till worse guise. When will the doctor let me hear
you sing?"

"Next week; but you musn't expect too much. You have too high an opinion
of me. Remember the proverb about still waters. Here in the depths it
often looks far less peaceful, than you probably suppose."

"But you have learned to keep the surface calm when it storms; I haven't.
A strange stillness has stolen over me here. Whether I owe it to illness
or to the atmosphere that pervades this house, I can't tell, but how long
will it last? My soul used to be like the sea, when the hissing waves
plunge into black gulfs, the seagulls scream, and the fishermen's wives
pray on the shore. Now the sea is calm. Don't be too much frightened, if
it begins to rage again."

At these words Maria clasped the excited girl's hands, saying
beseechingly:

"Be quiet, be quiet, Henrica. You must think only of your recovery now.
And shall I confess something? I believe everything hard can be more
easily borne, if we can cast it impatiently forth like the sea of which
you speak; with me one thing is piled on another and remains lying there,
as if buried under the sand."

"Until the hurricane comes, that sweeps it away. I don't want to be an
evil prophet, but you surely remember these words. What a wild, careless
thing I was! Then a day came, that made a complete revolution in my whole
nature."

"Did a false love wound you?" asked Maria modestly.

"No, except the false love of another," replied Henrica bitterly. "When I
was a child this fluttering heart often throbbed more quickly, I don't
know how often. First I felt something more than reverence for the
one-eyed chaplain, our music-teacher, and every morning placed fresh
flowers on his window, which he never noticed. Then--I was probably
fifteen--I returned the ardent glances of Count Brederode's pretty page.
Once he tried to be tender, and received a blow from my riding-whip. Next
came a handsome young nobleman, who wanted to marry me when I was barely
sixteen, but he was even more heavily in debt than my father, so he was
sent home. I shed no tears for him, and when, two months after, at a
tournament in Brussels, I saw Don Frederic, the son of the great Duke of
Alva, fancied myself as much in love with him as ever any lady worshipped
her Amadis, though the affair never went beyond looks. Then the storm, of
which I have already spoken, burst, and that put an end to love-making. I
will tell you more about this at some future