asp, and implanted two rapturous kisses on them. She snatched her hand
hastily away, closed the window with a sharp bang, and I was alone once
more in my darkness, but in such a flutter of blissful delight that even
the last reproving gesture could scarcely pain me. It mattered little to
me that day that the lightning felled a great pine and threw it across
the road, that the torrents were so swollen that we only could pass
them with crowds of peasants around the carriage with ropes and poles
to secure it, that four oxen were harnessed in front of our leaders to
enable us to meet the hurricane, or that the postboys were paid treble
their usual fare for all their perils to life and limb. I cared for none
of these, Enough for me that, on this day, I can say with Schiller,

"Ich habe genossen das irdische Gluck,
Ich habe gelebt and geliebt!"

CHAPTER XXIII. JEALOUSY UNSUPPORTED BY COURAGE

We arrived at a small inn on the bordera of the Titi-see at nightfall;
and though the rain continued to come down unceasingly, and huge masses
of cloud hung half-way down the mountain, I could see that the spot was
highly picturesque and romantic. Before I could descend from my lofty
eminence, so strapped and buttoned and buckled up was I, the ladies had
time to get out and reach their rooms. When I asked to be shown mine,
the landlord, in a very free-and-easy tone, told me that there was
nothing for me but a double-bedded room, which I must share with another
traveller. I scouted this proposition at once with a degree of force,
and, indeed, of violence, that I fancied must prove irresistible; but
the stupid German, armed with native impassiveness, simply said, "Take
it or leave it, it's nothing to me," and left me to look after his
business. I stormed and fumed. I asked the chambermaid if she knew who I
was, and sent for the Hausknecht to tell him that all Europe should ring
with this indignity. I more than hinted that the landlord had sealed
his own doom, and that his miserable cabaret had seen its last days of
prosperity.

I asked next, where was the Jew pedler? I felt certain he was a fellow
with pencil-cases and pipe-beads, who owned the other half of the
territory. Could he not be bought up? He would surely sleep in the
cow-house, if it were too wet to go up a tree!

Francois came to inform me that he was out fishing; that he fished all
day, and only came home after dark; his man had told him so much.

"His ma