ill were fragrance in these leaves!--_she_ gave it to
him--she, the young lady of that noble garden.

Here is the marsh-lotus which he himself has plucked and watered with
salt tears--the marsh-lotus from the fresh waters. And here is a
nettle: what does its leaf say? What did he think on plucking it--on
preserving it? Here are lilies of the valley from the woodland
solitudes; here are honeysuckle leaves from the village ale-house
flower-pot; and here the bare, sharp blade of grass.

The flowering lilac bends its fresh, fragrant clusters over the dead
man's head; the swallow again flies past; "quivit! quivit!" Now the
men come with nails and hammer; the lid is placed over the corpse,
whose head rests on the Mute-Book--preserved--forgotten!

THE ZAeTHER DALE.

* * * * *

Everything was in order, the carriage examined, even a whip with a
good lash was not forgotten. "Two whips would be best," said the
ironmonger, who sold it, and the ironmonger was a man of experience,
which travellers often are not. A whole bag full of "slanter"--that
is, copper coins of small value--stood before us for bridge-money, for
beggars, for shepherd's boys, or whoever might open the many
field-gates for us that obstructed our progress. But we had to do this
ourselves, for the rain pattered down and lashed the ground; no one
had any desire to come out in such weather. The rushes in the marsh
bent and waved; it was a real rain feast for them, and it whistled
from the tops of the rushes: "We drink with our feet, we drink with
our heads, we drink with the whole body, and yet we stand on one leg,
hurra! We drink with the bending willow, with the dripping flowers on
the bank; their cups run over--the marsh marigold, that fine lady, can
bear it better! Hurra! it is a feast! it pours, it pours; we whistle
and we sing; it is our own song. Tomorrow the frogs will croak the
same after us and say, 'it is quite new!'"

And the rushes waved, and the rain pattered down with a splashing
noise--it was fine weather to travel in to Zaether Dale, and to see its
far-famed beauties. The whip-lash now came off the whip; it was
fastened on again, and again, and every time it was shorter, so that
at last there was not a lash, nor was there any handle, for the handle
went after the lash--or sailed after it--as the road was quite
navigable, and gave one a vivid idea of the beginning of the deluge.

One poor jade now drew too m