Pilgrim brought with him, and laid in the baby's cradle, a huge paper, containing a great number of signatures and illuminated by himself. It was a diploma of the Liederkranz, he said, making the new-comer, in virtue of his unquestionably good voice, an honorary member of that society. "Do you know the sweetest tone in all the world?" asked Lenz,--"the first cry of one's child. Here is something else for you, my son. Take hold; see how he grasps it!" He put into the baby's little hand his father's file, as if for a special consecration; but Annele snatched it away. "The child might kill itself with that sharp edge," she cried, and threw the instrument with such violence to the ground as to break off the point. "There is my precious heirloom broken," said Lenz, sadly. Pilgrim tried to console him, and declared, laughing, that there must ever be new men and new tools in the world. Annele said not a word. CHAPTER XXV. THE PENDULUMS SWING EACH IN ITS OWN DIRECTION, AND THE CORD IS STRAINED ALMOST TO BREAKING. "Come here a minute, Annele, I have something to show you." "I have no time." "Just look; it will amuse you. See, I have set two pendulums on these two clocks swinging different ways; one from right to left, the other from left to right. In a few days they will both swing together, either from right to left or the other way. The force of attraction that they exercise upon each other gradually brings them to an exact correspondence." "I don't believe it." "You will see it with your own eyes, and the same will be the case with us. We began, like the pendulums, to swing in opposite directions; but we shall have, like them, to come into harmony. To be sure, two pendulums never tick precisely together, so as to give but one tone. A Spanish king once went mad, trying to make them." "What do I care for all your mad stories? You, apparently, have time for such nonsense; I have not." In a few days the two pendulums swung together, but the hearts of husband and wife held each its own accustomed motion. There were times when that miracle of the one stroke which no work of human hand could accomplish seemed about to come to pass. But it was only seeming, and made the reality all the harder. Lenz meant to be yielding, but in reality held fast to his old ways. Annele had no intention of making concessions. She knew better than her husband from the start; for had she not had experience in all the ways of the world? Had not men from all countries, old and young, rich and poor, told her from her childhood that her mind was as bright and clear as the day? Annele's character might be concisely, though not perhaps quite accurately, described as superficial. She took life easily, was capable and active, with great fluency of speech, which she abundantly exercised; but when her chat was over she never gave a second thought to what she had said or heard.