aving. Go, and God be
with you! Give old Flor's love to your countess, and to the darling
children; tell them that Flor has no other wish on earth, but that the
whole world might know Count Ernest's heart as she knows it, and then
the whole world would be ready to lay their hands beneath your feet, as
she is.'"

"He broke away from me, and ordered his horses to meet him at the top
of the walk that leads up the forest--He walked on before, and I heard
people say that he had wandered about the forest, taking leave of the
spots he loved, and now looked upon for the last time. So even at that
time he must have resolved never to return. He could not be happy again
in his old home."

"And so I knew that I had taken leave of him for ever. I would have
fretted still more about it, only I was so taken up with my mistress.
She pined away; white and quiet, and without a murmur. It was just as
if strong hands were dragging her down into her husband's grave. Even
dead, that proud man ruled her. When I wrote the sad tidings to Count
Ernest--it is hardly a year ago--he answered me immediately; he said I
was to go to them, at all events; and the young countess wrote and
begged me, as hard as one can beg. My Ernest had given up his post, and
settled where they are living still, on a very fine estate among the
hills, close by the sea, where I suppose it must be beautiful."

"'I would come myself to fetch you,' he wrote; 'only I am too
conscientious in my duties as a husband and a husbandman, to go from
home in harvest-time.'"

"He did not like to give his real reason. But all this melted me, and I
got my bits of things together, and gave over my keys to the new
steward. The countess's brother had a pride of his own, and never would
have anything to do with her inheritance; and so, one fine morning, I
really was quite ready to go, and drove away. But when I got to that
road in the hollow, to the place where one can see these chimney tops
just peeping above the woods, my heart failed me all at once, and I
jumped out of the carriage, and ran home as if the fiends had hunted
me. And when I got back into our court, I felt as if I had been a
hundred years away."

"Ah! Sir, it is no good transplanting a rotten tree!--it should be left
standing where it grew, waiting for the axe. Heaven knows, I would
gladly give the few years I have to live to see my Ernest's children
only once; to take them in my arms, and hug those darling babes; but I