think I was the man who had been through such hard experience as I have; I am today undergoing a bitter experience. Is it old age which makes it so difficult for me to give up a desire? I have learned to do so before now. Yes, yes; a man. becomes childish childish; a child cannot give up." He leaned heavily on Eric, who was shaken to the depth of his soul by the emotion of the noble man. He did not know what to reply, and Clodwig continued:

66

don't be anxious, it will not be for a long time yet. There, now sit down by me. Where is my wife?"

Eric went to call her, and she entered, with the physician and Sonnenkamp.

The doctor was not only willing, but expressly desired that Bella and Clodwig should return directly to Wolfsgarten. Sonnenkamp raised various objections, wishing to keep his noble guests with him, and saying with great hospitality,

66

Consider my house exactly as if it

were your own.

66

Will you permit Herr Dournay to accompany us?" asked Clodwig. Sonnenkamp started as he answered quickly,

"I have no permission to give the captain, but if you are determined to go, I would ask him as a favor to accompany you, with a promise of returning to us."

"I feel as if I knew not where I am. Do you not think it is very close ? " "No. Will you not sit down? " Hastily loosing his hold of Eric's arm to pass his hand over his face, Clodwig said,My young friend, when I die. Hardly had he uttered the word, when he sank down; Eric caught him in his arms. Bella, who was walking behind with the physician, uttered a cry; the physician hurried to the spot; Eric stooped, raised Clodwig in his arms like a child- all this was the work of a moment. So the four drove off through the mild Clodwig was carried into the great draw-spring night; little was said, though once ing-room, and laid upon a sofa. Bella Clodwig seized Eric's hand, with the words, sobbed aloud, but the doctor soothed her. "You are very strong." He had a remedy with him which soon restored Clodwig to consciousness; he begged Eric and Bella to leave the room as soon as the count had spoken.

Outside, Bella threw herself on Eric's breast, and he trembled as he felt her breath on his face, and a thrill ran through him as the beautiful woman leaned upon him in such passionate and unrestrained excitement.

"You are our helper, our friend in need! O my friend, my friend!"

Sonnenkamp entered hastily, and Bella, standing erect, with wonderful composure addressed him, saying,

66

Herr Sonnenkamp, our mutual friend, Captain Dournay, is a blessing to us all; with the strength of a giant he carried my husband. Thank him with me."

Eric was astonished at this rapid recovery of self-control.

The physician came out, and Sonnenkamp asked anxiously,

"How is he? how is he?"

His mind was set at rest by the doctor's declaration that it had been a very slight attack, which would have no bad consequences. Clodwig requested that Eric would come to him. Eric entered the drawing-room. Clodwig sitting upright held out his hand to Eric, saying, with a wonderfully bright smile, "I must finish my sentence; I was going to say: When I die, my young friend, I should like to have you near me. But

66

You will go with us also?" begged Bella of the physician, who assented.

Eric and the doctor spent the night at Wolfsgarten. In the early morning, the physician prepared for departure while Eric was still sleeping soundly; he woke him and said,

66

Doctor, remain here to-day, but no longer."

Eric stared at him.
"Did you understand me?"
"Yes."

"Now, good-bye."

Again Eric spent a whole day at Wolfsgarten. Clodwig was as cheerful and serene as ever; Bella's bearing toward Eric was shy, almost timid.

In the evening Sonnenkamp and Roland rode over, and Éric returned with them to Villa Eden. Sonnenkamp was in very good spirits, and the blood mounted to Eric's face as he said, looking sharply at him,

"Countess Bella will make a beautiful widow."

On the evening of the following day the physician appeared again at Villa Eden; he had been at Wolfsgarten and brought a good report. He took Eric aside, and said,

"You have confided to me that you neither expect, nor will accept in a personal interview, a decisive answer from Herr Sonnenkamp. I approve of that; it can be much better settled by letter. You will see more clearly, away from him, and so will he. So I advise you to leave the

house; every hour that you remain is your any more either. He didn't want either of ruin."

66

My ruin ?" Eric was startled.

The physician said, smiling,

66

Yes, my dear friend, this forced exhibition of yourself, which has now lasted almost a week, is injuring you.'

He continued, after a pause,

No man can be on parade for a week without receiving some harm. You must go away, or you will become an actor, or a preacher, or both together. You repeat what you have learned, and repeat it with the conscious purpose of producing a given effect. Therefore away with you! you have been examining, and examined, long enough. Come with me, spend the night at my house; to-morrow return to your mother, and wait quietly for what may come next."

"But Roland," asked Eric, "how can I leave the boy behind? His heart has turned to me, as mine has to him."

"That's well, very well. Then let him wait and long for you. Let him learn that the rich cannot have everything. Let him feel obliged to sue for you. All that will give you a power of incalculable influence in the family and over your pupil. Let me act for you now; to-morrow morning you will see with my eyes."

"There is my hand. I'll go with you!" answered Eric.

There was great surprise in the house when the announcement of Eric's sudden departure was made; an hour had scarcely elapsed when he entered the physician's carriage.

Eric was glad that his leave-taking of Roland was hurried. The boy could not understand what had happened; his emotion prevented him from speaking. After Eric had seated himself in the doctor's carriage, Roland came with one of the pappies and laid it in his lap, but the physician gave it back, saying that he could not take it, it was too young to be taken from the mother; but he would see that Eric should have it eventually.

us." Roland carried the dog to its mother, who was very glad to see her pup again.

"I'll go to my mother, too," said Roland; but he had first to be announced. She allowed him to enter, and when he lamented that Eric had gone so suddenly, she said, That's right; I advised him to go." "You? Why?"

66

66

Oh, your stupid why! One can't be always answering your why! Roland was silent, and his mother's kiss almost pained him.

He wanted to go to his father, but found that he had driven to the castle with the Major.

Deserted and lonely, he stood in the court; at last he went into the stable, sat down by his dogs and watched their amusing actions; then he went to his horse, and stood quietly leaning on his neck for a long time. Strange thoughts rolled tumultuously through the boy's brain. The horse and dog are yours; only what one can buy and possess is his own.

Like a flash of lightning, just seen, then gone again, there woke in the boy's soul the idea that nothing but love can give one human being possession of another. He was not used to steady thinking, and this into which he had fallen brought on a real headache. He had his horse saddled, and rode off over the road which Eric and the doctor had taken.

CHAPTER X.

THE PRACTICAL NATURE.

ERIC sat quiet and thoughtful by the doctor's side, and was disturbed by no word from him, seeming to himself to be driven hither and thither by wind and wave. A few days before, he had ridden to this place on a stranger's horse, and now he sat in a stranger's carriage; he had become intermingled with the life and destiny of so many persons, and this could no longer count for anything in his and their existence. He could not anticipate, however, that an unexpected event was awaiting him.

66

'You believe then in education?" asked the doctor at last.

66

Roland gazed wonderingly after the departing guests. In the boy's heart there was a confused whirl of all the feelings which he had experienced in the few days since Eric's arrival; but Eric did not look back. In his father's house the boy felt as I don't understand what you mean." if abandoned in a strange land. He took "I place no dependence whatever on edthe young dog by the nape of the neck, and ucation; men become what nature fits them was about to throw it from him, but the to be. They attain, under all relations, puppy whimpered pitifully, and he pressed what is called their destiny. As the huit to his breast, saying, "Be quiet, man being lies in his cradle, so he lies in nothing is hurting you; but I'm not a dog, his coffin. Some little help comes from and I don't whine, now don't you whine talents and capabilities, but as a whole they

are only incidental; the natural bias gives | smiled to himself, for he thought how easy the home blow." it is to theorize. The doctor had justly found fault with him for enlarging upon so many topics, and now he was to perceive that he could be silent. He said nothing, and the doctor continued:

Eric had no heart to enter upon these discussions; he was weary of this everlasting game of words.

The doctor continued:

"I have a peculiar grudge against these "As to the rest, I can tender you effectpeople; it vexes me that these rich people ual aid, if you conclude to accept the posishould buy for themselves the fragrant tion. Pity that you are not a medical man; fruits of higher culture; then, again, I am as I look at it, no one but a physician consoled by the word of Him who stood at should be an educator. Have you taken the very centre of thought, and said, 'A notice that the young fellow has a poor dirich man cannot enter into the kingdom of gestion? a young man in these times ought God.' The rich are too heavily ballasted; to be able to digest pebble-stones! I canthey have a pampered existence, they are not bring it about that only simple kinds removed far from the actual needs of life, of food should be given him. The noble and they withdraw themselves from the and the rich eat without hunger, and drink natural influences of the seasons; they without thirst. This young man can have flit into different climates and out of everything but one real, substantial enthem again, and everywhere they have joyment. It is a small matter, but take it comfortably prepared swallow-nests. It just for an example: Roland receives no would be an intolerable heartlessness of fate, if, without any irksome toil, they are to have also the higher joys as a possession, which belong alone to us.'

"There is no royal road to geometry, is Euclid's saying," Eric interposed; "science and knowledge are acquired only through labor, and what I want to do with this boy can all be comprehended in one word: I want to give him self-activity."

enjoyment from new clothes. Now strike this joy out of your childhood, out of your youth. I must confess, that I can take pleasure for weeks in a well-fitting gar ment, as often as I put it on. What are you smiling at?" the physician interrupted himself.

"I am thinking of a theological friend," answered Eric. "How he would be astonished, if any one should say to him, that the fall, which brought with it the consciousness of nakedness, has become the very foundation of all the enjoyment that comes from weaving, making, and sewing clothes."

The doctor smiled too, but he stuck to his subject, and went on,

66

"Just so," replied the physician; "yes, that's it! we who live to the spirit have the advantage over the rich in this respect, that we are alone by ourselves; the rich man does not know the silent growth in the dewy stillness of solitude; he always has so much, he never has himself, and never himself alone. This is what I understand by that verse of the Bible, What shall it profit thee, if thou shalt gain the whole world, and lose thine own soul? That is to say, Art never alone in thyself with thyself? He who has nowhere to lay his head, he can I believe, captain, that I know something yet carry his head high and free. You see it was to some purpose that I studied theology for two years, until I came to see that though much cannot be effected, yet more is to be done by practising quackery on the body, than on the soul."

The doctor could not speak, he laughed so heartily. At last he said,

"The great question always is, how receptivity itself confers upon one all that is desirable. That would be your principal task, to awaken and to perfect in Roland his power of receptivity. He must first of all, be taught in a regular way. In what he knows of the world, he is yet a child, and in what he desires of the world, he is a man, one may say a live man."

Eric had much to say in reply, but he

'Food and clothes are of the greatest importance, but the third most important thing is sleep; it is the regulator of life. Air, nourishment, and sleep are the three fundamental conditions of vegetative life.

I

about you already, but I cannot pronounce a full verdict upon you, until I have seen you sleep. Our nineteenth century sleeps poorly; our education, our labor, and our politics ought to be so arranged that people can once more get better sleep. should like to be able to write a history of sleep, showing how different nations and different ages have slept; that would lay bare to us the deepest roots of all the manifestations of civilization. As far as regards Roland, there is in him a strange blending of temperaments from the father's and the mother's constitution."

The doctor pictured out the muscular organization of Sonnenkamp, and the struggle he was obliged to make every moment with his violent natural tendencies. "A cer

tain indomitable energy in him always en-occurrence took place which I could not ters a disclaimer against his mildness, which have believed possible. I was sent for to is at once seen to be a result of self-com- the villa. The daughter of the house was in pulsion and of voluntary effort. He is aa condition of muscular rigidity, and at the suppressed pugilist, and he has in fact, as same time delirium, which I could not comhe once himself boasted in an unguarded moment, an iron fist. The old Germans must have possessed this stalwart force, who, with their naked arms, overthrew and crushed the mail-clad Romans."