All the servants are asleep. The knocking increases in loudness, a cry is heard, the gate opens, and the whole house resounds with strange murmurs. I hear several footsteps in the different apartments, the drawing-room door opens, somebody unlocks my bed-chamber, a slender form in white rushes in, and flies to my bosom.
Half-killed with fright, I had shut my eyes at the being's approach, and durst not open them again. The lights only cast a faint gleam, and the figure was so much muffled, that I could not recognize it. I thought it must be Francisca, and pressed her to my heart. I kissed her lips; but here I remarked they were not Francisca s. Begone woman," cried I, "thou art not Francisca. Who art thou?"
—"What, Carlos! Dost thou not know thy wife, not know thy Elmira?"
Heavenly powers! It was Elmira.
I now recognized her in the fire of her embraces, in the mellifluous softness of her voice. But it was no more that Elmira who once charmed me; that serene, sprightly,
