s household and how difficult the separation would be for
her. Whenever he thought how hard it would be for her to grow accustomed
to the change again, all his joy vanished at the prospect of her return.
Bruno had read the whole letter aloud and had therewith conjured up such
consternation and grief on every side that the mother hardly knew how to
comfort them. Leonore herself was sitting in the midst of the excited
group. She gave no sound and had unsuccessfully tried to swallow her
rising tears, but they had got the better of her and were falling over
her cheeks in a steady stream.

Mea was crying excitedly, "Oh, mother, you must help us. You have to
write to the ladies that they mustn't come. Please don't let Leonore
go!"

Bruno remarked passionately that no one had the right to drag a sick
person on a journey against the doctor's wishes. The doctor had said the
last time he had been here that Leonore was to have not less than a month
for her complete recovery.

Kurt cried out over and over again, "Oh, mother, it's cruel, it's
perfectly cruel! We all want to keep her here and she wants to stay. Now
she is to be violently taken from us. Isn't that absolutely cruel?"

Lippo, coming close to Leonore, also did his best to console her. He
remembered that he could not say "stay with us" any more, but he had
another plan.

"Don't cry, Leonore," he said encouragingly. "As soon as I am big, Uncle
Philip has promised to give me a house and a lot of meadows. I'll be a
farmer then, and I'll write to you to come to live with me, and Salo can
come for the holidays, too."

Leonore could not help smiling, but it only brought more tears when she
thought how much love she was receiving from all these children, and that
she had to leave them and might never see them again. The mother's
attempts to comfort them failed entirely, because she had no hope
herself.

In the middle of this agitating scene Maezli arrived, perfectly happy and
filled with her recent experiences. She wished to relate what the
Castle-Steward had said to her and what she had said to him, and what had
happened afterwards. But no one listened because they were so deeply
absorbed with their own disturbing thoughts. They were not in the least
interested in what Maezli had to say about the Steward, as they all
thought that the steward was Mr. Trius. That evening the unheard-of
happened. Maezli actually begged to go to bed before the evening song had
been sung, b