Page:The Works of J. W. von Goethe, Volume 5.djvu/97

Rh wish to see his pretty but one-coloured chair adorned with flowers and other ornaments. We showed ourselves accommodating. Colours, pencils, and other requisites were fetched from the tradesmen and apothecaries of the nearest towns. But, that we might not be wanting in a "Wakefield" mistake, we did not remark, until all had been most industriously and variously painted, that we had taken the wrong varnish, which would not dry: neither sunshine nor draught, neither fair nor wet weather, were of any avail. In the meanwhile we were obliged to make use of an old lumber-room, and nothing was left us but to rub out the ornaments with more assiduity than we had painted them. The unpleasantness of this work was still increased when the girls entreated us, for Heaven's sake, to proceed slowly and cautiously, for the sake of sparing the ground; which, however, after this operation, was not again to be restored to its former brilliancy.

By such little disagreeable contingencies which happened at intervals, we were, however, just as little interrupted in our cheerful life as Doctor Primrose and his amiable family; for many an unexpected pleasure befell both ourselves and our friends and neighbours. Weddings and christenings, the erection of a building, an inheritance, a prize in the lottery, were reciprocally announced and enjoyed. We shared all joy together, like a common property, and wished to heighten it by mind and love. It was not the first nor the last time that I found myself in families and social circles at the very moment of their highest bloom; and, if I may flatter myself that I contributed something toward the lustre of such epochs, I must, on the other hand, be reproached with the fact, that on this very account such times passed the more quickly and vanished the sooner.

But now our love was to undergo a singular trial.