“Oh! no,” she replied; “ ’Tis the invention of much wiser heads than mine. But can you possibly have lived at Lindenberg for three whole months without hearing of the Bleeding Nun?”

“You are the first, who ever mentioned the name to me. Pray, who may the lady be?”

“That is more than I can pretend to tell you. All my knowledge of her history comes from an old tradition in this family, which has been handed down from father to son, and is firmly credited throughout the Baron’s domains. Nay, the Baron believes it himself; and as for my aunt who has a natural turn for the marvellous, she would sooner doubt the veracity of the Bible, than of the Bleeding Nun. Shall I tell you this history?”

I answered that she would oblige me much by relating it: she resumed her drawing, and then proceeded as follows in a tone of burlesqued gravity.