"Why, gracious mamma," replied Agatha, with perfect ingenuousness, "he told me so himself. Oh, pray do not be displeased, dearest mamma, it was only the day before he left us. And he asked me," she added, blushing deeply, "whether he might ask you for my hand, and I said yes."

At this the count shook anew with laughter. It was evident that his little victory over his wife had put him in the best humor. The countess was too kind and too amiable not to suffer him to enjoy it, and submitted, smilingly, and without showing any annoyance, to his jokes on the subject; nor could the happiness which shone from the daughter's lovely eyes fail to cast its reflection also on the affectionate mother.

"Dearest husband," said the old lady, after a pause, "let us not be over-hasty in this important matter. As far as human wisdom can determine, this marriage seems convenable. Captain von Hohenhorst is a young man of Christian principles; he is of good. family; as a soldier he has won a good name and the approbation of his king; lastly, and what is of great weight in the scale, our daughter has, as it seems, the confidence in him that, with the help of God, he will make her happy. But it would leave a stain on my conscience, and certainly also on yours, my honored husband, if we decided an affaire of such importance solely according to our own judgment. For you know that the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God.' We will let the sacred Word of God itself determine what answer we are to give the young man."

The count looked at Agatha rather anxiously; but when he saw his fair daughter quite easy, full of trust

that God would decide in favor of her and her innocent love, through which she felt all the nearer to him, he also took courage, and declared himself of the countess's opinion.

Agatha now fetched the great family Bible, which was used chiefly for such oracles. As she laid it on the table before her father, she could not, after all, help trembling a little. Hardly conscious why she did so, she chose her father rather than her mother, perhaps because she considered him as being more decidedly on her side, or it might be because her mother had accustomed her to give him the preference in all outward things.

The count uttered a short, low prayer, and then, with nervous haste, pushed his left thumb between the leaves. He opened to Jeremiah xiii. 16:

"Give glory to the Lord your God, before He cause darkness, and before your feet stumble upon the dark mountains, and, while ye look for light, He turn it into the shadow of death, and make it gross darkness."

The count looked embarrassed, and sought the eyes of his wife, which were turned upon the ground for some time. But when she raised them, they expressed joyful gratitude.

"Praised be the Lord!" she said to her husband and to Agatha, who was somewhat dismayed. "Could the Lord have given a more beautiful answer to our humble question? Only we poor worms of the earth must not expect that He will order every thing according to our human wisdom, for, as Paul tells us, 'God hath made foolish the wisdom of this world.' Thus we are not to take these blessed words as an

answer to the question whether we shall give our child to monsieur the captain; but the Most High teaches us by them to perceive that we chose the right way, when we concluded to leave the decision of this question to the Holy Scriptures. Give glory to the Lord! This we do, O Lord, we, thy faithful servant and thy humble handmaidens. Let us, beloved in Christ, do according to His word, and be careful to look for light when He leads us to the dark mountains and makes gross darkness.

"And now, my dear ones," she continued, "when both her hearers remained devoutly silent, let us ask the decisive question."

She seated herself at the table, opposite her husband. The Bible was placed before her. Agatha's heart beat high. Her mother inserted her right thumb between the leaves, while she uttered a silent prayer.

Then she opened the book, and read: "This is the thing which the Lord doth command concerning the daughters of Zelophehad, saying, Let them marry to whom they think best; only to the family of the tribe of their father shall they marry."

“The Lord hath decided," she said, with emotion. Agatha threw herself into her arms.

"But what is that about the 'family of the tribe of their father?" asked the count, somewhat dubiously.

"That," explained the countess, "refers only to the people of Israel, which is under the law, the bonds of which the Saviour of the world has broken. It may be that it is intended for the scions of a Christian nobility, the entire race of the Christian order of nobility."

Ir is unnecessary to relate in detail how a messenger was sent to the camp, and Captain Baron von Hohenhorst was respectfully requested to take the trouble of repairing to Castle Wildeneck in person; how the happy man hastened thither; how he obtained the formal consent of Agatha's parents, and permission was granted the young couple to salute each other in their presence, and how they obeyed; how the lover longed for the moment when he should be left alone with his loved one, and the latter did not regret it when that moment at last arrived-it is unnecessary to relate all this in detail, I repeat, because each one of us has either had similar experiences himself or witnessed them in others, though with this difference, that such a family picture of a hundred and twenty years ago has to our fastidious eyes a somewhat oldfashioned, faded coloring. Yet it is remarkable that our painters choose, for their domestic scenes from high life, the more stately attire and the more picturesque style of our forefathers, in preference to the tight-fitting garments of our parents, who fancied that they

were thereby brought nearer to Nature, or the fashionable dress of our present day, which strives to unite in itself the contradictions of the different periods of the past, or even to recall their least pleasing features. And might not the same be the case sometimes with the soul-painter? Might he not find it more attractive to delineate hidden emotions, half-veiled by outward forms, to dissect psychologically the heart-features, never brought to open consciousness of men and women of deep feeling, indeed, but held in curb outwardly by the restraint of ceremonious decorum, than to depict the openly-expressed passions, the unrestricted heart-revelations which are authorized in both sexes by the greater freedom of manner and thought of the present day!

A few days later the formal betrothal of the lovers took place. The betrothal was, a hundred years ago, and long after, a ceremony almost as formal and binding as that of marriage. Like the latter, it was generally performed in the presence of witnesses, only that the festive celebration of a wedding was wanting, which, in pietistic families, however, had lost a great part of its original noisy character, through the banishment of music and dancing. The influence of the war naturally made the "quiet in the land," even though in Silesia they thanked God for their deliverance, more quiet than ever. The only witnesses invited, therefore, as the Counts of Promnitz in Sorau as well as in Halbau were absent from home, and the relations of the countess lived at too great a distance, were the clergyman of the parish, and the colonel of the regiment to which Moritz now belonged, and the