there he felt a piercing pain....

The earth continued to turn light-mindedly around the sun, now
coming nearer to it, now retreating coquettishly, and giving the
impression that it fixed all its attention upon its household friend,
the moon; the days were replaced by other days, and the dark nights
by other dark nights, with such pedantic German punctuality and
correctness that all the artistic natures were compelled to move over
to the far north by degrees, where the devil himself would break his
head endeavouring to distinguish between day and night--when suddenly
something happened to Max.

Somehow it happened that Max became misunderstood. He had calmed
the crowd by his words of wisdom many a time before and had saved
them from mutual destruction but now he was not understood. They
thought that it was he who had shouted "Fire!" With all the
eloquence of which he was capable he assured them that he was
exerting all his efforts for their sake alone; that he himself needed
absolutely nothing, for he was alone, childless; that he was ready to
forget the sad misunderstanding and serve them again with faith and
truth--but all in vain. They would not trust him. And in this
respect Max did not have any special peculiarities, either. The sad
incident ended for Max in a new intermission.

. . . . . . . .

Max was alive, as was positively established by medical experts, who
had made a series of simple tests. Thus, when they pricked a needle
into his foot, he shook his foot and tried to remove the needle. When
they put food before him, he ate it, but he did not walk and did not