tones.

"Oh, no, grandmother, we are only twelve and a half!" exclaimed the
young mother, taking the little one on her knee.

"This little fellow only counts half on the railroad."

All the party laughed at this remark, even the little cripple's
countenance relaxed into a sickly smile.

"Ay, ay," continued the old lady, "the trees are now putting forth
their verdure, but at the fall of the leaf who knows if all of us, or
any of us, may still be sitting here?"

* * * * *

Several months had passed since this slight incident.

In one of the apartments of the castle, the eldest Bardy and his son
were engaged in earnest conversation.

The father paced hastily up and down the apartment, now and then
stopping short to address his son, who stood in the embrasure of one
of the windows. The latter wore the dress of the Matyas Hussars[2]--a
gray dolmany, with crimson cord; he held a crimson csako, with a
tricolored cockade, in his hand.

"Go," said the father, speaking in broken accents; "the sooner the
better; let me not see you! Do not think I speak in anger, but I
cannot bear to look at you, and think where you are going. You are my
only son, and you know how I have loved you--how all my hopes have
been concentrated in you. But do not think that these tears, which you
see me shed for the first time, are on your account; for if I knew I
should lose you,--if your blood were to flow at the next battle,--I
should only bow my head in dust and say, 'The Lord gave, and the Lord
takes away, blessed be His holy name!' Yes, if I heard that you and
your infatuated companions were cut to pieces, I could stifle the
burning tears; but to know that your blood, when it flows, will be a
curse upon the earth, and your death will be the death of two
kingdoms--"

"They may die now; but they will regenerate----"

"This is not true; you only deceive yourselves with the idea that you
can build up a new edifice when you have overthrown the old one. Great
God, what sacrilege! Who had intrusted you with the fate of our
country, to tempt the Almighty? Who authorized you to lose all there
is for the hope of what may be? For centuries past have so many
honorable men fought in vain to uphold the old tottering constitution,
as you call it? Or were they not true patriots and heroes? Your
companions have hissed their persecuted countrymen in the Diet; but do
they love their country better than we do, who have shed