Schubert’s “Lindenbaum” is the song Hans sang when he first hiked up to the meadow where he would later spend so many days “playing king.” The song, which is set to text by the German poet Wilhelm Müller, is about a traveler who walks past a linden tree on a cold, winter night. The tree makes the traveler long for happier days, and he mournfully imagines that he “could have found rest” under the tree. Hans misunderstands the poem, interpreting it as validation of the “rest” he has found at the Berghof. In fact, the poem more accurately captures the bittersweet feeling of nostalgia, which can only be felt in retrospect. In reality, had the traveler stopped at the tree and sought refuge in his memories, he would perish of cold. The intensity of his emotion derives not from that happier time but from his longing for it. Hans, in remaining permanently at rest, denies himself the ability to experience this depth of emotion.