I looked at him in surprise. "Yes," he went on, "you would have to repeat the process on a thousand other occasions, and not even your strength would suffice for such Herculean labor." "Let us try that," I said. "No; let us by no means try that," he answered. "But the whole estate is going to ruin in this way," I cried, still under excitement. Herr von Zehren shrugged his shoulders, and said, "Well, it has not very far to go--two or three steps at the farthest. And now you understand, George, the word is, Things as they are! As for the men, they are no bees in point of industry, but they have this much of bees about them, that when they are meddled with they are very apt to sting. So be a little more cautious in future." He said it with a smile, but I perceived very clearly that he was thoroughly in earnest, and that the paradise I had been planning must be renounced. A paradise in which these brigand-looking malingerers slouched about at their pleasure, presented too glaring a contradiction to escape even my inexperienced eyes. I cannot say that it cost me much to give up my plans of radical reformation. I had chiefly thrown myself into them because I hoped thus to free myself of my load of obligation to my host. If he did not choose to be paid in this way, it was clearly no fault of mine; and when he reiterated to me every day that he wanted nothing of me but myself, that my company was inexpressibly delightful to him, and, so to speak, a godsend, whose value he could not sufficiently prize--how could I help believing assurances that were so flattering to me, and how could I withstand the allurements of a life that so exactly corresponded with my inclinations?