away herself, and dropping leaf after leaf, continues to shed perfume and
quickening balsam for the sick and weak, and awaits in patience the wind
which at last shall waft her from us."

"The gods grant that she may be with us for a long time yet! Dearest,
will you grant me one great favor?"

"It is granted before I hear it."

"When you take me home, do not leave Rhodopis here. She must come with
us. She is so kind and loves me so fervently, that what makes me happy
will make her so too, and whatever is dear to me, will seem to her worthy
of being loved."

"She shall be the first among our guests."

"Now I am quite happy and satisfied, for I am necessary to my
grandmother; she could not live without her child. I laugh her cares and
sorrows away, and when she is singing to me, or teaching me how to guide
the style, or strike the lute, a clearer light beams from her brow, the
furrows ploughed by grief disappear, her gentle eyes laugh, and she seems
to forget the evil past in the happy present."

"Before we part, I will ask her whether she will follow us home."

"Oh, how glad that makes me! and do you know, the first days of our
absence from each other do not seem so very dreadful to me. Now you are
to be my husband, I may surely tell you everything that pains or pleases
me, even when I dare not tell any one else, and so you must know, that,
when you leave, we expect two little visitors; they are the children of