Page:Hoffmann's Strange Stories - Hoffman - 1855.djvu/146

 fear that I should see this dear old relation expire, whose true affection for myself I was well acquainted with. Finally, after many hours of anguish, life gained the ascendant, the pulse commenced to beat, and the robust organization of the old man tired out the attacks of death. Gradually the danger disappeared; but he remained many months confined, without hardly moving, on his suffering bed. His health was so destroyed by this shaking, that it was necessary for him to retire from the practice of the law. There was no longer any hope of my return to R—sitten. The poor sick man could bear with no other care than mine, and, when his pain left him a moment of respite, all his consolation was to talk with me, but he never spoke of our stay at R—sitten, and I dared not myself recall it to his remembrance. When, by force of devotion and assiduous watching, I succeeded in restoring my great uncle to comparative health, the remembrance of Seraphine awoke in my heart, surrounded by a more powerful charm than ever. One day that I opened by chance, a portfolio, which I had used during my stay at R—sitten, something white fell from it. It was a silk ribbon that tied together a lock of Seraphine's hair. On examining this token of remembrance, given by secret love, that fate had crushed at its birth, I noticed a reddish spot on the ribbon. Was it blood? and this blood, was it a prognostic of some tragical event? My imagination abandoned itself to the most fatal suppositions, without having any means to verify its fears or putting a stop to them.

Meanwhile, my great uncle gradually regained his strength with the fine weather. During a mild evening, I had taken him to walk under the odorous lindens in our garden. He was in a joyous humor.

"Cousin," said he, "I feel myself exceedingly strong; but I do not deceive myself concerning the future; this return to health resembles the last vivid flashes of a lamp on the eve of going out. But, before going to sleep the last slumber, whose approach I feel with the calmness of a just