Page:Stories Translated from the German.djvu/220

 The professor replied stammering, "the characters are so similar, the letters run into one another so freely and boldly, and yet so indistinctly, that—I beg pardon"

He was silent, and withdrew with his friends, quite ashamed. When he had left the room, the company broke out into an irrepressible and unceasing laughter. At length the Count said:

"I must beg of you, my ladies and gentlemen, if it be only possible, not to take further notice of this singular affair; it will be as well if we can all forget the circumstance, in order not to wound the feelings of this otherwise really estimable man."'

"He can bear it," said a young lady, "the week will pass over and then it will be forgotten, whether we suppress or relate the anecdote."

The female traveller added: "If I were to correct his manner of reading in a new edition of my notes, should I be very much in the wrong?"

She did not see him again, and shortly afterwards returned with her sister to her own country.

Whether she may also have reckoned this circumstance as one of those, through which she has learnt to know our Germany?