"Yes. In it I shall counsel the creation of the Fourth Party, I shall declare that the Progressists do not represent the People at all, that their pretensions are as impertinent as their threats are hollow, that there is no People behind them. It will be a thunderbolt! Like Luther's nailing his theses to the church-door at Wittenberg. And to the real masses themselves I shall declare: 'You are the rock on which the Church of the Present is to be built. Steep yourselves in the thought of this, your mission. The vices of the oppressed, the idle indifference of the thoughtless, and even the harmless frivolity of the unimportant no longer become you.' And I shall teach them how to exact from the State the capital for co-operative associations that will oust the capitalist." "And make them capitalists themselves?" "That is what Rodbertus and Marx object. But you must give the working-man something definite, you must educate him gradually." "Put that second if you will, but Universal Suffrage must be first." "Naturally. It will be the instrument to force the second." "It will be the instrument to force you to the front. Bismarck will appear the mere tool of your will. Who knows but that the King himself may be a pawn on your board!" Lassalle seized her hands. "There I recognize my soul's mate." "And I recognize the voice of the von Bulows," she said, with a half-sob in her laughter, as she drew back. The lunch was brilliant, blending the delicate perfume of aristocracy with free-and-easy Bohemianism, and enhanced by the artistic background of pictures, bric-à-brac, and marble facsimiles of the masterpieces of statuary, including the Venus of Milo and the Apollo Belvedere. The Countess stayed only long enough to smoke a couple of cigarettes, but the other guests were much longer in shaking off the fascination of Lassalle's boyish spirits and delightful encyclopædic monologues. When the last guest was gone, Lassalle betook himself to the best florist in Berlin, composing a birthday poem on the way. At the shop he wrote it down, and, signing it "F.L.," placed it in the most beautiful basket of flowers he could find. The direction was Fräulein Helene von Dönniges. VII