To which speech Mr. Zacharias made reply: 

“Dame Christine, you possess a treasure!  Mademoiselle Charlotte merits all the good I have said of her.”

Then Master Yeri, raising his glass, cried out:  “Let us drink to the health of our good and venerated Judge Zacharias Seiler!”

The toast was drunk with a will.

Just then the clock, in its hoarse voice, struck the hour of eleven.  Out of doors there was the great silence of the forest, the grasshopper’s last cry, the vague murmur of the river.  As the hour sounded, they rose, preparatory to retiring.  How fresh and agile he felt!  With what ardor, had he dared, would he not have pressed a kiss upon Charlotte’s little hand!  Oh, but he must not think of that now!  Later on, perhaps!

“Come, Master Yeri,” he said, “it is bedtime.  Good-night, and many thanks for your hospitality.”

“At what hour do you wish to rise, Monsieur?” asked Christine.

“Oh!” he replied gazing at Charlotte, “I am an early bird.  I do not feel my age, though perhaps you might not think so.  I rise at five o’clock.”

“Like me, Monsieur Seiler,” cried the Head Forester.  I rise before daybreak; but I must confess it is tiresome all the same—­we are no longer young.  Ha!  Ha!”

“Bah!  I have never had anything ail me, Master Forester; I have never been more vigorous or more nimble.”

And suiting his actions to his words, he ran briskly up the steep steps of the staircase.  Really Mr. Zacharias was no more than twenty; but his twenty years lasted about twenty minutes, and once nestled in the large canopied bed, with the covers drawn up to his chin and his handkerchief tied around his head, in lieu of a nightcap, he said to himself: 

“Sleep Zacharias!  Sleep!  You have great need of rest; you are very tired.”

And the good man slept until nine o’clock.  The forester returning from his rounds, uneasy at his non-appearance, went up to his room and wished him good morning.  Then seeing the sun high in the heavens, hearing the birds warbling in the foliage, the Judge, ashamed of his boastfulness of the previous night, arose, alleging as an excuse for his prolonged slumbers, the fatigue of fishing and the length of the supper of the evening before.

“Ah, Monsieur Seiler,” said the forester, “it is perfectly natural; I would love dearly myself to sleep in the mornings, but I must always be on the go.  What I want is a son-in-law, a strong youth to replace me; I would voluntarily give him my gun and my hunting pouch.”

Zacharias could not restrain a feeling of great uneasiness at these words.  Being dressed, he descended in silence.  Christine was waiting with his breakfast; Charlotte had gone to the hay field.

The breakfast was short, and Mr. Seiler having thanked these good people for their hospitality, turned his face toward Stantz; he became pensive, as he thought of the worry to which Mademoiselle Therese had been subjected; yet he was not able to tear his hopes from his heart, nor the thousand charming illusions, which came to him like a latecomer in a nest of warblers.