united."

With rapid step and cheerful mind she continued her wandering. She
had now arrived at the darkest and most secluded part of the garden.
Nothing stirred around her, and there was only heard the rustling of
the dark fir-tree moved by the wind, or the melodious note of some
bird hidden in the foliage.

The garden, elsewhere so carefully and artistically tended, stretching
from the Leipsic Street to the Palisades, which surrounded the town
in lieu of a wall at that time, was here overgrown with underwood,
protecting the more beautiful parts like a quickset hedge. But this
bush was, besides, surrounded by a high wall, running immediately next
to the Palisades, and bounding the whole back part of the garden. It
was seldom that any one wandered in this neighborhood, and Elise
was certain, therefore, that no inquisitive eye could watch her, no
treacherous ear listen to her half-whispered words.

She seated herself on a bench under a tree, not far from the wall,
and looked up dreamingly and thoughtfully at the patches of blue
sky visible through the tree-tops. Her whole soul was sunk in
reminiscence. Ah, how often had she sat here, but not alone--not with
this painful longing in her heart, but in the fullest contentment of
happiness, listening with delighted ear to words spoken by him who
sat next to her, holding her hand in his, and gazing on her with looks
which made her heart tremble with happiness! Here, on this spot, he
had taken leave of her, and since then it had become, as it were, the
temple of her recollections, to which she daily made her pilgrimage to
offer up her devout, sincere, and ardent prayer of love.