make to you friends of influence.  That
lady who walks before us is the wife of a
deputy to the legislature, also of one of the
first families in Dresden.  The young man
who wears the green cap is her son.  He
likes much to draw.  Now, Miss Bella, you
shall walk with them, talk to the son about
his drawing, so will you flatter the mother;
and when you climbs the steep path, you
shall take his arm, so will you flatter him.
A young man likes always when an older
lady takes his arm. Thus shall you become
a friend in the mother."

Bella was quite thrust upon the chance
acquaintance by Fraülein Fanny; but
provoked her greatly by not accepting the
young man's arm, and entirely forgetting
all her good counsels, and straying from
the path and the influential party, to
gather flowers.

We met a jolly clergyman climbing to
the Prebischthor, away from his home in
his holiday, with his daughter.  Fraülein
Fanny, who soon learnt all about every one,
whispered to me that he was a very
distinguished man: a "superintendent pastor,"
the next thing to a bishop in his little
principality.  At dinner, Fraülein Fanny and the
superintendent pastor monopolised the
conversation.  Fraülein Fanny displayed all her
learning, and they reasoned on things too
deep for our stock of German; but as the
sparkling mellow Bohemian wine got low
in the bottles, the conversation came down
to our level, and the anecdotes and lively
sallies kept the table very gay.  As we
lingered on our way down, gathering flowers
and grasses, a party of jolly gentlemen
were heard high above us, singing in parts,
and the opposite wall of rocks sent their
voices back with a wonderful effect as of
a full choir.  We stopped to listen, until
they overtook us, and Fraülein Fanny
complimented them on their music. They
were in gay spirits, and chatted a little
and then sped on.  The superintendent
pastor had gone to the Winterberg
instead of returning by Herrneskretchen,
and we amused ourselves condoling with
Fraülein Fanny upon his loss. We assured
her we knew he was a widower, and then,
his mind was so congenial to her own.

We overtook the deputy's wife and son
a little further down, and the Fraülein
walked with her for lack of more intellectual
society, while we foreigners gathered
and compared ferns. We came down from
steep climbing to the sloping path at last,
and here we found the merry gentlemen
sitting on the grass, resting in a green cool
valley, with glasses of Adam's ale in their
hands, singing still.  A group of brown
and bright-eyed little children had brought
the water from the springs near by, which,
clear as crystal, sprang from the rocks on
purpose for tired travellers.  Who but
Germans, irrepressible poets and musicians,
would, after such a jaunt up and down,
have sat by the wayside with glasses of
water in their hands, singing sentimental
songs, and three-part and four-part songs,
all about love and Vaterland! The children
stood in admiration, and we seated
ourselves on the grass beside them.  When
our jovial musicians had finished we
applauded, and one gentleman jokingly passed
a hat around, into which the ladies threw
flowers.  Then some among us asked the
barefooted peasant boys to sing, who,
proud, pleased, and bashful, drew near and
grouped themselves together, looking at
each other to see who would have the
courage to lead off: when up stole a little
girl who had hitherto stood at a distance,
a serious large-eyed child of five, and they
began together.  Their voices, feeble at first,
soon sounded clear and strong, and they did
their small best.  Very modestly, too, their
little fingers pinching their palms while
they sang about "Gott und Kaiser."
There was a real contribution now, and we
left them, their heads all together, counting
up their kreutzers.

"Do you know we have a theatre in
town? Shall we not all go this evening?"
said Fraülein Zartoff.

"A theatre! Where?"

"At the Wirthshaus Zum Stadt Berlin."

A long name, but it was only the shabby,
dirty inn by the church.

"The company came yesterday, and
tonight they give their first representation.
They play up-stairs in one of the rooms of
the Wirthshaus.  They are strolling actors,
who have most of them seldom seen a city
larger than Bodenbach, and who spend
their winters in some little town, and in
summer time come here, or visit other little
villages like this. They always remind me
of Wilhelm Meister's early days.  They
will probably stay here six or eight weeks.

"And where do they live?"

"Among the peasants.  The manager
has a room in a cottage on the road near
the Herrenhaus, where he lives with his
wife, the 'first old woman' of the play,
their daughter, the sentimental heroine,
their son, who is 'the villain,' and the little
yellow-haired child, who is a 'fairy' on the
stage, and very dirty-faced at home. Their