* * * * *

Some weeks afterwards Victor was standing on the watch-tower at St. Luna
alone, with a letter from Lord Horion in his hand. He looked down from
the height, and he was tempted to throw himself over. He had regained
the friendship of Flamin, but it seemed to him that he had now lost all
hope of winning Clotilda. For Lord Horion had explained the whole of the
strange, tortuous policy which he had used in regard to Prince January.
He informed Victor that he had introduced Flamin to the prince, and had
proved to him that the young man was his heir. "They asked me, my dear
Victor," Horion went on to say in his letter, "a question which I was
surprised at your not asking. If Flamin is the son of the prince, where
is the son of Chaplain Eymann whom I took to London to be educated with
him? My dear boy, I have no son, and you really are the child of Eymann
and his good wife. This secret I felt bound to reveal to the prince at
the same time that I was forced to reveal the secret of Flamin's birth.
It was because I wished to postpone the revelations until you were
established in the prince's good graces that I made you take the oath
that you took so unwillingly."

Victor felt that what the heir to a great English nobleman might aspire
to, the son of a poor country clergyman could never hope to attain. By a
strange vicissitude of fortune he now found himself in the same position
as that in which Flamin had been when they met on the watch-tower after
their long separation. His mournful meditations were suddenly
interrupted by two figures who had silently crept up the stairs of the
tower. They were Flamin and Clotilda, and each of them put an arm around
Victor and led him to the parsonage. On the way he learnt that Clotilda
had known all along that he was the son of Chaplain Eymann.

* * * * *

Titan

The climax of Jean Paul Richter's inspiration, and of his
obscurity, was reached in "Titan," published during 1801-3. He
meant it to be his greatest romance, and posterity has
confirmed his judgement. Of all his works, it is the most
characteristic of its author. It has all the peculiarities of
his style, peculiarities that are reflected in the prose of
Thomas Carlyle, his most eminent British admirer and
interpreter. The book itself took ten years to write, and
according to his correspondence, Richter intend