human atomies, to whom everything around is strange, and a deep mystery. Still she conquered herself and avoided all sight of the child, trying to divert her mind, but--'the wine of life was drawn.' The child's existence caused her infinite torment; she was not one whom shams could satisfy. She called everything by its right name, and this foisting of a false heir upon the Lodrins she called, in her soul a crime. Sometimes she wished he would die--that would have untangled everything;--good Heavens! how many children die! but he--was never even ill, he throve and grew strong. The Count, who had never before ventured upon the slightest remonstrances with his headstrong wife, now reproached her continually for her neglect of the child. She listened to him with brows gloomily contracted and lips compressed, but said not a word in reply. In winter she could contrive never to see the boy, but in summer this was more difficult, especially at times when her husband declared that he could receive no guests at the castle, that he wished to be alone. She could hardly set foot in the park without hearing soft childish laughter, or without seeing some plaything, or the gleam of a little white dress among the bushes. Once, on a lovely day in June, after a thunder-shower, as she was walking in the park she suddenly noticed two tiny footprints on the damp gravel. She stood still, her eyes riveted upon the delicate outlines, when from the shrubbery close at hand a little creature toddled up to her, grasped her dress with his chubby hands and looked up roguishly at her out of his large dark eyes. But she extricated herself, and hurried past the little man so quickly and impatiently, that he lost his balance and fell down. What else could she do but turn and look at him....? Had he cried like other children of his age it would probably have made no impression upon her; but he sat stock-still, his little legs stretched out straight, and gazed at her in indignant surprise like, a little king to whom homage had been denied. He could not understand it. He was a comical little fellow, with tiny red shoes, a white frock that did not reach to his bare knees, and a broad-brimmed, starched, linen hat tied beneath his chin, shading his charming little face. In a flash her heart was conscious of a consuming thirst; she stooped and lifted him in her arms. Some children there are who dislike to be caressed, and will fretfully turn away their heads from their mother's kisses, but little Ossi was of a different stamp, and responded with a bewitching readiness to his mother's tenderness, nestling his head on her shoulder with a satisfied chuckle, and pressing his little lips to her cheek. For just one moment she resolved to yield, she would forget everything, and take her fill of kisses, and of delight in his beauty, in his bright eager looks, and in the droll way in which words, robbed of every harsh consonant by rosy little lips, came rippling like the twittering of birds.