waiting till it should reappear, and fearful that the slightest motion,
or even the flutter of my breath, might frighten it away. Thus have I
often started from a pleasant dream, and then kept quiet, in hopes to
wile it back. Deep were my musings, as to the race and attributes of
that ethereal being. Had I created her? Was she the daughter of my
fancy, akin to those strange shapes which peep under the lids of
children's eyes? And did her beauty gladden me, for that one moment, and
then die? Or was she a water-nymph within the fountain, or fairy, or
woodland goddess peeping over my shoulder, or the ghost of some forsaken
maid, who had drowned herself for love? Or, in good truth, had a lovely
girl, with a warm heart, and lips that would bear pressure, stolen softly
behind me, and thrown her image into the spring?

I watched and waited, but no vision came again. I departed, but with a
spell upon me, which drew me back, that same afternoon, to the haunted
spring. There was the water gushing, the sand sparkling, and the sunbeam
glimmering. There the vision was not, but only a great frog, the hermit
of that solitude, who immediately withdrew his speckled snout and made
himself invisible, all except a pair of long legs, beneath a stone.
Methought he had a devilish look! I could have slain him!

Thus did the Vision leave me; and many a doleful day succeeded to the
parting moment. By the spring, and in the wood, and on the hill, and
through the village; at dewy sunrise, burning noon, and at that magic
hour of sunset, when she had vanished from my sight, I sought her, but in
vain. Weeks came and went, months rolled away, and she appeared not in
them. I imparted my mystery to none, but wandered to and fro, or sat in
solitude, like one that had caught a glimpse of heaven, and could take no
more joy on earth. I withdrew into an inner world, where my thoughts
lived and breathed, and the Vision in the midst of them. Without