When I went out, on which occasions it
was necessary that I should be constantly watched by the Argus eyes
of Bendel, it was only to the Forester's Garden, for the sake of one
alone; for my love was the innermost heart of my life.
Oh, my good Chamisso! I will hope that thou hast not yet forgotten
what love is! I leave much unmentioned here to thee. Mina was really
an amiable, kind, good child. I had taken her whole imagination
captive. She could not, in her humility, conceive how she could
be worthy that I should alone have fixed my regard on her; and she
returned love for love with all the youthful power of an innocent
heart. She loved like a woman, offering herself wholly up;
self-forgetting; living wholly and solely for him who was her life;
regardless if she herself perished; that is to say--she really loved.
But I--oh what terrible hours--terrible and yet worthy that I should
wish them back again--have I often wept on Bendel's bosom, when,
after the first unconscious intoxication, I recollected myself, looked
sharply into myself--I, without a shadow, with knavish selfishness
destroying this angel, this pure soul which I had deceived and stolen.
Then did I resolve to reveal myself to her; then did I swear with a
most passionate oath to tear myself from her, and to fly; then did
I burst out into tears, and concert with Bendel how in the evening I
should visit her in the Forester's garden.
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