r. I am
sure you will be a great musician some day, Hans."

The young man (for such he now was) looked much gratified at his
friend's hopeful words, and said, "If I do turn that, I shall owe it all
to you, Frida."

But the girl interrupted his speech by saying, "Now, Mutter, let me see
little Gretchen;" and next minute she was stooping over the bed where
lay the sleeping child--the very bed whence the spirit of the blind
child whom she had loved so dearly had taken its flight to the heavenly
land.

"What a darling she looks, Elsie! Oh, I am glad God has sent you this
little treasure! She will cheer you when Hans has gone away and her
father is all day in the Forest."

"Yes," said Elsie, "she is indeed a gift from God; and you, Frida, must
teach her, as you taught her parents and Anna, the 'way of life.' And O
Frida, thou must go down to the Dorf, for all the people there are so
eager to see thee once more. And now that thou hast grown a young lady,
they all wonder if thou still beest like the woodland child, and wilt
care about the like of them, or if perchance thou hast forgotten them."

"Forgotten them! O Elsie, how could they think so? Could I ever forget
how they and you gave of their little pittance to maintain the child
found in the Black Forest, and how you all lavished kindness on her who
had neither father nor mother to care for her? I must go at once and ask
them what I have done that they should have thought so badly of me even
for a minute. Don't you know, Mutter, that I have given up the going to
England to live with Miss Drechsler at Dringenstadt, in order that I may
often see my dear friends in the Forest; and that shall be my life-work,
unless"--and here the girl looked sad--"any of my own friends find me
out and claim me."

"Hast had any clue to them, Frida?" asked Elsie.

"Alas, no!" said the girl, "none whatever; and yet I have seen a great
number of people during these few years. And I have always worn my
necklace, which, being such a peculiar one, might have attracted
attention and led to the discovery of my parentage; but except one
Englishman, whom I met at the Stanfords', who said I reminded him of
some one whom he had seen, there has been nothing to lead me to suppose
that any one thought of me except as a friend of the Stanfords. But,
Elsie, though I am not discontented, still at times there is the old
yearning for my own people. But God knows best, and I am not going to
waste my life