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t just such an utterly harmless old maid as I!" CHAPTER VII. The friends turned their steps toward a beer-garden on the Dultplatz, where, at this time of day--between two and three o'clock--it was pretty quiet in spite of its being Sunday. The noonday guests had finished with their dinners long ago, and the afternoon concert had not yet begun. Instead of it three sleepy fiddlers, an elderly harp-player, and a jovial clarinet were playing on a platform in the middle of the garden. Of these musicians the clarinet-player alone still defied the drowsy influences of the siesta hour, attempting, by wild and desperate runs, to rouse the nodding quartette. On the benches in the shade of the tall ash-trees there sat a very mixed company, for in Munich the differences between the classes is far less marked than in any of the other large German cities; and among the rest, at the smallest tables, were numerous pairs of lovers who, lulled into a state of dreamy comfort by plentiful eating and drinking, rested their heads on one another's shoulders, held each other's hands and abandoned themselves freely to their feelings. Yet no one seemed to take offense at this; on the contrary, it seemed to belong to the place as much as the gnats that swarmed in the air. The three late arrivals seated themselves in one of the most secluded corners and proceeded to do justice to the viands which the waitress, who treated Jansen with conspicuous respect, had put aside for them. It was anything but a sumptuous meal, but the taste for the pleasures of the table seemed to be so little developed in the sculptor that it never occurred to him to celebrate the reunion with his friend by a bottle of wine. Felix knew this and overlooked it. Still, he had hoped to find him more animated and communicative after their long separation; and now he could not help noticing how he sat at his side, preoccupied and speaking only in monosyllables, intent only upon feeding Homo, who swallowed the big mouthfuls that were given him with grave decorum. In the mean time, there joined the group a fourth person, for whom the battle-painter seemed to have looked from the beginning. He was a slim young man, pale and with curly black hair, whose manner at once announced him to be an actor. He wore, over one eye, a black silk shade, that made his paleness still more conspicuous, and the sharp lines above his expressive mouth gave evide
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