“Thanks, good Friend!” cried the brigand. And taking advantage of his enemy’s surprise, he sprang upon the back of his bear, who slowly descended the stairs backwards, still keeping his threatening front turned upon his master’s foes. Soon, recovering from their first astonishment, they beheld the bear, carrying the brigand beyond their reach, descend into the abyss, probably in the same way that he ascended, by clinging to the trunks of trees and to projecting rocks. They tried to roll great bowlders down upon him; but before they could detach a single one of those ancient granite fragments which had slumbered there so long, the brigand and his strange steed had vanished in a cave. XXVI. No, no, laugh no more. Look you, that which I thought so humorous has its serious side as well, a very serious side, like everything in this world! Believe me, that word, chance, is blasphemy; nothing beneath the sun is the work of chance; and do you not see herein the purpose marked out by Providence!--LESSING: _Emilia Galotti_. Yes, a deep design often lies at the root of what men call chance. There seems to be a mysterious hand which marks the cause and purpose of events. We inveigh against fickle fortune, against the strange accidents of our lot, and lo! chaos is made clear by a fearful flash of lightning or a marvellous beam of light, and human wisdom is humbled by the great lessons of fate. If, for instance, when Frederic d’Ahlefeld displayed his magnificent attire, his foolish complacency, and his presumptuous pride, in some sumptuous apartment, to the ladies of Copenhagen; if some man, endowed with the gift of second sight, had troubled his frivolous thoughts by gloomy revelations; if he had told him that one day the brilliant uniform of which he boasted should cause his death; that a monster in human shape should drink his blood as greedily as he, careless epicure that he was, drank the wines of France and Bohemia; that the locks upon which he could not lavish too many essences and perfumes should sweep the dust of a cave haunted by wild beasts; that the arm which he so gracefully offered to the fair ladies of Charlottenburg should be flung to a bear like a half-gnawed chicken-bone,--how would Frederic have answered these dismal prophecies? With a laugh and a pirouette; and, more frightful still, most sensible men would have applauded his reckless conduct.