my
father Eutharic, in the large palace garden at Ravenna. There, with the
dead, I sought the love which I did not find in the living; and
whenever I could escape my attendants, I hurried there to indulge in my
longing and to weep. The older I grew, the more this longing increased.
In the presence of my mother I was forced to hide all my feelings; she
despised me if I showed them. As I grew up I saw very well that
people's eyes were fixed upon me as if in admiration; but I thought
that they pitied me, and that pained me.

"And more and more frequently I took refuge by the grave of my father,
until they told my mother that I always wept there and returned quite
disordered. My mother angrily forbade me to go to the grave, and spoke
of contemptible weakness. But I revolted against this prohibition. Then
one day she surprised me there, and struck at me, and yet I was no
longer a child. She took me back to the palace and scolded me
violently, threatening to send me away; and, as she left me, she said
angrily: why had heaven punished her with such a child! That was too
much. Unspeakably miserable, I resolved to run away from this mother,
to whom I was a punishment, and to go where no one knew me, I did not
know whither. I would most gladly have joined my father in his quiet
tomb. When evening came, I stole out of the palace, and hurried once
more to the grave to take a long farewell. The stars were already out.
I slipped out of the garden and the palace, and hastened through the
dark streets to the Faventinian Gate. I managed to slip past the
sentinel, and ran a little way along the high-road, into the night;
straight to misery. But a man in armour came along the road towards me.
As I tried to pass him, he suddenly came up to me, looked into my face,
and gently laid his hand upon my shoulder, saying 'Whither, Lady
Mataswintha, whither goest thon alone, and so late at night?' I
trembled under his hand, tears burst from my eyes, and I cried,
sobbing, 'I am desperate!' Then the man took hold of both my hands and
looked at me; so kindly, so mildly, so sadly! He dried my tears with
his mantle, and said, in a tone of the warmest kindness, 'Wherefore?
what troubles thee so?' I felt both happy and miserable at the sound of
his voice. And as I looked into his kind eyes, I could no longer
control myself. 'Because my mother hates me,' I cried; 'because there
is no love for me on earth!' 'Child, child, thou art sick,' he said,
'and rave