life-like and so human,
my first impression was that I was entering a room where were three
living people.

"Never you mind these," exclaimed M---y, pleasantly, "but sit down
there," pointing to a large _fauteuil_, "and tell me when you reached
Munich, and if you will stay some time: then I can judge better how to
do for you."

My face flushed, for I felt guilty at the little fraud I seemed to have
practised on him. I hesitated only an instant, and then frankly told him
the truth: how it was eighteen months since I left America; how I had
been three months in Munich already; how, hearing so much about him
and observing him frequently in the streets, I became anxious for his
acquaintance, and had written to R. accordingly.

The man has the face of a child: cloud and sunshine pass rapidly over
it. Pleasure and chagrin, sometimes anger, oftener joy, flit across
it, swiftly as the flashing of a meteor. While I was making this
explanation, he looked at me with a searching scrutiny,--at first
angrily, then sadly, as if he were going to cry; but when I finished, he
took my hand in both of his, and said, very seriously,--

"You are welcome just the same."

Soon he commenced laughing: the oddity of the affair was just beginning
to strike him. After conversing awhile, he said,--

"Ah, we shall like each other,--shall we not? Where do you stay? You
shall come and live with me. But will that content you? Have you seen
enough of the outside of Munich?"

I really knew not what to make of so unexpected a demonstration. Should
I accept his invitation, so entirely a stranger as I was? Why not? M---y
was in earnest; he meant what he said; yet I hesitated.

"You need feel no embarrassment," he said, kindly. "I really want you to
come,--unless, indeed, it is not agreeable to you."

"A thousand thanks!" I exclaimed,--"I will come."

"Not a single one," said M---y. "Go and arrange affairs at your hotel,
and make haste back for dinner: it will be served in an hour."

The next day I was domesticated in M---y's house.

I have not the present design to give any account of him. Should the
reader find anything in what is written to interest or attract, it is
possible that in a future number a chapter may be devoted to the great
artist of Munich. Now, however, I remark simply, that the gossip and
strange stories and incidents and other _et ceteras_ told of him proved
to be ridiculous creations, with scarcely a shadow to rest on, havin