"Such as we may ourselves feel?" asked the Professor, seriously, laying aside the book. "How do you come by this experience? Have you, Ilse, some secret from your husband?"
Ilse rose and looked at him with dismay.
But the Professor continued, cheerfully: "I will first tell you why I ask, and what I would like to know from you. When I brought you from your country-home you were, in spite of your deep German feeling, in many respects just such as we like to picture to ourselves Nausicaa and Penelope. You freely received impressions from the world around you; you stood sure and strong in a firmly-bound sphere of right and duty; with childlike trust you gathered from the moral habits of your circle, and from Holy Scripture, your standard of judgment and conduct. Your love for me, and contact with other souls, and the insight into a new sphere of knowledge, awakened in your heart passionate vibrations; uncertainty came, and then doubt; new thoughts struggled against old impressions, the demands of your new life against the tenor of your maiden years. You were for months more unhappy than I had any idea of. But now, when I have been rejoicing in your cheerful repose of mind, I find you have acquired a knowledge of human nature that astonishes me. I have often lately seen, with secret pleasure, how warmly you have sympathized with, and how mildly you have judged, the characters of the drama. I had expected that their hard and monstrous fate would have been repulsive to you, and that you would have felt rapid transitions from tenderness to aversion. But you have sympathy with the dark forms as well as with the bright, as if your soul had begun to anticipate that in one's own life, good and evil, blessing and curse, might be associated, and as if you had yourself experienced that man has not to follow an outward moral law alone, however exalted its origin, but that he may at some period be compelled to seek for some other law in the depths of his own soul. But such an insight men can only attain when they themselves experience danger and trouble. It is improbable that this should have been the case with you, unless you have gone through some experience to which I have been a stranger. I do not wish to urge your confidence; I know what trust I can repose in you; but if you think fit, I would gladly know what has given rise to this sensitive feeling for the secret struggles of men who are hurried along by a tragic fate."
Ilse seized him by the hand and drew him into her room. "It was on this spot," she exclaimed, "a stranger asked me whether he should expose himself to the danger of death for the sake of his honor, or whether he should expose another in his place. I had given him a right to ask such a question, for I had before spoken to him of his life with greater frankness than was prudent for a careful woman. I stood and struggled against the question that he put to me, but I could not refuse to answer; and, Felix, to tell you the truth, I did not wish to do so. I gave him counsel which might have brought him to a bloody end. I gave him that advice secretly, and I became entangled in a fatal web from which I could not extricate myself. I thought of you, but I did not dare to tell you, as you must either have been unfaithful to the duties of your office, or you must for ever have wounded the honorable feelings of another. I questioned our holy teachings: they told me only that my advice was sinful. I was unhappy, Felix, that I had come into this position, but still more unhappy that neither you nor the teachings of my faith could help me out of it. It was no merit of mine that things turned out better than I feared they would. Since that I have known, Felix, what struggles of conscience are; now you know the only secret that I have ever had from you. If I did wrong, judge me mildly, for by all that is sacred I could not have done otherwise."
"And the Prince?" asked her husband, softly.
"He is a good and gentle soul, an immature man, while I was your wife. With him there was no doubt and no struggle."
"I know enough, you earnest, high-minded woman," said the Professor, "I see that, as against your knowledge of life, I can now pack up my books. For of what value is the teaching of books, however good they may be, in comparison to that of life. A foolish student's duel, in which you were the invisible adviser, has done more, perhaps to form your mind, than my prudent words would have done in the course of years. Be of good courage. Lady Ilse of Bielstein; whatever fate may still await us, I know now that you are fitted for inward struggles, and we need not be solicitous about dangers from without. For, however much we human beings may be troubled and agitated here on earth, he who has once learnt to know himself so well that he is able to read the secret writing of other souls, is well protected against the temptations of the world."
What the German scholar said as he now so warmly clasped his wife in his arms was not amiss, only it is a pity that we have no certainty of reading the secrets of other souls; and it is a pity that the greatest knowledge of the secret writing in the souls of others cannot serve us in warding off the storms of our own passions.
The Chamberlain, who now acted as marshal to the Hereditary Prince, was holding a conference with his father upon the concerns of his office. Among other things there was also the question of promoting Krüger, of butter-machine fame, to higher honors and, what was of no less importance, to the full salary due the valet of an Hereditary Prince. Contrary to expectations the Sovereign was ready to agree to his proposals, and the Chamberlain, pleased at the gracious humor of his master, was about to take leave, when the Sovereign stopped him by the kind remark, "Your sister Malwine, looks ill; does she dance too much? You should take care of her delicate health; nothing would be more injurious to such a constitution than an early marriage. I hope to see her pleasant countenance at Court for a long time yet."