"Good heavens," said Johannes, half compassionately and half annoyed, "was there ever such a child! First you climb into a tree at peril of your life, just that you may gratify your self-will, and then a single word of blame crushes you to the earth. I never saw anything like it!" Saying this, he lifted her up and held her out before him in the moonlight, regarding her as one would some rare animal or natural curiosity. "Here is a thing," he said, more to himself than to Ernestine, "so frail and delicate that you could crush it in your grasp, but there is such strength of will in the little frame that one is forced to yield to it, and such a wildly throbbing heart in the little breast that one is carried away by it in spite of one's self. I should like to know what odd combinations have produced this strange piece of humanity. Do not cry any more, little one; I will not harm you--what eyes the creature has! You are a remarkable child, but I would not like to have the charge of you--you would puzzle one well, and force and blows would have no effect upon you!" With these words he put her down upon the ground again and picked up his coat to put it on. As he did so, he felt something hard in the pocket; he looked to see what it was, and drew out a book in a splendid binding. "Ah," he cried gaily, "I had forgotten this. Can you read?" Ernestine nodded. She was glad that she had not to say no; how ashamed she would have been! "Come, that's right!" said the young man; and Ernestine was very proud of those first words of commendation, and determined instantly to be doubly diligent, that she might some time hear just such another "That's right!" Johannes put the book into her hand. "There, you shall have that, that you may carry something pleasant home with you after such a dreary day. The stories are charming. I brought it out for my little sister Angelika, but I could not give it to her because I had to run after you. Now I am glad that I have it still and can give it to you." "Yes--but Angelika?" Ernestine asked hesitatingly. "She shall have another to-morrow. Take it, and read the story of the Ugly Duckling; that will comfort you when people are cross to you. Take it--why do you hesitate?" The child took the book as carefully and timidly as if it were in reality a fairy book and would vanish at her touch. When she had it in her hands and it did not disappear, and she could really believe in her happiness in receiving such a present, she uttered a scarcely audible "Thank you very much!" but the look that accompanied the words touched Johannes. "You do not often have presents?" he asked. "Never!" "Oh! you seem not to be very affectionately treated. Does not your mother ever give you anything?" "I have no mother. She died because I was not a boy." "A most remarkable cause of death," observed Johannes, half dryly, half compassionately.