Transcriber's Note:
1. Page scan source:http://www.archive.org/details/childrenworld00heysgoog
Portrait of Paul Heyse.
THE CHILDREN OF
THE WORLD
BY
PAUL HEYSE
"The children of this world are in their generation wiser than the
children of light."
NEW YORK
WORTHINGTON CO., 747 BROADWAY
1890
Copyright, 1889, By
WORTHINGTON CO.
Barr-Dinwiddie
Printing and Book-Binding Co.,
Jersey City, N. J.
THE CHILDREN OF THE WORLD.
BOOK I.
CHAPTER I.
A few years ago, in the Dorotheen-strasse, in the midst of theLatinQuarter of Berlin, whose quiet, student-like appearance threatens tobecome effaced by the growing elegance of the capital, a small, narrow,unpretending two-story house, stood humbly, as if intimidated, betweenits broad-shouldered neighbors, though every year it received a washingof a delicate pink hue, and recently had even had a new lightning-rodaffixed to its ancient gable roof. The owner, an honest mastershoemaker, had in the course of time accumulated money enough to havecomfortably established himself in a new and far more elegant dwelling,but he had experienced beneath this sharply sloping roof, all theblessings of his life and though a man by no means given to sentimentalweaknesses, he would have thought it base ingratitude to turn his back,without good reason, upon the old witnesses and protectors of hishappiness. He had, at one time or another, laid his head in almostevery corner, from the little attic chamber, where, as a poor dunce ofan apprentice, he had, many a night, been unable to close his eyes onaccount of the pattering raindrops, to the best room on the firststory, where stood his nuptial couch, when, after a long and faithfulapprenticeship, he brought home, as head journeyman, the daughter ofhis dead master. But he was far too economical to permit himself tooccupy these aristocratic quarters longer than six months, preferringto live in the second story, unassuming as it was--the little househaving a front of but three windows--and there, two children had grownup about him. These first-floor apartments were rented to a childlessold couple, to whom the owner would not have given notice to quit onany account; for in the white-haired old man he honored a once famoustenor, whom in his youth, he had heard and admired; while the littlewithered old woman, his wife, had, in her time, been a no lesscelebrated actress. They had already been pensioned twelve years, and,without song or noise of any kind, spent their quiet days in their tinyrooms, adorned with faded laurel-wreaths and pictures of their famouscolleagues. These celebrities, according to the ideas of theproprietor, gave to his little house a certain artistic reputation, andif there were customers in the shop at noon when the old couplereturned from their walk, he never failed to direct attention to themand with boastful assurance to revive the fame of the two forgotten andvery sh