or with a friend who was not in "Society." And his good little sister, wife of a consul-general, would no longer need to shed tears at his want of social tone and polished manners—Emanuel was gone, the theological student was out of the way, and he would certainly not be quick to return.
No indeed, he would not turn back.
He looked around on the far-stretching shimmering snowfields with great content, and he felt as if he had climbed up from a deep, dark well, to a land very near heaven.
Here and there among the fields a reddish glimmer was to be seen from the lights in the cottage windows, which twinkled like fallen stars. An unearthly peace rested over the whole face of nature. No other sound was to be heard under the dome of heaven than the horses' rusty little bells; but in the intense stillness, this tinkling was like an echo of a thousand voices, as if the air was full of invisible bells.
He fell into a reverie—this then was henceforth to be his home, he was to wander through these fields, and to go into these cottages as the chosen servant of the Lord!—he already saw himself sitting in these small, low-roofed houses among the poorly clad, listening men and women, and he felt how dearly he would love them, how in the most miserable cabin—yes, there especially—he would be a hundred times happier than he had ever been in his father's magnificent house.
