How should I know it? I see how the hens lay eggs, and hear that Mamma had to carry me under her heart. But is that enough?——I remember, too, when I was a five year old child, to have been embarrassed when anyone turned up the décolleté queen of hearts. This feeling has disappeared. At the same time, I can hardly talk with a girl to-day without thinking of something indecent, and—I swear to you, Melchior—I don't know what.
Melchior.
I will tell you everything. I have gotten it partly from books, partly from illustrations, partly from observations of nature. You will be surprised; it made me an atheist. I told it to George Zirschnitz! George Zirschnitz wanted to tell it to Hans Rilow, but Hans Rilow had learned it all from his governess when he was a child.
Moritz.
I have gone through Meyer's Little Encyclopedia from A to Z. Words—nothing but words and words! Not a single plain explanation. Oh, this feeling of shame!——What good to me is an encyclopedia that won't answer me concerning the most important question in life?
Melchior.
Did you ever see two dogs running together about the streets?
Moritz.
No!——Don't tell me anything to-day, Melchior. I have Central America and Louis the Fifteenth before me. And then the sixty verses of Homer, the seven equations and the Latin composition.——I would fail in all of them again to-morrow. To drudge successfully I must be as stupid as an ox.
Melchior.