parents thought of marrying their daughter to a man of distinction,
that through her their name and large fortune might be perpetuated in
the world. When Euphemie first spoke to me on this subject, she was
wholly unembarrassed; her voice was as firm and steady as if she were
speaking of a friend. I felt as if she were relating to me a silly
improbable tale, so pure, exalted, and unattainable had my fancy
painted her. I could almost just as easily have persuaded myself that a
scheme of marriage was projecting with the evening star. But at night,
on my solitary couch, the aspect of affairs took another form: Again
was I doomed to learn, and how painfully! to know myself and the world.
Is she to belong to the world? I asked myself, wherefore then not first
to me? To me, to whom she already belongs, as my soul dwells in hers!

"The concealed ardour, which until now had slumbered in the sweetest
intoxication, burst through its bud and blossomed, and shone forth like
a rare flower, which unfolded a thousand purple leaves. I felt now
thoroughly, for the first time, that what until then I had considered
merely earthly, was of heavenly origin. I deemed myself called upon in
my pure love to renew as a real sacrament, the sublime symbol of
marriage, in such holy perfection as it is seldom, perhaps never, found
on earth. Euphemie was terrified at my plans, my ardent persuasions,
and my enterprising spirit. The more her hesitation, her timidity
increased my passion, the more did I appear to her a strange being,
whom until then she had not known at all. She was to be awakened from
her peaceful repose, thus my love desired it, but she was shocked at
the thought of grieving her parents in any way, to oppose them was with
her an unnatural sin, and all that I urged about elopement, force, and
death, only confused her delicate mind, as in the roaring of the
waterfall no speech can be heard. My high wrought passion grew almost
to frenzy; that she did not love me, that I was hateful to her, that
already she turned her affections on her bridegroom, whom I jealously
cursed, menacing to kill both him and myself: to all these frantic
expressions she listened with a suffering and endearing patience. Thus
then was this heaven destroyed for me, and black demons grinned on me
from the same places, where before my intoxicated ear had heard the
flapping of angel's wings, from whence formerly a sweet smile from a
radiant countenance bloomed on me like