at a stretch, and had nothing
better to eat than a light pottage flavoured with carroways, with a
wheaten loaf broken up in it. The Meyer girls, whenever they wanted to
make each other laugh, had only got to say, "Shall we go and have dinner
with Aunt Teresa?"

Now, when this partly ridiculous, partly malevolent old lady heard of
her younger brother's sad case, she immediately called in what little
money she had out at interest--the fruits of many years of pinching and
sparing--converted it into florins, and, tying them up in a bright
pocket-handkerchief, went up to town, and paid into the public coffers
the amount of her brother's defalcation, and would not be quiet till, by
dint of much weeping and supplication, she had induced all the great
gentlemen concerned (she visited them one by one) to promise not to put
her brother in jail, and to abandon criminal proceedings against him.

Meyer, on hearing of his sister's good deed, hastened to seek her out,
and kissing her hand repeatedly, sobbing and weeping bitterly all the
time, could not find words adequate to express his gratitude. Nay, he
even prevailed upon his daughters also to come and kiss his sister's
hand; and could the good girls have shown a greater spirit of
self-sacrifice than by condescending to bring lips like theirs,
veritable roses and strawberries, into immediate contact with the old
lady's withered hands, and looking without a smile at the old maid's
old-fashioned garments?

Meyer swore by heaven and earth that his whole life would henceforth be
devoted to showing his gratitude to his sister for her noble deed.

"You will do that best," replied the aged spinster, "by bringing up your
family honourably. I have given my all to preserve your name from a
great reproach, you must now take great care to preserve it from a still
greater, for here below there is even a greater degradation than being
thrust into prison. You know what I mean. Get something to do yourself,
and accustom your children to work. Don't be ashamed of offering your
services as a book-keeper to any tradesman who will have you; you will,
at least, earn enough that way to make both ends meet. As for your
girls, they are now old enough to help themselves. God guard them from
accepting the help of other people. One of them might earn her bread as
a milliner's apprentice, for she can do fine needlework. Another can go
as a governess into some gentleman's family. God will show the others
w