the Lago Maggiore. These Swiss, who were possessed
of an income of about a thousand crowns a year, had let the top story of
their house to the Lovelaces for three years, at a rent of two hundred
francs a year. Old Lovelace, a man of ninety, and much broken, was too
poor to allow himself any gratifications, and very rarely went out; his
daughter worked to maintain him, translating English books, and writing
some herself, it was said. The Lovelaces could not afford to hire boats
to row on the lake, or horses and guides to explore the neighborhood.

Poverty demanding such privation as this excites all the greater
compassion among the Swiss, because it deprives them of a chance of
profit. The cook of the establishment fed the three English boarders for
a hundred francs a month inclusive. In Gersau it was generally believed,
however, that the gardener and his wife, in spite of their pretensions,
used the cook's name as a screen to net the little profits of this
bargain. The Bergmanns had made beautiful gardens round their house, and
had built a hothouse. The flowers, the fruit, and the botanical rarities
of this spot were what had induced the young lady to settle on it as she
passed through Gersau. Miss Fanny was said to be nineteen years old; she
was the old man's youngest child, and the object of his adulation. About
two months ago she had hired a piano from Lucerne, for she seemed to be
crazy about music.

"She loves flowers and music, and she is unmarried!" thought Rodolphe;
"what good luck!"

The next day Rodolphe went to ask leave to visit the hothouses and
gardens, which were beginning to be somewhat famous. The permission was
not immediately granted. The retired gardeners asked, strangely enough,
to see Rodolphe's passport; it was sent to them at once. The paper was
not returned to him till next morning, by the hands of the cook, who
expressed her master's pleasure in showing him their place. Rodolphe
went to the Bergmanns', not without a certain trepidation, known only to
persons of strong feelings, who go through as much passion in a moment
as some men experience in a whole lifetime.

After dressing himself carefully to gratify the old gardeners of the
Borromean Islands, whom he regarded as the warders of his treasure, he
went all over the grounds, looking at the house now and again, but with
much caution; the old couple treated him with evident distrust. But his
attention was soon attracted by the little Englis