d by dark firs, which the
former director of the institution had caused to be erected to the
memory of his son, whose premature death was recorded on the stone.

Here the friends met at night, and by the fitful light of the moon
they pledged themselves to the rash and fanciful contract, and
confirmed and consecrated it the next morning by a religious ceremony.
After this they were able to look the approaching separation in the
face more manfully, and Edward strove hard to quell the melancholy
feeling which had lately arisen in his mind on account of the constant
foreboding that Ferdinand expressed of his own early death. "No,"
thought Edward, "his pensive turn of mind and his wild imagination
cause him to reproach himself without a cause for my sorrow and his
own departure. Oh, no, Ferdinand will not die early--he will not die
before me. Providence will not leave me alone in the world."

* * * * *

The lonely Edward strove hard to console himself, for after
Ferdinand's departure, the house, the world itself, seemed a desert;
and absorbed by his own memories, he now recalled to mind many a dark
speech which had fallen from his absent friend, particularly in the
latter days of their intercourse, and which betokened but too plainly
a presentiment of early death. But time and youth exercised, even
over these sorrows, their irresistible influence. Edward's spirits
gradually recovered their tone, and as the traveler always has the
advantage over the one who remains behind, in respect of new objects
to occupy his mind, so was Ferdinand even sooner calmed and cheered,
and by degrees he became engrossed by his new duties and new
acquaintances, not to the exclusion, indeed, of his friend's memory,
but greatly to the alienation of his own sorrow. It was natural, in
such circumstances, that the young officer should console himself
sooner than poor Edward. The country in which Hallberg found
himself was wild and mountainous, but possessed all the charms and
peculiarities of "far off" districts--simple, hospitable manners,
old-fashioned customs, many tales and legends which arise from
the credulity of the mountaineers, who invariably lean toward the
marvelous, and love to people the wild solitudes with invisible
beings.

Ferdinand had soon, without seeking for it, made acquaintance with
several respectable families in the town; and as it generally
happens in such cases, he had become quite domestic