She. That is of no consequence. I can go
my own way by myself.

/. So can I.

She. Good bye, then, sir.

/. Good bye, Miss A.

"Thank Heaven, it was not too late!"
thought I to myself, as, after my dismissal, I
hastened to my little farm in the country.
Although this abrupt termination of my
second love affair caused but little pain to my
heart, I felt considerable mortification, and a
secret hostility sprung up in my soul towards
the whole female sex. It happened, however,
very luckily for me, that while I remained in
this state of mind I met with one of my
neighbours who was precisely in the same
condition. He had been for some time
divorced from a wife with whom he had lived
very unhappily, and he drove about in his
sulky, upon which he had had a motto
inscribed in golden letters:

"It is better to be alone than to be ill-accompanied."

The sentiment struck me as very excellent;
and my neighbour and I often met, and agreed
admirably in our abuse of the ladies. In the
meantime I occupied myself with books and
agriculture.

I have a great esteem for books, and I bow
myself to the dust before learning, but, I know
not how it is, further than that I cannot go;
esteem and veneration I feel, but assuredly
my affections never grew in that soil. My
love for agriculture took me forth into Nature,
and Nature is lovely. But Adam was uneasy
in Paradise, and did not wake to life and
happiness until Eve came; and I, who did
not possess a paradise, found myself very
lonely and melancholy at "Stenbacke." Trees,
after all, are wooden and dull things, when
we crave for human sympathies; and echo, the
voice of the rocks, is the most wearisome
voice I know. No! heart to heart, eye to eye,
that is the life; and to live together, a happy
and healthy rural life, to work for the happiness
of those who depend upon us—to regulate
the home, to live, to think, to love, to rejoice
together. Ah! "my wife" still stood vividly
before my imagination.

My experience in the realms of love had,
however, made me suspicious. I feared that
I could never be happy, according to my ideas
of happiness, which my neighbour friend
characterised as "reposing in the shade of a pair
of slippers." I was in low spirits; and
accordingly, one day, after having finished the
last of six dozen of cigars, and quarrelled with
my neighbour, who bored me with his
everlasting and doleful tirades against the ladies,
I set off in my own sulky to amuse myself by
a drive.

I drove a considerable distance to the house
of an old friend, who had been a fellow-student
with me at the Military College at Carlberg,
and who had often invited me to visit him.
He was now married, and was, in fact, the
father of eight children. A large family, I
thought, at first; but not one too many, said
I to myself, after a single day spent in this
family, which had given me the impression of
a heaven upon earth.

The mistress of the house, the wife and
mother, was the silent soul of all. "It is she—
it is she, who is my happiness!" said the
fortunate husband; but she said, "It is he!
it is he!"

"My dear friend," said I to him one day,
"how have you managed to be so happy in
your marriage?"

"Oh," replied he, smiling, "I have a secret
to tell you."

"A secret! for goodness sake, what is it?"

"From my youth upwards," he replied,"I
have prayed God to give me a good wife."

"Yes," thought I to myself, "that is it!
Here am I unmarried, because I have never
discovered this secret, without God's especial
direction I may not venture to choose 'my
wife.'"

A younger sister of my friend's wife lived
in the family. No one would have been
attracted to her for her external charms, but
a short time brought you completely under
the spell of her kindness, the intellectual
expression of her countenance, and the cheerful
friendliness of her manners. All the
household loved her; she was kind and
amiable to all. To myself, however, it seemed
that there was an exception: I thought her
somewhat cold and distant. I was almost
sorry when I perceived that I was grieved by
this; a short time convinced me that I had
really fallen in love with this young lady.

There was, however, a great difference
between this and my former love affairs.
Formerly, I had permitted external charms to
lead and blind me: now, on the contrary, I was
attracted to the soul, and its beauty alone had
captivated my heart. But why then was so
excellent a soul so cold towards me?

My friend said that it was because Maria
had heard me represented as a fickle young
fellow; one who amused himself with
broken affiances. Righteous Heaven! was
that indeed one of my faults? / fickle! /,
who felt myself created as a model of fidelity.
It was impossible for me to bear patiently so
cruel an injustice. No! as truly as my name
was Constantine, must Maria do me justice.

From that time, as she retired from me,
so began I to walk after her. I was
determined to convince her that I was not the
fickle, inconstant being that I had been
described. It was not, however, very easy to
succeed in this, but at length I did succeed.
After having put me to a trial, from which I
came with flying colours, she accepted my
proposals, and agreed to try me still further
in—a union for life.

During the period of our betrothal, she said
several times, quite rapturously, "I am so glad
to see that you also have faults; I feel now
less humiliated, less unhappy from my own."

This pleased me very much, and all the