to the mayor before he rides out, and
remember me to him. By the bye, it has just occurred to me that I
dreamt of him. Go to Pilgrim, too, if you have time, and tell him I am
waiting at home for him. May good luck attend you! I am so glad that
you will now have a roof of your own."

Faller went with the security into the valley, and Lenz began his work;
but he first wound up one of the clocks, and it played a hymn. He
nodded in unison, while filing a wheel. "That clock plays well: it was
her favourite air--my mother's," thought Lenz. The large clock, in a
beautifully carved walnut-wood case, as tall as a clothes press, was
called "The Magic Flute," for its principal piece was the overture to
that opera of Mozart's, besides five other airs: it was already sold to
a well-frequented tea-garden near Odessa. A small clock stood beside
it, and Lenz was working at a third. He worked unremittingly till noon.
He was very hungry, but when he sat down to table alone, all hunger
seemed to leave him.

He begged the old maid to sit down with him. She affected great shyness
and modesty; however she allowed her scruples at last to be overcome,
and when the soup was finished, she even volunteered the remark--"I
really see no reason why you should marry."

"Who says that I have any thoughts of marrying?"

"My opinion is that if you do marry you ought to marry the beadle's
daughter, Kathrine: she is come of good people, and has a great respect
for you--she can talk of nothing but you. Such a wife would be worth
having. It would be a bad business if you got a wife to whom you would
have to play second fiddle. Girls, now-a-days, are so stylish in their
ideas, and think of nothing but dress and vanity."

"I have no thoughts of marriage, especially at this moment."

"And you are right: it is not at all necessary--you will never better
yourself, believe me. And I know how you have been coddled all your
life, and I will take care to manage every thing so that you may almost
think your mother is still in the world. Tell me, don't you find the
beans good? I learned how to dress them from your mother--they are the
very same. She understood everything, from the greatest thing to the
least. You shall see how well pleased you will be while we live
together--as happy as the day is long."

"But, Franzl," said Lenz, "I don't think I shall be long as I am."

"Really? Have you any one in your eye already? Look there!--People had
agreed that Lenz