they fell asleep earlier, though Balder did not close his
eyes until the shutting of a well known little window in the front
buildings told him that Reginchen had returned from her excursion in
safety.

Several of the verses he had written in the afternoon again passed
through his mind, and softly repeating them he lulled himself to sleep
with his own melodies.

CHAPTER XI.

When Marquard paid his usual visit to the "tun" the following morning,
he found everything in the household exactly the same as usual. In
spite of the late hour at which Reginchen returned from the country,
she had been at the pump at six o'clock, and an hour after carried the
brothers their blue milk and cleared up the room, but without talking
much; for kindly as Edwin treated her, she felt a great awe of him and
became terribly embarrassed at his most innocent jest.

The brothers also, according to old habit, had begun their day very
silently. When the doctor entered, Balder was sitting at his turning
lathe, making a set of ivory chess-men. Marquard talked to him for some
time with apparent unconcern, asked about one thing and another and
felt his pulse, but gave no prescription, except that he must drink the
wine regularly.

But on the stairs, when Edwin was accompanying him down, he suddenly
turned and said in a low tone: "You must not let the lad go on so. This
stooping and keeping shut up in the house won't do, he will weaken his
chest over that confounded turning lathe. If I were in your place, I
should assert my authority."

"In my place," sighed Edwin, shrugging his shoulders. "My dear fellow,
if you were in my place, that is, not a physician, but a philosopher,
you would know that there is no authority which can transform a man's
nature. Have I not tried every stratagem to get him out? When I
attacked him on his weakest, or rather his strongest side, his
brotherly love, and represented how dull it was for me to go out
without him, you ought to have seen the efforts he made to be a gay
companion, in order to cheer my walks and rides. But I know him too
well. I saw how he suffered from the noise and bustle of the streets,
and even when we once drove to Tegel, he was only comfortable while we
were alone. When we arrived, we found a crowd of school girls playing
graces, various mothers and aunts knitting, several pairs of lovers, in
short the usual Berlin pleasure seekers. As soon as possible he u