stable-boys and the men working in the garden being placed at the lower
end of the table.

The first female cook, a special favorite of Fraeulein Perini, insisted
strenuously upon grace being said before dinner. Bertram, the travelled
coachman, a decided free-thinker, always busied himself during the
blessing with his great embroidered waistcoat, which he drew proudly
down over his hips. Joseph folded his hands, but did not move his lips;
the rest prayed silently.

No sooner was the soup removed, and a little wine sipped,--for the
servants had their wine every day,--than Bertram started the talk, and
upon a very definite topic.

"I was just waiting to see whether Lieutenant Dournay would recognise
me; I belonged to his battery."

"Indeed!" Joseph delightedly chimed in. "He was right popular, I'm
certain?"

Bertram did not consider it incumbent upon him to give a direct reply.
He only said that he could never have believed that Herr Dournay would
ever become a servant.

"Servant?"

"Yes, a servant like us; and because he knows something of books, a
tutor."

Joseph smiled in a melancholy way, and took great pains to bring the
table over to a correct view. First he praised the celebrated father of
Eric, who had received at least twenty decorations; and his mother, who
belonged to the nobility; and he was very happy to say that Captain
Dournay understood all about the sciences, and, to throw at their heads
the very hardest names which he could get hold of,--Anthropology,
Osteology, Archaeology, and Petrifactology--all these the captain was
master of; he was a complete university in himself. But he did not
succeed in convincing the company that Eric was anything else than a
servant.

The head-gardener said, in a high-Prussian dialect:--

"Anyhow, he is a handsome man, and sits his horse well; but he don't
know a thing about gardening."

Lootz, the courier, praised Eric for speaking good French and English,
but of course, when it came to Russian, and Turkish, and Polish, the
learned gentleman didn't understand them; for Lutz himself, as a
journeyman tailor, having made the tour of all countries, understood
all languages. He had attended formerly Fraeulein von Pranken, the
present Countess Wolfsgarten, and two English ladies, on their travels;
now he acted as courier for Herr Sonnenkamp on his journeys, and was
idle the rest of the time, unless one calls work the carrying of the
letter-bag to and from the rai