pleasure unspeakable.

If the weather were fine the doctor would sometimes go out in the
mornings also, and then he liked best to take his young wife to the
Ueberhell garden outside the Petersthor, and show her what rare herbs
and fruit-trees his father and grandfather had planted, and Frau Bianca
amused herself by gathering the flowers, or helping her child to pick
the ripe cherries and early pears.

In Bologna she had found it difficult to entice her husband away from
his work, indeed her own father, his master, had held him back, and now
she rejoiced that in the new home he was willing to give her so many
hours of his time, moreover--he had confessed it to her--instead of
the elixir, which she had been taught from childhood to regard as the
worthiest object of research, he was seeking for a medicine that should
cure her.

Autumn came, and the starlings assembled on the Thomaskirche, the storks
in the village, and the swallows on the roof of the neighbour's house to
prepare for their flight towards the south; heavy storms tore the leaves
from the trees, one dull rainy day followed another, and when at last
the mountain-ash berries and the barberries were shining in all their
brightest scarlet, the rosy flush that had been coaxed into the young
wife's cheeks during the long, dry, happy summer changed to a crimson
spot, her eyes acquired a strained, longing, mournful expression, and
after she had had an attack of coughing she would sink together as if
the autumn winds had broken her as they had the stems of the mallow
which were hanging from the trellis in the little garden outside.

Then a day came when the Court physician Olearius found his way into
"The Three Kings." It was in the middle of December and straw was strewn
in the street in front of the Ueberhell house. Those who had held
aloof from the young couple in their happy hours now drew near in their
misfortune. It seemed as if the young Italian had suddenly become the
idol of the inhabitants of Leipsic, so many were the inquiries about her
condition, so numerous the friendly offers of service, the kindly gifts
of hot-house flowers and rare wines. Just as the Christmas bells rang
out along the streets of the city the joyful tidings "Christ is born"
a sharp cry rang through the rooms of The Three Holy Kings and Melchior
knelt beside his blighted flower that now was whiter even than the lily,
for the last shimmer of red had faded forever from her wan cheeks, a