But the prosperity thus produced was not the only result of his acquaintance with Father Rudolph. The dropped stitches of our life are sometimes taken up again strangely, through many intervening loops. One day, as Fritz was passing through the streets, when he was about sixteen years old, he stopped and listened intently; for he heard far off the sounds of a popular German ballad, which his grandmother and the peddler often used to sing together. Through all the din and rattle of the streets, he could plainly distinguish the monotonous minor cadence, which had often brought tears to his eyes when a boy. He followed the tones, and soon came in sight of an old man and his wife singing the familiar melody. A maiden, apparently somewhat younger than himself, played a tamborin at intervals. When he spoke to her in German, her face kindled, as his own had done, at the first sound of his native tongue in a strange land. “They call me Röschen,” she replied; “these are my father and mother. We came from the ship last night, and we sing for bread, till we can get work to do.” The soul looked simply and kindly through her blue eyes, and reminded him of sister Gretchen. Her wooden shoes, short blue petticoat, and little crimson jacket might seem vulgar to the fashionable, and picturesque to the artist; but to him it was merely the beloved costume of his native land. It warmed his heart with childish recollections; and when they sang again the quaint, sad melody, he seemed to hear the old brook flow plaintively by, and see the farewell moonlight on the mill. Thus began his acquaintance with the maiden, who was afterwards his wife, and the mother of his little Gretchen. Of these, and all other groups of emigrants, for many years, he inquired concerning his parents and his sister; but could obtain no tidings. At last, a priest in Germany, to whom he wrote, replied that Gretchen had died in childhood; and that the father and mother had also recently died. It was a great disappointment to the affectionate heart of Fritz Schelling; for through all his expanding fortunes he had cherished the hope of returning to them, or bringing them to share his comfortable home in the New World. But when he received the mournful news, he had Röschen to love, and her parents to care for, and a little one that twined herself round his heart with fresh flower-garlands every day. At thirty-five, he was a happy and a prosperous man. So prosperous, that he could afford to live well in the city, and yet build for himself a snug cottage in the country. “We can go out every Saturday and return on Monday,” said he to Röschen. “We can have fresh cream, and our own sweet butter. It will do the children good to roll on the grass, and they shall have a goat to play with.” “And, perhaps, by-and-by, we can go there to live all the time,” rejoined Röschen. “It is so quiet and pleasant in the country; and what’s the use of being richer than enough?”