—“Dear Lady,” said she, “recollect your weak condition: the sudden chill or the morning-air would be enough to kill you.”—
—“Right, right! then it is only morning yet? oh! yes; I now see myself that it is no more. Look, where the sun rises from behind yonder mountain! ha! how red and how gloomy he burns, foreboding that it will be a bloody day!”—
Gertrude comprehended not her meaning, and replied not. Adelaide repeated her request that she might be permitted to rise, with such earnestness that her attendants were compelled to obey her. She suddenly drew her arm from Gertrude’s, and walked a few paces without assistance.
—“Yes, it will do well,” said she, after a pause with a look of satisfaction. “Now then bring my child; let me once again embrace him.—But alas! it must not be. My boy is very young, and needs much attention; even in your hands, good Gertrude, he will not be taken sufficient care of, and I must remain here. Oh! my poor husband, I am forbid to follow you; but peace, peace to your tortured bones; repose and pardon to your afflicted spirit!”——
Adelaide with folded hands had sunk on her knees before the cottage-window, whose casement was illuminated by the beams of the morning sun. She now rose up, and again demanded, that her baby should be brought to her.
Her attendants delayed to obey the order. That delay alarmed her; she insisted with increased earnestness on seeing her child, and they were at last compelled to acknowledge, that on the evening before it had expired.
—“Dead!” she exclaimed, and the tone in which she spoke it exprest by that single word at once all the feelings of agony, which a mother’s heart can suffer.—“Dead!” she again repeated, after some moments of silence. Then as if she had suddenly discovered a ray of comfort, she added—“that is right! quite right!—but still I must see it!—my child! show me my child!”—
They conducted her to the cradle, in which the pallid infant lay, and appeared to smile even in death. She kist it without shedding a single tear, and desired to be conducted back to her couch, and to be left alone.
Gertrude was too much on her guard to grant the sufferer more than the first half of her request. She seated herself by her bedside, and for some time watched unremittingly.—But wearied with her long vigils during Adelaide’s insensibility, she at length found her powers inadequate to fulfill her good intentions. About midnight sleep completely overcame her; and now was an opportunity afforded to the wife of my unfortunate brother, to execute that wild resolution whose consequences soon re-united her to the husband whom she adored.
Adelaide rose silently from her bed, and left the house without being observed. Through the shadows of night she wandered towards the place, where her broken heart panted to arrive. Her weakness made her long in accomplishing this painful journey. On the day before her arrival Rodolpho had already undergone the torture of the rack; yet did Adelaide reach the place of execution time enough to receive his last breath and his last blessing. His breaking eyes recognized her well-known features, before they closed for ever; he murmured her name, and she sank upon his bleeding bosom[[1]].