dfrey continued, "marriage is part of the curse that was laid
on our first parents when they were thrust out of paradise." So saying
he opened his Bible and read the third chapter of Genesis aloud. Poor
Lina did not know what to do, or where to look, and Braesig muttered:
"The infamous Jesuit, to read all that to the child." He nearly jumped
down from the tree in his rage, and as for Lina, she would have run away
if it had not been the Bible her cousin was reading to her, so she hid
her face in her hands and wept bitterly. Godfrey was now quite carried
away by zeal for his holy calling; he put his arm round her waist, and
said: "I could not spare you this at a time when I purpose making a
solemn appeal to you. Caroline Nuessler, will you, knowing the gravity of
the step you take, enter the holy estate of matrimony with me, and
become my Christian helpmeet?" Lina was so frightened and distressed at
his whole conduct that she could neither speak nor think; she could only
cry.

At the same moment a merry song was heard at a little distance:

"One bright afternoon I stood to look
Into the depths of a silver brook,
And there I saw little fishes swim,
One of them was gray, I look'd at him.

He was swimming, swimming and swimming
And with delight seemed overbrimming;
I never saw such a thing in my life
As the little gray fish seeking a wife."

Lina struggled hard to regain her composure, and then, in spite of the
Bible and the Christian requirements demanded of her, she started up and
rushed out of the arbor. On her way to the house she passed Mina who was
coming out to join her with her sewing. Godfrey followed Lina with long
slow steps, and looked as much put out as the clergyman who was
interrupted in a very long sermon by the beadle placing the church key
on the reading desk and saying that he might lock up the church himself
when he had done, for he, the beadle, must go home to dinner. Indeed he
was in much the same position as that clergyman. Like him he had wished
to preach a very fine sermon, and now he was left alone in his empty
church.

Mina was an inexperienced little thing, for she was the youngest of the
family, but still she was quick-witted enough to guess something of what
had taken place. She asked herself whether she would cry if the same
thing were to happen to her, and what it would be advisable for her to
do under the circumstances. She seated herself quietly in the arbor, and
bega