ed hovels of
poverty, where she enters without hesitation. This is certainly a rare
quality in so young a creature. She rejoices the hearts of the children
by giving them clothes, sometimes made by herself, or pictures and the
like. Her whole object appears to be to reconcile and make all happy. I
have just seen her for the first time; her beauty is remarkable, and
might well adorn an angel. The common people wish only to Germanize
'Angela' when they call her 'Angel.' But she is indeed an angel of
heaven to the poor and needy."

Frank said nothing. He moved on in silence toward the weather-cross.

"I have accidentally discovered a singular custom of your 'angel,'
doctor. There is at the weather-cross a Madonna of stone. Angela has
imposed upon herself the singular task of adorning this Madonna, daily,
with fresh flowers."

"You are a profane fellow, Richard. You should not speak in such a
derisive tone of actions which are the out-flowings of pious
sentiment."

"Every one has his hobby. What will not people do through ambition? I
know ladies who torture a piano for half the night, in order to catch
the tone of the prima-donna at the opera. I know women who undergo all
possible privations to be able to wear as fine clothes, as costly furs,
as others with whom they are in rivalry. This exhaustive night-singing,
these deprivations, are submitted to through foolish vanity. Perhaps
Angela is not less ambitious and vain than others of her sex. As she
cannot dazzle these country folk with furs or toilette, she dazzles
their religious sentiment by ostentatious piety."

"Radically false!" said the doctor. "Charity and virtue are recognized
and honored not only in the country, but also in the cities. Why do not
your coquettes strive for this approval? Because they want Angela's
nobility of soul. And again, why should Angela wish to gain the
admiration of the peasants? She is the daughter of the wealthiest man
in the neighborhood. If such was her object, she could gratify her
ambition in a very different way."

"Then Angela is a riddle to me," returned Richard. "I cannot conceive
the motives of her actions."

"Which are so natural! The maiden follows the impulses of her own noble
nature, and these impulses are developed and directed by Christian
culture, and convent education. Angela was a long time with the nuns,
and only returned home two years ago. Here you have the very natural
solution of the riddle."

"Are you acq