APPRENTICESHIP
The little stable-boy, Michael Warden, hurried on to his sick father. It was late, and the journey would take him two hours. On his way he stopped to buy a few delicacies for his father with the coins the Duchess had given him. To his surprise, he found on arrival that his father was very much improved.
Before daybreak on the following morning, Michael hurried to the woods to find the nightingale's nest he knew so well. When he had last visited it, he had seen five brownish-green eggs there. But as he now peered into it he found, to his great astonishment, that the young birds had broken through their shells. With all haste he set out for the villa, several miles distant, to study the situation and decide where he could best fasten the nest. Arriving there, he found a suitable place, and then hurried back to the woods.
In the course of a few days, he succeeded in caging the parent birds. Placing the nest beside them in the cage, he carried it to the garden of the Duchess. He arrived there toward evening, and was hospitably received by the gardener, who had been fully acquainted with the idea.
Adjoining the villa was a large tract of land, well wooded, which was beautifully laid out with garden plots, pebbly, shaded paths, vine-covered bowers and rustic seats. In one corner of the garden there stood an odd little thatch-covered arbor, nestling between high rocks in the shadow of the tall trees. A brook which fell in foaming whiteness flowed past this little nook, clear as crystal, and made the stillness fascinating by its intermittent murmuring. This spot the Duchess loved well, and many hours of the day she spent here.
Scarcely a hundred feet distant, there stood a willow tree closely resembling the late home of the caged nightingales. The boy had chosen this tree and had prepared a place for the nest on a forked branch. He went there late one evening, as the moon was shining brightly, and placed the nest securely on this tree; then he gave the parent birds their freedom.
The next morning, the boy returned to the spot and hid himself in the thick shrubbery, to see whether the birds would feed their young, who were loudly crying for food. In a little while the parent birds returned and fed them.
"Now I have triumphed," said Michael; and he hurried to the villa to carry to Alfred the welcome news that in a few days the nightingales would be singing their song in his garden.
"Fine," said Alfred, "and then the money will be yours. Stay a few days longer and you can take it with you."
Two days later, the Duchess invited her friends to a lawn-party. The sun had risen in all its glory, the sky was unclouded, and the breezes were light and refreshing. The garden, with all its natural beauty, afforded a most entrancing spot for the feast, which proved perfect in every detail and was enjoyed in full measure.