"There is one strange thing about it," he said earnestly, putting a finger
on one little pyramid. "I made it without these, and I felt something was
wrong; I tried many changes, and at last I let these in, and then it was
right. But why was it? They are not beautiful in themselves."

"They relieve the monotony of the smooth leaves, I suppose."

He shook his head as over a weighty matter.

"The sky is monotonous," he said, "when it is blue, and yet it is
beautiful. I have thought of that often; but it is not monotony, and it is
not variety makes beauty. What is it? The sky, and your face, and this
box--the same thing is in them all, only more in the sky and in your face.
But what is it?"

She smiled.

"So you are at your old work still. Why, why, why? What is the reason?
It is enough for me," she said, "if I find out what is beautiful and what
is ugly, what is real and what is not. Why it is there, and over the final
cause of things in general, I don't trouble myself; there must be one, but
what is it to me? If I howl to all eternity I shall never get hold of it;
and if I did I might be no better off. But you Germans are born with an
aptitude for borrowing; you can't help yourselves. You must sniff after
reasons, just as that dog must after a mole. He knows perfectly well he
will never catch it, but he's under the imperative necessity of digging for
it."

"But he might find it."