"If I only could!" she cried, with sparkling eyes; "if I only could!" "You must not!" he said angrily, and seized her hands. "Bethink yourself; a man can assert himself, isolate himself upon the stage as elsewhere, a woman never; she loses her identity, degrades herself----" "There is no reason why she should do so," Johanna exclaimed, clasping tightly the hands which she had withdrawn from his grasp. "The inspiration which animates and strengthens a man can exalt a woman also above all petty, low considerations. I have been here more than a year, and have kept my eyes open. I have seen what has been mean and paltry, nay, disgusting, but never in my father, never! He is not only great in his art, he is a man great and complete as only an artist can be." Ludwig changed colour. "Do you really mean this, Johanna?" he asked. "Is it only in an artist that you can find a 'complete' man? Think what you are saying." "Yes, yes; I mean it!" she cried passionately, and her cheeks glowed. She seemed transformed. "Then I have nothing more to say," said Ludwig, as he arose. Then first Johanna was conscious of what she had done. "Oh, do not go!" she cried, confronting him. "I cannot let you go so. You did not understand me; I only meant----" "I not understand you, child?" said Ludwig, controlling himself. "I might deceive myself while I was absent from you; but now that we are together, I see into your heart just as I always did." "No, no; you do not see clearly. You do not understand me. You are offended----" "Hush, hush!" Ludwig interrupted her, leading her to her seat again. "Come, sit down, and listen to me. Why should I be offended? We all embody for ourselves an ideal of beauty and dignity. I have done the same. Shall I tell you how?" She only nodded an assent. There was something in his manner that confused her. "My ideal," he began, taking a seat opposite her,--"a woman, of course,--was a gay, simple-hearted creature, looking out upon life with clear, truthful eyes; not exacting much, but always ready to do her best, interested in all that was good, beautiful, and great, but with a keen sympathy for the poor and unfortunate, never neglectful of the daily tasks of life, but consecrating, as it were, the meanest among them by her performance of it, and surrounded as by a purer ether, diffusing harmony and content wherever she might be." "Your mother!" Johanna said, when he paused. "My mother," he repeated, with a sudden smile that wonderfully transfigured his set, determined face. And the earnest look that he turned upon Johanna was a strange mixture of gentleness, entreaty, and menace. "My mother," he repeated. "Yes, and one other who was like her; one who I believed for years would exactly resemble her. It was an illusion; it is past."