"Yes, Karl. You see if you had come with a great bag of money, they would have welcomed you with open arms, for money is the one thing which they hold in respect; but in your temporary embarrassment they look upon you and your little girl as nothing better than a couple of intruders, who will take the bread from their mouths, and from their old blockhead of a Jochen." "God bless me!" cried Habermann, "why didn't I leave the child with the Rassows? What shall I do with the poor little thing? Do you know any expedient? I cannot leave her here, not even with my own sister can I leave her here." "But naturally, you wish to have her near you. Now I will tell you, Karl, tonight you must stay with the Nüssler's; tomorrow we will go to the Herr Kammerrath at Pumpelhagen. If that goes well, then we can find a place for the child here in the neighbourhood; if not, we will ride to the city, and there we must find some opening,--if not otherwise, with the merchant Kurz. And now good-bye, Karl! Don't take the matter too much to heart,--things will improve, Karl!" whereupon he departed. "Yes, if all were like you," said Habermann, as he went back to his sister's house, "then I should get over the steep mountain; but get over it I must, and will," and the cheerful courage, which had been nurtured by labor and his feeling of duty, broke through the gloom, like the sun through a mist. "My sister shall suffer no inconvenience on my account, and I will take care of my child myself." In the evening, when the milk had been cared for, Habermann walked with his sister along the garden-path, and she spoke of his, and he of her, troubles. "Eh, Karl," said she, "don't fret about me! I am used to it all now. Yes, it is true, the old folks are very selfish and irritable; but if they sulk at me for a week, I forget it all the next hour, and as for Jochen, I must own that he lays nothing in my way, and has never given me a hard word. If he were only a little more active and ready,--but that is not to be looked for in him. I have enough to do in my house-keeping, but I have to concern myself with the out-of-door work, too, which is not a woman's business, and there Bräsig is a real comfort to me, for he has an eye to the fields and the farm-yard, and starts Jochen up a little." "Does the farming go well on the whole, and do you come out right at the year's end?" asked the brother.