for the same reason no dish is left untouched,
though it is a banquet that might even satiate a work-house. Soup,
sausage, roast veal, baked apples and stewed prunes; stewed liver,
fried liver, millet pudding; boiled beef with horseradish and
beet-root; hung beef; cabbage dished with tongue and pork; noodles;
and then a second soup to wash down what has gone before, but
followed by more substantial in the form of liver-cake, in which that
ingredient has been baked with bread-crumbs, eggs, onions and raisins.
Then come batter dumplings, one sort of _knoedel_ sprinkled with
poppy-seeds, roast beef with salad, and finally coffee.

There is little talking; only a clatter of plates, dishes, knives and
forks as the honest guests deliberately but persistently vanquish each
stage of the feast.

After coffee, "the mother's own sister" is called aside by Kathi, in
order that she, for her own and the dear dead Hofbauerin's sake
(of whom, bless her! in Kathi's eyes she is the very image), may be
privately presented to us, the foreign Herrschaft. A comely, compact
little figure, with delicate features, small hands and feet, and a
pair of dove-like eyes.

Wishing to be polite, she says it is _gar curios_ that any of the
Herrschaft should understand German. Immediately she fears this
implies ignorance on our part, and adds an apology: "But certainly
such Herrschaft who are so up in things of heaven and earth would know
German."

Then she waits with a sense of relief for one of us to speak. At this
moment, however, a bevy of bright, cheerful little peasant-girls,
who have been hovering in the distance, taking courage, approach and
cluster in a ring around her. She shows by her face that she fears
this is a liberty, but is nevertheless relieved by their supporting
her. We ask their names, and she goes off into a string of Madels,
Lisies, Nannies, who all smile spontaneously, and have not only to set
her right as to their ages, but, to their infinite astonishment, as to
their relationship to herself.

"Why, mother, I am your daughter!" says one little girl reproachfully.
"Why, aunt, my mother is dead, you know!" adds another, pulling at her
sleeve and whispering this correction. Then the whole group burst into
a shy titter.

The good soul stands calmly this battery of juvenile reproaches: "Ho,
are not you all my children? Have I not brought you all through the
measles, knitted the stockings for all your feet, until I taught you