I was a newly fledged
undergraduate then, I had many friends and the future smiled at me. I
was immensely proud of the first down on my upper lip and my little
college cap, and I remember as if it were to-day, the evening when
Fritz, Phil and myself went to hear this opera. We had heard 'Faust'
some years before and were great admirers of Gounod's genius. But
Romeo beat all our expectations. The music roused our wildest
enthusiasm. Now both my friends are dead. Fritz, who was ambitious,
was a private secretary when he died, Phil a medical student; I who
aspired to the position of a minister of state have to content myself
with that of a regimental judge. The years have passed by quickly and
imperceptibly. Of course I have noticed that the lines under my eyes
have grown deeper and that my hair has turned grey at the temples, but
I should never have thought that we had travelled so far on the road
to the grave."
"Yes, my dear, we've grown old; our children could teach us that. And
you must see it in me too, although you don't say anything."
"How can you say that!"
"Oh! I know only too well, my dear," continued the wife, sadly; "I
know that I am beginning to lose my good looks, that my hair is
growing thin, that I shall soon lose my front teeth.
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