"I generally can not paint at all by lamp-light; but this time I found no
difficulty, and I soon recovered that blissful, solemn mood which I had
felt in the presence of the dead. Only now and then it was clouded by a
sigh, or a faint moan from Berenike: 'Gone, gone! There is no comfort--
none, none!'

"And what could I answer? When did Death ever give back what he has
snatched away?

"' I can not even picture her as she was,' she murmured sadly to herself
--but this I might remedy by the help of my art, so I painted on with
increasing zeal; and at last her lamentations ceased to trouble me, for
she fell asleep, and her handsome head sank on her breast. The watchers,
too, had dropped asleep, and only their deep breathing broke the
stillness.

"Suddenly it flashed upon me that I was alone with Korinna, and the
feeling grew stronger and stronger; I fancied her lovely lips had moved,
that a smile gently parted them, inviting me to kiss them. As often as I
looked at them--and they bewitched me--I saw and felt the same, and at
last every impulse within me drove me toward her, and I could no longer
resist: my lips pressed hers in a kiss!"

Melissa softly sighed, but the artist did not hear; he went on: "And in
that kiss I became hers; she took the heart and soul of me. I can no
longer escape from her; awake or asleep, her image is before my eyes, and
my spirit is in her power."

Again he drank, emptying the cup at one deep gulp. Then he went on: