her again in another life, and heard from her that she loved me and that I was forgiven?  How mankind defers from day to day the best it can do, and the most beautiful things it can enjoy, without thinking that every day may be the last one, and that lost time is lost eternity!  Then all the words of the Hofrath, the last time I saw him, recurred to me, and I felt that I had only resolved to make my sudden journey to show my strength to him, and that it would have been a still more difficult task to have confessed my weakness and remained.  It was clear to me that it was my simple duty to return to her immediately and to bear everything which Heaven ordained.  But as soon as I had laid the plan for my return journey, I suddenly remembered the words of the Hofrath:  “As soon as possible she must go away and be taken into the country.”  She had herself told me that she spent the most of her time, in summer, at her castle.  Perhaps she was there, in my immediate vicinity; in one day I could be with her.  Thinking was doing; at daybreak I was off, and at evening I stood at the gate of the castle.

The night was clear and bright.  The mountain peaks glistened in the full gold of the sunset and the lower ridges were bathed in a rosy blue.  A gray mist rose from the valleys which suddenly glistened when it swept up into the higher regions, and then like a cloud-sea rolled heavenwards.  The whole color-play reflected itself in the gently agitated breast of the dark lake from whose shores the mountains seemed to rise and fall, so that only the tops of the trees and the peaks of the church steeples and the rising smoke from the houses defined the limits which separated the reality of the world from its reflection.  My glance, however, rested upon only one spot—­the old castle—­where a presentiment told me I should find her again.  No light could be seen in the windows, no footstep broke the silence of the night.  Had my presentiment deceived me?  I passed slowly through the outer gateway and up the steps until I stood at the fore-court of the castle.  Here I saw a sentinel pacing back and forwards, and I hastened to the soldier to inquire who was in the castle.  “The Countess and her attendants are here,” was the brief reply, and in an instant I stood at the main portal and had even pulled the bell.  Then, for the first time, my action occurred to me.  No one knew me.  I neither could nor dare say who I was.  I had wandered for weeks about the mountains, and looked like a beggar.  What should I say?  For whom should I ask?  There was little time for consideration, however, for the door opened and a servant in princely livery stood before me, and regarded me with amazement.

I asked if the English lady, who I knew would never forsake the Countess, was in the castle, and when the servant replied in the affirmative, I begged for paper and ink and wrote her I was present to inquire after the health of the Countess.