Alexandria Gazette

A True Story
Miss Frederika Bremer communicates the following story to Sartain's Magazine, for the truth of which she is ready to vouch:

In the University of Upsala, in Sweden, lived a young student, a lonely youth, with a great love for studies, but without means for pursuing them. He was poor, and without connexions. Still he studied, living in great poverty, but keeping a cheerful heart and trying not to look at the future, which looked so grimly at him. His good humor and good qualities made him beloved by his young comrades. Once he was standing with some of them in the great square of Upsala, passing away an hour of leisure, when the attention of the young men became arrested by a very young and elegant lady who, at the side of an elderly one, walked slowly over the place. It was the daughter of the governor of Upsala, living in the city, and the lady with her was the governess. She was generally known for her beauty and for her goodness and gentleness of character, and was looked upon with great admiration by the students. As the young men now stood gazing at her as she passed on like a grateful vision, one of them exclaimed:

"Well, it would be worth something to have a kiss from such a mouth!"

The poor student, the hero of our story, who was looking intently on that pure and angelic face, exclaimed, as if by inspiration,

"Well, I think I could have it."

"What!" cried his companions in a chorus,

"are you crazy? Do you know her?" &c.

"Not at all," he answered, "but I think she would kiss me now, if I asked her."

"What, in this place, before all our eyes?"

"In this place, before your eyes."

"Freely?"

"Freely."

"Well, if she will give you a kiss in that manner, I will give you a thousand dollars," exclaimed one of the party.

"And I: And I!" cried three or four others; for it so happened that several rich young men were in the group, and bets ran high on so improbable an event; and the challenge was made and received in less time than we take to relate it.

Our hero—(my authority tells not whether he was handsome or plain. I have my peculiar reasons for believing that he was rather plain, but singularly good-looking, at the same time)—our hero immediately walked off to meet the young lady, and said: (in French) my fortune is in your hand. She looked at him in astonishment, but arrested her steps. He proceeded to state his name and condition, his aspirations, and related simply and truly what had just passed between him and his companions. The young lady listened attentively, and when he ceased to speak, she said, blushing, but with great sweetness: "If by so little a thing so much good can be effected, it would be foolish in me to refuse your request;" and she kissed the young man publicly in the open square.

Next day the student was sent for by the governor. He wanted to see the man who had dared to ask a kiss from his daughter in that way, and whom she had consented to kiss so. He received him with a severe and scrutinizing brow, but after an hour's conversation, was so pleased with him that he offered him to dine at his table during his studies in Upsala.

Our young friend now pursued his studies in a manner which soon caused him to be regarded as the most promising scholar at the university. Three years were now passed after the day of the first kiss, when the young man was allowed to give a second one to the daughter of the governor, as his intended bride.

He became, later, one of the greatest scholars in Sweden, as much respected for his learning as for his character. His works will endure forever among the works of science: and from this happy union sprang a family well known in Sweden in the present day, and whose wealth of fortune and high position in society are regarded as small things compared with its goodness and love.