Then he rested his elbows on the window-sill beside me, puffing clouds of smoke from his short pipe. Extending his arm towards the distant mountains, he said at length:
"Look at that, Gaston; you should love it, for you are a son of the Black Forest. Look down there, way down; that is the Roche Creuse. Do you see it? You remember Gertrude? How far off those days seem!"
He stopped and cleared his throat; I was at a loss what to reply. We stood for a long time in a contemplative mood, mute before the grandeur of the scene that rolled away beneath us. From time to time, the old steward, seeing my eyes rest on some point of the horizon, would explain:
"That is the Wald Horn; this is the Tiefenthal. There you see the cascade of the Steinbach; it has stopped running now, and hangs like an ice cloak over the shoulder of the Harberg,—a cold garment for this season of the year. Down there is the path that leads to Tübingen; a fortnight more and we shall have difficulty in tracing it."
An hour passed thus; I could not tear myself away from the scene.
A few birds of prey, with gracefully hollowed wings, were sailing about the tower; a flock of herons flew above them, escaping their claws by reason of their loftier flight. Not a cloud was visible in the sky; all the snow had fallen to earth. The hunting-horn saluted the mountain for the last time.
"That is my friend Sebalt mourning down there," said Sperver. "No one is a better judge of horses and dogs than he, and when it comes to sounding the horn, there is not his equal in all Germany. Just hear how mellow those notes are, Gaston. Poor Sebalt! he is pining away since our master became ill; he cannot hunt as he used to. His only consolation is to climb the Altenberg every morning just at daybreak, and play the Count's favorite airs. He thinks that may cure him."
Sperver, with the tact of a man who himself loves beautiful things, had not interrupted my contemplation; but when, dazzled by the growing light, I turned back into the chamber, he said:
"Gaston, things look more encouraging; the Count has had no return of the convulsions."
These words brought me back to a more practical world.