inquietude and jealousy. Her husband was for her, above all, a friend. Neither her heart nor her passions seemed to require more from him. So that all was for the best, and the Countess Barineff, justly proud of her work, was feeling the satisfaction its contemplation gave her when one day the good fellow Podoi reminded her of the promise she had made to accept his name after her daughter's marriage.

"Do you, then, still think of making me your wife?" asked Lise's mother.

"More than ever," replied the general, in a feeling voice. "Come, now, have not I, too, worked for your daughter's happiness, and do not I deserve a reward? What is the only one I covet? Reflect, my dear Madeleine; I have loved you for fifteen years."

"True; and that has aged us both, eh?"

"You are still young and beautiful. As for me, you will give me back my youth."

The general had spoken those words with so dandified an air that the countess could not help smiling in offering him her hand.

"You give it me?" exclaimed Podoi, seizing the hand and covering it with kisses.

"I can not do otherwise," said Madeleine. "Will not people laugh at us a little, though? I shall soon be a grandmother."

"Well, well, we will begin by having grandchildren, that is all."

And the general straightened himself proudly, while the ex-actress tried to summon a faint blush at this freedom of speech in her old lover.

Within a fortnight, very quietly, the marriage of the Countess Barineff and General Podoi was celebrated at the Church of Isaac. The general, in truth, seemed younger than he was by the fifteen years of his constancy and devotion.

The same day, by a strange coincidence, Dumesnil appeared anew in the character of Georges Dandin at the Odéon.

CHAPTER III.
AT PAMPELN.

Toward the end of May, after a most brilliant winter season, all the society of St. Petersburg made ready for its departure. The sledges were put away in the coach-houses, the theaters were closed, and very soon all that were not kept back by their duties or business began their flight.

Some went to Yalta, to be at the sea-side with the court, which goes every year for the summer to the Palace of Livadia; others to the Caucasus, to hunt the lynx and the bear. Many prepared to refill their places at Paris and the watering-places of north-eastern France, in the charming Russian colony which is so truly French in its elegance and tastes.

The moment, then, was come for the Prince Olsdorf, like other great landed proprietors, to visit his estates. He had given his orders at Pampeln some time back. Moreover, as we have said, he had been thither in person to see that all was ready for the reception, not only of his wife, but also of General Podoi, his wife, and the many guests invited to pass part of the summer in Courland.

Somewhat fatigued by balls and receptions, Lise Olsdorf was not less wishful than her husband to quit the city, so that on the appointed day she did not keep the post-chaise waiting that was to take them to Pampeln.

At the time of which we are writing, in 1860, the railway that now joins St. Petersburg and Konigsberg did not exist. The distance between the prince's town house and his country place at Pampeln was not less than a hundred leagues.

All the household he took with him to Courland where his valet, a faithful servant who, so to speak, had seen his master born; his cook, formerly the head cook at the French Embassy, and two women servants for the princess. One of them was a French woman. General Podoi had transferred her services to his daughter when Lise married, being assured thus of always knowing what might be passing in the young people's household when he himself would be away from it.

The servants followed their master and mistress in a big coach, which carried the necessary provisions as well, for no dependence was to be placed on the hotel accommodation in the towns they had to pass through. In most of them the only thing that could be found was the "samovar," ready for the brewing of tea.

After a three days' journey the prince and his people reached the end of their journey.

It was dark when they arrived. All that the princess could make out of the château was its monumental appearance, but next day she had to confess that all that had been told her of Pampeln was short of the truth.

Built in the reign of the Empress Anne on a hill which overlooks the Wandau River, the residence of the Olsdorfs shows signs of the eclecticism which influenced Russian architecture in the eighteenth century. After having been Grecian in style, and then Italian, it did not take a truly national character until the time of the Czar Nicholas. Though, regarded as a building, the massive and heavy-looking château offered nothing remarkable to the view in its colossal dimensions, the Pampeln estate was, nevertheless, the most important in the neighborhood, from its extent, the richness of the soil, and the immensity of its forests.

A true gentleman farmer, as his father had been before him, Prince Pierre overlooked everything himself, sometimes being on horseback at day-break to visit the most distant parts of his property. His care was not wholly for the improvement of the land; as we have said before, he was ever anxious for the well-being of his tenants.

The inside of the château was luxuriously and comfortably furnished.

The wood-work, in cedar, of the great banqueting halls, in the style of Henry II., had been carved by the most skilled Flemish workmen. The fencing-room, the large Gothic windows of which looked on to the park, contained a curious collection of arms of all periods, from the heavy, damasked weapons of the forefathers of the house to the modern musket; while the chapel, whose service was performed by a pope who lived at the château the year round, was a marvel of Byzantine art.

As for the suite of apartments of the princess, it was easy for her to think in entering it that she had not left St. Petersburg, so scrupulous had the prince been about the furnishing of it, and every petty detail.

Besides the principal bed and reception-rooms there were forty guest chambers. The stables could accommodate at least a hundred horses, and the kennels were filled by the handsomest packs of hounds in the country.

The servants' quarters were at the end of the great shady park full of old trees, where huntsmen, grooms, and all the servants, to the number of forty or fifty, who were not employed within the mansion, were lodged. Counting in the gamekeepers who looked after his ponds and woods, the master of Pampeln had thus at his orders quite a small army, disciplined, alert, and wholly devoted to him.

The pride can easily be imagined that Lise Olsdorf felt when a few days after her arrival her husband conducted her over this splendid domain of which she was to be the queen, and wished to be the benefactress.

A week later her mother and General Podoi arrived. About a score of guests soon followed them, and the hunting season began in full earnest.

The princess had scarcely the time to become used to this stirring pleasure. Being enceinte, she was obliged to remain comparatively quiet, which she did very willingly.

From this time forth she was satisfied to go with the hunters in her carriage, as far as the state of the roads would permit. Then with her mother and some women friends she would return to the château, where in the evening she did the honors of the house with a grace and ease that charmed the guests.

Toward the end of August, Lise, to the great joy of her husband, was delivered of a son, whom they named Alexander. The happy