a restaurant and talked politics with three professors, and that is no
mean feat even if you do it in your own language. For some reason
which I have never been able to understand, these men were very pleased
with me; possibly they liked me because I never agreed with anything
they said. I asked them to come and see us if they were ever in
England, an invitation given out of joy in wishing them good-bye. The
prospect of leaving the German language made me very liberal in the way
of invitations to those who spoke it, and if all the people whom I
asked had happened to come at the same time, they would have caused a
considerable sensation in our small household. There were, however,
dangers in plunging me into foreign families which my father did not
discover; for I like everybody so much, when I am leaving them, that I
feel certain that they are the nicest people in the world. I had not
been at home for a day before I found out that something very like a
mystery had attached itself to The Bradder, so I went to my mother and
asked her what had happened.

"I meant to tell you," she answered. "My dear, he wants to marry Nina,
we were quite astonished." I did not think Nina would have cared to
hear that. "He was here for a fortnight, but we never suspected
anything, Nina is so very young. It only happened a week ago."

"Are they engaged?"

"No, we thought it best that there should be no engagement for at least
a year. I hope we decided right, for I must have time to think about
Nina being the wife of a don. I think they are very much in love with
one another."

"Nina is not so very young."

"Very young to be the wife of a don," my mother replied, and I believe
that she thought such a lady, to be suitable, ought to have numbered at
least forty years.

"The Bradder would have to go out of college if he married," I said;
"we shan't get such another man in a hurry," but my mother did not
think this as important as I did.

When I talked to Nina about this new state of things she was very
disappointed to find that I was not surprised. She seemed to think
that I was depriving her of something due to her, but her letters had
made me think that something startling was going to happen, and I was
prepared for almost anything.

"Our engagement is not to be announced for a year," Nina said.

"I thought there wasn't any engagement," I answered.

"There isn't, until it is announced, but we have quite made up our
mi