"I am very grateful to you," continued the young girl. Then, after hesitating a moment, “But I feel that you have another reason besides obedience to my father, for consenting to come here,-just here to receive M. de Farnow."

She glanced round the room, and looked again at the slight, suffering woman who was her mother, but Madame Oberlé did not hesitate.

"Yes," she answered.

"I knew it. Can you tell me what it is?"

"Presently."

"Before M. de Farnow?" "Yes."

A sudden annoyance transformed Lucienne's face; it became hard. "You surely are not capable, though we do not understand each other very well, of trying to turn away my fiancé from me?"

Two tears shone under Madame Oberle's eyelids. "Oh, Lucienne! No, no, I do not think so."

"Is it something important?" "Yes."

"Something that concerns me?" "No, not you."

The young girl was about to speak, but suddenly grew pale, and listened, turning completely towards the door, while her mother only turned partly in that direction. Some one was coming up the stairs. Wilhelm von Farnow, preceded by the woman in charge, who came no farther than the landing, saw Madame Oberlé through the half opened door, and gathering himself together as if he were on military parade, crossed the room, and bowed first to the mother and then to the daughter, his head held proudly. was in plain clothes, very elegant. He was pale and haggard with agitation. He said very politely in French, "I thank you, madame." Then he looked at Lucienne and in his unsmiling blue eyes was a spark of arrogant

He

joy. The young girl gave him a beaming glance.

Madame Oberlé shuddered with a feeling of dislike that she tried to conceal. She looked steadily into the steel-blue eyes of the young man, who held himself in the same attitude that he would have taken under arms and in the presence of his superior officer.

"You must not thank me, sir. I have no part in what is happening. My husband and my daughter have arranged everything."

He bowed again.

"If I were free I would refuse you for your race, your religion, your army, which are not mine. You see that I speak frankly. I am anxious that you should understand that you owe me nothing, but also that I have no ill will toward you personally. I even believe that you are a good soldier and an estimable man. I believe it so truly that I am going to confide to you an anxiety that tortures me." She hesitated a moment, then continued: "We had a terrible scene at Alsheim, when Count von Kassowitz came into the house"

"Count von Kassowitz related it to me, madame. He even advised me to renounce all pretensions to the hand of your daughter. But I never renounce. To make me renounce I should need to have"-he laughed "I should need to have an order from the Emperor! I am a German, as you say. I do not renounce my conquests so readily. And M. de Kassowitz is only my uncle."

"But what you do not know is, that my father-in-law, for the first time in long years, in his exasperation and in the extremity of his suffering, spoke. He cried out to Jean, 'Go away! Go away! I heard the words. I ran down. Eh bien! monsieur, what distracted me most was not the sight of M. Philippe Oberlé senseless on the floor-it was the expression of my son, the conviction that from that moment he had made up

his mind to obey and to leave Alsace." "Oh," said von Farnow, "that would be very bad!" He glanced at Lucienne, who shook her head with its load of fair hair. "Yes, very bad" said the mother, without understanding in what sense von Farnow had used the words. "What an old age for me, in my divided house, without my daughter whom you are going to take away, without my son who will have left me! Perhaps you wonder why I reveal all these anxieties to you?" He made a vague gesture. "It is for this," continued she more eagerly, "I have no one to help me, no one to advise me in these matters. Understand me. Whom can I go to? My husband? He would fly into a passion, he would set himself to work, he would bring influences to bear, and in a week we should learn that Jean had been sent to some regiment in the North or the East of the Empire. To my brother? He would advise my son to leave Alsace. You see, sir, you are the only person who can do anything."

"But exactly what could I do, madame?"

"You could do several things. Jean has promised me that he will enter his regiment. You could arrange such a welcome for him as would not repel him utterly, you could assure him of your interest, you could find him friends, you could talk to him. You could prevent his giving himself up to his gloomy thoughts, or putting such a plan into action, if it should tempt him again."

The lieutenant, frowning and agitated, changed countenance at these last words. "Madame," he said, "until the first of October you have your son's promise. After that he shall be in my care."

Then, speaking to himself, and seized by an idea which he did not entirely express: "Oh yes, very bad indeed-it must not be."

Lucienne overheard him. "Well, it cannot be helped," said she, "I must betray my brother's secret, but I am sure he will forgive me when he knows I tell it to calm mamma. You can be at rest, mamma; Jean will not leave Alsace."

"And why?"

"He loves someone, he too." "And where?"

"At Alsheim." "Who is it?"

"Odile Bastian."

Madame Oberlé asked, much startled, "Is that true?"

"It is as true as that we are here. He told me all about it."

The mother closed her eyes a moment; her breast heaved, she could hardly breathe. "Thank God! I may have a little hope! Leave me here to weep; I need tears."

She pointed to a room across the hall which had been opened and was lighted by a large bay window across which one saw a tree. Farnow bent his tall form, motioning to Lucienne that he would follow her. And the young girl passed him, crossing the room in which her grandparents had so loved Alsace. Madame Oberlé turned away: seated near the window she leaned her brow against the panes, through which as a child she had watched the sleet, the frost, the sunshine, the rain, the quivering air of summer and all the country of Alsace. "Odile Bastian!" repeated the poor woman. The serene face, the smile, the dress of the girl, the corner of Alsheim where she lived, a whole poem of beauty and moral health rose before the mother's mind, and she clung to it eagerly, jealously, so that she might forget those other loves for which she had come here. "But why did not Jean tell me of this?" she thought, "It would make up for the other. It gives me confidence. Jean will not leave us now that the strongest of all ties attaches him to the country.

Perhaps we shall succeed at last in conquering the obstinacy of my husband. I will make him understand the greatness of the sacrifice Jean and I have made in accepting this German." Sometimes she could hear laughter coming from the other room, all unfurnished except with the two chairs on which sat Lucienne and Farnow beside each other-Lucienne leaning an elbow on the balustrade of the open window, the lieutenant a little behind, looking at her and talking with extraordinary fervor. The laughter wounded Madame Oberlé, but she did not look round. She continued to see in the fugitive blue of the Alsacian landscape the consoling image evoked by Lucienne.

Wilhelm talked, taking advantage of an hour which he guessed would be a brief one to make himself better known to Lucienne. She looked dreamily out over the roofs but in reality she was listening attentively, emphasizing her answers with a pout or a smile.

The German was saying, “You are a glorious conquest. You will reign queen over the officers of my regiment. There is already one Frenchwoman but she was born in Austria, and she is ugly. There is an Italian, and there are Germans and Englishwomen. But you, mademoiselle, you alone have in your sole self all the gifts divided among them, beauty, wit, brilliancy, the German culture and French vivacity. As soon as we are married I will present you at the court of Berlin. How did you ever grow up in Alsheim?"

Her heart was more arrogant than tender, and admiration of this kind pleased her. ·

At this hour M. Ulrich, taking advantage of a trip which M. Joseph Oberlé was obliged to make to Barr, was making his nephew a visit. The day was approaching when Jean must

enter the barracks. It was necessary to tell him of the failure of his mission to M. Bastian. M. Ulrich, having hesitated a long time, finding it harder to destroy a youthful love than to go to war, at last went to his nephew and told him all. They talked for an hour, or rather the uncle delivered a monologue, and tried to console Jean who, before him alone, gave way to bitter tears and anguish.

"Weep if you will, dear child," said M. Ulrich, "at this moment your mother gives her countenance to the first interview between Lucienne and that other. I confess that it is beyond my comprehension. Weep, but do not let yourself be crushed; you must be courageous. Remember in three weeks you will be at the barracks; nobody there must know you weep. Well, the year will pass, and you will be with us again-who knows?"

Jean passed his hand over his eyes and said resolutely, "No, uncle." "What do you mean?"

On this same spot where the two men had talked of the future so happily, the winter before, they were seated now, one on each end of the sofa. Behind them the day was declining, still luminous and warm. On Jean's gloomy face there shone out again the expression of energy which had at first so struck and charmed his uncle. Those forest-colored eyes under their contracted brows, were filled with passing lights, and yet motionless.

"No," repeated Jean. "You must know, and I shall tell one other person, that I do not mean to take my military service here."

"Where then?" "In France."

"What do you say? Are you serious?"

"Nothing could be more serious." "And you will go immediately?"

"No, not till after my entrance into the corps."

M. Ulrich raised his hands, "But you are crazy! Just when it would be most diffcult and dangerous! You have lost your senses."

He began to walk from one extreme of the room to the other. In his agitation he gesticulated violently, but he never forgot to speak softly, so that no one in the house could hear.

"Why do you wait till afterwards? For in fact that was the first idea that came into my mind."

"I did intend to go before I entered the regiment," said the young man calmly, "But mamma guessed something and she made me promise I would enter the barracks. I will enter therefore. Do not try to dissuade me. It is unreasonable, but I promised."

M. Ulrich shrugged his shoulders. "Yes, the question of time is a serious detail, but it is nothing more. The most important thing is the resolution itself. What made you take it? Was it because your grandfather cried out 'Go away!' that you mean to go?"

"No, he thought as I did, that was all."

"Was it my friend Bastian's refusal that decided you?"

"Not even that. If he had consented, I should have been obliged to tell him what I am telling you; I will not live in Germany, nor in Alsace."

"Then was it the marriage of your sister?"

"Yes, if there had been no other reason that would have been enough to drive me away. What sort of a life can I have now at Alsheim? Have you thought of that?"

"But consider, Jean, you are forsaking your post as an Alsacian."

"No I can never do anything for Alsace now. I could never gain the confidence of the Alsacians with my father compromised and my sister married to a Prussian."

"They will say you have deserted." "Let them come and tell me that

when I am with my regiment in France."

"And your mother, are you going to leave her here alone?"

"That is the great objection-the only one. I have considered it. But my mother cannot wish my whole life to be as vainly sacrificed as hers has been. Her second thoughts will approve of me, because I have freed myself from the intolerable yoke that has weighed on her-Yes, she will forgive me. And then" Jean pointed to the green, jagged edge of the Vosges, "And then, there is beloved France. She draws me to her. She spoke to me from the first."

"Child!" said M. Ulrich, stationing himself in front of the young man still seated and almost smiling. "A country must be a noble one, if after thirty years it can inspire a love like yours. What other people would be so regretted! Oh blessed birthright, which still speaks in you."

He was silent for a moment. "But Jean, I cannot leave you ignorant of the difficulties and disillusions that await you. It is my duty. Dear Jean, when you have passed the frontier, when you have claimed the position of a French soldier as the law permits you to do, and finished your year of military service, what will you do then?"

"I will find some way to earn my living."

"Do not be too sure. Do not think that the French will receive you with favor because you are an Alsacian. Perhaps they have forgotten more than we have. At any rate it is like an old debt paid grudgingly, and as late as possible. Do not imagine that they will aid you over there more than anybody else."

His nephew interrupted, "I have decided, whatever may happen. Do not let us talk any more about it."

Then Uncle Ulrich, who had been

longer any right to question Odile. I must go away without knowing whether she suffers with me. But why cannot I see her at home in the quiet of this evening hour when they are all three together. I will not write to her, I will not try to speak to her, but I could see her, I could carry away a last memory, and she would believe that I was worthy of her compassion."

But he hesitated. This evening he felt too full of wretchedness, too weak. Before the first of October there would be other opportunities. A step approached from the direction of the garden. He gazed once more at the long, thin streak of light, piercing the night from the room where Odile sat. And he went away.

It is a familiar but significant fact that in every region of knowledge one fact involves another, one truth another, one aspect of experience or thought another. An isolated fact or truth does not exist. It is always bound by close and often unsuspected ties to other facts and other truths. Nor is this the case within the scope of any specified region of knowledge alone. Every branch of science trenches at some point or other on the subject-matter of other branches; the fundamental scientific assumptions demand and stimulate philosophic investigation: science and philosophy both bear in manifold and important ways on practical life and thought. Thus to the human intellect the known Universe in all its aspects inevitably comes to bear the marks of a vast and systematic whole in which every fact and every truth has its own essential place and function. Our present subject is an illustration in point.

Having in previous essays indicated the importance of Individuality in the Natural Order, its fundamental significance when conjoined with personality, the unique meaning of each ethical individual to God as well as to himself, and the consequent loss to the Eternal Meaning if one such individual

were to lapse from conscious being, we saw that to regard the physical accident of death as even a possible term to ethical individuality appears a manifest absurdity. But in this very recognition, another and darker possibility confronted us: What of ethical failure itself? This we seem to see on all sides of us. How does it affect the worth and significance of ethical individuality?

The answer to this question must obviously depend on what ethical failure really is, and before going further it will be well to ascertain and define this, bearing in mind that in dealing with so vast a subject, within the short compass of a single essay, it is not possible even to indicate all its aspects, and that our considerations must be limited to such as bear on the immediate point at issue.

In the world of practical life ethical failure means primarily failure to fulfil a specified social relationship. Thus a parent who does not fulfil the duties of a parent, a citizen who transgresses the laws of the state, a friend who is false to the claims of friendship, a trader who deliberately breaks the terms of his contract, each and all so far ethically fail. It will be observed, moreover, that the failure, in each