Produced by Stan Goodman and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team





  VOLUME XII



  GUSTAV FREYTAG
  THEODOR FONTANE



  [Illustration: FREDERICK THE GREAT PLAYING THE FLUTE
  _From the Painting by Adolph von Menzel_]




  THE GERMAN CLASSICS
  OF
  THE NINETEENTH AND
  TWENTIETH CENTURY


  Masterpieces of German Literature
  TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH



  EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
  KUNO FRANCKE, PH.D., LL.D., LITT.D.
  Professor of the History of German Culture,
  Emeritus, and Honorary Curator of the Germanic Museum,
  Harvard University


  ASSISTANT EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
  WILLIAM GUILD HOWARD, A.M.
  Professor of German, Harvard University


  In Twenty Volumes Illustrated



  ALBANY, N.Y.
  J.B. LYON COMPANY
  PUBLISHERS
  Copyright 1914






CONTRIBUTORS AND TRANSLATORS



VOLUME XII


Special Writers


ERNEST F. HENDERSON, Ph.D., L.H.D., Author of _The History of Germany
in the Middle Ages; Short History of Germany_, etc.: The Life of
Gustav Freytag.


WILLIAM A. COOPER, A.M., Associate Professor of German, Leland
Stanford Junior University: The Life of Theodor Fontane.


Translators

ERNEST F. HENDERSON, Ph.D., L.H.D., Author of _The History of Germany
in the Middle Ages; Short History of Germany_, etc.: The Journalists.

WILLIAM A. COOPER, A.M., Associate Professor of German, Leland
Stanford Junior University: Effi Briest; Extracts from "My Childhood
Days."

E.H. BABBITT, A.B., Assistant Professor of German, Tufts College:
Doctor Luther; Frederick the Great.

MARGARETE MÜNSTERBERG:

Sir Ribbeck of Ribbeck; The Bridge by the Tay.





CONTENTS OF VOLUME XII


  GUSTAV FREYTAG

  The Life of Gustav Freytag. By Ernest F. Henderson

  The Journalists. Translated by Ernest F. Henderson

  Doctor Luther. Translated by E.H. Babbitt

  Frederick the Great. Translated by E.H. Babbitt


  THEODOR FONTANE

  The Life of Theodor Fontane. By William A. Cooper

  Effi Briest. Translated by William A. Cooper

  Extracts from "My Childhood Days." Translated by William A. Cooper

  Sir Ribbeck of Ribbeck. Translated by Margarete Münsterberg

  The Bridge by the Tay. Translated by Margarete Münsterberg




ILLUSTRATIONS--VOLUME XII

Frederick the Great Playing the Flute.
  By Adolph von Menzel. _Frontispiece_

Gustav Freytag. By Stauffer-Bern

At the Concert. By Adolph von Menzel

Nature Enthusiasts. By Adolph von Menzel

On the Terrace. By Adolph von Menzel

In the Beergarden. By Adolph von Menzel

Lunch Buffet at Kissingen. By Adolph von Menzel

Luther Monument at Worms. By Ernst Rietschel

Frederick William I Inspecting a School. By Adolph von Menzel

Court Ball at Rheinsberg. By Adolph von Menzel

Frederick the Great and His Round Table. By Adolph von Menzel

Frederick the Great on a Pleasure Trip. By Adolph von Menzel

Theodor Fontane. By Hanns Fechner

Fontane Monument at Neu-Ruppin

A Sunday in the Garden of the Tuileries. By Adolph von Menzel

Divine Service in the Woods at Kösen. By Adolph von Menzel

A Street Scene at Paris. By Adolph von Menzel

Procession at Gastein. By Adolph von Menzel

High Altar at Salzburg. By Adolph von Menzel

Bathing Boys. By Adolph von Menzel

Frau von Schleinitz "At Home." By Adolph von Menzel

Supper at a Court Ball. By Adolph von Menzel





EDITOR'S NOTE

This volume, containing representative works by two of the foremost
realists of midcentury German literature, Freytag and Fontane, brings,
as an artistic parallel, selections from the work of the greatest
realist of midcentury German painting: Adolph von Menzel.

KUNO FRANCKE.





THE LIFE OF GUSTAV FREYTAG


By ERNEST F. HENDERSON, PH.D., L.H.D.

Author of _A History of Germany in the Middle Ages; A Short History of
Germany, etc._


It is difficult to assign to Gustav Freytag his exact niche in the
hall of fame, because of his many-sidedness. He wrote one novel of
which the statement has been made by an eminent French critic that no
book in the German language, with the exception of the Bible, has
enjoyed in its day so wide a circulation; he wrote one comedy which
for years was more frequently played than any other on the German
stage; he wrote a series of historical sketches--_Pictures of the
German Past_ he calls them--which hold a unique place in German
literature, being as charming in style as they are sound in
scholarship. Add to these a work on the principles of dramatic
criticism that is referred to with respect by the very latest writers
on the subject, an important biography, a second very successful
novel, and a series of six historical romances that vary in interest,
indeed, but that are a noble monument to his own nation and that,
alone, would have made him famous.

As a novelist Freytag is often compared with Charles Dickens, largely
on account of the humor that so frequently breaks forth from his
pages. It is a different kind of humor, not so obstreperous, not so
exaggerated, but it helps to lighten the whole in much the same way.
One moment it is an incongruous simile, at another a bit of sly
satire; now infinitely small things are spoken of as though they were
great, and again we have the reverse.

It is in his famous comedy, _The Journalists_, which appeared in 1853,
that Freytag displays his humor to its best advantage. Some of the
situations themselves, without being farcical, are exceedingly
amusing, as when the Colonel, five minutes after declaiming against
the ambition of journalists and politicians, and enumerating the
different forms under which it is concealed, lets his own ambition run
away with him and is won by the very same arts he has just been
denouncing. Again, Bolz's capture of the wine-merchant Piepenbrink at
the ball given under the auspices of the rival party is very cleverly
described indeed. There is a difference of opinion as to whether or
not Bolz was inventing the whole dramatic story of his rescue by
Oldendorf, but there can be no difference of opinion as to the
comicality of the scene that follows, where, under the very eyes of
his rivals and with the consent of the husband, Bolz prepares to kiss
Mrs. Piepenbrink. The play abounds with curious little bits of satire,
quaint similes and unexpected exaggerations. "There is so much that
happens," says Bolz in his editorial capacity, "and so tremendously
much that does not happen, that an honest reporter should never be at
a loss for novelties." Playing dominoes with polar bears, teaching
seals the rudiments of journalism, waking up as an owl with tufts of
feathers for ears and a mouse in one's beak, are essentially
Freytagian conceptions; and no one else could so well have expressed
Bolz's indifference to further surprises--they may tell him if they
will that some one has left a hundred millions for the purpose of
painting all negroes white, or of making Africa four-cornered; but he,
Bolz, has reached a state of mind where he will accept as truth
anything and everything.

Freytag's greatest novel, entitled _Soll und Haben_ (the technical
commercial terms for "debit" and "credit"), appeared in 1856. _Dombey
and Son_ by Dickens had been published a few years before and is worth
our attention for a moment because of a similarity of theme in the two
works. In both, the hero is born of the people, but comes in contact
with the aristocracy not altogether to his own advantage; in both,
looming in the background of the story, is the great mercantile house
with its vast and mysterious transactions. The writer of this short
article does not hesitate to place _Debit and Credit_ far ahead of
_Dombey and Son_. That does not mean that there are not single
episodes, and occasionally a character, in _Dombey and Son_ that the
German author could never have achieved. But, considered as an
artistic whole, the English novel is so disjointed and uneven that the
interest often flags and almost dies, while many of the characters are
as grotesque and wooden as so many jumping-jacks. In Freytag's work,
on the other hand, the different parts are firmly knitted together; an
ethical purpose runs through the whole, and there is a careful
subordination of the individual characters to the general plan of the
whole structure. It is much the same contrast as that between an
old-fashioned Italian opera and a modern German tone-drama. In the one
case the effects are made through senseless repetition and through
_tours de force_ of the voice; in the other there is a steady
progression in dramatic intensity, link joining link without a gap.

But to say that _Debit and Credit_ is a finer book than _Dombey and
Son_ is not to claim that Freytag, all in all, is a greater novelist
than Dickens. The man of a single fine book would have to be
superlatively great to equal one who could show such fertility in
creation of characters or produce such masterpieces of description.
Dickens reaches heights of passion to which Freytag could never
aspire; in fact the latter's temperament strikes one as rather a cool
one. Even Spielhagen, far inferior to him in many regards, could
thrill where Freytag merely interests.

Freytag's _forte_ lay in fidelity of depiction, in the power to
ascertain and utilize essential facts. It would not be fair to say
that he had little imagination, for in the parts of _The Ancestors_
that have to do with remote times, times of which our whole knowledge
is gained from a few paragraphs in old chronicles and where the
scenes and incidents have to be invented, he is at his best. But one
of his great merits lies in his evident familiarity with the
localities mentioned in the pages as well as with the social
environment of his personages. The house of T.D. Schröter in _Debit
and Credit_ had its prototype in the house of Molinari in Breslau, and
at the Molinaris Freytag was a frequent visitor. Indeed in the company
of the head of the firm he even undertook just such a journey to the
Polish provinces in troubled times as he makes Anton take with
Schröter. Again, the life in the newspaper office, so amusingly
depicted in _The Journalists_, was out of the fulness of his own
experience as editor of a political sheet. A hundred little natural
touches thus add to the realism of the whole and make the figures, as
a German critic says, "stand out like marble statues against a hedge
of yew." The reproach has been made that many of Freytag's characters
are too much alike. He has distinct types which repeat themselves both
in the novels and in the plays. George Saalfeld in _Valentine_, for
instance, is strikingly like Bolz in _The Journalists_ or Fink in
_Debit and Credit_. Freytag's answer to such objections was that an
author, like any other artist, must work from models, which he is not
obliged constantly to change. The feeling for the solidarity of the
arts was very strong with him. He practically abandoned writing for
the stage just after achieving his most noted success and merely for
the reason that in poetic narration, as he called it, he saw the
possibility of being still more dramatic. He felt hampered by the
restrictions which the necessarily limited length of an evening's
performance placed upon him, and wished more time and space for the
explanation of motives and the development of his plot. In his novel,
then, he clung to exactly the same arrangement of his theme as in his
drama--its initial presentation, the intensification of the interest,
the climax, the revulsion, the catastrophe. Again, in the matter of
contrast he deliberately followed the lead of the painter who knows
which colors are complementary and also which ones will clash.

[Illustration: GUSTAV FREYTAG. STAUFFER-BERN]

What, now, are some of the special qualities that have made
Freytag's literary work so enduring, so dear to the Teuton heart, so
successful in every sense of the word? For one thing, there are a
clearness, conciseness and elegance of style, joined to a sort of
musical rhythm, that hold one captive from the beginning. So evident
is his meaning in every sentence that his pages suffer less by
translation than is the case with almost any other author.

Freytag's highly polished sentences seem perfectly spontaneous, though
we know that he went through a long period of rigid training before
achieving success. "For five years," he himself writes, "I had pursued
the secret of dramatic style; like the child in the fairy-tale I had
sought it from the Sun, the Moon, and the Stars. At length I had found
it: my soul could create securely and comfortably after the manner
which the stage itself demanded." He had found it, we are given to
understand, in part through the study of the French dramatists of his
own day of whom Scribe was one just then in vogue. From them, says a
critic, he learned "lightness of touch, brevity, conciseness,
directness, the use of little traits as a means of giving insight into
character, different ways of keeping the interest at the proper point
of tension, and a thousand little devices for clearing the stage of
superfluous figures or making needed ones appear at the crucial
moment." Among his tricks of style, if we may call them so, are
inversion and elision; by the one he puts the emphasis just where he
wishes, by the other he hastens the action without sacrificing the
meaning. Another of his weapons is contrast--grave and gay, high and
low succeed each other rapidly, while vice and virtue follow suit.

No writer ever trained himself for his work more consciously and
consistently. He experimented with each play, watched its effect on
his audiences, asked himself seriously whether their apparent want of
interest in this or that portion was due to some defect in his work or
to their own obtuseness. He had failures, but remarkably few, and they
did not discourage him; nor did momentary success in one field
prevent him from abandoning it for another in which he hoped to
accomplish greater things. He is his own severest critic, and in his
autobiography speaks of certain productions as worthless which are
only relatively wanting in merit.

Freytag's orderly treatment of his themes affords constant pleasure to
the reader. He proceeds as steadily toward his climax as the builder
does toward the highest point of his roof. He had learned much about
climaxes, so he tells us himself, from Walter Scott, who was the first
to see the importance of a great final or concluding effect.

We have touched as yet merely on externals. Elegance of style,
orderliness of arrangement, consecutiveness of thought alone would
never have given Freytag his place in German literature. All these had
first to be consecrated to the service of a great idea. That idea as
expressed in _Debit and Credit_ is that the hope of the German nation
rests in its steady commercial or working class. He shows the dignity,
yes, the poetry of labor. The nation had failed to secure the needed
political reforms, to the bitter disappointment of numerous patriots;
Freytag's mission was to teach that there were other things worth
while besides these constitutional liberties of which men had so long
dreamed and for which they had so long struggled.

Incidentally he holds the decadent noble up to scorn, and shows how he
still clings to his old pretensions while their very basis is
crumbling under him. It is a new and active life that Freytag
advocates, one of toil and of routine, but one that in the end will
give the highest satisfaction. Such ideas were products of the
revolution of 1848, and they found the ground prepared for them by
that upheaval. Freytag, as Fichte had done in 1807 and 1808,
inaugurated a campaign of education which was to prove enormously
successful. A French critic writes of _Debit and Credit_ that it was
"the breviary in which a whole generation of Germans learned to read
and to think," while an English translator (three translations of the
book appeared in England in the same year) calls it the _Uncle Tom's
Cabin_ of the German workingman. A German critic is furious that a
work of such real literary merit should be compared to one so flat and
insipid as Mrs. Stowe's production; but he altogether misses the
point, which is the effect on the people of a spirited defense of
those who had hitherto had no advocate.

Freytag has been called an opportunist, but the term should not be
considered one of reproach. It certainly was opportune that his great
work appeared at the moment when it was most needed, a moment of
discouragement, of disgust at everything high and low. It brought its
smiling message and remained to cheer and comfort. _The Journalists_,
too, was opportune, for it called attention to a class of men whose
work was as important as it was unappreciated. Up to 1848, the year of
the revolution, the press had been under such strict censorship that
any frank discussion of public matters had been out of the question.
But since then distinguished writers, like Freytag himself, had taken
the helm. Even when not radical, they were dreaded by the
reactionaries, and even Freytag escaped arrest in Prussia only by
hastily becoming a court official of his friend the Duke of
Saxe-Coburg and Gotha--within whose domains he already owned an estate
and was in the habit of residing for a portion of each year--and thus
renouncing his Prussian citizenship. Even Freytag's _Pictures from the
German Past_ may be said to have been opportune. Already, for a
generation, the new school of scientific historians--the Rankes, the
Wattenbachs, the Waitzs, the Giesebrechts--had been piling up their
discoveries, and collating and publishing manuscripts describing the
results of their labors. They lived on too high a plane for the
ordinary reader. Freytag did not attempt to "popularize" them by cheap
methods. He served as an interpreter between the two extremes. He
chose a type of facts that would have seemed trivial to the great
pathfinders, worked them up with care from the sources, and by his
literary art made them more than acceptable to the world at large. In
these _Pictures from the German Past_, as in the six volumes of the
series of historical romances entitled _The Ancestors_, a patriotic
purpose was not wanting. Freytag wished to show his Germans that they
had a history to be proud of, a history whose continuity was unbroken;
the nation had been through great vicissitudes, but everything had
tended to prove that the German has an inexhaustible fund of reserve
force. Certain national traits, certain legal institutions, could be
followed back almost to the dawn of history, and it would be found
that the Germans of the first centuries of our era were not nearly so
barbarous as had been supposed.

And so with a wonderful talent for selecting typical and essential
facts and not overburdening his narrative with detail he leads us down
the ages. The hero of his introductory romance in _The Ancestors_ is a
Vandal chieftain who settles among the Thuringians at the time of the
great wandering of the nations--the hero of the last of the series is
a journalist of the nineteenth century. All are descendants of the one
family, and Freytag has a chance to develop some of his theories of
heredity. Not only can bodily aptitudes and mental peculiarities be
transmitted, but also the tendency to act in a given case much as the
ancestor would have done.

It cannot be denied that as Freytag proceeds with _The Ancestors_ the
tendency to instruct and inform becomes too marked. He had begun his
career in the world by lecturing on literature at the University of
Breslau, but had severed his connection with that institution because
he was not allowed to branch out into history. Possibly those who
opposed him were right and the two subjects are incapable of
amalgamation. Freytag in this, his last great work, revels in the
fulness of his knowledge of facts, but shows more of the thoroughness
of the scholar than of the imagination of the poet. The novels become
epitomes of the history of the time. No type of character may be
omitted. So popes and emperors, monks and missionaries, German
warriors and Roman warriors, minstrels and students, knights,
crusaders, colonists, landskechts, and mercenaries are dragged in and
made to do their part with all too evident fidelity to truth.

We owe much of our knowledge of Freytag's life to a charming
autobiography which served as a prefatory volume to his collected
works. Freytag lived to a ripe old age, dying in 1895 at the age of
seventy-nine. Both as a newspaper editor and as a member of parliament
(the former from 1848 to 1860, the latter for the four years from 1867
to 1871) he had shown his patriotism and his interest in public
affairs. Many of his numerous essays, written for the _Grenzboten_,
are little masterpieces and are to be found among his collected works
published in 1888. As a member of parliament, indeed, he showed no
marked ability and his name is associated with no important measure.

Not to conceal his shortcoming it must be said that Freytag, at the
time of the accession to the throne of the present head of the German
Empire, laid himself open to much censure by attacking the memory of
the dead Emperor Frederick who had always been his friend and patron.

In conclusion it may be said that no one claims for Freytag a place in
the front rank of literary geniuses. He is no Goethe, no Schiller, no
Dante, no Milton, no Shakespeare. He is not a pioneer, has not changed
the course of human thought. But yet he is an artist of whom his
country may well be proud, who has added to the happiness of hundreds
of thousands of Germans, and who only needs to be better understood to
be thoroughly enjoyed by foreigners.

England and America have much to learn from him--the value of long,
careful, and unremitting study; the advantage of being thoroughly
familiar with the scenes and types of character depicted; the charm of
an almost unequaled simplicity and directness. He possessed the rare
gift of being able to envelop every topic that he touched with an
atmosphere of elegance and distinction. His productions are not
ephemeral, but are of the kind that will endure.

       *       *       *       *       *




_GUSTAV FREYTAG_




       *       *       *       *       *

#THE JOURNALISTS#



  DRAMATIS PERSONÆ

  BERG, _retired Colonel_.

  IDA, _his daughter_.

  ADELAIDE RUNECK.

  SENDEN, _landed proprietor_.
                                         _
  PROFESSOR OLDENDORF, _editor-in-chief_. |
                                          |
  CONRAD BOLZ, _editor_.                  |
                                          |
  BELLMAUS, _on the staff._.              |
                                          |
  KÄMPE, _on the staff_.                  } of the newspaper
                                          |  _The Union_.
  KÖRNER, _on the staff_.                 |
                                          |
  PRINTER HENNING, _owner_.               |
                                          |
  MILLER, _factotum_.                    _|

                                         _
  BLUMENBERG, _editor_.                   |
                                          } of the newspaper
  SCHMOCK, _on the staff_.	         _|    _Coriolanus_.



  PIEPENBRINK, _wine merchant and voter_.

  LOTTIE, _his wife_.

  BERTHA, _their daughter_.

  KLEINMICHEL _citizen and voter_.

  FRITZ, _his son_.

  JUDGE SCHWARZ.

  _A foreign ballet-dancer._

  KORB, _secretary for Adelaide's estate_.

  CARL, _the Colonel's man-servant._

  _A waiter._

  _Club-guests._ _Deputations of citizens_.



_Place of action: A provincial capital._


THE JOURNALISTS[1] (1853)

TRANSLATED BY ERNEST F. HENDERSON, PH.D., L.H.D.




ACT I


SCENE I


_A summer parlor in the_ COLONEL'S _house. Handsome furnishings. In
the centre of rear wall an open door, behind it a verandah and garden;
on the sides of rear wall large windows. Right and left, doors; on the
right, well in front, a window. Tables, chairs, a small sofa_.

IDA _is sitting in front on the right reading a book. The_ COLONEL
_enters through centre door with an open box in his hand in which are
dahlias_.

COLONEL.

Here, Ida, are the new varieties of dahlias our gardener has grown.
You'll have to rack your brains to find names for them. Day after
tomorrow is the Horticultural Society meeting, when I am to exhibit
and christen them.

IDA.

This light-colored one here should be called the "Adelaide."

COLONEL.

Adelaide Buneck, of course. Your own name is out of the running, for
as a little dahlia you have long been known to the flower-trade.

IDA.

One shall be called after your favorite writer, "Boz."

COLONEL.

Splendid! And it must be a really fine one, this yellow one here with
violet points. And the third one--how shall we christen that?

IDA (_stretching out her hand entreatingly to her father_).

"Edward Oldendorf."

COLONEL.

What! The professor? The editor? Oh no, that will not do! It was bad
enough for him to take over the paper; but that he now has allowed
himself to be led by his party into running for Parliament--that I can
never forgive him.

IDA.

Here he comes himself.

COLONEL (_aside_).

It used to be a pleasure to me to hear his footstep; now I can hardly
keep from being rude when I see him.

_Enter_ OLDENDORF.

OLDENDORF.

Good morning, Colonel!

IDA (_with a friendly greeting_).

Good morning, Edward. Help me to admire the new dahlias that father
has grown.

COLONEL.

But do not trouble the professor. Such trifles no longer interest him;
he has bigger things in his head.

OLDENDORF.

At all events I have not lost my ability to enjoy what gives you
pleasure.

COLONEL (_grumbling to himself_).

You have not given me much proof of that. I fear you take pleasure in
doing the very things that vex me. You are doubtless quite busy now
with your election, Mr. Future Member of Parliament!

OLDENDORF.

You know, Colonel, that I myself have less than any one else to do
with it.

COLONEL.

Oh, I don't believe that! It is the usual custom in such elections, I
imagine, to pay court to influential persons and shake hands with the
voters, to make speeches, scatter promises, and do all the other
little devil's tricks.

OLDENDORF.

You yourself do not believe, Colonel, that I would do anything
discreditable?

COLONEL.

Not? I am not so sure, Oldendorf. Since you have turned journalist,
edit your _Union_ and daily reproach the State with its faulty
organization, you are no longer what you used to be.

OLDENDORF (_who up to this point has been conversing with_ IDA _about
the flowers, but now turns to the_ COLONEL).

Does what I now say or write conflict with my former views? It would
be hard to convince me of that. And still less can you have noticed
any change in my feelings or in my conduct toward you.

COLONEL (_obdurate_).

Well, I don't see what reason you would have for that. I am not going
to spoil my morning by quarreling. Ida may try to straighten things
out with you. I am going to my flowers. [_Takes the box and exit
toward the garden._]

OLDENDORF.

What has put your father in such a bad humor? Has something in the
newspaper vexed him again?

IDA.

I do not think so. But it annoys him that now in politics you again
find it necessary to advocate measures he detests and attack
institutions he reveres. (_Shyly._) Edward, is it really impossible
for you to withdraw from the election?

OLDENDORF.

It is impossible.

IDA.

I should then have you here, and father could regain his good humor;
for he would highly appreciate the sacrifice you were making for him,
and we could look forward to a future as peaceful as our past has
been.

OLDENDORF.

I know that, Ida, and I feel anything but pleasure at the prospect of
becoming member for this town; yet I cannot withdraw.

IDA (_turning away_).

Father is right. You have changed entirely since becoming editor of
the paper.

OLDENDORF.

Ida! You too! If this is going to cause discord between us I shall
indeed feel badly.

IDA.

Dear Edward! I am only grieving at losing you for so long.

OLDENDORF.

I am not yet elected. If I do become member and can have my way, I
will take you to the capital and never let you leave my side again.

IDA.

Ah, Edward, we can't think of that now! But do spare father.

OLDENDORF.

You know how much I stand from him; and I don't give up hope of his
becoming reconciled to me. The election once over, I will make another
appeal to his heart. I may wrest from him a favorable answer that will
mean our marriage.

IDA.

But do humor his little foibles. He is in the garden near his dahlia
bed; express your delight over the gay colors. If you go at it
skilfully enough perhaps he may still call one the "Edward Oldendorf."
We have been talking of it already. Come! [_Exeunt both._]

_Enter_ SENDEN, BLUMENBERG, CARL, SCHMOCK.

SENDEN (_entering_).

Is the Colonel alone?

CARL.

Professor Oldendorf is with him.

SENDEN.

Take in our names. [_Exit_ CARL.] This everlasting Oldendorf! I say,
Blumenberg, this connection of the old gentleman with the _Union_ must
stop. We cannot really call him one of us so long as the professor
frequents this house. We need the Colonel's influential personality.

BLUMENBERG.

It is the best-known house in town--the best society, good wine, and
art.

SENDEN.

I have my private reasons, too, for bringing the Colonel over to our
side. And everywhere the professor and his clique block our way.

BLUMENBERG.

The friendship shall cease. I promise you that it shall cease,
gradually, within the next few weeks. The first step has already been
taken. The gentlemen of the _Union_ have fallen into the trap.

SENDEN.

Into what trap?

BLUMENBERG.

The one I set for them in our paper. [_Turning upon_ SCHMOCK _who is
standing in the doorway._] Why do you stand here, Schmock? Can't you
wait at the gate?

SCHMOCK.

I went where you did. Why should I not stand here? I know the Colonel
as well as you do.

BLUMENBERG.

Don't be forward and don't be impudent. Go and wait at the gate, and
when I bring you the article, quickly run with it to the
press--understand?

SCHMOCK.

How can I help understanding when you croak like a raven?

[_EXIT_.]

[Illustration: _Permission F Bruckmann, A -G, Munich_
AT THE CONCERT    ADOLPH VON MENZEL.]

BLUMENBERG (_to_ SENDEN).

He is a vulgar person, but he is useful! Now that we are alone,
listen! The other day when you brought me to call here, I begged the
Colonel just to write down his ideas on the questions of the day.

SENDEN.

Yes, alas! You piled on the flattery much too thick, but the old
gentleman did, nevertheless, at last take fire.

BLUMENBERG.

We begged him to read to us what he had written; he read it to us, we
praised it.

SENDEN.

It was very tiresome all the same.

BLUMENBERG.

I begged it of him for our paper.

SENDEN.

Yes, unfortunately! And now I must carry these bulky things to your
press. These articles are too heavy; they won't do the _Coriolanus_
any good.

BLUMENBERG.

Yet I printed them gladly. When a man has written for a paper he
becomes a good friend of that paper. The Colonel at once subscribed
for the _Coriolanus_, and, the next day, invited me to dinner.

SENDEN (_shrugging his shoulders_).

If that is all you gain by it!

BLUMENBERG.

It is merely the beginning.--The articles are clumsy; why should I not
say so?

SENDEN.

God knows they are!

BLUMENBERG.

And no one knows who the author is.

SENDEN.

That was the old gentleman's stipulation. I imagine he is afraid of
Oldendorf.

BLUMENBERG.

And precisely what I anticipated has come to pass. Oldendorf's paper
has today attacked these articles. Here is the latest issue of the
_Union_.

SENDEN.

Let me look at it. Well, that will be a fine mix-up! Is the attack
insulting?

BLUMENBERG.

The Colonel will be sure to consider it so. Don't you think that that
will help us against the professor?

SENDEN.

Upon my honor you are the slyest devil that ever crept out of an
inkstand!

BLUMENBERG.

Give it to me, the Colonel is coming. _Enter the_ COLONEL.

COLONEL.

Good morning, gentlemen!--[_aside_] and that Oldendorf should just
happen to be here! If only he will remain in the garden! Well, Mr.
Editor, how is the _Coriolanus_?

BLUMENBERG.

Our readers admire the new articles marked with an arrow. Is there any
chance that some more--

COLONEL (_drawing a manuscript from his pocket and looking round_).

I rely on your discretion. As a matter of fact I wanted to read it
through again on account of the structure of the sentences.

BLUMENBERG.

That can best be done in the proof-reading.

COLONEL.

I think it will do. Take it; but not a word--

BLUMENBERG.

You will let me send it at once to press. [_At the door._] Schmock!

[SCHMOCK _appears at the door, takes the manuscript and exit
quickly._]

SENDEN.

Blumenberg is keeping the sheet up to the mark, but, as he has
enemies, he has to fight hard to defend himself.

COLONEL (_amused_).

Enemies? Who does not have them? But journalists have nerves like
women. Everything excites you; every word that any one says against
you rouses your indignation! Oh come, you are sensitive people!

BLUMENBERG.

Possibly you are right, Colonel. But when one has opponents like this
_Union_--

COLONEL.

Oh, yes, the _Union_. It is a thorn in the flesh to both of you. There
is a great deal in it that I cannot praise; but, really when it comes
to sounding an alarm, attacking, and pitching in, it is cleverer than
your paper. The articles are witty; even when they are on the wrong
side one cannot help laughing at them.

BLUMENBERG.

Not always. In today's attack on the best articles the
_Coriolanus_ has published in a long time I see no wit at all.

COLONEL.

Attack on what articles?

BLUMENBERG.

On yours, Colonel. I must have the paper somewhere about
me.

[_Searches, and gives him a copy of the Union._]

COLONEL.

Oldendorf's paper attacks my articles! [_Reads._] "We regret
such lack of knowledge--"

BLUMENBERG.

And here--

COLONEL.

"It is an unpardonable piece of presumption"--What! I am
presumptuous?

BLUMENBERG.

And here--

COLONEL.

"One may be in doubt as to whether the naïveté of the
contributor is comical or tragical, but at all events he has no right
to join in the discussion"--[_Throwing down the paper._] Oh, that is
contemptible! It is a low trick!

_Enter_ IDA _and_ OLDENDORF _from the garden._

SENDEN (_aside_).

Now comes the cloud-burst!

COLONEL.

Professor, your newspaper is making progress. To bad principles is now
added something else--baseness.

IDA (_frightened_).

Father!

OLDENDORF (_coming forward_).

Colonel, how can you justify this insulting expression?

COLONEL (_holding out the paper to him_).

Look here! That stands in your paper! In your paper, Oldendorf!

OLDENDORF.

The tone of the attack is not quite as calm as I could have wished--

COLONEL.

Not quite so calm? Not really?

OLDENDORF.

In substance the attack is justified.

COLONEL.

Sir! You dare say that to me!

IDA.

Father!

OLDENDORF.

Colonel, I do not comprehend this attitude, and I beg you to consider
that we are speaking before witnesses.

COLONEL.

Do not ask for any consideration. It would have been your place to
show consideration for the man whose friendship you are otherwise so
ready to claim.

OLDENDORF.

But, first of all, tell me frankly what is your own connection with
the articles attacked in the _Coriolanus_?

COLONEL.

A very chance connection, too insignificant in your eyes to deserve
your regard. The articles are by me!

IDA.

Heavens!

OLDENDORF (_vehemently_).

By you? Articles in the paper of this gentleman?

IDA (_entreating him_).

Edward!

OLDENDORF (_more calmly_).

The _Union_ has attacked not you but an unknown person, who to us was
merely a partisan of this gentleman. You would have spared us both
this painful scene had you not concealed from me the fact that you are
a correspondent of the _Coriolanus_.

COLONEL.

You will have to stand my continuing not to make you a confidant of my
actions. You have here given me a printed proof of your friendship,
which does not make me long for other proofs.

OLDENDORF (_taking up his hat_).

I can only say that I deeply regret the occurrence, but do not feel
myself in the least to blame. I hope, Colonel, that, when you think
the matter over calmly, you will come to the same conclusion. Good-by,
Miss Ida. Good day to you.

[_Exit as far as centre door._]

IDA (_entreating_).

Father, don't let him leave us that way!

COLONEL.

It is better than to have him stay.

_Enter_ ADELAIDE.

ADELAIDE (_entering in elegant traveling costume, meets_ OLDENDORF _at
the door_).

Not so fast, Professor!

[OLDENDORF _kisses her hand and leaves._]


  IDA.      }(_together_ Adelaide! [_Falls into her arms._]).
  COLONEL.  }  Adelaide! And at such a moment!


ADELAIDE (_holding_ IDA _fast and stretching out her hand to the_
COLONEL).

Shake hands with your compatriot. Aunt sends love, and Rosenau Manor,
in its brown autumn dress, presents its humble compliments. The
fields lie bare, and in the garden the withered leaves dance with the
wind.--Ah, Mr. von Senden!

COLONEL (_introducing_).

Mr. Blumenberg, the editor.

SENDEN.

We are delighted to welcome our zealous agriculturist to the city.

ADELAIDE.

And we should have been pleased occasionally to meet our neighbor in
the country.

COLONEL.

He has a great deal to do here. He is a great politician, and works
hard for the good cause.

ADELAIDE.

Yes, indeed, we read of his doings in the newspaper. I drove through
your fields yesterday. Your potatoes are not all in yet. Your steward
didn't get through with the work.

SENDEN.

You Rosenau people are privileged to get through a week earlier than
any one else.

ADELAIDE.

On the other hand, we have nothing to do but to farm. (_Amicably._)
The neighbors send greetings.

SENDEN.

Thank you. We must relinquish you now to friends who have more claim
on you than we have. But will you not receive me in the course of the
day so that I can ask for the news from home? [ADELAIDE _inclines her
head._]

SENDEN.

Good-by, Colonel. (_To_ IDA.) My respectful compliments, Miss Berg.

[_Exit together with_ BLUMENBERG.]

IDA (_embracing_ ADELAIDE).

I have you at last. Now everything will be all right!

ADELAIDE.

What is to be all right? Is anything not all right? Back there some
one passed me more quickly than usual, and here I see glistening eyes
and a furrowed brow. [_Kisses her on the eyes._] They shall not ruin
your pretty eyes. And you, honored friend, turn a more friendly
countenance to me.

COLONEL.

You must stay with us all winter; it will be the first you have given
us in a long time; we shall try to deserve such a favor.

ADELAIDE (_seriously_).

It is the first one since my father's death that I have cared to
mingle with the world again. Besides, I have business that calls me
here. You know I came of age this summer, and my legal friend, Judge
Schwarz, requires my presence. Listen, Ida, the servants are
unpacking, go and see that things are properly put away. (_Aside._)
And put a damp cloth over your eyes for people can see that you have
been crying. [_Exit_ IDA _to the right._ ADELAIDE _quickly goes up to
the_ COLONEL.] What is the matter with Ida and the professor?

COLONEL.

That would be a long story. I shall not spoil my pleasure with it now.
We men are at odds; our views are too opposed.

ADELAIDE.

But were not your views opposed before this, too? And yet you were on
such good terms with Oldendorf!

COLONEL.

They were not so extremely opposed as now.

ADELAIDE.

And which of you has changed his views?

COLONEL.

H'm! Why, he, of course. He is led astray in great part by his evil
companions. There are some men, journalists on his paper, and
especially there is a certain Bolz.

ADELAIDE (_aside_).

What's this I hear?

COLONEL.

But probably you know him yourself. Why, he comes from your
neighborhood.

ADELAIDE.

He is a Rosenau boy.

COLONEL.

I remember. Your father, the good old general, could not endure him.

ADELAIDE.

At least he sometimes said so.

COLONEL.

Since then this Bolz has become queer. His mode of life is said to be
irregular, and I fear his morals are pretty loose. He is Oldendorf's
evil genius.

ADELAIDE.

That would be a pity!--No, I do not believe it!

COLONEL. What do you not believe, Adelaide?

ADELAIDE (_smiling_).

I do not believe in evil geniuses. What has gone wrong between you and
Oldendorf can be set right again. Enemies today, friends
tomorrow--that is the way in politics; but Ida's feelings will not
change so quickly. Colonel, I have brought with me a beautiful design
for a dress. That new dress I mean to wear this winter as bridesmaid.

COLONEL.

No chance of it! You can't catch me that way, girl. I'll carry the war
into the enemy's country. Why do you drive other people to the altar
and let your own whole neighborhood joke you about being the Sleeping
Beauty and the virgin farmer?

ADELAIDE (_laughing_).

Well, so they do.

COLONEL.

The richest heiress in the whole district! Courted by a host of
adorers, yet so firmly intrenched against all sentiment; no one can
comprehend it.

ADELAIDE.

My dear Colonel, if our young gentlemen were as lovable as certain
older ones--but, alas! they are not.

COLONEL.

You shan't escape me. We shall hold you fast in town, until we find
one among our young men whom you will deem worthy to be enrolled under
your command. For whoever be your chosen husband, he will have the
same experience I have had--namely, that, first or last, he will have
to do your bidding.

ADELAIDE (_quickly_).

Will you do my bidding with regard to Ida and the professor? Now I
have you!

COLONEL.

Will you do me the favor of choosing your husband this winter while
you are with us? Yes? Now I have _you_!

ADELAIDE.

It's a bargain! Shake hands! [_Holds out her hand to him._]

COLONEL (_puts his hand in hers, laughing_).

Well, you're outwitted.

[_Exit through centre door._]

ADELAIDE (_alone_).

I don't think I am. What, Mr. Conrad Bolz! Is that your reputation
among people! You live an irregular life? You have loose morals? You
are an evil genius?--

_Enter_ KORB.

KORB (_through the centre door with a package_).

Where shall I put the account-books and the papers, Miss Adelaide?

ADELAIDE.

In my apartment. Tell me, dear Korb, did you find your room here in
order?

KORB.

In the finest order. The servant has given me two wax candles; it is
pure extravagance.

ADELAIDE.

You need not touch a pen for me this whole day. I want you to see the
town and look up your acquaintances. You have acquaintances here, I
suppose?

KORB.

Not very many. It is more than a year since I was last here.

ADELAIDE (_indifferently_).

But are there no people from Rosenau here?

KORB.

Among the soldiers are four from the village. There is John Lutz of
Schimmellutz--

ADELAIDE.

I know. Have you no other acquaintance here from the village?

KORB.

None at all, except him, of course--

ADELAIDE.

Except him? Whom do you mean?

KORB.

Why, our Mr. Conrad.

ADELAIDE.

Oh, to be sure! Are you not going to visit him? I thought you had
always been good friends.

KORB.

Going to visit him? That is the first place I am going to. I have been
looking forward to it during the whole journey. He is a faithful soul
of whom the village has a right to be proud.

ADELAIDE (_warmly_).

Yes, he has a faithful heart.

KORB (_eagerly_).

Ever merry, ever friendly, and so attached to the village! Poor man,
it is a long time since he was there!

ADELAIDE.

Don't speak of it!

KORB.

He will ask me about everything--about the farming--

ADELAIDE (_eagerly_).

And about the horses. The old sorrel he was so fond of riding is still
alive. KORB. And about the shrubs he planted with you.

ADELAIDE.

Especially about the lilac-bush where my arbor now stands. Be sure you
tell him about that.

KORB.

And about the pond. Three hundred and sixty carp!

ADELAIDE.

And sixty gold-tench; don't forget that. And the old carp with the
copper ring about his body, that he put there, came out with the last
haul, and we threw him back again.

KORB.

And how he will ask about you, Miss Adelaide!

ADELAIDE.

Tell him I am well.

KORB.

And how you have carried on the farming since the general died; and
that you take his newspaper which I read aloud to the farm-hands
afterward.

ADELAIDE.

Just that you need not tell him. [_Sighing, aside._] On these lines I
shall learn nothing whatever. [_Pause, gravely._] See here, dear Korb,
I have heard all sorts of things about Mr. Bolz that surprise me. He
is said to live an irregular life.

KORB.

Yes, I imagine he does; he always was a wild colt.

ADELAIDE.

He is said to spend more than his income.

KORB.

Yes, that is quite possible. But I am perfectly sure he spends it
merrily.

ADELAIDE (_aside_).

Small consolation I shall get from him! (_Indifferently._) He has now
a good position, I suppose; won't he soon be looking for a wife?

KORB.

A wife? No, he is not doing that. It is impossible.

ADELAIDE.

Well, I heard something of the kind; at least he is said to be much
interested in a young lady. People are talking of it.

KORB.

Why, that would be--no, I don't believe it. (_Hastily._) But I'll ask
him about it at once.

ADELAIDE.

Well, he would be the last person to tell you. One learns such things
from a man's friends and acquaintances. The village people ought to
know it, I suppose, if a Rosenau man marries.

KORB.

Of course they should. I must get at the truth of that.

ADELAIDE.

You would have to go about it the right way. You know how crafty he
is.

KORB.

Oh, I'll get round him all right. I'll find some way.

ADELAIDE.

Go, dear Korb! [_Exit_ KORB.] Those were sad tidings with which the
Colonel met me. Conrad--immoral, unworthy? It is impossible! A noble
character cannot change to that extent. I do not believe one word of
what they say!

[_EXIT_.]


SCENE II


_Editorial room of the "Union." Doors in the centre and on both sides.
On the left, in the foreground, a desk with newspapers and documents.
On the right, a similar, smaller table. Chairs._

_Enter_ BOLZ, _through the side door on the right, then_ MILLER
_through the centre door._

BOLZ (_eagerly_).

Miller! Factotum! Where is the mail?

MILLER (_nimbly with a package of letters and newspapers_).

Here is the mail, Mr. Bolz; and here, from the press, is the
proof-sheet of this evening's issue to be corrected.

BOLZ (_at the table on the left quickly opening, looking through, and
marking letters with a pencil_).

I have already corrected the proof, old rascal!

MILLER.

Not quite. Down here is still the "Miscellaneous" which Mr. Bellmaus
gave the type-setters.

BOLZ.

Let us have it!

[_Reads in the newspaper._]

"Washing stolen from the yard"--"Triplets
born"--"Concert"--"Concert"--"Meeting of an
Association"--"Theatre"--all in order--"Newly invented engine"--"The
great sea-serpent spied."

[_Jumping up._]

What the deuce is this? Is he bringing up the old sea-serpent again?
It ought to be cooked into a jelly for him, and he be made to eat it
cold.

[_Hurries to the door on the right._]

Bellmaus, monster, come out!

_Enter_ BELLMAUS.

BELLMAUS (_from the right, pen in hand_).

What is the matter! Why all this noise?

BOLZ (_solemnly_).

Bellmaus, when we did you the honor of intrusting you with the odds
and ends for this newspaper, we never expected you to bring the
everlasting great sea-serpent writhing through the columns of our
journal!--How could you put in that worn-out old lie?

BELLMAUS.

It just fitted. There were exactly six lines left.

BOLZ.

That is an excuse, but not a good one. Invent your own stories. What
are you a journalist for? Make a little "Communication," an
observation, for instance, on human life in general, or something
about dogs running around loose in the streets; or choose a
bloodcurdling story such as a murder out of politeness, or how a
woodchuck bit seven sleeping children, or something of that kind. So
infinitely much happens, and so infinitely much does not happen, that
an honest newspaper man ought never to be without news.

BELLMAUS.

Give it here, I will change it.

[_Goes to the table, looks into a printed sheet, cuts a clipping from
it with large shears, and pastes it on the copy of the newspaper._]

BOLZ.

That's right, my son, so do, and mend thy ways.

[_Opening the door on the right._]

Kämpe, can you come in a moment? (_To_ MILLER, _who is waiting at the
door._) Take that proof straight to the press!

[MILLER _takes the sheet from_ BELLMAUS _and hurries off._]

_Enter_ KÄMPE.

KÄMPE.

But I can't write anything decent while you are making such a noise.

BOLZ.

You can't? What have you just written, then? At most, I imagine, a
letter to a ballet-dancer or an order to your tailor.

BELLMAUS.

No, he writes tender letters. He is seriously in love, for he took me
walking in the moonlight yesterday and scorned the idea of a drink.

KÄMPE (_who has seated himself comfortably_).

Gentlemen, it is unfair to call a man away from his work for the sake
of making such poor jokes.

BOLZ.

Yes, yes, he evidently slanders you when he maintains that you love
anything else but your new boots and to some small degree your own
person. You yourself are a love-spurting nature, little Bellmaus. You
glow like a fusee whenever you see a young lady. Spluttering and smoky
you hover around her, and yet don't dare even to address her. But we
must be lenient with him; his shyness is to blame. He blushes in
woman's presence, and is still capable of lovely emotions, for he
started out to be a lyric poet.

BELLMAUS.

I don't care to be continually reproached with my poems. Did I ever
read them to you?

BOLZ.

No, thank Heaven, that audacity you never had. (_Seriously._) But,
now, gentlemen, to business. Today's number is ready. Oldendorf is not
yet here, but meanwhile, let us hold a confidential session. Oldendorf
_must_ be chosen deputy from this town to the next Parliament; our
party and the _Union must_ put that through. How does our stock stand
today?

KÄMPE.

Remarkably high. Our opponents agree that no other candidate would be
so dangerous for them, and our friends everywhere are most hopeful.
But you know how little that may signify. Here is the list of the
voters. Our election committee sends word to you that our calculations
were correct. Of the hundred voters from our town, forty surely ours.
About an equal number are pledged to the other party; the remnant of
some twenty votes are undecided. It is clear that the election will
be determined by a very small majority.

BOLZ.

Of course we shall have that majority--a majority of from eight to ten
votes. Just say that, everywhere, with the greatest assuredness. Many
a one who is still undecided will come over to us on hearing that we
are the stronger. Where is the list of our uncertain voters? [_Looks
it over._]

KÄMPE.

I have placed a mark wherever our friends think some influence might
be exerted.

BOLZ.

I see two crosses opposite one name; what do they signify?

KÄMPE.

That is Piepenbrink, the wine-dealer Piepenbrink. He has a large
following in his district, is a well-to-do man, and, they say, can
command five or six votes among his adherents.

BOLZ.

Him we must have. What sort of a man is he?

KÄMPE.

He is very blunt, they say, and no politician at all.

BELLMAUS.

But he has a pretty daughter.

KÄMPE.

What's the use of his pretty daughter? I'd rather he had an ugly
wife--one could get at him more easily.

BELLMAUS.

Yes, but he has one--a lady with little curls and fiery red ribbons
in her cap.

BOLZ.

Wife or no wife, the man must be ours. Hush, some one is coming; that
is Oldendorf's step. He needn't know anything of our conference. Go to
your room, gentlemen. To be continued this evening.

KÄMPE (_at the door_).

It is still agreed, I suppose, that in the next number I resume the
attack on the new correspondent of the _Coriolanus_, the one with the
arrow.

BOLZ.

Yes, indeed. Pitch into him, decently but hard. Just now, on the eve
of the election, a little row with our opponents will do us good; and
the articles with the arrow give us a great opening.

[_Exeunt_ KÄMPE _and_ BELLMAUS.]

_Enter_ OLDENDORF _through centre door._

OLDENDORF.

Good-day, Conrad.

BOLZ (_at the table on the right, looking over the list of voters_).

Blessed be thy coming! The mail is over there; there is nothing of
importance.

OLDENDORF.

Do you need me here today?

BOLZ.

No, my darling. This evening's issue is ready. For tomorrow Kämpe is
writing the leading article.

OLDENDORF.

About what?

BOLZ.

A little skirmish with the _Coriolanus_. Another one against the
unknown correspondent with the arrow who attacked our party. But do
not worry; I told Kämpe to make the article dignified, very dignified.

OLDENDORF.

For Heaven's sake, don't! The article must not be written.

BOLZ.

I fail to comprehend you. What use are political opponents if you
cannot attack them?

OLDENDORF.

Now see here! These articles were written by the Colonel; he told me
so himself today.

BOLZ.

Thunder and lightning!

OLDENDORF (_gloomily_).

You may imagine that along with this admission went other intimations
which place me just now in a very uncomfortable position as regards
the Colonel and his family.

BOLZ (_seriously_).

And what does the Colonel want you to do?

OLDENDORF.

He will be reconciled to me if I resign the editorship of this paper
and withdraw as candidate for election.

BOLZ.

The devil! He is moderate in his demands!

OLDENDORF.

I suffer under this discord; to you, as my friend, I can say so.

BOLZ (_going up to him and pressing his hand_).

Solemn moment of manly emotion!

OLDENDORF.

Don't play the clown just now. You can imagine how unpleasant my
position in the Colonel's house has become. The worthy old gentleman
either frigid or violent; the conversation spiced with bitter
allusions; Ida suffering--I can often see that she has been crying. If
our party wins and I become member for the town, I fear I shall lose
all hope of marrying Ida.

BOLZ (_vehemently_).

And if you withdraw it will be a serious blow to our party. (_Rapidly
and emphatically._) The coming session of Parliament will determine
the fate of the country. The parties are almost equal. Every loss is a
blow of a vote to our cause. In this town we have no other candidate
but you, who is sufficiently popular to make his election probable. If
you withdraw from the contest, no matter what the reason, our
opponents win.

OLDENDORF.

Unfortunately what you say is true.

BOLZ (_with continued vehemence_).

I won't dwell on my confidence in your talents. I am convinced that,
in the House, and, possibly, as one of the ministers, you will be of
service to your country. I merely ask you, now, to remember your duty
to our political friends, who have pinned their faith on you, and to
this paper and ourselves, who for three years have worked for the
credit of the name of Oldendorf which heads our front page. Your honor
is at stake, and every moment of wavering is wrong.

OLDENDORF (_dignified_).

You are exciting yourself without reason. I too deem it wrong to
retire now when I am told that our cause needs me. But in confessing
to you, my friend, that my decision means a great personal sacrifice,
I am not compromising either our cause or ourselves as individuals.

BOLZ (_soothingly_).

Right you are! You are a loyal comrade. And so peace, friendship,
courage! Your old Colonel won't be inexorable.

OLDENDORF.

He has grown intimate with Senden, who flatters him in every way, and
has plans, I fear, which affect me also. I should feel still more
worried but for knowing that I have now a good advocate in the
Colonel's house. Adelaide Runeck has just arrived.

BOLZ.

Adelaide Runeck? She into the bargain! (_Quickly calling through the
door on the right._) Kämpe, the article against the knight of the
arrow is not to be written. Understand?

_Enter_ KÄMPE.

KÄMPE (_at the door, pen in hand_).

But what is to be written, then?

BOLZ.

The devil only knows! See here! Perhaps I can induce Oldendorf to
write the leading article for tomorrow himself. But at all events you
must have something on hand.

KÄMPE.

But what?

BOLZ (_excitedly_).

For all I care write about emigration to Australia; that, at any rate,
will give no offense.

KÄMPE.

Good! Am I to encourage it or advise against it?

BOLZ (_quickly_).

Advise against it, of course; we need every one who is willing to work
here at home. Depict Australia as a contemptible hole. Be perfectly
truthful but make it as black as possible--how the Kangaroo, balled
into a heap, springs with invincible malice at the settler's head,
while the duckbill nips at the back of his legs; how the gold-seeker
has, in winter, to stand up to his neck in salt water while for three
months in summer he has not a drop to drink; how he may live through
all that only to be eaten up at last by thievish natives. Make it very
vivid and end up with the latest market prices for Australian wool
from the _Times_. You'll find what books you need in the library.
[_Slams the door to._]

OLDENDORF (_at the table_).

Do you know Miss Runeck? She often inquires about you in her letters
to Ida.

BOLZ.

Indeed? Yes, to be sure, I know her. We are from the same village--she
from the manor-house, I from the parsonage. My father taught us
together. Oh, yes, I know her!

OLDENDORF.

How comes it that you have drifted so far apart? You never speak of
her.

BOLZ.

H'm! It is an old story--family quarrels, Montagues and Capulets. I
have not seen her for a long time.

OLDENDORF (_smiling_).

I hope that you too were not estranged by politics.

BOLZ.

Politics did, indeed, have something to do with our separation; you
see it is the common misfortune that party life destroys friendship.

OLDENDORF.

Sad to relate! In religion any educated man will tolerate the
convictions of another; but in politics we treat each other like
reprobates if there be the slightest shade of difference of opinion
between us.

BOLZ (_aside_).

Matter for our next article! (_Aloud._) "The slightest shade of
difference of opinion between us." Just what I think! We must have
that in our paper! (_Entreating)_. Look! A nice little virtuous
article: "An admonition to our voters--Respect our opponents, for they
are, after all, our brothers!" (_Urging him more and more._)
Oldendorf, that would be something for you--there is virtue and
humanity in the theme; writing will divert you, and you owe the paper
an article because you forbade the feud. Please do me the favor! Go
into the back room there and write. No one shall disturb you.

OLDENDORF (_smiling_).

You are just a vulgar intriguer!

BOLZ (_forcing him from his chair_).

Please, you'll find ink and paper there. Come, deary, come! [_He
accompanies him to the door on the left. Exit_ OLDENDORF. BOLZ
_calling after him._] Will you have a cigar? An old Henry Clay?
[_Draws a cigar-case from his pocket._] No? Don't make it too short;
it is to be the principal article! [_He shuts the door, calls through
the door on the right._] The professor is writing the article himself.
See that nobody disturbs him! [_Coming to the front._] So that is
settled.--Adelaide here in town! I'll go straight to her! Stop, keep
cool, keep cool! Old Bolz, you are no longer the brown lad from the
parsonage. And even if you were, _she_ has long since changed. Grass
has grown over the grave of a certain childish inclination. Why are
you suddenly thumping so, my dear soul? Here in town she is just as
far off from you as on her estates. [_Seating himself and playing with
a pencil._] "Nothing like keeping cool," murmured the salamander as he
sat in the stove fire.

_Enter_ KORB.

KORB.

Is Mr. Bolz in?

BOLZ (_jumping up_).

Korb! My dear Korb! Welcome, heartily welcome! It is good of you not
to have forgotten me. [_Shakes hands with him._] I am very glad to see
you.

KORB.

And I even more to see you. Here we are in town. The whole village
sends greetings! From Anton the stable-boy--he is now head man--to the
old night watchman whose horn you once hung up on the top of the
tower. Oh, what a pleasure this is!

BOLZ.

How is Miss Runeck? Tell me, old chap!

KORB.

Very well indeed, now. But we have been through much. The late general
was ill for four years. It was a bad time. You know he was always an
irritable man.

BOLZ.

Yes, he was hard to manage.--

KORB.

And especially during his illness. But Miss Adelaide took care of
him, so gentle and so pale, like a perfect lamb. Now, since his death,
Miss Adelaide runs the estate, and like the best of managers. The
village is prospering again. I will tell you everything, but not until
this evening. Miss Adelaide is waiting for me; I merely ran in quickly
to tell you that we are here.

BOLZ.

Don't be in such a hurry, Korb.--So the people in the village still
think of me!

KORB.

I should say they did! No one can understand why you don't come near
us. It was another matter while the old gentleman was alive, but now--

BOLZ (_seriously_).

My parents are dead; a stranger lives in the parsonage.

KORB.

But we in the manor-house are still alive! Miss Runeck would surely be
delighted--

BOLZ.

Does she still remember me?

KORB.

Of course she does. This very day she asked about you.

BOLZ.

What did she ask, old chap?

KORB.

She asked me if it was true what people are saying, that you have
grown very wild, make debts, run after girls, and are up to the devil
generally.

BOLZ.

Good gracious! You stood up for me, I trust?

KORB.

Of course! I told her that all that might be taken for granted with
you.

BOLZ.

Confound it! That's what she thinks of me, is it? Tell me, Korb, Miss
Adelaide has many suitors, has she not?

KORB.

The sands of the sea are as nothing to it.

BOLZ (_vexed_).

But yet she can finally choose only one, I suppose.

KORB (_slyly_).

Correct! But which one? That's the question.

BOLZ.

Which do you think it will be?

KORB.

Well, that is difficult to say. There is this Mr. von Senden who is
now living in town. If any one has a chance it is probably he. He
fusses about us like a weasel. Just as I was leaving he sent to the
house a whole dozen of admission cards to the great fête at the club.
It must be the sort of club where the upper classes go arm-in-arm with
the townspeople.

BOLZ.

Yes, it is a political society of which Senden is a director. It is
casting out a great net for voters. And the Colonel and the ladies are
going?

KORB.

I hear they are. I, too, received a card.

BOLZ (_to himself_).

Has it come to this? Poor Oldendorf!--And Adelaide at the club fête of
Mr. von Senden!

KORB (_to himself_).

How am I going to begin and find out about his love-affairs?
(_Aloud._) Oh, see here, Mr. Conrad, one thing more! Have you possibly
some real good friend in this concern to whom you could introduce me?

BOLZ.

Why, old chap?

KORB.

It is only--I am a stranger here, and often have commissions and
errands where I need advice. I should like to have some one to consult
should you chance to be away, or with whom I could leave word for you.

BOLZ.

You will find me here at almost any time of day. [_At the door._]
Bellmaus! [_Enter_ BELLMAUS.] You see this gentleman here. He is an
honored old friend of mine from my native village. Should he happen
not to find me here, you take my place.--This gentleman's name is
Bellmaus, and he is a good fellow.

KORB.

I am pleased to make your acquaintance, Mr. Bellmaus.

BELLMAUS.

And I to make yours. You have not told me his name yet.

BOLZ.

Korb. He has had a great deal to carry in his life, and has often
carried me on his back, too.

BELLMAUS.

I too am pleased, Mr. Korb. [_They shake hands._]

KORB.

Well, that is in order, and now I must go or Miss Adelaide will be
waiting.

BOLZ.

Good-by! Hope to see you very soon again.

[_Exit_ KORB; _exit_ BELLMAUS _through door on the right._]

BOLZ (_alone_).

So this Senden is courting her! Oh, that is bitter!

_Enter_ HENNING, _followed by_ MILLER.

HENNING (_in his dressing-gown, hurriedly, with a printed roll in his
hand_).

Your servant, Mr. Bolz! Is "opponent" spelt with one p or with two
p's? The new proofreader has corrected it one p.

BOLZ (_deep in his thoughts_).

Estimable Mr. Henning, the _Union_ prints it with two p's.

HENNING.

I said so at once. [_To_ MILLER.] It must be changed; the press is
waiting.

[_Exit_ MILLER _hastily._]

I took occasion to read the leading article. Doubtless you wrote it
yourself. It is very good, but too sharp, Mr. Bolz. Pepper and
mustard--that will give offense; it will cause bad blood.

BOLZ (_still deep in his thoughts, violently_).

I always did have an antipathy to this man!

[Illustration: _Permission Union Deutsche Verlagsgesellschaft,
Stuttgart_. NATURE ENTHUSIASTS. ADOLPH VON MENZEL]

HENNING (_hurt_).

How? What? Mr. Bolz? You have an antipathy to me?

BOLZ.

To whom? No, dear Mr. Henning, you are a good fellow and would be the
best newspaper owner in the world, if only you were not often as
frightened as a hare. [_Embraces him._] My regards to Mrs. Henning,
sir, and leave me alone. I am thinking up my next article.

HENNING (_while he is being thrust out_).

But do, please, write very moderately and kindly, dear Mr. Bolz.

BOLZ (_alone, walking to and fro again_).

Senden avoids me whenever he can. He stands things from me that any
one else would strongly resent. Is it possible that he suspects--

_Enter_ MILLER.

MILLER (_hurriedly_).

A lady I don't know wishes to pay her respects to you.

BOLZ.

A lady! And to me?

MILLER.

To the editor. [_Hands him a card._]

BOLZ (_reads_).

Leontine Pavoni-Gessler, _née_ Melloni from Paris. She must have to do
with art. Is she pretty?

MILLER.

H'm! So, so!

BOLZ.

Then tell her we are very sorry that we cannot have the pleasure, that
it is the editor's big washing-day.

MILLER.

What?

BOLZ (_vehemently_).

Washing, children's washing. That we are sitting up to the elbows in
soapsuds.

MILLER (_laughing_).

And I am to--

BOLZ (_impatiently_).

You're a blockhead! [_At the door._] Bellmaus! [_Enter_ BELLMAUS.]
Stay here and receive the visitor. [_Gives him the card._]

BELLMAUS.

Ah, that is the new ballet-dancer who is expected here. [_Inspecting
his coat._] But I'm not dressed for it!

BOLZ.

All the more dressed she will be. [_To_ MILLER.] Show the lady in.

[_Exit_ MILLER.]

BELLMAUS.

But really I cannot--

BOLZ (_irritably_).

Oh the devil, don't put on airs! [_Goes to the table, puts papers in
the drawer, seizes his hat._]

_Enter_ MADAME PAVONI.

MADAME PAVONI.

Have I the honor of seeing before me the editor of the _Union_?

BELLMAUS (_bowing_).

To be sure--that is to say--won't you kindly be seated? [_Pushes up
chairs._]

BOLZ.

Adelaide is clear-sighted and clever. How can she possibly fail to see
through that fellow?

MADAME PAVONI.

Mr. Editor, the intelligent articles about art which adorn your
paper--have prompted me--

BELLMAUS.

Oh, please!

BOLZ. (_having made up his mind_).

I must gain entrance into this club-fête!

[_Exit with a bow to the lady._ BELLMAUS _and_ MADAME PAVONI _sit
facing each other._]




ACT II


SCENE I


_The_ COLONEL'S _summer parlor. In the foreground on the right_ IDA
_and_ ADELAIDE, _next to_ ADELAIDE _the_ COLONEL, _all sitting. In
front of them a table with coffee set._

COLONEL (_in conversation with_ ADELAIDE, _laughing_).

A splendid story, and cleverly told! I am heartily glad that you are
with us, dear Adelaide. Now, at any rate, we shall talk about
something else at table besides this everlasting politics! H'm! The
professor has not come today. He never used to miss our coffee-hour.

[_Pause;_ ADELAIDE _and_ IDA _look at each other._ IDA _sighs._]

ADELAIDE.

Perhaps he has work to do.

IDA.

Or he is vexed with us because I am going to the fête tonight.

COLONEL (_irritably_).

Nonsense, you are not his wife nor even openly his fiancée. You are in
your father's house and belong in my circle.--H'm! I see he treasures
it up against me that I did some plain speaking the other day. I think
I was a little impatient.

ADELAIDE (_nodding her head_).

Yes, a little, I hear.

IDA.

He is worried about the way you feel, dear father.

COLONEL.

Well, I have reason enough to be vexed; don't remind me of it. And
that, in addition, he lets himself be mixed up in these elections, is
unpardonable.

[_Walks up and down._]

But you had better send for him, Ida.

IDA _rings. Enter_ CARL.

IDA.

Our compliments to the professor and we are waiting coffee for him.

[_Exit_ CARL.]

COLONEL.

Well, that about waiting was not quite necessary. Why, we have
finished our coffee.

ADELAIDE.

Ida has not finished yet.

IDA.

Hush!

ADELAIDE.

Why did he ever let himself be put up as candidate? He has plenty to
do as it is.

COLONEL.

Pure ambition, girls. The devil of ambition possesses these young men.
He impels them as steam does a locomotive.

IDA.

No, father, _he_ never thought of himself in the matter.

COLONEL.

It does not stand out quite so nakedly as, "I must make a career for
myself," or "I wish to become a famous man." The procedure is more
delicate. The good friends come along and say: "Your duty to the good
cause requires you to--it is a crime against your country if you do
not--it is a sacrifice for you but we demand it." And so a pretty
mantle is thrown around vanity, and the candidate issues forth--from
pure patriotism of course! Don't teach an old soldier worldly wisdom.
We, dear Adelaide, sit calmly by and laugh at such weaknesses.

ADELAIDE.

And are indulgent toward them when we have so good a heart as you.

COLONEL.

Yes, one profits by experience.

_Enter_ CARL.

CARL.

Mr. von Senden and two other gentlemen.

COLONEL.

What do they want? Pleased to see them!

[_Exit_ CARL.]

Allow me to have them shown in here, children. Senden never stays
long. He is a roving spirit.

[_The ladies rise._]

IDA.

The hour is again spoiled for us.

ADELAIDE.

Don't mind it; we shall have all the more time to dress.

[_Exeunt_ IDA _and_ ADELAIDE _on the left._]

_Enter_ SENDEN, BLUMENBERG, _a third gentleman._

SENDEN.

Colonel, we come on behalf of the committee for the approaching
election to notify you that that committee has unanimously voted to
make you, Colonel, our party's candidate.

COLONEL. _Me?_

SENDEN.

The committee begs you to accept this nomination so that the necessary
announcement can be made to the voters at this evening's fête.

COLONEL.

Are you in earnest, dear Senden? Where did the committee get such an
idea?

SENDEN.

Colonel, our president, who had previously agreed to run for our town,
found that it would be more advantageous to be candidate from a
provincial district; apart from him no one of our townsmen is so well
known and so popular with the citizens as yourself. If you accede to
our request our party is certain of victory; if you refuse, there is
every probability that our opponents will have their own way. You will
agree with us that such an eventuality must be avoided under all
circumstances.

COLONEL.

I see all that; but, on personal grounds, it is impossible for me to
help our friends in this matter.

SENDEN (_to the others_).

Let me explain to the Colonel certain things which will possibly make
him look favorably on our request.

[_Exeunt_ BLUMENBERG _and the other gentlemen into the garden, where
they are visible from time to time._]

COLONEL.

But, Senden, how could you put me in this embarrassing position! You
know that for years Oldendorf has frequented my house and that it will
be extremely unpleasant for me openly to oppose him.

SENDEN.

If the professor is really so devoted to you and your household, he
has now the best opportunity to show it. It is a foregone conclusion
that he will at once withdraw.

COLONEL.

I am not quite so sure of that; he is very stubborn in many ways.

SENDEN.

If he do not withdraw such egotism can scarcely still be called
stubbornness. And in such a case you would scarcely be under
obligations to him; obligations, Colonel, which might work injury to
the whole country. Besides, he has no chance of being elected if you
accept, for you will defeat him by a majority not large but sure.

COLONEL.

Are we so perfectly certain of this majority!

SENDEN.

I think I can guarantee it. Blumenberg and the other gentlemen have
made very thorough inquiries.

COLONEL.

It would serve the professor quite right if he had to withdraw in my
favor.--But no--no; it will not do at all, my friend.

SENDEN.

We know, Colonel, what a sacrifice we are asking of you, and that
nothing could compensate you for it save the consciousness of having
done your country a great service.

COLONEL.

To be sure.

SENDEN.

It would be so regarded in the capital, too, and I am convinced that
your entering the House would also cause pleasure in other circles
than those of your numerous friends and admirers.

COLONEL.

I should meet there many old friends and comrades. (_Aside_.) I should
be presented at Court.

SENDEN.

The minister of war asked very warmly after you the other day; he too
must have been one of your companions in arms.

COLONEL.

Yes indeed! As young blades we served in the same company and played
many mad pranks together. It would be a pleasure to see him now in the
House, drawing his honest face into dark lines. He was a wild devil in
the regiment, but a fine boy.

SENDEN.

Nor will he be the only one to receive you with open arms.

COLONEL.

In any case, I should have to think the matter over.

SENDEN.

Don't be angry, Colonel, if I urge you to decide. This evening we have
to introduce their candidate to our citizen guests. It is high time,
or all is lost.

COLONEL (_hesitating_).

Senden, you put a knife to my throat!

[SENDEN, _from the door, motions the gentlemen in the garden to come
in_.]

BLUMENBERG.

We venture to urge you, knowing that so good a soldier as you,
Colonel, makes up his mind quickly.

COLONEL (_after struggling inwardly_).

Well, so be it, gentlemen, I accept! Tell the committee I appreciate
their confidence. This evening we will talk over details.

BLUMENBERG.

We thank you, Colonel. The whole town will be rejoiced to hear of your
decision.

COLONEL.

Good-by until this evening.

[_Exeunt the visitors_;

COLONEL _alone, thoughtfully_.]

I fear I ought not to have accepted so quickly; but I had to do the
minister of war that favor. What will the girls say to it? And
Oldendorf?

[_Enter_ OLDENDORF.]

There he is himself.

[_Clears his throat_.]

He will be astonished. I can't help it, he must withdraw. Good
morning, Professor, you come just at the right moment.

OLDENDORF (_hastily_).

Colonel, there is a report in town that Mr. von Senden's party have
put you up as their candidate. I ask for your own assurance that you
would not accept such a nomination.

COLONEL.

And, supposing the proposition had been made to me, why should I not
accept as well as you? Yes, rather than you; for the motives that
would determine me are sounder than your reasons.

OLDENDORF.

So there is some foundation then to the rumor?

COLONEL.

To be frank, it is the truth. I have accepted. You see in me your
opponent.

OLDENDORF.

Nothing so bad has yet occurred to trouble our relations. Colonel,
could not the memory of a friendship, hearty and undisturbed for
years, induce you to avoid this odious conflict?

COLONEL.

Oldendorf, I could not act otherwise, believe me. It is your place now
to remember our old friendship. You are a younger man, let alone other
relationships; you are the one now to withdraw.

OLDENDORF (_more excitedly_).

Colonel, I have known you for years. I know how keenly and how deeply
you feel things and how little your ardent disposition fits you to
bear the petty vexations of current politics, the wearing struggle of
debates. Oh, my worthy friend, do listen to my exhortations and take
back your consent.

COLONEL.

Let that be my concern. I am an old block of hard timber. Think of
yourself, dear Oldendorf. You are young, you have fame as a scholar;
your learning assures you every success. Why, in another sphere of
activity, do you seek to exchange honor and recognition for naught but
hatred, mockery, and humiliation? For with such views as yours you
cannot fail to harvest them. Think it over. Be sensible, and withdraw.

OLDENDORF.

Colonel, could I follow my own inclinations I should do so on the
spot. But in this contest I am under obligations to my friends. I
cannot withdraw now.

COLONEL (_excitedly_).

Nor can I withdraw, lest I harm the good cause. We are no further now
than in the beginning. (_Aside_.) Obstinate fellow!

[_Both walk up and down on opposite sides of the stage._]

You have not the least chance whatever of being elected, Oldendorf; my
friends are sure of having the majority of the votes. You are exposing
yourself to a public defeat. (_Kindly_.) I should dislike having you
of all people beaten by me; it will cause gossip and scandal. Just
think of it! It is perfectly useless for you to conjure up the
conflict.

OLDENDORF.

Even if it were such a foregone conclusion as you assume, Colonel, I
should still have to hold out to the end. But as far as I can judge
the general sentiment, the result is by no means so certain. And
think, Colonel, if you should happen to be defeated--

COLONEL (_irritated_).

I tell you, that will not be the case.

OLDENDORF.

But if it should be? How odious that would be for both of us! How
would you feel toward me then! I might possibly welcome a defeat in my
heart; for you it would be a terrible mortification, and, Colonel, I
dread this possibility.

COLONEL.

For that very reason you should withdraw.

OLDENDORF.

I can no longer do so; but there is still time for you.

COLONEL (_vehemently_).

Thunder and lightning, sir, I have said yes; I am not the man to cap
it with a no!

[_Both walk up and down._]

That appears to end it, Professor! My wishes are of no account to you;
I ought to have known that! We must go our separate ways. We have
become open opponents; let us be honest enemies--

OLDENDORF (_seizing the_ COLONEL'S _hand_).

Colonel, I consider this a most unfortunate day; for I see sad results
to follow. Rest assured that no circumstances can shake my love and
devotion for you.

COLONEL.

We are drawn up in line of battle, as it were. You mean to let
yourself be defeated by an old military man. You shall have your
desire.

OLDENDORF.

I ask your permission to tell Miss Ida of our conversation.

COLONEL (_somewhat uneasy_).

You had better not do that just now, Professor. An opportunity will
come in due time. At present the ladies are dressing. I myself will
say what is necessary.

OLDENDORF.

Farewell, Colonel, and think of me without hard feelings.

COLONEL.

I will try my best, Professor.

[_Exit_ OLDENDORF.]

He has not given in! What depths of ambition there are in these
scholars!

_Enter_ IDA, ADELAIDE.

IDA.

Was not that Edward's voice?

COLONEL.

Yes, my child.

ADELAIDE.

And he has gone away again! Has anything happened?

COLONEL.

Well, yes, girls. To make a long story short, Oldendorf does not
become member for this town, but I.

ADELAIDE} (_together_.) You, Colonel? IDA } You, father?

IDA.

Has Edward withdrawn?

ADELAIDE.

Is the election over?

COLONEL.

Neither one nor the other. Oldendorf has proved his much-vaunted
devotion to us by not withdrawing, and election day is not yet past.
But from what I hear there is no doubt that Oldendorf will be
defeated.

IDA.

And you, father, have come out before everybody as his opponent?

ADELAIDE.

And what did Oldendorf say to that, Colonel?

COLONEL.

Don't excite me, girls! Oldendorf was stubborn, otherwise he behaved
well, and as far as that is concerned all is in order. The grounds
which determined me to make the sacrifice are very weighty. I will
explain them to you more fully another time. The matter is decided; I
have accepted; let that suffice for the present.

IDA.

But, dear father--

COLONEL.

Leave me in peace, Ida, I have other things to think of. This evening
I am to speak in public; that is, so to say, the custom at such
elections. Don't worry, my child, we'll get the better of the
professor and his clique.

[_Exit_ COLONEL _toward the garden_. IDA _and_ ADELAIDE _stand facing
each other and wring their hands._]

IDA.

What do you say to that?

ADELAIDE.

You are his daughter--what do _you_ say?

IDA.

Not possible!--Father! Scarcely had he finished explaining to us
thoroughly what petty mantles ambition assumes in such elections--

ADELAIDE.

Yes, he described them right vividly, all the little wraps and cloaks
of vanity.

IDA.

And within an hour he lets them throw the cloak about himself. Why, it
is terrible! And if father is not elected? It was wrong of Edward not
to give in to father's weakness. Is that your love for me, Professor?
He, too, never thought of me!

ADELAIDE.

Shall I tell you what? Let us hope that they both fail. These
politicians! It was bad enough for you when only one was in politics;
now that both have tasted of the intoxicating drink you are done for.
Were I ever to come into a position to make a man my master, I should
impose upon him but one condition, the wise rule of conduct of my old
aunt: Smoke tobacco, my husband, as much as you please; at most it
will spoil the walls; but never dare to look at a newspaper--that will
spoil your character.

[KORB _appears at the door_.]

What news do you bring, Korb?

KORB (_hastily, mysteriously_).

It isn't true!

ADELAIDE (_the same_). What isn't true?

KORB.

That he has a fiancée. He has no idea of it. His friend says he has
but one lady-love.

ADELAIDE (_eagerly_).

Who is she?

KORB. His newspaper.


ADELAIDE (_relieved_).

Ah, indeed. (_Aloud_.)

One can see by that how many falsehoods people tell. It is good, dear
Korb.

[_Exit_ KORB.]

IDA. What isn't true?

ADELAIDE (_sighing_).

Well, that we women are cleverer than men. We talk just as wisely and
I fear are just as glad to forget our wisdom at the first opportunity.
We are all of us together poor sinners!

IDA.

You can joke about it. You never knew what it was to have your father
and the man you loved oppose each other as enemies.

ADELAIDE.

Do you think so! Well, I once had a good friend who had foolishly
given her heart to a handsome, high-spirited boy. She was a mere child
and it was a very touching relationship: knightly devotion on his part
and tender sighings on hers. Then the young heroine had the misfortune
to become very jealous, and so far forgot poetry and deportment as to
give her heart's chosen knight a box on the ear. It was only a little
box, but it had fateful consequences. The young lady's father had seen
it and demanded an explanation. Then the young knight acted like a
perfect hero. He took all the blame upon himself and told the alarmed
father that he had asked the young lady to kiss him--poor fellow, he
never had the courage for such a thing!--and the blow had been her
answer. A stern man was the father; he treated the lad very harshly.
The hero was sent away from his family and his home, and the heroine
sat lonely in her donjon-tower and mourned her lost one.

IDA.

She ought to have told her father the truth.

ADELAIDE.

Oh, she did. But her confession made matters only worse. Years have
gone by since then, and the knight and his lady are now old people and
have become quite sensible.

IDA (_smiling_).

And, because they are sensible, do they not love each other any
longer?

ADELAIDE.

How the man feels about it, dear child, I cannot tell you exactly. He
wrote the lady a very beautiful letter after the death of her
father--that is all I know about it. But the lady has greater
confidence than you, for she still hopes. (_Earnestly_.) Yes, she
hopes; and even her father permitted that before he died--you see, she
still hopes.

IDA (_embracing her_).

And who is the banished one for whom she still hopes?

ADELAIDE.

Hush, dearest, that is a dark secret. Few persons living know about
it; and when the birds on the trees of Rosenau tell each other the
story they treat it as a dim legend of their forefathers. They then
sing softly and sorrowfully, and their feathers stand on end with awe.
In due time you shall learn all about it; but now you must think of
the fête, and of how pretty you are going to look.

IDA.

On the one hand the father, on the other the lover--how will it end?

ADELAIDE.

Do not worry. The one is an old soldier, the other a young statesman;
two types that we women have wound around our little fingers from time
immemorial! [_Both leave_.]


SCENE II


_Side room of a public hall. The rear wall a great arch with columns,
through which one looks into the lighted hall and through it into another.
On the left, toward the front, a door. On the right, tables and chairs;
chandeliers. Later, from time to time distant music. In the hall ladies
and gentlemen walking about or standing in groups_. SENDEN, BLUMENBERG,
_behind them_ SCHMOCK _coming from the hall_.

SENDEN. All is going well. There is a splendid spirit in the company.
These good townspeople are delighted with our arrangements. It was a
fine idea of yours, Blumenberg, to have this fête.

BLUMENBEEG. Only hurry and get people warmed up! It's a good thing to
begin with some music. Vienna waltzes are best on account of the
women. Then comes a speech from you, then some solo singing, and, at
supper, the introduction of the Colonel, and the toasts. It can't help
being a success; the men must have hearts of stone if they don't give
their votes in return for such a fête.

SENDEN. The toasts have been apportioned.

BLUMENBERG. But the music?--Why has the music stopped?

SENDEN. I am waiting for the Colonel to arrive.

BLUMENBERG. He must be received with a blare of trumpets. It will
flatter him, you know.

SENDEN. That's what I ordered. Directly after, they start up a march
and we bring him in procession.

BLUMENBERG. First rate! That will lend solemnity to his entrance. Only
think up your speech. Be popular, for today we are among the rabble.

_Enter guests, among them_ HENNING.

SENDEN (_doing the honors with BLUMENBERG_). Delighted to see you
here! We knew that you would not fail us. Is this your wife?

GUEST. Yes, Mr. von Senden, this is my wife.

SENDEN. You here, too, Mr. Henning? Welcome, my dear sir!

HENNING. I was invited by my friend and really had the curiosity to
come. My presence, I hope, will not be unpleasant to any one?

SENDEN. Quite the contrary. We are most pleased to greet you here.

[_Guests leave through centre door_; SENDEN _goes out in conversation
with them._]

BLUMENBERG. He knows how to manage people. It's the good manners of
these gentlemen that does it. He is useful--useful to me too. He
manages the others, and I manage him. [_Turning, he sees_ SCHMOCK,
_who is hovering near the door_.] What are you doing here? Why do you
stand there listening? You are not a door-keeper! See that you keep
out of my vicinity. Divide yourself up among the company.

SCHMOCK. Whom shall I go to if I know none of these people at all? You
are the only person I know.

BLUMENBERG. Why must you tell people that you know me? I consider it
no honor to stand next to you.

SCHMOCK. If it is not an honor it's not a disgrace either; But I can
stay by myself.

BLUMENBERG. Have you money to get something to eat? Go to the
restaurant-keeper and order something charged to me. The committee
will pay for it.

SCHMOCK. I don't care to go and eat. I have no need to spend anything.
I have had my supper.

[_Blare of trumpets and march in the distance. Exit_ BLUMENBERG.
SCHMOCK _alone, coming forward, angrily_.]

I hate him! I'll tell him I hate him, that I despise him from the
bottom of my heart!

[_Turns to go, comes back._]

But I cannot tell him so, or he will cut out all I send in for the
special correspondence I write for his paper! I will try to swallow it
down!

_[Exit through centre door_.]

_Enter_ BOLZ, KÄMPE, BELLMAUS _by side door_.

BOLZ (_marching in_). Behold us in the house of the Capulets!
[_Pretends to thrust a sword into its scabbard._] Conceal your swords
under roses. Blow your little cheeks up, and look as silly and
innocent as possible. Above all, don't let me see you get into a row,
and if you meet this Tybaldus Senden be so good as to run round the
corner.

[_The procession is seen marching through the rear halls_.]

You, Romeo Bellmaus, look out for the little women. I see more
fluttering curls and waving kerchiefs there than are good for your
peace of mind.

KÄMPE. I bet a bottle of champagne that if one of us gets into a row
it will be you.

BOLZ. Possibly. But I promise you that you shall surely come in for
your share of it. Now listen to my plan of operations. You
Kämpe--[_Enter_ SCHMOCK.] Stop! Who is that? Thunder! The factotum of
the _Coriolanus_! Our _incognito_ has not lasted long.

SCHMOCK (_even before the last remark, has been seen looking in at the
door, coming forward_). I wish you good evening, Mr. Bolz.

BOLZ. I wish you the same and of even better quality, Mr. Schmock.

SCHMOCK. Might I have a couple of words with you?

BOLZ. A couple? Don't ask for too few, noble armor-bearer of the
_Coriolanus_! A couple of dozen words you shall have, but no more.

SCHMOCK. Could you not employ me on your paper.

BOLZ (_to_ KÄMPE _and_ BELLMAUS). Do you hear that? On our paper? H'm!
'Tis much you ask, noble Roman!

SCHMOCK. I am sick of the _Coriolanus_. I would do any kind of work
you needed done. I want to be with respectable people, where one can
earn something and be treated decently.

BOLZ. What are you asking of us, slave of Rome? We to entice you away
from your party--never! We do violence to your political convictions?
Make you a renegade? We bear the guilt of your joining our party? No,
sir! We have a tender conscience. It rises in arms against your
proposition!

SCHMOCK. Why do you let that trouble you? Under Blumenberg I have
learned to write whichever way the wind blows. I have written on the
left and again on the right. I can write in any direction.

BOLZ. I see you have character. You would be a sure success on our
paper. Your offer does us honor, but we cannot accept it now. So
momentous an affair as your defection needs deep consideration.
Meanwhile you will have confided in no unfeeling barbarian. (_Aside to
the others_.) We may be able to worm something out of him. Bellmaus,
you have the tenderest heart of us three; you must devote yourself to
him today.

BELLMAUS. But what shall I do with him?

BOLZ. Take him into the restaurant, sit down in a corner with him,
pour punch into every hollow of his poor head until his secrets jump
out like wet mice. Make him chatter, especially about the elections.
Go, little man, and take good care not to get overheated yourself and
babble.

BELLMAUS. In that case I shall not see much of the fête.

BOLZ. That's true, my son! But what does the fête mean to you? Heat,
dust, and stale dance-music. Besides, we will tell you all about it in
the morning; and then you are a poet, and can imagine the whole affair
to be much finer than it really was. So don't take it to heart. You
may think you have a thankless role, but it is the most important of
all, for it requires coolness and cleverness. Go, mousey, and look out
about getting overheated.

BELLMAUS. I'll look out, old tom-cat.--Come along Schmock!

[BELLMAUS _and_ SCHMOCK _leave_.]

BOLZ. We might as well separate, too.

KÄMPE. I'll go and see how people feel. If I need you I'll look you
up.

BOLZ. I had better not show myself much. I'll stay around here.

[_Exit_ KÄMPE.]

Alone at last!

[_Goes to centre door_.]

There stands the Colonel, closely surrounded. It is she! She is here,
and I have to lie in hiding like a fox under the leaves.--But she has
falcon eyes,--perhaps--the throng disperses--she is walking through
the hall arm-in-arm with Ida--(_Excitedly_.) They are drawing nearer!
(_Irritably_.) Oh, bother! There is Korb rushing toward me! And just
now!

_Enter_ KORB.

KORB. Mr. Conrad! I can't believe my eyes! You here, at this fête!

BOLZ (_hastily_). Hush, old chap! I'm not here without a reason. I can
trust you--you're one of us, you know.

KORB. Body and soul. Through all the talking and fiddling I've kept
saying to myself, "Long live the _Union!"_ Here she is!

[_Shows him a paper in his pocket_.]

BOLZ. Good, Korb, you can do me a great favor. In a corner of the
refreshment room Bellmaus is sitting with a stranger. He is to pump
the stranger, but cannot stand much himself and is likely to say
things he shouldn't. You'll do the party a great service if you will
hurry in and drink punch so as to keep Bellmaus up to the mark. You
have a strong head--I know it from of old.

KORB (_hastily_). I go! You are as full of tricks as ever, I see. You
may rely on me. The stranger shall succumb, and the _Union_ shall
triumph.

[_Exit quickly. The music ceases_.]

BOLZ. Poor Schmock! [_At the door_.]

Ah, they are still walking through the hall. Ida is being spoken to,
she stops, Adelaide goes on--(_Excitedly_.) she's coming, she's coming
alone!

ADELAIDE (_makes a motion as though to pass the door, but suddenly
enters_. BOLZ _bows_). Conrad! My dear doctor!

[_Holds out her hand_. BOLZ _bends low over it_.]

ADELAIDE (_in joyous emotion_). I knew you at once from a distance.
Let me see your faithful face. Yes, it has changed but little--a scar,
browner, and a small line about the mouth. I hope it is from laughing.

BOLZ. If at this moment I feel like anything but laughing it is only a
passing malignity of soul. I see myself double, like a melancholy
Highlander. In your presence my long happy childhood passes bodily
before my eyes. All the joy and pain it brought me I feel as vividly
again as though I were still the boy who went into the wood for you in
search of wild adventures and caught robin-red-breasts. And yet the
fine creature I see before me is so different from my playmate that I
realize I am only dreaming a beautiful dream. Your eyes shine as
kindly as ever, but--(_Bowing_.) I have scarcely the right still to
think of old dreams.

ADELAIDE. Possibly I, too, am not so changed as you think; and changed
though we both be, we have remained good friends, have we not?

BOLZ. Rather than give up one iota of my claim to your regard, I would
write and print and try to sell malicious articles against myself.

ADELAIDE. And yet you have been too proud all this time even to come
and see your friend in town. Why have you broken with the Colonel?

BOLZ. I have not broken with him. On the contrary, I have a very
estimable position in his house--one that I can best keep by going
there as seldom as possible. The Colonel, and occasionally Miss Ida,
too, like to assuage their anger against Oldendorf and the newspaper
by regarding me as the evil one with horns and hoofs. A relationship
so tender must be handled with care--a devil must not cheapen himself
by appearing every day.

ADELAIDE. Well, I hope you will now abandon this lofty viewpoint. I am
spending the winter in town, and I hope that for love of your
boyhood's friend you will call on my friends as a denizen of this
world.

BOLZ. In any role you apportion me.

ADELAIDE. Even in that of a peace-envoy between the Colonel and
Oldendorf?

BOLZ. If peace be at the cost of Oldendorf's withdrawal, then no.
Otherwise I am ready to serve you in all good works.

ADELAIDE. But I fear that this is the only price at which peace can be
purchased. You see, Mr. Conrad, we too have become opponents.

BOLZ. To do anything against your wishes is horrible to me, son of
perdition though I be. So my saint wills and commands that Oldendorf
do not become member of Parliament?

ADELAIDE. I will it and command it, Mr. Devil!

BOLZ. It is hard. Up in your heaven you have so many gentlemen to
bestow on Miss Ida; why must you carry off a poor devil's one and only
soul, the professor?

ADELAIDE. It is just the professor I want, and you must let me have
him.

BOLZ. I am in despair. I would tear my hair were the place not so
unsuitable. I dread your anger. The thought makes me tremble that you
might not like this election.

ADELAIDE. Well, try to stop the election, then.

BOLZ. That I cannot do. But so soon as it is over I am fated to mourn
and grow melancholy over your anger. I shall withdraw from the
world--far, far to the North Pole. There I shall end my days sadly,
playing dominoes with polar bears, or spreading the elements of
journalistic training among the seals. That will be easier to endure
than the scathing glance of your eyes.

ADELAIDE (_laughing_). Yes, that's the way you always were. You made
every possible promise and acted exactly as you pleased. But before
starting for the North Pole, perhaps you will make one more effort to
reconcile me here.

[KÄMPE _is seen at the door._]

Hush!--I shall look forward to your visit. Farewell, my re-found
friend!

[_EXIT_.]

BOLZ. And thus my good angel turns her back to me in anger! And now,
politics, thou witch, I am irretrievably in thy power!

[_Exit quickly through centre door._]

_Enter_ PIEPENBRINK, MRS. PIEPENBRINK, BERTHA _escorted by_ FRITZ
KLEINMICHEL, _and_ KLEINMICHEL _through centre door. Quadrille behind
the scenes._

PIEPENBRINK. Thank Heaven, we are out of this crowd!

MRS. PIEPENBRINK. It is very hot.

KLEINMICHEL. And the music is too loud. There are too many trumpets
and I hate trumpets.

PIEPENBRINK. Here's a quiet spot; we'll sit down here.

FRITZ. Bertha would prefer staying in the ball-room. Might I not go
back with her?

PIEPENBRINK. I have no objection to you young people going back into
the ball-room, but I prefer your staying here with us. I like to keep
my whole party together.

MRS. PIEPENBRINK. Stay with your parents, my child!

PIEPENBRINK. Sit down! (_To his wife._) You sit at the corner, Fritz
comes next to me. You take Bertha between you, neighbors. Her place
will soon be at your table, anyway.

[_They seat themselves at the table on the right--at the left corner_
MRS. PIEPENBRINK, _then he himself_, FRITZ, BERTHA, KLEINMICHEL.]

FRITZ. When will "soon" be, godfather? You have been saying that this
long time, but you put off the wedding day further and further.

PIEPENBRINK. That is no concern of yours.

FRITZ. I should think it is, godfather! Am I not the man that wants
to marry Bertha?

PIEPENBRINK. That's a fine argument! Any one can want that. But it's I
who am to give her to you, which is more to the point, young man; for
it is going to be hard enough for me to let the little wag-tail leave
my nest. So you wait. You shall have her, but wait!

KLEINMICHEL. He will wait, neighbor.

PIEPENBRINK. Well, I should strongly advise him to do so. Hey! Waiter,
waiter!

[Illustration: _Permission F. Bruckman, A.-G. Munich_ ON THE TERRACE
ADOLF VON MENZEL]

MRS. PIEPENBRINK. What poor service one gets in such places!

PIEPENBRINK. Waiter!

[_Waiter comes._]

My name is Piepenbrink. I brought along six bottles of my own wine.
The restaurant-keeper has them. I should like them here.

[_While the waiter is bringing the bottles and glasses_ BOLZ _and_
KÄMPE _appear. Waiter from time to time in the background._]

BOLZ (_aside to_ KÄMPE). Which one is it?

KÄMPE. The one with his back to us, the broad-shouldered one.

BOLZ. And what kind of a business does he carry on?

KÄMPE. Chiefly red wines.

BOLZ. Good! (_Aloud._) Waiter, a table and two chairs here! A bottle
of red wine!

[_Waiter brings what has been ordered to the front, on the left._]

MRS. PIEPENBRINK. What are those people doing here?

PIEPENBRINK. That is the trouble with such promiscuous assemblies,
that one never can be alone.

KLEINMICHEL. They seem respectable gentlemen; I think I have seen one
of them before.

PIEPENBRINK (_decisively_). Respectable or not, they are in our way.

KLEINMICHEL. Yes, to be sure, so they are.

BOLZ (_seating himself with_ KÄMPE). Here, my friend, we can sit
quietly before a bottle of red wine. I hardly dare to pour it out, for
the wine at such restaurants is nearly always abominable. What sort of
stuff do you suppose this will be?

PIEPENBRINK (_irritated_). Indeed? Just listen to that!

KÄMPE. Let's try it.

[_Pours out; in a low voice._]

There is a double P. on the seal; that might mean Piepenbrink.

PIEPENBRINK. Well, I am curious to know what these greenhorns will
have to say against the wine.

MRS. PIEPENBRINK. Be quiet, Philip, they can hear you over there.

BOLZ (_in a low tone_). I'm sure you are right. The restaurant takes
its wine from him. That's his very reason for coming.

PIEPENBRINK. They don't seem to be thirsty; they are not drinking.

BOLZ (_tastes it; aloud_). Not bad!

PIEPENBRINK (_ironically_). Indeed?

BOLZ (_takes another sip_). A good, pure wine.

PIEPENBRINK (_relieved_). The fellow's judgment is not so bad.

BOLZ. But it does not compare with a similar wine that I recently
drank at a friend's house.

PIEPENBRINK. Indeed?

BOLZ. I learned then that there is only one man in town from whom a
sensible wine-drinker should take his red wine.

KÄMPE. And that is?

PIEPENBRINK (_ironically_). I really should like to know.

BOLZ. It's a certain Piepenbrink.

PIEPENBRINK (_nodding his head contentedly_). Good!

KÄMPE. Yes, it is well known to be a very reliable firm.

PIEPENBRINK. They don't know that their own wine, too, is from my
cellars. Ha! Ha! Ha!

BOLZ (_turning to him_). Are you laughing at us, Sir?

PIEPENBRINK. Ha! Ha! Ha! No offense. I merely heard you talking about
the wine. So you like Piepenbrink's wine better than this here? Ha!
Ha! Ha!

BOLZ (_slightly indignant_). Sir, I must request you to find my
expressions less comical. I do not know Mr. Piepenbrink, but I have
the pleasure of knowing his wine; and so I repeat the assertion that
Piepenbrink has better wine in his cellar than this here. What do you
find to laugh at in that? You do not know Piepenbrink's wines and have
no right to judge of them.

PIEPENBRINK. I do not know Piepenbrink's wines, I do not know Philip
Piepenbrink either, I never saw his wife--do you hear that,
Lottie?--And when his daughter Bertha meets me I ask, "Who is that
little black-head?" That is a funny story. Isn't it, Kleinmichel?

KLEINMICHEL. It is very funny! [_Laughs._]

BOLZ (_rising with dignity_). Sir, I am a stranger to you and have
never insulted you. You look honorable and I find you in the society
of charming ladies. For that reason I cannot imagine that you came
here to mock at strangers. As man to man, therefore, I request you to
explain why you find my harmless words so astonishing. If you don't
like Mr. Piepenbrink why do you visit it on us?

PIEPENBRINK _(rising_). Don't get too excited, Sir. Now, see here! The
wine you are now drinking is also from Piepenbrink's cellar, and I
myself am the Philip Piepenbrink for whose sake you are pitching into
me. Now, do you see why I laugh?

BOLZ. Ah, is that the way things stand? You yourself are Mr.
Piepenbrink? Then I am really glad to make your acquaintance. No
offense, honored Sir!

PIEPENBRINK. No, no offense. Everything is all right.

BOLZ. Since you were so kind as to tell us your name, the next thing
in order is for you to learn ours. I'm Bolz, Doctor of Philosophy, and
my friend here is Mr. Kämpe.

PIEPENBRINK. Pleased to meet you.

BOLZ. We are comparative strangers in this company and had withdrawn
to this side room as one feels slightly embarrassed among so many new
faces. But we should be very sorry if by our presence we in any way
disturbed the enjoyment of the ladies and the conversation of so
estimable a company. Tell us frankly if we are in the way, and we will
find another place.

PIEPENBRINK. You seem to me a jolly fellow and are not in the least in
my way, Doctor Bolz--that was the name, was it not?

MRS. PIEPENBRINK. We, too, are strangers here and had only just sat
down. Piepenbrink!

[_Nudges him slightly._]

PIEPENBRINK. I tell you what, Doctor, as you are already acquainted
with the yellow-seal from my cellar and have passed a very sensible
verdict upon it, how would it be for you to give it another trial
here? Sit down with us if you have nothing better to do, and we will
have a good talk together.

BOLZ (_with dignity, as throughout this whole scene, during which both
he and KÄMPE must not seem to be in any way pushing_). That is a very
kind invitation, and we accept it with pleasure. Be good enough, dear
Sir, to present us to your company.

PIEPENBRINK. This here is my wife.

BOLZ. Do not be vexed at our breaking in upon you, Madam. We promise
to behave ourselves and to be as good company as lies in the power of
two shy bachelors.

PIEPENBRINK. Here is my daughter.

BOLZ (_to_ MRS. PIEPENBRINK). One could have known that from the
likeness.

PIEPENBRINK. This is my friend, Mr. Kleinmichel, and this, Fritz
Kleinmichel, my daughter's fiancé.

BOLZ. I congratulate you, gentlemen, on such delightful society. (_To_
PIEPENBRINK.) Permit me to sit next to the lady of the house. Kämpe, I
thought you would sit next to Mr. Kleinmichel.

[_They sit down_.]

Now we alternate! Waiter!

[_Waiter comes to him_.]

Two bottles of this!

PIEPENBRINK. Hold on! You won't find that wine here. I brought my own
kind. You're to drink with me.

BOLZ. But Mr. Piepenbrink----

PIEPENBRINK. No remonstrances! You drink with me. And when I ask any
one to drink with me, Sir, I don't mean to sip, as women do, but to
drink out and fill up. You must make up your mind to that.

BOLZ. Well, I am content. We as gratefully accept your hospitality as
it is heartily offered. But you must then let me have my revenge. Next
Sunday you are all to be my guests, will you? Say yes, my kind host!
Punctually at seven, informal supper. I am single, so it will be in a
quiet, respectable hotel. Give your consent, my dear Madam. Shake
hands on it, Mr. Piepenbrink.--You, too, Mr. Kleinmichel and Mr.
Fritz!

[_Holds out his hand to each of them_.]

PIEPENBRINK. If my wife is satisfied it will suit me all right.

BOLZ. Done! Agreed! And now the first toast. To the good spirit who
brought us together today, long may he live!--[_Questioning those
about him_.] What's the spirit's name?

FRITZ KLEINMICHEL. Chance.

BOLZ. No, he has a yellow cap.

PIEPENBRINK. Yellow-seal is his name.

BOLZ. Correct! Here's his health! We hope the gentleman may last a
long time, as the cat said to the bird when she bit its head off.

KLEINMICHEL. We wish him long life just as we are putting an end to
him.

BOLZ. Well said! Long life!

PIEPENBRINK. Long life!

[_They touch glasses_. PIEPENBRINK _to his wife_.]

It is going to turn out well today, after all.

MRS. PIEPENBRINK. They are very modest nice men.

BOLZ. You can't imagine how glad I am that our good fortune brought us
into such pleasant company. For although in there everything is very
prettily arranged--

PIEPENBRINK. It really is all very creditable.

BOLZ. Very creditable! But yet this political society is not to my
taste.

PIEPENBRINK. Ah, indeed! You don't belong to the party, I suppose, and
on that account do not like it.

BOLZ. It's not that! But when I reflect that all these people have
been invited, not really to heartily enjoy themselves, but in order
that they shall presently give their votes to this or that gentleman,
it cools my ardor.

PIEPENBRINK. Oh, it can hardly be meant just that way. Something could
be said on the other side--don't you think so, comrade?

KLEINMICHEL. I trust no one will be asked to sign any agreement here.

BOLZ. Perhaps not. I have no vote to cast and I am proud to be in a
company where nothing else is thought of but enjoying oneself with
one's neighbor and paying attention to the queens of society--to
charming women! Touch glasses, gentlemen, to the health of the ladies,
of the two who adorn our circle. [_All touch glasses_.]

PIEPENBRINK. Come here, Lottie, your health is being drunk.

BOLZ. Young lady, allow a stranger to drink to your future prosperity.


PIEPENBRINK. What else do you suppose they are going to do in there?

FRITZ KLEINMICHEL. I hear that at supper there are to be speeches, and
the candidate for election, Colonel Berg, is to be introduced.

PIEPENBRINK. A very estimable gentleman.

KLEINMICHEL. Yes, it is a good choice the gentlemen on the committee
have made.

ADELAIDE, _who has been visible in the rear, now saunters in_.

ADELAIDE. He sitting here? What sort of a company is that?

KÄMPE. People say that Professor Oldendorf has a good chance of
election. Many are said to be going to vote for him.

PIEPENBRINK. I have nothing to say against him, only to my mind he is
too young.

SENDEN _is seen in the rear, later_ BLUMENBERG _and guests_.

SENDEN. You here, Miss Runeck?

ADELAIDE. I'm amusing myself with watching those queer people. They
act as though the rest of the company were non-existent.

SENDEN. What do I see? There sits the _Union_ itself and next to one
of the most important personages of the fête!

[_The music ceases_.]

BOLZ (_who has meanwhile been conversing with_ MRS. PIEPENBRINK _but
has listened attentively--to_ MR. PIEPENBRINK). There, you see the
gentlemen cannot desist from talking politics after all. (_To_
PIEPENBRINK.) Did you not mention Professor Oldendorf?

PIEPENBRINK. Yes, my jolly Doctor, just casually.

BOLZ. When you talk of him I heartily pray you to say good things
about him; for he is the best, the noblest man I know.

PIEPENBRINK. Indeed? You know him?

KLEINMICHEL. Are you possibly a friend of his!

BOLZ. More than that. Were the professor to say to me today: "Bolz, it
will help me to have you jump into the water," I should have to jump
in, unpleasant as it would be to me just at this moment to drown in
water.

PIEPENBRINK. Oho! That is strong!

BOLZ. In this company I have no right to speak of candidates for
election. But if I did have a member to elect he should be the
one--he, first of all.

PIEPENBRINK. But you are very much prejudiced in the man's favor.

BOLZ. His political views do not concern me here at all. But what do I
demand of a member? That he be a man; that he have a warm heart and a
sure judgment, and that he know unwaveringly and unquestionably what
is good and right; furthermore, that he have the strength to do what
he knows to be right without delay, without hesitation.

PIEPENBRINK. Bravo!

KLEINMICHEL. But the Colonel, too, is said to be that kind of a man.

BOLZ. Possibly he is, I do not know; but of Oldendorf I know it. I
looked straight into his heart on the occasion of an unpleasant
experience I went through. I was once on the point of burning to
powder when he was kind enough to prevent it. Him I have to thank for
sitting here. He saved my life.

SENDEN. He lies abominably!

[_Starts forward_.]

ADELAIDE (_holding him back_). Be still! I believe there is some truth
to the story.

PIEPENBRINK. Well now, it was very fine of him to save your life; but
that kind of thing often happens.

MRS. PIEPENBRINK. Do tell us about it, Doctor!

BOLZ. The little affair is like a hundred others and would not
interest me at all, had I not been through it myself. Picture to
yourself an old house. I am a student living on the third floor. In
the house opposite me lives a young scholar; we do not know each
other. At dead of night I am awakened by a great noise and a strange
crackling under me. If it were mice, they must have been having a
torchlight procession for the room was brilliantly illuminated. I rush
to the window, the bright flame from the story under me leaps up to
where I stand. My window-panes burst about my head, and a vile cloud
of smoke rushes in on me. There being no great pleasure under the
circumstances in leaning out of the window, I rush to the door and
throw it open. The stairs, too, cannot resist the mean impulse
peculiar to old wood, they are all ablaze. Up three flights of stairs
and no exit! I gave myself up for lost. Half unconscious I hurried
back to the window. I heard the cries from the street, "A man! a man!
This way with the ladder!" A ladder was set up. In an instant it began
to smoke and to burn like tinder. It was dragged away. Then streams of
water from all the engines hissed in the flames beneath me. Distinctly
I could hear each separate stream striking the glowing wall. A fresh
ladder was put up; below there was deathly silence and you can imagine
that I, too, had no desire to make much of a commotion in my fiery
furnace. "It can't be done," cried the people below. Then a full, rich
voice rang out: "Raise the ladder higher!" Do you know, I felt
instantly that this was the voice of my rescuer. "Hurry!" cried those
below. Then a fresh cloud of vapor penetrated the room. I had had my
share of the thick smoke, and lay prostrate on the ground by the
window.

MRS. PIEPENBRINK. Poor Doctor Bolz!

PIEPENBRINK (_eagerly_). Go on!

[SENDEN _starts forward_.]

ADELAIDE (_holding him back_). Please, let him finish, the story is
true!

BOLZ. Then a man's hand seizes my neck. A rope is wound round me under
the arms, and a strong wrist raises me from the ground. A moment later
I was on the ladder, half dragged, half carried; with shirt aflame,
and unconscious, I reached the pavement.--I awoke in the room of the
young scholar. Save for a few slight burns, I had brought nothing with
me over into the new apartment; all my belongings were burned. The
stranger nursed me and cared for me like a brother. Not until I was
able to go out again did I learn that this scholar was the same man
who had paid his visit to me that night on the ladder. You see the man
has his heart in the right spot, and that's why I wish him now to
become member of Parliament, and why I could do for him what I would
not do for myself; for him I could electioneer, intrigue, or make
fools of honest people. That man is Professor Oldendorf.

PIEPENBRINK. Well, he's a tremendously fine man! [_Rising_.] Here's to
the health of Professor Oldendorf! [_All rise and touch glasses_.]

BOLZ (_bowing pleasantly to all--to_ MRS. PIEPENBRINK). I see warm
sympathy shining in your eyes, dear madam, and I thank you for it. Mr.
Piepenbrink, I ask permission to shake your hand; you are a fine
fellow. [_Slaps him on the back and embraces him_.] Give me your hand,
Mr. Kleinmichel! [_Embraces him_.] And you, too, Mr. Fritz
Kleinmichel! May no child of yours ever sit in the fire, but if he
does may there ever be a gallant man at hand to pull him out. Come
nearer, I must embrace you, too.

MRS. PIEPENBRINK (_much moved_). Piepenbrink, we have veal-cutlets
tomorrow. What do you think? [_Converses with him in a low tone_.]

ADELAIDE. His spirits are running away with him!

SENDEN. He is unbearable! I see that you are as indignant as I am. He
snatches away our people; it can no longer be endured.

BOLZ (_who had gone the rounds of table, returning and standing in
front of_ MRS. PIEPENBRINK). It really isn't right to let it stop
here. Mr. Piepenbrink, head of the house, I appeal to you, I ask your
permission--hand or mouth?

ADELAIDE (_horrified, on the right toward the front_). He is actually
kissing her!

PIEPENBRINK. Sail in, old man, courage!

MRS. PIEPENBRINK. Piepenbrink, I no longer know you!

ADELAIDE (_at the moment when_ BOLZ _is about to kiss_ MRS.
PIEPENBRINK _crosses the stage, passing them casually, as it were, and
holds her bouquet between_ BOLZ _and_ MRS. PIEPENBRINK. _In a low
tone, quickly to_ BOLZ). You're going too far! You are being watched!

[_Passes to the rear on the left, and exit_.]

BOLZ. A fairy interferes!

SENDEN _(who has already been haranguing some of the other guests,
including_ BLUMENBERG, _noisily pushes forward at this moment--to
those at the table_). He is presumptuous; he has thrust himself in!

PIEPENBRINK (_bringing down his hand on the table and rising_). Oho! I
like that! If I kiss my wife or let her be kissed, that is nobody's
concern whatever! Nobody's! No man and no woman and no fairy has a
right to put a hand before her mouth.

BOLZ. Very true! Splendid! Hear! Hear!

SENDEN. Revered Mr. Piepenbrink, no offense against you! The company
is charmed to see you here. Only to Mr. Bolz we will remark that his
presence is causing scandal. So completely opposed are his political
principles that we must regard his appearing at this fête as an
unwarrantable intrusion!

BOLZ. My political principles opposed? In society I know no other
political principle than this--to drink with nice people and not to
drink with those whom I do not consider nice. With you, Sir, I have
not drunk.

PIEPENBRINK _(striking the table_). That was a good one!

SENDEN _(hotly)_. You thrust yourself in here!

BOLZ _(indignantly)_. Thrust myself in?

PIEPENBRINK. Thrust himself in? Old man, you have an entrance ticket,
I suppose?

BOLZ _(frankly)_. Here is my ticket! It is not you I am showing it to,
but this honorable man from whom you are trying to estrange me by
your attack. Kämpe, give your ticket to Mr. Piepenbrink. He is the man
to judge of all the tickets in the world!

PIEPENBRINK. Here are two tickets just exactly as valid as my own.
Why, you scattered them right and left like sour grape juice. Oho! I
see quite well how things stand! I'm not one of your crowd, either,
but you want to get me. That's why you came to my house again and
again--because you expected to capture me. Because I am a voter,
that's why you're after me. But because this honorable man is not a
voter he does not count for you at all. We know those smooth tricks!

SENDEN. But, Mr. Piepenbrink!

PIEPENBRINK _(interrupting him, more angrily)_. Is that any reason for
insulting a peaceful guest? Is it a reason for closing my wife's
mouth? It is an injustice to this man, and he shall stay here as long
as I do. And he shall stay here by my side. And whoever attempts to
attack him will have to deal with me!

BOLZ. Your fist, good sir! You're a faithful comrade! And so
hand-in-hand with you Philip, I defy the Capulet and his entire clan!

PIEPENBRINK. Philip! Right you are, Conrad, my boy! Come here! They
shall swell with anger till they burst! Here's to Philip and Conrad!
_[They drink brotherhood.]_

BOLZ. Long live Piepenbrink!

PIEPENBRINK. So, old chum! Shall I tell you what! Since we are having
so good a time I think we'll leave all these people to their own
devices, and all of you come home with me. I'll brew a punch and we'll
sit together as merrily as jackdaws. I'll escort you, Conrad, and the
rest of you go ahead.

SENDEN _(and guests)_. But do listen, _revered_ Mr. Piepenbrink!

PIEPENBRINK. I'll listen to nothing. I'm done with you!

_Enter_ BELLMAUS _and other guests_.

BELLMAUS _(hurrying through the crowd_). Here I am!

BOLZ. My nephew! Gracious Madam, I put him under your protection!
Nephew, you escort Madam Piepenbrink. (MRS. PIEPENBRINK _takes a firm
grip on_ BELLMAUS'S _arm and holds him securely. Polka behind the
scene.)_ Farewell, gentlemen, it's beyond your power to spoil our good
humor. There, the music is striking up! We march off in a jolly
procession, and again I cry in conclusion, Long live Piepenbrink!

THE DEPARTING ONES. Long live Piepenbrink! _[They march off in
triumph_. FRITZ KLEINMICHEL _and his fiancée,_ KÄMPE _with_
KLEINMICHEL, MRS. PIEPENBRINK _with_ BELLMAUS, _finally_ BOLZ _with_
PIEPENBRINK.]

_Enter_ COLONEL.

COLONEL. What's going on here?

SENDEN. An outrageous scandal! The _Union_ has kidnapped our two most
important voters!




ACT III


SCENE I


_The_ COLONEL'S _Summer Parlor_.

_The_ COLONEL _in front, walking rapidly up and down. In the rear_,
ADELAIDE _and_ IDA _arm-in-arm, the latter in great agitation. A short
pause. Then enter_ SENDEN.

SENDEN (_hastily calling through centre door_).

All goes well! 37 votes against 29.

COLONEL.

Who has 37 votes?

SENDEN.

Why you, Colonel, of course!

COLONEL.

Of course! (_Exit_ SENDEN.) The election day is unendurable! In no
fight in my life did I have this feeling of fear. It is a mean
cannon-fever of which any ensign might be ashamed. And it is a long
time since I was an ensign!

[_Stamping his foot_.]

Confound it!

[_Goes to rear of stage_.]

IDA (_coming forward with_ ADELAIDE).

This uncertainty is frightful. Only one thing is sure, I shall be
unhappy whichever way this election turns out.

[_Leans on_ ADELAIDE.]

ADELAIDE.

Courage! Courage, little girl! Things may still turn out all right.
Hide your anxiety from your father; he is in a state of mind, as it
is, that does not please me at all.

_Enter_ BLUMENBERG _in haste; the_ COLONEL _rushes toward him_.

COLONEL.

Now, sir, how do things stand?

BLUMENBERG.

41 votes for you, Colonel, 34 for our opponents; three have fallen on
outsiders. The votes are being registered at very long intervals now,
but the difference in your favor remains much the same. Eight more
votes for you, Colonel, and the victory is won. We have every chance
now of coming out ahead. I am hurrying back, the decisive moment is at
hand. My compliments to the ladies!

[_Exit_.]

COLONEL.

Ida!

[IDA _hastens to him_.]

Are you my good daughter?

IDA.

My dear father!

COLONEL.

I know what is troubling you, child. You are worse off than any one.
Console yourself, Ida; if, as seems likely, the professor has to make
way for the old soldier, then we'll talk further on the matter.
Oldendorf has not deserved it of me; there are many things about him
that I do not like. But you are my only child. I shall think of that
and of nothing else; but the very first thing to do is to break down
the young man's obstinacy.

[_Releases_ IDA; _walks up and down again._]

ADELAIDE (_in the foreground, aside_).

The barometer has risen, the sunshine of pardon breaks through the
clouds. If only it were all over! Such excitement is infectious! (_To_
IDA.) You see you do not yet have to think of entering a nunnery.

IDA. But if Oldendorf is defeated, how will he bear it!

ADELAIDE (_shrugging her shoulders_).

He loses a seat in unpleasant company and wins, instead, an amusing
little wife. I think he ought to be satisfied. In any case he will
have a chance to make his speeches. Whether he makes them in one house
or another, what is the difference? I fancy you will listen to him
more reverently than any other member.

IDA (_shyly_).

But Adelaide, what if it really would be better for the country to
have Oldendorf elected?

ADELAIDE.

Yes, dearest, in that case there is no help for the country. Our State
and the rest of the European nations must learn to get along without
the professor. You have yourself to attend to first of all; you wish
to marry him; you come first.

[_Enter_ CARL.]

What news, Carl?

CARL.

Mr. von Senden presents his compliments and reports 47 to 42. The head
of the election committee, he says, has already congratulated him.

COLONEL.

Congratulated? Lay out my uniform, ask for the key of the wine-cellar,
and set the table; we are likely to have visitors this evening.

CARL.

Yes, Colonel.

[_Exit_.]

COLONEL (_to himself in the foreground_).

Now, my young professor! My style does not please you? It may be that
you are right. I grant you are a better journalist. But here, where it
is a serious matter, you will find yourself in the wrong, just for
once. [_Pause_.] I may be obliged to say a few words this evening. It
used to be said of me in the regiment, indeed, that I could always
speak to the point, but these manoeuvres in civilian dress disconcert
me a little. Let's think it over! It will be only proper for me to
mention Oldendorf in my speech, of course with due respect and
appreciation; yes indeed, I must do that. He is an honest fellow, with
an excellent heart, and a scholar with fine judgment. And he can be
very amiable if you disregard his political theories. We have had
pleasant evenings together. And as we sat then around my fat
tea-kettle and the good boy began to tell his stories, Ida's eyes
would be fixed on his face and would shine with pleasure--yes, and my
own old eyes, too, I think. Those were fine evenings! Why do we have
them no longer? Bah! They'll come back again! He'll bear defeat
quietly in his own way--a good, helpful way. No sensitiveness in him!
He really is at heart a fine fellow, and Ida and I could be happy with
him. And so, gentlemen and electors--but thunder and lightning! I
can't say all that to the voters! I'll say to them--

_Enter_ SENDEN.

SENDEN (_excitedly_).

Shameful, shameful! All is lost!

COLONEL.

Aha! (_Instantly draws himself up in military posture_.)


  ADELAIDE }                      My presentiment! Father!
           }                        [_Hurries to him_].
           } (_together_).
           }
  IDA      }                      Dear me!


SENDEN.

It was going splendidly. We had 47, the opponents 42 votes. Eight
votes were still to be cast. Two more for us and the day would have
been ours. The legally appointed moment for closing the ballot-box had
come. All looked at the clock and called for the dilatory voters. Then
there was a trampling of feet in the corridor. A group of eight
persons pushed noisily into the hall, at their head the vulgar
wine-merchant Piepenbrink, the same one who at the fête the other
day--

ADELAIDE.

We know; go on--

SENDEN.

Each of the band in turn came forward, gave his vote and "Edward
Oldendorf" issued from the lips of all. Then finally came this
Piepenbrink. Before voting he asked the man next to him: "Is the
professor sure of it?" "Yes," was the reply. "Then I, as last voter,
choose as member of Parliament"--[_Stops._]

ADELAIDE.

The professor?

SENDEN.

No. "A most clever and cunning politician," so he put it, "Dr. Conrad
Bolz." Then he turned short around and his henchmen followed him.

ADELAIDE (_aside, smiling_).

Aha!

SENDEN.

Oldendorf is member by a majority of two votes.

COLONEL.

Ugh!

SENDEN.

It is a shame! No one is to blame for this result but these
journalists of the _Union_. Such a running about, an intriguing, a
shaking of hands with all the voters, a praising of this Oldendorf, a
shrugging of the shoulders at us--and at you, dear Sir!

COLONEL.

Indeed?

IDA.

That last is not true.

ADELAIDE (_to_ SENDEN).

Show some regard, and spare those here.

COLONEL.

You are trembling, my daughter. You are a woman, and let yourself be
too much affected by such trifles. I will not have you listen to these
tidings any longer. Go, my child! Why, your friend has won, there is
no reason for you to cry! Help her, Miss Adelaide!

IDA (_is led by_ ADELAIDE _to the side door on the left;
entreatingly_.)

Leave me! Stay with father!

SENDEN.

Upon my honor, the bad faith and arrogance with which this paper is
edited are no longer to be endured. Colonel, since we are alone--for
Miss Adelaide will let me count her as one of us--we have a chance to
take a striking revenge. Their days are numbered now. Quite a long
time ago, already, I had the owner of the _Union_ sounded. He is not
disinclined to sell the paper, but merely has scruples about the party
now controlling the sheet. At the club-fête I myself had a talk with
him.

ADELAIDE.

What's this I hear?

SENDEN.

This outcome of the election will cause the greatest bitterness among
all our friends, and I have no doubt that, in a few days, by forming a
stock company, we can collect the purchase price. That would be a
deadly blow to our opponents, a triumph for the good cause. The most
widely-read sheet in the province in our hands, edited by a
committee--

ADELAIDE.

To which Mr. von Senden would not refuse his aid--

SENDEN.

As a matter of duty I should do my part. Colonel, if you would be one
of the shareholders, your example would at once make the purchase a
sure thing.

COLONEL.

Sir, what you do to further your political ideas is your own affair.
Professor Oldendorf, however, has been a welcome guest in my house.
Never will I work against him behind his back. You would have spared
me this moment had you not previously deceived me by your assurances
as to the sentiments of the majority. However, I bear you no malice.
You acted from the best of motives, I am sure. I beg the company to
excuse me if I withdraw for today. I hope to see you tomorrow again,
dear Senden.

SENDEN.

Meanwhile I will start the fund for the purchase of the newspaper. I
bid you good day. [_Exit_.]

COLONEL.

Pardon me, Adelaide, if I leave you alone. I have some letters to
write, and [_with a forced laugh_] my newspapers to read.

ADELAIDE (_sympathetically_).

May I not stay with you now, of all times?

COLONEL (_with an effort_).

I shall be better off alone, now.

[_Exit through centre door_.]

ADELAIDE (_alone_).

My poor Colonel! Injured vanity is hard at work in his faithful soul.
And Ida. [_Gently opens the door on the left, remains standing_.] She
is writing. It is not difficult to guess to whom. [_Closes the door_.]
And for all of this mischief that evil spirit Journalism is to blame.
Everybody complains of it, and every one tries to use it for his own
ends. My Colonel scorned newspaper men until he became one himself,
and Senden misses no opportunity of railing at my good friends of
the pen, merely because he wishes to put himself in their place. I see
Piepenbrink and myself becoming journalists, too, and combining to
edit a little sheet under the title of _Naughty Bolz_. So the _Union_
is in danger of being secretly sold. It might be quite a good thing
for Conrad: he would then have to think of something else besides the
newspaper. Ah! the rogue would start a new one at once!

_Enter_ OLDENDORF _and_ CARL.

OLDENDORF (_while still outside of the room_).

And the Colonel will receive no one?

CARL.

No one, Professor. [_Exit_.]

ADELAIDE (_going up to_ OLDENDORF).

Dear Professor, this is not just the right moment for you to come. We
are very much hurt and out of sorts with the world, but most of all
with you.

OLDENDORF.

I am afraid you are, but I must speak to him.

_Enter_ IDA _through the door on the left_.

IDA (_going toward him_).

Edward! I knew you would come!

OLDENDORF.

My dear Ida! [_Embraces her_.]

IDA (_with her arms around his neck_).

And what will become of us now?

_Enter_ COLONEL _through centre door_.

COLONEL (_with forced calmness_).

You shall remain in no doubt about that, my daughter! I beg you,
Professor, to forget that you were once treated as a friend in this
household. I require you, Ida, to banish all thought of the hours when
this gentleman entertained you with his sentiments. (_More
violently_.) Be still! In my own house at least I submit to no attacks
from a journalist. Forget him, or forget that you are my daughter. Go
in there! [_Leads_ IDA, _not ungently, out to the left, and places
himself in front of the door_.] On this ground, Mr. Editor and Member
of Parliament, before the heart of my child, you shall not beat me.

[_Exit to the left_.]

ADELAIDE (_aside_).

Dear me! That is bad!

OLDENDORF (_as the_ COLONEL _turns to go, with determination_).

Colonel, it is ungenerous of you to refuse me this interview. [_Goes
toward the door_.]

ADELAIDE (_intercepting him quickly_).

Stop! No further! He is in a state of excitement where a single word
might do permanent harm. But do not leave us this way, Professor; give
me just a few moments.

OLDENDORF.

I must, in my present condition of mind, ask your indulgence. I have
long dreaded just such a scene, and yet I hardly feel able to control
myself.

ADELAIDE.

You know our friend; you know that his quick temper drives him into
acts for which later he would gladly atone.

OLDENDORF.

This was more than a fit of temper. It means a breach between us
two--a breach that seems to me beyond healing.

ADELAIDE.

Beyond healing, Professor! If your sentiments toward Ida are what I
think they are, healing is not so difficult. Would it not be fitting
for you even now--especially now--to accede to the father's wishes.
Does not the woman you love deserve that, for once at least, you
sacrifice your ambition!

OLDENDORF.

My ambition, yes; my duty, no.

ADELAIDE.

Your own happiness, Professor, seems to me to be ruined for a long
time, possibly forever, if you part from Ida in this way.

OLDENDORF (_gloomily_).

Not every one can be happy in his private life.

ADELAIDE.

This resignation does not please me at all, least of all in a man.
Pardon me for saying so, plainly. (_Ingratiatingly_.) Is the
misfortune so great if you become member for this town a few years
later, or even not at all?

OLDENDORF.

Miss Runeck, I am not conceited. I do not rate my abilities very high,
and, as far as I know myself, there is no ambitious impulse lurking at
the bottom of my heart. Possibly, as you do now, so a later age will
set a low estimate on our political wrangling, our party aims, and all
that that includes. Possibly all our labor will be without result;
possibly much of the good we hope to do will, when achieved, turn out
to be the opposite--yes, it is highly probable that my own share in
the struggle will often be painful, unedifying, and not at all what
you would call a grateful task; but all that must not keep me from
devoting my life to the strife and struggle of the age to which I
belong. That struggle, after all, is the best and noblest that the
present has to offer. Not every age permits its sons to achieve
results which remain great for all time; and, I repeat, not every age
can make those who live in it distinguished and happy.

ADELAIDE.

I think every age can accomplish that if the individuals will only
understand how to be great and happy. [_Rising_.] You, Professor, will
do nothing for your own little home-happiness. You force your friends
to act for you.

[Illustration: Permission F. Bruckmann, A.-G. Munich
IN THE BEERGARDEN   Adolph von Menzel]

OLDENDORF.

At all events cherish as little anger against me as possible, and
speak a good word for me to Ida.

ADELAIDE.

I shall set my woman's wits to aiding you, Mr. Statesman.

[_Exit_ OLDENDORF.]

ADELAIDE (_alone_).

So this is one of the noble, scholarly, free spirits of the German
nation! And he climbs into the fire from a sheer sense of duty! But to
conquer anything--the world, happiness, or even a wife--for that he
never was made!

_Enter_ CARL.

CARL (_announcing_).

Dr. Bolz!

ADELAIDE.

Ah! He at least will be no such paragon of virtue!--Where is the
Colonel?

CARL.

In Miss Ida's room.

ADELAIDE.

Show the gentleman in here.

[_Exit_ CARL.]

I feel somewhat embarrassed at seeing you again, Mr. Bolz; I shall
take pains to conceal it.

_Enter_ BOLZ.

BOLZ.

A poor soul has just left you, vainly seeking consolation in your
philosophy. I too come as an unfortunate, for yesterday I incurred
your displeasure; and but for your presence, which cut short a
vexatious scene, Mr. von Senden, in the interests of social propriety,
would doubtless have pitched into me still harder. I thank you for the
reminder you gave me; I take it as a sign that you will not withdraw
your friendly interest in me.

ADELAIDE (_aside_).

Very pretty, very diplomatic!--It is kind of you to put so good a
construction on my astonishing behavior. But pardon me if I presume to
interfere again; that scene with Mr. von Senden will not, I trust,
give provocation for a second one?

BOLZ (_aside_).

This eternal Senden! (_Aloud_.) Your interest in him furnishes me
grounds for avoiding further consequences. I think I can manage it.

ADELAIDE.

I thank you. And now let me tell you that you are a dangerous
diplomatist. You have inflicted a thorough defeat on this household.
On this unfortunate day but one thing has pleased me--the one vote
which sought to make you member of Parliament.

BOLZ.

It was a crazy idea of the honest wine-merchant.

ADELAIDE.

You took so much trouble to put your friend in, why did you not work
for yourself? The young man I used to know had lofty aims, and nothing
seemed beyond the range of his soaring ambition. Have you changed, or
is the fire still burning?

BOLZ (_smiling_).

I have become a journalist, Miss Adelaide.

ADELAIDE.

Your friend is one, too.

BOLZ.

Only as a side issue. But I belong to the guild. He who has joined it
may have the ambition to write wittily or well. All that goes beyond
that is not for us.

ADELAIDE.

Not for you?

BOLZ.

For that we are too flighty, too restless and scatter-brained.

ADELAIDE.

Are you in earnest about that, Conrad?

BOLZ.

Perfectly in earnest. Why should I wish to seem to you different from
what I am? We journalists feed our minds on the daily news; we must
taste the dishes Satan cooks for men down to the smallest morsel; so
you really should make allowances for us. The daily vexation over
failure and wrong doing, the perpetual little excitements over all
sorts of things--that has an effect upon a man. At first one clenches
one's fist, then one learns to laugh at it. If you work only for the
day you come to live for the day.

ADELAIDE (_perturbed_).

But that is sad, I think.

BOLZ.

On the contrary, it is quite amusing. We buzz like bees, in spirit we
fly through the whole world, suck honey when we find it, and sting
when something displeases us. Such a life is not apt to make great
heroes, but queer dicks like us are also needed.

ADELAIDE (_aside_).

Now he too is at it, and he is even worse than the other one.

BOLZ.

We won't waste sentiment on that account. I scribble away so long as
it goes. When it no longer goes, others take my place and do the same.
When Conrad Bolz, the grain of wheat, has been crushed in the great
mill, other grains fall on the stones until the flour is ready from
which the future, possibly, will bake good bread for the benefit of
the many.

ADELAIDE.

No, no, that is morbidness; such resignation is wrong.

BOLZ.

Such resignation will eventually be found in every profession. It is
not your lot. To you is due a different kind of happiness, and you
will find it. (_Feelingly_.) Adelaide, as a boy I wrote you tender
verses and lulled myself in foolish dreams. I was very fond of you,
and the wound our separation inflicted still smarts at times.
[ADELAIDE _makes a deprecatory gesture_.] Don't be alarmed, I am not
going to pain you. I long begrudged my fate, and had moments when I
felt like an outcast. But now when you stand there before me in full
radiancy, so lovely, so desirable, when my feeling for you is as warm
as ever, I must say to you all the same: Your father, it is true,
treated me roughly; but that he separated us, that he prevented you,
the rich heiress, who could claim anything, with your own exclusive
circle of friends, from throwing herself away on a wild boy who had
always shown more presumption than power--that was really very
sensible, and he acted quite rightly in the matter.

ADELAIDE (_in her agitation seizing his hands_).

Thank you, Conrad, thank you for speaking so of my dead father! Yes,
you are good, you have a heart. It makes me very happy that you should
have shown it to me.

BOLZ.

It is only a tiny little pocket-heart for private use. It was quite
against my will that it happened to make its appearance.

ADELAIDE.

And now enough of us two! Here in this house our help is needed. You
have won, have completely prevailed against us. I submit, and
acknowledge you my master. But now show mercy and let us join forces.
In this conflict of you men a rude blow has been struck at the heart
of a girl whom I love. I should like to make that good again and I
want you to help me.

BOLZ.

I am at your command.

ADELAIDE.

The Colonel must be reconciled. Think up some way of healing his
injured self-esteem.

BOLZ.

I have thought it over and have taken some steps. Unfortunately, all I
can do is to make him feel that his anger at Oldendorf is folly. This
soft conciliatory impulse you alone can inspire.

ADELAIDE.

Then we women must try our luck.

BOLZ.

Meanwhile I will hurry and do what little I can.

ADELAIDE.

Farewell, Mr. Editor. And think not only of the progress of the great
world, but also occasionally of one friend, who suffers from the base
egotism of wishing to be happy on her own account.

BOLZ.

You have always found your happiness in looking after the happiness of
others. With that kind of egotism there is no difficulty in being
happy. [_Exit_.]

ADELAIDE (_alone_).

He still loves me! He is a man with feeling and generosity. But he,
too, is resigned. They are all _ill_--these men! They have no courage!
From pure learning and introspection they have lost all confidence in
themselves. This Conrad! Why doesn't he say to me: "Adelaide, I want
you to be my wife?" He can be brazen enough when he wants to! God
forbid! He philosophizes about my kind of happiness and his kind of
happiness! It was all very fine, but sheer nonsense.--My young
country-squires are quite different. They have no great burden of
wisdom and have more whims and prejudices than they ought to; but they
do their hating and loving thoroughly and boldly, and never forget
their own advantage. They are the better for it! Praised be the
country, the fresh air, and my broad acres! [_Pause; with decision_.]
The _Union_ is to be sold! Conrad must come to the country to get rid
of his crotchets! [_Sits down and writes; rings; enter_ CARL.] Take
this note to Judge Schwarz; I want him kindly to come to me on urgent
business.

[_Exit_ CARL.]

_Enter_ IDA _through the side door on the left_.

IDA.

I am too restless to keep still! Let me cry here to my heart's
content! [_Weeps on_ ADELAIDE'S _neck_.]

ADELAIDE (_tenderly_).

Poor child! The bad men have been very cruel to you. It's all right
for you to grieve, darling, but don't be so still and resigned!

IDA.

I have but the one thought: he is lost to me--lost forever!

ADELAIDE.

You are a dear good girl. But be reassured! You haven't lost him at
all. On the contrary, we'll see to it that you get him back better
than ever. With blushing cheeks and bright eyes he shall reappear to
you, the noble man, your chosen demigod--and your pardon the demigod
shall ask for having caused you pain!--

IDA (_looking up at her_).

What are you telling me?

ADELAIDE.

Listen! This night I read in the stars that you were to become Mrs.
Member-of-Parliament. A big star fell from heaven, and on it was
written in legible letters: "Beyond peradventure she shall have him!"
The fulfilment has attached to it but one condition.

IDA.

What condition? Tell me!

ADELAIDE.

I recently told you of a certain lady and an unknown gentleman. You
remember?

IDA.

I have thought of it incessantly.

ADELAIDE.

Good! On the same day on which this lady finds her knight again shall
you also be reconciled with your professor--not sooner, not later.
Thus it is written.

IDA.

I am so glad to believe you. And when will the day come?

ADELAIDE.

Yes, dear, I do not know that exactly. But I will confide in you,
since we girls are alone, that the said lady is heartily tired of the
long hoping and waiting and will, I fear, do something desperate.

IDA (_embracing her_).

If only she will hurry up!

ADELAIDE (_holding her_).

Hush! Some man might hear us! [_Enter_ KORB.] What is it, old friend?

KORB.

Miss Adelaide, out there is Mr. Bellmaus, the friend--

ADELAIDE.

Very well, and he wishes to speak to me?

KORB.

Yes. I myself advised him to come to you; he has something to tell
you.

ADELAIDE.

Bring him in here! [_Exit_ KORB.]

IDA.

Let me go away; my eyes are red with weeping.

ADELAIDE.

Well go, dear. In a few minutes I will rejoin you. (_Exit_ IDA.)

He too! The whole _Union_--one after the other!

_Enter_ BEULMAUS.

BELLMAUS (_shyly, bowing repeatedly_).

You permit me, Miss Runeck!

ADELAIDE (_kindly_).

I am glad to receive your visit, and am curious about the interesting
disclosures you have to make to me.

BELLMAUS.

There is no one to whom I would rather confide what I have heard, Miss
Runeck, than to you. Having learned from Mr. Korb that you are a
subscriber to our newspaper I feel sure--

ADELAIDE.

That I deserve, too, to be a friend of the editors. Thank you for the
good opinion.

BELLMAUS.

There is this man Schmock! He is a poor fellow who has been little in
good society and was until now on the staff of the _Coriolanus_.

ADELAIDE. I remember having seen him.

BELLMAUS.

At Bolz's request I gave him a few glasses of punch. He thereupon grew
jolly and told me of a great plot that Senden and the editor of the
_Coriolanus_ have hatched between them. These two gentlemen, so he
assures me, had planned to discredit Professor Oldendorf in the
Colonel's eyes and so drove the Colonel into writing articles for the
_Coriolanus_.

ADELAIDE.

But is the young man who made you these revelations at all
trustworthy?

BELLMAUS.

He can't stand much punch, and after three glasses he told me all this
of his own accord. In general I don't consider him very reputable. I
should call him a good fellow, but reputable--no, he's not quite that.

ADELAIDE (_indifferently_.)

Do you suppose this gentleman who drank the three glasses of punch
would be willing to repeat his disclosures before other persons?

BELLMAUS.

He said he would, and spoke of proofs too.

ADELAIDE (_aside_).

Aha! (_Aloud_.) I fear the proofs won't amount to much. And you have
not spoken of it to the professor or Mr. Bolz?

BELLMAUS.

Our professor is very much occupied these days, and Bolz is the
jolliest man in the world; but his relations with Mr. von Senden being
already strained I thought--

ADELAIDE (_quickly_).

And you were quite right, dear Mr. Bellmaus. So in other regards you
are content with Mr. Bolz?

BELLMAUS.

He is a sociable, excellent man, and I am on very good terms with him.
All of us are on very good terms with him.

ADELAIDE.

I am glad to hear it.

BELLMAUS.

He sometimes goes a little too far, but he has the best heart in the
world.

ADELAIDE (_aside_). "Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings" ye
shall hear the truth!

BELLMAUS.

His nature, you know, is a purely prosaic one; for poetry he has not
the least comprehension. ADELAIDE. Do you think so?

BELLMAUS.

Yes, he often bursts forth on the subject.

ADELAIDE (_rising_).

I thank you for your communication even if I cannot attach weight to
it, and I am glad to have met in you one of the editorial staff.
Journalists, I find, are dangerous people, and it is just as well to
secure their good will; although I, as an unimportant person, will try
never to furnish matter for a newspaper article. [_As_ BELLMAUS
_lingers._] Can I do anything more for you?

BELLMAUS (_with warmth_).

Yes, Miss Runeck, if you would be so good as to accept this copy of my
poems. They are poems of youth, to be sure, my first attempts, but I
count on your friendly indulgence.

[_Draws a gilt-edged book from his pocket, and hands it to her._]

ADELAIDE.

I thank you heartily, Mr. Bellmaus. Never before has a poet presented
me with his works. I shall read the beautiful book through in the
country, and, under my trees, shall rejoice that I have friends in
town who spare a thought for me too, when they represent beauty for
other people.

BELLMAUS (_fervently_).

Rest assured, Miss Runeck, that no poet will forget you, who has once
had the good fortune to make your acquaintance.

[_Exit with a deep bow._]

ADELAIDE.

This Mr. Schmock with the three glasses of punch is well worth
cultivating, I should say. Scarcely have I arrived in town when my
room turns into a regular business office, where editors and authors
ply their trade. I fear that is an omen.

[_Exit to the left._]

_It grows dark. The_ COLONEL _enters from the garden._

COLONEL (_slowly coming forward_).

I am glad that all is over between us. [_Stamping his foot._] I am
very glad! [_In a depressed tone._] I feel free and more relieved than
for a long time. I think I could actually sing! At this moment I am
the subject of conversation over all tea-cups, on all beer-benches.
Everywhere arguing and laughter: It serves him right, the old fool!
Damn! [_Enter_ CARL, _with lights and the newspaper_.] Who told you to
bring the lamp?

CARL.

Colonel, it is your hour for reading the newspaper. Here it is. [_Lays
it on the table_.]

COLONEL.

A low rabble, these gentlemen of the pen! Cowardly, malicious,
insidious in their anonymity. How this band will triumph now, and over
me! How they will laud their editor to the skies! There lies the
contemptible sheet! In it stands my defeat, trumpeted forth with full
cheeks, with scornful shrugs of the shoulders--away with it! [_Walks
up and down, looks at the newspaper on the ground, picking it up_.]
All the same I will drink out the dregs! [_Seats himself.]_ Here,
right in the beginning! [_Reading_.] "Professor Oldendorf--majority of
two votes. This journal is bound to rejoice over the result."--I don't
doubt it!--"But no less a matter for rejoicing was the electoral
contest which preceded it."--Naturally--"It has probably never before
been the case that, as here, two men stood against each other who were
so closely united by years of friendship, both so distinguished by the
good will of their fellow-citizens. It was a knightly combat between
two friends, full of generosity, without malice, without jealousy; yes
doubtless, deep down in his heart, each harbored the hope that his
friend and opponent and not himself would be the victor"--[_Lays down
the paper; wipes his brow_.] What sort of language is that? [_Reads_.]
"and aside from some special party views, never did a man have greater
claims to victory than our honored opponent. What he, through his
upright, noble personality stands for among his wide circle of friends
and acquaintances, this is not the place to dwell upon. But the way in
which, by his active participation in all public spirited enterprises
of the town, he has given aid and counsel, is universally known and
will be realized by our fellow-citizens, especially today, with
heartfelt gratitude." [_Lays the paper aside_.] That is a vile style!
[_Reads on_.] "By a very small majority of votes our town has decreed
to uphold the younger friend's political views in Parliament. But by
all parties today--so it is reported--addresses and deputations are
being prepared, not to extol the victor in the electoral contest, but
to express to his opponent the general reverence and respect of which
never a man was more worthy than he."--That is open assassination!
That is a fearful indiscretion of Oldendorf's, that is the revenge of
a journalist, so fine and pointed! Oh, it is just like him! No, it is
not like him! It is revolting, it is inhuman! What am I to do!
Deputations and addresses to me? To Oldendorf's friend? Bah, it is all
mere gossip, newspaper-babble that costs nothing but a few fine words!
The town knows nothing of these sentiments. It is blackguardism!

_Enter_ CARL.

CARL.

Letters from the local mail.

[_Lays them on the table._]

[_Exit_.]

COLONEL.

There is something up, here, too. I dread to open them. [_Breaks open
the first one_.] What the devil! A poem?--and to me? "To our noble
opponent, the best man in town."--Signed? What is the signature?
"B--aus!" B--aus? I don't know it, it must be a pseudonym! [_Reads_.]
It seems to be exceedingly good poetry!--And what have we here?
[_Opens the second letter_.] "To the benefactor of the poor, the
father of orphans." An address!--[_Reads_.] "Veneration and
kindliness."--Signature: "Many women and girls." The seal a P.P.--Good
God, what does it all mean? Have I gone mad? If these are really
voices from the town, and if that is the way people look on this day,
then I must confess men think better of me than I do of myself!

_Enter_ CARL.

CARL.

A number of gentlemen wish to speak to you, Colonel.

COLONEL.

What sort of gentlemen!

CARL.

They say: A deputation from the voters.

COLONEL.

Show them in. This confounded newspaper was right, after all.

_Enter_ PIEPENBRINK, KLEINMICHEL _and three other gentlemen. They
bow, the_ COLONEL _likewise_.

PIEPENBRINK (_solemnly_).

My Colonel: A number of voters have sent us as a deputation to you to
inform you on this special day that the whole town considers you a
most respectable and worthy man.

COLONEL (_stiffly_).

I am obliged for the good opinion.

PIEPENBRINK.

You have no reason to feel obliged. It is the truth. You are a man of
honor through and through, and it gives us pleasure to tell you so;
you cannot object to hearing this from your fellow-citizens.

COLONEL.

I always did consider myself a man of honor, gentlemen.

PIEPENBRINK.

There you were quite right. And you have proved your good principles,
too. On every occasion. In cases of poverty, of famine, of caring for
orphans, also at our shooting-club meeting--always when we citizens
enjoyed or needed a benevolent good man, you were among the first.
Always simple and loyal without arrogance or supercilious manners.
That's the reason why we universally love and honor you. (_Colonel
wipes his eyes_.) Today many of us gave their votes to the professor.
Some on account of politics, some because they know that he is your
close friend and possibly even your future son-in-law. COLONEL (_not
harshly_).

Sir--

PIEPENBRINK.

Nor did I myself vote for you.

COLONEL (_somewhat more excitedly_).

Sir--

PIEPENBRINK.

But for that very reason I come to you with the rest, and that is why
we tell you what the citizens think of you. And we hope that for long
years to come you will preserve to us your manly principles and
friendly heart as an honored, most respected gentleman and
fellow-citizen.

COLONEL (_without harshness_).

Why do you not say that to the professor, to the man that you have
chosen?

PIEPENBRINK.

He shall first deserve it in Parliament before the town thanks him.
But you _have_ deserved it of us, and therefore we come to you.

COLONEL (_heartily_).

I thank you, sir, for your kind words. They are very comforting to me
just now. May I ask your name?

PIEPENBRINK.

My name is Piepenbrink.

COLONEL (_morely coldly, but not impolitely_).

Ah, indeed, that is your name! (_With dignity._) I thank you,
gentlemen, for the friendly sentiment you have expressed, whether it
be that you render the true opinion of the town, or speak according to
the desire of individuals. I thank you, and shall go on doing what I
think is right.

[_Bows, so does the deputation; exit latter_.]

This, then, is that Piepenbrink, the close friend of his friend! But
the man's words were sensible and his whole demeanor honorable; it
cannot possibly be all rascality. Who knows! They are clever
intriguers; send into my house newspaper articles, letters, and these
good-natured people, to make me soft-hearted; act in public as my
friends, to make me confide again in their falseness! Yes, that is it.
It is a preconcerted plan! They will find they have miscalculated!

_Enter_ CARL.

CARL.

Dr. Bolz!

COLONEL.

I am at home to no one any longer!

CARL.

So I told the gentleman; but he insisted on speaking to you, saying
that he came in on an affair of honor.

COLONEL.

What? But Oldendorf won't be so insane--show him in here!

_Enter_ BOLZ.

BOLZ (_with dignity_).

Colonel, I come to make you an announcement which the honor of a third
person necessitates.

COLONEL.

I am prepared for it, and beg you not to prolong it unduly.

BOLZ.

No more than is requisite. The article in this evening's _Union_
which deals with your personality was written by me and inserted by me
in the paper without Oldendorf's knowledge.

COLONEL.

It can interest me little to know who wrote the article.

BOLZ (_courteously_).

But I consider it important to tell you that it is not by Oldendorf
and that Oldendorf knew nothing about it. My friend was so taken up
these last weeks with his own sad and painful experiences that he left
the management of the paper entirely to me. For all that has lately
appeared in it I alone am responsible.

COLONEL.

And why do you impart this information?

BOLZ.

You have sufficient penetration to realize, Colonel, that, after the
scene which took place today between you and my friend, Oldendorf as a
man of honor could neither write such an article nor allow it to
appear in his paper.

COLONEL.

How so, sir? In the article itself I saw nothing unsuitable.

BOLZ.

The article exposes my friend in your eyes to the suspicion of having
tried to regain your good-will by unworthy flattery. Nothing is
further from his thoughts than such a method. You, Colonel, are too
honorable a man yourself to consider a mean action natural to your
friend.

COLONEL.

You are right. (_Aside_.) This defiance is unbearable! (_Aloud_.) Is
your explanation at an end?

BOLZ.

It is. I must add still another: that I myself regret very much having
written this article.

COLONEL.

I imagine I do not wrong you in assuming that you have already written
others that were still more to be regretted.

BOLZ (_continuing_).

I had the article printed before hearing of your last interview with
Oldendorf. (_Very courteously_.) My reason for regretting it is, that
it is not quite true. I was too hasty in describing your personality
to the public. Today, at least, it is no longer a true portrait; it is
flattering.

COLONEL (_bursting out_).

Well, by the devil, that is rude!

BOLZ.

Your pardon--it is only true. I wish to convince you that a journalist
can regret having written falsehoods.

COLONEL.

Sir! (_Aside_.) I must restrain myself, or he will always get the
better of me.--Dr. Bolz, I see that you are a clever man and know your
trade. Since, in addition, you seem inclined today to speak only the
truth, I must beg you to tell me further if you, too, organized the
demonstrations which purport to represent to me public sentiment.

BOLZ (_bowing_).

I have, as a matter of fact, not been inactive in the matter.

COLONEL (_holding out the letter to him, angrily_).

Did you prompt these, too?

BOLZ.

In part, Colonel. This poem is the heart-outpouring of an honest youth
who reveres in you the paternal friend of Oldendorf and the ideal of a
chivalrous hero. I inspired him with the courage to send you the poem.
It was well-meant, at any rate. The poet will have to seek another
ideal. The address comes from women and girls who constitute the
Association for the Education of Orphans. The Association includes
among its members Miss Ida Berg. I myself composed this address for
the ladies; it was written down by the daughter of the wine-merchant
Piepenbrink.

COLONEL.

That was just about my opinion concerning these letters. It is
needless to ask if you too are the contriver who sent me the citizens?

BOLZ.

At all events I did not discourage them. [_From without a male chorus
of many voices_.]


  Hail! Hail! Hail!
  Within the precincts of our town,
  Blessed by each burgher's son,
  There dwells a knight of high renown,
  A noble, faithful one.

  Who doth in need for aid apply
  To this brave knight sends word;
  For love is his bright panoply
  And mercy is his sword.

  We laud him now in poem and song
  Protector of the lowly throng.
  The Colonel, the Colonel,
  The noble Colonel Berg!


COLONEL (_rings after the first measure of the song_. CARL _enters_).

You are to let no one in if you wish to remain in my service.

CARL.

Colonel, they are already in the garden, a great company of them. It
is the glee club; the leaders are already at the steps.

BOLZ (_who has opened the window_).

Very well sung, Colonel--from _La Juive_--he is the best tenor in town
and the accompaniment is exceedingly original.

COLONEL (_aside_).

It is enough to drive one mad. [_Aloud_.] Show the gentlemen in!

_Exit_ CARL. _At the end of the verse enter_ FRITZ KLEINMICHEL _and
two other gentlemen_.

FRITZ KLEINMICHEL.

Colonel, the local glee club asks to be allowed to sing you some
songs--kindly listen to the little serenade as a feeble expression of
the general veneration and love.

COLONEL.

Gentlemen, I regret exceedingly that a case of illness in my family
makes it desirable for me to have you curtail your artistic
performance. I thank you for your intentions, and beg you will sing to
Professor Oldendorf the songs you had designed for me.

FRITZ KLEINMICHEL.

We considered it our duty first to greet you before visiting your
friend. In order not to disturb invalids, we will, with your
permission, place ourselves further away from the house, in the
garden.

COLONEL.

Do as you please.

[FRITZ KLEINMICHEL _and the two others leave_.]

Is this act, too, an invention of yours?

BOLZ (_with a bow_).

Partially at least. But you are too kind, Colonel, if you look upon me
as the sole originator of all these demonstrations. My share in it is
really a small one. I have done nothing but edit public opinion a
little; all these different people are not dolls, which a skilful
puppet-man can move around by pulling wires. These are all voices of
capable and honorable persons, and what they have said to you is
actually the general opinion of the town--that is to say, the
conviction of the better and more sensible elements in the town. Were
that not the case I should have labored quite in vain with these good
people to bring a single one of them into your house.

COLONEL.

He is right again, and I am always in the wrong!

BOLZ (_very courteously_).

Permit me to explain further, that I consider these tender expressions
of general regard out of place now, and that I deeply regret my share
in them. Today at least, no friend of Oldendorf has any occasion to
praise your chivalrous sentiments or your self-effacement.

COLONEL (_going toward him_).

Doctor Bolz, you use the privilege of your profession to speak
recklessly, and are insulting outsiders in a way that exhausts my
patience. You are in my house, and it is a customary social amenity to
respect the domicile of one's opponent.

BOLZ (_leaning on a chair, good-naturedly_).

If you mean by that that you have a right to expel from your house
unwelcome guests you did not need to remind me of it, for this very
day you shut your doors on another whose love for you gave him a
better right to be here than I have.

COLONEL.

Sir, such brazen-facedness I have never yet experienced.

BOLZ (_with a bow_).

I am a journalist, and claim what you have just called the privilege
of my profession.

[_Grand march by brass band. Enter_ CARL _quickly_.]

COLONEL (_going toward him_).

Shut the garden gate; no one is to come in. [_The music stops_.]

BOLZ (_at the window_).

You are locking your friends out; this time I am innocent.

CARL.

Ah, Colonel, it is too late. The singers are back there in the garden,
and in front a great procession is approaching the house; it is Mr.
von Senden and the entire club.

[_Goes to rear of stage_.]

COLONEL (_to_ BOLZ).

Sir, I wish the conversation between us to end.

BOLZ (_speaking back at him from the window_).

In your position, Colonel, I find the desire very natural. [_Looking
out again_.] A brilliant procession! They all carry paper lanterns,
and on the lanterns are inscriptions! Besides the ordinary club
mottoes, I see others. Why isn't Bellmaus ever looking when he might
be helping the newspaper! [_Taking out a note book_.] We'll quickly
note those inscriptions for our columns. [_Over his shoulder_.] Pardon
me! Oh, that is truly remarkable: "Down with our enemies!" And here a
blackish lantern with white letters--"Death to the _Union_!" Holy
thunder! [_Calls out of the window_.] Good evening, gentlemen!

COLONEL (_going up to him_).

Sir, you're in league with the devil!

BOLZ (_turning quickly around_).

Very kind of you, Colonel, to show yourself at the window with me.

[COLONEL _retreats_.]

SENDEN (_from below_).

Whose voice is that!

BOLZ.

Good evening, Mr. von Senden!--The gentleman with the dark lantern and
white inscription would oblige us greatly by kindly lifting it up to
the Colonel. Blow your light out, man, and hand me the lantern. So,
thank you--man with the witty motto! [_Pulling in the stick and
lantern_.] Here, Colonel, is the document of the brotherly love your
friends cherish toward us. [_Tears the lantern from the stick_.] The
lantern for you, the stick for the lantern-bearer! [_Throws the stick
out of the window_.] I have the honor to bid you good day!

[_Turns to go, meets_ ADELAIDE.]

_Male chorus, close at hand again: "Within the precincts of our town;"
trumpets join in; then many voices: "Long live_ COLONEL BERG!
_Hurrah!_" ADELAIDE _has entered on the left, during the noise_.

ADELAIDE.

Well, is the whole town upside-down today?

BOLZ.

I've done my share; he is half converted. Good night!

COLONEL (_throwing the lantern on the ground--in a rage_).

To the devil with all journalists!

_Male chorus_, SENDEN, BLUMENBERG _and many other gentlemen, in
procession, are visible through the door into the garden; the
deputation comes in; chorus and lantern-bearers form a group at the
entrance_.

SENDEN (_with a loud voice while the curtain is lowered_).

Colonel, the Club has the honor of greeting its revered members!




ACT IV


SCENE I


_The_ COLONEL'S _summer parlor_. COLONEL _enters from the garden,
followed by_ CARL.

COLONEL (_on entering, crossly_).

Who ordered William to bring the horse round in front of the bedrooms?
The brute makes a noise with his hoofs that would wake the dead.

CARL.

Are you not going to ride today, Colonel?

COLONEL.

No. Take the horse to the stable!

CARL.

Yes, Colonel. [_Exit_.]

COLONEL (_rings_, CARL _reappears at the door_).

Is Miss Runeck at home?

CARL.

She is in her room; the judge has been with her an hour already.

COLONEL.

What? Early in the morning?

CARL.

Here she is herself.

[_Exit as soon as_ ADELAIDE _enters_.]

_Enter_ ADELAIDE _and_ KORB _through the door on the right_.

ADELAIDE (_to_ KORB).

You had better remain near the garden gate, and when the said young
man comes bring him to us.

[_Exit_ KORB.]

Good-morning, Colonel.

[_Going up to him and examining him gaily_.]

How is the weather today?

COLONEL.

Gray, girl, gray and stormy. Vexation and grief are buzzing round in
my head until it is fit to burst. How is the child?

ADELAIDE.

Better. She was wise enough to fall asleep toward morning. Now she is
sad, but calm.

COLONEL.

This very calmness annoys me. If she would only once shriek and tear
her hair a bit! It would be horrible, but there would be something
natural about it. It is this smiling and then turning away to dry
secret tears that makes me lose my composure. It is unnatural in my
child.

ADELAIDE.

Possibly she knows her father's kind heart better than he does
himself; possibly she still has hopes.

COLONEL.

Of what? Of a reconciliation with him? After what has happened a
reconciliation between Oldendorf and myself is out of the question.

ADELAIDE (_aside_).

I wonder if he wants me to contradict him!

_Enter_ KORB.

KORB (_to_ ADELAIDE).

The gentleman has come.

ADELAIDE.

I will ring.

[_Exit_ KORB.]

Help me out of a little dilemma. I have to speak with a strange young
man who seems in need of help, and I should like to have you stay near
me.--May I leave this door open?

[_Points to the door on the left_.]

COLONEL.

That means, I suppose, in plain English, that I
am to go in there?

ADELAIDE.

I beg it of you--just for five minutes.

COLONEL.

Very well--if only I don't have to listen.

ADELAIDE.

I do not require it; but you will listen all the
same if the conversation happens to interest you.

COLONEL (_smiling_).

In that case I shall come out.

[_Exit to the left_; ADELAIDE _rings_.]

_Enter_ SCHMOCK. KORB _also appears at the entrance, but quickly
withdraws_.

SCHMOCK (_with a bow_).

I wish you a good-morning. Are you the lady who sent me her secretary?

ADELAIDE.

Yes. You said you wished to speak to me personally.

SCHMOCK.

Why should the secretary know about it if I want to tell you
something? Here are the notes that Senden wrote and that I found in
the paper-basket of the _Coriolanus_. Look them over, and see if they
will be of use to the Colonel. What can I do with them? There's
nothing to be done with them.

ADELAIDE (_looking through them, reading, in an aside_).

"Here I send you the wretched specimens of style, etc." Incautious and
very low-minded! [_Lays them on the table. Aloud_.] At any rate these
unimportant notes are better off in my paper-basket than in any one
else's. And what, sir, induces you to confide in me?

[Illustration: _Permission Union Deutsch um Vellagssesellsckaft
Stuttgart_. LUNCH BUFFET AT KISSENGEN     ADOLPH VON MENZEL. ]

SCHMOCK.

I suppose because Bellmaus told me you were a clever person who would
choose a good way of telling the Colonel to be on his guard against
Senden and against my editor; and the Colonel is a kind man; the other
day he ordered a glass of sweet wine and a salmon sandwich as a lunch
for me.

COLONEL (_visible at the door, clasping his hands sympathetically_).

Merciful heavens!

SCHMOCK.

Why should I let him be duped by these people!

ADELAIDE.

Since you did not dislike the lunch, we will see that you get another
one.

SCHMOCK.

Oh please, don't trouble yourself on my account.

ADELAIDE.

Can we help you with anything else?

SCHMOCK.

What should you be able to help me with? [_Examining his boots and
clothes_.] I have everything in order now. My trouble is only that I
have got into the wrong occupation. I must try to get out of
literature.

ADELAIDE (_sympathetically_.)

It is very hard, I suppose, to feel at home in literature?

SCHMOCK.

That depends. My editor is an unfair man. He cuts out too much and
pays too little. "Attend to your style first of all," says he; "a good
style is the chief thing." "Write impressively, Schmock," says he;
"write profoundly; it is required of a newspaper today that it be
profound." Good! I write profoundly, I make my style logical! But when
I bring him what I have done he hurls it away from him and shrieks:
"What is that? That is heavy, that is pedantic!" says he. "You must
write dashingly; it's brilliant you must be, Schmock. It is now the
fashion to make everything pleasant for the reader." What am I to do?
I write dashingly again; I put a great deal of brilliant stuff in the
article; and when I bring it he takes his red pencil and strikes out
all that is commonplace and leaves me only the brilliant stuff
remaining.

COLONEL.

Are such things possible?

SCHMOCK.

How can I exist under such treatment? How can I write him only
brilliant stuff at less than a penny a line. I can't exist under it!
And that is why I'm going to try to get out of the business. If only I
could earn twenty-five to thirty dollars, I would never in my life
write again for a newspaper; I would then set up for myself in
business--a little business that could support me.

ADELAIDE.

Wait a moment! [_Looks into her purse_.]

COLONEL (_hastily coming forward_).

Leave that to me, dear Adelaide. The young man wants to cease being a
journalist. That appeals to me. Here, here is money such as you desire
if you will promise me from this day on not to touch a pen again for a
newspaper. Here, take it.

SCHMOCK.

A Prussian bank note--twenty-five thalers in currency? On my honor, I
promise you, on my honor and salvation, I go this very day to a cousin
of mine who has a paying business. Would you like an I.O.U., Colonel,
or shall I make out a long-term promissory note?

COLONEL.

Get out with your promissory note!

SCHMOCK.

Then I will write out a regular I.O.U. I prefer it to be only an
I.O.U.

COLONEL (_impatiently_).

I don't want your I.O.U. either. Sir, for God's sake get out of the
house!

SCHMOCK.

And how about the interest? If I can have it at five per cent. I
should like it.

ADELAIDE.

The gentleman makes you a present of the money.

SCHMOCK.

He makes me a present of the money? It's a miracle! I tell you what,
Colonel, if I don't succeed with the money it remains a gift, but if I
work my way up with it I return it. I hope I will work my way up.
COLONEL. Do just as you like about that.

SCHMOCK.

I like to have it that way, Colonel.--Meanwhile I thank you, and may
some other joy come to make it up to you. Good day, Sir and Madam.

ADELAIDE.

We must not forget the lunch. [_Rings,_ KORB _enters_.] Dear Korb!
[_Talks in a low tone to him_.]

SCHMOCK.

O please, do not go to that trouble!

[_Exeunt_ SCHMOCK _and_ KORB.]

COLONEL.

And now, dear lady, explain this whole conversation; it concerns me
intimately enough.

ADELAIDE.

Senden spoke tactlessly to outsiders about his relations with you and
your household. This young man had overheard some of it, and also had
notes written by Senden in his possession, which contained unsuitable
expressions. I thought it best to get these notes out of his hands.

COLONEL.

I want you to let me have those letters, Adelaide.

ADELAIDE (_entreating_).

Why, Colonel?

COLONEL.

I won't get angry, girl.

ADELAIDE.

Nor is it worth while to do so. But still I beg you won't look at
them. You know enough now, for you know that he, with his associates,
does not merit such great confidence as you have latterly reposed in
him.

COLONEL (_sadly_).

Well, well! In my old days I have had bad luck with my acquaintances.

ADELAIDE.

If you put Oldendorf and this one (_pointing to the letters_) in the
same class you are quite mistaken.

COLONEL.

I don't do that, girl. For Senden I had no such affection, and that's
why it is easier to bear it when he does me an injury.

ADELAIDE (_gently_).

And because you loved the other one, that was the reason why yesterday
you were so--

COLONEL.

Say it, mentor--so harsh and violent!

ADELAIDE.

Worse than that, you were unjust.

COLONEL.

I said the same thing to myself last night, as I went to Ida's room
and heard the poor thing cry. I was a hurt, angry man and was wrong in
the form--but in the matter itself I was, all the same, right. Let him
be member of Parliament; he may be better suited for it than I. It is
his being a newspaper writer that separates us.

ADELAIDE.

But he is only doing what you did yourself!

COLONEL.

Don't remind me of that folly! Were he as my son-in-law to hold a
different opinion from mine regarding current happenings--that I could
doubtless stand. But if day by day he were to proclaim aloud to the
world feelings and sentiments the opposite of mine, and I had to read
them, and had to hear my son-in-law reproached and laughed at for them
on all sides by old friends and comrades, and I had to swallow it
all--you see that is more than I could bear!

ADELAIDE.

And Ida? Because you won't bear it Ida is to be made unhappy?

COLONEL.

My poor child! She has been unhappy throughout the whole affair. This
half-hearted way of us men has long been a mistake. It is better to
end it with one sharp pain.

ADELAIDE (_seriously_).

I cannot see that ending of it as yet. I shall only see it when Ida
laughs once more as merrily as she used to do.

COLONEL (_excitedly walking about, exclaiming_).

Well then, I'll give him my child, and go and sit alone in a corner. I
had other views for my old age, but God forbid that my beloved girl
should be made unhappy by me. He is reliable and honorable, and will
take good care of her. I shall move back to the little town I came
from.

ADELAIDE (_seizing his hand_).

My revered friend, no--you shall not do that! Neither Oldendorf nor
Ida would accept their happiness at such a price. But if Senden and
his friends were secretly to take the paper away from the professor,
what then?

COLONEL (_joyfully_).

Then he would no longer be a journalist! (_Uneasily_.) But I won't
hear of such a thing. I am no friend of underhanded action.

ADELAIDE.

Nor am I! (_Heartily_.) Colonel, you have often shown a confidence in
me that has made me happy and proud. Even today you let me speak more
frankly than is usually permitted to a girl. Will you give me one more
great proof of your regard?

COLONEL (_pressing her hand_).

Adelaide, we know how we stand with each other. Speak out!

ADELAIDE.

For one hour, today, be my faithful knight. Allow me to lead you
wherever I please.

COLONEL.

What are you up to, child?

ADELAIDE.

Nothing wrong, nothing unworthy of you or of me. You shall not long be
kept in the dark about it.

COLONEL.

If I must, I will surrender. But may I not know something of what I
have to do?

ADELAIDE.

You are to accompany me on a visit, and at the same time keep in mind
the things we have just talked over so sensibly.

COLONEL.

On a visit?

_Enter_ KORB.

ADELAIDE.

On a visit I am making in my own interest.

KORB (_to_ ADELAIDE).

Mr. von Senden wishes to pay his respects.

COLONEL.

I don't wish to see him now.

ADELAIDE.

Be calm, Colonel! We have not time to be angry even with him. I shall
have to see him for a few moments.

COLONEL.

Then I will go away.

ADELAIDE (_entreating_).

But you will accompany me directly? The carriage is waiting.

COLONEL.

I obey the command. [_Exit to the left_.]

ADELAIDE.

I have made a hasty decision; I have ventured on something that was
doubtless too bold for a girl; for now that the crisis is at hand, I
feel my courage leaving me. I had to do it for his sake and for all
our sakes. (_To_ KORB.) Ask Miss Ida to get ready--the coachman will
come straight back for her. Dear Korb, let your thoughts be with me. I
am going on a weighty errand, old friend! [_Exit_ ADELAIDE.]

KORB.

(_alone_). Gracious, how her eyes shine! What is she tip to? She's not
going to elope with the old Colonel, I hope! Well, whatever she is up
to, she will carry it through. There is only one person who could ever
be a match for her. Oh, Mr. Conrad, if only I could speak!

[_EXIT_.]


SCENE II


_Editorial room of the Union. Enter_ BOLZ _through the door on the
left, directly afterward_ MILLER.

BOLZ (_at middle door_).

In here with the table!

MILLER (_carries small table, all set, with wine-bottles, glasses and
plates, to the foreground on the left; brings up five chairs while he
speaks_).

Mr. Piepenbrink sends his regards, with the message that the wine is
yellow-seal, and that, if the Doctor drinks any healths, he must not
forget Mr. Piepenbrink's health. He was very jolly, the stout
gentleman. And Madam Piepenbrink reminded him that he ought to
subscribe for the _Union_. He commissioned me to see to it.

BOLZ (_who meanwhile has been turning over papers at the work-table on
the right, rising_).

Let's have some wine!

[MILLER _pours some in a glass_.]

In honor of the worthy vintner! [_Drinks._]

I treated him scandalously, but he has proved true-hearted. Tell him
his health was not forgotten. There, take this bottle along!--Now, get
out!

[_Exit_ MILLER. BOLZ _opening the door on the left_.]

Come, gentlemen, today I carry out my promise.

[_Enter_ KÄMPE, BELLMAUS, KÖRNER.]

This is the lunch I agreed to give. And now, my charming day-flies,
put as much rose-color into your cheeks and your humors as your wits
will let you. [_Pouring out_.] The great victory is won; the _Union_
has celebrated one of the noblest of triumphs; in ages still to come
belated angels will say with awe: "Those were glorious days," and so
on--see continuation in today's paper. Before we sit down, the first
toast--

KÄMPE. The member-elect--

BOLZ.

No, our first toast is to the mother of all, the great power which
produces members--the newspaper, may she prosper!

ALL.

Hurrah! [_Clink glasses_.]

BOLZ.

Hurrah! And secondly, long live--hold on, the member himself is not
here yet.

KÄMPE.

Here he comes.

_Enter_ OLDENDORF.

BOLZ.

The member from our venerable town, editor-in-chief and professor,
journalist, and good fellow, who is angry just now because behind his
back this and that got into the paper--hurrah for him!

ALL.

Hurrah!

OLDENDORF (_in a friendly tone_.)

I thank you, gentlemen.

BOLZ (_drawing_ OLDENDORF _to the front_).

And you are no longer vexed with us?

OLDENDORF.

Your intention was good, but it was a great indiscretion.

BOLZ.

Forget all about it! (_Aloud_.) Here, take your glass and sit down
with us. Don't be proud, young statesman! Today you are one of us.
Well, here sits the editorial staff! Where is worthy Mr.
Henning--where tarries our owner, printer and publisher, Gabriel
Henning?

KÄMPE.

I met him a little while ago on the stairs. He crept by me as shyly as
though he were some one who had been up to mischief.

BOLZ.

Probably he feels as Oldendorf does--he is again not pleased with the
attitude of the paper.

MILLER (_thrusting in his head_).

The papers and the mail!

BOLZ.

Over there! [MILLER _enters, lays the papers on the work-table._]

MILLER.

Here is the _Coriolanus_. There is something in it about our paper.
The errand-boy of the _Coriolanus_ grinned at me scornfully, and
recommended me to look over the article.

BOLZ.

Give it here! Be quiet, Romans, _Coriolanus_ speaks.--All ye devils,
what does that mean? [_Reads_.] "On the best of authority we have just
been informed that a great change is imminent in the newspaper affairs
of our province. Our opponent, the _Union_, will cease to direct her
wild attacks against all that is high and holy."--This high and holy
means Blumenberg.--"The ownership is said to have gone over into other
hands, and there is a sure prospect that we shall be able from now on
to greet as an ally this widely read sheet." How does that taste to
you, gentlemen?

MILLER} Thunder! KÄMPE.}_(All together_.) Nonsense! BELLMAUS.} It's a
lie!

OLDENDORF.

It's another of Blumenberg's reckless inventions.

BOLZ.

There is something behind it all. Go and get me Gabriel Henning.
[_Exit_ MILLER.] This owner has played the traitor; we have been
poisoned. [_Springing up._] And this is the feast of the Borgia!
Presently the _misericordia_ will enter and sing our dirge. Do me the
favor at least to eat up the oysters before it be too late.

OLDENDORF (_who has seized the newspaper_.)

Evidently this news is only an uncertain rumor. Henning will tell us
there is no truth in it. Stop seeing ghosts, and sit down with us.

BOLZ (_seating himself_).

I sit down, not because I put faith in your words, but because I don't
wish to do injustice to the lunch. Get hold of Henning; he must give
an account of himself.

OLDENDORF.

But, as you heard, he is not at home.

BOLZ (_zealously eating_).

Oh, thou wilt have a fearful awakening, little Orsini! Bellmaus, pour
me out some wine. But if the story be not true, if this _Coriolanus_
have lied, by the purple in this glass be it sworn I will be his
murderer! The grimmest revenge that ever an injured journalist took
shall fall on his head; he shall bleed to death from pin-pricks; every
poodle in the street shall look on him scornfully and say: "Fie,
_Coriolanus_, I wouldn't take a bite at you even if you were a
sausage." [_A knock is heard_. BOLZ _lays down his knife.] Memento
mori_! There are our grave-diggers. The last oyster, now, and then
farewell thou lovely world!

_Enter_ JUDGE SCHWARZ _and_ SENDEN _from the door on the left; the
door remains open_.

SCHWARZ.

Obedient servant, gentlemen!

SENDEN.

Your pardon if we disturb you.

BOLZ (_remaining seated at the table_).

Not in the least. This is our regular luncheon, contracted for a whole
year--fifty oysters and two bottles daily for each member of the
staff. Whoever buys the newspaper has to furnish it.

SCHWARZ.

What brings us here, Professor, is a communication which Mr. Henning
should have been the first to make to you. He preferred handing over
the task to me.

OLDENDORF.

I await your communication.

SCHWARZ.

Mr. Henning has, from yesterday on, transferred to me by sale all
rights pertaining to him as owner of the newspaper _Union_.

OLDENDORF.

To you, Judge?

SCHWARZ.

I acknowledge that I have bought it merely as accredited agent of a
third person. Here is the deed; it contains no secrets. [_Hands him a
paper_.]

OLDENDORF (_looking through it, to_ BOLZ).

It is drawn up by a notary in due form--sold for thirty thousand
thalers. [_Agitation among the staff-members_.] Let me get to the
bottom of the matter. Is this change of owner also to be connected
with a change in the political attitude of the sheet?

SENDEN (_coming forward_).

Certainly, Professor, that was the intention in making the purchase.

OLDENDORF.

Do I possibly see in you the new owner?

SENDEN.

Not that, but I have the honor to be a friend of his. You yourself, as
well as these gentlemen, have a right to demand the fulfilment of your
contracts. Your contracts provide, I understand, for six months'
notice. It goes without saying that you continue to draw your salary
until the expiration of this term.

BOLZ (_rising_).

You are very kind, Mr. von Senden. Our contracts empower us to edit
the paper as we see fit, and to control its tone and its party
affiliations. For the next half-year, therefore, we shall not only
continue to draw our salaries but also to conduct the paper for the
benefit of the party to which you have not the honor to belong.

SENDEN (_angrily_).

We'll find a way to prevent that!

OLDENDORF.

Calm yourself. That kind of work would scarcely be worthy of us. If
such are the circumstances, I announce that I resign the editorship
from today, and release you from all obligations to me.

BOLZ.

I don't mind. I make the same announcement.

BELLMAUS.

KÄMPE}(_together_). We too!

KÖRNER}

SENDEN (_to_ SCHWARZ).

You can testify that the gentlemen voluntarily renounce their rights.

BOLZ (_to the staff_).

Hold on, gentlemen, don't be too generous. It is all right for you to
take no further part in editing the paper if your friends withdraw.
But why abandon your pecuniary claims on the new owner?

BELLMAUS.

I'd rather take nothing at all from them; I'll follow your example.

BOLZ (_stroking him_).

Noble sentiment, my son! We'll make our way in the world together.
What do you think of a hand-organ, Bellmaus! We 'll take it to fairs
and sing your songs through. I'll turn and you'll sing.

OLDENDORF.

Since the new owner of the paper is not one of you, you will, in
concluding this transaction, find the question only natural--To whom
have we ceded our rights?

SENDEN.

The present owner of the paper is--

_Enter_ COLONEL _through side door on the left_.

OLDENDORF (_starting back in alarm_).

Colonel!

BOLZ.

Ah, now it is becoming high tragedy!

COLONEL.

First of all, Professor, be assured that I have nothing to do with
this whole affair, and merely come at the request of the purchaser.
Not until I came here, did I know anything of what was going on. I
hope you will take my word for that.

BOLZ.

Well, I find this game unseemly, and I insist on being told who this
new owner is who mysteriously hides behind different persons!

_Enter_ ADELAIDE _from the side door, left._

ADELAIDE.

He stands before you!

BOLZ.

I should just like to faint.

BELLMAUS.

That is a heavenly joke!

ADELAIDE (_bowing_).

How do you do, gentlemen! [_To the staff_.] Am I right in assuming
that these gentlemen have hitherto been connected with editing the
paper?

BELLMAUS (_eagerly_).

Yes, Miss Runeck! Mr. Kämpe for leading articles, Mr. Körner for the
French and English correspondence, and I for theatre, music, fine
arts, and miscellaneous.

ADELAIDE.

I shall be much pleased if your principles will let you continue
devoting your talents to my newspaper. [_The three members of the
staff bow_.]

BELLMAUS (_laying his hand on his heart_).

Miss Runeck, under your editorship I'll go to the ends of the world!

ADELAIDE (_smiling and politely_).

Ah, no, merely into that room.

[_Points to the door on the right_.]

I
need half an hour to collect my thoughts for my new activities.

BELLMAUS (_while departing_).

That's the best thing I ever heard!

[BELLMAUS, KÄMPE, KÖRNER _leave_.]

ADELAIDE.

Professor, you resigned the management of the paper with a readiness
which delights me. (_Pointedly_.) I wish to edit the _Union_ in my
own fashion.

[_Seizes his hand and leads him to the_ COLONEL.]

Colonel, he is no longer editor; we have outwitted him; you have your
satisfaction.

COLONEL (_holding out his arms to him_).

Come, Oldendorf! For what happened I have been sorry since the moment
we parted.

OLDENDORF.

My honored friend!

ADELAIDE (_pointing to the door on the left_).

There is some one else in there who wants to take part in the
reconciliation. It might be Mr. Gabriel Henning.

IDA _appears at the side door_.

IDA.

Edward!

[OLDENDORF _hurries to the door_, IDA _meets him, he embraces
her. Both leave on the left. The_ COLONEL _follows_.]

ADELAIDE (_sweetly_).

Before asking you, Mr. von Senden, to interest yourself in the editing
of the newspaper, I beg you to read through this correspondence which
I received as a contribution to my columns.

SENDEN (_takes a glance at them_).

Miss Runeck, I don't know whose indiscretion--

ADELAIDE.

Fear none on my part. I am a newspaper proprietor, and (_with, marked
emphasis_) shall keep editorial secrets.

[SENDEN _bows_.]

May I ask
for the deed, Judge? And will you gentlemen be kind enough to ease the
mind of the vendor as to the outcome of the transaction?

[_Mutual
bows_. SENDEN _and_ SCHWARZ _leave_.]

ADELAIDE (_after a short pause_).

Now, Mr. Bolz, what am I going to do about you?

BOLZ.

I am prepared for anything. I am surprised at nothing any more. If
some one should go straight off and spend a capital of a hundred
millions in painting negroes white with oil-colors, or in making
Africa four-cornered, I should not let it astonish me. If I wake up
tomorrow as an owl with two tufts of feathers for ears and a mouse in
my beak, I will say, "All right," and remember that worse things have
happened.

ADELAIDE.

What is the matter with you, Conrad? Are you displeased with me?

BOLZ.

With you? You have been generous as ever; only too generous. And it
would all have been fine, if only this whole scene had been
impossible. That fellow Senden!

ADELAIDE.

We have seen the last of him! Conrad, I'm one of the party!

BOLZ.

Hallelujah! I hear countless angels blowing on their trumpets! I'll
stay with the _Union_!

ADELAIDE.

About that I am no longer the one to decide. For I have still a
confession to make to you. I, too, am not the real owner of the
newspaper.

BOLZ.

You are not? Now, by all the gods, I am at my wit's end. I'm beginning
not to care who this owner is. Be he man, will-of-the-wisp, or the
devil Beelzebub in person, I bid him defiance.

ADELAIDE.

He is a kind of a will-of-the-wisp, a little something of a devil, and
from top to toe a great rogue. For, Conrad, my friend, beloved of my
youth, it is you yourself.

[_Hands him the deed_.]

BOLZ (_stupefied for a moment, reads_).

"Ceded to Conrad Bolz"--correct! So that would be a sort of gift.
Can't be accepted, much too little!

[_Throws the paper aside_.]
Prudence be gone!

[_Falls on his knees before_ ADELAIDE.]

Here I
kneel, Adelaide! What I am saying I don't know in my joy, for the
whole room is dancing round with me. If you will take me for your
husband, you will do me the greatest favor in the world. If you don't
want me, box my ears and send me off!

ADELAIDE (_bending down to him_).

I do want you! (_Kissing him_.) This was the cheek!

BOLZ.

And these are the lips.

[_Kisses her; they remain in an embrace; short
pause_.]

_Enter_ COLONEL, IDA, OLDENDORF.

COLONEL (_in amazement, at the door_).

What is this?

BOLZ.

Colonel, it takes place under editorial sanction.

COLONEL.

Adelaide, what do I see?

ADELAIDE (_stretching out her hand to the_ COLONEL).

Dear friend, I'm betrothed to a journalist!

[_As_ IDA _and_ OLDENDORF _from either side hasten to the pair, the
curtain falls_]

       *       *       *       *       *

[Footnote 1: Permission S. Hirzel, Leipzig.]

       *       *       *       *       *




DOCTOR LUTHER (1859)


By GUSTAV FREYTAG

TRANSLATED BY E.H. BABBITT, A.B. Assistant Professor of German, Tufts
College.


Some well-meaning men still wish that the defects of their old church
had not led to so great a revolt, and even liberal Roman Catholics
still fail to see in Luther and Zwingli anything but zealous heretics
whose wrath brought about a schism. May such views vanish from
Germany! All religious denominations have reason to attribute to
Luther whatever in their present faith is genuine and sincere, and has
a wholesome and sustaining influence. The heretic of Wittenberg is
fully as much the reformer of the German Catholics as of the
Protestants. This is true not only because the teachers of the
Catholic Church in their struggle against him outgrew the old
scholasticism, and fought for their sacraments with new weapons gained
from his language, his culture, and his moral worth; nor because he,
in effect, destroyed the church of the Middle Ages and forced his
opponents at Trent to raise a firmer structure, though seemingly
within the old forms and proportions; but still more because he
expressed the common basis of all German denominations, of our
spiritual courage, piety, and honesty, with such force that a good
deal of his own nature, to the present benefit of every German, has
survived in our doctrines and language, in our civil laws and morals,
in the thoughtfulness of our people, and in our science and
literature. Some of the ideas for which Luther's stubborn and
contentious spirit fought, against both Catholics and Calvinists, are
abandoned by the free investigation of modern times. His intensely
passionate beliefs, gained in the heartrending struggles of a devout
soul, occasionally missed an important truth. Sometimes he was harsh,
unfair, even cruel toward his opponents; but such things should no
longer disturb any German, for all the limitations of his nature and
training are as nothing compared with the fulness of the blessings
which have flowed from his great heart into the life of our nation.

But he should not have seceded after all, some people say; for his
action has divided Germany into two hostile camps, and the ancient
strife, under varying battle-cries, has continued to our day. Those
who think so might assert with equal right that the Christian revolt
from Judaism was not necessary--why did not the apostles reform the
venerable high-priesthood of Zion? They might assert that Hampden
would have done better if he had paid the ship-money and had taught
the Stuarts their lesson peaceably; that William of Orange committed a
crime when he did not put his life and his sword into the hands of
Alva, as Egmont did; that Washington was a traitor because he did not
surrender himself and his army to the English; they might condemn as
evil everything that is new and great in doctrine and in life and that
owes its birth to a struggle against what is old.

To but few mortals has been vouchsafed such a powerful influence as
Luther had upon their contemporaries and upon subsequent ages. But his
life, like that of every great man, leaves the impression of an
affecting tragedy when attention is centred on its pivotal events. It
shows us, like the career of all heroes of history whom Fate permitted
to live out their lives, three stages. First, the personality of the
man develops, powerfully influenced by the restricting environment. It
tries to reconcile incompatibilities, while in the depth of his soul
ideas and convictions are gradually translated into volition. At last
they burst forth in a definite action, and the solitary individual
enters upon the contest with the world. Then follows a period of
greater activity, more rapid growth, and larger victories. The
influence of the one man upon the masses grows ever greater. Mightily
he draws the whole nation to follow in his footsteps, and becomes its
hero, its pattern; the vital force of millions appears summed up in
one man.

[Illustration: _Permission Underwood & Underwood, New York_
LUTHER MONUMENT AT WORMS by ERNST RIETSCHEL]

But the spirit of the nation does not long endure the preëminence of a
single, well-centred personality; for the life and the power and the
needs of a nation are more manifold than even the greatest single
force and lofty aim. The eternal contrast between the individual and
the nation appears. Even the soul of a nation is, in the presence of
the eternal, a finite personality--but in comparison with the
individual it appears boundless. A man is forced by the logical result
of his thoughts and actions, by all the significance of his own deeds,
into a closely restricted path. The soul of the nation needs for its
life irreconcilable contrasts and incessant effort in most varied
directions. Much that the individual failed to assimilate rises to
fight against him. The reaction of the people begins--at first weak,
here and there, based on different reasons and with slight
justification; then it grows stronger and ever more victorious.
Finally the intellectual influence of the life of the individual is
limited to his own followers, and crystallizes into a single one of
the many elements of national growth. The last period of a great life
is always filled with secret resignation, with bitterness, and with
silent suffering.

Thus it was with Luther. The first of these periods continued up to
the day on which he posted his theses, the second until his return
from the Wartburg, the third to his death and the beginning of the
Schmalkaldic War. It is not the purpose of this sketch to give his
entire biography, but to tell briefly how he developed and what he
was. Much in his nature appears strange and unpleasing so long as he
is viewed from afar; but this historic figure has the remarkable
quality of becoming greater and more attractive the more closely it is
approached, and from beginning to end it would inspire a good
biographer with admiration, tenderness, and a certain good humor.

Luther rose from the great source of all national strength, the
freeholding peasant class. His father moved from Möhra, a forest
village of the Thuringian mountains, where his relatives constituted
half the population, northward into the neighborhood of Mansfeld, to
work as a miner. So the boy's cradle stood in a cottage in which was
still felt the old thrill of the ghosts of the pine wood and the dark
clefts which were thought to be the entrances to the ore veins of the
mountain. Certainly the imagination of the boy was often busy with
dark traditions from heathen mythology. He was accustomed to feel the
presence of uncanny powers as well in the phenomena of nature as in
the life of man. When he turned monk such remembrances from childhood
grew gloomier and took the shape of the devil of Scripture, but the
busy tempter who everywhere lies in wait for the life of man always
retained for him something of the features of the mischievous goblin
who secretly lurks about the peasant's hearth and stable.

His father, a curt, sturdy, vigorous man, firm in his resolves, and of
unusual, shrewd common sense, had worked his way, after hard
struggles, to considerable prosperity. He kept strict discipline in
his household. Even in later years Luther thought with sadness of the
severe punishments he had endured as a boy and the sorrow they had
caused his tender, childish heart. But Old Hans Luther, nevertheless,
up to his death in 1530, had some influence on the life of his son.
When at the age of twenty-two Martin secretly entered the monastery
the old man was violently angry; for he had already planned a good
match for him. Friends finally succeeded in bringing the angry father
to consent to a reconciliation; and as his imploring son confessed
that a terrible apparition had driven him to the secret vow to enter
the monastery, he replied with the sorrowful words, "God grant that it
was not a deception and trick of the devil;" and he still further
wrenched the heart of the monk by the angry question, "You thought you
were obeying the command of God when you went into the monastery; have
you not heard also that you shall obey your parents?" These words made
a deep impression on the son, and when, many years after, he sat in
the Wartburg, expelled from the Church and outlawed by the Emperor, he
wrote to his father the touching words: "Do you still wish to tear me
from the monastery? You are still my father and I your son. The law
and the power of God are on your side--on my side human weakness. But
look that you boast not yourself against God, he has been beforehand
with you,--he has taken me out himself." From that time on it seemed
to the old man as if his son were restored to him. Old Hans had once
counted upon having a grandson for whom he would work. He now came
back obstinately to this thought, caring nothing for the rest of the
world, and soon urged his son to marry; his encouragement was not the
least of the influences to which Luther yielded, and when his father,
advanced in years, at last a councillor of Mansfeld, lay in his death
throes and the minister bent over him and asked the dying man if he
wished to die in the purified faith in Christ and the Holy Gospel, old
Hans gathered his strength once more and said curtly, "He is a wretch
who does not believe in it." When Luther told this later he added
admiringly, "Yes that was a man of the old time." The son received the
news of the father's death in the fortress of Coburg. When he read
the letter, in which his wife inclosed a picture of his youngest
daughter Magdalena, he uttered to a companion merely the words, "Well,
my father is dead too," rose, took his psalter, went into his room,
and prayed and wept so hard that, as the faithful Veit Dietrich wrote,
his head was confused the next day; but he came out again with his
soul at peace. The same day he wrote with deep emotion to Melanchthon
of the great love of his father and of his intimate relations with
him. "I have never despised death so much as today. We die so often
before we finally die. Now I am the oldest of my family and I have the
right to follow him." From such a father the son inherited what was
fundamental to his character--truthfulness, a sturdy will,
straightforward common sense, and tact in dealing with men and
affairs. His childhood was full of rigor. He had many a bitter
experience in the Latin school and as a choir boy, though tempered by
kindness and love, and he kept through it all--what is more easily
kept in the lowlier circles of life--a heart full of faith in the
goodness of human nature and reverence for everything great in the
world. When he was at the University of Erfurt, his father was already
in a position to supply his needs more abundantly. He felt the vigor
of youth, and was a merry companion with song and lute. Of his
spiritual life at that time little is known except that death came
near him, and that in a thunder storm he was "called upon by a
terrible apparition from heaven." In terror he took a vow to go into a
monastery, and quickly and secretly carried out his resolve.

From that time date our reports about the troubles of his soul. At
odds with his father, full of awe at the thought of an incomprehensible
eternity, cowed by the wrath of God, he began with supernatural
exertions a life of renunciation, devotion, and penance. He found no
peace. All the highest questions of life rushed with fearful force
upon his defenseless, wandering soul. Remarkably strong and passionate
with him was the necessity of feeling himself in harmony with God and
the universe. What theology offered him was all unintelligible,
bitter, and repulsive. To his nature the riddles of the moral order of
the universe were most important. That the good should suffer, and the
evil succeed; that God should condemn the human race to the monstrous
burden of sin because a simple-minded woman had bitten into an apple;
that this same God should endure our sins with love, toleration, and
patience; that Christ at one time sent away honorable people with
severity, and at another time associated with harlots, publicans,
and sinners--"human understanding with its wisdom turns to folly at
this." Then he would complain to his spiritual adviser, Staupitz:
"Dear Doctor, our Lord treats people so cruelly. Who can serve Him
if he lays on blows like this?" But when he got the answer, "How
else could He subdue the stubborn heads?" this sensible argument
could not console the young man. With fervid desire to find the
incomprehensible God, he searched all his thoughts and dreams with
self-torture. Every earthly thought, every beat of his youthful blood,
became for him a cruel wrong. He began to despair of himself; he
wrestled in unceasing prayer, fasted and scourged himself. At one time
the priests had to break into his cell in which he had been lying for
days in a condition not far from insanity. With warm sympathy Staupitz
looked upon such heart-rending torment, and sought to give him peace
by blunt counsel. Once when Luther had written to him, "Oh, my sin! My
sin! My sin!" his spiritual adviser gave him the answer, "You long to
be without sin, and you have no real sin. Christ is the forgiveness of
real sins, such as parricide and the like. If Christ is to help you,
you must have a list of real sins, and not come to Him with such trash
and make-believe sins, seeing a sin in every trifle." The manner in
which Luther gradually raised himself above such despair was decisive
for his whole life. The God whom he served was at that time a God of
terror. His anger was to be appeased only by the means of grace which
the ancient Church prescribed--in the first place through constant
confession, for which there were innumerable prescriptions and formulæ
which seemed to the heart empty and cold. By strictly prescribed
activities and the practice of so-called good works, the feeling of
real atonement and inward peace had not come to the young man. Finally
a saying of his spiritual adviser pierced his heart like an arrow:
"That alone is true penance which begins with love for God. Love for
God and inward exaltation is not the result of the means of grace
which the Church teaches; it must go before them." This doctrine from
Tauler's school became for the young man the basis of a new spiritual
and moral relation to God; it was for him a sacred discovery. The
transformation of his spiritual life was the principal thing. For that
he had to work. From the depths of every human heart must come
repentance, expiation, and atonement. He and every man could lift
himself up to God, alone. Not until now did he realize what free
prayer was. In place of a far-off divine power which he had formerly
sought in vain through a hundred forms and childish confessions, there
came before him at last the image of an all-loving protector to whom
he could speak at any time joyfully and in tears; to whom he could
bring all sorrow, every doubt; who took unceasing interest in him,
cared for him, granted or denied his heartfelt petitions tenderly,
like a good father. So he learned to pray; and how ardent his prayers
became! From this time he lived in peace with the beloved God whom he
had finally found, every day, every hour. His intercourse with the
Most High became more intimate than with the dearest companions of
this earth. When he poured out his whole self before Him, then calm
came over him and a holy peace, a feeling of unspeakable love. He felt
himself a part of God, and remained in this relation to Him from that
time throughout his whole life. He heeded no longer the roundabout
ways of the ancient Church; he could, with God in his heart, defy the
whole world. Even thus early he ventured to believe that those held
false doctrine who put so much stress on works of penance, that there
was nothing beyond these works but a cold satisfaction and a
ceremonious confession; and when, later, he learned from Melanchthon
that the Greek word for penitence, _metanoia_ meant literally "change
of mind," it seemed to him a wonderful revelation. On this ground
rested the confident assurance with which he opposed the words of
Scripture to the ordinances of the Church. By this means Luther in the
monastery gradually worked his way to spiritual liberty. All his later
doctrines, his battles against indulgences, his imperturbable
steadfastness, his method of interpreting the Scriptures, rested upon
the struggles through which he, while a monk, had found his God; and
it may well be said that the new era of German history began with
Luther's prayers in the monastery. Life was soon to thrust him under
its hammer, to harden the pure metal of his soul.

In 1508 Luther reluctantly accepted the professorship of dialectics at
the new university of Wittenberg. He would rather have taught that
theology which even then he believed the true one. When, in 1510, he
went to Rome on business for his order, it is well known what devotion
and piety marked his sojourn in the Holy City, and with what horror
the heathen life of the Romans and the moral corruption and
worldliness of the clergy filled him. It was there where his
devotions, while he was officiating at mass, were disturbed by the
reckless jests which the Roman priests of his order called out to him.
He never forgot the devil-inspired words[2] as long as he lived.

But the hierarchy, however deeply its corruption shocked him, still
contained his whole hope; outside of it there was no God and no
salvation. The noble idea of the Catholic Church, and its conquests of
fifteen hundred years, enraptured the mind even of the strongest. And
when this German in Roman clerical dress, at the risk of his life,
inspected the ruins of ancient Rome and stood in awe before the
gigantic columns of the temples which, according to report, the Goths
had once destroyed, the sturdy man from the mountains of the old
Hermunduri little dreamed that it would be his own fate to destroy the
temples of medieval Rome more thoroughly, more fiercely, more grandly.
Luther came back from Rome still a faithful son of the great Mother
Church. All heresy, such as that of the Bohemians, was hateful to him.
He took a warm interest, after his return, in Reuchlin's contest
against the judges of heresy at Cologne, and, in 1512, stood on the
side of the Humanists; but even then he felt that something separated
him from this movement. When, a few years later, he was in Gotha, he
did not call upon the worthy Mutianus Rufus, although he wrote him a
very polite letter of apology; and soon after he was offended by the
inward coldness and secular tone in which theological sinners were
ridiculed in Erasmus' dialogues. The profane worldliness of the
Humanists was never quite in harmony with the cheerful faith of
Luther's soul, and the pride with which he afterward offended the
sensitive Erasmus in a letter which was meant to be conciliatory, was
probably even then in his soul. Even the forms of literary modesty
adopted by Luther at that time give the impression that they were
wrung from an unbending spirit by the power of Christian humility.

For even at that time he felt himself secure and strong in his faith.
As early as 1516 he wrote to Spalatin, who was the link of intercourse
between him and the Elector, Frederick the Wise, that the Elector was
the most prudent of men in the things of this world, but was afflicted
with sevenfold blindness in matters concerning God and the salvation
of the soul. And Luther had reason for this expression, for the
provident spirit of that moderate prince appeared in his careful
efforts, among other things, to gather in for domestic use the means
of grace recommended by the Church. For instance, he had a special
hobby for sacred relics, and just at this time Staupitz, the vicar of
the Augustinian order for Saxony, was occupied in the Rhine region and
elsewhere in collecting them for the Elector. For Luther the absence
of his superior was important, for he had to fill his place. He was
already a respected man in his order. Although professor (of theology
since 1512), he still lived in his monastery in Wittenberg and
generally wore his monk's habit; and now he visited the thirty
monasteries in his charge, deposed priors, uttered severe censure of
bad discipline, and urged severity against fallen monks. But something
of the simple faith of the brother of the monastery still clung to
him.

It was in this spirit of confidence and German sincerity that he
wrote, October 31, 1517, after he had posted the theses against Tetzel
on the church door, to Archbishop Albert of Mainz, the protector of
the seller of indulgences. Full of the popular belief in the wisdom
and the goodwill of the highest rulers, Luther thought (he often said
so later) that it was only necessary to present honestly to the
princes of the Church the disadvantage and immorality of such abuses.
But how childish this zeal of the monk appeared to the polished and
worldly prince of the Church! What so deeply offended the honest man
was, from the point of view of the Archbishop, a matter long settled.
The sale of indulgences was an evil in the Church a hundred times
deplored, but as unavoidable as many institutions seem to the
politician; while not good in themselves, they must be kept for the
sake of a greater interest. The greatest interest of the Archbishop
and the curia was their supremacy, which was acquired and maintained
by such commercial dealings. The great interest of Luther and the
people was truth. This was the parting of the ways.

And so Luther entered upon the struggle, a poor and faithful son of
the Church, full of German devotion to authority; but yet he had in
his character something which gave him strength against too extreme
exercise of this authority--a close relation to his God. He was then
thirty-four years old, in the fulness of his strength, of medium
stature, his body vigorous and without the corpulency of his later
years, appearing tall beside the small, delicate, boyish form of
Melanchthon. In the face which showed the effects of vigils and inward
struggles, shone two fiery eyes whose keen brilliancy was hard to
meet. He was a respected man, not only in his order, but at the
University; not a great scholar--he learned Greek from Melanchthon in
the first year of his professorship, and Hebrew soon after. He had no
extensive book learning, and never had the ambition to shine as a
writer of Latin verse; but he was astonishingly well-read in the
Scriptures and some of the Fathers of the Church, and what he had once
learned he assimilated with German thoroughness. He was the untiring
shepherd of his flock, a zealous preacher, a warm friend, once more
full of a decorous cheerfulness; he was of an assured bearing, polite
and skilful in social intercourse, with a confidence of spirit which
often lighted up his face in a smile. The small events of the day
might indeed affect him and annoy him. He was excitable, and easily
moved to tears, but on any great emergency, after he had overcome his
early nervous excitement, such as, for instance, embarrassed him when
he first appeared before the Diet at Worms--then he showed wonderful
calmness and self-command. He knew no fear. Indeed, his lion's nature
found satisfaction in the most dangerous situations. The danger of
death into which he sometimes fell, the malicious ambushes of his
enemies, seemed to him at that time hardly worthy of mention. The
reason for this superhuman heroism, as one may call it, was again his
close personal relation to his God. He had long periods in which he
wished, with a cheerful smile, for martyrdom in the service of truth
and of his God. Terrible struggles were still before him, but those in
which men opposed him did not seem to deserve this name. He had
defeated the devil himself again and again for years. He even
overcame the fear and torment of hell, which did its utmost to cloud
his reason. Such a man might perhaps be killed, but he could hardly be
conquered.

The period of the struggle which now follows, from the beginning of
the indulgences controversy until his departure from the Wartburg--the
time of his greatest victories and of his tremendous popularity--is
perhaps best known; but it seems to us that even here his nature has
never yet been correctly judged.

Nothing is more remarkable at this period than the manner in which
Luther became gradually estranged from the Church of Rome. His life
was modest and without ambition. He clung with the deepest reverence
to the lofty idea of the Church, for fifteen hundred years the
communion of saints; and yet in four short years he was destined to be
cut off from the faith of his fathers, torn from the soil in which he
had been so firmly rooted. And during all this time he was destined to
stand alone in the struggle, or at best with a few faithful
companions--after 1518 together with Melanchthon. He was to be exposed
to all the perils of the fiercest war, not only against innumerable
enemies, but also in defiance of the anxious warnings of sincere
friends and patrons. Three times the Roman party tried to silence
him--through the official activity of Cajetan, through the persuasive
arts of Miltitz, and the untimely persistence of the contentious Eck.
Three times he spoke to the Pope himself in letters which are among
the most valuable documents of those years. Then came the parting. He
was anathematized and outlawed. According to the old university
custom, he burned the enemy's declaration of war, and with it the
possibility of return. With cheerful confidence he went to Worms in
order that the princes of his nation might decide whether he should
die or thenceforth live among them without pope or church, according
to the Bible alone.

[Illustration: _Permission F Pruelmann A G Munich_
FREDERICK WILLIAM I INSPECTING A SCHOOL Adolph von Menzel.]

At first, when he had printed his theses against Tetzel, he was
astonished at the enormous excitement which they caused in Germany, at
the venomous hatred of his enemies, and at the signs of joyful
recognition which he received from many sides. Had he, then, done such
an unheard-of thing? What he had expressed was, he knew, the belief of
all the best men of the Church. When the Bishop of Brandenburg had
sent the Abbot of Lehnin to him, with the request that Luther would
suppress the printed edition of his German sermon on indulgences and
grace, however near the truth he might be, the brother of the poor
Augustinian monastery was deeply moved that such great men should
speak to him in so friendly and cordial a manner, and he was ready to
give up the printing rather than make himself a monster that disturbed
the Church. Eagerly he sought to refute the report that the Elector
had instigated his quarrel with Tetzel--"they wish to involve the
innocent prince in the enmity that falls on me." He was ready to do
anything to keep the peace before Cajetan and with Miltitz. One thing
he would not do--recant what he had said against the unchristian
extension of the system of indulgences; but recantation was the only
thing the hierarchy wanted of him. For a long time he still wished for
peace, reconciliation, and return to the peaceful activity of his
cell; and again and again a false assertion of his opponents set his
blood on fire, and every opposition was followed by a new and sharper
blow from his weapon.

Even in the first letter to Leo X, May 30, 1518, Luther's heroic
assurance is remarkable. He is still entirely the faithful son of the
Church. He still concludes by falling at the Pope's feet, offers him
his whole life and being, and promises to honor his voice as the voice
of Christ, whose representative the head of the Church is; but even
from this devotion befitting the monk, the vigorous words flash out:
"If I have merited death, I refuse not to die." In the body of the
letter, how strong are the expressions in which he sets forth the
coarseness of the sellers of indulgences! Here, too, his surprise is
honest that his theses are making so much stir with their
unintelligible sentences, involved, according to the old custom, to
the point of riddles. And good humor sounds in the manly words: "What
shall I do? I cannot recant. In our century full of intellect and
beauty, which might put Cicero into a corner, I am only an unlearned,
limited, poorly educated man! But the goose must needs cackle among
the swans."

The following year almost all who honored Luther united in the
endeavor to bring about a reconciliation. Staupitz and Palatin, and
the Elector through them, scolded, besought, and urged; the papal
chamberlain, Miltitz himself, praised Luther's attitude, and whispered
to him that he was entirely right, implored him, drank with him, and
kissed him. Luther, to be sure, thought he knew that the courtier had
a secret mission to make him a captive, if possible, and bring him to
Rome. But the peacemakers successfully hit upon the point in which the
stubborn man heartily agreed with them--that respect for the Church
must be maintained, and its unity must not be destroyed. Luther
promised to keep quiet and to submit the decision of the contested
points to three worthy bishops. While in this position he was urged to
write a letter of apology to the Pope. But even this letter of March
3, 1519, though approved by the mediators and written under
compulsion, is characteristic as showing the advance Luther had made.
Humility, such as our theologians see in it, is hardly present, but a
cautious diplomatic attitude throughout. Luther regrets that what he
has done to defend the honor of the Roman Church should have been
interpreted as lack of respect in him. He promises henceforth to say
nothing more about indulgences--if, that is, his opponents will do
the same; he offers to address a manifesto to the people in which he
will advise them to give proper obedience to the Church and not to be
estranged from her because his adversaries have been insolent and he
himself harsh. But all these submissive words do not conceal the rift
which already separates his mind from the essential basis of the
Church of Rome. It sounds like cold irony when he writes: "What shall
I do, Most Holy Father? I am at a complete loss. I cannot endure the
weight of your anger, and yet I do not know how to escape it. They
demand a recantation from me. If it could accomplish what they propose
by it, I would recant without hesitation, but the opposition of my
adversaries has spread my writings farther than I had ever hoped; they
have taken hold too deeply on the souls of men. In Germany today
talent, learning, freedom of judgment are flourishing. If I should
recant, I should cover the Church, in the judgment of my Germans, with
still greater disgrace. It is they--my adversaries--who have brought
the Church of Rome into disrepute with us in Germany." He finally
closes politely: "If I should be able to do more, I shall without
doubt be very ready. May Christ preserve your Holiness! Martin
Luther."

Much is to be read between the lines of this studied reserve. Even if
the vain Eck had not immediately set all Wittenberg University by the
ears, this letter could hardly have been considered at Rome as a token
of repentant submission.

The thunderbolt of excommunication had been hurled; Rome had spoken.
Now Luther, again completely his old self, wrote once more to the Pope
that great and famous letter which, at the request of the untiring
Miltitz, he dated back to September 6, 1520, that he might be able to
ignore the bull of excommunication. It is a beautiful reflection of a
resolute mind which from a lofty standpoint calmly surveys its
opponent, and at the same time is magnificent in its sincerity, and of
the noblest spirit. With sincere sympathy he speaks of the personality
and of the difficult position of the Pope; but it is the sympathy of a
stranger. He still laments with melancholy the condition of the
Church, but it is plain that he himself has already outgrown it. It is
a farewell letter. With the keenest severity there is still a firm
attitude and silent sorrow. Such is the way a man parts from what he
has once loved and found unworthy. This letter was to be the last
bridge for the peacemakers. For Luther it was the liberation of his
soul.

In these years Luther had become a different man. In the first place
he had acquired prudence and self-reliance in his intercourse with the
most exalted personages, and at heavy cost had won insight into the
policies and the private character of the rulers. Nothing was at heart
more painful to the peaceable nature of his sovereign than this bitter
theological controversy, which sometimes furthered his political ends
but always disturbed his peace of mind. Constant efforts were made by
his court to keep the Wittenberg people within bounds, and Luther
always saw to it that they were made too late. Whenever the faithful
Spalatin dissuaded him from the publication of a new polemic, he
received the answer that there was no help for it, that the sheets
were printed and already in the hands of many and could not be
suppressed. And in his dealings with his adversaries Luther had
acquired the assurance of a seasoned warrior. He was bitterly hurt
when Hieronymus Emser, in the spring of 1518, craftily took him to a
banquet in Dresden where he was forced to argue with angry enemies,
especially when he learned that a Dominican friar had listened at the
door and the next day had spread it in the town that Luther had been
completely silenced, and that the listener had had difficulty to
restrain himself from rushing into the room and spitting in Luther's
face. At that first meeting with Cajetan Luther still prostrated
himself humbly at the feet of the prince of the Church; after the
second he allowed himself to express the view that the cardinal was as
fit for his office as an ass to play the harp. He treated the polite
Miltitz with fitting politeness. The Roman had hoped to tame the
German bear, but soon the courtier came of his own accord into the
position which was appropriate for him--he was used by Luther. And in
the Leipzig disputation against Eck the favorable impression which the
self-possessed, honest, and sturdy nature of Luther produced was the
best counterpoise to the self-satisfied assurance of his clever
opponent.

But Luther's inward life calls for greater sympathy. It was after all
a terrible period for him. Close to exaltation and victory lay for him
deathly anxiety, torturing doubt, and horrible apparitions. He, almost
alone, was in arms against all Christendom, and was becoming more and
more irreconcilably hostile to the mightiest power, which still
included everything that had been sacred to him since his youth. What
if, after all, he were wrong in this or that! He was responsible for
every soul that he led away with him--and whither? What was there
outside the Church but destruction and perdition for time and for
eternity? If his adversaries and anxious friends cut him to the heart
with reproaches and warnings, the pain, the secret remorse, the
uncertainty which he must not acknowledge to any one, were greater
beyond comparison. He found peace, to be sure, in prayer. Whenever his
fervid soul, seeking its God, rose in mighty flights, he was filled
with strength, peace, and cheerfulness. But in hours of less tense
exaltation, when his sensitive spirit quivered under unpleasant
impressions, then he felt himself embarrassed, divided, under the
spell of another power which was hostile to his God. He knew from
childhood how actively evil spirits ensnare mankind; he had learned
from the Scripture that the Devil works against the purest to ruin
them. On his path the busy devils were lurking to weaken him, to
mislead him, to make innumerable others wretched through him. He saw
their work in the angry bearing of the cardinal, in the scornful face
of Eck, even in the thoughts of his own soul. He knew how powerful
they had been in Rome. Even in his youth apparitions had tormented
him; now they reappeared. From the dark shadows of his study the
spectre of the tempter lifted its claw-like hand against his reason.
Even while he was praying the Devil approached him in the form of
the Redeemer, radiant as King of Heaven with the five wounds, as
the ancient Church represented Him. But Luther knew that Christ
appears to poor humanity only in His words, or in humble form, as He
hung upon the cross; and he roused himself vigorously and cried
to the apparition: "Avaunt, foul fiend!"--and the vision disappeared.
Thus the strong heart of the man worked for years in savage
indignation--always renewed. It was a sad struggle between reason and
insanity, but Luther always came out victorious; the native strength
of his sound nature prevailed. In long prayer, often lasting for
hours, the stormy waves of his emotion became calm, and his massive
intelligence and his conscience brought him every time out of doubt to
certainty. He considered this process of liberation as a gracious
inspiration of his God, and after such moments he who had once been in
such anxious doubt was as firm as steel, indifferent to the opinion of
men, not to be moved, inexorable. Quite a different picture is that of
his personality in contest with earthly foes. Here he retains almost
everywhere the superiority of conviction, particularly in his literary
feuds.

The literary activity which he developed at this time was gigantic. Up
to 1517 he had printed little. From that time on he was not only the
most productive but the greatest popular writer of Germany. The energy
of his style, the vigor of his argumentation, the ardor and passion of
his conviction, carried away his readers. No one had ever spoken thus
to the people. His language lent itself to every mood, to all keys;
now brief, forcible, sharp as steel, now in majestic breadth, the
words poured in among the people like a mighty stream. A figurative
expression, a striking simile, made the most difficult thoughts
intelligible. His was a wonderfully creative power. He used language
with sovereign ease. As soon as he touched a pen his mind worked with
the greatest freedom; his sentences show the cheerful warmth which
filled him, the perfect charm of sympathetic creation is poured out
upon them. And such power is by no means least apparent in the attacks
which he makes upon individual opponents, and it is closely connected
with a fault which caused misgivings even to his admiring
contemporaries. He liked to play with his opponents. His imagination
clothed the form of an enemy with a grotesque mask, and he teased,
scorned, and stabbed this picture of his imagination with turns of
speech which had not always the grace of moderation, or even of
decency; but in the midst of vituperation, his good humor generally
had a conciliatory effect--although, to be sure, not upon his victims.
Petty spite was rarely visible; not seldom the most imperturbable
good-nature. Sometimes he fell into a true artistic zeal, forgot the
dignity of the reformer, and pinched like a German peasant boy, even
like a malicious goblin. What blows he gave to all his opponents, now
with a club, wielded by an angry giant, now with a jester's bauble! He
liked to twist their names into ridiculous forms, and thus they lived
in Wittenberg circles as beasts, or as fools. Eck became Dr. Geck;
Murner was adorned with the head and claws of a cat; Emser, who had
printed at the head of most of his pamphlets his coat-of-arms the head
of a horned goat, was abused as a goat. The Latin name of the renegade
humanist Cochläus, was retranslated, and Luther greeted him as a snail
with impenetrable armor, and--sad to say--sometimes also as a dirty
boy whose nose needed wiping. Still worse, terrible even to his
contemporaries, was the reckless violence with which he declaimed
against hostile princes. It is true that he sometimes bestowed upon
his sovereign's cousin, Duke George of Saxony, a consideration hardly
to be avoided. Each considered the other the prey of the devil, but in
secret each esteemed in the other a manly worth. Again and again they
fell into dissension, even in writing, but again and again Luther
prayed warmly for his neighbor's soul. The reckless wilfulness of
Henry VIII. of England, on the other hand, offended the German
reformer to the depths of his soul; he reviled him horribly and
without cessation; and even in his last years he treated the
hot-headed Henry of Brunswick like a naughty school-boy. "Clown" was
the mildest of many dramatic characters in which he represented him.
When, later, such outpourings of excessive zeal stared at him from the
printed page, and his friends complained, he would be vexed at his
rudeness, upbraid himself, and honestly repent. But repentance availed
little, for on the next occasion he would commit the same fault; and
Spalatin had some reason to look distrustfully upon a projected
publication even when Luther proposed to write very gently and tamely.
His opponents could not equal him in his field. They called names with
equal vigor, but they lacked his inward freedom. Unfortunately it
cannot be denied that this little appendage to the moral dignity of
his nature was sometimes the spice which made his writings so
irresistible to the honest Germans of the sixteenth century.

In the autumn of 1517 he had got into a quarrel with a reprobate
Dominican friar; in the winter of 1520 he burned the Pope's bull. In
the spring of 1518 he had prostrated himself at the feet of the Vicar
of Christ; in the spring of 1521 he declared at the Diet of Worms,
before the emperor and the princes and the papal legates, that he
believed neither the Pope nor the Councils alone, only the testimony
of the Holy Scripture and the interpretation of reason. Now he was
free, but excommunication and outlawry hovered over his head. He was
inwardly free, but he was free as the beast of the forest is free, and
behind him bayed the blood-thirsty pack. He had reached the
culminating point of his life, and the powers against which he had
revolted, even the thoughts which he himself had aroused among the
people, were working from now on against his life and doctrine.

Even at Worms, so it appears, it had been made clear to Luther that he
must disappear for a while. The customs of the Franconian Knights,
among whom he had faithful followers, suggested the idea of having him
spirited away by armed men. Elector Frederick, with his faithful
friends, discussed the abduction, and it was quite after the manner
of this prince that he himself did not wish to know the place of
retreat, in order to be able, in case of need, to swear to his
ignorance. Nor was it easy to win Luther over to the plan, for his
bold heart had long ago overcome earthly fear; and with an
enthusiastic joy, in which there was much fanaticism and some humor,
he watched the attempts of the Romanists to put out of the way a man
of whom Another must dispose, He who spoke through his lips.

Unwillingly he submitted. The secret was not easy to keep, however
skilfully the abduction had been planned. At first none of the
Wittenbergers but Melanchthon knew where he was. But Luther was the
last man to submit to even the best-intentioned intrigue. Very soon an
active communication arose between the Wartburg and Wittenberg. No
matter how much caution was used in delivering the letters, it was
difficult to avoid suspicion. In his fortified retreat, Luther found
out earlier than the Wittenbergers what was going on in the world
outside. He was informed of everything that happened at his
university, and tried to keep up the courage of his friends and direct
their policy. It is touching to see how he tried to strengthen
Melanchthon, whose unpractical nature made him feel painfully the
absence of his sturdy friend. "Things will get on without me," he
writes to him; "only have courage. I am no longer necessary to you. If
I get out, and I cannot return to Wittenberg, I shall go into the wide
world. You are men enough to hold the fortress of the Lord against the
Devil, without me." He dated his letters from the air, from Patmos,
from the desert, from "among the birds that sing merrily on the
branches and praise God with all their might from morning to night."
Once he tried to be crafty. He inclosed in a letter to Spalatin a
letter intended to deceive: "It was believed without reason that he
was at the Wartburg. He was living among faithful brethren. It was
surprising that no one had thought of Bohemia;" and then came a
thrust--not ill-tempered--at Duke George of Saxony, his most active
enemy. This letter Spalatin was to lose with well-planned carelessness
so that it should come into the hands of the enemy. But in this kind
of diplomacy he was certainly not logical, for as soon as his leonine
nature was aroused by some piece of news, he would determine
impulsively to start for Erfurt or Wittenberg. It was hard for him to
bear the inactivity of his life. He was treated with the greatest
attention by the governor of the castle, and this attention expressed
itself, as was the custom at that time, primarily in the shape of the
best care in the matter of food and drink. The rich living, the lack
of activity, and the fresh mountain air into which the theologian was
transported, had their effect upon soul and body. He had already
brought from Worms a physical infirmity, now there were added hours of
gloomy melancholy which made him unfit for work.

On two successive days he joined hunting parties, but his heart was
with the few hares and partridges which were driven into the net by
the troop of men and dogs. "Innocent creatures! The papists persecute
in the same way!" To save the life of a little hare he had wrapped him
in the sleeve of his coat. The dogs came and crushed the animal's
bones within the protecting coat. "Thus Satan rages against the souls
that I seek to save." Luther had reason for protecting himself and his
friends from Satan. He had rejected all the authority of the Church;
now he stood terribly alone; nothing was left to him but his last
resort--the Scriptures. The ancient Church had represented
Christianity in continual development. The faith had been kept in a
fluid state by a living tradition which ran parallel with the
Scriptures, by the Councils, by the Papal decrees; and they had
adapted themselves, like a facile stream, to the sharp corners of
national character, to the urgent needs of each age. It is true that
this noble idea of a perpetually living organism had not been
preserved in its original purity. The best part of its life had
vanished; empty cocoons were being preserved. The old democratic
church had been transformed into the irresponsible sovereignty of a
few, had been stained with all the vices of an unconscientious
aristocracy, and was already in striking opposition to reason and
popular feeling. What Luther, however, could put in its place--the
word of the Scriptures--although it gave freedom from a hopeless mass
of soulless excrescences, threatened on the other hand new dangers.

What was the Bible? Between the earliest and latest writings of the
sacred book lay perhaps two thousand years. Even the New Testament was
not written by Christ himself, not even entirely by those who had
received the sacred doctrine from his lips. It was compiled after his
death. Portions of it might have been transmitted inexactly.
Everything was written in a foreign tongue, which it was difficult for
the Germans to understand. Even the keenest penetration was in danger
of interpreting falsely unless the grace of God enlightened the
interpreter as it had the apostles. The ancient Church had settled the
matter summarily; in it the sacrament of holy orders gave such
enlightenment. Indeed, the Holy Father even laid claim to divine
authority to decide arbitrarily what should be right, even when his
will was contrary to the Scriptures. The reformer had nothing but his
feeble human knowledge, and prayer.

The first unavoidable step was that he must use his reason, for a
certain critical treatment even of the Holy Bible was necessary. Nor
did Luther fail to see that the books of the New Testament were of
varying worth. It is well known that he did not highly esteem the
Apocalypse, and that the Epistle of James was regarded by him as "an
epistle of straw." But his objection to particular portions never
shook his faith in the whole. His belief was inflexible that the Holy
Scriptures, excepting a few books, contained a divine revelation in
every word and letter. It was for him the dearest thing on earth, the
foundation of all his learning. He had put himself so in sympathy
with it that he lived among its figures as in the present. The more
urgent his feeling of responsibility, the warmer the passion with
which he clung to Scripture; and a strong instinct for the sensible
and the fitting really helped him over many dangers. His
discrimination had none of the hair-splitting sophistry of the ancient
teachers. He despised useless subtleties, and, with admirable tact,
let go what seemed to him unessential; but, if he was not to lose his
faith or his reason, he could do nothing, after all, but found the new
doctrine on words and conditions of life fifteen hundred years old,
and in some cases he became the victim of what his adversary Eck
called "the black letter."

Under the urgency of these conditions his method took form. If he had
a question to settle, he collected all the passages of Holy Scripture
which seemed to offer him an answer. He sought earnestly to understand
all passages in their context, and then he struck a balance, giving
the greatest weight to those which agreed with each other, and for
those which were at variance patiently striving to find a solution
which might reconcile the seeming contradiction. The resulting
conviction he firmly established in his heart, regardless of
temptations, by fervent prayer. With this procedure he was sometimes
bound to reach conclusions which seemed, even to ordinary human
understanding, vulnerable. When, for instance, in the year 1522, he
undertook, from the Scriptures, to put matrimony on a new moral basis,
reason and the needs of the people were certainly on his side when he
subjected to severe criticism the eighteen grounds of the
Ecclesiastical Law for forbidding and annulling marriages and
condemned the unworthy favoring of the rich over the poor. But it was,
after all, strange when Luther tried to prove from the Bible alone
what degrees of relationship were permitted and what were forbidden,
especially as he also took into consideration the Old Testament, in
which various queer marriages were contracted without any opposition
from the ancient Jehovah. God undoubtedly had sometimes allowed his
elect to have two wives.

And it was this method which, in 1529, during the discussions with the
Calvinists, made him so obstinate, when he wrote on the table in front
of him, "This _is_ my body," and sternly disregarded the tears and
outstretched hand of Zwingli. He had never been narrower and yet never
mightier--the fear-inspiring man who had won his conviction in the
most violent inward struggles against doubt and the Devil. It was an
imperfect method, and his opponents attacked it, not without success.
With it his doctrine became subject to the fate of all human wisdom.
But in this method there was also a vivid emotional process in which
his own reason and the culture and the inward needs of his time found
better expression than he himself knew. And it became the
starting-point from which a conscientious spirit of investigation has
wrought for the German people the highest intellectual freedom.

With such tremendous trials there came also to the outcast monk at the
Wartburg other minor temptations. He had long ago, by almost
superhuman intellectual activity, overcome what were then regarded
with great distrust as fleshly impulses; now nature asserted herself
vigorously, and he several times asked his friend Melanchthon to pray
for him on this account. Then Fate would have it that during these
very weeks the restless mind of Carlstadt in Wittenberg fell upon the
question of the marriage of priests, and reached the conclusion, in a
pamphlet on celibacy, that the vow of chastity was not binding on
priests and monks. The Wittenbergers in general agreed--first of all,
Melanchthon, whose position in this matter was freest from prejudice,
since he had never received ordination and had been married for two
years.

So at this point a tangle of thoughts and moral questions was caused
from without in Luther's soul, the threads of which were destined to
involve his whole later life. Whatever heartfelt joy and worldly
happiness was granted him from this time on depended on the answer
which he found to this question. It was the happiness of his home-life
which made it possible for him to endure the later years. Only in it
did the flower of his abundant affection develop. So Fate graciously
sent the lonely man the message which was to unite him anew and more
firmly than ever with his people; and the way in which Luther dealt
with this question is again characteristic. His pious disposition and
the conservative strain in his nature revolted against the hasty and
superficial manner in which Carlstadt reasoned.

It may be assumed that much in his own feelings, at that particular
time, made him suspicious that the Devil might be using this dubious
question to tempt the children of God, and yet at this very moment, in
his confinement, he had special sympathy for the poor monks behind
monastery walls. He searched the Scriptures. He had soon disposed of
the marriage of priests, but there was nothing in the Bible about
monks. "The Scripture is silent; man is uncertain." And then he was
struck by the ridiculous idea that even his nearest friends might
marry. He writes to the cautious Spalatin, "Good Lord! Our
Wittenbergers want to give wives to the monks too. Well, they are not
going to hang one on my neck;" and he gives the ironical warning,
"Look out that you do not marry too." But the problem still occupied
him incessantly. Life is lived rapidly in such great times. Gradually,
through Melanchthon's reasoning, and, we may assume, after fervent
prayer, he found certainty. What settled the matter, unknown to
himself, must have been the recognition that the opening of the
monasteries had become reasonable and necessary for a more moral
foundation of civil life. For almost three months he had struggled
over the question. On the first of November, 1521, he wrote the letter
to his father already cited.

The effect of his words upon the people was incalculable. Everywhere
there was a stir in the cloisters. From the doors of almost all the
monasteries and convents monks and nuns stole out--at first singly and
in secret flight; then whole convents broke up. When Luther with
greater cares weighing upon him returned the next spring to
Wittenberg, the runaway monks and nuns gave him much to do. Secret
letters were sent to him from all quarters, often from excited nuns
who, the children of stern parents, had been put into convents, and
now, without money and without protection, sought aid from the great
reformer. It was not unnatural that they should throng to Wittenberg.
Once nine nuns came in a carriage from the aristocratic establishment
at Nimpfschen--among them a Staupitz, two Zeschaus, and Catherine von
Bora. At another time sixteen nuns were to be provided for, and so on.
He felt deep sympathy for these poor souls. He wrote in their behalf
and traveled to find them shelter in respectable families. Sometimes
indeed he felt it too much of a good thing, and the hordes of runaway
monks were an especial burden to him. He complains that "they wish to
marry immediately and are the most incompetent people for any kind of
work." Through his bold solution of a difficult question he gave great
offense. He himself had painful experiences; for among those who now
returned in tumult to civil life there were, to be sure, high-minded
men, but also those who were rude and worthless. Yet all this never
made him hesitate for a moment. As usual with him, he was made the
more determined by the opposition he met. When, in 1524, he published
the story of the sufferings of a novice, Florentina of Oberweimar, he
repeated on the title page what he had already so often preached: "God
often gives testimony in the Scriptures that He will have no
compulsory service, and no one shall become His except with pleasure
and love. God help us! Is there no reasoning with us? Have we no sense
and no hearing? I say it again, God will have no compulsory service. I
say it a third time, I say it a hundred thousand times, God will have
no compulsory service."

So Luther entered upon the last period of his life. His disappearance
in the Thuringian forest had caused an enormous stir. His adversaries
trembled before the anger which arose in town and country against
those who were called murderers. But the interruption of his public
activity became fateful for him. So long as in Wittenberg he was the
central point of the struggle, his word, his pen, had held sovereign
control over the great intellectual movement in north and south; now
it worked without method in different directions, in many minds. One
of the oldest of Luther's allies began the confusion. Wittenberg
itself became the scene of a strange commotion. Then Luther could
endure the Wartburg no longer. Once before he had been secretly in
Wittenberg; now, against the Elector's will, he returned there
publicly. And there began a heroic struggle against old friends, and
against the conclusions drawn from his own doctrine. His activity was
superhuman. He thundered without cessation from the pulpit, in the
cell his pen flew fast; but he could not reclaim every dissenting
mind. Even he could not prevent the rabble of the towns from breaking
out in savage fury against the institutions of the ancient Church and
against hated individuals, nor the excitement of the people from
brewing political storms, nor the knights from rising against the
princes, and the peasants against the knights. What was more, he could
not prevent the intellectual liberty which he had won for the Germans
from producing, even in pious and learned men, an independent judgment
about creed and life, a judgment which was contrary to his own
convictions. There came the gloomy years of the Iconoclasts, the
Anabaptists, the Peasant Wars, the regrettable dissensions over the
sacrament. How often at this time did Luther's form rise sombre and
mighty over the contestants! How often did the perversion of mankind
and his own secret doubts fill him with anxious care for the future of
Germany!

For in a savage age which was accustomed to slay with fire and sword,
this German had a high, pure conception of the battles of the
intellect such as no other man attained. Even in the times of his own
greatest danger he mortally hated any use of violence. He himself did
not wish to be sheltered by his prince--indeed he desired no human
protection for his doctrine. He fought with a sharp quill against his
foes, but he burnt only a paper at the stake. He hated the Pope as he
did the Devil, but he always preached a love of peace and Christian
tolerance of the Papists. He suspected many of being in secret league
with the Devil, but he never burned a witch. In all Catholic countries
the pyres flamed high for the adherents of the new creed; even Hutten
was under strong suspicion of having cut off the ears of a few monks.
So humane was Luther's disposition that he entertained cordial
sympathy with the humiliated Tetzel and wrote him a consolatory
letter. To obey the authorities whom God has established was his
highest political principle. Only when the service of his God demanded
it did his opposition flame up. When he left Worms he had been ordered
not to preach--he who was just on the point of being declared an
outlaw. He did not submit to the prohibition, but his honest
conscience was fearful that this might be interpreted as disobedience.
His conception of the position of the Emperor was still quite the
antiquated and popular one. As subjects obey the powers that be, so
the princes and electors had to obey the Emperor according to the law
of the land.

With the personality of Charles V. he had human sympathy all his
life--not only at that first period when he greeted him as "Dear
Youngster," but also later, when he well knew that the Spanish
Burgundian was granting nothing more than political tolerance to the
German Reformation. "He is pious and quiet," Luther said of him; "he
talks in a year less than I do in a day. He is a child of fortune." He
liked to praise the Emperor's moderation, modesty, and forbearance.
Long after he had condemned Charles' policy, and in secret distrusted
his character, he insisted upon it among his table companions that the
master of Germany should be spoken of with reverence, and said
apologetically to the younger ones, "A politician cannot be so frank
as we of the clergy."

Even as late as 1530 it was his view that it was wrong for the
Elector to take arms against his Emperor. Not until 1537 did he fall
in reluctantly with the freer views of his circle, but he thought then
that the endangered prince had no right to make the first attack. The
venerable tradition of a firm, well articulated federal State was
still thus active in this man of the people at a time when the proud
structure of the old Saxon and Franconian empires was already
crumbling away. Yet in such loyalty there was no trace of a slavish
spirit. When his prince once urged him to write an open letter, his
sense of truth rose against the title of the Emperor, "Most Gracious
Lord," for he said the Emperor was not graciously disposed toward him.
And in his frequent intercourse with those of rank, he showed a
reckless frankness which more than once alarmed the courtiers. In all
reverence he spoke truths to his own prince such as only a great
character may express and only a good-hearted one can listen to. On
the whole he cared little for the German princes, much as he esteemed
a few. Frequent and just were his complaints about their incapacity,
their lawlessness, and their vices. He also liked to treat the
nobility with irony; the coarseness of most of them was highly
distasteful to him. He felt a democratic displeasure toward the hard
and selfish jurists who managed the affairs of the princes, worked for
favor, and harassed the poor; for the best of them he admitted only a
very doubtful prospect of the mercy of God. His whole heart, on the
other hand, was with the oppressed. He sometimes blamed the peasants
for their stolidity, and their extortions in selling their grain, but
he often praised their class, looked with cordial sympathy upon their
hardships, and never forgot that by birth he belonged among them.

But all this belonged to the temporal order; he served the spiritual.
The popular conception was also firmly fixed in his mind that two
controlling powers ought to rule the German nation in common--the
Church and the princes; and he was entirely right in proudly
contrasting the sphere where lay his rights and duties with that of
the temporal powers. In his spiritual field there were solidarity, a
spirit of sacrifice, and a wealth of ideals, while in secular affairs
narrow selfishness, robbery, fraud, and weakness were to be found
everywhere. He fought vigorously lest the authorities should assume to
control matters which concerned the pastor and the independence of the
congregations. He judged all policies according to what would benefit
his faith, and according to the dictates of his Bible. Where the
Scriptures seemed endangered by worldly politics, he protested, caring
little who was hit. It was not his fault that he was strong and the
princes were weak, and no blame attaches to him, the monk, the
professor, the pastor, if the league of Protestant princes was weak as
a herd of deer against the crafty policy of the Emperor. He himself
was well aware that Italian diplomacy was not his strong point. If the
active Landgrave of Hesse happened not to follow the advice of the
clergy, Luther, in his heart, respected him all the more: "He knows
what he wants and succeeds, he has a fine sense of this world's
affairs."

Now, after Luther's return to Wittenberg, the flood of democracy was
rising among the people. He had opened the monasteries; now the people
called for redress against many other social evils, such as the misery
of the peasants, the tithes, the traffic in benefices, the bad
administration of justice. Luther's honest heart sympathized with this
movement. He warned and rebuked the landed gentry and the princes. But
when the wild waves of the Peasant War flooded his own spiritual
fields, and bloody deeds of violence wounded his sensibilities; when
he felt that the fanatics and demagogues were exerting upon the hordes
of peasants an influence which threatened destruction to his doctrine;
then, in the greatest anger, he threw himself into opposition to the
uncouth mob. His call to the princes sounded out, wild and warlike;
the most horrible thing had fallen upon him--the gospel of love had
been disgraced by the wilful insolence of those who called themselves
its followers. His policy here was again the right one; there was,
unfortunately, no better power in Germany than that of the princes,
and the future of the Fatherland depended upon them after all, for
neither the serfs, the robber barons, nor the isolated free cities
which stood like islands in the rising flood, gave any assurance.
Luther was entirely right in the essential point, but the same
obstinate, unyielding manner which previously had made his struggle
against the hierarchy so popular, turned now against the people
themselves. A cry of amazement and horror shot through the masses. He
was a traitor! He who for eight years had been the favorite and hero
of the people suddenly became most unpopular. His safety and his life
were again threatened; even five years later it was dangerous for him,
on account of the peasants, to travel to Mansfeld to visit his sick
father. The indignation of the people also worked against his
doctrine. The itinerant preachers and the new apostles treated him as
a lost, corrupted man.


[Illustration: _Permission F. Bruckmann, A.-G., Munich_
COURT BALL AT RHEINSBERG   Adolph von Menzel]

He was outlawed, banned, and cursed by the populace. Many well-meaning
men, too, had not approved of his attack on celibacy and monastic
life. The country gentry threatened to seize the outlaw on the
highways because he had destroyed the nunneries into which, as into
foundling asylums, the legitimate daughters of the poverty-stricken
gentry used to be cast in earliest childhood. The Roman party was
triumphant; the new heresy had lost what so far had made it powerful.
Luther's life and his doctrine seemed alike near their end.

Then Luther determined to marry. For two years Catherine von Bora had
lived in the house of Reichenbach, the city clerk, afterward mayor of
Wittenberg. A healthy, good looking girl, she was, like many others,
the abandoned daughter of a family of the country gentry of Meissen.
Twice Luther had tried to find her a husband, as in fatherly care he
had done for several of her companions. Finally Catherine declared
that she would marry no one but Luther himself, or his friend Amsdorf.
Luther was surprised, but he reached a decision quickly. Accompanied
by Lucas Kranach, he asked for her hand and married her on the spot.
Then he invited his friends to the wedding feast, asked at Court for
the venison which the Prince was accustomed to present to his
professors when they married, and received the table wine as a present
from the city of Wittenberg. How things stood in Luther's soul at that
time we should be glad to know. His whole being was under the highest
tension. The savage vigor of his nature struck out in all directions.
He was deeply shocked at the misery which arose about him from burned
villages and murdered men. If he had been a fanatic in his ideas, he
would probably have perished now in despair; but above the stormy
restlessness which could be perceived in him up to his marriage, there
shone now, like a clear light, the conviction that he was the guardian
of divine right among the Germans, and that to protect civil order and
morality, he must lead public opinion, not follow it. However violent
his utterances are in particular cases, he appears just at this time
preëminently conservative, and more self-possessed than ever. He also
believed, it is true, that he was not destined to live much longer,
and often and with longing awaited his martyrdom. He entered wedlock,
perfectly at peace with himself on this point, for he had fully
convinced himself of the necessity and the scriptural sanction of the
married state. In recent years he had urged all his acquaintances to
marry--finally even his old adversary, the Archbishop of Mainz. He
himself gave two reasons for his decision. For many years he had
deprived his father of his son; and it would be like an atonement if
he should leave to old Hans a grandson in case of his own death. There
was also some defiance in it. His adversaries were saying in triumph
that Luther was humiliated, and since all the world now took offense
at him, he proposed to give them still greater offense in his good
cause. He was of vigorous nature, but there was no trace of coarse
sensuality in him, and we may assume that the best reason, which he
confessed to no friend, was, after all, the decisive one: Gossip had
known for a long time more than he did, but now he also knew that
Catherine was dear to him. "I am no passionate lover, but I am fond of
her," he wrote to one of his closest friends.

And this marriage, performed in opposition to the judgment of his
contemporaries, and amid the shouts of scorn of his adversaries,
became the bond to which we Germans owe as much as to the years in
which he, a priest of the ancient Church, bore arms in behalf of his
theology. For henceforth the husband, the father, and the citizen,
became the reformer also of the domestic life of his nation; and the
very blessing of their earthly life which Protestants and Catholics
share alike today is due to the marriage of an excommunicated monk
with a runaway nun.

For twenty more busy years he was destined to work as an educator of
his nation. During this time his greatest work, the translation of the
Bible, was completed, and in this work, which he accomplished in
coöperation with his Wittenberg friends, he acquired a complete
control of the language of the people--a language whose wealth and
power he first learned to realize through this work. We know the lofty
spirit which he brought to this undertaking. His purpose was to create
a book for the people, and for this he studied industriously turns of
phrases, proverbs, and special terms which made up the people's
current language. Even Humanists had written an awkward, involved
German, with clumsy sentences in unfortunate imitation of the Latin
style. Now the nation acquired for daily reading a work which, in
simple words and short sentences, gave expression to the deepest
wisdom and the best intellectual life of the time. Along with Luther's
other works, the German Bible became the foundation of the modern
German language, and this language, in which our whole literature and
intellectual life has found expression, has become an indestructible
possession which, in the gloomiest times, even corrupted and
distorted, has reminded the various German strains that they have
common interests. Every individual in our country still rises superior
to the dialect of his native place, and the language of culture,
poetry, and science which Luther created is still the tie which binds
all German souls in unity.

And what he did for the social life of the Germans was no less; for by
his precepts and his writings he consecrated family prayers, marriage
and the training of children, the daily life of the community,
education, manners, amusements, whatever touches the heart, and all
social pleasures. He was everywhere active in setting up new ideals,
in laying deeper foundations. There was no field of human duty upon
which he did not force his Germans to reflect. Through his many
sermons and minor writings he influenced large groups of people, and
by his innumerable letters, in which he gave advice and consolation to
those who asked for them, he influenced individuals. When he
incessantly urged his contemporaries to examine for themselves whether
a desire was justified or not, or what was the duty of a father toward
his child, of the subject toward the authorities, of the councillor
toward the people, the progress which was made through him was so
important because here too he set free the conscience of the
individual and put everywhere in the place of compulsion from without,
against which selfishness had defiantly rebelled, a self-control in
harmony with the spirit of the individual. How beautiful is his
conception of the necessity of training children by schooling,
especially in the ancient languages! How he recommends the
introduction of his beloved music into the schools! How large is his
vision when he advises the city-councils to establish public
libraries! And again, how conscientiously he tried, in matters of
betrothal and marriage, to protect the heart of the lovers against
stern parental authority! To be sure, his horizon is always bounded by
the letter of the Scriptures, but everywhere there sounds through his
sermons, his advice, his censure, the beautiful keynote of his German
nature, the necessity of liberty and discipline, of love and morality.
He had overthrown the old sacrament of marriage, but gave a higher,
nobler, freer form to the intimate relation of man and wife. He had
fought the clumsy monastery schools; and everywhere in town and
hamlet, wherever his influence was felt, there grew up better
educational institutions for the young. He had done away with the mass
and with Latin church music; he put in its place, for friends and foes
alike, regular preaching and German chorals.

As time advanced, it became ever more apparent that it was a necessity
for Luther to perceive God in every gracious, good and tender gift of
this world. In this sense he was always pious and always wise--when he
was out-of-doors, or among his friends, in innocent merriment, when he
teased his wife, or held his children in his arms. Before a
fruit-tree, which he saw hanging full of fruit, he rejoiced in its
splendor, and said, "If Adam had not fallen, we should have admired
all trees as we do this one." He took a large pear into his hands and
marveled: "See! Half a year ago this pear was deeper under ground than
it is long and broad, and lay at the very end of the roots. These
smallest and least observed creations are the greatest miracles. God
is in the humblest things of nature--a leaf or a blade of grass." Two
birds made their nest in the Doctor's garden and flew up in the
evening, often frightened by passers-by. He called to them, "Oh, you
dear birds! Don't fly away. I am very willing to have you here, if you
could only believe me. But just so we mortals have no faith in our
God." He delighted in the companionship of whole-souled men; he drank
his wine with satisfaction, while the conversation ran actively over
great things and small. He judged with splendid humor enemies and good
acquaintances alike, and told jolly stories; and when he got into
discussion, passed his hand across his knee, which was a peculiarity
of his; or he might sing, or play the lute, and start a chorus.
Whatever gave innocent pleasure was welcome to him. His favorite art
was music; he judged leniently of dancing, and, fifty years before
Shakespeare, spoke approvingly of comedy, for he said, "It instructs
us, like a mirror, how everybody should conduct himself."

When he sat thus with Melanchthon, Master Philip was the charitable
scholar who sometimes put wise limitations upon the daring assertions
of his lusty friend. If, at such times, the conversation turned upon
rich people, and Frau Käthe could not help remarking longingly, "If my
man had had a notion, he would have got very rich," Melanchthon would
pronounce gravely, "That is impossible; for those who, like him, work
for the general good cannot follow up their own advantage." But there
was one subject upon which the two men loved to dispute. Melanchthon
was a great admirer of astrology, but Luther looked upon this science
with supreme contempt. On the other hand, Luther, through his method
of interpreting the Scriptures--and alas! through secret political
cares also--had arrived at the conviction that the end of the world
was near. That again seemed to the learned Melanchthon very dubious.
So if Melanchthon began to talk about the signs of the zodiac and
aspects, and explained Luther's success by his having been born under
the sign of the Sun, then Luther would exclaim, "I don't think much of
your Sol. I am a peasant's son. My father, grandfather, and
great-grandfather were thorough peasants." "Yes," replied Melanchthon,
"even in a hamlet, you would have become a leader, a magistrate, or a
foreman over other laborers." "But," cried Luther, victoriously, "I
have become a bachelor of arts, a master, a monk. That was not
foretold by the stars. And after that I got the Pope by the hair and
he in turn got me. I have taken a nun to wife and got some children by
her. Who saw that in the stars?" Melanchthon, continuing his
astrological prophecies and turning to the fate of the Emperor
Charles, declared that this prince was destined to die in 1584. Then
Luther broke out vehemently--"The world will not last as long as that,
for when we drive out the Turks the prophecy of Daniel will be
fulfilled and completed; then the Day of Judgment is certainly at our
doors."

How lovable he was as father in his family! When his children stood
before the table and looked hard at the fruit and the peaches, he
said, "If anybody wants to see the image of one who rejoiceth in hope,
he has here the real model. Oh, that we might look forward so
cheerfully to the Judgment Day! Adam and Eve must have had much better
fruit! Ours are nothing but crab-apples in contrast. And I think the
serpent was then a most beautiful creature, kindly and gracious; it
still wears its crown, but after the curse it lost its feet and
beautiful body." Once he looked at his three-year-old son who was
playing and talking to himself and said, "This child is like a drunken
man. He does not know that he is alive, yet lives on safely and
merrily and hops and jumps. Such children love to be in spacious
apartments where they have room," and he took the child in his arms.
"You are our Lord's little fool, subject to His mercy and forgiveness
of sins, not subject to the Law. You have no fear; you are safe,
nothing troubles you; the way you do is the uncorrupted way. Parents
always like their youngest children best; my little Martin is my
dearest treasure. Such little ones need their parents' care and love
the most; therefore the love of their parents always reaches down to
them. How Abraham must have felt when he had in mind to sacrifice his
youngest and dearest son! Probably he said nothing to Sarah about it.
That must have been a bitter journey for him." His favorite daughter
Magdalena lay at the point of death and he lamented, "I love her
truly, but, dear God, if it be Thy will to take her away to Thee, I
shall gladly know that she is with Thee. Magdalena, my little
daughter, you would like to stay here with your father, and yet you
would be willing to go to the other Father?" Then the child said,
"Yes, dear father, as God wills." When she was dying he fell on his
knees before the bed and wept bitterly, and prayed that God would
redeem her; and so she fell asleep under her father's hands, and when
the people came to help lay out the corpse and spoke to the Doctor
according to custom, he said, "I am cheerful in my mind, but the flesh
is weak. This parting is hard beyond measure. It is strange to know
she is certainly in peace and that it is well with her, and yet to be
so sorrowful all the time."

His Dominus, or Lord Käthe, as he liked to call his wife in letters to
his friends, had soon developed into a capable manager. And she had no
slight troubles: little children, her husband often in poor health, a
number of boarders--teachers and poor students--her house always open,
seldom lacking scholarly or noble guests, and, with all that, scanty
means and a husband who preferred giving to receiving, and who once,
in his zeal, when she was in bed with a young child, even seized the
silver baptismal presents of the child in order to give alms. Luther,
in 1527, for instance, could not afford even eight gulden for his
former prior and friend Briesger. He writes to him sadly: "Three
silver cups (wedding presents) are pawned for fifty gulden, the fourth
is sold. The year has brought one hundred gulden of debts. Lucas
Kranach will not go security for me any more, lest I ruin myself
completely." Sometimes Luther refuses presents, even those which his
prince offers him: but it seems that regard for his wife and children
gave him in later years some sense of economy. When he died his estate
amounted to some eight or nine thousand gulden, comprising, among
other things, a little country place, a large garden, and two houses.
This was surely in large part Frau Käthe's doing. By the way in which
Luther treats her we see how happy his household was. When he made
allusions to the ready tongue of women he had little right to do so,
for he himself was not by any means a man who could be called
reticent. When she showed her joy at being able to bring to table all
kinds of fish from the little pond in her garden, the Doctor, for his
part, was deeply pleased but did not fail to add a pleasant discourse
on the happiness of contentment. Or when on one occasion she became
impatient at the reading of the Psalter, and gave him to understand
that she had heard enough about saints--that she read a good deal
every day and could talk enough about them too--that God only desired
her to act like them; then the Doctor, in reply to this sensible
answer, sighed and said, "Thus begins discontent at God's word. There
will be nothing but new books coming out, and the Scriptures will be
again thrown into the corner." But the firm alliance of these two good
people was for a long time not without its secret sorrow. We can only
surmise the suffering of the wife's soul when, even as late as 1527,
Luther in a dangerous illness took final farewell from her with the
words: "You are my lawful wife, and as such you must surely consider
yourself."

In the same spirit as with his dear ones, Luther consorted with the
high powers of his faith. All the good characters from the Bible were
true friends to him. His vivid imagination had confidently given them
shape, and, with the simplicity of a child, he liked to picture to
himself their conditions. When Veit Deitrich asked him what kind of
person the Apostle Paul was, Luther answered quickly, "He was an
insignificant, slim little fellow like Philip Melanchthon." The Virgin
Mary was a graceful image to him. "She was a fine girl," he said
admiringly; "she must have had a good voice." He liked to think of the
Redeemer as a child with his parents, carrying the dinner to his
father in the lumber yard, and to picture Mary, when he stayed too
long away, as asking--"Darling, where have you been so long?" One
should not think of the Saviour seated on the rainbow in glory, nor as
the fulfiller of the law--this conception is too grand and terrible
for man--but only as a poor sufferer who lives among sinners and dies
for them.

Even his God was to him preëminently the head of a household and a
father. He liked to reflect upon the economy of nature. He lost
himself in wondering consideration of how much wood God was obliged to
create. "Nobody can calculate what God needs to feed the sparrows and
the useless birds alone. These cost him in one year more than the
revenues of the king of France. And then think of the other things!
God understands all trades. In his tailor shop he makes the stag a
coat that lasts a hundred years. As a shoemaker he gives him shoes for
his feet, and through the pleasant sun he is a cook. He might get rich
if he would; he might stop the sun, inclose the air, and threaten the
pope, emperor, bishops and the doctors with death if they did not pay
him on the spot one hundred thousand gulden. But he does not do that,
and we are thankless scoundrels." He reflected seriously about where
the food comes from for so many people. Old Hans Luther had asserted
that there were more people than sheaves of grain. The Doctor believed
that more sheaves are grown than there are people, but still more
people than stacks of grain. "But a stack of grain yields hardly a
bushel, and a man cannot live a whole year on that." Even a dunghill
invited him to deep reflection. "God has as much to clear away as to
create. If He were not continually carrying things off, men would have
filled the world with rubbish long ago." And if God often punishes
those who fear Him worse than those who have no religion, he appears
to Luther to be like a strict householder who punishes his son oftener
than his good-for-nothing servant, but who secretly is laying up an
inheritance for his son; while he finally dismisses the servant. And
merrily he draws the conclusion, "If our Lord can pardon me for having
annoyed Him for twenty years by reading masses, He can put it to my
credit also that at times I have taken a good drink in His honor. The
world may interpret it as it will."

He is also greatly surprised that God should be so angry with the
Jews. "They have prayed anxiously for fifteen hundred years with
seriousness and great zeal, as their prayer-books show, and He has not
for the whole time noticed them with a word. If I could pray as they
do I would give books worth two hundred florins for the gift. It must
be a great unutterable wrath. O, good Lord, punish us with pestilence
rather than with such silence!"

Like a child, Luther prayed every morning and evening, and frequently
during the day, even while eating. Prayers which he knew by heart he
repeated over and over with warm devotion, preferably the Lord's
Prayer. Then he recited as an act of devotion the shorter Catechism;
the Psalter he always carried with him as a prayer-book. When he was
in passionate anxiety his prayer became a stormy wrestling with God,
so powerful, great, and solemnly simple that it can hardly be compared
with other human emotions. Then he was the son who lay despairingly at
his father's feet, or the faithful servant who implores his prince;
for his whole conviction was firmly fixed that God's decisions could
be affected by begging and urging, and so the effusion of feeling
alternated in his prayer with complaints, even with earnest
reproaches. It has often been told how, in 1540, at Weimar, he brought
Melanchthon, who was at the point of death, to life again. When Luther
arrived, he found Master Philip in the death throes, unconscious, his
eyes set. Luther was greatly startled and said, "God help us! How the
Devil has wronged this _Organan_," then he turned his back to the
company and went to the window as he was wont to do when he prayed.
"Here," Luther himself later recounted, "Our Lord had to grant my
petition, for I challenged Him and filled His ears with all the
promises of prayer which I could remember from the Scriptures, so that
He had to hear me if I was to put any trust in His promises." Then he
took Melanchthon by the hand saying, "Be comforted, Philip, you will
not die;" and Melanchthon, under the spell of his vigorous friend,
began at once to breathe again, came back to consciousness, and
recovered.

As God was the source of all good, so, for Luther, the Devil was the
author of everything harmful and bad. The Devil interfered
perniciously in the course of nature, in sickness and pestilence,
failure of crops and famine. But since Luther had begun to teach, the
greater part of the Enemy's activity had been transferred to the souls
of men. In them he inspired impure thoughts as well as doubt,
melancholy, and depression. Everything which the thoughtful Luther
stated so definitely and cheerfully rested beforehand with terrible
force upon his conscience. If he awoke in the night, the Devil stood
by his bed full of malicious joy and whispered alarming things to him.
Then his mind struggled for freedom, often for a long time in vain.
And it is noteworthy how the son of the sixteenth century proceeded in
such spiritual struggles. Sometimes it was a relief to him if he stuck
out of bed the least dignified part of his body. This action, by which
prince and peasant of the time used to express supreme contempt,
sometimes helped when nothing else would. But his exuberant humor did
not always deliver him. Every new investigation of the Scriptures,
every important sermon on a new subject, caused him further pangs of
conscience. On these occasions he sometimes got into such excitement
that his soul was incapable of systematic thinking, and trembled in
anxiety for days. When he was busy with the question of the monks and
nuns, a text struck his attention which, as he thought in his
excitement, proved him in the wrong. His heart "melted in his body; he
was almost choked by the Devil." Then Bugenhagen visited him. Luther
took him outside the door and showed him the threatening text, and
Bugenhagen, apparently upset by his friend's excitement, began to
doubt too, without suspecting the depth of the torment which Luther
was enduring. This gave Luther a final and terrible fright. Again he
passed an awful night. The next morning Bugenhagen came in again. "I
am thoroughly angry," he said; "I have only just looked at the text
carefully. The passage has a quite different meaning." "It is true,"
Luther related afterward, "it was a ridiculous argument--ridiculous, I
mean, for a man in his senses, but not for him who is tempted."

Often he complained to his friends about the terrors of the struggles
which the Devil caused him. "He has never since the creation been so
fierce and angry as now at the end of the world. I feel him very
plainly. He sleeps closer to me than my Käthe--that is, he gives me
more trouble than she does pleasure." Luther never tired of censuring
the pope as the Anti-Christ, and the papal system as the work of the
Devil. But a closer scrutiny will recognize under this hatred of the
Devil an indestructible piety, in which the loyal heart of the man was
bound to the old Church. What became hallucinations to him were often
only pious remembrances from his youth, which stood in startling
contrast to the transformations which he had passed through as a man.

For no man is entirely transformed by the great thoughts and deeds of
his manhood. We ourselves do not become new through new deeds. Our
mental life is based upon the sum of all thoughts and feelings that we
have ever had. Whoever is chosen by Fate to establish new greatness by
destroying the greatness of the old, shatters in fragments at the same
time a portion of his own life. He must break obligations in order to
fulfil greater obligations. The more conscientious he is, the more
deeply he feels in his own heart the wound he has inflicted upon the
order of the world. That is the secret sorrow, the regret, of every
great historical character. There are few mortals who have felt this
sorrow so deeply as Luther. And what is great in him is the fact that
such sorrow never kept him from the boldest action. To us this appears
as a tragic touch in his spiritual life.

Another thing most momentous for him was the attitude which he had to
take toward his own doctrine. He had left to his followers nothing but
the authority of Scripture. He clung passionately to its words as to
the last effective anchor for the human race. Before him the pope,
with his hierarchy, had interpreted, misinterpreted, and added to the
text of the Scriptures; now he was in the same situation. He, with a
circle of dependent friends, had to claim for himself the privilege of
understanding the words of the Scriptures correctly, and applying them
rightly to the life of the times. This was a superhuman task, and the
man who undertook it must necessarily be subject to some of the
disadvantages which he himself had so grandly combatted in the
Catholic Church. His mental makeup was firmly decided and unyielding:
he was born to be a ruler if ever a mortal was; but this gigantic,
daemonic character of his will inevitably made him sometimes a tyrant.
Although he practised tolerance in many important matters, often as
the result of self-restraint and often with a willing heart, this was
only the fortunate result of his kindly disposition, which was
effective also here. Not infrequently, however, he became the pope of
the Protestants. For him and his people there was no choice. He has
been reproached in modern times for doing so little to bring the laity
into coöperation by means of a presbyterial organization. Never was a
reproach more unjust. What was possible in Switzerland, with
congregations of sturdy free peasants, was utterly impracticable at
that time in Germany. Only the dwellers in the larger cities had among
them enough intelligence and power to criticise the Protestant clergy;
almost nine-tenths of the Protestants in Germany were oppressed
peasants, the majority of whom were indifferent and stubborn, corrupt
in morals, and, after the Peasant War, savage in manners. The new
church was obliged to force its discipline upon them as upon neglected
children. Whoever doubts this should look at the reports of
visitations, and notice the continued complaints of the reformers
about the rudeness of their poverty-stricken congregations. But the
great man was subject to still further hindrances. The ruler of the
souls of the German people lived in a little town, among poor
university professors and students, in a feeble community of which he
often had occasion to complain. He was spared none of the evils of
petty surroundings, of unpleasant disputes with narrow-minded scholars
or uncultured neighbors. There was much in his nature which made him
especially sensitive to such things. No man bears in his heart with
impunity the feeling of being the privileged instrument of God.
Whoever lives in that feeling is too great for the narrow and petty
structure of middle-class society. If Luther had not been modest to
the depths of his heart, and of infinite kindness in his intercourse
with others, he would inevitably have appeared perfectly unendurable
to the matter-of-fact and common-sense people who stood indifferent by
his side. As it was, however, he came only on rare occasions into
serious conflict with his fellow-citizens, the town administration,
the law faculty of his university, or the councillors of his
sovereign. He was not always right, but he almost always carried his
point against them, for seldom did any one dare to defy the violence
of his anger. With all this he was subject to severe physical
ailments, the frequent return of which in the last years of his life
exhausted even his tremendous vigor. He felt this with great sorrow,
and incessantly prayed to his God that He might take him to Himself.
He was not yet an old man in years, but he seemed so to himself--very
old and out of place in a strange and worldly universe. These years,
which did not abound in great events, but were made burdensome by
political and local quarrels, and filled with hours of bitterness and
sorrow, will inspire sympathy, we trust, in every one who studies the
life of this great man impartially. The ardor of his life had warmed
his whole people, had called forth in millions the beginnings of a
higher human development; the blessing remained for the millions,
while he himself felt at last little but the sorrow. Once he joyfully
had hoped to die as a martyr; now he wished for the peace of the
grave, like a trusty, aged, worn-out laborer--another case of a tragic
human fate.

But the greatest sorrow that he felt lay in the relation of his
doctrine to the life of his nation. He had founded a new church on his
pure gospel, and had given to the spirit and the conscience of the
people an incomparably greater meaning. All about him flourished a new
life and greater prosperity, and many valuable arts--painting and
music--the enjoyment of comfort, and a finer social culture. Still
there was something in the air of Germany which threatened ruin:
princes and governments were fiercely at odds, foreign powers were
threatening invasions--the Emperor of Spain, the Pope from Rome, the
Turks from the Mediterranean; fanatics and demagogues were
influential, and the hierarchy was not yet fallen. As to his new
gospel, had it welded the nation into greater unity and power? The
discontent had only been increased. The future of his church was to
depend on the worldly interests of a few princes; and he knew the best
among them! Something terrible was coming; the Scriptures were to be
fulfilled; the Day of Judgment was at hand. But after this God would
build up a new universe more beautiful, grander, and purer, full of
peace and happiness, a world in which no devil would exist, in which
every human soul would feel more joy over the flowers and fruit of the
new trees of heaven than the present generation over gold and silver;
where music, the most beautiful of all arts, should ring in tones much
more delightful than the most splendid song of the best singers in
this world. There a good man would find again all the dear ones whom
he had loved and lost in this world.

The longing of the creature for the ideal type of existence grew
stronger and stronger in him. If he expected the end of the world, it
was due to dim remembrances from the far-distant past of the German
people, which still hovered over the soul of the new reformer. Yet it
was likewise a prophetic foreboding of the near future. It was not the
end of the world that was in preparation, but the Thirty Years' War.

Thus he died. When the hearse with his corpse passed through the
Thuringian country, all the bells in city and hamlet tolled, and the
people crowded sobbing about his bier. A large portion of the German
national strength went into the coffin with this one man. And Philip
Melanchthon spoke in the castle church at Wittenberg over his body:
"Any one who knew him well, must bear witness to this--that he was a
very kind man, gracious, friendly, and affectionate in all
conversation, and by no means insolent, stormy, obstinate, or
quarrelsome. And yet with this went a seriousness and courage in words
and actions, such as there should be in such a man. His heart was
loyal and without guile. The severity which he used in his writings
against the enemies of the Gospel came not from a quarrelsome and
malicious spirit but from great seriousness and zeal for the truth. He
showed very great courage and manhood, and was not easily disturbed.
He was not intimidated by threats, danger, or alarms. He was also of
such a high, clear intelligence that when affairs were confused,
obscure, and difficult he was often the only one who could see at once
what was advisable and feasible. He was not, as perhaps some thought,
too unobservant to notice the condition of the government everywhere.
He knew right well how we are governed, and noted especially the
spirit and the intentions of those with whom he had to do. We,
however, must keep a faithful, everlasting memory of this dear father
of ours, and never let him go out of our hearts." Such was Luther--an
almost superhuman nature; his mind ponderous and sharply limited, his
will powerful and temperate, his morals pure, his heart full of love.
Because no other man appeared after him strong enough to become the
leader of the nation, the German people lost for centuries their
leadership of the earth. The leadership of the Germans in the realm of
intellect, however, is founded on Luther.


[Footnote 2: "_Cito remitte matri filiolum_!" ("Send the little boy
right home to his mother.")]

       *       *       *      *       *




FREDERICK THE GREAT

By GUSTAV FREYTAG

TRANSLATED BY E.H. BABBITT, A.B.

Assistant Professor of German, Tufts College


What was it that, after the Thirty Years' War drew the attention of
the politicians of Europe to the little State on the northeastern
frontier of Germany which was struggling upward in spite of the Swedes
and the Poles, the Hapsburgs and the Bourbons? The inheritance of the
Hohenzollern was no richly endowed land in which the farmer dwelt in
comfort on well-tilled acres, to which wealthy merchant princes
brought, in deeply-laden galleons, the silks of Italy and the spices
and ingots of the New World. It was a poor, desolate, sandy country of
burned cities and ruined villages. The fields were untilled, and many
square miles, stripped of men and cattle, were given over to the
caprices of wild nature. When, in 1640, Frederick William succeeded to
the Electorate, he found nothing but contested claims to scattered
territories of some thirty thousand square miles. In all the fortified
places of his home land were lodged insolent conquerors. In an
insecure desert this shrewd and tricky prince established his state,
with a craft and disregard of his neighbors' rights which, even in
that unscrupulous age, aroused criticism, but at the same time, with a
heroism and greatness of mind which more than once showed higher
conceptions of German honor than were held by the Emperor himself or
any other prince of the realm. Nevertheless, when, in 1688, this
adroit statesman died, he left behind him only an unimportant State,
in no way to be reckoned among the powers of Europe. For while his
sovereignty extended over about forty-four thousand square miles,
these contained only one million three hundred thousand inhabitants;
and when Frederick II., a hundred years after his great-grandfather,
succeeded to the crown, he inherited only two million two hundred and
forty thousand subjects, not so many as the single province of Silesia
contains today. What was it then that, immediately after the battles
of the Thirty Years' War, aroused the jealousy of all the governments,
and especially of the Imperial house, and which since then has made
such warm friends and such bitter enemies for the Brandenburg
government? For two centuries neither Germans nor foreigners ceased to
set their hopes on this new State, and for an equally long time
neither Germans nor foreigners ceased to call it--at first with
ridicule, and then with spite--"an artificial structure which cannot
endure heavy storms, which has intruded without justification among
the powers of Europe." How did it come about that impartial judges
finally, soon after the death of Frederick the Great, declared that it
was time to cease prophesying the destruction of this widely hated
power? For after every defeat, they said, it had risen more
vigorously, and had repaired all the damages and losses of war more
quickly than was possible elsewhere; its prosperity and intelligence
also were increasing more rapidly than in any other part of Germany.

It was indeed a very individual and new shade of German character
which appeared in the Hohenzollern princes and their people on the
territory conquered from the Slavs, and forced recognition with sharp
challenge. It seemed that the characters there embraced greater
contrasts; for the virtues and faults of the rulers, the greatness and
the weakness of their policies, stood forth in sharp contradiction,
every limitation appeared more striking, every discord more violent,
and every achievement more astonishing. This State could apparently
produce everything that was strange and unusual, but could not endure
one thing--peaceful mediocrity, which elsewhere may be so comfortable
and useful.

With this the situation of the country had much to do. It was a border
land, making head at once against the Swedes, the Slavs, the French,
and the Dutch. There was hardly a question of European diplomacy which
did not affect the weal and woe of this State; hardly an entanglement
which did not give an active prince the opportunity to validate his
claim. The decadent power of Sweden and the gradual dissolution of
Poland opened up extensive prospects; the superiority of France and
the distrustful friendship of Holland urged armed caution. From the
very first year, in which Elector Frederick William had been obliged
to take possession of his own fortresses by force and cunning, it was
evident that there on the outskirts of German territory a vigorous,
cautious, warlike government was indispensable for the safety of
Germany. And after the beginning of the French War in 1674, Europe
recognized that the crafty policy which proceeded from this obscure
corner was undertaking also the astonishing task of heroically
defending the western boundary of Germany against the superior forces
of the King of France.

There was perhaps also something remarkable in the racial character of
the Brandenburg people, in which princes and subjects shared alike.
Down to Frederick's time, the Prussian districts had given to Germany
relatively few scholars, writers, and artists. Even the passionate
zeal of the Reformation seemed to be subdued there. The people who
inhabited the border land, mostly of the Lower Saxon strain, with a
slight tinge of Slavic blood, were a tough, sturdy race, not specially
graceful in social manners, but with unusual keenness of understanding
and clearness of judgment. Those who lived in the capital had been
glib of tongue and ready to scoff from time immemorial: all were
capable of great exertions; industrious, persistent, and of enduring
strength.

[Illustration: _From the Painting by Adolph von Menzel_
FREDERICK THE GREAT AND HIS ROUND TABLE]

But the character of the princes was a more potent factor than the
location of their country or the race-character of their people; for
the way in which the Hohenzollerns molded their state was different
from that of any other princes since the days of Charlemagne. Many a
princely family can show a number of rulers who have successfully
built up their state--the Bourbons, for instance, united a wide
expanse of territory into one great political body;--or who have been
brave warriors through several generations,--there never were any
braver than the Vasas or the Protestant Wittelsbachs in Sweden. But
none have been the educators of their people as were the early
Hohenzollerns, who as great landed proprietors in a devastated
country drew new men into their service and guided their education;
who for almost a hundred and fifty years, as strict managers, worked,
schemed, and endured, took risks, and even did injustice--all that
they might build up for their state a people like themselves--hard,
economical, clever, bold, with the highest civic ambitions.

In this sense we are justified in admiring the providential
character of the Prussian State. Of the four princes who ruled
it from the Thirty Years' War to the day when the "hoary-headed
abbot in the monastery of Sans Souci" closed his weary eyes, each
one, with his virtues and vices, was the natural complement of his
predecessor--Elector Frederick William, the greatest statesman
produced by the school of the Thirty Years' War, the splendor-loving
King Frederick I., the parsimonious despot Frederick William I., and
finally, in the eighteenth century, he in whom were united the talents
and great qualities of almost all his ancestors--the flower of the
family.

Life in the royal palace at Berlin was cheerless in Frederick's
childhood; poorer in love and sunshine than in most citizens'
households at that rude time. It may be doubted whether the king his
father, or the queen, was more to blame for the disorganization of the
family life--in either case through natural defects which grew more
pronounced in the constant friction of the household. The king, an odd
tyrant with a soft heart but a violent temper, tried to compel love
and confidence with a cudgel; he possessed keen insight into human
nature, but was so ignorant that he always ran the risk of becoming
the victim of a scoundrel. Dimly aware of his weakness, he had grown
suspicious and was subject to sudden fits of violence. The queen, in
contrast, was a rather insignificant woman, colder at heart, but with
a strong sense of her princely dignity; with a tendency to intrigue,
without prudence or discretion. Both had the best of intentions, and
took honest pains to bring up their children to a capable and worthy
maturity; but both unintelligently interfered with the sound
development of the childish souls. The mother was so tactless as to
make the children, even at a tender age, the confidants of her
annoyances and intrigues. The undignified parsimony of the king, the
blows which he distributed so freely in his rooms, and the monotonous
daily routine which he forced upon her, were the subject of no end of
complaining, sulking, and ridicule in her apartments. Crown Prince
Frederick grew up, the playmate of his elder sister, into a gentle
child with sparkling eyes and beautiful light hair. He was taught with
exactness what the king desired,--and that was little enough: French,
a certain amount of history, and the necessary accomplishments of a
soldier. Against the will of his father (the great King had never
surmounted the difficulties of the genitive and dative) he acquired
some knowledge of the Latin declensions. To the boy, who was easily
led and in the king's presence looked shy and defiant, the women
imparted his first interest in French literature. He himself later
gave his sister the credit for it, but his governess too was an
accomplished French woman. That the foreign atmosphere was hateful to
the king certainly contributed to make the son fond of it; for almost
systematically praise was bestowed in the queen's apartments upon
everything that was displeasing to the stern mind of the master. When
in the family circle the king made one of his clumsy, pious speeches,
Princess Wilhelmina and young Frederick would look at each other
significantly, until the mischievous face of one or the other aroused
childish laughter, and brought the king's wrath to the point of
explosion. For this reason, the son, even in his earliest years,
became a source of vexation to his father, who called him an
effeminate, untidy fellow with an unmanly pleasure in clothes and
trifles.

But from the report of his sister, for whose unsparing judgment
censure was easier than praise, it is evident that the amiability of
the talented boy had its effect upon those about him: as when, for
instance, he secretly read a French story with his sister, and recast
the whole Berlin Court into the comic characters of the novel; when
they made forbidden music with flute and lute; when he went in
disguise to her and they recited the parts of a French comedy to each
other. But in order to enjoy even these harmless pleasures the prince
was constantly forced into falsehood, deception, and disguise. He was
proud, high-minded, magnanimous, with an uncompromising love of truth.
The fact that deception was utterly repulsive to him, that even where
it was advisable he was unwilling to stoop to it, and that, if he ever
undertook it, he dissimulated unskilfully, threw a constantly
increasing strain upon his relations with his father. The king's
distrust grew, and the son's offended sense of personal dignity found
expression in the form of stubbornness.

So he grew up surrounded by coarse spies who reported every word to
the king. With a mind of the richest endowments, of the most
discerning eagerness for knowledge, but without any suitable male
society, it is no wonder that the young man went astray. In comparison
with other German courts, the Prussian might be regarded as very
virtuous: but frivolity toward women and a lack of reserve in the
discussion of the most dubious relations were pronounced even there.
After a visit to the dissolute court of Dresden, Prince Frederick
began to behave like other princes of his time, and generally found
good comrades among his father's younger officers. We know little
about him at that period, but may conclude that he ran some risk, not
of becoming depraved, but of wasting valuable years in a spendthrift
life among unworthy companions. It certainly was not alone the
increasing dissatisfaction of his father which at that time destroyed
his peace of mind and tossed him about aimlessly, but quite as much
that inner discontent, which leads an unformed youth the more wildly
astray the greater the secret demands are which his mind makes on
life.

He determined to flee to England. How the flight failed, how the anger
of the military commander, Frederick William, flamed up against the
deserting officer, every one knows. With the days of his imprisonment
in Küstrin and his stay in Ruppin, his years of serious education
began. The terrible experiences he had been through had aroused new
strength in him. He had endured, with princely pride, all the terrors
of death and of the most terrible humiliation. He had reflected in the
solitude of his prison on the greatest riddle of life--on death and
what is beyond. He had realized that there was nothing left for him
but submission, patience, and quiet waiting. But bitter, heart-rending
misfortune is a school which develops not only the good--it fosters
also many faults. He learned to keep his counsel hidden in the depth
of his soul, and to look upon men with suspicion, using them as his
instruments, deceiving and flattering them with prudent serenity in
which his heart had no share. He was obliged to flatter the cowardly
and vulgar Grumbkow, and to be glad when he finally had won him over
to his side. For years he had to take the utmost pains, over and over
again, to conquer the displeasure and lack of confidence of his stern
father. His nature always revolted against such humiliation, and he
tried by bitter mockery to give expression to his injured self-esteem.
His heart, which warmed toward everything noble, prevented him from
becoming a hardened egoist; but he did not grow any the milder or more
conciliatory, and long after he had become a great man and wise ruler,
there remained in him from this time of servitude some trace of petty
cunning. The lion sometimes, in a spirit of undignified vengeance, did
not scorn to scratch like a cat.

Still, in those years, he learned something useful too--the strict
spirit of economy with which his father's narrow but able mind cared
for the welfare of his country and his household. When, to please the
king, he had to draw up leases, and took pains to increase the yield
of a domain by a few hundred thalers; or even entered unduly into the
hobbies of the king and proposed to him to kidnap a tall shepherd of
Mecklenburg as a recruit--these doings were at first, to be sure, only
a tedious means of propitiating the king, for he asked Grumbkow to
procure for him a man to make out the lists in his stead; the officers
in public and private service informed him where a surplus was to be
made, here and there, and he continued to ridicule the giant soldiers
whenever he could with impunity. Gradually, however, the new world
into which he had been transplanted, and the practical interests of
the people and of the State, became attractive to him. It was easy to
see that even his father's turn for economy was often tyrannical and
whimsical. The king was always convinced that he wished nothing but
the best for his country, and therefore took the liberty to interfere,
in the most arbitrary manner, even in the details of the property and
business of private persons. He ordered, for instance, that no he-goat
should run with the ewes; that all colored sheep, gray, black, or
piebald, should be completely disposed of within three years, and only
fine white wool be tolerated; he prescribed exactly how the copper
standard measures of the Berlin bushel, which he had sent all over the
country (at the expense of his subjects) should be preserved and kept
locked up so as to get no dents. In order to foster the linen and
woolen industry, he decreed that his subjects should wear none of the
fashionable chintz and calico, and threatened with a hundred thalers'
fine and three days in the pillory everybody who, after eight months,
permitted a shred of calico in his house in dress, gown, cap, or
furniture coverings. This method of ruling certainly seemed severe and
petty; but the son learned to honor nevertheless the prudent mind and
good intentions which were recognizable underneath such edicts, and
himself gradually acquired a wealth of detailed knowledge such as is
not usually at the disposal of a prince--real estate values, market
prices, and the needs of the people; the usages, rights, and duties of
humble life. He even absorbed something of the pride with which the
King boasted of his business knowledge; and when he himself had become
the all-powerful administrator of his State, the unbounded advantage
which was due to his knowledge of the people and of trade became
manifest. Only in this way was the wise economy made possible with
which he managed his own household and the State finances, as well as
the unceasing care for detail by which he developed agriculture,
trade, prosperity, and culture among his people. He could examine
equally well the daily accounts of his cooks and the estimates of the
income from the domains, forests, and taxes. For his ability to judge
with precision the smallest things as well as the greatest, his people
were in great part indebted to the years during which he had sat
unwillingly as assessor at the green table at Ruppin. Sometimes,
however, there befell him also what in his father's time had been
vexatious--that his knowledge of business details was, after all, not
extensive enough, and that he, like his father, gave orders which
arbitrarily interfered with the life of his Prussians, and could not
be carried out.

Scarcely had Frederick partially recovered from the blows of the great
catastrophe of his youth, when a new misfortune fell upon him, just as
terrible as the first, and in its consequences still more momentous
for his life. He was forced by the King to marry. Heartrending is the
sorrow with which he struggles to free himself from the bride chosen
for him. "She may be as frivolous as she pleases if only she is not a
simpleton! That I cannot bear." It was all in vain. He looked upon
this alliance with bitterness and anger almost to the very day of his
wedding, and never outgrew the bitter belief that his father had thus
destroyed his emotional life. His sensitive feelings, his affectionate
heart, were bartered away in the most reckless manner. Nor by this act
was he alone made unhappy, but also a good woman who was worthy of a
better fate. Princess Elizabeth of Bevern had many noble qualities of
heart; she was not a simpleton, she did not lack beauty, and could
pass muster before the fierce criticism of the princesses of the royal
house. But we fear that, if she had been an angel from heaven, the
pride of the Prince would have protested against her, for he was
offended to the depths of his nature by the needless barbarity of a
compulsory marriage. And yet the relation was not always so cold as
has sometimes been assumed. For six years the kindness of heart and
tact of the Princess succeeded time after time in reconciling the
crown prince to her. In the retirement of Rheinsberg she was really
his helpmeet and an amiable hostess for his guests, and it was
reported by the Austrian agents to the Court of Vienna that her
influence was increasing. But her modest, clinging nature had too
little of the qualities which can permanently hold an intellectual
man. The wide-awake members of the Brandenburg line felt the need of
giving quick and pointed expression to every easily aroused feeling.
When the Princess was excited, she grew quiet as if paralyzed; she
also lacked the easy graces of society. The two natures did not agree.
Then, too, her manner of showing affection toward her husband, always
dutiful, and subordinating herself as if under a spell and overwhelmed
by his great mind, was not very interesting for the Prince, who had
acquired, with the French intellectual culture, no little of the
frivolity of French society.

When Frederick became King, the Princess soon lost even the slight
part which she had won in her husband's affections. His long absence
in the first Silesian War gave the finishing stroke to their
estrangement. The relations of husband and wife became more and more
distant. Years passed when they did not see each other, and icy
brevity and coolness can be perceived in his letters to her. Still the
fact that the King was obliged to esteem her character so highly
maintained her in her outward position. Later, his relations with
women influenced his emotions very slightly. Even his sister at
Bayreuth, sickly, nervous, embittered by jealousy of an unfaithful
husband, was estranged from her brother for years; and not until she
had given up all hope of life did this proud member of the House of
Brandenburg, aging and unhappy, seek again the heart of the brother
whose little hand she had once held as they stood before their stern
father. His mother also, to whom King Frederick always showed
excellent filial devotion, was not able to occupy a large place in his
heart. His other brothers and sisters were younger, and were only too
much disposed to hatch obscure domestic conspiracies against him. If
the King ever condescended to show any attentions to a lady of the
court or of the stage, these were in general as disturbing as they
were flattering for the persons in question. When he found
intelligence, grace, and womanly dignity united, as in Frau von Camas,
who was the Queen's first lady-in-waiting, he expressed the amiability
of his nature in many cordial attentions. But on the whole, women did
not add much light or splendor to his life, and the cordial intimacy
of family life hardly ever warmed his heart. In this direction his
feelings were dried up. This was perhaps fortunate for his people, it
was undoubtedly fatal to his private life. The full warmth of his
human feelings was reserved almost exclusively for his little circle
of intimates, with whom he laughed, wrote poetry, discussed
philosophy, made plans for the future, and later discussed his
military operations and dangers.

His married life in Rheinsberg opens the best period of his younger
years. He succeeded in bringing together there a number of well
educated, cheerful companions. The little circle led a poetic life of
which those who shared in it have left a pleasing picture. Frederick
began to work seriously on his education. The expression of emotion
easily took for him the form of conventional French versification. He
worked incessantly to acquire the refinements of the foreign style.
But his mind was also busy with more serious matters. He eagerly
sought answers to all the highest questions of humanity in the works
of the Encyclopedists and of Christian Wolff. He sat bent over maps
and battle-plans, and, along with parts for the amateur theatre and
architects' sketches, other projects were in preparation, which, a few
years later, were to arouse the attention of the world.

Then the day came when his dying father laid down the reins of
government and told the officer of the day to take his orders from the
new commander-in-chief of Prussia. How the Prince was judged by his
political contemporaries we see from the characterization which an
Austrian agent had given of him a short time before: "He is graceful,
wears his own hair, and has a somewhat careless bearing; likes the
fine arts and good cooking. He would like to begin his rule by
something striking. He is a firmer friend of the army than his father.
His religion is that of a gentleman: he believes in God and the
forgiveness of sins. He likes splendor and things on a large scale. He
will reëstablish all the court positions and bring the nobles to his
court." This prophecy was not fully justified. We seek to understand
other sides of his nature at this time. The new King was a man of
fiery, enthusiastic temperament, he was quickly aroused, and the tears
came readily to his eyes. Like his contemporaries, he too was
passionately eager to admire grandeur and to give himself up to tender
feelings in a poetical mood. He played adagios softly on his flute.
Like his worthy contemporaries, he did not easily find, in prose or
poetry, the full expression of his feelings; pathetic oratory stirred
him to tearful emotion. In spite of all his French aphorisms, the
essence of his nature was very German in this respect also.

Those who ascribe to him a cold heart have judged him unfairly. It is
not cold hearts in princes which give the most offense by their
harshness. Such hearts are almost always gifted with the art of
satisfying those about them by uniform graciousness and tactful
expression. The strongest utterances of contempt are generally found
close beside the pleasing tones of a caressing tenderness. But in
Frederick, it seems to us, there was a striking and unusual union of
two totally opposite tendencies of the emotional nature, which
elsewhere are engaged in an unending struggle. He had in equal degree
the need to idealize life for himself, and the impulse to destroy
ideal moods without mercy in himself and in others. This first
peculiarity of his was perhaps the most beautiful, perhaps the
saddest, with which a human being was ever equipped in the struggles
of earth. His was indeed a poetic nature. He possessed to a high
degree that peculiar power which endeavors to reconstruct vulgar
reality according to the ideal needs of its own nature, and covers
everything near with the grace and light of a new life. It was a
necessity for him to make over with the grace of his imagination the
image of those dear to him, and to adorn the relation to them into
which he had voluntarily entered. In this there was always a certain
kind of posing. Even where he had the most ardent feelings, he was
more in love with the glorified picture of the individual in his mind
than with the real personality. It was in such a mood that he kissed
Voltaire's hand. As soon as the difference between the ideal and the
real person became unpleasantly perceptible, he let go the person and
clung to the image. One to whom nature has given this temperament,
letting him see love and friendship chiefly through the colored glass
of a poetical mood, will always, according to the judgment of others,
show caprice in the choice of his friends. The uniform warmth which
treats with consideration all alike seems to be denied to such
natures. To any one to whom the King had become a friend in his own
fashion, he always showed the greatest attention and assiduity,
however much his moods changed at particular moments. He could become
as sentimental in his sorrow over the loss of such a friend as any
German of the Werther period. He had lived for many years on somewhat
distant terms with his sister in Bayreuth, and not until the last
years before her death, amid the terrors of a burdensome war, did her
image rise vividly again before him as that of an affectionate sister.
After her death he found a gloomy satisfaction in picturing to himself
and others the cordiality of his relations with her. He erected a
little temple to her and often made pilgrimages to it. Toward any one
who did not approach his heart through the medium of a poetic mood, or
incite him to poetic expression of his affection, or who touched a
wrong note anywhere in his sensitive nature, he was cold,
contemptuous, and indifferent--a king who only asked to what extent
the other person could be useful to him; he even pushed him aside when
he could no longer use him. Such a character may perhaps surround the
life of a young man with poetic lustre and give brightness and charm
even to common things, but unless it is coupled with a high degree of
morality, a sense of duty, and a mind set upon higher things, it will
leave him sad and lonely in later years. In the most favorable cases
it will make bitter enemies as well as very warm admirers. A somewhat
similar disposition brought to Goethe's noble soul heavy sorrows,
transitory relations, many disappointments, and a solitary old age. It
becomes doubly momentous for a king, before whom others rarely stand
with assurance and on equal terms; for his most sincere friends may
yet turn into admiring flatterers, unstable in their bearing, now
constrained under the moral spell of his majesty, now, under the
conviction of their own rights, fault-finding and discontented.

This need of ideal relations and longing for people to whom he could
unbosom himself without reserve, worked at cross purposes with
Frederick's penetrating discrimination, and his uncompromising love of
truth, which was a deadly enemy of all deception, impatiently resisted
every illusion, despised shams, and sought for the essence of things.
This scrutinizing view of life and its duties might well offer him
protection against those deceptions which oftener annoy an
imaginative prince, who gives his confidence, than a private
individual. His acuteness, however, showed itself also in savage moods
as unsparingly, sarcastically, and maliciously destructive. Where did
he get this disposition? Was it Brandenburg blood? Was it an
inheritance from his great-grandmother, the Electress Sophia of
Hanover, and his grandmother, Queen Sophia Charlotte, those
intellectual women with whom Leibniz had discussed the eternal harmony
of the universe? The harsh school of his youth certainly had had
something to do with it. His insight into the foibles of others was
keen. Wherever he saw a weak point, wherever any one's manners annoyed
or provoked him, his ready tongue was busy. His gibes fell unsparingly
upon friend and foe alike; and even where silence and patience were
demanded by every consideration of prudence, he could not control
himself. At such times his soul seemed to suffer some strange
transformation. With merciless exaggeration he distorted the picture
of his victim into a caricature. On closer examination the principal
motive here also appears to be pleasure in intellectual production. He
frees himself from an unpleasant impression by improvising against his
victim. He makes a grotesque picture with inner satisfaction and is
astonished if the victim, deeply offended, in turn takes up arms
against him. His resemblance to Luther in this respect is very
striking. Neither the king nor the reformer cared whether his behavior
was dignified or seemly, for both of them, excited like men on the
hunting field, entirely forgot the consequences in the joy of the
fight. Both did themselves and their great causes serious injury in
this way, and were honestly surprised when they discovered the fact.
To be sure, the blows with the cudgel or the whip which the great monk
of the sixteenth century dealt were far more terrible than the
pin-pricks of the great prince in the age of enlightenment. But when a
king teases and mocks and sometimes pinches maliciously, it is harder
to forgive him for his undignified behavior; for he frequently engages
in an unequal contest with his victims. The great prince treated all
his political opponents in this way, and aroused deadly enemies
against himself. He joked at the table, and put in circulation
stinging verses and pamphlets about Madame de Pompadour in France and
the Empresses Elizabeth and Maria Theresa. Similarly, he sometimes
caressed, sometimes scolded and scratched his poetical ideal,
Voltaire; but he also proceeded in this way with people whom he really
esteemed highly, in whom he put the greatest confidence, and whom he
took into the circle of his intimate friends. He brought the Marquis
d'Argens to his court, made him chamberlain, member of the Academy,
and one of his nearest and dearest friends. The letters which he wrote
to him from the camps of the Seven Years' War are among the most
beautiful and touching records that the King has left us. When
Frederick came home from the war it was his fond hope that the marquis
would live with him in his palace at Sans Souci. And a few years later
this charming relation was broken up in the most painful manner. How
was that possible! The marquis was perhaps the best Frenchman that the
King had brought into his circle, a man of honor, with fine feelings,
fine education, and really devoted to the King; but he was neither a
great character nor an especially strong man. For years the King had
admired in him a scholar--which he was not--a wise, clear-sighted,
assured philosopher with pleasing wit and fresh humor; he had in short
set up an extremely pleasing, fanciful image of him. Now, in daily
intercourse, Frederick found himself mistaken. A lack of robustness on
the part of the Frenchman, causing him to dwell with hypochondriac
exaggeration on his poor health, annoyed the King, who began to
realize that the aging marquis was neither a great genius nor an
intellectual giant. The ideal which he had formed of him was
destroyed. Now the King began to make fun of him on account of his
weaknesses. The sensitive Frenchman thereupon asked for leave of
absence, that a sojourn of a few months in France might restore his
health. The King was offended by this ill-humored attitude, and
continued his raillery in friendly letters which he sent him. He said
that it was rumored that a werewolf had appeared in France. This was
undoubtedly the marquis, in the disguise of a Prussian and a sick man,
and he asked if he had begun to eat little children. He had not
formerly had that bad habit, but people change a good deal in
traveling. The marquis, instead of a few months, stayed two winters.
When he was about to return, he sent certificates from his physicians.
Probably the worthy man had really been ill, but the King was
deeply offended by this awkward attempt at justification on the
part of an old friend, and when the latter returned, the old intimacy
was gone forever. The King would not let him go, but he took pleasure
in punishing the renegade by stinging speeches and harsh jokes.
Finally the Frenchman, deeply hurt, asked for his dismissal. His
request was granted, and the sorrow and anger of the King is seen from
the wording of the order. When the marquis, in the last letter which
he wrote the King before his death, represented to him again, and not
without bitterness, how scornfully and badly he had treated an
unselfish admirer, Frederick read the letter without a word. But he
wrote with grief to the dead man's widow telling her of his friendship
for her husband, and had a costly monument erected for him in a
foreign land. The great prince fared similarly with most of his
intimates. Magic as was his power to attract, he had demoniac
faculties for repelling. But if any one is disposed to blame the man
for this, let him be told that hardly another king in history has so
unsparingly disclosed his most intimate soul-life to his friends as
Frederick.

Frederick had worn the crown only a few months when the Emperor
Charles VI. died. Now everything urged the young King to risk a
master-stroke. That he determined upon such a step was in itself, in
spite of the momentary weakness of Austria, a token of bold courage.
The countries which he ruled had perhaps a seventh as many inhabitants
as the broad lands of Maria Theresa. True, his army was for the time
being far superior to the Austrian in numbers and discipline, and
according to the ideas of the time, the mass of the people was not
then in the same way as today available for recruiting purposes. Nor
did he fully realize the greatness of Maria Theresa. But even in the
preparations for the invasion the King showed that he had long hoped
to measure himself against Austria. In an exalted mood he entered upon
a struggle which was to be decisive for his own life and that of his
State. He cared little at heart for the right which he might have to
the Silesian duchies, and which with his pen he tried to prove before
Europe. For this the policy of the despotic States of the seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries had no regard whatever. Any one who could
find a plausible defense of his cause made use of it, but in case of
need the most improbable argument, the most shallow pretext, was
sufficient. In this way Louis XIV. had made war; in this way the
Emperor had followed up his interests against the Turks, Italians,
Germans, French, and Spaniards; in this way a great part of the
successes of the great Elector had been frustrated by others. Just
where the rights of the Hohenzollerns were the plainest, as in
Pomerania, they had been most ruthlessly curtailed, and by no one more
than by the Emperor and the Hapsburgs. Now the Hohenzollerns sought
their revenge. "Be my Cicero and prove the right of my cause, and I
will be your Cæsar and carry it through," Frederick wrote to Jordan
after the invasion of Silesia. Gaily, with light step as if going to a
dance, the King entered upon the fields of his victories. There was
still cheerful enjoyment of life, sweet coquetry with verse, and
intellectual conversation with his intimates on the pleasures of the
day, on God, nature, and immortality, which he considered the spice of
life. But the great task upon which he had entered began to have its
effect upon his soul even in the early weeks, even before he had
passed through the fiery ordeal of the first great battle. And from
that time on it hammered and forged upon his soul until it turned his
hair gray and hardened his fiery heart into ringing steel. With that
wonderful clearness which was peculiar to him, he watched the
beginning of these changes. He even then viewed his own life as from
without. "You will find me more philosophical than you think," he
writes to his friend. "I have always been so--sometimes more,
sometimes less. My youth, the fire of passion, the longing for glory,
and, to tell you the whole truth, curiosity, and finally, a secret
instinct, have forced me out of the sweet peace which I enjoyed, and
the wish to see my name in the gazettes and in history has led me into
new paths. Come here to me. Philosophy will maintain her rights, and I
assure you that if I had not this cursed love of fame, I should think
only of peaceful comfort."

When the faithful Jordan actually came to him and the King saw the man
of peaceful enjoyment timid and uncomfortable in the field, he
suddenly realized that he himself had become another and a stronger
man. The guest who had been honored by him so long as the more
scholarly, and who had corrected his verses, criticized his letters,
and been far ahead of him in the knowledge of Greek philosophy, now,
in spite of all his philosophical training, gave the King the
impression of a man without courage. With bitter derision Frederick
attacked him in one of his best improvisations, contrasting the
warrior in himself with the weak philosopher. In however bad taste the
ridiculing verses were with which he overwhelmed Jordan again and
again, the return of the old cordial feeling was just as quick; but it
was the first gentle hint of fate for the King himself. The same thing
was to befall him often. He was to lose valuable men, loyal friends,
one after another; not only by death, but still more by the coldness
and estrangement which arose between his nature and theirs. For the
way upon which he had now entered was destined to develop more and
more all the greatness, but also all the narrow features, of his
nature, up to the limit of human possibility. The higher he rose above
others, the smaller their natures inevitably appeared to him. Almost
all whom in later years he measured by his own standard were far from
able to endure the test, and the dissatisfaction and disappointment
which he then experienced became again keener and more relentless
until he himself, from a solitary height, looked down with stony eyes
upon the doings of the men at his feet; but always, even to his last
hours, the piercing chill of his searching glance was broken by the
bright splendor of soft human feelings, and the fact that these were
left to him is what makes his great tragic figure so affecting.

During the first war, to be sure, he still looked back with longing to
the calm peace of his "Remusberg," and felt deeply the exaction of the
tremendous fate which had already involved him. "It is hard to bear
with equanimity this good and bad fortune," he writes; "one may appear
indifferent in success and unmoved in adversity, the features of the
face can be controlled; but the man, the inward man, the depths of the
heart, are affected none the less." And he concludes hopefully, "All
that I wish for myself is that success may not destroy in me the human
feelings and virtues, to which I have always clung. May my friends
find me as I have always been." And at the end of the war he writes:
"See, your friend is victorious for the second time! Who would have
said a few years ago that your pupil in philosophy would play a
soldier's part in the world; that Providence would use a poet to
overthrow the political system of Europe?" This shows how fresh and
young Frederick felt when he returned to Berlin in triumph after his
first war.

For the second time he took the field to assert his claim to Silesia.
Again he was victorious. He had already the calm confidence of a tried
general. His joy at the excellence of his troops was great. "All that
flatters me in this victory," he wrote to Frau von Camas, "is that I
could contribute by a quick decision and a bold manoeuvre to the
preservation of so many good people. I would not have the least of my
soldiers wounded for vain glory, which no longer deceives me." But in
the midst of the contest came the death of two of his dearest friends,
Jordan and Kayserlingk. His grief was touching: "In less than three
months I have lost my two most faithful friends, people with whom I
had lived daily, pleasant companions, honorable men, and true friends.
It is hard for a heart that was made so sensitive as mine to restrain
my deep sorrow. When I come back to Berlin, I shall be almost a
stranger in my own fatherland, lonesome in my own house. You too have
had the misfortune to lose at one time several people who were dear to
you. I admire your courage, but I cannot imitate it. My only hope is
in time, which can overcome everything in nature. It begins by
weakening the impressions on our brains, and only ceases when it
destroys us utterly. I anticipate with terror visiting all the places
which call up in me sad memories of friends whom I have lost forever."
And four weeks after their death he writes to the same friend, who
tried to console him: "Do not believe that pressure of business and
danger give distraction in sadness. I know from experience that that
is a poor remedy. Unfortunately only four weeks have passed since my
tears and my sorrow began, but after the violent outbursts of the
first days, I feel myself just as sad, just as little consoled, as at
the beginning." And when his worthy tutor, Duhan, sent him at his
request some French books which Jordan had left behind, the King
wrote, late in the autumn of the same year: "Tears came into my eyes
when I opened the books of my poor dear Jordan. I loved him so much,
it will be hard to realize that he is no more." Not long after the
King lost also the intimate friend to whom this letter was addressed.

The loss, in 1745, of the friends of his youth was an important
turning point in the King's mental life. With these unselfish,
honorable men almost everything died which had made him happy in his
intercourse with others. The intimacies into which he now entered as a
man were all of another kind. Even the best of the new acquaintances
received perhaps his occasional confidence, but never his heartfelt
friendship. The need for stimulating intellectual intercourse
remained, and became even stronger and more imperative, for in this
too he was unique; he never could dispense with cheerful and
confidential companions, with light, almost reckless conversation,
flitting through all shades of human moods, thoughtful or frivolous,
from the greatest questions of the human race down to the little
events of the day. Immediately after his accession he had written to
Voltaire and invited him to his court. He had first met the Frenchman
in 1740 on a journey near Wesel. Soon after, Voltaire had come to
Berlin for a few days, at heavy expense. He had even then impressed
the King as a jester, but Frederick felt nevertheless an infinite
respect for the talent of the man. Voltaire was to him the greatest
poet of all times, the master of ceremonies of Parnassus, where the
King himself was so anxious to play a part. Frederick's desire to have
this man in his train became stronger and stronger. He regarded
himself as his pupil; he wished to have all his verses approved by the
master; among his Brandenburg officials he pined for the wit and
spirit of the elegant Frenchman, and finally, his vanity as a
sovereign was concerned--he wanted to be a prince of the _beaux
esprits_ and philosophers, as he had become a glorious leader of
armies. After the second Silesian war his intimates were mostly
foreigners. After 1750 he had the pleasure of seeing the great
Voltaire also as a member of his court. It was no misfortune that this
unworthy man endured for only a few years his sojourn among the
barbarians.

During these ten years, from 1746 to 1756, Frederick acquired literary
independence, and that importance as a writer which is not yet
sufficiently appreciated in Germany. As to his French poetry, a German
can only judge imperfectly. He was a facile poet, who was easily
master of every mood in metre and rhyme, but from the point of view
of a Frenchman, he never completely overcame in his lyric poetry the
difficulties of a foreign language, however diligently his confidants
revised his work. He even lacked, it seems to us, the uniform
rhetorical spirit, that style which in Voltaire's time was the first
mark of a born poet. The effect of beautiful and noble sentiments, in
splendid phraseology, is spoiled by trivial thoughts and commonplace
expressions in the next line. Nor was the development of his taste
sufficiently assured and independent. In his esthetic judgment he was
quick, both to admire and to condemn; in reality, he was much more
dependent upon the opinion of his French acquaintances than his pride
would have admitted. What was best, moreover, in French poetry at that
time--the return to Nature and the struggle of the beauty of reality
against the fetters of an antiquated conventionalism--remained to him
a sealed book. For a long time he looked upon Rousseau as an eccentric
vagabond, and upon the conscientious and accurate spirit of Diderot
even as shallow. And yet it seems to us that there often appear in his
poems, especially in the light improvisations which he made to please
his friends, a wealth of poetical detail and a charming tone of true
feeling, which at least his model Voltaire might have envied.

Frederick's history of his times is, like Cæsar's _Commentaries_, one
of the most important documents of historical literature. True, like
the Roman general, like all practical statesmen, he stated facts as
they are reflected in the soul of a participant. He does not give due
value to everything or full justice to everybody, but he knows
infinitely more than is revealed to one at a distance, and he wrote of
some of the motives underlying the great events, not without
prejudice, yet with magnanimity toward his opponents. Writing at times
without the enormous reference material which a professional historian
must collect about him, he was occasionally deceived by his memory and
his judgment, though both were very reliable. He was, moreover,
composing an apology for his house, his politics, his campaigns; and,
like Cæsar, he sometimes ignores facts or interprets them as he wishes
them to go down to posterity; but his love of truth and the frankness
with which he treats his house and his own actions are no less
admirable than his sovereign calm and the ease with which he soars
above events, in spite of the little rhetorical embellishments which
were due to the taste of his time.

His many-sidedness is as astonishing as his productiveness. One of the
greatest military writers, a historian of importance, a clever poet,
and at the same time a popular philosopher, a practical statesman,
even a writer of very free and easy anonymous pamphlets, and sometimes
a journalist, he was always ready to take up his pen for anything that
inspired him and aroused his passions or enthusiasm, or to attack, in
verse or prose, any one who provoked or annoyed him--not only the pope
and the Empress, the Jesuits and the Dutch journalists, but also old
friends if they seemed lukewarm to him,--which he could not
endure,--or if they actually threatened to break with him. Never since
Luther has there been such a belligerent, relentless, untiring writer.
As soon as he put pen to paper he was like Proteus, everything: sage
or intriguer, historian or poet, whatever the situation demanded,
always an active, fiery, intellectual--sometimes also an
ill-mannered--man, with never a moment's thought of his royal
position. Whatever he liked he praised in poems or eulogies: the noble
doctrines of his own philosophy, his friends, his army, religious
liberty, independent investigation, tolerance, and popular education.

The conquering power of Frederick's mind had reached out in all
directions. When ambition inspired him to victory it seemed as if
there were no obstacle that would check him. Then came the years of
trial--seven years of terrible, heartrending cares--the great period,
in which the heaviest tasks that ever a man accomplished were laid
upon his rich, ambitious spirit, in which almost everything perished
which was his own possession, joy and happiness, peace and selfish
comfort; in which also many pleasing and graceful characteristics of
the man were to disappear, that he might become the self-sacrificing
prince of his people, the foremost servant of his State, and the hero
of a nation. No lust of conquest made him take the field this time; it
had long been plain to him that he was fighting for his own life and
that of his State. But his determination had grown only the stronger.
Like the stormwind he purposed to dash into the clouds which were
collecting from all sides about his head, and to break up the
thunderbolts through the energy of an irresistible attack, before they
were discharged. He had never been conquered up to this time. His
enemies had been beaten every time he had fallen upon them with his
terrible instrument--the army. Herein lay his only hope. If his
well-tried power did not fail him now, he might save his State.

But in the very first conflict with his old enemy, the Austrians, he
saw that they, too, had learned from him and were changed. He exerted
his strength to the utmost, and at Kollin it failed him. The 18th of
June, 1757, is the most momentous day in Frederick's life. There
happened on that day what twice more in this war snatched victory from
him--the general had underestimated his enemy and had expected the
impossible from his own brave army. After a short period of
stupefaction Frederick arose with new strength. Instead of an
aggressive war, he had been forced to wage a desperate war of defense.
His foes attacked his little country from all sides. He entered upon a
death struggle with every great power of the Continent, master of only
four million men and a defeated army. Now his talent as general showed
itself as he escaped the enemy after defeats and again attacked in the
most unexpected quarters and beat them, faced first one army and then
another, unsurpassed in his dispositions, inexhaustible in expedients,
unequaled as leader of troops in battle. So he stood, one against
five--Austrians, Russians, French, any one of whom was his superior in
strength, and at the same time against the Swedes and the Imperial
troops. For five years he struggled thus against armies far larger
than his own--every spring in danger of being crushed merely by
numbers, every autumn free again. A loud cry of admiration and
sympathy ran through Europe; and among those who gave the loudest
praise, although reluctantly, were his most bitter enemies. Now, in
these years of changing fortune, when the King himself experienced
such bitter vicissitudes of the fortune of war, his generalship was
the astonishment of all the armies of Europe. How, always the more
rapid and skilful, he managed to establish his lines against his
opponents; how so often he outflanked in an oblique position the
weakest wing of the enemy, forced it back, and put it to rout; how his
cavalry, which, newly organized, had become the strongest in the
world, dashed in fury upon the foe, broke their ranks, scattered their
battalions: all this was celebrated everywhere as a new advance in
military art, and the invention of surpassing genius. The tactics and
the strategy of the Prussian army came to be for almost half a century
the ideal and model for all the armies of Europe. It was the unanimous
opinion that Frederick was the greatest general of his time, and that
there had been few leaders since the beginning of history who could be
compared with him. It seemed incredible that the smaller numbers so
often conquered the greater, and even when defeated, instead of being
routed, faced the enemy, who had hardly recovered from his injuries,
as threatening and fully equipped as before. Today we praise not only
the field operations of the King, but also the wise prudence with
which he handled his supplies. He knew very well how much he was
limited by having to consider the commissariat, and the thousands of
carts in which he had to take with him the provisions and the daily
supplies of the soldiers; but he also knew that this method was his
only salvation. Once, when after the battle of Rossbach he made the
astonishing march into Silesia--one hundred and eighty-nine miles in
fifteen days--he, in the greatest danger, abandoned his old method. He
made his way through the country as other armies did at that time,
and quartered his men upon the people. But he wisely returned at once
to his old plan. For as soon as his enemies learned to imitate this
free movement, he was certainly doomed. When the old militia in his
ancient provinces rose to arms again, helped to drive out the Swedes,
and bravely defended Colberg and Berlin, he accepted their assistance
without objection; but he took pains not to encourage a guerilla war;
and when his East Frisian peasantry revolted independently against the
French and were severely punished by them for it, he told them with
brutal frankness that it was their own fault, for war was a matter for
soldiers; the business of the peasants and citizens should be
uninterrupted industry, the payment of taxes, and the furnishing of
recruits. He well knew that he was lost if a people's war in Saxony
and Bohemia should be aroused against him. This readiness, indicative
of the cautious general, to restrict himself to military forms, which
alone made the contest possible for him, may be reckoned among his
greatest qualities.

Louder and louder became the cry of sorrow and admiration with which
Germans and foreigners watched this death-struggle of the lion at bay.
As early as 1740 the young King had been praised by the Protestants as
the champion of freedom of conscience and enlightenment, against
intolerance and the Jesuits. When, a few months after the battle at
Kollin, he completely defeated the French at Rossbach, he became the
hero of Germany. A glad cry of joy broke out everywhere. For two
hundred years the French had done great wrong to the divided country;
now the German national idea began to revolt against the influence of
French culture, and the King, who himself greatly admired Parisian
poetry, had effectively routed the Parisian generals with German
musket balls. It was such a brilliant victory, such a humiliating
defeat of the hereditary enemy, that everywhere in Germany there was
hearty rejoicing. Even where the soldiers of a State were fighting
against King Frederick, the people at home in city and country
rejoiced at the blows he dealt in good old German fashion. And the
longer the war lasted, the more active became the faith in the King's
invincibility, and the higher rose the confidence of the Germans. For
the first time in long, long years they now had a hero of whose
military glory they could be proud--a man who accomplished what seemed
more than human. Innumerable anecdotes about him ran through the
country. Every little touch about his calmness, good humor, kindness
to individual soldiers, and the loyalty of his army, traveled hundreds
of miles. How, in danger of death, he played the flute in his tent,
how his wounded soldiers sang chorals after the battle, how he took
off his hat to a regiment--he has often been imitated since--all this
was reported on the Neckar and the Rhine, was printed, and listened to
with merry laughter and tears of emotion. It was natural that poets
should sing his praise. Three of them had been in the Prussian army:
Gleim and Lessing, as secretaries of Prussian generals, and Ewald von
Kleist, a favorite of the younger literary circles, as an officer,
until the bullet struck him at Kunersdorf. But still more touching for
us is the loyal devotion of the Prussian people. The old provinces,
Prussia, Pomerania, Brandenburg, and Westphalia, were suffering
unspeakably by the war, but the proud joy of having a share in the
hero of Europe often lifted even humble men above their own
sufferings. Citizens and peasants took the field as militiamen again
and again for years. When a number of recruits from the province of
Cleves and the county of Ravensberg deserted after a lost battle and
returned home, the deserters were declared perjurers by their own
fellow-countrymen and relatives, were excluded from the villages and
driven back to the army.

Foreign opinion was no less enthusiastic. In the Protestant cantons of
Switzerland there was as warm sympathy with the King's fate as if the
descendants of the Rütli men had never been separated from the German
empire. There were people there who were made ill by vexation when the
King's cause was in a bad way. It was the same in England. Every
victory of the King aroused wild joy in London. Houses were
illuminated and pictures and laudatory poems offered for sale. In
Parliament Pitt announced with admiration every new deed of the great
ally. Even at Paris, in the theatres and salons, people were rather
Prussian than French. The French derided their own generals and the
clique of Madame de Pompadour. Whoever was on the side of the French
arms, so Duclos reports, hardly dared to give expression to his views.
In St. Petersburg, the grand duke Peter and his party were such good
Prussians that they grieved in secret at every reverse of Frederick's
cause. The enthusiasm penetrated even to Turkey and to the Khan of
Tartary; and this respectful admiration of a whole continent outlasted
the war. When Hackert, the painter, was traveling through the interior
of Sicily, a gift of honor of wine and fruit was offered him by the
city council because they had heard that he was a Prussian, a subject
of the great King for whom they wished thereby to show their
reverence; and Muley Ismail, the emperor of Morocco, released without
any ransom the crew of a ship belonging to a citizen of Emden, whom
the Berbers had brought prisoner to Mogador, sent them in new clothes
to Lisbon, and assured them that their King was the greatest man in
the world, that no Prussian should be a prisoner in his land, and that
his cruisers would never attack the Prussian flag.

Poor oppressed soul of the German people! Long years had passed since
the men between the Rhine and the Oder had felt the joy of being
esteemed above others among the nations of the earth! Now by the magic
of one man's power everything was transformed. The German citizen,
awakened as from an anxious dream, looked out upon the world and
within to his own heart. Men had long vegetated quietly, without a
past in which they could rejoice, without a great future in which they
could hope. Now all at once they felt that they, too, had a share in
the honor and the greatness of the world; that a king and his people,
all of their blood, had given to the German national idea a golden
setting, and to the history of civilization a new meaning. Now they
were experiencing the struggles, ventures, and victories of a great
man. Work on in your study, peaceful thinker, fantastic dreamer! You
have learned over-night to look down with a smile upon foreign ways
and to expect great things of your own talent. Try to realize, now,
what flows from your heart!

But while the youthful power of the people shook its wings with
enthusiastic warmth, how did the great prince feel who was struggling
ceaselessly against his enemies? The inspiring cry of the people rang
in his ears as a feeble sound. The King heard it almost with
indifference. His heart grew calmer and colder. To be sure, passionate
hours of sorrow and heart-rending cares came to him over and over
again. He kept them hidden from his army; his calm face became harder,
his brow more deeply furrowed, and his expression more rigid. Only
before a few intimates he opened his heart from time to time, and then
for a moment the sorrow of the man who had reached the limits of human
possibilities broke forth.

Ten days after the battle of Kollin his mother died. A few weeks
afterward he drove in anger his brother August Wilhelm from the army,
because he had not been strong enough to lead it. The next year this
brother died "of sorrow," as the officer of the day announced to the
King. Shortly after he received the news of the death of his sister at
Bayreuth. One after another his generals fell by his side, or lost the
King's confidence, because they were not equal to the superhuman tasks
of this war. His veterans, the pride of his heart, hardened warriors,
seasoned in three fierce wars, who, dying, stretched out their hands
toward him and called his name, were crushed in entire companies about
him, and what came to fill the broad gaps that death incessantly
mowed in his army were young men, some good material, but many
worthless. The King made use of them as he did of others, more
sternly, more severely. His glance and his word gave courage and
devotion even to the inferior sort, but still he knew that all this
was not salvation. His criticism became brief and cutting, his praise
rare. So he lived on; five summers and winters came and went; the work
was gigantic; his thinking and scheming was inexhaustible, his eagle
eye scrutinized searchingly the most remote and petty circumstances,
and yet there was no change, and no hope anywhere. The King read and
wrote in leisure hours just as before; he composed verses and kept up
a correspondence with Voltaire and Algarotti, but he was prepared to
see all this come soon to an end--a swift and sudden one. He carried
in his pocket day and night something which could make him free from
Daun and Laudon. At times the whole affair filled him with disdain.

The letters of the man from whom Germany dates a new epoch in its
intellectual life deserve to be read with reverence by every German.
When you find him writing to Frau von Camas, "For the last six years I
have felt that it is the living, not the dead, for whom one should be
sorry," if you are shocked by the gloomy energy of his determination
you must beware of thinking that in it the power of this remarkable
spirit found its highest expression. It is true that the King had some
moments of desperation when he longed for death by the enemy's bullet
in order not to be forced to use the capsule which he carried in his
pocket. He was indeed fully determined not to ruin the State by living
as a captive of Austria; to this extent what he writes is terribly
true. But he was also of a poetic temperament, a child of the century
which so longed for great deeds and found such immense satisfaction in
the expression of exalted feelings. He was, to the bottom of his
heart, a German with the same emotional needs as, for instance, the
infinitely weaker Klopstock and his admirers. The consideration and
resolute expression of his final resolve made him freer and more
cheerful at heart. He wrote to his sister at Bayreuth about it in the
momentous second year of the war; and this letter is especially
characteristic, for his sister also was determined not to survive him
and the downfall of his house; and he approved this decision, to
which, by the way, he gave little attention in his gloomy satisfaction
at his own reflections. The two royal children had once secretly
recited, in the house of their stern father, the parts of French
tragedies; now their hearts beat again in the single thought of
freeing themselves by a Catonian death from a life full of
disappointment, confusion, and suffering. But when the excited and
nervous sister fell seriously ill, Frederick forgot all his Stoic
philosophy, and clinging fast to life with a passionate tenderness,
worried and mourned over her who was the dearest to him of his family.
When she died, his poignant grief was perhaps increased by the feeling
that he had interfered in too tragic a manner with a tender woman's
life. Thus, even in the greatest of all Germans born in the first half
of the eighteenth century, poetic feelings, and the wish to appear
beautiful and great, were strangely mingled with the serious realities
of life. Poor little Professor Semler who, while under the deepest
emotion, still studied his attitudes and worked over his polite
phrases, and the great King, who in cool expectation of the hour of
his death, still wrote of suicide in beautifully balanced
periods--both were sons of the same age, in which pathos, which had
not yet found worthy expression in art, luxuriated like climbing
plants about the realities of life. But the King was greater than his
philosophy. In reality he never lost his courage, nor the persistent,
defiant vigor characteristic of the old Germans, nor the secret hope
which a man needs in every difficult task.

And he held out. The forces of his enemies grew weaker, their generals
were worn out, and their armies were scattered. Finally Russia
withdrew from the coalition. This, and the King's last victories,
turned the balance. He had won. He had not only conquered Silesia, but
vindicated its possession for his Prussian kingdom. But while his
people rejoiced, and the loyal citizens of his capital prepared a
festive reception for him, he shunned their merrymaking and withdrew
silent and alone to Sans Souci. He said that he wished to spend his
remaining days in peace, living for his people.

In the first twenty-three years of his reign he had struggled
and fought to maintain his power against the world. Twenty-three
years more he was destined to rule peacefully over his people as
a wise, stern patriarch. He guided his State with the greatest
self-denial, though with insistence on his own ways, striving for
the greatest things, but yet in full control even of the smallest.
Many of his ideas have been left behind by the advance of modern
civilization--they were the result of the experiences of his youth
and early manhood. Thought was to be free; every man to think what he
pleased, but to do his duty as a citizen. He himself subordinated his
comfort and his expenditures to the welfare of the State, meeting the
whole expense of the royal household with some two hundred thousand
thalers; thinking first of the advantage of his people and last of
himself. His subjects, in their turn, he felt should bear cheerfully
whatever duties and burdens he imposed upon them. Every one was to
remain in the station in which birth and education had placed him. The
noblemen were to be landholders and officers; to the citizens belonged
the towns, trade, manufacturing, instruction, and invention; to the
peasant, the land and the menial work. But in his sphere each one was
to be prosperous and happy. Equal, strict, ready justice for every
one; no favors to the highborn and rich--rather, in case of doubt, the
humble should have the preference. To increase the number of useful
men; to make every activity as profitable and as perfect as possible;
to buy as little as possible abroad; to produce everything at home,
exporting the surplus--these were the leading principles of his social
and economic theories. He exerted himself incessantly to increase the
acreage of arable land, and to provide new places for settlers. Swamps
were drained, lakes drawn off, dikes thrown up. Canals were dug and
money advanced to found new factories. At the instigation and with the
financial support of the government cities and villages were rebuilt,
more solid and sanitary than they had been before. The farmers' credit
system, fire insurance societies, and the Royal Bank were founded.
Everywhere public schools were established. Educated people were
brought in from abroad; the government officials everywhere were
required to be educated, and regulated by examination and strict
inspection. It is the duty of the historian to enumerate and praise
all this, if also to mention some unsuccessful attempts of the King,
which were inevitable owing to his endeavor to control everything
himself.

The King cared for all his lands, and by no means least for his child
of sorrow, the newly won Silesia. When he conquered this great
district it had a few more than a million inhabitants. They realized
vividly the contrast between the easy-going Austrian management and
the precise, restless, stirring rule of Prussia. In Vienna the
catalogue of prohibited books had been larger than at Rome; now bales
of books came incessantly from Germany into the province, reading and
buying were astonishingly free, even printed attacks upon the
sovereign himself. In Austria it was the privilege of the aristocracy
to wear foreign cloth. When the father of Frederick the Great of
Prussia had forbidden the importation of cloth, he had first of all
dressed himself and his princes in domestic goods. In Vienna no office
had been considered aristocratic if it implied anything but a nominal
function; all the actual work was a matter for subordinates. A
chamberlain stood higher than a veteran general or minister. In
Prussia even the highest born was little esteemed if he was not useful
to the State, and the King himself was a most exact official, who
watched and scolded over every thousand thalers saved or spent. Any
one in Austria who left the Catholic Church was punished with
confiscation of property and banishment; under the Prussians anybody
could leave or join any church--that was his own affair. Under the
imperial rule the government had been, on the whole, negligent if it
had been forced to occupy itself with any matter; the Prussian
officials had their noses and their hands in everything. In spite of
the three Silesian wars the province grew to be far more prosperous
than it had been under the Empire. Up to this time a hundred years had
not been sufficient to wipe out the visible traces of the Thirty
Years' War. The people remembered well how in the cities the heaps of
rubbish from the time of the Swedish invasions had lain about, and
between the remaining houses there were patches of waste ground
blackened by fire. Many small cities still had log houses in the old
Slavic style, with thatched or shingled roofs, patched up shabbily
from time to time. In a few decades the Prussians removed the traces
not only of former devastations, but also of the recent Seven Years'
War. Frederick laid out several hundred new villages, had fifteen
good-sized towns rebuilt in regular streets--largely with funds from
the royal treasury--and had compelled the landed proprietors to
restore several thousand farms which they had abolished as individual
holdings, and install upon them tenants with rights of succession.
Under the Empire the taxes had been lower, but they had been unfairly
distributed and had fallen chiefly upon the poor, the nobility being
exempt from the greater part of them. The collection was imperfect,
much was embezzled or poorly applied; relatively little came into the
imperial treasury. The Prussians, on the contrary, divided the country
into small districts, appraised every acre of land, and in a few years
abolished almost all exemptions. The outlying country now paid its
land taxes and the cities their excise duties. So the province bore
the double burden with greater ease, and no one but the privileged
classes grumbled; and with all this, it could maintain forty thousand
soldiers, whereas formerly there had been in the province only about
two thousand. Before 1740 the nobility had lived _en grand seigneur_.
All who were Catholic and rich lived in Vienna. Everybody else who
could raise enough money betook himself to Breslau. Now the majority
of landholders lived on their estates, the poverty-stricken nobles
disappeared, the nobility knew that the King honored them if they
looked after the cultivation of the land, and that the new master
showed cold contempt to those who neither managed their estates nor
filled civil or military positions. Formerly lawsuits had been endless
and expensive, hardly to be carried through without bribery and
sacrifice of money. Now it was observed that the number of lawyers
decreased, so quickly came the decisions. Under the Austrians, to be
sure, the caravan trade with the East had been greater; the people of
the Bukowina and Hungary, and also the Poles, turned elsewhere and
were already looking toward Trieste; but in place of this, new
manufacturing industries arose; wool and textiles, and in the mountain
valleys a flourishing linen industry. Many found the new era
uncomfortable, many were really incommoded by its severity; but few
dared to deny that on the whole things had been greatly improved.

But another thing in the Prussian system was astonishing to the
Silesians, and soon gained a secret power over their minds. This was
the Spartan spirit of devotion on the part of the King's servants,
which appeared so frequently even among the humblest officials; for
instance, the revenue collectors, never popular even before the
introduction of the French system. In this case they were retired
subaltern officers, veteran soldiers of the King, who had won his
battles for him and grown gray in powder smoke. They sat now by the
gates smoking their pipes; with their very small pay they could
indulge in no luxuries; but they were on the spot from early morning
until late at night, doing their duty skilfully, precisely and
quickly, as old soldiers are wont to do. Their minds were always on
their service; it was their honor and their pride. For years to come
old Silesians from the time of the great King used to tell their
grandchildren how the punctuality, strictness, and honesty of the
Prussian officials had astonished them. In every district
headquarters, for instance, there was a tax collector. He lived in his
little office, which was perhaps also his bedroom, and collected in a
great wooden bowl the land taxes, which the village officials brought
into his room monthly on an appointed day. Many thousand thalers were
entered on the lists, and were delivered, to the last penny, to the
great main treasuries. The pay too of such a man was small. He sat and
collected and stowed in purses until his hair became white and his
trembling hands were no longer able to manage the two-groschen pieces.
And it was the pride of his life that the King knew him personally,
and if he ever drove through the place would silently look at him from
his great eyes, while the horses were being changed, or, if he was
very gracious, give him a slight nod. With respect and a certain awe
the people looked upon even these subordinate servants of the new
principle, and the Silesians were not alone in this. Something new had
come into the world in general. It was not a mere figure of speech
when Frederick called himself the foremost servant of his State. As he
had taught his wild nobility on the battlefield that it was the
highest honor to die for the Fatherland, so his untiring, faithful
care forced upon the soul of the least of his servants in the distant
border towns the great idea of the duty of living and working first of
all for the good of his King and his country.

When the province of Prussia was forced, in the Seven Years' War, to
do homage to Empress Elizabeth, and remained for several years
incorporated in the Russian Empire, the officers of the district found
means nevertheless to raise money and grain for their King in secret,
and in spite of a foreign army and government. Great skill was used to
accomplish the transportation. There were many in the secret, but not
a traitor among them. In disguise they stole through the Russian lines
at the risk of their lives, although they knew that they would reap
small thanks from the King, who did not care for his East Prussians at
all. He spoke contemptuously of them, and showed them unwillingly the
favors which he bestowed on the other provinces. His face turned to
stone whenever he learned that one of his young officers was born
between the Memel and the Vistula, and after the war he never trod on
East Prussian soil. But this conduct did not disturb the East
Prussians in their admiration. They clung with faithful love to
their ungracious lord, and his best and most enthusiastic eulogist was
Emanuel Kant.

Life in the King's service was serious, often hard--work and
deprivation without end. It was difficult even for the best to satisfy
the strict master; and the greatest devotion received but curt thanks.
If a man was worn out he was likely to be coldly cast aside. There was
work without end everywhere: something new, something beginning, some
scaffolding of an unfinished structure. To a foreign visitor this life
did not seem at all graceful; it was austere, monotonous, and rude,
with little beauty or carefree cheerfulness. And as the King's
bachelor household, his taciturn servants, and the submissive
intimates under the trees of the quiet garden, gave a foreign guest
the impression of a monastery, so in all Prussian institutions he
found something of the renunciation and the discipline of a great busy
monastic brotherhood.

For something of this spirit had been transmitted even to the people
themselves. Today we honor in this an undying merit of Frederick II.,
for this spirit of abnegation is still the secret of the greatness of
the Prussian State, and the final and best guarantee of its
permanence. The artfully constructed machine which the great King had
set up with so much intelligence and effectiveness was not to last
forever; twenty years after his death it broke down; but in the fact
that the State did not perish with it, that the intelligence and
patriotism of the citizens were able of their own accord to establish
under his successors a new life on a new basis, we see the secret of
Frederick's greatness.

Nine years after the close of the last war which was fought for the
possession of Silesia, Frederick increased his domain by a new
acquisition, not much less in area, but thinly populated--the Polish
districts which have since become German territory under the name of
West Prussia.

If the King's claims to Silesia had been doubtful, all the acumen of
his officials was now needed to make a show of some uncertain right to
portions of the new acquisition. About this the King himself was
little concerned. He had defended before the world with almost
superhuman heroism the occupation of Silesia. This province was united
to Prussia by streams of blood. In the case of West Prussia the craft
of the politician did the work almost alone, and for a long time the
conqueror lacked in public opinion that justification for his action
which, as it seems, is given by the horrors of war and the capricious
fortune of the battlefield. But this last acquisition of the King's,
though wanting in the thunder of guns and the trumpets of victory, was
yet, of all the great gifts which the German people owe to Frederick
II., the greatest and most abounding in fortunate consequences.
Through several hundred years the Germans had been divided and hemmed
in and encroached upon by neighbors greedy for conquest; the great
King was the first conqueror who again pushed the German boundaries
toward the east. A hundred years after his great ancestor had in vain
defended the fortresses of the Rhine against Louis XIV., Frederick
gave the Germans again the explicit admonition that it was their duty
to carry law, education, liberty, culture, and industry into the east
of Europe. His whole territory, with the exception of a few Old Saxon
districts, had been originally German, then Slavic, then again won
from the Slavs by fierce wars or colonization; never since the
migrations of the Middle Ages had the struggle ceased for the broad
plains east of the Oder; never since the conquest of Brandenburg had
this house forgotten that it was the warden of the German border.
Whenever wars ceased the politicians were busy. The Elector Frederick
William had freed Prussia, the territory of the Teutonic Knights, from
feudal allegiance to Poland. Frederick I. had boldly raised this
isolated colony to a kingdom. But the possession of East Prussia was
insecure. It was not the corrupt republic of Poland which threatened
danger, but the rising power of Russia. Frederick had learned to
respect the Russians as enemies; he knew the soaring ambition of
Empress Catherine, and as a prudent prince seized the right moment.
The new territory--Pomerelia, the _voivodeship_ (administrative
province) of Kulm and Marienburg, the bishopric of Ermeland, the city
of Elbing, a portion of Cujavia, a portion of Posen--united East
Prussia with Pomerania and Brandenburg. It had always been a border
land. Since the early times people of different races had crowded into
the coasts of the Baltic: Germans, Slavs, Lithuanians, and Finns. From
the thirteenth century the Germans had made their way into this
Vistula country as founders of cities and agriculturists: Teutonic
Knights, merchants, pious monks, German noblemen and peasants. On both
sides of the Vistula arose the towers and boundary stones of German
colonies--supreme among them the magnificent city of Danzig, the
Venice of the Baltic, the great seaport of the Slavic countries, with
its rich St. Mary's Church and the palaces of its merchant princes;
and beyond it on another arm of the Vistula, its modest rival, Elbing:
farther up, the stately towers and broad avenues of Marienburg; near
it the great princely castle of the Teutonic order, the most beautiful
architectural monument of Northern Germany; and in the Vistula valley,
on a rich alluvial soil, the old prosperous colonial estates: one of
the most productive countries of the world, protected against the
devastations of the Slavic stream by massive dikes dating back to the
days of the Knights. Still farther up were Marienwerder, Graudenz,
Kulm, and in the low lands of the Netze, Bromberg, the centre of the
German border colonies among a Polish population. Smaller German towns
and village communities were scattered through the whole territory,
and the rich Cistercian monasteries of Oliva and Peplin had been
zealous colonizers. But in the fifteenth century the tyrannical
severity of the Teutonic order had driven the German cities and
landowners of West Prussia to an alliance with Poland.

The Reformation of the sixteenth century won the submission not only
of the German colonists but of three-quarters of the nobility in the
great republic of Poland; and toward 1590 about seventy out of a
hundred parishes in the Slavic district of Pomerelia were Protestant.
It seemed for a short time as if a new commonwealth and a new culture
were about to develop in the Slavic East--a great Polish State with
German elements in the cities. But the introduction of the Jesuits
brought an unsalutary change. The Polish nobility returned to the
Catholic Church: in the Jesuit schools their sons were trained to
proselytizing fanaticism, and from that time on the Polish State
declined, conditions becoming worse and worse.

The attitude of the Germans in West Prussia was not uniform toward the
proselytizing Jesuits and Slavic tyranny. A large proportion of the
immigrant German nobles became Catholic and Polish; the townsmen and
peasants remained for the most part obstinately Protestant. So there
was added to the conflict in language conflict in religious creed, and
to race hatred a religious frenzy. In this century of enlightenment
the persecution of Germans in these districts became fanatical. One
church after another was torn down, the wooden ones set on fire, and
after the church was burned the village had lost its right to a
parish: German preachers and school teachers were driven out and
disgracefully maltreated. "_Vexa Lutheranum dabit thalerum_" ("harry a
Lutheran and he will give up a thaler") was the usual motto of the
Poles against the Germans. One of the greatest landowners in the
country, a certain Unruh of the Birnbaum family, the starost of
Gnesen, was sentenced to die, after having his tongue pulled out and
his hands chopped off, because he had copied from German books into a
notebook sarcastic remarks about the Jesuits. There was no more
justice, no more safety. The national party of the Polish nobility, in
alliance with fanatic priests, persecuted most passionately those whom
they hated as Germans and Protestants. All sorts of plunder-loving
rabble collected on the side of the "patriots" or "confederates." They
collected into bands, overran the country in search of plunder, and
fell upon the smaller towns and German villages, not only from
religious zeal, but still more from the greed of booty. The Polish
nobleman Roskowsky wore boots of different colors, a red one to
indicate fire, and a black one for death. Thus he rode, levying
blackmail, from one place to another, and in Jastrow he had the hands,
the feet, and finally the head of the Protestant preacher Willich cut
off and thrown into a swamp. This happened in 1768.

Such was the condition of the country just before the Prussian
occupation. It was a state of things that might perhaps be found now
in Bosnia, but would be unheard of in the most wretched corner of
Christian Europe.

While still only a boy of twelve in the palace in Berlin, Frederick
the Great had been reminded by his father's anger and sorrow that the
kings of Prussia had a duty as protectors toward the German colonies
on the Vistula. For in 1724 a loud call from that quarter for help had
rung through Germany, and the bloody tragedy at Thorn became an
important subject of public interest and of diplomacy. During a
procession which the Jesuits were conducting through the city, some
Polish nobles of the Jesuit college had insulted some citizens and
schoolboys, and the angered populace had broken into the Jesuit school
and college and inflicted damage. This petty street-riot had been
brought up in the Polish parliament, sitting as a trial court, and the
parliament, after a passionate speech by the leader of the Jesuits,
had condemned to death the two burgomasters of the city and sixteen
citizens; whereupon the Jesuit party hastened to put to death the head
burgomaster, Rössner, and nine citizens, in some cases with barbarous
cruelty. The church of St. Mary was taken from the Protestants, the
clergymen driven out, and the school closed. King Frederick William
had tried in vain at the time to help the unfortunate city. He had
prevailed upon all the neighboring powers to send stern notes, and had
felt himself bitterly grieved and humiliated when all his
representations were disregarded; now after fifty years his son came
to put an end to this barbarous disorder, and to unite again with
Prussia this land which before the Polish sovereignty had belonged to
the Teutonic order.

[Illustration: FREDERICK THE GREAT ON A PLEASURE TRIP
_From the Painting by Adolph von Menzel_]

Danzig, to be sure, indispensable to the Poles, maintained itself
through these decades of disorder in aristocratic seclusion. It
remained a free city under Slavic protection, for a long time
suspicious of the great King and not well disposed toward him. Thorn
also had to wait twenty years longer in oppression, separated from the
other German colonies, as a Polish border city. But the energetic
assistance of the King saved the country and most of the German towns
from destruction. The Prussian officials who were sent into the
country were astonished at the desolation of the unheard-of situation
which existed but a few days' journey from their capital. Only certain
larger towns, in which the German life had been protected by strong
walls and the old market traffic, and some sheltered country
districts, inhabited exclusively by Germans (such as the lowlands near
Danzig, the villages under the mild rule of the Cistercians of Oliva,
and the prosperous German places of the Catholic Ermeland), were left
in tolerable condition. Other towns lay in ruins, as did most of the
farmsteads of the open country. The Prussians found Bromberg, a German
colonial city, in ruins; and it is even yet impossible to determine
exactly how the city came into that condition. In fact, the
vicissitudes which the whole Netze district had undergone in the last
nine years before the Prussian occupation are completely unknown. No
historian, no document, no chronicle, gives reports of the destruction
and the slaughter which must have raged there. Evidently the Polish
factions fought between themselves, and crop failures and pestilence
may have done the rest. Kulm had preserved from an earlier time its
well-built walls and stately churches, but in the streets the
foundation walls of the cellars stood out of the decaying wood and
broken tiles of the crumbled buildings. There were whole streets of
nothing but such cellar rooms in which wretched people lived. Of the
forty houses of the main market-place twenty-eight had no doors, no
roofs, no windows, and no owners. Other cities were in a similar
condition.

The majority of the country people also lived in circumstances which
seemed pitiable to the King's officers, especially on the borders of
Pomerania, where the Wendish Cassubians dwelt. Whoever approached a
village there saw gray huts with ragged thatch on a bare plain without
a tree, without a garden--only the wild cherry-trees were indigenous.
The houses were built of poles daubed with clay. The entrance door
opened into a room with a great fireplace and no chimney; heating
stoves were unknown. Seldom was a candle lighted, only pineknots
brightened the darkness of the long winter evenings. The chief article
of the wretched furniture was a crucifix with a holy water basin
below. The filthy and uncouth people lived on rye porridge, often on
herbs which they cooked like cabbage in a soup, on herrings, and on
brandy, to which women as well as men were addicted. Bread was baked
only by the richest. Many had never in their lives tasted such a
delicacy; few villages had an oven. If the people ever kept bees they
sold the honey to the city dwellers, they also trafficked in carved
spoons and stolen bark; in exchange for these they got at the fairs
their coarse blue cloth coats, black fur caps, and bright red
kerchiefs for the women. Looms were rare and spinning-wheels were
unknown. The Prussians heard there no popular songs, no dances, no
music--pleasures which even the most wretched Pole does not give up;
stupid and clumsy, the people drank their wretched brandy, fought, and
fell into the corners. And the country nobility were hardly different
from the peasants; they drove their own primitive plows and clattered
about in wooden shoes on the earthen floors of their cottages. It was
difficult even for the King of Prussia to help these people. Only the
potato spread quickly; but for a long time the fruit-trees which had
been planted by order were destroyed by the people, and all other
attempts at promoting agriculture met with opposition.

Just as poverty-stricken and ruined were the border districts with a
Polish population. But the Polish peasant in all his poverty and
disorder at least kept the greater vivacity of his race. Even on the
estates of the higher nobility, of the starosts, and of the crown, all
the farm buildings were dilapidated and useless. Any one who wished to
send a letter must employ a special messenger, for there was no post
in the country. To be sure, no need was felt of one in the villages,
for most of the nobility knew no more of reading and writing than the
peasants. If any one fell ill, he found no help but the secret
remedies of some old village crone, for there was not an apothecary in
the whole country. If any one needed a coat he could do no better than
take needle in hand himself--for many miles there was no tailor,
unless one of the trade made a trip through the country on the chances
of finding work. If any one wished to build a house he must provide
for artisans from the West as best he could. The country people were
still living in a hopeless struggle with the packs of wolves, and
there were few villages in which every winter men and animals were not
decimated. If the smallpox broke out, or any other contagious disease
came upon the country, the people saw the white image of pestilence
flying through the air and alighting upon their cottages; they knew
what such an apparition meant: it was the desolation of their homes,
the wiping out of whole communities; and with gloomy resignation they
awaited their fate. There was hardly anything like justice in the
country. Only the larger cities maintained powerless courts. The
noblemen and the starosts inflicted their punishments with
unrestrained caprice. They habitually beat and threw into horrible
dungeons not only the peasants but the citizens of the country towns
who were ruled by them or fell into their hands. In the quarrels which
they had with one another, they fought by bribery in the few courts
which had jurisdiction over them. In later years that too had almost
ceased. They sought vengeance with their own resources, by sudden
onslaughts and bloody sword-play.

It was in reality an abandoned country without discipline, without
law, without masters. It was a desert; on about 13,000 square miles
500,000 people lived, less than forty to a square mile. And the
Prussian King treated his acquisition like an uninhabited prairie. He
located boundary stones almost at his pleasure, then moved them some
miles farther again. Up to the present time the tradition remains in
Ermeland, the district around Heilberg and Braunsberg, with twelve
towns and a hundred villages, that two Prussian drummers with twelve
men conquered all Ermeland with four drumsticks. And then the King in
his magnificent manner began to build up the country. He was attracted
by precisely these run-down conditions, and West Prussia henceforth
became, as Silesia had been before, his favorite child, which with
infinite care, like a dutiful mother, he washed and brushed, provided
with new clothes, forced into school and good behavior, and never let
out of his sight. The diplomatic negotiations about the conquest were
still going on when he sent a troop of his best officials into the
wilderness. The territory was subdivided into small districts, in the
shortest possible time the whole land area was appraised and equitably
taxed, each district provided with a provincial magistrate, with a
court, and with post-offices and sanitary police. New parishes were
called into life as if by magic, a company of 187 school teachers was
brought into the country--the worthy Semler had chosen and drilled
part of them--and squads of German artisans were got together, from
the machinist down to the brickmaker. Everywhere was heard the bustle
of digging, hammering, building. The cities were filled with
colonists, street after street rose from the ruins, the estates of the
starosts were changed into crown estates, new villages of colonists
were laid out, new agricultural enterprises ordered. In the first year
after the occupation the great canal was dug, which in a course of a
dozen miles or so unites the Vistula by way of the Netze with the Oder
and the Elbe. A year after the King issued the order for the canal he
saw with his own eyes laden Oder barges 120 feet long enter the
Vistula, bound east. Through the new waterway broad stretches of land
were drained and immediately filled with German colonists. Incessantly
the King urged on, praised, and censured. However great the zeal of
his officials was, it was seldom able to satisfy him. In this way, in
a few years, the wild Slavic weeds which had sprung up here and there
even over the German fields were brought under control, and the Polish
districts, too, got used to the orderliness of the new life; and West
Prussia showed itself, in the wars after 1806, almost as stoutly
Prussian as the old provinces.

While the gray-haired King planned and created, year after year passed
over his thoughtful head. His surroundings became stiller and more
solitary; the circle of men whom he took into his confidence became
smaller. He had laid aside his flute, and the new French literature
appeared to him shallow and tedious. Sometimes it seemed to him as if
a new life were budding under him in Germany, but he was a stranger to
it. He worked untiringly for his army and for the prosperity of his
people; the instruments he used were of less and less importance to
him, while his feeling for the great duties of his crown became ever
loftier and more passionate.

But just as his seven years' struggle in war may be called superhuman,
so now there was in his work something tremendous, which appeared to
his contemporaries sometimes more than earthly and sometimes inhuman.
It was great, but it was also terrible, that for him the prosperity of
the whole was at any moment the highest thing, and the comfort of the
individual so utterly nothing. When he drove out of the service with
bitter censure, in the presence of his men, a colonel whose regiment
had made a vexatious mistake on review; when in the swamp land of the
Netze he counted more the strokes of the 10,000 spades than the
sufferings of the workmen who lay ill with malarial fever in the
hospitals he had erected for them; when he anticipated with his
restless demands the most rapid execution, there was, though united
with the deepest respect and devotion, a feeling of awe among his
people, as before one whose being is moved by some unearthly power. He
appeared to the Prussians as the fate of the State, unaccountable,
inexorable, omniscient, comprehending the greatest as well as the
smallest. And when they told each other that he had also tried to
overcome Nature, and that yet his orange trees had perished in the
last frosts of spring, then they quietly rejoiced that there was a
limit for their King after all, but still more that he had submitted
to it with such good-humor and had taken off his hat to the cold days
of May.

With touching sympathy the people collected all the incidents of the
King's life which showed human feeling, and thus gave an intimate
picture of him. Lonesome as his house and garden were, the imagination
of his Prussians hovered incessantly around the consecrated place. If
any one on a warm moonlight night succeeded in getting into the
vicinity of the palace, he found the doors open, perhaps without a
guard, and he could see the great King sleeping in his room on a camp
bed. The fragrance of the flowers, the song of the night birds, the
quiet moonlight, were the only guards, almost the only courtiers of
the lonely man. Fourteen times the oranges bloomed at Sans Souci after
the acquisition of West Prussia--then Nature asserted her rights over
the great King. He died alone, with but his servants about him.

He had set out in his prime with an ambitious spirit and had wrested
from fate all the great and magnificent prizes of life. A prince of
poets and philosophers, a historian and general, no triumph which he
had won had satisfied him. All earthly glory had become to him
fortuitous, uncertain and worthless, and he had kept only his iron
sense of duty incessantly active. His soul had grown up and out of the
dangerous habit of alternating between warm enthusiasm and sober
keenness of perception. Once he had idealized with poetic caprice some
individuals, and despised the masses that surrounded him. But in the
struggles of his life he lost all selfishness, he lost almost
everything which was personally dear to him; and at last came to set
little value upon the individual, while the need of living for the
whole grew stronger and stronger in him. With the most refined
selfishness he had desired the greatest things for himself, and
unselfishly at last he gave himself for the common good and the
happiness of the humble people. He had entered upon life as an
idealist, and even the most terrible experiences had not destroyed
these ideals but ennobled and purified them. He had sacrificed many
men for his State, but no one so completely as himself.

Such a phenomenon appeared unusual and great to his contemporaries; it
seems still greater to us who can trace even today in the character of
our people, in our political life, and in our art and literature, the
influence of his activities.

       *       *       *       *




THE LIFE OF THEODOR FONTANE

By WILLIAM A. COOPER, A.M.

Associate Professor of German, Leland Stanford Jr. University


Theodor Fontane was by both his parents a descendant of French
Huguenots. His grandfather Fontane, while teaching the princes of
Prussia the art of drawing, won the friendship of Queen Luise, who
later appointed him her private secretary. Our poet's father, Louis
Fontane, served his apprenticeship as an apothecary in Berlin. In 1818
the stately Gascon married Emilie Labry, whose ancestors had come from
the Cevennes, not far from the region whence the Fontanes had
emigrated to Germany. The young couple moved to Neu-Ruppin, where they
bought an apothecary's shop. Here Theodor was born on the thirtieth of
December, 1819.

Louis Fontane was irresponsible and fantastic, full of _bonhomie_, and
an engaging story teller. He possessed a "stupendous" fund of
anecdotes of Napoleon and his marshals, and told them with such charm
that his son acquired an unusual fondness for anecdotes, which he
indulges extensively in some of his writings, particularly the
autobiographical works and books of travel. The problem of making both
ends meet seems to have occupied the father less than the
gratification of his "noble passions," chief among which was card
playing. He gambled away so much money that in eight years he was
forced to sell his business and move to other parts. He purposely
continued the search for a new business as long as possible, but
finally bought an apothecary's shop in Swinemünde.

His young wife was passionate and independent, energetic and
practical, but unselfish. To her husband's democratic tendency she
opposed a strong aristocratic leaning. Their ill fortune in Neu-Ruppin
affected her nerves so seriously that she went to Berlin for treatment
while the family was moving.

In Swinemünde the father put the children in the public school, but
when the aristocratic mother arrived from Berlin she took them out,
and for a time the little ones were taught at home. The unindustrious
father was prevailed upon to divide with the mother the burden of
teaching them and undertook the task with a mild protest, employing
what he humorously designated the "Socratic method." He taught
geography and history together, chiefly by means of anecdotes, with
little regard for accuracy or thoroughness. Though his method was far
from Socratic, it interested young Theodor and left an impression on
him for life. His mother confined her efforts mainly to the
cultivation of a good appearance and gentle manners, for, as one might
perhaps expect of the daughter of a French silk merchant, she valued
outward graces above inward culture, and she avowedly had little
respect for the authority of scholars and books.

After a while an arrangement was made whereby Theodor shared for two
years the private lessons given by a Dr. Lau to the children of a
neighbor, and "whatever backbone his knowledge possessed" he owed to
this instruction. A similar arrangement was made with the private
tutor who succeeded Dr. Lau. He had the children learn the most of
Schiller's ballads by heart. Fontane always remained grateful for
this, probably because it was as a writer of ballads that he first won
recognition. If we look upon the ballad as a poetically heightened
form of anecdote we discover an element of unity in his early
education, and that will help us to understand why the technique of
his novels shows such a marked influence of the ballad.

"How were we children trained?" asks Fontane in _My Childhood Years_.
"Not at all, and excellently," is his answer, referring to the lack of
strict parental discipline in the home and to the quiet influence of
his mother's example.

[Illustration: _Permission Berlin Photo Co, New York_
THEODOR FONTANE    HANNS FECHNER]

Among the notable events of the five years Theodor spent in
Swinemünde, were the liberation of Greece, the war between Russia and
Turkey, the conquest of Algiers, the revolution in France, the
separation of Belgium from Holland, and the Polish insurrection.
Little wonder that the lad watched eagerly for the arrival of the
newspapers and quickly devoured their contents.

In Swinemünde the family again lived beyond their means. The father's
extravagance and his passion for gambling showed no signs of
abatement. The mother was very generous in the giving of presents, for
she said that what money they had would be spent anyhow and it might
as well go for some useful purpose. The city being a popular summer
resort, they had a great many guests from Berlin during the season,
and in the winter they frequently entertained Swinemünde friends.

Theodor left home at the age of twelve to begin his preparation for
life. The first year he spent at the gymnasium in Neu-Ruppin. The
following year (1833) he was sent to an industrial school in Berlin.
There he lived with his uncle August, whose character and financial
management remind one of our poet's father. Theodor was irregular in
his attendance at school and showed more interest in the newspapers
and magazines than in his studies. At the age of sixteen he became the
apprentice of a Berlin apothecary with the expectation of eventually
succeeding his father in business. After serving his apprenticeship he
was employed as assistant dispenser by apothecaries in Berlin, Burg,
Leipzig, and Dresden. When he reached the age of thirty he became a
full-fledged dispenser and was in a position to manage the business of
his father, but the latter had long ago retired and moved to the
village of Letschin. The Fontane home was later broken up by the
mutual agreement of the parents to dissolve their unhappy union. The
father went first to Eberswalde and then to Schiffmühle, where he died
in 1867; the mother returned to Neu-Ruppin and died there in 1869.

The beginning of Theodor's first published story appeared in the
_Berliner Figaro_ a few days before he was twenty years of age. The
same organ had previously contained some of his lyrics and ballads.
The budding poet had belonged to a Lenau Club and the fondness he had
there acquired for Lenau's poetry remained unchanged throughout his
long life, which is more than can be said of many literary products
that won his admiration in youth. He also joined a Platen Club, which
afforded him less literary stimulus, but far more social pleasure.
During his year in Leipzig he brought himself to the notice of
literary circles by the publication, in the _Tageblatt_, of a
satirical poem entitled _Shakespeare's Stocking_. As a result he was
made a member of the Herwegh Club, where he met, among others, the
celebrated Max Müller, who remained his life-long friend. After a year
in Dresden Fontane returned to Leipzig, hoping to be able to support
himself there by his writings. He made the venture too soon. When he
ran short of funds he visited his parents for a while and then went to
Berlin to serve his year in the army (1844). He was granted a furlough
of two weeks for a trip to London at the expense of a friend. In
Berlin he joined a Sunday Club, humorously called the "Tunnel over the
Spree," at the meetings of which original literary productions were
read and frankly criticised. During the middle of the nineteenth
century almost all the poetic lights of Berlin were members of the
"Tunnel." Heyse, Storm, and Dahn were on the roll, and Fontane came
into touch with them; he and Storm remained friends in spite of the
fact that Storm once called him "frivolous." Fontane later evened the
score by classing Storm among the "sacred kiss monopolists." The most
productive members of the Club during this period (1844-54) were
Fontane, Scherenberg, Hesekiel, and Heinrich Smidt. Smidt, sometimes
called the Marryat of Germany, was a prolific spinner of yarns, which
were interesting, though of a low quality. He employed, however, many
of the same motives that Fontane later put to better use. Hesekiel was
a voluminous writer of light fiction. From him Fontane learned to
discard high-sounding phrases and to cultivate the true-to-life tone
of spoken speech. Scherenberg, enthusiastically heralded as the
founder of a new epic style, confined himself largely to poetic
descriptions of battles.

When Fontane joined the "Tunnel" the particular _genre_ of poetry in
vogue at the meetings was the ballad, due to Strachwitz's clever
imitations of Scottish models. Fontane's lyrics were too much like
Herwegh's to win applause, but his ballads were enthusiastically
received. One, in celebration of Derfflinger, established his standing
in the Club, and one in honor of Zieten brought him permanently into
favor with a wider public; these poems were composed in 1846. Two
years later he read two books that for a long time determined his
literary trend--Percy's _Reliques of Ancient English Poetry_ and
Scott's _Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border_. He began to write ballads
on English subjects and one of them, _Archibald Douglas_, created a
great sensation at the "Tunnel" meeting and has ever since maintained
its place among the best German poems. Its popularity is partly due to
the fact that it was so appropriately set to music by Carl Löwe. When
Fontane returned to Berlin in 1852, after a summer's absence in
England, he felt estranged from the "Tunnel" and ceased attending the
meetings. Two noblemen members, von Lepel and von Merckel, who had
become his friends, introduced him to the country nobility of the Mark
of Brandenburg, which enabled him to make valuable additions to his
portfolio of studies later drawn upon for his novels, among others,
_Effi Briest_.

In 1847 Fontane passed the apothecary's examination by a "hair's
breadth" and soon found employment in Berlin. In the March Revolution
(1848) he played a comical rôle, but was subsequently elected a
delegate to the first convention to choose a representative. For a
year and a quarter he taught two deaconesses pharmacy at an
institution called "Bethany." When that employment came to an end he
decided that the hoped-for time had finally arrived to give up the
dispensing of medicines and earn his living by his pen. Some of his
new ballads were accepted by the _Morgenblatt_, and a volume of
verses, dedicated to his fiancée, found a publisher. When news arrived
of the victory of Denmark over Schleswig-Holstein at Idstedt (1850) he
set out for Kiel to enlist in the army. In Altona he received a letter
offering him a position in the press department of the Prussian
Ministry of the Interior. He accepted immediately and at the same time
wrote to Emilie Kummer, to whom he had been engaged for five years,
proposing that they should be married in October. She hastened to
secure an apartment in Berlin and furnish it, and the wedding was
celebrated on the sixteenth of October. Fontane thought he had entered
the harbor of success, but he lost his ministerial position in six
weeks and was again at sea. He had, however, a companion ready to
share his trials and triumphs, and their union proved to be very
happy.

In the summer of 1852 he was sent by the Prussian Ministry to London
to study English conditions and write reports for the government
journals, _Preussische Zeitung_ and _Die Zeit_. In 1855 he was again
sent to England, and this time his journalistic engagement lasted for
four years. Accounts of his experiences are contained in _A Summer in
London_ (1854) and _Beyond the Tweed_ (1860). From 1860 to 1870 he was
on the staff of the _Kreuzzeitung_ and during this time served as a
war correspondent in the campaigns of 1864, 1866, and 1870-71. While
accompanying the army in France he was seized with a desire to visit
the home of Joan of Arc at Domrémy, and was captured, taken for a spy,
and imprisoned for a time on the island of Oléron in the Atlantic
Ocean. An interesting account of his experiences is given in _Prisoner
of War_ (1871). During his years in England he had taken advantage of
the opportunity to visit Scotland and familiarize himself with its
picturesque beauties and its wealth of historical and literary
associations. In the midst of these travels the thought had occurred
to him that his own Mark of Brandenburg had its beauties, too, and its
wealth of associations. On returning to Berlin he began his long
series of journeyings through his native province, making a thorough
study of both country and people, particularly the Junkers, for which
his trained powers of observation, combined with warm patriotism and
true love of historical research, eminently fitted him. His published
records of these travels, _Rambles through the Mark of Brandenburg_
(1862-81) and _Five Castles_ (1889), won for him the title of the
interpreter of the Mark. His right to this distinction was further
established by the novels in which he later employed the fruits of
these studies.

Fontane is equally celebrated as an interpreter of Berlin, where he
lived for over fifty years, being the one prominent German writer to
identify himself with a great city. His two autobiographical works,
_From Twenty to Thirty_ and _C.F. Scherenberg_, tell of his early
experiences in the Prussian capital. From 1870 to 1889 he was dramatic
critic for the _Vossische Zeitung_, for which he reviewed the
performances at the Royal Theatre. In one of his last criticisms he
hailed Hauptmann as a dramatist of promise. In 1876 he was elected
secretary of the Berlin Academy of Arts, but served only a brief time.
In 1891 the Emperor made him a present of three thousand marks for his
services to German literature. In 1894 the University of Berlin
bestowed upon him the honorary title of doctor of philosophy. He died
on the twentieth day of September, 1898.

Fontane's lyric poetry in the narrower sense is not of a high order;
in fact almost none of his writings show the true lyric quality. There
is also a striking lack of the dramatic element in his works, and he
seems to have felt this limitation of his genius, for he studiously
avoided the portrayal of scenes that might prove intensely dramatic.
As a writer of ballads he excelled and ranks among the foremost of
Germany. The British subjects he treated were impressed upon him
during his travels in England and his study of English history. His
German themes were taken largely from Prussian history, particularly
the period of Frederick the Great. His permanent place in the history
of German literature is due, however, not so much to his verse as to
his prose writings. He is best known as a novelist, and in the field
of the modern novel he is one of the most conspicuous figures.

German novels of the older school were usually too long for a single
volume. Fontane's first important work of fiction, _Before the Storm_,
filled four volumes; but he had so much trouble in finding a publisher
for it that he began to write one-volume novels, introducing a
practice which has since become the common tradition. He employed in
them a typical feature of the technique of the ballad, which leaps
from one situation to another, leaving gaps to be filled by the fancy
of the reader. He says himself, in _Before the Storm_: "I have always
observed that the leaping action of the ballad is one of the chief
characteristics and beauties of this branch of poetry. All that is
necessary is that fancy be given the right kind of a stimulus. When
that end is attained, one may boldly assert, the less told the
better."

At the beginning of Fontane's career the Berlin novelists were
disciples of Scott, but the only one to survive was Alexis, who
adapted Scott's method to the Mark of Brandenburg. Fontane imitated
him in _Before the Storm_ (1878), which deals with conditions in the
Mark before the wars of liberation. _Schach von Wuthenow_ (1883), a
sort of prelude to _Before the Storm_, was far superior as a novel and
helped to establish Fontane's supremacy among his contemporaries, for
he had become the leader of the younger generation after the
publication of two stories of crimes, _Grete Minde_ (1880) and
_Ellernklipp_ (1881), and the creation of the modern Berlin novel, in
_L'Adultera_ (1882). _L'Adultera_ unfolds the history of a marriage of
reason between a young wife and a considerably older husband, a
situation which Fontane later treated, with important variations and
ever increasing skill, in _Count Petöfi_ (1884), _Cécile_ (1887), and
_Effi Briest_ (1895). With his inexhaustible fund of observation to
draw upon he could make the action of his novels a minor consideration
and concentrate his rare psychological powers upon realistic
conversations in which characters reveal themselves and incidentally
acquaint us intimately with others. We see and hear what the world
ordinarily sees and hears. A past master in the art of suggestion,
which he acquired in his ballad period, Fontane omits many scenes that
others would elaborate with minute detail, such as love scenes and
passionate crises, and contents himself with bringing vividly before
us his true-to-life figures in their historical and social
environments. As a conservative Prussian he believed in the supremacy
of the law and the punishment of transgression, and his works reflect
this belief.

_Trials and Tribulations_ (1887) and _Stine_ (1890) were the first
German novels absolutely to avoid the introduction of exciting scenes
merely for effect. These histories of mismated couples from different
social strata are recounted with hearty simplicity, deep understanding
of life, and frank recognition of human weakness, but without
condemnation, tears, or pointing a moral. They made Fontane famous.
_Frau Jenny Treibel_ (1892), an exquisitely humorous picture of the
Berlin _bourgeoisie_, and _Effi Briest_ "the most profound miracle of
Fontane's youthful art," added considerably to the fame of the
gray-haired "modern," while _The Poggenpuhls_ (1896) and _Stechlin_
(1898) won him further laurels at a time when most writers would long
ago have been resting on those they had already achieved. If a line
were drawn to represent graphically his productivity from his sixtieth
year on, it would take the form of a gradually rising curve.

His career as a novelist began so late in life that when he once
discovered his particular field he cultivated it with persistent
diligence and would not allow himself to be drawn away by enthusiasts
into other fields. Strength of character was not, however, a new
phenomenon in his life, for as long ago as the days when he was an
active member of the "Tunnel" he had come in close contact with the
Kugler coterie in Berlin, where the so-called Munich school
originated, and yet he did not follow his friends in that eclectic
movement. So when the naturalistic school of writers began to win
enthusiastic support, even though he found himself in the main in
sympathy with their announced creed, he did not join them in practice.
He felt that what the literature of the Fatherland needed was
"originality," and he sought to attain it in his own way, apart from
storm and stress. As his mind matured through accumulated knowledge of
the world, and his heart mellowed through years of experience and
observation, he rose to a point of view above sentiment and prejudice,
where the fogs of passion melt away and the light of kindly wisdom
shines.

[Illustration: FONTANE MONUMENT AT NEU RUPPIN.]

       *       *       *       *       *

_THEODOR FONTANE_

       *       *       *       *       *




EFFI BRIEST (1895)


TRANSLATED AND ABRIDGED BY WILLIAM A. COOPER, A.M.

Associate Professor of German, Leland Stanford Jr. University


CHAPTER I


In front of the old manor house occupied by the von Briest family
since the days of Elector George William, the bright sunshine was
pouring down upon the village road, at the quiet hour of noon. The
wing of the mansion looking toward the garden and park cast its broad
shadow over a white and green checkered tile walk and extended out
over a large round bed, with a sundial in its centre and a border of
Indian shot and rhubarb. Some twenty paces further, and parallel to
the wing of the house, there ran a churchyard wall, entirely covered
with a small-leaved ivy, except at the place where an opening had been
made for a little white iron gate. Behind this arose the shingled
tower of Hohen-Cremmen, whose weather vane glistened in the sunshine,
having only recently been regilded. The front of the house, the wing,
and the churchyard wall formed, so to speak, a horseshoe, inclosing a
small ornamental garden, at the open side of which was seen a pond,
with a small footbridge and a tied-up boat. Close by was a swing, with
its crossboard hanging from two ropes at either end, and its frame
posts beginning to lean to one side. Between the pond and the circular
bed stood a clump of giant plane trees, half hiding the swing.

The terrace in front of the manor house, with its tubbed aloe plants
and a few garden chairs, was an agreeable place to sit on cloudy days,
besides affording a variety of things to attract the attention. But,
on days when the hot sun beat down there, the side of the house toward
the garden was given a decided preference, especially by the mother
and the daughter of the house. On this account they were today sitting
on the tile walk in the shade, with their backs to the open windows,
which were all overgrown with wild grape-vines, and by the side of a
little projecting stairway, whose four stone steps led from the
garden to the ground floor of the wing of the mansion. Both mother and
daughter were busy at work, making an altar cloth out of separate
squares, which they were piecing together. Skeins of woolen yarn of
various colors, and an equal variety of silk thread lay in confusion
upon a large round table, upon which were still standing the luncheon
dessert plates and a majolica dish filled with fine large
gooseberries.

Swiftly and deftly the wool-threaded needles were drawn back and
forth, and the mother seemed never to let her eyes wander from the
work. But the daughter, who bore the Christian name of Effi, laid
aside her needle from time to time and arose from her seat to practice
a course of healthy home gymnastics, with every variety of bending and
stretching. It was apparent that she took particular delight in these
exercises, to which she gave a somewhat comical turn, and whenever she
stood there thus engaged, slowly raising her arms and bringing the
palms of her hands together high above her head, her mother would
occasionally glance up from her needlework, though always but for a
moment and that, too, furtively, because she did not wish to show how
fascinating she considered her own child, although in this feeling of
motherly pride she was fully justified. Effi wore a blue and white
striped linen dress, a sort of smock-frock, which would have shown no
waist line at all but for the bronze-colored leather belt which she
drew up tight. Her neck was bare and a broad sailor collar fell over
her shoulders and back. In everything she did there was a union of
haughtiness and gracefulness, and her laughing brown eyes betrayed
great natural cleverness and abundant enjoyment of life and goodness
of heart. She was called the "little girl," which she had to suffer
only because her beautiful slender mother was a full hand's breadth
taller than she.

Effi had just stood up again to perform her calisthenic exercises when
her mother, who at the moment chanced to be looking up from her
embroidery, called to her: "Effi, you really ought to have been an
equestrienne, I'm thinking. Always on the trapeze, always a daughter
of the air. I almost believe you would like something of the sort."

"Perhaps, mama. But if it were so, whose fault would it be? From whom
do I get it? Why, from no one but you. Or do you think, from papa?
There, it makes you laugh yourself. And then, why do you always dress
me in this rig, this boy's smock? Sometimes I fancy I shall be put
back in short clothes yet. Once I have them on again I shall courtesy
like a girl in her early teens, and when our friends in Rathenow come
over I shall sit in Colonel Goetze's lap and ride a trot horse. Why
not? He is three-fourths an uncle and only one-fourth a suitor. You
are to blame. Why don't I have any party clothes? Why don't you make a
lady of me?"

"Should you like me to?"

"No." With that she ran to her mother, embraced her effusively and
kissed her.

"Not so savagely, Effi, not so passionately. I am always disturbed
when I see you thus."

At this point three young girls stepped into the garden through the
little iron gate in the churchyard wall and started along the gravel
walk toward the round bed and the sundial. They all waved their
umbrellas at Effi and then ran up to Mrs. von Briest and kissed her
hand. She hurriedly asked a few questions and then invited the girls
to stay and visit with them, or at least with Effi, for half an hour.
"Besides, I have something else that I must do and young folks like
best to be left to themselves. Fare ye well." With these words she
went up the stone steps into the house.

Two of the young girls, plump little creatures, whose freckles and
good nature well matched their curly red hair, were daughters of
Precentor Jahnke, who swore by the Hanseatic League, Scandinavia, and
Fritz Reuter, and following the example of his favorite writer and
fellow countryman, had named his twin daughters Bertha and Hertha, in
imitation of Mining and Lining. The third young lady was Hulda
Niemeyer, Pastor Niemeyer's only child. She was more ladylike than the
other two, but, on the other hand, tedious and conceited, a lymphatic
blonde, with slightly protruding dim eyes, which, nevertheless, seemed
always to be seeking something, for which reason the Hussar Klitzing
once said: "Doesn't she look as though she were every moment
expecting the angel Gabriel?" Effi felt that the rather captious
Klitzing was only too right in his criticism, yet she avoided making
any distinction between the three girl friends. Nothing could have
been farther from her mind at this moment. Resting her arms on the
table, she exclaimed: "Oh, this tedious embroidery! Thank heaven, you
are here."

"But we have driven your mama away," said Hulda.

"Oh no. She would have gone anyhow. She is expecting a visitor, an old
friend of her girlhood days. I must tell you a story about him later,
a love story with a real hero and a real heroine, and ending with
resignation. It will make you open your eyes wide with amazement.
Moreover, I saw mama's old friend over in Schwantikow. He is a
district councillor, a fine figure, and very manly."

"Manly? That's a most important consideration," said Hertha.

"Certainly, it's the chief consideration. 'Women womanly, men manly,'
is, you know, one of papa's favorite maxims. And now help me put the
table in order, or there will be another scolding."

It took but a moment to put the things in the basket and, when the
girls sat down again, Hulda said: "Now, Effi, now we are ready, now
for the love story with resignation. Or isn't it so bad?"

"A story with resignation is never bad. But I can't begin till Hertha
has taken some gooseberries; she keeps her eyes glued on them. Please
take as many as you like, we can pick some more afterward. But be sure
to throw the hulls far enough away, or, better still, lay them here on
this newspaper supplement, then we can wrap them up in a bundle and
dispose of everything at once. Mama can't bear to see hulls lying
about everywhere. She always says that some one might slip on them and
break a leg."

"I don't believe it," said Hertha, applying herself closely to the
berries.

"Nor I either," replied Effi, confirming the opinion. "Just think of
it, I fall at least two or three times every day and have never broken
any bones yet. The right kind of leg doesn't break so easily;
certainly mine doesn't, neither does yours, Hertha. What do you think,
Hulda?"

"One ought not to tempt fate. Pride will have a fall."

"Always the governess. You are just a born old maid."

"And yet I still have hopes of finding a husband, perhaps even before
you do."

"For aught I care. Do you think I shall wait for that? The idea!
Furthermore one has already been picked out for me and perhaps I shall
soon have him. Oh, I am not worrying about that. Not long ago little
Ventivegni from over the way said to me: 'Miss Effi, what will you bet
we shall not have a charivari and a wedding here this year yet?'"

"And what did you say to that?"

"Quite possible, I said, quite possible; Hulda is the oldest; she may
be married any day. But he refused to listen to that and said: 'No, I
mean at the home of another young lady who is just as decided a
brunette as Miss Hulda is a blonde.' As he said this he looked at me
quite seriously--But I am wandering and am forgetting the story."

"Yes, you keep dropping it all the while; may be you don't want to
tell it, after all?"

"Oh, I want to, but I have interrupted the story a good many times,
chiefly because it is a little bit strange, indeed, almost romantic."

"Why, you said he was a district councillor."

"Certainly, a district councillor, and his name is Geert von
Innstetten, Baron von Innstetten."

All three laughed.

"Why do you laugh?" said Effi, nettled. "What does this mean?"

"Ah, Effi, we don't mean to offend you, nor the Baron either.
Innstetten did you say? And Geert? Why, there is nobody by that name
about here. And then you know the names of noblemen are often a bit
comical."

"Yes, my dear, they are. But people do not belong to the nobility for
nothing. They can endure such things, and the farther back their
nobility goes, I mean in point of time, the better they are able to
endure them. But you don't know anything about this and you must not
take offense at me for saying so. We shall continue to be good friends
just the same. So it is Geert von Innstetten and he is a Baron. He is
just as old as mama, to the day."

"And how old, pray, is your mama?"

"Thirty-eight."

"A fine age."

"Indeed it is, especially when one still looks as well as mama. I
consider her truly a beautiful woman, don't you, too? And how
accomplished she is in everything, always so sure and at the same time
so ladylike, and never unconventional, like papa. If I were a young
lieutenant I should fall in love with mama."

"Oh, Effi, how can you ever say such a thing?" said Hulda. "Why, that
is contrary to the fourth commandment."

"Nonsense. How can it be? I think it would please mama if she knew I
said such a thing."

"That may be," interrupted Hertha. "But are you ever going to tell the
story?"

"Yes, compose yourself and I'll begin. We were speaking of Baron von
Innstetten. Before he had reached the age of twenty he was living over
in Rathenow, but spent much of his time on the seignioral estates of
this region, and liked best of all to visit in Schwantikow, at my
grandfather Belling's. Of course, it was not on account of my
grandfather that he was so often there, and when mama tells about it
one can easily see on whose account it really was. I think it was
mutual, too."

"And what came of it?"

"The thing that was bound to come and always does come. He was still
much too young and when my papa appeared on the scene, who had already
attained the title of baronial councillor and the proprietorship of
Hohen-Cremmen, there was no need of further time for consideration.
She accepted him and became Mrs. von Briest."

"What did Innstetten do?" said Bertha, "what became of him? He didn't
commit suicide, otherwise you could not be expecting him today."

"No, he didn't commit suicide, but it was something of that nature."

"Did he make an unsuccessful attempt?"

"No, not that. But he didn't care to remain here in the neighborhood
any longer, and he must have lost all taste for the soldier's career,
generally speaking. Besides, it was an era of peace, you know. In
short, he asked for his discharge and took up the study of the law, as
papa would say, with a 'true beer zeal.' But when the war of seventy
broke out he returned to the army, with the Perleberg troops, instead
of his old regiment, and he now wears the cross. Naturally, for he is
a smart fellow. Right after the war he returned to his documents, and
it is said that Bismarck thinks very highly of him, and so does the
Emperor. Thus it came about that he was made district councillor in
the district of Kessin."

"What is Kessin? I don't know of any Kessin here."

"No, it is not situated here in our region; it is a long distance away
from here, in Pomerania, in Farther Pomerania, in fact, which
signifies nothing, however, for it is a watering place (every place
about there is a summer resort), and the vacation journey that Baron
Innstetten is now enjoying is in reality a tour of his cousins, or
something of the sort. He wishes to visit his old friends and
relatives here."

"Has he relatives here?"

"Yes and no, depending on how you look at it. There are no
Innstettens here, there are none anywhere any more, I believe. But he
has here distant cousins on his mother's side, and he doubtless wished
above all to see Schwantikow once more and the Belling house, to which
he was attached by so many memories. So he was over there the day
before yesterday and today he plans to be here in Hohen-Cremmen."

"And what does your father say about it?"

"Nothing at all. It is not his way. Besides, he knows mama, you see.
He only teases her."

At this moment the clock struck twelve and before it had ceased
striking, Wilke, the old factotum of the Briest family, came on the
scene to give a message to Miss Effi: "Your Ladyship's mother sends
the request that your Ladyship make her toilet in good season; the
Baron will presumably drive up immediately after one o'clock." While
Wilke was still delivering this message he began to put the ladies'
work-table in order and reached first for the sheet of newspaper, on
which the gooseberry hulls lay.

"No, Wilke, don't bother with that. It is our affair to dispose of the
hulls--Hertha, you must now wrap up the bundle and put a stone in it,
so that it will sink better. Then we will march out in a long funeral
procession and bury the bundle at sea."

Wilke smiled with satisfaction. "Oh, Miss Effi, she's a trump," was
about what he was thinking. But Effi laid the paper bundle in the
centre of the quickly gathered up tablecloth and said: "Now let all
four of us take hold, each by a corner, and sing something sorrowful."

"Yes, Effi, that is easy enough to say, but what, pray, shall we
sing?"

"Just anything. It is quite immaterial, only it must have a rime in
'oo;' 'oo' is always a sad vowel. Let us sing, say:


  'Flood, flood,
  Make it all good.'"


While Effi was solemnly intoning this litany, all four marched out
upon the landing pier, stepped into the boat tied there, and from the
further end of it slowly lowered into the pond the pebble-weighted
paper bundle.

"Hertha, now your guilt is sunk out of sight," said Effi, "in which
connection it occurs to me, by the way, that in former times poor
unfortunate women are said to have been thrown overboard thus from a
boat, of course for unfaithfulness."

"But not here, certainly."

"No, not here," laughed Effi, "such things do not take place here. But
they do in Constantinople and it just occurs to me that you must know
about it, for you were present in the geography class when the teacher
told about it."

"Yes," said Hulda, "he was always telling us about such things. But
one naturally forgets them in the course of time."

"Not I, I remember things like that."




CHAPTER II


The conversation ran on thus for some time, the girls recalling with
mingled disgust and delight the school lessons they had had in common,
and a great many of the teacher's uncalled-for remarks. Suddenly
Hulda said: "But you must make haste, Effi; why, you look--why, what
shall I say--why, you look as though you had just come from a cherry
picking, all rumpled and crumpled. Linen always gets so badly creased,
and that large white turned down collar--oh, yes, I have it now; you
look like a cabin boy."

"Midshipman, if you please. I must derive some advantage from my
nobility. But midshipman or cabin boy, only recently papa again
promised me a mast, here close by the swing, with yards and a rope
ladder. Most assuredly I should like one and I should not allow
anybody to interfere with my fastening the pennant at the top. And
you, Hulda, would climb up then on the other side and high in the air
we would shout: 'Hurrah!' and give each other a kiss. By Jingo, that
would be a sweet one."

"'By Jingo.' Now just listen to that. You really talk like a
midshipman. However, I shall take care not to climb up after you, I am
not such a dare-devil. Jahnke is quite right when he says, as he
always does, that you have too much Billing in you, from your mother.
I am only a preacher's daughter."

"Ah, go along. Still waters run deep--But come, let us swing, two on a
side; I don't believe it will break. Or if you don't care to, for you
are drawing long faces again, then we will play hide-and-seek. I still
have a quarter of an hour. I don't want to go in, yet, and anyhow it
is merely to say: 'How do you do?' to a district councillor, and a
district councillor from Further Pomerania to boot. He is elderly,
too. Why he might almost be my father; and if he actually lives in a
seaport, for, you know, that is what Kessin is said to be, I really
ought to make the best impression upon him in this sailor costume, and
he ought almost to consider it a delicate attention. When princes
receive anybody, I know from what papa has told me, they always put on
the uniform of the country of their guest. So don't worry--Quick,
quick, I am going to hide and here by the bench is the base."

Hulda was about to fix a few boundaries, but Effi had already run up
the first gravel walk, turning to the left, then to the right, and
suddenly vanishing from sight. "Effi, that does not count; where are
you? We are not playing run away; we are playing hide-and-seek." With
these and similar reproaches the girls ran to search for her, far
beyond the circular bed and the two plane trees standing by the side
of the path. She first let them get much farther than she was from the
base and then, rushing suddenly from her hiding place, reached the
bench, without any special exertion, before there was time to say:
"one, two, three."

"Where were you?"

"Behind the rhubarb plants; they have such large leaves, larger even
than a fig leaf."

"Shame on you."

"No, shame on you, because you didn't catch me. Hulda, with her big
eyes, again failed to see anything. She is always slow." Hereupon Effi
again flew away across the circle toward the pond, probably because
she planned to hide at first behind a dense-growing hazelnut hedge
over there, and then from that point to take a long roundabout way
past the churchyard and the front house and thence back to the wing
and the base. Everything was well calculated, but before she was half
way round the pond she heard some one at the house calling her name
and, as she turned around, saw her mother waving a handkerchief from
the stone steps. In a moment Effi was standing by her.

"Now you see that I knew what I was talking about. You still have that
smock-frock on and the caller has arrived. You are never on time."

"I shall be on time, easily, but the caller has not kept his
appointment. It is not yet one o'clock, not by a good deal," she said,
and turning to the twins, who had been lagging behind, called to them:
"Just go on playing; I shall be back right away."

The next moment Effi and her mama entered the spacious drawing-room,
which occupied almost the whole ground floor of the side wing.

"Mama, you daren't scold me. It is really only half past. Why does he
come so early? Cavaliers never arrive too late, much less too early."

Mrs. von Briest was evidently embarrassed. But Effi cuddled up to her
fondly and said: "Forgive me, I will hurry now. You know I can be
quick, too, and in five minutes Cinderella will be transformed into a
princess. Meanwhile he can wait or chat with papa."

Bowing to her mother, she was about to trip lightly up the little iron
stairway leading from the drawing-room to the story above. But Mrs.
von Briest, who could be unconventional on occasion, if she took a
notion to, suddenly held Effi back, cast a glance at the charming
young creature, still all in a heat from the excitement of the game, a
perfect picture of youthful freshness, and said in an almost
confidential tone: "After all, the best thing for you to do is to
remain as you are. Yes, don't change. You look very well indeed. And
even if you didn't, you look so unprepared, you show absolutely no
signs of being dressed for the occasion, and that is the most
important consideration at this moment. For I must tell you, my sweet
Effi--" and she clasped her daughter's hands--"for I must tell you--"

"Why, mama, what in the world is the matter with you? You frighten me
terribly."

"I must tell you, Effi, that Baron Innstetten has just asked me for
your hand."

"Asked for my hand? In earnest?"

"That is not a matter to make a jest of. You saw him the day before
yesterday and I think you liked him. To be sure, he is older than you,
which, all things considered, is a fortunate circumstance. Besides, he
is a man of character, position, and good breeding, and if you do not
say 'no,' which I could hardly expect of my shrewd Effi, you will be
standing at the age of twenty where others stand at forty. You will
surpass your mama by far."

Effi remained silent, seeking a suitable answer. Before she could find
one she heard her father's voice in the adjoining room. The next
moment Councillor von Briest, a well preserved man in the fifties, and
of pronounced _bonhomie_, entered the drawing-room, and with him Baron
Innstetten, a man of slender figure, dark complexion, and military
bearing.

When Effi caught sight of him she fell into a nervous tremble, but
only for an instant, as almost at the very moment when he was
approaching her with a friendly bow there appeared at one of the wide
open vine-covered windows the sandy heads of the Jahnke twins, and
Hertha, the more hoidenish, called into the room: "Come, Effi." Then
she ducked from sight and the two sprang from the back of the bench,
upon which they had been standing, down into the garden and nothing
more was heard from them except their giggling and laughing.




CHAPTER III


Later in the day Baron Innstetten was betrothed to Effi von Briest. At
the dinner which followed, her jovial father found it no easy matter
to adjust himself to the solemn rôle that had fallen to him. He
proposed a toast to the health of the young couple, which was not
without its touching effect upon Mrs. von Briest, for she obviously
recalled the experiences of scarcely eighteen years ago. However, the
feeling did not last long. What it had been impossible for her to be,
her daughter now was, in her stead. All things considered, it was just
as well, perhaps even better. For one could live with von Briest, in
spite of the fact that he was a bit prosaic and now and then showed a
slight streak of frivolity. Toward the end of the meal--the ice was
being served--the elderly baronial councillor once more arose to his
feet to propose in a second speech that from now on they should all
address each other by the familiar pronoun "Du." Thereupon he embraced
Innstetten and gave him a kiss on the left cheek. But this was not the
end of the matter for him. On the contrary, he went on to recommend,
in addition to the "Du," a set of more intimate names and titles for
use in the home, seeking to establish a sort of basis for hearty
intercourse, at the same time preserving certain well-earned, and
hence justified, distinctions. For his wife he suggested, as the best
solution of the problem, the continuation of "Mama," for there are
young mamas, as well as old; whereas for himself, he was willing to
forego the honorable title of "Papa," and could not help feeling a
decided preference for the simple name of Briest, if for no other
reason, because it was so beautifully short. "And then as for the
children," he said--at which word he had to give himself a jerk as he
exchanged gazes with Innstetten, who was only about a dozen years his
junior--"well, let Effi just remain Effi, and Geert, Geert. Geert, if
I am not mistaken, signifies a tall and slender trunk, and so Effi may
be the ivy destined to twine about it." At these words the betrothed
couple looked at each other somewhat embarrassed, Effi's face showing
at the same time an expression of childlike mirth, but Mrs. von Briest
said: "Say what you like, Briest, and formulate your toasts to suit
your own taste, but if you will allow me one request, avoid poetic
imagery; it is beyond your sphere." These silencing words were
received by von Briest with more assent than dissent. "It is possible
that you are right, Luise."

Immediately after rising from the table, Effi took leave to pay a
visit over at the pastor's. On the way she said to herself: "I think
Hulda will be vexed. I have got ahead of her after all. She always was
too vain and conceited."

But Effi was not quite right in all that she expected. Hulda behaved
very well, preserving her composure absolutely and leaving the
indication of anger and vexation to her mother, the pastor's wife,
who, indeed, made some very strange remarks. "Yes, yes, that's the
way it goes. Of course. Since it couldn't be the mother, it has to be
the daughter. That's nothing new. Old families always hold together,
and where there is a beginning there will be an increase." The elder
Niemeyer, painfully embarrassed by these and similar pointed remarks,
which showed a lack of culture and refinement, lamented once more the
fact that he had married a mere housekeeper.

[Illustration: _Permission F. Bruckmann A.-G. Munich_
A SUNDAY IN THE GARDEN OF THE TUILERIES   ADOLPH VON MENZEL.]

After visiting the pastor's family Effi naturally went next to the
home of the precentor Jahnke. The twins had been watching for her and
received her in the front yard.

"Well, Effi," said Hertha, as all three walked up and down between the
two rows of amaranths, "well, Effi, how do you really feel?"

"How do I feel? O, quite well. We already say 'Du' to each other and
call each other by our first names. His name is Geert, but it just
occurs to me that I have already told you that."

"Yes, you have. But in spite of myself I feel so uneasy about it. Is
he really the right man?"

"Certainly he is the right man. You don't know anything about such
matters, Hertha. Any man is the right one. Of course he must be a
nobleman, have a position, and be handsome."

"Goodness, Effi, how you do talk! You used to talk quite differently."

"Yes, I used to."

"And are you quite happy already?"

"When one has been two hours betrothed, one is always quite happy. At
least, that is my idea about it."

"And don't you feel at all--oh, what shall I say?--a bit awkward?"

"Yes, I do feel a bit awkward, but not very. And I fancy I shall get
over it."

After these visits at the parsonage and the home of the precentor,
which together had not consumed half an hour, Effi returned to the
garden veranda, where coffee was about to be served. Father-in-law and
son-in-law were walking up and down along the gravel path by the plane
trees. Von Briest was talking about the difficulties of a district
councillor's position, saying that he had been offered one at various
times, but had always declined. "The ability to have my own way in all
matters has always been the thing that was most to my liking, at least
more--I beg your pardon, Innstetten--than always having to look up to
some one else. For in the latter case one is always obliged to bear in
mind and pay heed to exalted and most exalted superiors. That is no
life for me. Here I live along in such liberty and rejoice at every
green leaf and the wild grape-vine that grows over those windows
yonder."

He spoke further in this vein, indulging in all sorts of
anti-bureaucratic remarks, and excusing himself from time to time with
a blunt "I beg your pardon, Innstetten," which he interjected in a
variety of ways. The Baron mechanically nodded assent, but in reality
paid little attention to what was said. He turned his gaze again and
again, as though spellbound, to the wild grape-vine twining about the
window, of which Briest had just spoken, and as his thoughts were thus
engaged, it seemed to him as though he saw again the girls' sandy
heads among the vines and heard the saucy call, "Come, Effi."

He did not believe in omens and the like; on the contrary, he was far
from entertaining superstitious ideas. Nevertheless he could not rid
his mind of the two words, and while Briest's peroration rambled on
and on he had the constant feeling that the little incident was
something more than mere chance.

Innstetten, who had taken only a short vacation, departed the
following morning, after promising to write every day. "Yes, you must
do that," Effi had said, and these words came from her heart. She had
for years known nothing more delightful than, for example, to receive
a large number of birthday letters. Everybody had to write her a
letter for that day. Such expressions as "Gertrude and Clara join me
in sending you heartiest congratulations," were tabooed. Gertrude and
Clara, if they wished to be considered friends, had to see to it that
they sent individual letters with separate postage stamps, and, if
possible, foreign ones, from Switzerland or Carlsbad, for her birthday
came in the traveling season.

Innstetten actually wrote every day, as he had promised. The thing
that made the receipt of his letters particularly pleasurable was the
circumstance that he expected in return only one very short letter
every week. This he received regularly and it was always full of
charming trifles, which never failed to delight him. Mrs. von Briest
undertook to carry on the correspondence with her future son-in-law
whenever there was any serious matter to be discussed, as, for
example, the settling of the details of the wedding, and questions of
the dowry and the furnishing of the new home. Innstetten was now
nearly three years in office, and his house in Kessin, while not
splendidly furnished, was nevertheless very well suited to his
station, and it seemed advisable to gain from correspondence with him
some idea of what he already had, in order not to buy anything
superfluous. When Mrs. von Briest was finally well enough informed
concerning all these details it was decided that the mother and
daughter should go to Berlin, in order, as Briest expressed himself,
to buy up the trousseau for Princess Effi.

Effi looked forward to the sojourn in Berlin with great pleasure, the
more so because her father had consented that they should take
lodgings in the Hotel du Nord. "Whatever it costs can be deducted from
the dowry, you know, for Innstetten already has everything." Mrs. von
Briest forbade such "mesquineries" in the future, once for all, but
Effi, on the other hand, joyously assented to her father's plan,
without so much as stopping to think whether he had meant it as a jest
or in earnest, for her thoughts were occupied far, far more with the
impression she and her mother should make by their appearance at the
table d'hôte, than with Spinn and Mencke, Goschenhofer, and other such
firms, whose names had been provisionally entered in her memorandum
book. And her demeanor was entirely in keeping with these frivolous
fancies, when the great Berlin week had actually come.

Cousin von Briest of the Alexander regiment, an uncommonly jolly young
lieutenant, who took the _Fliegende Blatter_ and kept a record of the
best jokes, placed himself at the disposal of the ladies for every
hour he should be off duty, and so they would sit with him at the
corner window of Kranzler's, or perhaps in the Café Bauer, when
permissible, or would drive out in the afternoon to the Zoological
Garden, to see the giraffes, of which Cousin von Briest, whose name,
by the way, was Dagobert, was fond of saying: "They look like old
maids of noble birth." Every day passed according to program, and on
the third or fourth day they went, as directed, to the National
Gallery, because Dagobert wished to show his cousin the "Isle of the
Blessed." "To be sure, Cousin Effi is on the point of marrying, and
yet it may perhaps be well to have made the acquaintance of the 'Isle
of the Blessed' beforehand." His aunt gave him a slap with her fan,
but accompanied the blow with such a gracious look that he saw no
occasion to change the tone.

These were heavenly days for all three, no less for Cousin Dagobert
than for the ladies, for he was a past master in the art of escorting
and always knew how quickly to compromise little differences. Of the
differences of opinion to be expected between mother and daughter
there was never any lack during the whole time, but fortunately they
never came out in connection with the purchases to be made. Whether
they bought a half dozen or three dozen of a particular thing, Effi
was uniformly satisfied, and when they talked, on the way home, about
the prices of the articles bought, she regularly confounded the
figures. Mrs. von Briest, ordinarily so critical, even toward her own
beloved child, not only took this apparent lack of interest lightly,
she even recognized in it an advantage. "All these things," said she
to herself, "do not mean much to Effi. Effi is unpretentious; she
lives in her own ideas and dreams, and when one of the Hohenzollern
princesses drives by and bows a friendly greeting from her carriage
that means more to Effi than a whole chest full of linen."

That was all correct enough, and yet only half the truth. Effi cared
but little for the possession of more or less commonplace things, but
when she walked up and down Unter den Linden with her mother, and,
after inspecting the most beautiful show-windows, went into Demuth's
to buy a number of things for the honeymoon tour of Italy, her true,
character showed itself. Only the most elegant articles found favor in
her sight, and, if she could not have the best, she forewent the
second-best, because this second meant nothing to her. Beyond
question, she was able to forego,--in that her mother was right,--and
in this ability to forego there was a certain amount of
unpretentiousness. But when, by way of exception, it became a question
of really possessing a thing, it always had to be something out of the
ordinary. In this regard she was pretentious.




CHAPTER IV


Cousin Dagobert was at the station when the ladies took the train for
Hohen-Cremmen. The Berlin sojourn had been a succession of happy days,
chiefly because there had been no suffering from disagreeable and, one
might almost say, inferior relatives. Immediately after their arrival
Effi had said: "This time we must remain incognito, so far as Aunt
Therese is concerned. It will not do for her to come to see us here in
the hotel. Either Hotel du Nord or Aunt Therese; the two would not go
together at all." The mother had finally agreed to this, had, in fact,
sealed the agreement with a kiss on her daughter's forehead.

With Cousin Dagobert, of course, it was an entirely different matter.
Not only did he have the social grace of the Guards, but also, what is
more, the peculiarly good humor now almost a tradition with the
officers of the Alexander regiment, and this enabled him from the
outset to draw out both the mother and the daughter and keep them in
good spirits to the end of their stay. "Dagobert," said Effi at the
moment of parting, "remember that you are to come to my nuptial-eve
celebration; that you are to bring a cortège goes without saying. But
don't you bring any porter or mousetrap seller. For after the
theatrical performances there will be a ball, and you must take into
consideration that my first grand ball will probably be also my last.
Fewer than six companions--superb dancers, that goes without
saying--will not be approved. And you can return by the early morning
train." Her cousin promised everything she asked and so they bade each
other farewell.

Toward noon the two women arrived at their Havelland station in the
middle of the marsh and after a drive of half an hour were at
Hohen-Cremmen. Von Briest was very happy to have his wife and daughter
at home again, and asked questions upon questions, but in most cases
did not wait for the answers. Instead of that he launched out into a
long account of what he had experienced in the meantime. "A while ago
you were telling me about the National Gallery and the 'Isle of the
Blessed.' Well, while you were away, there was something going on
here, too. It was our overseer Pink and the gardener's wife. Of
course, I had to dismiss Pink, but it went against the grain to do it.
It is very unfortunate that such affairs almost always occur in the
harvest season. And Pink was otherwise an uncommonly efficient man,
though here, I regret to say, in the wrong place. But enough of that;
Wilke is showing signs of restlessness too."

At dinner von Briest listened better. The friendly intercourse with
Cousin Dagobert, of whom he heard a good deal, met with his approval,
less so the conduct toward Aunt Therese. But one could see plainly
that, at the same time that he was declaring his disapproval, he was
rejoicing; for a little mischievous trick just suited his taste, and
Aunt Therese was unquestionably a ridiculous figure. He raised his
glass and invited his wife and daughter to join him in a toast. After
dinner, when some of the handsomest purchases were unpacked and laid
before him for his judgment, he betrayed a great deal of interest,
which still remained alive, or, at least did not die out entirely,
even after he had glanced over the bills. "A little bit dear, or let
us say, rather, very dear; however, it makes no difference. Everything
has so much style about it, I might almost say, so much inspiration,
that I feel in my bones, if you give me a trunk like that and a
traveling rug like this for Christmas, I shall be ready to take our
wedding journey after a delay of eighteen years, and we, too, shall be
in Rome for Easter. What do you think, Luise? Shall we make up what we
are behind? Better late than never."

Mrs. von Briest made a motion with her hand, as if to say:
"Incorrigible," and then left him to his own humiliation, which,
however, was not very deep.

       *       *       *       *       *

The end of August had come, the wedding day (October the 3d) was
drawing nearer, and in the manor house, as well as at the parsonage
and the schoolhouse, all hands were incessantly occupied with the
preparations for the pre-nuptial eve. Jahnke, faithful to his passion
for Fritz Reuter, had fancied it would be particularly "ingenious" to
have Bertha and Hertha appear as Lining and Mining, speaking Low
German, of course, whereas Hulda was to present the elder-tree scene
of _Käthchen von Heilbronn_, with Lieutenant Engelbrecht of the
Hussars as Wetter vom Strahl. Niemeyer, who by rights was the father
of the idea, had felt no hesitation to compose additional lines
containing a modest application to Innstetten and Effi. He himself was
satisfied with his effort and at the end of the first rehearsal heard
only very favorable criticisms of it, with one exception, to be sure,
viz., that of his patron lord, and old friend, Briest, who, when he
had heard the admixture of Kleist and Niemeyer, protested vigorously,
though not on literary grounds. "High Lord, and over and over, High
Lord--what does that mean? That is misleading and it distorts the
whole situation. Innstetten is unquestionably a fine specimen of the
race, a man of character and energy, but, when it comes to that, the
Briests are not of base parentage either. We are indisputably a
historic family--let me add: 'Thank God'--and the Innstettens are not.
The Innstettens are merely old, belong to the oldest nobility, if you
like; but what does oldest nobility mean? I will not permit that a von
Briest, or even a figure in the wedding-eve performance, whom
everybody must recognize as the counterpart of our Effi--I will not
permit, I say, that a Briest either in person or through a
representative speak incessantly of 'High Lord.' Certainly not, unless
Innstetten were at least a disguised Hohenzollern; there are some, you
know. But he is not one and hence I can only repeat that it distorts
the whole situation."

For a long time von Briest really held fast to this view with
remarkable tenacity. But after the second rehearsal, at which Käthchen
was half in costume, wearing a tight-fitting velvet bodice, he was so
carried away as to remark: "Käthchen lies there beautifully," which
turn was pretty much the equivalent of a surrender, or at least
prepared the way for one. That all these things were kept secret from
Effi goes without saying. With more curiosity on her part, however, it
would have been wholly impossible. But she had so little desire to
find out about the preparations made and the surprises planned that
she declared to her mother with all emphasis: "I can wait and see,"
and, when Mrs. von Briest still doubted her, Effi closed the
conversation with repeated assurances that it was really true and her
mother might just as well believe it. And why not? It was all just a
theatrical performance, and prettier and more poetical than
_Cinderella_, which she had seen on the last evening in Berlin--no, on
second thought, it couldn't be prettier and more poetical. In this
play she herself would have been glad to take a part, even if only for
the purpose of making a chalk mark on the back of the ridiculous
boarding-school teacher. "And how charming in the last act is
'Cinderella's awakening as a princess,' or at least as a countess!
Really, it was just like a fairy tale." She often spoke in this way,
was for the most part more exuberant than before, and was vexed only
at the constant whisperings and mysterious conduct of her girl
friends. "I wish they felt less important and paid more attention to
me. When the time comes they will only forget their lines and I shall
have to be in suspense on their account and be ashamed that they are
my friends."

Thus ran Effi's scoffing remarks and there was no mistaking the fact
that she was not troubling herself any too much about the pre-nuptial
exercises and the wedding day. Mrs. von Briest had her own ideas on
the subject, but did not permit herself to worry about it, as Effi's
mind was, to a considerable extent, occupied with the future, which
after all was a good sign. Furthermore Effi, by virtue of her wealth
of imagination, often launched out into descriptions of her future
life in Kessin for a quarter of an hour at a time,--descriptions
which, incidentally, and much to the amusement of her mother, revealed
a remarkable conception of Further Pomerania, or, perhaps it would be
more correct to say, they embodied this conception, with clever
calculation and definite purpose. For Effi delighted to think of
Kessin as a half-Siberian locality, where the ice and snow never fully
melted.

"Today Goschenhofer has sent the last thing," said Mrs. von Briest,
sitting, as was her custom, out in front of the wing of the mansion
with Effi at the work-table, upon which the supplies of linen and
underclothing kept increasing, whereas the newspapers, which merely
took up space, were constantly decreasing. "I hope you have everything
now, Effi. But if you still cherish little wishes you must speak them
out, if possible, this very hour. Papa has sold the rape crop at a
good price and is in an unusually good humor."

"Unusually? He is always in a good humor."

"In an unusually good humor," repeated the mother. "And it must be
taken advantage of. So speak. Several times during our stay in Berlin
I had the feeling that you had a very special desire for something or
other more."

"Well, dear mama, what can I say? As a matter of fact I have
everything that one needs, I mean that one needs _here_. But as it is
once for all decided that I am to go so far north--let me say in
passing that I have no objections; on the contrary I look forward with
pleasure to it, to the northern lights and the brighter splendor of
the stars--as this has been definitely decided, I should like to have
a set of furs."

"Why, Effi, child, that is empty folly. You are not going to St.
Petersburg or Archangel."

"No, but I am a part of the way."

"Certainly, child, you are a part of the way; but what does that mean?
If you go from here to Nauen you are, by the same train of reasoning,
a part of the way to Russia. However, if you want some furs you shall
have them. But let me tell you beforehand, I advise you not to buy
them. Furs are proper for elderly people; even your old mother is
still too young for them, and if you, in your seventeenth year, come
out in mink or marten the people of Kessin will consider it a
masquerade."

It was on the second of September that these words were spoken, and
the conversation would doubtless have been continued, if it had not
happened to be the anniversary of the battle of Sedan. But because of
the day they were interrupted by the sound of drum and fife, and Effi,
who had heard before of the proposed parade, but had meanwhile
forgotten about it, rushed suddenly away from the work-table, past the
circular plot and the pond, in the direction of a balcony built on the
churchyard wall, to which one could climb by six steps not much
broader than the rungs of a ladder. In an instant she was at the top
and, surely enough, there came all the school children marching along,
Jahnke strutting majestically beside the right flank, while a little
drum major marched at the head of the procession, several paces in
advance, with an expression on his countenance as though it were
incumbent upon him to fight the battle of Sedan all over again. Effi
waved her handkerchief and he promptly returned the greeting by a
salute with his shining baton.

A week later mother and daughter were again sitting in the same
place, busy, as before, with their work. It was an exceptionally
beautiful day; the heliotrope growing in a neat bed around the sundial
was still in bloom, and the soft breeze that was stirring bore its
fragrance over to them.

"Oh, how well I feel," said Effi, "so well and so happy! I can't think
of heaven as more beautiful. And, after all, who knows whether they
have such wonderful heliotrope in heaven?"

"Why, Effi, you must not talk like that. You get that from your
father, to whom nothing is sacred. Not long ago he even said:
'Niemeyer looks like Lot.' Unheard of. And what in the world can he
mean by it? In the first place he doesn't know how Lot looked, and
secondly it shows an absolute lack of consideration for Hulda.
Luckily, Niemeyer has only the one daughter, and for this reason the
comparison really falls to the ground. In one regard, to be sure, he
was only too right, viz., in each and every thing that he said about
'Lot's wife,' our good pastor's better half, who again this year, as
was to be expected, simply ruined our Sedan celebration by her folly
and presumption. By the by it just occurs to me that we were
interrupted in our conversation when Jahnke came by with the school.
At least I cannot imagine that the furs, of which you were speaking at
that time, should have been your only wish. So let me know, darling,
what further things you have set your heart upon."

"None, mama."

"Truly, none?"

"No, none, truly; perfectly in earnest. But, on second thought, if
there were anything--"

"Well?"

"It would be a Japanese bed screen, black, with gold birds on it, all
with long crane bills. And then perhaps, besides, a hanging lamp for
our bedroom, with a red shade."

Mrs. von Briest remained silent.

"Now you see, mama, you are silent and look as though I had said
something especially improper."

"No, Effi, nothing improper. Certainly not in the presence of your
mother, for I know you so well. You are a fantastic little person,
you like nothing better than to paint fanciful pictures of the future,
and the richer their coloring the more beautiful and desirable they
appear to you. I saw that when we were buying the traveling articles.
And now you fancy it would be altogether adorable to have a bed screen
with a variety of fabulous beasts on it, all in the dim light of a red
hanging lamp. It appeals to you as a fairy tale and you would like to
be a princess."

Effi took her mother's hand and kissed it. "Yes, mama, that is my
nature."

"Yes, that is your nature. I know it only too well. But, my dear Effi,
we must be circumspect in life, and we women especially. Now when you
go to Kessin, a small place, where hardly a streetlamp is lit at
night, the people will laugh at such things. And if they would only
stop with laughing! Those who are ill-disposed toward you--and there
are always some--will speak of your bad bringing-up, and many will
doubtless say even worse things."

"Nothing Japanese, then, and no hanging lamp either. But I confess I
had thought it would be so beautiful and poetical to see everything in
a dim red light."

Mrs. von Briest was moved. She got up and kissed Effi. "You are a
child. Beautiful and poetical. Nothing but fancies. The reality is
different, and often it is well that there should be dark instead of
light and shimmer."

Effi seemed on the point of answering, but at this moment Wilke came
and brought some letters. One was from Kessin, from Innstetten. "Ah,
from Geert," said Effi, and putting the letter in her pocket, she
continued in a calm tone: "But you surely will allow me to set the
grand piano across one corner of the room. I care more for that than
for the open fireplace that Geert has promised me. And then I am going
to put your portrait on an easel. I can't be entirely without you. Oh,
how I shall be homesick to see you, perhaps even on the wedding tour,
and most certainly in Kessin. Why, they say the place has no garrison,
not even a staff surgeon, and how fortunate it is that it is at least
a watering place. Cousin von Briest, upon whom I shall rely as my
chief support, always goes with his mother and sister to Warnemunde.
Now I really do not see why he should not, for a change, some day
direct our dear relatives toward Kessin. Besides, 'direct' seems to
suggest a position on the staff, to which, I believe, he aspires. And
then, of course, he will come along and live at our house. Moreover
Kessin, as somebody just recently told me, has a rather large steamer,
which runs over to Sweden twice a week. And on the ship there is
dancing (of course they have a band on board), and he dances very
well."

"Who?"

"Why, Dagobert."

"I thought you meant Innstetten. In any case the time has now come to
know what he writes. You still have the letter in your pocket, you
know."

"That's right. I had almost forgotten it." She opened the letter and
glanced over it.

"Well, Effi, not a word? You are not beaming and not even smiling. And
yet he always writes such bright and entertaining letters, and not a
word of fatherly wisdom in them."

"That I should not allow. He has his age and I have my youth. I should
shake my finger at him and say: 'Geert, consider which is better.'"

"And then he would answer: 'You have what is better.' For he is not
only a man of most refined manners, he is at the same time just and
sensible and knows very well what youth means. He is always reminding
himself of that and adapting himself to youthful ways, and if he
remains the same after marriage you will lead a model married life."

"Yes, I think so, too, mama. But just imagine--and I am almost ashamed
to say it--I am not so very much in favor of what is called a model
married life."

"That is just like you. And now tell me, pray, what are you really in
favor of?"

"I am--well, I am in favor of like and like and naturally also of
tenderness and love. And if tenderness and love are out of the
question, because, as papa says, love is after all only fiddle-faddle,
which I, however, do not believe, well, then I am in favor of wealth
and an aristocratic house, a really aristocratic one, to which Prince
Frederick Charles will come for an elk or grouse hunt, or where the
old Emperor will call and have a gracious word for every lady, even
for the younger ones. And then when we are in Berlin I am for court
balls and gala performances at the Opera, with seats always close by
the grand central box."

"Do you say that out of pure sauciness and caprice?"

"No, mama, I am fully in earnest. Love comes first, but right after
love come splendor and honor, and then comes amusement--yes,
amusement, always something new, always something to make me laugh or
weep. The thing I cannot endure is _ennui_."

"If that is the case, how in the world have you managed to get along
with us?"

"Why, mama, I am amazed to hear you say such a thing. To be sure, in
the winter time, when our dear relatives come driving up to see us and
stay for six hours, or perhaps even longer, and Aunt Gundel and Aunt
Olga eye me from head to foot and find me impertinent--and Aunt Gundel
once told me that I was--well, then occasionally it is not very
pleasant, that I must admit. But otherwise I have always been happy
here, so happy--"

As she said the last words she fell, sobbing convulsively, at her
mother's feet and kissed her hands.

"Get up, Effi. Such emotions as these overcome one, when one is as
young as you and facing her wedding and the uncertain future. But now
read me the letter, unless it contains something very special, or
perhaps secrets."

"Secrets," laughed Effi and sprang to her feet in a suddenly changed
mood. "Secrets! Yes, yes, he is always coming to the point of telling
me some, but the most of what he writes might with perfect propriety
be posted on the bulletin board at the mayor's office, where the
ordinances of the district council are posted. But then, you know,
Geert is one of the councillors."

"Read, read."

"Dear Effi: The nearer we come to our wedding day, the more scanty
your letters grow. When the mail arrives I always look first of all
for your handwriting, but, as you know, all in vain, as a rule, and
yet I did not ask to have it otherwise. The workmen are now in the
house who are to prepare the rooms, few in number, to be sure, for
your coming. The best part of the work will doubtless not be done till
we are on our journey. Paper-hanger Madelung, who is to furnish
everything, is an odd original. I shall tell you about him the next
time. Now I must tell you first of all how happy I am over you, over
my sweet little Effi. The very ground beneath my feet here is on fire,
and yet our good city is growing more and more quiet and lonesome. The
last summer guest left yesterday. Toward the end he went swimming at
nine degrees above zero (Centigrade), and the attendants were always
rejoiced when he came out alive. For they feared a stroke of apoplexy,
which would give the baths a bad reputation, as though the water were
worse here than elsewhere. I rejoice when I think that in four weeks I
shall row with you from the Piazzetta out to the Lido or to Murano,
where they make glass beads and beautiful jewelry. And the most
beautiful shall be yours. Many greetings to your parents and the
tenderest kiss for yourself from your Geert."

Effi folded the letter and put it back into the envelope.

"That is a very pretty letter," said Mrs. von Briest, "and that it
observes due moderation throughout is a further merit."

"Yes, due moderation it surely does observe."

"My dear Effi, let me ask a question. Do you wish that the letter did
not observe due moderation? Do you wish that it were more
affectionate, perhaps gushingly affectionate?"

"No, no, mama. Honestly and truly no, I do not wish that. So it is
better as it is."

"So it is better as it is. There you go again. You are so queer. And
by the by, a moment ago you were weeping. Is something troubling you?
It is not yet too late. Don't you love Geert?"

"Why shouldn't I love him? I love Hulda, and I love Bertha, and I love
Hertha. And I love old Mr. Niemeyer, too. And that I love you and papa
I don't even need to mention. I love all who mean well by me and are
kind to me and humor me. No doubt Geert will humor me, too. To be
sure, in his own way. You see he is already thinking of giving me
jewelry in Venice. He hasn't the faintest suspicion that I care
nothing for jewelry. I care more for climbing and swinging and am
always happiest when I expect every moment that something will give
way or break and cause me to tumble. It will not cost me my head the
first time, you know."

"And perhaps you also love your Cousin von Briest?"

"Yes, very much. He always cheers me."

"And would you have liked to marry Cousin von Briest?"

"Marry? For heaven's sake no. Why, he is still half a boy. Geert is a
man, a handsome man, a man with whom I can shine and he will make
something of himself in the world. What are you thinking of, mama?"

"Well, that is all right, Effi, I am glad to hear it. But there is
something else troubling you."

"Perhaps."

"Well, speak."

"You see, mama, the fact that he is older than I does no harm. Perhaps
that is a very good thing. After all he is not old and is well and
strong and is so soldierly and so keen. And I might almost say I am
altogether in favor of him, if he only--oh, if he were only a little
bit different."

"How, pray, Effi."

"Yes, how? Well, you must not laugh at me. It is something that I
only very recently overheard, over at the parsonage. We were talking
about Innstetten and all of a sudden old Mr. Niemeyer wrinkled his
forehead, in wrinkles of respect and admiration, of course, and said:
'Oh yes, the Baron. He is a man of character, a man of principles."

"And that he is, Effi."

"Certainly. And later, I believe, Niemeyer said he is even a man of
convictions. Now that, it seems to me, is something more. Alas, and
I--I have none. You see, mama, there is something about this that
worries me and makes me uneasy. He is so dear and good to me and so
considerate, but I am afraid of him."




CHAPTER V


The days of festivity at Hohen-Cremmen were past; all the guests had
departed, likewise the newly married couple, who left the evening of
the wedding day.

The nuptial-eve performance had pleased everybody, especially the
players, and Hulda had been the delight of all the young officers, not
only the Rathenow Hussars, but also their more critically inclined
comrades of the Alexander regiment. Indeed everything had gone well
and smoothly, almost better than expected. The only thing to be
regretted was that Bertha and Hertha had sobbed so violently that
Jahnke's Low German verses had been virtually lost. But even that had
made but little difference. A few fine connoisseurs had even expressed
the opinion that, "to tell the truth, forgetting what to say, sobbing,
and unintelligibility, together form the standard under which the most
decided victories are won, particularly in the case of pretty, curly
red heads." Cousin von Briest had won a signal triumph in his
self-composed rôle. He had appeared as one of Demuth's clerks, who had
found out that the young bride was planning to go to Italy immediately
after the wedding, for which reason he wished to deliver to her a
traveling trunk. This trunk proved, of course, to be a giant box of
bonbons from Hövel's. The dancing had continued till three o'clock,
with the effect that Briest, who had been gradually talking himself
into the highest pitch of champagne excitement, had made various
remarks about the torch dance, still in vogue at many courts, and the
remarkable custom of the garter dance. Since these remarks showed no
signs of coming to an end, and kept getting worse and worse, they
finally reached the point where they simply had to be choked off.
"Pull yourself together, Briest," his wife had whispered to him in a
rather earnest tone; "you are not here for the purpose of making
indecent remarks, but of doing the honors of the house. We are having
at present a wedding and not a hunting party." Whereupon von Briest
answered: "I see no difference between the two; besides, I am happy."

The wedding itself had also gone well, Niemeyer had conducted the
service in an exquisite fashion, and on the way home from the church
one of the old men from Berlin, who half-way belonged to the court
circle, made a remark to the effect that it was truly wonderful how
thickly talents are distributed in a state like ours. "I see therein a
triumph of our schools, and perhaps even more of our philosophy. When
I consider how this Niemeyer, an old village preacher, who at first
looked like a hospitaler--why, friend, what do you say? Didn't he
speak like a court preacher? Such tact, and such skill in antithesis,
quite the equal of Kögel, and in feeling even better. Kögel is too
cold. To be sure, a man in his position has to be cold. Generally
speaking, what is it that makes wrecks of the lives of men? Always
warmth, and nothing else." It goes without saying that these remarks
were assented to by the dignitary to whom they were addressed, a
gentleman as yet unmarried, who doubtless for this very reason was, at
the time being, involved in his fourth "relation." "Only too true,
dear friend," said he. "Too much warmth--most excellent--Besides, I
must tell you a story, later."

The day after the wedding was a clear October day. The morning sun
shone bright, yet there was a feeling of autumn chilliness in the air,
and von Briest, who had just taken breakfast in company with his wife,
arose from his seat and stood, with his hands behind his back, before
the slowly dying open fire. Mrs. von Briest, with her fancy work in
her hands, moved likewise closer to the fireplace and said to Wilke,
who entered just at this point to clear away the breakfast table: "And
now, Wilke, when you have everything in order in the dining hall--but
that comes first--then see to it that the cakes are taken over to the
neighbors, the nutcake to the pastor's and the dish of small cakes to
the Jahnkes'. And be careful with the goblets. I mean the thin cut
glasses."

Briest had already lighted his third cigarette, and, looking in the
best of health, declared that "nothing agrees with one so well as a
wedding, excepting one's own, of course."

"I don't know why you should make that remark, Briest. It is
absolutely news to me that you suffered at your wedding. I can't
imagine why you should have, either."

"Luise, you are a wet blanket, so to speak. But I take nothing amiss,
not even a thing like that. Moreover, why should we be talking about
ourselves, we who have never even taken a wedding tour? Your father
was opposed to it. But Effi is taking a wedding tour now. To be
envied. Started on the ten o'clock train. By this time they must be
near Ratisbon, and I presume he is enumerating to her the chief art
treasures of the Walhalla, without getting off the train--that goes
without saying. Innstetten is a splendid fellow, but he is pretty much
of an art crank, and Effi, heaven knows, our poor Effi is a child of
nature. I am afraid he will annoy her somewhat with his enthusiasm for
art."

"Every man annoys his wife, and enthusiasm for art is not the worst
thing by a good deal."

"No, certainly not. At all events we will not quarrel about that; it
is a wide field. Then, too, people are so different. Now you, you
know, would have been the right person for that. Generally speaking,
you would have been better suited to Innstetten than Effi. What a
pity! But it is too late now."

"Extremely gallant remark, except for the fact that it is not apropos.
However, in any case, what has been has been. Now he is my son-in-law,
and it can accomplish nothing to be referring back all the while to
the affairs of youth."

"I wished merely to rouse you to an animated humor."

"Very kind of you, but it was not necessary. I am in an animated
humor."

"Likewise a good one?"

"I might almost say so. But you must not spoil it.--Well, what else is
troubling you? I see there is something on your mind."

"Were you pleased with Effi? Were you satisfied with the whole affair?
She was so peculiar, half naïve, and then again very self-conscious
and by no means as demure as she ought to be toward such a husband.
That surely must be due solely to the fact that she does not yet fully
know what she has in him. Or is it simply that she does not love him
very much? That would be bad. For with all his virtues he is not the
man to win her love with an easy grace."

Mrs. von Briest kept silent and counted the stitches of her fancy
work. Finally she said: "What you just said, Briest, is the most
sensible thing I have heard from you for the last three days,
including your speech at dinner. I, too, have had my misgivings. But I
believe we have reason to feel satisfied."

"Has she poured out her heart to you?"

"I should hardly call it that. True, she cannot help talking, but she
is not disposed to tell everything she has in her heart, and she
settles a good many things for herself. She is at once communicative
and reticent, almost secretive; in general, a very peculiar mixture."

"I am entirely of your opinion. But how do you know about this if she
didn't tell you?"

"I only said she did not pour out her heart to me. Such a general
confession, such a complete unburdening of the soul, it is not in her
to make. It all came out of her by sudden jerks, so to speak, and then
it was all over. But just because it came from her soul so
unintentionally and accidentally, as it were, it seemed to me for that
very reason so significant."

"When was this, pray, and what was the occasion?"

"Unless I am mistaken, it was just three weeks ago, and we were
sitting in the garden, busied with all sorts of things belonging to
her trousseau, when Wilke brought a letter from Innstetten. She put it
in her pocket and a quarter of an hour later had wholly forgotten
about it, till I reminded her that she had a letter. Then she read it,
but the expression of her face hardly changed. I confess to you that
an anxious feeling came over me, so intense that I felt a strong
desire to have all the light on the matter that it is possible to have
under the circumstances."

"Very true, very true."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Well, I mean only--But that is wholly immaterial. Go on with your
story; I am all ears."

"So I asked her straight out how matters stood, and as I wished to
avoid anything bordering on solemnity, in view of her peculiar
character, and sought to take the whole matter as lightly as possible,
almost as a joke, in fact, I threw out the question, whether she would
perhaps prefer to marry Cousin von Briest, who had showered his
attentions upon her in Berlin."

"And?"

"You ought to have seen her then. Her first answer was a saucy laugh.
Why, she said, her cousin was really only a big cadet in lieutenant's
uniform. And she could not even love a cadet, to saying nothing of
marrying one. Then she spoke of Innstetten, who suddenly became for
her a paragon of manly virtues."

"How do you explain that?"

"It's quite simple. Lively, emotional, I might almost say, passionate
as she is, or perhaps just because she is so constituted, she is not
one of those who are so particularly dependent upon love, at least not
upon what truly deserves the name. To be sure, she speaks of love,
even with emphasis and a certain tone of conviction, but only because
she has somewhere read that love is indisputably the most exalted,
most beautiful, most glorious thing in the world. And it may be,
perhaps, that she has merely heard it from that sentimental person,
Hulda, and repeats it after her. But she does not feel it very deeply.
It is barely possible that it will come later. God forbid. But it is
not yet at hand."

"Then what is at hand? What ails her?"

"In my judgment, and according to her own testimony, she has two
things: mania for amusement and ambition."

"Well, those things can pass away. They do not disturb me."

"They do me. Innstetten is the kind of a man who makes his own career.
I will not call him pushing, for he is not, he has too much of the
real gentleman in him for that. Let us say, then, he is a man who will
make his own career. That will satisfy Effi's ambition."

"Very well. I call that good."

"Yes, it is good. But that is only the half. Her ambition will be
satisfied, but how about her inclination for amusement and adventure?
I have my doubts. For the little entertainment and awakening of
interest, demanded every hour, for the thousand things that overcome
ennui, the mortal enemy of a spiritual little person, for these
Innstetten will make poor provision. He will not leave her in the
midst of an intellectual desert; he is too wise and has had too much
experience in the world for that, but he will not specially amuse her
either. And, most of all, he will not even bother to ask himself
seriously how to go about it. Things can go on thus for a while
without doing much harm, but she will finally become aware of the
situation and be offended. And then I don't know what will happen. For
gentle and yielding as she is, she has, along with these qualities, a
certain inclination to fly into a fury, and at such times she hazards
everything."

At this point Wilke came in from the dining hall and reported that he
had counted everything and found everything there, except that one of
the fine wine glasses was broken, but that had occurred yesterday when
the toast was drunk. Miss Hulda had clinked her glass too hard against
Lieutenant Nienkerk's.

"Of course, half asleep and always has been, and lying under the elder
tree has obviously not improved matters. A silly person, and I don't
understand Nienkerk."

"I understand him perfectly."

"But he can't marry her."

"No."

"His purpose, then?"

"A wide field, Luise."

This was the day after the wedding. Three days later came a scribbled
little card from Munich, with all the names on it indicated by two
letters only. "Dear mama: This morning we visited the Pinakothek.
Geert wanted to go over to the other museum, too, the name of which I
will not mention here, because I am in doubt about the right way to
spell it, and I dislike to ask him. I must say, he is angelic to me
and explains everything. Generally speaking, everything is very
beautiful, but it's a strain. In Italy it will probably slacken
somewhat and get better. We are lodging at the 'Four Seasons,' which
fact gave Geert occasion to remark to me, that 'outside it was autumn,
but in me he was having spring.' I consider that a very graceful
compliment. He is really very attentive. To be sure, I have to be
attentive, too, especially when he says something or is giving me an
explanation. Besides, he knows everything so well that he doesn't even
need to consult a guide book. He delights to talk of you two,
especially mama. He considers Hulda somewhat affected, but old Mr.
Niemeyer has completely captivated him. A thousand greetings from your
thoroughly entranced, but somewhat weary Effi."

Similar cards now arrived daily, from Innsbruck, from Vicenza, from
Padua. Every one began: "We visited the famous gallery here this
morning," or, if it was not the gallery, it was an arena or some
church of "St. Mary" with a surname. From Padua came, along with the
card, a real letter. "Yesterday we were in Vicenza. One must see
Vicenza on account of Palladio. Geert told me that everything modern
had its roots in him. Of course, with reference only to architecture.
Here in Padua, where we arrived this morning, he said to himself
several times in the hotel omnibus, 'He lies in Padua interred,' and
was surprised when he discovered that I had never heard these words.
But finally he said it was really very well and in my favor that I
knew nothing about them. He is very just, I must say. And above all he
is angelic to me and not a bit overbearing and not at all old, either.
I still have pains in my feet, and the consulting of guide books and
standing so long before pictures wears me out. But it can't be helped,
you know. I am looking forward to Venice with much pleasure. We shall
stay there five days, perhaps even a whole week. Geert has already
begun to rave about the pigeons in St. Mark's Square, and the fact
that one can buy there little bags of peas and feed them to the pretty
birds. There are said to be paintings representing this scene, with
beautiful blonde maidens, 'a type like Hulda,' as he said. And that
reminds me of the Jahnke girls. I would give a good deal if I could be
sitting with them on a wagon tongue in our yard and feeding _our_
pigeons. Now, you must not kill the fan tail pigeon with the big
breast; I want to see it again. Oh, it is so beautiful here. This is
even said to be the most beautiful of all. Your happy, but somewhat
weary Effi."

When Mrs. von Briest had finished reading the letter she said: "The
poor child. She is homesick."

"Yes," said von Briest, "she is homesick. This accursed traveling--"

"Why do you say that now! You might have hindered it, you know. But it
is just your way to play the wise man after a thing is all over. After
a child has fallen into the well the aldermen cover up the well."

"Ah, Luise, don't bother me with that kind of stuff. Effi is our
child, but since the 3d of October she has been the Baroness of
Innstetten. And if her husband, our son-in-law, desires to take a
wedding tour and use it as an occasion for making a new catalogue of
every gallery, I can't keep him from doing it. That is what it means
to get married."

"So now you admit it. In talking with me you have always denied, yes,
always denied that the wife is in a condition of restraint."

"Yes, Luise, I have. But what is the use of discussing that now? It is
really too wide a field."




CHAPTER VI


Innstetten's leave of absence was to expire the 15th of November, and
so when they had reached Capri and Sorrento he felt morally bound to
follow his usual habit of returning to his duties on the day and at
the hour designated. So on the morning of the 14th they arrived by the
fast express in Berlin, where Cousin von Briest met them and proposed
that they should make use of the two hours before the departure of the
Stettin train to pay a visit to the Panorama and then have a little
luncheon together. Both proposals were accepted with thanks. At noon
they returned to the station, shook hands heartily and said good-by,
after both Effi and her husband had extended the customary invitation,
"Do come to see us some day," which fortunately is never taken
seriously. As the train started Effi waved a last farewell from her
compartment. Then she leaned back and made herself comfortable, but
from time to time sat up and held out her hand to Innstetten.

It was a pleasant journey, and the train arrived on time at the
Klein-Tantow station, from which a turnpike led to Kessin, ten miles
away. In the summer time, especially during the tourist season,
travelers were accustomed to avoid the turnpike and take the water
route, going by an old sidewheel steamer down the Kessine, the river
from which Kessin derived its name. But the "Phoenix"--about which the
wish had long been vainly cherished, that, at some time when there
were no passengers on board, it might justify its name and burn to
ashes--regularly stopped running on the 1st of October. For this
reason Innstetten had telegraphed from Stettin to his coachman Kruse:
"Five o'clock, Klein-Tantow station. Open carriage, if good weather."

It certainly was good weather, and there sat Kruse in the open
carriage at the station. He greeted the newly arrived couple with all
the prescribed dignity of a first-class coachman.

"Well, Kruse, everything in order?"

"At your service, Sir Councillor."

"Then, Effi, please get in." As Effi was doing as bid, and one of the
station porters was finding a place for a small satchel by the
coachman, in front, Innstetten left orders to send the rest of the
luggage by the omnibus. Then he, too, took his seat and after
condescendingly asking one of the bystanders for a light called to
Kruse: "Drive on, Kruse." The carriage rolled quickly over the rails
of the many tracks at the crossing, then slantingly down the slope of
the embankment, and on the turnpike past an inn called "The Prince
Bismarck." At this point the road forked, one branch leading to the
right to Kessin, the other to the left to Varzin. In front of the inn
stood a moderately tall, broad-shouldered man in a fur coat and a fur
cap. The cap he took off with great deference as the District
Councillor drove by. "Pray, who was that?" said Effi, who was
extremely interested in all she saw and consequently in the best of
humor. "He looked like a starost, though I am forced to confess I
never saw a starost before."

"Which is no loss, Effi. You guessed very well just the same. He does
really look like a starost and is something of the sort, too. I mean
by that, he is half Polish. His name is Golchowski, and whenever we
have an election or a hunt here, he is at the top of the list. In
reality he is a very unsafe fellow, whom I would not trust across the
road, and he doubtless has a great deal on his conscience. But he
assumes an air of loyalty, and when the quality of Varzin go by here
he would like nothing better than to throw himself before their
carriages. I know that at the same time he is hostile to the Prince.
But what is the use? We must not have any misunderstandings with him,
for we need him. He has this whole region in his pocket and
understands electioneering better than any one else. Besides, he is
considered well-to-do and lends out money at usury which is contrary
to the ordinary practice of the Poles."

"But he was good-looking."

"Yes, good-looking he is. Most of the people here are good-looking. A
handsome strain of human beings. But that is the best that can be said
of them. Your Brandenburg people look more unostentatious and more
ill-humored, and in their conduct they are less respectful, in fact,
are not at all respectful, but their yes is yes and no is no, and one
can depend upon them. Here everybody is uncertain."

"Why do you tell me that, since I am obliged to live here among them
now?"

"Not you. You will not hear or see much of them. For city and country
are here very different, and you will become acquainted with our city
people only, our good people of Kessin."

"Our good people of Kessin. Is that sarcasm, or are they really so
good?"

"That they are really good is not exactly what I mean to say, but they
are different from the others; in fact, they have no similarity
whatever to the country inhabitants here."

"How does that come?"

"Because they are entirely different human beings, by ancestry and
association. The people you find in the country here are the so-called
Cassubians, of whom you may have heard, a Slavic race, who have been
living here for a thousand years and probably much longer. But all the
inhabitants of our seaports, and the commercial cities near the coast,
have moved here from a distance and trouble themselves very little
about the Cassubian backwoods, because they derive little profit from
that source and are dependent upon entirely different sources. The
sources upon which they are dependent are the regions with which they
have commercial relations, and as their commerce brings them into
touch with the whole world you will find among them people from every
nook and corner of the earth, even here in our good Kessin, in spite
of the fact that it is nothing but a miserable hole."

"Why, that is perfectly charming, Geert. You are always talking about
the miserable hole, but I shall find here an entirely new world, if
you have not exaggerated. All kinds of exotics. That is about what you
meant, isn't it?"

He nodded his head.

"An entirely new world, I say, perhaps a negro, or a Turk, or perhaps
even a Chinaman."

"Yes, a Chinaman, too. How well you can guess! It may be that we still
have one. He is dead now and buried in a little fenced-in plot of
ground close by the churchyard. If you are not easily frightened I
will show you his grave some day. It is situated among the dunes, with
nothing but lyme grass around it, and here and there a few
immortelles, and one always hears the sea. It is very beautiful and
very uncanny."

"Oh, uncanny? I should like to know more about it. But I would better
not. Such stories make me have visions and dreams, and if, as I hope,
I sleep well tonight, I should certainly not like to see a Chinaman
come walking up to my bed the first thing."

"You will not, either."

"Not, either? Upon my word, that sounds strange, as though, after all,
it were possible. You seek to make Kessin interesting to me, but you
carry it a trifle too far. And have you many such foreigners in
Kessin?"

"A great many. The whole population is made up of such foreigners,
people whose parents and grandparents lived in an entirely different
region."

"Most remarkable. Please tell me more about them. But no more creepy
stories. I feel that there is always something creepy about a
Chinaman."

"Yes, there is," laughed Geert, "but the rest, thank heaven, are of an
entirely different sort, all mannerly people, perhaps a little bit too
commercial, too thoughtful of their own advantage, and always on hand
with bills of questionable value. In fact, one must be cautious with
them. But otherwise they are quite agreeable. And to let you see that
I have not been deceiving you I will just give you a little sample, a
sort of index or list of names."

"Please do, Geert."

"For example, we have, not fifty paces from our house, and our gardens
are even adjoining, the master machinist and dredger Macpherson, a
real Scotchman and a Highlander."

"And he still wears the native costume?"

"No, thank heaven, he doesn't, for he is a shriveled up little man, of
whom neither his clan nor Walter Scott would be particularly proud.
And then we have, further, in the same house where this Macpherson
lives, an old surgeon by the name of Beza, in reality only a barber.
He comes from Lisbon, the same place that the famous general De Meza
comes from. Meza, Beza; you can hear the national relationship. And
then we have, up the river by the quay, where the ships lie, a
goldsmith by the name of Stedingk, who is descended from an old
Swedish family; indeed, I believe there are counts of the empire by
that name. Further, and with this man I will close for the present, we
have good old Dr. Hannemann, who of course is a Dane, and was a long
time in Iceland, has even written a book on the last eruption of
Hekla, or Krabla."

"Why, that is magnificent, Geert. It is like having six novels that
one can never finish reading. At first it sounds commonplace, but
afterward seems quite out of the ordinary. And then you must also have
people, simply because it is a seaport, who are not mere surgeons or
barbers or anything of the sort. You must also have captains, some
flying Dutchman or other, or--"

"You are quite right. We even have a captain who was once a pirate
among the Black Flags."

"I don't know what you mean. What are Black Flags?"

"They are people away off in Tonquin and the South Sea--But since he
has been back among men he has resumed the best kind of manners and is
quite entertaining."

"I should be afraid of him nevertheless."

"You don't need to be, at any time, not even when I am out in the
country or at the Prince's for tea, for along with everything else
that we have, we have, thank heaven, also Rollo."

"Rollo?"

"Yes, Bollo. The name makes you think of the Norman Duke, provided you
have ever heard Niemeyer or Jahnke speak of him. Our Rollo has
somewhat the same character. But he is only a Newfoundland dog, a most
beautiful animal, that loves me and will love you, too. For Rollo is a
connoisseur. So long as you have him about you, you are safe, and
nothing can get at you, neither a live man nor a dead one. But just
see the moon over yonder. Isn't it beautiful?"

[Illustration: _Permission F Bruckmann A -G, Munich_
DIVINE SERVICE IN THE WOODS AT KOSEN    ADOLPH VON MENZEL]

Effi, who had been leaning back quietly absorbed, drinking in every
word, half timorously, half eagerly, now sat erect and looked out to
the right, where the moon had just risen behind a white mass of
clouds, which quickly floated by. Copper-colored hung the great disk
behind a clump of alders and shed its light upon the expanse of water
into which the Kessine here widens out. Or perhaps it might be looked
upon as one of the fresh-water lakes connected with the Baltic Sea.

Effi was stupefied. "Yes, you are right, Geert, how beautiful! But at
the same time there is something uncanny about it. In Italy I never
had such a sensation, not even when we were going over from Mestre to
Venice. There, too, we had water and swamps and moonlight, and I
thought the bridge would break. But it was not so spooky. What is the
cause of it, I wonder? Can it be the northern latitude?"

Innstetten laughed. "We are here seventy-five miles further north than
in Hohen-Cremmen, and you have still a while to wait before we come to
the first polar bear. I think you are nervous from the long journey
and the Panorama, not to speak of the story of the Chinaman."

"Why, you didn't tell me any story."

"No, I only mentioned him. But a Chinaman is in himself a story."

"Yes," she laughed.

"In any case you will soon recover. Do you see the little house yonder
with the light? It is a blacksmith's shop. There the road bends. And
when we have passed the bend you will be able to see the tower of
Kessin, or to be more exact, the two."

"Has it two?"

"Yes, Kessin is picking up. It now has a Catholic church also."

A half hour later the carriage stopped at the district councillor's
residence, which stood clear at the opposite end of the city. It was a
simple, rather old-fashioned, frame-house with plaster between the
timbers, and stood facing the main street, which led to the sea-baths,
while its gable looked down upon a grove, between the city limits and
the dunes, which was called the "Plantation." Furthermore this
old-fashioned frame-house was only Innstetten's private residence,
not the real district councillor's office. The latter stood diagonally
across the street.

It was not necessary for Kruse to announce their arrival with three
cracks of his whip. The servants had long been watching at the doors
and windows for their master and mistress, and even before the
carriage stopped all the inmates of the house were grouped upon the
stone doorstep, which took up the whole width of the sidewalk. In
front of them was Rollo, who, the moment the carriage stopped, began
to circle around it. Innstetten first of all helped his young wife to
alight. Then, offering her his arm, he walked with a friendly bow past
the servants, who promptly turned and followed him into the
entrance-hall, which was furnished with splendid old wardrobes and
cases standing around the walls. The housemaid, a pretty girl, no
longer very young, whose stately plumpness was almost as becoming to
her as the neat little cap on her blonde head, helped her mistress
take off her muff and cloak, and was just stooping down to take off
her fur-lined rubber shoes. But before she had time to make a
beginning, Innstetten said: "I suppose the best thing will be for me
to introduce to you right here all the occupants of our house, with
the exception of Mrs. Kruse, who does not like to be seen, and who, I
presume, is holding her inevitable black chicken again." Everybody
smiled. "But never mind Mrs. Kruse. Here is my old Frederick, who was
with me when I was at the university. Good times then, weren't they,
Frederick?--This is Johanna, a fellow countrywoman of yours, if you
count those who come from the region of Pasewalk as full-fledged
Brandenburgians; and this is Christel, to whom we trust our bodily
welfare every noon and evening, and who knows how to cook, I can
assure you.--And this is Rollo. Well, Rollo, how goes it?"

Rollo seemed only to have waited for this special greeting, for the
moment he heard his name he gave a bark for joy, stood up on his hind
legs and laid his forepaws on his master's shoulders.

"That will do, Rollo, that will do. But look here; this is my wife. I
have told her about you and said that you were a beautiful animal and
would protect her." Hereupon Rollo ceased fawning and sat down in
front of Innstetten, looking up curiously at the young wife. And when
she held out her hand to him he frisked around her.

During this introduction scene Effi had found time to look about. She
was enchanted, so to speak, by everything she saw, and at the same
time dazzled by the abundant light. In the forepart of the hall were
burning four or five wall lights, the reflectors themselves very
primitive, simply of tin-plate, which, however, only improved the
light and heightened the splendor. Two astral lamps with red shades, a
wedding present from Niemeyer, stood on a folding table between two
oak cupboards. On the front of the table was the tea service, with the
little lamp under the kettle already lighted. There were, beside
these, many, many other things, some of them very queer. From one side
of the hall to the other ran three beams, dividing the ceiling into
sections. From the front one was suspended a ship under full sail,
high quarter-deck, and cannon ports, while farther toward the front
door a gigantic fish seemed to be swimming in the air. Effi took her
umbrella, which she still held in her hand, and pushed gently against
the monster, so that it set up a slow rocking motion.

"What is that, Geert?" she asked.

"That is a shark."

"And that thing, clear at the end of the hall, that looks like a huge
cigar in front of a tobacco store?"

"That is a young crocodile. But you can look at all these things
better and more in detail tomorrow. Come now and let us take a cup of
tea. For in spite of shawls and rugs you must have been chilled.
Toward the last it was bitter cold."

He offered Effi his arm and the two maids retired. Only Frederick and
Rollo followed the master of the house as he took his wife into his
sitting room and study. Effi was as much surprised here as she had
been in the hall, but before she had time to say anything, Innstetten
drew back a portiere, which disclosed a second, larger room looking
out on the court and garden. "Now this, Effi, is your room. Frederick
and Johanna have tried to arrange it the best they could in accordance
with my orders. I find it quite tolerable and should be happy if you
liked it, too."

She withdrew her arm from his and stood up on her tip-toes to give him
a hearty kiss. "Poor little thing that I am, how you do spoil me! This
grand piano! and this rug! Why, I believe it is Turkish. And the bowl
with the little fishes, and the flower table besides! Luxuries,
everywhere I look."

"Ah, my dear Effi, you will have to put up with that. It is to be
expected when one is young and pretty and amiable. And I presume the
inhabitants of Kessin have already found out about you, heaven knows
from what source. For of the flower table, at least, I am innocent.
Frederick, where did the flower table come from?"

"Apothecary Gieshübler. There is a card on it."

"Ah, Gieshübler, Alonzo Gieshübler," said Innstetten, laughingly and
almost boisterously handing the card with the foreign-sounding first
name to Effi. "Gieshübler. I forgot to tell you about him. Let me say
in passing that he bears the doctor's title, but does not like to be
addressed by it. He says it only vexes the real doctors, and I presume
he is right about that. Well, I think you will become acquainted with
him and that soon. He is our best number here, a bel-esprit and an
original, but especially a man of soul, which is after all the chief
thing. But enough of these things; let us sit down and drink our tea.
Where shall it be? Here in your room or over there in mine! There is
no other choice. Snug and tiny is my cabin."

Without hesitating she sat down on a little corner sofa. "Let us stay
here today; you will be my guest today. Or let us say, rather: Tea
regularly in my room, breakfast in yours. Then each will secure his
rights, and I am curious to know where I shall like it best."

"That will be a morning and evening question."

"Certainly. But the way it is put, or better, our attitude toward it,
is the important thing."

With that she laughed and cuddled up to him and was about to kiss his
hand.

"No, Effi, for heaven's sake, don't do that. It is not my desire to be
a person looked up to with awe and respect. I am, for the inhabitants
of Kessin, but for you I am--"

"What, pray?"

"Ah, let that pass. Far be it from me to say what."




CHAPTER VII


The sun was shining brightly when Effi awoke the next morning. It was
hard for her to get her bearings. Where was she? Correct, in Kessin,
in the house of District Councillor von Innstetten, and she was his
wife, Baroness Innstetten. Sitting up she looked around with
curiosity. During the evening before she had been too tired to examine
very carefully all the half-foreign, half-old-fashioned things that
surrounded her. Two pillars supported the ceiling beam, and green
curtains shut off from the rest of the room the alcove-like sleeping
apartment in which the beds stood. But in the middle a curtain was
either lacking or pulled back, and this afforded her a comfortable
orientation from her bed. There between the two windows stood the
narrow, but very high, pier-glass, while a little to the right, along
the hall wall, towered the tile stove, the door of which, as she had
discovered the evening before, opened into the hall in the
old-fashioned way. She now felt its warmth radiating toward her. How
fine it was to be in her own home! At no time during the whole tour
had she enjoyed so much comfort, not even in Sorrento.

But where was Innstetten? All was still round about her, nobody was
there. She heard only the tick-tock of a small clock and now and then
a low sound in the stove, from which she inferred that a few new
sticks of wood were being shoved in from the hall. Gradually she
recalled that Geert had spoken the evening before of an electric bell,
for which she did not have to search long. Close by her pillows was
the little white ivory button, and she now pressed softly upon it.

Johanna appeared at once. "At your Ladyship's service."

"Oh, Johanna, I believe I have overslept myself. It must be late."

"Just nine."

"And my--" She couldn't make herself speak straightway of her
"husband." "His Lordship, he must have kept very quiet. I didn't hear
anything."

"I'm sure he did. And your Ladyship has slept soundly. After the long
journey--"

"Yes, I have. And his Lordship, is he always up so early?"

"Always, your Ladyship. On that point he is strict; he cannot endure
late sleeping, and when he enters his room across the hall the stove
must be warm, and the coffee must not be late."

"So he has already had his breakfast?"

"Oh, no, your Ladyship--His Lordship--"

Effi felt that she ought not to have asked the question and would
better have kept to herself the suspicion that Innstetten might not
have waited for her. So she was very eager to correct her mistake the
best she could, and when she had got up and taken a seat before the
pier-glass she resumed the conversation, saying: "Moreover, his
Lordship is quite right. Always to be up early was likewise the rule
in my parents' home. When people sleep away the morning, everything is
out of gear the rest of the day. But his Lordship will not be so
strict with me. For a long time last night I couldn't sleep, and was
even frightened a little bit."

"What must I hear, your Ladyship? What was it, pray?"

"There was a very strange noise overhead, not loud, but very
penetrating. At first it sounded as though gowns with long trains were
dragging over the floor, and in my excitement it seemed a few times as
though I heard little white satin slippers. It seemed as though they
were dancing overhead, but quite softly."

As the conversation ran on thus Johanna glanced over the shoulder of
the young wife at the tall narrow mirror in order the better to
observe Effi's facial expressions. In reply she said: "Oh, yes, that
is up in the social room. We used to hear it in the kitchen, too. But
now we don't hear it any more; we have become accustomed to it."

"Is there anything unusual about it?"

"God forbid, not in the least. For a while no one knew for sure what
it came from, and even the preacher looked embarrassed, in spite of
the fact that Dr. Gieshübler always simply laughed at it. But now we
know that it comes from the curtains. The room is inclined to be musty
and damp, and for that reason the windows are always left open, except
when there is a storm. And so, as there is nearly always a strong
draft upstairs, the wind sweeps the old white curtains, which I think
are much too long, back and forth over the floor. That makes a sound
like silk dresses, or even satin slippers, as your Ladyship just
said."

"That is it, of course. But what I cannot understand is why the
curtains are not taken down. Or they might be made shorter. It is such
a queer noise that it gets on one's nerves. And now, Johanna, give me
the little cape and put just a little dab of powder on my forehead.
Or, better still, take the 'refresher' from my traveling bag--Ah, that
is fine and refreshes me. Now I am ready to go over. He is still
there, isn't he, or has he been out?"

"His Lordship went out earlier; I believe he was over at the office.
But he has been back for a quarter of an hour. I will tell Frederick
to bring the breakfast."

With that Johanna left the room. Effi took one more look into the
mirror and then walked across the hall, which in the daylight lost
much of its charm of the evening before, and stepped into Geert's
room.

He was sitting at his secretary, a rather clumsy cylindrical desk,
which, however, he did not care to part with, as it was an heirloom.
Effi was standing behind him, and had embraced and kissed him before
he could rise from his chair.

"So early?"

"So early, you say. Of course, to mock me."

Innstetten shook his head. "How can I?" Effi took pleasure in accusing
herself, however, and refused to listen to the assurances of her
husband that his "so early" had been meant in all seriousness. "You
must know from our journey that I have never kept you waiting in the
morning. In the course of the day--well, that is a different matter.
It is true, I am not very punctual, but I am not a late sleeper. In
that respect my parents have given me good training, I think."

"In that respect? In everything, my sweet Effi."

"You say that just because we are still on our honeymoon,--why no, we
are past that already. For heaven's sake, Geert, I hadn't given it a
single thought, and--why, we have been married for over six weeks, six
weeks and a day. Yes, that alters the case. So I shall not take it as
flattery, I shall take it as the truth."

At this moment Frederick came in and brought the coffee. The breakfast
table stood across the corner of the sitting room in front of a sofa
made just in the right shape and size to fill that corner. They both
sat down upon the sofa.

"The coffee is simply delicious," said Effi, as she looked at the
room and its furnishings. "This is as good as hotel coffee or that we
had at Bottegone's--you remember, don't you, in Florence, with the
view of the cathedral? I must write mama about it. We don't have such
coffee in Hohen-Cremmen. On the whole, Geert, I am just beginning to
realize what a distinguished husband I married. In our home everything
was just barely passable."

"Nonsense, Effi. I never saw better house-keeping than in your home."

"And then how well your house is furnished. When papa had bought his
new weapon cabinet and hung above his writing desk the head of a
buffalo, and beneath that a picture of old general Wrangel, under whom
he had once served as an adjutant, he was very proud of what he had
done. But when I see these things here, all our Hohen-Cremmen elegance
seems by the side of them merely commonplace and meagre. I don't know
what to compare them with. Even last night, when I took but a cursory
look at them, a world of ideas occurred to me."

"And what were they, if I may ask?"

"What they were? Certainly. But you must not laugh at them. I once had
a picture book, in which a Persian or Indian prince (for he wore a
turban) sat with his feet under him on a silk cushion, and at his back
there was a great red silk bolster, which could be seen bulging out to
the right and left of him, and the wall behind the Indian prince
bristled with swords and daggers and panther skins and shields and
long Turkish guns. And see, it looks just like that here in your
house, and if you will cross your legs and sit down on them the
similarity will be complete."

"Effi, you are a charming, dear creature. You don't know how deeply I
feel that and how much I should like to show you every moment that I
do feel it."

"Well, there will be plenty of time for that. I am only seventeen, you
know, and have not yet made up my mind to die."

"At least not before I do. To be sure, if I should die first, I should
like to take you with me. I do not want to leave you to any other man.
What do you say to that?"

"Oh, I must have some time to think about it. Or, rather, let us not
think about it at all. I don't like to talk about death; I am for
life. And now tell me, how shall we live here? On our travels you told
me all sorts of queer things about the city and the country, but not a
word about how we shall live here. That here nothing is the same as in
Hohen-Cremmen and Schwantikow, I see plainly, and yet we must be able
to have something like intercourse and society in 'good Kessin,' as
you are always calling it. Have you any people of family in the city?"

"No, my dear Effi. In this regard you are going to meet with great
disappointments. We have in the neighborhood a few noble families with
which you will become acquainted, but here in the city there is nobody
at all."

"Nobody at all? That I can't believe. Why, you are upward of three
thousand people, and among three thousand people there certainly must
be, beside such inferior individuals as Barber Beza (I believe that
was his name), a certain élite, officials and the like."

Innstetten laughed. "Yes, officials there are. But when you examine
them narrowly it doesn't mean much. Of course, we have a preacher and
a judge and a school principal and a commander of pilots, and of such
people in official positions I presume there may be as many as a dozen
altogether, but they are for the most part, as the proverb says, good
men, but poor fiddlers. And all the others are nothing but consuls."

"Nothing but consuls! I beg you, Geert, how can you say 'nothing but
consuls?' Why, they are very high and grand, and, I might almost say,
awe-inspiring individuals. Consuls, I thought, were the men with the
bundles of rods, out of which an ax blade projected."

"Not quite, Effi. Those men are called lictors."

"Right, they are called lictors. But consuls are also men of very high
rank and authority. Brutus was a consul, was he not?"

"Yes, Brutus was a consul. But ours are not very much like him and are
content to handle sugar and coffee, or open a case of oranges and sell
them to you at ten pfennigs apiece."

"Not possible."

"Indeed it is certain. They are tricky little tradesmen, who are
always at hand with their advice on any question of business, when
foreign vessels put in here and are at a loss to know what to do. And
when they have given advice and rendered service to some Dutch or
Portuguese vessel, they are likely in the end to become accredited
representatives of such foreign states, and so we have just as many
consuls in Kessin as we have ambassadors and envoys in Berlin. Then
whenever there is a holiday, and we have many holidays here, all the
flags are hoisted, and, if we happen to have a bright sunny morning,
on such days you can see all Europe flying flags from our roofs, and
the star-spangled banner and the Chinese dragon besides."

"You are in a scoffing mood, Geert, and yet you may be right. But I
for my part, insignificant though I be, must confess, that I consider
all this charming and that our Havelland cities are nothing in
comparison. When the Emperor's birthday is celebrated in our region
the only flags hoisted are just the black and white, with perhaps a
bit of red here and there, but that is not to be compared with the
world of flags you speak of. Generally speaking, I find over and over
again, as I have already said, that everything here has a certain
foreign air about it, and I have not yet seen or heard a thing that
has not more or less amazed me. Yesterday evening, for example, there
was that remarkable ship out in the hall, and behind it the shark and
the crocodile. And here your own room. Everything so oriental and, I
cannot help repeating, everything as in the palace of an Indian
prince."

"Well and good! I congratulate you, Princess."

"And then upstairs the social room with its long curtains, which sweep
over the floor."

"Now what, pray, do you know about that room?"

"Nothing beyond what I just told you. For about an hour while I lay
awake in the night it seemed to me as though I heard shoes gliding
over the floor, and as though there were dancing, and something almost
like music, too. But all very quiet. I told Johanna about it this
morning, merely in order to excuse myself for sleeping so long
afterwards. She told me that it came from the long curtains up in the
social room. I think we shall put a stop to that by cutting off a
piece of the curtains or at least closing the windows. The weather
will soon turn stormy enough, anyhow. The middle of November is the
time, you know."

Innstetten was a trifle embarrassed and sat with a puzzled look on his
face, seemingly undecided whether or not he should attempt to allay
all these fears. Finally he made up his mind to ignore them. "You are
quite right, Effi, we can shorten the long curtains upstairs. But
there is no hurry about it, especially as it is not certain whether it
will do any good. It may be something else, in the chimney, or a worm
in the wood, or a polecat. For we have polecats here. But, in any
case, before we undertake any changes you must first examine our whole
house, under my guidance; that goes without saying. We can do it in a
quarter of an hour. Then you make your toilette, dress up just a
little bit, for in reality you are most charming as you are now. You
must get ready for our friend Gieshübler. It is now past ten, and I
should be very much mistaken in him if he did not put in his
appearance here at eleven, or at twelve at the very latest, in order
most devotedly to lay his homage at your feet. This, by the way, is
the kind of language he indulges in. Otherwise he is, as I have
already said, a capital man, who will become your friend, if I know
him and you aright."




CHAPTER VIII


It was long after eleven, but nothing had been seen of Gieshübler as
yet. "I can't wait any longer," Geert had said, whose duties called
him away. "If Gieshübler comes while I am gone, receive him as kindly
as possible and the call will go especially well. He must not become
embarrassed. When he is ill at ease he cannot find a word to say, or
says the queerest kind of things. But if you can win his confidence
and put him in a good humor he will talk like a book. Well, you will
do that easily enough. Don't expect me before three; there is a great
deal to do over across the way. And the matter of the room upstairs we
will consider further. Doubtless, the best thing will be to leave it
as it is."

With that Innstetten went away and left his young wife alone. She sat,
leaning back, in a quiet, snug corner by the window, and, as she
looked out, rested her left arm on a small side leaf drawn out of the
cylindrical desk. The street was the chief thoroughfare leading to the
beach, for which reason there was a great deal of traffic here in the
summer time, but now, in the middle of November, it was all empty and
quiet, and only a few poor children, whose parents lived in thatched
cottages clear at the further edge of the "Plantation" came clattering
by in their wooden shoes. But Effi felt none of this loneliness, for
her fancy was still engaged with the strange things she had seen a
short time before during her examination of the house.

This examination began with the kitchen, which had a range of modern
make, while an electric wire ran along the ceiling and into the maids'
room. These two improvements had only recently been made, and Effi was
pleased when Innstetten told her about them. Next they went from the
kitchen back into the hall and from there out into the court, the
first half of which was little more than a narrow passage-way running
along between the two side wings of the house. In these wings were to
be found all the other rooms set apart for house-keeping purposes. In
the right the maids' room, the manservant's room, and the mangling
room; to the left the coachman's quarters, situated between the stable
and the carriage shed and occupied by the Kruse family. Over this room
was the chicken house, while a trap door in the roof of the stable
furnished ingress and egress for the pigeons. Effi had inspected all
these parts of the house with a great deal of interest, but this
interest was exceeded by far when, upon returning from the court to
the front of the house, she followed Innstetten's leading and climbed
the stairway to the upper story. The stairs were askew, ramshackly,
and dark; but the hall, to which they led, almost gave one a cheerful
sensation, because it had a great deal of light and a good view of the
surrounding landscape. In one direction it looked out over the roofs
of the outskirts of the city and the "Plantation," toward a Dutch
windmill standing high up on a dune; in the other it looked out upon
the Kessine, which here, just above its mouth, was rather broad and
stately. It was a striking view and Effi did not hesitate to give
lively expression to her pleasure. "Yes, very beautiful, very
picturesque," answered Innstetten, without going more into detail, and
then opened a double door to the right, with leaves hanging somewhat
askew, which led into the so-called social room. This room ran clear
across the whole story. Both front and back windows were open and the
oft-mentioned curtains swung back and forth in the strong draft. From
the middle of one side wall projected an open fireplace with a large
stone mantlepiece, while on the opposite wall there hung a few tin
candlesticks, each with two candle sockets, just like those downstairs
in the hall, except that everything looked dingy and neglected. Effi
was somewhat disappointed and frankly said so. Then she remarked that
she would rather look at the rooms across the hall than at this
miserable, deserted social room. "To tell the truth, there is
absolutely nothing over there," answered Innstetten, but he opened the
doors nevertheless. Here were four rooms with one window each, all
tinted yellow, to match the social room, and all completely empty,
except that in one there stood three rush-bottomed chairs, with seats
broken through. On the back of one was pasted a little picture, only
half a finger long, representing a Chinaman in blue coat and wide
yellow trousers, with a low-crowned hat on his head. Effi saw it and
said: "What is the Chinaman doing here?" Innstetten himself seemed
surprised at the picture and assured her that he did not know. "Either
Christel or Johanna has pasted it there. Child's play. You can see it
is cut out of a primer." Effi agreed with that and was only surprised
that Innstetten took everything so seriously, as though it meant
something after all.

Then she cast another glance into the social room and said, in effect,
that it was really a pity all that room should stand empty. "We have
only three rooms downstairs and if anybody comes to visit us we shall
not know whither to turn. Don't you think one could make two handsome
guest rooms out of the social room? This would just suit mama. She
could sleep in the back room and would have the view of the river and
the two moles, and from the front room she could see the city and the
Dutch windmill. In Hohen-Cremmen we have even to this day only a
German windmill. Now say, what do you think of it? Next May mama will
surely come."

Innstetten agreed to everything, only he said finally: "That is all
very well. But after all it will be better if we give your mama rooms
over in the district councillor's office building. The whole second
story is vacant there, just as it is here, and she will have more
privacy there."

That was the result, so to speak, which the first walk around through
the house accomplished. Effi then made her toilette, but not so
quickly as Innstetten had supposed, and now she was sitting in her
husband's room, turning her thoughts first to the little Chinaman
upstairs, then to Gieshübler, who still did not come. To be sure, a
quarter of an hour before, a stoop-shouldered and almost deformed
little gentleman in an elegant short fur coat and a very
smooth-brushed silk hat, too tall for his proportions, had walked
past on the other side of the street and had glanced over at her
window. But that could hardly have been Gieshübler. No, this
stoop-shouldered man, who had such a distinguished air about him, must
have been the presiding judge, and she recalled then that she had once
seen such a person at a reception given by Aunt Therese, but it
suddenly occurred to her that Kessin had only a lower court judge.

While she was still following out this chain of thought the object of
her reflections, who had apparently been taking a morning stroll, or
perhaps a promenade around the "Plantation" to bolster up his courage,
came in sight again, and a minute later Frederick entered to announce
Apothecary Gieshübler.

"Ask him kindly to come in."

The poor young wife's heart fluttered, for it was the first time that
she had to appear as a housewife, to say nothing of the first woman of
the city.

Frederick helped Gieshübler take off his fur coat and then opened the
door.

Effi extended her hand to the timidly entering caller, who kissed it
with a certain amount of fervor. The young wife seemed to have made a
great impression upon him immediately.

"My husband has already told me--But I am receiving you here in my
husband's room,--he is over at the office and may be back any moment.
May I ask you to step into my room?"

Gieshübler followed Effi, who led the way into the adjoining room,
where she pointed to one of the arm chairs, as she herself sat down on
the sofa. "I wish I could tell you what a great pleasure it was
yesterday to receive the beautiful flowers with your card. I
straightway ceased to feel myself a stranger here and when I mentioned
the fact to Innstetten he told me we should unquestionably be good
friends."

"Did he say that? The good councillor. In the councillor and you, most
gracious Lady,--I beg your permission to say it--two dear people have
been united. For what kind of a man your husband is, I know, and what
kind of a woman you are, most gracious Lady, I see."

"Provided only you do not look at me with too friendly eyes. I am so
very young. And youth--"

"Ah, most gracious Lady, say nothing against youth. Youth, even with
all its mistakes, is still beautiful and lovable, and age, even with
its virtues, is not good for much. Personally I have, it is true, no
right to say anything about this subject. About age I might have,
perhaps, but not about youth, for, to be frank, I was never young.
Persons with my misfortune are never young. That, it may as well be
said, is the saddest feature of the case. One has no true spirit, one
has no self-confidence, one hardly ventures to ask a lady for the
honor of a dance, because one does not desire to cause her an
embarrassment, and thus the years go by and one grows old, and life
has been poor and empty."

Effi gave him her hand. "Oh, you must not say such things. We women
are by no means so bad."

"Oh, no, certainly not."

"And when I recall," continued Effi, "what all I have experienced--it
is not much, for I have gone out but little, and have almost always
lived in the country--but when I recall it, I find that, after all, we
always love what is worthy of love. And then I see, too, at once that
you are different from other men. We women have sharp eyes in such
matters. Perhaps in your case the name has something to do with it.
That was always a favorite assertion of our old pastor Niemeyer. The
name, he loved to say, especially the forename, has a certain
mysterious determining influence; and Alonzo Gieshübler, in my
opinion, opens to one a whole new world, indeed I feel almost tempted
to say, Alonzo is a romantic name, a fastidious name."

Gieshübler smiled with a very unusual degree of satisfaction and
mustered up the courage to lay aside his silk hat, which up to this
time he had been turning in his hand. "Yes, most gracious Lady, you
hit the nail on the head that time."

Oh, I understand. I have heard about the consuls, of Kessin is said to
have so many, and at the home of the Spanish consul your father
presumably made the acquaintance of the daughter of a sea-captain, a
beautiful Andalusian girl, I suppose; Andalusian girls are always
beautiful."

"Precisely as you suppose, most gracious Lady. And my mother really
was a beautiful woman, ill as it behooves me personally to undertake
to prove it. But when your husband came here three years ago she was
still alive and still had the same fiery eyes as in her youth. He will
confirm my statement. I personally take more after the Gieshüblers,
who are people of little account, so far as external features are
concerned, but otherwise tolerably well favored. We have been living
here now for four generations, a full hundred years, and if there were
an apothecary nobility--"

"You would have a right to claim it. And I, for my part, accept your
claim as proved, and that beyond question. For us who come of old
families it is a very easy matter, because we gladly recognize every
sort of noble-mindedness, no matter from what source it may come. At
least that is the way I was brought up by my father, as well as by my
mother. I am a Briest by birth and am descended from the Briest, who,
the day before the battle of Fehrbellin, led the sudden attack on
Rathenow, of which you may perhaps have heard."

"Oh, certainly, most gracious Lady, that, you know, is my specialty."

"Well then I am a von Briest. And my father has said to me more than
a hundred times: Effi,--for that is my name--Effi, here is our
beginning, and here only. When Froben traded the horse, he was that
moment a nobleman, and when Luther said, 'here I stand,' he was more
than ever a nobleman. And I think, Mr. Gieshübler, Innstetten was
quite right when he assured me you and I should be good friends."

Gieshübler would have liked nothing better than to make her a
declaration of love then and there, and to ask that he might fight and
die for her as a Cid or some other campeador. But as that was out of
the question, and his heart could no longer endure the situation, he
arose from his seat, looked for his hat, which he fortunately found at
once, and, after again kissing the young wife's hand, withdrew quickly
from her presence without saying another word.




CHAPTER IX


Such was Effi's first day in Kessin. Innstetten gave her half a week
further time to become settled and write letters to her mother, Hulda,
and the twins. Then the city calls began, some of which were made in a
closed carriage, for the rains came just right to make this unusual
procedure seem the sensible thing to do. When all the city calls had
been made the country nobility came next in order. These took longer,
as in most cases the distances were so great that it was not possible
to make more than one visit on any one day. First they went to the
Borckes' in Rothenmoor, then to Morgnitz, Dabergotz, and Kroschentin,
where they made their duty call at the Ahlemanns', the Jatzkows', and
the Grasenabbs'. Further down the list came, among other families,
that of Baron von Güldenklee in Papenhagen. The impression that Effi
received was everywhere the same. Mediocre people, whose friendliness
was for the most part of an uncertain character, and who, while
pretending to speak of Bismarck and the Crown Princess, were in
reality merely scrutinizing Effi's dress, which some considered too
pretentious for so youthful a woman, while others looked upon it as
too little suited to a lady of social position. Everything about her,
they said, betrayed the Berlin school,--sense in external matters and
a remarkable degree of uncertainty and embarrassment in the discussion
of great problems. At the Borckes', and also at the homes in Morgnitz
and Dabergotz, she had been declared "infected with rationalism," but
at the Grasenabbs' she was pronounced point-blank an "atheist." To be
sure, the elderly Mrs. Grasenabb, _née_ Stiefel, of Stiefelstein in
South Germany, had made a weak attempt to save Effi at least for
deism. But Sidonie von Grasenabb, an old maid of forty-three, had
gruffly interjected the remark: "I tell you, mother, simply an
atheist, and nothing short of an atheist, and that settles it." After
this outburst the old woman, who was afraid of her own daughter, had
observed discreet silence.

The whole round had taken just about two weeks, and at a late hour on
the second day of December the Innstettens were returning home from
their last visit. At the Güldenklees' Innstetten had met with the
inevitable fate of having to argue politics with old Mr. Güldenklee.
"Yes, dearest district councillor, when I consider how times have
changed! A generation ago today, or about that long, there was, you
know, another second of December, and good Louis, the nephew of
Napoleon--_if_ he was his nephew, and not in reality of entirely
different extraction--was firing grape and canister at the Parisian
mob. Oh well, let him be forgiven for that; he was just the man to do
it, and I hold to the theory that every man fares exactly as well and
as ill as he deserves. But when he later lost all appreciation and in
the year seventy, without any provocation, was determined to have a
bout with us, you see, Baron, that was--well, what shall I say?--that
was a piece of insolence. But he was repaid for it in his own coin.
Our Ancient of Days up there is not to be trifled with and He is on
our side."

"Yes," said Innstetten, who was wise enough to appear to be entering
seriously into such Philistine discussions, "the hero and conqueror of
Saarbrücken did not know what he was doing. But you must not be too
strict in your judgment of him personally. After all, who is master in
his own house? Nobody. I myself am already making preparations to put
the reins of government into other hands, and Louis Napoleon, you
know, was simply a piece of wax in the hands of his Catholic wife, or
let us say, rather, of his Jesuit wife."

"Wax in the hands of his wife, who proceeded to bamboozle him.
Certainly, Innstetten, that is just what he was. But you don't think,
do you, that that is going to save him? He is forever condemned.
Moreover it has never yet been shown conclusively"--at these words his
glance sought rather timorously the eye of his better half--"that
petticoat government is not really to be considered an advantage.
Only, of course, it must be the right sort of a wife. But who was this
wife? She was not a wife at all. The most charitable thing to call her
is a 'dame,' and that tells the whole story. 'Dame' almost always
leaves an after-taste. This Eugenie--whose relation to the Jewish
banker I gladly ignore here, for I hate the 'I-am-holier-than-thou'
attitude--had a streak of the _café-chantant_ in her, and, if the city
in which she lived was a Babylon, she was a wife of Babylon. I don't
care to express myself more plainly, for I know"--and he bowed toward
Effi--"what I owe to German wives. Your pardon, most gracious Lady,
that I have so much as touched upon these things within your hearing."

Such had been the trend of the conversation, after they had talked
about the election, the assassin Nobiling, and the rape crop, and when
Innstetten and Effi reached home they sat down to chat for half an
hour. The two housemaids were already in bed, for it was nearly
midnight.

Innstetten put on his short house coat and morocco slippers, and began
to walk up and down in the room; Effi was still dressed in her society
gown, and her fan and gloves lay beside her.

"Now," said Innstetten, standing still, "we really ought to celebrate
this day, but I don't know as yet how. Shall I play you a triumphal
march, or set the shark going out there, or carry you in triumph
across the hall? Something must be done, for I would have you know,
this visit today was the last one."

"Thank heaven, if it was," said Effi. "But the feeling that we now
have peace and quiet is, I think, celebration enough in itself. Only
you might give me a kiss. But that doesn't occur to you. On that whole
long road not a touch, frosty as a snow-man. And never a thing but
your cigar."

"Forget that, I am going to reform, but at present I merely want to
know your attitude toward this whole question of friendly relations
and social intercourse. Do you feel drawn to one or another of these
new acquaintances? Have the Borckes won the victory over the
Grasenabbs, or vice versa, or do you side with old Mr. Güldenklee?
What he said about Eugenie made a very noble and pure impression,
don't you think so?"

"Aha, behold! Sir Geert von Innstetten is a gossip. I am learning to
know you from an entirely new side."

"And if our nobility will not do," continued Innstetten, without
allowing himself to be interrupted, "what do you think of the city
officials of Kessin? What do you think of the club? After all, life
and death depend upon your answer. Recently I saw you talking with our
judge, who is a lieutenant of the reserves, a neat little man that one
might perhaps get along with, if he could only rid himself of the
notion that he accomplished the recapture of Le Bourget by attacking
him on the flank. And his wife! She is considered our best Boston
player and has, besides, the prettiest counters. So once more, Effi,
how is it going to be in Kessin? Will you become accustomed to the
place? Will you be popular and assure me a majority when I want to go
to the Imperial Diet? Or do you favor a life of seclusion, holding
yourself aloof from the people of Kessin, in the city as well as in
the country?"

"I shall probably decide in favor of a secluded life, unless the
Apothecary at the sign of the Moor draws me out. To be sure, that will
make me fall still lower in Sidonie's estimation, but I shall have to
take the risk. This fight will simply have to be fought. I shall stand
or fall with Gieshübler. It sounds rather comical, but he is actually
the only person with whom it is possible to carry on a conversation,
the only real human being here."

"That he is," said Innstetten. "How well you choose!"

"Should I have _you_ otherwise?" said Effi and leaned upon his arm.

That was on the 2d of December. A week later Bismarck was in Varzin,
and Innstetten now knew that until Christmas, and perhaps even for a
longer time, quiet days for him were not to be thought of. The Prince
had cherished a fondness for him ever since the days in Versailles,
and would often invite him to dinner, along with other guests, but
also alone, for the youthful district councillor, distinguished alike
for his bearing and his wisdom, enjoyed the favor of the Princess
also.

The first invitation came for the 14th. As there was snow on the
ground Innstetten planned to take a sleigh for the two hours' drive to
the station, from which he had another hour's ride by train. "Don't
wait for me, Effi. I can't be back before midnight; it will probably
be two o'clock or even later. But I'll not disturb you. Good-by, I'll
see you in the morning." With that he climbed into the sleigh and away
the Isabella-colored span flew through the city and across the country
toward the station.

That was the first long separation, for almost twelve hours. Poor
Effi! How was she to pass the evening? To go to bed early would be
inadvisable, for she would wake up and not be able to go to sleep
again, and would listen for every sound. No, it would be best to wait
till she was very tired and then enjoy a sound sleep. She wrote a
letter to her mother and then went to see Mrs. Kruse, whose condition
aroused her sympathy. This poor woman had the habit of sitting till
late at night with the black chicken in her lap. The friendliness the
visit was meant to show was by no means returned by Mrs. Kruse, who
sat in her overheated room quietly brooding away the time. So when
Effi perceived that her coming was felt as a disturbance rather than a
pleasure she went away, staying merely long enough to ask whether
there was anything the invalid would like to have. But all offers of
assistance were declined.

Meanwhile it had become evening and the lamp was already burning. Effi
walked over to the window of her room and looked out at the grove,
whose trees were covered with glistening snow. She was completely
absorbed in the picture and took no notice of what was going on behind
her in the room. When she turned around she observed that Frederick
had quietly put the coffee tray on the table before the sofa and set a
place for her. "Why, yes, supper. I must sit down, I suppose." But she
could not make herself eat. So she got up from the table and reread
the letter she had written to her mother. If she had had a feeling of
loneliness before, it was doubly intense now. What would she not have
given if the two sandy-haired Jahnkes had just stepped in, or even
Hulda? The latter, to be sure, was always so sentimental and as a
usual thing occupied solely with her own triumphs. But doubtful and
insecure as these triumphs were, nevertheless Effi would be very happy
to be told about them at this moment. Finally she opened the grand
piano to play some music, but she could not play. "No, this will make
me hopelessly melancholy; I will read, rather." She looked for a book,
and the first to fall into her hands was a thick red tourist's
handbook, an old edition, perhaps from the days when Innstetten was a
lieutenant. "Yes, I will read in this book; there is nothing more
quieting than books like this. Only the maps should always be avoided.
But I shall guard against this source of sand in the eyes, which I
hate."

She opened the book at random at page 153. In the adjoining room she
heard the tick-tock of the clock, and out of doors Rollo, who at
nightfall had left his place in the shed, as was his custom every
evening, and had stretched himself out on the large woven mat just
outside the bedroom door. The consciousness that he was near at hand
decreased Effi's feeling that she was forsaken. In fact, it almost put
her in a cheerful mood, and so she began, without further delay, to
read. On the page lying open before her there was something about the
"Hermitage," the well country-seat of the Margrave in the neighborhood
of Beireuth. It attracted her attention. Beireuth, Richard Wagner. So
she read: "Among the pictures in the 'Hermitage' let us mention one
more, which not because of its beauty, but because of its age and the
person it represents, may well claim our interest. It is a woman's
portrait, which has grown dark with age. The head is small, the face
has harsh, rather uncanny features, and she wears a ruff which seems
to support her head. Some think it is an old margravine from the end
of the 15th century, others are of the opinion that it is the Countess
of Orlamunde. All are agreed that it is the picture of the Lady who
since that time has achieved a certain notoriety in the history of the
Hohenzollern dynasty under the name of the 'Lady in white.'"

"That was a lucky accident!" said Effi, as she shoved the book aside.
"I seek to quiet my nerves, and the first thing I run into is the
story of the 'Lady in white,' of whom I have been afraid as long as I
can remember. But inasmuch as I already have a creepy feeling I might
as well finish the story."

She opened the book again and read further: "This old portrait itself,
the original of which plays such a rôle in Hohenzollern history, has
likewise a significance as a picture in the special history of the
Hermitage. No doubt, one circumstance that has something to do with
this is the fact that the picture hangs on a papered door, which is
invisible to the stranger and behind which there is a stairway leading
down into the cellar. It is said that when Napoleon spent the night
here the 'Lady in white' stepped out of the frame and walked up to his
bed. The Emperor, starting with fright, the story continues, called
for his adjutant, and to the end of his life always spoke with
exasperation of this 'cursed palace.'"

"I must give up trying to calm myself by reading," said Effi. "If I
read further, I shall certainly come to a vaulted cellar that the
devil once rode out of on a wine cask. There are several of these in
Germany, I believe, and in a tourist's handbook all such things have
to be collected; that goes without saying. So I will close my eyes,
rather, and recall my wedding-eve celebration as well as I can,--how
the twins could not get any farther because of their tears, and how,
when everybody looked at everybody else with embarrassment, Cousin von
Briest declared that such tears opened the gate to Paradise. He was
truly charming and always in such exuberant spirits. And look at me
now! Here, of all places! Oh, I am not at all suited to be a grand
Lady. Now mama, she would have fitted this position, she would have
sounded the key-note, as behooves the wife of a district councillor,
and Sidonie Grasenabb would have been all homage toward her and would
not have been greatly disturbed about her belief or unbelief. But I--I
am a child and shall probably remain one, too. I once heard that it is
a good fortune. But I don't know whether that is true. Obviously a
wife ought always to adapt herself to the position in which she is
placed."

At this moment Frederick came to clear off the table.

"How late is it, Frederick?"

"It is going on nine, your Ladyship."

"Well, that is worth listening to. Send Johanna to me."

       *       *       *       *       *

"Your Ladyship sent for me."

"Yes, Johanna; I want to go to bed. It is still early, to be sure, but
I am so alone. Please go out first and post this letter, and when you
come back it will surely be time. And even if it isn't."

Effi took the lamp and walked over to her bedroom. Just as she had
expected, there lay Rollo on the rush mat. When he saw her coming he
arose to make room for her to pass, and rubbed his ear against her
hand. Then he lay down again.

Meanwhile Johanna had gone over to the office to post the letter. Over
there she had been in no particular hurry; on the contrary, she had
preferred to carry on a conversation with Mrs. Paaschen, the wife of
the janitor of the building. About the young wife, of course.

"What kind of a woman is she anyhow?" asked Mrs. Paaschen.

"She is very young."

"Well, that is no misfortune, but rather the opposite. Young wives,
and that is just the good thing about them, never do anything but
stand before the mirror and pull at themselves and put on some
ornament. They don't see much or hear much and have not yet formed the
habit of counting the stubs of candles in the kitchen, and they don't
begrudge a maid a kiss if she gets one, simply because she herself no
longer gets any."

"Yes," said Johanna, "that was the way with my former madame, and
wholly without occasion. But there is nothing of that kind about our
mistress."

"Is he very affectionate?"

"Oh very. That you can easily imagine."

"But the fact that he leaves her thus alone--"

"Yes, dear Mrs. Paaschen, but you must not forget--the Prince. After
all, you know, he is a district councillor, and perhaps he wants to
rise still higher."

"Certainly he wants to, and he will, too. It's in him. Paaschen always
says so and he knows."

This walk over to the office had consumed perhaps a quarter of an
hour, and when Johanna returned, Effi was already sitting before the
pier-glass, waiting.

"You were gone a long time, Johanna."

"Yes, your Ladyship--I beg your Ladyship's pardon--I met Mrs. Paaschen
over there and was delayed a bit. It is so quiet here. One is always
glad to meet a person with whom one can speak a word. Christel is a
very good person, but she doesn't talk, and Frederick is such a
sleepy-head. Besides, he is so cautious and never comes right out with
what he has to say. True, one must be able to hold one's tongue when
necessary, and Mrs. Paaschen, who is so inquisitive, is really not at
all according to my taste. Yet one likes to see and hear something
once in a while."

Effi sighed. "Yes, Johanna, it is better so."

"Your Ladyship has such beautiful hair, so long, and soft as silk."

"Yes, it is very soft. But that is not a good thing, Johanna. As the
hair is, so is the character."

"Certainly, your Ladyship. And a soft character is better than a hard
one. I have soft hair, too."

"Yes, Johanna. And you have blonde hair, too. That the men like best."

"Oh, there is a great difference, your Ladyship. There are many who
prefer black."

"To be sure," laughed Effi, "that has been my experience, too. But it
must be because of something else entirely. Now, those who are blonde
always have a white complexion. You have, too, Johanna, and I would
wager my last pfennig that you have a good deal of attention paid to
you. I am still very young, but I know that much. Besides, I have a
girl friend, who was also so blonde, a regular flaxen blonde, even
blonder than you, and she was a preacher's daughter."

"Oh, yes."

"I beg you, Johanna, what do you mean by 'oh yes?' It sounds very
sarcastic and strange, and you have nothing against preachers'
daughters, have you?--She was a very pretty girl, as even our
officers thought, without exception, for we had officers, red hussars,
too. At the same time she knew very well how to dress herself. A black
velvet bodice and a flower, a rose or sometimes heliotrope, and if she
had not had such large protruding eyes--Oh you ought to have seen
them, Johanna, at least this large--" Effi laughingly pulled down her
right eye-lid--"she would have been simply a beauty. Her name was
Hulda, Hulda Niemeyer, and we were not even so very intimate. But if I
had her here now, and she were sitting there, yonder in the corner of
the little sofa, I would chat with her till midnight, or even longer.
I am so homesick"--in saying this she drew Johanna's head close to her
breast--"I am so much afraid."

"Oh, that will soon be overcome, your Ladyship, we were all that way."

"You were all that way? What does that mean, Johanna?"

"If your Ladyship is really so much afraid, why, I can make a bed for
myself here. I can take the straw mattress and turn down a chair, so
that I have something to lean my head against, and then I can sleep
here till morning, or till his Lordship comes home."

"He doesn't intend to disturb me. He promised me that specially."

"Or I can merely sit down in the corner of the sofa."

"Yes, that might do perhaps. No, it will not, either. His Lordship
must not know that I am afraid, he would not like it. He always wants
me to be brave and determined, as he is. And I can't be. I was always
somewhat easily influenced.--But, of course, I see plainly, I must
conquer myself and subject myself to his will in such particulars, as
well as in general. And then I have Rollo, you know. He is lying just
outside the threshold."

Johanna nodded at each statement and finally lit the candle on Effi's
bedroom stand. Then she took the lamp. "Does your Ladyship wish
anything more?"

"No, Johanna. The shutters are closed tight, are they not?"

"Merely drawn to, your Ladyship. Otherwise it would be so dark and
stuffy."

"Very well."

Johanna withdrew, and Effi went to bed and wrapped herself up in the
covers.

She left the candle burning, because she was determined not to go to
sleep at once. On the contrary, she planned to recapitulate her
wedding tour, as she had her wedding-eve celebration a short time
before, and let everything pass before her mind's eye in review. But
it turned out otherwise than she had expected, for when she had
reached Verona and was looking for the house of Juliet Capulet, her
eyes fell shut. The stub of candle in the little silver holder
gradually burned down, flickered once or twice, and went out.

Effi had slept quite soundly for a while, when all of a sudden she
started up out of her sleep with a loud scream, indeed, she was able
to hear the scream, as she awoke, and she also noticed Rollo's barking
outside. His "bow-wow" went echoing down the hall, muffled and almost
terrifying. She felt as though her heart stood still, and was unable
to call out. At this moment something whisked past her, and the door
into the hall sprang open. But the moment of extreme fright was also
the moment of her rescue, for, instead of something terrible, Rollo
now came up to her, sought her hand with his head, and, when he had
found it, lay down upon the rug before her bed. With her other hand
Effi had pressed three times on the button of the bell and in less
than half a minute Johanna was there, in her bare feet, her skirt
hanging over her arm and a large checkered cloth thrown over her head
and shoulders.

"Thank heaven, Johanna, that you are here."

"What was the matter, your Ladyship? Your Ladyship has had a dream."

"Yes, a dream. It must have been something of the sort, but it was
something else besides."

"Pray, what, your Ladyship?"

"I was sleeping quite soundly and suddenly I started up and
screamed--perhaps it was a nightmare--they have nightmares in our
family--My father has them, too, and frightens us with them. Mama
always says he ought not to humor himself so--But that is easy to
say--Well, I started up out of my sleep and screamed, and when I
looked around, as well as I could in the dark, something slipped past
my bed, right there where you are standing now, Johanna, and then it
was gone. And if I ask myself seriously, what it was--"

"Well, your Ladyship?"

"And if I ask myself seriously--I don't like to say it, Johanna--but I
believe it was the Chinaman."

[Illustration: _Permission F Bruckmann, A.-G. Munich_
A STREET SCENE AT PARIS     Adolph von Menzel]

"The one from upstairs?" said Johanna, trying to laugh, "our little
Chinaman that we pasted on the back of the chair, Christel and I? Oh,
your Ladyship has been dreaming, and even if your Ladyship was awake,
it all came from a dream."

"I should believe that, if it had not been exactly the moment when
Rollo began to bark outside. So he must have seen it too. Then the
door flew open and the good faithful animal sprang toward me, as
though he were coming to my rescue. Oh, my dear Johanna, it was
terrible. And I so alone and so young. Oh, if I only had some one here
with whom I could weep. But so far from home--alas, from home."

"The master may come any hour."

"No, he shall not come. He shall not see me thus. He would probably
laugh at me and I could never pardon him for that. For it was so
fearful, Johanna--You must stay here now--But let Christel sleep and
Frederick too. Nobody must know about it."

"Or perhaps I may fetch Mrs. Kruse to join us. She doesn't sleep
anyhow; she sits there all night long."

"No, no, she is a kindred spirit. That black chicken has something to
do with it, too. She must not come. No, Johanna, you just stay here
yourself. And how fortunate that you merely drew the shutters to. Push
them open, make a loud noise, so that I may hear a human sound, a
human sound--I have to call it that, even if it seems queer--and then
open the window a little bit, that I may have air and light."

Johanna did as ordered and Effi leaned back upon her pillows and soon
thereafter fell into a lethargic sleep.




CHAPTER X


It was six o'clock in the morning when Innstetten returned home from
Varzin. He made Rollo omit all demonstrations of affection and then
retired as quietly as possible to his room. Here he lay down in a
comfortable position, but would not allow Frederick to do more than
cover him up with a traveling rug. "Wake me at nine." And at this hour
he was wakened. He arose quickly and said: "Bring my breakfast."

"Her Ladyship is still asleep."

"But it is late. Has anything happened?"

"I don't know. I only know that Johanna had to sleep all night in her
Ladyship's room."

"Well, send Johanna to me then."

She came. She had the same rosy complexion as ever, and so seemed not
to have been specially upset by the events of the night.

"What is this I hear about her Ladyship? Frederick tells me something
happened and you slept in her room."

"Yes, Sir Baron. Her Ladyship rang three times in very quick
succession, and I thought at once it meant something. And it did, too.
She probably had a dream, or it may perhaps have been the other
thing."

"What other thing?"

"Oh, your Lordship knows, I believe."

"I know nothing. In any case we must put an end to it. And how did you
find her Ladyship?"

"She was beside herself and clung to Rollo's collar with all her
might. The dog was standing beside her Ladyship's bed and was
frightened also."

"And what had she dreamed, or, if you prefer, what had she heard or
seen? What did she say?"

"That it just slipped along close by her."

"What? Who?"

"The man from upstairs. The one from the social hall or from the small
chamber."

"Nonsense, I say. Over and over that same silly stuff. I don't want to
hear any more about it. And then you stayed with her Ladyship?"

"Yes, your Lordship. I made a bed on the floor close by her. And I had
to hold her hand, and then she went to sleep."

"And she is still sleeping?"

"Very soundly."

"I am worried about that, Johanna. One can sleep one's self well, but
also ill. We must waken her, cautiously, of course, so that she will
not be startled again. And tell Frederick not to bring the breakfast.
I will wait till her Ladyship is here. Now let me see how clever you
can be."

Half an hour later Effi came. She looked charming, but quite pale, and
was leaning on Johanna. The moment she caught sight of Innstetten she
rushed up to him and embraced and kissed him, while the tears streamed
down her face. "Oh, Geert, thank heaven, you are here. All is well
again now. You must not go away again, you must not leave me alone
again."

"My dear Effi--Just put it down, Frederick, I will do the rest--my
dear Effi, I am not leaving you alone from lack of consideration or
from caprice, but because it is necessary. I have no choice. I am a
man in office and cannot say to the Prince, or even to the Princess:
Your Highness, I cannot come; my wife is so alone, or, my wife is
afraid. If I said that it would put us in a rather comical light, me
certainly, and you, too. But first take a cup of coffee."

Effi drank her coffee and its stimulating effect was plainly to be
seen. Then she took her husband's hand again and said: "You shall have
your way. I see, it is impossible. And then, you know, we aspire to
something higher. I say we, for I am really more eager for it than
you."

"All wives are," laughed Innstetten.

"So it is settled. You will accept invitations as heretofore, and I
will stay here and wait for my 'High Lord,' which reminds me of Hulda
under the elder tree. I wonder how she is getting along?"

"Young ladies like Hulda always get along well. But what else were you
going to say?"

"I was going to say, I will stay here, and even alone, if necessary.
But not in this house. Let us move out. There are such handsome houses
along the quay, one between Consul Martens and Consul Grützmacher, and
one on the Market, just opposite Gieshübler. Why can't we live there?
Why here, of all places? When we have had friends and relatives as
guests in our house I have often heard that in Berlin families move
out on account of piano playing, or on account of cockroaches, or on
account of an unfriendly concierge. If it is done on account of such a
trifle--"

"Trifle? Concierge? Don't say that."

"If it is possible because of such things it must also be possible
here, where you are district councillor and the people are obliged to
do your bidding and many even owe you a debt of gratitude. Gieshübler
would certainly help us, even if only for my sake, for he will
sympathize with me. And now say, Geert, shall we give up this
abominable house, this house with the--"

"Chinaman, you mean. You see, Effi, one can pronounce the fearful word
without his appearing. What you saw or what, as you think, slipped
past your bed, was the little Chinaman that the maids pasted on the
back of the chair upstairs. I'll wager he had a blue coat on and a
very flat-crowned hat, with a shining button on top."

She nodded.

"Now you see, a dream, a hallucination. And then, I presume, Johanna
told you something last night, about the wedding upstairs."

"No."

"So much the better."

"She didn't tell me a word. But from all this I can see that there is
something queer here. And then the crocodile; everything is so uncanny
here."

"The first evening, when you saw the crocodile, you considered it
fairy-like--"

"Yes, then."

"And then, Effi, I can't well leave here now, even if it were possible
to sell the house or make an exchange. It is with this exactly as with
declining an invitation to Varzin. I can't have the people here in the
city saying that District Councillor Innstetten is selling his house
because his wife saw the little pasted-up picture of a Chinaman as a
ghost by her bed. I should be lost, Effi. One can never recover from
such ridiculousness."

"But, Geert, are you so sure that there is nothing of the kind?"

"That I will not affirm. It is a thing that one can believe or,
better, not believe. But supposing there were such things, what harm
do they do? The fact that bacilli are flying around in the air, of
which you have doubtless heard, is much worse and more dangerous than
all this scurrying about of ghosts, assuming that they do scurry
about, and that such a thing really exists. Then I am particularly
surprised to see _you_ show such fear and such an aversion, you a
Briest. Why, it is as though you came from a low burgher family.
Ghosts are a distinction, like the family tree and the like, and I
know families that would as lief give up their coat of arms as their
'Lady in white,' who may even be in black, for that matter."

Effi remained silent.

"Well, Effi; no answer?"

"What do you expect me to answer? I have given in to you and shown
myself docile, but I think you in turn might be more sympathetic. If
you knew how I long for sympathy. I have suffered a great deal, really
a very great deal, and when I saw you I thought I should now be rid of
my fear. But you merely told me you had no desire to make yourself
ridiculous in the eyes either of the Prince or of the city. That is
small comfort. I consider it small, and so much the smaller, since, to
cap the climax, you contradict yourself, and not only seem to believe
in these things yourself, but even expect me to have a nobleman's
pride in ghosts. Well, I haven't. When you talk about families that
value their ghosts as highly as their coat of arms, all I have to say
is, that is a matter of taste, and I count my coat of arms worth more.
Thank heaven, we Briests have no ghosts. The Briests were always very
good people and that probably accounts for it."

The dispute would doubtless have gone on longer and might perhaps have
led to a first serious misunderstanding if Frederick had not entered
to hand her Ladyship a letter. "From Mr. Gieshübler. The messenger is
waiting for an answer."

All the ill-humor on Effi's countenance vanished immediately. It did
her good merely to hear Gieshübler's name, and her cheerful feeling
was further heightened when she examined the letter. In the first
place it was not a letter at all, but a note, the address "Madame the
Baroness von Innstetten, _née_ Briest," in a beautiful court hand, and
instead of a seal a little round picture pasted on, a lyre with a
staff sticking in it. But the staff might also be an arrow. She handed
the note to her husband, who likewise admired it.

"Now read it."

Effi broke open the wafer and read: "Most highly esteemed Lady, most
gracious Baroness: Permit me to join to my most respectful forenoon
greeting a most humble request. By the noon train a dear friend of
mine for many years past, a daughter of our good city of Kessin, Miss
Marietta Trippelli, will arrive here to sojourn in our midst
till tomorrow morning. On the 17th she expects to be in St.
Petersburg, where she will give concerts till the middle of January.
Prince Kotschukoff is again opening his hospitable house to her. In
her immutable kindness to me, Miss Trippelli has promised to spend
this evening at my house and sing some songs, leaving the choice
entirely to me, for she knows no such thing as difficulty. Could
Madame the Baroness consent to attend this soirée musicale, at seven
o'clock? Your husband, upon whose appearance I count with certainty,
will support my most humble request. The only other guests are Pastor
Lindequist, who will accompany, and the widow Trippel, of course.
Your most obedient servant. A. Gieshübler."

"Well," said Innstetten, "yes or no?"

"Yes, of course. That will pull me through. Besides, I cannot decline
my dear Gieshübler's very first invitation."

"Agreed. So, Frederick, tell Mirambo, for I take it for granted he
brought the letter, that we shall have the honor."

Frederick went out. When he was gone Effi asked: "Who is Mirambo?"

"The genuine Mirambo is a robber chief in Africa,--Lake Tanganyika, if
your geography extends that far--but ours is merely Gieshübler's
charcoal dispenser and factotum, and will this evening, in all
probability, serve as a waiter in dress coat and cotton gloves."

It was quite apparent that the little incident had had a favorable
effect on Effi and had restored to her a good share of her
light-heartedness. But Innstetten wished to do what he could to hasten
the convalescence. "I am glad you said yes, so quickly and without
hesitation, and now I should like to make a further proposal to you to
restore you entirely to your normal condition. I see plainly, you are
still annoyed by something from last night foreign to my Effi and it
must be got rid of absolutely. There is nothing better for that than
fresh air. The weather is splendid, cool and mild at the same time,
with hardly a breeze stirring. How should you like to take a drive
with me? A long one, not merely out through the "Plantation." In the
sleigh, of course, with the sleigh-bells on and the white snow
blankets. Then if we are back by four you can take a rest, and at
seven we shall be at Gieshübler's and hear Trippelli."

Effi took his hand. "How good you are, Geert, and how indulgent! For I
must have seemed to you very childish, or at least very childlike,
first in the episode of fright and then, later, when I asked you to
sell the house, but worst of all in what I said about the Prince. I
urged you to break off all connection with him, and that would be
ridiculous. For after all he is the one man who has to decide our
destiny. Mine, too. You don't know how ambitious I am. To tell the
truth, it was only out of ambition that I married you. Oh, you must
not put on such a serious expression. I love you, you know. What is it
we say when we pluck a blossom and tear off the petals? 'With all my
heart, with grief and pain, beyond compare.'" She burst out laughing.
"And now tell me," she continued, as Innstetten still kept silent,
"whither shall we go?"

"I thought, to the railway station, by a roundabout way, and then back
by the turnpike. We can dine at the station or, better, at
Golchowski's, at the Prince Bismarck Hotel, which we passed on the day
of our return home, as you perhaps remember. Such a visit always has a
good effect, and then I can have a political conversation with the
Starost by the grace of Effi, and even if he does not amount to much
personally he keeps his hotel in good condition and his cuisine in
still better. The people here are connoisseurs when it comes to eating
and drinking."

It was about eleven when they had this conversation. At twelve Kruse
drove the sleigh up to the door and Effi got in. Johanna was going to
bring a foot bag and furs, but Effi, after all that she had juat
passed through, felt so strongly the need of fresh air that she took
only a double blanket and refused everything else. Innstetten said to
Kruse: "Now, Kruse, we want to drive to the station where you and I
were this morning. The people will wonder at it, but that doesn't
matter. Say, we drive here past the 'Plantation,' and then to the left
toward the Kroschentin church tower. Make the horses fly. We must be
at the station at one."

Thus began the drive. Over the white roofs of the city hung a bank of
smoke, for there was little stir in the air. They flew past Utpatel's
mill, which turned very slowly, and drove so close to the churchyard
that the tips of the barberry bushes which hung out over the lattice
brushed against Effi, and showered snow upon her blanket. On the other
side of the road was a fenced-in plot, not much larger than a garden
bed, and with nothing to be seen inside except a young pine tree,
which rose out of the centre.

"Is anybody buried there?" asked Effi.

"Yes, the Chinaman."

Effi was startled; it came to her like a stab. But she had strength
enough to control herself and ask with apparent composure: "Ours?"

"Yes, ours. Of course, he could not be accommodated in the community
graveyard and so Captain Thomsen, who was what you might call his
friend, bought this patch and had him buried here. There is also a
stone with an inscription. It all happened before my time, of course,
but it is still talked about."

"So there is something in it after all. A story. You said something of
the kind this morning. And I suppose it would be best for me to hear
what it is. So long as I don't know, I shall always be a victim of my
imaginations, in spite of all my good resolutions. Tell me the real
story. The reality cannot worry me so much as my fancy."

"Good for you, Effi. I didn't intend to speak about it. But now it
comes in naturally, and that is well. Besides, to tell the truth, it
is nothing at all."

"All the same to me: nothing at all or much or little. Only begin."

"Yes, that is easy to say. The beginning is always the hardest part,
even with stories. Well, I think I shall begin with Captain Thomsen."

"Very well."

"Now Thomsen, whom I have already mentioned, was for many years a
so-called China-voyager, always on the way between Shanghai and
Singapore with a cargo of rice, and may have been about sixty when he
arrived here. I don't know whether he was born here or whether he had
other relations here. To make a long story short, now that he was here
he sold his ship, an old tub that he disposed of for very little, and
bought a house, the same that we are now living in. For out in the
world he had become a wealthy man. This accounts for the crocodile and
the shark and, of course, the ship. Thomsen was a very adroit man, as
I have been told, and well liked, even by Mayor Kirstein, but above
all by the man who was at that time the pastor in Kessin, a native of
Berlin, who had come here shortly before Thomsen and had met with a
great deal of opposition."

"I believe it. I notice the same thing. They are so strict and
self-righteous here. I believe that is Pomeranian."

"Yes and no, depending. There are other regions where they are not at
all strict and where things go topsy-turvy--But just see, Effi, there
we have the Kroschentin church tower right close in front of us. Shall
we not give up the station and drive over to see old Mrs. von
Grasenabb? Sidonie, if I am rightly informed, is not at home. So we
might risk it."

"I beg you, Geert, what are you thinking of? Why, it is heavenly to
fly along thus, and I can simply feel myself being restored and all my
fear falling from me. And now you ask me to sacrifice all that merely
to pay these old people a flying visit and very likely cause them
embarrassment. For heaven's sake let us not. And then I want above all
to hear the story. We were talking about Captain Thomsen, whom I
picture to myself as a Dane or an Englishman, very clean, with white
stand-up collar, and perfectly white linen."

"Quite right. So he is said to have looked. And with him lived a young
person of about twenty, whom some took for his niece, but most people
for his grand-daughter. The latter, however, considering their ages,
was hardly possible. Beside the grand-daughter or the niece, there was
also a Chinaman living with him, the same one who lies there among the
dunes and whose grave we have just passed."

"Fine, fine."

"This Chinaman was a servant at Thomsen's and Thomsen thought a great
deal of him, so that he was really more a friend than a servant. And
it remained so for over a year. Then suddenly it was rumored that
Thomsen's grand-daughter, who, I believe, was called Nina, was to be
married to a captain, in accordance with the old man's wish. And so
indeed it came about. There was a grand wedding at the house, the
Berlin pastor married them. The miller Utpatel, a Scottish Covenanter,
and Gieshübler, a feeble light in church matters, were invited, but
the more prominent guests were a number of captains with their wives
and daughters. And, as you can imagine, there was a lively time. In
the evening there was dancing, and the bride danced with every man and
finally with the Chinaman. Then all of a sudden the report spread that
she had vanished. And she was really gone, somewhere, but nobody knew
just what had happened. A fortnight later the Chinaman died. Thomsen
bought the plot I have shown you and had him buried in it. The Berlin
Pastor is said to have remarked: 'The Chinaman might just as well have
been buried in the Christian churchyard, for he was a very good man
and exactly as good as the rest.' Whom he really meant by the rest,
Gieshübler says nobody quite knew."

"Well, in this matter I am absolutely against the pastor. Nobody ought
to say such things, for they are dangerous and unbecoming. Even
Niemeyer would not have said that."

"The poor pastor, whose name, by the way, was Trippel, was very
seriously criticised for it, and it was truly a blessing that he soon
afterward died, for he would have lost his position otherwise. The
city was opposed to him, just as you are, in spite of the fact that
they had called him, and the Consistory, of course, was even more
antagonistic."

"Trippel, you say? Then, I presume, there is some connection between
him and the pastor's widow, Mrs. Trippel, whom we are to see this
evening."

"Certainly there is a connection. He was her husband, and the father
of Miss Trippelli."

Effi laughed. "Of Miss Trippelli! At last I see the whole affair in a
clear light. That she was born in Kessin, Gieshübler wrote me, you
remember. But I thought she was the daughter of an Italian consul. We
have so many foreign names here, you know. And now I find she is good
German and a descendant of Trippel. Is she so superior that she could
venture to Italianize her name in this fashion?"

"The daring shall inherit the earth. Moreover she is quite good. She
spent a few years in Paris with the famous Madame Viardot, and there
made the acquaintance of the Russian Prince. Russian Princes, you
know, are very enlightened, are above petty class prejudices, and
Kotschukoff and Gieshübler--whom she calls uncle, by the way, and one
might almost call him a born uncle--it is, strictly speaking, these
two who have made little Marie Trippel what she is. It was Gieshübler
who induced her to go to Paris and Kotschukoff made her over into
Marietta Trippelli."

"Ah, Geert, what a charming story this is and what a humdrum life I
have led in Hohen-Cremmen! Never a thing out of the ordinary."

Innstetten took her hand and said: "You must not speak thus, Effi.
With respect to ghosts one may take whatever attitude one likes. But
beware of 'out of the ordinary' things, or what is loosely called out
of the ordinary. That which appears to you so enticing, even a life
such as Miss Trippelli leads, is as a rule bought at the price of
happiness. I know quite well how you love Hohen-Cremmen and are
attached to it, but you often make sport of it, too, and have no
conception of how much quiet days like those in Hohen-Cremmen mean."

"Yes I have," she said. "I know very well. Only I like to hear about
something else once in a while, and then the desire comes over me to
have a similar experience. But you are quite right, and, to tell the
truth, I long for peace and quiet."

Innstetten shook his finger at her. "My dear, dear Effi, that again
you only imagine. Always fancies, first one thing, then another."




CHAPTER XI


[Innstetten and Effi stopped at the Prince Bismarck Hotel for dinner
and heard some of Golchowski's gossip. All three went out near the
tracks, when they heard a fast express coming, and as it passed in the
direction of Effi's old home, it filled her heart with longing. The
soirée musicale at Gieshübler's was particularly enlivened by the
bubbling humor of Miss Trippelli, whose singing was excellent, but did
not overshadow her talent as a conversationalist. Effi admired her
ability to sing dramatic pieces with composure. An uncanny ballad led
to a discussion of haunted houses and ghosts, in both of which Miss
Trippelli believed.]




CHAPTER XII


The guests did not go home till late. Soon after ten Effi remarked to
Gieshübler that it was about time to leave, as Miss Trippelli must not
miss her train and would have to leave Kessin at six in order to catch
it. But Miss Trippelli overheard the remark and, in her own peculiar
unabashed way, protested against such thoughtful consideration. "Ah,
most gracious Lady, you think that one following my career needs
regular sleep, but you are mistaken. What we need regularly is
applause and high prices. Oh, laugh if you like. Besides, I can sleep
in my compartment on the train--for one learns to do such things--in
any position and even on my left side, and I don't even need to
unfasten my dress. To be sure, I am never laced tight; chest and lungs
must always be free, and, above all, the heart. Yes, most gracious
Lady, that is the prime essential. And then, speaking of sleep in
general, it is not the quantity that tells; it is the quality. A good
nap of five minutes is better than five hours of restless turning over
and over, first one way, then the other. Besides, one sleeps
marvelously in Russia, in spite of the strong tea. It must be the air
that causes it, or late dinners, or because one is so pampered. There
are no cares in Russia; in that regard Russia is better than America.
In the matter of money the two are equal." After this explanation on
the part of Miss Trippelli, Effi desisted from further warnings that
it was time to go. When twelve o'clock came, the guests, who had
meanwhile developed a certain degree of intimacy, bade their host a
merry and hearty good night.

       *       *       *       *       *

Three days later Gieshübler's friend brought herself once more to
Effi's attention by a telegram in French, from St. Petersburg: "Madame
the Baroness von Innstetten, née von Briest. Arrived safe. Prince K.
at station. More taken with me than ever. Thousand thanks for your
good reception. Kindest regards to Monsieur the Baron. Marietta
Trippelli."

Innstetten was delighted and gave more enthusiastic expression to his
delight than Effi was able to understand.

"I don't understand you, Geert."

"Because you don't understand Miss Trippelli. It's her true self in
the telegram, perfect to a dot."

"So you take it all as a bit of comedy."

"As what else could I take it, pray? All calculated for friends there
and here, for Kotschukoff and Gieshübler. Gieshübler will probably
found something for Miss Trippelli, or maybe just leave her a legacy."

Gieshübler's party had occurred in the middle of December.
Immediately thereafter began the preparations for Christmas. Effi, who
might otherwise have found it hard to live through these days,
considered it a blessing to have a household with demands that had to
be satisfied. It was a time for pondering, deciding, and buying, and
this left no leisure for gloomy thoughts. The day before Christmas
gifts arrived from her parents, and in the parcels were packed a
variety of trifles from the precentor's family: beautiful queenings
from a tree grafted by Effi and Jahnke several years ago, beside brown
pulse-warmers and knee-warmers from Bertha and Hertha. Hulda only
wrote a few lines, because, as she pretended, she had still to knit a
traveling shawl for X. "That is simply not true," said Effi, "I'll
wager, there is no X in existence. What a pity she cannot cease
surrounding herself with admirers who do not exist!"

When the evening came Innstetten himself arranged the presents for his
young wife. The tree was lit, and a small angel hung at the top. On
the tree was discovered a cradle with pretty transparencies and
inscriptions, one of which referred to an event looked forward to in
the Innstetten home the following year. Effi read it and blushed. Then
she started toward Innstetten to thank him, but before she had time to
carry out her design a Yule gift was thrown into the hall with a
shout, in accordance with the old Pomeranian custom. It proved to be a
box filled with a world of things. At the bottom they found the most
important gift of all, a neat little lozenge box, with a number of
Japanese pictures pasted on it, and inside of it a note, running,--


  "Three kings once came on a Christmas eve,
  The king of the Moors was one, I believe;--
  The druggist at the sign of the Moor
  Today with spices raps at your door;
  Regretting no incense or myrrh to have found,
  He throws pistachio and almonds around."


Effi read the note two or three times and was pleased. "The homage of
a good man has something very comforting about it. Don't you think so,
Geert?"

"Certainly I do. It is the only thing that can afford real pleasure,
or at least ought to. Every one is otherwise so encumbered with stupid
obligations--I am myself. But, after all, one is what one is."

The first holiday was church day, on the second they went to the
Borckes'. Everybody was there, except the Grasenabbs, who declined to
come, "because Sidonie was not at home." This excuse struck everybody
as rather strange. Some even whispered: "On the contrary, this is the
very reason they ought to have come."

New Year's eve there was to be a club ball, which Effi could not well
miss, nor did she wish to, for it would give her an opportunity to see
the cream of the city all at once. Johanna had her hands full with the
preparation of the ball dress. Gieshübler, who, in addition to his
other hobbies, owned a hothouse, had sent Effi some camelias.
Innstetten, in spite of the little time at his disposal, had to drive
in the afternoon to Papenhagen, where three barns had burned.

It became very quiet in the house. Christel, not having anything to
do, sleepily shoved a footstool up to the stove, and Effi retired into
her bedroom, where she sat down at a small writing desk between the
mirror and the sofa, to write to her mother. She had already written a
postal card, acknowledging receipt of the Christmas letter and
presents, but had written no other news for weeks.

/#
  "Kessin, Dec. 31.

  "_My dear mama_:

  "This will probably be a long letter, as I have not let you
  hear from me for a long time. The card doesn't count. The last
  time I wrote, I was in the midst of Christmas preparations; now
  the Christmas holidays are past and gone. Innstetten and my
  good friend Gieshübler left nothing undone to make Holy Night
  as agreeable for me as possible, but I felt a little lonely and
  homesick for you. Generally speaking, much as I have cause to
  be grateful and happy, I cannot rid myself entirely of a
  feeling of loneliness, and if I formerly made more fun than
  necessary, perhaps, of Hulda's eternal tears of emotion, I am
  now being punished for it and have to fight against such tears
  myself, for Innstetten must not see them. However, I am sure
  that it will all be better when our household is more
  enlivened, which is soon to be the case, my dear mama. What I
  recently hinted at is now a certainty and Innstetten gives me
  daily proof of his joy on account of it. It is not necessary to
  assure you how happy I myself am when I think of it, for the
  simple reason that I shall then have life and entertainment at
  home, or, as Geert says, 'a dear little plaything.' This word
  of his is doubtless proper, but I wish he would not use it,
  because it always give me a little shock and reminds me how
  young I am and that I still half belong in the nursery. This
  notion never leaves me (Geert says it is pathological) and, as
  a result, the thing that should be my highest happiness is
  almost the contrary, a constant embarrassment for me. Recently,
  dear mama, when the good Flemming damsels plied me with all
  sorts of questions imaginable, it seemed as though I were
  undergoing an examination poorly prepared, and I think I must
  have answered very stupidly. I was out of sorts, too, for often
  what looks like sympathy is mere inquisitiveness, and theirs
  impressed me as the more meddlesome, since I have a long while
  yet to wait for the happy event. Some time in the summer, early
  in July, I think. You must come then, or better still, so soon
  as I am at all able to get about, I'll take a vacation and set
  out for Hohen-Cremmen to see you. Oh, how happy it makes me to
  think of it and of the Havelland air! Here it is almost always
  cold and raw. There I shall drive out upon the marsh every day
  and see red and yellow flowers everywhere, and I can even now
  see the baby stretching out its hands for them, for I know it
  must feel really at home there. But I write this for you alone.
  Innstetten must not know about it and I should excuse myself
  even to you for wanting to come to Hohen-Cremmen with the baby,
  and for announcing my visit so early, instead of inviting you
  urgently and cordially to Kessin, which, you may know, has
  fifteen hundred summer guests every year, and ships with all
  kinds of flags, and even a hotel among the dunes. But if I show
  so little hospitality it is not because I am inhospitable. I am
  not so degenerate as that. It is simply because our residence,
  with all its handsome and unusual features, is in reality not a
  suitable house at all; it is only a lodging for two people, and
  hardly that, for we haven't even a dining room, which, as you
  can well imagine, is embarrassing when people come to visit us.
  True, we have other rooms upstairs, a large social hall and
  four small rooms, but there is something uninviting about them,
  and I should call them lumber rooms, if there were any lumber
  in them. But they are entirely empty, except for a few
  rush-bottomed chairs, and leave a very queer impression, to say
  the least. You no doubt think this very easy to change, but the
  house we live in is--is haunted. Now it is out. I beseech you,
  however, not to make any reference to this in your answer, for
  I always show Innstetten your letters and he would be beside
  himself if he found out what I have written to you. I ought not
  to have done it either, especially as I have been undisturbed
  for a good many weeks and have ceased to be afraid; but Johanna
  tells me it will come back again, especially if some new person
  appears in the house. I couldn't think of exposing you to such
  a danger, or--if that is too harsh an expression--to such a
  peculiar and uncomfortable disturbance. I will not trouble you
  with the matter itself today, at least not in detail. They tell
  the story of an old captain, a so-called China-voyager, and
  his grand-daughter, who after a short engagement to a young
  captain here suddenly vanished on her wedding day. That might
  pass, but there is something of greater moment. A young
  Chinaman, whom her father had brought back from China and who
  was at first the servant and later the friend of the old man,
  died shortly afterward and was buried in a lonely spot near the
  churchyard. Not long ago I drove by there, but turned my face
  away quickly and looked in the other direction, because I
  believe I should otherwise have seen him sitting on the grave.
  For oh, my dear mama, I have really seen him once, or it at
  least seemed so, when I was sound asleep and Innstetten was
  away from home visiting the Prince. It was terrible. I should
  not like to experience anything like it again. I can't well
  invite you to such a house, handsome as it is otherwise, for,
  strange to say, it is both uncanny and cozy. Innstetten did not
  do exactly the right thing about it either, if you will allow
  me to say so, in spite of the fact that I finally agreed with
  him in many particulars. He expected me to consider it nothing
  but old wives' nonsense and laugh about it, but all of a sudden
  he himself seemed to believe in it, at the very time when he
  was making the queer demand of me to consider such hauntings a
  mark of blue blood and old nobility. But I can't do it and I
  won't, either. Kind as he is in other regards, in this
  particular he is not kind and considerate enough toward me.
  That there is something in it I know from Johanna and also from
  Mrs. Kruse. The latter is our coachman's wife and always sits
  holding a black chicken in an overheated room. This alone is
  enough to scare one. Now you know why _I_ want to come when the
  time arrives. Oh, if it were only time now! There are so many
  reasons for this wish. Tonight we have a New Year's eve ball,
  and Gieshübler, the only amiable man here, in spite of the fact
  that he has one shoulder higher than the other, or, to tell the
  truth, has even a greater deformity--Gieshübler has sent me
  some camelias. Perhaps I shall dance after all. Our doctor says
  it would not hurt me; on the contrary. Innstetten has also
  given his consent, which almost surprised me. And now remember
  me to papa and kiss him for me, and all the other dear friends.
  Happy New Year!

  Your Effi."




CHAPTER XIII


The New Year's eve ball lasted till the early morning and Effi was
generously admired, not quite so unhesitatingly, to be sure, as the
bouquet of camelias, which was known to have come from Gieshübler's
greenhouse. After the ball everybody fell back into the same old
routine, and hardly any attempt was made to establish closer social
relations. Hence the winter seemed very long. Visits from the noble
families of the neighborhood were rare, and when Effi was reminded of
her duty to return the visits she always remarked in a half-sorrowful
tone: "Yes, Geert, if it is absolutely necessary, but I shall be bored
to death." Innstetten never disputed the statement. What was said,
during these afternoon calls, about families, children, and
agriculture, was bearable, but when church questions were discussed
and the pastors present were treated like little popes, even looked
upon themselves as such, then Effi lost her patience and her mind
wandered sadly back to Niemeyer, who was always modest and
unpretentious, in spite of the fact that on every important occasion
it was said he had the stuff in him to be called to the cathedral.
Seemingly friendly as were the Borcke, Flemming, and Grasenabb
families, with the exception of Sidonie Grasenabb, real friendship was
out of the question, and often there would have been very little of
pleasure and amusement, or even of reasonably agreeable association,
if it had not been for Gieshübler.

He looked out for Effi as though he were a special Providence, and she
was grateful to him for it. In addition to his many other interests he
was a faithful and attentive reader of the newspapers. He was, in
fact, the head of the Journal Club, and so scarcely a day passed that
Mirambo did not bring to Effi a large white envelope full of separate
sheets and whole papers, in which particular passages were marked,
usually with a fine lead pencil, but occasionally with a heavy blue
pencil and an exclamation or interrogation point. And that was not
all. He also sent figs and dates, and chocolate drops done up in satin
paper and tied with a little red ribbon. Whenever any specially
beautiful flower was blooming in his greenhouse he would bring some of
the blossoms himself and spend a happy hour chatting with his adored
friend. He cherished in his heart, both separately and combined, all
the beautiful emotions of love--that of a father and an uncle, a
teacher and an admirer. Effi was affected by all these attentions and
wrote to Hohen-Cremmen about them so often that her mother began to
tease her about her "love for the alchymist." But this well-meant
teasing failed of its purpose; it was almost painful to her, in fact,
because it made her conscious, even though but dimly, of what was
really lacking in her married life, viz., outspoken admiration,
helpful suggestions, and little attentions.

Innstetten was kind and good, but he was not a lover. He felt that he
loved Effi; hence his clear conscience did not require him to make any
special effort to show it. It had almost become a rule with him to
retire from his wife's room to his own when Frederick brought the
lamp. "I have a difficult matter yet to attend to." With that he went.
To be sure, the portiere was left thrown back, so that Effi could hear
the turning of the pages of the document or the scratching of his pen,
but that was all. Then Rollo would often come and lie down before her
upon the fireplace rug, as much as to say: "Must just look after you
again; nobody else does." Then she would stoop down and say softly:
"Yes, Rollo, we are alone." At nine Innstetten would come back for
tea, usually with the newspaper in his hand, and would talk about the
Prince, who was having so much annoyance again, especially because of
that Eugen Richter, whose conduct and language beggared all
description. Then he would read over the list of appointments made and
orders conferred, to the most of which he objected. Finally he would
talk about the election and how fortunate it was to preside over a
district in which there was still some feeling of respect. When he had
finished with this he asked Effi to play something, either from
_Lohengrin_ or the _Walküre_, for he was a Wagner enthusiast. What had
won him over to this composer nobody quite knew. Some said, his
nerves, for matter-of-fact as he seemed, he was in reality nervous.
Others ascribed it to Wagner's position on the Jewish question.
Probably both sides were right. At ten Innstetten relaxed and indulged
in a few well-meant, but rather tired caresses, which Effi accepted,
without genuinely returning them.

Thus passed the winter. April came and Effi was glad when the garden
behind the court began to show green.

She could hardly wait for summer to come with its walks along the
beach and its guests at the baths. * * * The months had been so
monotonous that she once wrote: "Can you imagine, mama, that I have
almost become reconciled to our ghost? Of course, that terrible night,
when Geert was away at the Prince's house, I should not like to live
through again, no, certainly not; but this being always alone, with
nothing whatever happening, is hard, too, and when I wake up in the
night I occasionally listen to see if I can hear the shoes, shuffling
up above, and when all is quiet I am almost disappointed and say to
myself: If only it would come back, but not too bad and not too
close!"

It was in February that Effi wrote these words and now it was almost
May. The "Plantation" was beginning to take on new life again and one
could hear the song of the finches. During this same week the storks
returned, and one of them soared slowly over her house and alighted
upon a barn near Utpatel's mill, its old resting place. Effi, who now
wrote to her mother more frequently than heretofore, reported this
happening, and at the conclusion of her letter said: "I had almost
forgotten one thing, my dear mama, viz., the new district commander of
the landwehr, who has been here now for almost four weeks. But shall
we really have him? That is the question, and a question of
importance, too, much as my statement will make you laugh, because you
do not know how we are suffering here from social famine. At least I
am, for I am at a loss to know what to make of the nobility here. My
fault, perhaps, but that is immaterial. The fact remains, there has
been a famine, and for this reason I have looked forward, through all
the winter months, to the new district commander as a bringer of
comfort and deliverance. His predecessor was an abominable combination
of bad manners and still worse morals and, as though that were not
enough, was always in financial straits. We have suffered under him
all this time, Innstetten more than I, and when we heard early in
April that Major von Crampas was here--for that is the name of the new
man--we rushed into each other's arms, as though no further harm could
befall us in our dear Kessin. But, as already mentioned, it seems as
though there will be nothing going on, now that he is here. He is
married, has two children, one eight, the other ten years old, and
his wife is a year older than he--say, forty-five. That of itself
would make little difference, and why shouldn't I find a motherly
friend delightfully entertaining? Miss Trippelli was nearly thirty,
and I got along with her quite well. But Mrs. Crampas, who by the way
was not a _von_, is impossible. She is always out of sorts, almost
melancholy, much like our Mrs. Kruse, of whom she reminds me not a
little, and it all comes from jealousy. Crampas himself is said to be
a man of many 'relations,' a ladies' man, which always sounds
ridiculous to me and would in this case, if he had not had a duel with
a comrade on account of just such a thing. His left arm was shattered
just below the shoulder and it is noticeable at first sight, in spite
of the operation, which was heralded abroad as a masterpiece of
surgical art. It was performed by Wilms and I believe they call it
resection.

"Both Mr. and Mrs. Crampas were at our house a fortnight ago to pay us
a visit. The situation was painful, for Mrs. Crampas watched her
husband so closely that he became half-embarrassed, and I wholly. That
he can be different, even jaunty and in high spirits, I was convinced
three days ago, when, he sat alone with Innstetten, and I was able to
follow their conversation from my room. I afterward talked with him
myself and found him a perfect gentleman and extraordinarily clever.
Innstetten was in the same brigade with him during the war and they
often saw each other at Count Gröben's to the north of Paris. Yes, my
dear mama, he is just the man to instill new life into Kessin.
Besides, he has none of the Pomeranian prejudices, even though he is
said to have come from Swedish Pomerania. But his wife! Nothing can be
done without her, of course, and still less with her."

Effi was quite right. As a matter of fact no close friendship was
established with the Crampas family. They met once at the Borckes',
again quite casually at the station, and a few days later on a steamer
excursion up the "Broad" to a large beech and oak forest called "The
Chatter-man." But they merely exchanged short greetings, and Effi was
glad when the bathing season opened early in June. To be sure, there
was still a lack of summer visitors, who as a rule did not come in
numbers before St. John's Day. But even the preparations afforded
entertainment. In the "Plantation" a merry-go-round and targets were
set up, the boatmen calked and painted their boats, every little
apartment put up new curtains, and rooms with damp exposure and
subject to dry-rot were fumigated and aired.

In Effi's own home everybody was also more or less excited, not
because of summer visitors, however, but of another expected arrival.
Even Mrs. Kruse wished to help as much as she could. But Effi was
alarmed at the thought of it and said: "Geert, don't let Mrs. Kruse
touch anything. It would do no good, and I have enough to worry about
without that." Innstetten promised all she asked, adding that Christel
and Johanna would have plenty of time, anyhow.

       *       *       *       *       *

[An elderly widow and her maid arrived and took rooms for the season
opposite the Innstetten house. The widow died and was buried in the
cemetery. After watching the funeral from her window Effi walked out
to the hotel among the dunes and on her way home turned into the
cemetery, where she found the widow's maid sitting in the burning
sun.]

       *       *       *       *       *

"It is a hot place you have picked out," said Effi, "much too hot. And
if you are not cautious you may have a sun-stroke."

"That would be a blessing."

"How so?"

"Then I should be out of the world."

"I don't think you ought to say that, even if you had bad luck or lost
a dear friend. I presume you loved her very dearly?"

"I? Her? Oh, heaven forbid!"

"You are very sad, however, and there must be some cause."

"There is, too, your Ladyship."

"Do you know me?"

"Yes. You are the wife of the district councillor across the street
from us. I was always talking with the old woman about you. But the
time came when she could talk no more, because she could not draw a
good breath. There was something the matter with her here, dropsy,
perhaps. But so long as she could speak she spoke incessantly. She was
a genuine Berlin--"

"Good woman?"

"No. If I said that it would be a lie. She is in her grave now and we
ought not to say anything bad about the dead, especially as even they
hardly have peace. Oh well, I suppose she has found peace. But she was
good for nothing and was quarrelsome and stingy and made no provision
for me. The relatives who came yesterday from Berlin * * * were very
rude and unkind to me and raised all sorts of objections when they
paid me my wages, merely because they had to and because there are
only six more days before the beginning of a new quarter. Otherwise I
should have received nothing, or only half, or only a quarter--nothing
with their good will. And they gave me a torn five-mark note to pay my
fare back to Berlin. Well, it is just enough for a fourth-class ticket
and I suppose I shall have to sit on my luggage. But I won't do it. I
will sit here and wait till I die--Heavens, I thought I should have
peace here and I could have stood it with the old woman, too. But now
this has come to nothing and I shall have to be knocked around again.
Besides, I am a Catholic. Oh, I have had enough of it and I wish I lay
where the old woman lies. She might go on living for all of me. * * *"



Rollo, who had accompanied Effi, had meanwhile sat down before the
maid, with his tongue away out, and looked at her. When she stopped
talking he arose, stepped forward, and laid his head upon her knees.
Suddenly she was transformed. "My, this means something for me. Why,
here is a creature that can endure me, that looks at me like a friend
and lays its head on my knees. My, it has been a long time since
anything like that has happened to me. Well, old boy, what's your
name? My, but you are a splendid fellow!"

"Rollo," said Effi.

"Rollo; that is strange. But the name makes no difference. I have a
strange name, too, that is, forename. And the likes of me have no
other, you know."

"What is your name?"

"I am called Roswitha."

"Yes, that is strange; why, that is--"

"Yes, quite right, your Ladyship, it is a Catholic name. And that is
another trouble, that I am a Catholic. From Eichsfeld. Being a
Catholic makes it harder and more disagreeable for me. Many won't have
Catholics, because they run to the church so much. * * *"

"Roswitha," said Effi, sitting down by her on the bench. "What are you
going to do now?"

"Ah, your Ladyship, what could I be going to do? Nothing. Honestly and
truly, I should like to sit here and wait till I fall over dead. * *
*"

"I want to ask you something, Roswitha. Are you fond of children? Have
you ever taken care of little children?"

"Indeed I have. That is the best and finest thing about me. * * * When
a dear little thing stands up in one's lap, a darling little creature
like a doll, and looks at one with its little peepers, that, I tell
you, is something that opens up one's heart. * * *"

"Now let me tell you, Roswitha, you are a good true person; I can
tell it by your looks. A little bit unceremonious, but that doesn't
hurt; it is often true of the best people, and I have had confidence
in you from the beginning. Will you come along to my house? It seems
as though God had sent you to me. I am expecting a little one soon,
and may God help me at the time. When the child comes it must be cared
for and waited upon and perhaps even fed from a bottle, though I hope
not. But one can never tell. What do you say? Will you come?"

Roswitha sprang up, seized the hand of the young wife and kissed it
fervently. "Oh, there is indeed a God in heaven, and when our need is
greatest help is nearest. Your Ladyship shall see, I can do it. I am
an orderly person and have good references. You can see for yourself
when I bring you my book. The very first time I saw your Ladyship I
thought: 'Oh, if I only had such a mistress!' And now I am to have
her. O, dear God, O, holy Virgin Mary, who would have thought it
possible, when we had put the old woman in her grave and the relatives
made haste to get away and left me sitting here?"

"Yes, it is the unexpected that often happens, Roswitha, and
occasionally for our good. Let us go now. Rollo is getting impatient
and keeps running down to the gate."

Roswitha was ready at once, but went back to the grave, mumbled a few
words and crossed herself. Then they walked down the shady path and
back to the churchyard gate. * * *




CHAPTER XIV


In less than a quarter of an hour the house was reached. As they
stepped into the cool hall * * * Effi said: "Now, Roswitha, you go in
there. That is our bedroom. I am going over to the district
councillor's office to tell my husband that I should like to have you
as a nurse for the baby. He will doubtless agree to it, but I must
have his consent. Then when I have it we must find other quarters for
him and you will sleep with me in the alcove * * *"

When Innstetten learned the situation he said with alacrity: "You did
the right thing, Effi, and if her testimonials are not too bad we will
take her on her good face * * *"

Effi was very happy to have encountered so little difficulty, and
said: "Now it will be all right. Now I am no longer afraid * * *"

That same hour Roswitha moved into the house with her few possessions
and established herself in the little alcove. When the day was over
she went to bed early and, tired as she was, fell asleep instantly.

The next morning Effi inquired how she had slept and whether she had
heard anything.

"What?" asked Roswitha.

"Oh, nothing. I just meant some sound as though a broom were sweeping
or some one were sliding over the floor."

Roswitha laughed and that made an especially good impression upon her
young mistress. Effi had been brought up a Protestant and would have
been very much alarmed if any Catholic traits had been discovered in
her. And yet she believed that Catholicism affords the better
protection against such things as "that upstairs" * * *

All soon began to feel at home with one another, for Effi, like most
country noblewomen of Brandenburg, had the amiable characteristic of
liking to listen to such little stories as those for which the
deceased widow, with her avarice, her nephews and their wives,
afforded Roswitha an inexhaustible fund of material. Johanna was also
an appreciative listener.

Often, when Effi laughed aloud at the drastic passages, Johanna would
deign to smile, but inwardly she was surprised that her Ladyship found
pleasure in such stupid stuff. This feeling of surprise, along with
her sense of superiority, proved on the whole very fortunate and
helped to avoid quarrels with Johanna about their relative positions.
Roswitha was simply the comic figure, and for Johanna to be jealous of
her would have been as bad as to envy Rollo his position of
friendship.

Thus passed a week, chatty and almost jolly, for Effi looked forward
with less anxiety than heretofore to the important coming event. Nor
did she think that it was so near. On the ninth day the chattering and
jollity came to an end. Running and hurrying took their place, and
Innstetten himself laid aside his customary reserve entirely. On the
morning of the 3d of July a cradle was standing by Effi's bed. Dr.
Hannemann joyously grasped the young mother's hand and said: "We have
today the anniversary of Königgrätz; a pity, that it is a girl. But
the other may come yet, and the Prussians have many anniversaries of
victories." Roswitha doubtless had some similar idea, but for the
present her joy over the new arrival knew no bounds. Without further
ado she called the child "little Annie," which the young mother took
as a sign. "It must have been an inspiration," she said, "that
Roswitha hit upon this particular name." Even Innstetten had nothing
to say against it, and so they began to talk about "little Annie" long
before the christening day arrived.

Effi, who expected to be with her parents in Hohen-Cremmen from the
middle of August on, would have liked to postpone the baptism till
then. But it was not feasible. Innstetten could not take a vacation
and so the 15th of August * * * was set for the ceremony, which of
course was to take place in the church. The accompanying banquet was
held in the large clubhouse on the quay, because the district
councillor's house had no dining hall. All the nobles of the
neighborhood were invited and all came. Pastor Lindequist delivered
the toast to the mother and the child in a charming way that was
admired on all sides. But Sidonie von Grasenabb took occasion to
remark to her neighbor, an assessor of the strict type: "Yes, his
occasional addresses will pass. But he cannot justify his sermons
before God or man. He is a half-way man, one of those who are
rejected because they are lukewarm. I don't care to quote the Bible
here literally." Immediately thereafter old Mr. von Borcke took the
floor to drink to the health of Innstetten: "Ladies and Gentlemen:
These are hard times in which we live; rebellion, defiance, lack of
discipline, whithersoever we look. But * * * so long as we still have
men like Baron von Innstetten, whom I am proud to call my friend, just
so long we can endure it, and our old Prussia will hold out. Indeed,
my friends, with Pomerania and Brandenburg we can conquer this foe and
set our foot upon the head of the poisonous dragon of revolution. Firm
and true, thus shall we gain the victory. The Catholics, our brethren,
whom we must respect, even though we fight them, have the 'rock of
Peter,' but our rock is of bronze. Three cheers for Baron Innstetten!"
Innstetten thanked him briefly. Effi said to Major von Crampas, who
sat beside her, that the 'rock of Peter' was probably a compliment to
Roswitha, and she would later approach old Councillor of Justice
Gadebusch and ask him if he were not of her opinion. For some
unaccountable reason Crampas took this remark seriously and advised
her not to ask the Councillor's opinion, which amused Effi
exceedingly. "Why, I thought you were a better mind-reader."

"Ah, your Ladyship, in the case of beautiful young women who are not
yet eighteen the art of mind-reading fails utterly."

"You are defeating your cause completely, Major. You may call me a
grandmother, but you can never be pardoned for alluding to the fact
that I am not yet eighteen."

When they left the table the late afternoon steamer came down the
Kessine and called at the landing opposite the clubhouse. Effi sat by
an open window with Crampas and Gieshübler, drinking coffee and
watching the scene below. "Tomorrow morning at nine the same boat will
take me up the river, and at noon I shall be in Berlin, and in the
evening I shall be in Hohen-Cremmen, and Roswitha will walk beside me
and carry the child in her arms. I hope it will not cry. Ah, what a
feeling it gives me even today! Dear Gieshübler, were you ever so
happy to see again your parental home?"

[Illustation: _Permission F. Bruckmann A.-G. Munich_ PROCESSION AT
GASTEIN Adolph von Menzel] "Yes, the feeling is not new to me, most
gracious Lady, excepting only that I have never taken any little Annie
with me, for I have none to take."




CHAPTER XV


Effi left home in the middle of August and was back in Kessin at the
end of September. During the six weeks' visit she had often longed to
return, but when she now reached the house and entered the dark hall
into which no light could enter except the little from the stairway,
she had a sudden feeling of fear and said to herself: "There is no
such pale, yellow light in Hohen-Cremmen."

A few times during the days in Hohen-Cremmen she had longed for the
"Haunted house," but on the whole her life there had been full of
happiness and contentment. To be sure, she had not known what to
make of Hulda, who was not taking kindly to her rôle of waiting
for a husband or fiancé to turn up. With the twins, however, she
got along much better, and more than once when she played ball or
croquet with them she entirely forgot that she was married. Those
were happy moments. Her chief delight was, as in former days, to
stand on the swing board as it flew through the air and gave her
a tingling sensation, a shudder of sweet danger, when she felt she
would surely fall the next moment. When she finally sprang out of
the swing, she went with the two girls to sit on the bench in front
of the schoolhouse and there told old Mr. Jahnke, who joined them,
about her life in Kessin, which she said was half-hanseatic and
half-Scandinavian, and anything but a replica of Schwantikow and
Hohen-Cremmen.

Such were the little daily amusements, to which were added occasional
drives into the summery marsh, usually in the dog-cart. But Effi liked
above everything else the chats she had almost every morning with her
mother, as they sat upstairs in the large airy room, while Roswitha
rocked the baby and sang lullabies in a Thuringian dialect which
nobody fully understood, perhaps not even Roswitha. Effi and her
mother would move over to the open window and look out upon the park,
the sundial, or the pond with the dragon flies hovering almost
motionless above it, or the tile walk, where von Briest sat beside the
porch steps reading the newspapers. Every time he turned a page he
took off his nose glasses and greeted his wife and daughter. When he
came to his last paper, usually the _Havelland Advertiser_, Effi went
down either to sit beside him or stroll with him through the garden
and park. On one such occasion they stepped from the gravel walk over
to a little monument standing to one side, which Briest's grandfather
had erected in memory of the battle of Waterloo. It was a rusty
pyramid with a bronze cast of Blücher in front and one of Wellington
in the rear.

"Have you any such walks in Kessin?" said von Briest, "and does
Innstetten accompany you and tell you stories?"

"No, papa, I have no such walks. It is out of the question, for we
have only a small garden behind the house, in reality hardly a garden
at all, just a few box-bordered plots and vegetable beds with three or
four fruit trees. Innstetten has no appreciation of such things and, I
fancy, does not expect to stay much longer in Kessin."

"But, child, you must have exercise and fresh air, for you are
accustomed to them."

"Oh, I have both. Our house is situated near a grove, which they call
the 'Plantation,' and I walk there a great deal and Rollo with me."

"Always Rollo," laughed von Briest. "If I didn't know better, I should
be tempted to think that you cared more for Rollo than for your
husband and child."

"Ah, papa, that would be terrible, even if I am forced to admit that
there was a time when I could not have gotten along without Rollo.
That was--oh, you know when--On that occasion he virtually saved my
life, or I at least fancied he did, and since then he has been my good
friend and my chief dependence. But he is only a dog, and of course
human beings come first."

"Yes, that is what they always say, but I have my doubts. There is
something peculiar about brute creatures and a correct understanding
of them has not yet been arrived at. Believe me, Effi, this is another
wide field. When I think how a person has an accident on the water or
on the slippery ice, and some dog, say, one like your Rollo, is at
hand, he will not rest till he has brought the unfortunate person to
the shore. And if the victim is already dead, the dog will lie down
beside him and bark and whine till somebody comes, and if nobody
comes he will stay by the corpse till he himself is dead. That is what
such an animal always does. And now take mankind on the other hand.
God forgive me for saying it, but it sometimes seems to me as though
the brute creature were better than man."

"But, papa, if I said that to Innstetten--"

"No, Effi, you would better not."

"Rollo would rescue me, of course, but Innstetten would, too. He is a
man of honor, you know."

"That he is."

"And loves me."

"That goes without saying. And where there is love it is reciprocated.
That is the way of the world. I am only surprised that he didn't take
a vacation and flit over here. When one has such a young wife--"

Effi blushed, for she thought exactly the same thing. But she did not
care to admit it. "Innstetten is so conscientious and he desires to be
thought well of, I believe, and has his own plans for the future.
Kessin, you know, is only a stepping stone. And, after all, I am not
going to run away from him. He has me, you see. If he were too
affectionate--beside the difference between our ages--people would
merely smile."

"Yes, they would, Effi. But one must not mind that. Now, don't say
anything about it, not even to mama. It is so hard to say what to do
and what not. That is also a wide field."

More than once during Effi's visit with her parents such conversations
as the above had occurred, but fortunately their effect had not lasted
long. Likewise the melancholy impression made upon her by the Kessin
house at the moment of her return quickly faded away. Innstetten was
full of little attentions, and when tea had been taken and the news
of the city and the gossip about lovers had been talked over in a
merry mood Effi took his arm affectionately and went into the other
room with him to continue their chat and hear some anecdotes about
Miss Trippelli, who had recently had another lively correspondence
with Gieshübler. This always meant a new debit on her never settled
account. During this conversation Effi was very jolly, enjoying to the
full the emotions of a young wife, and was glad to be rid of Roswitha,
who had been transferred to the servants' quarters for an indefinite
period.

The next morning she said: "The weather is beautiful and mild and I
hope the veranda on the side toward the 'Plantation' is in good order,
so that we can move out of doors and take breakfast there. We shall be
shut up in our rooms soon enough, at best, for the Kessin winters are
really four weeks too long."

Innstetten agreed heartily. The veranda Effi spoke of, which might
perhaps better be called a tent, had been put up in the summer, three
or four weeks before Effi's departure for Hohen-Cremmen. It consisted
of a large platform, with the side in front open, an immense awning
overhead, while to the right and left there were broad canvas
curtains, which could be shoved back and forth by means of rings on an
iron rod. It was a charming spot and all summer long was admired by
the visitors who passed by on their way to the baths.

Effi had leaned back in a rocking chair and said, as she pushed the
coffee tray toward her husband: "Geert, you might play the amiable
host today. I for my part find this rocker so comfortable that I do
not care to get up. So exert yourself and if you are right glad to
have me back again I shall easily find some way to get even." As she
said this she straightened out the white damask cloth and laid her
hand upon it. Innstetten took her hand and kissed it.

"Well, how did you get on without me?"

"Badly enough, Effi."

"You just say so and try to look gloomy, but in reality there is not a
word of truth in it."

"Why, Effi--"

"As I will prove to you, If you had had the least bit of longing for
your child--I will not speak of myself, for, after all, what is a
woman to such a high lord, who was a bachelor for so many years and
was in no hurry--"

"Well?"

"Yes, Geert, if you had had just the least bit of longing, you would
not have left me for six weeks to enjoy widow-like my own sweet
society in Hohen-Cremmen, with nobody about but Niemeyer and Jahnke,
and now and then our friends in Schwantikow. Nobody at all came from
Rathenow, which looked as though they were afraid of me, or I had
grown too old."

"Ah, Effi, how you do talk! Do you know that you are a little
coquette?"

"Thank heaven that you say so. You men consider a coquette the best
thing a woman can be. And you yourself are not different from the
rest, even if you do put on such a solemn and honorable air. I know
very well, Geert--To tell the truth, you are--"

"Well, what?"

"Well, I prefer not to say. But I know you very well. To tell the
truth, you are, as my Schwantikow uncle once said, an affectionate
man, and were born under the star of love, and Uncle Belling was quite
right when he said so. You merely do not like to show it and think it
is not proper and spoils one's career. Have I struck it?"

Innstetten laughed. "You have struck it a little bit. And let me tell
you, Effi, you seem to me entirely changed. Before little Annie came
you were a child, but all of a sudden--"

"Well?"

"All of a sudden you are like another person. But it is becoming to
you and I like you very much. Shall I tell you further?"

"What?"

"There is something alluring about you."

"Oh, my only Geert, why, what you say is glorious. Now my heart is
gladder than ever--Give me another half a cup--Do you know that that
is what I have always desired? We women must be alluring, or we are
nothing whatever."

"Is that your own idea?"

"I might have originated it, but I got it from Niemeyer."

"From Niemeyer! My, oh my, what a fine pastor he is! Well, I just tell
you, there are none like him here. But how did he come by it? Why, it
seems as though some Don Juan, some regular heart smasher had said
it."

"Ah, who knows?" laughed Effi. "But isn't that Crampas coming there?
And from the beach! You don't suppose he has been swimming? On the
27th of September!"

"He often does such things, purely to make an impression."

Crampas had meanwhile come up quite near and greeted them.

"Good morning," cried Innstetten. "Come closer, come closer."

Crampas, in civilian dress, approached and kissed Effi's hand. She
went on rocking, and Innstetten said: "Excuse me, Major, for doing the
honors of the house so poorly; but the veranda is not a house and,
strictly speaking, ten o'clock in the morning is no time. At this hour
we omit formalities, or, if you like, we all make ourselves at home.
So sit down and give an account of your actions. For by your hair,--I
wish for your sake there were more of it--I see plainly you have been
swimming."

He nodded.

"Inexcusable," said Innstetten, half in earnest and half joking. "Only
four weeks ago you yourself witnessed Banker Heinersdorf's calamity.
He too thought the sea and the magnificent waves would respect him on
account of his millions. But the gods are jealous of each other, and
Neptune, without any apparent cause, took sides against Pluto, or at
least against Heinersdorf."

Crampas laughed. "Yes, a million marks! If I had that much, my dear
Innstetten, I should not have risked it, I presume; for beautiful as
the weather is, the water was only 9° centigrade. But a man like me,
with his million deficit,--permit me this little bit of boasting--a
man like me can take such liberties without fearing the jealousy of
the gods. Besides, there is comfort in the proverb, 'Whoever is born
for the noose cannot perish in the water.'"

"Why, Major," said Effi, "you don't mean to talk your neck
into--excuse me!--such an unprosaic predicament, do you? To be sure,
many believe--I refer to what you just said--that every man more or
less deserves to be hanged. And yet, Major--for a major--"

"It is not the traditional way of dying. I admit it, your Ladyship.
Not traditional and, in my case, not even very probable. So it was
merely a quotation, or, to be more accurate, a common expression.
Still, there is some sincerity back of it when I say the sea will not
harm me, for I firmly expect to die a regular, and I hope honorable,
soldier's death. Originally it was only a gypsy's prophesy, but with
an echo in my own conscience."

Innstetten laughed. "There will be a few obstacles, Crampas, unless
you plan to serve under the Sublime Porte or the Chinese dragon. There
the soldiers are knocking each other around now. Take my word for it,
that kind of business is all over here for the next thirty years, and
if anybody has the desire to meet his death as a soldier--"

"He must first order a war of Bismarck. I know all about it,
Innstetten. But that is a mere bagatelle for you. It is now the end of
September. In ten weeks at the latest the Prince will be in Varzin
again, and as he has a liking for you--I will refrain from using the
more vulgar term, to avoid facing the barrel of your pistol--you will
be able, won't you, to provide a little war for an old Vionville
comrade? The Prince is only a human being, like the rest of us, and a
kind word never comes amiss."

During this conversation Effi had been wadding bread and tossing it on
the table, then making figures out of the little balls, to indicate
that a change of topic was desirable. But Innstetten seemed bent on
answering Crampas's joking remarks, for which reason Effi decided it
would be better for her simply to interrupt. "I can't see, Major, why
we should trouble ourselves about your way of dying. Life lies nearer
to us and is for the time being a more serious matter."

Crampas nodded.

"I am glad you agree with me. How are we to live here? That is the
question right now. That is more important than anything else.
Gieshübler has written me a letter on the subject and I would show it
to you if it did not seem indiscreet or vain, for there are a lot of
other things besides in the letter. Innstetten doesn't need to read
it; he has no appreciation of such things. Incidentally, the
handwriting is like engraving, and the style is what one would expect
if our Kessin friend had been brought up at an Old French court. The
fact that he is humpbacked and wears white jabots such as no other
human being wears--I can't imagine where he has them ironed--all this
fits so well. Now Gieshübler has written to me about plans for the
evenings at the club, and about a manager by the name of Crampas. You
see, Major, I like that better than the soldier's death, let alone the
other."

"And I, personally, no less than you. It will surely be a splendid
winter if we may feel assured of the support of your Ladyship. Miss
Trippelli is coming--"

"Trippelli? Then I am superfluous."

"By no means, your Ladyship. Miss Trippelli cannot sing from one
Sunday till the next; it would be too much for her and for us. Variety
is the spice of life, a truth which, to be sure, every happy marriage
seems to controvert."

"If there are any happy marriages, mine excepted," and she held out
her hand to Innstetten.

"Variety then," continued Crampas. "To secure it for ourselves and our
club, of which for the time being I have the honor to be the
vice-president, we need the help of everybody who can be depended
upon. If we put our heads together we can turn this whole place upside
down. The theatrical pieces have already been selected--_War in Peace,
Mr. Hercules, Youthful Love,_ by Wilbrandt, and perhaps _Euphrosyne_,
by Gensichen. You as Euphrosyne and I middle-aged Goethe. You will be
astonished to see how well I can act the prince of poets, if act is
the right word."

"No doubt. In the meantime I have learned from the letter of my
alchemistic correspondent that, in addition to your other
accomplishments, you are an occasional poet. At first I was
surprised."

"You couldn't see that I looked the part."

"No. But since I have found out that you go swimming at 9° I have
changed my mind. Nine degrees in the Baltic Sea beats the Castalian
Fountain."

"The temperature of which is unknown."

"Not to me; at least nobody will contradict me. But now I must get up.
There comes Roswitha with little Annie."

She arose and went toward Roswitha, took the child, and tossed it up
with pride and joy.




CHAPTER XVI


[For the next few weeks Crampas came regularly every morning to gossip
a while with Effi on the veranda and then ride horseback with her
husband. Finally she desired to ride with them and, although
Innstetten did not approve of the idea, Crampas secured a horse for
her. On one of their rides Crampas let fall a remark about how it
bored him to have to observe such a multitude of petty laws. Effi
applauded the sentiment. Innstetten took the Major to task and
reminded him that one of his frivolous escapades had cost him an arm.
When the election campaign began Innstetten; could no longer take the
time for the horseback rides, and so Effi went out with Crampas,
accompanied by two lackeys. One day, while riding slowly through the
woods, Crampas spoke at length of Innstetten's character, telling how
in earlier life the councillor was more respected than loved, how he
had a mystical tendency and was inclined to make sport of his
comrades. He referred also to Innstetten's fondness for ghost
stories, which led Effi to tell her experience with the Chinaman.
Crampas said that because of an unusual ambition Innstetten had to
have an unusual residence; hence the haunted house. He further
poisoned Effi's mind by telling her that her husband was a born
pedagogue and in the education of his wife was employing the haunted
house in accordance with a definite pedagogical plan.]




CHAPTER XVII


The clock struck two as they reached the house. Crampas bade Effi
adieu, rode into the city, and dismounted at his residence on the
market square. Effi changed her dress and tried to take a nap, but
could not go to sleep, for she was less weary than out of humor. That
Innstetten should keep his ghosts, in order to live in an
extraordinary house, that she could endure; it harmonized with his
inclination to be different from the great mass. But the other thing,
that he should use his ghosts for pedagogical purposes, that was
annoying, almost insulting. It was clear to her mind that "pedagogical
purposes" told less than half the story. What Crampas had meant was
far, far worse, was a kind of instrument designed to instill fear. It
was wholly lacking in goodness of heart and bordered almost on
cruelty. The blood rushed to her head, she clenched her little fist,
and was on the point of laying plans, but suddenly she had to laugh.
"What a child I am!" she exclaimed. "Who can assure me that Crampas is
right? Crampas is entertaining, because he is a gossip, but he is
unreliable, a mere braggart, and cannot hold a candle to Innstetten."

At this moment Innstetten drove up, having decided to come home
earlier today than usual. Effi sprang from her seat to greet him in
the hall and was the more affectionate, the more she felt she had
something to make amends for. But she could not entirely ignore what
Crampas had said, and in the midst of her caresses, while she was
listening with apparent interest, there was the ever recurring echo
within: "So the ghost is part of a design, a ghost to keep me in my
place."

Finally she forgot it, however, and listened artlessly to what he had
to tell her.

       *       *       *       *       *

About the middle of November the north wind blew up a gale, which for
a day and a half swept over the moles so violently that the Kessine,
more and more dammed back, finally overflowed the quay and ran into
the streets. But after the storm had spent its rage the weather
cleared and a few sunny autumn days followed. "Who knows how long they
will last," said Effi to Crampas, and they decided to ride out once
more on the following morning. Innstetten, who had a free day, was to
go too. They planned to ride to the mole and dismount there, then take
a little walk along the beach and finally have luncheon at a sheltered
spot behind the dunes.

At the appointed hour Crampas rode up before the house. Kruse was
holding the horse for her Ladyship, who quickly lifted herself into
the saddle, saying that Innstetten had been prevented from going and
wished to be excused. There had been another big fire in Morgenitz the
night before, the third in three weeks, pointing to incendiarism, and
he had been obliged to go there, much to his sorrow, for he had looked
forward with real pleasure to this ride, thinking it would probably be
the last of the season.

Crampas expressed his regret, perhaps just to say something, but
perhaps with sincerity, for inconsiderate as he was in chivalrous love
affairs, he was, on the other hand, equally a hale fellow well met. To
be sure, only superficially. To help a friend and five minutes later
deceive him were things that harmonized very well with his sense of
honor. He could do both with incredible bonhomie.

The ride followed the usual route through the "Plantation." Rollo went
ahead, then came Crampas and Effi, and Kruse followed. Crampas's
lackey was not along.

"Where did you leave Knut?"

"He has the mumps."

"Remarkable," laughed Effi. "To tell the truth, he always looked as
though he had something of the sort."

"Quite right. But you ought to see him now. Or rather not, for you can
take the mumps from merely seeing a case."

"I don't believe it."

"There is a great deal that young wives don't believe."

"And again they believe many things they would better not believe."

"Do you say that for my benefit?"

"No."

"Sorry."

"How becoming this 'sorry' is to you! I really believe, Major, you
would consider it entirely proper, if I were to make a declaration of
love to you."

"I will not go quite that far. But I should like to see the fellow who
would not desire such a thing. Thoughts and wishes go free of duty."

"There is some question about that. Besides, there is a difference
between thoughts and wishes. Thoughts, as a rule, keep in the
background, but wishes, for the most part, hover on the lips."

"I wish you wouldn't say that."

"Ah, Crampas, you are--you are--"

"A fool."

"No. That is another exaggeration. But you are something else. In
Hohen-Cremmen we always said, I along with the rest, that the most
conceited person in the world was a hussar ensign at eighteen."

"And now?"

"Now I say, the most conceited person in the world is a district
major of the landwehr at forty-two."

"Incidentally, my other two years that you most graciously ignore make
amends for the remark. Kiss the hand" (--My respects to you).

"Yes, 'kiss the hand.' That is just the expression that fits you. It
is Viennese. And the Viennese--I made their acquaintance four years
ago in Carlsbad, where they courted me, a fourteen-year-old slip of a
girl. What a lot of things I had to listen to!"

"Certainly nothing more than was right."

"If that were true, the intended compliment would be rather rude--But
see the buoys yonder, how they swim and dance. The little red flags
are hauled in. Every time I have seen the red flags this summer, the
few times that I have ventured to go down to the beach, I have said to
myself: there lies Vineta, it must lie there, those are the tops of
the towers."

"That is because you know Heine's poem."

"Which one?"

"Why, the one about Vineta."

"No, I don't know that one; indeed I know very few, to my sorrow."

"And yet you have Gieshübler and the Journal Club. However, Heine gave
the poem a different name, 'Sea Ghosts,' I believe, or something of
the sort. But he meant Vineta. As he himself--pardon me, if I proceed
to tell you here the contents of the poem--as the poet, I was about to
say, is passing the place, he is lying on the ship's deck and looking
down into the water, and there he sees narrow, medieval streets, and
women tripping along in hoodlike hats. All have songbooks in their
hands and are going to church, and all the bells are ringing. When he
hears the bells he is seized with a longing to go to church himself,
even though only for the sake of the hoodlike hats, and in the heat of
desire he screams aloud and is about to plunge in. But at that moment
the captain seizes him by the leg and exclaims: 'Doctor, are you
crazy?'"

"Why, that is delicious! I'd like to read it. Is it long?"

"No, it is really short, somewhat longer than 'Thou hast diamonds and
pearls,' or 'Thy soft lily fingers,'" and he gently touched her hand.
"But long or short, what descriptive power, what objectivity! He is my
favorite poet and I know him by heart, little as I care in general for
this poetry business, in spite of the jingles I occasionally
perpetrate myself. But with Heine's poetry it is different. It is all
life, and above everything else he is a connoisseur of love, which,
you know, is the highest good. Moreover, he is not one-sided."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean he is not all for love."

"Well, even if he had this one-sidedness it would not be the worst
thing in the world. What else does he favor?"

"He is also very much in favor of romance, which, to be sure, follows
closely after love and, in the opinion of some people, coincides with
it. But I don't believe it does. In his later poems, which have been
called 'romantic'--as a matter of fact, he called them that
himself--in these romantic poems there is no end of killing. Often on
account of love, to be sure, but usually for other, more vulgar
reasons, among which I include politics, which is almost always
vulgar. Charles Stuart, for example, carries his head under his arm in
one of these romances, and still more gruesome is the story of
Vitzliputzli."

"Of whom?"

"Vitzliputzli. He is a Mexican god, and when the Mexicans had taken
twenty or thirty Spaniards prisoners, these twenty or thirty had to be
sacrificed to Vitzliputzli. There was no help for it, it was a
national custom, a cult, and it all took place in the turn of a
hand--belly open, heart out--"

"Stop, Crampas, no more of that. It is indecent, and disgusting
besides. And all this when we are just about on the point of eating
lunch!"

"I for my part am not affected by it, as I make it my rule to let my
appetite depend only upon the menu."

During this conversation they had come from the beach, according to
program, to a bench built in the lee of the dunes, with an extremely
primitive table in front of it, simply a board on top of two posts.
Kruse, who had ridden ahead, had the lunch already served--tea rolls,
slices of cold roast meat, and red wine, and beside the bottle stood
two pretty little gold-rimmed glasses, such as one buys in watering
places or takes home as souvenirs from glass works.

They dismounted. Kruse, who had tied the reins of his own horse around
a stunted pine, walked up and down with the other two horses, while
Crampas and Effi sat down at the table and enjoyed the clear view of
beach and mole afforded by a narrow cut through the dunes.

The half-wintery November sun shed its fallow light upon the still
agitated sea and the high-running surf. Now and then a puff of wind
came and carried the spray clear up to the table. There was lyme grass
all around, and the bright yellow of the immortelles stood out sharply
against the yellow sand they were growing in, despite the kinship of
colors. Effi played the hostess. "I am sorry, Major, to have to pass
you the rolls in a basket lid."

"I don't mind the platter, so long as it holds a favor."

"But this is Kruse's arrangement--Why, there you are too, Rollo. But
our lunch does not take you into account. What shall we do with
Rollo?"

"I say, give him everything--I for my part out of gratitude. For, you
see, dearest Effi--"

Effi looked at him.

"For, you see, most gracious Lady, Rollo reminds me of what I was
about to tell you as a continuation or counterpart of the Vitzliputzli
story, only much more racy, because a love story. Have you ever heard
of a certain Pedro the Cruel?"

"I have a faint recollection."

"A kind of Bluebeard king."

"That is fine. That is the kind girls like best to hear about, and I
still remember we always said of my friend Hulda Niemeyer, whose name
you have heard, I believe, that she knew no history, except the six
wives of Henry the Eighth, that English Bluebeard, if the word is
strong enough for him. And, really, she knew these six by heart. You
ought to have heard her when she pronounced the names, especially that
of the mother of queen Elizabeth,--so terribly embarrassed, as though
it were her turn next--But now, please, the story of Don Pedro."

"Very well. At Don Pedro's court there was a handsome black Spanish
knight, who wore on his breast the cross of Calatrava, which is about
the equivalent of the Black Eagle and the _Pour le Mérite_ together.
This cross was essential, they always had to wear it, and this
Calatrava knight, whom the queen secretly loved, of course--"

"Why of course?"

"Because we are in Spain."

"So we are."

"And this Calatrava knight, I say, had a very beautiful dog, a
Newfoundland dog, although there were none as yet, for it was just a
hundred years before the discovery of America. A very beautiful dog,
let us call him Rollo."

When Rollo heard his name he barked and wagged his tail.

"It went on thus for many a day. But the secret love, which probably
did not remain entirely secret, soon became too much for the king, who
cared very little for the Calatrava knight anyhow; for he was not only
a cruel king, but also a jealous old wether--or, if that word is not
just suited for a king, and still less for my amiable listener, Mrs.
Effi, call him at least a jealous creature. Well, he resolved to have
the Calatrava knight secretly beheaded for his secret love."

"I can't blame him."

"I don't know, most gracious Lady. You must hear further. In part it
was all right, but it was too much. The king, in my judgment, went
altogether too far. He pretended he was going to arrange a feast for
the knight in honor of his deeds as a warrior and hero, and there was
a long table and all the grandees of the realm sat at this table, and
in the middle sat the king, and opposite him was the place of honor
for the Calatrava knight. But the knight failed to appear, and when
they had waited a long while for him, they finally had to begin the
feast without him, and his place remained vacant. A vacant place just
opposite the king!"

"And then?"

"And then, fancy, most gracious Lady, as the king, this Pedro, is
about to rise in order dissemblingly to express his regret that his
'dear guest' has not yet appeared, the horrified servants are heard
screaming on the stairway, and before anybody knows what has happened,
something flies along the table, springs upon the chair, and places a
severed head upon the empty plate. Over this very head Rollo stares at
the one sitting face to face with him, viz., the king. Rollo had
accompanied his master on his last journey, and the moment the ax fell
the faithful animal snatched the falling head, and here he was now,
our friend Rollo, at the long festal board, accusing the royal
murderer."

Effi was rapt with attention. After a few moments she said: "Crampas,
that is in its way very beautiful, and because it is very beautiful I
will forgive you. But you might do better, and please me more, if you
would tell stories of another kind, even from Heine. Certainly Heine
has not written exclusively of Vitzliputzli and Don Pedro and _your_
Rollo. I say _your_, for mine would not have done such a thing. Come,
Rollo. Poor creature, I can't look at you any more without thinking of
the Calatrava knight, whom the queen secretly loved--Call Kruse,
please, that he may put these things back in the saddle bag, and, as
we ride home, you must tell me something different, something entirely
different."

Kruse came. As he was about to take the glasses Crampas said: "Kruse,
leave the one glass, this one here. I'll take it myself."

"Your servant, Major."

Effi, who had overheard this, shook her head. Then she laughed.
"Crampas, what in the world are you thinking of? Kruse is stupid
enough not to think a second time about anything, and even if he did
he fortunately would arrive at no conclusion. But that does not
justify you in keeping this thirty-pfennig glass from the Joseph Glass
Works."

"Your scornful reference to its price makes me feel its value all the
more deeply."

"Always the same story. You are such a humorist, but a very queer one.
If I understand you rightly you are going to--it is ridiculous and I
almost hesitate to say it--you are going to perform now the act of the
King of Thule."

He nodded with a touch of roguishness.

"Very well, for all I care. Everybody wears his right cap; you know
which one. But I must be permitted to say that the rôle you are
assigning to me in this connection is far from flattering. I don't
care to figure as a rhyme to your King of Thule. Keep the glass, but
please draw no conclusions that would compromise me. I shall tell
Innstetten about it."

"That you will not do, most gracious Lady."

"Why not?"

"Innstetten is not the man to see such things in their proper light."

She eyed him sharply for a moment, then lowered her eyes confused and
almost embarrassed.




CHAPTER XVIII


[Effi's peace was disturbed, but the prospect of a quiet winter, with
few occasions to meet Crampas, reassured her. She and her husband
began to spend their evenings reviewing their Italian journey.
Gieshübler joined them and soon announced that Crampas was planning an
amateur performance of _A Step out of the Way_, with Effi as the
heroine. She felt the danger, but was eager to act, as Crampas was
only the coach. Her playing won enthusiastic applause and Innstetten
raved over his captivating wife. A casual remark about Mrs. Crampas
led him to assert that she was insanely jealous of Effi, and to tell
how Crampas had wheedled her into agreeing to stay at home the second
day after Christmas, while he himself joined the Innstettens and
others on a sleighing party. Innstetten then said, in a way suggesting
the strict pedagogue, that Crampas was not to be trusted, particularly
in his relations to women. On Christmas day Effi was happy till she
discovered she had received no greeting from Crampas. That put her out
of sorts and made her conscious that all was not well. Innstetten
noticed her troubled state and, when she told him she felt unworthy of
the kindness showered upon her, he said that people get only what they
deserve, but she was not sure of his meaning. The proposed sleighing
party was carried out. After coffee at Forester Ring's lodge all went
out for a walk. Crampas remarked to Effi that they were in danger of
being snowed in. She replied with the story of a poem entitled _God's
Wall_, which she had learned from her pastor. During a war an aged
widow prayed God to build a wall to protect her from the enemy. God
caused her cottage to be snowed under, and the enemy passed by.
Crampas changed the subject.]




CHAPTER XIX


[At seven o'clock dinner was served. At the table Sidonie Grasenabb
had much to say against the loose modern way of bringing up girls,
with particular reference to the Forester's frivolous daughters. After
a toast to Ring, in which Güldenklee indulged in various puns on the
name, the Prussian song was sung and the company made ready to start
home. Gieshübler's coachman had meanwhile been kicked in the shin by
one of the horses and the doctor ordered him to stay at the Forester's
for the present. Innstetten undertook to drive home in his place.
Sidonie Grasenabb rode part of the way with Effi and Crampas, till a
small stream with a quicksand bottom was encountered, when she left
the sleigh and joined her family in their carriage. Crampas who had
been sent by Innstetten to look after the ladies in his sleigh, was
now alone with Effi. When she saw that the roundabout way was bringing
them to a dark forest, through which they would have to pass, she
sought to steady her nerves by clasping her hands together with all
her might. Then she recalled the poem about _God's Wall_ and tried two
or three times to repeat the widow's prayer for protection, but was
conscious that her words were dead. She was afraid, and yet felt as
though she were under a spell, which she did not care to cast off.
When the sleigh entered the dark woods Crampas spoke her name softly,
with trembling voice, took her hand, loosened the clenched fingers,
and covered them with fervent kisses. She felt herself fainting. When
she again opened her eyes the sleigh had passed out of the woods and
it soon drove up before her home in Kessin.]




CHAPTER XX


Innstetten, who had observed Effi sharply as he lifted her from the
sleigh, but had avoided speaking to her in private about the strange
drive, arose early the following morning and sought to overcome his
ill-humor, from the effects of which he still suffered.

"Did you sleep well?" he asked, as Effi came to breakfast.

"Yes."

"How fortunate! I can't say the same of myself. I dreamed you met with
an accident in the sleigh, in the quicksand, and Crampas tried to
rescue you--I must call it that--, but he sank out of sight with you."

"You say all this so queerly, Geert. Your words contain a covert
reproach, and I can guess why."

"Very remarkable."

"You do not approve of Crampas's coming and offering us his
assistance."

"Us?"

"Yes, us. Sidonie and me. You seem to have forgotten entirely that the
Major came at your request. At first he sat opposite me, and I may
say, incidentally, that it was indeed an uncomfortable seat on that
miserable narrow strip, but when the Grasenabbs came up and took
Sidonie, and our sleigh suddenly drove on, I suppose you expected that
I should ask him to get out? That would have made a laughing stock of
me, and you know how sensitive you are on that point. Remember, we
have ridden horseback many times together, with your consent, and now
you don't think I should ride in the same vehicle with him. It is
wrong, we used to say at home, to mistrust a nobleman."

"A nobleman," said Innstetten with emphasis.

"Isn't he one? You yourself called him a cavalier, a perfect cavalier,
in fact."

"Yes," continued Innstetten, his tone growing more friendly, though it
still betrayed a slight shade of sarcasm. "A cavalier he is, and a
perfect cavalier, that is beyond dispute. But nobleman? My dear Effi,
a nobleman has a different look. Have you ever noticed anything noble
about him? Not I."

Effi stared at the ground and kept silent.

"It seems we are of the same opinion. But, as you said, I myself am to
blame. I don't care to speak of a _faux pas_; it is not the right word
in this connection. I assume the blame, and it shall not occur again,
if I can prevent it. But you will be on your guard, too, if you heed
my advice. He is coarse and has designs of his own on young women. I
knew him of old."

"I shall remember what you say. But just one thing--I believe you
misunderstand him."

"I do _not_ misunderstand him."

"Or me," she said, with all the force at her command, and attempted to
meet his gaze.

"Nor you either, my dear Effi. You are a charming little woman, but
persistence is not exactly your specialty."

He arose to go. When he had got as far as the door Frederick entered
to deliver a note from Gieshübler, addressed, of course, to her
Ladyship.

Effi took it. "A secret correspondence with Gieshübler," she said.
"Material for another fit of jealousy on the part of my austere Lord.
Or isn't it?"

"No, not quite, my dear Effi. I am so foolish as to make a distinction
between Crampas and Gieshübler. They are not the same number of carats
fine, so to speak. You know, the value of gold is estimated by carats,
in certain circumstances that of men also. And I must add that I
personally have a considerably higher regard for Gieshübler's white
jabot, in spite of the fact that jabots are no longer worn, than I
have for Crampas's red sapper whiskers. But I doubt if that is
feminine taste."

"You think we are weaker than we are."

"A consolation of extraordinarily little practical application. But
enough of that. Read your note."

Effi read: "May I inquire about the health of my gracious Lady? I know
only that you luckily escaped the quicksand. But there was still
plenty of danger lurking along the road through the woods. Dr.
Hannemann has just returned and reassures me concerning Mirambo,
saying that yesterday he considered the case more serious than he
cared to let us know, but not so today. It was a charming
sleigh-ride.--In three days we shall celebrate New Year's eve. We
shall have to forego a festivity like last year's, but we shall have a
ball, of course, and to see you present would delight the dancers and,
by no means least, Yours most respectfully, Alonzo G."

Effi laughed. "Well, what do you say?"

"The same as before, simply that I should rather see you with
Gieshübler than with Crampas."

"Because you take Crampas too seriously and Gieshübler too lightly."

Innstetten jokingly shook his finger at her.

Three days later was New Year's eve. Effi appeared in a charming ball
gown, a gift that the Christmas table had brought her. But she did not
dance. She took her seat among the elderly dames, for whom easy chairs
were placed near the orchestra gallery. Of the particular noble
families with which the Innstettens associated there was nobody
present, because, shortly before, there had occurred a slight
disagreement with the city faction in the management of the club,
which had been accused of "destructive tendencies," especially by old
Mr. Güldenklee. However, three or four other noble families from over
the Kessine, who were not members of the club, but only invited
guests, had crossed over the ice on the river, some of them from a
great distance, and were happy to take part in the festivity. Effi sat
between the elderly wife of baronial councillor von Padden and a
somewhat younger Mrs. von Titzewitz. The former, an excellent old
lady, was in every way an original, and sought by means of orthodox
German Christianity to counteract the tendency toward Wendish
heathenism, with which nature had endowed her, especially in the
prominent structure of her cheek bones. In her orthodoxy she went so
far that even Sidonie von Grasenabb was in comparison a sort of
_esprit fort_. The elderly dame, having sprung from a union of the
Radegast and the Schwantikow branches of the family, had inherited the
old Padden humor, which had for years rested like a blessing upon the
family and had heartily rejoiced everybody who came into touch with
them, even though enemies in politics or religion.

"Well, child," said the baronial councillor's wife, "how are you
getting on, anyhow?"

"Quite well, most gracious Lady. I have a very excellent husband."

"I know. But that does not always suffice. I, too, had an excellent
husband. How do matters actually stand? No temptations?"

Effi was startled and touched at the same time. There was something
uncommonly refreshing about the free and natural tone in which the old
lady spoke, and the fact that she was such a pious woman made it even
more refreshing.

"Ah, most gracious Lady--"

"There it comes. Nothing new, the same old story. Time makes no change
here, and perhaps it is just as well. The essential thing, my dear
young woman, is struggle. One must always wrestle with the natural
man. And when one has conquered self and feels almost like screaming
out, because it hurts so, then the dear angels shout for joy."

"Ah, most gracious Lady, it is often very hard."

"To be sure, it is hard. But the harder the better. You must be glad
of that. The weakness of the flesh is lasting. I have grandsons and
granddaughters and see it every day. But the conquering of self in the
faith, my dear Lady, that is the essential thing, that is the true
way. This was brought to our knowledge by our old man of God, Martin
Luther. Do you know his _Table Talks_?"

"No, most gracious Lady."

"I am going to send them to you."

At this moment Major von Crampas stepped up to Effi and inquired about
her health. Effi was red as blood. Before she had time to reply he
said: "May I ask you, most gracious Lady, to present me to these
Ladies?"

Effi introduced Crampas, who had already got his bearings perfectly
and in the course of his small talk mentioned all the von Paddens and
von Titzewitzes he had ever heard of. At the same time he excused
himself for not yet having made his call and presented his wife to the
people beyond the Kessine. "But it is strange what a separating power
water has. It is the same way with the English Channel."

"How?" asked old Mrs. von Titzewitz.

Crampas, considering it inadvisable to give explanations which would
have been to no purpose, continued: "To twenty Germans who go to
France there is not one who goes to England. That is because of the
water. I repeat, water has a dividing power."

Mrs. von Padden, whose fine instinct scented some insinuation in this
remark, was about to take up the cudgels for water, but Crampas spoke
on with increasing fluency and turned the attention of the ladies to a
beautiful Miss von Stojentin, "without question the queen of the
ball," he said, incidentally casting an admiring glance at Effi. Then
he bowed quickly to the three ladies and walked away.

"Handsome man," said Mrs. von Padden. "Does he ever come to your
house?"

"Casually."

"Truly a handsome man," repeated Mrs. von Padden. "A little bit too
self-assured. Pride will have a fall. But just see, there he is,
taking his place with Grete Stojentin. Why, really, he is too old, he
is at least in the middle of the forties."

"He is going on forty-four."

"Aha, you seem to be well acquainted with him."

       *       *       *       *       *

It was very opportune for Effi that the new year, from the very
beginning, brought a variety of diversions. New Year's eve a sharp
northeast wind began to blow and during the next few days it increased
in velocity till it amounted almost to a hurricane. On the 3d of
January in the afternoon it was reported that a ship which had not
been able to make its way into port had been wrecked a hundred yards
from the mole. It was said to be an English ship from Sunderland
and, so far as could be ascertained, had seven men on board. In spite
of strenuous efforts the pilots were unable to row around the mole,
and the launching of a boat from the beach was out of the question, as
the surf was too heavy. That sounded sad enough. But Johanna, who
brought the news, had a word of comfort. Consul Eschrich, she said,
was hastening to the scene with the life-saving apparatus and the
rocket battery, and success was certain. The distance was not quite as
great as in the year '75, and that time all lives had been saved; even
the poodle had been rescued. "It was very touching to see how the dog
rejoiced and again and again licked with his red tongue both the
Captain's wife and the dear little child, not much larger than little
Annie."

"Geert, I must go there, I must see it," Effi declared, and both set
out at once in order not to be too late. They chose just the right
moment, for as they reached the beach beyond the "Plantation" the
first shot was fired and they saw plainly how the rocket with the life
line sailed beneath the storm cloud and fell down beyond the ship.
Immediately all hands were astir on board and they used the small line
to haul in the heavier hawser with the basket. Before long the basket
returned and one of the sailors, a very handsome, slender man, with an
oilcloth hood, was safe on land. He was plied with questions by the
inquisitive spectators, while the basket made another trip to fetch
the second man, then the third, and so on. All were rescued, and as
Effi walked home with her husband a half hour later she felt like
throwing herself on the sand and having a good cry. A beautiful
emotion had again found lodgment in her heart and she was immeasurably
happy that it was so.

This occurred on the 3d. On the 5th a new excitement was experienced,
of an entirely different kind, to be sure. On his way out of the
council house Innstetten had met Gieshübler, who, by the way, was an
alderman and a member of the magistracy. In conversation with him
Innstetten had learned that the ministry of war had inquired what
attitude the city authorities would assume in case the question of a
garrison were raised. If they showed their willingness to meet the
necessary conditions, viz., to build stables and barracks, they might
be granted two squadrons of hussars. "Well, Effi, what do you say
about it?" Effi looked as though struck dumb. All the innocent
happiness of her childhood years was suddenly brought back to her and
for a moment it seemed as though red hussars--for these were to be red
hussars, like those at home in Hohen-Cremmen--were the true guardians
of Paradise and innocence. Still she remained silent.

"Why, you aren't saying anything, Effi."

"Strangely, I'm not, Geert. But it makes me so happy that I cannot
speak for joy. Is it really going to be? Are they truly going to
come?"

"It is a long way off yet. In fact, Gieshübler said the city fathers,
his colleagues, didn't deserve it at all. Instead of simply being
unanimous and happy over the honor, or if not over the honor, at least
over the advantage, they had brought forward all sorts of 'ifs' and
'buts,' and had been niggardly about the buildings. In fact,
Confectioner Michelsen had gone so far as to say it would corrupt the
morals of the city, and whoever had a daughter would better be
forehanded and secure iron grills for his windows."

"That is incredible. I have never seen more mannerly people than our
hussars. Really, Geert. Well, you know so yourself. And so this
Michelsen wants to protect everything with iron bars. Has he any
daughters?"

"Certainly. Three, in fact. But they are all out of the race."

Effi laughed more heartily than she had for a long time. But the mood
was of short duration and when Innstetten went away and left her alone
she sat down by the baby's cradle, and tears fell on the pillows. The
old feeling came over her again that she was a prisoner without hope
of escape.

She suffered intensely from the feeling and longed more than ever for
liberty. But while she was capable of strong emotions she had not a
strong character. She lacked steadfastness and her good desires soon
passed away. Thus she drifted on, one day, because she could not help
it, the next, because she did not care to try to help it. She seemed
to be in the power of the forbidden and the mysterious.

So it came about that she, who by nature was frank and open,
accustomed herself more and more to play an underhand part. At times
she was startled at the ease with which she could do it. Only in one
respect she remained unchanged--she saw everything clearly and glossed
nothing. Late one evening she stepped before the mirror in her
bedroom. The lights and shadows flitted to and fro and Rollo began to
bark outside. That moment it seemed to her as though somebody were
looking over her shoulder. But she quickly bethought herself. "I know
well enough what it is. It was not _he_," and she pointed her finger
toward the haunted room upstairs. "It was something else--my
conscience--Effi, you are lost."

Yet things continued on this course; the ball was rolling, and what
happened one day made the actions of the next a necessity.

About the middle of the month there came invitations from the four
families with which the Innstettens associated most. They had agreed
upon the order in which they would entertain. The Borckes were to
begin, the Flemmings and Grasenabbs followed, the Güldenklees came
last. Each time a week intervened. All four invitations came on the
same day. They were evidently intended to leave an impression of
orderliness and careful planning, and probably also of special
friendliness and congeniality.

"I shall not go, Geert, and you must excuse me in advance on the
ground of the treatment which I have been undergoing for weeks past."

Innstetten laughed. "Treatment. I am to blame it on the treatment.
That is the pretext. The real reason is you don't care to."

"No, I am more honest than you are willing to admit. It was your own
suggestion that I consult the doctor. I did so and now I must follow
his advice. The good doctor thinks I am anæmic, strangely enough, and
you know that I drink chalybeate water every day. If you combine this
in imagination with a dinner at the Borckes', with, say, brawn and eel
aspic, you can't help feeling that it would be the death of me. And
certainly you would not think of asking such a thing of your Effi. To
be sure, I feel at times--"

"I beg you, Effi."

"However, the one good thing about it is that I can look forward with
pleasure to accompanying you each time a part of the way in the
carriage, as far as the mill, certainly, or the churchyard, or even to
the corner of the forest, where the crossroad to Morgnitz comes in.
Then I can alight and saunter back. It is always very beautiful among
the dunes."

Innstetten was agreed, and when the carriage drove up three days later
Effi got in with her husband and accompanied him to the corner of the
forest. "Stop here, Geert. You drive on to the left now, but I am
going to the right, down to the beach and back through the
'Plantation.' It is rather far, but not too far. Dr. Hannemann tells
me every day that exercise is everything, exercise and fresh air. And
I almost believe he is right. Give my regards to all the company, only
you needn't say anything to Sidonie."

The drives on which Effi accompanied her husband as far as the corner
of the forest were repeated every week, but even on the intervening
days she insisted that she should strictly observe the doctor's
orders. Not a day passed that she did not take her prescribed walk,
usually in the afternoon, when Innstetten began to become absorbed in
his newspapers. The weather was beautiful, the air soft and fresh, the
sky cloudy. As a rule she went out alone, after saying to Roswitha:
"Roswitha, I am going down the turnpike now and then to the right to
the place with the merrygo-round. There I shall wait for you, meet me
there. Then we can walk back by the avenue of birches or through the
ropewalk. But do not come unless Annie is asleep. If she is not
asleep send Johanna. Or, rather, just let it go. It is not necessary;
I can easily find the way."

The first day they met as planned. Effi sat on a bench by a long shed,
looking over at a low yellow plaster house with exposed timbers
painted black, an inn at which the lower middle classes drank their
glass of beer or played at ombre. It was hardly dusk, but the windows
were already bright, and their gleams of light fell upon the piles of
snow and the few trees standing at one side. "See, Roswitha, how
beautiful that looks."

This was repeated for a few days. But usually, when Roswitha reached
the merry-go-round and the shed, nobody was there, and when she came
back home and entered the hall Effi came to meet her, saying: "Where
in the world have you been, Roswitha? I have been back a long time."

Thus it went on for weeks. The matter of the hussars was about given
up, on account of objections made by the citizens. But as the
negotiations were not yet definitely closed and had recently been
referred to the office of the commander in chief, Crampas was called
to Stettin to give his opinion to the authorities.

From there he wrote the second day to Innstetten: "Pardon me,
Innstetten, for taking French leave. It all came so quickly. Here,
however, I shall seek to draw the matter out long, for it is a
pleasure to be out in the world again. My regards to your gracious
wife, my amiable patroness."

He read it to Effi, who remained silent. Finally she said:

"It is very well thus."

"What do you mean by that?"

"That he is gone. To tell the truth, he always says the same things.
When he is back he will at least for a time have something new to
say."

[Illustration: HIGH ALTAR AT SALZBURG
_From the Painting by Adolph von Menzel_]

Innstetten gave her a sharp scrutinizing glance, but he saw nothing,
and his suspicion was allayed. "I am going away, too," he said after
a while, "and to Berlin at that. Perhaps I, too, can bring back
something new, as well as Crampas. My dear Effi always wants to hear
something new. She is bored to death in our good Kessin. I shall be
away about a week, perhaps a day or two longer. But don't be
alarmed--I don't think it will come back--You know, that thing
upstairs--But even if it should, you have Rollo and Roswitha."

Effi smiled to herself and felt at the same time a mingling of
sadness. She could not help recalling the day when Crampas had told
her for the first time that her husband was acting out a play with the
ghost and her fear. The great pedagogue! But was he not right? Was not
the play in place? All kinds of contradicting thoughts, good and bad,
shot through her head.

The third day Innstetten went away. He had not said anything about his
business in Berlin.




CHAPTER XXI


Innstetten had been gone but four days when Crampas returned from
Stettin with the news that the higher authorities had definitely
dropped the plan of detailing two squadrons to Kessin. There were so
many small cities that were applying for a garrison of cavalry,
particularly for Blücher hussars, that as a rule, he said, an offer of
such troops met with a hearty reception, and not a halting one. When
Crampas made this report the magistracy looked quite badly
embarrassed. Only Gieshübler was triumphant, because he thought the
discomfiture served his narrow-minded colleagues exactly right. When
the news reached the common people a certain amount of depression
spread among them, indeed even some of the consuls with eligible
daughters were for the time being dissatisfied. But on the whole they
soon forgot about it, perhaps because the question of the day, "What
was Innstetten's business in Berlin?" was more interesting to the
people of Kessin, or at least to the dignitaries of the city. They
did not care to lose their unusually popular district councillor, and
yet very exaggerated rumors about him were in circulation, rumors
which, if not started by Gieshübler, were at least supported and
further spread by him. Among other things it was said that Innstetten
would go to Morocco as an ambassador with a suite, bearing gifts,
including not only the traditional vase with a picture of Sans Souci
and the New Palace, but above all a large refrigerator. The latter
seemed so probable in view of the temperature in Morocco, that the
whole story was believed.

In time Effi heard about it. The days when the news would have cheered
her were not yet so very far distant. But in the frame of mind in
which she had been since the end of the year she was no longer capable
of laughing artlessly and merrily. Her face had taken on an entirely
new expression, and her half-pathetic, half-roguish childishness,
which she had preserved as a woman, was gone. The walks to the beach
and the "Plantation," which she had given up while Crampas was in
Stettin, she resumed after his return and would not allow them to be
interfered with by unfavorable weather. It was arranged as formerly
that Roswitha should come to meet her at the end of the ropewalk, or
near the churchyard, but they missed each other oftener than before.
"I could scold you, Roswitha, for never finding me. But it doesn't
matter; I am no longer afraid, not even by the churchyard, and in the
forest I have never yet met a human soul."

It was on the day before Innstetten's return from Berlin that Effi
said this. Roswitha paid little attention to the remarks, as she was
absorbed in hanging up garlands over the doors. Even the shark was
decorated with a fir bough and looked more remarkable than usual. Effi
said: "That is right, Roswitha. He will be pleased with all the green
when he comes back tomorrow. I wonder whether I should go out again
today? Dr. Hannemann insists upon it and is continually saying I do
not take it seriously enough, otherwise I should certainly be looking
better. But I have no real desire today; it is drizzling and the sky
is so gray."

"I will fetch her Ladyship's raincoat."

"Do so, but don't come for me today; we should not meet anyhow," and
she laughed. "Really, Roswitha, you are not a bit good at finding. And
I don't want to have you catch a cold all for nothing."

So Roswitha remained at home and, as Annie was sleeping, went over to
chat with Mrs. Kruse. "Dear Mrs. Kruse," she said, "you were going to
tell me about the Chinaman. Yesterday Johanna interrupted you. She
always puts on such airs, and such a story would not interest her. But
I believe there was, after all, something in it, I mean the story of
the Chinaman and Thomsen's niece, if she was not his granddaughter."

Mrs. Kruse nodded.

Roswitha continued: "Either it was an unhappy love"--Mrs. Kruse nodded
again--"or it may have been a happy one, and the Chinaman was simply
unable to endure the sudden termination of it. For the Chinese are
human, like the rest of us, and everything is doubtless the same with
them as with us."

"Everything," assured Mrs. Kruse, who was about to corroborate it by
her story, when her husband entered and said: "Mother, you might give
me the bottle of leather varnish. I must have the harness shining when
his Lordship comes home tomorrow. He sees everything, and even if he
says nothing, one can tell that he has seen it all."

"I'll bring it out to you, Kruse," said Roswitha. "Your wife is just
going to tell me something more; but it will soon be finished and then
I'll come and bring it."

A few minutes later Roswitha came out into the yard with the bottle of
varnish in her hand and stood by the harness which Kruse had just hung
over the garden fence. "By George!" he said, as he took the bottle
from her hand, "it will not do much good; it keeps drizzling all the
time and the shine will come off. But I am one of those who think
everything must be kept in order."

"Indeed it must. Besides, Kruse, that is good varnish, as I can see at
a glance, and first-class varnish doesn't stay sticky very long, it
must dry immediately. Even if it is foggy tomorrow, or dewy, it will
be too late then to hurt it. But, I must say, that is a remarkable
story about the Chinaman."

Kruse laughed. "It is nonsense, Roswitha. My wife, instead of paying
attention to proper things, is always telling such tales, and when I
go to put on a clean shirt there is a button off. It has been so ever
since we came here. She always had just such stories in her head and
the black hen besides. And the black hen doesn't even lay eggs. After
all, what can she be expected to lay eggs out of? She never goes out,
and such things as eggs can't come from mere cock-a-doodle-dooing. It
is not to be expected of any hen."

"See here, Kruse, I am going to repeat that to your wife. I have
always considered you a respectable man and now you say things like
that about the cock-a-doodle-dooing. Men are always worse than we
think. Really I ought to take this brush right now and paint a black
moustache on your face."

"Well, Roswitha, one could put up with that from you," and Kruse, who
was usually on his dignity, seemed about to change to a more flirting
tone, when he suddenly caught sight of her Ladyship, who today came
from the other side of the "Plantation" and just at this moment was
passing along the garden fence.

"Good day, Roswitha, my, but you are merry. What is Annie doing?"

"She is asleep, your Ladyship."

As Roswitha said this she turned red and quickly breaking off the
conversation, started toward the house to help her Ladyship change her
clothes. For it was doubtful whether Johanna was there. She hung
around a good deal over at the "office" nowadays, because there was
less to do at home and Frederick and Christel were too tedious for her
and never knew anything.

Annie was still asleep. Effi leaned over the cradle, then had her hat
and raincoat taken off and sat down upon the little sofa in her
bedroom. She slowly stroked back her moist hair, laid her feet on a
stool, which Roswitha drew up to her, and said, as she evidently
enjoyed the comfort of resting after a rather long walk: "Roswitha, I
must remind you that Kruse is married."

"I know it, your Ladyship."

"Yes, what all doesn't one know, and yet one acts as though one did
_not_ know. Nothing can ever come of this."

"Nothing is supposed to come of it, your Ladyship."

"If you think she is an invalid you are reckoning without your host.
Invalids live the longest. Besides she has the black chicken. Beware
of it. It knows everything and tattles everything. I don't know, it
makes me shudder. And I'll wager all that business upstairs has some
connection with this chicken."

"Oh, I don't believe it. But it is terrible just the same, and Kruse,
who always sides himself against his wife, cannot talk me out of it."

"What did he say?"

"He said it was nothing but mice."

"Well, mice are quite bad enough. I can't bear mice. But, to change
the subject, I saw you chatting with Kruse, plainly, also your
familiar actions, and in fact I think you were going to paint a
moustache on his lip. That I call pretty far advanced. A little later
you will be jilted. You are still a smug person and have your charms.
But beware, that is all I have to say to you. Just what was your
experience the first time? Was it such that you can tell me about it?"

"Oh, I can tell you. But it was terrible. And because it was so
terrible, your Ladyship's mind can be perfectly easy with regard to
Kruse. A girl who has gone through what I did has enough of it and
takes care. I still dream of it occasionally and then I am all knocked
to pieces the next day. Such awful fright."

Effi sat up and leaned her head on her arm. "Tell me about it, and how
it came about. I know from my observations at home that it is always
the same story with you girls."

"Yes, no doubt it is always the same at first, and I am determined not
to think that there was anything special about my case. But when the
time came that they threw it into my face and I was suddenly forced to
say: 'yes, it is so,' oh, _that_ was terrible. Mother--well, I could
get along with her, but father, who had the village blacksmith's shop,
he was severe and quick to fly into a rage. When he heard it, he came
at me with a pair of tongs which he had just taken from the fire and
was going to kill me. I screamed and ran up to the attic and hid
myself and there I lay and trembled, and did not come down till they
called me and told me to come. Besides, I had a younger sister, who
always pointed at me and said: 'Ugh!' Then when the child was about to
come I went into a barn near by, because I was afraid to stay in the
house. There strangers found me half dead and carried me into the
house and laid me in my bed. The third day they took the child away
and when I asked where it was they said it was well taken care of. Oh,
your Ladyship, may the holy mother of God protect you from such
distress!"

Effi was startled and stared at Roswitha with wide-opened eyes. But
she was more frightened than vexed. "The things you do say! Why, I am
a married woman. You must not say such things; it is improper, it is
not fitting."

"Oh, your Ladyship."

"Tell me rather what became of you. They had robbed you of your baby.
You told me that."

"And then, a few days later, somebody from Erfurt drove up to the
mayor's office and asked whether there was not a wet nurse there, and
the mayor said 'yes,' God bless him! So the strange gentleman took me
away with him and from that day I was better off. Even with the old
widow my life was tolerable, and finally I came to your Ladyship. That
was the best, the best of all." As she said this she stepped to the
sofa and kissed Effi's hand.

"Roswitha, you must not always be kissing my hand, I don't like it.
And do beware of Kruse. Otherwise you are a good and sensible
person--With a married man--it is never well."

"Ah, your Ladyship, God and his saints lead us wondrously, and the
bad fortune that befalls us has also its good side. If one is not made
better by it there is no help for him--Really, I like the men."

"You see, Roswitha, you see."

"But if the same feeling should come over me again--the affair with
Kruse, there is nothing in that--and I could not control myself, I
should run straight into the water. It was too terrible. Everything.
And I wonder what ever became of the poor baby? I don't think it is
still living; they had it killed, but I am to blame." She threw
herself down by Annie's cradle, and rocked the child and sang her
favorite lullaby over and over again without stopping.

"Stop," said Effi, "don't sing any more; I have a headache. Bring in
the newspapers. Or has Gieshübler sent the journals?"

"He did, and the fashion paper was on top. We were turning over the
leaves, Johanna and I, before she went across the street. Johanna
always gets angry that she cannot have such things. Shall I fetch the
fashion paper?"

"Yes, fetch it and bring me the lamp, too."

Roswitha went out and when Effi was alone she said: "What things they
do have to help one out! One pretty woman with a muff and another with
a half veil--fashion puppets. But it is the best thing for turning my
thoughts in some other direction."

In the course of the following morning a telegram came from
Innstetten, in which he said he would come by the second train, which
meant that he would not arrive in Kessin before evening. The day
proved one of never ending restlessness. Fortunately Gieshübler came
in the afternoon and helped pass an hour. Finally, at seven o'clock,
the carriage drove up. Effi went out and greeted her husband.
Innstetten was in a state of excitement that was unusual for him and
so it came about that he did not notice the embarrassment mingled with
Effi's heartiness. In the hall the lamps and candles were burning, and
the tea service, which Frederick had placed on one of the tables
between the cabinets, reflected the brilliant light.

"Why, this looks exactly as it did when we first arrived here. Do you
remember, Effi?"

She nodded.

"Only the shark with his fir bough behaves more calmly today, and even
Rollo pretends to be reticent and does not put his paws on my
shoulders. What is the matter with you, Rollo?"

Rollo rubbed past his master and wagged his tail.

"He is not exactly satisfied; either it is with me or with others.
Well, I'll assume, with me. At all events let us go in." He entered
his room and as he sat down on the sofa asked Effi to take a seat
beside him. "It was so fine in Berlin, beyond expectation, but in the
midst of all my pleasure I always felt a longing to be back. And how
well you look! A little bit pale and also a little bit changed, but it
is all becoming to you."

Effi turned red.

"And now you even turn red. But it is as I tell you. You used to have
something of the spoiled child about you; now all of a sudden you look
like a wife."

"I like to hear that, Geert, but I think you are just saying it."

"No, no, you can credit yourself with it, if it is something
creditable."

"I should say it is."

"Now guess who sent you his regards."

"That is not hard, Geert. Besides, we wives, for I can count myself
one since you are back"--and she reached out her hand and laughed--"we
wives guess easily. We are not so obtuse as you."

"Well, who was it?"

"Why, Cousin von Briest, of course. He is the only person I know in
Berlin, not counting my aunts, whom you no doubt failed to look up,
and who are far too envious to send me their regards. Haven't you
found, too, that all old aunts are envious?"

"Yes, Effi, that is true. And to hear you say it reminds me that you
are my same old Effi. For you must know that the old Effi, who looked
like a child, also suited my taste. Just exactly as does your Ladyship
at present."

"Do you think so? And if you had to decide between the two"--

"That is a question for scholars; I shall not talk about it. But there
comes Frederick with the tea. How I have longed for this hour! And I
said so, too, even to your Cousin Briest, as we were sitting at
Dressel's and drinking Champagne to your health--Your ears must have
rung--And do you know what your cousin said?"

"Something silly, certainly. He is great at that."

"That is the blackest ingratitude I have ever heard of in all my life.
'Let us drink to the health of Effi,' he said, 'my beautiful
cousin--Do you know, Innstetten, that I should like nothing better
than to challenge you and shoot you dead? For Effi is an angel, and
you robbed me of this angel.' And he looked so serious and sad, as he
said it, that one might almost have believed him."

"Oh, I know that mood of his. The how-manieth were you drinking?"

"I don't recall now and perhaps could not have told you then. But this
I do believe, that he was wholly in earnest. And perhaps it would have
been the right match. Don't you think you could have lived with him?"

"Could have lived? That is little, Geert. But I might almost say, I
could not even have lived with him."

"Why not? He is really a fine amiable fellow and quite sensible,
besides."

"Yes, he is that."

"But--"

"But he is a tomfool. And that is not the kind of a man we women love,
not even when we are still half children, as you have always thought
me and perhaps still do, in spite of my progress. Tomfoolery is not
what we want. Men must be men."

"It's well you say so. My, a man surely has to mind his p's and q's.
Fortunately I can say I have just had an experience that looks as
though I had minded my p's and q's, or at least I shall be expected to
in the future--Tell me, what is your idea of a ministry?"

"A ministry? Well, it may be one of two things. It may be people, wise
men of high rank, who rule the state; and it may be merely a house, a
palace, a Palazzo Strozzi or Pitti, or, if these are not fitting, any
other. You see I have not taken my Italian journey in vain."

"And could you make up your mind to live in such a palace? I mean in
such a ministry?"

"For heaven's sake, Geert, they have not made you a minister, have
they? Gieshübler said something of the sort. And the Prince is
all-powerful. Heavens, he has accomplished it at last and I am only
eighteen."

Innstetten laughed. "No, Effi, not a minister; we have not risen to
that yet. But perhaps I may yet develop a variety of gifts that would
make such a thing not impossible."

"So not just yet, not yet a minister?"

"No. And, to tell the truth, we are not even to live in the ministry,
but I shall go daily to the ministry, as I now go to our district
council office, and I shall make reports to the minister and travel
with him, when he inspects the provincial offices. And you will be the
wife of a head clerk of a ministerial department and live in Berlin,
and in six months you will hardly remember that you have been here in
Kessin, where you have had nothing but Gieshübler and the dunes and
the 'Plantation.'"

Effi did not say a word, but her eyes kept getting larger and larger.
About the corners of her mouth there was a nervous twitching and her
whole slender body trembled. Suddenly she slid from her seat down to
Innstetten's feet, clasped her arms around his knees and said in a
tone, as though she were praying: "Thank God!"

Innstetten turned pale. What was that? Something that had come over
him weeks before, but had swiftly passed away, only to come back from
time to time, returned again now and spoke so plainly out of his eyes
that it startled Effi. She had allowed herself to be carried away by a
beautiful feeling, differing but little from a confession of her
guilt, and had told more than she dared. She must offset it, must find
some way of escape, at whatever cost.

"Get up, Effi. What is the matter with you?"

Effi arose quickly. However, she did not sit down on the sofa again,
but drew up a high-backed chair, apparently because she did not feel
strong enough to hold herself up without support.

"What is the matter with you?" repeated Innstetten. "I thought you had
spent happy days here. And now you cry out, 'Thank God!' as though
your whole life here had been one prolonged horror. Have I been a
horror to you? Or is it something else? Speak!"

"To think that you can ask such a question!" said Effi, seeking by a
supreme effort to suppress the trembling of her voice. "Happy days!
Yes, certainly, happy days, but others, too. Never have I been
entirely free from fear here, never. Never yet a fortnight that it did
not look over my shoulder again, that same face, the same sallow
complexion. And these last nights while you were away, it came back
again, not the face, but there was shuffling of feet again, and Rollo
set up his barking again, and Roswitha, who also heard it, came to my
bed and sat down by me and we did not go to sleep till day began to
dawn. This is a haunted house and I was expected to believe in the
ghost, for you are a pedagogue. Yes, Geert, that you are. But be that
as it may, thus much I know, I have been afraid in this house for a
whole year and longer, and when I go away from here the fear will
leave me, I think, and I shall be free again."

Innstetten had not taken his eyes off her and had followed every word.
What could be the meaning of "You are a pedagogue," and the other
statement that preceded, "And I was expected to believe in the ghost?"
What was all that about? Where did it come from? And he felt a slight
suspicion arising and becoming more firmly fixed. But he had lived
long enough to know that all signs deceive, and that in our jealousy,
in spite of its hundred eyes, we often go farther astray than in the
blindness of our trust. Possibly it was as she said, and, if it was,
why should she not cry out: "Thank God!"

And so, quickly looking at the matter from all possible sides, he
overcame his suspicion and held out his hand to her across the table:
"Pardon me, Effi, but I was so much surprised by it all. I suppose, of
course, it is my fault. I have always been too much occupied with
myself. We men are all egoists. But it shall be different from now on.
There is one good thing about Berlin, that is certain: there are no
haunted houses there. How could there be! Now let us go into the other
room and see Annie; otherwise Roswitha will accuse me of being an
unaffectionate father."

During these words Effi had gradually become more composed, and the
consciousness of having made a felicitous escape from a danger of her
own creation restored her countenance and buoyancy.




CHAPTER XXII


The next morning the two took their rather late breakfast together.
Innstetten had overcome his ill-humor and something worse, and Effi
was so completely taken up with her feeling of liberation that not
only had her power of feigning a certain amount of good humor
returned, but she had almost regained her former artlessness. She was
still in Kessin, and yet she already felt as though it lay far behind
her.

"I have been thinking it over, Effi," said Innstetten, "you are not
entirely wrong in all you have said against our house here. For
Captain Thomsen it was quite good enough, but not for a spoiled young
wife. Everything old-fashioned and no room. You shall have a better
house in Berlin, with a dining hall, but different from the one here,
and in the hall and on the stairway colored-glass windows, Emperor
William with sceptre and crown, or some religious picture, a St.
Elizabeth or a Virgin Mary. Let us say a Virgin Mary; we owe that to
Roswitha."

Effi laughed. "So shall it be. But who will select an apartment for
us? I couldn't think of sending Cousin von Briest to look for one, to
say nothing of my aunts. They would consider anything good enough."

"When it comes to selecting an apartment, nobody can do that to the
satisfaction of any one else. I think you will have to go yourself."

"And when do you think?"

"The middle of March."

"Oh, that is much too late, Geert; everything will be gone then. The
good apartments will hardly wait for us."

"All right. But it was only yesterday that I came home and I can't
well say: 'go tomorrow.' That would not look right and it would not
suit me very well either. I am happy to have you with me once more."

"No," she said, as she gathered together the breakfast dishes rather
noisily to hide a rising embarrassment, "no, and it shall not be
either, neither today nor tomorrow, but before very long, however. And
if I find anything I shall soon be back again. But one thing more,
Roswitha and Annie must go with me. It would please me most if you
went too. But, I see, that is out of the question. And I think the
separation will not last long. I already know, too, where I shall
rent."

"Where?"

"That must remain my secret. I want to have a secret myself. I want to
surprise you later."

At this point Frederick entered to bring the mail. The most of the
pieces were official and newspapers. "Ah, there is also a letter for
you," said Innstetten. "And, if I am not mistaken, mama's
handwriting."

Effi took the letter. "Yes, from mama. But that is not the Friesack
postmark. Just see, why, it is plainly Berlin."

"Certainly," laughed Innstetten. "You act as though it were a miracle.
Mama is doubtless in Berlin and has written her darling a letter from
her hotel."

"Yes," said Effi, "that is probably it. But I almost have fears, and
can find no real consolation in what Hulda Niemeyer always said: that
when one has fears it is better than when one has hopes. What do you
think about it?"

"For a pastor's daughter not quite up to the standard. But now read
the letter. Here is a paper knife."

Effi cut open the envelope and read: "My dear Effi: For the last
twenty-four hours I have been here in Berlin--Consultations with
Schweigger. As soon as he saw me he congratulated me, and when I asked
him, astonished, what occasion there was, I learned that a director of
a ministerial department by the name of Wüllersdorf had just been at
his office and told him that Innstetten had been called to a position
with the ministry. I am a little vexed to have to learn a thing like
that from a third person. But in my pride and joy I forgive you.
Moreover, I always knew, even when I was at Rathenow, that he would
make something of himself. Now you are to profit by it. Of course you
must have an apartment and new furniture. If, my dear Effi, you think
you can make use of my advice, come as soon as your time will permit.
I shall remain here a week for treatment, and if it is not effective,
perhaps somewhat longer. Schweigger is rather indefinite on the
subject. I have taken a private room on Schadow St. Adjoining my room
there are others vacant. What the matter is with my eye I will tell
you when I see you. The thing that occupies me at present is your
future. Briest will be unspeakably happy. He always pretends to be so
indifferent about such things, but in reality he thinks more of them
than I do. My regards to Innstetten, and a kiss for Annie, whom you
will perhaps bring along. As ever your tenderly loving mother, Louise
von B."

Effi laid the letter on the table and said nothing. Her mind was
firmly made up as to what she should do, but she did not want to say
it herself. She wanted Innstetten to speak the first word and then she
would hesitatingly say, "yes."

Innstetten actually fell into the trap. "Well, Effi, you remain so
calm."

"Ah, Geert, everything has its two sides. On the one hand I shall be
happy to see mother again, and maybe even in a few days. But there are
so many reasons for delaying."

"What are they?"

"Mama, as you know, is very determined and recognizes only her own
will. With papa she has been able to have her way in everything. But I
should like to have an apartment to suit _my_ taste, and new furniture
that _I_ like."

Innstetten laughed. "Is that all?"

"Well, that is enough, I should think. But it is not all." Then she
summoned up her courage, looked at him, and said: "And then, Geert, I
should not like to be separated from you again so soon."

"You rogue, you just say that because you know my weakness. But we are
all vain, and I will believe it. I will believe it and yet, at the
same time, play the hero who foregoes his own desires. Go as soon as
you think it necessary and can justify it before your own heart."

"You must not talk like that, Geert. What do you mean by 'justifying
it before my own heart?' By saying that you force me, half
tyrannically, to assume a role of affection, and I am compelled to
say from sheer coquetry: 'Ah, Geert, then I shall never go.' Or
something of the sort."

Innstetten shook his finger at her. "Effi, you are too clever for me.
I always thought you were a child, and now I see that you are on a par
with all the rest. But enough of that, or, as your papa always said,
'that is too wide a field.' Say, rather, when you are going?"

"Today is Tuesday. Let us say, then, Friday noon by the boat. Then I
shall be in Berlin in the evening."

"Settled. And when will you be back?"

"Well, let us gay Monday evening. That will make three days."

"Impossible. That is too soon. You can't accomplish everything in
three days. Your mama will not let you go so soon, either."

"Then leave it to my discretion."

"All right," and Innstetten arose from his seat to go over to the
district councillor's office.

       *       *       *       *       *

The days before Effi's departure flew by quickly. Roswitha was very
happy. "Ah, your Ladyship, Kessin, oh yes--but it is not Berlin. And
the street cars. And then when the gong rings and one does not know
whether to turn to the right or the left, and it has sometimes seemed
to me as though everything would run right over me. Oh, there is
nothing like that here. Many a day I doubt if we see six people, and
never anything else but the dunes and the sea outside. And it roars
and roars, but that is all."

"Yes, Roswitha, you are right. It roars and roars all the time, but
this is not the right kind of life. Besides, one has all sorts of
stupid ideas. That you cannot deny, and your conduct with Kruse was
not in accord with propriety."

"Ah, your Ladyship--"

"Well, I will not make any further inquiries. You would not admit
anything, of course. Only be sure not to take too few things with you.
In fact, you may take all your things along, and Annie's too."

"I thought we were coming back."

"Yes, I am. It is his Lordship's desire. But you may perhaps stay
there, with my mother. Only see to it that she does not spoil little
Annie too badly. She was often strict with me, but a grandchild--"

"And then, too, you know, little Annie is so sweet, one is tempted to
take a bite of her. Nobody can help being fond of her."

That was on Thursday, the day before the departure. Innstetten had
driven into the country and was not expected home till toward evening.
In the afternoon Effi went down town, as far as the market square, and
there entered the apothecary's shop and asked for a bottle of _sal
volatile_. "One never knows with whom one is to travel," she said to
the old clerk, with whom she was accustomed to chat, and who adored
her as much as Gieshübler himself.

"Is the doctor in?" she asked further, when she had put the little
bottle in her pocket.

"Certainly, your Ladyship, he is in the adjoining room reading the
papers."

"I shall not disturb him, shall I?"

"Oh, never."

Effi stepped in. It was a small room with a high ceiling and shelves
around the walls, on which stood alembics and retorts. Along one wall
were filing cases arranged alphabetically and provided with iron rings
on the front ends. They contained the prescriptions.

Gieshübler was delighted and embarrassed. "What an honor! Here among
my retorts! May I invite her Ladyship to be seated for a moment?"

"Certainly, dear Gieshübler. But really only for a moment. I want to
bid you farewell."

"But, most gracious Lady, you are coming back, aren't you? I heard it
was only for three or four days."

"Yes, dear friend, I am supposed to come back, and it is even arranged
that I shall be back in Kessin in a week at the latest. But it is
possible that I may _not_ come back. I don't need to tell you all the
thousand possibilities--I see you are about to tell me I am still too
young to--but young people sometimes die. And then there are so many
other things. So I prefer to take leave of you as though it were for
ever."

"But, most gracious Lady--"

"As though it were for ever. And I want to thank you, dear Gieshübler.
For you were the best thing here; naturally, because you were the best
man. If I live to be a hundred years old I shall not forget you. I
have felt lonely here at times, and at times my heart was so heavy,
heavier than you can ever know. I have not always managed rightly. But
whenever I have seen you, from the very first day, I have always felt
happier, and better, too."

"Oh, most gracious Lady."

"And I wished to thank you for it. I have just bought a small bottle
of _sal volatile_. There are often such remarkable people in the
compartment, who will not even permit a window to be opened. If I shed
any tears--for, you know, it goes right up into one's head, the salts,
I mean--then I will think of you. Adieu, dear friend, and give my
regards to your friend, Miss Trippelli. During these last weeks I have
often thought of her and of Prince Kotschukoff. After all is said and
done it remains a peculiar relation. But I can understand it--and let
me hear from you some day. Or I shall write."

With these words Effi went out. Gieshübler accompanied her out upon
the square. He was dumbfounded, so completely that he entirely
overlooked many enigmatical things she said.

Effi went back home. "Bring me the lamp, Johanna," she said, "but into
my bedroom. And then a cup of tea. I am so cold and cannot wait till
his Lordship returns."

The lamp and the tea came. Effi was already sitting at her little
writing desk, with a sheet of letter paper before her and the pen in
her hand. "Please, Johanna, put the tea on the table there."

When Johanna had left the room Effi locked her door, looked into the
mirror for a moment and then sat down again, and wrote: "I leave
tomorrow by the boat, and these are farewell lines. Innstetten expects
me back in a few days, but I am _not_ coming back--why I am not coming
back, you know--it would have been better if I had never seen this
corner of the earth. I implore you not to take this as a reproach. All
the fault is mine. If I look at your house--_your_ conduct may be
excusable, not mine. My fault is very grievous, but perhaps I can
overcome it. The fact that we were called away from here is to me, so
to speak, a sign that I may yet be restored to favor. Forget the past,
forget me. Your Effi."

She ran hastily over the lines once more. The strangest thing to her
was the avoidance of the familiar "Du," but that had to be. It was
meant to convey the idea that there was no bridge left. Then she put
the letter into an envelope and walked toward a house between the
churchyard and the corner of the forest. A thin column of smoke arose
from the half tumbled down chimney. There she delivered the letter.

When she reached home Innstetten was already there and she sat down by
him and told him about Gieshübler and the _sal volatile_. Innstetten
laughed. "Where did you get your Latin, Effi?"

The boat, a light sailing vessel (the steamers ran only in the summer)
left at twelve. A quarter of an hour before, Effi and Innstetten were
on board; likewise Roswitha and Annie.

The baggage was bulkier than seemed necessary for a journey of so few
days. Innstetten talked with the captain. Effi, in a raincoat and
light gray traveling hat, stood on the after deck, near the tiller,
and looked out upon the quay and the pretty row of houses that
followed the line of the quay. Just opposite the landing stood the
Hoppensack Hotel, a three-story building, from whose gable a yellow
flag, with a cross and a crown on it, hung down limp in the quiet
foggy air. Effi looked up at the flag for a while, then let her eyes
sink slowly until they finally rested on a number of people who stood
about inquisitively on the quay. At this moment the bell rang. Effi
had a very peculiar sensation. The boat slowly began to move, and as
she once more looked closely at the landing bridge she saw that
Crampas was standing in the front row. She was startled to see him,
but at the same time was glad. He, on the other hand, with his whole
bearing changed, was obviously agitated, and waved an earnest adieu to
her. She returned his greeting in like spirit, but also with great
friendliness, and there was pleading in her eyes. Then she walked
quickly to the cabin, where Roswitha had already made herself at home
with Annie. She remained here in the rather close rooms till they
reached the point where the river spreads out into a sheet of water
called the "Broad." Then Innstetten came and called to her to come up
on deck and enjoy the glorious landscape. She went up. Over the
surface of the water hung gray clouds and only now and then could one
catch a half-veiled glimpse of the sun through a rift in the dense
mass. Effi thought of the day, just a year and a quarter ago, when she
had driven in an open carriage along the shore of this same "Broad." A
brief span, and life often so quiet and lonely. Yet how much had
happened since then!

Thus they sailed up the fairway and at two o'clock were at the station
or very near it. As they, a moment later, passed the Prince Bismarck
Hotel, Golchowski, who was again standing at the door, joined them and
accompanied them to the steps leading up the embankment. At the
station they found the train was not yet signaled, so they walked up
and down on the platform. Their conversation turned about the question
of an apartment. They agreed on the quarter of the city, that it must
be between the Tiergarten and the Zoological Garden. "I want to hear
the finches sing and the parrots scream," said Innstetten, and Effi
was willing.

Then they heard the signal and the train ran into the station. The
station master was full of attentions and Effi received a compartment
to herself.

Another handshake, a wave of her handkerchief, and the train began
again to move.




CHAPTER XXIII


[Effi was met at the Berlin station by her mother and Cousin von
Briest. While drinking tea in the mother's room Cousin von Briest was
asked to tell a joke, and propounded a Bible conundrum, which Effi
took as an omen that no more sorrow was to befall her. The following
day began the search for an apartment, and one was found on Keith
street, which exactly suited, except that the house was not finished
and the walls not yet dried out. Effi kept it in mind, however, and
looked further, being as long about it as possible. After two weeks
Innstetten began to insist on her return and to make pointed
allusions. She saw there was nothing left but to sham illness. Then
she rented the apartment on Keith street, wrote a card saying she
would be home the next day, and had the trunks packed. The next
morning she stayed in bed and feigned illness, but preferred not to
call a doctor. She telegraphed about her delay to her husband. After
three days of the farce she yielded to her mother and called an old
ladies' doctor by the name of Rummschüttel ('Shake 'em around'). After
a few questions he prescribed a mixture of bitter almond water and
orange blossom syrup and told her to keep quiet. Later he called every
third day, noticing that his calls embarrassed her. She felt he had
seen through her from the start, but the farce had to be kept up till
Innstetten had closed his house and shipped his things. Four days
before he was due in Berlin she suddenly got well and wrote him she
could now travel, but thought it best to await him in Berlin. As soon
as she received his favorable telegram she hastened to the new
apartment, where she raised her eyes, folded her hands, and said:
"Now, with God's help, a new life, and a different one!"]




CHAPTER XXIV


Three days later, at nine o 'clock in the evening, Innstetten arrived
in Berlin. Effi, her mother, and Cousin Briest were at the station.
The reception was hearty, particularly on the part of Effi, and a
world of things had been talked about when the carriage they had taken
stopped before their new residence on Keith street. "Well, you have
made a good choice, Effi," said Innstetten, as he entered the
vestibule; "no shark, no crocodile, and, I hope, no spooks."

"No, Geert, that is all past. A new era has dawned and I am no longer
afraid. I am also going to be better than heretofore and live more
according to your will." This she whispered to him as they climbed the
carpeted stairs to the third story. Cousin von Briest escorted the
mother.

In their apartment there was still a great deal to be done, but enough
had been accomplished to make a homelike impression and Innstetten
exclaimed out of the joy of his heart: "Effi, you are a little
genius." But she declined the praise, pointing to her mother, saying
she really deserved the credit. Her mother had issued inexorable
commands, such as, "It must stand here," and had always been right,
with the natural result that much time had been saved and their good
humor had never been disturbed. Finally Roswitha came in to welcome
her master. She took advantage of the opportunity to say: "Miss Annie
begs to be excused for today,"--a little joke, of which she was proud,
and which accomplished her purpose perfectly.

They took seats around the table, already set, and when Innstetten had
poured himself a glass of wine and all had joined him in a toast to
"happy days," he took Effi's hand and said: "Now tell me, Effi, what
was the nature of your illness?"

"Oh, let us not talk about that; it would be a waste of breath--A
little painful and a real disturbance, because it cancelled our plans.
But that was all, and now it is past. Rummschüttel justified his
reputation; he is a fine, amiable old man, as I believe I wrote you.
He is said not to be a particularly brilliant scholar, but mama says
that is an advantage. And she is doubtless right, as usual. Our good
Dr. Hannemann was no luminary either, and yet he was always
successful. Now tell me, how are Gieshübler and all the others?"

"Let me see, who are all the others? Crampas sends his regards to her
Ladyship."

"Ah, very polite."

"And the pastor also wishes to be remembered to you. But the people in
the country were rather cool and seemed inclined to hold me
responsible for your departure without formally taking leave. Our
friend Sidonie spoke quite pointedly, but good Mrs. von Padden, whom I
called on specially the day before yesterday, was genuinely pleased to
receive your regards and your declaration of love for her. She said
you were a charming woman, but I ought to guard you well. When I
replied that you considered me more of a pedagogue than a husband, she
said in an undertone and almost as though speaking from another world:
'A young lamb as white as snow!' Then she stopped."

Cousin von Briest laughed. "'A young lamb as white as snow.' Hear
that, cousin?" He was going to continue teasing her, but gave it up
when he saw that she turned pale.

The conversation dragged on a while longer, dealing chiefly with
former relations, and Effi finally learned, from various things
Innstetten said, that of all their Kessin household Johanna alone had
declared a willingness to move with them to Berlin. She had remained
behind, to be sure, but would arrive in two or three days with the
rest of the things. Innstetten was glad of her decision, for she had
always been their most useful servant and possessed an unusual amount
of the style demanded in a large city, perhaps a bit too much. Both
Christel and Frederick had said they were too old, and Kruse had not
even been asked. "What do we want with a coachman here?" concluded
Innstetten, "private horses and carriages are things of the past; that
luxury is seen no more in Berlin. We could not even have found a place
for the black chicken. Or do I underestimate the apartment?"

Effi shook her head, and as a short pause ensued the mother arose,
saying it was half past ten and she had still a long way to go, but
nobody should accompany her, as the carriage stand was quite near.
Cousin Briest declined, of course, to accede to this request.
Thereupon they bade each other good night, after arranging to meet the
following morning.

Effi was up rather early and, as the air was almost as warm as in the
summer, had ordered the breakfast table moved close to the open
balcony door. When Innstetten appeared she stepped out upon the
balcony with him and said: "Well, what do you say? You wished to hear
the finches singing in the Tiergarten and the parrots calling in the
Zoological Garden. I don't know whether both will do you the favor,
but it is possible. Do you hear that? It came from the little park
over yonder. It is not the real Tiergarten, but near it."

Innstetten was delighted and as grateful as though Effi herself had
conjured up all these things for him. Then they sat down and Annie
came in. Roswitha expected Innstetten to find a great change in the
child, and he did. They went on chatting, first about the people of
Kessin, then about the visits to be made in Berlin, and finally about
a summer journey. They had to stop in the middle of their conversation
in order to be at the rendezvous on time.

They met, as agreed, at Helms's, opposite the Red Palace, went to
various stores, lunched at Hiller's, and were home again in good
season. It was a capital day together, and Innstetten was very glad to
be able once more to share in the life of a great city and feel its
influence upon him. The following day, the 1st of April, he went to
the Chancellor's Palace to register, considerately foregoing a
personal call, and then went to the Ministry to report for duty. He
was received, in spite of the rush of business and social obligations,
in fact he was favored with a particularly friendly reception by his
chief, who said: "I know what a valuable man you are and am certain
nothing can ever disturb our harmony."

Likewise at home everything assumed a good aspect. Effi truly
regretted to see her mother return to Hohen-Cremmen, even after her
treatment had been prolonged to nearly six weeks, as she had predicted
in the beginning. But the loss was partly offset by Johanna's arrival
in Berlin on the same day. That was at least something, and even if
the pretty blonde was not so near to Effi's heart as the wholly
unselfish and infinitely good-natured Roswitha, nevertheless she was
treated on an equality with her, both by Innstetten and her young
mistress, because she was very clever and useful and showed a decided,
self-conscious reserve toward the men. According to a Kessin rumor the
roots of her existence could be traced to a long-retired officer of
the Pasewalk garrison, which was said to explain her aristocratic
temperament, her beautiful blonde hair, and the special shapeliness of
her appearance. Johanna shared the joy displayed on all hands at her
arrival and was perfectly willing to resume her former duties as house
servant and lady's maid, whereas Roswitha, who after an experience of
nearly a year had acquired about all of Christel's cookery art, was to
superintend the culinary department. The care and nurture of Annie
fell to Effi herself, at which Roswitha naturally laughed, for she
knew young wives.

Innstetten was wholly devoted to his office and his home. He was
happier than formerly in Kessin, because he could not fail to observe
that Effi manifested more artlessness and cheerfulness. She could do
so because she felt freer. True, the past still cast a shadow over her
life, but it no longer worried her, or at least much more rarely and
transiently, and all such after-effects served but to give her bearing
a peculiar charm. In everything she did there was an element of
sadness, of confession, so to speak, and it would have made her happy
if she could have shown it still more plainly. But, of course, she
dared not.

When they made their calls, during the first weeks of April, the
social season of the great city was not yet past, but it was about to
end, so they were unable to share in it to any great extent. During
the latter half of May it expired completely and they were more than
ever happy to be able to meet at the noon hour in the Tiergarten, when
Innstetten came from his office, or to take a walk in the afternoon to
the garden of the Palace in Charlottenburg. As Effi walked up and down
the long front, between the Palace and the orange trees, she studied
time and again the many Roman emperors standing there, found a
remarkable resemblance between Nero and Titus, gathered pine cones
that had fallen from the trees, and then walked arm in arm with her
husband toward the Spree till they came to the lonely Belvedere
Palace.

"They say this palace was also once haunted," she remarked.

"No, merely ghostly apparitions."

"That is the same thing."

"Yes, sometimes," said Innstetten. "As a matter of fact, however,
there is a difference. Ghostly apparitions are always artificial, or
at least that is said to have been the case in the Belvedere, as
Cousin von Briest told me only yesterday, but hauntings are never
artificial; hauntings are natural."

"So you do believe in them?"

"Certainly I believe in them. There are such things. But I don't quite
believe in those we had in Kessin. Has Johanna shown you her Chinaman
yet?"

"What Chinaman?"

"Why, ours. Before she left our old house she pulled him off the back
of the chair upstairs and put him in her purse. I caught a glimpse of
him not long ago when she was changing a mark for me. She was
embarrassed, but confessed."

"Oh, Geert, you ought not to have told me that. Now there is such a
thing in our house again."

"Tell her to burn it up."

"No, I don't want to; it would not do any good anyhow. But I will ask
Roswitha--"

"What? Oh, I understand, I can imagine what you are thinking of. You
will ask her to buy a picture of a saint and put it also in the purse.
Is that about it?"

Effi nodded.

"Well, do what you like, but do not tell anybody."

       *       *       *       *       *

Effi finally said she would rather not do it, and they went on talking
about all sorts of little things, till the plans for their summer
journey gradually crowded out other interests. They rode back to the
"Great Star" and then walked home by the Korso Boulevard and the broad
Frederick William Street.

They planned to take their vacation at the end of July and go to the
Bavarian Alps, as the Passion Play was to be given again this year at
Oberammergau. But it could not be done, as Privy Councillor von
Wüllersdorf, whom Innstetten had known for some time and who was now
his special colleague, fell sick suddenly and Innstetten had to stay
and take his place. Not until the middle of August was everything
again running smoothly and a vacation journey possible. It was too
late then to go to Oberammergau, so they fixed upon a sojourn on the
island of Rügen. "First, of course, Stralsund, with Schill, whom you
know, and with Scheele, whom you don't know. Scheele discovered
oxygen, but you don't need to know that. Then from Stralsund to Bergen
and the Rugard, where Wüllersdorf said one can get a good view of the
whole island, and thence between the Big and the Little Jasmund Bodden
to Sassnitz. Going to Rügen means going to Sassnitz. Binz might
perhaps be possible, too, but, to quote Wüllersdorf again, there are
so many small pebbles and shells on the beach, and we want to go
bathing."

Effi agreed to everything planned by Innstetten, especially that the
whole household should be broken up for four weeks, Roswitha going
with Annie to Hohen-Cremmen, and Johanna visiting her younger
half-brother, who had a sawmill near Pasewalk. Thus everybody was well
provided for.

At the beginning of the following week they set out and the same
evening were in Sassnitz. Over the hostelry was the sign, "Hotel
Fahrenheit." "I hope the prices are according to Réaumur," added
Innstetten, as he read the name, and the two took an evening walk
along the beach cliffs in the best of humor. From a projecting rock
they looked out upon the bay quivering in the moonlight. Effi was
entranced. "Ah, Geert, why, this is Capri, it is Sorrento. Yes, let us
stay here, but not in the hotel, of course. The waiters are too
aristocratic for me and I feel ashamed to ask for a bottle of soda
water."

"Yes, everybody is an employee. But, I think, we can find private
quarters."

"I think so too. And we will look for them the first thing in the
morning."

The next morning was as beautiful as the evening had been, and they
took coffee out of doors. Innstetten received a few letters, which had
to be attended to promptly, and so Effi decided at once to employ the
hour thus left free for her in looking for quarters. She first walked
past an inclosed meadow, then past groups of houses and fields of
oats, finally turning into a road which ran through a kind of gully to
the sea. Where this gully road struck the beach there stood an inn
shaded by tall beech trees, not so aristocratic as the "Fahrenheit," a
mere restaurant, in fact, which because of the early hour was entirely
empty. Effi sat down at a point with a good view and hardly had she
taken a sip of the sherry she had ordered when the inn-keeper stepped
up to engage her in conversation, half out of curiosity and half out
of politeness.

"We like it very well here," she said, "my husband and I. What a
splendid view of the bay! Our only worry is about a place to stay."

"Well, most gracious Lady, that will be hard."

"Why, it is already late in the season."

"In spite of that. Here in Sassnitz there is surely nothing to be
found, I can guarantee you. But farther along the shore, where the
next village begins--you can see the shining roofs from here--there
you might perhaps find something."

"What is the name of the village?"

"Crampas."

Effi thought she had misunderstood him. "Crampas," she repeated, with
an effort. "I never heard the word as the name of a place. Nothing
else in the neighborhood?"

"No, most gracious Lady, nothing around here. But farther up, toward
the north, you will come to other villages, and in the hotel near
Stubbenkammer they will surely be able to give you information.
Addresses are always left there by people who would be willing to rent
rooms."

Effi was glad to have had the conversation alone and when she reported
it a few moments later to her husband, keeping back only the name of
the village adjoining Sassnitz, he said: "Well, if there is nothing
around here the best thing will be to take a carriage, which,
incidentally, is always the way to take leave of a hotel, and without
any ado move farther up toward Stubbenkammer. We can doubtless find
there some idyllic spot with a honeysuckle arbor, and, if we find
nothing, there is still left the hotel, and they are all alike."

Effi was willing, and about noon they reached the hotel near
Stubbenkammer, of which Innstetten had just spoken, and there ordered
a lunch. "But not until half an hour from now. We intend to take a
walk first and view the Hertha Lake. I presume you have a guide?"

Following the affirmative answer a middle-aged man approached our
travelers. He looked as important and solemn as though he had been at
least an adjunct of the ancient Hertha worship.

The lake, which was only a short distance away, had a border of tall
trees and a hem of rushes, while on its quiet black surface there swam
hundreds of water lilies.

"It really looks like something of the sort," said Effi, "like Hertha
worship."

"Yes, your Ladyship, and the stones are further evidences of it."

"What stones?"

"The sacrificial stones."

While the conversation continued in this way they stepped from the
lake to a perpendicular wall of gravel and clay, against which leaned
a few smooth polished stones, with a shallow hollow in each drained by
a few grooves.

"What is the purpose of these?"

"To make it drain better, your Ladyship."

"Let us go," said Effi, and, taking her husband's arm, she walked back
with him to the hotel, where the breakfast already ordered was served
at a table with a view far out upon the sea. Before them lay the bay
in the sunshine, with sail boats here and there gliding across its
surface and sea gulls pursuing each other about the neighboring
cliffs. It was very beautiful and Effi said so; but, when she looked
across the glittering surface, she saw again, toward the south, the
brightly shining roofs of the long-stretched-out village, whose name
had given her such a start earlier in the morning.

Even without any knowledge or suspicion of what was occupying her,
Innstetten saw clearly that she was having no joy or satisfaction. "I
am sorry, Effi, that you derive no real pleasure from these things
here. You cannot forget the Hertha Lake, and still less the
stones."

[Illustration: _Permission F Bruckmann A.-G. Munich_
BATHING BOYS    Adolph von Menzel]

She nodded. "It is as you say, and I must confess that I have seen
nothing in my life that made me feel so sad. Let us give up entirely
our search for rooms. I can't stay here."

"And yesterday it seemed to you a Gulf of Naples and everything
beautiful you could think of."

"Yes, yesterday."

"And today? No longer a trace of Sorrento?"

"Still one trace, but only one. It is Sorrento on the point of dying."

"Very well, then, Effi," said Innstetten, reaching her his hand. "I do
not want to worry you with Rügen and so let us give it up. Settled. It
is not necessary for us to tie ourselves up to Stubbenkammer or
Sassnitz or farther down that way. But whither?"

"I suggest that we stay a day longer and wait for the steamer that
comes from Stettin tomorrow on its way to Copenhagen. It is said to be
so pleasurable there and I can't tell you how I long for something
pleasurable. Here I feel as though I could never laugh again in all my
life and had never laughed at all, and you know how I like to laugh."

Innstetten showed himself full of sympathy with her state, the more
readily, as he considered her right in many regards. Really
everything, though beautiful, was melancholy.

They waited for the Stettin boat and in the very early morning of the
third day they landed in Copenhagen. Two hours later they were in the
Thorwaldsen Museum, and Effi said: "Yes, Geert, this is beautiful and
I am glad we set out for here." Soon thereafter they went to dinner
and at the table made the acquaintance of a Jutland family, opposite
them, whose daughter, Thora von Penz, was as pretty as a picture and
attracted immediately the attention and admiration of both Innstetten
and Effi. Effi could not stop looking at her large blue eyes and
flaxen blonde hair, and when they left the table an hour and a half
later the Penz family, who unfortunately had to leave Copenhagen the
same day, expressed the hope that they might have the privilege of
entertaining the young Prussian couple in the near future at Aggerhuus
Castle, some two miles from the Lym-Fiord. The invitation was accepted
by the Innstettens with little hesitation.

Thus passed the hours in the hotel. But that was not yet enough of a
good thing for this memorable day, which Effi enthusiastically
declared ought to be a red-letter day in the calendar. To fill her
measure of happiness to the full the evening brought a performance at
the Tivoli Theatre, an Italian pantomime, _Arlequin and Columbine_.
She was completely captivated by the little roguish tricks, and when
they returned to their hotel late in the evening she said: "Do you
know, Geert, I now feel that I am gradually coming to again. I will
not even mention beautiful Thora, but when I consider that this
morning Thorwaldsen and this evening Columbine--"

"Whom at bottom you liked better than Thorwaldsen--"

"To be frank, yes. I have a natural appreciation of such things. Our
good Kessin was a misfortune for me. Everything got on my nerves
there. Rügen too, almost. I suggest we stay here in Copenhagen a few
days longer, including an excursion to Fredericksborg and Helsingor,
of course, and then go over to Jutland. I anticipate real pleasure
from seeing beautiful Thora again, and if I were a man I should fall
in love with her."

Innstetten laughed. "You don't know what I am going to do."

"I shouldn't object. That will create a rivalry and I shall show you
that I still have my powers, too."

"You don't need to assure me of that."

The journey was made according to this plan. Over in Jutland they went
up the Lym-Fiord as far as Aggerhuus Castle, where they spent three
days with the Penz family, and then returned home, making many stops
on the way, for sojourns of various lengths, in Viborg, Flensburg,
Kiel, and Hamburg. From Hamburg, which they liked uncommonly well,
they did not go direct to Keith St. in Berlin, but first to
Hohen-Cremmen, where they wished to enjoy a well-earned rest. For
Innstetten it meant but a few days, as his leave of absence expired,
but Effi remained a week longer and declared her desire not to arrive
at home till the 3d of October, their wedding anniversary.

Annie had flourished splendidly in the country air and Roswitha's plan
of having her walk to meet her mother succeeded perfectly. Briest
proved himself an affectionate grandfather, warned them against too
much love, and even more strongly against too much severity, and was
in every way the same as always. But in reality all his affection was
bestowed upon Effi, who occupied his emotional nature continually,
particularly when he was alone with his wife.

"How do you find Effi?"

"Dear and good as ever. We cannot thank God enough that we have such a
lovely daughter. How thankful she is for everything, and always so
happy to be under our rooftree again."

"Yes," said Briest, "she has more of this virtue than I like. To tell
the truth, it seems as though this were still her home. Yet she has
her husband and child, and her husband is a jewel and her child an
angel, and still she acts as though Hohen-Cremmen were her favorite
abode, and her husband and child were nothing in comparison with you
and me. She is a splendid daughter, but she is too much of a daughter
to suit me. It worries me a little bit. She is also unjust to
Innstetten. How do matters really stand between them?"

"Why, Briest, what do you mean?"

"Well, I mean what I mean and you know what, too. Is she happy? Or is
there something or other in the way? From the very beginning it has
seemed to me as though she esteemed him more than she loved him, and
that to my mind is a bad thing. Even love may not last forever, and
esteem will certainly not. In fact women become angry when they have
to esteem a man; first they become angry, then bored, and in the end
they laugh."

"Have you had any such experience?"

"I will not say that I have. I did not stand high enough in esteem.
But let us not get wrought up any further. Tell me how matters stand."

"Pshaw! Briest, you always come back to the same things. We have
talked about and exchanged our views on this question more than a
dozen times, and yet you always come back and, in spite of your
pretended omniscience, ask me about it with the most dreadful naïveté,
as though my eyes could penetrate any depth. What kind of notions have
you, anyhow, of a young wife, and more especially of your daughter? Do
you think that the whole situation is so plain? Or that I am an
oracle--I can't just recall the name of the person--or that I hold the
truth cut and dried in my hands, when Effi has poured out her heart to
me?--at least what is so designated. For what does pouring out one's
heart mean? After all, the real thing is kept back. She will take care
not to initiate me into her secrets. Besides, I don't know from whom
she inherited it, but she is--well, she is a very sly little person
and this slyness in her is the more dangerous because she is so very
lovable."

"So you do admit that--lovable. And good, too?"

"Good, too. That is, full of goodness of heart. I am not quite certain
about anything further. I believe she has an inclination to let
matters take their course and to console herself with the hope that
God will not call her to a very strict account."

"Do you think so?"

"Yes, I do. Furthermore I think she has improved in many ways. Her
character is what it is, but the conditions since she moved to Berlin
are much more favorable and they are becoming more and more devoted to
each other. She told me something to that effect and, what is more
convincing to me, I found it confirmed by what I saw with my own
eyes."

"Well, what did she say?"

"She said: 'Mama, things are going better now. Innstetten was always
an excellent husband, and there are not many like him, but I couldn't
approach him easily, there was something distant about him. He was
reserved even in his affectionate moments, in fact, more reserved then
than ever. There have been times when I feared him.'"

"I know, I know."

"What do you mean, Briest? That I have feared you, or that you have
feared me? I consider the one as ridiculous as the other."

"You were going to tell me about Effi."

"Well, then, she confessed to me that this feeling of strangeness had
left her and that had made her very happy. Kessin had not been the
right place for her, the haunted house and the people there, some too
pious, others too dull; but since she had moved to Berlin she felt
entirely in her place. He was the best man in the world, somewhat too
old for her and too good for her, but she was now 'over the mountain.'
She used this expression, which, I admit, astonished me."

"How so? It is not quite up to par, I mean the expression. But--"

"There is something behind it, and she wanted to give me an inkling."

"Do you think so?"

"Yes, Briest. You always seem to think she could never be anything but
innocent. But you are mistaken. She likes to drift with the waves, and
if the wave is good she is good, too. Fighting and resisting are not
her affair."

Roswitha came in with Annie and interrupted the conversation.

This conversation occurred on the day that Innstetten departed from
Hohen-Cremmen for Berlin, leaving Effi behind for at least a week. He
knew she liked nothing better than whiling away her time, care-free,
with sweet dreams, always hearing friendly words and assurances of her
loveliness. Indeed that was the thing which pleased her above
everything else, and here she enjoyed it again to the full and most
gratefully, even though diversions were utterly lacking. Visitors
seldom came, because after her marriage there was no real attraction,
at least for the young people. * * *

On her wedding anniversary, the 3d of October, Effi was to be back in
Berlin. On the evening before, under the pretext of desiring to pack
her things and prepare for the journey, she retired to her room
comparatively early. As a matter of fact, her only desire was to be
alone. Much as she liked to chat, there were times when she longed for
repose.

Her rooms were in the upper story on the side toward the garden. In
the smaller one Roswitha was sleeping with Annie and their door was
standing ajar. She herself walked to and fro in the larger one, which
she occupied. The lower casements of the windows were open and the
little white curtains were blown by the draft and slowly fell over the
back of the chair, till another puff of wind came and raised them
again. It was so light that she could read plainly the titles of the
pictures hanging in narrow gilt frames over the sofa: "The Storming of
Düppel, Fort No. 5," and "King William and Count Bismarck on the
Heights of Lipa." Effi shook her head and smiled. "When I come back
again I am going to ask for different pictures; I don't like such
warlike sights." Then she closed one window and sat down by the other,
which she left open. How she enjoyed the whole scene! Almost behind
the church tower was the moon, which shed its light upon the grassy
plot with the sundial and the heliotrope beds. Everything was covered
with a silvery sheen. Beside the strips of shadow lay white strips of
light, as white as linen on the bleaching ground. Farther on stood the
tall rhubarb plants with their leaves an autumnal yellow, and she
thought of the day, only a little over two years before, when she had
played there with Hulda and the Jahnke girls. On that occasion, when
the visitor came she ascended the little stone steps by the bench and
an hour later was betrothed.

She arose, went toward the door, and listened. Roswitha was asleep and
Annie also.

Suddenly, as the child lay there before her, a throng of pictures of
the days in Kessin came back to her unbidden. There was the district
councillor's dwelling with its gable, and the veranda with the view of
the "Plantation," and she was sitting in the rocking chair, rocking.
Soon Crampas stepped up to her to greet her, and then came Roswitha
with the child, and she took it, held it up, and kissed it.

"That was the first day, there is where it began." In the midst of her
revery she left the room the two were sleeping in and sat down again
at the open window and gazed out into the quiet night.

"I cannot get rid of it," she said. "But worst of all, and the thing
that makes me lose faith in myself--" Just then the tower clock began
to strike and Effi counted the strokes. "Ten--Tomorrow at this time I
shall be in Berlin. We shall speak about our wedding anniversary and
he will say pleasing and friendly things to me and perhaps words of
affection. I shall sit there and listen and have a sense of guilt in
my heart." She leaned her head upon her hand and stared silently into
the night.

"And have a sense of guilt in my heart," she repeated. "Yes, the sense
is there. But is it a burden upon my heart? No. That is why I am
alarmed at myself. The burden there is quite a different thing--dread,
mortal dread, and eternal fear that it may some day be found out. And,
besides the dread, shame. I am ashamed of myself. But as I do not feel
true repentance, neither do I true shame. I am ashamed only on account
of my continual lying and deceiving. It was always my pride that I
could not lie and did not need to--lying is so mean, and now I have
had to lie all the time, to him and to everybody, big lies and little
lies. Even Rummschüttel noticed it and shrugged his shoulders, and
who knows what he thinks of me? Certainly not the best things. Yes,
dread tortures me, and shame on account of my life of lies. But not
shame on account of my guilt--that I do not feel, or at least not
truly, or not enough, and the knowledge that I do not is killing me.
If all women are like this it is terrible, if they are not--which I
hope--then _I_ am in a bad predicament; there is something out of
order in my heart, I lack proper feeling. Old Mr. Niemeyer once told
me, in his best days, when I was still half a child, that proper
feeling is the essential thing, and if we have that the worst cannot
befall us, but if we have it not, we are in eternal danger, and what
is called the Devil has sure power over us. For the mercy of God, is
this my state?"

She laid her head upon her arms and wept bitterly. When she
straightened up again, calmed, she gazed out into the garden. All was
so still, and her ear could detect a low sweet sound, as of falling
rain, coming from the plane trees. This continued for a while. Then
from the village street came the sound of a human voice. The old
nightwatchman Kulicke was calling out the hour. When at last he was
silent she heard in the distance the rattling of the passing train,
some two miles away. This noise gradually became fainter and finally
died away entirely--Still the moonlight lay upon the grass plot and
there was still the low sound, as of falling rain upon the plane
trees. But it was only the gentle playing of the night air.




CHAPTER XXV


[The following evening Innstetten met Effi at the station in Berlin
and said he had thought she would not keep her word, as she had not
when she came to Berlin to select their apartment. In a short time he
began to bestir himself to make a place for his wife in Berlin
society. At a small party early in the season he tactlessly twitted
her about Crampas and for days thereafter she felt haunted by the
Major's spirit. But once the Empress had selected her to be a lady of
honor at an important function, and the Emperor had addressed a few
gracious remarks to her at a court ball, the past began to seem to her
a mere dream, and her cheerfulness was restored. After about seven
years in Berlin Dr. Rummschüttel was one day called to see her for
various reasons and prescribed treatment at Schwalbach and Ems. She
was to be accompanied by the wife of Privy Councillor Zwicker, who in
spite of her forty odd years seemed to need a protectress more than
Effi did. While Roswitha was helping with the preparations for the
journey Effi called her to account for never going, as a good Catholic
should, to a priest to confess her sins, particularly her great sin,
and promised to talk the matter over with her seriously after
returning from Ems.]




CHAPTER XXVI


[Innstetten could see by Effi's letters from Ems that Mrs. Zwicker was
not the right kind of a companion for her and he longed for her to
come back to him. As the end of her sojourn at the watering place
approached, preparations were made to welcome her on her return home.
A "W," made of forget-me-nots, was to be hung up and some verses
composed by a friend of the family were to be spoken by Annie. One day
when Annie was returning from school Roswitha went out to meet her and
was challenged by her to a race up the stairs. When Annie reached the
top she stumbled and fell upon a scraper, cutting an ugly gash in her
forehead. Roswitha and Johanna washed the wound with cold water and
decided to tie it up with the long bandage once used to bind the
mother's sprained ankle. In their search for the bandage they broke
open the lock to the sewing table drawers, which they began to empty
of their contents. Among other things they took out a small package of
letters tied up with a red silk cord. Before they had ended the search
Innstetten came home. He examined the wound and sent for Dr.
Rummschüttel. After scolding Annie and telling her what she must do
till her mother came home, he sat down with her to dine and promised
to read her a letter just received from her mother.]




CHAPTER XXVII


For a while Innstetten sat at the table with Annie in silence.
Finally, when the stillness became painful to him, he asked her a few
questions about the school superintendent and which teacher she liked
best. She answered rather listlessly, because she felt he was not
paying much attention. The situation was not improved till Johanna
whispered to little Annie, after the second course, that there was
something else to come. And surely enough, good Roswitha, who felt
under obligation to her pet on this unlucky day, had prepared
something extra. She had risen to an omelet with sliced apple filling.

The sight of it made Annie somewhat more talkative. Innstetten's frame
of mind was likewise bettered when the doorbell rang a moment later
and Dr. Rummschüttel entered, quite accidentally. He had just dropped
in, without any suspicion that he had been sent for. He approved of
the compresses. "Send for some Goulard water and keep Annie at home
tomorrow. Quiet is the best remedy." Then he asked further about her
Ladyship and what kind of news had been received from Ems, and said he
would come again the next day to see the patient.

When they got up from the table and went into the adjoining room,
where the bandage had been searched for so zealously, albeit in vain,
Annie was again laid upon the sofa. Johanna came and sat down beside
her, while Innstetten began to put back into the sewing table the
countless things that still lay in gay confusion upon the window sill.
Now and then he was at a loss to know what to do and was obliged to
ask.

"Where do these letters belong, Johanna?"

"Clear at the bottom," said she, "here in this drawer."

During the question and answer Innstetten examined more closely than
before the little package tied up with a red cord. It seemed to
consist of a number of notes, rather than letters. Bending it between
his thumb and forefinger, like a pack of cards, he slowly let the
edges slip off one at a time, and a few lines, in reality only
disconnected words, darted past his eyes. It was impossible to
distinguish them clearly, yet it seemed to him as though he had
somewhere seen the handwriting before. Should he look into the
matter?

"Johanna, you might bring us the coffee. Annie will also take half a
cup. The doctor has not forbidden it, and what is not forbidden is
allowed."

As he said this he untied the red cord, and while Johanna was going to
the kitchen he quickly ran over the whole contents of the package.
Only two or three letters were addressed to Mrs. District Councillor
von Innstetten. He now recognized the handwriting; it was that of the
Major. Innstetten had known nothing about a correspondence between
Crampas and Effi. His brain began to grow dizzy. He put the package in
his pocket and returned to his room. A few moments later Johanna
rapped softly on his door to let him know that the coffee was served.
He answered, but that was all. Otherwise the silence was complete. Not
until a quarter of an hour later was he heard walking to and fro on
the rug. "I wonder what ails papa?" said Johanna to Annie. "The doctor
said it was nothing, didn't he?"

The walking to and fro in the adjoining room showed no signs of
ending, but Innstetten finally came out and said: "Johanna, keep an
eye on Annie and make her remain quiet on the sofa. I am going out to
walk for an hour or two." Then he gazed fixedly at the child and left
the room.

"Did you notice, Johanna, how papa looked?"

"Yes, Annie. He must have had a great vexation. He was all pale. I
never saw him like that."

Hours passed. The sun was already down and only a red glow was visible
above the roofs across the street, when Innstetten came back. He took
Annie's hand and asked her how she was. Then he ordered Johanna to
bring the lamp into his room. The lamp came. In its green shade were
half-transparent ovals with photographs, various pictures of his wife
that had been made in Kessin for the other members of the cast when
they played Wichert's _A Step out of the Way_. Innstetten turned the
shade slowly from left to right and studied each individual picture.
Then he gave that up and, as the air was so sultry, opened the balcony
door and finally took up the package of letters again. He seemed to
have picked out a few and laid them on top the first time he looked
them over. These he now read once more in a half audible voice:

"Come again this afternoon to the dunes behind the mill. At old Mrs.
Adermann's we can see each other without fear, as the house is far
enough off the road. You must not worry so much about everything. We
have our rights, too. If you will say that to yourself emphatically, I
think all fear will depart from you. Life would not be worth the
living if everything that applies in certain specific cases should be
made to apply in all. All the best things lie beyond that. Learn to
enjoy them."

"'Away from here,' you write, 'flight.' Impossible. I cannot leave my
wife in the lurch, in poverty, along with everything else. It is out
of the question, and we must take life lightly, otherwise we are poor
and lost. Light-heartedness is our best possession. All is fate; it
was not so to be. And would you have it otherwise--that we had never
seen each other?"

Then came the third letter:

"Be at the old place again today. How are my days to be spent without
you here in this dreary hole? I am beside myself, and yet thus much of
what you say is right; it is salvation, and we must in the end bless
the hand that inflicts this separation on us."

Innstetten had hardly shoved the letters aside when the doorbell rang.
In a moment Johanna announced Privy Councillor Wüllersdorf.
Wüllersdorf entered and saw at a glance that something must have
happened.

"Pardon me, Wüllersdorf," said Innstetten, receiving him, "for having
asked you to come at once to see me. I dislike to disturb anybody in
his evening's repose, most of all a hard-worked department chief. But
it could not be helped. I beg you, make yourself comfortable, and
here is a cigar."

Wüllersdorf sat down. Innstetten again walked to and fro and would
gladly have gone on walking, because of his consuming restlessness,
but he saw it would not do. So he took a cigar himself, sat down face
to face with Wüllersdorf, and tried to be calm.

"It is for two reasons," he began, "that I have sent for you. Firstly,
to deliver a challenge, and, secondly, to be my second in the
encounter itself. The first is not agreeable and the second still
less. And now your answer?"

"You know, Innstetten, I am at your disposal. But before I know about
the case, pardon me the naïve question, must it be? We are beyond the
age, you know--you to take a pistol in your hand, and I to have a
share in it. However, do not misunderstand me; this is not meant to be
a refusal. How could I refuse you anything? But tell me now what it
is."

"It is a question of a gallant of my wife, who at the same time was my
friend, or almost a friend."

Wüllersdorf looked at Innstetten. "Instetten, that is not possible."

"It is more than possible, it is certain. Read."

Wüllersdorf ran over the letters hastily. "These are addressed to your
wife?"

"Yes. I found them today in her sewing table."

"And who wrote them?"

"Major von Crampas."

"So, things that occurred when you were still in Kessin?"

Innstetten nodded.

"So, it was six years ago, or half a year longer?"

"Yes."

Wüllersdorf kept silent. After a while Innstetten said: "It almost
looks, Wüllersdorf, as though the six or seven years made an
impression on you. There is a theory of limitation, of course, but I
don't know whether we have here a case to which the theory can be
applied."

"I don't know, either," said Wüllersdorf. "And I confess frankly, the
whole case seems to turn upon that question."

Innstetten looked at him amazed. "You say that in all seriousness?"

"In all seriousness. It is no time for trying one's skill at
pleasantry or dialectic hair-splitting."

"I am curious to know what you mean. Tell me frankly what you think
about it."

"Innstetten, your situation is awful and your happiness in life is
destroyed. But if you kill the lover your happiness in life is, so to
speak, doubly destroyed, and to your sorrow over a wrong suffered will
be added the sorrow over a wrong done. Everything hinges on the
question, do you feel absolutely compelled to do it? Do you feel so
injured, insulted, so indignant that one of you must go, either he or
you? Is that the way the matter stands?"

"I don't know."

"You must know."

Innstetten sprang up, walked to the window, and tapped on the panes,
full of nervous excitement. Then he turned quickly, stepped toward
Wüllersdorf and said: "No, that is not the way the matter stands."

"How does it stand then?"

"It amounts to this--that I am unspeakably unhappy. I am mortified,
infamously deceived, and yet I have no feeling of hatred or even of
thirst for revenge. If I ask myself 'why not?' on the spur of the
moment, I am unable to assign any other reason than the intervening
years. People are always talking about inexpiable guilt. That is
undeniably wrong in the sight of God, but I say it is also in the
sight of man. I never should have believed that time, purely as time,
could so affect one. Then, in the second place, I love my wife, yes,
strange to say, I love her still, and dreadful as I consider all that
has happened, I am so completely under the spell of her loveliness,
the bright charm peculiarly her own, that in spite of myself I feel in
the innermost recesses of my heart inclined to forgive."

Wüllersdorf nodded. "I fully understand your attitude, Innstetten, I
should probably feel the same way about it. But if that is your
feeling and you say to me: 'I love this woman so much that I can
forgive her everything,' and if we consider, further, that it all
happened so long, long ago that it seems like an event in some other
world, why, if that is the situation, Innstetten, I feel like asking,
wherefore all this fuss?"

"Because it must be, nevertheless. I have thought it over from every
point of view. We are not merely individuals, we belong to a whole,
and have always to take the whole into consideration. We are
absolutely dependent. If it were possible to live in solitude I could
let it pass. I should then bear the burden heaped upon me, though real
happiness would be gone. But so many people are forced to live without
real happiness, and I should have to do it too, and I could. We don't
need to be happy, least of all have we any claim on happiness, and it
is not absolutely necessary to put out of existence the one who has
taken our happiness away. We can let him go, if we desire to live on
apart from the world. But in the social life of the world a certain
something has been worked out that is now in force, and in accordance
with the principles of which we have been accustomed to judge
everybody, ourselves as well as others. It would never do to run
counter to it. Society would despise us and in the end we should
despise ourselves and, not being able to bear the strain, we should
fire a bullet into our brains. Pardon me for delivering such a
discourse, which after all is only a repetition of what every man has
said to himself a hundred times. But who can say anything now? Once
more then, no hatred or anything of the kind, and I do not care to
have blood on my hands for the sake of the happiness taken away from
me. But that social something, let us say, which tyrannizes us, takes
no account of charm, or love, or limitation. I have no choice. I
must."

"I don't know, Innstetten."

Innstetten smiled. "You shall decide yourself, Wüllersdorf. It is now
ten o 'clock. Six hours ago, I will concede, I still had control of
the situation, I could do the one thing or the other, there was still
a way out. Not so now; now I am in a blind alley. You may say, I have
nobody to blame but myself; I ought to have guarded and controlled
myself better, ought to have hid it all in my own heart and fought it
out there. But it came upon me too suddenly, with too much force, and
so I can hardly reproach myself for not having held my nerves in check
more successfully. I went to your room and wrote you a note and
thereby lost the control of events. From that very moment the secret
of my unhappiness and, what is of greater moment, the smirch on my
honor was half revealed to another, and after the first words we
exchanged here it was wholly revealed. Now, inasmuch as there is
another who knows my secret, I can no longer turn back."

"I don't know," repeated Wüllersdorf. "I don't like to resort to the
old worn-out phrase, but still I can do no better than to say:
Innstetten, it will all rest in my bosom as in a grave."

"Yes, Wüllersdorf, that is what they all say. But there is no such
thing as secrecy. Even if you remain true to your word and are secrecy
personified toward others, still _you_ know it and I shall not be
saved from your judgment by the fact that you have just expressed to
me your approval and have even said you fully understood my attitude.
It is unalterably settled that from this moment on I should be an
object of your sympathy, which in itself is not very agreeable, and
every word you might hear me exchange with my wife would be subject to
your check, whether you would or no, and if my wife should speak of
fidelity or should pronounce judgment upon another woman, as women
have a way of doing, I should not know which way to look. Moreover, if
it came to pass that I counseled charitable consideration in some
wholly commonplace affair of honor, 'because of the apparent lack of
deception,' or something of the sort, a smile would pass over your
countenance, or at least a twitch would be noticeable, and in your
heart you would say: 'poor Innstetten, he has a real passion for
analyzing all insults chemically, in order to determine their
insulting contents, and he _never_ finds the proper quantity of the
suffocating element. He has never yet been suffocated by an affair.'
Am I right, Wüllersdorf, or not?"

Wüllersdorf had risen to his feet. "I think it is awful that you
should be right, but you _are_ right. I shall no longer trouble you
with my 'must it be.' The world is simply as it is, and things do not
take the course _we_ desire, but the one _others_ desire. This talk
about the 'ordeal,' with which many pompous orators seek to assure us,
is sheer nonsense, there is nothing in it. On the contrary, our cult
of honor is idolatry, but we must submit to it so long as the idol is
honored."

Innstetten nodded.

They remained together a quarter of an hour longer and it was decided
that Wüllersdorf should set out that same evening. A night train left
at twelve. They parted with a brief "Till we meet again in Kessin."




CHAPTER XXVIII


According to the agreement Innstetten set out the following evening.
He took the same train Wüllersdorf had taken the day before and
shortly after five o'clock in the morning was at the station, from
which the road branched off to the left for Kessin. The steamer
referred to several times before was scheduled to leave daily, during
the season, immediately after the arrival of this train, and
Innstetten heard its first signal for departure as he reached the
bottom step of the stairway leading down the embankment. The walk to
the landing took less than three minutes. After greeting the captain,
who was somewhat embarrassed and hence must have heard of the whole
affair the day before, he took a seat near the tiller. In a moment the
boat pulled away from the foot bridge; the weather was glorious, the
morning sun bright, and but few passengers on board. Innstetten
thought of the day when, returning here from his wedding tour, he had
driven along the shore of the Kessine with Effi in an open carriage.
That was a gray November day, but his heart was serene. Now it was the
reverse: all was serene without, and the November day was within.
Many, many a time had he come this way afterward, and the peace
hovering over the fields, the horses in harness pricking up their ears
as he drove by, the men at work, the fertility of the soil--all these
things had done his soul good, and now, in harsh contrast with that,
he was glad when clouds came up and began slightly to overcast the
laughing blue sky. They steamed down the river and soon after they had
passed the splendid sheet of water called the "Broad" the Kessin
church tower hove in sight and a moment later the quay and the long
row of houses with ships and boats in front of them. Soon they were at
the landing. Innstetten bade the captain goodbye and approached the
bridge that had been rolled out to facilitate the disembarkation.
Wüllersdorf was there. The two greeted each other, without speaking a
word at first, and then walked across the levee to the Hoppensack
Hotel, where they sat down under an awning.

"I took a room here yesterday," said Wüllersdorf, who did not wish to
begin with the essentials. "When we consider what a miserable hole
Kessin is, it is astonishing to find such a good hotel here. I have no
doubt that my friend the head waiter speaks three languages. Judging
by the parting of his hair and his low-cut vest we can safely count on
four--Jean, please bring us some coffee and cognac."

Innstetten understood perfectly why Wüllersdorf assumed this tone, and
approved of it, but he could not quite master his restlessness and
kept taking out his watch involuntarily. "We have time," said
Wüllersdorf. "An hour and a half yet, or almost. I ordered the
carriage at a quarter after eight; we have not more than ten minutes
to drive."

"Where?"

"Crampas first proposed a corner of the woods, just behind the
churchyard. Then he interrupted himself and said: 'No, not there.'
Then we agreed upon a place among the dunes, close by the beach. The
outer dune has a cut through it and one can look out upon the sea."

Innstetten smiled. "Crampas seems to have selected a beautiful spot.
He always had a way of doing that. How did he behave?"

"Marvelously."

"Haughtily? frivolously?"

"Neither the one nor the other. I confess frankly, Innstetten, it
staggered me. When I mentioned your name he turned as pale as death,
but tried hard to compose himself, and I saw a twitching about the
corners of his mouth. But it was only a moment till he had regained
his composure and after that he was all sorrowful resignation. I am
quite certain he feels that he will not come out of the affair alive,
and he doesn't care to. If I judge him correctly he is fond of living
and at the same time indifferent about it. He takes life as it comes
and knows that it amounts to but little."

"Who is his second? Or let me say, rather, whom will he bring along?"

"That was what worried him most after he had recovered himself. He
mentioned two or three noblemen of the vicinity, but dropped their
names, saying they were too old and too pious, and that he would
telegraph to Treptow for his friend Buddenbrook. Buddenbrook came and
is a capital man, at once resolute and childlike. He was unable to
calm himself, and paced back and forth in the greatest excitement. But
when I had told him all he said exactly as you and I: 'You are right,
it must be.'"

The coffee came. They lighted their cigars and Wüllersdorf again
sought to turn the conversation to more indifferent things. "I am
surprised that nobody from Kessin has come to greet you. I know you
were very popular. What is the matter with your friend Gieshübler?"

Innstetten smiled. "You don't know the people here on the coast. They
are half Philistines and half wiseacres, not much to my taste. But
they have one virtue, they are all very mannerly, and none more so
than my old Gieshübler. Everybody knows, of course, what it is about,
and for that very reason they take pains not to appear inquisitive."

At this moment there came into view to the left a chaise-like carriage
with the top down, which, as it was ahead of time, drove up very
slowly.

"Is that ours?" asked Innstetten.

"Presumably."

A moment later the carriage stopped in front of the hotel and
Innstetten and Wüllersdorf arose to their feet. Wüllersdorf stepped
over to the coachman and said: "To the mole."

The mole lay in the wrong direction of the beach, to the right instead
of the left, and the false orders were given merely to avoid any
possible interference. Besides, whether they intended to keep to the
right or to the left after they were beyond the city limits, they had
to pass through the "Plantation" in either case, and so their course
led unavoidably past Innstetten's old residence. The house seemed more
quiet than formerly. If the rooms on the ground floor looked rather
neglected, what must have been the state upstairs! The uncanny feeling
that Innstetten had so often combatted in Effi, or had at least
laughed at, now came over him, and he was glad when they had driven
past.

"That is where I used to live," he said to Wüllersdorf.

"It looks strange, rather deserted and abandoned."

"It may be. In the city it was called a haunted house and from the way
it stands there today I cannot blame people for thinking so."

"What did they tell about it?"

"Oh, stupid nonsense. An old ship's captain with a granddaughter or a
niece, who one fine day disappeared, and then a Chinaman, who was
probably her lover. In the hall a small shark and a crocodile, both
hung up by strings and always in motion, wonderful to relate, but now
is no time for that, when my head is full of all sorts of other
phantoms."

"You forget that it may all turn out well yet."

"It must not. A while ago, Wüllersdorf, when you were speaking about
Crampas, you yourself spoke differently."

Soon thereafter they had passed through the "Plantation" and the
coachman was about to turn to the right toward the mole. "Drive to the
left, rather. The mole can wait."

The coachman turned to the left into the broad driveway, which ran
behind the men's bathhouse toward the forest. When they were within
three hundred paces of the forest Wüllersdorf ordered the coachman to
stop. Then the two walked through grinding sand down a rather broad
driveway, which here cut at right angles through the three rows of
dunes. All along the sides of the road stood thick clumps of lyme
grass, and around them immortelles and a few blood-red pinks.
Innstetten stooped down and put one of the pinks in his buttonhole.
"The immortelles later."

They walked on thus for five minutes. When they had come to the rather
deep depression which ran along between the two outer rows of dunes
they saw their opponents off to the left, Crampas and Buddenbrook, and
with them good Dr. Hannemann, who held his hat in his hand, so that
his white hair was waving in the wind.

Innstetten and Wüllersdorf walked up the sand defile; Buddenbrook came
to meet them. They exchanged greetings and then the two seconds
stepped aside for a brief conference. They agreed that the opponents
should advance _a tempo_ and shoot when ten paces apart. Then
Buddenbrook returned to his place. Everything was attended to quickly,
and the shots were fired. Crampas fell.

Innstetten stepped back a few paces and turned his face away from the
scene. Wüllersdorf walked over to Buddenbrook and the two awaited the
decision of the doctor, who shrugged his shoulders. At the same time
Crampas indicated by a motion of his hand that he wished to say
something. Wüllersdorf bowed down to him, nodded his assent to the few
words, which could scarcely be heard as they came from the lips of the
dying man, and then went toward Innstetten.

"Crampas wishes to speak to you, Innstetten. You must comply with his
wish. He hasn't three minutes more to live."

Innstetten walked over to Crampas.

"Will you--" were the dying man's last words. Then a painful, yet
almost friendly expression in his eyes, and all was over.




CHAPTER XXIX


In the evening of the same day Innstetten was back again in Berlin. He
had taken the carriage, which he had left by the crossroad behind the
dunes, directly for the railway station, without returning to Kessin,
and had left to the seconds the duty of reporting to the authorities.
On the train he had a compartment to himself, which enabled him to
commune with his own mind and live the event all over again. He had
the same thoughts as two days before, except that they ran in the
opposite direction, beginning with conviction as to his rights and his
duty and ending in doubt. "Guilt, if it is anything at all, is not
limited by time and place and cannot pass away in a night. Guilt
requires expiation; there is some sense in that. Limitation, on the
other hand, only half satisfies; it is weak, or at least it is
prosaic." He found comfort in this thought and said to himself over
and over that what had happened was inevitable. But the moment he
reached this conclusion he rejected it. "There must be a limitation;
limitation is the only sensible solution. Whether or not it is prosaic
is immaterial. What is sensible is usually prosaic. I am now
forty-five. If I had found the letters twenty-five years later I
should have been seventy. Then Wüllersdorf would have said:
'Innstetten, don't be a fool.' And if Wüllersdorf didn't say it,
Buddenbrook would, and if _he_ didn't, either, I myself should. That
is clear. When we carry a thing to extremes we carry it too far and
make ourselves ridiculous. No doubt about it. But where does it begin?
Where is the limit? Within ten years a duel is required and we call it
an affair of honor. After eleven years, or perhaps ten and a half, we
call it nonsense. The limit, the limit. Where is it? Was it reached?
Was it passed? When I recall his last look, resigned and yet smiling
in his misery, that look said: 'Innstetten, this is stickling for
principle. You might have spared me this, and yourself, too.' Perhaps
he was right. I hear some such voice in my soul. Now if I had been
full of deadly hatred, if a deep feeling of revenge had found a place
in my heart--Revenge is not a thing of beauty, but a human trait and
has naturally a human right to exist. But this affair was all for the
sake of an idea, a conception, was artificial, half comedy. And now I
must continue this comedy, must send Effi away and ruin her, and
myself, too--I ought to have burned the letters, and the world should
never have been permitted to hear about them. And then when she came,
free from suspicion, I ought to have said to her: 'Here is your
place,' and ought to have parted from her inwardly, not before the
eyes of the world. There are so many marriages that are not marriages.
Then happiness would have been gone, but I should not have had the
eye staring at me with its searching look and its mild, though mute,
accusation."

Shortly before ten o'clock Innstetten alighted in front of his
residence. He climbed the stairs and rang the bell. Johanna came and
opened the door.

"How is Annie?"

"Very well, your Lordship. She is not yet asleep--If your Lordship--"

"No, no, it would merely excite her. It would be better to wait till
morning to see her. Bring me a glass of tea, Johanna. Who has been
here?"

"Nobody but the doctor."

Innstetten was again alone. He walked to and fro as he loved to do.
"They know all about it. Roswitha is stupid, but Johanna is a clever
person. If they don't know accurate details, they have made up a story
to suit themselves and so they know anyhow. It is remarkable how many
things become indications and the basis for tales, as though the whole
world had been present."

Johanna brought the tea, and Innstetten drank it. He was tired to
death from the overexertion and went to sleep.

The next morning he was up in good season. He saw Annie, spoke a few
words with her, praised her for being a good patient, and then went to
the Ministry to make a report to his chief of all that had happened.
The minister was very gracious. "Yes, Innstetten, happy is the man who
comes out of all that life may bring to us whole. It has gone hard
with you." He approved all that had taken place and left the rest to
Innstetten.

It was late in the afternoon when Innstetten returned home and found
there a few lines from Wüllersdorf. "Returned this morning. A world of
experiences--painful, touching--Gieshübler particularly. The most
amiable humpback I ever saw. About you he did not say so very much,
but the wife, the wife! He could not calm himself and finally the
little man broke out in tears. What strange things happen! It would be
better if we had more Gieshüblers. But there are more of the other
sort--Then the scene at the home of the major--dreadful. Excuse me
from speaking about it. I have learned once more to be on my guard. I
shall see you tomorrow. Yours, W."

Innstetten was completely staggered when he read the note. He sat down
and wrote a few words in reply. When he had finished he rang the bell.
"Johanna, put these letters in the box."

Johanna took the letters and was on the point of going.

"And then, Johanna, one thing more. My wife is not coming back. You
will hear from others why. Annie must not know anything about it, at
least not now. The poor child. You must break the news to her
gradually that she has no mother any more. I can't do it. But be wise
about it, and don't let Roswitha spoil it all."

Johanna stood there a moment quite stupefied, and then went up to
Innstetten and kissed his hand.

By the time she had reached the kitchen her heart was overflowing with
pride and superiority, indeed almost with happiness. His Lordship had
not only told her everything, he had even added the final injunction,
"and don't let Roswitha spoil it all." That was the most important
point. And although she had a kindly feeling and even sympathy for her
mistress, nevertheless the thing that above all else occupied her was
the triumph of a certain intimate relation to her gracious master.

Under ordinary conditions it would have been easy for her to display
and assert this triumph, but today it so happened that her rival,
without having been made a confidante, was nevertheless destined to
appear the better informed of the two. Just about at the same time as
the above conversation was taking place the porter had called
Roswitha into his little lodge downstairs and handed her as she
entered a newspaper to read. "There, Roswitha, is something that will
interest you. You can bring it back to me later. It is only the
_Foreigners' Gazette_, but Lena has already gone out to get the _Minor
Journal_. There will probably be more in it. They always know
everything. Say, Roswitha, who would have thought such a thing!"

Roswitha, who was ordinarily none too curious, had, however, after
these words betaken herself as quickly as possible up the back stairs
and had just finished reading the account when Johanna came to her.

Johanna laid the letters Innstetten had given her upon the table,
glanced over the addresses, or at least pretended to, for she knew
very well to whom they were directed, and said with feigned composure:
"One goes to Hohen-Cremmen."

"I understand that," said Roswitha.

Johanna was not a little astonished at this remark. "His Lordship does
not write to Hohen-Cremmen ordinarily."

"Oh, ordinarily? But now--Just think, the porter gave me _this_
downstairs only a moment ago."

Johanna took the paper and read in an undertone a passage marked with
a heavy ink line: "As we learn from a well informed source, shortly
before going to press, there occurred yesterday morning in the
watering place Kessin, in Hither Pomerania, a duel between Department
Chief von Innstetten of Keith St. and Major von Crampas. Major von
Crampas fell. According to rumors, relations are said to have existed
between him and the Department Chief's wife, who is beautiful and
still very young."

"What don't such papers write?" said Johanna, who was vexed at seeing
her news anticipated. "Yes," said Roswitha, "and now the people will
read this and say disgraceful things about my poor dear mistress. And
the poor major! Now he is dead!"

"Why, Roswitha, what are you thinking of anyhow? Ought he _not_ to be
dead? Or ought our dear gracious master to be dead?"

"No, Johanna, our gracious master, let him live, let everybody live. I
am not for shooting people and can't even bear the report of the
pistol. But take into consideration, Johanna, that was half an
eternity ago, and the letters, which struck me as so strange the
moment I saw them, because they had a red cord, not a ribbon, wrapped
around them three or four times and tied--why, they were beginning to
look quite yellow, it was so long ago. You see, we have been here now
for over six years, and how can a man, just because of such old
things--"

"Ah, Roswitha, you speak according to your understanding. If we
examine the matter narrowly, you are to blame. It comes from the
letters. Why did you come with the chisel and break open the sewing
table, which is never permissible? One must never break open a lock in
which another has turned a key."

"Why, Johanna, it is really too cruel of you to say such a thing to my
face, and you know that _you_ are to blame, and that you rushed half
crazy into the kitchen and told me the sewing table must be opened,
the bandage was in it, and then I came with the chisel, and now you
say I am to blame. No, I say--"

"Well, I will take it back, Roswitha. But you must not come to me and
say: 'the poor major!' What do you mean by the 'poor major?' The poor
major was altogether good for nothing. A man who has such a red
moustache and twirls it all the time is never good for anything, he
does nothing but harm. When one has always been employed in
aristocratic homes--but you haven't been, Roswitha, that's where you
are lacking--one knows what is fitting and proper and what honor is,
and knows that when such a thing comes up there is no way to get
around it, and then comes what is called a challenge and one of the
men is shot."

"Oh, I know that, too; I am not so stupid as you always try to make me
appear. But since it happened so long ago--"

"Oh, Roswitha, that everlasting 'so long ago!' It shows plainly enough
that you don't know anything about it. You are always telling the same
old story about your father with the red-hot tongs and how he came at
you with them, and every time I put a red-hot heater in the iron I see
him about to kill you on account of the child that died so long ago.
Indeed, Roswitha, you talk about it all the time, and all there is
left for you to do now is to tell little Annie the story, and as soon
as little Annie has been confirmed she will be sure to hear it,
perhaps the same day. I am grieved that you should have had all that
experience, and yet your father was only a village blacksmith who shod
horses and put tires on wheels, and now you come forward and expect
our gracious master calmly to put up with all this, merely because it
happened so long ago. What do you mean by long ago? Six years is not
long ago. And our gracious mistress, who, by the way, is not coming
back--his Lordship just told me so--her Ladyship is not yet twenty-six
and her birthday is in August, and yet you come to me with the plea of
'long ago.' If she were thirty-six, for at thirty-six, I tell you, one
must be particularly cautious, and if his Lordship had done nothing,
then aristocratic people would have 'cut' him. But you are not
familiar with that word, Roswitha, you know nothing about it."

"No, I know nothing about it and care less, but what I do know is that
you are in love with his Lordship."

Johanna struck up a convulsive laugh.

"Well, laugh. I have noticed it for a long time. I don't put it past
you, but fortunately his Lordship takes no note of it. The poor wife,
the poor wife!"

Johanna was anxious to declare peace. "That will do now, Roswitha. You
are mad again, but, I know, all country girls get mad."

"May be."

"I am just going to post these letters now and see whether the porter
has got the other paper. I understood you to say, didn't I, that he
sent Lena to get one? There must be more in it; this is as good as
nothing at all."




CHAPTER XXX


[After Effi and Mrs. Zwicker had been in Ems for nearly three weeks
they took breakfast one morning in the open air. The postman was late
and Effi was impatient, as she had received no letter from Innstetten
for four days. The coming of a pretty waitress to clear away the
breakfast dishes started a conversation about pretty housemaids, and
Effi spoke enthusiastically of her Johanna's unusual abundance of
beautiful flaxen hair. This led to a discussion of painful
experiences, in the course of which Effi admitted that she knew what
sin meant, but she distinguished between an occasional sin and a
habitual sin. Mrs. Zwicker was indulging in a tirade against the
pleasure resorts and the ill-sounding names of places in the environs
of Berlin, when the postman came. There was nothing from Innstetten,
but a large registered letter from Hohen-Cremmen. Effi felt an
unaccountable hesitation to open it. Overcoming this she found in the
envelope a long letter from her mother and a package of banknotes,
upon which her father had written with a red pencil the sum they
represented. She leaned back in the rocking chair and began to read.
Before she had got very far, the letter fell out of her hands and all
the blood left her face. With an effort she picked up the letter and
started to go to her room, asking Mrs. Zwicker to send the maid. By
holding to the furniture as she dragged herself along she was able to
reach her bed, where she fell in a swoon.]




CHAPTER XXXI


Minutes passed. When Effi came to she got up and sat on a chair by the
window and gazed out into the quiet street. Oh, if there had only been
turmoil and strife outside! But there was only the sunshine on the
macadam road and the shadows of the lattice and the trees. The feeling
that she was alone in the world came over her with all its might. An
hour ago she was a happy woman, the favorite of all who knew her, and
now an outcast. She had read only the beginning of the letter, but
enough to have the situation clearly before her. Whither? She had no
answer to this question, and yet she was full of deep longing to
escape from her present environment, to get away from this Zwicker
woman, to whom the whole affair was merely "an interesting case," and
whose sympathy, if she had any such thing in her make-up, would
certainly not equal her curiosity.

"Whither?"

On the table before her lay the letter, but she lacked the courage to
read any more of it. Finally she said: "What have I further to fear?
What else can be said that I have not already said to myself? The man
who was the cause of it all is dead, a return to my home is out of the
question, in a few weeks the divorce will be decreed, and the child
will be left with the father. Of course. I am guilty, and a guilty
woman cannot bring up her child. Besides, wherewith? I presume I can
make my own way. I will see what mama writes about it, how she
pictures my life."

With these words she took up the letter again to finish reading it.

"--And now your future, my dear Effi. You will have to rely upon
yourself and, so far as outward means are concerned, may count upon
our support. You will do best to live in Berlin, for the best place to
live such things down is a large city. There you will be one of the
many who have robbed themselves of free air and bright sunshine. You
will lead a lonely life. If you refuse to, you will probably have to
step down out of your sphere. The world in which you have lived will
be closed to you. The saddest thing for us and for you--yes, for you,
as we know you--is that your parental home will also be closed to you.
We can offer you no quiet place in Hohen-Cremmen, no refuge in our
house, for it would mean the shutting off of our house from all the
world, and we are decidedly not inclined to do that. Not because we
are too much attached to the world or that it would seem to us
absolutely unbearable to bid farewell to what is called 'society.' No,
not for that reason, but simply because we stand by our colors and are
going to declare to the whole world our--I cannot spare you the
word--our condemnation of your actions, of the actions of our only and
so dearly beloved child--"

[Illustration: _Permission F Bruckmann A.-G., Munich_
FRAU VON SCHLEINITZ AT HOME Adolph von Menzel]

Effi could read no further. Her eyes filled with tears and after
seeking in vain to fight them back she burst into convulsive sobs and
wept till her pain was alleviated.

Half an hour later there was a knock at the door and when Effi called:
"Come in!" Mrs. Zwicker appeared.

"May I come in?"

"Certainly, my dear," said Effi, who now lay upon the sofa under a
light covering and with her hands folded. "I am exhausted and have
made myself as comfortable here as I could. Won't you please take a
seat?"

Mrs. Zwicker sat down where the table with the bowl of flowers would
be between her and Effi. Effi showed no sign of embarrassment and made
no change in her position; she did not even unfold her hands. It
suddenly became immaterial to her what the woman thought. All she
wanted was to get away.

"You have received sad news, dear, gracious Lady?"

"Worse than sad," said Effi. "At any rate sad enough to bring our
association here quickly to an end. I must leave today."

"I should not like to appear obtrusive, but has the news anything to
do with Annie?"

"No, not with Annie. The news did not come from Berlin at all, it was
a letter from my mother. She is worried about me and I am anxious to
divert her, or, if I can't do that, at least to be near at hand."

"I appreciate that only too well, much as I lament the necessity of
spending these last days in Ems without you. May I offer you my
services?"

Before Effi had time to answer, the pretty waitress entered and
announced that the guests were just gathering for lunch, and everybody
was greatly excited, for the Emperor was probably coming for three
weeks and at the end of his stay there would be grand manoeuvres and
the hussars from her home town would be there, too.

Mrs. Zwicker discussed immediately the question, whether it would be
worth while to stay till then, arrived at a decided answer in the
affirmative, and then went to excuse Effi's absence from lunch.

A moment later, as the waitress was about to leave, Effi said: "And
then, Afra, when you are free, I hope you can come back to me for a
quarter of an hour to help me pack. I am leaving by the seven o'clock
train."

"Today? Oh, your Ladyship, what a pity! Why, the beautiful days are
just going to begin."

Effi smiled.




CHAPTER XXXII


Three years had passed and for almost that length of time Effi had
been living in a small apartment on Königgrätz Street--a front room
and back room, behind which was the kitchen with a servant's bedroom,
everything as ordinary and commonplace as possible. And yet it was an
unusually pretty apartment, that made an agreeable impression on
everybody who saw it, the most agreeable perhaps on old Dr.
Rummschüttel, who called now and then and had long ago forgiven the
poor young wife, not only for the rheumatism and neuralgia farce of
bygone years, but also for everything else that had happened in the
meantime--if there was any need of forgiveness on his part,
considering the very different cases he knew about. He was now far
along in the seventies, but whenever Effi, who had been ailing
considerably for some time, wrote a letter asking him to call, he came
the following forenoon and would not listen to any excuses for the
number of steps he had to climb. "No excuse, please, dear, most
gracious Lady; for in the first place it is my calling, and in the
second I am happy and almost proud that I am still able to climb the
three flights so well. If I were not afraid of inconveniencing
you,--since, after all, I come as a physician and not as a friend of
nature or a landscape enthusiast,--I should probably come oftener,
merely to see you and sit down for a few minutes at your back window.
I don't believe you fully appreciate the view."

"Oh, yes I do," said Effi; but Rummschüttel, not allowing himself to
be interrupted, continued: "Please, most gracious Lady, step here just
for a moment, or allow me to escort you to the window. Simply
magnificent again today! Just see the various railroad embankments,
three, no, four, and how the trains glide back and forth continually,
and now that train yonder disappears again behind a group of trees.
Really magnificent! And how the sun shines through the white smoke! If
St. Matthew's Churchyard were not immediately behind it it would be
ideal."

"I like to look at churchyards."

"Yes, you dare say that. But how about us? We physicians are
unavoidably confronted with the question, might there, perhaps, not
have been some fewer graves here? However, most gracious Lady, I am
satisfied with you and my only complaint is that you will not listen
to anything about Ems. For your catarrhal affections--"

Effi remained silent.

"Ems would work miracles. But as you don't care to go there--and I
understand your reasons--drink the water here. In three minutes you
can be in the Prince Albrecht Garden, and even if the music and the
costumes and all the diversions of a regular watering-place promenade
are lacking, the water itself, you know, is the important thing."

Effi was agreed, and Rummschüttel took his hat and cane, but stepped
once more to the window. "I hear people talking about a plan to
terrace the Hill of the Holy Cross. God bless the city government!
Once that bare spot yonder is greener--A charming apartment! I could
almost envy you--By the way, gracious Lady, I have been wanting for a
long time to say to you, you always write me such a lovely letter.
Well, who wouldn't enjoy that? But it requires an effort each time.
Just send Roswitha for me."

"Just send Roswitha for me," Rummschüttel had said. Why, was Roswitha
at Effi's? Instead of being on Keith Street was she on Königgrätz
Street? Certainly she was, and had been for a long time, just as long
as Effi herself had been living on Königgrätz Street. Three days
before they moved Roswitha had gone to see her dear mistress and that
was a great day for both of them, so great that we must go back and
tell about it.

The day that the letter of renunciation came from Hohen-Cremmen and
Effi returned from Ems to Berlin she did not take a separate apartment
at once, but tried living in a boarding house, which suited her
tolerably well. The two women who kept the boarding house were
educated and considerate and had long ago ceased to be inquisitive.
Such a variety of people met there that it would have been too much of
an undertaking to pry into the secrets of each individual. Such things
only interfered with business. Effi, who still remembered the
cross-questionings to which the eyes of Mrs. Zwicker had subjected
her, was very agreeably impressed with the reserve of the boarding
house keepers. But after two weeks had passed she felt plainly that
she could not well endure the prevailing atmosphere of the place,
either the physical or the moral. There were usually seven persons at
the table. Beside Effi and one of the landladies--the other looked
after the kitchen--there were two Englishwomen, who were attending the
university, a noblewoman from Saxony, a very pretty Galician Jewess,
whose real occupation nobody knew, and a precentor's daughter from
Polzin in Pomerania, who wished to become a painter. That was a bad
combination, and the attempts of each to show her superiority to the
others were unrefreshing. Remarkable to relate, the Englishwomen were
not absolutely the worst offenders, but competed for the palm with the
girl from Polzin, who was filled with the highest regard for her
mission as a painter. Nevertheless Effi, who assumed a passive
attitude, could have withstood the pressure of this intellectual
atmosphere if it had not been combined with the air of the boarding
house, speaking from a purely physical and objective point of view.
What this air was actually composed of was perhaps beyond the
possibility of determination, but that it took away sensitive Effi's
breath was only too certain, and she saw herself compelled for this
external reason to go out in search of other rooms, which she found
comparatively near by, in the above-described apartment on Königgrätz
St. She was to move in at the beginning of the autumn quarter, had
made the necessary purchases, and during the last days of September
counted the hours till her liberation from the boarding house. On one
of these last days, a quarter of an hour after she had retired from
the dining room, planning to enjoy a rest on a sea grass sofa covered
with some large-figured woolen material, there was a gentle rap at her
door.

"Come in!"

One of the housemaids, a sickly looking person in the middle thirties,
who by virtue of always being in the hall of the boarding house
carried the atmosphere stored there with her everywhere, in her
wrinkles, entered the room and said: "I beg your pardon, gracious
Lady, but somebody wishes to speak to you."

"Who?"

"A woman."

"Did she tell you her name?"

"Yes. Roswitha."

Before Effi had hardly heard this name she shook off her drowsiness,
sprang up, ran out into the corridor, grasped Roswitha by both hands
and drew her into her room.

"Roswitha! You! Oh, what joy! What do you bring? Something good, of
course. Such a good old face can bring only good things. Oh, how happy
I am! I could give a kiss. I should not have thought such joy could
ever come to me again. You good old soul, how are you anyhow? Do you
still remember how the ghost of the Chinaman used to stalk about?
Those were happy times. I thought then they were unhappy, because I
did not yet know the hardness of life. Since then I have come to know
it. Oh, there are far worse things than ghosts. Come, my good
Roswitha, come, sit down by me and tell me--Oh, I have such a longing.
How is Annie?"

Roswitha was unable to speak, and so she let her eyes wander around
the strange room, whose gray and dusty-looking walls were bordered
with narrow gilt molding. Finally she found herself and said that his
Lordship was back from Glatz. That the old Emperor had said, "six
weeks were quite sufficient (imprisonment) in such a case," and she
had only waited for his Lordship's return, on Annie's account, who had
to have some supervision. Johanna was no doubt a proper person, but
she was still too pretty and too much occupied with herself, and God
only knows what all she was thinking about. But now that his Lordship
could again keep an eye on Annie and see that everything was right,
she herself wanted to try to find out how her Ladyship was getting on.

"That is right, Roswitha."

"And I wanted to see whether your Ladyship lacked anything, and
whether you might need me. If so I would stay right here and pitch in
and do everything and see to it that your Ladyship was getting on well
again."

Effi had been leaning back in the corner of the sofa with her eyes
closed, but suddenly she sat up and said: "Yes, Roswitha, what you
were saying there is an idea, there is something in it. For I must
tell you that I am not going to stay in this boarding house. I have
rented an apartment farther down the street and have bought furniture,
and in three more days I shall move in. And if, when I arrive there, I
could say to you: 'No, Roswitha, not there, the wardrobe must stand
here and the mirror there,' why, that would be worth while, and I
should like it. Then when we got tired of all the drudgery I should
say: 'Now, Roswitha, go over there and get us a decanter of Munich
beer, for when one has been working one is thirsty for a drink, and,
if you can, bring us also something good from the Habsburg Restaurant.
You can return the dishes later.' Yes, Roswitha, when I think of that
it makes my heart feel a great deal lighter. But I must ask you
whether you have thought it all over? I will not speak of Annie, to
whom you are so attached, for she is almost your own child;
nevertheless Annie will be provided for, and Johanna is also attached
to her, you know. So leave her out of the consideration. But if you
want to come to me remember how everything has changed. I am no longer
as I used to be. I have now taken a very small apartment, and the
porter will doubtless pay but little attention to you and me. We shall
have to be very economical, always have what we used to call our
Thursday meal, because that was cleaning day. Do you remember? And do
you remember how good Mr. Gieshübler once came in and was urged to sit
down with us, and how he said he had never eaten such a delicate dish?
You probably remember he was always so frightfully polite, but really
he was the only human being in the city who was a connoisseur in
matters of eating. The others called everything fine."

Roswitha was enjoying every word and could already see everything
running smoothly, when Effi again said: "Have you considered all this?
For, while it is my own household, I must not overlook the fact that
you have been spoiled these many years, and formerly no questions were
ever asked, for we did not need to be saving; but now I must be
saving, for I am poor and have only what is given me, you know,
remittances from Hohen-Cremmen. My parents are very good to me, so far
as they are able, but they are not rich. And now tell me what you
think."

"That I shall come marching along with my trunk next Saturday, not in
the evening, but early in the morning, and that I shall be there when
the settling process begins. For I can take hold quite differently
from your Ladyship."

"Don't say that, Roswitha. I can work too. One can do anything when
obliged to."

"And then your Ladyship doesn't need to worry about me, as though I
might think: 'that is not good enough for Roswitha.' For Roswitha
anything is good that she has to share with your Ladyship, and most to
her liking would be something sad. Yes, I look forward to that with
real pleasure. Your Ladyship shall see I know what sadness is. Even if
I didn't know, I should soon find out. I have not forgotten how I was
sitting there in the churchyard, all alone in the world, thinking to
myself it would probably be better if I were lying there in a row with
the others. Who came along? Who saved my life? Oh, I have had so much
to endure. That day when my father came at me with the red-hot
tongs--"

"I remember, Roswitha."

"Well, that was bad enough. But when I sat there in the churchyard, so
completely poverty stricken and forsaken, that was worse still. Then
your Ladyship came. I hope I shall never go to heaven if I forget
that."

As she said this she arose and went toward the window. "Oh, your
Ladyship must see _him_ too."

Effi stepped to the window. Over on the other side of the street sat
Rollo, looking up at the windows of the boarding house.

A few days later Effi, with the aid of Roswitha, moved into the
apartment on Königgrätz St., and liked it there from the beginning.
To be sure, there was no society, but during her boarding house days
she had derived so little pleasure from intercourse with people that
it was not hard for her to be alone, at least not in the beginning.
With Roswitha it was impossible, of course, to carry on an esthetic
conversation, or even to discuss what was in the paper, but when it
was simply a question of things human and Effi began her sentence
with, "Oh, Roswitha, I am again afraid," then the faithful soul always
had a good answer ready, always comfort and usually advice.

Until Christmas they got on excellently, but Christmas eve was rather
sad and when New Year's Day came Effi began to grow quite melancholy.
It was not cold, only grizzly and rainy, and if the days were short,
the evenings were so much the longer. What was she to do! She read,
she embroidered, she played solitaire, she played Chopin, but
nocturnes were not calculated to bring much light into her life, and
when Roswitha came with the tea tray and placed on the table, beside
the tea service, two small plates with an egg and a Vienna cutlet
carved in small slices, Effi said, as she closed the piano: "Move up,
Roswitha. Keep me company."

Roswitha joined her. "I know, your Ladyship has been playing too much
again. Your Ladyship always looks like that and has red spots. The
doctor forbade it, didn't he?"

"Ah, Roswitha, it is easy for the doctor to forbid, and also easy for
you to repeat everything he says. But what shall I do? I can't sit all
day long at the window and look over toward Christ's Church. Sundays,
during the evening service, when the windows are lighted up, I always
look over that way; but it does me no good, it always makes my heart
feel heavier."

"Well, then, your Ladyship ought to go to church. Your Ladyship has
been there once."

"Oh, many a time. But I have derived little benefit from it. He
preaches quite well and is a very wise man, and I should be happy if I
knew the hundredth part of it all. But it seems as though I were
merely reading a book. Then when he speaks so loud and saws the air
and shakes his long black locks I am drawn, entirely out of my
attitude of worship."

"Out of?"

Effi laughed. "You think I hadn't yet got into such an attitude. That
is probably true. But whose fault is it? Certainly not mine. He always
talks so much about the Old Testament. Even if that is very good it
doesn't edify me. Anyhow, this everlasting listening is not the right
thing. You see, I ought to have so much to do that I should not know
whither to turn. That would suit me. Now there are societies where
young girls learn housekeeping, or sewing, or to be kindergarten
teachers. Have you ever heard of these?"

"Yes, I once heard of them. Once upon a time little Annie was to go to
a kindergarten."

"Now you see, you know better than I do. I should like to join some
such society where I can make myself useful. But it is not to be
thought of. The women in charge wouldn't take me, they couldn't. That
is the most terrible thing of all, that the world is so closed to one,
that it even forbids one to take a part in charitable work. I can't
even give poor children a lesson after hours to help them catch up."

"That would not do for your Ladyship. The children always have such
greasy shoes on, and in wet weather there is so much steam and smoke,
your Ladyship could never stand it."

Effi smiled. "You are probably right, Roswitha, but it is a bad sign
that you should be right, and it shows me that I still have too much
of the old Effi in me and that I am still too well off."

Roswitha would not agree to that. "Anybody as good as your Ladyship
can't be too well off. Now you must not always play such sad music.
Sometimes I think all will be well yet, something will surely turn
up."

And something did turn up. Effi desired to become a painter, in spite
of the precentor's daughter from Polzin, whose conceit as an artist
she still remembered as exceedingly disagreeable. Although she laughed
about the plan herself, because she was conscious she could never
rise above the lowest grade of dilettantism, nevertheless she went at
her work with zest, because she at last had an occupation and that,
too, one after her own heart, because it was quiet and peaceful. She
applied for instruction to a very old professor of painting, who was
well-informed concerning the Brandenburgian aristocracy, and was, at
the same time, very pious, so that Effi seemed to be his heart's
delight from the outset. He probably thought, here was a soul to be
saved, and so he received her with extraordinary friendliness, as
though she had been his daughter. This made Effi very happy, and the
day of her first painting lesson marked for her a turning point toward
the good. Her poor life was now no longer so poor, and Roswitha was
triumphant when she saw that she had been right and something had
turned up after all.

Thus things went on for considerably over a year. Coming again in
contact with people made Effi happy, but it also created within her
the desire to renew and extend associations. Longing for Hohen-Cremmen
came over her at times with the force of a true passion, and she
longed still more passionately to see Annie. After all she was her
child, and when she began to turn this thought over in her mind and,
at the same time, recalled what Miss Trippelli had once said, to wit:
"The world is so small that one could be certain of coming suddenly
upon some old acquaintance in Central Africa," she had a reason for
being surprised that she had never met Annie. But the time finally
arrived when a change was to occur. She was coming from her painting
lesson, close by the Zoological Garden, and near the station stepped
into a horse car. It was very hot and it did her good to see the
lowered curtains blown out and back by the strong current of air
passing through the car. She leaned back in the corner toward the
front platform and was studying several pictures of blue tufted and
tasseled sofas on a stained window pane, when the car began to move
more slowly and she saw three school children spring up with school
bags on their backs and little pointed hats on their heads. Two of
them were blonde and merry, the third brunette and serious. This one
was Annie. Effi was badly startled, and the thought of a meeting with
the child, for which she had so often longed, filled her now with
deadly fright. What was to be done? With quick determination she
opened the door to the front platform, on which nobody was standing
but the driver, whom she asked to let her get off in front at the next
station. "It is forbidden, young lady," said the driver. But she gave
him a coin and looked at him so appealingly that the good-natured man
changed his mind and mumbled to himself: "I really am not supposed to,
but perhaps once will not matter." When the car stopped he took out
the lattice and Effi sprang off.

She was still greatly excited when she reached the house.

"Just think, Roswitha, I have seen Annie." Then she told of the
meeting in the tram car. Roswitha was displeased that the mother and
daughter had not been rejoiced to see each other again, and was very
hard to convince that it would not have looked well in the presence of
so many people. Then Effi had to tell how Annie looked and when she
had done so with motherly pride Roswitha said: "Yes, she is what one
might call half and half. Her pretty features and, if I may be
permitted to say it, her strange look she gets from her mother, but
her seriousness is exactly her father. When I come to think about it,
she is more like his Lordship."

"Thank God!" said Effi.

"Now, your Ladyship, there is some question about that. No doubt there
is many a person who would take the side of the mother."

"Do you think so, Roswitha? I don't."

"Oh, oh, I am not so easily fooled, and I think your Ladyship knows
very well, too, how matters really stand and what the men like best."

"Oh, don't speak of that, Roswitha."

The conversation ended here and was never afterward resumed. But even
though Effi avoided speaking to Roswitha about Annie, down deep in her
heart she was unable to get over that meeting and suffered from the
thought of having fled from her own child. It troubled her till she
was ashamed, and her desire to meet Annie grew till it became
pathological. It was not possible to write to Innstetten and ask his
permission. She was fully conscious of her guilt, indeed she nurtured
the sense of it with almost zealous care; but, on the other hand, at
the same time that she was conscious of guilt, she was also filled
with a certain spirit of rebellion against Innstetten. She said to
herself, he was right, again and again, and yet in the end he was
wrong. All had happened so long before, a new life had begun--he might
have let it die; instead poor Crampas died.

No, it would not do to write to Innstetten; but she wanted to see
Annie and speak to her and press her to her heart, and after she had
thought it over for days she was firmly convinced as to the best way
to go about it.

The very next morning she carefully put on a decent black dress and
set out for Unter den Linden to call on the minister's wife. She sent
in her card with nothing on it but "Effi von Innstetten, _née_ von
Briest." Everything else was left off, even "Baroness." When the man
servant returned and said, "Her Excellency begs you to enter," Effi
followed him into an anteroom, where she sat down and, in spite of her
excitement, looked at the pictures on the walls. First of all there
was Guido Reni's _Aurora_, while opposite it hung English etchings of
pictures by Benjamin West, made by the well known aquatint process.
One of the pictures was King Lear in the storm on the heath.

Effi had hardly finished looking at the pictures when the door of the
adjoining room opened and a tall slender woman of unmistakably
prepossessing appearance stepped toward the one who had come to
request a favor of her and held out her hand. "My dear most gracious
Lady," she said, "what a pleasure it is for me to see you again." As
she said this she walked toward the sofa and sat down, drawing Effi to
a seat beside her.

Effi was touched by the goodness of heart revealed in every word and
movement. Not a trace of haughtiness or reproach, only beautiful human
sympathy. "In what way can I be of service to you?" asked the
minister's wife.

Effi's lips quivered. Finally she said: "The thing that brings me here
is a request, the fulfillment of which your Excellency may perhaps
make possible. I have a ten-year-old daughter whom I have not seen for
three years and should like to see again."

The minister's wife took Effi's hand and looked at her in a friendly
way.

"When I say, 'not seen for three years,' that is not quite right.
Three days ago I saw her again." Then Effi described with great
vividness how she had met Annie. "Fleeing from my own child. I know
very well that as we sow we shall reap and I do not wish to change
anything in my life. It is all right as it is, and I have not wished
to have it otherwise. But this separation from my child is really too
hard and I have a desire to be permitted to see her now and then, not
secretly and clandestinely, but with the knowledge and consent of all
concerned."

"With the knowledge and consent of all concerned," repeated the
minister's wife. "So that means with the consent of your husband. I
see that his bringing up of the child is calculated to estrange her
from her mother, a method which I do not feel at liberty to judge.
Perhaps he is right. Pardon me for this remark, gracious Lady."

Effi nodded.

"You yourself appreciate the attitude of your husband, and your only
desire is that proper respect be shown to a natural impulse, indeed, I
may say, the most beautiful of our impulses, at least we women all
think so. Am I right?"

"In every particular."

"So you want me to secure permission for occasional meetings, in your
home, where you can attempt to win back the heart of your child."

Effi expressed again her acquiescence, and the minister's wife
continued: "Then, most gracious Lady, I shall do what I can. But we
shall not have an easy task. Your husband--pardon me for calling him
by that name now as before--is a man who is not governed by moods and
fancies, but by principles, and it will be hard for him to discard
them or even give them up temporarily. Otherwise he would have begun
long ago to pursue a different method of action and education. What to
your heart seems hard he considers right."

"Then your Excellency thinks, perhaps, it would be better to take back
my request!"

"Oh, no. I wished only to explain the actions of your husband, not to
say justify them, and wished at the same time to indicate the
difficulties we shall in all probability encounter. But I think we
shall overcome them nevertheless. We women are able to accomplish a
great many things if we go about them wisely and do not make too great
pretensions. Besides, your husband is one of my special admirers and
he cannot well refuse to grant what I request of him. Tomorrow we have
a little circle meeting at which I shall see him and the day after
tomorrow morning you will receive a few lines from me telling you
whether or not I have approached him wisely, that is to say,
successfully. I think we shall come off victorious, and you will see
your child again and enjoy her. She is said to be a very pretty girl.
No wonder."




CHAPTER XXXIII


Two days later the promised lines arrived and Effi read: "I am glad,
dear gracious Lady, to be able to give you good news. Everything
turned out as desired. Your husband is too much a man of the world to
refuse a Lady a request that she makes of him. But I must not keep
from you the fact that I saw plainly his consent was not in accord
with what he considers wise and right. But let us not pick faults
where we ought to be glad. We have arranged that Annie is to come some
time on Monday and may good fortune attend your meeting."

It was on the postman's second round that Effi received these lines
and it would presumably be less than two hours till Annie appeared.
That was a short time and yet too long. Effi walked restlessly about
the two rooms and then back to the kitchen, where she talked with
Roswitha about everything imaginable: about the ivy over on Christ's
Church and the probability that next year the windows would be
entirely overgrown; about the porter, who had again turned off the gas
so poorly that they were likely to be blown up; and about buying their
lamp oil again at the large lamp store on Unter den Linden instead of
on Anhalt St. She talked about everything imaginable, except Annie,
because she wished to keep down the fear lurking in her soul, in spite
of the letter from the minister's wife, or perhaps because of it.

Finally, at noon, the bell was rung timidly and Roswitha went to look
through the peephole. Surely enough, it was Annie. Roswitha gave the
child a kiss, but said nothing, and then led her very quietly, as
though some one were ill in the house, from the corridor into the back
room and then to the door opening into the front room.

"Go in there, Annie." With these words she left the child and returned
to the kitchen, for she did not wish to be in the way.

Effi was standing at the other end of the room with her back against
the post of the mirror when the child entered. "Annie!" But Annie
stood still by the half opened door, partly out of embarrassment, but
partly on purpose. Effi rushed to her, lifted her up, and kissed her.

"Annie, my sweet child, how glad I am! Come, tell me." She took Annie
by the hand and went toward the sofa to sit down. Annie stood and
looked shyly at her mother, at the same time reaching her left hand
toward the corner of the table cloth, hanging down near her. "Did you
know, Annie, that I saw you one day?"

"Yes, I thought you did."

"Now tell me a great deal. How tall you have grown! And that is the
scar there. Roswitha told me about it. You were always so wild and
hoidenish in your playing. You get that from your mother. She was the
same way. And at school? I fancy you are always at the head, you look
to me as though you ought to be a model pupil and always bring home
the best marks. I have heard also that Miss von Wedelstädt praises
you. That is right. I was likewise ambitious, but I had no such good
school. Mythology was always my best study. In what are you best?"

"I don't know."

"Oh, you know well enough. Pupils always know that. In what do you
have the best marks?"

"In religion."

"Now, you see, you do know after all. Well, that is very fine. I was
not so good in it, but it was probably due to the instruction. We had
only a young man licensed to preach."

"We had, too."

"Has he gone away?"

Annie nodded.

"Why did he leave?"

"I don't know. Now we have the preacher again."

"And you all love him dearly?"

"Yes, and two of the girls in the highest class are going to change
their religion."

"Oh, I understand; that is fine. And how is Johanna?"

"Johanna brought me to the door of the house."

"Why didn't you bring her up with you?"

"She said she would rather stay downstairs and wait over at the
church."

"And you are to meet her there?"

"Yes."

"Well, I hope she will not get impatient. There is a little front yard
over there and the windows are half overgrown with ivy, as though it
were an old church."

"But I should not like to keep her waiting."

"Oh, I see, you are very considerate, and I presume I ought to be glad
of it. We need only to make the proper division of the time--Tell me
now how Rollo is."

"Rollo is very well, but papa says he is getting so lazy. He lies in
the sun all the time."

"That I can readily believe. He was that way when you were quite
small. And now, Annie, today we have just seen each other, you know;
will you visit me often?"

"Oh, certainly, if I am allowed to."

"We can take a walk in the Prince Albrecht Garden."

"Oh, certainly, if I am allowed to."

"Or we may go to Schilling's and eat ice cream, pineapple or vanilla
ice cream. I always liked vanilla best."

"Oh, certainly, if I am allowed to."

At this third "if I am allowed to" the measure was full. Effi sprang
up and flashed the child a look of indignation.

"I believe it is high time you were going, Annie. Otherwise Johanna
will get impatient." She rang the bell and Roswitha, who was in the
next room, entered immediately. "Roswitha, take Annie over to the
church. Johanna is waiting there. I hope she has not taken cold. I
should be sorry. Remember me to Johanna."

The two went out.

Hardly had Roswitha closed the door behind her when Effi tore open her
dress, because she was threatened with suffocation, and fell to
laughing convulsively. "So that is the way it goes to meet after a
long separation." She rushed forward, opened the window and looked for
something to support her. In the distress of her heart she found it.
There beside the window was a bookshelf with a few volumes of Schiller
and Körner on it, and on top of the volumes of poems, which were of
equal height, lay a Bible and a songbook. She reached for them,
because she had to have something before which she could kneel down
and pray. She laid both Bible and songbook on the edge of the table
where Annie had been standing, and threw herself violently down before
them and spoke in a half audible tone: "O God in Heaven, forgive me
what I have done. I was a child--No, no, I was not a child, I was old
enough to know what I was doing. I _did_ know, too, and I will not
minimize my guilt. But this is too much. This action of the child is
not the work of my God who would punish me, it is the work of _him_,
and _him_ alone. I thought he had a noble heart and have always felt
small beside him, but now I know that it is he who is small. And
because he is small he is cruel. Everything that is small is cruel.
_He_ taught the child to say that. He always was a school-master,
Crampas called him one, scoffingly at the time, but he was right. 'Oh,
certainly if I am allowed to!' You don't _have_ to be allowed to. I
don't want you any more, I hate you both, even my own child. Too much
is too much. He was ambitious, but nothing more. Honor, honor, honor.
And then he shot the poor fellow whom I never even loved and whom I
had forgotten, because I didn't love him. It was all stupidity in the
first place, but then came blood and murder, with me to blame. And now
he sends me the child, because he cannot refuse a minister's wife
anything, and before he sends the child he trains it like a parrot and
teaches it the phrase, 'if I am allowed to.' I am disgusted at what I
did; but the thing that disgusts me most is your virtue. Away with
you! I must live, but I doubt if it will be long."

When Roswitha came back Effi lay on the floor seemingly lifeless, with
her face turned away.




CHAPTER XXXIV


Rummschüttel was called and pronounced Effi's condition serious. He
saw that the hectic flush he had noticed for over a year was more
pronounced than ever, and, what was worse, she showed the first
symptoms of nervous fever. But his quiet, friendly manner, to which he
added a dash of humor, did Effi good, and she was calm so long as
Rummschüttel was with her. When he left, Roswitha accompanied him as
far as the outer hall and said: "My, how I am scared, Sir Councillor;
if it ever comes back, and it may--oh, I shall never have another
quiet hour. But it was too, too much, the way the child acted. Her
poor Ladyship! And still so young; at her age many are only beginning
life."

"Don't worry, Roswitha. It may all come right again. But she must get
away. We will see to that. Different air, different people."

Two days later there arrived in Hohen-Cremmen a letter which ran:
"Most gracious Lady: My long-standing friendly relations to the houses
of Briest and Belling, and above all the hearty love I cherish for
your daughter, will justify these lines. Things cannot go on any
longer as they are. Unless something is done to rescue your daughter
from the loneliness and sorrow of the life she has been leading for
years she will soon pine away. She always had a tendency to
consumption, for which reason I sent her to Ems years ago. This old
trouble is now aggravated by a new one; her nerves are giving out.
Nothing but a change of air can check this. But whither shall I send
her? It would not be hard to make a proper choice among the watering
places of Silesia. Salzbrunn is good, and Reinerz still better, on
account of the nervous complication. But no place except Hohen-Cremmen
will do. For, most gracious Lady, air alone cannot restore your
daughter's health. She is pining away because she has nobody but
Roswitha. The fidelity of a servant is beautiful, but parental love is
better. Pardon an old man for meddling in affairs that lie outside of
his calling as a physician. No, not outside, either, for after all it
is the physician who is here speaking and making demands--pardon the
word--in accordance with his duty. I have seen so much of life--But
enough on this topic. With kindest regards to your husband, your
humble servant, Dr. Rummschüttel."

Mrs. von Briest had read the letter to her husband. They were sitting
on the shady tile walk, with their backs to the drawing room and
facing the circular bed and the sundial. The wild grapevine twining
around the windows was rustling gently in the breeze and over the
water a few dragon-flies were hovering in the bright sunshine.

Briest sat speechless, drumming on the tea-tray.

"Please don't drum, I had rather you would talk."

"Ah, Luise, what shall I say? My drumming says quite enough. You have
known for over a year what I think about it. At the time when
Innstetten's letter came, a flash from a clear sky, I was of your
opinion. But that was half an eternity ago. Am I to play the grand
inquisitor till the end of my days? I tell you, I have had my fill of
it for a long time."

"Don't reproach me, Briest. I love her as much as you, perhaps more;
each in his own way. But it is not our only purpose in life to be weak
and affectionate and to tolerate things that are contrary to the law
and the commandments, things that men condemn, and in the present
instance rightly."

"Hold on! One thing comes first."

"Of course, one thing comes first; but what is the one thing?"

"The love of parents for their children, especially when they have
only one child."

"Then good-by catechism, morality, and the claims of 'society.'"

"Ah, Luise, talk to me about the catechism as much as you like, but
don't speak to me about 'society.'"

"It is very hard to get along without 'society."'

"Also without a child. Believe me, Luise,'society' can shut one eye
when it sees fit. Here is where I stand in the matter: If the people
of Rathenow come, all right, if they don't come, all right too. I am
simply going to telegraph: 'Effi, come.' Are you agreed?"

She got up and kissed him on the forehead. "Of course I am. Only you
must not find fault with me. An easy step it is not, and from now on
our life will be different."

"I can stand it. There is a good rape crop and in the autumn I can
hunt an occasional hare. I still have a taste for red wine, and it
will taste even better when we have the child back in the house. Now I
am going to send the telegram."

       *       *       *       *       *

Effi had been in Hohen-Cremmen for over six months. She occupied the
two rooms on the second floor which she had formerly had when there
for a visit. The larger one was furnished for her personally, and
Roswitha slept in the other. What Rummschüttel had expected from this
sojourn and the good that went with it, was realized, so far as it
could be realized. The coughing diminished, the bitter expression that
had robbed Effi's unusually kind face of a good part of its charm
disappeared, and there came days when she could laugh again. About
Kessin and everything back there little was said, with the single
exception of Mrs. von Padden--and Gieshübler, of course, for whom old
Mr. von Briest had a very tender spot in his heart. "This Alonzo, this
fastidious Spaniard, who harbors a Mirambo and brings up a
Trippelli--well, he must be a genius, and you can't make me believe
he isn't." Then Effi had to yield and act for him the part of
Gieshübler, with hat in hand and endless bows of politeness. By virtue
of her peculiar talent for mimicry, she could do the bows very well,
although it went against the grain, because she always felt that it
was an injustice to the dear good man.--They never talked about
Innstetten and Annie, but it was settled that Annie was to inherit
Hohen-Cremmen.

Effi took a new lease on life, and her mother, who in true womanly
fashion was not altogether averse to regarding the affair, painful
though it was, as merely an interesting case, vied with her father in
expressions of love and devotion.

"Such a good winter we have not had for a long time," said Briest.
Then Effi arose from her seat and stroked back the sparse hairs from
his forehead. But beautiful as everything seemed from the point of
view of Effi's health, it was all illusion, for in reality the disease
was gaining ground and quietly consuming her vitality. Effi again
wore, as on the day of her betrothal to Innstetten, a blue and white
striped smock with a loose belt, and when she walked up to her parents
with a quick elastic step, to bid them good morning, they looked at
each other with joyful surprise--with joyful surprise and yet at the
same time with sadness, for they could not fail to see that it was not
the freshness of youth, but a transformation, that gave her slender
form and beaming eyes this peculiar appearance. All who observed her
closely saw this, but Effi herself did not. Her whole attention was
engaged by the happy feeling at being back in this place, to her so
charmingly peaceful, and living reconciled with those whom she had
always loved and who had always loved her, even during the years of
her misery and exile.

She busied herself with all sorts of things about the home and
attended to the decorations and little improvements in the household.
Her appreciation of the beautiful enabled her always to make the right
choice. Reading and, above all, study of the arts she had given up
entirely. "I have had so much of it that I am happy to be able to lay
my hands in my lap." Besides, it doubtless reminded her too much of
her days of sadness. She cultivated instead the art of contemplating
nature with calmness and delight, and when the leaves fell from the
plane trees, or the sunbeams glistened on the ice of the little pond,
or the first crocuses blossomed in the circular plot, still half in
the grip of winter--it did her good, and she could gaze on all these
things for hours, forgetting what life had denied her, or, to be more
accurate, what she had robbed herself of.

Callers were not altogether a minus quantity, not everybody shunned
her; but her chief associates were the families at the schoolhouse and
the parsonage.

It made little difference that the Jahnke daughters had left home;
there could have been no very cordial friendship with them anyhow. But
she found a better friend than ever in old Mr. Jahnke himself, who
considered not only all of Swedish Pomerania, but also the Kessin
region as Scandinavian outposts, and was always asking questions about
them. "Why, Jahnke, we had a steamer, and, as I wrote to you, I
believe, or may perhaps have told you, I came very near going over to
Wisby. Just think, I almost went to Wisby. It is comical, but I can
say 'almost' with reference to many things in my life."

"A pity, a pity," said Jahnke.

"Yes, indeed, a pity. But I actually did make a tour of Rügen. You
would have enjoyed that, Jahnke. Just think, Arcona with its great
camping place of the Wends, that is said still to be visible. I myself
did not go there, but not very far away is the Hertha Lake with white
and yellow water lilies. The place made one think a great deal of your
Hertha."

"Yes, yes, Hertha. But you were about to speak of the Hertha Lake."

"Yes, I was. And just think, Jahnke, close by the lake stood two large
shining sacrificial stones, with the grooves still showing, in which
the blood used to run off. Ever since then I have had an aversion for
the Wends."

"Oh, pardon me, gracious Lady, but they were not Wends. The legends of
the sacrificial stones and the Hertha Lake go back much, much farther,
clear back before the birth of Christ. They were the pure Germans,
from whom we are all descended."

"Of course," laughed Effi, "from whom we are all descended, the
Jahnkes certainly, and perhaps the Briests, too."

Then she dropped the subject of Rügen and the Hertha Lake and asked
about his grandchildren and which of them he liked best, Bertha's or
Hertha's.

Indeed Effi was on a very friendly footing with Jahnke. But in spite
of his intimate relation to Hertha Lake, Scandinavia, and Wisby, he
was only a simple man and so the lonely young woman could not fail to
value her chats with Niemeyer much higher. In the autumn, so long as
promenades in the park were possible, she had an abundance of such
chats, but with the beginning of winter came an interruption for
several months, because she did not like to go to the parsonage. Mrs.
Niemeyer had always been a very disagreeable woman, but she pitched
her voice higher than ever now, in spite of the fact that in the
opinion of the parish she herself was not altogether above reproach.

The situation remained the same throughout the winter, much to Effi's
sorrow. But at the beginning of April when the bushes showed a fringe
of green and the park paths dried off, the walks were resumed.

Once when they were sauntering along they heard a cuckoo in the
distance, and Effi began to count to see how many times it called. She
was leaning on Niemeyer's arm. Suddenly she said: "The cuckoo is
calling yonder, but I don't want to consult him about the length of my
life. Tell me, friend, what do you think of life?"

"Ah, dear Effi, you must not lay such doctors' questions before me.
You must apply to a philosopher or offer a prize to a faculty. What do
I think of life? Much and little. Sometimes it is very much and
sometimes very little."

"That is right, friend, I like that; I don't need to know anymore." As
she said this they came to the swing. She sprang into it as nimbly as
in her earliest girlhood days, and before the old man, who watched
her, could recover from his fright, she crouched down between the two
ropes and set the swing board in motion by a skillful lifting and
dropping of the weight of her body. In a few seconds she was flying
through the air. Then, holding on with only one hand, she tore a
little silk handkerchief from around her neck and waved it happily and
haughtily. Soon she let the swing stop, sprang out, and took
Niemeyer's arm again.

"Effi, you are just as you always were."

"No, I wish I were. But I am too old for this; I just wanted to try it
once more. Oh, how fine it was and how much good the air did me! It
seemed as though I were flying up to heaven. I wonder if I shall go to
heaven? Tell me, friend, you ought to know. Please, please."

Niemeyer took her hand into his two wrinkled ones and gave her a kiss
on the forehead, saying: "Yes, Effi, you will."




CHAPTER XXXV


Effi spent the whole day out in the park, because she needed to take
the air. Old Dr. Wiesike of Friesack approved of it, but in his
instructions gave her too much liberty to do what she liked, and
during the cold days in May she took a severe cold. She became
feverish, coughed a great deal, and the doctor, who had been calling
every third day, now came daily. He was put to it to know what to do,
for the sleeping powders and cough medicines Effi asked for could not
be given, because of the fever.

"Doctor," said old von Briest, "what is going to come of this? You
have known her since she was a little thing, in fact you were here at
her birth. I don't like all these symptoms: her noticeable falling
away, the red spots, and the gleam of her eyes when she suddenly turns
to me with a pleading look. What do you think it will amount to? Must
she die?"

Wiesike shook his head gravely. "I will not say that, von Briest, but
I don't like the way her fever keeps up. However, we shall bring it
down soon, for she must go to Switzerland or Mentone for pure air and
agreeable surroundings that will make her forget the past."

"Lethe, Lethe."

"Yes, Lethe," smiled Wiesike. "It's a pity that while the ancient
Swedes, the Greeks, were leaving us the name they did not leave us
also the spring itself."

"Or at least the formula for it. Waters are imitated now, you know.
My, Wiesike, what a business we could build up here if we could only
start such a sanatorium! Friesack the spring of forgetfulness! Well,
let us try the Riviera for the present. Mentone is the Riviera, is it
not? To be sure, the price of grain is low just now, but what must be
must be. I shall talk with my wife about it."

That he did, and his wife consented immediately, influenced in part by
her own ardent desire to see the south, particularly since she had
felt like one retired from the world. But Effi would not listen to it.
"How good you are to me! And I am selfish enough to accept the
sacrifice, if I thought it would do any good. But I am certain it
would only harm me."

"You try to make yourself think that, Effi."

"No. I have become so irritable that everything annoys me. Not here at
home, for you humor me and clear everything out of my way. But when
traveling that is impossible, the disagreeable element cannot be
eliminated so easily. It begins with the conductor and ends with the
waiter. Even when I merely think of their self-satisfied countenances
my temperature runs right up. No, no, keep me here. I don't care to
leave Hohen-Cremmen any more; my place is here. The heliotrope around
the sundial is dearer to me than Mentone."

After this conversation the plan was dropped and in spite of the great
benefit Wiesike had expected from the Riviera he said: "We must
respect these wishes, for they are not mere whims. Such patients have
a very fine sense and know with remarkable certainty what is good for
them and what not. What Mrs. Effi has said about the conductor and the
waiter is really quite correct, and there is no air with healing power
enough to counterbalance hotel annoyances, if one is at all affected
by them. So let us keep her here. If that is not the best thing, it is
certainly not the worst."

This proved to be true. Effi got better, gained a little in weight
(old von Briest belonged to the weight fanatics), and lost much of her
irritability. But her need of fresh air kept growing steadily, and
even when the west wind blew and the sky was overcast with gray
clouds, she spent many hours out of doors. On such days she would
usually go out into the fields or the marsh, often as far as two
miles, and when she grew tired would sit down on the hurdle fence,
where, lost in dreams, she would watch the ranunculi and red sorrel
waving in the wind.

"You go out so much alone," said Mrs. von Briest. "Among our people
you are safe, but there are so many strange vagabonds prowling
around."

That made an impression on Effi, who had never thought of danger, and
when she was alone with Roswitha, she said: "I can't well take you
with me, Roswitha; you are too fat and no longer sure-footed."

"Oh, your Ladyship, it is hardly yet as bad as that. Why, I could
still be married."

"Of course," laughed Effi. "One is never too old for that. But let me
tell you, Roswitha, if I had a dog to accompany me--Papa's hunting dog
has no attachment for me--hunting dogs are so stupid--and he never
stirs till the hunter or the gardener takes the gun from the rack. I
often have to think of Rollo."

"True," said Roswitha, "they have nothing like Rollo here. But I don't
mean anything against 'here.' Hohen-Cremmen is very good."

Three or four days after this conversation between Effi and Roswitha,
Innstetten entered his office an hour earlier than usual. The morning
sun, which shone very brightly, had wakened him and as he had
doubtless felt he could not go to sleep again he had got out of bed to
take up a piece of work that had long been waiting to be attended to.

At a quarter past eight he rang. Johanna brought the breakfast tray,
on which, beside the morning papers, there were two letters. He
glanced at the addresses and recognized by the handwriting that one
was from the minister. But the other? The postmark could not be read
plainly and the address, "Baron von Innstetten, Esq.," showed a happy
lack of familiarity with the customary use of titles. In keeping with
this was the very primitive character of the writing. But the address
was remarkably accurate: "W., Keith St. 1c, third story."

Innstetten was enough of an official to open first the letter from
"His Excellency." "My dear Innstetten: I am happy to be able to
announce to you that His Majesty has deigned to sign your appointment
and I congratulate you sincerely." Innstetten was pleased at the
friendly lines from the minister, almost more than at the appointment
itself, for, since the morning in Kessin, when Crampas had bidden him
farewell with that look which still haunted him, he had grown somewhat
sceptical of such things as climbing higher on the ladder. Since then
he had measured with a different measure and viewed things in a
different light. Distinction--what did that amount to in the end? As
the days passed by with less and less of joy for him, he more than
once recalled a half-forgotten minister's anecdote from the time of
the elder Ladenberg, who, upon receiving the Order of the Red Eagle,
for which he had long been waiting, threw it down in a rage and
exclaimed: "Lie there till you turn black." It probably did turn into
a black one subsequently, but many days too late and certainly without
real satisfaction for the receiver. Everything that is to give us
pleasure must come at the right time and in the right circumstances,
for what delights us today may be valueless tomorrow. Innstetten felt
this deeply, and as certainly as he had formerly laid store by honors
and distinctions coming from his highest superiors, just so certainly
was he now firmly convinced that the glittering appearance of things
amounted to but little, and that what is called happiness, if it
existed at all, is something other than this appearance. "Happiness,
if I am right, lies in two things: being exactly where one
belongs--but what official can say that of himself?--and, especially,
performing comfortably the most commonplace functions, that is,
getting enough sleep and not having new boots that pinch. When the 720
minutes of a twelve-hour day pass without any special annoyance that
can be called a happy day."

Innstetten was today in the mood for such gloomy reflections. When he
took up the second letter and read it he ran his hand over his
forehead, with the painful feeling that there is such a thing as
happiness, that he had once possessed it, but had lost it and could
never again recover it. Johanna entered and announced Privy Councillor
Wüllersdorf, who was already standing on the threshold and said:
"Congratulations, Innstetten."

"I believe you mean what you say; the others will be vexed. However--"

"However. You are surely not going to be pessimistic at a moment like
this."

"No. The graciousness of His Majesty makes me feel ashamed, and the
friendly feeling of the minister, to whom I owe all this, almost
more."

"But--"

[Illustration: SUPPER AT A COURT BALL
_From the Painting by Adolph van Menzel_]

"But I have forgotten how to rejoice. If I said that to anybody but
you my words would be considered empty phrases. But you understand me.
Just look around you. How empty and deserted everything is! When
Johanna comes in, a so-called jewel, she startles me and frightens me.
Her stage entry," continued Innstetten, imitating Johanna's pose, "the
half comical shapeliness of her bust, which comes forward claiming
special attention, whether of mankind or me, I don't know--all this
strikes me as so sad and pitiable, and if it were not so ridiculous,
it might drive me to suicide."

"Dear Innstetten, are you going to assume the duties of a permanent
secretary in this frame of mind?"

"Oh, bah! How can I help it? Read these lines I have just received."

Wüllersdorf took the second letter with the illegible postmark, was
amused at the "Esq.," and stepped to the window that he might read
more easily.

"Gracious Sir: I suppose you will be surprised that I am writing to
you, but it is about Rollo. Little Annie told us last year Rollo was
so lazy now, but that doesn't matter here. He can be as lazy as he
likes here, the lazier the better. And her Ladyship would like it so
much. She always says, when she walks upon the marsh or over the
fields: 'I am really afraid, Roswitha, because I am so alone; but who
is there to accompany me? Rollo, oh yes, he would do. He bears no
grudge against me either. That is the advantage, that animals do not
trouble themselves so much about such things.' These are her
Ladyship's words and I will say nothing further, and merely ask your
Lordship to remember me to my little Annie. Also to Johanna. From your
faithful, most obedient servant, Roswitha Gellenbagen."

"Well," said Wüllersdorf, as he folded the letter again, "she is ahead
of us."

"I think so, too."

"This is also the reason why everything else seems so doubtful to
you."

"You are right. It has been going through my head for a long time, and
these simple words with their intended, or perhaps unintended
complaint, have put me completely beside myself again. It has been
troubling me for over a year and I should like to get clear out of
here. Nothing pleases me any more. The more distinctions I receive the
more I feel that it is all vanity. My life is bungled, and so I have
thought to myself I ought to have nothing more to do with strivings
and vanities, and ought to be able to employ my pedagogical
inclinations, which after all are my most characteristic quality, as a
superintendent of public morals. It would not be anything new. If the
plan were feasible I should surely become a very famous character,
such as Dr. Wichern of the Rough House in Hamburg, for example, that
man of miracles, who tamed all criminals with his glance and his
piety."

"Hm, there is nothing to be said against that; it would be possible."

"No, it is not possible either. Not even _that_. Absolutely every
avenue is closed to me. How could I touch the soul of a murderer? To
do that one must be intact himself. And if one no longer is, but has a
like spot on his own hands, then he must at least be able to play the
crazy penitent before his confreres, who are to be converted, and
entertain them with a scene of gigantic contrition."

Wüllersdorf nodded.

"Now you see, you agree. But I can't do any of these things any more.
I can no longer play the man in the hair shirt, let alone the dervish
or the fakir, who dances himself to death in the midst of his
self-accusations. And inasmuch as all such things are impossible I
have puzzled out, as the best thing for me, to go away from here and
off to the coal black fellows who know nothing of culture and honor.
Those fortunate creatures! For culture and honor and such rubbish are
to blame for all my trouble. We don't do such things out of passion,
which might be an acceptable excuse. We do them for the sake of mere
notions--notions! And then the one fellow collapses and later the
other collapses, too, only in a worse way."

"Oh pshaw! Innstetten, those are whims, mere fancies. Go to Africa!
What does that mean! It will do for a lieutenant who is in debt. But a
man like you! Are you thinking of presiding over a palaver, in a red
fez, or of entering into blood relationship with a son-in-law of King
Mtesa? Or will you feel your way along the Congo in a tropical helmet,
with six holes in the top of it, until you come out again at Kamerun
or thereabouts? Impossible!"

"Impossible? Why? If _that_ is impossible, what then?"

"Simply stay here and practice resignation. Who, pray, is unoppressed!
Who could not say every day: 'Really a very questionable affair.' You
know, I have also a small burden to bear, not the same as yours, but
not much lighter. That talk about creeping around in the primeval
forest or spending the night in an ant hill is folly. Whoever cares
to, may, but it is not the thing for us. The best thing is to stand in
the gap and hold out till one falls, but, until then, to get as much
out of life as possible in the small and even the smallest things,
keeping one eye open for the violets when they bloom, or the Luise
monument when it is decorated with flowers, or the little girls with
high lace shoes when they skip the rope. Or drive out to Potsdam and
go into the Church of Peace, where Emperor Frederick lies, and where
they are just beginning to build him a tomb. As you stand there
consider the life of that man, and if you are not pacified then, there
is no help for you, I should say."

"Good, good! But the year is long and every single day--and then the
evening."

"That is always the easiest part of the day to know what to do with.
Then we have _Sardanapal_, or _Coppelia_, with Del Era, and when that
is out we have Siechen's, which is not to be despised. Three steins
will calm you every time. There are always many, a great many others,
who are in exactly the same general situation as we are, and one of
them who had had a great deal of misfortune once said to me: 'Believe
me, Wüllersdorf, we cannot get along without "false work."' The man
who said it was an architect and must have known about it. His
statement is correct. Never a day passes but I am reminded of the
'false work.'"

After Wüllersdorf had thus expressed himself he took his hat and cane.
During these words Innstetten may have recalled his own earlier
remarks about little happiness, for he nodded his head half agreeing,
and smiled to himself.

"Where are you going now, Wüllersdorf? It is too early yet for the
Ministry."

"I am not going there at all today. First I shall take an hour's walk
along the canal to the Charlottenburg lock and then back again. And
then make a short call at Huth's on Potsdam St., going cautiously up
the little wooden stairway. Below there is a flower store."

"And that affords you pleasure? That satisfies you?"

"I should not say that exactly, but it will help a bit. I shall find
various regular guests there drinking their morning glass, but their
names I wisely keep secret. One will tell about the Duke of Ratibor,
another about the Prince-Bishop Kopp, and a third perhaps about
Bismarck. There is always a little something to be learned.
Three-fourths of what is said is inaccurate, but if it is only witty I
do not waste much time criticising it and always listen gratefully."

With that he went out.




CHAPTER XXXVI


May was beautiful, June more beautiful, and after Effi had happily
overcome the first painful feeling aroused in her by Rollo's arrival,
she was full of joy at having the faithful dog about her again.
Roswitha was praised and old von Briest launched forth into words of
recognition for Innstetten, who, he said, was a cavalier, never petty,
but always stout-hearted. "What a pity that the stupid affair had to
come between them! As a matter of fact, they were a model couple." The
only one who remained calm during the welcoming scene was Rollo
himself, who either had no appreciation of time or considered the
separation as an irregularity which was now simply removed. The fact
that he had grown old also had something to do with it, no doubt. He
remained sparing with his demonstrations of affection as he had been
with his evidences of joy, during the welcoming scene. But he had
grown in fidelity, if such a thing were possible. He never left the
side of his mistress. The hunting dog he treated benevolently, but as
a being of a lower order. At night he lay on the rush mat before
Effi's door; in the morning, when breakfast was served out of doors by
the sundial, he was always quiet, always sleepy, and only when Effi
arose from the breakfast table and walked toward the hall to take her
straw hat and umbrella from the rack, did his youth return. Then,
without troubling himself about whether his strength was to be put to
a hard or easy test, he ran up the village road and back again and did
not calm down till they were out in the fields. Effi, who cared more
for fresh air than for landscape beauty, avoided the little patches of
forest and usually kept to the main road, which 'at first was bordered
with very old elms and then, where the turnpike began, with poplars.
This road led to the railway station about an hour's walk away. She
enjoyed everything, breathing in with delight the fragrance wafted to
her from the rape and clover fields, or watching the soaring of the
larks, and counting the draw-wells and troughs, to which the cattle
went to drink. She could hear a soft ringing of bells that made her
feel as though she must close her eyes and pass away in sweet
forgetfulness. Near the station, close by the turnpike, lay a road
roller. This was her daily resting place, from which she could observe
what took place on the railroad. Trains came and went and sometimes
she could see two columns of smoke which for a moment seemed to blend
into one and then separated, one going to the right, the other to the
left, till they disappeared behind the village and the grove. Rollo
sat beside her, sharing her lunch, and when he had caught the last
bite, he would run like mad along some plowed furrow, doubtless to
show his gratitude, and stop only when a pair of pheasants scared from
their nest flew up from a neighboring furrow close by him.

"How beautiful this summer is! A year ago, dear mama, I should not
have thought I could ever again be so happy," said Effi every day as
she walked with her mother around the pond or picked an early apple
from a tree and bit into it vigorously, for she had beautiful teeth.
Mrs. von Briest would stroke her hand and say: "Just wait till you are
well again, Effi, quite well, and then we shall find happiness, not
that of the past, but a new kind. Thank God, there are several kinds
of happiness. And you shall see, we shall find something for you."

"You are so good. Really I have changed your lives and made you
prematurely old."

"Oh, my dear Effi, don't speak of it. I thought the same about it,
when the change came. Now I know that our quiet is better than the
noise and loud turmoil of earlier years. If you keep on as you are we
can go away yet. When Wiesike proposed Mentone you were ill and
irritable, and because you were ill, you were right in saying what you
did about conductors and waiters. When you have steadier nerves again
you can stand that. You will no longer be offended, but will laugh at
the grand manners and the curled hair. Then the blue sea and white
sails and the rocks all overgrown with red cactus--I have never seen
them, to be sure, but that is how I imagine them. I should like to
become acquainted with them."

Thus the summer went by and the meteoric showers were also past.
During these evenings Effi had sat at her window till after midnight
and yet never grew tired of watching. "I always was a weak Christian,
but I wonder whether we ever came from up there and whether, when all
is over here, we shall return to our heavenly home, to the stars above
or further beyond. I don't know and don't care to know. I just have
the longing."

Poor Effi! She had looked up at the wonders of the sky and thought
about them too long, with the result that the night air, and the fog
rising from the pond, made her so ill she had to stay in bed again.
When Wiesike was summoned and had examined her he took Briest aside
and said: "No more hope; be prepared for an early end."

What he said was only too true, and a few days later, comparatively
early in the evening, it was not yet ten o'clock, Roswitha came down
stairs and said to Mrs. von Briest: "Most gracious Lady, her Ladyship
upstairs is very ill. She talks continually to herself in a soft voice
and sometimes it seems as though she were praying, but she says she is
not, and I don't know, it seems to me as though the end might come any
hour."

"Does she wish to speak to me?"

"She hasn't said so, but I believe she does. You know how she is; she
doesn't want to disturb you and make you anxious. But I think it would
be well."

"All right, Roswitha, I will come."

Before the clock began to strike Mrs. von Briest mounted the stairway
and entered Effi's room. Effi lay on a reclining chair near the open
window. Mrs. von Briest drew up a small black chair with three gilt
spindles in its ebony back, took Effi's hand and said: "How are you,
Effi! Roswitha says you are so feverish."

"Oh, Roswitha worries so much about everything. I could see by her
looks she thought I was dying. Well, I don't know. She thinks
everybody ought to be as much worried as she is."

"Are you so calm about dying, dear Effi?"

"Entirely calm, mama."

"Aren't you deceiving yourself? Everybody clings to life, especially
the young, and you are still so young, dear Effi."

Effi remained silent for a while. Then she said: "You know, I haven't
read much. Innstetten was often surprised at it, and he didn't like
it."

This was the first time she had mentioned Innstetten's name, and it
made a deep impression on her mother and showed clearly that the end
was come.

"But I thought," said Mrs. von Briest, "you were going to tell me
something."

"Yes, I was, because you spoke of my still being so young. Certainly I
am still young; but that makes no difference. During our happy days
Innstetten used to read aloud to me in the evening. He had very good
books, and in one of them there was a story about a man who had been
called away from a merry table. The following morning he asked how it
had been after he left. Somebody answered: 'Oh, there were all sorts
of things, but you really didn't miss anything.' You see, mama, these
words have impressed themselves upon my memory--It doesn't signify
very much if one is called away from the table a little early."

Mrs. von Briest remained silent. Effi lifted herself up a little
higher and said: "Now that I have talked to you about old times and
also about Innstetten, I must tell you something else, dear mama."

"You are getting excited, Effi."

"No, no, to tell about the burden of my heart will not excite me, it
will quiet me. And so I wanted to tell you that I am dying reconciled
to God and men, reconciled also to _him_."

"Did you cherish in your heart such great bitterness against him?
Really--pardon me, my dear Effi, for mentioning it now--really it was
you who brought down sorrow upon yourself and your husband."

Effi assented. "Yes, mama, and how sad that it should be so. But when
all the terrible things happened, and finally the scene with
Annie--you know what I mean--I turned the tables on him, mentally, if
I may use the ridiculous comparison, and came to believe seriously
that he was to blame, because he was prosaic and calculating, and
toward the end cruel. Then curses upon him crossed my lips."

"Does that trouble you now?"

"Yes. And I am anxious that he shall know how, during my days of
illness here, which have been almost my happiest, how it has become
clear to my mind that he was right in his every act. In the affair
with poor Crampas--well, after all, what else could he have done? Then
the act by which he wounded me most deeply, the teaching of my own
child to shun me, even in that he was right, hard and painful as it is
for me to admit it. Let him know that I died in this conviction. It
will comfort and console him, and may reconcile him. He has much that
is good in his nature and was as noble as anybody can be who is not
truly in love."

Mrs. von Briest saw that Effi was exhausted and seemed to be either
sleeping or about to go to sleep. She rose quietly from her chair and
went out. Hardly had she gone when Effi also got up, and sat at the
open window to breathe in the cool night air once more. The stars
glittered and not a leaf stirred in the park. But the longer she
listened the more plainly she again heard something like soft rain
falling on the plane trees. A feeling of liberation came over her.
"Rest, rest."

       *       *       *       *       *

It was a month later and September was drawing to an end. The weather
was beautiful, but the foliage in the park began to show a great deal
of read and yellow and since the equinox, which had brought three
stormy days, the leaves lay scattered in every direction. In the
circular plot a slight change had been made. The sundial was gone and
in the place where it had stood there lay since yesterday a white
marble slab with nothing on it but "Effi Briest" and a cross beneath.
This had been Em's last request. "I should like to have back my old
name on my stone; I brought no honor to the other." This had been
promised her.

The marble slab had arrived and been placed in position yesterday, and
Briest and his wife were sitting in view of it, looking at it and the
heliotrope, which had been spared, and which now bordered the stone.
Rollo lay beside them with his head on his paws.

Wilke, whose spats were growing wider and wider, brought the breakfast
and the mail, and old Mr. von Briest said: "Wilke, order the little
carriage. I am going to drive across the country with my wife."

Mrs. von Briest had meanwhile poured the coffee and was looking at the
circle and its flower bed. "See, Briest, Rollo is lying by the stone
again. He is really taking it harder than we. He wont eat any more,
either."

"Well, Luise, it is the brute creature. That is just what I have
always said. We don't amount to as much as we think. But here we
always talk about instinct. In the end I think it is the best."

"Don't speak that way. When you begin to philosophize--don't take
offense--Briest, you show your incompetence. You have a good
understanding, but you can't tackle such questions."

"That's true."

"And if it is absolutely necessary to discuss questions there are
entirely different ones, Briest, and I can tell you that not a day
passes, since the poor child has been lying here, but such questions
press themselves on me."

"What questions?"

"Whether after all we are perhaps not to blame?"

"Nonsense, Luise. What do you mean?"

"Whether we ought not to have disciplined her differently. You and I
particularly, for Niemeyer is only a cipher; he leaves everything in
doubt. And then, Briest, sorry as I am--your continual use of
ambiguous expressions--and finally, and here I accuse myself too, for
I do not desire to come off innocent in this matter, I wonder if she
was not too young, perhaps?"

Rollo, who awoke at these words, shook his head gravely and Briest
said calmly: "Oh, Luise, don't--that is _too_ wide a field."

       *       *       *       *       *




EXTRACTS FROM "MY CHILDHOOD YEARS" (1894)

By THEODOR FONTANE

TRANSLATED BY WILLIAM A. COOPER, A.M.

Associate Professor of German, Leland Stanford Jr. University


On one of the last days of March, in the year 1819, a chaise drove up
before the apothecary's shop at the sign of the Lion, in Neu-Ruppin,
and a young couple, who a short time before had jointly purchased the
shop, alighted from the carriage and were received by the servants of
the house. The husband was only twenty-three years of age--for people
married very young in those days, just after the war. The wife was
twenty-one. They Were my parents....

I was born there on the 30th of December that same year. With my
mother it was a matter of life and death, for which reason, whenever
she was twitted with favoring me, she was accustomed simply to reply:
"That is because I suffered most for him." In this favored position I
remained a long time, some eighteen years, till the birth of a late
child, my youngest sister, for whom I stood sponsor and whom I even
held during the christening. This was a great honor for me, but with
it went hand in hand my dethronement by this very sister. It goes
without saying that as the youngest child she straightway became the
darling of the family.

At Easter, 1819, my father took possession of the apothecary's shop in
Neu-Ruppin, which he had acquired at a most favorable price, for a
song, so to speak; at Easter, 1826, after three of my four brothers
and sisters had been born there, he disposed of the property. Whenever
this early sale of the business became a topic of conversation, it
was always characterized as disastrous for my father and the whole
family. But unjustly. The disastrous feature, which revealed itself
many years later--and fortunately even then in a bearable form, for my
papa was truly a lucky man--lay not in the particular act of the sale,
but in the character of my father, who always spent more than his
income, and would not have given up the habit, even if he had remained
in Neu-Ruppin. That he confessed to me with his peculiar frankness
many, many times, when he had grown old and I was no longer young. "I
was still half a boy when I married," he was wont to say, "and my too
early independence explains everything." Whether or not he was right,
this is not the place to say. Generally speaking, his habits were
anything but businesslike; he took his dreams of good fortune for
realities and applied himself to the cultivation of "noble passions,"
without ever stopping to think that at best he had but modest means at
his disposal. His first extravagance was a horse and carriage; then he
soon acquired a passion for gaming, and, during the seven years from
1819 to 1826, he gambled away a small fortune. The chief winner was
the lord of a neighboring manor. When, thirty years later, the son of
this lord loaned me a small sum of money, my father said to me: "Don't
hesitate to take the money; his father took ten thousand thalers from
me at dummy whist, a little at a time." Perhaps this figure was too
high, but however that may be, the sum was at all events large enough
to throw his credit and debit out of balance and to make him, among
other things, a very tardy payer of interest. Now in ordinary
circumstances, if, for example, he could have had recourse to
mortgages and the like, this would not have been, for a time at least,
a wholly unbearable situation; but unfortunately it so happened that
my father's chief creditor was his own father, who now took occasion
to give expression to his only too justified displeasure, both in
letters and in personal interviews. To make the situation even more
oppressive, these reproaches were approved, and hence made doubly
severe, by my mother, who stood wholly on her father-in-law's side. In
short, the further matters went, the more my father was placed between
two fires, and for no other reason than to extricate himself from a
position which continually injured his pride he resolved to sell the
property and business, the exceptional productiveness of which was as
well known to him as to anybody else, in spite of the fact that he was
the very opposite of a business man. After all, his whole plan proved
to be, at least in the beginning and from his point of view,
thoroughly proper and advantageous. He received for the apothecary's
shop double the original purchase price, and saw himself thereby all
at once put in a position to satisfy his creditors, who were at the
same time his accusers. And he did it, too. He paid back the sum his
father had advanced him, asked his wife, half jokingly, half
scoffingly, whether perchance she wished to invest her money "more
safely and more advantageously," and thereby achieved what for seven
years he had been longing for, namely, freedom and independence.
Relieved from all irksome tutelage, he found himself suddenly at the
point where it was "no longer necessary to take orders from anybody."
And with him that was a specially vital matter his whole life long.
From youth to old age he thirsted for that state; but as he did not
know well how to attain it, he never enjoyed his longed-for liberty
and independence for more than a few days or weeks at a time. To use
one of his favorite expressions, he was always in the "lurch," was
always financially embarrassed, and for that reason recalled to the
end of his life with special pleasure the short period, now reached,
between Easter, 1826, and Midsummer day, 1827. With him this was the
only time when the "lurch" was lacking....

During this time we lived near the Rheinsberg Gate, in a capacious
rented apartment, which included all the rooms on the main floor. So
far as home comforts are concerned, my parents were both very well
satisfied with the change; so were the other children, who found here
ample room for their games; but I could not become reconciled to it,
and have even to this day unpleasant memories of the rented residence.
There was a butcher's shop in the building, and that did not suit my
fancy. Through the long dark court ran a gutter, with blood always
standing in it, while at the end of one of the side wings a beef,
killed the night before, hung on a broad ladder leaning against the
house. Fortunately I never had to witness the preceding scenes, except
when pigs were slaughtered. Then it was sometimes unavoidable. One day
is still fresh in my memory. I was standing in the hall and gazing out
through the open back door into the court, where it just happened that
several persons were down on the ground struggling with a pig that was
squealing its last. I was paralyzed with horror. As soon as I
recovered control of myself I took to my heels, running down the
street, through the town gate, and out to the "Vineyard," a favorite
resort of the Ruppiners. But before I had finally reached that place I
sat down on the top of a hummock to rest and catch my breath. I stayed
away the whole forenoon. At dinner I was called upon to give an
account of myself. "For heaven's sake, boy, where have you been so
long?" I made a clean breast of the matter, saying that I had been put
to flight by the spectacle down in the court and that half way to the
"Vineyard" I had rested on a hummock and leaned my back against a
crumbling pillar. "Why, there you sat in perfect composure on Gallows
Hill," said my father, laughing. Feeling as though the noose were
being laid about my neck, I begged permission to leave the table.

It was also at this time that I entered the primary school, which was
nothing unusual, inasmuch as I was going on seven years of age. I was
quick to learn and made progress, but my mother considered it her duty
to help me on, now and then, especially in reading, and so every
afternoon I stood by her little sewing table and read to her all sorts
of little stories out of the _Brandenburg Children's Friend_, a good
book, but illustrated, alas, with frightful pictures. My performance
was probably quite tolerable, for the ability to read and write
well--by the way, a very important thing in life--is a sort of
inheritance in the family. But my mother was not easy to satisfy;
furthermore she acted on the assumption that recognition and praise
spoil character, a point of view which even now I do not consider
right. At the slightest mistake she brought into play the "quick hand"
always at her service. But she displayed no temper in doing it; she
was always merely proceeding in accordance with her principle,
"anything but coddling." One blow too many could never do any harm
and, if it turned out that I had really not deserved any particular
one, it was reckoned as offsetting some of my naughty pranks that had
happened to escape discovery. "Anything but coddling." That is indeed
a very good principle, and I do not care to criticise it, in spite of
the fact that its application did not help me, not even as a hardening
process; but whatever one may think of it, my mother now and then
carried her harsh treatment too far.

I had long blond hair, less to my own delight than to my mother's; for
to keep it in its would-be state of beauty I was subjected to the most
interminable and occasionally the most painful combing ordeals,
especially those with the fine comb. If I had been called upon at the
time to name the medieval instruments of torture, the "fine comb"
would have stood among those at the head of my list. Until the blood
came there was no thought of stopping. The following day the scarcely
healed spot was again scrutinized with suspicious eye, and thus one
torture was followed by another. To be sure, if, as may be possible, I
owe it to this procedure that I still have a fairly good head of hair,
I did not suffer in vain, and I humbly apologize.

This careful treatment of my scalp was accompanied by an equally
painstaking treatment of my complexion, and this painful care also
showed a tendency to apply too drastic remedies. If my skin was
chapped by the east wind or the severe heat of the sun, my mother was
immediately at hand with a slice of lemon as an unfailing remedy. And
it always helped. Cold cream and such things would have been more to
my fancy and would doubtless have accomplished the same end. But my
mother showed the same relentlessness toward herself, and one who
valiantly leads the way into the battle may properly command others to
follow.

During the time that we occupied the rented apartment I became seven
years of age, just old enough to retain all sorts of things; and yet I
remember exceedingly little from that period, in fact but two events.
These I probably recall because a vivid color impression helped me to
retain them. One of the events was a great fire, in which the barns
outside the Eheinsberg Gate burned down. However, I must state in
advance that it was not the burning of the barns that impressed itself
upon my memory, but a scene that took place immediately before my
eyes, one only incidentally occasioned by the fire, which I did not
see at all. On that day my parents were at a small dinner party, clear
at the other end of the city. When the company was suddenly apprised
of the news that all the barns were on fire, my mother, who was a very
nervous person, immediately felt certain that her children could not
escape death in the flames, or were at least in grave danger of losing
their lives. Being completely carried away by this idea she rushed
from the table, down the long Frederick William street, and without
hat or cloak, and with her hair half tumbled down in her mad chase,
burst into our large front room and found us, snatched out of bed and
wrapped in blankets, sitting around on cushions and footstools. On
catching sight of us she screamed aloud for joy and then fell in a
swoon. When, the next moment, various people, the landlord's family
among others, came in with candles in their hands, the whole picture
which the room presented received a dazzling light, especially the
dark red brocade dress of my mother and the black hair that fell down
over it, and this red and black with the flickering candles round
about--all this I have retained to the present hour.

The other picture, or let me say, rather, the second little occurrence
that still lives in my memory, was entirely devoid of dramatic
elements, but color again came to my assistance. This time it was
yellow, instead of red. During the interim year my father made
frequent journeys to Berlin. Once, say, in the month of November, the
sunset colors were already gleaming through the trees on the city
ramparts, as I stood down in our doorway watching my father as he put
on his driving gloves with a certain aplomb and then suddenly sprang
upon the front seat of his small calash. My mother was there also.
"Really the boy might go along," said my father. I pricked up my ears,
rejoiced in my little soul, which even then longed eagerly for
anything a little out of the ordinary and likely to give me the
shivers. My mother consented immediately, a thing which can be
explained only on the assumption that she expected her darling child
with the beautiful blond locks to make a good impression upon my
grandfather, whose home was the goal of the journey. "Very well," she
said, "take the boy along. But first I will put a warm coat on him."
"Not necessary; I'll put him in the footbag." And, surely enough, I
was hauled up into the carriage and put just as I was into the footbag
lying on the front of the carriage, which was entirely open, with not
even a leather apron stretched across it. If a stone got in our way or
we received a jolt there was nothing to keep me from being thrown out.
But this notion did not for a single moment disturb my pleasure. At a
quick trot we rolled along through Alt-Ruppin toward Cremmen, and long
before we reached this place, which was about half way along the
journey, the stars came out and grew brighter and brighter and more
and more sparkling. I gazed enraptured at this splendor and no sleep
came to my eyes. Never since have I traveled with such delight; it
seemed as though we were journeying to heaven. Toward eight o 'clock
in the morning our carriage drove up before my grandfather's house.
Let me here insert the remark that my grandfather, with the help of
his three wives, whom he had married a number of years apart, had
risen first from a drawing teacher to a private secretary, and then,
what was still more significant, had recently advanced to the dignity
of a well-to-do property owner in Berlin. To be sure, only in the
Little Hamburg street. The art of living implied in this achievement
was not transmitted to any of his sons or grandsons.

We climbed the stairs and entered the door. Here we were greeted by a
homely idyl. Pierre Barthélemy and his third wife--an excellent woman,
whom I later learned to esteem very highly--were just sitting at
breakfast. Everything looked very cozy. On the table was a service of
Dresden china, and among the cups and pitchers I noticed a neat blue
and white figured open-work bread basket with Berlin milk rolls in it.
The rolls then were different from now, much larger and circular in
shape, baked a light brown and yet crisp. Over the sofa hung a large
oil portrait of my grandfather, just recently painted, by Professor
Wachs. It was very good and full of life, but I should have forgotten
the expressive face and perhaps the whole scene of the visit, if it
had not been for the black and sulphur-yellow striped vest, which
Pierre Barthélemy, as I was later informed, regularly wore, and which,
in consequence, occupied a considerable portion of the picture hanging
above his head.

It goes without saying that we shared in the breakfast, and the
grandparents, well-bred people that they were, did not show so very
plainly that, on the whole, the visit, with its to-be-expected
business negotiations, was for them in reality a disturbance. True,
there was all day long not a sign of tenderness toward me, so that I
was heartily glad when we started back home in the evening. Not until
a great deal later was I able to see that the coolness with which I
was received was not meant for poor little me, but, as already
indicated, for my father. I merely had to suffer with him. To such an
extremely solid character as my grandfather the self-assured,
man-of-the-world tone of his son, who by a clever business stroke had
acquired a feeling of independence and comfortable circumstances, was
so disagreeable and oppressive, that my blond locks, on whose
impression my mother had counted with such certainty, failed utterly
to exert their charm.

I have already remarked that such excursions to Berlin occurred
frequently in those days, but still more frequent were journeys into
the provinces, because it was incumbent upon my father to look about
for a new apothecary's shop to buy. If he had had his way about it he
doubtless would never have changed this state of affairs and would
have declared the interim permanent. For, whereas his passion for
gaming was in reality forced upon him by his need to kill time, he had
by nature a genuine passion for his horse and carriage, and to drive
around in the world the whole of life in search of an apothecary's
shop, without being able to find one, would have been, I presume, just
the ideal occupation for him. But he saw that it was out of the
question; a few years of travel would have consumed his means. So he
only took great care to guard against too hasty purchases, and that
answered the same purpose. The more critically he proceeded the longer
he could continue his journeys and provide new quarters every evening
for his beloved white horse, which, by the way, was a charming animal.
I say "his white horse," for he was more concerned about good quarters
for the horse than for himself. And so, for three-fourths of a year,
till Christmas, 1826, he was on the road a great deal, not to say
most, of the time, covering, to be sure, quite an extensive territory,
which, beside the Province of Brandenburg, included Saxony, Thuringia,
and finally Pomerania.

In later life this period of travel was a favorite topic of
conversation with my father, and likewise with my mother, who
ordinarily assumed a rather indifferent attitude toward the favorite
themes of my father. That she made an exception in this case was due
in part to the fact that during his journeyings my father had written
to his young wife many "love letters," which as letters it was my
mother's chief delight to ridicule, so long as she lived. "For I would
have you know, children," she was wont to say, "I still have your
father's love letters; one always keeps such charming things. One of
these I even know by heart, at least the beginning. The letter came
from Eisleben, and in it your father wrote to me: 'I arrived here this
afternoon and have found very good quarters. Also for the horse, whose
neck and shoulders are somewhat galled. However, I will not write you
today about that, but about the fact that this is the place where
Martin Luther was born on the 10th of November, 1483, nine years
before the discovery of America.' There you have your father as a
lover. You see, he would have been qualified to publish a _Letter
Writer_."

All this was said by my mother not only with considerable seriousness,
but also, unfortunately, with bitterness. It always grieved her that
my father, much as he loved her, had never shown the slightest
familiarity with the ways of tenderness.

The travels, which were kept up for nine months, were finally directed
eastward toward the mouth of the Oder. Shortly before Christmas my
father set out by stage coach, to save his horse from the hardships of
winter travel, and when he arrived in Swinemünde the thermometer stood
at 15° below zero, Fahrenheit. The cognac in his bottle was frozen to
a lump of ice. He was so much the more warmly received by the widow
Geisler, who, inasmuch as her husband had died the previous year,
desired to sell her apothecary's shop as quickly as possible. And the
sale was made. In the letter announcing the conclusion of the
transaction was this passage: "We now have a new home in the province
of Pomerania, Pomerania, of which false notions are frequently held;
for it is really a splendid province and much richer than the Mark.
And where the people are rich is the best place to live. Swinemünde
itself is, to be sure, unpaved, but sand is better than bad pavement,
where the horses are always having something the matter with their
insteps. Unfortunately the transfer is not to be made for six months,
which I regret. But I must be doing something again, must have an
occupation once more."

Three days after the arrival of this letter he was home again himself.
We were dragged out of bed, heavy with sleep, and called upon to
rejoice that we were to go to Swinemünde.

To me the word represented but a strange sound....

When we arrived in Swinemünde, in the summer of 1827, it seemed an
ugly hole, and yet, on the other hand, a place of very rare charm,
for, in spite of the dullness of the majority of its streets, it had
that peculiar liveliness that commerce and navigation produce. It
depended altogether upon what part of the city one chose as a point of
observation, whether one's judgment was one thing or its opposite,
favorable or unfavorable. If one chose the Church Square, surrounded
by houses, among which was our apothecary's shop, one could find
little of good to say, although the chief street ran past there. But
if one forsook the inner city and went down to the "River," as the
Swine was regularly called, his hitherto unfavorable opinion was
converted into its opposite. Here ran along the river, for nearly a
mile, the "Bulwark," as poetic a riverside street as one could
imagine. The very fact that here everything was kept to medium
proportions, and there was nowhere anything to recall the grandeur of
the really great commercial centres, these very medium dimensions gave
everything an exceedingly attractive appearance, to which only a
hypochondriac, or a person wholly unappreciative of the charms of form
and color, could fail to respond. To be sure, this "Bulwark" street
was not everywhere the same, indeed some parts of it left much to be
desired, especially those up the river; but from the cross street
which began at the corner of our house and led off at right angles
one could find refreshment of spirit in the pictures that presented
themselves, step by step, as one followed the course of the river.
Here ran out from the sloping bank into the river a number of board
rafts, some smaller, some larger, floating benches upon which, from
early morning on, one saw maids at work washing clothes, always in
cheerful conversation with one another, or with the sailors who leaned
lazily over the street wall watching them. These rafts, which with the
figures upon them produced a most picturesque effect, were called
"clappers," and were used, especially by strangers and summer guests,
for orientation and description of location. E.g. "He lives down by
Klempin's clapper," or "opposite Jahnke's clapper." Between the rafts
or wash benches were regular spaces devoted to piers, and here the
majority of the ships were moored, in the winter often three or four
rows. The crews were on shore at this time, and the only evidence that
the vessels were not wholly unguarded was a column of smoke rising
from the kitchen stovepipes, or, more often, a spitz-dog sitting on a
mound of sailcloth, if not on the top of his kennel, and barking at
the passersby. Then in the spring, when the Swine was again free from
ice, everything began at once, as though by magic, to show signs of
life, and the activity along the river indicated that the time for
sailing was again near. Then the ships' hulls were laid on their
sides, the better to examine them for possible injuries, and if any
were found, one could see the following day, at corresponding places
along the wharf, little fires made of chips of wood and raveled-out
bits of old hawsers, and over them tar was simmering in three-legged
iron pots. Beside these lay whole piles of oakum. And now the process
of calking began. Then, as noon approached, another pot, filled with
potatoes and bacon, was shoved into the fire, and many, many a time,
as I passed by here on my way, at this hour, I eagerly inhaled the
appetizing vapors, not in the least disturbed by the admixture of
pitch. Even in my old age I am still fond of regaling myself, or at
least my nerves, with the bitumen smoke that floats through our Berlin
streets, when they are being newly asphalted.

In the spring and summer time activity was also resumed by the English
steam dredger, which lay in the middle of the river, and upon which it
was incumbent to clear the channel. The quantities of earth and slime
drawn up from the bottom were emptied at a shallow place in the river
and piled up so as to cause a little artificial island to come into
existence. A few years later this island was covered with a rank
growth of reeds and sedges, and in all probability it now supports
houses and establishments of the marine station, as evidence to all
those who saw the first third of the century, that times have changed
and we have been growing as a world power.

For half an hour at a time, when possible, I watched the work of the
English dredger, whose engineer, an old Scotchman by the name of
Macdonald, was a special friend of mine. Who could have told then
that, a generation later, I should make a tour of his Scottish clan
and, under the guidance of a Maedonald, should visit the spot on the
island of Icolmkill, where, according to an old fiction, King Macbeth
lies buried.

I watched also, with as much interest as the dredging, the mooring of
ships, when they came home from long voyages, some of them, such as
the Queen Luise, a marine trading vessel, from their voyages around
the world, which signified something in those days. My main vessel,
however, was the Mentor, which was said to have won the victory in a
fight with Chinese pirates. The pirates carried a long-barreled bronze
cannon which shot better than the rough cast-iron cannons of which the
Mentor had a few on board. Besides, the pirate boat was much swifter,
so that our Swinemünde trader soon found itself in a bad position. But
the captain was equal to the emergency. He had all his heavy cannons
moved to one side of the ship, then purposely moderated his speed, in
order to make it easier for his pursuers to catch up with him. And now
their boat was really alongside, and the pirates were already
preparing to climb over the side of the ship, when the captain of the
Mentor gave the preconcerted signal and the cannons rolled with all
force and swiftness from the one side of the ship to the other and the
weight of the heavy guns, carrying the thin wall before them, crushed
to pieces the boat lying below, already certain of victory, so that
every soul on board was lost.

Such stories were always in the air and were associated, not only with
the ships lying along the "Bulwark," but occasionally also with the
houses on the opposite side. Further down the river both the houses
and the stories lost their charm, until, at the very end of the city,
one came to a large building standing back from the street, which
again aroused interest. This was the recently erected "Society House,"
the meeting place not only for the summer bathers, but also, during
the season, for the leading people of the city, of whom no one,
perhaps, was more often seen there than my father. To be sure, his
frequent visits were really not made on account of the "Society House"
itself, least of all on account of the concerts and theatrical
performances given in it, to say nothing of the occasional balls,--no,
what attracted him and took him out there now and then even £or his
morning glass, was a pavilion standing close by the "Society House,"
in which a major with a historical name and most affable manners,
dressed in a faultless blue frock coat with gold buttons, kept the
bank. This was only too often the resort of my father, who, when he
had lost a considerable sum and had correspondingly enriched the pot
of the bank keeper, instead of being out of sorts over it, simply drew
the inference that the keeping of the bank was a business that
produced sure gain, and the old major with the high white neckcloth
and the diamond pin was an extremely enviable man and, above all, one
very worthy of emulation. In such a career one got something out of
life. My father expressed such opinions, too, when he came home and
sat down late to dinner. This he did once in the presence of a
recently married sister of my mother, who was visiting in our home
during the bathing season.

"But you are not going to-do that," she replied to his remarks.

"Why not?"

"Because there is no honor in it."

"Hm, honor," he ejaculated, and began to drum upon the table with his
fingers; but, not having the courage to argue the question, he merely
turned his face away and left the table.

       *       *       *       *       *

The city was very ugly and very handsome, and an equal contrast was,
to be observed in its inhabitants, at least with respect to their
moral qualities. Here, as in all seaports, there was a broad stratum
of human beings day in and day out under the influence of rum and
arrack, and they composed the main body of the population; but there
was also, as is quite general in seaports, a society of a materially
higher type spiritually, which overshadowed by far what one usually
met with in those days in the small cities of the inland provinces,
especially the Mark of Brandenburg, where the narrowest philistinism
held sway. That these inhabitants were so thoroughly free from
narrow-mindedness was without doubt due to a variety of causes, but
chiefly, perhaps, to the fact that the whole population was of a
pronounced international character. In the villages of the environs
there still lived presumably a certain number of the descendants of
the Wendic Pomeranian: aborigines of the days of Julin and Vineta. In
Swinemünde itself, especially in the upper stratum of society, there
was such a confusion of races that one came in contact with
representatives from all the nations of Northern Europe, Swedes,
Danes, Dutchmen, and Scotchmen, who had settled here at one time or
another, most of them, no doubt, at the beginning of the century, the
period when the hitherto unimportant city first began to grow and
prosper.

The number of inhabitants, at the time of our arrival, was about four
thousand, of whom hardly a tenth were citizens of the city, and a
still very much smaller fraction entered into consideration socially.
What could be called, with more or less justice, the society of the
city was composed of not more than twenty families. These twenty
families, together with a few of the nobility, who came in from the
country to spend the winter, formed a private club, with headquarters
in the Olthoff Hall, and the club's membership was further enlarged,
as was the society of the city in general, by the dependents, or
retinue, of a few of the richest and most respected houses. These
protégés, half of them poor relatives, half bankrupt merchants,
were not always invited, but were, on all important convivial
occasions, designed to produce a deep impression, and their function
then was to submit to what the Englishmen call practical jokes,
during the second half of the banquet, the first half being, as a
usual thing, conspicuous for the remarkably proper conduct of the
company. When the time arrived for this part of the program all
bonds of pious awe were loosed and they proceeded with most daring
experiments, which my pen hesitates to record. On one occasion one of
these unfortunates--unfortunate because poor and dependent--had to
suffer a jaw tooth to be pulled out with the first pair of tongs that
could be found; but it must not be inferred that those who undertook
the operation were necessarily rough men. It was only a case where the
socially arrogant, who made themselves so generally conspicuous in
those days, especially under the stimulation of wine, did not hesitate
to take such liberties. In rich aristocratic houses in the country
they occasionally went to even greater extremes....

How did we live at our house? On the whole, well, far beyond our
station and our means. So far as the culinary department was
concerned, there were, to be sure, occasional strange periods; for
example, in the summer time, when, on account of the superabundant
yield of milk, the star of milk soup reigned supreme. Then everybody
struck, feigning lack of appetite.

But these were only exceptional conditions, of short duration.
Ordinarily we were well and very sensibly fed, a thing which we owed
less to our mother than to our housekeeper, a Miss Schröder. Before
going any further I must tell about her. When we reached Swinemünde my
mother was still in Berlin taking treatment for her nerves, so that my
father was immediately confronted with the question, who should manage
the household in the interim. There were no local newspapers, so he
had to inquire around orally. After a few days a letter was brought by
messenger from the head forester's lodge at Pudagla, inquiring whether
the head forester's sister might offer us her services. She had
learned housekeeping in her brother's home. My father answered
immediately in the affirmative and for two days rejoiced in the
thought of being able to take into his home as housekeeper a sister of
a head forester, and from Pudagla, to boot. That afforded relief; he
felt honored. On the third day the Schröder girl drove up to our house
and was received by my father. He declared later that he had kept his
countenance, but I am not quite sure of it, in spite of the
possibility that his good heart and his politeness may have made the
victory over himself easier. The good Schröder girl, be it said, was a
pendant to the "princess with the death's head," who came to notice in
Berlin at about this time. What had caused the misfortune of the
latter (who was restored to her original appearance by Dieffenbach, by
a plastic surgical treatment, since become famous), I do not know. In
the case of the Schröder girl, however, it was the smallpox. Now what
is smallpox? Everybody has seen persons who have been afflicted with
smallpox, and has considered the expression, "the devil has threshed
peas on his or her face," more or less apt. At least the expression
has become proverbial. In this case, however, the proverbial phrase,
if applied, would have been mere glossing over, for the Schröder girl
had, not pits the size of peas, but scars half as broad as your hand,
a spectacle, the like of which I have never again encountered. Yet, as
already said, a contract was entered into, and a happier one was never
closed. The Schröder girl was a treasure, and when my mother came home
six weeks later she said: "You did well to take her, Louis; disfigured
as she is, her eyes have been spared, and they tell one that she is
faithful and reliable. And she is safe from love affairs, and we with
her. With her we shall have only pleasant experiences."

And so it proved. So long as we remained in Swinemünde the Schröder
girl remained in our house, loved and respected by old and young, not
least of all by my father, who gave her particular credit for her
sense of justice and her candor, in spite of the fact that he
occasionally had to suffer severely because of these two qualities.
She was always waging war against him. In the first place, out of love
for my mother, for whom she came to be an eloquent advocate, in spite
of the fact that my mother was thoroughly able to defend herself, in
accordance with her maxim, "The best defense is a blow." In the second
place, she was the mistress of the pantry, which was intrusted to her
with most plenary powers, and my father was always undertaking
pillaging expeditions against it, not only to satisfy his own personal
wants, which she might have tolerated, even though he was capable of
consuming half a veal roast for his breakfast, without thinking
anything about it; but she objected strenuously to his raids for the
benefit of his pet chickens, dogs, and cats. We had two cats, Peter
and Petrine. Peter, also called Peter the Great, who might have been
mistaken for a young jaguar, was his special pet, and when this
beautiful animal followed him, purring, into the pantry, and he always
followed, there was no end to the dainty morsels given him. The best
was none too good. This wanton waste made the Schröder girl, faithful
soul that she was, fly into a rage, for she often saw her plans for
dinner completely upset.

In the house she was indeed a treasure, but for us children,
especially me, she was even more than that, she was a real blessing.
The training we received from our parents advanced by fits and starts;
sometimes there was training and again there was none, and never any
thought of continuity. But the Schröder girl supplied the continuity.
She had no favorites, never allowed herself to be outwitted, and knew
just how to handle each one of us. As for me, she knew that I was
good-natured, but sensitive, proud, and under the control of a certain
degree of megalomania. These bad inclinations she wished to hold in
check, and so said to me times without number: "Yes, you think you are
a marvelous fellow, but you are only a childish boy, just like the
rest of them, only at times a bit worse. You always want to play the
young gentleman, but young gentlemen don't lick honey from their
plates, or at least don't deny it if they have done so, in fact they
never tell lies. Not long ago I heard you prating about honor, but I
want to tell you, _that_ doesn't look to me like honor." She insisted
upon truthfulness, treated boasting with fine ridicule, and was chary
of compliments. But when she did praise it was effective. She did me
many a good turn, and not until late in life, when I was past fifty,
did I meet another woman, this time an elderly lady, who exerted such
an educational influence upon me. Even now I am still taking lessons
and learn from people who are young enough to be my grandchildren.

Thus much about the good Schröder girl, and after this digression in
memory of her I ask once more: "Well, how did we live?" I propose to
show how we lived, by means of a series of pictures, and in order to
introduce order and clarity into the description it will be well to
divide our life as we lived it into two halves, a summer life and a
winter life.

First, then, there was the summer life. About the middle of June we
regularly had the house full of visitors; for my mother, in accordance
with the old custom, still kept in touch with her relatives, a trait
which we children only very imperfectly inherited from her. But let it
be understood, she kept in touch with her relatives, not to derive
advantages from them, but to bestow advantages. She was incredibly
generous, and there were times when we, after we had grown up, asked
ourselves the question, which passion really threatened us most, the
gaming passion of our father, or the giving and presenting passion of
our mother. But we finally discovered the answer to the question. What
our father did was simply money thrown away, whereas the excessive
amounts given away by our mother were always unselfishly given and
carried with them a quiet blessing. No doubt a certain desire to be,
so far as possible, a _grande dame_, if only in a very small degree,
had something to do with it, but then all our doings show some
elements of human weakness. Later in life, when we talked with her
about these things, she said: "Certainly, I might have refrained from
doing many things. We spent far more than our income. But I said to
myself: 'What there is will be spent anyhow, and so it is better for
it to go my way than the other.'"

These summer months, from the middle of June on, were often made
especially charming by the numbers of visitors in our home, mostly
young women relatives from Berlin, who were both cheerful and
talkative. The household was then completely changed, for weeks at a
time, and, the hatchet being temporarily buried, merriment and playing
of sly tricks, with occasional boisterous pranks, became the order of
the day. The most brilliant performer in the fun-making competitions
that frequently arose was always my father himself. He was, as
handsome men often are, the absolute opposite of Don Juan, and proud
of his virtue. But by as much as he was unlike Don Juan, he was
charming as a Gascon, when it came to a spirited discussion of pert
and often most daring themes, with young ladies, of whom he made but
one requirement, that they be handsome, otherwise it was not worth his
while. I inherited from him this inclination to enter into subtle
discussions with ladies, in a jesting tone; indeed I have ever carried
this inclination over into my style of writing, and when I read
corresponding scenes in my novels and short stories it once in awhile
seems to me as though I heard my father speaking. Except with this
difference, that I fall far short of his felicitousness, as people who
had known him in his prime often told me, when he was over severity
and I was correspondingly along in years. I have frequently been
addressed in some such way as this: "Now see here, you do very well,
when you have your good days, but you can't compete with your father."
And that was certainly true. His small talk, born of bonhomie and at
the same time enlivened with fantastic lawyerly artifice, was simply
irresistible, even when dealing with business matters, in which as a
rule heartiness has no place. And yet his remarks on money matters had
a lasting effect, so that none of us children ever cherished the
slightest feeling of bitterness on account of his most remarkable
financial operations. My mother, however, was of too different a
nature to be easily converted or carried away by his social graces.
These matters were to her most repugnant when treated lightly and
jestingly. "Whatever is serious is not funny, that's all." But she
never disputed the fact that, as a happy humorist, he always succeeded
in drawing people over to his side, though she never failed to add:
"unfortunately."

And now let us return to the summer visitors in our home. At times it
was rather difficult to furnish continual rounds of entertainment for
the young women, and would perhaps have proved impossible, if it had
not been for the horses. Almost every afternoon, when the weather was
good, the carriage drove up to our door, and such days during the
bathing season, when we were often almost completely overwhelmed with
visitors, were probably the only times when my mother, without in the
least sacrificing her fundamental convictions, was temporarily
reconciled to the existence of horse and carriage. Whoever knows
Swinemünde, and there are many who do know the place, is aware of the
fact that one is never embarrassed there for a beautiful spot to visit
on afternoon drives, and even in those days this was as true as it is
today. There was the trip along the beach to Heringsdorf, or, on the
other side, out to the moles; but the most popular drives, because
they afforded protection from the sun, were those back into the
country, either through the dense beech forest toward Corswant, or
better still to the village of Camminke, situated near the Haff of
Stettin and the Golm (mountain). There was a much frequented
skittle-alley there, where women played as well as men. I myself liked
to stand by the splintery lath trough, in which the skittle-boy rolled
back the balls. My only reason for choosing this position was because
I had heard a short time before that one of the players at this very
alley, in catching a ball as it rolled to him, had run a long lath
splinter under the nail of his index finger. That had made such an
impression on me that I always stood there shuddering for fear of a
repetition of the accident, which fortunately did not occur. When I
finally grew tired of waiting I stepped through a lattice gate, always
hanging aslant and always creaky, into a garden plot running along
close by the skittle-alley and parallel with it. It was a genuine
peasant's garden, with touch-me-nots and mignonette in bloom, and in
one place the mallows grew so tall that they formed a lane. Then when
the sun went down behind the forest the Golm, which lay to the west,
was bathed in red light, and the metal ball on its tall pillar looked
down, like a sphere of gold, upon the village and the skittle-garden.
Myriads of mosquitoes hung in the air, and the bumble bees flew back
and forth between the box-edged beds.

Our visitors usually left at the beginning of August, and when
September came the last of the hotel guests departed from the city.
If anybody chose to remain longer it was inconvenient for the
landlords, in which connection the following scene occurred. A man, a
Berliner of course, on returning to his hotel, after accompanying some
departing friends to their steamer, sat down leisurely by his host and
hostess, rubbed his hands together, and said: "Well, Hoppensack, at
last the Berliners are all gone, or at least nearly all of them; now
we shall have a good time, now it will be cozy." He expected, of
course, that the host and hostess would agree with him most heartily.
But instead of that he found himself looking into long faces. Finally
he screwed up his courage and asked why they were so indifferent.
"Why, good heavens, Mr. Schünemann," said Hoppensack, "a recorder and
his wife came to us the last of May and now it is almost the middle of
September. We want to be alone again, you see." As Mrs. Hoppensack
nodded approvingly, there was nothing left for Schünemann to do but to
depart himself the next day.

Not long after the last summer guests had gone the equinoctial storms
set in, and, if it was a bad year, they lasted on into November. First
the chestnuts fell, then the tiles rattled down from the roof, and
from the eaves-troughs, always placed with their outlets close by
bedroom windows, the rain splashed noisily down into the yard. In the
course of time, scattered clouds sailed across the clearing sky and
the air turned cold. Everybody felt the chilliness, and all day long
there was an old woodchopper at work in the shed. My father would
often go down to see him, take the ax and split wood for him a
half-hour at a time.

Social activities were at a standstill during these late autumn days.
People were recovering from the strain of the summer season and
storing up strength for winter entertainments. Before these began
there was an interregnum of several weeks, the slaughtering and baking
times, the latter coinciding with the Christmas period. First came
the slaughtering of geese. A regular household without a goose-killing
time could hardly have been thought of. Many things had to be taken
into account. First of all, perhaps, were the feathers to make new
beds, which were always needed for guest chambers; but the chief
concern were the smoked goose-breasts, almost as important articles as
the hams and sides of bacon hanging in the chimney. Shortly before St.
Martin's day, if enough geese had been collected to supply the needs,
they were penned up for fattening, in the court, which gave rise to a
horrible cackling, well calculated to rob us of our night's rest for a
whole week. But a day was straightway set for the beginning of the
feast, about the middle of November. In the court, in a lean-to built
near the end of the house, and, strange to say, with a dove-cote over
it, was the servants' room, in which, beside the cook, two house-maids
slept, provided always they did any sleeping. The coachman was
supposed, according to a rule of the house, to occupy the straw-loft,
but was happy to forego the independence of these quarters, which went
with his position, preferring by his presence to crowd still worse the
already crowded space of the servants' room, in full accord with
Schiller's lines,


  "Room is in the smallest hovel
  For a happy, loving pair."


But when goose-killing time came it meant a very considerable further
overcrowding, for on the evening that the massacring was to begin
there was added to the number of persons usually quartered in the
servants' room a special force of old women, four or five in number,
who at other times earned a living at washing or weeding.

Then the sacrificial festivities began, always late in the evening.
Through the wide-open door--open, because otherwise it would not have
been possible to endure the stifling air--the stars shone into the
smoky room, which was dimly lighted by a tallow candle, with always a
thief in the candle. Near the door stood in a semi-circle the five
slaughter priestesses, each with a goose between her knees, and as
they bored holes through the skullcaps of the poor fowls, with sharp
kitchen knives--a procedure, the necessity of which I have never
understood--they sang all sorts of folk-songs, the text of which
formed a strange contrast, as well to the murderous act as to the
mournful melody. At least one had to suppose this to be the case, for
the maids, who sat on the edge of the bed with their guest from the
straw-loft between them, followed the folksongs with never-ending
merriment, and at the passages that sounded specially mournful they
even burst into cheers. Both my parents were morally strict, and they
often discussed the question, whether there were not some way to put a
stop to this insolent conduct, but they finally gave it up. My father
had a lurking suspicion that such a custom had existed in antiquity,
and, after he-had looked the matter up, said: "It is a repetition of
ancient conditions, the Roman saturnalia, or, what amounts to the same
thing, a case where the servants temporarily lord it over the
so-called lords." When he had thus classified the occurrence
historically he was satisfied, the more so as the maids always amused
him the following morning by lowering their eyes in a most unusually
modest fashion. Then he would make fantastically extravagant remarks,
as though _Gil Blas_ had been his favorite book. That was not the
case, however. He read Walter Scott exclusively, for which I am
grateful to him even to this day, since, even then, a few crumbs fell
from his table for me. His favorite among all the works was _Quintin
Durward_, probably on account of its French subject.

I have here further to add that the terrors of this goose-killing time
were by no means ended with the slaughter night and the mournful
melodies. On the contrary, they lasted at least three or four days
longer, for the slaughtering time was also the time when the giblets
dressed with goose-blood were served daily at our table, a dish which,
according to the Pomeranian view, stands unrivaled in the realm of
cookery. Furthermore my father considered it his duty to support the
view peculiar to this region, and, when the great steaming platter
appeared, would say: "Ah, that is fine! Just eat some of this; it is
the black soup of the Spartans, full of strength and stamina." But I
observed that he, along with the rest of us, picked out the dried
fruit and almond dumplings, leaving the nourishing gravy for the
servants outside, above all for the slaughtering and mourning women,
who by their boring operations had established the most legitimate
claim to it.

About a fortnight later came the pig-killing, toward which my feeling
remained exactly the same as on that occasion when, hardly seven
years of age, I had fled from the city toward Alt-Ruppin, in
order to escape, not only the spectacle, but a whole gamut of
ear-and-heart-rending sounds. But I had meanwhile grown out of
childhood into boyhood, and a boy, whether he will or no, feels
honor-bound manfully to take everything that comes along, even if his
own deepest nature revolts against it. That the prospect of rice
pudding with raisins in it was a contributing factor in this comedy of
bravery, I am unable to say, for fond as I am of good things to eat, I
was always, during the weeks just preceding Christmas, half upset by
the smell of hot grease that drifted through the house. At least I
never had what could be called a really good appetite during this
period, despite the fact that it would have been particularly worth
while just then. Especially would such have been the case when, as
usually happened about the first of December, a stag was sent in from
the chief forester's and was hung up, eviscerated, as game usually is,
against the gable end of the servants' house. Day after day the cook
would go to this horrible gable ornament and cut out, first the
haunch, then the shoulders and legs, with the result that we always
heaved a sigh of relief when the glory of this venison was a thing of
the past.

A far happier time was the baking week, which began with spice-nuts
and sugar cookies, and ended with bretzels, wreath-cakes, and cakes
baked on tins. Not only were we admitted to the bakeroom, where there
was a most alluring odor of bitter almonds and grated lemons; we also
received, as a foretaste of Christmas, a bountiful supply of little
cake-rolls, baked especially for us children. "I know," said my
mother, "that the children will upset their stomachs eating them, but
even that is better than that they should be restricted to too low a
diet. They shall have joyful holiday feeling during all these days,
and nothing can give it to them better than holiday cakes." There is
something in that view, and it may be absolutely right if the children
are thoroughly robust. But we were not so robust that the principle
could be applied to us without modification. And so, about Christmas
time, I was always much given to crying.

On New Year's Eve there was a club ball, which I, being the oldest
child, was allowed to witness. I took my position in one corner of the
hall and looked on with vacillating feelings. When the dancing couples
whirled past me I was happy, on the one hand, because I was permitted
to stand there as a sort of guest and share in the pleasure with my
eyes, and yet, on the other hand, I was unhappy, because I was merely
an onlooker instead of a participator in the dance. My personal
insignificance weighed heavy upon me, doubly heavy because of the
gastric condition I was regularly in at this reason, and it continued
so until the nightwatchman, wrapped in his long blue cloak, came into
the hall at midnight and, after blowing a preliminary signal on his
horn, wished everybody a happy New Year. Then, as if by magic, my
feeling of sentimentality vanished entirely, and I was carried away by
the comic grotesqueness of the scene, and soon regained my freedom and
buoyancy of spirit.

Just about this time social activities began, taking the form of a
series of weekly feasts, many of which resembled that of Belshazzar,
in so far as a spirit hand was at the very time writing the bankruptcy
of the host upon the wall. However, my knowledge of the details of
these feasts was derived only from hearsay. But any special banquets,
whether great or small, that fell to the lot of our own house I saw
with my own eyes and it is about these that I now propose to tell.

When it came our turn to entertain, the whole house was pervaded with
a feeling of solemnity, which had a certain similarity to the feeling
at the time of a wedding. Furthermore, a parallel to the tripartite
division into wedding-eve celebration, wedding day, and the day after,
appeared in the form of preparation day, real feast-day, and eating of
the remnants. Which of these three days deserved the prize may remain
an open question, but I am inclined to believe I liked the first the
best. To be sure, it was unepicurean and called for much
self-restraint, but it was rich in anticipation of glorious things to
come.

On this day of preparation the widow Gaster, a celebrated cook, came
to our house, as she did to all other houses on similar occasions. Her
personal appearance united complacence with dignity, and by virtue of
this latter quality she was received with respect and unlimited
confidence. Because of a dislike, easily understood, for all the
things she had to prepare day in and day out, especially sweets, she
lived-almost exclusively on red wine, deriving the little other
sustenance she needed from the vapors of hot grease, with which she
was continually surrounded. Her arrival at our house was always a
signal for me to plant myself near the kitchen, where everything that
took place could be observed and, incidentally, admired. It was always
her first task to bake a tree-cake on a spit. She kept a record of all
the tree-cakes she baked, and when the number reached a thousand the
housewives of Swinemünde gave her a well-deserved feast in celebration
of the achievement. To be sure, tree-cakes are to be had even today,
but they are degenerations, weak, spongy, and pale-cheeked, whereas in
those days they had a happy firmness, which in the most successful
specimens rose to crispness, accompanied by a scale of colors running
from the darkest ocher to the brightest yellow. It always gave me
great pleasure to watch a tree-cake come into being. Toward the back
wall of a huge fireplace stood a low half-dome, built of bricks, the
top projecting forward like a roof, the bottom slanting toward the
back. Along this slanting part was built a narrow charcoal fire about
four feet long and by it were placed two small iron supports, upon
which a roasting spit was laid, with a contrivance for turning it.
However, the spit resting upon the supports proved to be something
more than a mere rod. In fact the spit itself was run lengthwise
through a hollow wooden cone, which had a covering of greased paper
over its outer surface, and the purpose of which was to form a core
for the tree-cake. Then, with a tin spoon fastened upon a long stick,
the cook began to pour on a thin batter, which at first dripped off in
a way that made the method of application appear futile, and this
continued for a considerable length of time. But from the moment that
the batter became more consistent, and the dripping slower, hope began
to revive, and in a few hours the splendidly browned and copiously
jagged tree-cake was taken off the wooden cone. All this had a
symbolical significance. The successful completion of this _pièce de
résistance_ inspired confidence in the success of the feast itself.
The tree-cake cast the horoscope, so to speak, of the whole affair.

I shall pass over the kitchen activities on the day of the
entertainment and describe instead the feast itself. Along extension
table was moved into my mother's parlor--the only room available for
the purpose--and soon stood well set in front of the moire sofa with
the three hundred silver studs. The guests were not seated at the
table till the candles were lit. The man who presided over the banquet
always sat with his back toward the Schinkel mirror, whereas all the
other guests could, with little or no inconvenience, observe
themselves in the glass.

So far as I can recall they were always gentlemen's dinner parties,
with twelve or fourteen persons, and only on rare occasions did my
mother appear at the table, then usually accompanied by her sister,
who often visited us for months at a time in the winter season and was
in those days still very young and handsome. It was always a specially
difficult matter to assign her a suitable place, and only when old Mr.
von Flemming and Privy Councillor Kind were present was she in any
degree safe from extremely ardent attentions. It was almost impossible
to protect her from such attentions. The men had respect for virtue,
perhaps, though I have my doubts even about that, but virtuous airs
were considered in bad taste, and where was the line to be drawn
between reality and appearance? That the ladies retired from the table
toward the end of the meal and appeared again only for a brief quarter
of an hour to do the honors at coffee, goes without saying.

I have spoken above of the culinary art of good Mrs. Gaster, but in
spite of that art the bill of fare was really simple, especially in
comparison with the luxury prevalent nowadays at dinner parties.
Simple, I say, and yet stable. No man was willing to fall behind a set
standard, nor did he care to go beyond it. The soup was followed by a
fish course, and that, without fail, by French turnips and smoked
goose-breast. Then came a huge roast, and finally a sweet dish, with
fruits, spice-cakes, and Königsberg marchpane. An almost greater
simplicity prevailed with respect to the wines. After the soup sherry
was passed. Then a red wine of moderate price and moderate quality
gained the ascendant and held sway till coffee was served. So the
peculiar feature of these festivities did not lie in the materials
consumed, but, strange to say, in a certain spiritual element, in the
tone that prevailed. This varied considerably, when we take into
account the beginning and the end. The beginning was marked by toasts
in fine style, and occasionally, especially if the feast was at the
same time a family party--a birthday celebration or something of the
sort--there were even verses, which from the point of view of
regularity of form and cleverness of ideas left nothing to be desired.
Only recently I found among my father's papers some of these literary
efforts and was astonished to see how good they were. Humor, wit, and
playing on words were never lacking. There were special occasions when
even deep emotion, was expressed and then those who were farthest from
having a proper feeling, but nearest to a state of delirium, arose
regularly from their seats and marched up to the speaker to embrace
and kiss him. This kissing scene always denoted the beginning of the
second half of the feast. The further the dinner advanced the freer
became the conversation, and, when it had reached the stage where all
feeling of restraint was cast aside, the most insolent and often the
rudest badgering was indulged in, or, if for any reason this was not
allowed, the company began to rally certain individuals, or, as we
might say, began to poke fun at them. One of the choicest victims of
this favorite occupation of the whole round table was my papa. It had
long been known that when it was a question of conversation he had
three hobbies, viz., personal ranks and decorations in the Prussian
State, the population of all cities and hamlets according to the
latest census, and the names and ducal titles of the French marshals,
including an unlimited number of Napoleonic anecdotes, the latter
usually in the original. Occasionally this original version was
disputed from the point of view of sentence structure and grammar,
whereupon my father, when driven into a corner, would reply with
imperturbable repose: "My French feeling tells me that it must be
thus, thus and not otherwise," a declaration which naturally served
but to increase the hilarity.

Yes, indeed, Napoleon and his marshals! My father's knowledge in this
field was simply stupendous, and I wager there was not in that day a
single historian, nor is there any now, who, so far as French war
stories and personal anecdotes of the period from Marengo to Waterloo
are concerned, would have been in any sense of the word qualified to
enter into competition with him. Where he got all his material is an
enigma to me. The only explanation I can offer is that he had in his
memory a pigeonhole, into which fell naturally everything he found
that appealed to his passion, in his constant reading of journals and
miscellanies.

       *       *       *       *       *

When we had been safely lodged, at Midsummer, 1827, in the house with
the gigantic roof and the wooden eavestrough, into which my father
could easily lay his hand, this question immediately presented itself:
"What is to become of the children now? To what school shall we send
them?" If my mother had been there a solution of the problem would
doubtless have been found, one that would have had due regard for what
was befitting our station, at least, if not for what we should learn.
But since my mama, as already stated, had remained in Berlin to
receive treatment for her nerves, the decision rested with my father,
and he settled the matter in short order, presumably after some such
characteristic soliloquy as follows: "The city has only one school,
the city school, and as the city school is the only one, it is
consequently the best." No sooner thought than done. Before a week was
passed I was a pupil of the city school. About the school I remember
very little, only that there was a large room with a blackboard,
stifling air in spite of the fact that the windows were always open,
and an endless number of boys in baize and linen jackets, unkempt and
barefoot, or in wooden shoes, which made a fearful noise. It was very
sad. But even then, as unfortunately in later years, I had so few
pleasing illusions about going to school that the conditions
previously described to me did not appear specially dreadful when I
became personally acquainted with them. I simply supposed that things
had to be thus. But toward autumn, when my mother arrived on the scene
and saw me coming home from school with the wooden-shoe boys, she was
beside herself and cast an anxious glance at my hair, which she
doubtless thought she could not well trust in such company. She then
had one of her heart-to-heart talks with my father, who was probably
told that he had again taken only himself into consideration. That
same day my withdrawal from school was announced to Rector Beda, who
lived diagonally across the street from us. He was not angry at the
announcement, declared, on the contrary, to my mother that "he had
really been surprised. * * *" Thus far all was well. Just criticism
had been exercised and action had been taken in accord with it. But
now that it was necessary to find something better to substitute for
the school, even my mother was at her wits' end. Teachers seemed to
be, or were in fact, lacking, and as it had been impossible in so
short a time to establish relations to the good families of the city,
it was decided for the present to let me grow up wild and calmly to
wait till something turned up. But to prevent my lapsing into dense
ignorance I was to read an hour daily to my mother and learn some
Latin and French words from my father, in addition to geography and
history.

"Will you be equal to that, Louis?" my mother had asked.

"Equal to? What do you mean by 'equal to?' Of course I am equal to it.
Your same old lack of confidence in me."

"Not twenty-four hours ago you yourself were full of doubt about it."

"I presume the plan did not appeal to me then. But if it must be, I
understand the Prussian pharmacopoeia as well as anybody, and in my
parents' house French was spoken. As for the rest, to speak of it
would be ridiculous. You know that in such things I am more than a
match for ten graduates."

As a matter of fact he really gave me lessons, which, I may say in
advance, were kept up even after the need of them no longer existed,
and, peculiar as these lessons were, I learned more from them than
from many a famous teacher. My father picked out quite arbitrarily the
things he had long known by heart or, perhaps, had just read the same
day, and vitalized geography with history, always, of course, in such
a way that in the end his favorite themes were given due prominence.
For example:

"Do you know about East and West Prussia?"

"Yes, papa; that is the country after which Prussia is called Prussia
and after which we are all called Prussians."

"Very good, very good; a little too much Prussia, but that doesn't
matter. And do you also know the capitals of the two provinces?"

"Yes, papa; Königsberg and Danzig."

"Very good. I myself have been in Danzig, and came near going to
Königsberg, too, but something intervened. Have you ever heard
perchance who it was that finally captured Danzig after the brave
defense of our General Kalckreuth?"

"No, papa."

"Well, it is not to be expected. Very few people do know it, and the
so-called higher educated never know it. Well, it was General Lefèvre,
a man of rare bravery, upon whom Napoleon later bestowed the title of
_Duc de Dantzic_, spelled with a final c, in which regard the
languages differ. That was in the year 1807."

"After the battle of Jena?"

"Yes, it may be put that way; but only in the same sense as if you
were to say, it was after the Seven Years' War."

"I don't understand, papa."

"Doesn't matter. I mean, Jena was too long ago. But one might say it
was after the battle of Prussian Eylau, a fearfully bloody battle, in
which the Russian Guard was almost annihilated, and in which Napoleon,
before surrendering, said to his favorite Duroc: 'Duroc, today I have
made the acquaintance of the sixth great power of Europe, _la boue_.'"

"What does that mean?"

"_La boue_ means the mud. But one can express it more strongly in
German, and I am inclined to think that Napoleon, who, when he felt
like it, had something cynical about him, really meant this stronger
expression."

"What is cynical?"

"Cynical--hm, cynical--it is a word often used, and one might say,
cynical is the same as rough or brutal. But I presume it may be
defined more accurately. We will look it up later in the encyclopedia.
It is well to be informed about such things, but one does not need to
know everything on the spur of the moment."

Such was the character of the geography lessons, always ending with
historical anecdotes. But he preferred to begin at once with history,
or what seemed to him history. And here I must mention his pronounced
fondness for all the events and the persons concerned in them between
the siege of Toulon and the imprisonment on the island of St. Helena.
He was always reverting to these persons and things. I have elsewhere
named his favorites, with Ney and Lannes at the head of the list, but
in that enumeration I forgot to mention one man, who stood perhaps
nearer to his heart than these, namely, Latour d'Auvergne, of whom he
had told me any number of anecdotes back in our Ruppin days. These
were now repeated. According to the new stories Latour d'Auvergne bore
the title of the "First Grenadier of France," because in spite of his
rank of general he always stood in the rank and file, next to the
right file-leader of the Old Guard. Then when he fell, in the battle
of Neuburg, Napoleon gave orders that the heart of the "First
Grenadier" be placed in an urn and carried along with the troop, and
that his name, Latour d'Auvergne, be regularly called at every
roll-call, and the soldier serving as file-leader be instructed to
answer in his stead and tell where he was. This was about what I had
long ago learned by heart from my father's stories; but his fondness
for this hero was so great that, whenever it was at all possible, he
returned to him and asked the same questions. Or, to be more accurate,
the same scene was enacted, for it was a scene.

"Do you know Latour d'Auvergne?" he usually began.

"Certainly. He was the First Grenadier of France."

"Good. And do you also know how he was honored after he was dead?"

"Certainly."

"Then tell me how it was."

"Very well; but you must first stand up, papa, and be file-leader, or
I can't do it."

Then he would actually rise from his seat on the sofa and in true
military fashion take his position before me as file-leader of the Old
Guard, while I myself, little stick-in-the-mud that I was, assumed the
part of the roll-calling officer. Then I began to call the names:

"Latour d'Auvergne!"

"He is not here," answered my father in a basso profundo voice.

"Where is he, pray?"

"He died on the field of honor."

Once in awhile my mother attended these peculiar lessons--the one
about Latour, however, was never ventured in her presence--and she did
not fail to give us to understand, by her looks, that she considered
this whole method, which my father with an inimitable expression of
countenance called his "Socratic method," exceedingly dubious. But
she, by nature wholly conventional, not only in this particular, but
in others, was absolutely wrong, for, to repeat, I owe in fact to
these lessons, and the similar conversations growing out of them, all
the best things, at least all the most practical things, I know. Of
all that my father was able to teach me nothing has been forgotten and
nothing has proved useless for my purposes. Not only have these
stories been of hundredfold benefit to me socially throughout my long
life, they have also, in my writing, been ever at hand as a Golden
Treasury, and if I were asked, to what teacher I felt most deeply
indebted, I should have to reply: to my father, my father, who knew
nothing at all, so to speak, but, with his wealth of anecdotes picked
up from newspapers and magazines, and covering every variety of theme,
gave me infinitely more help than all my _Gymnasium_ and _Realschule_
teachers put together. What information these men offered me, even if
it was good, has been for the most part forgotten; but the stories of
Ney and Rapp have remained fresh in my memory to the present hour.

My father's method, which, much as I feel indebted to it, was after
all somewhat peculiar and utterly devoid of logic and consistency,
would in all probability have led to violent quarrels between my
parents, if my critical mother, who saw only its weaknesses and none
of its virtues, had attached any special significance to it in
general. But that was not the case. She only felt that my father's way
of teaching was totally different from the usual way, in that it would
not lead to many practical results, i.e., would not give me much
preparation for an examination, and in this respect she was perfectly
right. However, as she herself attached so little value to knowledge
in general, she contented herself with smiling at the "Socratic
method," as she saw no reason for becoming seriously wrought up over
it. According to her honest conviction there were other things in life
of far greater importance than knowledge, to say nothing of erudition,
and these other things were: a good appearance and good manners. That
her children should all present a good appearance was with her an
article of faith, so to speak, and she considered it a natural
consequence of their good appearance that they either already had or
would acquire good manners. So the only essential was to present a
good appearance. Serious studies seemed to her not a help, but, on the
contrary, a hindrance to happiness, that is to say, real happiness,
which she looked upon as inseparable from money and property. A
hundred-thousand-dollar man _was_ something, and she respected, even
honored him, whereas chief judges and councillors of the chancery
commanded very little respect from her, and would have commanded even
less, if the State, which she did respect, had not stood behind them.
She was incapable of bowing in good faith to any so-called spiritual
authority, not because she cherished too exalted an opinion of
herself--she was, on the contrary, entirely without vanity and
arrogance--but solely because, constituted as she was, she could not
recognize an authority of knowledge, much less of erudition, in a
practical field of life--and with her the non-practical fields never
entered into consideration.

I still remember the time, some twenty years after the events just
narrated, when my parents were thinking of separating and of
eventually being divorced. A separation actually came about, the
divorce idea was dropped. But the latter was for a time considered in
all seriousness, and a friend of our family, Pastor Schultz, the then
preacher at Bethany, who made a specialty of divorce questions--it was
in the reign of Frederick William IV., when such problems were treated
with revived dogmatic severity--Pastor Schultz, I say, opposed the
plan, as soon as he heard of it, with all his power and eloquence. My
mother had a great deal of admiration for him and knew, besides, the
respect he enjoyed of "those highest in authority," and "those highest
in authority" meant something to her; nevertheless his severe
presentation of the matter made not the slightest impression upon her;
in fact his argument was so fruitless that, as soon as he finished,
she said with a reposeful air of superiority: "My dear Schultz, you
understand this question thoroughly; but whether or not I have a right
to secure a divorce is a question which no human being in the whole
world can answer so well as I myself." With that she closed the
conversation.

She was similarly skeptical of every kind of authority, and had no
confidence whatever in the ability of the three university faculties.
For example, since patriarchal conditions were her ideal, she
questioned whether mankind derived any material advantages from
jurisprudence. It settled everything, as she thought, by favoritism or
personal advantage, or at least in a mechanical way. Riches, property,
especially landed property, accompanied if possible by the airs of a
legation attaché--_that_ was something that unlocked the world and
the hearts of men, that was real power. Everything else was comedy,
illusion, a soap-bubble, that threatened to burst any moment. And then
nothing was left. One can readily understand why my mother, with such
views, insisted upon taking me out of the barefoot school, and did not
consider an interim, with no regular school instruction, any special
misfortune. The evil in it was that it violated the rule. As for the
rest, the little bit of learning lost could be made up at any time.
And if not, then not....

It is a pretty saying that every child has its angel, and one does not
need to be very credulous to believe it. For the little tots this
angel is a fairy, enveloped in a long white lily veil, which stands
smiling at the foot of a cradle and either wards off danger or helps
out of it when it is really at hand. That is the fairy for the little
ones. But when one has outgrown the cradle or crib, and has begun to
sleep in a regular bed, in other words, when one has become a robust
boy, one still needs his angel just the same, indeed the need is all
the greater. But instead of the lily angel it needs to be a sort of
archangel, a strong, manly angel, with shield and spear, otherwise his
strength will not suffice for his growing tasks.

As a matter of fact, I was not wild and venturesome, and all my
escapades that were attributed to me as of such a nature were always
undertaken after a wise estimate of my strength. Nevertheless I have,
with respect to that period, a feeling that I was constantly being
rescued, a feeling in which I can hardly be in error. When I left home
at the age of twelve, the age at which, as a usual thing, real dangers
begin, there was doubtless a sudden change in my case, for it now
seems to me as though my angel had had a vacation from that time on.
All dangers ceased entirely or shrank into such insignificance that
they left no impression upon me. In view of the fact that the two
periods were so close together, there must have been this difference,
otherwise I should not have retained such entirely different feelings
about them.

It was one of our chief sports to fire off so-called shooting-keys.
That the children of large cities know anything about shooting-keys is
hardly probable, hence I may be permitted to describe them here. They
were hollow keys with very thin walls, consequently of enormous bore,
so to speak, and were used to lock trunks, especially the trunks of
servant girls. It was our constant endeavor to gain possession of such
keys and at times our expeditions were nothing short of piracy. Woe be
unto the poor servant girl who forgot to take a key out of its lock!
She never saw it again. We took possession of it, and the simple
procedure of filing out a touchhole produced a finished firearm. As
these keys were always rusty, and occasionally split, it not
infrequently happened that they burst; but we always escaped injury.
The angel helped.

Much more dangerous was the art of making fireworks, which I was
always practicing. With the help of sulphur and saltpeter, which we
kept in a convenient place in the apothecary's shop, I had made of
myself a full-fledged pyrotechnician, in which process I was very
materially aided by my skill in the manipulation of cardboard and
paste. All sorts of shells were easily made, and so I produced
Catherine-wheels, revolving suns, and flower-pots. Often these
creations refused to perform the duty expected of them, and then we
piled them up and, by means of a sulphurated match, touched off the
whole heap of miscarried glory and waited to see what it would do.
This was all done with comparatively little danger. Fraught with all
the more danger for us was the thing which was considered the simplest
and lowest product of the art of pyrotechnics, and was so rated by us,
viz., the serpent. Very often the serpents I made would not burn
properly, because I had not used the right mixture, no doubt, and that
always vexed me greatly. When a Catherine-wheel refused to turn, that
could at least be tolerated, for a Catherine-wheel is a comparatively
difficult thing to make. A serpent, on the other hand, could not well
help burning, and when, for all that, one simply would not burn, that
was a humiliation that could not be suffered. So I would bend over the
shells as they stuck in the pile of sand and begin to blow, in order
to give new life to the dying tinder fire. When it went out entirely,
that was really the best thing for me. But if it went off suddenly, my
hair was singed or my forehead burned. Nothing worse ever happened,
for the angel was protecting me with his shield.

That was the element of fire. But we also came in contact with water,
which was not to be wondered at in a seaport.

In the autumn of 1831 a Berlin relative made me a present of a cannon,
not just an ordinary child's plaything, such as can be bought of any
coppersmith or tinner, but a so-called pattern-cannon, such as is seen
only in arsenals,--a splendid specimen, of great beauty and elegance,
the carriage firm and neat, the barrel highly polished and about a
foot and a half long. I was more than delighted, and determined to
proceed at once to a bombardment of Swinemünde. Two boys of my age and
my younger brother climbed with me into a boat lying at Klempin's
Clapper, and we rowed down-stream, with the cannon in the bow. When we
were about opposite the Society House I considered that the time had
arrived for the beginning of the bombardment, and fired three shots,
waiting after each shot to see whether the people on the "Bulwark"
took notice of us, and whether they showed due respect for the
seriousness of our actions. But neither of these things happened. A
thing that did happen, however, was that we meanwhile got out into the
current, were caught by it and carried away, and when we suddenly saw
ourselves between the embankments of the moles, I was suddenly seized
with a terrible fright. I realized that, if we kept on in this way, in
ten minutes more we should be out at sea and might drift away toward
Bornholm and the Swedish coast. It was a desperate situation, and we
finally resorted to the least brave, but most sensible, means
imaginable, and began to scream with all our might, all the time
beckoning and waving various objects, showing on the whole
considerable cleverness in the invention of distress signals. At last
we attracted the attention of some pilots standing on the West mole,
who shook their fingers threateningly at us, but finally, with smiling
countenances, threw us a rope. That rescued us from danger. One of the
pilots knew me; his son was one of my playmates. This doubtless
accounts for the fact that the seamen dismissed us with a few
epithets, which might have been worse. I took my cannon under my arm,
but not without having the satisfaction of seeing it admired. Then I
went home, after promising to send out Hans Ketelböter, a lusty
sailor-boy who lived quite near our home, to row back the boat, which
was meanwhile moored to a pile.

This was the most unique among my adventures with water, but by no
means the most dangerous. The most dangerous was at the same time the
most ordinary, because it recurred every time I went swimming in the
sea. Any one who knows the Baltic seaside resorts, knows the so-called
"reffs." By "reffs" are meant the sandbanks running parallel to the
beach, out a hundred or two hundred paces, and often with very little
water washing over them. Upon these the swimmers can stand and rest,
when, they have crossed the deep places lying between them and the
shore. In order that they may know exactly where these shallow places
are, little red banners are hoisted over the sandbanks. Here lay for
me a daily temptation. When the sea was calm and everything normal, my
skill as a swimmer was just sufficient to carry me safely over the
deep places to the nearest sandbank. But if the conditions were less
favorable, or if by chance I let myself down too soon, so that I had
no solid ground beneath my feet, I was frightened, sometimes almost to
death. Luckily I always managed to get out, though not by myself.
Strength and help came from some other source.

Another danger of water which I was destined to undergo had no
connection with the sea, but occurred on the river, close by the
"Bulwark," not five hundred paces from our house. I shall tell about
it later; but first I wish to insert here another little occurrence,
in which no help of an angel was needed.

I was not good at swimming, nor at steering or rowing; but one of the
things I could do well, very well indeed, was walking on stilts.
According to our family tradition we came from the region of
Montpelier, whereas I personally ought by rights to be able, in view
of my virtuosity as a stilt-walker, to trace my ancestry back to the
Landes, where the inhabitants are, so to speak, grown fast to their
stilts, and hardly take them off when they go to bed. To make a long
story short, I was a brilliant stilt-walker, and in comparison with
those of the western Garonne region, the home of the very low stilts,
I had the advantage that I could not get my buskins high enough to
suit me, for the little blocks of wood fastened on the inner side of
my stilts were some three feet high. By taking a quick start and
running the ends of the two poles slantingly into the ground I was
able to swing myself without fail upon the stilt-blocks and to begin
immediately my giant stride. Ordinarily this was an unremunerative
art, but on a few occasions I derived real profit from it, when my
stilts enabled me to escape storms that were about to break over my
head. That was in the days just after Captain Ferber, who had served
out his time with the "Neufchâtellers," retired on a pension and moved
to Swinemünde. Ferber, whom the Swinemünders called Teinturier, the
French translation of his name, because of his relation to Neufchâtel,
came of a very good family, was, if I mistake not, the son of a high
official in the ministry of finance, who could boast of long-standing
relations to the Berlin Court, dating back to the war times of the
year 1813. This was no doubt the reason why the son, in spite of the
fact that he did not belong to the nobility and was of German
extraction--the Neufchâtel officers were in those days still for the
most part French-Swiss--was permitted to serve with the élite
battalion, where he was well liked, because he was clever, a good
comrade, and an author besides. He wrote novelettes after the fashions
then in vogue. But in spite of his popularity he could not hold his
position, because his fondness for coffee and cognac, which soon
became restricted to the latter, grew upon him so rapidly that he was
forced to retire. His removal to Swinemünde was doubtless due to the
fact that seaports are better suited for such passions than are inland
cities. Fondness for cognac attracts less attention.

Whatever his reason may have been, however, Ferber was soon as popular
in his new place of residence as previously in Berlin, for he had that
kindliness of character which is the "dearest child of the
dram-bottle." He was very fond of my father, who reciprocated the
sentiment. But this friendship did not spring up at the very beginning
of their acquaintance. In fact it developed out of a little
controversy between them, that is to say, a defeat sustained by my
father, one of whose amiable peculiarities it was, within twenty-four
hours at the latest to convert his anger at being put to flight, into
approbation bordering on homage for the victor.

His defeat came about thus. One day the assertion was made by Ferber,
that, whether we liked it or not, a German must be looked upon as the
"father of the French Revolution," for Minister Necker, though born in
Geneva, was the son or grandson of a Küstrin postmaster. This seemed
to my father a perfectly preposterous assertion, and he combated it
with a rather supercilious mien, till it was finally shown to be
substantially correct. Then my father's arrogance, growing out of a
conviction of his superior knowledge, was transformed first into
respect and later into friendship, and even twenty years after,
whenever we drove from our Oderbruch village to the neighboring city
of Küstrin, he never had much to say about Crown Prince Fritz, or
Katte's decapitation, but regularly remarked: "Oh yes, Necker, who may
be called the father of the French Revolution, traced his ancestry
back to this city of Küstrin. I owe the information to Ferber, Captain
Ferber, whom we called Teinturier. It is a pity he could not give up
his _aqua vitæ_. At times it was pitiable."

Yes, pitiable it was, but not to us children, who, on the contrary,
always broke out into cheers whenever the captain, usually in rather
desolate costume, came staggering up the Great Church Street to find a
place to continue his breakfast. We used to follow close behind him
and tease and taunt him till he would try to catch and thrash one or
the other of us. Occasionally he succeeded; but I always escaped with
ease, because I chose for my teasings only days when it had rained a
short time before. Then there stood in the street between our house
and the church on the other side a huge pool of water, which became my
harbor of refuge. Holding my stilts at the proper angle, I sprang
quickly upon them as soon as I saw that Teinturier, in spite of his
condition, was close on my heels, and then I marched triumphantly into
the pool of water. There I stood like a stork on one stilt and
presented arms with the other, as I continued scoffing at him. Cursing
and threatening he marched away, the poor captain. But he took care
not to make good his threats, because in his good moments he did not
like to be reminded of the bad ones.

We had several playgrounds. The one we liked best perhaps was along
the "Bulwark," at the point where the side street branched off from
our house. The whole surroundings were very picturesque, especially in
the winter time, when the ships, stripped of their topmasts, lay at
their moorings, often in three rows, the last pretty far out in the
river. We were allowed to play along the "Bulwark" and practice our
rope-walking art on the stretched hawsers as far as they hung close to
the ground. Only one thing was prohibited. We were not allowed to go
on board the ships, much less to climb the rope ladders to the
mastheads. A very sensible prohibition. But the more sensible it was,
the greater was our desire to disregard it, and in the game of "robber
and wayfarer," of which we were all very fond, disregarding of this
prohibition was almost a matter of course. Furthermore, discovery lay
beyond the range of probability; our parents were either at their
"party" or invited to dine out. "So let's go ahead. If anybody tells
on us, he will be worse off than we."

So we thought one Sunday in April, 1831. It must have been about that
time of year, for I can still recall the clear, cold tone of the
atmosphere. On the ship there was not a sign of life, and on the
"Bulwark" not a human soul to be seen, which further proves to me that
it was a Sunday.

I, being the oldest and strongest, was the robber, of course. Of the
eight or ten smaller boys only one was in any measure able to compete
with me. That was an illegitimate child, called Fritz Ehrlich
(Honorable), as though to compensate him for his birth. These boys had
set out from the Church Square, the usual starting-point of the chase,
and were already close after me. I arrived at the "Bulwark" exhausted,
and, as there was no other way of escape, ran over a firm broad plank
walk toward the nearest ship, with the whole pack after me. This
naturally forced me to go on from the first ship to the second and
from the second to the third. There was no going any further, and if I
wished, in spite of this dilemma, to escape my enemies, there was
nothing left for me but to seek a hiding-place on the ship itself, or
at least a spot difficult of access. I found such a place and climbed
up about the height of a man to the top of the superstructure near the
cabin. In this superstructure was usually to be found, among other
rooms, the ship's cuisine. My climbing was facilitated by steps built
in the perpendicular wall. And there I stood then, temporarily safe,
gazing down as a victor at my pursuers. But the sense of victory did
not last long; the steps were there for others as well as for me, and
an instant later Fritz Ehrlich was also on the roof. Now I was indeed
lost if I foiled to find another way of escape. So, summoning all my
strength, I took as long a running start as the narrow space would
permit and sprang from the roof of the kitchen over the intervening
strip of water back to the second ship and then ran for the shore, as
though chased by all the furies. When I had reached the shore it was
nothing to run to the base in front of our house and be free. But I
was destined not to enjoy my happiness very long, for almost the very
moment I once more had solid ground beneath my feet I heard cries of
distress coming from the third and second ships, and my name called
repeatedly, which made me think something must have happened. Swiftly
as I had made for the shore over the noisy plank walk, I now hastened
back over it. There was no time to lose. Fritz Ehrlich had tried to
imitate my leap from the kitchen, but, failing to equal my distance,
had fallen into the water between the ships. And there the poor boy
was, digging his nails into the cracks in the ship's hull. Swimming
was out of the question, even if he knew anything about it. Besides,
the water was icy cold. To reach him from the deck with the means at
hand was impossible. So I grasped a piece of rope hanging from a rope
ladder and, letting myself down the side of the ship, tried every way
I could think of to lengthen my body as much as possible, till finally
Fritz was barely able to catch hold of my left foot, which reached
furthest down, while I held on above with my right hand. "Take hold,
Fritz!" But the doughty fellow, who may have realized that we should
both be lost if he really took a firm hold, contented himself with
laying his hand lightly upon the toe of my boot, and little as that
was, it nevertheless sufficed to keep his head above water. To be
sure, he may have been by natural endowment a "water treader," as they
are called; or he may have had the traditional luck of the
illegitimate, which seems to me on second thought more probable. In
any case he kept afloat till some people came from the shore and
reached a punt-pole down to him, while some others untied a boat
lying at Hannemann's Clapper and rowed it into the space between the
ships to fish him out. The moment that the saving punt-pole arrived
some man unknown to me reached down from the ladder, seized me by the
collar, and with a vigorous jerk hoisted me back on deck.

On this occasion not a word of reproach was uttered, though I could
not say as much of any other occasion of the kind. The people took
Fritz Ehrlich, drenched and freezing, to a house in the immediate
neighborhood, while the rest of us started home in a very humble frame
of mind. To be sure, I had also a feeling of elation, despite the fact
that my prospects for the future were not of the pleasantest. But my
fears were not realized. Quite the contrary. The following morning, as
I was starting to school, my father met me in the hall and stopped me.
Neighbor Pietzker, the good man with the nightcap, had been tattling
again, though with better intentions than usual.

"I've heard the whole business," said my father. "Why, in the name of
heaven, can't you be obedient! But we'll let it pass, since you
acquitted yourself so well. I know all the details. Pietzker across
the street ..."

Hereupon I was allowed to go to school.




SIR RIBBECK OF RIBBECK[3]

By THEODOR FONTANE



  Sir Ribbeck of Ribbeck in Havelland--
  A pear-tree in his yard did stand,
  And in the golden autumn-tide,
  When pears were shining far and wide,
  Sir Ribbeck, when barely the bells struck noon,
  Would stuff both his pockets with pears right soon.
  If a boy in clogs would come his way,
  He would call: "My boy, have a pear today?"
  To a girl he'd call: "Little maid over there,
  Now come here to me, and I'll give you a pear."
  And thus he did ever, as years went by,
  Till Sir Ribbeck of Ribbeck came to die.
  He felt his end coming, 'twas autumn-tide,
  And the pears were laughing, far and wide,
  Then spoke Sir Ribbeck: "And now I must die.
  Lay a pear in my grave, beside me to lie!"
  From the double-roofed house in three days more,
  Sir Ribbeck to his grave they bore.
  All the peasants and cotters with solemn face,
  Did sing: "Lord Jesus, in Thy Grace"--
  And the children moaned with hearts of lead:
  "Who will give us a pear? Now he is dead."
  Thus moaned the children--that was not good--
  Not knowing old Ribbeck as they should.
  The new, to be sure, is a miser hard;
  Over park and pear-tree he keeps stern guard.
  But the old, who this doubtless could foretell,
  Distrusting his son, he knew right well
  What he was about when he bade them lay
  A pear in his grave, on his dying day:

  Out of his silent haunt, in the third year,
  A little pear-tree shoot did soon appear.
  And many a year now comes and goes,
  But a pear-tree on the grave there grows,
  And in the golden autumn-tide,
  The pears are shining far and wide.
  When a boy o'er the grave-yard wends his way,
  The tree whispers: "Boy, have a pear today?"
  To a girl it says: "Little maid over there,
  Come here to me and I'll give you a pear."
     So there are blessings still from the hand
     Of Sir Ribbeck of Ribbeck in Havelland.


[Footnote 3: Translator: Margarete Münsterberg.]


THE BRIDGE BY THE TAY[4] (1879)

/#
"_When shall we three meet again_".--Macbeth
#/


  "When shall we three meet again?"
     "The dam of the bridge at seven attain!"
         "By the pier in the middle. I'll put out amain
  "The flames."
         "I too."
                   "I'll come from the north."
  "And I from the south."
                   "From the sea I'll soar forth."

  "Ha, that will be a merry-go-round,
   The bridge must sink into the ground."
  "And with the train what shall we do
   That crosses the bridge at seven?"
                       "That too."
  "That must go too!"
                       "A bawble, a naught,
   What the hand of man hath wrought!"

   The bridgekeeper's house that stands in the north--
   All windows to the south look forth,
   And the inmates there without peace or rest
   Are gazing southward with anxious zest;
   They gaze and wait a light to spy
   That over the water "I'm coming!" should cry,
  "I'm coming--night and storm are vain--
   I from Edinburg the train!"

   And the bridgekeeper says: "I see a gleam
   On the other shore. That's it, I deem.
   Now mother, away with bad dreams, for see,
   Our Johnnie is coming--he'll want his tree,
   And what is left of candles, light
   As if it were on Christmas night.
   Twice we shall have our Christmas cheer--
   In eleven minutes he must be here."

   It is the train, with the gale it vies
   And panting by the south tower flies.
   "There's the bridge still," says Johnnie. "But that's all right,
   We'll make it surely out of spite!
   A solid boiler and double steam
   Should win in such a fight, 'twould seem,
   Let it rave and rage and run at its bent,
   We'll put it down: this element!

   And our bridge is our pride. I must laugh always
   When I think back of the olden days,
   And all the trouble and misery
   That with the wretched boat would be;
   And many cheerful Christmas nights
   I spent at the ferryman's house--the lights
   From our windows I'd watch and count them o'er,
   And could not reach the other shore."

   The bridgekeeper's house that stands in the north--
   All windows to the south look forth,
   And the inmates there without peace or rest
   Are gazing southward with anxious zest:
   More furious grew the winds' wild games,
   And now, as if the sky poured flames,
   Comes shooting down a radiance bright
   O'er the water below.--Now again all is night.

  "When shall we three meet again?"
  "At midnight the top of the mountain attain!"
  "By the alder-stem on the high moorland plain!"
  "I'll come."
            "And I too."
                      "And the number I'll tell."
  "And I the names."
                      "I the torture right well."
  "Whoo!
            Like splinters the woodwork crashed in two."
                      "A bawble,--a naught,
   What the hand of man hath wrought!"


[Footnote 4: Translator: Margarete Münsterberg.]

       *       *       *       *       *