nnenkamp is somewhat rough outside, but he is good at heart; and, as
to his past history, who is there who can feel satisfied with all his
past life? can any man? certainly not I, and I don't know anyone who
can. I have not always lived as I wish I had. But enough, you are wiser
than I."

"I understand perfectly," replied Eric. "American life is an existence
without a seventh day of rest; there is a continual working and
striving to win money, nothing else. If men have led such a life for
half a score of years, they lose the power of turning to anything else;
they say to themselves that if they only had enough--ah, those who
strive for gold never get enough--they say then they would devote
themselves to nobler ends. If it were only still possible! I understand
you, and wonder at Herr Sonnenkamp."

"Just so--just so," said the Major, "he must have dragged himself
through a good deal of mud, as a gold-hunter, to get such a great
property together. Yes, yes, I am easy--you are wiser than I. But now,
just for the first time, the main question occurs to me--look at me,
tell me honestly, is it true that you have been to see Fraeulein Manna
at the convent?"

"I have been at the convent, and saw Fraeulein Manna, but without
knowing her or speaking to her."

"And you didn't come to establish yourself in the house, in order to
marry the daughter?"

Eric smiled, as he said in reply, how strangely this question came to
him from every direction.

"Look you, comrade, put the maiden out of your thoughts, she is as good
as betrothed to Baron Pranken--I would rather you should have her, but
it can't be changed."

Eric at last got away, and went back toward the villa with cheerful
thoughts. Good powers were working together to keep Roland constantly
in a circle of thought and feeling, from which he might not deviate
through his whole life.

He stopped before a wide-spreading walnut tree, and looked up smiling
into its rich branches.

"Sonnenkamp is right," he said to himself; "the planting of trees and
their growth depend upon the surrounding heights and the prevailing
winds. There are nervous trees, which are killed by the blasts, and
others which only strike root when they are blown this way and that by
the wind. Is not the life of man such a plant? the men around it
constitute its climatic zone."

Eric thought he was constantly getting a better insight into the
influences which were helping, and those which were hinderin