Page:The genius - Carl Grosse tr Joseph Trapp 1796.djvu/144

 to bed, blew out the candles, drew the curtains, and began to snore.

At last the castle-bell struck half past eleven, when I gently stole from my bed, and tript on my toes to the widow's apartment, the door of which was on the jar. On my entrance, she was in the highest agitation, and I could scarce keep her from swooning in my arms. I made use of all the eloquence I was master of, to animate her to courage. It was a strange conflict between curiosity and fear, feminine softness and enthusiasm, shame and expectation. She seemed both to dread for and be afraid of me.

It could not be denied, that her situation was then rather critical, and had she at first felt the whole extent of its danger, I doubt whether I should have been able to persuade her to such a measure. A stormy night which even familiarizes the bodies of two sympathetic souls; the opportunity, which deprived her from every assistance, the negligence and derangement of her dress, equal danger and equal apprehensions, might well have shaken the virtue of more solid charac-