strongly inclined to regret the loss of Rosa; and when, at about three in the morning, he fell asleep, overcome with fatigue, and harassed with remorse, the grand black tulip yielded precedence in his dreams to the sweet blue eyes of the fair maid of Friesland.
CHAPTER XIX.
The Maid And The Flower.
But poor Rosa, in her secluded chamber, could not have known of whom or of what Cornelius was dreaming.
From what he had said she was more ready to believe that he dreamed of the black tulip than of her; and yet Rosa was mistaken.
But as there was no one to tell her so, and as the words of Cornelius’ thoughtless speech had fallen upon her heart like drops of poison, she did not dream, but she wept.
During the whole of this terrible night the poor girl did not close an eye, and before she rose in the morning, she had come to the resolution of making her appearance at the grated window no more.
But as she knew with what ardent desire Cornelius looked forward to the news about his tulip; and as, notwithstanding her determination not to see any more a man, her pity for whose fate was fast growing into love; she did not, on the other hand, wish to drive him to despair, she resolved to continue by herself the reading and writing lessons; and, fortunately, she had made sufficient progress to dispense with the help of a master, when the master was not to be Cornelius.
Rosa, therefore, applied herself most diligently to reading poor Cornelius De Witte’s Bible, on the second
