period which, though not very remote, we seem to have left far
behind us--a time when young men still believed in eternal
friendship, and could feel enthusiasm for great deeds or great
ideas. Youth in the present day is, or thinks itself, more rational.
Hermann and Warren in those days were simple-minded and ingenuous;
and not only in the moment of elation, when they had sworn to be
friends for ever, but even the next day, and the day after that, in
sober earnestness, they had vowed that nothing should separate them,
and that they would remain united through life. The delusion had not
lasted long. The pitiless machinery of life had caught up the young
men as soon as they left the university, and had thrown one to the
right, the other to the left. For a few months they had exchanged
long and frequent letters; then they had met once, and finally they
had parted, each going his way. Their letters had become more
scarce, more brief, and at last had ceased altogether. It would
really seem that the fact of having interests in common is the one
thing sufficiently powerful to prolong and keep up the life of
epistolary relations. A man may feel great affection for an absent
friend, and yet not find time to write him ten lines, while he will
willingly expend daily many hours on a stranger from whom he expects
something. None the less he may be a true and honest friend. Man is
naturally selfish; the instinct of self-preservation requires it of
him. Provided he be not wicked, and that he show himself ready to
serve his neighbor--after himself--no one has a right to complain,
or to accuse him of hard-heartedness.

At the time this story begins, Hermann had even forgotten whether he
had written to Warren last, or whether he had left his friend's last
letter unanswered. In a word, the correspondence which began so
enthusiastically had entirely ceased. Hermann inhabited a large