in the world to
claim the sole charge of his child, that it might be possible to train it
unimpeded to the lofty position of the father, instead of the humble one
of the mother.

Hitherto Barbara had remained silent, but her breath had come more and
more quickly, the tremor of the nostrils had increased; but at the
physician's last remark she could control herself no longer, and burst
forth like a madwoman: "And you pretend to be my friend, pretend to be a
fairminded man? You are the tool, the obedient echo of the infamous
wretch who now stretches his robber hand toward my most precious
possession! Ay, look at me as though my frank speech was rousing the
greatest wrath in your cowardly soul! Where was the ocean-deep gulf when
the perjured betrayer clasped me in his arms, uttered vows of love, and
called himself happy because his possession of me would beautify the
evening of his life? Now my voice has lost its melting music, and he
sends his accomplice to leave the mute 'nightingale'--how often he has
called me so!--to her fate."

Here she faltered, and her cheeks glowed with excitement as, with her
clinched hand on her brow, she continued: "Must everything be changed and
overturned because this traitor is the Emperor, and the betrayed only the
child of a man who, though plain, is worthy of all honour, and who,
besides, was not found on the highway, but belongs to the class of
knights, from whom even the proudest races of sovereigns descend? You
trample my father and me underfoot, to exalt the grandeur of your master.
You make him the idol, to humble me to a worm; and what you grant the
she-wolf--the right of defence when men undertake to rob her of her
young--you deny me, and, because I insist upon it, I must be a deluded,
unbridled creature."

Here she sobbed aloud and covered her face with her hands; but Dr. Mathys
had been obliged to do violence to his feelings in order not to put a
speedy end to the fierce attack. Her glance had been like that of an
infuriated wild beast as the rage in her soul burst forth with elementary
power, and the sharpness of her hoarse voice still pierced him to the
heart.

Probably the man of honour whom she had so deeply-insulted felt justified
in paying her in the same coin, but the mature and experienced physician
knew how much he must place to the account of the physical condition of
this unfortunate girl, and did not conceal from himself that her charges
were not wholly unjustifi