ness, that to look on it were alone a
blessing. I have that night's looks and cheerful voices fresh in my
memory, and have thought of them many a long mile away from where I then
heard them.

A slight noise beside me made me turn round, and I saw the Black
Colonel, as the waiter called him, and whom I had not met for several
days past. He was seated on a bench near, but with his back towards me,
and I could perceive he was evidently unaware of my presence. I had, I
must confess it, felt somewhat piqued at his avoidance of me, for such
the distant recognition with which he saluted me seemed to imply. He had
made the first advances himself, and it was scarcely fair that he should
have thus abruptly stopped short, after inviting acquaintance. While I
was meditating a retreat, he turned suddenly about, and then, taking off
his hat, saluted me with a courtly politeness quite different from his
ordinary manner.

'I see, sir,' said he with a very sweet smile, as he looked towards
the little group--'I see, sir, you are indeed an admirer of pretty
prospects.'

Few and simple as the words were, they were enough to reconcile me to
the speaker; his expression, as he spoke them, had a depth of feeling in
it which showed that his heart was touched.

After some commonplace remark of mine on the simplicity of German
domestic habits and the happy immunity they enjoyed from that rage of
fashion which in other countries involved so many in rivalry with others
wealthier than themselves, the colonel assented to the observation, but
expressed his sorrow that the period of primitive tastes and pleasures
was rapidly passing away. The French Revolution first, and subsequently
the wars of the Empire, had done much to destroy the native simplicity
of German character; while in latter days the tide of travel had brought
a host of vulgar rich people, whose gold corrupted the once happy
peasantry, suggesting wants and tastes they never knew nor need to know.

'As for the great cities of Germany,' continued he, 'they have scarcely
a trace left of their ancient nationality. Vienna and Berlin, Dresden,
and Munich, are but poor imitations of Paris; it is only in the old and
less visited towns, such as Nuremberg, or Augsburg, that the Alt Deutsch
habits still survive. Some few of the Grand-Ducal States--Weimar, for
instance--preserve the primitive simplicity of former days even in
courtly etiquette; and there, really, the government is paternal, in