to whom, in spite
of her beautiful exterior, they ascribed absolute stupidity, and were
pleased to find therein the cause why Spalanzani kept her so long
concealed. Nathaniel did not hear this without increased rage; but,
nevertheless, he held his peace, for, thought he, "Is it worth while to
convince these fellows that it is their own stupidity that prevents
them from recognising Olympia's deep, noble mind?"

One day Sigismund said to him: "Be kind enough, brother, to tell me how
it was possible for a sensible fellow like you to fall in love with
that wax face, that wooden doll up there?"

Nathaniel was about to fly out in a passion, but he quickly recollected
himself, and retorted: "Tell me, Sigismund, how it is that Olympia's
heavenly charms could escape your glance, which generally perceives
every thing so clearly--your active senses? But, for that very reason,
Heaven be thanked, I have not you for my rival; otherwise, one of us
must have fallen a bleeding corpse!"

Sigismund plainly perceived his friend's condition, so he skilfully
gave the conversation a turn, and added, after observing that in
love-affairs there was no disputing about the object: "Nevertheless it
is strange, that many of us think much the same about Olympia. To
us--pray do not take it ill, brother,--she appears singularly stiff and
soulless. Her shape is symmetrical--so is her face--that is true! She
might pass for beautiful, if her glance were not so utterly without a
ray of life--without the power of seeing. Her pace is strangely
measured, every movement seems to depend on some wound-up clockwork.
Her playing--her singing has the unpleasantly correct and spiritless
measure of a singing machine, and the same may be said of her dancing.
To us, this Olympia has been quite unpleasant; we wished to have
nothing to do with her; it seems as if she acts like a living being,
and yet has some strange peculiarity of her own." Nathaniel did not
completely yield to the bitter feeling, which was coming over him at
these words of Sigismund; he mastered his indignation, and merely said,
with great earnestness, "Well may Olympia appear awful to you, cold
prosaic man. Only to the poetical mind does the similarly organised
develop itself. To me alone was her glance of love revealed, beaming
through mind and thought; only in the love of Olympia do I find myself
again. It may not suit you, that she does not indulge in idle
chit-chat like other shallow