"You--why don't you go away, too? Why don't people tell you to emigrate? Perhaps for you, too, it would be better elsewhere. But, to be sure, you are too large--you did not place yourself here, and who knows if you would not die in some other place. You can only be hewn down, not transplanted. Nonsense! I also had to leave my home. If it were my father, I should be obliged to go with him--he would not need to ask me. And he who asks too much, goes astray. No one can advise me in this matter, not even Marianne. And, after all, with my uncle, it's like this: 'I am doing you a good turn, and you must repay me.' If he's severe with me, and with Damie, because he's awkward, and we have to run away, where in this wide, strange world are we to go? Here everybody knows us, and every hedge, every tree has a familiar face. 'You know me, don't you?' she said, looking up at the tree. 'Oh, if you could but speak! God created you too--why cannot you speak? You knew my father and mother so well--why cannot you tell me what they would advise me to do?' Oh, dear father! Oh, dear mother! It grieves me so to have to go away! I have nothing here, and hardly anybody, and yet I feel as if I were being driven out of a warm bed into the cold snow. Is this deep sadness that I feel a sign that I ought not to go? Is it the true voice of conscience, or is it but a foolish fear? Oh, good Heaven, I do not know! If only a voice from Heaven would come now and tell me!" The child trembled with inward terror, and the sense of life's difficulties for the first time arose vividly within her. And again she went on, half-thinking, half-talking to herself--but this time in a more decided way: "If I were alone, I know for certain that I should not go; I should stay here. For it would grieve me too much. Alone I could get along. Good--remember that; of one thing, then, you are sure--as to yourself you are decided. But what foolish thoughts are these! How can I imagine that I am alone, and without Damie? I am not alone--I belong to Damie, and he belongs to me. And for Damie it would be better if he had a fatherly hand to guide him--it would help him up. But why do you want anybody else, Amrei?--can you not take care of him yourself, if it be necessary? If he once starts out in that way, I can see that he'll be nothing but a servant all his life, a drudge for other people. And who knows how uncle's children will behave toward us? Because they're poor people themselves, they'll play the masters with us. No, no! I'm sure they're good,--and it would be a fine thing to be able to say: 'Good morning, cousin.' If uncle had only brought one of the children with him, I could decide much better--I could find out about things. Oh, good heavens, how difficult all this is!"