tifully his honoured father
said grace after meals, and did it as well as the pastor; also how he
once recited before the prince, for a whole half hour, something, I
know not what, in pure Latin. One thing pleases me much in my Martin
Andres, that he has such a subtle, reflecting head. He himself
suggested to me to help him sometimes to gain money, by allowing him to
keep the redemption money for the stray cattle impounded on my fields.
He is so intent upon this that he lurks the whole day in the corn to
catch a couple of pigs or the like, whereby he has already gained as
much as half a thaler. But, nevertheless, if I only knew for certain
that my Junker Hans Christoph would prosper in this war business, like
your noble sons, honoured sister, I would not let another year pass
without endeavouring to persuade him to go. If he would but become for
certain an officer or a baron, and obtain a rich wife. She, however, to
suit me, must be of true, real, noble blood, for otherwise, I swear she
should never be permitted to appear before me, even though she were up
to her ears in gold. And who knows, dear honoured sister? I have all my
life long heard that in other countries the nobility are not so good as
with us, and that in Holland, from whence this officer comes, the women
are driven to the market naked as God has created them, just like the
cows. For my deceased honoured mother's sister, the dear Frau Grete von
T. lived to see her son devil-ridden, and he brought home just such a
wild woman. This so grieved her that she did not live much longer, and
she could not be persuaded to see this wild woman more than once. But
to return to my son. Junker Hans Christoph, if it should so happen that
he were not sent among the Tartars, nor obliged to be a sentinel, I
would try to persuade my old maid, who altogether reared and waited
upon him, to accompany him for a year, and look after him, to wash his
shirts and keep his head clean, and I would provide for her by sowing a
half peck of flax seed on her account.'

"The Frau von K. would, probably have given a good answer to this
nonsense, if she had not been led off to dance by Herr von K. Thus she
left the old lady alone, with whom the Junker Vogelbach, who was
present, and had a tobacco-pipe of a finger's length in his mouth, held
this discourse:--'How are you--how fares it with you, my honoured and
dear cousin? I observe that you rejoice to see Junker Hans Christoph
enjoy himself. M