derick. He had always felt drawn to artists. Their conversation, their
camaraderie never failed to exercise a charm over him. Now was added the
fact that here, where he had counted upon a chilly foreignness and
complete isolation, he had been ardently expected, had been welcomed with
open arms by such a circle. In the midst of their merry toasting and
informal dining, informal despite their evening dress, Frederick every
now and then asked himself whether the awful experiences he had gone
through had really occurred. Was he actually in New York, three thousand
miles away from old Europe? Was not this his home? Within the past ten
years in his own country had he ever felt even nearly so comfortable
and at home as here? How life came surging toward him! Each minute a new
wave rolling to his feet--to him who had undeservedly escaped with his
bare existence from almost universal perdition.

"I thank you from the depths of my heart, gentlemen and countrymen," he
said, "for the hospitality you show me. I don't deserve it." He raised
his glass, and they all touched glasses with him. Suddenly, to his own
surprise Frederick expanded in a wave of frankness, calling himself a
shipwrecked man in two senses of the word. "I have gone through much in
my past; and were not the sinking of the _Roland_ so fearfully tragic, I
should feel inclined to look upon it as a symbol of my former life. The
Old World, the New World. I have taken the step across the great pond,
and already feel something like new life within me.

"I don't know just what I shall do." He did not realise he was
contradicting himself. "I shall certainly not practise medicine or take
up my profession as a bacteriologist. Possibly I shall write books.
What sort of books I don't know. One of the things I think of a great
deal is the restoration of the Venus of Milo's body. I have already
completed in my mind a work on Peter Vischer and Adam Krafft. But for all
I know, I may merely write on the use of artificial manure. For I am
thinking of buying some land, felling trees, and living a retired life,
farming and raising cattle. Then again, I may write nothing but a sort of
romance, the romance of a whole life, which may turn out to be something
like a modern philosophy. In that case, I should begin where Schopenhauer
left off. I mean the sentence that is always going around in my head from
_Welt als Wille und Vorstellung_: 'Something lurks behind our existence
which is inacce