ll live here."

"Oh, indeed."

"You have a home, I suppose?"

"Of course."

"Brothers and sisters?"

"Two sisters," I replied, mightily ruffled by what I chose to consider
her curiosity and impertinence; though, when I looked at her, I saw what
I could not but confess to be a real, and not unkind, interest in her
plain face and big eyes.

"Ah! I have no brothers and sisters. I have only a little house in the
country, and as I have always lived in a town, I don't care for the
country. It is so lonely. The people are so stupid too--not always
though. You were offended with me at dinner, _nicht wahr_?"

"Oh, dear, no!" said I, very awkwardly and very untruly. The truth was,
I did not like her, and was too young, too ignorant and _gauche_ to try
to smooth over my dislike. I did not know the pain I was giving, and if
I had, should perhaps not have behaved differently.

"_Doch!_" she said, smiling. "But I did not know what a child you were,
or I should have let you alone."

More offended than ever, I maintained silence. If I were certainly
touchy and ill to please, Fraeulein Sartorius, it must be owned, did not
know how to apologize gracefully. I have since, with wider knowledge of
her country and its men and women, got to see that what made her so
inharmonious was, that she had a woman's form and a man's disposition
and love of freedom. As her countrywomen taken in the gross are the most
utterly "in bonds" of any women in Europe, this spoiled her life in a
manner which can not be understood here, where women in comparison are
free as air, and gave no little of the brusqueness and roughness to her
manner. In an enlightened English home she would have been an
admirable, firm, clever woman; here she was that most dreadful of all
abnormal growths--a woman with a will of her own.

"What do they do here?" I inquired, indifferently.

"Oh, many things. Though it is not a large town there is a School of
Art, which brings many painters here. There are a hundred and
fifty--besides students."

"And you are a student?"

"Yes. One must have something to do--some _carriere_--though my
countrywomen say not. I shall go away for a few months soon, but I am
waiting for the last great concert. It will be the 'Paradise Lost' of
Rubinstein."

"Ah, yes!" said I, politely, but without interest. I had never heard of
Rubinstein and the "Verlorenes Paradies." Before the furor of 1876, how
many scores of provincial English had?

"T