Everything came upon him at once, —
thoughts for which he was, or was not ac-
countable, — God's providence, his own
weakness and frivplity, his sisters' desolate
condition and his own inability to help
them, more than all, his father's thoughtful-
ness and kindness, which were never want-
ing in good or evil times. He was quite
beside himself. His nature was one to be
easily excited even by less serious causes
than the present. He wept and mourned
and lamented, and kept asking how this
and that had happened, and, when he heard
from Franz that the last words of his
father had been spoken to Habermaim, he
took the old Inspector aside and questioned
him, and the latter made a clean breast
of it, and told him that his father's last
earthly care had been about his future, and
how he and his sisters might get along by
a prudent management of the estate.
Ah, yes, that should be done 1 Axel
swore it to himself, under the blue heavens,
as he walked alone through the garden ; he
would turn the shillings into dollars, he
would retire from the world and from his
comrades. He could do it easily ; but he
would not resign from the army immedi-
ately, and take up the study of farming, a?
Habermann advised; he was too old for
that, and it did not suit his position a^ an
officer, and there was really no necessity.
When he came by and by to live on the
estate, he should learn about it, naturally ;
meantime he would live sparingly, pay up
his debts, and study agricultural books, as
his father desired. So a man deceives him-
self, even in the holiest and most earnest
hours.
