Elsa had already repented her rash words, and right earnestly she besought him to remain by her side.  But, alas! her tears and pleadings were in vain, for, even as her entreaties were uttered, she heard the exquisite strains of music which had first heralded her lover’s approach, while from the window of the castle she espied the swan-boat rapidly drawing toward the shore.

With grave tenderness Lohengrin bade farewell to his wife and family, first, however, revealing to them his identity, and commending them to the care of some of his trusty followers.

Tradition tells that Elsa did not long survive the loss of her beloved husband, but her sons became brave knights, well worthy of the proud name they bore.

A Legend of Liege

A legend of Liege! and is not Liege itself now almost legendary?  Its venerable church, its world-famous library replete with the priceless treasures of the past, “with records stored of deeds long since forgot,” where are they?—­but crumbling clusters of ruins fired by the barbarian torch whose glow, we were told, was to enlighten an ignorant and uncultured Europe!  But one gem remains:  the wonderful Hotel de Ville, type of the Renaissance spirit in Flanders.  Liege may be laid in ruins, but the memory of what it was can never die: 

     Athens in death is nobler far
     Than breathing cities of the West;

and the same may be said of those splendours in stone, those wonders of medieval architecture, even the blackened walls of which possess a dignity and beauty which will ever assist the imagination to re-create the picture of what has been.

Liege is a city of the Middle Ages.  Time was when the place boasted but a single forge; and though bucklers were heaped beside the anvil, and swords and spears lay waiting for repair, the blacksmith leant against his door-post, gazing idly up the hill-side.  Gradually he was aware of a figure, which seemed to have grown into shape from a furze-bush, or to have risen from behind a stone; and as it descended the slope he eyed curiously the grimy face, long beard, and squat form of what he was half unwilling to recognize as a human being.  Hobbling awkwardly, and shrugging his shoulders as though cold, the man came in time to the smithy door.

“What!  Jacques Perron—­idle when work is to be done?  Idle smith! idle smith!  The horse lacks the bit, and the rider the spur.

     ’Ill fares the hide when the buckler wants mending;
     Ill fares the plough when the coulter wants tending.’

Idle smith! idle smith!”

“Idle enough,” quoth Jacques.  “I’m as idle as you are ugly; but I can’t get charcoal any more than you can get beauty, so I must stand still, and you be content with your face, though I’d fain earn a loaf and a cup full enough for both of us this winter morning.”