nd trouble from his
heart, so that his mind was again clear and cheerful, his spirit free
and buoyant as before. Nought remained but a silent, inward longing,
and a sound of sadness in the spirit's depths; but the wild torments of
solitude, the sharp anguish of unspeakable loss, the terrible sense of
a mournful void, had passed away with all earthly faintness, and the
pilgrim again looked forth upon a world teeming with expression. Voice
and language renewed their life within him, all things seemed more
known and prophetic than before, so that death appeared to him a high
revelation of life, and he viewed his own fleeting existence with
child-like and serene emotion. The future and the past had met within
him, and formed an eternal union. He stood far from the present, and
the world was now for the first time dear to him, when he had lost it,
and was there only as a stranger, who would yet wander but a while
through its diversified and spacious halls. It was now evening, and the
earth lay before him like an old beloved dwelling, which he had found
again after long absence. A thousand recollections recurred to him;
every stone, every tree, every hillock, made itself recognised. Each
was the memorial of a former history.

The pilgrim snatched his lute, and sang:--

Love's tears, love's glowing,
Together flowing,
Hallow every place for me,
Where Elysium quenched my longing,
And in countless prayers are thronging,
Like the bees around this tree.

Gladly is it o'er them bending,
Thither wending,
Them protecting from the storm;
Gratefully its leaves bedewing,
And its tender life renewing,
Wonders will the prayers perform.

E'en the rugged rock is sunken,
Joy-drunken,
At the Holy Mother's feet.
Are the stones devotion keeping,
Should not man for her be weeping
Tears and blood in homage meet?

The afflicted hither stealing
Should be kneeling;
Here will all obtain relief.
Sorrow will no more be preying,
Joyfully will all be saying:
Long ago we were in grief.

On the mountain, walls commanding
Will be standing;
In the vales will voices cry,
When the bitter times are waking:
Let the heart of none be aching,
Thither to those places fly!

Oh, thou Holy Virgin Mother!
With another
Heart the sorrowing wanders hence.