ul tradition
which belongs to Liebenstein and Sternfels.

You must imagine then, dear Gertrude (said Trevylyan), a beautiful
summer day, and by the same faculty that none possess so richly as
yourself, for it is you who can kindle something of that divine spark
even in me, you must rebuild those shattered towers in the pomp of old;
raise the gallery and the hall; man the battlements with warders, and
give the proud banners of ancestral chivalry to wave upon the walls. But
above, sloping half down the rock, you must fancy the hanging gardens of
Liebenstein, fragrant with flowers, and basking in the noonday sun.

On the greenest turf, underneath an oak, there sat three persons, in the
bloom of youth. Two of the three were brothers; the third was an orphan
girl, whom the lord of the opposite tower of Sternfels had bequeathed
to the protection of his brother, the chief of Liebenstein. The castle
itself and the demesne that belonged to it passed away from the female
line, and became the heritage of Otho, the orphan's cousin, and the
younger of the two brothers now seated on the turf.

"And oh," said the elder, whose name was Warbeck, "you have twined a
chaplet for my brother; have you not, dearest Leoline, a simple flower
for me?"

The beautiful orphan (for beautiful she was, Gertrude, as the heroine of
the tale you bid me tell ought to be,--should she not have to the dreams
of my fancy your lustrous hair, and your sweet smile, and your eyes
of blue, that are never, never silent? Ah, pardon me, that in a former
tale, I denied the heroine the beauty of your face, and remember that to
atone for it, I endowed her with the beauty of your mind)--the beautiful
orphan blushed to her temples, and culling from the flowers in her lap
the freshest of the roses, began weaving them into a wreath for Warbeck.

"It would be better," said the gay Otho, "to make my sober brother a
chaplet of the rue and cypress; the rose is much too bright a flower for
so serious a knight."

Leoline held up her hand reprovingly.

"Let him laugh, dearest cousin," said Warbeck, gazing passionately on
her changing cheek; "and thou, Leoline, believe that the silent stream
runs the deepest."

At this moment, they heard the voice of the old chief, their father,
calling aloud for Leoline; for ever when he returned from the chase
he wanted her gentle presence; and the hall was solitary to him if the
light sound of her step and the music of her voice wer