indicated. Beruna married! Beruna dying!

He could

not understand it. No, it should not, it must not, be. He came to the place. A young woman was lying on the grass upon a mass of wraps, her face looked deadly pale, all but a hectic spot that burnt in her cheeks—and, yes, it was, it must be Beruna, for there were those wondrous, unmistakable eyes. Overcome with emotion, Fritz knelt by her side, unable to utter a word.

'Poor Fritz,' she murmured, 'is it thus that we meet again? I knew thou wouldst come, for thou hadst promised upon thy garnet. Ah! thou hast been true and constant, Fritz, as thy grandmother said garnets made their owners. I have not. Woe is me! If I could have written, Fritz, thou mightest have come and saved me from the woywod; but I could not write, and there was no one to do it for me; and they said he was the chief, and I must obey him. It was an honour to be his wife, they said. Do not weep Fritz; I should never have made a wife for a village man. It was in me, the gipsy blood, I felt the longing to wander. I could not have stayed. But I wanted to see thee once more. Friend of my childhood, thou art not angry with me?'

'Oh, Beruna!'

'How thou hast altered!' she said, scanning his face. 'Thou hast grown a handsome man; but thou art fair,

and different to our people-it could not have been. It would not have been right. And now I am dying.'

'Do not say so; thou wilt get better.'

'I never can.' She shook her head sadly. 'And I would not if I could.

He was not good to me; he is

Oh, my husband is cruel! Just

not good to my child. now he is away, and so I sent for thee. I want thee to take my little girl, and rear her for my sake. I do not want her to be one of us. She has my eyes.

love her for that, wilt thou not?'

Fritz bent over her weeping.

Thou wilt

'Her father will not take her from me?' he asked.

'No; it is with his consent I offer her. He does not wish for the child, he said, if I die. O Fritz, I shall quit life so happily if I can leave her with thee!'

'She shall be my own child,' he said, 'for the sake of her mother, who I once hoped would have been my wife. Alas, my life is ended too!'

'No; thou wilt marry yet, and forget me.'

'Never, Beruna, I promise it to thee; I promise it by my garnet, that thou hast worn these years, and thou knowest I keep my word. The child shall never have a step-mother.'

'Wilt thou see her?' Beruna made a sign for the child to be brought.

A young gipsy girl came with it, and placed it on the ground near its mother.

'And

'Is she not like me, Fritz?' said the mother. her name is Beruna too. See now, I give her thy garnet,' and she hung the little silken packet round the child's neck as she spoke. 'Now she is quite thy Beruna. Thy Beruna, young once more, and full of life and hope. And now leave me, dear friend. I am tired; this meeting has exhausted me. Come again to-morrow. Thou wilt leave me the child till then?'

'As long as thou wishest,' he sobbed.

Next morning when he came to seek Beruna he heard she had passed away quietly in the night; her last words had been his name and the child's.

With a broken heart the young man wended his way homeward.

'Father,' he said, as he re-entered their humble house, 'thy dreams to see me married can never come to pass. I loved once, but she whom I loved is on earth no longer. But I have brought thee home a child, another little Beruna. Thou wilt let her be thy grandchild, wilt thou not?'

'Ay, ay, my son; the little gipsy shall be my child. for thy sake, and for that of the poor wanderer whom thou once broughtest into this home.'

So Beruna stayed, and grew up with her new parents. After some years Hans Schmidt died. Fritz never married, and never will, though soon he will be quite

alone, as Beruna is about to leave him for a home of

her own.

Poor Fritz! I wonder if he ever regrets having met that little gipsy child when she had strayed from the Winterberg. I do not think he does. Her memory has been a bright spot in his life, and the little daughter she bequeathed him is his greatest joy.

Ο

February.

THE MAGIC GOBLET.

NCE upon a time there lived and reigned in a remote corner of the earth, a king named Jodo. He was a careless ruler, violent and capricious.

This was not because he was a bad man, but simply from his having given way to a passion that had completely won the mastery over him. It was the love of drink. When high feasts were held, invariably the king would partake of too much wine, and none dared bid him. desist; for he was the king, and woe to any man who should have ventured on such a liberty. He would have paid for it with life.

No wonder, therefore, that Jodo was capricious, his temper uncertain, and the justice administered by him of so unjust a nature that his nobles had long since given up bringing their differences before him. It seems almost strange that they allowed him to remain their ruler. - Probably this arose from the fact that the great mass of the people were ignorant of this failing; and his lords and attendants loved him for the