nights' revel he would not even feel weary, and how difficult the women
made it for the handsome, black-bearded fellow to commence his work
early! Did you ever ask yourself why young steeds are not broken in
flowery meadows, but upon sand? Nothing which attracts their attention
and awakens their desires must surround them; but your father's gold
led Hermon, ere the season of apprenticeship was over, into the most
luxuriant clover fields. Honour and respect the handsome, hot-blooded
youth that, nevertheless, he allowed himself to be diverted from work
only a short time and soon resumed it with ardent zeal, at first in
superabundance, and then amid fresh need and privation."

"O Myrtilus," the girl interrupted, "how terribly I suffered in those
days! For the first time the gods made me experience that there are
black clouds, as well as bright sunshine, in the human soul. For weeks
an impassable gulf separated me from my father, with whom I had always
had one heart and soul. But I never saw him as he was then. The first
prize had been awarded to you for your Aphrodite, radiant in marvellous
beauty, and your brow had also been already crowned for your statue of
Alexander, when Hermon stepped forward with his works. They were at the
same time the first which were to show what he believed to be the true
mission of art--a hideous hawker, hide in hand, praising his wares with
open mouth, and the struggling Maenads. Surely you know the horrible
women who throw one another on the ground, tearing and rending with
bestial fury. The spectacle of these fruits of the industry of one dear
to me grieved me also, and I could not understand how you and the others
saw anything to admire in them. And my father! At the sight of these
things the colour faded from his cheeks and lips, and, as if by virtue
of his guardianship he had a right to direct Hermon in the paths of art
also, he forbade his ward to waste any more time in such horrible
scarecrows, and awaken loathing and wrath instead of gratification,