It was--the lovely
Lady fair! She was standing in the garden, in a black velvet gown,
lifting her veil from her face with one hand, and looking abroad
over a distant and beautiful landscape. The longer I looked the more
vividly did it seem to be the castle garden, and the flowers and
boughs waved in the wind, while in the depths of green I could see
my little toll-house, and the high-road, and the Danube, and in the
distance the blue mountains.
"'Tis she! 'tis she!" I exclaimed at last, and, seizing my hat, I
ran out of the door and down the long staircase, while the astonished
painter called after me to come back toward evening, and we might
perhaps learn something more.
CHAPTER VIII
I ran in a great hurry through the city to present myself immediately
at the house, in the garden of which the Lady fair had been singing
yesterday evening. The streets were full of people; gentlemen and
ladies were enjoying the sunshine and exchanging greetings, elegant
coaches rolled past, and the bells in all the towers were summoning
to mass, making wondrous melody in the air above the heads of the
swarming crowd. I was intoxicated with delight, and with the hubbub,
and ran on in my joy until at last I had no idea where I was. It was
like enchantment; the quiet Square with the fountain, and the garden
and the house, seemed the fabric of a dream, which had vanished in the
clear light of day.
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