to his own success in making up. At last, however, the manager could
not possibly help finding out what the old fellow was doing, and you
may suppose he flew at him like a raging wild boar, so that it was all
that he could do to escape mishandling. He did not dare to appear on
the stage again; but the audience and the public had got so fond of the
old actor, and took his side with so much zeal, that the manager
(burdened, moreover, since that celebrated evening, with the curse of
ludicrosity), found himself compelled to close his theatre, and betake
himself elsewhere. Several respectable townsmen, with the innkeeper at
their head, met, and collected a considerable sum of money for the old
actor, enough to enable him to have done for ever with the worries of
the stage, and end his days in comfort in the place. But marvellous,
nay, unfathomable, is the mind of an actor! Before a year was over he
suddenly disappeared, nobody knew whither, and presently he was
discovered travelling with a strolling company, quite in the same
subordinate position from which he had so recently shaken himself
clear."

"With a very slight 'moral application,'" said Ottmar, "this tale of
the old actor belongs to the moral codex of all stage-players, and of
those who desire to become players."

During this, Cyprian had risen silently, and, after walking once or
twice up and down the room, taken his position behind the window
curtain. Just when Ottmar ceased speaking, a blast of wind came
suddenly howling and raging in. The lights threatened to go out;
Theodore's writing-table seemed to become alive; hundreds of papers
flew up, and were wafted about the room; the strings of the old piano
groaned aloud.

"Hey, hey!" cried Theodore, as he saw his literary notices, and who
knows what other written matter, at the mercy of the raging autumn
storm. "Hey, hey, Cyprianus, what are you about?" And they all set to
work to keep the lights in, and shield themselves from the thick
snowflakes which came swirling in.

"It is true," said Cyprian, shutting the window, "the weather won't let
one look to see what it is."

"Tell me," said Sylvester, taking the wholly absentminded and deeply
preoccupied Cyprian by both hands, and forcing him to sit down again in
the seat he had left, "only tell me--that is all I ask--where have you
been? In what distant region have you been wandering? for far, far away
from us has that restless spirit of yours been bearing you