n with his son-in-law as he perceived the visitor. Reginchen
cast a hasty glance at her husband, which the latter answered with a
slight shrug of the shoulders, but when a lamp was brought in and the
simple supper placed upon the table, the cheerful mood that usually
reigned in the household soon returned, and even the old gentleman
became more good natured. He told Leah that his wife, who had never
been farther from Berlin than Potsdam or the Mueggelsee, had this time
also obstinately refused to visit her daughter in her own house. She
declared she could not eat anything that was not cooked in Berlin
water, and during the one night she spent at Potsdam, she had been
unable to close her eyes, because there were no good beds out of
Berlin. "What's to be done, dear Frau Doctorin? Women are women. I
tried to conquer her by rousing her jealousy, and threatened to
persuade the Frau Professorin, I mean Madame Koenig, your step-mother,
to come with me, as your father unfortunately cannot stir from home on
account of his gout. She knows I think your mother a very beautiful
lady, in spite of her forty-five years, and we're always joking
together. But she also knew very well, that it was only a joke, for
that young couple--your parents I mean--can't be so easily separated.
They gave me the kindest messages for you, and asked why you didn't
come to Berlin. After all, you owe it to your parents to do so, and you
might be so comfortable in their new house."

"A teacher of mathematics, who has learned how to calculate and has
opportunities in abundance for doing so, doesn't find it as easy to
travel, as a house-owner in the capital," replied Leah with a faint
blush. "Besides Edwin needs his vacations to regain his strength, and
Berlin, as he always says, is a great human mill, where one is ground
to powder in a fortnight."

"Why, he lived there more than fourteen years, and was always well,"
said the old man. "'But every one to his taste.'" He, for instance,
could not endure to stay six months in such a little place as this
town, where his children lived. He should feel like a great pike that
had wandered into stagnant water and could not find its way back to the
flowing river again. "The future, dear Frau Doctorin," he continued,
"belongs to the great cities; smaller ones are dying out. I shall not
live to see the day--but you and my children may perhaps do so, at any
rate the little ones sleeping yonder--when Germany will have no