en and sent off at once. It was highly necessary,
he thought, that the good fortune which he considered so important for
the family, should be known as widely as possible through the
ill-natured and misinterpreting world. For indeed these late
entanglements and perplexities had got abroad among the public, which at
all times has a conviction that, whatever happens, happens only in order
that it may have something to talk about.

The ceremony of the baptism was to be observed with all due honor, but
it was to be as brief and as private as possible. The people came
together; Ottilie and Mittler were to hold the child as sponsors. The
old pastor, supported by the servants of the church, came in with slow
steps; the prayers were offered. The child lay in Ottilie's arms, and as
she was looking affectionately down at it, it opened its eyes and she
was not a little startled when she seemed to see her own eyes looking at
her. The likeness would have surprised any one. Mittler, who next had to
receive the child, started as well; he fancying he saw in the little
features a most striking likeness to the Captain. He had never seen a
resemblance so marked.

The infirmity of the good old clergyman had not permitted him to
accompany the ceremony with more than the usual liturgy.

Mittler, however, who was full of his subject, recollected his old
performances when he had been in the ministry, and indeed it was one of
his peculiarities that, on every sort of occasion, he always thought
what he would like to say, and how he would express himself about it.

At this time he was the less able to contain himself, as he was now in
the midst of a circle consisting entirely of well-known friends. He
began, therefore, toward the conclusion of the service, to put himself
quietly into the place of the clergyman; to make cheerful speeches
aloud, expressive of his duty and his hopes as godfather, and to dwell
all the longer on the subject, as he thought he saw in Charlotte's
gratified manner that she was pleased with his doing so.

It altogether escaped the eagerness of the orator, that the good old man
would gladly have sat down; still less did he think that he was on the
way to occasion a more serious evil. After he had described with all his
power of impressiveness the relation in which every person present stood
toward the child, thereby putting Ottilie's composure sorely to the
proof, he turned at last to the old man with the words, "And yo