More he did not say. But it was the right word and the right tone--a cordial tone full of tender suggestion, and yet so firm, so true, that it resounded again in the heart of the maiden: "Catherine!" and filled her soul with sweet pleasure. What she had just said, in the bitter feeling of her injured pride, and in her painful conviction that she must subordinate her own happiness and the happiness of him she loved--it now seemed to her but idle breath, like the wind sweeping above through the rustling tops of the pines and below over the bending grass of the meadow. The pines stood firm, the grass rose again, and everything remained as it was before--yes, more beautiful and delightful than before. What was now her pride except a small additional offering that she brought to her beloved who would not be happy without her--who without her could not be happy? This Lambert said to her again and again; and she said to him that separation from her beloved and death would be the same for her, and that she would never again think of it, but that she could live for him and be happy with him. So they sat a long time at the edge of the primitive forest in the shadow of the venerable trees--before them the sunlit prairie with its bending flowers and grass, alone--speaking in whispers, as though the mottled butterflies which were moving about the flowers must not hear. And if a bird happened to fly past uttering his warning cry, frightened, they crowded close to each other and then laughed, happy that they were alone and might sink into each other's arms and say what they had already said a hundred times, and yet did not get tired of saying and hearing it. Then they formed plans for the future--far-reaching plans--that during the fall they would clear at least yet five acres, and that they would in any case keep the calf of which Aunt Ursul had the care, and whether it would not be best to partition off a chamber in the upper story of the house, leaving sufficient space for the store-room; and, as the stairway was very narrow and steep, they would make a new one. They must also not fail to have a suitable garden in which to raise greens and gooseberries and currants; and a honeysuckle-arbor, such as Catherine had in her father's garden, there surely must be, though Lambert was not sure that he quite understood what Catherine meant by a honeysuckle-arbor.