No one was here to blow a warning to the rash one⁠—unless, indeed, Herr Settembrini, with his farewell shout at Hans Castorp’s disappearing back, had been that man. But possessed by valorous desire, our youth had given the call no heed⁠—as little as he had the steps behind him on a certain carnival night. “ Eh, Ingegnere, un po’ di ragione, sa! ” “Yes, yes, pedagogic Satana, with your ragione and your ribellione ,” he thought. “But I’m rather fond of you. You are a windbag and a hand-organ man, to be sure. But you mean well, you mean much better, and more to my mind, than that knife-edged little Jesuit and terrorist, apologist of the Inquisition and the knout, with his round eyeglasses⁠—though he is nearly always right when you and he come to grips over my paltry soul, like God and the Devil in the medieval legends.”