beaming upon him with love and longing, and at the same moment he
thought that the pulse began to beat in her cold hand, and the warm
life-blood to course through her veins. And passion burned more
intensely in his own heart also; he threw his arm round her beautiful
waist and whirled her round the hall. He had always thought that he
kept good and accurate time in dancing, but from the perfectly
rhythmical evenness with which Olimpia danced, and which frequently put
him quite out, he perceived how very faulty his own time really was.
Notwithstanding, he would not dance with any other lady; and everybody
else who approached Olimpia to call upon her for a dance, he would have
liked to kill on the spot. This, however, only happened twice; to his
astonishment Olimpia remained after this without a partner, and he
failed not on each occasion to take her out again. If Nathanael had
been able to see anything else except the beautiful Olimpia, there
would inevitably have been a good deal of unpleasant quarrelling and
strife; for it was evident that Olimpia was the object of the smothered
laughter only with difficulty suppressed, which was heard in various
corners amongst the young people; and they followed her with very
curious looks, but nobody knew for what reason. Nathanael, excited by
dancing and the plentiful supply of wine he had consumed, had laid
aside the shyness which at other times characterised him. He sat beside
Olimpia, her hand in his own, and declared his love enthusiastically
and passionately in words which neither of them understood, neither he
nor Olimpia. And yet she perhaps did, for she sat with her eyes fixed
unchangeably upon his, sighing repeatedly, "Ach! Ach! Ach!" Upon this
Nathanael would answer, "Oh, you glorious heavenly lady! You ray from
the promised paradise of love! Oh! what a profound soul you have! my
whole being is mirrored in it!" and a good deal more in the same
strain. But Olimpia only continued to sigh "Ach! Ach!" again and again.

Professor Spalanzani passed by the two happy lovers once or twice, and
smiled with a look of peculiar satisfaction. All at once it seemed to
Nathanael, albeit he was far away in a different world, as if it were
growing perceptibly darker down below at Professor Spalanzani's. He
looked about him, and to his very great alarm became aware that there
were only two lights left burning in the hall, and they were on the
point of going out. The music and dancing had lon