tar or a book, tall and
beautiful as an angel, and I was only half conscious whether I were
awake or dreaming.

Thus, once as I was passing a summer-house on my way to work, I was
singing to myself--

"I gaze around me, going
By forest, dale, and lea,
O'er heights where streams are flowing,
My every thought bestowing,
Ah, Lady fair, on thee!"--

when, through the half-opened lattice of the cool, dark summer-house
buried amid flowers, I saw the sparkle of a pair of beautiful,
youthful eyes. I was so startled that I could not finish my song, but
passed on to my work without looking round.

In the evening--it was Saturday, and, in joyous anticipation of the
coming Sunday, I was standing, fiddle in hand, at the window of
the gardener's house, still thinking of the sparkling eyes--the
lady's-maid came tripping through the twilight--"The gracious Lady
fair sends you this to drink her health, and a 'Good-Night' besides!"
And in a twinkling she put a flask of wine on the window-sill and
vanished among the flowers and shrubs like a lizard.

I stood looking at the wonderful flask for a long time, not knowing
what to think. And if before I played the fiddle merrily, I now
played it ten times more so, and I sang the song of the Lady fair all
through, and all the other songs that I knew, until the nightingales
wakened outside and the moon and stars lit up the garden. Ah, that was
a lovely night!

No cradle-song tells the child's future; a blind hen finds many a
grain of wheat; he laughs best who laughs last; the unexpected often
happens; man proposes, God disposes: thus did I meditate the next day,
sitting in the garden with my pipe, and as I looked down at myself I
seemed to myself to be a downright dunce. Contrary to all my habits
hitherto, I now rose betimes every day, before the gardener and the
other assistants were stirring. It was most beautiful then in the
garden. The flowers, the fountains, the rose-bushes, the whole place,
glittered in the morning sunshine like pure gold and jewels. And in
the avenues of huge beeches it was as quiet, cool, and solemn as
a church, only the little birds fluttered around and pecked in the
gravel paths. In front of the castle, just under the windows, there
was a large bush in full bloom. Thither I used to go in the early
morning, and crouch down beneath the branches where I could watch the
windows, for I had not the courage to appear in the open. Thence I
sometimes saw