was about to speak, but Braesig pressed down his head,
saying: "Hold your tongue, Joseph--put your head nearer the tree." He
then stepped on his back, and when standing there firmly, said: "Now
straighten yourself--It does exactly!" Then seizing the lower branch
with both hands, Braesig pulled himself up into the tree. Joseph had
never spoken all this time but now he ventured to remark: "But, Braesig,
they're not nearly ripe yet." "What a duffer you are, Joseph," said
Braesig, thrusting his red face through the green leaves which surrounded
him. "Do you really think that I expect to eat Rhenish cherries at
midsummer. But go away now as quickly as you can and don't stand there
looking like a dog when a cat has taken refuge in a tree." "Ah well,
what shall I do?" said Joseph, going away and leaving Braesig to his
fate.

Braesig had not been long in his hiding-place, when he heard a light step
on the gravel walk, and, peering down, saw Lina going into the arbor
with such a large bundle of work in her arms that if she had finished it
in one day it would have been difficult to keep her in sewing. She laid
her work on the table and, resting her head on her hand, sat gazing
thoughtfully at the blue sky beyond Braesig's cherry-tree. "Ah, how happy
I am," she said to herself in the fulness of her grateful heart. "How
happy I am. Mina is so kind to me; and so is Godfrey, or why did he
press my foot under the table at dinner. What made Braesig stare at us so
sharply, I wonder? I think I must have blushed. What a good man Godfrey
is. How seriously and learnedly he can talk. How decided he is, and I
think he has the marks of his spiritual calling written in his face. He
isn't the least bit handsome it is true; Rudolph is much better looking,
but then Godfrey has an air with him that seems to say, 'don't disturb
me by telling me of any of your foolish worldly little vanities, for I
have high thoughts and aspirations, I am going to be a clergyman.' I'll
cut his hair short though as soon as I have the power." It is a great
blessing that every girl does not set her heart on having a handsome
husband, for otherwise we ugly men would all have to remain bachelors;
and pleasant looking objects we should be in that case, as I know of
nothing uglier than an ugly old bachelor. Lina's last thought, that of
cutting Godfrey's hair, had shown so much certainty of what was going to
happen, that she blushed deeply, and as at the same moment she heard