Manna perhaps felt that he might think strangely of her omitting to
mention Pranken's name, and she asked:--

"Were not you and Baron von Pranken formerly intimate friends?"

"We were comrades, never friends."

They were silent again; there were so many things to be spoken of,
crowding upon both of them, that they did not seem to know where to
begin.

The evening bell tolled, and Manna saw that Eric did not remove his
hat. She trembled. Every thing stood as an obstacle between them; even
the Church separated them from each other.

Manna wore around her waist, beneath her clothes, a small hempen cord
that a nun had given her as a perpetual reminder of her promise to
assume in public the hempen girdle. It seemed to her now as if the
hidden cord were suddenly tightened, and then it appeared to have
become loosened. With her left hand she grasped tightly a tree by the
road-side, and breathed heavily.

"What is the matter?" asked Eric.

"Oh, nothing, and every thing. I thank you for remaining with us. Look
there--there above--high over the castle-tower, two falcons are flying.
Ah, if one could thus mount aloft, and leave behind and forget all that
is beneath! What was life to me? A labor, a labor upon our shroud. I
wanted to live above the world and do penance, to implore heaven's
grace in another's behalf--in behalf of another! Ah, I can do it no
longer--no longer."

She passed her hand over her forehead, and what she said she knew not.
She continued walking, and yet she felt as if she would like to remain
in the same spot.

A woman, who was mowing the third crop of grass in the meadow, called
out to Manna, saying that her father had got well, and would help take
in the hay to-morrow.

"I wish I was yonder mower," Manna exclaimed.

"Forgive me," answered Eric, "if I cannot help expressing my surprise
at your uttering a wish like that."

"I, like that? Why should I not?"

"You have to-day shown such clearness of thought, that I cannot
comprehend your giving utterance to an expression so common on the lips
of thousands. What does it mean, when one says, 'I would like to be
somebody else'? If you were some one else, you would still not be a
different person; and if you retain the consciousness you had before,
you would not be some one else. To speak in this way is not only
unreasonable, but, as I view it, irreligious."

Manna stopped, and Eric continued,--

"We are what we are, not through our own instr