Chapter II: Part 2

"O heavens! those were fearful hours that I then went through! My fist trembled, my heart throbbed convulsively; a low voice whispered murder and vengeance in my ears: but I saw my brother's wretchedness--I forgave him; and well it is for me that I did so.

"Oh, that he could have forgiven himself! But his misery and his crime were present day and night to his soul. Clara came back to him in his dreams, and shewed him the dagger reeking with her heart's warm blood. From that hour he never smiled again.

"'I am condemned to the most ghastly misery,' cried he, as he grasped me by the hand; 'nor on the other side of the grave shall I be at rest; my spirit will wander still in quest of Clara, and still never find her: a fearful future drags its slow length in review before me. Ah, my brother! even in death there is no more hope for me.'

"My heart was broken; but my life seemed now granted that I might console him. We left the castle, and laid aside our knightly garb; we shrouded ourselves in holy weeds, and thus we went wayfaring through the dark woods and over the desert plains, till this cavern at last received us.

"Often would my brother stand for long, long days by that rivulet, gazing vacantly on the waters; even in the night he was sometimes there; and then he would sit on a sundered fragment of the rock, while his tears trickled down into the stream. My efforts to console him were all in vain.

"At last he revealed to me that Clara had appeared to him in a dream; but she never could be reconciled, she said, till her blood should float down that little brook; and for this reason he sat on the bank, counting and watching the waves, in the eager hope of again finding the drops that had gushed from her heart in that fatal hour.

"I wept at the sight of my brother's madness; I tried to rid him of the thought, but it was impossible. 'Ah!' cried he, 'and in distant Spain her blood was shed; it flowed down the stream into the sea: how long will it be before it returns hitherward to the springs?'

"Now he scarcely ever left the brook--his sorrow and his delusion increased with every day: at last he died of a broken heart. I buried him by my cave.

"Since then I have often seen his ghost sitting beside the stream: it was always watching the passing ripple, and softly sighing, 'She comes not--she comes not.' A thrill of horror runs through me every time, and I pray till midnight for the peace of his soul."

* * * * *

The hermit ended; he cast down his eyes and silently counted his beads. The knight had listened to the tale with anxious interest, and after a few moments he inquired--

"And where was your brother's son left?"

"We sought him in the convent," replied the old man, "but he had clandestinely made his escape from the monks."

"Your name?"

"Why do you so fix your gaze upon me?--Ulfo of Waldburg."

"O my uncle!" cried the knight, and threw himself on the bosom of the astonished hermit. "Doubt not," cried he; "ah! that unhappy shade by the rivulet is the spirit of my father."

"Your father! his name was"--

"Charles of Waldburg. I ran away from the monks because their lonely cloisters appeared a prison to me. I took service with a knight; and now for some years I have been seeking you and my father."

"O my son!" cried the old man, and locked him more fervently in his arms; "yes, you are he: I know you by that sparkling eye; those are your father's features and his chestnut locks."

"O my unhappy father!" sighed the youth; "would that I could procure his wandering spirit peace! would that my prayers could conciliate Heaven and my mother's shade!"

He stood in a musing mood, with his hands folded: "Uncle," cried he, "what, if I have read aright the import of the dream? what, if my mother's spirit had wished to direct the wretched man to me? Oh, come now!"

They left the cave. Clouds shrouded the moon; a hallowed stillness spread its mantle over the world; they went into the lonely forest as into a temple. Charles kneeled down on his father's grave.

"Spirit of my father," said he in fervent prayer, "oh, hear thy son! hearken to thy son, O my mother! and, gracious Heaven, let me not implore thee in vain! Give rest to the unhappy one, and let the dread pilgrim find a lodging in the grave. Oh, let me hear from thee, spirit of my father, whether I conceived aright the sense of the prophecy! Oh, grant me some sign that thou art reconciled with my mother's ghost!"

Like the soft echo of a flute came a breathing through the tree-tops: two bright apparitions floated downwards in closely-wound embrace. They came nearer. "We are reconciled," whispered a more than earthly voice. Two hands were stretched forth over the kneeling one; and like a light zephyr the words passed over him, "Be true to knighthood!"

A cloud glided away from before the moon; and the phantoms dissolved in her silver radiance. In glad amazement the two mortals gazed long and lingeringly after them.

THE FRIENDS.

It was a beautiful spring morning, when Lewis Wandel went out to visit a sick friend, in a village some miles distant from his dwelling. This friend had written to him to say that he was lying dangerously ill, and would gladly see him and speak to him once more.

The cheerful sunshine now sparkled in the bright green bushes; the birds twittered and leapt to and fro on the branches; the larks sang merrily above the thin fleeting clouds; sweet scents rose from the fresh meadows, and the fruit-trees of the garden were white and gay in blossom.

Lewis's eye roamed intoxicate around him; his soul seemed to expand; but he thought of his invalid friend, and he bent forward in silent dejection. Nature had decked herself all in vain, so serenely and so brightly; his fancy could only picture to him the sick bed and his suffering brother.

"How song is sounding from every bough!" cried he; "the notes of the birds mingle in sweet unison with the whisper of the leaves; and yet in the distance, through all the charm of the concert, come the sighs of the sick one."

Whilst he thus communed, a troop of gaily-clad peasant girls issued from the village; they all gave him a friendly salutation, and told him that they were on their merry way to a wedding; that work was over for that day, and had to give place to festivity. He listened to their tale, and still their merriment rang in the distance on his ear; still he caught the sound of their songs, and became more and more sorrowful. In the wood he took his seat on a dismantled tree, drew the oft-read letter from his pocket, and ran through it once more:--

"My very dear friend,--I cannot tell why you have so utterly forgotten me, that I receive no news from you. I am not surprised that men forsake me; but it heartily pains me to think that you too care nothing about me. I am dangerously ill; a fever saps my strength: if you delay visiting me any longer, I cannot promise you that you will see me again. All nature revives, and feels fresh and strong; I alone sink lower in languor; the returning warmth cannot animate me; I see not the green fields, nothing but the tree that rustles before my window, and sings death-songs to my thoughts; my bosom is pent, my breathing is hard; and often I think the walls of my room will press closer together and crush me. The rest of you in the world are holding the most beautiful festival of life, whilst I must languish in the dwelling of sickness. Gladly would I dispense with spring, if I could but see your dear face once more: but you that are in health never earnestly think what it really is to be ill, and how dear to us then, in our helplessness, the visit of a friend is: you do not know how to prize those precious minutes of consolation, because the whole world receives you in the warmth and the fervour of its friendship. Ah! if you did but know, as I do, how terrible is death, and how still more terrible it is to be ill,--O Lewis, how would you hasten then to behold once more this frail form, that you have hitherto called your friend, and that by and by will be so ruthlessly dismembered! If I were well, I would haste to meet you, or fancy that you may perhaps be ill at this moment. If I never see you again--farewell."

What a painful impression did the suffering depicted in this letter make upon Lewis's heart, amid the liveliness of Nature, as she lay in brilliancy before him! He melted into tears, and rested his head on his hand.--"Carol now, ye foresters," thought he; "for ye know no lamentation; ye lead a buoyant poetic existence, and for this are those swift pinions granted you; oh, how happy are ye, that ye need not mourn: warm summer calls you, and ye wish for nothing more; ye dance forth to meet it, and when winter is advancing, ye are gone! O light-winged merry forest-life, how do I envy thee! Why are so many heavy cares burdened upon poor man's heart? Why may he not love without purchasing his love by wailing--his happiness by misery? Life purls on like a fleeting rivulet beneath his feet, and quenches not his thirst, his fervid longing."

He became more and more absorbed in thought, and at last he rose and pursued his way through the thick forest. "If I could but help him," cried he; "if Nature could but supply me with a means of saving him; but as it is, I feel nothing but my own impotency, and the pain of losing my friend. In my childhood I used to believe in enchantment and its supernatural aids; would I now could hope in them as happily as then!"

He quickened his steps; and involuntarily all the remembrances of the earliest years of his childhood crowded back upon him: he followed those forms of loveliness, and was soon entangled in such a labyrinth as not to notice the objects that surrounded him. He had forgotten that it was spring--that his friend was ill: he hearkened to the wondrous melodies, which came borne, as if from distant shores, upon his ear: all that was most strange united itself to what was most ordinary: his whole soul was transmuted. From the far vista of memory, from the abyss of the past, all those forms were summoned forth that ever had enraptured or tormented him; all those dubious phantoms were aroused, that flutter formlessly about us, and gather in dizzy hum around our heads. Puppets, the toys of childhood, and spectres, danced along before him, and so mantled over the green turf, that he could not see a single flower at his feet. First love encircled him with its twilight morning gleam, and let down its sparkling rainbow over the mead: his earliest sorrows glided past him in review, and threatened to greet him in the same guise at the end of his pilgrimage. Lewis sought to arrest all these changeful feelings, and to retain a consciousness of self amid the magic of enjoyment,--but in vain. Like enigmatic books, with figures grotesquely gay, that open for a moment and in a moment are closed, so unstably and fleetingly all floated before his soul.

The wood opened, and in the open country on one side lay some old ruins, encompassed with watch-towers and ramparts. Lewis was astonished at having advanced so quickly amid his dreams. He emerged from his melancholy, as he did from the shades of the wood; for often the pictures within us are but the reflection of outward objects. Now rose on him, like the morning sun, the memory of his first poetical enjoyments, of his earliest appreciations of that luscious harmony which many a human ear never inhales.

"How incomprehensibly," said he, "did those things commingle then, which seemed to me eternally parted by such vast chasms; my most undefined presentiments assumed a form and outline, and gleamed on me in the shape of a thousand subordinate phantoms, which till then I had never descried! So names were found me for things that I had long wished to speak of: I became recipient of earth's fairest treasures, which my yearning heart had so long sought for in vain: and how much have I to thank thee for since then, divine power of fancy and of poetry! How hast thou smoothed for me the path of life, that erst appeared so rough and perplexed! Ever hast thou revealed to me new sources of enjoyment and happiness, so that no arid desert presents itself to me now: every stream of sweet voluptuous inspiration hath wound its way through my earth-born heart: I have become intoxicate with bliss, and have communed with beings of heaven."

The sun sank below the horizon, and Lewis was astonished that it was already evening. He was insensible of fatigue, and was still far from the point which he had wished to reach before night: he stood still, without being able to understand how the crimson of evening could be so early mantling the clouds; how the shadows of every thing were so long, while the nightingale warbled her song of wail in the thicket. He looked around him: the old ruins lay far in the background, clad in blushing splendour; and he doubted whether he had not strayed from the direct and well-known road.

Now he remembered a phantasy of his early childhood, that till that moment had never recurred to him: it was a female form of awe, that glided before him over the lonely fields: she never looked round, yet he was compelled, against his will, to follow her, and to be drawn on into unknown scenes, without in the least being able to extricate himself from her power. A slight thrill of fear came over him, and yet he found it impossible to obtain a more distinct recollection of that figure, or to usher back his mind into the frame, in which this image had first appeared to him. He sought to individualise all these singular sensations, when, looking round by chance, he really found himself on a spot which, often as he had been that way, he had never seen before.

"Am I spell-bound?" cried he; "or have my dreams and fancies crazed me? Is it the wonderful effect of solitude that makes me irrecognisable to myself; or do spirits and genii hover round me and hold my senses in thrall? Sooth, if I cannot enfranchise myself from myself, I will await that woman-phantom that floated before me in every lonely place in my childhood."

He endeavoured to rid himself of every kind of phantasy, in order to get into the right road again; but his recollections became more and more perplexed; the flowers at his feet grew larger, the red glow of evening more brilliant, and wondrously shaped clouds hung drooping on the earth, like the curtains of some mystic scene that was soon to unfold itself. A ringing murmur arose from the high grass, and the blades bowed to one another, as if in friendly converse; while a light warm spring rain dropped pattering amongst them, as if to wake every slumbering harmony in wood, and bush, and flower. Now all was rife with song and sound; a thousand sweet voices held promiscuous parley; song entwined itself in song, and tone in tone; while in the waning crimson of eve lay countless blue butterflies rocking, with its radiance sparkling from their wavy wings. Lewis fancied himself in a dream, when the heavy dark-red clouds suddenly rose again, and a vast prospect opened on him in unfathomable distance. In the sunshine lay a gorgeous plain, sparkling with verdant forests and dewy underwood. In its centre glittered a palace of a myriad hues, as if composed all of undulating rainbows and gold and jewels: a passing stream reflected its various brilliancy, and a soft crimson aether environed this hall of enchantment: strange birds, he had never seen before, flew about, sportively flapping each other with their red and green wings: larger nightingales warbled their clear notes to the echoing landscape: lambent flames shot through the green grass, flickering here and there, and then darting in coils round the mansion. Lewis drew nearer, and heard ravishing voices sing the following words:--

Traveller from earth below,
Wend thee not farther,
In our hall's magic glow
Bide with us rather.
Hast thou with longing scann'd
Joy's distant morrow,
Cast away sorrow,
And enter the wish'd-for land.

Without further scruple, Lewis stepped to the shining threshold, and lingering but a moment ere he set his foot on the polished stone, he entered. The gates closed after him.

"Hitherward! hitherward!" cried invisible lips, as from the inmost recesses of the palace; and with loudly throbbing heart he followed the voices. All his cares, all his olden remembrances were cast away: his inmost bosom rang with the songs that outwardly encompassed him: his every regret was stilled: his every conscious and unconscious wish was satisfied. The summoning voices grew so loud, that the whole building re-echoed them, and still he could not find their origin, though he long seemed to have been standing in the central hall of the palace.

At length a ruddy-cheeked boy stepped up to him, and saluted the stranger guest: he led him through magnificent chambers, full of splendour and melody, and at last entered the garden, where Lewis, as he said, was expected. Entranced he followed his guide, and the most delicious fragrance from a thousand flowers floated forth to meet him. Broad shady walks received them. Lewis's dizzy gaze could scarcely gain the tops of the high immemorial trees: bright-coloured birds sat perched upon the branches: children were playing on guitars in the shade, and they and the birds sang to the music. Fountains shot up, with the clear red of morning sparkling upon them: the flowers were as high as shrubs, and parted spontaneously as the wanderer pressed through them. He had never before felt the hallowed sensations that then enkindled in him; never had such pure heavenly enjoyment been revealed to him: he was over-happy.

But bells of silver sound rang through the trees, and their tops were bowed: the birds and children with the guitars were hushed: the rose-buds unfolded: and the boy now conducted the stranger into the midst of a brilliant assembly.

Lovely dames of lofty form were seated on beautiful hanks of turf, in earnest conference. They were above the usual height of the human race, and their more than earthly beauty had at the same time something of awe in it, from which the heart shrunk back in alarm. Lewis dared not interrupt their conversation: it seemed as if he were among the god-like forms of Homer's song, where every thought must be excluded that formed the converse of mortals. Odd little spirits stood round, as ready ministers, waiting attentively for the wink of the moment that should summon them from their posture of quietude: they fixed their glances on the stranger, and then looked jeeringly and significantly at each other. At last the beautiful women ceased speaking, and beckoned Lewis to approach; he was still standing with an embarrassed air, and drew near to them with trembling.

"Be not alarmed," said the fairest of them all; "you are welcome to us here, and we have long been expecting you: long have you wished to be in our abode,--are you satisfied now?"

"Oh, how unspeakably happy I am!" exclaimed Lewis; "all my dearest dreams have met with their fulfillment, all my most daring wishes are gratified now: yes, I am, I live among them. How it has happened so, I cannot comprehend: sufficient for me, that it is so. Why should I raise a new wail over this enigma, ere my olden lamentations are scarcely at an end?"

"Is this life," asked the lady, "very different from your former one?"

"My former life," said Lewis, "I can scarcely remember. But has, then, this golden state of existence fallen to my lot? this beautiful state, after which my every sense and prescience so ardently aspired; to which every wish wandered, that I could conceive in fancy, or realise in my inmost thought; though its image, veiled in mist, seemed ever strange in me--and is it, then, mine at last? have I, then, achieved this new existence, and does it hold me in its embrace? Oh, pardon me, I know not what I say in my delirium of ecstacy, and might well weigh my words more carefully in such an assemblage."

The lady signed; and in a moment every minister was in motion: there was a stirring among the trees, every where a running to and fro, and speedily a banquet was placed before Lewis of fair fruits and fragrant wines. He sat down again, and music rose anew on the air. Rows of beautiful boys and girls sped round him, intertwined in the dance, while uncouth little cobolds lent life to the scene, and excited loud laughter by their ludicrous gambols. Lewis noted every sound and every gesture: he seemed newly-born since his initiation into this joyous existence. "Why," thought he, "are those hopes and reveries of ours so often laughed at, that pass into fulfilment sooner than ever had been expected? Where, then, is that border-mark between truth and error which mortals are ever ready with such temerity to set up? Oh, I ought in my former life to have wandered oftener from the way, and then perhaps I should have ripened all the earlier for this happy transmutation."

The dance died away; the sun sank to rest; the august dames arose; Lewis too left his seat, and accompanied them on their walk through the quiet garden. The nightingales were complaining in a softened tone, and a wondrous moon rose above the horizon. The blossoms opened to its silver radiance, and every leaf kindled in its gleam; the wide avenues became of a glow, casting shadows of a singular green; red clouds slumbered on the green grass of the fields; the fountains turned to gold, and played high in the clear air of heaven.

"Now you will wish to sleep," said the loveliest of the ladies, and shewed the enraptured wanderer a shadowy bower, strewed with soft turf and yielding cushions. Then they left him, and he was alone.

He sat down and watched the magic twilight glimmering through the thickly-woven foliage. "How strange is this!" said he to himself: "perhaps I am now only asleep, and I may dream that I am sleeping a second time, and may have a dream in my dream; and so it may go on for ever, and no human power ever be able to awake me. No! unbeliever that I am! it is beautiful reality that animates me now, and my former state perhaps was but the dream of gloom." He lay down, and light breezes played round him. Perfume was wafted on the air, and little birds sang lulling songs. In his dreams he fancied the garden all around him changed: the tall trees withered away; the golden moon fallen from the sky, leaving a dismal gap behind her; instead of the watery jet from the fountains, little genii gushed out, caracoling over each in the air, and assuming the strangest attitudes. Notes of woe supplanted the sweetness of song, and every trace of that happy abode had vanished. Lewis awoke amid impressions of fear, and chid himself for still feeding his fancy in the perverse manner of the habitants of earth, who mingle all received images in rude disorder, and present them again in this garb in a dream. A lovely morning broke over the scene, and the ladies saluted him again. He spoke to them more intrepidly, and was to-day more inclined to cheerfulness, as the surrounding world had less power to astonish him. He contemplated the garden and the palace, and fed upon the magnificence and the wonders that he met there. Thus he lived many days happily, in the belief that his felicity was incapable of increase.

But sometimes the crowing of a cock seemed to sound in the vicinity; and then the whole edifice would tremble, and his companions turn pale: this generally happened of an evening, and soon afterwards they retired to rest. Then often there would come a thought of earth into Lewis's soul; then he would often lean out of the windows of the glittering palace to arrest and fix these fleeting remembrances, and to get a glimpse of the high road again, which, as he thought, must pass that way. In this sort of mood, he was one afternoon alone, musing within himself why it was just as impossible for him then to recall a distinct remembrance of the world, as formerly it had been to feel a presage of this poetic place of sojourn,--when all at once a post-horn seemed to sound in the distance, and the rattle of carriage-wheels to make themselves heard. "How strangely," said he to himself, "does a faint gleam, a slight reminiscence of earth, break upon my delight--rendering me melancholy and dejected! Then, do I lack anything here? Is my happiness still incomplete?"

The beautiful women returned. "What do you wish for?" said they, in a tone of concern; "you seem sad."

"You will laugh," replied Lewis; "yet grant me one favour more. In that other life I had a friend, whom I now but faintly remember: he is ill, I think; restore him by your skill."

"Your wish is already gratified," said they.

"But," said Lewis, "vouchsafe me two questions."

"Speak!"

"Does no gleam of love fall on this wondrous world? Does no friendship perambulate these bowers? I thought the morning blush of spring-love would be eternal here, which in that other life is too prone to be extinguished, and which men afterwards speak of as of a fable. To confess to you the truth, I feel an unspeakable yearning after those sensations."

"Then you long for earth again?"

"Oh, never!" cried Lewis; "for in that cold earth I used to sigh for friendship and for love, and they came not near me. The longing for those feelings had to supply the place of those feelings themselves; and for that reason I turned my aspirations hitherward, and hoped here to find every thing in the most beautiful harmony."

"Fool!" said the venerable woman: "so on earth you sighed for earth, and knew not what you did in wishing to be here; you have overshot your desires, and substituted phantasies for the sensations of mortals."

"Then who are ye?" cried Lewis, astounded.

"We are the old fairies," said she, "of whom you surely must have heard long ago. If you ardently long for earth, you will return thither again. Our kingdom flourishes when mortals are shrouded in night; but their day is _our_ night. Our sway is of ancient date, and will long endure. It abides invisibly among men--to your eye alone has it been revealed."

She turned away, and Lewis remembered that it was the same form which had resistlessly dragged him after it in his youth, and of which he felt a secret dread. He followed now also, crying, "No, I will not go back to earth! I will stay here!" "So, then," said he to himself, "I devined this lofty being even in my childhood! And so the solution of many a riddle, which we are too idle to investigate, may be within ourselves."

He went on much further than usual, till the fairy garden was soon left far behind him. He stood on a romantic mountain-range, where the ivy clambered in wild tresses up the rocks; cliff was piled on cliff, and awe and grandeur seemed to hold universal sway. Then there came a wandering stranger to him, who accosted him kindly, and addressed him thus:--"Glad I am, after all, to see you again."

"I know you not," said Lewis.

"That may well be," replied the other; "but once you thought you knew me well. I am your late sick friend."

"Impossible! you are quite a stranger to me!"

"Only," said the stranger, "because to-day you see me for the first time in my true form: till now you only found in me a reflection of yourself. You are right too in remaining here; for there is no love, no friendship--not here, I mean, where all illusion vanishes."

Lewis sat down and wept.

"What ails you?" said the stranger.

"That it is you--you who were the friend of my youth: is not that mournful enough? Oh, come back with me to our dear, dear earth, where we shall know each other once more under illusive forms--where there exists the superstition of friendship! What am I doing here?"

"What will that avail?" answered the stranger. "You will want to be back again; earth is not bright enough for you: the flowers are too small for you, the song too suppressed. Colour there, cannot emerge so brilliantly from the shade; flowers there are of small comfort, and so prone to fade; the little birds think of their death, and sing in modest constraint: but here every thing is on a scale of grandeur."

"Oh, I will be contented!" cried Lewis, as the tears gushed profusely from his eyes. "Do but come back with me, and be my friend once more; let us leave this desert, this glittering misery!"

Thus saying, he opened his eyes, for some one was shaking him roughly. Over him leant the friendly but pale face of his once sick friend. "But are you dead?" cried Lewis.

"Recovered am I, wicked sleeper," he replied. "Is it thus you visit your sick friend? Come along with me; my carriage is waiting there, and a thunder-storm is rising."

Lewis rose: in his sleep he had glided off the trunk of the tree; his friend's letter lay open beside him. "So am I really on the earth again?" he exclaimed with joy; "really? and is this no new dream?"

"You will not escape from earth," answered his friend with a smile; and both were locked in heart-felt embraces.

"How happy I am," said Lewis, "that I have you once more, that I feel as I used to do, and that you are well again!"

"Suddenly," replied his friend, "I felt ill; and as suddenly I was well again. So I wished to go to you, and do away with the alarm that my letter must have caused you; and here, half-way, I find you asleep."

"I do not deserve your love at all," said Lewis.

"Why?"

"Because I just now doubted of your friendship."

"But only in sleep."

"It would be strange enough though," said Lewis, "if there really were such things as fairies."

"There are such, of a certainty," replied the other; "but it is all a fable, that their whole pleasure is to make men happy. They plant those wishes in our bosoms which we ourselves do not know of; those over-wrought pretensions--that super-human covetousness of super-human gifts; so that in our desponding delirium we afterwards despise the beautiful earth with all its glorious stores."

Lewis answered with a pressure of the hand.

THE ELVES.

"Where is Maria, our child?" asked the father.

"She is playing on the green," replied the mother, "with our neighbour's son."

"Do not let them run away," said the father anxiously; "they are so thoughtless."

The mother attended to the wants of the little ones, and gave them their supper.

"The weather is hot, mother," said the boy; and the little maiden longed exceedingly to have some red cherries.

"Be careful, child," said the mother; "do not run too far from the house, or into the wood; your father and I are going into the field."

"Oh, do not be anxious on that account," was the prompt reply of young Andrew, "for we are all afraid of the wood; we will remain here sitting at home, where we are near to the men."

The mother went in, and soon returned with the father. They closed their cottage, and turned towards the fields to look after the peasants, and to see the hay-harvest in the meadows.

Their dwelling was situated on a little green eminence, fenced round by an ornamental hedge, which enclosed a fruit and flower garden; the town lay a little lower down; and still further there rose in the distance the towers of the baronial castle. Martin rented a large farm of the lord, the proprietor, and lived in a happy state of contentment with his wife and only child, as he was enabled, year by year, to lay by something in reserve for the future, with the prospect of becoming one day himself a man of property; for through his toil and industry the land was fruitful, and the Count did not oppress him with undue exactions.

As he was walking towards the fields with his wife, he gazed joyously around, and said, "How is it, Bridget, that the country about here is so different from that in which we formerly lived? Here it is so green and verdant; the whole town is beautified with thickly planted fruit-trees; the soil teems with rich vegetation and shrubs; all the houses are gay and cleanly--the inhabitants prosperous; indeed, it would appear to me that the woods here are more majestic, and the sky more blue; and as far as the eye can scan, we have pleasure in beholding the bountiful earth."

"But," said Brigitta, "to pass over to the other side of the river is to migrate into quite another region, every thing there wears so gloomy and withered an aspect; but as for our own hamlet, every traveller confesses it to be the prettiest in the whole district."

"Come, then, to the fir-plantation," answered her husband; "look back and see how dark and dreary that spot seems in the distance, in the midst of such a gay and animated landscape; the dusky huts behind the dark firs; those detached buildings fallen into ruinous heaps; and even the very stream flowing onwards so sadly and sluggishly."

"That is true," said she, as they both stood still to gaze upon the scene. "As often as one approaches the spot, one becomes sad and sorrowful, one knows not why."

"Who can the people really be? and why should they keep themselves at such a distance from all the neighbourhood, avoiding any intercourse with us, as though they were inwardly conscious of deeds of darkness?"

"They are poor folk," said the young farmer; "seemingly of a gipsy-tribe, who rob and pilfer at a distance off, and make this spot perhaps their head-quarters: I wonder only that the baron allows them to remain."

"Possibly," said the woman kindly and compassionately, "they are poor people, ashamed of their poverty; for, to speak the truth, we cannot lay any crime, or even any trivial injury, to their charge; still it is remarkable that they never go to church; and how they contrive to subsist is strange enough, for their little garden, in itself a perfect wilderness, cannot support them, and they have no pasture-land."

"God only knows," continued Martin, as they proceeded on their way--"God only knows what they do; this at least is certain, that they hold no intercourse; no stranger ever comes from, or goes to them; for the spot where they dwell is bewitched and under ban, so that the boldest young townsmen would hardly venture into it."

This conversation continued through their walk to the fields.

That dark district of which they spoke lay beyond the town in a hollow that was surrounded on all sides by firs; there appeared to be a hut, and several domestic buildings fast falling to decay. Smoke was seldom seen to curl from it, still less frequently were any human beings visible; at times some persons, led on by curiosity to venture somewhat nearer, had seen on the rising ground in front of the hut frightful old women, clad in uncouth rags, dandling equally frightful and dirty children on their laps; black dogs prowled about continually before the stream; and in the evening a monster of a man, whom no one knew, passed over the bridge, and disappeared into the hut; then several figures, like dim shadows, flitted along in the darkness, and danced round about a fire which was heaped up on the earth: this gloomy sport, the dark firs, and the ruinous huts, formed a most singular contrast to the gay green landscape, the clear white houses of the town, and the splendid new castle.

The two children had eaten up all their fruit, and then began to run races; and the little buoyant Maria outran, on each occasion, the tardy Andrew.

"That's no proof of your skill," he cried; "come, let us try a longer distance, and then we'll see who shall be the conqueror."

"As you please," said the little Maria; "only we must not run towards the stream."

"No," said Andrew; "but at the summit of that hill stands a large pear-tree, about a quarter of a mile off. I will run to the left past the fir-plantation, and you can go to the right through the fields; and we shall not know, till we meet, which of us is the fastest runner."

"Good," said Maria, immediately starting off; "we shall not hinder each other by going the same way, and our father says it is just the same distance to the top of the hill, whether we go on this side, or by the gipsy-huts."

Andrew had already started off, and Maria, who ran towards the right, saw him no more.

"How very stupid he is!" said she to herself; "for if I could only summon up courage enough to run over the bridge by the hut, and then again out across the yard, I should certainly get there much sooner than he will." She was already standing facing the stream and the fir-hill. "Shall I?--No, it's too terrible." A little white dog stood on the other side, keeping up a loud and continued bark at her. In her fright the little animal appeared a perfect monster, and she sprang back trembling. "Oh dear," said she, "Andrew has by this time got such a long distance before me, while I'm stopping here to consider." The little dog still barked on; and as she looked at it more attentively, it no longer struck her as being so terrible, but, on the contrary, she was quite charmed with it. It had a red collar, to which was affixed a tiny glittering bell; and as often as it raised its head and shook it, while barking, the tinkling noise it produced was to her ears most musical. "Oh, I'll venture," cried little Maria; "I'll run as fast as I can, and I shall soon be on the other side; they surely can't eat me entirely." With this the young courageous child sprang on the bridge, and quickly passed the little dog, who immediately ceased his barking to fawn upon her. And now she was standing on the dread spot; and the black firs, that were thickly grouped together, shut out from her view the home of her fathers, and the rest of the pretty landscape. But how amazed was she at the spectacle before her!

Around her was a most brilliant expanse of flower-garden, in which roses, lilies, and tulips, intertwining with one another, shone in all those gorgeous colours in which Nature loves to garb her bright creations; blue and golden butterflies fluttered about from blossom to blossom, glittering as the sunbeams danced upon their fairy livery; birds, whose plumage borrowed the tints of the rainbow, and whose tiny throats quivered again as each note swelled forth more delicious than the last, hung on cages and on glittering perches; children in short white garments, with golden hair hanging in luxuriant curls, and clear blue eyes, sported about, some leading little pet-lambs, others feeding the birds; some culled the fragrant flowers, and wove garlands for one another; others were tasting the delicious fruits--pears, large clusters of grapes, and red apricots: no hut was visible, but a large handsome mansion, with gates of brass and wood of exquisite workmanship, towered on high in the middle of this paradise. Maria was rivetted to the spot; indeed, the beauty of the garden and the magnificence of the mansion had taken so firm a hold on her fancy, that some moments elapsed ere she recovered her surprise even partially. But, as it had ever been the study of her parents to enable her to appear composed, whatever novelty might offer itself to her, she approached fearlessly the nearest child, and with extended hand wished it good day.

"So you have come to see us then at last," said the little girl; "I have often seen you dancing and sporting without there, but you were afraid of our little dog."

"Then you are not gipsies and strollers, as Andrew says you are. Ah, truly, he's very stupid, and talks a great deal too much."

"Only stop with us here," said her new friend; "you shall be so happy."

"But we are running for a wager, and--"

"Oh, you'll get back to him very soon; take some of our fruit." Maria tasted it, and it proved so delicious to her palate, that she declared she had never before eaten any like it; and from this moment Andrew, the race, and the prohibition of her parents, were altogether forgotten. Then a more elderly female, whose dress was still more beautiful than any thing Maria had hitherto seen, stepped forward, and made inquiry about the stranger-child.

"Most beautiful lady," said Maria, "I ran in here by accident, and now they wish to keep me here."

"You know, Zerina," said the beautiful lady, "that there is a short time only allowed her; besides, you should first of all have asked my permission."

"I thought," said the child, "as she had been allowed to cross the bridge, that I might keep her; we have often seen her running about in the fields, and you have yourself been pleased with her gay and spirited air; and she will be obliged to leave us soon enough."

"No, I will stay here," said Maria, "it is so charming here; and I find the best things to play with here are strawberries and pears; it is not half so fine outside."

The golden-dressed lady now retired, smiling; and many of the children playfully sported about Maria--laughing, and inviting her to join their dance. Some brought her a pet-lamb or wonderful toys, others brought novel instruments and played and sang to her; but she preferred the little playfellow, her first friend, for she was the most gentle and good-natured of all. The little Maria constantly cried out, "I will always stop here, and you shall be my sisters;" at which all the children smiled and embraced her.

"Now then," said Zerina, "we shall have a fine game;" and running hastily into the palace, she returned with a little golden basket, in which were very fine glittering seeds. She took some in her delicate little fingers, and strewed the grains upon the green turf; and immediately they saw the grass heave and float about, as it were in waves; and after a few moments, beautiful rose-trees sprang from the ground, grew rapidly up, and suddenly burst themselves into their full beauty, exhaling the sweetest odours that floated round them in the air. Maria herself took some of the seed, and scattered it; and immediately there sprang up at her feet white lilies and cloves of every hue. At a motion of Zerina's, these flowers all disappeared, and others still more beautiful sprang up in their place.

"Now," said Zerina to the astonished child, "prepare yourself for something still greater." She then placed two pine-cones in the ground, and stamped on them violently with her feet: instantly two green shrubs stood before them. "Grasp me firmly," said she; and Maria threw her arms around her delicate waist, and felt herself rising up into the air; for the trees grew beneath them with surprising quickness. The tall pines swayed to and fro at the will of the breeze, and the two children, locked in each other's arms, kissed each other, while floating backwards in the red clouds of evening. The other little ones clambered up and down the stems of the trees with elastic step, and if by chance one impeded the progress of another, the whole number raised a loud shout of laughter. Maria at length grew terrified; and at some mystic words uttered by the little one, the trees sank again gently into the earth, setting them down in the spot from which they had raised them up. They then went through the brazen gate of the palace; here many women, some younger, some older, all of that degree of beauty that no pencil could portray, were seated round a circular hall, feasting on the most delicious fruits, and listening to a concert of most delightful and invisible harmony.

Round the ceiling of the hall, which was studded with gold and gems, representing the starry sphere, were palm-trees, plants, and shrubs, between which children clambered and sported in most graceful groups. The figures varied and glowed in more burning colours, according to the tones of the music. At one time, green and blue, sparkling like clear rays of light, prevailed. Then the colours paled away, and purple and gold burst forth: then the naked children, amid the fanciful clusters that the different flowers wove, seemed to be full of life, and to inhale and exhale breath with their ruby-red lips, so that their beautiful white teeth were visible, and the bright glances of their clear blue eyes were seen from beneath their dark fringe. From the hall, some steps of marble and jasper led into a large subterraneous chamber. The floor of this room was covered with vast heaps of gold and silver; diamonds, pearls, and gems of all colours dazzled the eyes; large deep vessels stood around the walls, all filled with precious stones, and gold wrought into curious devices, and mystic characters, with such ingenuity as no artisan, however skilful, could form. Many little dwarfs were occupied in sorting the precious heaps, and in filling vessels with the riches; others, with crooked legs and long red noses, dragged in heavy sacks, as millers carry their corn, and bending forward, poured out the grains on the earth: then they jumped to the right and left, and seized the treasures as they rolled away; and it often happened, that through their zeal and eagerness to recover them, they rolled one against the other and fell heavily on the ground. They made frightful faces whenever Maria laughed at their grotesque manner and hideous deformity. Behind sat a little old man, wrinkled by age, whom Maria saluted very respectfully, but he merely bent his head in answer to her deferential salutation: he had a sceptre in his right hand, and a crown encircled his brow; all the other dwarfs seemed to look up to him as their chief and superior; his fiat was instantly obeyed, though his commands were given by signs and motions.

"What is the matter now?" said he in a surly tone, as the children approached nearer to him. The timid Maria kept silence, but her little playfellow answered, that they had only come to see the chamber.

"What," said the old man peevishly, "will there always be these childish freaks? is there never to be an end to this idling?" He then turned his attention again to his work, and ordered the pieces of gold to be weighed and collected together. Some of the dwarfs he despatched in different directions; many, too, he scolded right heartily.

At length Maria's curiosity got the better of her fear, and in an eager manner she said to her little friend, "Who is that old man?"

"Our metal-prince," said the little one, as they left the chamber.

They soon found themselves in the open air, by the side of a large lake; still no sun had appeared hitherto, nor could they see any sky above them. Here a little boat received them, and Zerina took the helm and steered their course very skilfully. They floated rapidly down the lake, and when they had arrived at about the middle, Maria saw that a thousand canals, streams, and rivulets, branched off in every direction from this miniature sea.

"These waters," said the bright-beaming child, "flow exactly under your garden, irrigating the soil around; and hence it is that your flowers bloom more beautifully and more fragrantly than others, and that your fruits are so superior in flavour; from this stream we launch into the great canal." On a sudden there rose to the surface from every branch of these blue waters a countless number of beautiful children, swimming and plunging up and down among the mimic waves; many wore graceful coronets of flags and water-lilies, glittering as though with gems from the drops of spray; others waved branches of red and white coral; others again carried curious horns, tastefully decorated with blue ribbons; then several beautiful women rose to the surface, swimming about among the group of younger naiads, and at times the children might be seen hanging on the necks of the women, covering them with kisses. They all saluted the stranger party; and through the midst of this grouped assemblage the little barque floated on from the main stream into a smaller rivulet, which became gradually narrower and narrower, and at the same time the depth of water diminished till the little boat grounded on the shore. Here the group of naiads, who had accompanied their tiny vessel, took leave of them; and Zerina knocked against the rock, which immediately opened like a magnificent doorway to admit them, and a female figure, of a glowing red colour, assisted them to disembark.

"Is all going on merrily?" inquired Zerina.

"Ay, merrily indeed," replied the other; "you are ever on the wing; no cloud of sorrow ever darkens your brow, but the sunshine of happiness always lights up those features of yours, curling that lip with a smile of joy."

They mounted a winding staircase, and Maria suddenly found herself in a most glittering hall, so that on entering, her eyes were dazzled with the brilliant lights that burst in their full splendour upon her. Deep-red tapestry covered the walls with a brilliant glow; and as soon as her eye was familiar with the unusual halo that invested the whole chamber, she perceived figures moving gracefully up and down in the tapestry, of such exquisite beauty and delicate symmetry of form, that her imagination could not paint any thing more lovely. Their bodies appeared to be formed of crystal of a reddish tint, and so transparent, that one might see the life-blood circulating in their veins. They smiled at the stranger-child, and bowed courteously: but when the little Maria wished to approach nearer, Zerina held her back forcibly, exclaiming, "You will burn yourself, little Maria; what you are gazing upon is all fire."

Maria perceived the heat, and said to Zerina, "Why don't these charming creatures come out and play with us?"

"It is impossible," answered Zerina; "as you live in air, so they live in fire; if you were to be taken out of your peculiar element, you would languish and droop; in the same manner, if you were to transport them into your element, they would perish."

"Only look," said Maria, "how happy and joyous they seem; listen how they shout and sing."

"Below," said her little friend, "the fire-streams spread in every direction throughout the whole earth, imparting heat to the vegetation, and ripening the seed, till it shoots upward into a fruitful plant: hence you have your flowers and fruits. These fire-streams go side by side with the water-streams; and to their mutual agency you owe all the herbage of your pasture-land, all the beauties of your flower-garden, all the luscious produce of your orchards: they are your great benefactors: without them your present fruitful land would be a desolate wilderness; your flower-gardens overrun with noxious weeds, and your orchard-trees blighted and dying away. In consequence of such benefits resulting from them, they are ever active, ever happy. But this heat is too great for a child of air; come, let us return to the garden."

There had been a great change in the atmosphere; the moonshine lay on all the flowers, the birds were hushed, and the children were slumbering on the greensward.

"Happy, holy calmness," thought Maria; "Peace has certainly chosen her retreat in these lovely regions; Contentment is linked with her; and wherever they roam hand in hand, all is joy, all is tranquillity."