"'My friend has left,' said she, soon after the first exchange of greetings; I learned that she now lived quite by herself in a villa at Stresa. Our conversation became lively, but it avoided everything personal. She knew Germany and German affairs, but her enthusiasm was all for beautiful Italy, where Art and Nature both disclose themselves in such enrapturing beauty. We spoke of poets, painters, theatres and music. The sun had disappeared behind the hills; only its reflection still hung upon the rosy-tinted western clouds, but to-day the scene on the terrace was peculiarly animated. Countless miladies, with red guide-books, and guttural-voiced milords succeeded one another; they cast a few cursory glances at the lake, convinced themselves that all the guaranteed items of its decorations stood on their proper places, as they are described in books--here, the Isola Madre and del Pescatore, there the Sasso Ferrato, here Stresa, yonder Pallanza--and finally took leave with an expression of perfect satisfaction. Then came a few noisy Frenchmen and women, who uttered their delight on finding a morsel of Versailles in this Italian water-basin, and then sought the laurel tree in which Napoleon had cut the word '_battaglia_' before the battle of Marengo. "It was a restless coming and going! As if in silent accord, we turned our steps towards the lonely shaded walks of the evergreen island, beneath the pines and cypresses, laurels and camellia trees. We did not talk much; often we walked silently side by side. The dusk of evening and of the green leaves seemed to hold us chained in some sweet spell. When we spoke, we spoke of that which was nearest to us, which stirred our feelings, of Nature's charms and the splendour of the manifold southern plants which were assembled there like a green court-dress for the old Palazzos; nor were the northern fir trees wanting, and I remarked that they reminded me of my home. Yet she asked no more about it. It was like a secret understanding between us not to disturb our mutual _incognito_, and thus even to envelop the circumstances of our lives in the same charm of twilight as that which hovered over the enchanted island. "We descended the steps of the palazzo to the shore; an elegant gondola, with a gondolier in livery, was awaiting them. "'May I invite you,' asked she, 'to accompany me in my bark as far as Stresa?' "I accepted this invitation with pleasure. "The moon had risen; the mountains' shadows floated in the silvery waves. The skiff drew a broad furrow in the molten silver that seemed to drip from the oars; the pines by the villas on the shore intercepted the moonlight with their broad fans. Like a sparkling plateau the glaciers of the Simplon Pass gleamed above a little cloud. "How many magnificent villas shone beneath intensely dark, silvered green on the shores! Which was hers? I did not venture to ask, and she did not point to the spot on which she had taken up her abode.