face, which was radiant with the light within, he thought, 'Thus we effect the transfiguration, which is the mystery of love.'

This exalted state of feeling was, however, not to last, for man's nature endures not in such an atmosphere. It was Frau Warning who awoke the sleep-walkers. Ever since Johannes had been much in the house, the mother had retired to her room; and since even her son-in-law had clung to the strange guest as though he were a friend and younger brother, she had heard a voice in her conscience which told her that she must now raise her hand and avert a misfortune.

A man who had a past like Johannes was not suitable to a quiet home. Frau Warning had only to think with what sort of people he had once breathed the same air, to feel him outlawed for ever. She was conscious of having no prejudices, and if she would prefer not sitting down at the same table with a Jew or a Roman Catholic, it was a peculiarity of her own. She allowed that these might be very good people; but civil dishonour was a point which she could not get over, and moreover she would not. She could not look at this man, not even in his useful humane labours, without the inward shudder with which we should

regard a lion, even though he were tamed as a companion by such a saint as St. Hieronymus. Frau Warning thought. The wild nature may break forth, when the lion sees blood. This man had shed blood; he must see blood in his remembrance, and then he may grow wild and furious. He is not fit for our society.'

Her daughter went so securely on her way, that the mother could not manage to speak with Franziska about him; moreover, she thought that in the bosom of a wife and mother feelings could not again obtain a place which she had fostered while unmarried. She had no fears for Franziska ; but what did this doctor want who, after such a stormy past, had wandered about the world, patronized by nobles, and who had achieved nothing more than that he lived on his salarybore a false name and dared not utter his ownwhat did he want in her family? Her granddaughter, the bright Leonora, began to be absorbed with him; the child spoke so gladly of the unfortunate man, she would sit so often under the limes with her work, waiting for him to join her; and then she would look so merry and laughing, that the grandmother delighted in the pleasant face; but, after all, it was not right. Her son-in-law

had even said, that if he could manage it, he should like to have Doctor Olaf established as a physician near the family.

Frau Warning was not satisfied with her daughter; she ought to have told her husband everything; she ought to have requested that another doctor should be sent to the hospital. A wife ought to keep her house locked up, so that nothing might enter which did not belong there. As the gardener nurtures and waters his treasures, so she ought to keep the plants in her garden free from all that was noxious. At times Frau Warning had a feeling of pity, for she said to herself, that fate had therefore willed it, and where the paths of Providence are to be suspected and where not the widow could not make up her mind; but she must interfere, and she did so.

CHAPTER V.

FRAU WARNING'S DISCLOSURE.

IT was the middle of the month of October, on a gloomy autumn day-which was to be a decisive one, moreover, as regarded the family movements -when Frau Warning, after having opened her window in the morning and given the birds that came to be fed their wonted ration, seated herself on the sofa, prepared to open her mind to Doctor Olaf, whom she had requested to come to her. The conversation had, however, taken another turn than that the old lady had intended; and when Johannes left her again, she shook her head and sat lost in thought; for with his mild manly manner, and his superiority, he had turned to naught the words of reproach which she had prepared for him. The end had been that Frau Warning had held out her hand to the reprobate man, and had told him that she had meant nothing unkind. She had truly meant nothing unkind towards him, only she had wished not to have him in the house or anywhere in her vicinity. Worldly

wisdom, while it piques itself on cleverness and
firmness of feeling, has no perception of the ruling
of higher powers, and Frau Warning, who was not
blessed with any great acuteness of judgment, and
whose motives were all rooted in moral rectitude,
had imprudently let slip a word upon what Fran-
ziska had done for Johannes' liberation. She had
not been able to forbear remarking how he had
never written a word; how he had not even ex-
pressed his thanks, just as if no good deed had
been done him, while her daughter had sacrificed
the years of her youth for him and his unhappy
fate, until it had become at last even too much for
Klaren, and he had turned away from him. And
having once given vent to her heart, the widow
had added a word as to the depravity of many
men who marry actresses or run after light-minded
women, till others become tedious to them.
mother had thanked God that all had been as it
was; she would rather have seen Franziska dead
than married to him; still she bore him a grudge
that he could have overlooked her daughter when
she had entertained an inclination for him. The
feeling, for years repressed, had, without her in-
tending it, found vent at last.

Johannes had become pale as death.

The

This then Franziska had done for him! Was

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