"would he not have felt under to me, had he known that, being born to a throne, I had humbled myself to him? Yet, alas! love makes little difference between the sceptre and the crook! Can the imaginary greatness, so much boasted of, actually possess the soul and satisfy it? No; virtue alone has the right to do so. She places us above the throne, and can detach us from it; the shepherd who loves me is wise, witty, and amiable. In what can a prince be superior to him?"
As she indulged in these reflections, she saw him at her feet; he had followed her to the river-side: and presenting her with a garland of flowers of a charming variety, he said, "Whence came you, lovely shepherdess? For hours have I been seeking you, and impatiently awaiting your arrival." "Shepherd," said she, "I have been occupied by a wonderful adventure. I should reproach myself did I conceal it from you; but remember, that this mark of my confidence binds you to everlasting secresy. I am a princess, my father was a king, whom I have just discovered in the person of Sublime."
The Prince was so astounded and agitated at this revelation, that he had not the power to interrupt her, while she related to him, in the kindest manner, her whole history. What reason had he not to fear that the good shepherd who had educated him would, being a king, refuse him his daughter, or that she herself reflecting upon the difference between a great Princess and himself, would one day withdraw from him the kindness she had at first shown him. "Ah, Madam," said he mournfully, "I am a lost man: I must die! You are born to a throne; you have found your parents: and I am an unfortunate being who knows neither his country nor his kindred. An eagle was my foster-mother, and her nest my cradle; if you have deigned to look upon me favourably, you will be advised to think of me no longer." The Princess mused for a moment, and, without answering him, she took a bodkin which kept up part of her beautiful hair, and wrote upon the bark of a tree—
"Canst thou love for love return?"
The Prince instantly wrote these words—
"With a thousand flames I burn."
