"_Eh bien, nous voilà d'accord!_ Will you give me your arm? I see they are making ready." At that moment Cloten came up, out of breath. "One word, Oldenburg--pardon me, Miss Klaus--Oldenburg, you must get me another lady. I cannot go with Hortense." "_Pourquoi pas, mon cher?_" "Because--oh, pshaw!--because----" "_Je suis au désespoir, mon brave_; but Barnewitz has proposed you himself!" "Are you sure?" "You may rely on it." He hastened back to his lady, his face beaming with joy. "Oswald," said Melitta, "I have reconsidered it. It is better so--there is no prospect for the cotillon. Now come, give me your arm, and be good again." The older people had gone into the dining-room first, and were standing behind their chairs; the company from the ball-room came now. Baron Barnewitz came for a moment across to see that all was right. He looked very black when he saw his wife on Cloten's arm, and Melitta standing by Oswald, and still more so when Oldenburg himself entered, leading his lady like a princess by the hand. "Oldenburg, what a mess you have made!" whispered Barnewitz, furiously. "I do not want Cloten to sit by my they are quite enough talked about already." "Well, my dear fellow, you told me to take the most insignificant; that left me no doubt!" "And Melitta with the doctor; you with Miss Klaus--that is too absurd." "Well, Barnewitz, it's done now, and please do me the favor not to interfere any more with my arrangements. Go quietly to your seat, the Countess Grieben is looking for you with her big owl eyes!" "I wash my hands of it," growled Barnewitz, hurrying away. "And I drink a bottle of champagne in honor of my successful _coup d'état_," grinned Oldenburg, sitting down by the little governess, just opposite Melitta and Oswald, and not far from Cloten and Hortense. "Ladies and gentlemen," he said, "I hope you will join me in drinking, silently but enthusiastically, the health of the man who has assigned us all our places, and who, while he looked to the common welfare of all, yet has known how to fulfil the wishes of every guest. I pray you will bear in mind that a want of enthusiasm at this solemn moment would deeply wound the feelings of that man, and at the same time inexpressibly pain one of your neighbors, whom you are bound to love at least as your neighbor. Ladies and gentlemen, drink with me the health of your and my best friend, Adalbert Oldenburg!" As a matter of course, no one within reach of the Baron's moderately strong voice dared to refuse to join in this ironical toast. The glasses clinked, and soon a lively conversation began all around the table, like fire in a bundle of straw which has been set on fire on all sides at once; that humming, chirping, chuckling, tittering, laughing conversation, in which very soon the most brilliant witticism and the most foolish remark have the same value.