On this day a display of beautiful women and gallant men of all classes had been invited to celebrate the nuptials of the Duke's friend and favourite. They were seated around tables which groaned under loads of good cheer. The fiddlers in the galleries flourished their fiddlesticks merrily; the cheeks of the trumpeters were swelled to the fullest stretch; the drummers' sticks beat heavily on their skins; and the spectators who were admitted in the other part of the galleries, joined chorus with shouting and hallooing when the company drank a toast. At the upper end of the room sat the Duke upon a throne, under a canopy. His hat was pushed off his forehead, he looked around him with an air of satisfaction, and did not spare the bottle. On his right, at the side of the table, sat Bertha, who was no longer obliged to submit to the ceremonious restraint of cast-down eyes, and keeping at a respectable distance from the bridegroom. Her glance and the expression of her features bespoke happiness. She looked at her husband, who sat opposite to her, and she could scarcely convince herself her being actually a wife was not all a dream, and that the name she had borne eighteen years was changed to that of Sturmfeder. She smiled as often as she regarded him, for it appeared to her that he had already assumed the direction of her conduct. "He is my head," she said to herself, playfully, "my lord, my master!" And her thoughts were really verified, for Albert felt all the importance and responsibility of his new position in society. It seemed to him as if the young people already paid him more respect than heretofore, and that the old knights treated him more upon an equality since he had become the head of a family, and stood no longer alone in the world. The notions in the good old times were somewhat different to those in the present day respecting the marriage state, for the designation of nobles and citizens was invariably supposed to include that of wife and children, leaving the state of celibacy to monks alone.