some time; but Hermann's heart was
sick within him; he had no spirit left for the revelry. An indescribable
feeling of terror and anxiety possessed him. The clock struck twelve;
the guests dispersed. They had hardly left the house when a terrific
storm broke forth, appalling in its awful violence; the house shook,
trees were uprooted, lightning blazed continually. The tempest was
nothing, however, compared to that in Hermann's breast; he could not
rest or sleep; fearful visions assailed him: he seemed to hear his
beloved Lenore calling him, or begging for mercy from her cruel father.

Towards morning the storm had somewhat abated though it was by no means
over. Hermann rushed out of the house, taking a wild pleasure in
battling with the fierce elements. Up and up with a certain step he went
towards that lake where all his anguish had begun, and yet where all his
hopes and desires were centred. As he approached the lake through the
fir-wood, the sky over the great cliff was rosy in the early dawn, the
birds were singing, the harebells raised their dew-drenched heads and
looked at him. No motion--no sound--the lake was cruel it seemed to him
in its indifference to his grief. "Lenore," he cried, "Lenore!"

Then the waters of the lake stirred and three waves arose, each one
greater than the last, and in the third was the nixy king with a cruel
expression on his face.

"Ah, call for Lenore," he said mockingly, "but you will never see her
again!--Behold, the doom of the disobedient daughters is fulfilled." As
he spoke the lake stirred again, the waters whirled round, three
exquisite rose-leaves rose from the depths of the lake and floated on
the surface of the water. "Never again will you or any mortal man behold
the nixies of the pool; they are changed into rose-leaves; this was
their punishment," he said, "a poetical punishment--ha, ha!" and he
vanished with a tremendous clap of thunder.

More than half-mad Hermann stumbled home; for weeks he lingered between
life and death.

The kind little Brigitte would have liked to have taken care of him, and
would have made him a good wife; but because of his consuming love for
Lenore, he slowly pined away, until one day he was found lying dead
beside the fatal lake.

KING REINHOLD

There are villages in the heart of the Taunus Mountains that are little
altered by this progressive age; no railway, not even the post-chaise
reaches them, and motor-cars are only to be se