for morality; and because the said moral law seems to the man a
wretched slavery, while the unhappy young woman thinks even a very
moderate freedom immoral! Ah, my dear old Hans, what did I not endure
in those six weeks!--and more especially because I was thoroughly
dissatisfied with myself. After our altogether fruitless (and therefore
all the more obstinate) discussions of these questions, in which I
poured out my bitterest scorn upon her court-etiquette, her kid-gloved
prejudices, her duenna-like code of morals, while she put my baseless
principles to shame with a maidenly pride and firmness that I could
have kissed her for--always after these discussions I used to say to
myself, in the quiet of my chamber, that I was a mad fool to upset
matters as I did. With a little diplomacy, a little delicate tact, and
patient hypocrisy, I could have thoroughly gained my end; could have
borne the stupid ban of society until my marriage; and then, when we
were alone together, could have gradually developed my little wife out
of her doll-like state of servitude, and rejoiced to see her spread her
wings in freedom.

"But it was odd: as often as I appeared before her with the best
resolves in the world--the war began again. You must not imagine that
she fairly entered the lists, challenged me, and herself brought up our
old points of conflict. But it was precisely her quiet reserve, her
obvious good intention to be cautious with the reckless scapegrace, and
to leave his reform to time--it was all this that overthrew my finest
diplomatic projects. I would begin to joke, then to chaff, then to hurl
the most fearful insults against people and customs that seemed fairly
holy to her--and so it went on, day after day, until there came one day
that fairly 'forced the bottom out of the cask'--a wretched, wretched
day!"

He paused a moment, and fixed his eyes gloomily upon the ground.

"There's no help for it!" he said, at last. "It must come out.
Once in my life I did something that humiliated me in my own eyes. I
committed a sin against my own sense of honor--a base act, for which I
never can forgive myself, although a court of honor in matters of
gallantry--chosen from among my own equals, mind you--would probably
have let me off with a slight penance, if not scot-free altogether. You
know what I think of what is called sin; there is no _absolute_ moral
code; what brands one forever is only a little spot upon another--all
according to