And the room was well worth her attention. The timbers and the plastered walls had been allowed to remain since former times, and the whitewashed ceiling was so low that one could reach it with one's hand. But whatever could be improved had been improved. Instead of the small panes which one still saw on the ground floor, a large window reaching nearly down to the floor had been set in, which afforded, as the host had said, a beautiful view of the scenery, both woods and water. But the large window was not all that had been accomplished here in the way of modern comfort. A few good pictures, very likely bought at some auction, hung on the old irregular plastered walls, and where the projecting window gable joined the sloping roof of the room itself stood a pair of handsome toilet tables facing each other. Everything showed that the character of the fisherman's and boatman's tavern had been carefully kept, while at the same time the place had been turned into a pleasing hotel for the rich sportsmen of the yacht club. Lena was much pleased with all that she saw, and began to examine the pictures that hung in broad frames to the right and left of the bed. They were engravings, the subjects of which interested her keenly, and so she wanted to read the inscriptions under each. One was inscribed "Washington Crossing the Delaware" and the other "The Last Hour at Trafalgar." But she could get no further than merely to decipher the syllables, and although it was a very small matter, it gave her a pang, because it emphasised the chasm that divided her from Botho. He was, indeed, in the habit of making fun of learning and education, but she was clever enough to know what to think of such jesting. Close to the entrance door, above a rococo table, on which stood some red glasses and a water carafe, hung a gay colored lithograph with an inscription in three languages: "_Si jeunesse savait_"--a picture which Lena remembered having seen at the Doerrs'. Doerr loved such things. When she saw it here again, she shivered and felt distressed. Her fine sensibility was hurt by the sensual quality of the picture as if it were a distortion of her own feeling, and so, in order to shake off the impression, the went to the window and opened both sashes to let in the night air. Oh. how refreshing it was! She seated herself on the windowsill, which was only a couple of hands' breadth from the floor, threw her left arm around the middle bar and listened to hear what was happening on the veranda. But she heard nothing. Deep stillness reigned, except that in the old elm there was a stirring and rustling, and any discomfort that might have lingered in her mind disappeared at once, as she gazed with ever-growing delight on the picture spread out before her. The water flowed gently, wood and meadow lay in the dim evening light, and the thin crescent of the new moon cast its light on the stream and showed the tremulous motion of the rippling waves.