orthography. In this she excelled all her many relations. Accounts she
understood far better than her mother, and had, when scarcely fifteen
years of age, during a long absence of her mother, so accurately
reckoned up the details of an income of 1800 gulden, that there was
nothing missing. She had for some years kept her own accounts in
respect of a property which she had inherited from an uncle at
Coburg, amounting to a thousand gulden or more. She had learned to
dance, and held herself well, but was not particularly fond of it; her
head-dresses she made herself, and many of her clothes, and always in
good taste. This pleasure in the work of her own hands was considered
by others of her own age, who had no such pleasure in it, as the result
of great parsimony, which it certainly was not, as I shall presently
show.

"We now associated more freely, and during the few remaining days of my
stay, often walked together, especially in the great garden on the
Lossau. There we sat, sometimes under the trees overlooking the city.
She was so frank with me, that she said to me of her own accord, 'Now
you must exert yourself, and take some control over me, to wean me from
the faults which long solitude has engendered in me. I may, by my
devotion perhaps, and by my pure good heart, recommend myself to you;
but, as we must mix with many people and become a portion of the
so-called great world, you must help me, that I may not then appear to
disadvantage, till I can myself judge rightly with respect to
externals. For you are superior to me in understanding and in the
refinements of language and social intercourse.' This honesty brought
tears into my eyes. She wept with me, asking whether I now repented,
and whether I had not long known these defects of hers?

"In answer to this, I said, 'I have more cause to be uneasy than you,
lest you should repent of having given your hand and heart to a
Professor, whom you will soon find deficient in all external means,
although very laborious. And now I will lay before you all my
anxieties, entirely without reserve. You know it is true that my father
can give me nothing; but you do not know that I cannot at present pay
you for board and lodging, and that I must incur many small debts, that
we may leave Coburg in suitable style.'

"She looked at me tenderly, and said: 'If you have really no other
cause for uneasiness, I am truly very happy to say that I can help to
place you in a better posit