“I die, my Seraphitus, loving none but thee,” she said, making a mechanical movement to fling herself into the abyss.

Seraphitus breathed softly on her forehead and eyes.  Suddenly, like a traveller relaxed after a bath, Minna forgot these keen emotions, already dissipated by that caressing breath which penetrated her body and filled it with balsamic essences as quickly as the breath itself had crossed the air.

“Who art thou?” she said, with a feeling of gentle terror.  “Ah, but I know! thou art my life.  How canst thou look into that gulf and not die?” she added presently.

Seraphitus left her clinging to the granite rock and placed himself at the edge of the narrow platform on which they stood, whence his eyes plunged to the depths of the fiord, defying its dazzling invitation.  His body did not tremble, his brow was white and calm as that of a marble statue,—­an abyss facing an abyss.

“Seraphitus! dost thou not love me? come back!” she cried.  “Thy danger renews my terror.  Who art thou to have such superhuman power at thy age?” she asked as she felt his arms inclosing her once more.

“But, Minna,” answered Seraphitus, “you look fearlessly at greater spaces far than that.”

Then with raised finger, this strange being pointed upward to the blue dome, which parting clouds left clear above their heads, where stars could be seen in open day by virtue of atmospheric laws as yet unstudied.

“But what a difference!” she answered smiling.

“You are right,” he said; “we are born to stretch upward to the skies.  Our native land, like the face of a mother, cannot terrify her children.”

His voice vibrated through the being of his companion, who made no reply.

“Come! let us go on,” he said.

The pair darted forward along the narrow paths traced back and forth upon the mountain, skimming from terrace to terrace, from line to line, with the rapidity of a barb, that bird of the desert.  Presently they reached an open space, carpeted with turf and moss and flowers, where no foot had ever trod.

“Oh, the pretty saeter!” cried Minna, giving to the upland meadow its Norwegian name.  “But how comes it here, at such a height?”

“Vegetation ceases here, it is true,” said Seraphitus.  “These few plants and flowers are due to that sheltering rock which protects the meadow from the polar winds.  Put that tuft in your bosom, Minna,” he added, gathering a flower,—­“that balmy creation which no eye has ever seen; keep the solitary matchless flower in memory of this one matchless morning of your life.  You will find no other guide to lead you again to this saeter.”