These, a
little lower down, reunited into a narrower and yet swifter stream--a
small fierce river, which presently, at one reckless bound, shot into the
air, to tumble to a valley a thousand feet below, shattered into spray as
it fell.
"The chalet stood alone. The village was at no great distance, but not a
house was visible from any of its windows. It had no garden. The meadow,
one blaze of colour, softened by the green of the mingling grass, came up
to its wooden walls, and stretched from them down to the rocky bank of
the river, in many parts to the very water's-edge. The chalet stood like
a yellow rock in a green sea. The meadow was the drawing-room where the
lady generally received us.
"One lovely evening, I strolled out of the hostelry, and went walking up
the road that led to the village of Auerbach, so named from the stream
and the meadow I have described. The moon was up, and promised the
loveliest night. I was in no haste, for the lady had, in our common
hearing, said, she was going to pass that night with a friend, in a town
some ten miles away. I dawdled along therefore, thinking only to greet
the place, walk with the stream, and lie in the meadow, sacred with the
shadow of her demonian presence. Quit of the restless hope of seeing her,
I found myself taking some little pleasure in the things about me, and
spent two hours on the way, amid the sound of rushing water, now
swelling, now sinking, all the time.
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