the cares of business to his apprentice, whose name was Nature.
Bettina, as became the daughter of a gardener, was a kind of rose:
Wilhelm, the baker's young man, would have thrown himself into the
furnace for her. But there came along Fritz, the dyer, who had been
in France and who wore gloves. She continued a while to promenade with
Wilhelm under the chestnut trees which surround the fortifications
of Ettlingen, but one night she suddenly withdrew her hand: 'You had
better find a nicer girl than I am: I do not feel that I could make
you happy.' Wilhelm disappeared from the country. His departure, which
was the talk of Ettlingen, caused Bettina more remorse than regret.
For six months she shut herself up: then, hearing nothing of her
lover, she reappeared shyly on the promenade, divested of rings,
ear-drops and ornaments. The beautiful Fritz, in his loveliest gloves,
intercepted her beneath the chestnuts, and, armed with her father's
consent, proposed himself for her _verlobter_.

"'Not yet,' she answered: 'wait till I wear my flowers again.'

"In Germany, as in Switzerland and Italy, natural flowers are
indispensable to a young girl's toilet. To appear at an assembly
without a blooming tuft at the corsage or in the hair is to indicate
that the family is in mourning, the mother sick or the lover
conscripted.

[Illustration: THE LEGAL PROFESSION AND PROFESSION OF FRIENDSHIP.]

"With an exquisite natural sense, Bettina, daughter of a gardener,
would never wear any flowers but wild ones. About this time there was
a grand fair at Durlach: almost all Ettlingen went there, and Bettina
too, but as spectatress only, and without her flowers.