"Nobody wonders at that nowadays. Only the envious and spiteful who have no money themselves. But we may as well admit it; what is true of our own small circle is true everywhere. Well-deserving persons are trammelled in their activities. So far and no farther! Wherever we look, we see them chained to the lowest stages. 'Not beyond the boundary we have mapped out for you,' says the Government. 'You want to climb, you are equipped to be brave mountaineers, you lack nothing you need to reach the summit, neither courage, nor endurance, nor strength. Yet remain below, remain below!' The foot-hills reached at the first spurt, mere child's play for their abilities, are the only heights they are allowed to scale. The way is barred, the natural course of their energies repressed. It is frightful that restrictions other than considerations of capacity should hold back the aspirants; that ostracism should be decreed because of a mere chance adherence to a certain faith." "Then Hugo and his friends are not so greatly in the wrong as you sometimes declare?" she asked with tense expectancy in her voice. "No, not in principle, but in their aims. Those are phantoms, fantasies! A dream which foolish boys dream,--and clever women." Rita had followed her parents' conversation, partly in absent revery, partly with alert interest. "No, you can't get rid of it," she said in a soft, reflective voice. "I myself experienced it this evening, when I was speaking with Dr. Weilen. Suddenly we, too, had arrived at the fateful subject." "Well, that settles it. You, too--and he!" Her father kissed her tenderly on her forehead, and added jestingly, "Pray, don't tell Hugo or Henry of this. Good-night, Rita." "Good-night, papa. Good-night, mamma." She respectfully kissed her parents' hands. "Sleep well, dear child," her mother said, also kissing her upon her forehead. * * * * * On the twenty-third of December a company of young men gathered at the house of Hugo Benas, in his roomy, comfortable study on the second floor. They were in the midst of an exciting debate, when Dr. Henry Rosenfeld entered. "Why so late, Henry?" one of the young men called to him. He glanced around at the bright, clear-cut faces. Two decidedly showed the racial type, but in the others the keenest eye could not detect even a slight indication of their origin; they were blonde and blue-eyed, and crowned broad-shouldered figures. Dr. Rosenfeld himself answered this description, and no one would have suspected him to be a Jew. "We have been expecting you this last half-hour. Magnus told us that you would be here at eight o'clock," said Hugo as he drew out his watch. "It is half-past eight now." "I was detained by Professor Lisotakis, in the Oriental Seminar." He placed his note-books and volumes on the table and accepted the ready courtesy of one of his companions, who helped him to remove his overcoat.