which seemed to me
redolent with your breath and your sighs! How I love that good, faithful
Jane, the silent messenger of our love! When I behold her entering my
chamber, with the unsullied paper in hand, she is to me the dove with
the olive-leaf, that brings me peace and happiness, and I rush to her,
and press her to my bosom; and give her all the kisses I would give you,
and feel how poor and powerless I am, because I cannot repay her all the
happiness that she brings me. Ah, Henry, how many thanks do we owe to
poor Jane!"

"Why do you call her poor, when she can be near you, always behold yon,
always hear you?"

"I call her poor, because she is unhappy. For she loves, Henry--she
loves to desperation, to madness, and she is not loved. She is pining
away with grief and pain, and wrings her hands in boundless woe. Have
you not noticed how pale she is, and how her eyes become daily more
dim?"

"No, I have not seen it, for I see naught but you, and Lady Jane is to
me a lifeless image, as are all other women. But what! You tremble; and
your whole frame writhes in my arms, as if in a convulsion! And what is
that? Are you weeping?"

"Oh, I weep, because I am so happy. I weep, because I was thinking how
fearful the suffering must be, to give the whole heart away, and receive
nothing in return, naught but death! Poor Jane!"

"What is she to us? We, we love each other. Come, dear one, let me kiss
the tears from your eyes; let me drink this nectar, that it may inspire
me, and transfigure me to a god! Weep no more--no, weep not; or, if you
will do so, be it only in the excess of rapture, and because word and
heart are too poor to hold all this bliss!"

"Yes, yes, let us shout for joy; let us be lost in blessedness!"
exclaimed she passionately, as with frantic violence she threw herself
on his bosom.

Both were now silent, mutely resting on each other's heart.

Oh, how sweet this silence; how entrancing this noiseless, sacred night!
How the trees without there murmur and rustle, as if they were singing a
heavenly lullaby to the lovers! how inquisitively the pale crescent moon
peeps through the window, as though she were seeking the twain whose
blessed confidante she is!

But happiness is so swift-winged, and time flies so fast, when love is
their companion!

Even now they must part again--now they must again say farewell. "Not
yet, beloved, stay yet! See, the night is still dark; and hark, the
castle clock is just s