Ch. 24 - The Grave and the Camp

While the second and last embassy from the Senate proceeds towards the
tent of the Gothic king, while the streets of Rome are deserted by all
but the dead, and the living populace crowd together in speechless
expectation behind the barrier of the Pincian Gate, an opportunity is at
length afforded of turning our attention towards a scene from which it
has been long removed. Let us now revisit the farm-house in the
suburbs, and look once more on the quiet garden and on Hermanric's
grave.

The tranquility of the bright warm day is purest around the retired path
leading to the little dwelling. Here the fragrance of wild flowers rises
pleasantly from the waving grass; the lulling, monotonous hum of insect
life pervades the light, steady air; the sunbeams, intercepted here and
there by the clustering trees, fall in irregular patches of brightness
on the shady ground; and, saving the birds which occasionally pass
overhead, singing in their flight, no living creature appears on the
quiet scene, until, gaining the wicket-gate which leads into the farm-
house garden, we look forth upon the prospect within.

There, following the small circular footpath which her own persevering
steps have day by day already traced, appears the form of a solitary
woman, pacing slowly about the mound of grassy earth which marks the
grave of the young Goth.

For some time she proceeds on her circumscribed round with as much
undeviating, mechanical regularity, as if beyond that narrow space rose
a barrier which caged her from ever setting foot on the earth beyond.
At length she pauses in her course when it brings her nearest to the
wicket, advances a few steps towards it, then recedes, and recommences
her monotonous progress, and then again breaking off on her round,
finally succeeds in withdrawing herself from the confines of the grave,
passes through the gate, and following the path to the high-road, slowly
proceeds towards the eastern limits of the Gothic camp. The fixed,
ghastly, unfeminine expression on her features marks her as the same
woman whom we last beheld as the assassin at the farm-house, but beyond
this she is hardly recognisable again. Her formerly powerful and
upright frame is bent and lean; her hair waves in wild, white locks
about her shrivelled face; all the rude majesty of her form has
departed; there is nothing to show that it is still Goisvintha haunting
the scene of her crime but the savage expression debasing her
countenance and betraying the evil heart within, unsubdued as ever in
its yearning for destruction and revenge.

Since the period when we last beheld her, removed in the custody of the
Huns from the dead body of her kinsman, the farm-house had been the
constant scene of her pilgrimage