"That is a very wise remark of yours, my respected friend; but it can't be helped; on account of just such absurdities the most sensible men have lost their lives and whole nations their blood and treasure. To be sure, there must be wars, else how would the battle-painters live? However, you know my sentiments on that subject. Considering the present system of artillery battles and rapid firing, you may be sure it isn't for the sake of art that I am going." "You going to the war? You don't know what you are talking about, Rosenbusch! You a warrior and hero? That is undoubtedly your second item of news, the comic one, I mean." "You are again mistaken, and of course to my disadvantage, my dear patroness. The second item has nothing whatever to do with the first; on the contrary, if we must regard the first as a public calamity, we can call the second a joyful private occurrence: Fraeulein Nanny and Herr Franz Xavier Kiederhuber are announced as engaged; the wedding is to take place in three weeks." His face had not lost its indifferent expression while he spoke these words, but yet there was something about his voice as if everything were not yet quite right. "My dear friend," she said, at last. "I have been so little _au courant_ of your affairs of the heart for the last few months, that I really do not know whether I ought to congratulate you or to assure you of my silent sympathy, I must tell you frankly, though, that of all your lovesick moods I never could understand this passion of yours for that insignificant, coquettish, and not particularly attractive little doll--" (Even now, when the faithless one had ceased to be dangerous, Angelica's jealousy vented itself in this harsh criticism.) "And now for your grief at having found out such a little hypocrite to drive you into the jaws of a park of artillery, belching forth death and destruction--" "It isn't that at all," he interrupted, with a heavy sigh. "It isn't any sardonic mood that makes me think this vengeance of fate absurd. For all I care she may make her brewer's son happy, and prefer his beer and brewery horses to my oil and chargers. That unfortunate love of mine has long ceased to be anything but a spectre, a mere phantom, as is shown most clearly by the verses I have composed about it. Elfinger told me to my face long ago: 'You don't love her at all; the stronger the love, the weaker the love poems, and yours are unusually good this time!' Nevertheless, Angelica, you are not altogether wrong in supposing that I am going off to the war on account of an unhappy passion. It is the same hopeless affection that has robbed me of my usual good spirits for some time past. But what's the odds? The powder that is to remedy this folly has been invented at last!" "_Another_ unhappy love affair? Oh, you wretch! I could almost take sides with the beautiful Nanny; she must have found out what a butterfly with blue-velvet wings was fluttering around her!"