stle of Schweppenbourg,
which our party failed not to visit.

Gertrude felt fatigued on their return, and Trevylyan sat by her in the
little inn, while Vane went forth, with the curiosity of science, to
examine the strata of the soil.

They conversed in the frankness of their plighted troth upon those
topics which are only for lovers: upon the bright chapter in the history
of their love; their first meeting; their first impressions; the little
incidents in their present journey,--incidents noticed by themselves
alone; that life _within_ life which two persons know together,--which
one knows not without the other, which ceases to both the instant they
are divided.

"I know not what the love of others may be," said Gertrude, "but
ours seems different from all of which I have read. Books tell us of
jealousies and misconstructions, and the necessity of an absence, the
sweetness of a quarrel; but we, dearest Albert, have had no experience
of these passages in love. _We_ have never misunderstood each other;
_we_ have no reconciliation to look back to. When was there ever
occasion for me to ask forgiveness from you? Our love is made up only of
one memory,--unceasing kindness! A harsh word, a wronging thought, never
broke in upon the happiness we have felt and feel."

"Dearest Gertrude," said Trevylyan, "that character of our love is
caught from you; you, the soft, the gentle, have been its pervading
genius; and the well has been smooth and pure, for you were the spirit
that lived within its depths."

And to such talk succeeded silence still more sweet,--the silence of
the hushed and overflowing heart. The last voices of the birds, the sun
slowly sinking in the west, the fragrance of descending dews, filled
them with that deep and mysterious sympathy which exists between Love
and Nature.

It was after such a silence--a long silence, that seemed but as a
moment--that Trevylyan spoke, but Gertrude answered not; and, yearning
once more for her sweet voice, he turned and saw that she had fainted
away.

This was the first indication of the point to which her increasing
debility had arrived. Trevylyan's heart stood still, and then beat
violently; a thousand fears crept over him; he clasped her in his
arms, and bore her to the open window. The setting sun fell upon her
countenance, from which the play of the young heart and warm fancy
had fled, and in its deep and still repose the ravages of disease were
darkly visible. What