ect blank in which there was room for other
people's misfortunes.

It was impossible not to remark how Czipra became attached to him in her
simplicity. She had a feeling which she had never felt before, a feeling
of shame, if some impudent jest was made at her expense by one of
Topandy's guests, in the presence of Lorand.

Once, when Topandy and Lorand were amusing themselves at greater length
with optical experiments in the lonely scientific apartment, Lorand took
the liberty of introducing the subject.

"Is it true that that girl has grown up without any knowledge whatever?"

"Surely; she knows neither God nor alphabet."

"Why don't you allow the poor child to learn to know them?"

"What, her alphabet? Because in my eyes it is quite superfluous. A mad
idea once occurred to me of picking some naked gypsy child out of the
streets, with the intention of making a happy being therefrom. What is
happiness in the world? Ease and ignorance. Had I a child of my own, I
should do the same with it. The secret of life is to have a good
appetite, sound sleep, and a good heart. If I reflect what bitternesses
have been my lot my whole life, I find the cause of each one was what I
have learned. Many a night did I lie awake in agonized distraction,
while my servants were snoring in peace. I desired to see before me a
person as happy as it was my ideal to be; a person free from those
distressing tortures, which the civilized world has discovered for the
persecution of man by man. Well, I have begun by telling you why I did
not teach Czipra her alphabet."

"And God?"

Topandy took his eyes off the telescope, with which he had just been
gazing at the starry sky.

"I don't know Him myself."

Lorand turned from him with a distressed air. Topandy remarked it.

"My dear boy, my dear twenty-year-old child, probably you know more than
I do; if you know Him, I beg you to teach me."

Lorand shrugged his shoulders, then began to discuss scientific
subjects.

"Does Dollond's telescope show stars in the Milky Way?"

"Yes, a million twinkling stars o'erspread the Milky Way, each several
star a sun."

"Does it dissipate the mist in the head of the Northern Hound?"

"The mist remains as it was before--a round cloudy mass with a ring of
mist around it."

"Perhaps Gregory's telescope, just arrived from Vienna, magnifies
better?"

"Bring it here. Since its arrival there has been no clear weather, to
enable us to make experiments wi