sonage could be no other than the gentle and beloved Undine.

Whenever a door was heard to open, all eyes were involuntarily turned
in that direction; and if it was nothing but the steward with new
dishes, or the cup-bearer with a supply of wine of higher flavor than
the last, they again looked down in sadness and disappointment, while
the flashes of wit and merriment which had been passing at times from
one to another were extinguished by tears of mournful remembrance.

The bride was the least thoughtful of the company, and therefore the
most happy; but even to her it sometimes seemed strange that she
should be sitting at the head of the table, wearing a green wreath and
gold-embroidered robe, while Undine was lying a corpse, stiff and
cold, at the bottom of the Danube, or carried out by the current into
the ocean. For ever since her father had suggested something of this
sort, his words were continually sounding in her ear; and this day in
particular, they would neither fade from her memory nor yield to other
thoughts.

Evening had scarcely arrived when the company returned to their homes;
not dismissed by the impatience of the bridegroom, as wedding parties
are sometimes broken up, but constrained solely by heavy sadness and
forebodings of evil. Bertalda retired with her maidens, and the knight
with his attendants, to undress; but there was no gay laughing company
of bridesmaids and bridesmen at this mournful festival.

Bertalda wished to awake more cheerful thoughts: she ordered her
maidens to spread before her a brilliant set of jewels, a present from
Huldbrand, together with rich apparel and veils, that she might select
from among them the brightest and most beautiful for her dress in the
morning. The attendants rejoiced at this opportunity of pouring forth
good wishes and promises of happiness to their young mistress, and
failed not to extol the beauty of the bride with the most glowing
eloquence. This went on for a long time, until Bertalda at last,
looking in a mirror, said with a sigh:--

"Ah, but do you not see plainly how freckled I am growing? Look here
on the side of my neck."

They looked at the place and found the freckles indeed, as their fair
mistress had said; but they called them mere beauty-spots, the
faintest touches of the sun, such as would only heighten the whiteness
of her delicate complexion. Bertalda shook her head, and still viewed
them as a blemish.

"And I could remove them," she s