orse than regret.
For six months she shut herself up: then, hearing nothing of her
lover, she reappeared shyly on the promenade, divested of rings,
ear-drops and ornaments. The beautiful Fritz, in his loveliest gloves,
intercepted her beneath the chestnuts, and, armed with her father's
consent, proposed himself for her _verlobter_.

"'Not yet,' she answered: 'wait till I wear my flowers again.'

"In Germany, as in Switzerland and Italy, natural flowers are
indispensable to a young girl's toilet. To appear at an assembly
without a blooming tuft at the corsage or in the hair is to indicate
that the family is in mourning, the mother sick or the lover
conscripted.

[Illustration: THE LEGAL PROFESSION AND PROFESSION OF FRIENDSHIP.]

"With an exquisite natural sense, Bettina, daughter of a gardener,
would never wear any flowers but wild ones. About this time there was
a grand fair at Durlach: almost all Ettlingen went there, and Bettina
too, but as spectatress only, and without her flowers.

"The dances which animated the others made her sad. She left the ball
and wandered on the hillside. There, beneath the hedge of a sunken
road, she recognized her beauteous Fritz. Poor Fritz! he was refusing
himself the pleasure of the dance which he might not partake with her.
Ah, the time for temporizing is over! Bettina determines that to-day,
in the eyes of every one, they shall dance together, and he shall be
recognized as her _verlobter_. She looks hastily around for flowers.
The hill is bare, the road is stony: an enclosure at the left offers
some promise, and Bettina enters.

"It was a cemetery. Animated with her new resolve, she thought little
of the profanation, and crowned herself with flowers from the nearest
grave. In an hour the villagers from Ettlingen saw her leaning on
Fritz's shoulder in the waltz. That night the shade of Wilhelm stood
at her bed-head: 'You have accepted the flowers growing on my grave
and nourished from my heart. I am once more your _verlobter_.'

"Next day Fritz came, radiant, with a silver engagement-ring, which he
was to exchange for that on Bettina's finger, returned by Wilhelm at
his departure. But the ring was gone. At night Wilhelm reappeared, and
showed the ring on his finger. Some time passed, and Bettina lost a
good part of her beauty, distracted as she was between the laughing
Fritz in the daytime and the pale Wilhelm at night. She was a sensible
girl, however, and persuaded herself, w