ore or less distinct, from this or that friend, to
draw the reins tighter; a young untamed thing like her would be sure to
bolt some day or other. For hints like these I had always the same
superior smile, and only told my wife of them that I might laugh at the
Philistinism of my colleagues.

"The daughter of such a thoroughly well-balanced person, surely one
could confidently leave her to herself, in cases where there would have
been danger for weaker natures.

"And now came the discovery of our shame! Now came the fearful fall
from that height to which we had soared in our dreams!

"Any other man would have turned his eyes inward, would, before all
else, have taken himself to task and looked upon the sad and terrible
occurrence as a just chastisement of his foolish blindness. But this
model man was superior to all such weaknesses. Oh, my good friend, it
is not true what philosophy teaches, that the real nature of a man
cannot be changed; that it is only his outward conduct that gradually
gains a certain power of habit over the true character of the
individual. I know this by bitter experience; of that fool who drove
his poor child from his home in her shame and misery and forbade her
ever to come in his sight again; of that childish and cruel father
there is not a vestige left in me--so little that I can search my
nature for it as much as I will. With all my other faults and human
weaknesses, it is absolutely incomprehensible to me how I could ever
have torn my poor flesh and blood from me, and cast it forth into the
outside world.

"The child bore herself far better and more nobly than her parents. She
declared decidedly that having, as she found to her sorrow, forfeited
forever the love of father and mother by her weakness, she would no
longer accept anything from their bounty. We thought this was merely a
fine phrase. But we soon learned how seriously she had meant what she
said. The poor girl suddenly disappeared from our house and the
city--and probably from the country--for all our efforts to find her
were without result.

"She had persistently refused to give the name of her betrayer, and we
were either compelled or tempted to suspect every friend who had been
intimate at our house; so that, although appearances were kept up for a
while longer, and a plausible pretext was found for the disappearance
of our daughter, our domestic bliss was ended at a blow, and soon
vanished utterly. She who had given, life