t learned the power of self-control, nor to
bend her will to any higher power. Fortune seemed anxious to spare yet
awhile this warm, loving heart, and to allow her a little longer the
freedom of happy ignorance, before it initiated her into the painful
and tearful mysteries of actual life. Besides this, Elise had
inherited from her father a strong will and dauntless courage, and
behind her bright, dreamy eyes dwelt a proud and spirited soul. Like
her father, her whole soul yearned for freedom and independence;
but the difference between them was, that while she only understood
freedom as applying to herself personally, Gotzkowsky's more capacious
mind comprehended it in its larger and more general sense. She wished
for freedom only for herself; he desired it for his country, and he
would willingly have allowed his own person to be cast into bonds and
fetters, if he could thereby have secured the liberties of the people.
Out of this similarity, as well as from this difference of character,
arose all the discord which occasionally threatened to disturb the
harmony of these two hearts.

Gotzkowsky could not understand the heart of the young maiden, nor
Elise that of the noble patriot. To these two strong and independent
natures there had been wanting the gentle, soothing influence of a
mother's love, acting conciliatingly on both. Elise's mother had died
while she was young, and the child was left to the care of strangers.
Her father could seldom find time to be with his daughter; but,
though seldom personally present, yet his whole soul was faithfully,
unalterably devoted to her. Elise did not suspect this, and in
consequence of seldom seeing or meeting him, and the want of mutual
intercourse, the heart of his daughter became estranged from him, and
in the soul of this young girl, just budding into life, brought up
without companions, in the midst of wealth and plenty, arose at first
the doubt, and later the conviction, of the indifference of her father
toward his only child. But proud as she was, and full of a feeling
of independence, she never met him with a reproach or complaint, but
withdrew into herself, and as she believed herself repelled, strove
also, on her part, to emancipate herself.

"Love cannot be forced, nor can it be had for the asking," said she,
as, yielding sometimes to a natural childish feeling, she felt an
irresistible longing to go to her father, whom she had not seen the
livelong day; to hunt him