has become for her! And having done
all that in vain must she not have felt ashamed? Oh, she is right not
to want to have anything more to do with me. I must learn to be
different."

And this resolution had been no bloomless bud. His cousin's house in
Cologne did not encourage dreaming of any kind. Apollonius found an
entirely different family life there from that in his own home. His
old cousin was as full of life as the youngest member of the family.
Loneliness was impossible. A lively sense of the ridiculous
[Illustration: Jacob's Journey. Schnorr Von Carolsfeld] [Blank Page]
prevented the growth of any kind of peculiarity. Every one had to be
on his guard; no one could let himself go.

Apollonius could not have avoided growing to be another man, even if
he had not wanted to change; and he recognized clearly that it was a
piece of good fortune that had led him to his cousin. He lost more and
more of his dreaminess; before long his cousin could put the most
difficult task into the young man's hands and he would complete it,
without the aid of another's advice, so satisfactorily that his cousin
was obliged to confess to himself that even he would not have begun
the matter more thoroughly, carried it on more energetically, finished
it more speedily and happily. Soon the youth was able to form his own
opinion of the way in which the business at home had been carried on.
He was obliged to acknowledge that it had not been the most practical
way, in fact, that some of his father's orders could not but be called
wrong-headed; then he reproached himself bitterly for his unfilial
criticism, endeavored to justify his father's actions to himself, and,
if he found that impossible, forced himself to believe that the old
man must have had his good reasons and it could only be that he
himself was too limited in knowledge to be able to guess them.

Letters came from his brother. In the first one he wrote that he was
now clear in his mind about the girl to this extent, that her
harshness toward Apollonius was due to her fondness for another whom
he could not bring her to name. In the next, one in which he scarcely
spoke of the girl, Apollonius read between the lines a certain pity
for himself, the reason for which he knew not how to find. The third
gave this reason only too clearly. His brother himself was the object
of the girl's secret affection. She had given him various signs of
this, after he had renounced his former sweethear