ike a girl for
Confirmation, in a black silk dress and long red shawl. She was in grand
array, for she was on a visit. This young lady understood dress-making,
and could play upon the flute; which, however, she never did without
a certain bashfulness: besides this, she spoke well, especially upon
melancholy events. The bottle of wine only circulated at the upper
end of the table; the shopman and aunt only drank ale, but it foamed
gloriously: it had been made upon raisin-stalks.

"He is an excellent man, the merchant, whom you have received as
guardian, Mr. Thostrup," said the master of the house. "I am in
connection with him."

"But it is strange," interrupted the lady, "that only one out of his
five daughters is engaged. If the young ladies in Copenhagen do not go
off better than that, what shall we say here?"

"Now Mr. Thostrup can take one of them," said the husband. "There is
money, and you have fortune also; if you get an office, you can live in
floribus!"

Maren colored, although there was no occasion for coloring; she even
cast down her eyes.

"What should Mr. Thostrup do with one of them?" pursued the wife. "He
shall have a Jutland maiden! There are pretty young ladies enough here
in the country-seats," added she, and laid the best piece of meat upon
his plate.

"Do the royal company give pretty operas?" asked Maren, and gave another
direction to the conversation.

Otto named several, among others Der Freischuetz.

"That must be horrible!" said the lieutenant. "They say the wolf-glen
is so natural, with a waterfall, and an owl which flutters its wings.
Burgomaster Mimi has had a letter from a young lady in Aarhuus, who has
been in Copenhagen, and has seen this piece. It was so horrible that she
held her hand before her face, and almost fainted. They have a splendid
theatre!"

"Yes, but our little theatre was very pretty!" said the lady of the
house. "It was quite stupid that the dramatic company should have been
unlucky. The last piece we gave is still clear in my recollection; it
was the 'Sandsesloese.' I was then ill; but because I wished so much to
see it, the whole company was so obliging as to act it once more, and
that, too, in our sitting-room, where I lay on the sofa and could
look on. That was an extraordinary mark of attention from them! Only
think--the burgomaster himself acted with them!"

In honor of the strangers, coffee was taken after dinner in the garden,
where, under the plum-tree