That evening when he returned with his spraddling milch-nannies, he found a second stool placed alongside the first.  It was a happy augury; his attentions, then, were not altogether distasteful.  He seated himself gravely upon the stool, and when Katrina had done milking, she came and occupied the other.  He mechanically renewed his proposal.  Then the artless maid proceeded to recapitulate the obstacles to the union.  She was too young.  Her old father required all her care.  Her little brother would cry.  She was engaged to Max Manglewurzzle.  As each objection was stated and told off on the frauelein’s fingers, Deidrick nodded a resigned acquiescence, and at the finish was fast asleep.  Every evening after that Deidrick proposed in perfect good faith, the girl repeated her objections with equal candour, and they were received with somnolent approval.  Love-making is very agreeable, and by the usuage of long years it becomes a confirmed habit.  In less than a decade it became impossible for Katrina to enjoy her supper without the regular proposal, and Deidrick could not sleep of a night without the preliminary nap in the goat-yard to taper off his wakefulness.  Both would have been wretched had they retired to bed with a shade of misunderstanding between them.

And so the seasons went by.  The earth grayed and greened herself anew; the planets sailed their appointed courses; the old goats died, and their virtues were perpetuated in their offspring.  Max Manglewurzzle married the miller’s daughter; Katrina’s little brother, who would have cried at her wedding, did not cry any at his own; the aged Buttersprecht was long gathered to his fathers; and Katrina was herself well stricken in years.  And still at fall of night she defined her position to the sleeping lover who had sought her hand—­defined it in the self-same terms as upon that eventful eve.  The gossiping frauen began to whisper it would be a match; but it did not look like it as yet.  Slanderous tongues even asserted that it ought to have been a match long ago, but I don’t see how it could have been, without the girl’s consent.  The parish clerk began to hanker after his fee; but, lacking patience, he was unreasonable.

The whole countryside was now taking a deep interest in the affair.  The aged did not wish to die without beholding the consummation of the love they had seen bud in their youth; and the young did not wish to die at all.  But no one liked to interfere; it was feared that counsel to the woman would be rejected, and a thrashing to the man would be misunderstood.  At last the parson took heart of grace to make or mar the match.  Like a reckless gambler he staked his fee upon the cast of a die.  He went one day and removed the two stools—­now worn extremely thin—­to another corner of the milking-yard.