Hermann nodded affirmatively.  He was greatly pained.  In lieu of the friend of his youth, for whom he had hoped a brilliant future, here was a poor monomaniac!

“You see,” said Warren, speaking collectedly, like a professor, “if I raise my pendulum till it reaches the point of Moderate Desires and then let it go, it will naturally swing to the point of Slight Troubles, and go no further.  Then it will oscillate for some time in a more and more limited space on the line of Indifference, and finally it will stand still without any jerk on Dead Stop, Absolute Repose.  That is a great consolation!”

He paused, as if waiting for some remark from Hermann; but as the latter remained silent, Warren resumed his demonstration.

“You understand now, I suppose, what I am coming to.  If I raise the pendulum to the point of Ambition or Mania of Greatness, and then let it go, that same law which I have already applied will drive it to Deep Sorrow or Despair.  That is quite clear, is it not?”

“Quite clear,” repeated Hermann sadly.

“Very well,” continued Warren, with perfect gravity; “for my misfortune, I discovered this fine theory rather late.  I had not set bounds to my dreams and limited them to trifles.  I had wished to be President of the Republic, an illustrious savant, the husband of Ellen.  No great things, eh?  What say you to my modesty?  I had raised the pendulum to such a giddy height that when it slipped from my impotent hands it naturally performed a long oscillation, and touched the point Despair.  That was a miserable time.  I hope you have never suffered what I suffered then.  I lived in a perpetual nightmare—­like the stupor at intoxication.”  He paused, as he had done before, and then, with a painfully nervous laugh, be added, “Yes, like intoxication.  I drank.”  Suddenly a spasm seemed to pass over his face, be looked serious and sad as before, and he said, with a shudder, “It’s a terrible thing to see one’s self inwardly, and to know that one is fallen.”

After this he remained long silent.  At last, raising his head, he turned to his friend and said, “Have you had enough of my story, or would you like to hear it to the end?”

“I am grieved at all you have told me,” said Hermann; “but pray go on; it is better I should know all”

“Yes; and I feel, too, that it relieves me to pour out my heart.  Well, I used to drink.  One takes to the horrid habit in America far easier than anywhere else.  I was obliged to give up more than one good situation because I had ceased to be respectable.  Anyhow, I always managed to find employment without any great difficulty.  I never suffered from want, though I have never known plenty.  If I spent too much in drink, I took it out of my dress and my boots.

“Eighteen months after I had left Elmira, I met Ellen one day in Central Park, in New York.  I was aware that she had been married a twelve-month.  She knew me again at once, and spoke to me.  I would have wished to sink into the earth.  I knew that my clothes were shabby, that I looked poor, and I fancied that she must discern on my face the traces of the bad habits I had contracted.  But she did not, or would not, see anything.  She held out her hand, and said in her gentle voice: