es of
adventure. The life of a delegate, it seems to me, combines the
peculiar features of both of those conditions. It is no trifling matter
to leave a pleasant home and to bid adieu to wife and children, and to
stand shoulder to shoulder, laboring faithfully day and night for the
common weal.

I have had the good fortune to gain the friendship of man. It differs
somewhat from the love of woman, but is none the less blessed.

I was not only a delegate from our district but also a member of the
German Parliament. I was in accord with the best men of my country, and
we were true to one another at our posts. May those who in a happier
period replace us act as faithfully and unselfishly as we did!

During the winter session my wife's letters were a source of great
enjoyment to me. She kept me fully informed of all that happened at
home, and especially in regard to Martella.

On the morning that I left home she came to my wife and said,
"Mother--I may call you so, may I not?--and I shall try to be worthy of
it; and when master returns, I shall call him father."

She pointed to her feet. My wife did not know what she meant by that,
until she at last said, "Rothfuss said that if I were to lay aside my
red stockings, I would be making a good beginning."

And after this she began again: "I shall learn all that you tell me,
but not from the schoolmaster's assistant. When he was alone with me
the other day, he stroked my cheeks and I slapped him for his
impertinence. I shall gladly learn all that you wish me to learn."

She remained with my wife, and appeared quite pliant and docile. My
wife had her sleep in her own bedchamber, and on the first night she
exclaimed, with a voice full of emotion, "I have a mother at last? O
Ernst, you ought to know where I am! How happy you have been to have
had a mother all your life!"

I took these letters to my daughter Bertha, who thoroughly appreciated
and loved Martella. She said that her own experience had been somewhat
similar; for her marriage had introduced her to an aristocratic and
military circle, in which she was at first considered as an interloper,
and where it took some time before she could acquire the position due
her. For even to this day the aristocracy retain the advantage that
those who are well born can enter good society, even though they be
utterly devoid of culture.

Annette, who had also married an officer, had become quite attached to
her, and the result of t