“But am I then really a wife?” asked Marietta; “and really Colin’s wife?”
Mother Manon nodded her head, and Marietta hung upon Colin’s arm. Thus they went to Colin’s farm, to his dwelling-house, through the garden.
“Look at the flowers, Marietta,” said Colin; “how carefully I cultivated them for your cup!”
Colin, who had not expected so pleasant an event, now prepared a wedding feast on the spur of the occasion. Two days was it continued. All Napoule was feasted. Who shall describe Colin’s extravagance?
The broken cup is preserved in the family to the present day as a memorial and sacred relic.
CASTLE NEIDECK
BY WILHELM HEINRICH VON RIEHL
Popular wherever German is read, Riehl ought to be more than a mere name among readers of English. In “Castle Neideck” there is the old-world atmosphere, the truth to nature, the originality, the seriousness of aim, lightened with a sly humor, that characterize all the writings of this most important author—including his histories of culture and morals. Of his culture novels in general the author himself says: “The problem of the historical novel is to display upon the background of social conditions freely modeled characters”—and of “Castle Neideck” in particular: “It is entirely imaginative, based on a study of the times.”
Riehl was born in 1823 at Biebrich, near Wiesbaden. His father was Castle Administrator of the place, and undoubtedly prototype of the old schoolmaster in Castle Neideck, as, by his son’s own account, Burg Reichenberg, near St. Goarshausen, was prototype of Castle Neideck itself. In 1880 Riehl was ennobled, and died in 1897.