She paused to ponder upon it. And then there was an end to her fervent prayer, and God vanished again. Thus the struggle between faith and doubt continued feverishly, and her soul thirsted for love as did her parched lips for water. Where was there a kind, gentle hand to offer her a cooling draught, and with it the kiss that should refresh her thirsty soul,--such a hand as only a mother has? Ernestine gazed out into the darkness. Her breath came in gasps, her heart beat audibly, but no more kindly tears came to her burning eyes. "O God! my God! why hast thou forsaken me?" was the last moan of her tortured heart; and then she sank into a feverish slumber. CHAPTER VII. DEPARTURE. The autumnal gales had stripped the leaves from the trees; the tall firs in the forest, bordering the spacious brown fields of the Hartwich estate, were the only green on the landscape. Over the cheerless desert plain wandered a lonely little figure, pale and sad as Heine's Last Fairy. Ernestine had so far recovered that she was once more able to brave the autumn wind. She extended her arms, and could not help imagining that they might become wings, that would bear her far, far aloft. She knew it could never really be so; but the thought was so delightful! Up, up, far away from the earth,--it was so sad upon the earth. She was a stranger here, and she felt that her home must be elsewhere. In heaven? Oh, there was no heaven; but in the air--at least, in the air. And she ran on--ran as fast as she could--and her heart throbbed with excitement as the wind whistled in her ears and tossed her clothes about, and her hair. An insatiable yearning--she knew not for what--had driven her out of the house--she knew not whither. There was nothing for her to crave for, and yet she could not help it. She thought she should die of longing! She wished she could dissolve into foam, like the little mermaid, that the daughters of the air might bear her aloft into endless space! And she stood still and gazed up into the gray clouds, and took a long breath. There was no longer anything there for her to aspire to, and she had not yet learned to look within. One vast void around and above her, and forth into this immense void she was driven!