ned
with recollections and relations out of the lately-past time. They hoped
that Louise would become pleasant and contented with her calm activity
in the house and family as formerly, but it was not so; a gnawing pain
seemed to consume her; she became perceptibly thinner; her good humour
had vanished, and her eyes were often red with weeping. In vain her
parents and sisters endeavoured, with the tenderest anxiety, to fathom
the occasion of the change; she would confess it to no one. That the
root of her grief lay at her heart she would not deny, but she appeared
determined to conceal it from the eye of day. Jacobi also began to look
pale and thin, since he lamented deeply her state of feeling, and her
altered behaviour, especially towards himself, which led him to the
belief that he unconsciously had wounded her, or in some other way that
he was the cause of her displeasure; and never had he felt more than now
what a high value he set upon her, nor how much he loved her. This
tension of mind, and his anxiety to approach Louise, and bring back a
friendly understanding between them, occasioned various little scenes,
which we will here describe.

FIRST SCENE.

Louise sits by the window at her embroidery-frame: Jacobi seats himself
opposite to her.

Jacobi (sighing). Ah, Mamselle Louise!

Louise looks at her shepherdess, and works on in silence.

Jacobi. Everything in the world has appeared to me for some time
wearisome and oppressive.

Louise works on, and is silent.

Jacobi. And you could so easily make all so different. Ah, Louise! only
one kind word, one friendly glance!--Cannot you bestow one friendly
glance on him who would gladly give everything to see you happy?
[_Aside._ She blushes--she seems moved--she is going to speak! Ah, what
will she say to me!]

Louise. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten
stitches to the nose--the pattern is here not very distinct.

Jacobi. You will not hear me, will not understand me; you play with my
distress! Ah, Louise!

Louise. I want some more wool;--I have left it in my room. [She goes.]

SECOND SCENE.

The family is assembled in the library; tea is just finished. Louise, at
Petrea's and Gabriele's urgent request, has laid out the cards on a
little table to tell them their fortunes. The Candidate seats himself
near them, and appears determined to amuse himself with them, and to be
lively; but "the object" assumes all the more her "cathedral