"Look you, Herr Geheimrath," Leuthold began after some moments of reflection; "I will be frank with you. You know the dark stain that sullies my past, and the fault of my nature,--ambition. But, for all that, Herr Geheimrath, I am not heartless! In my childhood I was repelled on all sides, just as Ernestine has been. I was always cast in the shade by Hartwich, the son of my wealthy step-mother. You, as a student of human nature, well know what power there is in early surroundings to mould a man's future,--perhaps this may make you more lenient to my faults. Neither affection nor interest was shown me, and so kindly feelings faded away within me,--I could not give what I never received. Thus, Herr Geheimrath, I grew up an embittered, hardened man. The severity and sternness with which I was treated caused me to cultivate a sort of plausibility that won me friends, although I had no qualities to enable me to retain them. Therefore I was accounted a flatterer and a hypocrite. But the worst of all was, I was never taught the nice distinction between honours and honour, and thus it was that, in my blind grasp after honours, I sacrificed my honour!" He covered his eyes with his hand and paused for a moment. Old Heim shook his huge head, vexed with himself for the emotion of sympathy that he could not suppress. "My step-mother," Leuthold continued, "was an imperious, masculine woman, who tyrannized over her husband and made him as unhappy as her son and step-son. You have seen the effect of her training upon Hartwich,--he became a drunkard, sinning in the flesh; I, of a less sensual nature, sinned in spirit!" "Forgive me for interrupting you," Heim interposed here; "but I am constrained to observe that if you had sinned no further than in robbing poor Hilsborn of his discovery, you would indeed have coveted only spiritual things, and there might have been some excuse for you; but you longed for earthly possessions,--you even grasped after the property of the poor child who has been left to your care. Judge for yourself whether such a helpless little creature can be confided without anxiety to the charge of a guardian who has not scrupled to endeavour to possess himself of her inheritance!"