Having escaped from the affectionate care of Bendel, I now wandered wildly through the neighbouring woods and meadows.  Drops of anguish fell from my brow, deep groans burst from my bosom—­frenzied despair raged within me.

I knew not how long this had lasted, when I felt myself seized by the sleeve on a sunny heath.  I stopped, and looking up, beheld the grey-coated man, who appeared to have run himself out of breath in pursuing me.  He immediately began: 

“I had,” said he, “appointed this day; but your impatience anticipated it.  All, however, may yet be right.  Take my advice—­ redeem your shadow, which is at your command, and return immediately to the ranger’s garden, where you will be well received, and all the past will seem a mere joke.  As for Rascal—­who has betrayed you in order to pay his addresses to Minna—­leave him to me; he is just a fit subject for me.”

I stood like one in a dream.  “This day?” I considered again.  He was right—­I had made a mistake of a day.  I felt in my bosom for the purse.  He perceived my intention, and drew back.

“No, Count Peter; the purse is in good hands—­pray keep it.”  I gazed at him with looks of astonishment and inquiry.  “I only beg a trifle as a token of remembrance.  Be so good as to sign this memorandum.”  On the parchment, which he held out to me, were these words:  —­“By virtue of this present, to which I have appended my signature, I hereby bequeath my soul to the holder, after its natural separation from my body.”

I gazed in mute astonishment alternately at the paper and the grey unknown.  In the meantime he had dipped a new pen in a drop of blood which was issuing from a scratch in my hand just made by a thorn.  He presented it to me.  “Who are you?” at last I exclaimed.  “What can it signify?” he answered; “do you not perceive who I am?  A poor devil—­a sort of scholar and philosopher, who obtains but poor thanks from his friends for his admirable arts, and whose only amusement on earth consists in his small experiments.  But just sign this; to the right, exactly underneath—­Peter Schlemihl.”

I shook my head, and replied, “Excuse me, sir; I cannot sign that.”

“Cannot!” he exclaimed; “and why not?”

“Because it appears to me a hazardous thing to exchange my soul for my shadow.”

“Hazardous!” he exclaimed, bursting into a loud laugh.  “And, pray, may I be allowed to inquire what sort of a thing your soul is?—­have you ever seen it?—­and what do you mean to do with it after your death?  You ought to think yourself fortunate in meeting with a customer who, during your life, in exchange for this infinitely-minute quantity, this galvanic principle, this polarised agency, or whatever other foolish name you may give it, is willing to bestow on you something substantial—­in a word, your own identical shadow, by virtue of which you will obtain your beloved Minna, and arrive at the accomplishment of all your wishes; or do you prefer giving up the poor young girl to the power of that contemptible scoundrel Rascal ?  Nay, you shall behold her with your own eyes.  Come here; I will lend you an invisible cap (he drew something out of his pocket), and we will enter the ranger’s garden unseen.”