s. The water in
the spring, and the living human heart, both contain foreign elements
within themselves, and no one can foretell how a new ingredient may
affect the invisible atoms thus held in solution.

Irma's soul was deeply agitated. Her great power had been exercised and
had sought some act in which to spend itself. She had felt happy in the
possession of the king's friendship and in the thought that she could
furnish so great a mind as his with the congenial companionship he
would otherwise be obliged to forego; but the daily bouquet, trivial
attention as it was, had aroused and offended her. "He isn't my ideal,"
said she to herself, and her heart felt lonely again, as it had been
ever since she was old enough to think.

Although she had been lonely while at the cloister, she had there found
a friend who, if she had little to impart, gratefully accepted all that
Irma could give her. At the court, she felt lonely in spite of her
wanton humors. She was always obliged to be doing something, be it
playing, singing, painting or modeling; anything but this deathlike
solitude. She was suffering the homesickness of the soul.

"Are not all in this world homeless?" she asked herself, and, while
searching her mind for an answer, Gunther had introduced her to his
household.

There, all seemed beautiful and complete. There was a home, and a
mother who showed that she understood a young and ardent life; the
daughters would never suffer as she did. The mother's glance fell upon
her and seemed to say: "I shall understand you and will soothe all
sorrows you may tell me of." But Irma could not complain, nor exclaim:
"Help me!"--and where nothing was required of her, least of all. She
could and must help herself.

Madame Gunther had touched her most tender chord: the memory of her
mother, and, although Irma gently avoided the subject, her pain was so
much the greater.

She wept, but did not know it until a tear dropped on her bosom.

There is so much comfort, so much of real and beautiful seclusion, in a
world which is content with itself, and which, in its work and
education, requires no favors from those above. How happy the lot of a
daughter in such a home, until she, in turn, becomes the head of
another household.

Irma felt humbled. All her pride had left her. Her thoughts were still
in the garden, where the people moved about in careless unconstraint
and where the men, returning from their professional labors, and th