# Popular Tales of the Germans/Volume 1/The Stealing of the Veil

Translation of "Der geraubte Schleier" from Volksmährchen der Deutschen volume 3 (1784).
THE STEALING OF THE VEIL,
OR THE
TALE À LA MONTGOLFIER.
THE situation of the Swansfield near Zwikow, in the mountains called, from the abundance of their ores, Ertzgebirge, is well known. The name is derived from a pool, entitled the Swan’s pool, which is at present nearly but not quite dried up. The water of this pool possesses an efficacy unknown to the Pyrmont, Carlsbad, Spa, or any other medicinal spring in Germany, or even to the king’s bath at Pisa in Italy, or the wells to which the turtle-fed victims of English luxury repair, in the vain hope of making a shaking hand steady, or restoring to a ​shrivelled limb its former plumpness. This water is, in fact, the genuine oil of beauty, more effectual than essence of roses, Olympian dew, or the wash of Madame de la Pompadour. The wonder-working stream glides along in silence, under the shade of vile and unseemly brambles; after watering their roots, it hides itself in the maternal bosom of the earth, as if in disgust that its powers should be overlooked; while its neighbour at Carlsbad bubbles up with patrician noise and impatience, announces its entrance into the world by hot lixivial fumes, and hears its praises from the mouth of the whole gouty world. Doubtless were the latent virtues of the mountain spring, whether in perpetuating the short-lived blessing of female beauty, or restoring its bloom when faded, properly advertised, all Christendom, to the no small emolument of the good town of Zwikow, would pour forth its maids and matrons, in the form of pil​grims journeying to the fountain of beauty, and impelled with no less devotion than the Turkish caravan, when it repairs to the prophet’s grave at Mecca. The daughters of the town would likewise go forth with pitchers on their shoulders to draw the precious water, and as little miss such an opportunity of carrying on the trade of matrimony, as the daughters of Nahor in days of yore. But neither are the skirts of every cloud gilded by the sun; nor is every flower that drinks the refreshing dew of the morning arrayed in splendid apparel, nor does every pearl, after being clouded with sweat, regain its first water, when soaked in lemon-juice—but on the contrary, the action of the rays of the fertilizing dew, and the acid, still remaining the same, a different effect is produced by the intrusion of certain circumstances; so, without disparagement to its sovereign virtue, neither would the Zwikow spring fasten the flower of youth and beauty upon every ​stock of a nymph that bathes in it; both are indeed harder to gain in the viâ humidâ of a water bath, than to be aped in the viâ siccâ of the brush and rouge box.
There is, besides, this particular to be taken into the account, that the Zwikow beauty-bath exerts its wonderful virtue on those ladies who are founders kin, though but in the thousandth degree, to the race of the fairies. Let not this, however, be understood so as to deter any damsel from a trial of the remedy or preservative; for who can be sure that she descends in an undisturbed succession, both on the father’s and mother’s side, from the terrestrial loins of grandam Eve; that not a single fairy has ever intervened in the long series of her forgotten grandmothers, to infuse a drop of ethereal blood into her veins? Possibly the restless spirit of human science may discover a profile peculiar to the fairy race, as it has already shrewdly suspected a line that marks the descendants of kings, ​and has clearly traced a physiognomy proper to poor sinners. Till then, other tokens may perhaps stand, instead of that more certain characteristic which we may expect hereafter. Each alluring attribute of the daughters of Teutonia, whether it be ease and elegance of shape, the heart-piercing glance of the eye, the fair proportion of the mouth, the jutting bosom, the melody of the voice, the gift of enchanting wit, or proficiency in any of the fine arts, may afford just hopes that they inherit from some fairy ancestor the privilege of the race—And where is the maid who does not possess some one of these bewitching gifts? Surely, then, a journey to the Zwikow conservatory of beauty would be worth the trouble: and I would especially recommend the trial to that portion of the fair sex, who are upon the melancholy eve of striking the flag of beauty before some aspiring neighbour.
In full view of the little lake, into which the magic spring poured its silver stream, ​on the gentle declivity of an hill, there lived, in a spacious grotto in the rock, a reverend hermit, who had borrowed from the Bishop of Meissen, of pious memory, the name of Benno, and was no less celebrated for his sanctity, than the patron of his name. Nobody could tell who our Benno really was, or whence he came. He had long since arrived here as a stout able-bodied pilgrim, had settled in the Swansfield, formed with his own hands an handsome hermitage, and planted a little garden round it, in which he raised a fine plantation of exotic fruit-trees with rows of choice vines.
He also reared sweet melons, then esteemed a great delicacy: with these products of his industry he entertained his visitants. Nor was he more beloved for his hospitality, than for his cheerful and obliging disposition. The inhabitants of the mountains had recourse to him, on account of his piety, as a spokesman and solicitor in all their affairs before the high court ​above; and, without a fee, he readily engaged his services in endeavouring to obtain the fulfilment of the most opposite wishes. Nevertheless, disinterested as he was, he wanted none of the necessaries of life: on the contrary, the blessing of Heaven poured upon him a profusion of every good thing. But whether a divine call had led Benno from the tumult of the world to his silent cell, or another Heloisa had inspired another Abelard with the desire of a contemplative life, is a secret which may perhaps be disclosed in the sequel.
About the time when Margrave Frederic with the bite fought out his quarrel with the Emperor Albert, and the Swabian army ravaged the land of Austria, age had thinned the locks of the venerable Benno, and bleached the remnant of hair on his forehead; he was bowed toward the ground, and leaned heavy on his staff: his strength would no more suffice to dig his garden in spring; he wished for a companion and helpmate, but found it diffi​cult to find among the mountains an assistant to his mind, for age had made him distrustful and capricious. Accident unexpectedly satisfied his wants, by giving him an associate, on whom he could lean as securely as on his pilgrim’s staff.—The inhabitants of Meissen had overthrown the Swabians with great slaughter, and killed one hundred and fifty dozen. The Swabian army was seized with a panic: fear gave the word, ‘Save himself who can!’ Every man who felt a pair of sound legs under him, thanked God for his mercy as well as all the saints, and used them as a scared flight of larks use their wings—to rise above the insidious flaxen walls and escape the meshes of death. Many flew to the neighbouring forests, and when they were tired, hid themselves in hollow trees. One ​faithful mess, seven men in number, vowed to abide by one another, and to live or die together. They luckily escaped the thrusts and cuts of the enemy. They were all hale, well-limbed lads, and so nimble that no racer from Midian could have overtaken them. At last they grew tired of their long run, and at the approach of night held a council to consider how they might hide themselves. They did not think themselves safe enough in the open fields, so they resolved to slip into a lonely village that had just fallen in their way, for they very sagaciously judged that all the men had gone out to join the Meissen camp. They proceeded, however, with great caution, and in order to observe the strictest incognito, the seven heroes agreed to take up their abode in an oven;—an oven indeed may not afford a weary traveller the most comfortable lodging; and before the battle at Lucka our travellers would ill have relished such quarters, for a thousand herrings will ​lie far more contentedly in a single ton than seven soldiers in the most roomy oven: but inexorable necessity at this time acted as Quarter-master, weariness enjoined unanimity, and sleep silence. One pair of eye-lids fell to after another, and the associates in misfortune slept till broad day-light, though they had agreed to decamp quietly at the peep of dawn.
Before the seven sleepers were awake, they were discovered by a peasant’s wife, who, for joy of the victory which was by this time noised abroad all over the country, had kneaded a cake, and wanted to bake it in haste. Looking into the oven, she perceived the lodgers, and concluded from the doublets and hose that the guests within were some of the runaways. She hurried into the village, and reported the discovery to her neighbours. Immediately an army of women, equipped with spits and fire-forks, was collected; the oven was formally blockaded, and a council held how they were to proceed, and in ​case of assault whether they should storm with the weapons in their hands, or with the element of fire: for they were resolved to avenge the shame of the virgins and wives, their countrywomen, upon these scandalous gallants, who, on their irruption into the country, had neither respected the sanctity of cloisters nor the chastity of venerable matrons and their tender daughters. It availed nothing that the seven martyrs might have been innocent of the crime of their countrymen. The severe commission of chastity condemned them one and all ​to the spit. The spirit of vengeance already brandished the unaccustomed arms in the hands of the village matrons, as the Bacchanalian fury formerly waved the heavy thyrsus in the hands of the female votaries of the God of wine. The whole troop fell with one accord upon our heroes’ quarters, without the smallest regard to the laws of hospitality. The defenceless wights were rudely awaked from their refreshing sleep by furious thrusts and the sharp fangs of the fire-forks. They discerned their danger from this unfriendly morning salutation, set up great lamentations, attempted to negotiate from the oven, and begged piteously for their lives. The in​exorable Amazons, however, refused quarter, but kept pushing and thrusting into the murderous hole, till a deadly silence prevailed within; and not one of the unfortunate mess-mates moved a limb. They then fastened the door, and marched triumphantly into the village.
Six of the associated fugitives were actually killed outright in this oven skirmish. The imminent danger suggested to the seventh, who was more cunning or resolute than the rest, a certain method of self-preservation. He wisely made a retreat in time into the chimney, clambered up through it into the open air, contrived to slide down the roof unhurt and get into the open fields, along which he fled to the neighbouring woods and mountains, where he wandered without any certain track all day long, under the immediate terrors of death. Towards sun-set he sunk down oppressed with fa​tigue and hunger, under a forest tree, and when the coolness of the evening had refreshed his spirits and recruited his strength, he lifted up his eyes, and beheld at a short distance a pious hermit performing his orisons before a simple crucifix, of which the cross pieces were only fastened together with the bark of a tree. This devout spectacle gave him courage to approach the holy father; he assumed a very supplicating posture, and kneeled down behind him. The hermit having ended his devotions gave the stranger his blessing: on perceiving his paleness and trepidation, and judging from his habit that he was either a pike-man or shield-bearer, he entered into a conversation with him. The honest Swabian unfolded his misfortunes with as much sincerity as if he had been confessing, without suppressing his apprehensions of death, for he still fancied the destroying angels were close behind him with their spits and fire-forks aimed at his fleshy buttocks. The hermit took pity on ​the innocent suppliant, and offered him shelter and protection under his roof. At his entrance into the dusky grotto, the affrighted fancy of the fugitive painted it as another cut-throat den; and not only the grotto, but the chapel, eating-room, and cellar of the hermit, and even the azure vault of heaven, assumed in his eyes the shape of an oven, and one cold fit fell upon him after another: but the hospitable father soon cheared his spirits by his soothing conversation; he offered him water to wash his feet, and placed fine bread before him, with a platter of fruit for his supper. He loosened his tongue, which was so parched as to cling to the roof of his mouth, with a cup of wine, and prepared him a bed of soft moss, where Friedbert slept in one continued nap till the pious Benno waked him to prayers. By the time he had finished his morning repast, all his troubles and adversities had vanished from his mind, and he could not find words ​enough to thank his host for his kind reception and care.
In three days he thought it time to be gone; yet he had as little desire to quit this peaceful and secure retreat as a sea-captain, who lies at anchor in a snug cove, has to sail while the winds are yet howling, and the waves foaming. Benno, on his side, found so much plain sense and openness, so much simplicity and readiness to oblige, in the honest soldier, that he wished to keep him constantly beside him. This coincidence of sentiments made the bargain short. Friedbert received the tonsure from father Benno, exchanged his military coat for the hermit’s frock, and remained as brother in waiting; he was to serve his benefactor, take care of the garden and kitchen, and attend upon the pilgrims who arrived at the hermitage. At the time of the equinox which parts spring from summer, and introduces the sun into the sign of the Crab, Benno never failed to dispatch his ​faithful attendant to observe whether any swans appeared on the pool, to watch their flight, and count their number. He seemed always to listen with great attention to his report. The visit of the swans made him chearful; but when none appeared, the old man shook his head and grew melancholy and peevish for several days. The honest unsuspecting Swab gave himself no further concern about this anxiety and singular kind of curiosity; or he thought, perhaps, that the arrival or failure of the swans afforded a presage of the fruitfulness or unfruitfulness of the year.
One day as Friedbert was keeping watch, he saw a number of swans skim along the pool and reported it as usual to father Benno, who testified great joy upon the occasion, and ordered him to prepare a dainty supper, with plenty of wine. The glass soon exerted its inspiring powers on both the partners of the feast: the old man laid aside his reserve, be​came affable and jocose, and talked of love and wine with so much glee, that you would have supposed the hoary Teian bard had come to life again in the disguise of an hermit. He renewed the old hymn in praise of Venus and Bacchus; an hymn which, in some form or other, has been in vogue ever since the grape was first pressed and maidens first kissed. After he had handed to his foster-son a full bumper, who had honestly pledged him, he confidentially addressed him in these words: ‘My son, lay thine hand on thine heart, and give me an answer to one question; but take care thy heart do not prove knavish and cheat thee: guard thy tongue also, that no false word glide over it, else will the lie stain thy tongue black, even as the pot over the fire is blackened by the soot. Tell me then truly and without deceit, has love of woman ever entered thy heart, has the glow of desire warmed thy bosom; or ​does the tender passion yet slumber in thy soul? Hast thou sipped at the honied cup of chaste connubial joy, or drank deep of the intoxicating bowl of voluptuousness? Does the oil of hope feed the flame of thy love, or does a latent spark glow beneath the embers of despondency? Is the maiden, who has pleased thine eye, now sighing over thee as one departed, or longing with impatience for thy return to her arms? Unlock the secrets of thy bosom, and I will lay open mine also, and tell thee what thou wilt be glad to hear.’
‘Reverend father,’ replied the guileless Swab, ‘as to the state of my heart, be assured that it has never worn the fetters of love, and is still free like the birds of the air from the net of the bird-catcher. I was pressed young into the service of the Emperor Albert, before the down on my chin had ripened to the stiffness of a man’s beard, or the girls paid any ​regard to me; for the smock face and downy chin are not, you know, high in their books; besides, I have a faint heart: at times, when I have longed to cast a sheep’s eye at a pretty girl, my courage has failed me—I have never ventured to look a blue-eyed damsel in the face, nor has any one ever made advances, so as to encourage me by word, gesture, or look. So I know not that a female tear has ever been dropped on my account, except those my mother and sisters shed the day I was taken for a soldier.’
The old hermit was glad to hear this, and then proceeded thus: ‘Thou hast now waited on me full three years as a faithful attendant: for this thou art entitled to a recompence, which I wish thou mayest receive from the hand of love, provided fortune be kinder to thee than she has proved to me. ​Know, then, it is not piety, but love, that has led me from far distant lands into this cell. Listen to my adventures, and attend to the history of that pool, which gleams before our eyes like a lake of silver in the moonshine.—In my youth I was a bold and manful knight: I was born in Switzerland, of the family of the Margraves of Kyburg. I followed pastimes in my youth, and amused myself in making love. I once slew a priest, who craftily seduced a fair maiden, and made her prove false to me: upon this I journeyed to Rome for absolution from the holy father; who enjoined me, by way of penance, to make three crusades to the Holy Land against the Saracens, under condition, that if I did not return my effects should fall to Holy Mother church. I took my passage on board a Venetian galley, and set sail in good spirits; but in the Ionian sea the faithless south-west wind began to howl, the sea swelled, and our vessel was dashed to pieces against a concealed rock near ​the island Naxos in the Archipelago. Though I was no swimmer, my guardian angel bore me up by the hair of the head, and I reached the shore, where the natives received me kindly, and took care of me till I was disburthened of the salt-water I had swallowed. I then repaired to Quisa, where Zeno, a descendant of Marcus Sanuto, to whom the Emperor Henry of Swabia had granted the Cyclades, held his court; here in the character of an Italian knight I found a good reception.
‘Here I saw the slender Zoe, his wife, a lady formed according to the nicest measures of Grecian proportion, and whom Apelles would have chosen as a model for the goddess of love. The sight of Zoe kindled a flame in my breast, which overpowered all other thoughts and desires. I forgot my vow of going a crusader into the Holy Land, and all my thoughts and actions had no other tendency than how to make my passion ​known to the young princess. I endeavoured to distinguish myself in every tournament, and the effeminate Greeks were no match for me either in strength or agility. I did not fail to insinuate myself into the good graces of the charming Zoe by a thousand little attentions, which so easily render the female heart favourable to our sex. I was careful to find out by my spies how she would dress on every feast-day, and the colour of her garment always appeared in the ribbands of my armour, and the crest that nodded over my helmet. She loved song music and the chearful choral dance: she danced herself in a manner not less captivating than the daughter of Herodias. I surprised her often with a serenade while she was enjoying the brightness of the Grecian sky on her terrace by the sea-side, where the little silver waves imitated the friendly whispers of confidential lovers. I procured bands of dancers from the Morea, in order to ​amuse her, and engaged in frequent traffic with the milliners at Constantinople, that I might be the first to procure the improvements of female dress, according to the latest fashion of the metropolis, which I conveyed by various ways to the lady of my heart, so that she could easily divine the author of these gallantries.
Hadst thou any experience in the affairs of love, my son, thou wouldst not be ignorant that such apparently insignificant attentions are, in the world of gallantry, a kind of hieroglyphics which the uninitiated take for empty toying and trifling, but which have as determinate a sense as letters and words in common language; they are a species of free-mason’s dialect, which two, who are in the secret, can employ, in the presence of a third person, who may, for any thing he knows, be bought or sold; whereas the lovers understand every word without further comment or explanation. ​These mutes of mine, which I dispatched into the palace, spoke very loud in my behalf. I observed with rapture the fine eyes of the princess single me out among the crowd of courtiers, and seem to say many obliging things. Hence I became bolder in my plans, I found a confidante among her attendants, who, for a valuable consideration, consented to be the carrier of love. We came to mutual explanations, secret assignations were made, but they always failed; some trivial circumstance for ever spoiled the plan which love had formed: I either did not find my princess where she had appointed me, or could not find access to the place where I was to meet her. Jealousy kept such close watch over the fair Grecian that I could never gain a view of her, except in presence of the whole court. Against these difficulties, as against an adamantine rock, were all my hopes and wishes dashed to pieces, but not ​my passion, which, like an hungry wolf, became still more ravenous, the less nourishment it found. The secret flame consumed the marrow in my bones, my cheeks grew pale, my skin shrunk and shrivelled, my pace faultered, my knees shook like a reed bent to and fro by the wind. In this melancholy situation I was still in want of a trusty friend, into whose discreet bosom I could pour forth my griefs, and who at least could raise my drooping spirits by the cordial of hope.
As I lay ill at my inn, and had given up all hopes of life, the prince charged his body physician, Theophrastus, with the care of my health. As he approached I held out my hand, expecting he would feel my pulse, but he only shook it with a friendly smile, without troubling himself about the irritability of my nerves, and said, Do not suppose, noble knight, that I am come to attempt your recovery by balsams and electuaries; your ​health has flown away on the wings of love, it can only return by the same conveyance. I was surprized that Theophrastus should have as accurate intelligence of the secrets of my heart, as if he had dissected it with his anatomical knife. I did not therefore conceal from him what he already knew, and added, in a tone of deep melancholy, How shall I hope for recovery from love, who has slily thrown his shackles round me, and fastened them with a Gordian knot? Nothing remains but to resign myself to my fate, and choak in the treacherous noose. By no means, replied he; hopeless love is in truth bitterer than death: do not therefore abandon all hopes. There is indeed nothing new under the sun; but what has once happened, may happen again. Did the lean Tithonus, I pray you, dream that he should ever sleep in the bed of the Goddess of the dawn? yet he so spent himself with love in her arms, that at last his whole substance was scarce ​enough to make a grasshopper. When the shepherd boy on Ida piped his sheep down the withered pastures, did he imagine that he should carry off the fair bride of Sparta, as the prize of love? And what was Sir Anchises more than you? Yet he was preferred, by the fairest goddess in heaven, before the sturdy god of war; and the mortal warrior dismounted the immortal leader of armies. Thus did the physician philosophize away my sorrows: his words insinuated themselves, with the smoothness of oil, into my bosom; and, for me, they were more balsamic and salutary than all the apothecary’s stores. Soon after my recovery I applied myself to the old trade, and there were now some signs as if fortune was in better humour. Theophrastus became my bosom friend, the confidant and broker of my amour. The fair Zoe eluded the vigilance of her spies, I was able to overleap the brazen walls of my former difficulties, ​and I found the long-wished for opportunity of speaking to her alone in the jessamine arbour of her garden. The rapture I felt, in approaching so close to the object of my wishes, filled my soul with transport surpassing all human sensations. I fell, inspired with love, at her feet, and seized her snowy hand, which I pressed in mute extacy to my lips, while I endeavoured to collect myself so far as to avow my passion. But the cunning despot had watched all my footsteps with the eye of a basilisk, and now saw me fallen into the snare he had long laid for me. A party of his guards at this instant emerged from behind their place of concealment, and tore me forcibly from the arms of the charming princess, though she stretched them out in deep distress to protect me. The terror of so sudden a surprize, and the clanking of armour, overpowered her senses; her spirits retired inward, her cheeks grew pale, and ​down she sank, with a deep sob, on a sofa that stood behind her.
‘There lies, about a stone’s throw from the island, accessible only by a draw-bridge, guarded by a well-appointed watch, a strong tower, built on a steep rock, and compleatly surrounded by the sea. Here, in the age of paganism, was the residence of joy. Here are now the ruins of a celebrated temple consecrated to the jovial god of wine. The gate of the temple may still be seen, as also the canals, along which the gifts of Bacchus flowed in copious streams into a capacious reservoir. Christian charity has converted this Heathenish abomination into a fortress of famine, and it is now frequented by bats and owls alone. The unhappy victims of a despot’s jealousy here found inevitable destruction. I was forced into this abominable dun​geon down an endless ladder, which was withdrawn as soon as my foot touched the ground. Egyptian darkness and a death-like silence, reigned in the horrid cell: a cadaverous smell assailed my senses. I soon felt that I stood before the entrance of the kingdom of the dead, for I stumbled sometimes against a skeleton, and sometimes against an half-putrified body, as I pored about in search of a place for my own death-bed. Full of despair, I stretched myself along the hard floor, and invoked death to free me from the pains of life; but for this time he only sent his brother sleep, who made me forget for a while the misery of my situation. On awaking, I was surprised at a light glimmering in the den, and on observing whence it proceeded, saw a lamp burning in the middle of my charnel-house; it rested on a basket, which seemed to have been let down from above by a rope. I examined the contents of the basket, and ​found it well provided with eatables, with the addition of several flasks of Chios wine, and a cruse of oil. Though the lamp disclosed all the horrors of my dreary prison, the sensation of hunger soon overpowered that of disgust. I immediately shoved a number of skeletons together, and placed them so as to serve me for a table and chair. I now sate myself down before my basket, and made as hearty a meal as a sexton, when he has dug a grave in the morning before his breakfast.
‘In the course of a few days, as I guessed, for time in a subterraneous cavern moves on leaden wings, I heard a noise above me; the ladder of endless rounds descended, and I saw a man trip down it, whom I conceived either to be a companion in misfortune or an executioner. But when I beheld my physician and friend, Theophrastus, my joy was equal to my surprize: and his voice sounded as gratefully in my ears ​as I fancy the blast of the last trump will in those of the dead, whom it is to summon from the grave. He spoke very laconically, and did not stay long below, as probably the mephitic breath of this gate of hell might not affect his lungs very agreeably. I am, in all likelihood, the first person whose footsteps ever returned out of the lion’s den. I arrived, under the wing of my protecting angel, at his habitation, where he disclosed the mystery of my wonderful deliverance. Thank, said he, your good fortune, and the power of love, for having this time escaped the ignominious and pining death of hunger. Fly quickly the enchanted circle of the Cyclades, before your passage from the dangerous labyrinth is for ever barred. A jealous prince is worse than Argus and Briareus: he has an hundred eyes to watch, and an hundred arms to seize you. Zeno is at once the fondest of husbands, and the most vindictive of ​enemies: his veins are turgid with tiger’s blood, yet the fetters of love enchain his furious passions. Hence he revenges the tricks of Cupid on the Paladins of the beautiful Zoe, never on herself. Your lot would have been the same with your predecessors in the tower of famine, had she not felt more for you than for all the rest that have suffered and hungered for her sake. She offered to prove her innocence and your virtue by the fiery ordeal; and boldly demanded your deliverence from yonder charnel-house. But when the prince harshly refused this just request, she departed from him in sorrow, and took a solemn oath never more to touch food, in order that she might die the same death with you, sir knight. The hard-hearted husband was so little affected, that he set out on a hunting party. She took the advantage of his absence to bribe the guard, and supply you with necessaries, though she herself, in ​compliance with her vow, rigorously abstained from all nourishment. In three days the prince was told that a leaden-coloured paleness began to feed on the damask cheek of his spouse, and to extinguish the spark of life in her brilliant eyes. This touched him to the soul: he flew repentant to her feet, and entreated her to desist from her purpose of extirpating beauty from the earth. He agreed to spare your life, under condition that you should depart from Naxos, as father Adam from Paradise, never to return. The prince committed to me the care of the beautiful Zoe’s health, and the princess that of your deliverance. Prepare, therefore, for an immediate departure: a ship is ready to set sail for the Hellespont, in her you will get safe to the continent.
‘At the end of his speech I embraced the kind physician, and thanked him cordially for my emancipation. But the departure from Naxos lay heavy on my heart. The ​charms of the beautiful Zoe had so infatuated me, that it seemed easier to part from life. My friend, said I, your last words are a sentence of death. Did not you yourself say, that love without hope was bitterer far than death. Had you let me pine in the tower of famine, I had got rid of this wretched life, which can only be a burden and plague to me; if I am to give up all my hopes, let me die an honourable and knightly death. Tell the prince without reserve, that I have chosen the beautiful Zoe to be the mistress of my heart, and am ready to maintain my choice in a single combat for life or death: and, since I can never gain her as the prize of valour, I will engage all his knights, till I fall by the hand of one of them, in order that she may shed a tender tear over me in secret! My friend Theophrastus shook his venerable head, and smiled on me, as on one whose brain had become delirious from the violence of a fever. Your scheme, said ​he, is folly; a brave knight must not fight on purpose to be overcome, but to conquer, and acquire renown and praise. Consider, moreover, that the prince would decide on your challenge not according to the laws of knighthood, but jealousy, and remand you without delay to the antichamber of Pluto. But as love prevails over the dread of death, and I observe your passion is stronger than your reason, so that nothing can divert you from the beautiful Zoe, I will pour a drop of the balsam of hope into your heart, which may revive though it cannot cure you. Hear, therefore, a secret known but to few philosophers, and which no reward nor hope of gain could extort from me, though friendship and compassion for your situation is able to break the seal of silence—your adored Zoe descends, like many of our Grecian beauties, as well as those of other countries, from the lineage of the fairies, and is only related on one side to the race of mortals. The antient tra​dition of a line of gods that formerly dwelt in Greece is no dream of fancy, though the poets have now mixed so much fable and falsehood with it, that it is more difficult to part one from the other than to purify silver calcined by antimony: nevertheless, the silver is contained in the scoriæ, and may be found by the adept. The lineage of gods is only a species of ethereal spirits, that inhabit the upper regions of the atmosphere, or the top of mount Olympus. In the chain of beings they are the link next above man, and connect him with the gods. Formerly they lived with men in confidential and visible intercourse; they mixed with the descendants of Adam; and the offspring has continued in this lower world to the present hour. The amorous swan who surprised the unguarded Leda in a lonely bath under the assumed character of the imaginary thunderer, was only one of these genii. He endowed his posterity ​with the power of taking the borrowed form of their progenitor, under certain circumstances and for certain purposes. In the three quarters of the globe there arise from the bosom of the earth three fountains, used by the genii of the air as baths, and endowed with the power of perpetuating the youthful charms of the fair inhabitants of the upper sky, whom we know under the name of fairies, and our ancestors worshipped as goddesses. These springs exert the same power on all the mortal beauties, who date their descent from the interposition of any genius or fairy, provided they bathe once every year, at the season of the summer solstice. But as the waters rise in far distant climes, and only that branch of the fairy noblesse which were hatched from mother Leda’s egg has been furnished with wings, few can reap the benefit of their hereditary privilege, the greater part fade away like mortal ​flowers, and are subject to the vulgar fate of the daughters of Eve.
‘However marvellous it may seem to you, sir knight, it is nevertheless true, that the pedigree of the beautiful Zoe ascends as high as Leda’s eggs. As the most certain proof of this, she becomes a swan once every year, or, as she expresses it, puts on her swan’s dress; for Leda’s daughters do not, like those of common mortals, make their entry into the world stark naked, but have their delicate bodies cloathed in an aerial garment, formed of condensed light, which expands in proportion to their growth, and not only possesses all the properties of the purest phlogiston, so as to overcome the weight of gross earthy matter, and elevate it rapidly to the clouds, but also changes the wearer into a swan, as soon as she puts it on. The annual flight to the bath of beauty takes nine days; and when it is not prevented or omitted, it confers on female vanity ​the otherwise unattainable privilege of unfading youth and beauty.
‘If you do not grudge to undertake so long a journey, and to lie in ambush beside one of these wonder-working springs, in order to make that declaration of love, which the beautiful Zoe will hardly hear from you in Naxos, I will tell you where to seek them. The first lies in Abyssinia, in the depth of Africa, and is in fact the long-sought fountain of the Nile. The second is a bottomless pool, at the foot of Mount Ararat, in Asia, which received and swallowed up the waters of Noah’s flood. The third springs in Europe, in the empire of Germany, where the roots of the Sudetes shoot out westward towards the plain country. Its waters are collected in a pool situated in a delightful valley, named by the inhabitants of the country the Swansfield. This pool is most frequently visited by Zoe, for it is nearest home. You will not find any ​difficulty in distinguishing the magic from common swans, by a crown of feathers on the top of the head. If you stand on the watch in the early hour of the morning, before the rays of the rising sun strike the surface of the water, or in the evening, when in descending to rest, its retiring light reddens the western sky, observe carefully whether any swans arrive. If you see them alight on the water or among the reeds, you will immediately perceive nymphs bathing instead of swans, and your eye will at once discover whether your mistress be there, or whether she has not this time joined the company of her cousins. Should fortune bring her to you, do not delay a moment to take possession of her veil and crown, which you will find on the shore: you will then have her quite in your power, for she will not be able to fly away without this aerial garment. How you are then to proceed, love, I suppose, will instruct you.
​‘Here friend Theophrastus ended: and I marvelled much at his discourse, not knowing whether to give his words credit, or regard him as a smooth lyar, who desired to send me on a fool’s errand; but a solemn oath, and a firm and guileless countenance, which seemed still more worthy of credit than any corporal oath, convinced me that such was the true account of the affair. After a long pause, I replied, in full confidence of his veracity, Come then, my friend; ship me on board instantly: I will undertake the adventure, and like the wandering Jew range over the world, till I come to the pool where I may hope to enjoy the aim of my wishes.
‘I then set sail—at Constantinople I took the pilgrim’s staff, and joining a company of my brethren on their return from the Holy Land, I made straight for the Sudetes, where I wandered long, till I was directed to the Swans pool I had so ardently sought. Full in view of it I ​built this hermitage, under the hypocritical mask of devotion; it was soon visited by a crowd of pious souls, for the neighbourhood esteemed me a saint, and came in search of heavenly consolation to one, who harboured only the desires of the flesh: all my thoughts and wishes having no other object but the visit of the swans.
‘Soon after my settlement here, I formed yonder cove of reeds, in order to watch, at the proper season, for the arrival of the half celestial visitants. I found that Theophrastus had not fed me with delusive forgeries; at the summer solstice I saw a number of swans alight on the pool, some retaining their proper form, and others changing into beautiful damsels; yet I could not perceive my beloved Zoe among the swimmers. I bore the impatience of desire for three summers longer, but in vain. The fourth came. I watched with anxiety from my place of ambush. One morning early I heard the sound of wings rustling over my head, and immediately perceived ​nymphs wantonly sporting on the lake, little imagining they were beheld by a spy. As the day broke I saw with an extacy of delight the form of the beautiful Zoe floating before me. My heart throbbed strong in my breast, but the hurry of passion so transported me, that I no longer remembered the instructions of my friend Theophrastus. Instead of securing the possession of my charming mistress, by the certain pledge of her flying veil, the impatience of joy carried me out of my watch-house of reeds: I lifted up my voice aloud, and cried, Zoe of Naxos, darling of my soul, behold the Italian knight, your faithful Paladin, to whom love has whispered your secret, and instigated him to wait here for you at the fountain of beauty.
‘Great surprize and terror fell on the abashed company of bathers; they uttered a loud shriek, took up water in the hollow of their hands, and dashed it like a thunder-shower against me, as if with a design to ​dazzle my audacious eyes. In my consternation I apprehended the fate of Acteon at least, and drew back in alarm; meanwhile they slipped among the reeds, and hid themselves. Shortly thereafter I saw seven swans ascend high into the air: they soon vanished from before my eyes. I now had time to reflect on my own foolish conduct; I acted like a madman, tore my coat, plucked my beard, and wept aloud, till the fury of my sorrow sunk gradually away into the stillness of melancholy. I slunk in silence to my cell, and took my way along the place whence the swans had risen on wing opposite my reed cot; I there found the morning dew brushed from the grass, I saw a trace in the wet sand, which seemed to have been impressed by the elegant foot of Zoe: beside it lay a packet closely rolled up, which I snatched in haste. It proved, upon opening it, to be a woman’s glove of fine white silk, which would have been too small for any other but Zoe’s delicate hand. There fell out ​of it a ring, ornamented with a sparkling ruby, in the shape of an heart. From this packet, which had all the appearance of being left behind on purpose, I deduced the most favourable interpretation. Zoe, I supposed, meant to say, that she left her heart behind her, that she was not insensible to my deserts; and though she could not, for the sake of appearances, part from her company, she would as soon as possible return without attendants, and hearken to my desires.
‘With these thoughts I consoled myself, and remained one, two, and more years, in longing expectation of another visit from the swans. Nor was my patience yet exhausted; but my imprudence seemed to have banished them from the pool. Afterwards a few returned, and I conceived fresh hopes. I watched them close, and enjoyed from time to time the unreserved view of angelic forms with calm indifference—for how easy to resist the temptation of the banquet, when the appetite is ​wanting! For my part, I had no eyes but for the charming Zoe, who has never more appeared. Meanwhile I preserve the ring in my box, as an holy relic, and in my heart the memory of my tender affection, as a sacred deposit. Where I found the packet I have planted roses and lilies, lovage and forget-me-not. In the deceitful hope of the return of my beloved mistress, time has bowed me towards the earth, and ploughed deep furrows in my forehead. Yet the arrival of the swans, by reminding me of the adventure of my youth, and the pleasantest dream of my life, still affords me pleasure. Whenever I now cast a serious look upon the past, from the margin of my earthly pilgrimage, I feel an uncomfortable sensation at having squandered away my life, as a spendthrift his riches, without fruit or enjoyment. It is gone like the vision of a long winter’s night, to which the fancy still clings with fondness, and which when you awake leaves fatigue rather than refreshment ​behind it. Yet I console myself with reflecting, that mine does not differ from the common lot of mortals, who to dream away their lives, consecrate the better part of it to a phantom of the imagination, and spend upon this creature of the brain their whole activity. All enthusiasm, all castle-building in the air, whether it relate to heaven or earth, is idleness and folly; nor is a devout better than an amorous caprice. Every human being whose thoughts are turned inwards upon himself, whether immured in a cell, or wandering about the fields and forests, gaping at the moon, tossing straws and flowers in a melancholic mood into the brook that murmurs by him, or sighing out his elegy to rocks and rivers, or the listening queen of night; is a senseless dreamer. For the Spirit of contemplation, let him be of what sort he may, if he does not walk behind the plough, or take the hoe or spade in his hand, is the vilest puppet upon the stage of human life. To have engrafted young ​fruit-trees, planted vines, and reared melons, by which I could refresh the weary traveller, I esteem more meritorious than all the praying, fasting, and penance, that have raised the fame of my piety so high: these are works of more worth than even the romance of my life. Therefore,’ proceeded father Benno, addressing himself to his faithful companion, the attentive Friedbert; ‘therefore I would not have an active young man like you dream away your life in this dreary solitude. Stay, however, the short time which yet remains to me, perform the last duties, and lay my bones in the grave which I dug many years ago, in ostentatious hypocrisy, under yonder rocks. Then return again to the world, and earn by the sweat of thy brow bread to feed a lovely wife and a blooming circle of boys and girls round thy table. The rape of the Sabines turned out a fortunate adventure to the Romans. Thou, if thou pleasest, mayest try whether for​tune has in store for thee the favour of surprizing a mistress of the fairy race by this pool; one that, when love has domesticated her, shall be willing to remain with thee. But if an earlier flame has taken possession of thy heart, so that she cannot enjoy thy affections, let the butterfly escape, else shall the torments of joyless wedlock fall upon thee.’
The morning had already begun to peep over the silent horizon, before the old man’s talkativeness had tacked this application to his own extraordinary story. He then stretched himself on his bed of dry leaves, in order to enjoy repose after so long an interval; but a crowd of ideas floated in Friedbert’s brain, so party-coloured and entangled, that sleep came not near his eye-lids. He seated himself before the entrance of the hermitage, looked toward the rising sun, and took every swallow that whizzed over his head for a swan.
After a few changes of the moon Benno ​slept with his fathers. He was consigned to the earth by his pupil, amid the loud lamentations of every devout soul on the mountains; these good people grieved for the loss of their heavenly intercessor, and performed pilgrimages to his grave, which brought in good profit to the heir of the departed. The pious simplicity of the mourners desired relics from the effects which had belonged to the holy man: the legatee did not fail to furnish them for sterling cash; he cut in pieces an old hermit’s frock, and distributed the fragments to all that sought holy trumpery. The briskness of the demand awakened the spirit of traffick in his mind: he speculated upon another article, which proved not less productive—he divided the white-thorn staff of his master into small splinters, which were to cure the tooth-ache, when used for tooth-picks: and as he did not want for materials, he would have provided all Christendom with his sovereign tooth-picks, if customers ​had not failed him. In time the concourse abated, rival traders in sanctified commodities drew their share of business, and the hermitage became a real solitude. So much the better for its possessor, who could now attend without interruption to his romantic ideas. He saw with increasing satisfaction the growing days compress the nights into a narrower space, and the sun come nearer the crown of his head. At the time of the solstice, he went regularly to the pool, concealed himself morning and evening in his sentinel-box of reeds, and on the eve of St. Alban’s made the discovery he had so much at heart. Three swans approached from the south with a majestic sweep, and thrice encompassed the pool, as if to survey whether every thing was safe. They gradually sunk among the reeds, when behold three lovely maidens came forth, arm in arm, like the three Graces, forming the fairest groupe ever beheld by mortal eye. They sported and poised themselves ​upon the crystal plain, then rested and chatted for a time, pouring between whiles a soft stream of melody from their tuneful tongues. The lurcher, in an extacy of rapture, stood motionless as a marble statue, and had well nigh lost the golden opportunity of seizing his prize. Luckily he recovered his recollection and awoke just in season from his trance. He left his station on tip-toe, and crept unperceived through the bushes to the place where the company of swans had quitted their ethereal robes. He found three virgin’s veils spread out on the grass, of an unknown texture, finer than the spider’s web, and whiter than new-fallen snow: the top was drawn through a golden crown, and puffed so as to have the appearance of a tuft. Round about lay under-garments of coarser materials, of sea-green lined with pink, apparently of Persian silk. The audacious robber darted at the first veil that came within his grasp with an eager hand. He then hastened home with his ​prey in a transport of joy, burning with impatience to know what lot fortune had sent him.
As soon as he had entrusted the treasure to his iron coffer, he took his station on a kind of terrace at the entrance of his grotto, and there he stood watching, like a Roman augur, the flight of the birds—anxious for the revelation of his own fate. The evening star began now to sparkle in the heavens, when immediately two swans arose with a shy suspicious flight, and hastened away as if scared by a bird of prey. Now his heart began to labour with stronger pulsations, joy thrilled in every vein and nerve: curiosity urged him to the pool, caution pulled him back into the grot. After a long battle, consideration gained the victory—a rare event in the concerns of love. He sagaciously concluded that it was adviseable, and would promote his cause, to hide the knave; and it would be at least more prudent to act the hypocrite than the robber. He im​mediately kindled his lamp (the light of which he rationally conjectured would allure the distressed fair) took his rosary in his hand, threw himself into a devout posture, and counted bead after bead, at the same time listening with both his ears if any thing stirred abroad.
The stratagem succeeded: he heard a low noise, like a cautious tread on the sand, as of one afraid of being discovered. The crafty anchoret redoubled his feigned devotion as soon as he found he was observed: having ended his orisons, he rose from his cushion, and looked sideways, where she stood, his fair captive! in the simplest female attire, with a countenance expressive of the deepest grief, in the captivating softness of silent, bashful beauty. The feeling heart of Friedbert at the moving sight melted away like wax before the flame of candle, in the tenderness of soft desire. The fairest student of sentimental novels would in vain aspire to rival the inimitable expression of her sorrow. She ​opened her lovely mouth with the accents of an anxious suppliant: the young hermit heard a melodious voice soothe his ear, but understood not a word of her discourse, for the maiden’s language was strange to him. He, however, easily guessed that the substance of her address amounted to an heartfelt petition for the restoration of her veil: but the malicious hermit purposely misunderstood her gestures, and only tried to make her comprehend, that in this asylum of piety she had nothing to fear for her virtue. He shewed her a cleanly couch in a separate apartment, set before her choice fruit and sweetmeats, and exerted all his hermit’s address to gain her confidence. The afflicted beauty seemed however to take no notice of his attentions. She sate down in a corner, gave herself up to sorrow, wrung her lily-white hands, wept and sobbed without remission, which the pious Friedbert took so much to heart, that he could not refrain from tears. In ​this weeping drama he acted his part so artfully, that the fair stranger found some alleviation of her sorrows in his kind participation, absolved the sympathising philanthropist from all suspicion of the robbery, and in her heart begged pardon for the injury her thoughts had done him. She wished only to find out some means of conveying to her pious host the occasion of her sorrow, as he seemed not precisely able to guess what it was for which she wept.
The first night passed very mournfully; but the rosy finger of the dawn has ever been endowed with the power of drying up the tears of the afflicted. At sun-rise Friedbert was careful to perform his morning devotions; a circumstance which gave his fair guest great satisfaction. She suffered herself to be persuaded to taste of the breakfast provisions; and afterwards went out to the side of the pool, to make another search for her lost veil, for she now imagined some wanton zephyr had played ​her a malicious trick, and carried it away among the bushes. The officious Friedbert attended, and helped her very sincerely to search, well assured nothing would be found. The ill success of the experiment again darkened the damsel’s countenance; but her veins were filled with light ethereal blood, and sorrow was as little capable of striking deep root into her heart, as deadly nightshade into a quick-sand. She accommodated herself, by degrees, to her fortune: her heavy eye glistened like a cloud illuminated by the gleam of evening; she grew familiar with the associate of her solitude, and her glances would sometimes fix with pleasure on his blooming cheeks. The watchful anchoret observed the omen with inward satisfaction: and strove so much the more earnestly to improve these favourable prepossessions, and to secure his advantage by a thousand little services. So much were his sentiments refined, and ​such an insight had he acquired into the female heart, that his plain, broad, rustic sense, seemed to have been cast in a new mould. Inventive love by degrees supplied the sequestered pair with a laconic language, but a language so expressive, that they could converse as intelligibly as Inkle and Yarico.
Friedbert had long harboured a wish to know of what tongue, from what country and race the fair unknown sprung; as also in what situation of life she had been born, that he might judge how far love had matched like with like. Being an unlearned layman, he had no idea that the delicate mouth of the lovely maid was rounded by Grecian sounds: for to him every language but Swabian was no better than Chinese. He was informed, by the help of the new-invented dialect, that fortune had thrown into his net a Grecian beauty. In Friedbert’s time, indeed, no Greek model had inflamed the fancy of the German youth: no one dreamed of translat​ing the charms of his mistress into Greek, to celebrate her Grecian form, to estimate the finest proportion of the female person at between eight and nine heads, or to denominate that a Grecian profile, where the root of the nose is continued in a straight line from the forehead. The eye and not the ruler, the feelings and not school subtleties, were the sole judges of beauty: their sentence was deemed valid; and no man troubled himself about the opinion of Greek or Barbarian on the subject. But Friedbert opened both his ears, when she informed him that she was of princely blood, and no other than the youngest daughter of Zeno and the beautiful Zoe of Naxos.
‘Explain to me,’ she continued, ‘friendly hermit, if thou knowest, the nature of this pool; tell me why my mother warned her daughters to avoid the northern bath? Had she herself at any time the misfortune to lose her veil here? She used to send us every ​year to the sources of the Nile, without ever accompanying us herself; for my father, from jealousy, kept her in close confinement till his death: and, as she could no longer renovate her youth and beauty in the fairy bath, she lost her bloom, faded away, and grew old. She now passes her widowhood in melancholy solitude—for when youth and beauty are once flown, life has little enjoyment left for our sex. We lived under the care of our mother, far from the court of my uncle, who succeeded my father in the government of the Cyclades; nor did she ever part from us, except for the short time of our annual visit to the fairy springs. My elder sisters once ventured on a flight towards the north; the levity of youth made them disregard the warning of their mother: they supposed that they should be less oppressed by a sultry climate in these regions than in the deserts bordering on Egypt. We met with no misfortune in this ex​pedition; we repeated it several times, without our mother’s knowledge, till I became the victim of my elder sisters’ curiosity. Ah, where does the malignant enchanter, who lurks in secret to rob the bathing nymphs of their veil, conceal himself? Do thou, holy man, exorcise the despiteful sorcerer, that he may fall down headlong before my feet, out of the air, if he is an inhabitant of the upper regions; or, if he shuns the light, let him ascend at the solemn hour of midnight out of the gaping earth, and restore me my property and inheritance, which can neither render him service nor procure him pleasure.’
Friedbert was not a little rejoiced at the mistake of the charming Callista respecting the author of the theft, and did all he could to confirm her in it. He invented a story of some prince, who for his sins, as tradition says, was damned to wander about the Swans-field, where he takes a malicious pleasure in annoying the winged ​visitants of the pool. At the same time he gave her to understand, that he was not invested with the power of exorcising spirits; but that he had heard of a certain Swanhilda, who many ages since lost her veil, but found instead a faithful lover, and under the pinions of wedded love contentedly resigned the means of flight, especially as the preservative of youth and beauty lay so near at hand. In this representation the charming Callista found much consolation: yet to live in a solitude, however richly the romantic spot had been adorned by the bounty of nature, seemed not much to suit her disposition;—a proof that sentimental softness, the twin sister of love, had not yet entered into her heart; for a lonely vale, in some remote uninhabited island, is the true elysium of sentimental souls. No sooner did the complaisant hermit perceive which way the wishes of his guest pointed, than he consented to quit the hermitage. At the same time he hinted, that ​nothing could recompense him for the sacrifice he made, in returning to the tumults of the world, but the enjoyment of domestic happiness in the arms of a virtuous wife. Here his eyes glanced with so much tenderness upon her, as perfectly to explain and apply the general sentiment. She blushed and looked down, a movement so animating to his hopes, that he instantly set about packing up; having performed this, he decked himself once more in a soldier’s habit, and, with his fair companion by his side, pursued the path which led to his home.
In Swabia there is a small town, called Eglington on the Rock; it belongs to the Gravenegg family, and it was there Friedbert’s mother lived, blessing the memory of her departed husband, and cursing the people of Meissen, whom she supposed to have cut off Friedbert, the last stay of the family. Upon every maimed and wounded pike-man, who, on his return from the expedition, begged alms at her door, she ​charitably bestowed an eleemosynary farthing. She never failed, on these occasions, to make enquiries after her son; and if a prating invalid had the wit to invent a story on the spot—how he fought like a good man and true and fell like an hero; how many salutations he sent to his loving mother, before he gave up the ghost on the field of battle, she would draw the lyar a cup of wine, and pour such a flood of maternal tears, that you might have wrung out the wet from her tucker. In such lamentations four summers had now passed away, and the chilly air of autumn was beginning to shake the discoloured leaves from the trees, when the decent, still, little town suddenly broke out into a tumultuous uproar of joy. A messenger on horseback brought word, that the valiant Friedbert had not fallen in the defeat, but was now on his return from distant lands to his native place, habited as a stately knight that had atchieved many adventures in the East, and was bringing home ​a fair and noble bride,—no less than the daughter of the Sultan of Egypt, with an immense dower. Fame, we well know, magnifies every thing. It was true that Friedbert, between the inheritance of Father Benno and his tooth-pick manufacture, had acquired so much wealth as enabled him to swell his pomp from place to place, as he journeyed onward. He bought palfreys and horses of burthen, cloathed himself and the fair Callista with great magnificence, and proceeded with as high a carriage as if he had been Lord Ambassador to his Most Catholic Majesty.
As soon as the train was seen moving along on the Augspurg road, all the inhabitants assembled with great shouting and clapping of hands; Friedbert’s sisters and brothers-in-law, and the town-council in their robes, with the reverend bailiff at their head, went out to meet him, with colours flying: they moreover caused the drums to beat and the bells to ring for joy of their returning fellow citizen, as ​though one had risen from the dead. The tearful mother embraced her son with gladness that wore the face of grief. She made a great feast for her friends and relations, and distributed her whole store of farthings among the poor. She could not satisfy her eyes with looking at the delicate shape of her future daughter-in-law, and had almost stifled her with caresses, and stunned her with a profusion of her well-intended babbling. The fair Greek became the talk of town and country. Knights and nobles and plebeian connoisseurs in female beauty, came in shoals, calling the happy Friedbert brother and cousin, and vowing him eternal regard and fellowship. He, however, feeling the jealous vein beat in his temples so hard as to produce a dizziness and head-ach, concealed his beautiful Callista from the eyes of all the world. He planted his watchful mother as a kind of duenna over her, whenever he rode out to pay his compliments to the lord of Gravenegg, whose vassal he ​was. At the same time he urged his suit with unremitting ardour; and the fair Greek, seeing no chance of returning to her own country, and feeling no dislike to her blooming sweet-heart, whose appearance now, as a well-dressed squire, was very different from her first acquaintance, the hermit in sackcloth, was content to overlook the difference of rank, and consented to the union. He presented her with a costly wedding suit, the happy day was fixed, the fatted calf and capons were killed, and the wedding cake kneaded.
The day before, our bridegroom, according to the custom of the country, rode out to invite company to the marriage feast. In his absence the beautiful bride employed herself in arranging the bridal dress: female vanity led her to try on the new gown, in order to see whether it fitted her delicate shape. The spirit of finding fault, one of the endowments of the fair sex, soon led her to perceive something ​amiss: an alteration appeared necessary, and she called in the advice of the good old mother. The first sight of the lady full dressed set her ready tongue in motion. She poured a torrent of praise on the elegant shape of her lovely daughter, and did not cease to admire her son’s taste in the choice, and the mantua-maker’s art in the cut of the gown. But when she found the damsel differed in opinion on the latter question, she changed her tone, lest she should betray her inexperience in the niceties of fashion; and the poor artist was allowed no quarter. The criticism of the lady fell principally on the awkward shape of the veil, which she compared to a clumsy Augspurg umbrella. ‘Ah!’ said she, with a sigh, ‘if the Grecian veil, with its golden crown, did but grace my bridal dress! had I but its light and snowy arch, floating in the air and sporting with the breeze, then would the maidens of the town view me with envy, ​and Friedbert’s beloved would be esteemed the fairest of brides: Alas, it is gone! the grace of the Grecian maid, the bestower of the charms, which enchant the eyes of our youth.’ Here a desponding tear dropped from her rosy cheek on her snow-white bosom, which quite melted the good mother, especially as she held the weeping of a bride for as bad an omen as the crying of a child in its mother’s womb. Her sympathy squeezed out the secret, which had long stood just between her lips—for the open-hearted Friedbert had unwarily entrusted the loquacious dame with the prize of his stratagem, without adding any account of its properties. He had only desired her to lay it by in a safe place, as a pledge of love he had taken from Callista, enjoining her by no means to hint that she had it in her possession. The matron, rejoiced at so good an opportunity of easing her bosom of a load which had long lain upon it like a stone: ‘Weep not,’ said ​she, ‘my tender damsel: let not your bright eyes be eclipsed, and the joys of wedlock be overcast with tears. Give yourself no trouble about the veil; it has been carefully preserved and is now in my possession. Since you have such a longing desire—promise but to keep it from your husband, and not to betray me, and I will fetch it from my flax-chamber: I long myself to see how it suits your wedding cloaths, and becomes you.’ Callista stood motionless as a statue; the blood stopped in her veins for astonishment. Joy for the discovery, and anger at Friedbert’s hypocrisy, held her in suspense for several seconds; but on hearing the matron tramping back in her wooden shoes, she collected all her thoughts, joyfully received the veil from her hands, threw open the window, and as she fastened the golden crown on her head, and the ethereal garment rolled down her shoulders, she was changed to a swan, spread ​her silken wings, and sailed away towards the skies.
It was now the old lady’s turn to be thunder-struck by surprize at the strange metamorphosis. She crossed herself, uttered a loud shriek, and recommended herself to the holy Virgin; for as she harboured the rude notions of her age, concerning the intellectual world, she concluded the beautiful Callista to be either a ghost or a devil in disguise. The trusty Friedbert appeared at once in the light of a sorcerer and magician; which consideration threw her into deep sorrow, and made her devoutly wish he had rather been killed in battle, like a good Christian, than have thus fallen into the snares of Satan. Friedbert apprehended nothing of the sad catastrophe which had taken place in his absence. Towards evening he returned brisk and chearful; and ran nimbly up stairs, without laying aside his whip and spurs, eager to embrace his lovely bride. As he opened the door, he was struck full in the ​face with an execration from his mother: the good lady drew up the flood-gates of her eloquence, and a cataract of reproach and abuse dashed down upon him. Suspecting immediately what had happened, he began to rave like a madman; and would have compleated the tragedy by killing both his mother and himself, if the loud storm raised by her voice had not brought the whole houshold together in time to disarm the furious Orlando.
When the first burst of violence had blown over, they fell to calm explanations. Friedbert endeavoured to free himself from the suspicion of being an exorciser of spirits, or an adept in the black art: in order to clear himself from the imputation of attempting to impose upon his orthodox mother, for a daughter-in-law a she-devil in disguise, he related the whole progress of his adventure with the beautiful Greek, and explained the quality of her flying garment. Evidence, however, commonly labours in ​vain against prejudice once rooted in a woman’s breast; the matron believed of his story no more than she thought proper; and Friedbert was indebted to maternal instinct alone, for escaping a prosecution for witchcraft and sorcery. Meanwhile this strange event gave rise to numberless conjectures: the suspicious Friedbert wanted but a black cat, to be reputed as great a conjurer as Doctor Faustus or Cornelius Agrippa.
The brideless bridegroom found himself in a most uncomfortable situation: despair for the loss of his beautiful Callista tortured his bosom; his fate long wavered between life and death; the choice of either cost him some struggles. There can scarce be imagined a harder case, than to be shipwrecked at entering into port, after you have happily circumnavigated the globe; and to lose a beloved bride on the eve of the wedding-day is just as provoking. If she had fallen a prey to death, been ravished by a robber, ​or immured in a cloister by a hard-hearted father, the lover has a straight road before him: he may either follow her to the grave, pursue the robber and rescue the prize, or break through the bars and bolts of the cloister-doors—but when she flits away out of a window, who but your Parisian aëronauts can pretend to pursue her? Unluckily the noble art of sailing through the fields of æther could stand poor Friedbert in little stead, the discovery being reserved for an happier and wiser age. The dim-sighted or envious wiseacres of the Royal Society may judge as slightingly as they please of the aërostatical projects of their neighbours, yet it is obvious, that a marechaussée in the air, which should rain down melted brimstone and pitch, would more effectually check smuggling on the British coasts, than all their ​heavy cutters and guarda-costas, together with the long strings of paper resolutions of the squabbling lower house.
Friedbert had no other way of falling upon the track of his fugitive mistress than the very same the frogs would take, were they to undertake the grand tour, that is, to hop and swim, as occasion demands, till they arrive at the place of their destination. Eagerness to find his lovely girl made the distance from Swabia to the Cyclades seem greater than if he had had to travel to the moon. ‘Alas!’ cried he in despair, ‘how can the snail pursue the light-winged butterfly that flutters from flower to flower and rests long at no station? Who can assure me that Callista is gone back to Naxos? Will not the dread of scandal in her own country direct her flight to some other asylum? And if she is in Naxos; what will that avail me? How shall a plain pike-man dare to lift up his eyes to a daughter of the ​prince of the island?’ With such thoughts did our despairing lover torture himself day after day; but he might have spared himself these unpleasant reflections, if he had been sensible to the violence of his passion, and had known what miracles enthusiasm is used to perform. Instinct immediately produced the resolution, which calm consideration could never have brought to maturity. After he had reduced his property to the dimensions of his pocket-book, he saddled his horse, rode out at the back gate, in order to avoid the long-winded farewell of his mother, crossed the bounds of his country at a brisk trot, just as if he had intended to reach the Cyclades without baiting on the road. He luckily recollected the way father Benno had taken; and arrived, as he had done, safe and sound in the harbour of Naxos, after having sustained many hardships on the voyage from Venice.
He jumped nimbly on shore, and felt a secret pleasure on treading the earth that ​bore his mistress, whom he hoped to find once more in the bosom of her country. His enquiries were calculated to obtain information concerning the fair Callista; but nobody could tell whither the young lady had vanished. Various reports, it is true, were in circulation; and, as is usual when a pretty girl disappears from the circle of her acquaintance, this and that was surmised: and the whispers were seldom to the absentee’s credit. There is indeed one fence, behind which you may retire from the arrows of foul-mouthed slander, and this is the golden saying, ‘They talk what they please, well, let them talk on, what care I?’ Whoever chooses may, if he is able, retire behind this bulwark; but you will please to observe, that it is impossible for a young lady, who sets the smallest value on her reputation. Friedbert, grieved beyond measure that his mistress had so foiled him, hesitated between two schemes, whether he should retire to his hermitage, or take a ​walk into the east, and lie perdue at the sources of the Nile. While he was deliberating with himself on this difficulty, prince Isidor of Paros, who held of the Despot of the Cyclades at Naxos, arrived for the purpose of celebrating his nuptials with Miss Irene, sister to the fair Callista. Great preparations were made for the rejoicings, which were to conclude with a splendid tournament. The hero from Swabia felt his antient military courage roused at this news. He was a sufferer both from disappointment and listlessness; of course he wanted diversion, and expected to find it at the appointed games, to which knights of every country were invited by proclamation in the market-place of the city, and at all the cross roads. In his own country he had no pretensions to enter the lists; and had he presumed to intrude among the knights, he would have been infallibly exposed to public scorn and mockery. But at this distance he thought he ran no risque by investing himself, under ​patronage of a full purse, with those conventional privileges that adhere to birth. Friedbert acted the knight in Naxos with at least as much dignity and grace as an English taylor does mi lord at Paris, or a runaway valet the Marquis at a German court. He arrayed himself in armour without bearing or device: a knightly steed, well instructed in the manege, was purchased at an high price. On the day of tilting he was admitted within the lists. His imagination, it is true, played him an unforeseen trick: The space inclosed for the tilting, and the amphitheatre, which arose gradually seat above seat, and was filled with numberless spectators, recalled the idea of the tremendous oven; but sometimes, in time of danger, a faint heart serves for a spur to valour. The self-created knight continued firm in the saddle, broke a lance with honour, and merited a knightly recompence, which he received from the hand of the bride. On this occasion, he had also the honour of kissing the beautiful Zoe’s hand, ​whom the common etiquette of courts had left in the possession of titular beauty, as an Ex-minister is still styled His Excellency, though the tooth of time had gnawn away every one of the good lady’s charms, and Apelles could now only use her as a model for a fine old head. He assumed, on his introduction to her, the character of an Italian knight. And whether Zoe still retained a predilection for travellers of this denomination, or perceived the ring that had once been hers, now sparkling with its heart-shaped ruby on the adventurer’s finger, he met with the most welcome reception; she seemed, indeed, to take a singular fancy to him. When the tumult of the marriage rejoicings was over, the princess quitted the court, and retired to the silent residence of her palace: but Friedbert received permission to enter the monastic sanctuary, a privilege confined to a few confidential friends; and Zoe by degrees came to regard him with the affection of a parent. As they were once walk​ing among the trees in the park, she drew him aside, and said, ‘I have a boon to beg, sir knight, which you must not refuse: Tell me how you got possession of the ring you wear on the little finger of your left hand. That ring was formerly mine.—I know not how or when I lost it; and I long exceedingly to know how it came into your hands.’ ‘Noble lady,’ replied the artful adventurer, ‘I honourably gained the ring at a tilting match, from a valiant knight, whom I vanquished in my own country; and who unhappily lost his life on the occasion. But how he came by it, whether it was the prize of war, purchased from a Jew, received as the recompence of knighthood, or inherited from his predecessors, I am not able to inform you.’ ‘What would you do,’ replied Zoe, ‘should I demand it as my property?’ ‘It would ill become the gallantry of our knightly profession to refuse a lady’s request.’——‘Yet I do not ​desire as a present what you nobly acquired in war: I will recompense you according to your estimation of the jewel; and moreover always retain a deep sense of the obligation.’
Friedbert was by no means disconcerted at the requisition; he rather rejoiced that his plan had so well succeeded. ‘Your wishes,’ he proceeded, ‘virtuous princess, are to me an inviolable law. I pledge my blood and property to you, on the honour of a knight; these I will freely risque whenever you require; only do not desire me to violate my oath, and wrong my conscience. After gaining the ring in an hard and doubtful combat, I made a solemn vow, and engaged the salvation of my precious soul, never to quit the ring, till I had bestowed it as the pledge of my hand and heart, before the holy altar, in token of matrimonial fidelity. I can only be absolved from this oath by fulfilling it. But if you are disposed to assist me therein, I can have ​no objection to your applying to my bride, and receiving back from her hand your former property.’ ‘Fairly spoken,’ replied Zoe; ‘choose from among my attendants a virgin that finds favour in your eyes: she shall be furnished with a liberal dower, on condition that she forego the jewel, and place it on my finger as soon as she receives it from your hand. I will also exalt you to great honour and high trust.’
No sooner was this secret treaty ratified, than the princess’s nunnery changed to an harem. She invited every beauty of the country, and placed them in her train. She attired them in splendid cloaths, and attempted to exalt their natural charms, by the unnatural appendage of tawdry tinsel, tortured and twisted according to the rules of fashion. For she was just as much mistaken as our fair contemporaries, who think the gilded frame, and not the painting, sells the picture; though daily experience evinces, that a court dress as little ​promotes love, as the stiff brocade of our Lady of Loretto inspires devotion. A plain decent dishabille is the proper uniform of love—it makes more conquests than a cuirass of jewels, or an head-piece of point and gauze, with the addition of triumphant plumes, which gain no victory. Friedbert floated in a stream of pleasure, but did not suffer himself to be hurried away by it. In the tumult of the restoration of the court, amid song, and dance, and music, the wrinkles of sorrow still furrowed his brow. For him did the fairest maids of Greece adorn themselves, that like armed magnets they might attract his heart more forcibly: nevertheless he remained cold and unmoved. Respecting the theory of love, Zoe had herself always followed the doctrine of her countryman, the sage Plato—whether from inclination, or because the watchful jealousy of her despotic husband allowed her passions no freer scope, may be hard to decide; but to a knight in full blood, she thought the sensual system of Epicurus ​much better adapted; therefore she disposed every thing with the view of entrapping his heart through the medium of his senses. But she found herself mistaken in her speculations. Neither Epicurean sensuality, nor the more refined and sentimental purity of Platonic love, seemed to be the system for him: he appeared rather to be a strict adherent of the Stoics—a discovery which raised no small astonishment, while it afforded but faint hopes of the ring.
In this state of indecision several months had elapsed, when the impatient dame thought it high time to hold a conference with her knight, for so she used to call him, on the concerns of his heart. On the day when the return of spring was celebrated, and all her virgins, adorned with recent flowers, were engaged in the choral dance, she found him pensive and alone. He was amusing himself in an arbour, with a pastime symbolical of unsuccessful love—plucking and tearing to pieces fresh blown flowers. ‘Unfeeling knight!’ she ​exclaimed, as she approached, ‘has the bloom of nature such little charms for you, that you cannot employ yourself better than in tearing to pieces her earliest presents, and profaning the feast of Flora? Is your heart so incapable of every soft and amiable affection, that neither the flowers of my garden, nor the blooming race of the virgins of my court, can make a tender impression upon it? Why do you remain in this solitary arbour, when Joy is calling you aloud to yon festive hall, and Love smiles in every blossom, and peeps from all the social bowers of this garden? But if your sadness springs from the tender passion, make me acquainted with your secret pain, if perchance it lies within my power to satisfy the cravings of your heart.’ ‘Your sagacity, discreet Zoe,’ replied Friedbert, ‘has pierced the recesses of my soul: you judge very justly that a latent fire glows within my bosom: nor do I know, whether I should feed ​it with the oil of hope, or whether it will consume the marrow of my bones. Towards every virgin that celebrates the feast of Flora in the sprightly choral dance, my heart is insensible and cold. The divine maid, to whom I have devoted my enraptured heart, does not move in that circle of chearful dancers: yet I have discovered her in your palace; but perhaps she is only a creature of the glowing imagination of the painter. Yet cannot believe that the artist could have invented such a portrait: no, the master hand of nature must needs have traced the original traits of so glorious a copy.’
The princess was impatient to learn what picture had made so strange an impression on the young adventurer. ‘Follow me,’ said she, ‘this instant into the palace: let me know whether the caprice of Cupid is making sport with your heart, by offering you a cloud instead of a Goddess, for his malice is unbounded; or whether, contrary to his custom, ​he has dealt honestly, and destined you a substantial prize in his lottery.’ Zoe had a select collection of paintings, partly works of the greatest masters, and partly family pieces. Among the former were portraits of the most celebrated Grecian beauties of every age: among the latter was her own form, represented in various attitudes and employments, with all those youthful charms which she possessed while she yet visited the fairy waters. A gleam of vanity—for vanity will sometimes adhere to the sex beyond the grand climacteric—a recollection of her former splendor amid the present decay, suggested the idea, that probably her own portrait had enchanted Friedbert’s imagination; and she felt the glow of secret satisfaction, when she fancied herself saying to him, ‘Friend, I am myself the original of that painting.’ The idea of his astonishment, when the powerful spell should thus break, gave her great glee by anticipation. Sir Slyboots, however, was too sure of his ​aim: he had no apprehension, whatever he pretended, of an illusion of the painter. He well knew that the original existed in nature, and was far more beautiful than the imitation by the artist: he was only ignorant where it was to be found, and how he could get it into his possession.
On entering the gallery he flew with fiery impatience towards the beloved portrait, and throwing himself into the attitude of worship: ‘Behold here the goddess of my devotion; where is she to be found? On your lips, discreet princess, hangs my destiny—decide whether I am to live or die. If I am deceived by a bewitching phantom, let me sink lifeless at your feet: but if my own presentiments justify the choice of my heart, discover to me what land or people possesses this jewel, that I may sally forth in quest of my mistress, and gain her favour by knightly atchievements.’ The venerable princess was not a little disconcerted at this unexpected discovery: a serious air overshadowed her face, whose ​well-proportioned oval—for so much of her former self remained—had been hitherto rounded by a whimsical idea; but it was now elongated a good inch in the line from the forehead to the chin: ‘Inconsiderate young man,’ said she, ‘how could you devote your heart to a mistress, of whom you know not whether she has ever existed, whether she is your contemporary, and still less whether she can return your love? Your presentiments have not deceived you indeed; this fair portrait is neither a fiction nor the monument of a beauty of past ages; it belongs to a young maiden, whose name is Callista—once, alas! my darling daughter! but now a wretch deserving pity. She can never be yours: her bosom glows with an inextinguishable flame for a villain, whom a space of many hundred miles separates from her; for though she has had firmness to escape from his insidious wiles, yet she still doats upon him, and now, in the re​tirement of a cloister, weeps over her untoward fate, and is utterly unsusceptible of any other affection.’ Friedbert, at this fragment of Zoe’s family history, affected an air of amazement, but was glad in his heart that he had detected the abode of his mistress; still more was he rejoiced at so irreproachable a testimony, from her mother’s own mouth, of the princess’s affection for her humble servant. He did not fail to extort from the open-hearted dowager, a full account of this singular adventure. She gratified his apparent curiosity with an allegorical history; nor had he any difficulty in unravelling the secret meaning.
‘Callista,’ she related, ‘was one day walking on the sea shore with her sisters, whom curiosity had led to visit an unfrequented shore beyond the limits of their mother’s residence. A corsair lay at anchor beyond an eminence of the winding coast. The careless maidens apprehended no danger, when a pirate jumped ​from his lurking-place, overtook the hindmost of the party, bore her on board his ship, and carried her away, while her light-heeled sisters escaped. He tried a thousand arts to insinuate himself into her good graces; and succeeded but too well in stealing away her heart: she forgot the dignity of her birth, and was on the point of binding herself to the traitor by the indissoluble contract, when a propitious wind brought a boat to the strand. The idea of her country, and the tears her mother was shedding on her account, rushed into her mind: she gave ear to the voice of duty, and seized the oportunity of escaping from captivity. But the irresistible passion, which had taken possession of her heart, pursued her by land and sea: it has sunk deep traces of sorrow in her breast, and banished all the sprightliness of youth. The spark of her pining eyes is ready to expire: and melancholy will soon unite her with the grave, which ​she has chosen for her bridegroom.’ ‘If so,’ interrupted Friedbert, ‘her grave shall be mine. My life is in my own hand; who shall hinder me from dying with the beautiful Callista? I only request one favour, that my body may be interred near her; so shall my shade watch over her grave. Yet indulge me first with the melancholy consolation of declaring to her that she is the lady of my heart; I will deliver her the ring as the pledge of my fidelity, in order to be absolved from my vow; and you may then receive it as the inheritance of your daughter.’
Mother Zoe was so affected by this pathetic declaration on the part of the youthful knight, that she refrained not from tears. And she set so high a value on the ring, that she could not refuse his request. She was only afraid that in the present situation of her heart the young lady would not receive so ambiguous a present. Friedbert, however, was ​able to convince her that such a piece of gallantry was not inconsistent with the strictest notions of the ladies respecting the inviolable sanctity of prior engagements. She therefore yielded to his entreaty, and furnished him with a written order to the abbess, to be admitted to an audience with the inconsoleable Callista. Friedbert set out early, hope and doubt spurred on his steed, for he was impatient to know how his mistress would receive him. Circumstances seemed to indicate that she would pardon his theft of the veil. He entered the virgin’s cell with a beating heart; the young lady was sitting on a sofa, with her face turned from the door; her hair fell in natural ringlets down her shoulders, and was only negligently bound with a sky-blue ribband. Her sunk eye, and features, seemed to betray deep melancholy; her head was supported on her lily-white arm. She took but little notice of the person who approached; yet his unaccustomed tread impressed her ​with the idea of a more important message than a salutation from her mother, or an enquiry after her health. She lifted up her lovely eyes, and recognized the stranger, who lay at her feet. Wonder and amazement produced an involuntary movement; she started like a roe, which takes flight on the appearance of danger. He seized her delicate hand with rapture; but she repelled him with an angry gesture. ‘Away from me, perfidious man! it is enough that thou hast once deceived me; wouldst thou practise the same arts a second time?’ Friedbert had looked for such a squall at the onset: he was not therefore overset. He brought the defence of his amorous theft, with the talent of persuasion peculiar to lovers, home to Callista’s bosom, in which he hoped to find a powerful advocate; and as nothing is more easily excused, than offences committed from excess of passion, if the parties are agreed in the main, even should the dispute relate to a weightier offence than ​stealing a veil, every new reason tended more and more to appease the damsel’s wrath. As soon as he discovered that his arguments in mitigation of the theft found admittance into her heart, he was no longer in dread lest she should take flight, either out at the door or through the window. The palpable proof of his fidelity, his journey after her from Swabia to the Cyclades, and her persuasion that he would have followed her to the world’s end, procured him at last full forgiveness. The lady avowed her love, and agreed to share the lot of life with him.
Victory over so many obstacles put the forgiven Friedbert in such extacy, that he was unable to grasp the measure of his happiness. He hurried back, attended by his lovely mistress, and intoxicated with joy, to the palace of her mother. Zoe was strangely surprized, that the melancholy Callista should so suddenly have abandoned her resolution of mourning away life apart from human society; for on her entrance ​into her mother’s apartment not a vestige of sadness could be perceived on her brow. Friedbert had nearly fallen a second time into the suspicion of practising magic, especially when the old lady was assured by the parties, that the preliminaries to an indissoluble union were as good as signed; for she had never imagined that the vow of the wandering knight to deliver a ring to the lady of his heart, aimed at the conquest of her heart, especially as she supposed an earlier competitor had taken possession of it, and in proof of his right had kindled fire on the altar, as on his own property. However high the stranger stood in the princess’s good graces, this predilection had no influence on her royal prejudices in favour of high birth; and before Zoe gave her final consent, she required the adventurer to submit to a regular proof of his pedigree. Now though at Naxos, as well as elsewhere, there are genealogical smiths, in whose shop he might have had a brazen table ​of progenitors fabricated with little trouble, of a length and breadth suitable to the formality, yet he prudently rested his pretensions to be admitted into so illustrious a family on the testimony of love, who, as he said, pairs like with like, and does not couple the jackdaw with the eagle, nor the owl with the ostrich. In saying this he appealed to his sword, as an irreproachable evidence, ready to maintain, against an host of gainsayers, the honour of his birth. Zoe found nothing to object to the validity of these proofs, especially as she observed, that the stranger knight had awakened Callista’s sensibility, in which case a prudent mother, unless she is disposed wantonly to disturb the family peace, has no alternative but to approve her dear daughter’s choice, and totally to forego the maternal prerogative of controuling the concerns of the virgin’s heart.
Miss Callista dubbed honest Friedbert a Tetrarch in Swabia, with as good a right as his holiness creates bishops and prelates in partibus, and under this splendid ​title he led her to the altar, where she received the ring, and the day after consummation faithfully restored it to her longing mother. The new-created Tetrarch no longer hesitated to unfold the true history of the ring to the princess, his mother-in-law. He related fully how he acquired it by right of inheritance, as a relic of father Benno; and on this occasion he went fully into the history of the venerable hermit. Zoe returned this honest declaration with equal ingenuousness. She owned that she had designedly left the ring in her glove at the side of the Swans pool; adding, that father Benno had rightly unravelled the secret sense of the hieroglyphic: it was no fault of hers that she did not repeat the visit to the pool; but the adventure was betrayed to her husband by a loquacious cousin, who attended her on that occasion; upon which he flew into so violent a rage, that he got possession of the magic veil, and tore it in his first fury into a thousand pieces, by which her return to the magic bath was rendered ​impossible. The persevering patience of the faithful hermit gave her much satisfaction, and she rewarded it by a tender remembrance of the good old father. And as it appeared from the bridegroom’s narrative that he himself had occasioned the stealing of the veil, which had served him to good purpose, he obtained so much more readily full pardon from the kind lady; and his services to her beloved Benno made her value her Swabian son-in-law to the day of her death.
Friedbert lived with his ever-blooming spouse in the enjoyment of wedded happiness, such as now-a-days is only found in the fondest reveries of enthusiastic love, which always pictures the thorny copse of wedlock as a garden of roses. Callista only lamented that she could not impart the glorious prerogative of the magic bath to her husband, for when she celebrated the five-and-twentieth anniversary of her golden wedding-day, his brown locks had faded, and the points were acquiring a silvery hue, as the first sprinkling of snow ​on the mountain tops betokens the approach of winter. The beautiful Callista was, on the contrary, still fresh as a rose-bud in the finest days of spring.
Tradition does not inform us whether the connubial felicity of the tender pair continued undisturbed, even at the trying period when winter and spring met; or whether, according to the common course of nature when two opposite seasons contend, sunshine alternated with sleet and squalls. But if we may believe report, the ladies of Lyons have so warmly patronized the aëronauts, and subscribed so liberally towards aërostatical experiments, for no other reason, than in order to use this noble invention by way of a packet-boat, in which they might speedily and conveniently perform journies to the distant well of beauty, and under favour of a proper pedigree prove its efficacy, if Monsieur Pilatre de Rozier can but be prevailed upon to put his hand to the helm.
END OF THE FIRST VOLUME.
* ↑ Genesis, xxiv. 15.——T.
* ↑ The conquerors may have numbered the slain by dozens, like larks, because the Leipsic burghers, on the side of Margrave, compared the campaign to lark-catching, from the easiness of the victory.
* ↑ This expression alludes to a singular and edifying institution of the once beautiful Maria Theresa. Having, it seems, outlived the memory of the feelings of her youth, her devout age was scandalized by the gallantries of her loving subjects, or else she envied them the keen pleasures she could no longer enjoy. She therefore determined to suppress the desires of her Austrians by the dread of punishment. Every guest that tasted of the feast of love before grace was said, suffered as severely as if he had taken away his neighbour’s property or life. A court of chastity was established: spies and informers beset the haunts of Venus, and watched with malicious satisfaction every amorous glance, and every gesture which betrayed the feelings of nature. What pity that Maria Theresa did not live in time to be celebrated by the unfeeling sanctity of St. Jerome or some other monkish declaimer against the sins of the flesh!——T.
* ↑ Glafey, the historian, warrants this anecdote.
* ↑ The taste of the ladies has now undergone a memorable change, as is well known, in favour of the gentleman of the smooth chin.
* ↑ These remains are still visible, according to Tournefort.
* ↑ I shall only inform the reader, that this passage stands exactly thus in the original, and leave him to make his own reflections upon it.——T.
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