when the other half of the soul strives to awaken.

Be it because his professional duties gave him no time or
opportunity for courtship, or for some other reason, Fritz Bagger
remained a bachelor; and a bachelor with the income of his
profession is looked upon as a rich man. Counsellor Bagger would,
when business allowed, enter into social life, treating it in that
elegant, independent, almost poetic manner, which in most cases is
denied to married men, and which is one reason why they press the
hand of a bachelor with a sigh, a mixture of envy, admiration, and
compassion. If we add here that a bachelor with such a
professional income is the possible stepping-stone to an
advantageous marriage, it is easily seen that Fritz Bagger was
much sought for in company. He went, too, into it as often as
allowed by his legal duties, from which he would hasten in the
black "swallow-tail" to a dinner or soiree, and often amused
himself where most others were weary; because conversation about
anything whatever with the cultivated was to him a refreshment,
and because he brought with him a good appetite and good humor,
resting upon conscientious work. He could show interest in divers
trifles, because in their nothingness (quite contrary to the
trifles in which half an hour previous, with painful interest, he
had ferreted out crime), they appeared to him as belonging to an
innocent, childish world; and if conversation approached more
earnest things, he spoke freely, and evidently gave himself quite
up to the subject, letting the whole surface of his soul flow out.
And this procured him friendship and reputation.

In this way, then, six years had slipped by, when Counsellor
Bagger, or rather Fritz Bagger as we will call him, in remembrance