"I was not thinking of myself at the moment," replied Drost Peter, with calm animation, lying back on the green height, his clear blue eye resting on the deep vault of the spring-heaven over his head. "I was thinking of our young heir to the throne, and the little Princess Ingeborg of Sweden. They are already, one may say, bride and bridegroom, although they are yet both children. They played together at that tourney festival where the proud Ingrid gave you her troth, and you, with grave self-confidence, believed you could determine your fortune. It was to me a wonderful thought, when I saw the children playing together, that I knew what neither of them yet could dream of--that these two innocent beings were already secretly destined for one another, and chosen to become the bond of union between two kingdoms and people. It did not in any manner move me: it occurred to me, not as an audacious interference with the designs of Providence by a cold, calculating state policy, or as an unnatural usurpation, as you term it, by short-sighted men; it appeared to me as a mysterious carrying out of God's will, and as if these children had been destined for each other before any of the individuals were in being by whose plans and counsels it should be accomplished. I will not defend these views: I know you will call them fanatical, or even superstitious and foolish; but in the same manner has my own dim destination hitherto come before my eyes. This fanaticism, as you may readily term it, has, thanks to God! preserved me from a bewilderment of heart, that might have driven me mad, or, what were worse, have lost me my peace of mind, here and hereafter." "I believe I guess what you mean, my brave friend," said Sir Thorstenson, heartily shaking his hand. "I will not enter into argument with your pious fancies. Your heart has the least share in your aristocratic bigotry; for, fortunately, your fancies have juggled the heart into a slumber. But ask not that I should regard, in the same calm manner, the dull obstacles to my happiness as a wise ordination. I esteem you fortunate that you really do not experience that vehemence of passion you seem to dread, and which would destroy your world of fancy, quick as a stormblast destroys the glittering cobweb." "All hearts are not alike," replied Drost Peter; and his manly voice trembled, from a deep, suppressed feeling. "When it boils and tosses in you, as in the mighty ocean, in my soul it burns deep and still. If, then, I could not fix my eye on the great, calm, eternal depth above, and find peace in its contemplation, I should waste in secret; whilst you find relief and consolation in wild outbreaks."