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158
MARIA FELICIA

you,” Andrew frankly admitted. “Your sudden appearance in this forgotten castle, your choice of its most desolate corner, where no one can behold your secret doings, and, most of all, your conversation with the stewardess—all are witnesses against you. Oh, confess frankly, as I acknowledge my suspicion against you, that you have come here to see what sort of spirit prevails among the Bohemian peasants. And why not? If the nobility thought it necessary at other times to send out spies for that purpose, why should they not think it necessary now, when repeated failures in crops drive people to despair, and when services and taxes increase every year? Hunger has long been a dweller among our mountains; and his equally terrible brother, the plague, has now joined him. They both faithfully help the nobility. Oh, tell Miss Felsenburk to rejoice; tell all her friends to rejoice. Soon will their wish be realized; only a little while longer, and if a miracle do not come from above, the hated Bohemian race, which they say for ages has been filled