widely in the pool. Great had been the labours of that stream, and great and agreeable the changes it had wrought. It had cut through dykes of stubborn rock, and now, like a blowing dolphin, spouted through the orifice; along all its humble coasts, it had undermined and rafted-down the goodlier timber of the forest; and on these rough clearings it now set and tended primrose gardens, and planted woods of willow, and made a favourite of the silver birch. Through all these friendly features the path, its human acolyte, conducted our two wanderers downward, -- Otto before, still pausing at the more difficult passages to lend assistance; the Princess following. From time to time, when he turned to help her, her face would lighten upon his -- her eyes, half desperately, woo him. He saw, but dared not understand. `She does not love me,' he told himself, with magnanimity. `This is remorse or gratitude; I were no gentleman, no, nor yet a man, if I presumed upon these pitiful concessions.'

Some way down the glen, the stream, already grown to a good bulk of water, was rudely dammed across, and about a third of it abducted in a wooden trough. Gaily the pure water, air's first cousin, fleeted along the rude aqueduct, whose sides and floor it had made green with grasses. The path, bearing it close company, threaded a wilderness of briar and wild-rose. And presently, a little in front, the brown top of a mill and the tall mill-wheel, spraying diamonds, arose in the narrows of the glen; at the same time the snoring music of the saws broke the silence.

The miller, hearing steps, came forth to his door, and both he and Otto started.

`Good-morning, miller,' said the Prince. `You were right, it seems, and I was wrong. I give you the news, and bid you to Mittwalden. My throne has fallen -- great was the fall of it! -- and your good friends of the Phoenix bear the rule.'

The red-faced miller looked supreme astonishment. `And your Highness?' he gasped.

`My Highness is running away,' replied Otto, `straight for the frontier.'

`Leaving Grünewald?' cried the man. `Your father's son? It's not to be permitted!'

`Do you arrest us, friend?' asked Otto, smiling.

`Arrest you? I?' exclaimed the man. `For what does your Highness take me? Why, sir, I make sure there is not a man in Grünewald would lay hands upon you.'

`O, many, many,' said the Prince; `but from you, who were bold with me in my greatness, I should even look for aid in my distress.'

The miller became the colour of beetroot. `You may say so indeed,' said he. `And meanwhile, will you and your lady step into my house.'

`We have not time for that,' replied the Prince; `but if you would oblige us with a cup of wine without here, you will give a pleasure and a service, both in one.'

The miller once more coloured to the nape. He hastened to bring forth wine in a pitcher and three bright crystal tumblers. `Your Highness must not suppose,' he said, as he filled them, `that I am an habitual drinker. The time when I had the misfortune to encounter you, I was a trifle overtaken, I allow; but a more sober man than I am in my ordinary, I do not know where you are to look for; and even this glass that I drink to you (and to the lady) is quite an unusual recreation.'

The wine was drunk with due rustic courtesies; and then, refusing further hospitality, Otto and Seraphina once more proceeded to descend the glen, which now began to open and to be invaded by the taller trees.

`I owed that man a reparation,' said the Prince; `for when we met I was in the wrong and put a sore affront upon him. I judge by myself, perhaps; but I begin to think that no one is the better for a humiliation.'