The Dove in the Eagle's Nest [72]
be again his child; but, even while she felt each acceptance of a token of respect as almost an injury to them, every look and tone was showing how much the same Christina she had returned.
In truth, though her life had been mournful and oppressed, it had not been such as to age her early. It had been all submission, without wear and tear of mind, and too simple in its trials for care and moiling; so the fresh, lily-like sweetness of her maiden bloom was almost intact, and, much as she had undergone, her once frail health had been so braced by the mountain breezes, that, though delicacy remained, sickliness was gone from her appearance. There was still the exquisite purity and tender modesty of expression, but with greater sweetness in the pensive brown eyes.
"Ah, little one!" said her uncle, after duly contemplating her; "the change is all for the better! Thou art grown a wondrously fair dame. There will scarce be a lovelier in the Kaiserly train."
Ebbo almost pardoned his great-uncle for being his great-uncle.
"When she is arrayed as becomes the Frau Freiherrinn," said the housewife aunt, looking with concern at the coarse texture of her black sleeve. "I long to see our own lady ruffle it in her new gear. I am glad that the lofty pointed cap has passed out; the coif becomes my child far better, and I see our tastes still accord as to fashion."
"Fashion scarce came above the Debateable Ford," said Christina, smiling. "I fear my boys look as if they came out of the Weltgeschichte, for I could only shape their garments after my remembrance of the gallants of eighteen years ago."
"Their garments are your own shaping!" exclaimed the aunt, now in an accent of real, not conventional respect.
"Spinning and weaving, shaping and sewing," said Friedel, coming near to let the housewife examine the texture.
"Close woven, even threaded, smooth tinted! Ah, Stina, thou didst learn something! Thou wert not quite spoilt by the housefather's books and carvings."
"I cannot tell whose teachings have served me best, or been the most precious to me," said Christina, with clasped hands, looking from one to another with earnest love.
"Thou art a good child. Ah! little one, forgive me; you look so like our child that I cannot bear in mind that you are the Frau Freiherrinn."
"Nay, I should deem myself in disgrace with you, did you keep me at a distance, and not THOU me, as your little Stina," she fondly answered, half regretting her fond eager movement, as Ebbo seemed to shrink together with a gesture perceived by her uncle.
"It is my young lord there who would not forgive the freedom," he said, good-humouredly, though gravely.
"Not so," Ebbo forced himself to say; "not so, if it makes my mother happy."
He held up his head rather as if he thought it a fool's paradise, but Master Gottfried answered: "The noble Freiherr is, from all I have heard, too good a son to grudge his mother's duteous love even to burgher kindred."
There was something in the old man's frank, dignified tone of grave reproof that at once impressed Ebbo with a sense of the true superiority of that wise and venerable old age to his own petulant baronial self-assertion. He had both head and heart to feel the burgher's victory, and with a deep blush, though not without dignity, he answered, "Truly, sir, my mother has ever taught us to look up to you as her kindest and best--"
He was going to say "friend," but a look into the grand benignity of the countenance completed the conquest, and he turned it into "father." Friedel at the same instant bent his knee, exclaiming, "It is true what Ebbo says! We have both longed for this day. Bless us, honoured uncle, as you have blessed my mother."
For in truth there was in the soul of the boy, who had never had any but women to look up to, a strange yearning towards reverence, which was called into action with inexpressible force by the very aspect and tone of such a sage elder and counsellor as Master Gottfried Sorel, and he took advantage of the first opening permitted by his
In truth, though her life had been mournful and oppressed, it had not been such as to age her early. It had been all submission, without wear and tear of mind, and too simple in its trials for care and moiling; so the fresh, lily-like sweetness of her maiden bloom was almost intact, and, much as she had undergone, her once frail health had been so braced by the mountain breezes, that, though delicacy remained, sickliness was gone from her appearance. There was still the exquisite purity and tender modesty of expression, but with greater sweetness in the pensive brown eyes.
"Ah, little one!" said her uncle, after duly contemplating her; "the change is all for the better! Thou art grown a wondrously fair dame. There will scarce be a lovelier in the Kaiserly train."
Ebbo almost pardoned his great-uncle for being his great-uncle.
"When she is arrayed as becomes the Frau Freiherrinn," said the housewife aunt, looking with concern at the coarse texture of her black sleeve. "I long to see our own lady ruffle it in her new gear. I am glad that the lofty pointed cap has passed out; the coif becomes my child far better, and I see our tastes still accord as to fashion."
"Fashion scarce came above the Debateable Ford," said Christina, smiling. "I fear my boys look as if they came out of the Weltgeschichte, for I could only shape their garments after my remembrance of the gallants of eighteen years ago."
"Their garments are your own shaping!" exclaimed the aunt, now in an accent of real, not conventional respect.
"Spinning and weaving, shaping and sewing," said Friedel, coming near to let the housewife examine the texture.
"Close woven, even threaded, smooth tinted! Ah, Stina, thou didst learn something! Thou wert not quite spoilt by the housefather's books and carvings."
"I cannot tell whose teachings have served me best, or been the most precious to me," said Christina, with clasped hands, looking from one to another with earnest love.
"Thou art a good child. Ah! little one, forgive me; you look so like our child that I cannot bear in mind that you are the Frau Freiherrinn."
"Nay, I should deem myself in disgrace with you, did you keep me at a distance, and not THOU me, as your little Stina," she fondly answered, half regretting her fond eager movement, as Ebbo seemed to shrink together with a gesture perceived by her uncle.
"It is my young lord there who would not forgive the freedom," he said, good-humouredly, though gravely.
"Not so," Ebbo forced himself to say; "not so, if it makes my mother happy."
He held up his head rather as if he thought it a fool's paradise, but Master Gottfried answered: "The noble Freiherr is, from all I have heard, too good a son to grudge his mother's duteous love even to burgher kindred."
There was something in the old man's frank, dignified tone of grave reproof that at once impressed Ebbo with a sense of the true superiority of that wise and venerable old age to his own petulant baronial self-assertion. He had both head and heart to feel the burgher's victory, and with a deep blush, though not without dignity, he answered, "Truly, sir, my mother has ever taught us to look up to you as her kindest and best--"
He was going to say "friend," but a look into the grand benignity of the countenance completed the conquest, and he turned it into "father." Friedel at the same instant bent his knee, exclaiming, "It is true what Ebbo says! We have both longed for this day. Bless us, honoured uncle, as you have blessed my mother."
For in truth there was in the soul of the boy, who had never had any but women to look up to, a strange yearning towards reverence, which was called into action with inexpressible force by the very aspect and tone of such a sage elder and counsellor as Master Gottfried Sorel, and he took advantage of the first opening permitted by his