"They are the initials of my name. Forget me not. Your image is engraven on my heart, and will never be effaced. Farewell! I must be gone." He kissed her hand, and meant to rise; but, as in dreams, some strange thing fades and changes into something stranger, and the succeeding wonder takes us by surprise; so, without knowing how it happened, he found the countess in his arms: her lips were resting upon his, and their warm mutual kisses were yielding them that blessedness which mortals sip from the topmost sparkling foam on the freshly poured cup of love. Her head lay on his shoulder: the disordered ringlets and ruffles were forgotten. She had thrown her arm round him: he clasped her with vivacity, and pressed her again and again to his breast. Oh that such a moment could but last forever! And woe to envious Fate that shortened even this brief moment to our friends! How terrified was Wilhelm, how astounded did he start from his happy dream, when the countess, with a shriek, on a sudden tore herself away, and hastily pressed her hand against her heart. He stood confounded before her: she held the other hand upon her eyes, and, after a moment's pause, exclaimed, "Away! leave me! delay not!" He continued standing. "Leave me!" she cried; and, taking off her hand from her eyes, she looked at him with an indescribable expression of countenance, and added, in the most tender and affecting voice, "Flee, if you love me." Wilhelm was out of the chamber, and again in his room, before he knew what he was doing. Unhappy creatures! What singular warning of chance or of destiny tore them asunder? BOOK IV. CHAPTER I. Laertes was standing at the window in a thoughtful mood, resting on his arm, and looking out into the fields. Philina came gliding towards him, across the large hall: she leaned upon him, and began to mock him for his serious looks. "Do not laugh," replied he: "it is frightful to think how time goes on, how all things change and have an end. See here! A little while ago there was a stately camp: how pleasantly the tents looked! what restless life and motion was within them! how carefully they watched the whole enclosure! And, behold, it is all vanished in a day! For a short while, that trampled straw, those holes which the cooks have dug, will show a trace of what was here; and soon the whole will be ploughed and reaped as formerly, and the presence of so many thousand gallant fellows in this quarter will but glimmer in the memories of one or two old men." Philina began to sing, and dragged forth her friend to dance with her in the hall. "Since Time is not a person we can overtake when he is past," cried she, "let us honor him with mirth and cheerfulness of heart while he is passing." They had scarcely made a step or two, when Frau Melina came walking through the hall. Philina was wicked enough to invite her to join them in the dance, and thus to bring her in mind of the shape to which her pregnancy had reduced her.