“With such a man”--oh! the emphasis on “such a man,” and her eyes lit up like a couple of Bengal lights--“with such a man you should conduct yourself very differently, dearest Muschi. He is not accustomed to the kind of conversation you indulge in with the fast young men you have about you. It is plain that he likes you; how could it be otherwise? but it is very evident that your talk and manners often horrify him.” And then she must needs launch out into a tirade against horsiness and stable talk, frivolity and lack of reading and thinking, and goodness only knows what. Heaven knows, I detest everything fast, but her way of depreciating the things that I most like and value exhausted my--never too great--stock of patience. I dare say I answered her very rudely, and I certainly told her that her room was as good as her company. And so my lady took herself off, looking uncommonly like a bedraggled poodle. And in my first fury I sat down then and there and made a sketch of her presiding over the school of needlework she had started at home, a book under each arm, one hand wielding a birch rod, the other displaying a darned stocking, upon the tip of her nose, flattened for the purpose, pirouettes a tiny weeny scholar. My caricature made the round of the drawing room, and everybody had a secret giggle over it. Nagel, of course, deplored my fresh piece of mischief, and had nearly let the cat out of the bag. Clara was more amused by it than anyone, which was far from my intention, and the count was amazed at my talent for drawing, and thought it a thousand pities that I had not had drawing lessons. The remainder of the evening he devoted to Clara, presumably talking to her about the school of needlework. Poor man! Yours, MUSCHI. I open this to tell you that the count has begged me to grant him an interview. Things are becoming serious. My parents are beaming. I will telegraph to you when our engagement is to be made known. SEBENBERG CASTLE, December 28, 1883. Yes, dearest, we shall soon be coming to Vienna, and I shall be jolly glad to see your sweet self again, and glad of Carnival. What a nuisance that it is cut so short now; there is no possibility of crowding in enough dances; and I feel inclined to rush in madly for gayety. Unluckily Fred will be away; he is spending the winter in Old England, as he wrote papa a few days ago, with apologies to the ladies for not having come over to say good-by before starting. Papa is angry because Fred rather did him over some horses--as if that----