been. Yet wherefore speak of it? Thou art good
and wise, noble and innocent. Do not fill thy heart with sorrow from a
time which is past, and which, for thy sake, shall be forgotten."

"But Heinrich still lives!" said Otto; "I have met with him, have spoken
with him: it was as if all presence of mind forsook me."

"When and where?" asked Rosalie.

Otto related of his walk with Wilhelm in the park, and of the juggler,
in whom he had recognized Heinrich. "I tore myself from my friends,
I wandered the whole night alone in the wood. O Rosalie, I thought
of death! I thought of death as no Christian ought to do. A beautiful
morning followed, I wandered beside the sea which I love, and in which
I have so often dived. Since that explanation of the initials on my
shoulder was suggested, that explanation which reminded me of my unhappy
birth, I have never uncovered them before any one. O, I have rubbed
thorn with a stone, until they were bloody! The letters are gone, but
still I imagine I can read them in the deep scar--that in it I see a
Cain's mark! That morning the desire to bathe came upon me. The fresh
current infused life once more into my soul. Just then Wilhelm and
several acquaintance came down; they called to me and carried off my
clothes; my blood boiled; all my unhappiness, which this night had
stirred within my soul, again overwhelmed me: it was as though the
obliterated initials on my shoulder would reveal themselves in the scar
and betray the secret of my grief. Disgust of life seized upon me. I
no longer knew what I shouted to them, but it seemed to me as if I must
swim out into the stream and never return. I swam until it became night
before my eyes. I sank, and Wilhelm rescued me! Never since then have
we spoken of this hour! O Rosalie! long is it since I have been able to
open my heart as before thee at this moment. What use is it to have a
friend if one cannot lay before him one's whole thoughts? To no one
have I been able to unfold them but to thee, who already knowest them. I
suffer, as a criminal and yet am I innocent,--just as the misshapen, the
deformed man, is innocent of his ugliness!"

"I do not possess thy knowledge, Otto," said Rosalie, and pressed his
hand; "have never rejoiced in such a clear head as thine; but I have
that which thou canst not as yet possess--experience. In trouble,
as well as in joy, youth transforms the light cobweb into the cable.
Self-deception has changed the blood in thy