rate them from each other. It was humiliating, it was
annihilating. But for Sophie? No, how could he, after that, declare the
love of his heart? how far below her should he be placed, as the child
of poverty and shame! But the mother of the family? Yes, she was gentle
and kind; with a maternal sentiment she extended to him her hand, and
looked upon him as on a near relation. His thoughts raised themselves on
high, his hands folded themselves to prayer; "The will of the Lord
alone be done!" trembled involuntarily from his lips. Courage returned
refreshingly to his heart. The help of man was like the spark which
was soon extinguished; God was an eternal torch, which illumined the
darkness and could guide him through it.

"Almighty God! thou alone canst and willest!" said he; "to thou who
knowest the heart, do thou alone help and lead me!"

This determination was firmly taken; to no human being would he confide
himself; alone would he release the prisoner, and give her up to
Heinrich. He thought upon the future, and yet darker and heavier than
hitherto it stood before him. But he who confides in God can never
despair the only thing that was now to be done was to obtain the key of
the chamber where Sidsel was confined, and then when all in the house
were asleep he would dare that which must be done.

Courage and tranquillity return into every powerful soul when it once
sees the possibility of accomplishing its work. With a constrained
vivacity Otto mingled in the conversation, no one imagining what a
struggle his soul had passed through.

The disputation continued. Wilhelm was in one of his eloquent moods. The
doctor regarded the "Letters of the Wandering Ghost" as one of the most
perfect books in the Danish literature. Once Sophie had been of the same
opinion, now she preferred Cooper's novels to this and all other books.

"People so easily forget the good for the new," said Wilhelm; "if the
new is only somewhat astonishing, the many regard the author as the
first of writers. The nation is, aesthetically considered, now in its
period of development. Every really cultivated person, who stands among
the best spirits of his age, obtains, whilst he observes his own advance
in the intellectual kingdom, clearness with regard to the development
of his nation. This has, like himself, its distinct periods; in him
some important event in life, in it some agitating world convulsion,
may advance them suddenly a great leap forward.