le sister?"

"No, she's a year older than I."

"And is she beautiful too?"

Lilian did not wait for the answer; she beckoned to Roland to keep
quiet, for just then a lady-bug ran over her hand. She placed the
little creature on its back, saying,--

"Look, now it's kicking, it can't help itself--there, now, its little
wings are under its back, and with them it has got up again, all by
itself. Hi! it's off. 'Twill have a long story to tell when it gets
home. Ah, it will say. There was a great animal that had five legs on
its hand--my fingers must appear to it like legs, and when it eats
supper to-night it eats with----"

"Tell me, aren't you hungry too? I'm hungry."

"What are you doing there?" suddenly called out a woman's loud voice.
"Come into the house."

Lilian's aunt had made her appearance behind the children, and they had
to go with her to the house.

Lilian saw Roland's frightened expression, and with the idea that he
must certainly be thinking of the wicked woman in the story, who eats
the children up in the wood, she said in a low tone,--

"Aunt won't do us any harm; instead, we'll get something very nice
to-night, great pancakes and leeks. Don't you see a leek in her hand,
which she has just cut? That's for the pancakes."

Roland and Lilian accompanied Frau Weidmann into the house.

CHAPTER IV.

VOCATION AND FATHER-LAND.

While the children had been dreaming and chattering together in the
garden, the men had gone into the house. They stepped into the large
wainscoted entrance-hall, where a great many withered wreaths were
suspended. Weidmann pointed out to Eric that forty-two of these
belonged to him, for that was the number of harvests he had worked in
here.

The single wreath hanging by itself was the fiftieth one of his
father-in-law, which had been placed upon his grave. Weidmann nodded as
Eric said:--

"This is a decoration which cannot be purchased, which one can acquire
only for himself."

Eric was glad to point this out to Roland.

They entered the sitting-room on the ground-floor. It was spacious and
comfortable, with pleasant seats in the window-recesses, and chairs and
tables scattered about here and there.

"We live on the ground-floor in the summer," said Weidmann to Eric;
"every thing can be overlooked here better: After the leaves have
fallen, we remove to the upper story for the winter."

The great sitting-ro