By good fortune I
discovered her beneath the greenish moon that hung amid mist above the
forest, stretching a disconsolate neck at the waterside as if in
search of the Lorelei.
When, as it seemed to me, it must be nearing dawn, though how the
hours flitted so swiftly passed my comprehension, I very cautiously
climbed out of my narrow window and descended slowly to the lawns
beneath. My foot had scarcely touched ground when ringing and menacing
from some dark gallery of the palace above me broke out a distant
baying.
Nothing shall persuade me to tell how fast I ran; how feverishly I
haled poor Rosinante out of sleep, and pushed her down into the deeps
of that coal-black stream; with what agility I clambered into the
saddle.
Yet I could not help commiserating the while the faithful soul who
floated beneath me. The stream was swift but noiseless, the water
rather rare than cold, yet, despite all the philosophy beaming out of
her maidenly eyes across the smooth surface of the tide, Rosinante
must have preferred from the bottom of her heart dry land.
I, too, momentarily, when I discovered that we were speedily
approaching the roaring fall whose reverberations I had heard long
since.
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