I want to be talking,
But yet it won't gee?
'No, no,' and 'Yes, yes,'
And 'I s'pose,' and 'In course,'
Is often the whole of our loving discourse."
"Come, wake up!" said she, shaking the teacher's arm; "stir your stumps. 'I lost my stocking at Lauterbach:'" and she danced around the room, dragging him after her.
Thaddie now came in, and general hilarity with him. In a grand council the politic resolve was taken that, if the Constantine question should be still unadjusted when harvest-home came on, the teacher was to attend Agnes at the festival, while Thaddie was to figure as the nominal escort of Hedwig.
After a long conversation in anticipation of what the future was expected to bring forth, Agnes called upon the teacher to reward her intervention by telling a story. The others joined their requests to hers. The teacher offered to go home to get a book; but this was not permitted: he had nothing to do but begin at once.
Collecting his thoughts with an effort, he launched into the story of the Beautiful Magelona. At first he spoke almost without intonation, hardly knowing what he said, and thinking more of Hedwig's hand, which rested in his, than of the tale. As the interest of the narrative increased, he closed his eyes, and resigned his imagination entirely to the world of wonders and witchery he was describing. His hearers hung upon his words with beaming eyes, and Hedwig's heart bounded within her.
When he had finished, Agnes took his head between her hands and shook it, saying, "He is a fine fellow, every inch of him. May I kiss him now, Hedwig?"