“Never,” answered Greta, quickly. “Oh, if thou only knowest how happy I am, that at last I may be old! And, also, it would be impossible on account of our children and grandchildren. No, gracious forest-sprite, a thousand thanks for your good deed, but we remain as we are. Is it not so, Hans?”
“Yes,” nodded Hans, “we remain old. If thou couldst but know, Greta, how well your gray hair becomes you.”
“As you will,” said the wood-sprite, a little vexed. “There is no ceremony here.” So speaking, she went into the house and locked the door behind her.
But the old couple kissed each other anew. Then they stepped homeward, arm in arm, through the forest, and the midsummer sun shed a golden light upon their gray heads.
GOOD BLOOD
BY ERNST VON WILDENBRUCH
“Few stories of cadet or student life,” says General Charles King, “have impressed me as did ‘Das Edle Blut.’”
The author of “Good Blood” was born at Beirut, Syria, in 1845, his father having been Prussian Consul-General there. He entered the Prussian cadet corps and the Potsdam preparatory school, and after serving as officer during two wars, he resigned from the army in 1865, and studied law, became Referendar at the Frankfort-on-Oder Court of Appeals, Judge at Berlin, member of the Foreign Office of the German Empire, and Privy Councilor.
With his “heroic songs” he was the first to give epic treatment to the war with France. Through his series of historical plays for the people, he became enormously popular.