concerning her, and in the mean time you will carefully avoid appearing in public with any member of the circus-rider's family. Answer particularly at what time you intend to return, and accept the cordial good wishes of your affectionate grandfather, "JOHANN FREIHERR V. DÖNNINGHAUSEN." The Freiherr gave this letter to Otto to read and to supplement, saying, "I have told the silly child what I require without circumlocution; now you can sweeten the pill of obedience to her as you please. You need not tone down what you want to say. I will not read what you write. Love-letters are interesting only to those for whom they are composed." Would he have considered the following a love-letter?-- "Your hasty departure, dear Johanna, has unfortunately still further complicated matters. If you only would have granted me an interview, you would have forgiven me, I feel sure, and the delightful relations existing between our grandfather and yourself need not have been disturbed by any discord. But I have no idea of reproaching you. I only entreat you, as earnestly as I can, to deliver me from the false position you have forced me to take to our grandfather. One word of forgiveness and a promise to return, and all will be well. Think of the happy hours we have passed together, of the fair future that lies before us, and believe in the repentance and love of your "OTTO." Aunt Thekla also wrote a long letter, in which some passages were almost obliterated by her tears, repeating everything that she had said on the previous day, and then the epistles were all despatched, and the Freiherr awaited with certainty the answer he desired. A letter from Johanna to her grandfather arrived after a week's delay, with an enclosure for Aunt Thekla, but not a line for Otto. The Freiherr's letter ran thus: