es my poor crippled
brother. He says he must go out and beg; that an object like him on
crutches could stand at the church-door on Sundays, and in the market
on week-days, and get pence enough to support himself. Oh, it is
shameful of him! And to-day we had a quarrel about it. He came to take
me to church, where we were to be called for the third time. I was
nearly ready, but I said I should first give my little brother some
warm milk, and I went to fetch it. The boy was sitting on the doorstep
waiting for it.

"'Warm milk!' cried Peter, in a rage. 'I will give him what will make
him fat!' and then he struck the child and tore at his ear as if he
would tear it from his head. The child has a peculiarity--strange for
a child--he never cries, although you might beat him to death. He
opens his eyes and his mouth, but says nothing, and gives out no
sound. I implored Peter to let the poor thing alone, for I loved him.
This set him in a horrible rage.

"'Then let the dwarf go packing!' he screamed. 'Give him a beggar's
wallet, and let him beg from door to door; there never was a more
unsightly cripple than he is, so let him bring home something for his
keep, the scarecrow!'"

The tears ran down the girl's face as she told this.

"How can he help being so ugly and deformed?" she went on. "It was not
God who made him so, it was stepfather; and so I told Peter, and that
I would rather he would beat me than that he should touch the child.

"'And I will beat you,' he said, 'if you say another word'; and then
he seized hold of the child and kicked him. 'Get out of my sight, you
little monster of ugliness!' he said. 'Go to the church-door and beg,
or I will eat you.' And he made such a horrible face that my poor
little brother shrieked with fright. I could not stand seeing him
tortured in this way. I took him from him, and would have covered him
up in my arms, but he ran and hid himself in the chimney. I _was_ very
angry.

"'If you torment him like this,' I said, 'I shall break with you.'

"Then he seized me by my hair and fell to beating me, as you saw. Now
he will do it every day."

"No, no," returned Felix. "The fellow will have to serve his term; a
muscular giant like him cannot shirk military duty. If every one did
that, who the deuce would defend the country and the emperor? It
cannot be winked at--"

"Then are you really a doctor?" said Evila, doubting.

"Of course I am, when I say I am."

A faint reflection of