-- -- I mean their mother is in an i-- c--. They are both in
a frightful rage, and Nelly said to me to-day: "It's a perfect scandal;"
they find it so awkward going about with their mother. I can't say I'd
noticed anything myself; but they say it has really been obvious for a
long time; "_the happy event!!_ will take place in October," said Olga.
It really must be very disagreeable, and I took a dislike to Frau W.
from the first. I simply can't understand how such a thing can happen
when people are so old. I'm awfully sorry for the two Weiner girls.
Something of the same sort must have happened in the case of the Schs.,
for Luise has told me that the young gentleman is 21 and his sister not
32 but 35, she had made a mistake; so she is 14 years older, appalling.
I'm awfully sorry for her because her father won't let her marry, or
rather would not let her marry. I'm sure Father would never refuse if
either of us wanted to marry. I have written all this to Hella; I miss
her dreadfully, for after all the Weiner girls are only strangers, and I
could _never_ tell my secrets to Dora, though we are quite on good terms
now. Oswald is coming to-morrow.

August 1st. A young man has a fine time of it. He comes and goes when he
likes and where he likes. A telegram arrived from Oswald to-day,
saying he was not coming till the middle of August: Konigsee, Watzmann,
glorious tramp. Letter follows. Father did not say much, but I fancy
he's very much annoyed. Especially just now, after poor Mother's death,
Oswald might just as well come home. Last year he was so long away
after matriculation, quite alone, and now it's the same this year. One
pleasure after another like that is really not the thing when one's
Mother has been dead only three months. The day after we came here and
before we had got to know anyone, I went out quite early, at half past
8, and went alone to the cemetery. It is on the slope of the mountain
and some of the tombstones are frightfully old, in many cases one can't
decipher the inscriptions; there was one of 1798 in Roman figures. I sat
on a little bank thinking about poor Mother and all the unhappiness,
and I cried so terribly that I had to bathe my eyes lest anyone should
notice it. I was horribly annoyed to-day. A letter came from Aunt Alma,
she wants to come here, we are to look for rooms for her, to see if we
can find anything suitable, Aunt Alma always means by that very cheap,
but above all it must be in a priva