It was between night and dawn of day that Huldbrand was lying on his couch, half waking and half sleeping.

Whenever he attempted to compose himself to sleep, a terror came upon him and scared him, as if his slumbers were haunted with spectres.

But he made an effort to rouse himself fully.

He felt fanned as by the wings of a swan, and lulled as by the murmuring of waters, till in sweet confusion of the senses he sank back into his state of half-consciousness.
At last, however, he must have fallen perfectly asleep; for he seemed to be lifted up by wings of the swans, and to be wafted far away over land and sea, while their music swelled on his ear most sweetly.

"The music of the swan! the song of the swan!" he could not but repeat to himself every moment; "is it not a sure foreboding of death ?" Probably, however, it had yet another meaning.