o court?"

"My father was riding-master to Prince Adolar, and her royal highness
had me educated in the convent school."

A chain of dependents, from generation to generation, thought the old
man to himself.

The maid looked at him wonderingly.

He was tall and broad-shouldered.

He wore the mountaineer's dress and a white horn whistle hung by a cord
from his neck. His fine head bent slightly forward and rested on a
massive neck; his gray hair and beard were thick and closely cropped;
his brown eye still sparkled, as if in youth; his expressive
countenance looked like embossed work, and his whole figure resembled
that of a knight who has just laid aside his armor and put himself at
ease.

"I wish to see my daughter," said the old man as he went into the
adjoining room. It was dark. Eberhard stepped to the window, on tiptoe,
and drew aside the green damask curtain. A broad ray of light streamed
into the room. He stood before the bed and, with bated breath, watched
the sleeping one.

Irma was beautiful to behold. Her head, encircled by the long,
loosened, golden-brown tresses; the clear, arched brow, the delicately
chiseled nose, the mouth with its exquisitely curved upper lip, the
rosy chin, the full cheeks with their peach-like glow--over all there
lay a calm and peaceful expression. The beautiful, small, white hands
lay folded on her breast.

Irma was breathing heavily, and her lips moved as if with a sad smile.
It is difficult to sleep with one's hands folded on the breast. The
hands gently loosened themselves, but the left one still rested on her
heart. The father lifted it carefully and laid it at her side. Irma
slept on quietly. Silently, the father took a chair and sat down at
her bedside. While he sat there, two doves alighted on the broad
window-sill, where they remained cooing with each other. He would have
liked to frighten them away, but he dared not stir. Irma slept on and
heard nothing.

Suddenly the pigeons flew away, and Irma opened her eyes.

"Father!" she cried, throwing her arms around his neck and kissing him.
"Home again! Oh, how happy it makes me! Do draw the other curtain, so
that I can see you better, and pray open the window so that I may
inhale my native air! Oh, father! I've been away and now I've come back
to you, and you won't let me go away again. You will support me in your
powerful arms. Oh, now I think of what you said to me in my dream. We
were standing together up on the C