Undine (novella)  

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Undine (1811) is a novella by Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué in which Undine, a water spirit, marries a knight named Huldbrand in order to gain a soul.

Plot summary

A knight named Huldbrand comes across a fisherman's hut in the forest, and is welcomed in by the fisherman and his wife. He also meets their capricious eighteen-year-old foster daughter, Undine. The fisherman explains that years ago, their young daughter was lost in the lake and apparently drowned, but that same day, Undine appeared on their doorstep. Since then, they have raised her as their own.

Undine asks Huldbrand what he’s doing in the forest. He explains that he was participating in a tournament when he met Bertalda, a duke's foster daughter. As they flirted, she promised to give him her glove if he would explore the haunted forest. He did so, encountering strange and threatening spirits until he reached the fisherman’s home.

A storm arrives and a flood surrounds the house, stranding the group. During their time together, Huldbrand and Undine fall in love, although she continues to behave erratically and can seemingly control the weather. An elderly priest, Father Heilmann, arrives after being washed overboard from a ferry. Huldbrand suggests that the priest marry him and Undine, and they hold the ceremony immediately.

The morning after the wedding, Undine suddenly acts like a completely different person, kind and gentle. She explains to Huldbrand that elemental beings exist and she is a water-spirit. Her kind does not have immortal souls or any sense of morals, but can gain them by marrying humans. She was sent to live among humans by her parents, who hoped she would earn a soul in this way, and with her marriage to Huldbrand she’s accomplished this. She fears that Huldbrand will leave now that he knows what she is, but he swears never to abandon her.

With the flood receding, Huldbrand and Undine depart for his home. On the way they encounter Kuhleborn, a shapeshifting water-spirit and Undine's uncle. She is now frightened of him and begs him to leave, and Huldbrand tries to attack him, only for him to vanish into a waterfall.

In the city, everyone welcomes Huldbrand back. Bertalda is deeply disappointed when she learns that he is now married, but becomes friends with Undine. One day Kuhleborn visits Undine briefly, warning her of Bertalda. She rejects his warning but reveals at dinner that he told her who Bertalda's true parents are - Undine's own foster parents, the fisherman and his wife, whom she has brought to meet her. Bertalda is the child who they believed had drowned. Instead of the joyful reunion Undine expects, Bertalda feels humiliated to realize that she was born a peasant. She publicly reviles them and calls Undine a witch, but her identity is proven by her birthmarks.

Bertalda’s behavior causes both her foster parents and biological parents to disown her. Destitute, she begs Undine for forgiveness. Undine immediately takes her into her home, but Bertalda remains fearful of her, and Huldbrand's attraction to Bertalda resurfaces, leading to tension.

Undine orders the servants to seal up a fountain in their castle’s courtyard. Bertalda, who uses the water for her complexion, argues with her and complains to Huldbrand. He harshly demands an explanation. Undine explains that she is protecting their home from the malicious Kuhleborn, who would be able to enter through the fountain. She then asks Huldbrand never to speak angrily to her while they are near water, or her relatives will take her away. He contritely agrees.

Bertalda flees the castle in shame, and Huldbrand goes to rescue her. Kuhleborn, in different forms, torments and tricks the pair. He is about to drown them with a flood when Undine arrives, calms the waters, and carries them to safety.

The three live in peace for a while, until they decide to take a trip along the Danube to Vienna. While on the river, Kuhleborn continually torments them with storms, waves and frightening apparitions. The sailors and servants become suspicious of Undine as she magically stops these attacks, and Huldbrand begins to resent her. When a water-spirit steals Bertalda's golden necklace, Undine immediately offers her a coral necklace to replace it. Seeing this as a sign that Undine is colluding with the spirits, Huldbrand throws the coral necklace overboard and accuses her of being a sorceress. As she predicted, Undine disappears into the river, but not before sadly warning him to remain true to her.

Huldbrand grieves her loss, but as time goes on, decides to marry Bertalda. He even asks Father Heilmann to perform the wedding, but he refuses. The priest has received messages from Undine and cautions Huldbrand against breaking his wedding vows by taking another wife while Undine still lives. Huldbrand himself dreams of Undine and Kuhleborn talking beneath the sea, saying that if Huldbrand marries another, Undine will be compelled to kill him. Undine says that she has protected the castle by sealing the fountain, so no water-spirits including herself can go there, but Kuhleborn points out that Huldbrand will be doomed if he ever unseals the fountain or leaves the castle.

Despite these warnings, Huldbrand continues with the wedding. Immediately after the ceremony, Bertalda wishes for water from the sealed fountain. The servants uncover the fountain, only for the veiled and weeping Undine to rise from it. She enters the castle and kisses Huldbrand, drowning him with her tears. She appears once more during his funeral and transforms into a stream encircling his grave, so that she is eternally embracing him.

Inspirations

The story was inspired by the works of the occultist Paracelsus, who coined the term "undine." Paracelsus's Book on Nymphs states that undines can gain an immortal soul by marrying a human. It mentions the French legend of Melusine, in which a water-sprite marries a knight on condition that he shall never see her on Saturdays, when she resumes her mermaid shape, and the German story of Peter von Staufenberg, in which a fairy kills her human lover when he marries another woman.

Fouqué may have been more directly influenced by the Comte de Gabalis, a Rosicrucian novel which adapted Paracelsus's ideas. Another model was probably the 1798 opera Das Donauweibchen, which - like Undine - is set around the Danube and features a love triangle between a man, a woman, and a water nymph.

Success and influence

During the nineteenth century the book was very popular and was, according to The Times in 1843, "a book which, of all others, if you ask for it at a foreign library, you are sure to find engaged".

An unabridged English translation of the story by William Leonard Courtney and illustrated by Arthur Rackham was published in 1909. George MacDonald thought Undine "the most beautiful" of all fairy stories, while Lafcadio Hearn referred to Undine as a "fine German story" in his essay "The Value of the Supernatural in Fiction". The references to Undine in such works as Charlotte Mary Yonge's The Daisy Chain and Louisa Alcott's Little Women show that it was one of the best loved of all books for many 19th-century children.

The first adaptation of Undine was E. T. A. Hoffmann's opera in 1816. It was a collaboration between Hoffmann, who composed the score, and Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué who adapted his own work into a libretto. The opera proved highly successful, and Carl Maria von Weber admired it in his review as the kind of composition which the German desires: "an art work complete in itself, in which partial contributions of the related and collaborating arts blend together, disappear, and, in disappearing, somehow form a new world".

In the 1830s, the novella was translated into Russian dactylic hexameter verse by the Romantic poet Vasily Zhukovsky. This verse translation became a classic in its own right and later provided the basis for the libretto to Tchaikovsky's operatic adaptation. The novella has since inspired numerous similar adaptions in various genres and traditions.

Hans Christian Andersen was influenced by the portrayal of souls in Undine while writing The Little Mermaid. In one of his letters he stated, "I have not, like de la Motte Fouqué in Undine, allowed the mermaid's acquiring of an immortal soul to depend upon an alien creature, upon the love of a human being. I'm sure that's wrong! It would depend rather much on chance, wouldn't it? I won't accept that sort of thing in this world. I have permitted my mermaid to follow a more natural, more divine path."

The breathing disorder known as central hypoventilation syndrome, when first identified in 1962, was nicknamed "Ondine's curse." This was based on a scene in Jean Giraudoux's 1938 play adaptation, Ondine, in which the dying love interest describes his difficulty breathing. Medical literature frequently misunderstood the play and thus confused the symptoms of the disorder, leading to criticism of the name.

Full text

(Charlotte M Yonge translation)

Introduction

Four tales are, it is said, intended by the Author to be appropriate to the Four Seasons: the stern, grave “Sintram”, to winter; the tearful, smiling, fresh “Undine”, to Spring; the torrid deserts of the “Two Captains”, to summer; and the sunset gold of “Aslauga’s Knight”, to autumn. Of these two are before us.

The author of these tales, as well as of many more, was Friedrich, Baron de la Motte Fouque, one of the foremost of the minstrels or tale-tellers of the realm of spiritual chivalry—the realm whither Arthur’s knights departed when they “took the Sancgreal’s holy quest,”—whence Spenser’s Red Cross knight and his fellows came forth on their adventures, and in which the Knight of la Mancha believed, and endeavoured to exist.

La Motte Fouque derived his name and his title from the French Huguenot ancestry, who had fled on the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. His Christian name was taken from his godfather, Frederick the Great, of whom his father was a faithful friend, without compromising his religious principles and practice. Friedrich was born at Brandenburg on February 12, 1777, was educated by good parents at home, served in the Prussian army through disaster and success, took an enthusiastic part in the rising of his country against Napoleon, inditing as many battle-songs as Korner. When victory was achieved, he dedicated his sword in the church of Neunhausen where his estate lay. He lived there, with his beloved wife and his imagination, till his death in 1843.

And all the time life was to him a poet’s dream. He lived in a continual glamour of spiritual romance, bathing everything, from the old deities of the Valhalla down to the champions of German liberation, in an ideal glow of purity and nobleness, earnestly Christian throughout, even in his dealings with Northern mythology, for he saw Christ unconsciously shown in Baldur, and Satan in Loki.

Thus he lived, felt, and believed what he wrote, and though his dramas and poems do not rise above fair mediocrity, and the great number of his prose stories are injured by a certain monotony, the charm of them is in their elevation of sentiment and the earnest faith pervading all. His knights might be Sir Galahad—

           “My strength is as the strength of ten,
            Because my heart is pure.”

Evil comes to them as something to be conquered, generally as a form of magic enchantment, and his “wondrous fair maidens” are worthy of them. Yet there is adventure enough to afford much pleasure, and often we have a touch of true genius, which has given actual ideas to the world, and precious ones.

This genius is especially traceable in his two masterpieces, Sintram and Undine. Sintram was inspired by Albert Durer’s engraving of the “Knight of Death,” of which we give a presentation. It was sent to Fouque by his friend Edward Hitzig, with a request that he would compose a ballad on it. The date of the engraving is 1513, and we quote the description given by the late Rev. R. St. John Tyrwhitt, showing how differently it may be read.

“Some say it is the end of the strong wicked man, just overtaken by Death and Sin, whom he has served on earth. It is said that the tuft on the lance indicates his murderous character, being of such unusual size. You know the use of that appendage was to prevent blood running down from the spearhead to the hands. They also think that the object under the horse’s off hind foot is a snare, into which the old oppressor is to fall instantly. The expression of the faces may be taken either way: both good men and bad may have hard, regular features; and both good men and bad would set their teeth grimly on seeing Death, with the sands of their life nearly run out. Some say they think the expression of Death gentle, or only admonitory (as the author of “Sintram”); and I have to thank the authoress of the “Heir of Redclyffe” for showing me a fine impression of the plate, where Death certainly had a not ungentle countenance—snakes and all. I think the shouldered lance, and quiet, firm seat on horseback, with gentle bearing on the curb-bit, indicate grave resolution in the rider, and that a robber knight would have his lance in rest; then there is the leafy crown on the horse’s head; and the horse and dog move on so quietly, that I am inclined to hope the best for the Ritter.”

Musing on the mysterious engraving, Fouque saw in it the life-long companions of man, Death and Sin, whom he must defy in order to reach salvation; and out of that contemplation rose his wonderful romance, not exactly an allegory, where every circumstance can be fitted with an appropriate meaning, but with the sense of the struggle of life, with external temptation and hereditary inclination pervading all, while Grace and Prayer aid the effort. Folko and Gabrielle are revived from the Magic Ring, that Folko may by example and influence enhance all higher resolutions; while Gabrielle, in all unconscious innocence, awakes the passions, and thus makes the conquest the harder.

It is within the bounds of possibility that the similarities of folk-lore may have brought to Fouque’s knowledge the outline of the story which Scott tells us was the germ of “Guy Mannering”; where a boy, whose horoscope had been drawn by an astrologer, as likely to encounter peculiar trials at certain intervals, actually had, in his twenty-first year, a sort of visible encounter with the Tempter, and came off conqueror by his strong faith in the Bible. Sir Walter, between reverence and realism, only took the earlier part of the story, but Fouque gives us the positive struggle, and carries us along with the final victory and subsequent peace. His tale has had a remarkable power over the readers. We cannot but mention two remarkable instances at either end of the scale. Cardinal Newman, in his younger days, was so much overcome by it that he hurried out into the garden to read it alone, and returned with traces of emotion in his face. And when Charles Lowder read it to his East End boys, their whole minds seemed engrossed by it, and they even called certain spots after the places mentioned. Imagine the Rocks of the Moon in Ratcliff Highway!

May we mention that Miss Christabel Coleridge’s “Waynflete” brings something of the spirit and idea of “Sintram” into modern life?

“Undine” is a story of much lighter fancy, and full of a peculiar grace, though with a depth of melancholy that endears it. No doubt it was founded on the universal idea in folk-lore of the nixies or water-spirits, one of whom, in Norwegian legend, was seen weeping bitterly because of the want of a soul. Sometimes the nymph is a wicked siren like the Lorelei; but in many of these tales she weds an earthly lover, and deserts him after a time, sometimes on finding her diving cap, or her seal-skin garment, which restores her to her ocean kindred, sometimes on his intruding on her while she is under a periodical transformation, as with the fairy Melusine, more rarely if he becomes unfaithful.

There is a remarkable Cornish tale of a nymph or mermaiden, who thus vanished, leaving a daughter who loved to linger on the beach rather than sport with other children. By and by she had a lover, but no sooner did he show tokens of inconstancy, than the mother came up from the sea and put him to death, when the daughter pined away and died. Her name was Selina, which gives the tale a modern aspect, and makes us wonder if the old tradition can have been modified by some report of Undine’s story.

There was an idea set forth by the Rosicrucians of spirits abiding in the elements, and as Undine represented the water influences, Fouque’s wife, the Baroness Caroline, wrote a fairly pretty story on the sylphs of fire. But Undine’s freakish playfulness and mischief as an elemental being, and her sweet patience when her soul is won, are quite original, and indeed we cannot help sharing, or at least understanding, Huldbrand’s beginning to shrink from the unearthly creature to something of his own flesh and blood. He is altogether unworthy, and though in this tale there is far less of spiritual meaning than in Sintram, we cannot but see that Fouque’s thought was that the grosser human nature is unable to appreciate what is absolutely pure and unearthly.

C. M. YONGE.

UNDINE

TO UNDINE

Undine! thou fair and lovely sprite, Since first from out an ancient lay I saw gleam forth thy fitful light, How hast thou sung my cares away!

How hast thou nestled next my heart, And gently offered to impart Thy sorrows to my listening ear, Like a half-shy, half-trusting child, The while my lute, in wood-notes wild, Thine accents echoed far and near!

Then many a youth I won to muse With love on thy mysterious ways, With many a fair one to peruse The legend of thy wondrous days.

And now both dame and youth would fain List to my tale yet once again; Nay, sweet Undine, be not afraid! Enter their halls with footsteps light, Greet courteously each noble knight, But fondly every German maid.

And should they ask concerning me, Oh, say, “He is a cavalier, Who truly serves and valiantly, In tourney and festivity, With lute and sword, each lady fair!”

CHAPTER 1 On a beautiful evening, many hundred years ago, a worthy old fisherman sat mending his nets. The spot where he dwelt was exceedingly picturesque. The green turf on which he had built his cottage ran far out into a great lake; and this slip of verdure appeared to stretch into it as much through love of its clear waters as the lake, moved by a like impulse, strove to fold the meadow, with its waving grass and flowers, and the cooling shade of the trees, in its embrace of love. They seemed to be drawn toward each other, and the one to be visiting the other as a guest.

With respect to human beings, indeed, in this pleasant spot, excepting the fisherman and his family, there were few, or rather none, to be met with. For as in the background of the scene, toward the west and north-west, lay a forest of extraordinary wildness, which, owing to its sunless gloom and almost impassable recesses, as well as to fear of the strange creatures and visionary illusions to be encountered in it, most people avoided entering, unless in cases of extreme necessity. The pious old fisherman, however, many times passed through it without harm, when he carried the fine fish which he caught by his beautiful strip of land to a great city lying only a short distance beyond the forest.

Now the reason he was able to go through this wood with so much ease may have been chiefly this, because he entertained scarcely any thoughts but such as were of a religious nature; and besides, every time he crossed the evil-reported shades, he used to sing some holy song with a clear voice and from a sincere heart.

Well, while he sat by his nets this evening, neither fearing nor devising evil, a sudden terror seized him, as he heard a rushing in the darkness of the wood, that resembled the tramping of a mounted steed, and the noise continued every instant drawing nearer and nearer to his little territory.

What he had fancied, when abroad in many a stormy night, respecting the mysteries of the forest, now flashed through his mind in a moment, especially the figure of a man of gigantic stature and snow-white appearance, who kept nodding his head in a portentous manner. And when he raised his eyes towards the wood, the form came before him in perfect distinctness, as he saw the nodding man burst forth from the mazy web-work of leaves and branches. But he immediately felt emboldened, when he reflected that nothing to give him alarm had ever befallen him even in the forest; and moreover, that on this open neck of land the evil spirit, it was likely, would be still less daring in the exercise of his power. At the same time he prayed aloud with the most earnest sincerity of devotion, repeating a passage of the Bible. This inspired him with fresh courage, and soon perceiving the illusion, and the strange mistake into which his imagination had betrayed him, he could with difficulty refrain from laughing. The white nodding figure he had seen became transformed, in the twinkling of an eye, to what in reality it was, a small brook, long and familiarly known to him, which ran foaming from the forest, and discharged itself into the lake.

But what had caused the startling sound was a knight arrayed in sumptuous apparel, who from under the shadows of the trees came riding toward the cottage. His doublet was violet embroidered with gold, and his scarlet cloak hung gracefully over it; on his cap of burnished gold waved red and violet-coloured plumes; and in his golden shoulder-belt flashed a sword, richly ornamented, and extremely beautiful. The white barb that bore the knight was more slenderly built than war-horses usually are, and he touched the turf with a step so light and elastic that the green and flowery carpet seemed hardly to receive the slightest injury from his tread. The old fisherman, notwithstanding, did not feel perfectly secure in his mind, although he was forced to believe that no evil could be feared from an appearance so pleasing, and therefore, as good manners dictated, he took off his hat on the knight’s coming near, and quietly remained by the side of his nets.

When the stranger stopped, and asked whether he, with his horse, could have shelter and entertainment there for the night, the fisherman returned answer: “As to your horse, fair sir, I have no better stable for him than this shady meadow, and no better provender than the grass that is growing here. But with respect to yourself, you shall be welcome to our humble cottage, and to the best supper and lodging we are able to give you.”

The knight was well contented with this reception; and alighting from his horse, which his host assisted him to relieve from saddle and bridle, he let him hasten away to the fresh pasture, and thus spoke: “Even had I found you less hospitable and kindly disposed, my worthy old friend, you would still, I suspect, hardly have got rid of me to-day; for here, I perceive, a broad lake lies before us, and as to riding back into that wood of wonders, with the shades of evening deepening around me, may Heaven in its grace preserve me from the thought.”

“Pray, not a word of the wood, or of returning into it!” said the fisherman, and took his guest into the cottage.

There beside the hearth, from which a frugal fire was diffusing its light through the clean twilight room, sat the fisherman’s aged wife in a great chair. At the entrance of their noble guest, she rose and gave him a courteous welcome, but sat down again in her seat of honour, not making the slightest offer of it to the stranger. Upon this the fisherman said with a smile:

“You must not be offended with her, young gentleman, because she has not given up to you the best chair in the house; it is a custom among poor people to look upon this as the privilege of the aged.”

“Why, husband!” cried the old lady, with a quiet smile, “where can your wits be wandering? Our guest, to say the least of him, must belong to a Christian country; and how is it possible, then, that so well-bred a young man as he appears to be could dream of driving old people from their chairs? Take a seat, my young master,” continued she, turning to the knight; “there is still quite a snug little chair on the other side of the room there, only be careful not to shove it about too roughly, for one of its legs, I fear, is none of the firmest.”

The knight brought up the seat as carefully as she could desire, sat down upon it good-humouredly, and it seemed to him almost as if he must be somehow related to this little household, and have just returned home from abroad.

These three worthy people now began to converse in the most friendly and familiar manner. In relation to the forest, indeed, concerning which the knight occasionally made some inquiries, the old man chose to know and say but little; he was of opinion that slightly touching upon it at this hour of twilight was most suitable and safe; but of the cares and comforts of their home, and their business abroad, the aged couple spoke more freely, and listened also with eager curiosity as the knight recounted to them his travels, and how he had a castle near one of the sources of the Danube, and that his name was Sir Huldbrand of Ringstetten.

Already had the stranger, while they were in the midst of their talk, heard at times a splash against the little low window, as if some one were dashing water against it. The old man, every time he heard the noise, knit his brows with vexation; but at last, when the whole sweep of a shower came pouring like a torrent against the panes, and bubbling through the decayed frame into the room, he started up indignant, rushed to the window, and cried with a threatening voice—

“Undine! will you never leave off these fooleries?—not even to-day, when we have a stranger knight with us in the cottage?”

All without now became still, only a low laugh was just audible, and the fisherman said, as he came back to his seat, “You will have the goodness, my honoured guest, to pardon this freak, and it may be a multitude more; but she has no thought of evil or of any harm. This mischievous Undine, to confess the truth, is our adopted daughter, and she stoutly refuses to give over this frolicsome childishness of hers, although she has already entered her eighteenth year. But in spite of this, as I said before, she is at heart one of the very best children in the world.”

“YOU may say so,” broke in the old lady, shaking her head; “you can give a better account of her than I can. When you return home from fishing, or from selling your fish in the city, you may think her frolics very delightful, but to have her dancing about you the whole day long, and never from morning to night to hear her speak one word of sense; and then as she grows older, instead of having any help from her in the family, to find her a continual cause of anxiety, lest her wild humours should completely ruin us, that is quite another thing, and enough at last to weary out the patience even of a saint.”

“Well, well,” replied the master of the house with a smile, “you have your trials with Undine, and I have mine with the lake. The lake often beats down my dams, and breaks the meshes of my nets, but for all that I have a strong affection for it, and so have you, in spite of your mighty crosses and vexations, for our graceful little child. Is it not true?”

“One cannot be very angry with her,” answered the old lady, as she gave her husband an approving smile.

That instant the door flew open, and a fair girl, of wondrous beauty, sprang laughing in, and said, “You have only been making a mock of me, father; for where now is the guest you mentioned?”

The same moment, however, she perceived the knight also, and continued standing before the young man in fixed astonishment. Huldbrand was charmed with her graceful figure, and viewed her lovely features with the more intense interest, as he imagined it was only her surprise that allowed him the opportunity, and that she would soon turn away from his gaze with increased bashfulness. But the event was the very reverse of what he expected; for, after looking at him for a long while, she became more confident, moved nearer, knelt down before him, and while she played with a gold medal which he wore attached to a rich chain on his breast, exclaimed,

“Why, you beautiful, you kind guest! how have you reached our poor cottage at last? Have you been obliged for years and years to wander about the world before you could catch one glimpse of our nook? Do you come out of that wild forest, my beautiful knight?”

The old woman was so prompt in her reproof as to allow him no time to answer. She commanded the maiden to rise, show better manners, and go to her work. But Undine, without making any reply, drew a little footstool near Huldbrand’s chair, sat down upon it with her netting, and said in a gentle tone—

“I will work here.”

The old man did as parents are apt to do with children to whom they have been over-indulgent. He affected to observe nothing of Undine’s strange behaviour, and was beginning to talk about something else. But this the maiden did not permit him to do. She broke in upon him, “I have asked our kind guest from whence he has come among us, and he has not yet answered me.”

“I come out of the forest, you lovely little vision,” Huldbrand returned; and she spoke again:

“You must also tell me how you came to enter that forest, so feared and shunned, and the marvellous adventures you met with in it; for there is no escaping without something of this kind.”

Huldbrand felt a slight shudder on remembering what he had witnessed, and looked involuntarily toward the window, for it seemed to him that one of the strange shapes which had come upon him in the forest must be there grinning in through the glass; but he discerned nothing except the deep darkness of night, which had now enveloped the whole prospect. Upon this he became more collected, and was just on the point of beginning his account, when the old man thus interrupted him:

“Not so, sir knight; this is by no means a fit hour for such relations.”

But Undine, in a state of high excitement, sprang up from her little stool and cried, placing herself directly before the fisherman: “He shall NOT tell his story, father? he shall not? But it is my will:—he shall!—stop him who may!”

Thus speaking, she stamped her little foot vehemently on the floor, but all with an air of such comic and good-humoured simplicity, that Huldbrand now found it quite as hard to withdraw his gaze from her wild emotion as he had before from her gentleness and beauty. The old man, on the contrary, burst out in unrestrained displeasure. He severely reproved Undine for her disobedience and her unbecoming carriage towards the stranger, and his good old wife joined him in harping on the same string.

By these rebukes Undine was only excited the more. “If you want to quarrel with me,” she cried, “and will not let me hear what I so much desire, then sleep alone in your smoky old hut!” And swift as an arrow she shot from the door, and vanished amid the darkness of the night.

Huldbrand and the fisherman sprang from their seats, and were rushing to stop the angry girl; but before they could reach the cottage-door, she had disappeared in the stormy darkness without, and no sound, not so much even as that of her light footstep, betrayed the course she had taken. Huldbrand threw a glance of inquiry towards his host; it almost seemed to him as if the whole of the sweet apparition, which had so suddenly plunged again amid the night, were no other than a continuation of the wonderful forms that had just played their mad pranks with him in the forest. But the old man muttered between his teeth,

“This is not the first time she has treated us in this manner. Now must our hearts be filled with anxiety, and our eyes find no sleep for the whole night; for who can assure us, in spite of her past escapes, that she will not some time or other come to harm, if she thus continue out in the dark and alone until daylight?”

“Then pray, for God’s sake, father, let us follow her,” cried Huldbrand anxiously.

“Wherefore should we?” replied the old man. “It would be a sin were I to suffer you, all alone, to search after the foolish girl amid the lonesomeness of night; and my old limbs would fail to carry me to this wild rover, even if I knew to what place she has betaken herself.”

“Still we ought at least to call after her, and beg her to return,” said Huldbrand; and he began to call in tones of earnest entreaty, “Undine! Undine! come back, come back!”

The old man shook his head, and said, “All your shouting, however loud and long, will be of no avail; you know not as yet, sir knight, how self-willed the little thing is.” But still, even hoping against hope, he could not himself cease calling out every minute, amid the gloom of night, “Undine! ah, dear Undine! I beseech you, pray come back—only this once.”

It turned out, however, exactly as the fisherman had said. No Undine could they hear or see; and as the old man would on no account consent that Huldbrand should go in quest of the fugitive, they were both obliged at last to return into the cottage. There they found the fire on the hearth almost gone out, and the mistress of the house, who took Undine’s flight and danger far less to heart than her husband, had already gone to rest. The old man blew up the coals, put on dry wood, and by the firelight hunted for a flask of wine, which he brought and set between himself and his guest.

“You, sir knight, as well as I,” said he, “are anxious on the silly girl’s account; and it would be better, I think, to spend part of the night in chatting and drinking, than keep turning and turning on our rush-mats, and trying in vain to sleep. What is your opinion?”

Huldbrand was well pleased with the plan; the fisherman pressed him to take the empty seat of honour, its late occupant having now left it for her couch; and they relished their beverage and enjoyed their chat as two such good men and true ever ought to do. To be sure, whenever the slightest thing moved before the windows, or at times when even nothing was moving, one of them would look up and exclaim, “Here she comes!” Then would they continue silent a few moments, and afterward, when nothing appeared, would shake their heads, breathe out a sigh, and go on with their talk.

But, as neither could think of anything but Undine, the best plan they could devise was, that the old fisherman should relate, and the knight should hear, in what manner Undine had come to the cottage. So the fisherman began as follows:

“It is now about fifteen years since I one day crossed the wild forest with fish for the city market. My wife had remained at home as she was wont to do; and at this time for a reason of more than common interest, for although we were beginning to feel the advances of age, God had bestowed upon us an infant of wonderful beauty. It was a little girl; and we already began to ask ourselves the question, whether we ought not, for the advantage of the new-comer, to quit our solitude, and, the better to bring up this precious gift of Heaven, to remove to some more inhabited place. Poor people, to be sure, cannot in these cases do all you may think they ought, sir knight; but we must all do what we can.

“Well, I went on my way, and this affair would keep running in my head. This slip of land was most dear to me, and I trembled when, amidst the bustle and broils of the city, I thought to myself, ‘In a scene of tumult like this, or at least in one not much more quiet, I must soon take up my abode.’ But I did not for this murmur against our good God; on the contrary, I praised Him in silence for the new-born babe. I should also speak an untruth, were I to say that anything befell me, either on my passage through the forest to the city, or on my returning homeward, that gave me more alarm than usual, as at that time I had never seen any appearance there which could terrify or annoy me. The Lord was ever with me in those awful shades.”

Thus speaking he took his cap reverently from his bald head, and continued to sit for a considerable time in devout thought. He then covered himself again, and went on with his relation.

“On this side the forest, alas! it was on this side, that woe burst upon me. My wife came wildly to meet me, clad in mourning apparel, and her eyes streaming with tears. ‘Gracious God!’ I cried, ‘where’s our child? Speak!’

“‘With Him on whom you have called, dear husband,’ she answered, and we now entered the cottage together, weeping in silence. I looked for the little corpse, almost fearing to find what I was seeking; and then it was I first learnt how all had happened.

“My wife had taken the little one in her arms, and walked out to the shore of the lake. She there sat down by its very brink; and while she was playing with the infant, as free from all fear as she was full of delight, it bent forward on a sudden, as if seeing something very beautiful in the water. My wife saw her laugh, the dear angel, and try to catch the image in her tiny hands; but in a moment—with a motion swifter than sight—she sprang from her mother’s arms, and sank in the lake, the watery glass into which she had been gazing. I searched for our lost darling again and again; but it was all in vain; I could nowhere find the least trace of her.

“The same evening we childless parents were sitting together by our cottage hearth. We had no desire to talk, even if our tears would have permitted us. As we thus sat in mournful stillness, gazing into the fire, all at once we heard something without,—a slight rustling at the door. The door flew open, and we saw a little girl, three or four years old, and more beautiful than I can say, standing on the threshold, richly dressed, and smiling upon us. We were struck dumb with astonishment, and I knew not for a time whether the tiny form were a real human being, or a mere mockery of enchantment. But I soon perceived water dripping from her golden hair and rich garments, and that the pretty child had been lying in the water, and stood in immediate need of our help.

“‘Wife,’ said I, ‘no one has been able to save our child for us; but let us do for others what would have made us so blessed could any one have done it for us.’

“We undressed the little thing, put her to bed, and gave her something to drink; at all this she spoke not a word, but only turned her eyes upon us—eyes blue and bright as sea or sky—and continued looking at us with a smile.

“Next morning we had no reason to fear that she had received any other harm than her wetting, and I now asked her about her parents, and how she could have come to us. But the account she gave was both confused and incredible. She must surely have been born far from here, not only because I have been unable for these fifteen years to learn anything of her birth, but because she then said, and at times continues to say, many things of so very singular a nature, that we neither of us know, after all, whether she may not have dropped among us from the moon; for her talk runs upon golden castles, crystal domes, and Heaven knows what extravagances beside. What, however, she related with most distinctness was this: that while she was once taking a sail with her mother on the great lake, she fell out of the boat into the water; and that when she first recovered her senses, she was here under our trees, where the gay scenes of the shore filled her with delight.

“We now had another care weighing upon our minds, and one that caused us no small perplexity and uneasiness. We of course very soon determined to keep and bring up the child we had found, in place of our own darling that had been drowned; but who could tell us whether she had been baptized or not? She herself could give us no light on the subject. When we asked her the question, she commonly made answer, that she well knew she was created for God’s praise and glory, and that she was willing to let us do with her all that might promote His glory and praise.

“My wife and I reasoned in this way: ‘If she has not been baptized, there can be no use in putting off the ceremony; and if she has been, it still is better to have too much of a good thing than too little.’

“Taking this view of our difficulty, we now endeavoured to hit upon a good name for the child, since, while she remained without one, we were often at a loss, in our familiar talk, to know what to call her. We at length agreed that Dorothea would be most suitable for her, as I had somewhere heard it said that this name signified a gift of God, and surely she had been sent to us by Providence as a gift, to comfort us in our misery. She, on the contrary, would not so much as hear Dorothea mentioned; she insisted, that as she had been named Undine by her parents, Undine she ought still to be called. It now occurred to me that this was a heathenish name, to be found in no calendar, and I resolved to ask the advice of a priest in the city. He would not listen to the name of Undine; and yielding to my urgent request, he came with me through the enchanted forest in order to perform the rite of baptism here in my cottage.

“The little maid stood before us so prettily adorned, and with such an air of gracefulness, that the heart of the priest softened at once in her presence; and she coaxed him so sweetly, and jested with him so merrily, that he at last remembered nothing of his many objections to the name of Undine.

“Thus, then, was she baptized Undine; and during the holy ceremony she behaved with great propriety and gentleness, wild and wayward as at other times she invariably was; for in this my wife was quite right, when she mentioned the anxiety the child has occasioned us. If I should relate to you—”

At this moment the knight interrupted the fisherman, to direct his attention to a deep sound as of a rushing flood, which had caught his ear during the talk of the old man. And now the waters came pouring on with redoubled fury before the cottage-windows. Both sprang to the door. There they saw, by the light of the now risen moon, the brook which issued from the wood rushing wildly over its banks, and whirling onward with it both stones and branches of trees in its rapid course. The storm, as if awakened by the uproar, burst forth from the clouds, whose immense masses of vapour coursed over the moon with the swiftness of thought; the lake roared beneath the wind that swept the foam from its waves; while the trees of this narrow peninsula groaned from root to topmost branch as they bowed and swung above the torrent.

“Undine! in God’s name, Undine!” cried the two men in an agony. No answer was returned. And now, regardless of everything else, they hurried from the cottage, one in this direction, the other in that, searching and calling.

CHAPTER 2 The longer Huldbrand sought Undine beneath the shades of night, and failed to find her, the more anxious and confused he became. The impression that she was a mere phantom of the forest gained a new ascendency over him; indeed, amid the howling of the waves and the tempest, the crashing of the trees, and the entire change of the once so peaceful and beautiful scene, he was tempted to view the whole peninsula, together with the cottage and its inhabitants, as little more than some mockery of his senses. But still he heard afar off the fisherman’s anxious and incessant shouting, “Undine!” and also his aged wife, who was praying and singing psalms.

At length, when he drew near to the brook, which had overflowed its banks, he perceived by the moonlight, that it had taken its wild course directly in front of the haunted forest, so as to change the peninsula into an island.

“Merciful God!” he breathed to himself, “if Undine has ventured a step within that fearful wood, what will become of her? Perhaps it was all owing to her sportive and wayward spirit, because I would give her no account of my adventures there. And now the stream is rolling between us, she may be weeping alone on the other side in the midst of spectral horrors!”

A shuddering groan escaped him; and clambering over some stones and trunks of overthrown pines, in order to step into the impetuous current, he resolved, either by wading or swimming, to seek the wanderer on the further shore. He felt, it is true, all the dread and shrinking awe creeping over him which he had already suffered by daylight among the now tossing and roaring branches of the forest. More than all, a tall man in white, whom he knew but too well, met his view, as he stood grinning and nodding on the grass beyond the water. But even monstrous forms like this only impelled him to cross over toward them, when the thought rushed upon him that Undine might be there alone and in the agony of death.

He had already grasped a strong branch of a pine, and stood supporting himself upon it in the whirling current, against which he could with difficulty keep himself erect; but he advanced deeper in with a courageous spirit. That instant a gentle voice of warning cried near him, “Do not venture, do not venture!—that OLD MAN, the STREAM, is too full of tricks to be trusted!” He knew the soft tones of the voice; and while he stood as it were entranced beneath the shadows which had now duskily veiled the moon, his head swam with the swelling and rolling of the waves as he saw them momentarily rising above his knee. Still he disdained the thought of giving up his purpose.

“If you are not really there, if you are merely gambolling round me like a mist, may I, too, bid farewell to life, and become a shadow like you, dear, dear Undine!” Thus calling aloud, he again moved deeper into the stream. “Look round you—ah, pray look round you, beautiful young stranger! why rush on death so madly?” cried the voice a second time close by him; and looking on one side he perceived, by the light of the moon, again cloudless, a little island formed by the flood; and crouching upon its flowery turf, beneath the branches of embowering trees, he saw the smiling and lovely Undine.

O how much more gladly than before the young man now plied his sturdy staff! A few steps, and he had crossed the flood that was rushing between himself and the maiden; and he stood near her on the little spot of greensward in security, protected by the old trees. Undine half rose, and she threw her arms around his neck to draw him gently down upon the soft seat by her side.

“Here you shall tell me your story, my beautiful friend,” she breathed in a low whisper; “here the cross old people cannot disturb us; and, besides, our roof of leaves here will make quite as good a shelter as their poor cottage.”

“It is heaven itself,” cried Huldbrand; and folding her in his arms, he kissed the lovely girl with fervour.

The old fisherman, meantime, had come to the margin of the stream, and he shouted across, “Why, how is this, sir knight! I received you with the welcome which one true-hearted man gives to another; and now you sit there caressing my foster-child in secret, while you suffer me in my anxiety to wander through the night in quest of her.”

“Not till this moment did I find her myself, old father,” cried the knight across the water.

“So much the better,” said the fisherman, “but now make haste, and bring her over to me upon firm ground.”

To this, however, Undine would by no means consent. She declared that she would rather enter the wild forest itself with the beautiful stranger, than return to the cottage where she was so thwarted in her wishes, and from which the knight would soon or late go away. Then, throwing her arms round Huldbrand, she sang the following verse with the warbling sweetness of a bird:

    “A rill would leave its misty vale,
    And fortunes wild explore,
    Weary at length it reached the main,
    And sought its vale no more.”

The old fisherman wept bitterly at her song, but his emotion seemed to awaken little or no sympathy in her. She kissed and caressed her new friend, who at last said to her: “Undine, if the distress of the old man does not touch your heart, it cannot but move mine. We ought to return to him.”

She opened her large blue eyes upon him in amazement, and spoke at last with a slow and doubtful accent, “If you think so, it is well, all is right to me which you think right. But the old man over there must first give me his promise that he will allow you, without objection, to relate what you saw in the wood, and—well, other things will settle themselves.”

“Come—only come!” cried the fisherman to her, unable to utter another word. At the same time he stretched his arms wide over the current towards her, and to give her assurance that he would do what she required, nodded his head. This motion caused his white hair to fall strangely over his face, and Huldbrand could not but remember the nodding white man of the forest. Without allowing anything, however, to produce in him the least confusion, the young knight took the beautiful girl in his arms, and bore her across the narrow channel which the stream had torn away between her little island and the solid shore. The old man fell upon Undine’s neck, and found it impossible either to express his joy or to kiss her enough; even the ancient dame came up and embraced the recovered girl most cordially. Every word of censure was carefully avoided; the more so, indeed, as even Undine, forgetting her waywardness, almost overwhelmed her foster-parents with caresses and the prattle of tenderness.

When at length the excess of their joy at recovering their child had subsided, morning had already dawned, shining upon the waters of the lake; the tempest had become hushed, the small birds sung merrily on the moist branches.

As Undine now insisted upon hearing the recital of the knight’s promised adventures, the aged couple readily agreed to her wish. Breakfast was brought out beneath the trees which stood behind the cottage toward the lake on the north, and they sat down to it with contented hearts; Undine at the knight’s feet on the grass. These arrangements being made, Huldbrand began his story in the following manner:—

“It is now about eight days since I rode into the free imperial city which lies yonder on the farther side of the forest. Soon after my arrival a splendid tournament and running at the ring took place there, and I spared neither my horse nor my lance in the encounters.

“Once while I was pausing at the lists to rest from the brisk exercise, and was handing back my helmet to one of my attendants, a female figure of extraordinary beauty caught my attention, as, most magnificently attired, she stood looking on at one of the balconies. I learned, on making inquiry of a person near me, that the name of the young lady was Bertalda, and that she was a foster-daughter of one of the powerful dukes of this country. She too, I observed, was gazing at me, and the consequences were such as we young knights are wont to experience; whatever success in riding I might have had before, I was now favoured with still better fortune. That evening I was Bertalda’s partner in the dance, and I enjoyed the same distinction during the remainder of the festival.”

A sharp pain in his left hand, as it hung carelessly beside him, here interrupted Huldbrand’s relation, and drew his eye to the part affected. Undine had fastened her pearly teeth, and not without some keenness too, upon one of his fingers, appearing at the same time very gloomy and displeased. On a sudden, however, she looked up in his eyes with an expression of tender melancholy, and whispered almost inaudibly,—

“It is all your own fault.”

She then covered her face; and the knight, strangely embarrassed and thoughtful, went on with his story.

“This lady, Bertalda, of whom I spoke, is of a proud and wayward spirit. The second day I saw her she pleased me by no means so much as she had the first, and the third day still less. But I continued about her because she showed me more favour than she did any other knight, and it so happened that I playfully asked her to give me one of her gloves. ‘When you have entered the haunted forest all alone,’ said she; ‘when you have explored its wonders, and brought me a full account of them, the glove is yours.’ As to getting her glove, it was of no importance to me whatever, but the word had been spoken, and no honourable knight would permit himself to be urged to such a proof of valour a second time.”

“I thought,” said Undine, interrupting him, “that she loved you.”

“It did appear so,” replied Huldbrand.

“Well!” exclaimed the maiden, laughing, “this is beyond belief; she must be very stupid. To drive from her one who was dear to her! And worse than all, into that ill-omened wood! The wood and its mysteries, for all I should have cared, might have waited long enough.”

“Yesterday morning, then,” pursued the knight, smiling kindly upon Undine, “I set out from the city, my enterprise before me. The early light lay rich upon the verdant turf. It shone so rosy on the slender boles of the trees, and there was so merry a whispering among the leaves, that in my heart I could not but laugh at people who feared meeting anything to terrify them in a spot so delicious. ‘I shall soon pass through the forest, and as speedily return,’ I said to myself, in the overflow of joyous feeling, and ere I was well aware, I had entered deep among the green shades, while of the plain that lay behind me I was no longer able to catch a glimpse.

“Then the conviction for the first time impressed me, that in a forest of so great extent I might very easily become bewildered, and that this, perhaps, might be the only danger which was likely to threaten those who explored its recesses. So I made a halt, and turned myself in the direction of the sun, which had meantime risen somewhat higher, and while I was looking up to observe it, I saw something black among the boughs of a lofty oak. My first thought was, ‘It is a bear!’ and I grasped my weapon. The object then accosted me from above in a human voice, but in a tone most harsh and hideous: ‘If I, overhead here, do not gnaw off these dry branches, Sir Noodle, what shall we have to roast you with when midnight comes?’ And with that it grinned, and made such a rattling with the branches that my courser became mad with affright, and rushed furiously forward with me before I had time to see distinctly what sort of a devil’s beast it was.”

“You must not speak so,” said the old fisherman, crossing himself. His wife did the same, without saying a word, and Undine, while her eye sparkled with delight, looked at the knight and said, “The best of the story is, however, that as yet they have not roasted you! Go on, now, you beautiful knight.”

The knight then went on with his adventures. “My horse was so wild, that he well-nigh rushed with me against limbs and trunks of trees. He was dripping with sweat through terror, heat, and the violent straining of his muscles. Still he refused to slacken his career. At last, altogether beyond my control, he took his course directly up a stony steep, when suddenly a tall white man flashed before me, and threw himself athwart the way my mad steed was taking. At this apparition he shuddered with new affright, and stopped trembling. I took this chance of recovering my command of him, and now for the first time perceived that my deliverer, so far from being a white man, was only a brook of silver brightness, foaming near me in its descent from the hill, while it crossed and arrested my horse’s course with its rush of waters.”

“Thanks, thanks, dear brook!” cried Undine, clapping her little hands. But the old man shook his head, and looked down in deep thought.

“Hardly had I well settled myself in my saddle, and got the reins in my grasp again,” Huldbrand pursued, “when a wizard-like dwarf of a man was already standing at my side, diminutive and ugly beyond conception, his complexion of a brownish-yellow, and his nose scarcely smaller than the rest of him together. The fellow’s mouth was slit almost from ear to ear, and he showed his teeth with a grinning smile of idiot courtesy, while he overwhelmed me with bows and scrapes innumerable. The farce now becoming excessively irksome, I thanked him in the fewest words I could well use, turned about my still trembling charger, and purposed either to seek another adventure, or, should I meet with none, to take my way back to the city; for the sun, during my wild chase, had passed the meridian, and was now hastening toward the west. But this villain of a dwarf sprang at the same instant, and, with a turn as rapid as lightning, stood before my horse again. ‘Clear the way there!’ I cried fiercely; ‘the beast is wild, and will make nothing of running over you.’

“‘Ay, ay,’ cried the imp with a snarl, and snorting out a laugh still more frightfully idiotic; ‘pay me, first pay what you owe me. I stopped your fine little nag for you; without my help, both you and he would be now sprawling below there in that stony ravine. Hu! from what a horrible plunge I’ve saved you!’

“‘Well, don’t make any more faces,’ said I, ‘but take your money and be off, though every word you say is false. It was the brook there, you miserable thing, and not you, that saved me,’ and at the same time I dropped a piece of gold into his wizard cap, which he had taken from his head while he was begging before me.

“I then trotted off and left him, but he screamed after me; and on a sudden, with inconceivable quickness, he was close by my side. I started my horse into a gallop. He galloped on with me, though it seemed with great difficulty, and with a strange movement, half ludicrous and half horrible, forcing at the same time every limb and feature into distortion, he held up the gold piece and screamed at every leap, ‘Counterfeit! false! false coin! counterfeit!’ and such was the strange sound that issued from his hollow breast, you would have supposed that at every scream he must have tumbled upon the ground dead. All this while his disgusting red tongue hung lolling from his mouth.

“I stopped bewildered, and asked, ‘What do you mean by this screaming? Take another piece of gold, take two, but leave me.’

“He then began again his hideous salutations of courtesy, and snarled out as before, ‘Not gold, it shall not be gold, my young gentleman. I have too much of that trash already, as I will show you in no time.’

“At that moment, and thought itself could not have been more instantaneous, I seemed to have acquired new powers of sight. I could see through the solid green plain, as if it were green glass, and the smooth surface of the earth were round as a globe, and within it I saw crowds of goblins, who were pursuing their pastime and making themselves merry with silver and gold. They were tumbling and rolling about, heads up and heads down; they pelted one another in sport with the precious metals, and with irritating malice blew gold-dust in one another’s eyes. My odious companion ordered the others to reach him up a vast quantity of gold; this he showed to me with a laugh, and then flung it again ringing and chinking down the measureless abyss.

“After this contemptuous disregard of gold, he held up the piece I had given him, showing it to his brother goblins below, and they laughed immoderately at a coin so worthless, and hissed me. At last, raising their fingers all smutched with ore, they pointed them at me in scorn; and wilder and wilder, and thicker and thicker, and madder and madder, the crowd were clambering up to where I sat gazing at these wonders. Then terror seized me, as it had before seized my horse. I drove my spurs into his sides, and how far he rushed with me through the forest, during this second of my wild heats, it is impossible to say.

“At last, when I had now come to a dead halt again, the cool of evening was around me. I caught the gleam of a white footpath through the branches of the trees; and presuming it would lead me out of the forest toward the city, I was desirous of working my way into it. But a face, perfectly white and indistinct, with features ever changing, kept thrusting itself out and peering at me between the leaves. I tried to avoid it, but wherever I went, there too appeared the unearthly face. I was maddened with rage at this interruption, and determined to drive my steed at the appearance full tilt, when such a cloud of white foam came rushing upon me and my horse, that we were almost blinded and glad to turn about and escape. Thus from step to step it forced us on, and ever aside from the footpath, leaving us for the most part only one direction open. When we advanced in this, it kept following close behind us, yet did not occasion the smallest harm or inconvenience.

“When at times I looked about me at the form, I perceived that the white face, which had splashed upon us its shower of foam, was resting on a body equally white, and of more than gigantic size. Many a time, too, I received the impression that the whole appearance was nothing more than a wandering stream or torrent; but respecting this I could never attain to any certainty. We both of us, horse and rider, became weary as we shaped our course according to the movements of the white man, who continued nodding his head at us, as if he would say, ‘Quite right!’ And thus, at length, we came out here, at the edge of the wood, where I saw the fresh turf, the waters of the lake, and your little cottage, and where the tall white man disappeared.”

“Well, Heaven be praised that he is gone!” cried the old fisherman; and he now began to talk of how his guest could most conveniently return to his friends in the city. Upon this, Undine began laughing to herself, but so very low that the sound was hardly perceivable. Huldbrand observing it, said, “I thought you were glad to see me here; why, then, do you now appear so happy when our talk turns upon my going away?”

“Because you cannot go away,” answered Undine. “Pray make a single attempt; try with a boat, with your horse, or alone, as you please, to cross that forest stream which has burst its bounds; or rather, make no trial at all, for you would be dashed to pieces by the stones and trunks of trees which you see driven on with such violence. And as to the lake, I know that well; even my father dares not venture out with his boat far enough to help you.”

Huldbrand rose, smiling, in order to look about and observe whether the state of things were such as Undine had represented it to be. The old man accompanied him, and the maiden went merrily dancing beside them. They found all, in fact, just as Undine had said, and that the knight, whether willing or not willing, must submit to remaining on the island, so lately a peninsula, until the flood should subside.

When the three were now returning to the cottage after their ramble, the knight whispered in the ear of the little maiden, “Well, dear Undine, are you angry at my remaining?”

“Ah,” she pettishly replied, “do not speak to me! If I had not bitten you, who knows what fine things you would have put into your story about Bertalda?”

CHAPTER 3 It may have happened to thee, my dear reader, after being much driven to and fro in the world, to reach at length a spot where all was well with thee. The love of home and of its peaceful joys, innate to all, again sprang up in thy heart; thou thoughtest that thy home was decked with all the flowers of childhood, and of that purest, deepest love which had grown upon the graves of thy beloved, and that here it was good to live and to build houses. Even if thou didst err, and hast had bitterly to mourn thy error, it is nothing to my purpose, and thou thyself wilt not like to dwell on the sad recollection. But recall those unspeakably sweet feelings, that angelic greeting of peace, and thou wilt be able to understand what was the happiness of the knight Huldbrand during his abode on that narrow slip of land.

He frequently observed, with heartfelt satisfaction, that the forest stream continued every day to swell and roll on with a more impetuous sweep; and this forced him to prolong his stay on the island. Part of the day he wandered about with an old cross-bow, which he found in a corner of the cottage, and had repaired in order to shoot the waterfowl that flew over; and all that he was lucky enough to hit he brought home for a good roast in the kitchen. When he came in with his booty, Undine seldom failed to greet him with a scolding, because he had cruelly deprived the happy joyous little creatures of life as they were sporting above in the blue ocean of the air; nay more, she often wept bitterly when she viewed the water-fowl dead in his hand. But at other times, when he returned without having shot any, she gave him a scolding equally serious, since, owing to his carelessness and want of skill, they must now put up with a dinner of fish. Her playful taunts ever touched his heart with delight; the more so, as she generally strove to make up for her pretended ill-humour with endearing caresses.

The old people saw with pleasure this familiarity of Undine and Huldbrand; they looked upon them as betrothed, or even as married, and living with them in their old age on their island, now torn off from the mainland. The loneliness of his situation strongly impressed also the young Huldbrand with the feeling that he was already Undine’s bridegroom. It seemed to him as if, beyond those encompassing floods, there were no other world in existence, or at any rate as if he could never cross them, and again associate with the world of other men; and when at times his grazing steed raised his head and neighed to him, seemingly inquiring after his knightly achievements and reminding him of them, or when his coat-of-arms sternly shone upon him from the embroidery of his saddle and the caparisons of his horse, or when his sword happened to fall from the nail on which it was hanging in the cottage, and flashed on his eye as it slipped from the scabbard in its fall, he quieted the doubts of his mind by saying to himself, “Undine cannot be a fisherman’s daughter. She is, in all probability, a native of some remote region, and a member of some illustrious family.”

There was one thing, indeed, to which he had a strong aversion: this was to hear the old dame reproving Undine. The wild girl, it is true, commonly laughed at the reproof, making no attempt to conceal the extravagance of her mirth; but it appeared to him like touching his own honour; and still he found it impossible to blame the aged wife of the fisherman, since Undine always deserved at least ten times as many reproofs as she received; so he continued to feel in his heart an affectionate tenderness for the ancient mistress of the house, and his whole life flowed on in the calm stream of contentment.

There came, however, an interruption at last. The fisherman and the knight had been accustomed at dinner, and also in the evening when the wind roared without, as it rarely failed to do towards night, to enjoy together a flask of wine. But now their whole stock, which the fisherman had from time to time brought with him from the city, was at last exhausted, and they were both quite out of humour at the circumstance. That day Undine laughed at them excessively, but they were not disposed to join in her jests with the same gaiety as usual. Toward evening she went out of the cottage, to escape, as she said, the sight of two such long and tiresome faces.

While it was yet twilight, some appearances of a tempest seemed to be again mustering in the sky, and the waves already heaved and roared around them: the knight and the fisherman sprang to the door in terror, to bring home the maiden, remembering the anguish of that night when Huldbrand had first entered the cottage. But Undine met them at the same moment, clapping her little hands in high glee.

“What will you give me,” she cried, “to provide you with wine? or rather, you need not give me anything,” she continued; “for I am already satisfied, if you look more cheerful, and are in better spirits, than throughout this last most wearisome day. Only come with me; the forest stream has driven ashore a cask; and I will be condemned to sleep through a whole week, if it is not a wine-cask.”

The men followed her, and actually found, in a bushy cove of the shore, a cask, which inspired them with as much joy as if they were sure it contained the generous old wine for which they were thirsting. They first of all, and with as much expedition as possible, rolled it toward the cottage; for heavy clouds were again rising in the west, and they could discern the waves of the lake in the fading light lifting their white foaming heads, as if looking out for the rain, which threatened every instant to pour upon them. Undine helped the men as much as she was able; and as the shower, with a roar of wind, came suddenly sweeping on in rapid pursuit, she raised her finger with a merry menace toward the dark mass of clouds, and cried:

“You cloud, you cloud, have a care! beware how you wet us; we are some way from shelter yet.”

The old man reproved her for this sally, as a sinful presumption; but she laughed to herself softly, and no mischief came from her wild behaviour. Nay more, what was beyond their expectation, they reached their comfortable hearth unwet, with their prize secured; but the cask had hardly been broached, and proved to contain wine of a remarkably fine flavour, when the rain first poured down unrestrained from the black cloud, the tempest raved through the tops of the trees, and swept far over the billows of the deep.

Having immediately filled several bottles from the cask, which promised them a supply for a long time, they drew round the glowing hearth; and, comfortably secured from the tempest, they sat tasting the flavour of their wine and bandying jests.

But the old fisherman suddenly became extremely grave, and said: “Ah, great God! here we sit, rejoicing over this rich gift, while he to whom it first belonged, and from whom it was wrested by the fury of the stream, must there also, it is more than probable, have lost his life.”

“No such thing,” said Undine, smiling, as she filled the knight’s cup to the brim.

But he exclaimed: “By my unsullied honour, old father, if I knew where to find and rescue him, no fear of exposure to the night, nor any peril, should deter me from making the attempt. At least, I can promise you that if I again reach an inhabited country, I will find out the owner of this wine or his heirs, and make double and triple reimbursement.”

The old man was gratified with this assurance; he gave the knight a nod of approbation, and now drained his cup with an easier conscience and more relish.

Undine, however, said to Huldbrand: “As to the repayment and your gold, you may do whatever you like. But what you said about your venturing out, and searching, and exposing yourself to danger, appears to me far from wise. I should cry my very eyes out, should you perish in such a wild attempt; and is it not true that you would prefer staying here with me and the good wine?”

“Most assuredly,” answered Huldbrand, smiling.

“Then, you see,” replied Undine, “you spoke unwisely. For charity begins at home; and why need we trouble ourselves about our neighbours?”

The mistress of the house turned away from her, sighing and shaking her head; while the fisherman forgot his wonted indulgence toward the graceful maiden, and thus rebuked her:

“That sounds exactly as if you had been brought up by heathens and Turks;” and he finished his reproof by adding, “May God forgive both me and you—unfeeling child!”

“Well, say what you will, that is what I think and feel,” replied Undine, “whoever brought me up; and all your talking cannot help it.”

“Silence!” exclaimed the fisherman, in a voice of stern rebuke; and she, who with all her wild spirit was extremely alive to fear, shrank from him, moved close up to Huldbrand, trembling, and said very softly:

“Are you also angry, dear friend?”

The knight pressed her soft hand, and tenderly stroked her locks. He was unable to utter a word, for his vexation, arising from the old man’s severity towards Undine, closed his lips; and thus the two couples sat opposite to each other, at once heated with anger and in embarrassed silence.

In the midst of this stillness a low knocking at the door startled them all; for there are times when a slight circumstance, coming unexpectedly upon us, startles us like something supernatural. But there was the further source of alarm, that the enchanted forest lay so near them, and that their place of abode seemed at present inaccessible to any human being. While they were looking upon one another in doubt, the knocking was again heard, accompanied with a deep groan. The knight sprang to seize his sword. But the old man said, in a low whisper:

“If it be what I fear it is, no weapon of yours can protect us.”

Undine in the meanwhile went to the door, and cried with the firm voice of fearless displeasure: “Spirits of the earth! if mischief be your aim, Kuhleborn shall teach you better manners.”

The terror of the rest was increased by this wild speech; they looked fearfully upon the girl, and Huldbrand was just recovering presence of mind enough to ask what she meant, when a voice reached them from without:

“I am no spirit of the earth, though a spirit still in its earthly body. You that are within the cottage there, if you fear God and would afford me assistance, open your door to me.”

By the time these words were spoken, Undine had already opened it; and the lamp throwing a strong light upon the stormy night, they perceived an aged priest without, who stepped back in terror, when his eye fell on the unexpected sight of a little damsel of such exquisite beauty. Well might he think there must be magic in the wind and witchcraft at work, when a form of such surpassing loveliness appeared at the door of so humble a dwelling. So he lifted up his voice in prayer:

“Let all good spirits praise the Lord God!”

“I am no spectre,” said Undine, with a smile. “Do I look so very frightful? And you see that I do not shrink from holy words. I too have knowledge of God, and understand the duty of praising Him; every one, to be sure, has his own way of doing this, for so He has created us. Come in, father; you will find none but worthy people here.”

The holy man came bowing in, and cast round a glance of scrutiny, wearing at the same time a very placid and venerable air. But water was dropping from every fold of his dark garments, from his long white beard and the white locks of his hair. The fisherman and the knight took him to another apartment, and furnished him with a change of raiment, while they gave his own clothes to the women to dry. The aged stranger thanked them in a manner the most humble and courteous; but on the knight’s offering him his splendid cloak to wrap round him, he could not be persuaded to take it, but chose instead an old grey coat that belonged to the fisherman.

They then returned to the common apartment. The mistress of the house immediately offered her great chair to the priest, and continued urging it upon him till she saw him fairly in possession of it. “You are old and exhausted,” said she, “and are, moreover, a man of God.”

Undine shoved under the stranger’s feet her little stool, on which at all other times she used to sit near to Huldbrand, and showed herself most gentle and amiable towards the old man. Huldbrand whispered some raillery in her ear, but she replied, gravely:

“He is a minister of that Being who created us all; and holy things are not to be treated with lightness.”

The knight and the fisherman now refreshed the priest with food and wine; and when he had somewhat recovered his strength and spirits, he began to relate how he had the day before set out from his cloister, which was situated far off beyond the great lake, in order to visit the bishop, and acquaint him with the distress into which the cloister and its tributary villages had fallen, owing to the extraordinary floods. After a long and wearisome wandering, on account of the rise of the waters, he had been this day compelled toward evening to procure the aid of a couple of boatmen, and cross over an arm of the lake which had burst its usual boundary.

“But hardly,” continued he, “had our small ferry-boat touched the waves, when that furious tempest burst forth which is still raging over our heads. It seemed as if the billows had been waiting our approach only to rush on us with a madness the more wild. The oars were wrested from the grasp of my men in an instant; and shivered by the resistless force, they drove farther and farther out before us upon the waves. Unable to direct our course, we yielded to the blind power of nature, and seemed to fly over the surges toward your distant shore, which we already saw looming through the mist and foam of the deep. Then it was at last that our boat turned short from its course, and rocked with a motion that became more wild and dizzy: I know not whether it was overset, or the violence of the motion threw me overboard. In my agony and struggle at the thought of a near and terrible death, the waves bore me onward, till I was cast ashore here beneath the trees of your island.”

“Yes, an island!” cried the fisherman; “a short time ago it was only a point of land. But now, since the forest stream and lake have become all but mad, it appears to be entirely changed.”

“I observed something of it,” replied the priest, “as I stole along the shore in the obscurity; and hearing nothing around me but a sort of wild uproar, I perceived at last that the noise came from a point exactly where a beaten footpath disappeared. I now caught the light in your cottage, and ventured hither, where I cannot sufficiently thank my Heavenly Father that, after preserving me from the waters, He has also conducted me to such pious people as you are; and the more so, as it is difficult to say whether I shall ever behold any other persons in this world except you four.”

“What mean you by those words?” asked the fisherman.

“Can you tell me, then, how long this commotion of the elements will last?” replied the priest. “I am old; the stream of my life may easily sink into the ground and vanish before the overflowing of that forest stream shall subside. And, indeed, it is not impossible that more and more of the foaming waters may rush in between you and yonder forest, until you are so far removed from the rest of the world, that your small fishing-canoe may be incapable of passing over, and the inhabitants of the continent entirely forget you in your old age amid the dissipation and diversions of life.”

At this melancholy foreboding the old lady shrank back with a feeling of alarm, crossed herself, and cried, “God forbid!”

But the fisherman looked upon her with a smile and said, “What a strange being is man! Suppose the worst to happen; our state would not be different; at any rate, your own would not, dear wife, from what it is at present. For have you, these many years, been farther from home than the border of the forest? And have you seen a single human being beside Undine and myself? It is now only a short time since the coming of the knight and the priest. They will remain with us, even if we do become a forgotten island; so after all you will be a gainer.”

“I know not,” replied the ancient dame; “it is a dismal thought, when brought fairly home to the mind, that we are for ever separated from mankind, even though in fact we never do know nor see them.”

“Then YOU will remain with us—then you will remain with us!” whispered Undine, in a voice scarcely audible and half singing, while she nestled closer to Huldbrand’s side. But he was immersed in the deep and strange musings of his own mind. The region, on the farther side of the forest river, seemed, since the last words of the priest, to have been withdrawing farther and farther, in dim perspective, from his view; and the blooming island on which he lived grew green and smiled more freshly in his fancy. His bride glowed like the fairest rose, not of this obscure nook only, but even of the whole wide world; and the priest was now present.

Added to which, the mistress of the family was directing an angry glance at Undine, because, even in the presence of the priest, she leant so fondly on the knight; and it seemed as if she was on the point of breaking out in harsh reproof. Then burst forth from the mouth of Huldbrand, as he turned to the priest, “Father, you here see before you an affianced pair; and if this maiden and these good old people have no objection, you shall unite us this very evening.”

The aged couple were both exceedingly surprised. They had often, it is true, thought of this, but as yet they had never mentioned it; and now, when the knight spoke, it came upon them like something wholly new and unexpected. Undine became suddenly grave, and looked down thoughtfully, while the priest made inquiries respecting the circumstances of their acquaintance, and asked the old people whether they gave their consent to the union. After a great number of questions and answers, the affair was arranged to the satisfaction of all; and the mistress of the house went to prepare the bridal apartment of the young couple, and also, with a view to grace the nuptial solemnity, to seek for two consecrated tapers, which she had for a long time kept by her, for this occasion.

The knight in the meanwhile busied himself about his golden chain, for the purpose of disengaging two of its links, that he might make an exchange of rings with his bride. But when she saw his object, she started from her trance of musing, and exclaimed—

“Not so! my parents by no means sent me into the world so perfectly destitute; on the contrary, they foresaw, even at that early period, that such a night as this would come.”

Thus speaking she went out of the room, and a moment after returned with two costly rings, of which she gave one to her bridegroom, and kept the other for herself. The old fisherman was beyond measure astonished at this; and his wife, who was just re-entering the room, was even more surprised than he, that neither of them had ever seen these jewels in the child’s possession.

“My parents,” said Undine, “sewed these trinkets to that beautiful raiment which I wore the very day I came to you. They also charged me on no account whatever to mention them to any one before my wedding evening. At the time of my coming, therefore, I took them off in secret, and have kept them concealed to the present hour.”

The priest now cut short all further questioning and wondering, while he lighted the consecrated tapers, placed them on a table, and ordered the bridal pair to stand opposite to him. He then pronounced the few solemn words of the ceremony, and made them one. The elder couple gave the younger their blessing; and the bride, gently trembling and thoughtful, leaned upon the knight.

The priest then spoke out: “You are strange people, after all; for why did you tell me that you were the only inhabitants of the island? So far is this from being true, I have seen, the whole time I was performing the ceremony, a tall, stately man, in a white mantle, standing opposite to me, looking in at the window. He must be still waiting before the door, if peradventure you would invite him to come in.”

“God forbid!” cried the old lady, shrinking back; the fisherman shook his head, without opening his lips; and Huldbrand sprang to the window. It seemed to him that he could still discern a white streak, which soon disappeared in the gloom. He convinced the priest that he must have been mistaken in his impression; and they all sat down together round a bright and comfortable hearth.

CHAPTER 4 Before the nuptial ceremony, and during its performance, Undine had shown a modest gentleness and maidenly reserve; but it now seemed as if all the wayward freaks that effervesced within her burst forth with an extravagance only the more bold and unrestrained. She teased her bridegroom, her foster-parents, and even the priest, whom she had just now revered so highly, with all sorts of childish tricks; but when the ancient dame was about to reprove her too frolicsome spirit, the knight, in a few words, imposed silence upon her by speaking of Undine as his wife.

The knight was himself, indeed, just as little pleased with Undine’s childish behaviour as the rest; but all his looks and half-reproachful words were to no purpose. It is true, whenever the bride observed the dissatisfaction of her husband—and this occasionally happened—she became more quiet, placed herself beside him, stroked his face with caressing fondness, whispered something smilingly in his ear, and in this manner smoothed the wrinkles that were gathering on his brow. But the moment after, some wild whim would make her resume her antic movements; and all went worse than before.

The priest then spoke in a kind although serious tone: “My fair young maiden, surely no one can look on you without pleasure; but remember betimes so to attune your soul that it may produce a harmony ever in accordance with the soul of your wedded bridegroom.”

“SOUL!” cried Undine with a laugh. “What you say has a remarkably pretty sound; and for most people, too, it may be a very instructive and profitable caution. But when a person has no soul at all, how, I pray you, can such attuning be then possible? And this, in truth, is just my condition.”

The priest was much hurt, but continued silent in holy displeasure, and turned away his face from the maiden in sorrow. She, however, went up to him with the most winning sweetness, and said:

“Nay, I entreat you first listen to me, before you are angry with me; for your anger is painful to me, and you ought not to give pain to a creature that has not hurt you. Only have patience with me, and I will explain to you every word of what I meant.”

It was evident that she had come to say something important; when she suddenly faltered as if seized with inward shuddering, and burst into a passion of tears. They were none of them able to understand the intenseness of her feelings; and, with mingled emotions of fear and anxiety, they gazed on her in silence. Then, wiping away her tears, and looking earnestly at the priest, she at last said:

“There must be something lovely, but at the same time something most awful, about a soul. In the name of God, holy man, were it not better that we never shared a gift so mysterious?”

Again she paused, and restrained her tears, as if waiting for an answer. All in the cottage had risen from their seats, and stepped back from her with horror. She, however, seemed to have eyes for no one but the holy man; an awful curiosity was painted on her features, which appeared terrible to the others.

“Heavily must the soul weigh down its possessor,” she pursued, when no one returned her any answer—“very heavily! for already its approaching image overshadows me with anguish and mourning. And, alas, I have till now been so merry and light-hearted!” and she burst into another flood of tears, and covered her face with her veil.

The priest, going up to her with a solemn look, now addressed himself to her, and conjured her, by the name of God most holy, if any spirit of evil possessed her, to remove the light covering from her face. But she sank before him on her knees, and repeated after him every sacred expression he uttered, giving praise to God, and protesting “that she wished well to the whole world.”

The priest then spoke to the knight: “Sir bridegroom, I leave you alone with her whom I have united to you in marriage. So far as I can discover, there is nothing of evil in her, but assuredly much that is wonderful. What I recommend to you is—prudence, love, and fidelity.”

Thus speaking, he left the apartment; and the fisherman, with his wife, followed him, crossing themselves.

Undine had sunk upon her knees. She uncovered her face, and exclaimed, while she looked fearfully round upon Huldbrand, “Alas! you will now refuse to look upon me as your own; and still I have done nothing evil, poor unhappy child that I am!” She spoke these words with a look so infinitely sweet and touching, that her bridegroom forgot both the confession that had shocked, and the mystery that had perplexed him; and hastening to her, he raised her in his arms. She smiled through her tears; and that smile was like the morning light playing upon a small stream. “You cannot desert me!” she whispered confidingly, and stroked the knight’s cheeks with her little soft hands. He turned away from the frightful thoughts that still lurked in the recesses of his soul, and were persuading him that he had been married to a fairy, or some spiteful and mischievous being of the spirit-world. Only the single question, and that almost unawares, escaped from his lips.

“Dearest Undine, tell me this one thing: what was it you meant by ‘spirits of earth’ and ‘Kuhleborn,’ when the priest stood knocking at the door?”

“Tales! mere tales of children!” answered Undine, laughing, now quite restored to her wonted gaiety. “I first frightened you with them, and you frightened me. This is the end of the story, and of our nuptial evening.”

“Nay, not so,” replied the enamoured knight, extinguishing the tapers, and a thousand times kissing his beautiful and beloved bride; while, lighted by the moon that shone brightly through the windows, he bore her into their bridal apartment.

The fresh light of morning woke the young married pair: but Huldbrand lay lost in silent reflection. Whenever, during the night, he had fallen asleep, strange and horrible dreams of spectres had disturbed him; and these shapes, grinning at him by stealth, strove to disguise themselves as beautiful females; and from beautiful females they all at once assumed the appearance of dragons. And when he started up, aroused by the intrusion of these hideous forms, the moonlight shone pale and cold before the windows without. He looked affrighted at Undine, in whose arms he had fallen asleep: and she was reposing in unaltered beauty and sweetness beside him. Then pressing her rosy lips with a light kiss, he again fell into a slumber, only to be awakened by new terrors.

When fully awake, he had thought over this connection. He reproached himself for any doubt that could lead him into error in regard to his lovely wife. He also confessed to her his injustice; but she only gave him her fair hand, sighed deeply, and remained silent. Yet a glance of fervent tenderness, an expression of the soul beaming in her eyes, such as he had never witnessed there before, left him in undoubted assurance that Undine bore him no ill-will.

He then rose joyfully, and leaving her, went to the common apartment, where the inmates of the house had already met. The three were sitting round the hearth with an air of anxiety about them, as if they feared trusting themselves to raise their voice above a low, apprehensive undertone. The priest appeared to be praying in his inmost spirit, with a view to avert some fatal calamity. But when they observed the young husband come forth so cheerful, they dispelled the cloud that remained upon their brows: the old fisherman even began to laugh with the knight till his aged wife herself could not help smiling with great good-humour.

Undine had in the meantime got ready, and now entered the room; all rose to meet her, but remained fixed in perfect admiration—she was so changed, and yet the same. The priest, with paternal affection beaming from his countenance, first went up to her; and as he raised his hand to pronounce a blessing, the beautiful bride sank on her knees before him with religious awe; she begged his pardon in terms both respectful and submissive for any foolish things she might have uttered the evening before, and entreated him with emotion to pray for the welfare of her soul. She then rose, kissed her foster-parents, and, after thanking them for all the kindness they had shown her, said:

“Oh, I now feel in my inmost heart how much, how infinitely much, you have done for me, you dear, dear friends of my childhood!”

At first she was wholly unable to tear herself away from their affectionate caresses; but the moment she saw the good old mother busy in getting breakfast, she went to the hearth, applied herself to cooking the food and putting it on the table, and would not suffer her to take the least share in the work.

She continued in this frame of spirit the whole day: calm, kind attentive—half matronly, and half girlish. The three who had been longest acquainted with her expected every instant to see her capricious spirit break out in some whimsical change or sportive vagary. But their fears were quite unnecessary. Undine continued as mild and gentle as an angel. The priest found it all but impossible to remove his eyes from her; and he often said to the bridegroom:

“The bounty of Heaven, sir, through me its unworthy instrument, entrusted to you yesterday an invaluable treasure; cherish it as you ought, and it will promote your temporal and eternal welfare.”

Toward evening Undine was hanging upon the knight’s arm with lowly tenderness, while she drew him gently out before the door, where the setting sun shone richly over the fresh grass, and upon the high, slender boles of the trees. Her emotion was visible: the dew of sadness and love swam in her eyes, while a tender and fearful secret seemed to hover upon her lips, but was only made known by hardly-breathed sighs. She led her husband farther and farther onward without speaking. When he asked her questions, she replied only with looks, in which, it is true, there appeared to be no immediate answer to his inquiries, but a whole heaven of love and timid devotion. Thus they reached the margin of the swollen forest stream, and the knight was astonished to see it gliding away with so gentle a murmuring of its waves, that no vestige of its former swell and wildness was now discernible.

“By morning it will be wholly drained off,” said the beautiful wife, almost weeping, “and you will then be able to travel, without anything to hinder you, whithersoever you will.”

“Not without you, dear Undine,” replied the knight, laughing; “think, only, were I disposed to leave you, both the Church and the spiritual powers, the Emperor and the laws of the realm, would require the fugitive to be seized and restored to you.”

“All this depends on you—all depends on you,” whispered his little companion, half weeping and half smiling. “But I still feel sure that you will not leave me; I love you too deeply to fear that misery. Now bear me over to that little island which lies before us. There shall the decision be made. I could easily, indeed, glide through that mere rippling of the water without your aid, but it is so sweet to lie in your arms; and should you determine to put me away, I shall have rested in them once more,... for the last time.”

Huldbrand was so full of strange anxiety and emotion, that he knew not what answer to make her. He took her in his arms and carried her over, now first realizing the fact that this was the same little island from which he had borne her back to the old fisherman, the first night of his arrival. On the farther side, he placed her upon the soft grass, and was throwing himself lovingly near his beautiful burden; but she said to him, “Not here, but opposite me. I shall read my doom in your eyes, even before your lips pronounce it: now listen attentively to what I shall relate to you.” And she began:

“You must know, my own love, that there are beings in the elements which bear the strongest resemblance to the human race, and which, at the same time, but seldom become visible to you. The wonderful salamanders sparkle and sport amid the flames; deep in the earth the meagre and malicious gnomes pursue their revels; the forest-spirits belong to the air, and wander in the woods; while in the seas, rivers, and streams live the widespread race of water-spirits. These last, beneath resounding domes of crystal, through which the sky can shine with its sun and stars, inhabit a region of light and beauty; lofty coral-trees glow with blue and crimson fruits in their gardens; they walk over the pure sand of the sea, among exquisitely variegated shells, and amid whatever of beauty the old world possessed, such as the present is no more worthy to enjoy—creations which the floods covered with their secret veils of silver; and now these noble monuments sparkle below, stately and solemn, and bedewed by the water, which loves them, and calls forth from their crevices delicate moss-flowers and enwreathing tufts of sedge.

“Now the nation that dwell there are very fair and lovely to behold, for the most part more beautiful than human beings. Many a fisherman has been so fortunate as to catch a view of a delicate maiden of the waters, while she was floating and singing upon the deep. He would then spread far the fame of her beauty; and to such wonderful females men are wont to give the name of Undines. But what need of saying more?—You, my dear husband, now actually behold an Undine before you.”

The knight would have persuaded himself that his lovely wife was under the influence of one of her odd whims, and that she was only amusing herself and him with her extravagant inventions. He wished it might be so. But with whatever emphasis he said this to himself, he still could not credit the hope for a moment: a strange shivering shot through his soul; unable to utter a word, he gazed upon the sweet speaker with a fixed eye. She shook her head in distress, sighed from her full heart, and then proceeded in the following manner:—“We should be far superior to you, who are another race of the human family,—for we also call ourselves human beings, as we resemble them in form and features—had we not one evil peculiar to ourselves. Both we and the beings I have mentioned as inhabiting the other elements vanish into air at death and go out of existence, spirit and body, so that no vestige of us remains; and when you hereafter awake to a purer state of being, we shall remain where sand, and sparks, and wind, and waves remain. Thus we have no souls; the element moves us, and, again, is obedient to our will, while we live, though it scatters us like dust when we die; and as we have nothing to trouble us, we are as merry as nightingales, little gold-fishes, and other pretty children of nature.

“But all beings aspire to rise in the scale of existence higher than they are. It was therefore the wish of my father, who is a powerful water-prince in the Mediterranean Sea, that his only daughter should become possessed of a soul, although she should have to endure many of the sufferings of those who share that gift.

“Now the race to which I belong have no other means of obtaining a soul than by forming with an individual of your own the most intimate union of love. I am now possessed of a soul, and my soul thanks you, my best beloved, and never shall cease to thank you, if you do not render my whole future life miserable. For what will become of me, if you avoid and reject me? Still, I would not keep you as my own by artifice. And should you decide to cast me off, then do it now, and return alone to the shore. I will plunge into this brook, where my uncle will receive me; my uncle, who here in the forest, far removed from his other friends, passes his strange and solitary existence. But he is powerful, as well as revered and beloved by many great rivers; and as he brought me hither to the fisherman a light-hearted and laughing child, he will take me home to my parents a woman, gifted with a soul, with power to love and to suffer.”

She was about to add something more, when Huldbrand, with the most heartfelt tenderness and love, clasped her in his arms, and again bore her back to the shore. There, amid tears and kisses, he first swore never to forsake his affectionate wife, and esteemed himself even more happy than Pygmalion, for whom Venus gave life to his beautiful statue, and thus changed it into a beloved wife. Supported by his arm, and in the confidence of affection, Undine returned to the cottage; and now she first realized with her whole heart how little cause she had for regretting what she had left—the crystal palace of her mysterious father.

CHAPTER 5 Next morning, when Huldbrand awoke from slumber, and perceived that his beautiful wife was not by his side, he began to give way again to his wild imaginations—that his marriage, and even the lovely Undine herself, were only shadows without substance—only mere illusions of enchantment. But she entered the door at the same moment, kissed him, seated herself on the bed by his side, and said:

“I have been out somewhat early this morning, to see whether my uncle keeps his word. He has already restored the waters of the flood to his own calm channel, and he now flows through the forest a rivulet as before, in a lonely and dreamlike current. His friends, too, both of the water and the air, have resumed their usual peaceful tenor; all will again proceed with order and tranquillity; and you can travel homeward, without fear of the flood, whenever you choose.”

It seemed to the mind of Huldbrand that he must be in some waking dream, so little was he able to understand the nature of his wife’s strange relative. Notwithstanding this he made no remark upon what she had told him, and her surpassing loveliness soon lulled every misgiving and discomfort to rest.

Some time afterwards, while he was standing with her before the door, and surveying the verdant point of land, with its boundary of bright waters, such a feeling of bliss came over him in this cradle of his love, that he exclaimed:

“Shall we, then, so early as to-day, begin our journey? Why should we? It is probable that abroad in the world we shall find no days more delightful than those we have spent in this green isle so secret and so secure. Let us yet see the sun go down here two or three times more.”

“Just as my lord wills,” replied Undine meekly. “Only we must remember, that my foster-parents will, at all events, see me depart with pain; and should they now, for the first time, discover the true soul in me, and how fervently I can now love and honour them, their feeble eyes would surely become blind with weeping. As yet they consider my present quietness and gentleness as of no better promise than they were formerly—like the calm of the lake just while the air remains tranquil—and they will learn soon to cherish a little tree or flower as they have cherished me. Let me not, then, make known to them this newly bestowed, this loving heart, at the very moment they must lose it for this world; and how could I conceal what I have gained, if we continued longer together?”

Huldbrand yielded to her representation, and went to the aged couple to confer with them respecting his journey, on which he proposed to set out that very hour. The priest offered himself as a companion to the young married pair; and, after taking a short farewell, he held the bridle, while the knight lifted his beautiful wife upon his horse; and with rapid steps they crossed the dry channel with her toward the forest. Undine wept in silent but intense emotion; the old people, as she moved away, were more clamorous in the expression of their grief. They appeared to feel, at the moment of separation, all that they were losing in their affectionate foster-daughter.

The three travellers had reached the thickest shades of the forest without interchanging a word. It must have been a fair sight, in that hall of leafy verdure, to see this lovely woman’s form sitting on the noble and richly-ornamented steed, on her left hand the venerable priest in the white garb of his order, on her right the blooming young knight, clad in splendid raiment of scarlet, gold, and violet, girt with a sword that flashed in the sun, and attentively walking beside her. Huldbrand had no eyes but for his wife; Undine, who had dried her tears of tenderness, had no eyes but for him; and they soon entered into the still and voiceless converse of looks and gestures, from which, after some time, they were awakened by the low discourse which the priest was holding with a fourth traveller, who had meanwhile joined them unobserved.

He wore a white gown, resembling in form the dress of the priest’s order, except that his hood hung very low over his face, and that the whole drapery floated in such wide folds around him as obliged him every moment to gather it up and throw it over his arm, or by some management of this sort to get it out of his way, and still it did not seem in the least to impede his movements. When the young couple became aware of his presence, he was saying:

“And so, venerable sir, many as have been the years I have dwelt here in this forest, I have never received the name of hermit in your sense of the word. For, as I said before, I know nothing of penance, and I think, too, that I have no particular need of it. Do you ask me why I am so attached to the forest? It is because its scenery is so peculiarly picturesque, and affords me so much pastime when, in my floating white garments, I pass through its world of leaves and dusky shadows;—and when a sweet sunbeam glances down upon me at times unexpectedly.”

“You are a very singular man,” replied the priest, “and I should like to have a more intimate acquaintance with you.”

“And who, then, may you be yourself, to pass from one thing to another?” inquired the stranger.

“I am called Father Heilmann,” answered the holy man; “and I am from the cloister of Our Lady of the Salutation, beyond the lake.”

“Well, well,” replied the stranger, “my name is Kuhleborn; and were I a stickler for the nice distinctions of rank, I might, with equal propriety, require you to give me the title of noble lord of Kuhleborn, or free lord of Kuhleborn; for I am as free as the birds in the forest, and, it may be, a trifle more so. For example, I now have something to tell that young lady there.” And before they were aware of his purpose, he was on the other side of the priest, close to Undine, and stretching himself high into the air, in order to whisper something in her ear. But she shrank from him in terror, and exclaimed:

“I have nothing more to do with you.”

“Ho, ho,” cried the stranger with a laugh, “you have made a grand marriage indeed, since you no longer know your own relations! Have you no recollection, then, of your uncle Kuhleborn, who so faithfully bore you on his back to this region?”

“However that may be,” replied Undine, “I entreat you never to appear in my presence again. I am now afraid of you; and will not my husband fear and forsake me, if he sees me associate with such strange company and kindred?”

“You must not forget, my little niece,” said Kuhleborn, “that I am with you here as a guide; otherwise those madcap spirits of the earth, the gnomes that haunt this forest, would play you some of their mischievous pranks. Let me therefore still accompany you in peace. Even the old priest there had a better recollection of me than you have; for he just now assured me that I seemed to be very familiar to him, and that I must have been with him in the ferry-boat, out of which he tumbled into the waves. He certainly did see me there; for I was no other than the water-spout that tore him out of it, and kept him from sinking, while I safely wafted him ashore to your wedding.”

Undine and the knight turned their eyes upon Father Heilmann; but he appeared to be moving forward, just as if he were dreaming or walking in his sleep, and no longer to be conscious of a word that was spoken. Undine then said to Kuhleborn: “I already see yonder the end of the forest. We have no further need of your assistance, and nothing now gives us alarm but yourself. I therefore beseech you, by our mutual love and good-will, to vanish, and allow us to proceed in peace.”

Kuhleborn seemed to become angry at this: he darted a frightful look at Undine, and grinned fiercely upon her. She shrieked aloud, and called her husband to protect her. The knight sprang round the horse as quick as lightning, and, brandishing his sword, struck at Kuhleborn’s head. But instead of severing it from his body, the sword merely flashed through a torrent, which rushed foaming near them from a lofty cliff; and with a splash, which much resembled in sound a burst of laughter, the stream all at once poured upon them and gave them a thorough wetting. The priest, as if suddenly awakening from a trance, coolly observed: “This is what I have been some time expecting, because the brook has descended from the steep so close beside us—though at first sight, indeed, it appeared to resemble a man, and to possess the power of speech.”

As the waterfall came rushing from its crag, it distinctly uttered these words in Huldbrand’s ear: “Rash knight! valiant knight! I am not angry with you; I have no quarrel with you; only continue to defend your lovely little wife with the same spirit, you bold knight! you valiant champion!”

After advancing a few steps farther, the travellers came out upon open ground. The imperial city lay bright before them; and the evening sun, which gilded its towers with gold, kindly dried their garments that had been so completely drenched.

The sudden disappearance of the young knight, Huldbrand of Ringstetten, had occasioned much remark in the imperial city, and no small concern amongst those who, as well on account of his expertness in tourney and dance, as of his mild and amiable manners, had become attached to him. His attendants were unwilling to quit the place without their master, although not a soul of them had been courageous enough to follow him into the fearful recesses of the forest. They remained, therefore, at the hostelry, idly hoping, as men are wont to do, and keeping the fate of their lost lord fresh in remembrance by their lamentations.

Now when the violent storms and floods had been observed immediately after his departure, the destruction of the handsome stranger became all but certain; even Bertalda had openly discovered her sorrow, and detested herself for having been the cause of his taking that fatal excursion into the forest. Her foster-parents, the duke and duchess, had meanwhile come to take her away; but Bertalda persuaded them to remain with her until some certain news of Huldbrand should be obtained, whether he were living or dead. She endeavoured also to prevail upon several young knights, who were assiduous in courting her favour, to go in quest of the noble adventurer in the forest. But she refused to pledge her hand as the reward of the enterprise, because she still cherished, it might be, a hope of its being claimed by the returning knight; and no one would consent, for a glove, a riband, or even a kiss, to expose his life to bring back so very dangerous a rival.

When Huldbrand now made his sudden and unexpected appearance, his attendants, the inhabitants of the city, and almost every one rejoiced. This was not the case with Bertalda; for although it might be quite a welcome event to others that he brought with him a wife of such exquisite loveliness, and Father Heilmann as a witness of their marriage, Bertalda could not but view the affair with grief and vexation. She had, in truth, become attached to the young knight with her whole soul; and her mourning for his absence, or supposed death, had shown this more than she could now have wished.

But notwithstanding all this, she conducted herself like a wise maiden in circumstances of such delicacy, and lived on the most friendly terms with Undine, whom the whole city looked upon as a princess that Huldbrand had rescued in the forest from some evil enchantment. Whenever any one questioned either herself or her husband relative to surmises of this nature, they had wisdom enough to remain silent, or wit enough to evade the inquiries. The lips of Father Heilmann had been sealed in regard to idle gossip of every kind; and besides, on Huldbrand’s arrival, he had immediately returned to his cloister: so that people were obliged to rest contented with their own wild conjectures; and even Bertalda herself ascertained nothing more of the truth than others.

For the rest, Undine daily felt more love for the fair maiden. “We must have been before acquainted with each other,” she often used to say to her, “or else there must be some mysterious connection between us, for it is incredible that any one so perfectly without cause—I mean, without some deep and secret cause—should be so fondly attached to another as I have been to you from the first moment of our meeting.”

And even Bertalda could not deny that she felt a confiding impulse, an attraction of tenderness toward Undine, much as she deemed this fortunate rival the cause of her bitterest disappointment. Under the influence of this mutual regard, they found means to persuade, the one her foster-parents, and the other her husband, to defer the day of separation to a period more and more remote; nay, more, they had already begun to talk of a plan for Bertalda’s accompanying Undine to Castle Ringstetten, near one of the sources of the Danube.

Once on a fine evening they happened to be talking over their scheme just as they passed the high trees that bordered the public walk. The young married pair, though it was somewhat late, had called upon Bertalda to invite her to share their enjoyment; and all three proceeded familiarly up and down beneath the dark blue heaven, not seldom interrupted in their converse by the admiration which they could not but bestow upon the magnificent fountain in the middle of the square, and upon the wonderful rush and shooting upward of its waters. All was sweet and soothing to their minds. Among the shadows of the trees stole in glimmerings of light from the adjacent houses (sic). A low murmur as of children at play, and of other persons who were enjoying their walk, floated around them—they were so alone, and yet sharing so much of social happiness in the bright and stirring world, that whatever had appeared rough by day now became smooth of its own accord. All the three friends could no longer see the slightest cause for hesitation in regard to Bertalda’s taking the journey.

At that instant, while they were just fixing the day of their departure, a tall man approached them from the middle of the square, bowed respectfully to the company, and spoke something in the young bride’s ear. Though displeased with the interruption and its cause, she walked aside a few steps with the stranger; and both began to whisper, as it seemed, in a foreign tongue. Huldbrand thought he recognized the strange man of the forest, and he gazed upon him so fixedly, that he neither heard nor answered the astonished inquiries of Bertalda. All at once Undine clapped her hands with delight, and turned back from the stranger, laughing: he, frequently shaking his head, retired with a hasty step and discontented air, and descended into the fountain. Huldbrand now felt perfectly certain that his conjecture was correct. But Bertalda asked:

“What, then, dear Undine, did the master of the fountain wish to say to you?”

Undine laughed within herself, and made answer: “The day after to-morrow, my dear child, when the anniversary of your name-day returns, you shall be informed.” And this was all she could be prevailed upon to disclose. She merely asked Bertalda to dinner on the appointed day, and requested her to invite her foster-parents; and soon afterwards they separated.

“Kuhleborn?” said Huldbrand to his lovely wife, with an inward shudder when they had taken leave of Bertalda, and were now going home through the darkening streets.

“Yes, it was he,” answered Undine; “and he would have wearied me with his foolish warnings. But, in the midst, quite contrary to his intentions, he delighted me with a most welcome piece of news. If you, my dear lord and husband, wish me to acquaint you with it now, you need only command me, and I will freely and from my heart tell you all without reserve. But would you confer upon your Undine a very, very great pleasure, wait till the day after to-morrow, and then you too shall have your share of the surprise.”

The knight was quite willing to gratify his wife in what she had asked so sweetly. And even as she was falling asleep, she murmured to herself, with a smile: “How she will rejoice and be astonished at what her master of the fountain has told me!—dear, dear Bertalda!”

CHAPTER 6 The company were sitting at dinner. Bertalda, adorned with jewels and flowers without number, the presents of her foster-parents and friends, and looking like some goddess of spring, sat beside Undine and Huldbrand at the head of the table. When the sumptuous repast was ended, and the dessert was placed before them, permission was given that the doors should be left open: this was in accordance with the good old custom in Germany, that the common people might see and rejoice in the festivity of their superiors. Among these spectators the servants carried round cake and wine.

Huldbrand and Bertalda waited with secret impatience for the promised explanation, and hardly moved their eyes from Undine. But she still continued silent, and merely smiled to herself with secret and heartfelt satisfaction. All who were made acquainted with the promise she had given could perceive that she was every moment on the point of revealing a happy secret; and yet, as children sometimes delay tasting their choicest dainties, she still withheld the communication. Bertalda and Huldbrand shared the same delightful feeling, while in anxious hope they were expecting the unknown disclosure which they were to receive from the lips of their friend.

At this moment several of the company pressed Undine to sing. This she seemed pleased at; and ordering her lute to be brought, she sang the following words:—

                  “Morning so bright,
                   Wild-flowers so gay,
                   Where high grass so dewy
                   Crowns the wavy lake’s border.

                   On the meadow’s verdant bosom
                   What glimmers there so white?
                   Have wreaths of snowy blossoms,
                   Soft-floating, fallen from heaven?

                   Ah, see! a tender infant!—
                   It plays with flowers, unwittingly;
                   It strives to grasp morn’s golden beams.
                   O where, sweet stranger, where’s your home?
                   Afar from unknown shores
                   The waves have wafted hither
                   This helpless little one.

                   Nay, clasp not, tender darling,
                   With tiny hand the flowers!
                   No hand returns the pressure,
                   The flowers are strange and mute.

                   They clothe themselves in beauty,
                   They breathe a rich perfume:
                   But cannot fold around you
                   A mother’s loving arms;—
                   Far, far away that mother’s fond embrace.

                   Life’s early dawn just opening faint,
                   Your eye yet beaming heaven’s own smile,
                   So soon your tenderest guardians gone;
                   Severe, poor child, your fate,—
                   All, all to you unknown.

                   A noble duke has crossed the mead,
                   And near you checked his steed’s career:
                   Wonder and pity touch his heart;
                   With knowledge high, and manners pure,
                   He rears you,—makes his castle home your own.

                   How great, how infinite your gain!
                   Of all the land you bloom the loveliest;
                   Yet, ah! the priceless blessing,
                   The bliss of parents’ fondness,
                   You left on strands unknown!”

Undine let fall her lute with a melancholy smile. The eyes of Bertalda’s noble foster-parents were filled with tears.

“Ah yes, it was so—such was the morning on which I found you, poor orphan!” cried the duke, with deep emotion; “the beautiful singer is certainly right: still

                       ‘The priceless blessing,
                   The bliss of parents’ fondness,’

it was beyond our power to give you.”

“But we must hear, also, what happened to the poor parents,” said Undine, as she struck the chords, and sung:—

                 “Through her chambers roams the mother
                    Searching, searching everywhere;
                  Seeks, and knows not what, with yearning,
                    Childless house still finding there.

                  Childless house!—O sound of anguish!
                    She alone the anguish knows,
                  There by day who led her dear one,
                    There who rocked its night-repose.

                  Beechen buds again are swelling,
                    Sunshine warms again the shore;
                  Ah, fond mother, cease your searching!
                    Comes the loved and lost no more.

                  Then when airs of eve are fresh’ning,
                    Home the father wends his way,
                  While with smiles his woe he’s veiling,
                    Gushing tears his heart betray.

                  Well he knows, within his dwelling,
                    Still as death he’ll find the gloom,
                  Only hear the mother moaning,—
                    No sweet babe to SMILE him home.”

“O, tell me, in the name of Heaven tell me, Undine, where are my parents?” cried the weeping Bertalda. “You certainly know; you must have discovered them, you wonderful being; for, otherwise you would never have thus torn my heart. Can they be already here? May I believe it possible?” Her eye glanced rapidly over the brilliant company, and rested upon a lady of high rank who was sitting next to her foster-father.

Then, bending her head, Undine beckoned toward the door, while her eyes overflowed with the sweetest emotion. “Where, then, are the poor parents waiting?” she asked; and the old fisherman, hesitating, advanced with his wife from the crowd of spectators. They looked inquiringly, now at Undine, and now at the beautiful lady who was said to be their daughter.

“It is she! it is she there before you!” exclaimed the restorer of their child, her voice half choked with rapture. And both the aged parents embraced their recovered daughter, weeping aloud and praising God.

But, terrified and indignant, Bertalda tore herself from their arms. Such a discovery was too much for her proud spirit to bear, especially at the moment when she had doubtless expected to see her former splendour increased, and when hope was picturing to her nothing less brilliant than a royal canopy and a crown. It seemed to her as if her rival had contrived all this on purpose to humble her before Huldbrand and the whole world. She reproached Undine; she reviled the old people; and even such offensive words as “deceiver, bribed and perjured impostors,” burst from her lips.

The aged wife of the fisherman then said to herself, in a low voice: “Ah, my God, she has become wicked! and yet I feel in my heart that she is my child.”

The old fisherman had meanwhile folded his hands, and offered up a silent prayer that she might NOT be his daughter.

Undine, faint and pale as death, turned from the parents to Bertalda, from Bertalda to the parents. She was suddenly cast dawn from all that heaven of happiness in which she had been dreaming, and plunged into an agony of terror and disappointment, which she had never known even in dreams.

“Have you, then, a soul? Have you indeed a soul, Bertalda?” she cried again and again to her angry friend, as if with vehement effort she would arouse her from a sudden delirium or some distracting dream of night, and restore her to recollection.

But when Bertalda became every moment only more and more enraged—when the disappointed parents began to weep aloud—and the company, with much warmth of dispute, were espousing opposite sides—she begged, with such earnestness and dignity, for the liberty of speaking in this her husband’s hall, that all around her were in an instant hushed to silence. She then advanced to the upper end of the table, where, both humbled and haughty, Bertalda had seated herself, and, while every eye was fastened upon her, spoke in the following manner:—

“My friends, you appear dissatisfied and disturbed; and you are interrupting, with your strife, a festivity I had hoped would bring joy to you and to me. Ah! I knew nothing of your heartless ways of thinking; and never shall understand them: I am not to blame for the mischief this disclosure has done. Believe me, little as you may imagine this to be the case, it is wholly owing to yourselves. One word more, therefore, is all I have to add; but this is one that must be spoken:—I have uttered nothing but truth. Of the certainty of the fact, I give you the strongest assurance. No other proof can I or will I produce, but this I will affirm in the presence of God. The person who gave me this information was the very same who decoyed the infant Bertalda into the water, and who, after thus taking her from her parents, placed her on the green grass of the meadow, where he knew the duke was to pass.”

“She is an enchantress!” cried Bertalda; “a witch, that has intercourse with evil spirits. She acknowledges it herself.”

“Never! I deny it!” replied Undine, while a whole heaven of innocence and truth beamed from her eyes. “I am no witch; look upon me, and say if I am.”

“Then she utters both falsehood and folly,” cried Bertalda; “and she is unable to prove that I am the child of these low people. My noble parents, I entreat you to take me from this company, and out of this city, where they do nothing but shame me.”

But the aged duke, a man of honourable feeling, remained unmoved; and his wife remarked:

“We must thoroughly examine into this matter. God forbid that we should move a step from this hall before we do so.”

Then the aged wife of the fisherman drew near, made a low obeisance to the duchess and said: “Noble and pious lady, you have opened my heart. Permit me to tell you, that if this evil-disposed maiden is my daughter, she has a mark like a violet between her shoulders, and another of the same kind on the instep of her left foot. If she will only consent to go out of the hall with me—”

“I will not consent to uncover myself before the peasant woman,” interrupted Bertalda, haughtily turning her back upon her.

“But before me you certainly will,” replied the duchess gravely. “You will follow me into that room, maiden; and the old woman shall go with us.”

The three disappeared, and the rest continued where they were, in breathless expectation. In a few minutes the females returned—Bertalda pale as death; and the duchess said: “Justice must be done; I therefore declare that our lady hostess has spoken exact truth. Bertalda is the fisherman’s daughter; no further proof is required; and this is all of which, on the present occasion, you need to be informed.”

The princely pair went out with their adopted daughter; the fisherman, at a sign from the duke, followed them with his wife. The other guests retired in silence, or suppressing their murmurs; while Undine sank weeping into the arms of Huldbrand.

The lord of Ringstetten would certainly have been more gratified, had the events of this day been different; but even such as they now were, he could by no means look upon them as unwelcome, since his lovely wife had shown herself so full of goodness, sweetness, and kindliness.

“If I have given her a soul,” he could not help saying to himself, “I have assuredly given her a better one than my own;” and now he only thought of soothing and comforting his weeping wife, and of removing her even so early as the morrow from a place which, after this cross accident, could not fail to be distasteful to her. Yet it is certain that the opinion of the public concerning her was not changed. As something extraordinary had long before been expected of her, the mysterious discovery of Bertalda’s parentage had occasioned little or no surprise; and every one who became acquainted with Bertalda’s story, and with the violence of her behaviour on that occasion, was only disgusted and set against her. Of this state of things, however, the knight and his lady were as yet ignorant; besides, whether the public condemned Bertalda or herself, the one view of the affair would have been as distressing to Undine as the other; and thus they came to the conclusion that the wisest course they could take, was to leave behind them the walls of the old city with all the speed in their power.

With the earliest beams of morning, a brilliant carriage for Undine drove up to the door of the inn; the horses of Huldbrand and his attendants stood near, stamping the pavement, impatient to proceed. The knight was leading his beautiful wife from the door, when a fisher-girl came up and met them in the way.

“We have no need of your fish,” said Huldbrand, accosting her; “we are this moment setting out on a journey.”

Upon this the fisher-girl began to weep bitterly; and then it was that the young couple first perceived it was Bertalda. They immediately returned with her to their apartment, when she informed them that, owing to her unfeeling and violent conduct of the preceding day, the duke and duchess had been so displeased with her, as entirely to withdraw from her their protection, though not before giving her a generous portion. The fisherman, too, had received a handsome gift, and had, the evening before, set out with his wife for his peninsula.

“I would have gone with them,” she pursued, “but the old fisherman, who is said to be my father—”

“He is, in truth, your father, Bertalda,” said Undine, interrupting her. “See, the stranger whom you took for the master of the water-works gave me all the particulars. He wished to dissuade me from taking you with me to Castle Ringstetten, and therefore disclosed to me the whole mystery.”

“Well then,” continued Bertalda, “my father—if it must needs be so—my father said: ‘I will not take you with me until you are changed. If you will venture to come to us alone through the ill-omened forest, that shall be a proof of your having some regard for us. But come not to me as a lady; come merely as a fisher-girl.’ I do as he bade me, for since I am abandoned by all the world, I will live and die in solitude, a poor fisher-girl, with parents equally poor. The forest, indeed, appears very terrible to me. Horrible spectres make it their haunt, and I am so fearful. But how can I help it? I have only come here at this early hour to beg the noble lady of Ringstetten to pardon my unbecoming behaviour of yesterday. Sweet lady, I have the fullest persuasion that you meant to do me a kindness, but you were not aware how severely you would wound me; and then, in my agony and surprise, so many rash and frantic expressions burst from my lips. Forgive me, ah, forgive me! I am in truth so unhappy, already. Only consider what I was but yesterday morning, what I was even at the beginning of your yesterday’s festival, and what I am to-day!”

Her words now became inarticulate, lost in a passionate flow of tears, while Undine, bitterly weeping with her, fell upon her neck. So powerful was her emotion, that it was a long time before she could utter a word. At length she said:

“You shall still go with us to Ringstetten; all shall remain just as we lately arranged it; but say ‘thou’ to me again, and do not call me ‘noble lady’ any more. Consider, we were changed for each other when we were children; even then we were united by a like fate, and we will strengthen this union with such close affection as no human power shall dissolve. Only first of all you must go with us to Ringstetten. How we shall share all things as sisters, we can talk of after we arrive.”

Bertalda looked up to Huldbrand with timid inquiry. He pitied her in her affliction, took her hand, and begged her tenderly to entrust herself to him and his wife.

“We will send a message to your parents,” continued he, “giving them the reason why you have not come;”—and he would have added more about his worthy friends of the peninsula, when, perceiving that Bertalda shrank in distress at the mention of them, he refrained. He took her under the arm, lifted her first into the carriage, then Undine, and was soon riding blithely beside them; so persevering was he, too, in urging forward their driver, that in a short time they had left behind them the limits of the city, and a crowd of painful recollections; and now the ladies could take delight in the beautiful country which their progress was continually presenting.

After a journey of some days, they arrived, on a fine evening, at Castle Ringstetten. The young knight being much engaged with the overseers and menials of his establishment, Undine and Bertalda were left alone. They took a walk upon the high rampart of the fortress, and were charmed with the delightful landscape which the fertile Suabia spread around them. While they were viewing the scene, a tall man drew near, who greeted them with respectful civility, and who seemed to Bertalda much to resemble the director of the city fountain. Still less was the resemblance to be mistaken, when Undine, indignant at his intrusion, waved him off with an air of menace; while he, shaking his head, retreated with rapid strides, as he had formerly done, then glided among the trees of a neighbouring grove and disappeared.

“Do not be terrified, Bertalda,” said Undine; “the hateful master of the fountain shall do you no harm this time.” And then she related to her the particulars of her history, and who she was herself—how Bertalda had been taken away from the people of the peninsula, and Undine left in her place. This relation at first filled the young maiden with amazement and alarm; she imagined her friend must be seized with a sudden madness. But from the consistency of her story, she became more and more convinced that all was true, it so well agreed with former occurrences, and still more convinced from that inward feeling with which truth never fails to make itself known to us. She could not but view it as an extraordinary circumstance that she was herself now living, as it were, in the midst of one of those wild tales which she had formerly heard related. She gazed upon Undine with reverence, but could not keep from a shuddering feeling which seemed to come between her and her friend; and she could not but wonder when the knight, at their evening repast, showed himself so kind and full of love towards a being who appeared to her, after the discoveries just made, more to resemble a phantom of the spirit-world than one of the human race.

CHAPTER 7 The writer of this tale, both because it moves his own heart and he wishes it to move that of others, asks a favour of you, dear reader. Forgive him if he passes over a considerable space of time in a few words, and only tells you generally what therein happened. He knows well that it might be unfolded skilfully, and step by step, how Huldbrand’s heart began to turn from Undine and towards Bertalda—how Bertalda met the young knight with ardent love, and how they both looked upon the poor wife as a mysterious being, more to be dreaded than pitied—how Undine wept, and her tears stung the conscience of her husband, without recalling his former love; so that though at times he showed kindness to her, a cold shudder soon forced him to turn from her to his fellow-mortal Bertalda;—all this, the writer knows, might have been drawn out fully, and perhaps it ought to have been. But it would have made him too sad; for he has witnessed such things, and shrinks from recalling even their shadow. Thou knowest, probably, the like feeling, dear reader; for it is the lot of mortal man. Happy art thou if thou hast received the injury, not inflicted it; for in this case it is more blessed to receive than to give. Then only a soft sorrow at such a recollection passes through thy heart, and perhaps a quiet tear trickles down thy cheek over the faded flowers in which thou once so heartily rejoiced. This is enough: we will not pierce our hearts with a thousand separate stings, but only bear in mind that all happened as I just now said.

Poor Undine was greatly troubled; and the other two were very far from being happy. Bertalda in particular, whenever she was in the slightest degree opposed in her wishes, attributed the cause to the jealousy and oppression of the injured wife. She was therefore daily in the habit of showing a haughty and imperious demeanour, to which Undine yielded with a sad submission; and which was generally encouraged strongly by the now blinded Huldbrand.

What disturbed the inmates of the castle still more, was the endless variety of wonderful apparitions which assailed Huldbrand and Bertalda in the vaulted passages of the building, and of which nothing had ever been heard before within the memory of man. The tall white man, in whom Huldbrand but too plainly recognized Undine’s uncle Kuhleborn, and Bertalda the spectral master of the waterworks, often passed before them with threatening aspect and gestures; more especially, however, before Bertalda, so that, through terror, she had several times already fallen sick, and had, in consequence, frequently thought of quitting the castle. Yet partly because Huldbrand was but too dear to her, and she trusted to her innocence, since no words of love had passed between them, and partly also because she knew not whither to direct her steps, she lingered where she was.

The old fisherman, on receiving the message from the lord of Ringstetten that Bertalda was his guest, returned answer in some lines almost too illegible to be deciphered, but still the best his advanced life and long disuse of writing permitted him to form.

“I have now become,” he wrote, “a poor old widower, for my beloved and faithful wife is dead. But lonely as I now sit in my cottage, I prefer Bertalda’s remaining where she is, to her living with me. Only let her do nothing to hurt my dear Undine, else she will have my curse.”

The last words of this letter Bertalda flung to the winds; but the permission to remain from home, which her father had granted her, she remembered and clung to—just as we are all of us wont to do in similar circumstances.

One day, a few moments after Huldbrand had ridden out, Undine called together the domestics of the family, and ordered them to bring a large stone, and carefully to cover with it a magnificent fountain, that was situated in the middle of the castle court. The servants objected that it would oblige them to bring water from the valley below. Undine smiled sadly.

“I am sorry, my friends,” replied she, “to increase your labour; I would rather bring up the water-vessels myself: but this fountain must indeed be closed. Believe me when I say that it must be done, and that only by doing it we can avoid a greater evil.”

The domestics were all rejoiced to gratify their gentle mistress; and making no further inquiry, they seized the enormous stone. While they were raising it in their hands, and were now on the point of adjusting it over the fountain, Bertalda came running to the place, and cried, with an air of command, that they must stop; that the water she used, so improving to her complexion, was brought from this fountain, and that she would by no means allow it to be closed.

This time, however, Undine, while she showed her usual gentleness, showed more than her usual resolution: she said it belonged to her, as mistress of the house, to direct the household according to her best judgment; and that she was accountable in this to no one but her lord and husband.

“See, O pray see,” exclaimed the dissatisfied and indignant Bertalda, “how the beautiful water is curling and curving, winding and waving there, as if disturbed at being shut out from the bright sunshine, and from the cheerful view of the human countenance, for whose mirror it was created.”

In truth the water of the fountain was agitated, and foaming and hissing in a surprising manner; it seemed as if there were something within possessing life and will, that was struggling to free itself from confinement. But Undine only the more earnestly urged the accomplishment of her commands. This earnestness was scarcely required. The servants of the castle were as happy in obeying their gentle lady, as in opposing the haughty spirit of Bertalda; and however the latter might scold and threaten, still the stone was in a few minutes lying firm over the opening of the fountain. Undine leaned thoughtfully over it, and wrote with her beautiful fingers on the flat surface. She must, however, have had something very sharp and corrosive in her hand, for when she retired, and the domestics went up to examine the stone, they discovered various strange characters upon it, which none of them had seen there before.

When the knight returned home, toward evening, Bertalda received him with tears, and complaints of Undine’s conduct. He cast a severe glance of reproach at his poor wife, and she looked down in distress; yet she said very calmly:

“My lord and husband, you never reprove even a bondslave before you hear his defence; how much less, then, your wedded wife!”

“Speak! what moved you to this singular conduct?” said the knight with a gloomy countenance.

“I could wish to tell you when we are entirely alone,” said Undine, with a sigh.

“You can tell me equally well in the presence of Bertalda,” he replied.

“Yes, if you command me,” said Undine; “but do not command me—pray, pray do not!”

She looked so humble, affectionate, and obedient, that the heart of the knight was touched and softened, as if it felt the influence of a ray from better times. He kindly took her arm within his, and led her to his apartment, where she spoke as follows:

“You already know something, my beloved lord, of Kuhleborn, my evil-disposed uncle, and have often felt displeasure at meeting him in the passages of this castle. Several times has he terrified Bertalda even to swooning. He does this because he possesses no soul, being a mere elemental mirror of the outward world, while of the world within he can give no reflection. Then, too, he sometimes observes that you are displeased with me, that in my childish weakness I weep at this, and that Bertalda, it may be, laughs at the same moment. Hence it is that he imagines all is wrong with us, and in various ways mixes with our circle unbidden. What do I gain by reproving him, by showing displeasure, and sending him away? He does not believe a word I say. His poor nature has no idea that the joys and sorrows of love have so sweet a resemblance, and are so intimately connected that no power on earth is able to separate them. A smile shines in the midst of tears, and a smile calls forth tears from their dwelling-place.”

She looked up at Huldbrand, smiling and weeping, and he again felt within his heart all the magic of his former love. She perceived it, and pressed him more tenderly to her, while with tears of joy she went on thus:

“When the disturber of our peace would not be dismissed with words, I was obliged to shut the door upon him; and the only entrance by which he has access to us is that fountain. His connection with the other water-spirits here in this region is cut off by the valleys that border upon us; and his kingdom first commences farther off on the Danube, in whose tributary streams some of his good friends have their abode. For this reason I caused the stone to be placed over the opening of the fountain, and inscribed characters upon it, which baffle all the efforts of my suspicious uncle; so that he now has no power of intruding either upon you or me, or Bertalda. Human beings, it is true, notwithstanding the characters I have inscribed there, are able to raise the stone without any extraordinary trouble; there is nothing to prevent them. If you choose, therefore, remove it, according to Bertalda’s desire; but she assuredly knows not what she asks. The rude Kuhleborn looks with peculiar ill-will upon her; and should those things come to pass that he has predicted to me, and which may happen without your meaning any evil, ah! dearest, even you yourself would be exposed to peril.”

Huldbrand felt the generosity of his gentle wife in the depth of his heart, since she had been so active in confining her formidable defender, and even at the very moment she was reproached for it by Bertalda. He pressed her in his arms with the tenderest affection, and said with emotion:

“The stone shall remain unmoved; all remains, and ever shall remain, just as you choose to have it, my sweetest Undine!”

At these long-withheld expressions of tenderness, she returned his caresses with lowly delight, and at length said:

“My dearest husband, since you are so kind and indulgent to-day, may I venture to ask a favour of you? See now, it is with you as with summer. Even amid its highest splendour, summer puts on the flaming and thundering crown of glorious tempests, in which it strongly resembles a king and god on earth. You, too, are sometimes terrible in your rebukes; your eyes flash lightning, while thunder resounds in your voice; and although this may be quite becoming to you, I in my folly cannot but sometimes weep at it. But never, I entreat you, behave thus toward me on a river, or even when we are near any water. For if you should, my relations would acquire a right over me. They would inexorably tear me from you in their fury, because they would conceive that one of their race was injured; and I should be compelled, as long as I lived, to dwell below in the crystal palaces, and never dare to ascend to you again; or should THEY SEND me up to you!—O God! that would be far worse still. No, no, my beloved husband; let it not come to that, if your poor Undine is dear to you.”

He solemnly promised to do as she desired, and, inexpressibly happy and full of affection, the married pair returned from the apartment. At this very moment Bertalda came with some work-people whom she had meanwhile ordered to attend her, and said with a fretful air, which she had assumed of late:

“Well, now the secret consultation is at an end, the stone may be removed. Go out, workmen, and see to it.”

The knight, however, highly resenting her impertinence, said, in brief and very decisive terms: “The stone remains where it is!” He reproved Bertalda also for the vehemence that she had shown towards his wife. Whereupon the workmen, smiling with secret satisfaction, withdrew; while Bertalda, pale with rage, hurried away to her room.

When the hour of supper came, Bertalda was waited for in vain. They sent for her; but the domestic found her apartments empty, and brought back with him only a sealed letter, addressed to the knight. He opened it in alarm, and read:

“I feel with shame that I am only the daughter of a poor fisherman. That I for one moment forgot this, I will make expiation in the miserable hut of my parents. Farewell to you and your beautiful wife!”

Undine was troubled at heart. With eagerness she entreated Huldbrand to hasten after their friend, who had flown, and bring her back with him. Alas! she had no occasion to urge him. His passion for Bertalda again burst forth with vehemence. He hurried round the castle, inquiring whether any one had seen which way the fair fugitive had gone. He could gain no information; and was already in the court on his horse, determining to take at a venture the road by which he had conducted Bertalda to the castle, when there appeared a page, who assured him that he had met the lady on the path to the Black Valley. Swift as an arrow, the knight sprang through the gate in the direction pointed out, without hearing Undine’s voice of agony, as she cried after him from the window:

“To the Black Valley? Oh, not there! Huldbrand, not there! Or if you will go, for Heaven’s sake take me with you!”

But when she perceived that all her calling was of no avail, she ordered her white palfrey to be instantly saddled, and followed the knight, without permitting a single servant to accompany her.

The Black Valley lies secluded far among the mountains. What its present name may be I am unable to say. At the time of which I am speaking, the country-people gave it this appellation from the deep obscurity produced by the shadows of lofty trees, more especially by a crowded growth of firs that covered this region of moorland. Even the brook, which bubbled between the rocks, assumed the same dark hue, and showed nothing of that cheerful aspect which streams are wont to wear that have the blue sky immediately over them.

It was now the dusk of evening; and between the heights it had become extremely wild and gloomy. The knight, in great anxiety, skirted the border of the brook. He was at one time fearful that, by delay, he should allow the fugitive to advance too far before him; and then again, in his too eager rapidity, he was afraid he might somewhere overlook and pass by her, should she be desirous of concealing herself from his search. He had in the meantime penetrated pretty far into the valley, and might hope soon to overtake the maiden, provided he were pursuing the right track. The fear, indeed, that he might not as yet have gained it, made his heart beat with more and more of anxiety. In the stormy night which was now approaching, and which always fell more fearfully over this valley, where would the delicate Bertalda shelter herself, should he fail to find her? At last, while these thoughts were darting across his mind, he saw something white glimmer through the branches on the ascent of the mountain. He thought he recognized Bertalda’s robe; and he directed his course towards it. But his horse refused to go forward; he reared with a fury so uncontrollable, and his master was so unwilling to lose a moment, that (especially as he saw the thickets were altogether impassable on horseback) he dismounted, and, having fastened his snorting steed to an elm, worked his way with caution through the matted underwood. The branches, moistened by the cold drops of the evening dew, struck against his forehead and cheeks; distant thunder muttered from the further side of the mountains; and everything put on so strange an appearance, that he began to feel a dread of the white figure, which now lay at a short distance from him upon the ground. Still, he could see distinctly that it was a female, either asleep or in a swoon, and dressed in long white garments such as Bertalda had worn the past day. Approaching quite near to her, he made a rustling with the branches and a ringing with his sword; but she did not move.

“Bertalda!” he cried, at first low, then louder and louder; yet she heard him not. At last, when he uttered the dear name with an energy yet more powerful, a hollow echo from the mountain-summits around the valley returned the deadened sound, “Bertalda!” Still the sleeper continued insensible. He stooped down; but the duskiness of the valley, and the obscurity of twilight would not allow him to distinguish her features. While, with painful uncertainty, he was bending over her, a flash of lightning suddenly shot across the valley. By this stream of light he saw a frightfully distorted visage close to his own, and a hoarse voice reached his ear:

“You enamoured swain, give me a kiss!” Huldbrand sprang upon his feet with a cry of horror, and the hideous figure rose with him.

“Go home!” it cried, with a deep murmur: “the fiends are abroad. Go home! or I have you!” And it stretched towards him its long white arms.

“Malicious Kuhleborn!” exclaimed the knight, with restored energy; “if Kuhleborn you are, what business have you here?—what’s your will, you goblin? There, take your kiss!” And in fury he struck his sword at the form. But it vanished like vapour; and a rush of water, which wetted him through and through, left him in no doubt with what foe he had been engaged.

“He wishes to frighten me back from my pursuit of Bertalda,” said he to himself. “He imagines that I shall be terrified at his senseless tricks, and resign the poor distressed maiden to his power, so that he can wreak his vengeance upon her at will. But that he shall not, weak spirit of the flood! What the heart of man can do, when it exerts the full force of its will and of its noblest powers, the poor goblin cannot fathom.”

He felt the truth of his words, and that they had inspired his heart with fresh courage. Fortune, too, appeared to favour him; for, before reaching his fastened steed, he distinctly heard the voice of Bertalda, weeping not far before him, amid the roar of the thunder and the tempest, which every moment increased. He flew swiftly towards the sound, and found the trembling maiden, just as she was attempting to climb the steep, hoping to escape from the dreadful darkness of this valley. He drew near her with expressions of love; and bold and proud as her resolution had so lately been, she now felt nothing but joy that the man whom she so passionately loved should rescue her from this frightful solitude, and thus call her back to the joyful life in the castle. She followed almost unresisting, but so spent with fatigue, that the knight was glad to bring her to his horse, which he now hastily unfastened from the elm, in order to lift the fair wanderer upon him, and then to lead him carefully by the reins through the uncertain shades of the valley.

But, owing to the wild apparition of Kuhleborn, the horse had become wholly unmanageable. Rearing and wildly snorting as he was, the knight must have used uncommon effort to mount the beast himself; to place the trembling Bertalda upon him was impossible. They were compelled, therefore, to return home on foot. While with one hand the knight drew the steed after him by the bridle, he supported the tottering Bertalda with the other. She exerted all the strengths in her power in order to escape speedily from this vale of terrors. But weariness weighed her down like lead; and all her limbs trembled, partly in consequence of what she had suffered from the extreme terror which Kuhleborn had already caused her, and partly from her present fear at the roar of the tempest and thunder amid the mountain forest.

At last she slid from the arm of the knight; and sinking upon the moss, she said: “Only let me lie here, my noble lord. I suffer the punishment due to my folly; and I must perish here through faintness and dismay.”

“Never, gentle lady, will I leave you,” cried Huldbrand, vainly trying to restrain the furious animal he was leading, for the horse was all in a foam, and began to chafe more ungovernably than before, till the knight was glad to keep him at such a distance from the exhausted maiden as to save her from a new alarm. But hardly had he withdrawn five steps with the frantic steed when she began to call after him in the most sorrowful accents, fearful that he would actually leave her in this horrible wilderness. He was at a loss what course to take. He would gladly have given the enraged beast his liberty; he would have let him rush away amid the night and exhaust his fury, had he not feared that in this narrow defile his iron-shod hoofs might come thundering over the very spot where Bertalda lay.

In this extreme peril and embarrassment he heard with delight the rumbling wheels of a waggon as it came slowly descending the stony way behind them. He called out for help; answer was returned in the deep voice of a man, bidding them have patience, but promising assistance; and two grey horses soon after shone through the bushes, and near them their driver in the white frock of a carter; and next appeared a great sheet of white linen, with which the goods he seemed to be conveying were covered. The greys, in obedience to a shout from their master, stood still. He came up to the knight, and aided him in checking the fury of the foaming charger.

“I know well enough,” said he, “what is the matter with the brute. The first time I travelled this way my horses were just as wilful and headstrong as yours. The reason is, there is a water-spirit haunts this valley—and a wicked wight they say he is—who takes delight in mischief and witcheries of this sort. But I have learned a charm; and if you will let me whisper it in your horse’s ear, he will stand just as quiet as my silver greys there.”

“Try your luck, then, and help us as quickly as possible!” said the impatient knight.

Upon this the waggoner drew down the head of the rearing courser close to his own, and spoke some words in his ear. The animal instantly stood still and subdued; only his quick panting and smoking sweat showed his recent violence.

Huldbrand had little time to inquire by what means this had been effected. He agreed with the man that he should take Bertalda in his waggon, where, as he said, a quantity of soft cotton was stowed, and he might in this way convey her to Castle Ringstetten. The knight could accompany them on horseback. But the horse appeared to be too much exhausted to carry his master so far. Seeing this, the man advised him to mount the waggon with Bertalda. The horse could be attached to it behind.

“It is down-hill,” said he, “and the load for my greys will therefore be light.”

The knight accepted his offer, and entered the waggon with Bertalda. The horse followed patiently after, while the waggoner, sturdy and attentive, walked beside them.

Amid the silence and deepening obscurity of the night, the tempest sounding more and more remote, in the comfortable feeling of their security, a confidential conversation arose between Huldbrand and Bertalda. He reproached her in the most flattering words for her resentful flight. She excused herself with humility and feeling; and from every tone of her voice it shone out, like a lamp guiding to the beloved through night and darkness, that Huldbrand was still dear to her. The knight felt the sense of her words rather than heard the words themselves, and answered simply to this sense.

Then the waggoner suddenly shouted, with a startling voice: “Up, my greys, up with your feet! Hey, now together!—show your spirit!—remember who you are!”

The knight bent over the side of the waggon, and saw that the horses had stepped into the midst of a foaming stream, and were, indeed, almost swimming, while the wheels of the waggon were rushing round and flashing like mill-wheels; and the waggoner had got on before, to avoid the swell of the flood.

“What sort of a road is this? It leads into the middle of the stream!” cried Huldbrand to his guide.

“Not at all, sir,” returned he, with a laugh; “it is just the contrary. The stream is running in the middle of our road. Only look about you, and see how all is overflowed!”

The whole valley, in fact, was in commotion, as the waters, suddenly raised and visibly rising, swept over it.

“It is Kuhleborn, that evil water-spirit, who wishes to drown us!” exclaimed the knight. “Have you no charm of protection against him, friend?”

“I have one,” answered the waggoner; “but I cannot and must not make use of it before you know who I am.”

“Is this a time for riddles?” cried the knight. “The flood is every moment rising higher; and what does it concern ME to know who YOU are?”

“But mayhap it does concern you, though,” said the guide; “for I am Kuhleborn.”

Thus speaking he thrust his head into the waggon, and laughed with a distorted visage. But the waggon remained a waggon no longer; the grey horses were horses no longer; all was transformed to foam—all sank into the waters that rushed and hissed around them; while the waggoner himself, rising in the form of a gigantic wave, dragged the vainly-struggling courser under the waters, then rose again huge as a liquid tower, swept over the heads of the floating pair, and was on the point of burying them irrecoverably beneath it. Then the soft voice of Undine was heard through the uproar; the moon emerged from the clouds; and by its light Undine was seen on the heights above the valley. She rebuked, she threatened the floods below her. The menacing and tower-like billow vanished, muttering and murmuring; the waters gently flowed away under the beams of the moon; while Undine, like a hovering white dove, flew down from the hill, raised the knight and Bertalda, and bore them to a green spot, where, by her earnest efforts, she soon restored them and dispelled their terrors. She then assisted Bertalda to mount the white palfrey on which she had herself been borne to the valley; and thus all three returned homeward to Castle Ringstetten.

CHAPTER 8 After this last adventure they lived at the castle undisturbed and in peaceful enjoyment. The knight was more and more impressed with the heavenly goodness of his wife, which she had so nobly shown by her instant pursuit and by the rescue she had effected in the Black Valley, where the power of Kuhleborn again commenced. Undine herself enjoyed that peace and security which never fails the soul as long as it knows distinctly that it is on the right path; and besides, in the newly-awakened love and regard of her husband, a thousand gleams of hope and joy shone upon her.

Bertalda, on the other hand, showed herself grateful, humble, and timid, without taking to herself any merit for so doing. Whenever Huldbrand or Undine began to explain to her their reasons for covering the fountain, or their adventures in the Black Valley, she would earnestly entreat them to spare her the recital, for the recollection of the fountain occasioned her too much shame, and that of the Black Valley too much terror. She learnt nothing more about either of them; and what would she have gained from more knowledge? Peace and joy had visibly taken up their abode at Castle Ringstetten. They enjoyed their present blessings in perfect security, and now imagined that life could produce nothing but pleasant flowers and fruits.

In this happiness winter came and passed away; and spring, with its foliage of tender green, and its heaven of softest blue, succeeded to gladden the hearts of the three inmates of the castle. The season was in harmony with their minds, and their minds imparted their own hues to the season. What wonder, then, that its storks and swallows inspired them also with a disposition to travel? On a bright morning, while they were wandering down to one of the sources of the Danube, Huldbrand spoke of the magnificence of this noble stream, how it continued swelling as it flowed through countries enriched by its waters, with what splendour Vienna rose and sparkled on its banks, and how it grew lovelier and more imposing throughout its progress.

“It must be glorious to trace its course down to Vienna!” Bertalda exclaimed, with warmth; but immediately resuming the humble and modest demeanour she had recently shown, she paused and blushed in silence.

This much moved Undine; and with the liveliest wish to gratify her friend, she said, “What hinders our taking this little voyage?”

Bertalda leapt up with delight, and the two friends at the same moment began painting this enchanting voyage on the Danube in the most brilliant colours. Huldbrand, too, agreed to the project with pleasure; only he once whispered, with something of alarm, in Undine’s ear—

“But at that distance Kuhleborn becomes possessed of his power again!”

“Let him come, let him come,” she answered with a laugh; “I shall be there, and he dares do none of his mischief in my presence.”

Thus was the last impediment removed. They prepared for the expedition, and soon set out upon it with lively spirits and the brightest hopes.

But be not surprised, O man, if events almost always happen very differently from what you expect. That malicious power which lies in ambush for our destruction delights to lull its chosen victim asleep with sweet songs and golden delusions; while, on the other hand, the messenger of heaven often strikes sharply at our door, to alarm and awaken us.

During the first days of their passage down the Danube they were unusually happy. The further they advanced upon the waters of this proud river, the views became more and more fair. But amid scenes otherwise most delicious, and from which they had promised themselves the purest delight, the stubborn Kuhleborn, dropping all disguise, began to show his power of annoying them. He had no other means of doing this, indeed, than by tricks—for Undine often rebuked the swelling waves or the contrary winds, and then the insolence of the enemy was instantly humbled and subdued; but his attacks were renewed, and Undine’s reproofs again became necessary, so that the pleasure of the fellow-travellers was completely destroyed. The boatmen, too, were continually whispering to one another in dismay, and eying their three superiors with distrust, while even the servants began more and more to form dismal surmises, and to watch their master and mistress with looks of suspicion.

Huldbrand often said in his own mind, “This comes when like marries not like—when a man forms an unnatural union with a sea-maiden.” Excusing himself, as we all love to do, he would add: “I did not, in fact, know that she was a maid of the sea. It is my misfortune that my steps are haunted and disturbed by the wild humours of her kindred, but it is not my crime.”

By reflections like these, he felt himself in some measure strengthened; but, on the other hand, he felt the more ill-humour, almost dislike, towards Undine. He would look angrily at her, and the unhappy wife but too well understood his meaning. One day, grieved by this unkindness, as well as exhausted by her unremitted exertions to frustrate the artifices of Kuhleborn, she toward evening fell into a deep slumber, rocked and soothed by the gentle motion of the bark. But hardly had she closed her eyes, when every person in the boat, in whatever direction he might look, saw the head of a man, frightful beyond imagination: each head rose out of the waves, not like that of a person swimming, but quite perpendicular, as if firmly fastened to the watery mirror, and yet moving on with the bark. Every one wished to show to his companion what terrified himself, and each perceived the same expression of horror on the face of the other, only hands and eyes were directed to a different quarter, as if to a point where the monster, half laughing and half threatening, rose opposite to each.

When, however, they wished to make one another understand the site, and all cried out, “Look, there!” “No, there!” the frightful heads all became visible to each, and the whole river around the boat swarmed with the most horrible faces. All raised a scream of terror at the sight, and Undine started from sleep. As she opened her eyes, the deformed visages disappeared. But Huldbrand was made furious by so many hideous visions. He would have burst out in wild imprecations, had not Undine with the meekest looks and gentlest tone of voice said—

“For God’s sake, my husband, do not express displeasure against me here—we are on the water.”

The knight was silent, and sat down absorbed in deep thought. Undine whispered in his ear, “Would it not be better, my love, to give up this foolish voyage, and return to Castle Ringstetten in peace?”

But Huldbrand murmured wrathfully: “So I must become a prisoner in my own castle, and not be allowed to breathe a moment but while the fountain is covered? Would to Heaven that your cursed kindred—”

Then Undine pressed her fair hand on his lips caressingly. He said no more; but in silence pondered on all that Undine had before said.

Bertalda, meanwhile, had given herself up to a crowd of thronging thoughts. Of Undine’s origin she knew a good deal, but not the whole; and the terrible Kuhleborn especially remained to her an awful, an impenetrable mystery—never, indeed, had she once heard his name. Musing upon these wondrous things, she unclasped, without being fully conscious of what she was doing, a golden necklace, which Huldbrand, on one of the preceding days of their passage, had bought for her of a travelling trader; and she was now letting it float in sport just over the surface of the stream, while in her dreamy mood she enjoyed the bright reflection it threw on the water, so clear beneath the glow of evening. That instant a huge hand flashed suddenly up from the Danube, seized the necklace in its grasp, and vanished with it beneath the flood. Bertalda shrieked aloud, and a scornful laugh came pealing up from the depth of the river.

The knight could now restrain his wrath no longer. He started up, poured forth a torrent of reproaches, heaped curses upon all who interfered with his friends and troubled his life, and dared them all, water-spirits or mermaids, to come within the sweep of his sword.

Bertalda, meantime, wept for the loss of the ornament so very dear to her heart, and her tears were to Huldbrand as oil poured upon the flame of his fury; while Undine held her hand over the side of the boat, dipping it in the waves, softly murmuring to herself, and only at times interrupting her strange mysterious whisper to entreat her husband—

“Do not reprove me here, beloved; blame all others as you will, but not me. You know why!” And in truth, though he was trembling with excess of passion, he kept himself from any word directly against her.

She then brought up in her wet hand, which she had been holding under the waves, a coral necklace, of such exquisite beauty, such sparkling brilliancy, as dazzled the eyes of all who beheld it. “Take this,” said she, holding it out kindly to Bertalda, “I have ordered it to be brought to make some amends for your loss; so do not grieve any more, poor child.”

But the knight rushed between then, and snatching the beautiful ornament out of Undine’s hand, hurled it back into the flood; and, mad with rage, exclaimed: “So, then, you have still a connection with them! In the name of all witches go and remain among them with your presents, you sorceress, and leave us human beings in peace!”

With fixed but streaming eyes, poor Undine gazed on him, her hand still stretched out, just as when she had so lovingly offered her brilliant gift to Bertalda. She then began to weep more and more, as if her heart would break, like an innocent tender child, cruelly aggrieved. At last, wearied out, she said: “Farewell, dearest, farewell. They shall do you no harm; only remain true, that I may have power to keep them from you. But I must go hence! go hence even in this early youth! Oh, woe, woe! what have you done! Oh, woe, woe!”

And she vanished over the side of the boat. Whether she plunged into the stream, or whether, like water melting into water, she flowed away with it, they knew not—her disappearance was like both and neither. But she was lost in the Danube, instantly and completely; only little waves were yet whispering and sobbing around the boat, and they could almost be heard to say, “Oh, woe, woe! Ah, remain true! Oh, woe!”

But Huldbrand, in a passion of burning tears, threw himself upon the deck of the bark; and a deep swoon soon wrapped the wretched man in a blessed forgetfulness of misery.

Shall we call it a good or an evil thing, that our mourning has no long duration? I mean that deep mourning which comes from the very well-springs of our being, which so becomes one with the lost objects of our love that we hardly realize their loss, while our grief devotes itself religiously to the honouring of their image until we reach that bourne which they have already reached!

Truly all good men observe in a degree this religious devotion; but yet it soon ceases to be that first deep grief. Other and new images throng in, until, to our sorrow, we experience the vanity of all earthly things. Therefore I must say: Alas, that our mourning should be of such short duration!

The lord of Ringstetten experienced this; but whether for his good, we shall discover in the sequel of this history. At first he could do nothing but weep—weep as bitterly as the poor gentle Undine had wept when he snatched out of her hand that brilliant ornament, with which she so kindly wished to make amends for Bertalda’s loss. And then he stretched his hand out, as she had done, and wept again like her, with renewed violence. He cherished a secret hope, that even the springs of life would at last become exhausted by weeping. And has not the like thought passed through the minds of many of us with a painful pleasure in times of sore affliction? Bertalda wept with him; and they lived together a long while at the castle of Ringstetten in undisturbed quiet, honouring the memory of Undine, and having almost wholly forgotten their former attachment. And therefore the good Undine, about this time, often visited Huldbrand’s dreams: she soothed him with soft and affectionate caresses, and then went away again, weeping in silence; so that when he awoke, he sometimes knew not how his cheeks came to be so wet—whether it was caused by her tears, or only by his own.

But as time advanced, these visions became less frequent, and the sorrow of the knight less keen; still he might never, perhaps, have entertained any other wish than thus quietly to think of Undine, and to speak of her, had not the old fisherman arrived unexpectedly at the castle, and earnestly insisted on Bertalda’s returning with him as his child. He had received information of Undine’s disappearance; and he was not willing to allow Bertalda to continue longer at the castle with the widowed knight. “For,” said he, “whether my daughter loves me or not is at present what I care not to know; but her good name is at stake: and where that is the case, nothing else may be thought of.”

This resolution of the old fisherman, and the fearful solitude that, on Bertalda’s departure, threatened to oppress the knight in every hall and passage of the deserted castle, brought to light what had disappeared in his sorrow for Undine,—I mean, his attachment to the fair Bertalda; and this he made known to her father.

The fisherman had many objections to make to the proposed marriage. The old man had loved Undine with exceeding tenderness, and it was doubtful to his mind that the mere disappearance of his beloved child could be properly viewed as her death. But were it even granted that her corpse were lying stiff and cold at the bottom of the Danube, or swept away by the current to the ocean, still Bertalda had had some share in her death; and it was unfitting for her to step into the place of the poor injured wife. The fisherman, however, had felt a strong regard also for the knight: this and the entreaties of his daughter, who had become much more gentle and respectful, as well as her tears for Undine, all exerted their influence, and he must at last have been forced to give up his opposition, for he remained at the castle without objection, and a messenger was sent off express to Father Heilmann, who in former and happier days had united Undine and Huldbrand, requesting him to come and perform the ceremony at the knight’s second marriage.

Hardly had the holy man read through the letter from the lord of Ringstetten, ere he set out upon the journey and made much greater dispatch on his way to the castle than the messenger from it had made in reaching him. Whenever his breath failed him in his rapid progress, or his old limbs ached with fatigue, he would say to himself:

“Perhaps I shall be able to prevent a sin; then sink not, withered body, before I arrive at the end of my journey!” And with renewed vigour he pressed forward, hurrying on without rest or repose, until, late one evening, he entered the shady court-yard of the castle of Ringstetten.

The betrothed were sitting side by side under the trees, and the aged fisherman in a thoughtful mood sat near them. The moment they saw Father Heilmann, they rose with a spring of joy, and pressed round him with eager welcome. But he, in a few words, asked the bridegroom to return with him into the castle; and when Huldbrand stood mute with surprise, and delayed complying with his earnest request, the pious preacher said to him—

“I do not know why I should want to speak to you in private; what I have to say as much concerns Bertalda and the fisherman as yourself; and what we must at some time hear, it is best to hear as soon as possible. Are you, then, so very certain, Knight Huldbrand, that your first wife is actually dead? I can hardly think it. I will say nothing, indeed, of the mysterious state in which she may be now existing; I know nothing of it with certainty. But that she was a most devoted and faithful wife is beyond all dispute. And for fourteen nights past, she has appeared to me in a dream, standing at my bedside wringing her tender hands in anguish, and sighing out, ‘Ah, prevent him, dear father! I am still living! Ah, save his life! Ah, save his soul!’

“I did not understand what this vision of the night could mean, then came your messenger; and I have now hastened hither, not to unite, but, as I hope, to separate what ought not to be joined together. Leave her, Huldbrand! leave him, Bertalda! He still belongs to another; and do you not see on his pale cheek his grief for his lost wife? That is not the look of a bridegroom; and the spirit says to me, that ‘if you do not leave him you will never be happy!’”

The three felt in their inmost hearts that Father Heilmann spoke the truth; but they would not believe it. Even the old fisherman was so infatuated, that he thought it could not be otherwise than as they had latterly settled amongst themselves. They all, therefore, with a determined and gloomy eagerness, struggled against the representations and warnings of the priest, until, shaking his head and oppressed with sorrow, he finally quitted the castle, not choosing to accept their offered shelter even for a single night, or indeed so much as to taste a morsel of the refreshment they brought him. Huldbrand persuaded himself, however, that the priest was a mere visionary; and sent at daybreak to a monk of the nearest monastery, who, without scruple, promised to perform the ceremony in a few days.

CHAPTER 9 It was between night and dawn of day that Huldbrand was lying on his couch, half waking and half sleeping. Whenever he attempted to compose himself to sleep, a terror came upon him and scared him, as if his slumbers were haunted with spectres. But he made an effort to rouse himself fully. He felt fanned as by the wings of a swan, and lulled as by the murmuring of waters, till in sweet confusion of the senses he sank back into his state of half-consciousness.

At last, however, he must have fallen perfectly asleep; for he seemed to be lifted up by wings of the swans, and to be wafted far away over land and sea, while their music swelled on his ear most sweetly. “The music of the swan! the song of the swan!” he could not but repeat to himself every moment; “is it not a sure foreboding of death?” Probably, however, it had yet another meaning. All at once he seemed to be hovering over the Mediterranean Sea. A swan sang melodiously in his ear, that this was the Mediterranean Sea. And while he was looking down upon the waves, they became transparent as crystal, so that he could see through them to the very bottom.

At this a thrill of delight shot through him, for he could see Undine where she was sitting beneath the clear crystal dome. It is true she was weeping very bitterly, and looked much sadder than in those happy days when they lived together at the castle of Ringstetten, both on their arrival and afterward, just before they set out upon their fatal passage down the Danube. The knight could not help thinking upon all this with deep emotion, but it did not appear that Undine was aware of his presence.

Kuhleborn had meanwhile approached her, and was about to reprove her for weeping, when she drew herself up, and looked upon him with an air so majestic and commanding, that he almost shrank back.

“Although I now dwell here beneath the waters,” said she, “yet I have brought my soul with me. And therefore I may weep, little as you can know what such tears are. They are blessed, as everything is blessed to one gifted with a true soul.”

He shook his head incredulously; and after some thought, replied, “And yet, niece, you are subject to our laws, as a being of the same nature with ourselves; and should HE prove unfaithful to you and marry again, you are obliged to take away his life.”

“He remains a widower to this very hour,” replied Undine, “and I am still dear to his sorrowful heart.”

“He is, however, betrothed,” said Kuhleborn, with a laugh of scorn; “and let only a few days wear away, and then comes the priest with his nuptial blessing; and then you must go up to the death of the husband with two wives.”

“I have not the power,” returned Undine, with a smile. “I have sealed up the fountain securely against myself and all of my race.”

“Still, should he leave his castle,” said Kuhleborn, “or should he once allow the fountain to be uncovered, what then? for he thinks little enough of these things.”

“For that very reason,” said Undine, still smiling amid her tears, “for that very reason he is at this moment hovering in spirit over the Mediterranean Sea, and dreaming of the warning which our discourse gives him. I thoughtfully planned all this.”

That instant, Kuhleborn, inflamed with rage, looked up at the knight, wrathfully threatened him, stamped on the ground, and then shot like an arrow beneath the waves. He seemed to swell in his fury to the size of a whale. Again the swans began to sing, to wave their wings and fly; the knight seemed to soar away over mountains and streams, and at last to alight at Castle Ringstetten, and to awake on his couch.

Upon his couch he actually did awake; and his attendant entering at the same moment, informed him that Father Heilmann was still lingering in the neighbourhood; that he had the evening before met with him in the forest, where he was sheltering himself under a hut, which he had formed by interweaving the branches of trees, and covering them with moss and fine brushwood; and that to the question “What he was doing there, since he would not give the marriage blessing?” his answer was—

“There are many other blessings than those given at marriages; and though I did not come to officiate at the wedding, I may still officiate at a very different solemnity. All things have their seasons; we must be ready for them all. Besides, marrying and mourning are by no means so very unlike; as every one not wilfully blinded must know full well.”

The knight made many bewildered reflections on these words and on his dream. But it is very difficult to give up a thing which we have once looked upon as certain; so all continued as had been arranged previously.

Should I relate to you how passed the marriage-feast at Castle Ringstetten, it would be as if you saw a heap of bright and pleasant things, but all overspread with a black mourning crape, through whose darkening veil their brilliancy would appear but a mockery of the nothingness of all earthly joys.

It was not that any spectral delusion disturbed the scene of festivity; for the castle, as we well know, had been secured against the mischief of water-spirits. But the knight, the fisherman, and all the guests were unable to banish the feeling that the chief personage of the feast was still wanting, and that this chief personage could be no other than the gentle and beloved Undine.

Whenever a door was heard to open, all eyes were involuntarily turned in that direction; and if it was nothing but the steward with new dishes, or the cupbearer with a supply of wine of higher flavour than the last, they again looked down in sadness and disappointment, while the flashes of wit and merriment which had been passing at times from one to another, were extinguished by tears of mournful remembrance.

The bride was the least thoughtful of the company, and therefore the most happy; but even to her it sometimes seemed strange that she should be sitting at the head of the table, wearing a green wreath and gold-embroidered robe, while Undine was lying a corpse, stiff and cold, at the bottom of the Danube, or carried out by the current into the ocean. For ever since her father had suggested something of this sort, his words were continually sounding in her ear; and this day, in particular, they would neither fade from her memory, nor yield to other thoughts.

Evening had scarcely arrived, when the company returned to their homes; not dismissed by the impatience of the bridegroom, as wedding parties are sometimes broken up, but constrained solely by heavy sadness and forebodings of evil. Bertalda retired with her maidens, and the knight with his attendants, to undress, but there was no gay laughing company of bridesmaids and bridesmen at this mournful festival.

Bertalda wished to awaken more cheerful thoughts; she ordered her maidens to spread before her a brilliant set of jewels, a present from Huldbrand, together with rich apparel and veils, that she might select from among them the brightest and most beautiful for her dress in the morning. The attendants rejoiced at this opportunity of pouring forth good wishes and promises of happiness to their young mistress, and failed not to extol the beauty of the bride with the most glowing eloquence. This went on for a long time, until Bertalda at last, looking in a mirror, said with a sigh—

“Ah, but do you not see plainly how freckled I am growing? Look here on the side of my neck.”

They looked at the place, and found the freckles, indeed, as their fair mistress had said; but they called them mere beauty spots, the faintest touches of the sun, such as would only heighten the whiteness of her delicate complexion. Bertalda shook her head, and still viewed them as a blemish. “And I could remove them,” she said at last, sighing. “But the castle fountain is covered, from which I formerly used to have that precious water, so purifying to the skin. Oh, had I this evening only a single flask of it!”

“Is that all?” cried an alert waiting-maid, laughing as she glided out of the apartment.

“She will not be so foolish,” said Bertalda, well-pleased and surprised, “as to cause the stone cover of the fountain to be taken off this very evening?” That instant they heard the tread of men passing along the court-yard, and could see from the window where the officious maiden was leading them directly up to the fountain, and that they carried levers and other instruments on their shoulders.

“It is certainly my will,” said Bertalda with a smile, “if it does not take them too long.” And pleased with the thought, that a word from her was now sufficient to accomplish what had formerly been refused with a painful reproof, she looked down upon their operations in the bright moonlit castle-court.

The men raised the enormous stone with an effort; some one of the number indeed would occasionally sigh, when he recollected they were destroying the work of their former beloved mistress. Their labour, however, was much lighter than they had expected. It seemed as if some power from within the fountain itself aided them in raising the stone.

“It appears,” said the workmen to one another in astonishment, “as if the confined water had become a springing fountain.” And the stone rose more and more, and, almost without the assistance of the work-people, rolled slowly down upon the pavement with a hollow sound. But an appearance from the opening of the fountain filled them with awe, as it rose like a white column of water; at first they imagined it really to be a fountain, until they perceived the rising form to be a pale female, veiled in white. She wept bitterly, raised her hands above her head, wringing them sadly as with slow and solemn step she moved toward the castle. The servants shrank back, and fled from the spring, while the bride, pale and motionless with horror, stood with her maidens at the window. When the figure had now come close beneath their room, it looked up to them sobbing, and Bertalda thought she recognized through the veil the pale features of Undine. But the mourning form passed on, sad, reluctant, and lingering, as if going to the place of execution. Bertalda screamed to her maids to call the knight; not one of them dared to stir from her place; and even the bride herself became again mute, as if trembling at the sound of her own voice.

While they continued standing at the window, motionless as statues, the mysterious wanderer had entered the castle, ascended the well-known stairs, and traversed the well-known halls in silent tears. Alas, how different had she once passed through these rooms!

The knight had in the meantime dismissed his attendants. Half-undressed and in deep dejection, he was standing before a large mirror, a wax taper burned dimly beside him. At this moment some one tapped at his door very, very softly. Undine had formerly tapped in this way, when she was playing some of her endearing wiles.

“It is all an illusion!” said he to himself. “I must to my nuptial bed.”

“You must indeed, but to a cold one!” he heard a voice, choked with sobs, repeat from without; and then he saw in the mirror, that the door of his room was slowly, slowly opened, and the white figure entered, and gently closed it behind her.

“They have opened the spring,” said she in a low tone; “and now I am here, and you must die.”

He felt, in his failing breath, that this must indeed be; but covering his eyes with his hands, he cried: “Do not in my death-hour, do not make me mad with terror. If that veil conceals hideous features, do not lift it! Take my life, but let me not see you.”

“Alas!” replied the pale figure, “will you not then look upon me once more? I am as fair now as when you wooed me on the island!”

“Oh, if it indeed were so,” sighed Huldbrand, “and that I might die by a kiss from you!”

“Most willingly, my own love,” said she. She threw back her veil; heavenly fair shone forth her pure countenance. Trembling with love and the awe of approaching death, the knight leant towards her. She kissed him with a holy kiss; but she relaxed not her hold, pressing him more closely in her arms, and weeping as if she would weep away her soul. Tears rushed into the knight’s eyes, while a thrill both of bliss and agony shot through his heart, until he at last expired, sinking softly back from her fair arms upon the pillow of his couch a corpse.

“I have wept him to death!” said she to some domestics, who met her in the ante-chamber; and passing through the terrified group, she went slowly out, and disappeared in the fountain.

CHAPTER 10 Father Heilmann had returned to the castle as soon as the death of the lord of Ringstetten was made known in the neighbourhood; and he arrived at the very hour when the monk who had married the unfortunate couple was hurrying from the door, overcome with dismay and horror.

When Father Heilmann was informed of this, he replied, “It is all well; and now come the duties of my office, in which I have no need of an assistant.”

He then began to console the bride, now a widow though with little benefit to her worldly and thoughtless spirit.

The old fisherman, on the other hand, though severely afflicted, was far more resigned to the fate of his son-in-law and daughter; and while Bertalda could not refrain from accusing Undine as a murderess and sorceress, the old man calmly said, “After all, it could not happen otherwise. I see nothing in it but the judgment of God; and no one’s heart was more pierced by the death of Huldbrand than she who was obliged to work it, the poor forsaken Undine!”

He then assisted in arranging the funeral solemnities as suited the rank of the deceased. The knight was to be interred in the village church-yard, in whose consecrated ground were the graves of his ancestors; a place which they, as well as himself, had endowed with rich privileges and gifts. His shield and helmet lay upon his coffin, ready to be lowered with it into the grave, for Lord Huldbrand of Ringstetten had died the last of his race. The mourners began their sorrowful march, chanting their melancholy songs beneath the calm unclouded heaven; Father Heilmann preceded the procession, bearing a high crucifix, while the inconsolable Bertalda followed, supported by her aged father.

Then they suddenly saw in the midst of the mourning females in the widow’s train, a snow-white figure closely veiled, and wringing its hands in the wild vehemence of sorrow. Those next to whom it moved, seized with a secret dread, started back or on one side; and owing to their movements, the others, next to whom the white stranger now came, were terrified still more, so as to produce confusion in the funeral train. Some of the military escort ventured to address the figure, and attempt to remove it from the procession, but it seemed to vanish from under their hands, and yet was immediately seen advancing again, with slow and solemn step, among the followers of the body. At last, in consequence of the shrinking away of the attendants, it came close behind Bertalda. It now moved so slowly, that the widow was not aware of its presence, and it walked meekly and humbly behind her undisturbed.

This continued until they came to the church-yard, where the procession formed a circle round the open grave. Then it was that Bertalda perceived her unbidden companion, and, half in anger and half in terror, she commanded her to depart from the knight’s place of final rest. But the veiled female, shaking her head with a gentle denial, raised her hands towards Bertalda in lowly supplication, by which she was greatly moved, and could not but remember with tears how Undine had shown such sweetness of spirit on the Danube when she held out to her the coral necklace.

Father Heilmann now motioned with his hand, and gave order for all to observe perfect stillness, that they might breathe a prayer of silent devotion over the body, upon which earth had already been thrown. Bertalda knelt without speaking; and all knelt, even the grave-diggers, who had now finished their work. But when they arose, the white stranger had disappeared. On the spot where she had knelt, a little spring, of silver brightness, was gushing out from the green turf, and it kept swelling and flowing onward with a low murmur, till it almost encircled the mound of the knight’s grave; it then continued its course, and emptied itself into a calm lake, which lay by the side of the consecrated ground. Even to this day, the inhabitants of the village point out the spring; and hold fast the belief that it is the poor deserted Undine, who in this manner still fondly encircles her beloved in her arms.

William Leonard Courtney translation

UNDINE This is the story of the Knight Huldbrand of Ringstetten and of Undine, telling how the Knight wedded with a water-sprite, and what chanced therefrom: and how the Knight died and was buried: and how Undine returned to her element beneath the Mediterranean Sea. 17 CHAPTER I HOW THE KNIGHT CAME TO THE FISHERMAN Now it may be hundreds of years agone that there lived a worthy old fisherman: and he was seated on a fine evening before his door, mending his nets. The part of the country where he lived was right pleasant to behold. The grassy space on which his cottage stood ran far into the lake, and perchance one might well conceive that it was through love of the clear blue waters that the tongue of land had stretched itself among them; while with embrace as close and as loving the lake sent its arms round the pleasaunce where the flowers bloomed and the trees yielded their grateful shade. 18 It was as though water welcomed land and land welcomed water, and it was this made both so lovely. But on this happy sward the fisherman and his household dwelt alone. Few human beings, or rather none at all, even cared to visit it. For you must know that at the back of this little tongue of land there lay a fearsome forest right perilous to traverse. It was dark and solitary and pathless, and many a marvellous strange creature and many a wraith and spectral illusion haunted its glades, so that none might dare adventure unless a sheer necessity drave them. Nathless, the worthy fisherman might pass unharmed, whensoever he was carrying some choice fish caught in his beautiful home to a large town bordering the confines of the forest. He was a man full of holy thoughts, and as he took his way through the gloomy shades peopled with forms of dread, he was wont to sing a pious chaunt with a clear voice, and an honest heart, and a conscience void of guile. Well, the fisherman sate him over his nets, and he minded no evil, when a sudden fear came over him. He thought he heard a rustling noise in the forest as though a horse and rider were drawing every moment nearer to his little home. And it seemed as though all he had dreamed on many a stormy night of the wizardry of the forest was coming to his ken, and above all, the semblance of a snow-white man huge 19 At the back of this little tongue of land there lay a fearsome forest right perilous to traverse 20 21 and terrible, who nodded his head unceasingly with vague and bodeful portent. Nay, but as he raised his eyes towards the wood, he thought he saw the nodding man drawing nigh through the branches of the trees. Yet comfort came to him and a better mind: for he bethought himself how no evil had befallen him even in the forest itself, and here upon the open tongue of land there was little chance of evil influences. So he said aloud a verse from Holy Writ, repeating it with all his heart, and his courage came back so that he almost laughed at the vain fancy that had possessed him. And the white nodding man he saw to be nothing but a stream, well-known and familiar, which ran foaming from the forest and fell into the lake. But the noise he had heard was no fancy. It was in sooth caused by a gallant knight, bravely apparelled, who issued forth from the shadow of the wood and came riding towards the cottage. A scarlet mantle was thrown over his doublet, embroidered with gold; red and violet feathers waved from his golden-coloured headgear; and a beautiful sword, richly dight, flashed from his shoulder-belt. The white horse whereon the knight rode was more slender than chargers are wont to be, and as he trod lightly over the turf, it seemed as though the green and flowery carpet took no harm from the print of his hoofs. It was a fair and comely sight to see the knight advance. Nathless, the old fisherman was not wholly at his ease, albeit that he told himself that no evil might come to him from so much beauty. He stayed, therefore, quietly busy 22 with his nets, politely taking off his head-gear as the stranger drew near, and saying never a word. Presently the knight came up and asked whether he and his horse might have shelter and care for the night. “Fair sir,” quoth the fisherman, “as for your horse, I may give him no better stable than this shady meadow, and no better provender than the grass that groweth thereon. But for yourself I bid you welcome to my cottage, and glad shall I be to offer such supper and lodging as we have.” Right pleased was the knight: he dismounted forthwith, and with the fisherman’s help took off both saddle and bridle from the horse, letting him loose upon the flowery green. Then turning to the fisherman: "Good fisherman,” quoth he, “I thank thee. Yet had I found thee less hospitable and kind, methinks thou wouldst scarcely have got quit of me to-day. For, as I see, there is a broad lake before us, and behind lieth the wood. God forbid that I should ride back into its mysterious depths, now that the shades of night are falling.” “Nay, nay,” quoth the fisherman, “we will not speak too much of that!” So he led his guest into the cottage. Within, beside the hearth, whence a scanty fire shed a dim light through a clean-swept room, was sitting the fisherman’s old wife in a large chair. She rose as the knight entered to give him a kindly welcome, but seated herself 23 again in the chair of honour without offering it to her guest. Whereupon saith the fisherman, with a smile, “Fair sir, thou must not be angered nor take it amiss that she hath not given to thee the best seat in the house. For it is a custom among poor people that only the aged should have it.” “Why, husband,” quoth the dame, “of what art thou thinking? Doth not our guest belong to Christian folk, and how then might it come into his head, being of good young blood, to drive old people from their seats? Take a chair, I beseech thee, young master,” said she, turning to the knight. “Pretty enough is the chair over yonder. Only treat it not with roughness, I beg thee, for one of its legs is none of the soundest.” Then the knight took the chair with care and seated himself upon it in all good humour; for indeed it seemed to him as though he were kinsman to this little household, and had but just come back from abroad. The three soon began to talk in friendly and familiar manner. As to the forest, indeed, concerning which the knight asked some questions, the old man showed no desire to speak at large; for it was not a subject, it seemed to him, to discuss at nightfall. But of their home and former life the old couple spoke freely, and listened eagerly enough when the knight discoursed to them on his travels, and how he had a castle near the source of the Danube, and how he was hight Sir Huldbrand of Ringstetten. While the talk went on 24 pleasantly and eagerly, the knight became aware that now and again there was a splashing sound at the little low window, as though some one were throwing water against it. Each time the splash came, the old man knit his brow and seemed marvellously distempered. But when at length a whole shower dashed against the panes and bubbled into the room through the decayed window-frame, he rose, with anger in his face, and called out in threatening tones: “Undine,” cried he, “wilt thou for once leave off these childish pranks? And to-day there is the more reason, for that there is a stranger knight with us in the cottage.” All grew silent without; only a low laugh was faintly heard, and the fisherman, as he came back from the window, addressed himself to the stranger. “Honoured sir,” quoth he, “thou must needs pardon such tricks, and perchance many a freakish whim besides. For indeed, she meaneth no harm. It is but our foster-child, Undine, who though she hath already entered her eighteenth year, will not wean herself from such childishness. Nathless, as I have said, she hath a good heart.” “Nay, thou mayest talk,” quoth the old dame. “Certès, when thou comest home from fishing or a journey her frolics may please thee well enough. But an thou hadst her with thee the whole day long, and heard not a sensible word, and so far from being a help in the housekeeping as she grew older, found that it was only by much care and anxiety she could be kept from ruining us altogether by her follies–that 25 meseemeth, is quite another thing; nor could the patience of a saint fail to be worn out at last.” “Ay, ay,” quoth the fisherman with a smile, “thou hast thy troubles with the girl, and I have mine with the lake. Often it breaketh through my dams and teareth my nets to pieces. Yet I love it; and so too dost thou love the pretty elf, for all the torment and vexation she bringeth. Is it not so?” “Nay,” quoth the dame, “’tis impossible to be angry with her, and that is the truth.” And she smiled, well pleased. Then of a sudden the door flew open and lo! a strangely fair and beautiful maiden glided into the room, with happy laughter on her lips. “Thou hast jested with me, father,” saith she, “for where is thy guest?” And then she saw him. Full of wonder and amazement she stood watching the handsome knight; while Huldbrand, on his part, looked with all the more earnestness at her beautiful face, because he deemed that it was but her momentary surprise which lent her so strange a charm. Right soon, he thought, will she turn away her eyes and become all the more bashful and composed. But it was not so. When she had gazed her full, she drew near to him confidingly, and knelt at his feet; and while she played with a gold medal hanging from a rich chain on his breast, she whispered: 26 “Kind sir and handsome guest, why then is it that thou art come at last to our poor cottage? Hast thou wandered about the world for years and only now found thy way? Is it out of that wild forest that thou comest, my beautiful knight?” The quick reproof of the angry beldame gave him no moment for reply. Sternly she bade the maiden behave herself seemly, and go to her work. But Undine, minding not a jot for all her words, drew a little footstool close to Huldbrand’s chair and sat down on it with her spinning. “It is here that I will work,” quoth she. The old man did, as parents are wont to do with spoilt children. He made as though he had marked naught of Undine’s wilfulness, and was beginning to talk of something else. But this the girl would not suffer. “I have asked,” said she, “our beautiful guest whence he cometh, and he hath not answered me as yet.” “I come,” saith Huldbrand, “from the forest.” Then said she, “Thou must tell me how you came there, for all men dread it: and what marvellous adventures befell thee, for without some strange things of the sort no man can win his way.” Now Huldbrand shuddered at the memory, and as he looked towards the window, it seemed as though one of the weird figures he had met in the forest were pushing in his grinning face; but it was but the deep dark night that he saw, 27 shrouding everything without. So he collected himself and was about to begin his tale, when the fisherman broke in. “Sir Knight,” quoth he, “this is no fit hour for such discourse as this.” Whereupon Undine sprang angrily from her stool, and standing straight before the old man with her little hands pressed to her sides, “Father,” cried she, “he is not to tell his story? He shall not? But I will have it! It is my will! He shall, in spite of you!” And she stamped her foot on the floor. Now, albeit that she was violent enough, she wore through all her fury so comic a grace that Huldbrand could but the more eagerly watch her anger than at first he did her gentleness. But far other did it fare with the fisherman. His wrath, which hitherto he had suppressed, burst forth in open flame, and with harsh words he reproved Undine’s disobedience and unmannerly behaviour towards the stranger, his good old wife joining with him heartily. But Undine cared not a jot. “If ye choose to scold,” cried she, “and will not do what I want, ye may sleep alone in your smoky old hut!” And like an arrow she was at the door and out into the dark night. 28 CHAPTER II HOW UNDINE HAD COME TO THE FISHERMAN Now when she had gone, both Huldbrand and the fisherman sprang from their seats and were bent on following the angry girl. But before they had reached the cottage door, Undine had long vanished in the darkness without, and not a sound of her light footstep betrayed whither she had gone. Huldbrand looked questioningly at his host. "Perchance," he mused to himself, "this sweet vision, which hath gone back again into the night, is but one of those marvellous shapes 29 which, a short while agone, played their mad tricks upon me in the forest." But the old man muttered between his teeth: "This is not the first time that she hath treated us thus. Now shall we have aching hearts and sleepless eyes the livelong night; for who knoweth but that she may sometime come to harm, if she remaineth alone in the dark until daylight?" "Then for God's sake," cried the knight, "let us follow her forthwith!" "And what would be the use?" returned the old man. "It would be a sin were I to let you pursue the foolish girl in solitude and darkness; while as for me, my old limbs could not catch the runaway, even if we knew whither she had gone." "Nathless," quoth Huldbrand, "let us at least call after her and beg her to come back;" and eagerly did he raise his voice, "Undine! Undine! Come back!" But the old man shook his head. "Little good will shouting serve," saith he. "Thou knowest not her perversity." And yet he too could not forbear to call, "Undine! Undine! Come back, I beg you, come back–if only this once!" It came to pass, however, as the fisherman had surmised. No Undine could be seen or heard, and since the old man could by no means suffer that Huldbrand should go forth 30 alone, they had perforce to return to the cottage. There they found the fire almost extinguished on the hearth, while the old wife, to whom Undine's flight and danger seemed of far smaller moment than they did to her husband, had already retired to rest. The fisherman bestirred himself to blow up the embers, and put fresh wood upon them; and by the light of the kindling flame he sought out a tankard of wine, which he placed between himself and his guest. "Sir Knight," quoth he, "I perceive that thou too art disturbed about the silly girl. It were better, methinks, that we both should talk and drink and so pass the night, than that we should toss sleeplessly upon our rush mats. Is it not so?" Huldbrand readily agreed. The fisherman made him take the old housewife's seat of honour, and thereupon they drank and talked as beseemed two honest and worthy men. Howbeit, as often as anything seemed to move before the windows, or even at times when nothing was moving, one of the two would start, and look up and whisper, "She is coming!" And then they would be silent for a space, and when nothing appeared they would shake their heads with a sigh, and resume their talk. Yet, as neither of them could help but think of Undine, naught pleased them better than that the fisherman should tell, and the knight should hear, the story how Undine had first come to the cottage. So the fisherman began, as followeth: 31 "It may be," saith he, "some fifteen years ago that I was one day passing through that wild forest to sell my fish at the city. As for my wife, she was resting at home, as is her wont; and at that time, I wis, for a happy cause, for God had given us two old people a marvellously fair child. A girl she was; and it had come into our minds whether for the sake of the new comer it might be a wiser course to leave this beautiful home, and seek a more habitable spot in which to bring up our treasure. Poor folk, as thou dost know, Sir Knight, have not always full liberty in such cases; but, Heaven helping, each must do as he can. Now the matter somewhat troubled me, as I went along, for this slip of land was dear to me, and I bethought me with a shudder amid the noise and brawls of the city, how it might come to pass that in such a bustle, or in some scene not much quieter, I should have perforce to take up my abode. Nathless, no murmur against the good God passed my lips. Nay, I thanked him in secret for my new-born babe. Nor yet can I say that aught befell me, either going or returning, out of the common way. At that time nothing had I seen of the marvels and portents of the wood. The Lord was ever with me in its mysterious shades." At that he lifted his cap reverently from his bald head, and stayed for a while musing with prayerful thoughts. Then, covering himself once more, he went on as followeth: "Alack," saith he, "on this side of the forest a great sorrow awaited me. With tears in her eyes, and all clad in 32 mourning, my wife came to meet me. 'O gracious God,' I sobbed, 'where is our child?' "'Our child is with Him on whom thou hast called,' returned she. "We entered the cottage together, weeping silently. And then, when I had looked round for the little corpse and found it not, I learnt all that had chanced. My wife had sat her down with the child by the edge of the lake. Right happily was she playing with it, and void of all fear, when on a sudden the little one bent forward, as though she had seen something marvellously fair beneath the waves. My wife saw her laugh, the dear angel, and put forth her little hands: and in a moment she had sprung out of her arms and disappeared beneath the glittering mirror of the lake. Anxiously and long did I seek for our lost one; but it was all in vain. No trace of her was to be found. "That selfsame evening we were sitting, childless and alone, in the cottage. Neither had any pleasure in talk, nor indeed would our tears have allowed it. It seemed better to gaze into the fire and utter never a word. On a sudden, something rustled outside the door, which straightway opened; and lo! a beautiful little girl, clad in rich garments, stood there on the threshold, smiling at us. Marvellously astonied were we; as for me, I wist not whether it might be illusion or reality on which I gazed. But I saw the water dripping from her golden hair and her rich garment, and methought the pretty 33 child had been lying in the water and needed our help. 'Good wife,' said I, 'no one hath been able to save our dear one; let us, at least, do for others what would have been so 34 A beautiful little girl clad in rich garments stood there on the threshold smiling 35 36 blessed a boon for ourselves.' So we took the little one and undressed her, put her to bed and gave her something warm; but she, meanwhile, spoke not a word. Only she smiled upon us with eyes full of the colour of lake and sky. "Next morning we saw at once that she had taken no hurt from her wetting, and methought I should ask her about her parents, and by what odd chance she had come hither. But full strange and confused was the account that she gave. Far away from here must she have been born; for, during these fifteen years past, not a word have I learnt of her parentage. Moreover, both then and since, her talk has been of such strange things that, for aught we can tell, she may have dropped down to us from the moon! Golden castles, crystal domes–of such does she prattle, and I know not what marvels beside. The simplest and clearest tale she tells is that, being out with her mother on the great lake she fell into the water, and that she only came to her senses here under the trees, when she found herself with joy on this right happy shore. "Certès, we have had our fill of misgiving and perplexities. It was our mind forthwith to keep the child we had found, and to bring her up in the place of our lost darling; but who could reveal to us whether she had been baptized or no? On this matter she had naught to tell us. When we questioned her, it was her wont to answer that she knew full well that she was created for God's praise and glory, and that 37 whatever might appertain to God's praise and glory she was well content should be done to her. "Now it seemed to my wife and to me that, an she had not been baptized, there was no time for delay; whereas, an she had, we could not repeat a good thing too often. So, thinking it out, we sought for a good name for the child, for we were often at a loss what to call her. And, as we pondered, it seemed that Dorothea might be the best name, for I had heard that it signifieth a gift of God, and full sure had she been sent to us by God as a gift and comfort in our woe. But she would not hear of this; it irked her sore; Undine, she said, her parents had named her, and Undine she still would be. Now this appeared to me to be but a heathenish name, not to be found in any calendar; and for this reason I took counsel of a priest in the city. He approved the name no better than I did: but yet at my prayer he came with me through the forest in order to perform the right of baptism here in my cottage. So prettily clad was the little one, so sweetly did she bear herself, that she at once won the priest's heart. With such soft speech and cozening words did she flatter him, using the while such merry mockery, that he could remember none of the grave arguments he thought to use against the name Undine. Undine, therefore, was she baptized; and while the ceremony went on she held herself with much simplicity and sweetness, and seemed to have forgotten all the wild 38 The Infancy of Undine 39 40 and untamed restlessness of her daily behaviour. For indeed, Sir Knight, my wife was wholly in the right when she told you that she hath been most difficult to bear with. If I were to tell———" And here the knight stayed the fisherman's talk. He would fain call his notice to a sound of rushing waters which ever and anon had caught his ear while the old man rambled on. Now the water seemed to burst against the cottage window with redoubled force, and both sprang to the door. There, by the light of the lately risen moon, they saw the brook, which came from the forest, wildly overflowing its banks, and sweeping away stones and tree-trunks in its impetuous course. The storm, as if awakened by the tumult, broke furiously from the clouds that passed swiftly over the moon: the lake howled under the mad buffet of the wind: the trees of the little peninsula groaned from root to topmost bough, and bent dizzily over the surging waters. "Undine! For Heaven's sake, Undine!" cried the two men in terror. Not a word came back in answer, and without further thought they rushed out of the cottage, one in this direction, the other in that, searching and calling for Undine. 41 CHAPTER III HOW UNDINE WAS FOUND AGAIN Hereupon the story telleth how Huldbrand fared in his search for Undine. The longer he sought for her beneath the shades of the trees and found her not, the more anxious and distraught did he become. Once more the thought that Undine was but a phantom, a vision caused by the mysterious forest, took 42 possession of him. Indeed, as the waves howled and the tempest roared, and the trees crashed down in ruin, the complete change and contrast in a scene which had been but a few moments agone so peaceful and beautiful, made him marvel whether peninsula, cottage and fisherman were not all a mockery and an illusion. Yet still from afar he could hear through the din the cries of the old man for Undine, and the wife's loud prayers and hymns. At length cometh he to the brink of the swollen stream and marked how it had driven its wild course right in front of the forest, so that the peninsula was turned into an island. "Ah, God," he thought, "it might well be that Undine has adventured herself into that fearful wood–perchance in her pretty petulance because I was not allowed to tell her aught of its horrors; and now behold how the stream severs us from her, and she may well be weeping on the other side alone, among ghosts and spectres!" Sharply did he cry out in his terror, and swiftly did he clamber down some rocks and uprooted pine-stems, that he might reach the raging stream and by wading or swimming across find the fugitive on the other side. He bethought him of all the shapes of wonder and fear that he had encountered even in daylight beneath the branches that now rustled and roared so ceaselessly. And more than all, it seemed to him as though on the opposite shore a tall man in white, whom he knew only too well, were grinning and nodding at him in mockery. It was these very monstrous forms which urged 43 him to cross the flood, as he bethought him that Undine might be among them, alone in her agony. Now, as he grasped the stout branch of a pine and stood, supporting himself by it in the midst of the current, which only with all his force could he withstand; and while yet with unblenching courage he pressed further into the stream: he heard a soft voice which said to him, "Venture not, venture not; full crafty is that old man, the stream!" He knew the sweet tones: he stood there, beneath the shadows which shrouded the moon, as though in a trance, all dizzy and bewildered in the waves which were now rapidly rising up to his very waist. Nathless he would not desist. "If thou are not really there, if thou art but a floating mist, then let me too cease to live and become a shadow like thee, thou dear Undine!" Crying these words aloud, he stepped deeper still into the waters. "Look round, look round," came a voice to his ear; and as he turned he saw by the moonlight, momentarily unveiled, a little island encircled by the flood; and there under the branches of the overhanging trees was Undine, smiling and nestling happily in the flowery grass. Ah, how much more joyously now than before did the knight use the aid of his stout pine-branch! Nimbly he crossed the flood, and stood beside the maiden on a little plot of grass, safely guarded and screened by the good old 44 trees. Undine half raised herself from the ground, and under the green leafy tent, throwing her arms round his neck, she drew the knight down beside her on her soft couch. 45 He saw by the moonlight momentarily unveiled, a little island encircled by the flood; and there under the branches of the overhanging trees was Undine 46 47 "Beautiful friend," whispered she, "thou shalt tell me thy story here. Here the cross old people cannot hear us. And our roof of leaves giveth us as good shelter as their poor old hut!" "Nay, but it is Paradise itself!" quoth Huldbrand, as he covered her face with eager kisses. Meantime the fisherman had come to the edge of the stream and raised his voice to the young people. "Why, how is this, Sir Knight?" said he, "I welcomed thee as one honest man may welcome another, and behold, I find thee playing in secret the lover with my foster-child, and leaving me the while to run hither and thither through the night in search of her!" "I have only just found her myself, old father," returned the knight. "So much the better," was the answer; "and now bring her across forthwith to firm ground." But this Undine would by no means allow. She protested that she would rather go with the stranger into the depths of the forest than return to the cottage where no one would do what she wished, and from which the knight himself would sooner or later depart. Then, again throwing her arms round Huldbrand, she sang with pretty grace: 48 The old man wept bitterly at her song, but this seemed not to move her a jot. She was all for kissing and caressing her new friend, until he said to her, "Undine, if the old man's grief touch not thy heart, it toucheth mine; let us go back to him." She opened wide her large eyes in wonder, and spoke at last slowly and hesitatingly. "If this be thy wish, well and good. What is right for thee is right for me. But the old man yonder must first give me his word that he will let thee tell me what thou sawest in the wood and–other things will follow as they must." "Come, only come," cried the fisherman, unable to utter another word. He stretched his hands to her across the rushing stream, and as he nodded his head as though in fulfilment of her request, his white hair fell strangely over his face in such sort that Huldbrand bethought himself of the nodding white man of the forest. But not letting himself think of anything that might baffle or confuse him, the knight took the beautiful girl in his arms and bore her over the narrow space where the stream had divided her little island from the shore. A stream flowed forth of a darkling vale And sought the bright sea-shore: In the ocean's depths it found a home And never returnèd more! 49 The old man fell on Undine's neck and seemed as though he could never have his fill of joy; his good wife also came up and with great tenderness kissed her recovered child. No word of reproach passed their lips, and even Undine, forgetting all her petulance, almost overwhelmed her fosterparents with 50 The Knight took the beautiful girl in his arms and bore her over the narrow space where the stream had divided her little island from the shore 51 52 loving endearments. When at last they had recovered themselves of their transports, lo, it was already dawn and the lake shone rosy red. Peace had followed storm and the little birds were singing merrily on the dripping branches. And now when Undine insisted on hearing the knight's story, the old couple smiled and readily acceded to her wish. They brought out breakfast under the trees which screened the cottage from the lake and then sate down with thankful hearts. Undine, because she must needs have it so, lay on the grass at Huldbrand's feet, the while he proceeded with his story. 53 CHAPTER IV OF THAT WHICH BEFELL THE KNIGHT IN THE WOOD Now this is what Huldbrand told of the things that had befallen him. "Eight days agone," saith he, "I rode into the imperial city which is on the other side of the forest. And it chanced that, hard on my arrival, there was a splendid tournament and running at the ring, and certès, I spared neither horse nor lance. Once, as I stood still at the lists, resting after the toil that I loved, and was handing my helmet back to my squire, lo, I espied a very beautiful 54 woman standing, richly dight, in one of the spectators' galleries. "I asked those about me and learnt that the name of the lady was Bertalda, and that she was the foster-daughter of a mighty duke in the land. Now her eyes rested on me, as mine on her; and as is the wont of young knights, forasmuch as I had already ridden bravely, I bore myself for the rest of the encounter with yet higher courage. That evening I was Bertalda's partner in the dance, and so I remained all the days of the festival." Hereupon a sharp pain in his left hand, which was hanging down, stayed Huldbrand in his discourse, and he looked down to see what might be the cause. Undine had bitten hard his finger, and seemed marvelously gloomy and distempered. Of a sudden, however, she looked up into his eyes with gentle, sorrowful face, and whispered very softly, "'Tis thou who art to blame!" hiding her face the while. The knight began to speak again, in no small measure perplexed and thoughtful. "Now, this Bertalda was a wayward and a haughty damsel. She pleased me not so much the second day as the first, and the third day still less. Nathless, I busied myself about her, for that she seemed to hold me in higher favour than other knights; and thus it befell that once in sport I besought her for one of her gloves. 'Sir Knight,' quoth she, 'I will give it to thee when, all by thyself, thou hast searched the ill- 55 omened forest through and through, and canst bring me tidings of its marvels.' I recked little of her glove; but the word of a knight once given cannot be withdrawn, and a man of honour needs no second prompting to a deed of valour." "Methought she loved you," saith Undine. "Ay, so it seemed," returned Huldbrand. "Why, then," laughed the maiden, "right foolish must she be to drive from her the man she loved–and, moreover, into a wood of evil fame! The forest and its mysteries might have waited long enough for me!" Huldbrand smiled fondly at Undine. "Yester morning," quoth he, "I set off on my enterprise. The morning was fair, and the red tints of sunrise caught the tree-stems and lay along the green turf. The leaves were whispering merrily together, and in my heart I could have laughed at the silly folk who were frightened at so beautiful a place. 'Full soon shall I have passed and repassed the wood,' said I to myself with confident gaiety, and ere I had had time to bethink myself of the matter I was deeply plunged into the thick glades, and could see no more the plain that lay behind me. Thereupon it came to my mind for the first time that I might easily lose my way in the forest, and that perchance this was the only peril the traveller had 56 to face. So I paused awhile and looked round at the position of the sun, which meanwhile had risen higher in the heavens. As I looked I saw something black in the branches of a high oak. 'A bear, maybe,' I thought, and I felt for my sword. But it spoke with a human voice, all harsh and ugly, and called to me from above: 'Sir Malapert,' it cried, 'an I fail to nibble away the branches up here, what shall we have to roast you with at midnight?' And so saying it grinned and made the branches shake and rustle in such sort that my horse, grown wild with terror, galloped me away before I had time to see what kind of devil's beast it might be." "Thou must not give him a name," said the fisherman, and he crossed himself. His wife did the like with never a word. But Undine looked at the knight with sparkling eyes. "The best of the story is," quoth she, "that they have not roasted him! Go on, fair sir!" So the knight went on with his tale. "So wild was my horse that it went hard with me to stay him from charging the stems and branches of trees. He was dripping with sweat, and yet he would not suffer himself to be held in. At length he galloped straight towards a precipice. Whereupon it appeared to me as though a tall white man threw himself across the path. The horse, trembling with fear, stopped, and I regained my hold on him. Then for the first time did I become aware that what 57 saved me was no man, but a brook, bright as silver, rushing down from a hill by my side, and crossing and stemming my horse's path." "Thanks, dear Brook," cried Undine, clapping her hands. But the old man shook his head and bent him thoughtfully over the ground. Huldbrand continueth his tale. "Scarce," quoth he, "had I settled myself in the saddle and taken a firm grip on the reins, when, lo, a marvellous little man, very small and hideous beyond measure, stood at my side. Tawny brown was his skin, and his nose almost as big as his whole body, while, grinning like a clown and stretching wide his huge mouth, he kept bowing and scraping over and over again. Since this fool's play pleased me but ill, I gave him brief good-day, and turned about my horse which still quivered with fear. Methought I would find some other adventure or else I would bestir myself homeward, for, during my wild gallop, the sun had already passed the meridian. Whereupon, quick as lightning, the little fellow whipped round and again stood before my horse. 'Make room there,' I cried angrily,' the animal is fiery and may easily overrun thee.' 'Oh, ay,' snarled the imp, grinning yet more hideously, 'give me first some drink-money, for it was I who stopped your horse; without my aid both thou and he would now be lying in the stony ravine, Ugh!' 'Make no more faces,' quoth I; 'take your gold, albeit that thou liest, for see, it was the good brook that saved me and not thou, thou wretched 58 wight!' And therewith I dropped a piece of gold into the quaint cap which he held before me in his begging. And I made as though I would ride on. But he shrieked aloud, and swifter than can be imagined he was once more at my side. I urged my horse to a gallop; the imp ran too, and strange enough were the contortions he made with his body, 59 He held up the gold piece, crying at each leap of his, “False gold! false coin! false coin!” 60 61 half laughable and half horrible, the while he held up the gold piece, crying at each leap of his, 'False gold! false coin! false coin! false gold!' And these words he uttered in such sort, with so hollow a sound from out his breast, that one might well conceive that after each shriek he would fall dead to the ground. "Moreover his hideous red tongue lolled out of his mouth. And for my part, I stopped in doubt and said, 'What meaneth this screaming? Take another gold piece or yet another; but quit my side.' Once more he began his strange mockery of courtesy and snarled: 'Not gold, not gold, young sir,' quoth he, 'enough and to spare of that trash have I myself, as forthwith I will show you.' Thereupon of a sudden it appeared to me as if the solid ground were as transparent as green glass, and the smooth earth were a round ball, wherein a multitude of goblins made sport with silver and gold. Heads up and heads down they rolled hither and thither, pelting one another in jest with the precious ore and blowing gold dust in perverse sport into one another's eyes. My horrible comrade stood partly on the ground and partly within it; at times he bade the others reach him up handfuls of gold: then with harsh laugh, having shown them to me, he would fling them down clattering into the bottomless abyss. Thereupon he minded to show the piece of gold I had given him to the goblins below and they laughed themselves half dead over it and hissed out at me. At length they all pointed their stained fingers at me, and 62 more and more wildly, more and more densely, and more and more madly, the whole swarm came clambering up to me. A terror seized me as erst it had seized my horse; clapping the spurs into him I galloped, for the second time, I know not how far into the forest. "But when at last I stayed my wild course the coolness of evening was around me. A white footpath–so it appeared to me–gleamed through the branches of the trees, and that methought must needs lead to the city. Full eager was I to work my way thither: but lo, a face, white, indistinct, with features constantly changing, was ever peering at me between the leaves. Try as I might to avoid it, it accompanied me wherever I turned. And being wroth thereat, I drave my horse against it, when the phantom gushed forth volumes of water upon us and forced us, willynilly, to retreat. So that at the last, perpetually diverting us step by step from the path, it left the way open only in one direction: and so long as we obeyed its guidance, though it kept close behind, it did us no harm. "From time to time I eyed it and meseemed that the white face that had besprinkled us with foam belonged to a body equally white and of gigantic stature. Full oft I fancied that it was but a moving stream: but never did I gain any certainty on this matter. Horse and knight both wearied out, we yielded 63 At length they all pointed their stained fingers at me 64 65 to the influence of the white man, who kept nodding his head as though he would say 'Quite right, quite right!' And so at the last we came out here to the end of the forest, where I saw grass and lake and your little hut, and the white man vanished." "'Tis well that he hath gone," muttered the fisherman; and now he began to mind him how best his guest might return to his friends in the city. Whereupon Undine laughed slyly, and Huldbrand perceiving it addressed her: "Undine," quoth he, "methought thou wert glad to see me here. Why then dost rejoice when there is talk of my departure?" "Because thou cannot go," returned Undine; "essay the task, an thou wilt: cross that swollen stream with boat or horse or thine own legs, according to thy fancy. Nay but do not try, for sure would be thy fate: thou wouldest be crushed by the stones and tree-trunks swirling down its course like lightning. And as for the lake, full well I know it; Father dare not adventure himself far enough out with his boat." Thereat Huldbrand arose with a smile that he might see whether Undine were right. The old man bore him company: and the maiden danced merrily along by their side. And in sooth Undine was right, and the knight found that he must needs abide on the tongue of land that was now an island, until such time as the flood might subside. 66 As the three made their way back to the cottage, the knight bent his head to whisper in the maiden's ear: "How is it," quoth he, "my pretty Undine, art angry that I stay?" "Ah," saith she petulantly, "let me be. Had I not bitten thy hand, who knoweth how much more of Bertalda might not have appeared in the story?" 67 CHAPTER V HOW THE KNIGHT FARED ON THE PENINSULA Now my story hath a pause. Perchance, thou too, who readest these lines, may, after many a buffet in this rude world, have reached at length some haven where all was well with thee. Home and the peace of home, which all must needs desire, appeal strongly to thy heart: and here thou thinkest is a home where the flowers of childhood may bloom—ay, and that pure deep love which resteth on the 68 graves of our dead may encircle thee. Tis good thou sayest to be here, and here will I build me an habitation. Nay, an thou mayest have erred and have had afterwards to do bitter penance for thine error, that mattereth not to thee now, nor wilt thou sadden thyself with unwelcome memories. But call up again in thee thy sweet hopes of future joy which no tongue may utter, bring back again to thy mind that heavenly sense of peace, and then, methinks, thou shalt know somewhat of how it was with Huldbrand while he lived on the peninsula. Full oft he saw, and it pleasured him right well, how every day the forest stream rolled along more wildly; how it made its bed ever wider and wider, and so prolonged his stay on the island. Part of the day it was his wont to ramble with an old crossbow which he had found in a corner of the cottage and had repaired; and watching for the waterfowl, he shot all he could for the cottage kitchen. When he brought back his booty, Undine would oft upbraid him for his cruelty in robbing the happy birds of their life; yea, she would shed bitter tears at the sight. But, an it chanced that he brought nothing home, then she would scold him no less earnestly, for that now, through his carelessness and want of skill, they must needs be content with a fare of fish alone. Nathless, her pretty scoldings pleased him right well; the more so as she made amends for her angry reproaches by the sweetest caresses. 69 Now the old people saw how it was with the young pair, and they were well content; they looked upon them as betrothed or as already married, so that they might still live on in this isolation, and be a succour and a help to them in their old age. Nay, to Huldbrand himself the loneliness of the place seemed to suggest the thought that he was already Undine's accepted suitor. To him it appeared as if there were no world beyond these encircling waters, and no other men with whom he might mingle if he recrossed them. When at times his horse might chance to neigh to remind him of knightly deeds, or the coat of arms on his saddle and horsegear confront him with a frown, or his sword of a sudden fall from its nail on the wall, slipping from its scabbard as it fell: he would stay his uneasiness by murmuring to himself "Undine, certès, is no fisherman's daughter: she is sprung more likely from a princely house in some foreign land." But one matter irked him sore. It was when the old dame scolded Undine in his presence. Not that the maiden cared a jot, she was wont to laugh and took no pains to hide her mirth. But his own honour seemed concerned therein, albeit that he could not blame the fisherman's wife, for Undine ever deserved ten times the reproof that she received. In his heart he could not but feel that the balance was in the old woman's favour. And so his life flowed on in happiness and peace. There came, however, a break at last. It was the habit of the fisherman and the knight when they sate them down to their midday meal, or in the evening when the wind, as it 70 commonly did, roared without, to share together a flask of wine. But now the store that the old man had brought from time to time in his visits to the city was exhausted, and the two men were quite out of humour in consequence. Undine laughed gaily at them all day, but for their part they were neither of them merry enough to join in her jests as usual. Towards evening she left the cottage to avoid, as she said, faces so long and so dismal. As night fell, there were again signs of a storm and the waters began to rush and roar. Full of fear, the knight and the fisherman sprang to the door to bring home the maiden, for they bethought them of the anxiety of that night when Huldbrand first came to the cottage. But Undine swiftly came up to them, clapping her little hands with joy. "What will ye give me," quoth she, "if I provide some wine? or rather, give me nothing, for it will content me well if ye look merrier and be of better cheer than throughout this dismal day. Only come with me, the stream has thrown a cask ashore. 'Tis a winecask for certain, or else let me pay the penalty with a week's sleep!" The men followed her forthwith, and sure enough in a sheltered creek they found a cask which they ardently hoped might contain the generous liquor for which they thirsted. With as much haste as possible they rolled the cask towards the cottage, for the western sky was overcast with heavy storm-clouds, and they might see in the twilight the waves of the lake lifting their foamy crests as if looking for the rain which must shortly come down. Undine helped the men all she might, and when the storm threatened to burst 71 on their heads, she uttered a laughing reproof to the clouds. "Come, come," saith she, "look to it that ye wet us not; we are still some way from shelter." The old man warned her that she might suffer for such presumption; but she laughed softly to herself, and no evil came of it to any one. Nay more, to their surprise they reached the hearth with their prize perfectly dry; and not till they had opened the cask and found that it contained a most exquisite wine, did the rain burst from the dark cloud and the storm sweep through the tree-tops and over the heaving waves of the lake. Full soon a score of bottles were filled from the cask, promising a supply for many days, and they sate them round the glowing fire, drinking with many a merry jest and comfortably secure against the raging storm without. Of a sudden, however, the fisherman became grave. "Ah, great God," saith he, "here we be, rejoicing over this rich treasure and, mayhap, he to whom it once belonged hath lost his life in the waters that robbed him of his possession." "Nay, that he hath not," returned Undine, and she filled the knight's cup to the brim with a smile. But Huldbrand answered, "By my honour, old father, an I knew where to find and rescue him, no task of peril by night would I shirk. This much, however, I can promise. If ever it be my lot to return to places where my fellows live, I will seek out the owner of this wine or his heirs, and pay for it twofold or threefold." The speech pleased the old man full 72 well; he nodded approvingly and drained his cup with greater pleasure and a clearer conscience. But Undine was not so pleased. "Do as thou wilt," quoth she, "with thy gold and thy repayment, but about thy venturing out in search, thou spakest foolishly. I should weep full sore if thou wert lost in the attempt; and is it not truth that thou wouldest fain stay with me and the good wine?" "Ay, in sooth," quoth Huldbrand, with a smile. "Then," saith Undine, "thy words were foolish. For charity, it is said, beginneth at home, and in what do other people concern us?" The old woman turned away with a sigh, shaking her head, while the fisherman forgot for the nonce his love for the maiden and scolded her. "Thy speech," saith he, as he finished his reproof, "soundeth as though Turks and heathen had brought thee up. May Heaven forgive both me and thee, thou mannerless girl!" "Well," returned Undine, "'tis what I feel for all that, let who will have brought me up; and what availeth thy sermon?" "Be silent," cried the fisherman; and Undine, who in spite of her petulance, was very timid, shrank from him. Trembling she nestled close to Huldbrand's side, and softly 73 murmured, "Art thou also wroth with me, dear friend!" The knight for answer pressed her hand and stroked her hair. Naught could he say, 74 When the storm threatened to burst on their heads, she uttered a laughing reproof to the clouds. “Come, come” saith she, “look to it that you wet us not” 75 76 for it irked him that the old people should be so severe against Undine. But he kept his lips closed, and thus they all sat opposite to each other for a while in embarrassed silence with anger in their hearts. 77 CHAPTER VI TELLETH OF A WEDDING Now in the midst of this stillness came the sound of soft knocking at the door, and startled those that were within; for, at times, but a trifling incident can scare us, when it happeneth unexpectedly. But in this case there was the more reason for alarm in that the enchanted forest lay so near, and that the little promontory appeared out of the reach of all human visitors. They looked at each other with doubt in their faces, and when the knocking came again, and this time accompanied with a groan, the knight sprang to reach his sword. But the old man whispered softly, "Sir Knight," quoth he, "an it be what I fear, no weapon will be of avail." Meantime Undine approached the door and called out 78 boldly and angrily, "Spirits of the earth, I warn ye! If ye mean mischief, Kühleborn shall teach ye better!" Words so full of mystery only added to the terror of the others, and they looked at the maiden fearfully. When Huldbrand, however, was minded to ask Undine what she might mean by such a speech, there came a voice from without. "I am no spirit of the earth," it said, "but a spirit still within its earthly frame. I pray ye within the hut, if ye fear God and will help me, open to me." Undine at these words opened the door and held out a lantern into the night, so that they perceived an aged priest standing there. He stepped back in wonder: full startled was he to see so beautiful a maiden at the humble cottage entrance, and he might well suppose in such a case that witchcraft and magic were at work. So he began to pray, "All good spirits praise the Lord God!" "No spirit am I," saith Undine, smiling. "Do I then look so ugly? Moreover, thou mayest see that holy words do not frighten me. I, too, know of God, and understand how to praise him–every one in his own way, to be sure, for so hath he created us. Come in, reverend father, thou art come among good people." So the holy man came in, bowing and looking around him. Full venerable and mild was his demeanour, but the water was dropping from every fold of his garment, and from his 79 long white beard and his white hair. The fisherman and knight took him into another chamber, and gave him clothes to wear, while they left his own wet attire for the women to dry. The old man thanked them in humble and courteous sort; but he would on no account take the knight's rich mantle when it was offered to him, choosing instead an old grey overcoat of the fisherman. Thereupon they returned to the outer room, and the old dame at once gave up her easy chair for the reverend father, and would not rest till he had sate himself down in it. "For," quoth she, "thou art old and weary, and a priest to boot." Moreover, Undine pushed under the stranger's feet the little stool on which she was wont to sit by Huldbrand's side, and showed herself in all ways gentle and kind towards the priest. Huldbrand whispered some jest about it in her ear, but she answered full seriously, "He is a servant of Him who hath made us all: holy things must not be mocked." Then the knight and fisherman refreshed their guest with food and wine, and when he had somewhat recovered himself he began to tell his story. He told how the day before he had set out from his monastery, which lay far on the other side of the great lake, with intent to journey to the Bishop, for that he ought to know how deep was the distress into which both monastery and its dependent villages had fallen owing to the present marvellous floods. He had gone far out of his way, for the floods compelled him, and this day towards evening he had been forced to ask the aid of two stout boatmen to cross an arm of the lake, where the 80 water had overflown its banks. "Hardly, however," said he, "had our little craft touched the waves when the furious storm came down upon us which is now raging over our heads. It seemed as though the waters had only waited our approach to begin their maddest dance with our boat. The oars were torn out of the hands of the boatmen and driven by the force of the waves further and further beyond our reach. Ourselves, a helpless prey in the hands of natural forces, drifted over the surging billows towards your distant shore, which we saw looming through the mist and foam. Then our boat was caught in a giddy whirlpool, and for myself I know not whether I was upset or fell overboard. Suffice it to say that in a vague agony of approaching death, I drifted on, till a wave cast me here, under the trees of your island." "Island," cried the fisherman, "ay, 'tis an island for sure! But a day or two agone, it was a point of land; but, now that stream and lake have alike been bewitched, all is changed with us." "Ay, so it seemed to me," said the priest, "as I crept along the shore in the dark. Naught but the wild uproar could I hear, but at last I saw a beaten footpath, which lost itself in the waters, and then I caught sight of the light in your cottage and ventured hither. Nor can I ever thank enough my Heavenly Father that he hath saved me from death and led me to such good and pious people as ye are; the more 81 so, since I know not, whether beside you four, I shall ever look upon human beings again." "What mean you by that?" asked the fisherman. "Know you then," replied the holy man, "how long this turmoil of the elements may last? And I am old in years. Full easily may the stream of my life run itself out ere the overflow of the forest stream may subside. And indeed it were not impossible that more and more of the flood may force itself between you and yonder forest, until you are cut off from the rest of the world in such sort that your fishingboat may not suffice to carry you across. Then the dwellers on the continent beyond, giving themselves up to their own pleasures and cares, may entirely forget you in your old age." The old wife started at this, and crossing herself, said, "God forbid!" But the fisherman looked at her with a smile. "What strange creatures we are," quoth he. "Even were it so, things would not be very different–at least not for thee, dear wife–than they are now. For many years past hast thou ever been further than the edge of the forest? And hast thou seen any human beings other than Undine and myself? The knight and this holy man are but recent visitors; and they will stay with us even if this become a forgotten island. Methinks thou wouldest be a gainer by it, after all!" 82 "I know not," said the dame, "it is a gloomy thought to be altogether cut off from other people, even though we neither see them nor know them." "Then thou wilt stay with us; thou wilt stay with us!" whispered Undine, in a low, chanting voice, as she nestled closer to Huldbrand's side. But he was lost in deep and strange thoughts. Since the priest spoke his last words, the other side of the forest seemed to fade away; the island grew more green and smiled more freshly to his thought. The maiden whom he loved shone as the fairest rose of this little spot of earth, and even of the world–and lo, there was a priest ready at hand! Moreover, at that moment, the old dame shot an angry glance at the maiden, because even in the presence of the holy man she leaned so closely on the knight; and it seemed that a torrent of reproach might break forth. So Huldbrand turned him to the priest and exclaimed: "Holy Father," quoth he, "thou seest before thee a pair betrothed to one another, and if this maiden and these good people have no word to say, thou shalt wed us this very evening." The old couple marvelled greatly at this speech. Somewhat of the kind had indeed ere this entered their minds. But they had never given it utterance; and the knight's words came upon them as something wholly new and unexpected. And Undine had of a sudden grown grave, casting her eyes down to the ground in thought; while the priest inquired of the facts of the case and asked whether the old people gave their consent or no. And much discourse took place ere the matter was finally settled. 83 The old dame went to prepare the bridal chamber for the youthful pair, and to seek out two consecrated tapers which had long been in her possession and which she deemed necessary for the nuptial ceremony. Meantime the knight unfastened his gold chain, so that he might take off two gold rings to make exchange with his bride. Undine, however, when she saw what he did, roused her from her reverie. "Nay, not so," she cried, "my parents have not sent me into the world quite destitute; on the contrary, they must surely have reckoned that such an evening as this would come." Thus saying, she quickly left the room and came back in a moment with two costly rings, one of which she gave to the bridegroom and kept the other herself. The old fisherman marvelled greatly thereat, and yet more his wife, for neither had ever seen these jewels in the child's possession. "See," said Undine, "my parents had these baubles sewn into the beautiful gown I was wearing when I came to you. They forbade me to speak of them to any one before my wedding, so I unfastened them in secret and kept them hidden till now." Thereupon the priest stayed all further questionings by lighting the consecrated tapers. He placed them on a table and summoned the bridal pair to stand before him. With a few solemn words he gave them each to the other: the elder pair blest the younger; and the bride, trembling and thoughtful, leaned upon the knight. 84 Then spake the priest of a sudden. "Ye are strange people!" quoth he. "Why did ye tell me that ye were alone on the island? During the whole ceremony a tall stately figure, clad in a white mantle, has been looking at me through the window opposite. He must be still there before the door if ye will invite him into the house." "God forbid," said the old dame shuddering: the fisherman shook his head in silence and Huldbrand sprang to the window. It seemed to him that he could still see a white streak, but it soon vanished altogether in the darkness. Wherefore he assured the priest that he must have been mistaken; and they all seated themselves together round the hearth. 85 CHAPTER VII OF ALL THAT CHANCED ON THE EVENING OF THE WEDDING Now, both before the marriage ceremony commenced, and while it was in progress, Undine had shown herself as quiet and gentle as might be. But now that the ceremony was over, it seemed as if all the strange and untoward humours that were in her burst forth wholly without restraint or shame. Childish she was, and childish were the tricks with which she teased both her wedded lord and her fosterparents. Nay, she even went so far as to spite and annoy the holy man to whom lately she had shown such reverent obeisance. When the foster-mother was all for reproving 86 her, the knight stayed her with a few grave words, "for," saith he, "Undine is now my wife." Nathless, the knight was no better pleased with Undine's waywardness than were the others. It irked him sore that she should play the child; but no signs and no warning words were of any avail. Yet it seemed that at times the bride took note of her husband's discomfiture, and then at once she became more quiet, sitting down by his side, caressing him with her hands, and whispering something smilingly into his ear, so that the wrinkles on his forehead would all be smoothed away. And then again the tender mood would pass, and some wild freak of temper would make her yet more perverse and froward; so that matters would be worse than they were before. At last the priest addressed her with kind and serious words. "Lady," quoth he, "no man can look at thee without delight, for thou art fair and young to behold, and the eye of mortal man must needs yield to thy beauty. And yet I bid thee beware and take heed to thy ways, so that thy soul may be attuned and brought into harmony with that of thy wedded husband." "What is this thou sayest?" answered Undine. "Thou talkest of my soul. And, indeed, it may well be that for most of the sons of men thou mayest utter a wise and seasonable caution. But I pray you, if I have no soul at all, what is it that I may do? In such case the task of harmony that thou prescribest seemeth to be difficult." 87 Now the priest turned him away and was silent when Undine spake thus. But she came over to him, and addressed him in more reverent sort. "Sir Priest," quoth she, "thou art angry with me, and I know well the cause. Yet thou painest me with thine angry look; and thou must not pain any creature that liveth without due cause. Listen to me, I pray thee, and have patience with me; and for my part I will seek to tell thee plainly what I mean." Thereupon it was clear that she had bent herself to give a full and plain account of something that had hitherto been concealed. But suddenly she hesitated, as though some secret hand of restraint had been laid upon her, and with a quick shudder she burst into a flood of tears. Not a person there knew what to make of her in this case. They gazed at her in silence, filled with dim and vague apprehension. For a moment or two she rested thus, and then, wiping away her tears, she looked gravely and earnestly at the holy man, and spake as follows: "Meseemeth that there is something strange and difficult to understand about the soul. It hath a beauty of its own, hath it not? And yet to me it appeareth full of dread and awe. I ask thee, Sir Priest, might we not all of us be in better case if we never shared so beautiful and so perilous a gift?" Once again Undine was silent, as though waiting for some reply, and her tears had ceased to flow. All those in the cottage had started from their seats at her strange words, and had stepped back from her with something akin to 88 horror in their eyes. Nathless, she looked neither to right nor to left, but only bent her gaze on the holy man, with a yearning of curiosity on her face, as though she waited for some message of terrible import. And once more she spake. "It must be a burden right heavy to bear, this soul of which thou speakest, for even the shadow of its approach filleth me with sadness and dread. And yet, God knoweth, I had pleasure and happiness enough in my life till now." Thereupon Undine burst into a fresh flood of tears, and covered her face with the raiment that she wore. And the priest went up to her with a solemn air, and spoke to her weighty words, conjuring her, by the name of the Most Holy, to rend and cast aside the veil that enveloped her, if so be that any spirit of evil possessed her. She meanwhile sank on her knees before him, saying after him all the sacred words he uttered, praising God, and protesting that in her heart she wished well to the whole world. At the last the priest turned him towards the knight. "Sir Bridegroom," quoth he, "I will leave thee alone with her to whom I have united thee in holy wedlock. So far as my wisdom may lead me, I find nothing of evil in her, though much that is strange and mysterious. I commend to thee three things wherewith thou mayest bear thyself well in thy future life–Prudence, Love, and Faithfulness." With these words the priest left the room, and the fisherman and his wife followed him, crossing themselves as they passed Undine. 89 Undine herself had sunk on her knees. She took the raiment from her face, and, looking humbly and timidly on Huldbrand, spake as follows: "Woe be it to me, for thou wilt surely refuse to keep me as thine own! And yet no evil have I done, God wotteth, and am naught but an unhappy child." And as she said these words her face had on it a look so tender and so wistful in its humility and beauty that her bridegroom clean forgot all the horror he had felt, and all the mystery that surrounded her, and, hastening to her side, he raised her in his arms. She smiled through her tears. It was a smile like the light of dawn playing on a little stream. "Ah, thou canst not leave me," she whispered, stroking the knight's cheek with her tender hand. Sir Huldbrand did his best to banish the thoughts of fear and dread that lurked in the background of his mind, persuading him that some fairy or some malicious and mischievous being of the spirit world had come to be his wife. Only the single question, half unawares, passed his lips: "Undine, my little Undine," quoth he, "tell me at least this one thing. What was all thy talk of spirits of the earth, and of Kühleborn, what time the priest was knocking at the door?" "Naught but fairy-tales," answered Undine merrily, "children's fairy-tales. At the first I frighted you with them, and then you frighted me. And that is the end of our story, and of our wedding-night." 90 "Nay, God be my witness," quoth the knight, "certès, it is not the end." Saying thus, he blew out the tapers, and by the light of the moon, which shone softly in at the window, he bore, with a thousand eager kisses, his beloved to her room. 91 CHAPTER VIII THE DAY AFTER THE WEDDING The bright morning light awoke the pair: Undine hid her face beneath the bed-coverings, while Huldbrand lay for a moment in silent thought. So oft as he had slept during the night, strange and marvellous visions had disturbed his rest: spectres, grinning mysteriously, had striven to disguise themselves as beautiful women; beautiful women had taken upon themselves the form of dragons: and when he started up from these hideous dreams, the moon shone pale and 92 cold into the room, and in terror he looked at Undine in whose arms he had fallen to sleep. But lo, there she lay at his side, unchanged in loveliness and grace. Whereupon he would press a light kiss on her rosy lips and would fall again to sleep, only to be awakened by new terrors. Now that he was fully awake, he bethought himself of all this and blamed himself full sore for every doubt that had turned him against his sweet wife. He begged her to pardon his unjust suspicions; but for her part she only held out to him her hand and, sighing deeply, said not a word. Nathless she looked at him with a tender yearning such as he had never seen before, so that he might be certain that she bore him no manner of ill-will. With a lighter heart he rose from bed and left her to join the rest of the household in the common room. Now the three were sitting round the hearth, with a cloud on their faces, none daring to express their fear in words. It seemed that the priest was praying in his inmost spirit that all evil might be turned aside. But as soon as they beheld the young husband come into the room with such good cheer, they put aside their trouble and anxiety; and the fisherman bethought himself to make merry jests with the knight, and so pleasantly withal that the old dame smiled, well pleased to hear them. Thereupon Undine entered the room. Now all rose to give her greeting and yet stood still a space, marvelling greatly because the young wife seemed so strange to them and yet the same. The priest first, with fatherly love in his eyes, went up to her, and as he raised his 93 hand to bless her, she sank on her knees before him and did him reverence. With gentle and lowly words she begged him to forgive her for all that was foolish and petulant in her speech of yestereven, and implored him with no little emotion to pray for the welfare of her soul. Then, rising from her knees, she kissed her foster-parents and gave them thanks for the goodness they had shown her. "Ah!" quoth she, "it moveth me to my inmost soul to bethink me how great, how immeasurably great, have been your kindnesses to me, my dear, dear parents!" Nor could she at the first leave off her caresses; but when she saw the old dame bestirring herself about breakfast, she went forthwith to the hearth, cooked and prepared the meal, and would not suffer the good mother to concern herself with aught. So she remained during the day–silent, affectionate, attentive–at once a matron, and a tender, bashful girl. The three who had known her longest, thought at every moment to see some whimsical and petulant outbreak of her old wild mood. But they looked for it in vain. Undine was as mild and gentle as an angel. The priest could not take his eyes off her, and turned ofttimes to the bridegroom. "Sir Knight," quoth he, "the goodness of God hath through me, His unworthy servant, entrusted thee with a treasure; cherish it therefore, as is thy bounden duty, so will it be for thy welfare, both in time and in eternity." 94 Now, as evening fell, Undine, hanging on the knight's arm with humble tenderness, drew him gently forth from the door. Full pleasant to behold was the gleam of the setting sun on the fresh grass and the slender stems of the trees. The young wife's eyes were dewy with sadness and love, while her lips seemed to quiver with some secret mystery, at once sweet and bodeful, which might only be revealed by scarcely audible sighs. Onward and onward she led her husband and spake never a word. Indeed, when he said something, she answered not at all, but turned upon him a look in which lay a whole heaven of love and timid devotion. Thus they reached the edge of the forest stream and the knight marvelled much to see it rippling along in gentle waves, without a trace of its former wild overflow. And Undine began to speak with regret in her voice. "By to-morrow," saith she, "it will be quite dry, and then thou mayest travel whithersoever thou wilt, without let or hindrance." But the knight answered laughingly. "Not without thee, my little Undine," quoth he, "for bethink thee that an I wished to desert thee, church and priests, empire and emperor, would interpose and bring thee back again thy fugitive." "Nay, but all hangs on thee," whispered she, half weeping and half smiling, "all hangs on thee! Nathless, I think that thou wilt hold by me, for that I love thee so dearly. Only carry me over to that little island before us; the matter shall 95 be decided there. Easily enough could I glide through the ripples; but it is so sweet to rest in thine arms, and if thou castest me off, at the least I shall have rested in them once more for the last time." Now, Huldbrand, full as he was of wonder and fear at her words, knew not in what sort to make reply. But he took her in his arms, carrying her across, and thereupon bethought him that this was the same little island whence he had borne her back to the fisherman on the first night of his arrival. On the further side, he put her down on the soft grass, and was minded to throw himself fondly at her side. But she stayed him with a word. "Nay," quoth she, "sit there, opposite to me, I will read my sentence in thine eyes before thy lips speak. Now listen attentively, I pray thee, to what I shall say." And she spake as followeth: "Thou must know, my beloved, that there exist in the elements beings not unlike mortal men, which yet rarely let themselves be seen of men. Wonderful salamanders glisten and sport in the flames of fire; gnomes, lean and spiteful, dwell deep within the earth; spirits, which are of the air, wander through the forests; and a vast family of waterspirits live in the lakes and streams and brooks. In domes of crystal, echoing with many sounds, through which heaven looks in with its sun and its stars, the water-spirits find their beautiful home; lofty trees of coral with blue and crimson 96 fruits shine in their gardens; they wander over the pure sand of the sea, and among lovely variegated shells and amid all the exquisite treasure of the old world, which the present world is no longer worthy to enjoy. All these the floods have covered with their mysterious veil of silver; below sparkle, stately and solemn, many noble ruins, washed by the loving waters which win from them delicate mossflowers and entwining clusters of sea-grass. Those who dwell there are very fair and lovely to behold–more beautiful, I ween, than human beings. Here and there a fisherman has been lucky enough to espy some mermaid as she rose from the waters and sang; thereupon he would tell, near and far, of her beauty, and such wondrous beings have been called Undines. Thou, dear one, art actually seeing an Undine." Now the knight tried hard to persuade himself that the spell of one of her strange humours was upon his wife, and that it pleased her to tease him with some extravagant fancy of her own. But albeit that he said this to himseif over and over again, he persuaded himself none the better; he shook with a strange unnatural shudder, and having no power to utter a word, stared at his companion with unmoving eyes. For her part, Undine moved her head to and fro sadly, and with a deep sigh went on as followeth: "We should live far more happily than other human beings– for human beings we call ourselves, being similar in face and stature–were it not for one evil that is peculiar to us. 97 We, and our like in the other elements, vanish into dust and pass away, body and spirit, so that not a vestige of us remains behind; and when ye human beings awake hereafter to a purer life, we abide with the sand and the sparks of fire, the wind and the waves. For we have no souls. The element in which we live animates us; it even obeys us while we live; but it scatters us to dust when we die. And we are merry, having naught to grieve us–merry as are the nightingales and little gold-fishes, and other pretty children of nature. Nathless, all beings aspire to be higher than they are; and so my Father, who is a mighty waterprince in the Mediterranean Sea, was fain that his only daughter should become possessed of a soul, even though she must needs in that case endure the sufferings of those similarly endowed. Beings such as we can only gain a soul by an union of deepest love with one of thy race. A soul I now possess; and my soul thanks thee, oh my beloved, and will ever thank thee, if thou on thy part makest not my whole life wretched. For what, thinkest thou, will become of me if thou avoidest me and drivest me from thee? Still, Heaven forbid that I should hold thee to me by deceit. And if thou wilt reject me, do it forthwith and go back to the shore alone. I will plunge into this brook, which is my uncle, for here in the forest, alienated from other friends, he leads his strange and solitary life. Powerful, indeed, he is, and receiveth tribute from many great streams; and, as he bore me to the fisherman a light-hearted and laughing child, so will he take me back again to my parents, a loving, suffering woman, gifted with a soul." 98 Now she was minded to say more, but Huldbrand, taking her into his arms with the tenderest love, bore her back again to the shore. Not till he had gained it, did he swear, with full many tears and kisses, never to forsake his sweet wife; and he deemed himself happier far than the heathen sculptor, Pygmalion, whose beautiful statue Venus endowed with life, so that it became his love. And Undine, clinging to his arm with sweet trustfulness, walked to the cottage, feeling now for the first time with all her heart how little need there was for her to regret the forsaken crystal palaces of her mysterious father. 99 CHAPTER IX HOW THE KNIGHT BORE AWAY HIS YOUNG WIFE Now the story here telleth how next morning Huldbrand, waking from his sleep, found not his wife by his side; and how forthwith the strange thoughts returned to his mind that his marriage, ay, and sweet Undine herself, were but 100 delusions and sorceries. But as he mused thus, lo, Undine came into the room and sate her down beside him. "Dear love," saith she, "I have been out betimes to see if my uncle keeps his word. And he hath already led all the waters back again into his own quiet channel, and behold he floweth once more through the forest, lonely and dreaming, as is his wont. His friends in air and water have also gone to rest; all is again peaceful and orderly around us, and thou mayest travel homewards, when thou wilt, dryshod." Now to Huldbrand it seemed that he was in some waking dream, and little enough could he understand the strange kindred of his wife. Nathless, he made no comment on the matter, and the exquisite grace of Undine soon lulled to rest every uneasy misgiving. When, after some space of time, he stood with her before the door, and looked over the green peninsula with its boundary of clear waters, he felt so happy in this cradle of his love that he could not forbear to say:– "Why must we needs travel to-day? Rarely enough shall we find happier days in the world yonder than those we have spent in this quiet shelter. Nay, but let us see the sun go down here, twice or thrice more!" "As my lord willeth," said Undine, humbly. "It is only that the old people will in any case part from me with pain, and when they now for the first time discern the true soul within me, and know how heartily I can love and honour them, 101 methinks their aged eyes will be dimmed with many tears. At present they still hold my quietness and gentleness for nothing better than what they were once–the calm of the lake when the air is still; and, as matters now are, they will full soon learn to cherish a flower or a tree as they have cherished me. Let me not, therefore, I beg thee, reveal to them this soul of mine, so loving and so newly-won, just at the moment when they must lose it for this world; and how can I conceal it if we remain longer together?" Huldbrand perceived that she was right, and forthwith spoke to the old people of the journey which he proposed to undertake that very hour. The priest offered to bear company with the young pair, and so, after taking a hasty farewell, he and the knight helped the bride to mount the horse and both walked with rapid steps by her side across the dry channel of the forest stream into the wood beyond. Silently and bitterly did Undine weep, while, as for the old people, they cried aloud. It seemed that all that they were losing in their foster-child was now borne in upon their minds. Now the three travellers had reached in silence the densest shades of the forest. Right fair was it to see how, under the green canopy of leaves, the beautiful Undine sat on the richly-caparisoned steed, while on one side walked the venerable priest in the white garb of his order, and on the other strode the knight in gay and splendid attire, girt with his sword. Huldbrand had no eyes save for his wife. 102 Undine, who had dried her tears, had no eyes save for him. Full soon there was naught between them but a mute converse of glance and gesture, from which they were roused at length by the low talk of the priest with a fourth traveller, who, meantime, had joined them unobserved. He was clad in a white garment, almost like the habit of the monk, only that the hood hung low over his face; and his raiment with its vast folds floated round him in such sort that ever and anon he must needs gather it up and throw it over his arm or dispose of it in some fashion, albeit that in no way did it let or hinder his movements. When the young couple first became aware of his presence, he was speaking as followeth: "Sir Priest," quoth he, "for many years have I dwelt thus in the forest and yet no hermit am I, in the proper sense of the word. For, as I have said, of penance I know naught, nor do I think myself to have any special need of it. I love the forest in that it hath a beauty peculiar to itself; and it pleaseth me well to pass in my white flowing garments midmost the leaves and dusky shadows, while here and there a sweet sunbeam cometh upon me unawares." "Thou art a strange man," saith the priest, "and full willingly would I know thee better." "And to pass from one thing to another," returned the stranger, "what sort of man art thou?" 103 "Father Heilmann am I called," quoth the priest, "and I come from the monastery of Our Lady beyond the lake." "Indeed," was the reply, "my name is Kühleborn, and, so far forth as courtesy requireth, I might claim the title of Lord Kühleborn or Free-lord Kühleborn; for free am I as the birds of the forest, perchance somewhat freer. For example, I have a word to say to the lady there." And, ere they saw what he would be at, he was on the other side of the priest, hard by Undine. He raised himself up to whisper something in her ear, but she turned away with alarm, and cried out "Nothing more have I to do with thee!" "Ho, ho," laughed the stranger, "hast made so grand a marriage that no longer thou recognisest thy relations? Hast forgotten thy uncle Kühleborn, who so faithfully bore thee on his back to this region?" "Nathless I beg of thee," quoth Undine, "not to appear to me again. I fear thee now. What if my husband were to learn to avoid me, when he seeth me in such strange company and with such relations!" "Little niece," saith Kühleborn, "forget not that I am here with thee as a guide–else might the malicious goblins of the earth play some stupid pranks with thee. Let me therefore go on quickly at thy side. The old priest had better memory for me than thou hast, for he told me that I seemed familiar 104 to him and that perchance I was with him in the boat, out of which he fell into the water. In sooth was I, for I was the waterspout that threw him out of it and washed him safely ashore for thy bridals." Undine and the knight turned then to Father Heilmann, but he seemed walking as it were in a dream, and perceived naught of what was passing. Thereupon said Undine to Khüleborn, "Lo! there I see 105 “Little niece,” said Kühleborn, “forget not that I am here with thee as a guide” 106 107 the end of the forest. No need have we of thy help, and 'tis only thou who scarest us. I beg thee, therefore, in all love and goodwill, vanish and leave us in peace." But Kühleborn was angered thereat, his face grew hideous, and right fiercely did he gnash his teeth at Undine, who screamed aloud and called on her husband for help. Quick as lightning the knight sprang to the other side of the horse and aimed a stout blow with his sword at Kühleborn's head. But the blade struck against a waterfall, which was rushing down near them from a lofty crag, and with a splash, which sounded almost like a burst of laughter, it poured over them and drenched them to the skin. Whereat the priest of a sudden woke from his dream: "Long since," quoth he, "have I been expecting something of the sort, for the stream ran down from the heights so close to us. At the first, methought it was really a man and could speak with human voice." Now, as the waterfall rushed down, it distinctly spoke to Huldbrand's ear in words like these: Rash knight, Brave knight, I am not wroth, Nor will I chide. But ever guard, whate'er betide, Thy wife as closely at thy side: 108 A few steps more and they were upon open ground. Bright shone the imperial city before them, and the evening sun, which gilded its towers, dried with its kindly beams the drenched garments of the travellers. Brave knight, Rash knight! 109 CHAPTER X HOW THEY FARED IN THE CITY For a time the story must go back somewhat and tell all that had chanced in the imperial city while Huldbrand was away in the forest. The sudden disappearance of the master of Ringstetten had indeed caused great marvel and solicitude amongst those who liked him well enough for his skill at the tourney and dance, and still more for his gentle manners and bearing. His servants were not minded to leave the place without their lord, albeit that not one of them might dare to seek him in the shades of the dreaded forest. Idle therefore they remained, idly hoping, as men will do in such 110 case, and reminding themselves of their lost master by their outspoken sorrow. Now when full soon they were ware of the storms and floods in all their violence, they the less doubted that Huldbrand was now irretrievably lost; and Bertalda mourned for him openly, blaming herself in no small measure for that she had tempted the ill-starred knight to his fatal ride. Her foster-parents, the duke and the duchess, had come to fetch her away; but Bertalda begged them to remain with her until sure news should arrive of Huldbrand's life or death. Several young knights, who courted her full eagerly, she sought to persuade to follow the gallant adventurer into the forest. But no pledge would she give of her hand as reward for the enterprise. She ever hoped that Huldbrand might return and claim her; while, as for her suitors, not one of them cared to risk his life to fetch back so dangerous a rival for the sake of glove or ribbon or even kiss. And now, look you, Huldbrand suddenly appeared! Great was the joy of his servants and the citizens. Almost every one was glad at his return, save only Bertalda. It might indeed please the others that Huldbrand should bring with him so beautiful a bride, together with Father Heilmann as witness of the marriage; but Bertalda could feel naught but grief and vexation. For, in the first place, she had really loved the knight with all her heart, and, in the second place, her sorrow at his absence had proclaimed her love in the public eye far more than was now becoming. Nathless, in such circumstances, she demeaned herself as a wise 111 maiden, and bore herself in most friendly sort towards Undine–whom, indeed, all men thought to be a princess, rescued by Huldbrand in the forest from some evil enchantment. If questioned on such a matter, both husband and wife were wise enough to hold their peace, or dexterously evaded the inquiry. And Father Heilmann's lips were sealed to idle gossip of any kind; moreover, immediately after Huldbrand's arrival, he had taken his way back to his monastery. Hence it came that every one must needs be content with his own conjectures, and even Bertalda knew no more of the truth than the rest. Now, day by day, Undine felt her affection grow for the fair maiden. "Certès, we must have known one another before," she was wont to say, "or else there must be some strange tie between us, for without some cause–some deep and secret cause–one loveth not another so dearly as I have loved you from the first moment of our meeting." Nor could Bertalda herself deny but that she was drawn to Undine in sympathy and love, for all that she might hold herself aggrieved at so successful a rival. And so strong was this mutual affection that they both persuaded–the one her foster-parents, the other her husband–to postpone the day of departure from time to time: indeed, there was some talk that Bertalda should bear Undine company to the castle of Ringstetten, near the sources of the Danube. 112 Of this plan they spoke to one another one evening, as they walked by starlight in the public square of the imperial city, under the tall trees that encircle it. The young husband and wife had begged Bertalda to join them in their evening walk, and the three paced to and fro under the dark blue sky, now and again interrupting their talk to admire the magnificent fountain in the middle of the square, as its waters rushed and bubbled forth in strange beauty. Full happy and peaceful was the scene; glimmering lights from the neighbouring houses stole in upon them through the branches of the trees; a low murmur of children at play and folk who took pleasure in their walk, sounded in their ears; alone they seemed and yet not alone, in the midst of a bright, living world; the difficulties of the day smoothed themselves away; and the three friends could no longer understand what hindrance or objection there might be to Bertalda's visit to Ringstetten. Whereupon, as they were about to fix the day for their departure together, lo, a tall man, coming to them from the middle of the square, bowed with deep respect to the company, and said some words in the ear of the young wife. It irked her that she should be thus interrupted and by a stranger, but she went some steps aside with him and both began to whisper together, as it seemed, in a foreign tongue. Now Huldbrand thought that he recognised the man, and stared so fixedly at him that he neither heard nor answered Bertalda's astonished questions. Of a sudden, Undine clapped her hands joyously and, laughing, left the stranger, 113 while he, shaking his head, went away hastily as though illpleased, and vanished in the fountain. Then Huldbrand was certain that he was right; but Bertalda addressed herself to Undine. "Tell me," quoth she, "what had the master of the fountain to say to thee?" And Undine laughed to herself as she made reply. "The day after to-morrow, dear one, on thy birthday, shalt thou know all." No more would she say; but she asked Bertalda and, through her, her foster parents to dine with her husband and herself on the appointed day, and soon after they parted. "Kühleborn, was it Kühleborn?" said Huldbrand, with a secret shudder, when they had taken leave of Bertalda, and were pacing homewards through the darkening streets. "Ay, 'twas he," quoth Undine. "And he was minded to say many foolish things to me. But in the midst, and quite against his will, he gave me a most welcome piece of news. An thou wouldst wish to hear it forthwith, dear lord and husband, thou hast but to command, and I will tell it to thee with all my heart. But if thou wilt give a real pleasure to thy Undine, wait till the day after to-morrow and then thou too, wilt have a share in the surprise." Full readily did the knight grant to her the boon that she had so sweetly asked; and as she fell asleep, she murmured to 114 herself with a smile. "Dear, dear Bertalda!" quoth she. "How glad she will be, and how great will be her wonder at what the master of the fountain revealed to me!" 115 CHAPTER XI BERTALDA'S BIRTHDAY Here beginneth the story of the feast of Bertalda's nameday, how it fared for those who took part in it and in what sort it ended. Now the company were sitting at dinner, and Bertalda, who shone like some goddess of spring with her flowers and her jewels given her by her foster-parents and friends, was placed between Undine and Huldbrand. When the rich repast was ended, and the last course had been served, the doors remained open, as the good old German custom hath it, so that the common people might look on and bear a part in the festivity of the nobles. Servants were bearing cake and wine among the spectators. Huldbrand and Bertalda, for 116 their part, waiting with scarce-concealed impatience till the secret might be divulged, kept their eyes fixed on Undine. Silent, however, she still remained; only that now and again she smiled to herself in her hidden joy. Those who knew of the 117 Bertalda 118 119 promise she had made, might espy well enough that she was ever on the point of making the revelation, and that it was only by a sort of gay self-denial that she repressed her longing, as children are wont to do when they defer to the last their choicest dainties. Bertalda and Huldbrand shared this delightful feeling, looking forward with impatient hope to Undine’s message. Just at that moment some of the guests pressed Undine to sing. The time was opportune, and when her lute had been brought to her, she sang as followeth: Fair was the morn and gay the flowers, The grasses sweet and tall: But there on the verge of the glassy lake Was a pearl outshining all. What glitters there amid the grass? A blossom white as snow? Or is it a gem of Heavenly light Fallen to earth below? ’Tis an infant child, so frail and dear, And while it dreams it plays With rosy buds and happy flowers, And grasps the morning rays. Ah, whence, poor stranger, art thou here From far and unknown strand? The waves of the lake have borne thee on 120 With a sad smile Undine let fall her lute, and the eyes of Bertalda’s foster-parents filled full of tears. “Ay, ay,” quoth the duke, “’twas so indeed that I found thee, my poor orphan,” and he seemed deeply moved; “the fair To an unfamiliar land. Nay put not forth, O little child, Thy tiny hands outspread: No answering hand will meet thine own Voiceless that flowery bed. The flowers may deck themselves full sweet, And sweetly scent the air; But none can press thee to its heart With the love of a mother’s care. So early at the gate of life Has dawned an orphan’s lot; The highest blessing thou hast missed And yet thou know’st it not. A noble duke comes riding by, And stops, beholding thee: He takes thee to his castle-halls, A maid of high degree. Great is the boon and great thy gain, Thou’rt fairest in the land: Yet, ah, the purest joy of all Is lost–on an unknown strand! 121 singer says truly. The purest joy of all we have had no power to give thee!” “But now listen,” said Undine, “for we must hear how it fared with the poor parents.” Thereat she struck the strings and sang as followeth: The mother wanders through the house: Wherever she might come, She seeks with tears she knows not what, And finds an empty home. An empty home! oh, word of woe To one that had been blest: Who held her child throughout the day And cradled it to rest! The beech is growing green again, The sun shines on the shore; But, mother, fruitless is thy search, Thy babe comes back no more! And when the breath of eve blows cool And father home returns, He tries to smile as he smiled of yore,– But a tear his eyelid burns. For him his hearth is desolate And he finds but blank despair; For he hears the wail of that mother pale And no child to greet him there! 122 “Ah, in Heaven’s name,” cried Bertalda through her tears, “tell me, Undine, I pray thee, where are my parents? For surely thou must know; surely thou must have discovered; for else thou wouldst not so have torn my heart! Perchance they are here? Can it be so?” Her eyes glanced quickly over the brilliant company and rested on a lady of high rank who was seated hard by her foster-father. But Undine turned her towards the door and her eyes shone with tender light. “Where, then,” quoth she, “are the poor parents who have waited so long!” Whereupon, look you, ’twas the old fisherman and eke his wife, who stepped hesitatingly forth from the crowd of spectators! They looked, and there was much question in their looks–first at Undine and then on the beautiful maiden said to be their daughter. "Ay, 'tis she," murmured Undine, "'tis she, indeed!" And the two old people flung their arms round the neck of their long-lost child, weeping sore and praising God. But little pleasure, I wis, did Bertalda gain therefrom. Angry and astonished, she tore herself from their embrace. A discovery such as this was more than her proud spirit could bear at a moment when she had fondly dreamed that still greater fortune was to be her lot–nay that she might come even to royal honours. Her rival, it seemed to her, had devised this plan so that she might be all the more signally humiliated before Huldbrand and the whole world. Undine 123 she covered with reproaches; the old people she reviled; and bitter, hateful words, such as "liar," "deceiver," "bribed impostors," fell from her lips. Thereupon the old fisherman's wife said to herself in a low voice: "Ah me, she is become, I ween, a wicked girl, and yet I feel in my heart that she was born of me." As for the fisherman, he folded his hands and prayed silently that it might not be his daughter. Undine, pale as death, turned from the parents to Bertalda and from Bertalda to the parents. From the heaven of happiness of which she had dreamed she was of a sudden cast out, and such anguish and terror as she had never known even in dreams overwhelmed her thoughts. "Hast thou a soul?" cried she, "hast thou indeed a soul, Bertalda?" She uttered these words over and over again as though to rouse her, despite her wrath, from some sudden madness or distracting nightmare. But when Bertalda only grew the hotter in her anger, while the parents whom she had rejected began to utter loud lamentation, and the guests, in eager dispute, took this side or that in the controversy, Undine asked with such dignity and seriousness to be allowed to speak in this, her husband's hall, that all were forthwith silenced. Then she moved to the upper end of the table, where Bertalda had sate her down; and, while every eye was fixed upon her, she spoke with modesty and pride the words that follow: "My friends," quoth she, "I see that ye are troubled and angry, and truly, God wot, ye have marred my happy feast 124 with your bickerings. But in sooth I know naught of your foolish ways and your harsh thoughts; nor indeed am I fain through all my life to become acquainted with them. No fault is it of mine that the matter hath turned out so ill; but, believe me an ye will, the fault may very well be with you, little as it so appears. Wherefore I have little to say; but one thing I must say. I have spoken naught but the truth. I cannot, nor I will not, give ye proof beyond these words of mine, but I declare it to be so. He told me of it, who lured Bertalda from her parents into the water, and who afterwards placed her on the green meadow in the duke's path." "She is a sorceress!" cried Bertalda, "a witch who holdeth intercourse with evil spirits! Why, she confesseth it herself!" "Nay, not so," quoth Undine, and a heaven of innocence and truth was in her eyes. "I am no witch: only look at me." "False is she," saith Bertalda, "false and boastful. Nor can she prove that I am the child of these base-born people. My noble parents, I ask ye to take me from this company, and from this city, where they are only minded to bring me to shame." Nathless, the duke's sense of honour forbade him to move, while his wife was as firm as he. "We must be careful," said she, "how we act. God forbid that we should take a step from this hall without due 125 thought." Thereupon the fisherman's wife drew near, and curtseying low to the duchess, she said these words: "Thou hast opened my heart, noble lady, for thou fearest God. If this wicked child be in sooth my daughter, I must tell thee that she hath a mark, like a violet, between her shoulders, and another like it on the instep of her left foot. If she will but come with me out of the hall———" "I shall not bare myself before a peasant woman," cried Bertalda, turning proudly away. "But before me thou wilt," said the duchess, very gravely. "Follow me into yonder room, and the good old woman shall come with us." So the three disappeared, and the others remained 126 “She hath a mark, like a violet, between her shoulders, and another like it on the instep of her left foot” 127 128 where they were, waiting in silence. After a time they came back. Bertalda was deadly pale. "Right is right," said the duchess; "needs must I therefore declare that our hostess hath spoken naught but the exact truth. Bertalda is the fisherman's daughter, and that is all that it is necessary to say." Duke and duchess went out with their adopted daughter; at a sign from the duke, the fisherman and his wife followed. The other guests departed in silence, or with secret murmurs; and Undine sank weeping into Huldbrand's arms. 129 CHAPTER XII HOW THEY JOURNEYED FROM THE CITY Now the lord of Ringstetten might well have been better pleased had the events of the day turned out otherwise; yet even so, it must needs content him that his wife should have been shown to be so good and sweet and kindly. "If a soul I have given her," he would say to himself, "'tis indeed a better one than mine own." And forthwith his only thought 130 was to speak comfortingly to the weeping Undine, and on the following morning to leave a city, which after such events, must have become distasteful to her. No one judged her with disfavour, it is true. From the first, something of strangeness and mystery was looked for in her, and the discovery of Bertalda's birth caused no great wonderment; moreover, every one who had heard the story and seen how distempered was Bertalda's behaviour, felt disgust at her alone. Of this, however, the knight and his lady knew nothing as yet. Praise or blame was alike painful to Undine, and there was therefore naught better to be done than leave the old walls of the city behind them with all possible speed. At early dawn, a well-appointed carriage drove up to the entrance gate for Undine. Huldbrand's horses and those of his attendant squires were pawing the ground in the court. The knight was leading his wife from the door, when a fisher-girl crossed their way. "We need not thy merchandise," said Huldbrand, "we are just leaving the city." Whereupon, as the fisher-girl began to weep bitterly, the husband and wife recognised that she was Bertalda. They went back with her at once to their apartments and learnt that the duke and duchess, bitterly displeased at her violence and ill-behaviour yesterday, had withdrawn their protection from her, albeit that they had given her a rich dowry. The fisherman, also, had been 131 handsomely rewarded, and with his wife had already set out for their lonely home. "I would fain have gone with them," she went on, "but the old man who is said to be my father———" "He is truly thy father," Undine broke in. "Listen. The stranger who appeared to thee to be the master of the fountain told me the whole story, word for word. He wished to dissuade me from taking thee to Castle Ringstetten, and so the secret came out." "Well, then," said Bertalda, "my father, if so it must be–my father refused to take me with him until such time as I might be changed in nature and dress. 'Adventure thyself alone through the haunted forest,' quoth he; 'that shall be the proof whether thou hast any regard for us or no. But come not as a lady; come as a fisher-girl.' Now I would do as he said, for I am forsaken by the whole world, and I will live and die alone with my poor parents as a poor fisher-girl. But I dread the forest. Hideous spectres dwell there and make me afraid. But there is no help for it. I came here but to implore pardon of the noble lady of Ringstetten for that I demeaned myself so unworthily yesterday. I know well, gentle lady, that you meant to do me a kindness; but you knew not how you would wound me, and in my distress and surprise, full many a rash and frantic word escaped my lips. Ah, forgive me, forgive me, I am so unhappy! Bethink 132 thyself what I was yesterday morning–yesterday when your feast began–and what I am now!" Her voice was choked with a burst of passionate tears, and Undine, who also wept full sore, fell on her neck. It was long before she could utter a word; at length she said: "Truly thou canst go with us to Ringstetten," quoth she. "Everything shall be as before arranged. Only, I beg thee, do not call me 'noble lady.' Look you, we were exchanged as children–that made our destinies akin; and we will now so closely link our destinies together that no power of man shall be able to sever them. Only, first of all, come to Ringstetten; there can we discuss how to share everything as sisters." Bertalda raised her eyes timidly to Huldbrand. As for him, he pitied the beautiful girl in her distress, gave her his hand and begged her in all kindness to trust herself to him and his wife. "We will send a message to your parents," quoth he, "to tell them why you have not come"; and he would have added further words about the good old couple, had he not seen that Bertalda shrank from the mention of their name. He therefore said no more. Thereupon he helped her into the carriage; Undine followed; while he, mounting his horse and trotting gaily by their side, urged the coachman to drive with all convenient speed. Full soon they were beyond the confines of the 133 imperial city and all its painful recollections, and the ladies could now begin to enjoy the beautiful country through which their road lay. After a few days journey they came one exquisite evening to Castle Ringstetten. The knight had much business to transact with his steward and with his other retainers, so that Undine and Bertalda were left alone. Both went out on the ramparts of the fortress and were delighted with the fair landscape that spread far and wide before them through fertile Swabia. At that moment a tall man approached them, greeting them courteously, and it seemed to Berthalda that he bore a likeness to the master of the fountain in the city. Still stronger grew the resemblance, as Undine, indignantly and with threatening gesture, bade him begone, and he departed with hasty steps, shaking his head as before, and vanishing at last in a thicket close by. But Undine reassured her friend. "Do not be afraid, dear Bertalda," she said, "this time that hateful master of the fountain shall do no harm." And then she told the whole story in detail–who she was herself, and how Bertalda had been taken away from the fisherman and his wife, and Undine brought to them instead. At first the girl was frightened, for she thought her friend to be seized with sudden madness. But soon she felt more and more convinced that all was true, because Undine's story held together so well, and suited so aptly past events. Moreover, truth is truth, and brings its own testimony. It seemed, 134 indeed, strange to Bertalda that she should be living, as it were, in the midst of one of those fairy tales, to which formerly she had but lent an ear. Full reverently did she gaze upon Undine, but always with a sense of dread that came between her and her friend. At their evening meal she could not help but marvel that the knight could bear himself with such tenderness and love towards a being who now, after all she had discovered, appeared to be a phantom rather than a human being. 135 CHAPTER XIII HOW THEY FARED AT CASTLE RINGSTETTEN Now the story is silent concerning some events, and only mentioneth others cursorily; while it passeth over a considerable space of time. And for this he who reads the tale must pardon him that wrote it, the reason being that the writer is himself moved by the sadness of it, and would fain have others touched likewise. He could, an he willed it, portray for—perchance he hath the skill—how, step by step, Huldbrand's heart began to turn from Undine to Bertalda; how Bertalda more and more answered devotion by 136 devotion; how both looked upon the wife as a mysterious being to fear rather than to pity; how Undine wept, and how her tears stirred the knight's remorse without awakening his old love–in such sort that, though at times he was kind and affectionate, a cold shudder would soon drive him from her and make him turn to his fellow mortal, Bertalda. All this, the writer knoweth full well, might be drawn out at length; mayhap, it ought so to be; but it grieveth him overmuch, for he hath known such things by sad experience, and he dreadeth even the shadow of their remembrance. And thou, too, who readest these pages, art like to have had a similar knowledge, for such is the lot of man. Happy art thou if thou hast felt the pain, rather than caused it; for in such things 'tis more blessed to receive than to give. If so it be, such a memory will give thee sorrow, and a tear, perchance, may fall on the faded flowers which once thou wert wont to prize. But enough of this. We will not pierce our hearts with a thousand separate stings, but be content to know that matters were so as I have stated them. Now poor Undine was sad, and the others in no better case. Bertalda in especial thought she detected an injured wife's jealousy whenever her wishes were thwarted. For this reason it was her wont to bear herself imperiously, and Undine gave way sorrowfully; while as for Huldbrand, his blindness was such that he encouraged Bertalda in her arrogance. Moreover, the peace of the castle was still further disturbed by many apparitions, strange and marvellous, which met Huldbrand and Bertalda in the 137 vaulted galleries, and these had never been heard of before in the memory of man. The tall white man, whom the knight knew only too well as Uncle Kühleborn, and Bertalda as the spectral master of the fountain, often passed before them with threats in his eye. It was Bertalda whom he especially menaced–so much so that many times she had been sick with terror, and often bethought her of leaving the castle. But Huldbrand was all too dear; and she trusted to her innocence, sith no words of love had passed between them. Besides, she knew not whither to go. Now you must know that the old fisherman, when he received the message from the lord of Ringstetten that Bertalda was his guest, had written a few words in an almost illegible hand–such words as in his old age, and his want of experience, it would be natural for him to write. "I am now," he wrote, "a widower: my dear and faithful wife is dead. Nathless, though I be lonely in my cottage, I would rather that Bertalda were with thee than with me. Only let her do no harm to my beloved Undine–on pain of my curse." The last words Bertalda flung to the winds; but she paid especial attention to the part concerning her absence from her father. We are all wont to do the like in similar circumstances. 138 It happened one day, when Huldbrand had just ridden forth, that Undine called together the servants of the household. She bade them bring a large stone and carefully cover with it the magnificent fountain, which was in the midst of the castle court. The servants urged that this would oblige them to fetch water from far down in the valley. Undine smiled sadly. "Full sorry am I, friends," quoth she, "to increase your labour. I would rather carry the pitchers with my own hands. But this fountain must be closed. Believe me, there is no other way of escaping a much greater evil." Well pleased, I ween, were the whole household to do anything for their gentle mistress. They asked no more questions, but took up the enormous stone. Already they had raised it in their hands, and were poising it over the fountain, when, lo, Bertalda came up running, and ordered them to stop. It was from this fountain that the water came which was so good for her complexion, and, for her part, said she: "I will never allow it to be closed." Undine, however, despite her usual gentleness, was firmer than her wont. She told Bertalda that it was her business, as mistress of the house, to make such arrangements as she thought best, and that in this she was accountable only to her lord and husband. "Nay, but look," cried Bertalda, angry and displeased, "look how the poor water curls and writhes! It cannot bear to be 139 shut out from the bright sunshine and the cheerful look of human faces which it loveth to mirror!" And, in sooth, the water bubbled and hissed full strangely; it was as though there were something within which strove to release itself; but Undine only the more earnestly insisted that her orders should be carried out. There was no need to urge; the servants were as glad to obey their gentle mistress as they were to thwart Bertalda's self-will; and despite all her rude and angry threats, the stone was soon firmly fixed over the opening of the fountain. Thereupon Undine bent thoughtfully over it, and wrote something on its surface. It would seem that she held a sharp and cutting instrument in her hand, for when she had gone and the servants came near to examine the stone, they saw various strange characters upon it which none had seen before. Now, when the knight returned home in the evening, Bertalda received him with tears and complaints of Undine's conduct. Huldbrand looked hard and cold at his wife, and she cast down her eyes in distress. Yet she made answer calmly enough. "My lord and husband," said she, "doth not reprove even a bond slave without hearing; how much less his wedded wife?" "Speak," said the knight, with a stern face, "what moved thee to act so strangely?" 140 "I fain would tell thee when we are alone," sighed Undine. "Thou mayest tell me just as well in Bertalda's presence," he returned. "Ay," quoth Undine, "if such be thy command. But command it not, I beseech thee." She looked so humble, so sweet, so obedient, that a gleam from better times shone in the knight's heart. He took her with some show of tenderness by the hand and led her within to an inner room, where she began to speak as followeth: "My beloved lord," saith she, "knoweth somewhat of my evil uncle, Kühleborn, and it hath displeased him more than once to meet him in the galleries of the castle. Several times hath Kühleborn frightened Bertalda and made her ill. This is because he is devoid of soul; he is an elemental force, a mere mirror of external things, without ability to reflect the world within. Now at times he seeth that thou art displeased with me; that I, in my childlike way, am crying; and that Bertalda is perhaps at the same moment laughing. Hence he imagineth various unlikely jars and troubles in our home life, and in many ways mixeth himself unbidden with our circle. What avails it that I reprove him, that I send him angrily away? He doth not believe a word I say. His undeveloped nature can give him no idea how sweetly the joys and sorrows of love resemble one another, how closely and inseparably they are united. Why, tears beget smiles, and from their hidden source smiles conjure up tears!" 141 She looked up at Huldbrand, smiling and weeping, and once more he felt within him all the enchantment of his old love. She was aware of this and pressed him closer to her, as she went on more happily: "As the disturber of our peace was not to be dismissed with words, I have had to shut the door upon him, and the only door by which he can enter is that fountain. He is at variance with all the water-spirits of the adjacent valleys, and his dominion only beginneth again far down the Danube, to which some of his good friends are tributaries. 'Twas for this reason that I had the stone placed over the opening of the fountain, and I inscribed characters on it which cripple all my jealous uncle's power in such sort that he can come neither in thy way, nor mine, nor Bertalda's. Now it is true that ordinary men can raise the stone again with but common effort, for all that it is marked with strange characters. They are not let or hindered by the inscription. If it be thy will, therefore, comply with Bertalda's desire; but in truth she knoweth not what she asketh. On her, above all, the rude Kühleborn hath set his mark; and if that came to pass which he hath predicted to me, and which might well enough happen without any evil intention on thy part–thou thyself, beloved one, wouldst not be safe from peril!" Huldbrand felt deeply how generous had been his wife in her eagerness to shut up her formidable champion, albeit that she had been upbraided therefor by Bertalda. Folding 142 her most tenderly in his arms he said with obvious sincerity, "The stone shall remain, and all shall remain, as thou wilt have it, now and ever, my sweet Undine." Timidly and fondly she kissed him in this re-awakening of a love so long withheld; and at the last she said: "Dearest husband," quoth she, "so gentle and kind art thou to-day that I would fain ask a favour of thee. See now, it is the same with thee as it is with summer. In the height of its glory, summer puts on its flaming and thundering crown of storms, so as to prove that it is a king over the earth. And thou, too, sometimes, art angry, and thine eyes flash and thy voice stormeth; and these things become thee well, though they make me in my folly weep. But never, I pray thee, behave thus on the water or even near it, for in that case my kinsfolk would regain power over me. They would tear me irrevocably from thy arms, deeming that one of their race was injured; and then I must needs dwell all my life below in the crystal palaces, never daring to come up to thee again; or else they would send me up to thee, and that, O Heaven, would be infinitely worse! No, no, beloved one, let it not come to this, if poor Undine be dear to thee!" Full solemnly he gave the promise to do as she desired, and both left the room, full of love and gladness. As they came forth, lo, Bertalda appeared with some workmen to whom she had already given orders, and in the sullen tone she had assumed of late, said: "The secret conference, methinks, is 143 over at last. I suppose the stone may now be removed; go ye men, and see that it be done." But the knight, incensed at her forwardness, gave orders, shortly and decisively, that the stone should be left where it was; and he uttered some reproof likewise to Bertalda for her behaviour towards his wife. Whereupon the workmen went away, smiling and well-satisfied; and Bertalda, pale with rage, hurried to her room. The hour of supper arrived and, behold, they waited in vain for Bertalda. They sent to summon her, but the servant found her room empty and only brought back a sealed letter addressed to the knight. He opened it in some amazement and read as follows: "I am but a fisher-girl–I know it well; and shame holdeth me fast. If I forgot it for a moment, I will atone by going to the miserable cottage of my parents. Live happy with thy beautiful wife!" Now Undine was much distressed thereat: and she earnestly begged Huldbrand to hasten after their friend and bring her back. Alas, there was no need to urge! His love for Bertalda burst out anew. Hurrying round the castle, he inquired if any had seen which way the fugitive had gone. Naught could he learn, and he was already on his horse in the castle-yard, resolved at a venture to take the road by which he had brought Bertalda hither, when, of a sudden, a page came up and assured him that he had met the lady on the path to the Black Valley. Like an arrow, the knight sped 144 through the gateway in the direction pointed out to him; nor did he hear Undine's voice of agony, as she called to him from the window: "The Black Valley! Oh, go not there, Huldbrand, go not there! or else, for Heaven's sake, take me too!" And when she saw that she cried in vain, she ordered her white palfrey to be saddled forthwith, and rode after the knight. Nor did she permit any servant to accompany her. 145 CHAPTER XIV THE BLACK VALLEY Now the Black Valley lieth deep within the mountains. What name it may bear now I know not; at that time the country people gave it this title because of the deep gloom that the tall trees, chiefly fir-trees, threw over the ravine. Even the brook bubbling between the rocks had a black look, and was far less joyous in its flow than streams that have the blue sky over them. And now, in the darkening twilight, it ran yet more wild and gloomy beneath the hills. With no little anxious care the knight rode along the edge of the brook; at one moment he feared that by delay he might allow the fugitive to get too far in advance, and at the next, that in his overhaste he might pass her by in some hiding- 146 place. He had meanwhile penetrated far into the valley and hoped soon to win his quest, if so be that he were on the right track. The fear, indeed, that this might not be the case, made his heart beat fast with dread. How, he 147 Bertalda in the Black Valley 148 149 asked himself, might Bertalda fare, should he fail to find her, throughout the stormy night which lowered so threateningly over the valley? At length something white gleaming through the branches on the slope of the mountain caught his eye, and he thought he recognised Bertalda's dress. But when he turned in that direction his horse refused to advance and reared furiously; and the knight, because he was unwilling to lose a moment, and also because he saw that the brushwood opened no passage for him on horseback, dismounted. Fastening his snorting and terrified horse to an elm-tree, he worked his way cautiously through the bushes. On his forehead and cheeks the branches shed the cold drops of evening dew; distant thunder growled beyond the mountains; and all looked so wild that he began to feel a dread of the white figure, now lying only a short distance from him on the ground. Still right plainly he could see that it was a woman, either asleep or in a swoon, and that she wore long white robes such as Bertalda had worn that day. Close to her he stepped, rustled the branches, and let his sword fall with a clatter. She did not move. "Bertalda!" he cried, first softly, then louder and louder. She did not hear. At last, in answer to a yet louder appeal to her name, a hollow echo from the mountain caverns repeated "Bertalda!" But the sleeper awoke not. He bent over her, but the gloom of the ravine and the darkness of coming night did not allow him to recognise her features. 150 And now a strange thing chanced. As with sickening dread he stooped still closer over her, a flash of lightning shot across the valley, and he saw before him a face distorted and hideous, while a hollow voice exclaimed, "Kiss me, thou love-sick fool!" Huldbrand sprang up with a cry, and the hideous figure rose with him. "Go home," it muttered, "unholy spirits are abroad. Go home, or I shall claim thee!" and it caught at him with its long white arms. Thereupon the knight recovered himself. "Malicious Kühleborn," he cried, "thy tricks are vain, I know thy goblin arts. There, take thy kiss!" And he struck his sword madly against the figure. But it vanished like vapour, and a drenching spray left the knight in no manner of doubt as to who his enemy might be. "He would fain scare me away from Bertalda," he said aloud. "Doubtless he thinks to frighten me with his foolish pranks, and to force me to abandon the helpless girl to his vengeance. But that he shall not do. Poor, weak spirit as he is, he is powerless to understand what a strong man's heart can dare, when once he is firmly resolved in purpose." He felt the truth of his words and they brought him fresh courage. Fortune herself, too, or so it seemed, was on his side, for no sooner did he reach his tethered horse than he heard, distinctly enough, Bertalda's moaning voice at no 151 great distance, and through the growing tumult of thunder and storm he could catch the sound of her sobs. Hurrying forthwith to the spot, he found her. She was trying to climb the side of the hill, so that she might at least escape the awful darkness of the valley. As he came with loving words towards her, all her pride and strength of resolve fainted and failed before the delight of seeing the friend, who was so dear to her, close at hand to rescue her from her terrible loneliness. "Once more," she thought, "the happy life of the castle holds out to me its arms. I can but yield." So she followed the knight unresisting, but so wearied was she that Huldbrand was right glad to have his horse to carry her. In all haste he untethered him in order to put the fugitive on his back, and thus, holding the reins with all care, he hoped to win his way through the uncertain shades of the valley. Howbeit the wild apparition of Kühleborn had made the horse mad with terror. Scarce might the knight himself have mounted and ridden so ungovernable a beast; but to put the trembling Bertalda on him was wholly beyond his power. So they resolved, perforce, to go home on foot. Drawing the horse after him by the bridle, the knight supported Bertalda with his other hand, and she, on her part, made brave show to pass as quickly as might be through the ravine. But weariness weighed her down like lead, and her limbs trembled–partly because of the past terror she had undergone through Kühleborn's pursuit, and partly because of her continued alarm at the howling of the storm and the pealing of the thunder in the wooded mountains. 152 And, at the last, she could no more. She slid down from the knight's supporting arm and sank on the moss. "Leave me here, my noble lord," cried she; "I must needs suffer the penalty of my folly and die here in weariness and fear." "Nay, nay, sweet friend," quoth he, "say not so, for desert thee I will not." And so saying he endeavoured all the more to curb his furious horse, who, rearing and plunging worse than before, must now be kept at some distance from Bertalda lest he might increase her discomfiture. So the knight withdrew a few paces, but no sooner had he gone than she called after him in most piteous sort as though in truth he were going to leave her in this solitary wilderness. What course to take he knew not; he was utterly at a loss. Gladly enough would he have given the excited beast his liberty to gallop away into the night and so exhaust his terror. Yet he feared that in this narrow defile he might come thundering with his iron-shod hoofs over the very spot where Bertalda lay. Now he was in this sore distress and perplexity, when he heard with unspeakable relief the sound of a waggon driven slowly down the stony road behind them. He called out for help; a man's voice answered, bidding him have patience but promising assistance; and soon after two grey horses appeared through the bushes, and beside them the driver in the white smock of a carter; next a great white tilt came into 153 sight covering the goods that lay in the waggon. At a sign from their master the obedient horses halted, and the waggoner coming towards the knight helped him to soothe his frightened animal. "Full well I see," quoth he, "what aileth the beast. When I first travelled this way it fared no better with my horses. An evil water-spirit in truth haunteth the place, and he taketh delight in mischief of this sort. But I have learned a spell: if thou wilt let me whisper it in thy horse's ear, he will forthwith stand as quiet as my greys yonder." "Try thy spell and quickly!" cried the knight impatiently. Then the man drew down to him the head of the restive horse and whispered something in his ear. Straightway the animal stood still and subdued, and his heaving flanks bedewed with sweat alone bore witness to his former fury. Huldbrand had no time to inquire how all this had come about; he agreed with the carter that he should take Bertalda in his waggon–in which, so the man assured him, there were a quantity of soft cotton bales–and so bear her back to Castle Ringstetten. He himself was minded to follow on horseback, but the horse appeared too exhausted by his past fury to carry his master so far, and the waggoner persuaded him to take his place beside Bertalda. The horse could be fastened behind. "We are going down hill," said the man, "and that will be easy work for my greys." Thereupon the knight agreed and 154 entered the waggon with Bertalda; the horse followed patiently behind, and the waggoner steadily and watchfully walked by the side. Amid the stillness of the night, now that the darkness had fallen and the subsiding storm seemed to grow more and more remote, Huldbrand and Bertalda, in the pleasant sense of renewed security and a right happy escape, began to converse in low and confidential tones. Caressingly he rallied her on her daring flight, and she excused herself full humbly; but from every word she said there shone as it were a light which revealed amidst the darkness and mystery that her love was truly his. The meaning of her words was felt rather than heard, and it was to the meaning only that the knight responded. Of a sudden the waggoner gave a shout: "Step high, my greys," cried he; "lift up your feet! Step together and bethink ye who ye are!" The knight looked forth from the waggon and saw how the horses were stepping into the midst of a foaming stream; already they were almost swimming, while the waggon wheels turned and flashed like the wheels of a mill, and the driver had got up in front to escape the swelling waters. "Why, what sort of road is this?" cried Huldbrand, "it goeth into the very middle of the stream!" "By no means," said their guide, with a laugh, "it is just the reverse; the stream goeth into the very middle of our road. Look round and see how overwhelming is the flood." And, 155 indeed, the whole valley was filled with a rushing and heaving torrent of water, which was visibly swelling higher and higher. "'Tis Kühleborn, the evil spirit," cried the knight, "he wishes to drown us! Hast thou no spell against him, my friend?" "Ay, ay," returned he. "I know one well enough. But I may not and cannot use it until thou knowest who I am." "Is this a time for riddles?" shouted Huldbrand. "The flood is rising higher and higher; and what mattereth it to me who thou art?" "Nathless, it doth matter," quoth the waggoner, "for I am Kühleborn!" Thereupon he thrust a distorted face into the waggon with a grin. But, lo and behold, the waggon was a waggon no longer! The horses were no longer horses–all melted into foam and vanished in the seething waters. Even the waggoner himself towering over them as some gigantic billow, and dragging down the horse beneath the waves despite his struggles, rose and swelled higher and higher over the drowning pair of lovers, like a mighty column of water, threatening to bury them for ever. And then, hark, 'twas Undine's voice which rang through the uproar; 'twas Undine herself who, as the moon swam clear of the clouds, was seen standing on the heights above 156 the valley. 'Twas she, in sooth, who rebuked and threatened the floods below; and the menacing column of water vanished, murmuring and muttering, and the streams flowed gently away in the moonlight. Like a white dove Undine flew down from the height; she laid hold on the knight and Bertalda, and bore them with her to a green and grassy spot on the hill. There she refreshed their weariness and dispelled their fears; and when she had helped Bertalda to mount her white palfrey, they all three made their way back, as best they might, to Castle Ringstetten. 157 CHAPTER XV HOW THEY JOURNEYED TO VIENNA Now the story halteth for a space. After the last adventure all was quiet and peaceful at the castle. More and more was the knight conscious of that heavenly goodness in his wife, which had been so nobly proved in her hasty pursuit and rescue of them from the Black Valley, where Kühleborn's power began again. And Undine felt that inner peace and security which never fail the heart that knows itself to be in the right way. Besides, in the newly-awakened love and esteem of her husband, many a gleam of hope and joy shone upon her. As for Bertalda, she seemed humble, grateful, modest, without claiming any merit for such virtues. It might chance that either Huldbrand or Undine sought now and again to explain to her why the fountain was covered, or the real meaning of the Black Valley adventure; but she always earnestly begged them to spare her. "For," said she, "the fountain makes me feel ashamed, and the Black Valley terrifies me." Naught more of either then did she learn. 158 And, indeed, why should she? Peace and joy had visibly come to stay at Castle Ringstetten. Real security was theirs, or so they deemed–why should life produce aught but flowers and fruit? In conditions like these winter had come and passed away, and spring with her green buds and blue sky visited the happy inmates of the castle. Spring was in tune with their hearts and their hearts with spring. What wonder then if her storks and swallows awoke in them also a wish to travel? One day, as they were sauntering to one of the sources of the Danube, Huldbrand spoke of the majesty of the noble river, and how it flowed on, ever widening, through fertile lands; how the glory of Vienna rose on its banks, and new might and loveliness were revealed in every tract and reach of its course. "It must be glorious to sail down the river to Vienna," exclaimed Bertalda; then falling back on her present mood of humbleness and reserve, she coloured deeply and was silent. Undine was much touched thereby, and with an eager wish to please her friend, she said: "What hinders us from taking this voyage?" Bertalda was delighted, and forthwith both began to picture to themselves in the most glowing colours the delight of travel on the Danube. Hulbrand also gladly agreed; yet once he whispered in Undine's ear: 159 "But Kühleborn regains his power lower down the river!" "Let him come," quoth Undine gaily, "I shall be there, and he tries none of his tricks before me!" Thus the last obstacle disappeared. When they had prepared themselves for the voyage, they set out with the best courage and the brightest hopes. Howbeit, meseemeth for us mortal men there is little to marvel at, if things should turn out contrary to our hopes. The evil power which lurks to destroy us is wont to lull to sleep its chosen victim with sweet songs and golden delusions, while the saving messenger from heaven often knocks at our door with sharp and terrifying summons. Now for the first few days of the voyage down the Danube, their cup of happiness seemed full. Everything grew more and more beautiful the farther they sailed down the proudlyflowing river. Nathless, in a country which smiled so sweetly and was so full of the promise of pure delight, lo, Kühleborn, with his ungovernable malice, began openly to show his powers of interference. It is true that he essayed naught but irritating tricks, for Undine would often rebuke the rising waves or the contrary winds, and then for an instant the power of the enemy was humbled. But the attacks began again and again. Undine's reproofs became necessary in such sort that the pleasure of the little party was completely destroyed. Moreover the boatmen were continually whispering and looking with a certain mistrust 160 at their passengers; while even the servants began to have forebodings and watched their masters with suspicious glances. Huldbrand would often say to himself: "Certès, like should only wed with like; this cometh of an union with a mermaid!" And making excuses for himself, as we are all wont to do, he would bethink him: "I knew not in truth that she was a sea-maiden; mine is the misfortune that all my life is let and hindered by the freaks of her mad kindred. It is no fault of mine!" Such thoughts seemed to hearten him; yet, on the other hand, his ill-humour grew and he felt something like animosity against Undine. She, poor thing, understood well enough what his angry looks signified. One evening, exhausted with these outbursts of ill-temper, and her constant efforts to frustrate Kühleborn's devices, she fell into a deep slumber, rocked soothingly by the gentle motion of the boat. But hardly had she closed her eyes, when every one on board saw, wherever he turned, a horrible human head. It rose out of the waves, not like that of a person swimming, but perfectly perpendicular, as though kept upright on the watery surface, and floating along in the same course as the boat. Each man wanted to point out to his fellow the cause of his alarm, but each found on other faces the same horror– only that his neighbour's hands and eyes were turned in a different direction from that where the phantom, half laughing and half threatening, rose before him. But when 161 they wished to make each other understand, and were all crying out "Look there!"–"No–there!" all the horrible heads together and at the same moment appeared to their view, and the whole river swarmed with hideous apparitions. The universal shriek of fear awoke Undine, and, as she opened her eyes, the wild crowd of ugly faces vanished. But as for Huldbrand, it irked him sore to see such jugglery. He had well nigh burst out in a storm of indignation; but Undine implored him in humble and soothing tones: "For God's sake," saith she, "bethink thee, my husband! We are on the water, do not be angry with me now!" So the knight held his peace and sat down with brooding thoughts. Undine whispered in his ear. "Were it not better, my love, that we gave up this foolish voyage, and returned in peace to Ringstetten?" But Hudbrand murmured moodily: "So I must needs be a prisoner in my own castle, and only able to breathe so long as the fountain is closed! Would that thy mad kindred ———" Hereupon Undine lovingly pressed her hand on his lips; and he paused, musing in silence over much that Undine had before told him. Meantime, Bertalda had given herself up to many strange thoughts. Much of Undine's origin she knew, and yet not everything; as to Kühleborn, he above all had remained for her a terrible and insoluble puzzle. Indeed, she had never even heard his name. Pondering thus, she unclasped, half 162 conscious of the act, a gold necklace which Huldbrand had recently bought for her from a travelling merchant; dreamily she drew it along the surface of the water, pleased with the bright glimmer it cast upon the evening-tinted stream. Of a sudden, a huge hand rose out of the Danube, caught hold of the necklace, and drew it down beneath the waters. Bertalda screamed aloud, and a mocking laugh echoed from the depths of the stream. And now the wrath of Huldbrand burst all bounds. Starting up, he cursed the river, cursed all those who dared to thrust themselves into his family life, and challenged them, whether water-spirits or sirens, to come and face his naked sword. And Bertalda went on weeping for her lost and much loved toy, adding thereby fuel to the flame of the knight's anger; while Undine held her hand over the side of the vessel, dipping it into the water and softly murmuring to herself. Now and again she interrupted her strange and mysterious whisper by entreaties to her husband. "Chide me not here, my best beloved!" she said, "Chide whom else thou wilt; but not me and here. Thou knowest why!" And, in truth, he kept back the words of anger that were trembling on his tongue. Presently in her wet hand she brought up from beneath the water a beautiful coral necklace, so beautiful and 163 Soon she was lost to sight in the Danube 164 165 so brilliant that it dazzled the eyes of all who saw it. "Take this," she said, as she held it out to Bertalda. "I have had this fetched from below to make amends to thee. Do not grieve any more, my poor child!" But the knight sprang between them. He tore the pretty trinket from Undine's hand, flung it into the river, and exclaimed in passionate rage: "So then," cried he, "thou still hast dealings with them? In the name of all the witches, abide with them, thou and thy presents, and leave us mortals in peace, sorceress!" Poor Undine looked at him with fixed and tearful eyes, her hand still outstretched, as when she had offered her present so lovingly to Bertalda. Then she wept, ever more and more bitterly, like an innocent child who feels that it has been sorely misused. At length, wearied and outworn, she murmured: "Alas! sweet friend, I must needs bid thee farewell! They shall do thee no harm; only remain true, so that I may have the power to protect thee from them. But for myself, I must go–go hence in the springtide of my life. Oh, what hast thou done! What hast thou done! Alas! Alas!" And so Undine vanished over the side of the vessel. Whether she plunged into the stream or was drawn into it they knew not; it might have been either or perhaps somewhat of both. But full soon she was lost to sight in the 166 Danube; only a few little waves seemed to whisper and sob round the boat, as though they murmured: "Alas! alas! Be faithful!" And Huldbrand lay on the deck, weeping bitterly, till a deep swoon cast a veil of merciful oblivion over his unhappiness. 167 CHAPTER XVI HOW IT FARED FURTHER WITH HULDBRAND Hereupon the story must again have some pause. All men know that sorrow is short-lived. But is it well or ill that it should be so? And by sorrow the writer means the deeper sort–that which springs from the very sources of life, which so unites itself with the lost objects of our love that they are no longer lost, and which consecrates their image as a sacred treasure, until that final bourn be reached which they have gained before us. Should such a sorrow as this be brief? Many men, it is true, preserve these sacred memories, but their feeling is no longer that of the first keen grief. Other new images have thronged between, and we end by learning how all earthly things are transitory, even grief itself. And for this reason must one say: "Alas! that our mourning should be of such short duration!" 168 Now the lord of Ringstetten had this experience sure enough–whether for his good the sequel of this story shall tell. At first he could do naught but weep, as bitterly as Undine had wept when he tore from her hand that bright trinket which was to mend all that was awry. And then he was fain to stretch out his hand as she had done, and weep again like her. It was his secret hope that his bodily frame might melt and dissolve in tears–and hath not a similar hope, God wot, appealed to many, with a sad sort of joy, what time their affliction is heavy? Nor was he alone in his grief. Bertalda wept with him, and they lived a long while quietly together at Castle Ringstetten, cherishing Undine's memory, and almost wholly for getting their former love. And because these things were so, the good Undine often visited Huldbrand in his dreams, caressing him with many tender kisses, and then going away silently and with tears. When he woke, he scarcely knew why his cheeks were wet; were they her tears or his own? Nathless, as time passed, these dream-visions became rarer and the knight's grief grew less acute. Still it might well have been that he would have cherished no other wish than thus to think of Undine and talk of her, had not the old fisherman appeared of a sudden one day at the castle, and solemnly claimed Bertalda once more as his child. He had heard full soon of Undine's disappearance, and he straightway had resolved that no longer should Bertalda live at the castle, now that the knight had lost his wife. "Whether my daughter love me or no," quoth he, 169 "concerneth me not; it is her honour that is at stake, and where that speaketh clear, there is naught further to be said." Now when the knight learnt that the fisherman was thus minded, and when he bethought himself how lonely his life would be among the halls and galleries of the empty castle with Bertalda gone away, full soon he felt anew what until now he had forgotten in his grief for Undine–his love for the beautiful Bertalda. Certès, for a marriage thus suggested and proposed, the fisherman had but little inclination. Undine had been exceedingly dear to the old man, nor yet could he hold it for certain that she was dead. And if in sooth her body lay cold and stark at the bottom of the Danube, or had floated away with the current into the ocean, even so, on Bertalda's head for sure rested the blame for her death. How could it be seemly that she should step into the dead wife's shoes? Yet, for the knight, too, the fisherman had a strong liking; while to his daughter's prayers he must needs also pay some heed, now that she wept for the loss of Undine. For one cause or another his consent must have been given at the last, for he stayed on at the castle without making further ado. Moreover a messenger was sent for Father Heilmann. As he had made Huldbrand and Undine man and wife in happy days gone by, so now for the second marriage of the knight 'twere seemly that he should be summoned to the castle. 170 Howbeit the holy man was sore perplexed when the summons arrived. So great was his distemperature that no sooner had he read Huldbrand's letter, than he girt himself for his journey with far greater expedition than the messenger had used in his coming. What time his breath failed him or his aged limbs refused their service, he would say to himself, "Fail not, body of mine, fail not till the goal be reached! Perchance I may yet be soon enough to prevent a crime!" And thus with renewed strength he would press and urge himself on, without stop or stay, until late one evening he found himself at last in the shady courtyard of Ringstetten. Now it chanced that the betrothed pair were sitting side by side under the trees, while the fisherman sate near, deep in many thoughts. Seeing Father Heilmann, they sprang up and pressed round him with warm welcome. But he was sparing of speech, only begging Huldbrand to go with him into the castle. When the knight hesitated and marvelled somewhat at the grave summons, the father spoke: "My lord of Ringstetten," quoth he, "to speak to thee in private was my desire, but why should I persist in it any longer? What I have to say concerneth equally Bertalda and the fisherman, and what must be heard at some time had better be heard forthwith. Art thou then so sure, Knight Huldbrand, that thy first wife is dead? For myself, I cannot think so. Naught indeed will I say of the mystery that surroundeth her, for of that I know nothing certain. But that 171 she was a faithful and God-fearing wife, of that at least there is no doubt. Now, for the last fortnight she hath stood in dreams at my bedside, wringing her hands in anguish and murmuring at my ear: 'Good Father, stay him from his purpose! I am yet living. Ah! Save his life! Save his soul!' What this night vision might mean passed my comprehension, until thy messenger came for me. Then I hurried hither with all imaginable speed–not to unite, but to separate, those who must on no account be joined. Leave her, Huldbrand! Leave him, Bertalda! For he belongs still to another. Dost thou not see how pale his cheek is through grief for his lost wife? He hath no bridegroom's air, and a voice telleth me that, an thou leave him not, thou wilt never be happy." Now Father Heilmann spoke the truth, and the three listeners knew it in their innermost hearts; yet would they not believe it. Even the old fisherman was under a spell, for he thought that the issue must needs be what they had settled in their recent discussions. So they all set their wild and reckless haste against the priest's warnings in such sort that the holy father must perforce leave the castle with a sad heart. So little indeed was it in his heart to stay that he might not accept even a night's shelter, or take the refreshment offered to him. As for Huldbrand, he told himself that the priest was naught but a dreamer; and with the dawn of the following day he sent for a father from the nearest monastery, who, without hesitation, promised to perform the marriage ceremony in a few days. 172 173 THE KNIGHT'S DREAM It was between night and the dawn of day that a vision came to Huldbrand as he lay on his bed, half waking and half sleeping. Whensoe'er he composed himself to full slumber, lo, a terror crept over him and scared away his rest, so fearful were the spectres that haunted him. Yet, if he tried to rouse himself in good earnest, behold, swans' wings seemed to fan his head, and waters softly murmured at his ear, until he sank back again into half-conscious dreaminess and delusion. At length deep sleep must have overcome him, for it seemed as though he were borne on the wings of many swans far over land and sea, they ever singing most sweetly the while. CHAPTER XVII 174 "The music of the swan! the music of the swan!" so the words rang in his brain–"doth it not ever presage death?" But it would seem that it had another meaning. He appeared to be floating over the Mediterranean, and a swan was singing in his ear: "This is the Mediterranean Sea." And whilst he gazed down upon the waters below, lo, they became as clear as crystal so that he might see to the depths. Full pleased was he, for he could see Undine sitting beneath the crystal vault. Tears, it is true, were in her eyes, and much sadder was her look than in the happy days when first they had lived in Castle Ringstetten, and afterwards too, just before the ill-starred voyage on the Danube. And the knight must needs ponder these things in his mind very deeply and intently. Undine, it would appear, did not perceive him. But he saw Kühleborn come up to her with intent to reprove her for her tears. Whereat she drew herself up, and faced him with such dignity that he almost shrank back before her look. "I know full well," quoth she, "that beneath the waters is my home; but my soul is still mine, and therefore I may well weep, albeit that thou canst not know what such tears mean. They, too, are blessed, as all is blessed to one who hath a true soul." He shook his head, for he believed her not; then, bethinking himself of somewhat, he spoke: 175 He could see Undine beneath the crystal vault 176 177 "Nathless, the laws of our element hold thee bound, my niece; an he marrieth again and break his troth, thou must needs take away his life." "A widower he is," saith Undine, "to this very hour, and his sad heart holdeth me dear." "Nay, but at the same time he hath already exchanged vows with another;" and Kühleborn laughed right scornfully. "Wait but a day or two, and the priest will have given his blessing on the pair, and then–it is thy duty to go up to earth and give death to the twice-wedded!" "That may not be;" and Undine laughed in her turn, "for with my own hands have I sealed up the fountain against myself and my race." "Ah, but what if he leave his castle," said Kühleborn, "or have the fountain opened? He thinketh but little of such things." "'Tis for this very reason," Undine replied, smiling through her tears, "that he is now hovering in spirit over the Mediterranean, and is hearing this talk of ours, in a warning and bodeful dream. With manifest intent have I arranged it all." Then Kühleborn looked up at the knight; muttering threats and stamping his feet in furious rage, he shot like an arrow beneath the waters. And so wild was his anger that he seemed to swell and grow to the size of some huge whale. And now 178 again did the swans commence their song, flapping their wings for flight; and the knight soared, or so it appeared to him, over mountains and streams till once more he was in the Castle Ringstetten and awoke on his bed. In truth 'twas on his bed that he opened his eyes, and his servant, coming in, told him that Father Heilmann still lingered in the neighbourhood. He had found him, said he, the evening before in a hut which he had built for himself of branches and covered with moss and brushwood. When the priest was asked what he did there, since he refused to give the marriage-blessing, the answer came in strange fashion: "There are other blessings," said he, "than those at the marriage-altar. I go not to the bridals; but mayhap, at some other rite I shall be present. For all things alike must we hold ourselves prepared. Marrying and mourning are not so diverse–as all may see who do not wilfully shut their eyes." Now words like these and his strange dream gave the knight much reason for anxious thought. But it is not an easy thing, God wot, to break off a matter that a man hath once regarded as certain. And so all remained as before. 179 CHAPTER XVIII HOW THE KNIGHT HULDBRAND IS MARRIED The story now telleth of the marriage feast at Castle Ringstetten, how it was held and what cheer they had who were present thereat. Bethink thee of a multitude of bright and pleasant things heaped together, and over them all a veil of mourning spread. Would not the gloom of the covering make mockery of all their brilliance? Would it be happiness, think you, on which you looked? Would it not 180 rather suggest the nothingness of all human joys? Now it is true that no ghostly visitants disturbed the festal company, for the castle, as we well know, had been made safe against the mischief of angry water-sprites. But that of which the knight was ware, ay, and the fisherman, too, and all the guests, was that the chief person of the feast was absent, and that the chief person could be none other than the gentle and much loved Undine. If so be that a door opened, all eyes turned, willy-nilly, in that direction; and if it were but the steward with new dishes, or the cellarer with a flask of still richer wine, each would look down sadly, and the few flashes of wit and merriment which had passed to and fro would be quenched in sad memories. Not but what the bride was happy enough, just because she was less troubled by thought; yet ever to her, I ween, it seemed passing strange that she should be sitting at the head of the table, with green wreath and gold embroidered gown, while Undine lay a corpse, cold and stiff, at the bottom of the Danube, or else was driven far by the current into the mighty ocean. Her father had spoken some such words as these, and ever since they had rung in her ears. To-day, above all, 'twas little likely that they would be forgotten. Early enough in the evening the company went their ways, sadly and gloomily. It was not the impatience of the bridegroom which dismissed them, but their own joyless mood and their forebodings of evil. Bertalda retired with her women, the knight with his attendants; but the wedding 181 was too sad for the usual gay escort of bridesmaids and bridegroom's men. Now Bertalda was all for more cheerful thoughts; therefore had she ordered the magnificent jewels which Huldbrand had given her, together with rich apparel and veils, to be spread out before her, that she might choose from them the brightest and most beautiful for next morning's attire. Her waiting-women were not slow to wish their mistress well; in flattering words they vaunted high the beauty of the bride, and added praise to praise, until at length Bertalda looked at a mirror and sighed. "See ye not," she said, "the freckles which disfigure my throat?" They looked and saw that it was even as their mistress had said–only they called them beauty-spots, mere tiny blemishes, which set off the exceeding whiteness of her skin. But Bertalda shook her head. "A defect is a defect," quoth she. "And I could remove them," she sighed, "only the fountain is closed whence comes the precious water with its purifying power. Oh! if I had but a flask of it today!" Thereupon one of the waiting-women laughed. "Is that all?" she said, as she slipped out of the room. "Surely," said Bertalda, at once surprised and well pleased, "she will not be so mad as to have the stone removed from the fountain this very evening?" Full soon they listened and 182 heard how men were crossing the castle yard, and they could espy from the window the waiting-woman busying herself with her task, and leading straight to the fountain men who carried levers and other tools on their shoulders. And Bertalda smiled. "Well-pleased am I," saith she, "if only the work taketh not too long." She was happy in that now a mere look from her could effect what had long since been so irritatingly denied, and she had no eyes save for the progress of the work in the moonlit castle yard. It was no light task, be sure, to raise the enormous stone, and now and again one of the men would sigh as he remembered that he was undoing the work of his beloved first mistress. Nathless, the labour was not so severe as they had imagined. It seemed as if some power within the fountain were aiding them to raise the stone. The workmen stared at each other and marvelled. "Why," said they, "it is all one as though the water within had become a springing fountain!" And indeed the stone rose higher and higher, and, almost by itself, it rolled slowly down upon the pavement, making a hollow sound. Forthwith from the fountain's mouth there rose as it were a white column of water, and at first they were minded to think that it had in truth become a springing fountain; but afterwards they perceived that it was a pale woman's figure which rose, all veiled in white. It was weeping bitter tears, and wringing its hands distractedly, as it paced with slow and solemn steps 183 to the castle building. Swiftly the servants fled from the spring; pale and stiff with horror, the bride with her attendants watched the scene from her window. And now the figure had come close below her room, and as it looked up at her with choked sobs, Bertalda thought she recognised beneath the veil the white face of Undine. But on paced the weeping figure, slow and sad and reluctant, as though passing to a place of judgment. Bertalda shrieked out to her women to call the knight, but none of them dared to move; and even the bride herself was struck with silence, as though scared at the sound of her own voice. Motionless, like statues, they stood at the window; and the wanderer from another world reached the castle and passed up the familiar stairs and through the well-known halls, still with silent tears. Alas! 'twas with a different step that once she had wandered there! Now Huldbrand had dismissed his men, and stood, halfdressed, before a mirror, revolving bitter thoughts; a torch burnt dimly at his side. Of a sudden there was a light tap at the door–just so light a tap was Undine wont to give in merry sport. "Nay, 'tis but my fancy," said the knight to himself, "I must to my wedding chamber." "Ay, ay," said a tearful voice without, "thou must indeed, but the bed is cold!" Thereupon he saw in the mirror how 184 the door opened slowly, slowly, and a white figure entered and carefully shut the door after her. "They have opened the fountain," and her voice was soft and low. "And now I am here and thou must die." Straightway in his beating heart he knew full well that it must be so; but he covered his face with his hands. "Make me not mad with terror," he whispered, "in my hour of death. If thou hidest a hideous face behind that veil, raise it not. Take my life, but let me not see thy face!" The white figure made answer. "I am as fair as when thou didst woo me on the promontory. Wilt thou not look upon me once more?" "Ah," sighed Huldbrand, "if only it might be so! and I might die by a kiss from thy lips!" "Right glad am I, my beloved!" saith she; she threw back her veil and her face smiled forth, divinely beautiful. And, trembling with love and with the nearness of death, the knight bent towards her, and she kissed him with a holy kiss. But she did not again draw back, she pressed him to her ever closer and closer, and wept as if she would weep away her soul. Tears rushed into Huldbrand's eyes, and his breast surged and heaved, till, at the last, breath failed him, and he fell back softly from Undine's arms upon the pillows of his couch–dead. 185 "My tears have been his death," she said to some servants who met her in the ante-chamber. This is all she spake, and passing them by as they stared on her with terror, she went slowly out towards the fountain. 186 CHAPTER XIX HOW THE KNIGHT HULDBRAND WAS BURIED Now the story draweth to a close. As soon as the news of the lord of Ringstetten's death had been noised about the district, Father Heilmann returned to the castle; and it so chanced that his arrival timed with the speedy departure of the monk who had married the unhappy pair. The latter had, indeed, fled from the gates with some haste, for he was overwhelmed with fear and horror. "It is well;" said Heilmann, when he was informed of this, "now my duties begin, and I need no associate." Thereupon, it was his first task to bring consolation to the widowed bride–albeit that little enough could his words avail for so 187 worldly and so thoughtless a spirit. The old fisherman, on the contrary, he found deeply grieved, it is true, but far more resigned to the fate that had befallen his daughter and son-in-law; for, while Bertalda did not scruple to charge Undine with sorcery and murder, the old man was in far better case. "It could be no other than it is," he said calmly; "I see in this naught but the judgment of God; nor hath any heart been more deeply riven by Huldbrand's death than that of her who was the cause–the poor, forsaken Undine!' And now the funeral rites had to be arranged, such as might befit the rank of the dead lord. In the village churchyard, filled with the graves of his grandsires–the church itself having been endowed with many fair privileges and gifts by his ancestors and himself–Knight Huldbrand was to find burial. Already his shield and helmet lay on the coffin, to be lowered with it into the grave, for Sir Huldbrand of Ringstetten, you must know, was the last of his race; the mourners began their sorrowful march, singing requiems for the dead, under the calm blue canopy of heaven. Father Heilmann walked in advance, bearing a crucifix; last came the disconsolate Bertalda, supported by her old father. Of a sudden, among the black-robed attendants in the widows' train, lo, there was seen a snow-white figure, closely veiled, and wringing her hands in the deepest grief. Those near whom she walked were seized with terror and retreated either backward or to one side, and thus the alarm spread 188 itself to others to whom the white stranger was now nearest, and it went hard with them to avoid a panic. Indeed, some of the soldiers, escorting the dead, ventured to address themselves to the figure, and were all for removing it from the procession. But it seemed to vanish from their hands, and yet the next moment it was seen again walking with slow and solemn step in the melancholy cortège. At the last, inasmuch as the company was for ever moving to the right or the left, it came close behind Bertalda, and walked so slow and quiet that the widow saw it not, and it was left undisturbed. So at length they came to the churchyard, and round the open grave the procession formed a circle. Then it was that Bertalda saw her unbidden companion, and starting up, half in anger and half in fear, bade her leave the knight's last resting-place. But the veiled figure did not move. She gently shook her head, and raised her hands as if in humble entreaty to Bertalda, who, on her part, could not choose but think with how gentle a grace Undine had held out to her the coral necklace on the Danube. Then Father Heilmann made a sign and commanded silence so that all might pray with mute supplication over the body which was now being committed to the earth. Bertalda knelt in silence; and there was not a soul that knelt not; even the grave-diggers bending themselves on their knees, when their task was done. And when they rose again, the white stranger had vanished. 189 But, lo! a miracle; for on the spot where she had knelt there gushed out of the turf a little silver spring. It rippled on till it had all but encircled the knight's grave; then it ran further and fell into a lake which lay by the side of the burial-place. And even to this day the villagers show the spring, and cherish the firm belief that it is poor, rejected Undine herself, who thus holds in fast embrace her husband with her loving arms. Thus endeth the story of Undine and of the Knight Huldbrand.