playing gay waltzes, 
 a whisper went round among the groups of young people to the right 
 and left ; the lads laid aside their pipes, each put his arm around his 
 lass's waist, and in the twinkling of an eye the young folk were all 
 waltzing around me ; the dogs barked, skirts and coat-tails fluttered, 
 and the children stood around me in a circle gazing curiously into 
 my face and at my briskly-moving fingers. 
 
 When the first waltz was ended, it was easy to see how good music 
 loosens the limbs. The peasant lads, who had before been restlessly 
 shuffiing about on the benches, with their pipes in their mouths and 
 
 41 
 
their legs stretched out stif&y in front of them, were positively- 
 transformed, and, with their gay handkerchiefs hanging from the 
 button-holes of their coats, capered about with the lasses so that it 
 was a pleasure to look at them. One of them, who evidently thought 
 a deal of himself, fumbled in his waistcoat-pocket for a long while, 
 that the others might see him, and finally brought out a little silver 
 coin, which he tried to put into my hand. It irritated me, although 
 I had not a stiver in my pocket. I told him to keep his pennies, I 
 was playing only for joy, because I was glad to be among people once 
 more. Soon afterwards, however, a pretty girl came up to me with 
 a great tankard of wine. " Musicians are thirsty folk," she said, with 
 a laugh that displayed her pearls of teeth gleaming so temptingly 
 between her red lips that I should have liked to kiss her then and 
 there. She put the tankard to her charming mouth, and her eyes 
 sparkled at me over its rim ; she then handed it to me ; I drained 
 it to the bottom, and played afresh, till all were spinning merrily 
 about me once more. 
 
 By and by the old peasants finished their game, and the young 
 people grew tired and separated, so that gradually all was quiet and 
 deserted in front of the inn. The girl who had brought me the wine 
 also walked towards the village, but she went very slowly, and looked 
 around from time to time as if she had forgotten something. At 
 last she stopped and seemed to search for it on the ground, but as she 
 stooped I saw her glance towards me from under her arm. I had 
 learned polite manners at the castle, so I sprang towards her and 
 said, " Have you lost anything, my pretty ma'amselle ?" She blushed 
 crimson. "Ah, no," she said; "it was only a rose; will you have 
 it?" I thanked her, and stuck the rose in my button-hole. She 
 looked very kindly at me, and said, " You play beautifully." " Yes," 
 I I'eplied, "it is a gift from God." "Musicians are very rare in the 
 
 42 
 
country about here," she began again, then stammered, and cast 
 down her eyes. " You might earn a deal of money here. My 
 father plays the fiddle a little, and likes to hear about foreign coun- 
 tries, — and my father is very rich." Then she laughed, and said, 
 " If you only would not waggle your head so, when you play." " My 
 dearest girl," I said, "do not blush so, — and as for the tremoloso 
 motion of the head, we can't help it, great musicians all do it." 
 " Oh, indeed !" rejoined the girl. She was about to say more, when 
 a terrible racket arose in the inn ; the front door was opened with 
 a bang, and a tall, lean fellow was shot out of it like a. ramrod, after 
 which it was slammed to behind him. 
 
 At the first sound the girl ran oS like a deer and vanished in the 
 darkness. The man picked himself up and began to rave against the 
 inn with such volubility that it was a wonder to hear him. " What !" 
 he yelled, " I drunk ? I not pay the chalk-marks on your smoky door ? 
 Rub them out ! rub them out ! Did I not shave you yesterday over a 
 ladle, and cut you just under the nose so that you bit the ladle in two? 
 Shaving takes ofi' one mark; ladle, another mark; court-plaster on 
 your nose, another. How many more of your dirty marks do you 
 want to have paid? But all right, — all right. I'll let the whole 
 village, the whole world go unshaved. Wear your beards, for all 
 I care, till they are so long, that at the judgment-day the Almighty 
 will not know whether you are Jews or Christians. Yes, hang your- 
 selves with your beards, shaggy bears that you are !" Here he burst 
 into tears and, in a maudlin, falsetto voice, sobbed out, " Am I to 
 drink water Hke a wretched fish ? Is that loving your neighbour ? 
 Am I not a man and a skilled surgeon ? Ah, I am beside myself to- 
 day; my heart is full of pity, and of love for my fellow-creatures." 
 And then, finding that all was quiet in the house, he began to walk 
 away. When he saw me, he came plunging towards me with out- 
 
 43 
 
stretched arms. I thought the fellow was about to embrace me, and 
 sprang aside, letting him stumble on in the darkness, where I heard 
 him discoursing to himself for some time. 
 
 All sorts of fancies filled my brain. The girl who had given me 
 the rose was young, pretty, and rich. I could make my fortune 
 before one could turn round. And sheep and pigs, turkeys, and fat 
 geese stuffed with apples — ^verily, I seemed to see the Porter strut- 
 ting up to me : " Seize your luck. Receiver, seize your luck ! ' Marry 
 jyoung, you're never wrong;' take home your bride, live in the coun- 
 try, and live well." Plunged in these philosophical reflections, I sat 
 me down on a stone, for, since I had no money, I did not venture to 
 knock at the inn. The moon shone brilliantly, the forests on the 
 mountain-side murmured in the still night; now and then a dog 
 barked in the village which lay farther down the valley, buried, as 
 it were, beneath foliage and moonlight. I gazed up at the heavens, 
 where a few clouds were sailing slowly and now and then a falling 
 star shot down from the zenith. Thus this same moon, thought I, 
 is shining down upon my father's mill and upon his Grace's castle. 
 Everything there is quiet by this time, the Lady fair is asleep, 
 and the fountains and leaves in the garden are whispering just 
 as they used to whisper, all the same whether I am there, or here, 
 or dead. And the world seemed to me so terribly big, and I so 
 utterly alone in it, that I could have wept from the very depths of 
 my heart. 
 
 While I was thus sitting there, suddenly I heard the sound of 
 horses' hoofs in the forest. I held my breath and listened as the 
 sound came nearer and nearer, until I could hear the horses snorting. 
 Soon afterwards two horsemen appeared under the trees, but paused 
 at the edge of the woods, and talked together in low, very eager 
 tones, as T could see by the moving shadows which were thrown 
 
 44 
 
across the bright village-green, and by their long dark arms pointing 
 in various directions. How often at home, when my mother, now 
 dead, had told me of savage forests and fierce robbers, had I 
 privately longed to be a part of such a story- ! I was well paid now 
 for my silly, rash longings. I reached up the linden-tree, beneath 
 which I was sitting, as high as I could, unobserved, until I clasped 
 the lowest branch, and then I swung myself up. But just as I 
 had got my body half across the branch, and was about to drag 
 my legs up after it, one of the horsemen trotted briskly across the 
 green towards me. I shut my eyes tight amid the thick foliage, and 
 did not stir. " Who is there ?" a voice called directly under me. 
 " Nobody !" I yelled in terror at being detected, although I could not 
 but laugh to myself at the thought of how the rogues would look 
 when they should turn my empty pockets inside out. "Aha !" said 
 the robber, "whose are these legs, then, hanging down here?" 
 There was no help for it. "They are," I replied, "only a couple 
 of legs of a poor, lost musician." And I hastily let myself drop, 
 for I was ashamed to hang there any longer like a broken fork. 
 
 The rider's horse shied when I dropped so suddenly from the tree. 
 He patted the animal's neck, and said, laughing, " Well, we too are 
 lost, so we are comrades ; perhaps you can help us to find the road 
 to B. You shall be no loser by it." I assured him that I knew 
 nothing about the road to B., and said that I would ask in the inn, 
 or would conduct them to the village. But the man would not listen 
 to reason; he drew from his girdle a pistol, the barrel of which 
 glittered in the moonlight. " My dear feUow," he said in a very 
 friendly tone, as he wiped off the glittering barrel and then ran his 
 eye along it, — "my dear fellow, you will have the kindness to go 
 yourself before us lo B." 
 
 Verily, I was in a scrape." If I chanced to hit the right road, 
 
 45 
 
I should certainly get into the midst of the robber band and be 
 beaten because I had no money ; if I did not find the road, I should 
 be beaten of course. I wasted very little thought upon the matter, 
 but took the first road at hand, the one past the inn which led away 
 from the village. The horseman galloped back to his companion, 
 and both followed me slowly at some distance. Thus we wandered 
 on foolishly enough at hap-hazard through the moonlit night. The 
 road led through forests on the side of a mountain. Sometimes we 
 could see, above the tops of the pines stirring darkly beneath us, far 
 abroad into the deep, silent valleys ; now and then a nightingale burst 
 into song ; the dogs bayed in the distant villages. A brook babbled 
 ceaselessly from the depths below us, and here and there glistened in 
 the moonlight. The hush was disturbed by the monotonous tramp of 
 the horses and by the stir and movement of their riders, who talked 
 together incessantly in a foreign tongue, and the bright moonlight 
 contrasted sharply with the long shadows of the trees, which swept 
 across the figures of the horsemen, making them appear now black, 
 now light, now dwarfish, and anon gigantic. My thoughts grew 
 strangely confused, as though in a dream from which I could not 
 waken, but I marched straight ahead. We certainly must reach the 
 end of the forest and of the night too, I thought. 
 
 At last long, rosy streaks flushed the horizon here and there 
 but faintly, as when one breathes upon a mirror, and a lark began to 
 sing high up above the peaceful valley. My heart at once grew 
 perfectly light at the approach of dawn, and all fear left me. The 
 two horsemen stretched themselves, looked around, and seemed for 
 the first time to suspect that we might not have taken the right 
 road. They chatted much, and I could perceive that they were talk- 
 ing of me ; it even seemed to me that one of them began to mistrust 
 me, as though I were a rogue trying to lead them astray in the forest. 
 
 46 
 
This amused me mightily, for the lighter it grew the greater grew 
 my courage, until we emerged upon a fine, spacious opening. Here 
 I looked about me quite savagely, and whistled once or twice through 
 my fingers, as scoundrels always do when they wish to signal one 
 another. 
 
 " Halt !" exclaimed one of the horsemen, so suddenly that I 
 jumped. When I looked round I saw that both had alighted and 
 had tied their horses to a tree. One of them came up to me rapidly, 
 stared me full in the face, and then burst into a fit of immoderate 
 laughter. I must confess this senseless- merriment irritated me. But 
 he said, "Why, it is actually the gardener — I should say the Ee- 
 ceiver, from the castle !" 
 
 I stared at him in turn, but could not remember who he was ; 
 indeed, I should have had enough to do to recognize all the young 
 gentlemen who came and went at the castle. He kept up an 
 eternal laughter, however, declaring, " This is magnificent ! You're 
 taking a holiday, I see ; we are just in want of a servant ; stay with 
 us and you will have a perpetual holiday." I was dumfounded, and 
 said at last that I was just on my way to visit Italy. " Italy ?" the 
 stranger rejoined. "That is just where we wish to go!" "Ah, if 
 that be so !" I exclaimed, and, taking out my fiddle, I tuned up so 
 that all the birds in the wood awaked. The young fellow immedi- 
 ately threw his arm around his companion, and they waltzed around 
 the meadow Uke mad. 
 
 Suddenly they stood still. " By heavens," exclaimed one, " I can 
 see the church-tower of B. ! We shall soon be there." He took out 
 his watch and made it repeat, then shook his head, and made the 
 watch strike again. " No," he said, " it will not do; we should arrive 
 too early, and that might be very bad." 
 
 Then they brought out from their saddle-bags cakes, cutlets, and 
 
 47 
 
bottles of wine, spread a gay cloth on the grass, stretched themselves 
 beside it, and feasted to their hearts' content, sharing all generously 
 with me, which I greatly enjoyed, seeing that for some days I had 
 not had over and above enough to eat. "And let me tell you," one 
 of them said to me — "but you do not know us yet?" I shook my 
 head. " Then let me tell you. I am the painter Lionardo, and my 
 friend here is, a painter also, called Guido." / 
 
 I could see the two painters more clearly in the dawning morning. 
 Herr Lionardo was tall, brown, and slender, with merry, ardent eyes. 
 The other was much younger, smaller, and more delicate, dressed in 
 antique German style, as the Porter called it, with a white collar 
 and bare throat, about which hung dark brown curls, which he 
 was often obliged to toss aside from his pretty face. When he had 
 breakfasted, he picked up my fiddle, which I had laid on the grass 
 beside me, seated himself upon the fallen trunk of a tree, and 
 strummed the strings. Then he sang in a voice clear as a wood- 
 robin's, so that it went to my very heart, — 
 
 " When the earliest morning ray 
 Through the valley finds its way, 
 Hill and forest fair awaking, 
 All who can their flight are taking. 
 
 "And the lad who's free from care 
 Shouts, with cap flang high in air, 
 ' Song its flight can aye be winging ; 
 Let me, then, be ever singing.' " 
 
 As he sang, the ruddy rays of morning exquisitely illumined his 
 pale face and dark, love-lit eyes. But I was so tired that the words 
 and notes of his song mingled and blended strangely in my ears, until 
 at last I fell sound asleep. 
 
 48 
 
When, by and by, I began gradually to awaken, I heard, as in a 
 dream, the two painters talking together beside me, and the birds 
 singing overhead, while the morning sun shining through my closed 
 eyelids produced the sensation of looking towards the light through 
 red curtains. " Com' e hello I" I heard some one exclaim close to 
 me. I opened my eyes, and saw the younger painter bending over me 
 in the clear morning light, so near that I seemed to see only his large 
 black eyes between his drooping curls. 
 
 I sprang up hastily, for it was broad day. Herr Lionardo seemed 
 cross, — he had two angry furrows on his brow, — and hastily made 
 ready to move on. But the other painter shook his curls away from 
 his face and quietly hummed an air to himself as he was bridling 
 his steed, until at last Lionardo burst into a sudden fit of laughter, 
 picked up a bottle standing on the grass, and poured the contents 
 into a couple of glasses. "To our happy arrival!" he exclaimed, as 
 the two clinked their glasses melodiously. Whereupon Lionardo 
 tossed the empty bottle high in the air, and it sparkled brilliantly. 
 
 At last they mounted their horses, and I marched on beside 
 them. Just at our feet lay a valley in measureless extent, into 
 which our road descended. How clear and fresh and bright and 
 jubilant were all the sights and sounds around ! I was so cool, so 
 happy, that I felt as if I could have flown from the mountain out 
 into the glorious landscape. 
 
 49 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Farewell, mill, and castle, and Porter ! We went at such a pace 
 that the wind nearly blew my hat off. Eight and left, villages, towns, 
 and vineyards flew past in a twinkling; behind me the two painters 
 were seated in the carriage, Ijefore me were four horses and a gor- 
 geous postilion, while I, seated high up on the box, bounced into the 
 air from time to time. 
 
 It had happened thus : Arrived at B., while we were as yet in the 
 outskirts a tall, thin, crusty gentleman in a green plush coat came 
 to meet us, and, with many obeisances to the two painters, conducted 
 us into the village, where, beneath the tall linden beside the post- 
 station, stood a iine carriage with four post-horses. lierr Lionardo 
 
 50 
 
meanwhile insisted that I had outgrown my clothes, and in a trice he 
 produced another suit from his portmanteau, and I had to put on a 
 beautiful new dress-coat and vest; very fine to- see, but they were too 
 long and too wide for me, and absolutely fluttered about me. And 
 I also had a brand-new hat, which shone in the sunlight as if it 
 had been smeared with fresh butter. Then the crusty stranger 
 gentleman took the bridles of the two horses which the painters had 
 been riding, the painters themselves got into the carriage, I mounted 
 upon the box, and we started, just as the postmaster poked his head 
 out of the window, in his nightcap. The postilion blew his horn 
 merrily, and we were off for Italy. — 
 
 I led a magnificent existence up there, like a bird in the air, ex- 
 cept that I did not need to fly. I had absolutely nothing to do but 
 to sit on the box day and night, and bring out food and drink 
 to the carriage from the inns, for the painters never alighted, and 
 in the daytime they shut the carriage windows close, as if the sun 
 would have killed them; only now and then Herr Guido put his 
 pretty head out of the carriage window and chatted kindly with me, 
 laughing the while at Herr Lionardo, who always seemed to dis- 
 like these talks. Once or twice I nearly fell into disgrace with my 
 master, — the first time because on a clear starry night I began to 
 play the fiddle up there on my box, and then because of my sleeping. 
 It was strange ! I longed to see all that I could of Italy, and opened 
 my eyes wide every fifteen minutes. And yet, after I had gazed 
 steadily about me for a while, the sixteen trotting feet before me 
 would grow indistinct and dreamy, my eyes would gradually close, 
 and at last I would fall into a slumber so profound and invincible 
 that it was impossible to rouse me. Then day or night, rain or sun- 
 shine, Tyrol or Italy, it was all the same; I swayed first to the right, 
 then to the left, then backwards, — nay, sometimes my head nodded 
 
 51 
 
down so low that my hat dropped off, and Herr Guido screamed * - 
 aloud. ■ " ■ . , ; 
 
 Thus we had passed, I hardly., know how, half 'through the part of 
 Italy that they call Lombardy, when on a fine evening we stopped at 
 a country inn. The post-horses were to be ready for us at the 
 neighbouring station in a couple of hours, so the painters left the 
 carriage, and were shown into a special apartment, to rest a little, 
 and to write some letters. I was greatly pleased, and betook myself 
 to the common room to eat and drink in comfort. Here everything ' 
 looked rather disreputable: the maids were going about with their 
 hair in diBorder and their neckerchiefs awry, exposing their sallow 
 skin; the men-servants were at their supper .in jAne smock-frocks, 
 around a circular table, whence they glowereoat me from time to 
 time. They all wore their hair tied behind in a short, thick queue 
 which looked quite dandified. " Here you are," I said to myself, as 
 I ate my supper, "here you are in the country from which such 
 queer people used to come to the Herr Pastor's with mouse-traps, 
 and barometers, and pictures. How much a man learns who makes 
 up his mind not to stick close to his own hearth-stone all his 
 life !" 
 
 As I was thus eating my supper and meditating, a little man, who ; 
 had been sitting in a dim corner of the room over a glass of wine, 
 darted out of his nook at me like a spider. He was quite short and 
 crooked, and he had a big ugly head, with a long hooked nose and 
 sparse red whiskers, while his powdered hair stood on end all over his 
 head as if a hurricane had swept over it. He wore an old-fashioned, 
 threadbare dress-coat, short, plush breeches, and faded silk stockings. 
 He had once been in Germany, and prided himself upon his knowledge 
 of German. He sat down by me and asked a hundred questions, 
 perpetually taking snuff the while, — was I the servitore? when did 
 
 52 
 
..■:isM 
 
we arriva? did we went to Koma? All this I myself did not know, 
 and really I could not understand his gibberish. " Farlez-vous fran- 
 cais ?" I asked him at last in my distress. He shook his big head, 
 and I was very glad, for neither did I speak French. But it was of 
 no use, he had taken me in hand, and went on asking question after 
 question; the more we parleyed the less we understood each other, 
 until at last we both grew angry, and I actually thought the Siguor 
 would have liked to peck me with his hooked beak, until the maids, 
 who had been listening to our confusion of tongues, laughed heartily 
 at us. I put down my knife and fork and went out of doors; for 
 in this strange land I, with my German tongue, seemed to have 
 sunk down fathoms deep into the sea, where all sorts of unfamiliar, 
 crawling creatures were gliding about me, peopling the solitude and 
 glaring and snapping at me. 
 
 Outside, the summer night was warm and inviting. From the 
 distant vineyards a labourer's song now and then fell on the ear; there 
 was lightning low on the horizon, and the landscape seemed to tremble 
 and whisper in the moonlight. Sometimes I thought I perceived a 
 tall, dim figure gliding behind the hazel hedge in front of the house 
 and peeping through the twigs, and then all would be motionless. 
 Suddenly Herr Guide appeared on the balcony above me. He did 
 not see me, and began to play with great skill on a zither which he 
 must have found in the house, singing to it like a nightingale : 
 
 " When the yearning heart is stilled 
 
 As in dreams, the forest sighing, 
 
 To the listening earth replying, 
 Tells the thoughts with which 'twas filled ; 
 
 Days long vanished, soothing sorrow, — 
 
 From the Past a light they borrow, 
 And the heart is gently thrilled." 
 
 53 
 
I do not know whether he sang any more, for I had stretched 
 myself on a 'bench outside the door, and I fell asleep in the warm 
 air from sheer exhaustion. 
 
 A couple of hours must have passed, when I was roused by the 
 winding of a post-horn, which sounded merrily in my dreams for a 
 while before I fully recovered consciousness. At last I sprang up ; 
 day was already dawning on the mountains, and I felt through all my 
 limbs the freshness of the morning. Then it occurred to me that by 
 this time we ought to be far on'"oui*'^ay. ' " Aha !" I thought, " now 
 it is my turn to laugh. How Herr Guido will shake his sleepy, curly 
 head when he hears me outside !" So I went close beneath the 
 window in the little garden at the back of the house, stretched my 
 limbs well in the morning air, and sang merrily, — 
 
 " If the cricket's chirp we hear, 
 Then be sure the day is near ; 
 When the sun is rising, — then 
 'Tis good to go to asleep again." 
 
 The window of the room where my masters were stood open, but 
 all within was quiet ; the breeze alone rustled the leaves of the vine 
 that clambered into the window itself. "What does this mean?" 
 I exclaimed in surprise, and ran into the house, and through the 
 silent corridors, to the room. But when I opened the door my heart 
 stood still with dismay ; the room was perfectly empty ; not a coat, 
 not a hat, not a boot, anywhere. Only the zither upon which Herr 
 Guido had played was hanging on the wall, and on the table in the 
 centre of the room lay a purse full of money, with a card attached to 
 it. I took it to the window, and could scarcely trust my eyes when I 
 read, in large letters, ' For the Herr Receiver !' 
 
 But what good could it all do me if I could not find my dear, 
 
 54 
 
merry masters again ? I thrust the purse into my deep coat- 
 pocket, where it plumped down as into a well and almost pulled me 
 over backwards. Then I rushed out, and made a great noise, and 
 waked up all the maids and men in the house. They could not 
 imagine what was the matter, and thought I must have gone crazy. 
 But they were not a little amazed when they saw the empty nest. 
 No one knew anything of my masters. One maid only had observed 
 ■ — so far as I could make out from her signs and gesticulations — that 
 Herr Guido, when he was singing on the balcony on the previous 
 evening, had suddenly screamed aloud, and had then rushed back into 
 the room to the other gentleman. And once, when she waked in the 
 night afterwards, she had heard the tramp of a horse. She peeped 
 out of the little window of her room, and saw the crooked Signer, who 
 had talked so much to me, on a white horse, galloping so furiously 
 across the field in the moonlight that he bounced high up from his 
 saddle ; and the maid crossed herself, for he looked like a ghost riding 
 upon a three-legged horse. I did not know what in the world to do. 
 Meanwhile, however, our carriage was standing before the door 
 ready to start, and the impatient postilion blew his horn fit to burst, 
 for he had to be at the next station at a certain hour, because every- 
 thing had been ordered with great exactitude in the way of changing 
 horses. I ran once more through all the house, calling the painters, 
 but no one made answer ; the inn-people stared at me, the postilion 
 cursed, the horses neighed, and at last, completely dazed, I sprang 
 into the carriage, the hostler shut the door behind me, the postilion 
 cracked his whip, and away I went into the wide world. 
 
 55 
 
i 
 
 :^^. 
 
 We drove on now over hill and dale, day and night. I had no 
 time for reflection, for wherever we arrived the horses were standing 
 ready harnessed. I could not talk with the people, and my signs and 
 gestures were of no use ; often just in the midst of a fine dinner the 
 postilion wound his horn, and I had to drop knife and fork and 
 spring into the carriage again without knowing whither I was going, 
 or why or wherefore I was obliged to hurry on at such a rattling pace. 
 
 Otherwise the life was not unpleasant. I reclined upon the soft 
 cushions first in one corner of the carriage and then in the other, and 
 took note of countries and people, and when we drove through the 
 villages I leaned both arms on the window of the carriage, and ac- 
 knowledged the courtesy of the men who took off their hats to me, or 
 else I kissed my hand like an old acquaintance to the young girls at 
 the windows, who looked surprised, and stared after me as long as 
 the carriage was in sight. 
 
 But a day came when I was in a terrible fright. I had never 
 counted the money in the purse left for me, and I had to pay a great 
 
 56 
 
deal to the postmasters and innkeepers everywhere, so that before I 
 was aware, the purse was empty. When I first discovered this I had 
 an idea of jumping out of the carriage and making my escape, the 
 next time we drove through a lonely wood. But I could not make 
 up my mind to give up the beautiful carriage and leave it all alone, 
 when if it were possible I would gladly have driven in it to the end 
 of the world. 
 
 So I sat buried in thought, not knowing what to do, when all at 
 once we turned aside from the highway. I shouted to the postilion 
 to ask him where he was going, but, shout as I would, the fellow' 
 never made any answer save " Si, si, Signore !" and on he drove over 
 stock and stone till I was jolted from side to side in the carriage. 
 
 I was not at all pleased, for the high-road ran through a charming 
 country, directly towards the setting sun, which was bathing the land- 
 scape in a sea of splendour, while before us, when we turned aside, 
 -lay a dreary hilly region, broken by ravines, where in the gray depths 
 darkness had already set in. The further we drove, the lonelier and 
 drearier grew the road. At last the moon emerged from the clouds, 
 and shone through the trees with a weird, unearthly brilliancy. We 
 had to go very slowly in the narrow rocky ravines, and the continu- 
 ous, monotonous rattle of the carriage re-echoed from the walls on 
 either side, as if we were driving through a vaulted tomb. From the 
 depths of the forest came a ceaseless murmur of unseen water-falls, 
 and the owlets hooted in the distance ' Come too ! come too !' As I 
 looked at the driver, I noticed for the first time that he wore no 
 uniform and was not a postilion ; he seemed to be growing restless ; 
 turning his head and looking behind him several times. Then he 
 began to drive quicker, and as I leaned out of the carriage a horse- 
 man came out of the shrubbery on one side of the road, crossed it at 
 a bound directly in front of our horses, and vanished in the forest on 
 
 57 
 
the other side. I felt bewildered ; as far as I could see in the bright 
 moonlight the rider was that very same crooked little man who had 
 so pecked at me with his hooked nose in the inn, and mounted, too, 
 on the same white horse. The driver shook his head and laughed 
 aloud at such horsemanship, then quickly turned to me and said a 
 great deal very eagerly, not a word of which did I understand, and 
 then he drove on more rapidly than ever. 
 
 I was rejoiced soon afterwards when I perceived a light glimmer- 
 ing in the distance. Gradually more and more lights appeared, and at 
 last we passed several smoke-dried huts clinging like swallows' nests 
 to the rocks. As the night was warm, the doors stood open, and I 
 could see into the lighted rooms, and all sorts of ragged figures 
 gathered about the hearths. We rattled on through the quiet night, 
 along a steep, stony road leading up a high mountain. Soon lofty 
 trees and hanging vines arched completely over us, and anon the 
 heavens became visible, and we could overlook in the depths a distant 
 circle of mountains, forests, and valleys. On the summit of the moun- 
 tain stood a grand old castle, its many towers gleaming in the bril- 
 liant moonlight. " God be thanked !" I exclaimed, greatly relieved, 
 and on the tiptoe of expectation as to whither I was being conducted. 
 
 A good half-hour passed, however, before we reached the gate-way 
 of the castle. It led under a broad round tower, the summit of which 
 was half ruined. The driver cracked his whip three times, so that the 
 old castle re-echoed, and a flock of startled rooks flew forth from every 
 sheltered nook and careered wildly overhead with hoarse caws. Then 
 the carriage rolled on through the long, dark gate-way. The iron 
 shoes of the horses struck fire upon the stone pavement, a large dog 
 barked, the' wheels thundered along the vaulted passage, the rooks' 
 hoarse cries resounded, and amidst all this horrible hubbub we 
 reached a small, paved court-yard. 
 
 58 
 
" A qiieer post-station this," I thought, when the coach stopped. 
 The coach door was opened, and a tall old man with a small lantern 
 scanned me grimly from beneath his hushy eyebrows. He then took 
 my arm and helped me to alight from the coach as if I had been a 
 person of quality. Outside, before the castle door, stood a very ugly 
 old woman in a black camisole and petticoat, with a white apron and 
 a black cap, the long point of which in front almost touched her nose. 
 A large bunch of keys hung on one side of her waist, and she held in 
 her hand an old-fashioned candelabrum with two lighted wax candles. 
 As soon as she saw me she began to duck and courtesy and to talk 
 volubly. I did not understand a word, but I scraped innumerable 
 bows, and felt very uncomfortable. 
 
 Meanwhile, the old man had peered into every corner of the coach 
 with his lantern, and grumbled and shook his head upon finding 
 no trace of trunk or luggage. The driver, without asking for the 
 usual pour-hoire, proceeded to put up the coach in an old shed on one 
 side of the court-yard, while the old woman by all sorts of courteous 
 signs invited me to follow her. She showed the way with her wax 
 candles through a long, narrow passage, and up a little stone stair- 
 case. As we passed the kitchen a couple of maids poked their heads 
 inquisitively through the half-open door, and stared at me, as they 
 winked and nodded furtively to each other, as if they had never in 
 all their lives seen a man before. At last the old woman opened a 
 door, and for a moment I was quite dazed ; the apartment was spa- 
 cious and very handsome, the ceiling decorated with gilded carving 
 and the walls hung with magnificent tapestry portraying all sorts of 
 figures and flowers. In the centre of the room stood a table spread 
 with catlets, cakes, salad, fruit, wine, and confections, enough to 
 make one's mouth water. Between the windows hung a tall mirror, 
 reaching from the floor to the ceiling. 
 
 59 
 
I must say that all this delighted me. I stretched myself once 
 or twice, and paced the room to and fro with much dignity, after 
 which I could not resist looking at myself in such a large mirror. 
 Of a truth Herr Lionardo's new clothes became me well, and I had 
 caught an ardent expression of eye from the Italians, but otherwise 
 I was just such a whey-face as I had been at home, with only a soft 
 down on my upper lip. 
 
 Meanwhile, the old woman ground away with her toothless jaws, 
 as if she were actually chewing the end of her long nose. She made 
 
 60 
 
me sit down, chucked me under the chin with her lean fingers, called 
 me ' poverltio,' and leered at me so roguishly with her red eyes that 
 one corner of her moufh twitched half-way up her cheek as she at 
 last left the room with a low courtesy. 
 
 I sat down at the table, and a young, pretty girl came in to wait 
 on me. I made all sorts of gallant speeches to her, which she did 
 not understand, but watched me curiously while I applied myself to 
 the viands with evident enjoyment ; they were delicious. When I 
 had finished and rose from table, she took a candle and conducted me 
 to another room, where were a sofa, a small mirror, and a magnificent 
 bed with green silk curtains. I inquired by signs whether I were to 
 sleep there. She nodded assent, but I could not undress while she 
 stood beside me as if she were rooted to the spot. At last I went and 
 got a large glass of wine from the table in the next I'ooni, drank it ofi', 
 
 61 
 
and wished her " Felidssima notte !" for I had managed to learn that 
 much Italian. But while I was emptying the glass at a draught she 
 suddenly burst into a fit of suppressed giggling, grew very red, and 
 went into the next room, closing the door behind her. " What is 
 there to laugh at ?" thought I in a puzzle. " I believe Italians are 
 all crazy." 
 
 Still in anxiety lest the postilion should begin to blow his horn 
 again, I listened at the window, but all was quiet outside. "Let 
 him blow!" I thought, undressed myself, and got into the magnifi- 
 cent bed, where I seemed to be fairly swimming in milk and 
 honey ! The old linden in the court-yard rustled, a rook now and 
 then flew ofi' the roof, and at last, completely happy, I fell asleep. 
 
 62 
 
iwrm 
 
 "When I awoke, the beams of early morning were shining on the 
 green curtains of my bed. At first I could not remember where I 
 was. I seemed to be still driving in the coach, where I had been 
 dreaming of a castle in the moonlight, and of an old witch and her 
 pale daughter. 
 
 I sprang hastily out of bed, dressed myself, and, looking about my 
 room, perceived in the wainscoting a small door, which I had not 
 seen the night before. It was ajar; I opened it, and saw a pretty 
 little room looking very fresh and neat in the early dawn. Some 
 articles of feminine apparel were lying in disorder over the back of a 
 chair, and in a bed beside it lay the girl who had waited upon me 
 the evening before. She was sleeping soundly, her head resting upon 
 her bare white arm, over which her black curls Avere straying. " How 
 mortified she would be if she knew that the door was open !" I said to 
 myself, and I crept back into my room, bolting the door after me, 
 that the girl might not be horrified and ashamed when she awoke. ' 
 
 63 
 
Not a sound was yet to be heard outside, except from an early- 
 robin that was singing his morning song, perched upon a spray 
 growing out of the wall beneath my window. "No," said I, "you 
 shall not shame me by singing all alone your early hymn of praise 
 to God!" I hastily fetched my fiddle, which I had laid upon the 
 table the night before, and left the room. Everything in the castle 
 was silent as death, and I was a long while finding my way through 
 the dim corridors out into the open air. 
 
 There I found myself in a large garden extending half-way down 
 the mountain, its broad terraces lying one beneath the other like 
 huge steps. But the gardening was slovenly. The paths were all 
 grass-grown, the yew figures were not trimmed, but stretched long 
 noses and caps a yard high into the air like ghosts, so that really 
 they must have been quite fearsome at nightfall. Linen was hanging 
 to dry on the broken marble statues of an unused fountain ; here and 
 there in the middle of the garden cabbages were planted beside some 
 common flowers; everything was neglected, in disorder, and Over- 
 grown with tall weeds, among which glided varicoloured lizards. On 
 all sides through the gigantic old trees there was a distant, lonely 
 prospect of range after range of mountains stretching as far as the 
 eye could reach. 
 
 After I had been sauntering about through this wilderness for a 
 while in the dawn, I descried upon' the terrace below me, striding to 
 and fro with folded arms, a tall, slender, pale youth in a long brown 
 surtout. He seemed not to perceive me, and shortly seated him- 
 self upon a stone bench, took a book out of his pocket, read very loud 
 from it, as if he were preaching, looked up to heaven at intervals, 
 and leaned his head sadly upon his right hand. I looked at him for 
 a long time, but at last I grew curious to know why he was making 
 such extraordinary gestures, and I went hastily towards him. He had 
 
 64 
 
just heaved a profound sigh, and sprang up startled as I approached. 
 He was completely confused, and so was I; we neither of us knew 
 what to say, and we stood there bowing, until he made his escape, 
 striding rapidly through the shrubbery. Meanwhile, the sun had 
 arisen over the forest ; I mounted on the stone bench, and scraped 
 my fiddle merrily, so that the quiet valleys re-echoed. The old 
 woman with the bunch of keys, who had been searching anxiously for 
 me all through the castle to call me to breakfast, appeared upon the 
 terrace above me, and was surprised that I could play the fiddle so 
 well. The grim old man from the castle came too, and was as much 
 amazed, and at last the maids came, and they all stood up there 
 together agape, while I fingered away, and wielded my bow in the 
 most artistic manner, playing cadenzas and variations until I was 
 downright tired. 
 
 The castle was a mighty strange place ! No one dreamed of jour- 
 neying further. It was no inn or post-station, as I learned from 
 one of the maids, but belonged to a wealthy count. When I some- 
 times questioned the old woman as to the count's name and where 
 he lived, she only smirked as she had done on the evening of my 
 arrival, and slyly pinched me and winked at me archly as if she were 
 out of her senses. If on a warm day I drank a whole bottle of 
 wine, the maids were sure to giggle when they brought me another ; 
 and once when I wanted to smoke a pipe, and informed them by 
 signs of my desire, they all burst into a fit of foolish laughter. But 
 most mysterious of all was a serenade which often, and always upon 
 the darkest nights, sounded beneath my window. A guitar was 
 played fitfully; soft, low chords being heard from time to time. 
 Once I imagined I heard some one down below call up, " Pst ! pst !" 
 I sprang out of bed and, putting my head out of the window, called, 
 " Holla ! who's there ?" But no answer came ; I only heard the 
 
 65 
 
rustling of the shrubbery, as if some one were hastily running 
 away. The large dog in the court-yard, roused by my shout, barked 
 a couple of times, and then all was stiU again. After this the sere- 
 nade was heard no more. 
 
 Otherwise my life here was all that mortal could desire. The 
 worthy Porter knew well what he was talking about when he was 
 ■ftront to declare that in Italy raisins dropped into one's mouth of 
 themselves. I lived in the lonely castle like an enchanted Prince. 
 Wherever I went the servants treated me with the greatest respect, 
 though they all knew that I had not a farthing in my pocket. I 
 had but to say, " Table, be spread," and lo, I was served with delicious 
 viands, rice, wine, melons, and Parmesan cheese. I lived on the best, 
 slept in the magnificent canopied bed, walked in the garden, played 
 my fiddle, and sometimes helped with the gardening. I often lay for 
 hours in the tall grass, and the pale youth in his long surtout — he 
 was a student and a relative of the old woman's, and was spending 
 his vacation here — would pace around me in a wide circle, muttering 
 from his book like a conjurer, which was always sure to send me to 
 sleep. Thus day after day passed, until, what with the good eating 
 and drinking, I began to grow quite melancholy. My limbs became 
 limp from perpetually doing nothing, and I felt as if I should fall 
 to pieces from sheer laziness. 
 
 One sultry afternoon, I was sitting in the boughs of a tall tree that 
 overhung the valley, gently rocking myself above its quiet depths. 
 The bees were humming among the leaves around me; all else 
 was silent as the grave; not a human being was to be seen on the 
 mountains, and below me on the peaceful meadows the cows were 
 resting in the high grass. But from far away the note of a post- 
 horn floated across the wooded heights, at first scarcely audible, then 
 clearer and more distinct. On the instant my heart re-echoed an old 
 
song which I had learned when at home at my father's mill from a 
 travelling journeyman, and I sang, — 
 
 " Whenever abroad you are straying, 
 Take with you your dearest one: 
 While others are laughing and playing, 
 A stranger is left all alone. 
 
 " And what know these trees, with their sighing, 
 Of an older, a lovelier day? 
 Alas, o'er yon blue mountains lying. 
 Thy home is so far, far away ! 
 
 " The stars in their courses I treasure, 
 My pathway to her they shone o'er; 
 The nightingale's song gives me pleasure. 
 It sang nigh my dearest one's door. 
 
 " When starlight and dawn are contending, 
 I climb to the mountain-tops clear ; 
 Thence gazing, my greeting I'm sending 
 To Germany, ever most dear." 
 
 It seemed as if the post-horn in the distance would fain accom- 
 pany my song. While I was singing, it came nearer and nearer 
 among the mountains, until at last I heard it in the castle court-yard. 
 I got down from the tree as quickly as possible, in time to meet the 
 old woman with an opened packet coming towards me. " Here is 
 something too for you," she said, and handed me a neat little 
 note. It was without address ; I opened it hastily, and on the instant 
 flushed as red as a peony, and my heart beat so violently that the 
 old woman observed my agitation. The note was from — my Lady 
 fair, whose handwriting I had often seen at the bailiff's. It was ' 
 
 67 
 
' short : " All is well once more ; all obstacles are removed. I take 
 a private opportunity to be the first to write you the good news. 
 i Come, hasten bacli. It is so lonely here, and I can scarcely bear to 
 I live since you left us. Aurelia." 
 
 As I read, my eyes grew dim with rapture, alarm, and ineffable 
 delight. I was ashamed in presence of the old woman, who began 
 to smirk and wink odiously, and I flew like an afrow to the loneliest 
 nook of the garden. There I threw myself on the grass beneath the 
 hazel-bushes and read the note again, repeating the words by heart, 
 and then re-reading them over and over, while the sunlight danced 
 between the leaves upon the letters, so that they were blended and 
 blurred before my eyes like golden and bright-green and crimson 
 blossoms. " Is she not married, then ?" I thought ; " was that 
 young of&cer her brother, perhaps, or is he dead, or am I crazy, 
 
 or ? but no matter!" I exclaimed at last, leaping to my feet. 
 
 " It is clear enough, she loves me ! she loves me !" 
 
 When I crept out, of the shrubbery the sun was near its setting. 
 The heavens were red, the birds were singing merrily in the 
 woods, the valleys were full of a golden sheen, but in my heart all 
 was a thousand times more beautiful and more glad. 
 
 I shouted to them in the castle to serve my supper out in the 
 garden. The old woman, the grim old man, the maids, — I made them 
 all come and sit at table with me under the trees. I brought out my 
 fiddle and played, and ate and drank between-whiles. Then they all 
 grew merry ; the old man smoothed the grim wrinkles out of his face, 
 and emptied glass after glass, the old woman chattered away, — heaven 
 knows about what, — the maids began to dance together on the green- 
 sward. At last the pale student approached inquisitively, cast a scorn- 
 ful glance at the party, and was about to pass on with great dignity. 
 But I sprang up in a twinkling, and, before he knew what I was 
 
about, seized him by his long surtout and waltzed merrily round with 
 him. He actually began to try to dance after the latest and most 
 approved fashion, and footed it so nimbly that the moisture stood in 
 beads upon his forehead, his long coat flew round like a wheel, and 
 Jhe looked at me so strangely withal, and his eyes rolled so, that I 
 ■began to be really afraid of him, and guddenly released him. 
 
 The old wonfan was very curious to know the contents of the 
 note, and why I was so very merry of a sudden. But the matter 
 was far too intricate for me to be able to explain it to her. I 
 merely pointed to a couple of storks that were sailing through the 
 air far above our heads, and said that so must I go, far, far away. At 
 this she opened her bleared eyes wide, and cast a sinister glance 
 first at me and then at the old man. After that, I noticed as often 
 as I turned away that they put their heads together and talked 
 eagerly, glancing askance towards me from time to time. 
 
 This puzzled me. I pondered upon what scheme they could be 
 hatching, and I grew more quiet. The sun had long set, so I wished 
 them all good-night and betook myself thoughtfully to my bed- 
 room. 
 
 I felt so happy and so restless that for a long while I paced the 
 apartment to and fro. Outside, the wind was driving black, heavy 
 clouds high above the castle-tower; the nearest mountain-summit 
 could be scarcely discerned in the thick darkness. Then I thought I 
 heard voices in the garden below. I put out my candle and sat down 
 at the window. The voices seemed to come nearer, speaking in low 
 tones, and suddenly a long ray of light shot from a small lantern 
 concealed under the cloak of a dark figure. I instantly recognized 
 the grim old steward and the old housekeeper. The light flashed in 
 the face of the old woman, who looked to me more hideous than ever, 
 and upon the blade of a long knife which she held in her hand. 
 
I could plainly see that both of them were looking up at my window. 
 Then the steward folded his cloak more closely, and all was dark and 
 silent. 
 
 "What do they want," I thought, "out in the garden, at this 
 hour?" I shuddered; I could not help recalling all the stories of 
 murders that I had ever heard, — all the tales of- witches and robbers 
 who slaughtered people that they might devour their hearts. Whilst 
 I was filled with such thoughts, I heard footsteps coming up the stairs 
 softly, then very softly along the narrow passage directly to my door ; 
 and at the same time I thought I heard voices whispering together. 
 I ran hastily to the other end of the room and behind a large table, 
 which I could lift and bang against the door as soon as anything 
 stirred outside. But in the darkness I upset a chair, which made a 
 tremendous crash. In an instant all was profound silence outside. 
 I listened behind the table, staring at the door as if I could 
 pierce it with my eyes, which felt as if they were starting from my 
 head. When I had kept so quiet for a while that the buzzing of 
 a fly could have been plainly heard, I distinguished the sound of a 
 key softly put into the keyhole of my door on the outside. I 
 was just about to make a demonstration with my table, when the key 
 was turned slowly three times round in the lock, and then cautiously 
 withdrawn, after which the footsteps retreated along the passage and 
 down the staircase. 
 
 I took a long breath. "Oho," I thought, "they have locked me 
 up that all may be easy when I am sound asleep." I tried the door, 
 and found it locked, as was also the other door, behind which the 
 pale maid slept. This had never been so before since I had been at 
 the castle. 
 
 Here was I imprisoned in a foreign land ! The Lady fair un- 
 doubtedly was even now standing at her window and looking across 
 
 70 
 
the quiet garden towards the high-road, to see if I were not coming 
 from the toll-house with my fiddle. The clouds were scudding across 
 the sky; time was passing, — and I could not get "away. Ah, but 
 my heart was sore ; I did not know what to do. And if the leaves 
 rustled outside, or a rat gnawed behind the wainscot, I fancied I 
 saw the old woman gliding in by a secret door and creeping softly 
 through the room, with that long knife in hand. 
 
 As, given over to such fancies, I sat on the side of my bed, I 
 heard, the first time for a long while, the music beneath my 
 window. At the first twang of the guitar a ray of light darted 
 into my soul. I opened the window, and called down softly, that 
 I was awake. " Pst, pst!" was the answer from below. Without 
 more ado, I thrust the note into my pocket, took my fiddle, got out 
 of the window, and scrambled down the ruinous old wall, clinging to 
 the vines growing from the crevices. One or two crumbling stones 
 gave way, and I began to slide faster and faster, until at last I came 
 down upon my feet with such a sudden bump that my teeth rattled 
 in my head. 
 
 Scarcely had I thus reached the garden when I felt myself 
 embraced with such violence that I screamed aloud. My kind friend, 
 however, clapped his hand on my mouth, and, taking my arm, led 
 me through the shrubbery to the open lawn. Here, to my astonish- 
 ment, I recognized the tall student, who had a guitar slung around 
 his neck by a broad silk ribbon. I explained to him as quickly as 
 possible that I Avished to escape from the garden. He seemed per- 
 fectly aware of my wishes, and conducted me by various covert 
 pathways to the lower door in the high garden wall. But when we 
 reached it, it was fast locked ! The student, however, seemed to be 
 quite prepared for this ; he produced a large key and cautiously 
 unlocked it. 
 
 71 
 
When we found ourselves in the forest, and I was about to inquire 
 of him the best road to the nearest town, he suddenly fell ujjon one 
 knee before me, raised a hand aloft, and began to curse and to swear 
 in the most horrible manner. I could not imagine what he wanted ; 
 I could hear frequent repetitions of ' Iddio and ' cuore and ' amore 
 and 'furore f But when he began hobbling close up to me on both 
 knees, I grew positively terrified, I perceived clearly that he had lost 
 his wits, and I fled into the depths of the forest without looking 
 back. 
 
 I heard the student behind me shouting like one possessed, and 
 soon afterwards a rough voice from the castle shouting in reply. 
 
 72 
 
I was sure they would pursue me. The road was entirely un- 
 known to me ; the night was dark ; I should probably fall into their 
 hands. Therefore I climbed up into a tall tree to await my oppor- 
 tunity to escape. 
 
 From here I could distinguish one voice after another calling in 
 the castle. Several links appeared in the garden, and cast a weird 
 lurid light over the old walls and down the mountain out into the 
 black night. I commended my soul to the Almighty, for the confused 
 uproar grew louder and nearer. At last the student, bearing aloft a 
 torch, ran past my tree below me so fast that the skirt of his surtout 
 flew out behind him in the wind. After this the tumult gradually 
 retreated to the other side of the mountain ; the voices sounded more 
 and more distant, and at last the wind alone sighed through the silent 
 forest. I then descended from my tree and ran breathless down into 
 the valley and out into the night. 
 
 73 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 I HURRIED Oil for the rest of the night and the next day, for there 
 was a din in my ears for a long time, as if all the people from the 
 castle were after me, shouting, waving torches, and brandishing long 
 knives. On the way I learned that I was only five or six miles from 
 Rome, whereat I could have jumped for joy. As a child at home 
 I had heard wonderful stories of gorgeous Rome, and as I lay on my 
 back in the grass on Sunday afternoons near the mill, and everything 
 around was so quiet, I used to picture Rome out of the clouds sailing 
 above me, with wondrous mountains and abysses, around the blue 
 sea, with golden gates and lofty gleaming towers, Avhere angels in 
 shining robes were singing. 
 
 The night had come again, and the moon shone brilliantly, when at 
 
 74 
 
last I emerged from the forest upon a hill-top, and saw the city lying 
 before me in the distance. The sea gleamed afar off, the heavens 
 glittered with innumerable stars, and beneath them lay the Holy 
 City, a long strip of mist, like a slumbering lion on the quiet earth, 
 watched and guarded by^ mountains around like shadowy giants. 
 
 I soon reached an extensive, lonely heath, where all was gray and 
 silent as the grave. Here and there a ruined wall was still standing, 
 or some strangely-gnarled trunk of a tree ; now and then night-birds 
 whirred through the air, and my own shadow glided long and black 
 in the solitude beside me. They say that a primeval city lies buried 
 here, and that Frau Vgnus makes it her abode, and that sometimes 
 the old pagans rise up from their graves and wander about the heath 
 and mislead travellers. I cared nothing, however, for such tales, 
 .but walked on steadily, for, the city arose before me more and 
 more 'distincj; and magnificent, and the high castles and gates and 
 golden domes gleamed wondrously in the moonlight, as if angels in 
 golden garments were actually standing on the roofs and singing 
 in the quiet night. 
 
 At last I passed some humble houses, and then through a 
 gorgeous gate-way into the famous city of Eome. The moon shone 
 bright as day among the palaces, but the streets were empty, except 
 for some lazy fellow lying dead asleep on a marble step in the warm 
 night air. The fountains plashed in the silent squares, and from the 
 gardens bordering the street the trees added their murmur, and 
 filled the air with refreshing fragrance. 
 
 As I was sauntering on, not knowing — what with delight, moon- 
 light, and fragrance — which way to turn, I heard a guitar touched 
 in the depths of a garden. " Great heavens !" I thought, " the crazy 
 student with his long surtout has been secretly following me all this 
 time." But in a moment a lady in the garden began to sing dehciously. 
 
 75 
 
I stood spellbound ; it was the voice of the Lady fair ! and the self- 
 same Italian song which she often used to sing at her open window ! 
 
 Then the dear old time recurred so vividly to my mind that I 
 could have wept bitterly ; I saw the quiet garden befofe the castle 
 in the early dawn, and thought how happy I had been among the 
 shrubbery before that stupid fly flew up my nose. I could restrain 
 myself no longer, but clambered over the gilded ornaments surmount- 
 ing the grated gate-way and leaped down into the garden whence the 
 song proceeded. As I did so I perceived a slender white figure 
 standing in the distance behind a poplar-tree, looking at me in 
 amazement; but in an instant it had turned and fled through the 
 dim garden towards the house so quickly that in the moonlight 
 it seemed to ghde. "It was she, herself!" I exclaimed, and my 
 heart throbbed with delight ; I recognized her on the instant by her 
 pretty little fleet feet. It was unfortunate that in clambering over 
 ' the gate I had slightly twisted my ankle, and had to limp along for 
 >, a minute or two before I could run after her towards the house. 
 In the mean while the doors and windows had been closed. I 
 knocked modestly, listened, and then knocked again. I seemed to 
 hear low laughter and whispering within the house, and once I was 
 almost sure that a pair of bright eyes peeped between the jalousies 
 in the moonlight. But finally all was silent. 
 
 " She does not know that it is I," I thought ; I took out my 
 fiddle, and promenaded to and fro on the path before the house and 
 sang the song of the Lady fair and played over all my songs that I 
 had been wont to play on lovely summer nights in the castle garden, 
 or on the bench before the toll-house so that the sound should reach 
 the castle windows. But it was all of no use ; no one stirred in the 
 entire house. Then I put away my fiddle sadly, and seated myself 
 upon the door-step, for I was very weary with my long march. The 
 
 76 
 
night was -warm; the flower-beds before the house sent forth a 
 delicious fragrance, and a fountain somewhere in the depths of the 
 garden plashed continuously. I thought dreamily of azure flowers, of 
 dim, green, lovely, lonely spots where brooks were rippling and gay 
 birds singing, until at last I fell sound asleep. 
 
 When I awoke the fresh air of morning was playing over me; 
 the birds were already awake and twittering in the trees around, as 
 if they were making game of me. I started up and looked about ; 
 the fountain in the garden was still playing, but nothing was to be 
 heard within the house. I peeped through the green blinds into one 
 of the rooms, where I could see a sofa and a large round table cov- 
 ered with gray linen. The chairs were all standing against the wall 
 in perfect order ; the blinds were down at all the windows, as if the 
 house had been uninhabited for years. On a sudden downright horror 
 of the lonely house and garden and of the white figure of the pre- 
 ceding night possessed me, and I ran, without once turning to look 
 back, through the silent paths and avenues until I reached the garden 
 gate and clambered up. But there I paused in an ecstasy of delight, 
 when from the top of the high gate-way I saw the magnificent city 
 below me. The morning sun was glittering on the roofs and in the 
 streets, and I shouted for joy as I sprang from my post of observation. 
 
 Whither should I turn in the great, foreign city ? The strange 
 night I had passed, and the Lady fair's Italian song which I had 
 heard, confused me still. At last I sat down on the edge of the stone 
 basin of a fountain in the centre of a lonely Square, and sang, as I 
 bathed my face and eyes in the clear, fresh water, — 
 
 " Were I but a little bird, 
 
 I know full well what I'd be singing. 
 Had I but two little wings, 
 
 I know what flight I'd fain be winging." 
 
 77 
 
" Ah, my merry fellow, you sing like a lark in the dawn !" A 
 young man who had approached the fountain during my song sud- 
 denly addressed me thus. When I heard my German tongue so un- 
 expectedly it was as if the Sunday-morning bells of my native vil- 
 lage were all at once echoing in my ears. " God bless you, my dear 
 fellow-countryman !" I exclaimed, starting up from the fountain. The 
 young man smiled, and scanned me from head to foot. " What are 
 you doing here in Rome ?" he asked at last. I really did not know 
 what answer to make, for I could not tell him that I was in pursuit of 
 the lovely Lady fair. " I am sauntering about," I replied, " to see a 
 little of the world." " Indeed ?" rejoined the young man. " 'Tis a 
 mighty fine calling. I am doing the same thing, and painting a little 
 between- whiles." "What! a painter!" I exclaimed joyfully, for I 
 thought of Herr Lionardo and Herr Guide. But before I got any 
 further the young man interposed : " Come and breakfast with me, 
 and I'll paint your portrait so that it will delight you." I readily 
 consented, and walked along with the painter through the empty 
 streets, where a few window-shutters were being opened, and where 
 here and there a pair of white arms or a pretty, sleepy face peeped 
 forth into the fresh morning air. 
 
 The young man conducted me hither and thither through a laby- 
 rinth of dark, narrow streets until at last we reached an old smoke- 
 dried hoiise. Here we ascended first one dark staircase, and then 
 another, until we seemed to be aspiring to the skies. We stopped 
 before a door under the roof, and the painter began to search his 
 pockets in a great hurry. But he had forgotten to lock his door 
 when he left the room, and the key was inside, for, as he had informed 
 me as we walked, he had been out since daybreak to watch the effects 
 of sunrise. He only shook his head, and pushed the door open with 
 his foot. 
 
 78 
 
We entered a very long and large apartment, spacious enough 
 to dance in if the floor had not been so littered up. But there lay 
 books, papers, clothes, overturned paint-pots, all huddled together; 
 in the middle of the room were some large frames like those used 
 for picking pears, and pictures were leaning against the walls. On 
 a long wooden table was a plate, upon which were some bread and 
 butter and a paint-brush, with a bottle of wine. 
 
 " Now, first of all, let us eat and drink, fellow-countryman," said 
 the painter. I would gladly have spread myself a slice of bread and 
 butter, but there was no knife. We rummaged for a long time among 
 the papers on the table, and found a knife at last under a sketch-book. 
 The painter opened the window, so that the fresh morning breeze 
 swept through the room, and we could enjoy the glorious prospect 
 of the city and of the surrounding hills where the morning sun 
 glittered upon the white villas and the green vineyards. " All hail 
 to our cool, green Germany behind the mountains there !" said the 
 painter, taking a drink from the wine-flask, which he then handed 
 to me. I politely followed his example, with many a loving thought 
 of my fair, distant home. 
 
 Meanwhile, the painter had arranged near the window one of the 
 frames upon which a large piece of paper was stretched. An old 
 hovel was cleverly drawn in charcoal upon the paper, and within 
 it sat the Blessed Virgin with a lovely, happy face, upon which 
 there was withal a shade of melancholy. At her feet in a little nest 
 of straw lay the Infant Jesus, — very lovely, with large serious eyes. 
 Without, upon the threshold of the open door were kneeling two 
 shepherd lads with staff and wallet. " You see," said the painter, 
 " I am going to put your head upon one of these shepherds, and 
 so people will know your face and, please God, take pleasure in it long 
 after we are both under the sod, and are ourselves kneeling happily 
 
 79 
 
before the Blessed Mother and her Son like those shepherd lads." 
 Then he seized aii old chair, the back of which came off in his 
 hand as he lifted it. He soon fitted it into its place again, however, 
 pushed it in front of the frame, and I had to sit down on it, and 
 turn my face sideways to him. I sat thus for some minutes 
 perfectly still, without stirring. After a while, however, — I am sure I 
 do not know why, — I felt that I could endure it no longer, every part 
 of me began to twitch, and besides, there hung directly in front of me 
 a piece of broken looking-glass, into which I could not help glancing 
 perpetually, making all sorts of grimaces from sheer weariness. The 
 painter, noticing this, burst into a laugh, and waved his hand to 
 signify that I might leave my chair. My face upon the paper was 
 already finished, and was so exactly like me that I was immensely 
 pleased with it. 
 
 The young man went on painting in the cool morning, singing 
 as he worked, and sometimes looking from the open window at the 
 glorious landscape. I, in the mean time, spread myself another piece 
 of bread and butter, and walked up and down the room, looking at 
 the pictures leaning against the wall. Two of them pleased me 
 especially. " Did you paint these, too ?" I asked the painter. " Not 
 exactly," he replied. " They are by the famous masters Lionardo 
 da Vinci and Guido Reni; but you know nothing about them." I 
 was nettled by the conclusion of his remark. " Oh," I rejoined very 
 composedly, " I know those two masters as well as I know myself." 
 He opened his eyes at this. " How so ?" he asked hastily. " Well," 
 said I, " I travelled with them day and night, on horseback, on foot, 
 and driving at a pace that made the wind whistle in my ears, and I 
 lost them both at an inn, and then travelled post alone in their coach, 
 
 which went bumping on two wheels over the rocks, and " 
 
 " Oho ! oho !" the painter interrupted me, staring at me as if he 
 
 80 
 
thought me mad. Then he suddenly burst into a fit of laughter. 
 " Ah," he cried, " now I begin to understand. You travelled with 
 two painters called Guido and Lionardo?" When I assented, he 
 sprang up and looked me all over from head to foot. " I verily 
 
 believe," he said, " that actually Can you play the violin ?" I 
 
 struck the pocket of my coat so that my fiddle gave forth a tone, and 
 the painter went on : " There was a Countess here lately from Germany, 
 who made inquiries in every nook and corner of Rome for those two 
 painters and a young musician with a fiddle." " A young Countess 
 from Germany ?" I cried in an ecstasy. " Was the Porter with her ? 
 " Ah, that I do not know," replied the painter. " I saw her only once 
 or twice at the house of one of her friends, who does not live in the ■ 
 city. Do you know this face?" he went on, suddenly lifting the 
 covering from a large picture standing in a corner. In an instant I 
 felt as we do when in a dark room the shutters are opened and 
 the rising sun flashes in our eyes. It was — the lovely Lady fair ! 
 She was standing in the garden, in a black velvet gown, lifting her 
 veil from her face with one hand, and looking abroad over a distant 
 and beautiful landscape. The longer I looked the more vividly did 
 it seem to be the castle garden, and the flowers and boughs waved 
 in the wind, while in the depths of green I could see my little toll- 
 house, and the high-road, and the Danube, and in the distance the 
 blue mountains. 
 
 " 'Tis she ! 'tis she !" I exclaimed at last, and, seizing my hat, 
 I ran out of the door and down the long staircases, while the 
 astonished painter called after me to come back towards evening, and 
 we might perhaps learn something more. 
 
 81 
 
CHAPTEE VIII. 
 
 I RAN ill a great hurry 
 through the city to pre- 
 sent myself immediately 
 at the house, in the garden 
 of which the Lady fair 
 had been singing yester- 
 day evening. The streets 
 were full of people ; gen- 
 tlemen and ladies were 
 enjoying the sunshine and exchanging greet- 
 ings, elegant coaches rolled past, and the bells 
 in all the towers were summoning to mass, 
 making wondrous melody in the air above the 
 heads of the swarming crowd. I was intoxicated 
 with delight, and with the hubbub, and ran on in 
 m}"- joy until at last I had no idea where I was. 
 It was like enchantment; the quiet Square with 
 the fountain, and the garden and the house, 
 seemed the fabric of a dream, which had van- 
 ished in the clear light of day. 
 
 I could not make any inquiries, for I did not 
 know the name of the Square. At last it began 
 to be very sultry; the sun's rays darted down 
 upon the pavement like burning arrows, people 
 crept into their houses, the blinds everywhere 
 were closed, and the street became once more 
 silent and dead. I threw myself down in despair 
 in front of a fine, large house with a balcony 
 
resting upon pillars and affording a deep shade, and surveyed, first 
 the quiet city, which looked absolutely weird in its sudden noonday 
 solitude, and anon the deep blue, perfectly cloudless sky, until, tired 
 out, I fell asleep. I dreamed that I was lying in a lonely green 
 meadow near my native village; a warm summer rain was falling 
 and glittering in the sun, which was just setting behind the moun- 
 tains, and wherever the rain-drops fell upon the grass they turned into 
 beautiful, bright flowers, so that I was soon covered with them. 
 
 What was my astonishment when I awoke to find a quantity of 
 beautiful, fresh flowers lying upon me and beside me ! I sprang up, 
 but could see nothing unusual, except that in the house above me 
 there was a window filled with fragrant shrubs and flowers, behind 
 which a parrot talked and screamed incessantly. I picked up the 
 scattered flowers, tied them together, and stuck the nosegay in my 
 button-hole. Then I began to discourse with the parrot ; it amused 
 me to see him get up and down in his gilded cage with all sorts of odd 
 twists and turns of his head, and always stepping awkwardly over his 
 own toes. But before I was aware of it he was scolding me for a 
 furfante ! Even though it were only a senseless bird, it irritated 
 me. I scolded him back; we both got angry; the more I scolded 
 in German, the more he abused me in Italian. 
 
 Suddenly I heard some one laughing behind me. I turned quickly, 
 and perceived the painter of the morning. " "What nonsense are you 
 at now !" he said. " I have been waiting for you for half an hour. 
 The air has grown cooler : we will go to a garden in the suburbs where 
 you will find several fellow-countrymen, and perhaps learn something 
 further of the German Countess." 
 
 I was charmed with this proposal, and we set out immediately, 
 the parrot screaming out abuse of me as I left him. 
 
 After we had walked for a long while outside of the city, ascending 
 
 83 
 
by a narrow, stony pathway an eminence clotted with villas" and 
 vineyards, we reached a small garden very high up, where several 
 young men and maidens were sitting in the open air about a round 
 table. As soon as we made our appearance they all signed to us to 
 keep silence, and pointed towards the other end of the garden, where 
 in a large, vine-wreathed arbour two beautiful ladies were sitting 
 opposite each other at a table. One was singing, while the other 
 accompanied her on the guitar. Between them stood a pleasant- 
 looking gentleman, who occasionally beat time with a small baton. 
 The setting sun shone through the vine-leaves, upon the fruits 
 and flasks of wine with which the table was provided, and upon 
 the plump, white shoulders of the lady with the guitar. The other 
 one grimaced so that she looked convulsed, but she sang in Italian 
 in so extremely artistic a manner that the sinews in her neck stood 
 out like cords. 
 
 Just as she was executing a long cadenza with her eyes turned up to 
 the skies, while the gentleman beside her held his baton suspended in 
 the air awaiting the moment when she would fall into the beat again, 
 the garden gate was flung open, and a girl looking very much heated, 
 and a young man with a pale, delicate face, entered, quarrelling 
 violently. The conductor, startled, stood with raised baton like a 
 petrified conjurer, although the singer had some time before snapped 
 short her long trill and had arisen angrily from the table. All the 
 others turned upon the new arrivals in a rage. " You savage," some 
 one at the round table called out, " you have interrupted the most 
 perfect tableau of the description which the late Hoffmann gives on 
 page 347 of the ' Ladies' Annual' for 1816 of the finest of Hummel's 
 pictures exhibited in the autumn of 1814 at the Berlin Art-Ex- 
 position!" But it did no good. "What do I care," the young man 
 retorted, " for your tableaux of tableaux ! My picture any one 
 
 84 
 
may have; my sweetheart I choose to keep for myself. Oh, you 
 faithless, false-hearted girl," he went on to his poor companion, " you 
 fine critic to whom a painter is nothing but a tradesman, and a poet 
 only a money-maker, you care for nothing save flirtation ! May you 
 fall to the lot, not of an honest artist, but of an old Duke with a 
 diamond-mine and beplastered with gold and silver foil ! Out with 
 the cursed note that you tried to hide from me ! What have you 
 been scribbling ? From whom did it come, or to whom is it going ?" 
 
 But the girl resisted him steadfastly, and the more the other 
 young men present tried to soothe and pacify the angry lover, the 
 more he scolded and threatened ; particularly as the girl herself did 
 not restrain her little tongue, until at last she extricated herself, 
 weeping aloud, from the confused coil, and uuexpectedly threw her- 
 self into my arms for protection. I immediately assumed the correct 
 attitude; but since the rest paid no attention to us, she suddenly 
 composed her face and whispered hastily in my ear, " You odious 
 Receiver ! it is all on your account. There, stuff the wretched note 
 into your pocket ; you will find out from it where we live. When 
 you approach the gate, at the appointed hour, turn into the lonely 
 street on the right hand." 
 
 I was too much amazed to utter a word, for, now that I looked 
 closely, I recognized her at once ; actually it was the pert lady's-maid 
 of the Castle who had brought me the flask of wine on that lovely 
 Sunday afternoon. She never looked as pretty as now, when, heated 
 by her quarrel, she leaned against my shoulder and her black curls 
 hung down over my arm. " But, dear ma'amselle," I said in aston- 
 ishment, "how do you come " "For heaven's sake hush!— be 
 
 quiet !" she replied, and in an instant, before I could fairly collect 
 myself, she had left me and had fled across the garden. 
 
 Meanwhile, the others had almost entirely forgotten the original 
 
cause of the turmoil, and now took a pleasing interest in proving 'to 
 the young man that he was intoxicated, — a great disgrace for an 
 honourable painter. The stout, smihng gentleman from the *arbour, 
 who was — as I afterwards learned — a great connoisseur and patron 
 of Art, and who was always ready to lend his aid for the love of 
 Science, had thrown aside his baton, and showed his broad face, 
 fairly shining with good humour, in the midst of the thickest con- 
 fusion, zealously striving to restore peace and order, but regretting 
 between-whiles the loss of the long cadenza, and of the beautiful 
 tableau which he had taken such pains to arrange. 
 
 In my heart all was as serenely bright as on that blissful Sunday 
 when I had played on my fiddle far into the night at the open window 
 where stood the flask of wine. Since the rumpus showed no signs of 
 abating, I hastily pulled out my violin, and without more ado played 
 an Italian dance, popular among the mountains, which I had learned 
 at the old castle in the forest. 
 
 All turned' their heads to listen. "Bravo! Bravissimo ! A 
 delicious idea!" cried the merry connoisseur of Art, running from 
 one to another to arrange a rustic divertissement, as he called it. He 
 made a beginning himself by leading out the lady who had played 
 the guitar in the arbour. Thereupon he began to dance with extraor- 
 dinary artistic skill, and describe all sorts of letters on the grass 
 with the points of his toes, really trilling with his feet, and now and 
 then jumping pretty high in the air. But he soon had enough of it, 
 for he was rather corpulent. His jumps grew fewer and clumsier, 
 until at last he withdrew from the circle, puffing violently, and mop- 
 ping the moisture from his forehead with a snowy pocket-handker- 
 chief. Meanwhile, the young man, who had regained his composure, 
 brought from the inn some castanets, and before- 1 was aware all 
 were dancing merrily beneath the trees. The sun had set, but the 
 
 86 
 
crimson sky in the west cast bright reflections among the shadows, 
 and upon the old walls and the half-buried columns covered with ivy 
 in the depths of the garden, while below the vineyards we could see 
 the Eternal City bathed in the evening glow. The dance in the still, 
 clear air was charming, and my heart within me laughed to see how 
 the slender girls and the lady's-maid glided among the trees with 
 arms upraised like heathen wood-nymphs, and kept time to the 
 music with their castanets. At last I could no longer restrain myself; 
 I joined their ranks, and danced away merrily, still fiddling all the 
 time. 
 
 I had been hopping about thus for some minutes, not noticing that 
 the others were beginning to be tired and were dropping out of the 
 dance, when I felt some one twitch me by the coat-tail. It was the 
 lady's-maid. " Don't be a fool," she said under her breath ; '' you 
 are jumping about like a kid ! Read your note, and come soon; the 
 beautiful young Countess awaits you." She slipped out of the garden 
 in the twilight and vanished among the vineyards. 
 
 My heart beat fast ; I longed to follow her. Fortunately, a waiter 
 was just lighting the lantern over the garden gate. I took out my 
 note, which contained a somewhat rudely pencilled plan of the gate 
 and the streets leading to it, just as I, had been directed by the lady's- 
 maid, and in addition the words ' Eleven o'clock, at the little door.' 
 
 Two long hours to wait ! Nevertheless I should have set out 
 immediately, for I could not stay still, had not the painter, who had 
 brought me hither, rushed up. "Did you speak to the girl?" he 
 asked. " I cannot see her now. It was the German Countess's maid." 
 " Hush, hush !" I replied ; " the Countess is still in Rome." " So much 
 the better," said the painter ; " come then and drink her health." 
 And in spite of all I could say he forced me to return to the garden 
 with him. 
 
 87 
 
It looked quite deserted. The merry company had departed, and 
 were sauntering towards Rome, each lad with his lass upon his arm. 
 We could hear them talking and laughing among the vineyards in 
 the quiet evening, until at last their voices died away in the valley 
 below, lost in the rustling of the trees and the murmur of the 
 stream. I stayed with my painter and Herr Eckbrecht, which was 
 the name of the other young painter who had been quarrelling with 
 the maid. The moon shone brilliantly through the tall, dark ever- 
 greens ; a candle on the table before us flickered in the breeze and 
 gleamed over the wine spilled copiously around it. I had to sit down 
 with my companions, and my painter chatted with me about my 
 native village, my travels, and my plans for the future. Herr Eck- 
 brecht had seated upon his knee the pretty girl who had brought us 
 our wine, and was teaching her the accompaniment of a song on the 
 guitar. Her slender fingers soon picked out the correct chords, and 
 they sang together an Italian song ; first he sang a verse, and then 
 the girl sang the next; it sounded deliciously, in the clear, bright 
 evening. When the girl was called away, Herr Eckbrecht, taking no 
 further notic? of us, leaned back on his bench with his feet on a low 
 stool and played and sang many an exquisite song. The stars glit- 
 tered ; the landscape turned to silver in the moonlight ; I thought of 
 the Lady fair, and of my far-off home, and quite forgot the painter 
 at my side. Herr Eckbrecht had occasionally to tune his instru- 
 ment ; whereat he grew downright angry, and at last he screwed a 
 string so tight that it broke, whereupon he tossed aside the guitar 
 and sprang to his feet, noticing for the first time that my painter 
 had laid his head on his arm upon the table and was fast 
 asleep. He hastily wrapped around him a white cloak which hung 
 on a bough near by, then suddenly paused, glanced keenly at my 
 painter, and then at me several times, then seated himself on the 
 
table directly in front of me, cleared his throat, settled his cravat, 
 and instantly began to hold forth to me. "Beloved hearer and 
 fellow-countryman," he said, "since the bottles are nearly empty, 
 and morality is indisputably the first duty of a citizen when the 
 virtues are on the wane, I feel myself moved, out of sympathy for a 
 fellow-countryman, to present for your consideration a few moral 
 axioms. It might be supposed," he went on, " that you are a mere 
 youth, whereas your coat has evidently seen its best years ; it might 
 be supposed that you had leaped about like a satyr ; nay, some might 
 maintain that you are a vagabond, because you are out here in the 
 country and play the fiddle ; but I am influenced by no such super- 
 ficial considerations; I form my judgment on your delicately chis- 
 elled nose; I take you for a strolling genius." His ambiguous 
 phrases irritated me ; I was about to retort sharply. But he gave me 
 no chance to speak. "Observe," he said, "how you are pufi'ed up 
 by a modicum , of praise. Retire within yourself and, ponder upon 
 your perilous vocation. We geniuses — for I am one too; — care as 
 httle for the world as it cares for us ; without any ado, in the seven- 
 league boots which we bring into the world with us, we stride on 
 directly into eternity. A most lamentable, inconvenient straddling 
 position this, — one leg in the future, where nothing is to be discerned 
 but the rosy morn and the faces of future children, the other leg still 
 in the middle of Eome, in the Piazza del Popolo, where the entire 
 present century would fain seize the opportunity to advance, and 
 clings to the boot tight enough to pull the leg off! And then all 
 this restlessness, wine-bibbing, and hunger solely for an immortal 
 eternity ! And look you at my comrade there on the bench, another 
 genius ; his time hangs heavy on his hands here and now, what under 
 heaven is he to do in eternity ? Yes, my highly-esteemed comrade, 
 you and I and the sun rose early together this morning, and have 
 
pondered and painted all day long, and it was all beautiful, — and 
 now the drowsy night passes its furred sleeve over the world and 
 wipes out all the colours." He kept on talking thus for a long while, 
 his hair all dishevelled with dancing and drinking, and his face look- 
 ing deadly pale in the moonlight. 
 
 But I was seized with a horror of him and of his wild talk, and 
 when he turned and addressed the sleeping painter I took' advantage 
 of the opportunity and slipped round the table, without being per- 
 ceived by him, and out of the garden. Thence, alone and glad at 
 heart, I descended through the vine-trellises into the wide moonlit 
 valley. 
 
 The clocks in the city were striking ten. Behind me, in 
 the quiet night, I still heard an occasional note of the guitar, and at 
 times the voices of the two painters, going home at last, were audible. 
 I ran on as quickly as possible, that they might not overtake me. 
 
 At the city gate I turned into the. street on the right hand, and 
 hurried on with a throbbing heart among the silent houses and 
 gardens. To my amazement, I suddenly found myself in the very 
 Square with the fountain, for which, by daylight, I had vainly 
 searched. There stood the solitary summer-house again in the 
 glorious moonlight, and again the Lady fair was singing the same 
 Italian song as on the evening before. In an ecstasy I tried first 
 the low door, then the house door, and at last the big garden gate, 
 but all were locked. Then first it occurred to me that eleven had 
 not yet struck. I was irritated by the slow flight of time, but good 
 manners forbade my climbing over the garden gate as I had done 
 yesterday. Therefore I paced the lonely Square to and fro for a 
 while, and at last again seated myself upon the basin of the fountain 
 and resigned myself to meditation and calm expectancy. 
 
 The stars twinkled in the skies; the Square was quiet and deserted; 
 
 90 
 
I listened with delight to the song of the Lady fair, as it mingled with 
 the ripple of the fountain. All at once I perceived a white figure 
 
 91 
 
approach from the opposite side of the Square and go directly towards 
 the little garden door. I peered eagerly -through the dazzling moon- 
 light, — it was the queer painter in his white cloak. He drew forth 
 a key quickly, unlocked the door, and, before I knew it, was within 
 the garden. 
 
 I had from the first entertained a special dislike of this painter 
 on account of his nonsensical talk. But now I fell into a rage with 
 him. "The low fellow is certainly intoxicated again," I thought; 
 "he has got the key from the maid, and intends to surprise, and 
 perhaps to assault, the Lady fair." And I rushed precipitately 
 through the low door, which was still open, into the garden. 
 
 When I entered, all was quiet and lonely. The folding-doors of 
 the summer house were open, and a ray of lamplight issuing from 
 it played upon the grass and flowers near. Even from a distance 
 I could see the interior. In a magnificent apartment, hung with 
 green and partially illumined by a lamp with a white shade, the 
 lovely Lady fair with her guitar was reclining on a silken lounge, 
 never dreaming, in her innocence, of the danger without. 
 
 I had not much time, however, to look, for I perceived the white 
 figure among the shrubbery, stealthily approaching the summer-house 
 from the opposite side, while the song floating on the air from the 
 house was so melancholy that it went to my very soul. I therefore 
 took no long time for reflection, but broke off a stout bough from a 
 tree, and rushed at the white-cloaked figure, shouting " Murder !" so 
 that the garden rang again. 
 
 The painter when he beheld me appear thus unexpectedly took 
 to his heels, screaming frightfully. I screamed louder still. He ran 
 towards the house, and I after him, and I had very nearly caught 
 him, when I became entangled in some plaguy trailing vines, and 
 measured my length upon the ground just before the front door. 
 
 92 
 
" So it is you, is it, you fool !" I heard some one say above me. 
 "You frightened me nearly to death." I picked myself up, and 
 when I had wiped my eyes clear of dust, I saw before me the lady's- 
 maid, from whose shoulders the white cloak was just falling. " But," 
 said I, in confusion, "was not the painter here?" "He was," she 
 replied, saucily; "at least his cloak was, which he put around me 
 when I met him at the gate, because I was cold." The Lady fair, 
 hearing the noise, sprang up from the lounge and came out to us. 
 My heart beat as if it would burst ; but what was my dismay when 
 I looked at her, and instead of the lovely Lady fair saw an entire 
 stranger ! 
 
 She was a rather tall, stout lady, with a haughty, hooked nose 
 and high-arched black eyebrows, very beautiful and imposing. She 
 looked at me so majestically out of her big, glittering eyes that I 
 was overwhelmed with awe. So confused was I that I could only 
 make bow after bow, and at last I attempted to kiss her hand. 
 But she snatched it from me, and said something in Italian to her 
 maid which I could not understand. 
 
 Meanwhile, the racket I had made had aroused the entire 
 neighbourhood. Dogs barked, children screamed, and men's voices 
 were heard, approaching the garden. The Lady gave me another 
 glance, as though she would have liked to pierce me through and 
 through with fiery bullets, then turned hastily and went into the 
 room, with a haughty, forced laugh, slamming the door directly in 
 my face. The maid seized me by the sleeve and pulled me towards 
 the garden gate. 
 
 "Your stupidity is beyond belief!" she said in the most spiteful 
 way as we went along. I too was furious. " What the devil did 
 you mean," I said, " by telling me to come here ?" " That's just it !" 
 exclaimed the girl. " My Countess favoured you so, — first threw 
 
 93 
 
flowers out of the window to you, sang songs — and this is her reward ! 
 But there is absolutely nothing to be done with you ; you positively 
 throw away your luck." "But," I rejoined, "I meant the Countess 
 
 from Germany, the lovely Lady fair " "Oh," she interrupted 
 
 me, " she went back to Germany long ago, with your crazy passion for 
 her. And you'd better run after her! No doubt she is pining for 
 you, and you can play the fiddle together and gaze at the moon, only 
 for pity's sake let me see no more of you !" 
 
 All was confusion about us by this time. People from the next 
 garden were climbing over the fence armed with clubs, others were 
 searching among the paths and avenues ; frightened faces in nightcaps 
 appeared here and there in the moonlight ; it seemed as if the devil 
 had let loose upon us a mob of evil spirits. The lady's-maid was 
 nowise daunted. "There, there goes the thief!" she called out to 
 the people, pointing across the garden. Then she pushed me out of 
 the gate and clapped it to behind me. 
 
 There I stood once more beneath the stars in the deserted Square, 
 as forlorn as when I had seen it first the day before. The fountain, 
 which had but now seemed to sparkle as merrily in the moonlight as 
 if cherubs were flitting up and down in it, plashed on, but all joy 
 and happiness were buried beneath its waters. I determined to turn 
 my back forever on treacherous Italy, with its crazy painters, its 
 oranges, and its lady's-maids, and that very hour I wandered forth 
 through the gate. 
 
 94 
 
Tin.' liindscape far and near I know; 
 Tlie birds and brouks and furests fair 
 Send me tlieir greetings on the air; 
 
 The Danube sparkles down below; 
 St. Stephen's spire far in the blue 
 Seems waving me a welcome too. 
 
 "Warm to its core my heart shall be, 
 Austria fur thee ! 
 
 I WAS standing on the sammit of a mountain whence the first 
 view of Austria can be had, and I waved my hat joyfully in the air 
 as I sang the last versCj when suddenly from the forest behind me 
 some fine instrumental music joined in. I turned quickly and per- 
 
 95 
 
ceived three young fellows in long blue cloaks, one playing a haut- 
 boy, another a clarionet, and the third, who wore an old three- 
 cornered hat, a horn. They played an accompaniment to my song 
 which made the woods ring again. I, nothing loath, took out my 
 fiddle, and played and sang with a will. Then one glanced mean- 
 ingly at the others ; he who played the horn stopped puffing out his 
 cheeks and took the instrument down from his mouth ; at last they 
 all ceased playing, and stared at me. I ended my performance also, 
 and in turn stared at them. " We supposed," the cornetist said at 
 last, " from the length of the gentleman's coat that he was a travel- 
 ling Englishman, journeying afoot here to admire the beauties of 
 nature, and we thought we might perhaps earn a trifle for our 
 own travels. But the gentleman seems to be a musician himself." 
 "Properly speaking, a Receiver," I interposed, "and I come at 
 present directly from Eome ; but, as it is some time since I re- 
 ceived anything, I have paid my way with my violin." " 'Tis not 
 worth much nowadays," said the cornetist, as he betook himself to 
 the woods again, and began fanning with his cocked hat a fire that 
 they had kindled there. "Wind-instruments are more profitable," 
 he continued. "When a noble family is seated quietly at their 
 mid-day meal, and we unexpectedly enter their vaulted vestibule 
 and all three begin to blow with all our might, a servant is sure to 
 come running out to us with money or food, just to get rid of the 
 noise. But will you not share our repast ?" 
 
 The fire in the forest was burning cheerily, the morning was fresh ; 
 we all sat down on the grass, and two of the musicians took from the 
 fire a can in which there was coffee with milk. Then they brought 
 forth some bread from the pockets of their cloaks, and each dipped 
 it in the can and drank turn about with such relish that it was a 
 pleasure to see them. But the cornetist said, " I never could endure 
 
 96 
 
the black slops," and, after handing me a huge slice of bread and 
 butter, he brought out a bottle of wine, from which he offered me 
 a draught. I took a good pull at it, but had to put it down in, a 
 hurry with my face all of a pucker, for it tasted like 'old Goose- 
 berry.' "The wine of the country," said the cornetist; "but Italy 
 has probably spoilt your German taste." 
 
 Then he rummaged in his wallet, and finally produced from among 
 all sorts of rubbish an old, tattered map of the country, in the corner 
 of which the emperor in his royal robes was still to be discerned, a 
 sceptre in his right hand, the orb in his left. This map he care- 
 fully spread out upon the ground ; the others drew nearer, and they 
 all consulted together as to their route. 
 
 " The vacation is nearly over," said one ; " let us turn to the left 
 as soon as we leave Linz, so as to be in Prague in time." " Upon 
 my word !" exclaimed the cornetist. " Whom do you propose to pipe 
 to on that road? Nobody there save wood-choppers and charcoal- 
 burners; no culture nor taste for art, — no station where one can 
 spend a night for nothing!" "Oh, nonsense!" rejoined the other. 
 " I like the peasants best ; they know where the shoe pinches, 
 and are not so particular if you sometimes blow a false note." 
 " That is, you have no point d'honneur," said the cornetist. " Odi 
 profanum vulgus et aroeo, as the Latin has it." "Well, there must 
 be some churches on the road," struck in the third; "we can stop 
 at the Herr Pastors'." "No, I thank you," said the cornetist; 
 " they give little money, but long sermons on the folly of philander- 
 ing about the world when we might be acquiring knowledge, and 
 they wax specially eloquent when they sniff in me a future member 
 of their fraternity. No, no, clericus clericum non decimat. But 
 why be in such a hurry? The Herr Professors are still at Carls- 
 bad, and are sure not to be precise about the very day." "Nay, 
 
 97 
 
distinguendum est inter et inter," replied the other ; " quod licet Jovi, 
 
 I non licet bovi /" 
 
 ■-' I now saw that they were students from Prague, and I 
 conceived a great respect for them, especially as they spoke Latin 
 like their mother-tongue. "Is the gentleman a student?" the 
 cornetist asked me. I replied modestly that I had always been 
 very fond of study, but that I had had no money. " That's of no 
 consequence," said the cornetist ; "we have neither money nor rich 
 patrons, but we get along by mother- wit. . Aurora musis arnica, 
 which means, being interpreted, ' Do not waste too much time at 
 breakfast.' But when the bells at noon echo from tower to tower, 
 and from mountain to mountain, and the scholars crowd out of the 
 old dark lecture-room, and swarm shouting through the streets, we 
 betake us to the Capuchin monastery, to the father who presides in 
 the refectory, where there is sure to be a table spread for us, or if 
 not actually spread there will be at least a dish apiece, and we fall 
 to, and perfect ourselves at the same time in our Latin. So you see we 
 study right ahead from day to day. And when at last the vacation 
 comes, and all the bthers depart for their homes, by coach or on horse- 
 back, then we stroll forth through the streets and through the city 
 gate with our instruments under our cloaks and the world before us." 
 I can't tell how it was, but, while he spoke, the thought that such 
 learned people were so forlorn and forsaken in this world, went to 
 my very heart. And then I thought of myself, and how I was not 
 much better off, and the tears came into my eyes. The cornetist 
 eyed me askance. " I wouldn't give a fig," he went on, " to travel 
 with horses, and coffee, and freshly-made beds, and nightcaps and 
 bootjacks, all ordered beforehand. It's just the delightful part of it 
 that, when we set out early in the morning, and the birds of pas- 
 sage are winging their flight high in the air above us, we do not 
 
 98 
 
know what chimney is smoking for us to-day, and can never foresee 
 what special piece of luck may befall us before evening." "Yes," 
 said the other, " and wherever we go, and take out our instruments, 
 people are merry; and when we play at noon in the vestibule of ' 
 some great country-house, the maids will dance before the door, and 
 their masters and mistresses will have the drawing-room door opened 
 a little, the better to hear the music, and the clatter of plates and 
 the smell of the roast float out through the chink, and the young 
 misses at table wellnigh twist their necks off to see the musicians 
 outside." "That's true!" exclaimed the cornetist, with sparkling 
 eyes. " Let who will pore over their compendiums, we choose to 
 study in the vast picture-book which the dear God spreads open 
 before us ! Yes, the gentleman may believe me, we make the right 
 sort of fellows, who know how to preach tp the peasants from the 
 pulpit and to bang the cushion, so that the clodpoles down below 
 are ready to burst with humiliation and edification." 
 
 At hearing them talk thus, I became so pleased and interested 
 that I longed to be a student too. I could have listened forever, for 
 I enjoy the conversation of men of learning, from whom much is to 
 be gained. But we had no real, sensible conversation, for one of the 
 students was worried because the vacation was so nearly at an end. 
 He put his clarionet together, set up a sheet of music on his knees, 
 and began to practise a difficult passage from a mass which was to be 
 played when they returned to Prague. There he sat and fingered 
 and played away, sometimes so false that it fairly pierced your ears 
 and you couldn't hear your own voice. 
 
 Suddenly the cornetist exclaimed in his bass tones, "I have it!" 
 and down came his fist on the map before him. The other stopped 
 practising for a moment, and looked at him in surprise. " Hark ye," 
 said the cornetist, "there is a castle not far from "Vienna, and in 
 
that castle there is a porter, and that porter is my cousin ! Dearest 
 fellow-students, that must be our goal ; we must pay our respects to 
 my cousin, and he will arrange for our further journey." "When I 
 heard that, I sprang to my feet. "Doesn't he play on the bassoon?" 
 I cried. " Is he not tall and straight, with a big, prominent nose ?" 
 The cornetist nodded, upon which I embraced him so enthusiastic- 
 ally that his three-cornered hat fell off, and we all immediately 
 determined to take the mail-boat on the Danube to the castle of the 
 beautiful Countess. 
 
 When we arrived at the wharf all was ready for departure. The 
 fat host before whose inn the ship had lain all night was standing 
 broad and cheery in his door-way, which he quite iilled, shouting 
 out all sorts of jokes and farewell speeches, while from every window 
 a girl's head was poked out nodding to the sailors, who were just 
 carrying the last packages aboard. An elderly gentleman with a 
 gray overcoat and a black neckerchief, who was also going in the 
 boat, stood on the shore talking very earnestly with a slim young 
 fellow in leather breeches and a trig scarlet jacket, mounted on a 
 magnificent chestnut. To my great surprise, they seemed to glance 
 at times towards me, and to be speaking of me. At last the old 
 gentleman laughed, and the slim young fellow cracked his riding- 
 whip and galloped off through the fresh morning across the shining 
 landscape, with the larks soaring above him. 
 
 Meanwhile, the students and I had combined our resources. The 
 captain laughed and shook his head when the cornetist counted out 
 our passage-money to him in coppers, for which we had diligently 
 searched every corner of our pockets. I shouted aloud when I once 
 more saw the Danube before me, we hurried aboard, the captain 
 gave the signal, and away we glided in the brilliant morning sun- 
 shine past the meadows and the mountains. 
 
 100 
 
The birds in the woods were singing, and the morning bells 
 echoed afar from the villages on each side of us, while overhead the 
 larks' clear notes were now and then heard. On the boat a canary- 
 bird in its cage trilled and twittered back so that it was a delight 
 to listen to it. 
 
 It belonged to a pretty young girl who was on the boat with us. 
 She kept the cage close beside her, and under the other arm she had 
 a small bundle of linen ; she sat by herself, quite still, looking in great 
 content, now at her new travelling-shoes, which peeped out from be- 
 neath her petticoats, and now down at the water, while the morning 
 sun shone on her white forehead, above which the hair was neatly 
 parted. I noticed that the students would have liked to engage 
 her in polite discourse, for they kept passing to and fro before her, 
 and the cornetist, whenever he did so, cleared his throat, and settled, 
 first his cravat, and then his three-cornered hat. But their cour- 
 age failed them, and moreover the girl cast down her eyes as soon as 
 they approached her. 
 
 They seemed, besides, to stand in special awe of the elderly 
 gentleman in the gray overcoat, who was now sitting on the other 
 side of the boat, and whom they took for a divine. He held an open 
 breviary, in which he was reading, looking up from it frequently to 
 admire the lovely scenery, while the gilt edges of the book and the 
 gay pictures of saints laid between its leaves shone brilliantly in 
 the sunlight. He was perfectly w-ell-: awara, too, of what was going 
 on around him, and soon recognized the birds by their feathers, for 
 before long he addressed one of the students in Latin, whereupon 
 all three approached him, took off their hats, and made answer also 
 in Latin. 
 
 Meanwhile, I had seated myself at the prow of the boat, where, 
 highly delighted, I dangled my legs above the water, gazing, while 
 
 101 
 
the boat glided onward and the waves below me leaped and foamed, 
 constantly into the blue distance, watching : towers and castles one 
 after another emerge from the dim depths of green, grow and grow 
 upon the sight, and finally •recede and vanish behind us. "If I had 
 but wings at this moment!" I thought; and at last in my impa- 
 tience I drew forth my dear violin and played all my oldest pieces, 
 which I had learned at home and at the castle of the Lady fair. 
 
 All at once some one behind me tapped me on the shoulder. It 
 was the reverend gentleman, who had laid aside his book, and had 
 been listening to me 'for a while. " Aha," he said laughing, " aha, my 
 young ludi magister is forgetting to eat and drink." Whereupon he 
 bade me put a;way my fiddle and take a bit of luncheon with him, 
 and he then led me to a pleasant little arbour which the boatmen 
 had erected in the centre of the boat out of young birches and firs. 
 He had a table placed beneath it, and I and the students, and even 
 the young girl, were invited to sit down around it upon the casks and 
 packages. 
 
 The reverend gentleman now produced cold meat and bread and 
 butter, which had all been carefully wrapped in paper, and took from 
 a case several bottles of wine and a silver goblet, gilt inside, which 
 he filled, tasted first himself, then smelled, tasted again, and finally 
 presented to each of us in turn. The students sat bolt upright on 
 their casks, and only sipped a little, so great was their awe. The 
 girl, too, just dipped her little beak in the goblet, glancing shyly 
 first at me and then at the students ; but the oftener she looked at 
 us the bolder she grew. 
 
 At last she informed the reverend gentleman that she was leaving 
 her home for the first time, to go into service at a certain castle, and 
 as she spoke I blushed all over, for the castle she mentioned was that 
 of the Lady fair. " Then she is my future lady's-maid!" I thought, 
 
 102 
 
staring at her, and feeling almost giddy. fTherfe is soon to be a 
 grand wedding at the castle," said his reverence. " Yes," replied the 
 girl, who would have liked to learn more of the matter; "they say 
 it is an old secret attachment, but that the Countess could never be 
 brought to give her consent." His reverence replied only by 'hm! 
 hm !' refilling his goblet, and sipping from it with a thoughtful air. 
 I leaned forward with both elbows on the table, that I might lose no 
 word of the conversation. His reverence observed it. " Let me tell 
 you," he began again, " that both Countesses sent me forth to discover 
 whether the bridegroom be not in the country hereabouts. A lady 
 wrote from Eome that he left there some time ago." When he 
 began about the lady in Eome I blushed again. " Is your reverence 
 acquainted with the bridegroom?" I asked, in confusion. "No," 
 replied the old gentleman; "but they say he is a gay bird." "Oh, 
 yes," said I, hastily, " a bird that escapes as soon as it can from 
 every cage, and sings gaily when it regains its freedom." "And 
 wanders about in foreign countries," the old gentleman continued, 
 composedly, " goes everywhere at night, and sleeps on door-steps in 
 the daytime." That vexed me extremely. "Eeverend sir," I ex- 
 claimed, with some heat, "you have been falsely informed. The 
 bridegroom is a slender, moral, promising youth, who has been Hving 
 in luxury in an old castle in Italy, and has associated solely with 
 Countesses, famous painters, and lady's-maids, who knows perfectly 
 
 well how to take care of his money, if he had any, who " 
 
 " Come, come, I had no idea that you knew him so well," the divine 
 here interrupted me, laughing so heartily that he grew quite purple 
 in the face and the tears rolled down his cheeks. " But I heard," 
 the girl interposed, " that the bridegroom was a stout, very wealthy 
 gentleman." " Good heavens, yes, yes, to be sure ! Confusion worse 
 confounded!" exclaimed his reverence, laughing so that it brought 
 
 103 
 
on a fit of coughing. Wheri-he had somewhat recovered himself, he 
 raised his goblet aloft and cried, " Here's to the^ bridal pair !" I did 
 not know what to make of the reverend gentleman and his talk, and 
 I was ashamed, because of my adventures in Eome, to tell him here 
 before all these people that I myself was the missing, thrice happy 
 bridegroom. 
 
 The goblet kept passing from hand to hand ; the reverend gentle- 
 man had a kind word for every one, so that all liked him, and finally 
 the entire company chatted gaily together. The students grew more 
 and more loquacious, recounting their experiences in the mountains, 
 and at last brought out their instruments and played away merrily. 
 The cool breeze from the water sighed through the leaves of the 
 arbour, the afternoon sun gilded the woods and vales which flew past 
 us, while the shores echoed back the notes of the horn. And when 
 the reverend gentleman, stimulated by the music, grew more and 
 more genial, and told us stories of his youth, how in vacation-time he 
 too had wandered over hills and dales, and had been often hungry 
 and thirsty, but always happy, and how, in fact, a student's whole 
 life, from its first day in the narrow, dry lecture-room to its last, is 
 one long vacation, then the students drank all around once more, 
 and struck up a song, that re-echoed among the distant mountains : 
 
 " The birds are southward winging 
 
 Their yearly, airy flight, 
 And roving lads are swinging 
 
 Their caps in morning's light ; 
 We students thus are going. 
 
 And, when the gates are nigh. 
 Our trumpets shall be blowing. 
 
 In token of good-bye. 
 A long farewell we give thee, 
 Prague, for we must leave thee, 
 
 104 
 
St habcat honam pacem, 
 Qui sedet post fbrnacem ! 
 
 " When through the towns we're going 
 
 At night, the windows shine, 
 Behind their curtains showing 
 
 Full many a damsel fine. 
 We play at many a gate-way. 
 
 And when our throats are dry 
 We call mine host, and straightway 
 
 He treats us generously ; 
 And o'er a goblet foaming 
 We rest awhile from roaming. 
 Venit ex sua domo — 
 Beatus ille homo! 
 
 " When roaming through the forest 
 
 Cold Boreas whistles shrill, 
 'Tis then our need is sorest ; 
 
 Wet through on plain and hill. 
 Our cloaks the winds are tearing, 
 
 Our shoes are worn and old, 
 Still playing, onward faring. 
 
 In spite of rain and cold. 
 Beatus ille homo 
 Qui sedet in sua domo 
 Et sedet post fomacem 
 Et habeat bonam pacem!" 
 
 I, the captain, and the girl, although we did not understand Latin, 
 joined gaily in the last lines of each verse ; but I was the gayest of 
 all, for I had caught a glimpse in the distance of my toll-house, and 
 soon afterwards the castle shone among the trees in the light of the 
 setting sun. 
 
 105 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 r~\ 
 
 The iDoat touched tlie shore, and we all left it as quickly as 
 le, and scattered about in the meadows, like birds suddenly set 
 free from the cage. The reverend gentleman took a hasty leave of 
 us, and strode off towards the castle. The students repaired to a 
 retired dingle, where they could shake out their cloaks, wash them- 
 selves in the brook, and shave one another. The new lady's-maid, 
 with her canary-bird and her bundle, set out for an inn, the hostess 
 of which I had recommended to her as an excellent person, and 
 where she wished to change her gown before she presented herself 
 at the castle. As for me, — the lovely evening shone right into my 
 heart, and as sooa as all the rest had disappeared I lost not a 
 moment, but ran directly to the castle garden. 
 
 My toll-house, which I had to pass, was standing on the old spot, 
 the tall trees in the castle gaixlen were still murmuring above it, and 
 
 106 
 
a yellow-hammer, which alwayi3 used to sing at sunset in the chestnut- 
 tree before the window, was singing again, as if nothing in the world 
 had happened since I last heard him. The toll-house window was 
 open ; I ran up to it with delight and looked in. There was no one 
 there, but the clock in the corner was ticking away, the writing- 
 table stood by the window, and the long pipe in the corner as of old. 
 I could not resist the temptation to climb through the window and 
 seat myself at the writing-table before the big account-book. Again 
 the sunlight shone golden-green through the chestnut boughs upon 
 the figures in the open book, again the bees buzzed in and out of the 
 window, and again the yellow-hammer's jocund song sounded from the 
 tree outside. All at once the door of the sleeping-room opened, and a 
 tall, old Keceiver, in my dotted dressing-gown, entered ! He paused 
 on the threshold upon beholding me thus unexpectedly, took his 
 spectacles quickly from his nose, and looked angrily at me. Not 
 a little alarmed, I started up, and, without saying a word, ran out 
 of the door and through the little garden, where I was very nearly 
 tripped up by the confounded potato-vines which the old Eeceiver 
 had planted, evidently by the Porter's advice, in place of my flowers. 
 I heard him as he came out of the door scolding after me, but I was 
 mounted atop of the garden wall, and gazing with a throbbing heart 
 over into the castle garden. 
 
 Ah, how the birds were flitting and twittering and singing ! The 
 lawns and paths were deserted, but the gilded tree-tops nodded a 
 welcome to me in the evening breeze, and on one side up through 
 masses of dark green foliage gleamed the Danube. 
 
 On a sudden I heard sung from the depths of the garden 
 
 " When the yearning heart is stilled 
 As in dreams, the forest sighing, 
 To the listening earth replying, 
 
 107 
 
Tells the thoughts with which 'twas filled, 
 Days long vanished, soothing sorrow,r- 
 From the Past a light thejr borrow. 
 
 And the heart is gently thrilled." 
 
 The voice and the song were strangely famihar, as if I had heard 
 them somewhere in a dream. I pondered over and over again, and 
 at last exclaimed, joyfully, " It is Herr Guido !" swinging mySelf 
 quickly down into the garden. It was the self-same song that he had 
 sung on the balcony of the Italian inn on that summer evening 
 when I saw him for the last time. 
 
 He went on singing, while I bounded over beds and hedges to- 
 wards the singer. But as I emerged from between the last clumps of 
 rose-bushes I suddenly paused spell-bound. For on the green opening 
 beside the little lake with the swans, clearly illuminated in the ruddy 
 evening light, on a stone bench sat the lovely Lady fair in a beautiful 
 dress, with- a wreath of red and white roses on her black hair, and 
 downcast eyes, tracing lines on the greensward with her riding-whip, 
 just as she had sat in the skiff when I was forced to sing her the 
 song of the Lady fair. Opposite her sat another young lady, with 
 brown curls clustering on a plump white neck, which was turned 
 towards me ; she was singing to a guitar, while the swans ghded in 
 wide circles on the placid water. All at once the Lady fair raised her 
 eyes, and gave a scream on perceiving me. The other lady turned 
 round towards me so quickly that her brown curls fell over her eyes, 
 and when she saw me she burst into a fit of immoderate laughter, 
 sprang up from the bench, and clapped her hands thrice. Where- 
 upon a crowd of little girls in white short skirts with red and green 
 sashes came running out from among the rose-bushes, so that I could 
 not imagine where they had all been hiding. They had long gar- 
 
 108 
 
lands of flowers in their hands, and quickly formed a circle around 
 me, dancing and singing, — 
 
 " With ribbons gay of violets blue 
 
 The bridal wreath we bring thee ; 
 The merry dance we lead thee to, 
 
 And wedding songs we sing thee. 
 Ribbons gay of violets blue, 
 
 Bridal wreath we bring thee." 
 
 It was from " Der Freischiitz." I recognized some of the little 
 singers ; they were girls from the village. I pinched their cheeks, and 
 tried to escape from the circle, but the roguish little things would not 
 let me out. I could not tell what to make of it all, and stood there 
 perfectly dazed. 
 
 Suddenly a young man in hunting costume emerged from the 
 shrubbery. Hardly could I believe my eyes, — it was merry Herr 
 Lionardo ! The little girls now opened the circle and stood as if 
 spell-bound on one foot, with the other stretched out, holding 
 the garlands of flowers high above their heads with both hands. 
 Herr Lionardo took the hand of the lovely Lady fair, who had 
 risen, and had only now and then glanced at me, and, leading her up 
 to me, said, — 
 
 " Love — on this point philosophers are unanimous — is one of the 
 most courageous qualities of the human heart : it shatters with a glance 
 of fire the barriers of rank and station, the world is too confined for 
 it, eternity too brief. It is, so to speak, a poet's robe, in which every 
 dreamer enwraps himself once in this cold world, for a journey to 
 Arcadia. And the farther two parted lovers wander from each other, 
 the more beautiful and the richer are the folds of the robe, the more 
 surprising and wonderful is its extent, as it sweeps behind them, so 
 
 109 
 
I that one really cannot travel far without treading on a couple of 
 such trains. beloved Herr Receiver, and bridegroom ! although 
 wrapped in this robe you reached the shores of the Tiber, the 
 little hands of your present bride held you fast by the extreme 
 end of the train, and, however you might fiddle and fume, you had to 
 return within the magic influence of her beautiful eyes. And since 
 this is so, you two dear, foolish people, wrap yourselves both up in 
 this blessed robe, forget all the rest of the world, love like turtle- 
 doves, and be happy !" 
 
 Hardly had Herr Lionardo finished his speech when the other 
 young lady who had sung the song approached me, crowned me with 
 a wreath of fresh myrtle, and as she was arranging it, with her face 
 close to my own, archly sang, — 
 
 " And therefore do I crown thee, 
 And therefore love thee bo, 
 Because thou oft hast moved me 
 With the music of thy bow." 
 
 As she retreated a step or two, " Do you remember the robbers 
 who shook you down from the tree at night ?" said she, courtesying, 
 and giving me so arch a glance that my heart danced within me. 
 Thereupon, without waiting for an answer, she walked around me. 
 " Actually just the same, without any Italian aifectations ! But no ! 
 look, look at his fat pockets!" she exclaimed suddenly to the lovely 
 Lady fair. "Violin, linen, razor, portmanteau, everything stuffed 
 together !" She turned me all round as she spoke, and could scai'cely 
 say anything more for laughing. Meanwhile, the lovely Lady fair 
 was quite silent, and could hardly raise her eyes for shame and con- 
 fusion. It seemed to me that at heart she was provoked at all this 
 jesting talk. At last her eyes filled with tears, and she hid her 
 
 110 
 
face on the breast of the other lady, who first looked at her in 
 surprise and then clasped her affectionately in her arms. 
 
 I stood there as in a dream. The longer I looked at the strange 
 lady the more clearly I recognized her; she was in truth no other than 
 — the young painter, Herr Guido ! 
 
 I did not know what to say, and was just about to question her, 
 when Herr Lionardo approached her and spoke in an under- 
 tone. " Does he not know yet?" I heard him ask. She shook her 
 head. He reflected for a moment, and then said aloud, " No, no, he 
 must be told all immediately, or there will be all kinds of fresh gossip 
 and confusion. 
 
 "Herr Receiver," he said, turning to me, "we have not much 
 time at present, but do me the favour to exhaust your stock of 
 surprise and wonder as quickly as possible, that you may not here- 
 after, by questions, and wonderings, and head-shakings among the 
 people about here, revive old tales and give rise to new rumours and 
 suspicions." So saying, he drew me aside into the shrubbery, while 
 Fraulein Guido made passes in the air with the Lady fair's riding- 
 whip, and shook all her curls down over her eyes, which did not 
 prevent my seeing that she was blushing violently. 
 
 " Well, then," said Herr Lionardo, " Fraulein Flora, who is trying 
 to look as if she neither knew nor had heard anything of the whole 
 affair, had exchanged hearts in a hurry with somebody. Where- 
 upon somebody else appears, and with sound of trumpet and drum 
 offers her his heart, and wishes for hers in return. But her heart is 
 already bestowed upon somebody, and somebody's heart is in her pos- 
 session, and that somebody will neither take back his heart nor give 
 back hers. All the world exclaims, — but have you never read any 
 romances ?" I shook my head. " Well, then, at all events you have 
 taken part in one. In brief, there was such a jumble with the hearts 
 
 111 
 
that somebody — that is, I — had'f to take matters in hand. I 
 sprang on my horse one warm summer night, mounted Fraulein 
 Plora as the painter Guido on another, and rode towards the 
 south, to conceal her in one of my lonely caatles in Italy till 
 all the ftfss about the hearts should be over. But on the way we 
 were tracked, and from th^ balcony of the Italian inn before which 
 you kept, sound asleep, such admirable watch, Flora suddenly caught 
 
 sight of our pursuer." " The crooked Signor, then " " Was a spy. 
 
 Therefore we secretly took to the woods, and left you to travel' post 
 alone over our prearranged route. That misled our pursuer, and my 
 people in the mountain castle besides ; they were hourly expecting 
 the disguised Flora, and with more zeal than penetration they took 
 you for the Fraulein. Even here at the castle they thought Flora was 
 among the mountains : they inquired about her, they wrote to her, 
 — did you not receive a note ?" In an instant I produced the note 
 
 from my pocket: "This letter, then ?" "Is addressed to me," 
 
 said Fraulein Flora, who up to this point had seemed to be paying no 
 attention to our conversation. She snatched the note from me, read 
 it, and put it into her bosom. " And now," said Herr Lionardo, " we 
 must hasten to the castle, where they are all waiting for us. In 
 conclusion, as a matter of course, and as is fitting for every well-bred 
 romance : discovery, repentance, reconciliation, — we are all happy 
 together once more, and the wedding takes place the day after to- 
 morrow !" 
 
 Just as he had finished, a terrific racket of drums and trumpets, 
 horns and clarionets, was suddenly heard in the shrubbery; guns 
 were fired at intervals, loud cheers were given, the little girls began 
 to dance again, and heads appeared among the bushes as if they had 
 grown out of the earth. I Tan and leaped about in all the hurry and 
 scurry, but as it began to grow dark I only gradually recognized all the 
 
 112 
 
faces. The old gardener beat the drum, the students from Prague 
 in their cloaks played away, and among them the Porter fingered his 
 bassoon li&e mad. When I suddenly perceived him thus unexpectedly, 
 I ran to him and embraced him with enthusiasm, causing him to 
 play quite out of time. " Upon my word, if he should travel to the 
 ends of the earth he would never be anything but a goose !" he said 
 to the students, and then went on blowing away at his bassoon in 
 a fury. 
 
 Meanwhile, the lovely Lady fair had privately escaped from all the 
 noise and confusion, and had fled like a startled fawn far into the 
 depths of the garden. 
 
 I caught sight of her in time and hurried after her. In their 
 zeal the musicians never noticed us ; after a while they thought that 
 we had decamped to the castle, and then the entire band took up the 
 line of march in that direction. 
 
 We, however, almost at the same moment reached a summer-house 
 on the borders of the garden, whence through the open window 
 there was a view of the wide, deep valley. The sun had long since 
 set behind the mountains, a rosy haze glimmered in the warm 
 fading twilight, through which the murmur of the Danube ascended 
 clearer and clearer the stiller grew the air. I looked long at the 
 lovely Countess, who stood before me heated with her flight and so 
 close that I could almost hear her heart beat. Now that I was 
 alone with her I could find no words to speak, so great was my 
 awe of her. At last I took heart of grace, and clasped in mine 
 one of her little white hands, — and in one moment her head lay on 
 my breast and my arms were around her. 
 
 In an instant she extricated herself and turned to the window 
 to cool her glowing cheeks in the evening air. "Ah," I cried, 
 " my heart is full to bursting, but it all seems like a dream to 
 
 ns 
 
me!" "And to me too," said the lovely Lady fair. "When last 
 summer," she went on after a while, " I came back with the Countess 
 from Eome, where we fortunately, found Fraulein Flora, and had 
 brought her back with us, but could hear nothing of you either there 
 or here, I never thought all this would come to pass. It was only at 
 .noon to-day that Jocky, the good, brisk fellow, came breathless into the 
 court-yard and brought the news that you had come by the mail-boat." 
 Then she laughed quietly to herself " Do you remember," she said, , 
 " that time when I came out on the balcony ? It was just such an ' 
 evening as this, and there was music in the garden." "And he is 
 really dead ?" I asked hastily. " Whom do you mean ?" replied the 
 Lady fair, looking at me in surprise. " Your ladyship's husband," said 
 I, " who was with you on the balcony." She flushed crimson. " What 
 strange fancies you have in your head !" she exclaimed. " That was 
 .the Countess's son, who had just returned from his travels, and, since 
 it happened to be my birthday, he led me_ out on the balcony with 
 jhim that I might have a share of the cheers. Was that why you 
 ran away?" "Good heavens, yes!" I cried, striking my forehead 
 . with my hand. She shook her head and laughed merrily. 
 
 I was so happy there beside her while she went on chatting so 
 confidingly, that I could have sat listening until morning. I found 
 in my pocket a handful of almonds which I had brought with me 
 from Italy. She took some, and we sat and cracked them and gazed 
 abroad over the quiet country. " Do you see that little white villa," 
 she said after a while, " gleaming over there in the moonlight ? The 
 Count has given us that, with its garden and vineyard ; there is where 
 we are to live. He found out long ago that we cared for each other, 
 and he is very fond of you, for if he had not had you with them when 
 he was running off with Fraulein Flora they would both have been 
 caught before the Countess had become reconciled to him, and every- 
 
 114 
 
thing would have been spoiled." " &ood heavensi fairest, sweetest 
 Countess," I cried out, "my head is fairly spinning with all this 
 unexpected and amazing information ; are you talking of Herr Lio- 
 nardo ?" " Yes, yes," she rephed ; " that is what he called himself in 
 Italy ; he owns all that property over there, and he is going to marry 
 our Countess's daughter, the lovely Flora. But why do you call me 
 Countess?" I stared at her. "I am no Countess," she went on. 
 " Our Countess took me into the castle and had me educated under 
 her care when my uncle, the Porter, brought me here a poor httle 
 orphan child. " '' ■ 
 
 Ah, what a stone fell from my heart at these words ! " God bless 
 the Porter," I said in an ecstasy, " for being our uncle ! I always set 
 great store by him." "And he would be very fond of you," she 
 replied, " if you would only comport yourself with more dignity, as 
 he expresses it. You must dress with greater elegance." " Oh," I ex- 
 claimed, enchanted, " an English dress-coat, straw hat, long trousers, 
 and spurs ! And as soon as we're married we will take a trip to Italy, 
 — to Rome, — where lovely fountains are playing, and we'll take with 
 us the Prague students, and the Porter !" She smiled quietly, and 
 gave me a happy glance, while the music echoed in the distance, 
 and rockets flew up from the castle above the garden in the quiet 
 night, and the Danube kept murmuring on, and everything, every- 
 
 thing was delightful ! 
 
 THE END. 
 
 115