I reprimanded him severely for his tone. Without changing a feature, he allowed me to finish my remarks. After that he arose, threw his rifle over his shoulder, put on his green hat, and left the house. I wanted to call him back, but my wife prevented me. I reproached myself for the violent manner in which I had spoken to him. Now he will rush into misfortune--who knows what he may do next? With mild words, I might have been able to direct him on the right path; but now he may, perhaps, not return, and will even persuade himself to hate me. My wife consoled me with the words: "He will return before nightfall." And it was so. In the evening he returned, and addressing me with a voice full of emotion, said: "Father, forgive me!" Rothfuss was in the room at the time, and I beckoned to him to leave; but Ernst requested that he should remain, and continued: "I have done wrong. I am heartily sorry for it. I have also done wrong to Martella. I should not have acted as I have done, but ought to have brought her to you first of all. She deserves quite different treatment--better indeed than I do. I beg of you, give back the words that I uttered! Forgive me! and, above all things, do not make Martella suffer for what I have said." He uttered these words with a trembling voice. Rothfuss had left the room. I held out my hand to Ernst, and he continued firmly: "You have so often told me, and as I am always forgetting it, you will have to tell it to me many a time again, that there is something in me which causes me at times to express myself quite differently from the way in which I intended to. I also know, dear father, that such a word lingers in your memory like a smouldering spark, especially when the word is uttered by your own child; and that in your grief you picture to yourself the utter ruin of a character that can indulge in such expressions. I understand you, do I not? Trust in me: I am not so bad, after all. "I do not believe in the possessed; and yet there must be something of that kind. Enough on that point, however. Though I seemed cheerful, I had a heavy heart; but now I am one of the happiest beings alive; and if I were obliged to be a wood-cutter for the rest of my days, I could still content myself. O mother, I would not have believed that I could have found such a creature in a world in which all others are mere pretence and _rouge_, lies and deceit. "She is in perfect health, and as pure and as fresh as a dewdrop. Although she has learned nothing, she knows everything. She cannot couch it in words, but her eyes speak it. Her heart is so thoroughly good,--so strong,--so pure,--indeed, I cannot find the right word for it. She has no parents, no brothers or sisters. She is a child of the woods, and as pure and as holy as the primeval forest itself.