Walpurga, unable to accompany them on their long walk to church, was obliged to remain at home. Her friend Stasi, who, on the previous Sunday, had altered the prayer for the queen in Walpurga's favor, remained to bear her company. Walpurga, seated in grandmother's arm-chair, looked out of the latticed window, at the violets, the buttercups, and the rosemary, the peaceful lake and the blue skies, while she listened to the sound of the church bell. "This is the first time my babe goes out into the wide, wide world, and I'm not with it," said she; "and some day I shall go into the other world and never be with it again. And still I feel as if it was with me all the same." "I don't know what makes you so downhearted today," said her companion; "if that comes o' getting married, I'll never have a husband." "Nonsense!" curtly replied Walpurga; her meaning was plain enough. Soon afterward, she added in a voice tremulous with emotion: "I'm not downhearted. It's only this. I just feel as if the baby and I had been both born over again. I don't know how it is, but I feel as if I were another person. Just think of it! In all my life, I've never lain abed so quietly and peacefully as I've been doing these many days. And to be lying there perfectly well, and with nothing to do but think and sleep, and awake again, and nurse the baby, while kind folks are forever bringing whatever heart can wish for--I tell you, if I'd been a hermit in the woods for seven years, I couldn't have done more thinking. It would keep me busy day and night to tell you all. But what's that?" said she, suddenly interrupting herself; "just then it seemed as if the whole house were shaking." "I didn't notice anything. But your face is enough to give one the blues. Let's sing something. Just try whether you're still our best singer." Her companion insisting, Walpurga at last began to sing, but soon stopped. Stasi essayed another song, but Walpurga did not care for it; indeed, none of them were to her liking that day. "Let's be quiet," said she at last. "Don't worry me through all those songs; I don't feel like doing anything to-day." The bells were tolling for the third time. The two friends were sitting together in silence. At last Stasi said: "How kind it is of the innkeeper to let them ride home from church in his wagon." "Listen! I hear wheels. They can't be coming already." "No, that's the rattle of the doctor's carriage. There he is, up there by the willows; and there's another gentleman with him." "Don't talk to me now, Stasi," said the young mother; "let the whole world drive by; it's all the same to me."