too, how cold and trembling the little hand had
been as it lay in mine when the time came to
say farewell and to leave Rothesgaard.

But what could I do? Continental etiquette
is very rigid in matters matrimonial, and Baron
Dyring and his kind wife would have had
a right to be angry with me had I profited
by their hospitality to steal the affections of
their daughter. They had made a friend of me,
the solitary young Englishman, had cherished
me in sickness, and had never by word or deed
betrayed the slightest feeling of any social
inequality between us. And yet such inequality
existed. The Dyrings, impoverished as they
were, were of a proud old race, and it was hardly
probable that an English engineer, bred in
quiet Essex parsonage, and without wealth or
connexion to recommend him, would be thought
a fitting suitor for the long-descended Christina
Dyring.

I had got so far in my meditations when there
was a tap at the door, and the baron himself came
in. He was in Copenhagen for a day or so, and
had come, he said, to have a peep at me before
leaving. That I was glad to see him, and to
hear the latest news from Rothesgaard, I need
not say. All well? Certainly, certainly! Christina
a little pale and subdued in manner, her
father thought, but madame attributed that
to the unhealthy season, the fall of the leaf. I
could not but think that the baron himself was
looking ill. He was haggard, as if with want
of sleep, and his strong right hand was hot and
feverish. But he protested that he was quite
well, quite well. He had been restless of late,
he said, flitting from town to town, ransacking
libraries and archives for information relative to
the drainage of meres and marshes. He said,
with a forced laugh, that I should think him
very foolish, but that that distich, that doggrel
prophecy I had discovered, and which tallied
with half-forgotten legends, haunted him. He
had heard, when a child, much of the treasure
lost in the old inundation.

But what was my amazement when, after
much beating about the bush, the baron came
out with a serious proposal to drain the Agger
fiord, and produced a quantity of rough calculations
bearing on the subject! He was to
borrow money on mortgage, since he had no
pecuniary capital; the fiord was to be drained
on the "polder" principle, so successful in
Holland, and in the management of which I
had, as he was aware, some experience; to cap
all, I was to be head engineer, and reside at
Rothesgaard during the operations, with one-
fourth of the recovered treasure for my meed.

It was a great temptation, very great. To
go back to the castle, back to Christina!
But I drove the fiend, dishonesty, from me,
though it cost me a pang before I could
say, "My dear good friend, don't think me a
churl for saying no. As I'm an honest man,
I must say it for two reasons. In the first
place, those old treasures turn out myths,
nine times in ten, while the expenses would be
awful, and the probable result, ruin. I know
what you would say; I have just reclaimed
sixteen hundred acres from the sea. Yes, but
it was done by a wealthy company of British
capitalists, and, though we have beaten Neptune
for once, the costs will swallow up all profit
for ten years or more. And next, forgive my
bluntness, I love Mademoiselle Dyring, and I
should be base were I to try to win her love
in return, without your permission; yet——"
And here I broke down. The baron got very
red; walked to the window, and looked out
into the busy street, beating with his fingers
on the glass of the window-pane. After a
good while he turned round, and said, kindly,
that I had behaved most honourably, and that
he liked me better than ever. He went on to
add that Christina was but a child (girls are
always children in a parent's eyes), and that
there was plenty of time before her, ere she
troubled her little head about love and marriage.
As to me, I should myself be married long
before that day. And he gave my hand a squeeze
that I felt for an hour afterwards, and took leave
of me.

Long months afterwards, in the pleasant
spring weather, I got a letter from Madame
Dyring, ostensibly to beg that I would execute
certain commissions for her in the Friedrick-
street. However, the good mistress of Rothesgaard
was a poor diplomatist, and she soon
revealed her real purpose. I had not, it seemed,
been successful in dissuading the baron from
his rash project. His mind was so bent on
draining off the waters of the Agger fiord, and
regaining the treasure whose recovery would
restore the fallen fortunes of the family, that
he was on the high road to ruin. He had for
months, even through the inclement season,
been carrying on extensive and costly operations,
under the guidance of a very clever
American, a military man, a certain Colonel
Popplewell, of the United States service. This
gentleman, whom the baron had met at Kiel,
was a man of science, and a skilled engineer,
and he was superintendent of the works, and a
guest at the castle. The baron thought highly
of him, and followed his advice implicitly,
but the rest of the household had not taken
any peculiar fancy to him. Evidently the
baroness was alarmed as to the consequences
of the lavish expenditure going on, and she
begged, as a favour, that I would come down
for a week or two and give my opinion of the
state of affairs. "We shall all be glad to see
our English friend again!" said the
postscript.

I could not get leave of absence at once, but in
about three weeks after the receipt of madame's
letter, I crossed the threshold ot Rothesgaard.
The baron, looking ten years older than he
used to look, but still frank and hearty, came
into the hall to greet me. The family, he said,
would be glad to have me back among them,
and he was sure that I, on my part, would be
charmed with Colonel Popplewell. He, the
baron, had not mentioned my name or profession,
or even my nationality, to the colonel; but