? You seem to be a
precocious genius."

"My first service was with a baron; then I learned to ride, and I had
the reins to hold when he got out of the cabriolet, for he drove,
himself. Here there is only a hired coachman."

"And how long have you lived with this young lady?"

"Just a fortnight. It's a very easy place, I have every Sunday to
myself; there is a chambermaid too."

"Can you speak French, Jean Jacques?"

The boy blushed. Edwin seemed to have wounded his pride.

"The young lady speaks German," he replied. "But there is her bell. I
must go."

Edwin mechanically took up the book that lay upon the little table.
"Balzac!" said he. "'Pere Goriot.' After all, she is probably a
wandering Pole or Russian; they speak all languages, and drink in
Balzac, with their mother's milk."

He rose and glanced into the adjoining room. The little _salon_, into
which the light struggled, through heavy crimson curtains, was rendered
still darker by the wide spreading leaves of the palms. Before the
mirror a parrot was swinging in a ring, without uttering a sound. The
walls were dark, the ceiling wainscoted with brown wood, and on the
black marble mantlepiece stood a heavy _verde antique_ clock. The
brightness and spaciousness of the next apartment, into which he could
obtain but a partial glimpse through the open door, seemed greatly
enhanced in comparison with this. Tent-like hangings with gilded rods,
a portion of a dainty buffet with glittering silverware, and directly
opposite to the door a little table covered with dishes, but, so far as
he could see, furnished with but one plate. Besides these things, he
noticed the constant chirping and fluttering of the birds in the great
cage.

Edwin had had ample opportunity, while teaching the young members of
noble families, to compare the furnishing of the "tun" with the
luxurious arrangements of city houses. Hitherto the contrast had never
been painful to him. To-day, for the first time, he seemed to himself
as he chanced to glance into the mirror, like the shepherd in the fairy
tale, who wandered into a magic castle. Any attempt to improve his
costume he gave up as hopeless, but he was about to draw from his coat
pocket the gloves which he usually carried there, when the opposite
door of the little ante-room unclosed, and the beautiful, bewitching
creature entered, followed by the dwarf.

She paused upon the threshold with an air of indignant surprise, then
turning to t