e anything to tell thee, I firmly believe that thy
spirit is fixed upon me as upon so many enigmas of nature. In fact, I
believe that every human being is such an enigma, and that the mission
of love between friends is to solve that enigma so that each shall learn
to know his deeper nature through and in his friend. Yes, dearest, it
makes me happy that my life is gradually developing through thee, and
for that reason I do not want to seem what I am not; I should prefer to
have all my faults and weaknesses known to thee rather than give thee a
false conception of what I am, for then thy love would not concern me
but rather an illusion that I had substituted for myself. For that
reason, also, a feeling often warns me that I must avoid this or that
for love of thee, because I should deny it in thy presence.

From the Rochusberg.

Oh, Goethe, thy letters are so dear to me that I have tied them up
in a silk kerchief embroidered with bright flowers and golden ornaments.
The last day before our Rhine trip I did not know what to do with them.
I did not want to take them along, since we had only one portmanteau
between us, and I did not want to leave them in my little room, which I
could not lock because it was being used; I thought the boat might sink
and I drown--and then these letters, one after the other of which has
reposed close to my heart, would fall into strange hands. At first I
wanted to leave them with the nuns in Vollratz (they are St. Bernard
nuns who were driven from their convent and are now living there), but I
changed my mind afterwards. The last time I was up here on the mountain
I found a spot. Beneath the confession-chair still standing in the
Rochus chapel, in which I'm also in the habit of keeping my writings, I
dug a hole and lined it on the inside with shells from the Rhine and
beautiful little pebbles that I found on the mountain. I placed the
letters in it, wrapped in their silken covering, and before the spot
planted a thistle which I had pulled up carefully by the roots together
with the earth about them. On the journey I was often worried about
them; what a shock it would have been if I had not found them again! My
heart stands still at the very thought of it!

August 24, 1808.

* * * It was midnight; the moon rose dim. The ship, whose shadow sailed
along beside it, like a monster, upon the illuminated Rhine, cast a
dazzling light upon the woody meadow of Ingelheim along which it was
moving. T