When she became a young lady she did not go to parties often and limited her exercise to a daily walk. The people then all corresponded to marked types, and Miss Mary was the type of an old maid. If any of her acquaintances put to her the question, she invariably replied: “Can one not serve God, married or single?” And when anyone asked Mrs. Nocar, she shrugged her shoulders and replied: “Why she did not wish to! She could have married many times—and men of consequence—I know of two myself—good people. She did not wish to!”
I, however, know that the two men were vagabonds and not worth considering. They were the merchant, Cibulka, and the engraver, Rechner, and whenever anyone spoke of them they said—“The vagabonds!” They were good for nothing in every way, no mind, no character. Rechner never worked before Wednesday, and Saturday afternoon again, he did not work.
“He might have scraped together a little competence because of his dexterity,” said a friend of my mother, Mr. Hermann—but he didn't like to work. And the merchant Cibulka would rather be in a wine shop than in his own place of business.
