onger to get to a settlement. But when she
noticed that Erick, on the first hint, rose at once and did what was
desired, then her fears turned to hopes that one might impress the
others a little with this ever-ready boy, which impressed her very
favorably. 'Lizebeth alone continued her dislike of the new-comer, and
whenever she met him in the house she measured him with her eyes from
his head to as far as the velvet reached.

Erick soon felt quite at home in the parsonage. He now went with the
three children to the same school, shared Edi's historical interest as
long as the latter entertained him with it, which was the case on every
walk to school, and as often as possible besides, for Edi found large
gaps in the historical knowledge of his new friend and felt himself
called upon to fill them in. Erick was a good listener and often put
questions which drove Edi to new, deep studies and which excited him so
much that he had almost no other thoughts but Rome and Carthage.

With good-natured Ritz, Erick was also on good terms. The little fellow
ran after him wherever he went, and looked delighted when he saw him
from afar; then he rushed at him and was always sure of a pleasant
reception and jocular conversation, for Erick was always friendly,
talkative and in good humor, and never buried in history books which
often made Edi unhappy. So Ritz spent all the time out of school either
with Erick, or seeking him, which however sometimes cost him a good deal
of time, for the very nearest friends, after all, were Erick and Sally.
The two could not be separated. There was a great similarity in their
temperaments, for what the one wanted the other liked also, and what the
one did not like, did not please the other, and both liked nothing
better than to go together up into the woods, where under the old
fir-tree was the small bench on which they could sit and tell each other
all they knew; or to go down to the foaming Woodbach and there, sitting
on the stones near the bank, watch the tossing waves rush down. They
never seemed to lack topics of conversation. Erick told about his
mother, and how they had lived together, and of her beautiful singing;
and Sally never grew weary of hearing again and again the same stories,
and would keep on asking questions.

So they sat on their bench under the tree on the sunny Sunday afternoon
in the first week in October, and Sally had just begun her questions.
This time she wanted to know why th