When his book was finished he left Gottingen and crossed the Alps into Italy; there he joined in the more active struggle between authority and its antagonists. Nevertheless, he was not satisfied with himself, nor could he bring himself entirely to sympathise with the persons and actions of those whose cause he had espoused and so ardently endeavoured to defend.
The image of Flora Adair, moreover, constantly rose up before him, and thinking of her as he had known her in all things, save in her tenacious clinging to her religious faith, he felt her softening influence often stealing upon him. It was a miserable weakness, he would try to persuade himself; and yet it was something which in his inmost heart he loved. It led him always, he saw, to better and more peaceful thoughts; so true is it that "God is a centre of love towards which the weight of love directs every creature."
These, however, were but fugitive and passing thoughts, yet they awakened and kept alive in him that desire for good, that thirst after what is true, which is the ever-blessed fruit of all real love.
At length he yielded to a strange and increasing yearning which he felt to go to Capri. "I shall find there something real," he would often say to himself, "and little Anina's joy will gladden my heart...."
And what is like the joy of a faithful people? In vain do they pretend to it who are without faith and hope in the world. The sunny smile, even more than the sunny sky, is the charm which attracts our less joyous wanderers to the faithful Italian people. What wonder, then, that Mr. Earnscliffe found his old love returning with the happiness which his presence seemed to create around him in Capri? Anina's joy and that of her parents, however, was not without some alloy, since they all saw with pain his altered appearance, and his habitual expression sterner even than of old.
His affection for Anina seemed unchanged, and notwithstanding his more silent and reserved general manner, he liked to have her with him as much as ever, although he did not laugh and talk with her as he had formerly done. One day she timidly asked him if he were ill, "because," she said, "he looked so sad and grave now?"
"No," he answered, "I am not ill, carina; but some one whom I loved dearly has made me very unhappy."
"How wicked it is of any one to make il caro Signore unhappy!" exclaimed the child. "But I will ask the Madonna to pray that he may be happy again!"
"Never name the Madonna to me again, Anina," said Mr. Earnscliffe with a dark frown, "if you do not wish to offend me!"
The child wondered greatly as to what he meant by this, and for a long time did not venture to disobey the command, but all the more did she implore her loved Madonna to pray for his happiness.