xcitability saved him. In his magnificent solicitude for the
mission that is at once the token and the curse of those who are really
called, he shut himself off from a world from which the one thing he
wanted was bread; bread and nothing else.

After the publication of the songs a review appeared in the _Phoenix_
which had a remarkably realistic ring to the ear of the layman. As a
matter of fact it was merely an underhanded attempt at assassination.
The thing was signed with a big, isolated "W." Wurzelmann, the little
slave, had shot from his ambush.

Other musical journals copied this review. A half dozen people bought
the songs; then they were forgotten.

It was no use to hope. The trouble was, he needed bread, just bread.

V

It was often difficult for him to find the peace and quiet necessary for
effective work. May brought cold weather; they had to make a fire; the
stove smoked; the potter came in and removed the tiles; the room looked
like an inferno.

Gertrude was pounding sugar: "Don't be angry at me, Daniel; I must pound
the sugar to-day." And she pounded away until the hammer penetrated the
paralysed brain of the listener by force of circumstances.

The hinges of the door screeched. "You ought to oil them, Gertrude."
Gertrude looked high and low for the oil can, and when she finally found
it, she had no feather to use in smearing the oil on. She went over to
the chancellor's, and borrowed one from her maid. While she was gone,
the milk boiled over and filled the house with a disagreeable stench.

The door bell rang. It was the cobbler; he had come to get the money for
the patent leather shoes. The wives of Herr Kirschner and Herr Ruebsam
had both said that Daniel must not think of appearing at the coming
recital at the Baroness's without patent leather shoes.

"I haven't the money, Gertrude; have you got that much?"

Gertrude went through her chests, and scraped up five marks which she
gave the cobbler as a first instalment. The man went away growling;
Daniel hid from him.

Gertrude was sitting in the living room making clothes for her
baby-to-come. There was a happy expression on her face. Daniel knew that
it was a display of maternal joy and expectation, but since he could not
share this joy, since indeed he felt a sense of fear at the appearance
of the child, her happiness embittered him.

Between the fuchsias in the window stood a robin red-breast; the impi