But when you did get to land again, you returned the compliment, and made me as wet as though I had been in the dyke too, and as dirty as the maid in the story book, who sat among the cinders.

Vander Dordrecht laughed heartily at being thus humerously reminded of the wild tricks of his youth, and Aaltje was by no means unwilling to recapitulate them.

"And then, Mynheer," continued Aaltje,how jealous you were of Ryk of the Lommeryk Hoef! Many a time have I encouraged him to come, that ye might fall together by the ears. Not that I ever liked Ryk though, Vander Dordrecht, he was too much of the puppy, and I always hated a fop. Well, well, poor Ryk is gone the way of all flesh, the dead clock tolled heavily for him, and though he wore the wapenrusting of the French, they shot him at last for desertion.

“I'll wager you a stuiver, Aaltje,” said Vander Dordrecht, "that you wept

yourself almost blind for Ryk, though you did not like him.”

"Not I, Vander Dordrecht. Truly you have a good opinion of my discretion to suppose that I should have wept for such a thing as Ryk. Trust me Mynheer, when I weep for any man he must be something worth calling up the tears for. Ryk of the Lommeryk Hoef, indeed!—but it is not becoming to speak ill of the dead, and so I say no more. He was always fond of the shade, poor fellow, when he was alive, and now he rests under the yew tree in the kerkyard."

"You need not be so passionate, good Aaltje," said Mynheer, in a conciliating tone of voice," nor talk till your cheeks are redder than your top-knot. I wagered you a stuiver but in jest, and then forsooth you take fire like touchwood,

and defend yourself as vehemently as Madame Kikvorsch lectures her husband."

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But," returned Aaltje applying her her handkerchief to her eyes, and breathing a few hysterical sobs, "you have made me angry. To accuse me of loving Ryk!-me who have only lived for you! -Though I must say, Mynheer, that

had

my heart not been so obdurate he would never have been shot."

Here, Aaltje, who was perfectly skilled in the science of deception, sobbed most violently. Mynheer was not the most acute observer, nor capable of entering into the fine and delicate distinctions which exist between the sighs of feeling and the sobs of passion. Neither from nature nor from education did he possess the judicious faculty of directing the powers of discrimination. Penetration, which Greville very sensibly observed, seemed to him a kind of inspira

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tion, and gave him an idea of prophecy, had no place in the frozen ideas of Vander Dordrecht. This, Aaltje had long been aware of. She was a compound of ease and gaiety, and her understanding was not so hampered and confined as that of her portly admirer.

A dewy cloud spread itself over the eyes of Vander Dordrecht while Aaltje continued her tearless sighs. Such power has the sorrow of a pretty woman over the heart of a man, even though his mind should be dull as the waters of the Lethean stream.

"Aaltje, Aaltje, woman" said Mynheer, half inclined to bear her company in her sighs, and add his double bass notes to the shrill treble of hers; Aaltje vrouw, give over your sobbing, woman, and be blythe as the lark when he whistles in the sky on the May morn. I did but jest with you, Aaltje, when I said that you were sorry for Ryk-and now you

have let the wildbraad grow cold, whilst you were shedding forth tears till they fell upon your hands like the rain-dew on the petals of a lilly bloom."

"Then will you be reasonable, Mynheer?" enquired Aaltje, as she slowly removed the handkerchief from her eyes, which she had gently chafed till they appeared as if swollen and red from weeping. "If we talk of old times, Mynheer, you might surely treat me with more respect, than to accuse me of weeping for him of the Lommeryk Hoef. And you well know, Vander Dordrecht, that I refused the French Commandant, and what did I do it for, but for you, you cruel unkind man? Well, well, women are generally the dupes of their own folly, and so perhaps the least I say about it the better."

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That's true," ejaculated Vander Dordrecht, who finding that he was likely to have the worst of the dispute,