In fact, he had been very blind; to-day he must confess it to himself, when he, like Scipio upon the ruins of Carthage, sat upon those of his first love. From want of an appropriate reply, which it is not so easy to find to such disclosures, he contemplated Olga at first with a mournful glance and rather absently, then with increasing interest, for she spoke in such a cordial tone to console him, and the more he looked at her, the more did he discover that she was a handsome girl, not so intellectual as Cäcilie, but certainly more calculated to make an impression upon peoples' minds in Masuren than her sister. These were vague ideas, which were reflected in the most shadowy outlines upon the remotest background of his mind; he would have repelled them energetically had they ventured farther into the light, as unseemly and impious. Nevertheless he had already sinned against well-founded custom of immediately taking up his hat, after such an intimation, and retiring from the scene. Olga chatted so innocently, she led the conversation with such tact to indifferent matters, but these indifferent matters were full of a special interest for Wegen. Olga's heart was not with George Sand and the _père_ Enfantin, even although she must talk about them with Dr. Kuhl, and was fairly at home in the great questions upon which the welfare of mankind depended, had even made a note of several stock-phrases; but when dress, family events, engagements, or the affairs of relations were under discussion, then her whole nature warmed, and she quite forgot that all these subjects were most heterodox, and in part were even opposed to the social programme of the future, by which she had been obliged to swear in Dr. Kuhl's chemical laboratory. She gave Baron von Wegen great pleasure by her unexpected knowledge of all his extensive family; she knew the Wegens of Labiau and the Wegens at Insterburg. She had even once spoken to the old uncle, whose heir he was, and who lived close to the Memel in the Lithuanian woods; she was able to distinguish between first cousins and those who were more distantly connected. She planted the family tree of the Wegens before him with as steady a hand as did Joan of Arc the standard with the lilies of the Valois; and he must indeed be a degenerate nobleman who would not thus be flattered and reminded of home.