I.

stood only with difficulty by the inhabitants of the districts where the Jomaïtic language (commonly called Jmond) is spoken, that is to say in the palatinate of Samogitia. This language is more akin to Sanscrit even than the high Lithuanian. My remark, notwithstanding the furious criticisms it drew forth from a certain professor well known at the university of Dorpat, enlightened the honourable members. of the Council of the Biblical Society, and they unhesitatingly made me the flattering proposal that I should direct and superintend the translation of the gospel of St. Matthew into Samogitian. was then too much occupied with my studies of trans-Uralian languages to take up a larger work which would have embraced the four gospels. Postponing, accordingly, my marriage with Mlle. Gertrude Weber, I set off for Kowno, in order to collect all the linguistical monuments I could procure, whether printed or written, in the Jmond language, without neglecting, be it understood, the popular poems, dainos, and tales and legends, pasakos, which would furnish me with materials for a Jomaïtic vocabulary, a work which would necessarily precede that of the translation.

I had been given a letter of introduction to the young Count Michel Szémioth, whose father I

was assured had owned the famous Catechismus Samogiticus of Father Lawicki, a work so rare that its existence even had been disputed, notably by the Dorpat professor to whom I have already alluded. In his library, according to my information, an old collection of dainos was to be found, as well as poetry written in the ancient Prussian language. Having written to Count Szémioth to lay before him the object of my visit, I received a most kind invitation to spend all the time necessary for my researches at his residence, Medintiltas. He concluded his letter by informing me in the most graceful manner that he prided himself upon speaking Jmond almost as well as his peasants, and that he would be happy to join his efforts to mine in an enterprise that he characterized as grand and interesting. some others among the wealthiest Lithuanian proprietors, he was a member of the Evangelical Church, of which I have the honour to be a minister. I was warned that I should find him of a somewhat eccentric character, but very hospitable, with literary and scientific tastes, and particularly friendly to those who were of the same bent. I accordingly set out for Medintiltas.

Like

Upon the castle steps I was received by the Count's steward, who led the way at once to a room prepared for me.

"My lord the Count," he said, "is much distressed, sir, that he cannot join you at dinner to-day. He has a bad headache-an ailment to which he is unfortunately rather subject. If you do not wish to have something sent up to your own room, you will dine with Dr. Froeber, my lady the Countess's medical attendant. Dinner will be ready in an hour, and evening dress is not in the least necessary. If you have any orders to give, sir,

there is the bell;" and he withdrew, making me a low bow.

The room was large, well furnished, and ornamented with mirrors and gilding. From one side of it there was a view of the garden or park, while the other looked out upon the court-yard. Notwithstanding the intimation as to there being no necessity for evening dress, I thought it proper to get my black coat out of my trunk. I was in my shirt-sleeves and busy unpacking my things, when the noise of wheels drew me to the window facing the yard. A handsome carriage had just driven in. Its occupants were a lady in black, a man, and a woman dressed like the Lithuanian peasants, but so tall and strongly built, that I was tempted at first sight to take her for a man in disguise. She got out first; two other women, of equally robust make, were also standing on the steps. The man leaned forward in the direction of the lady in black, and, to my great surprise, unbuckled a large leathern belt which had secured her to her place in the carriage. I observed that this lady had long white hair which was much dishevelled, and her dilated eyes seemed inanimate; in fact her face might have been that of a wax-figure. After having unloosed her, her companion spoke to her in a low voice, and very respectfully, but she seemed to pay no attention to him. Then he turned towards the attendants and made them a slight sign with his head, whereupon the three women immediately seized the lady in black, and in spite of her efforts to cling to the carriage carried her off as if she were a feather into the interior of the castle. Several servants of the establishment were spectators of this scene, and seemed to think it a very ordinary performance. The man who had directed the operation looked at his watch and asked if dinner were nearly ready.

"It will be ready in a quarter of an hour, doctor," some one replied, and I had no difficulty in guessing that I saw before me Doctor Froeber, and that the lady in black was the Countess. From her age I gathered she was the mother of Count Szémioth, and the precautions taken with her showed clearly enough that her reason was impaired.

A few moments later the doctor himself appeared in my room. "The Count is ill," he said, " and I am obliged to introduce myself to you, Professor. I am Doctor Froeber, quite at your service, and very much gratified at making the acquaintance of a learned gentleman whose worth is well known to all the readers of the "Scientific and Literary Journal" of Koenigsberg. Are you ready for dinner?"

I made the best reply I could to all this civility, and added that if it were time, I was quite ready to follow him to the dining-room.

As soon as we entered the apartment, according to the northern custom, the butler handed us a silver salver laden with liqueurs and some highly seasoned trifles calculated to excite appetite.

"As a doctor, Professor," said the medical man, "allow me to recommend you a glass of this starka-real Cognac, forty years in cask. It is the king of liqueurs. Have a Drontheim anchovy toothere is nothing better for opening and preparing the digestive tube, the most important organ of the body. . . . And now let us sit down. Why shouldn't we talk German, by the way? You come from Koenigsberg, I from Memel, but I studied at Jéna. We shall be less constrained if we do so, for the servants only understand Polish and Russian."

For a while we ate in silence, but after my first glass of Madeira I asked Doctor Froeber if the Count often suffered from the indisposi

tion that deprived us of his company.

"Yes-and No," replied the doctor; "it depends entirely upon the expeditions he makes." "How so?"

"Well, if he goes in the direction of Rossiena, for instance, he comes back with a headache, and in a bad humour."

"I have been to Rossiena without any such bad results."

"That, Professor, is because you are not in love," replied the doctor, laughing; but I sighed, thinking of Mlle. Gertrude Weber.

"Then the Count's betrothed lives in the direction of Rossiena?" I remarked.

"Yes, in the neighbourhood; but as to her being betrothed to him, I'm not so sure about it. She is a regular flirt, and I expect she'll make him as mad as his mother." "Ab, yes, I fancy the Countess is ill."

"She's mad, my dear sir-stark staring mad: and I am a greater lunatic still to be here."

"Let us hope your care will restore her to health."

The doctor shook his head slowly while he examined carefully the colour of a glass of Bordeaux that he held in his hand. "I was surgeon-major in the the Kalonga regiment, Professor. At Sebastopol we were busy from morning till night cutting off arms and legs; to say nothing of shells that swarmed in upon us like flies about a skinned horse. Well, badly housed, badly fed, as I was then, I was not so bored as I am here, where I eat and drink of the best, live like a prince, and am paid like a court physician. Ah, liberty is the thing, but with that fury of a woman, you can imagine I have never a moment to myself."

"Has she been long under your care?"

"Not two years, but she has

been out of her mind twenty-seven years at the very least, since before the birth of the Count. Did you never hear the story at Rossiena or Koono? No! well listen then, for the case is one upon which I intend to write some day in the medical journal of St. Petersburg. She went mad from fright."

"From fright! How could that be ?"

"From a fright she got. She is a Keystut-ob, that is a house where such a thing as a mésalliance is not known. We are descendants of Gedymin, we are, no less. Well, Professor, two or three days after her marriage, which took place in this very castle (your good health!), the Count, this man's father, went out hunting. Our Lithuanian ladies, as you know, are Amazons, so the Countess accompanied him. She remained in the rear of the party, or went on ahead, I'm not sure which, when all of a sudden the Count saw her little Cossack, a child of twelve or fourteen years old, riding towards him at full speed.

"Master!' he screamed, 'a bear is carrying off my mistress !'

"Where?' cried the Count.
"There,' replied the little Cos-

full of chivalrous courage, and wished to attack the bear, singlehanded, and armed with his hunting knife only. My good sir, a Lithuanian bear does not allow himself to be stabbed like a stag. By good luck the Count's gun-carrier, a disreputable fellow, and so drunk on this particular day that he couldn't tell a rabbit from a roebuck, fired at the bear from more than a hundred yards' distance, without caring whether the ball would hit the beast or the woman." "And he killed the bear?"

"Dead. There is no one like a drunkard for such a shot as that. There are also such things as bullets destined to hit their mark, Professor; and we have sorcerers in this country who will sell them at a reasonable price. Well, the Countess was somewhat lacerated, and her leg was broken, and I need scarcely add that she was unconscious. They carried her off and she came to, but her reason was gone. In time they took her to St. Petersburg, and there was a grand consultation of doctors, whose breasts glittered with orders and decorations. They gave it as their opinion that the birth of her child would prove a favourable crisis with the Countess. 'Give her good country air, plenty of whey, and codeine,' they said, after which they each received a hundred roubles. Some months later a fine boy was born-but what about the favourable crisis? Favourable indeed! there was simply an increase of the malady. The Count showed her the child-as you know, the effects of that treatment are always certain-in novels.

"Kill it! kill the beast!' she screamed, and would have strangled it had she been able. Since then she has had alternations of stupid insanity and raging frenzy. She has also a decided suicidal tendency, and we are obliged to pinion her

when we take her out It takes three strong women-servants to hold her. Nevertheless, Professor, I have one way of quieting her, and please to make a note of it. When I have used up all my Latin without making her obey me, I threaten to cut off her hair; long ago, I fancy, it was splendid. Vanity that is the last human feeling left her. Is it not queer?" "Doctor," said a servant, entering the room at this moment," Jdanord says the Countess won't eat anything."

THE night was hot, and I had left the window facing the park open. When my letter was written, finding I was not inclined to sleep, I set to work at the Lithuanian irregular verbs, going over them and seeking in Sanscrit the causes of their irregularities. While I was absorbed in this work, a tree close to my window was violently shaken, I could hear the crackling of dead branches, and it seemed to me as if some heavy animal were trying to climb up it. With my mind still full of the doctor's bear stories, I got up, not without alarm, and at the distance of only a few feet from my window, I saw the head of a human being in the full light of my lamp. The apparition only lasted a few seconds, but the strange gleaming of the eyes that met mine struck me more than I can say. Involuntarily I started back, but immediately afterwards I ran to the

window, and, in angry tones, asked the intruder what he wanted. He, however, climbed down at full speed, and seizing a big branch in his hands, swung himself to the ground, and disappeared forthwith. I rang my bell, and a servant answered the summons. I told him all that had happened.

"You must have been mistaken, sir," he said.

"I am quite positive about the matter," I replied; "and I am afraid there is a thief in the park." "Impossible, sir!"

"Then it was some one in the house."

The man opened his eyes and stared at me, but made no reply. At last he asked me had I any orders to give him. I told him to close the window, and then I went to bed.

I slept well, without dreaming of bears or robbers; and, in the morning, just as I was finishing my dressing, there came a knock at my door. I opened it, and found myself face to face with a tall handsome young man in a Bokhara dressing-gown, and with a Turkish pipe in his hand.

"I have come to apologize to you for my reception of such a distinguished guest," he said;

am Count Szémioth."

I hastened to reply that, on the contrary, I had to thank him humbly for his splendid hospitality; and I also asked whether his headache was gone.

"Nearly," he replied. "It is gone till next time," he added, sadly. "I hope you are pretty comfortable here. Please to remember you are among barbarians. One must not be exacting in Samogitia."

I assured him I could not be better off, but all the time I was talking to him, I could not help looking at him with a curiosity that even myself I felt to be imperti