For not in resistance, which is only the form and the cloak, but in self-surrender, does Heyse see the essence of womanhood and woman's true nature; and adorer of nature as he is, he does honor to Eros as the irresistible one who breaks through all barriers. Woman never regrets having subjected herself to his power, but she may repent her defiance. Bettina, somewhere in her letters, makes about the following remark, "The strawberries I plucked I have forgotten; but those I left untouched are still branded on my soul." Heyse has made more than one variation on this theme; after the maiden of Treppi has repented her youthful coyness during seven long years, chance brings the object of her affections once more to her native village, and she overcomes, by virtue of an enthusiastic and superstitious conviction of the power and justice of her love, all external and internal obstacles, even the indifference and coldness of the returned wanderer himself. Madelina, in the "Reise nach dem Glück," as before mentioned, has driven her lover at night from her door, and having been compelled to ride away in the dark, he had a fall from his horse which killed him on the spot. Remorse for this defiance of love gives her no rest. "Of what avail was my virtue?" said she; "it was sound and whole, and by no means threadbare; and yet it chilled me to the innermost recesses of my heart."[14] It is not enough, though, that she regrets having followed the dictates of conventional morality: the image of the deceased haunts her year after year; it seems to be jealously watching over her each time in her life that she thinks it possible to forget the past, and find happiness anew; she hears the finger of the dead man knocking at the door, as he knocked that night she drove him from her. Severe are the punishments of Eros for those who do not sacrifice on his altar. And Heyse in other of his creations still further amplifies this idea. Here the repulsed lover meets his death, simply as an accidental result of the rigor shown him by the being for whose presence he yearned so ardently. Let us suppose the case to be one where, instead of an humble petitioner, one who threatens violence approaches, and that the resistance of the proud woman be not based on a sense of duty that conquers temptation, but is merely self-defence at the time of a dreaded invasion, how then? Even then Eros bestows chastisement, as a zealous god. The drama "Die Sabinerinnen" (The Sabine Women) was evidently written by Heyse for the sake of one single character. How, otherwise, could it have occurred to him to choose for tragic treatment this purely burlesque material, so little adapted to tragedy. This character is Tullia, the Sabine king's daughter. Carried off by a Roman warrior, held captive in his house, she kills him, when, on the bridal night, he dares approach her. If a tragic woe should now befall the rash woman in order that the Roman might be avenged, no one