An evening similar in purpose to the one devoted to the Italians
was organized for the Germans, in our first year. Owing to the
superior education of our Teutonic guests and the clever leading
of a cultivated German woman, these evenings reflected something
of that cozy social intercourse which is found in its perfection
in the fatherland. Our guests sang a great deal in the tender
minor of the German folksong or in the rousing spirit of the
Rhine, and they slowly but persistently pursued a course in
German history and literature, recovering something of that
poetry and romance which they had long since resigned with other
good things. We found strong family affection between them and
their English-speaking children, but their pleasures were not in
common, and they seldom went out together. Perhaps the greatest
value of the Settlement to them was in placing large and pleasant
rooms with musical facilities at their disposal, and in reviving
their almost forgotten enthusiams. I have seen sons and
daughters stand in complete surprise as their mother's knitting
needles softly beat time to the song she was singing, or her worn
face turned rosy under the hand-clapping as she made an
old-fashioned curtsy at the end of a German poem. It was easy to
fancy a growing touch of respect in her children's manner to her,
and a rising enthusiasm for German literature and reminiscence on
the part of all the family, an effort to bring together the old
life and the new, a respect for the older cultivation, and not
quite so much assurance that the new was the best.
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