June 6, 1878.Ⓐemendation Ⓐalteration in the MS I reached the little house on the peak of the Königsstuhl this morning, about 11. As I steppedⒶalteration in the MS into the small living-room, Fräulein Marie stepped into the same room from the kitchen. Her head was down. She raised it and showed such a heart-broken face! Her eyes were dim with tears which she was trying hard to keep from flowing. The mother, the two sisters, the good old stocking-knitterⒶemendation and I all sprung forward with one impulse and one exclamation of distress and sympathy: “O, child, what has happened!” She could not speak; but she touchedⒶalteration in the MS one of her ear-rings with one fore-finger, and laid her other fore-finger eloquently upon the remains of the other, and her tale was told.—Two-thirds of the pendant was broken off and lost. They were simple jewels, these ear-rings, and had not cost what a lady pays forⒶalteration in the MS a pair of kid gloves in America, but they were precious to the owner, for she was not rich in such things. Now from all lips burst a simultaneous torrent of mingled consternationⒶalteration in the MS, grief, pity, and attempted consolation. All crowded about Marie and touched and examined the remnantⒶalteration in the MS of the trinket which remained in her ear, and out of the confusion of exclamations I caught odds and ends here and there: like this, from the mother: “Ach Gott, my child! Gott be with theeⒶalteration in the MS in thy misfortune!” and this from the good old stocking-knitter: “Ach Gott, it is a blow! try thou to bear it, child—we will help thee!” The sisters offered to go [begin page 146] and ransack the house, the wood, the road—please God it might be found yet. I put in my word; and grateful I was that I had one German phrase which I could depend on to convey something of what I felt and wanted to say in this time of trouble: “Ah, FräuleinⒶalteration in the MS, es thut mir sehr leid!”—(“AhⒶemendation, Fräulein, I am so sorry!”) Then I fell into irregular grammar, and tried to cheer her up with the suggestion that a jewelerⒶalteration in the MS could mateⒶalteration in the MS the remaining ear-ring by making another just like it; but she shook her head, uncomforted, and said, Ah, it would cost so much money—as much, indeed, as a new pair. The mother and the others said the same, and I easily saw, myself, that they were right, and that my solution of the difficulty was no solution at all. Then I said, it was too early toⒶemendation give up hope—without a doubt the lost part would be found again. I said that this ear-dropⒶalteration in the MS was different from some other things: if one lets a perfectly round grape fall on the floor, it does not roll away, but places itself carefully right where you are bound to step on it the moment you startⒶalteration in the MS to hunt for it; but if you drop a perfectly square piece of billiard chalk, it will roll to the other end of the house, avoiding all chair-legs and things, and hide where you will never find it again; now this ear-drop is light, and thin, and flat—it cannot roll, it lies at this moment right where it fell; it will be found again, without the slightest question in the world. But the Fräulein shook her head as hopelessly as before, and said, if she lost it when she walked out yesterday noon,Ⓐalteration in the MS God help us, think where it is now!—there was the heavy rain in the afternoon, then the people, then the wagons—ah, it is trampled deep in the mud, and none will ever see it again! This thought so wrung her heart that for once the tears got the better of her resistance, and a crystal drop or two stole over the lids.Ⓐalteration in the MS The mother and the sisters agreed with what the Fräulein had said; so also did the kindly oldⒶalteration in the MS stocking-knitter, interlarding her speech with manyⒶalteration in the MS an Ach GottⒶalteration in the MS! and Gott abide with us in our sorrow!Ⓐalteration in the MS and so on.Ⓐalteration in the MS However, they were all getting ready to go out and begin the search.

My work was urgent, so I went up stairs and set myself at it; but I could get no life into it; this house was a house of mourning, and there was no getting away from the sense of it. To argue that nothing was the matter except that an almost costless trifle had been lost, was an easy thing to do, but it did no good after it was done. ThereⒶalteration in the MS was no [begin page 147] arguing away the fact that the only real thing about affliction is the affliction itself—the causeⒶalteration in the MS of it is not a thing to be considered; the loss of a king's crown and a young girl's trinket weigh just the same in the scales of the Angel of Calamity.

At the end of three hours I judged that I had worked enough; so I went down stairs and struck into the road which leads through the beechⒶalteration in the MS wood. The old stocking-knitter was in her usual nook among the trees, plying her needles. The faceⒶalteration in the MS bent over the work was sorrowful, so I knew that the season of mourning still continued. When I had almost reached her, she heard my step, lookedⒶalteration in the MS up, then glanced at my white canvas walking shoes; the next moment she was on her feet and running toward me, her face ablaze and her ball of yarn tumbling and tangling after her on the ground. “O, the beautiful shoes! O, the lovely shoes! O, the strange white foreign things, and so beautiful!” Then down she plunged, clasped my ancle, thrust up my pantaloons to see how high the shoes came, then stroked the instep and the toe and broke forth again: “O, in God's name, cloth!—all cloth!—can one believe the wonder of it!—and so wunderschön!”

I explained that I was rather a starchy person and accustomed to wearing just such princely things as these dollar-and-a-half shoes, and then I inquired about the ear-ring. The shadow of mourning fell upon the old dame's face again, and she gathered up her trail of yarn and sat down to her work again, with a dreary shake of the head. Then she told how the house had been searched, and re-searched, and searched again; and how Marie had sadly traced out every step she had taken in the road and the forest the day before, the family following in procession behind her, all stooping and turning over every leaf and clod and peering around every root and bowlder—Ⓐalteration in the MSall in vain; and how the procession had gone searching back and forth over the same ground, time and time again, still patiently searching—and all in vain; and how all had given up hope at last, and gone once more about their usual avocations, with sad faces and heavy hearts: “We are born to suffer—God's will be done!”

I left her in the vale of sorrow, and moved on—not cheerfully, and light of step, but otherwise—and unconsciously scanningⒶtextual note the ground for the lost trifle, too. By and by I turned back; when I was nearly to [begin page 148] my old dame, I stopped, and stood there watching her; I could see the sideⒶalteration in the MS of her grieving face over an intervening leafy bough,Ⓐalteration in the MS and was near enough to hear her deep sighs and broken ejaculations. Presently I caught the flutter of a dress beyond, and the next moment Fräulein Marie, with radiant face,Ⓐalteration in the MS stood before the old soul, and held up a glittering object, uttering never a word! Down went stocking, ball and all, up went the clasped old hands, and out came an indescribably eloquent “Gott sei dank!”

Then followedⒶalteration in the MS a rattling volley of questions: Where was it? How did she find it? When did she find it? How did it comeⒶalteration in the MS about? The Fräulein's rapture was as mastering,Ⓐalteration in the MS now, as her grief had been in the morning—she could not speak; but she did what answered just as well: with a pretty grace she spread open a little pocket in her apron with one hand, placed the recovered trinket at her ear with the other, bent her head to one side, like a bird, and let the jewel drop. Yes—that had been the way of it; when the ear-drop broke, she had had the luck to be in such a position that the dismembered part fell into her apron pocket. Up went the devout hands again, and out came a fervent, “The ways of God are wonderful!”

My friend the reader isⒶalteration in the MS privileged to imagine for himselfⒶalteration in the MS what the rejoicing in the homestead was like when we all ran thither—it is beyond my art to paint it.