pilgrimage to the monument which he may erect for himself, somewhere between earth and heaven! Perhaps,--oh, father--father, look out for some other name, or the very peddlers and street boys who have seen the effigy of your worthy son exhibited in the market-place at Leipsic will point at you with the finger of scorn! OLD M. And thou, too, my Francis, thou too? Oh, my children, how unerringly your shafts are levelled at my heart. FRANCIS. You see that I too have a spirit; but my spirit bears the sting of a scorpion. And then it was "the dry commonplace, the cold, the wooden Francis," and all the pretty little epithets which the contrast between us suggested to your fatherly affection, when he was sitting on your knee, or playfully patting your cheeks? "He would die, forsooth, within the boundaries of his own domain, moulder away, and soon be forgotten;" while the fame of this universal genius would spread from pole to pole! Ah! the cold, dull, wooden Francis thanks thee, heaven, with uplifted hands, that he bears no resemblance to his brother. OLD M. Forgive me, my child! Reproach not thy unhappy father, whose fondest hopes have proved visionary. The merciful God who, through Charles, has sent these tears, will, through thee, my Francis, wipe them from my eyes! FRANCIS. Yes, father, we will wipe them from your eyes. Your Francis will devote--his life to prolong yours. (Taking his hand with affected tenderness.) Your life is the oracle which I will especially consult on every undertaking--the mirror in which I will contemplate everything. No duty so sacred but I am ready to violate it for the preservation of your precious days. You believe me? OLD M. Great are the duties which devolve on thee, my son--Heaven bless thee for what thou has been, and wilt be to me. FRANCIS. Now tell me frankly, father. Should you not be a happy man, were you not obliged to call this son your own? OLD M. In mercy, spare me! When the nurse first placed him in my arms, I held him up to Heaven and exclaimed, "Am I not truly blest?" FRANCIS. So you said then. Now, have you found it so? You may envy the meanest peasant on your estate in this, that he is not the father of such a son. So long as you call him yours you are wretched. Your misery will grow with his years--it will lay you in your grave. OLD M. Oh! he has already reduced me to the decrepitude of fourscore. FRANCIS. Well, then--suppose you were to disown this son. OLD M. (startled). Francis! Francis! what hast thou said!