"When I first came here I thought the cold would have been my death; for I had been so used to our fine bright sunshine on the Morgenhalde. There is not a single ray of sun there of which we don't get our share. Now, however, I have at last become accustomed to do without it; but Lenz, you look very ill? There is something strange in your face that I never saw there before--that is not natural to you--Oh! when you smile like that, I see your old face again--your kindly face. I have prayed every morning and every evening, since I left you, for you and your family. I hope you got some good from it. I am no longer angry with Annele--not in the least: she was quite right; I am regular old lumber. How are your children? What are they like? What are they called? If I am still alive next spring, I must see them, even if I creep on my hands and feet the whole way." And then Franzl went on to say that she had three hens of her own, and two geese, and a patch of potato land, also her own. "We are poor," said she, crossing her hands on her breast, "but, thank God! we have never yet had occasion to see how other people live; we have always had enough for our own wants, and if it be God's will, I mean to get a goat next spring." She praised her geese highly, but still more her poultry. The hens, who had taken up their winter quarters in a coop near the stove, cackled as if in gratitude, and turning their red combs first to the right and then to the left, looked sideways at the man who was hearing all their good qualities detailed by Franzl. Indeed, the speckled golden Hamburg hen, whose name was Goldammer, stretched out her wings from joy, and flapped them cheerfully. Lenz could not succeed in getting in a word, and Franzl thought she was consoling him, when she attacked the former Landlady of the "Lion" fiercely, and then branched off to tell how kind her old acquaintance Kathrine had been towards her, and the good she did to all the poor round her. "She gives me food for my hens, and they give me my food in return." Franzl could not help laughing at her own joke. At last Lenz managed to say that he must leave her. Annele is right, he lets himself be detained too long by anyone, or everyone; even when he is in an agony to be off, he cannot cut short any person, especially if they are telling him their sorrows. He felt the justice of Annele's reproaches at this moment; she seemed to stand behind him to urge him away. He looked round, as if he really expected to see her, and seized his hat and his stick; then Franzl begged him to go up with her to her attic, for she had something to say to him. Lenz was inwardly troubled. Has Franzl also heard of the discord in his house? and is she going to talk to him about it? She, however, made no allusion whatever to such a thing, but she brought forth from the centre of the straw mattress on her bed, a heavy, well filled shoe, knotted together with many fastenings, and said:--