“Does Mr. Rosenberg never spend his evenings at home?” asked Hamilton, after having waited three weeks in expectation of becoming better acquainted with him.

“Oh, no; what could he do at home?” asked his wife, seemingly surprised at the question.

Hamilton was silent; he remembered that he had never seen Mr. Rosenberg converse with his wife.

“He never drinks his beer or reads the papers at home,” she continued; “but you can go out with him whenever you like—I wonder you do not, for it is very natural that you should find it dull here when you cannot go to the theatre.”

“I do not find it dull,” said Hamilton; “and I should not go so often to the theatre if I had not heard that it was the best means to perfect one’s self in a foreign language. By-the-by, I received a letter from my father this morning, and he desires me forthwith to engage a German master; he expects me to write German as well as English when I return home, and says I should study German literature. I wished to have asked Mr. Rosenberg to recommend me to someone, for as I am not quite a beginner, I should like to have a person really capable of directing my studies during the winter. One can read a good deal in six months when the dictionary is no longer in requisition.”

“If you wish to study French, Hildegarde could give you instructions, for she understands it thoroughly; but German has been rather neglected in her education. I really think I must let her take lessons at the same time with you.”

“I shall be very much obliged to you,” said Hildegarde, bestowing, for the first time, a look of regard on her step-mother; “very much obliged indeed.”

“That will be delightful,” said Hamilton, eagerly. “I have always received my German lessons with my sister, and am particularly fond of learning in company.”

“May I not learn too, mamma?” asked Crescenz, timidly.

“What for?” asked her mother, with a laugh. “Have you not already secured a good husband, who is satisfied with you as you are? It would be time and money thrown away, and you have enough to do preparing your trousseau at present. The workwoman comes to-morrow, and we must then begin in earnest. As to Hildegarde, she has thrown away an opportunity which I hope she may not hereafter regret. Husbands will not fall down from heaven to be picked up just when she is in the humour to marry; she must try in every way to improve herself now, as a time may come when she may be obliged to give instruction. Life is precarious; if anything should happen to your father——”

“My father!” exclaimed Hildegarde, anxiously. “Has he been complaining lately? Do you fear a return of——”

“Your anxiety is unnecessary; he is at present perfectly well,” answered her mother dryly. “I wish, when I am really suffering, you would sometimes show a little of the attention and anxiety which you bestow at times so unnecessarily on him; it would become you better, Hildegarde, than the cold heartlessness which you evince for everything that concerns me. Crescenz is quite different, and therefore I feel for her as if she were my own child.”

“But, mamma,” said Crescenz, in a very low voice, “you are always kind to me!”

“Am I not kind to Hildegarde?”

Crescenz blushed, stammered, and looked anxiously towards her sister.

“No,” said Hildegarde, courageously, “you are not kind to me; perhaps I do not deserve it. I have no right to expect you to love me, but I have a right to expect you to be just.”

“I was disposed to be more than just to you at first, Hildegarde, if you allowed me. Mr. Hamilton shall be judge between us.”

“Excuse me,” said Hamilton, “I do not feel competent to give an opinion on such a subject.”

“Chance has, however, placed you exactly in a position to act as umpire; we must be satisfied with your decision, because we know you to be an unbiassed looker-on. My step-daughters were with me but a few weeks before I met you at Seon; since that time you have been constantly with us. Hildegarde, shall I go on?”

Hildegarde murmured something about “strangers” and “family dissensions.”

“Mr. Hamilton is no longer a stranger; and as to the dissensions, such as they are, he has been a witness to them. For my part, I should like to explain, but if you acknowledge that you have been unjustly and unnecessarily prejudiced against me, I shall be silent.”

“Mr. Hamilton is not so unbiassed an arbitrator as you suppose,” observed Hildegarde, looking up steadily while she leaned on the table.

Madame Rosenberg looked from one to the other with a puzzled air, until Hildegarde added: “He will find it difficult not to lean to your side, and take your part, even if he wished to be just, because he dislikes me personally.”

“Another argument against you, Hildegarde!” cried Madame Rosenberg, triumphantly. “Why should he dislike you more than another, if you were not less amiable? Your own words condemn you!”

“Be it so,” said Hildegarde, with some emotion. “No one loves me but—but—my father.”

“I love you, Hildegarde,” whispered Crescenz, gently taking her sister’s hand, and, at the same time, looking timidly towards her step-mother, “I love you too.”

“I shall soon see your affection decline; it cannot be otherwise,” said Hildegarde, bending over her work to conceal the large tears which stood in her eyes, ready to fall when she could permit them to do so unperceived.

Madame Rosenberg was not a person of much observation, although possessed of a good deal of common sense. She heard the words, and answered to them. “Of course, when Crescenz marries, you cannot expect any longer to be her first object; Major Stultz will, and ought to take your place in her affections—it is the way of the world—the law of nature!”

Hildegarde’s work dropped from her hands. Hamilton, who was sitting beside her, picked it up; and as she stooped to take it from him, the tears which he had been watching in stolen glances, now, to his infinite dismay, fell slowly on his hand. He started, as if they had hurt him; and then, under pretence of seeking a book, left the room, hoping to find the discussion at an end on his return. He was mistaken; on again opening the door, Madame Rosenberg was speaking with even more than usual volubility. “The fact is, Hildegarde, you cannot pardon my being a smith’s daughter; although I was a much better match for your father than his first wife, with all her fine relations! What’s the use of being a countess when one is penniless? Your mother had not even a respectable trousseau—there is scarcely anything remaining to be given to Crescenz; and you know yourself, your relations have been so unkind that your father never intends to allow you to visit them; and I am quite sure were you to meet them in the street they would look away to avoid bowing to you. Take my advice, Hildegarde, forget that your mother was a Countess Raimund, remember that your father is plain Franz Rosenberg; and though your mother is a smith’s daughter, you ought not to forget that many of the comforts of your home come from her, and the produce of the much despised iron works. Cease to fancy yourself a martyr to a cruel step mother; I might be a great deal worse than I am; if you find me sometimes a little strict, it is only for your good, and necessary, too, at your age! As to your refusal of the Major, I shall never mention it again—he has not gone out of the family, you know; if he had not proposed to Crescenz, I could not have got over the loss or forgiven you so easily. You must endeavour to correct your irritability of temper, and I am sure in time everyone will like you; even Mr. Hamilton will overcome his dislike to you.”

Hildegarde’s varying colour showed how much she suffered during this speech; and Hamilton was again on the point of leaving the room, when Madame Rosenberg called out: “You need not run away again, we have talked the matter out, and intend to be good friends in future, eh, Hildegarde? Come here and give me a kiss to prove that you bear no malice.”

Hildegarde put aside her work, approached her step-mother, and received her hearty kiss with an evident effort at cordiality.

“May I hope to be included in this reconciliation?” asked Hamilton, holding out his hand, with a smile.

Hildegarde pretended not to understand him; and again took her place at the table.

“Hildegarde,” said her step-mother, “you may give your hand to Mr. Hamilton—he is an Englishman, and will put no wrong construction on the action. Captain Smith told me that shaking hands is a common English custom, and means nothing more than kissing a lady’s hand here.”

“I should think it must mean a great deal less,” said Hamilton, laughing, while Hildegarde, after a moment’s consideration, placed her hand in his, and unreservedly returned his firm pressure.

“Ah! here comes the Major,” cried Madame Rosenberg, as a slight knock was heard at the drawing-room door. “Come in, Major, and tell us what you have been doing with yourself the whole afternoon; we expected you to supper, and I should not be surprised if Crescenz were to scold you a little for your unusual absence.”

“I cannot imagine Crescenz scolding me, even if I deserved it, which, however, in this instance, is not the case,” said Major Stultz. “I have spent the whole day in lodging-hunting. The sooner I am established the better, as Crescenz must assist me to choose our furniture.”

“Why, what a hurry you are in,” said Madame Rosenberg, with evident satisfaction. “Quite an ardent lover, I declare. However, I shall not be behindhand in performing my part. The workwoman comes to-morrow, and then we shall work our fingers to the bone, eh, Crescenz?”

Crescenz blushed, and smiled faintly.

“I should like very much to talk over the different lodgings with you, Crescenz,” said Major Stultz, growing very red. “I have noted them for that purpose in my pocket-book. That is,” he added, in a whisper, “if we can go to another table.”

Madame Rosenberg heard the whisper, pushed a candle towards him, and pointed to a card-table at the other end of the room. No sooner were they established at it than she jingled her keys once or twice, as a sort of tacit excuse, and then left the room.

Hamilton, who was, as usual, sitting near the stove, pretended to be wholly occupied with a book; his eyes, nevertheless, wandered perpetually over it, towards Hildegarde, who now began strangely to interest him. As the door closed on her mother, her hands fell listlessly on her lap, and by degrees became clasped round her knee, while she gazed steadfastly on the floor for several minutes. She then raised her head, and having looked at her sister for some time, turned towards Hamilton, but so slowly that he was able to fix his eyes on his book, although he coloured violently in doing so; he thought she must perceive his confusion, and continued pertinaciously to read the words, although they conveyed no idea whatever to his mind. When he had reached the end of the page, he became curious to know whether or not she was still looking at him, and, after a moment’s hesitation, he half turned over the leaf, and at the same time raised his eyes without moving his head; he had given himself unnecessary trouble to catch her glance—her eyes met his with the most unconcerned expression possible, and though he felt that he continued to blush, she either did not observe it, or attributed it to the heat of the room.

“I wonder that you can sit so near the stove, and that you can read at such a distance from the candle,” she observed, quietly.

“I am rather surprised at it myself,” answered Hamilton, pushing his chair close to hers, so as to form a tÊte-À-tÊte.

“Perhaps if I snuff the candle you will be better able to read.” She snuffed the candle out.

“Thank you,” said Hamilton, vainly attempting to repress a laugh; “I have no doubt I shall be better able to read now. Perhaps you have done this on purpose to make me feel that I ought to have snuffed the candle myself.”

“Oh, no, indeed,” said Hildegarde, joining half unwillingly in the laughter, “I happened to overhear something which Crescenz said, and then I looked up and——”

Crescenz rose from her chair, looked at them for a moment, and then, in a voice of ill-suppressed emotion, stammered out: “They—they—are laughing at me—at us!”

“No, oh no!” cried Hildegarde, eagerly, taking up the extinguished candle to light it. “No, indeed, Mr. Hamilton is laughing because I have snuffed out the candle, and I am laughing I don’t know what for,” she added with a sigh. “I am sure I never felt less inclined to be merry in my life.”

Crescenz sat down again, but followed her sister with her eyes as she turned to her place. Major Stultz in vain talked of his yellow sofa and six chairs, and asked her whether he should buy a long or a round table for her drawing-room; or proposed purchasing both, if she wished it. She heard him not, for Hildegarde was again beside Hamilton, and he was leaning on the arm of his chair, and looking at her as Crescenz had never seen him look at anyone before.

“Crescenz! you do not hear a word I am saying,” exclaimed Major Stultz at length. “Not one word! If you wish it, we can return to the other table, and then you can watch your sister playing with the snuffers and the wick of the candle at your leisure.”

Crescenz did not answer.

“Perhaps,” he continued, yielding to an unconquerable feeling of jealousy, “perhaps I have mistaken the object of your attention—I do believe you are admiring the bold black eyes of that long-legged English boy!”

Crescenz blushed deeply and turned away.

This was stronger confirmation than he had expected, and he now continued, in the low voice of suppressed anger: “I have long suspected something of this kind, Crescenz—your mother desired me to say nothing to you about it, as she imagined you too innocent to be capable of such perfidy—I cannot, at my age, expect you to love me as I do you—but I did imagine that in time I should gain your affection—if this be not possible, tell me so at once, for I will not be made a fool of by you or any one else!”

“I don’t understand you!” cried Crescenz, terrified at his constrained manner and flushed face, “I don’t in the least understand you!”

“Then I will speak to your mother,” he cried, rising hastily, and pushing back his chair with great violence. “She will understand me quickly enough.”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, don’t complain of me!” cried Crescenz beseechingly, while the tears started to her eyes. “I will do anything you please, and pay the greatest attention, if you will only promise not to tell mamma.”

“Then you did understand me, and know what I was about to say to her?” he asked, frowning.

“Oh, yes—you were going to tell her that I would not talk about the furniture, and that I looked at Hildegarde playing with the snuffers—and—Mr. Hamilton with his foot on the stove, instead of listening to you!”

This speech was made with consummate cunning—a more common ingredient in the composition of weak characters than is generally supposed. Major Stultz’s manner had frightened Crescenz—she feared the anger of her step-mother and the reproaches of her father, for she was essentially timid, and the want of moral courage made her affect a simplicity which, although in perfect keeping with her real character, was on the present occasion mere acting, as she had perfectly understood Major Stultz’s meaning. She could not have answered better; he was deceived, and while wiping the perspiration from his crimson face, he begged her to forgive his impatience, said that he had been guilty of entertaining odious suspicions, and though Crescenz continued to blush while he spoke, and would not raise her eyes from the table, he was too generous to distrust her again, and attributed her subsequent embarrassment altogether to timidity. Partly from a jealous recollection of the expression of Hamilton’s eyes, partly from shame at her own duplicity and annoyance at the unmerited praises now lavished on her by her lover, Crescenz began to weep bitterly, and poor Major Stultz was obliged to talk a deal of youthful nonsense in order to restore her equanimity, and induce her to continue the interrupted conversation.

In the meantime, the unconscious cause of all the disturbance had indulged in a long scrutiny of Hildegarde’s beautiful profile. She put an end to it by turning to him, and saying with a glance at his book: “You must have been reading French or English—our German letters at such a distance from the light would have been illegible.”

“I have been reading Bulwer’s last novel. It is extremely interesting.”

“Indeed! I wish you would lend it to me before you send it back to the library.”

“Is it possible you understand English, and have never spoken one word to me!” exclaimed Hamilton.

“I do not see anything extraordinary in that,” replied Hildegarde, smiling.

“You speak French so remarkably well, that I know you have a talent for languages. I dare say you speak English perfectly!”

“I cannot speak a word.”

“You have not had enough practice, perhaps, but you understand it when it is spoken.”

“Not a syllable.”

“Then may I ask you what you intend to do with this novel when I lend it to you?”

“Read it from daybreak until seven o’clock, and at night as long as my candle lasts,” replied Hildegarde, taking the book from him and looking at the title page.

“If you can read that book, and understand it, you must be able to speak a little,” observed Hamilton.

“I tell you I can neither speak nor understand English when it is spoken, and yet I can read this novel, if you will lend it to me, quite as well as if it were French or German.”

“You have had an odd kind of master!”

“I have had no master at all—mamma thought English an unnecessary study, though I should have greatly preferred it to music. The master too was expensive, so I was obliged to give up all hope of instruction; but I had heard of some person who had learned to read and understand a language perfectly without being able to pronounce a word, and who found it very easy, when chance gave him an opportunity to learn the pronunciation afterwards. I begged papa to buy me a grammar and dictionary, borrowed all the English books I could get from my school-fellows, learned them almost by heart from having read them so often; and when the Baroness Z— lent me some English novels at Seon, I scarcely missed my dictionary, which I had left in Munich.”

“What extraordinary perseverance!” exclaimed Hamilton, with undisguised admiration.

“Mamma would call it obstinacy,” said Hildegarde quickly. “Nothing would induce me to tell her that I had dared to learn English, after she had refused to let me take lessons.”

“There is a great difference between obstinacy and perseverance,” said Hamilton.

“The difference is sometimes difficult to define—my step-mother says I am obstinate!”

“I really do think your organ of firmness must be tolerably well developed,” said Hamilton, laughingly placing his hand on the top of her head.

Hildegarde coloured, and hastily pushed back her chair—he saw she did not understand him, but he was too lazy to explain. The thought passed quickly through his mind, that it was odd his not as yet having met a single person who understood or was interested about phrenology in Germany—the country of Gall and Spurzheim!—while in England most people had read Combe’s works, attended lectures on, or had at least heard phrenology spoken of sufficiently to understand what he had just said. “You can keep the book if you wish it,” he observed, in order to renew the conversation.

“But you have not quite read it,” said Hildegarde, “and I can imagine nothing more disagreeable than resigning a novel before one knows how it ends. Perhaps other people do not feel the same degree of interest that I do, but——”

“I have often sat up until four o’clock in the morning to read an interesting novel,” said Hamilton.

“It must be very pleasant to have a light as long as one pleases at night! Mamma is quite surprised when I ask for a candle oftener than every three days, and then she always observes that sitting up at night is very injurious to the health and eyes, and I get nothing but little ends of candle for a fortnight afterwards.”

“I will give you as many candles as you can burn,” said Hamilton, laughing.

“That was not what I meant,” said Hildegarde in great confusion. “I dare say mamma is right. For in summer, though I only read in bed from daylight until six o’clock, I have often felt terribly fatigued during the day afterwards—I heard mamma tell papa, that if you were her son, she would go into your room every night at ten o’clock, and put out your candles.”

“I do not exactly wish her to be my mother, for the sake of having a living extinguisher, which I should consider rather a bore than otherwise,” said Hamilton, “but if she were my mother, you would of course be my sister, and I should have no objection to that relationship.”

“Have you a sister?” asked Hildegarde, abruptly.

“Yes, an only sister, and I like her better than all my brothers put together.”

“And do you not quarrel with her?”

“Never. She is my most intimate friend when I am at home, my principal correspondent when I am abroad. She is the most amiable, the most excellent of human beings!”

“Older? much older than you?” asked Hildegarde, with some appearance of interest.

“Only a year or two,” replied Hamilton. “We learned French as children together, and afterwards Italian and German. You will take her place to-morrow or the day after, when we begin our studies, and if you wish to learn to speak English, I am quite willing to assist you.”

“Oh, delightful!” cried Hildegarde, unconsciously moving her chair quite close to his, and leaning her hand confidentially on the arm of it; “delightful! that is exactly what I have long wished for; but,” she added hesitatingly, “but I fear you will expect me to—to—that is, not to——”

“What?” asked Hamilton, with a smile.

“Not to say what I think; or—or quarrel in future.”

“I made the offer unconditionally; we can fight our battles all the same, whenever you feel disposed.”

“If that be the case,” said Hildegarde, apparently much relieved, “I accept your offer, thankfully, and I hope I shall not give you much trouble.”

“Suppose you take your first lesson now,” said Hamilton. “As you merely require the pronunciation, let us begin with this book.” He laid it before her as he spoke, and they both turned towards the table. Hildegarde began at once to read, but with the most unintelligible foreign accent he had ever heard. He used his utmost effort to suppress his laughter, and did not venture to correct a single word. At the end of the page she looked up rather surprised, and encountered Hamilton’s eyes brilliant with suppressed mirth, while every other feature of his face was drawn into a forced seriousness of expression, forming altogether so extraordinary a distortion of countenance that she threw herself back in her chair and burst into a fit of laughter.

“Why don’t you laugh out, if you feel inclined?” she asked, as Hamilton half covered his face with his pocket-handkerchief.

“I really was afraid of offending you,” he replied.

“Oh! you never can offend me by laughing openly; it is only by speaking ironically or sneering that you can annoy me, and make me feel almost inclined at times to give you a box on the ear.”

“I give you leave to do so whenever you please,” said Hamilton; “but you will incur a penalty of which I shall most certainly take advantage.”

“And what may that be?”

“If my lips may not explain otherwise than by words, they decline the office.”

Hildegarde bent her face over her book, shaded her eyes, and remained silent.

“Go on,” said Hamilton; “now that you have given me leave to laugh I have lost all inclination.”

Hildegarde continued to read, looking up, however, at the end of every sentence, and asking for the necessary corrections.

When Major Stultz stood up to take leave, he put an end to the first of the English lessons, which were, however, continued with unfailing regularity every day from that time forward. A young medical student, recommended alike for his talent and poverty, was engaged to give German lessons, and the drawing-room being found too subject to interruptions, Hamilton’s sitting-room was converted into a study. The youthful preceptor seemed to enjoy his pupil’s society, and often remained long to discuss literary and philosophical subjects with Hamilton, and not unfrequently to smoke a cigar, Hildegarde having had the complaisance to profess to like the smell of tobacco when it was good.