It was on a bright, breezy morning of the early autumn that a heavy old German travelling-carriage,--a wagon!--rattled over the uneven pavement of Kalbbratonstadt, and soon gaining one of the long forest alleys, rolled noiselessly over the smooth sward. Within sat an elderly lady with a due allowance of air-cushions, toy-terriers, and guide-books; in the rumble were a man and a maid; and in the cabriolet in front were a pale but placid girl, with large gray eyes and long lashes, and he who now writes these lines beside her. They who had only known me a few months back as a freshman of Trinity would not have recognized me now, as I sat with a long-peaked travelling-cap, a courier's belt and bag at my side, and the opening promise of a small furry moustache on my upper lip; not to say that I had got up a sort of supercilious air of contemptuous pity for the foreigner, which I had observed to be much in favor with the English abroad. It cost me dear to do this, and nothing but the consciousness that it was one of the requirements of my station could have made me assume it, for in my heart of hearts, I revelled in enjoyment of all around me. I liked the soft breezy balmy air, the mellow beech wood, the grassy turf overgrown with violets, the wild notes of the frightened wood-pigeon, the very tramp-tramp of the massive horses, with their scarlet tassels and their jingling bells; all pleased and interested me. Not to speak of her, who, at my side, felt a very child's delight at every novelty of the way. “What would I have said to any one who, only a fortnight ago, had promised me such happiness as this?” said I to my companion, as we drove along, while the light branches rustled pleasantly over the roof of the carriage, darkening the shade around us, or occasionally deluging us with the leaves as we passed. “And are you then so very happy?” asked she, with a pleasant smile. “Can you doubt it? or rather is it that, as the emotion does not extend to yourself, you _do_ doubt it?” “Oh, as for me,” cried she, joyfully, “it is very different. I have never travelled till now--seen nothing, actually nothing. The veriest commonplaces of the road, the peasants' costumes, their wayside cottages, the little shrines they kneel at, are all objects of picturesque interest to me, and I am ready to exclaim at each moment, 'Oh! why cannot we stop here? shall we ever see anything so beautiful again as this?'” “And hearing you talk thus, you can ask me am I so very happy!” said I, reproachfully. “What I meant was, is it not stupid to have no companion of your own turn of mind, none with whom you could talk, without condescending to a tone beneath you, just as certain stories are reduced to words of one syllable for little children?” “Mademoiselle is given to sarcasm, I see,” said I, half peevishly.