I thank you for your frank
confession. I cannot possibly accept your hand without your heart.
Nay--do not frown, father--I have a secret for your ear, and if you do
not wish to wreck your daughter's happiness, you will urge me no
further."

Von Steinberg frowned, and pshawed, and pished, and then, clearing his
voice, addressed the baron.

"Come, Von Rosenberg," said he, "confess that we have been acting like
a couple of old fools, in trying our hand at match making--it is a
business for the young people themselves, and not for old soldiers
like us. Say, shall we reduce the mutineers to obedience, or shall we
let them have it their own way?"

"Circumstances alter cases," answered the baron. "When I proposed for
Julia's hand, I didn't know my wife had a daughter to marry. And if
that were not the case, I am inclined to think the secret alluded to
by the young lady, would prove an insuperable obstacle to the
ratification of our treaty."

This secret was no other than a love affair between the fair Julia and
a certain count who had waltzed with her at the baths of Baden-Baden,
the preceding summer. We are glad to say that the flirtation thus
happily commenced ended in matrimony. As for Rudolph, he was shortly
after united to the fair Adelaide, on which occasion the baron gave
such a rouse as the old towers of Von Rosenberg had not known since
the rollicking days of its first feudal masters. It was illuminated at
every window and loophole, so that the waters of the Rhine rolled
beneath it a sea of fire, or as if their channels were overflowed
with generous Asmanshausen; and the old butler discharged his swivel
so many times that he had to be taken down from the battlements and
drenched with Rhenish to preserve his life.

Thus ended all that is worthy commemorating in the modern history of
the Castle on the Rhine.

LOVE IN A COTTAGE.

"Tell me, Charley, who is that fascinating creature in blue that
waltzes so divinely?" asked young Frank Belmont of his friend Charles
Hastings, as they stood "playing wallflower" for the moment, at a
military ball.

"Julia Heathcote," answered Charles, with a half sigh, "an old flame
of mine. I proposed, but she refused me."

"On what ground?"

"Simply because I had a comfortable income. Her head is full of
romantic notions, and she dreams of nothing but love in a cottage. She
contends that poverty is essential to happiness--and money its bane."

"Have you given up all h