This slight incident gave rise in me to the most painful reflections; nor do I now dare express the emotions I felt.  That he should be restless I understood; that he should wander as an unlaid ghost and find no quiet from the burning hell that consumed his heart.  But why approach my chamber?  Was not that sacred?  I felt almost ready to faint while he had stood there, but I had not betrayed my wakefulness by the slightest motion, although I had heard my own heart beat with violent fear.  He had withdrawn.  Oh, never, never, may I see him again!  Tomorrow night the same roof may not cover us; he or I must depart.  The mutual link of our destinies is broken; we must be divided by seas—­by land.  The stars and the sun must not rise at the same period to us:  he must not say, looking at the setting crescent of the moon, “Mathilda now watches its fall.”—­No, all must be changed.  Be it light with him when it is darkness with me!  Let him feel the sun of summer while I am chilled by the snows of winter!  Let there be the distance of the antipodes between us!

At length the east began to brighten, and the comfortable light of morning streamed into my room.  I was weary with watching and for some time I had combated with the heavy sleep that weighed down my eyelids:  but now, no longer fearful, I threw myself on my bed.  I sought for repose although I did not hope for forgetfulness; I knew I should be pursued by dreams, but did not dread the frightful one that I really had.  I thought that I had risen and went to seek my father to inform him of my determination to seperate myself from him.  I sought him in the house, in the park, and then in the fields and the woods, but I could not find him.  At length I saw him at some distance, seated under a tree, and when he perceived me he waved his hand several times, beckoning me to approach; there was something unearthly in his mien that awed and chilled me, but I drew near.  When at [a] short distance from him I saw that he was deadlily [sic] pale, and clothed in flowing garments of white.  Suddenly he started up and fled from me; I pursued him:  we sped over the fields, and by the skirts of woods, and on the banks of rivers; he flew fast and I followed.  We came at last, methought, to the brow of a huge cliff that over hung the sea which, troubled by the winds, dashed against its base at a distance.  I heard the roar of the waters:  he held his course right on towards the brink and I became breathless with fear lest he should plunge down the dreadful precipice; I tried to augment my speed, but my knees failed beneath me, yet I had just reached him; just caught a part of his flowing robe, when he leapt down and I awoke with a violent scream.  I was trembling and my pillow was wet with my tears; for a few moments my heart beat hard, but the bright beams of the sun and the chirping of the birds quickly restored me to myself, and I rose with a languid spirit, yet wondering what events the day would bring forth.