is capture. And Joseph added that this would not have happened to him
had he taken the Dervishes Lozenges. You see that pleased my brother so
much that he forgave him. Ah! there is my wife coming to look for me. Not
a word of all this! It is not necessary to repeat that there is a reporter
in the family, and there is another reason for not telling it. When I want
to sell off to the people of Versailles, I go and find Joseph and tell him
of my little plan. He arranges everything for me as it should be, puts it
in the paper quietly, and they don't know how it comes there!"

A FOREST BETROTHAL

BY ERCKMANN-CHATRIAN

One day in the month of June, 1845, Master Zacharias' fishing-basket was
so full of salmon-trout, about three o'clock in the afternoon, that the
good man was loath to take any more; for, as Pathfinder says: "We must
leave some for to-morrow!" After having washed his in a stream and
carefully covered them with field-sorrel and rowell, to keep them fresh;
after having wound up his line and bathed his hands and face; a sense of
drowsiness tempted him to take a nap in the heather. The heat was so
excessive that he preferred to wait until the shadows lengthened before
reclimbing the steep ascent of Bigelberg.

Breaking his crust of bread and wetting his lips with a draught of
Rikevir, he climbed down fifteen or twenty steps from the path and
stretched himself on the moss-covered ground, under the shade of the
pine-trees; his eyelids heavy with sleep.

A thousand animate creatures had lived their long life of an hour, when
the judge was wakened by the whistle of a bird, which sounded strange to
him. He sat up to look around, and judge his surprise; the so-called bird
was a young girl of seventeen or eighteen years of age; fresh, with rosy
cheeks and vermilion lips, brown hair, which hung in two long tresses
behind her. A short poppy-colored skirt, with a tightly-laced bodice,
completed her costume. She was a young peasant, who was rapidly descending
the sandy path down the side of Bigelberg, a basket poised on her head,
and her arms a little sunburned, but plump, were gracefully resting on her
hips.

"Oh, what a charming bird; but she whistles well and her pretty chin,
round like a peach, is sweet to look upon."

Mr. Zacharias was all emotion--a rush of hot blood, which made his heart
beat, as it did at twenty, coursed through his veins. Blushing, he arose
to his feet.

"Good-day, my pretty one!" he sa