path made for the goats across the lofty walls of bluish granite
between which foams the Rhine. Presently they descended by one of the

declivities of the gorge, at the foot of which is placed the little
town, seated coquettishly on the banks of the river and offering a

convenient port to mariners.
"Germany is a beautiful country!" cried one of the two young men, who

was named Prosper Magnan, at the moment when he caught sight of the
painted houses of Andernach, pressed together like eggs in a basket,

and separated only by trees, gardens, and flowers. Then he admired for
a moment the pointed roofs with their projecting eaves, the wooden

staircases, the galleries of a thousand peaceful dwellings, and the
vessels swaying to the waves in the port.

[At the moment when Monsieur Hermann uttered the name of Prosper
Magnan, my opposite neighbor seized the decanter, poured out a glass

of water, and emptied it at a draught. This movement having attracted
my attention, I thought I noticed a slight trembling of the hand and a

moisture on the brow of the capitalist.
"What is that man's name?" I asked my neighbor.

"Taillefer," she replied.
"Do you feel ill?" I said to him, observing that this strange

personage was turning pale.
"Not at all," he said with a politegesture of thanks. "I am

listening," he added, with a nod to the guests, who were all
simultaneously looking at him.

"I have forgotten," said Monsieur Hermann, "the name of the other
young man. But the confidences which Prosper Magnan subsequently made

to me enabled me to know that his companion was dark, rather thin, and
jovial. I will, if you please, call him Wilhelm, to give greater

clearness to the tale I am about to tell you."
The worthy German resumed his narrative after having, without the

smallest regard for romanticism and local color, baptized the young
French surgeon with a Teutonic name.]

By the time the two young men reached Andernach the night was dark.
Presuming that they would lose much time in looking for their chiefs

and obtaining from them a military billet in a town already full of
soldiers, they resolved to spend their last night of freedom at an inn

standing some two or three hundred feet from Andernach, the rich color
of which, embellished by the fires of the setting sun, they had

greatly admired from the summit of the hill above the town. Painted
entirely red, this inn produced a most piquant effect in the

landscape, whether by detaching itself from the general background of
the town, or by contrasting its scarlet sides with the verdure of the

surrounding foliage, and the gray-blue tints of the water. This house
owed its name, the Red Inn, to this externaldecoration, imposed upon

it, no doubt from time immemorial by the caprice of its founder. A
mercantile superstition, natural enough to the different possessors of

the building, far-famed among the sailors of the Rhine, had made them
scrupulous to preserve the title.

Hearing the sound of horses' hoofs, the master of the Red Inn came out
upon the threshold of his door.

"By heavens! gentlemen," he cried, "a little later and you'd have had
to sleep beneath the stars, like a good many more of your compatriots

who are bivouacking on the other side of Andernach. Here every room is
occupied. If you want to sleep in a good bed I have only my own room

to offer you. As for your horses I can litter them down in a corner of
the courtyard. The stable is full of people. Do these gentlemen come

from France?" he added after a slight pause.
"From Bonn," cried Prosper, "and we have eaten nothing since morning."

"Oh! as to provisions," said the innkeeper, nodding his head, "people
come to the Red Inn for their wedding feast from thirty miles round.

You shall have a princely meal, a Rhine fish! More, I need not say."
After confiding their weary steeds to the care of the landlord, who

vainly called to his hostler, the two young men entered the public
room of the inn. Thick white clouds exhaled by a numerous company of

smokers prevented them from at first recognizing the persons with whom
they were thrown; but after sitting awhile near the table, with the

patience practised by philosophical travellers who know the inutility
of making a fuss, they distinguished through the vapors of tobacco the

inevitable accessories of a German inn: the stove, the clock, the pots
of beer, the long pipes, and here and there the eccentric

physiognomies of Jews, or Germans, and the weather-beaten faces of
mariners. The epaulets of several French officers were glittering

through the mist, and the clank of spurs and sabres echoed incessantly
from the brick floor. Some were playing cards, others argued, or held

their tongues and ate, drank, or walked about. One stout little woman,
wearing a black velvet cap, blue and silver stomacher, pincushion,

bunch of keys, silver buckles, braided hair,--all distinctive signs of
the mistress of a German inn (a costume which has been so often

depicted in colored prints that it is too common to describe here),--
well, this wife of the innkeeper kept the two friends alternately

patient and impatient with remarkable ability.
Little by little the noise decreased, the various travellers retired

to their rooms, the clouds of smoke dispersed. When places were set
for the two young men, and the classic carp of the Rhine appeared upon

the table, eleven o'clock was striking and the room was empty. The
silence of night enabled the young surgeons to hear vaguely the noise

their horses made in eating their provender, and the murmur of the
waters of the Rhine, together with those indefinable sounds which

always enliven an inn when filled with persons preparing to go to bed.
Doors and windows are opened and shut, voices murmur vague words, and

a few interpellations echo along the passages.
At this moment of silence and tumult the two Frenchmen and their

landlord, who was boasting of Andernach, his inn, his cookery, the
Rhine wines, the Republican army, and his wife, were all three

listening with a sort of interest to the hoarse cries of sailors in a
boat which appeared to be coming to the wharf. The innkeeper, familiar

no doubt with the guttural shouts of the boatmen, went out hastily,
but presently returned conducting a short stout man, behind whom

walked two sailors carrying a heavy valise and several packages. When
these were deposited in the room, the short man took the valise and

placed it beside him as he seated himself without ceremony at the same
table as the surgeons.

"Go and sleep in your boat," he said to the boatmen, "as the inn is
full. Considering all things, that is best."

"Monsieur," said the landlord to the new-comer, "these are all the
provisions I have left," pointing to the supper served to the two

Frenchmen; "I haven't so much as another crust of bread nor a bone."
"No sauer-kraut?"

"Not enough to put in my wife's thimble! As I had the honor to tell
you just now, you can have no bed but the chair on which you are

sitting, and no other chamber than this public room."
At these words the little man cast upon the landlord, the room, and

the two Frenchmen a look in which caution and alarm were equally
expressed.

["Here," said Monsieur Hermann, interrupting himself, "I ought to tell
you that we have never known the real name nor the history of this

man; his papers showed that he came from Aix-la-Chapelle; he called
himself Wahlenfer and said that he owned a rather extensive pin

manufactory in the suburbs of Neuwied. Like all the manufacturers of
that region, he wore a surtout coat of common cloth, waistcoat and

breeches of dark green velveteen, stout boots, and a broad leather
belt. His face was round, his manners frank and cordial; but during

the evening he seemed unable to disguisealtogether some secret
apprehension or, possibly, some anxious care. The innkeeper's opinion

has always been that this German merchant was fleeing his country.
Later I heard that his manufactory had been burned by one of those

unfortunate chances so frequent in times of war. In spite of its
anxious expression the man's face showed great kindliness. His

features were handsome; and the whiteness of his stout throat was well
set off by a black cravat, a fact which Wilhelm showed jestingly to

Prosper."
Here Monsieur Taillefer drank another glass of water.]