he comes to me and ofttimes he frightens me as though I were again a
little child.

'Brothers and cousins, too, were mine and played with me on the yellow
sands beneath the blue sea.

'Merry were our lives and free, for the sorrows of mortals came not
near to us. We had no soul, the gift God gives to every mortal, and
without a soul no pain could enter into our lives.

'Yet my father, the King of the Ocean, longed that I, his only
daughter, should gain the great gift which is given to every mortal.
And this he wished, though well he knew that to mortals was given,
with the gift of a soul, the power to suffer.

'An Undine can gain a soul in one way alone. She must love and be
loved by one of mortal birth.

'You, Huldbrand, you have given me my soul, and should you now despise
me or drive me from you, I should suffer even as one of your own race.

'Yet if you care not to have an Undine for your wife, leave me, and I
will plunge into the waters. Then Kühleborn, my uncle, who brought me
a merry happy child to the fisherman, will come and carry me back to
my ocean home. There will I live, loving, sorrowing, for into the
depths of the blue sea will I carry my new-won soul.'

Then Huldbrand forgot everything save the great love he bore his fair
wife Undine. He took her in his arms and carried her across the
little stream, whispering to her that she should never leave him.