But his horse refused to go forward; it reared impatiently; and its master, unwilling to lose a moment, and seeing moreover that the copse was impassable on horseback, dismounted; and, fastening his snorting steed to an elm-tree, he worked his way cautiously through the bushes.

The branches sprinkled his forehead and cheeks with the cold drops of the evening dew; a distant roll of thunder was heard murmuring from the other side of the mountains; everything looked so strange that he began to feel a dread of the white figure, which now lay only a short distance from him on the ground.

Still he could plainly see that it was a female, either asleep or in a swoon, and that she was attired in long white garments, such as Bertalda had worn on that day.

He stepped close up to her, made a rustling with the branches, and let his sword clatter, but she moved not.

"Bertalda!" he exclaimed, at first in a low voice, and then louder and louder--still she heard not.