w seated in his own particular corner by the stove, and
smoking out of his own particular corner of his mouth, and while his
lively wife wept in sympathy with her brother's sorrow, and kissed and
fondled him and his little daughter alternately, he kept quite still,
glancing every now and then from his wife and Hawermann at Braesig, and
muttering through a cloud of tobacco smoke: "It all depends upon what it
is. It all depends upon circumstances. What's to be done now in a case
like this?"

Braesig had quite a different disposition from young Joseph, for instead
of sitting still like him, he walked rapidly up and down the room, then
seated himself upon the table, and in his excitement and restlessness
swung his short legs about like weaver's shuttles. When Mrs. Nuessler
kissed and stroked her brother, he did the same; and when Mrs. Nuessler
took the little child and rocked it in her arms, he took it from her and
walked two or three times up and down the room with it, and then placed
it on the chair again, and always right on the top of the grandmother's
best cap.

"Bless me!" cried Mrs. Nuessler at last, "I quite forgot. Braesig, _you_
ought to have thought of it. You must all want something to eat and
drink!" She went to the blue cupboard, and brought out a splendid loaf
of white household bread and some fresh butter, then she went out of the
room and soon returned with sausages, ham and cheese, a couple of
bottles of the strong beer that was brewed on purpose for old Mr.
Nuessler, and a jug of milk for the children. When everything was neatly
arranged on a white table cloth, she placed a seat for her brother, and
lifting her little niece, chair and all, put her beside her father. Then
she set to work and cut slices of bread, and poured out the beer, and
saw that there was enough for everybody.

"I'll be ready to give you something presently," she said, stroking her
little girls' flaxen heads fondly, "but I must see to your little cousin
first. Here's a chair for you, Braesig--Come, Joseph." "All right," said
Joseph, blowing a last long cloud of smoke out of the left corner of his
mouth, and then dragging his chair forward, half sitting on it all the
time. "Charles," said Braesig, "I can recommend these sausages. Your
sister, Mrs. Nuessler, makes them most capitally, and I've often told my
housekeeper that she ought to ask for the receipt, for you see the old
woman mixes up all sorts of queer things that oughtn't to g