“It may be,” answered Registrator Heerbrand, “but, I must confess, I am quite downcast in spirit; the whole night through there was such a piping and organing.”

“That was I,” said the Conrector, “for I snore loud.”

“Well, maybe,” answered the Registrator; “but Conrector, Conrector!  Ah, not without cause did I wish to raise some cheerfulness among us last night—­But that Anselmus has spoiled all!  You know not—­O Conrector, Conrector!” And with this, Registrator Heerbrand started up, plucked the cloth from his head, embraced the Conrector, warmly pressed his hand, and again cried, in quite heart-breaking tones:  “O Conrector, Conrector!” and, snatching his hat and staff, rushed out of doors.

“This Anselmus comes not over my threshold again,” said Conrector Paulmann; “for I see very well that, with this obdurate madness of his, he robs the best people of their senses.  The Registrator is now over with it too; I have hitherto kept safe; but the Devil, who knocked hard last night in our carousal, may get in at last and play his tricks with me.  So Apage, Satanas!  Off with thee, Anselmus!” Veronica had grown quite pensive; she spoke no word; only smiled now and then very oddly, and liked best to be alone.  “Also of her distress Anselmus is the cause,” said the Conrector, full of malice; “but it is well that he does not show himself here; I know he fears me, this Anselmus, and so he never comes.”

These concluding words Conrector Paulmann spoke aloud; then the tears rushed into Veronica’s eyes, and she said, sobbing:  “Ah! how can Anselmus come?  He has long been corked up in the glass bottle.”

“How?  What?” cried Conrector Paulmann.  “Ah Heaven!  Ah Heaven! she is doting too, like the Registrator; the loud fit will soon come!  Ah, thou cursed, abominable, thrice-cursed Anselmus!” He ran forth directly to Doctor Eckstein, who smiled, and again said:  “Ey!  Ey!” This time, however, he prescribed nothing; but added, to the little he had uttered, the following words, as he walked away:  “Nerves!  Come round of itself.  Take the air; walks; amusements; theatre; playing Sonntagskind, Schwestern von Prag.  Come round of itself.”

“So eloquent I have seldom seen the Doctor,” thought Conrector Paulmann; “really talkative, I declare!”

Several days and weeks and months were gone; Anselmus had vanished; but Registrator Heerbrand also did not make his appearance—­not till the fourth of February, when the Registrator, in a new fashionable coat of the finest cloth, in shoes and silk stockings, notwithstanding the keen frost, and with a large nosegay of fresh flowers in his hand, did enter precisely at noon into the parlor of Conrector Paulmann, who wondered not a little to see his friend so dizened.  With a solemn air, Registrator Heerbrand stepped forward to Conrector Paulmann; embraced him with the finest elegance, and then said:  “Now at last, on the Saint’s-day of your beloved and most honored