he Devil
leads me into that cursed apple-basket, and now must I sit moping
in solitude, with nothing but a poor pipe of----" Here the student
Anselmus was interrupted in his soliloquy by a strange rustling and
whisking, which rose close by him in the grass, but soon glided up
into the twigs and leaves of the elder-tree that stretched out over
his head. It was as if the evening wind were shaking the leaves; as if
little birds were twittering among the branches, moving their little
wings in capricious flutter to and fro. Then he heard a whispering and
lisping; and it seemed as if the blossoms were sounding like
little crystal bells. Anselmus listened and listened. Ere long, the
whispering, and lisping, and tinkling, he himself knew not how, grew
to faint and half-scattered words:

"'Twixt this way, 'twixt that; 'twixt branches, 'twixt blossoms, come
shoot, come twist and twirl we! Sisterkin, sisterkin! up to the shine;
up, down, through and through, quick! Sun-rays yellow; evening-wind
whispering; dew-drops pattering; blossoms all singing: sing we with
branches and blossoms! Stars soon glitter; must down: 'twixt this way,
'twixt that, come shoot, come twist, come twirl we, sisterkin!"

And so it went along, in confused and confusing speech. The student
Anselmus thought: "Well, it is but the evening-wind, which tonight
truly is whispering distinctly enough." But at that moment there
sounded over his head, as it were, a triple harmony of clear crystal
bells: he looked up, and perceived three little snakes, glittering
with green and gold, twisted round the branches, and stretching out
their heads to the evening sun. Then, again, began a whispering and
twittering in the same words as before, and the little snakes went
gliding and caressing up and down through the twigs; and while they
moved so rapidly, it was as if the elder-bush were scattering a
thousand glittering emeralds through the dark leaves.

"It is the evening sun which sports so in the elder-bush," thought the
student Anselmus; but the bells sounded again, and Anselmus observed
that one Snake held out its little head to him. Through all his limbs
there went a shock like electricity; he quivered in his inmost heart;
he kept gazing up, and a pair of glorious dark-blue eyes were looking
at him with unspeakable longing; and an unknown feeling of highest
blessedness and deepest sorrow was like to rend his heart asunder.
And as he looked, and still looked, full of war