ought that creation
of the old master which came so wondrously to life and approached me,
was a thing like myself, and that I could drag it down into this
wretched earthly existence. No, no, Felizitas! I have not lost you. You
are, and shall be, mine for ever, because you are the creative art
which lives within me. It is only now that I really know you. What have
you, what have I, to do with Mrs. Mathesius, the police magistrate's
wife? Nothing, that I can see.'

"'I couldn't quite see what you had to do with her, either, Mr.
Traugott,' a voice fell in.

"Traugott awoke from a dream. He found himself, without knowing how, in
the Artus Hof again, leaning on the granite pillar. The person who had
just spoken was Christina's husband. He handed Traugott a letter which
had just arrived from Rome. Matuszewski wrote:

"'Dorina is prettier and more charming than ever; only rather pale, for
love of you, dear friend. She expects you hourly, for she is certain
you could not desert her. She is really tremendously devoted to you.
When shall we see you here again?'

"'I'm very glad, indeed,' said Traugott to Christina's husband after
reading this, 'that we managed to settle all our business to-day, for I
start to-morrow for Rome, where the lady I am going to marry is
expecting me eagerly.'"

When Cyprian finished reading, the friends congratulated him on the
pleasant, healthy tone which pervaded his story. Only Theodore thought
the fair sex might find a good deal to take exception to in it, and
that not only the blonde Christina with her well scoured pots and pans,
but the mystification of the hero, Mrs. Mathesius the police
magistrate's wife and all the latter part of the story, with its
profound irony, would much displease them.

"If you are going to model your work," said Lothair, "according
to what pleases women, you must, of course, leave out irony
altogether--although it is the source of the most delicate and
delightful kind of humour--because they have not, as a general rule,
the smallest sense of it."

"Which I, for one, am thoroughly glad is the case," said Theodore.
"You'll admit that humour, which, in us, takes its source in striking
contrasts, is quite foreign to feminine nature. And we are vividly
conscious of this, though we may not often clearly account to ourselves
for it. For, tell me, though you may take pleasure for a time in the
conversation of a witty and humorous woman, would you like her as a
sweeth