awful word than Providence, and who could blame him, for he meant it reverently enough. Anybody would have been religious in such a storm of waters. How could I bear malice after such a testimony to dear old England? After all, it was the pudding that forced it from him, and for my beloved country I can sacrifice even such a treat as that.

Said Polly, "My pudding, dear mother,
Must be nothing but sugar and plum ;

And the sauce which the pudding must smother,
Shall be nothing but brandy and rum!”

Said Tommy," No, nothing but flour;
Such a pudding would last us for years;

Let us mix it with vinegar, sour,

And water it well with our tears,"

"My children," she said, "you are clever;
But neither exactly is right,-

Polly thinks she shall stop here for ever,
Tom thinks he may leave here to-night.

We can't tell how long we may stay;
Poll must stint both with pudding and tart,
Or else she'll be sick some fine day

When she finds herself ordered to start.

And, Tommy, the sweets you may use them,
And all the good things you find here,
Unless you're afraid to abuse them,

And that's but a cowardly fear."

J. T. W. B.

WHILE they sat thus comfortably eating, a knock came at the door. It was a poor woman who had a little child hanging in a cloth on her back, and who begged for a piece of bread. Mariechen quickly opened the door. The woman's garments were ragged and dirty, but yet they had the appearance of having once belonged to a lady. Father Stilling directed that she should be seated by the room-door, and that a bit of everything should be given her to eat. "You can give the child some rice milk, Mariechen," he added. She ate and enjoyed the meal, and when she and the child were satisfied, she expressed her thanks with tears in her eyes and prepared to go.

"No," said old Stilling; "sit down and tell us whence you came, and how it is that you are in such straits, and I will give you some beer to drink.”

She seated herself and said

"Oh dear Lord." (Stilling's daughter, Mariechen, sat next to her, but a little way off, and listened with great attention, gazing at her with eyes that were already moist.) "I am now a very poor woman indeed; but ten years ago you would have felt it an honour if I had dined with you."

"Indeed!" said Wilhelm Stilling.

"Perhaps," interrupted Johann Stilling, "you had a Stollbeinish disposition?"

"Be quiet, children," said Father Stilling; "let the woman speak."

"My father is pastor at-—”

"Oh! Gemini," exclaimed Mariechen; "is your father a pastor?" and Mariechen approached somewhat nearer.

"Yes, indeed, he is a pastor. A very learned and very rich.

man."

"Where is he pastor?" inquired Father Stilling.

"At Goldingen, in Barchinger Land. Yes, indeed——-”

"I must look. for that on the map," said Johann Stilling. "That cannot be far from the Mühlersee, at the far end of it, towards Septentrio" (the north).

"Ah! young sir, I do not know any place near there, called Schlendrian."

"Our Johann did not say Schlendrian."

"What did you say?"

"Go on," said Father Stilling; don't interrupt her, children."

"I was a pretty girl then, and had fine offers of marriage (Mariechen eyed her from head to foot); but none of them pleased my father. One was not rich enough, another was not respectable enough, the third did not go to church enough."

"What do you call those people who don't go to church, Johann," asked Mariechen.

"Hush, girl!" said Johann; "they are called Separatists." "Well, at last a young barber's assistant

"What is a barber's assistant?" inquired Mariechen.

My dear sister," said Wilhelm Stilling, "let the woman finish her story. Afterwards you can question her about everything. They are people who shave."

"Well, we fell in love, and were married. My husband was as good a surgeon as he was a barber. We settled in Spelterburg, on the river Spaa."

"Yes," said Johann Stilling, into it,"

where the river Milder flows

"Yes, that's where it is. Then, unhappy woman that I am, I discovered that my husband was intimate with some low people; for although my father was only a cobbler--"

Here the woman seized her child, and taking it on her back, ran away as fast as she could.

Neither Father Stilling nor his wife and children could conceive why she broke off in the midst of her recital and ran away. Every one gave an opinion, but all were doubtful. But Father Stilling, according to custom, deduced a lesson from this story, that it is best to implant in one's children religion and love of virtue, and, when they are of ripe age, to give them leave to marry according to their own selection, if they only make such a choice as would not disgrace the family. Parents ought certainly to admonish their children; but compulsion is useless, after a human being has reached manhood. He thinks then that he understands every thing as well as his parents.

During these remarks, to which everybody was very attentive. William sat in deep cogitation, his head resting in his hands, and his gaze fixed on vacancy.

"Hum," said he, at last, "all that the woman said seems to me to be suspicious. First of all she said her father was pastor at-at-"

"At Goldingen, Barchinger Land," said Mariechen.

'Yes, that was the name of the place, and at the end she said her father was a cobbler."

At this they all clapped their hands together and were very much shocked. They could now see why the woman ran away, and prudently resolved to make latches and holdfasts to every door and opening in the house, and no one will be inclined to blame the Stilling family on this account.

Dorothy had said nothing during the whole time. Why, I cannot say. But her time seemed quite taken up by her little Heinrich. The youngster was a pretty child and very plump. The most experienced gossips of the neighbourhood had discovered fimmediately after the child's birth, how completely it resembled its ather. They noticed particularly that there was already, on the upper eyelid, the signs of a future wart, similar to one which its father had in the same place. But it is to be feared that a secret partiality had conduced to this testimony, for the boy had his mother's features, and her kind and feeling heart.

left

Dorothy had fallen into a gentle melancholy state. She had no longer either pleasure or pain in anything. She enjoyed the bliss of being sad, and her tender heart seemed to melt into tears,-tears without grief or care. When the sun rose in all his beauty, she gazed at it thoughtfully, with tears in her eyes, and sometimes said, How lovely He must be who made it!" At sunset she wept again, saying, "Our kind friend is leaving us again;" and at twilight she wished to be far away in the forest. The moonlight affected her more than anything else, and she passed whole evenings on the Geisenberg, whither Wilhelm almost always accompanied her. They were somewhat similar in character. They could have spared the whole world of human beings, but not each other. For all that, they were very sensitive to the sufferings of their fellowmortals.

CHAPTER VII.

DOROTHY'S FORTUNE.

ONE Sunday afternoon, about a year and a half after the birth of her little Heinrich, Dorothy asked her husband to take a walk with her to Geisenberg Castle. Wilhelm had never refused her anything, and so away they went. When once in the wood they wound their arms round each other, and ascended the mountain

G