Do you ask me why I am so attached to the forest?
It is because its scenery is so peculiarly picturesque, and affords me so much pastime when, in my floating white garments, I pass through its world of leaves and dusky shadows;--and when a sweet sunbeam glances down upon me at times unexpectedly." "You are a very singular man," replied the priest, "and I should like to have a more intimate acquaintance with you." "And who, then, may you be yourself, to pass from one thing to another ?" inquired the stranger.
"I am called Father Heilmann," answered the holy man; "and I am from the cloister of Our Lady of the Salutation, beyond the lake." "Well, well," replied the stranger, "my name is Kuhleborn; and were I a stickler for the nice distinctions of rank, I might, with equal propriety, require you to give me the title of noble lord of Kuhleborn, or free lord of Kuhleborn; for I am as free as the birds in the forest, and, it may be, a trifle more so.

For example, I now have something to tell that young lady there." And before they were aware of his purpose, he was on the other side of the priest, close to Undine, and stretching himself high into the air, in order to whisper something in her ear.

But she shrank from him in terror, and exclaimed: "I have nothing more to do with you." "Ho, ho," cried the stranger with a laugh, "you have made a grand marriage indeed, since you no longer know your own relations! Have you no recollection, then, of your uncle Kuhleborn, who so faithfully bore you on his back to this region ?" "However that may be," replied Undine, "I entreat you never to appear in my presence again.

I am now afraid of you; and will not my husband fear and forsake me, if he sees me associate with such strange company and kindred ?" "You must not forget, my little niece," said Kuhleborn, "that I am with you here as a guide; otherwise those madcap spirits of the earth, the gnomes that haunt this forest, would play you some of their mischievous pranks.

Let me therefore still accompany you in peace.