do."

"What is there to reflect upon, you simple child?" laughed Fink; but an
unusual degree of excitement was visible in his manner.

"Do you then love Sabine?" asked Anton.

"Another of your home questions," replied Fink. "Yes, I do love her in
my own way."

"And do you mean to take her into the back woods?"

"Yes; for she will be a high-hearted, strong-minded wife, and will give
stability and worth to my life there. She is not fascinating--at least
one can't get on with her as readily as with many others; but if I am to
take a wife, I need one who can look after me. Believe me, the
black-haired one is the very one to do that; and now let me go; I must
find out how I stand."

"Speak at least to the principal in the first instance," cried Anton
after him.

"First to herself," cried Fink, rushing down the stairs.

Anton paced up and down the room. All that Fink had said in praise of
Sabine was true; that he warmly felt. He knew, too, how deep her feeling
for him was, and yet he foresaw that his friend would meet with some
secret obstacle or other. Then another thing displeased him. Fink had
only spoken of himself; had he thought of her happiness in the
matter--had he even felt what it would cost her to leave her beloved
brother, her country, and her home? True, Fink was the very man to
scatter the blossoms of the New World profusely at her feet, but he was
always restless; actively employed, would he have any sympathy for the
feelings of his German wife? And involuntarily our hero found himself
taking part against his friend, and deciding that Sabine ought not to
leave the home and brother to whom she was so essential; and, absorbed
in these thoughts, Anton paced up and down, anxious and heavy-hearted.
It grew dark, and still Fink did not return.

Meanwhile he was announced to Sabine. She came hurriedly to meet him,
and her cheeks were redder than usual as she said, "My brother has told
me that you must leave us."

Fink began in some agitation, "I must not, I can not leave without
having spoken openly to you. I came here without any interest in the
quiet life to which I had been so unaccustomed. I have here learned the
worth and the happiness of a German home. You I have ever honored as the
good spirit of the house. Soon after my arrival, you began to treat me
with a distance of manner which I have always lamented. I now come to
tell you how much my eyes and heart have clung to you. I feel that my
life woul