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Page 22
When fully awake, he had thought over this connection. He reproached
himself for any doubt that could lead him into error in regard to his
lovely wife. He also confessed to her his injustice; but she only
gave him her fair hand, sighed deeply, and remained silent. Yet a
glance of fervent tenderness, an expression of the soul beaming in
her eyes, such as he had never witnessed there before, left him in
undoubted assurance that Undine bore him no ill-will.
He then rose joyfully, and leaving her, went to the common apartment,
where the inmates of the house had already met. The three were
sitting round the hearth with an air of anxiety about them, as if
they feared trusting themselves to raise their voice above a low,
apprehensive undertone. The priest appeared to be praying in his
inmost spirit, with a view to avert some fatal calamity. But when
they observed the young husband come forth so cheerful, they
dispelled the cloud that remained upon their brows: the old fisherman
even began to laugh with the knight till his aged wife herself could
not help smiling with great good-humour.
Undine had in the meantime got ready, and now entered the room; all
rose to meet her, but remained fixed in perfect admiration--she was
so changed, and yet the same. The priest, with paternal affection
beaming from his countenance, first went up to her; and as he raised
his hand to pronounce a blessing, the beautiful bride sank on her
knees before him with religious awe; she begged his pardon in terms
both respectful and submissive for any foolish things she might have
uttered the evening before, and entreated him with emotion to pray
for the welfare of her soul. She then rose, kissed her foster-
parents, and, after thanking them for all the kindness they had shown
her, said:
"Oh, I now feel in my inmost heart how much, how infinitely much, you
have done for me, you dear, dear friends of my childhood!"
At first she was wholly unable to tear herself away from their
affectionate caresses; but the moment she saw the good old mother
busy in getting breakfast, she went to the hearth, applied herself to
cooking the food and putting it on the table, and would not suffer
her to take the least share in the work.
She continued in this frame of spirit the whole day: calm, kind
attentive--half matronly, and half girlish. The three who had been
longest acquainted with her expected every instant to see her
capricious spirit break out in some whimsical change or sportive
vagary. But their fears were quite unnecessary. Undine continued as
mild and gentle as an angel. The priest found it all but impossible
to remove his eyes from her; and he often said to the bridegroom:
"The bounty of Heaven, sir, through me its unworthy instrument,
entrusted to you yesterday an invaluable treasure; cherish it as you
ought, and it will promote your temporal and eternal welfare."
Toward evening Undine was hanging upon the knight's arm with lowly
tenderness, while she drew him gently out before the door, where the
setting sun shone richly over the fresh grass, and upon the high,
slender boles of the trees. Her emotion was visible: the dew of
sadness and love swam in her eyes, while a tender and fearful secret
seemed to hover upon her lips, but was only made known by hardly-
breathed sighs. She led her husband farther and farther onward
without speaking. When he asked her questions, she replied only with
looks, in which, it is true, there appeared to be no immediate answer
to his inquiries, but a whole heaven of love and timid devotion.
Thus they reached the margin of the swollen forest stream, and the
knight was astonished to see it gliding away with so gentle a
murmuring of its waves, that no vestige of its former swell and
wildness was now discernible.
"By morning it will be wholly drained off," said the beautiful wife,
almost weeping, "and you will then be able to travel, without
anything to hinder you, whithersoever you will."
"Not without you, dear Undine," replied the knight, laughing; "think,
only, were I disposed to leave you, both the Church and the spiritual
powers, the Emperor and the laws of the realm, would require the
fugitive to be seized and restored to you."
"All this depends on you--all depends on you," whispered his little
companion, half weeping and half smiling. "But I still feel sure
that you will not leave me; I love you too deeply to fear that
misery. Now bear me over to that little island which lies before us.
There shall the decision be made. I could easily, indeed, glide
through that mere rippling of the water without your aid, but it is
so sweet to lie in your arms; and should you determine to put me
away, I shall have rested in them once more,....for the last time."
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