One day some visitors had been at Uncle Ulrich's castle. They had complimented me on my golden hair, which Heinz always says is the colour of the princess' in the fairy tale. I went out at Aunt Chriemhild's desire, feeling half shy and half flattered, to play with my cousins in the forest. As I was sitting hidden among the trees, twining wreaths from the forget-me-nots my cousins were gathering by the stream below, these ladies passed again. I heard one of them say,—
"Yes, she is a well-mannered little thing for a schoolmaster's daughter."
"I cannot think whence a burgher maiden—the Cottas are all burghers, are they not—should inherit those little white hands and those delicate features," said the other.
"Poor, too, doubtless, as they must be!" was the reply, "one would think she had never had to work about the house, as no doubt she must."
"Who was her grandfather?"
"Only a printer at Wittemberg!"
"Only a schoolmaster!" and "only a printer!"
My whole heart rose against the scornful words. Was this what people meant by paying compliments? Was this the estimate my father was held in in the world—he, the noblest man in it, who was fit to be the Elector or the Emperor? A bitter feeling came over me, which I thought was affection and an aggrieved sense of justice. But love is scarcely so bitter, or justice so fiery.
I did not tell any one, nor did I shed a tear, but went on weaving my forget-me-not wreaths, and forswore the wicked and hollow world. Had I not promised to do so long since, through my godsponsers, at my baptism? Now, I thought, I was learning what all that meant.
At Aunt Elsè's, however, another experience awaited me. There was to be a fair, and we were all to go in our best holiday dresses. My cousins had rich Oriental jewels on their bodices; and although, as burgher maidens, they might not, like my cousins at the castle, wear velvets, they had jackets and dresses of the stiffest, richest silks, which Uncle Reichenbach had sent for from Italy and the East.