cutcheon was most artistically draped with ancient, luxuriant ivy, which drew the richest nourishment from the wide, muddy moat beneath. The main building, which was also covered with this ivy to the roof, was so oddly constructed as to really appear to consist entirely of three slender square towers, which, erected a short distance apart, were united by walls. Thus a most charming little nook was formed between two of the towers, protected on three sides by the walls and in front by the screen of ivy. The tables and chairs placed within showed that the owner's family knew how to appreciate the spot. This picturesque dwelling was called Castle Wilstorp. The family in possession were bound to it by entails and other feudal ties, which, as the singular stranger of the forest had expressed it, would not release them. This fact had of late weighed heavily on them. They had come from a neighboring city, where Herr von Mansdorf had had charge of an ecclesiastical institution—the good-natured, comfortable-looking gentleman, who had not a drop of bad blood in his body until he gathered it from the poisonous compounds which the wine-dealer put in the numerous bottles he emptied during the day for pastime. They had come into possession of the romantic castle as heirs of a distant relative, an old bachelor, but the castle had become something like the lion's den, from which no footsteps returned. It was an oppressive situation, from which Frau von Mansdorf, a tall, thin, crabbed lady, with an imperious, eagle nose, suffered most mentally, because she saw that in this solitude and idleness her husband would gradually and hopelessly fall a victim to drink; and her daughter Adelheid physically, because she lost her blooming health. She suffered from an affection of the chest, which the doctor said could be cured only by a residence in the south. But in the present state of affairs a residence in the south, or any change of place for a length of time, was not to be thought of. This family were not sole owners of Wilstorp; there was another relative equally near to the former possessor, who had bequeathed it to him "jointly" with the Mansdorfs. The latter, therefore, had no right to dispose of anything without communicating with the co-heir and obtaining his consent, so it was impossible to raise money for a long journey or even to live in a larger city. To do this required the aid of the other heir, and he had disappeared. pedients, no inquiries, no appeals in the newspapers, led to his discovery. Perhaps he had died and been buried long ago. But, if this were the case, he stretched in a most diabolical fashion a ghostly hand from his unknown grave, arresting every step Herr von Mansdorf might otherwise take. No ex How they had tormented themselves in searching for this man, who bore the name of Ulrich Gerhard von Uffeln! How many evenings Herr von Mansdorf had talked with a notary from Idar about the best means of procuring a certificate of the death of the said Ulrich Gerhard von Uffeln, who undoubtedly -they knew he had entered the army-was mouldering somewhere in foreign soil! How often they had discussed the question, whether some legal authority might not be procured to enable them to act freely, by giving security that they would grant the missing man ample compensation if he ever emerged from the mists that shrouded his existence! But this plan was also impracticable. They had not the means to offer such security. Such was the condition of affairs at Wilstorp, and to the weight with which the name of Ulrich Gerhard von Uffeln oppressed the heart of each individual was added the universal anxiety about the approaching decisive event on the great stage of the war, for it was late in the summer of 1813; and, though people scarcely ventured to give themselves up without reserve to the hope that the allied powers would succeed in breaking the iron rule of the soldier-emperor, and at least wresting Germany from his grasp, news of the battle of Katzbach had shown the possibility of victory. A shade of excitement had at last appeared in the country, usually so apathetic and submissive to its political fate-nay, there were even rumors of preparations being made in secret to give substantial aid to the allies when their armies arrived, and vague reports were current of conspirators busily employed in conveying arms to certain appointed places. One evening Herr von Mansdorf was sitting in the pretty nook under the ivy roof, with his broad back almost filling the entire space between the two projecting towers; around him were all his family. On the bench at the right sat the stern mistress of the house and the daughter; on the left, opposite to them, Herr Plümer, the notary, and beside him Herr Runkelstein, the prince's head-forester, who had his official residence in an old hunting-box half an hour's ride from Wilstorp. The wife was darning a woolen sock; the young lady bent her delicate oval face over a newspaper, from which she was reading tidings of French victories; and the gentlemen were smoking clay-pipes. "What are we to think?" said the master of the house, after a long pause, in which each of the party seemed to have been pondering in his heart the accounts just read from the newspaper-" what are we to think? They always write of their victories, and yet the steward told me that one battalion of Prussians after another would march through Idar before the year was out." "I should be very glad," replied the notary, a little yellow man with a skeptical smile" I should be very glad, though the steward's predictions are not always to be trusted." "Not to be trusted?" said the mistress of the house. "Pray don't say that. The steward has foretold wonderful things, and they've all come true to a hair." "Don't be vexed, madame; but really many of them haven't happened—" "Many? I didn't know that," she replied. "And what does it matter? If he foresees anything, and it doesn't happen, I don't think he is to blame. We are all in God's hand; and if he foresees a funeral or a fire, and they don't in reality happen, it doesn't prove that other things he foresees won't come to pass, and most of them do, as you know." "Of course, of course," said the notary, somewhat sarcastically, puffing out a cloud of smoke, "though this view of the case might lead me to believe that foreseeing events was easier than is generally supposed." which grow on the old dam, toward the building; when I reached the window, I wasn't tall enough to peep in, so I looked about for a stone or something of the sort, and found a block of wood, which I put near the wall-" "To climb up," interrupted the notary, impatiently, "and see that the light was nothing but the Ah, Herr Plümer, you are not a good Chris- phosphorescent glow from the rotten old wood of tian," replied the rigid hostess. the window-sill-" "I wish," exclaimed Herr von Mansdorf, striking his powerful hand heavily on the table, "the steward would foresee this confounded Ulrich Gerhard von Uffeln enter these old towers." "Isn't that a proof of the matter?” replied his wife. "He doesn't see him, and therefore he won't come." "What do you think, Fräulein?" asked the forester, turning to the young lady. "I?" she answered, looking up at him with a sly smile. "I don't know what mysterious and horrible things the steward foresees, but I know I see something uncanny and frightful, when he suddenly stands before me with his long, thin figure, high forehead, and glittering eyes; he makes one think of church-windows when the moon is shining on them." The forester smiled; then, clearing his throat, observed, thoughtfully: "Let him go on, and don't interrupt!" said the stern voice of the mistress of the house. Herr Plümer smilingly knocked the ashes out of his pipe, while the forester, casting an indignant glance at him, continued: "I did climb up-but what I saw was certainly no phosphorescent glow from rotting wood, that I can assure you." Well, what did you see, then? Out with it, man!" said Herr von Mansdorf. But Herr Runkelstein was in no hurry to reach his principal effect, or play out too quickly the card with which he expected to trump the notary's skepticism. "What did I see?" he said, and then cleared his throat, looked around the circle, and at last fixed his eyes upon the mistress of the house, who had let her stocking fall and was leaning eagerly forward, and "Wouldn't it be a good idea to put this seer to the added, in a low, hollow tone, "coffins." test?" "To the test? How could you do that?" said Frau von Mansdorf. "A strange thing happened to me a short time ago," replied the forester. "Something I can't understand. And it was something alarming, too. I told Faustelmann he must go with me, that we might both see it together, and then he should explain. But I can't get him to do so; he acts as if he thought I was trying to take advantage of him—" "Coffins!" added the ladies, in horror. The notary smilingly shook his head, while the features of the rest of the party expressed a shade of distrust, for his statement that he had seen half a dozen coffins at once was something so incredible that it materially weakened the effect of his tale, which, without the least intention of doing so, the "Tell your story!" exclaimed Herr von Mans- forester still further injured by adding: dorf, impatiently. “A few evenings ago," said the forester, "about an hour before midnight, I was returning from Idar, when, on passing the old ruined castle which stands in the swampy lowlands not far from the road, I saw a faint ray of light reflected from the surface of the water in the moat before the building; I stood still, saying to myself, 'Where can the light come from?' It wasn't from the moon-it had not risen; nor from the windows, for they are always closed with heavy wooden shutters. Whence could the ray of light come? The matter seemed strange, and, to get to the bottom of it, I turned to the right and walked straight toward the old barrack, and, as I ap⚫proached nearer the moat, saw that the light reflected from the water, now gently ruffled by the nightbreeze, must come from two of the windows in the lower story, whose shutters were open-a chink through which the ray fell obliquely down. So,' said I to myself, there must be some people in the old building, but how did they get there, since it is closed and locked, and what are they doing? I'd like to know that,' I thought as I trudged over the rubbish, and through the wild reeds and nettles "There might have been eight or ten, for the last were almost lost in the darkness of the great, dreary room, which was only lighted in the centre by a lamp standing on a table. They were not large, as if intended for grown people, but like those used for children. The room was in great disorder. I saw large pieces of the plastering, which had fallen from the walls and ceiling, lying on the floor-and also—" The forester passed his hand across his face and closed his eyes; then, when he opened them, shook his head with its shock of gray hair, as if to dispel the vision, and said: "It was horrible! Out of the floor at the back of the room, illumined by the lamp, appeared a head-a man's head-with very large eyes and a mustache; the eyes stared fixedly at me, as if they could look through walls and window-shutters, and, when I met them gazing searchingly at me through the narrow chink under the shutters, I dared not look longer, but jumped down from the block of wood and turned toward home." "You saw a head, Runkelstein?" exclaimed Herr von Mansdorf; "but when we see a head we also see a body." "Like a mushroom," muttered the notary in an breathless with excitement. undertone. A long pause ensued. All gave themselves up so completely to the impression produced by these facts, that when Herr von Mansdorf struck the table with his clinched hand everybody started in terror. "Now, let any one tell me this isn't the strangest thing that ever happened!" he exclaimed. "Yes," observed the forester, "and that's why I wished I had had the steward with me, and he had seen the coffins and the head. But he won't even listen to my story; he pretends he doesn't believe me." "Yes, you see you ought not to have meddled with his trade," remarked the notary. "Even the ghost-seer is human, and doesn't like to be rivaled by people who, returning very late at night from jolly companions in Idar, wander out of the path to an old ruined building." The skeptical notary's comment met with no applause. Not a syllable was uttered. There was a general silence, for each was occupied with his own thoughts and asking himself what these little coffins and the strange head, to which no body was attached, could mean - - what tragical event might occur in reality, since the forester had evidently only seen it as a vision. The spectacle in the empty old house, they thought, could have been nothing but a "warning." But there he comes," exclaimed Herr von Mansdorf; "there comes the steward—why does he take such long, solemn strides? I see by his walk that he has something in his head." In fact, the steward was taking very long, heavy steps; there was an air of resolution and defiance in the whole aspect of the tall, somewhat stooping figure of the sturdy man, as he advanced with his eyes fixed on vacancy. He entered the gate and came directly toward the group. "Have you any business with me, Faustelmann?" cried Herr von Mansdorf. He is here," replied Faustelmann, nodding, in the same tone, and apparently no whit disturbed by the effect produced by his communication. "But where is he? Why don't you bring him here?" exclaimed Herr von Mansdorf, in a voice trembling with emotion. "He's in my house," replied Faustelmann. "He arrived fifteen minutes ago. After looking at the papers he placed before me, I invited him to come to you with me, but he refused." "Refused? And why?" cried the mistress of the house, whose pallor was transformed into a flush of joy. "Because he seems to be a very modest, almost shy gentleman," replied Faustelmann. "He was firmly convinced that his arrival would greatly startle you." "Startle us?" exclaimed Herr von Mansdorf. "Really, Faustelmann, you must have infected him with your fear of ghosts." "Startle!" continued the steward, without condescending to take any notice of his master's personal remark-" startle, because he appears here to deprive you of half the property you have enjoyed alone for several years." 'Oh, pshaw !—didn't you tell him, Faustelmann,” cried Herr von Mansdorf, “that the property was little else than a locked strong-box, to which I had no key, and he is the very key we have been searching for all these years?" "Of course I told him, and it somewhat relieved his mind. But he earnestly entreated me to announce his arrival before he appeared in person; so I've done so." "And my name isn't Mansdorf, if you ever announced anything better or pleasanter in all your life, Faustelmann!" said his master; "and now go Make haste, and bring us this diffident cousin." "I'll fetch Herr Ulrich Gerhard von Uffeln," replied the steward, as he turned and went back along "Yes, Herr von Mansdorf, business, and of a very the path by which he had come. important nature." Herr Faustelmann approached the table, as he said this in an extremely melancholy, hollow tone of his always half-subdued voice. The little company looked after him in breathless expectation. Frau von Mansdorf clasped her hands, and exclaimed: "God bless the day which at last brings this But the notary whispered: "Well, what is it?" said Herr von Mansdorf; man!" "what has happened?" Faustelmann looked at him in silence, and then fixed his eyes on the mistress of the house-it seemed as if he were asking himself whether he ought to speak in her presence, and whether she was strong enough to endure the blow he must deal; then, once more fixing his eyes on vacancy, he said, in a low, hollow voice, with a very marked tone of melancholy: the I hope this cousin isn't one of the visions of ghost-seer." III. BUT the skeptical notary was speedily satisfied. Faustelmann brought back the cousin in bodily form, and there was nothing about him that resembled an apparition-a man, perhaps thirty years of age, or possibly a little less, with fair hair, a tolerably ex- he desired to undertake was now removed, but the pressionless face, and somewhat unsteady, timid man who had at last presented himself as co-heir glances. He was a soldier, he said, a discharged appeared to be a person with whom business arrangeFrench officer; but no bold, soldierly spirit lookedments could be settled in the easiest and most amiforth from those eyes. He was discharged because cable manner. Whatever traits of character might he had been wounded in the hand while serving appear on a longer acquaintance, he was certainly with the army in Spain. The regimental surgeon neither arrogant, obstinate, nor argumentative. He had treated it unskillfully, so his right hand became preferred to listen rather than talk; did not show paralyzed; he could move the wrist, but not the fin- the slightest indiscreet curiosity about the property, gers; when he wanted to take anything he was which was of so much importance to him; paid Frau obliged to lift it with the left hand and close the fin- von Mansdorf and Adelheid the utmost attentiongers over it, then they held as firmly as ever, but they and thus made a most satisfactory impression upon would not obey his will. He had entered the French all the members of the circle in which he had so service when very young; his parents, who lived suddenly appeared. It was long since so cheerful at Freiburg in Breisgau, where his father occupied an evening had been spent in the little nook bethe position of syndic, had died during the campaign tween the towers at Castle Wilstorp. Faustelmann of 1809, and he had then been sent with one of the alone took no part in the gayety. He had quietly Rhenish regiments to Spain, where he underwent retired at an early hour and gone “to see ghosts," incredible hardships, sufferings, and deprivations; he as Herr von Mansdorf, in his excited mood, exappeared to prefer to speak of these toils and hard-pressed it. ships rather than of the battles in which he had been engaged, and the victorious deeds of his corps -a circumstance that plainly showed the peaceful bent of his mind. When a lad, he had often heard from his father, who was a native of this region, that there was an estate which would some day descend —or at least a portion of it—to him. But while in the army he had troubled himself very little about the matter, and not until he was dismissed on account of | his wound did he think of looking up the affair, and at once applied to an old friend of his father in Freiburg, who informed him that the estate in question had been bequeathed long ago, and the papers were full of advertisements for the heir. "Yes," said the notary, interrupting the young man's slowly and cautiously uttered story, "the coheir, Herr von Mansdorf, took possession of Wilstorp; you, as the other heir, share with him, so you are sole owners, and, by mutual consent, unrestricted by the old laws of entail, can do and leave undone whatever you please. If, for instance, it should annoy you that neither can take any step without the other's consent, there is nothing to prevent you from dividing the property, one claiming this half, the other that, or one leasing or selling his portion to the other, as you may choose." The new-comer fixed his eyes on the notary with so questioning a look that Herr von Mansdorf took it as a request for a formal introduction. "Herr Plümer, my-our notary," he said. Ulrich Gerhard von Uffeln bowed with dignified courtesy. Frau von Mansdorf now sent her daughter to provide some refreshments for the stranger, and, in her joyful excitement, followed herself to assist. As for Herr von Mansdorf, he never wearied of inviting the guest to drink, and touching glasses to the health of the new-comer, whom, under the influence of increasing conviviality, he soon treated in a most familiar manner. Herr von Mansdorf's excited mood was very pardonable. He not only had reason to congratulate himself that the spell which had rested on everything The following day only increased the pleasant impression Herr von Uffeln had made upon all the family. A few business matters were first settled, during which the notary and steward had been present, and Ulrich had acceded to everything proposed, especially when advised by Faustelmann, at whose grave countenance the young man often glanced, and who seemed to inspire him with a certain dread. Then, after dinner, a long walk had been taken through the fields and forests, to show the new heir the extent of the property. Ulrich von Uffeln had looked at these things with ever-increasing interest, and made inquiries about the method of cultivation and the income obtained from various portions of the estate. Herr von Mansdorf had given the most elaborate details with the pleasure felt by a man to whom this rôle rarely falls. While the two distant cousins were entertaining each other in this way, Adelheid, who followed them with her mother, thought with deep emotion how grateful they all ought to be to this Ulrich von Uffeln, who was so good-natured a man that he did not seem to have the least intention of opposing any of the plans built upon his arrival; that they would now be at liberty for the winter, and could go out into the world, to the beautiful south, where her physician wanted to send her—the kind physician who was so truly solicitous about her health. Adelheid thought of the joyful surprise that would illuminate this doctor's face when he came to see her that evening, and she had told him her cousin was here at last. She resolved to walk a short distance down the road toward Idar, where he lived, about the time she expected him, in order to be able to give him the joyful news a little earlier. On the way home, Ulrich von Uffeln and Adelheid walked side by side. quite know whether my parents do right in believing and trusting him so implicitly. It often seems to me-you won't betray me, will you?-it often seems to me as if his face was scarcely an honest one. I don't want to injure him, and he certainly has a wonderful gift; you'll see yourself what strange things he foresees, and how wonderfully they come to pass; but I think there is something deceitful about him, and he deceives the people who have so much respect for his supernatural gift—” it at all. A castle, a large landed property, people | heid slightly lowered her voice-" though I don't to give me a cordial welcome—I did not venture to imagine these things. My former life was such that I could not believe they would fall to my lot. I have always been poor and dependent upon my own exertions; I was a soldier, 'and had no talent, no liking for my profession; I always felt uncomfortable in the uniform in which I was obliged to march and countermarch, and always go to places to which nothing attracted me. I was forced, while in this uniform, to consider myself the mortal enemy of men to aid in whose destruction I had come hundreds of miles, though these men had never done anything to injure me. And when one has such thoughts and feelings, Fräulein, he has no friends among the soldiers with whom he must live, and is very, very much alone, without home, friends, or object in life." Adelheid nodded, touched and roused to sympathy by the thought of the joyless, desolate life this distant cousin had experienced. "True," she said, "yet this state of affairs has one good side; you have not come to us with any exaggerated expectations, and therefore our simple circumstances cause you no disappointment." “Oh, no, certainly not," he answered, smiling. "I am surprised, confused, and utterly humiliated, at the thought of being looked upon in this charming little world as a person who has a right to direct; that I have the same title to the estate as your father; it's the first time in my life that my wishes have ever been consulted, and it makes me—at least for the present-diffident and confused. I should prefer to leave everything just as it is, put all these things in your father's hands, and declare myself satisfied if you will receive me into your house as a friend, and allow me to remain and quietly pursue my musical studies in the pleasant corner - room where I was lodged last night." "You are musical, then?" "A little. Only, during my military life, I had no time to cultivate my taste. And now my wounded hand prevents it. I play on the flute." "How unlucky that wound is-" "You think," interrupted Ulrich von Uffeln, as if surprised, "that he turns people's faith in him to his own profit?" I have a feeling as if it were sometimes so," said Adelheid. Ulrich von Uffeln was silent. "I will take notice," he observed, after a long pause. IV. HERR VON MANSDORF and the newly-arrived cousin had paid a visit to Prince von Idar, and Princess Elizabeth had seen him. What marvel, then, that she was utterly astonished when, a few days after, she met in the forest the mysterious stranger, on whose card she read the name "Ulrich Gerhard von Uffeln?" man. Never, in all her young life, had anything so occupied her imagination as the appearance of this But, reflect as she could upon the enigma of his name and appearance, she could discover no solution to the mystery. As she daily grew more eager to obtain some explanation, she at last took the course which seemed the only feasible one-to apply to Meyer Jochmaring. The stranger had betrayed that Meyer was the source through which he had heard of her. Therefore the latter must know him, and be able to give some information about him. So one fine afternoon Princess Elizabeth, accompanied by her faithful Marianne, set out on their walk to Meyer's farm, availing herself of the pretext that she wanted to give Meyer her father's receipt for the loan of his money. After a rapid walk through the forest, she again sat down on the bench under the old oaks. The old peasant was absent upon his farm, but his wife brought out some refreshments for the princess, fruit and honey, and, that you are here you must study your rights and being excessively fond of talking, informed her of duties as master." “Oh, yes, I'll do that, too. Only help me a little. You see I shall need assistance a long time. Interest yourself in me a very, very little. It would make me so happy." several remarkable events in the various stages of the production of flax, yarn, and linen, which had occurred this year, and commenced the same revelations on the great subject of butter, until the princess arrested her flow of words by stating that she advise," had come to ask Meyer about a stranger, whom he must know, because this man had spoken to the princess of him. "You see, "I will at least tell you what I should replied Adelheid, with a slight blush. my father is too indulgent, too ready to trust every one he is so good himself. If you are also confiding and satisfied with everything, there will be danger that you will both be cheated-" The good woman's eyes sparkled with secret delight at having an opportunity to talk of this man. You've seen and spoken to him, your highness?" she said, lowering her voice. "Then I can surely talk of it to you; he's the strangest person I ever He came to our house one beautiful evening, Faustelmann! Why, yes, though I"-Adel- just at dusk, and brought a note from our son, An "Certainly, but Herr Faustelmann appears to understand everything so thoroughly, and be so devoted to his employer-" saw. |