CHAPTER I.

MORNING DISPUTE AND EVENING CONTENTION.

"My sweet friend," said Judge Frank, in a tone of vexation, "it is not worth while reading aloud to you if you keep yawning incessantly, and looking about, first to the right and then to the left;" and with these words he laid down a treatise of Jeremy Bentham, which he had been reading, and rose from his seat.

"Ah, forgive me, dear friend!" returned his wife, "but really these good things are all somewhat indigestible, and I was thinking about——Come here, dear Brigitta!" said Mrs. Elise Frank, beckoning an old servant to her, to whom she then spoke in an under tone.

Whilst this was going on, the Judge, a handsome strong-built man of probably forty, walked up and down the room, and then suddenly pausing as if in consideration, before one of the walls, he exclaimed to his wife, who by this time had finished her conversation with the old servant, "See, love, now if we were to have a door opened here—and it could very easily be done, for it is only a lath-and-plaster wall—we could then get so conveniently into our bedroom, without first going through the sitting-room and the nursery—it would indeed be capital!"

"But then, where could the sofa stand?" answered Elise, with some anxiety.

"The sofa?" returned her husband; "oh, the sofa could be wheeled a little aside; there is more than room enough for it."

"But, my best friend," replied she, "there would come a very dangerous draft from the door to every one who sat in the corner."[Pg 2]

"Ah! always difficulties and impediments!" said the husband. "But cannot you see, yourself, what a great advantage it would be if there were a door here?"

"No, candidly speaking," said she, "I think it is better as it is."

"Yes, that is always the way with ladies," returned he; "they will have nothing touched, nothing done, nothing changed, even to obtain improvement and convenience; everything is good and excellent as it is, till somebody makes the alteration for them, and then they can see at once how much better it is; and then they exclaim, 'Ah, see now that is charming!' Ladies, without doubt, belong to the stand-still party!"

"And the gentlemen," added she, "belong to the movement party; at least wherever building and molestation-making comes across them!"

The conversation, which had hitherto appeared perfectly good-humoured, seemed to assume a tone of bitterness from that word "molestation-making;" and in return the voice of the Judge was somewhat austere, as he replied to her taunt against the gentlemen. "Yes," said he, "they are not afraid of a little trouble whenever a great advantage is to be obtained. But——are we to have no breakfast to-day? It is twenty-two minutes after nine! It really is shocking, dear Elise, that you cannot teach your maids punctuality! There is nothing more intolerable than to lose one's time in waiting; nothing more useless; nothing more insupportable; nothing which more easily might be prevented, if people would only resolutely set about it! Life is really too short for one to be able to waste half of it in waiting! Five-and-twenty minutes after nine! and the children—are they not ready too? Dear Elise——"

"I'll go and see after them," said she; and went out quickly.

It was Sunday. The June sun shone into a large cheerful room, and upon a snow-white damask tablecloth, which in soft silken folds was spread over a long table, on which a handsome coffee-service was set out with considerable elegance. The disturbed countenance with which the Judge had approached the breakfast-table, cleared itself instantly as a person, whom young ladies would unquestionably have called "horribly ugly," but whom no reflective physiognomist could have observed without interest, entered the room.[Pg 3] This person was tall, extremely thin, and somewhat inclining to the left side; the complexion was dark, and the somewhat noble features wore a melancholy expression, which but seldom gave place to a smile of unusual beauty. The forehead elevated itself, with its deep lines, above the large brown extraordinary eyes, and above this a wood of black-brown hair erected itself, under whose thick stiff curls people said a multitude of ill-humours and paradoxes housed themselves; so also, indeed, might they in all those deep furrows with

which his countenance was lined, not one of which certainly was without its own signification. Still, there was not a sharp angle of that face; there was nothing, either in word or voice, of the Assessor, Jeremias Munter, however severe they might seem to be, which at the same time did not conceal an expression of the deepest goodness of heart, and which stamped itself upon his whole being, in the same way as the sap clothes with green foliage the stiff resisting branches of the knotted oak.

"Good day, brother!" exclaimed the Judge, cordially offering him his hand, "how are you?"

"Bad!" answered the melancholy man; "how can it be otherwise? What weather we have! As cold as January! And what people we have in the world too: it is both a sin and shame! I am so angry to-day that——Have you read that malicious article against you in the——paper?"

"No, I don't take in that paper; but I have heard speak of the article," said Judge Frank. "It is directed against my writing on the condition of the poor in the province, is it not?"

"Yes; or more properly no," replied the Assessor, "for the extraordinary fact is, that it contains nothing about that affair. It is against yourself that it is aimed—the lowest insinuations, the coarsest abuse!"

"So I have heard," said the Judge; "and on that very account I do not trouble myself to read it."

"Have you heard who has written it?" asked the visitor.

"No," returned the other; "nor do I wish to know."

"But you should do so," argued the Assessor; "people ought to know who are their enemies. It is Mr. N. I should like to give the fellow three emetics, that he might know the taste of his own gall!"

"What!" exclaimed Judge Frank, at once interested in the Assessor's news—"N., who lives nearly opposite to us,[Pg 4] and who has so lately received from the Cape his child, the poor little motherless girl?"

"The very same!" returned he; "but you must read this piece, if it be only to give a relish to your coffee. See here; I have brought it with me. I have learned that it would be sent to your wife to-day. Yes, indeed, what pretty fellows there are in the world! But where is your wife to-day? Ah! here she comes! Good morning, my lady Elise. So charming in the early morning; but so pale! Eh, eh, eh; this is not as it should be! What is it that I say and preach continually? Exercise, fresh air—else nothing in the world avails anything. But who listens to one's preaching? No—adieu my friends! Ah! where is my snuff-box? Under the newspapers? The abominable newspapers; they must lay their hands on everything; one can't keep even one's snuff-box in peace for them! Adieu, Mrs. Elise! Adieu, Frank. Nay, see how he sits there and reads coarse abuse of himself, just as if it mattered nothing to him. Now he laughs into the bargain. Enjoy your breakfasts, my friends!"

"Will you not enjoy it with us?" asked the friendly voice of Mrs. Frank; "we can offer you to-day quite fresh home-baked bread."

"No, I thank you," said the Assessor; "I am no friend to such home-made things; good for nothing, however much they may be bragged of. Home-baked, home-brewed, home-made. Heaven help us! It all sounds very fine, but it's good for nothing."

"Try if to-day it really be good for nothing," urged she. "There, we have now Madame Folette on the table; you must, at least, have a cup of coffee from her."

"What do you mean?" asked the surprised Assessor; "what is it? What horrid Madame is it that is to give me a cup of coffee? I never could bear old women; and if they are now to come upon the coffee-table——"

"The round coffee-pot there," said Mrs. Frank, good-humouredly, "is Madame Folette. Could you not bear that?"

"But why call it so?" asked he. "What foolery is that?"

"It is a fancy of the children," returned she. "An honest old woman of this name, whom I once treated to a cup of coffee, exclaimed, at the first sight of her favourite beverage, 'When I see a coffee-pot, it is all the same to me as if I saw an angel from heaven!' The children heard this, and insisted[Pg 5] upon it that there was a great resemblance in figure between Madame Folette and this coffee-pot; and so ever since it has borne her name. The children are very fond of her, because she gives them every Sunday morning their coffee."

"What business have children with coffee?" asked the Assessor. "Cannot they be thin enough without it; and are they to be burnt up before their time? There's Petrea, is she not lanky enough? I never was very fond of her; and now, if she is to grow up into a coffee wife, why—"

"But, dear Munter," said Mrs. Frank, "you are not in a good humour to-day."

"Good humour!" replied he: "no, Mrs. Elise, I am not in a good humour; I don't know what there is in the world to make people good-humoured. There now, your chair has torn a hole in my coat-lap! Is that pleasant? That's home-made too! But now I'll go; that is, if your doors—are they home-made too?—will let me pass."

"But will you not come back, and dine with us?" asked she.

"No, I thank you," replied he; "I am invited elsewhere; and that in this house, too."

"To Mrs. Chamberlain W——?" asked Mrs. Frank.

"No, indeed!" answered the Assessor: "I cannot bear that woman. She lectures me incessantly. Lectures me! I have a great wish to lecture her, I have! And then, her blessed dog—Pyrrhus or Pirre; I had a great mind to kill it. And then, she is so thin. I cannot bear thin people; least of all, thin old women."

"No?" said Mrs. Frank. "Don't you know, then, what rumour says of you and poor old Miss Rask?"

"That common person!" exclaimed Jeremias. "Well, and what says malice of me and poor old Miss Rask?"

"That, not many days since," said Mrs. Frank, "you met this old lady on your stairs as she was going up to her own room; and that she was sighing, because of the long flight of stairs and her weak chest. Now malice says, that, with the utmost politeness, you offered her your arm, and conducted her up the stairs with the greatest possible care; nor left her, till she had reached her own door; and further, after all, that you sent her a pound of cough lozenges; and——"

"And do you believe," interrupted the Assessor, "that I did that for her own sake? No, I thank you! I did it that the poor old skeleton might not fall down dead upon my[Pg 6] steps, and I be obliged to climb over her ugly corpse. From no other cause in this world did I drag her up the stairs. Yes, yes, that was it! I dine to-day with Miss Berndes. She is always a very sensible person; and her little Miss Laura is very pretty. See, here have we now all the herd of children! Your most devoted servant, Sister Louise! So, indeed, little Miss Eva! she is not afraid of the ugly old fellow, she—God bless her! there's some sugar-candy for her! And the little one! it looks just like a little angel. Do I make her cry? Then I must away; for I cannot endure children's crying. Oh, for heaven's sake! It may make a part of the charm of home: that I can believe;—perhaps it is home-music! Home-baked, home-made, home-music——hu!"

The Assessor sprang through the door; the Judge laughed; and the little one became silent at the sight of a kringla,[1] through which the beautiful eye of her brother Henrik spied at her as through an eye-glass; whilst the other children came bounding to the breakfast-table.

"Nay, nay, nay, my little angels, keep yourselves a little quiet," said the mother. "Wait a moment, dear Petrea; patience is a virtue. Eva dear, don't behave in that way; you don't see me do so."

Thus gently moralised the mother; whilst, with the help of her eldest daughter, the little prudent Louise, she cared for the other children. The father went from one to another full of delight, patted their little heads, and pulled them gently by the hair.

"I ought, yesterday, to have cut all your hair," said he. "Eva has quite a wig; one can hardly see her face for it. Give your papa a kiss, my little girl! I'll take your wig from you early to-morrow morning."

"And mine too, and mine too, papa!" exclaimed the others.

"Yes, yes," answered the father, "I'll shear every one of you."

All laughed but the little one; which, half frightened, hid its sunny-haired little head on the mother's bosom: the father raised it gently, and kissed, first it, and then the mother.

"Now put sugar in papa's cup," said she to the little one; "look! he holds it to you."

[Pg 7]

The little one smiled, put sugar in the cup, and Madame Folette began her joyful circuit.

But we will now leave Madame Folette, home-baked bread, the family breakfast, and the morning sun, and seat ourselves at the evening lamp, by the light of which Elise is writing.

TO CECILIA.

I must give you portraits of all my little flock of children; who now, having enjoyed their evening meal, are laid to rest upon their soft pillows. Ah! if I had only a really good portrait—I mean a painted one—of my Henrik, my first-born, my summer child, as I call him—because he was born on a Midsummer-day, in the summer hours both of my life and my fortune; but only the pencil of a Correggio could represent those beautiful, kind, blue eyes, those golden locks, that loving mouth, and that countenance all so perfectly pure and beautiful! Goodness and joyfulness beam out from his whole being; even although his buoyant animal life, which seldom allows his arms or legs to be quiet, often expresses itself in not the most graceful manner. My eleven-years-old boy is, alas! very—his father says—very unmanageable. Still, notwithstanding all this wildness, he is possessed of a deep and restless fund of sentiment, which makes me often tremble for his future happiness. God defend my darling, my summer child, my only son! Oh, how

dear he is to me! Ernst warns me often of too partial an affection for this child; and on that very account will I now pass on from portrait No. 1 to

No. 2.—Behold then the little Queen-bee, our eldest daughter, just turned ten years; and you will see a grave, fair girl, not handsome, but with a round, sensible face; from which I hope, by degrees, to remove a certain ill-tempered expression. She is uncommonly industrious, silent and orderly, and kind towards her younger sisters, although very much disposed to lecture them; nor will she allow any opportunity to pass in which her importance as "eldest sister" is not observed; on which account the little ones give her the titles of "Your Majesty" and "Mrs. Judge." The little Louise appears to me one of those who will always be still and sure; and who, on this account, will go fortunately though the world.[Pg 8]

No. 3.—People say that my little nine-years-old Eva will be very like her mother. I hope it will prove a really splendid fac-simile. See, then, a little, soft, round-about figure, which, amid laughter and merriment, rolls hither and thither lightly and nimbly, with an ever-varying physiognomy, which is rather plain than handsome, although lit up by a pair of beautiful, kind, dark-blue eyes. Quickly moved to sorrow, quickly excited to joy; good-hearted, flattering, confection-loving, pleased with new and handsome clothes, and with dolls and play; greatly beloved too by brothers and sisters, as well as by all the servants; the best friend and playfellow, too, of her brother. Such is little Eva.

No. 4.—Nos. 3 and 4 ought not properly to come together. Poor Leonore had a sickly childhood, and this rather, I believe, than nature, has given to her an unsteady and violent temper, and has unhappily sown the seeds of envy towards her more fortunate sisters. She is not deficient in deep feeling, but the understanding is sluggish, and it is extremely difficult for her to learn anything. All this promises no pleasure; rather the very opposite. The expression of her mouth, even in the uncomfortable time of teething, seemed to speak, "Let me be quiet!" It is hardly possible that she can be other than plain, but, with God's help, I hope to make her good and happy.

"My beloved, plain child!" say I sometimes to her as I clasp her tenderly in my arms, for I would willingly reconcile her early to her fate.

No. 5.—But whatever will fate do with the nose of my Petrea? This nose is at present the most remarkable thing about her little person; and if it were not so large, she really would be a pretty child. We hope, however, that it will moderate itself in her growth.

Petrea is a little lively girl, with a turn for almost everything, whether good or bad; curious and restless is she, and beyond measure full of failings; she has a dangerous desire to make herself observed, and to excite an interest. Her activity shows itself in destructiveness; yet she is good-hearted and most generous. In every kind of foolery she is a most willing ally with Henrik and Eva, whenever they will grant her so much favour; and if these three be heard whispering together, one may be quite sure that some roguery or[Pg 9] other is on foot. There exists already, however, so much unquiet in her, that I fear her whole life will be such; but I will early teach her to turn herself to that which can change unrest into rest.

No. 6.—And now to the pet child of the house—to the youngest, the loveliest, the so-called "little one"—to her who with her white hands puts the sugar into her father's and mother's cup—the coffee without that would not taste good—to her whose little bed is not yet removed from the chamber of the parents, and who, every morning, creeping out of her own bed, lays her bright curly little head on her father's shoulder and sleeps again.

Could you only see the little two-years-old Gabriele, with her large, serious brown eyes; her refined, somewhat pale, but indescribably lovely countenance; her bewitching little gestures; you would be just as much taken with her as the rest are,—you would find it difficult, as we all do, not to spoil her. She is a quiet little child, but very unlike her eldest sister. A predominating characteristic of Gabriele is love of the beautiful; she shows a decided aversion to what is ugly and inconvenient, and as decided a love for what is attractive. A most winning little gentility in appearance and manners, has occasioned the brother and sisters to call her in sport "the little young lady," or "the little princess." Henrik is really in love with his little sister, kisses her small white hands with devotion, and in return she loves him with her whole heart. Towards the others she is very often somewhat ungracious; and our good friend the Assessor calls her frequently "the little gracious one," and frequently also "the little ungracious one,"

but then he has for her especially so many names; my wish is that in the end she may deserve the surname of "the amiable."

Peace be with my young ones! There is not one of them which is not possessed of the material of peculiar virtue and excellence, and yet not also at the same time of the seed of some dangerous vice, which may ruin the good growth of God in them. May the endeavours both of their father and me be blessed in training these plants of heaven aright! But ah! the education of children is no easy thing, and all the many works on that subject which I have studied appear to me,[Pg 10] whether the fault be in me or in them I cannot tell, but small helps. Ah! I often find no other means than to clasp the child tenderly in my arms, and to weep bitterly over it, or else to kiss it in the fulness of my joy; and it often has appeared to me that such moments are not without their influence.