ce of land to grow
potatoes and vegetables; also a strip of vineyard and fine strawberry
fields on the Dachberg, the produce of which they sold in Frankfurt for
a good price. Moreover, they kept pigs and chickens and geese, and two
dear little goats that gave them milk.

On a fine September day Kaethchen (that was the daughter's name) was on
the Dachberg, helping her parents to gather up the potatoes for the
winter. Two sacks stood already full, looking from a distance like funny
old peasants. Kaethe liked to watch the potato fires that are lit to burn
the refuse of the plants, smouldering and crackling in the dry autumn
air, and the smoke curling up in the clear sky.

It was now about five o'clock, and as she had worked all day, she was
tired and began to groan and grumble. So her mother said: "Hurry up and
go home now, child, before it gets dark. Fetch the baby (the neighbours
had taken charge of it for the day), light the fire, put on the kettle,
and peel and boil the potatoes for supper."

Kaethe was only too glad to be let off; her tiredness soon vanished as
she flew down the steep, grassy slope of the Dachberg, slipping and
tumbling every minute. The sun was low, and glowed through the pines and
larches, which stand here together, making a wonderful contrast.

Kaethe found her way across the wet emerald field coloured with patches
of exquisite lilac from the autumn crocuses growing there in thousands,
hanging out their cheeky little orange tongues. She sang and shouted for
joy, and a feeling half sadness, half exhilaration, that comes to us
often at the twilight, came over her. She wore a little red skirt and
loose cotton blouse, and a tidy pinafore put on in order to cover her
soiled frock on the way home. Her hair was ash blonde, and braided in
two plaits round her head. Her eyes were dark and deep-set, and were a
strange contrast to her hair. She passed over the tiny bridge where the
brook crosses the field, and gathered a bunch of wild flowers,
meadowsweet and harebells, water forget-me-nots and ragged robin, and
made a pretty nosegay. She also picked a graceful spray of hops, the
leaves slightly tinged with red, and wound it in and out of her hair.
She had forgotten the baby and the supper and all the things for which
she was responsible, and was just a little maiden living in her own
enchanted land.

Now the path wound close by the pine woods, and the air seemed to grow
chillier and more solemn. She saw