Skip to main content

Full text of "Flower, fruit, and thorn pieces; or : The wedded life, death, and marriage of Firmian Stanislaus Siebenkaes, parish advocate in the burgh of Kuhschnappel, A genuine thorn piece"

See other formats 


fco 

•CM 
100 


=  CO 


'CD 


CO 


II 


2454 
B513 
Roba 


Presented  to  the 

UNIVERSITY  OF  TORONTO 
LIBRARY 

by  the 

ONTARIO  LEGISLATIVE 
LIBRARY 


1980 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2007  with  funding  from 

Microsoft  Corporation 


http://www.archive.org/details/flowerfruitthornOOjeanuoft 


BOHN'S  STANDARD  LIBRARY. 


RICHTER'S 
FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN   PIECES. 


>   '     — r  '• 


GEORGE  BELL  &   SONS 

LONDON  :  YORK  ST.,  COVENT  GARDEX 
NEW  YORK  :  66  FIFTH  AVENUE,  AND 
BOMBAY:  53  ESPLANADE  ROAD 
CAMBRIDGE  :     DEIGHTON    BELL    &    CO- 


5      50 

FLO^g^RUIT,  AND 
VlECES; 

WEDDED  LIFE,  DEATH.^AND  MARRTAGE 


m 


FIRMIAN  STANISLAUS  SIEBENOES, 

PARISH  ADVOCATE 
IN   THE    BURGH    OF    KUHSCHNAPPEL. 


{A   GENUINE   TIFORN  PIECE.) 


JEAN    PAUL    FRIEDRICH    RICHTER. 


Sranslattn  from  tfje  ©erman 


ALEXANDER    EWING. 


%W  &/ 


•  MtYteLONDON 


CM 


GEORGE    BELL   AND    SONS.  q^ 


i897 


-<: 


< 


*"\ 


{Reprinted  from  Stertoiypt  platts.} 


*N   *\» 


v 


PREFACE 


SECOND     EDITION. 


What  advantage  shall  I  reap  in  giving  to  the  world  this, 
my  new  edition  of '  Siebenkoes,'  embellished  and  perfected  as 
it  is  with  all  the  additions,  corrections,  and  improvements 
which  it  has  been  in  my  power  to  make  ?  Can  I  expect  to 
be  any  the  better  for  it?  People  will,  I  daresay,  buy  it 
and  read  it ;  but  not  give  much  of  their  time  to  the  study 
of  it,  nor  be  sufficiently  detailed  and  thorough  in  their 
criticism  of  it.  The  Pythia  of  Criticism  has  hitherto  been 
ohary  of  her  oracles  to  me,  as  the  Greek  Pythia  was  to 
other  inquirers ;  she  has  chewed  up  my  laui  els,  instead  of 
crowning  me  with  them,  and  prophesied  little  or  nothing. 
The  author  very  distinctly  remembers  setting  to  work,  foi 
instance,  at  the  second  edition  of  his  •  Hesperus,'  *  with 
his  pruning-saw  in  his  left  hand  and  his  oculist's  knife  in 
his  right,  and  applying  both  instruments  to  the  work  to 
an  extraordinary  extent ;  it  was  in  vain,  however,  that  he 
looked  for  anything  like  an  appreciative  notice  of  it, 
either  in  literary  or  non-literary  publications.  Similarly, 
in  all  his  new  editions  (those  of  '  Fixlein,'  the  '  Prepara- 
tory School,'  and  'Levana,'  are  proofs  and  witnessesf), 
however  he  may  set  to  work,  hanging  up  new  pictures, 
turning  some  of  the  old  ones'  faces  to  the  wall — marching 

Name  of  one  of  the  author's  other  worts.      f  Other  works  of  his. 


VI  TREFACE   TO   THE   SECOND    EDITION. 

off  some  ideas,  relieving  them  by  others — making  cha- 
racters conduct  themselves  better,  or  worse,  or  hit  upon 
better,  or  upon  worse,  ideas,  as  the  case  may  be, — the  deuce 
a  reviewer  takes  the  least  notice  of  it,  or  says  a  word  to 
the  world  on  the  subject.  But  in  this  way  1  leam  little, 
am  not  told  where  I  have  done  pretty  well,  or  the  reverse, 
and  am  minus,  perhaps,  some  little  bit  of  praise  and  en- 
couragement which  I  may  deserve. 

This  is  how  the  question  stands,  and  several  conse- 
quences follow  as  matters  of  course ;  the  indifferent  class 
of  readers  consider  the  author  incapable  of  making  any 
critical  emendations,  while  the  enthusiastic  class  think 
none  are  necessary — their  common  point  of  agreement 
being  the  supposition  that  he  absorbs  and  emits  the 
whole  thing  with  the  same  natural,  matter  of  course,  ease 
and  absence  of  effort  as  the  Aphides,  the  plant-lice, 
do  the  honey-dew,  which  is  in  such  request  with  the 
bees;  though,  unlike  the  said  bees,  ho  is  not  very  clever 
at  making  the  wax  for  it. 

Then  there  are  a  good  many  who  think  every  line 
should  be  left  in  the  condition  in  which  it  first  flowed, 
or  burst,  spontaneously  from  its  author's  fancy — just  as  if 
corrections  were  not  themselves  spontaneous  outbursts  as 
well  as  the  other.  Other  readers  prefer  to  belong  to  none 
of  the  above  factions — and  consequently  belong,  to  some 
extent,  to  all.  Were  it  my  object  to  express  myself  bi  iefl}', 
I  should  merely  have  to  do  so  as  follows: — firstly,  they 
say,  it  would  be  much  better  if  ho  simply  spoke  artlessly 
out  whatever  he  finds  it  in  his  heart  to  say !  and  (if  this 
is  just  what  one  happens  to  have  done),  secondly,  how 
much  better  would  be  the  effect  of  that  which  he  finds 
it  in  that  heart  of  his  to  say,  and  how  much  it  would  l>o 
improved,  were  it  to  be  done  according  to  the  canons  of 
taste  and  criticism!     I  can  express  these  ideas  likewise 


PREFACE   TO   THE   SECOND   EDITION.  VII 

in  a  more  roundabout  form,  as  follows : — If  a  writer 
curbs  himself  too  closely,  if  be  thinks  less  about  the  strong 
throb  of  his  heart  than  about  the  delicate  arterial  network 
and  plexus  of  taste,  and  breaks  up  its  broad  stream  into 
fine,  minute,  dew-drops  of  the  invisible  perspiration  of 
criticism — then  they  say — "the  fact  is,  that  the  thicker 
and  more  powerful  a  jet  of  water  is,  the  higher  it  shoots, 
penetrating  the  atmosphere,  and  overcoming  its  resist- 
ance; whilst  a  more  delicate  jet  is  dissipated  before  it 
gets  half  as  far."  But,  when  the  author  does  just  the 
reverse  of  the  above;  when  he  presses  out  all  his  over- 
flowing heart  in  one  gush,  and  lets  the  blood-billows  flow 
when  and  how  they  will,  then  the  critics  point  the  fol- 
lowing moral — doing  it,  however,  in  a  metaphor  other  than 
I  should  have  expected  of  them — "  A  work  of  art  is  like  a 
paper  kite,  which  rises  the  higher  the  more  the  boy  pulls 
and  holds  back  the  string,  but  falls  the  moment  he  lets 
it  go." 

We  return  at  last  to  our  book.  The  most  important 
of  the  emendations  made  upon  it  are,  perhaps,  the  his- 
torical ;  for,  since  the  first  edition  appeared,  I  have  had 
tbe  good  fortune — partly  because  I  have  had  an  opportunity 
of  visiting  and  seeing  Kuhschnappel  itself,  the  scene  of 
the  story  (as  was  some  time  since  stated  in  Jean  Paul's 
letters),  partly  from  my  correspondence  with  the  hero  of 
it  himself — of  becoming  acquainted  with  family  circum- 
stances and  occurrences  which,  probably,  I  could  not  have 
got  at  in  any  other  way,  unless  I  had  sat  down  and  coolly 
invented  them.  I  have  even  made  prize  of  some  fresh 
Leibgeberiana,  which  I  am  happy  to  be  able  now  to  com- 
municate to  the  public. 

The  new  edition  is  also  improved  by  the  banishment  of 
all  those  foreigners  of  words  which  occupied  places  mor»" 
appropriately  to  be  filled  by  natives  of  the  country ;  also 


VU1  PREFACE  TO  THE  SECOND   EDITION. 

by  a  critical  cleansing  away  of  all  the  genitive  final  b's 
of  compound  words.  But  really  the  labour  of  sweeping 
and  striking  out  letters  and  words  all  through  four  long 
volumes  can  be  estimated  so  highly  by  nobody,  not  even 
by  Posterity,  as  by  the  sweeper  and  striker-out  himself. 

Another  of  the  improvements  made  in  the  Second 
Edition  is,  that  I  have  placed  both  the  "  Flower-pieces  "  at 
the  end  of  the  second  volume  *  (for  in  the  former  edition 
they  came  both  at  the  beginning  of  the  first),  and  that  it 
is  no  longer  the  first  volume,  but,  much  more  appro- 
priately, the  second,  which  closes  with  the  first  Fruit- 
piece. 

And  lastly,  it  may,  perhaps,  be  reckoned  as  one  of  the 
minor  improvements,  that  in  the  two  Flower-pieces — par- 
ticularly in  that  of  the  Dead  Christ — I  have  not  made 
any  improvements,  but  left  everything  as  it  was,  and  not 
attempted  to  scrape  away  any  of  the  golden  writing-sand 
with  which  I  had  made  the  letters  a  little  rough  and 
illegible. 

The  above  are  the  principal  alterations,  concerning 
which  I  should  be  so  glad  to  be  favoured  with  the 
opinions  of  able  reviewers,  to  the  increasing  of  my  in- 
formation, perhaps  also  of  my  reputation.  But,  as  there 
could  not  be  a  more  troublesome  business  than  the  com- 
paring of  the  old  book  with  the  improved  one,  page  by 
page,  as  it  were,  I  have  deposited  in  the  school-book  shop 
the  printed  copy  of  the  old  edition,  in  which  all  the 
writing-ink  emendations  of  the  printing-ink,  that  is  to 
say,  all  the  places  which  have  been  written  or  stroked 
through,  can  be  easily  seen  at  a  glance,  often  half  and 
whole  pages  done  to  death,  so  that  it  would  really  astonish 
you.     Critics  not  on  the  spot  must,  indeed,  content  them- 

*  Second  Book  in  the  translation. 


PREFACE   TO   THE   SECOND   EDITION.  IX 

selves  with  laying  the  volumes  of  each  of  the  editions 
into  the  opposite  scales  of  a  grocer's  balance,  and  then 
looking,  when  they  will  see  how  much  the  new  edition 
outweighs  the  old.  From  my  strict  and  anxious  treat- 
ment of  my  Second  Edition,  then,  all  critics  may  form  an 
idea  of  my  strict  and  anxious  treatment  of  my  first ;  they 
may  also  form  an  idea  how  much  I  struck  out  of  my 
manuscript  before  printing,  when  they  observe  how  much 
I  have  struck  out  after  printing. 

Dr.  Jean  Paul  Fr.  Kichter. 

Baybetjth,  September,  1817. 


CONTENTS. 


PAGB 

PREFACE  to  the  Second  Edition y 

PREFACE,  with  which  I  was  obliged  to  put  Jacob  Oehrmann, 
General  Dealer,  to  sleep,  because  I  wished  to  narrate  the 
"  Dog  Post  Days,"  and  these  present  "  Flower-Pieces," 
&c,  &c,  to  his  Daughter 1 

Wedded  Life,  Death,  and  Marriage  of  F.  S.  Siebenejes.    17 

&  ©entunt  Churn  $tece. 


BOOK  I. 

CHAPTER  I. 

A  Wedding  Day,  succeeding  a  day  of  respite  —  The  Counterparts 
—  Dish  Quintette  in  two  Courses  —  Table-talk  —  Six  Arms  and 
Hands 19 

CHAPTER  H. 

Home  Fun  —  Sundry  formal  Calls —  The  Newspaper  Article  —  A 
Love  Quarrel,  and  a  few  hard  words  —  Antipathetic  ink  on 
the  wall  —  Friendship  of  the  Satirists  —  Government  of 
Kuhschnappel 36 

Appendix  to  Chapter  II. 
Government  of  the  Imperial  Market  Borough  of  Kuhschnappel        58 


Xll  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER  III. 

fags 
Lennette's  Honeymoon  —  Book  Brewing  —  Scliulrath  Stiefel  — 
Mr.  Everard  —A  Day  before  the  Fuir  —  The  Red  Cow  — St. 
Michael's  Fair  —  The  Beggars'  Opera  —  Diabolical  Tempta- 
tion in  the  Wilderness,  or  the  Mannikin  of  Fashion  —  Autumn 
Joya  —  A  New  Labyrinth  .......       64 

CHAPTER  IV. 

A  Matrimonial  Partie  a  la  Guerre  — Letter  to  that  Hair  Collector, 
the  Venner  —  Self-deceptions  —  Adam's  Marriage  Sermon  — 
Shadowing  and  Over-shadowing 100 

End  of  the  Preface  and  of  the  First  Book  .         .         .         .121 


PREFACE  to  the  Second,  Third  and  Fourth  Books  .     131 

PREFACE  by  the  Author  of  '  Hesperus  '  .        .        .133 

BOOK   II. 

CHAPTER  V. 

The  Broom  and  the  Besom  as  Passion  Implements  —  The  Im- 
\  ortance  of  a  Bookwriter  —  Diplomatic  Negotiations  and  Dis- 
cussions on  the  subject  of  Candle  Snuffing  —  The  Pewter 
Cupboard  —  Domestic  Hardships  and  Enjoyments         .         .139 

CHAPTER  VI. 

Matrimonial  Jars —  Extra  Leaflet  on  the  Loquacity  of  Women  — 
More  Pledging— The  Mortar  and  the  Snuff-mill — A  Scholar's 
Kiss  —  On  the  Consolations  of  Humanity     ....     171 

Continuation  and  Conclusion  of  Chapter  VI. 

The  Checked  Calico  Dress  —  More  Pledges  —  Christian  Neglect 
of  the  Study  of  Judaism  —  A  Helping  Arm  (of  Leather) 
stretched  forth  from  the  Clouds  —  The  Auction    .        .         .190 

CHAPTER  VII. 

The  Shooting-Match  —  Rosa's  Autumnal  Campaign  —  Considera- 
tions concerning  Curses,  Kisses,  and  the  Militia  .         .        .210 


CONTENTS.  Xlll 

CHAPTER  VIII. 

PAGE 

Scruples  as  to  Payment  of  Debts — The  Rich  Pauper's  Sunday 
Throne-ceremonial  —  Artificial  Flowers  on  the  Grave  —  New 
Thistle  Seedlings  of  Contention 243 

JHrst  JFIoincr  $)uce. 
The  Dead  Christ  proclaims  that  there  is  no  God       .         .        .     259 

isrconti  jFlofoer  ffitct. 
A  Dream  within  a  Dream .    265 


BOOK  III. 

CHAPTER  IX. 

A  Potato  War  with  Women — and  with  Men  —  A  Walk  in 
December  —  Tinder  for  Jealousy  —  A  War  of  Succession  on 
the  subject  of  a  piece  of  checked  calico  —  Rupture  with  Stiefel 
—  Sad  Evening  Music        .         .         ...         .         .     271 

CHAPTER  X. 

A  Lonely  New- Year's  Day — The  Learned  Schalaster  —  Wooden- 
leg  of  Appeal  —  Chamber  Postal  Delivery  —  The  11th  of 
February,  and  Birth-day  of  the  year  1786    ....    312 

CHAPTER  XI. 

Leibgeber's  Disquisition  on  Fame — Firmian's  "  Evening  Paper  "    335 

CHAPTER  XII. 

The  Flight  out  of  Egypt  — The  Glories  of  Travel  -^  The  Un» 
known  —  Bayreuth  —  Baptism  in  a  Storm  —  Nathalie  and  the 
Hermitage  —  The  most  important  Conversation  in  all  this 
Book  —  An  Evening  of  Friendship      .....    347 

CHAPTER  XIIL 

A  Clock  of  Human  Beings  —  A  Cold  Shoulder  —  The  Venner        879 


XIV  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER  XIV. 

PAOB 

A  lever's  Dismissal  —  Fantaisie  —  The  Child  with  the  Bouquet 
—  The  Eden  of  the  Night,  and  the  Angel  at  the  Gate  of 
Paradise 391 

JHrst  JFruit  tyicct. 

Letter  of  Dr.  Victor  to  Cato  the  Elder,  on  the  Conversion  of  I 
into  T7*ou,  He,  She,  Ye,  and  They ;  or  the  Feast  of  Kindness 
of  the  20th  March 408 

Postscript  by  Jean  Paul 425 


BOOK    IV. 


CHAPTER  XV. 
Rosa  ron  Meyern —  Tone-Echoes  and  After- Breezes  from  the 
loveliest  of  all  Nights  —  Letters  of  Nathalie  and  Firmian — 
Table-talk  by  Leibgeber 433 

CHAPTER  XVI. 

The  Homeward  Journey,  with  all  its  Pleasures  —  The  Arrival  at 
Home       .         •         .         .         ■         .         .         .         .         .     451 

CHAPTER  XVII. 

The  Butterfly  Rosa  in  the  Form  of  Mining  Caterpillar  —  Thorn- 
crowns,  and  Thistle-heads  of  Jealousy         ....     457 

CHAPTER  XVIII. 

After-Summer  of  Marriage — Preparations  for  Death         .         .     4(38 

CHAPTER  XIX. 

The  Apparition  —  Homrooming  of  the  Storms  in  August,  or  the 
last  Quarrel  —  The  Raiment  of  the  Children  of  Israel  .         .     471 

CHAPTER  XX. 

Apoplexy — The  President  of  the  Board  of  Health — The  Notary- 
Public  —  The  last  Will  and  Testament  —  The  Knight's  Move 
—  Revel,  the  Morning  Preacher  —  The  Second  Apoplectic 
Attack     .         .         .         .         .         .         .  .         .     484 


CONTENTS.  XV 


CHAPTER  XXI. 


PAGE 


Dr.  (Elhafen  and  Medical  Boot  and  Shoemaking  —  The  Burial 
Society  —  A  Deaths  Head  in  the  Saddle  —  Frederick  II.  and 
his  Funeral  Oration 505 

CHAPTER  XXII. 

Journey  through  Fantaisie  —  Re-union  on  the  Bindlocher  Moun- 
tain —  Berneck  —  Man-doubling  —  Gefreea  —  Exchange  of 
Clothes  —  Miinchberg  —  Solo-whistling  —  Hof —  The  Stone 
of  Gladness  and  Double-parting  .....     515 

CHAPTER  XXIII. 

Days  in  Vaduz  —  Nathalie's  Letter  —  A  New  Year's  Wish  — 
Wilderness  of  Destiny  and  the  Heart  ....     533 

CHAPTER  XXIV. 

News  from  Kuhschnappel  —  Woman's  Anticlimax  —  Opening  of 
the  Seventh  Seal 513 

CHAPTER  XXV.,  AND  LAST. 

The  Journey— The  Churchyard  —  The  Spectre  —  The  End  of 
the  Trouble,  and  of  the  Book     ......     553 


PEEFACE, 


WITH  WHICH  I  WAS  OBLIGED  TO  PUT  JACOB  OEHRMANN,  GENERAL 
DEALER,  TO  SLEEP,  BECAUSE  I  WISHED  TO  NARRATE  THE 
"DOG  POST  DAYS"*  AND  THESE  PRESENT  "FLOWER-PIECES," 
&C,  &C,  TO  HIS  DAUGHTER. 

On  Christmas  Eve  of  1794,  when  I  came  from  the  pub- 
lishers of  the  two  works  in  question,  and  from  Berlin,  to 
the  town  of  Scheerau,  I  went  straight  from  the  mail 
coach  to  the  house  of  Mr.  Jacob  Oehrmann  (whose  law 
affairs  I  had  formerly  attended  to),  having  with  me  letters 
from  Yienna  which  might  be  of  considerable  service  to 
him.  A  child  can  see  at  a  glance  that  at  that  time  there 
was  no  idea  of  anything  connected  with  such  a  matter  as 
a  Preface  in  my  head.  It  was  very  cold — being  the  24th 
of  December — the  street  lamps  were  lighted,  and  I  was 
frozen  as  stiff  as  the  fawn  which  had  been  my  fellow- 
passenger  (a  "  blind  "  one  |),  by  the  coach.  In  the  shop 
itself,  which  was  full  of  draughts  and  other  kinds  of  wind, 
it  was  impossible  for  a  preface-maker  of  any  sense,  such  as 
myself,  to  set  to  work,  because  there  was  a  young  lady 
preface-maker  —  Oehrmann's  daughter  and  shop-girl  — 
already  at  work  making  oral  prefaces  to  the  little  books 
she  was  selling — Christmas  almanacs  of  the  best  of  all 
kinds—  duodecimo  books,  printed  on  unsized  paper  indeed, 
but  full  of  real  fragments  of  the  golden  and  silver  ages — 
I  mean,  the  little  books  of  mottoes,  all  gold  and  silver 
leaf,  with  which  the  blessed  Christmas  gilds  its  gifts  like 
the  autumn,  or  silvers  them  over  like  the  winter.  I  don't 
blame  the  poor  shop-wench  that,  besieged  as  she  was  by 

*  The  chapters  in  one  of  the  author's  books  are  called  "  Dog  Post 
Da3'8,"  for  a  reason  therein  explained. 

t  This  means,  in  German,  one  who  pays  no  fare.  Puns  which  are 
not  translatable  must  be  "  explained,"  or  else  the  sentence  left  out. 


2  PREFACE. 

such  a  crowd  of  Christmas  Eve  customers,  she  hardly 
had  a  nod  to  throw  at  me,  old  acquaintance  as  I  was ; 
and,  although  I  had  only  that  moment  arrived  from  Berlin, 
she  showed  me  in  to  her  father  at  once. 

All  was  in  a  glow  in  there,  Jacob  Oehrmann  as  well  as 
bis  counting-house.  He,  too,  was  sitting  over  a  book,  not 
as  a  preface-maker,  however,  but  as  a  registrator  and 
epitomator ;  he  was  balancing  his  ledger.  He  had  added 
up  his  balance-sheet  twice  over  already,  but,  to  his  horror, 
the  credit  side  was  always  a  Swiss  oertlein  (that  is,  13$ 
kreuzers,  Zurich  currency)  more  than  the  debit  side.  The 
man's  attention  was  wholly  fixed  upon  the  driving-wheel  of 
the  calculating  machine  inside  his  head ;  he  hardly  noticed 
me,  well  as  he  knew  me,  and  though  I  had  Vienna  letters. 
To  mercantile  people,  who,  like  the  carriers  they  employ, 
are  at  home  all  the  world  over,  and  to  whom  the  remotest 
trading  powers  are  daily  sending  ambassadors  and  envoy6s, 
namely,  commercial  travellers — to  them,  I  say,  it  makes 
little  difference  whether  it  be  Berlin,  Boston,  or  Byzance, 
that  one  happens  to  arrive  from. 

Being  well  accustomed  to  this  commercial  indifference 
to  fellow  mortals,  I  stood  quietly  by  the  fire,  and  had  my 
thoughts,  which  shall  here  be  made  the  reader's  property. 

1  cogitated,  as  I  stood  at  the  fire,  on  the  subject  of  the 
public  in  general,  and  found  that  I  could  divide  it,  like 
man  himself,  into  three  parts — into  the  Buying-public, 
the  Reading-public,  and  the  Art-public,  just  as  speculative 
persons  have  assumed  that  man  consists  of  Body,  Soul, 
and  Spirit.  The  Body,  or  Buying-public,  which  consists 
of  scholars  by  trade,  professional  teachers,  and  people  en- 
gaged in  business — that  true  corpus  callomm  of  the  German 
empire — buys  and  uses  the  very  biggest  and  most  corpulent 
books  (works  of  body),  and  deals  with  them  as  women 
do  with  cookery  books,  it  opens  them  and  consults  them 
in  order  to  be  guided  by  them.  In  the  eyes  of  this  class 
the  world  contains  two  kinds  of  utter  idiots,  differing 
from  each  other  only  in  the  direction  taken  by  their 
crack-brained  fancies,  those  of  the  one  going  too  much 
downward,  those  of  the  other  too  much  upward ;  in  a 
word,  philosophers  and  poets.  Naudaeus,  in  his  '  Enume- 
ration of  the  Learned   Men  who  were  supposed  to  be 


PREFACE.  3 

Necromancers  in  the  Middle  Ages,'  has  admirably  re- 
marked that  this  never  was  the  case  with  jurists  or 
theologians,  but  always  with  philosophers.  It  is  the  case 
to  this  day  with  the  wise  of  the  world,  only  that,  the  noble 
idea  of"  wizard  "  and  "  witchmaster," — whose  spiritus  rector 
and  grand  master  seems  to  have  been  the  devil  himself — 
having  got  degraded  to  a  name  applied  to  great  and  clever 
men  and  conjurors,  the  philosopher  must  be  content  to 
put  up  with  the  latter  signification  of  the  term.  Poets 
are  in  a  more  pitiable  case  still;  the  philosopher  is  a 
member  of  the  fourth  faculty,  has  recognised  official  posi- 
tions— can  lecture  on  his  own  subjects;  but  the  poet  is 
nothing  at  all,  holds  no  state  appointment — (if  he  did  he 
would  no  longer  be  "  born,"  he  would  be  "  made  "  by  the 
Imperial  Chancery),  and  people  who  can  criticise  him  and 
pass  their  opinions  upon  him  throw  it  in  his  teeth  without 
ceremony  that  he  makes  plentiful  use  of  expressions  which 
are  current  neither  in  commerce,  nor  in  synodal  edicts, 
nor  in  general  regulations,  nor  in  decisions  of  the  high 
court  of  justiciary,  nor  in  medical  opinions  or  histories  of 
diseases — and  that  he  visibly  walks  on  stilts,  is  turgid  and 
bombastic,  and  never  copious  enough  or  condensed  enough. 
At  the  same  time,  I  at  once  admit  that,  in  the  rank  thus 
assigned  to  the  poet,  he  is  treated  very  much  as  the  night- 
ingale was  by  Linnaaus,  which  (as  he  was  not  taking  its 
song  into  account)  he,  no  doubt  properly,  classed  among 
the  funny,  jerking  water-wagtails. 

The  second  part  of  the  public,  the  Soul,  the  Eeading- 
public,  is  composed  of  girls,  lads,  and  idle  persons  in 
general.  I  shall  praise  it  in  the  sequel;  it  reads  us  all, 
at  any  rate,  and  skips  obscure  pages,  where  there's 
nothing  but  talk  and  argument,  sticking,  like  a  just  and 
upright  judge,  or  historical  inquirer,  to  matters  of  pure 
fact. 

The  Art-public,  the  Spirit,  I  might,  perhaps,  leave 
altogether  out  of  consideration  ;  the  few  who  have  a  taste, 
not  only  for  all  kinds  of  taste,  and  for  the  taste  of  all 
nations,  but  for  higher,  almost  cosmopolitan  beauties,  such 
as  Herder,  Goethe,  Lessing,  Wieland  and  one  or  two  more 
— an  author  has  little  need  to  trouble  himself  about  their 
votes,  they  are  in  such  a  minority,  and  moreover,  they 

b  2 


4  PREFACE. 

don't  read  him.  At  all  events,  they  don't  deserve  the 
dedication  with  which  I,  at  the  fireside,  came  to  the  con- 
clusion that  I  would  bribe  the  great  Buying-public,  which 
is,  of  course,  what  keeps  the  book  trade  going.  I  resolved, 
in  fact,  regularly  to  dedicate  my  •  Hesperus,'  or  the  '  Kuh- 
hchnappler  Siebenkaes,'  to  Jacob  Oehrmann ;  and  through 
him,  as  it  were,  to  the  Buying-public.  To  wit,  in  this 
way  :— 

Jacob  Oehrmann  is  not  a  man  to  be  despised,  I  can 
tell  you.  He  served  as  porter  of  the  Stock  Exchange  in 
Amsterdam  for  four  years,  and  rang  the  Exchange  bell 
from  11.45  till  12  o'clock.  Soon  after  this,  by  scraping 
and  pinching,  he  became  a  "pretty  rich  house"  (though 
he  kept  a  very  poor  one),  and  rose  to  the  dignity  of  seal- 
keeper  of  a  whole  collection  of  knightly  seals  pasted  on  to 
noble,  escheated,  promises  to  pay.  True,  like  celebrated 
authors,  he  assumed  no  municipal  offices,  preferring  to  do 
nothing  but  write ;  but  the  town  militia  of  Scheerau, 
whose  hearts  are  always  in  the  right  place  (that  is  to  say, 
the  safest),  and  who  bravely  exhibit  themselves  to  passing 
troops  as  a  watchful  corps  of  observation,  insisted  upon 
making  him  their  captain,  though  he  would  have  been 
quite  content  to  have  been  nothing  but  their  cloth  con- 
tractor. He  is  honest  enough,  particularly  in  his  dealings 
with  the  mercantile  world;  and,  far  from  burning  the 
laws  of  the  Church,  like  Luther,  all  he  burns  even  of  the 
municipal  law  is  a  title  or  two  of  the  Seventh  Command- 
ment, indeed,  he  only  makes  a  beginnirig  at  burning  them, 
as  the  Vienna  censorship  does  with  prohibited  books ;  and 
even  this  only  in  the  cases  of  carriers,  debtors,  and  people 
of  rank.  Before  a  man  of  this  stamp  I  can,  without  any 
qualms  of  conscience,  burn  a  little  sweet-smelling  incense, 
and  make  his  Dutch  face  appear  magnified,  to  some  extent, 
like  a  spectre's  through  magic  vapour. 

Now  I  thought  I  should  portray,  in  his  likeness,  some 
of  the  more  striking  features  of  the  great  Buying-public ; 
for  he  is  a  sort  of  portable  miniature  of  it — like  itself,  he 
cares  only  for  bread-studies,  and  beer-studies,  for  no  talk 
but  table-talk,  no  literature  but  politics — he  knows  that 
the  magnet  was  only  created  to  hold  up  his  shop-door  key 
if  he  chooses  to  stick  it  on  to  it — the  tourmaline  only  to 


PREFACE.  5 

collect  his  tobacco  ashes,  his  daughter  Pauline  to  take  the 
place  of  both  (although  she  attracts  stronger  things,  and 
with  greater  attractive  power  than  either) — he  knows  no 
higher  thing  in  the  world  than  bread,  and  detests  the 
town  painter,  who  uses  it  to  rub  out  pencil  marks  with. 
He  and  his  three  sons,  who  are  immured  in  three  of  the 
Hanse  towns,  read  or  write  no  other,  and  no  less  impor- 
tant, books  than  the  waste-book  and  the  ledger. 

"  May  I  be  d — d,"  thought  T,  as  I  was  warming  myself 
at  the  stove,  "  if  I  can  paint  the  Buying-public  to  greater 
perfection  than  under  the  name  of  Jacob  Oehrmann,  who 
is  but  a  twig,  or  fibre,  of  it ;  but  then  it  couldn't  possibly 
know  what  I  meant "  it  occurred  to  me ;  and  on  account  of 
this  error  in  my  calculations,  I  have  to-day  hit  upon  quite 
another  plan. 

Just  as  I  had  committed  my  error  the  daughter  came  in, 
rectified  her  father's,  and  brought  out  the  balance  cor- 
rectly. Oehrmann  looked  at  me  now,  and  became  to  some 
extent  conscious  of  my  existence ;  and,  on  my  presenting 
the  Vienna  epistles  by  way  of  credentials  (epistles  of  this 
kind  are  more  to  him  than  poetical,  or  St.  Pauline,  epistles) 
— from  being  a  mere  fresco  figure  on  the  wall,  as  I  had 
been  up  to  that  time,  I  became  a  something  possessed  of  a 
mind  and  a  stomach,  and  I  was  asked  (together  with  the 
latter)  to  stay  to  supper. 

Now,  although  the  critics  may  set  all  the  cliques  and 
circles  of  Germany  about  my  ears — aye,  and  have  a  new 
Turkish  bell  cast  specially  for  the  purpose — I  mean  to 
make  a  clean  breast  of  it  here,  and  state  in  plain  words 
that  it  was  solely  on  account  of  the  daughter  that  I  came, 
and  that  I  stayed,  there.  I  knew  that  the  darling  would 
have  read  all  my  recent  books,  if  the  old  man  had  given 
her  time  to  do  it ;  and  for  that  very  reason  it  was  impos- 
sible for  me  to  blink  the  fact  that  it  was  incumbent  upon 
me  as  a  simple  duty  to  talk,  if  not  to  sing,  her  father  to 
sleep,  and  then  tell  his  daughter  all  that  I  had  been  telling 
the  world,  though  the  agency  of  the  press.  This,  as  of 
course  you  perceive,  was  why  I  usually  came  there  to 
have  a  talk  on  the  evenings  of  his  foreign  mail  days,  when 
it  didn't  take  much  to  put  him  to  sleep. 


6  PREFACE. 

On  the  Christmas  Eve,  then,  what  I  had  to  do  was  to 
condense  and  abridge  my  "  45  Dog  Post  Days  "  into  the 
space  of  about  the  same  number  of  minutes;  a  longish 
business,  rendering  a  sleep  of  no  brief  duration  necessary. 

I  wish  Messrs.  the  Editors  and  Reviewers,  who  find 
much  to  blame  in  this  proceeding  of  mine,  could  have  just 
sat  down,  for  once  in  their  lives,  on  the  sofa  beside  my 
namesake  Johanna  Paulina  ;  they  would  have  related  to 
her  most  of  my  biographical  histories  in  those  cleverly 
epitomised  forms  in  which  they  communicate  them  in 
their  magazines  and  papers  to  audiences  of  a  very  different 
type.  They  would  have  been  beside  themselves  with 
rapture  at  the  truth  and  felicity  of  her  remarks,  at  the 
natural,  unaffected,  simplicity  and  sincerity  of  her  manner, 
at  the  innocence  of  her  heart,  and  at  her  lively  sense  of 
humour,  and  they  would  have  taken  hold  of  her  hand,  and 
cried  '•  let  the  author  treat  us  to  comedies  half  as  delicious 
as  this  one  which  is  sitting  beside  us  now,  and  he  is  the 
man  for  us."  Indeed,  had  these  gentlemen,  the  editors 
and  reviewers,  got  to  know  a  little  more  than  they  do  about 
the  art  of  briefly  extracting  the  pith  and  marrow  of  a  book, 
and  had  they  been  able  to  move  Pauline  just  a  little  more 
than  I  think  such  great  critical  functionaries  could  be 
expected  to  do  ;  and  had  they  then  seen,  or  more  properly, 
nearly  lost  sight  of,  that  gentle  face  of  hers  as  it  melted 
away  in  a  dew  of  tears  (because  girls  and  gold  are  the 
softer  and  the  more  impressionable  the  purer  they  are),  and 
had  they,  as  of  course  they  would  have  done,  in  the 
heavenliness  of  their  emotion,  well-nigh  clean  forgotten 

themselves,  and  the  snoring  father 

*  *  *  *  * 

Good  gracious !    I  have  got  into  a  tremendous  state  over 
it  myself,  and  shall  keep  the  preface  till  to-morrow.     It  is 

clear  that  it  must  be  gone  on  with  in  a  calmer  mood. 

***** 

I  thought  I  might  take  it  for  granted  that  the  master 
of  the  house  would  have  tired  himself  so  much  with  letter- 
writing  on  the  Christmas  Eve,  that  all  that  would  be 
wanted  to  put  him  to  sleep  would  be  some  person  who 
should  hasten  the  process  by  talking  in  a  long-winded  and 
tedious  style.      I  considered  myself  to  be  that  person. 


PREFACE.  7 

However,  at  first,  while  supper  was  going  on,  I  only 
introduced  subjects  which  he  would  understand.  While 
he  was  plying  his  spoon  and  fork,  and  till  grace  had  been 
said,  a  sleep  of  any  duration  was  more  than  could  be 
expected  of  him.  Wherefore  I  entertained  him  with  matter 
of  interest  and  amusement,  such  as  my  blind  fellow- 
passenger  (the  fawn),  one  or  two  stoppages  of  payment — 
my  opinions  on  the  French  War,  and  the  high  prices  of 
everything — that  Frederick  Street,  Berlin,  was  half  a  mile 
in  length — that  there  was  great  freedom,  both  of  the  press 
and  of  trade,  in  that  city.  I  also  mentioned  that  in  most 
parts  of  Germany  which  I  had  visited,  I  had  found  that  the 
beggar  boys  were  the  "revising  barristers"  of  and  "lodgers 
of  appeals"  against  the  newspaper  writers;  that  is  to  say, 
that  the  newspaper  makers  bring  to  life,  with  their  ink,  the 
people  who  are  killed  in  battle,  and  arc  able  to  avail  them- 
selves of  these  resurrected  ones  in  the  next  "  affaire ; "  whilst 
the  soldiers'  children,  on  the  other  hand,  like  to  kill  their 
fathers  and  then  beg  upon  the  lists  of  killed :  they  shoot 
their  fathers  dead  for  a  halfpenny  each,  and  the  newspaper 
evangelists  bring  them  to  life  again  for  a  penny.  And 
thus  these  two  classes  of  the  community  are,  in  a  beautiful 
manner,  by  reciprocity  of  lying,  the  one  the  antidote  to  the 
other.  This  is  the  reason  why  neither  a  newspaper  writer, 
nor  an  orthographer,  can  strictly  adhere  to  Klopstock's 
orthographical  rule,  only  to  write  what  you  hear. 

When  the  cloth  was  off,  I  saw  that  it  was  time  for  me  to  set 
my  foot  to  work  at  the  rocking  of  Captain  Oehrmann's  cradle. 
M y '  Hesperus '  is  too  big  a  book.  On  other  occasions  I  should 
have  had  time  enough.  On  these  occasions  all  I  had  to  do  to 
get  the  great  Dutch  tulip  to  close  its  petals  in  sleep  was,  to 
begin  with  wars  and  rumours  of  wars — then  introduce  the 
Law  of  Nature,  orrather  the  Lawsof  Nature,  seeing  that  every 
fair  and  every  war  provides  a  fresh  supply — from  this  point 
I  had  but  a  short  step  to  arrive  at  the  most  sublime  axioms 
of  moral  science,  thus  dipping  the  merchant  before  he  knew 
where  he  was  into  the  deepest  centre  of  the  health-giving 
mineral  well  of  truth.  Or  I  lighted  up  sundry  new  systems 
(of  my  own  invention),  held  them  under  his  nose,  attacked 
and  refuted  them,  benumbing  and  narcotising  him  with 
the  smoke  till  he  fell  down  benseless.   Then  came  freedom  I 


8  PREFACE. 

Then  his  daughter  and  I  would  open  the  window  to  the 
stars  and  the  flowers  outside,  while  I  placed  hefore  the 
poor  famished  soul  a  rich  supply  of  the  loveliest  poetical 
honey-bearing  blossoms.  Such  had  been  my  process  on 
previous  occasions.  But  this  evening  I  took  a  shorter 
path.  As  soon  as  grace  was  said,  I  got  as  near  as  I  could 
to  complete  unintelligibility,  and  proposed  to  the  house  of 
business  of  Oehrmann's  soul  (his  body)  the  following 
query :  whether  there  were  not  more  Kartewans  than 
Newtonists  among  the  princes  of  Germany.  "  I  do  not 
mean  as  regards  ihe  animal  world,"  I  continued  slowly 
and  tediously.  "  Kartesius,  as  we  know,  is  of  opinion 
that  the  animals  are  insentient  machines,  and  conse- 
quently, man,  the  noblest  of  animals,  would  be  im- 
properly comprehended  in  this  dictum ;  what  my  meaning 
is,  and  what  I  want  to  know,  is  this — do  not  the  majority 
(of  the  princes  of  Germany)  consider  that  the  essentiality 
of  a  realm  consists  in  Extension,  as  Kartesius  holds  that 
of  matter  to  do,  only  the  minority  of  them  holding,  as 
Newton  (a  greater  man)  does  of  matter,  that  its  essentiality 
consists  in  Solidity." 

He  terrified  me  by  answering  with  the  greatest  liveli- 
ness, and  as  broad  awake  as  you  please,  "  There  are  only 
two  of  them  that  can  pay  their  way — the  Prince  of 
Flachsenfingen  and  the  Prince  of " 

At  this  point  his  daughter  placed  a  basket  of  clothes 
come  from  the  wash  upon  the  table,  and  a  little  box 
of  letters  upon  the  basket,  and  set  to  work  printing  her 
brothers'  names  at  full  length  upon  their  shirts.  As  she 
took  out  of  the  basket  a  tall  white  festival  tiara  for  her 
father,  and  took  away  from  him  the  base  Saturday  cowl 
which  he  had  on,  I  was  incited  to  become  as  obscure  and 
as  long-winded  as  the  night-cap  and  my  own  designs 
called  upon  me  to  be. 

Now,  as  there  is  nothing  about  which  he  is  so  utterly 
indifferent  as  my  books,  and  polite  literature  in  all  its 
branches,  I  determined  to  settle  him,  once  for  all,  with 
this  detested  stuff.  I  succeeded  in  pumping  out  what 
follows. 

"  I  almost  fear,  Captain,  that  yon  must  have  rather 
wondered  that  I  have  never  enabled  you  to  make  acquaint- 


PREFACE.  9 

ance  in  anything  like  a  very  detailed  or  explicit  manner 
with  my  two  latest  opuscula,  or  little  works  ;  the  elder 
of  the  two  is,  curiously  enough,  called  '  Dog  Post  Days,' 
and  the  later  '  Flower-pieces.'  Perhaps,  if  I  just  give  you 
a  slight  idea  to-night  of  the  principal  points  of  my  forty-five 
Dog  Post  Days,  and  then  fetch  up  with  the  Flower-pieces 
this  day  week,  I  shall  he  doing  a  little  towards  making 
amends  for  my  negligence.  Of  course,  it's  my  fault  alone, 
and  nohody  else's,  if  you  find  yon  don't  quite  know  what 
the  first  of  the  two  may  he  about — whether  you  are  to 
suppose  it  to  he  a  work  on  heraldry  or  on  insects — or  a 
dictionary  of  some  particular  dialect — or  an  ancient 
codex — or  a  Lexicon  Homericum — or  a  collection  of 
inaugural  disputations — or  a  ready  reckoner — or  an 
epic  poem — or  a  volume  of  funeral  sermons.  It  really  is 
nothing  hut  an  interesting  story,  with  threads  of  all  the 
ahove  subjects  woven  into  it,  however.  I  should  he  very 
glad  myself,  Captain,  if  it  were  better  than  it  is ;  and 
particularly  I  wish  it  were  written  with  that  degree  of 
lucidity  that  one  could  half  read  it,  and  half  compose  it 
even,  in  his  sleep.  I  do  not  know,  Captain,  quite  what 
your  canons  of  criticism  may  he,  and  hence  I  cannot  say 
whether  your  taste  is  British  or  Greek.  I  must  admit 
that  I  shrewdly  suspect  that  it  is  not  much  in  the  hook's 
favour  that  there  are  parts  of  it  to  he  found — I  hope  not 
very  many — in  which  there  are  more  meanings  than  one, 
of  all  kinds  of  metaphors  and  flowery  styles  hashed  up 
together,  or  an  outside  semblance  of  gravity  with  no  reality 
behind  it,  but  only  mere  fun  (you  see  Germans  insist  upon 
a  businesslike  style),  and  (which  I  am  most  of  all  afraid 
is  the  case),  though  the  book  is  of  some  considerable  extent, 
my  attempts  at  imitating  the  romances  of  chivalry  so 
popular  in  the  present  day  (which  so  often  seem  as  if  they 
really  must  have  been  written  by  the  old  artless  knights 
themselves,  fellows  who  were  better  at  wielding  the  heavy 
two-handed  sword  than  the  light  goose  quill) — that  my 
attempts,  I  say,  at  imitating  these  romances  have  scarcely 
been  attended  with  that  amount  of  success  at  which  I  have 
aimed  at  attaining.  Perhaps,  too,  I  might  oftener  have 
offended  the  modesty  and  the  ears  of  the  ladies,  as  many 
men  of  the  world  have  thought  I  might ;  for,  indeed,  books 


10  PREFACE. 

which  do  not  offend  the  ears  of  the  great — but  only  those 
of  the  chaste — are  not  considered  the  most  objectionable." 

I  saw  here,  when  too  late,  that.  I  had  struck  on  a  subjeot 
which  enlivened  him  up  prodigiously.  I  did,  indeed, 
instantly  make  a  jump  to  a  quite  different  topic,  saying, 
"it  is  probably  the  safest  way  of  all,  to  have  improper 
books  deposited  in  public  libraries,  where  the  librarians  are 
of  the  usual  type,  because  the  rudeness  of  their  manners 
and  their  disagreeable  behaviour,  does  more  to  prevent 
these  books  from  being  read  than  an  edict  of  the  censor- 
ship." But  Jacobus  would  speak  out  his  thought,  "  Pauline, 
don't  let  me  forget  that  the  woman  Stenzin  hasn't  paid 
her  fine  yet." 

It  was  uncommonly  annoying  that,  just  when  I  got 
sleep  lured  on  to  within  a  step  or  two  of  him,  the  Captain 
should  all  of  a  sudden  draw  his  trigger  and  let  off  a  thing 
calculated  to  blow  all  my  sleeping  powder  to  the  four 
winds  of  heaven.  There  is  nobody  more  difficult  to  weary 
than  a  person  who  wearies  everybody  else.  I  would 
rather  undertake  to  weary  out  a  lady  who  happens  to  have 
nothing  to  do  in  five  minutes'  time,  than  a  man  of  business 
in  as  many  hours. 

Pauline,  the  darling,  anxious  to  hear  the  stories  which  I 
had  accompanied  in  manuscript  to  Berlin,  put  slowly  into 
my  hand  one  by  one  the  following  letters  from  her  letter- 
box :  "  Story  " — i.  e.  she  wanted  to  be  told  the  "  Dog  Post 
Days  "  that  evening. 

So  I  set  to  work  again,  and,  with  a  sigh,  began  in  this 
way  :  "  The  fact  is,  Mr.  Oehrmann,  that  your  humble 
servant  here  will  soon  be  setting  letters  of  this  sort  flying 
about  in  Berlin,  by  his  new  book,  and  my  "  Post  Days  "  may 
be  printed  on  shirts  quite  as  fine  as  those  your  sons'  names 
sire  being  printed  upon,  if  the  people  happen  to  have  made 
their  paper  from  such.  But,  indeed,  I  must  admit  to  you 
that  as  I  was  sitting  on  the  coach  on  my  way  to  Berlin, 
with  my  right  foot  under  my  manuscripts,  and  my  left 
beneath  a  bale  of  petitions  on  their  way  to  the  Prince  of 
Scheeran,  with  the  army,  the  only  thing  1  had  in  the  way 
of  a  comforting  thought  was  this  very  natural  one,  'Devil 
make  a  better  of  it  all  I'  Only  he's  just  the  very  last 
person  to  do  it.     For,  good  heavens!  in  an  age  like  this 


PKEFACE.  1 1 

present  age  of  ours,  when  the  instruments  of  universal 
"world  history  are  only  being  tuned  in  the  orchestra  before 
the  concert  begins,  that  is  to  say,  are  all  grumbling  and 
squeaking  together  in  confusion  (which  was  why  on  one 
occasion  the  tuning  of  the  orchestra  pleased  a  Morocco 
Ambassador  at  Vienna  much  better  than  the  opera  itself) 
— in  such  an  age,  when  it  is  so  hard  to  tell  the  coward 
from  the  brave  man — him  who  lets  everything  go  as  it 
pleases  from  him  who  strives  to  do  something  great  and 
good — those  who  are  withering  up  from  those  who  are 
flourishing  and  promising  fruit,  just  as  in  winter  the 
fruit-bearing  trees  look  much  the  same  as  the  dead  ones — 
in  such  an  age,  there  is  only  one  consolation  for  an  author, 
one  which  I  have  not  yet  spoken  of  to-night,  and  it  is  this  : 
that,  after  all,  though  it  be  an  age  in  which  the  nobler 
kinds  of  virtue,  love,  and  freedom,  are  the  rarest  of 
Phoenixes  and  birds  of  the  sun,  he  can  manage  to  put  up 
with  it,  and  can  go  on  drawing  vivid  pictures  and  writing 
lively  descriptions  of  all  the  birds  in  question,  until  they 
wing  their  way  to  us  in  the  body.  Doubtless,  when  the 
originals  of  the  pictures  have  fairly  come  and  taken  up 
their  abode  here  on  earth,  then  will  all  our  panegyrics  of 
them  be  out  of  place,  and  loathsome  to  the  palate,  and  a  mere 
threshing  of  empty  straw.  People  who  are  incapable  of 
business  can  work  for  the  press." 

"  There's  work,  and  there's  work,"  the  merchant,  wide 

awake,  struck  in;  "  it  all  depends Now  trade  keeps  a 

man ;  but  book-writing  isn't  much  better  than  spinning 
cotton,  and  spinning  is  next  door  to  begging — not  meaning 
anything  personal  to  yourself.  But  all  the  broken-down 
book-keepers  and  bankrupt  tradesmen  take  to  the  making 
of  books — arithmetic  books,  and  so  on." 

The  public  sees  what  a  poor  opinion  this  shopkeeper- 
captain  had  of  me,  because  my  business  was  only  the 
making  of  books,  though  in  old  days  I  had  been  con- 
tinually running  in  to  him  day  and  night,  as  notary 
depute,  for  the  protesting  of  bills.  I  know  the  sort  of 
view  many  people  take  of  the  convenances  of  society ;  but 
I  think  anyone  on  earth  will  consider  that,  after  being 
tr  ated  in  this  style,  I  was  to  be  excused  for  going  quite 
wild  on  the  spot,  and  responding  to  the  fellow's  imperii- 


12  PREFACE. 

nence,  although  he  was  no  longer  quite  in  his  five  sensea, 
in  no  less  formidable  a  manner  than  by  repeating,  accu- 
rately and  without  abridgment,  my  "extra  leaflets"  from 
my  '  Hesperus.' 

This,  of  course,  was  bound  to  put  him  to  death — sleep,  I 
mean. 

And  then  thousands  of  propitious  stars  arose  for  the 
daughter  and  the  author — then  commenced  our  feast  of 
unleavened  bread — then  I  could  sit  down  with  her  at  the 
front  window,  and  tell  her  all  that  which  the  public  has 
for  some  time  had  in  its  hands.  Truly  there  can  be 
nothing  sweeter  than  to  some  kind  tender  heart,  hemmed 
in  on  all  sides  and  besieged  by  sermons — which  cannot 
refresh  itself  at  so  much  as  a  birthday  ball,  were  it  only  the 
superintendent's  and  his  wife's,  nor  with  a  novel,  though 
its  author  be  the  family  legal  adviser :  to  such  a  beleaguered 
famishing  heart,  I  say,  it  is  more  delicious  than  virgin 
honey  to  march  up  with  a  strong  army  of  relief,  and, 
taking  hold  of  some  mesh  in  the  nun's  veil  which  is 
over  the  soul,  tear  it  wider,  let  her  peep  through  and 
look  out  at  the  glimmer  of  some  flowery  eastern  land — to 
wile  the  tears  of  her  dreams  to  her  waking  eyes — to  lift  her 
beyond  her  own  longings,  and  at  a  stroke  set  free  the  fond 
tender  heart,  long  heavy  with  yearning,  and  bound  in 
bitter  slavery — to  set  it  free,  and  to  rock  it  softly  up  and 
down  in  the  fresh  spring  breeze  of  poesy,  while  the  dewy 
warmth  gives  birth  to  flowers  therein  of  fairer  growth 
than  those  of  the  country  round. 

I  had  just  finished  by  one  o'clock.  I  had  taken  only 
three  hours  to  the  three  volumes  of  my  story,  because 
I  had  torn  out  all  the  "  extra  leaves."  "  If  the  father  is  the 
Buying-public,  the  daughter  is  the  Eeading-public,  and  we 
must  not  plague  her  with  anything  that's  not  purely 
historical,"  I  said,  and  sacrificed  my  most  precious  digres- 
sions, for  which,  moreover,  such  an  enchanting  neighbour- 
hood is  not  quite  the  proper  soil. 

Then  the  old  man  coughed,  got  up  from  his  chair,  asked 
what  o'clock  it  was,  wished  me  good  night,  and  opening 
the  door  saw  me  out  (thereby  depriving  me  of  a  good 
one),  and  saw  me  no  more  till  that  night  week,  on  New 
Year's  Eve. 


PREFACE.  13 

My  readers  wiL  remember  that  I  had  promised  to  come 
on  that  evening,  because  I  had  to  make  a  brief  report 
to  my  client  concerning  my  "  Flower-pieces  " — this  very 
book. 

I  assure  the  gentle  reader  that  I  shall  report  the  events 
of  the  evening  exactly  as  they  occurred. 

I  appeared  again,  then,  on  the  last  evening  of  the  year 
1794,  on  the  red  waves  of  which  so  many  bodies,  bled  to 
death,  were  borne  away  to  the  Ocean  of  Eternity.  My 
client  received  me  with  a  coldness  which  I  attributed 
partly  to  that  of  the  temperature  outside  (for  both  men 
and  wolves  are  most  ferocious  in  bard  frost),  partly  to  the 
Vienna  letters  which  I  had — not  with  me ;  and  on  the 
whole,  I  had  but  little  to  say  to  the  fellow  on  this  occasion. 
As,  besides,  I  was  going  to  leave  Scheerau  on  the 
New  Year's  Day  by  the  Thursday  coach,  and  was  very 
anxious  to  lay  before  my  dear  Pauline  some  more  Paulina, 
namely  these  sketches,  because  I  knew  that  whatever  other 
wares  she  might  find  upon  her  counter,  these  wouldn't  be 
among  them — I  consider  that  no  editor  who  has  any 
principles  whatever  can  possibly  get  into  a  passion  at  my 
having  duly  appeared.  Let  any  hot-headed  person  of  the  sort 
just  listen  to  the  plan  I  had.  I  wanted  first  to  give  to 
this  silent  soul-flower  the  Flower-pieces,  two  dreams  made 
of  flowers  put  together  mosaic-fashion — next  the  Thorn- 
pieces,*  from  which  I  had  to  break  away  the  thorns,  that 
is,  the  satires,  so  that  nothing  remained  but  a  mere  curious 
story — and  lastly,  the  Fruit-piece  was  to  be  served  up  last, 
as  it  is  in  the  book  itself,  by  way  of  dessert ;  and  in  thi? 
ripe  fruit  (from  which  I  had  previously  orally  expressed  all 
the  chilling  ice-apple  juice  of  philosophy,  which  the  press 
has,  however,  left  in)  I  meant  to  appear  at  the  end  of  the 
day,  myself  as  Appleworm.  This  would  have  led  by  easy 
steps  to  my  departure  or  farewell ;  for  I  did  not  know 
whether  I  should  ever  again  see  or  hear  of  Pauline,  this 
flower-polypus,  stretching  out  eyeless,  palpitating,  tenta- 
cula,  from  mere  instinct  towards  the  light.     With  the  old 

*  This  is  how  all  these  pieces  were  really  arranged  in  the  first,  un- 
improved edition ;  but  I  am  sure  Pauline  won't  be  offended  that,  in 
the  second  edition  (so  strikingly  improved)  I  have  adverted  more  to  the 
entire  German  empire,  and  arranged  them  very  differently.  . 


14  PREFACE. 

decayed  wood  on  which  the  polyp  was  blooming  I,  of 
course,  having  no  Vienna  letters,  had  little  to  do. 

But  near  as  it  was  to  the  time  for  wishing  new  year's 
wishes,  the  old  year  was  doomed  to  end  with  wishes 
unfulfilled. 

Yet  I  have  little  to  blame  myself  about ;  for,  as  soon  as 
ever  I  came  in,  I  did  my  best  to  tire  out  the  live  East  India 
House  and  put  him  to  sleep,  and  I  continued  to  do  so 
while  he  sat  there.  The  only  agreeable  remarks  I  made  to 
him  were,  that  when  he  had  said  some  insulting  things 
about  my  successor,  his  present  legal  adviser,  I  extended 
them  so  as  to  apply  them  to  the  legal  profession  in 
general,  thus  elevating  the  mere  pasquinade  into  the  nobler 
satire :  "  1  always  picture  lawyers  and  clients  as  two 
strings  of  people  with  buckets  or  purses  near  a  kind  of 
engine  for  quenching  money  thirst — the  one  row,  the  clients, 
always  passing  away  with  their  buckets,  or  purses,  empty, 
and  the  other  row  standing  and  handing  each  other  buckets 
or  purses  full,"  said  I. 

I  think  it  was  not  otherwise  than  on  purpose,  that  I 
painted  to  him  the  great  Buying-public  with  lineaments 
much  like  his  own — for  he  is  a  small  Buying-public,  only 
a  few  feet  long  and  broad.  In  fact,  I  made  on  him  an 
experiment  to  ascertain  what  the  Buying-public  itself 
would  t>ay  to  the  following  ideas. 

"  The  public  of  the  present  day,  Captain,  is  gradually 
getting  to  be  a  nourishing  North  India  Company,  and,  it 
seems  to  me,  it  will  soon  rival  the  Dutch,  amongst  whom 
butter  and  books  are  articles  of  export  trade  only ;  the  attio 
salt  they  have  a  taste  for,  is  that  which  Benkelszoon  used 
for  pickling  fish  with.  Though  they  have  provided 
Erasmus,  in  consideration  of  his  salt  (of  a  better  quality), 
with  a  statue  (he  never  ate  salt,  by  the  way),  yet  I  think 
this  was  excusable  in  them,  when  we  remember  that 
they  first  had  one  erected  to  the  fish-curer  in  question. 
Even  Campe,  who  by  no  means  classes  the  inventors  of  the 
spinning-wheel  and  of  Brunswick  beer  beneath  the  con- 
structors and  brewers  of  epic  poems,  will  coincide  with  me 
when  I  say  that  the  German  is  really  being  made  some- 
thing of  at  the  present  day ;  that  he  is  positively  becoming 
a  serious,  solid,  well-grounded  fellow — a  tradesman,  a  man 


PREFACE.  15 

}f  business;  a  man  getting  past  his  youthful  follies,  whc 
knows  edible  from  cogitable  matter  (when  he  sees  it),  and 
can  winnow  out  the  latter  from  the  former;  who  can 
distinguish  the  printer  from  the  publisher,  and  the  book- 
seller (as  the  more  important)  from  both ;  he  is  becoming 
a  speculative  individual  who,  like  the  hens  who  run  from 
a  harp  string  with  fox-gut,  can't  bear  the  noise  of  any 
poet's  harp  whatever,  were  it  strung  with  the  harper's 
own  heart-strings — and  who  will  soon  come  to  suffer  no 
pictorial  art  to  exist,  except  upon  bales  of  merchandise,* 
nor  any  printing  except  calico-printing." 

Here  I  saw,  to  my  amazement,  that  the  merchant 
was  asleep  ah-eady,  and  had  shut  the  window-shutters  of 
his  senses.  was  a  good  deal  annoyed  that  I  had  been 
standing  in  awe  of  him,  as  well  as  talking  to  him,  all  this 
time  unnecessarily  ;  I  had  been  playing  the  part  of  the 
Devil,  and  he  that  of  King  Solomon,  supposed  by  the  evil 
one  to  be  alive  when  he  was  dead.f 

Meantime,  with  the  view  of  not  waking  him  up  by  means 
of  a  sudden  change  of  key,  I  went  on  talking  to  him  as  if 
nothing  had  happened,  speaking  to  him  all  the  time  I  was 
slipping  away  from  him  further  and  further  towards  the 
window  with  an  exceedingly  gradual  diminuendo  of  my 
tone,  as  follows  : — "  And  of  such  a  public  as  this,  I  quite 
expect  that  a  time  will  come  when  it  will  value  shoe 
leather  much  above  altar  -  pieces,  J  and  that,  when 
the  moral  and  philosophical  credit  of  any  philosopher 
chances  to  be  in  question,  its  first  inquiry  of  all  will  be, 
•  is  the  fellow  solvent  ? '  And  further,  my  beloved  listener 
(I  continued  in  the  same  tone,  so  as  not  to  run  the  risk  of 
waking  the  sleeper  by  any  change  in  the  kind  of  sound),  it 

*  I  earnestly  beg  that  section  of  the  publio  the  description  of  whicn 
is  here  levelled  at  the  head  of  the  shopkeeper-captain  not  to  suppose 
it  is  meant  for  them ;  they  must  see  that  I  am  only  joking,  and  my 
intention,  of  course  is  dear. 

t  The  Koran  says,  the  devils  were  compelled  to  serve  and  obey 
Solomon.  After  his  death  he  was  stuffed,  and,  by  means  of  a  stick  in 
his  hand,  and  another  propping  him  up  about  the  os  coccygis,  kept  on 
such  an  apparent  footing  of  being  alive,  that  the  devils  themselves 
were  taken  in  by  it,  until  the  hinder  axis  of  him  was  eaten  by  worms, 
and  the  sovereign  rolled  over  topsy-turvy. — See  Boysen's  Koran  in 
MichaehV  '  Orient.  Bibl.'  %  Untranslatable  pun. 


16  PREFACE. 

is  to  be  hoped  and  expected  that  I  shall  now  have  an 
opportunity  of  going  through,  for  your  entertainment,  my 
Flower-pieces,  which  have  not  even  been  committed  to 
paper  as  yet,  and  which  I  can  quite  easily  finish  this 
evening,  if  he  (father  Jacobus)  will  have  the  goodness  to 
sleep  long  enough." 

I  commenced,  accordingly,  as  follows : — 

P.S. — But  it  would  be  too  utterly  ridiculous  altogether, 
if  I  were  to  have  the  whole  of  the  Flower  and  Thorn  pieces, 
which  are  all  in  the  book  itself,  printed  over  again  in  the 
preface !  At  the  end  of  book  the  first,  however,  I  shall 
give  the  continuation  and  conclusion  of  this  preface,  and 
of  the  New  Year's  Eve,  and  shall  then  go  on  with  the  second 
book,  so  that  it  may  be  ready  for  the  Easter  fair. 

Jean  Paul  Fr.  Richtkr. 
Hof,  1th  November,  1796. 


*  ■•  ■'  -' 


WEDDED  LIFE.  DEATH  AND  MARRIAGE 

OF 

F.  S.  SIEBENK^ES, 

VAEISH  ADVOCATE  IN  THE  KOTAL  BURGH  OF  KCHSCHNAPP8L. 


A  GENUINE  THOKN  PIECE. 


\*W*  Jfe 


CftttfftYiQ 


n. 


BOOK    I. 


CHAPTER  I. 

A  WEDDING  DAY,  SUCCEEDING  A  DAY  OF  RESPITE  —  THE  COUNTER- 
PARTS —  DISH  QUINTETTE  IN  TWO  COURSES  —  TABLE-TALK  — 
SIX  ARMS  AND  HANDS. 

Siebesk.es,  parish  advocate*  for  the  royal  borough  of 
Kuhschnappel,  had  spent  the  whole  of  Monday  at  his 
attic-window  watching  for  his  wife  that  was  to  be,  who 
had  been  expected  to  arrive  from  Augspurg  a  little  be- 
fore service-time,  so  as  to  get  a  sip  of  something  warm 
before  going  to  church  for  the  wedding. 

The  Schulrath  of  the  place,  happening  to  be  returning 
from  Augspurg,  had  promised  to  bring  the  bride  with  him 
as  return  cargo,  strapping  her  wedding  outfit  on  to  his 
trunk  behind. 

She  was  an  Augspurger  by  birth — only  daughter  of  the 
deceased  Engelkraut,  clerk  of  the  Lutheran  Council — and 
she  lived  in  the  Fuggery,  in  a  roomy  mansion  which  was 
probably  bigger  than  many  drawing-rooms  are.  She  was 
by  no  means  portionless,  for  she  lived  by  her  own  work, 
not  on  other  people's,  as  penisoned  court-ladies'-maids  do. 
She  had  all  the  newest  fashions  in  bonnets  and  other  head- 
gear in  her  hands  earlier  than  the  ricbest  ladies  of  the 
neighbourhood,  albeit  in  such  miniature  editions  that  not 
even  a  duck  could  have  got  them  on;  and  she  erected 

•  Or  "Poor's  Advocate"  (more  literally).  The  appointment  ac 
named,  exists,  or  lately  existed,  in  Scotland. 

c  2 


20  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  I. 

edifices  for  the  female  head  at  a  few  days'  notice,  on  a 
large  scale,  after  these  miniature  sketches  and  small-scale 
plans  of  them. 

All  that  Siebenkaes  did  during  his  long  wait  was  to 
depose  on  oath  (more  than  once)  that  it  was  the  devil 
who  invented  seeking,  and  his  grandmother  who  devised 
waiting.  At  length,  while  it  was  still  pretty  early,  came, 
not  the  bride,  but  a  night  post  from  Augspurg,  with  an 
epistle  from  the  Schulrath  to  say  that  he  and  the  lady 
"  could  not  possibly  arrive  before  Tuesday.  She  was  still 
busy  at  her  wedding-clothes,  and  he  in  the  libraries  of 
the  ex-Jesuits,  and  of  Privy  Councillor  Zopf,  and  (among 
the  antiquities)  at  the  city  gates." 

Siebenkaes's  butterfly-proboscis,  however,  fuund  plenty 
of  open  honey  cells  in  every  blue  thistle  blossom  of  his 
fate ;  he  could  now,  on  this  idle  Monday,  make  a  final 
application  of  the  arm  file  and  agate  burnisher  to  his  room, 
brush  out  the  dust  and  the  writing-sand  with  the  feather 
of  a  quill  from  his  table,  rout  out  the  accumulations  of 
bits  of  paper  and  other  rubbish  from  behind  the  mirror, 
wash,  with  unspeakable  labour,  the  white  porcelain  ink- 
stand into  a  more  dazzling  whiteness,  and  bring  the  butter- 
boat and  the  coffee-pot  into  a  more  advanced  and  promi- 
nent position  (drawing  them  up  in  rank  and  file  on  the 
cupboard),  and  polish  the  brass  nails  on  the  grandfather's 
leather  arm-chair  till  they  shone  again.  This  new  temple- 
purification  of  his  chamber  he  undertook  merely  by  way  of 
something  to  do ;  for  a  scholar  considers  the  mere  arranging 
of  his  books  and  papers  to  be  a  purification  as  of  the  temple, 
at  least  so  maintained  the  parish  advocate,  saying  further, 
"orderliness  is,  properly  defined,  nothing  but  a  happy 
knack  which  people  acquire  of  putting  a  thing  for 
twenty  years  in  the  old  place,  let  that  place  be  where 
it  will." 

Not  only  was  he  tenant  of  a  pleasant  room,  but  also  of  a 
long  red  dining-table,  which  he  had  hired  and  placed  beside 
a  commoner  one;  also  of  some  high-backed  arm-chairs: 
moreover  the  landlords  or  proprietors  of  the  furniture  and 
of  the  lodgings  (who  all  lived  in  the  house)  had  all  been 
invited  by  him  to  dinner  on  this  his  play  Monday,  which 
was  an  excellent  arrangement,  inasmuch  as — most  of  the 


CHAP.  I.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.  21 

people  of  the  house  being  working-men — their  play  Monday 
and  his  fell  together ;  for  it  was  only  the  landlord  who  was 
anything  superior,  and  he  was  a  wig-maker. 

I  should  have  had  cause  to  feel  ashamed  of  myself 
had  I  gone  and  used  my  precious  historical  colours  in 
portraying  a  mere  advocate  of  the  poor  (a  fit  candidate 
for  his  own  services  in  that  capacity).  But  I  have  had 
access  to  the  documents  and  accounts  relating  to  my  hero's 
guardianship  during  his  minority,  and  from  these  I  can 
prove,  at  any  hour,  in  a  court  of  justice,  that  he  was 
a  man  worth  at  least  1200  Ehenish  guldens  (i.e.  100/.), 
to  say  nothing  of  the  interest.  Only,  unfortunately,  the 
study  of  the  ancients,  added  to  his  own  natural  turn  of 
mind,  had  endowed  him  with  an  invincible  contempt  for 
money,  that  metallic  mainspring  of  the  machinery  of  our 
human  existence,  that  dial  plate  on  which  our  value  is 
read  off,  although  people  of  sense,  tradespeople  for  example, 
have  quite  as  high  an  opinion  of  the  man  who  acquires, 
as  of  him  who  gets  rid  of  it;  just  as  a  person  who  is 
electrified  gets  a  shining  glory  round  his  head  whether 
the  fluid  be  passing  into  or  out  of  him.  Indeed, 
Siebenkaes  even  said  (and  on  one  occasion  he  did  it)  that 
we  ought  sometimes  to  put  on  the  beggar's  scrip  in  jest, 
simply  to  accustom  the  back  to  it  against  more  serious 
times.  And  he  considered  that  he  justified  (as  well  as 
complimented)  himself  in  going  on  to  say,  "  It  is  easier  to 
bear  poverty  like  Epictetus  than  to  choose  it  like  Anto- 
ninus; in  the  same  way  that  it  is  easier  for  a  slave  to 
stick  out  his  own  leg  to  be  cut  off,  than  for  a  man 
who  wields  a  sceptre  a  yard  long  to  leave  the  legs 
of  his  slaves  alone."  Wherefore  he  made  shift  to  live 
for  ten  years  in  foreign  parts,  and  for  half  a  year  in  the 
imperial  burgh,  without  asking  his  guardian  for  a  single 
halfpenny  of  the  interest  of  his  capital.  But  as  it  was 
his  idea  to  introduce  his  orphan,  moneyless  bride  as  mis- 
tress and  overseer  into  a  silver  mine  all  ready  opened  and 
timbered  for  her  reception  (for  such  he  considered  his  100Z. 
with  the  accumulated  interest  to  be),  it  had  pleased  him 
to  give  her  to  understand,  while  he  was  in  Augspurg,  that 
he  had  nothing  but  his  bare  bread,  and  that  what  little  he 
could  scrape  together  by  the  sweat  of  his  brow,  went  from 


22  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH    RICHTER.  [BOOK  1. 

hand  to  mouth,  though  he  worked  as  hard  as  any  man, 
and  cared  little  about  the  Upper  House  of  Parliament  or 
the  Lower.  "  I'll  be  hanged,"  he  had  long  ago  said,  "  if  I 
ever  many  a  woman  who  knows  how  much  I  have  a  year. 
As  it  is,  women  often  look  upon  a  husband  as  a  species  of 
demon,  to  whom  they  sign  away  their  souls— often  their 
child — that  the  evil  one  may  give  them  money  and 
eatables." 

This  longest  of  summer  days  and  Mondays  was  followed 
by  the  longest  of  winter  nights  (which  is  impossible  only 
in  an  astronomical  sense).  Early  next  morning,  the 
Schuliath  Stiefel  drove  up,  and  lifted  out  of  the  carriage 
(fine  manners  have  twice  their  charm  when  they  adorn  a 
scholar)  a  bonnet-block  instead  of  the  bride,  and  ordered 
the  rest  of  her  belongings,  which  consisted  of  a  white 
tinned  box,  to  be  unloaded,  while  he,  with  her  head  under 
his  arm,  ran  upstairs  to  the  advocate. 

"  Your  worthy  intended."  he  said,  "  is  coming  directly. 
She  is  getting  ready  at  this  moment,  in  a  farm  cottage, 
fc  <t  the  sacred  rite,  and  begged  me  to  come  on  before,  lest 
you  should  be  impatient.  A  true  woman,  in  Solomon's 
sense  of  the  teini,  and  I  congratulate  you  most  heartily." 

"  The  Herr  Advocate  Siebenka?s,  my  pretty  lady  'i — I 
can  conduct  you  to  him  myself.  He  lodges  with  me,  and 
I  will  wait  upon  you  this  moment,"  said  the  wig-maker, 
down  at  the  door,  and  offered  his  hand  to  lead  her  up : 
but,  as  she  caught  sight  of  her  second  bonnet-block,  still 
Bitting  in  the  carriage,  she  took  it  on  her  left  arm  as  if 
it  had  been  a  baby  (the  hairdresser  in  vain  attempting 
to  get  hold  of  it),  and  followed  him  with  a  hesitating  step 
into  the  advocate's  room.  She  held  out  her  right  hand 
only,  with  a  deep  curtsey  and  gentle  greeting,  to  her 
bridegroom,  and  on  her  full  round  face  (everything  in  it 
was  round,  brow,  eyes,  mouth,  and  chin)  the  roses  far 
out-bloomed  the  lilies,  and  were  all  the  prettier  to  look 
upon  as  seen  below  the  large  black  silk  bonnet;  while 
tl.e  snow-white  muslin  dress,  the  many-tinted  nosegay 
of  artificial  flowers,  and  the  white  points  of  her  shoes, 
added  charm  upon  charm  to  her  timid  figure.  She  at 
once  untied  her  bonnet — there  being  barely  time  to  get 
one's  hair  done   and  be  married — and  laid  her  my i  tie 


CHAP.  I.J     FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  THORN   PIECES.  23 

garland,  which  she  had  hidden  at  the  farm  that  the 
people  might  not  see  it,  down  upon  the  table,  that  her 
head  might  be  properly  put  to  rights,  and  powdered  for 
the  ceremony  (as  a  person's  of  quality  ought  to  be)  by  the 
landlord,  thus  conveniently  at  hand. 

Thou  dear  Lenette !  A  bride  is,  it  is  true,  during  many 
days,  for  everyone  whom  she's  not  going  to  many,  a  poor 
meagre  piece  of  shewbread — and  especially  is  she  so  to 
me.  But  I  except  one  hour,  namely,  that  on  the  morning 
of  the  wedding-day,  when  the  girl,  whose  life  has  been 
all  freedom  hitherto,  trembling  in  her  wedding  dress,  over- 
grown (like  an  ivied  tree)  with  flowers  and  feathers,  which, 
with  others  like  them,  fate  is  soon  to  pluck  away — and 
with  anxious  pious  eyes  overflowing  on  her  mother's 
heart  for  the  last  and  loveliest  time ;  this  hour,  I  say, 
moves  me,  in  which,  standing  all  adorned  on  the  scaffold 
of  joy,  she  celebrates  so  many  partings,  and  one  single 
meeting :  when  the  mother  turns  away  from  her  and  goes 
back  to  her  other  children,  leaving  her,  all  fainthearted, 
to  a  stranger.  "  Thou  heart,  beating  high  with  happiness," 
1  think  then,  "  not  always  wilt  thou  throb  thus  throughout 
the  sultry  years  of  wedded  life ;  often  wilt  thou  pour  out 
thine  own  blood,  the  better  to  pass  along  the  path  to  age, 
as  the  chamois  hunter  keeps  his  foot  from  sliding  by 
the  blood  from  his  own  heel."  And  then  I  would 
fain  go  out  to  the  gazing,  envious  virgins  by  the  wayside 
leading  to  the  church,  and  say  to  them,  "Do  not  so 
begrudge  the  poor  girl  the  happiness  of  a,  perhaps  fleeting, 
illusion.  Ah,  what  you  and  she  are  looking  at  to-day 
is  the  strife-  and  beauty-apple  of  marriage  hanging  only 
on  the  sunny  side  of  love,  all  red  and  soft;  no  one  sees 
the  green  sour  side  of  the  apple  hidden  in  the  shade. 
And  if  ye  have  ever  been  grieved  to  the  soul  for  some 
luckless  wife  who  has  chanced,  ten  years  after  her  wed- 
ding, to  come  upon  her  old  bridal  dress,  in  a  drawer,  while 
tears  for  all  the  sweet  illusions  she  has  lost  in  these  ten 
years  rise  in  a  moment  to  her  eyes,  are  you  so  sure  it  will 
be  otherwise  with  this  envied  one  who  passes  before  you 
all  joy  and  brightness  now?  " 

I  should  not,  however,  have  performed  this  unexpected 
modulation  into  the  "remote  key"  of  tenderheartedness, 


24  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.  [BOOK  I. 

had  it  not  been  that  I  managed  to  form  to  myself  a  picture 
so  irresistibly  vivid  of  Lenette's  myrtle  wreath,  beneath 
her  hat  (I  really  had  not  the  slightest  intention  to  touch 
on  the  subject  of  my  own  personal  feelings),  and  her  being 
all  alone  without  a  mother,  and  her  powdery  white-flower 
face,  and  (more  vivid  still)  of  the  ready  willingness  with 
which  she  put  her  young  delicate  arms  (she  was  scarcely 
past  nineteen)  into  the  polished  handcuffs  and  chain-rings 
of  matrimony,  without  so  much  as  looking  round  her  to 

see  which  way  she  was  going  to  be  led  by  them 

I  could  here  hold  up  my  hand  and  take  oath  that  the 
bridegroom  was  quite  as  much  moved  as  myself,  if  not 
more  so ;  at  all  events,  when  he  gently  wiped  the  Auricula 
dust  from  the  blossom-face,  so  that  the  flowers  there  were 
seen  to  bloom  unobscured.  But  he  had  to  be  careful  how 
he  carried  about  that  heart  of  his — so  full  to  the  brim  of  the 
potion  of  love,  and  tears  of  gladness — lest  it  should  run 
over  in  the  presence  of  the  jovial  hairdresser  and  the 
serious  Schulrath,  to  his  shame.  Effusion  was  a  thing 
he  never  permitted  himself.  All  strong  feeling,  even  of 
the  purest,  he  hid  away,  and  hardened  over :  he  always 
thought  of  poets  and  actors,  who  let  on  the  waterworks 
of  their  emotions  to  play  for  show ;  and  there  was  no 
one,  on  the  whole,  at  whom  he  bantered  so  much  as 
at  himself.  For  these  reasons,  his  face  to-day  was  drawn 
and  crinkled  by  a  queer,  laughing,  embarrassment,  and 
only  his  eyes,  where  the  moisture  gleamed,  told  of  the 
better  side  of  this  condition.  As  he  noticed  presently 
that  he  wasn't  masking  himself  sufficiently  by  merely 
playing  the  part  of  barber's  mate,  and  commissary  of  pro- 
visions (of  the  breakfast),  he  adopted  stronger  measures, 
and  began  to  exhibit  himself  and  his  movable  property 
in  as  favourable  a  light  as  possible  to  Lenette,  in- 
quiring of  her  whether  she  didn't  think  her  room  "  nicely 
situated,"  and  saying,  "  I  can  see  into  the  senate  house 
window,  on  to  the  great  table,  and  all  the  ink  bottles. 
Several  of  these  chairs  I  got  last  spring  at  a  third  of  their 
value,  and  very  handsome  they  are,  don't  you  think 
so  ?  My  good  old  grandfather's  chair  here,  though " 
(he  had  sat  down  in  it,  and  laid  his  lean  arms  on  the 
chair's  stuffed  ones),  "  does,  I  think,  take  the  precedence  ia 


CHAP.  I.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN  PIECES.  25 

the  grandfather  dance :  *  '  how  they  so  softly  rest,'  arm 
upon  arm  !  The  flowers  upon  my  tahle-cloth  are  rather 
cleverly  done,  hut  the  coffee-tray  is  considered  the  hetter 
work  of  the  two,  1  am  given  to  understand,  on  account  of  its 
flora  being  japanned ;  however,  they  both  do  their  best  in 
the  flower  line.  My  Leyser  with  his  pigf«kin  '  Meditations ' 
is  a  great  ornament  to  the  room :  the  kitchen,  though,  is 
the  place — better  still  than  this  rocni ;  there  are  pots,  all 
ranged  side  by  side — and  a) I  sorts  of  things — the  hare- 
skinner  and  the  hare-spit — my  father  used  to  shoot  the 
hares  for  these." 

The  bride  smiled  on  him  so  contentedly  that  I  must 
almost  believe  she  had  heard  the  greater  part  of  the  story 
of  the  100Z.  (with  interest)  in  her  Fuggery  through  twenty 
united  ear-  and  speaking-trumpets.  I  shall  be  the  more 
inclined  to  believe  this  if  the  public  should  happen  to  be 
looking  forward  eagerly  to  the  hour  when  he  is  to  hand  it 
over  to  her. 

It  may  not  be  otheiwise  than  agreeable  to  my  fair  readers 
to  be  informed  that  the  bridegroom  now  put  on  a  liver- 
coloured  dress  coat,  and  that  he  waited  to  the  church  with 
his  dress-maker  without  any  dress  cravat,  and  with  no 
queue  in  his  hair,  picturing  as  he  went,  to  his  own  satirical 
delight,  the  slanderous  glances  with  which  the  fair  Kuh- 
schnappelers  were  following  the  good  stranger  girl  across 
the  market  to  the  sacrificial  altar  of  her  maiden  name.  He 
had  said  on  a  previous  occasion,"  We  ought  rather  to  facilitate 
than  obstruct  backbiting,  to  a  moderate  extent,  in  a  married 
woman,  as  some  slight  compensation  for  lost  flatteries." 

The  Schulrath  Stiefel  remained  in  the  bridal  chamber, 
where  he  sketched  the  outlines  of  a  critique  on  a  school- 
programme  at  the  writing-table. 

I  see  before  me,  as  I  write,  the  lovers  kneeling  at  the 
altar  steps ;  and  I  should  like  to  cast  wishes  at  them  (as 
flowers  are  thrown),  especially  a  wish  that  they  may  be 
like  the  married  in  Heaven,  who,  according  to  Sweden- 
borg's  vision,  always  merge  into  one  angel — although  on 
earth,  too,  they  are  often  fused,  by  warmth,  into  one  angel, 
and  that  a  fallen  one — the  husband  (who  is  the  head  of 

*  The  "  Grandfather  Dance "  is  equivalent  to  the  English  "  Si* 
Boger  de  Coverley." 


26  JEAN   PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.  [BOOK  I. 

the  wife)  representing  the  hutting  head  of  this  evil  one ; 
this  wish,  I  say,  I  would  fain  cast  at  them ;  but  my  atten- 
tion, in  common  with  that  of  all  the  wedding  company 
is  riveted  by  an  extraordinary  circumstance  and  puzzling 
apparition  behind  the  music  desks  of  the  choir. 

For  there  appears  there,  looking  down  at  us — and  we  all 
looking  up  at  it — Siebenkaes's  spirit,  as  the  popular  ex- 
pression has  it,  t.  e.  his  body,  as  it  ought  to  be  called.  If 
the  hridegroom  should  look  up  he  might  turn  pale,  and 
think  he  saw  himself.  We  are  all  wrong;  he  only  turns 
red.  It  was  his  friend  Leibgeber  who  was  standing  there, 
having  many  years  ago  vowed  to  travel  any  distance  to 
his  marriage,  solely  that  he  might  laugh  at  him  for  twelve 
hours'  time. 

There  has  seldom  been  a  case  of  a  royal  alliance  between 
two  peculiar  natures  like  that  between  these  two.  The 
same  contempt  for  the  childish  nonsense  held  in  this 
life  to  be  noble  matter,  the  same  enmity  to  all  pettiness  and 
perfect  indulgence  to  the  little,  the  same  indignation  with 
dishonourable  selfishness,  the  same  delight  in  laughing  in 
ihis  lovely  madhouse  of  an  earth,  the  same  deafness  to 
the  voice  of  the  multitude,  but  not  to  that  of  honour; 
these  are  but  some  of  the  first  at  hand  of  the  similarities 
which  made  of  these  two  but  one  soul  doing  duty  in  two 
bodies.  And  the  fact  that  they  were  also  foster-brothers 
in  their  studies,  having  for  nurses  the  same  branches  of 
knowledge,  including  the  Law  herself,  I  do  not  reckon 
among  their  chief  resemblances;  for  it  is  often  the  case 
that  the  very  identity  of  study  becomes  a  dissolving  de- 
component  of  friendship.  Indeed,  it  was  not  even  the  dis- 
similarity of  their  opposite  poles  which  determined  their 
mutual  attraction  for  each  other  (Siebenkees  leant  towards 
forgiving,  Leibgeber  towards  punishing ;  the  former  was 
more  a  satire  of  Horace,  the  latter  a  street  ballad  of  Aristo- 
phanes with  unpoetic  as  well  as  poetic  harshnesses).  But, 
as  two  female  friends  are  fond  of  being  dressed  alike,  these 
two  men's  souls  h<>.d  put  on  just  the  same  frock-coat  and 
morning  costume  of  life ;  I  mean,  two  bodies  of  identical 
fashion,  colour,  button-holes,  finishings,  and  cut.  Both 
had  the  same  flash  of  the  eyes,  the  same  earthy  coloured 
face,  the  same  tallness,  leanness,  and  everything.     And 


CHAP.  I.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.  27 

indeed,  the  Nature  freak  of  counterpart  faces  is  commoner 
than  we  suppose,  because  we  only  notice  it  when  some 
prince  or  great  person  casts  a  corporeal  reflection. 

For  which  reason  I  very  much  wish  that  Leibgeber  had 
not  had  a  slight  limp,  so  that  he  might  not  have  been 
thereby  distinguishable  from  Siebenkaes,  seeing,  at  least, 
that  the  latter  had  cleverly  etched  and  dissolved  away  his 
own  peculiar  mark  by  causing  a  live  toad  to  breathe  its  last 
above  it.  For  there  had  been  a  pyramidal  mole  near  his  left 
ear,  in  the  shape  of  a  triangle,  or  of  the  zodiacal  light,  or  a 
turaed-up  comet's  tail,  of  an  ass's  ear  in  short.  Partty  from 
friendship,  partly  from  the  enjoyment  they  had  in  the 
scenes  of  absurdity  which  their  being  confounded  with  each 
other  gave  rise  to  in  eveiy-day  life,  they  wished  to'  carry 
the  algebraic  equation  which  existed  between  them  yet  a 
step  further,  by  adopting  the  same  Christian  and  surname. 
But  on  this  point  they  had  a  friendly  contest,  as  each 
wanted  to  be  the  other's  namesake,  till  at  length  they  set- 
tled the  difference  by  exchanr/ing  names,  thus  following 
the  example  of  the  natives  of  Otaheite,  among  whom  the 
lovers  exchange  names  as  well  as  hearts. 

As  it  is  now  several  years  since  my  hero  was  thus 
lightened  of  his  worthy  name  by  this  friendly  name-stealer 
receiving  the  other  worthy  name  in  exchange,  I  can't  do 
anything  to  alter  this  in  my  chapters.  I  must  go  on 
calling  him  Firmian  Stani.vlaus  Siebenkaes  ns  I  did  at  the 
beginning,  and  the  other  Leibgeber ;  although  it  is  quite  un- 
necessary for  any  reviewer  to  point  out  to  me  that  the  more 
comic  name  of  Siebenkaes  would  have  been  better  suited  to 
this  more  humoristic  newcomer,  with  whom,  however,  the 
world  shall  yet  be  better  acquainted  than  I  am  myself. 

When  these  two  counterparts  caught  sight  of  one  another 
in  the  church,  their  blushing  faces  crinkled  and  curled 
oddly,  at  which  the  looker-on  laughed,  until  he  compared 
the  faces  with  the  eyes,  which  glowed  warm  with  the 
deepest  affection.  While  the  wedding-rings  were  being 
exchanged,  Leibgeber  in  the  choir  took  from  his  pocket  a 
pair  of  scissors  and  a  quarto  sheet  of  black  paper,  and  cut 
out  a  distant  view  of  the  bride's  profile.  This  cutting  out 
of  likenesses  he  generally  gave  out  as  being  his  cookhhop  and 
bakery  upon  his  perpetual  journeyings ;  and  as  it  appears 


28  JEAN  PAUL    FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.  [BOOK  L 

that  this  strange  man  does  not  choose  to  disclose  upon 
what  eminences  the  waters  gather  which  well  up  for  him 
down  in  the  valleys,  I  am  glad  to  quote  (and  express  my 
own  belief  in)  a  frequent  saying  of  his  regarding  his 
profile  cutting — "  In  the  process  of  clipping,  slices  of 
bread,  we  know,  fall  with  the  cuttings  for  the  book- 
binder, the  letter- writer,  and  the  lawyer,  when  the  paper 
is  white ;  but  in  clipping  black  paper,  whether  profiles  or 
white  mourning  letters  with  black  borders,  there  fall  many 
more :  and  if  a  man  is  versed  in  the  liberal  art  of  painting 
his  fellow  Christian  blacker  than  he  is — with  more  mem- 
bers than  one — the  tongue  for  instance  can  do  it  to  some 
extent — then  Fortune,  the  Babylonish  harlot,  will  ring 
that  man's  bells  (his  dinner  bell,  and  his  little  altar  bell), 
till  her  arm  is  half  crippled." 

While  the  deacon  was  laying  his  hands  on  the  pair, 
Leibgeber  came  down  and  stood  at  the  red  velvet  steps  of 
the  altar.  And  when  the  ceremony  was  over  he  made,  on 
the  occasion  of  a  meeting  such  as  this,  after  a  separation 
of  some  half-a-year  or  so,  the  following  somewhat  lengthy 
speech : — 

"  Good  morning,  Siebenkaes." 

They  never  said  more  to  each  other,  though  years  might 
have  elapsed ;  and  at  the  resurrection  of  the  dead,  Sie- 
benkses  will  answer  him,  just  as  he  did  to-day, — 

"  Good  morning,  Leibgeber." 

The  twelve  hours  of  banter,  however,  which  friends 
often  find  it  an  easy  matter  to  threaten  each  other  with 
in  absence,  are  an  impossibility  to  the  tender  heart,  keenly 
enough  alive  though  it  may  be  to  the  humorous  sides  of 
matters,  when  it  is  moved  (as  in  this  case)  at  the  sight 
of  the  friend  passing  into  the  vestibule  of  some  new 
labyrinth  of  our  subterranean  existence. 

I  have  now  before  my  writing-desk  the  long  wedding- 
table  set  out;  and  I  am  sorry  that  no  painting  of  it  occurs 
on  any  of  the  vases  buried  at  Herculaneum,  as  it  would 
have  been  dug  out  with  the  rest,  and  an  exact  copy  of  it 
given  in  the  Herculanean  illustrations,  so  that  I  could 
have  inserted  the  copy  in  place  of  anything  else.  Few 
have  a  higher  opinion  of  the  powers  of  my  pen  than 
1  have  myself;  but  I  see  quite  well  that  it  is  neither  in 


CHAP.  I.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.  29 

my  power  nor  in  my  pen's  to  half  portray,  and  that  in  a 
feeble  style,  how  the  guests — there  were  almost  as  many 
there  as  there  were  chairs — enjoyed  themselves  at  the 
dinner;  how,  moreover,  there  was  not  one  single  rogue 
among  them  (for  the  bridegroom's  guardian,  Heimlicher 
von  Blaise,  had  sent  an  excuse,  saying  he  was  very  sick 
indeed) ;  how  the  landlord  of  the  house,  a  jovial,  con- 
sumptive Saxon,  did  something  towards  expediting  his  de- 
parture from  this  life  by  his  powdering  and  his  drinking  ; 
how  they  banged  the  glasses  with  the  forks,  and  the  table 
with  the  marrowbones,  that  the  former  might  be  filled 
and  the  latter  emptied;  how  in  all  the  house  not  a  soul, 
not  even  the  shoemaker  or  the  bookbinder,  did  a  stroke  of 
any  other  work  but  eating,  and  how  even  the  old  woman 
Sabel  (Sabine)  who  squatted  under  the  mouse-coloured 
town  gate,  shut  up  her  stall  on  this  one  day  before  the 
closing  of  the  gate ;  how  not  only  was  there  one  course 
served  up,  but  a  second,  a  "  Doppel  ganger."  To  anyone, 
indeed,  who  has  dined  at  great  men's  tables,  and  there 
remarked  how  fine  dishes,  if  there  are  two  courses,  have 
got  to  be  marshalled  according  to  the  laws  of  rank,  it  will 
not  appear  unheard  of  or  over  splendid  that  Siebenkses 
(the  hairdresser's  wife  had  dune  the  cooking  on  this 
occasion)  provided  for  the  first  course. 

1.  In  the  centre  the  soup-tub,  or  broth  fishpond,  where- 
in people  could  enjoy  the  sport  of  crayfish-catching  with 
their  spoons,  although  the  crayfish,  like  the  beavers,  had 
in  this  water  no  more  than  Eobespierre  had  in  the  con- 
vent— that  is  to  say,  merely  the  tail. 

2.  In  the  first  quarter  of  the  globe  a  beautiful  beef 
torso,  or  cube  of  meat,  as  pedestal  of  the  entire  culinary 
work  of  art. 

3.  In  the  second,  a  fricassee,  being  a  complete  pattern- 
card  of  the  butcher's  shop,  sweetly  treated. 

4.  In  the  third,  a  Behemoth  of  pond-carps,  which  might 
have  swallowed  the  prophet  Jonah,  but  which  underwent 
his  fate  itself. 

5.  In  the  fourth,  a  baked  hen-house  of  a  pie,  to  which 
the  birds  had  sent  their  best  members,  as  a  community 
does  to  parliament. 

I  cannot  deny  myself  and  my  fair  readers  the  pleasure 


30  JEAN   PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.  [BOOK  I. 

of  just  slightly  sketching  for  them  a  little  "cookery -piece" 
of  the  second  course. 

1.  In  ihe  middle  stood,  as  a  "basket  of  garden-flowers 
might,  a  pile  of  cress-salad.  2.  Then  the  four  corners 
were  occupied  by  the  four  syllogistic  figures,  or  the  four 
faculties.  In  the  first  corner  of  the  taole  was,  as  first 
syllogistic  figure  and  faculty,  a  hare,  who,  as  antipode  of 
a  barefooted  friar,  had  kept  on  his  natural  fur  boots  in  the 
pan,  and  who,  as  Leibgeber  justly  remarked,  had  come 
from  the  field  with  his  legs  safe  and  sound  in  spite  of  the 
enemy's  fire,  more  fortunate,  in  this  respect,  than  many 
a  soldier.  The  second  syllogistic  figure  consisted  of  a 
calf's  tongue,  which  was  black,  not  from  arguing,  but 
from  being  smoked.  The  third,  crisped  colewort,  but 
without  the  stalks:  this,  ordinarily  the  food  of  the  two 
preceding  faculties,  was  on  this  occasion  eaten  along  with 
them*  thus  is  it  that  in  this  world  one  goes  up  and 
another  down.  The  concluding  figure  was  made  up  of  the 
three  figures  of  the  bridal  pair  and  an  eventual  baby 
baked  in  butter ;  these  three  glorified  bodies,  which,  like 
"  the  three  children,"  had  come  forth  unscathed  from  the 
fiery  furnace,  and  had  raisins  for  souls,  were  eaten  up 
bodily,  skin  and  bones,  by  those  cannibals  the  guests, 
with  the  exception  of  an  arm  or  so  of  the  infant,  which, 
like  the  bird  Phoenix,  was  personified  ere  it  existed. 

This  picture  draws  me  on.  But  it  ought  to  be  coloured, 
and  as  regards  the  luxury  of  the  feast,  it  would  not  be 
passing  it  over  too  lightly  were  1  to  compare  it  to  a  Saxon 
electoral  banquet,  by  reference  to  which  1  might  illus- 
trate it.  It  is  true,  the  electors  of  that  country  require 
a  good  deal  (and  on  that  account  they  used  to  be  weighed 
every  year) ;  and  1  am  quite  aware  that  at  the  beginning 
of  the  16th  century,  a  Saxon  treasurer  made  the  following 
entry  in  his  accounts:  —  "This  day  was  our  gracious 
sovereign  at  the  wine,  with  his  court,  for  which  I  have 
had  to  disburse  the  sum  of  fifteen  gulden  (25*.).  That's 
what  I  call  banquetting ! "  But  what  would  the  Saxon 
treasurer  have  written?  how  he  would  have  lifted  his 
hands  up  with  amazement  if  he  had  read  in  my  very  first 
chapter  that  a  poor's  advocate  had  gone  and  spent  three 
gulden  and  seven  groscheu  more  than  his  royal  master ! 


CHAP.  I.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND   THORN   PIECES.  31 

As  is  tho  cape  with  many  natural  springs,  the  fountains 
of  mirth,  which  welled  but  slowly  in  the  daytime,  jetted 
up  higher  in  the  hearts  of  the  guests  as  the  evening  came 
on.  The  two  advocates  indeed  told  the  company  that,  as 
they  remembered  from  their  college  days,  though  the 
privilege  formerly  possessed  by  every  German  of  drinking 
his  fill  had  been  but  too  much  curtailed  by  emperors  and 
parliaments,  and  the  imperial  decrees  of  1512,  1531, 1548, 
and  1577  permitted  no  drunkenness,  yet  they  did  not 
prohibit  Kuhschnappel  from  exercising  the  right  common 
to  all  imperial  states,  of  abrogating  imperial  statutes  in  cases 
where  local  laws  exist  within  their  own  boundaries.  The 
Schulrath  alone  could  not  quite  see  (and  he  shook  his 
head  about  it  internally  to  himself  twenty  times)  how 
two  scholars,  two  lawyers  at  all  events,  could  go  on 
gravely  joking  with  a  set  of  such  unlearned  plebeians  and 
empty  heads  as  were  here  supported  upon  elbows ; — joking 
with  them,  and  actually  conversing  about  the  utter  rubbish 
which  they  talked.  More  than  once  he  spliced  on  threads 
of  scholarly  speech,  concerning  the  newest,  most  highly 
elaborated  school  addresses,  as  well  as  sundry  critiques  on 
the  same,  but  the  advocates  would  have  nothing  to  do  with 
his  threads,  but  made  the  bookbinder  speak  the  appren- 
tice speech  he  made  at  his  admission  to  the  rank  of  master, 
to  which  the  shoemaker,  of  his  own  motion,  stitched  and 
cobbled  on  one  which  lie  had  made  on  a  similar  occasion. 

Siebenkaes  remarked  to  tho  company  in  general  that  in 
the  upper  circles  of  society  people  are  much  graver,  and 
more  tedious,  and  empty  than  in  the  lower ;  that  in  the 
former,  if  any  party  happens  to  come  to  an  end  without 
accursed  tedium,  people  talk  of  it  for  a  whole  week,  whereas 
in  the  latter  everyone  contributes  so  much  to  the  merry 
picnic  of  conversation  that  the  only  thing  there  generally 
is  not  enough  of,  is  beer.  "  Oh  1"  he  went  on,  "  if  everyone 
of  our  condition  would  but  think  of  it,  he  would  but  envy 
those  of  a  lower;  how  accurately,  in  a  figurative  sense  too, 
does  that  old  truth  hold  good,  that  coarse  linen  keeps  one 
much  warmer  than  fine  linen,  or  even  silk,  just  as  a  wooden 
house  is  easier  warmed  than  a  stone  one — and  the  stone 
one  again  doesn't  get  cool  so  soon  as  the  wooden  in  summer 
—or  as  coarse  brown  flour  is  much  more  nourishing  than 


32  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.  BOOK  L 

the  fine  white,  as  all  the  doctors  tell  us.  And  I  cannot 
bring  myself  to  believe  that  ladies  in  Paris  who  wear 
diamond  hairpins,  lead  half  such  happy  lives  as  the  women 
there  who  get  their  living  by  picking  up  old  hairpins  out 
of  the  street  sweepings;  and  many  a  one  whose  fuel  is 
nothing  but  drj'  fir-cones,  gathered  by  himself  as  a  substi- 
tute for  fir-fuel"  (here  the  fuel  economising  company 
thought  vividly  of  their  own  case),  "  is  often  quite  as  well 
off"  on  the  whole  as  people  whj  can  preserve  green  cones  in 
sugar  and  eat  them." 

"  Friend  Parish  Advocate,"  said  Leihgeber,  "  there  you 
hit  it !  In  the  tap-room  and  the  bar-parlour  the  worst  is 
at  the  beginning,  the  blow,  the  kick,  the  angry  word  come 
first  of  all ;  the  pleasure  swells  with  the  reckoning.  The 
reverse  is  the  case  in  the  palace ;  in  a  *  palais '  for  the 
1  palais '  everybody's  enjoyment  goes  into  his  mouth  at 
the  same  instant;  just  as  the  little  Aphides  on  the  leaves 
all  lift  up  their  tail-ends,  and  squirt  out  the  honey  at  the 
same  moment,*  in  the  palace  it  is  absorbed  with  like  simul- 
taneousness  and  sociability.  Tediousness,  again,  annoy- 
ance and  satiety,  are  only  mixed  up  ingeniously  among  the 
various  pleasures  which  are  served  up  and  administered  in 
the  course  of  a  great  entertainment,  just  as  we  give  a  dog 
an  emetic  by  rubbing  him  all  over  with  it,  so  that  he  may 
bring  it  to  operate  by  licking  it  slowly  off." 

,  And  other  similar  sayings  were  spoken.  When  once 
any  pleasure  has  reached  a  considerable  height,  its  natural 
tendency  is  to  become  greater.  Many  of  the  lower  class 
members  of  the  sitting  exercised  the  privilege  of  drink, 
and  of  the  special  inquisition,  to  say  "  Thou "  to  one 
another.  Even  the  gentleman  in  the  red  plush  coat  (the 
Schulrath  was  given  to  wear  one  in  the  dog-day  holidays) 
screwed  up  his  lips,  and  smiled  in  a  seductive  manner,  as 
elderly  maiden  ladies  do  in  the  presence  of  elderly  single 
gentlemen,  and  gave  hints  that  he  had  got  at  home  a  couplo 
of  real  Horatian  bottles  of  champagne.  "Not  sparkling 
then,  I'm  sure?"  Leibgeber  answered  inquiringly.  The 
Schulrath,  who  thought  the  best  kind  of  champagne  exactly 
the  worst,  replied  with  some  self-consciousness,  "If  it  isn't 
•parkling,  well  and  good,  I  swear  I'll  drink  every  drop  of 

*  Wil  helm's  '  Recreations  in  Natural  History.    Insects.*    Vol.  i. 


CHAP.  I.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN   PIECES.  3b 

it  myself."  The  bottles  appeared.  Leibgeber,  taking  the 
first  one,  carefully  filed  through  its  barrier  chain,  removed 
the  cork  and  opened  it  as  if  it  had  been  a  last  will  and 
testament. 

What  I  maintain  is,  that,  even  should  the  two  balsam- 
trees  of  life,  namely  wit  and  the  love  of  our  fellow  men,  be 
withered  away  up  to  the  very  topmost  twig,  they  can  still 
be  brought  to  life  by  a  proper  shower  out  of  the  watering 
pot  of  these  said  bottles — in  three  minutes  they  will  begin 
to  sprout.  As  the  glad,  wild  essence,  the  wine  of  the 
silver  foam,  touched  the  heads  of  the  guests,  every  brain 
began  to  seethe  and  glow  while  fair  air-castles  rose  in 
each  amain.  Brilliant  and  many  tinted  were  the  floating 
bubbles  blown  and  set  free  by  the  Schulrath  Stiefel's  ideas 
of  all  categories,  his  simple  as  well  as  his  compound  ideas, 
his  innate  ideas,  and  also  his  fixed.  And  can  it  ever  be 
forgotten  that  he  ceased  to  make  learned  statements,  except 
on  the  subject  of  Lenette's  perfections,  and  that  he  told 
Leibgeber  in  confidence,  that  he  should  really  like  to 
marry,  not  indeed,  "  the  tenth  Muse,  or  the  fourth  Grace, 
or  the  second  Venus — for  it  was  clear  who  had  got  her 
already — but  some  step-sister  goddess,  a  distant  relation 
or  other  of  hers."  During  the  whole  journey,  he  said,  he 
had  preached  from  the  coachbox,  as  from  a  pulpit,  enlarging 
to  the  bride  on  the  subject  of  the  blessedness  of  the  married 
state,  painting  it  to  her  in  the  brightest  colours,  and  drawing 
such  a  lively  picture  of  it,  that  he  quite  longed  to  enter 
into  it  himself:  and  the  bridegroom  would  have  thanked 
him  if  he  had  seen  how  gratefully  she  had  looked  at  him 
in  return.  And,  indeed,  the  bride  was  a  great  success, 
and  happy  in  all  she  did  that  day,  and  particularly 
that  evening ;  and  what  became  her  best  of  all  was  that 
on  such  a  high  day  as  this,  she  waited  upon  others  more 
than  she  let  herself  be  waited  upon — that  she  put  on  a 
light  every-day  dress — that  even  at  this  advanced  stage 
of  her  own  education  she  took  private  lessons  in  cookery 
and  household  matters  from  her  female  guests,  who  aired 
their  own  theories  on  these  subjects — and  that  she  already 
began  to  think  about  to-morrow.  Stiefel,  in  his  inspired 
state,  ventured  upon  exploits  which  were  all  but  impos- 
sible.   He  placed  his  left  arm  under  his  right,  and  thus 

n.  t 


34  JEAN   PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.       [BOOK  I 

supporting  its  weight  and  that  of  its  plush  sleeve,  in  a 
horizontal  position,  snuffed  the  candle  before  the  whole 
company,  and  did  it  rather  skilfully  on  the  whole ;  some- 
what like  a  gardener  on  a  ladder  holding  out  his  pruning 
shears  at  arm's  length  to  a  high  branch  and  snipping  off 
the  whole  concern  by  a  slight  movement  of  his  hand  at  the 
bottom.  He  asked  Leibgeber  plump  out  to  give  him  a 
profile  of  Lenette,  and  later  on,  when  he  was  going  away, 
he  even  made  an  attempt  (but  this  was  the  only  one 
of  his  ventures  which  failed)  to  get  hold  of  her  hand  and 
kiss  it. 

At  length  all  the  joy-fires  of  this  happy  little  company 
burnt  down  like  their  candles,  and  one  by  one  the  rivers 
of  Eden  fell  away  into  the  night.  The  guests  and  the 
candles  got  fewer  and  fewer ;  at  last  there  was  only  one 
guest  there,  Stiefel  (for  Leibgeber  is  not  a  guest),  and  one 
long  candle.  It  is  a  lovely  and  touching  time  when  the 
loud  clamour  of  a  merry  company  has  finally  buzzed  itself 
away  into  silence,  and  just  one  or  two,  left  alone,  sit 
quietly,  often  sadly,  listening  to  the  faint  echoes,  as  it 
were,  of  all  the  joy.  Finally,  the  Schulrath  struck  the 
last  remaining  tent  of  this  camp  of  enjoyment,  and  de- 
parted ;  but  he  would  not  for  a  moment  suffer  that  those 
fingers,  which,  in  spite  of  all  their  efforts,  his  lips  could  not 
touch,  should  be  clasped  about  a  cold  brass  candlestick, 
for  the  purpose  of  lighting  him  downstairs.  So  Leibgebei 
had  to  do  this  lighting.  The  husband  and  wife,  for  the 
first  time,  were  alone  in  the  darkness,  hand  in  hand. 

Oh,  hour  of  beauty  !  when  in  every  cloud  there  stood  a 
smiling  angel,  dropping  flowers  instead  of  rain,  may  some 
faint  reflection  from  thee  reach  even  to  this  page  of  mine, 
and  shine  on  there  for  ever. 

The  bridegroom  had  never  yet  kissed  his  bride.  He 
knew,  or  fancied,  that  his  face  was  a  clever  one,  with  sharp 
lines  and  angles,  expressing  energetic,  active  effort,  not  a 
smooth,  regular,  "  handsome "  one :  and  as,  moreover,  he 
always  laughed  at  himself  and  his  own  appearance,  he  sup- 
posed it  would  strike  other  persons  in  the  same  light. 
Hence  it  was  that,  although  as  an  every-day  matter  he 
rose  superior  to  the  eyes  and  tongues  of  a  whole  street 
(not  even  taking  the  pains  mentally  to  snap  his  fingers  at 


CHAP.  I.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.  35 

them),  he  never,  except  in  extraordinary  moments  of 
dithyrambics  of  friendship,  had  mustered  up  the  courage 
to  kiss  his  Leibgeber — let  alone  Lenette.  And  now  he 
pressed  her  hand  more  closely,  and  in  a  dauntless  manner 
turned  his  face  to  hers  (for,  you  see,  they  were  in  the  dark, 
and  he  couldn't  see  her) ;  and  he  wished  the  staircase  had 
as  many  steps  as  the  cathedral  tower,  so  that  Leibgeber 
might  be  a  long  time  coming  back  with  the  candle.  Of 
a  sudden  there  danced  (so  to  speak)  over  his  lips  a  gliding, 
tremulous  kiss,  and — then  all  the  flames  of  his  affection 
blazed  on  high,  the  ashes  blown  clean  away.  For  Lenette, 
innocent  as  a  child,  believed  it  to  be  the  bride's  duty  to  give 
this  kiss.  He  put  bis  arms  about  the  frightened  giver  with 
the  courage  of  bashfulness,  and  glowed  upon  her  lips  with 
his  with  all  the  fire  wherewith  love,  wine  and  joy  had  en- 
dowed him ;  but — so  strange  is  her  sex — she  turned  away 
her  mouth,  and  let  the  burning  lips  touch  her  cheek.  And 
there  the  modest  bridegroom  contented  himself  with  one 
long  kiss,  giving  expression  to  his  rapture  only  in  tears 
of  unutterable  sweetness  which  fell  like  glowing  naphtha- 
drops  upon  Lenette's  cheeks,  and  thence  into  her  trembling 
heart.  She  leant  her  face  further  away;  but  in  her 
beautiful  wonder  at  his  love,  she  drew  him  closer  to  her. 

He  left  her  before  his  darling  friend  came  back.  The 
tell-tale  powder-snow  which  had  fallen  on  the  bridegroom 
— that  butterfly-dust  which  the  very  slightest  touch  of 
these  white  butterflies  leaves  upon  our  fingers  (and  hence 
it  was  a  good  idea  of  Pitt's  to  put  a  tax  on  powder  in  1795) 
— told  some  of  the  story,  but  the  eyes  of  the  friend  and  the 
bride,  gleaming  in  happy  tears,  told  him  it  all.  The  two 
friends  looked  for  some  time  at  each  other  with  embarrassed 
smiles,  and  Lenette  looked  at  the  ground.  Leibgeber  said, 
"  Hem !  Hem  !"  twice  over,  and  at  length,  in  his  perplexity, 
remarked,  "  We've  had  a  delightful  evening !"  He  took  up 
a  position  behind  the  bridegroom's  chair,  to  be  out  of  sight, 
and  laid  his  hand  on  his  shoulder,  and  squeezed  it  right 
heartily ;  but  the  happy  Siebenkses  could  restrain  him- 
self no  longer ;  he  stood  up,  resigned  the  bride's  hand, 
and  the  two  friends,  at  last,  after  the  long  yearning  of  the 
long  day,  as  if  celebrating  the  moment  of  their  meeting, 
stood  silently  embracing,  united  by  angels,  with  Heavea 

D  2 


36        JEAN  PAUL  TRIEDEICH  EICHTER.   [BOOK  I. 

all  around  them.  His  heart  beating  higher,  the  bridegroom 
would  fain  have  widened  and  con  pleted  this  circle  of  union, 
by  joining  his  bride  and  his  friend  in  one  embrace  ;  but 
the  bride  and  the  friend  took  each  one  side  of  him,  eaoh 
embiacing  only  him.  Then  three  pure  heavens  opened  in 
glory  in  three  pure  hearts;  and  nothing  was  there  but 
God,  love,  and  happiness,  and  the  little  earthly  tear  which 
hangs  on  all  our  joy-flowers,  here  below. 

In  this  their  great  joy  and  bliss,  overborne  by  unwonted 
emotion,  and  feeling  almost  strange  to  each  other,  they 
had  scarce  the  courage  to  look  into  each  other's  tearful 
eyes ;  and  Leibgeber  went  away  in  silence,  without  a  word 
of  parting  or  good  night. 


CHAPTER  II. 

HOME  FUN —  SUNDRY  FORMAL  CALLS  —  THE  NEWSPAPER  ARTICLE 

—  A    LOVE    QUARREL,    AND    A    FEW   HARD   WORDS  —  ANTIPA- 
THETIC  INK   ON   THE   WALL  —  FRIENDSHIP    OF   THE    SATIRISTS 

—  GOVERNMENT   OF   KUHSCHNAPPEL. 

There  is  many  a  life  which  is  as  pleasant  to  live  as  to  write, 
and  the  material  of  this  one,  in  particular,  which  I  am 
engaged  in  writing,  is  as  yet  always  giving  out,  like 
rosewood  on  the  turning  lathe,  a  truly  delicious  perfume, 
all  over  my  workshop.  Siebenkass  duly  arose  on  the 
Wednesday,  but  not  till  the  Sunday  was  it  his  intention  to 
deposit  in  the  hands  of  his  diligent  house  goddess — who 
put  a  cap  on  to  her  cap-block  in  the  morning  before  she 
put  one  on  to  herself — the  silver  ingots  from  his  guardian's 
'•offer  (wrapped  in  blotting  paper),  her  palisades  of 
refuge  in  the  siege  of  this  life  ;  for  in  fact  he  couldn't  do 
so  any  sooner,  because  his  guardian  had  gone  into  the 
country,  that  is  to  say,  out  of  town,  till  the  Saturday 
night.  "  I  can  give  you  no  notion,  old  Leibgeber,"  said 
isiebenkaes,  "  what  a  joy  I  feel  in  looking  forward  to  ho"W 


CHAP.  II.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        87 

tins  will  delight  my  wife.  I'm  sure,  to  give  her  pleasure, 
I  could  wish  it  were  three  thousand  dollars.  The  dear 
child  has  always  hitherto  had  to  live  from  bonnet  to  bon- 
net, but  how  she  will  consider  herself  a  woman  set  up 
on  a  sudden  fur  life,  when  she  finds  she  can  carry  out  a 
hundred  housekeeping  projects,  which,  I  see  as  well  as 
possible,  she  has  got  in  her  head  already.  And  then, 
old  boy,  with  the  money  in  our  hands,  we  shall  begin 
the  keeping  of  my  silver  wedding  directly,  the  moment 
the  evening  service  is  over — there  shall  be  a  good  half- 
florin's  worth  of  beer  in  every  room  in  the  house.  Look 
here  !  why  shouldn't  the  dove,  or  call  him  the  sparrow,  of 
my  hymen  play  out  beer  on  the  people  as  the  two-headed 
eagle  in  Frankfort  does  wine  at  a  coronation  ?"  Leibgeber 
answered,  "  The  reason  he  can't  is,  that  the  prey  he 
catches  is  of  quite  another  brand.  The  sour  wine  (of  the 
Frankfort  eagle)  is  but  the  grapeskins — the  feathers,  the 
wool,  and  the  hair  which  eagles  always  eject." 

It  would  be  of  no  use  whatever — because  hundreds  of 
Kuhschnappelers  would  correct  my  statement  in  their  local 
paper,  the  '  Imperial  News  ' — if  I  were  to  tell  a  falsehood 
here  (which  I  should  like  very  much  to  do),  and  assert 
that  the  two  advocates  spent  the  short  week  of  their  being 
together  with  that  gravity  and  propriety  which,  becoming 
as  they  are  to  mankind  in  general,  do  yet  more  particularly 
secure  to  scholars  and  to  the  learned  the  respect  and 
consideration  of  commoner  minds,  to  say  nothing  of  the 
Kuhschnappelian  intelligences. 

Unfortunately  I  have  got  to  sing  to  another  tune.  In  the 
town  of  Kuhschnappel,  as  in  all  other  towns,  provincial,  or 
metropolitan,  what  Leibgeber  was  least  of  all  conspicuous 
for  was  a  proper  gravity  of  deportment  and  behaviour. 
Here,  as  elsewhere,  his  first  proceeding  was  to  get  an  intro- 
duction to  the  club,  as  a  stranger  artist,  in  order  that  he  might 
ensconce  himself  on  a  sofa,  and,  without  uttering  a  word  or 
a  syllable  to  a  human  being,  go  to  sleep  under  the  noses  of 
the  company  of  the  "  Relaxation"  as  the  club  was  called. 
"  This,"  he  said,  "  was  what  he  liked  to  have  the  opportunity 
of  doing  in  all  towns  where  there  were  clubs,  casinos, 
museums,  musical  societies,  &c. ;  because  to  sleep  in  any 
.  rational  manner  at  night  in  one's  ordinary  quiet  bed  was  a 


38  JEAN  PAUL   FEIEDEICH   RICHTER.       [BOOK  L, 

thing  which  he,  at  least,  found  he  was  seldom  able  to 
manage,  on  account  of  the  loud  battle  of  ideas  which 
went  on  in  his  head,  and  the  firework  trains  of  processions 
of  pictures  all  interweaving  and  whirling  in  and  out  with 
such  a  crash  and  a  din  that  one  could  hardly  see  or  hear 
one's  self.  Whereas  when  one  lies  down  upon  a  club  sofa, 
everything  of  this  sort  quiets  itself  down,  and  a  universal 
truce  of  ideas  establishes  itself;  the  delicious  effect  of  the 
company  all  talking  at  once — the  happily  chosen  and  appro- 
priate words  contributed  to  the  political-and-other-con- 
versation-picnic,  of  which  one  distinguishes  nothing  but 
an  ultima,  perhaps,  or  sometimes  only  an  antepemdtima  ; 
this  alone  sings  you  into  a  light  slumber.  But  when  a 
more  serious  discussion  arises,  and  some  point  is  argued, 
disputed  and  discussed  in  all  its  bearings  in  a  universal 
clamorous  shout — your  barometer  becomes  completely  sta- 
tionary, and  you  sleep  the  deep  sleep  of  a  flower  which 
is  rocked,  but  not  awakened,  by  the  storm." 

One  or  two  towns  with  which  I  am  acquainted  must,  I 
am  sure,  remember  a  stranger  who  always  used  to  go  to 
sleep  in  their  clubs,  and  must  also  recollect  the  beaming 
expression  of  countenance  with  which  he  would  look  about 
him  when  he  got  up  and  took  his  hat,  as  much  as  to  say, 
"  Many  thanks  for  this  refreshing  rest." 

However,  I  have  little  to  do  with  Leibgeber's  waking  or 
with  his  sleeping  here  in  Kuhschnappel ;  him  I  may  treat 
with  some  indulgence,  seeing  that  he  is  soon  to  be  off  again 
into  the  wide  world.  But  it  is  anything  but  a  matter  of 
indifference  that  my  young  hero,  just  established  here 
with  his  wife,  and  whose  pranks  I  have  undertaken  to 
give  some  account  of,  as  well  as  of  the  hits  he  gets  in 
return,  should  go  and  conduct  himself  just  as  if  his  namo 
was  Leibgeber;  which  had  long  ceased  to  be  the  case, 
seeing  that  he  had  given  formal  notice  to  his  guardian  that 
he  had  changed  it  to  Siebenkees. 

To  mention  but  one  prank — was  it  not  a  piece  of  true  tom- 
foolery that,  when  the  procession  of  poor  scholars,  singing 
for  alms  about  the  streets,  were  just  beginning  their  usual 
begging  hymn  under  the  windows  of  the  best  religious 
families  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  street,  and  just  as  they 
had  struck  their  key-note  and  were  going  to  start  off  with 


CHAP.  IT.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.         39 

their  chorus,  Leibgeber,  to  begin  with,  made  his  boar- 
hound  "  SSaufinder"  (he  couldn't  live  without  a  big  dog)  look 
out  of  window  with  a  fashionable  lady's  night-cap  on  his 
head  ?  And  was  it  by  any  means  a  soberer  proceeding  on 
Siebenkass's  part,  that  he  took  lemons  and  bit  into  them 
before  the  eyes  of  the  whole  singing  class,  so  that  all  their 
teeth  begun  to  water  in  an  instant  ?  The  result  will 
answer  these  questions  for  itself.  The  singers,  having 
Saufinder  in  his  night-cap  in  full  view,  could  no  more 
bring  their  lips  together  into  a  singing  position  than  a 
man  can  whistle  and  laugh  at  the  same  instant.  At  the 
same  time  all  their  vocal  apparatus  being  completely  sub- 
merged by  the  opening  of  their  glands,  every  note  they 
attempted  to  give  out  had  to  wade  painfully  through 
water.  In  short,  was  this  entire  ludicrous  interruption  of 
the  whole  company  of  street  singers  not  the  precise  end 
aimed  at  by  both  the  advocates  ? 

But  Siebenkses  has  only  recently  come  back  from  college, 
and  being  still  half-full  of  the  freedom  of  university  life, 
may  be  excused  a  liberty  or  two.  And  indeed  I  consider 
the  little  exuberances  of  university  youth  to  be  like  the 
adipose  matter,  which,  according  to  Reaumur,  Bonnet, 
and  Cuvier,  is  stored  up  by  the  caterpillar  for  the  nourish- 
ment of  the  future  butterfly  during  its  chrysalis  state; 
the  liberty  of  manhood  has  to  be  alimented  by  that  of 
youth,  and  if  a  son  of  the  muse  has  not  room  given  him 
to  develop  in  full  freedom,  he  will  never  develop  into 
anything  but  some  office-holder  creeping  along  on  all 
fours. 

Meanwhile  the  two  friends  spent  the  following  days — 
not  wholly  in  a  disorderly  manner — in  the  writing  of 
marriage  cards.  With  these,  on  which  of  course  there  was 
nothing  but  the  words,  "  Mr.  Firmian  Stanislaus  Siebenka?s, 
Poor's  Advocate,  and  his  wife,  nee  Engelkraut ;  with  com- 
pliments,"— with  these  papers,  and  with  the  lady,  they 
were  buth  to  drive  about  the  town  on  the  Saturday,  and 
Leibgeber  had  to  get  down  at  a>ll  the  respectable  houses 
and  hand  in  a  card,  which  is  by  no  means  otherwise  than 
a  laudable  and  befitting  custom  in  towns  where  people 
observe  the  usages  of  good  society.  But  the  two  brethren, 
Siebenkass  and  Leibgeber,  appeared  to  follow  these  usages 


40  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.        [BOOK  I. 

of  imperial  and  rural  towns  more  from  satirical  motives 
than  anything  else,  conforming  to  them  pretty  minutely, 
it  is  true,  but  clearly  chiefly  for  the  fun  of  the  thing, 
each  of  them  playing  the  part  of  first  low  comedian 
and  of  audience  at  the  same  time.  It  would  be  an  insult 
to  the  borough  of  Kuhschnappel  to  suppose  that,  notwith- 
standing Siebenkses's  zealous  readiness  to  join  in  all  the 
processions  of  the  little  place,  in  and  out  of  churches, 
to  the  town  hall  and  the  shooting-ground,  it  was  wholly 
unobservant  of  the  satisfaction  which  it  afforded  him 
rather  to  make  fun  of  some  properly  ordered  cortege,  and 
mar  the  effect  of  it  by  his  unsuitable  dress  and  absurd 
behaviour,  than  to  be  an  ornament  to  it.  And  the 
genuine  eagerness  with  which  he  tried  to  get  admitted 
as  a  member  of  the  Kuhschnappel  shooting-club  was  as- 
cribed rather  to  his  love  of  a  joke  than  to  his  being  the 
son  of  a  keen  sportsman.  As  for  Leibgeber,  he  of  course 
has  the  very  devil  in  him  as  regards  all  such  matters;  but 
he  is  younger  than  Siebenkaes,  and  about  to  set  out  on  his 
travels. 

So  they  drove  about  the  town  on  the  Saturday — and  where 
anybody  in  the  shape  of  a  grandee  lived  they  stopped,  left 
their  passengers'  tickets  and  drove  on,  without  any  mis- 
behaviour. Many  ladies  and  gentlemen,  it  is  true,  got 
the  wrong  sow  by  the  ear,  and  confounded  the  card  carrier 
with  the  young  husband  sitting  in  the  carriage;  but  the 
card  carrier  maintained  his  gravity,  knowing  that  fun 
has  its  own  proper  time.  The  cards  (some  of  which  were 
glazed)  were  delivered  according  to  the  directory,  firstly 
to  the  members  of  the  government,  both  of  the  greater  and 
lesser  council — to  the  seventy  members  of  the  greater,  and 
the  thirteen  of  the  lesser  council ;  consequently  the  judge, 
the  treasu  rer,  the  two  finance  councillors,  the  Heimlicher  (so 
to  say,  tribune  of  the  people)  and  the  remaining  eight 
ordinary  members — these  constituting  the  said  lesser 
council— each  received  his  card.  After  which  the  carriage 
drove  down  lower,  and  provided  the  minor  government 
officials  in  the  various  chambers  and  offices  with  their 
cards,  such  as  the  Offices  of  Woods,  of  the  Game  Com- 
missioners, the  Office  of  Eeform  (which  latter  was  for  the 
repression  of  luxury),  and  the  Meat  Tax  Commission, 


CHAP.  II.J      FLOWER,    FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.         41 

which  was  presided  over  by  a  single  master  butcher,  a  very 
nice  old  man. 

I  am  much  afraid  I  have  made  a  considerable  slip,  inas- 
much as  I  have  drawn  up  no  tables  relative  to  the  consti- 
tution, &c,  of  this  imperial  borough  of  Kuhschnappel 
(which  is  properly  a  small  imperial  town,  though  it  was 
once  a  large  one)  to  lay  before  the  learned  and  statistical 
world.  However,  I  can't  possibly  pull  up  here  in  the  full 
gallop  of  my  chapter,  but  must  wait  till  we  all  get  to  the 
end  of  it,  when  I  can  more  conveniently  open  my  statis- 
tical warehouse. 

The  wheel  of  fortune  soon  began  to  rattle,  and  throw  up 
mud  ;  for  when  Leibgeber  took  bis  eighth  part  of  a  placard 
of  Siebenkass's  marriage  to  the  house  of  his  guardian,  the 
Heimlicher  von  Blaise,  a  tall,  meagre,  barge-pole  of  a 
woman,  wrapped  up  in  wimples  of  calico,  the  Heimlicher's 
wife,  received  it  indeed,  and  with  warmth,  but  warmth  of 
the  sort  with  which  we  generally  administer  a  cudgelling ; 
moreover,  she  uttered  the  following  words  (calculated  to 
give  rise  to  reflection) — 

"  My  husband  is  the  Heimlicher  of  this  town,  and 
what  is  more,  he's  away  from  home.  He  has  nothing 
to  do  with  seven  cheeses ;  *  he  is  tutor  and  guardian  to 
persons  belonging  to  the  highest  and  noblest  families.  You 
had  better  be  off  as  fast  as  you  like;  you've  got  hold  of 
the  wrong  man  here." 

"  I  quite  think  we  have,  myself,"  said  Leibgeber. 

Siebenkaes,  the  ward,  here  tried  to  pacify  his  letter  or 
paper  carrier  with  the  woman  a  little,  by  suggesting  that, 
like  every  good  dog,  she  was  but  barking  at  the  strangers 
before  fetching  and  carrying  for  them :  and  when  his  friend, 
more  anxious  than  himself,  said,  "  You're  quite  sure,  are 
you  not,  that  you  took  proper  legal  precautions  against 
any  venomous  '  objections '  which  the  guardian  might 
make  to  paying  up  your  money,  on  account  of  your  changing 
your  name  ?  "  he  assured  him,  that  before  he  had  esta- 
blished himself  as  Siebenkaas,  he  had  procured  his 
guardian's  opinion  and  approval  in  writing,  which  he 
would  show  him  when  they  got  home. 

*  Siebenksea  means  H  seven  cheese*." 


42  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.       [ROOK  I. 

But  when  they  did  get  home,  Von  Blaise's  letter  was 
nowhere  to  be  found — it  wasn't  in  any  of  the  boxes,  nor  in 
any  of  the  college  note-books,  nor  even  among  the  waste- 
paper — in  fact,  there  was  nothing  of  the  kind. 

"  But  what  a  donkey  I  am  to  bother  about  it ! "  cried 
Siebenkees,  "  what  do  I  require  it  for,  at  all  ?  " 

Here  Leibgeber,  who  had  been  glancing  at  the  Saturday 
newspapers,  suddenly  shoved  them  into  his  pocket,  and  said 
in  a  somewhat  unwonted  tone  of  voice,  "  Come  out,  old  boy, 
and  let's  have  a  run  in  the  fields."  When  they  got  there, 
he  put  into  his  hands  the  '  Schaffhausen  Kews,'  the '  Swabian 
Mercury,'  the  '  Stuttgart  Times,'  and  the  •  Erlangen  Gazette,' 
and  said,  "  These  will  enable  you  to  form  some  idea  of  the 
sort  of  scoundrel  you  have  for  a  guardian." 

In  each  of  these  newspapers,  the  following  notification 
appeared : — 

"Whereas,  Hoseas  Heinrich  Leibgeber,  now  in  his 
29th  year,  proceeded  to  the  University  of  Leipzig  in  1774, 
but  since  that  date  has  not  been  heard  of:  now  the  said 
Hoseas  Heinrich  Leibgeber,  is  hereby,  at  the  instance  of 
his  cousin,  Herr  Heimlicher  von  Blaise,  edictally  cited  and 
summoned  by  himself  or  the  lawful  heirs  of  his  body, 
within  six  months  from  the  date  of  these  presents  (whereof 
two  months  are  hereby  constituted  the  first  term,  two 
months  the  second,  and  two  months  the  third  and  per- 
emptory term),  to  appear  within  the  Inheritance  Office  of 
this  borough,  and,  on  satisfactory  proof  of  identity,  to 
receive  over  the  sum  of  1200  Bhenish  gulden  deposited 
in  the  hands  of  the  said  Heimlicher  von  Blaise  as  trustje 
and  guardian  ;  which  failing,  that,  as  directed  by  the  decree 
of  council  of  24th  July  J  655  (which  enacts,  that  any 
person  who  shall  be  for  ten  years  absent  from  the  realm, 
shall  be  taken  pro  mortuo),  the  above-named  sum  of  1200 
Bhenish  florins  may  be  made  over  and  paid  to  his  said 
guardian  and  trustee,  the  aforesaid  Heimlicher  von  Blaise. 
l)ated  at  Kuhschnappel  in  Swabia,  the  20th  August,  1785. 

"  Inheritance  Office  of  the  free  Imperial 
Borough  of  Kuhschnappel." 

It  is  unnecessary  to  remind  the  legal  reader  thai  the 


CHAP.  II.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN  PIECES.         43 

decree  of  council  referred  to  is  not  in  accordance  with' 
the  legal  usage  of  Bohemia,  where  thirty-one  years  is 
the  stipulated  period,  but  with  that  which  formerly  pre- 
vailed in  France,  when  ten  years  were  sufficient.  And 
when  the  advocate  came  to  the  end  of  the  notice,  and 
stared,  motionless,  at  its  concluding  lines,  his  soul's 
brother  took  hold  of  his  hand,  and  cried,  "  Alas !  alas ! 
it  is  I  who  am  to  blame  for  all  this,  for  changing  names 
with  you." 

"  You  ? — oh,  you  ?  The  devil  alone,  and  nobody  else. 
But  I  must  find  that  letter,"  he  said,  and  they  made 
another  search  all  over  the  house,  in  every  corner  where  a 
letter  could  be.  After  an  hour  of  this  Leibgeber  hunted 
out  one  with  a  broken  seal  of  the  guardian,  of  which  the 
thick  paper,  and  the  broad  legal  fold,  without  an  envelope, 
told  unmistakeably  that  it  had  been  addressed  neither  by 
a  lady,  a  merchant,  nor  courtier,  but  by  the  quill  of  a  bird 
of  quite  a  different  tribe.  However,  there  was  nothing  in 
this  letter,  except  Siebenka^s's  name  in  Siebenkass's  own 
writing — not  another  word,  outside  or  inside.  Quite 
natural;  for  the  advocate  had  a  bad  habit  of  trying  his 
hand  and  his  pen  on  the  backs  of  letters,  and  writing  his 
own  name  and  other  people's  as  well,  with  flourishes  about 
them. 

The  letter  had  once  been  written  in  the  inside,  but,  to 
save  an  incredible  waste  of  good  paper,  the  Heimlicher 
von  Blaise  had  written  his  concurrence  in  the  exchange  of 
the  names  with  an  ink  which  vanishes  from  the  paper 
of  itself,  and  leaves  it,  in  integrum,  white  as  it  was  before 
it  was  written  on. 

I  may,  perhaps,  be  doing  a  chance  service  to  many 
persons  of  the  better  classes,  who  nowadays  more  than 
ever  have  occasion  to  write  promissory  notes  and  other 
business  documents,  if  I  here  copy  out  for  them  the  receipt 
for  this  ink  which  vanishes  after  it  is  dry  ;  I  take  it  from 
a  n  liable  source.  Let  the  man  of  rank  scrape  off  the 
surface  from  a  piece  of  fine  black  cloth,  such  as  he  wears 
at  court — grind  the  scrapings  finer  still  on  a  piece  of 
marble — moisten  this  fine  cloth  dust  repeatedly  with  water, 
then  make  his  ink  with  this,  and  write  his  promissory 
note  with  it;  he  will  find  that,  as  soon  as  the  moisture 


44  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDPvICH   RICHTER.        [BOOK  I. 

has  evaporated,  every  letter  of  the  promissory  note  has 
flown  away  with  it  in  the  form  of  dust ;  the  white  star 
will  have  shone  out,  as  it  were,  through  the  blackness  of 
the  ink. 

But  I  consider  that  I  am  doing  an  equal  service  to  the 
holders  and  presenters  of  such  promissory  notes  as  to 
the  drawers  of  them,  inasmuch  as,  for  the  future,  they 
will  be  careful  not  to  be  satisfied  with  a  security  of  this 
description,  till  they  have  exposed  it  for  some  time  to 
the  sun. 

Some  time  ago,  I  should  have  here  been  apt  to  confound 
this  cloth  ink  with  the  sympathetic  ink  (likewise  possessing 
the  property  of  turning  pale  and  disappearing  after  a  time), 
which  is  commonly  made  use  of  in  both  the  preliminary 
and  final  treaties  entered  into  between  royal  persons  ;  the 
latter  however,  has  a  red  tint.  A  treaty  of  peace  of  three 
years'  standing  is  no  longer  legible  to  a  man  in  the  prime 
of  life,  because  the  red  ink — the  encawtum,  with  which 
formerly  no  one  but  the  Roman  emperors  might  write — 
is  too  apt  to  turn  pale,  unless  a  sufficient  number  of  human 
beings  (from  whom,  as  from  the  cochineal  insect,  this  dye 
stuff  is  prepared)  have  been  made  use  of  in  its  manufac- 
ture ;  and  this  (from  motives  of  sordid  parsimony)  is  not 
always  the  case.  So  that  the  treaty  has  frequently  to  be 
engraved  and  etched  into  the  territory  afresh  with  good 
instruments — the  so-called  "  instruments  of  peace" — at  the 
point  of  the  bayonet. 

The  two  friends  kept  the  happy  young  wife  in  ignorance 
of  this  first  thunderclap  of  the  storm  which  was  threaten- 
ing her  married  life.  On  the  Sunday  morning  they  went 
to  make  a  friendly  call  on  the  Heimlicher  during  the 
church  service ;  unfortunately  he  was  at  church,  however. 
They  postponed,  their  entertaining  visit  till  the  afternoon  ; 
but  then  he  himself  was  paying  one  to  the  chapel  of  the 
orphan  asylum,  the  whole  blooming  body  of  the  orphans, 
boys  and  girls,  having  previously  made  one  to  him,  to  enjoy 
the  privilege  of  kissing  his  hand  in  his  capacity  of  superin- 
tendent of  the  orphan  asylum ;  for  the  inspectorship  of  that 
institution  was,  as  he  modestly  but  truly  observed,  entrusted 
to  his  unworthy  hands.  After  the  evening  sermon,  he 
had  to  perform  a  service  of  his  own  in  his  own  house,  in 


CHAP.  II.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN   PIECES.        45 

short,  he  was  fenced  off  from  the  two  advocates  hy  a  triple 
row  of  spiritual  altar  rails.  It  was  his  admirable  custom 
to  permit  the  members  of  his  household,  not  indeed  to  eat, 
but  to  pray  at  the  same  table  with  him.  He  thought  it 
well  to  spend  the  Sunday  as  a  day  of  labour  in  psalm- 
singing  with  them,  because,  by  such  devotional  exercises, 
he  best  preserved  them  from  sins  of  Sabbath  breaking, 
such  as  working  on  their  own  account,  at  sewing,  mend- 
ing, &c.  And,  on  the  whole,  he  thought  it  well  to  make 
of  the  Sunday  in  this  manner  a  day  of  preparation  for  the 
coming  week,  just  as  actors  in  places  where  Sunday 
representations  are  not  allowed,  have  their  rehearsals  on 
that  day. 

However,  I  recommend  people  in  delicate  health  not  to 
go  near  or  smell  at  this  sort  of  beautiful  nky-blue  plants 
which  grow  in  the  Church's  vineyard  only  to  be  looked 
at,  as  an  English  garden  is  adorned  with  the  pretty 
aconite  and  its  sky-  or  Jesuit's-blue  poisonous  flowers, 
which  grow  pyramidally  to  man's  height.*  People  like 
Von  Blaise,  not  only  ascend  Mount  Sinai  and  the  Golgotha, 
that,  like  goats,  they  may  feed  as  they  climb ;  but  they 
occupy  these  sacred  heights  for  the  purpose  of  making 
attacks  and  incursions  from  them,  just  as  good  generals 
take  possession  of  the  hills,  and  particularly  the  gallows- 
hills.  The  Heimlicher  mounts  from  earth  to  the  heavens 
oftener  than  Blanchard  does,  and  with  similar  motives, 
indeed,  he  can  keep  his  soul  on  the  wing  in  these  elevated 
regions  for  half  a  day  at  a  time,  in  which  respect,  how- 
ever, he  does  not  quite  equal  the  King  of  Siam's  dragon 
kites  which  the  mandarins,  by  relieving  each  other  at 
the  task,  manage  to  keep  up  in  the  sky  for  a  couple  of 
months  at  a  time.  He  soars,  not  as  the  lark  does,  to  make 
music,  but  as  the  noble  falcon  does,  to  swoop  down  upon 
something  or  other.     If  you  see  him  praying  on  a  Mount 

*  Sky-blue  is  the  colour  of  the  order  of  the  Jesuits,  as  also  of  the 
Indian  Krisna,  and  of  anger.  The  hypothesis  of  the  natural  philo- 
sopher Marat,  that  blue  and  red  together  mako  black,  should  be  ex- 
po imented  upon,  by  mixing  the  cardinal's  red  with  the  Jesuit's  blue. 
He  himself,  subsequently,  during  the  French  Revolution,  produced 
from  blue,  red,  and  white  the  most  beautiful  ivory  black,  or  the  Indian 
ink  with  which  Napoleon  afterwards  painted. 


46  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.        LBOOK  L 

of  Olives,  be  sure  that  he's  going  to  build  an  oil  mill  on  it; 
and  if  he  weeps  by  a  brook  Kedron,  depend  upon  it  he's 
either  going  a-fishing  in  it,  or  else  thinking  of  pitching 
somebody  into  it.  He  prays  with  the  object  of  luring  to 
him  the  ignes-fatui  of  sins ;  he  kneels,  but  only  as  a  front 
rank  does,  to  deliver  its  fire  at  the  foe  before  it;  he 
opens  his  arms  as  with  warm  benevolent  affection,  to  fold 
some  one,  a  ward  say,  in  their  embrace,  but  only  in  the 
manner  of  the  red-hot  Moloch,  that  he  may  burn  him  to 
cinders ;  or  he  folds  his  arms  piously  together,  but  does  it 
as  the  machines  called  "maidens"  did,  only  to  cut  people 
to  pieces. 

At  last  the  friends,  in  their  anxiety,  came  to  see  that 
there  are  some  people  whom  one  can  only  manage  to  get 
access  to  when  one  comes  as  thieves  do,  unannounced 
so  at  8  o'clock  on  the  Sunday  evening  they  walked,  sans 
fafon,  into  Von  Blaise's  house.  Everything  was  still  and 
empty ;  they  went  through  an  empty  hall  into  an  empty 
drawing-room,  the  half-open  folding  doors  of  which  led 
into  the  household  chapel.  All  they  could  see  through 
the  crevice  was  six  chairs,  an  open  hymn-book  lying  on 
its  face  on  each  of  them,  and  a  table  with  wax-cloth  cover, 
on  which  were  Miller's  *  Heavenly  Kiss  of  the  Soul,'  and 
Schlichthoher's  'Five-fold  Dispositions  for  all  Sundays 
and  Feasts  of  the  Church.'  They  pressed  through  the 
gap,  and  lo  and  behold!  there  was  the  Heimlicher  all 
alone,  continuing  his  devotions  in  his  sleep,  with  his  cap 
under  his  arm.  His  house-  and  church-servants  had  read 
to  him  till  sleep  had  stiffened  him  to  a  petrifaction,  or 
pillar  of  salt  (an  event  which  occurred  every  Sunday),  for 
his  eyes  and  nis  head  were  alike  heavy  with  the  edible,  » 
the  potable,  and  the  spiritual,  refreshment  of  which  he 
had  partaken;  or  because  he  was  like  many  who  think 
it  well  to  close  *  their  eyes  during  the  sowing  of  the 
heavenly  seed,  just  as  people  do  when  their  heads  are 
being  powdered,  or  because  churches  and  private  chapels 
are  still  like  those  ancient  temples  in  which  the  com- 
munications of  the  oracles  were  received  during  sleep. 
And  as  soon  as  they  saw  his  eyes  closed,  the  servants 
would  read  more  and  more  softly,  to  accustom  him  gra- 
dually to  the  complete  cessation  of  the  sound ;  and,  by  and 


CHAP.  II.  J      FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN  PIECES.        47 

by,  the  devout  domestics  would  steal  gently  away,  leaving 
him  in  his  attitude  of  prayer  till  10  o'clock ;  at  that  hour 
(when,  moreover,  Madame  von  Blaise  generally'  came 
home  from  paying  visits)  the  domestic  sacristan  and 
night  watchman  would  rouse  him  from  his  sleep  with  a 
shrill  "Amen,"  and  he  would  put  something  on  to  his 
bald  head  again. 

This  evening  matters  fell  out  differently.  Leibgeber 
rapped  loudly  on  the  table  two  or  three  times  with  the 
knuckle  of  his  forefinger  to  wake  the  city's  father  out  of 
his  first  sleep.  When  he  opened  his  eyes  and  saw  before 
him  the  two  lean  parodies  and  copies  of  one  another,  he 
took,  in  his  beer-  and  sleep-heaviness  of  idea,  a  glass  peri- 
wig from  off  a  block,  and  put  that  on  his  head  instead  of  his 
cap,  which  had  fallen  down.  His  ward  addressed  him 
politely,  saying  he  wished  .to  present  to  him  his  friend 
with  whom  he  had  made  the  exchange  of  names.  He 
likewise  called  him  his  "kind  cousin  and  guardian." 
Leibgeber,  more  angry  and  less  self-contained,  because 
he  was  younger,  and  because  the  wrong  had  not  been 
done  to  him,  fired  into  the  Heimlicher's  ears,  from  a  posi- 
tion closer  to  him  by  three  discourteous  paces,  the  in- 
quiries, "  Which  of  us  two  is  it  that  your  worship  has 
given  out  pro  mortuo,  that  you  may  be  able  to  cite  him  as 
a  dead  man  ?  There  are  the  ghosts  of  two  of  us  here  both 
together."  Blaise  turned  with  a  lofty  air  from  Leibgeber 
to  Siebenkaes,  and  said,  "  If  you  have  not  changed  your 
dress,  sir,  as  well  as  your  name,  I  believe  you  are  the 
gentleman  whom  I  have  had  the  honour  of  talking  with 
on  several  previous  occasions.  Or  was  it  you,  sir?"  he 
said  to  Leibgeber,  who  shook  like  one  possessed.  "Well," 
he  continued  in  a  more  pleasant  tone,  "  I  must  confess  to 
you,  Mr.  Siebenkaes,  that  I  had  always  stipposed,  until 
now,  that  you  were  the  person  who  left  this  for  the  uni- 
versity ten  years  ago,  and  whose  little  inheritance  I  then 
assumed  the  guardianship  or  curatorship  of.  What  pro- 
bably chiefly  contributed  to  my  mistake,  if  it  be  a  mistake, 
was,  I  presume,  the  likeness  which,  prozier  propter,  you 
certainly  seem  to  bear  to  my  missing  ward ;  for  in  many 
details  you  undoubtedly  differ  from  him ;  for  instance,  he 
had  a  mole  beside  his  ear." 


48  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  1 

"  The  infernal  mole,"  interrupted  Leibgeber,  "  was  ob- 
literated by  means  of  a  toad,  on  my  account  entirely, 
because  it  was  like  an  ass's  ear,  and  he  never  thought 
that,  when  he  lost  his  ear,  he  should  lose  a  relative  along 
with  it." 

"  That  may  be,"  said  the  guardian  coldly,  "  You  must 
prove  to  me,  Herr  Advocate,  that  it  was  to  you  I  had  been 
thinking  of  paying  over  the  inheritance  to-day ;  for  your 
announcement  that  you  had  exchanged  your  family  name 
for  that  of  an  utter  stranger  I  considered  to  be  probably 
one  of  the  jokes  for  which  you  are  so  celebrated.  But  I 
learned  last  week  that  you  had  been  proclaimed  in  church 
and  married  in  the  name  of  Siebenkaes,  and  more  to  the 
same  effect.  I  then  discussed  the  question  with  Herr 
Gross  weibel  (the  President  of  the  Chamber  of  Inherit- 
ance), and  with  my  son-in-law,  Herr  von  Knarnschilder, 
and  they  assured  me  I  should  be  acting  contrary  to  my 
duty  and  safety  if  I  let  this  property  out  of  my  hands. 
"What  would  you  do — they  very  properly  said — what  an- 
swer would  you  have  to  make  if  the  real  owner  of  the 
name  were  to  appear  and  demand  another  settlement  of 
the  guardianship  accounts  ?  It  would  be  too  bad,  truly, 
for  a  man.  who,  besides  his  manifold  business  of  other 
kinds,  undertook  this  troublesome  guardian  work,  which 
the  law  does  not  require  him  to  do,  purely  from  affection 
for  his  relative,  and  from  the  love  which  he  bears  to  all 
his  brethren  of  mankind* — it  would  be  too  bad,  I  say,  for 
him  to  have  to  pay  up  this  money  a  second  time  out  of 
his  own  pocket.  At  the  same  time,  Mr.  Siebenkaes,  as, 
in  my  capacity  of  a  private  individual,  I  am  more  disposed 
to  admit  the  validity  of  your  claim  than  you  perhaps 
suppose,  you  being  a  lawyer,  know  quite  as  well  as  I  that 
my  individual  conviction  carries  with  it  no  legal  weight 
whatever,  and  that  I  have  to  deal  with  this  matter  not  as 
a  man,  but  as  a  guardian-^it  would  probably  be  the  best 

*  He  styles  mankind  his  brethren,  as  many  monks,  princes,  and 
religious  persons  are  given  to  do  to  each  other,  and  perhaps  he  is  right 
in  so  doing,  seeing  that  he  treats  these  brethren  of  his  just  as  many 
eastern  princes  treat  theirs,  and,  in  fact,  moce  kindly,  beheading, 
blinding,  and  cutting  them  up  in  a  spiritual  sense  cnly,  not  in  a 
corporeal. 


CHAP.  II.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.  *9 

course  to  let  some  third  party  less  biassed  in  my  favour, 
such  as  the  Inheritance  Office,  decide  the  question.  Let 
me  have  the  satisfaction,  Mr.  Siebenkass,  as  soon  as  it 
may  be  possible  "  (he  ended  more  smilingly,  and  laying 
his  hand  on  the  other's  shoulder)  "  to  see  that  which  I 
hope  may  prove  the  case,  namely,  that  you  are  my  long- 
missing  cousin,  Leibgeber,  properly  established  by  legal 
proof." 

"  Then,"  said  Leibgeber,  grimly  calm,  and  with  all 
kinds  of  scale-passages  and  fugatos  coursing  over  the 
colour-piano  of  his  faco,  "is  the  little  bit  of  resemblance 
which  Mr.  Siebenkees  there  has  to — to  himself,  that  is  to 
say,  to  your  worship's  ward,  to  be  taken  as  proving 
nothing;  not  even  as  much  as  an  equal  similarity  in  a 
case  of  comparatio  literarum  would  prove  ?  " 

"  Oh,  of  course,"  said  Blasius,  "  something,  certainly, 
but  not  everything ;  for  there  were  several  false  Neros, 
and  three  or  four  sham  Sebastians  in  Portugal ;  suppose, 
now,  you  should  be  my  cousin  yourself,  Mr.  Leibgeber ! " 

Leibgeber  jumped  up  at  once,  and  said  in  an  altered 
and  joyful  voice,  "  So  I  am,  my  dearest  guardian — it  was 
all  done  to  try  you — I  hope  you  will  pardon  my  friend  his 
share  in  the  little  mystification." 

"All  very  well,"  answered  Blasius,  more  inflatedly, 
"  but  your  own  changes  of  ground  must  show  you  tho 
necessity  for  a  proper  legal  investigation." 

This  was  more  than  Siebenkaas  could  endure,  he  squeezed 
his  friend  by  the  hand,  as  much  as  to  say, '"Pray  be  patient," 
and  inquired  in  a  voice  which  an  unwonted  feeling  of 
hatred  rendered  faint,  "  Did  you  never  write  to  me  when 
I  was  in  Leipzig?" — "If  you  are  my  ward,  I  certainly 
did,  many  times ;  if  you  are  not,  you  have  got  hold  of  my 
letters  in  some  other  way." 

Then  Siebenktes  asked,  more  faintly  still,  :'Have  you  no 
recollection  at  all  of  a  letter  in  which  you  assured  mo 
there  was  not  the  slightest  risk  invoWed  in  my  proposed 
change  of  name,  none  whatever?" 

"  This  is  really  quite  ludicrous,"  answered  Blaise,  "  in 
that  case  there  could  be  no  question  about  the  matter ! " 

Here  Leibgeber  clasped  the  father  of  the  city  with  his 
two  fingers  as  if  they  had  been  iron  rivets,  grasped  his 

II.  K 


50  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICK   RICHTER,       [HOOK  I. 

shoulders  as  one  does  the  pommel  of  a  saddle  at  mounting, 
clamped  him  firmly  into  his  chair,  and  thundered  out, 
"  You  never  wrote  anything  of  the  kind,  did  you  ?  you 
smooth-tongued,  grey-headed  old  scoundrel !  Stop  your 
grunting,  or  I'll  throttle  you !  never  wrote  the  letter,  eh? 
keep  quiet — if  you  lift  a  finger,  my  dog  will  tear  your 
windpipe  out.  Answer  me  quietly — you  say  you  never 
received  any  letter  on  the  subject,  do  you?" 

"I  had  rather  say  nothing,"  whispered  Blasius,  "evi- 
dence given  under  coercion  is  valueless." 

Here  Siebenkass  drew  his  friend  away  from  the  Heim- 
licher,  but  Leibgeber  said  to  the  dog,  "  Mordax !  hooy, 
Sau.,"  took  the  glass  periwig  from  the  head  of  the  servant 
of  the  state,  broke  off  the  principal  curls  of  it,  and  said  to 
Siebenkaes  (Saufinder  lay  ready  to  spring),  "  Screw  him 
down  yourself,  if  the  dog  is  not  to  do  it,  that  he  may  listen 
to  me.  I  want  to  say  one  or  two  pretty  things  to  him — 
don't  let  him  say  'Pap!' — Herr  Heimlicher  von  Blasius,  I 
have  not  the  slightest  intention  of  making  use  of  libellous 
or  abusive  language  to  you,  or  of  spouting  an  improvised 
pasquinade ;  I  merely  tell  you,  that  yoxt  are  an  old  rascal, 
a  robber  of  orphans,  a  varnished  villain,  and  everything 
else  of  the  kind — for  instance,  a  Polish  bear,  whose  foot- 
marks are  just  like  a  human  being's.*  The  epithets  which 
I  here  make  use  of,  such  as  scoundrel — Judas — gallows- 
bird"  (at  each  word  he  struck  the  glass  turban  like  a 
cymbal  against  his  other  hand),  "skunk,  leech,  horse- 
leech— nominal  definitions  such  as  these  are  not  abuse, 
and  do  not  constitute  libel,  firstly  because,  according  to 
'  L.  §  de  injur.,'  the  grossest  abuse  may  be  uttered  in 
jest,  and  I  am  in  jest  here — and  we  may  always  make  use 
of  abusive  language  in  maintaining  our  own  rights — see 
'Leyser.'|  Indeed,  according  to  Quistorp's  'Penal  Code,' 
we  may  accuse  a  person  of  the  gravest  crimes  without 
animus  injurandi,  provided  that  he  has  not  been  already 
tried  and  punished  for  them.  And  has  your  honesty  ever 
been  put  on  its  trial  and  punished,  you  cheating  old  grey- 
headed vagabond?    I  suppose  you  are  like  the  Heimlicher 

*  The  same  robbing,  strangling  paw  is  masked  in  both  under  the 
likeness  of  the  track  of  a  man.  -j-  '  Sp.'  r>47,  N.  Tr. 


CHAP.  II.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND   THORN   PIECES.  51 

in  Freyburg* — rather  a  different  sort  of  man  to  you,  it's 
to  bo  hoped — and  have  half-a-dozen  years  or  so,  during 
which  no  one  can  lay  hold  of  you — but  I've  got  hold  of 
you  to-day,  hypocrite ! — Mordax ! "  The  dog  looked  up  at 
this  word  of  command. 

"  Let  him  go,  now,"  Siebenkses  begged,  compassionating 
the  prostrate  sinner. 

"  In  a  moment. ;  but  don't  you  put  me  in  a  fury,  please," 
said  Leibgeber,  letting  fall  the  plucked  wig,  standing  on 
it,  and  taking  out  his  scissors  and  black  paper,  "  I  want 
to  be  quite  calm  while  I  clip  out  a  likeness  of  the  padded 
countenance  of  this  portentous  cotton-nightcap  of  a  crea- 
ture, because  I  shall  take  it  away  with  me  as  a  gage  d'amour. 
I  want  to  cany  this  ecce  homunculus  about  with  me  half 
over  the  world,  and  say  to  everybody,  '  Hit  it,  bang  away 
at  it  well ;  blessed  is  he  who  doth  not  depart  this  life  till 
he  hath  thrashed  Heimlicher  Blasius  of  Kuhschnappel ; 
I  would  have  done  it  myself  if  I  had  not  been  far  too 
strong.' 

"  I  shan't  be  able,"  he  went  on,  turning  to  Siebenkaes, 
and  finishing  a  good  portrait,  "  to  give  that  sneak  and 
sharper  there  an  account  by  word  of  mouth  of  my  success, 
for  a  whole  year  to  come ;  but  by  that  time  the  one  or  two 
little  touches  of  abuse  which  I  have  just  lightly  applied 
to  him  will  be  covered  by  the  statute  of  limitations,  and 
we  shall  be  as  good  friends  as  ever  again." 

Here  he  unexpectedly  requested  Siebenkses  to  stay  by 
Saufinder — whom  he  had  constituted  into  a  corps  of  obser- 
vation by  a  motion  of  his  finger — as  he  was  obliged  to 
leave  the  room  for  a  moment  On  the  last  occasion  of  his 
being  in  Blaise's  grand  drawing-room  (where  he  displayed 
his  magnificence  before  the  Kuhschnappel  world,  great  and 
small),  he  had  noticed  the  paper-hangings  there,  and  an 
exceedingly  ingenious  stove,  in  the  form  of  the  goddess 
of  justice,  Themis,  who  does,  indeed,  singe  as  frequently 
as  she  merely  warms.  And  this  time  he  had  brought  with 
him  a  camel's-hair  pencil,  and  a  bottle  of  an  ink  made 
from  cobalt  dissolved  in  aquafortis,  with  a  little  muriatic 

*  The  Heimlicher  of  Freyburg  is  inviolable  for  throe  years  during 
his  tenure  of  office,  and  for  three  years  after  it  expires. 

E  2 


52  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.       [BOOK  t 

acid  dropped  into  it.  Unlike  the  black  cloth  ink,  which 
is  visible  at  first  and  disappears  afterwards,  the  sym- 
pathetic ink  here  spoken  of  is  invisible  at  first,  and  only 
comes  out  a  green  colour  on  the  paper  when  it  is  warmed. 
Leibgeber  now  wrote  with  his  camel's-hair  pencil  and  this 
ink  the  following  invisible  notification  on  the  paper  which 
was  closest  to  the  stove,  or  Themis. 

"The  Goddess  of  Justice  hereby  protests  in  presence 
of  this  assembly  against  being  thus  sat  up  in  effigy,  and 
warmed  and  cooled  (if  not  absolutely  hanged),  at  the 
pleasure  of  the  Heimlicher  von  Blaise,  who  is  long  since 
condemned  at  her  inner  secret  tribunal. 

"  Themis." 

Leibgeber  came  away,  leaving  the  silent  seed  of  this 
Priestley's  green  composition  behind  him  on  the  wall  with 
the  pleasing  certainty  that  next  winter,  some  evening 
when  the  drawing-room  was  nicely  warmed  by  the  goddess 
for  a  party,  the  whole  dormant  green  crop  would  all  of  a 
sudden  shoot  lustily  forth. 

So  he  came  back  to  the  oratory  again,  finding  Saufinder 
keeping  up  his  appointed  official  contemplation,  and  his 
friend  maintaining  his  observation  of  the  dog.  They  then 
all  took  a  most  polite  leave,  and  even  begged  the  Heim- 
licher not  to  come  into  the  street  with  them,  as  it  mightn't 
be  so  easy  to  keep  Mordax  from  a  bite  or  so  there. 

When  they  got  to  the  street  Leibgeber  said  to  his  friend, 
"  Don't  pull  such  a  long  face  about  it— I  shall  keep  flying 
backwards  and  forwards  to  you,  of  course.  Come  through 
the  gate  with  me — I  must  get  across  the  frontier  of  this 
country;  let's  run,  and  get  on  to  royal  territory  before 
six  minutes  are  over  our  heads." 

When  they  had  passed  the  gate,  that  is  to  say,  the  un- 
Palmyra-like  ruins  of  it,  the  crystal  reflecting  grotto  of  the 
August  night  stood  open  and  shining  above  the  dark -green 
earth,  and  the  ocean-calm  of  nature  stayed  the  wild  storm 
of  the  human  heart.  Night  was  drawing  and  closing 
her  curtain  (a  sky  full  of  silent  suns,  not  a  breath  of 
breeze  moving  in  it),  up  above  the  world  and  down 
beneath  it ;  the  reaped  corn  stood  in  the  sheaves  without 
a  rustle.     The  cricket  with  his  one  constant  song,  and  a 


CHAP.  II.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND   THORN   PIECES.        53 

poor  old  man  gathering  snails  for  the  snail-pits,  seemed  to 
be  the  onlv  things  that  dwelt  in  the  far  reaching  darkness. 
The  fires  of  anger  had  suddenly  gone  out  in  the  two  friends' 
hearts.  Leibgeber  said,  in  a  voice  pitched  two  octaves 
lower,  "  God  be  thanked !  this  writes  a  verse  of  peace 
round  the  storm  bell  within !  the  night  seems  to  me  to 
have  muffled  my  alarum  drum  with  her  black  robe,  and 
softened  it  down  to  a  funeral  march.  I  am  delighted  to 
find  myself  growing  a  little  sad  after  all  that  anger  and 
shouting." 

"If  it  only  hadn't  all  been  on  my  account,  old  Henry," 
said  Siebenkaes,  "your  humorous  fury  at  that  barefaced 
old  sinner." 

"Though  you  are  not  so  apt  to  shy  your  satire  into 
people's  faces  as  I  am,"  said  Leibgeber,  "  you  would  have 
been  in  a  greater  rage  if  you  had  been  in  my  place.  One 
can  bear  injustice  to  one's  self — particularly  when  one  has 
as  good  a  temper  as  I  have — but  not  to  a  friend.  And 
unluckily  you  are  the  martyr  to  my  name  to-day,  and  eye- 
witness and  blood-witness  into  the  bargain.  Besides,  I 
should  tell  you  that,  as  a  general  rule,  when  once  I  am 
ridden  by  the  devil  of  anger — or  rather  when  1  have  got  on 
to  his  back — I  always  spur  the  brute  nearly  to  death,  till  he 
falls  down,  so  that  I  mayn't  have  to  mount  him  again  for 
the  next  three  months.  However,  I  have  poured  you  out  a 
nice  basin  of  black  broth,  and  left  you  sitting  with  the  spoon 
in  your  hand."  Siebenkaes  had  been  dreading  for  some  time 
that  he  would  say  something  about  the  1200  gulden,  those 
baptismal  dues  of  his  re-baptism,  the  discount  of  his  name. 
He  therefore  said,  as  cheerfully  and  pleasantly  as  his  heart, 
torn  by  this  sudden,  nocturnal  parting,  would  let  him,  "  My 
wife  and  I  have  plenty  of  supplies  in  our  little  bit  of  a 
fortress  of  Konigstein,  and  we  can  sow  and  reap  there  too. 
Heaven  only  grant  that  we  may  have  many  a  hard  nut  to 
crack  ;  they  give  a  delicious  flavour  to  the  table- wine  of  our 
stale,  flat,  everyday  life.  I  shall  bring  my  action  to-morrow." 

They  both  concealed  their  emotion  at  the  approach  of 
the  moment  of  parting  under  the  cloak  of  comic  speeches. 
These  two  counterparts  came  to  a  column  which  had  been 

erected  by  the  Princess  of on  the  spot  where,  on  her 

return  from  England,  she  had  met  her  sister  coming  from 


54  JEAN   PAUL   FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  I. 

the  Alps ;  and  as  this  joyful  souvenir  of  a  meeting  had  a  quite 
opposite  significance  to-night,  Leibgeher  said,  "  Now,  right 
about  fece — march !  Your  wife  is  getting  anxious — it's 
past  eleven  o'clock.  There,  you  see,  we  have  reached  your 
boundary  mark,  your  frontier  fortress,  the  gallows.  I  am 
off  at  once  into  Bayreuth  and  Saxony  to  cut  my  crop — other 
people's  faces,  to  wit,  and  sometimes  my  own  fool's  face  into 
the  bargain.  I  shall  most  likely  come  and  see  you  again, 
just  for  the  fun  of  the  thing,  in  a  year  and  a  day,  when 
the  verbal  libels  are  pretty  well  out  of  date.  By  the  by." 
he  added,  hastily,  "  promise  me  on  your  word  of  honour  to 
do  me  one  little  favour." 

Siebenkaes  instantly  did  so.  "Don't  send  my  deposit 
after  me  * — a  plaintiff  has  payments  to  make.  So  fare  you 
well,  dearest  old  man,"  he  blurted  huskily  out,  and  after  a 
hurried  kiss,  ran  quickly  down  the  little  hill  with  an  air 
of  assumed  unconcern.  His  friend,  bewildered  and  for- 
saken, looked  after  the  runner,  without  uttering  a  syllable. 
When  he  got  to  the  bottom  of  the  hillock,  the  runner 
stopped,  bent  his  head  low  towards  the  ground,  and — 
loosened  his  garters. 

"  Couldn't  you  have  done  that  up  here  ?"  cried  Sieben- 
kaes, and  went  down  to  him,  and  said,  "  We'll  go  as  far  as 
the  gallows  hill  together."  The  sand-bath  and  reverbe- 
rating furnace  of  a  noble  anger  made  all  their  emotions 
warmer  to-day,  just  as  a  hot  climate  gives  strength  to 
poisons  and  spices.  As  the  first  parting  had  caused  their 
eyes  to  overflow,  they  had  nothing  more  to  keep  in  con- 
trol but  voice  and  language. 

"  Are  you  sure  you  feel  quite  well  after  being  so  much 
vexed  ?"  said  Siebenkaes.  "  If  the  death  of  domestic  ani 
mals  portends  the  death  of  the  master  of  the  house,  as  the 
superstition  runs,"  said  Leibgeber,  "I  shall  live  to  all 
eternity,  for  my  menagerie  f  of  beasts  is  all  alive  and 
kicking."  At  last  they  stopped  at  the  market  house, 
beside  the  place  of  execution.  "  Just  up  to  the  top,"  said 
Siebenkaes,  "  no  further." 

When  they  came  to  the  top  of  this  boundary -hill  of  so 

*  It  consisted  chiefly  of  curious  coins,  vicariat -dollars,  &c. 
f  Plato  likens  out  lower  passions  to  animals  kicking  inside  us. 


CHAP,  n.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND   THORN   PIECES.         55 

many  an  unhappy  life — and  when  Siebenkaes  looked  down 
upon  the  green  spotted  stone  altar  where  so  many  an 
innocent  sacrifice  had  been  offered  up,  and  thought,  in 
that  dark  minute,  of  the  heavy  blood  drops  of  agony,  the 
burning  tears  which  women  who  had  killed  their  children  * 
(and  were  themselves  put  to  death  by  the  state  and  their 
lovers)  had  let  fall  upon  this  their  last  and  briefest  rack 
of  torture  here  in  this  field  of  blood — and  as  he  gazed 
from  this  cloudbank  of  life  out  over  the  broad  earth  with 
the  mists  of  night  steaming  up  round  its  horizons  and  over 
all  its  streams — he  took  his  friend's  hand,  and,  looking  to 
the  free  starry  heaven,  said,  "  The  mists  of  our  life  on 
earth  must  be  resolved  into  stars,  up  there  at  last,  as  the 
mists  of  the  milky  way  part  into  suns.  Henry,  don't 
you  yet  believe  in  the  soul's  immortality  ?" — "  It  will  not 
do  yet,  I  can  not,"  Leibgeber  replied.  "  Blasius,  now,  hardly 
deserves  to  live  once,  let  alone  twice  or  several  times.  I 
sometimes  can't  help  feeling  as  if  a  little  piece  of  the  other 
world  had  been  painted  on  to  this,  just  to  finish  it  off  and 
make  it  complete,  as  I've  sometimes  seen  subsidiary  sub- 
jects introduced  in  fainter  colours  towards  the  edge  of  a 
picture,  to  make  the  principal  subject  stand  out  from  the 
frame,  and  to  give  it  unity  of  effect.  But  at  this  moment, 
human  beings  strike  me  as  being  like  those  crabs  which 
priests  used  to  fasten  tapers  to  and  set  them  crawling 
about  churchyards,  telling  the  people  they  were  the  souls 
of  the  departed.  Just  so  do  we,  in  a  masquerade  imper- 
sonation of  immortal  beings,  crawl  about  over  graves  with 
our  tapers  of  souls.     Ten  to  one  they  go  out  at  last." 

His  friend  fell  on  his  heart,  and  said  with  vivid  convic- 
tion, "We  do  not  go  out!  Farewell  a  thousand  times. 
We  shall  meet  where  there  is  no  parting.  By  my  soul ! 
we  do  not  go  out.     Farewell,  farewell." 

And  so  they  parted.  Henry  passed  slowly  and  with 
drooping  arms  through  the  footpaths  between  the  stubble- 
fields,  raising  neither  hand  nor  e)'e,  that  he  might  give  no 
sign  of  sorrow.  But  a  deep  grief  fell  on  Sietienkags,  for 
men  who  rarely  shed  tears  shed  all  the  more  when  they 
do  weep.     So  he  went  to  his  house  and  laid  his  weary 

i         •  He  happened  to  have  the  case  )f  one  to  defend,  just  then. 


56  JEAN    PAUL  FRIEDETCH   RIC'HTER.        [BOOK  I. 

melting  heart  to  rest  on  his  wife's  untroubled  breast  (there 
was  not  even  a  dream  stirring  it).  But  far  on  into  the  fore- 
court of  the  world  of  dreams  did  the  thought  of  the  days 
in  store  for  Lenette  attend  him — and  of  his  friend's 
night  journey  under  the  stars,  which  he  would  be  look- 
ing up  at  without  any  hope  of  ever  being  nearer  to 
them;  and  it  was  chiefly  for  his  friend  that  his  tears 
flowed  fast. 

Oh  ye  two  friends — thou  who  art  out  in  the  dark- 
ness there,  and  thou  who  art  here  at  home !  But  where- 
fore should  I  be  continually  harping  back  upon  the  old 
emotion  which  you  have  once  more  awakened  in  me — the 
same  which  in  old  days  used  to  penetrate  and  refresh  me 
60  when  I  read  as  a  lad  about  the  friendship  of  a  Swift, 
an  Arbuthnott  and  a  Pope  in  their  letters?  Many  another 
heart  must  have  been  fired  and  aroused  as  mine  was  at  the 
contemplation  of  the  touching,  calm  affection  which  the 
hearts  of  these  men  felt  for  one  another  ;  cold,  sharp,  and 
cutting  to  the  outer  world,  in  the  inner  land  which  was 
common  to  them  they  could  work  and  beat  for  each  other ; 
like  lofty  palm  trees,  presenting  long  sharp  spines  towards 
the  common  world  below  them,  but  at  their  summits  full 
of  the  precious  palm-wine  of  strong  friendship. 

So,  in  their  lesser  degree,  1  think  we  may  find  some- 
thing of  a  similar  kind  to  like  and  to  admire  in  our  two 
friends,  Leibgeber  and  Siebenkses.  We  need  not  inquire 
very  closely  into  the  causes  which  brought  about  their 
friendship ;  for  it  is  hate,  not  love,  which  needs  to  be  ex- 
plained and  accounted  for.  The  sources  whence  every- 
thing that  is  good  wells  forth  from  this  universe  upwards 
to  God  himself,  are  veiled  by  a  night  all  thick  with  stars ; 
but  the  stars  are  very  far  away. 

These  two  men,  while  as  yet  in  the  fresh,  green  springtime 
of  university  life,  at  once  haw  straight  through  each  other's 
breasts  into  each  other's  hearts,  and  they  attracted  each 
other  with  their  opposite  poles.  What  chiefly  delighted 
Siebenkses  was  Leibgeber's  firmness  and  power,  and  even 
his  capability  of  anger,  as  well  as  his  flights  and  laughter 
over  every  kind  of  sham  grandeur,  sham  fine  feeling,  sham 
scholarship.  Like  the  condor,  he  laid  the  eggs  (of  his  act 
or  of  his  pregnant  saying)  in  to  nest,  but  on  the  bara 


CHAP.  II.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND    THORN   PIECES.        57 

rock,  preferring  to  live  without  a  name,  and  consequently 
always  taking  some  other  than  his  own.  On  which  ac- 
count the  poor's  advocate  used  to  tell  him,  ten  times  over, 
the  two  following  anecdotes,  just  to  enjoy  his  irritation  at 
them. 

The  first  was,  that  a  German  professor  in  D&rpat,  who 
was  delivering  a  eulogistic  address  on  the  subject  of  the 
reigning  grand  duke  Alexander,  suddenly  stopped  in  the 
middle  of  it,  and  gazed  for  a  long  time  in  silence  on  a 
bust  of  that  potentate,  saying  at  length,  "  The  speechless 
heart  has  spoken." 

The  second  was  that  Klopstock  sent  finely  got-up  copies 
of  his  '  Messiah '  to  schoolporters,  with  the  request  that  the 
most  deserving  among  them  might  scatter  spring-flowers 
on  the  grave  of  his  own  old  teacher,  Stubel,  while  softly 
pronouncing  his  (Klopstock's)  name.  To  which,  if  Leibgeber 
had  anything  to  adduce  on  the  subject,  Siebenkass  would 
go  on  to  add  that  the  poet  had  called  up  four  new  porters 
to  give  them  three  readings  apiece  from  his  '  Messiah,'  re- 
warding each  with  a  gold  medal  provided  by  a  friend. 
After  telling  him  this  he  would  look  to  see  Leibgeber's 
foaming  and  stamping  at  a  person's  thus  worshipping 
himself  as  a  species  of  reliquary  full  of  old  fingers  and 
bones. 

"What  Leibgeber,  on  the  other  hand, — more  like  the 
Morlacks,  who,  as  Towinson  and  Forlis  tell  us,  though 
they  have  but  one  word  to  express  both  revenge  and 
Banctification  (osveta),  do  yet  have  their  friends  betrothed 
to  them  with  a  blessing  at  the  altar — chiefly  delighted  in 
and  loved  about  his  satirical  foster-brother  was  the  dia- 
mond brooch  which  in  his  case  pinned  together  poetry, 
kindly  temper,  and  a  stoicism  which  scorned  this  world's 
absurdities.  And  lastly,  each  of  them  daily  enjoyed  the 
gratification  of  knowing  that  the  other  understood  him 
completely  and  wonderfully,  whether  he  were  in  jest  or  in 
earnest.  But  it  is  not  every  friend  who  meets  with  another 
of  this  stamp. 


58  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        fBOOK  I. 


APPENDIX  TO  CHAPTER  II. 

GOVERNMENT   OF   THE   IMPERIAL    MARKET   BOROUGH   OF 
KUHSCHNAPPEL. 

1  have  omitted,  all  through  two  chapters,  to  state  that  the 
free  imperial  borough  of  Kuhschnappel  (of  which,  it 
appears,  there  is  a  namesake  in  the  Erzgebirge  country)  is 
the  thirty-second  of  the  Swabian  towns  which  takes  its 
seat  on  Swabia's  town-bench  of  thirty-one  towns.  Swabia 
may  look  upon  herself  as  being  a  hotbed  and  forcing- house 
of  imperial  towns,  these  colonies,  or  hostelries,  of  the 
goddess  of  freedom  in  Germany,  whom  persons  of  position 
worship  as  their  hou!«ehold  goddess ;  and  according  to 
whose  "  election  of  grace "  it  is  that  poor  sinners  are 
called  to  salvation.  I  must  now,  in  this  place,  accede  to 
the  universally  expressed  desire  for  an  accurate  sketch  map 
of  the  Kuhschnappel  Government;  though  few  readers, 
save  people  such  as  Nikolai,  Schlaezer  and  the  like,  can  be 
expected  to  form  an  idea  of  the  difficulty  I  have  experienced, 
and  the  sum  I  have  had  to  expend  in  postage,  before  getting 
hold  of  information  somewhat  more  accurate  than  that 
which  is  generally  current  on  the  subject  of  Kuhschnappel. 
Indeed,  imperial  towns,  like  Swi>s  towns,  always  plaster 
over  and  stop  up  the  combs  where  their  honey  is  stored, 
as  though  their  constitutions  were  stolen  silver  plate  with 
the  owner's  name  still  unobliterated — or  as  though  the 
little  bits  of  towns  and  territories  were  fortresses  (which 
indeed  they  are  as  against  their  own  inhabitants  more  than 
against  their  enemies),  of  which  strangers  are  not  allowed 
to  take  sketches. 

The  constitution  of  our  noteworthy  borough  of  Kuh- 
schnappel seems  to  have  been  the  original  rough  draft  or 
sketch  which  Bern  (a  place  at  no  great  distance)  has 
copied  hers  from,  only  with  the  pantograph  on  a  larger 
scale.  For  Bern,  like  Kuhschnappel,  has  her  Upper  House, 
or  supreme  council,  which  decides  upon  peace  and  war, 
and  has  the  power  of  life  and  death  ju,st,  as  in  Kuhschnap- 
pel, and  consists  of  chief  magistrates,  treasurers,  tenners. 


CHAr.  II. J      FLOV.'ER,    FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.         59 

Heimlichers  and  counsellors,  only  that  there  are  more  of 
them  in  Bern  than  in  Kuhschnappel.  Further,  Bern  has 
her  Lower  House,  consisting  of  presidenis,  deputies  and 
pensioners,  subsidiary  to  the  Upper.  The  two  Chambers 
of  Appeal,  those  of  Woods  and  Forests,  Game  Laws,  and 
Reform,  the  Meat  Tax  and  other  commissions  are  clearly 
but  large  text  copies  of  the  Kuhschnappel  outlines. 

To  speak  the  truth,  however,  I  have  drawn  this  com- 
parison between  these  two  places  solely  with  the  view  of 
bein&  comprehensible  (perhaps  at  the  same  time  agreeable) 
to  the  Swiss  generally,  and  particulaily  to  ihe  people  of 
Bern.  For  in  reality,  Kuhschnappel  tejoices  in  a  much 
more  perfect  and  aristocratic  constitution  than  Bern,  such 
as  was  to  be  found  in  a  measure  in  Ulm  and  Niirnberg, 
though  the  stormy  weather  of  the  revolution  has  rather 
kept  them  back  than  brought  them  forward.  A  short  time 
since,  Nurnberg  and  Ulm  were  as  fortunate  as  Kuhschnap- 
pel is  now,  inasmuch  as  they  were  governed,  not  by  the 
common,  working  classes,  but  by  people  of  family  only,  so 
that  no  mere  citizen  could  meddle  with  the  matter  in  the 
least  degree  either  in  person  or  by  deputy.  Now,  unfor- 
tunately, it  appears  to  be  the  case  in  both  towns  that  the 
cask  of  the  state  has  had  to  be  fresh  tapped  just  about  an 
inch  or  so  above  the  thick  dregs  of  the  common  herd, 
because  what  came  from  the  tap  nearer  the  top  proved  sour. 
However,  it  is  impossible  for  me  to  go  on  until  I  have 
cleared  out  of  the  way  a  much  too  prevalent  error  respect- 
ing large  towns. 

The  Behemoths  and  Condors  among  towns — Petersburg, 
London,  Vienna — might,  if  they  chose,  establish  universal 
equality  of  liberty  and  liberty  of  equality ;  very  few  sta- 
tisticians have  been  struck  by  this  idea,  although  it  is  so  very 
clear.  For  a  capital  which  it  takes  two  hours  and  a  quarter 
to  go  round  is,  as  it  were,  an  ^Etna-crater  of  equivalent 
circumference  for  an  entire  country,  and  benefits  the  neigh- 
bourhood of  it  as  the  volcano  does,  not  only  by  what  it 
ejects  (its  eruptive  matter),  but  by  what  it  swallows  up. 
It  clears  the  country  in  the  first  place  of  villages,  and 
next  of  country  towns — which  are  primarily  the  outhouses 
and  office-buildings  of  capital  cities — inasmuch  as  it 
pushes  itself  outwards  in  all  directions  year  by  year,  and 


60  JEAN  FAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.       [BOOK  I. 

gets  grown  over,  fringed  round,  and  walled  about  with  the 
villages.  London,  we  know,  has  converted  the  neigh- 
bouring villages  into  streets  of  itself;  but  in  the  lapse  of 
centuries  the  long,  constantly  extending  arms  of  all  great 
towns  must  eufold  not  only  the  villages,  but  also  the 
country  towns,  converting  them  into  suburbs.  Now,  in 
this  process,  the  roads,  fields  and  meadows  which  lie 
between  the  giant  city  and  the  villages  get  covered  over 
like  a  river-bed  with  a  deposit  of  stone-paving ;  and  conse- 
quently the  operations  of  agriculture  can  no  longer  be 
carried  on  otherwise  than  in  flower-pots  in  the  windows. 
Where  there  is  no  agriculture,  I  cannot  see  what  the  agri- 
cultural population  can  become  but  unemployed  idlers, 
such  as  no  state  allows  within  its  boundaries ;  and,  pre- 
vention being  better  than  cure,  the  state  will  have  to  clear 
this  agricultural  population  out  of  the  way  before  it  sinks 
into  this  condition  of  idling,  either  by  means  of  letters  inhi- 
bitory directedagainst  the  increase  of  population,  or  by  exter- 
mination, or  by  ennobling  them  into  soldiery  and  domestics. 
In  a  village  which  has  undergone  this  process  of  being 
morticed  into  a  town  like  a  lump  of  rubble, — or  converted 
into  a  stave  of  the  great  tun  of  Heidelberg  in  this  manner 
— any  country  people  that  might  be  still  to  the  fore,  would 
be  as  ludicrous  as  useless  ;  the  coral  cells  of  the  villages 
must  be  cleared  out  before  they  attain  the  dignity  of  be- 
coming reefs  or  atolls  of  a  town. 

When  this  is  done,  the  hardest  step  towards  equality 
has,  no  doubt,  been  taken  ;  the  people  of  the  country 
towns,  a  class  the  most  hostile  of  all  classes,  at  heart,  to 
equality — have  next  to  be  attacked  and,  if  possible,  exter- 
minated by  the  great  town  ;  this,  however,  is  more  a 
matter  of  time  than  of  good  management.  At  the  same 
time,  what  one  or  two  residency-towns  have  accom- 
plished in  this  direction,  is  a  good  beginning  at  all  events. 
Could  we  attain  to  our  ideal,  however — could  we  live  to 
see  the  day  when  the  two  classes  who  are  the  most  formid- 
able opponents  of  equality — the  peasants,  and  the  people 
of  the  smaller  towns — should  have  disappeared ;  and  when 
not  only  the  agricultural  races  but  the  lower  nobility,  the 
small  proprietors,  should  be  extinct — ah !  then  the  world 
would  be  in  the  blissful  enjoyment  of  an  equality  of  a 


CHAP.  II.J      FLOWER,  FKUIT,  AND  THOBN  PIECES.         61 

i>obler  sort  than  that  which  obtained  in  France,  where  tt 
was  merely  a  plebeian  one.  There  would  be  an  absolute 
equality  it  pure  nobility  and  collective  humanity  could 
rejoice  in  the  possession  of  one  patent  of  nobility,  and  of 
real  authentic  ancestors.  In  Paris,  the  revolution  wrote 
(as  people  did  in  the  most  ancient  times)  without  capital 
letters;  but  if  my  golden  age  came  to  pass,  the  writing 
would  be  as  it  was  in  somewhat  later  times  than  those 
just  alluded  to,  all  capital  letters,  not,  as  at  present,  with 
capitals  sticking  up  like  steeples  among  quantities  of  small 
letters.  But  though  such  a  lofty  style,  such  an  ennoble- 
ment of  humanity  as  this  may  be  nothing  but  a  beautiful 
di  earn,  and  though  we  must  be  content  with  the  minor 
consolation  of  seeing,  in  towns,  the  middle  classes  restricted 
to  a  single  street,  as  is  now  the  case  with  the  Jews ;  even 
that  would  be  a  clear  gain  to  the  intellectual  portion  of 
mankind  in  the  eyes  of  anyone  who  considers  what  an 
accomplished,  capable  set  of  people  the  higher  nobility 
are. 

It  is  upon  the  smaller  towns,  however,  that  we  can  more 
confidently  rely  than  upon  the  great  residency-towns,  for  aid 
in  bringing  about  the  nobilisation  of  the  collective  human 
race,  and  this  brings  me  back  to  Kuhschnappel.  People 
really  seem  to  forget  that  it  is  too  much  to  expect  that  the 
four  square  versts  or  so  which  a  residency-town  occupies 
shall  be  able  to  dominate,  swallow  up,  and  convert  into 
portions  of  itself,  more  than  a  thousand  square  miles  of  the 
.  surrounding  country  (just  as  the  boa-constrictor  swallows 
animals  bigger  than  itself).  London  has  not  much  above 
600,000  inhabitants ;  what  a  miserably  small  force  com- 
pared to  the  5£  millions  of  all  England,  which  that  city 
has  to  contend  with,  and  cut  off  the  wings,  and  supplies 
of,  alone  and  unassisted — to  say  nothing  of  Scotland  and 
Ireland!  This,  however,  does  not  apply  to  provincial 
towns ;  here  the  number  of  villages,  villagers,  and 
burghers  which  have  to  be  coerced,  starved,  and  put  to 
rout,  are  in  a  fair  proportion  to  the  size  of  the  town,  the 
numbers  of  the  aristocracy  or  governing  classes,  who  have 
to  execute  the  task,  and  woik  the  smoothing  planf 
which  is  to  level  the  surface  of  humanity.  Here  there  is 
little  difficulty  in  precipitating  the  oitizens  (as  if  they  were 


62  JEAN   PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.       [BOOK  I. 

a  kind  of  coarse  dregs  swimming  in  the  clear  fluid  of 
nobility) ;  and  when  this  precipitation  is  not  successfully 
accomplished,  it  is  the  aristocracy  themselves  who  are  to 
blame,  in  that  they  often  show  mercy  in  the  wrong  place, 
and  look  upon  the  Burgher-bank  as  a  grassbank,  the  grass 
of  which  is,  it  is  true,  grown  only  to  be  sat  upon  and 
pressed  down,  but  is  kept  always  watered,  in  order  that  it 
may  not  wither  from  being  so  constantly  sat  upon.  If  there 
were  to  be  nothing  left  but  the  noblest  classes,  thecitizenic 
cinnamon-trees  would  be  completely  barked,  by  means  of 
taxes  and  levyings  of  contributions — (which  none  but 
plebeian  authors  term  "  flaying  "  and  "  pulling  the  hide 
over  the  ears"), — and,  the  bark  being  otf,  the  trees  of 
course  wither  and  die.  At  the  same  time,  this  process  of 
aristocratization  costs  men.  But  in  my  opinion  it  would  be 
cheaply  purchased  by  the  few  thousands  of  people  it  would 
cost,  seeing  that  the  Ameiicans,  the  Swiss,  and  the  Dutch 
paid  (so  to  speak)  whole  millions  of  men  "  cash  down,"  on 
the  battlefield,  as  the  price  of  a  freedom  of  a  much  more 
restricted  kind.  The  fault  which  is  sometimes  found  with 
modern  battle  pictures,  namely  that  they  are  overcrowded 
with  people,  can  rarely  be  found  with  modern  countries. 
"YVe  should  rather  notice  the  clever  manner  in  which  many 
German  states  have,  by  energetic  treatment,  determined 
their  population,  as  morbid  matter,  in  a  downward  direction 
(as  good  physicians  are  wont  to  do),  namely,  down  to  the 
United  States  of  America,  which  are  situated  straight 
below  them. 

Kuhschnappel  (to  return  to  our  subject)  has  the  pull 
over  hundreds  of  other  towns.  I  admit,  as  fticolai's 
assertion,  that  of  the  60,000  which  Kiirnberg  contained 
there  are  but  30,000  left,  and  that  is  something ;  at  the 
same  time  it  takes  fifty  burghers,  and  more,  to  be  equiva- 
lent to  one  aristocrat,  which  is  much.  Now  I  im  *n  a 
position  to  show  at  any  moment  by  reference  to  registers 
of  deaths  and  baptisms,  that  the  borough  of  Kuhschnappel 
contains  almost  as  many  aristocrats  as  burghers,  which  is 
all  the  more  wonderful  when  we  reflect  that  the  former, 
on  account  of  their  appetites,  find  it  a  harder  matter  to 
live  than  the  latter.  What  modern  town,  I  ask,  can  point 
tc  so  many  free  inhabitants  ?    Were  there  not  even  in  free 


CHAP.  II.]      FLOWER,    FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.         63 

Athens  and  Rome — in  the  West  Indiesthere  were  of  course — 
more  slaves  than  free  men,  for  which  reason  the  latter  did 
not  dare  to  make  the  former  wear  any  distinctive  dr»jss  ? 
And  are  there  not  in  all  towns  more  tenants  than  noble 
landlords,  although  the  latter  ought,  one  would  think,  to  be 
in  the  majority,  since  peasants  and  burghers  grow  only  by 
nature,  while  aristocrats  are  raised,  both  by  nature,  and  by 
art  (in  the  shape  of  princely  and  imperial  chanceries).  If 
this  appendix  were  not  a  digression  (and  digressions  are 
generally  expected  to  be  brief)  I  should  proceed  to  show, 
at  some  length,  that  in  several  respects  Kuhschnappel,  if 
she  does  not  surpass,  is  at  least  quite  on  a  par  with,  many 
of  the  towns  of  Switzerland  ;  for  instance,  in  a  good  method 
of  sharpening  and  lengthening  the  sword  of  justice,  and, 
on  the  whole,  in  her  manner  of  wielding  a  good,  spiked, 
knotty  mace — in  the  tax  she  levies  on  (ecclesiastical)  corn, 
not  that  imported  from  abroad,  but  that  of  home  growth, 
to  exclude  thought  and  other  (in  an  ecclesiastical  sense) 
rubbish  of  that  sort — and  even  in  her  "  green  market,"  or 
trade  in  young  men.  As  regards  the  latter,  the  reason 
why  the  tiade  with  France  for  young  Kuhschnappelers  to 
serve  as  porters  and  defenders  of  the  Crown  has  hitherto 
been  so  flat  is,  that  the  Swiss  have  so  terribly  overdone 
the  market  with  fine  young  fellows  who  go  and  stand 
in  front  of  all  the  doors  and  (in  war  time)  in  front  of  all  the 
cannons.  Of  course,  were  it  not  for  this,  there  would  be 
more  doors  than  one  with  a  Kuhschnappeler  standing  and 
saving,  "Nobody  at  home."  (Indeed,  here  in  my  second 
edition,  I  can  assert  that  Kuhschnappel  continues  to  main- 
tain its  title  of  imperial  market  town,  like  a  secondary 
electoral  dignity,  and  keeps  up  its  old  protective  laws 
against  the  import  of  ideas  and  the  export  of  information, 
and  its  blood  tithe;  or  young  men  tithe  to  France,  just  as 
Switzerland  does,  which  is  like  the  keeper  of  the  castle  of 
the  Wartburg,  who  keeps  constantly  re-blackening  the  in- 
delible mark  of  the  ink  which  Luther  threw  at  the  devil.) 


64  JEAN  PAUL  FEIEDRICH  RICHTEJR.       [BOOK  L 


CHAPTER  III. 

lenette's  honeymoon — book  brewing — schulrath  stiefrl — 
mr.  everard — a  day  before  the  fair — the  red  cow  — 
st.  Michael's  fair— the  beggars'  opera — diabolical  temp- 
tation IN  THE  WILDERNESS,  OR  THE  MANNIKIN  OF  FASHION — 
AUTUMN  JOYS — A  NEW  LABYRINTH. 

The  world  could  not  make  a  greater  mistake  than  \o 
suppose  that  our  common  hero  would  be  to  be  seen  on  the 
Monday  sitting  in  a  mourning  coach,  in  a  mourning 
cloak,  crape  hat-band  and  scarf,  and  black  shoe-buckles, 
figuring  as  chief  mourner  at  the  sham  funeral  of  his  happi- 
ness and  his  capital. 

Heavens!  how  can  the  world  make  such  an  exceedingly 
bad  shot  as  that  ?  The  advocate  was  not  even  in  quarter 
mourning,  let  alone  half;  he  was  in  as  good  spirits  as  if 
he  had  this  third  chapter  before  him,  and  were  just  begin- 
ing  it,  as  I  am. 

The  reason  was,  that  he  had  drawn  up  an  able  plaint 
against  his  guardian,  Blaise  (enlivening  it  with  sundry 
satirical  touches,  which  nobody  but  himself  understood), 
and  laid  it  before  the  Inheritance  Office.  When  we  are  in 
a  difficulty,  it  is  always  so  much  gained  if  we  can  but  do 
something  or  other.  Let  fortune  bluster  in  our  faces  with 
ever  so  harsh  and  frosty  an  autumn  wind — as  long  as  it 
does  not  break  the  fore  joint  of  our  wing  (as  in  the  case  of 
the  swans),  our  very  fluttering,  though  it  may  not  trans- 
port us  into  a  warmer  climate,  will  at  all  events  have 
the  effect  of  warming  us  a  little.  From  motives  of  kind- 
ness, Siebenkees  kept  his  wife  in  ignorance  of  the  delay  in 
the  settling  of  his  heritage  accounts,  as  well  as  of  the  old 
story  of  the  change  of  names  ;  he  thought  there  was  very 
little  likelihood  of  a  struggling  advocate's  wife  ever  having 
an  opportunity  of  looking  over  a  patrician's  shoulder  into 
his  family  hand  at  cards. 

And,  indeed,  what  could  a  man  who  had  made  a  sudden 
plunge  from  out  his  hermit's  holy-week  of  single  blessed- 
ness, into  the  full  honeymoon  of  double  blessedness  wish 
lor  besides?      Not  until  now  had  he  been  able  to  hold 


CHAP.  III.]      FLOWER,   FRTJIT,  AND  THOEN  PIECES.       65 

his  Lenette  in  both  his  arms  rightly — hitherto  his  friend, 
always  fluttering  backwards  and  forwards  in  life,  had  been 
held  fast  with  his  left  arm  ;  but  now,  she  was  able  to  stretch 
herself  out  far  more  comfortably  in  the  chambers  of  his 
heart.  And  the  bashful  wife  did  this  as  much  as  she  dared. 
She  confessed  to  him,  albeit  timidly,  that  she  was  almost 
glad  not  to  have  that  boisterous  iSaufinder  lying  under  the 
table  and  glaring  out  in  that  terrible  way  of  his.  Whether 
she  experienced  a  similar  relief  at  the  absence  of  his  wild 
master,  she  could  not  be  brought  to  say.  To  the  advo- 
cate she  felt  a  good  deal  like  a  daughter,  and  her  great 
tall  father  could  never  have  enough  of  her  quaint  little 
ways.  That,  when  he-  went  out,  she  used  to  louk  after 
him  as  long  as  he  was  in  sight,  was  nothing  in  comparison 
to  the  way  in  which  she  used  to  run  out  after  him  with  a 
brush,  when  she  noticed  from  the  window  that  there  was 
such  a  quantity  of  street  paving  sticking  to  his  coat-tails 
that  nothing  would  do  but  she  must  have  him  back  again 
into  the  house,  and  brush  his  back  as  clean  as  if  the 
Kuhschnappel  municipality  would  charge  him  paving-tax 
if  any  of  the  mud  were  found  on  him.  He  would  take  hold 
of  the  brush  and  stop  it,  and  kiss  her,  and  say,  "  There's  a 
good  deal  inside  as  well ;  but  nobody  sees  it  there  ;  when 
I  come  back  we'll  set  to  work  and  scrub  some  of  that 
away." 

Her  maidenly  obedience  to  his  every  wish  and  hint,  her 
daughterly  observance  and  fulfilment  of  them,  were  more 
than  he  looked  for  or  required,  indeed ;  but  not  too  great 
for  the  love  he  bestowed  in  return.  "  Senate  clerk's 
daughter,"  he  said,  "you  mustn't  be  too  obedient  to  me; 
remember  I'm  not  your  father,  a  senate  clerk,  but  a  poor's 
advooate  who  has  married  you  and  signs  himself  Siebenkjes, 
to  the  best  of  his  belief." 

"  My  poor  dear  father,"  she  answered,  "  used  often  to 
compose  and  write  down  things  too  at  home,  himself,  with 
uis  own  hand,  and  then  fair-copy  them  beautifully  after- 
wards." But  he  enjoyed  these  crooked  answers  which  she 
used  to  make.  And  though,  from  sheer  veneration  of  him, 
she  never  understood  a  single  one  of  the  jokes  which  he 
was  always  making  about  himself  (for  she  gainsaid  him 
when  he  satirically  depreciated  himself,  and  agreed  with 

u.  F 


66  JEAN  PAUL   FEIEDRICH   EICHTER.        [BOOK  L 

him  completely  if  he  ironically  lauded  himself),  yet  these 
mental  provincialisms  of  hers  pleased  him  not  a  little. 
She  would  use  such  words  as  "fleuch"for  "fliehe,"  "reuch" 
and  "  kreuch  "  for  "  riehe  "  and  "  kriehe  ; "  religious 
antiquities  out  of  Luther's  Bible,  which  were  valuable  and 
enjoyable  contributions  to  her  stock  of  idiosyncracies,  and 
to  the  happiness  of  his  honeymoon.  One  day  when  he 
took  a  particularly  pretty  cap  which  she  had  tried  on  with 
much  satisfaction  to  each  of  her  three  cap-blocks,  one  after 
another  (she  would  often  gently  kiss  these  cap-blocks), 
and  putting  it  on  her  own  little  head  before  the  looking- 
glass,  said, "  See  how  it  looks  on  your  own  head ;  perhaps 
that's  as  good  a  block  as  the  others,"  she  laughed  with 
immense  delight,  and  said,  "  Now,  you  are  always  flattering 
one ! " 

Believe  me,  this  naive  failure  of  hers  to  see  his  joke  so 
touched  him  that  he  made  a  secret  vow  never  to  make 
another  of  the  kind,  except  in  private  to  himself.  But 
there  was  a  greater  honeymoon  pleasure  still.  This  was 
that,  when  there  came  a  fast  day,  Lenette  would  on  no 
account  allow  him  to  kiss  her,  when  she  came  into  the 
room  (ready  for  church),  her  white  and  red  bloom  of  youth 
shining  out  with  threefold  beauty  from  under  her  black 
lace  head-dress,  and  the  dark  leafage  of  her  dress. 

"  Worldly  thoughts  of  that  kind,"  she  said,  "  weren't  at 
all  proper  before  service,  when  people  had  on  their  fast- 
day  things  ;  people  must  wait !  " 

"  By  heaven  ! "  said  Siebenkaes  to  himself,  "  may  I  stick 
a  soup  spoon  five  inches  long  and  three  broad  through  my 
lower  lip,  like  a  North  American  squaw,  and  go  about 
with  it  there,  if  ever  I  begin  spooning  and  kissing  the 
pious  soul  again,  when  she  has  a  black  dress  on,  and  the 
bells  are  ringing."  And  though  he  wasn't  much  of  a 
churchgoer  himself,  he  kept  his  word.  See  how  we  men 
behave  in  matrimonial  life,  young  ladies ! 

From  all  which  it  will  readily  appear  how  perfectly  happy 
the  advocate  was  during  his  honeymoon,  when  Lenette, 
in  the  most  delightful  manner,  did  all  those  things  for 
him  which  he  used  previously  to  have  to  do  for  himself 
in  a  most  miserable  fashion  and  against  the  grain,  making 
by  unwearied  sweepings  and  brushings  his  dithyrambio 


CHAP.  III.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND   THORN  PIECES.       67 

chartreuse  as  clean  and  level  and  smooth  as  a  billiard- 
table.  Whole  honey-trees  full  of  cakes  did  she  plant 
during  the  honeymoon  ;  humming  round  him  of  a  morning 
like  a  busy  bee,  carrying  wax  into  her  little  hive  (while 
he  was  going  quietly  on  with  his  law-papers,  building 
away  at  his  juridical  wasp's  nest),  forming  her  cells,  clean- 
ing them  out,  ejecting  foreign  bodies,  and  mending  chinks  ; 
he  now  and  then  looking  out  of  his  wasp's  nest  at  the 
pretty  little  figure  in  the  tidiest  of  household  dresses,  at 
sight  of  which  he  would  take  his  pen  in  his  mouth,  hold 
his  hand  out  to  her  across  the  ink-bottle,  and  say,  "  Only 
wait  till  the  afternoon  comes  and  you're  sitting  sewing — 
then,  as  I  walk  up  and  down,  I  .shall  pay  you  with  kisses 
to  your  heart's  content."  But  that  none  of  my  fair  readers 
may  be  unhappy  about  the  souring  of  the  honey  of  this 
moon  which  the  conduct  of  that  disinheriting  blackguard 
Blaise  might  bring  about,  let  me  just  ask  one  question  ? 
Hadn't  Siebenkses  a  whole  silver  mine  and  a  coining  mill, 
in  the  shape  of  seven  law  suits  all  going  on,  full  of  veins 
of  rich  ore  ?  And  hadn't  Leibgeber  sent  him  a  military 
treasury  chest  on  four  wheels  of  fortune,  containing 
two  spectacle  dollars  of  Julius  Duke  of  Brunswig,  a 
Russian  triple-dollar  of  1679,  a  tail  or  queue  ducat — a 
gnat  or  wasp  dollar — five  vicariat  ducats,  and  a  heap  of 
Ephraimites  ?  For  he  might  melt  down  and  volatilise 
this  collection  of  coins  without  a  moment's  hesitation,  in- 
asmuch as  his  friend  had  only  pocketed  them  by  way 
of  a  jest  on  the  people  who  pay  a  hundred  dollars  for 
one.  They  two  had  all  things  corporeal  and  mental  in 
common  to  an  extent  comprehensible  by  few.  They  had 
arrived  at  that  point  where  there  is  no  distinction  visible 
between  the  giver  and  the  receiver  of  a  benefit,  and  they 
etepped  across  the  chasms  of  life  bound  together,  as  the 
crystal-seekers  in  the  Alps  tie  themselves  to  each  other  to 
prevent  their  falling  into  the  ice  clefts. 

One  Lady  Day,  towards  evening,  however,  he  hit  upon 
an  idea  which  will  quite  reassure  all  fair  readers  of  his 
history  who  may  be  in  a  state  of  anxiety  about  him,  and 
which  made  him  happier  than  the  receipt  of  the  biggest 
basket  of  bread  with  little  baskets  of  fruit  in  it  would 
have  done — or  a  hamper  of  wine.    He  had  felt  sure  all 

F  2 


68  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  I. 

along  that  he  would  hit  upon  an  idea.  Whenever  he  was 
in  a  difficulty  of  any  kind,  he  always  used  to  say,  "  Now, 
I  wonder  what  I  shall  hit  upon  this  time ;  for  I  shall  hit 
upon  something  or  other  as  sure  as  there  are  four  chambers 
in  my  brain."  The  delightful  idea  in  question  was,  that 
he  should  do  what  I  am  doing  at  this  moment — write  a 
book ;  only  his  was  to  be  a  satirical  one.*  A  torrent  oi 
blood  rushed  through  the  opened  sluices  of  his  heart,  right 
in  amongst  the  wheels  and  nrill-machinerj'  of  his  idea.-, 
and  the  whole  of  the  mental  mechanism  rattled,  whirred, 
and  jingled  in  a  moment— a  peck  or  two  of  material  for 
the  book  was  ground  on  the  spot. 

I  know  of  no  greater  mental  tumult — hardly  of  any 
sweeter — which  can  arise  in  a  young  man's  being,  than 
that  which  he  experiences  when  he  is  walking  up  and 
down  his  room,  and  forming  the  daring  resolution  that  he 
will  take  a  book  of  blank  paper  and  make  it  into  a  manu- 
script ;  indeed  it  is  a  point  which  might  be  argued 
whether  Winckelmann,  or  Hannibal  the  great  general, 
strode  up  and  down  their  rooms  at  a  greater  pace  when 
they  respectively  formed  the  (equally  daring)  resolution 
that  they  would  go  to  Rome.  Siebenkees,  having  made  up 
his  mind  to  write  a  'Selection  fiom  the  Devil's  Papers.' 
was  forced  to  run  out  of  the  house,  and  three  times  round 
the  market-place,  just  to  fix  his  fluttering,  rushing  ideas 
into  their  proper  grooves  again  by  the  process  of  tiring  his 
legs.  He  came  back  wearied  by  the  glow  within  him — 
looked  to  see  if  there  was  enough  white  paper  in  the  house 
for  his  manuscript — and  running  up  to  his  Lenette,  who 
was  tranquilly  working  away  at  a  cap,  gave  her  a  kiss 
before  she  could  well  take  the  needle  out  of  her  mouth — last 
thom  upon  the  rose-tree!  During  the  kiss  she  quietly 
gave  a  finishing  stitch  to  the  border  of  the  cap  (squinting 
down  a;  it  the  best  way  she  could  without  moving  her  head). 

"Rejoice  with  me!"  he  cried,  "come  and  dance  about 
with  me  !  to-morrow  I'm  going  to  begin  a  work,  a  book ! 
Roast  the  calf  s  head  to-night,  though  it  be  a  breach  of  our 
ten  commandments."    For  he  and  she,  on  the  Wednesday 

*  The  book  was  published  in  1789,  by  Beckmann  of  Gera,  and  was 
entitled,  '  Selections  from  the  Devil's  Papers.'  I  shall  venture  to 
express  my  opiuion  on  theaa  satires  further  on. 


CHAP.  III.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN  PIECES.        69 

before,  had  formed  themselves  into  a  committee  on  food 
regulations,  and,  of  the  Thirty-nine  articles  of  domestio 
economy,  which  had  then  been  passed  and  subscribed  to, 
one  was  that,  Brahminlike,  they  were  to  do  without  meat 
at  supper. 

But  he  had  the  greatest  difficulty  in  getting  her  to 
understand  how  it  was  that  he  made  out  that  he  would  be 
able  to  procure  her  another  calfs  head  with  a  smgle  sheet 
of  the  •  Selections  from  the  Devil's  Papers,'  and  that  he  was 
perfectly  justified  in  issuing  a  dispensation  from  that 
evening's  fast ;  for  like  the  common  herd  of  mankind,  or 
like  the  printers,  Lenette  thought  that  a  written  hook  was 
paid  for  at  the  same  rate  as  a  printed  one,  and  that  the 
compositor  got  rather  more  than  the  author.  She  had 
never  in  her  life  had  the  slightest  idea  of  the  enormous 
sums  which  authors  are  paid  nowadays  ;  she  was  like 
Racine's  wife,  who  did  not  know  what  a  line  of  poetry  or 
a  tragedy  was,  although  she  kept  house  upon  them.  For 
my  part,  however,  I  should  never  lead  to  the  altar,  or  into 
my  home  as  my  wife,  any  woman  who  wasn't  capable  of  at 
least  completing  any  sentence  which  death  should  knock  me 
over  with  his  hour-glass  in  the  middle  of,— or  who  wouldn't 
be  unspeakably  delighted  when  I  read  to  her  learned 
Gottingen  gazettes,  or  universal  German  magazines,  in 
which  I  was  bepraised,  more  than  I  deserved  perhaps. 

The  rapture  of  authorship  had  set  all  Siebeukaes's  blood- 
globules  into  such  a  flow,  and  all  his  ideas  into  such  a 
whirlwind  this  whole  evening  that,  in  the  condition  of  vi- 
vidness of  fueling  and  fancy  in  which  he  was  (a  condition 
which  in  him  often  assumed  the  appearance  of  temper), 
he  would  instantly  have  flown  out  and  exploded  like  so 
much  fulminating  gold  at  everything  of  a  slow  moving 
kind  which  he  came  across — such  as  the  servant  girl's 
heavy  dawdling  step,  or  the  species  of  dropsy  with  which 
her  utterance  was  afflicted ; — but  that  he  at  once  laid  hold 
on  a  precious  sedative  powder  for  the  over-excitement 
caused  by  happiness,  and  took  a  dose  of  it.  It  is  easier  to 
communicate  an  impetus  and  a  rapid  flow  to  the  slow- 
gliding  blood  of  a  heavy,  sorrowful  heart,  than  to  moderate 
and  restrain  the  billowy,  surging,  foaming  current  which 
rushes  through  the  veins  in  happiness;  but  he  could  always 


70  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  I. 

calm  himself,  even  in  the  wildest  joy,  by  the  thought  of  the 
inexhaustible  Hand  which  bestowed  it,  and  that  gentle 
tenderness  of  heart  wherewith  our  eyes  are  drooped  to 
earth  as  we  remember  the  invisible,  eternal  Benefactor  of 
all  hearts.  At  such  a  time  the  heart,  softened  by  thank- 
fulness and  by  joyful  tears,  will  speak  irs  gratitude  by  at 
least  being  kindlier  towards  all  mankind,  if  in  no  other 
way.  That  fierce,  untamed  delight,  which  is  what  Nemesis 
avenges,  can  best  be  kept  within  due  bounds  by  this 
sense  of  gratitude ;  and  those  who  have  died  of  joy  would 
either  not  have  died  at  all,  or  would  have  died  of  a  better 
and  lovelier  joy,  if  their  hearts  had  first  been  softened  by 
a  grateful  heavenward  gaze. 

His  first  and  best  thanksgiving  for  the  new,  smooth, 
beautiful  banks,  between  which  his  life-stream  had  now 
been  led,  took  the  form  of  a  zealous  and  careful  drawing  up 
of  a  defence  which  he  had  to  prepare  in  the  case  of  a  girl 
charged  with  child-murder,  to  save  her  from  torture  on 
the  rack.  The  state-physician  of  the  borough  had  con- 
demned her  to  the  M  trial  by  the  lungs,"  a  neither  more 
nor  less  suitable  punishment  than  the  "  trial  by  water  " 
(which  used  to  be  inflicted  on  witches). 

Calm  spring-days  of  matrimony,  peaceful  and  un- 
disturbed, laid  down  their  carpet  of  flowers  for  the  feet  of 
these  two  to  tread  upon.  Only  there  sometimes  appeared 
under  the  window,  when  Lenette  was  stretching  herself 
and  her  white  arm  out  of  a  morning,  and  slowly  accom- 
plishing the  fastening  back  of  the  outside  shutters,  a  gen- 
tleman in  flesh-coloured  silk. 

"I  really  feel  quite  ashamed  to  stretch,"  she  said; 
"  there's  a  gentleman  always  standing  in  the  street,  and 
he  takes  off  his  hat,  and  notes  one  down  just  as  if  he  were 
the  meat  appraiser." 

The  Schulrath  Stiefel  kept,  on  the  school  Saturday 
holidays,  the  solemn  promise  he  had  made  on  the  wedding- 
day  to  come  and  see  them  often,  and  at  all  events  to  be 
sure  and  come  on  the  Saturdays.  I  think  I  shall  call  him 
Peltzstiefel  (Furboots)  as  a  pleasing  variety  for  the  ear — 
seeing  that  the  whole  town  gave  him  that  name  on 
account  of  the  gray  miniver,  faced  with  hareskin,  which  he 
wore  on  his  legs  by  way  of  a  portable  wood-economising 


CHAP.  III.]      FLOWEE,   FRUIT,  AND   THORN  PIECES.        71 

stove.  Well,  Peltzstiefel,  the  moment  he  came  in  at  the 
door,  fastened  joy-flowers  together  into  a  nosegay,  and 
stuck  them  into  the  advocate's  button-bole,  by  appointing 
him  on  the  spot  his  collaborateur  on  the  '  Kuhschnappel 
Indicator,  Heavenly  Messenger,  and  School  Programme 
Beview' — a  work  which  ought  to  be  better  known,  so 
that  the  works  recommended  by  it  might  be  so  too.  This 
newspaper  engagement  of  Siebenkaes  is  a  great  pleasure  to 
me ;  it  will  at  any  rate  bring  my  hero  in  sixpence  or  so 
towards  a  supper  now  and  then.  The  Schulrath,  who  was 
editor  of  this  paper,  had  a  high  sense  of  the  power  and 
responsibility  of  his  post ;  but  Siebenkaas  had  now  risen  to 
the  dignity  of  an  author — the  only  being  who  in  his  eye? 
was  superior  even  to  a  reviewer — for  Lenette  had  told  him 
on  the  way  to  church  that  her  husband  was  going  to  have 
a  great  thick  book  printed.  The  Schulrath  considered  the 
1  Salzburg  Literary  Gazette '  of  the  period  the  apocryphal, 
and  the  '  Jena  Literary  Gazette '  the-  canonical  scriptures  : 
the  single  voice  of  one  reviewer  was,  for  his  ears,  multiplied 
by  the  echo  in  the  critical  jiidgment  hall  into  a  thousand 
voices.  His  deluded  imagination  multiplied  the  head  of 
one  single  reviewer  into  several  Lernaean  heads,  as  it  was 
believed  of  old  that  the  devil  used  to  surround  the  heads 
of  sinners  with  delusive  false  heads,  that  the  executioner 
might  miss  his  stroke  at  them. 

The  fact  that  a  reviewer  writes  anonymously  gives  to  a 
single  individual's  opinions  the  weight  and  authority  they 
would  possess,  if  arrived  at  by  a  whole  council ;  but  then 
if  his  name  were  put  at  the  end,  for  instance,  "  X.Y.Z., 
Student  of  Divinity,"  instead  of  *  New  Universal  German 
Library,"  it  would  weaken  the  effect  of  the  divinity  student's 
learned  laying  down  of  the  law  to  too  great  an  extent. 
The  Schulrath  paid  court  to  my  hero  on  account  of  his 
satirical  turn  ;  for  he  himself,  a  very  lamb  in  common  life, 
transformed  himself  into  a  wehrwolf  in  a  review  article ; 
which  is  frequently  the  case  with  good-tempered  men  when 
they  write,  particularly  on  humaniora  and  such  like  sub- 
jects. As  indeed,  peaceful  shepherd  races  (according  to 
Gibbon)  are  fond  of  making  war,  and  of  beginning  it,  or 
just  as  the  Idyllic  painter,  Gessner,  was  himself  a  biting 
caricaturist. 


72  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  I. 

And  our  hero  for  his  part  afforded  Stiefel  a  great  pleasure 
this  evening,  as  well  as  holding  out  to  him  the  prospect  of 
many  more  such,  when  he  took  from  Leihgeber's  collection 
of  coins  a  gnat  or  wasp  dollar,  and  gave  it  to  him,  not  as  a 
douceur  for  his  appointment  to  the  critical  wasp's  nest, 
but  that  he  might  turn  it  into  small  change.  The  Schul- 
rath  who,  being  himself  the  zealous  "Silberdiener"  (master 
of  the  plate  and  jewels)  of  a  dollar-cabinet  of  Ins  own, 
would  have  been  delighted  if  money  had  existed  solely  for 
the  sake  of  cabinets — (meaning,  however,  numismatic,  not 
political,  cabinets) — sparkled  and  blushed  delighted  over 
the  dollar,  and  declared  to  the  advocate  (who  only  wanted 
the  absolute  value  of  it,  not  the  coin-fancier's  price)  that 
he  considered  this  a  piece  of  true  friendship.  "  No," 
answered  Siebenkees,  "  the  only  piece  of  true  friendship 
about  the  matter  is  Leibgeber  giving  me  the  dollar."  "  But 
I'll  give  you  certainly  three  dollars  for  it,  if  you  like  to 
ask  it,"  said  Stiefel.  Lenette,  delighted  at  Stiefel's  delight, 
and  at  his  kindly  feeling,  and  secretly  giving  her  husband 
a  push  as  an  admonition  not  to  give  way,  here  struck  in 
with  an  amount  of  determination  which  astonishes  me, 
"  But  my  husband's  not  going  to  do  anything  of  the  kind, 
I  assure  you  ;  a  dollar's  a  dollar."  "  But,"  said  Siebenktes, 
"  I  ought  rather  to  ask  you  only  a  third  of  the  price,  if  I'm 
going  to  hand  over  my  coins  to  you  one  at  a  time  in  this 
way."  Ye  dear  souls  !  If  people's  "  yeses  "  in  this  world 
were  only  always  such  as  your  "  buts." 

Stiefel,  confirmed  bachelor  though  he  was,  wasn't  going 
to  let  himself  be  found  wanting,  on  such  a  delightful 
occasion  as  this,  at  all  events,  in  proper  politeness  towards 
the  fair  sex,  least  of  all  towards  a  woman  whom  he  had 
begun  to  be  so  fond  of,  even  when  he  was  bringing  her 
home  to  be  married,  and  whom  he  liked  twice  as  much  now 
that  she  was  the  wife  of  such  a  dear  friend,  and  was  such 
a  dear  friend  herself  too.  He  therefore  adroitly  led  her  to 
join  in  the  conversation  (which  had  previously  been  too 
deep  and  scholarly  for  her)  by  using  the  three  cap-blocks 
as  stepping-stones  over  to  the  journal  of  fashions ;  only 
he  slid  back  again  sooner  than  he  might  have  done  to  a 
more  ancient  journal  of  fashions,  that  of  Rubenius  on 
the  'Costume  of  the  ancient  Greeks  and  Romans.'    He 


CHAP.  III.]      FLOWER,  FKUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      78 

said  he  should  be  happy  to  lend  her  his  sermons  every 
Sunday,  as  advocates  don't  deal  in  theology  much.  And 
when  she  was  looking  on  the  floor  at  her  feet  for  the 
snuffers  which  had  fallen,  he  held  the  candle  down  that 
she  might  see. 

The  next  Sunday  was  an  important  day  for  the  house 
(or  rather  rooms)  of  Siebenkaes,  for  it  introduced  thereto 
a  grander  character  than  any  who  have  appeared  hitherto, 
namely  the  Venner  (Finance  Councillor)  —  Mr.  Everard 
Eosa  von  Meyern,  a  young  member  of  the  aristocracy, 
who  went  daily  in  and  out  at  Heimlicher  von  Blaise's  to 
"learn  the  routine  of  official  business;"  he  was  also  en- 
gaged to  be  married  to  a  poor  niece  of  the  Heimlicher's, 
who  was  being  brought  up  and  educated  for  his  heart  in 
another  part  of  Germany. 

Thus  the  Venner  was  a  character  of  consequence  in  the 
borough  of  Kuhschnappel  as  well  as  in  our  '  Thorn-piece,' 
and  this  in  every  political  point  of  view.  In  a  corporeal 
point  of  view  he  was  much  less  so.  His  body  was  stuck 
through  his  flowered  garments  much  like  a  piece  of  stick 
through  a  village  nosegay ;  under  the  shining  wing-covers 
of  his  waistcoat  (in  itself  a  perfect  animal-picture)  *  there 
pulsated  a  thorax,  perpendicular,  if  not  absolutely  concave, 
and  his  legs  had,  all  told,  abouff  the  same  amount  of  calf 
as  those  wooden  ones  which  stocking-makers  put  into 
their  windows  as  an  advertisement. 

The  Venner  gave  the  advocate  to  understand,  in  a  cold 
and  politely  rude  manner,  that  he  had  merely  come  to 
relieve  him  from  the  task  of  defending  the  cafe  of  child- 
murder,  as  he  had  so  much  to  attend  to  besides.  But 
Siebenkaes  saw  through  this  pretence  with  great  ease.  It 
was  a  well-known  circumstance  that  the  girl  accused  of 
this  crime  had  adopted  as  the  father  of  her  child  (now 
flown  away  above  this  earth)  a  certain  commercial  traveller, 
whose  name  neither  she  nor  the  documents  connected  with 
her  case  could  mention;  but  that  the  real  father — who, 
like  a  young  author,  was  bashful  about  putting  his  name 
to  his  piece  fugitive — was   no   other  than   the  emaciated 

*  The  fashionable  waistcoats  of  those  days  had  animals  and  flowers 
cpon  them. 


74  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  EICHTEE.        [BOOK  I. 

Venner,  Everard  Rosa  von  Meyern  himself.  There  are 
certain  things  which  a  whole  town  will  determine  and 
make  up  its  mind  to  ignore ;  and  one  of  these  was  Rosa's 
authorship.  Heimlicher  von  Blaise  knew  that  Siebenkses 
was  aware  of  it,  however,  and  feared  that  he  might,  out  of 
revenge  for  the  affair  of  the  inheritance,  purposely  make 
a  poor  defence  of  the  girl,  that  the  shame  and  disgrace  of 
her  end  might  fall  upon  his  relative,  Meyem's  shoulders. 
What  a  terrible,  mean  suspicion  ! 

And  yet  the  purest  minds  are  sometimes  driven  to 
entertain  such  suspicions.  Fortunately  Siebenkass  had 
already  got  the  poor  mother's  lightning-conductor  all 
ready  forged  and  set  up.  When  he  showed  it  to  this 
false  bridegroom  of  the  supposed  child-murderess,  the 
latter  immediately  declared  that  she  could  not  have  found 
an  abler  guardian  saint  among  all  the  advocates  in  the 
town  ;  to  which  author  and  reader  can  both  add  "  nor  one 
who  should  be  actuated  by  worthier  motives,"  as  we  know 
he  did  it  as  a  thank-offering  to  Heaven  for  the  first  idea  of 
the  'Devil's  Papers.' 

At  this  juncture,  the  advocate's  wife  came  suddenly 
back  from  the  adjoining  bookbinder's  room,  where  she 
had  been  paying  a  dying  visit.  The  Venner  sprang  to 
meet  her  at  the  threshold  with  a  degree  of  politeness 
which  couldn't  have  been  carried  further,  inasmuch  as 
she  had  to  open  the  door  before  he  could  reach  her.  He 
took  her  hand,  which,  in  her  respect  and  awe  of  him,  she 
half  permitted,  and  kissed  it  stooping,  but  twisted  his  eyes 
up  to  her  face,  and  said : 

"  Meddem !  I  have  had  this  beautiful  hand  in  mine  for 
several  da}  a." 

It  now  appeared,  from  what  he  said,  that  he  was  the 
identical  flesh-coloured  gentleman  who  had  stolen  her 
hand  with  his  drawing-pen  when  she  had  had  it  out  of 
the  window ;  because  he  had  been  anxious  to  get  a  pretty 
Dolce's  hand  for  a  three-quarter  portrait  of  the  young  lady 
he  was  engaged  to,  and  hadn't  known  what  to  do;  her 
head  he  was  doing  from  memory.  He  then  took  off  his 
gloves,  in  which  alone  he  had  dared  as  yet  to  touch  her 
(as  many  of  the  early  Christians  used  only  to  touch  the 
Euchari&t  in  gloves  from  reverence  therefor),  displaying 


CHAP.  III.J       FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN  PIECES.      75 

the  fires  of  his  rings  and  the  snow  of  his  skin.  To  pre- 
serve the  whiteness  of  the  latter  from  the  sun,  he  hardly 
ever  took  his  gloves  off,  except  in  winter  when  tne  sun 
has  scarcely  power  to  burn. 

The  Kuhschnappel  aristocracy,  particularly  its  younger 
members,  give  a  willing  obedience  to  the  commandment 
which  Christ  gave  to  His  apostles,  to  "  greet  no  man  by 
the  way,"  and  the  Venner  observed  the  required  degree  of 
incivility  towards  the  husband,  though  not  by  any  means 
to  the  wife,  towards  whom  his  condescension  was  infinite. 
An  inborn  characteristic  of  Siebenkses's  satirical  disposi- 
tion was  a  fault  which  he  had  of  being  too  polite  and 
kindly  with  the  lower  classes,  and  too  forward  and  aggres- 
sive with  the  upper.  He  had  not  as  yet  sufficient  know- 
ledge of  the  world  to  enable  him  to  determine  the  precise 
angle  at  which  his  back  should  bend  before  the  various 
great  ones  of  the  place,  wherefore  he  preferred  to  go  about 
bolt  upright,  though  he  did  so  against  the  promptings  of 
his  kind  heart.  An  additional  cause  was,  that  the  pro- 
fession to  which  he  belonged  being  of  a  belligerent  nature, 
has  a  tendency  to  embolden  those  who  belong  to  it ;  an 
advocate  has  the  advantage  of  never  requiring  to  employ 
one  himself,  and  consequently  he  is  often  inclined  to  treat 
even  the  grandest  folks  with  some  amount  of  coolness, 
unless  they  happen  to  be  judges  or  clients,  at  the  disposal 
of  both  of  which  classes  of  society  his  best  services  are  at 
all  times  ready  to  be  placed.  Notwithstanding  which,  it 
generally  happened  that,  in  Siebenkses's  kindly  feeling  to 
all  mankind,  his  moveable  bridge  got  shoved  down  so  low 
under  his  tightened  strings  that  the  notes  given  out  by 
them  became  quite  low  and  soft.  On  the  present  occasion, 
however,  it  was  much  more  difficult  to  be  polite  to  the 
Venner  (whose  designs  as  regarded  Lenette  he  was  com- 
pelled to  see)  than  to  be  rude  to  him. 

Moreover,  he  had  an  inborn  detestation  for  dressy  men 
— although  just  the  contrary  feeling  fi>r  dressy  women — 
so  that  he  would  often  sit  and  stare  for  a  long  time  at  the 
little  Fugel-mannikins  of  dress  in  the  fashion  journals, 
just  to  get  properly  angry  at  them ;  and  he  would  assure 
the  Kuhschnappelersthar,  there  was  nobody  whom  he  should 
bo  delight  in  playing  practical  jokes  upon  as  on  such  a 


76  JEAN  PAUL   FKIEDBICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  I. 

mannikin — yea,  in  insulting  him,  or  even  doing  him  an 
injury  (to  the  extent  of  a  good  cudgelling).  Also  it  had 
always  been  a  source  of  delight  to  him  that  Socrates  and 
Cato  walked  barefoot  about  in  the  market-place;  going 
bareheaded,  on  the  other  hand  (chapeau  has),  he  did  not  like 
half  so  much. 

But,  ere  he  could  utter  himself  otherwise  than  by 
making  faces,  the  wooden-head  of  a  Venner  stroked  his 
sprouting  beard,  and  in  a  distant  manner  graciously  offered 
himself  to  the  advocate  in  the  capacity  of  cardinal  pro- 
tector or  mediator  in  the  Blaise  inheritance  business ; 
this  he  did,  of  course,  partly  to  blind  the  advocate's  eyes, 
and  partly  to  impress  upon  him  how  immeasurably  in- 
ferior was  his  station.  The  latter,  however,  shuddering 
at  the  idea  of  taking  a  gnome  of  this  kind  for  paraclete 
and  household  angel,  said  to  him  (but  in  Latin') — 

"  In  the  first  place  I  must  insist  that  my  wife  shall  not 
hear  a  syllable  about  that  insignificant  potato  quarrel. 
And  moreover,  in  any  legal  question  I  scorn  and  despise 
anybody's  assistance  but  a  legal  friend's,  and  in  this  in- 
stance I  am  my  own  legal  friend.  I  fill  an  official  position 
here  in  Kuhschnappel ;  it  is  true,  the  official  position  by 
no  means  fills  me."  The  latter  play  upon  words  he  ex- 
pressed by  means  of  a  Latin  one,  which  displayed  such  an 
unusual  amount  of  linguistic  ability,  that  I  should  almost 
like  to  quote  it  here.  The  Venner,  however,  who  could 
neither  construe  the  pun  nor  the  rest  of  the  speech  with 
the  ease  with  which  we  have  read  it  here,  answered  at 
once  (so  as  to  escape  without  exposing  his  ignorance)  in 
the  same  langunge,  "  Imo,  immo,"  whioh  he  meant  for  yes. 
Firmian  then  went  on,  in  German,  saying,  "  Guardian 
and  ward,  intimate  as  their  connection  should  be,  in  this 
case  came  into  contact  to  an  extent  almost  too  great  to  be 
pleasant ;  although,  no  doubt,  there  have  been  cases  before 
where  one  cousin  has  cozened  another ;  *  however,  the 
very  members  of  ecclesiastical  councils  have  come  to  fisti- 
cuffs before  now,  e.  g.  at  Ephesus  in  the  fifteenth  century. 
Indeed,  the  Abbut  Barsumas   and   Dioscurus,  Bishop  of 

*  For  the  next  six  pages  or  so  the  original  literally  bristles  with 
untranslatable  puns  and  plays  upon  words. — Translator. 


CHAP  III.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        77 

Alexandria,  men  of  position,  pummelled  the  good  Flavian 
on  that  very  occasion  till  he  was  as  dead  as  a  herring.* 
And  this  was  on  a  Sunday  too,  a  day  on  which,  in  these 
absurd  old  times,  a  sacred  truce  was  put  to  quarrels  and 
differences  of  every  description ;  though  now,  Sundays  and 
feast-days  are  the  very  days  when  the  peace  is  broken; 
the  public-house  bells  and  the  tinkling  of  the  glasses  ring 
the  truce  out,  and  people  pummel  each  other,  so  that  the 
law  gets  her  finger  into  the  pie.  In  old  days,  people  mul- 
tiplied the  number  of  saints'  days  for  the  sake  of  stopping 
fights,  but  the  fact  is  that  everybody  connected  with  the 
legal  profession,  Herr  von  Meyern  (who  must  have  some- 
thing to  live  upon),  ought  to  petition  that  a  peaceable 
working-day  or  two  might  be  abolished  now  and  then,  so 
that  the  number  of  rows  might  be  increased,  and  with 
them  the  fines  and  the  fees  in  like  ratio.  Yet  who  thinks 
of  such  a  thing,  Venner  ?" 

He  was  quite  safe  in  spouting  the  greater  part  of  this 
before  Lenette ;  she  had  long  been  accustomed  to  under- 
standing only  a  half,  a  fourth,  or  an  eighth  part  of  what 
he  said ;  as  for  the  whole  Venner,  she  gave  herself  no  con- 
cern about  him.  When  Meyern  had  taken  his  departure 
with  frigid  politeness,  Siebenkses,  with  the  view  of  helping 
to  advance  him  in  his  wife's  good  opinion,  extolled  his 
whole  and  undivided  love  for  the  entire  female  sex  (though 
engaged  to  be  married),  and  more  particularly  his  attach- 
ment to  that  preliminary  bride  of  his,  who  was  now  in  the 
condemned  cell  of  the  prison  ;  this,  however,  rather  seemed 
to  have  the  effect  of  lowering  him  in  her  good  opinion. 

"  Thou  good,  kind  soul,  may  you  always  be  as  faithful 
to  yourself  and  to  me!"  said  he,  taking  her  to  his  heart. 
But  she  didn't  know  that  she  had  been  faithful,  and  said, 
"  to  whom  should  1  be  unfaithful?" 

From  this  day  onwards  to  Michaelmas  Day,  which  was 
the  day  of  the  borough  fair,  fortune  seems  to  have  led  our 
pathway,  I  mean  the  reader's  and  mine,  through  no  very 
special  flower-beds  to  speak  of,  but  merely  along  the  smooth 
green  turf  of  an  English  lawn, one  would  suppose  on  purpose 
that  the  fair  on  Michaelmas  Day  may  suddenly  arise  upon 


*  Mosheim's  '  Ecclesiastical  History.' 


78  JEAN  PAUL  FKIEDRICH   RICHTER.       [BOOK  I. 

our  view  as  some  shining,  dazzling  town  starts  up  out  of 
a  valley.  Very  little  did  occur  until  then  ;  at  least,  my 
pen,  which  only  considers  itself  bound  to  record  incidents 
of  some  importance,  is  not  very  willing  to  be  troubled  to 
mention  that  the  Venner  Meyern  dropped  in  pretty  often 
at  the  bookbinder's  (who  lived  under  the  same  roof  with 
the  Siebenkaeses) — he  merely  came  to  see  whether  the 
*  Liaisons  Dangereuses '  were  bound  yet. 

But  that  Michaelmas !  Truly  the  world  shall  remember 
it.  And  in  fact  the  very  eve  of  it  was  a  time  of  such  a 
splendid  and  exquisite  quality  that  we  may  venture  to 
give  the  world  some  account  of  it. 

Let  the  world  read  the  account  of  this  eve  of  preparation 
at  all  events,  and  then  give  its  vote. 

On  this  eve  of  the  fair  all  Kuhschnappel  (as  all  otlier 
places  are  at  such  a  time)  was  turned  into  a  workhouse 
and  house  of  industry  for  women ;  you  couldn't  have  found 
a  woman  in  the  whole  town  either  sitting  down,  or  at 
peace,  or  properly  dressed.  Girls  the  most  given  to  read- 
ing opened  no  books  but  needle-books  to  take  needles  out, 
and  the  only  leaves  they  turned  over  were  paste  ones  to 
be  put  on  pies.  Scarcely  a  woman  took  any  dinner ;  the 
Michaelmas  cakes  and  the  coming  enjoyment  of  them  were 
the  sole  mainspring  of  the  feminine  machinery. 

On  these  occasions  women  may  be  said  to  hold  their 
exhibitions  of  pictures,  the  cakes  being  the  altar-pieces. 
Everyone  nibbles  at  and  minutely  inspects  these  baked 
escutcheons  of  her  neighbour's  nobility ;  and  each  has,  as 
it  were,  her  cake  attached  to  her,  as  a  medal  is,  or  the  lead 
tickets  on  bales  of  cloth,  to  indicate  her  value.  They 
scarcely  eat  or  drink  anything,  it  is  true,  thick  coffee  being 
their  consecrated  sacrament  wine,  and  thin  transparent 
pastry  their  wafers ;  only  the  latter  (in  their  friend's  and 
hostess's  houses)  tastes  best,  and  is  eaten  almost  with 
fondness  when  it  has  turned  out  hard  and  stony  and  shot 
and  dagger  proof — or  is  burnt  to  a  cinder — or,  in  short,  is 
wretched  from  some  cause  or  other;  they  cheerfully  ac- 
knowledge all  the  failures  of  their  dearest  friends,  and  try 
to  comfort  them  by  taking  them  to  their  own  houses  and 
treating  them  to  something  of  a  very  different  kind. 

As  for  our  Lenette,  she,  my  dear  lady  reader,  has  always 


CHAP.  III.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN  PIECES.        79 

been  a  baker  of  such  a  sort  that  male  connoisseurs  have 
preferred  her  crust,  and  female  connoisseurs  her  crum,  both 
classes  maintaining  that  no  one  but  she  (and  yourself, 
dearest)  could  bake  anything  like  either.  The  kitchen 
fire  was  this  salamander's  second  element,  for  the  first  and 
native  element  of  this  dear  nixie  was  water.  To  be  scour- 
ing with  sand,  and  squattering  and  splattering  in  it,  in  a 
great  establishment  like  Siebenka3s's  (who  had  devoted  all 
Leibgeber's  Ephraimites  to  the  keeping  of  this  feast),  was 
quite  her  vocation.  No  kiss  could  be  applied  to  her  glow- 
ing face  on  such  a  day — and  indeed  she  had  her  hands 
pretty  full,  for  at  ten  o'clock  the  butcher  came  bringing 
more  work  with  him. 

The  world  will  be  glad  (I'm  perfectly  certain  in  my 
own  mind)  if  I  just  give  them  a  very  short  account  of  this 
business — who  could  have  dune  it  better,  for  that  matter  ? 
The  facts  of  it  were  these :  at  the  beginning  of  summer  the 
four  fellow  lodgers  had  clubbed  together  and  bought  a  cow 
in  poor  condition  which  they  had  then  put  up  to  fatten. 
The  bookbinder,  the  cobbler,  the  poor's  advocate  and  the 
hairdresser — between  whom  and  'his  tenants  there  was 
this  distinction,  that  they  owed  their  rent  to  him,  whereas 
he  owed  his  to  his  creditors — caused  to  be  prepaid  and 
drawn  up  by  a  skilful  hand  (which  was  attached  to  the 
arm  of  Siebenkajs)  an  authentic  instrument  (here  Kolbk 
the  word-purist  will  snarl  at  poor  innocent  me  in  his 
usual  manner  for  employing  foreign  words  in  a  document 
based  on  the  Roman  law)  relative  to  the  life  and  death  of 
the  cow ;  in  which  instrument  the  four  contracting  parties 
aforesaid — who  all  stood  attentively  round  the  document, 
he  who  was  sitting  and  drawing  it  excepted — bound  and 
engaged  themselves  in  manner  following,  that  is  to  say, 
that — 

lstly.  Each  of  the  four  parties  interested,  as  aforesaid, 
in  the  said  cow  might  and  should  have  the  privilege  of 
milking  her  alternately. 

2ndly.  That  this  Cooking  or  Fattening  Society  might 
and  should  defray  from  a  common  treasury  chest  the 
price  of  said  cow,  the  cost  of  the  carriage  of  imple- 
ments and  provisions,  and  maintenance  generally  of  the 
same;  and 


80  JEAN   PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.       [BOOK  I, 

3rdly.  That  the  allied  powers  as  aforesaid  should  not 
only  on  the  day  before  Michaelmas,  the  28th  September, 
1785,  slaughter  the  said  cow.  but  further  that  each  quarter 
of  the  same  should  then  and  there  be  further  divided  into 
four  quarters,  conformably  to  the  lex  agraria,  for  partition 
among  the  said  parties  to  the  said  contract. 

Siebenkaes  prepared  four  certified  copies  of  this  treaty, 
one  for  each ;  he  never  wrote  anything  with  graver 
pleasure.  All  that  now  remained  to  be  performed  of  the 
contract  by  the  house  association  of  our  four  evangelists, 
who  had  collectively  adopted  as  their  armorial  crest  or 
emblematic  animal,  one  single  joint-stock  beast,  namely, 
the  female  of  that  of  Saint  Luke — was  the  third  article 
of  it. 

However.  I  know  the  learned  classes  are  panting  for 
my  fair,  so  I  shall  only  dash  down  a  hurried  sketch  of  my 
Man-and- Animal  piece  (Kolbe  of  course  goes  on  taking 
me  to  task). 

That  Septembriseur,  the  butcher,  did  his  part  of  tho 
business  well,  though  it  was  at  the  close  of  Fructidor — 
the  four  messmates  looking  on  throughout  the  operation,  as 
also  did  old  Sabine,  who  did  a  good  deal,  and  got  something 
for  it.  The  quadruple  alliance  regaled  itself  en  the  slain 
animal  at  a  general  picnic,  to  which  each  contributed 
something  in  order  that  tho  butcher  might  be  included 
gratis ;  and  it  is  undeniable  that  one  member  of  the  league, 
whom  I  shall  name  hereafter,  attended  this  picnic  in  a 
frame  of  mind  and  in  a  costume  barely  serious  enough  for 
the  occasion.  The  slaughter  confederation  then  set  to 
working  its  division  sura,  according  to  the  number  of  its 
members,  and  the  golden  calf  round  which  their  dance 
was  executed  was  cut,  up  with  the  appropriate  heraldic 
cuts.  Then  the  whole  thing  was  over.  I  think  I  can 
say  nothing  more  laudatory  of  the  manner  in  which  the 
whole  process  of  zootomic  division  was  carried  out  than 
what  Siebenkass,  an  interested  party,  said  himself,  viz., 
"  It's  to  be  wished  that  the  twelve  tribes  of  Israel,  as  well 
as,  in  later  times,  the  Eoman  empire,  had  been  divided 
into  as  many  and  as  fair  divisions  as  our  cow  and  Poland 
have  been." 

I  shall  be  doing  ample  justice  to  the  cow's  embonpoint 


CHAP,  in.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       81 

if  I  merely  mention  that  Fecht  the  cobhler  uttered  a  pane- 
gyric which  commenced  with  the  most  lively  and  vigorous 
oaths,  and  the  statement  that  she  was  an  (adjective)  bag 
of  skin  and  bones,  and  ended  with  an  assurance,  uttered  in 
mild  and  pious  accents  that  Heaven  had  indeed  favoured 
the  poor  beast,  and  "  blessed  us  unworthy  sinners  above 
measure."  A  frolicsome  cult  by  nature,  he  had  had  the 
heavy  coach-harness  of  pietism  put  on  to  him,  and  was 
consequently  obliged  to  keep  softening  down  the  "  strong 
language"  which  came  naturally  to  him  into  the  pious 
sighs  appropriate  to  his  "converted  state."  And  it  was  to 
the  frame  of  mind  and  the  costume  of  this  very  Fecht  that 
I  made  allusion  above  as  being  barely  suitable  to  the 
occasion,  for  I'm  sorry  to  say  he  had  no  breeches  on  him 
the  whole  day  of  this  great  slaughter,  but  ran  up  and 
down  the  slaughter-house  in  a  white  frieze  frock  of  his 
wife's,  having  a  strange  general  effect  of  looking  something 
like  his  own  better  half.  However,  the  members  of  the 
association  didn't  take  any  offence ;  he  couldn't  help  it, 
because  while  he  was  going  about  got  up  in  this  Amazon's 
demi-negligee,  and  presenting  this  hermaphrodite  appearance, 
his  own  black-leather  leg-cases  were  in  the  dye  pot,  being 
prepared  for  a  reissue. 

The  poor's  advocate  had  begged  Lenette  (about  a  quarter 
past  four  in  the  afternoon)  not  to  go  on  working  herself  to 
death,  and  never  to  mind  bothering  about  any  supper,  as  he 
was  going  to  be  miserly  for  once,  save  himself  a  supper  to- 
night, and  sup  upon  eighteen  penn'orth  of  pastry :  but  the 
busy  soul  kept  running  about  brushing  and  sweeping,  and 
by  six  o  'clock  they  were  both  lying  resting  in  the  leather 
arms  of — a  big  easy  chair  (for  he  had  no  flesh  and  she  no 
bones),  and  looking  around  them  with  that  expression  of 
tranquil  happiness  which  you  may  see  in  children  while 
eating,  at  the  room  in  its  state  of  mathematical  order,  at 
the  way  in  which  everything  in  it  was  shining,  at  the 
pastry  new-moon-crescents  in  their  hands,  and  at  the 
liquid  burnished  gold  (or  rather  foilgold  *)  of  the  setting 
sun  creeping  up  and  up  upon  the  gleaming  tin  dishes. 
There  they  rested  and  reposed  like  cradled  children,  with 

*  Gold  in  leaves,  o  two  colours,  used  bj  bookbinders. 
U.  Q 


82  JEAN   PAUL  FRIEDKICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  I. 

the  screeching,  clattering,  twelve  herculean  lahours  of  the 
rest  of  the  people  of  the  house  going  on  all  round  them  ; 
and  the  clearness  of  the  sky  and  the  newly  cleaned  windows 
added  a  full  half-hour  to  the  length  of  the  day  ;  the  hell- 
hammer,  or  tuning-hammer  of  the  curfew  bell  gently  let 
down  the  pitch  of  their  melodious  wishes  till  they — lapsed 
into  dreams. 

At  ten  o'clock  they  woke  up  and  went  to  bed  .  .  .  . ! 

I  quite  enjoy  this  little  stariy  night  picture  myself; 
though  my  head  has  reflected  it  all  glimmery  and  oxit  of 
focus,  as  the  gilt  hemisphere  of  my  watch  does  the  evening 
sun  when  1  hold  it  up  to  it.  Evening  is  the  time  when 
Ave  weary,  hunted  men  long  to  be  at  rest ;  it  is  for  the 
evening  of  the  day,  for  the  evening  of  the  year  (autumn), 
and  for  the  evening  of  life,  that  we  lay  up  our  hard-earned 
harvests,  and  with  such  eager  hopes !  But  hast  thou  never 
seen  in  fields,  when,  the  crops  were  gathered,  an  image  and 
emblem  of  thyself — I  mean  the  autumn  dais}*,  the  flower 
of  harvest;  she  delays  her  blossom  till  the  summer  is  past 
and  gone,  the  winter  snows  cover  her  before  her  fruit 
appears,  and  it  is  not  till  the — coming  spring  that  that 
fruit  is  ripe ! 

But  see  how  the  roaring,  dashing  surges  of  the  fair-day 
morning  come  beating  upon  our  hero's  bedposts!  He 
comes  into  the  white,  shining  room,  which  Lenette  had 
stolen  out  of  bed  like  a  thief  before  midnight  to  wash 
while  he  was  in  his  first  sleep,  and  had  sanded  all  over 
like  an  Arabia :  in  which  manner  she  had  her  own  way 
while  he  had  his.  On  a  fair-day  morning  I  recommend 
everybody  to  open  the  window  and  lean  out,  as  Siebenkaes 
did,  to  watch  the  rapid  erection  and  hiring  of  the  wooden 
booths  in  the  market-place,  and  the  falling  of  the  first 
drops  of  the  coming  deluge  of  people,  only  let  the  reader 
observe  that  it  wasn't  by  my  advice  that  my  hero,  in  the 
very  arrogance  of  his  wealth  (for  there  were  samples  of 
every  kind  of  pastry  which  the  house  contained  on  a  table 
behind  him),  called  down  to  many  of  the  little  green  aris- 
tocratic caterpillars  whom  he  saw  moving  along  in  the 
street  with  even  greater  arrogance  than  his  own,  and  whose 
natural  history  he  felt  inclined  to  learn  by  a  look  at  their 
laces. 


CHAP.  III.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.       83 

"  I  say,  sir,  will  you  just  be  good  enough  to  look  at  that 
house,  that  one  there — do  you  notice  anything  particular  ?" 

If  the  caterpillar  lifted  up  its  physiognomy,  he  could 
peruse  and  study  it  at  his  ease, — which  was  of  course  his 
object. 

"  You  don't  notice  anything  particular  ?"  he  would  ask. 

"When  the  insect  shook  its  head,  he  concurred  with  it, 
and  did  the  same  up  at  the  window,  saying : 

"  No,  of  course  not !  I've  been  looking  at  it  for  the  last 
twelve  months  myself,  and  can't  see  anything  particular 
about  it ;  but  I  didn't  choose  to  believe  my  own  eyes." 

Giddypated  Firmian  !  Your  seething  foam  of  pleasure 
may  soon  drop  down  and  disappear — as  it  did  that  Saturday 
when  the  cards  were  left.  As  yet,  however,  his  little  drop 
of  must  which  he  has  squeezed  out  of  the  forenoon  hours 
was  foaming  and  sparkling  briskly.  The  landlord  moved 
at  a  gallop,  casting  (with  his  powder-sowing  machine)  seed 
into  a  fruitful  soil.  The  bookbinder  conveyed  his  goods 
(consisting  partly  of  empty  manuscript  books,  partly  of 
still  emptier  song  books,  partly  of  "  novelties,"  in 
almanacs)  to  the  fair  by  land-carriage  in  a  wheelbarrow, 
which  he  had  to  make  two  journeys  with  in  going,  but 
only  one  in  returning  in  the  evening,  because  then  he  had 
got  rid  of  his  almanacs  to  purchasers  and  to  sellers 
(almanacs  are  the  greatest  of  all  novelties,  or  pieces  of 
news — for  there  is  nothing  in  all  the  long  course  of  time 
so  new  as  the  new  year).  Old  Sabel  had  set  up  her  East 
India  house,  her  fruit  garner,  and  her  cabinet  of  tin  rings 
at  the  town  gate ;  she  wouldn't  have  let  that  warehouse 
of  hers  go  to  her  own  brother  at  a  lower  figure  than  half- 
a-sovereign.  The  cobbler  put  a  stitch  in  no  shoe  on  this 
St.  Michael's  Day  except  his  wife's. 

Suck  away,  my  hero,  at  your  nice  bit  of  raffinade  sugar 
of  life,  and  empty  your  forenoon  sweetstuff  spoon,  not 
troubling  your  head  about  the  devil  and  his  grandmother, 
although  the  pair  of  them  should  be  thinking  (after  the 
nature  of  them)  about  getting  a  bitter  potion,  even  a 
poison  cup,  made  ready  and  handing  it  to  you. 

But  his  greatest  enjoyment  is  still  to  come,  to  wit,  the 
numberless  beggar  people.  I  will  describe  this  enjoyment, 
and  so  distribute  it. 

G  2 


84  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH  EICHTEE.        [BOOK  I. 

A  fair  is  the  high  mass  which  the  beggars  of  all  ranks 
and  classes  attend ;  when  it  is  still  a  day  or  two  off,  all  the 
footsoles  that  have  nothing  to  walk  upon  but  compassionate 
hearts,  are  converging  towards  the  spot  like  so  many  radii, 
but  on  the  morning  of  the  fair-day  itself  the  whole  annual 
congress  of  beggardom  and  the  column  of  cripples  are 
fairly  on  the  march.  Anyone  who  has  seen  Furth,  or  been 
in  Elwangen  during  P.  Gassner's  government,  may  cut 
these  few  leaves  out  of  his  copy  ;  but  no  one  else  has  any 
idea  of  it  till  I  proceed  and  lead  him  in  at  the  town-gate 
of  Kuhschnappel. 

The  street  choral  service  and  the  vocal  serenades  now 
commence.  The  blind  sing  like  blinded  singing-birds — 
better,  but  louder ;  the  lame  walk ;  the  poor  preach  the 
gospel  themselves;  the  deaf  and  dumb  make  a  terrible 
noise,  and  ring  in  the  feast  with  little  bells — everybody 
sings  his  own  tune  in  the  middle  of  everybody  else's — a 
paternoster  is  clattering  at  the  door  of  every  house,  and  in 
the  rooms  inside  nobody  can  hear  himself  swear.  Whole 
cabinets  of  small  coppers  are  lavished  on  one  hand,  pocketed 
on  the  other.  The  one-legged  soldiery  spice  their  ejacula- 
tory  pra}Ters  with  curses,  and  blaspheme  horribly,  because 
people  don't  give  them  enough — in  brief,  the  borough  which 
had  made  up  its  mind  for  a  day's  enjoyment,  is  invaded 
and  almost  taken  by  storm  by  the  rabble  of  beggars. 

And  now  the  maimed  and  the  diseased  begin  to  appear. 
Whoever  has  a  wooden  jury-leg  under  him,  sets  it  and 
his  long  third  leg  and  fellow-labourer  the  crutch,  in  motion 
towards  Kuhschnappel,  and  drives  and  plants  his  sharp- 
pointed  timber  toe  into  moist  earth  there  in  the  vicinity  ot 
the  town-gate,  in  hopes  of  its  thriving  and  bearing  fruit. 
Whosoever  has  no  arms  or  hands  left,  stretches  both  out 
for  an  alms.  Those  to  whom  Heaven  has  entrusted  the 
beggars'  talent,  disease,  above  all  paralysis,  the  beggars' 
vapeurs — trades  with  his  talent,  and  the  body  appertaining 
to  it,  levying  contributions  with  it  on  the  whole  and  the 
sound.  People  who  might  stand  as  frontispieces  to  works 
on  surgery  and  medicine,  quite  as  appropriately  as  at  city 
gates,  take  up  their  position  near  the  latter  and  announce 
what  they  lack,  which  is,  first  and  foremost,  other  people's 
cash.     There  are  plenty  of  legs,  noses,  and  arms  in  Kuh- 


CHAP.  III.]      FLOWEK,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN  PIECES.       85 

schuappel,  but  a  great  many  more  people.  There  is  one  most 
extraordinary  fellow — (to  be  admired  at  a  distance,  though 
impossible  to  be  equalled — looked  upon  with  envy,  though 
indeed  only  by  such  blotting-paper  souls  as  can  never  see 
supreme  excellence  without  longing  to  possess  it)  ;  there's 
only  half  of  him  there,  because  tlie  other  half's  in  his  grave 
already,  everything  you  could  call  legs  having  been  shot 
clean  away ;  and  these  shots  have  placed  him  in  a  position 
at  once  to  arrogate  and  assume  to  himself  the  primacy  and 
generalship-in-chief  of  the  cripples,  and  be  drawn  about 
on  a  triumphal  car  as  a  kind  of  demigod,  whose  soul,  in 
place  of  a  corporeal  garment,  has  on  merely  a  sort  of  cape 
and  short  doublet.  "  A  soldier,"  said  Siebenkaes,  "  who 
is  still  afflicted  with  one  leg,  and  who  on  that  ground 
expostulates  with  fate,  inquiring  of  her,  '  Why  am  I  not 
shot  to  pieces  like  that  cripple,  so  that  I  might  make  as 
much  in  the  day  as  he  does  ? '  seems  to  forget  that  on  the 
other  side  of  the  question  there  are  thousands  of  other 
warriors  besides  himself  who  haven't  even  one  wooden  leg 
("let  alone  more),  but  are  totally  unprovided  with  even  that 
nre-  and  begging-certificate ;  moreover,  that  however 
many  of  his  limbs  he  might  have  been  relieved  of  by  bul- 
lets, he  might  still  keep  on  asking,  '  Why  not  more  ? '  " 

Siebenkaes  was  merry  over  the  poor  because  they  are 
merry  over  themselves ;  and  he  never  would  kick  up  a 
politico-economical  row  about  their  occasionally  tippling 
and  guzzling  a  little  too  much, — when,  for  instance,  a  whole 
lazarette-wagon,  or  ambulance-load  of  them,  halting  at  some 
shepherd's  hut,  they  get  down,  and  go  in,  and  their  plasters, 
their  martyrs'  crowns,  their  spiked  girdles  and  hair-shirts 
come  off,  leaving  nothing  but  a  brisk  human  being  who  has 
left  off  sighing  just  for  a  minute ;  or — since  what  every- 
body works  for  is,  not  merely  to  live,  but  to  live  a  little 
better  now  and  then — when  the  beggar  too  has  some- 
thing a  little  better  than  his  everyday  fare,  and  when  the 
cripple  pulls  the  goddess  of  joy  into  his  boarded  dancing- 
barn  to  dance  with  him  as  his  partner,  and  her  hot  mask 
falls  off  in  the  waltz  (as  for  our  ball-rooms,  it  never  falls  off 
in  them). 

About  11  o'clock,  the  devil,  as  I  have  half  hinted  already, 
dropped  a  handful  of  blue-bottle  flies  into  Firmian's  wecU 


86  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDBICH  EIOHTER.        [BOOK  L 

ding  soup — to  wit,  Herr  Kosa  von  Meyern,  who  graciously 
intimated  his  aristocratic  intention  of  coming  to  call  that 
afternoon,  "because  there  was  such  a  good  view  of  the 
market-place."  People  of  impecunious  gentility,  who  can't 
issue  orders  in  any  houses  but  their  own,  construct  in  their 
own,  with  much  ease,  loopholes  whence  the}'  can  fire  upon 
the  enemy  who  makes  his  attack  from — within.  The  ad- 
vocate had  a  piece  of  rudeness  towards  the  Venner  to  put 
into  either  scale  of  his  balance  of  justice,  so  as  to  determine 
which  was  the  least  of  the  two.  The  one  was,  to  let  him 
be  told  he  might  stay  where  he  was ;  the  other,  to  let  him 
in,  and  then  behave  just  as  though  the  noodle  were  up  in 
the  moon.     Siebenkass  chose  the  latter  as  the  smaller. 

Women,  good  souls,  have  always  to  carry  and  hold  up 
Ihe  Jacob's  ladder  by  which  the  male  sex  mount  into  the 
blue  aether  and  into  the  evening-red  ;  this  call  of  the 
Venner  oame  as  an  extra  freight  loaded  on  to  Lenette's 
two  burden-poles  of  arras.  The  laving  of  all  moveable 
property,  and  the  aspersion  of  all  immoveable,  recommenced. 
Meyern,  the  false  lover  of  the  poor  child-murderess,  Lenette 
detested  with  all  her  heart ;  at  the  same  time,  all  her 
polishing  machinery  was  at  once  set  agoing  on  the  room. 
Indeed,  I  think  women  dress  themselves  more  and  with 
greater  pains  for  their  lady-enemies  than  for  their  lady- 
friends. 

The  advocate  went  up  and  down,  all  behung  with  long 
chains  of  ratiocination,  like  a  ghost,  and  would  fain  have  suc- 
ceeded in  imbuing  her  with  the  idea  that  she  shouldn't  give 
herself  the  slightest  bother  of  any  kind  about  the  nincom- 
poop. "  It  was  no  good,"  she  said,  "  what  would  he  think 
of  me  ?"  It  was  not  until  having  eliminated  from  the  room 
as  a  piece  of  crudity  his  old  ink-bottle,  into  which  he  had 
only  that  minute  put  ink-powder  to  dissolve  and  make  ink 
for  the  '  Selection  from  the  Devil's  Papers,'  she  was  about 
to  lay  hands  on  that  holy  ark,  his  writing-table — that  the 
head  of  the  house  ramped  up — on  his  hind  legs,  pointing 
with  his  fore  paw  to  the  line  of  demarcation. 

Kosa  appeared !  Nobody  who  had  just  a  little  soft  place  in 
3»is  heart  could  really  have  cursed  this  youngster,  or  beaten 
Him  into  a  jelly;  one  rather  got  to  feel  a  kind  of  a  liking 
for  him,  between  his  pranks.    He  had  white  hair  on  his 


CHAP.  III.]      FLOWER,    FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.       87 

head  and  on  his  chin,  and  was  soft  all  over;  and  had  stuff 
like  milk  instead  of  blood  in  his  veins,  like  the  insects, 
just  as  poisonous  plants  have  generally  white  milky  juice. 
He  was  of  a  very  forgiving  nature,  especially  towards 
women,  and  often  shed  more  tears  himself  in  an  evening  at 
the  theatre  than  he  had  caused  many  whom  he  had  ruined 
to  let  fall.  His  heart  was  really  not  made  of  stone,  or 
lapis  infernalis,  and  if  he  prayed  for  a  certain  time,  he  grew 
pious  during  the  process  and  sought  out  the  most  time- 
honoured  of  religious  formularies  to  give  in  his  adhesion  to 
them  then  and  there.  Thunder  was  to  him  a  watchman's 
rattle,  arousing  him  from  the  sleep  of  sin.  He  loved  to  take 
the  needy  by  the  hand,  especially  if  the  hand  was  pretty.  All 
things  considered,  he  may  perhaps  get  to  heaven  sooner  or 
later;  for,  like  many  debtors  in  the  upper  circles  of  society, 
he  doesn't  pay  his  play-debts,  and  he  also  has  in  his  heart 
an  inborn  duel-prohibition  against  shooting  and  hacking. 
As  yet  he  is  not  a  man  of  his  word ;  and  if  he  were 
poorer,  he  would  steal  without  a  moment's  hesitation. 
Like  a  lap-dog,  he  lies  down  wagging  his  tail  at  the  feet  of 
people  of  any  importance,  but  tugs  women  by  the  skirts, 
or  shows  his  teeth  and  snarls  at  them. 

Pliant,  water- weeds  of  this  sort  fall  away  from  the  very 
slightest  satiric  touch,  and  you  can't  manage  to  hit  them 
with  one,  richly  as  they  deserve  it,  because  its  effect  is 
only  proportionate  to  the  resistance  it  meets  with.  Sieben- 
kaes  would  have  been  better  pleased  had  Von  Meyern  only 
been  a  little  rougher  and  coarser,  for  it  is  just  these  yielding, 
pitiful,  sapless,  powerless  sort  of  creatures  that  filch  away 
good  fortune,  hard  cash,  feminine  honour,  good  appoint- 
ments and  fair  names,  and  are  exactly  like  the  ratsbane 
or  arsenic,  which,  when  it  is  good  and  pure,  must  be  quite 
white,  shining  and  transparent. 

Rosa  appeared,  I  have  said,  but  oh!  lovely  to  behold 
beyond  expression  !  His  handkerchief  was  a  great  Molucca, 
of  perfume ;  his  two  side  lucks  were  two  small  ones.  On 
his  waistcoat  he  had  a  complete  animal  kingdom  painted 
(as  the  fashion  of  the  day  was),  or  Zimmermann's  Zoological 
Atlas.  His  little  breeches  and  his  little  coat,  and  every- 
thing about  him  salted  the  women  of  the  house  intoLottish 
Bait-pillars,  merely  in  passing  them  by  on  his  way  upstuiis, 


88  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICII   RICHTEB.       [BOOK  I. 

I  must,  say,  though,  that  what  dazzle  me  personally,  are 
the  rings  which  emboss  six  of  his  fingers, — there  were 
profile  portraits,  landscapes,  stones,  even  beetle-wing 
covers  all  employed  in  this  gold-shoeing  of  his  fingers. 

Wo  may  quite  properly  apply  to  the  human  hand  the 
expression  "  it  was  shod  with  rings  like  a  horse's  hoof,'' 
it  has  been  long  applied  to  the  horse's  hoof  itself,  and 
Daubenton  has  proved,  by  dissections,  that  the  latter 
contains  all  the  different  parts  of  the  human  hand.  The 
use  of  these  hand  or  finger  manacles  is  quite  proper  and 
permissible  ;  indeed  rings  are  indispensable  to  the  fingers 
of  those  who  ought  by  rights  to  have  them  in  their  noses. 
According  to  the  received  opinion,  these  metal  spavins,  or 
excrescences  of  the  fingers,  were  only  invented  to  make 
pretty  hands  ugly,  as  a  kind  of  chain  and  nose-rings  to 
keep  vanity  in  check ;  so  that  fists  which  are  ugly  by 
nature  can  easily  dispense  with  these  disfigurements.  I 
should  like  to  know  whether  there  is  anything  in  another 
idea  of  mine  bearing  on  this  subject.  It  is  this.  Pascal 
used  to  wear  a  great  iron  ring  with  sharp  spines  on  it 
round  his  naked  body,  that  he  might  always  be  ready  to 
punish  himself  for  any  vain  thought  which  might  occur  to 
him  by  giving  this  ring  a  slight  pressure ;  now  is  it  not 
perhaps  the  case  that  these  smaller  and  prettier  rings  in  a 
similar  way  chastise  any  vain  thoughts  which  may  occur, 
by  slightly,  but  frequently  hurting?  They  seem  at  least  to 
be  worn  with  some  such  object,  *br  it  is  exactly  the  people 
who  suffer  most  from  vanity  who  wear  the  greatest 
quantities  of  them,  and  move  about  their  beringed  hands 
the  most. 

Unwished-for  visits  often  pass  off  better  than  others; 
on  this  occasion  everyone  got  on  pretty  comfortably. 
Siebenkaes  of  course  was  in  his  own  house — and  behaved 
himself  accordingly.  He  and  the  Venner  looked  out  of 
the  window  at  the  people  in  tho  market-place.  Lenette, 
in  accordance  with  her  upbringing,  and  the  manners  and 
customs  of  the  middle  classes  of  small  towns,  didn't  ven- 
ture to  be  otherwise  than  silent,  or  at  the  most  to  take  an 
exceedingly  subordinate,  obligato,  accompanying  part  in 
the  concert  of  a  conversation  between  men  ;  she  fetched  and 
carried  in  and  out,  and,  in  fact,  sat  most  of  the  time  down 


CHAP.  III.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       89 

stairs  with  the  other  women.  It  was  in  vain  that  the 
courteous,  gallant  Eosa  Everard,  tried  upon  her  his 
wonted  wizaid  spells  to  root  women  to  a  given  spot.  To 
her  husband  he  complained  that  there  was  little  real 
refinement  in  Kuhschnappel,  and  not  one  single  amateur 
theatre  where  one  could  act,  as  there  was  in  Ulm.  He 
had  to  order  his  new  books  and  latest  fashions  from 
abroad. 

Siebenkaes  in  return  expressed  to  him  merely  his  enjoy- 
ment over  the — beggars  in  the  market-place.  He  made 
him  notice  the  little  boys  blowing  red  wooden  trumpets, 
loud  enough  to  burst  the  drum  of  the  ear,  if  not  to  over- 
throw the  walls  of  Jericho.  But  he  added,  with  proper 
thoughtful ness,  that  he  shouldn't  omit  to  notice  those 
other  poor  devils  who  were  collecting  the  waste  bits  of 
split  wood  in  their  caps  for  fuel.  He  asked  him  if,  like 
other  members  of  the  chamber,  he  disapproved  of  lotteries 
and  lotto,  and  whether  he  thought  it  was  very  bad  for  the 
Kuhschnappel  common  people's  morals  that  they  should  be 
crowding  about  an  old  cask  turned  upside  down,  with  an 
index  fixed  to  the  bottom  of  it  which  revolved  round  a  dial 
formed  of  gingerbread  and  nuts,  and  where  the  share- 
holders, for  a  small  stake,  carried  off  from  the  banker  of 
the  establishment,  a  greedy  old  harridan  of  a  woman,  a 
nut  or  a  ginger  cake.  Siebenkass  took  pleasure  in  the 
little,  because  in  his  eyes  it  was  a  satirical,  caricaturing 
diminishing  mirror  of  everything  in  the  shape  of 
burgherly  pomposity.  The  Venner  saw  no  entertainment 
whatever  in  double-meaning  allusions  of  the  kind ;  but 
indeed  the  advocate  never  dreamt  of  amusing  anybody 
but  himself  with  them.  "  I  may  surely  speak  out  what- 
ever I  like  to  myself,"  he  once  said ;  "  what  is  it  to  me  if 
people  choose  to  listen  behind  my  back,  or  before  my  face 
either  ?  " 

At  length  he  went  down  among  the  people  in  the 
market-place,  not  without  the  full  concurrence  of  the 
Venner,  who  expected  at  last  to  be  able  to  have  some 
rational  conversation  with  the  wife.  Now  that  Firmian 
was  gone,  Everard  begun  to  feel  in  his  element,  swimming 
in  his  own  native  pike-pond  as  it  were.  As  an  intro- 
ductory move  he  constructed  for  Lenette  a  model  of  her 


90  JEAN   PAUL   FR1EDRICH   RICHTER.         [BOOK  I. 

native  town ;  he  knew  a  good  many  streets  and  people  in 
Augspurg,  and  had  often  ridden  through  the  Fuggery, 
and  it  seemed  only  yesterday,  he  said,  that  he  saw  her 
there  working  at  a  lady's  hat,  beside  a  nice  old  lady,  her 
mother  he  should  think.  He  took  her  right  hand  in  his 
(in  an  incidental  manner),  she  allowing  him  to  do  so  out 
of  gratefulness  for  calling  up  such  pleasant  memories  ;  he 
pressed  it — then  suddenly  let  it  go  to  see  if  she  mightn't 
just  have  returned  the  pressure  the  least  bit  in  the  world, 
in  the  confusion  of  fingers  as  it  were — or  should  try  to 
recover  the  lost  pressure.  But  he  might  as  well  have 
pressed  Gotz  von  Berlichingen's  iron  hand  with  his 
thievish  thumb  as  her  warm  one.  He  next  came  upon  the 
subject  of  her  millinery  work,  and  talked  about  cap  and 
bonnet  fashions  like  a  man  who  knew  what  he  was  talking 
about ;  whereas  when  Siebenkses  mixed  himself  up  with 
these  questions,  he  displayed  no  real  knowledge  of  the 
subject  at  all.  He  promised  her  two  consignments,  of 
patterns  from  Ulm,  and  of  customers  from  Kuhschnappel. 
*'  I  know  several  ladies  who  must  do  what  I  abk  them,"  he 
said,  and  showed  her  the  list  of  his  engagements  for  the 
coming  winter  balls  in  his  pocket-book;  "I  shan't  dance 
with  them  if  they  don't  give  you  an  order."  "  1  hope  it 
won't  come  to  that,"  said  Lenette  (with  many  meanings). 
Finally,  he  was  obliged  to  ask  her  to  let  him  see  her  at 
work  for  a  little,  his  object  here  being  to  weaken  the 
enemy  by  effecting  a  diversion  of  her  forces — her  eyes 
being  occupied  with  her  needle,  she  could  only  have  her 
ears  at  liberty  to  observe  him  with.  She  blushed  as  she 
took  two  bodkins  and  stuck  one  of  them  into  the  round 
red  little  pincushion  of — her  mouth  ;  this  was  more  than  he 
could  really  allow,  it  was  so  very  dangerous — it  formed  a 
hedge  against  himself — and  she  might  swallow  either  the 
stiletto  in  question,  or  at  all  events  some  of  the  poisonous 
verdigris  off  it.  So  he  drew  this  lethal  weapon  with  his 
own  hand  out  of  its  sheath  in  her  lips,  scratching  the 
cherry  mouth  a  little,  or  not  at  all— as  he  loudly  lamented 
— in  the  process,  however.  A  venner  of  the  right  sort 
considers  himself  liable  in  a  case  of  this  kind  for  the  fees 
and  expenses  consequent  upon  the  accident ;  Everard, 
in  his   liberality,   took  out  his    English  patont  pomade, 


CIIAP.  III. J     FLOWER,    FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.        91 

smeared  some  on  to  her  left  forefinger,  and  applied  the 
salve  to  the  invisible  wound  with  the  finger  as  a  spatula — 
in  doing  which  he  was  obliged  to  take  hold  of  her  whole 
hand  as  the  handle  of  the  spatula,  and  frequently  squeeze 
it  unconsciously.  He  stuck  the  unfortunate  stiletto  itself 
into  his  shirt  front,  giving  her  his  own  breastpin  instead, 
and  exposing  his  own  tender  white  breast  to — the  cold.  I 
particularly  beg  persons  who  have  had  experience  in  this 
description  of  service  to  give  their  opinion  with  firm  im- 
partiality on  my  hero's  conduct,  and,  sitting  in  court 
martial  on  him,  to  point  out  such  of  his  movements  and 
dispositions  as  they  may  consider  to  have  been  ill- 
advised. 

Kow  that  she  was  wounded,  poor  thing,  he  wouldn't  let 
her  go  on  working,  but  only  show  him  her  finished  pro- 
ductions. He  ordered  a  copy  of  one  of  them  for  Madame 
von  Blaise.  He  begged  her  to  put  it  on  and  let  him  see 
it  on  her — and  he  set  it  himself  just  as  Madame  von  Blaise 
would  wear  it.  By  heaven  !  it  was  better  even  than  he 
had  thought;  he  swore  it  would  suit  Madame  von  Blaise 
quite  as  well,  as  she  was  just  the  same  height  as  Lenette. 
This  was  all  stuff  and  nonsense,  really  the  one  was  taller 
by  quite  half  a  nose  than  the  other.  Lenette  said  so 
herself,  she  had  seen  Madame  von  Blaise  at  church.  Bosa 
6tuck  to  his  own  opinion,  and  swore  by  his  soul  and  sal- 
vation (for  in  cases  of  the  kind  he  was  given  to  profane 
language),  and  by  the  sacrament,  that  he  had  measured 
himself  with  her  a  hundred  times,  and  that  she  was  half- 
an-inch  taller  than  himself.  "  By  heaven  ! "  he  said, 
suddenly  jumping  up,  "  of  course  I  carry  her  measure 
about  with  me,  like  her  tailor ;  all  that  need  be  done  is 
that  you  and  I  measure  ourselves  together." 

1  shall  not  here  withhold  from  little  girls  a  golden  rule 
of  war  made  by  myself,  "  Don't  argue  long  with  a  man, 
whatever  it  may  be  about — warmth  is  always  warmth, 
even  if  it  only  be  warmth  of  argument — one  forgets  one's 
self,  and  ultimately  takes  to  proving  by  syllogistic  figures, 
and  this  is  just  what  the  enemy  wants — he  converts  these 
figures  into  poetical  figures — ultimately  ev«n  into  plastic 
figures." 

Lenette,  a  li/tle  giddy  with  the  rapid  whirl  of  events^ 


92  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.       [BOOK  L 

good  naturedly  stood  up  to  serve  as  recruit  measure  for 
her  recruit  Rosa ;  he  leant  his  back  to  hers.  "  This  won't 
do,"  he  said,  "  I  can't  see,"  and  unlocked  his  fingers  which 
had  been  intertwined  together,  backwards,  over  the  region 
of  her  heart.  He  turned  quickly  round,  stood  before  her, 
and  embraced  her  gently,  so  as  to  determine,  by  com- 
paring the  levels  of  their  eyes,  whether  their  brows  were 
an  exact  height  or  not.  His  were  glaring  quite  an  inch 
higher  up  than  hers ;  he  clasped  her  closely  and  said, 
turning  red,  "  you  see  you  were  right ;  but  my  mistake 
was  that  I  added  your  beauty  to  your  height,"  and  in  this 
proximity  he  pressed  his  mouth,  red  as  sealing-wax,  upon 
her  lips,  very  founts  and  sources  of  truth  as  they  were. 

She  was  ashamed,  annoyed  and  embarrassed,  angry,  and 
ready  to  cry,  but  had  not  the  courage  to  let  her  indigna- 
tion break  out  upon  a  gentleman  of  quality.  She  didn't 
speak  another  word  then.  He  set  her  and  himself  at  the 
window,  and  said  he  would  read  her  some  songs,  of  rather 
a  different  kind,  he  hoped,  to  those  which  were  being 
hawked  down  in  the  street.  For  he  was  one  of  the 
greatest  poets  in  Kuhschnappel,  although  as  yet  it  was 
not  so  much  that  his  verses  had  made  him  known,  as  that 
he  had  made  his  verses  known.  His  poems,  like  so 
many  others  nowadays,  were  like  the  muses  themselves, 
children  of  memory.  Every  old  Frankish  town  has  at 
least  its  one  fashionable  fop,  a  person  who  fait  lea  honneurs  ; 
and  every  town,  however  old,  prosaic,  imperial-judicature- 
endowed,  possesses  its  genius,  its  poet,  and  sentimentalist ; 
often  both  these  offices  are  filled  by  the  same  individual 
— as  was  the  case  in  Kuhschnappel.  The  greater  and 
likewise  the  lesser  house  of  assembly  looked  upon  Rosa  as  a 
mighty  genius,  smitten  with  the  genius-epidemic-fever.  This 
disease  is  something  like  elephantiasis,  of  which  Troil  in  his 
travels  in  Iceland  gives  such  an  accurate  description  in 
twenty-four  letters,  and  the  principal  features  of  which 
are  that  the  patient  is  exactly  like  an  elephant  as  to  hair, 
cracks,  colour,  and  lumps  of  the  skin,  but  has  not  the 
power  of  the  elephant,  and  lives  in  a  cold  climate. 

Everard  took  a  touching  elegy  out  of  one  of  his  pockets, 
the  left  one,  in  which  (i  mean  in  the  elegy)  a  noble 
gentleman,  lovesick,  sang  himself  to  death ;  and  he  told 


V 


CHAP.  III.  J     FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       93 

her  he  should  like  to  read  it  to  her,  if  his  feelings  would 
let  him  get  through  it  without  breaking  down.  However, 
the  poem  shortly  drew  more  than  one  tear  and  emotion 
from  its  owner,  and  he,  to  his  honour,  was  constrained  to 
furni.sh  a  fresh  proof  of  the  fact  that  however  manly  and 
cold  he  and  poets  of  his  stamp  can  be  to  the  heaviest 
sorrows  of  humanity,  they  really  cannot  quite  contain 
themselves  at  the  woes  of  love,  hut  are  compelled  to  weep 
at  them.  Meanwhile  Eosa,  who,  like  swindlers  at  play, 
alwaj-s  kept  one  eye  upon  a  reflecting  surface  of  some  sort 
— water,  window  panes,  or  polished  steel  for  instance,  so 
as  to  catch  a  passing  glimpse  of  the  female  countenance 
from  time  to  time — saw  by  means  of  a  little  mirror  in 
one  of  the  rings  of  his  left  hand,  in  which  hand  he  was 
holding  the  elegy,  just  a  trace  or  two  in  Lenette's  eyes  of 
the  tiagic  dew  left  there  by  his  poem.  So  he  pulled  out 
of  his  second  pocket  a  ballad  (it  is,  no  doubt,  printed  long 
ago)  in  which  an  innocent  child  murderess,  with  a  tearful 
adieu  to  her  lover,  throws  herself  upon  a  sword.  This 
ballad  (very  unlike  his  other  poetical  children)  had  real 
poetic  merit,  for  luckily  (for  the  poem  at  least)  he  was  a 
lover  of  that  kind  himself,  so  that  he  could  speak  from  the 
heart  to  the  heart.  It  is  not  easy  to  portray  the  emotion 
and  the  melting  pitying  tears  on  Lenette's  face ;  all  her 
heart  rose  to  her  tear-dimmed  eyes. 

It  was  an  experience  utterly  new  to  her  to  be  thufe 
agitated  by  a  combination  of  truth  and  fiction. 

The  Venner  threw  the  ballad  into  the  fire,  and  himseif 
into  Lenette's  arms,  and  cried — 

"  Oh  !  you  sympathising,  noble,  holy  creature !" 

I  cannot  paint  the  amazement  with  which,  completely 
unprepared  for  and  incomprehensive  of  this  transition  from 
crying  to  kissing,  she  shoved  him  away.  This  made  little 
impression  on  him ;  he  was  on  his  high  horse  and  said  he 
must  have  some  souvenir  of  this  "sacred  entrancing 
moment" — only  a  little  lock  of  her  hair.  Her  humble 
station,  his  high-flown  language,  and  the  fact  that  she 
was  perfectly  unable  to  form  the  slightest  idea  what  use 
her  hair  would  be  to  him,  even  supposing  she  gave  enough 
to  stuff  a  pillow — all  this  put  into  her  head  the  fuoli.-h 
idea  that  he  wanted  it  to  perform  some  magical  rite  with4 


94  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICtf   RICHTER.       [BOOK  ft 

such  as  putting  her  tinder  a  love  spell,  or  something  of  the 
sort. 

He  might  have  stabbed  himself  there  and  then  before 
her,  hewn  himself  in  pieces,  impaled  himself  alive,  she 
wouldn't  have  interfered ;  she  might  indeed  have  shed  her 
blood  to  save  him,  but  not  a  single  hair  of  her  head. 

He  had  still  one  resource  in  petto — he  had  really  never 
met  with  such  a  case  as  this  before ;  he  lifted  up  his  hand 
and  vowed  that  he  would  get  Heir  von  Blaise  to  recognise 
her  husband  as  his  nephew,  and  pay  over  his  inheritance 
— and  that  with  the  greatest  ense,  because  he  would 
threaten  to  jilt  his  niece  unless  he  did  it — if  she  would 
just  take  the  scissors  and  cut  off  a  little  hair  memorial,  no 
bigger  even  than  the  fourth  part  of  a  moustache. 

She  knew  nothing  about  the  business  of  the  inheritance, 
and  he  was  consequently  obliged,  to  the  great  detriment  of 
his  enthusiastic  state,  to  give  a  prosaic,  detailed  account  of 
the  species  facti  of  the  whole  of  that  law  suit.  By  great 
good  fortune  he  had  still  in  his  pocket  the  number  of  the 
4  Gazette '  in  which  the  inheritance  chamber's  inquiry  as  to 
the  advocate's  existence  appeared  in  print,  and  he  was  able 
to  put  it  into  her  hands.  And  now  this  plundered  wife 
began  to  cry  bitterly,  not  for  the  loss  of  the  money,  but 
because  her  husband  had  told  her  nothing  about  it  all  this 
time,  and  still  more  because  she  couldn't  quite  make  out 
what  her  own  name  really  was,  or  whether  she  was 
married  to  a  Siebenkaes  or  to  a  Leibgeber.  Her  tears 
flowed  faster  and  faster,  and  in  her  passion  of  grief  the 
would  have  let  the  deceiver  before  her  have  all  the  pretty 
hair  on  her  head,  had  not  an  accidental  circumstance  burst 
the  whole  chain  of  events,  just  as  he  was  kneeling  and 
imploring  her  for  one  little  lock. 

But  we  must  first  look  after  her  husband  a  little,  and 
see  how  he  is  getting  on.  and  whither  he  bends  his  steps. 
At  first  among  the  market  stalls;  for  the  many-throated 
roaring,  and  the  Olla  Podrida  of  cheap  pleasures,  and  the 
displayed  pattern  cards  of  all  the  rags  out  of,  and  upon, 
which  we  human  clothes  moths  construct  our  covering 
cases  and  our  abodes — all  these  caused  his  mind  to  sink 
deep  into  a  sea  of  humoristic-melancholy  reflections  con- 
cerning this  mosaic  picture  of  a  life  of  ours,  made  up  as  it 


CHAP.  III.]       FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.       95 

is  of  so  inany  little  bits,  many-tinted  moments,  motes, 
atoms,  drops,  dust,  vapours.  He  laughed,  and  listened, 
with  an  emotion  incomprehensible  by  many  of  my  readers, 
to  a  ballad  singer,  bawling,  with  his  rhapsodist's  staff  in 
his  right  hand  pointed  at  a  big,  staring  picture  of  a 
horrible  murder,  and  his  left  full  of  smaller,  printed  pic- 
tures, for  sale,  in  which  the  misdeed  and  the  perpetrator  of 
it  were  displayed  to  the  German  public  in  no  brighter 
colours  than  those  of  poetry.  Siebenkaes  bought  two  copies, 
and  put  them  in  his  pocket,  to  read  in  the  evening. 

This  tragic  murder  picture  evoked  in  the  background  of 
his  fancy  that  of  the  poor  girl  he  had  defended,  and  the 
gallows,  on  to  which  fell  those  burning  tears  which  had 
flowed  from  his  wounded  heart — that  heart  which  nobody 
on  earth,  save  one,  understood — when  last  it  had  been 
lacerated.  He  left  the  noisy  market-place,  and  sought 
all-peaceful  nature,  and  that  isolatorium,  destined  alike 
for  friendship  and  for  guilt,  the  gallows.  When  we  pass 
from  the  stormy  uproar  of  a  fair  into  the  still  expanse  of 
wide  creation,  entering  into  the  dim  aisles  of  nature's 
hushed  cathedral,  the  strange  sudden  calm  is  to  the  soul 
as  the  caressing  touch  of  some  beloved  hand. 

With  a  sad  heart  he  climbed  up  to  the  well-known 
spot,  whose  ugly  name  I  shall  omit,  and  from  these  ruins 
he  gazed  around  upon  creation,  as  if  he  were  the  last  of 
living  beings.  Neither  in  the  blue  sky,  nor  upon  the  wide 
earth,  was  there  voice  or  sound;  nothing  but  one  forlorn 
cricket,  chirping  in  monosyllables,  among  the  bare  furrows, 
where  the  harvest  had  been  cleared  away.  The  troops  of 
birds  flocking  together  with  discordant  cries  flew  to  the 
green  nets  spread  upon  the  ground — and  not  to  meet  the 
green  spring  far  away.  Above  the  meadows,  where  all 
the  flowers  were  withered  and  dead,  above  the  fields, 
where  the  corn  „ars  waved  no  more,  floated  dim  phantom 
forms,  all  pale  and  wan,  faint  pictures  of  the  past.  Over 
the  grand  eternal  woods  and  hills  a  biting  mist  was 
draped  in  clinging  folds,  as  if  all  nature,  trembling  into 
dust,  must  vanish  in  its  wreaths.  But  one  bright  thought 
pierced  these  dark  fogs  of  nature  and  the  soul,  turning 
them  to  a  white  gleaming  mist,  a  dew  all  glittering  with 
rainbow  colours,  and  gently  lighting  upon  flowers.    He 


96  JEAN  PAUL   FEIEDEICH   EICHTER.       [BOOK  I 

turned  Ms  face  to  the  north-east,  to  the  hills  which  lay 
between  him  and  his  other  heart,  and  up  from  behind 
them  rose,  like  an  early  moon  in  harvest,  a  pale  image  of 
his  friend.  The  spring,  when  he  should  go  to  him  and 
see  him  once  more,  was  at  work  already  preparing  for  him 
a  fair  broad  pathway  thither,  all  rich  with  grass  and 
flowers.  Ah !  how  we  play  with  the  world  about  us,  so 
quickly  dressing  it  all  with  the  webs  which  our  own  spirits 
spin. 

The  cloudless  sky  seemed  sinking  closer  to  the  dusky 
earth,  bright  with  a  softer  blue.  And  though  a  whole 
long  winter  lay  between,  the  music  of  the  coming  spring 
already  came,  faint  and  distant,  to  his  ear;  it  was  there  in 
the  evening  chime  of  the  cattle  bells  down  in  the  meadows, 
in  the  birds'  wild  wood  notes  in  the  groves,  and  in  the 
free  streams  flowing  fast  away  amid  the  flowery  tapestries 
that  were  yet  to  be. 

A  palpitating  chrysalis  was  hanging  near  him  still  in 
her  haif-shrivelled  caterpillar's  case,  sleeping  away  the 
time  till  the  flower  cups  all  should  open  ;  phantasy,  that 
eye  of  the  soul,  saw  beyond  and  over  the  sheaves  of 
autumn  the  glories  of  a  night  in  June ;  every  autumn- 
tinted  tree  seemed  blooming  once  again ;  their  bright 
coloured  crests,  like  magnified  tulips,  painted  the  autumn 
mist  with  rainbow  dyes ;  light  breezes  of  early  May 
seemed  chasing  each  other  through  the  fresh,  fluttering 
leaves ;  they  breathed  upon  our  friend,  and  buoyed  him 
up,  and  rose  with  him  on  high,  and  held  him  up  above  the 
harvest  and  above  the  hills,  till  he  could  see  beyond  these 
hills  and  lands — and  lo !  the  springs  of  all  his  life  to 
conie,  lying  as  yet  enfolded  in  the  bud,  lay  spread  before 
his  sight  like  gardens  side  by  side — and  there,  in  every 
spring  time,  stood  his  friend. 

He  left  the  place,  but  wandered  a  long  while  about  the 
meadows,  where  at  this  time  of  year  there  was  no  need  to 
hunt  carefully  for  footpaths — chiefly  that  his  eyes  might 
not  betray  where  his  thoughts  had  been  to  all  the  market 
people  who  were  to  be  met.  It  was  of  little  use — for  in 
certain  moods  the  torn  and  wounded  heart,  like  injured 
trees,  bleeds  on  and  on,  and  at  the  slightest  touch. 

He  shunned  eye-witnesses,  such  as  Kosa  above  all,  foi 


CHAP.  III.]    FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.  97 

this  reason,  that  he  was  (I  am  sorry  to  have  to  say  it)  in 
just  one  of  those  moods  when,  whether  from  modesty  or 
from  vividness  of  feeling,  he  was  most  disposed  to  masL 
his  emotion  under  the  semblance  of  temper.  At  last  a 
weapon  of  victory  came  to  his  hand,  the  thought  that  he 
had  to  apologize  and  make  amends  to  his  guest  for  so  long 
and  so  uncourteous  an  absence. 

When  he  got  home — what  a  strange  state  of  matters ! 
The  old  guest  gone — another  there  in  his  place — and  near 
the  latter  his  wife  in  tears.  When  he  came  into  the  room, 
Lenette  went  to  one  of  the  windows,  and  a  fresh  torrent 
of  tears  fell  down.  "  Madame  Siebenkaes,"  said  the  Schul- 
rath,  continuing  his  address  to  her,  and  keeping  hold  of 
her  hand,  "submit  yourself  to  the  will  of  God,  I  beseech 
you ;  nothing  has  happened  but  what  can  be  put  to  rights 
without  difficulty.  I  am  willing  to  concede  you  a  sorrow 
of  the  heart — but  it  must  be  a  restrained  and  a  subdued 
one." 

Lenette  looked  out  of  the  window,  not  at  her  husband. 

The  Schulrath  related,  in  the  first  place,  all  that  I 
have  already  given  my  account  of  (Firmian,  listening 
to  him  and  looking  at  him,  took  the  glowing  hand  of 
Lenette,  whose  face  was  still  averted),  and  then  con- 
tinued— 

•*  When  I  came  in,  merciful  Heavens,  there  was  his 
lordship  on  his  knees  before  Madame  Siebenkaes,  with 
carnal  tears,  and — I  am  constrained  to  have  the  gravest 
suspicions — a  design  upon  her  precious  honour!  How- 
ever, I  raised  him  up,  without  the  least  ceremony,  and 
I  said  to  him,  with  the  boldness  of  St.  Paul  himself 
— for  which  I  am  ready  to  answer  before  God  and  man 
— '  Your  Lordship,  are  these  the  doctrines  which  I  incul- 
cated into  your  Lordship  when  I  was  your  private  tutor ; 
is  it  Christian  conduct  to  go  down  upon  your  knees  in 
such  a  manner  ?  Fie,  for  shame,  Herr  von  Meyern.  Fie, 
for  shame,  Herr  von  Meyern  ! '  " 

Here  the  Schulrath  got  into  a  terrible  heat  again,  and 
strode  up  and  down  the  room  with  his  hands  in  the 
pockets  of  his  plush  coat. 

Firmian  said,  "  It's  a  simple  matter  to  set  up  a  scarecrow 
and  plant  a  hedge  to  keep  off  a  hare  like  him ;  but  what 

II.  H 


&8  JEAN   PAUL   FBIEDRICH   BICHTEB.        [BOOK  L 

ails  you,  love,"  he  said,  "and  what  are  you  crying  so 
bitterly  about  ?" 

She  cried  more  bitterly  than  ever ;  when  the  Schulrath 
planted  his  hands  on  his  sides,  and  said  to  her  in  much 
wrath,  "  Very  well,  Madame  Siebenkses,  this  is  the  way  of 
it,  is  it?  This  is  all  the  impression  my  good  counsel  and 
comforting  words  have  made  upon  your  mind,  is  it?  I 
never  should  have  believed  it  of  you ! 

"  It  was  all  for  nothing  then  (as  I  am  constrained  to 
conclude)  that,  when  I  had  the  honour  of  bringing  you 
here  from  Augspurg  in  my  carriage,  I  described  to  you  with 
all  the  eloquence  at  my  command,  the  blessedness  of  the 
married  state,  before  you  had  had  an  opportunity  of  learn- 
ing it  by  experience  ;  it  seems  I  might  just  as  well  have 
spoken  to  the  winds  of  heaven.  Can  it  really  be  the  case 
that  all  that  I  said  to  you  in  the  carriage  simply  went  in  at 
one  ear  and  out  at  the  other  ?  when  I  told  you  how  happy  a 
wife  was  in  and  through  her  husband,  how  she  often  could 
hardly  help  crying  for  joy  at  possessing  him — how  these 
two  had  but  one  heart  and  one  flesh,  and  shared  every- 
thing between  them,  joy  and  sorrow,  every  morsel  of  food, 
every  wish  and  desire,  ay  and  the  very  smallest  secrets. 
Well,  well,  Madame  Siebenkaes,  I  see  the  Schulrath  may 
keep  his  breath  to  cool  his  porridge." 

Upon  this  she  twice  wiped  and  dried  her  eyes  hurriedly, 
constrained  herself  to  look  at  him  very  kindly  indeed,  and 
with  a  forced  appearance  of  being  quite  pleased  again,  and 
said  with  a  deep  sigh,  but  softly  and  not  in  a  tone  of  pain, 
**  Oh  dear  me !" 

The  Schulrath  touched  her  hand  as  it  hung  down  with 
his  finger  tips  in  a  priestly  manner,  and  said — 

"  But  may  the  Lord  be  your  physician  and  helper  in  all 
your  necessities  "  (he  could  hardly  say  more,  for  his  tears 
were  coming),  "Amen, — which  is,  being  interpreted, 4  Yea, 
verily,  so  mote  it  be.' "  Here  he  embraced  and  kissed  the 
husband,  and  this  with  much  warmth,  saying,  "Send  for 
me,  if  your  wife  can  obtain  no  consolation — and  may  God 
give  you  both  strength.  0,  by  the  by — the  very  thing 
I  came  here  about — the  review  of  the  Easter  programme 
must  be  ready  by  Wednesday — and  I  am  in  your  debt 
for  the  eight  lines  or  more  you  did  about  that  piece  of 


CHAP.  III.]       FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN  PIECES.       99 

rubbish  the  other  day,  which  you  gave  such  a  capital 
dressing  to." 

When  he  had  gone,  however,  Lenette  didn't  seem  so 
thoroughly  consoled  as  might  have  been  expected ;  she 
leant  at  the  window  sunk  in  deep,  hopeless,  amazement 
and  reflection.  It  was  in  vain  that  Firmian  pointed  out 
that  of  course  he  wasn't  going  to  change  his  and  her  pre- 
sent name  any  more,  and  that  her  honour,  marriage,  and 
love  didn't  depend  upon  a  wretched  name  or  so  up  or 
down,  but  upon  himself  and  his  heart.  She  restrained  her 
tears,  but  she  continued  to  be  troubled  and  silent  the 
whole  of  the  evening. 

Now  let  no  one  call  our  good  Firmian  over  jealous  or 
suspicious  when,  having  just  got  well  rid  of  one  wretched 
sacrilegious  robber  of  marriage  honour,  the  Venner,  the 
idea  of  a  volcanic  eruption  which  might  throw  stones  and 
ashes  all  over  a  great  tract  of  his  life  suddenly  occurs  to 
him ;  what  if  his  friend  Stiefel  should  be  really  (as  it 
almost  seems)  falling  in  love  with  his  wife,  in  all  innocence, 
himself.  His  whole  behaviour  from  the  very  beginning — 
his  attentions  on  the  wedding-day,  his  constant  visits, 
and  even  his  exasperation  with  the  Venner  that  very  day, 
and  his  warm  feeling  and  sympathy  on  the  occasion  alto- 
gether, all  these  were  the  separate  parts  of  a  pretty 
coherent  whole,  and  seemed  to  indicate  a  deep  and  growing 
affection,  thoroughly  honourable,  no  doubt,  and  unper- 
ceived  by  himself.  Whether  or  not  a  spark  of  it  had 
jumped  off  into  Lenette's  heart,  and  was  smouldering 
there,  it  was  impossible  as  yet  to  determine ;  but  true 
and  good  as  he  knew  his  wife  and  his  friend  to  be,  his 
hopes  and  his  fears  could  not  but  be  pretty  equally 
balanced. 

Dear  hero !  Do  continue  to  be  one !  Destiny,  as  I  see 
more  and  more  clearly  as  time  goes  on,  seems  to  have 
made  up  her  mind  gradually  to  join  the  separate  pieces  of 
a  drill  machine  together  with  which  to  pierce  through  the 
diamond  of  thy  stoicism ;  or  else  by  slow  degrees  to  build 
and  fashion  English  scraping  and  singeing  machines 
(made  out  of  poverty,  household  worries,  law  suits,  and 
jealousy)  to  scrape  and  singe  away  from  tbee  every  rough 
and  ill-placed  fibre,  as  if  you  were  a  web  of  finest  English 

h  2 


I 

100  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH   ETCHTER.       [BOOK  I. 

cloth.  If  this  should  be  so,  do  but  come  out  of  the  mill  aa 
splendid  a  piece  of  English  stuff  as  was  ever  brought  to 
the  Leipzig  cloth  and  book  fair,  and  you  will  be  glorious 
indeed. 


CHAPTEE  IV. 

<  MATRIMONIAL  PARTIE  A  LA  GUERRE — LETTER  TO  THAT  HAIR 
COLLECTOR,  THE  VENNER — SELF-DECEPTIONS— ADAm's  MARRIAGE 
SERMON — SHADOWING  AND  OVER-SHADOWING. 

There  is  nothing  which  I  observe  and  note  down  with 
more  scrupulous  and  copious  accuracy  than  two  equinoctial 
periods,  the  matrimonial  equinox  when,  after  the  honey- 
moon, the  sun  enters  the  constellation  Libra  (or  the 
balance),  and  the  meteorologic  vernal  equinox;  because, 
by  observing  the  weather  which  prevails  at  these  two 
periods,  I  am  enabled  to  prognosticate  with  surprising 
accuracy  the  nature  of  that  which  will  characterise  the 
succeeding  season.  I  consider  the  first  storm  of  the  spring 
to  be  always  the  most  important,  and  similarly,  the  first 
matrimonial  storm;  the  others  all  come  from  the  same 
quarter. 

When  the  Schulrath  was  gone,  the  poor's  advocate  took 
his  sulky  house-goddess  into  his  arms,  and  plied  her  with 
every  conceivable  method  of  proof;  with  proofs  derived 
from  immemorial  hearsay,  partial  proofs,  evidential  proof, 
proof  on  oath,  and  by  logical  deduction — every  kind  of 
proof  wherewith  one  can  harden  one's  own  heart,  or  soften 
another's. 

But  the  whole  of  the  evidence  he  adduced  was  useless. 
He  might  just  as  well  have  been  embracing  the  cold  hard 
angel  at  the  baptismal  font  in  the  principal  church,  his 
own  angel  remained  quite  as  cold  and  silent.  Furboots 
had  been  the  tourniquet  which  stopped  the  hemorrhage  of 
Lenette's  open,  streaming  artery ;  but  his  departure  had 
taken  the  German  tinder  stopping  from  her  eyes — and 
now  they  streamed  unstanched. 


CHAP.  IV.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.      101 

Siebenkaes  went  often  to  the  window,  and  up  and  down 
in  the  room,  that  she  might  not  see  that  he  was  following 
her  example,  and  that  her  sorrow,  little  reasonable  as  it  was, 
infected  him  by  sympathy.  We  can  more  easily  bear,  and 
forgive  pain  of  our  own  causing  than  of  another's.  All 
the  following  day  there  was  an  unendurable  silence  in  the 
house.  This  was  the  very  first  of  the  beds  of  the  matri- 
monial nursery-garden  in  which  a  seed  of  the  apple  of 
discord  had  been  planted,  and  as  yet  not  the  faintest  rustle 
of  its  sap  was  audible.  It  is  not  in  the  first  domestic 
squabble,  not  till  the  fourth,  tenth,  ten-thousandth,  that  a 
woman  can  keep  perfect  silence  with  her  tongue,  yet  make 
a  tremendous  nuise  with  her  body,  and  turn  every  chair 
which  she  shoves  about,  and  every  reel  of  cotton  which 
she  lets  fall,  into  a  language-machine  and  fountain  of 
speech,  and  play  her  instrumental  music  all  the  louder, 
because  her  vocal  parts  are  counting  their  rests.  Lenettk 
Wexdeline  moved  everything  and  said  everything,  as 
softly  as  if  her  liege  lord  had  the  gout  and  was  lying 
with  cramped  foot  pressed  in  agony  against  the  trembling 
bottom  board  of  his  bed. 

When  the  third  day  of  this  came  on,  he  was  vexed  and 
annoyed — and  he  had  reason.  I  beg  to  say  that,  for  my  own 
part,  I  should  be  quite  prepared  to  quarrel  with  my  own 
wife,  if  I  had  one — ay,  and  to  do  it  with  a  will — and  that 
to  some  purpose,  and  to  bandy  words  with  her,  as  well  as 
letters  (though  I  should  prefer  the  former).  But  there's 
one  thing  which  would  kill  me  outright,  and  that  would 
be  her  keeping  up  a  long,  dreary,  tearful  sulking,  a  thing 
which,  like  the  sirocco  wind,  ends  by  blowing  out  all  a 
man's  lights,  thoughts,  and  joys,  and  at  length  his  life 
itself.  Just  as  we  all  of  us,  rather  like  a  violent  thunder- 
storm in  summer,  and  think  it  refreshing  rather  than 
otherwise  in  itself — and  yet  consider  it  a  cursed  nuisance 
on  the  whole,  because  it's  sure  to  be  followed  by  some  days 
of  dreary  wet  weather.  Siebenkaes  was  all  the  more  vexed 
on  this  occasion,  because  he  was  a  man  who  scarcely 
ever  was  vexed.  As  other  jurists  have  reckoned  them- 
selves among  men  exempt  from  torture,  so  Siebenkaes 
had  long  ago  fortified  himself  against  grief  and  care, 
those  torture  racks  of  the   soul  (by  the  help   of  Epic- 


102  JEAN   PAUL   FEIEDRICH   EICHTER.        [BOOK  I* 

tetas),  as  effectually  as  he  had  the  infanticide  against 
bodily  torture. 

The  Jews  hold  that  when  Messiah  comes,  hell  will  be 
joined  on  to  paradise,  so  as  to  make  a  bigger  dancing 
saloon.  And  all  the  year  long,  Siebenkses  occupied  himself 
in  building  and  adding  on  his  torture  chambers  and  schools 
of  suffering  to  the  entertainment  halls  of  his  bagatelle,  so 
as  to  have  more  room  to  perform  his  ballets. 

He  often  said  a  medal  should  be  struck  for  any  citizen 
who  should  be  three  hundred  and  sixty-five  days,  five 
hours,  forty-eight  minutes  and  fifty-five  seconds,  without 
either  growling  or  snarling. 

He  wouldn't  have  got  that  medal  himself  in  the  year 
1785.  On  the  third  day,  the  Saturday,  he  was  so  wild  at 
his  wife's  speechlessness,  that  he  was  wilder  still  with 
that  kill-joy  of  an  Everard.  For,  of  course,  that  minne- 
singer, might  come  in  again  at  any  moment,  bringing  in 
his  company  the  goddess  of  discord  (who,  as  directrix  and 
ambassadress,  performs  such  important  poetical  functions 
in  Voltaire's  Henriade),  and  introducing  her  into  the 
homely  "  Volkslied  "  of  an  advocate,  by  way  of  a  dea  ex 
machina  to  unloose  the  matrimonial  knot,  and  tie  a  fresh 
one  with  the  Venner.  Siebenkses  accordingly  wrote  him 
the  following  academic-controversial  document. 

"  May  it  please  your  Lordship, 

"  1  take  the  liberty  to  lay  before  your  Lordship  in  this 
little  memorial  my  humble  petition, 

"  That  you  will  be  pleased  to  stay  at  home,  and  spare  me 
the  honour  of  your  visits. 

"Should  your  Lordship  find  it  necessary  to  become 
possessed  of  a  certain  quantity  of  my  wife's  hair — the 
undersigned  hereby  undertakes  to  cut  and  deliver  the 
same  himself.  In  the  event  of  your  Lordship's  being 
minded  to  exercise  a  jus  compascui,  or  right  of  free  common 
and  pasturage  in  my  premises,  and  appearing  therein  in 
person,  I  shall  embrace  with  much  pleasure  the  oppor- 
tunity then  afforded  me  of  plucking  as  many  of  your 
Lordship's  own  hairs  as  may  be  requisite  to  constitute  a 
souvenir  out  of  your  Lordship's  head,  by  the  roots,  like 
monthly  radishes,  with  my.  own  hands.     While  I  was  in 


CHAP.  IV. J      FLOWER,    FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.      103 

Niirnberg,  I  used  ofien  to  go  and  dine  in  the  neighbouring 
villages  (against  the  will  of  the  authorities)  with  a  fine  old 
Prugbl  Knecht,*  i.e.  with  a  private  tutor,  who  had 
towzed  out  and  excerpted  from  the  heads  of  three  little 
slips  of  nobility,  while  he  was  giving  them  their  lessons, 
enough  silky  hair  to  make  him  a  handsome  mouse-coloured 
bag-wig,  which  the  man  most  probably  wears  to  this  day. 
His  motivein  thus  applying  himself  to  the  production  of  silk, 
or  rather,  his  reason  for  divesting  these  little  heads  of  their 
exterior  foliage,  was,  that  his  own  beams  might  the  more 
effectually  ripen  the  fruit  within,  as,  for  similar  reasons,  it 
is  usual  to  remove  leaves  from  the  vines  in  August. 

"  I  have  the  honour  to  remain,  &c." 

I  shall  be  very  sorry  if  I  cannot  manage  to  get  the  reader 
to  understand  that  the  advocate  wrote  this  biting  letter 
without  the  slightest  bitterness  of  feeling.  He  had  read 
the  brilliant  satirical  writings  of  the  three  merry  wise  men 
of  London,  Butler,  Swift,  and  Sterne — those  three  bodies 
of  the  satirical  giant,  Geryon,  or  three  furies  (Parcra)  of  the 
foolish — to  such  an  extent  that,  as  their  disciple  and 
follower,  he  never  thought  whether  it  was  a  biting  letter 
or  not.  In  his  admiration  of  the  artistic  beauties  of  his 
composition,  he  lost  sight  of  its  meaning ;  and  indeed,  if 
a  stinging  speech  were  made  to  himself,  he  would  think 
nothing  of  the  length  of  its  prickles  in  comparison  with 
its  form  and  shape.  I  need  merely  instance  his  '  Selection 
from  the  Devil's  Papers ;'  the  satirical  poison  bubbles  and 
venomous  prickles  so  frequent  in  that  work  came  from  his 
pen  and  ink— i.e.  his  head  only,  not  from  his  heart. 

I  take  the  opportunity  of  begging  the  reader  always  to 
infuse  the  very  soul  of  gentleness  and  kindness  into  every 
word  and  tone  he  utters  (because  it  is  our  words  more 
than  our  deeds  which  make  people  angry),  and,  more 
particularly  still,  into  every  page  he  writes.  For,  truly, 
even  if  your  correspondents  have  forgiven  you  an  episto- 

*  According  to  Kliiber's  notes  to  Delacurne  de  Sainto  Palaye  on 
Chivalry,  this  was  the  title  of  the  official  who  superintended  the 
tourney,  or  gymnastic  practices  and  exercises.  There  are  at  the  pre- 
sent day  certain  private  tutors  in  aristocratic  families  who  are  feeble 
imitations  of  him. 


104  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.        [BOOK  1 

lary  pereat  long  ago,  yet  the  old  leaven  of  ill-will  ferments 
anew,  if  the  sorrel-leaf  of  a  letter  containing  it  chances  to 
come  to  hand  again.  We  may,  of  course,  on  the  other 
hand,  reckon  upon  a  similar  immortality  for  a  piece  of 
epistolary  kindness.  Truly,  though  a  long,  cutting 
December  wind  had  made  my  heart  stiff  and  immoveable 
to  everything  in  the  shape  of  kindly  feeling  for  one  who, 
once  on  a  time,  used  to  write  me  absolute  Epistles  of 
St.  John,  tender  pastorals  of  letters,  what  would  it  matter, 
if  I  should  but  chance  to  turn  up  these  old  letters  in  my 
letter- treasury  of  bundles  and  packets  of  letters? 

The  sight  of  the  beloved  handwriting,  the  welcome  seal, 
the  kind,  endearing  words,  and  the  pieces  of  paper  where 
so  many  a  pleasure  found  space  to  sport  and  play,  would 
cast  the  sunshine  of  the  old  affection  upon  the  frozen  heart 
once  more  ;  it  would  reopen  at  the  memory  of  the  dear 
old  time,  as  some  flower  that  has  closed  reopens  when  a 
sunbeam  lights  upon  it,  and  its  only  thought — ay,  were  it 
but  the  day  before  yesterday  that  it  had  conceived  itself 
mortally  offended — would  be,  "Ah!  I  was  too  hard  upon 
him  (or  her)  after  all."  Many  of  the  saints  in  the  first 
century  used  to  drive  devils  out  of  the  possessed,  in  a 
somewhat  similar  way,  merely  by  means  of  letters. 

Furboots  came,  as  if  he  had  been  sent  for,  on  the 
Saturday  evening,  like  a  Jewish  Sabbath.  I  have  often 
seen  a  guest  serve  as  cement  or  hefting  powder  to  two 
better  halves  in  a  state  of  fracture,  because  shame  and 
necessity  compelled  them  to  speak  and  behave  kindly  to 
each  other,  at  all  events  while  the  guest  was  there. 
Every  husband  should  be  provided  with  two  or  three 
visitors  of  this  sort,  to  come  in  when  he's  suffering  from 
an  attack  of  wife-possessed-too-long-with-the-devil-of- 
dumbness ;  as  long  as  the  people  are  there,  at  all  events, 
she  must  speak,  and  take  the  iron  thief-apple  of  silence — 
which  grows  on  the  same  stalk  as  the  apple  of  discord — out 
of  her  mouth. 

The  Schulrath  stood  up  before  Lenette  Wendeline  as  if  she 
were  one  of  his  school  girls,  and  asked  her  if  she  had  borne 
this  first  cross  of  her  married  life  patiently,  and  like  a 
worthy  sister  in  suffering  of  the  patriarch  Job.  She 
drooped  her  big  eyes,  wound  a  thread   the  length  of  a 


CHAP.  IV.]      FLOWEE,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      105 

finger  into  a  white  snowball,  and  breathed  deeper.  Her 
imsband  answered  for  her :  "  I  was  her  brother  in  afflic- 
tion, and  bore  the  cross-bar  of  the  burden — I  without  a 
murmur,  she  without  a  murmur.  In  the  twelfth  century, 
the  heap  of  ashes  on  which  Job  endured  his  sufferings 
used  still  to  be  shown.  Our  two  chairs  are  our  heaps  of 
ashes  ;  there  they  are  still  to  be  seen  !  " 

"Good  woman!"  said  Stiefel,  in  the  softest  pianissimo 
of  his  pedal  reed-stop  of  a  masculine  voice,  and  laid  his 
mow-white  hand  on  the  soft,  raven  hair  upon  her  fore- 
head. Siebenkaps  heard  a  multiplying  sympathetic  echo 
of  these  words  in  his  heart,  and  laid  his  arm  on  Lenette's 
shoulders,  who  was  blushing  with  pleasure  at  the  honour 
conferred  upon  her  by  this  kindness  of  the  man  in  office. 
Her  husband  softly  pressed  her  left  side  to  his  right,  and 
said : — 

"  She  is  good,  indeed  ;  she  is  gentle,  and  quiet,  and  patient, 
and  only  too  industrious.  If  the  whole  tag,  rag  and  bob- 
tail of  Hell's  army,  in  the  shape  of  the  Venner,  had  only 
not  advanced  upon  our  little  summer-house  of  happiness, 
to  knock  its  roof  off,  we  should  have  lived  happy  in  it  for 
many  a  day,  Mr.  Stiefel,  far  into  the  winter  of  our  lives. 
For  my  Lenette  is  good,  and  too  good  for  me  and  for 
many  another  man."  Here  Stiefel,  in  his  emotion,  sur- 
rounded that  hand  of  hers  which  had  the  skein  of  thread 
in  it,  at  the  seat  of  the  pulse  with  his  fine  fingers — the 
empty  hand  being  in  her  husband's  possession — and  the 
Wound  Water  of  our  pain,  the  great  drops  of  which  trickled 
from  her  drooped  eyes  down  her  cheeks,  where  her  im- 
prisoned hands  could  not  wipe  them  away,  made  the  two 
male  hearts  very  tender.  And  besides,  her  husband  could 
never  praise  any  one  long  without  his  eyes  overflowing. 
He  went  on,  faster,  "  Yes,  she  might  have  been  very  com- 
fortable and  well-off  with  me,  but  that  my  mother's  money 
is  kept  back  from  me  in  this  terrible  way.  But,  even  for 
all  that,  I  should  have  made  her  happy  without  the  money, 
and  she  me — we  never  had  a  word,  never  a  single  unhappy 
moment — now  had  we,  Lenette?  nothing  but  peace  and 
love,  till  the  Venner  came.  He  has  taken  a  good  deal 
from  us/" 

The  Schulrath  raised  his  olenohed  fist  in  wrath,  and 


106  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDBICH  BICHTEB.        [BOOK  I. 

exolaimed,  sawing  the  air  with  it,  "  You  child  of  hell ! 
you  robber-captain  and  filibuster!  You  silken  Catiline 
and  mischief-maker !  Does  it  ever  strike  you  that  you'll 
have  to  answer  for  this  and  your  other  pranks  one  day  ? 
Mr.  Siebenkaes,  this,  at  all  events,  I  do  expect  of  you,  that 
if  ever  he  comes  here  again  asking  for  hair,  you  will  turn 
him  out  by  the  hair  of  his  own  head,  or  hit  this  fur-maggot 
(as  you  call  him  yourself)  across  the  shoulders  with  a 
boot-jack,  and  squeeze  his  hand  with  a  pair  of  pincers — in 
fact,  the  long  and  the  short  of  it  is,  I  will  not  have  him 
come  here  any  more." 

And  here  Siebenkaes,  to  cool  down  his  own  emotions  and 
other  people's,  mentioned  the  fact  of  his  having  already 
taken  steps  in  tbe  matter,  and  served  the  necessary  letter 
of  inhibition  upon  the  Venner.  Stiefel  clucked  his  tongue 
in  a  joyful  manner,  and  nodded  his  head  approvingly.  He 
considered  any  person  high  in  office  to  be  a  vicegerent  of 
Christ  on  earth,  a  count  to  be  a  demigod,  and  an  emperor 
as  a  whole  one ; — but  a  single  one  of  the  deadly  sins  com- 
mitted by  any  of  them  all  would  at  once  cost  them  the 
whole  of  his  deferential  good  will, — and  a  slip  in  Latin 
grammar,  though  committed  by  a  head  crowned  with  gold, 
he  would  at  once  have  done  battle  with  in  a  whole  Latin 
Easter  programme.  Men  of  "the  world  have  straight  bodies 
and  crooked  souls ;  scholars  often  have  neither  the  one  nor 
the  other.  The  last  of  Lenette's  clouds  cleared  away  when 
Bhe  heard  that  a  paper  escarpment  and  cheval  de  frise 
against  the  Venner  had  been  constructed  at  her  door. 
'•  Then  he  will  trouble  me  no  more !  Thanks  be  to 
Heaven!  He  goes  about  lying  and  deceiving  everyone 
he  comes  across."* 

"  We  don't  employ  these  words,  Madame  Siebenkaes,  if 
we  care  to  speak  grammatically,"  said  Stiefel ;  "  irregular 
verbs  such  as  '  hriechen,  triigen,  lugen,'  though  they  are  verba 
anomala,  and  as  such  have  '  kroch,  log,  trog,'  and  so  on  in 
the  imperfect  tense,  are  still  always  inflected  quite  regu- 

*  In  this  last  speech  Lenette  makes  use  of  several  of  the  obsolete 
forms  of  verbs  referred  to  in  a  previous  chapter  as  "  religious  anti- 
quities out  of  Luther's  Bible."  I  cannot  give  English  equivalents. 
Of  course  what  follows  would  be  unintelligible  without  this  explana- 
tion.— Tbanslatob. 


CHAP.  IV.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN   PIECES.      107 

larly  in  the  present  by  the  best  German  grammarians — 
although  the  poets  permit  themselves  a  poetical  licence  in 
such  cases,  as,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  they  do  in  most  others — 
and  therefore  we  say,  if  we  care  to  be  grammatically  cor- 
rect, ' liigt,  trugt,  kriecht'  &c,  at  the  present  day,  that  is." 

"  Don't  find  fault  with  my  dear  Augspurger's  Lutheran 
inflections,"  said  Siebenkses ;  "  there's  something  touching 
to  me  about  these  irregular  verbs  of  hers ;  they  are  the 
Schmalkaldian  article  of  the  Augspurg  confession."  Here 
she  drew  her  husband's  ear  softly  down  to  her  lips  and 
said,  "  What  would  you  like  me  to  get  for  supper  ?  Tell 
the  gentleman  that  you  know  I  mean  no  offence,  whatever 
words  1  use.  And  I  wish  you  would  ask  his  reverence, 
Firmian  dear,  when  I'm  out  of  the  room,  whether  our 
marriage  is  really  all  right  according  to  the  Bible."  He 
asked  this  question  on  the  spot.  Stiefel  answered  it  de- 
liberately as  follows : — "  We  have  only  to  look  at  the  case 
of  Leah,  who  was  conducted  to  Jacob's  tent  under  the 
pseudonym  of  Eachel  on  her  marriage  night,  and  whose 
marriage  the  Bible  holds  to  be  perfectly  valid.  Is  it 
names  or  bodies  that  exchange  rings  ?  And  can  a  name 
fulfil  the  marriage  vow?" 

Lenette  answered  these  questions,  and  spoke  her  thanks 
for  this  consistorial  decision  by  a  bashful  glance  of  restored 
content  and  a  beaming  face  upturned  towards  him.  She 
went  to  the  kitchen,  but  kept  constantly  coming  back  and 
snuffing  the  candle,  which  was  on  the  table  at  which  the 
two  gentlemen  sat  talking ;  and  probably  nobody,  except  the 
advocate  and  I,  will  consider  this  to  be  any  indication 
of  a  more  than  ordinary  liking  for  Stiefel.  The  latter 
always  took  the  snuffers  from  her,  saying  "it  was  his  duty." 
Siebenkaes  clearly  perceived  that  both  the  apples  of  his 
eyes  revolved,  satellite-fashion,  round  his  own  planet, 
Lenette ;  but  he  did  not  grudge  the  Latin  knight  his  little 
glimpse  of  an  age  of  chivalry  thus  sweetened  by  a  Dul- 
cinea ;  like  most  men,  he  could  far  sooner  pardon  the  rival 
lover  than  the  unfaithful  fair ;  women,  on  the  other  hand, 
hate  the  rival  more  than  the  unfaithful  lover.  Moreover, 
he  knew  perfectly  that  Stiefel  had  not  the  least  idea 
himself  whom  or  what  he  cared  for  or  sighed  for,  and 
that  he  was  a  far  better  hand  at  reviewing  schoolmen 


108  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.        [BOOK  I. 

and  authors  than  himself.  For  instance,  his  own  anger 
he  called  professional  zeal ;  his  pride,  the  dignity  due  to 
his  office ;  his  passions,  sins  of  weakness ;  and  on  this 
occasion  love  appeared  to  him  disguised  as  mere  philan- 
thropy. The  arch  of  Lenette's  troth  was  firmly  finished 
off  in  the  keystone  of  religion,  and  the  Venner's  assault 
upon  it  had  not  shaken  this  sacred  masonry  in  the  slightest 
degree. 

At  this  juncture  the  postman  stumped  up  stairs  with  a 
new  constellation  which  he  6et  in  their  serene  family  sky, 
namely,  the  following  letter  from  Leibgeber. 

"  Bayreuth,  21  Sept.,  1785. 

"  My  dear  Brother,  Cousin,  and  Uncle, 
Father  and  Son ! 

"  For  the  two  auricles  and  the  two  ventricles  of  thy 
heart  constitute  my  entire  genealogical  tree: — as  Adam, 
when  he  went  for  a  walk,  carried  about  with  him  the 
whole  of  his  blood  relations  that  were  to  be,  and  his  long 
line  of  descendants — which  is  not  wholly  unreeled  and 
wound  up  even  at  this  day — till  he  became  a  father,  and 
his  wife  bare  a  child.  I  wish  to  goodness  I  had  been  the 
first  Adam !  Siebenkaes,  I  do  adjure  you,  let  me,  let  me, 
follow  up  this  idea  which  has  struck  me  i  nd  taken  hold 
of  me  with  such  power ;  let  me  not  write  a  word  in  this 
letter  that  does  not  add  a  touch  to  the  three-quarter- 
length  portrait  which  I  shall  draw  of  myself  as  the  first 
father  of  mankind ! 

"  Men  of  learning  are  much  mistaken  who  suppose  my 
reason  for  wishing  I  were  Adam  to  be,  that  Puffendorf 
and  many  other  writers  very  properly  award  me  the 
whole  of  this  earth  as  a  kind  of  European  colony  in  the 
India  of  the  universe,  as  my  patrimonium  Petri,  Pauli, 
Judce  and  the  rest  of  the  Apostles ;  inasmuch  as  I,  being 
the  sole  Adam  and  man,  and  consequently  the  first  and 
last  of  universal  monarchs  (although  as  yet  without  any 
subjects),  might  of  course  lay  claim  to  the  entire  earth. 
It  might  occur  to  the  pope,  indeed  (he  being  holy  father, 
though  not  our  first  father),  to  make  a  similar  claim,  or 
rather  it  did  occur  to  him  some  centuries  ago,  when  he 


CHAP.  IV.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      109 

constituted  himself  the  guardian  and  the  heir  of  all  tho 
countries  of  the  earth,  and  indeed  made  bold  to  set  two 
other  crowns  on  the  top  of  his  earthly  one,  a  crown  of 
heaven  and  a  crown  of  hell. 

"How  stiall  a  thing  it  is  that  I  desire !  All  that  I  wish 
I  had  been  the  old  Adam  (in  fact,  the  oldest  Adam)  for, 
is  merely  that  I  might  have  strolled  up  and  down  with 
Eve  among  the  espaliers  of  Eden  on  our  marriage  night, 
in  our  aprons  and  beasts'  skins,  and  delivered  an  address  in 
Hebrew  to  the  mother  of  all  living. 

"  Before  commencing  my  address  I  beg  to  observe  that, 
while  I  was  yet  unfallen,  it  fortunately  occurred  to  me  to 
note  down  the  more  important  heads  of  my  univert-al 
knowledge.  For  I  had,  in  my  condition  of  innocence,  a 
perfect  and  intuitive  knowledge  of  all  the  sciences,  of 
history,  both  universal  and  literary,  the  various  criminal 
and  other  codes  of  law,  all  the  dead  languages  as  well  as 
the  living,  and  was  a  kind  of  live  Pindus  and  Pegasus, 
a  portable  Lodge  of  Light  and  learned  society,  a  pocket 
university,  and  miniature  golden  Siecle  de  Louis  XIV. 
Considering  what  my  mental  powers  were  at  that  juncture 
it  is  a  miracle  (and  what's  more,  a  very  lucky  job)  that  in 
my  leisure  moments  I  put  down  the  cream  of  my  uni- 
versal knowledge  on  paper,  because  when  I  subsequently 
fell,  and  became  simple  and  ignorant,  I  had  these  excerpts, 
or  Catalogues  raisonnes,  of  my  former  wisdom  by  me,  so 
that  I  could  refer  to  them. 

m  « yirgin ! '  (it  was  thus  that  the  sermon  delivered  out- 
side Paradise  commenced)  '  it  is  true  we  are  the  first  of 
parents,  and  are  minded  to  originate  all  the  subsequent 
parents ;  though  all  that  you  think  about  is  sticking  your 
spoon  into  a  forbidden  apple.  However,  I,  being  a  man 
and  protoplast,  reflect  and  ponder,  and  as  we  walk  to  and 
fro,  I  shall  undertake  the  office  of  preacher  of  the  sermon 
on  this,  the  occasion  of  our  entering  into  the  bonds  of 
wedlock  (not  having  as  yet,  unfortunately,  begotten  any- 
body else  to  do  it),  and,  in  a  brief  wedding  exhortation, 
direct  your  attention  to  the  doubts  affecting  and  the  rea- 
sons deciding,  the  protoplasts,  or  the  first  parents  and 
first  of  wedded  couples  (that  is  to  say,  you  and  me),  in  the 
act  of  reflecting  and.  considering,  and  how — 


110  JEAN   PAUL   FEIEDRICH  EICHTEE.         [BOOK  I. 

"  '  Tn  the  first  place,  they  consider  the  reasons  why  they 
should  not  people  the  earth,  hut  emigrate  this  very  day,  the 
one  into  the  old  world,  the  other  into  the  new  ;  and 

" '  In  the  second  place,  the  reasons  why  they  should  do 
nothing  of  the  kind,  but  marry. 

"'After  which  a  short  elench,  or  usus  epanorthoticus, 
will  he  adduced,  and  will  conclude  the  lecture  and  the 
night.' 

IN   THE  FIRST   PLACE 

"  «  My  dearly  beloved ! 

" '  Here,  in  my  sheepskin,  as  I  appear  before  yon, 
grave,  thoughtful,  and  wise,  it  is  nevertheless  the  fact  that 
I  am  fall  to  the  very  brim  of — not  so  much  follies  as  fools, 
with  a  good  many  wise  men  stuck  in  here  and  there  between 
them  by  way  of  parentheses.  I  am  of  short  stature,  it  is 
true,  and  the  ocean  *  came  a  good  deal  above  my  ancles, 
and  besprinkled  my  new  beasts'  skin  ;  and  yet,  as  I  walk 
up  and  down  here,  I  am  girt  about  with  a  seed  cloth, 
containing  the  seeds  of  all  nations,  and  carrying  the 
repertory  of  the  whole  human  race,  an  entire  world  in 
miniature  and  orbis  pictus,  round  my  middle  like  a  pedlar's 
stock  in  trade.  For  Bonnet,  who  is  in  me  among  the  rest, 
will  sit  down  at  his  desk  (when  he  comes  out),  and  prove 
that  they  are  all  one  inside  the  other,  like  a  nest  of  boxes 
or  a  set  of  parentheses,  that  the  father  contains  the  son, 
that  the  grandfather  contains  them  both,  the  great-grand- 
father consequently  the  grandfather  and  all  the  contents 
of  him,  the  great-great-grandfather  the  great-grandfather 
and  the  oontents  of  his  contents  and  all  his  episodes,  all 
sitting  waiting  one  inside  the  other.  Are  there  not  then 
here  embodied  in  thy  bridegroom — this  is  a  point,  dear 
bride,  which  cannot  be  made  too  intelligible  to  you — all 
religious  sects,  excepting  the  Preadamites,  but  including 
the  Adamites,|  and  all  giants,  the  great  Christopher  himself 
among  them — every  individual  of  every  nation  of  all  the 

*  The  French  academician,  N.  Beurion,  made  out  that  Adam  was 
123  feet  9  inches  high,  and  Eve  118  feet  9f  inches.  The  rest  is  related 
by  the  Rabbin,  that  Adam  went  through  the  ocean  after  his  fall. 

t  The  members  of  this  celebrated  sect  went  to  church  without  any 
clothes  on  them. 


CHAP.  IV.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      Ill 

earth — all  the  shiploads  of  negroes  destined  for  America, 
and  the  packets  marked  with  red  containing  the  soldiers 
promised  by  England  to  Anspach  and  Bayreuth'?  Eve, 
am  I  not,  as  I  stand  here  hefore  you,  a  whole  Jews'-quarter 
— a  Louvre  of  all  the  crowned  heads  of  the  earth — since  I  can 
hring  them  all  into  existence  if  I  please,  and  if  I  am  not 
induced  by  this  first  head  of  my  discourse  to  refrain  from 
doing  so  ?  You  will  admire  me,  and  yet  laugh  at  me  at 
the  same  time  if  you  but  look  at  me  well,  lay  your  hand 
on  my  shoulder,  and  say  to  yourself:  "  Now,  in  this  man 
and  protoplast  are  contained  all  mankind,  all  the  learned 
faculties,  all  schools  of  philosophy,  and  of  sewing  and 
spinning,  cheek  by  jowl  in  peace  and  harmony,  the  highest 
and  noblest  royal  families  and  princely  houses  (though  not 
yet  sorted  out  from  among  the  common  ship's  company), 
all  free  imperial  orders  of  knighthood,  packed  higgledy- 
piggledy  with  their  vassals,  cottiers,  and  tenants,  it  is  true — 
monasteries  and  nunneries  next  door  to  each  other — barracks 
and  members  of  Parliament,  to  say  nothing  of  cathedral 
chapters,  with  all  their  provosts,  deans,  priors,  sub-priors, 
and  canons!  What  a  man!  What  an  Anak!"  you  will  add. 
You  are  right,  dear,  I  am  indeed — the  very  nest  dollar  of  the 
human  coin-cabinet,  the  universal  court  of  assembly  of  all 
judicatures,  with  all  the  members  of  all  assemblies,  not  one 
out  of  its  place,  the  walking  corpus  juris  of  all  civil,  canon, 
criminal,  feudal,  and  municipal  law.  Haven't  I  Meusel's 
'  Learned  Germany '  and  Jocher's  '  Scholastic  Lexicon  ' 
within  me  all  complete,  and  Jocher  and  Meusel  themselves, 
to  say  nothing  of  their  supplementary  volumes?  I  wish  I 
could  just  let  you  see  Cain — who,  if  head  second  of  this 
discourse  should  determine  me,  would  be  our  first  offshoot 
and  sucker,  our  Prince  of  Wales,  Calabria,  Asturias  and  the 
Brazils.  You  would  see,  if  he  were  transparent — as  I 
believe  him  to  be — how  he  contains  all  the  rest,  one  inside 
the  other,  like  beer  glasses  —  all  oecumenical  counoils, 
inquisitions,  and  propaganda,  and  the  devil  and  his  grand- 
mother. But,  loveliest,  thou  didst  not  write  down  any  of 
thy  scicntia  media  before  thy  fall,  as  I  did,  and  conse- 
quently thou  starest  into  the  future  as  blind  as  a  bat.  I , 
however,  who  see  into  it  quite  clearly,  am  enabled  by 
my  chrestomathy  to  perceive  that,  where  other  men  beget 


112  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  I. 

perhaps  some  ten  fools,  I  shall  beget  whole  millions  of  tens, 
and  units  into  the  bargain,  seeing  that  the  Bohemian*, 
Parisians,  Viennese,  Leipzigers,  Bayreuthers,  Hofians, 
Dublinese,  Kuhschnappeleis  (and  their  wives  and  daughters 
over  and  above)  have  all  got  to  come  into  existence  through 
me,  and  that  in  every  million  of  them  there  will  always  be 
at  least  five  hundred  who  neither  have,  nor  will  listen  to, 
reason.  Duenna,  as  yet  you  know  little  of  the  human 
race,  but  two  in  fact,  for  the  serpent  is  not  one ;  but  I 
know  what  sort  of  race  I  am  going  to  produce,  and  that  in 
opening  my  limbus  infantum,  1  open  at  the  same  time  a 
Bedlam.  By  heaven,  I  weep  and  lament  when  I  merely 
peep  in  between  the  leaves  of  the  centuries  in  their  long 
course,  and  see  nothing  there  but  gouts  of  gore,  and  a  con- 
geries of  idiots — when  I  think  of  the  trouble  and  pain  to 
be  undergone  before  a  century  shall  learn  to  write  a  legible 
hand,  a  hand  even  as  good  as  a  minister's  or  an  elephant's 
trunk  —  before  poor  humanity  gets  through  its  dame's 
school,  and  private  tutors,  and  French  governesses,  so  as  tc 
be  fit  for  Latin  grammar  schools,  public  schools,  Jesuit 
seminaries,  and  next  for  fencing  classes,  dancing  classes, 
dogmatic  and  clinical  courses.  By  old  Harry,  I  feel  hot. 
Nobody  will  think  of  you  as  the  brood-hen  of  the  coming 
flock  of  starlings,  as  the  spawning  codfish  m  whom  Leu  wen- 
hack  will  count  9£  millions  of  eggs ;  not  you,  my  little 
Eve,  but  your  husband,  will  get  all  the  blame,  who  should 
have  known  better,  and  rather  begotten  nothing  than  such 
a  rabble  of  thieves  and  robbers,  crowned  emperors  on  the 
Eoman  throne,  and  vicegerents  on  the  Roman  chair,  the 
former  of  whom  will  call  themselves  after  Antoninus  and 
Caesar,  the  latter  after  Christus  and  Petrus,  and  among 
whom  there  are  men  whose  thrones  shall  be  Liineburg 
torture  chairs  for  the  human  race,  if  not  the  converse  of 
a  Place  de  Greve,  where  the  masses  shall  be  put  to  death, 
and  the  single  individual  feted  and  amused.*   And  I  shall 

*  It  seems  almost  to  indicate  a  crossing  of  the  breeds  between  the 
grave  tiger  and  the  playful  ape,  that  the  Place  de  Greve  in  Paris  ia 
the  place  where  malefactors  are  executed,  and  where  the  populace 
assemble  for  fetes — that  on  the  selfsame  spot  horses  tear  a  regicide  to 
pieces  and  citizens  celebrate  the  accession  of  a  new  king ;  the  fire 
wheels  of  the  fireworks  and  of  the  people  who  are  broken  on  the  wheel 


CHAP.  IV.J     FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.      113 

be  taken  to  task  on  account  of  Borgia,  Pizarro,  St.  Dominic, 
and  Potemkin.  Even  supposing  I  should  manage  to  evade 
being  blamed  for  black  exceptions  such  as  these,  I  should 
be  obliged  to  admit  that  my  descendants  really  cannot 
get  through  the  space  of  half-an-bour  without  either 
thinking  or  doing  something  foolish,  that  the  war  of 
giants,  waged  in  them  by  their  passions,  is  never  broken 
by  a  peace,  seldom  even  by  a  truce  •  that  the  greatest  of 
all  man's  faults  is  that  he  lias  such  a  number  of  litle  ones; 
that  his  conscience  serves  for  scarcely  anything  but 
hating  his  neighbours  and  being  morbidly  sensitive  to  their 
transgressions  ;  that  he  never  leaves  off  evil  ways  till  he  is 
on  his  deathbed  ;  that  he  learns  and  loves  the  language  of 
virtue,  but  is  at  enmity  with  the  virtuous — just  as  the 
English  employ  French  language  teachers,  though  they 
detest  the  French  themselves.  Eve,  Eve,  we  shall  have 
little  to  congratulate  ourselves  upon  if  we  marry ;  Adam 
means  in  the  original  "  red  earth,"  and  truly  my  cheeks  will 
consist  entirely  thereof,  and  will  blush  scarlet  at  the  mere 
thought  of  the  indescribable  and  unparalleled  conceit  and 
vanity  of  our  great-grandchildren,  increasing  as  the  cen- 
turies go  on.  Nobody  will  tweak  himself  by  the  nose — 
unless  perhaps  when  he  is  shaving.  Critics  will  set  them- 
selves up  above  authors,  authors  above  critics — Heimlicher 
von  Blaise  will  give  his  hand  to  be  kissed  by  orphans  ; 
ladies  theirs  to  be  kissed  by  all  and  sundry ;  mighty  ones 
the  embroidered  hems  of  their  garments.  Eve,  1  had  only 
got  as  fa-  on  with  my  prophetic  extracts  from  the  world's 
history  as  the  sixth  century,  when  you  bit  the  apple  under 
the  tr;e,  and  I,  like  a  fool,  did  as  you  did,  and  everything 
slipped  out  of  my  head :  God  only  knows  what  sort  of  a 
set  thf  fools  and  foolesses  of  the  subsequent  centuries  may 
turn  out  to  be.  Virgin,  wilt  thou  now  put  into  action  thy 
Sternocleidomastoideum,  as  Summering  styles  the  muscle 
which  nods  the  head,  and  so  express  your  "  yes  "  when  I 
put  to  you  the  question,  "  Wilt  thou  have  the  marriage- 
preacher  to  thy  wedded  husband  ?" 

whirling  at  the  selfsame  time  and  place.  Frightful  contrasts !  we 
may  not  a.lduco  others  lest  we  should  get  to  imitating  those  whom  we 
lave  here  found  fault  with. 

11.  1 


114      JEAN  PAUL  FEIEDKIOH  EICHTEB.   [BOOK  I. 

" '  You  will  no  doubt  reply,  let  us  first  hear  the  second 
head  of  the  discourse,  in  which  the  subject  is  considered 
from  another  point  of  view.  And  indeed,  dearly  beloved, 
we  had  almost  forgotten  that  we  must  proceed  to  the 

SEC0HD  PLACE, 

an!  consider  the  reasons  which  may  persuade  first  parents 
to  become  such,  and  to  marry,  and  serve  Destiny  in  the 
capacity  of  sewing  and  spinning  machines  of  linseed,  hemp, 
flax,  and  tow,  to  be  wound  by  her  in  endless  networks 
and  coils  around  the  earthly  sphere.  My  strongest  reason, 
and,  I  trust,  yours  also,  is  the  thought  of  the  Day  of  Judg- 
ment. For,  in  the  event  of  our  becoming  the  entrepreneurs 
of  the  human  race,  I  shall  see  all  my  descendants,  when 
they  ascend  from  the  calcined  earth  like  vapour,  at  the 
last  day,  into  the  nearest  planet,  and  fall  into  order  for  the 
last  review ;  and  among  this  harvest  of  childien  and  grand- 
children, I  shall  hit  upon  a  few  sensible  people  with  whom 
one  may  be  able  to  exchange  a  rational  word  or  two — men 
whose  whole  lives  were  passed,  as  well  as  lost,  amid  thunder 
and  lightning  (as  according  to  the  Romans  those  whom 
the  gods  loved  were  killed  by  lightning),  and  who  never 
clostd  their  eyes  or  their  ears,  however  wild  the  storm.  I 
see  the  four  heathen  evangelists  among  them  too,  Socrates, 
Cato,  Epictetus,  and  Antoninus,  men  who  went  through 
the  world,  using  their  voices  like  fire-engine  pipes,  two 
hundred  feet  long,  to  save  people  from  being  burnt  out  of 
house  and  home  by  the  fire  of  their  own  passions,  sluicing 
them  all  over  with  pure,  cold,  Alp-water.  And  there  can 
be  no  doubt  after  all,  that  I  may  really  be  the  arch-papa,  and 
you  the  arch-mamma,  of  some  very  great  and  celebrated 
people,  that's  to  say,  if  we  choose.  I  tell  you,  Eve,  that  I 
have  it  here  in  black  and  white  among  my  excerpts  and 
eollectanea  that  I  shall  be  the  forefather,  ancestor,  and 
Bethlehem  of  an  Aristotle,  Plato,  Shakespeare,  Newton, 
Rousseau,  Goethe,  Kant,  Leibnitz,  people,  take  them  for  all 
in  all,  who  are  as  able  thinkers  as  their  protoplast  himself, 
if  not  abler.  Eve,  thou  active  and  important  member  of  the 
fruit-bearing  jointstock  company,  or  productive  class  of  the 
slate  (consisting  of  thyself  and  this  marriage-preacher),!  as* 


CHAP.  IV.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.      115 

sure  you  I  expect  to  pass  a  few  hours  of  exquisite  enjoyment 
when  on  that  neighbouring  star  I  survey  in  a  cursory  man- 
ner that  classic  concourse  newly  risen  from  the  dead,  and  at 
length  kneel  down,  and  cry,  "  Good  morning,  my  children  ! 
Such  of  you  as  are  Jews  were  wont  to  utter  an  ejaculatory 
prayer  when  ye  met  a  wise  man  ;  but  what  such  utterance 
would  suffice  for  me,  now  that  I  behold  all  the  wise  and  all 
the  faculties  at  once,  all  of  them  my  own  blood  relations 
too,  who  amid  the  wolfish  hunger  of  their  desires  have 
stedfastly  refrained  from  forbidden  apples,  pears,  and 
pine  apples,  and,  deep  as  their  thirst  for  wisdom  might  be, 
committed  no  orchard-robbery  on  the  tree  of  knowledge, 
though  their  first  parents  seized  upon  the  forbidden  fruit, 
although  they  had  never  known  what  hunger  was,  and  upon 
the  tree  of  knowledge,  although  they  possessed  all  know- 
ledge, except  knowledge  of  the  serpent  nature."  And  then 
I  shall  arise  from  the  ground,  pass  into  the  angelic  crowd, 
fall  on  the  bosom  of  some  distinguished  descendant,  and, 
throwing  my  arms  around  him ,  say,  "  Thou,  true,  good, 
contented-minded,  gentle  son !  If  I  could  just  have  shown 
thee  only,  sitting  in  thy  brood-cell,  to  my  Eve,  the  queen- 
bee  of  this  great  swarm  here  present,  at  the  time  when  I 
was  delivering  the  second  head  of  my  marriage  sermon, 
I'm  sure  she  would  have  listened  to  reason,  and  given  a 
favourable  answer." ' 

"  And  thou,  Siebenkees,  art  that  same,  true,  good  son, 

and  thou  restest  ever  on  the  warm,  heaving  breast  of 

i 

"  Thy  Friend. 

"  Postscript  and  Clausula  Salutaris. 

"  Please  to  forgive  me  this  merry  private  ball  and  witches' 
dance  upon  cheap  and  nasty  letter-paper,  notwithstanding 
that  you  are  unfortunately  an  infinitesimal  fractional  part 
of  the  German  race,  and  as  such,  can't  be  expected  either 
to  stand,  or  to  understand,  such  a  dance  of  ideas.  This  is 
why  I  never  print  anything  for  the  unwieldy  German 
intellect;  entire  sheets  which  I  have  spawned  full  of 
playful  idea-fishes  of  this  sort  I  consign  at  once  to  regions 
where  such  productions  do  not  usually  arrive  till  they 

i  2 


116  JEAN  PAUL  FBIEDBICH  BICHTER.        [BOOK  I. 

attain  the  evening  of  their  days,  having  previously  exer- 
cised the  right  of  transit  through  the  booksellers'  shops. 
I  was  eight  days  in  Hof,  and  am  at  present  living  a 
retired  life  at  Bayreuth ;  in  both  of  these  towns  I  have 
made  faces,  that  is,  other  people's  profiles ;  but  most 
of  the  heads  which  sat  or  stood  to  my  scissors  opined 
that  all  was  not  quite  right  in  mine.  Tell  me  the  real 
truth  of  the  matter ;  it's  not  altogether  a  matter  of  in- 
difference to  me,  because  if  I  should  turn  out  not  to  be 
quite  'all  there,'  1  should  be  incapable  of  devising  my 
property  by  will,  or  of  exercising  various  civil  functions. 

"In  conclusion,  I  send  a  thousand  kind  remembrances 
and  kisses  to  your  dear,  good  Lenette,  and  my  compli- 
ments to  Herr  Schulrath  Stiefel,  and  will  you  please  a*>k 
him  if  he  is  any  relation  to  Magister  Stiefel,  the  rector  of 
Holzdorf  and  Lochau  (in  Wittemberg),  who  prophesied 
(incorrectly,  as  1  consider)  that  the  end  of  the  world 
would  take  place  on  the  1st  January,  1533,  at  8  o'clock 
in  the  morning,  and  lived  to  die  in  his  own  bed  after  all. 

also  send,  for  you  and  the  '  Advertiser,'  a  couple  of  pro- 
grammes of  Professor  Lang's  of  this  place,  relative  to  the 
General  Supeiintendent  of  Bayreuth,  and  one  of  Dr. 
Frank's  of  Pa  via.  There  is  a  very  charming  young  lady, 
exceedingly  clever  and  intellectual,  living  here  at  the  Sun 
Hotel  (she  is  in  the  front  rooms,  and  I  in  the  back). 
She  has  been  very  much  pleased  with  me  and  my  face,  I 
am  happy  to  tell  you,  seeing  how  exactly  you  and  I  are 
alike,  the  only  difference  between  us  being  my  lame  foot. 
So  that  the  things  I  pride  myself  upon  in  ladies'  society 
are  my  likeness  to  you  and  my  weaknesses.  Unless  I 
have  been  misinformed,  this  lady  is  a  poor  niece  of  your 
old  uncle's  with  the  broken  glass  wig,  and  is  being 
brought  up  at  his  expense,  and  destined  for  a  marriage 
with  some  Kuhschnappeler  of  the  upper  ten  thousand. 
Perhaps  she  may  soon  be  forwarded  to  you,  entered  in 
the  way-bill  as  bridegroom's  effects. 

"  The  above  is  my  oldest  news,  but  my  newest  news, 
namely  your  own  self,  I  shall  not  expect  to  arrive  here  at 
Bayreuth  till  I  and  the  spring  get  back  to  it  together  (for 
the  day  after  to-morrow  I  am  off  to  meet  it  in  J  taly),  and 
we,  I  and  the  spring,  together  beautify  the  world  to  such 


CHAP.  IV.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      117 

a  degree  that  you  will  certainly  enjoy  a  happy  time  of  it 
in  Bayreuth,  the  houses  and  the  hills  of  that  place  being 
so  particularly  charming.  And  so,  fare  thee  somewhat 
well." 

They  all  felt  certain  that  the  Kuhpchnappeler  of  rank  for 
whom  the  Heimlicher's  niece  was  being  brought  up  could 
be  none  other  than  the  Venner  Eosa,  whose  little  bumt- 
down  stump  of  a  heart — what  was  left  of  it  after  being 
hitherto  made  use  of  to  set  fire  to  the  bosoms  of  female 
humanity  in  general  (as  the  lamp  in  a  smoking-room 
serves  to  kindle  the  pipes  of  the  collective  frequenters 
thereof) — would  be  the  marriage  torch  to  light  her  to 
her  new  home. 

As  there  were  three  heavens  in  this  letter — one  for  each 
of  the  party — kind  remembrances  for  Lenette,  the  pro- 
grammes for  Peltzstiefel,  the  letter  itself  for  Siebenkaes — 
I  shouldn't  have  been  astonished  if  the  terzetto  of  them 
had  danced  for  joy.  The  Schulrath,  intoxicated  with  de- 
light— for  the  glad  blood  rose  to  his  sober  head — opened 
the  papers  sent  him  upon  the  square  patterned  supper- 
cloth  (which  was  laid  already),  and  hungrily  began  to 
devour  his  three  printed  "  relishes  before  supper,"  and 
literary  pet  its  soupers,  upon  the  tin  plate  without  even 
saying  grace,  until  an  invitation  to  stay  and  have  some 
supper  reminded  him  that  he  must  be  off.  But  before 
leaving,  he  petitioned  that,  by  way  of  fee  for  having  acted 
as  middleman  and  court  of  arbitration  between  them,  or 
as  an  alkali  to  promote  the  blending  of  his  oil  with  her 
water — he  might  have  a  new  profile  of  Lenette.  The  old 
one  cut  out  by  Leibgeber  (which  the  letter  brought  to  his 
recollection),  and  which,  as  we  may  remember,  Leibgeber 
let  him  have,  happened  to  have  been  put  into  the  pocket 
of  his  dressing-gown  and  sent  to  the  wash  with  it  (being 
of  much  the  same  colour,  moreover).  "  It  shall  be  put  on 
the  stocks  to-night,"  said  Siebenkaes. 

VV  hen  the  Schulrath  was  going,  as  he  could  see  that  the 
ring  upon  Lenette's  finger  didn't  squeeze  it  so  uncom- 
fortably as  it  had  done  (and  gave  himself  credit  for  having 
been  the  means  of  filing  it  smoother  and  padding  it  softer), 
he  shook  her  hand  with  much  warmth,  and  said — 


118  JEAN  PAUL   FBIEDBICH  BICHTEB.        [BOOK  I 

**  I  shall  always  be  delighted  to  come  whenever  there's 
the  slightest  thing  the  matter  with  you  two  charming 
people." 

Lenette  answered,  "  Oh  yes,  do  come  very  often." 
And  Siebenkaes  added,  "  The  oftener  the  better." 
And  yet,  when  he  had  gone,  the  ring  seemed  to  be  not 
quite  so  comfortable  again,  and  medical  students  who  may 
be  working  at  psychology  may  be  a  little  surprised  that 
during  supper  the  advocaie  said  -very  little  to  his  wife, 
and  she  very  little  to  him.  The  reason  was  that  he  had 
Leibgeber's  letter  lying  by  his  plate  in  the  place  where 
the  bread  normally  is,  and  the  image  of  his  beloved  friend 
shone  bright  before  his  mental  vision  from  Bayreuth  all 
athwart  the  far  misty  darkness  between — their  first  happy 
meeting  to  come  floated  magically  before  him.  Hope  shot 
down  a  pure  clearing  ray  into  the  dark  mephitic  cave 
where  he  was  panting  and  toiling  now — and  the  coming 
spring  stood  like  some  cathedral  tower  all  hung  with 
lamps  lofty  and  bright  in  the  distance,  beaming  through 
the  dark  night  sky. 

At  length  he  "  came  to  himself,"  i.  e.  to  his  wife ;  the 
strong  image  of  Leibgeber  had  buoyed  him  up  from  the 
sharp  stones  which  strewed  the  present;  the  dear  old 
friend,  who  had  clipped  out  the  bride's  profile  up  in  the 
choir  on  the  wedding-day,  and  been  with  them  in  the 
early  weeks  of  their  honeymoon,  seemed  to  fling  a  chain 
of  flower- wreaths  about  him  and  draw  him  closer  to  the 
silent  form  by  his  side.  "  Well  darling,  and  how  are  you 
getting  on?"  he  said,  awaking  from  his  reverie  and  taking 
her  hand,  now  that  all  was  peace  again  between  them. 
She  had,  however,  the  feminine  peculiarity  or  foible, 
habit  at  all  events,  of  being  much  quicker  to  show  that 
she  was  vexed  than  that  her  anger  was  over ;  of,  at  all 
events,  being  slow  to  show  the  latter ;  and  of  commencing 
a  reconsideration  of  all  the  matters  in  dispute  at  the  very 
moment  that  amends  have  been  made  and  accepted,  and 
pardon  begged  and  granted.  There  are  very  few  married 
women  indeed  who  will  put  their  hand  into  their  hus- 
bands', and  say  "  There,  I'm  good  again,"  without  a  very 
considerable  hesitation  and  delay ;  unmarried  women  are 
muoh  more  ready  to  do  it.    Wendeline  did  hold  hers  out, 


CHAP.  IV.  I     FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.      119 

but  did  it  too  coldly,  and  drew  it  away  again  in  a  great 
hurry,  to  take  up  the  table-cloth,  which  she  asked  him  to 
help  her  to  smooth  and  fold  up.  He  did  this  smilingly — she 
gravely  giving  her  whole  attention  to  the  process  of  folding 
the  long  white  parallelogram  into  exact  squares — and  at 
length,  when  the  last  and  thickest  square  was  arrived  at, 
he  held  it  fast  there — she  pulled,  trying  to  look  very 
serious — he  looked  at  her  very  fondly  and  tenderly — she 
couldn't  help  smiling  at  this — and  then  he  took  the  table- 
cloth from  her,  pressed  it  and  himself  with  it  to  her  heart, 
and  said,  in  her  arms,  "Little  thief!  how  can  you  be  so 
naughty  to  your  old  ragamuffin  of  a  Siebenkaes,  or  what- 
ever his  name  may  be?"  And  now  the  rainbow  of  a 
brighter  future  appeared  shining  above  the  fast  ebbing 

flood  which  had  risen  as  high  as  their  hearts  so  lately 

But,  my  dears,  rainbows  now-a-days  very  often  mean  just 
the  reverse  of  what  the  first  was  said  to  signify. 

The  prize  he  awarded  to  his  queen  of  the  rose-feast  of 
the  heart  was  to  ask  her  to  let  him  take  a  profile  of  her 
pretty  face,  that  Peltzstiefel  might  find  a  joy  and  a  present 
waiting  for  him  on  the  morrow.  I  think  I  shall  just  trace 
an  outline  of  his  outline-tracing  for  people  of  taste  in  this 
place ;  but  I  must  stipulate  that  nobody  is  to  expect  a  pen 
to  be  a  painter's  brush — or  a  painter's  brush  to  be  an 
engraver's  style — or  an  engravers  style  a  flower  anther, 
generating  generation  upon  generation  of  lilies  and  roses. 

The  advocate  borrowed  a  drawing-board,  viz.  the  fagade 
of  a  new  pigeon-house,  from  Fecht  the  cobbler.  Lenette's 
shoulder  fitted  into  the  oval  portal  of  it  as  a  clasp-knife 
does  into  its  handle ;  a  sheet  of  white  paper  was  tacked 
on  to  the  board — her  pretty,  soft  head  was  pressed  on  the 
stiff  paper — he  applied,  with  much  care  and  self  restraint, 
his  pencil  at  the  upper  part  of  the  brow,  difficult  as  it  was 
to  catch  the  shadow  in  such  immediate  proximity  to  the 
reality — and  went  slowly  down  the  beautiful,  flowery  de- 
clivity all  roses  and  lilies.  But  little  or  nothing  came  of 
it;  the  back  part  of  the  head  was  pretty  good.  His  eyes 
would  keep  turning  away  from  his  work  to  the  sitter,  so 
that  he  drew  as  vilely  as  a  box-painter. 

"  Wendeline,  your  head  isn't  still  a  moment,"  he  said. 
And  indeed  her  face,  as  well  as  her  brain-fibres,  shook  by 


120  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.         [BOOK  I, 

reason  of  the  heightened  heat  of  her  pulse  and  the  quick- 
ening of  her  breathing;  while,  on  the  other  hand,  his 
pencil  stumbled  when  it  came  to  the  delicate  basso  relievo 
of  her  little  nose,  fell  into  the  cleft  at  her  lips,  and 
stranded  on  the  shoal  of  her  chin.  He  kissed  those  lips 
which  he  couldn't  draw,  and  which  she  always  had  either 
too  much  open  or  too  tightly  closed,  and  brought  a  shaving- 
glass  and  said,  "See,  haven't  you  got  more  faces  than 
Janus,  or  any  Indian  god?  The  Schulrath  will  think 
you  were  making  faces,  and  I  copying  them.  Look,  here's 
where  you  moved,  and  I  sprung  after  you  like  a  chamois  ; 
the  effect  of  the  jump  is,  that  the  upper  part  of  the  face 
sticks  out  before  the  lower  like  a  half  mask.  Just  think 
how  the  Schulrath  will  stare  in  the  morning." 

"  Try  once  more,  dear ;  I'll  do  just  as  you  tell  me ;  I 
should  like  it  to  be  very  nice,"  Lenette  said,  blushing; 
and  stiffened  her  neck,  and  steadied  her  soft  cheek  against 
the  drawing-board.  And  as  her  husband  gently  glided  his 
drawing  ovipositor  over  her  brow — like  a  segment  of  sorao 
white  hemisphere — instead  of  breathing,  he  found  she  way 
holding  her  breath  this  time  till  she  shook  again,  and  till 
the  colour  came  to  her  face. 

And  here  jealousy,  like  some  exploding  fire-ship,  sent 
hard  fragments  of  the  wreck  of  his  shattered  happiness 
crashing  on  a  sudden  against  his  heart. 

"  Ah ! "  (he  thought)  "  can  it  be  that  she  does  really 
love  him  ?  "  (i.  e.  the  Schulrath). 

His  pencil  stood  still  in  the  obtuse  angle  between  her 
nose  and  her  chin  as  if  under  a  spell ;  he  heard  her  let  go 
her  pent-up  breath ;  his  pencil  made  black  zigzags  at  the 
edge  of  the  paper,  and  as  he  stopped  at  the  closed  lips, 
which  nothing  warmer  than  his  own,  and  her  morning 
prayers,  had  ever  touched,  and  thought  "  Must  this  come 
upon  me  too?  must  this  joy  be  taken  from  me  like  all  the 
rest?  And  am  I  drawing  up  my  bill  of  divorce  and 
Uriah-letter  here  with  my  own  very  hands?"  He  could 
do  no  more  at  it.  He  took  the  drawing-board  qxiickly 
from  her  shoulder — fell  upon  her  closed  lips — kissed  away 
the  pent-up  sigh — pressed  the  life  out  of  his  jealousy 
between  his  heart  and  hers,  and  said — 

"  I  can't  do  it  till  to-morrow,  Lenette !     Don't  be  vexed, 


CHAP.  IV.J     FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN   PIECES.      121 

darling!  Tell  me,  are  you  quite  as  you  used  to  "be  in 
Augspurg?  Don't  you  understand  me?  Have  you  not 
the  slightest  idea  what  I  am  driving  at?" 

She  answered  quite  innocently,  "  Now  you  will  be 
annoyed,  Firmian,  I  know,  but  I  really  have  not  the 
slightest  idea." 

Then  the  Goddess  of  Peace  took  from  the  God  of  Sleep 
his  poppy  garland,  and  twined  it  into  her  own  olive 
wreath — and  led  the  wedded  pair,  garlanded  and  recon- 
ciled, hand  in  hand  into  the  glittering,  gleaming,  icefields 
of  the  land  of  dreams — the  magic  shadowy  background  of 
the  noisy  jarring,  shifting  day — our  camera  obscura  full 
of  moving  miniature  pictures  of  a  world  all  dwarfed,  in 
which  man,  like  the  Creator,  dwells  alone  with  his  own 
creations. 


END  OF  THE  PEEFACE  AND  OF  THE  FIEST 
BOOK. 

The  reader  will  remember  that,  at  the  beginning  of  the 
preface,  I  stated  that  I  succeeded  in  putting  the  old 
merchant  into  a  sweet  sleep,  and  in  providing  his  daughter 
with  a  gladsome  feast  of  tabernacles,  in  the  shape  of  the 
young  unopened  buds  of  this,  my  little  cottage-garden 
here.  But  the  foul  fiend  knows  how  to  breeze  up  a 
sudden  rain  squall,  and  let  it  splattering  down  upon  all 
our  loveliest  fireworks.  I  was  only  performing  a  duty  in 
converting  myself  into  a  small,  pocket  circulating  library 
for  a  poor  lonely  thing  of  a  girl,  whose  father  gave  her  no 
chance  of  a  word  or  two  of  rational  conversation  except 
with  her  parrot,  and  with  the  family  lawyer  aforesaid. 

The  cage  of  the  former  was  placed  near  her  inkstand 
and  waste-book ;  and  he  acquired  from  his  mistres-s  as 
much  in  the  shape  of  German-Italian  as  a  bookkeeper  finds 
necessary  for  carrying  on  his  foreign  correspondence. 
And  a  parrot  being  always  incited  to  talkativeness  by  a 
looking-glass  in  his  cage,  he  and  his  language-mistress 
were  enabled  to  look  at  themselves  in  it  together.     The 


122  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  BICHTEB.        [BOOK  L 

latter  (the  family  lawyer)  I  myself  was.  But  the  Captain 
— for  fear  of  seductive  princess-kidnappers  and  pirates 
such  as  me,  and  because  her  mother  was  dead,  and  because 
she  was  useful  in  the  business — would  let  her  speak  to 
no  man  whomsoever,  except  in  the  presence  of  a  third 
party  (viz.,  himself).  So  that  it  was  very  seldom  any 
man  came  to  the  house,  except  me ;  whereas,  a  father 
generally  decoys  whole  museums  of  insects  into  his  house 
by  means  of  a  blooming  daughter,  just  as  a  cherry-tree 
in  blossom  near  a  window  fills  a  room  with  wasps  and 
bees.  It  wasn't  exactly  everybody  who,  when  he  wanted 
to  speak  a  rational  word  with  her  (i.  e.  one  her  father 
shouldn't  hear),  could  manage  to  draw  the  flute  stop  of  his 
organ,  and  then  play  away  for  an  hour  to  this  Argus  till  he 
should  close  his  hundred  green  eyes,  so  that  two  blue  ones 
might  be  looked  into.  I  did  manage  it,  indeed ;  but  the 
world  shall  hear  what  sort  of  a  psalm  of  thanksgiving  and 
vote  of  thanks  I  was  treated  to  for  my  pains. 

The  old  man — who  had  grown  suspicious  on  account  of 
the  length  of  time  I  had  remained  the  evening  before — had 
this  evening  only  pretended  to  be  asleep,  that  he  might  see 
what  I  was  going  to  be  at.  The  rapidity  with  which  he 
went  asleep  (the  reader  no  doubt  remembers  it  at  the 
beginning  of  the  book)  ought  to  have  struck  me  more  than 
it  did.  I  ought  to  have  reckoned  on  a  contrary  state  of 
matters  myself,  and  been  ready  with  more  prefaces  in 
addition  to  this  present  one,  to  serve  as  sleeping  powders. 

The  rascally  eavesdropper  lay  in  wait  till  I  had  made 
my  report  on  the  two  Flower-pieces  and  the  four  first 
chapters  of  this  book.  At  the  end  of  the  fourth  he 
bounced  up  as  a  mole-trap  does  when  one  walks  on  it,  and 
addressed  me  from  behind  with  the  following  harangue  of 
congratulation — "  Has  the  devil  got  you  by  the  coat-tails? 
You  must  come  here  from  Berlin,  must  you,  and  stuff  my 
daughter's  head  with  all  sorts  of  atheistical,  nonsensical, 
romantic  balderdash  and  nonsense,  till  she'll  be  of  no 
more  use  in  a  shop  than " 

"  Just  listen  to  one  word,  Herr  Pigtail ! "  said  I  quite 
quietly,  taking  him  into  the  next  room,  where  there  was 
neither  fire  nor  light;  "just  listen  to  one  single,  half- 
word!" 


CHAP.  IV.]   FLOWER,   FRMT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.       123 

I  put  my  hands  upon  his  shoulders,  and  said,  "  Herr 
Pigtai  1 — for  in  Charles  the  Great's  time  every  officer  was 
so  styled,  because  in  those  days  the  soldiers  wore  tails,  as 
the  women  do  now — Herr  Pigtail,  I'm  not  going  to  have 
a  tussle  with  you  to-night,  when  the  old  year's  going  out 
and  the  new  year's  coming  in.     I  assure   you  solemnly 

that  I  am  the  son  of  the  ,*  and  that  I  shall  never 

see  you  more,  though  you  shall  have  all  the  Vienna  letters 
just  the  same.  But  I  implore  you,  for  God's  sake,  to  allow 
your  daughter  to  read.  Now -a  days  every  tradesman  reads 
— one  of  whom  will  be  her  hu>band — and  every  trades- 
man's wife.  Yet  for  all  this  reading,  there's  still  plenty  of 
spinning  and  cooking  going  on;  there  are  shirts  in  plenty, 
and  fat  people  in  abundance.  And  as  for  corrupting  her — 
why !  that's  just  what  a  man  who  reads  will  find  it  most 
difficult  to  accomplish  in  the  case  of  a  woman  who  reads, 
and  most  easy  in  the  case  of  one  who  hardly  knows  her 
ABC.    Let  me  entreat  you,  Captain." 

"  If  you  would  but  just  mind  your  own  affairs  !  What's 
the  girl  to  you  ? "  was  his  reply.  It  was  a  true  harbour 
of  refuge  for  me  that,  on  neither  of  these  two  evenings, 
the  Christmas  Eve  or  the  New  Year's,  had  I,  in  the 
enthusiasm  of  narration,  so  much  as  touched  anything  of  the 
daughter's  but  about  a  groschen's  worth  of  hair  (and 
that  not  her  own),  which  got  among  my  fingers  some- 
how or  other,  1  hardly  know  how. 

It  would  have  been  little  to  have  seized  her  hands,  in 
the  fervour  of  my  biographical  enthusiasm  it  would  have 
been  nothing  at  all ;  but,  as  I  have  said,  I  hadn't  done  it. 
I  had  said  to  myself,  "  Enjoy  a  pretty  face  as  you  would 
a  picture,  and  a  female  voice  as  you  would  a  nightingale's, 
and  don't  touch  the  picture  or  throttle  the  bird.  What ! 
must  every  tulip  be  out  up  for  salad,  and  all  altar-cloths 
made  into  camisoles?" 

Of  all  truths,  the  one  which  we  bring  ourselves  to  credit 
last  of  all  is  that  there  are  certain  men  whom  no  amount 
of  truth  will  convince.  That  Herr  Pigtail  was  one  of 
these  presently  occurred  to  me,  not  so  soon  as  it  ought 
to  have  done,  and  I  determined  that  the  only  saraaon  I 

*  This  is  an  allusion  to  '  Hesperus.' 


124  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRIOH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  L 

should  preach  to  him  would  be  of  the  jocular  and  middle- 
age-Easter  kind.*  "  Not  so  loud,  Herr  Pigtail,  or  made- 
moiselle will  hear  every  syllable ;  you  have  pinned  her, 
poor  butterfly,  into  your  letter  book  ;  but  at  the  great  day 
of  judgment  I  shall  accuse  you  of  not  having  given  her 
my  works  to  read.     I  do  wish  you  had  only  gone   on 

Sretending  to  be  asleep  long  enough  to  allow  me  to  tell 
er  the  other  books  of  the  history  of  Kuhschnappel,  where 
Siebenkses's  troubles  occur,  and  his  death,  and  his  marriage. 
But,  mademoiselle,  I  shall  tell  my  publisher  in  Berlin  to 
send  you  the  remaining  books  of  the  story  the  moment 
they  are  in  print,  fresh  out  of  the  press,  still  all  damp, 
like  a  morning  newspaper.  And  now,  adieu,  Herr  Pigtail ; 
may  Heaven  grant  you  a  new  heart  with  the  new  year, 
and  your  dear  daughter  a  second  heart  inside  her  own." 

The  elemental  conflict  of  his  and  my  dissimilar  com- 
ponents raged  louder  and  louder  :  but  I  say  no  more  about 
it — every  additional  word  would  have  the  appearance  of 
an  act  of  vindictiveness.  This,  however,  I  may  at  all 
events  say :  happy  is  every  daughter  who  may  read  my 
works  while  her  father  is  awake  (very  few  such  daughters, 
however,  recognise  this  truth).  Unhappy  is  every  de- 
pendent of  an  Oehrmann,  because  he  will  be  starved,  as  a 
greyhound  is,  that  he  may  be  the  more  nimble  at  running 
(I  do  not  mean  on  the  piano  with  his  fingers),  as  the 
dancers'  children  get  nothing  to  eat  that  they  may  spring 
the  better!  And  fortunate  are  all  needy  persons  who 
have  nothing  to  do  with  him ;  because  Jacob  Oehrmann 
gives  to  everyone  just  as  much  moral,  as  he  possesses  mer- 
cantile, credit,  to  which  recruit-measure  of  worth  he  has 
been  habituated  by  his  fellow-tradesmen,  who  measure 
each  other  with  yard-measures  of  metal.  The  only  people 
who  find  favour  in  his  sight  are  those  who  are  complete 
paupers,  and  this  because  they  serve  as  pedestals  for  his 
charity  ;  for  the  alms  which  he  distributes  in  the  name  of 
the  town  and  out  of  its  exchequer,  he  looks  upon  as  his 
own.  Peace  be  with  him  !  At  that  time  I  had  not  taken 
a  part  myself  in  celebrating  the  peace-festival  of  the  soul 
which  I  have  described  in  the  Fruit-piece  of  this  book,  and 

*  Jooular  discourses  were  delivered  on  Easter  Sunday  in  the  middK 
tgea,  and  went  by  the  name  of  "  Christian  Easter-Merriment." 


CHAP.  IV. J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.      125 

I  had  read  but  little  of  what  I  have  there  written  concera- 
ing  the  year  of  Jubilee  which  ought  to  last  as  long  as  the 
Long  Parliament  in  our  hearts  with  respect  to  all  our  moral 
debtors  ;  for  if  I  had  1  should  not  even  have  contradicted 
Herr  Pigtail. 

I  vexed  him,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  once  more  by  my  parting 
speech  to  his  daughter  (for  I  wished  him  and  her  my 
wishes  both  together  and  at  once,  so  that  it  might  not 
appear  which  was  for  which). 

"  Herr  Pigtail,  and  mademoiselle,  I  bid  you  a  long  fare- 
well. JSTo  more  shall  I  be  able,  in  elysian  evenings,  to 
relate  to  you  any  of  my  biographies  (shorn  of  the  digres- 
sions) ;  and  the  feast  days  and  the  holidays,  as  well  as  the 
eves  thereof,  will  come  and  will  go,  but  he  who  has  caused 
you  such  vivid  emotions  will  come  no  more.  May  fate 
send  thee  books  instead  of  bookmakers,  sometimes  stir 
thy  dull  heart  with  a  poetic  throb,  heave  thy  still  breast 
with  tender  sighs  prophetic  of  the  future — bring  to  thy 
eyes  some  gentle  tear  drops,  such  as  an  andante  causes 
to  flow,  and  lead  thee  on  through  the  hot,  toilsome  summer 
days,  not  to  an  after  summer,  but  to  a  flowery  tuneful 
spring.     And  so,  good  night." 

It  goes  to  my  heart  to  part  with  people ;  even  were  it 
my  sworn  hereditary  foe  :  one  is  going  to  see  him  no 
more.  Pauline  was  anything  but  my  sworn  hereditary 
foe.  Out  in  the  streets  tbere  were  more  new  year  well- 
wishers  going  their  rounds,  the  watchmen,  who  were  giving 
utterance  to  their  good  wishes  in  wind  instrumental  music 
and  miserable  verse.  Stiff,  old-fashioned,  rude  verses 
always  touch  me  more — particularly  in  an  appropriate 
mouth — than  your  sapless,  new  poems,  all  tricked  out  with 
artificial  flowers  and  ice-plants;  poetry  altogether  wretched 
is  better  than  the  mediocre.  I  decided  upon  going  through 
the  town  gate ;  my  heart  was  filled  with  emotions  of  very 
different  kinds — for  you  see  it  was  only  eleven  o'clock  and 
the  cold  night  was  full  of  stars.  And  it  was  the  last  night 
of  the  year,  and  I  didn't  want  to  pass  from  the  old  year  to 
the  new  in  sleep,  though  that  is  how  I  would  pass  from 
this  life  to  the  next.  I  resolved  to  take  that  flushed, 
throbbing  heart  of  mine  out  of  the  streets,  and  to  a  quieter 
ooir»pa»y. 


126       JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRIOH  RICHTER.   [BOOK  \ 

Place  a  man  in  some  waste  Sahara  desert  stretching 
further  than  the  eye  can  reach,  and  afterwards  pen  him 
up  into  the  narrowest  of  corners,  he  will  he  struck,  in  both 
cases,  by  the  same  vivid  consciousness  of  his  own  indivi- 
duality— the  widest  spaces  and  the  narrowest  have  the 
same  powerful  effect  in  quickening  our  perception  of  our 
own  Ego  and  of  its  relationship.  There  is  nothing,  on  the 
whole,  ofrener  forgotten  than  that  which  is  what  forgets — 
namely,  the  forgetter's  self.  Not  only  do  the  mechanical 
employments  of  labour  and  trade  always  draw  men  out  of 
themselves,  but  the  mental  effort  of  study  and  investigation, 
also,  renders  scholars  and  philosophers  just  as  deaf  and 
blind  to  their  own  Ego,  and  its  position  with  respect  to 
other  entities — deafer  and  blinder  even.  Nothing  is  more 
difficult  than  to  convert  an  object  of  contemplation  (which 
we  always  move  away  to  a  certain  distance  from  ourselves, 
and  from  the  mind's  eye,  so  as  to  bring  the  latter  to  bear 
<>n  it  properly)  into  an  object  of  sensation,  and  to  feel  that 
the  object  is  the  eye  itself.  1  have  often  read  whole  books 
on  the  subject  of  the  Ego,  and  of  printing,  right  through, 
until  at  last  I  saw,  to  my  astonishment,  that  the  Ego 
and  the  printed  letters  were  before  me — so  to  speak  under 
my  nose. 

Let  the  reader  say  trnly:  has  he  not  even  at  this 
moment,  while  I  have  been  talking,  been  forgetting  that 
there  are  letters  before  him,  ay,  and  his  own  Ego  into  the 
bargain  ? 

But  out  where  I  was,  under  the  twinkling  heavens,  and 
on  a  snow-covered  height,  round  about  which  there 
gleamed  a  white,  frozen  plain,  my  Ego  burst  away  from 
irs  relationships  (while  in  connection  with  them  it  was  no 
more  than  an  attribute,  a  quality),  and  it  became  a  person- 
age— a  separate  entity.  And  then  I  could  look  upon  my- 
self. All  marked  points  of  time— stanzas  as  it  were,  or 
music  phrases,  of  existence — new  years'  days  for  example, 
and  birthdays,  lift  man  high  out  of  and  up  above  the  waves 
which  are  round  him  ;  he  clears  the  water  from  his  eyes, 
and  looks  about  him,  and  says — "  How  the  current  has 
been  carrying  me  along,  drowning  my  hearing,  and  blind- 
ing my  sight !  Those  are  the  waves,  down  there,  onward, 
which  have  been  bearing  me  along,  and  these,  now  coming 


CHAP.  IV.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      127 

toward  me,  when  I  dip  down  among  them,  will  whirl  me 
away  !" 

Without  this  clear,  distinct  consciousness  of  one's  Ego, 
there  can  he  no  freedom,  and  no  calm  equanimity  amid  the 
crowding  elbowing  tumult  of  the  world. 

I  shall  go  on  with  my  story.  I  stood  upon  an  iceberg, 
but  my  soul  was  all  aglow — the  cloven  moon  shone  brightly 
down,  and  the  shadows  of  the  pine-trees  about  me  lay,  like 
dismembered  limbs  of  the  night,  black  upon  the  lily  ground 
of  snow.  Away,  some  distance  from  me,  a  man  seemed  to 
be  kneeling  motionless  on  the  ground. 

And  now  12  o'clock  struck,  and  1794,  year  of  war  and 
tumult,  fell,  with  all  its  rivers  of  blood,  into  the  ocean  of 
eternity ;  the  booming  after-tone  of  the  bell  seemed  to  say 
to  me,  "  Now  has  Destiny,  with  the  twelfth  stroke  of  her 
hammer,  knocked  down  the  old  year  to  you,  poor  perishing 
mortals,  at  her  auction  of  minutes." 

The  kneeling  man  now  stood  up  and  went  quickly  away. 
I  could  long  see  him  and  his  shadow  disappearing  in  the 
moonlight. 

I  left  my  height,  the  boundary  hill  between  two  years, 
and  went  down  to  where  the  man  had  been  kneeling.  I 
found  a  crucifix  and  a  black  leather  prayer-book  in  duo- 
decimo, all  thumbed  yellow,  except  one  haf  at  the  begin- 
ning on  which  was  the  name  of  the  owner,  whose  knees 
had  worn  deep  traces  in  the  ice.  I  knew  him  well,  he  was 
a  cottager  whose  two  sons  had  had  to  go  to  the  war.  On 
looking  more  closely,  I  found  he  had  drawn  a  circle  in  the 
snow,  to  keep  off  evil  spirits. 

I  saw  it  all ;  the  simple,  weak-minded  creature,  whose 
soul  was  darkened  by  a  perpetual  annular  eclipse,  had 
gone  there  on  ihis  solemn  night  to  hearken  to  the  hollow 
distant  muttering  thunder  of  the  coming  storm,  and 
laid  his  prostrate  soul,  as  it  were,  upon  the  earth  to 
hear  the  distant  march  of  the  approaching  foe.  "Shal- 
low, timid  soul,"  thought  1,  why  should  the  dead  that 
are  to  be  come  floatiug  athwart  the  face  of  the  clear, 
still  night — thy  sleeping  sons  among  them,  memberless  ? 
Why  strive  already  to  see  the  darting  flames  of  con- 
flagrations yet  to  come,  and  to  hear  the  dismal  turmoil, 
the  bitter  wail,  of  a  woe  as  yet  unborn?    The   coffins 


128  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTEE.        [BOOK  I. 

of  the  coming  year  have,  as  in  times  of  pestilence,  nc 
inscriptions  yet — why  should  the  names  appear  upon 
them  ?  Oh !  thy  Solomon's  ring  has  been  no  protection 
against  the  destroying  angel  who  dwells  within  our 
breasts.  And  that  vague,  ugly  giant-cloud,  behind  which 
are  death  and  the  future,  will  prove,  on  approach,  to  be 
death  and  the  future  itself.'' 

In  hours  like  these  we  are  all  ready  to  lay  our  hats  and 
swords  on  to  the  bier — ay,  and  ourselves  as  well — our  old 
wounds  burn  anew,  and  our  hearts,  not  being  truly  healed, 
a  little  thing  breaks  them  again,  like  arms  imperfectly 
tset.  But  the  cruel,  piercing  lightning  flash  of  some  great 
minute,  the  reflection  of  which  stretches  gleaming  athwart 
the  whole  river  of  our  life,  is  necessary  to  us  to  make  us 
blind  to  the  ignes  fatui  and  glowworms  which  meet  us,  to 
guide  us,  every  hour :  and  frivolous,  giddy  man  needs 
home  powerful  shock  to  counteract  his  tendency  to  con- 
tinual petty  naggling.  Therefore,  to  us  little  crustaceans 
sticking  with  our  suckers  upon  the  ship  of  this  earth,  every 
new  year's  night  is,  like  night  in  the  old  mythologies,  a 
mother  of  many  gods  in  us— and  in  such  a  night  there 
begins  for  us  a  better  norm  d  year  than  that  which  began 
in  1624.  And  I  felt  as  if  1  should  kneel,  humble  and 
penitent,  on  the  spot  where  the  poor  childless  father  had 
knelt. 

But  now  a  brisker  air  brought  to  my  ears  a  burst  of 
gladsome  music ;  it  came  like  the  breath  of  flowers  acro>t» 
the  frozen  plain,  horns  and  trumpets  on  the  church  tower, 
sending  their  cheering  harmonies  over  the  sleeping  earth, 
ushering,  with  glad  vigorous  tones,  the  first  hour  of  the 
new  year  in  to  a  world  of  anxious,  doubting  men.  And  I 
too  grew  glad  and  strong ;  I  raised  my  glance  from  the 
white  shroud  of  the  coming  spring,  and  gazed  at  the  moon  ; 
mid  on  these  spots  on  her  face  (these  spots  which  grow 
green  as  you  approach)  I  saw  our  earthly  spring  reposing 
upon  flowers,  and  already  moving  his  young  wings,  soop 
to  take  his  flight  with  other  birds  of  passage,  and,  bright 
with  glittering  plumes,  and  hailed  by  skylarks'  anthems, 
come  and  alight  upon  our  shores. 

'A  he  distant  new  year's  music  flowed  around  me  still 
I  felt  much  happier,  and  far  more  tender;  I  bawtbe  cmiing 


CHAP.  IV.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.     129 

sorrows  in  the  new  born  year,  but  they  wore  such  lovely 
masks  that  they  were  more  like  sorrows  that  are  past,  or 
like  the  music  around  me — just  as  the  rain  which  falls 
through  the  great  caverns  in  the  Derbyshire  hills  sounds 
in  the  distance  like  music. 

But  when  I  looked  around  me,  and  saw  the  white  earth 
shining  like  a  white  sun,  and  the  silent  deep  blue  sphere 
all  round,  like  a  household  circle  of  one  great  family — and 
as  the  music,  like  lovelier  sighs,  accompanied  my  thoughts 
— as  I  fixed  my  gaze,  with  grateful  heart,  upon  the  starry 
sky  where  all  these  thousands  of  stedfast  witnesses  of 
the  beautiful  moments  (moments  faded,  out  of  bloom, 
indeed,  now — but  the  great  Beneficence  spreads  their  seed 
for  evermore; — when  I  thought  of  the  men  asleep  all 
around  me,  and  wished  that  they  might  all  be  happier 
when  they  opened  their  eyes  in  the  morning — and  when 
I  thought  of  those  awake  under  me,  whose  slumbering 
souls  stood  in  need  of  such  a  wish, — my  heart,  oppressed 
by  the  music,  and  by  the  night,  grew  heavy  and  grew  full, 
and  the  blue  sky,  the  glittering  moon,  and  the  sparkling 
snow-height  all  melted  into  one  great  floating  shimmer. 

And  in  the  shimmer,  and  amid  the  music,  1  heard  voices 
of  my  friends,  and  dear  fellow-creatures,  tenderly  and 
anxiously  wishing  their  new  year's  wishes.  They  touched 
my  heart  so  deeply,  that  I  could  but  barely  think  my 
own — 

"  Oh !  may  you  all  be  happy  all  the  years  of  your  lives." 


BND   OF   BOOK   I. 


u. 


PREFACE  TO  THE  SECOND,  THIRD, 
AND  FOURTH  BOOKS. 

It  lias  often  been  a  source  of  much  annoyance  to  me  that 
to  every  preface  I  write  I  am  obliged  to  append  a  book 
— like  the  endorsement  on  a  bill  of  exchange — or  an 
appendix  to  letters  A  to  Z.  Many  a  man  who  dabbles 
in  authorship  by  way  of  amusement  has  his  books  sent 
to  him  all  ready  written  and  complete,  straight  from  the 
cradle ;  so  that  all  he  has  to  do  is  to  attach  his  gold 
frontlets  of  prefaces  to  their  foreheads — which  is  nothing 
but  painting  the  corona  about  the  sun.  As  yet,  however, 
not  a  single  author  has  applied  to  me  for  a  preamble  to  a 
book,  although  for  several  years  I  have  had  a  considerable 
number  of  prefaces  by  me  (all  ready  beforehand,  and  going 
at  great  bargains),  in  which  I  extol  to  the  best  of  my  ability 
works  which  have  not  as  yet  come  into  being.  In  fact,  I  have 
now  a  perfect  museum  of  these  prize  medals  and  commemora- 
tion medals  of  other  people's  cleverness  at  the  service  of 
anyone  who  may  stand  in  need  of  them  ;  they  are  all 
made  by  the  very  finest  of  mint-machinery,  and  my  collec- 
tion of  them  is  increasing  day  by  day ;  so  that  I  shall  be 
obliged  to  sell  it  off  wholesale'before  very  long  (I  don't  see 
what  else  I  can  do),  and  bring  out  a  book — consisting  of 
nothing  but  pre-existent  prefaces. 

They  will  still  be  obtainable  singly,  however,  until  the 
Easter  fair,  and  authors  who  make  early  application  can 
have  the  entire  fascicle  of  preludes  forwarded  to  them,  so  that 
they  can  pick  out  for  themselves  whichever  preface  seems 
to  them  the  most  laudatory  of  a  book.  After  the  Easter 
fair  however,  when  the  Book  of  Prefaces  above  mentioned 
comes  out  (and  it  will  be  interleaved  with  the  fair 
catalogue),  the  literary  world  will  only  be  beglorified  in 
corpore,  in  coro,  and  I  shall  be  (so  to  speak)  making  a 
present  of  a  patent  of  nobility  to  the  republic  of  letters  k» 

k  a 


132  PBEFACE  TO  SECOND,  THIED,  AND  FOUBTH  BOOKS. 

the  lump, — as  the  Empress  Queen  did  in  1775  to  the 
whole  mercantile  community  of  Vienna  ;  although  I  have 
before  my  eyes  (in  the  shape  of  the  poor  reviewers  who 
work  themselves  well  nigh  to  death,  hammering  and 
building  away  at  the  temple  of  fame,  and  at  triumphal 
arches)  the  melancholy  proof  that  though  a  man  were  to 
extol  the  republic  of  letters  even  in  six  volumes  folio, 
he  would  get  less  for  it  than  Sannazaro  did  for  belauding 
the  republic  of  Venice  in  as  many  lines — for  each  line  in 
the  lafer  case  brought  the  poet  in  a  matter  of  a  hundred 
five-dollar  pieces. 

I  propose  to  interstratify  one  of  the  prefaces  in  question 
in  this  place  by  way  of  a  specimen  and  experiment,  making 
as  if  its  celebrated  author  had  written  it  to  order  for  this 
book  (which  is  the  actual  truth,  moreover).  There  is  nc 
difficulty  in  my  splitting  myself  up  into  two  characters, 
the  flower  painter  and  the  preface  maker.  But, — as  one 
cannot  quite  lose  sight  of  feelings  of  becoming  modesty 
— I  carefully  pick  out  the  most  miserable  specimen  of  the 
lot,  one  in  which  laudation  occurs  but  to  a  very  moderate 
extent,  one  which  places  the  author  of  the  book  attached 
to  it  upon  a  funeral  car,  rather  than  upon  a  triumphal  one, 
with  nothing  whatever  to  draw  it  along  moreover ;  whereas 
the  other  prefaces  harness  posterity  to  them,  and  the 
reading  public  are,  by  them,  yoked  on  to  the  heavenly 
chariot,  the  Elijah's  chariot,  of  Immortality,  in  which  they 
draw  the  author  along. 

In  conclusion,  then,  I  have  only  to  observe  that  the  cele- 
brated author  of '  Hesperus  '  has  been  kind  enough  to  look 
through  my  Flower-pieces,  and  contribute  to  them  the 
following  preface,  which  will  be  found  well  worthy  of 
perusal. 


PREFACE,  BY  THE  AUTHOR  OF 
'HESPERUS.' 

The  following  remarks  may  be  thrown  into  the  form  of  a 
series  of  postulates,  which  are,  at  the  same  time,  so  many 
similes. 

Many  authors  (Toung  is  an  instance)  set  fire  to  their 
nerve-spirit,  which,  like  burning  spirit  of  another  kind 
(brandy),  tinges  every  person  who  stands  round  the  ink- 
bottle  where  it  is  flaring  with  a  sham  deadly  pallor.  But, 
unfortunately,  each  looks  only  at  the  others,  none  looks 
into  the  mirror.  The  effect  of  the  proximity  of  this 
universal  mortality  all  about,  upon  people  and  authors, 
is  that  each  is  impressed  with  a  livelier  sense  of  the 
exceptional  nature  of  his  own  immortality ;  and  this  is 
remarkably  comforting  to  us  all. 

The  consequence  is,  as  it  seems  to  me,  very  plain. 
Poets,  living  in  fifth,  or  fiftieth  floors,  may  make  poems, 
but  not  marriages ;  neither  may  they  keep,  nor  establish, 
houses.  Canaries'  breeding  cages  have  to  be  more  roomy 
than  their  singing  cages. 

If  this  be  so,  then,  what  does  the  author's  pen  do  ?  Like 
a  child's,  it  traces  in  ink  the  characters  which  nature  has 
faintly  marked  in  the  reader  with  pencil. 

The  author's  strings  only  vibrate  in  unison  with  the 
reader's  octaves,  fifths,  fourths,  and  thirds — not  with  his 
seconds  or  sevenths.  Unsympathetic  readers  do  not  become 
sympathetic  ones ;  it  is  only  the  cognate,  or  congruent, 
sort  which  rise  to  the  author's  level  or  pass  beyond  it. 

And  with  this  stands  or  falls  my  fourth  postulate.  The 
iron  shoe  of  Pegasus  is  the  armature  of  the  magnet  of 
truth,  increasing  its  power  of  attraction;  yet  we  are 
jungry  birds,  and  fly  at  the  poet's  grapes  as  though  they 
were  real  ones,  thinking  the  boy  a  painted  one,  when 
we  really  ought  to  be  frightened  at  him. 


134   PREFACE,  BY  THE  AUTHOB  OF  'HESPERUS.' 

The  transition  from  this  to  the  fifth  postulate  is  a  self- 
evident  matter.  Man  has  such  a  high  opinion  of  everything 
in  the  shape  of  antiquity,  that  he  prolongs  it,  and  keeps 
it  alive,  and  lives  according  to  it,  though  it  be  but  the 
cover  and  the  mask  of  the  very  poison  which  will  destroy 
itself.  There  are  two  proofs  of  this  proposition  which  I 
leave  aside,  of  set  purpose  ;  the  first  is,  Keligion,  which  is  all 
gnawed  to  worm  dust ;  the  second,  Freedom,  which  is  quite 
as  much  crumbled  to  powder  as  the  other.  In  my  capacity 
of  a  member  of  the  Lutheran  Church,  I  merely  glance  at 
the  subject  of  relics  (in  support  of  rhe  proposition) — relics, 
in  the  case  of  which,  as  Vasquez  the  Jesuit  informs  us,  if 
they  chance  to  be  entirely  eaten  up  of  worms,  we  must 
continue  to  worship  what  remains — that  is  to  say,  the 
worms  which  have  eaten  them.  Wheiefore,  meddle  not 
with  that  nest  of  worms,  the  time  in  which  thou  livest,  or 
it  will  eat  thee  up ;  a  million  of  worms  are  quite  equal  to 
one  dragon. 

This  must  be  admitted  and  assumed,  at  least  if  my  sixth 
postulate  is  to  have  any  sense  in  it  which  is, — that  no  man 
is  wholly  indifferent  to,  and  unaffected  by,  every  kind  of 
truth ;  indeed  even  if  it  be  only  to  poetical  reflections 
(illusions)  that  he  swears  allegiance — inasmuch  as  he  does 
even  that  he  thereby  does  homage  to  truth  ;  for  in  all  poetry 
it  is  but  the  part  which  is  true  which  goes  to  the  heart 
(or  head),  just  as  in  our  passions  and  emotions  nothing 
but  the  Moral  produces  effect.  A  reflection  which  should 
be  nothing  whatever  but  a  reflection  would  necessarily,  for 
that  very  reason,  not  be  a  reflection.  Every  semblance 
(meaning  every  thing  which  we  see,  or  suppose  we  see)  pre- 
supposes the  existence  of  light  somewhere,  and  is  itself  light, 
only  in  an  enfeebled  or  reflected  condition.  Only,  most 
people  in  our,  not  so  much  enlightened  as  enlightening  times, 
are  like  nocturnal  insects  who  avoid,  or  are  pained  by,  the 
light  of  day,  but,  in  the  night,  fly  to  every  nocturnal  light, 
every  phosphorescent  surface. 

The  graves  of  the  best  men  are  like  those  of  the 
Moravians,  level  and  flat,  and  this  earthly  sphere  of  ours 
is  a  Westminster  Abbey  of  such  levellings  and  flattenings 
— ah !  what  'nnumerable  drops  of  tears  as  well  as  blood 
(which  are  what  the  three  grand  trees  of  this  world — the 


PREFACE,   BY  THE  AUTHOR  OF  'HESPERUS.'      135 

trees  of  Life,  of  Knowledge,  and  Liberty — are  watered  with) 
have  been  shed,  but  never  counted.  History,  in  painting 
the  human  race,  does  not  follow  the  example  of  that 
painter  who,  making  a  portrait  of  a  one-eyed  king,  drew 
only  his  seeing  profile ;  what  history  paints  is  the  blind 
side,  and  it  needs  some  grand  calamity  to  bring  great  men 
to  light — as  comets  are  seen  during  total  eclipses  of  the 
sun.  Not  upon  the  battle-field  only — upon  the  holy 
ground  of  virtue  also,  and  upon  the  classic  soil  of  truth — 
the  pedestal  whereon  history  raises  on  high  some  single 
hero  whose  name  rings  in  all  men's  ears  has  to  be  composed 
and  built  up  of  thousands  of  other  heroes  who  have  fought 
and  fallen,  nameless  and  unknown.  The  noblest  deeds  of 
heroism  are  done  within  four  walls,  not  before  the  public 
gaze, — and  as  history  keeps  record  only  of  the  men  sacri- 
ficed, and,  on  the  whole,  writes  only  in  sp^lt  blood,  doubt-* 
less  our  annals  are  grander  and  more  beautiful  in  the  eyes 
of  the  all-pervading  spirit  of  the  universe  than  in  those 
of  the  history-writer ;  the  great  scenes  of  history  are 
estimated  according  to  the  numbers  of  angels  or  devils  on 
the  stage,  the  men  not  being  taken  into  account. 

These  are  the  grounds  on  which  I  rely  when  I  assert 
with  a  good  deal  of  boldness  that  when  we  inhale  the 
perfume  of  the  full-blown  blossoms  of  joy  with  too  deep 
and  strong  an  inhalation,  without  having  first  given  them 
a  good  shake,  we  run  the  risk  of  snuffing  up  some  torment- 
ing insect  (before  we  know  what  we  are  about)  through 
the  ethmoid  into  the  brain  ;  *  and  who — tell  me  if  you  can — 
is  to  get  it  out  again  ?  Whereas  little  or  nothing  of  a 
risky  sort  can  be  snuffed  up  out  of  Flower-pieces,  and  their 
painted  calices,  since  painted,  worms  remain  where  they  are. 

This,  then,  is  what  I  have  to  postulate  by  means  of 
similes.  What  the  public  postulates,  or  demands,  is  in 3' 
opinion  of  these  Flower-pieces.  The  author  is  a  promising 
youth  of  five  years  of  age  ;\  he  and  I  have  been  friends 

^  *  In  the  3rd  part  of  the '  Lichtenberg  Philosophical  Magazine,'  the  case 
is  mentioned  of  a  woman,  who,  while  smelling  at  a  flower,  inhaled  a 
worm  into  her  brain,  which  tormented  her  with  delirium,  headache, 
Ac.,  till  it  came  out  at  her  nose  again,  still  alive. 

t  Voltaire  proves  that  a  person  who  is  23  years  old,  has  only  lived 
3J  years  In  the  proper  sense  of  the  word. 


]  3*3      PREFACE,  BY   THE  AUTHOR  OP   «  HESPERUS.' 

since  childhood,  and,  I  think,  can  assert  that  we  have  but 
one  soul  between  ns,  as  Aristotle  says  should  be  the  case 
with  friends.  He  gets  me  to  read  over  everything  he  thinks 
of  publishing,  and  to  give  him  my  opinion  and  advice. 
And,  as  I  returned  these  Flower-pieces  to  him  with  the 
warmest  (and,  at  the  same  time,  sincerest)  expression  of 
my  approval,  he  has  requested  me  to  make  my  verdict 
somewhat  more  widely  known,  believing  as  he  does 
(rather  too  flatteringly  perhaps)  that  it  may  carry  a 
certain  amount  of  weight  with  it,  more  especially  as  it  is 
an  impartial  verdict,  and,  as  such,  one  which  can  be  placed 
in  the  hands  of  the  critics  as  a  species  of  ruler  wherewith 
to  draw  the  lines  upon  which  their  verdicts  may  be 
written. 

In  this,  however,  he  goes  a  little  too  far.  All  I  can  say 
is  that  the  work  is  written  quite  as  if  I  had  done  it  myself. 
There  is  no  greater  amount  of  dynamic  ornamentation  in 
it  than  is  usual  in  books,  and,  happy  as  the  author  would 
have  been  to  have  thundered,  stormed,  and  poured  in  it, 
there  was  of  course  no  room  in  a  parish  advocate's  lodgings 
for  Ehine  cataracts,  thunderstorms,  tropical  hurricanes 
(of  tropes)  or  waterspouts,  and  he  has  had  to  reserve 
his  more  terrific  tornadoes  for  a  future  work.  I  have  his 
permission  to  mention  the  name  of  this  future  work  ;  it  is 
the  '  Titan.'  In  this  work  he  means  to  be  an  absolute 
Hecla,  and  shatter  the  ice  of  his  country  (and  himself  into 
the  bargain)  to  pieces  ;  like  the  volcanoes  in  Iceland,  he 
will  spout  up  a  column  of  boiling  water  four  feet  in 
diameter  to  a  height  of  eighty-nine  or  ninety  feet  in  the 
air,  and  that  at  such  a  temperature  that  when  this  wet  fire 
pillar  falls  down  again  and  flows  into  the  book  shops,  it 
will  still  be  warm  enough  to  boil  eggs  hard  or  their  mother 
soft.  "  Then  "  (he  always  says — very  sadly  however — 
because  he  sees  what  a  hard  matter  it  is  to  distinguish 
between  full  half  of  our  battling  and  harrying  here  below 
and  a  Jack  Pudding  farce  and  piece  of  utter  buffoonery  and 
nonsense, — also,  that  the  cradle  of  this  life  rocks  us,  and 
etills  us  indeed,  but  carries  us  not  a  step  on  our  way) 
— "  then   may  the  Arbor  Toxicaria  Macassarierms  *  of  the 

*  The  poisonous  Boa  Upas,  beneath  which  one  loses  one's  hair  in  a 
few  minutes. 


PREFACE,  BY  THE  AUTHOR  OP  'HESPERUS.'   137 

Ideal,  beneath  which  I  have  lost  a  little  hair  already,  go  on 
poisoning  me,  and  dispatch  me  to  the  Land  of  the  Ideal. 
At-  all  events,  I  have  knelt  down  and  prayed  nnder 
the  solemnising  soul-elevating  sighing  roar  of  its  death- 
dealing  branches.  And  why  should  there  be  a  hut  made 
ready  for  the  traveller  beside  the  eternal  well  of  truth, 
marked  with  the  title  '  Travellers'  rest,'  if  no  one  ever 
enters  it?"  He  wants,  by  way  of  broad  "flies"  for  his 
life  stage  on  earth,  merely  a  regular,  downright,  rainy 
year  or  two  (two  will  suffice)  ;  for  a  broad,  bright,  open 
sky  overpowers  us,  and  weakens  the  hand's  pen  power  by 
making  the  eyes  over  full.  And  here  the  book-maker 
differs  markedly  from  his  provision-contractor,  the  paper- 
maker,  who  shuts  his  mill  up  precisely  when  the  weather 
is  wet. 

I  should  also  be  glad  if  readers  would  have  the  goodness 
to  go  once  more  through  the  few  chapters  composing  the 
first  book — that  they  may  see  what  they  really  lack ;  and 
indeed  a  book  which  is  not  worth  reading  twice  is  not 
worth  reading  once. 

In  conclusion,  I  (albeit  the  most  inconsiderable  clubbist 
and  vote-possessor  of  all  the  public)  would  fain  incite  the 
author  to  the  production  of  other  seedlings,  suckers,  and 
infantas  of  the  same  stamp,  trusting  that  the  reading 
world  may  form  its  opinion  on  his  work  with  the  same 
careful  favour  and  indulgent  approval  as  I  have  formed 
mine. 

Jean  Paul  Fr.  Richter. 

Hof  in  Voigtland, 
June  5th,  1796. 

Thus  far  my  friend's  preface.  Utterly  absurd  as  it  is, 
my  own  preface,  you  see,  has  got  to  be  concluded  too, 
and  at  the  end  of  it  I  can  but  sign  myself  as  my  aforesaid 
man  Friday  and  namesake  does,  videlicet, 

Jean  Paul  Fr.  Kichter. 

Hof  in  Voigtland, 
June  5th,  1796. 


BOOK   IT. 


CHAPTER  V. 

THE  BROOM  AND  THE  BESOM  AS  PASSION  IMPLEMENTS — THE 
IMPORTANCE  OF  A  BOOKWRITER — DIPLOMATIC  NEGOTIATIONS 
AND  DISCUSSIONS  ON  THE  SUBJECT  OF  CANDLE  SNUFFING — THE 
PEWTER    CUPBOARD — DOMESTIC    HARDSHIPS   AND  ENJOYMENTS. 

Catholics  hold  that  there  were  fifteen  mysteries  in  the 
life  of  Christ — five  of  Joy,  five  of  Woe,  five  of  Glory.  I 
have  carefully  accompanied,  our  hero  through  the  five  joy- 
ful mysteries  of  which  the  Linden  honey-month  of  his 
marriage  has  had  to  tell.  I  now  come  with  him  to  the 
five  mysteries  of  Woe  with  which  the  series  of  the  mysteries 
of  most  marriages  is — concluded.  I  trust,  however,  that 
his  may  yet  he  found  to  contain  the  five  of  Glory  also. 

In  my  first  edition,  I  began  this  book  of  my  hero's 
story  in  an  unconcerned  manner,  with  the  above  sentence 
just  as  if  it  were  literally  correct.  A  second,  and  care- 
fully revised  edition,  however,  renders  it  incumbent  upon 
me  to  add,  as  an  emendation,  that  the  fifteen  mysteries  in 
question  do  not  come  one  after  another,  like  steps  of  stairs, 
or  ancestors  in  a  pedigree,  but  are  shuffled  up  together 
like  good  and  bad  cards  in  a  hand.  Yet,  in  spite  of  this 
shuffling,  the  joy  outbalances  the  sorrow,  at  any  rate  in 
its  duration,  as  has  been  the  case,  indeed,  with  this  terres- 
trial globe,  our  planet  itself,  which  has  survived  several 
last  days,  and  as  a  consequence  still  more  springs,  that 
is  to  say,  re-creations  on  a  smaller  scale.  I  mention  all 
this  to  save  a  number  of  poor  devils  of  readers  from  the 
dreadful  thought  that  they  have  got  to  wade  through 
a  whole  "  Book  II."  full  of  tears,  partly  to  be  read  about, 
partly  to  be  shed  out  of  compassion.  I  am  not  one  of 
those  authors  who,  like  very  rattlesnakes,  can  sit  and 
gaze  upon  thousands  of  charmed  people  running  up 
and  down,  a  prey  to  every  kind  of  agitation,  suspense, 


140       JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.   [BOOK  IL, 

and  anxiety,  till  his  time  conies  to  spring  upon  them  and 
swallow  them  up. 

When  Siebenkass  awoke  in  the  morning,  he  at  once 
packed  the  devil  of  jealousy,  the  marriage  devil,  off  to 
the  place  where  all  other  devils  dwell.  For  a  calming 
sleep  lowers  the  pulse  of  the  soul's  fever — the  grains 
thereof  are  fever-bark  for  the  cold  fever  of  hate,  and  also 
for  the  hot  fever  of  love.  Indeed  he  put  down  the  tracing 
board,  and  with  a  pantograph  made  a  correct,  re- 
duced copy  of  his  yesterday's  free  translation  of  the 
Engelkrautian  countenance,  and  blackened  it  nicely. 
When  it  was  done,  he  said  to  his  wife,  for  very  love  of 
her,  "  We'll  send  him  the  profile  this  morning,  at  once. 
It  may  be  a  good  long  while  before  he  comes  to  fetch  it." 
44  Oh  yes  I  he  won't  be  here  till  Wednesday,  and  by  that 
time  he'll  have  forgotten  all  about  it."  "  But  I  could 
bring  him  here  sooner  than  that,  "  Siebenka?s  answered ; 
"  I  need  only  send  him  the  Kussian  Trinity  dollar  of  1*379 
to  get  changed  for  me ;  he  won't  send  me  a  farthing  of  the 
money — he'll  bring  it  himself  as  he  always  has  done  all 
through  Leibgeber's  collection."  "Or  you  might  send  him 
the  dollar  and  the  picture  both,"  said  Lenette,  "  he  would 
like  it  better."  "Which  would  he  like  better?"  he 
asked.  She  didn't  see  exactly  what  answer  to  make  to 
this  ridiculous  question  (whether  she  meant  the  stamped 
face  or  the  pictured  one)  sprung  upon  her  like  a  mine  in 
this  sort  of  way,  and  got  out  of  her  difficulty  by  saying, 
"  Well,  the  things,  of  course."  He  spared  her  any  further 
catechising. 

The  Schulrath,  however,  sent  nothing  but  an  answer 
to  the  effect  that  he  was  beside  himself  with  delight 
at  the  charming  presents,  and  would  come  to  express 
his  thanks  in  person,  and  to  settle  up  with  the  advocate, 
by  the  end  of  the  following  week  at  latest.  The  little 
dash  of  bitter  flavour  which  was  perceptible  to  the  taste 
in  this  unexpected  answer  of  the  too  happy  Sclmlrath, 
was  by  no  means  sweetened  away  by  the  arrival  at  this 
moment  of  the  messenger  of  the  Inheritance  Office,  with 
Heimlicher  von  Blaise's  first  proceedings  in  the  matter 
of  the  plaint  lodged  against  him,  consisting  of  a  petition 
for  three  weeks'  grace  within  which   to  ludge  answers, 


CHAP.  V.J      FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND   THORN  PIECES.       141 

a  delay  which  the  Court  had  readily  accorded.  Siebenkses, 
as  his  own  poor's  advocate,  lived  in  the  sure  and  certain 
hope  that  the  promised  land  of  inheritance,  flowing 
with  milk  and  honey,  would  be  reached  by  his  children, 
though  he  would  in  all  probability  have  long  ere  that 
time  peri.vhed  in  the  wilderness  of  the  law ;  for  justice 
is  given  to  recompensing  the  children,  and  the  children's 
children,  for  the  uprightness  of  the  fathers,  and  for 
the  goodness  of  their  cause.  It  was  more  or  less  in 
convenient,  at  the  same  time,  to  have  nothing  to  live 
upon  during  one's  own  lifetime.  The  Russian  Trinity 
dollar — for  which  the  Schulrath  hadn't  even  paid  as  yet 
— couldn't  be  lived  upon,  and  there  were  but  one  or  two 
queue  ducats  remaining  of  the  treasury  chest  provided 
by  Leibgeber,  for  the  carrying  on  of  operations  against 
the  Heimlicher.  This  gold  coin  and  those  few  silver 
ones  were  (although  I  have  said  nothing  about  it  till  now) 
the  entire  money  contents  remaining  in  the  Leibgeberian 
saviour's  scrip,  and  indeed  none  but  a  true  disciple  and 
follower  of  the  Saviour  could  be  expected  to  hold  out 
upon  them.  My  silence  on  this  matter  of  the  emptying  of 
the  coin  cabinet  may  perhaps  be  accepted  in  evidence 
of  the  fact  that  I  try  as  much  as  I  can  to  avoid  mentioning 
anything  calculated  to  give  my  readers  pain. 

"  Oh  !  I  shall  get  on  somehow  or  other,"  said  Siebenkses 
quite  gleefully,  as  he  set  to  work  harder  than  ever  at  his 
writing,  with  the  view  of  getting  a  considerable  haul  of 
money  into  the  house,  at  the  earliest  moment  possible, 
in  the  6hape  of  payment  for  his  *  Selection  from  the 
Devil's  Papers.' 

But  there  was  a  fresh  purgatorial  fire  now  being  stoked 
and  blown,  till  it  blazed  hotter  and  hotter  about  him. 
I  have  refrained  from  saying  anything  about  the  fire  in 
question  till  now,  though  he  has  been  sitting  roasting  at  it 
since  the  day  before  yesterday,  Lenette  being  the  cook, 
and  his  writing  table  the  larkspit. 

During  the  few  days  when  the  wordless  quarrel  was 
going  on,  he  had  got  into  a  habit  of  listening  with  the 
closest  attention  to  what  Lenette  was  doing,  as  he  sat 
writing  away  at  his  '  Selection  from  the  Devil's  Papers'  ; 
and  this  sent  his  ideas  all  astray.    The  softest  step,  the 


142  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDEICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  IT. 

very  slightest  shake  of  anything  affected  him  just  as  if 
ho  had  had  hydrophobia,  or  the  gout,  and  put  one  or  two 
fine  young  ideas  to  death,  as  a  louder  noise  kills  young 
canaries,  or  silkworms. 

He  controlled  himself  very  well  at  first  He  pointed 
out  to  himself  that  his  wife  really  could  not  help  moving 
about,  and  that  as  long  as  she  hadn't  a  spiritual  or  glorified 
body  and  furniture  to  deal  with,  she  couldn't  possibly  go 
about  as  silently  as  a  sunbeam,  or  as  her  invisible  good  and 
evil  angels  behind  her.  But  while  he  was  listening  to  this 
conn  de  morale,  this  collegium  pietatis  of  his  own,  he  lost  the 
run  of  his  satirical  conceits  and  contexts,  and  his  language 
was  deprived  of  a  good  deal  of  its  sparkle. 

But  the  morning  after  the  silhouette  evening,  when 
their  hearts  had  shaken  hands  and  renewed  the  old 
royal  alliance  of  Love,  he  could  go  much  more  openly  to 
work,  and  so,  as  soon  as  he  had  blackened  the  profile,  and 
had  only  his  own  original  creations  to  go  on  blackening — 
t.  e.  when  he  was  going  to  begin  working  in  his  own  charcoal 
burning  hut,  he  said  to  his  wife,  as  a  preliminary — 

"  If  you  can  help  it,  Lenette,  don't  make  very  much 
noise  to-day.  I  really  can  hardly  get  on  with  my  writing, 
if  you  do — you  know  it's  for  publication." 

She  said  "  I'm  sure  you  can't  hear  me — I  go  about  so 
very  quietly." 

Although  a  man  may  be  long  past  the  years  of  his 
youthful  follies,  yet  in  every  year  of  his  life  there  crop 
up  a  few  weeks  and  days  in  which  he  has  fresh  follies 
to  commit.  It  was  truly  in  a  moment  of  one  of  these  days 
that  Siebenkaes  made  the  request  above  mentioned ;  for 
he  had  now  laid  upon  himself  the  necessity  of  lying  in 
wait  and  watching  to  see  what  Lenette  would  do  in 
consequence  of  it.  She  skimmed  over  the  floor,  and 
athwart  the  various  webs  of  her  household  labours,  with 
the  tread  of  a  spider.  Like  her  sex  in  general,  she  had 
disputed  his  little  point,  merely  for  the  sake  of  disputing 
it,  not  of  doing  what  she  was  asked  not  to  do.  Siebenkasa 
had  to  keep  his  ears  very  much  on  the  alert  to  hear  what 
little  noise  she  did  make,  either  with  her  hands  or  her 
feet — but  he  was  successful,  and  did  hear  the  greater 
part  of  it.    Unless  when  we  are  asleep  we  are  more 


CHAP.  V.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  THORN  FIECES.      143 

attentive  to  a  slight  noise  than  to  a  loud  one ;  and  our 
author  listened  to  her  wherever  she  went,  his  ear  and  his 
attention  going  about  fixed  to  her  like  a  pedometer  where- 
ever  she  moved.  In  short  he  had  to  break  off  in  the 
middle  of  the  satire,  called  "  The  Nobleman  with  the 
Ague,"  and  jump  up  and  cry  to  her  (as  she  went  creeping 
about),  "  For  one  whole  hour  have  I  been  listening  and 
watching  that  dreadful  tripping  about  on  tiptoe.  I  had 
much  rather  you  would  stamp  about  in  a  pair  of  the  iron- 
goled  sandals  people  used  to  wear  for  beating  time  in.* 
Please  go  about  as  you  usually  do,  darling." 

She  complied,  and  went  about  almost  as  she  usually  did. 
He  would  have  very  much  liked  to  have  prohibited  the 
intermediate  style  of  walking,  as  he  had  the  light  and 
the  heavy  ;  but  a  husband  doesn't  care  to  contradict  him- 
self twice  in  one  morning;  once  is  enough.  In  the 
evening  he  asked  her  if  she  would  mind  going  about 
the  house  in  her  stockings  when  he  was  at  work  at  his 
writing.  She  would  find  it  nice  and  cool  for  the  feet. 
"  In  fact,"  he  added,  "  as  I'm  working  all  the  forenoon 
literally  for  our  bread,  it  would  be  well  if  you  would  do 
nothing  that  isn't  absolutely  necessary  while  I  am  at  my 
literary  work." 

Next  morning  he  sat  in  judgment  (mentally')  upon 
everything  that  went  on  behind  his  back,  and  challenged 
it  to  see  if  it  could  produce  the  free-pass  of  necessity — 
going  on  with  his  writing  all  the  time,  but  doing  it 
worse  than  usual.  This  scribbling  martyr  endured  a 
great  many  things  with  as  much  patience  as  he  could 
muster,  but  when  Wendeline  took  to  whisking  the  straw 
under  the  green  painted  marriage  torus  with  a  long 
broom,  the  cross  grew  too  heavy  for  his  shoulder.  It 
happened,  moreover,  that  he  had  been  reading  two  days 
before  in  an  old  Ephemeris  of  scientific  inquirers,  that 
a  clergyman,  of  the  name  of  Johann  Pechmann,  couldn't 
bear  the  sound  of  a  besom — that  it  nearly  took  his  breath 
away,  and  that  he  once  took  to  his  heels  and  bolted 
when  a  crossing  sweeper  accidentally  ran  against  him. 
The  effect  of  his  having    read    this  was,   that  he  was 

*  The  mualcans  among  the  ancients  wore  them. — Bartholin  de  Tib 
Vet  iii.  4. 


144  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  IL 

involuntarily  more  observant  and  intolerant  of  a  cognate 
discomfort.  He  called  out  to  the  domestic  sweeper  in  the 
next  room,  from  his  chair  where  he  sat — 

"  Lenette,  do  not  go  on  scrubbing  and  switching  about 
with  that  besom  of  yours,  it  drives  away  the  whole  of  my 
best  ideas  out  of  my  head.  There  was  an  old  clergyman 
once  of  the  name  of  Pechmann,  who  would  rather  have  been 
condemned  to  sweep  a  crossing  in  Vienna  himself,  than 
to  listen  to  another  sweeping  it — he  would  rather  have 
been  flogged  with  a  birch-broom,  than  have  heard  the 
infernal  sound  of  it  swishing  and  whishing.  How  is 
a  man  to  get  a  coherent  idea,  fit  to  go  to  the  printer  and 
publisher,  into  his  head  with  all  this  sweeping  and 
scrubbing  going  on?" 

Lenette  did  what  every  good  wife,  and  her  lap  dog, 
would  have  done ;  she  left  off  the  noise  by  degrees.  At 
last  she  laid  down  the  besom,  and  merely  whisked  three 
straws  and  a  little  feather  fluff  gently  with  the  hair- 
broom,  from  under  the  bed,  not  making  as  much  noise 
even  as  he  did  with  his  writing.  However  the  editor 
of  the  '  Devil's  Papers'  managed  to  hear  it,  in  a  manner 
beyond  his  fondest  hopes.  He  rose  up,  went  to  the 
bedroom  door  and  called  in  at  the  room,  "  My  darling,  it's 
every  bit  as  hellish  a  torment  to  me  if  I  can  hear  it  at 
all.  You  may  fan  those  miserable  sweepings  with  a  pea- 
cock's feather,  or  a  holy-water  asperger,  or  you  may  puff 
them  away  with  a  pair  of  bellows,  but  I  and  my  poor  book 
must  suffer  and  pay  the  piper  all  the  same." 

"  I'm  quite  done  now,  at  all  events,"  she  said. 

He  set  to  work  ag;iin,  and  gaily  took  up  tne  threads 
of  his  fourth  satire,  "  Concerning  the  five  Monsters  and 
their  receptacles,  whereon  I  at  first  intended  to  subsist." 

Meanwhile  Lenette  gently  closed  the  door,  so  that  he 
was  driven  to  the  conclusion  that  there  was  something  or 
other  going  on  to  annoy  him  again  in  his  Gehenna  and 
place  of  penitence.     He  laid  down  his  pen  and  cried — 

"  Lenette,  I  can't  hear  very  distinctly  what  it  is — but 
you're  up  to  something  or  other  in  there  that  I  can  not 
stand.  For  God's  dear  sake,  stop  it  at  once,  do  put  a 
period  to  my  martyrdom  and  sorrows  of  Werther,  for  thia 
one  day — come  here,  let  me  see  you." 


CHAP.  V.J      FLOWEK,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.     44&*a*  *^ 


She  answered,  all  out  of  breath  with  hard  work — 

"  I'm  not  doing  anything." 

He  got  up  and  opened  the  door  of  his  chamber  of 
torture.  There  was  his  wife  rubbing  away  with  a  piece 
of  grey  flannel,  polishing  up  the  green  rails  of  the  bed. 
The  author  of  this  history  once  lay  sick  of  smallpox  in 
a  bed  of  this  kind,  and  knows  them  well.  But  the  reader 
may  not  be  aware  that  a  green  slumber  cage  of  this  kind 
is  a  good  deal  like  a  magnified  canaries'  breeding  cage 
with  its  latticed  folding  doors  or  portcullises,  and  that 
this  trellis  and  hothouse  for  dreams  is,  though  less  hand- 
some in  appearance,  much  better  for  health  than  our 
heavy  bastille  towers  all  hung  about  with  curtains  which 
keep  away  every  breath  of  fresh  air.  The  advocate 
swallowed  about  half  a  pint  of  bedroom  air,  and  said,  in 
measured  accents — 

"  You're  at  your  brushing  and  sweeping  again,  are  you  ? 
although  yon  know  quite  well  that  I'm  sitting  there 
working  like  a  slave  for  you  and  myself  too,  and  that 
I've  been  writing  away  for  the  last  hour  with  scarcely 
an  idea  in  my  head.  Oh!  my  heavenly  better  half! 
out  with  all  your  cartridges  at  one  shot,  for  God's  sake, 
and  don't  finish  me  off  altogether  with  that  rag  of  yours." 

Lenette,  full  of  astonishment  said,  "  It's  simply  im- 
possible, old  man.  that  you  can  hear  me  in  the  next 
room" — and  polished  away  harder  than  ever.  He  took 
her  hand,  somewhat  hastily,  though  not  roughly,  and  said 
in  a  louder  tone,  "  Come,  get  up  ! — It's  exactly  that  which 
I  complain  of,  that  I  can't  hear  you  in  the  next  room ;  I'm 
obliged  to  rack  my  brains  to  guess  what  you're  at — and 
the  only  ideas  left  in  my  head  are  connected  with  brush- 
ing and  scrubbing,  so  that  all  the  brilliant  notions  which 
I  might  otherwise  be  putting  down  on  paper  are  driven 
away.  My  darling  child,  nobody  could  possibly  sit 
and  work  away  here  more  composedly  and  con+entedly 
than  I,  if  it  were  only  grape-shot  and  canister,  howitzer 
shells,  and  hundred-pounders  that  you  were  banging 
away  with  at  my  back  out  of  these  embrasures  of  yours. 
What  it  is  that  1  really  can  not  stand,  is  a  quiet  noise." 

All  this  talk  having  put  him  a  little  out  of  temper,  he 
fetched  her  out  of  the  room,  rag  and  all,  saying — 

II.  h 


346  JEAN   PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  II. 

"  It  does  seem  a  little  hard  that,  while  I'm  labouring 
away  here  with  all  my  might,  working  myself  almost  to 
death,  to  provide  a  little  entertainment  for  tl  e  reading 
public,  a  regular  bear-baiting  pit  should  be  Btarted  in 
my  own  room,  and  that  an  author's  very  bed  should  be 
turned  into  a  siege-trench,  and  arrows  and  fire-balls  sen 
about  his  ears  out  of  it.  There,  I  shan't  be  writing  while 
we're  at  dinner,  I'll  talk  the  thing  out  at  full  length  with 
you  then." 

At  noon,  then,*  as  he  was  about  to  enter  on  the  subject 
of  the  morning's  tourney,  he  had  first  to  hold  a  prayer- 
tourney.  I  mean  this :  "  prayers  "  do  not,  in  Nurnberg 
and  Kuhschnappel,  mean  a  certain  hereditary  office  and 
service  of  mass  in  a  court  chapel,  but — the  ringing  of  the 
twelve  o'clock  bell.  Now  the  dining-table  of  our  couple 
stood  against  the  wall,  and  was  not  put  in  the  middle  of 
the  floor  except  for  meals.  Well,  Siebenkaes  never  suc- 
ceeded above  twice  during  his  married  life  in  having  this 
table  brought  forward  bi;fore  the  soup  came  in  (for  if 
a  woman  once  forgets  a  thing,  she  goes  on  forgetting  it  a 
thousand  times  running  f),  though  he  preached  his  lungs 
as  dry  as  a  fox's  (which  are  used  for  curing  ours) ;  both 
tsoup  and  table  were  always  moved  together,  after  the 
soup  came  in,  without  the  spilling  of  a  greater  quantity 
of  the  latter  than  one  might  have  used  in  swallowing  a 
pill. 

To-day  this  was  the  case  as  usual.  Siebenkaes  slowly 
chewed  the  pill  which  he  swallowed  with  the  soup.  The 
delay  in  moving  the  table  he  observed  anxiously  (as  if  it 
had  been  a  delay  in  the  arrival  of  an  equinox),  with  a  long 
face  and  slow  breathing,  and  when  the  soup-libation  was 
duly  poured  as  usual,  he  broke  out  as  follows,  in  a  calm 
tone  of  voice,  however — 

*  The  common  German  dinner-time  then. — Tbanslatob. 

+  So  do  men  forget  it,  though  in  a  lesser  degree.  Suppose  a  man 
who  dots  ninety  tilings  every  day,  accurately  remembering  them, 
should  once  <>r  twice  forget  a  ninety-tirst  thing,  he'll  go  on  forgetting 
that  afterwards,  though  he  remembers  all  the  rest.  There's  no  remedy 
for  this  unless  some  person  happens  to  come  in,  or  something  chances 
to  occur  just  at  the  instant  of  forgetting,  and  recalls  the  ninety-first 
thing  to  hifl  iuind.  If  he  once  forgets  to  forget,  he  won't  forget  any 
more. 


CHAP.  V.J       FLOWER,  FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.      147 

"  The  fact  is,  Lenette,  we  are  on  board  a  good  ship.  At 
sea,  you  know,  people  spill  their  soup  because  their  vessel 
rolls  and  pitches — and  ours  is  spilt  for  a  similar  reason. 
See  here,  the  dinner-table  and  the  morning  besom  are  both 
in  a  tale  together;  they  are  two  conspirators  who  will 
blowout  your  husband's  candle — to  use  a  strong  expression 
— before  they  have  done." 

This,  the  exordium  of  his  sermon,  was  followed  by  way 
of  hymn,  by  the  arrival  of  the  town  fool  of  Knhschnappel, 
who  brought  in  a  great  sheet  of  paper  containing  an  invita- 
tation  to  the  shooting  match  on  St.  Andrew's  Day,  the  30th 
of  November.  Every  one  of  us  must,  I  am  sure,  have 
gathered  from  what  has  already  been  said  that  the  only 
money  left  in  the  house  was  the  queue-ducat.  At  the  same 
time,  Siebenkass  couldn't  leave  the  shooting-club,  without 
thereby  granting  to  himself  a  certificate  of  poverty,  a 
testimonium  paupertatis,  in  the  face  of  the  whole  town.  And 
really  a  shooting-ticket  for  this  match  was  almost  as  good 
as  mining  shares  or  East  India  stock  to  a  man  who  was 
as  good  a  shot  as  Siebenkaas.  It  would  also  give  him  an 
opportunity  of  doing  that  public  honour  to  his  wife  which 
she,  as  a  senate  clerk's  daughter  from  Augspurg,  had  a 
right  to  expect.  Unfortunately,  however,  the  grave  man 
of  folly  couldn't  be  got  to  give  change  for  the  curious 
queue-ducat,  particularly  as  Siebenkaes  aroused  his  sus- 
picions with  respect  to  it  himself,  by  saying,  "  This  is  a 
very  good  tail  or  queue-ducat.  I  assure  you.  I  don't  wear 
a  tail  myself,"  he  added,  "  but  that's  no  reason  why  a 
ducat  shouldn't,  if  the  King  of  Prussia  chooses  to  immor- 
talise his  own  by  having  it  stamped  upon  it.  "Wife,  would 
you  get  our  landlord,  the  hairdresser,  to  come  up ;  nobody 
can  know  better  than  he  whether  it's  a  queue-ducat  or  not, 
seeing  he  has  queues  (not  upon  ducats)  in  his  hands  every 
day."  The  pickle-herring  of  Kuhsohnappel  didn't  vouch- 
safe the  ghost  of  a  smile  at  this.  The  hairdresser  came, 
and  declared  it  to  be  a  queue,  and  civilly  took  it  away 
himself  to  get  it  changed.  Hairdressers  can  run ;  in  five 
minutes  he  brought  the  change  for  the  ducat. 

When  the  melancholy  buffoon  had  pocketed  his  portion 
of  it,  Lenette's  face  was  all  over  double  interjections  and 
paarks  of  interrogation ;  wherefore  Siebenkaes  resumed  hia 

l2 


148  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH   EICHTER.      [BOOK  IL 

midday  Bermon.  "  The  principal  prizes,"  he  said,  "  are 
pewter  dishes  and  sums  of  money  for  hitting  the  bird,  and 
mostly  provisions  for  the  other  marks  we  shoot  at.  I  sus- 
pect that  you  and  I  shall  dine  on  St.  Andrew's  Day  upon  a 
nice  piece  of  roast  meat  in  a  new  dish,  both  of  which  I 
shall  have  shot  into  your  kitchen,  if  I  only  take  a  little 
pains.  And  at  all  events  don't  worry  yourself,  darling, 
because  our  money's  nearly  all  gone.  Take  refuge  behind 
me.  I  am  your  sandbag,  your  gabion,  your  shelter  trench, 
and  with  my  rifle,  more  certainly  still  with  my  pen,  I  feel 
pretty  sure  I  shall  keep  the  devil  of  poverty  at  his  distance, 
till  my  precious  guardian  hands  over  my  mother's  property. 
Only  for  God's  sake  don't  let  your  work  interrupt  mine. 
Your  rag  and  your  besom  have  cost  me  at  least  sixteen 
currency  dollars  this  morning.  For  supposing  I  get  eight 
imperial  dollars  a  printed  sheet  for  my  Devilish  Papers 
(counting  the  imperial  dollar  at  ninety  kreuzer) — and  I 
ought  to  get  more — I  should  have  earned  forty-eight  cur- 
rency dollars  this  morning  if  I  had  written  a  (printed) 
sheet  and  a  half.  But  you  see  I  had  to  stop  in  the  middle 
of  it  and  expend  a  great  many  words  upon  you,  for  none  of 
which  1  get  a  single  kreuzer.  You  should  look  upon  me 
as  a  fat  old  spider  stowed  away  in  a  box  to  shrivel  up  in 
time  into  a  precious  gold  nugget  or  jewel.  Whenever  I 
take  a  dip  of  ink  I  draw  a  thread  of  gold  out  of  the  ink 
bottle,  as  I've  often  told  you,  and  (as  the  proverb  says) 
the  morning  hours  have  gold  in  their  mouths  (Morgenstund 
hat  Gold  iui  Mund).  Go  on  with  your  dinner,  and  listen. 
I'll  just  take  this  opportunity  of  explaining  to  you  the 
principal  points  in  which  the  preciousness  of  an  author 
consists,  and  so  give  you  the  key  to  a  good  many  things. 
In  Swabia,  in  Saxony,  and  Pomerania,  there  are  towns  in 
which  there  are  people  who  appraise  authors  as  our  master 
butcher  here  does  beef.  They  are  usually  known  by 
the  name  of  tasters  or  rulers  of  taste,  because  they  try  the 
flavour  of  every  book  as  it  comes  out,  and  then  tell  the 
people  whether  they'll  like  it  or  not.  We  authors  in  our 
irritation  often  call  thrse  people  critics,  but  they  might 
bring  an  action  against  us  for  libel  fur  so  doing.  Now  as 
these  directors  of  taste  seldom  write  books  themselves,  they 
have  all  the  more  time  to  read  and  find  fault  with  other 


CHAP.  V."|      FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND   THORN  PIECES.        149 

people's.    Yet  it  does  sometimes  happen  that  some  of  them 
have  written  bad  books  themselves,  and  consequently  know 
a  bad  book  in  a  moment  when  they  come  across  one. 
Many  become  patron  saints  of  authors  and  of  their  books 
for  the  same  reason  that  St.  John  Nepomuck  became  the 
patron  saint  of  bridges  and  those  who  cross  them ;  because 
he  was  once  thrown  off  one  into  the  water.     Now  these 
scribblings  of  mine  will  be  sent  to  these  gentlemen  as  soon 
as  they  are  in  print  (as  your  hymn-book  is).     And  they'll 
peer  all  through  my  productions  to  see  whether  or  not  I've 
written  them  quite  legibly  and  distinctly  (not  too  large  or 
too  small),  whether  I've  put  any  wrong  letters,  a  little  e 
for  a  big,  or  an  f  instead  of  a  ph,  whether  the  hyphen- 
strokes  are  too  long  or  too  short,  and  all  that  sort  of  thing : 
indeed  they  often  even  give  opinions  about  the  thoughts 
in  the  book  (which  they  have  nothing  to  do  with).     Now 
you  see,  if  you   go  on    scrubbing    and  swishing  about 
with  besoms  behind  me,  I  shall  keep  writing  all  sorts  of 
stuff  and  nonsense,  and  it'll  all  be  printed.   Of  course  that's 
a  terrible  thing  to  happen  to  a  man,  for  these  tasters  tear 
great  frightful  holes  and  wounds  in  the  paper  however 
fine  it  is,  with  nails  as  long  as  fingers  (buttonmakers'  nails 
are  shorter,  but  not  circumcisers'  among  the  Jews),  before 
they  give  it  a  name  to  carry  about  with  it,  as  the  circum- 
cisers do  to  the  Jew  boys.     And  after  this,  they  circulate  a 
slip  of  unsized  paper,  in  which  they  find  fault  with  me,  and 
give  me  a  bad  name,  all  over  the  empire,  in  Saxony  and 
Pomerania,  and  tell  all  Swabia  in  so  many  plain  words 
that  I'm  an  ass.     May  the  devil  confound  their  imperti- 
nence !     This  is  the  sort  of  birching,  you  see,  that  besom 
of  yours  will  be  getting  me  in  for.     Whereas,  if  I  write 
beautifully  and   legibly,  and  with   proper  attention  and 
ability — and  every  sheet  of  my  Devilish  Papers  is  so  written 
— if  I  carefully  weigh  and  consider  every  word  and  every 
page  before  I  write  it,  if  I  am  playful  in  one  place,  in- 
structive in  another,  pleasing  in  all, — in  that  case  I  am 
bound  to  tell  you,  Lenette,  that  the  tasters  are  people  who 
are  quite  capable  of  appreciating  work  of  that  sort,  a-id 
would  think  nothing  of  sitting  down  and  circulating  papers 
in  which  the  least  they  would  say  of  me  would  be  that  I 
had  certainly  brought  something  away  from  college  in  iuy 


150  JEAN   PAUL   FRIEDRICH    RICHTER.       [BOOK  IL 

head,  and  had  a  little  to  show  for  my  studies.  In  short, 
they  would  s«y,  they  hadn't  expected  it  of  me,  and  there 
was  really  something  in  me.  Now  a  panegyric  of  this  kind 
upon  a  husband  is  reflected,  of  course,  upon  his  wife,  and 
when  the  Augspurg  people  are  all  asking  '  Where  does  he 
live,  this  Siebenkaes  whom  everybody's  talking  of?'  there 
are  sure  to  be  lots  of  folks  in  the  Fuggery  to  answer,  *  Oh ! 
he  lives  in  Kuhschnappel,  his  wife  was  a  daughter  of 
Engelkraut,  the  senate  clerk,  and  a  very  good  wife  she 
is  to  him.' " 

"  You've  told  me  all  that  about  bookmaking  hundreds 
of  times,"  she  answered.  "  And  it's  just  what  the  book- 
binder says  too ;  and  I  am  sure  l.e  has  all  the  best  books 
through  his  hands,  binding  them." 

This  allusion  to  his  repetitions  of  himself,  though  not 
meant  ill-tempered ly,  he  didn't  very  much  relish.  In 
fact,  the  habit  had  hitherto  been,  as  it  were,  incubating 
n n perceived  in  him,  as  a  fever  does  in  its  early  stage. 
Husbands,  even  those  who  are  sage  and  of  few  words,  talk 
to  rheir  wives  with  the  same  boundless  liberty  and  un- 
restraint as  they  do  to  their  own  selves  ;  and  a  man  repeats 
himself  to  himself  immeasurably  oftener  than  to  anybody 
else,  and  that  without  so  much  as  observing  that  he  does 
it,  let  alone  taking  any  count  of  how  often.  The  wife, 
however,  both  observes  and  counts ;  accustomed  as  she  is 
to  hear  the  cleverest  (and  most  unintelligible)  remarks 
from  her  husband's  lips  daily,  she  can't  help  remembering 
them  when  they  occur  again. 

The  hairdresser  reappeared  unexpectedly,  bringing  a 
fleeting  cloud  with  him.  He  said  he  had  been  to  all  the 
poor  devils  in  the  house  to  see  if  he  could  get  as  much  of 
the  Martinmas  rent  out  of  them  in  advance  as  would  pay 
his  subscription  to  the  shooting  match,  but  that  they  were 
a  set  of  church  mice  and  he  hadn't  succeeded.  The  whole 
garrison  of  them  were  naturally  unequal  to  the  payment 
of  an  impost  of  this  description  six  whole  weeks  before  it 
was  due,  inasmuch  as  the  majority  of  them  didn't  see  how 
thoy  were  to  pay  it  when  it  was  due.  So  the  Saxon  came 
to  the  grandee  of  his  house,  to  the  "  Lord  of  Ducats  "  as 
he  styled  the  advocate.  Siebenkaes  couldn't  find  in  his 
heart  to  disappoint  the  patient  soul  with  another  "  no  "  on 


CHAP.  V.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       151 

the  top  of  those  he  had  borne  so  good-humouredly ;  hia 
wife  and  he  scraped  together  the  little  small  change  they 
had  left  out  of  the  ducat,  and  sent  him  away  rejoicing 
with  half  of  the  rent,  three  gulden.  All  they  had  left 
for  themselves  was — the  question  what  they  should  do  for 
light  in  the  evening ;  for  there  weren't  even  a  couple  of 
groschen  in  the  house  to  get  half  a  pound  of  candles,  and 
there  were  no  candles  in  natura. 

I  cannot  say  that  he  here  turned  deadly  pale,  or  fainted, 
or  began  to  rave.  Praise  be  lo  every  manly  soul  who  has 
drunk  the  icy  whey  of  stoicism  for  only  half  a  spring,  and 
does  not  fall  down  paralysed  and  frozen,  like  a  woman, 
before  the  chill  spectre  of  penury.  In  an  age  which  has 
had  all  its  strongest  sinews  cut  through  except  the  uni- 
versal one,  money,  any  diatribe,  even  the  most  extravagant, 
against  riches,  is  nobler  and  more  useful  than  the  most 
accurately  just  depreciation  of  poverty.  For  pasquinades 
on  gold  dirt  are  agreeable  to  the  rich,  reminding  them 
that  though  their  riches  may  take  to  themselves  wings, 
true  happiness  does  not  depend  thereon ;  while  the  poor 
derive  from  them  not  bitterer  feeling  merely,  but  also  the 
sweeter  satisfaction  of  conquering  the  same.  All  that  is 
base  in  man — thoughts,  fancies,  what  we  look  on  as  being 
examples — all  join  in  one  chorus  in  praise  of  gold ;  why 
should  we  desire  to  deprive  poverty  of  her  true  reserve 
force,  her  chevaliers  d'honneur,  philosophy  and  beggars' 
pride  ? 

The  first  thing  Siebenkaes  opened  was  not  his  mouth,  but 
the  door,  and  then  the  pewter  cupboard  in  the  kitchen, 
from  which  he  carefully  and  with  a  good  deal  of  gravity 
took  down  a  bell-shaped  tureen  and  three  pewter  plates, 
and  put  them  on  a  chair.  Lenette  could  no  longer  stand 
by  in  silence ;  she  clasped  her  hands  and  said  in  a  faint 
voice  of  shame,  "  Merciful  Providence  !  is  it  come  to  selling 
our  dishes  ?" 

"  I'm  only  going  to  turn  them  into  silver,"  he  said ;  "  as 
kings  make  church  bells  into  dollars,  so  shall  we  make  our 
bell-dishes  into  coin.  There's  nothing  you  need  be  ashamed 
about  in  converting  trash  of  table  ware,  the  coffins  of 
beasts,  into  currency,  when  Duke  Christian  of  Brunswick 
turned   a  king's  silver  coffin  into  dollars  in  1662.     Is  a 


152  JEAN   PAUL  FRIEDEICH   RICHTER.        [BOO*  II. 

plate  an  apostle,  do  you  think?  Great  monarchs  hare 
taken  many  an  apostle,  if  he  happened  to  be  a  silver  one, 
Hugo  of  St.  Caio  and  others  as  well,  divided  them  (as  it 
■were)  into  chapters,  verses,  and  legends,  sent  them  to  the 
mint,  and  then  dispatched  them  off  all  over  the  -world  in 
that  analysed  form." 

"Ah!  stupid  nonsense,"  she  answered. 

Some  few  readers  will  probably  say  "  What  else  was  it  ?" 
and  I  ought  long  ago  to  have  apologized,  perhaps,  for  the 
style  of  speech,  so  incomprehensible  to  Lenette,  which 
the  advocate  makes  use  of. 

He  justified  it  satisfactorily  to  himself  by  the  considera- 
tion that  his  wife  always  had  some  distant  idea  of  what  he 
was  talking  about,  even  when  he  made  use  of  the  most 
learned  technical  expressions,  and  the  farthest-fetched 
plays  upon  words,  because  of  its  being  good  practice,  and 
of  his  liking  to  hear  himself  do  it.  "  Women,"  he  would 
repeat,  "have  a  distant  and  dim  comprehension  of  all 
these  things,  and  therefore  don't  waste,  in  long  tedious 
efforts  to  discover  the  precise  signification  of  these  unin- 
telligibilities.  precious  time  which  might  be  better  em- 
ployed." This,  I  may  observe,  is  not  much  encouragement 
for  Reinhold's  '  Lexicon  to  Jean  Paul's  Levana,'  nor  for 
me  personally  either,  in  some  senses. 

"  Ah !  stuff  and  nonsense  "  had  been  Lenette's  answer. 
Firmian  merely  asked  her  to  bring  the  pewter  into  the 
sitting-room,  and  he  would  talk  the  matter  over  sensibly. 
But  he  might  as  well  have  set  forth  his  reasons  before  a 
woman's  skin  stuffed  with  straw.  What  she  chiefly  blamed 
him  for,  was  that  by  his  contribution  to  the  shooting-club 
purse  he  had  emptied  hers.  And  thus  she  herself  suggested 
to  him  the  best  answer  he  could  have  made.  He  said,  "It 
was  an  angel  that  put  it  in  my  head ;  because  on  St. 
Andrew's  Day  I  shall  regain  everything  that  1  turn  into 
silver  now,  and  repewterise  it  immediately.  To  please 
you,  I  shall  keep  not  only  the  tureen  and  the  plates  I  get 
as  piizes,  but  all  the  rest  of  the  pewter  ware,  and  put  it  all 
into  your  cupboard.  I  assure  you  I  had  madenp  my  mind 
before  to  sell  all  my  prizes." 

What  was  to  be  done,  then  ?  There  was  no  help  for  it. 
This  banished  and  expatriated  table  ware  was  lowered  in 


CHAP.  V.J      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND   THORN  PIECES,        153 

the  darkness  of  evening  into  old  Sabel's  basket — and  she 
■was  celebrated  all  over  the  town  for  transacting  this  sort 
of  commission  agency  or  transfer  business,  with  as  discreet 
a  silence  as  if  she  were  dealing  in  stolen  gold.  "Nobody 
gets  it  out  of  me,"  she  would  say,  "  whose  the  things  are. 
The  treasurer,  who'n  dead  and  gone  poor  man — you  know 
I  sold  everything  he  had  in  the  world  for  him— he  often 
used  to  say  there  whs  never  the  equal  of  me." 

But,  my  poor  dear  young  couple,  I  fear  this  Sabbath  * 
or  "  Descent  of  the  Saviour  into  Hades  "  is  but  little  likely 
to  help  you  long,  in  that  antechamber  of  hell  which  you've 
got  into.  The  flames  are  gone  from  about  you  to-day, 
certainly,  and  a  cool  sea-breeze  is  refreshing  you,  but  to- 
morrow and  the  day  after  the  old  smoke  and  the  old  fire 
will  be  blazing  at  your  hearts !  However,  I  don't  v?ant 
to  put  any  restrictions  upon  your  trade  in  tin.  We're 
quite  right  to  have  a  good  dinner  to-day  though  we  know 
perfectly  well  we  shall  be  just  every  bit  as  hungry 
to-morrow  again. 

So  the  next  morning  Siebenkses  begged  that  he  might 
be  allowed  to  be  all  the  quieter  that  day  because  he  had 
been  obliged  to  talk  so  much  the  day  before.  Our  dear 
Lenette,  who  was  a  live  washing-machine  and  scouring- 
mill,  and  in  whose  e}'es  the  washing  bill  and  the  bill  of 
fare  had  much  of  the  weight  of  a  confessor's  certificate, 
would  sooner  have  let  go  her  hold  of  everything  in  the 
world — her  husband  included — than  of  the  duster  and  the 
besom.  She  thought  this  was  merely  his  obstinate  persis- 
tency, whereas  it  was  really  her  own,  in  blowing  the  organ 
bellows  and  thundering  away  upon  her  pedal  reed  stops 
right  behind  her  author's  back  during  the  morning  hours, 
whose  mouths  had  two  kinds  of  gold  in  them  for  him, 
namely  gold  from  the  golden  age,  and  ordinaiy  metallic 
gold.  She  might  have  played  with  a  thirty-two  feet  stop  out 
in  the  afternoon  as  long  as  she  liked,  but  she  wasn't  to  be 
got  out  of  her  usual  daily  routine.  A  woman  is  the  most 
heterogeneous  compound  of  obstinate  will  and  self-sacrifice 
that  I  have  ever  met  with  ;  she  would  let  her  head  be  cut 

*  According  to  the  Rabbin,  the  pains  of  the  damned  are  intermitted 
on  the  Sabbath;  the  Christians  hold  tliut  the  same  was  the  cum 
during  the  descent  into  Hades. 


154  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.         [BOOK   IL 

off  by  the  headsman  of  Paris  for  her  husband's  sake,  very 
likely,  but  not  a  single  hair  of  it.  And  she  can  deny  her- 
self to  almost  any  extent  for  others'  good,  but  not  one  bit 
for  her  own.  She  can  forego  sleep  for  three  nights  running 
for  a  sick  person,  but  not  one  minute  of  a  nap  before 
bed-time,  to  ensure  herself  a  better  night's  sleep  in  bed. 
Neither  the  souls  of  the  blest  nor  butterflies,  though  neither 
of  them  possess  stomachs,  can  eat  less  than  a  woman  going  to 
a  ball  or  to  her  wedding,  or  than  one  cooking  for  her  guests  ; 
but  if  it's  only  her  doctor  and  her  own  health  that  forbid 
her  some  Esau's  mess  or  other,  she  eats  it  that  instant. 
Now  men's  sacrifices  are  all  just  turned  the  opposite  way. 

Lenette,  impelled  by  two  imposing  forces,  what  she  was 
asked  to  do  and  what  she  wanted  to  do,  tried  to  find  the 
feminine  line  of  the  resultant,  and  hit  upon  the  middle 
course  of  stopping  her  scouring  and  sweeping  as  long  as 
he  was  sitting  at  his  writing.  But  the  moment  he  got  up, 
and  went  to  the  piano  for  a  couple  of  minutes,  or  to  the 
window,  or  across  the  doorstep,  that  instant  back  she 
would  bring  her  washing  and  scrubbing  instruments  of  tor- 
ture into  the  room  again.  Siebenkses  wasn't  long  in  be- 
coming cognisant  of  this  terrible  alternation  and  relieving- 
of-the-guard  between  her  besom  and  his  (satirical)  one ; 
and  the  way  she  watched  and  lay  in  wait  for  his  move- 
ments drove  all  the  ideas  in  his  head  higgledy-piggledy. 
At  first  he  bore  it  with  really  very  great  patience,  as  great 
as  ever  a  husband  has,  patience,  that  is,  which  lasts  for  a 
short  time.  But  after  reflecting  for  a  considerable  period  in 
silence,  that  the  public,  as  well  as  he,  were  sufferers  by 
this  room-cleaning  business,  and  that  all  posterity  was,  in 
a  manner,  watching  and  hanging  upon  every  stroke  of  that 
besom,  which  might  do  its  work  just  as  well  in  the  after- 
noon when  he  would  only  be  at  his  law  papers — the  tumour 
of  his  anger  suddenly  broke,  and  he  grew  mad,  i.e.  madder 
than  he  was  before,  and  ran  up  to  her  and  cried — 

"  Oh !  this  is  the  very  devil !  At  it  again,  eh !  I  see 
what  you're  about.  You  watch  till  I  get  up  from  the 
table!  Just  be  kind  enough  to  finish  me  off  at  once; 
hunger  and  worry  will  kill  me  before  Easter,  whether  or 
not.  Good  God !  It's  a  thing  I  really  can  not  comprehend. 
She  sees  as  well  as  possible  that  mv  book  is  ««"  larder — 


CHAP.  V.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  THORN   PIECES.       155 

that  there  are  whole  rations  of  bread  in  every  page  of  it — 
yet  she  holds  my  hands  the  entire  morning,  so  that  I  can't 
do  a  line  of  it.  Here  I've  been  sitting  on  the  nest  all  this 
time  and  only  hatched  as  far  as  letter  E,  where  I  describe 
the  ascent  of  Justice  to  heaven.     Oh  !  Lenette !  Lenette ! " 

"  Very  well,"  said  Lenette,  "  it's  all  the  same  whatever 
I  do,  it's  sure  to  be  wrong;  do  let  me  tidy  the  house 
properly,  like  any  other  woman." 

And  she  asked  him,  in  a  simple  manner,  why  it  was  that 
the  bookbinder's  little  boy  (the  language  is  mine,  not  hers), 
who  played  fantasias  the  whole  day  long  upon  a  child's  toy 
fiddle,  composing  and  enjoying  whole  Alexander's  Feasts 
upon  it,  didn't  disturb  him  with  his  screeching  wnhar- 
ni<>nical  progressions — and  how  he  bore  the  chimney- 
sweep's sweeping  the  other  day  so  much  better  than  he 
did  her  sweeping  of  the  room.  And  as  he  couldn't  quite 
manage  to  condense,  just  in  a  moment,  into  few  words  the 
demonstration  of  the  magnitude  of  the  difference  which 
existed  between  these  things,  he  found  it  better  to  get  into 
a  rage  again,  and  say — 

"  Do  you  suppose  I'm  going  to  make  a  great  long  speech 
and  explanation  gratis,  and  lose  dollar  after  dollar  at  my 
work  ?  Himmel  !  Kreuz  !  Wetter  !  The  municipal  code, 
the  Koman  pandects,  forbid  a  coppersmith  even  to  enter  a 
street  where  a  professor  is  working,  and  here's  my  own 
wife  harder  than  an  old  jurist — and  not  only  that— she's 
the  coppersmith  herself.  I'll  tell  you  what  it  is,  Lenette, 
1  shall  really  speak  to  the  Schulrath  about  this."  This 
did  a  great  deal  of  service. 

The  produce  of  the  Trinity  dollar  here  arrived  before 
the  Schulrath  ;  a  piece  of  polite  attention  which  no  one 
would  have  expected  from  a  man  of  so  much  learning  and 
knowledge.  No  doubt  all  my  readers  will  be  as  much  de- 
lighted as  if  they  were  husbands  of  Lenette  themselves  at 
the  fact  that  she  was  a  perfect  angel  all  the  afternoon  ;  her 
hands  made  no  more  noise  at  their  work  than  her  fingers 
or  her  needle  ;  she  even  put  off  the  doing  of  several  things 
which  were  not  necessary.  She  accompanied  a  sister  in 
the  oratorical  art,  who  came  in  with  a  divine  bonnet  (in 
her  hands,  to  be  altered),  all  the  way  down  stairs,  not 
so  much  out  of  politeness  as  thoughtfulness,  that  all  the 


156  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  IL 

points  of  principal  importance  connected  with  the  doing 
up  of  the  bonnet,  which  had  already  been  settled,  migLi. 
be  gone  over  again  two  or  three  times  out  of  the  advocate's 
hearing. 

This  touched  the  old  noise-hunter,  and  went  to  the  weak 
and  tender  spot  in  him,  his  heart.  He  sought  long  in  him- 
self for  a  fitting  thank-offering  in  return,  till  he  at  last  hit 
upon  quite  a  new  sort  of  one. 

"  Listen,  child,"  he  said,  taking  her  hand  very  affection- 
ately;  "wouldn't  it  be  more  reasonable  in  me  if  I  were  to 
amuse  myself  with  my  writing  in  the  evening  ?  I  mean, 
if  the  husband  were  to  do  his  creating  at  a  time  when  the 
wife  had  no  washing  to  do.  Just  think  what  a  life  of 
nectar  and  ambrosia  that  would  be  ;  we  should  sit  opposite 
to  each  other  with  a  candle  between  us — you  at  your  sew- 
ing, I  at  my  writing — the  other  people  in  the  house  would 
all  have  their  work  done  and  be  at  their  beer — of  course 
there  wouldn't  be  customers  with  bonnets  coming  at  that 
time  of  night  to  make  themselves  visible  and  audible.  The 
evenings  will  be  getting  longer  too,  and  of  course  I  shall 
have  the  more  time  for  my  writing  fun.  but  we  need  say 
nothing  about  that  now.  What  do  you  think,  or  what  do 
you  say  (if  you  like  the  expression  better),  to  this  new 
style  of  life  ?  Remember  too,  that  we're  quite  rich  again 
now — the  Russian  Trinity  dollar  is  like  so  much  found 
money." 

"  Oh !  it  will  be  delightful,"  she  said,  "  I  shall  be  able 
to  do  all  my  household  work  in  the  morning,  as  a  proper 
reasonable  housekeeper  should." 

"  Yes,  just  so,"  he  answered,  "  I  shall  write  away 
quietly  at  my  satires  all  morning,  then  wait  till  evening, 
and  go  on  where  I  left  off." 

The  evening  of  nectar  and  ambrosia  came  duly  on,  and 
was  quite  without  a  rival  among  all  evenings  that  had 
gone  before  it.  A  young  married  couple,  sitting  one  on 
each  side  of  a  table,  working  away  quietly  at  their  work, 
with  a  candle  between  them,  have  a  considerable  notion 
what  happiness  is.  He  was  all  happy  thoughts  and  kisses; 
she  all  smiles,  and  what  little  noise  she  made  with  the 
frying-pan  seemed  no  louder  to  hiui  than  what  she  made 
with  her  needle.      "  When  people    are    earning  double 


CHAP.  V.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.      157 

working-pay  by  the  light  of  one  candle,"  he  said,  greatly 
delighted  at  the  domestic  reformation,  "  they  needn't,  as 
far  as  I  see,  restrict  themselves  to  a  miserable  dip,  the 
thickness  of  a  worm,  which  they  can  see  nothing  by, 
unless  it  be  the  wretchedness  of  its  own  light.  To-morrow 
we'll  set  up  a  mould  candle,  and  no  more  about  it." 

As  I  take  some  credit  to  myself  for  selecting  for  narra- 
tion in  this  story  such  events  only  as  are  of  universal 
interest,  it  will  be  bufficient  cursorily  to  mention  that 
the  mould  candle  duly  appeared  next  evening,  and  kindled 
a  feeble  strife,  because,  apropos  of  this  candle,  the  advocate 
once  more  brought  forward  a  new  theory  of  his,  concern- 
ing the  lighting  of  candles.  He  held  the  somewhat 
schismatic  opinion  that  the  rational  way  of  lighting  all 
candles,  more  particularly  thick  ones,  was  to  light  them 
at  the  thick  end,  and  not  at  the  top  or  thin  end ;  and  that 
this  was  the  reason  of  there  being  two  wicks  projecting 
from  every  candle.  "  A  law  of  combustion,"  he  would 
add,  "  in  support  of  which  I  need  only  refer  (at  least  for 
women  of  sense)  to  the  self-evident  truth  that,  when  a 
candle  is  burning  down,  it  keeps  growing  larger  and  larger 
at  its  lower  extremity — just  as  people  who  are  burning 
down  from  debauchery  grow  thicker  at  theirs,  with  fat 
and  dropsy.  If  we  light  the  candle  at  the  top,  we  find 
the  result  to  be  a  useless  lump,  plug,  or  stump  of  tallow 
running  all  over  our  candlestick.  Whereas,  if  we  light 
it  at  the  bottom,  the  liquefied  grease  from  the  thick  end 
wraps  itself  gradually  and  Avith  the  most  exquisite  sym- 
metry all  over  the  thinner  end  as  if  feeding  it,  and  equal- 
ising its  proportions." 

In  reply  to  which,  Lenette,  with  some  force,  adduced 
Shaftesbury's  touchstone  of  truth,  ridicule.  u  Why,  every- 
body that  came  in  of  an  evening,  and  noticed  that  I  had 
put  my  candle  upside  down  in  the  candlestick,  would 
burst  out  laughing ;  and  it  would  be  the  wife  that  every- 
body would  blame."  So  that  a  mutual  treaty  of  peace  had 
to  put  a  period  to  this  battle  of  the  candle,  to  the  effect  that 
he  should  light  his  candle  at  the  bottom,  and  she  hers  at 
the  top.  And  for  the  present,  as  the  candle  commou  to 
both  parties  happened  to  be  thick  at  the  top,  he  agreed  to 
admit,  without  objection,  the  erroneous  method  cf  lighting. 


158  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  II. 

However,  the  Devil,  who  crosses  and  blesses  himself  at 
euch  treaties  of  peace,  managed  so  to  play  his  cards,  that 
on  this  very  day  Siebenkees  chanced,  in  his  reading,  to  come 
upon  the  touching  anecdote  of  the  younger  Pliny's  wife 
holding  the  lamp  for  her  husband  that  he  might  see  to 
write.  And  it  occurred  to  him  that,  now  that  he  was 
getting  along  so  swimmingly  with  his  selection  from  the 
said  Devil's  Papers,  it  would  be  a  splendid  arrangement, 
and  save  him  many  interruptions,  if  Lenette  would  snuff 
the  candle  always  instead  of  his  doing  it  himself. 

"Of  course,"  said  she,  "I  shall  be  delighted."  The 
first  fifteen  or  twenty  minutes  passed,  and  everything 
seemed  to  be  all  right. 

The  above  period  having  elapsed,  he  cocked  up  his  chin 
towards  the  candle,  by  way  of  reminder  to  her  to  snuif  it. 
Next,  he  gently  touched  the  snuffers  with  the  tip  of  his  pen, 
with  the  like  object,  not  saying  anything  however;  and  a 
little  while  after  that,  he  moved  the  candlestick  a  little  bit, 
and  said  softly,  "  The  candle."  Matters  now  began  to 
assume  a  more  serious  aspect ;  he  began  to  observe  and 
watch  with  greater  attention  the  gradual  obscuration  of 
his  paper,  and  consequently  the  very  snuffers  which,  in 
Lenette's  hands,  had  promised  to  throw  so  much  light  on 
his  labours,  became  the  means  of  impeding  his  progress 
quite  as  effectually  as  the  crabs  did  Hercules  in  his  battle 
with  the  hydra.  The  two  wretched  ideas,  "  snuff  "  and 
"  snuffers,"  took  bodily  shape,  and  danced  hand  in  hand, 
with  a  sprightly  pertness  up  and  down  on  every  letter  of 
his  most  biting  satires.  "  Lenette,"  he  had  soon  to  say 
again,  "  please  to  amputate  that  stupid  black  stump  there, 
on  both  our  accounts." 

"  Dear  me,  have  I  been  forgetting  it  ? "  she  said,  and 
snuffed  it  in  a  great  hurry. 

Readers  of  a  historical  turn — such  as  I  should  wish 
mine  to  be — can  now  see  that  things  couldn't  but  get 
worse  and  worse,  and  more  and  more  out  of  joint.  He  had 
often  to  stop,  making  letters  a  yard  or  so  in  length,  wait- 
ing till  some  beneficent  hand  should  remove  the  black 
thorn  from  the  rose  of  light,  till,  at  length,  he  broke  out 
with  the  word  "Snuff!"  Then  he  took  to  varying  his 
verbs,  saying,  "Enlighten  !"  or  "Behead  !  "  or  "  ^.'ip-off.^ 


CHAP.  V.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND   THORN   PIECES.        159 

Or  he  endeavoured  to  introduce  an  agreeable  variety  by 
using  other  forms  of  speech,  such  as  "The  candle's  cap, 
Capmaker  ;  "  "  There's  a  long  spot  in  the  sun  again  ;  "  or, 
"  This  is  a  charming  chiaroscuro,  well  adapted  for  night 
thoughts  in  a  beautiful  Correggio-night ;  but  snuff  away 
all  the  same." 

At  last,  shortly  before  supper,  when  the  charcoal  stack  in 
the  flame  had  really  attained  a  great  height,  he  inhaled  half 
a  river  of  air  into  his  lungs,  and,  slowly  dropping  it  out 
again,  said,  in  a  grimly  mild  manner,  "  You  don't  snuff  a 
bit — as  far  as  I  can  see,  the  black  funereal  pyre  might 
rise  up  to  the  ceiling  fur  all  you  would  care.  All  right ! 
I  prefer  to  be  the  candle-snuffer  of  this  theatre  myself  till 
6upper-time ;  and  while  we're  at  supper  I  shall  just  say  to 
you,  as  a  rational  man,  what  there  is  to  say  on  the  sub- 
ject."    "Oh  !  yes,  please,"  she  said,  quite  delighted. 

When  she  had  set  four  eggs  on  the  table,  two  for  each, 
he  commenced :  "  You  see,  I  had  been  looking  forward  to 
my  working  at  night  being  attended  with  several  advan- 
tages, because  I  thought  you  would  have  managed  this 
easy  little  task  of  snuffing  the  candle  always  at  the  right 
time,  as  a  "Roman  lady  of  high  rank  made  herself  do  duty 
as  a  candlestick  for  her  celebrated  husband,  I'liny  junior 
(to  use  a  commercial  expression),  and  held  his  light  for 
him.  I  was  mistaken,  it  appears;  for,  unfortunately,  I 
can't  write  with  my  toes  under  the  table,  like  a  person 
with  no  arms,  nor  yet  in  the  dark,  as  a  clairvoyant  might. 
The  only  use  the  candle  is  to  me,  in  the  circumstances,  is 
that  it  serves  as  an  Epictetus  lamp,  enabling  me  to  get 
some  practice  in  stoicism  It  had  often  as  much  as  twelve 
inches  of  eclipse,  like  a  sun,  and  I  wished  in  vain,  darling, 
for  an  invisible  eclipse — such  as  frequently  occurs  in  the 
heavens.  The  cursed  slag  of  our  candle  hatches  just  these 
obscure  ideas  and  gloomy  night  thoughts,  which  authors 
(too)  often  have.  Whereas,  gracious  goodness !  if  you  had 
only  snufl'ed,  as  you  ought  to  have  done " 

"  You're  in  fun,  are  you  not?"  she  asked.  " My  stitches 
are  much  smaller  than  your  strokes,  and  I'm  sure  I  saw 
quite  well." 

"  Well,  dear,"  he  continued,  "  I'll  proceed  to  point  out 
to  you  that,  on  the  grounds  of  psychology  and  mental 


160  IEAN   PAUL   FRIEDRICH   EICHTER.      [BOOK  II. 

science,  it  isn't  that  it  matters  a  bit  whether  a  person  who 
is  writing  and  thinking  sees  a  little  more  or  less  distinctly 
or  not,  it's  the  snuffers  and  the  snuff  that  he  can't  get  out 
of  his  head,  and  they  get  behind  his  spiritual  legs,  trip  up 
his  ideas,  and  stop  him,  just  as  a  log  does  a  horse  hobbled 
to  it.  For  even  when  you've  only  just  snuffed  the  candle, 
and  I'm  in  the  full  enjoyment  of  the  light,  I  begin  to  look 
out  for  the  instant  when  you'll  do  it  next.  Now,  this 
watching  being  in  itself  neither  visible  nor  audible,  can  b> 
nothing  but  a  thought,  or  idea ;  and  as  every  thought  has 
the  property  of  occupying  the  mind  to  the  exclusion  of  all 
others,  it  follows  that  all  an  author's  other  and  more 
valuable  ideas  are  sent  at  once  to  the  dogs.  But  this  is 
by  no  means  the  worst  of  the  affair.  I,  of  course,  ought 
not  to  have  had  to  occupy  my  head  with  the  idea  of 
candle-snuffing  any  more  than  with  that  of  snuff-taking ; 
but  when  the  ardently  longed-for  snuffing  never  comes  off 
at  all,  the  black  smut  on  the  ripe  ear  of  light  keeps 
growing  longer  —  the  darkness  deepening  —  a  regular 
funereal  torch  feebly  casting  its  ray  upon  a  half  dead 
writer,  who  can't  drive  from  his  head  the  thought  of  the 
conjugal  hand  which  could  snap  all  the  fetters  asunder 
with  one  single  snip; — then,  my  deare.»t  Lenette,  it's  not 
easy  for  the  said  writer  to  help  writing  like  an  ass,  and 
stamping  like  a  dromedary.  At  least,  1  express  my  own 
opinion  and  experience  on  the  subject !" 

On  this,  she  assured  him  that,  it  he  were  really  serious, 
she  would  take  great  care  to  do  it  properly  next  evening. 

And,  in  truth,  this  story  must  give  her  credit  for  keep- 
ing her  word,  for  she  not  only  snuffed  much  oftener  than 
the  night  before,  but,  the  fact  is,  she  hardly  ever  left  off 
snuffing,  particularly  after  he  had  nodded  his  head  once 
or  twice  by  way  of  thanks. 

"  Don't  snuff  too  often,  darling,"  he  said,  at  length,  but 
very,  very  kindly.  "  If  you  attempt  too  tine  sub-sub-sub- 
divisions (fractions  of  fractions  of  fractions  of  fractions) 
of  the  wick,  it'll  be  almost  a*  bad  as  ever — a  candle 
snufl'ed  too  short  gives  as  little  light  as  one  with  an  over- 
grown wick — which  you  may  apply  to  the  lights  of  the 
world  and  of  the  Church,  that's  to  say  if  you  can.  It's 
only  for  a  short  while  before  and  after  the  bnuffing,  entr« 


CHAP.  V.J       FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  THORN   PIECES.      161 

chien  et  hup  as  it  were,  that  that  delicious  middle-age  of 
the  soul  prevails  when  it  can  see  to  perfection  ;  when  it  is 
truly  a  life  for  the  gods,  a  just  proportion  of  black  and 
white,  both  in  the  candle  and  on  the  book." 

I  and  others  really  do  not  see  any  great  reason  to  con- 
gratulate ourselves  upon  this  new  turn  of  events.  The 
poor's  advocate  has  evidently  laid  upon  himself  the  addi- 
tional burden,  that  all  the  time  he  is  writing  he  has  to 
keep  watching  and  calculating, — superficially  perhaps,  but 
still,  watching  and  calculating — the  mean  term,  or  middle- 
distance,  between  the  long  wick  and  the  short.  And  what 
time  has  he  left  for  his  work  ? 

Some  minutes  after,  when  the  snuffing  came  a  little 
too  soon,  he  asked,  though  somewhat  doubtfuUy,  "  Dirty 
clothes  for  the  wash  already  ?  "  Next  time,  as  she  let  it 
be  almost  too  long  before  she  snuffed,  he  looked  at  her 
interrogatively,  and  *aid,  "  Well  ?  well  ?  " 

"  In  one  instant,"  said  she.  By-and-by,  he  having 
got  rather  more  deeply  absorbed  than  usual  in  his  writing, 
and  she  in  her  work,  he  found,  when  he  suddenly  came  to 
himself  and  looked,  one  of  the  longest  spears  in  the  candle 
that  had  yet  appeared,  and  with  two  or  three  thieves  round 
it  to  the  bargain. 

"  Oh,  good  Lord !  Ton  my  soul,  this  is  really  the  life 
of  a  dog !  "  cried  he  ;  and,  seizing  the  snuffers  in  a  fury,  he 
snuffed  the  candle — out. 

This  holiday  pause  of  darkness  afforded  a  capital  oppor- 
tunity for  jumping  up,  flying  into  a  passion,  and  pointing 
out  to  Lenette  more  in  detail  how  it  was  that  she  plagued 
and  tormented  him,  however  admirably  he  might  have 
arranged  things ;  and,  like  all  women,  had  neither 
rhyme  nor  reason  in  her  ways  of  doing  things,  always 
snuffing  either  too  close  or  not  close  enough.  She,  how- 
ever, lighted  the  candle  without  saying  a  word,  and  he 
got  into  a  greater  rage  than  before,  and  demanded  to  be 
informed  whether  he  had  ever  as  yet  asked  anything  of 
her  but  the  merest  trifles  possible  to  conceive,  and  if 
anybody  but  his  own  wedded  wife  would  have  hesitated 
for  a  moment  to  attend  to  them.  "  Just  answer  me,"  he 
paid. 

She  did  not  answer  him;  she  set  the  freshly-lighted 

u.  a 


162  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH   EICHTER.      [BOOK  II, 

candle  on  the  table,  and  tears  were  in  her  eyes.  It  was 
the  first  time  ho  had  caused  her  a  tear,  since  her  marriage. 
In  a  moment,  like  a  person  magnetised,  he  saw  and 
diagnosed  all  that  was  diseased  and  unhealthy  in  his  sys- 
1em ;  and,  on  the  spot,  he  cast  out  the  old  Adam,  and 
shied  him  contemptuously  away  into  a  corner.  This  was 
an  easy  task  for  him ;  his  heart  was  always  so  open  to 
love  and  justice,  that  the  moment  these  goddesses  came 
into  view,  the  tone  of  anger  with  which  he  had  commenced 
a  sentence  would  fall  into  gentle  melody  before  he  reached 
the  end  of  it ;  he  could  stop  his  battle-axe  in  the  middle 
of  its  stroke. 

So  that  a  household  peace  was  here  concluded,  the  in- 
struments thereof  being  one  pair  of  moist  eyes  and  one 
pair  of  bright  kind  ones ;  and  a  Westphalia  treaty  of  peace 
accorded  one  candle  to  each  party,  with  absolute  freedom 
of  snuffing. 

But  the  peace  was  soon  embittered,  inasmuch  as  Penia, 
goddess  of  poverty  (who  has  thousands  of  invisible  churches 
all  about  the  country,  where  most  houses  are  her  taber- 
nacles and  lazar  cells),  began  to  make  manifest  her  bodily 
presence  and  her  all-oontrollmg  power.  There  was  no 
more  money  in  the  house.  But,  rather  than  place  his 
honour  and  his  freedom  in  pledge,  and  incur  obligations 
which  he  had  less  and  less  prospect  of  repaying — I  mean, 
rather  than  borrow — he  would  have  sold  all  he  had,  and 
himself  into  the  bargain,  like  the  old  German.  It  is  said, 
the  national  debt  of  England,  if  counted  out  in  dollars, 
would  make  a  ring  round  the  earth,  like  a  second  equator ; 
however,  I  have  not  as  yet  measured  this  nose-ring  of  the 
British  Lion,  this  annular  eclipse,  or  halo,  round  the  sun 
of  Britain,  myself.  But  I  know  that  Siebenkaes  would 
have  considered  a  negative  money-girdle  of  this  sort  about 
his  waist  to  be  a  penance-helt  stuck  full  of  spines,  or  an 
iron  ring,  such  as  people  who  tow  boats  have  on ;  a  girdle 
compressing  the  heart  in  a  fatal  manner.  Even  supposing 
he  were  to  borrow,  and  then  stop  payment,  as  nations 
and  banking-houses  do — a  catastrophe  which  debtors  and 
aristocratic  persons,  who  have  their  wits  about  them, 
manage  to  avoid  without  difficulty,  by  the  simple  expe- 
dient of  never  beginning  payment — yet,  having  only  on© 


CHAP.  V.J      FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  SHORN   PIECES.       1 63 

friend  whom  he  could  convert  into  a  creditor  (Stiefel),  he 
couldn't  possibly  have  seen  this  dear  friend,  who  was  in 
the  first  rank  of  his  spiritual  creditors  already,  figuring 
in  the  fifth  rank,  or  that  of  the  unpaid.  He  therefore 
avoided  such  a  two-fold  transgression  as  this  would  have 
been — a  sin  against  both  friendship  and  honour — by  pledg- 
ing things  of  less  value,  namely,  household  furniture. 

He  went  back  (but  alone)  to  the  pewter  cupboard  in 
the  kitchen,  and  peeped  through  the  rail  to  see  whether 
there  were  two  ranks  of  dishes  or  three.  Alas !  there  was 
but  one  rear-rank  man  of  a  plate  standing  behind  his 
front-rank  man,  like  double  notes  of  interrogation.  He 
marched  the  rear-rank  man  to  the  front  accordingly,  and 
gave  him  for  travelling  companions  and  fellow-refugees  a 
herring-dish,  a  sauce-boat,  and  a  salad-bowl.  Having 
effected  this  reduction  of  his  army,  he  extended  the  re- 
maining troops  so  as  to  occupy  a  wider  front,  and  sub- 
divided the  three  large  gaps  into  twenty  small  ones.  He 
then  moved  these  disbanded  soldiers  to  the  sitting-room, 
and  went  and  called  Lenette,  who  was  in  the  bookbinder's 
room. 

"  I've  been  looking  at  our  pewter  cupboard  for  the  last 
five  or  ten  minutes,"  he  said.  "  I  really  shouldn't  have 
noticed,  if  I  hadn't  known  it,  that  I  had  taken  away  the 
tureen  and  the  plates.     Should  you  ?  " 

"  Ah,  indeed,  I  do  notice  it  every  day  of  my  life,"  she 
declared. 

Here,  however,  being  rather  uneasy  at  the  idea  of  what 
might  be  the  result  of  too  long  an  inspection,  he  hurried 
her  into  the  sitting-room,  where  the  dishes  were  which  he 
had  just  taken  out,  and  made  known  his  intention  of 
transposing,  like  a  clever  musician,  this  quartett  from  the 
key  of  pewter  into  that,  of  silver.  He  proposed  the  selling 
of  them,  that  she  might  be  got  to  agree  the  more  easily  to 
their  being  pawned.  But  she  pulled  out  every  stop  of  the 
feminine  organ,  the  clarion,  the  stopped  diapason,  flute, 
bird -stop,  vox  humana,  and,  lastly,  the  tremolo  stop.  He 
might  say  whatever  he  liked ;  she  said  whatever  she  liked. 
A  man  does  not  try  to  arrest  the  iron  arm  of  necessity,  or 
to  avert  it ;  he  calmly  awaits  its  stroke ;  a  woman  tries  to 
Struggle  away  from  its  grip,  at  any  rate  for  a  few  hours, 


164  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTKR.      [BOOK  IL 

before  it  encircles  her.  It  was  in  vain  that  Siebenkaes 
quietly  and  simply  asked  her  if  she  knew  what  else  was  to 
he  done.  To  questions  of  this  sort,  there  float  up  and 
down  in  women's  heads  not  one  complete  answer,  hut 
thousands  of  half  answers,  which  are  supposed  to  amount 
to  a  whole  one,  just  as  in  the  differential  calculus  an 
infinite  number  of  straight  lines  go  to  form  a  curved  one. 
Some  of  these  unripe,  half-formed,  fugitive,  mutually 
auxiliary  answers  were — 

"  He  shouldn't  have  changed  his  name,  and  he  would 
have  had  his  mother's  money  by  this  time." 

"  Of  course,  he  might  borrow." 

"  Look  at  all  his  clients,  well  off  and  comfortable,  and 
he  won't  ask  them  to  pay  him." 

"He  never  dreams  of  asking  a  fee  for  defending  the 
infanticide." 

"  And  he  shouldn't  spend  so  much  money."  "  He 
needn't  have  paid  that  half-term's  rent  in  advance."  For 
the  latter  would  have  kept  him  going  for  a  day  or  two, 
you  see ! 

It  is  always  a  vain  task  to  oppose  the  "  minority  of 
one  "  of  the  complete  and  true  answer  to  the  immense 
majority  of  feminine  partial  proofs  of  this  sort ;  women 
know,  at  any  rate,  thus  much  of  the  law  of  Switzerland, 
that  four  half  or  invalid  witnesses  outweigh  one  whole  or 
valid  one.*  But  the  best  way  of  confuting  them  is,  to  let 
them  say  what  they  have  got  to  say,  and  not  utter  a  word 
yourself;  they're  certain  to  diverge,  before  very  long,  into 
suhsidiary  or  accessory  matters,  which  you  yield  to  them, 
confuting  them,  as  regards  the  real  subject  of  argument, 
simply  by  action.  This  is  the  only  species  of  confutation 
which  they  ever  forgive.  Siebenkses,  unfortunately,  at- 
tempted to  apply  the  surgical  bandage  of  philosophy  to 
Lenette's  two  principal  members,  her  head  and  her  heart, 
and  therefore  commenced  as  follows — 

"Dear  wife,  in  the  parish  church  you  sing  against 
worldly  riches,  like  the  rest  of  the  congregation,  and  yet 
you  have  them  fixed  on   your  heart   as  firmly  as  your 

*  In  Bern  and  the  Pays-du-Vaud,  two  male  witnesses,  or  foui 
female,  are  necessary  for  a  legal  proof. 


CHAP.  V.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      165 

brooch.  Now,  I  don't  go  to  a  church,  it's  true,  but  I  have 
a  pulpit  in  my  own  breast,  and  I  prize  one  single  happy 
moment  more  than  the  whole  of  this  pewter  dirt.  Tell 
me  truly  now,  has  your  immortal  heart  been  pained  by 
the  tragical  fate  of  the  soup-tureen,  or  was  it  only  your 
pericardium  ?  The  doctors  prescribe  tin,  in  powder,  for 
worms ;  and  may  not  this  miserable  tin,  which  we  have 
broken  into  little  pieces  and  swallowed,  have  had  a  similar 
effect  on  the  abominable  worms  of  the  heart  ?  Collect 
yourself,  and  think  of  our  cobbler  here,  does  his  soup  taste 
any  the  worse  to  him  out  of  his  painted  iron  sauciere 
because  his  bit  of  roast  meat  is  eaten  out  of  it  too  ?  You 
sit  behind  that  pincushion  of  yours,  and  can't  see  that 
society  is  mad,  and  drinks  coffee,  tea,  and  chocolate  out 
of  different  cups,  and  has  particular  kinds  of  plates  for 
fruit,  for  salad,  and  for  herrings,  and  particular  sorts  of 
dishes  for  hares,  fish,  and  poultry.  And  I  say  that  it 
will  get  madder  and  madder  as  time  goes  on,  and  order 
as  many  kinds  of  fruit  plates  from  the  china  shops  as  there 
are  different  fruits  in  the  gardens — at  least,  I  should  do  it 
myself;  and  if  I  were  a  crown  prince,  or  a  grand  master, 
I  should  insist  upon  having  lark  dishes  and  lark  knives, 
snipe  dishes  and  snipe  knives  ;  neither  would  I  carve  the 
haunch  of  a  stag  of  sixteen  upon  any  plate  I  had  once  had 
a  stag  of  eight  upon.  The  world  is  a  fine  madhouse,  and 
one  gets  up  and  preaches  his  false  doctrine  in  it  when 
another  has  done,  just  as  they  do  in  a  Quaker  meeting. 
So  the  Bedlamites  think  that  only  two  follies  are  veritable 
follies,  follies  which  are  past,  and  follies  which  are  yet 
to  come — old  follies  and  new ;  but  I  would  show  them 
that  theirs  partake  of  the  nature  of  both." 

Lenette's  only  reply  was  an  inexpressibly  gentle  request : 
"  Oh  I  please,  Firmian,  do  not  sell  the  pewter." 

"Very  well,  then,  I  shan't!"  (he  answered,  with  a  bitter 
satirical  joy  at  having  got  the  brilliant  neck  of  the  pigeon 
fairly  into  the  noose  which  he  had  so  long  had  ready  baited 
for  it).  "  The  emperor  Antoninus  sent  his  real  silver  plate 
to  the  mint,  so  that  I  might  surely  send  mine ;  but  just  as 
you  like :  I  don't  care  twopence.  Not  an  ounce  of  it  shall  be 
■old ;  I  shall  merely  pawn !  I'm  much  obliged  to  you  for 
the  suggestion ;  and  if  I  only  hit  the  eagle's  tail  on  St. 


166  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  II. 

Andrew's  Day,  or  the  imperial  globe,  1  can  redeem  the 
whole  of  it  in  a  minute — I  mean  with  the  money  of  the 
prize ;  at  all  events,  the  salad-bowl  and  the  soup-tureen. 
I  think  you're  quite  right.  Old  Sabel  's  in  the  house,  is 
she  not?  She  can  take  the  things  and  bring  back  the 
money." 

She  let  it  be  so  now.  The  shooting-match  on  St. 
Andrew's  Day  was  her  Fortunatus's  wishing-cap,  the 
wooden  wings  of  the  eagle  were  as  waxen  flying-apparatus 
fixed  on  to  her  hopes,  the  powder  and  shot  were  the  flower- 
seeds  of  her  future  blossoms  of  peace  (as  they  are  to  crowned 
heads  also).  Thou  poor  soul,  in  many  senses  of  the  word  ! 
But  the  poor  hope  incredibly  more  than  the  rich ;  there- 
fore it  is  that  poor  devils  are  more  apt  to  catch  the  infec- 
tion of  lotteries  than  the  rich — just  as  they  are  to  catch 
the  plague  and  other  epidemics. 

Siebenkses— who  looked  down  with  contempt  not  only 
on  the  loss  of  his  household  goods,  but  on  the  loss  of  his 
money — was  secretly  resolved  to  leave  the  trash  at  the 
pawnbroker's,  unredeemed  for  ever,  like  a  state-bond,  even 
though  he  should  chance  to  be  king  (at  the  shooting-match), 
and  convert  the  transaction  into  a  regular  sale  some  future 
day,  when  he  happened  to  be  passing  the  shop. 

After  a  few  bright  quiet  days  Peltzstiefel  came  again  to 
make  an  evening  call.  Amid  the  manifold  embargoes  laid 
upon  their  supplies,  the  risks  attending  their  smuggling 
operations,  and  as  a  tear  or  a  sigh  was  laid  as  a  tax  which 
must  necessarily  be  paid  upon  every  loaf  of  bread,  Firmian 
had  had  no  time,  to  say  nothing  of  inclination,  to  remember 
his  jealousy.  In  Lenette's  case,  matters  were  necessarily 
exactly  reversed  ;  and  if  she  really  has  any  love  for  Stiefel, 
it  must  grow  faster  on  his  money-dunghill  than  on  the 
advocate's  field  all  over  wells  of  hunger.  The  Schulrath's 
eye  was  not  one  of  those  which  read  the  troubles  of  a 
household  in  a  minute,  though  they  are  masked  by  smiling 
faces ;  he  noticed  nothing  of  the  kind.  And  for  that  very 
reason  it  came  to  pass  that  this  friendly  trio  spent  a  happy 
hour  free  from  clouds,  during  which,  though  the  sun  of 
happiness  did  not  shine,  yet  the  moon  of  happiness  (hope 
and  memory)  rose  shimmering  in  their  sky.  Moreover-, 
fiiebenkaes  had  the  enjoyment  of  being  provided  with  a 


CHAP.  V.J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.       167 

cultivated  listener,  who  could  follow  and  appreciate  the 
jingle  of  the  bells  on  the  jester's  cap,  the  trumpet  fanfares 
of  his  Leibgeberish  sallies.  Lenette  could  neither  follow 
nor  appreciate  them  in  the  very  least,  and  even  Peltzstiefel 
didn't  understand  him  when  he  read  him,  but  only  when 
he  heard  him  talk.  The  two  men  at  first  talked  only  of 
persons,  not  of  things,  as  women  do ;  only  that  they  called 
their  chronique  scandaleuse  by  the  name  of  History  of 
Literature  and  Men  of  Letters.  For  literary  men  like  to 
know  every  little  trait  and  peculiarity  of  a  great  author — 
what  clothes  he  wears,  and  what  his  favourite  dishes  are. 
For  similar  reasons,  women  minutely  observe  every  little 
trait  and  peculiarity  of  any  crown  princess  who  happens 
to  pass  through  the  town,  even  to  her  ribbons  and  fringes. 
From  literary  men  they  passed  to  scholarship ;  and  then 
all  the  clouds  of  this  life  melted  away,  and  in  the  land  of 
learning,  the  fair  realm  of  science,  the  downcast  sorrowful 
head,  wrapped  and  veiled  in  the  black  Lenten  altar-cloth  of 
hardship  and  privation,  is  lifted  up  once  more.  The  soul 
inhales  the  mountain  air  of  its  native  land,  and  looks  down 
from  the  lofty  peak  of  Pindus  upon  its  poor  bruised  and 
wounded  body  lying  beneath — that  body  which  it  has  to 
drag  and  bear  about,  sighing  under  its  weight.  When 
some  dunned,  needy  scholar,  some  skin-and-bone  reading- 
master,  a  poor  curate  with  five  children,  or  a  baited  and 
badgered  tutor,  is  lying  woeful  and  wretched — every  nerve 
quivering  under  some  instrument  of  torture — and  a  brother 
of  his  craft,  plagued  by  just  as  many  instruments  of  torture 
as  himself,  comes  and  argues  and  philosophises  with  him  a 
whole  evening,  and  tells  him  all  the  latest  opinions  of  the 
literary  papers,  then  truly  the  sand-glass  which  marks  the 
hours  of  the  torture  *  is  laid  on  its  side — Orpheus  comes, 
all  bright  and  shining,  with  the  lyre  of  knowledge  in  his 
hand,  into  the  psychic  hell  of  the  two  brethren  in  office, 
the  sad  tears  vanish  from  their  brightening  eyes,  the  snakes 
of  the  furies  twine  into  graceful  curls,  the  Ixion's  wheel 
rolls  harmoniously  to  the  lyre,  and  these  two  poor  Sisy- 
phuses  sit  resting  quietly  on  their  stones  and  listen  to 
the  music.    But  the  poor  curate's,  the  reading-master's,  the 

•  The  sand-glass  is  upright  during  the  time  the  torture  goes  on. 


168  JEAN  PAUL   ERIEDRICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  II. 

scholar's,  pood  wife,  what  is  her  comfort  in  her  misery  ? 
She  has  none  except  her  husband,  who  ought,  therefore,  to 
be  very  tender  to  all  her  shortcomings. 

The  reader  was  made  aware  in  the  first  book  that 
Leibgeber  had  sent  three  programmes  from  Bayreuth. 
Stiefel  brought  the  one,  by  Dr.  Frank,  with  him,  and  asked 
Siebenkses  to  write  a  notice  of  it  for  the  '  Kuhschnappel 
Heavenly  Messenger.'  He  also  took  out  of  his  pocket 
another  little  book,  to  receive  its  sentence.  The  reader 
will  hail  both  these  works  with  gladness,  seeing  that  my 
hero  and  his  has  no  money  in  the  house,  and  will  be  able 
to  live  for  a  day  or  two  by  reviewing  them.  The  second 
manuscript,  which  was  in  a  roll,  was  entitled :  '  Lessingii, 
Emilia  Galotti.  Pro  gymnasmatis  loco  latine  reddita  et 
publico  acta,  moderante  J.  H.  Steffens.     Cell  is  1788.! 

It  seems  that  a  good  many  of  the  subscribers  to  the 
•  Heavenly  Messenger '  have  complained  of  the  length  of 
time  which  elapsed  before  this  work  was  noticed,  drawing 
disadvantageous  comparisons  between  the  '  Messenger'  and 
the  '  Universal  German  Library ;'  for  the  latter,  notwith- 
standing the  greatness  of  its  universal  German  circulation, 
notices  good  works  within  a  few  years  of  their  birth — 
sometimes  even  as  early  as  the  third  year  of  their  existence 
— so  that  the  favourable  notice  can  frequently  be  bound  up 
with  the  work,  the  first  paper-covers  of  it  not  being  worn 
out  before.  The  reason,  however,  why  the  *  Heavenly 
Messenger '  did  not,  and  in  fact  could  not,  review  more  of 
the  books  of  the  year  1788,  was,  that  it  was  not  until  five 
years  afrer  that  date  that  it — first  saw  the  light  itself. 

"  Don't  you  think,"  said  Siebenkaes,  in  a  friendly  manner 
to  Peltzstiefel,  "  that  if  I'm  going  to  write  proper  notices 
of  Messrs.  Frank  and  Steffens  here,  my  wife  should  take 
care  not  to  make  a  thundering  noise,  swishing  away  with 
her  broom  at  my  back  ?" 

"  That  might  really  be  a  matter  of  very  considerable 
importance,"  said  Stiefel,  gravely.  Upon  which  a  playful 
and  somewhat  abridged  report  of  the  proceedings  in  the 
household  action  of  inhibition  was  laid  before  him.  Wen- 
deline  fixed  her  kindly  eyes  on  Peltzstiefel's  face,  striving 
to  read  the  Bubrum  (the  red  title),  and  the  Nigrum  (the 
black  body  matter)  of  hie  judgment  there  before  it  waa 


CHAP.  V.]      FLOWER,    FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       169 

pronounced.  Both  colours  were  there.  But  though  Sticfel's 
bosom  heaved  with  genuine  sighs  of  the  deepest  affection 
for  her,  he  nevertheless  addressed  her  as  follows — 

"  Madame  Siebenkses,  this  really  won't  do  at  all ;  for 
God  hath  not  created  anything  nobler  than  a  scholar  sitting 
at  his  writing.  Hundreds  of  thousands  of  people,  ten  times 
told,  are  sitting  in  every  quarter  of  the  globe,  as  if  on 
school-forms  before  him,  and  to  all  of  these  he  has  to  speak. 
EiTors  held  by  the  wisest  and  cleverest  people  he  has  to 
eradicate :  ages,  long  since  gone  to  dust  and  passed  away, 
with  those  who  lived  in  them,  he  has  to  describe  with 
accuracy  and  minuteness ;  systems,  the  most  profound  and 
the  most  complex,  he  has  to  confute  and  overthrow,  or 
otherwise  to  invent  and  establish,  himself.  His  light  has 
to  pierce  through  massy  crowns,  through  the  Pope's  triple 
tiara,  through  Capuchin  hoods  and  through  wreaths  of 
laurel — to  pierce  them  all  and  enlighten  the  brains  within. 
This  is  his  work ;  and  this  work  he  can  perform.  But 
Madame  Siebenkaes,  what  a  strain  on  his  faculties !  What 
a  grand  sustained  effort  is  necessary !  It  is  a  hard  matter 
and  a  difficult  to  set  up  a  book  in  type,  but  harder  still 
to  write  it !  Think  what  the  strain  must  have  been  when 
Pindar  wrote,  and  Homer,  earlier  still — I  mean  in  the 
'  Iliad ' — and  so  with  one  after  another,  down  to  our  own 
day.  Is  it  any  wonder,  then,  that  great  writers,  in  the 
terrible  strain  and  absorption  of  all  their  ideas,  have  often 
scarcely  known  where  they  were,  what  they  were  doing, 
or  what  they  would  be  at;  that  they  were  blind  and 
dumb,  v.nd  insensible  to  everything  but  what  was  per- 
ceived by  the  five  interior  spiritual  senses,  like  blind  people, 
who  see  beautifully  in  their  dreams,  but  in  their  waking 
state  are,  as  we  have  said,  blind !  This  state  of  absorbed- 
noss  and  strain  it  is  which  I  consider  to  explain  how  it 
was  that  Socrates  and  Archimedes  could  stand  and  be 
completely  unconscious  of  the  storm  and  turmoil  going 
on  around  them ;  how  Cardanus  in  the  profundity  of  his 
meditation  was  unconscious  of  his  Chiragra ;  others  of  the 
gout ;  one  Frenchman  of  a  great  conflagration,  and  a  second 
Frenchman  of  the  death  of  his  wife." 

"There,  you  see,"  said  Lenette,  much  delighted,  in  a 
low  voice  to  her  husband,  "how  can  a  learned  gentleman 


170  JEAN  PAUL   FR1EDRICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  II. 

possibly  hear  his  wife  when  she's  at  her  washing  and 
scrubbing?" 

Stiefel,  unmoved,  went  on  with  the  thread  of  his  argu- 
ment :  "  Now,  a  fire  of  this  description  can  only  be  kindled 
in  absolute  and  uninterrupted  calm.  And  this  is  the  reason 
why  all  the  great  artists  and  men  of  letters  in  Paris  live 
nowhere  but  in  the  Rue  Ste.  Victoire ;  the  other  streets  are 
all  too  noisy.  And  it  is  hence  that  no  smiths,  tinkers,  or 
tinmen,  are  allowed  to  work  in  the  street  where  a  professor 
lives." 

"  No  tinmen  especially,"  added  Siebenkses,  very  gravely. 
•*  It  should  always  be  remembered  that  the  mind  cannot 
entertain  more  than  half-a-dozen  of  ideas  at  a  time ;  so  that 
if  the  idea  of  noise  should  make  its  appearance  as  a  wicked 
seventh,  of  course  some  one  or  other  of  the  previous  ideas, 
which  might  otherwise  have  been  followed  up  or  written 
down,  takes  its  departure  from  the  head  altogether." 

Indeed  Stiefel  made  Lanette  give  him  her  hand  as  a 
pledge  that  she  would  always  stand  still,  like  Joshua's  sun, 
while  Firmian  was  smiting  the  foe  with  pen  and  scourge. 

M  Haven't  I  often  asked  the  bookbinder  myself,"  she  said, 
"  not  to  hammer  so  hard  upon  his  books,  because  my  hus- 
band would  hear  him  when  he  was  making  his."  However, 
she  gave  the  Schulrath  her  hand,  and  he  went  away  con- 
tented with  their  contentment,  leaving  them  quite  hopeful 
of  quieter  times. 

But,  ye  dear  souls,  of  how  little  use  to  you  is  this  state 
of  peace,  seeing  ye  are  on  half-pay  and  starving  in  this  cold, 
empty,  orphan  hospital  of  an  earth — how  little  will  it  help 
you  in  these  dim  labyrinthian  wanderings  of  your  destiny, 
of  which  even  the  Ariadne  clue-threads  all  turn  to  nets  and 
snares  ?  How  long  will  the  poor's  advocate  manage  to  live  on 
the  produce  of  the  pawned  pewter,  and  on  the  prioe  of  the 
two  reviews  which  he  is  going  to  write  ?  Only,  we  are  all 
like  the  Adam  of  the  epio,  and  take  our  first  night  to  be  the 
day  of  judgment,  and  the  setting  of  the  sun  for  the  end  of 
the  world.  We  sorrow  for  our  friends,  just  as  if  there 
were  no  brighter  future  yonder,  and  we  sorrow  for  our- 
selves as  if  there  were  no  brighter  future  here.  For  all  oui 
passions  are  bora  Atheists  and  unbelievers. 


CHAP.  VI.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,   AND   THORN  PIECES.      171 


CHAPTER  VI. 

MATRIMONIAL    JARS — EXTRA    LEAFLET    ON    THE   LOQUACITY    OF 

WOMEN — MORE  PLEDGING THE  MORTAR  AND  THE  SNUFF-MILL 

— A  SCHOLAR'S  KISS — ON  THE  CONSOLATIONS  OF   HUMANITY — 
CONTINUATION  OF  THE  SIXTH  CHAPTER. 

This  chapter  commences  at  once  with  pecuniary  diffi- 
culties. The  wretched,  leaky  Danaid's  bucket  which  our 
good  couple  had  to  use  for  washing  their  groschen  or  two, 
their  grains  of  gold-dust — few  and  far  between  as  they 
were — out  of  the  sands  of  their  Pactolus,  had  always  run 
dry  again  in  the  course  of  a  couple  of  days,  or  of  three 
at  the  outside.  On  this  occasion,  however,  they  had  some- 
thing certain  to  go  upon,  namely,  the  reviews  of  the  two 
works;  they  could  count  upon  four  florins  certainly,  if 
not  upon  five. 

Early  next  day,  after  his  morning  kiss,  Firmian  seated 
himself  upon  his  critical  judgment-bench  again,  and  pro- 
ceeded to  pass  his  sentences.  He  might  have  written  an 
epic  poem,  so  light  were  the  trade-winds  which  had 
hitherto  been  prevalent  during  the  early  hours  of  the  day. 
From  eight  o'clock  in  the  morning  till  eleven  in  the  fore- 
noon, he  was  engaged  in  holding  up  to  the  world  in  a 
favourable  light  the  programme  of  Dr.  Frank  of  Pavia, 
which  was  entitled  :  '  Sermo  Academicus  de  civis  medici  in 
republica  conditione  atque  officiis,  ex  lege  prseipue  erutis. 
Auct.  Frank.  1785.'  He  criticised,  praised,  blamed,  and 
made  extracts  from  this  little  production,  till  he  thought 
he  had  covered  enough  paper  to  earn  what  would  suffice 
to  redeem  the  pcwned  herring-dish,  salad-bowl,  sauce-boat, 
and  plates — his  views  on  the  work  occupying  one  sheet, 
four  pages,  and  fifteen  lines. 

The  morning  had  passed  so  pleasantly,  in  holding  Vehm- 
gericht  in  this  manner,  that  he  thought  he  might  as  well 

go  on,  and  hold  another  in  the  afternoon  on  the  other 
ook.  He  had  never  ventured  upon  this  before ;  in  the 
afternoons  he  had  done  advocate's  work,  not  reviewer's, 
appearing  in  the  character  of  defendant  (maker  of  defence), 


172  JEAN  PAUL  ERIEDRICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  U 

not  of  fiscal  (prosecutor).  He  had  ample  reason  for  this, 
seeing  that  every  afternoon  girls  and  maid-servants  came 
with  honnets  and  caps,  and  with  mouths  full  of  conversa- 
tional treasures,  which  they  at  once  unpacked ;  richer  in 
language  than  the  Arabs,  who  have  only  a  thousand  words 
to  express  the  same  idea,  these  young  women  had  a 
thousand  idioms  for  it,  or  different,  ways  of  putting  it ; — 
and,  as  an  organ  when  it  's  out  of  order,  immediately  be- 
gins to  cipher  on  twenty  of  its  pipes  or  so  at  a  time  as 
soon  as  you  begin  to  work  the  bellows,  though  no  notes 
may  be  pressed  down,  so  would  they  the  moment  the 
bellows  of  their  lungs  was  set  a-going.  He  didn't  mind 
this,  however,  seeing  that  at  the  particular  hours  to 
which  these  feminine  alarum  clocks  were  set,  he  let  his 
own  juristical  alarum  go  rattling  off  too,  and  during  the 
arguing  of  Lenette's  cases,  went  on  with  the  arguing  of 
his.  Be  wasn't  disturbed  by  this;  he  maintained:  "A 
lawyer  is  not  to  be  put  out,  he  can  open  and  close  his 
sentences  when  he  chooses — his  periods  are  long  tape- 
worms, and  can  be  lengthened  or  cut  down  with  impunity 
— for  each  segment  of  them  is  itself  a  worm,  each  comma 
a  period." 

But  reviewing  was  another  matter,  and  couldn't  be 
done  so  well.  At  the  same  time,  I  shall  here  faithfully 
transcribe  for  the  benefit  of  the  unlearned  (the  learned 
have  read  the  review  long  ago),  so  much  as  he  actually 
did  manage  to  get  done  after  his  dinner.  He  wrote  down 
the  title  of  Stetten's  Latin  translation  of  "  Emilia  Galotti," 
and  proceeded  as  follows — 

"  This  translation  meets  a  want  which  we  have  long 
experienced.  It  is,  indeed,  a  striking  phenomenon,  that 
bo  few  of  the  German  classics  have  as  yet  been  translated 
into  Latin  for  the  use  of  scholars,  who,  for  their  part,  have 
supplied  us  with  German  versions  of  nearly  all  the  Greek 
and  Roman  classic  authors.  The  German  nation  can  point 
to  literary  productions  of  its  own  which  are  quite  worthy 
of  perusal  by  scholars  and  by  linguists,  who,  although 
they  can  translate  them,  do  not  understand  them,  because 
they  are  not  written  in  Latin.  Lichtenberg's  •  Pocket 
Calendar'  has  appeared  simultaneously  in  a  German 
edition — for  the  English,  who  are  studying  German — and 


CHAP.  VI.]    FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      173 

in  a  French  for  our  own  haute  noblesse.  But  why  should 
not  German  original  works,  and  even  the  very  'Calendar' 
itself,  be  made  known  to  linguists  and  to  scholars  by 
means  of  a  good  and  faithful  Latin  translation  ?  There 
can  be  no  doubt  that  they  would  be  the  very  first  to  be 
struck  by  the  great  resemblance  which  may  be  traced 
between  the  odes  of  Eamler  and  those  of  Horace,  if  the 
former  were  but  translated.  The  reviewer  must  confess 
that  it  has  always  been  matter  of  surprise,  as  well  as 
regret,  to  him  that  but  two  correct  editions  of  Klopstock's 
•  Messiah '  have  as  yet  appeared,  the  original  edition  and 
his  own — and  that  there  is  no  Latin  edition  of  it  for 
scholars— (Lessing  having  scarcely  translated  the 'Invo- 
cation '  in  his  miscellaneous  writings) — nor  one  in  the 
curial  style  for  lawyers,  nor  a  plain  prose  one  for  the 
commercial  world,  nor  one  in  Jew-German  for  the  Jewish 
community." 

V\  hen  he  had  got  thus  far,  he  was  compelled  to  stop, 
because  a  housemaid  wouldn't  stop,  but  went  on  reiterat- 
ing what  her  mistress  had  gone  on  re-iterating,  namely, 
how  her  night-cap  was  to  be  done  up ;  twenty  times  did 
she  sketch  the  ground-plan  and  elevation  of  the  said  cap, 
and  laid  weight  on  the  necessity  for  speedy  execution. 
Lenette  answered  her  tautologies  with  equivalent  ones, 
paying  her  back  to  the  full  in  her  own  coin.  Scarce 
was  the  housemaid  out  at  the  door,  when  the  reviewer 
said — 

"I  haven't  written  a  word  while  that  windmill  was 
clacking.  Lenette,  tell  me,  is  it  really  a  positive  impossi- 
bility for  a  woman  to  say,  *  It's  four  o'clock,'  instead  of 
1  The  four  quarters  to  four  have  gone  ? '  Can  no  woman 
say,  '  The  head-clout  will  be  ready  to-morrow,'  aud  then 
an  end  of  the  matter?  Can  no  woman  say,  'I  want  a 
dollar  for  it,'  and  there  an  end  of  the  story  ?  Nor,  4  Kun 
in  again  to-morrow ! '  and  no  more  about  it  ?  Can  you  not 
do  it,  for  instance  ?  " 

Lenette  answered  very  coldly,  "  Oh !  of  courge  you 
think  everybody  thinks  just  as  you  think  yourself! " 

Lenette  had  two  feminine  bad  habits,  which  have  sent 
millions  of  male  rockets,  or  pyrotechnic  serpents — namely, 
curses — up  skywards.     The  first  was,  that  whenever  she 


174  JEAN   PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.       [BOOK  tit 

gave  the  servant  an  order,  she  did  it  as  if  it  were  a 
memorial  in  two  copies,  and  then  went  out  of  the  room 
with  her  and  repeated  the  order  in  question  three  or  four 
times  more  in  the  passage.  The  second  was,  that  let 
Siebenkaes  shout  a  thing  to  her,  as  distinctly  as  man 
could,  her  first  answer  was,  "  What?  "  or,  "  What  do  you 
say  ?  Now,  I  not  only  advise  ladies  always  to  demand  a 
M  second  of  exchange  "  of  this  sort  when  they  are  in  any 
embarrassment  for  an  answer,  and  I  laud  them  for  so 
doing;  but  in  cases  where  what  is  required  of  them  is 
attention,  not  the  truth,  this  ancora  and  bis  which  they 
cry  to  a  speaker  who  is  anxious  not  to  waste  time,  is  as 
cumbersome  as  it  is  unnecessary.  Matters  of  this  kind 
are  trifles  in  married  life  only  so  long  as  the  sufferer  by 
them  does  not  complain  o*  them.  But  when  they  have 
been  found  fault  with  they  are  worse  than  deadly  sins, 
and  felonies,  and  adulteries — seeing  that  they  occur  much 
more  frequently. 

If  the  author  were  disturbed  at  his  work  by  pleonasms 
of  the  above  description ;  what  he  would  do  would  be, 
not  deliver  a  serious  lecture,  but  (because  this  is  a  good 
opportunity)  write  the  following 

Extra  Leaflet  on  Female  Loquacity. 

"  The  author  of  the  work  on  '  Marriage '  has  said,  '  A 
woman  who  does  not  talk  is  a  stupid  woman.'  But  it  is 
easier  to  be  his  encomiast  than  his  disciple.  The  cleverest 
women  are  often  silent  with  women,  and  the  most  stupid 
and  most  silent  are  often  both  with  men.  On  the  whole, 
this  statement,  which  has  been  applied  to  the  male  sex, 
is  true  also  of  the  female,  namely,  that  those  who  think 
most  have  least  to  say  ;  as  frogs  cease  croaking  when  a 
light  is  brought  to  the  side  of  their  pond.  Moreover,  the 
extreme  talkativeness  of  women  is  a  result  of  the  sedentary 
nature  of  their  occupations.  Men,  whose  work  is  seden- 
tary, such  as  tailors,  shoemakers,  weavers,  have  in  com- 
mon with  women  not  only  their  hypochondriac  fancies, 
but  also  their  loquacity. 

"  The  little  work-tables,  where  feminine  fingers  are 
employed,  are  also  the  playgrounds  of  the  feminine 
imagination,  and  their  needles  become  little  magio  wands, 


CHAP.  VI.]    FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND   THORN  PIECES.      175 

wherewith  they  transform  their  rooms  into  isles  of  spirits 
filled  with  dreams.  Hence  it  is  that  a  letter  or  a  book 
distracts  a  woman  who  is  in  love  more  than  the  knitting 
of  a  whole  pair  of  stockings.  Savages  say  that  the 
monkeys  refrain  from  talking  that  they  may  not  be  made 
to  work ;  but  many  a  woman  talks  twice  as  much  when 
she  is  working  as  when  she  is  not. 

"  I  have  devoted  much  thought  to  the  question,  what 
purpose  this  peculiarity  subserves  in  the  economy  of  the 
universe.  At  first  it  might  strike  us  that  Nature  has  or- 
dained these  re-iterations  of  that  which  has  been  already 
said  with  a  view  to  the  development  of  metaphysical 
truths :  for,  as  demonstration,  according  to  Jacobi  and 
Kant,  is  merely  a  series,  or  progression,  of  identical  pro- 
positions, it  is  evident  that  women,  who  always  proceed 
from  the  same  thing  to  the  same  thing,  are  continually 
demonstrating.  There  can  be  no  doubt,  however,  that  the 
object  which  Nature  has  chiefly  had  in  view  is  the  follow- 
ing. Accurate  observers  of  nature  have  pointed  out  that 
the  reason  why  the  leaves  of  trees  keep  up  their  constant 
fluttering  motion  is  that  the  atmosphere  may  be  purified 
by  this  perpetual  flagellation  —  this  oscillation  of  the 
leaves  having  very  much  the  effect  of  a  light  and  gentle 
breeze.*  It  would,  however,  be  very  wondeiful  had 
Nature — always  economising  her  forces,  Nature,  who 
never  does  anything  in  vain — ordained  this  much  longer 
oscillation,  this  seventy  years'  wagging  of  the  feminine 
tongue,  to  no  definite  purpose.  For  the  purpose  in  ques- 
tion, however,  we  have  not  far  to  seek.  It  is  the  same 
which  is  subserved  by  the  quivering  of  the  leaves  of 
trees.  The  endless,  regular,  unceasing  beat  of  the 
feminine  tongue  is  to  assist  in  agitating  and  stirring  up 
the  atmosphere,  which  would  otherwise  become  putrescent. 
The  moon  has  her  ocean  of  water,  and  the  feminine  head 
has  its  ocean  of  air,  to  stir  into  salubrity  and  to  keep 
in  perpetual  freshness.     Hence  a  universal  Pythagorean 

*  We  cannot  say,  however,  that  it  is  by  carrying  away  noxious  vapours 
that  the  wind  purifies  the  air,  since  while  it  blows  my  noxious  emana- 
tions to  the  person  behind  me,  it  brings  me  those  of  the  person  before 
me ;  and  because  stagnant  water  does  not  become  putrid  solely  because 
there  is  no  current  to  carry  away  decaying  matter. 


176  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  IL 

noviciate  would,  sooner  or  later,  give  rise  to  epidemics, 
and  Chartreuses  of  nuns  would  become  pesthouses.  Hence 
it  is  that  diseases  of  the  pestiferous  type  are  less  frequent 
among  civilised  nations,  who  talk  the  most.  And  hence 
Nature's  beneficent  arrangement  that  it  is  exactly  in  the 
largest  cities — and  moreover  in  the  winter — and  moreover 
indoors — and  in  large  assemblages — that  women  talk  most, 
inasmuch  as  it  is  exactly  in  these  places  and  at  these 
periods  that  the  atmosphere  is  most  impure,  and  charged 
with  the  largest  proportion  of  carbonic  acid  and  other 
products  of  respiration,  &c,  requiring  to  be  thoroughly 
fanned  and  set  in  motion.  And,  indeed,  Nature  here 
overthrows  all  artificial  barriers  and  impediments;  for, 
although  many  European  women  have  endeavoured  to 
imitate  those  of  America  —  who  fill  their  mouths  with 
water  in  order  to  keep  silence — and,  while  making  calls, 
fill  theirs  with  tea  or  coffee,  yet  these  fluids  have  been 
found  rather  to  facilitate  than  to  prevent  the  free  flow  of 
feminine  speech. 

"  I  trust  that  in  this  I  am  far  from  being  like  the  narrow- 
minded  teleologists,  who,  to  every  grand  sun-path,  or  sun- 
orbit  of  Nature,  must  always  be  appending  and  interca- 
lating little  subsidiary  foot-tracks  and  '  ends  in  view. 
Such  persons  might  permit  themselves  the  supposition  (1 
should  be  ashamed  to  do  so)  that  the  oscillation  of  the 
female  tongue,  the  use  of  which  is  sufficiently  apparent  in  the 
motion  which  it  communicates  to  the  atmosphere,  may  pos- 
sibly serve  to  give  typical  illustration  to  some  thoughtor  idea 
of  a  spiritual  nature — e.  g.  the  female  soul  itself,  perhaps. 

"  This  belongs  to  that  class  of  things  with  respect  to 
which  Kant  has  said  that  they  can  neither  be  proved  nor 
disproved.  I  myself  should  rather  incline,  however,  to  the 
opinion  that  the  talking  of  women  is  an  indication  of  the 
cessation  of  thought  and  mental  activity — as  in  a  good  mill 
the  warning  bell  only  rings  when  there  is  no  com  left  in 
the  hopper.  Moreover,  every  husband  knows  that  tongues 
are  attached  to  women's  heads  in  order  to  give  due  notice, 
by  their  clanging,  that  some  contradiction,  something 
irregular  or  impossible,  ia  dominating  in  them.*    Similarly, 

*  A  woirin  finds  it  much  easier  to  yield  and  say  nothing  when  aha 
if  in  thi  ri;ht  than  when  she  is  in  the  wrong. 


CHAP.  VI.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,    AND   THORN   PIEGES.       177 

H.  Miiller's  calcm  'ating  machine  has  a  little  bell  in  it,  which 
rings  merely  to  give  notice  that  some  error  has  occurred  in 
a  calculation.  However,  it  now  remains  for  the  natural 
philosopher  to  prosecute  this  inquiry,  and  to  determine  to 
what  extent  my  views  may  prove  to  be  erroneous." 

I  may  just  mention  that  the  above  leaflet  was  written  bj 
the  advocate. 

He  did  not  finish  his  review  till  the  following  morning.  He 
had  intended  to  go  on  writing  down  his  ideas  on  the  subject 
of  the  translation  of  Emilia  Galotti  till  the  money  coming 
to  him  as  the  price  of  the  ideas  should  be  enough  to  pay 
for  new  toes  to  his  boots — Fecht  asked  a  sheet  and  a  half 
for  doing  the  pair — but  he  had  not  time  for  this,  as  he  was 
obliged  to  calculate  the  price  of  his  notice  by  the  com- 
positor's sight-rule,  and  get  the  money  for  it  that  very  day. 

The  reviews  were  sent  to  the  editor ;  the  critical  invoice 
amounted  to  three  florins  four  groschen  and  five  pfennige 
Strange !  we  smile  when  we  see  the  spiritual  and  the  cor- 
poreal, intellect  and  hard  cash,  pain  and  pecuniary  compen- 
sation, stated  as  sums  in  proportion  ;  but  is  not  our  whole 
life  an  equation,  a  sum  in  "  partnership  "  between  soul  and 
body ;  and  is  not  all  action  upon  us  corporeal,  and  all  re- 
section from  ns  spiritual  ? 

The  servant-girl  brought  back  only  "  kind  regards  ;"  not 
the  leaves  of  silver  which  his  ink  should  have  crystallised 
into.  Peltzstiefel  had  not  given  the  matter  a  thought. 
He  was  so  absorbed  in  his  studies  that  he  was  indifferent 
to  his  own  money,  and  blind  to  the  poverty  of  other  people. 
He  was  capable,  indeed,  of  noticing  a  hiatus  ;  but  it  must  be 
in  a  manuscript — not  in  his  own  or  other  people's  shoes, 
6tockings,  &c.  An  inward  fire  blinded  this  fortunate  man  to 
the  phosphorescence  of  the  rotten  wood  around  him.  And 
happy  is  every  actor  in  the  school-theatricals  of  life  who 
finds  the  lofty  inward  delusion  suffice  to  compensate  him 
for  the  delusions  without,  or  to  hide  them  from  his  view  ; 
— who  is  so  carried  away  by  the  enthusiasm  with  which 
he  enters  into  and  renders  his  spiritual  role,  that  the  coarse 
daubs  of  landscapes  of  the  scenery  seem  to  bloom,  and  the 
branches  to  rustle  in  the  refreshing  showers  (of  peas)  from 
the  rain-box — and  who  does  not  wake  to  reality  at  the 
shifting  of  the  scenes. 

C  a 


178  JEAN   PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICIITER.      [BOOK  II. 

But  this  beautiful  blindness  of  the  Kath  was  very  dis- 
tressing to  our  two  dear  friends ;  their  little  constellation, 
which  was  to  have  shone  in  their  evening  sky,  fell  all  down 
in  meteorio  drops  upon  the  earth.  I  do  not  blame  Stiefel ; 
he  had  an  ear  for  distress,  though  not  an  eye.  But  ye  rich 
and  great  ones  of  the  earth,  who,  helpless  in  the  honey- 
combs of  your  pleasures,  swimming  with  clogged  wings  in 
your  melted  sugar  of  roses,  do  not  find  it  an  easy  matter  to 
move  your  hand,  put  it  into  your  money-bag,  and  take  out 
the  wage  of  him  who  helped  to  fill  your  honey-cells — an  hour 
of  judgment  will  strike  at  last  for  you,  and  ask  you  if  ye  were 
worthy  to  live,  let  alone  to  live  a  life  of  pleasure,  when  ye 
avoid  even  the  trifling  trouble  of  paying  the  poor  who  have 
undergone  the  immense  trouble  of  earning.  But  ye  would 
be  better  if  ye  thought  what  misery  your  comfortable,  indo- 
lent, indisposition  to  open  a  purse,  or  to  read  a  little 
account,  often  inflicts  upon  the  poor;  if  ye  pictured  to 
yourselves  the  backward  start  of  hopeless  disappointment  of 
some  poor  woman  whose  husband  comes  home  without  his 
money — the  staivation,  the  obliteration  of  so  many  hopes, 
and  the  weary  sorrowful  days  of  a  whole  family. 

The  advocate,  therefore,  put  on  his  wicked  silverising 
face  again  and  went  prying  about  into  every  corner  with 
his  eyeglass,  making  himself  into  a  species  of  pressgang  of 
the  furniture.  As  a  king  or  an  English  minister  sits  up  in 
his  bed  at  night,  rests  his  head  on  his  hand,  and  considers 
what  commodity  or  what  tree-stem  full  of  birch-sap  he  may 
stick  his  winetap  of  a  new  tax  into,  or  (in  another  meta- 
phor) so  cut  the  peat  of  taxation  that  new  peat  may  grow 
in  its  place :  thus  did  Siebenkais.  With  his  letter  of  marque 
in  his  hand  he  soanned  minutely  every  flag  that  hove  in 
sight ;  he  lifted  up  his  shaving-dish  and  set  it  down ;  he 
shook  the  paralytic  arms  of  an  old  chair  till  they  cracked 
again — he  subjected  it  to  a  trial  more  severe,  by  sitting 
down  in  it  and  getting  up  again. — I  interrupt  my  period  to 
observe  en  passant  that  Lenette  fully  understood  the  danger 
of  this  conscription  and  measuring  of  the  children  of  the 
land,  and  that  she  protested  continuously  and  unavailingly 
against  this  game  of  pledges  with  Job-like  lamentations. — 
He  also  took  down  from  its  hook  an  old  yellow  mirror, 
with  a  gilt  leaf-pattern  frame,  which  hung  in  the  bedroom 


CHAP.   VI. j     FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.      179 

opposite  the  green-railed  bed,  examined  its  wooden  case  and 
the  back  of  it,  moved  the  glass  of  it  up  and  down  a  little 
and  then  hung  it  up  again — an  old  firedog  and  some  bed- 
room crockery  he  did  not  touch ;  he  whipt  the  lid  ofi'a  porce- 
lain butter-boat,  made,  according  to  the  plastic  art  of  the 
period,  in  the  shape  of  a  cow,  and  glanced  into  the  inside  of 
it,  but  set  it  back,  empty  and  full  of  dust,  as  an  ornament 
on  the  mantelpiece  again ;  he  weighed,  longer  and  with 
both  hands,  a  spice-mortar,  and  put  it  back  again  into  the 
©upboard. 

He  looked  more  and  more  dangerous,  and  more  and  more 
merry ;  he  drew  out  with  both  arms  the  drawer  of  a  ward- 
robe, shoved  back  table-napkins,  and  begun  to  overhaul  a 

mourning-dress  of  checked  cotton  a  little .     But  here 

Lenette  flew  out,  seized  him  by  his  overhauling  arm,  and 
cried,  "  Why  not,  indeed !  But,  please  God,  it  shall  not 
come  to  that  with  me  !  " 

He  shut  the  drawer  quietly,  opened  the  cupboard  again, 
and  carefully  lifted  the  mortar  on  to  the  table,  saying, 
"  Oh !  very  well,  it  matters  little  to  me,  it  comes  all  to  the 
same  thing ;  the  mortar  will  have  to  take  its  departure." 
By  covering  this  bell  of  shame  with  his  open  hand  by  way 
of  a  damper,  he  was  able  to  take  out  the  pestle,  its  clapper, 
without  producing  any  ring  or  clang.  He  had  been  per- 
fectly aware  all  the  time  that  she  would  rather  pawn  the 
garment  of  her  soul  (i.  e.  her  body)  than  the  checked  gar- 
ment of  that  garment;  but  it  was  of  set  purpose  that,  like 
the  Court  of  Borne,  he  demanded  the  entire  hand  that  he 
might  be  the  more  likely  to  obtain  a  single  finger  of  it — in 
this  case  the  mortar — and  moreover  he  hoped  the  mere 
frequency  with  which  he  reiterated  his  determination  would 
save  him  the  necessity  of  stating  any  reasons,  and  that  he 
would  familiarise  Lenette  with  the  bugbear  and  hobgoblin 
by  keeping  it  continually  before  her  eyes  (I  mean,  with 
his  design  upon  the  mortar).  Wherefore  he  went  on  to 
say,  "  The  fact  is,  that  it's  very  little  that  we  have  to 
pound  in  the  course  of  a  twelvemonth,  except  when  we  have 
a  quarter  of  a  fat  beast;  at  the  same  time,  just  give  me 
some  idea  why  you're  so  anxious  to  keep  the  checked  gown 
—what  on  earth  is  the  use  of  it  ?  The  only  time  you  can  wear 
it  will  be  when  I  depart  this  life.    Now,  Lenette,  that's  a 

*  2 


180  JEAN  PAUL   FEIEDEICH   EICHTER.      [BOOK  II. 

terrible  sort  of  idea ;  I  can't  stand  it.  Coin  the  dress  into 
silver — eliminate  it  altogether;  I'll  send  two  pairs  of 
mourning-buckles  of  mine  along  with  it;  I  hope  I  may 
never  have  anything  to  buckle  with  them  again." 

She  stormed  without  bounds  and  preached  with  much 
wisdom  against  all  "  careless,  thoughtless  householders ;" 
and  this  for  the  very  reason,  that  she  felt  it  was  only  too 
probable  that  he  would  soon  take  every  article  of  furniture 
in  the  place  (which  he  had  been  feeling  and  valuing,  like  a 
person  buying  bullocks)  to  the  slaughter-house,  and — good- 
ness gracious  ! — the  checked  dress  among  the  rest.  "  1  had 
rather  starve,"  she  cried,  "  than  throw  away  that  mortar 
for  a  mere  song.  The  Schulrath  is  sure  to  be  here  to-morrow 
evening,  with  the  money  for  your  reviews." 

"  Now  you  begin  to  talk  sense,"  said  he ;  and  he  carried 
the  pestle  horizontally  in  both  his  hands  into  the  bedroom, 
and  laid  it  on  to  Lenette's  pillow — next' bringing  the  mortar, 
and  placing  it  on  his  own.  "  If  people  should  happen  to 
hear  it  ring,"  he  said,  "  they  would  think  I  wanted  to  turn 
it  into  silver,  as  we  were  pounding  nothing  in  it;  and  I 
shouldn't  like  that." 

The  united  capital  contained  in  his  greenish-yellow 
cotton-purse,  and  her  large  money-bag  (which  she  wore  at 
her  girdle),  amounted  to  about  three  groschen,  good  money. 
In  the  evening  there  would  have  to  be  a  groschen-loaf 
bought,  for  cash,  and  the  remainder  of  the  metallic-seed 
must  be  sown  in  the  morning  to  grow  the  breakfast-  and 
dinner-crop.  The  servant-girl  went  out  for  the  bread,  but 
came  back  with  the  groschen  and  with  the  Job's  message, 
"  There's  nothing  left  at  the  bakers'  shops  at  this  time  of 
night  but  two-groschen  loaves ;  father  (the  cobbler  Fecht) 
couldn't  get  any  either."  This  was  lucky;  the  advocate 
could  enter  into  partnership  with  the  shoemaker,  and  it 
would  be  easy  for  these  partners,  by  each  contributing  a 
groschen  to  the  partnership  funds,  to  obtain  a  two-groschen 
loaf.  The  Fechts  were  aRked  if  they  agreed  to  this.  The 
cobbler,  who  made  no  secret  of  his  daily  bankruptcies, 
answered — 

"  With  all  my  heart.  G — d  d — n  me !  (Heaven  forgive 
me  for  swearing)  if  I  and  the  whole  crew  of  young  tatter- 
demalions in  the  place  have  had  a  scrap  of  anything  to  fill 


CHAP.   VI.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,   A.ND   THORN  PIECES.     181 

our  months  with  the  whole  blessed  day  hut  waxed-ends." 
In  short,  this  coalition  of  the  tiers  etat  with  the  learned 
estates  put  an  end  to  the  famine,  and  the  covenanting  parties 
broke  the  loaf  in  two  and  weighed  it  in  a  just  balance, 
it  being  itself  both  the  weight  and  the  thing  weighed. 
Ah!  ye  rich!  Ye,  with  your  manna,  or  bread  sent  from 
heaven,  little  think  how  indispensable  to  poverty  are  small 
weights,  apothecaries'  measure,  heller-loaves,*  a  dinner  for 
eight  kreuzers  (and  your  shirt  washed  into  the  bargain) ; 
and  a  broken-bread  shop,  where  mere  crumbs  and  black- 
bread  powder  are  to  be  had  for  money ;  and  how  the  com- 
fort of  a  whole  family's  evening  depends  on  the  fact  that 
your  hundred  weights  are  on  sale  in  lots  of  half-an-  ounce. 

They  ate,  and  were  content.  Lenette  was  in  good 
humour  because  she  had  gained  her  point.  At  night  the 
advocate  put  the  things  which  were  to  be  pawned  upon  a 
soft  chair.  In  the  morning  she  facilitated  his  writing  by 
keeping  very  quiet.  It  was  a  good  omen,  however,  that 
she  did  not  put  the  mortar  back  into  the  cupboard.  And 
Siebenkaes  fired  off  various  queries  out  of  the  said  bomb- 
mortar  in  parabolic  curves.  He  knew  perfectly  well  that 
the  Loretto-  and  Harmonica-bell  in  question  must  march 
that  day  or  the  next  over  the  frontier  for  a  small  pecuniary 
Abzug-geld.]  Women  always  like  to  put  everything  off  till 
the  very  last  possible  moment. 

Peltzstiefel  came  in  that  evening.  It  was  both  ridiculous 
and  natural  to  expect  that  the  first  thing  the  editor  of  the 
1  Heavenly  Messenger '  would  do  would  be  to  pay  the  critic 
his  wages,  so  that  he  might  at  least  be  able  to  set  before 
his  editor  a  candlestick  with  a  candle  in  it,  and  a  beer- 
glass  containing  beer.  Nothing  can  be  more  cruel  than  an 
anxiety  of  this  sort,  because  this  kind  of  shame  breaks  in  a 
moment  all  the  springs  in  the  human  machine.  Siebenkaes 
wouldn't  let  it  trouble  his  head,  because  he  knew  Stiefel 
wouldn't  let  it  trouble  his.  But  Lenette  was  to  be  pitied, 
inasmuch  as  the  blushes  of  her  shame  were  heightened  by 
her  fondness  for  Stiefel !     At  last  the  Kath  put  his  hand  in 

*  Heller  =  half-a-farthing. 

+  J.  e.  a  sum  which  people  pay  to  the  exchequer  for  permission  tc 
leave  the  country. 


182  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  II. 

his  pocket.  They  thought  now  he  was  going  to  produce  the 
review-money ;  but  all  he  took  out  was  his  snuff-machine, 
his  tobacco-grater,  and  he  dived  back  into  his  coat-tail 
pocket  for  half-an-ounce  of  rappee  to  put  upon  this  little 
chopping-bench.  But  he  had  grated  the  half-ounce  already. 
He  searched  his  breeches-pockets  for  money  to  send  for 
another  half-ounce.  Truly — and  here  he  swore  an  oath  for 
which  he  would  have  incurred  a  fine  had  he  been  in 
England — he  had  sent,  like  an  ass,  not  only  his  purse  but 
also  the  money  for  the  reviews,  carefully  counted  out  and 
neatly  wrapped  in  paper,  with  his  breeches — they  were  his 
plush  ones — to  the  tailor's.  He  said  it  wasn't  the  first 
time,  and  it  was  a  lucky  job  that  the  tailor  was  an  honest 
man;  the  only  thing  was,  he  hadn't  noticed  how  much 
there  was  in  his  purse.  He  innocently  requested  Lenette 
to  "  send  and  get  him  an  ounce  of  rappee ;  he  would  repay 
her  next  morning,  when  he  sent  the  money  for  the  reviews." 
Siebenkajs  roguishly  added,  "  And  send  for  some  beer  at 
the  same  time,  dear."  He  and  Stiefel  looked  out  of  win- 
dow ;  but  he  saw  that  his  poor  wife — her  bosom  torn  with 
sighs,  and  suffering  peine  forte  et  dure — stole  into  the  bed- 
room and  noiselessly  put  the  spice-mill  into  her  apron. 

After  a  good  half-hour,  rappee,  beer,  money,  and  happi- 
ness entered  the  room ;  the  bell-metal  of  the  mortar  was 
transformed  into  sustenance  for  the  inward  man,  and  the 
bell  in  question  had  been  somewhat  like  the  little  altar-bell, 
which  in  this  case,  besides  announcing  a  transubstantiation, 
or  transformation  of  the  substance  of  the  bread,  as  it  does 
in  the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  had  undergone  one  itself. 
Their  blood  no  longer  gurgled  among  rocks  and  stones,  but 
flowed  softly  and  tranquilly  along,  by  meadows,  and  over 
silver  sands.  Such  is  man.  When  he  is  in  the  depths  of 
misery,  the  first  happy  moment  lifts  him  out ;  when  he  is 
at  the  height  of  bliss,  the  remotest  sorrowful  moment, 
even  though  it  is  down  beneath  the  horizon,  casts  him  to 
earth.  No  great  man,  who  has  maitres  de  cuigine,  clerks  of 
the  cellar,  capon-stuffers,  and  confectioners,  has  any  true 
enjoyment  of  the  pleasure  it  is  to  give  and  receive  hospi- 
tality ;  he  gets  and  gives  no  thanks.  But  a  poor  man  and 
his  poor  guest,  with  whom  he  halves  his  loaf  and  his  can, 
are  united  by  a  mutual  bond  of  gratitude. 


CHAP.   VI.J     FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     183 

The  evening  wound  a  soft  bandage  about  the  pain  of 
the  morning.  The  poppy-juice  of  sixty  drops  of  hap- 
piness was  taken  hourly,  and  the  medicine  had  a  gently 
soothing  and  exhilarating  power.  When  his  old,  kind 
friend  was  leaving,  Siebenkees  gave  him  a  hearty,  grateful 
kiss  for  his  cheering  visit,  Lenette  standing  by,  with  the 
candle  in  her  hand.  Her  husband,  as  some  little  compen- 
sation to  her  for  having  pounded  her  little  fit  of  obstinacy 
to  groats  in  the  mortar,  said  to  her  in  an  off-hand,  cheerful 
manner,  "  You  give  him  one,  too."  The  blushes  mantled 
on  her  cheeks  like  fire,  and  she  leant  back,  as  if  she  had 
a  mouth  to  avoid  already.  It  was  quite  clear  that,  if  she 
had  not  been  obliged  to  perform  the  office  of  torch-bearer, 
she  would  have  fled  to  her  room  on  the  spot.  The  Eath 
stood  before  her  beaming  with  affectionate  friendliness — 
something  like  a  white  winter-landscape  in  sunshine — 
waiting  till — she  should  give  him  the  kiss.  The  fruitless- 
ness  of  this  expectation,  and  the  prematureness  of  her 
bending  her  head  out  of  the  way,  began  to  vex  him  a 
little  at  last.  Somewhat  hurt,  but  still  beaming  as  affec- 
tionately as  ever,  he  said — 

"  Am  I  not  worth  a  kiss,  Madam  Siebenkaes  ?  " 

Her  husband  said,  "  Surely  you  don't  expect  my  wife 
to  give  you  the  kiss.  She  would  set  her  hair  and  every- 
thing in  a  blaze  with  the  candle !  " 

Upon  this,  Peltzstiefel  inclined  his  head  slowly  and  cau- 
tiously, and  at  the  same  time  commandingly,  down  to  her 
mouth,  and  laid  his  warm  lips  on  hers,  like  the  half  of  a 
stick  of  melted  sealing-wax  on  the  other  half.  Lenette 
gave  him  more  space,  by  bending  back  her  head ;  yet  it 
must  be  said  that  while  she  held  her  left  arm  with  the 
candle  high  up  in  the  air,  for  fear  of  fire,  she  did  a  good 
deal  to  push  away  the  Bath — another,  more  proximate,  fire 
—politely  with  the  other.  When  he  was  gone,  she  was 
still  just  the  least  bit  embarrassed.  She  moved  about  with 
a  certain  floating  motion,  as  though  some  great  happiness 
was  buoying  her  up  with  its  wings — the  evening  red  was 
still  bright  on  her  cheek,  though  the  moon  was  high  in 
the  heavens :  her  eyes  were  bright,  but  dreamy,  seeming 
to  notice  nothing  about  her — her  smiles  came  before  her 
words,  and  she  spake  very  few — not  the  slightest  allusion 


.184  JEAN  PAUL   FEIEDMCH   EICHTER.  '    [ BOOK  It 

•was  made  to  the  mortar.  She  touched  everything  more 
gently,  and  looked  out  of  the  window  at  the  sky  two  or 
three  times.  She  didn't  seem  to  care  to  eat  more  of  the 
two-groschen  loaf,  and  drank  no  heer,  but  only  a  glass  or 
two  of  water.  Anybody  else — myself  for  example — would 
have  held  up  his  finger  and  sworn  he  was  looking  upon  a 
giil  who  had  just  had  a  first  kiss  from  her  sweetheart. 

And  I  shouldn't  have  regretted  having  taken  that  oath 
iiad  I  seen  the  sudden  blush  which  suffused  her  face  next 
day  when  the  money  for  the  reviews  and  the  snuff  was 
brought.  It  was  a  miracle,  and  an  extraordinary  piece  of 
politeness,  that  Peltzstiofel  should  not  have  forgotten  about 
his  having  contracted  this  little  loan — little  debts  of  two 
or  three  groschen  always  escaped  his  preoccupied  memory. 
But  rich  people,  who  always  carry  less  money  about  them 
than  the  poor,  and  therefore  borrow  from  them,  ought  to 
inscribe  trifling  debts  of  this  sort  on  a  memorial  tablet,  in 
their  brain,  because  it  is  veiy  wrong  to  break  into  a  poor 
devil's  purse,   who  gets,  moreover,  no  thanks  for  these 

groschen  of  his  which  thus  drop  into  the  stream  of  Lethe. 

****** 

Now,  I  beg  to  say,  I  should  be  happy  to  give  two  sheets 
of  this  manuscript  if  the  day  of  the  shooting-match  were 
but  come,  solely  because  our  dear  couple  build  so  upon  it 
and  upon  its  bird-pole.  For  the  position  of  these  people 
is  really  going  on  from  bad  to  worse ;  the  days  of  their 
destiny  move  with  those  of  the  calendar,  from  October 
on  to  November,  that  is  to  say,  from  the  end  of  summer  to 
the  beginning  of  winter,  and  they  find  that  moral  frosts 
and  nights  get  harder  and  longer  in  the  same  ratio  with 
those  of  the  season.  However,  I  must  go  regularly  on 
with  my  story. 

I  think  there  is  no  doubt  that  November,  the  month 
which  is  such  a  Novembriseur  of  the  British,  is  the  most 
horrible  month  of  all  the  year — for  me  it  is  a  regular  Septem- 
briseur.  I  wish  I  could  hybernate,  sleep,  till  the  beginning 
of  the  Christmas  month,  December.  The  November  of 
'85  had,  at  the  commencement  of  its  reign,  a  dreadful 
wheezing  breath,  a  hand  as  cold  as  death,  and  an  unpleasant 
lachrymal  fistula  ;  in  fact  it  was  unendurable.  The  north- 
east wind,  which  in   summer  it  is  so  pleasant   to  hear 


CHAP.   VI.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     185 

blowing  past  one's  ears,  because  one  knows  it  is  a  sure 
sign  of  settled  weather,  is,  in  autumn,  only  a  sign  of 
steady  cold.  To  our  couple  the  weathercock  was  really  a 
funeral  standard.  Though  they  didn't  exactly  go  out  to  the 
woods  themselves  with  baskets  and  barrows  to  pick  up 
fallen  branches  and  twigs,  like  the  poor  day-labourer,  they 
had  to  buy  the  stuff  for  firewood  from  the  wood-gatherers, 
by  weight,  as  if  it  had  been  wood  from  the  Indies,  and  it 
had  to  be  dried  by  the  combustion  of  other  wood  before  it 
would  burn.  But  this  damp  cold  weather  was  more  trying 
to  the  advocate's  stoicism,  after  all,  than  even  to  bis  purse; 
he  couldn't  run  out  and  go  up  a  hill,  and  look  about  him, 
and  seek  in  the  heavens  for  that  which  consoles  and  com- 
forts the  anxious  and  sorrowful,  that  which  dissipates 
the  clouds  which  shroud  our  life,  and  shows  us  guiding 
nebulas  (Magellan's  clouds),  if  nothing  else,  gleaming 
through  the  fog-banks.  For  when  he  could  go  up  the 
Rabenstein,  or  some  other  hill,  he  could  get  sight  from 
thence  of  the  aurora  of  the  sun  of  happiness,  though  that 
sun  was  under  his  horizon  ;  the  sorrows  and  torments  of 
this  earthly  life  lay,  writhing,  like  other  vipers,  in  the 
clefts  and  hollows  beneath  him,  and  no  rattlesnake  could 
rear  itself  with  its  fangs  up  to  his  hill.  Ah !  there,  in  the 
free  air,  close  to  the  ocean  of  life  which  stretches  on  into 
the  invisible  distance  of  infinity,  near  to  the  lofty  heavens, 
the  blue  coal  smoke  of  the  stifling,  suffocating  dwelling 
of  our  daily  life  cannot  rise  to  us,  we  see  its  wreaths 
hanging  far  down  beneath ;  our  sorrows  drop,  like  leeches, 
from  our  bleeding  bosoms,  and  raised,  for  the  time,  above 
our  woes,  we  stretch  our  arms — no  fetters  on  them  now, 
though  sore  and  marked,  and  bruised  with  the  galling  iron — 
we  stretch  them  out  as  if  to  soar  in  the  pure  bright  sether ; 
we  stretch  them  out,  and  fain  would  take  to  our  bosom 
the  peaceful  universe  above  us,  we  stretch  them  to  the 
invisible  eternal  Father,  like  children  hastening  home  to 
Him — and  we  open  them  wider  yet  to  clasp  our  visible 
mother,  created  Nature,  crying,  "  Oh  take  not  this  solace, 
this  comfort,  away  from  me,  when  I  am  down  there  again 
among  the  fog  and  the  sorrow."  And  why  is  it  that 
prisoners  and  the  sick  are  so  wretched  in  their  confine- 
ment ?     They  are  there  shut  up  in  their  holes,  the  cloudg 


186  JEAN   PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  IT. 

sail  over  them,  they  can  only  see  the  mountains  far  away 
in  the  distance,  these  mountains  whence,  as  from  those  of 
the  Polar  regions  in  summer  midnights,  the  sun,  down 
below  the  horizon,  can  be  seen  shining  with  a  mild  face, 
as  if  in  slumber.  But  in  this  wretched  weather  though 
Siebenkees  could  not  enjoy  the  consolations  of  imagination, 
which  bloom  beneath  the  open  sky,  he  could  derive  com- 
fort from  reason,  which  thrives  in  the  flower-pots  of  the 
window-sills.  His  chief  consolation,  which  I  commend  to 
everybody,  was  this :  Man  is  under  the  pressure  of  a 
necessity  of  two  kinds — an  every -day  necessity,  which 
everybody  bears  uncomplainingly,  and  a  rare,  or  yearly- 
recurrent  necessity,  which  is  only  submitted  to  after 
struggles  and  complaints.  The  daily  and  everlastingly 
recurrent  necessity  is  this — that  corn  does  not  ripen  in 
winter — that  we  have  not  got  wings,  though  so  many  lower 
creatures  have  them — or  that  we  cannot  go  and  stand 
upon  the  ring-shaped  craters  of  the  lunar  mountains,  and 
looking  down  into  the  abyt-ses,  which  are  miles  in  depth, 
watch  the  marvellous  and  beautiful  effects  of  the  setting 
sun's  rays.  The  annual,  or  rarely  recurrent,  necessity  is 
that  there  is  rainy  weather  when  the  corn  is  in  blossom — 
that  there  are  a  great  many  water-meadows  of  this  world 
where  it  is  very  bad  walking,  and  that  sometimes,  because 
we  have  corns,  or  no  shoes,  we  cannot  even  walk  anywhere. 
Only  the  annual  necessity  and  the  daily  are  of  exactly 
equal  magnitude,  and  it  is  just  as  senseless  to  murmur 
because  we  have  paralysed  limbs  as  because  we  have  no 
wings.  All  the  past — and  this  alone  is  the  subject  of  our 
sorrow — is  of  so  iron  a  necessity  that  in  the  eyes  of  a 
superior  intelligence  it  is  just  as  senseless  of  an  apothecary 
to  mourn  because  his  shop  is  burnt  to  the  ground  as  to 
sigh  because  he  can't  go  botanising  in  the  moon,  although 
there  may  be  many  things  in  the  phials  there  which  he  has 
not  got  in  his. 

I  mean  to  introduce  an  extra  leaflet  here  on  the  con- 
solations which  we  may  meet  with  in  this  damp,  chilly,, 
draughty  life  of  ours.  Anybody  who  may  be  annoyed  at 
these  brief  digressions  of  mine,  and  is  scarcely  to  be 
consoled,  let  him  seek  consolation  in  this — 


CHAP.  VI.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,   AND   THORN  PIECES.     187 
EXTRA   LEAFLET   ON   CONSOLATION. 

A  time  may,  that  is  to  say,  must  come  when  it  shall  be 
held  to  be  a  moral  obligation  not  only  to  cease  to  torment 
other  people,  but  to  cease  to  torment  ourselves;  a  time 
must  and  will  come  when  we  shall  wipe  away  the  greater 
part  of  our  tears,  even  here  on  earth,  were  it  only  from 
proper  pride. 

It  is  true,  nature  is  so  constantly  drawing  tears  from 
our  eyes,  and  forcing  sighs  from  onr  breasts,  that  a  wise 
nmn  can  scarcely  ever  wholly  lay  aside  his  body's  garb  of 
mourning ;  but  let  his  soul  wear  none !  For  if  it  is  a 
simple  duty  or  merit  to  endure  minor  sorrows  with  proper 
cheerfulness,  it  is  likewise  a  merit,  only  a  greater  one,  to 
bear  the  greatest  sorrows  bravely,  just  as  the  same  reason 
which  enjoins  the  forgiveness  of  small  injuries  is  equally 
valid  for  the  forgiveness  of  the  greatest. 

V\  hat  we  have  principally  to  <5ontend  against,  and  to 
treat  with  due  contempt,  in  sorrow,  as  in  anger,  is  its 
paralysing  poisonous  sweetness,  which  we  are  so  loth  to 
exchange  for  the  exertion  of  consoling  ourselves  and  of 
exercising  our  reasoning  faculties. 

We  must  not  expect  Philosophy  to  produce,  with  one 
stroke  of  the  pen,  the  converse  effect  to  that  which  Rubens 
produced,  when  he  converted  a  smiling  child  into  a  weep- 
ing one  with  one  stroke  of  his  brush.  It  is  sufficient  if 
she  converts  the  soul's  deep  mourning  garb  into  half- 
mourning  ;  it  is  enough  when  I  car  say  to  myself,  *'  I  am 
content  to  bear  that  share  of  my  sorrow  of  which  my 
philosophy  has  not  relieved  me;  but  for  her  it  would 
have  been  greater — the  gnat's  sting  would  have  been  a 
wasps." 

It  is  only  through  the  imagination,  as  from  an  electric 
condenser,  that  even  physical  pain  emits  its  sparks  upon 
us.  We  would  bear  the  severest  physical  pains  without  a 
wince  if  they  were  not  of  longer  duration  than  a  sixtieth 
part  of  a  second ;  but  we  never  really  do  have  an  hour  of 
pain  to  endure,  but  only  a  succession  of  sixtieth  parts  of  a 
second  of  pain,  the  sixty  separate  rays  of  which  are  con- 
centrated into  the  focus  and  burning-point  of  a  second, 
and  directed  upon  our  nerves  by  the  imagination  alone. 


138  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.       [BOOK  II* 

The  most  painful  part  of  corporeal  pain  is  the  incorporeal 
part  of  it,  that  is  to  say,  our  own  impatience,  and  our 
delusive  conviction  that  it  will  last  for  ever. 

We  all  know  for  certain  that  we  shall  have  given  up 
grieving  for  many  a  loss,  in  twenty,  ten,  or  two  years 
why  do  we  not  say  to  ourselves,  "  Very  well — if  this  is  an 
opinion  which  I  shall  cease  to  hold  in  twenty  years'  time, 
— I  prefer  to  abandon  it  to-day,  at  once  ?  Why  must  it 
take  me  twenty  years  to  abandon  an  error,  when  I  need  not 
hold  it  twenty  hours?" 

When  I  awake  from  a  dream  which  has  painted  for  me 
an  Otaheite  on  the  black  background  of  the  night,  and  find 
the  flowery  land  melted  away,  I  scarcely  sigh,  and  I 
think  it  was  but  a  dream.  How  were  it  if  I  had  actually 
po>sessed  this  flowery  island  in  waking  life,  and  it  had 
been  submerged  in  the  sea  by  an  earthquake?  Why 
should  I  not,  then  also,  say,  "  The  island  was  but  a  dream"  ? 
Why  am  I  more  inconsolable  for  the  loss  of  a  longer 
dream  than  for  the  loss  of  a  shorter  (for  that  is  what 
constitutes  the  distinction), — and  why  does  man  think 
a  great  loss  less  necessary  and  less  probable  than  a 
small  ? 

The  reason  is  that  every  sentiment  and  every  passion  is 
a  mad  thing,  demanding,  or  building,  a  complete  world  of 
its  own.  We  are  capable  of  being  vexed  because  it's  past 
twelve  o'clock,  or  because  it's  not  past,  but  only  just 
twelve  o'clock.  What  nonsense !  The  passion  wants 
besides  a  personality  of  its  own  (sein  eigneslch),  and  a 
world  of  its  own, — a  time  of  its  own  as  well.  I  beg  every 
one,  just  for  once,  to  let  his  passions  speak  plainly  out, 
and  to  listen  to  them,  and  ascertain  what  it  is  that  they 
really  each  of  them  want ;  he  will  be  dismayed  when  he 
sees  what  monstrous  things  are  these  desires  of  theirs 
which  they  have  previously  only  half  muttered.  Anger 
would  have  but  one  neck  for  all  mankind,  love  would 
have  but  one  heart,  sorrow  but  one  pair  of  lachrymal 
ducts,  and  pride  two  bent  knees  ! 

When  I  was  reading  in  Widman's  •  Hofer  Chronik '  the 
account  of  the  fearful,  bloody  times  of  the  thirty  years' 
war,  and,  as  it  were,  lived  them  over  again  ;  when  I 
beard  once  more  the  cries  for  help  of  those  poor  suffering 


CHAP,  vi.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND   THORN   PIECES.     189 

people,  all  struggling  in  the  Danube-whirlpools  of  their 
days — and  saw  the  beating  of  their  hands,  and  their 
delirious  wanderings  on  the  crumbling  pillars  of  broken 
bridges,  foaming  billows  and  drifting  ice-floes  dashing 
against  them ;  and  then,  when  I  thought  "  All  these  waves 
have  gone  down,  the  ice  is  melted,  the  howling  turmoil  is 
all  sunk  to  silence,  so  are  the  human  beings  and  all  their 
sighs  " — I  was  filled  with  a  melancholy  comfort,  a  thought 
of  consolation  for  all  times,  and  I  asked,  "  Was,  and  is, 
then,  this  passing,  cursory,  transient  burst  of  sorrow  at  the 
churchyard-gate  of  life,  which  three  steps  into  the  nearest 
cavern  could  end,  a  fit  cause  for  this  cowardly  lamen- 
tation ?"  Truly  if,  as  I  believe,  there  be  such  a  thing 
as  true  patience  under  an  eternal  woe,  then,  verily,  patience 
under  a  transitory  sorrow  is  hardly  worth  the  name. 

A  great  but  unmerited  national  calamity  should  not 
humble  us,  as  the  theologians  would  have  it — it  should 
make  us  proud.  When  the  long,  heavy  sword  of  war  falls 
upon  mankind,  and  thousands  of  blanched  hearts  are  torn 
and  bleeding — or  when  in  the  blue,  pure  evening  sky  the 
hot  cloud  of  a  burning  city,  smoking  on  its  funereal  pyre, 
hangs  dark  and  lurid,  like  a  cloud  of  ashes,  the  ashes  of 
thousands  of  hearts  and  joys  all  burnt  to  cinders  and  dust 
— then  let  thy  spirit  be  lifted  up  in  pride,  let.  it  loathe, 
contemn,  and  despise  tears,  and  that  for  which  they  fall, 
and  let  it  say — 

"  Thou  art  much  too  small  a  thing,  thou  every-day, 
common  life,  that  an  immortal  being  should  be  inconsolable 
with  regard  to  thee,  thou  torn  and  tattered  chance-bargain 
of  an  existence.  Here  upon  this  earth — the  ashes  of  cen- 
turies rolled  into  a  sphere,  worked  into  shape  and  form 
from  vapour  by  convulsion — the  cry  of  one  dreaming  in  a 
sorrowful  dream — I  say,  it  is  a  disgrace  that  the  sigh  should 
cease  only  when  the  breast  which  gives  it  utterance  is 
resolved  into  its  elements,  and  that  the  tear  should  cease 
to  flow  only  when  the  eye  is  closed  in  death." 

But  moderate  this  thy  sublime  transport  of  indignation 
and  put  to  thyself  this  question,  "  If  He,  the  Infinite  one, 
who,  veiled  from  thy  sight,  sits  surrounded  by  the  gleaming 
abysses,  without  bounds  save  such  as  Himself  creates,  were 
to  lay  bare  to  thy  sight  the  immeasurability  of  infinity,  and 


190  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH   BICHTER.      [BOOK  II. 

let  Himself  be  seen  of  thee  as  he  distributes  the  suns,  the 
great  spirits,  the  little  human  hearts,  and  our  days,  and  a 
tear  or  two  therein ;  wouldst  thou  rise  up  out  of  thy 
dust  against  Him,  and  say,  '  Almighty,  be  other  than  thou 
art!"' 

But  there  is  one  sorrow  whioh  will  be  forgiven  thee,  and 
for  which  there  is  recompense ;  it  is  sorrow  for  thy  dead. 
For  this  sweet  sorrow  for  thy  lost  ones  is,  in  truth,  but 
another  form  of  consolation ;  when  we  long  for  them,  this 
is  but  a  sadder  way  of  loving  them  still ;  and  when  we 
think  of  their  departure  we  shed  tears,  as  well  as  when  we 
picture  to  ourselves  our  happy  meeting  with  them  again. 
And  perhaps  these  tears  differ  not. 


CONTINUATION  AND  CONCLUSION 
OF  CHAPTER  VI. 

THE  CHECKED  CALICO  DRESS — MORE  PLEDGES — CHRISTIAN  NEGLECT 
OF  THE  STUDY  OF  JUDAISM — A  HELPING  ARM  (OF  LEATHER) 
STRETCHED   FORTH   FROM   THE   CLOUDS — THE   AUCTION. 

The  St.  Andrew's  shooting-match  will  take  place  in  the 
seventh  chapter :  the  present  one  fills  up  the  wintry  thorny 
interval  up  to  that  period — that  is  to  say,  the  wolf-month 
with  its  wolf-hunger.  Siebenkees  would  at  that  period  have 
been  much  annoyed  if  any  one  had  told  him  beforehand 
with  what  compassion  the  flourishing  state  of  his  trading 
enterprises  was  one  day  to  be  described  by  me,  and,  as  a 
consequence,  read  by  millions  of  persons  in  all  time  to  come. 
He  wanted  no  pity,  and  said,  "  If  I  am  quite  happy,  why 
should  you  be  pitying  me?"  The  articles  of  household 
furniture  which  he  had  touched,  as  with  the  hand  of  death, 
or  notched  with  his  axe,  like  trees  marked  for  cutting,  were 
one  by  one  duly  felled  and  hauled  away.  The  mirror,  with 
the  floral  border,  in  the  bedroom  (which,  luckily  for  itself, 
could  not  see  itself  in  any  other),  was  the  first  thing  to  be 
tolled  out  of  the  house  by  the  passing-  or  vesper-bell,  under 
the  pall  of  an  apron.  Before  he  stationed  it  in  the  train  of 
this  dance  cf  death,  he  proposed  to  Lenette  a  substitute  for 


CHAP.  "W.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.     191 

it,  the  checked  calico  mourning-dress,  in  order  to  accustom 
her  to  the  idea.  It  was  the  "  Censeo  Carthaginem  delendam  " 
(I  vote  for  the  destruction  of  Carthage)  which  old  Cato  used 
to  say  daily  in  the  senate  after  every  speech. 

Next  the  old  arm-chair  was  got  rid  of  bodily  (not  like 
Shakespeare's  arm-chair,  which  was  weighed  out  by  the 
ounce,  like  saffron,  or  in  carats,  like  gold),  and  the  firedog 
went  in  company  with  it.  Siebenkaes  had  the  wisdom  to 
say,  before  they  went  away,  "  Censeo  Carthaginem  delen- 
dam," i.  e.  "  Wouldn't  it  be  better  to  pawn  the  checked 
calico  ?  " 

They  could  barely  subsist  for  two  days  upon  the  dog  and 
the  chair. 

And  then  the  process  of  alchemical  transmutation  of 
metals  was  applied  to  the  shaving-basin  and  the  bedroom 
crockery,  which  were  converted  into  table-money.  Of 
course  he  previously  said  "  Censeo."  It  is  scarcely  worth 
the  trouble,  but  I  may  just  observe  here  how  little  fruit 
was  born  by  this  branch  of  trade ;  it  was  rather  a  woody 
branch  than  a  fruit-bearing  one. 

The  lean  porcelain  cow  or  butter-boat  would  scarcely 
have  served  as  their  nourishing  milch  cow  for  more  than  a 
day,  if  she  had  not  been  attended  by  seven  potentates  (that 
is  to  say,  most  miserable  prints  of  them),  who  went  "  into 
the  bargain,"  but  for  whom  the  woman  at  the  shop  added 
some  melted  butter.  Wherefore  he  said  "  Censeo."  Many 
of  my  readers  must  remember  my  mentioning  that,  a  short 
time  ago,  when  he  was  distributing  sentences  of  death 
among  the  furniture,  he  did  not  take  very  much  notice  of 
certain  table-napkins  which  were  lying  beside  the  checked 
calico  dress.  Now,  however,  he  acted  as  screech-owl,  or 
bird  of  death,  and  gallows-priest  to  them  also,  and  routed 
them  out  all  but  a  few.  When  they  were  gone,  he  re- 
marked, in  an  incidental  manner,  shortly  before  Martinmas 
Day,  that  the  napkin-press  was  still  to  the  fore,  though  it 
was  not  very  clear  what  was  the  use  of  it,  as  there  was 
nothing  for  it  to  press. 

"  If  such  a  thing  should  be  necessary,"  he  said,  "  the 
press  might  very  well  get  leave  of  absence  on  private 
affairs,  until  we  get  through  the  smoothing-press,  oiljng- 
press,  and  napkin-press  of  destiny,  and  come  out  all  smooth 


192  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  IL 

and  beautiful  ourselves,  and  can  stick  the  napkins  into  our 
button-holes  on  their  return."  His  first  intention  had  even 
been  to  reverse  the  order  of  the  funeral  procession,  and  put 
the  press  in  the  van  of  it  as  avant-courier  of  the  napkins,  and 
in  that  event  he  would  only  have  had  to  invert  his  syllo- 
gism (as  well  as  his  procession)  in  this  way  :  "  I  don't  see 
what  we  can  do  with  the  napkins,  or  how  we're  to  press 
them  and  keep  them  smooth,  till  we  get  the  press  home 
again." 

I  am  most  firmly  convinced  that  the  majority  of  people 
would  have  done  as  Lenette  did  with  reference  to  my  trade- 
consul  Siebenkses,  and  his  Hanseatic  confederation  with 
everybody  who  dealt  in  anything — that  is,  clasped  her 
hands  above  her  head,  and  said,  "  Oh !  the  thoughtless,  silly 
creature !  he'll  soon  be  a  beggar  at  this  rate  :  the  beautiful 
furniture ! " 

Firmian's  constant  answer  was — 

"  You  would  have  me  kneel  down  and  howl,  and  tear  my 
coat  in  lamentation,  like  a  Jew — my  coat,  which  is  torn 
already — and  pull  my  hair  out  by  the  roots— that  hair, 
which  terror  frequently  causes  to  fall  off  in  a  single  night. 
Isn't  it  enough  if  you  do  the  howling?  Are  you  not  my 
appointed  prcejica  and  keening-woman  ?  Wife,  I  swear  tc 
you,  and  that  as  solemnly  as  if  I  were  standing  on  pig's 
bristles,*  that  if  it  is  the  will  of  God,  who  has  given  me  so 
light  and  merry  a  heart — if  it  be  His  will  that  I  am  to  go 
about  the  town  with  eight  thousand  holes  in  my  coat,  and 
without  a  sole  to  either  shoe  or  stocking — that  I  am  to  go 
on  always  getting  poorer  and  poorer  "  (here  his  eyes  grew 
moist  in  spite  of  him,  and  his  voice  faltered),  "  may  the 
devil  take  me  and  lash  me  to  death  with  the  tuft  of  his  tail ' 
if  I  leave  off  laughing  and  singing ;  and  anybody  who  pities 
me,  I  tell  him  to  his  face,  is  an  ass.  Good  heavens!  the 
apostles,  and  Diogenes,  and  Epictetus,  and  Socrates,  had 
seldom  a  whole  coat  to  their  backs — never  such  a  thing  as 
a  shirt — and  shall  a  creature  such  as  I  let  a  hair  of  him  turn 
grey  for  such  a  reason,  in  miserable  provjncialistic  times 
such  as  these?" 

*  Jews  were  formerly  obliged  to  stand  with  bare  feet  on  pigs-skia 
when  they  took  oath. 


CHAP.  *t.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      193 

Right,  my  Firmian !  Have  a  proper  contempt  for  the 
narrow  heart-sacs  of  the  big  clothes-moths  about,  you —  the 
human  furniture-boring  worms.  And  ye,  poor  devils,  who 
chance  to  be  reading  me — whether  ye  be  sitting  in  colleges 
or  in  offices,  or  even  in  parsonage-houses,  who  perhaps 
haven't  got  a  hat  without  a  hole  in  it  to  put  on  your  heads, 
most  certainly  haven't  got  a  black  one — rise  above  the 
effeminate  surroundings  of  your  times  to  the  grand  Greek 
and  Roman  days,  wherein  it  was  thought  no  disgrace  to  a 
noble  human  creature  to  have  neither  clothes  nor  temple, 
like  the  statue  of  Hercules;  take  heed  only  that  your  soul 
shares  not  the  poverty  of  your  outward  circumstances ; 
lift  your  faces  to  heaven  with  pride — a  sickly  faint  northern 
Aurora  is  veiling  it,  but  the  eternal  stars  are  breaking 
through  the  thin  blood-red  storm  ! 

It  was  but  a  few  weeks  now  to  the  St.  Andrew's  Day 
shooting-match,  which  was  Lenette's  consolation  in  all  her 
tooubles,  and  to  which  all  her  wishes  were  directed  ;  how- 
ever, there  came  one  day  on  which  she  was  something  worse 
than  melancholy — inconsolable. 

This  was  Michaelmas  :  on  that  day  the  press  was  to  havo 
followed  Lenette's  Salzburg  emigrants,  the  napkins,  as  their 
lady  superior;  but  nobody  in  all  the  town  would  have 
anything  to  do  with  it.  The  sole  anchor  of  refuge  was  one 
Jew,  because  there  was  no  species  of  animal  (in  the  shape 
of  articles  of  merchandise)  which  did  not  flee  to  his  Noah's 
ark  of  a  shop.  Unfortunately,  however,  the  day  when  the 
napkin-press  applied  to  him  was  a  Jewish  feast-day,  which 
he  kept  more  strictly  than  ever  he  did  his  word.  He  said 
he  would  see  about  it  to-morrow. 

Permit  me,  if  you  please,  to  take  this  opportunity  of 
making  a  few  remarks  of  importance.  Is  it  not  a  piece  of 
most  culpable  negligence  on  the  part  of  the  Government 
that,  seeing  the  Jews  are,  as  it  were,  farmers-general  and 
metal-kings  of  the  Christians  in  German  states,  the  days 
of  their  feasts  and  fasts,  and  other  times  connected  with 
their  worship,  are  not  published  and  clearly  made  known 
for  the  benefit  of  those  very  numerous  persons  who  wish 
to  borrow  of  them,  or  have  any  business  to  transact  with 
them?  Those  who  suffer  most  from  this  omission  are  just 
the  upper  circles  of  society,  persons  of  birth  and  rank, 

U.  O 


194  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.      [BOOK  II, 

officials  of  high  position ;  these  are  the  persons  who  bring 
papers  and  want  money  on  Feasts  of  Haman,  Feasts  of 
Esther,  of  the  Destruction  of  the  Temple,  of  the  Rejoicing 
of  the  Law,  and  can't  obtain  any.  Surely  the  Jewish  fes- 
tivals, with  the  hours  at  which  they  begin  and  end,  ought  to 
be  given  in  every  almanack — as  they  have  been  fortunately, 
for  a  considerable  time,  in  those  of  Berlin  and  Bavaria — or 
in  newspapers — or  be  proclaimed  by  the  crier,  and  carefully 
taught  in  schools.  The  Jew,  indeed,  has  m  need  of  a 
calendar  of  our  festivals,  since  we  are  always  ready  to  put 
off  and  postpone,  if  he  likes,  every  Sunday  of  the  year, 
though  it  were  the  first  Sunday  of  it,  the  feast  of  the  Jewish 
Circumcision ;  and  consequently  hereafter,  when  the  uni- 
versal monarchy  of  the  Jews  is  actually  established,  he 
won't  take  the  trouble  to  append  a  Christian  calendar  to 
his  own  Jewish  calendars,  as  we  now  append  the  Jewish  to 
our  Christian.  The  necessity,  however,  of  inculcating  in 
our  schools  a  better  and  more  exact  acquaintance  with  the 
seasons  of  the  Jewish  festivals,  and  with  their  religious 
observances  in  general,  will  not  be  so  fully  manifest  until 
hereafter,  when  the  Jews  shall  have  elevated  Germany  to 
the  proud  position  of  being  their  Land  of  Promise,  leaving 
us  to  make  our  crusade,  and  our  return  to  the  Asiatic  land 
of  promise,  if  we  feel  disposed — to  a  holy  sepulchre,  and  a 
sacred  Calvary. 

And  yet  I  think  (to  close  this  digression  by  another) 
that  hereafter,  when  we  become  the  Christian  numerators 
of  Jewish  denominators,  we  should  be  wrong  to  set  out,  as 
modern  crusaders,  for  the  holy  land,  as  to  which  the  Jews 
themselves  trouble  their  heads  but  little.  It  is  certain  that 
they  will  treat  us  with  a  far  wider  measure  of  the  spirit  of 
tolerance  than  we,  unfortunately,  have  extended  to  them ; 
but  their  genius  for  commerce,  which  they  have  hitherto 
been  so  much  reproached  with,  will  be  found  to  prove  itself 
a  guardian  angel  for  us  poor  Christians,  and  to  take  us  under 
its  tutelage,  inasmuch  as  we  are  so  indispensably  necessary 
to  them  as  purchasers  and  consumers  of  the  unprepared  hind- 
quarters of  the  cattle  (for  it  is  only  the  fore-quarters  which 
they  may  eat,  unless  the  veins  are  all  taken  out).  Who 
eise  but  Christians  can  take  the  place  of  the  beasts  of 
burden — as  no  animal  may  be  degraded  by  working  on 


.CHAP.  VI.]      FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.      19o 

the  "Schabbes"*  (Sabbath) — and  perform  the  necessary 
draught  and  other  labour  ?  and  to  whom  are  they  to  entrust 
the  performance  of  menial  and  manual  employments,  like 
the  ancient  republicans,  but  to  us,  their  nobler  slaves  and 
helots,  whom  they  will,  therefore,  be  sure  to  treat  with 
more  consideration  than  they  have  hereto  fore  treated  us 
when  we  have  omitted  to  pay  our  promissory  notes  as  they 
became  due. 

I  return  to  our  poor's  advocate,  and  record  that  on 
Michaelmas  Day  he  could  get  no  money,  and  consequently 
no  Michaelmas  goose.  Lenette's  grief  at  the  absence  of 
the  goose  of  her  ecclesiastical  communion  we  must  all 
share.  Women,  who  care  less  about  eating  and  drinking 
than  the  most  ascetic  philosophers — caring,  indeed,  more 
about  the  latter  themselves  than  about  the  former — are  at 
the  same  time  not  to  be  controlled  if  they  have  to  go  without 
certain  chronological  articles  of  diet.  Their  natural  liking 
for  burgherly  festivities  brings  it  about  that  they  would 
rather  go  without  the  appointed  hymns  and  the  gospel  of 
the  day  than  without  butter-cakes  at  Christmas,  cheese- 
cakes at  Easter,  the  goose  at  Michaelmas ;  their  stomachs 
require  a  particular  cover  for  each  festival,  like  Catholic 
altars.  So  that  the  canonical  dish  is  a  kind  of  secondary 
sacrament,  which,  like  the  primary  one,  they  take,  not  for 
the  palate's  sake,  but  "  by  reason  of  the  ordinance."  Anto- 
ninus and  Epictetus  could  provide  Siebenkses  with  no 
efficient  substitute  for  the  goose,  with  which  to  console  the 
weeping  Lenette,  who  said,  "We  really  are  Christians, 
whatever  you  may  say,  and  belong  to  the  Lutheran  Church  ; 
and  every  Lutheran  has  a  goose  on  his  table  to-day — l:m 
sure  my  poor  dear  father  and  mother  always  had.  As  for 
you,  you  believe  in  nothing."  Whether  he  believed  m 
anything  or  not,  however,  he  slipped  off,  though  it  was  the 
afternoon  of  the  Jewish  feast-day,  to  the  Jew,  who  kept  a 
nice  pen  of  geese,  with  livers  both  fat  and  lean,  serving 
as  a  post-stable  for  country  friends  of  his  own  religion. 

*  Animals  may  not  carry  anything  on  the  Schabhes  ;  even  the  lappets 
which  fowls  sometimes  have  tied  to  them  as  marks  of  distinction,  havu 
to  be  taken  off  on  that  day ;  and  the  Jews  must  get  non-Jews  to  milk 
for  them;  they  may  not  even  wipe  off  dust  or  moisture  from  theil 
persons. 

o2 


196      JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.   [BOOK  II. 

When  he  went  into  his  place  he  pulled  a  duodecimo  Ilebrew 
Bible  out  of  his  pocket  and  put  it  down  on  the  table,  with 
the  words,  "  It  was  a  great  pleasure  to  him  to  meet  with  a 
keen,  diligent,  student  of  the  law ;  to  such  a  man  it  would 
be  a  real  satisfaction  to  make  a  present  of  his  Bible,  without 
asking  a  halfpenny  for  it ;  as  it  was,  an  unpointed  edition 
(that  is  to  say,  one  without  vowels),  he  couldn't  read  it 
himself,  especially  as  even  if  it  had  had  points,  he  couldn't 
have  managed  it.  This  napkin-press  of  mine,  here  " — he 
said,  producing  it  from  under  his  coat-tails — "I  should 
be  very  glad  if  you  would  allow  me  to  leave  with  you, 
because  I  find  it  a  good  deal  in  my  way  at  home ;  I 
don't  quite  know  what  to  do  with  it.  You  see,  I  have 
particular  reasons  for  being  anxious  to  get  hold  of  a  goose 
out  of  your  pen ;  I  don't  mind  if  it's  as  thin  as  a  whipping- 
post. If  you  like,  you  may  call  it  giving  it  to  me  in  charity 
on  a  holy  day  of  this  sort,  for  all  I  care;  it '11  make  no 
difference  to  me.  If  I  should  ever  come  and  take  away  the 
press  again,  it'll  be  an  easy  matter,  and  it'll  be  time  enough, 
to  go  into  the  transaction  afresh." 

It  was  thus  that,  in  order  to  secure  his  wife  the  free 
exercise  of  her  religious  observances,  he  brought  in  this 
goose  of  controversy,  which  seemed  to  have  some  polemical 
bearing,  as  well  as  to  be  connected  with  distinctive  doo- 
trines  of  faith;  and  next  day  these  two  Doctor  Martin 
Lutherists  ate  up  the  Schmalkaldian  article  (and,  indeed, 
another  Schmalkaldian  article,  a  commercial  one — cold  iron, 
namely — has  often  been  employed  in  defence  of  the  articles 
of  theology).  Thus  was  the  capitol  of  the  Lutheran 
religion  saved,  in  an  easy  manner,  by  the  bird,  which  was 
roasted  (so  to  speak)  at  the  fire  of  an  auto-da-fe. 

But  on  this  particular  morning  up  came  the  wigmaker, 
an  individual  whom  he  was  delighted  to  see  generally, 
though  not  to-day,  for  on  the  day  before,  Michaelmas,  the 
quarter's  house  rent  was  due,  as  we  may  remember.  The 
Friseur  presented  himself  as  a  sort  of  mute  bill  "  at  sight ;" 
yet  he  was  polite  enough  not  to  ask  for  anything.  He 
merely  mentioned,  in  a  casual  manner,  that  "there  was 
going  to  be  an  auction  of  a  variety  of  things  on  the  Monday 
before  St.  Andrew's  Day,  and  in  case  the  advocate  might 
care  to  get  together  a  few  things  for  it,  he  thought  lie 


CHAP.  VI.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      197 

would  give  him  notice  of  it,  as  he  held  a  life  appointment 
from  the  Houses  of  Assembly  as  auction-crier." 

He  was  scarcely  down  stairs  before  Lenette  gave  deep, 
but  not  loud,  expression  to  her  woes,  saying  he  had  "  dunned 
them  now,  and  that  the  whole  house  must  know  all  ahout 
their  disreputable  style  of  housekeeping :  had  he  not  talked 
about  furniture?"  It  was  incomprehensible  how  the  poor 
woman  could  have  fancied  anybody  had  been  in  the  dark 
about  it  before !  Poor  people  are  always  the  first  to  nose 
out  poverty.  At  the  same  time  Firmian  had  been  ashamed 
to  tell  the  Friseur  that  he  had  been  obliged  to  appoint 
himself  auctioneer  of  his  own  furniture.  Here  he  per- 
ceived that  he  blushed  for  his  poverty  more  before  one 
person,  and  before  the  poor,  than  he  did  before  a  whole 
town,  and  before  the  rich  ;  and  he  flew  into  a  furious  indig- 
nation with  these  execrable  eructations  of  human  vanity  in 
his  noblest  parts. 

The  path  from  hence  to  St.  Andrew's  Day,  all  bordered 
with  nothing  but  thistles  as  it  is,  cannot  possibly  seem 
longer,  even  to  the  reader,  than  it  did  to  my  hero,  who, 
moreover,  had  to  take  hold  of  the  thistles  and  pull  them  up 
with  his  own  hands.  The  garden  of  his  life  kept  getting 
more  and  more  like  a  jardin  Anglais,  where  only  prickly  and 
barren  trees,  but  no  fruit-ti  ees,  were  to  be  found. 

Every  night,  when  he  opened  the  latch  of  his  bed- 
railings,  he  would  say,  with  great  enjoyment,  to  his 
Lenette,  "  Only  twenty  (or  nineteen,  or  eighteen,  or  seven- 
teen) days  now  to  the  shooting-match."  But  the  hair- 
dresser and  auction-crier  had  played  the  deuce  and  all  with 
Lenette,  though  the  evenings  were  long  and  dark  and 
splendidly  convenient  for  needy  borrowers  on  deposit, 
veiling  and  hiding  the  naked,  abashed,  misery  of  the  poor ; 
she  was  ashamed  the  people  in  the  house  should  know, 
and  afraid  to  meet  them.  Firmian,  who  was  astonished 
equally  at  the  inexhaustible  resources  of  his  brain  and  of 
his  house,  and  who  kept  saying  to  himself,  "  Do  you  know, 
I'm  really  curious  to  see  what  1  shall  hit  upon  to-day  again, 
and  how  I  shall  manage  to  get  out  of  this  difficulty  now — " 
Firmian,  a  day  or  two  after  the  Michaelmas  dinner,  got  his 
eye  upon  two  more  good  articles  of  furniture — a  long  cask- 
siphon  and  a  rocking-horse  (a  relic  of  his  childhood).    "  We 


198  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER,      [BOOK  IT. 

haven't  a  cask,  and  wo  haven't  a  bahy,"  he  said.  But  hia 
wife  implored  him,  for  heaven's  sake,  u  not  to  put  her  to 
this  shame.  The  horse  and  the  siphon  "  (she  said)  "  are 
things  that  would  stick  out  of  the  basket  so  terribly,  or  out 
from  under  one's  apron,  and  in  the  moonlight  everybody 
would  see  them." 

And  yet  something  must  go!  Firmian  said,  in  an  odd 
cutting,  yet  sorrowful  way,  "  It  must  be  so !  Fate,  like 
Pritzel,*  is  beating  on  the  bottom  of  the  drum,  and  the  oats 
are  jumping  on  the  top  of  it ;  we  have  got  to  eat  off  tho 
drum." 

"  Anything,"  she  said,  faint  and  beaten,  "  except  things 
that  stick  out  so."  She  searched  about,  opened  the  top 
drawer  of  tho  cupboard,  and  took  out  a  faded  wreath  of 
artificial  flowers :  she  said,  "  Bather  take  this ! "  and  neither 
smiled  nor  wept !  He  had  often  looked  at  it ;  but  as  he 
had  sent  it  to  her  himself  last  New  Year's  Day,  the  day  of 
their  betrothal,  and  because  it  was  so  romantically  beautifu] 
(a  white  rose,  two  red  rosebuds,  and  a  border  of  forget- 
me-nots)  every  fibre  of  that  tender  heart  of  his  would  have 
stood  out  against  parting  with  this  pretty  relic — this  me- 
morial of  better,  happier,  days.  The  patient,  resigned  way 
in  which  she  made  the  sacrifice  of  these  poor  old  flowers 
tore  his  heart  in  two.  "  Lenette ! "  he  said,  moved  beyond 
expression — "why,  you  know,  these  are  our  betrothal 
flowers ! " 

"  Well,  who's  to  be  any  the  wiser,"  she  said,  quite  cheer- 
fully and  quite  coolly.  "  You  see  they're  not  so  big  as 
other  things  are.'* 

M  Have  you  forgotten,  then  quite,"  he  stammered,  "  what 
I  told  you  these  flowers  meant  ?  " 

"  Let  me  see,"  she  said,  more  coldly  still,  and  proud  of 
the  goodness  of  her  memory,  "the  forget-me-nots  mean 
that  I'm  not  to  forget  you,  and  that  you  won't  forget  me — 
the  buds  mean  happiness — no,  no,  the  buds  mean  happi* 
ness  that's  not  quite  all  como  yet — and  the  white  rose — I 
don't  recollect  tow  what  the  white  rose  means " 

*  Frizelius  trained  war-horses  to  stand  the  beating  of  the  drums  in 
bnttle,  by  screwing  oats  on  the  tops  of  drums,  and  beating  on  the  lower 
side  of  them  while  the  horses  ate  the  oats  as  they  jumped  about  oa 
tho  top. 


CHAP.   Vi.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND   THORN  PIECES.      199 

"  It  means  pain  "  (he  said,  overwhelmed  with  emotion), 
"  and  innocence,  and  sorrow,  and  a  poor  white  face."  He 
clasped  her  in  his  arms,  as  the  tears  came  to  his  eyes,  and 
cried,  "  Oh  !"  poor  darling!  poor  darling!  What  can  I  do? 
It's  all  beyond  me !  I  should  like  to  give  you  everything 
the  world  contains,  and  I  have  nothing " 

He  ceased  suddenly,  for  while  his  arms  were  round  her, 
she  had  shut  up  the  drawer  of  the  cuphoard,  and  was 
looking  at  him  with  calm,  clear,  gentle  eyes,  not  the  trace 
of  a  tear  in  them.  She  resumed  her  petition  in  the  old  tone 
saying,  "  I  may  keep  the  siphon  and  the  horse,  mayn't  I  ? 
We  shall  get  more  money  for  the  flowers."  What  he  said 
was, "  Lenette ! — Oh,  darling  Lenette,"  over  and  over  again, 
each  time  more  tenderly. 

"  But  why  not?"  she  asked,  more  gently  each  time,  for 
she  didn't  understand  him  in  the  least.  "I  had  sooner 
pawn  the  coat  off  my  back,"  was  his  answer.  But  as  she 
now  got  the  alarming  idea  into  her  head  that  what  he  was 
driving  at  was  the  calico  gown,  and  as  this  put  her  into  a 
great  svate,  and  as  she  immediately  began  to  inveigh  warmly 
against  all  pledging  of  large  articles ;  and  as  he  clearly 
perceived  that  her  previous  coldness  had  been  thoroughly 
genuine,  and  not  assumed,  he  knew,  alas  !  the  very  worst, 
a  grief  which  no  sweet  drops  of  philosophy  could  avail  to 
alleviate,  namely — she  either  loved  him  no  longer,  or,  she 
had  never  really  loved  him  at  all. 

The  sinews  of  his  arms  were  now  fairly  cut  in  two,  the 
sinews  of  his  arms  which  had  till  now  kept  misfortune  at 
bay.  In  the  prostration  of  this  his  (spiritual)  putrid  fever 
he  could  say  nothing  but — "  Whatever  you  please,  dear ; 
it's  all  the  same  to  me  now." 

Upon  that,  she  went  out  delighted,  and  quickly,  to  old 
Sabel,  but  came  back  again  immediately.  This  pleased  him ; 
sorrow  having  gnawed  deeper  into  his  heart  during  the 
three  moments  she  was  gone,  he  could  follow  up  the  bitter 
speech  with  these  quiet  words :  "  Put  up  your  marriage 
wreath  along  with  the  other  flowers,  there'll  be  a  little 
more  weight,  and  a  little  more  money  for  it ;  though  it  is 
nothing  like  such  pretty  work  as  my  flowers." 

"My  marriage  wreath?"  cried  Lenette,  colouring  with 
anger,  while  two  bitter  tears  burst  from  her  eyes.     "  No, 


200  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  11 

that  I  positively  shall  not  let  go,  it  shall  be  put  with  me 
into  my  coffin,  as  my  poor  dear  mother's  was.  Did  you  not 
take  it  up  in  your  hand  from  the  table  on  my  wedding-day, 
when  I  had  taken  it  off  to  have  my  hair  powdered,  and 
say  you  thought  quite  as  much  of  it  as  you  did  of  the 
marriage  ceremony  itself,  if  not  more  ?  (I  noticed  what 
you  said  very  carefully,  and  remember  it  quite  distinctly). 
No,  no,  I  am  your  wife,  at  all  events,  and  I  shall  never  let 
that  wreath  go  as  long  as  I  live." 

His  emotion  now  took  a  new  bent,  one  more  in  harmony 
with  hers,  but  he  masked  this  behind  the  question,  "  What 
made  you  come  back  in  such  a  hurry  ?  "  It  was  that  old 
Sabel  had  just  been  in  at  thi  bookbinder's,  it  seemed,  and 
Herr  von  Meyern  had  been  there  too.  That  young  gentle- 
man was  in  the  habit  of  getting  off  his  horse  and  dropping 
in,  partly  to  see  what  new  books  the  ladies  were  having 
bound  at  the  bookbinder's,  and  in  what  sort  of  pretty 
bindings,  partly  to  stick  up  his  leg  with  its  riding  boot 
upon  the  cobbler's  bench  and  get  him  to  stitch  a  top 
tighter,  asking  about  all  sorts  of  things  during  the  process. 
The  world — (which  expression  can  only  mean  the  col- 
lection of  female  tongue-threshers  of  empty  straw  belong- 
ing to  Kuhschnappel) — may  undoubtedly  conclude,  if  it 
be  so  minded,  the  Venner  to  be  a  regular  Henry  the  Fowler 
with  respect  to  more  women  than  one  in  the  house,  the 
latter  being  a  feminine  Voliere  to  him  ;  but  I  want  proofs 
of  this.  Lenette,  however,  didn't  trouble  herself  about 
any  proofs,  but  piously  fled  out  of  the  way  of  Kosa  the 
birdcatcher. 

I  further  relate  (doing  so,  moreover,  without  any  very 
marked  blush  for  the  mutability  of  the  human  heart)  that 
at  this  point  Firmian's  compressed  thoracic  cavity  grew 
several  inches  wider,  so  as  to  give  admission  to  a  con- 
siderable modicum  of  happiness,  for  no  other  reason  but 
that  Lenette  had  kept  such  a  tight  grasp  of  her  marriage- 
wreath,  and  had  endured  the  Yenner  for  so  short  a  time. 
"  She  is  faithful,  at  all  events,  although  she  may  be 
rather  cool ;  in  fact,  I  don't  really  believe  she  is  a  bit  cool, 
either,  after  all."  So  that  he  was  quite  pleased  that  she 
should  have  her  way  (which  was  his  also)  about  keeping 
the  wedding-wreath  in  the  house  and  in  her  heart.     Be- 


CHAP.  VI.  J     FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.      201 

6ides  which,  without  contending  further  ahout  the  he* 
trothal-wreath,  he  let  her  have  that  other  way  of  hers, 
though  less  willingly — this  being  a  proceeding  which 
hurt  his  feelings  only,  not  hers.  His  old  flower  keepsake 
was  accordingly  deposited  in  the  hands  of  an  ohliging  lady 
who  rejoiced  in  the  title  of  "  Appraiser,"  on  the  solemn 
understanding  that  it  was  to  he  redeemed  with  the  very 
first  dollar  which  should  drop  from  the  bird-pole  on  tit. 
Andrew's  Day. 

The  blood-money  of  these  silken  flowers  was  so  parcelled 
out  as  to  be  made  available  by  way  of  stepping-stones  in 
the  muddy  path  leading  to  the  Sunday  before  the  shooting- 
match.  This  Sunday  (the  27th  November,  1785)  was  to 
be  followed  by  the  Monday  for  which  the  auction  had 
been  announced ;  on  the  \\  ednesday  he  (and  I  hope  all 
of  us  with  him)  would  be  in  his  place  in  front  of  the 
bird-pole. 

It  is  true,  however,  that  on  the  Sunday  he  had  to  ford 
a  stream  swollen  to  a  considerable  extent  by  rainy  weather; 
we  will  go  through  it  after  him,  but  1  give  due  notice  that, 
iu  the  middle,  it  is  pretty  deep. 

The  stomach  of  his  inner  man  evinced  a  wonderful  dis- 
relish, and  exhibited  a  reversed  peristaltic  motion  towards 
everything  in  the  shape  of  pawning,  since  the  affair  of 
the  flowers.  The  reason  was — there  was  nothing  more  to 
which  he  could  refer  his  wife.  At  first,  he  used  to  refer 
her  to  the  shooting-match  ;  but  when  the  mortar  and  the 
chair  had  evacuated  the  fortress  without  tuck  of  drum, 
they  not  being  articles  of  a  sort  to  be  obtained  as  prizes 
for  shooting,  he  took  to  referring  her  to  public  auctions 
at  which  he  could  always  buy  what  he  might  require  at 
about  half  price.  Finally,  though  still  referring  her  to 
auctions,  he  did  so  no  longer  with  a  view  to  import, 
but  to  export,  trade — as  a  seller,  rather  than  as  a  buyer, 
of  commodities ;  in  which  respect  he  surpasses  Spain. 

He  who  has  risen  victorious  over  great  and  serious 
attacks  of  an  insulting  or  offensive  nature,  has  often  had  to 
yield  to  very  small  and  trifling  ones ;  and  so  it  is  with 
our  troubles.  The  stout,  firm  heart,  which  has  beat 
strongly  on  all  through  long  years  of  bitter  trial  and 
affliction,  will  often  break  at  once,  like  over-flooded  ice,  at 


202  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  IL 

some  lightest  touch  of  Fortune's  foot.  Till  now,  Siebenkees 
had  carried  himself  erect,  and  borne  his  burden  without  a 
bend,  ay,  and  with  a  merrier  heart  than  many  a  man. 
Up  to  this  hour,  he  really  hadn't  minded  the  whole  affair 
one  single  button.  Had  he  not  (merely  to  mention  one  or 
two  instances)  pointed  out  that,  in  the  matter  of  clothes,  he 
was  better  off  than  the  Emperor  of  Germany,  who  (he  said) 
had  nothing  to  put  on,  on  his  coronation-day  in  Frankfort, 
but  a  frightful  old  cast-off  robe  of  Charles  the  Great's,  not 
much  better  than  Rabelais's  old  gown,  though  that  was  not 
by  several  centuries  so  old  as  the  Imperial  one?  And 
once  when  his  wife  was  sadly  looking  over  his  fading 
perennial  clothes  flora,  he  told  her  all  she  had  to  do  was 
to  suppose  he  was  serving  in  the  new  world  with  a 
thousand  or  so  of  other  Anspach  men,  and  the  ship  which 
was  bringing  out  their  new  uniforms  had  been  captured 
by  the  enemy,  so  that  the  whole  force  had  nothing  to  put 
on  but  what  they  would  have  preferred  to  have  been  able 
to  take  off.  Likewise  that  what  he  had  had  to  go  upon, 
and  to  take  his  stand  xipon  for  a  considerable  time  past, 
had  been  something  much  superior  to  his  own  pair  of 
boots  (by  this  he  clearly  meant  pure  apathy) ;  as  for  his 
boots,  they,  having  been  twice  new  fronted,  had  been 
shoved  in  like  pocket  telescopes,  or  trombones,  till  they 
had  become  a  pair  of  fair  hal f- boots ;  just  as  the  German 
corpora,  also,  by  the  influence  of  long  years  of  civilisa- 
tion and  culture,  have  got  considerably  taken  in,  the  long 
rifle  having  been  docked  into  a  short,  or  non-commis- 
sioned officers'  rifle. 

But  on  the  Sunday  to  which  I  am  alluding,  he  was  far 
too  much  scared  at  the  sight  of  one  single  bird  of  prey  and 
of  ill  omen,  flying  athwart  the  lonely  Sahara  desert  iu 
which  his  life  was  passing.  He  himself  was  taken  by 
surprise  at  this  alarm  of  his ;  he  would  have  expected 
anything  else  but  alarm  under  the  circumstances.  For  as 
it  nad  hitherto  been  his  custom  to  prepare  himself  for  dark 
and  tragic  scenes  by  comedy  rehearsals  of  them — by  which 
1  mean,  that  he  carefully  read  up,  beforehand,  all  the 
legal  steps  which  Herr  von  Blaise  could  take  against  him, 
thus  taking  up,  in  sport,  and  in  advance,  the  burdens 
which  the  future  had  in  store — it  astonished  him  greatly 


CHAP.   VI.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      203 

to  find  that  an  ill,  quite  certain  to  come,  and  clearly  fore- 
seen, should  prove  to  have  longer  thorns,  when  it  came 
up  towards  him  out  of  ihe  future,  than  it  seemed  to  possess 
while  still  at  a  distance. 

So  that  when,  on  the  Sunday,  the  messenger  of  the 
Inheritance  Office  came,  with  the  long-expected  third  dila- 
tory plea  of  the  Heimlicher,  and  with  the  third  affirmatory 
decree  written  on  the  face  thereof,  as  his  breast  was  in 
the  condition  of  a  vacuum  (no  air  to  breathe  in  it)  before 
his  coming,  his  poor  heart  grew  sick  and  breathless  indeed, 
when  this  fresh  stroke  of  the  air-pump  exhausted  the 
receiver  even  more  thoroughly  than  it  had  been  emptied 
before. 

Amid  the  multiplicity  of  matters  which  it  has  been  my 
duty  to  report  to  the  public,  I  have  omitted,  on  purpose,  all 
mention  of  the  second  of  Mr.  Blaise's  dilatory  pleas,  because 
1  thought  I  might  assume  that  every  reader  who  has  had  as 
much  as  half  a  ship's  pound  weight  of  legal  documents 
through  his  hands — or  one  single  settlement  of  law  accounts 
— would  take  it  for  granted,  as  a  matte]-  of  couise,  that  the 
first  petition  for  delay  would  infallibly  be  followed  by  a 
second.  It  reflects  much  discredit  on  our  administration  of 
justice  that  every  upright,  honourable  counsel  finds  himself 
compelled  to  adduce  such  a  number  of  reasons  (I  wish  I 
might  say  "  lies  ")  before  he  can  be  accorded  the  smallest, 
necessary  term  of  delay ;  he  has  got  to  say  his  children 
and  his  wife  are  dying ;  that  he  has  met  with  all  kinds  of 
unfortunate  accidents,  and  has  thousands  of  things  to  do, 
journeys  to  make,  and  sicknesses.  Whereas  it  ought  to  be 
quite  enough  for  him  to  say  that  the  preparation  of  the 
innumerable  petitions  for  delay  with  which  he  is  over- 
whelmed, leaves  him  little  time  to  write  anything  else. 
People  ought  to  notice  that  these  petitions  for  delay  tend, 
as  all  other  petitions  do,  to  the  protracting  cf  the  suit,  just 
as  all  the  wheels  of  a  watch  work  together  to  retard  the 
principal  wheel.  A  slow  pulse  is  a  sign  of  longevity  not 
only  in  human  beings  but  in  lawsuits.  It  seems  to  me 
that  an  advocate  who  has  any  conscience  is  glad  to  do 
what  he  can  to  promote  the  length  of  life  in  his  opponent's' 
suit — not  in  his  own  client's,  he  would  make  an  end  of  that 
in  a  minute  if  he  could — partly  to  punish  the  said  opponent, 


204  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.       [BOOK  IL 

partly  to  terrify  him,  or  else  to  snatch  from  his  grasp  a 
favourable  judgment  (a  sort  of  thing  as  to  which  nobody 
can  form  an  idea  whether  it  is  likely  or  not) — for  as  many 
years  as  possible  ;  just  as  in  •  Gulliver's  Travels/  the 
people  who  had  a  black  mark  on  their  brow  were  doomed 
to  the  torture  of  eternal  life.  The  object  of  the  man  of 
business  on  the  opposite  side  is  a  similar  prolongation  of 
the  war  to  his  opponents,  and  thus  the  two  counsel  immesh 
the  two  clients  in  a  long  drag-net  of  documents,  &c.,  each 
with  the  best  possible  intentions.  On  the  whole,  lawyers 
are  not  so  indifferent  to  the  question,  "  W  hat  is  the  law  ?  " 
as  to  the  question,  "  "What  is  justice?"  For  which  reason 
they  prefer  arguing  to  writing  ;  as  Simonides,  when  he  was 
asked  by  the  king  the  question,  M  What  is  God  ?  "  begged 
for  a  day  to  consider  his  answer — then  for  another  day — 
then  for  another — and  for  another,  and  always  for  another, 
because  no  man's  life  is  sufficient  to  answer  that  question — 
so  the  jurist,  when  he  is  asked.  "What  is  justice?"  keeps 
continually  asking  for  more  and  more  delays — he  can 
never  reply  to  the  question — indeed,  if  the  judges  and 
clients  would  let  him,  he  would  gladly  devote  his  whole 
life  to  writing  replies  to  a  legal  question  of  this  sort. 
Advocates  are  so  used  to  this  way  of  looking  at  matters, 
that  it  never  strikes  them  that  there  is  anything  unusual 
about  it. 

I  return  to  my  story.  This  blow  of  the  iron  secular  arm, 
with  its  six  long  thief-  and  writing-fingers,  all  but  felled 
Siebenkaes  to  the  earth.  The  vapours  about  his  path  in 
life  condensed  to  morning  mist,  the  morning  mist  to  even- 
ing clouds,  the  clouds  to  showers  of  rain.  "  Many  a  poor 
devil  has  more  to  do  than  he  can  manage,"  he  said.  It*  he 
had  had  a  pleasant,  cheerful  wife,  he  would  not  have  said 
this ;  but  one  such  as  his,  who  painfully  trailed  her  cross 
(instead  of  taking  it  up),  and  was  all  lamentations — an 
elegiac  poetess,  a  Job's  comforter — was  herself  a  second 
cross  to  bear. 

He  set  to  work  and  thought  the  whole  thing  over ;  he 
had  hardly  enough  left  to  buy  the  next  year's  almanack, 
or  a  bundle  of  Hamburgh  quills  (for  his  satires  used  up 
Lenette's  feather  dusters  much'  more  than  his  own  ener- 
gies, so  that  he  often  thought  of  cutting   Stiefel's  red 


CHAP.  VI. J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      205 

pipe-stalk  into  a  pen) ;  he  would  have  heen  delighted  to 
convert  his  plates  into  something  to  eat  (there  were  none 
left,  however),  following  the  example  of  the  Gauls,  who 
used  round  pieces  of  bread  as  plates  first,  and  afterwards 
as  dessert ;  or  of  the  Huns,  who,  after  riding  upon  pieces 
of  beef  (by  way  of  saddles)  till  it  was  partly  cooked,  dined 
upon  these  saddles.  His  half-boots  would  need  to  be  new 
fronted,  and  abbreviated  for  the  third  time,  before  the 
arrival  of  the  impending  shooting-match  day ;  and  of  the 
necessary  requisites  for  the  performance  of  that  operation 
the  only  one  in  existence  was  the  artist,  Fecht  the  cobbler. 
In  short,  for  that  important  occasion  he  had  nothing  to 
put  on  his  back  or  in  his  pocket,  his  bullet-pouch,  or  his 
powder-born. 

When  a  man  intentionally  works  his  anxieties  and  ap- 
prehensions up  to  the  highest  possible  pitch,  some  con- 
solation is  sure  to  fall  upon  his  heart  from  heaven,  like  a 
drop  of  warm  rain.  Siebenkaes  began  catechising  himself 
more  strictly,  asking  himself  what  it  really  was  that  he 
was  tormenting  himself  about.  Nothing  but  the  fear  of 
having  to  go  to  the  shooting-match  without  money,  with- 
out powder  and  shot,  and  without  having  had  his  boots 
abbreviated  for  the  third  time !  "  Is  that  really  all  ?  "  he 
said.  "  And  what,  if  you  please,  is  there  to  make  it  a 
compulsory  matter  that  I  should  go  there  at  all?  I'll 
tell  you  what  it  is  "  (he  went  on  to  himself),  "  I  am  the 
monkey  complaining  bitterly  that,  having  stuck  his  hand 
into  a  narrow-mouthed  bottle  of  rice,  and  filled  it,  he  can't 
pull  it  out  without  a  corkscrew.  All  I've  got  to  do  is  to 
sell  my  rifle  and  my  shooting  ticket;  all  I've  got  to  do  is 
to  open  my  hand  and  draw  it  out  empty."  So  he  made  up 
his  mind  to  take  his  rifle  to  the  barber  on  the  day  of  the 
auction  to  be  put  up  to  ss  le. 

All  battered,  bruised,  and  weary  with  the  day,  he 
climbed  into  his  bed,  with  the  thought  of  which  safe  and 
sheltered  anchoring  ground  he  consoled  himself  all  day 
long.  "  There  is  this  blessed  property  about  night,"  he 
said,  as  he  sat  and  spread  the  feathers  of  his  quilt  level, 
"  that  while  it  lasts  we  need  trouble  ourselves  neither  about 
candles,  coals,  victuals,  drink,  debts,  nor  clothes ;  all  we 
want  is  a  bed.     A  poor  fellow  is  in  peace  and  comfort  as 


206     .  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH   EICHTER.       [BOOK  II. 

long  as  he  is  lying  down :  and,  luckily,  he  has  only  got  to 
stand  for  half  of  his  time." 

The  attacks  of  syncope,  to  which  our  sonls  and  our 
cheerfulness  are  subject,  cease,  as  those  of  the  body  do 
(according  to  Zimmerinann),  when  the  patient  is  placed  in 
a  horizontal  position. 

Had  his  bed  been  provided  with  bed-tassel,  I  should 
have  called  it  the  capstan,  whereby  he  heaved  himself 
slowly  up  on  the  Monday  morning  from  his  resting  place. 
When  he  got  up,  he  ascended  to  the  garret,  where  his  rifle 
was  nailed  up  in  an  old,  long  field-chest,  to  keep  it  safe. 
This  rifle  was  a  valuable  legacy  from  his  father,  who  had 
been  huntsman  and  gun-loader  to  a  great  prince  of  the 
empire.  He  took  a  crowbar,  and,  using  it  as  a  lever,  prised 
up  the  lid  with  its  roots,  t.  e.  nails ;  and  the  first  thing  he 
saw  in  it  was  a  leather  arm,  which  "  gave  him  quite  a 
turn ;"  for  he  had  had  many  a  good  thrashing  from  that 
arm  in  bygone  days. 

It  will  not  take  me  too  far  out  of  my  way  to  expend  a 
word  or  two  on  this  subject  This  full-dress  arm  had  been 
borne  by  Siebenkres's  father  on  his  body  (as  it  might  be  in 
the  field  of  his  escutcheon)  ever  since  the  time  when  he 
had  lost  his  natural  arm  in  the  military  service  of  the 
before-mentioned  prince,  who,  as  some  slight  reward,  had 
got  him  his  appointment  as  gun-loader  to  his  corps  of 
Jagers.  The  gun-loader  wore  this  auxiliary  arm  fastened 
to  a  hook  on  his  left  shoulder ;  it  being  more  like  the  arm 
of  a  Hussar's  pelisse,  or  an  elongated  glove,  worn  by  way  of 
ornament,  than  as  a  month  Christian  of  an  arm  (pretending 
to  be  what  it  was  not).  In  the  education  of  his  children, 
however,  the  leather  arm  served,  to  some  extent,  the  pur- 
pose of  a  school  library  and  Bible  Society,  and  was  the 
collaborateur  of  the  fleshly  arm.  Every -day  shoitcomings 
■ — for  instance,  when  Firmian  made  a  mistake  in  his  mul- 
tiplication, or  rode  on  the  pointer  dog,  or  ate  gunpowder, 
or  broke  a  pipe — were  punished  not  severely,  that  is,  only 
with  a  stick,  which  in  all  good  schools  runs  up  the  backs 
or  the  children  by  way  of  capillary  sap-vessel  or  siphon, 
to  supply  the  nourishing  juice  of  knowledge ;  or  is  the 
carriage-pole  to  which  entire  winter-schools  are  harnessed, 
and  at  which  they  tug  with  a  will.     But  there  were  two 


CHAP.  VI.  J     FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN  PIECES.      207 

other  sorts  of  transgressions  which  he  punished  more 
severely.  When  one  of  the  children  laughed  at  table 
during  meals,  or  hesitated,  or  made  a  blunder  during 
the  long  table-grace  or  evening  prayers,  he  would  imme- 
diately amputate  his  adventitious  arm  with  his  natural 
one,  and  administer  a  tremendous  thrashing  to  the  little 
darling. 

Firmian  remembered,  as  if  it  had  happened  yesterday, 
one  occasion  when  he  and  his  sisters  had  been  thrashed, 
turn  about,  for  a  whole  half-hour  at  dinner-time  with  the 
battle-flail,  because  one  of  them  began  to  laugh  while  the 
long  muscle  was  swishing  about  the  ears  of  another,  who 
was  serious  enough.  The  sight  of  the  bit  of  leather  made 
his  heart  burn  even  at  this  day.  I  can  quite  see  the  advan- 
tage to  parents  and  teachers  who  try  the  expedient  of 
unhooking  an  empty  by  an  organic  arm,  and  smiting  a 
pupil  with  this  species  of  Concordat,  and  alliance  between 
the  temporal  and  spiritual  arms;  but  this  mode  of  punish- 
ment ought  to  be  invariably  the  one  made  use  of;  for  there 
is  nothing  which  infuriates  children  more  than  anything 
new  in  the  way  ■* f  instruments  of  punishment,  or  a  new 
mode  of  application  of  those  in  general  use.  A  child  who 
is  accustomed  to  rulers  and  blows  on  the  back,  must  not 
be  set  upon  with  boxes  on  the  ear  and  bare  hands ;  nor 
one  accustomed  to  the  latter  treated  to  the  former.  The 
author  of  these  Flower-pieces  had  once  a  slipper  thrown 
at  him  in  his  earlier  days.  The  scar  of  that  slipper  is  still 
fresh  in  his  heart,  whereas  he  has  scarcely  any  recol- 
lection of  lickings  of  the  ordinary  sort. 

biebenkaes  pulled  the  arm  of  punishment  and  the  rifle 
out  of  the  chest ;  but  what  a  treasure  trove  there  was 
beneath  them  !  Here  was  help,  indeed  !  At  all  events  he 
could  go  to  the  shooting-match  in  shorter  boots,  and  eat 
whatever  he  liked  for  some  days  to  come.  What  most 
astonishes  both  him  and  me  in  this  affair  (it  is  easily 
explicable,  however)  is  that  he  had  never  thought  of  it 
sooner,  inasmuch  as  his  father  was  a  Jager ;  while,  on  the 
other  hand,  I  must  confess  it  could  not  have  happened  on 
a  luckier  day,  because  it  chanced  to  be  just  the  day  of  the 
auction. 

The  hunting  spear,  the  horse's  tail,  the  deooy  bird,  the 


U08  JEAN  PAUL  FR1EDEICH   RICIITEB.      [BOOK  II. 

fox-trap,  the  couteau  de  cJiasse,  the  medicine-chest,  the 
fencing  mask  and  foil — a  collection  of  things  which  he 
had  never  had  a  thought  of  looking  for  in  the  chest — could 
be  taken  over  instantly  to  the  town-house,  and  set  ud  to 
auction  on  the  spot  by  the  hairdressing  Saxon. 

It  was  done  accordingly.  After  all  his  troubles,  the 
little  piece  of  good  luck  warmed  and  gladdened  his  heart. 
He  went  himself  after  the  box — which  was  sent  just  as  it 
stood  to  the  auction,  except  that  the  rifle  and.  the  leathern 
artery  were  kept  back — to  hear  what  would  be  offered  for 
the  things. 

He  took  up  his  position  (on  account  of  the  excessive 
length  of  his  half-boots)  at  the  back  of  the  auctioneer's 
table,  close  to  his  hectic  landlord.  The  sight  of  this  pile 
of  heterogeneous  goods  and  chattels  all  heaped  up  hig- 
gledy-piggledy (as  if  some  grand  conflagration  were  raging, 
and  it  had  been  collected  in  haste  for  safety ;  or  as  if  it 
were  the  plunder  of  some  captured  city),  goods  and  chat- 
tels sold,  for  the  most  part,  by  people  on  the  downward 
path  to  poverty,  and  bought  by  those  who  had  arrived  at 
poverty  already — had  the  effect  of  making  him  contemn 
and  despise  more  every  moment  all  this  complex  pumping 
apparatus,  this  machinery  for  keeping  the  spring-wells  of 
a  few  petty,  feeble  lives  in  clear  and  vigorous  flow ;  and 
he  himself,  the  engineer  and  driver  of  this  machinery,  felt 
his  sense  of  manliness  grow  stronger.  He  was  furious 
with  himself,  because  his  soul  had  seemed  yesterday  to 
be  but  a  sham  jewel,  which  a  drop  of  aquafortis  deprives 
of  its  colour  and  lustre,  whereas  a  real  jewel  never  loses 
either. 

Nothing  awakens  our  humour  more,  nor  renders  us  more 
utterly  indifferent  to  the  honour  paid  to  mere  rank  and 
worldly  position,  than  our  being  in  any  manner  compelled 
to  fall  back  upon  the  honour  due  to  ourselves  (independently 
of  our  chance  position),  our  own  intrinsic  worth,  our  being 
compelled  to  tar  over  our  inner  boing  with  philosophy  (as 
if  it  were  a  Diogenes'  tub),  by  way  of  protection  against 
injuries  from  without;  or  (in  a  prettier  metaphor)  when, 
like  pearl  oysters,  we  have  to  exude  pearls  of  maxims  to 
fill  the  holes  which  worms  bore  in  our  mother-of-pearl. 
Now  pearls  are  better  than  uninjured  mother-of-pearl ; 


CHAP.  VI.l     FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.      209 

an  idea  which  I  should  like  to  have  written  in  letters  of 
gold. 

I  have  good  reasons  of  my  own  for  prefacing  what  has 
to  follow  with  all  this  philosophy,  because  I  want  to  get 
the  reader  into  such  a  f  rame  of  mind  that  he  may  not  make 
too  great  a  fuss  about  what  the  advocate  is  going  to  do 
now :  it  was  really  nothing  but  a  harmless  piece  of  fun.  As 
the  be-powdered  lungs  of  the  auctioneer  were  more  adapted 
to  wheezing  and  coughing  than  to  shouting,  he  took  the 
auction-hammer  from  this  hammer-man  and  sold  off  the 
things  himself.  True,  he  only  did  it  for  about  half  an 
hour,  and  only  auctioned  his  own  things ;  and  even  then 
he  would  have  thought  twice  about  taking  the  hammer  in 
hand  and  setting  to  work,  if  it  hadn't  been  such  an  inde- 
scribable delight  to  him  to  hold  up  the  horse's  tail,  the 
spear,  the  decoy-bird,  &c,  and  hammer  on  the  table  and 
cry,  °  Four  groschen  for  the  horse's  tail,  once  !  five  kreuzer 
for  the  decoy,  twice  I — going !  Half-a  dollar  for  the  fox- 
trap,  once !  two  gulden  for  this  fine  foil,  twice  !  two 
gulden — going — going — and  gone!"  He  did  what  it  is 
an  auctioneer's  duty  to  do,  he  praised  the  goods.  He 
turned  the  horse's  tail  over  and  over,  and  opened  it  out 
before  the  huntsmen  who  were  at  the  sale  (the  shooting- 
match  had  attracted  many  from  a  distance,  as  carrion 
does  vultures),  stroked  it  with  and  against  the  hair,  and 
said  there  was  enough  of  it  to  make  snares  for  all  the 
blackbirds  in  the  Black  Forest.  He  held  up  the  decoy- 
bird  in  its  best  light,  exhibiting  to  the  company  its  wooden 
beak,  its  wings,  talons,  and  feathers,  and  only  wished  there 
were  a  hawk  present,  that  he  might  bait  the  decoy  and 
lure  it. 

The  entries  in  his  housekeeping  account-book,  which,  on 
account  of  the  wretchedness  of  my  memoiy,  I  have  had  to 
refer  to  twice,  show  that  the  sum  received  from  the  huntsmen 
amounted  to  seven  florins  and  some  groschen.  This  does 
not  include  the  medicine-chest  nor  the  long-necked  mask  ; 
for  nobody  would  have  anything  to  say  to  them.  When 
he  went  home  he  poured  the  whole  of  this  crown-treasure 
and  sinking-fund  into  Lenette's  gold  satchel,  taking  occa- 
sion to  warn  her  and  himself  of  the  dangers  of  great  riches, 
and  holding  up  to  both  the  example  of  those  who  are  arro- 

ii.  p 


210  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IL 

gant  by  reason  of  wealth,  and  must  therefore  of  necessity, 
sooner  or  later,  come  to  ruin. 

In  my  Seventh  Chapter,  which  T  shall  commence  imme- 
diately, I  shall  at  length  be  able,  after  all  these  thousands 
of  domestic  worries  and  miseries,  to  conduct  the  learned 
world  of  Germany  to  the  shooting-ground  and  present  to 
them  my  hero  as  a  worthy  member  of  the  shooting-club, 
with  a  rifle  and  bullets,  and  properly  and  respectably — well, 
booted,  more  than  attired — for  his  bullets  are  cast,  his  rifle 
cleaned,  and  his  boots  have  put  on  their  shoes,  Fecht  having 
stitched,  on  his  kne^,  the  three-quarter  boots  down  to  half- 
boots,  and  soled  them  with  the — leather  arm,  of  which 
enough  has  been  said  already. 


CHAPTER  VII. 


THE     SHOOTING-MATCH —  ROSAS    AUTUMNAL    CAMPAIGN — CON- 
SIDERATIONS CONCERNING  CURSES,   KISSES,  AND  THE  MILITIA. 

There  is  nothing  which  so  much  inconveniences  me,  or  is 
so  much  to  the  prejudice  of  this  story  (so  beautiful  in 
itself),  as  the  fact  that  I  have  made  a  resolution  to  restrict 
it  within  the  compass  of  four  alphabets.  I  have  thus,  by 
my  own  act,  deprived  myself  of  everything  in  the  shape  of 
room  for  digressions.  I  find  myself,  metaphorically,  in  a 
somewhat  similar  position  to  one  which  I  once  found  myself 
in,  without  metaphor,  on  an  occasion  when  I  was  measuring 
the  diameter  and  circumference  of  the  town  of  Hof.  On 
that  occasion  I  had  fastened  a  Catel's  pedometer  by  a  hook 
to  the  waistband  of  my  trousers  and  the  silken  cord  which 
runs  down  the  thigh  to  a  curved  hook  of  steel  at  my  knee, 
so  that  the  three  indexes  on  one  dial  (of  which  the  first 
marks  a  hundred  steps,  the  second  a  thousand,  and  the  third 
up  to  twenty  thousand)  were  all  moving  just  as  I  moved 
myself.  At  this  moment  I  met  a  young  lady,  whom  it  was 
incumbent  on  me  that  I  should  see  home.  I  begged  her 
to  excuse  me,  as  I  had  a  Catel's  pedometer  on,  and  had 
already  made  a  certain  number  of  steps  towards  my  mea- 
surement of  the  diameter  of  Hof.    "  You  see,  in  a  moment,** 


CHAP.  VII.]    FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     211 

I  said,  "  how  I  am  situated.  The  pedometer,  like  a  species 
of  conscience,  records  all  the  steps  I  take ;  and,  with  a  lady, 
I  shall  be  obliged  to  take  shorter  steps,  besides  thousands 
of  sidewayand  backward  steps,  all  of  which  the  pedometer 
will  put  to  the  account  of  the  diameter.  So,  you  see,  I  am 
afraid,  it's  quite  impossible  that  I  can  have  the  pleasure 
of "  However,  this  only  made  her  the  more  deter- 
mined that  I  should,  and  1  was  well  laughed  at :  but  I 
screwed  myself  to  the  spot,  and  wouldn't  stir.  At  last  I 
said  I  would  go  home  with  her,  pedometer  and  all,  if  she 
would  just  read  off  my  indexes  for  me  (seeing  I  couldn't 
twist  myself  down  low  enough  to  see  the  dial) — read  them 
off  for  me  twice — firstly,  then  and  there,  and  secondly, 
when  we  got  to  her  house — so  that  I  might  deduct  the 
steps  taken  by  me  in  this  young  lady's  company  from  the 
size  of  Huf.  This  agreement  was  honestly  kept ;  and  this 
little  account  of  the  occurrence  may  be  of  service  to  me 
some  day  if  ever  I  publish  (as  1  have  not  given  up  all 
hopes  of  doing)  my  perspective  sketch  of  the  town  of 
Hof ;  and  townspeople  who  saw  me  walking  with  the  said 
young  lady,  and  with  the  pedometer  trailing  at  my  knee, 
might  cast  it  in  my  teeth  and  say  it  was  a  lame  affair,  and 
that  nobody  could  calculate  as  to  the  steps  he  might  take 
in  a  lady's  company,  far  less  apply  them  to  the  measurement 
of  a  town. 

St.  Andrew's  Day  was  bright  and  fine,  and  not  very 
windy.  It  was  tolerably  warm,  and  there  wasn't  as  much 
snow  in  the  furrows  as  would  have  cooled  a  nutshell  of 
wine,  or  knocked  over  a  humming-bird.  On  the  previous 
Tuesday  Siebenkaas  had  been  looking  on  with  the  other 
spectators,  when  the  bird-pole  had  described  its  majestic 
arc  in  descending  to  impale  the  black  golden  eagle  with 
outstretched  wings,  and  rise  again  therewith  on  high.  He 
felt  some  emotion  as  the  thought  struck  him,  "  That  bird 
of  prey  up  there  holds  in  his  claws,  and  will  dispense,  the 
happiness  or  the  misery  of  thy  Lenette's  coming  weeks, 
and  our  goddess  of  Fortune  has  transformed  herself  and 
dwindled  into  that  black  form,  nothing  left  of  her  but  her 
wings  and  ball." 

On  St.  Andrew's  morning,  as  he  said  gooa-oye  to  Lenette, 
with  kisses,  and  in  his  abbreviated  boots,  over  which  he 

p2 


212      '  JEAN  PAUL   TEIEDRICH  RICHTEE.      [ BOOK  it 

had  a  pair  of  goloshes,  she  said,  "  May  God  grant  you  luck, 
and  not  let  you  do  any  mischief  with  your  rifle."  She 
asked  several  times  if  there  was  nothing  he  had  forgotten — 
his  eyeglass,  or  his  handkerchief,  or  his  purse  ;  "  And  mind 
you  don't  get  into  any  quarrel  with  Mr.  von  Meyern,"  was 
her  parting  counsel :  and  finally,  as  one  or  two  preliminary 
thundrous  drum-ruffles  were  heard  from  the  direction  nt 
the  courthouse,  she  added  most  anxiously,  "  For  God's 
sake,  mind  and  don't  shoot  yourself;  my  blood  will  run 
cold  the  whole  forenoon  every  time  I  hear  a  gun  go  off!" 

At  length  the  long  thread  of  riflemen,  rolled  up  like  a 
ball,  began  to  unwind  itself,  and  the  waving  line,  like 
a  great  serpent,  moved  off  in  surging  convolutions  to  the 
sound  of  trumpets  and  drums.  A  banner  represented  the 
serpent's  crest,  and  the  standard-bearer's  coat  was  like  a 
second  flag  beneath  *he  other.  The  town-soldiery,  more 
remarkable  for  quality  than  for  quantity,  shot  the  mottled 
line  of  competitors  at  intervals  with  the  white  of  their 
uniforms.  The  auctioneering  hairdresser — the  only  member 
of  the  lower  ten  thousand  who  rejoiced  in  a  powdered 
head — tripped  along,  keeping  the  white  peak  of  his  cap  at 
the  due  degree  of  distance  from  the  leather  pigtails  of  the 
aristocracy,  which  he  had  that  morning  tied  and  powdered. 
The  multitude  felt  what  a  lofry  position  in  this  world 
really  was,  when,  with  bent  heads,  they  raised  their  eyes 
to  Heimlicher  von  Blaise,  the  director  of  the  competition, 
who  accompanied  the  procession  in  his  capacity  of  aorta  of 
the  whole  arterial  system,  or  elementary  fire  of  all  these 
ignes-fatui — or,  in  a  word,  as  master  of  the  shooters'  lodge. 
Happy  was  the  wife  who  peeped  out  and  saw  her  husband 
marching  past  in  the  procession — happy  was  Lenette,  for 
her  husband  was  there,  and  looked  gallantly  up  as  he 
passed  by.  His  short  boots  looked  very  nice,  indeed ;  they 
were  made  both  in  the  old  fashion  and  in  the  new,  and, 
like  man,  had  put  on  the  new  (short)  Adam  over  the 
old  one. 

I  wish  Schulrath  Stiefel  had  given  a  thought  or  so  to 
the  St.  Andrew's  shooting-match,  and  looked  out  of  his 
window  at  his  Orestes;  however,  ho  went  on  with  his 
reviewing. 

Now,  when  these  processional  caterpillars  had  crept 


CHAP.  VII.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.     213 

'together  again  at  the  shooting-ground,  as  upon  a  leaf — 
when  the  eagle  hung  in  his  heavenly  eyrie,  like  the  crest 
of  the  future's  armorial  healings — when  the  wind  instru- 
ments, which  the  troop  of  "wandering  minstrels"  had 
.scarce  heen  ahle  to  hold  firmly  to  their  lips,  blared  out 
their  loudest  now  that  the  band  was  halted,  and  as  the 
•procession,  with  martial  tramp  and  rattle  of  grounded 
rifles,  came  with  a  rush  into  the  empty  echoing  shooting- 
house,  everybody,  strictly  speaking,  was  more  or  less  out 
of  his  senses,  and  mentally  intoxicated  ;  and  that  although, 
the  lots  were  not  even  drawn,  far  less  any  shot  fired. 
Siebenkass  said  to  himself,  "  The  whole  thing  is  stuif  and 
nonsense,  yet  see  how  it  has  gone  to  all  our  heads,  and  how 
a  mere  unbroken  faded  flower-wreath  of  pleasant  trifles, 
wound  ten  times  about  our  hearts,  half  chokes  and  darkens 
them.  Our  thirsty  heart  is  made  of  loose,  absorptive 
mould  ;  a  warm  shower  makes  it  swell,  and  as  it  expands 
it  cracks  the  roots  of  all  the  plants  that  are  growing  in  it." 

Mr.  von  Blaise,  who  smiled  unceasingly  upon  my  hero, 
and  treated  the  others  with  the  rudeness  becoming 
authority,  ordered  the  lots  to  be  drawn  which  were  to  de- 
cide the  order  in  which  the  competitors  were  to  shoot.  The 
reader  cannot  expect  Chance  to  stop  the  wheel  of  Fortune, 
thrust  in  her  hand,  and,  behind  her  bandage,  pull  out  from 
among  seventy  numbers  the  very  first  for  the  advocate; 
she  drew  him  the  twelfth,  however.  And  at  length  the 
brave  Germans  and  imperial  citizens  opened  fire  upon  the 
Roman  eagle.  At  first  they  aimed  at  his  crown.  The 
eagerness  and  zeal  of  these  pretenders  were  proportioned 
to  the  importance  of  the  affair:  was  there  not  a  royal 
revenue  of  six  florins  attached  to  this  golden  penthouse 
when  the  bullet  brought  it  down — to  say  nothing  whatever 
of  other  crown  property,  consisting  of  three  pounds  of  tow 
and  a  pewter  shaving-dish.  The  fellows  did  what  they 
could ;  but  the  rifle  placed  the  crown  of  the  eagle,  not, 
alas!  on  our  hero's  head,  but  upon  that  of  No.  11,  his  pre- 
decessor, the  hectic  Saxon.  He  had  need  of  it,  poor  fellow! 
seeing  that,  like  a  Prince  of  Wales,  he  had  come  into  pos- 
session of  the  crown  debts  sooner  than  of  the  crown  itself. 

At  a  shooting  contest  of  this  kind  nothing  is  better 
calculated  to  dissipate  everything  in  the  shape  of  tedium 


214  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IL 

than  to  have  arrangements  made  for  "  running  shooting  M 
(as  it  is  called)  being  carried  on  by  those  who  are  waiting 
their  turn  at  the  birdpole.  A  man  who  has  to  wait  while 
sixty-nine  other  people  slowly  aim  and  shoot  before  his 
turn  comes  round,  may  find  a  good  deal  to  amuse  him  if, 
during  that  time,  he  can  load  and  aim  at  something  of  a 
less  lofty  kind — for  instance,  a  Capuchin  general.  The 
"  running  "  or  "  swing  "  shooting,  as  carried  out  at  Kuh- 
schnappel,  differs  in  no  respect  from  that  of  other  places. 
A  piece  of  canvas  is  hung  up,  and  floats  to  and  fro ;  there 
are  painted  dishes  of  edibles  upon  it,  as  on  a  table-cloth, 
and  whoever  puts  a  bullet  through  one  of  these  paintings 
obtains  the  original — just  as  princes  choose  their  brides 
from  their  portraits,  before  bringing  home  the  brides  in 
person  ;  or  as  witches  stick  pins  into  a  man's  image  in 
order  to  wound  the  prototype  himself.  The  Kuhschnap- 
pelers  were,  on  this  occasion,  shooting  at  a  portrait  on  this 
canvas,  which  a  great  many  persons  considered  to  represent 
a  Capuchin  general.  I  know  that  there  were  some  who, 
basing  their  opinion  chiefly  upon  the  red  hat  in  the 
portrait,  considered  it  to  represent  a  cardinal,  or  cardinal- 
protector,  but  these  have  clearly,  in  the  first  place,  got  to 
settle  the  point  with  a  third  party,  which  differed  from  both 
of  those  above  mentioned,  holding  that  it  portrayed  the 
whore  of  Babylon— that  is  to  say,  a  European  one.  From 
all  of  which  we  may  form  a  pretty  accurate  estimate  of 
the  amount  of  truth  contained  in  another  rumour — which 
I  contradicted  in  the  first  hour  of  its  existence — namely, 
that  the  Augsburg  people  had  taken  offence  at  this  effigy- 
arquebusading,  and  had  written,  in  consequence,  to  the 
attorney-general  representing  that  they  feit  themselves 
aggrieved,  and  that  it  was  an  injustice  to  one  religion  if, 
within  the  bounds  of  the  holy  Koman  empire,  a  general  of 
a  religious  order  should  be  shot  to  shivers,  without  a 
Lutheran  superintendent  general  being  also  shot  to  shivers 
at  the  same  time.  I  should  certainly  have  heard  some- 
thing further  about  this,  if  it  had  been  anything  but  mere 
wind.  Indeed,  I  have  a  shrewd  suspicion  that  the  whole 
story  is  no  more  than  a  false  tradition,  or  garbled  version 
of  another  story,  which  a  gentleman  of  rank  belonging  to 
Vienna  recently  lied  to  me  at  table.     What  he  said  was. 


CHAP.  VII.  J    FLO  WEE,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     215 

that  in  the  more  considerahle  towns  of  the  empire,  where 
the  spirit-level  of  religious  toleration  has  established  a  beau- 
tiful equilibrium  between  Papists  and  Lutherans,  many  had 
complained,  on  the  part  of  the  Lutherans,  of  the  circum- 
stance that  although  there  were  equal  numbers  of  night- 
watchmen  and  censors  (that  is,  transcendental  night-watch- 
men), keepers  of  hotels,  and  keepers  of  circulating  libraries 
of  each  communion,  yet  there  were  more  Papists  hanged 
than  Lutherans;  so  that 'it  was  very  clear,  whether  the 
Jesuits  had  to  do  with  it  or  not,  that  a  high  and  important 
post  such  as  the  gallows  was  not  filled  with  the  same 
amount  of  impartiality  as  the  Council  of  State,  but  with 
a  certain  bias  towards  the  Catholics.  I  thought  of  contra- 
dicting the  story,  in  the  most  distinct  terms,  in  the 
4  Literary  Gazette'  of  December  last,  but  Government 
declined  to  pay  the  expense  of  the  insertion. 

However,  although  those  who  occupied  themselves  with 
the  "  swing  "  shooting  did  only  have  a  Capuchin  to  aim  at, 
the  said  swing  shooting  was  every  bit  as  important  a 
business  as  the  shooting  at  the  standing  mark.  I  must 
point  out  (in  this  connection)  that  there  were  edible  prizes 
attached  to  the  divers  bodily  members  of  this  said  general 
of  his  order,  which  had  their  attractions  for  riflemen  of  a 
reflective  turn  of  mind.  An  entire  Bohemian  porker  was 
the  prize  appointed  for  him  who  should  pierce  the  heart 
of  the  Capuchin  pasha — which  heart,  however,  was  repre- 
sented by  a  spot  no  bigger  than  a  beauty-patch — so  that 
he  who  should  hit  this  little  mark  would  have  need  of  all 
his  skill  and  nerve.  The  cardinal's  hat  was  easier  of 
attainment,  for  which  reason  it  was  worth  only  a  couple  of 
jack.  The  honorarium  of  the  oculist  who  should  succeed 
in  inserting  new  (leaden)  pupils  into  the  cardinal's  eyes 
consisted  of  an  equivalent  number  of  geese.  As  he  was 
portrayed  in  the  full  fervour  of  prayer,  it  was  well  worth 
anyone's  while  to  send  a  bullet  through  between  his  hands, 
seeing  that  this  would  be  tantamount  to  knocking  the  two 
fore-quarters  out  of  a  cantering,  smoked  pig.  And  each  of 
the  cardinal's  feet  rested  upon  a  fine  hind-quarter  or  ham. 
I  do  not  hesitate  for  a  moment — whatever  the  imperial 
burgh  of  Kuhschnappel  may  *ay  to  it — to  record,  with  the 
utmost  distinctness,  that  no  portion  of  the  whole  lord- 


216  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  EICHTER.      [BOOK  II. 

protector  was  more  poorly  endowed,  or  had  a  scantier 
revenue  and  salarium  allotted  to  it,  than  his  navel ;  for 
there  was  nothing  to  be  got  out  of  that,  with  however  good 
a  bullet,  but  a  Bologna  sausage. 

The  advocate  had  failed  in  his  designs  upon  the  crown ; 
but  fortune  chucked  him  the  cardinal's  hat  to  make  up  for 
it — the  cardinal's  hat  with  two  pike  inside  it.  But  some 
puissant  necromantic  spell  of  invulneraoility  turned  all  his 
bullets  aside  from  the  eagle's  head,  and  from  the  general's 
too.  lie  would  fain  have  sent  one  eye,  at  any  rate,  out  of 
the  face  of  the  harlot  of  Babylon,  but  he  could  not  manage 
that  either. 

Now  the  prize-lists — which  are  correct,  seeing  that  they 
were  made  out  by  the  secretary,  under  the  eyes  of  the 
president,  Herr  von  Blaise — state  with  distinctness  that 
the  head,  the  ring  in  the  beak,  and  the  little  flag,  fell  into 
the  hands  of  numbers  16,  2,  and  63. 

The  sceptre  was  now  being  aimed  at ;  and  Siebenkasa' 
would  have  been  very  very  glad,  for  his  dear  little  wife's 
sake  (waiting  for  him  now,  as  she  was,  with  the  soup),  to 
have  sent  that,  at  least,  flying  out  of  the  eagle's  talons* 
and  to  have  fixed  it,  by  way  of  a  bayonet,  on  to  his  rifle. 

All  the  numbers  who  had  tried  their  best  to  break  off 
this  golden  oak-branch  had  shot  in  vain,  except  the  worst 
— the  most  to  be  dreaded  of  all  —  his  own  predecessor 
and  landlord.  He  aimed,  and  shot — and  the  gilded  har- 
poon quivered.  Siebenkges  fired— and  the  eel-spear  came 
tumbling  down. 

Messrs.  Meyern  and  Blaise  smiled,  and  uttered  congra- 
tulations ;  the  blowers  of  instruments,  crooked  and  straight, 
blew,  in  honour  of  the  advent  of  this  new  bird-member, 
a  blast  both  loud  and  shrill  (like  the  Karlsbad  people, 
when  a  new  bath-guest  arrives;,  looking  closely  and  care- 
fully at  their  music  as  they  did  so,  though  they  had  played 
their  little  fanfares  far  oftener  than  the  very  night-watch- 
men. All  the  infantas — I  mean  all  the  children — began  a 
race  for  the  sceptre,  but  the  buffoon  dashed  among  them, 
and  scattered  them ;  and,  taking  up  the  sceptre,  presented 
that  emblem  of  sovereignty  to  the  advocate  with  one  hand, 
holding  in  the  other  his  oven  emblem  of  sovereignty,  the 
whip. 


CHAP.  VII.]    FLOWER,  FRUIT,   AND  THORN   PIECES.    217 

Siebenkaes  contemplated  with  a  smile  the  little  twig  of 
timber — the  little  branch,  sticking  to  which  the  buzzing 
swarms  of  nations  are  so  often  borne  away  ;  and  he  veiled 
his  satisfaction  nnder  cover  of  the  following  satirical  re- 
marks (which  the  reigning  Heimlicher  overheard,  and 
applied  to  himself)  : — 

44  A  very  pretty  little  frog-shooter  !  It  ought,  by  rights,  to 
be  a  honey -gauge ;  but  the  poor  bees  are  crushed  by  it,  that 
their  honey-bags  may  be  got  out  of  them  !  The  Waiwodes 
and  the  despots,  child-like,  put  the  bees  of  the  country  to 
death,  and  take  the  honey  from  their  stomachs,  not  from 
their  combs.  A  truly  preposterous  and  absurd  implement ! 
It  is  made  of  wood ;  very  likely  a  piece  broken  off  a  shep- 
herd's crook,  and  gilded,  pointed,  and  notched — one  of 
those  shepherd's  staves  with  which  the  shepherds  often 
drag  the  sheep's  fat  out  of  them  while  they  are  feeding  in 
the  meadows !  " 

He  had  ceased  to  be  conscious,  now,  when  he  emitted  the 
bitterest  satirical  matter  (there  was  never  a  drop  of  it  in 
his  heart);  he  often  turned  mere  aquaintances  into  foes 
with  some  joke,  made  merely  for  the  sake  of  jesting ; 
and  couldn't  imagine  what  made  people  vexed  with  him, 
and  why  it  was  that  he  couldn't  have  his  little  bit  of  fun 
with  them  as  well  as  any  one  else. 

He  put  the  sceptre  into  the  breast  of  his  coat  and  took  it 
home,  seeing  that  they  would  not  shoot  up  to  his  number 
again  befoi  e  dinner-time.  He  held  it  up  straight  and  stiff, 
as  the  king  of  diamonds  holds  his,  and  said  to  Lenette, 
44  There's  a  soup-ladle  and  sugar-tongs  for  you,  all  in  one  ! " 
the  allusion  being  to  the  two  pewter  prizes,  which,  in 
company  with  a  sum  of  nine  florins,  had  fallen  to  his  share 
by  way  of  sceptre-fief.  It  was  enough  for  one  shot.  And 
next  he  gave  an  account  of  the  catching  of  the  pike.  He 
expected  that  Lenette  would,  at  the  very  least,  go  through 
the  five  dancing  positions  and  execute  Euler's  "  knight's 
move  "  on  the  chess-board  of  the  room-floor,  into  the  bar- 
gain, within  the  first  five  seconds  after  hearing  the  news. 
She  did  what  she  could  do,  namely,  nothing  at  all ;  and 
said  what  she  knew,  namely,  that  the  landlady  had  been 
holding  forth,  with  bitter  severity,  to  the  bookseller's  wife, 
on  the  subject  of  the  non-payment  of  the  rent,  and  further, 


218  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICII  BICHTER.      [BOOK  II. 

concerning  her  own  husband,  whom  she  characterised  as  a 
smooth-tongued  flatterer  and  payer  of  compliments— a  man 
who  didn't  half  threaten  people.  "  What  I  tell  yon," 
repeated  the  sceptre-bearer,  "  is,  that  I  have  this  day  had 
the  luck  to  shoot  a  couple  of  pikes  and  a  sceptre,  Wende- 
line  Engelkraut ! "  and  he  banged  his  sceptre-knout  in 
indignation  upon  the  table  where  the  crockery  was  all  set 
out.  She  answered  at  last,  "  Well,  Lucas  came  running  a 
short  time  ago  and  told  me  all  about  that ;  I  am  so  glad 
about  it,  but  I  should  quite  think  you  will  shoot  a  good 
many  more  things  yet— will  you  not?  I  said  so  to  the 
bookseller's  wife." 

She  was  slipping  into  her  old  cart-rut  again,  you  see, 
but  Firmian  thought,  "  She  can  cry  and  mourn  loud  enough, 
but  deuce  a  bit  of  gladness  can  she  show  when  a  fellow 
comes  home  with  a  pike  or  two  under  his  arm,  and  a  sceptre 
or  so."  It  was  just  the  same  with  the  wife  of  the  gentle- 
hearted  Racine,  when  he  threw  down  a  long  purse  of  golden 
Louis  XVI.  he  had  got  hold  of,  on  the  table. 

How,  or  whence,  oh !  beloved  wives,  cometh  to  you  the 
naughty  trick  ye  have  of  making  a  kind  of  parade  of  an 
insupportable  frigidity  and  indifference,  just  on  the  very 
occasions  when  your  husbands  come  to  you  laden  with 
good  news,  or  with  presents — that  at  the  very  moment 
when  Fate  brightens  the  wine  of  your  joy  into  "  bloom," 
your  vats  grow  turbid  with  the  lees  of  the  old  liquor? 
Comes  it  from  your  custom  of  showing  only  one  of  your 
faces  at  a  time,  like  your  sister  and  prototype,  the  moon  ? 
or  from  a  peevish  discontent  with  destiny  ?  or  is  its  cause 
a  sweet,  delicious,  overflowing  happiness  and  gladness, 
making  the  heart  too  lull  and  the  tongue  too  hard  to  move  ? 

I  believe  it  is  often  from  all  these  causes  combined. 

In  men,  again — sometimes,  too,  in  women,  but  only  in 
one  out  of  a  thousand— it  may  arise  from  the  sad  thought 
of  the  sharks  which  tear  off  the  arm  with  which,  down  in 
the  dark  ocean,  all  breathless  and  anxious,  we  have  clasped 
hold  of  four  pearls  of  happiness.  Or,  perhaps,  from  a  deeper 
question  still.  Is  not  our  heart's  inward  bliss  but  an  olive- 
leaf  which  a  dove  brings  to  us,  fluttering  over  the  great 
deluge  foaming  and  seething  all  round  us — an  olive-leaf 
which  she  has  culled  for  us  away  in  the  fur  distant  Para- 


CHAP.  VII.]    FLOWER,  FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.    219 

dise,  high  up  above  the  flood,  clear  and  blissful  in  the 
eternal  sun?  And  if  all  we  attain  of  that  whole  olive- 
garden  is  but  one  leaf,  instead  of  all  its  flowers  and  its 
fruit,  is  this  leaf  of  peace,  is  this  dove  of  peace,  to  give  to 
us  something  beyond  peace — namely,  hope  ? 

Firmian  went  back  to  the  shooting-ground,  his  breast 
full  of  growing  hopes.  The  heart  of  man,  which,  in  matters 
of  chance,  makes  its  calculations  in  direct  defiance  of  the 
theory  of  probabilities.,  and  when  heads  have  turned  up 
once,  expects  them  three  times  running — (although  what 
ought  to  be  anticipated  is  the  very  reverse) — or  reckons 
upon  hitting  the  eagle's  talon  because  it  has  knocked  the 
sceptre  out  of  it — this  heart  of  man,  uncontrollable  alike  in 
its  fears  and  in  its  hopes,  the  advocate  took  with  him  to 
the  shooters'  trench. 

He  came  not  by  the  talons,  however.  And  at  the  folded 
praying  claws  or  hands  of  the  general  of  the  Capuchins — 
these  algebraic  exponents  or  heraldic  devices  of  two  fore- 
quartei  s  of  pork — aimed  he  alike  in  vain. 

It  mattered  not ;  more  was  left  of  the  eagle,  when  all 
was  done,  than  would  be  this  day  of  Poland,  if  the  latter, 
or  its  coat  of  arms — a  silver  eagle  in  a  bloody  field — were 
to  be  set  up  on  a  throne  or  a  bird-pole,  and  shot  at  by  a 
shooting-club  composed  of  an  army  or  two. 

Even  the  imperial  globe  was  not  yet  knocked  down. 
Number  69,  a  formidable  foregoar,  Mr.  Everard  Rosa  von 
Meyern,  had  taken  his  aim — eager  to  cull  this  forbidden 
fruit — a  Ribstone  pippin  and  football  fit  for  a  very  prince, 
such  as  this  imperial  apple,  was  a  thing  of  too  great  price 
to  be  grasped  for  the  sake  of  what  was  to  be  gained  along 
with  it — 'twas  honour  alone  that  fired  his  heart — lie  pulled 
his  trigger,  and  he  might  just  as  well  have  aimed  in  the 
opposite  direction.  Rosa — this  particular  apple  being  too 
high  out  of  bis  reach — went,  all  blushes,  in  among  the  lady 
spectators,  dealing  out  apples  of  Paris  all  lound,  and  telling 
each  lady  how  lovely  she  was,  that  she  might  be  convinced 
how  handsome  he  was  himself.  In  the  eyes  of  a  woman, 
her  panegyrist  is,  firstly,  a  very  clever  man,  and,  ere  long, 
such  a  »tce-LooKiNG  one.  Rosa  knew  that  grains  of  incense 
are  the  anibe  which  these  doves  fly  after,  as  though 
infatuated. 


220  JEAN  PAUL  FRlEDRICH  EICHTER.      [BOOK  II.' 

Our  friend  had  no  need  to  disquiet  himself  about  any  of 
the  would-be  fruit-gatherers — about  the  second,  eighth,  or 
ninth,  till  it  came  to  the  eleventh — and  he  was  the  Saxon, 
who  shot  like  the  demon  in  person.  There  were  few  among 
the  seventy  who  didn't  wish  this  accursed  gallows-number 
at  the  deuce,  or  at  all  events  into  the  vegetable  kingdom, 
where  it  is  altogether  absent.*  The  hairdresser  fired, 
struck  the  eagle  on  the  leg,  and  the  leg  remained  hanging 
aloft,  with  the  imperial  globe  in  the  talons. 

His  lodger  (and  lawyer)  came  up  to  the  scratch,  but  the 
landlord  stood  still  in  the  trench,  to  satisfy  his  soul  with 
curses  of  his  luckless  star.  As  the  former  levelled  the  sights 
of  his  rifle  upon  the  ball  above,  he  made  up  his  mind  that 
he  would  not  aim  at  the  ball  at  all,  but  at  the  eagle's  tail, 
so  as  simply  to  shake  the  apple  down. 

In  one  second  the  worm-eaten  world-apple  fell.  The 
Saxon  cursed  beyond  all  description. 

Siebenkaes  all  but  offered  up  an  inward  prayer,  not 
because  a  pewter  mustard-pot,  a  sugar-dish,  and  five  florins 
came  showering  along  with  the  apple  into  his  lap,  but  for 
the  piece  of  good  luck — for  the  warm  burst  of  sunshine 
which  thus  came  breaking  out  from  among  the  clouds  of 
the  distant  storm.  "  Thou  wouldst  prove  this  soul  of  mine, 
happy  Fortune,"  thought  he,  "  and  thou  placest  it,  as  men 
do  watches,  in  all  positions — perpendicular  and  horizontal, 
quiet  and  unquiet — to  see  if  it  will  go  and  mark  the  time 
correctly  in  all,  or  no.     Ay,  truly  !  it  shall!" 

He  let  this  little,  bright,  miniature  earth-ball  roll  from 
one  hand  to  the  other,  spinning  and  weaving,  as  he  did  so, 
the  following  brief  chain  of  syllogisms: — "  What  a  genea- 
logical tree  of  copies !  Nothing  but  pictures  within  pic- 
tures— comedies  within  comedies!  The  emperor's  globe 
is  an  emblem  of  this  terrestrial  globe  of  ours — the  core  of 
each  is  a  handful  of  earth — and  this  emperor's  glube  of 
mine,  again,  is  a  miniature  emblem  of  a  real  emperor's,  with 
even  less  of  earth — none  at  all,  in  fact.  The  mustard-pot 
and  sugar-dish,  again,  are  emblems  of  this  emblem.  What 
a  long,  diminishing  series,  ere  man  arrives  at  enjoyment ! " 
Most  of  man's  pleasures  are  but  preparations  for  pleasiire ; 

*  There  is  no  plant  with  eleven  stamens. 


CHAP.  VII.]     FLOWEK,    FKUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.     221 

he  thinks  lie  has  attained  his  ends,  when  he  has  merely  got 
hold  of  his  means  to  those  ends.  The  burning  sun  of  bliss 
is  beheld  of  our  feeble  eyes  but  in  the  seventy  mirrors  of 
our  seventy  years.  Each  of  these  mirrors  reflects  that 
sun's  image  less  brightly — more  faint  and  pale — upon  the 
next ;  and  in  the  seventieth  it  shimmers  upon  us  all  frozen, 
and  is  become  a  moon. 

He  ran  home,  but  without  his  globe,  for  he  did  not  mean 
to  tell  her  of  that  till  the  evening.  It  was  a  great  refresh- 
ment to  him  to  slip,  during  his  shooting  vacations,  away 
frum  the  public  turmoil  to  his  quiet  little  chamber,  give  a 
rapid  narrative  of  anything  of  importance  going  on,  and 
then  cast  himself  back  into  the  melee.  As  his  number  was 
a  next-door  neighbour  to  Eosa's,  and  they  had,  conse- 
quently, their  holidays  at  the  same  time,  it  surprises  me 
that  he  did  not  come  upon  Herr  von  Meyern  beneath  his 
own  window,  inasmuch  as  that  gentleman  was  walking  up 
and  down  there,  with  his  head  elevated,  like  an  ant.  He 
who  desires  to  destroy  a  young  gentleman  of  this  species, 
let  him  look  for  him  under  (if  not  in)  a  lady's  window ; 
just  as  an  experienced  gardener,  when  he  wants  to  kill 
woodlice  or  earwigs,  needs  only  lift  up  his  flower-pots  to 
annihilate  them  by  the  score. 

Siebenkses  did  not  hit  so  much  as  another  shaving  the 
whole  of  the  afternoon ;  even  the  very  tail,  which  he  had 
attacked  with  such  success  in  his  bold  stroke  for  the  con- 
quest of  the  globe  of  the  holy  Euman  empire,  resisted  all 
his  efforts  to  knock  it  off.  He  let  himself  be  drummed  and 
fifed  home  by  the  town  militia  towards  evening.  When  he 
got  to  his  wife's  door,  he  there  assumed  the  role  of  Knecht 
Ruprecht  (the  children's  "  Bogie,"  who,  on  St.  Andrew's 
Day,  bestows  upon  them,  for  the  first  time  in  their  career, 
fruit,  and  fear  along  with  the  same),  and,  growling  in  a 
terrible  manner,  chucked  his  (wooden)  apple  in  to  her ;  a 
piece  of  fun  which  delighted  her  immensely.  But  really 
I  ought  not  to  record  such  little  trifles. 

As  Firmian  laid  his  head  on  his  pillow,  he  said  to  his 
wife,  "  This  time  to-morrow,  wife,  we  shall  know  if  it  be 
two  crowned  heads  that  we  are  going  to  lay  on  the  pillow, 
or  not!  I  shall  just  recall  this  important  minute  to 
your  memory  to-morrow  night,  when  we're  going  to  bed ! " 


222  JEAN  PAUL  PBIEDEICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  II. 

When  he  got  up  in  the  morning  he  said,  "  Very  likely  this 
is  the  last  time  that  I  shall  rise  a  common,  ordinary  person, 
without  a  crown." 

He  was  so  anxious  to  have  the  mutilated  bird  (all  wet 
with  dew,  a  mass  of  gunshot  wounds  and  compound  frac- 
tures) once  more  before  his  bodily  eyes,  that  he  hardly 
knew  how  to  possess  himself  in  patience  till  the  time  came. 
But  it  was  only  as  long  as  he  did  not  see  the  eagle  that  his 
hopes  of  shooting  himself  into  a  king  at  him  endured.  He 
was,  therefore,  delighted  to  agree  to  a  proposal  made  by 
the  clever  Saxon,  whose  bullet  had  throughout  the  pro- 
ceedings always  cleared  the  way  for  his  number-neigh- 
bour's ;  the  proposal  was,  "  we  go  shares  in  gains  and  in 
losses — in  the  bird  and  in  the  cardinal."  This  copartner- 
ship doubled  the  advocate's  hopes  by  the  process  of  halving 
them. 

But  these  companions  in  arms  didn't  bring  down  a  single 
painted  splinter  the  whole  of  the  afternoon.  Each  in  his 
secret  heart  thought  the  other  was  the  bird  of  evil  omen  ; 
for  in  matters  of  chance  we  are  prone  to  hang  our  faith 
upon  a  bit  of  superstition,  rather  than  to  nothing  at  all. 
The  fickle  Babylonish  harlot  went  fluttering  off  with  that 
amount  of  bashful  coyness,  that  the  hairdresser  once  sent  a 
bullet  within  an  ace  of  the  fellow  who  was  working  her 
backwards  and  forwards. 

At  last,  however,  in  the  afternoon,  he  sent  his  Capid's 
dart  right  through  that  black  heart  of  hers,  and,  by  cunse. 
quence,  through  the  pig  at  the  same  time.  This  almost 
terrified  Firmian  ;  he  said  that  if  he  couldn't  hit  anything 
himself  he  would  accept  only  the  head  of  this  pig — this 
polypus  in  the  heart  of  the  Babylonian  fille  de  joie.  All  that 
was  left  of  the  bird  was  its  torso,  which  stuck  10  its  perch 
like  the  very  Bump  Parliament,  which  these  pretenders  to 
the  crown  would  so  fain  have  dissolved. 

A  regular  running  musketry  fusilade  of  eager  interest, 
enthusiasm,  emulation,  now  went  flashing  from  breast  to 
breast,  fanned  by  every  puff  of  powder  which  rose  in  smoke 
as  a  rifle  went  off.  When  the  bird  shook  a  little  all  the 
competitors  shook  also,  except  Herr  von  Meyern,  who  had 
gone  off,  and — seeing  what  a  htate  of  excitement  everybody 
was  in,  especially  our  hero — marched   away  to  Madame 


CHAP.  VII.]    FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     223 

Siebenkees,  thinking  that  he  had  a  better  chance  of  be- 
coming, in  that  quarter,  king  of  a  queen  than  he  had  here 
of  acquiring  the  sovereignty  of  the  riflemen.  However,  my 
readers  and  I  shall  slip  into  the  Siebenkses'  chamber  after 
him  presently. 

Twice  already  had  the  seventy  numbers  loaded  in  vain 
for  the  decisive  6hot ;  the  obstinate  stump  still  stuck  glued 
to  its  perch,  and  scarce  so  much  as  trembled ;  the  poor 
tantalised  hearts  were  torn  and  pierced  by  every  bullet 
that  sped  on  its  course.  Their  fears  waxed  apace,  so  did 
their  hopes,  but  most  of  all  their  curses  (those  brief  ejacu- 
latory  prayers  to  the  devil).  The  theologians  of  the  seventh 
decade  of  the  present  century  had  the  devil  often  enough 
in  their  pens — in  their  denials  or  in  their  assertions  of 
him — but  the  Kuhschnappelers  had  him  far  oftener  in  their 
mouths,  particularly  the  upper  classes. 

Seneca,  in  his  '  Remedies  for  Anger,'  has  omitted  the 
simplest  of  all,  the  devil.  True,  the  Kabbalists  highly  extol 
the  therapeutic  powers  of  the  word  Shemhamphorash, 
which  is  a  name  of  a  diametrically  opposite  character ;  but 
I  have  observed,  for  my  part,  that  the  spotted,  malignant 
fever  of  wrath,  so  readily  diagnosed  by  the  raving  delirium 
of  the  patient,  is  instantly  relieved,  dispersed,  and  miti- 
gated, by  invoking  the  name  of  the  devil,  which  is  per- 
haps, indeed,  quite  as  efficacious  a  remedy  as  the  wearing 
of  amulets.  In  the  absence  of  this  name,  the  ancients,  who 
were  altogether  without  a  Satan,  recommended  a  mere 
repetition  of  the  ABC,  which,  it  is  true,  does  contain  the 
devil's  name,  only  too  much  diluted  with  other  letters. 
And  the  word  Abracadabra,  spoken  diminuendo,  was  a  cure 
for  corporeal  fevers.  As  regards  the  inflammatory  fever  of 
anger,  however,  the  greater  the  quantity  of  morbid  matter 
which  has  to  be  ejected  from  the  system  through  the  secre- 
tions of  the  mouth,  the  greater  is  the  number  of  devils 
necessary  to  make  mention  of.  For  a  mere  trifling  irrita- 
tion— a  mild  case  of  simple  anger — "  the  devil,"  or  perhaps 
"  hell  and  the  devil,"  will  generally  be  found  sufficient ; 
but  for  the  pleuritic  fever  of  rage  I  should  be  disposed 
to  prescribe  "  the  devil  and  his  infernal  grandmother :" 
strengthening  the  dose,  moreover,  with  a  '*  donner wetter  " 
or  two,  and  a  few  "  sacraments,"  as  the  curative  powers  of 


224  JEAN   PAUL   FRIEDRICH  EICHTER.       [BOOK  II. 

the  electric  fluid  are  now  so  generally  recognised.  It  is 
unnecessary  to  point  out  to  me  that  in  cases  of  absolute 
canine  fury  or  maniacal  wrath,  doses  of  the  bpecific,  such 
as  the  foregoing,  are  of  little  avail :  I  should,  of  course,  let 
a  patient  in  this  condition  be  "  taken  and  torn  by  all  the 
devils  in  hell."  But  what  I  would  fain  render  clear  is 
that,  in  all  these  remedies,  the  real  specific  is  the  devil ;  for 
as  it  is  his  sting  which  is  the  cause  of  our  malady,  he  him- 
self has  got  to  be  employed  as  the  remedy,  just  as  the  stings 
of  scorpions  are  cured  by  the  application  of  scorpions  in 
powder. 

The  tumult  of  anticipation  shook  up  the  aristocracy  and 
the  sixpenny  gallery  into  one  common  whole.  On  occa- 
sions like  this — as  also  in  the  chase  and  in  agricultural 
operations — the  aristocracy  forget  what  they  are,  viz., 
something  better  than  the  citizen  classes.  An  aristocrat 
should,  in  my  opinion,  never  for  a  momant  lose  sight  of 
the  fact  that  his  position  with  reference  to  the  common 
herd  is  that  which  the  actor  now  a  days  stands  in  with 
respect  to  the  chorus.  In  the  time  of  Thespis  the  whole 
of  the  tragedy  was  sung  and  acted  by  the  chorus,  while 
one  single  actor,  called  the  protagonist,  delivered  a  speech 
or  two,  unaccompanied  by  any  music,  bearing  on  the  subject 
of  the  play.  iEschylus  introduced  a  second  actor,  the 
deuteragonist ;  Sophocles  even  a  third,  the  tritagonist.  In 
more  recent  times  the  actors  have  been  retained,  but  the 
chorus  omitted,  unless  we  consider  those  who  applaud  to 
represent  it.  In  a  similar  manner  also,  in  this  world  of 
OU7S  (mankind's  natural  theatre),  the  chorus,  •'.  e.  the 
people,  has  been  gradually  cleared  off  the  stage,  only  with 
more  advantage  than  in  the  case  of  smaller  theatrical  ones, 
and  promoted  from  taking  part  in  the  action  of  the  drama 
(which  the  protagonists  (princes),  deuteragonists  (minis- 
ters), and  tritagonists  (people  of  quality),  are  better  fit  to 
do),  to  the  post  of  spectators  who  criticise  and  applaud — 
what  was  the  chorus  in  Athens,  now  sitting  at  ease  in  the 
pit,  near  the  orchestra,  and  before  the  stage  where  the 
great  "  business  "  is  going  on. 

By  this  time  it  was  past  two  o'clock,  and  the  afternoons 
Were  hrief ;  yet  the  6aucy  bird  would  not  stir.  Everybody 
Bwore  that  the  carpenter  who  had  hatched  it  from  its  native 


CHAP.  VII.]    FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.     225 

block  was  a  low  scoundrel,  and  must  have  carved  it  out  of 
tough  hranchwood.  But  at  last,  all  battered,  with  nearly 
the  whole  of  its  paint  broken  away  from  it,  it  did  appear  to 
be  somewhat  disposed  to  topple  down.  The  hairdresser, 
who,  like  the  common  herd  in  general,  was  conscientious 
towards  individuals  only,  not  towards  an  aggregation  of 
them,  now  without  any  scruple  secretly  doubled  his  bullets 
(since  he  could  not  double  his  rifle),  putting  in  one  for  him- 
self and  one  for  his  brother  in  arms,  in  the  hope  that  this 
decomposing  medium  might  have  the  effect  of  precipitating 
the  eagle.  "  The  devil  and  his  infernal  grandmother !  "cried 
he,  when  he  had  fired  his  shot,  making  use  of  the  febrifuge 
or  cooling  draught  above  alluded  to.  He  now  had  to  place 
all  his  trust  in  his  lodger,  to  whom  he  handed  his  rifle. 
Siebenkaes  fired,  and  the  Saxon  cried,  "Ten  thousand 
devils  ! "  doubling  in  vain  the  dose  of  devils,  as  he  had  the 
dose  of  bullets. 

They  now,  in  despair,  laid  asido  their  rifles  and  also  their 
hopes ;  for  there  were  more  pretenders  to  this  crown  than 
there  were  to  that  of  Eome  in  the  time  of  Galienus,  when 
there  were  but  thirty.  This  shooting  septuaginta  had  all 
telescopes  at  their  eyes  (when  they  had  not  rifles  there), 
that  they  might  observe  how  there  were  a  gi-eater  number 
of  bullets  in  this  heaven-suspended  constellation  of  theirs 
than  there  are  stars  in  the  astronomical  one  of  the  eagle. 
The  faces  of  all  beholders  were  now  turned  towards  this 
Keblah  of  a  bird,  like  those  of  the  Jews  towards  their  ruined 
Jerusalem.  Even  old  Sabel  sat  behind  her  table  of  sweet- 
meats customerless,  and  gazing  up  at  the  eagle.  The  earlier 
numbers  didn't  even  give  themselves  the  trouble  of  shaking 
a  pinch  of  powder  into  their  pans. 

Firmian  pitied  these  oppressed  hearts,  swimming  heavily 
in  turbid,  earthy  blood — for  whom  at  this  time,  the 
setting  sun,  the  bright  array  of  sky  tints,  and  the  broad, 
fair  world  were  all  invisible — or,  rather,  all  shrivelled  up 
to  a  battered  block  of  wood.  The  surest  token  that  these 
heaits  were  all  lying  fettered  in  the  eternal  dungeon  of 
need  and  necessity,  was  that  none  could  make  a  single 
witty  allusion  either  to  the  bird  or  the  kingship.  It  is 
only  concerning  matters  which  leave  our  souls  free  and 
unshackled  that  we  notice   similitudes  and  connection, 


226  JEAN  PAUL  FBIEDRICH   EICHTER.      [BOOK  II. 

11  This  "bird,"  thought  Firmian,  "  is  the  decoy  of  all 
these  men,  and  the  money  is  what  baits  the  lure."  But 
he  himself  had  three  reasons  for  desiring  to  be  king : 
firstly,  to  laugh  himself  to  death  at  his  own  coronation  ; 
secondly,  on  account  of  his  Lenette :  thirdly,  on  account 
of  the  Saxon. 

The  second  half  of  the  seventy  gradually  fired  off,  and 
the  earlier  numbers  began  to  load  again,  if  it  were  for 
nothing  but  the  fun  of  the  thing.  Every  one  put  in  two 
bullets  now.  Our  two  Hanseatic  confederates  came  once 
more  up  to  the  mark,  and  Siebenkaes  borrowed  a  more 
powerful  glass,  screwing  it  on  to  his  rifle  like  the  finder  of 
a  telescope. 

No.  10  loosened  the  bird  from  its  joining  to  the  pole. 
Nothing  but  the  sheer  weight  of  it  now  retained  it  on  its 
perch,  for  they  had  well  nigh  saturated  and  incrusted  the 
wood  of  it  with  lead  (as  certain  springs  transform  wood 
into  iron). 

The  Saxon  had  but  to  graze  the  eagle-torso  —  ay,  or 
even  the  perch  of  it — nay,  the  very  evening  breeze  had 
but  to  give  an  extra  puff — to  send  the  bird  of  prey  swoop- 
ing down.  He  had  his  rifle  to  his  shoulder — aimed  for 
a  whole  eternity  (there  were  fifty  florins  hanging  in 
the  sky) — and  pulled  his  trigger.  Tho  powder  flashed 
in  the  pan.  The  band  had  all  their  trumpets  ready  at 
their  lips  —  trumpets  horizontal,  music  perpendicular — 
the  boys  stood  round  ready  to  seize  the  fallen  skeleton ; 
the  buffoon  in  his  excitement  couldn't  think  of  a  joke  to 
make — his  ideas  were  all  up  beside  the  bird ;  the  poor, 
anxious,  eager,  excited  hairdresser  drew  his  trigger  once 
more,  and  again  'twas  but  a  flash  in  the  pan.  Great  drops 
of  perspiration  bedewed  him ;  he  glowed,  he  trembled ; 
loaded,  aimed,  fired,  and  sent  his  bullet  several  ells,  at  the 
least,  away  over  the  bird. 

Be  stepped  back,  pale  and  silent,  in  a  cold  perspiration ; 
not  an  oath  did  he  utter ;  nay,  I  suspect  he  offered  up  a 
silent  prayer  or  two  that  his  co-partner  might,  by  heaven's 
grace,  capture  the  feathered  game. 

Firmian  went  forward,  thinking  as  hard  as  he  could 
about  something  else,  to  keep  down  his  thrilling  excite- 
ment;  aimed,  not  very  long,  at  this,  his  anchor  in   his 


CHAP.  YII.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.    227 

little  storms,  as  it  hung  hovering  in  the  twilight,  fired ; 
saw  the  old  stump  turn  three  times  round  in  the  air,  like 
Fortune's  wheel,  and,  at  last,  break  loose,  and  come  pitch- 
ing down. 

As,  when  the  old  French  kings  were  crowned,  a  live 
bird  always  fluttered  in  the  air  ;  as,  at  the  apotheoses  of  the 
Roman  emperors,  an  eagle  soared  skyward  from  out  the 
funeral  pyre,  so  did  one  swoop  downward  from  the  heavens 
at  the  coronation  of  my  hero. 

The  children  screamed,  and  the  trumpets  blared.  One 
moiety  of  the  assemblage  crowded  to  see  who  the  new 
king  was,  and  to  have  a  look  at  him ;  while  the  other 
moiety  streamed  crowding  round  the  jester,  as  he  ad- 
vanced bearing  that  shattered  bullet-case,  the  eagle's 
body,  holding  it  up  above  the  heads  of  the  throng.  The 
barber  ran  to  meet  it,  crying,  "Vive  le  roi,"  and  adding 
that  he  was  a  king  himself  into  the  bargain  ;  and  Firmian 
moved  towards  the  door  in  silence,  full  of  happiness,  but 
fuller  of  emotion. 

And  now  it  is  time  that  we  should  all  of  us  hurry  to  the 
town  to  see  how  Rosa  fares,  what  kind  of  throne  he  gains 
chez  Madame  Siebenkaas  (while  her  husband  is  thus 
ascending  his) — a  richer  throne,  or  only  a  pillory — and 
what  number  of  steps  he  climbs  towards  whichever  of  the 
two  it  may  prove  to  be. 

Rosa  knocked  at  Lenette's  door,  and  straightway  entered 
in  at  it,  in  order  that  she  might  not  have  a  chance  of 
coming  and  ascertaining  who  was  there.  "  He  had  torn 
himself  away  from  the  shooting-match ;  her  husband  was 
coming  immediately,  and  he  would  wait  for  him  there. 
His  rifle  had  once  more  been  excessively  fortunate."  It 
was  with  these  truths  that  he  came  into  the  presence  of 
the  alarmed  Lenette,  bearing,  however  upon  his  counte- 
nance, an  assumed  aristocratic  frigid  zone.  He  walked,  in 
an  easy  and  unconcerned  manner,  up  and  down  the  room. 
He  inquired  whether  this  April  weather  affected  her 
health  at  all;  as  for  himself,  it  produced  in  him  a  kind 
of  miserable  prostrating  low  fever.  Lenette,  timid  and 
nervous,  stood  at  the  window,  her  eyes  half  in  the  street, 
lialf  in  the  room.  He  glanced,  in  passing,  at  her  work- 
table,  took  up  a  paper  bonnet  shape  and  a  pair  of  scissors, 

Q2 


228  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  II 

and  put  them  down  again,  his  attention  being  arrested  by 
a  paper  of  pins.  "  Why,  these  are  No.  8\s,"  he  said  ;  "  these 
pins  are  a  great  deal  too  large,  Madame  ;  their  heads 
would  do  for  No.  1  shot!  The  lady  whose  hat  you  were 
putting  them  in  ought  really  to  be  immensely  grateful  to 
me." 

He  then  went  quickly  up  to  her,  and,  from  a  spot  a 
trifling  distance  below  her  heart  (where  she  had  a  whole 
quiver,  or  thorn-hedge  of  needles  planted,  ready  for  use), 
he  plucked  one  out  with  a  dauntless  coolness,  and  held  it 
up  for  her  inspection,  saying,  "  Look  how  badly  this  i", 
plated ;  'twill  spoil  every  stitch  you  take  with  it."  He 
threw  it  out  of  the  window,  and  evinced  symptoms  of 
being  about  to  pluck  out  the  remainder  from  that  heart 
(where  the  fates  had  stuck  none  other  than  such  as  were 
"badly  plated"),  and  stick  the  contents  of  his  own 
needle-book  into  that  pretty  pincushion  instead.  But  she 
waved  him  off  with  an  icy,  repellant,  gesture,  saying, 
"  Don't  trouble  yourself." 

"  I  really  wish  your  husband  would  come,"  ho  said,  look- 
ing at  his  watch.  ' '  The  king's  shot  must  be  over  long 
ere  this  time." 

He  took  up  the  paper  cap-pattern  again,  and  the  scissors ; 
but,  as  she  fixed  on  him  a  gaze  of  deep  anxiety  (lest  he 
should  spoil  her  pattern),  he  took  from  his  pocket  a  sheet 
of  verses  dipped  in  hippocrene,  and,  by  way  of  passing 
the  time,  he  clipped  this  up,  by  wavy  lines,  into  a  series 
of  hearts,  one  within  the  other.  This  gentleman,  who, 
like  the  Augurs,  always  strove  to  carry  off  the  heart 
of  the  sacrifice  —  he,  whose  own  heart  (like  that  of  a 
coquette)  constantly  grew  again  as  often  as  he  lost  it 
(as  a  lizard's  tail  does) — he  had  the  word  M  heart,"  which 
Germans  and  men  in  general  seem  almost  to  shrink  from 
uttering,  continually  on  his  tongue,  or,  at  all  events, 
impressions  of  it  in  his  hand. 

My  belief  that  his  motive  for  leaving  behind  him  (as  he 
did)  his  needles,  and  his  rhymeful  hearts,  was  that  he  had 
observed  of  women  that  they  always  ihink  fondly  of  an 
absent  person  when  they  chance  to  see  something  of  his 
which  he  has  left  behind.  Rosa  belonged  to  that  class  of 
persons  (of  both  sexes)  who  never  show  any  cleverness, 


CHAP.  VII.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.    229 

delicacy  of  perception,  or  knowledge  of  human  nature, 
save  in  matters  relating  to  love  of  the  opposite  sex. 

He  now  catechised  out  of  her  a  number  of  cooking  and 
washing  receipts  of  various  kinds,  and  these,  despite  hex 
cautious  monosyllabicity,  she  imparted  —  prescription 
fashion — in  all  their  fulness,  both  of  words  and  of  ingre- 
dients. At  length  he  made  preparations  for  departure, 
s <ying,  he  had  been  most  anxious  for  her  husband's  home- 
coming because  of  a  certain  matter  of  business  which  he 
could  not  well  discuss  with  him  on  the  shooting-ground, 
among  so  many  people,  and  before  Herr  von  Blaise.  "I 
shall  come  another  day,"  he  said  ;  "  but  the  most  important 
point  of  the  affair  I  can  mention  to  yourself,"  and  he  sat 
down  before  her,  with  his  hat  and  stick  in  liis  hand.  Just  as 
lie  commenced  his  recital,  however,  observing  that  she  was 
standing,  he  laid  aside  his  hat  and  stick  to  place  a  chair 
for  her,  opposite  to  his.  His  propinquity  was  grateful  to 
her  Schneiderian  membrane,  at  any  rate  ;  his  odour  was 
paradisaic ;  his  pocket-handkerchief  a  musk-bag,  his  head 
an  altar  of  incense,  or  magnified  civet-ball.  (Shaw  has 
remarked  that  the  whole  viper  tribe  has  the  property  of 
emitting  a  peculiar,  sweet  scent.) 

"  She  might  readily  see,"  he  said,  "  that  it  referred  to 
that  wretched  lawsuit  with  the  Heimlicher.  The  poor's 
advocate  did  not  deserve,  indeed,  that  a  man  should 
interest  himself  in  his  favour;  but  then,  you  see,  he  had 
an  admirable  wife,  who  did  deserve  it."  (He  italicised  the 
word  "  admirable  "  by  means  of  a  hurried  squeeze  of  her 
hand.)  "  He  had  been  fortunate  enough  to  induce  Herr 
von  Blaise  to  defer  his  4  no  '  three  separate  times,  though  he 
had  not  as  yet  been  able  to  speak  to  the  advocate  in  person. 
But  now,  that  a  pasquinade  of  Mr.  Leibgeber's  (whose 
hand  was  well  known),  had  come  to  light  near  a  stove- 
statue  at  the  Heimlicber's,  nothing  approximating  to  a 
yielding,  or  a  payment  of  the  trust-fund,  was  to  be  dreamt 
of  for  a  moment.  Kow  this  was  a  state  of  matters  for 
which  his  very  heart  bled,  particularly  as,  since  he  had 
been  in  such  poor  health  of  late,  he  felt  only  too  keen  a 
sympathy  and  interest  in  everything ;  he  knew  perfectly 

k well  what  an  unhappy  condition  her  (Lenette's)  household 
matters  had  been  placed  in  by  this  lawsuit ;  and  had  often 


230  Jean  paul  friedrich  richter.    [book  ii 

Mghed,  in  vain,  over  many  things.  He  should  be  de- 
lighted, therefore,  to  advance  whatever  she  might  require 
for  current  expenditure.  As  yet  she  did  not  know  him  in 
the  slightest  degree,  and  perhaps  could  scarce  surmise 
what  he  did,  from  motives  of  the  purest  benevolence,  for 
six  charities  in  Kuhschnappel — though  he  could  produce 
documentary  evidence  if  she  liked,"  and  he  did  produce 
and  hand  to  her  six  receipts  of  the  Charitable  Commission. 
I  should  not  be  giving  proof  of  that  impartiality  of  character 
which  I  bear  the  reputation  of  possessing,  did  I  not  here 
freely  admit,  and  clearly  place  on  record,  that  the  Venner 
had,  from  his  youth  up,  always  shown  a  certain  disposition 
to  benefit  and  assist  the  poor  of  both  sexes,  and  that  his 
consciousness  that  he  dealt  in  this  large-hearted  manner, 
did  (wheu  compared  with  the  narrow  close-fistedness 
prevalent  in  Kuhschnappel)  give  him  some  warrant  for 
bearing  himself  with  a  certain  amount  of  proper  pride 
towards  those  mean  and  miserly  beings  who  sate  in  judg- 
ment upon  his  little  genial  breaches  of  the  moral  laws. 
For  his  conscience  bore  him  witness  that,  conversely  to 
the  process  whereby  spiders  are  metamorphosed  into 
jewels,  he  spun  his  shining  webs  (of  gold  and  silver),  and 
in  their  meshes,  wet  with  the  glittering  dew  of  tears,  made 
an  occasional  capture  from  time  to  time. 

But  for  a  woman  like  Lenette  (he  continued)  he  would 
do  things  of  a  much  grander  description  ;  as  proofs  of 
which,  given  already  by  him,  he  needed  only  to  point  to 
the  fact  that  he  had  set  at  defiance  the  Heimlicher's 
hostility  towards  her  husband,  and  that  he  had  more  than 
once  quietly  swallowed  speeches  of  her  husband's  own, 
such  as  in  his  social  position  he  had  never  suffered  any- 
body to  address  to  him  before.  "  Name  any  sum  of  money 
vou  are  in  want  of;  by  Heaven,  all  you  have  to  do  is  to  ask 
for  it." 

Lenette,  bashful  and  trembling,  glowed  red  with  shame 
at  this  discovery  of  (what  she  had  believed  to  be)  the 
mystery  of  her  poverty  and  her  pawnings.  With  the 
view  of  pouring  a  few  drops  of  oil  on  the  troubled  waters, 
he  began,  by  way  of  preamble,  to  make  some  disparaging 
remarks  concerning  his  fiancee  at  Bayreuth.  "  She  reads 
too  much,  and  doesn't  work  enough.    I  only  wish  she  could 


CHAP.  VII.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     231 

have  the  benefit  of  a  few  lessons  from  you  in  housekeeping. 
And  really,  a  lady  such  as  you,  with  so  many  attractions 
(quite  unaware  of  them,  too,  herself),  so  much  patience, 
such  wonderful  diligence  and  assiduity,  should  have  a 
very  different  kind  of  household  than  this  place  for  her 
sphere  of  action."  Her  hand  was  by  this  time  lying  still 
in  the  stocks — the  close  arrest — of  his ;  her  wings  and  her 
tongue,  as  well  as  her  hands,  were  tied  and  fettered  by 
that  fainthearted  incapacity  of  self-assertion  which  is  born 
of  the  sense  of  povei-ty.  When  women  were  in  question, 
Mr.  Everard's  longings  and  likings  paid  no  heed  to 
boundary-marks;  but  rather  strove  hard  to  obliterate 
them,  and  get  rid  of  them  altogether.  Most  men,  in  the 
wild,  unreasoning  whirl  of  their  appetites,  are  like  the 
jay,  which  tears  the  carnation  to  tatters  in  order  to  get 
at  its  seeds. 

Upon  her  downcast  eyes  he  now  riveted  a  long  gaze  of 
fondness,  not  withdrawing  it,  however,  when  she  raised 
them  up ;  and,  by  dint  of  keeping  his  eyes  very  wide 
open,  and  thinking  with  great  vividness  on  pathetic  and 
touching  subjects,  he  managed  to  squeeze  out  about  as 
much  water  as  would  have  sufficed  to  make  an  end  of  a 
humming  bird  of  the  smaller  sort. 

In  him,  as  in  a  fine  actor,  all  false  emotions  became  for 
the  time  real  and  genuine  ;  and  when  he  flattered  any  one, 
he  at  once  began  to  respect  him.  As  soon  as  he  felt  there 
were  tears  enough  in  his  eyes,  and  sighs  enough  in  his 
breast,  he  asked  her  if  she  had  any  idea  what  was  causing 
them.  She  looked  innocently,  and  with  kindly  alarm,  into 
those  eyes  of  his,  and  her  own  began  to  overflow.  This 
greatly  encouraged  him,  and  he  said,  "  It  is  the  fact  that 
you  have  not  such  a  happy  lot  as  you  deserve." 

Ah  !  selfish  pigmy  !  at  such  a  moment  you  might  have 
spared  this  poor,  anxious,  trembling  soul,  sinking,  well 
nigh,  in  an  ocean  of  tears  for  all  the  long,  long  past. 

But  he  knew  no  sorrow  save  of  the  theatrical,  the 
transient,  the  petty,  and  the  sham  sort ;  and  so  he  spared 
her  not. 

Yet  that  which  he  had  expected  would  prove  the  bridge 
from  his  heart  to  hers,  namely,  sorrow,  became,  on  the  con- 
trary, the  portcullis  barrier  between  them.   A  dance,  or  some 


232  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDEICH  RICHTER.      [iJOOK  II. 

joyful  tumult  of  the  senses  would  have  brought  him 
further  with  this  commonplace,  every-day,  honest,  and 
upright  woman  than  three  pailfuls  of  selfish  tears.  Hig 
hopes  rose  high,  as  he  laid  his  flowery,  sorrow-laden  head 
upon  his  hands,  down  into  her  lap. 

But  Lenette  jumped  up  with  such  a  suddenness  that  it 
nearly  knocked  him  over  altogether.  She  gazed  inquiringly 
into  his  eyes.  Upright  women  must,  I  think,  have  some 
instinct  of  their  own  concerning  the  lightnings  of  the 
eye,  by  means  of  which  they  can  distinguish  between  the 
lurid  flashes  of  hell  and  the  pure  coruscations  of  heaven. 
This  profligate  was  as  little  aware  of  the  flashes  of  his 
eyes  as  was  Moses  of  the  brightness  of  his  countenance. 
Her  glance  shrunk  before  his  scorching  gaze ;  at  the  same 
time  I  feel  it  incumbent  on  me  as  an  historian — seeing 
that  readers  by  the  thousand  (and  I  myself  into  the  bar- 
gain) are  all  up  in  arms  to  such  an  extent  against  this 
defenceless  Everard — not  to  conceal  the  fact  that  Lenette 
hud  had  her  mind's  eye  firmly  fixed  upon  certain  rather 
rude  and  free-handed  sketches  which  Schulrath  Stiefel  had 
drawn  for  her  of  the  manoeuvring  grounds  of  rakes  in 
general  (and  this  one  in  particular),  and,  in  consequence, 
had  pricked  up  her  ears  in  alarm  at  each  move  he  made, 
whether  in  advance  or  in  retreat. 

And  yet  every  word  I  write  in  defence  of  the  poor  rascal 
will  only  tell  against  him  now ;  indeed,  there  are  many 
ladies  whose  acquaintance  with  the  Salic  Law  (or  Mr. 
Meiner's  work)  teaches  them  that  in  former  times  the 
penalty  for  touching  a  woman's  hand  was  the  same  as  for 
hewing  off  a  man's  middle  finger,  namely,  fifteen  shillings, 
and  who,  being  indignant  with  Kosafor  his  hand  pressures, 
would  fain  have  him  to  be  duly  punished  therefor.  I  am 
convinced  that  these  ladies  would  b}r  no  means  be  pacified 
were  I  to  go  on  speaking  in  his  extenuation,  for  they  have 
doubtless  learnt,  out  of  Mallet's  '  Introduction  to  the  History 
of  Denmark,'  that  formerly  persons  who  kissed  without 
leave,  and  against  the  will,  were,  by  the  law  of  the  land, 
liable  to  be  banished.  And  there  are  very  many  women  of 
tae  present  day  who  are  strictly  governed  by  the  ancient 
pandects  of  Germany,  and,  in  the  ca^e  of  lip-thieves  (since,  in 
the  eye  of  the  law,  banishment  and  confinement  to  one  place 


CHAP.  VII.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN   PIECES.     233 

are  held  to  be  tantamount  and  equivalent  one  to  another), 
they  adjudge  them — not,  it  is  true,  io  be  banished  from  their 
chambers,  but  to  remain  in  them ;  similarly,  they  lodge 
debtors  (to  whom  they  have  given  their  hearts,  and  who 
insist  on  retaining  possession  of  the  same)  in  the  Marshalsea 
of  the  Matrimonial  Torus. 

When  Rosa  jumped  up  (as  before  set  forth),  he  had 
nothing  to  urge  in  extenuation  of  his  false  step  but  an 
aggravation  or  augmentation  of  it,  and  accordingly  he  fairly 

took  the  marble  goddess  in  his  arms But  at  this  point 

my  progress  is  barred  for  a  moment  by  an  observation  which 
has  to  be  made  ere  I  proceed ;  it  is  this :  There  are  many 
kindly  beauties  who  cover  their  retreats  or  make  amends 
for  their  denials  by  concessions.  By  way  of  making  them- 
selves some  amends  for  their  hard  services  in  the  campaign 
of  virtue,  they  offer  no  resistance  at  all  in  matters  of  the 
smaller  sort,  skilfully  abandoning  a  good  many  intrench- 
ments  and  outworks  (in  the  shape  of  words,  articles  of  dress, 
and  so  on),  to  enable  them  to  deftly  steal  a  march  upon  the 
enemy  and  outmanoeuvre  him — just  as  clever  generals  burn 
the  suburbs  that  they  may  fight  the  better  up  in  the 
citadel. 

My  sole  object  in  making  this  observation  is  to  point  out 
that  it  did  not  apply  to  Lenette  in  any  respect  whatever. 
Pure  as  she  was  in  soul  and  in  body,  she  might  have  gone 
straight  away  into  heaven  just  as  she  stood,  without 
changing  so  much  as  a  stitch  of  her  attire — have  taken  her 
eyes,  heart,  clothes,  everything  except  that  tongue  of  hers, 
which  was  uncultivated,  rude,  indiscreet;  so  that  her 
resistance  to  Everard's  attempted  burglary  on  her  lips  was 
unnecessarily  grave  and  discourteous  (considering  what  a 
trifling  case  of  orchard-robbery  it  really  was),  much  more 
so  than  it  would  have  been  had  Lenette  been  able  to  drive 
the  Schulrath's  highly-coloured  prognostics  concerning 
Rosa  out  of  her  head. 

Rosa  had  anticipated  a  denial  of  a  less  unpleasant  kind. 
His  obstinacy  availed  him  nothing  as  against  hers,  which 
was  the  greater  of  the  two.  A  gnat-swarm  of  firm  and 
passionate  resolves  buzzed  about  his  ears ;  but  when  at 
length  (probably  inspired  thereto  by  the  Schulrath)  she 
said,  "  Your  lordship  remembers  that  the  Tenth  Command- 


234  JEAN   PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  II 

ment  saj'g,  ■  Thou  shalt  not  covet  thy  neighbour's  wife' " — 
from  the  crossroad  between  love  and  hatred,  on  which  he 
wag  standing,  he  suddenly  made  a  great  jump — into  his 
pocket  and  brought  out  a  wreath  of  artificial  flowers, 
"There!"  he  cried,  "take  them,  you  nasty,  inexorable 
creature  !  just  this  one  forget-me-not  as  a  souvenir ;  devil 
fly  away  with  me  if  I  want  anything  further!"  If  she 
had  taken  it,  he  would  immediately  have  wanted  something 
further;  but  she  turned  her  face  aside  and  repulsed  the 
silken  garland  with  both  hands.  At  this  the  honeycomb 
of  love  in  his  heart  soured  into  very  vinegar ;  he  grew  wild 
with  fury,  and  throwing  the  flowers  right  over  the  table, 
he  cried,  "  Why,  they  are  your  own  pawned  flowers — I 
redeemed  them  myself — so  take  them  you  must."  On  which 
he  took  his  departure,  not,  however,  without  making  his 
bow,  whioh  Lenette,  all  hurt  and  offended  as  she  was, 
ceremoniously  returned. 

She  took  the  envenomed  wreath  to  the  window,  to  have 
a  better  light  to  examine  it  by.  Alas !  these  were  indeed, 
and  beyond  all  doubt,  the  very  roses  and  rosebuds  whose 
steely  thorns  were  wet  with  the  blood-drops  from  a  pair  of 
pierced  hearts.  Whilst  she,  thus  weeping  and  bowed 
beneath  the  weight  of  her  woe,  stunned  and  stupid  rather 
than  observant,  stood  at  her  window,  it  suddenly  struck 
her  as  a  strange  circumstance  that  the  torturer  of  her  soul, 
though  he  had  gone  rattling  down  the  stairs  in  a  hurry 
with  noise  enough,  had  never  gone  out  at  the  street-door. 
After  a  long  and  attentive  watch,  during  which  anxiety, 
closely  bordering  upon  terror,  assumed  the  role  of  com 
forter  and  spake  louder  than  her  sorrow  (the  future,  at  the 
same  time,  driving  the  past  out  of  view),  the  becrowned 
hairdresser  came  galloping  home  (the  crown  of  his  hat 
pointing  heavenwards),  and  shouted  to  her  in  a  mere  paren- 
thetical manner  as  he  dashed  by,  "  Madame  the  queen ! " 
for  his  great  idea  was,  that  before  anything  else  he  should 
rush  home,  and  there  on  the  spot,  and  without  a  moment's 
delay,  make  proclamation  of  the  kingship  and  queenship  of 
four  persons. 

There  now  devolves  upon  me  the  duty  of  conducting  my 
readers  to  the  corner  where  the  Venner  is  cowering.  From 
Lenette  he  had  descended  (in  two  senses  of  that  word)  to 


CHAP.  VII.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     235 

the  hairdresser's  wife,  one  of  that  common  class  of  women 
who  never  so  much  as  dream  of  an  infidelity  all  the  year 
round — for  no  horse  in  all  the  kingdom  is  harder  worked — 
and  commit  one  only  when  there  appears  on  the  scene  some 
tempter,  whom  they  neither  invite  nor  resist,  probably 
forgetting  all  about  the  incident  by  the  time  next  baking 
day  comes  round.  On  the  whole,  the  superiority  which  the 
female  middle-class  is  disposed  to  arrogate  to  itself  over 
that  of  a  higher  rank,  is  just  about  equally  great  as  it  is 
questionable.  There  are  not  a  great  many  tempters  in  the 
middle-class,  and  those  there  are  are  not  of  a  very  tempting 
sort. 

Like  the  earthworm,  which  has  ten  hearts  that  extend 
all  the  way  from  one  end  of  it  to  the  other,  Rosa  was  fitted 
out  with  as  many  hearts  as  there  are  species  of  women  ;  for 
the  delicate,  the  coarse,  the  religious,  the  immoral — every 
sort,  in  fact;  he  was  always  ready  with  the  appropriate 
heart.  For  as  Lessing  and  others  so  frequently  blame  the 
critics  for  narrowness  and  onesidedness  in  matters  of 
taste,  inculcating  upon  them  a  greater  universality  of  it — 
a  greater  power  of  appreciation  of  the  beautiful,  to  what- 
soever times  and  nations  belonging — so  do  men  of  the  world 
also  advocate  a  universality  of  taste  for  the  live  beautiful, 
on  two  legs,  not  excluding  any  variety  of  it,  but  deriving 
gratification  from  all.  This  taste  the  Yenner  possessed. 
There  was  such  a  marked  distinction  between  his  feelings 
for  the  wigmaker's  wife  and  for  Lenette,  that,  in  revenge 
upon  the  latter,  he  came  to  the  determination,  on  the  stair, 
to  take  a  jump  right  over  this  distinction  and  slip  in  to  pay 
a  visit  to  the  landlady,  while  her  narrow-chested  husband 
was  away  scheming  and  plotting  in  confederacy  for  a  crown 
in  another  quarter.  Sophia  (this  was  her  name)  had  been 
always  combing  at  wigs  in  the  bookbinder's  on  the  occa- 
sions when  the  Venner  had  been  sitting  there  on  the  busi- 
ness of  getting  his  novels  and  life  romances  done  up  and 
bound,  and  there  they  had  communicated  to  one  other,  by 
looks  and  glances,  all  that  which  people  are  not  in  the 
habi  of  confiding  to  third  parties.  Meyern  made  his  entree 
into  the  childless  abode  with  all  the  confident  assurance  of 
an  epic  poet,  who  soars  superior  to  all  prefaces.  There  was 
a  certain  corner  partitioned  oif  from  the  room  by  boards : 


236  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  II. 

it  contained  little  or  nothing — no  window,  no  chair,  a  little 
warmth  from  the  sitting-room,  a  clothes-cupboard,  and  the 
couple's  bed. 

When  the  first  compliments  had  been  exchanged,  Rosa 
took  up  a  position  behind  the  door  of  this  partitioned  space, 
for  the  street  passed  close  by  the  window,  and  at  this  late 
hour  he  was  anxious  not  to  give  occasion  to  unpleasant 
surmises  on  the  part  of  passers  by.  Of  a  sudden,  however, 
Sophia  saw  her  husband  run  by  the  window.  The  intent 
to  commit  a  sin  may  betray  itself  by  a  superabundance  of 
carefulness  and  caution ;  Rosa  and  Sophia  were  so  startled 
at  the  sight  of  the  runner,  that  she  begged  the  young  gen- 
tleman to  get  behind  the  partition  until  her  husband  should 
go  back  to  the  shooting-range.  The  Venner  went  stumbling 
into  the  sanctum  sanctorum,  while  Sophia  placed  herself  at 
the  door  of  it,  and,  as  her  husband  entered,  made  as  though 
she  were  just  coming  out  of  it,  closing  the  door  after  her. 
The  moment  he  had  stuttered  out  the  news  of  his  elevation 
in  rank,  he  darted  out  of  the  room,  crying,  "  She  upstairs 
there  knows  nothing  about  it  yet."  Gladness  and  hurried 
draughts  of  liquor  had  just  blurred  the  sharp  outlines  of  his 
lighter  ideas  with  a  thin  haze  or  fog.  He  ran  out  and 
called  "  Madame  Siebenkees  "  up  the  stairs  (he  was  anxious 
to  be  off  again  so  as  to  join  the  procession).  She  hastened 
half  way  down,  heard  the  glad  news  with  trembling,  and, 
either  by  way  of  masking  her  joy,  or  as  a  fruit  of  a  warmer 
liking  for  her  husband  now  that  fortune  seemed  kinder  to 
him  (or  it  may  have  been,  perhaps,  another  fruit  which 
joy  commonly  bears,  namely,  anxiety,  or  shall  I  name  it 
fear  ?),  she  threw  down  to  him  the  question,  "  is  Mr.  von 
Meyern  out  yet  ?" 

"  What!  was  he  in  my  room  just  now?"  cried  he,  while 
his  wife  echoed,  unbidden,  from  the  door,  "  Has  he  been  in 
the  house?"  "He  was  here,  upstairs,"  Lenette  replied, 
with  a  touch  of  suspicion,  "  and  he  hasn't  gone  out  yet." 

The  hairdresser's  suspicions  were  now  awakened,  for 
the  consumptive  trust  no  woman,  and,  like  children,  take 
every  chimney-sweep  they  see  for  the  devil  himself,  hoof, 
horns,  tail  and  all.  "  Things  are  not  all  exactly  as  they 
should  be  here,  Sophy,"  said  he  to  his  wife.  The  passing 
brain-dropsy,  induced  by  what  he  had  drank  during  the 


CHAP.  VII.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND    THORN  PIECES.     237 

day  and  by  his  half-share  in  a  throne  and  fifty  florins,  had 
the  effect  of  screwing  his  courage  up  to  such  a  pitch  that 
he  secretly  formed  the  idea  of  treating  the  Venner  to  a 
good  sound  cudgelling  in  the  event  of  his  coming  upon 
him  in  any  illegal  coiner.  Accordingly  he  started  upon 
voyages  of  discovery,  first  exploring  the  entrance  passage, 
where  Rosa's  sweet-scented  head  served  him  as  a  trail,  or 
lure ;  he  followed  this  incense-pillar  of  cloud  into  his  own 
room,  observing  that  this  Ariadne's  thread  of  his,  this 
sweet  odour,  grew  stronger  as  he  went.  Here  among  the 
flowers  lay  the  serpent — as,  according  to  Pliny,  sweet- 
smelling  forests  harbour  venomous  snakes.  Sophia  wished 
herself  in  the  nethermost  of  Dante's  hells,  though  in  fact 
and  reality  she  was  there  already.  It  dawned  upon  the 
hairdresser  that  if  the  Venner  woirld  only  stay  where  he 
was,  in  the  closed  titmouse-trap  of  the  partitioned  corner, 
he  should  have  bruin  safe  in  his  toils ;  consequently  he 
reserved  till  the  last  a  peep  into  the  said  corner.  What  is 
historically  certain  is,  that  he  seized  upon  a  pair  of  curling- 
tongs  wherewith  to  probe  the  dark  corner  and  gauge  the 
cubic  contents  thereof.  Into  its  dark  depths  he  made  a 
horizontal  lunge  with  his  tongs,  but  encountered  nothing. 
He  next  inserted  this  probe,  this  searcher  of  his,  into  more 
places  than  one — firstly,  into  the  bed,  next,  under  the  bed 
(taking  this  time  the  precaution  to  keep  opening  and 
shutting  the  tongs,  which  were  not  hot,  on  the  chance  ot 
some  stray  lock  of  hair  getting  caught  in  them  in  the  dark- 
ness.) However,  all  this  trap  captured  was  air.  At  this 
juncture  he  came  upon  a  clothes-cupboard,  the  door  of 
which  had  always  stood  gaping  ajar  for  the  last  six  years 
or  so ;  the  key  had  been  lost  just  that  time,  and  in  this 
slipshod  household  it  was  a  matter  of  necessity  to  keep  this 
door  open,  otherwise  the. lock  would  have  snapped  to,  and 
there  would  have  been  no  getting  in.  To-day,  however, 
this  door  was  close  shut.  The  Venner  (in  a  profuse  perspi- 
ration) was  inside;  the  friseur  pressed  the  lock  home,  and 
then  the  net  was  fairly  over  the  quail. 

The  hairdresser,  now  master  of  the  situation,  quietly 
took  the  command  of  his  establishment  at  his  ease ;  the 
Venner  could  not  get  out ! 

He  despatched  Sophia  (as  red  as  a  furnace  and  loudly 


238  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IL 

dissentient,  though  forced  to  obey)  for  the  locksmith  and 
his  breaching  implements;  however,  she  quite  made  up 
her  mind  to  come  back  with  a  lie,  not  with  a  locksmith. 
When  she  had  marched  off  he  fetched  Fecht,  the  cobbler, 
up,  to  be  at  once  his  witness  of  and  his  assistant  in  that 
which  he  proposed  to  accomplish.  The  shoe-stitcher  crept 
into  the  room  softly  at  his  heels ;  the  phthisic  haircurler 
went  up  to  the  canary-cage  and  addressed  the  bird  impri- 
soned therein  (tapping  the  while  with  his  tongs  on-  the 
gate  of  this  fortress  of  Engelsburg)  as  follows :  "  I  know 
you  .are  in  there,  honourable  Sir,  make  a  move ;  there's 
nobody  here  but  me,  as  yet  (there'll  soon  be  more).  I  can 
break  the  cupboard  open  with  my  tongs  and  let  you  out." 
Laying  his  ear  close  to  the  door  of  this  Spandau,  he  heard 
the  captive  sigh. 

44  Ah  1  you  are  puffing  and  panting  a  little,  honourable 
gentleman,"  said  the  wigmaker;  44 1  am  here  at  the  door 
by  myself  now.  When  the  locksmith  comes  and  breaks  it 
open,  we  shall  all  see  you,  and  I'll  call  the  whole  house ; 
but  all  I  shall  ask  to  let  you  jump  out  now,  quietly,  and 
be  off  unseen,  will  be  a  mere  trifle.  Give  mo  that  hat  of 
yours,  and  a  shilling  or  two,  and  give  me  your  custom." 

At  length  the  miserable  prisoner  knocked  upon  the  door 
and  said,  44 1  am  in  here ;  just  let  me  out,  will  you,  my  man, 
and  I'll  do  all  you  say.  I  can  help,  from  the  inside,  to 
break  open  the  door."  The  wigmaker  and  the  cobbler 
applied  their  battering  apparatus  to  the  44  parloir  "  of  this 
donjon-keep,  and  the  captive  bounded  forth.  During  the 
breaking  open  of  the  gates  of  jubilee  the  friseur  parleyed 
or  negotiated  a  little  more,  and  amerced  the  anchorite  in 
the  locksmith's  fee  ;,  at  last,  bringing  liosa  forth,  like  Pallas 
in  her  mail,  when  she  issued  from  Jove's  cranium  into  the 
light  of  day,  44  The  landlord,"  said  Fecht,  "  couldn't  have 
managed  the  job  without  me." 

Rosa  opened  his  eyes  wide  at  the  sight  of  this  auxiliary 
deliverer  from  the  house  of  bondage,  took  off  the  sweet- 
smelling  hat  (which  the  gobbler  immediately  clapped  on 
to  his  own  head),  shed  some  drops  of  golden  rain  from  his 
waistcoat-pocket  upon  the  pair,  and,  in  dread  of  them  and 
of  the  locksmith's  arrival,  fled  home  bareheaded  in  tho 
dark.      The  friseur,  whose  bald  pate  was  so  near  to  the 


CHAP.  VII.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND  THORN  PIECES.    239 

triple  crown  of  the  emperors  of  old,  and  the  popes  oi 
the  present  (for  the  eagle  gave  him  a  crown,  the  Venner 

a  hat,  and  his  wife  had  nearly  placed  something  else ), 

— however,  ihe  friseur,  in  high  satisfaction  of  this  new 
martyr- crown  of  felt,  which  he  had  been  envying  the  Venner 
the  possession  of  all  the  afternoon,  went  back  with  it  to 
the  shooting-ground,  that  he  might  have  the  gratification 
of  marching  home  in  company  with  his  co-emperor,  at- 
tended by  their  subjects  and  their  vassals. 

The  wigmaker  took  his  hat  otf  to  his  royal  brother  Sie- 
benkaes  (that  hat  so  much  more  worthy  of  a  co-king  than 
his  former  one),  and  told  him  something  of  what  had  been 
happening. 

The  Heimlicher  von  Blaise  smiled  his  Domitian  smile 
to-day  more  affectionately  than  ever,  which  made  the 
bird  emperor  far  from  comfortable;  for  friendliness  and 
smiling  make  the  heart  colder  when  it  is  cold  to  begin 
with,  and  warmer  when  it  is  warm — just  as  spiritus  nitri 
does  water.  From  a  friendliness  of  this  particular  kind 
nothing  was  to  be  expected  but  its  opposite,  as  in  ancient 
jurisprudence  excessive  piety  in  a  woman  was  merely  a 
proof  that  she  had  sold  herself  to  the  devil.  Christ's  im- 
plements of  torture  became  holy  relics ;  and,  conversely, 
relics  of  saints  often  become  implements  of  torture. 

Under  the  twinkling  gleams  of  the  wide,  starry  firma- 
ment (where  new  constellations  kept  bursting  into  view, 
in  the  shape  of  banging  rockets)  the  grand  procession 
marched  along.  The  competitors  who  had  come  after  the 
king's  shot  had  fired  their  rifles  in  the  air,  by  way  ot 
salute  to  the  royal  pair.  The  two  kings  walked  side  by 
side,  but  the  one  who  belonged  to  the  guild  of  wigmakers 
found  some  difficulty  in  standing  (what  between  joy  and 
beer),  and  would  gladly  have  sat  down  upon  a  throne. 
However,  over  these  seventy  Brethren  of  the  Eagle,  and 
the  two  vicars  of  the  empire,  we  are  losing  sight,  and  de- 
laying to  treat  of  something  else. 

To  wit,  the  town  militia,  wno  are  also  present,  or 
more  properly  speaking,  the  Boyal  Kuhschnappel  Militia. 
Concerning  this  regiment  I  think  a  good  deal,  and  6ay  only 
about  half  what  I  think.  A  city  or  county  militia  regi- 
ment— and  particularly  the  Boyal  Kuhschnappel  Militia — 


240  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.      [BOOK  It 

is  a  distinguished  and  important  body  of  men,  whose  raiaon 
d'etre  is  to  scorn  and  show  contempt  for  the  enemy,  by 
always  turning  their  backs  upon  him — showing  him,  in 
fact,  nothing  but  backs,  like  a  well-ordered  library.  If 
the  enemy  has  anything  in  the  nature  of  courage,  then  our 
said  force  sacrifices  to  Fear  like  the  ancient  Spartans ;  and 
as  poets  and  actors  ought  in  the  first  place  to  experience 
and  picture  to  themselves  in  a  vivid  manner  the  emotions 
they  are  about  to  portray,  the  militia  endeavours  to  give 
an  illustration,  in  itself,  of  that  panic  terror  into  which  it 
would  fain  throw  the  enemy.  Now  with  the  view  of 
affording  these  men  of  war  (or  "  of  peace  "  if  you  prefer  it) 
the  necossary  amount  of  practice  in  the  mimic  representa- 
tion of  terror,  they  are  daily  put  through  a  process  of  being 
terrified  at  the  city  gates.  It  is  called"  being  relieved." 
When  one  of  these  men  of  peace  is  on  sentry,  another  of 
them,  a  comrade  of  his,  marches  up  to  his  sentry  box, 
shouts  out  words  of  command  at  him  in  a  warlike  tone  of 
voice,  and  makes  hostile  and  threatening  gestures  in  close 
proximity  to  his  nose ;  the  one  who  is  on  sentry  also  cries 
out  in  a  similar  voice,  goes  through  certain  motions  with 
his  weapon,  and  then  lays  it  down  and  gets  away  as  fast 
as  he  can ;  the  conqueror  in  this  brief  winter  campaign 
retains  possession  of  the  field,  and  puts  on  the  watchcoat 
which  he  has  taken  from  the  other  man  by  way  of  booty ; 
but  that  they  may  each  have  an  opportunity  of  being 
terrified  by  the  others,  they  take  the  part  of  conqueror 
turn  about.  A  warrior  of  this  peaceful  order  may  very 
often  be  most  dangerous  in  actual  war,  when,  in  the  act  of 
bolting,  he  happens,  in  throwing  his  rifle  away  with  the 
ba}Tonet  fixed,  to  throw  it  too  far,  and  harpoon  his  too 
proximate  pursuer  with  it.  Militiamen  of  this  sort 
("  precious  "  they  are  in  eveiy  sense)  are  usually  posted, 
for  greater  security's  sake,  in  public  places  where  they  are 
safe  from  injury,  such  as  the  gates  of  towns,  where 
these  harpooners  are  protected  by  the  town  and  gate ;  at 
the  same  time  I  have  often  wished,  in  passing,  that  these 
students  of  the  art  military  were  provided  with  a  good 
thick  stick,  so  that  they  might  have  something  to  defend 
themselves  with  if  anybody  should  try  to  take  away  their 
muskets. 


CHAP.  VII.]     FLOWER,   FRUIT,   AND   THORN   PIECES.    241 

It  will  appear  to  many  that  I  am  but  artfully  cloaking 
the  shortcomings  of  the  militia  in  these  respects;  I  am 
prepared  for  this — but  it  is  not  difficult  to  perceive  that 
this  species  of  praise  also  applies  to  all  small  standing 
armies  of  lesser  principalities — forces  which  are  recruited 
only  that  they  may  recruit.  I  shall  here  utter  myself  on 
this  subject  a  little.  Vuillaume  recommends  educators 
to  teach  children  to  play  at  soldiers,  to  make  them  drill 
and  mount  guard,  in  order  to  accustom  them,  by  this  play, 
to  firm  and  active  habits  both  of  body  and  of  mind ;  in 
short,  to  render  them  firm  and  upright.  This  soldier-game 
has  been  carried  on  for  a  considerable  time  already  in 
Canape's  Institute.  But  is  Mr.  Vuillaume  really  ignorant 
that  scholar-drill,  such  as  he  recommends,  has  been  long 
since  introduced  by  every  good  prince  of  the  empire  into 
his  dominions  ?  Does  he  suppose  it  is  anything  new 
when  I  tell  him  that  these  princes  seize  upon  all  strong 
young  fellows  (as  soon  as  they  attain  the  canonical  hdight) 
and  have  them  drilled,  in  order  that  they,  the  State's 
children,  may  thus  be  taught  mores,  carriage,  and  all  that 
has  to  be  acquired  in  the  State's  school  ?  The  truth  is 
that,  even  in  the  very  smallest  principalities,  the  soldiers 
often  possess  all  the  acquirements  and  accomplishments  of 
real  soldiers;  they  can  present  arms,  stand  bolt  upright  at 
portals,  and  smoke  at  all  events,  if  not  fire — matters  which 
a  poodle  learns  with  ease,  but  a  country  bumpkin  with 
more  difficulty. 

To  these  rehearsals  of  warlike  business  I  attribute  it 
that  many  otherwise  clever  and  sensible  men  have  allowed 
themselves  to  believe  that  this  sham  soldiery  of  the  little 
States,  is  in  fact  a  real  soldiery ;  they  must  otherwise  have 
seen  in  a  moment  that  with  so  small  a  force  neither  could 
a  small  territory  be  defended,  nor  a  large  one  attacked ; 
neither  is  there  indeed  any  need  for  even  this  small  force, 
since  in  Germany  the  question  of  relative  strength  is 
merged  in  that  of  equality  of  religion.  Hunger,  cold,  naked- 
ness, and  privation  are  the  benefits  which  Vuillaume  con- 
siders the  soldier-game  tc  hold  out  to  his  scholars,  as 
lessons  in  patient  endurance  and  fortitude  ;  now  these  are 
the  very  advantages  which  the  State  schools  above  referred 
to  confer  upon  the  young  men  of  the  country — and  that 


242  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDEICH   KIOHTER.      [BOOK  II. 

much  more  thoroughly  and  efficaciously  than  Vuillaume 
does — which,  of  course,  is  the  entire  ohject  of  the  insti- 
tution. I  am  quite  aware  that  there  are  not  infrequent 
cases  in  which  perhaps  a  third  part  of  the  population 
escapes  "being  made  into  soldiery,  and  consequently  gets 
none  of  the  valuable  practice  in  question;  at  the  same 
time  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  if  we  even  get  the  length 
of  having  two-thirds  of  the  population  with  rifles  on  their 
shoulders  in  the  place  of  scythes,  the  remaining  third  (in- 
asmuch as  it  has  considerably  less  to  mow,  to  thresh,  and 
to  subsist  upon)  obtains  the  before-mentioned  benefits  (of 
cold,  hunger,  nakedness,  &c),  almost  gratis,  and  without 
having  to  fire  so  much  as  a  single  shot.  Let  but  barracks 
be  multiplied  in  a  sufficient  ratio  in  a  country,  in  a  pro- 
vince, parish,  town,  village  (as  the  case  may  be),  and  the 
remainder  of  the  houses  will  of  themselves  settle  down 
into  suburbs,  and  accessory  and  out-buildings  to  the 
barracks,  nay,  become  absolute  conventual  establishments, 
in  which  the  three  monastic  vows  (the  Prince  alone  being 
pere  provincial)  are,  whether  taken  or  not,  at  all  events  most 
religiously  kept. 

We  now  hear  the  two  vicars  of  the  empire  go  into 
their  homes.  The  friseur's  sole  punishment  to  his  wife 
is  a  narrative  of  the  whole  affair,  and  a  sight  of  the  hat ; 
while  the  advocate  rewards  Lenette  with  the  kiss  which 
she  had  refused  to  other  lips.  If  her  story  did  not  please 
him,  the  teller  of  it  did,  and  on  the  whole  the  only  thing 
she  omitted  was  the  flower-wreath,  and  the  allusions  made 
to  it.  She  would  not  cloud  the  happiness  of  his  evening, 
nor  bring  back  upon  him  the  pain  and  the  reproaches  of 
that  other  evening  when  she  had  pawned  it.  I,  like  many 
of  my  readers,  had  expected  that  Lenette  would  have 
received  the  news  of  the  enthronisation  far  too  coldly ; 
she  has  deceived  us  all ;  she  received  it  even  too  joyfully. 
But  there  were  two  good  reasons  for  this ;  she  had  heard 
of  it  an  hour  before,  and  consequently  the  first  feminine 
mourning  over  a  joy  had  had  time  to  give  place  to  the  joy 
itself.  For  women  are  like  thermometers,  which  on  a  sudden 
application  of  heat  sink  at  first  a  few  degrees,  as  a  prelimi- 
nary to  rising  a  good  man}'.  The  second  reason  for  her 
being  thus  indulgent  and  sympathetic  was  the  humiliating 


CHAP.  VHI.J    FLOWER,  FRUIT,   AND   THORN  PIECES.    243 

consciousness  she  possessed  of  the  Venner's  visit,  and  of 
the  wreath  in  its  hiding-place;  for  we  are  often  severe 
when  we  are  strong,  and  practise  forbearance  when  we 
stand  in  need  of  it. 

I  now  wish  the  entire  royal  family  and  household  a 
good  night,  and  a  pleasant  awaking  in  the  eighth  chapter. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 


SCRUPLES  AS  TO  PAYMENT  OF  DEBTS — THE  RICH  PAUPER  S  SUNDAY 
THRONE-CEREMONIAL — ARTIFICIAL  FLOWERS  ON  THE  GRAVE — 
NEW  THISTLE  SEEDLINGS  OF  CONTENTION. 

Siebenk^es,  a  king,  and  yet  a  poor's-advocate  and  member 
of  a  wood-economising  association,  arose  next  morning  a 
man  who  could  lay  forty  good  florins  down  upon  his  table 
at  any  hour  of  the  day.  The  whole  of  that  forenoon  he 
enjoyed  a  pleasure  which  possesses,  for  the  virtuous  and 
right-thinking,  an  especial  charm — that  of  paying  debts : 
firstly,  to  the  Saxon  his  house-rent,  and  then  to  the 
butchers,  bakers,  and  other  nurses  of  this  needy  machine, 
our  body,  their  little  duodecimo  accounts.  For  he  was 
like  the  aristocracy  who  borrow  from  the  lower  classes, 
not  money,  but  only  victuals,  just  as  there  are  many  judges 
who  are  bribeable  with  the  latter,  but  not  with  the 
former. 

That  he  does  pay  his  debts  is  not  a  circumstance  which 
should  lower  him  in  the  opinion  of  anybody  who  re- 
members that  he  is  a  man  of  very  poor  "  extraction  " — 
scarcely  of  any  "  extraction  "  at  all,  in  fact.  A  man  of 
rank  is  expected  (as  a  thing  becoming  his  position)  not  to 
pay  his  debts,  fur  thanks  to  the  papal  indulgences  granted 
to  his  noble  ancestors  at  the  time  of  the  Crusades,  he  need 
give  his  mind  no  trouble  on  the  subject  of  liability,  and 
least  of  all  should  liabilities  of  a  pecuniary  nature  cause 
him  a  thought.  To  place  a  man  of  a  high  and  delicate 
sense  of  honour,  a  courtier  say,  under  an  obligation  (e.^.  to 
lend  him  money)  is  to  wound  his  feelings  to  a  greater  or 

b  2 


244  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.      [BOOK  II. 

less  extent ;  and  a  wound  of  this  sort  to  the  feelings  is 
a  matter  which  his  refined  sensitive  nature  naturally  leads 
him  to  endeavour  to  forgive ;  he  will,  therefore,  do  his 
utmost  to  drive  the  injury  thus  done  him,  with  all  its 
attendant  circumstances,  completely  out  of  his  mind. 
Should  the  person  who  inflicted  this  hurt  upon  his  sense 
of  honour  remind  him  of  it,  he  will  then,  with  genuine 
delicacy  of  feeling,  make  as  if  he  were  scarcely  aware  that 
he  had  been  wounded.  Eough  young  squires,  again,  and 
officers  on  the  march  do  really  pay,  and  moreover,  they 
coin  (if  the  expression  may  be  used)  for  themselves  the 
money  they  require,  as  is  the  case  in  Algiers,  where  every 
one  possesses  the  privilege  of  minting.  In  Malta  there  is 
current  a  leathern  coin  of  the  value  of  eightpence,  on 
which  is  the  legend  "  Non  As,  sed  Fides."  With  leather 
money  of  a  somewhat  different  description,  not  circular  in 
shape,  but  drawn  out  to  some  length,  more  like  that  of  the 
ancient  Spartans  (and,  indeed,  this  sort  of  money  usually 
gets  the  appellation  of  dog-whips  or  riding-whips),  the 
landed  gentry  and  people  of  village  nobility  pay  their 
coachmen,  Jews,  carpenters,  and  others  to  whom  they  owe 
money — going  on  paying  them,  in  fact,  until  they  are  quite 
satisfied.  Indeed  I  once  stood  at  table  and  saw  officers,  men 
most  tenacious  of  their  honour,  take  their  swords  from  the 
wall  or  from  their  sides,  and  therewith,  when  the  boots 
asked  for  his  money,  pay  him  in  the  true  currency  of 
antiquity  (among  the  brave  Spartans,  also,  weapons  were 
money),  so  that,  in  fact,  the  fellow's  jacket  got  a  better 
brushing  than  most  of  the  boots  for  cleaning  which  he 
wanted  to  be  paid.  And  looking  at  the  matter  all  round, 
ought  it  really  to  be  accounted  a  grave  offence  in  military 
personages,  even  of  the  highest  rank,  to  pay  their  small 
debts  ?  So  that  often,  when  some  wretched  tailor  asks  for 
metal,  they  take  the  iron  ell-measure  from  him,  and  (while, 
moreover,  applying  to  him  in  person  the  very  measure  which 
he  applied  to  their  furs)  press — not  perhaps  into  his  hands, 
but  on  to  a  part  of  his  body  on  which  "contour"  lines 
might  be  drawn — not  mere  coins,  or  bills  on  approved 
Becurity,  but  a  metal  which  Peru  with  all  its  wealth  does 
not  boast  the  possession  of,  the  aforesaid  iron  to  wit  ?  In 
Sumatra  the  skulls  of  the  enemy  are  their  Louis  d'ors  and 


GHAP.  VIII.J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      245 

head-pieces,  and  even  this  species  of  currency — the  hostile 
head  of  the  tradesman  who  has  furnished  goods — is  often 
taken  by  the  nobler  creditor,  just  by  way  of  satisfying  him 
"  in  full  of  all  demands."  Neither  in  the  Clausular  Juris- 
prudence nor  in  the  most  recent  Prussian  code  is  it  enacted 
that  a  creditor  is  to  stipulate  in  his  bill  which  species  of 
currency  he  elects  to  be  paid  in  by  his  noble  debtor,  the 
metallic  currency  or  the  castigatoiy. 

On  this  Thursday  morning  Siebenkses  had  a  tough  and 
ticklish  argument,  or  piece  of  special  pleading,  to  go 
through  on  the  subject  of  the  half-heart  or  (half-pig)  of 
the  cardinal  protector,  which  his  co-king,  the  hairdresser, 
pressed  the  acceptance  of  upon  him,  by  way  of  making 
more  sure  of  duly  sharing  all  the  prizes  which  appertained 
to  the  king's  shot  himself.  But  his  having  gained  the 
twenty-five  florin  prize  did  not  add  to  the  warmth  of  his 
arguments,  and  at  last  he  agreed  to  the  arrangement  that 
the  animal  should  be  eaten,  pure  and  clean,  like  a  pass- 
over  lamb,  next  Sunday  in  Siebenkajs's  room  by  the  lodgers 
generally,  and  by  the  two  rifle  kings  with  their  queens  in 
company  with  Schulrath  Stiefel.  The  flower  goddess  of  the 
days  of  man  took  at  this  juncture  a  fingertipful  or  two  of 
.seeds  of  quickly  blooming  and  quickly  fading  flowers 
(such  as  like  the  hellebore  come  into  blossom  in  our  De- 
cember) and  sowed  them  beside  the  path  which  Firmian's 
steps  most  often  trod.  Ah,  happy  man,  how  soon  will 
these  forced  blossoms  fall  from  your  days.  Will  not  your 
philosophic  Diana-and -bread-fruit  tree  (which  takes  the 
place,  in  your  case,  of  an  oak  of  lamentation)  fare  like  the 
cut  plants  which  people  put  in  lime-water  in  their 
chambers  on  St.  Andrew's  Day,  and  which,  after  a  hurried 
outburst  of  yellowish  leaves  and  feeble  dingy  flowers,  fade 
and  perish  for  good  and  all  ? 

Sleep,  riches,  and  health,  to  be  truly  enjoyed,  must  be 
interrupted  ;  it  is  only  during  the  first  few  days  after  the 
burden  of  poverty  or  sickness  has  been  lifted  from  a  man's 
shoulders,  that  the  upright  posture,  and  the  free  breath, 
cause  their  fullest  measure  of  delight.  These  days  lasted 
for  our  Firmian  until  the  Sunday.  He  built  a  whole  cubic- 
foot  of  his  Devil  rampart  (in  his '  Selection  from  the  Devil's 
Papers '),  he  wrote  reviews,  he  wrote  law  papers,  he  kept  a 


246  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  II. 

careful  eye  on  the  maintenance  of  the  household  trace 
(liable  to  be  disturbed  by  the  question  of  the  redemption 
of  the  pawned  furniture).  I  shall  treat  of  this  matter 
firstly,  before  proceeding  to  give  an  account  of  the  Platonic- 
banquet  of  the  Sunday.  On  Firmian's  coronation-day  he 
invested  twenty-one  florins  in  a  watch,  with  the  view 
of  avoiding  frittering  away  his  money  by  driblets ;  he 
thought  it  well  to  cast  an  anchor  of  hope  into  his  watch- 
pocket.  Then,  when  his  wife  talked  of  redeeming  the 
salad-bowl,  the  herring-di^h,  and  other  pledges — a  matter 
involving  not  kisses  only  but  half  of  his  capital — he  would 
say,  "  I'm  not  in  favour  of  it,  old  Sabel  would  very  soon 
have  to  carry  them  off  again;  however,  if  you're  deter- 
mined, pray  have  them  out,  I  shall  not  interfere."  If  he 
had  offered  any  opposition,  back  they  would  have  had  to 
come;  but,  inasmuch  as  he  poured  the  greater  portion  of 
his  cash  into  her  money  bag,  and  as  she  marked  its  daily 
ebb — and  as  she  could  go  and  redeem  the  furniture  any 
day — why  for  that  very  reason  she  lot  it  alone.  Women 
are  fond  of  putting  off,  men  of  pushing  on;  with  the 
former,  patience  most  speedily  gains  us  our  point ;  with 
the  latter  (ministers  of  the  crown  for  instance)  impatience. 
I  here  once  more  remind  all  German  husbands,  who  have 
any  pledge  they  do  not  wish  to  redeem,  how  to  deal  with 
their  fair  resisters. 

Every  morning  she  said,  "  Ah !  we  really  must  send 
and  get  back  our  plates,"  to  which  he  as  regularly  anti- 
phonated,  "  I  don't  think  so ;  I  praise  you  rather  for  not 
doing  it."  And  in  this  manner  he  caused  his  own  desire 
to  assume  the  form  of  another  person's  desert.  Firmiau 
understood  some  individual  specimens  of  humanity,  but 
not  humanity  as  a  class,  in  its  broad  sense ;  he  was  em- 
barrassed with  every  woman  at  first,  while  her  acquaintance 
was  new,  though  not  so  afterwards  when  he  came  to  know 
her  better;  he  knew  exactly  how  one  ought  to  talk,  walk, 
And  stand,  in  "society,"  but  he  never  put  this  knowledge 
in  practice ;  he  took  accurate  note  of  all  outward  and 
inward  awkwardness  of  other  people,  but  yet  retained  all 
his  own;  and  after  treating  his  acquaintances  for  years 
with  the  airs  of  a  superior,  experienced  man  of  the  world 
accustomed  to  "  society,"  he  would  suddenly  find,  on  some 


CHAP.  VIII.]   FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       247 

occasion  of  his  being  from  home,  that,  unlike  a  true  man  of 
the  world,  he  had  no  effect  or  influence  whatever  on  people 
to  whom  he  was  a  stranger ;  to  make  a  long  tale  short,  he 
was  a  man  of  letters. 

Meanwhile,  however,  before  the  Sunday  came,  notwith- 
standing all  the  peace-sermons  and  peace-treaties  in  his 
heart,  he  found  that  he  had  plumped,  before  he  knew 
where  he  was,  right  into  the  thick  of  a  household  battle  of 
the  frogs  and  mice  once  more,  which  occurred  as  follows  : — 
It  is  matter  of  history,  derived  from  his  own  statement, 
that,  as  Lenette  kept  on  ceaselessly  washing  her  hands  and 
arms,  as  well  as  other  things  by  the  hundred  (although,  for 
the  most  part,  with  cold  water,  it  being  impossible  to  have 
warm  water  continually  ready) — that,  I  say,  he  simply 
asked,  in  the  gentlest  tone  in  the  world,  the  kindly  and 
half-playful  question,  "  Doesn't  that  cold  water  give  you 
cold?"  She  answered  " No,"  in  a  sostenuto  voice.  "Per- 
haps warm  water  would  be  more  likely  to  do  so,  would  it  ? " 
he  continued.  Her  answer  was,  "  Yes,  it  would,"  delivered 
in  a  snapping  staccato.  Moralists  and  psychologists,  who 
may  be  a  good  deal  surprised  at  this  half-angry  answer  to 
a  question  so  innocent,  are,  contrary  to  my  expectations,  far 
behindhand  in  their  knowledge  of  psychology  in  general, 
and  the  psychology  of  this  tale  in  particular.  Lenette 
knew  by  experience  that  the  advocate,  like  Socrates,  gene- 
rally opened  his  battles  in  the  most  dulcet  tones,  as  the 
Spartans  commenced  theirs  to  the  sound  of  flutes,  and,  in 
fact,  continued  them  in  the  same  strain,  that,  like  the  said 
Spartans,  he  might  retain  complete  command  of  himself. 
She  therefore  dreaded  that,  on  this  occasion  also,  his  flute- 
text  might  usher  in  a  declaration  of  war  against  the  femi- 
nine form  of  government,  of  which  the  various  provinces 
of  work  are  divided  one  from  another  by  washing- waters, 
as  the  judicial  districts  of  modern  Bavaria  are  by  rivers. 

"  What  key  is  a  husband  to  play  his  tune  in,  I  ask  you 
all ! "  the  advocate  would  often  cry  with  curses,  "  since, 
whether  he  takes  it  in  the  major  or  in  the  minor,  or  plays 
piano  or  forte,  it  seems  all  the  same  in  the  end?" 

On  the  present  occasion,  however,  all  he  was  aiming  at, 
his  gentleness  of  demeanour  notwithstanding,  was  a  preface 
to  a  proper  system  of  educating  or  training  the  bodies  of 


248  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDMCH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  II. 

children.  For  after  her  answer  he  went  on  to  say,  "  I  am 
delighted  to  hear  you  say  so.  If  we  had  children,  1  see 
you  would  be  continually  washing  them,  and  with  cold 
water,  too,  over  their  whole  bodies,  and  this  would  invigo- 
rate them  and  make  them  strong  and  hardy,  since,  as  you 
sa}',  it  produces  warmth."  Her  only  answer  to  this  was  to 
hold  her  hands  aloft,  folded  for  victory,  like  the  biblical 
prophet — for,  in  her  eyes,  a  cold  bathing  of  children  was.  a 
Herodian  blood-bath.  Firmian  then  developed  with  much 
greater  clearness  his  invigorating  system  of  upbringing, 
while  more  and  more  strenuously  strove  his  wife  against 
it,  with  all  her  feathers  ruffled,  till  by  dint  of  able  expo- 
sition on  both  sides  of  the  respective  masculine  and  femi- 
nine systems  of  rearing,  they  had  nearly  reached  a  point 
where  they  would  have  clashed  together,  like  a  couple  of 
summer  thunderclouds,  had  not  he  dispelled  these  by  firing 
the  following  shot :  "  Good  heavens !  have  ice  any  children  ? 
Why  should  we  make  fools  of  ourselves  in  this  way  about 
the  matter  ?  " 

"  I  was  speaking  of  other  people's  children,"  was  Le- 
nette's  reply. 

Consequently,  as  I  said  above,  war  did  not  break  out, 
but,  on  the  other  hand,  the  morning  of  the  Sabbath  of  peaco 
brake  in,  and  with  it  came  the  guests  who  were  bent  upon 
possessing  themselves  of  (and  eating)  the  warm  and  divided 
heart,  or  pig,  of  the  Babylonish  harlot,  or  Cardinal  Pro- 
tector. It  seemed,  in  fact,  as  if  some  happy  star  of  the 
wise  men  of  the  East  must  be  standing  in  the  heavena 
above  this  houseful  of  recipients  of  out-door  relief,  for  there 
had,  by  good  luck,  been  a  gale  of  wind  on  the  previous 
Friday  which  had  blown  down  some  half  of  the  Govern- 
ment forest  and  strewn  the  path  to  Advent,  for  the  poor, 
so  grandly  with  branches  (and  the  trees  attached)  that  the 
entire  staff  of  forest  officials  could  not  hinder  the  ingathering 
of  such  a  vintage.  For  many  a  long  year  the  Morbitzer'a 
house  hadn't  boasted  anything  approaching  to  such  a  stock 
of  timber,  part  of  it  purchased,  part  adroitly  collected. 

And  if  every  Sunday  is — in  a  poor  man's  quarters — in  it- 
self and  in  the  nature  of  things,  not  only  a  sun-day,  but  a 
moon-and-stars-day  into  the  bargain — a  day  when  a  poor 
fellow  has  his  mouthful  or  two  of  food,  his  trifle  or  two  of 


CHAP.  VIII.]   FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       249 

good  clothes,  his  twelve  hours  for  eating  and  twelve  for 
lying  down,  besides  the  necessary  neighbours  to  talk  with — 
it  may  be  conjectured  in  what  a  superlative  sort  this  par- 
ticular Sunday  dawned  upon  the  Morbitzer  household, 
■where  everybody  was  as  sure  of  eating  his  share  of  the  pig 
in  the  afternoon  as  of  hearing  the  sermon  in  the  morning, 
and  with  as  little  to  pay  for  the  one  as  for  the  other,  seeing 
that  it  was  a  settled  matter  that  the  lodger  of  greatest 
dignity  in  the  establishment  had  determined  that  his  coro- 
nation feast  should  be  celebrated  nowhere  but  there,  at  the 
table  with  mere  working  men. 

Old  Sabel  was  on  the  spot  before  the  earliest  church-bell 
had  begun  to  toll.  The  rifle-king's  crown-treasury  could 
afford  to  appoint  her  hereditary  mistress  of  the  kitchen, 
under  Lenette,  for  a  kreuzer  or  two  and  a  plate  or  so  of 
victuals ;  but  the  queen  looked  upon  her  as  a  superfluity  and 
coadjutor,  or  auxiliary  queen.  A  king  on  the  chessboard 
gets  two  queens  whenever  a  mere  ordinary  pawn  gets  moved 
on  to  the  place  of  royalty,  one  of  the  royal  squares  (though 
he  has  not  lost  his  first  consort) ;  and  indeed  it  is  just 
the  same  when  it  happens  under  the  canopy  of  a  throne. 
Lenette,  however,  would  have  preferred  to  have  washed, 
cooked,  and  served  the  meats  with  her  own  unassisted 
hands,  like  a  true  Homeric  or  Carlovingian  princess.  The 
marksman-monarch  himself  fled  the  noisy,  dusty  throne- 
scaffold  of  the  day,  and  in  a  loose  old  coat,  happy  and  free, 
he  rambled  about  the  broad  green  levels  of  the  quiet,  blue, 
latter  autumn,  checked  by  no  interfering  dry  stems  or 
straw  sheaves  standing  sentry  on  the  plain,  and  bursting 
no  thicker  barrier-chains  than  the  webs  of  the  spiders. 
Never  do  husbands  more  happily  and  tranquilly  take  their 
walks  abroad — out  in  the  open  country,  or,  indeed,  up  and 
down  in  other  people's  rooms — than  when,  in  their  own, 
the  stamping-mills,  the  sugar  and  fanning-mills  are  at 
work,  whirling  and  roaring,  and  they  promise  themselves, 
at  their  home-coming,  the  clean,  finished  product  and  out- 
come of  all  these  mill-wheels.  Siebenkaes  glanced  with  a 
poet's  idyllic  eye  from  his  quiet  meadow  into  the  distant 
noise-chamber,  full  of  pans,  choppers,  and  besoms,  and 
found  true  and  deep  delight  in  a  peaceful  contemplation  of 
the  whirl  of  backwards  and  forwards  assiduity  going  on 


250  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  II. 

there,  and  in  picturing  to  himself  and  joining  in,  the  plea- 
sant tongue-visions  of  the  hungry  guests,  till  suddenly  he 
grew  red  and  hot.  "  You're  doing  a  fine  thing  !"  he  said, 
addressing  himself;  "/could  do  that,  myself,  too!  But 
there's  the  poor  wife  scrubbing  and  cooking  herself  to  death 
at  home,  and  nobody  giving  her  even  a  thought  of  thanks." 
And  the  least  he  could  do  was  to  vow,  on  the  spot,  that 
however  ho  might  find  things  moved  about  and  "  put  in 
order "  in  the  house  on  his  return,  he  would  accept  and 
belaud  it  all  without  a  word  of  demur. 

And  history  vouches,  to  his  honour,  for  the  fact  that 
when,  on  his  reaching  the  house,  he  found  his  bookshelves 
dusted  and  his  inkpot  washed  white  on  the  outside,  and  all 
his  belongings  "  put  in  order" — (in  a  different  order  to  the 
previous  one,  be  it  observed), — he  at  once  praised  Lenette 
in  the  kindest  manner,  without  a  shade  of  irritation,  and 
said  she  had  performed  her  household  processes  and  accom- 
plished her  cleaning  and  brushing  in  a  manner  quite  after 
his  heart,  for  that  it  was  impossible  to  be  too  exquisitely 
neat  and  spick  and  span  in  the  eyes  of  commonplace  women, 
particularly  such  as  composed  the  infernal  triumvirate  who 
were  to  be  present  that  day  (i.e.  the  bookbinder's,  the 
barber's,  and  the  shoemaker's  wives)  ;  and  on  that  account 
lie  had  left  the  intendance-general  of  the  theatre  of  opera- 
tions entirely  to  her — whereas,  in  the  case  of  scholars,  like 
Stiefel  and  himself,  the  room  might  be  turned  into  a  com- 
plete English  scouring,  carding,  and  brushing  apparatus — 
for  men  of  their  sort  never  glanced  down  at  trifles  of  that 
description  from  their  sublime  heights  of  mental  contem- 
plation. 

But  how  pleasantly  and  cheerily  did  the  president  of 
the  eating  congress  put  all  things  in  train  by  this  his 
kindly  temper,  even  before  the  assembling  of  the  congress ; 
though  this  appeared  most  fully  after  it  had  assembled. 
When  the  thirteen  United  (States,  by  their  thirteen  deputies, 
dine  together  at  a  round  table  to  celebrate  some  arrange- 
ment which  they  have  jointly  arrived  at  (and  that  they  do 
bo  at  least,  establishes  the  fact  that  when  thirteen  dine  at  a 
table  the  thirteenth  does  not  necessarily  die),  it  is  an  easy 
matter  for  the  thirteen  free  states  in  question,  paying,  aa 
they  do,  the  expenses  out  of  thirteen  treasuries,  to  treat 


CHAP.  VIII.]    FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      251 

their  delegates  as  liberally  as  Firinian  treated  his  guests. 
It  is  pleasant  to  look  at  cattle  grazing  in  the  meadows,  but 
not  so  pleasant  to  see  Nebuchadnezzar  conducting  himself 
like  one  of  them  ;  and  similarly  it  is  repulsive  to  see  a  man 
of  cultivation  pasturing  with  a  too  eager  delight  on  the 
stomach's  meadow,  the  dinner-table  (though  it  is  not  so  in 
the  case  of  the  poor).  Firmian's  guests  were  all  of  one 
mind,  even  the  married  couples ;  for  it  is  a  leading  cha- 
racteristic of  the  lower  classes  that  they  enter  into  a  dozen 
treaties  of  peace  and  make  as  many  declarations  of  war,  in 
the  course  of  the  four-and-twenty  hours,  and  particularly 
that  they  ennoble  each  of  their  meals  into  a  feast  of  love 
and  reconciliation.  Firmian  saw  in  the  lower  classes  a 
kind  of  standing  troupe  of  actors  playing  Shakespeare's 
comedies,  and  thousands  of  times  fancied  that  the  dramatist 
himself  was  prompting  them  unseen.  He  had  long  coveted 
the  pleasure  of  having  some  enjoyment  or  other  of  which 
he  could  give  away  some  portion  to  the  poor;  he  envied 
those  rich  Britons  who  pay  the  score  of  a  beershop  full 
of  labourers,  or,  like  Caesar,  give  free  commons  to  an  entire 
town.  The  poor  who  have  houses  give  to  the  poor  who 
have  not — one  lazzarone  gives  to  another — as  shell-fish 
become  the  habitations  of  other  crustaceans,  and  earth- 
worms are  the  habitable  universes  of  lesser  worms. 

In  the  evening  arrived  Peltzstiefel,  who  was  too  learned 
a  man  to  eat  swine's  flesh,  or  a  measure  of  salt,  among  the 
untaught  vulgar.  And  then  Siebenkaes  could  once  more 
entertain  an  idea  unintelligible  to  any  one  but  Stiefel. 
He  could  lay  the  sceptre  and  the  tinted,  glass-ball  of  the 
imperial  globe  upon  the  table,  and  in  his  capacity  of  king 
of  the  feast  and  of  the  eagle,  say  that  his  long  hair  served 
him  for  a  crown,  like  that  of  the  old  Frank  kings,  his  own 
crown  having  been  knocked  down  by  his  landlord's  rifle ; 
he  could  assert  that  the  rule  by  which  only  he  by  whose 
hands  the  eagle  was  brought  down  became  king  was  clearly 
imitated  from  the  code  of  the  Fraticelli  Berghadi,  who 
could  only  elect  to  the  papacy  a  person  who  had  killed  a 
child.  That  'twas  true  he  had  it  not  in  his  power  to  reign 
over  Kuhschnappel  so  long  by  fourteen  days  as  the  King 
of  Prussia  over  the  ecclesiastical  see  of  Elten  (the  latter 
period  being  one  of  fifteen  days) — that  'twas  true  he  had  a 


252  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  II. 

crown  and  revenues,  but  the  latter  were  sadly  reduced, 
cut  down  by  one-half,  in  fact — and  that  he  was  far  too 
much  like  the  Great  Mogul,  who  formerly  had  an  income 
of  two  hundred  and  twenty-six  millions  a  year,  but  now 
receives  only  the  one  hundred  and  thirteenth  part  of  that 
sum ;  however,at  his  (Siebenkaes's)  coronation,  though  there 
had  been  no  general  liberation  of  the  icicked  prisoners,  yet 
one  good  one  had  been  released,  namely,  himself;  also  that, 
like  Peter  the  Second  of  Arragon,  he  had  been  crowned  with 
nothing  worse  than  bread :  finally  that,  under  his  ephe- 
meral rule,  nobody  was  beheaded,  robbed,  or  beaten  to 
death;  and — which  delighted  him  most  of  all — the  feeling 
that  he  was  like  one  of  the  ancient  German  princes,  who 
governed,  defended,  and  increased  a  fiee  people,  and  was 
a  member  of  that  free  people  himself,  &c.  &c. 

The  throats  in  this  royal  chamber  grew  louder  and 
drier  as  the  evening  advanced  ;  the  pipes  (those  chimneys 
of  the  mouth)  made  of  the  room  a  heaven  of  clouds,  and  of 
their  heads  heavens  of  joy.  Outside,  the  autumn  sun 
brooded,  with  warm,  flaming  wings,  over  the  cold,  naked 
earth,  as  if  in  haste  to  hatch  the  spring.  The  guests  had 
drawn  the  quint  (I  mean  the  five  prizes  of  the  five  senses) 
out  of  the  ninety  numbers,  or  ninety  years  of  the  lottery 
of  human  life ;  the  famished  eyes  were  sparkling,  and  in 
Firmian's  soul  the  buds  of  gladness  had  burst  their  leaflet 
envelopes  and  swelled  forth  into  flower.  Deep  happiness 
always  leads  love  by  the  hand ;'  and  Firmian  longed  to-day, 
with  an  unutterable  longing,  to  press  his  heart,  all  heavy 
with  bliss,  upon  Lenette  s  breast,  and  there  forget  all  his 
wants  and  hers. 

These  circumstances,  in  their  combination,  inspired  him 
with  a  strange  idea.  He  determined,  on  this  happy  day, 
to  go  and  redeem  the  pawned  silken  flower-wreath  and 
plant  it  in  some  dark  spot  out  of  doors,  then  take  her  out 
theie  in  the  evening,  or  perhaps  even  in  the  night,  and 
give  her  a  pleasant  little  surprise  at  the  sight  of  it.  He 
slipped  out  and  took  his  way  to  the  pawnbroker's ;  but — 
as  all  our  resolves  begin  in  us  as  tiny  sparks,  and  end  in 
broad  lightning  flashes — so,  as  he  went,  he  improved  his 
original  idea  (of  redeeming  the  wreath  from  pawn)  into 
an  altogether  different  one.  that  of  buying  real  flowers 


CHAP.  VIII.]    FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      253 

and  planting  them  by  way  of  goal  of  the  nocturnal  ramble. 
There  was  no  difficulty  in  getting  red  and  white  roses  from 
the  greenhouse  of  a  gardener  of  the  Prince  of  Oettingen- 
Spielberg,  who  had  lately  come  to  the  place.  He  walked 
round  under  the  upright  glass  roofs,  all  behung  with  blos- 
som, went  to  the  gardener  and  got  what  he  wanted — only 
no  forget-me-nots,  for  these,  of  course,  the  man  had  left 
the  meadows  to  supply.  But  forget-me-nots  were  indis- 
pensable, to  make  the  loving  surprise  complete.  He  there- 
fore took  his  real  autumn  flowers  to  the  pawnbroker 
woman's,  in  whose  hands  his  silk  plants  had  been  deposited, 
that  he  might  twine  the  dead,  poor,  cocoon  forget-me-nots 
among  the  living  roses.  What  was  his  astonishment  to 
learn  that  the  pledge  had  been  redeemed  and  taken  away 
by  Mr.  von  Meyern,  and  that  he  had  paid  a  sum  of  money 
bo  considerable  that  the  woman  thought  she  still  owed  the 
advocate  a  debt  of  thanks.  It  needed  all  the  strength  of 
a  heart  fortified  by  love  to  keep  him  from  going  at  once  to 
the  Venner  with  a  storm  of  reproaches  for  this  move  of 
warlike  strategy — this  pledge-robbery — for  he  could  scarce 
endure  the  thought  (a  mistaken  idea,  'tis  true,  only  given 
rise  to  by  Lenette's  silence  on  the  subject  of  the  garland) 
of  his  pure  love's  pretty  token  in  Rosa's  beringed  and 
thievish  fingers.  The  brokeress,  too,  though  she  was  not 
to  blame,  would  have  been  severely  taken  to  task  had  it 
been  any  other  day,  one  less  full  of  love  and  happiness  ;  as 
it  was,  however,  Firmian  cursed  in  a  merely  general 
manner,  especially  as  the  woman  gave  him  silk  forget-me- 
nots  of  somebody  else's,  when  he  said  he  wanted  some. 
When  in  the  street  again,  he  was  at  variance  with  himself 
as  to  the  spot  where  he  should  plant  his  flowers ;  he  wished 
he  knew  where  to  find  some  fresh-dug  bed  of  fine  old 
mould,  of  which  the  dark  colour  should  setoff  to  advantage 
the  red  and  blue  of  the  flowers.  At  length  he  saw  a  field 
which  is  broken  into  beds  at  all  seasons — in  summer  and 
in  winter,  ay,  in  the  bitterest  cold — the  churchyard,  with 
its  church,  hanging  like  a  vineyard  on  the  slope  of  a  hill 
beyond  the  town.  He  slipped  in  by  a  back  entrance  and 
saw  the  fresh-raised  boundary-hillock  which  marked  the 
close  of  an  earthly  life,  rolled,  as  it  were,  up  to  the  foot  of 
the  triumphal  gate,  through  which  a  mother,  with  her  new- 


254  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  II. 

born  child  in  her  arm8,  had  passed  away  into  the  brighter 
world.  Upon  this  earthen  bier  he  laid  his  flowers  down, 
like  a  funeral  garland,  and  then  went  home. 

The  members  of  the  gladsome  company  had  scarcely 
missed  him  ;  they  were  floating,  like  fish  benumbed  in  their 
element  saturated  with  foreign  matter,  paralysed  with  the 
poison  of  pleasure  ;  but  Stiefel  was  still  in  his  senses,  and 
was  talking  with  Lenette.  The  world  has  already  learned 
from  the  former  portion  of  this  history — the  people  of  the 
house,  too,  were  well  aware — that  Firmian  was  fond  of 
running  away  from  his  guests,  in  order  to  throw  himself 
back  into  their  society  with  a  greater  zest,  and  that  he 
interrupted  his  pleasures  in  order  that  he  might  savour 
them — as  Montaigne  used  to  have  himself  awakened  from 
his  sleep  that  he  might  thoroughly  appreciate  what  it  was 
— and  so  Firmian  merely  said  that  he  had  been  out. 

All  the  waves,  even  the  most  turbulent  of  them,  subsided 
at  last,  and  there  was  nothing  left  in  the  ebb  save  those 
three  pearl  mussels,  our  three  friends.  Firmian  gazed 
with  tender  eyes  upon  Lenette's  bright  ones,  for  he  loved 
her  the  more  fondly  because  he  had  a  pleasure  in  store  for 
her.  Stiefel  glowed  with  a  love  so  pure  that,  without  any 
serious  error  of  logic,  he  was  able  to  define  and  classify  it  to 
himself  as  a  mere  sympathetic  rejoicing  in  her  happiness ; 
particularly  as  his  love  for  the  wife  placed  wings,  not 
fetters,  upon  his  affection  for  her  husband.  Indeed  the 
Schulrath's  anxiety  was  directed  altogether  to  the  reverse 
side  of  the  question,  his  only  doubt  being  whether  he  had 
it  in  him  to  express  his  love  with  adequate  force  and 
ardour.  Therefore  he  pressed  both  their  hands  many  times, 
and  laid  them  between  his  own  ;  he  said  beauty  was  a  thing 
to  which  he  very  rarely  paid  any  attention,  but  that  he 
had  been  observant  of  it  that  day,  becaiise  that  of  Mrs. 
Siebenkass  had  appeared  to  such  great  advantage  amid  all 
her  labours,  particularly  with  all  these  ordinary  women 
about  her,  and  at  them  he  had  not  so  much  as  looked.  He 
assured  the  advocate  that  he  had  considered  his  good- 
ness and  kindness  to  this  admirable  wife  of  his  as  a  mark 
of  increased  personal  friendship  for  himself;  and  he 
asseverated  to  her  that  his  affection  for  her,  of  which  he 
had  given  some  little  proof  as  they  came  together  from 


CHAP.  VIII.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      255 

Augspurg  in  the  coach,  would  grow  stronger  the  more  she 
loved  his  friend,  and  through  that  friend,  himself. 

Into  this  cup  of  joy  of  hers  Firmian  of  course  cast  no 
di'op  of  poison  relative  to  (what  he  supposed  to  be)  the 
news  of  the  Venner's  having  made  prize  of  the  flowers. 
He  was  so  happy  that  day  ;  his  little  toy  crown  had  so 
tenderly  covered  and  soothed  all  the  bleeding  wounds  on 
that  head  of  his  whence  he  had  lifted  his  crown  of  thorns 
just  a  little  way  (as  Alexander's  diadem  soothed  the  bleed- 
ing head  of  Lysimachus),  that  his  only  wish  was  that  the 
night  might  be  as  long  as  a  Polar  one,  since  it  was  just  as 
calm  and  peaceful,  as  bright  and  serene.  In  moments  like 
these  the  poison  fangs  of  all  our  troubles  are  broken  out, 
and  a  Paul,  like  him  in  Malta  of  old,  has  turned  all  the 
tongues  of  the  soul's  serpents  to  stone. 

When  Stiefel  rose  to  go,  Firmian  did  not  detain  him,  but 
insisted  that  he  should  allow  them  both  to  go  with  him, 
not  to  their  own  door  only,  but  to  his.  They  went  out.  The 
broad  heaven,  with  the  streets  of  the  City  of  God  all  lit 
with  the  lamps  which  are  suns,  drew  them  on,  out  beyond 
the  narrow  crossways  of  the  town,  and  into  the  great 
spectacle  hall  of  night,  where  we  breathe  the  blue  of 
heaven,  and  drink  the  east  breeze.  We  should  conclude 
and  sanctify  all  our  chamber  feasts  by  "  going  to  church  " 
in  that  cool,  vast  temple,  that  great  cathedral  whose 
dome  is  adorned  with  the  sacred  picture  of  the  Most  Holy, 
portrayed  in  a  mosaic  of  stars.  They  roamed  on  refreshed 
and  exalted  by  breezes  of  the  coming  spring  hastening  to 
blow  before  their  appointed  time,  those  breezes  which 
wipe  the  snow  away  from  the  mountains.  All  nature  gave 
promise  of  a  mild  winter — to  lead  the  poor,  who  have  no 
fuel,  gently  through  the  darkest  quarter  of  the  year — it 
was  a  season  such  as  none  curse  except  the  rich,  who  can 
order  sleighs  but  not  6now. 

The  two  men  carried  on  a  conversation  befitting  the 
sublimity  of  the  night ;  Lenette  said  nothing.  Firmian 
said,  "  How  near  together  these  miserable  oyster  banks, 
the  villages,  seem  to  be,  and  how  small  they  are ;  when 
we  go  from  one  of  these  villages  to  another  the  journey 
seems  to  us  about  the  same  in  length  as  a  mite's,  if  it 
crawled  on  a  map  from  the  name  of  the  one  to  the  name  of 


256  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  II 

the  other,  might  appear  to  it.  And  to  higher  spirits  our 
earth-ball  may  perhaps  be  a  globe  for  their  children, 
which  their  tutor  turns  and  explains." 

"  Yot,"  said  Stiefel,  "there  may  very  possibly  be  worlds 
even  smaller  than  this  earth  of  ouis  ;  and,  after  all,  there 
must  be  something  in  ours  since  the  Lord  Christ  died  for 
it."  At  this  the  warm  blood  rushed  to  Lenette's  heart. 
Firmian  merely  answered,  "  More  Saviours  than  one  have 
died  for  this  world  and  mankind,  and  I  am  convinced  that 
Christ  will  one  day  take  many  a  good  man  by  the  hand, 
and  say, '  You  have  suffered  under  your  Pontius  Pilate  too !' 
And  for  that  matter  many  a  seeming  Pilate  is  very  likely 
a  Messiah,  if  the  truth  were  known."  Lenette's  secret 
dread  was  that  her  husband  was  really  an  absolute  Atheist, 
or  at  all  events  a  "  philosopher." 

He  led  them  by  snaky  windings  and  corkscrew  paths  to 
the  churchyard ;  but  suddenly  his  eyes  grew  moist,  as 
one's  do  when  passing  through  a  thick  mist,  when  he 
thought  of  the  mother's  grave  with  the  flowers  on  it,  and 
on  Lenette  who  gave  no  sign  of  ever  becoming  one.  He 
strove  to  expel  the  sadness  from  his  heart  by  philosophic 
speeches.  He  said  human  beings  and  watches  stop  while 
they  are  being  wound  up  for  a  new  long  day;  and  that  he 
believed  that  those  dark  intervals  of  sleep  and  death,  which 
break  up  and  divide  our  existence  into  segments,  prevent 
any  one  particular  idea  from  getting  to  glare  too  brightly, 
and  our  never-cooling  desires  from  searing  us  wholly — and 
even  our  ideas  from  interflowing  into  confusion — just  as 
the  planetary  systems  are  separated  by  gloomy  wastes  of 
space,  and  the  solar  systems  by  yet  greater  gulfs  of  dark- 
ness. That  the  human  spirit  could  never  take  in  and  contain 
the  endle-s  stream  of  knowledge  which  flows  throughout 
eternity,  but  that  it  sips  it  by  portions  at  a  time,  with 
intervals  between :  the  eternal  day  would  blind  our  souls 
were  it  not  broken  into  separate  days  by  midsummer 
nights  (which  we  call,  now  sleep,  now  death),  framing  its 
noons  in  a  border  of  mornings  and  evenings. 

Lenette  was  frightened,  and  would  have  liked  to  run 
away  behind  the  wall  and  not  go  into  the  churchyard ; 
however,  she  had  to  go  in.  Firmian,  holding  her  closely 
to  him,  took  a  roundabout  path  to  the  place  where  the 


CHAP.  VIII.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     257 

wreath  was.  He  closed  the  little  clattering  metal  gates 
which  guarded  the  pious  verses  and  the  brief  life-careers. 
They  came  to  the  better-class  graves  nearest  the  church, 
which  lay  round  that  fortress  like  a  kind  of  moat.  Here 
there  were  nothing  but  upright  monuments  standing  over 
the  quiet  mummies  below,  while  further  on  were  mere 
trapdoors  let  down  upon  recumbent  human  beings.  A 
bony  head,  which  was  sleeping  in  the  open  air,  Firmian 
set  a-rolling,  and  —  heedless  of  Lenette's  oft-renewed 
entreaties  to  him  not  to  make  himself  "unclean" — he 
took  up  in  both  his  hands  this  last  capsule  case  of  a  spirit 
of  many  dwelling  places,  and,  looking  into  the  empty 
window-openings  of  the  ruined  pleasure-house,  said, 
"  They  ought  to  get  up  into  the  pulpit  inside  there  at 
midnight,  and  put  this  scalped  mask  of  our  Personality 
down  upon  the  desk  in  place  of  the  Bible  and  the  hour- 
glass, and  preach  upon  it  as  a  text  to  the  other  heads 
sitting  there  still  packed  in  their  skins.  They  should 
have  my  head,  if  they  liked  to  skin  it  after  my  decease, 
and  hook  it  up  in  the  church  like  a  herring's,  upon  a  string, 
by  way  of  angel  at  the  font — so  that  the  silly  souls  might 
for  once  in  their  lives  look  upward  and  then  downward  — 
for  we  hang  and  hover  between  heaven  and  the  grave. 
The  hazel-nut  worm  is  still  in  our  heads,  Herr  Schulrath, 
but  it  has  gone  through  its  transformation  and  flown  out 
from  this  one,  for  there  are  two  holes  in  it  and  a  kernel 
of  dust."  * 

Lenette  was  terrified  at  this  godless  jesting  in  such  close 
proximity  to  ghosts ;  yet  it  was  but  a  disguised  form  of 
mental  exaltation.  All  at  once  she  whispered,  "  There's 
something  looking  down  at  us  over  the  top  of  the  charnel 
house.  See,  see,  it's  raising  itself  higher  up."  It  was  only 
the  evening  breeze  lifting  a  cloud  higher ;  but  this  cloud 
had  the  semblance  of  a  bier  resting  on  the  roof,  and  a  hand 
was  stretched  forth  from  it,  while  a  star,  shining  close  to 
the  cloud's  edge,  seemed  like  a  white  flower  laid  on  the 
heart  of  the  form  which  lay  upon  the  bier  of  cloud. 

"  It  is  only  a  cloud,"  said  Firmian ;  "  come  nearer  to  the 

*  Two  holes  in  a  hazel-nut  Bhow  that  the  heetie  which  gnawed  away 
its  kernel,  in  the  shape  of  a  little  larval  worm,  has  crept  out  in  its 
transformed  state. 

II.  S 


258  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTEK.        [BOOK  II. 

house,  and  then  we  shall  lose  sight  of  it."  This  furnished 
him  with  the  best  possible  pretext  for  leading  her  up  to 
the  blooming  Eden  in  miniature  upon  the  grave.  When 
they  had  walked  some  twenty  paces,  the  bier  was  hidden 
by  the  house.  "  Dear  me,"  said  the  Rath,  "  what  may 
that  be  in  flower  there  ?"  "  Upon  my  life,"  cried  Firmian, 
"white  and  red  roses,  and  forget-me-nots,  wife."  She 
looked  tremblingly,  doubtingly,  inquiringly  at  this  resting- 
place  of  a  heart,  decked  with  a  garland,  at  this  altar  with 
the  sacrifice  lying  beneath  it.  "  Very  well  then,  Firmian," 
she  cried,  "  I'm  sure  I  can't  help  it,  it  is  no  fault  of  mine ; 
but  oh !  you  shouldn't  have  done  such  a  thing !  oh  dear ! 
oh  dearl  will  you  never  cease  tormenting  me  !"  She  began 
to  weep,  and  hid  her  streaming  eyes  on  Stiefel's  arm. 

For  she,  who  was  so  delicately  clever  in  nothing  as  in 
touchiness  and  taking  umbrage,  supposed  this  garland  was 
the  silken  one  from  her  wardrobe,  and  that  her  husband 
knew  that  Rosa  had  presented  it  to  her,  and  had  placed 
the  flowers  upon  this  grave  of  a  woman,  dead  in  childbed, 
in  mockeiy  either  of  her  childlessness  or  of  herself.  These 
mutual  misunderstandings  were  to  the  full  as  confounding 
to  him  as  to  her ;  he  had  to  combat  her  errors,  and  at  the 
same  time  ask  himself  what  his  own  consisted  of.  It  was 
only  now  that  she  told  him  that  Rosa  had  some  time  since 
returned  the  pawned  wreath  to  her.  Upon  the  green 
thistle-plant  of  mistrust  of  her  love,  a  flower  or  two  now 
came  out;  nothing  is  more  painful  than  when  a  person 
whom  we  love  hides  something  from  us  for  the  first  time, 
were  it  but  the  merest  trifle.  It  was  a  great  distress  and 
disappointment  to  Firmian  that  the  pleasant  surprise  he 
had  prepared  should  have  taken  such  a  bitter  turn.  There 
was  too  much  of  the  artificial  about  his  garland  to  com- 
mence with,  but  the  foul  fiend,  Chance,  had  malevolently 
crisped  and  twirled  it  up,  with  added  weeds,  into  a  more 
unreal  and  unnatural  affair  than  ever.  Let  us  take  care 
then  not  to  hire  Chance  into  the  heart's  service. 

The  Schulrath,  at  his  wits'  end,  gave  vent  to  his  embar- 
rassment in  a  warm  curse  or  two  upon  the  Venner's  head  ; 
he  tried  to  establish  a  peace  congress  between  the  husband 
and  wife  (who  were  sunk  in  silent  musing),  and  strongly 
urged  Lecette  to  give  her  hand  to  her  husband  and  be 


CHAP.  VIII.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      259 

reconciled  to  him.  But  nothing  would  induce  her.  Yet, 
after  long  hesitation,  she  agreed  to  do  it,  but  only  on  con- 
dition that  he  would  first  wash  his  hands.  Hers  shrunk 
away  in  convulsive  loathing  from  touching  those  which 
had  been  in  contact  with  a  skull. 

The  Schulrath  took  away  the  battle-flag  from  them,  and 
delivered  a  peace-sermon  which  came  warm  from  his  heart. 
He  reminded  them  what  the  place  was  in  which  they  stood, 
surrounded  by  human  beings  all  gone  to  their  last  account ; 
he  bade  them  think  for  a  moment  how  near  they  were  to 
the  angels  who  guard  the  graves  of  the  just .  the  very 
mother  (he  pointed  out)  who  was  mouldering  at  their  feet, 
with  her  baby  in  her  arms  (and  whose  eldest  son  he  him- 
self was  bringing  along  in  his  Latin  studies — he  was  then 
in  Scheller's  principia),  might  be  said  to  be  admonishing 
them  not  to  fall  out  about  a  flower  or  two  over  her  quiet 
grave,  but  rather  to  take  them  away  as  olive-branches  of 
peace.  Lenette's  heart  drank  his  theologic  holy  water  with 
far  greater  zest  than  Firniian's  pure,  philosophic  Alp 
water,  and  the  latter's  lofty  thoughts  of  Death  shot  athwart 
her  soul  without  tbe  slightest  penetration.  However,  the 
sacrifice  of  reconciliation  was  accomplished  and  mutual 
letters  of  indulgence  exchanged.  At  the  same  time,  a  peace 
like  this,  brought  about  by  a  third  party,  is  always  some- 
thing in  the  nature  of  a  mere  suspension  of  hostilities. 
Strangely  enough  they  both  awoke  in  the  morning  with 
tears  in  their  eyes,  but  could  not  tell  whether  happy  dreams 
or  sad  ones  had  left  these  drops  behind. 


FIRST  FLOWER  PIECE. 

THE   DEAD  CHRIST   PROCLAIMS  THAT   THERE   IS   NO   GOD. 

INTRODUCTION. 

My  aim  in  writing  this  fiction  must  be  my  excuse  for  its 
audacity. 

Men,  as  a  class,  deny  God's  existence  with  about  the 
same  small  amount  of  true  consideration,  conviction,  and 

s  2 


260  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRIClf  RICHTER.         [BOOK  TI. 

feeling  as  that  with  which  most  individual  men  admit  it. 
Even  in  our  regularly  established  systems  of  belief  we  form 
collections  of  mere  words,  game-counters,  medallions — just 
as  coin-collectors  accumulate  cabinetsful  of  coins — and 
not  till  long  after  our  collection  is  made  do  we  convert  the 
words  into  sentiments,  the  coins  into  enjoyments.  We 
may  believe  in  the  immortality  of  the  soul  for  twenty  years 
long,  yet  it  may  be  the  twenty-first  before,  in  some  one 
supreme  moment,  we  suddenly  perceive,  to  our  astonish- 
ment, what  this  belief  involves,  and  how  wonderful  is  the 
warmth  of  that  naphtha  spring. 

In  a  similar  manner  to  this,  T  myself  was  suddenly 
horror-struck  at  the  perception  of  the  poison-power  of  that 
vapour  which  strikes  with  such  suffocating  fumes  to  the 
heart  of  him  who  enters  the  school  of  Atheistic  doctrine. 
It  would  cause  me  less  pain  to  deny  immortality  than  to 
deny  God's  existence.  In  the  former  case,  what  I  lose  is 
but  a  world  hidden  by  clouds  ;  but  in  the  latter,  I  lose  this 
present  world,  that  is  to  say,  its  sun.  The  whole  spiritual 
universe  is  shattered  and  shivered,  by  the  hand  of  Atheism, 
into  innumerable  glittering  quicksilver  globules  of  indi- 
vidual personalities,  running  hither  and  thither  at  random, 
coalescing,  and  parting  asunder  without  unity,  coherence, 
or  consistency.  In  all  this  wide  universe  there  is  none 
so  utterly  solitary  and  alone  as  a  denier  of  God.  With 
orphaned  heart — a  heart  which  has  lost  the  Great  Father — 
he  mourns  beside  the  immeasurable  corpse  of  Nature,  a 
corpse  no  longer  animated  or  held  together  by  the  Great 
Spirit  of  the  Universe — a  corpse  which  grows  in  its  grave  ; 
and  by  this  corpse  he  mourns  until  he  himself  crumbles 
and  falls  away  from  it  into  nothingness.  The  wide  earth  lies 
before  such  an  one  like  the  great  Egyptian  sphinx  of  stone, 
half-buried  in  the  desert  sand  ;  the  immeasurable  universe 
has  become  for  him  but  the  cold  iron-mask  upon  an  eternity 
which  is  without  form  and  void. 

I  would  also  fain  awaken,  with  this  piece  of  fiction,  some 
alarm  in  the  hearts  of  certain  masters  and  teachers  (reading, 
as  well  as  read) ;  for,  in  truth,  these  men  (now  that  they 
have  come  to  do  their  appointed  day's  work,  like  so  many 
vonvicts,  in  the  canal-diggings  and  in  the  mine-shaft  exca- 
vations, of  the  "critical"  schools  of  philosophy)  discuss 


CHAP.  VIII.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      261 

God's  existence  as  cold-bloodedly  and  chill-heartedly  as 
though  it  were  a  question  of  the  existence  of  the  kraken  or 
the  unicorn. 

For  others,  who  have  not  progressed  quite  so  far  as  this 
I  would  further  remark,  that  the  belief  in  immortality  may 
without  contradiction,  co-exist  with  the  belief  in  Atheism  , 
for  the  self-same  necessity  which,  in  this  life,  placed  my 
little  shining  dew-drop  of  a  personality  in  a  flower-cup  and 
beneath  a  sun,  can  certainly  do  the  same  in  a  second  life 
— ay,  and  could  embody  me  with  still  greater  ease  for  a 
second  time  than  for  the  first. 

****** 

When,  in  our  childhood,  we  are  told  that,  at  midnight, 
when  our  sleep  reaches  near  the  soul  and  darkens  our  veiy 
dreams,  the  dead  arise  from  theirs,  and  in  the  churches  ape 
the  religious  services  of  the  living,  we  shudder  at  death, 
because  of  the  dead,  and  in  the  loneliness  of  night  we  turn 
our  eyes  in  terror  from  the  tall  windows  of  the  silent 
church,  and  dread  to  look  at  their  pale  shimmer  to  see 
whether  it  be  truly  the  reflection  of  the  moon's  beams — ur 
something  else  ! 

Childhood  and  its  terrors  (even  more  than  its  pleasures) 
assume,  in  our  dreams,  wings  and  brightness,  shining  glow- 
worm-like in  the  dark  night  of  the  soul.  Extinguish  not 
these  little  flickering  sparks !  Leave  us  the  dim  and 
painful  dreams  even  ;  they  serve  to  make  life's  high-lights 
all  the  more  brilliant.  And  what  will  ye  give  us  in  ex- 
change for  the  dreams  which  raise  and  bear  us  up  from 
beneath  the  roar  of  the  falling  cataract  back  to  the  peace- 
ful mountain-heights  of  childhood,  where  the  river  of  life 
was  flowing  as  yet  in  peace,  reflecting  heaven  upon  its  little 
surface,  on  towards  the  precipices  of  the  future  course. 

Once  on  a  summer  evening  I  was  lying  upon  a  quiet 
hillside  in  the  sun.  I  fell  asleep,  and  dreamed  that  1  awoke 
in  a  churchyard.  The  rattle  of  the  wheels  of  the  clock 
running  down  as  it  was  striking  eleven,  had  awakened  me. 
I  looked  for  the  sun  in  the  dark  and  void  night  sky,  for  I 
supposed  that  some  eclipse  was  hiding  it  with  the  moon. 
And  all  the  graves  were  open,  and  the  iron  doors  of  the 
charnel-house  kept  opening  and  shutting,  moved  by  in- 
visible hands.     Athwart  the  walls  shadows  went  flitting; 


262  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  EICHTEB.         [liOOE  1L 

but  no  bodies  cast  those  shadows — and  there  were  others, 
too,  moving  about  out  in  the  open  air.  Within  the  open 
coffins  there  were  none  now  asleep,  except  the  children. 
Nothing  was  in  the  sky  but  sultry  fog,  heavy  and  grey, 
hanging  there  in  great  clammy  folds ;  and  some  gigantic 
shadow  closed  and  closed  this  fog  as  in  a  net,  and  drew  it 
ever  nearer,  closer,  and  hotter.  Up  overhead  I  heard  the 
thunder  of  distant  avalanches,  and  beneath  my  feet  the  first 
footfalls  of  a  boundless  earthquake.  The  church  was  heaved 
and  shaken  to  and  fro  by  two  terrific  discords  striving  in 
it,  beating  in  stormy  effort  to  attain  harmonious  resolution. 
Now  and  then  a  greyish  glimmer  passed  with  rapid  gleam 
flittering  athwart  the  windows;  but,  whenever  this  glimmer 
came,  the  lead  and  iron  of  the  frames  always  melted  and 
ran  rolling  down.  The  fog's  net,  and  the  quaking  of  the 
earth,  drove  me  into  the  temple,  past  gleaming,  glittering 
basilisks,  brooding  in  poison-nests  beside  the  door.  I  passed 
among  shadows,  strange  and  unknown  to  me;  but  they 
all  bore  the  impress  of  the  centuries.  These  shadows  stood 
all  grouped  about  the  altar,  and  their  breasts  quivered  and 
throbbed — their  breasts  but  not  their  hearts.  There  was 
but  one  of  the  dead  still  lying  on  his  pillow,  and  he  was 
one  who  had  but  just  been  buried  in  the  church  ;  he  lay  at 
peace,  his  breast  without  a  throb,  a  happy  dream  upon  his 
smiling  face.  But  now,  as  I  came  in  (I,  one  of  the  living), 
his  sleep  broke,  he  awoke,  and  smiled  no  more ;  with  painful 
effort  he  raised  his  heavy  eyelids — and  there  was  no  eye 
beneath — and  in  his  beating  breast  there  was  no  heart,  but 
a  deep  wound  instead.  He  raised  his  hands,  folded  as  it 
for  prayer;  but  then  his  arms  shot  out  and  came  apart 
from  his  poor  trunk,  the  folded  hands  came  off  and  fell 
away.  Upon  the  dome  above  there  was  inscribed  the  dial 
of  eternity — but  figures  there  were  none,  and  the  dial  itself 
was  its  own  gnomon ;  a  great  black  finger  was  pointing  at 
it,  and  the  dead  strove  hard  to  read  the  time  upon  it. 

And  at  this  point  a  lofty,  noble  form,  bearing  the  im- 
press of  eternal  sorrow,  came  sinking  down  towards  our 
group,  and  rested  on  the  altar ;  whereupon  all  the  dead 
cried  out,  "  Christ !     Is  there  no  God  ?" 

He  answered,  "  There  is  none." 

At  this  the  dead  quivered  and  trembled  ;  but  now  it  was 


CHAP.  VIII.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      263 

not  their  breasts  alone  that  throbbed ;  the  quivering  ran 
all  through  the  shadows,  so  that  one  by  one  the  shudder 
shook  them  into  nothingness.  And  Christ  spake  on, 
saying,  "  I  have  traversed  the  worlds,  I  have  risen  to  the 
6uns,  with  the  milky  ways  I  have  passed  athwart  the  great 
waste  spaces  of  the  sky ;  there  is  no  God.  And  I  descended 
to  where  the  very  shadow  cast  by  Being  dies  out  and  ends, 
and  I  gazed  out  into  the  gulf  beyond,  and  cried,  '  Father, 
where  art  Thou  V  But  answer  came  there  none,  save  the 
eternal  storm  which  rages  on,  controlled  by  none;  and 
towards  the  west,  above  the  chasm,  a  gleaming  rainbow 
hung,  but  there  was  no  sun  to  give  it  birth,  and  so  it  sank 
and  fell  by  drops  into  the  gulf.  And  when  I  looked  up  to 
the  boundless  universe  for  the  Divine  eye,  behold,  it  glared 
at  me  from  out  a  socket,  empty  and  bottomless.  Over  the 
face  of  chaos  brooded  Eternity,  chewing  it  for  ever,  again 
and  yet  again.  Shriek  on,  then,  discords,  shatter  the 
shadows  with  your  shrieking  din,  for  He  is  not  ! " 

The  pale  and  colourless  shades  flickered  away  to  no- 
thingness, as  frosty  fog  dissolves  before  warm  breath, 
and  all  grew  void.  Ah !  then  the  dead  children,  who  had 
been  asleep  out  in  the  graves,  awoke,  and  came  into  the 
temple,  and  fell  down  before  the  noble  form  (a  sight  to 
rend  one's  heart),  and  cried,  "  Jesus,  have  we  no  Father?" 
He  made  answer,  with  streaming  tears,  "  We  are  orphans 
all,  both  I  and  ye.     We  have  no  Father." 

Then  the  discords  clashed  and  clanged  more  harshly 
yet;  the  shivering  walls  of  the  temple  parted  asunder, 
and  the  temple  and  the  children  sank — the  earth  and  sun 
sank  with  them — and  the  boundless  fabric  of  the  universe 
Bank  down  before  us,  while  high  on  the  summit  of  immea- 
surable nature  Jesus  stood  and  gazed  upon  the  sinking 
universe,  besprent  with  thousand  suns,  and  like  a  mine 
dug  in  the  face  of  black  eternal  night;  the  suns  being 
miners'  lamps,  and  the  milky  way  the  veins  of  silvery  ore. 

And  as  he  gazed  upon  the  grinding  mass  of  worlds,  the 
wild  torch  dance  of  starry  will-o'-the-wisps,  and  all  the 
coral  banks  of  throbbing  hearts — and  saw  how  world  by 
world  shook  forth  its  glimmering  souls  on  to  the  Ocean  of 
Death — then  He,  sublime,  loftiest  of  finite  beings,  raised 
his  eyes   towards   the   nothingness  and   boundless  void, 


264  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  II. 

saying,  "  Oh  dead,  dumb,  nothingness !  necessity  endless 
and  chill !  Oh  !  mad  unreasoning  Chance — when  will  ye 
dash  this  fabric  into  atoms,  and  me  too  ?  Chance,  knowest 
thou — thou  knowest  not — when  thou  dost  march,  hurri- 
cane-winged, amid  the  whirling  snow  of  stars,  extinguish- 
ing sun  after  sun  upon  thy  onward  way,  and  when  the 
sparkling  dew  of  constellations  ceases  to  gleam,  as  thou 
dost  pass  them  by  ?  How  every  soul  in  this  great  corpse- 
trench  of  an  universe  is  utterly  alone  ?  Jam  alone — none 
by  me — 0  Father,  Father  !  where  is  that  boundless  breast 
of  thine,  that  I  may  rest  upon  it  ?  Alas !  if  every  soul 
be  its  own  father  and  creator,  why  shall  it  not  be  its  own 
destroying  angel  too  ?  Is  this  a  man  still  near  me  ? 
Wretched  being!  That  petty  life  of  thine  is  but  the 
sigh  of  nature,  or  the  echo  of  that  sigh.  Your  wavering 
cloudy  forms  are  but  reflections  of  rays  cast  by  a  concave 
mirror  upon  the  clouds  of  dust  which  shroud  your  world — 
dust  which  is  dead  men's  ashes.  Look  ye  down  into  the 
chasm  athwart  the  face  of  which  the  ash-clouds  float  and 
fly.  A  mist  of  worlds  rises  up  from  the  Ocean  of  Death ; 
the  future  is  a  gathering  cloud,  the  present  a  falling 
vapour.     Dost  thou  see  and  know  thy  earth  ?  " 

Here  Christ  looked  downward,  and  his  eyes  grew  full 
of  tears,  and  he  spake  on,  and  said,  "Alas!  I,  too,  was 
once  of  that  poor  earth ;  then  I  was  happy,  then  I  still 
possessed  my  infinite  Father,  and  I  could  look  up  from  the 
hills  with  joy  to  the  boundless  heaven,  and  I  could  cry 
even  in  the  bitterness  of  death,  '  My  Father,  take  thy  Son 
from  out  this  bleeding  earthly  shell,  and  lift  Him  to  thy 
heart.'  Alas!  too  happy  dwellers  upon  earth,  ye  still 
believe  in  Him.  Your  sun,  it  may  be,  is  setting  at  this 
hour,  and  amid  flowers  and  brilliance,  and  with  tears  ye 
sink  upon  your  knees,  and,  lifting  up  your  hands  in 
rapturous  joy ,  ye  cry  each  one  aloud  up  to  the  open  heavens, 
'  Oh  Father,  infinite,  eternal,  hear !  Thou  knowest  me 
in  all  my  littleness,  even  as  Thou  knowest  all  things, 
and  Thou  seest  my  wounds  and  sorrows,  and  Thou  wilt 
receive  me  after  death  and  soothe  and  heal  them  a  I  ' 
Alas !  unhappy  souls  I  For  after  death  these  wounds  will 
not  be  healed.  But  when  the  sad  and  weary  lays  down 
his  worn  and  wounded  frame  upon   the  earth  to  sleep 


CHAP.  VIII.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       265 

towards  a  fairer  brighter  morn  all  truth,  goodness  and  joy, 
— behold !  he  awakes  amid  a  howling  chaos,  in  a  night 
endless  and  everlasting  ;  and  no  morning  dawns,  there  is 
no  healing  hand,  no  everlasting  Father.  Oh,  mortal,  who 
standest  near,  if  still  thou  breathest  the  breath  of  life,  wor- 
ship and  pray  to  Him,  or  else  thou  losest  Him  for  evermore." 

And  I  fell  down  and  peered  into  the  shining  mass  of 
worlds,  and  beheld  the  coils  of  the  great  serpent  of  eternity 
all  twined  about  those  worlds;  these  mighty  coils  began 
to  writhe  and  rise,  and  then  again  they  tightened  and 
contracted,  folding  round  the  universe  twice  as  closely  as 
before ;  they  wound  about  all  nature  in  thousandfolds, 
and  crashed  the  worlds  together,  and  crushed  down  the 
boundless  temple  to  a  little  churchyard  chapel.  And  all 
grew  narrow,  and  dark,  and  terrible.  And  then  a  great 
immeasurable  bell  began  to  swing  in  act  to  toll  the  last 
hour  of  Time,  and  shatter  the  fabric  of  the  universe  to 
countless  atoms, — when  my  sleep  broke  up,  and  I  awoke. 

And  my  soul  wept  for  joy  that  it  could  still  worship 
God— my  gladness,  and  my  weeping,  and  my  faith — these 
were  my  prayer !  And  as  I  rose  the  sun  was  gleaming 
low  in  the  west,  behind  the  ripe  purple  ears  of  corn,  and 
casting  in  peace  the  reflection  of  his  evening  blushes  over 
the  sky  to  where  the  little  moon  was  rising  clear  and 
cloudless  in  the  east.  And  between  the  heaven  and  the 
earth,  a  gladsome,  shortlived  world  was  spreading  tiny 
wings,  and,  like  myself,  living  in  the  eternal  Father's 
sight.  And  from  all  nature  round,  on  every  hand,  rose 
music-tones  of  peace  and  jo}r,  a  rich,  soft,  gentle  harmony, 
like  the  sweet  chime  of  bells  at  evening  pealing  far  away. 


SECOND  FLOWER  PIECE. 

A  DREAM   WITHIN  A  DREAM. 

A  sky  of  glorious  and  sublime  beauty  was  spread  out 
above  this  earth;  a  rainbow  stood  in  the  east,  like 
the  circle  of  eternity :  a  storm,  with  broken  wings, 
passed  thundering,   as  if  weary,  along  by  the  lightning 


266  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  EICHTEB.         [BOOK  IL 

conductors,  and  away  through  the  gle  wing  gate  of  Eden 
in  the  west;  the  evening  sun  gazed  after  the  storm 
with  a  brightness  tender  as  if  it  shone  through  tears, 
resting  its  glance  upon  the  great  triumphal  arch  of 
Nature.  All  enraptured  with  the  loveliness  of  the  scene, 
I  closed  my  eyes,  and  seeing  nothing,  save  the  sun 
shining  warm  and  glowing  through  my  lids,  listened  to 
the  thunder  as  it  died  away  in  the  far  distance.  And  at 
length  the  mists  of  sleep  sank  down  into  my  soul,  and 
shrouded  all  the  spring  in  folds  of  grey ;  but  soon  there  came 
luminous  bands  of  brightness  piercing  through  the  mist, 
and  by-and-by  shone  many-tinted  lines  of  beauty,  and  ere 
long  the  dark  face  of  my  sleep  was  painted  with  the 
brilliant  pictures  of  the  world  of  dreams. 

And  then  I  thought  that  I  was  standing  in  the  second 
world,  and  all  about  me  a  dim  green  grassy  plain,  which,  in 
the  distance,  merged  into  brighter  flowers,  and  woods  of 
glowing  red,  and  hills  so  clear  that  you  could  see  the  lodes  of 
gold  within  them.  Beyond  these  crystal  hills  there  glowed  a 
bright  rose  dawn  of  morning,  with  dewy  rainbows  arching 
it  all  over.  All  the  shiring  woods  were  sprent  with  suns 
(where  earthly  forests  would  have  gleamed  with  drops  of 
dew) ;  while  all  the  flowers  were  draped  with  nebulas,  as 
earthly  flowers  are  hung  with  gossamer.  At  times  the 
meadows  shook,  as  waves  of  motion  passed  quivering  over 
them — but  this  was  not  because  the  zephyrs  bent  the  grasses 
in  their  play — it  was  that  passing  souls  brushed  them 
with  unseen  wings.  I  was  invisible  in  this  second  world, 
for  there  this  shell  of  ours  is  but  a  little  shroud,  a  tiny 
fleck  of  fog  not  yet  condensed. 

And  on  the  brink  of  this,  the  second  world,  reposed  the 
holy  Virgin  near  her  Son ;  and  she  was  looking  down- 
ward to  our  earth,  there  as  it  floated  dwarfed  and  far 
beneath,  in  its  pale,  feeble  spring-time,  on  the  mighty  face 
of  the  Ocean  of  Death.  And  every  wave  was  tossing  it 
at  will,  and  its  dim  light  was  nothing  but  the  shadow 
of  a  shadow.  Then  Mary's  heart  beat  with  a  yearning 
pulse,  when  she  beheld  the  old  beloved  world,  and  all  her 
*-oul  grew  tender,  and  she  said,  with  brightening  glance, 
"  Oh,  Son !  this  heart  of  mine  is  full  of  longing,  and 
mine  eyes  with  tears,  for  all  these  my  beloved  human 


CHAP.  VIII.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      267 

friends !  Eaise  the  earth  near  us,  that  I  once  more 
may  look  into  the  eyes  of  mine  own  race,  my  brothers, 
and  my  sisters.  Ah!  my  tears  will  fall  when  I  behold 
the  living  once  again." 

But  Christ  replied,  "  The  earth  is  but  a  dream  of  many 
dreams ;  and  thou  must  sleep  to  see  these  dreams." 

And  Mary  answered,  "  I  will  gladly  sleep  that  I  may 
dream  of  man."  And  then  Christ  said,  "  Say  what  the 
dream  shall  show  thee." 

"  Oh  beloved  !  I  would  the  dream  would  show  me 
mankind's  love.  Love  such  as  hearts  which  meet  once 
more  in  bliss  after  long  painful  parting  only  know." 

And  as  she  spake  it,  lo !  the  angel  of  Death  stood  close 
behind  her,  and  with  closing  eyes  she  sank  upon  his 
bosom,  which  was  cold  as  polar  ice.  And  then  the  little 
earth  rose  quivering  up,  but  as  it  seared  it  paled  and 
narrowed,  and  grew  more  dim  and  small.  The  clouds 
about  it  parted,  and  the  cleft  mists  gave  to  view  the  little 
night  in  which  it  lay,  and  from  a  sleeping  brook  a  star  or 
two  of  the  second  world  were  mirrored  back.  And  all 
the  children  lay  sleeping  on  the  earth,  and  all  were 
smiling — for  they  had  seen  Mary  appear  to  them  as  they 
slept,  in  semblance  of  a  mother.  But,  in  the  night,  stood 
one  unhappy  being,  the  power  of  outward  grief  almost 
gone  from  her,  except  in  sighs  which  tore  her  breaking 
heart.  Even  her  very  tears  had  ceased  to  flow.  Oh !  gaze 
no  more,  sad  soul,  towards  the  west,  where  stands  the  house 
of  mourning  all  behung  with  funeral  crape ;  nor  to  the 
east,  upon  the  grave  and  house  of  death.  For  this  one 
day,  turn  thy  sad  gaze  away  from  that  drear  charnel  house 
where  the  loved  corpse  is  laid,  so  that  the  cool  night 
breeze  may  fan  and  wake  him  from  his  sleep  earlier  than 
if  he  were  shut  up  within  the  narrow  grave !  Yet,  no  I 
bereaved  one,  gaze  thy  fill  on  thy  beloved  one  while  ho 
still  is  here,  and  ere  he  falls  to  dust — and  steep  thy  heart 
deep  in  the  eternal  woe. 

As  then  an  echo  in  the  lone  churchyard  began  to  talk 
in  faint  and  mutmuing  tones,  repeating  the  notes  of  the 
low-voiced  funeral  hymn  that  rose  within  the  house  of 
mourning;  and  this  after-song,  floating  half-heard  in 
air — as   though   the  dead   were   chanting  low— tore    all 


268  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDKICH  EICHTER.         [BOOK  II. 

her  heart  in  twain  ;  and  then  her  tears  .found  vent  and 
flowed  anew,  and  wild  with  sorrow  she  raised  her  voice 
and  cried,  "  For  ever  silent  !  oh  my  love,  my  love  ! 
Callest  thou  me  once  more  ?  oh,  speak  again — hut  once — 
only  this  once,  once  more,  to  me  whom  thou  hast  left  for 
ever !  Ah,  no !  nothing  but  silence  ;  no  sound  except  the 
echo  stirring  among  the  graves.  All  the  poor  dead  lie  deaf 
beneath,  and  not  a  tone  comes  from  the  broken  heart." 

But  when  the  mourning  hymn  ceased  of  a  sudden,  and 
the  dying  echo  from  the  graves  sung  faintly  on  alone, 
a  tremor  seized  her,  and  her  very  life  shook  in  the 
balance ;  for  the  echo  came  neaier  and  nearer,  and  from  out 
the  night  one  of  the  dead  came  close.  And  he  stretched 
forth  his  pale  and  shadowy  hand  and  took  her  own, 
saying,  "  My  darling,  why  is  it  that  you  weep  ?  Where 
have  we  been  so  long?  for  I  have  been  dreaming  that 
I  had  lost  you ! "  But  they  had  not  lost  each  other. 
From  Mary's  closed  lids  there  fell  some  happy  tears, 
and  ere  her  son  could  wipe  those  tears  away,  the  earth 
had  sunk  back  to  its  place  again — and  on  its  face  this 
happy  pair,  restored  to  one  another,  and  in  bliss. 

Then  all  at  once  there  rose  a  spark  of  fire  up  from  the 
earth,  and  presently  a  soul  hovered  all  trembling  near 
the  second  world,  as  if  in  doubt  whether  to  enter  there. 
And  Christ  a  second  time  raised  up  the  earth  ball,  and 
the  bodily  frame  from  whence  this  soul  had  winged  its 
way  was  lying  still  on  earth,  marked  with  the  scars  and 
wounds  of  a  long  life.  Beside  this  fallen  leafage  of 
the  soul  a  grey  old  man  was  standing,  and,  speaking  to 
the  corpse,  he  said,  "  I  am  as  old  as  thou ;  why  must  my 
death  be  after  thine,  oh  kind  and  faithful  wife?  Morning 
by  morning,  evening  by  evening,  now,  what  can  1  do  but 
think  how  deep  thy  grave,  how  far  thy  form  has  crumbled 
on  its  course  to  undistinguished  dust,  till  my  time  comes 
to  lie  and  crumble  with  thee  side  by  side  !  I  am  alone  ! 
And  what  a  loneliness  is  mine !  For  nothing  hears  me 
now.  She  cannot  hear!  Well!  well!  To-morrow  I 
shall  gaze  with  such  a  woe  upon  her  faithful  hands  and 
her  grey  hairs  that  my  poor  broken  life  must  snap  and 
end.  Oh,  thou  All-merciful !  end  it  to-day ;  spare  me 
that  last  great  sorrow." 


CHAP.  VIII.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     269 

Why  should  it  be  that,  even  in  old  age,  wher:  man 
has  grown  so  weary  and  oppressed,  and  has  descended  to 
the  lowest  and  last  of  all  the  steps  that  lead  him  down- 
ward to  his  grave,  the  spectre,  Sorrow,  sits  so  heavy  -upon 
him,  bowing  his  head  (where  every  bygone  year  has  left 
its  special  thorns)  to  earth  with  a  new  despair? 

But  the  Lord  Christ  sent  not  the  angel  of  death  with 
the  hand  of  ice ;  fur  he  himself  looked  on  the  bereaved 
old  man,  standirg  so  near  him  now,  with  such  a  glance 
of  glowing  solar  warmth  that  the  ripe  fruit  broke  from 
the  tree.  Like  sudden  flame  his  soul  burst  upwards  from 
his  riven  heart,  and  hovering  above  the  second  world 
rejoined  that  other  soul  it  loved  so  well;  there  knit 
together  in  silent  close  embrace,  like  those  of  old,  they 
trembled  downward  into  Elysium,  where  no  embrace  finds 
end.  And  Mary  stretched,  all  love,  her  hands  towards 
them,  and  all  joy  and  rapture  from  her  dream,  she  cried, 
"  Ah,  happy  pair,  ye  are  together  now  for  evermore." 

But  now  there  rose  a  pillar  of  red  vapour  up  on  high 
above  the  hapless  earth,  and  clung  there  hiding  with 
its  dun  folds  a  battle-field's  loud  roar.  At  length  the 
smoke  parted  asunder,  and  two  bleeding  men  were  seen 
lying  enlocked  in  each  other's  bleeding  arms.  They  were 
two  grand  and  glorious  friends,  and  they  had  sacrificed  all 
to  each  other,  ay!  and  their  very  selves, — but  not  the 
Fatherland.  "  Lay  thy  wounds  upon  mine,  beloved  friend. 
The  past  lies  all  behind  us  now,  we  can  be  friends  again ; 
thou  hast  sacrificed  me  to  the  Fatherland,  as  I  have  thee. 
Give  me  thy  heart  again,  ere  it  bleeds  quite  away.  Alas ! 
we  can  only  die  together  now."  And  each  gave  to  his 
friend  his  pierced  and  wounded  heart.  But  these  glorious 
friends  beamed  with  a  lustre  such  that  Death  shrank  back, 
and  the  great  berg  of  ice,  wherewith  he  crushes  man, 
melted  away  at  touching  their  warm  hearts.  And  the 
earth  kept  those  two,  who  rose  above  her  level  like  two 
lofty  mountains,  dowering  her  with  streams,  with  healing 
virtues,  and  with  lofty  views,  she  giving  only  clouds  to 
them  in  return. 

Mary  in  her  dream  here  glanced  and  bent  her  head 
towards  her  son,  for  truly  he  alone  can  reads  support,  and 
succour  hearts  like  these. 


270      JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.    |  BOOK  II. 

Why  does  she  smile  now,  like  some  happy  mother  ?  Is 
it  because  the  earth  she  loves  so  well,  still  rising  nearer, 
seems  to  hover  close  above  the  border  of  the  second  world, 
sweet  with  the  flowers  of  spring,  while  nightingales  lie 
brooding,  with  those  burning  hearts  of  theirs  pi-essed  on 
the  grasses  and  the  meadow  blooms, — the  stormy  skies  all 
brightening  into  rainbows?  Is  it  because  the  earth, 
never  to  be  forgotten  of  her  heart,  now  shows  so  happy 
and  so  gay  bedecked  in  its  spring  dress,  radiant  in  all  its 
flowers,  the  joy  hymn  bursting  from  all  its  singers' 
throats  ?  No,  not  for  this  alone  ;  that  happy  smile  breaks 
over  her  sleeping  face  because  she  ^ees  a  mother  and  her 
child.  For  this  must  be  a  mother  who  bends  down  and 
holds  her  arms  wide  open,  and  calls  in  sweet  enraptured 
tones,  "  Come,  darling  child,  come  to  my  heart  again." 
This  is  her  child,  we  see  and  know,  standing  all  inno- 
cence, within  the  ringing  temple  of  the  spring,  by  his 
good  genius  who  teaches  him — and  now  goes  running  up 
to  that  smiling  form — thus  early  blest,  pressed  to  that 
heart  overflowing  with  a  mother's  love,  scarce  under- 
standing the  blissful  words  she  speaks.  "  Oh,  dearest 
child,  how  thou  delightest  me.  Art  thou  happy  too? 
Thou  lovest  me  !  Oh,  look  at  me,  my  own,  and  smile  for 
evermore." 

But  now  the  very  blissfulness  of  her  dream  woke  Maiy 
up ;  and  with  a  tender  tremor  she  fell  upon  her  own 
son's  heart,  saying  with  tears,  "None,  save  a  mother, 
knows  what  it  is  to  love."  And  as  she  spoke  the  earth 
sank  to  its  place  (where  its  own  asther  flowed  around  its 
orb),  and  with  it  that  glad  mother  with  her  arms  about 
her  child. 

And  all  this  bliss  bursting  upon  my  heart  dissolved  my 
dream.  And  I  awoke — but  nothing  had  truly  changed 
or  passed  away ;  for  the  mother  of  my  dream  still  clasped 
her  child  close  to  her  heart  here  on  earth's  face ;  she  reads 
my  dream,  and,  for  its  truth,  forgives,  perchance,  the 
dreamer  who  tells  his  tale. 


BOOK   III. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

A  POTATO  WAR  WITH  WOMEN  —  AND  WITH  MEN — A  WALK  BT 
DECEMBER — TINDER  FOR  JEALOUSY — A  WAR  OF  SUCCESSION 
ON  THE  SUBJECT  OF  A  PIECE  OF  CHECKED  CALICO — RUPTURE 
WITH   STIEFEL, — SAD   EVENING   MUSIC. 

I  should  very  much  like  to  make  an  incidental  digression 
about  this  point ;  however,  I  feel  that  I  don't  dare. 

You  see  there  are,  now-a-days,  so  very  few  readers  (at 
all  events,  of  the  younger  and  more  aristocratic  sort)  who 
don't  know  everything  —  while,  at  the  same  time,  they 
expect  heir  pet  authors  (and  I  don't  blame  them  for  it) 
to  know  more  than  themselves — which  is  impossible.  By 
the  help  of  the  English  machinery  (now  brought  to  such 
high  perfection),  of  encyclopaedias,  of  encyclopaedic-dic- 
tionaries, of  conversations-lexicons,  of  excerpts  from  con- 
versations-lexicons, of  Ersch  and  Gruber's  '  Universal 
Dictionaries  of  all  the  Sciences,'  a  young  man,  after  de. 
voting  his  days  to  it  for  a  month  or  two  (he  has  no  occasion 
to  devote  his  nights)  converts  himself  into  a  perfect  Senatus 
Academicus  of  all  the  Faculties  of  a  University,  which  he 
represents  in  his  own  single  person ;  besides,  in  a  sense, 
also  himself  standing  to  it  in  the  relation  of  the  student- 
body  at  the  same  time. 

1  have  never,  myself,  met  with  a  phenomenal  youth 
of  the  sort  above  described,  unless  it  were,  perhaps,  a 
fellow  I  once  heard  playing  in  the  Baireuth  band,  who 
represented  in  his  own  person  a  whole  Boyal  Academy 
of  Music — a  complete  orchestra — inasmuch  as  he  held, 
carried,  and  played  upon  instruments  of  every  kind. 
This  Panharmonist  performing,  to  us  oartial  harmonists 


272  JEAN   PAUL  FRIEDRICH  EICHTER.        [BOOK  III. 

only  (as  we  were),  blew  a  French  horn,  which  he  held 
tinder  his  right  arm,  and  this  right  arm  bowed  a  fiddle 
placed  under  his  left;  and  that  left  arm  beat,  at  the 
proper  moments,  a  drum  which  was  fastened  on  his 
back ;  his  cap  was  hung  round  with  bells,  out  of  which 
he  shook  an  accompaniment  "  alia  Turca,"  by  moving 
his  head,  and  he  had  a  cymbal  strapped  upon  each  of 
his  knees,  which  he  banged  vigorously  together;  so 
that  the  man  was  all  music,  from  the  crown  of  his  head 
to  the  sole  of  his  foot  So  that  one  is  tempted  to  make 
this  simile-man  an  occasion  and  ground-work  of  further 
similes,  and  liken  him  to  a  prince  who  represents  in 
his  own  person  all  the  instruments  of  his  State,  and  all 
its  members  and  representatives.  Now,  in  the  presence 
of  readers  who  are  all-knowers,  just  as  this  man  was  an 
all-player,  how  is  a  humble  individual  such  as  I,  who 
am  but  a  mere  Heidelberg  master  of  seven  arts,  at  the 
outside,  and  doctor  of  a  small  trifle  of  philosophy,  or 
so,  to  venture  to  take  upon  himself  to  attempt  such  a 
thing  as  a  bit  of  a  digression  with  any  approach  to  the 
clever  or  the  felicitous  about  it  ?  No ;  the  safe  course, 
in  the  circumstances,  for  me  is  to  go  quietly  on  with 
my  story. 

We  find  the  advocate,  Siebenkaes,  once  more,  then,  in 
full  blossom  of  hope  ;  although  that  blossom  is  all  sterile, 
and  not  of  the  sort  which  bears  fruit.  After  his  royal 
shot,  he  had  reckoned  upon,  at  any  rate,  as  many  happy 
days  as  the  money  would  last  for — upon  fourteen  at  least ; 
but  mourning- black,  now  the  traveller's  uniform,  ought 
to  have  been  the  colour  of  his  upon  his  earthly  night- 
journey — that  voyage  pittoresque  for  poets.  Though  mar- 
mots and  squirrels  know  how  to  plug  up  that  particular 
hole  in  their  dwellings  which  chances  to  be  on  the  side 
from  which  the  approaching  storm  is  coming,  men  do  not ; 
Firniian  thought  if  the  hole  in  his  purse  was  mended  no 
more  was  necessary.  Alas!  a  better  thing  than  money  now 
departed  from  him — Love.  His  good  Lenette  receded  to  a 
greater  distance  from  his  heart,  as  he  did  from  hers,  day 
by  day. 

Her  having  concealed  from  him  the  fact  that  Eosa  had 


CHAP.  IX.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        273 

given  back  the  wreath,  formed  in  his  heart  (as  foreign 
matter  lodged  in  any  vessel  of  the  body  always  does)  the 
nucleus  of  a  gradual  deposit  of  stone  about  it.  But  that 
was  only  a  small  matter. 

For  she  brushed  and  scraped  of  a  morning,  and  every 
morning,  and  that  whether  (as  the  saying  goes)  he  "  liked 
it  or  lumped  it." 

She  would  persist,  and  insist,  on  communicating  all  her 
prorogations  of  parliament  and  other  decrees  to  the  servant 
girl,  in  several  duplicates  and  revised  copies,  let  him  pro- 
test as  much  as  he  chose. 

She  asked  him  everything  she  had  to  ask  him  (no  matter 
what)  two  or  three  separate  times  over ;  and  that  whether 
he  shouted  beforehand  like  a  quack  doctor  at  a  fair,  or 
swore  afterwards  like  one  of  his  customers. 

She  continued  to  say,  "  It  has  struck  four  quarters  to 
four  o'clock." 

When  he  had  proved,  with  immense  care  and  trouble, 
that  Augspurg  was  not  in  the  Island  of  Cyprus,  she  would 
return  him  the  quiet  incontrovertible  answer,  "  Well,  it's 
not  in  Eoumania  either,  nor  in  Bulgaria,  nor  in  the  Prin- 
cipality of  Jauer,  nor  in  Vauduz,  nor  in  the  neighbour- 
bourhood  of  Hushen— two  very  little,  insignificant  places, 
both  of  them."  He  could  never  bring  her  to  give  an 
unqualified  assent,  when  he  made  the  unconditional  and 
positive  assertion  (in  a  loud  voice),  "  It's  in  Swabia — or 
the  devil's  in  it."  She  would  go  no  further  than  to  admit 
that  it  was  situated,  in  a  certain  sense,  and  to  some  extent, 
between  Franconia,  Bavaria,  and  Switzerland,  &c. ;  it  was 
only  to  the  bookbinder's  wife  that  she  would  acknowledge 
that  it  was  in  Swabia. 

Burdens,  nay,  overloads,  of  this  sort,  however,  can  be 
borne  more  or  less  easily  and  bravely  by  a  soul  fortified 
by  the  example  of  great  sufferers — such  as  a  Lycurgus,  who 
let  himself  be  deprived  of  an  eye,  and  an  Epictetus,  who 
allowed  his  master  to  hack  off  his  leg ;  and  all  these  little 
failings  of  Lenette's  have  been  touched  upon  in  a  previous 
chapter.  But  I  have  to  tell  of  new  shortcomings  besides ; 
and  as  regards  these,  I  leave  it  to  unbiassed  married  men 
to  determine  whether  they  are  among  the  matters  which*J^iV>£  7ff 
husbands  can,  and  should,  put  up  with.  *>&d  ^^  \ 

1         Oft 


274  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.      [BOOK  III. 

Firstly  :  Lenette  washed  her  hands  forty  times  in  the 
course  of  the  day,  at  the  very  least ;  no  matter  what  she 
touched,  she  must  needs  put  herself  through  this  process  of 
Holy  Ee-baptism ;  like  a  Jew,  she  was  rendered  unclean 
by  the  propinquity  of  everything.  She  would  far  more  pro- 
bably have  followed  the  example  of  Eabbi  Akiba,  than 
have  been  in  the  least  astonished  at  his  proceedings — who, 
when  he  was  a  captive  in  prison,  and  in  the  direst  distress 
for  water,  instead  of  quenching  his  thirst  with  the  very 
small  quantity  of  it  he  could  get,  preferred  to  use  it  for 
his  ablutions. 

"  Of  course  it  is  right  and  proper  that  she  should  be 
scrupulous  about  cleanliness,"  said  Siebenkass,  "  and  more 
so  than  I  am ;  but  there  are  limits  to  all  things.  Why 
doesn't  she  rub  herself  with  a  towel  when  anybody  breathes 
upon  her?  Why  not  purify  her  lips  with  soap  after  a  fly 
has  deposited  itself  (and  not  only  itself)  upon  them  ?  I'm 
sure  she  turns  our  sitting-room  into  a  regular  English 
man-of-war,  scoured  and  holystoned  from  stem  to  stern 
every  morning  ;  and  I  look  on  as  pleased  as  any  officer  on 
her  quarter-deck." 

If  a  heavy  Irish  rain-cloud,  or  a  waterspout  with  its 
attendant  thunders  and  lightnings,  came  over  his  and  her 
days,  she  always  managed  to  put  her  husband  right  under 
water  (like  a  Dutch  fortress),  with  all  his  courageous 
energy,  and  gave  free  course  to  all  her  tears.  But  when 
the  sun  of  happiness  cast  a  feeble  ray  no  broader  than 
a  window  into  the  room,  Lenette  would  always  have  a 
hundred  things,  other  than  this  pleasant  one,  to  attend  to 
and  to  look  at.  Firmian  had  particularly  made  up  his 
mind  that  he  would  most  thoroughly  winnow  the  husks 
from  the  corn  of  these  few  days  during  which  he  had  a 
few  shillings  of  ready  money  in  his  pocket ;  that  ho  would 
skim  off  the  cream  of  them,  and  completely  hide,  with  a 
thick  veil,  the  second  Janus  face,  let  it  be  smiling  or 
weeping  over  the  past  or  the  future,  as  the  case  might  be ; 
but  Lenette  would  insist  upon  rending  this  veil,  and  point- 
ing to  the  hidden  face.  "  My  dear  soul !  "  her  husband  more 
than  once  implored  her,  "  do  but  wait  till  we're  as  poor  as 
church  mice,  and  leading  the  life  of  a  dog,  again ;  then 
I'll  groan  and  moan  with  you  with  the  greatest  pleasure." 
And    she  only   once  made    him   any  pertinent  answer, 


CHAP.  IX.J      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        275 

namely,  "How  long  will  it  be  before  we're  without  a 
farthing  in  the  house  ? "  But  to  this  he  was  able  to 
return  a  still  inoi'e  apposite  reply :  "  If  that  is  your  way 
of  looking  at  the  matter,  you  will  never  be  able  to  enjoy 
a  single  quiet,  bright,  happy  day,  unless  one  can  give  you 
his  solemn  oath  that  there  will  never  come  another  dark, 
cloudy,  wretched  one  again ;  in  which  case,  of  course,  you 
can  never  enjoy  one.  What  king  or  emperor — ay !  and 
though  he  had  thrones  upon  the  head  of  him  and  crowns 
under  his  tail — can  ever  be  sure  but  that  any  post-deli- 
very, or  any  sitting  of  his  parliament,  may  bring  him  a 
cloudy  time  of  it ;  yet  he  passes  his  happy  day  in  his  Sans 
Souci,  or  his  Bellevue  (or  whatever  he  may  call  it),  and 
enjoys  his  life."  (She  shook  her  head).  "  I  can  prove  it  to 
you  in  print,  and  from  the  Greek."  And,  opening  the  New 
Testament,  he  read  out  the  following  passage  (inserted  by 
himself  on  the  spur  of  the  moment) :  "  If,  in  a  time  of 

food  fortune  and  happiness,  thou  delayest  the  joy  of  thine 
eart  until  a  moment  shall  come  in  which  nothing  shall 
lie  before  thee  save  hopes  in  unbroken  sequence  for  whole 
years  to  come,  then  there  can  be  no  true  happiness  on  tho 
face  of  this  changing  world.  For  after  ten  days,  or  years, 
tsoine  sorrow  shall  surely  come ;  and  thus  thou  canst 
delight  in  no  May-day,  though  it  shower  blossoms  and 
nightingales  upon  thee,  since,  beyond  all  doubt,  the  winter 
will  come  thereafter,  with  its  nights  and  its  snowflakes.  Yet 
thou  enjoyest  thine  ardent  youth,  not  thinking  with  dread 
upon  the  ice-pit  of  age,  which  is  ready  in  the  background, 
with  a  gradually -increasing  coldness  to  preserve  thee  for  a 
certain  season.  Look,  then,  upon  the  glad  To-day  as  a  long 
youth ;  and  let  the  sad  Day-after-to-morrow  appear  unto 
thee  hut  as  a  brief  old  age." 

"  The  Latin  or  the  Greek  always  has  a  more  religious 
sound,  I  know,"  she  answered,  "  and  we  often  hear  the 
thing  in  the  pulpit,  too ;  and  whenever  I  do  hear  it 
preached  I  always  go  home  and  feel  much  comforted  and 
consoled,  till  the  money's  all  gone  again." 

He  had  greater  difficulty  still  to  get  her  to  jump  for 
joy  quite  to  his  liking  at  the  dinner-table  at  mid-day.  If, 
instead  of  their  every-day  fare,  some  extraordinary  flesh- 
pot  of  Egypt  should  chance  to  be  smoking  on  the  table — 

T  2 


276  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

some  dish  such  as  the  Counts  of  Wratislaw  might  have 
served,  and  the  Counts  of  Waldstein  have  carved,  without 
a  blush — then  Siebenkaes  might  be  sure  that  his  wife 
would  have  at  least  one  hundred  things  more  than  usual 
to  finish  and  to  put  away  before  she  could  come  to  dinner. 
There  sits  her  husband,  eager  to  begin ;  he  looks  round 
for  her,  quietly  at  first,  angrily  after  a  while,  but  keeps 
command  of  himself  for  two  or  three  entire  minutes, 
during  which  he  has  time  to  remember  all  his  troubles  as 
well  as  think  about  the  roast — then,  however,  he  discharges 
the  first  thunder-clap  of  his  storm,  and  shouts,  "  Thunder 
and  lightning  !  here  have  I  been  sitting  for  a  whole 
Eternity,  and  everything  getting  as  cold  as  charity.  Wife ! 
Wife ! ! " 

In  Lenette,  as  in  other  women,  the  cause  of  this  was  not 
ill-temper,  neither  was  it  stupidity,  nor  stubborn  indiffer- 
ence to  the  matter  or  to  her  husband  ;  she  really  could 
not  do  otherwise,  however,  and  that's  quite  sufficient 
explanation. 

At  the  same  time,  my  friend  Siebenkees — who  will  have 
this  story  in  his  hands  even  before  the  printer's  devils  get 
hold  of  it — musn't  take  it  ill  of  me  that  I  divulge  to  the 
world  in  general  certain  small  breakfast-failings  of  his  own 
— which  he  has  communicated  to  me  with  his  own  lips. 
As  he  lay  in  his  trellis-bed  in  the  morning,  before  getting 
up,  with  his  eyes  closed,  there  would  suddenly  flash  upon 
him  ideas  for  his  book,  and  forms  in  which  to  express 
them,  such  as  never  occurred  to  him  while  he  was  sitting 
or  standing  during  the  day ;  and,  indeed,  I  have  in  tho 
course  of  my  reading  found  that  there  have  been  many 
men  of  learning — such,  for  instance,  as  Descartes,  Abbe" 
Galiani,  Basedow — I,  myself,  too,  whom  of  course  I  don't 
count,  who  belonged  to  the  Coleopterous  family  of  back- 
swimmers  (Notonectoe),  and  got  on  quickest  in  the  recum- 
bent position,  and  in  whose  cases  bed  has  been  the  brew- 
ing-kettle of  their  most  brilliant  and  original  ideas.  I, 
myself,  could  point  to  many  such  which  1  have  written 
down  immediately  after  getting  out  of  bed  in  the  morning. 
Any  one  who  sets  himself  to  work  to  explain  this  pheno- 
menon should  adduce  in  the  first  place  the  matutinal 
power  of  the  brain,  and  the  fact  of  its  lending  itself  with 


CHAP.  IX.J      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        277 

a  more  nimble,  as  well  as  vigorous  obedience  to  the  im- 
pulses of  the  spirit  after  its  internal  and  external  holiday 
of  rest ;  next,  the  freedom  and  facility  both  of  thinking 
and  of  brain  mobility,  which  the  manifold  impulsions  of 
the  day  has  .not  yet  begun  to  weary  and  impair ;  and, 
lastly,  the  vigour  which  is  a  peculiar  property  of  all  first- 
born things — a  vigour  which  our  earliest  morning  thoughts 
possess  in  common  with  the  first  impressions  of  youth. 

Now,  after  the  above  explanations,  it  will  doubtless 
seem  clear  that,  when  the  advocate  lay  in  this  fashion, 
sprouting  and  sending  out  long  shoots  in  the  warm 
forcing-house  of  the  pillow,  and  bearing  the  most  precious 
flowers  and  fruit,  nothing  could  strike  upon  his  ear  in  a 
harsher  and  more  distracting  manner  than  the  voice  of 
Lenette  calling  from  the  next  room,  "  Come  to  breakfast, 
the  coffee's  ready."  He  generally  gave  birth  to  one  or 
two  more  happy  turns  of  expression  after  he  did  hear  it, 
pricking  his  ears  all  the  while,  however,  in  dread  of  a 
second  order  to  march.  But  as  Lenette  knew  that  he 
always  allowed  himself  a  considerable  number  of  minutes 
of  grace  after  the  summons,  she  always  cried,  "  Get  up,  the 
coffee's  cold,"  when  it  was  only  just  coming  to  the  boil. 
The  notonectic  satirist,  for  his  part,  had  observed  the  law 
which  governed  this  precession  of  the  equinoxes,  and  lay 
quietly  among  the  feathers  breeding  his  ideas  happy  and 
undisturbed  when  it  was  only  once  that  she  had  sum- 
moned him,  merely  answering,  "  This  very  moment !"  and 
availing  himself  of  the  double  usance  prescribed  by  law. 

This  obliged  his  wife,  for  her  part,  to  go  farther  back, 
and  when  the  coffee  was  made  and  standing  by  the  fire,  to 
cry,  "  Come,  dear,  it's  getting  quite  cold."  Now,  on  this 
system,  of  getting  earlier  on  one  side  and  later  on  the 
other,  matters  became  more  critical  every  day,  with 
nowhere  a  prospect  of  extrication  from  the  difficulty ;  in 
fact,  what  was  naturally  to  be  expected  was  the  arrival  of 
a  state  of  things  in  which  Lenette  would  end  by  calling 
him  to  get  up  a  whole  day  too  soon  ;  although,  in  the  end, 
this  would  eventuate  in  a  mere  restoration  of  the  original 
condition  of  affairs,  just  as  our  suppers  at  the  present  day 
threaten  to  become  too-early  breakfasts,  and  our  break- 
fasts unfashionably  early  dinners.     Had  Siebenkees  been 


278  JEAN  PAUL  FBIEDRICH  RICHTEE.       [BOOK  IIL 

able  to  bear  the  process  of  grinding  the  coffee,  he  might 
have  moored  himself  to  that  as  to  an  anchor  of  hope,  and 
it  would  then  have  been  a  simple  matter  to  calculate 
the  time  the  coffee  would  take  to  get  ready ;  but  this  he 
could  not,  for,  in  the  absence  of  a  coffee-mill,  the  coffee 
was  bought  ready  ground  (by  everybody  in  the  house,  for 
that  matter).  If  Lenette  could  have  been  induced  to  call 
him  just  one  exact  minute  before  the  coffee  was  boiling 
and  smoking,  she  would  have  done  instead  of  the  coffee- 
mill — however,  she  could  not  be  induced. 

What  are  trifling  differences  of  opinion  before  marriage 
assume  large  dimensions  thereafter — as  north  winds  are 
warm  in  summer  and  cold  in  winter ;  the  zephyr,  when 
it  is  breathed  forth  by  conjugal  lungs,  is  like  Homer's 
zephyr,  concerning  the  biting  keenness  of  which  the  poet 
sings  so  much.  For  this  period  onward,  Firmian  set 
himself  to  look  with  much  care  and  minuteness  for  every 
Crack,  feather,  flaw,  or  cloudiness,  which  might  be  dis- 
coverable in  that  diamond — Lenette's  heart.  Poor  fellow ! 
this  being  the  case  with  thee,  soon,  soon  must  the  crumb- 
ling altar  of  thy  love  go  toppling  down  one  stone  after 
another,  and  the  sacrificial  fire  flutter  and  go  out. 

He  now  discovered  that  she  was  not  nearly  as  learned  a 
woman  as  Mdlles.  Burmann  and  Eeiske.  It  is  true  no  book 
wearied  her,  but  neither  did  any  interest  her,  and  she 
could  read  her  one  book  of  Sermons  as  often  as  scholars 
can  go  through  Homer  and  Kant.  Her  secular  or  "  pro- 
fane" authors  were  only  two ;  in  fact,  one  married  pair  of 
authors— the  immortal  authoress  of  her  own  cookery 
receipts,  and  that  lady's  husband— but  the  latter  she  never 
read.  She  paid  his  essays  the  tribute  of  her  profoundest  ad- 
miration, but  she  never  glanced  into  them.  Three  sensible 
words  with  the  bookbinder's  wife  were  of  more  value 
in  her  eyes  than  all  the  bookbinder's  and  bookmaker's 
printed  ones  put  together.  To  a  literary  man  who  is 
making  new  arguments,  and  new  ink,  all  the  year  long,  it 
is  incomprehensible  how  those  persons  who  have  neither  a 
book,  nor  a  pen.  nor  a  drop  of  ink  in  the  house  (except 
the  pale  rusty  liquid  borrowed  from  the  village  school- 
master) can  exist  at  all.  Firmian  sometimes  appointed 
himself  a  species  of  special  Professor-extraordinary,  and 


CHAP.  IX.J       FLOWER.  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        279 

mounted  the  professional  chair  with  the  view  of  initiating 
Lenette  into  one  or  two  of  the  elementary  principles  of 
Astronomy ;  but  either  she  had  no  pineal  gland  (that 
manor-house  of  the  soul  and  its  ideas),  or  else  the  cham- 
bers of  her  brain  were  saturated,  satiated,  and  crammed  to 
the  roof  with  lace,  bonnets,  shirts,  and  saucepans  ;  at  all 
events,  it  was  beyond  his  power  to  get  a  single  star  into 
her  head  bigger  than  a  reel  of  cotton.  With  Pneuma- 
tology  (Psychology),  again,  his  difficulty  was  exactly  of 
the  converse  sort.  In  this  branch  of  science,  where  the 
calculus  of  the  infinitesimally  small  would  have  come  to 
his  aid  with  an  equal  amount  of  serviceableness  as  that  of 
the  infinitely  great  in  astronomy,  Lenette  expanded  and 
stretched  out  the  dimensions  of  the  angels,  souls,  and  so 
forth,  passing  the  minutest  and  most  ethereal  of  spiritual 
beings  through  the  stretching  mill  of  her  imagination,  so 
that  angels — of  whom  the  scholiasts  would  have  invited 
whole  companies  to  a  carpet-dance  on  the  tip  of  a  new 
needle  (or  have  threaded  them  with  it  by  couples  on  one 
and  the  same  point  of  space) — expanded  on  her  hands  to 
such  an  extent  that  each  angel  would  have  filled  a  cradle 
by  itself;  and  as  for  the  Devil,  he  swelled  out  upon  her  till 
he  got  to  be  pretty  much  about  the  size  of  her  husband. 

Further,  Siebenkass  discovered  an  iron-mould  stain,  a 
pock-mark  or  wart,  on  her  heart ;  he  could  never  warm  her 
into  a  true  lyric  enthusiasm  of  Love,  in  which  she  should 
forget  heaven  and  earth,  and  all  things.  She  could  count 
the  strokes  of  the  town  clock  amid  his  kisses ;  though 
some  affecting  story  or  discourse  of  his  might  bring  the 
big  tears  to  her  eyes,  she  could  still  hear  the  soup-pot 
boiling  over,  and  run  away  to  it,  tears  and  all.  She  would 
join  devoutly  in  the  hymns  which  came  resounding  from 
the  other  lodgers'  rooms  of  a  Sunday,  but  in  the  middle  of 
of  a  verse  ask  the  prosaic  question,  "  What  shall  I  warm 
for  supper  ?"  and  he  never  could  forget  that,  once,  when 
she  was  listening,  apparently  much  interested  and  quite 
touched,  to  one  of  his  chamber-sermons  on  death  and  im- 
mortality, she  looked  at  him,  thoughtfully  it  is  true,  but 
with  a  glance  directed  downward,  and  said,  "  Don't  put  on 
that  left  etocking  to-morrow  morning  till  I've  darned  it 
for  you." 


280  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IIL 

The  author  of  this  tale  declares  that  he  has  sometimes 
been  driven  nearly  out  of  his  mind  by  feminine  entr'actes 
of  this  sort,  against  the  occurrence  of  which  there  is  no 
warranty  for  the  man  who  soars  up  into  the  eether  in 
company  with  these  beautiful  birds  of  paradise,  and  there 
hovers  up  and  down  with  them,  in  the  fond  hope  of 
hatching  the  eggs  of  his  phantasies  upon  their  backs  up 
among  the  clouds.*  All  in  an  instant,  down  drops  the 
winged  mate,  as  if  by  magic,  with  a  green  gleam,  on  to  a 
clod  of  earth.  I  admit  that  this  is  but  an  excellence  the 
more ;  it  makes  them  resemble  the  hens,  whose  eyes  the 
Great  Optician  of  the  Universe  has  made  so  perfect  that 
they  can  see  the  most  distant  sparrow-hawk  in  the  sky  as 
well  as  the  nearest  grain  of  malt  on  the  dunghill.  It  is 
to  be  hoped,  indeed,  that  the  author  of  this  story,  should  he 
ever  chance  to  marry,  may  meet  with  a  wife  to  whom  he 
may  be  able  to  give  readings  concerning  the  more  er>sen- 
tial  principles  and  dictata  of  psychology  and  astronomy 
without  her  bringing  in  the  subject  of  hi*  stockings  in  the 
middle  of  his  loftiest  and  fullest  flights  of  enthusiasm ; 
but  yet  he  will  be  well  content  should  one  possessed  of 
moderate  excellencies  fall  to  his  lot — one  who  shall  be 
capable  of  accompanying  him,  side  by  side  with  him,  in 
his  flights,  so  far  as  they  may  extend — whose  eyes  and  heart 
may  be  wide  enough  to  take  in  the  blooming  earth  and 
the  shining  heavens  in  great,  grand  masses  at  a  time,  and 
not  in  mere  infinitesimal  particles ;  for  whom  this  uni- 
verse shall  be  something  higher  than  a  nursery  and  a 
ball-room  ;  and  who,  with  feelings  delicate  and  tender,  and 
a  heart  both  pious  and  wide,  should  be  continually  making 
her  husband  better  and  holier.  The  author's  fondest 
wishes  go  not  beyond  this. 

Thus,  then,  while  the  flowers,  if  not  the  leaves,  were 
falling  fast  from  Firmian's  love,  Lenette's  was  like  a  rose 
somewhat  overblown,  whose  beauty  a  touch  will  scatter  to 
the  earth.  Her  husband's  endless  arguments  wearied  her 
heart  at  length.  Moreover,  she  was  one  of  those  women 
whose  loveliest  blossoms  remain  sterile  and  dead,  unless 
children  troop  around  to  enjoy  them,  as  the  flowers  of  the 

*  Allusion  to  the  fable  that  the  male  birds  of  paradise  hatch  the 
eggs  on  the  backs  of  the  females  up  in  air. 


CHAP.  IX.  J      FLOWER,  FEU  IT,  AND  THORN  flECES.        281 

vine  do  not  produce  grapes  unless  frequented  by  bees. 
She  belonged  to  tnis  class  of  women  also  in  this  respect, 
that  she  was  born  to  be  the  spiral  mainspring  of  a  house- 
keeping engine — the  stage-manageress  of  a  great  house- 
hold theatre.  Alas  !  the  market-value  of  the  shares,  and 
the  state  of  the  treasury  of  the  said  theatre  are  well-known 
to  everybody — from  Hamburg  to  Ofen. 

Moreover,  our  couple,  like  phoenixes  and  giants,  were 
childless  :  the  two  columns  stood  apart  and  unconnected, 
no  fruit  garlands  twining  about  them  to  bind  them  one 
to  another.  Firmian  had,  in  imagination,  thoroughly  re- 
hearsed the  character  of  pere  de  famille,  and  despatcher  of 
invitations  to  be  godfather,  but  it  never  came  to  a  perfor- 
mance. 

What  was  most  of  all  effective  in  breaking  him  away 
from  Lenette's  heart,  however,  was  his  dissimilarity  to 
Peltzstiefel.  The  Schulrath  had  in  him  as  much  of  the 
wearisome,  the  deliberately  circumspect,  the  grave  and 
reserved,  the  stiff  and  starched,  the  pompous  and  inflated, 

the  heavy  and  the  dull,  as these  three  lines  have ; 

but  this  delighted  the  very  soul  of  our  born  housekeeper. 
Siebenkaes,  again,  was  like  a  jerboa  from  morning  till 
night.  She  often  said  to  him,  "  I'm  sure  people  must  think 
you're  not  quite  right  in  the  head;"  to  which  he  would 
answer,  "And  am  I?"  He  concealed  the  beauty  of  hig 
character  behind  a  comedy  mask,  and  the  trodden-down 
heels  of  the  buskins  he  alwa37s  wore  made  his  stature  seem 
shorter  than  it  really  was.  The  brief  drama  of  his  own  life 
he  turned  into  a  mere  burlesque  and  parodied  epic,  and  it 
was  from  higher  motives  than  mere  vain  folly  that  he  so  gave 
himself  over  to  grotesque  performances.  In  the  first  place 
he  delighted  with  a  deep  delight  ir  the  sense  of  freedom 
of  soul,  and  entire  absence  of  all  conventional  trammels; 
secondly,  he  found  pleasure  in  the  thought  that  he  travestied 
— not  imitated — the  follies  of  his  fellow-men.  In  acting  his 
part  he  had  a  double  enjoyment — that  of  comedian  as  well 
as  that  of  the  spectator.  A  person  who  puts  humour  into 
action  is  a  satirical  improvisatore.  Every  male  reader  under- 
Btands  this — though  no  female  reader  does.  I  have  often 
wished  that  I  could  place   in  the  hands  of  a  woman, 


282  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  III 

looking  at  the  white  sun-ray  of  wisdom  broken  into  a 
tinted  spectrum  by  the  prism  of  humour,  some  powerful 
lens  which  should  burn  that  spectrum  back  into  its  pris- 
tine whiteness, — but  it  is  not  to  be  done.  The  fine,  delicate, 
womanly  sense  of  the  fit,  the  proper,  the  becoming,  seems 
to  be  torn  and  scratched  by  the  touch  of  anything  angular 
and  unpolished  ;  these  souls,  so  firmly  welded  on  to  the 
everyday,  commonplace,  conventional  relations  of  things, 
cannot  understand  souls  which  place  themselves  in  an- 
tagonism to  these  relations.  And  therefore  it  is  that 
humorists  are  so  rare  in  the  hereditary  kingdoms  of 
women,  courts — and  in  their  realm  of  shadows,  France. 

Lenette  could  not  be  otherwise  than  much,  and  con- 
tinually, vexed  and  annoyed  with  this  whistling,  singing, 
dancing  husband  of  hers — a  man  who  didn't  behave  to  his 
very  clients  with  anything  like  proper  professional  gravity ; 
who,  sad  to  say — and  people  assured  her  it  was  a  fact — 
often  walked  in  circles  round  the  gallows  on  the  hill, — con- 
cerning whose  sanity  sensible  people  spoke  very  doubtfully 
— as  to  whom  she  complained,  that  you  would  never  think, 
to  see  him,  that  he  lived  in  a  royal  burgh,  the  capital  of  the 
province — and  who  was  respectful  and  reserved  only  before 
one  person  in  the  world,  namely,  himself.  Why,  when  maid- 
servants, from  the  very  best  houses  in  the  place,  came  in — 
with  linen  to  be  made  up,  and  so  on — didn't  they  very  often 
see  him  jump  up  and,  without  a  "  With  your  leave,"  or 
"  By  your  leave,"  to  anybody,  run  to  his  old,  battered, 
rattling  piano  (it  still  had  all  its  keys,  and  nearly  as  many 
strings),  and  there  he  would  stand  with  a  wooden  yard- 
measure  in  his  mouth,  up  which,  as  over  a  drawbridge,  the 
notes  climbed  to  him  from  the  soundboard,  then  through  the 
portcullis  of  his  teeth,  finally  arriving  at  his  soul  by  way 
of  the  Eustachian  tube  and  the  drum  of  the  ear.  He  held 
this  stork'g-beak  of  a  yard-measure  between  his  teeth  as 
described  in  order  to  magnify  the  inaudible  pianissimo  of 
his  piano  into  a  fortissimo  at  its  upper  end.  However, 
humour  looks  paler  when  reflected  in  narrative  than  in 
the  vividness  of  reality. 

That  portion  of  earth's  surface  on  which  these  two 
stood  was  riven  into  two  distinct  islets  by  these  continual 


UHAP.  IX.J      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        283 

tremblings  of  the  soil,  and  these  islets  kept  drifting  steidily 
further  and  further  apart.  And  ere  long  there  came  a 
serious  shock  of  earthquake. 

For  the  Heimlicher  came  on  the  stage  again,  with  his 
plea  of  demurrer  to  Siebenkses's  suit,  in  which  all  he 
demanded  was  justice  and  equity — in  other  words,  the 
money  which  was  in  question,  unless  Siebenkaes  could 
prove  himself  to  be  himself,  that  is  to  say,  the  ward,  whose 
patrimony  the  Heimlicher  had  hitherto  kept  in  his  paternal 
hands  and  purse.  This  juridical  Hell-river  took  Firmian's 
breath  away  and  struck  ice-cold  to  his  heart,  though  he 
had  jumped  over  the  three  previous  petitions  for  postpone- 
ment a?  easily  as  the  crowned  lion  over  the  three  livers  in 
the  Gotha  coat-of-arms.  The  wounds  which  we  receive 
from  Fate  soon  heal,  but  those  inflicted  by  the  blunt  and 
rusty  torture-implement  of  an  unjust  man  suppurate  and 
take  long  to  close.  This  cut,  made  into  nerves  already  laid 
bare  by  so  many  a  rude  clutch  and  sharp  tongue,  caused 
our  dear  friend  some  severe  pain ;  yet  he  had  seen  that 
the  cut  was  coming  long  before  it  came,  and  had  cried  to 
his  spirit,  "Look  out — mind  your  head!"  Alas  !  there  is 
something  new  in  every  pain.  He  had  even  taken  legal 
steps  in  anticipation  of  it.*  A  few  weeks  before  he  had 
had  evidence  sent  from  Leipsic,  where  he  had  studied,  to 
prove  that  he  had  formerly  been  known  by  the  name  of 
Leibgeber,  and  was,  consequently,  Blaise's  ward.  A  young 
notary  there,  of  the  name  of  Giegold,  an  old  college  friend 
and  literary  brother  in  arms,  had  done  him  the  service  of 
seeing  all  the  people  who  had  known  of  his  Leibgeberhood 
— particularly  a  rusty,  musty  old  tutor,  who  had  often  been 
present  when  the  guardian's  register-ships  came  in — and  a 
postman,  who  had  piloted  them  into  port,  and  his  landlord 
and  other  well-informed  persons,  who  all  took  the  Jus 
credulitalis  (or  oath  of  conviction),  and  whose  evidence  the 
young  lawyer  forwarded  to  Siebenkaes  (like  a  mountain 
full  of  precious  ore) ;  he  had  no  great  difficulty,  to  speak 
of,  in  paying  the  postage  of  it,  as  he  was  king  of  the 
marksmen. 

With  this  stout  club  of  evidence  he  resisted  and  with- 
stood his  guardian  and  robber. 

When  Blaise's  denial  was  lodged,  the   timid  Lenetta 


284  JEAN  PAUL  FRTEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

gave  herself  and  the  suit  up  for  lost ;  poverty,  lean  and 
bare,  seemed  in  her  eyes  now  to  enmesh  them  in  a  net- 
work of  parasite  ivy,  and  there  was  no  other  prospect  for 
them  but  to  perish  and  fall  to  the  ground.  Her  first  pro- 
ceeding was  to  burst  into  loud  abuse  of  Von  Meyern  ;  for 
as  he  had  himself  told  her  that  his  father-in-law's  three 
applications  for  delay  had  been  the  result  of  his  intercession, 
which  he  had  made  for  her  sake  alone,  she  looked  upon 
Blaise's  plea  of  demurrer  as  being  the  first  thorn-sucker 
sent  forth  by  Rosa's  revengeful  soul  in  return  for  the  im- 
prisonment and  the  sacking  he  had  undergone  in  Firmian's 
house  (and  half  ascribed  to  her),  and  for  what  he  had  lost. 

Up  to  the  day  of  the  shooting-match  he  had  supposed 
that  the  husband  was  his  enemy,  but  not  the  wife ;  then, 
however,  his  pleasant  conceit  hud  been  embittered  and 
proved  to  be  groundless.  But  the  Venner  not  being  present 
to  hear  her  reproaches,  she  was  obliged  to  turn  the  full 
stream  of  her  anger  on  to  her  husband,  to  whom  she  attri- 
buted all  the  blame,  because  of  his  having  so  wickedly  and 
sinfully  changed  names  with  Leibgeber.  He  who  has 
married  a  wife  will  be  prepared  to  relieve  me  of  the  trouble 
of  mentioning  that  it  made  not  the  slightest  difference  what 
Siebenkaes  said  in  reply  or  adduced  concerning  Blaise's 
wickedness  (who,  being  the  greatest  Judas  Iscariot  Jind 
corn-Jew  the  world  contained,  would  have  robbed  him  just 
the  same  if  his  name  had  been  Leibgeber  still,  and  would 
have  found  out  a  thousand  legal  byepaths  by  which  to 
proceed  to  the  plundering  of  his  ward).  It  had  no  effect. 
At  last  the  following  words  were  forced  out  of  him :  "  You 
are  quite  as  unjust  as  I  should  be  were  I  to  attribute  this 
document  of  Blaise's  to  your  behaviour  to  the  Venner." 
Nothing  irritates  women  so  much  as  derogatory  compari- 
sons; they  apply  them  indiscriminately,  without  distinc- 
tion. Lenette's  ears  lengthened  to  tongues,  like  those  of 
Rumour;  her  husband  was  immediately  out-bawled  and 
unlistened  to. 

He  was  obliged  to  send  privately  to  Peltzstiefel  to  ask 
where  he  had  been  so  long,  and  why  he  had  utterly 
forgotten  their  house;  Stiefel  was  not  oven  in  his  own 
house,  however,  but  out  walking,  for  it  was  a  beautiful 
day. 


CHAP.  IX.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        285 

"  Lenette,"  said  Siebenkses  suddenly — he  often  preferred 
yaulting  over  a  marsh  on  the  leaping-pole  of  an  idea  to 
wading  painfully  across  it  on  the  long  stilts  of  syllogism, 
and  was  anxious  to  banish  from  ber  memory  the  innocent 
remark  which  he  bad  let  slip  about  Rosa,  and  which  she 
had  so  utterly  misunderstood — "  Lenette,  I'll  tell  you  what 
we'll  do  this  afternoon;  we'll  take  a  strong  cup  of  coffee, 
and  go  and  take  a  walk  and  enjoy  ourselves :  it  is  not  a 
Sunday,  but  it  is  the  day  which  all  the  Catholics  in  the 
town  keep  holiday  on  as  the  feast  of  the  Annunciation,  and 
the  weather  is  really  too  magnificent.  We'll  go  and  sit  in 
the  big  upstairs  room  at  the  Rifle  Club-house,  as  it  would 
be  a  little  too  warm  outside  perhaps,  and  we  can  look 
down  from  the  windows  and  see  all  the  heterodox  people 
promenading  in  their  best  clothes — and  our  Lutheran 
Stiefel  among  them,  who  knows  ?  " 

Either  I  am  more  in  error  than  I  often  am,  or  this  was  a 
most  agreeable  surprise  to  Lenette.  Coffee,  in  the  morning 
the  water  of- baptism  and  altar- wine  of  the  fair  sex,  is  their 
love-philter  and  their  waters-of-strife  in  the  afternoon  (the 
latter,  however,  only  as  regards  the  absent);  but  what 
a  wondrous  mill-stream  for  the  setting  in  motion  of  the 
machinery  of  the  ideas  must  an  afternoon  cup  of  coffee  on  a 
common  working-day  be  for  a  woman  such  as  Lenette,  who 
rarely  had  any  on  other  than  Sunday  afternoons ;  for  before 
the  days  of  the  blockade  of  the  continent  it  cost  too  much 
money. 

A  woman  who  is  really  very  much  delighted  needs  but 
a  very  short  time  to  put  on  her  black  silk  bonnet  and  take 
her  big  church-fan,  and  (contrary  to  all  her  ordinary 
manners  and  customs)  be  quite  ready  and  dressed  for  a 
walk  to  the  Rifle  Club-house,  even  going  the  length  of 
making  the  coffee  during  the  process  of  dressing,  so  as  to 
be  able  to  take  it,  and  the  milk,  with  her  in  her  hand. 

Our  couple  set  forth  at  two  o'clock  in  the  happiest  pos- 
sible frame  of  mind,  carrying  with  them  warm  in  their 
pockets  what  was  to  be  warmed  up  later  on  in  the  after- 
noon. 

Even  at  two  o'clock,  early  as  it  was,  the  western  and 
southern  hills  lay  all  beflooded  with  the  warm  evening 
glow  with  which  the  low  December  sun  was  bathing  them, 


286  JEAN  PAUL  FEIEDEICH  EICHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

while  great  glaciers  of  cloud,  ranged  about  the  sky,  cast 
their  cheerful  lights  over  tlie  landscape.  All  about  this 
world  there  beamed  a  beautiful  brightness,  which  cheered 
and  lighted  up  many  a  dark  and  narrow  lite. 

Siebenkees  pointed  out  the  eagle's  perch  to  Lenette  while 
they  were  still  at  some  distance  from  it — the  alpenstock 
or  boat-pole  which  had  so  recently  helped  him  out  of  his 
most,  imminent  difficulties.  When  they  reached  the  Club- 
house he  took  her  and  showed  her  the  shooter 's-stand  where 
he  had  shot  himself  with  his  rifle  up  to  the  dignity  of  bird 
emperor,  and  out  of  the  Frankfort-Jew's-quarter  of  duns, 
liberating  at  his  coronation  at  least  one  debtor,  namely, 
hitm«elf.  They  had  room  and  to  spare  to  "  spread  them- 
selves out "  (so  to  speak)  upstairs  in  the  members'  hall — he 
at  a  writing-table  by  the  right-hand  window,  and  she  with 
her  work  at  another  on  the  left. 

How  the  coffee  gave  warmth  to  this  December  festival 
may  be  imagined,  but  not  described. 

Lenette  put  on  one  stocking  of  her  husband's  after 
another — put  them  on  her  left  arm,  that  is,  while  her  right 
wielded  the  darning-needle  ;  and  as  she  sat,  with  a  stocking 
generally  quite  open  at  the  bottom,  she  was,  as  regarded 
one  of  her  arms  at  all  events,  like  a  lady  with  the  long, 
fashionable  Danish  mittens,  with  holes  for  the  fingers. 
However,  she  did  not  raise  these  arm-stockings  of  hers 
high  enough  to  be  seen  by  the  people  walking  in  the  upper 
walks,  but  kept  nodding  down  her  "  your  very  humble 
and  obedient  servant "  from  the  open  window  to  numbers 
of  the  mo>t  genteel  she-heretics  as  they  passed,  wearing 
her  own  works  of  art  upon  their  heads,  in  honour  of  the 
Annunciation-feast ;  and  more  than  one  sent  an  obliging 
salute  up  to  her  roof-thatcher. 

The  strictest  religious  and  political  parity  being  esta- 
blished by  law  in  Kuhschnappel,  it  was  natural  that 
Protectants  of  position  should  also  go  a- walking  on  this 
Catholic  holiday.  However,  the  advocate  was  perhaps 
enjoying  himself  quite  as  much  as  his  wife ;  he  went  on 
writing  his  '  Devil's  Papers,'  and  at  the  same  time  feasting 
his  gaze  upon  the  high  places,  the  sommites  of  the  land- 
scape, if  not  of  Kuhschnappel  society. 

When  he  first  entered  the  room  he  had  a  most  agreeable 


CHAP.  IX.  J      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        287 

reception  from  a  child's  trumpet,  left  there  by  accident ; 
the  paint  was  not  quite  all  licked  away  from  it,  and  it  was 
the  smell  of  this  paint,  more  even  than  the  squeak  of  the 
trumpet,  which  pleased  him  so  very  much,  by  recalling 
the  vague  delights  of  Christmases  of  the  past :  so  that 
pleasure  was  heaped  upon  pleasure.  He  could  rise  from 
his  satires  and  point  out  to  Lenette  the  great  rooks'  nests 
in  the  leafless  trees,  and  the  bare  tables  and  benches  in  the 
arbours,  and  the  invisible  guests  who  had  occupied  seats  of 
the  blessed  there  on  summer  evenings,  and  still  remem- 
bered the  time,  looking  forward  to  a  repetition  of  it ;  and 
he  could  draw  her  attention  to  the  fields,  where,  late  as  it 
was  in  the  year,  volunteer  gardeneresses  were  gathering 
salad  for  him,  namely,  corn  salad  or  rampion,  which  be 
might  have  some  of  for  supper  if  he  had  a  mind. 

And  now  he  sat  at  his  window,  with  his  eyes  fixed  upon 
the  hills,  all  flushed  with  the  evening  red,  the  sun  growing 
larger  as  it  sunk  towards  them.  Beyond  these  hills  lay 
the  lands  where  wandered  his  Leibgeber,  sporting  away 
his  life. 

"  How  delightful  it  is,  wife,"  he  said,  "  that  what  parts 
me  from  Leibgeber  is  not  a  mere  wide  level  plain,  with 
nothing  but  a  hillock  or  two  cropping  up  here  and  there 
on  it,  but  a  grand,  lofty  wall  of  mountains,  behind  which 
he  stands  as  if  behind  the  grating  of  a  monastery."  This 
sounded  to  her  almost  as  if  her  husband  was  glad  that 
this  barrier  stood  between  them ;  she  herself  had  but  little 
liking  fur  Leibgeber,  and  considered  him  to  be  a  sort  of 
coin-clipper  to  her  husband,  who  cut  all  his  angles  sharper 
than  they  were  by  nature ;  however,  in  dubious  cases  like 
this,  she  was  always  glad  to  ask  no  questions.  What  he 
had  meant  was  exactly  the  reverse  of  what  she  supposed ; 
he  had  meant  that  it  is  good,  if  parted  from  those  we  love, 
that  it  should  be  by  holy  hills,  because  they  are,  as  it  were, 
lofty  garden-walls,  behind  which  we  picture  the  flowery 
thickets  of  our  Edens ;  whereas,  on  the  other  verge  of  the 
broadest  barnfloor  of  a  level  plain  we  only  picture  to 
ourselves  a  repetition  of  it  sloping  the  other  way.  And 
this  applies  to  nations  as  well  as  to  individuals.  The 
Luneburg  moors  or  the  Marklands  of  Prussia  will  not  draw 
even  an  Italian's  longing  gaze  towards  Italy;  but  when  a 


288  JEAN  TAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

Markman  in  Italy  sees  the  Apennines,  his  heart  yearns  to 
his  German  loved  ones  behind  them. 

As  Firmian  looked  upon  that  sunny  mountain-barrier 
between  two  severed  spirits,  there  was  that  in  his  eyes 
which  much  resembled  tears ;  but  he  only  turned  his  chair 
a  little  away,  that  Lenette  might  ask  no  questions ;  he  was 
well  aware  of  his  old  ingrained  habit  of  getting  angry  when 
anybody  asked  what  brought  tears  to  his  eyes,  and  he 
strove  with  it.  Was  he  not,  in  fact,  tenderness  personified 
to-day,  only  acting  his  comedy  in  the  palest  middle-tints 
before  his  wife,  because  he  was  delighting  in  the  fresh- 
growth  of  this  enjoyment  of  hers,  of  which  he  was  himself 
the  origin.  It  is  true  she  did  not  discover  the  existence  of 
this,  his  feeling  of  delicate  consideration  for  her ;  but  just 
as  he  was  quite  content  when  no  one  but  himself  (least  of 
all,  she)  perceived  that  he  was  poking  fun  at  her  (in  the 
most  delicate  manner),  so  was  he  content  that  she  should 
be  in  utter  ignorance  that  he  was  causing  her  a  little 
happiness. 

At  last  they  left  the  spacious  room,  the  sun  now  robing 
them  in  purple  hues ;  and  as  they  went  he  drew  Lenette's 
attention  to  the  liquid,  golden  splendour  shining  upon 
the  roofs  of  the  greenhouses,  and  he  hung  himself  on  to  the 
sun — at  that  moment  cut  in  two  by  the  mountain-range — 
that  he  might  sink,  with  it,  to  his  far-away  friend.  Ah  ! 
how  strong  is  love  in  distance — be  it  distance  of  space,  or 
of  time,  of  the  future  or  the  past — ay,  or  that  greater  dis- 
tance still — beyond  this  world !  And  so  the  evening 
might  very  well  have  ended  in  an  altogether  delightful 
manner,  had  not  something  intervened. 

For  some  particularly  ingenious  evil  spirit  or  other  had 
taken  the  Heimlicher  von  Blaise,  and  so  set  him  down, 
promenading  in  the  open  air,  that  the  advocate  mutt  needs 
come  within  shooting  range  and  hailing  distance  of  him 
just  on  a  feast  of  the  Annunciation  for  good  folks  only. 
When  the  guardian  went  through  the  proper  forms  of 
salutation — accompanying  them  with  a  smile  such  as, 
fortunately,  can  never  be  seen  on  a  child's  face — Siebenkaes 
returned  his  salutes  politely,  although  with  a  mere  clutch- 
ing and  jerking  at  his  hat — which  he  didn't  take  off. 
Lenette  tried  to  make  amends  for  this,  by  doubling  the 


CHAP.  IX."]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        289 

profundity  of  her  own  bow  and  curtsey;  but  as  soon  as 
practicable  she  administered  to  her  husband  a  gaiden 
lecture,  or,  rather,  a  garden  'paling  lecture,  on  his  always, 
as  if  on  purpose,  irritating  his  guardian  whenever  he  had 
an  opportunity.  "  Indeed,  love,"  he  said,  "  I  couldn't 
help  it.  I  really  meant  nothing  of  the  kind  to-day,  of  all 
days  in  tho  year." 

The  truth  of  the  matter,  indeed,  is,  that  Siebenkses  had 
sometime  before  complained  to  his  wife  that  his  hat, 
which  was  of  softish  felt,  was  getting  a  good  deal  spoiled 
by  having  to  be  so  often  taken  off  to  people  in  the  streets, 
and  that  he  could  think  of  nothing  better  than  to  protect 
it  with  a  coat  of  mail  in  the  shape  of  a  stiff  cover  of  green 
oilskin,  so  that  when  packed  up  in  this  pudding  roll  he 
mi^ht  go  on  daily  employing  it  in  those  offices  of  out-door 
politeness  which  men  owe  one  to  another,  without  ever 
having  to  take  hold  of  the  hat  itself  at  all.  Well,  the  first 
walk  he  took  after  assuming  this  double  hat,  or  hat's  hat, 
was  to  a  grocer's,  where  he  disembowelled  the  inner  one 
from  its  envelope  and  swopped  it  away  for  six  pounds  of 
coffee,  which  warmed  the  four  chambers  of  his  brain  better 
than  the  hare-skin  had  ever  done ;  he  then  went  tran- 
quilly home,  with  only  the  coadjutor  hat  on  his  head,  un- 
detected, and  thenceforward  bore  the  empty  case  through 
the  streets  with  a  secret,  joy  that,  in  a  sense,  he  now  really 
took  off  his  hat  to  nobody — with  other  entertaining  fancies 
bearing  on  the  subject  of  his  sugar-loaf. 

Of  course,  when  he  forgot — and  on  that  day  in  particu- 
lar, it  was  perhaps  excusable  that  he  did  so — to  support 
his  hat-case  with  the  necessary  framework  of  artificial 
rafters,  it  was  really  almost  an  impossibility  to  take  this 
mere  shell  of  a  hat  rigid  off  for  purposes  of  salutation. 
The  most  he  could  do  was  just  to  touch  it  courteously,  like 
an  officer  returning  a  salute  ;  and  thus,  against  his  will, 
play  the  part  of  a  rude  and  ill-bred  individual. 

And  it  so  happened  that  just  on  this  very  day  get  it  off 
he  could  not. 

It  was  so  ordained,  however,  that  matters  should  not 
even  rest  here  (as  regarded  our  couple's  promenade),  but 
one  of  the  above-mentioned  ingenious  evil  spirits  changed 
the  scene  of  the  drama  with  such  nimblencss,  that  we 

II.  u 


290  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDEICH  EICHTER.        [BOOK  IIL 

have  a  fresh  combination  before  our  eyes  before  we 
know  where  we  are.  Just  in  front  of  our  wedded  pair, 
a  master  tailor  of  the  Catholic  confession  was  taking 
his  walk,  most  sprucely  attired  in  honour  of  the  Feast 
of  the  Annunciation,  like  all  the  rest  of  his  pro-  and 
oON-fession.  As  ill  luck  would  have  it,  this  tailor, 
being  in  a  narrow  walk,  had  (whether  for  fear  of  mud,  or 
in  the  delight  of  his  soul  over  his  holiday)  so  elevated 
his  coat-tails  that  the  vertebral  extremity,  the  os  coccygis, 
or  (shall  we  call  it)  insertion  of  the  spinal  cord,  of 
his  waistcoat,  was  clearly  exhibited ;  in  other  words, 
the  background  of  his  waistcoat,  which,  as  we  know,  is 
generally  executed  in  colours  more  subdued  thail  those 
used  for  the  brighter  and  more  prominent  foreground  on 
the  chest  of  the  wearer.  "  Hy !  Mr.!"  cried  Lenette; 
"  what  are  you  doing  with  a  lot  of  my  chintz  on  the  back 
of  you?" 

The  truth  was  that  this  tailor  had  put  aside  and  taken 
possession  of  so  much  of  a  nice  green  Augspurg  chintz  (sent 
to  him  by  Lenette,  on  her  becoming  a  queen,  to  make  her 
a  new  body)  as  he  considered  proper  and  Christianly  honest, 
calculating  on  the  principle  of  "  no  charge  for  wine 
samples,"  and  this  trifle  of  a  sample  had  just  barely 
sufficed  to  form  a  sober  background  to  his  pea-green  waist- 
coat; and  he  had  contented  himself  with  so  dim  a  reverse 
side  for  this  waistcoat  in  the  confident  expectation  that 
it  would  never  be  seen.  However,  as  the  tailor  went  on 
with  his  walk  (after  Lenette  had  shouted  her  query  at 
him),  as  utterly  unmoved  as  if  it  had  nothing  on  earth  to 
do  with  him,  the  little  spark  of  her  anger  became  a  blazing 
flame,  and,  regardless  of  all  her  husband's  winks  and 
whispers,  she  cried  aloud,  "  Why,  it's  my  very  own  chintz, 
that  I  got  all  the  way  from  Augspurg ;  do  you  hear,  Mr. 
Mowser,  you've  stolen  my  chintz,  you  blackguard,  you  !  " 
Then,  and  not  till  then,  the  guilty  chintz-robber  turned 
round  with  much  sangfroid,  and  said,  "  Prove  that,  if  you 
please  !  But,  mind,  Til  chintz  you,  if  there  be  such  a  thing 
as  law  in  all  Kuhschnappel." 

At  this  she  burst  into  a  conflagration.     Her  husband's 

prayers  and  entreaties  were  but  as  wind  to  her.     "  Ey ! 

,  you  riff-ran0,"  she  snapped  out.     "  But  I'll  have  what's 


CHAP.  IX.J      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.         291 

my  own — you  villain !  "  she  cried.  The  only  reply  the 
tailor  vouchsafed  to  this  attack  was  this — he  simply 
lifted  his  coat-tails  with  both  hands  high  above  the  en- 
dorsed waistcoat,  and,  bending  a  little  forward,  said, 
"There!"  after  which  he  strode  slowly  on,  keeping  at 
the  same  focal  distance  from  her,  so  as  to  bask  in  her 
warmth  as  long  as  possible. 

Siebenkaes  was  the  most  to  be  pitied  on  this  rich  feast 
day,  when,  in  spite  of  all  his  juristic  and  theological 
exorcisms,  he  could  not  cast  out  this  devil  of  discord — 
when  by  good  luck  his  guardian  angel  suddenly  emerged 
from  a  side  path,  Peltzstiefel  to  wit,  taking  his  walk. 
Gone,  so  far  as  Lenette  was  concerned,  were  the  tailor,  the 
quarter-ell  of  chintz,  the  apple  of  discord,  and  the  devil 
thereof;  the  blue  of  her  eyes  and  the  blush  on  her  cheek 
fronted  Stiefel  as  bright  and  as  fresh  as  the  blue  of  the 
evening  sky  and  the  blush  on  its  sunset  clouds.  Ten  ells  of 
chintz  and  half  that  number  of  tailors  with  waistcoat-backs 
of  it  into  the  bargain,  were  to  her,  at  that  moment,  feathers 
light  as  air,  not  worth  a  word  or  a  farthing;  so  that 
Siebenkaes  saw  on  the  instant  that.  Stiefel's  coming  was  as 
that  of -a  regular  Mount  of  Olives  all  full  of  mere  olive- 
branches  of  peace  ;  although  for  discord  devils  hailing  from 
another  quarter  there  might  without  difficulty  be  pressed 
from  the  olives  on  said  mountain  an  oil  which  could  not  be 
poured  on  any  fire  of  matrimonial  difference  which  Stiefel'e 
would  be  the  bucket  to  put  out.  If  Lenette  was  a  tender, 
delicate,  white  butterfly,  silently  hovering  and  fluttering 
about  Peltzstiefel's  flowery  path,  out  of  doors — when  she 
got  him  into  her  house  she  was  an  absolute  Greek  Psyche  ; 
and,  in  spite  of  all  my  partiality  for  her,  I  am  bound,  under 
pain  of  having  all  the  rest  discredited,  to  insert  in  this 
protocol  a  clear  statement  (much  as  I  regret  to  do  so)  to 
the  effect  that  on  this  particular  evening  she  gave  one  the 
idea  of  being  nothing  but  some  clear-winged  translucent 
soul  free  from  all  trammels  of  body  —  which,  at  some 
former  time,  while  as  yet  in  the  body,  had  stood  in  some 
love-relationship  to  the  Schulrath,  but  now  hovered  about 
him  with  upraised  pinions,  and  fanned  him  with  fluttering 
downy  plumes,  and  which  at  length  weary  of  hovering, 
and  pleased  to  rest  once  more  on  the  loved  perch  of  a  body, 

u  2 


292  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  HI. 

nettled  upon  Lenette's,  there  being  no  other  feminine  one 
at  hand,  and  there  folded  its  wings  to  rest.  Such  seemed 
Lenette.  But  why  was  she  thus  to-day?  Stiefel's  igno- 
rance and  delight  at  it  were  great;  Firmian's  very  small. 
Before  I  explain  it,  I  will  say,  "  I  pity  thee,  poor  husband, 
and  thee,  too,  poor  wife.  For  why  must  the  smooth  flow 
of  the  stream  of  your  life  (and  of  our  own)  be  always 
broken  by  sorrows  or  by  sins,  and  why  cannot  it  fall 
into  its  grave  in  the  Black  Sea,  without  having  to  pass 
over  thirteen  cataracts,  like  the  river  Dnieper  ?  However, 
the  reason  why  Lenette  on  this  day  in  particular  exhibited 
all  her  heart  toward  Stiefel,  almost  bared  of  the  cloister 
grating  of  the  breast,  was  that  she  was,  just  on  this 
day,  so  keenly  suffering  under  her  misery — her  poverty. 
Stiefel  was  full  of  genuine,  solid  treasures ;  Firmian's 
were  all  lacquered.  I  know  that  her  Siebenkaes,  whom 
before  marriage  she  had  loved  with  the  calm  and  cool 
regard  of  a  wife,  would  have  found  that  she  would  have 
come  to  love  him  after  marriage  with  the  warm  affection 
< >f  a  fiancee,  if  he  had  only  been  able  to  give  her  the  bare 
necessaries  of  life.  There  are  hundreds  of  girls  who  bring 
themselves  to  believe  that  they  love  the  man  to  whom 
they  are  engaged,  whereas  it  is  not  till  after  marriage 
that  the  play  becomes  a  reality — and  that  for  good  reasons, 
both  metallic  and  physiological.  In  a  well-filled  room 
and  kitchen,  filled  with  a  comfortable  income,  and  twelve 
household  labours  of  Hercules,  Lenette  would  have  been 
quite  true  to  the  advocate,  though  an  entire  philosophical 
society  of  Stiefels  had  sat  down  all  round  her,  and  would 
have  said  and  thought,  every  hour  of  the  day,  "  No 
more,  thank  you — I  am  helped;"  but  as  things  were,  in 
a  house  and  kitchen  so  empty  as  hers,  the  chambers  of 
a  woman's  heart  grow  full ;  in  one  word,  no  good  comes 
of  it.  For  a  woman's  soul  is  by  nature  a  beautiful  fresco 
painted  on  rooms,  table-leaves,  dresses,  silver  salvers,  and 
household  plenishing  in  general.  A  woman  has  a  large 
stock  of  virtue,  but  few  virtues;  she  needs  a  confined 
sphere  and  social  forms,  and  without  these  flower-sticks 
the  pure  white  flowers'  trail  in  the  dust  of  the  border.  A 
man  may  be  a  citizen  of  the  world,  and  if  he  has  nothing 
else  to  put  his  arms  round  he  can  press  the  entire  earthly 


CHAP.  IX.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.         293 

ball  to  his  bosom,  although  he  can't  put  his  arms  round 
much  more  of  it  than  will  make  him  a  grave.  But  a  citizen  ess 
of  the  world  is  a  giantess,  and  goes  through  the  world 
with  nothing  but  spectators,  and  is  nothing  but  a  charac- 
ter on  the  stage. 

I  ought  to  have  described  the  whole  of  this  evening  much 
more  circumstantially  than  I  have  done,  for  it  was  upon 
this  evening  that  the  wheels  of  the  vis-a-vis  phaeton  of 
wedded  life  began  to  smoke,  as  a  consequence  of  the 
friction  they  had  recently  been  subjected  to,  and  threatened 
to  break  out  into  a  blaze  of  the  fire  of  jealousy.  Jealousy 
is  like  Maria  Theresa's  small-pox,  which  allowed  that 
princess  to  pass  with  impunity  through  thirty  hospitals, 
full  of  small-pox  patients,  but  attacked  her  beneath  the 
Crowns  of  Hungary  and  Germany.  Siebenkaes  had  had 
on  that  of  Kuhschnappel  (the  Bird-one)  for  a  week  or  two 
now. 

After  this  evening  Stiefel,  who  took  an  increasing 
delight  in  sitting  basking  in  the  rays  of  the  still  rising 
Sun  of  Lenette,  came  oftener  and  oftener,  and  considered 
himself  the  peace-maker,  aot  the  peace-breaker. 

It  is  now  my  duty  to  paint  with  the  utmost  minutiae  of 
detail  the  last  and  most  important  day  of  this  year,  the 
31st  of  December,  with  its  background  and  foreground  all 
complete,  and  with  all  accessories. 

Before  the  31st  of  December  arrived,  of  course  Christmas 
came,  a  time  which  had  to  be  gilt,  and  which  turned 
Siebenkaes's  silver  age  (after  the  Boyal  shot)  into  a  brazen 
and  a  wooden  age.  The  money  went.  But,  worse  than 
that,  poor  Firmian  had  fretted,  and  laughed,  himself  into 
an  illness.  A  man  who  has  all  his  life,  upon  the  upper 
wings  of  Fantasy  and  the  lower  wings  of  good  spirits, 
skimmed  lightly  away  over  the  tops  of  all  the  spread-net 
snares  and  the  open  pitfalls  of  life,  does,  if  once  he  chances 
to  get  impaled  upon  the  hard  spines  of  the  full-blown 
thistles  (above  the  purple  blossoms  and  the  honey-vessels 
of  which  he  used  to  hover)  beat  in  a  terrible  way  about 
him,  hungiy,  bleeding,  epileptically — a  glad,  happy  man 
finds  in  the  first  sunstroke  of  trouble  well-nigh  his 
death-blow.  To  the  polypus  of  anxiety  daily  growing 
in  Siebenkaes's  heart  add  the  effects  of  the  work  and  ex* 


29 1  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

citement  of  authorship.  He  was  very  anxious  to  get  done 
with  his  '  Selections  from  the  Devil's  Papers '  at  the 
earliest  moment  possible,  so  as  to  live  on  the  price  of  them 
and  carry  on  the  law-suit  besides.  So  that  he  sat  through 
entire  nights  almost  (and  chairs  as  well).  And  in  this 
way  he  wrote  himself  into  an  affection  of  the  chest,  such 
as  the  present  author  brought  upon  himself,  and  that,  as 
far  as  he  could  make  out,  simply  by  excess  of  bountiful 
generosity  towards  the  world  of  letters.  He  was  attacked, 
ju.»t  as  I  was,  by  a  sudden  pausing  of  the  breath  and  of 
the  action  of  the  heart,  succeeded  by  a  blank  disappearance 
of  the  spirit  of  life,  and  then  by  a  throbbing  rush  of  blood 
up  to  the  brain ;  and  this  came  on  most  frequently  while 
he  was  sitting  at  his  literary  spinning-wheel  and  spool.* 

However,  not  a  soul  offers  either  of  us  one  single 
farthing,  by  way  of  indemnification,  on  account  of  it.  It 
would  appear  to  be  ordained  that  authors  are  not  to  go 
down  to  posterity  in  the  body,  but  only  in  the  form  of 
portraits  or  plaster-casts ;  as  delicate  trout  are  boiled 
before  being  sent  away  as  presents,  people  don't  put  in 
the  laurel-sprig  (which  is  stuck  into  our  mouths  as  lemons 
are  into  the  wild  boar's)  until  we  have  been  killed  and 
dished.  It  would  be  a  giatification  to  my  colleagues  and 
to  me  if  a  reader  whose  heart  we  have  moved  (as  well  as 
its  auricles)  were  only  to  say  as  much  as,  "  This  siceet 
emotion  of  my  heart  was  not  produced  without  a  hypo 
chondriac  palpitation  of  theirs."  We  brighten  and 
illuminate  many  a  head  which  never  dreams  of  thinking. 
"  Yes,  1  have  to  thank  them  for  this,  it  is  true,  but  what 
is  their  reward  ?  Why,  pains  in  their  own  heads — kephal- 
algia  and  neuralgia  in  various  forms !  "  Ay,  he  ought  to 
interrupt  me  in  the  middle  of  a  satire  like  this,  and  cry, 

*  Particularly  on  cold  bright  winter  mornings  and  evenings.  I  (and 
Sicbenkajs  for  the  same  reason)  have  been  troubled  with  this  complaint 
lor  more  than  twenty  years,  and  I  bave  bad  an  attack  of  it  on  this 
coldest  of  Christmas  eves,  iust  as  I  was  describing  it.  It  is  nothing 
but  a  passing  paralysis  of  the  nerves  of  the  lungs — paiticularly  of  the- 
nereus  vagus— and  In  course  of  time  (tor  you  see  even  twenty  years  have 
not  been  enough),  leads  to  that  pulmonary  apoplexy  which  Leville  in 
Paris,  and  recently  Hohnbaum,  have  held  to  be  a  new  form  of  the 
disease,  and  which,  perhaps,  after  the  precedent  of  "  Miller's  Asthma." 
may  receive  tbe  name  of  "  Siebtnl-aesian,"  or  "  Jean  Paulish  apoplexy." 


GHAP.  IX.l   FLO  WEE,  FEOIT,  AND  THOEN  PIECES.    295 

M  Great  as  is  the  pain  which  his  satires  cause  me,  they  cause 
him  far  more  ;  luckily,  my  pain  is  only  mental !  "  Health 
of  body  only  runs  parallel  with  health  of  mind ;  it  turns 
aside  and  departs  from  erudition,  from  over-much  imagina- 
tion, and  from  great  profundity.  All  these  as  little  indicate 
health  of  mind  as  corpulence,  a  runner's  feet,  a  wrestler's 
arms,  indicate  health  of  body.  I  have  often  wished  that 
all  souls  were  bottled  into  their  bodies  as  the  Pyrmont 
water  is  put  into  its  flasks.  The  best  strength  of  it  is 
allowed  to  escape  first,  because,  otherwise,  it  would  break 
the  bottle  ;  but  it  would  seem  that  it  is  only  in  the  case  of 
colleges  of  cardinals  (if  we  are  to  credit  Gorani),  cathedral 
chapters,  &c,  that  this  precaution  is  adopted,  and  that 
their  extraordinary  power  of  ability,  which  would  other  • 
wise  have  burst  their  bodies  up,  is,  as  a  preliminary 
measure,  let  off  a  good  deal  before  they  are  put  into  bodies 
and  sent  upon  earth ;  so  that  the  bottles  last  quite  well  for 
seventy  or  eighty  years. 

With  a  sick  mind,  then,  and  a  sick  heart,  without 
money,  Siebenkass  begun  the  last  day  of  the  year.  The 
day  itself  had  put  on  its  most  beautiful  eummer-dress — one 
of  Berlin  blue  ;  it  was  as  cerulean  as  Krishna,  or  the  new 
sect  of  Grahamites,  or  the  Jews  in  Persia.  It  had  had  a 
fire  lighted  in  the  balloon-stove  of  the  sun,  and  the  snow, 
delicately  candied  upon  the  earth,  melted  into  winter- 
green,  like  the  sugar  on  some  cunningly-devised  supper- 
dish,  as  soon  as  the  hills  were  brought  within  reach  of  its 
warmth.  The  year  seemed  to  be  saying  good-bj'e  to  Time 
as  if  with  a  cheerful  warmth,  attended  with  joyful  tears. 
Firmian  longed  to  run  and  sun  himself  upon  the  moist, 
green  sward ;  but  he  had  Professor  Lang,  of  Baireuth,  to 
review  first. 

He  wrote  reviews  as  many  people  offer  up  prayers — only 
in  time  of  need.  It  was  like  the  water-carrying  of  the 
Athenian,  done  that  he  might  afterwards  devote  himself 
to  the  studies  of  his  choice  without  dying  of  hunger.  But 
when  he  was  reviewing,  he  drew  his  satiric  sting  into  its 
j-heath,  constructing  his  criticisms  of  material  drawn  only 
irom  his  store  of  wax  and  his  honey-bag.  "  Little  authors," 
h  said,  "  are  always  better  than  their  works,  and  great 
ones  are  worse  than  theirs.     Why  should  I  pardon  moral 


296  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  III. 

failings — e.g.  self-conceit — in  the  genius,  and  not  in  the 
dunce?  Least  of  all  should  it  be  forgiven  the  genius. 
Unmerited  poverty  and  ugliness  do  not  deserve  to  be 
ridiculed ;  but  they  as  little  deserve  it  when  they  are 
merited — though  I  am  aware  Cicero  is  against  me  here — 
for  a  moral  fault  (and  consequently  its  punishment)  can,  of 
a  certainty,  not  be  made  greater  by  a  chance  physical  con- 
sequence, which  sometimes  follows  upon  it,  and  sometimes 
does  not.  Can  it?  Does  an  extravagant  person  who 
chances  to  come  to  poverty  deserve  a  severer  punishment 
than  one  who  does  not  ?  If  anything,  rather  the  reverse." 
If  we  apply  this  to  bad  authors,  from  whose  own  eyes  their 
lack  of  merit  is  hidden  by  an  impenetrable  veil  of  self- 
conceit,  and  at  whose  unoffending  heart  the  critic  dis- 
charges the  fury  which  is  aroused  in  him  by  their  (offend- 
ing) heads,  we  may,  indeed,  direct  our  bitterest  irony 
against  the  race,  but  the  individual  will  be  best  instructed  by 
means  of  gentleness.  I  think  it  would  be  the  gold-test,  the 
trial-by-crucible,  of  a  morally  great  and  altogether  perfect 
scholar  to  give  him  a  bad,  but  celebrated  book  to  review. 

For  my  own  part,  I  will  allow  myself  to  be.  reviewed  by 
Dr.  Merkel  throughout  eternity  if  I  digress  again  in  this 
chapter.  Firmian  worked  in  some  haste  at  his  notice  of 
Lang's  essay,  entitled  '  Prasmissa  Historiai  Supei  intenden- 
tium  Generalium  Bairuthi  non  Specialium — Continua- 
tione  XX."  It  was  quite  essential  that  he  should  get  hold 
of  a  dollar  or  two  that  day,  and  he  also  longed  to  go  and 
take  a  walk,  the  weather  was  so  motherly,  so  hatching.  The 
new  year  fell  on  the  Saturday,  and  as  early  as  the  Thursday 
(the  day  before  the  one  we  are  writing  of)  Lenette  had 
begun  the  holding  of  preliminary  feasts  of  purification 
(she  now  washed  daily  more  and  more  in  advance  of  actual 
necessities) ;  but  to-day  she  was  keeping  a  regular  feast  of 
in-gathering  among  the  furniture,  &c.  The  room  was 
being  put  through  a  course  of  derivative  treatment  for  the 
clearing  away  of  all  impurities.  With  her  eye  on  her 
index  expuryandorum,  she  thrust  everything  that  had 
wooden  legs  into  the  water,  and  followed  it  herself  with 
balls  of  soap;  in  short,  she  paddled  and  bubbled,  in  the 
Levitical  purification  of  the  room,  in  her  warm,  native 
element,  for  once  in  her  life  to  her  heart's  full  content. 


CHAP.  IX.]   FRUIT,  FLOWER,  AND  THORN  .PIECES.    297 

As  for  Siebenkaas,  lie  sat  bolt-upright  in  purgatorial  fire, 
already  beginning  to  emit  a  smell  of  burning. 

For,  as  it  happened,  he  was  rather  madder  than  usual 
that  day,  to  begin  with.  Firstly,  because  he  had  made  up 
his  mind  that  he  would  pawn  the  striped  calico-gown  in 
the  afternoon,  though  whole  nunneries  were  to  shriek 
their  loudest  at  it,  and  because  he  foresaw  that  he  would 
have  to  grow  exceedingly  warm  in  consequence.  And  this 
resolve  of  resolves  he  had  taken  on  this  particular  day, 
because  (and  this  is  at  the  same  time  the  second  reason 
why  he  was  madder  than  usual) — because  he  was  sorry  that 
their  good  days  were  all  gone  again,  and  that  their  music 
of  the  spheres  had  all  been  marred  by  Lenette's  funereal 
Misereres. 

"  Wife ! "  he  said,  "  I'm  reviewing  for  money  now,  recol- 
lect." She  went  on  with  her  scraping.  "  I  have  got 
Professor  Lang  before  me  here — the  seventh  chapter  of 
him,  in  which  he  treats  of  the  sixth  of  the  Superintendents- 
General  of  Bayreuth,  Herr  Stockfleth."  She  was  going  to 
stop  in  a  minute  or  two,  but  just  then,  you  know,  she 
really  could  not.  Women  are  fond  of  doing  everything 
"  by  and  bye  " — they  like  putting  a  thing  off  just  for  a 
minute  or  two,  which  is  the  reason  why  they  put  off  even 
their  arrival  in  this  world  a  few  minutes  longer  than  boys 
do.*  "  This  essay,"  he  continued,  with  forced  calmness, 
"  ought  to  have  been  reviewed  in  the  '  Messenger '  six 
months  ago,  and  it'll  never  do  for  the  '  Messenger '  to  be 
like  the  '  Universal  German  Library'  and  the  Pope,  and 
canonise  people  a  century  or  so  after  date." 

If  he  had  only  been  able  to  maintain  his  forced  calmness 
for  one  minute  longer,  he  would  have  got  to  the  end  of 
Lenette's  buzzing  din ;  however,  he  couldn't.  "  Oh !  the 
devil  take  me,  and  you,  too,  and  the  '  Messenger  of  the 
Gods'  into  the  bargain,"  he  burst  out,  starting  up  and 
dashing  his  pen  on  the  floor.  "  I  don't  know,"  he  went  on, 
suddenly  resuming  his  self-control,  speaking  in  a  faint, 
piteous  tone,  and  sitting  down,  quite  unnerved,  feeling 
something  like  a  man  with  cupping-glasses  on  all  over 
him — "  I  don't  know  a  bit  what  I'm  translating,  or  whether 
I'm  writing  Stockfleth  or  Lang.  What  a  stupid  arrange- 
*  Buffon. 


298  JEAN  PAUL  FKIEDKICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

merit  it  is  that  an  advocate  mayn't  be  as  deaf  as  a  judge. 
If  I  were  deaf,  I  should  be  exempt  from  torture  then.  Do 
you  know  how  many  people  it  takes  to  constitute  a  tumult 
by  law  ?  Either  ten,  or  you  by  yourself  in  that  washing 
academy  of  music  of  yours."  He  was  not  so  much  inclined 
to  be  reasonable  as  to  do  as  the  Spanish  innkeeper  did,  who 
charged  the  noise  made  by  his  guests  in  the  bill.  But 
now,  having  had  her  way,  and  gained  her  point,  she  was 
noiseless  in  word  and  deed. 

He  finished  his  critique  in  the  forenoon,  and  sent  it  to 
Stiefel,  his  chief,  who  wrote  back  that  he  would  bring  the 
money  for  it  himself  in  the  evening,  for  he  now  seized 
upon  every  possible  opportunity  of  paying  a  visit.  At 
dinner  Finnian  (in  whose  head  the  sultiy,  foetid  vapour  of 
ill-temper  would  not  dissolve  and  fall),  said,  "I  can't 
understand  how  you  come  to  care  so  very  little  about 
cleanliness  and  order.  It  would  be  better  even  if  you 
rather  overdid  your  cleanliness  than  otherwise.  People  say, 
what  a  pity  it  is  such  an  orderly  man  as  Siebenkses  should 
have  such  a  slovenly  kind  of  wife !  "  To  irony  of  this  sort, 
though  she  knew  quite  well  it  was  irony,  she  always 
opposed  regular  formal  arguments.  He  could  never  get 
her  to  enjoy  these  little  jests  instead  of  arguing  about 
them,  or  join  him  in  laughing  at  the  masculine  view  of 
the  question.  The  fact  is,  a  woman  abandons  her  opinion 
as  soon  as  her  husband  adopts  it.  Even  in  church,  the 
women  sing  the  tunes  an  octave  higher  than  the  men  that 
they  may  differ  from  them  in  all  things. 

In  the  afternoon  the  great,  the  momentous,  hour  ap- 
proached in  which  the  ostracism,  the  banishment  from 
house  and  home,  of  the  checked  calico  gown  was  at,  last  to 
be  carried  out — the  last  and  greatest  deed  of  the  year  1785. 
Of  this  signal  for  fight,  this  Timour's  and  Muhammed's 
red  battle-flag,  this  Ziska's  hide,  which  always  set  them 
by  the  ears,  his  very  soul  was  sick :  he  would  ha-\  e  been 
delighted  if  somebody  would  have  stolen  it,  simply  to  be 
quit  of  the  wearisome,  threadbare  idea  of  the  wretched 
rag  for  good  and  all.  He  did  not  hurry  himself,  but  intro- 
duced his  petition  with  ail  the  wordy  prolixity  of  an  M.P. 
addressing  the  house  (at  home).  He  asked  her  to  guess 
what  might  be  the   greatest   kindness,  the   most  signal 


CHAP.  IX.J      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.         299 

favour  which  she  could  do  him  on  this  last  day  of  the  old 
year.  He  said  he  had  an  hereditary  enemy,  an  Anti- 
Christ,  a  dragon,  living  under  his  roof;  tares  sown  among 
his  wheat  by  an  enemy,  which  she  could  pull  up  if  she 
chose ;  and,  at  last,  he  brought  the  checked  calico  gown 
out  of  the  drawer,  with  a  kind  of  twilight  sorrow  :  "  This," 
he  said,  "  is  the  bird  of  prey  which  pursues  me ;  the  net 
which  Satan  sets  to  catch  me  ;  his  sheep-skin  my  martyr- 
robe,  my  Cassim's  slipper.  Dearest,  do  me  but  this  one 
favour — send  it  to  the  pawn-shop  I " 

"  Don't  answer  just  yet,"  he  said,  gently  laying  his  hand 
on  her  lips ;  u  let  me  just  remind  you  what  a  stupid  parish 
did  when  the  only  blacksmith  there  was  in  it  was  going 
to  be  hanged  in  the  village.  This  parish  thought  it  pre- 
ferable to  condemn  an  innocent  master-tailor  or  two  to  the 
gallows,  because  they  could  be  better  spared.  Now,  a 
woman  of  your  good  sense  must  surely  see  how  much 
easier  and  better  it  would  be  to  let  me  take  away  this 
mere  piece  of  tailor's  stitch-work,  than  metal  things 
which  we  eat  out  of  every  day ;  the  mourning  calico  won't 
be  wanted,  you  know,  as  long  as  I'm  alive." 

"  I've  seen  quite  clearly  for  a  long  while  past,"  she  said, 
"  that  you've  made  up  your  mind  to  carry  off  my  mourning 
dress  from  me,  by  hook  or  by  crook,  whether  1  will  or 
no.  But  I'm  not  going  to  let  you  have  it.  Suppose  I 
were  to  say  to  you,  pawn  your  watch,  how  would  you 
like  that  ? "  Perhaps  the  reason  why  husbands  get  into 
the  way  of  issuing  their  orders  in  a  needlessly  dictatorial 
manner  is,  that  they  generally  have  little  effect,  but  rather 
confirm  opposition  than  overcome  it. 

"  Damnation  ! "  he  cried  ;  "  that'll  do,  that's  quite 
enough !  I'm  not  a  turkey-cock,  nor  a  bonassus  neither, 
to  be  continually  driven  into  a  frenzy  by  a  piece  of 
coloured  rag.  It  goes  to  the  pawn-shop  to-day,  as  6ure  as 
my  name's  Siebenkaes." 

"  Your  name  is  Leihgeber  as  well,"  said  she. 

"  Devil  fly  away  with  me,  if  that  calico  remains  in  this 
house  !"  said  he.  On  which  she  began  to  cry,  and  lament 
the  bitter  fortune  which  left  her  nothing  now,  not  even 
the  very  clothes  for  her  back.  When  thoughtless  tears 
fall  into  a  seething  masculine  heart,  they  often  have  the 


30C  JEAN  PAUL  FEIEDRICH  FJCHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

effect  which  drops  of  water  have  when  they  fall  upon 
bubbling  molten  copper;  the  fluid  mass  bursts  asunder 
with  a  great  explosion. 

"  Heavenly,  kind,  gentle  Devil,"  said  he,  "  do  please 
come  and  break  my  neck  for  me.  May  God  have  pity  on 
a  woman  like  this!  Very  well,  then,  keep  your  calico; 
keep  this  Lenten  altar-cloth  of  yours  to  yourself.  But 
may  the  Dovil  fly  away  with  me  if  I  don't  cock  the  old 
deer's  horns  that  belonged  to  my  father  on  to  my  head  this 
very  day,  like  a  poacher  on  the  pillory,  and  hawk  them 
about  the  streets  for  sale  in  broad  daylight.  Ay.  I  give 
you  my  word  of  honour  it  shall  be  done,  for  all  the  fun  it 
may  afford  every  soul  in  the  place.  And  I  shall  simply 
say  that  it  is  your  doing;  I'll  do  it,  as  sure  as  there's  a 
devil  in  hell." 

He  went,  gnashing  his  teeth,  to  the  window,  and  looked 
into  the  street,  seeing  vacancy.  A  rustic  funeral  was 
passing  slowly  by ;  the  bier  was  a  man's  shoulder,  and  on 
it  tottered  a  child's  rude  coffin. 

Such  a  sight  is  a  touching  one,  when  one  thinks  of  the 
little,  obscure,  human  creature,  passing  over  from  the  foetal 
slumber  to  the  slumber  of  death,  from  the  amnion-mem- 
brane  in  this  life  to  the  shroud,  that  amnion-membrane  of 
the  next ;  whose  eyes  have  closed  at  their  first  glimpse  of 
this  bright  earth,  without  looking  on  the  parents  who  now 
gaze  after  it  with  theirs  so  wet  with  tears;  which  has 
been  loved  without  loving  in  return ;  whose  little  tongue 
moulders  to  dust  before  it  has  ever  spoken  ;  as  does  its 
face  ere  it  has  smiled  upon  this  odd,  contradictory,  incon- 
sistent orb  of  ours.  These  cut  buds  of  this  mould  will 
find  a  stem  on  which  great  destiny  will  graft  them,  these 
flowers  which,  like  some  besides,  close  in  sleep  while  it  is 
still  early  morning,  will  yet  feel  the  rays  of  a  morning 
sun  which  will  open  them  once  more.  As  Firmian  looked 
at  the  cold,  shrouded  child  passing  by,  in  this  hour,  when 
he  was  ignobly  quarrelling  about  the  mourning  dress 
(which  should  mourn  for  Am)— now,  when  the  very  last 
drops  of  the  old  year  were  flowing  so  fast  away,  and  his 
heart,  now  becoming  so  terribly  accustomed  to  these 
passing  fainting  fits,  forbade  him  to  hope  that  he  could 
ever  complete  the  new  one — now,  amid  all  these  pains 


C1IAF.  IX.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.         301 

and  sorrows,  he  seemed  to  hear  the  unseen  river  of  Death 
murmuring  under  his  feet  (as  the  Chinese  lead  rushing 
brooks  under  the  soil  of  their  gardens),  and  the  thin, 
brittle  crusr  of  ice  on  which  he  was  standing  seemed  as  if 
it  would  soon  crack  and  sink  with  him  into  the  watery 
depths.  Unspeakably  touched,  he  said  to  Lenette,  "  Per- 
haps you  may  be  quite  right,  dear,  after  all,  to  keep  your 
mourning  dress ;  you  may  have  some  presentiment  that  I 
am  not  going  to  live.  Do  as  you  think  best,  then,  dear; 
I  would  fain  not  embitter  this  last  of  December  any 
more;  I  don't  know  that  it  may  not  be  my  last  in  another 
sense,  and  that  in  another  year  I  may  not  be  nearer  to 
that  poor  baby  than  you.     I  am  going  for  a  walk  now." 

She  said  nothing ;  all  this  startled  ami  surprised  her. 
He  hurried  away,  to  escape  the  answer  which  was  sure  to 
come  eventually ;  his  absence  would,  in  the  circumstances, 
be  the  most  eloquent  kind  of  oratory.  All  persons  are 
better  than  their  outbreaks  (or  ebullitions) — that  is,  than 
their  bad  ones;  for  all  are  worse  than  their  noble  ones, 
also — and  when  we  allow  the  former  an  hour  or  so  to  dis- 
sipate and  disperse,  we  gain  something  better  than  our 
point — we  gain  our  opponent.  He  left  Lenette  a  very 
grave  subject  for  cogitation,  however, — the  stag's  horns 
and  his  word  of  honour. 

I  have  already  once  written  it.  The  winter  was  lying 
on  the  ground  all  bare  and  naked,  not  even  the  bed-sheet 
and  chrisom-cloth  of  snow  thrown  over  it ;  there  it  lay 
beside  the  dry,  withered  mummy  of  the  by-gone  summer. 
Firmian  looked  with  an  unsatisfied  gaze  athwart  unclothed 
fields  (over  which  the  cradle-quilt  of  the  snow,  and  the 
white  crape  of  the  frost,  had  not  yet  been  laid),  and  down 
at  the  streams,  not  yet  struck  palsied  and  speechless. 
Bright,  warm  days,  at  the  end  of  December  soften  us  with 
a  sadness  in  which  there  are  four  or  five  bitter  drops  more 
than  in  that  belonging  to  the  af  er-summer.  Up  to  twelve 
o'clock  at  night,  and.  until  the  thirty-first  day  of  the 
twelfth  month,  the  wintry,  nocturnal,  idea  of  dissolution 
and  decay  oppresses  us ;  but  as  soon  as  it  is  one  in  the 
morning,  and  the  first  of  January,  a  morning  breeze, 
speaking  of  new  life,  moves  away  the  clouds  which  were 
lying  over  our  souls,  and  we  begin  to  look  for  the  dark, 


302  JEAN  PAUL  FEIEDE1CH  EICHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

pure,  morning  blue,  the  rising  of  the  star  of  morning  and 
of  spring.  On  a  December  day  like  this  the  pale,  dim, 
stagnant  world  of  stiffened,  sapless,  plants  about  us  op- 
presses and  hems  us  round ;  and  the  insect-collections 
lying  beneath  the  vegetation,  covered  with  earth ;  and 
the  rafter-work  of  bare,  dry,  wrinkly  trees ;  the  December 
sun  hanging  in  the  sky  at  noon  no  higher  than  the  Juue 
sun  does  at  evening;  all  these  combined  shed  a  yellow 
lustre  as  of  death  (like  that  of  burning  alcohol)  over  the 
pale,  faded  meadows ;  and  long  giant  shadows  lie  ex- 
tended, motionless,  everywhere — evening  shadows  of  this 
evening  of  nature  and  of  the  year — like  the  ruined  re- 
mains, the  burnt-out  ash-heaps  of  nights  as  long  as  them- 
selves. But  the  glistening  snow,  on  the  other  hand,  spread 
over  the  blooming  earth  under  us,  is  like  the  blue  fore- 
ground of  spring,  or  a  white  fog  a  foot  or  two  in  depth. 
The  quiet  dark  sky  lies  above,  and  the  white  earth  is  like 
some  white  moon,  whose  sparkling  ice-fields  melt,  as  we 
draw  nearer,  into  dark  waving  meadows  of  flowers. 

The  heart  of  our  sorrowful  Firmian  grew  sadder  yet  as 
ho  stood  upon  this  cold,  burnt-out  hearth-place  of  nature. 
The  daily-recurring  pausings  of  his  heart  and  pulse  were 
(he  thought)  the  sudden  silences  of  the  storm-bell  in  his 
breast,  presaging  a  speedy  end  of  the  thunder,  and  dissolu- 
tion of  the  storm-cloud,  of  life.  He  thought  the  faltering 
of  his  mechanism  was  caused  by  some  loose  pin  having 
fallen  in  among  the  wheels  somewhere ;  he  ascribed  it  to 
polypus  of  the  heart,  and  his  giddiness  he  felt  sure  gave 
warning  of  an  attack  of  apoplexy.  To-day  was  the  three 
hundred  and  sixty-fifth  Act  of  the  year,  and  the  curtain 
was  slowly  dropping  upon  it  already:  what  could  this 
suggest  to  him  save  gloomy  similes  of  his  own  epilogue — 
of  the  winter  solstice  of  his  shortened,  over-shadowed  life  ? 
The  weeping  image  of  his  Lenette  came  now  before  his 
forgiving,  departing  soul,  and  he  thought,  "  She  is  really 
not  in  the  right ;  but  1  will  yield  to  her,  as  we  have  not 
very  long  to  be  together  now.     I  am  glad  for  her  sake, 

Eoor  soul,  that  my  arms  are  mouldering  away  from  about 
er,  and  that  her  friend  is  taking  her  to  his." 
He  went  up  on  to  the  scaffold  of  blood  and  sorrow  where 
his  friend,  Heinrich,  had  taken  his  farewell.     From  that 


CHAF.  IX.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.         303 

eminence,  as  often  as  his  heart  was  heavy,  his  glance  would 
follow  Leibgeber's  path  as  far  as  the  bills ;  but  to-day  his 
eyes  were  moister  tban  before,  for  he  had  no  hope  that  he 
would  see  the  spring  again.  This  spot  was  to  him  the  bill 
which  the  Emperor  Adrian  permitted  the  Jews  to  go  up 
twice  in  the  year,  that  they  might  look  towards  the  ruins 
of  the  holy  city  and  weep  for  the  place  wherein  their  steps 
might  tread  no  more.  The  sun  was  now  assembling  the 
shadows  which  were  to  close  in  upon  the  old  year,  and  as 
the  stars  appeared — the  stars  which  rose  at  evening  now 
being  those  which  in  spring  adorn  the  morning — fate 
snapped  away  the  loveliest  and  richest  in  flowers  of  the 
liana-branches  from  his  soul,  and  from  the  wound  flowed 
clear  water.  "  1  shall  see  nothing  of  the  coming  spring," 
he  thought,  "  except  her  blue,  which,  as  in  enamel-paint- 
ing, is  the  first  laid  on  of  all  her  colours."  His  heart — one 
educated  to  be  loving — could  always  fly  for  rest  from  his 
satires  and  from  dry  details  of  business-duty,  sometimes, 
too,  from  Lenette's  indifference  and  lack  of  sympathy,  to 
the  warm  breast  of  the  eternal  goddess  Mature,  ever 
ready  to  take  us  to  her  heart.  Into  the  free,  unveiled,  and 
blooming  out-door  world,  beneath  the  grand  wide  sky,  he 
loved  to  repair  with  all  his  sighs  and  sorrows,  and  in  this 
great  garden  he  made  all  his  graves  (as  the  Jews  made 
them  in  smaller  ones).  And  when  our  fellows  forsake  and 
wound  us,  the  sky  and  the  earth,  and  the  little  blooming 
tree,  open  their  arms  and  take  us  into  them  ;  the  flowers 
press  themselves  to  our  wounded  hearts,  the  streams  mingle 
in  our  tears,  and  the  breezes  breathe  coolness  into  our 
sighs.  A  mighty  angel  troubles  and  inspires  the  great 
ocean-pool  of  Bethesda ;  into  its  warm  waves  we  plunge, 
with  all  our  thousand  aches  and  pains,  and  ascend  from 
the  water  of  life  with  our  spasms  all  relaxed  and  our  health 
and  vigour  renewed  once  more. 

Firmian  walked  slowly  home  with  a  heart  all  concilia- 
tion, and  eves  which,  now  that  it  was  dark,  he  did  not 
take  the  pains  to  dry.  He  went  over  in  his  mind  every- 
thing which  could  possibly  be  adduced  in  his  Lenette's 
excuse.  He  strove  to  win  himself  over  to  her  side  of  the 
question  by  reflecting  that  she  could  not  (like  him)  arm 
herself  against  the  shocks,  tho  stumbling-stones,  of  life  by 


304  JEAN  PAUL  FBIEDBICn  BICHTEB.       [BOOK  III. 

putting  on  the  Minerva's  helm,  the  armour  of  meditation, 
philosophy,  authorship.  He  thoroughly  determined  (he 
had  determined  the  same  thing  thirty  times  before)  to  be 
as  scrupulously  careful  to  ol  &  i  ve  in  all  things  the  outside 
politesses  of  life  with  her  as  with  i lie  most  absolute  stranger;  * 
nay,  he  already  enveloped  himself  in  the  fly-net  or  mail- 
shirt  of  patience,  in  case  he  should  really  find  the  checked 
calico  untranslated  at  home.  This  is  how  we  men  con- 
tinually behave — stopping  our  ears  tight  with  both  hands, 
trying  our  hardest  to  fall  into  the  siesta,  the  mid-day  sleep, 
of  a  little  peace  of  mind  (if  we  can  only  anyhow  manage 
it);  thus  do  our  souls,  swayed  by  our  passions,  reflect  the 
sunlight  of  truth  as  one  dazzling  spot  (like  mirrors  or 
calm  water),  while  all  the  surrounding  surface  lies  but  in 
deeper  shade. 

How  differently  all  fell  out !  He  was  received  by  Peltz- 
stiefel,  who  advanced  to  meet  him,  all  solemnity  of  deport- 
ment, and  with  a  church-visitation  countenance  full  of 
inspection-sermons.  Lenette  scarcely  turned  her  swollen 
eyes  towards  the  windward  side  of  her  husband  as  he  came 
in  at  the  door.  Stiefel  kept  the  strings  tight  which  held 
the  muscles  of  his  knit  face,  lest  it  might  unbend  before 
Firmian's,  which  was  all  beaming  soft  with  kindliness, 
and  thus  commenced :  "  Mr.  Siebvnkses,  I  came  to  this 
house  to  hand  you  the  money  for  your  review  of  Professor 
Lang;  but  friendship  demands  of  me  a  duty  of  a  far  more 
serious  and  important  kind,  that  I  should  exhort  you  and 
constrain  you  to  conduct  yourself  towards  this  poor  unfor- 
tunate wife  of  yours  here  like  a  true  Christian  man  to  a 
true  Christian  woman."     "  Or  even  better,  if  you  like,"  he 

*  The  husband  should  always  play  the  lover  by  rights — and  the 
lover  the  husband.  It  is  impossible  to  describe  the  amount  of  soothing 
influence  which  little  acts  of  politeness  and  innocent  flatteries  exercise 
upon  just  the  very  people  who  usually  expect,  and  receive,  none — 
wives,  sisters,  relations — and  this  even  when  they  quite  understand 
what  this  politeness  really  amounts  to.  We  ought  to  be  applying  this 
emollient  pomade  to  our  rude  rough  lips  all  day  long,  even  if  we  have 
only  three  words  to  speak, — and  we  should  have  a  similar  one  for  our 
hands,  to  soften  down  their  actions.  I  trust  that  I  shad  always  keep 
my  resolution  never  to  flatter  any  woman,  not  even  my  own  wife,  but 
I  know  I  shall  begin  to  break  it  four  months  and  a -half  after  my 
betrothal,  and  ex>  on  breaking  it  all  my  life. 


CHAP.  IX.J      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.         305 

said.  "  What  is  it  all  about,  wife?"  She  preserved  an 
embarrassed  silence.  She  had  asked  Stiefel's  advice  and 
assistance,  less  for  the  sake  of  obtaining  them  than  to  have 
an  opportunity  of  telling  her  story.  The  truth  was,  that 
when  the  Schulrath  came  unexpectedly  in,  while  her  burst 
of  crying  was  at  its  bitterest,  she  had  really  just  that  very 
moment  sent  her  checked,  spiny,  outer  caterpillar-skin  (the 
calico-dress,  to  wit)  away  to  the  pawnshop ;  for  her  husband 
having  pledged  his  honour,  she  felt  sure  that,  beyond  a 
doubt,  he  would  stick  those  preposterous  horns  on  his  head 
and  really  go  and  hawk  them  all  over  the  town,  for  she 
well  knew  how  sacredly  he  kept  his  word,  and  also  how 
utterly  he  disregarded  "  appearances," — and  that  both  of 
these  peculiarities  of  his  were  always  at  their  fellest  pitch 
at  a  time  of  domestic  difficulty  like  the  present.  Perhaps 
she  would  have  told  her  ghostly  counsellor  and  adviser 
nothing  about  the  matter,  but  contented  herself  with 
having  a  good  cry  when  he  came,  if  she  had  had  her  way 
(and  her  dre-s) ;  but,  having  sacrificed  both,  she  needed  com- 
pensation and  revenge.  At  first  she  had  meiely  reckoned 
up  difficulties  in  indeterminate  quantities  to  him ;  but 
when  he  pressed  her  more  closely,  her  bursting  heart  over- 
flowed and  all  her  woes  streamed  forth.  Stiefel,  contrarily 
to  the  laws  of  equity  (and  of  several  universities),  always 
held  the  complainant  in  any  case  to  be  in  the  right,  simply 
because  he  spoke  first :  most  men  think  impartiality  of 
heart  is  impartiality  of  head.  Stiefel  swore  that  he  would 
tell  her  husband  what  he  ought  to  be  told,  and  that  the 
calico  should  be  back  in  the  house  that  very  afternoon. 

So  this  father-confessor  began  to  jingle  his  bunch  of 
binding-and-loosing  keys  in  the  advocate's  face,  and  re- 
ported to  him  his  wife's  general  confession  and  the  pawning 
of  the  dress.  When  there  are  two  diverse  actions  of  a 
person  to  be  given  account  of — a  vexatious  and  an  agreeable 
one — the  effect  depends  on  which  is  spoken  of  the  first ;  it 
is  the  first  narrated  one  which  gives  the  ground-tint  to  the 
listener's  mind,  and  the  one  subsequently  portrayed  only 
takes  rank  as  a  subdued  accessory  figure,  lirmian  should 
have  heard  that  Lenette  pawned  the  dress  first,  while  he 
was  still  out  of  doors,  and  of  her  tale-bearing  not  till  after- 
wards.    But  you  see  how  the  devil  brought  it  about,  as  it 

a.  x 


306      JEAN  PAUL  FKIEDRICH  RICHTER.    [BOOK  III. 

really  did  all  happen.  "What!"  (Siebenkses  felt,  if  not 
exactly  tliought)  "  What !  She  makes  my  rival  her  confi- 
dant and  my  judge!*  I  bring  her  home  a  heart  all  kind- 
ness and  reconciliation,  and  she  makes  a  fresh  cut  in  it  at 
once,  distressing  and  annoying  me  in  this  way,  on  the  very 
last  day  of  tha  year,  with  her  confounded  chattering  and 
tale-telling."  By  this  last  expression  he  meant  something 
which  the  reader  does  not  yet  quite  understand ;  for  I  have 
not  yet  told  him  that  Lenette  had  the  bad  habit  of  being — 
rather  ill-bred ;  wherefore  she  made  common  people  of  her 
own  sex,  such  as  the  bookbinder's  wife,  the  recipients  of 
her  secret  thoughts — the  electric  discharging-rods  of  her 
little  atmospheric  disturbances ;  while,  at  the  same  time, 
she  took  it  ill  of  her  husband  that,  though  he  did  not, 
indeed,  admit  serving-men  and  maids  and  "  the  vulgar " 
into  his  own  mysteries,  he  yet  accompanied  them  into  theirs. 
Stiefel  (like  all  people  who  have  little  knowledge  of  the 
world,  and  are  not  gifted  with  much  tact, — who  never 
assume  anything  as  granted  in  the  first  place,  but  always 
go  through  every  subject  ab  initio) — now  delivered  a  long, 
theological,  matrimonial- service  sort  of  exhortation  con- 
cerning love  as  between  Christian  husband  and  wife,  and 
ended  by  insisting  on  the  recall  of  the  calico  (his  Necker, 
so  to  say).  This  address  irritated  Firmian,  and  that 
chiefly  because  (irrespectively  of  it)  his  wife  thought  he 
had  not  any  religion,  or,  at  all  events,  not  so  much  as 
StiefeL  "I  remember"  (he  said)  "seeing  in  the  history 
of  France  that  Gaston,  the  first  prince  of  the  blood,  having 
caused  his  brother  some  little  difficulties  or  other  of  the 
warlike  sort  on  one  occasion,  in  the  subsequent  treaty  of 
peace  bound  himself,  in  a  special  article,  to  love  Cardinal 
Eich'dieu.  Now  I  think  there's  no  question  but  that  an 
article  to  the  effect  that  man  and  wife  shall  love  one  another 
ought  to  be  inserted  as  a  distinct,  separate,  secret  clause,  in 
all  contracts  of  marriage ;  for  though  love,  like  man  himself, 
is  by  origin  eternal  and  immortal,  yet,  thanks  to  the  wiles  of 
the  serpent,  it  certainly  becomes  mortal  enough  within  a 
short  time.  But,  as  far  as  the  calico's  concerned,  let's  all 
thank  God  that  that  apple  of  discord  has  been  pitched  out  of 
the  house."  Stiefel,  by  way  of  offering  up  a  sacrifice,  and 
burning  a  little  incense  before  the  shrine  of  his  beloved 


CHAP.  IX.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.         307 

Lenette,  insisted  on  the  return  of  the  calico,  and  did  so  very 
firmly ;  for  Siebenkaes's  gentle,  complaisant  readiness  to  yield 
to  him,  up  to  this  point,  in  little  matters  of  sacrifice  and 
Bervice,  had  led  him  to  entertain  the  deluded  idea  that  ha 
possessed  an  irresistible  authority  over  him.  The  husband, 
a  good  deal  agitated  now,  said,  "  We'll  drop  the  subject,  if 
you  please."  "  Indeed,  we'll  do  nothing  of  the  kind,"  said 
Stiefel ;  "  I  must  really  insist  upon  it  that  3  our  wife  has 
her  dress  back."  "It  can't  be  done,  Herr  Schulrath."  "  I'll 
advance  you  whatever  money  you  require,"  cried  Stiefel, 
in  a  fever  of  indignation  at  this  striking  and  unwonted 
piece  of  disobedience.  It  was  now,  of  course,  more  impos- 
sible than  ever  for  the  advocate  to  retire  from  his  position; 
he  shook  his  head  eighty  times.  "  Either  you  are  out  of 
your  mind,"  said  Stiefel,  "or  Jam;  just  let  me  go  through 
my  reasons  to  you  onee  more."  "  Advocates,"  said  Sie- 
benkaes,  "  were  fortunate  enough,  in  former  times,  to  have 
private  chaplains  of  their  own ;  but  it  was  found  that  there 
was  no  converting  any  of  them,  and  therefore  they  are  now 
exempt  from  being  preached  at." 

Lenette  wept  more  bitterly — Stiefel  shouted  the  louder 
on  that  account ;  in  his  annoyance  at  his  ill  success,  he 
thought  it  well  to  repeat  his  commands  in  a  ruder  and 
blunter  form  ;  of  course  Siebenkass  resisted  more  firmly. 
Stiefel  was  a  pedant,  a  class  of  men  which  surpasses  all 
others  in  a  bare-faced,  blind,  self-conceit,  just  like  an  un- 
ceasing wind  blowing  from  all  the  points  of  the  compass 
at  once  (for  a  pedant  even  makes  an  ostentatious  display 
of  his  own  personal  idiosyncrasies).  Stiefel,  like  a  care- 
ful and  conscientious  player,  felt  it  a  duty  to  thoroughly 
throw  himself  into  the  part  he  was  representing,  and 
carry  it  out  in  all  its  details,  and  say,  "Either''  "Or" 
Mr.  Siebenkass ;  "  either  the  mourning  gown  comes,  or  1 
go,  autaut.  My  visits  cannot  be  of  much  consequence,  it's 
true,  still  they  have  I  consider,  a  certain  value,  if  it  were 
but  on  Mrs.  Siebenkaes's  account."  Firmian,  doubly 
irritated,  firstly  at  the  imperious  rudeness  and  conceit  of 
an  alternative  of  the  sort,  and  secondly  at  the  lowness  of 
the  market  price  for  which  the  Eath  abandoned  their 
society,  could  but  say,  "  Nobody  can  influence  your  deci- 
sion on  that  point  now  but  yourself.     I  most  certainly 

x  2 


308  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  III, 

cannot.  It  will  be  an  easy  matter  for  you,  Herr 
Schulrath,  to  give  up  our  acquaintance — though  there  is 
no  real  reason  why  you  should — but  it  will  not  be  easy 
for  me  to  give  up  yours,  although  I  shall  have  no  choice." 
Stiefel,  from  whose  brow  the  sprouting  laurels  were  thus 
so  unexpectedly  shorn — and  that,  too,  in  the  presence  of 
the  woman  he  loved — had  nothing  to  do  but  take  his  leave ; 
but  he  did  it  with  three  thoughts  gnawing  at  his  heart — 
his  vanity  was  hurt,  his  dear  Lenette  was  crying,  and  her 
husband  was  rebellious  and  insubordinate,  and  resisting 
his  authority. 

And  as  the  Schulrath  said  farewell  for  ever,  a  bitter, 
bitter  sorrow  stood  fixed  in  the  eyes  of  his  beloved 
Lenette — a  sorrow  which,  though  the  hand  of  time  has 
long  since  covered  it  over,  I  still  see  there  in  its  fixity ; 
and  she  could  not  go  down  stairs,  as  at  other  times,  with 
her  sorrowing  friend,  but  went  back  into  the  dark,  un- 
lighted  room,  alone  with  her  overflowing  breaking  heart. 

Firmian's  heart  laid  aside  its  hardness,  though  not  its 
coldness,  at  the  sight  of  his  persecuted  wife  in  her  dry, 
stony  grief  at  this  falling  to  ruin  of  every  one  of  her  little 
plans  and  joys ;  and  he  did  not  add  to  her  sorrow  by  a 
single  word  of  reproach.  "You  see,"  was  all  he  said, 
"  that  it  is  no  fault  of  mine  that  the  Schulrath  gives  up 
our  acquaintance ;  he  ought  never  to  have  been  told  any- 
thing about  the  matter, — however,  it's  all  over  now."  She 
made  no  reply.  The  hornet's  sting  (which  makes  a  triple 
stab),  the  dagger,  thrown  as  by  some  revengeful  Italian, 
was  left  sticking  firm  in  her  wound,  which  therefore  could 
not  bleed.  Ah  !  poor  soul ;  thou  hast  deprived  thyself  of 
so  much !  Firniian,  however,  could  not  see  that  he  had 
anything  to  accuse  himself  of;  he  being  the  gentlest, 
the  most  yielding  of  men  under  the  sun,  always  ruffled  all 
the  feathers  on  his  body  up  with  a  rustle  in  an  instant  at 
the  slightest  touch  of  compulsion,  most  especially  if  it  con- 
cerned his  honour.  He  would  accept  a  present,  it  is  true, 
but  only  from  Leibgeber,  or  (on  rare  occasions)  from  others 
in  the  warmest  hours  of  soul  communion ;  and  his  friend 
and  he  both  held  the  opinion  that,  in  friendship,  not  only 
was  a  farthing  of  quite  as  much  value  as  a  sovereign,  but 
that  a  sovereign  was  worth  just  as  little  as  a  farthing,  and 


CHAP.  IX.]      FLOWER,  FEUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.  309 

that  one  is  bound  to  accept  the  most  splendid  presents 
just  as  readily  as  the  most  trifling ;  and  hence  he  counted 
it  among  the  unrecognised  blessings  of  childhood  that 
children  can  receive  gifts  without  any  feeling  of  shame. 

In  a  mental  torpor  he  now  sat  down  in  the  arm-chair, 
and  covered  his  eyes  with  his  hand ;  and  then  the  mists 
which  hid  the  future  all  rolled  away,  and  showed  in  it  a 
wide  dreary  tract  of  country,  full  of  the  black  ashy  ruins 
of  burnt  homesteads,  and  of  dead  bushes  of  underwood, 
and  the  skeletons  of  beasts  lying  in  the  sand.  He  saw 
that  the  chasm,  or  landslip,  which  had  torn  his  heart  and 
Lenette's  asunder,  would  go  on  gaping  wider  and  wider ; 
he  saw,  oh !  so  clearly  and  cheerlessly,  that  his  old 
beautiful  love  would  never  come  back,  that  Lenette  would 
never  lay  aside  her  self-willed  pertinacity,  her  whims,  the 
habits  of  her  daily  life ;  that  the  narrow  limits  of  her 
heart  and  head  would  remain  fixed  firmly  for  ever ;  that 
she  would  as  little  learn  to  understand  him,  as  get  to  love 
him  ;  while,  again,  her  repugnance  to  him  would  get  the 
greater  the  longer  her  friend's  banishment  endured,  and 
that  her  fondness  for  the  latter  would  increase  in  propor- 
tion. Stiefel's  money,  and  his  seriousness,  and  religion, 
and  attachment  to  herself  combined  to  tear  in  two  the 
galling  bond  of  wedlock  by  the  pressure  of  a  more  com- 
plex and  gentle  tie.  Sorrowfully  did  Siebenkaes  gaze  into 
a  long  prospect  of  dreary  days,  all  constrained  silence,  and 
dumb  hostility  and  complaint. 

Lenette  was  working  in  her  room  in  silence,  for  her 
wounded  heart  shrunk  from  a  word  or  a  look  as  from 
a  cold  fierce  wind.  It  was  now  very  dark,  she  wanted 
no  light.  On  a  sudden,  a  wandering  street-singing 
woman  began  to  play  a  harp,  and  her  child  to  accom- 
pany her  on  a  flute,  somewhere  in  the  house  downstairs. 
At  this  our  friend's  bursting  heart  seemed  to  have  a 
thousand  gashes  inflicted  on  it  to  let  it  bleed  gently  away. 
As  nightingales  love  to  sing  where  there  is  an  echo,  so  our 
hearts  speak  loudest  to  music.  As  these  tones  brought 
back  to  him  his  old  hopes,  almost  irrecognisable  now, — as 
he  gazed  down  at  his  Arcadia  now  lying  hidden  deep, 
deep,  beneath  the  stream  of  years,  and  s  iw  himself  down 
in  it,  with  all  his  young  fresh  wishes,  amid  his  long  lost 


310  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  HI. 

friends,  gazing  with  happy  eyes  round  their  circle,  all  con- 
fidence and  trust,  his  growing  heart  hoarding  and  cherish- 
ing its  love  and  truth  for  some  warm  heart  yet  to  be  met 
in  the  time  to  come :  and  as  he  now  burst  into  that 
music  with  a  dissonance,  crying,  "  And  I  have  never 
found  that  heart,  and  now  all  is  past  and  over,"  and  as 
the  pitiless  tones  brought  pictures  of  blossomy  springs 
and  flowery  lands,  and  circles  of  loving  friends  to  pass,  as 
in  a  camera  obscura,  before  him — him  who  had  nothing, 
not  one  soul  in  all  the  land  to  love  him ;  his  steadfast 
spirit  gave  way  at  last,  and  sank  down  on  earth  to  rest  as 
quite  overdone,  and  nothing  soothed  him  now  but  that 
which  pained.  Suddenly  this  sleep-walking  music  ceased, 
and  the  pause  clutched,  like  a  speechless  nightmare, 
tighter  at  his  heart.  In  the  silence  he  went  into  the  room 
and  said  to  Lenette,  "  Take  them  down  what  little  we  have 
left."  But  over  the  latter  words  his  voice  broke  and  failed, 
for  he  saw  (by  the  flare  of  some  potash-burning  which 
was  going  on  opposite)  that  all  her  glowing  face  was 
covered  with  streaming,  undried  tears,  though  when  he 
came  in  she  pretended  to  be  busily  wiping  the  window- 
pane  dimmed  by  her  breath.  She  laid  the  money  down 
on  the  window.  He  said,  more  gently  yet,  "  Lenette,  you 
will  have  to  take  it  to  them  now,  or  they  will  be  gone.'* 
She  took  it ;  her  eyes  worn  with  weeping  met  his  (which 
were  worn  with  weeping  too) ;  she  went,  and  then  their 
eyes  grew  well-nigh  dry,  so  far  apart  were  their  two  souls 
already. 

They  were  suffering  in  that  terrible  position  of  circum- 
stances when  not  even  a  moment  of  mutual  and  reciprocal 
emotion  can  any  longer  reconcile  and  warm  two  hearts. 
His  whole  heart  swelled  with  overflowing  affection,  but 
hers  belonged  to  his  no  more ;  he  was  urged  at  once  by 
the  wish  to  love  her,  and  the  feeling  that  it  was  now  im- 
possible, by  the  perception  of  all  her  shortcomings  and  the 
conviction  of  her  indifference  to  him.  He  sat  down  in  the 
window  seat,  and  leaned  his  head  upon  the  sill,  where  it 
rested,  as  it  chanced,  upon  a  handkerchief  which  she  had 
left  there,  and  which  was  moist  and  cold  with  tears.  She 
had  been  solacing  herself  after  the  long  oppression  of  the 
day,  with  this  gentle  effusion,  much  as  we  have  a  vein 


CHAP.  IX.        FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.         311 

opened  after  some  severe  contusion.  When  he  touched 
the  handkerchief,  an  icy  shudder  crept  down  his  back,  like 
a  sting  of  conscience,  but  immediately  after  it  there  came 
a  burning  glow  as  the  thought  flashed  to  his  mind  that  her 
weeping  had  been  for  another  person  than  himself  altogether. 
The  singing  and  the  flute  now  began  again  (without  the 
harp  this  time),  and  floated  in  the  rising,  falling  waves, 
of  a  slow-timed  song,  of  which  the  verses  ended  always 
with  the  words,  "  Gone  is  gone,  and  dead  is  dead." 
Sorrow  now  clutched  him  in  her  grasp,  like  some  mantle- 
fish,  casting  around  him  her  dark  and  suffocating  folds. 
He  pressed  Lenette's  wet  handkerchief  to  his  eyes  hard, 
and  heard  (but  less  distinctly),  "  Gone  is  gone,  and  dead 
is  dead."  Then  of  a  sudden  his  whole  soul  melted  and 
dissolved  at  the  thought  that  perhaps  that  halting  heart 
of  his  would  let  him  see  no  other  new  year  save  that  of 
the  morrow,  and  he  thought  of  himself  as  dying ;  and  the 
cold  handkerchief,  wet  with  his  own  tears  now  as  well  as 
hers,  lay  cool  upon  his  burning  brow,  while  the  notes  of 
the  music  seemed  to  mark  like  bells  each  stroke  of  time, 
go  that  its  rapid  flight  was  made  distinguishable  by  the 
ear,  and  he  saw  himself  asleep  in  a  quiet  grave,  like  one  in 
the  Grotto  of  the  Serpents,  but  with  worms  in  place  of  the 
serpents,  licking  off  the  burning  poison  of  life. 

The  music  had  ceased.  He  heard  Lenette  moving  in 
the  next  room  and  getting  a  light ;  he  went  to  her  and 
gave  her  her  handkerchief.  But  his  heart  was  so  pained 
and  bleeding  that  he  longed  to  embrace  some  one,  no 
matter  whom  ;  he  was  impelled  to  press  his  Lenette  to 
his  heart,  his  Lenette  of  the  past  if  not  of  the  present,  his 
suffering,  if  no  longer  his  loving,  Lenette;  at  the  same 
time  he  could  not  utter  one  word  of  affection,  neither  had 
he  the  slightest  wish  to  do  so.  He  put  his  arms  round  her 
slowly,  unbent,  and  held  her  to  him,  but  she  turned  her 
head  quickly  and  coldly  away  as  from  a  kiss  which  was 
not  proffered.  This  pained  him  greatly,  and  he  said, 
"  Do  you  suppose  I  am  any  happier  than  you  are  your- 
self?" He  laid  his  face  down  on  her  averted  head,  pressed 
her  to  him  again,  and  then  let  her  away ;  and  this  vain 
embrace  at  an  end,  his  heart  cried,  "  Gone  is  gone,  and 
dead  is  dead." 


312  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  EICHTER.         [BOOK  III. 

The  silent  room  in  which  the  music  and  the  words 
had  ceased  to  sound  was  like  some  unhappy  village 
from  whence  the  enemy  has  carried  off  all  the  hells, 
and  where  there  is  nothing  but  silence  all  the  day  and 
night,  and  the  church  tower  is  mute  as  if  time  itself 
were  past. 

As  Firmian  laid  him  down  on  his  bed,  he  thought,  "  A 
sleep  closes  the  old  year  as  if  it  were  one's  last,  and  ushers 
in  the  new  as  it  does-  our  own  lives ;  and  I  sleep  on 
towards  a  future  all  anxiety,  vague  of  form,  and  darkly 
veiled.  Thus  does  man  sleep  at  the  gate  behind  which 
the  dreams  are  barred ;  but  although  his  dreams  are  but 
a  step  or  two — a  minute  or  two — within  that  gate,  he 
cannot  tell  what  dreams  await  him  at  its  opening ;  whether 
in  the  brief  unconscious  night  beasts  of  prey  with  glaring 
eyes  are  lying  in  wait  to  dash  upon  him,  or  smiling 
children  to  come  trooping  round  him  in  their  play ;  nor  if, 
when  the  cloudy  shapes  beyond  that  mystic  door  come 
about  him,  their  clasp  is  to  be  the  fond  embrace  of  love, 
or  the  murderous  clutch  of  death." 


CHAPTEK  X. 


A  LONELY  NEW-YEARS  DAY — THE  LEARNED  SCHALASTER  — 
WOODEN-LEG  OF  APPEAL — CHAMBER  POSTAL  DELIVERY — THE 
llTH   OF   FEBRUARY,   AND   BIRTH-DAY   OF   THE   YEAR   1786. 

I  really  cannot  wish  my  hero  a  happy  new  year  on  a 
Aew  year's  day  when,  on  his  awaking  in  the  morning,  he 
rolls  his  swollen  eyeballs  heavily  in  their  sockets  towards 
the  dawn,  and  then  buries  his  worn  and  stupefied  head 
deep  again  in  his  pillow,  as  ho  does  now.  A  man  who 
scarcely  ever  sheds  a  tear  is  always  attacked  in  this  way 
by  physical,  as  a  consequence  of  moral,  pain.  He  lay  in 
bed  much  later  than  usual,  thinking  over  what  he  had 
done,  and  what  he  had  now  to  do.  He  awoke,  feeling 
much  cooler  towards  Lenette  than  he  had  done  when  he 
went  to  bed.     When  two  hearts  can  no  longer  be  brought 


CHAP.  X.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.  313 

together  by  the  influence  of  some  mutual,  warm  emotion, 
when  the  glow  of  enthusiasm  no  longer  links  them  together, 
still  less  can  they  mingle  and  unite  when  the  glow  has 
passed  away,  and  chilly  reserve  has  resumed  its  sway. 
There  is  a  certain  half-and-half  state  of  partial  reconcilia- 
tion in  which  the  vertical  index  of  the  jewel-balance,  in 
its  glass-case,  is  turned  by  the  lightest  breath  from  the 
tongue  of  a  third  person  ;  to-day,  alas !  the  scale  on  Fir- 
mian's  side  sunk  a  little,  and  that  on  Lenette's  went  down 
altogether.  He  prepared  himself,  however,  and  dreaded 
at  the  same  time,  to  give  and  to  return  the  new  year 
greetings.  He  took  heart,  and  entered  the  room  with  his 
usual  hearty  step,  as  if  nothing  had  happened.  She  had 
let  the  coffee-pot  turn  into  a  refrigerator  rather  than  call 
him,  and  was  standing  with  her  back  to  him,  at  the  drawer 
of  the  commode,  tearing  hearts  to  pieces,  to  see  what  was 
inside  them.  The  hearts  in  question  were  printed  new 
year's  wishes  in  verse,  which  she  had  received,  in  happier 
days,  from  her  friends  in  Augspurg ;  the  kindly  wishes 
were  hidden  behind  groups  of  hearts  clipped  out  and  twined 
together  in  spiral  lines.  As  the  Holy  Virgin  gets  behung 
with  "  assigned  "  hearts  of  wax,  so  do  other  virgins  with 
paper  ones ;  for  with  these  fair  maidens  all  warmth  and 
enthusiasm  gets  the  name  of  "  heart,"  much  as  map-makers 
fancy  that  the  outline  of  burning  Africa  has  a  considerable 
resemblance  to  a  heart. 

Firmian  could  well  divine  how  many  a  longing  sigh  the 
poor  soul  had  heaved  over  so  many  a  ruined  wish  and 
hope,  and  all  her  mournful  comparisons  of  the  present 
time — with  those  smiling  days  gone  by — and  all  that  sor- 
row and  the  memory  of  the  past  spake  to  the  gentle, 
tender  heart.  Alas  !  since  even  the  happy  greet  the  new 
year  with  sighs,  the  wretched  may  well  be  allowed  a  tear 
or  two.  He  said  his  "  good  morning  "  gently,  and  had  he 
received  a  gentle  answer,  would  have  gone  so  far  as  to  add 
his  wishes  to  the  stock  of  printed  ones ;  but  Lenette,  who 
had  been  oftener  hurt,  and  more  deeply  too,  on  the  previous 
day,  than  he  had,  snarled  back  at  him  a  cold  and  hasty 
reply.  So  that  he  could  not  offer  any  wishes ;  she  offered 
none ;  ard  thus  stonily  and  thus  miserably  they  went 
elbowing  one  another  through  the  gate  of  the  new  year. 


314  JEAN  PAUL  FEIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  III. 

I  must  say  it ;  he  had  been  looking  forward  for  some- 
thing like  eight  weeks  to  the  happiness  of  this  new  year's 
morning — to  the  blissful  union  of  their  hearts — to  the 
thousands  of  loving  wishes  which  he  would  offer — to  their 
close  embraces  and  happy  silences  of  lips  upon  lips  !  Ah  ! 
how  different  it  all  was ;  cold,  deathly  cold !  On  some 
other  occasion,  when  I  have  more  paper,  I  must  explain  at 
full  length  why  and  wherefore  his  satirical  vein  served 
the  purpose  of  a  ferment,  a  leaven  or  yeast,  or,  say  a  kind 
of  irrigating  engine  to  that  sensitive  heart  of  his  of  which 
he  was  both  proud  and  ashamed  at  once.  The  royal  burgh 
of  Kuhschnappel  itself  had  more  to  do  with  it  than  any- 
thing else.  Upon  this  town,  as  upon  some  others  in  Ger- 
many, the  dew  of  sensibility  has  never  fallen  (as  if  these 
places  were  made  of  metal),  whilst  their  inhabitants  have 
provided  themselves  with  hearts  of  bone,  on  which,  as  on 
frozen  limbs,  and  witches  bearing  the  stigmata  of  the  devil, 
it  is  impossible  to  inflict  wounds  of  any  consequence  to 
speak  of.  Amid  a  population  possessed  of  this  sort  of 
frigidity,  one  is,  of  course,  inclined  to  pardon — and  even 
go  out  of  one's  way  in  search  of — a  little  warmth,  even  of 
an  exaggerated  kind, — whereas  a  man  who  had  been  living 
about  1785  in  Leipzig,  where  nearly  all  hearts  and  arteries 
were  injected  full  of  the  spirit  of  tears,  might  have  been 
disposed  to  carry  his  humorous  indignation  at  that  cir- 
cumstance a  little  too  far,  in  the  same  way  that  cooks  dish 
up  watery  vegetables  with  more  pepper  in  wet  weather 
than  in  dry. 

Lenette  went  three  times  to  church  that  day,  not  that 
there  was  anything  extraordinary  in  that.  It  is  not  so 
much  with  respect  to  the  church-goers  that  the  words 
"  three  times  "  in  this  connection,  alarming  as  they  are, 
horrify  one.  The  church-goers  may  sometimes,  perhaps, 
be  all  the  better  for  going  so  ofien ;  but  it  is  for  the  sake 
of  the  unfortunate  clergy  who  are  obliged  to  preach  so 
many  times  in  one  day,  that  they  may  think  themselves 
lucky  if  all  that  happens  to  them  is  that  they  go  to  the 
devil  and  don't  lose  their  voices  into  the  bargain.  The 
first  time  a  man  preaches,  he  certainly  moves  himself  more 
than  anybody  else,  and  becomes  his  own  prosel3rte  ;  but 
when,  it  comes  to  the  millionth  time  or  so  of  his  laying 


CHAP.  X.]       FLOWEK,  FRUIT,  AND  THOEN  PIECES.  315 

down  the  moral  law,  it  must  be  much  the  same  with  him  as 
with  the  Egerian  peasants,  who  drink  the  Egerian  waters 
every  day,  and  consequently  cease  to  be  susceptible  to 
their  derivative  qualities,  however  visitors  may  be  affected 
by  them. 

At  dinner  our  melancholy  pair  sat  silent,  except  that  the 
husband,  seeing  the  wife  preparing  to  go  to  the  afternoon 
service  at  church,  which  she  had  not  been  in  the  habit  of 
attending  for  some  time,  asked  her  who  was  going  to  preach. 
"  Most  probably  Schulrath  Stiefel,"  she  said,  although  he 
usually  preached  only  in  the  morning,  but  just  now  the 
evening  preacher  couldn't  preach,  he  had  received  "  a  chas- 
tisement from  God — he  had  put  out  his  collar-bone."  At 
another  time  Siebenkees  would  have  had  a  good  deal  to  say 
as  touching  the  latter  clause  of  her  sentence ;  but  on  the 
present  occasion  (circumstances  being  as  they  were),  all  he 
did  was  to  strike  his  plate  with  one  of  the  prongs  of  his 
fork,  and  then  hold  it  up  to  one  of  his  ears,  while  he 
stopped  the  other ;  this  droning  bass,  this  humming  har- 
mony, bore  his  tortured  soul  away  upon  the  waves  of  music, 
and  this  echoing  sound-board,  this  vibrating  bell-tongue, 
seemed  to  be  singing  to  him  (by  way  of  new  year's  greet- 
ing), "  Hearest  thou  not  the  distant  bell  ringing  at  the 
close  of  thy  chill  life's  high  mass  ?  The  question  is,  shalt 
thou,  when  next  new  year's  day  comes,  be  able  to  hear ;  or 
lying,  by  that  time,  crumbling  into  dust?" 

After  dinner  he  looked  out  of  window,  directing  his 
gaze  less  to  the  street  than  to  the  sky.  There,  as  it 
chanced,  he  saw  two  mock  suns,  and  almost  in  the  zenith 
the  half  of  a  rainbow  with  a  paler  one  intersecting  it. 
These  tinted  stars  began  strangely  to  sway  his  soul, 
making  it  sad,  as  if  he  saw  in  them  the  reflected  image 
of  his  own  dim,  pale,  shattered  life.  For  to  man,  when 
swayed  by  emotion,  Nature  is  ever  a  great  mirror,  all 
emotion  too ;  it  is  only  to  him  who  is  satisfied  and  at  rest 
that  she  seems  nothing  but  a  cold,  dead  window  between 
him  and  the  world  beyond. 

When  he  was  alone  in  the  room  after  dinner,  and  the 
jubilant  hymns  from  the  church,  and  the  glad  song  of  a 
canary  in  a  neighbour's  room  came  upon  his  weary  soul 
like  the  movement  and  the  tumult  of  all  the  joy  of  hia 


316  JEAN  PAUL  FKIEDEICII  KICHTER.         [BOOK  III. 

youth,  now  buried  alive  in  the  tomb ;  and  when  the  bright 
magic  sunshine  broke  into  his  chamber,  and  light  cloud- 
shadows  slid  athwart  the  spot  of  light  upon  the  floor, 
questioning  his  sick,  moaning  heart  in  a  thousand  melan- 
choly tropes,  and  saying,  "  Is  it  not  thus  with  all  things  ? 
Are  not  your  own  days  fleeting  by  like  vapours  through 
a  chilly  sky,  above  a  dead  earth,  floating  away  towards 
the  night?" — he  could  but  open  his  swelling  heart  by 
means  of  the  soft-edged  sword  of  music,  that  so  the  nearest 
and  heaviest  of  the  drops  of  his  sorrow  might  be  set  free 
to  flow.  He  struck  a  single  triad  chord  upon  his  piano, 
and  struck  it  once  again,  letting  it  gradually  die  away ; 
the  tones  floated  away  as  the  clouds  had,  the  sweet  har- 
mony trembled  more  slowly  and  more  slowly,  grew  fainter 
and  fainter,  and  ceased  at  last ;  silence,  as  of  the  grave, 
was  all  that  was  left.  As  he  listened,  his  breath  and  his 
heart  stopped,  a  faintness  came  over  him  which  extended 
to  his  very  soul ;  and  then — and  then — as  floods  wash  the 
dead  from  out  of  the  churches  and  the  graves,  in  this 
morbid  hour  of  dreams,  the  stream  of  his  heart  came  flow- 
ing again,  and  bearing  upon  its  billows  a  new  corpse  from 
out  the  future,  torn  all  unshrouded  from  its  earthly  bed ; 
it  was  his  own  body;  he  was  dead.  He  looked  out  of 
window  towards  the  comforting  and  reassuring  light  and 
star  of  life,  but  the  voice  within  him  cried  on  still,  "  Do 
not  deceive  thyself;  before  the  new  year's  wishes  are  said 
again,  thou  wilt  have  departed  hence." 

When  a  shivering  heart  is  thus  all  shorn  of  its  leaves 
and  standing  bare,  every  breeze  that  touches  it  is  a  freez- 
ing blast.  With  what  a  soft,  warm,  gentle  touch  Lenette 
would  have  had  to  touch  it  so  as  not  to  startle  it.  A  heart 
in  this  condition  is  like  a  clairvoyante,  who  feels  a  chill 
as  of  death  in  every  hand  which  touches  from  beyond  the 
charmed  circle. 

He  determined  to  join  the  corpse-lottery  (as  it  was 
called)  that  very  day,  so  as  to  be  able  at  all  events  to  pay 
the  toll  or  tax  on  his  departure  for  the  next  world.  He 
told  Lenette  so,  but  she  thought  this  was  only  another 
of  his  harpings  on  the  subject  of  the  mourning  dress. 
Thus  cloudily  passed  the  first  day  of  the  year,  and  the 
first  week  was  even  more  rainy.     The  garden-hedge  and 


CHAP.  X.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.         317 

fencing  round  Lenette's  love  for  Stiefel  were  completely  cut 
down  and  pulled  up  now,  and  the  love  was  to  be  clearly 
seen  of  every  passer-by.  Every  evening  at  the  time  when 
the  Schulrath  used  formerly  to  come,  vexation  and  regret 
graved  a  deeper  furrow  on  her  round  young  face,  which 
as  time  went  on  turned  wholly  into  a  piece  of  carving 
fretted  by  the  hand  of  grief.  She  found  out  the  days 
when  he  was  to  preach,  so  that  she  might  go  and  hear 
him,  and  whenever  a  funeral  passed,  she  went  to  tbe  win- 
dow to  see  him.  The  bookbinder's  wife  was  her  "  corres- 
ponding member,"  from  whom  she  constantly  drew  fresh 
discoveries  concerning  the  Schulrath,  and  repeated  the  old 
ones  with  her  over  and  over  again.  What  an  amount  of 
warmth  the  Schulrath  must  bave  gained  by  reason  of  his 
focal  distance,  and  her  husband  have  lost  on  account  ot 
his  proximity  will  be  at  once  apparent ;  just  as  tbe  earth 
derives  least  warmth  from  the  sun  when  they  are  nearest 
together,  i.e.  in  winter  !  Moreover  another  event  came  just 
then  to  pass  wbich  increased  Lenette's  aversion.  Yon 
Blaize  had  secretly  circulated  a  report  that  Siebenkaes  was 
an  atheist  and  no  Christian.  Eespectable  old  maiden 
ladies  and  the  clergy,  form  a  charming  contrast  to  the 
vindictive  Eomans  under  tbe  Empire,  who  often  accused 
the  most  innocent  people  possible  of  being  Christians,  in 
order  that  they  might  obtain  a  martyr's  crown.  The  old 
maids  and  parsons  aforesaid  rather  take  the  part  of  a  man 
who  is  in  a  position  of  this  kind,  and  deny  that  he  is  a 
Christian;  and  in  tbis  they  contrast,  likewise  with  tho 
Eomans  and  Italians  of  the  present  day,  who  always  say 
"  there  are  four  Christians  here,"  when  they  mean  "  four 
men."  In  St.  Ferieux,  near  Besancon,  the  most  virtuous  girl 
used  to  be  presented  with  a  lace  veil  of  the  value  of  rive 
shillings  by  way  of  a  prize  ;  and  people  like  Blaize  are  fond 
of  throwing  a  prize  for  virtue  of  this  kind,  namely,  a  moral 
veil,  over  the  good.  This  is  why  they  are  fond  of  calling 
thinking  men  infidels,  and  the  heterodox  wolves,  whoso 
teeth  help  to  smooth  and  polish, — which  is  the  reason  why 
wolves  are  engraved  upon  the  best  steel  blades. 

When  Siebenkaes  first  told  his  wife  this  report  of  Blaize's 
(that  he  was  no  Christian,  if  not,  indeed,  altogether  an 
infidel),  she  didn't  pay  very  much  attention  to  it,  inasmuch 


318  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICfl  RICHTEE.         [BOOK  III. 

as  it  seemed  out  of  the  question  such  a  thing  could  be  true 
of  a  man  to  whom  she  had  united  herself  in  the  holy  state 
of  matrimony.  It  was  not  until  sometime  afterwards  that 
she  remembered  that,  one  month  when  there  had  been  a 
long  period  of  dry  weather  he  had  spoken  disparagingly 
(without  the  least  hesitation),  not  only  of  the  Roman 
Catholic  processions  (for  she  did  not  think  they  were  ot 
very  much  use  herself),  but  concerning  the  Protestant's 
prayers  for  rain,  inquiring,  "  Do  the  processions,  miles 
long,  in  the  Arabian  deserts,  which  go  by  the  name  of 
caravans,  ever  lead  to  the  production  of  a  single  cloud  in 
the  sky,  let  them  pray  for  rain  as  hard  as  they  choose  ?" 
And  "  Why  do  the  clergy  get  up  processions  only  for  rain 
or  fine  weather  ?  why  not  to  get  rid  of  a  severe  winter, 
when  at  all  events  those  who  took  part  in  the  processions 
would  feel  a  little  warmer;  or,  in  Holland,  for  bright 
sunny  weather  and  the  dispersion  of  fog ;  or  against  the 
aurora-bo realis in  Greenland?"  "  But  what  he  wondered  at 
most,"  he  said,  "  was  why  those  converters  of  the  heathen, 
who  pray  so  often,  and  with  so  much  success  for  the  sun 
when  he's  only  behind  a  cloud  or  two,  should  not  suppli- 
cate for  him  in  circumstances  of  infinitely  greater  import- 
ance— in  the  polar  regions,  namely,  where  for  months  at  a 
time  he  never  appears  even  when  the  sky  is  altogether 
cloudless  ?  Or  why,"  he  asked  in  the  last  place,  "  do  they 
take  no  steps  to  petition  against  the  great  solar  eclipses 
(which  are  seldom  very  enjoyable  occurrences),  suffering 
themselves  to  be  outdone  by  savage  nations  in  this  respect, 
for  as  the  latter  do  howl  and  pray  them  away  ?"  Many 
speeches,  in  themselves  innocuous  at  first,  nay  sweet, 
acquire  poisonous  properties  in  the  storehouse  of  time,  as 
sugar  does  when  kept  for  thirty  years  in  a  warehouse.* 
These  few  words,  candidly  spoken  out  in  the  course  of 
common  conversation,  took  a  great  hold  upon  Lenette  now 
that  she  sate  under  Stiefel's  pulpit  (made  of  apostles  all 
carpentered  up  together),  and  heard  him  offering  up  one 
prayer  after  another,  for,  or  against  (as  the  case  might  be), 
sickness,  government,  child-birth,  harvest,  &c,  &c. !  How 
dear,  on  the  other  hand,  Peltzstiefel  grew  to  her ;  his 
very  sermons  became,  in  the  most  charming  manner, 
*  Sander,  on  "  The  Great  and  Beautiful  in  Nature." 


CHAP.  X.]        FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.         319 

regular  love-letters  to  her  heart.  And  indeed  clericality 
does,  at  all  times,  stand  in  a  very  close  relation  to  the 
feminine  heart ;  that's  why  "  hearts  "  formerly  meant  trie 
clergy  on  German  playing  cards. 

Now  what  all  this  time  did  Stanislaus  Siebenkags  think 
and  do?  Two  contradictory  things.  If  a  hard  word 
escaped  him,  he  was  sorry  for  the  feeble,  forsaken  soul, 
whose  whole  rose-border  of  enjoyment  had  been  hoed  up, 
whose  first  love  for  the  Schulrath  lay  languishing  in  sorrow 
and  famine ;  for  the  thousand  charms  of  that  imprisoned 
nature  of  hers  would  have  opened  in  all  their  beauty  to 
some  heart  she  loved,  which  his  was  not.  "  And  can  1  not 
see,"  he  said  further,  M  how  impossible  it  is  that  the  pin's 
or  needle's  point  can  act  as  a  lightning  conductor  to  the 
sultry,  lightning-charged  clouds  of  her  life,  in  the  same 
way  that  the  pen's  point  does  for  mine.  One  can  write  a 
good  deal  of  one's  mind,  but  one  can't  stitch  very  much  off 
it.  And  when  I  consider  what  swimming-belts  and  cork- 
jackets  for  the  deepest  floods  I  am  prepared  with,  in  the 
shape  of  the  self-contemplation  of  the  Emperor  Antoninus 
and  in  Arrianus  Epictetus,  of  neither  of  whom  she  knows 
even  the  binding,  let  alone  the  name  (to  say  nothing  of 
my  astronomy  and  psychology)  ;  and  what  splendid  hands 
a£  the  fire  engine-pumps  they  are  to  me  when  I  blaze  up  in 
a  conflagration  of  anger  as  I  did  just  now,  while  she  has 
to  let  her  anger  burn  itself  out,  verily  I  ought  to  be  ten 
times  more  gentle  with  her,  instead  of  being  ten  times 
more  irritable."  If  it  happened,  on  the  other  hand,  that 
he  had  not  given  but  had  received  a  few  hard  words,  he 
thought  of  her  warm  longing  for  the  Schulrath  which  she 
could  so  readily  increase  and  magnify  in  secret  during  her 
wholly  mechanical  work,  to  any  extent ;  and  of  the  con- 
tinual yielding  of  his  own  too  soft  heart ;  a  thing  for  which 
his  strong-souled  Leibgeber  would  have  scolded  him,  while 
his  wife  would  have  done  so  for  the  contrary  defect,  which 
she  was  not  likely  to  encounter  in  her  stiff  unyielding 
Stiefel,  judging  by  the  recent  unceremoniousness  of  style 
in  which  he,  the  other  day,  gave  his  notice  of  the  calling 
in  of  his  capital  of  Eegard. 

In  this  frame  of  mind,  one  day  when  his  spirit  was  heavy 
with  anger,  he  put  to  her,  as  bhe  was  starting  again  tc  gc 


320  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  IIL 

to  the  Schulrath's  evening  sermon,  the  simple  little  ques- 
tion, why  it  was  she  used  formerly  to  go  so  seldom  to  the 
evening  service,  and  now  went  so  often  ?  She  answered 
that  it  was  because  the  evening  preacher,  Mr.  Schalaster, 
always  used  to  preach  in  the  evenings,  but  that  since  he 
had  put  out  his  collar-bone  the  Schulrath  had  taken  his 
duty.  Heaven  forbid  that  she  should  go  to  the  evening 
services  when  Mr.  Schalaster 's  collar-bone  was  well  again. 
By  slow  degrees  he  drew  out  of  her  that  she  considered 
this  young  Mr.  Schalaster  a  most  dangerous  disseminator 
of  false  doctrine,  a  man  who  by  no  means  adhered  to 
Luther's  bible,  but  believed  in  Mosheh,  and  in  Jesos 
Christos,  Petros  and  Paulos,  and,  in  fact,  osd  all  the 
Apostles  in  such  a  manner  as  to  be  an  offence  to  all 
Christian  folks;  nay  he  had  gone  the  length  of  naming 
the  Holy  Jerusalem  in  such  an  extraordinary  way  that 
she  couldn't  so  much  as  say  it  after  him ;  it  was  soon  after 
this  that  he  had  put  out  his  collar-bone,  but  far  be  it  from 
her  to  judge  the  nv\n.  "No,  don't,  dear,"  her  husband 
said,  "  perhaps  the  young  gentleman  may  be  a  little  near- 
sighted, or  he  mayn't  know  his  Greek  Testament  so  well 
as  he  ought,  the  u's  in  it  are  sometimes  a  good  deal  like 
o's.  Ah  1  how  many  Schalasters  there  are  who  do  in  their 
several  sciences  and  doctrines,  say  Petros  for  Petrus,  and 
where  there's  not  the  slightest  occasion,  and  nothing  in 
the  shape  of  a  stumbling-block  in  the  path,  breed  dissen- 
sion among  mankind  by  means  of  consanguineous  vowels." 
On  this  particular  occasion,  however,  Schalaster  drew 
our  couple  a  little  nearer  together  again.  It  was  a  satis- 
faction to  Siebenkaes  to  find  that  he  had  been  a  little 
mistaken  up  to  this  point,  and  that  it  was  not  only  love 
to  Stiefel  which  had  taken  her  to  evening  church,  but  that 
regard  for  purity  of  doctrine  had  something  to  do  with  it 
as  well.  The  distinction  was  fine,  it  is  true  ;  but  in  time 
of  need  one  catches  at  the  minutest  fragment  of  comfort ; 
>r,nd  Siebenkaes  was  delighted  that  his  wife  wasn't  quite  so 
'ieeply  in  love  with  the  Schulrath  as  he  had  been  sup- 
posing. Let  no  one  hear  speak  lespairingly  of  the  delicate 
gossamer  web  which  suppoi  i&  us  and  our  happiness.  If 
wo  do  spin  and  draw  it  out  of  ourselves,  as  the  spider 
does  hers,  yet  it  bears  us  pretty  firmly  up,  and,  like  tha 


CHAP.  X.J      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.  321 

spider,  we  hang  safe  and  sound  in  the  middle  of  it,  while 
the  storm-wind  rocks  both  our  web  and  us  uninjured  to 
and  fro. 

From  this  day  Siebenkses  went  straightway  back  to 
Lis  only  friend  in  the  place,  Stiefel,  whose  little  mistake 
he  had  forgiven  from  his  heart  long  long  since — half 
an  hour  after  it  happened,  I  believe.  He  knew  that  the 
sight  of  him  would  be  a  consolation  to  the  exiled  evange- 
list in  his  Patmos- chamber,  and  that  his  wife  would  find 
a  consolation  in  it  too.  Yea,  he  carried  greetings  which 
had  never  been  intrusted  to  him  backwards  and  forwards 
between  the  two. 

The  little  scraps  of  news  of  the  Schulrath,  which  he  would 
let  drop  of  an  evening,  were  to  Lenette  as  the  young  green 
shoots  which  the  partridge  scratches  up  from  beneath  the 
snow.  At  the  same  time,  I  am  not  concealing  the  fact  that 
I  am  very  sorry  both  for  him  and  fcr  her ;  although  I  am 
not  such  a  wretched  partisan  of  either  as  to  withhold  my 
love  and  my  sympathy  from  two  people  who  are  mutually 
misunderstanding  and  making  war  upon  each  other. 

Out  of  this  grey  sultry  sky,  whose  electrical  machines 
were  being  charged  fuller  and  fuller  every  hour,  there 
broke,  at  last,  a  first  harsh  peal  of  thunder — Firmian  lost 
his  law  suit.  The  Heimlicher  was  the  catskin  rubber,  the 
foxtail  switch,  which  charged  the  Inheritance  Chamber, 
the  goldsmith's  pitch-cake  of  Justice,  full  of  pocket- 
lightning.  But  the  suit  was  adjudged  to  be  lost  on  the 
simple  ground  that  the  young  notary,  Giegold,  with  whose 
notarial  instrument  Siebenkaes  had  armed  himself,  was 
not  as  yet  duly  matriculated.  There  cannot  be  very 
many  persons  unaware  that  in  Saxony  no  legal  instrument 
is  valid  unless  drawn  up  by  a  notary  who  has  been  duly 
matriculated,  while,  at  the  same  time,  documentary  evi- 
dence can  be  of  no  greater  force  in  another  country  than 
of  that  which  it  possessed  in  the  country  where  it  was 
drawn  up.  Firmian  lost  his  suit,  and  his  inheritance  along 
with  it.  However,  the  latter  remained  untouched,  for, 
perhaps,  nothing  can  keep  a  sum  of  money  safer  from  the 
attacks  of  thieves,  clients,  and  lawyers,  than  the  fact  of  its 
being  the  subject  of  a  lawsuit — nobody  can  touch  it  then. 
The  sum  is  clearly  specified  in  all  the  documents,  and 

B.  T 


322  JBA.N  PAUL  FKIEDRICH  KICHTEK.        [BOOK  HI. 

these  documents  would  have,  themselves,  to  be  got  out  of 
the  way  before  the  money  could  be  got  at.  Similarly,  the 
good  man  of  the  farm  rejoices  when  the  weevil  has  papered 
his  ccrnricks  all  over  with  white,  because  then  the  corn 
which  has  not  had  the  heart  of  it  eaten  out  by  the  spinner 
is  safe  against  the  ravages  of  all  other  corn  worms. 

A  lawsuit  is  never  more  easily  won  than  when  it  is 
lost — one  lodges  an  appeal.  After  payment  of  the  costs, 
ordinary  and  extraordinary,  the  law  concedes  the  beneficium 
appellationis  (benefit  of  appeal  to  a  higher  tribunal), 
although  this  benefit-farce  cannot  be  of  much  avail  to 
anybody  who  has  not  had  certaiu  other  benefits  conferred 
upon  him  beforehand. 

Siebenkaes  had  the  right  to  appeal ;  he  could  with 
ease  adduce  evidence  of  his  name  and  wardship  through  a 
duly  matriculated  Leipzig  notary.  All  he  wanted  was 
the  worktool — the  weapon  for  the  fight,  which  was  also 
the  subject  of  it — to  wit,  money.  During  the  ten  days 
which  the  appeal  (foetus-like)  had  wherein  to  come  to 
maturity,  he  went  about  sickly  and  thoughtful.  Each  of 
these  decimal  days  exercised  upon  him  one  of  the  persecu- 
tions of  the  early  Christians  and  decimated  his  hours  of 
happiness.  To  apply  to  his  Leibgeber,  in  liayreuth,  for 
money,  the  distance  was  too  long  and  the  time  too  short ; 
for  Leibgeber,  to  judge  by  his  silence,  had  probably  leapt 
over  many  a  mountain  on  the  leaping-pole,  the  climbing- 
spurs,  of  his  silhouette-clipping.  Firmian  cast  everything 
to  the  winds,  and  went  to  his  old  friend,  Stiefel,  that  he 
might  comfort  himself  and  tell  all  the  story.  Stiefel  fumed 
at  the  sight  of  marshy  bottomless  paths  of  the  law,  and 
pressed  upon  Siebenkses  the  acceptance  of  a  pair  of  stilts 
whereon  to  traverse  them,  namely,  the  money  necessaiy 
for  the  appeal.  Ah !  this  to  the  disconsolate,  longing, 
Schulrath  was  almost  tantamount  to  another  clasp  of 
Lenette's  beloved,  clinging  hand ;  his  honest  blood,  coagu- 
lated by  all  these  days  of  mere  icy  cold,  thawed  once  more 
and  began  to  flow.  It  was  through  no  cheating  of  his 
sense  of  honour  that  Firmian,  who  preferred  starving 
to  borrowing,  at  once  accepted  Stiefel's  money,  looking 
upon  each  dollar  as  a  little  stone  wherewith  to  pave  the 
path  of  the  law,  and  so  pass  over  it  unbemired.    His 


CHAP.  X.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.  323 

principal  idea  was  that  he  would  soon  be  dead,  and  that, 
at  all  events,  his  helpless  widow  would  have  the  enjoy- 
ment of  his  inheritance. 

He  appealed  to  the  Supreme  Court  and  ordered  another 
instrument  to  be  drawn  up  in  Leipzig. 

These  fresh  nail-scratches  of  fortune,  on  the  one  hand, 
and  Stiefel's  kindness  and  money,  on  the  other,  laid  up  a 
fresh  accumulation  of  oxygenous,  or  acidifying,  matter  in 
Lenette,  and,  at  the  same  time,  the  acid  of  her  ill-humour 
became  (as  acids  in  general  do)  stronger  in  a  time  of  frost, 
and  on  this  subject  I  shall  here  communicate  the  few 
meteorological  observations  which  I  have  to  make. 

They  are  as  follows : — Since  the  misunderstanding  with 
Stiefel,  Lenette  was  mute  the  whole  day  long,  recovering 
from  this  lingual  paralysis  only  in  the  presence  of  stran- 
gers. I  presume  there  must  exist  some  physical  cause  for 
the  phenomenon  that  a  woman  is  frequently  unable  to  speak 
except  in  the  presence  of  strangers,  and  we  should  be  able 
to  discover  the  reason  of  the  converse  phenomenon,  that  a 
mesmerized  subject  can  converse  only  with  the  mesme- 
rizer  or  with  persons  who  are  en  rapport  with  him.  In  St. 
Kilda  everybody  coughs  when  a  stranger  arrives  in  the 
island,  and  although  coughing  is  not  exactly  speaking,  per- 
haps, yet  it  is  a  preliminary  whirring  of  the  wheels  of  the 
mechanism  of  speech.  This  periodic  or  intermittent  dumb- 
ness, which,  perhaps,  like  the  non-periodic  or  continued 
form  of  the  complaint  may  be  the  result  of  the  suppres- 
sion of  (surface)  outbreaks,  is  nothing  new  to  the  medical 
world.  Wepfer  mentions  the  case  of  a  paralytic  woman 
who  could  say  nothing  except  the  Lord's  Prayer  and  the 
Creed ;  and  cases  of  dumbness  are  of  frequent  occurrence 
in  matrimonial  life,  in  which  the  wife  can  say  nothing  to 
the  husband  beyond  a  word  or  two  of  the  extremest 
necessity.  There  was  a  fever-patient  at  Wittenberg  who 
couldn't  speak  a  word  the  whole  day  long  except  between 
12  and  1  o'cluck;  and  we  meet  with  plenty  of  poor  dumb 
women  who  are  only  in  a  condition  to  speak  for  about  a 
quarter  of  an  hour  in  the  course  of  the  day,  or  can  just 
manage  to  get  out  a  word  or  two  in  the  evening,  and  ar< 
obliged  to  have  recourse  to  dumb-bells  by  way  of  helping  ou  t 
their  meaning,  using  for  that  purpose  plates,  keys, and  doors, 

T2 


324  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDEICH  EICHTER.        [BOOK  III. 

This  dumbness,  at  last,  so  worked  upon  poor  Siebenkaea 
that  he  caught  it  himself.  He  mimicked  his  wife  as  a 
father  does  his  children  for  their  good.  His  satiric 
humour  often  had  a  good  deal  the  appearance  of  satiric 
i7Z-humour ;  but  this  was  done  with  the  sole  view  of 
keeping  himself  at  all  times  perfectly  calm  and  cool. 
"When  chamber-wenches  distracted  him  most  utterly  as  he 
was  in  the  depths  of  his  auctorial  sugar-refinery  and  beer- 
brewery,  by  converting  (with  Lenette's  assistance)  his 
room  into  a  regular  herald's  chancellery  and  orator's 
tribune,  he  could  always  bring  his  wife,  at  all  events, 
down  from  the  platform  by  striking  three  blows  on  his 
desk  with  his  bird-sceptre  (this  was  by  virtue  of  an 
arrangement  which  he  had  come  to  with  her  on  the 
subject).  Also,  on  the  many  occasions  when  he  would 
find  himself  sitting  over  against  these  talking  Cicero- 
heads,  powerless  to  frame  an  idea,  or  to  write  a  line,  and 
regretting  the  loss  (not  so  much  to  himself  as  to  the  innu- 
merable mass  of  persons  of  the  highest  condition  and 
intelligence)  of  the  thousands  of  ideas  which  were  thus 
abstracted  by  these  adepts  in  the  art  of  talk — he  could 
give  a  Lemendous  thump  with  hia  sceptre-ruler,  upon  the 
table,  such  as  one  gives  to  a  pond  to  make  the  frogs  cease 
croaking.  What  pained  him  most  with  regard  to  this 
robbery  of  posterity  was  the  thought  that  his  book  would 
go  down  to  it  shorn  of  its  fair  and  due  proportions  as  a 
consequence  of  all  this  fugitive  chatter.  It  is  a  beautiful 
thing  that  all  authors,  even  those  who  deny  the  immor- 
tality of  their  own  souls,  seldom  have  anything  to  say 
against  that  of  their  names.  As  Cicero  declared  that  he 
would  believe  in  the  second  life,  even  were  there  none,  they 
cleave  to  a  belief  in  the  second,  eternal,  life  of  their  names, 
however  their  critics  may  demonstrate  the  contrary. 

Siebenkses  now  most  distinctly  intimated  to  his  wife, 
that  he  should  not  speak  any  more  at  all,  not  even  con- 
cerning matters  of  the  utmost  necessity,  and  this  because 
he  simply  could  not  and  would  not  be  distracted  or  chilled 
in  the  fervour  of  composition,  by  long  angry  discussions  con- 
cerning talking,  washing,  or  the  like,  neither  be  induced 
to  lose  his  temper  with  her  about  such  matters.  Any 
given  matter  of  perfect  indifference  can  be  spoken  of  in  ton 


CHAP.  X.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.  325 

different  tones  and  mistones,  and,  therefore,  with  the  view 
of  not  depriving  his  wife  of  whatever  enjoyment  she  might 
derive  from  speculating  as  to  the  tones  in  which  things 
were  capable  of  being  said,  he  gave  her  to  understand  that 
for  the  future  he  would  speak  to  her  only  in  writing. 

I  am  ready,  here,  with  an  explanation  of  the  fullest  de- 
scription as  to  this  proceeding.  That  grave  and  earnest 
person,  the  bookbinder,  was  exercised  in  his  mind,  all  through 
the  ecclesiastical  year,  by  nothing  to  such  an  extent  as  by 
the  conduct  of  his  "  Eascal,"  as  he  styled  his  son,  a  bit  of 
a  mauvai8  sujet,  who  was  a  better  hand  at  reading  a  book 
than  at  binding  one — always  clipping  the  edges  askew,  or 
cropping  them  too  closely,  or  doubling  or  halving  the 
dimensions  of  the  damp  sheets  by  screwing  the  press  too 
tight.  Now  these  were  matters  of  a  sort  which  his  father 
could  by  no  means  endure,  and  he  lost  his  temper  over 
them  to  such  an  extent  that  he  would  not  speak  to  this 
child  of  the  devil  and  his  realm,  not  so  much  as  a  syllable. 
Such  sumptuary  laws  and  golden  rules  connected  with 
bookmaking,  therefore,  as  he  had  to  communicate  to  his 
son  he  delivered  to  his  wife,  in  her  capacity  of  post- 
mistress, and  she  (using  her  needle  by  way  of  rod  of 
office)  would  then  get  up  in  her  distant  corner  of  the 
room  and  transmit  the  commands  of  the  father  to  the  son, 
who  would  be  planing  away  at  no  very  great  distance. 
The  son,  who  had  to  deliver  all  Ms  questions  and  answers 
to  the  postmistress  in  the  same  manner,  approved  of  this 
arrangement  most  thoroughly ;  his  father's  tongue  gave 
much  less  trouble  than  before.  The  father  got  into  the 
habit  of  this  system  and  ceased  to  treat  of  anything  by 
word  of  mouth,  no  matter  what.  He  even  got  to  trying  to 
express  his  views  concerning  his  son's  proceedings  by 
means  of  looks,  darting  burning  glances  at  him,  like  a 
lover,  as  he  sat  opposite  to  him.  An  eye  full  of  glances, 
however  (notwithstanding  the  fact  that  there  are  ocular 
letters,  as  well  as  palatals,  labials,  and  glossals),  is  at  best 
but  a  box  of  confused  pearl  type.  But  as,  by  good  fortune, 
the  invention  of  writing,  and  the  institution  of  the  post- 
office  have  enabled  a  man,  who  iff  drifting  round  the  North 
Pole  on  a  slab  of  ice,  to  communicate  with  another  who  ia 
sitting  in  a  palm-tree  amidst  parrots  in  the  torrid  zone 


326  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RJ.CHTER.        [BOOK  III 

—  this  father  and  son  (when,  thus  divided,  the}7  sat  opposite 
to  one  another  at  the  work-table)  were  provided  with  a 
means  of  sweetening  and  lightening  their  separation  by 
help  of  an  epistolary  correspondence  carried  on  across  the 
table.  Business  letters  of  the  utmost  importance  were 
conveyed  from  one  to  the  other  unsealed,  and  in  complete 
safety,  for  the  mail  bags,  the  mail-packet  of  this  penny- 
post,  consisted  of  a  pair  of  fingers.  The  interchange  of 
letters  and  couriers  between  these  two  silent  powers  took 
place  over  roads  so  smooth,  and  by  such  an  admirable 
system  of  "  Poste  aux  Anes  "  without  interruption  and  free 
from  all  delay,  that  the  father  could,  without  difficulty, 
receive  a  reply  on  a  subject  of  importance  from  his  corres- 
pondent within  one  minute  of  its  despatch  (such  was  the 
facility  of  communication),  in  fact,  they  were  quite  as  near 
to  one  another  as  if  they  had  been  next  door  neighbours. 
I  would  here  beg  any  traveller  who  may  visit  Kuh- 
schnappel  before  I  do  so  to  saw  off  the  two  corners  of  the 
table,  of  which  the  one  served  as  Bureau  d 'Intelligence  to 
the  other,  put  both  these  bureaux  in  his  pocket  and  exhibit 
them  to  the  curious  in  some  great  city  or  company — or  to 
me  in  Hof. 

Siebenkses  partially  copied  the  bookbinder's  system. 
He  cut  out  brief  letters  of  decretal  in  anticipation,  to  be 
ready  for  the  occasions  when  they  should  be  required.  If 
Lenette  put  an  unforeseen  question  to  which  there  wasn't 
an  answer  in  his  letter-bag,  he  would  write  three  lines  and 
pass  them  across  the  table.  Such  notes  of  hand  or  orders 
in  council  as  had  to  be  renewed  daily,  he  ordered  the  return 
of  in  a  standing  requisition,  so  as  to  save  paper,  and  not  be 
obliged  to  write  a  fresh  order  on  this  subject  every  day ; 
for  he  merely  passed  this  particular  paper  back  across  the 
table  again.  But  what  said  Lenette  to  all  this  ?  I  shall 
be  better  able  to  answer  this  question  after  relating  what 
follows  here.  There  was  only  one  occasion  on  which  he 
spoke  in  this  deaf  and  dumb  institution  of  a  house  of  his ; 
it  was  while  he  was  eating  salad  out  of  an  earthenware- 
dish,  which  had  poetical  as  well  as  pictorial  flowers  on  it 
by  way  of  ornament.  Lifting  the  salad  with  his  fork,  he 
disclosed  to  view  the  little  carmen  which  bordered  this 
dish,  and  which  ran  as  follows : — 


CHAP.  X.J       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.  327 

"  Peace  feeds,  but  strife 
Consumes  our  life." 

Whenever  he  lifted  up  a  forkful  of  his  salad,  he  was  in 
a  position  to  read  one  or  the  other  foot  of  this  didactio 
poem ;  and  he  did  so  aloud. 

"  Well,  and  what  said  Lenette  to  all  this?"  we  inquired 
above.  Not  a  word,  I  answer.  She  wasn't  going  to  let 
his  sulks  and  silence  diminish  hers  in  the  slightest  degree, 
for  in  the  end  it  seemed  clear  to  her  that  he  was  holding 
his  tongue  out  of  sheer  ill-temper,  and  she  wasn't  going  to 
be  outdone  by  him  in  that  respect.  And,  in  fact,  he  carried 
matters  further  and  further  every  day,  continually  passing 
new  broken  tables-of-the-law  across  the  table  to  her,  or 
carrying  them  round  to  her  side.  I  shall  not  catalogue 
the  whole  of  them,  but  merely  quote  a  few  specimens,  e.  g. 
'  The  Forty-eight-pounder  Paper '  (he  gratified  himself  by 
continually  inventing  new  titles  for  these  missives),  of 
which  the  contents  were :  "  Stop  the  mouth  of  that  tall 
sewing  creature  there,  who  sees  perfectly  well  how  busy  I 
am  with  my  writing,  or  I  shall  seize  her  by  that  throat 
with  which  she's  haiting  me." 

"  The  '  Official  Gazette '  paragraph  :" — "  Let  me  have  a 
little  drop  of  some  of  your  dirty  wash- water;  I  want  to 
get  the  ink  off  these  raccoon  paws  of  mine."  "  The  Pas- 
toral Letter :" — "  I  want  to  get  a  glance  or  so  at '  Epictetus 
on  what  Man  has  to  endure,'  could  I  find  a  moment  of  some 
sort  of  peace ;  don't  disturb  me."  "  The  Pin-paper :" — "  I 
happen  to  be  in  the  middle  of  a  satire,  of  the  hardest  and 
severest  nature,  on  the  subject  of  women ;  take  that  screech- 
ing bookbinderess  down  stairs  to  the  hairdresseress,  and 
yell  away  there  as  sprightlily  as  ye  have  a  mind."  "  Tor- 
ture-bench Note,"  or  rather  "  Folio :" — "  I  have  held  out, 
this  forenoon,  through  well-nigh  as  much  as  is  possible ;  1 
have  fought  my  course  through  besoms,  feather-dusters., 
women's  bonnets,  and  women's  tongues.  Is  there  no  bopp> 
that,  now  that  evening  is  falling,  I  may  have  a  little,  brief 
hour  of  peace,  in  which  to  try  to  get  some  slight  idea  of  the 
sense  of  these  terrible  Acts  of  Parliament  before  me  here  ?" 
Nobody  can  convince  me  that  it  was  any  blunting  of  the 
stings  of  these  vioiting  cards  of  his  (which  he  left  upon  her 
so  very  frequentty),  that  he  occasionally  translated  writing 


328  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDEICH  RICHTER.      [BOOK  1IL 

into  speech,  and  when  other  people  were  present,  jested 
with  them  concerning  cognate  subjects.  Thus  he  said  on 
one  occasion  to  Meerbitzer,  the  hairdresser,  in  Lenette's 
presence,  "  Monsieur  Meerbitzer,  it's  incredible  what  my 
housekeeping  costs  in  the  course  of  the  year.  Why,  that 
wife  of  mine,  there  as  she  stands,  gets  through  half-a-ton 
of  food  or  so  by  herself  alone,  and"  (when  she  and  the 
barber  both  beat  their  hands  together  above  their  heads) 
"  so  do  I,  too."  He  showed  it  to  Meerbitzer,  printed  in 
Schotzer's  book,  that  every  one  does  consume  about  that 
quantity  of  sustenance  in  the  course  of  the  year ;  but  did 
anybody  in  that  room  fancy  such  a  thing  was  possible  ? 

Ill-will  towards  a  person  is  a  kind  of  catalepsy  of  the 
mind,  and  so  is  sulking ;  and  in  this  mental  catalepsy,  as 
in  the  bodily,  every  limb  remains  immovably  fixed  in  the 
position  which  it  chanced  to  be  in  when  the  attack  came 
on.  Moreover,  mental  catalepsy  has  this  feature  in  com- 
mon with  corporeal — that  women  are  more  subject  to  it 
than  men.  Consequently  the  only  effect  upon  Lenette  of 
her  husband's  little  joke  (which  had  the  outward  semblance 
of  being  a  piece  of  ill  temper,  although  it  was  in  reality 
only  carried  on  with  a  view  to  the  complete  maintaining 
of  his  own  calmness  and  self-control)  was  to  redouble  her 
stiffness  and  chilliness.  Yet  how  very  little  she  would 
have  minded  it  had  she  but  seen  Stiefel  even  once  in  the 
course  of  the  week,  and  had  not  the  cares  connected  with 
those  house  expen>es  of  hers  (which  melted  down  and 
swallowed  up  all  the  pewter-plattery  of  the  eagle's  perch) 
decomposed  and  dried  up  the  veiy  last  drop  of  happy  warm 
blood  in  her  wretched  heart.  Ah !  sorrow-laden  soul ! 
But,  as  things  were,  there  was  no  help  for  her,  nor  any 
for  him  whom  she  so  terribly  misunderstood. 

Poverty  is  the  only  burden  which  grows  heavier  in  pro- 
portion to  the  number  of  dear  ones  who  have  to  help  to 
bear  it.  Had  Firmian  been  alone,  he  would  scarcely  have 
so  much  as  glanced  at  the  holes  and  ruts  in  the  streets  of 
life  ;  for  destiny  lays  down  little  piles  of  stones  for  us  every 
thirty  steps  with  which  we  may  fill  the  holes  up.  And  he 
had  a  haven  of  refuge,  a  diving-bell,  to  fly  to  in  the  strongest 
gale  tnat  might  blow — in  the  shape  of  his  watch  (to  say 
nothing  of  his  glorious  philosophy),  which  he  could  always 


CHAP.  X.J        FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  IIECES.         329 

turn  into  cash.  But  that  wife  of  his,  and  all  her  funereal 
music  and  Kyrie  Eleisons,  and  a  thousand  things  betides, 
and  Leibgeber's  inexplicable  silence,  and  his  growing 
ill-health — the  continual  immixture  of  all  these  impure 
matters  into  the  breeze  of  his  life  converted  it  into  a  sultry, 
unnerving  sirocco  blast — a  wind  which  creates  in  a  man  a 
dry,  hot,  sickly  thirst,  which  often  makes  him  put  that  into 
his  breast  which  soldiers  put  into  their  mouths  to  cure 
bodily  thirst,  namely,  cold  powder  and  lead. 

On  the  11th  of  February,  Firmian  sought  relief. 

On  the  11th  of  February,  Euphrosyne's  day,  1767,  Le- 
nette  was  born. 

She  had  often  mentioned  this  to  him,  and  oftener  yet  to 
her  sewing-  customers.  However,  he  would  have  forgotten 
all  about  it  but  for  the  Superintendent-General  Ziethen, 
who  had  printed  a  book  in  which  he  reminded  him  of  the 
11th  of  February.  The  superintendent  had  given  due 
notice,  in  this  work  of  his,  that  on  the  11th  of  February, 
1786,  a  segment  of  South  Germany  would  be  sent  down, 
by  an  earthquake,  into  the  realms  below,  like  so  much  corn 
laid  by  a  summer  storm.  As  a  consequence,  the  Kuh- 
schnapplers  would  have  been  lowered,  upon  the  dropped 
coffin-cords  or  lowered  drawbridges  of  sinking  soil,  into 
hell  by  entire  companies  at  a  time,  instead  of  going  there 
as  single  envoyes,  as  theretofore  was  the  usage.  However, 
nothing  came  of  all  this. 

On  the  day  before  the  earthquake,  and  before  Lenette's 
birthday,  Firmian  repaired  to  the  lifting-crane — the  spring- 
board of  his  soul — namely,  the  old  height  where  his  Henry 
had  taken  his  farewell.  The  forms  of  his  friend  and  wife 
stood,  dim  and  vague,  before  his  soul's  sight.  He  thought 
upon  the  circumstance  that  since  his  friend  had  left  him  there 
had  been  about  the  same  number  of  ruptures  and  divisions 
in  his  married  life  as,  according  to  Moreri,  took  place 
in  the  Church  from  the  time  of  the  Apostles  down  to 
Luther's  days,  namely,  124.  Labourers,  innocent  and 
simple,  silent  and  happy,  were  smoothing  the  spring's  path. 
rJ  e  had  passed  by  gardens  where  they  were  clearing  the 
moss  and  the  autumn-leaves  away  from  the  trees — by 
beehives  and  vine-stocks  being  transplanted,  cjeaned, 
pruned — by  osiers  being  trimmed  and  dressed.     The  sun 


330  JEAN  PAUL  FKIEDEICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  III. 

shone  bright  and  warm  over  the  land,  all  rich  with  buds ; 
and  suddenly  he  was  struck  by  one  of  these  sensations 
•which  often  come  upon  imaginative  men — and  this  is  why 
these  are  somewhat  apt  to  be  a  little  fanciful  and  visionary 
— it  seemed  to  him  as  if  his  life  dwelt,  not  in  a  bodily 
heart,  but  in  some  warm  and  tender  tear,  as  if  his  heavy- 
laden  soul  were  expanding  and  breaking  away  through 
j*ome  chink  in  its  prison,  and  melting  into  a  tone  of  music 
— a  blue  aether  wave. 

"  I  must  and  will  forgive  her,  on  her  birthday,"  cried 
his  softened  heart  and  soul ;  "  I  have  little  doubt  that  I 
have  been  too  hard  upon  her  all  this  time."  He  resolved 
that  he  would  have  the  Schulrath  into  the  house,  and  the 
calico-gown  beforehand,  and  make  her  a  birthday  present 
of  the  pair,  and  of  a  new  sewing-cushion.  He  grasped  his 
watch-chain  and  pulled  out  that  Elijah's  and  Faust's 
mantle,  which  was  to  bear  him  away  over  all  his  ills 
by  being  converted  into  cash.  He  went  home  with  every 
corner  of  his  heart  glowing  with  sunshine,  artfully  made 
his  watch  stop,  and  told  Lenette  he  must  take  it  to 
the  watchmaker's  to  be  repaired  (and  indeed  its  move- 
ments hitherto  had  been  like  those  of  the  planets  above  us, 
a  forward  movement  at  the  beginning  of  the  terrestrial  or 
clock-day,  afterwards  stationary,  and  latterly  retrograde). 
In  this  fashion  he  concealed  his  projects  from  her.  He  took 
the  watch  himself  to  the  market-place  and  sold  it,  though 
he  knew  very  well  he  would  never  be  able  to  write  with 
comfort  unless  it  was  ticking  on  his  table  (like  the  noble- 
man mentioned  by  Locke,  who  could  only  dance  in  one 
particular  room,  in  which  there  was  an  old  box  standing). 
Also,  in  the  evening,  the  redeemed,  checked  shirt-of-blood, 
or  seedbag  of  evil  weeds,  was  clandestinely  introduced 
into  thp  house.  Towards  evening  Firmian  went  to  the 
Schulrath,  and  with  all  the  warmth  of  his  eloquent  heart 
told  him  of  his  resolve  and  everything  connected  with  it — 
the  birthday,  the  return  of  the  calico,  his  request  to  Mm  to 
come  and  see  them  again,  his  own  imminent  death,  and 
his  resignation  to  everything.  Warm  breath  of  life  was 
breathed  into  Stiefel,  long  languishing  in  absence  and 
love  (which,  together,  had  gnawed  him  into  paleness,  as 
lime  does  the  shadows  of  a  fresco),  when  he  heard  that  on 


CHAP.  X.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        331 

the  morrow  the  beloved  voice  of  his  Lenette,  longed  for 
during  all  this  weary  time  (she  could  hear  his,  hy-the-by, 
in  church,  of  course),  would  once  more  stir  the  chords  of 
his  being. 

I  must  here  just  glance  at  a  defence,  for  a  moment, 
as  well  as  an  accusation.  The  former  relates  to  my  hero, 
who  seems  rather  to  have  rumpled  his  honour's  patent  of 
nobility  to  a  greater  or  less  extent,  by  having  made  this 
request  to  Stiefei;  but,  then,  we  must  consider  that  his 
intention  in  making  it  was  to  do  a  great  kindness  to  his 
suffering  wife,  and  a  small  one  to  himself.  The  fact  is, 
that  the  very  strongest  and  roughest  of  men  cannot  hold 
out  in  the  long  run  against  the  everlasting  feminine 
sulking  and  undermining.  For  the  sheer  sake  of  a  little 
peace  and  quietness,  a  man  who  may  have  sworn  a  thou- 
sand oaths  before  marriage  that  he  would  have  his  own 
way  in  that  condition  of  life,  comes,  in  the  long  run,  to  let 
his  wife  have  Tiers.  The  remainder  of  Siebenkaes'  conduct 
I  have  no  need  to  defend,  since  'tis  not  possible  to  do  so, 
but  only  necessary.  The  accusation  to  which  I  alluded  is 
against  my  own  fellow-labourers,  and  it  is — that  they  differ 
so  widely  in  their  romances  from  this  Biography  and  from 
real  life,  in  describing  the  ruptures  and  reconciliations  of 
their  characters  as  being  possible,  and  as  actually  occur- 
ring, in  periods  of  time  so  brief  that  one  might  stand  by 
and  time  them  with  a  stop-watch  in  one's  hand.  But 
a  man  does  not  break  with  a  person  he  loves  all  in  an 
instant;  the  rendings  alternate  with  little  re-bindings 
with  bands  of  silk  and  flowers,  till  at  length  the  long 
alternation  between  seeking  and  shunning  ends  in  com- 
plete separation,  and  it  is  then,  and  not  till  then,  that  we 
wretched  creatures  are  at  our  wretchedest.  The  same  is 
generally  true  of  the  union  of  souls ;  for  though  at  times 
an  unseen  infinite  Arm  seems  suddenly  to  press  us  upon 
some  new  heart,  yet  we  have  always  long  known  this 
heart,  in  the  Gallery  of  the  Saints  of  our  longing  devo- 
tion— and  often  taken  the  picture  down,  uncovered,  and 
adored  it.  It  became  impossible  to  Firmian  (sitting  in 
the  evening  in  his  lonesome  chair  of  anxiety  and  sus- 
pense) to  keep  all  that  love  of  his  waiting  with  any  sort 
of  patience  for  the  morrow.    The  very  restraint  which 


332  JEAN  PAUL  FKIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IIL 

was  upon  him  made  his  love  wax  warmer ;  and  when  his 
old  familiar  fear — that  he  would  die  before  the  equinox 
came  round — fell  upon  him,  it  terrified  him  more  than  it 
was  wont;  but  not  the  thought  of  death.  What  shook 
him  was  the  idea  of  Lenette's  difficulties,  and  how  she 
would  ever  find  the  money  requisite  for  the  performance 
of  the  final  trial,  the  anchor-proof*  of  his  humanity.  As 
it  chanced,  he  had  plenty  of  money  among  his  fingers 
at  this  very  moment.  He  sprang  up  and  ran  that  very 
evening  to  the  manager  of  the  corpse  lottery,  so  that,  at 
all  events,  his  wife  should  be  entitled  to  a  capital  of  fifty 
florins  at  his  death,  and  be  able  to  cover  his  body  de- 
cently over  with  a  little  earth.  I  don't  know  the  exact 
sum  he  paid;  but  I  am  quite  accustomed  to  embarrass- 
ments of  this  description,  which  novel-writers,  who  can 
invent  any  sum  they  please  in  a  case  of  this  sort,  have 
no  idea  of,  but  which  are  exceedingly  troublesome  to  a 
writer  of  actual  biography,  who  does  not  put  down  any- 
thing which  he  is  not  in  a  position  to  substantiate  by 
documentary  evidence,  and  a  reference  to  records. 

On  the  morning  of  the  11th  of  February,  that  is  to  say 
on  the  Saturday,  Firmian  entered  his  room,  feeling  very 
tender-hearted  (for  every  illness  and  weakness  softens  our 
heart — loss  of  blood,  for  instance,  and  trouble),  and  all 
the  more  so  because  he  was  looking  forward  to  a  kindly, 
peaceful  day.  We  love  much  more  warmly  when  we  are 
looking  forward  to  making  somebody  happy  than  we  do 
half  an  hour  after,  when  we  have  done  it.  It  was  as 
windy  this  morning  as  if  the  gales  were  holding  tourna- 
ment, or  riding  at  the  ring,  or  as  if  iEolus  were  shooting 
his  winds  out  of  air-guns.  Hence  many  people  thought 
either  that  the  earthquake  was  beginning,  or  that  a  few 
people  here  and  there  had  hanged  themselves  for  fear  of 
it.  Firmian  met  a  pair  of  eyes  in  Lenette's  face,  from 
which,  even  at  that  early  hour,  there  had  fallen  a  warm 
blood-rain  of  tears,  on  this  first  of  her  days.  She  had  not 
in  the  slightest  degree  guessed  at  his  tenderness  towards 
her,  or  at  that  which  he  had  in  his  mind.  She  had  had 
no  thought  of  anything  of  the  kind ;  her  only  idea  had 

*  The  anchor  proof  consists  in  casting  the  anchor  forcibly  down  upon 
ft  deep  hard  bottom. 


CHAP.  X.J       FLOWER,  FEUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.         333 

been,  "  Ah,  me !  since  nay  poor  father  and  mother  have 
been  dead  and  gone,  there  is  not  a  soul  that  ever  re- 
members I  have  a  birthday."     Something  or  other  was 
evidently  pre-occupying  her.     She  looked  once  or  twice, 
very  inquiringly,  into  his  eyes,  and  seemed  to  be  making 
up  her  mind  to  something ;  so  he  put  off  for  a  time  the 
outpouring  of  his  full  heart,  and  the  unveiling  of  his  two- 
fold birthday-present.    At  last  she  came  up  to  him  slowly, 
with  the  colour  in  her  face,  tried  in  a  troubled  way  to 
get  his  hand  into  hers,  and  said,  with  downcast  eyes,  in 
which,  as  yet,  there  were  no  tears,  "  We  will  be  friends 
again  to-day.     If  you  have  hurt  me,  and  given  me  a  little 
pain,  what  I  want  is  to  forgive  you  from  my  heart.     Do 
you  the  same  to  me."     This  address  rent  his  warm  breast 
in  twain,  and  at  first  all  he  could  do  was  to  be  dumb,  and 
clasp  her  in  this  silence  to  his  o'er-fraught  heart,  saying, 
after  a  time,  "  Forgive  thou  me  only !  for,  ah  !  I  love  the© 
far  more  than  thou  lovest  me."    And  here,  at  the  thought 
of    bygone    days,   the    heavy  tear-drops    rose   from   the 
depths  of  his  laden  heart,  and  flowed,  silent  and  slow,  as 
the  deep  streams  flow.    She  gazed  at  him  much  astonished, 
saying,  "  We  are  going  to  be  friends,  then,  are  we,  to-day? 
and  it  is  my  birthday.     But,  ah,  me !   it  is  a  sad,  sad 
birthday,  too."     It  was  only  at  this  point  that  he  remem- 
bered his  birthday-present.     He  ran  and  brought  it — that 
is  to  say,  the  oushion,  the  calico-dress,  and  the  news  that 
Stiefel  was  coming  in  the  evening.     At  this  she  began  to 
shed  tears,  and  said,  "Ah!    did  you  really  do   all   this 
yesterday  ?    And  you  remembered  that  this  was  my  birth- 
day ?     Oh !  it  was  so  kind  of  you,  and  I  do  so  thank  you 
for  it  ;    particularly — particularly— for   the   delightful — 
cushion.     I  never  thought  you  would  remember  anything 
about  my  wretched  birthday  at  all  I "     His  manly,  beau 
tiful  soul,  which  kept  no  watch  upon  its  enthusiasm  (aa 
women's  do),  told  her  everything,  including  the  fact  that 
he  had  joined  the  corpse-lottery  the  day  before,  so  that 
Bhe  might  be  able  to  put  him  under  ground  at  less  ex. 
pense.    Her  emotion  became  as  strong  and  as  visible  as  his 
own.     "  No,  no,"  she  cried  at  length,  "  God  will  preserve 
you;   but,  then,  there's  this  terrible  day;  who  knows  if 
we  shall  ever  see  another  morning.     Tell  me,  what  does 


334  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  IIL 

Mr.  Stiefel  think  about  the  earthquake  ? "  "  Don't  dis- 
tress yourself  on  that  score,"  said  Firmian ;  "  he  says  there 
won't  be  anything  of  the  kind." 

Keluctantly  he  let  her  away  from  his  glowing  heart. 
Until  he  went  out  into  the  free  air  (for  writing  was  utterly 
impossible)  he  gazed  continually  upon  her  bright,  shining 
face,  whence  all  the  clouds  were  quite  cleared  away.  He 
practised  upon  himself  an  old  trick  he  had  (which  I  have 
learnt  from  him) ;  when  he  wished  to  love  some  dear 
person  very  dearly,  and  forgive  him  everything,  he  looked 
long  on  his  face.  For  we  (that's  to  say  he  and  I)  see  in  a 
human  face,  when  it  is  old,  the  finger-board,  the  counting 
board,  of  all  the  bitter  pains  and  sorrows  which  have 
passed  so  rudely  over  it ;  and  when  it  is  young,  it  is  like 
a  bed  of  flowers  on  the  slope  of  a  volcano,  whose  next 
eruption  will  split  it  into  shivers.  Either  the  future  or 
the  past  is  written  on  every  face — making  us  gentle  and 
tender,  if  not  sad. 

Firmian  would  have  been  delighted  to  have  held  his 
new-found,  restored  Lenette  to  his  heart  all  the  day  long ; 
at  all  events  till  evening  came ;  but  her  house -work  and 
other  occupations  were  so  many  bars'  rest  in  this  music, 
and  her  lachrymal  ducts  were  sources  of  appetite,  as  well 
as  of  tears.  And  she  had  not  the  courage  to  question  him 
concerning  the  metallic  source  of  his  gold-bearing  stream, 
upon  whose  gentle  waves  she  was  floating  now.  But  her 
husband  gladly  divulged  the  secret  of  the  sale  of  his 
watch.  The  actual  estate  of  matrimony  was  to-day  to 
him  what  the  pre-nuptial  period  is  always — a  ajmbale 
d'amour — having  a  sounding-board  at  each  of  its  faces 
which  doubles,  not  the  strings  of  the  instrument,  but  the 
tone  of  those  it  has.  The  entire  day  was  like  a  piece  cut 
out  of  the  full  moon,  unclouded  by  the  slightest  haze,  or 
rather  out  of  the  second  world,  into  which  the  people  of 
the  moon  themselves  proceed.  Lenette,  in  her  morning 
glow,  was  like  the  (so-called)  Moss  of  Violet  Stone — the 
Iolite — which  gives  out  the  perfume  of  a  miniature-bed 
of  violets,  if  you  but  rub  it  till  it  gets  a  little  warm. 

At  evening  finally  appeared  the  Eath,  all  a-shake  with 
agitation.  He  looked  just  the  least  bit  haughty,  but 
when  he  tried  to  wish  Lenette  many  happy  returns  of 


CHAP.  XI.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        335 

the  day,  lie  could  not  do  it  for  tears,  which  were  in  his 
throat  quite  as  much  as  in  his  eyes.  His  embarrassment 
served  to  conceal  hers ;  but  at  length  the  opaque  mist 
cleared  away  from  among  them,  and  they  were  able  to 
look  at  one  another.  And  then  they  were  very  happy ; 
Firmian  forced  himself  to  be  so ;  the  other  two  required 
no  constraining. 

The  heavy  storm-clouds,  then,  ceased  for  a  time  to  hang 
and  sweep  so  low,  as  they  had  been  doing  of  late,  over 
their  comforted,  softened  hearts.  The  boding  comet  of 
the  future  was  shorn  of  its  sword,  and  went  sweeping 
on,  far  brighter  and  whiter,  into  the  blue  expanse  of 
heaven,  passing  athwart  more  brilliant  constellations. 
And  there  came  into  their  evening  a  brief  letter  from 
Leibgeber,  of  which  the  joy-bringing  lines  bedeck  and 
adorn  our  hero's  evening,  as  well  as  our  next  chapter. 

Thus  did  the  quick,  transient,  quivering  Flower-pieces  of 
Fantasy  mature  in  the  brains  of  our  triple  alliance  (as  in  the 
reader's  own)  into  actual  and  living  flowers  of  joy — as  the 
fever-patient  takes  the  flowers  patterned  upon  his  waving 
bed-curtain  to  be  real  and  tangible  forms.  In  truth,  this 
winter  night,  like  one  of  summer,  would  hardly  quite  cool 
down  and  die  out  on  their  horizon,  and  when  they  parted 
at  midnight  they  said,  "We  have  all  had  a  very  happy 
time." 


CHAPTER  XI. 

leibgeber's  disquisition  on  fame — firmian's  "evening 

PAPER." 

SiT<N  my  last  chapter  I  practised  a  deception  on  the  reader 
ou\t  of  pure  goodwill  towards  him;  however,  I  must  let 
hinA  remain  undeceived  until  he  has  read  the  following 
letter  of  Leibgeber's  : — 
" MyIfirmian  Stanislaus,  " Vaduz> February 2, 1786. 

1"  In  May  I  shall  be  in  Bayreuth,  and  you  must  be 
there  W.  I  have  nothing  else  of  any  consequence  to  write 
to  yoii-  now — however,  this  is  quite  important  enough, 


386  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  EICHTER.      [BOOK  III. 

namely,  that  I  order  you  to  arrive  in  Bayreuth  upon  the 
first  day  of  the  month  of  gladness,  because  I  have  some- 
thing of  the  most  extraordinarily  mad  and  important  kind 
in  my  head  concerning  you,  and  that  as  sure  as  there  is  a 
heaven  above  us.  My  joy  and  your  happiness  depend  on 
your  making  this  journey.  1  would  reveal  the  whole 
mystery  to  you  in  this  letter  if  I  were  certain  that  it  would 
fall  into  no  hands  but  your  own.  Come !  You  might  travel 
in  company  with  a  certain  Kuhschnappler,  of  the  name  of 
Rosa,  who  is  coming  to  Bayreuth  to  fetch  his  bride  home. 
But  if  (which  God  forbid)  this  Kuhschnappler  be  that 
Meyern,  of  whom  you  have  written  to  me,  and  if  the  said 
goldfish  is  about  to  come  swimming  here  to  freeze  (rather 
than  to  warm)  his  pretty  bride  with  his  dry,  wizzened  arms 
(as  in  Spain  they  put  serpents,  something  like  him,  round 
bottles  to  cool  them),  I  shall  take  care,  as  soon  as  I  get  to 
Bayreuth  to  give  her  a  very  distinct  idea  of  him,  and  shall 
maintain  that  he's  ten  thousand  times  better  than  the 
Heresiarch  Bellarmin,  who  committed  adultery  a  great  deal 
oftener  during  his  career — two  thousand  two  hundred  and 
thirty-six  times,  to  wit.  I  have  the  most  anxious  and 
heartfelt  longing  to  behold  the  Heimlicher  von  Blaise ; 
were  he  but  a  little  nearer  at  hand  I  should — (seeing  that 
there's  always  something  sticking  in  that  throat  of  his 
which  he  has  some  difficulty  in  getting  down,  such  as  an 
inheritance,  or  somebody  else's  house  and  land), — I  say,  I 
should  give  him  a  good  hard  thwack  every  now  and  then 
in  the  small  of  his  back  (by  way  of  a  cure)  and  await  the 
outcome — I  mean,  of  the  mouthful.  I  myself  have  been 
limping  about  the  world  in  all  directions,  with  my  sil- 
houette scissors,  and  am  now  taking  a  little  rest  in  Vaduz 
at  a  studious,  bibliothecarian  Count's,  who  really  deserves 
that  I  should  like  him  ten  times  better  than  I  do.  But, 
you  see,  my  fondness  for  you  is  fully  as  much  as  my  hearse 
can  hold  ;  and  (to  speak  in  general  terms')  the  human  ra<*oe, 
and  this  green  cheese  of  a  world  which  it  keeps  on  gnawing 
at,  seem  to  me  more  and  more  rotten  and  stinking  every 
day.  I  must  say  to  you,  '  Fame  may  go  to  the  devil !  '  I 
think  I  shall  decidedly  dip  down,  disappear,  and  ge>t  out 
of  the  way  altogether,  almost  immediately,  run  right  into 
the  thick  of  the  crowd,  and  come  to  the  surface  every  week 


CHAP.  XI.]        FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        337 

under  a  new  name,  so  that  the  fools  shan't  know  who  I  am. 
Ah !  there  were  a  few  years,  once  on  a  time,  when  I  really 
did  wish  to  be  something — if  not  a  great  author,  at  least  a 
ninth  elector — to  be  mitred,  at  any  rate,  if  not  belaurelled 
— if  not  (now  and  then)  to  be  a  pro-rector,  certainly  (and 
very  often)  to  be  a  dean.  At  that  period  of  my  life  I  should 
have  been  exceedingly  delighted  had  I  suffered  the  most 
atrocious  tortures  from  gallstones,  because  I  should  have 
been  able  to  erect  (with  those  eliminated  from  my  system) 
an  altar  or  temple  in  my  own  honour,  higher  than  the 

Eyramid  mentioned  by  Ruysh  in  his  '  Cabinet  of  Natural 
cience '  as  having  been  constructed  of  the  forty-two  gall- 
stones of  a  certain  noble  lady.  Siebenkass,  in  those  days 
I  could  have  gotten  me  a  beard  of  wasps  (as  Wildau  used 
to  have  one  of  bees) — a  stinging  beard  of  wasps,  for  nothing 
else  but  to  become  famous  thereby.  '  I  quite  admit '  (said  I, 
at  the  period  in  question)  '  that  it  is  not  accorded  to  every 
son  of  earth  (neither  should  he  expect  it),  as  it  was  to  Saint 
Eomuald  (as  Bembo  mentions  in  his  life  of  him),  that  a 
city  shall  beat  him  to  death,  merely  to  be  enabled  to  filch 
his  holy  body  by  way  of  a  relic ;  but  he  may,  I  think, 
without  being  unduly  conceited,  entertain  a  desire  that  a 
few  hairs,  if  not  of  his  fur-coat  (as  of  Voltaire's,  in  Paris), 
yet,  at  all  events,  of  his  head,  may  have  the  good  luck  to 
be  plucked  out  as  a  souvenir  by  people  who  have  a  certain 
opinion  of  him.  (Here  I  chiefly  allude  to  the  reviewers.)' 
"  At  the  time  in  question  I  thought  as  above  set  forth, 
but  now  my  views  are  far  more  enlightened.  Fame  is  a 
thing  altogether  un  .vorthy  of  fame.  1  was  once  sitting,  on 
a  cold,  wet  evening,  on  a  boundary-stone,  considering  myself 
carefully,  and  I  said,  '  Now,  is  there  really  anything  in  the 
wide  world  that  can  be  made  of  you?  What  is  it?  Have 
you  any  chance  of  becoming  (like  the  deceased  Cornelius* 
Agrippa)  Secretary  of  State  for  War  to  the  Emperor  Maxi- 
milian, and  Historiographer  to  the  Emperor  Charles  the 
Fifth?  Will  you  ever  hoist  yourself  up  to  the  position  of 
Syndic  and  Advocate  of  the  city  of  Metz,  Physician  in 
Ordinary  to  the  Duchess  of  Anjou,  and  Professor  of  Theo- 
logy in  Pavia  ?  Do  you  find  that  the  Cardinal  of  Lorraine 
is  as  anxious  to  stand  godfather  to  your  son  as  he  was  to 
Agrippa's  ?  And  would  it  not  be  ludicrous  if  you  were  to 
II.  z 


338  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  BICHTER.      [BOOK  IIL 

give  out  (and  give  yourself  airs  about  it)  that  a  Margrave 
in  Italy,  and  the  King  of  England,  the  Chancellor  Mercu- 
rius  Galinaria,  and  Margarita  (a  Princess  of  Austria),  had 
all  wished  to  have  you  in  their  service  in  the  same  year  ? 
Wouldn't  it  be  ludicrous,  and  a  lie  into  the  bargain,  to  say 
nothing  of  the  utter  impossibility  of  the  thing,  seeing  that 
all  these  people  exploded  into  the  sleeping-powder  of  death  so 
many  years  before  you  flashed  up  in  the  shape  of  the  priming 
and  detonating  powder  of  life !  In  what  well-known  work 
(let  me  ask  you)  does  Paul  Jovius  style  you  a  portentosum 
ingenium  f  What  author  reckons  you  among  the  clarissima 
sui  8oeculi  lumina  ?  If  it  had  been  the  case  that  you  stood  in 
extraordinary  credit  with  four  cardinals  and  five  bishops 
— with  Erasmus,  Melancthon,  and  Capellanus — wouldn't 
Schrockh  and  Schmidt  have  mentioned  it,  en  passant,  in 
their  "  History  of  the  Eeformation  "  ?  Even  supposing  that 
I  were  actually  reposing  side  by  side  with  Cornelius 
Agrippa  under  his  great  grove  of  shrubbery  of  laurels,  the 
same  lot  would  be  mine  and  his ;  we  should  both  rot  away 
in  obscurity  beneath  the  thicket,  and  it  would  be  centuries 
before  anybody  came  to  lift  the  branches  and  take  a  look 
at  us.' 

"  It  would  do  me  no  more  good  were  I  to  go  about  the 
matter  more  knowingly,  and  have  myself  belauded  in  the 
4  Universal  German  Library.'  I  might  stand  for  many  a 
long  year,  with  my  wreath  of  bays  round  my  hat  in  that 
chill  pocket-Pantheon,  in  my  niche  amongst  the  great 
literati  lying  and  sitting  round  me  on  their  beds  of 
state — we  might  all  (I  say)  wait  begarlanded  there,  all 
alone  together  in  that  Temple  of  Fame  of  ou^s  for  many  a 
long  year  before  a  single  soul  came  and  opened  the  door, 
and  looked  in  at  us,  or  entered  and  knelt  down  before 
me ;  and  our  triumphal  car  would  be  nothing  but  a  wheel- 
barrow, on  which  our  temple,  with  all  its  riches,  should 
be  whirled  occasionally  to  a  public  auction.  Yet  I  might, 
perhaps,  soar  above  all  that,  and  make  myself  immortal, 
could  I  but  indulge  a  demi-hope  that  my  immortality 
would  reach  the  ears  of  any  but  those  who  are  themselves 
as  yet  in  this  mortal  life.  But  can  it  afford  me  the  smallest 
gratification  when  I  am  compelled  to  perceive  that  it  is 
exactly  to  all  the  most  renowned  and  cele -/talnd  of  people, 


CHAP.  XI.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        339 

over  whose  faces  the  laurel  is  growing,  year  by  year,  in 
their  coffins  (as  the  rosemary  does  over  humbler  dead), 
that  I  can  never  be  anything  but  an  unexplored  Africa — 
particularly  to  Shem,  Ham,  and  Japhet;  to  Absalom  and 
his  father;  to  both  the  Catos,  the  two  Anthonys,  Nebu- 
chadnezzar, the  Seventy  Interpreters,  and  their  wives ;  t« 
the  seven  wise  men  of  Greece ;  even  to  mere  fools,  such  as 
Taubmann  and  Eulenspiegel  ?  When  a  Henry  IV.,  and 
the  four  Evangelists,  and  Bayle  (who  knows  all  the  rest 
of  the  learned),  and  the  charming  Ninon  (who  knows  them 
better  still),  and  Job,  the  bearer  of  sorrows — or,  at  all 
events,  the  author  of  Job — don't  know  that  there  ever  was 
such  a  thing  as  a  Leibgeber  on  the  face  of  the  earth :  when 
I  am,  and  must  ever  remain,  to  a  whole  bj'e-gone  world 
(i.e.,  six  thousand  years  replete  with  great  and  grand  men 
and  nations),  a  mathematical  point,  an  invisible  eclipse,  a 
wretched  je  ne  sais  quoi,  I  really  do  not  see  how  posterity 
(in  which  there  mayn't  be  so  very  much  after  all),  or  the 
next  six  thousand  years,  can  do  anything  to  speak  of  by 
way  of  compensation. 

"  Besides,  I  cannot  tell  what  description  of  glorious 
heavenly  hosts  and  archangels  there  are  upon  other  world- 
balls,  and  on  the  little  spheres  in  the  milky  way — that 
paternoster  bead-chaplet  of  world-balls  —  seraphs,  com- 
pared to  whom  T  cannot  be  looked  upon  as  anything  but 
a  sheep.  We  souls  do,  it  is  true,  progress  to  a  consider- 
able extent,  and  ascend  to  loftier  levels.  Even  here  upon 
earth  the  oyster-soul  develops  into  a  frog-soul,  the  frog- 
soul  into  a  cod-fish,  the  cod-fish  into  a  goose,  thence  to  a 
sheep,  an  ass — aye,  or  even  an  ape — and  ultimately  into  a 
Bush  Hottentot  (for  we  can  suppose  nothing  higher  than 
that).  But  a  peripatetic  climax  of  this  kind  begins  to 
cease  inflating  one  with  pride  when  the  following  reflection 
occurs  to  one.  Among  the  various  individuals  which 
compose  a  species  of  animals  (among  whom  there  must 
certainly  occur  geniuses,  good,  sound,  common-sense  intel- 
ligences, and  absolute  blockheads),  we  find  that  we  remark 
and  take  notice  only  of  the  latter,  or,  at  most,  of  the 
extremes.  No  species  of  animals  (considered  collectively) 
is  close  enough  to  our  retina  to  admit  of  our  perceiving  its 
delioate  middle  tints  and  gradations :  and  thus  must  it  be 

z  2 


340  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.      [BOOK  III. 

with  us  when  some  spirit,  sitting  in  heaven,  looks  at  us 
in  the  mass.  He  is  so  far  away,  that  he  will  find  some 
trouble  (very  vain  trouble,  too)  in  drawing  a  proper  dis- 
tinction between  Kant,  and  his  shaving  looking-glasses — 
the  Kantists;  between  Goethe  and  his  imitators;  and  will 
see  little  or  no  difference  between  members  of  faculty  and 
dunces,  professors'  lecture-rooms  and  lunatic  asylums ;  for 
little  steps  are  wholly  lost  to  the  sight  of  one  who  is 
standing  on  the  uppermost  of  them. 

"  Now  this  deprives  a  thinker  of  all  pleasure  and  cou- 
rage ;  and.  Siebenkses,  hang  me  if  I  ever  sit  down  and 
grow  one  bit  famous,  or  give  myself  the  trouble  either  to 
build  up  or  to  pull  down  any  learned  or  ingenious  system 
whatever,  or  write  anything  at  all  of  greater  length  than 
a  letter. 

"  Thy  (not  my)  Self, 
"L. 

"  P.S. — I  wish  it  would  please  God  to  grant  me  a  second 
life  after  this,  that  I  might  have  the  opportunity  of  dealing 
with  a  few  realities  in  the  next  world ;  for  this  one  is  really 
altogether  too  hollow  and  stupid ;  a  wretched  Nurnberg 
toy ;  nothing  but  the  falling  froth  of  a  life  ;  a  jump  through 
the  hoop  of  eternity;  a  rotten,  dusty,  apple  of  Sodom, 
which,  splutter  as  much  as  I  will,  I  can't  get  out  of  my 
mouth.     Oh !— " 

To  readers  who  think  the  above  piece  of  humour  not  suffi- 
ciently serious,  I  shall  prove,  in  another  place,  that  it  is  too 
serious,  and  that  it  is  only  an  oppressed  heart  which  can  jest 
in  this  fashion ;  that  it  is  only  an  eye  which  is  in  much 
too  feverish  a  condition  —with  the  fireworks  of  life  darting 
round  it  like  the  flying  fire-flashes  which  precede  amaurosi$ 
— which  is  capable  of  seeing  and  picturing  such  fever-forms. 

Firmian  understood  it  all,  at  the  time  in  question  at  all 
events.  But  I  must  go  back  to  the  11th  of  February,  in 
order  to  half-deprive  the  reader  of  his  sympathising  enjoy- 
ment of  the  re-union  of  the  trefoil  of  friends  which  then 
took  place.  Lenette's  trembling  petition  that  her  husband 
would  pardon  her,  was  but  the  forced  hot-bed  fruit  of  Ziehen's 
earth-shaking  prophecy.  She  thought  that  she  herself,  and 
the  ground  she  stood  upon,  were  about  to  be  let  down ;  and 


CHAP.  XI.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        341 

it  was  at  the  near  approach  of  death  (whom  she  thought  she 
already  saw  wagging  his  tiger's  tail)  that  she  held  out  to  her 
husband  a  hand  of  Christian  peace.  For  (and  to)  that  beau- 
tiful  soul  of  his  (disembodied)  hers  wept  tears  of  love  and 
of  rapture.  But  very  probably  she,  to  some  extent,  con- 
fused her  happiness  with  her  love — satisfaction  with 
fidelity ;  and  (it  may  be  suspected)  the  eagerness  with 
which  she  was  looking  forward  to  enwrapping  the  Schul- 
rath,  that  very  evening,  in  a  warm  and  tender — gaze, 
found  outward  expression  in  the  shape  of  an  unusual 
degree  of  affection  for  her  husband.  It  is  here  most  es- 
sential that  I  should  communicate  to  all  and  sundry  per- 
sons one  of  the  most  valuable  of  all  my  maxims;  in 
dealings  with  even  the  very  best  woman  in  the  world,  it 
is  of  the  utmost  importance  that  we  should  make  exces- 
sively certain,  and  discriminate  with  the  utmost  accuracy, 
what  it  is  which  she  really  wants  (at  the  time  being),  and 
particularly  whom — (this  is  not  always  the  person  who  is 
thus  discriminating).  There  is  in  the  female  heart  such  a 
rapid  coming  and  going,  and  fluctuation,  of  emotions  of 
every  kind ;  such  an  effusion  of  many-tinted  bubbles  which 
reflect  everything,  but  most  particularly  whatever  chances 
to  be  nearest,  that  a  woman,  under  the  influence  of  emotion, 
shall,  while  she  sheds  a  tear  for  you  out  of  her  left  eye, 
go  on  thinking,  and  drop  another  for  your  predecessor  or 
successor  (as  the  case  may  be)  out  of  her  right.  Also  a 
feeling  of  tenderness  for  a  rival  falls  half  to  a  husband's 
share ;  and  a  woman,  even  the  most  loyally  faithful,  weeps 
more  at  what  she  thinks  than  at  what  she  hears. 

'Tis  very  stupid  that  so  many  masculine  persons  among 
us  are  stupid  precisely  on  this  point ;  that  a  woman  thinking 
(as  she  does)  more  of  other  people's  feelings  than  of  her 
own,  is,  in  tliis  matter,  neither  the  deceiver  nor  the  de- 
ceived ;  what  she  is  is  the  deception  itself — the  optical 
deception  and  the  acoustic. 

But  Firmians  seldom  make  well-digested  reflections  of 
this  sort  concerning  elevenths  of  February  until  the 
twelfth.  Wendeline  was  in  love  with  the  Schulrath ;  that 
was  the  fact  of  the  matter.  Like  all  women  of  any  sense 
(in  Kuhschnappel),  she  had  believed  in  the  superintendent- 
general,  and  in  the  kick  he  had  administered  to  the  earth, 


342       JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.   [BOOK  III. 

until  Peltzstiefel,  in  the  evening, unhesitatingly  pronounced 
the  idea  of  such  a  thing  to  be  simply  impious,  when  she 
abandoned  the  prophetic  superintendent  and  gave  in  her 
adhesion  to  the  incredulous  worldling,  Firmian.  We  all 
know  that  he  had  every  bit  as  much  of  the  masculine 
failing  of  overdoing  consistency  as  she  had  of  the  feminine 
one  of  carrying  inconsistency  too  far.  It  was  foolish,  there- 
fore, in  him  to  think  that  he  was  going  to  regain,  by 
means  of  one  grand  effusion  of  the  heart,  an  affection  em- 
bittered by  so  many  small  effusions  of  gall.  The  grandest 
benefits,  the  loftiest  manly  enthusiasm,  are  incapable  of 
uprooting,  all  in  an  instant,  a  feeling  of  ill-will  which  has 
rooted  itself  all  over  a  person's  heart  with  a  thousand 
little  spreading  fibres.  The  affection  which  we  have  de- 
prived ourselves  of  by  means  of  a  long-continued,  gradual 
process  of  chilling,  is  only  to  be  regained  by  an  equally 
lengthy  process  of  warming. 

In  a  word,  it  became  evident  in  the  course  of  a  day  or 
two  that  things  were  just  as  they  had  been  three  weeks 
before.  Lenette's  love  had  flourished  and  grown  to  such 
an  extent,  by  reason  of  Stiefel's  absence,  that  there  was 
not  room  for  it  any  longer  under  its  bell-glass — it  was 
shooting  out  leaves  beyond  the  edge  of  it  into  the  open- 
air.  The  Aqua  Toffana  of  jealousy  at  last  permeated  every 
vessel  in  Firmian's  body,  flowed  into  his  heart,  and  gnawed 
it  slowly  in  pieces.  He  was  but  the  tree  on  which  Lenette 
had  inscribed  her  love  for  another,  and  was  withering  by 
reason  of  the  incisions.  He  had  so  hoped  that  the  Schulrath, 
recalled  to  them  on  Lenette's  birthday,  would  have  healed 
all  wounds,  however  deep ;  or  at  all  events  cicatrized  them 
over  :  whereas,  what  he  really  had  done  was  to  open  them 
all  wider  than  ever — all  unconscious  as  he  was  of  it.  Ah ! 
what  pain  this  was  to  the  wretched  husband !  He  grew 
poorer  and  weaker,  and  more  miserable — both  outwardly 
and  inwardly — as  the  days  went  by,  and  gave  up  all  hope 
of  ever  seeing  the  First  of  May  and  Bayreuth.  February, 
March,  and  April  passed  over  head — all  heavy,  dripping 
clouds,  without  a  single  break  of  blue  sky  or  blink  of 
evening-red. 

On  the  1st  of  April  he  lost  his  law-suit  for  the  second 
time ;  and  on  the  13th  (Maunday  Thursday)  he  finished, 


CHAP.  XI.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        343 

for  ever,  his  •  Evening  Paper '  (this  was  the  name  he  gave 
to  his  diary,  because  he  wrote  it  of  an  evening),  meaning 
to  consign  that,  along  with  his  '  Selections  from  the  Devil's 
Papers '  (as  far  as  they  were  completed)  into  Leibgeber's 
most  faithful  hands  (at  Bayreuth),  in  place  of  his  body,  so 
soon  to  vanish  and  be  resolved  into  its  elements.  For,  he 
thought,  those  hands  would  fanner  clasp  his  soul  (which 
was  in  the  papers)  than  his  poor  meagre  body — of  which, 
du  reste,  Liebgeber  always  possessed  a  second  unaltered 
edition  (a  perfect  facsimile  copy,  so  to  speak)  at  all  times 
at  hand,  in  the  shape  of  his  own.  I  have  no  hesitation 
in  here  quoting,  without  emendation,  the  whole  of  this  con- 
cluding page  of  the  'Evening  Paper' — Firmian's  'Swan 
Sung,'  which — which  went  off  by  the  following  post. 

"  Yesterday,  my  law-suit  was  wrecked  on  the  shoal  of  the 
Court  of  Appeal  of  the  second  instance.  The  defendant's 
counsel,  and  the  Court, brought  to  bear  upon  me  an  old  Sta- 
tute, of  force  in  Kuhschnappel  as  well  as  in  Bayreuth,  which 
enacts  that  a  deposition  made  before  a  notary  is  not  valid 
— depositions  having  to  be  made  before  the  Court.  These 
two  hearings  of  my  case  render  the  uphill  path  to  the 
third  a  little  easier.  For  my  poor  Lenette's  sake  I  have 
appealed  to  the  Lower  House,  my  kind  Stiefel  advancing 
me  the  necessary  cash.  Truly,  in  applying  to  the  oracles 
of  Justice  we  have  to  fast  and  mortify,  just  as  much  as 
was  de  rigueur  in  consulting  the  heathen  oracles  of  old.  I 
have  reason  to  hope  that  I  shall  be  able  to  effect  my  escape 
from  the  clutches  of  the  knaves  of  the  State  ;*  or  (shall  I 
say),  from  these  game-keepers  and  their  couteauz  de  chasse, 
and  hunting-spears  or  swords  of  Themis.  I  think  I  shall 
get  through  their  hunting-tackle  of  legal  proceedings,  the 
toils,  nets,  and  gins  of  their  Acts  of  Parliament — not  by  my 
purse  (which  is  fallen  away  to  the  thickness  of  an  insect's 
feeler,  and  could  be  drawn,  like  a  leather  queue,  through 
the  smallest  mesh  in  any  of  their  legal  nets) — but  with  my 
body,  which,  as  it  approaches  the  topmost  of  their  nets 
will  be  turned  into  dust  of  death,  and  will  then  fly  free 
through  and  over  every  trap  they  can  set. 

*  Servants  were  called  "knaves"  of  old,  and  deserve  the  name 
pretty  often  at  the  present  day. 


344  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  EICHTER.      [BOOK  III. 

"  I  desire  to  lift  my  hand  away  from  this,  my  evening 
paper,  to-night  for  the  last  time,  ere  it  becomes  an  absolute 
martyrology.  If  one  could  give  away  his  life  as  a  gift,  I 
should  be  very  happy  to  give  mine  to  any  dying  person 
who  would  care  to  accept  it.  At  the  same  time,  let 
nobody  suppose  that  because  there  chances  to  be  a  total 
eclipse  of  the  sun  above  my  head,  I  think,  for  a  moment,  that 
there  must  be  one  in  America  as  well ;  or  that  I  imagine 
the  Gold  Cuast  must  be  snowed  up  for  the  winter  because 
a  snowflake  or  two  happen  to  be  falling  in  front  of  my 
own  nose.  Life  is  warm  and  beautiful ;  even  mine  was  so 
once.  If  it  must  be  that  I  am  to  melt  away,  even  before 
these  snowflakes,  I  beg  of  my  heirs,-  and  of  all  Christian 
people,  that  they  will  not  publish  any  part  of  my  selection 
from  the  *  Devil's  Papers,'  except  that  which  I  have  copied 
out  fair,  which  extends  as  far  as  the  '  Satire  upon  Women ' 
(inclusively).  And  as  regards  this  diary  of  mine,  in  which 
one  or  two  satirical  fancies  crop  out  here  and  there,  I  beg, 
also,  that  not  a  single  one  of  these  may  be  put  into  print. 

"  Should  any  curious  inquirer  into  the  history  of  this 
flay-and-night-book  of  mine  be  anxious  to  discover  what 
the  heavy  weights,  the  nests,  the  clothes  hung  out  to  dry 
upon  my  branches,  really  consisted  of,  that  they  should  so 
bend  my  top  shoot  and  my  branches  down  (and  all  the  more 
curious  to  know  it,  inasmuch  as  I  have  written  humorous 
satires) — (though,  indeed,  my  sole  object  has  been  to  nourish 
and  support  myself  by  help  of  these  satire  prickles  of  mine, 
absorbent  vessels,  to  me,  like  those  of  the  torch-thistle),  I 
beg  to  inform  him  that  he  seeks  to  know  more  than  I  know 
myself,  and  more  than  I  mean  to  tell.  For  man  and  the  horse- 
radish are  most  biting  when  grated ;  and  the  satirist  is 
sadder  than  the  jester,  for  the  same  reason  that  the  Urang- 
Utang  is  more  melancholy  than  the  ape,  namely,  because  he 
is  nobler.  If  this  paper  does  really  reach  your  hands,  my 
Henry,  my  beloved,  and  you  wish  to  hear  somewhat  con- 
cerning the  hail  which  has  kept  falling  deeper  and  deeper 
upon  my  young  seed-crop — count  not  the  melted  hail- 
stones, but  the  broken  stalks.  I  have  nothing  left  to  give 
me  joy,  save  your  affection — everything  else  is  battered 
down  into  ruin.  Since,  for  more  reasons  than  one,*  it  is 
*  Lack  of  money  and  of  health. 


CHAP.  XI.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        345 

most  unlikely  that  I  shall  ever  come  to  you  at  Bayreuth, 
let  us  part,  on  this  page,  like  spirits,  giving  each  other 
hands  of  air.  I  detest  the  sentimental,  but  Fate  has  well- 
nigh  grafted  it  on  to  me  at  last,  in  spite  of  myself,  and 
I  swallow  great  spoonsful  of  that  satiric  Glauber's  salt, 
which  is  generally  so  good  a  remedy  for  it— as  sheep,  who 
have  caught  the  rot  from  feeding  in  damp  meadows,  are 
cured  by  licking  salt.  I  say  I  swallow  great  spoonsful, 
about  the  size  of  my  prizes  at  the  bird-shooting,  without 
the  least  perceptible  eifect.  But,  on  the  whole,  it  matters 
little.  Fate,  unlike  our  Sheriffs'  Courts,  does  not  wait 
until  we  are  well  before  she  inflicts  her  sentence.  My 
giddiness  and  other  premonitory  symptoms  of  apoplexy, 
give  me  to  understand,  with  sufficient  clearness,  that  I 
shall  soon  be  subjected  to  a  good  Galenian  blood-letting,* 
by  way  of  remedy  for  the  nose-bleedings  of  this  life.  I 
cannot  say  that  I  am  particularly  glad  of  it,  or  anxious 
for  it.  On  the  contrary,  I  am  annoyed  with  people  who 
demand  that  Fate  shall  at  once  unswaddle  them  (for  we 
are  swaddled  in  our  bodies,  the  nerves  and  arteries  being 
the  swaddling-bandrs) — as  a  mother  does  her  infant  just 
because  it  cries,  and  has  a  little  pain  in  its  stomach.  I 
should  be  glad  to  remain  swaddled  for  a  whil©  to  come 
among  the  rest  of  the  '  Children  of  the  Bope,'")"  particu- 
larly as  I  cannot  but  fear  that,  in  the  next  world,  I  shall 
be  able  to  make  little  or  no  use  of  my  satirical  humour. 
However,  I  shall  have  to  go.  But  when  that  comes  to 
pass,  I  should  like  to  ask  you,  Henry,  to  come  some  day 
to  this  town,  and  make  them  uncover  your  friend's  quiet 
face,  which  will  scarce  manage  to  put  on  the  Hippocratic 
mien  again.  Then,  my  Henry,  when  you  gaze  long  upon 
the  grey,  spotty,  new  moon-face  there,  and  think  that 
very  little  sunshine  ever  fell  thereon — no  sunshine  of 
love,  of  fame,  or  fortune — you  will  not  be  able  to  look 
up  to  heaven,  and  cry  out  to  God,  'And  now,  at  last, 
after  all  his  sorrows  and  troubles,  Thou,  0  God,  hast 
annihilated  him  altogether ;  when  he  stretched  his  arms, 
in  death,  towards  Thee,  and  that  world  of  thine,  Thou  hast 
broken  him  in  sunder  as  he  lies  there — poor  soul ! '     No, 

*  One  continued  until  fainting  supervenes. 

f  Persons  condemned  by  the  seore   tribunals  were  so  styled. 


846  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDR1UII  RICHTER.      [BOOK  III. 

Henry,  when  I  die,  you  will  be  compelled  to  believe  in 
Immortality. 

"Now  that  I  have  finished  this  'Evening  Paper'  of  mine, 
I  am  going  to  put  out  the  light,  for  the  full  moon  is 
shedding  broad,  imperial  sheets  of  brightness  into  tho 
room.  Then,  as  there  is  no  one  else  awake  in  the  house, 
I  will  sit  down  in  the  twilight  stillness,  and,  while  I  gaze 
at  the  moon's  white  magic  amid  the  black  magic  of  night, 
and  listen  to  great  flocks  of  birds  of  passage  as  they  come 
flying  hither  from  warmer  lands  through  the  blue,  clear 
moonlight — while  I  am  passing  away  into  a  sister  country — 
I  will  stretch  my  feelers  out  from  my  snail's  shell  once  more 
before  the  last  frost  closes  it  up  for  ever.  Henry,  I  want 
to  picture  to  myself  to-night,  clearly  and  brightly,  all 
that  is  now  over  and  past ;  the  May  of  our  friendship — 
every  evening  when  we  were  too  much  moved  by  emotion 
and  could  not  but  fall  into  each  other's  arms — my  hopes, 
so  old  and  grey  now  that  I  hardly  know  them  to  be  mine 
— five  old,  but  bright  and  happy,  springs  which  I  still 
remember — my  dead  mother,  who,  when  she  was  dying, 
gave  me  a  lemon,  which  she  thought  would  be  put  into 
her  coffin,  and  said,  '  Ah,  1  wish  it  were  going  into  my 
bridal  garland.'  And  I  will  picture  to  myself,  also,  that 
moment,  now  so  near,  of  my  own  death,  when  thy  image 
will  rise  before  the  broken  sight  of  my  soul  for  the  last 
time — wheu  I  shall  part  from  thee,  and,  with  a  dark, 
inward  pang,  which  can  no  more  bring  a  tear  into  my 
cold  and  glazing  eyes,  sink  away  from  thy  shadowy  form 
into  the  dark,  and  from  amid  the  thick  and  heavy  clouds 
of  death,  call  to  thee  with  a  faint  and  hollow  cry,  '  Henry, 
good-night !  good-night !  Ah,  fare  thee  well !  for  I  can 
say  no  more.' " 

End  of  the  •  Evening  Paper.' 


CHAP.    XII.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      347 


CHAPTEE  XII. 

THE  FLIGHT  OUT   OF   EGYPT  —  THE   GLORIES   OF   TRAVEL  —  THK 
UNKNOWN  —  BAYREUTH  —  BAPTISM  IN  A  STORM  —  NATHALIE 

AND   THE  HERMITAGE THE  MOST  IMPORTANT  CONVERSATION 

IN   ALL   THIS  BOOK  —  AN   EVENING   OF   FRIENDSHIP. 

Once,  in  the  Easter  week,  when  Firmian  came  home  from 
a  half-hour's  pleasure-trip  full  of  forced  marches,  Lenette 
linked  him  why  he  had  not  come  back  sooner,  because  the 
postman  had  been  with  a  great,  enormous  packet,  and  had 
6aid  that  the  husband  must  sign  the  receipt  for  it  himself. 
In  a  small  establishment  like  Siebenkae.s'  an  occurrence 
such  as  this  ranks  among  the  world's  greatest  events,  or 
the  principal  revolutions  in  its  history.  The  moments  of 
waiting  lay  on  their  souls  like  cupping-glasses  and  drawing 
plasters.  At  length  the  postman,  in  his  yellow  uniform,  put 
an  end  to  the  bitter-  sweet  hemp  beating  of  their  arteries. 
Firmian  acknowledged  the  receipt  of  fifty  dollars,  while 
Lenette  asked  the  postman  who  had  sent  them,  and  where 
they  came  from.     The  letter  commenced  thus  : — 

"  My  dear  Siebenkaes, 

"  I  have  received  your  '  Evening  Paper '  and  '  Devil's 
Selections  '  all  safely.     The  rest  by  word  of  mouth. 

"  Postscript. 
"  But  listen !  If  the  future  course  of  my  waltz  of  life 
is  a  matter  of  the  slightest  interest  to  you — if  you  care  in 
the  least  degree  about  my  happiness,  my  plans,  or  ideas 
— if  it  is  anything  to  you  but  a  matter  of  the  supremest 
indifference  that  I  frank  you  as  far  as  Bayieuth,  providing 
you  with  board,  lodging,  and  travelling  expenses — all  on 
account  of  a  project  whose  yarn  the  spinning-mills  of  the 
future  must  either  manufacture  into  gin-snares  and  gallows- 
ropes  (for  my  life),  or  else  into  rope-ladders  and  best  bower 
anchor-cables — if  this,  and  other  matters  more  momentous 
still,   have   the  smallest  power   over  you,   Firmian,  for 

heaven's  sake,  on  with  a  pair  of  boots  and  start ! " 

****** 

"And,  by  thy  holy  friendship!"  said  Siebenkass,  "1 


348  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

will  on  with  a  pair,  though  the  bolt  of  apoplexy  should 
flash  out  of  the  blue  sky  of  Swabia,  and  strike  me  down 
beneath  a  cherrv-tree  in  full  blossom.  Nothing  shall 
prevent  me  now  !  " 

He  kept  his  word,  for  in  six  days  from  thence  we  find 
him,  at  eleven  o'clock  at  night,  ready  for  his  journey,  with 
clean  linen  on  his  back,  and  in  his  pockets — with  a  hat- 
cover  on  his  head  (secretly  freighted  and  stuffed  with  an 
old  soft  hat) — his  newest  boots  (the  antediluvian  pairs 
relieved  from  duty,  being  left  behind  in  garrison) — and  a 
tower-clock,  borrowed  from  Peltzstiefel,  in  his  pocket — 
and  fresh  bathed,  shaven,  and  kempt,  standing  by  his  wife 
and  friend — both  of  whom  kept  their  eyes  fixed,  with  a 
gladsome,  courteous  watchfulness  upon  the  departing 
traveller  only,  and  did  not,  for  the  time  being,  look  at  all 
at  one  another.  He  took  his  leave  of  the  pair  while  it 
was  still  night,  being  minded  to  pass  the  rest  of  it  in  his 
arm  chair  (of  many  sorrows),  and  be  off  about  three 
o'clock,  while  Lenette  should  still  be  snoring.  He  com- 
mitted to  the  Schulrath  the  office  of  treasurer-in-chief  of 
the  widow's  fund  to  his  grass-widow,  and  the  manager- 
ship, or,  at  least,  the  '•  leading  business,"  of  his  miniature 
Covent  Garden  full  of  Gay's  Beggar's  Operas,  the 
theatrical  journal  whereof  I  am  here  writing  for  the 
edification  of  a  full  half  of  the  world.  "  Lenette,"  he  said, 
"  when  you  want  any  counsel,  apply  to  the  counsellor 
here ;  he  is  going  to  do  me  the  favour  to  come  and  see  you 
very  often  indeed."  Peltzstiefel  made  the  most  solemn 
promises  to  come  every  day.  Lenette  did  not  go  down 
stairs  to  the  door  with  the  Schulrath  when  he  went 
away,  as  she  usually  did,  but  remained  above,  and  draw- 
ing her  hand  out  of  her  replenished  money-bag  (the  starved 
stomachic  coats  of  which  had  hitherto  been  rubbing 
together),  snapped  it  to.  It  is  not  of  sufficient  import- 
ance to  be  recorded  that  Siebenkaes  asked  her  to  put  out 
the  light,  and  go  to  her  bed,  and  that  he  gave  her  charm- 
ing face  his  long  parting  kiss,  and  said  good  night,  and 
took  the  tender  farewell,  almost  within  the  Eden-gate  of 
the  land  of  dreams  with  that  redoublement  of  fondness 
with  which  we  take  our  leave  of  those  we  love,  and 
greet  them  when  we  come  back  to  them  again. 


CHAP.  XII.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      349 

The  watchman's  last  call  at  length  drew  him  from  his 
Bleeping  chair  out  into  the  starlight,  breezy  morning ;  but, 
first,  he  crept  once  more  into  the  bed-room  to  the  rose- 
maiden  dreaming  there,  warm  and  happy,  pulled  the 
window  to  (for  there  was  a  cool  air  from  it  falling  upon 
her  unprotected  breast),  and  would  not  suffer  his  lips  to 
touch  her  in  an  awakening  kiss.  He  gazed  at  her  by 
the  light  of  the  stars  and  early  blush  of  dawn,  till  he 
turned  his  eyes  away  (fast  growing  dim)  at  the  thought, 
"  perhaps  I  may  never  see  her  again." 

As  he  passed  through  the  sitting-room,  her  distaff  seemed 
to  look  at  him  as  if  it  were  a  thing  of  life ;  it  was  wrapped 
in  broad  bands  of  coloured  paper  (which  she  had  put  on  it 
because  she  had  not  got  silk)  ;  and  there  was  her  spinning- 
wheel,  too,  which  she  used  to  work  at  in  the  dark  morn- 
ings and  evenings  when  there  was  not  light  enough  for 
sewing.  As  he  pictured  her  to  himself  working  indus- 
triously at  them  while  he  was  away,  every  wish  of  his 
heart  cried  out,  "  Ah,  poor  darling !  may  all  go  well  with 
her,  always,  whether  I  ever  come  back  to  her  or  not." 

This  thought  of  the  last  time  grew  more  vivid  still  when 
he  was  out  in  the  open  air,  and  felt  a  slight  giddiness 
produced,  in  the  physical  part  of  his  head,  by  agitation 
and  broken  sleep,  as  well  as  natural  regret  at  the  sight 
of  his  home  receding  from  view,  and  the  town  growing 
dimmer,  and  the  foreground  changing  into  background, 
and  the  disappearance  of  all  the  paths  and  heights  on 
which  he  had  so  often  walked  a  little  life  into  his  be- 
numbed heart,  frozen  by  the  past  winter.  The  little  leaf 
whereon,  like  a  leaf  roller,  or  miner-worm,  he  had  been 
crawling  and  feeding,  was  falling  now  to  earth  behind  him, 
a  skeleton  leaf. 

But  the  first  spot  of  foreign,  unfamiliar  soil,  as  yet 
unmarked  by  any  "  Station  of  his  Passion,"  drew,  like  a 
serpent-stone,  an  acrid  drop  or  two  of  sorrow-poison  out 
of  his  heart. 

And  now  the  solar  flames  shot  higher  and  higher  up 
upon  the  enkindled  morning  clouds,  till,  at  length, 
hundreds  of  suns  rose  in  an  instant  in  the  sky,  in  the 
streams  and  pools,  and  in  the  dew-cups  of  the  flowers, 
while  thousands  of  varied  colours  went  flowing  athwart 


350  JEAN  PAUL  FEIEDRICH  BICHTEE.      |_BOOKI.  IX« 

the  face  of  earth,  and  one  bright  whiteness  broke  from 
the  sky. 

Fate  plucked  away  most  of  the  yellow,  faded  leaves 
from  Firmian's  soul,  as  gardeners  remove  those  of  plants 
in  spring.  His  giddiness  diminished  rather  than  other- 
wise as  he  went  on ;  the  walking  did  it  good.  As  the 
bun  rose  in  heaven,  another,  a  super-earthly  sun,  rose 
in  his  soul.  In  every  valley,  in  every  grove,  on  every 
rising  ground,  he  broke  and  cast  away  a  ring  or  two 
of  the  chrysalis-case  of  wintry  life  and  trouble  (which 
had  been  clinging  so  tightly  to  him),  and  unfolded  his  moist 
upper  and  nether  wings,  and  let  the  breeze  of  May  waft 
him  away,  on  four  outspread  pinions,  up  into  the  bright 
air  among  the  butterflies,  but  higher  than  they,  and  over 
loftier  flowers. 

And  then  with  what  a  burst  of  power  the  life  within  him 
began,  under  this  new  impetus,  to  boil  and  seethe,  as,  issuing 
from  a  diamond-mine  of  a  valley  all  shade  and  dew- 
drops,  he  walked  a  pace  or  two  up  through  the  heaven- 
gate  of  the  spring  It  was  as  if  some  great  earthquake  had 
upheaved  a  new-created  flowery  plain,  all  dripping  from 
the  ocean,  stretching  further  than  the  eye  could  reach,  all 
rich  in  youthful  powers  and  impulses.  The  fire  of  earth 
glowed  beneath  the  roots  of  this  great  hanging  garden, 
and  the  fire  of  heaven  flamed  above  it  burning  the  colours 
into  the  trees  and  flowers.  Between  the  white  mountains, 
as  between  porcelain  towers,  stood  the  bright  tinted, 
flowery  slopes  like  thrones  for  the  fruit  goddesses.  And 
all  over  the  face  of  this  great  camp  of  gladness,  the  cups 
of  the  flowers  and  the  heavy  dewdrops  were  pitched,  like 
peopled  tents.  The  earth  teemed  with  young  broods,  and 
sprouting  grasses,  and  countless  little  hearts ;  and  heart 
after  heart,  life  after  life,  burst  forth  into  being  from  out  the 
warm  brooding-cells  of  Mother  Nature — burst  forth  with 
wings,  or  silken  threads,  or  delicate  feelers — and  hummed, 
and  sucked,  and  smacked  its  lips  and  sang  And  for 
every  one  of  these  countless  honeysucking  trunks  a  cup 
of  gladness  had  long  since  been  filled  and  ready. 

In  this  great  market-place  of  this  living  city  of  the 
sun,  so  full  of  glory  and  sounding  life,  the  pet  child  of 
the  infinite  Mother  stood  solitary — gazing,  with  bright 


CHAP.  XII.  j      FLOWEK,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      351 

and  happy  eyes,  delighted,  around  him  into  all  its  innu- 
merable streets.  But  his  eternal  Mother  wore  her  veil 
of  immeasurable  immensity,  and  it  was  only  the  warmth 
which  pierced  to  his  heart  which  told  him  that  he  was 
lying  upon  her  breast.  Firmian  reposed  from  this  two 
hours'  intoxication  of  heart  in  a  peasant's  hut.  The 
foaming  spirit  of  a  cup  of  joy  like  this  went  quicker  to 
the  heart  of  a  sick  man  such  as  he  than  to  those  of  the 
commoner  run  of  sufferers. 

When  he  went  out  again  the  glory  had  sobered  down 
into  brightness,  and  his  enthusiasm  into  simple  happiness. 
Every  red  ladybird  fluttering  on  its  way,  every  red 
church-roof,  and.  every  sparkling  stream  as  it  glittered  and 
glistened  with  dancing  stars,  shed  joyous  lights  and 
brilliant  colours  upon  his  soul.  When  he  heard  the  cries 
of  the  charcoal  burners  in  the  wood,  the  resounding  crack- 
ing of  whips,  and  the  crash  of  falling  trees,  and  then,  when 
coming  out  into  the  open,  he  saw  the  white  chateaux  and 
roads  standing  out  against  the  dark-green  background  like 
constellations  and  milky  ways,  and  above  the  shining 
cloud  specks  in  the  deep  blue  sky ;  while  lights  flashed 
and  darted  everywhere,  now  down  from  trees,  now  up 
from  streams,  now  athwart  saws  in  the  distance — there 
was  no  such  thing  as  a  foggy  corner  left  in  his  soul,  nor 
a  single  spot  in  it  all  unpenetrated  by  the  spring  sun- 
shine :  the  moss  of  gnawing,  corroding  care,  which  can 
grow  only  in  damp  shade,  fell  from  his  bread-trees  and 
trees  of  liberty  out  here  in  the  glad,  free  air,  and  his  soul 
could  not  but  join  in  the  great  chorus  of  flying  and 
humming  creatures  which  was  rising  all  round  him,  sing- 
ing, "  Life  is  beautiful,  and  youth  is  lovelier  still ;  but 
spring  is  loveliest  of  all." 

The  bygone  winter  lay  behind  him  like  the  dark, 
frozen  South  Pole  ;  the  royal  burgh  of  Kuhschnappel  like 
some  deep,  dreary  school-dungeon  with  dripping  walls. 
The  only  spot  in  it  over  which  broad,  gladsome  sunbeams 
were  intertwining  was  his  own  home,  and  he  pictured  to 
himself  Lenette  in  that  home  as  commander-in-chief,  free 
to  talk,  cook,  and  wash  at  her  own  sweet  will,  and  with 
her  head  (and  hands,  too)  full  all  day  long  of  the  delight 
that  was  coming  in  the  evening.    He  was  glad  from  the 


352  JEAN  PAUL  TOIEDRICH  EICIITER.      [BOOK  III. 

very  depths  of  his  heart  that,  in  that  little  egg-shell  of 
hers,  that  sulphur-hut  and  chartreuse,  she  should  enjoy 
the  glory  and  brightness  which  that  angel  Peltzstiefel 
would  bring  with  him  into  her  St.  Peter's  prison.  "  Ah ! 
in  God's  name,"  thought  he,  "  may  she  be  as  happy  as  I 
am — nay,  and  happier,  too,  if  that  be  possible." 

The  more  villages  he  came  to,  with  their  troupes  of 
strolling  players  (of  inhabitants),  the  more  did  life  in 
general  seem  to  assume  a  theatrical  guise  —  his  past 
troubles  were  transformed  into  leading  parts  in  the  drama, 
or  Aristotelian  problems — his  clothes  into  stage  costumes 
— his  new  boots  became  loihurna — and  his  purse  a  theatre 
treasury — while  a  delicious  stage-recognition  was  await- 
ing him  in  the  arms  of  his  beloved  Henry. 

About  half-past  three  in  the  afternoon,  in  a  Swabian 
village,  whose  name  he  did  not  inquire,  his  whole  soul 
melted  of  a  sudden  to  tears,  so  that  he  was  completely 
astonished  at  the  unlooked-for  and  rapid  attendriasement 
His  surroundings  at  the  time  would  have  rather  led  him 
to  anticipate  a  contrary  effect.  He  was  standing  by  an 
old  thorn-tree,  rather  crooked,  and  dead  at  the  top;  the 
village  women  were  on  the  green  washing  their  clothes, 
which  glistened  in  the  sunlight,  and  throwing  down 
chopped  eggs  and  nettles  to  feed  the  downy,  yellow  gos- 
lings ;  a  gentleman's  gardener  was  clipping  a  hedge,  while 
a  herd-boy  was  summoning  his  sheep  (clipped  already  for 
their  part)  round  the  thorn-tree,  with  his  cornemuse.  It 
was  all  so  youthful,  so  pretty,  so  Italian !  The  beautiful 
May  had  half  (or  wholly)  unclad  everything  and  every- 
one— the  sheep,  the  geese,  the  women,  the  shepherd-min- 
strel, the  hedger,  and  his  hedge.    .   .    . 

Why  was  he  thus  moved  to  tenderness  in  this  gladsome 
ind  smiling  scene  ?  Partly  because  he  had  been  so  happy 
all  day,  but  chiefly  by  the  shepherd  bassoonist  calling  his 
flock  together  with  that  stage  instrument  of  his  beneath 
the  thorn.  Firmian  had  helped  a  shepherd  of  this  sort, 
with  a  crook  and  a  reed-pipe,  to  drive  his  own  father's 
sheep  home  hundreds  of  times  when  he  was  a  boy ;  and 
the  tones  of  the  Banz  des  Vaches  brought  back  in  an  instant 
his  own  rose-coloured  childhood — it  arose  from  out  its 
dew  of  the  morning,  its  bowers  of  budding  blossoms  and 


CHAP.  XII.J      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      353 

sleeping  flowers,  and  stood  before  him  in  heavenly  guise, 
and  smiled  in  all  its  own  innocence  dressed  in  its  thousand 
hopes,  saying,  "  Behold  me !  see  how  lovely  T  am ;  we 
used  to  piay  together,  you  and  I ;  how  much  I  used  to 
give  you  ! — grand  kingdoms,  broad  meadows,  and  gold, 
and  a  great,  endless  Paradise  beyond  the  hills.  But  it 
seems  you  have  nothing  left  now.  And  how  pale  you  are, 
and  worn  I     Come  and  play  with  me  again  !" 

Who  is  there  amongst  us  to  whom  Music  has  not  brought 
back  his  ohildhood  a  thousand  times?  She  comes  and  says, 
"Are  not  the  rosebuds  blown  yet  which  I  gave  you?" 
Yes,  yes,  they  are  blown  ;  they  were  white  roses,  though  ! 

The  evening  made  his  joy-flowers  close,  folding  their 
petals  together  above  their  nectaries ;  and  an  evening  dew 
of  melancholy  fell  ever  heavier  and  thicker  upon  his  soul 
as  he  went  on  his  way.  Just  before  sunset  he  came  to  a 
village ;  I  am  sorry  to  say  I  cannot  remember  whether  it 
was  Honbart,  or  Houstein,  or  Jaxheim ;  but  of  this  I  am 
pretty  certain,  that  it  was  one  of  the  three,  because  it  was 
near  the  Paver  Jagst,  and  in  Anspach,  on  the  borders  of 
Ellwangen.  His  night-quarters  lay  smoking  down  in  the 
valley  before  him.  Before  going  on  into  them  he  lay 
down  on  the  hill-side  beneath  a  tree,  whose  branches  were 
the  cathedral  chancel  of  a  choir  of  singing  creatures. 
Not  far  from  him  gleamed  the  trembling  tinsel  of  a  piece 
of  water,  glittering  in  the  evening  sun ;  and  above  him 
the  gulden  leaves  and  the  white  blossoms  rustled  like 
grasses  waving  over  flowers.  The  cuckoo  (always  her 
own  sounding-board  and  multiplying  echo)  talked  to  him 
from  the  tree-top  in  mournful  tones  of  sorrow ;  the  sun 
was  goue  ;  the  shadows  were  throwing  thick  veils  of  crape 
over  the  brightness  of  the  day.  He  asked  himself,  "  Wliat 
is  my  Lenette  doing  now  ?  Of  whom  is  she  thinking  ? 
Who  is  with  her?"  And  here  there  fell  about  his  heart, 
like  a  band  of  ice,  the  thought,  "  Ah  !  but  I  have  no  loved 
one  whose  hand  I  can  clasp  !  " 

After  drawing  to  himself  a  vivid  picture  of  the  tender, 
delicate,  beautiful,  woman  whom  he  had  so  often  invoked, 
but  never  met — to  whom  he  would  have  given  and  sacri- 
ficed— oh !  so  gladly — so  much  ! — not  only  his  heart  and  his 
life,  but  his  everv  wish,  his  every  whim — he  went  down  the 

ii.  2  x 


354  JEA.N  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.  [BOOK  III. 

hill  with  streaming  eyes,  which  he  strove  in  vain  to  dry  ; 
but,  at  all  events,  any  kind  womanly  heart  (among  the 
readers  of  this  tale)  which  has  loved  in  vain,  or  to  its  own 
detriment,  will  forgive  him  these  burning  tears,  knowing, 
from  sad  personal  experience,  how  the  soul  seems  to 
journey  on  through  a  desolate  wilderness,  where  the 
deathly  Samiel  wind  blows  ceaselessly,  while  lifeless  forms 
lie  scattered  around,  dashed  to  earth  by  the  blast,  their 
arms  breaking  from  their  crumbling  trunks  when  the 
living  touches  them  in  act  to  clasp  them  to  his  own  warm 
heart.  But  ye,  in  whose  clasp  so  many  a  heart  has  grown 
cold,  chilled  by  inconstancy  or  by  the  frost  of  death — ye 
should  Qot  mourn  so  bitterly  as  do  those  lonely  souls  who 
have  never  lost,  because  they  have  never  found  ;  who  yearn 
for  that  immortal  and  eternal  love  of  which  even  the  mortal 
and  transient  reflex  has  never  been  vouchsafed  to  bless 
them. 

Firmian  carried  with  him  into  his  night-quarters  a 
tranquil,  though  a  tender,  heart,  which  healed  itself  in 
dreams.  When  he  looked  up  from  his  slumbers,  the  con- 
stellations, set  in  his  window  as  in  a  picture-frame, 
twinkled  lovingly  before  his  bright  and  happy  eyes,  and 
beamed  upon  him  the  astrological  prophecy  of  a  happy 
morrow. 

He  fluttered,  with  the  earliest  lark,  up  out  of  the  furrow 
of  his  bed,  with  as  many  trills  as  he,  and  quite  as  much 
energy.  That  day,  fatigue  plucking  the  bird-of-paradise 
wings  from  his  fancy,  he  could  not  quite  get  out  of  the 
territory  of  Anspach.  The  day  after,  he  reached  Bam- 
berg, leaving  on  the  right  hand  Nurnberg — that  and  its 
Pays  Coutumier8  and  Pays  de  Droit  ecrit.  His  path  led 
him  from  one  paradise  to  another.  The  plain  seemed  to 
be  one  great  mosaic  of  gardens ;  the  hills  seemed  to  crouch 
closer  to  the  earth,  as  if  to  let  men  the  more  readily  climb 
up  upon  their  backs  and  humps.  The  groves  of  deciduous 
trees  were  like  garlands,  twined  and  placed  to  adorn  Na- 
ture on  some  great  festal  day ;  and  the  setting  sun  often 
glowed  through  the  trellis-work  of  some  leafy  balustrade 
on  a  hill-side,  like  a  purple  apple  in  some  perforated  fruit- 
vase.  In  one  valley  one  longed  to  take  one's  mid-day 
sleep ;  in  another,  one's  breakfast ;  in  this  stream,  to  see  tha 


CHAP.  XII.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        355 

moon  reflected  when  she  stood  in  the  zenith ;  to  see  her 
rise  behind  this  group  of  trees ;  to  see  the  sun  rise  out  of 
that  green  trellised  bed  of  trees  at  the  Streitberg. 

When  he  arrived  the  next  day  at  Streitberg,  where  all 
those  delights  could  be  indulged  in  at  once,  he  might  easily 
have  seen  the  top  of  the  spire  of  Bayreuth  put  on  the 
blushing  tints  of  the  evening  Aurora — unless  he  was  a 
much  worse  walker  than  his  historian ;  however,  he  did 
not  care  to  do  so.  He  said  to  himself,  "  I  should  be  an 
ass  were  I  to  go  rushing,  all  dog-tired  and  dried  up  as  I 
am,  upon  the  first  hour  of  a  delicious  reunion  and  meeting 
of  this  sort;  neither  he  (Leibgeber)  nor  I  would  get  a 
wink  of  sleep ;  and  what  should  we  have  time  to  talk 
about  at  this  hour  in  the  evening  ?  No,  no,  better  wait, 
and  get  there  the  first  thing  in  the  morning,  about  six 
o'clock,  and  so  have  the  whole  day  before  us  for  our  mil- 
lennium." 

Accordingly  he  passed  the  night  in  Fantaisie,  an  arti- 
ficial pleasure,  rose,  and  flower-valley,  half  a  mile  from 
Bayreuth.  I  find  it  a  very  hard  and  difficult  matter  to 
reserve  the  erection  of  my  paper  model  of  this  Seifersdorf 
miniature  valley  (which  I  should  so  much  like  to  intro- 
duce at  this  point),  until  I  find  a  roomier  place  for  it  than 
the  present ;  however,  I  can't  help  it,  and  should  I  not  find 
such  a  place,  there  is  sure  to  be  ample  space  in  the  blank 
pages  at  the  end  of  the  book. 

Firmian  started,  then,  in  oompany  with  a  body  of  bats 
and  beetles — the  advanced  guard  of  a  beautiful  bright 
day — and  bringing  up  the  rear  (so  to  speak)  of  the  people 
of  Bayreuth,  who  had  just  finished  their  Sunday  and  Feast 
of  the  Ascension  (it  was  the  7th  of  May)  :  and  he  walkocl 
so  late  that  the  moon,  in  her  first  quarter,  was  castin<>- 
deep,  strong  shadows  of  the  blossoms  and  branches  upon 
the  greensward.  Thus  late  in  the  evening,  then,  Firmian 
climbed  a  height  from  whence  he  could  look  down,  with  tears 
of  joy,  to  Bayreuth — where  the  beloved  brother  of  his  soul 
was  waiting  for  him  and  thinking  of  him — as  it  lay  softly 
veiled  in  the  bridal  night  of  spring,  and  broidered  over  with 
shining  flakes  of  Luna's  radiance.  I  can  affirm  in  his  name 
with  a  "  Verily  "  that  he  nearly  did  what  I  should  have 
done  myself;  that  is  to  say,  /,  with  a  heart  welling  up  in 

2  a  2 


356  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [LOOK  III. 

such  a  warm  sort  of  manner  as  his  was,  and  on  a  night  all 
so  adorned  and  pranked  out  with  gold  and  silver,  should 
have  made  but  one  bound  into  the  Sun  Hotel,  and  into 
my  Leibgeber's  arms.  However,  he  went  back  again  into 
his  odour-breathing  Capua  (Fantaisie),  and  there,  in  the 
brief  intervening  spar-e  of  time  between  his  return  and 
supper  and  evening  prayer  time,  he  met — beside  a  dried- 
n p  water-basin  or  fish-pond,  peopled  by  a  race  of  deities 
transformed  into  stone — he  met  with  nothing  less  than 
an  exceedingly  charming  adventure.  I  proceed  to  give  an 
account  of  it. 

Beside  the  wall  which  surrounded  the  little  lake  in 
question,  there  was  a  lady  standing;  she  was  dressed  all 
in  black  except  her  veil,  which  was  white;  she  had  a 
bouquet  of  faded  flowers  in  her  hand,  and  was  turning  it 
over  with  her  fingers.  She  was  looking  towards  the  west, 
that  is  to  say,  away  from  him,  and  seemed  to  be  con- 
templating partly  the  confused  mass  of  stone  Suisseries, 
and  the  coral-ieef  of  sea-horses,  tritons,  and  so  on,  and 
partly  a  temple,  in  artificial  ruins,  which  was  close  by. 
As  he  passed  slowly  on  he  saw,  by  ,'  side  glance,  that  she 
threw  a  flower,  not  so  much  at  as  over  him,  as  if  this  sign 
of  exclamation  were  meant  to  rouse  a  pre- occupied  person 
from  his  reverie.  He  looked  round  a  little,  just  to  show 
that  he  was  really  awake  and  observant,  and  went  up  to 
the  glass-door  of  the  artificially-ruined  temple,  in  order 
to  linger  a  little  longer  in  the  vicinity  of  this  enigma. 
Inside  the  temple,  facing  him,  there  was  a  mirrored  pillar, 
which  reflected  all  the  foreground  and  middle  distance 
(including  the  fair  unknown)  in  the  green  perspective  of 
a  long  background.  Firmian  saw,  in  the  mirror,  the  lady 
throw  her  bouquet  at  him  bodily,  and  then  roll  an  orange 
(which  would  not  fly  so  far  is  the  flowers)  towards  his 
ieet.  He  turned  round  with  a  smile.  A  soft  voice  cried 
m  an  eager,  hasty  way,  "  Don't  you  know  me  ?"  He  said, 
"  No ;  '  and  ere  he  had  added,  more  slowly,  "  I  am  a 
stranger,"  the  unknown  Lady  Abbess  had  drawn  near  to 
him,  and  lifted  the  Moses  veil  rapidly  from  her  face,  and 
asked,  in  a  louder  tone,  " Don't  you,  now?"  And  a  female 
head  which  might  have  been  sawn  from  the  shoulders  of 
the  Vatican  Apollo  (only  softened  by  some  eight  or  ten 


CHAP.  XII.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       357 

feminine  traits,  and  a  narrower  brow)  glowed  upon  him 
like  some  bust  illumined  by  the  flare  of  a  torch.  But,  on  his 
repeating  that  he  was  a  stranger,  and  when  she  examined 
him  more  closely,  and  without  her  veil,  and  let  her  gauze 
portcullis  down  again  (which  movements  took  altogether 
about  as  long  as  one  beat  of  the  pendulum  of  an  astro- 
nomical clock),  she  turned  away  saying,  "  I  beg  your  par- 
don," in  a  tone  which  expressed  more  womanly  annoyance 
than  embarrassment. 

A  very  little  thing  would  have  set  him  off  to  follow  her 
in  a  mechanical  sort  of  manner.  He  immediately  set 
about  adorning  all  Fantaisie  with  plaster-casts  of  her  head 
(instead  of  the  stone  goddesses) — of  her  head,  which  had 
but  three  pleonasms  in  the  face  of  it — too  .much  colour  in 
the  cheeks,  too  much  curve  in  the  nose,  and  too  much  wild 
fire  (or  rather  material  for  kindling  it)  in  the  eyes.  "  That 
is  the  sort  of  head,"  he  thought,  "  which  would  be  well  in 
its  place  in  an  opera-box,  beside  the  sparkling  one  of  some 
royal  bride  (ay,  and  hold  its  own  there),  and  might  contain 
all  the  wisdom  it  might  deprive — other  people  of." 

One  carries  a  magic  adventure  such  as  this  into  one's 
dreams  with  one,  for  it  is  like  a  dream  itself.  The  month 
of  May  now  stuck  in  little  flower-sticks  to  all  Firmian's 
drooping,  trembling,  joy-flowers  (as  she  had  done  to  Na- 
ture's), and  lightly  bound  them  to  them.  Ah  !  with  what 
brightness  do  even  little  joys  beam  upon  the  soul  when  it 
stands  on  some  spot  all  darkened  by  clouds  of  sorrow — 
as  stars  shine  out  in  the  empty  sky  when  we  look  up  at  it 
from  a  cellar  or  deep  well. 

On  the  exquisite  morning  which  followed,  the  earth  rose 
with  the  sun.  Siebenkaes  had  his  friend  of  all  time  in  his 
head  and  heart  more  than  the  unknown  of  yesterday ; 
although,  at  the  same  time,  he  took  care  that  his  path 
should  lead  him  by  the  ocean,  and  the  shell  out  of  which 
that  Venus  had  arisen — for  mere  curiosity's  sake — which 
led  to  no  result.  And  so  he  waded  away  through  the 
moist  radiance  and  cloudy  vapour  of  the  glittering  silver- 
mine,  tearing  down  in  his  passage  the  gossamer- wreaths 
all  behung  with  seed-pearls  of  dew  which  hung  upon  the 
flowers ;  brushing  (in  his  eagerness  to  reach  his  Olympus 
of  yesterday)  the  chilled  butterflies  and  dew-drops  from 


358  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  III. 

off  the  branches,  all  a-flutter  with  the  insect  swarms  (the 
ke}r-board  of  a  harmonica  framed  in  flowers).  He  climbed 
to  his  place  in  the  great  "  Auditorium "  all  delight  at 
length.  Bayreuth  la}'  behind  a  glowing  drop-curtain  of 
mist.  The  sun  (in  his  character  of  "  king"  of  this  drama) 
stood  on  a  hill-top,  and  looked  down  at  this  many-tinted 
curtain,  which  took  fire  and  blazed,  while  the  morning 
breezes  caught  and  bore  away  its  fluttering,  sparkling, 
tinder  fragments,  and  scattered  them  over  the  gardens  and 
the  flowers.  And  soon  nothing  save  the  sun  was  shining ; 
nothing  round  him  now  except  the  sky.  Amid  this  radi- 
ance Siebenkaes  made  his  entry  into  his  dear  friend's  camp 
of  recreation  and  head-quarter  city,  whereof  all  the  build- 
ings looked  as  if  they  were  a  glittering,  solider  sort  of 
air-and-magic  castles  fallen  down  from  the  sether.  It  was 
strange,  but,  on  noticing  certain  window-curtains  drawn 
in  (which  the  street  breeze  had  been  toying  with),  he 
could  scarcely  help  feeling  certain  that  it  was  the  "  Un- 
known "  of  yesterday  who  was  doing  it,  although  at  that 
time  of  the  morning  (it  was  barely  eight  o'clock)  a  Bay- 
reuth  lady  would  have  as  little  got  through  her  flower- 
sleep  as  the  red  mouse-ear,  or  the  Alpine  hawksbeard.* 
His  heart  beat  quicker  at  every  street.  It  was  quite  a 
pleasure  to  him  to  lose  his  way  a  little,  as  to  some  extent 
delaying  and  adding  to  his  happiness.  At  length  he 
attained  his  perihelion — that  is  to  say — reached  the  Sun 
(Hotel),  where  was  the  metallic  sun  which  had  attracted 
to  it  hi8  comet,  as  the  astronomical  sun  does  ccmets  in 
general.  He  inquired  the  number  of  Leibgeber's  room ; 
they  said  it  was  number  8,  at  the  back  of  the  house,  but 
that  he  had  gone  that  day  on  a  trip  into  Swabia,  unless  he 
was  still  upstairs.  Fortunately  there  just  then  came  in 
from  the  street  an  individual  who  testified  to  the  correct- 
ness of  the  latter  hypothesis,  and  wagged  his  tail  at  sight 
of  Siebenkaes — Leibgeber's  dog  to  wit. 

To  storm  up  the  stairs,  to  burst  open  the  door  of  joy,  to  fall 
upon  the  beloved  breast,  was  the  work  of  a  single  instant ; 
and  then  the  barren  minutes  of  life  passed  unseen  and 
unheard  by  the  close,  silent  union  of  two  human  creatures, 

*  The  former  plant  opens  after  eight  in  the  morning,  the  latter  at 
eleven. 


CHAP.  XII.J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       359 

who  lay  clinging  together  on  the  waters  of  life,  like  two 
shipwrecked  brothers  floating,  embracing  and  embraced,  on 
the  chill  waves,  with  nothing  left  them  save  the  heart 
they  die  upon.  .  .  . 

As  yet  they  had  not  said  a  word  to  one  another.  Fir- 
mian,  whom  a  longer  continuance  of  troubles  had  made 
the  weaker  of  the  two,  wept  without  disguise  at  sight  of 
the  face  of  his  newly  recovered  friend.  Heinrich's  features 
were  drawn  as  if  by  pain.  They  both  had  their  hats  still 
on.  Leibgeber,  in  his  emharrassment,  could  think  of 
nothing  to  hold  on  to  except  the  bell-rope.  The  waiter 
came  running  in.  "  Oh  !  it's  nothing  ! "  said  Leibgeber ; 
"  except,  by  the  way,  that  I  shan't  go  out  now.  Heaven 
grant,"  he  added,  "  that  we  may  get  fairly  into  the  thick 
of  a  long  talk !     Drag  me  into  one,  brother !" 

He  had  no  difficulty  in  beginning  one  with  the  pragmatic 
detailing  of  the  Nouvelle  du  Jour — or  rather  de  la  Nuit — 
in  short,  the  town  (or,  more  properly  speaking,  the 
country)  news  of  what  had  taken  place  on  the  previous 
day  in  the  vicinity  of  the  veil  of  the  beautiful  Je  ne  sais 
quoi. 

"  I  know  her  "  (Leibgeber  answered),  "  as  I  know  my 
own  pulse ;  but  I  don't  intend  to  say  anything  whatever 
about  her  just  now.  I  should  be  obliged  to  sit  still  and 
wait  here  for  such  a  time.  Put  the  whole  thing  off  till 
we  are  sitting  in  Abraham's  warm  bosom  in  the  Hermitage, 
which  is  the  second  heaven  of  Bayreuth,  next  to  Fan- 
taisie, — for  Fantaisie  is  the  first  heaven,  and  the  whole 
country  is  the  third." 

They  then  made  an  ascent  into  heaven  in  every  fresh 
street  they  came  to,  and  also  in  every  subject  of  conversa- 
tion which  they  fell  upon.  "  You  shall  knock  my  head 
off  its  stalk  like  a  poppy,"  said  Leibgeber,  on  Firmian's 
betraying  (I  regret  to  say)  as  great  a  curiosity  as  the 
reader's  own  to  know  the  secret,  "  before  I  transform  my 
mysteries  into  yours,  either  to-day,  3r  to-morrow,  or  the  day 
after  that.  Thus  much  I  will  tell  you,  that  your  '  Selec- 
tions from  the  Devil's  Papers '  (your  '  Evening  Journal ' 
contains  matter  more  morbific)  are  perfectly  divine,  and 
very  heavenly  indeed,  and  not  at  all  bad,  and  by  no 
means  without  beauties ;  but,  on  the  whole  (let  us  say), 


360  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDKICH  RICHTEE.         [BOOK  III. 

passable  enough."  Leibgeber  then  toldhitn  how  delighted 
he  was  with  the  work,  and  how  it  surprised  him  that  he,  a 
lawyer  in  a  little  country  town,  with  nobody  in  it  but  a 
parcel  of  shopkeepers  and  juristic  souls,  with  a  sprinkling 
of  higher  officialities,  should  have  managed  to  rise  in  these 
satires  to  such  a  freedom  and  purity  of  art;  and,  indeed, 
when  I  first  read  the  '  Selections  from  the  Devil's  Papers,' 
I  said,  myself  now  and  then,  "  I  am  sure  I  couldn't  have 
written  anything  of  the  kind  in  Hof  in  Voigtland,  and  1 
have  written  one  or  two  pretty  good,  things  there,  too." 

Leibgeber  placed  a  crown  on  the  top  of  the  laurel 
wreath  by  declaring  that  it  was  much  easier  for  him  to 
laugh  at  the  world  aloud,  and  with  both  lips,  than  under 
his  breath  and  with  the  pen,  and  this  in  accordance  with 
well-tried  rules  of  art.  Siebenkses  was  beyond  himself 
with  delight  at  his  friend's  praise.  But  let  no  one  grudge 
a  pleasure  of  this  sort  to  our  advocate,  or  to  any  other 
worker  who,  in  solitude,  and  without  a  single  soul  to  give 
him  a  word  of  prahe,  has  gone  steadfastly  forward  along 
the  path  of  art  which  he  has  honestly  chosen,  unsup- 
ported, unassisted  by  the  smallest  encouragement  of  any 
kind,  whom,  at  last,  on  reaching  the  goal,  the  fragrance 
of  a  leaf  or  two  of  laurel  from  a  friend'6  hand,  penetrates, 
strengthens,  and  recompenses,  with  an  aroma  as  of  Araby 
the  Blest.  If  even  the  far-famed  and  the  self-satisfied  stand 
in  need  of  a  little  of  the  warmth  which  is  derived  from 
other  people's  opinions,  how  much  more  the  diffident  and 
the  unknown  !  Ah  !  lucky  Firmian  !  to  what  a  distanco 
in  the  far  south-south-west  did  the  passing  thunder-storms 
of  thy  life  now  go  drifting  away.  AY  hen  the  sun  fell  upon 
them,  nothing  of  them  was  to  be  seen  but  a  gentle  fall 
of  rain. 

At  the  table  d'hote  he  observed  with  delight,  in  the  case 
of  Leibgeber,  how  wonderfully  a  constant  intercourse 
with  men  and  cities  loosens  the  tongue — though,  at  the 
same  time,  the  heart  puts  on  the  bridle  which  has  been 
taken  from  the  lips.  Leibgeber  thought  nothing  of  talk- 
ing about  himself,  and  this  in  the  most  humorous 
manner,  before  all  sorts  of  grand  councillors  of  state  and 
chancery  officials  dining  at  the  Sun — a  thing  which  he, 
a  cabined,  cribbed,  confined  parish  advocate  would  scarce 


CHAP.  XII.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT.  AND  THORN  PIECES.        361 

have  dared  ever,  after  a  good  bottle  of  wine.  As  the 
discourse  which  he  delivered  on  this  occasion  pleased 
the  parish  advocate,  I  shall  build  it  into  this  history,  and 
place  over  it  the  superscription — 

Leibgeber's  Dinner  Speech. 

"  I  think  I  may  venture  to  say  that  of  all  the  Chris- 
tians and  persons  of  name  and  title  seated  at  this  table, 
not  one  was  made  into  one  with  such  wonderful  diffi- 
culty as  1  was.  My  mother,  a  native  of  Gascony, 
■was  on  her  way  to  Holland,  by  sea,  from  London,  where 
she  had  left  m}r  father  as  diocesan  of  a  German  com- 
munity. But,  never  since  there  has  been  such  a  thing 
on  the  face  of  the  earth  as  a  councillor  of  the  Ger- 
man empire,  did  the  German  Ocean  rage  and  in  surge 
so  teirifically  as  upon  the  occasion  in  question  when  it 
Avas  my  mother's  lot  to  he  crossing  it.  Pour  all  hell, 
hissing  lakes  of  brimstone,  boiling  copper,  splattering 
devils,  and  all,  into  the  cold  ocean,  and  observe  the 
crackling,  the  roaring,  and  the  seething  of  the  hell-flames 
and  ocean -waves  contending,  till  one  of  these  hostile  ele- 
ments swallow  up  the  other,  and  you  have  a  faint  (but, 
at  dinner-time,  a  sufficient)  idea  of  the  infernal  storm 
in  which  I  came  upon  the  sea,  and  into  the  world. 
When  I  tell  you  that  the  main  braces,  the  topsail  sheets, 
and  the  main  topgallant  stays  (to  say  nothing  of  the  cross- 
jack  braces  and  fore  topgallant  halyards,  which  were  in 
a  worse  state  still) — and  when,  moreover,  the  mizen 
topsail,  and  the  foretop  mast  staysail  rigging,  and  the 
flying  jib  (to  say  nothing  of  the  spanker) — when  things 
so  accustomed  to  the  sea  as  these  (I  say)  felt  as  if  their 
last  hour  was  come,  it  was  a  real  ocean  miracle  that  a 
creature  so  tender  as  I  was  at  that  time  should  have 
managed  to  commence  his  first.  I  had  about  as  much 
Jiesh  on  my  body  then  as  I  have  fat  now,  and  may  have 
weighed,  at  the  outside,  about  four  Kurnberg  pounds, 
which  (if  we  may  credit  the  authority  of  the  best  ana- 
tomical theatres)  is  at  the  present  moment  about  the  weight 
of  my  brain  alone.  Besides  which,  I  was  the  merest  of 
beginners.  I  had  seen  absolutely  nothing  of  the  world, 
except  this  infernal  gale.     I  was  a  creature,  not  so  much 


362      JEAN  PAUL  FRTEDEICH  KICHTEK.   [BOOK  ITI. 

of  few  years  as  of  none  at  all  (though  everybody's  life 
commences  some  nine  months  sooner  than  the  parish 
registers  indicate),  excessively  tender  and  delicate  — 
having  been  (in  opposition  to  all  the  rules  of  hygiene) 
kept  much  too  warm,  swaddled,  and  coddled  during  these 
very  first  nine  months  in  question,  when  I  ought  rather 
to  have  been  undergoing  a  preparation  of  some  kind  to 
enable  me  to  bear  the  chill  atmosphere  of  this  world.  And 
thus,  quarter-grown,  a  tender  flower-bud,  liquidly  soft  as 
first  love,  when  I  made  my  appearance  during  a  storm 
such  as  was  raging  (1  added  one  or  two  feeble  squeaks, 
with  some  difficulty,  to  its  roar),  what  was  to  be  expected 
was,  that  I  should  be  extinguished  altogether,  even  before 
it  calmed  down.  People  didn't  like  the  idea  of  my  going 
without  something  in  the  shape  of  a  name — without  some 
little  vestige  of  Christianity  of  some  kind — out  of  this 
world,  which  is  a  place  whence  we  do  carry  away  even  less 
than  we  bring  into  it  with  us.  But  the  grand  difficulty 
experienced  was  that  of  standing  godfather,  in  a  rolling, 
plunging  vessel,  which  pitched  everything  and  everybody 
higgledy-piggledy  that  wasn't  made  fast.  The  chaplain 
was  (luckily)  lying  in  a  hammock,  and  he  baptized  down 
out  of  thence.  My  godfather  was  the  boatswain,  who  held 
me  for  five  whole  minutes ;  but  inasmuch  as  he  couldn't, 
without  help,  stand  steady  enough  to  enable  the  chaplain 
to  touch  my  brow  with  the  water  without  missing  me, 
he  Wiis  held  by  the  barber's  mate,  who  was  made  fast 
to  a  marine,  who  was  made  fast  to  a  boatswain's  mate,  who 
was  made  fast  to  the  master-at-arms,  who  sat  upon  the 
knee  of  an  old  bluejacket,  who  held  on  to  him  like  grim 
death. 

"  However,  neither  the  ship  nor  the  child  (as  I  after- 
wards ascertained)  came  to  any  detriment ;  but  you  all 
see,  do  you  not,  that,  hard  as  it  is  for  any  one  amid  the 
storms  of  life,  to  become,  and  continue,  a  Christian,  or  to 
get  a  name — be  it  in  a  directory,  in  a  literary  gazette,  in 
a  herald's  college,  or  upon  a  medal — yet  there  are  few 
who  have  had  the  same  difficulty  as  I  have  had  in  acquir- 
ing the  mere  first  elements  of  a  name — the  groundwork, 
the  binomial  root,  of  a  Christian  name,  whereon,  at  a  sub- 
sequent period,  the  other  great  name  might  be  engrafted-- 


CHAP.  XII.  J   FLO  WEE,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.   363 

and  to  get  hold  of  a  faint  smattering  of  Christianity,  as  much 
as  a  catechumen  and  candidate  as  yet  in  a  speechless  and 
sucking  condition  might  be  capable  of.  There  is  but 
one  thing  more  difficult  to  make;  the  greatest  princes 
and  heroes  can  only  doit  once  in  their  lives — the  mightiest 
geniuses  —  even  the  three  electors  of  the  Church,  the 
Emperor  of  Germany  himself,  with  all  their  united 
efforts,  can't  do  more,  were  they  to  sit  for  years,  stamping 
in  the  mint  with  all  the  latest  improvements  in  coining 
machinery." 

The  whole  of  the  company  entreated  him  to  explain 
what  this  was  that  was  so  hard  to  frame. 

"  'Tis  a  crown  prince,"  he  answered,  quietly ;  "  even  a 
reigning  sovereign  finds  it  no  easy  matter  to  produce  an 
appanaged  prince — but,  let  him  try  as  he  will,  even  in 
the  best  days  of  his  life,  he  can  never  produce  more  than 
one  specimen  of  a  crown  prince ;  for  a  Seminarist  of  that 
sort  is  none  of  your  accessory- works,  but  the  prime  mover, 
the  regulator,  the  striking  and  driving-wheel  of  the  whole 
nation.  On  the  other  hand,  gentry,  counts,  barons, 
chamberlains,  staff-officers,  and,  above  all,  common  people 
and  subjects  of  the  altogether  every -day  sort — to  be  brief,  a 
scurvy  crew  of  that  description — a  generatio  cequivoca — can 
be  brought  into  being  by  a  prince  with  such  wonderful  ease 
that  he  creates  these  lusus  natures,  and  virgin  swarms,  or 
protoplasmata,  in  considerable  numbers  even  in  his  earlier 
days,  although  in  riper  years  he  may  not  manage  to  turn 
out  an  heir  to  his  throne.  Yet,  after  so  much  preliminary 
drill,  so  many  trial-shots,  one  would  have  taken  one's  oath 
the  other  way  !  " 

End  of  Leibgeber's  Table-Talk. 

In  the  afternoon  they  paid  a  visit  to  that  verdant,  plea- 
sure place,  the  Hermitage,  and  the  alley  leading  thither 
seemed  to  their  happy  hearts  to  be  a  path  cut  through 
some  beauteous  grove  of  gladness.  That  young  bird  of 
passage,  Spring,  was  encamped  all  over  the  plain  around, 
her  unladen  floral  treasures  scattered  about  the  meadows, 
and  floating  down  the  streams,  while  the  birds  were  drawn 
up  into  air  upon  long  sunbeams,  and  the  world  of  winged 


364  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDEICH  EICHTER.         [BOOK  III. 

creatures  hovered  all  about  in  intoxication  of  bliss  amid 
the  exquisite  scents  shed  abroad  by  kind  Nature. 

Leibgeber  determined  to  pour  out  his  heart  and  his 
secret  at  the  Hermitage  that  day,  and  (by  way  of  pre- 
liminary) a  bottle  of  wine  or  so  to  begin  with. 

He  begged  and  constrained  Siebenkaes  first  of  all  to 
deliver  a  diary-lecture  concerning  his  adventures  by  land 
;md  by  water  up  to  the  present  time.  Firmian  complied, 
but  with  discretion.  Over  his  stomach's  barren  year, 
over  Ids  hard  times,  over  the  (metaphorical)  winter  of 
his  life  (upon  whose  snow  he  had  had  to  make  his  nest, 
ioobird-like),  and  over  all  the  bitter  northerly  wind, 
which  drives  a  man  to  bury  himself  in  the  earth  (as 
suldiers  do) — over  all  these  he  passed  lightly  and  quickly. 
I  myself  must  approve  of  him  for  so  doing ;  firstly,  be- 
cause a  man  would  be  none  who  should  shed  a  bigger 
tear  over  wounds  of  poverty  than  a  young  lady  drops  at 
the  piercing  of  her  ears,  for  in  both  cases  the  wounds 
become  points  of  suspension  for  jewels ;  secondly,  because 
Siebenkaes  would  not  cause  his  friend  the  slightest  pain 
on  the  score  of  their  change  of  names,  the  main  source  of 
all  his  hunger-springs.  However,  his  friend  knew,  and 
sympathised  with  him  sufficiently  to  consider  that  his 
pale,  faded  face  and  his  sunken  eyes  constituted  a  sufficient 
almanac  month-emblem  of  his  frost-month  or  winter- 
picture  of  the  snowed-up  tracts  of  his  life-road. 

But  when  Siebenkaes  came  to  speak  of  the  deep  and 
secret  wounds  of  his  soul,  it  was  all  he  could  do  to  keep 
Iwck  the  drops  of  blood-water  which  pressed  to  his  eyes ; 
I  mean  the  subject  of  Lenette's  hatred  and  love.  But 
while  he  drew  a  very  indulgent  picture  of  her  little  love 
lor  him,  and  her  great  love  for  Stiefel,  he  used  much 
brighter  colours  for  the  historical  piece  which  he  painted 
of  her  admirable  behaviour  to  the  Venner,  and  of  that 
gentleman's  wickedness  in  general. 

"  As  soon  as  you  have  done,"  said  Leibgeber,  "  you  must 
allow  yourself  to  be  informed  that  women  are  not  fallen 
angels,  but  falling  ones.  By  all  the  heavens  !  while  we 
stand  patient,  like  sheep  being  shorn,  they  stick  the  shears 
oftener  into  our  skins  than  into  our  wool.  I  should  think 
of  the  fair  sex  if  I  were  to  cross  the  bridge  of  St.  Angelo 


CHAP.  XII.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      365 

at  Eome,  for  there  are  twelve  statxies  of  angels  there, 
holding  the  implements  of  the  Passion,  each  a  different 
one ;  one  has  the  nails,  another  the  reed,  another  the 
dice,  and  similarly  each  woman  has  a  peculiar  torture- 
instrument  of  her  own  to  apply  to  us  poor  lambs.  Whom, 
think  you,  for  instance  now,  is  the  Palladium  of  yesterday, 
your  unknown  beauty,  going  to  tether  to  her  bed-post 
with  the  nose-ring  of  a  wedding-ring  ?  But  I  must  tell 
you  about  her.  She  is  altogether  glorious  :  she  is  poetic  ; 
full  of  romantic,  enthusiastic  admiration  for  the  British, 
and  for  intellectual  people  in  general  (consequently  for 
me),  and  lives  with  an  aristocratic  English  lady,  a  sort 
of  companion  to  Lady  Craven  and  the  Margrave  at  Fan- 
taisie  yonder.  She  has  nothing,  and  accepts  nothing ;  is 
poor  and  proud,  daring  to  rashness,  and  pure  as  the  day ; 
and  she  signs  hei self  '  Nathalie  Aquiliana.'  Do  you  know 
who's  going  to  be  her  husband  ?  A  horrible,  burnt-out, 
used-up  wretch — a  feeble,  puny  creature,  whose  egg-shell 
was  chipped  a  week  or  two  before  its  time,  and  who  now 
goes  cheeping  about  our  toes  like  a  chicken  with  the  pip ; 
a  fellow  who  copies  Heliogabalus  (who  put  on  a  new  ring 
every  day)  in  the  matter  of  wedding-rings ;  a  hop-o'-my- 
thumb  whom  I  could  sneeze  over  the  Korth  Pole  (and  I 
should  like  very  much  to  do  it),  and  whom  I  have  the  less 
need  to  give  3  ou  any  description  of,  inasmuch  as  you  have 
just  given  me  one  of  him  yourself :  when  I  tell  you  his 
name,  you  will  see  that  you  know  him  pretty  well.  This 
magnificent  creature  is  going  to  be  married  to  the  Venner 
Iiosa  von  Meyern  ! " 

Firmian  fell,  not  from  the  clouds,  but  right  into  them. 
To  make  a  long  tale  short,  this  Nathalie  is  the  Heimlicher's 
niece,  of  whom  Leibgeber  wrote  some  account  in  our  first 
volume.  "  But,  listen,"  continued  Leibgeber,  "  I  will  let 
myself  be  hewn  and  hacked  into  crumbs  smaller  than  those 
of  Poland — into  clippings  not  big  enough  to  cover  a 
Hebrew  vowel — if  this  affair  comes  to  anything ;  for  I 
am  going  to  put  a  stop  to  it." 

Since  Leibgeber  (as  we  know)  was  in  the  habit  of  talking 
to  the  lady  every  day  (his  spotless  soul  and  his  bold  mind 
having  unspeakable  attractions  for  her),  all  he  had  to  do 
in  order  to  break  the  marriage  off,  was  simply  to  repeat  to 


366  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDKICH  UICHTEB.  [BOOK  III. 

her  what  Siebenkaes  had  told  him  concerning  her  bride- 
groom elect.  It  was  his  intimacy  with  her,  and  his  re- 
semblance to  Siebenkaes  which  had  led  to  her  mistaking 
Firmian  for  him  on  the  evening  of  his  arrival. 

The  majority  of  my  readers  will  urge  against  me  and 
Leibgeber  the  same  objection  which  Siebenkaes  brought 
forward  —  that  Nathalie's  love  and  marriage  for  money 
were  quite  out  of  harmony  with  her  character,  and  her 
disregard  for  riches.  But,  in  one  word,  all  she  had  ever 
as  yet  seen  of  that  gaudy  flycatcher,  Mr.  Eosa,  was  his 
Esau's  hand,  that  is  to  say,  his  writing,  t.  e.  his  Jacob's 
voice ;  he  had  only  written  her  a  few  irreprehensible, 
sentimental  letters  of  assurance  (pin-papers,  stuck  full  of 
Cupid's  darts  and  stitching -needles),  and  so  given  guarantee 
of  the  documentary  nobility  of  his  heart.  .  .  .  The  Heim- 
licher,  moreover,  had  written  to  his  niece,  saying,  on  St. 
rancrasius'  day  (May  12th,  that  is  in  four  days'  time), 
the  Venner  would  come  and  present  himself,  and  if  she 
refused  him,  let  her  never  call  herself  his  niece  again, 
and  starve  in  her  native  village  for  all  he  cared. 

But,  speaking  as  a  man  of  honour,  I  really  have  never 
had  above  three  of  Bosa's  letters  in  my  hands  for  two  or 
three  minutes,  and  in  my  pocket  for  about  an  hour ;  and 
they  were  really  not  so  very  bad — far  more  moral  than 
their  author. 

Just  as  Leibgeber  said  he  would  assume  the  office  of 
consistory,  and  divorce  Nathalie  from  Kosa  before  their 
marriage,  she  came  driving  up,  with  one  or  two  lady  friends, 
and  got  out  of  the  carriage ;  but  instead  of  going  with 
them  to  where  the  company  were  assembling,  she  went 
away  alone,  by  a  solitary  side  walk,  to  the  so-called 
Temple.  In  her  haste  she  had  not  noticed  her  friend 
Leibgeber  sitting  opposite  the  stables.  I  ought  to  explain 
here  that  when  the  Bayreuthians  go  to  the  Hermitage  they 
have  been  in  the  habit,  ever  since  the  days  of  the  Mar- 
grave, of  sitting  in  a  little  wood,  all  breezes  and  cool 
shade,  in  front  of  the  extensive  farm-buildings  and  stables, 
but  having  the  loveliest  of  prospects  just  at  their  backs, 
which  they  could  easily  substitute  for  the  blank  wall 
upon  which  they  feast  their  gaze,  by  merely  getting  up 
and  going  a  little  way  out  of  the  wood  on  either  side. 


CHAP.  XII.]     FLOWEK,  FRUIT,  AND  THOEN  PIECES.       367 

Leibgeber  told  Siebenkaes  he  could  take  him  to  her  in  a 
moment,  as  she  would  be  sure  to  sit  down  in  the  temple 
(as  she  usually  did)  to  enjoy  the  enchanting  view  of  the 
city  towers  and  the  hills,  as  they  lay  in  the  light  of 
the  evening  sun  beyond  the  shrubberies.  He  added  that, 
unfortunately,  she  cared  too  little  about  appearances ;  and 
would  go  to  the  summer-house  all  by  herself,  greatly  to  the 
distress  of  the  English  lady,  who,  after  the  manner  of  her 
countrywomen,  didn't  like  going  anywhere  alone,  and 
wouldn't  trust  herself  to  go  near  even  a  gentleman's 
clothes  cupboard  without  an  Insurance  Company  and 
Bible  Society  of  women  with  her  to  protect  her.  He  said 
he  had  it  on  good  authority  that  a  British  lady  never  per- 
mitted the  idea  of  a  man  to  enter  her  head  without  at  once 
surrounding  it  with  the  number  of  ideas  of  women,  neces- 
sary to  bridle  and  restrain  him,  should  he  begin  behaving 
(in  the  four  chambers  of  her  brain)  with  that  amount  of 
freedom  which  he  might  employ  if  at  home  there. 

They  found  Nathalie  in  the  open  temple,  with  some 
papers  in  her  hand.  "I  bring  you  our  author  of  ihe 
'  Selections  from  the  Devil's  Papers,' "  said  Leibgeber, 
"  which  I  see  you  are  just  reading ;  will  you  allow  me  to 
introduce  him  to  you  ?  "  After  a  passing  blush  at  having 
mistaken  Siebenkaes  for  Leibgeber,  in  Fantaisie,  she  said 
to  him,  very  kindly  and  pleasantly,  "  It  would  take  very 
little  to  make  me  mistake  you  for  your  friend  again,  Mr. 
Siebenkaes ;  and  you  seem  almost  exactly  alike  in  mind, 
as  well  as  in  body.  Your  satire  is  often  exactly  like  his ; 
it  is  only  your  graver  '  Appendices  '  which  I  was  just  read- 
ing, and  which  I  like  very  much,  that  seem  to  me  as  if 
they  hadn't  been  written  by  him." 

I  have  not  at  present  time  to  make — (for  Leibgeber's 
unauthorized  communication  to  one  friend  of  the  papers  of 
another) — excuses  occupying  long  pages  of  print  to  readers 
who  may  insist  upon  extreme  delicacy  in  matters  of  this 
description.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  Leibgeber  took  it  for 
granted  that  every  one  who  liked  him  would  join  with  him 
in  liking  his  friends,  and  that  Siebenkaes  (and  even  Na- 
thalie) would  see  nothing  in  his  unhesitatingly  communi- 
cating these  papers,  but  a  mere  passing  on  of  a  friendly 
circular  letter,  pre-supposing,  as  he  did,  the  existence 
between  them  of  a  triple  elective  affinity. 


868  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  lit 

Nathalie  scanned  the  pair — particularly  Leibgeher,  whose 
big  dog  she  was  stroking — with  a  kindly  and  observant 
look  of  comparison,  as  if  she  were  trying  to  find  out  di— 
similarities  between  them ;  for,  in  fact,  Siebenkass  seemed 
to  her  to  be  scarcely  as  like  his  fiiend  as  she  had  thought. 
He  was  taller  and  slighter,  and  younger  in  the  face ;  but 
this  was  because  Leibgeber,  whose  shoulders  and  chest 
were  more  strongly  built,  bent  his  strange,  earnest  face 
more  forward  when  he  talked,  as  if  he  were  spenking  into 
the  earth.  He  himself  said  he  never  had  looked  really 
young,  not  even  at  his  baptism — as  his  baptismal  certificate 
would  prove — and  wasn't  likely  to  grow  much  younger 
now  till  he  arrived  at  his  second  childhood.  But  when 
Leibgeber  straightened  his  back  somewhat,  and  Siebenkajs 
bent  his  a  little,  they  looked  very  much  like  one  another ; 
however,  this  is  more  a  hint  fur  the  drawer-up  of  their 
passports  than  anything  else. 

Let  us  felicitate  the  Kuhschnappel  lawyer  on  this  oppor- 
tunity of  enjoying  a  few  minutes'  conversation  with  a  lady 
of  position,  and  of  such  many-sided  cultivation  as  even  to 
be  capable  of  appreciating  satires.  All  he  wished  was  that 
a  phoenix  of  this  sort — such  as,  hitherto,  he  had  only  seen 
a  pinch  or  so  of  the  ashes  of  in  actual  life,  or  a  phoenix- 
feather  or  two  preserved  in  a  book — might  not  take  wing 
and  disappear  instanter  ;  but  that  he  might  be  lucky  enough 
to  listen  to  a  long  talk  between  her  and  Leibgeber,  as  well 
as  help  to  spin  it  out  himself.  But  suddenly  her  liayreuth 
friends  came  hurrying  up  to  say  that  the  fountains  were 
just  going  to  play,  and  there  wasn't  a  moment  to  be  lost. 
The  whole  party,  therefore,  went  towards  the  waterworks, 
Siebenkaes'  whole  care  being  to  keep  as  close  as  he  could  to 
the  noblest  of  the  spectatresses. 

The)r  stood  by  the  basin,  and  dooked  at  the  beautiful 
water  artifices,  which,  no  doubt,  have  long  since  played 
before  the  reader,  either  on  the  spot,  or  in  the  pages  of  the 
various  writers  of  travels,  who  have  expressed  themselves 
on  the  subject  of  them  at  sufficient  length,  and  in  adequate 
terms  of  laudation.  All  kinds  of  mythologic  demigod-ical 
demibeasts  spouted  forth  streams  ;  and  from  out  this  world, 
peopled  with  water-gods,  there  spouted  a  crystal  forest, 
whose  descending  branches,  liana-like,  took  root  again  in 


JHAP.  XII.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        369 

the  earth.  They  enjoyed  for  a  long  while  the  sight  of  this 
talkative,  intercommingling  water-world.  At  length  the 
fluttering,  ever-growing  water-forms  sank  down  and  died ; 
the  transparent  lily-stems  grew  shorter  and  shorter,  as  they 
watched  them.  "Why  is  it,  I  wonder?  "said  Nathalie 
to  Siebenka?s,  "that  a  waterfall  lifts  up  one's  heart;  but 
tiiis  dying-down  of  these  springing  jets,  this  visible  sinking 
away  uf  these  grand  streaming  beams  of  water,  always 
makes  me  sad  and  anxious  ?  We  never  see  any  such  falling 
in  of  high  things  in  real  life." 

Siebenkaes  was  thinking  out  the  apt  and  comprehensive 
reply  to  this  true  and  just  expression  of  Nathalie's  feeling, 
when  all  at  once  she  jumped  into  the  water  to  rescue,  with 
as  little  delay  as  possible,  a  child  who  had  fallen  in,  a  few 
steps  away  from  her ;  for  the  water  was  there  about  waist- 
deep.  Before  the  men  who  were  present  had  so  much  as 
thought  about  it,  she  had  done  it ;  and  she  was  right,  for  in 
this  case  rapidity  without  reflection  was  the  good  and  true 
thing.  She  lifted  the  child  out,  and  gave  it  to  the  women  ; 
but  Siebenkass  and  Leibgeber  took  her  hands,  and  lightly 
raised  the  fiery  creature  (all  blushes,  of  body  and  of  soul) 
on  to  the  bank.  "  What  does  it  matter?"  she  said,  with 
a  smile,  to  the  alarmed  Siebenkass,  "  I  shall  be  none  the 
worse,"  and  hurried  away  with  her  friends  (who  were  all 
shocked  into  speechlessness),  having  first  begged  Leib- 
geber to  come  next  evening,  with  his  friend,  to  Fantaisie. 
"  That  of  course  I  shall  do,"  he  said  ;  "  but  first  of  all,  I  am 
coming  to  see  you  by  myself  early  in  the  morning." 

The  crying  need  of  our  two  friends  was  now  to  be  alone 
with  one  another.  Leibgeber,  under  the  new  excitement, 
could  scarce  wait  to  attain  the  birch  wood,  where  he  meant 
to  continue  their  previous  conversation  regarding  Sie- 
benkges'  domestic  and  conjugal  affairs.  With  respect  to 
Nathalie,  he  briefly  pointed  out  to  his  astonished  friend 
that  what  so  much  delighted  him  in  her  was  just  the  un- 
hesitating, downright  straightforwardness  which  marked 
all  her  thoughts  and  actions,  and  her  manly  cheerfulness, 
athwart  which  the  world,  and  poverty,  and  chances  and 
accidents  of  every  kind  merely  passed  floating  away,  like 
light,  shining  summer  clouds,  never  darkening  her  day. 
■  Now  as   regards  you  and  your  Lenette  "  he  went  on 

ii.  2  b 


370  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDKICH  EiCHTER.         [BOOK  III. 

(when  they  reached  the  solitude  of  the  little  wood),  as 
quietly  as  if  he  had  been  talking  continuously  up  to  that 
instant,  "  if  I  were  in  your  place,  I  should  take  an  alter- 
ative, and  get  rid  of  the  hard  gall-stone  of  matrimony  for 
good  and  all.  You  will  never  really  be  able  to  bear  the 
pain  of  the  bonds  of  wedlock,  though  you  scrape  and  scratch 
away  at  them  for  years  to  come  with  all  your  finest  hair- 
saws  and  bone-saws.  The  Divorce  Court  will  give  one 
grand  cut  and  tear — and  there  you  are,  free  of  one  another 
for  ever  and  ever." 

The  idea  of  a  divorce  terrified  Siebenkses,  although  he 
saw  very  clearly  that  it  was  the  only  possible  breaking- 
point  for  the  storm-clouds  of  his  life.  He  was  far  from 
grudging  to  Lenette  either  her  freedom,  or  the  marriage 
with  Stiefel,  which  would  infallibly  result ;  but  he  felt 
quite  sure  that,  however  much  she  might  wish  for  it,  she 
never  would  consent  to  an  enforced  separation,  on  account 
of  her  strong  regard  for  appearances, — also  that  on  their 
road  to  this  parting  both  she  and  he  would  have  to  pass 
many  a  bitter  hour  of  heart-strain  and  nerve-fever, — and 
that  they  could  hardly  afford  to  pay  for  a,  betrothal,  much 
less  for  a  divorce. 

It  was  likewise  an  accessory  circumstance,  that  it  was 
more  than  he  could  bear  to  think  of  the  sight  of  the 
poor  innocent  soul,  who  had  shivered  at  his  side  through 
so  many  a  cold  storm  of  life,  going  away  for  ever  from  his 
home,  and  from  his  arms — ay,  and  with  tlwit  handkerchief  in 
her  hand,  too ! 

All  these  considerations,  with  many  stronger,  and  many 
weaker,  he  laid  before  his  friend,  finishing  up  with  tins 
final  one  :  "  I  assure  you,  moreover,  that  if  she  went  away 
from  me,  lag  and  baggage,  and  left  me  by  myself  in  that 
empty  room  (as  in  a  grave),  and  in  all  the  blank,  cleared- 
out  spaces,  where,  when  all's  said  and  done,  we  have  sat 
together  through  so  many  kindly  happy  hours,  and  seen 
the  flowers  growing  green  about  us — she  never  could  pass 
by  my  window  (while  she  bore  my  name,  at  all  events, 
though  no  longer  mine),  but  something  within  me  would  bid 
me  throw  myself  down,  and  dash  myself  in  pieces  at  her  feet. 
Would  it  not  be  ten  times  better,"  he  continued  in  an 
altered  tone,  "  to  wait  till  I  fall  down  upstairs  in  the  room 


CHAP.  XU.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIEOES.      371 

(or  what  does  my  giddiness  mean),  and  be  taken  out  of 
the  window,  and  out  of  the  world,  in  a  better  fashion  ? 
Friend  Death  would  take  his  long  erasing  knife,  and 
scrape  my  name  (and  other  blots  into  the  bargain)  out  of 
her  marriage-lines." 

Contrary  to  all  expectation,  this  seemed  to  make  Leib- 
geber  merrier  and  livelier  than  ever.  "  Do  so  ! "  he  said  ; 
"  it's  tho  very  thing !  Die  by  all  means !  The  funeral 
expenses  can't  possibly  come  to  anything  approaching  the 
costs  of  the  other  kind  of  separation ;  and  besides,  you  belong 
to  the  Burial  Society."  Siebenkses  stared  at  him  in  asto- 
nishment. 

He  went  on  in  a  tone  of  the  utmost  indifference  :  "  Only  I 
must  tell  you  it  will  do  neither  of  us  much  good,  if  you 
dawdle  a  long  time  at  your  saddling  and  bridling,  and  take  a 
year  or  two  about  your  dying.  I  should  think  it  much  more 
to  the  purpose  were  you  to  be  off  to  Kuhschnappel  as  soon 
as  ever  you  can,  take  to  your  sick-bed  and  death-bed 
directly  you  get  there  ;  and  die  as  quickly  as  ever  you  can 
manage  it.  And  I'll  give  you  my  reasons.  For  one  thing 
your  Lenette's  year  of  mourning  would  be  out  just  before 
Advent,  so  that  she  would  require  no  dispensation,  if  she 
wanted  to  marry  Peltzstiefel  before  Christmas.  It  would 
suit  me  very  well,  too,  for  I  could  then  disappear  in  the 
crowd,  and  I  shouldn't  see  you  again  for  some  considerable 
time  to  come.  Besides,  it  is  anything  but  a  matter  of 
indifference  to  yourself,  for  of  course  the  sooner  you're 
appointed  Inspector  the  better." 

"  This  is  the  very  first  of  your  jokes,  dear  old  Henry," 
said  Siebenkses,  "  of  which  I  don't  understand  one  single 
word." 

Leibgeber,  with  a  disturbed  countenance,  whereon  a 
whole  history  of  the  world  was  legible,  and  which  indi- 
cated, as  well  as  gave  rise  to,  the  greatest  possible  anti- 
cipation of  something  of  immense  importance  to  come, 
pulled  a  letter  from  his  pocket  and  handed  it  to  Siebenkaes 
in  silence.  It  was  a  letter  of  appointment  by  the  Count 
von  Vaduz,  constituting  Leibgeber  Inspector  of  the  Chief 
Bailiwick  of  Vaduz.  He  next  handed  him  a  letter  in 
the  count's  handwriting.  While  Firmian  was  reading  the 
letter,  Leibgeber  brought  out  his  pocket-diary,  and  calmly 

2b2 


372  JEAN  PAUL  TRIEDRICH  RICHTEK.         [  BOOK  III. 

muttered  to  himself,  "  From  the  quarter-day  after  Whit- 
sunday, it  says,  does  it  not?  to  the  time  when  I  am  to 
enter  upon  my  office;  that  is  to  say,  from  to-day — St. 
Stanislaus'  Day.  Ah  !  only  think  of  that — how  odd  it 
seems  —  from  St.  Stanislaus'  day  one,  two,  three,  four — 
four  weeks  and  a  half."  • 

Firmian,  much  pleased,  was  handing  him  back  the  letter, 
but  he  wouldn't  take  it,  but  pressed  it  back  to  him,  saying, 
u  I  read  it  long  ago,  long  before  you  did.  Put  it  in  your 
pocket." 

And  here  Heinrich,  in  a  burst  of  solemn,  impassioned, 
liumoristic  enthusiasm,  knelt  down  in  the  middle  of  a 
]<>ng  narrow  path,  which  looked  between  the  trees  of  the 
thick  grove  like  some  subterranean  passage  (the  weather- 
cock of  the  distant  steeple  ended  off  the  perspective  of  it 
as  if  with  a  turnstile) — knelt  down  facing  the  west,  and 
gazed  through  the  long  green  hollow  way  upon  the  even- 
ing sun,  sinking  earthward  like  some  brilliant  meteor,  its 
hroad  beams  darting  down  upon  the  long  green  path,  liko 
forest-water  gilt  by  the  spring;  he  gazed  fixedly  at  it,  and 
his  eyes  all  blinded  (and  lighted  up)  by  its  sheen,  he  began 
to  speak  as  follows : — 

"  If  there  be  a  good  spirit  near  me,  or  a  guardian  angel 
of  mine  or  of  his,  or  if  thy  spirit  surviveth  still  thine  ashes, 
oh  !  my  old,  hind,  loving  father,  so  deep  in  thy  grave,  then 
draw  near,  oh  !  thou  dim  and  ancient  shade,  and  grant  to 
thy  stupid,  silly  son  (still  limping  about  here  in  this  flut- 
tering, ragged  shirt  of  a  body)  this  one,  one  favour,  the 
first  and  the  last,  and  enter  into  Firmian's  heart,  and 
(while  giving  it  a  good  sound  shaking)  address  it  as  fol- 
lows :  '  Die,  Firmian,  for  my  son's  sake,  though  it  be  but 
in  jest  and  in  appearance  only.  Throw  away  your  own 
name,  go  in  his  (which  was  yours  before)  to  Vaduz  as 
Inspector,  and  give  yourself  out  to  be  him.  My  poor  son 
here  (like  that  Joujou  de  Normandie  whereon  he  is  sticking, 
which  circles  round  the  sun  upon  strings  of  sunbeams) 
would  fain  go  whirling  about  upon  said  Joujou  himself  for 
a  little  while  longer.  Before  all  you  parrots  the  ring  of 
eternity  is  still  hanging,  and  you  can  hop  on  to  it  and 
rock  upon  it  if  you  will.  But  he  does  not  see  the  ring ; 
don't  deprive  the  poor  Poll-parrot  of  the  pleasure  of  hop- 


CHAP.  XII.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       373 

ping  about  on  the  perch  of  this  earth  till,  when  he  has  wound 
his  life's  thread  some  sixty  times  about  its  reels,  the  reel 
gives  a  ring  and  a  snap,  the  thread  breaks,  and  all  his  fun 
is  over  and  done ! '  Oh !  kind  spirit  of  my  father,  stir  up 
my  friend's  heart  this  day,  and  guide  his  tongue,  that  it 
may  not  say  '  No,'  when  I  ask  him,  '  Will  you  do  all  this.'  " 
Blinded  by  the  evening  sun,  he  felt  for  Firnrian's  hand, 
crying,  "Where's  your  hand,  dear  friend?  and  do  not 
say  «  No.'  " 

But  Firmian,  quite  carried  away  by  emotion  (for  this 
sudden  outburst  of  Leibgeber's  long  pent-up  excitement 
was  most  contagious),  speechless,  and  all  in  tears,  like 
an  evening  shade,  knelt  down  before  his  friend  and  fell  on 
his  breast,  and  said  in  a  low  tone  (for  he  could  do  no 
otherwise),  "  1  am  ready  to  die  for  you  a  thousand  deaths, 
any  death  you  please :  only  say  what  death  I  can  die  for 
you.  All  I  ask  is,  tell  me  plainly  what  you  would  have 
me  do.  I  swear  to  you  beforehand  that  I  will  do  what- 
ever you  tell  me  ;  I  swear  it  by  your  dear  father's  soul.  I 
will  gladly  give  my  life  for  you,  and  you  know  I  have 
nothing  but  that  to  give."  Heinrich  said,  in  a  most 
unusually  subdued  voice,  Let's  get  away  in  among  the 
Bayreuthians.  I  certainly  have  an  attack  of  hydrothorax 
this  afternoon,  or  else  a  hot  mineral  spring  inside  my 
waisteoat ;  'pon  my  word,  any  ordinary  heart  ought  to 
have  a  swimming-belt  on,  or  a  scaphander,  in  a  vapour-bath 
of  this  kind."  But  up  at  the  table  under  the  trees,  among 
the  people  come  to  keep  the  Whitsuntide  fair,  the  great 
holiday  and  festival  of  spring — up  there  among  people  all 
happy  and  enjoying  themselves,  emotion  was  easier  to 
conquer.  Here  Heinrich  quickly  unrolled  the  ground- 
plans  and  elevations  of  his  castle  in  the  air,  the  building 
grants  of  his  Tower  of  Babel.  To  the  Count  von  Vaduz 
(whose  ears  and  heart  opened  and  expanded  to  him  hun- 
grily) he  had  given  his  saored  word  of  honour  that  he 
would  return  to  him  as  Inspector.  But  his  idea  was  that 
his  dear  coadjutor  and  substitute,  cum  spe  succedendi,  Fir- 
mian, should  take  his  place  and  personate  him :  Firmian, 
who  was  such  a  tautology  of  him  in  mind  and  body,  that 
both  the  count,  and  the  theory  of  distinctive  differences 
itself,  would  have  been  puzzled  to  tell  one  of  them  from 


o74  JEAN  PAUL  FBLEDBICH  BICHTEB.        [BOOK  III. 

the  other.  Even  in  the  worst  of  years  the  Inspectorship 
brought  in  an  income  of  1200  thalers  ;  that  is  to  say,  the 
exact  amount  of  Firmian's  whole  inheritance  (now  sealed 
•up  with  the  law's  leaden  signet) ;  so  that  when  Siebenkses 
re-assumed  his  old  name  of  Leibgeber,  he  would  regain 
just  what  he  had  lost  by  changing  it.  "  For,"  said  Leib- 
geber, "  now  that  1  have  read  your  '  Devil's  Papers,'  I  can't 
endure  or  swallow  the  notion  of  your  lying  fallow  any 
longer  in  Kuhschnappel ;  sitting  there  in  solitude,  like  a 
pelican  (or  an  unicorn,  or  an  unknown  hermit)  in  the 
wilderness.  Now,  will  it  take  you  as  long  to  think  about 
the  matter  as  it  takes  the  Chief  Clerk  of  the  Chancellery 
there  to  shake  the  ashes  out  of  his  pipe,  when  I  tell  you 
that,  though  you  are  a  fellow  who  could  fill  any  and  every 
office  in  the  world  splendidly,  there's  only  one  calling  I 
can  follow — that  of  a  Grazioso ;  for  though  I  know  more 
than  most  people,  I  can't  put  my  knowledge  to  any  prac- 
tical use  except  satirising,  and  my  language  is  a  parti- 
coloured Lingua  Franca,  my  head  a  Proteus,  and  I  myself 
a  delightful  compilation  of  the  devil  and  his  grandmother. 
Besides,  if  I  could  do  anything  else,  I  wouldn't.  What,  am  I, 
in  the  very  flower  of  my  days,  to  stamp  and  neigh,  like  a 
state  draught-horse,  a  government  prisoner  in  the  donjon- 
keep,  the  shoeing  travis  of  some  miserable  office  counting- 
houge,  with  nothing  to  look  at  but  my  saddle  and  bridle 
hanging  on  the  stable-wall,  and  the  loveliest  Parnassuses 
and  Tempe  valleys  wooing  the  free  feet  of  the  sons  of  the 
Muses  just  outside !  In  the  very  years  when  my  milk  of 
life  is  inclined  to  throw  out  a  little  cream  — (and  the  years 
when  a  fellow  sours  and  turns  to  curds  and  whey  come  on 
so  fast) — shall  I  go  and  throw  the  rennet  of  an  appoint- 
ment into  my  morning  milk?  Now,  as  for  you,  you  have  a 
different  song  to  sing  altogether;  you  are  half  a  man  of 
office  already,  and  you  are  married  into  the  bargain.  Ah ! 
it  will  beat  all  '  Bremish  Contributions  to  the  Pleasures  of 
Wit  and  Understanding;'  it  will  be  a  business  far  beyond 
every  existing  comic  opera,  and  every  funny  novel  that 
ever  was  written,  when  I  go  back  to  Kuhschnappel  with 
you,  and  you  make  your  will  and  depart  this  life.  And 
then  when,  after  we  have  paid  you  the  last  honours,  you 
jump   up  again  (in  a   good   deal  of  a  hurry)   and  take 


CKAP.  XII.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        375 

yourself  off  to  receive  greater  honours  still ;  not  to  enter 
into  the  bliss  of  the  departed  so  much  as  to  become  a 
bond  fide  live  Inspector;  not  to  appear  before  a  tribunal, 
but  to  take  your  seat  upon  one  yourself.  Joke  upon  joke 
wherever  we  turn  !  I  can't  quite  see  all  the  consequences 
of  it  yet,  or  only  in  a  very  half-and-half  sort  of  way ;  the 
burial  club  will  have  to  pay  your  afflicted  widow  (you  can 
pay  them  back  again  when  you're  in  cash).  Death  will 
lop  off  your  ring-finger,  all  swollen  with  the  betrothal 
ring.  Your  widow  will  be  able  to  marry  anybody  she 
pleases  (yourself  if  she  likes),  and  so  will  you." 

Here,  all  of  a  sudden,  Leibgeber  slapped  his  leg  forty 
times  running,  and  cried,  "Ey!  Ey !  Ey !  Ey!  Ey!  i 
can  hardly  wait  till  you're  fairly  dead  and  off  the  hooks ; 
only  think  of  this,  your  death  may  make  two  women 
widows  instead  of  one.  I  will  persuade  Nathalie  to  insure 
herself  a  pension  of  200  dollars  a  year,  payable  on  your 
death,  in  the  Royal  Prussian  Provident  Widows'  Fund  * 
(you  can  pay  them  it  back  again  as  soon  as  you  get  your 
money).  When  your  widow  that  is  to  be  gives  the  Venner 
the  sack,  you  must  privately  provide  her  with  a  sack  of  bread- 
fruit. And  supposing  you  really  could  never  pay  them  back, 
and  were  to  die  in  sober  earnest,  I  should  take  care  that 
their  treasury  was  none  the  worse  for  it  as  soon  as  I  was  in 
funds  again."  For  Leibgeber  lived  in  a  constant  myste- 
rious state  of  intermittent  fever  between  riches  and  poverty 
(which  he  has  never  explained),  or,  to  use  his  own  ex- 
pression, between  the  inspiration  and  expiration  of  that 
breath  of  life  (Aura  Vitalis)  called  money.  Any  other  but 
this  man,  who  played  his  game  of  life  with  such  a  dashing 
boldness,  whose  blazing  fire  for  the  true,  the  right,  and  the 
unselfish,  had  gleamed  upon  the  advocate  for  so  many  a 
year  as  if  from  a  lighthouse-tower,  would  have  startled 
Siebenkaes,  particularly  in  his  capacity  of  lawyer,  or  have 
made  him  very  angry,  instead  of  over-persuading  him. 
But  Leibgeber  thoroughly  saturated  him,  nay,  burnt  him 
through  and  through  with  the  etherial  playfulness  of  his 
humour,  and  hurried  him  resistlessly  on  to  the  commission 

*  It  is  explained  in  a  long  note  in  the  original,  that  she  could  ilc 
this  even  before  being  married. 


376  JEAN  PAUL  FKIEDEICH  EICHTER.         [BOOK  III. 

of  a  mimic  deception,  which  had  no  aim  of  selfish  untruth- 
fulness or  deceit. 

Firmian,  however,  notwithstanding  his  intoxication  of 
mind,  retained  sufficient  control  over  himself  to  think,  at 
least,  of  the  risk  which  Leibgeber  would  run  in  this  trans- 
action. "  Suppose,"  said  he,  "  anybody  should  come  across 
my  dear  real  Heinrich  (whose  name  I  steal)  in  the  vicinity 
of  me,  a  coiner  of  false  names,  what  then  ? ' 

"  Nobod}7  ever  will,"  said  Heinrich,  "  for  as  soon  as  you 
have  re-assumed  your  own  canonical  name  of  Leibgeber, 
and  given  up  '  Firmian  Stanislaus,'  which  was  conferred 
upon  me  at  such  a  stormy  baptismal  font  (and  Heaven 
grant  you  may  do  so!),  I  shall,  under  names  altogether 
unheard  of — (perhaps,  indeed,  that  I  may  have  the  gra- 
tification of  being  able  to  keep  365  name-days  in  the 
course  of  the  year,  I  shall  take  every  name  in  the  calendar, 
one  after  the  other)  —  I  shall  throw  myself  off  the  dry 
land  (under  these  names  or  some  of  them)  into  the  great 
ocean,  and  propel  myself  with  my  dorsal,  ventral,  and 
caudal  fins  (and  any  others  I  may  have  besides),  through 
the  waves  and  the  billows  of  life  towards  the  thick,  muddy 
sea  of  death  •  so  that  'twill  probably  be  many  a  day  before 
we  meet  again." 

He  gazed  fixedly  towards  the  sun,  then  sinking  in  glory 
beyond  Bayreuth ;  his  motionless  eyes  shone  with  a  moister 
sheen,  and  he  continued,  more  slowly,  thus :  "  Firmian, 
the  Almanac  says  this  is  St.  Stanislaus'  Day;  it  is  your 
name-day,  and  mine,  and  the  death-day  of  that  wandering, 
migratory  name,  because  you  will  have  to  give  it  up  afier 
your  mock  death.  I,  poor  devil  as  I  am,  would  fain  be 
serious  to-day — for  the  first  time  this  many  a  long  year. 
Go  you  home,  alone,  through  the  village  of  Johannes ;  I 
shall  go  by  the  alley;  we'll  meet  again  at  the  inn.  By 
Heaven !  everything  is  so  beautiful  here,  and  so  rose- 
coloured,  that  one  would  think  the  Hermitage  was  a  piece 
of  the  sun.     Don't  be  very  long,  though  ! " 

But  a  sharp  pang  of  pain  shot,  with  swelling  folds,  athwart 
Heinrich's  face,  and  he  averted  that  image  of  sorrow  and  his 
blinded  eyes — (which  were  full  of  radiance,  and  of  water,  too) 
— and  marched  rapidly  off  past  the  spectators,  looking  as  if  at 
something  very  far  away  with  a  face  of  apparent  attention. 


CHAP.  XII.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      377 

Firmian,  alone,  with  tearful  eyes,  fronted  the  gentle  sun- 
light dissolving  into  varied  tints  over  the  face  of  the  green- 
hued  world.  Close  beneath  the  sun-fire  the  deep  gold-mine 
of  an  evening  cloud  was  falling  in  drops  upon  the  hill-tops 
which  lay  under  it;  the  wandering  shifting  gold  of  the 
evening  sky  lay,  all  transparently,  upon  the  yellow-green 
buds  and  red  and  white  hill-tops,  whilst  a  great,  grand, 
immeasurable  smoke,  as  if  of  an  altar,  cast  a  strange,  magic 
reflection — all  shifting,  distant,  translucent  hues — athwart 
the  hills.  The  hills  and  the  happy  earth,  reflecting  the 
sun  as  it  sank,  seemed  to  be  receiving  him  in  their  arms, 
and  taking  him  into  their  embrace.  But  at  tho  moment 
when  the  sun  dipped  wholly  beneath  the  earth,  there  came 
(as  it  were)  the  angel  of  a  higher  light  into  this  gleaming 
world  (which  seemed,  to  Firmian's  tearful  eyes,  to  tremble 
like  some  flickering  fiery  meteor  of  the  air);  this  angel 
advanced,  flashing  like  day,  into  the  midst  of  the  night- 
torch-dance  of  the  living,  who,  at  his  coming,  turned  pale, 
and  halted  still.  But,  as  Firmian  dried  his  e}-es,  the  sun 
set,  the  earth  grew  stiller  and  paler  yet,  and  night,  dewy 
and  wintry,  came  forth  from  the  woods. 

But  that  melted  heart  of  his  longed  for  its  fellows,  and 
for  all  whom  it  knew  and  loved ;  it  throbbed  insatiate  in 
this  lonely  prison-cell,  our  life ;  it  yearned  to  love  all 
humanity.  Ah !  the  soul  which  has  had  to  give  up  much, 
or  has  lost  much,  is  too,  too  wretched  on  such  an  evening 
as  this. 

In  a  blissful,  tranced  reverie,  Firmian  went  his  way 
through  the  blossomy  fragrance,  among  the  American 
flowers  which  open  to  the  sky  of  our  night,  through  the 
closed  meadows  ("chambers  of  sleep),  and  under  dew-drop- 
ping flowers.  The  moon  stood  on  the  pinnacle  of  the 
heavenly  temple  in  the  midday  effulgence  which  the  sun 
cast  up  to  her  from  the  deeps  beneath  the  earth  and  her 
evening-blushes.  As  Firmian  passed  through  the  leaf- 
hidden  village  of  Johannes  (where  the  houses  were  all 
scattered  about  in  a  great  orchard),  the  evening  bells  from 
the  distant  hamlets  were  lulling  the  slumbering  spring  to 
sleep  with  cradle-songs.  iEolian  harps,  breathed  on  by 
zephyrs,  seemed  to  be  sending  forth  their  tones  from  out 
the  evening-red,  their  melodies  flowed  softly  on  iuto  the 


378  JEAN  PATH-  FKIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  III. 

wide  realm  of  sleep,  and  there  took  the  form  of  dreams. 
Firmian's  heart,  moved  to  its  very  centre,  yearned  for  love — ■ 
and  for  very  longing  he  felt  impelled  to  press  his  flowers 
into  the  white  hands  of  a  pretty  child  in  Johannes — just 
that  he  might  touch  a  human  hand. 

Go,  dear  Firmian,  with  tliat  softened  heart  of  yours,  to 
your  deeply-moved  friend,  whose  inner  being,  too,  stretches 
its  arms  out  towards  its  likeness ;  for,  to-day,  you  are  no- 
where so  happy  as  together.  When  Firmian  entered  their 
common  chamber  (which  was  dark  save  for  the  glow  of  the 
red  twilight  in  the  west),  Heinrich  turned  to  meet  him ; 
they  fell  silently  into  each  other's  arms  and  forgot  all  the 
tears  which  burned  within  them,  even  those  of  joy.  Their 
embrace  ended,  but  their  silence  did  not.  Heinrich  threw 
himself  on  his  bed,  in  his  clothes,  and  covered  himself  up. 
Firmian  sank  upon  the  other  bed  and  wept  there,  with 
closed  lids.  After  an  hour  or  two  of  excited  fancy,  heated 
by  visions  and  by  pangs  of  pain,  a  soft  light  fell  upon  his 
burning  eyelids ;  he  opened  them,  and  there  hung  the  pale, 
glowing  moon  over  against  his  window.  He  rose  up; 
but  when  he  saw  his  friend  standing  pale  and  motionless, 
like  a  shadow  cast  by  the  moon  upon  the  wall — and  sud- 
denly there  came  up  from  a  neighbouring  garden  (like  a 
nightingale's  voice  awaking),  Bust's  melody  to  the  words — 

"  Tis  not  for  this  earthly  land 
TL  -t  Friendship  weaves  her  holy  band  " — 

he  fell  back  under  the  load  of  bitter  memory ;  an  emotion, 
too  great  to  bear,  a  spasm,  closed  his  sad  eyes,  and  he  said, 
:n  hollow  accents, 

"  Heinrich !  oh  believe  in  immortality.  How  can  we 
love,  if  we  perish !  " 

"  Peace,  peace ! "  said  Heinrich.  "  To-day  I  am  keeping 
my  name-day,  and  that  is  enough ;  for  man,  certainly,  hag 
no  birth-day,  and,  consequently,  no  death-day  either." 


CHAP.  XIII.J    FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       379 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

A  CLOCK  OF  HUMAN  BEINGS — A  COLD  SHOULDER— THE  VENNER. 

When,  in  my  last  chapter,  I  spoke  of  ladies  who  were 
given  to  brevity  of  sleep,  and  awoke  six  hours  before  their 
sisters  at  the  Antipodes,  I  think  I  did  well  not  to  cram 
into  my  twelfth  chapter  (among  the  numerous  events  so 
tightly  packed  there)  a  model  of  a  certain  clock,  composed 
of  men  and  women,  which  I  invented  a  considerable  rime 
ago.  but  to  reserve  it  for  this  thirteenth  chapter,  where  I 
shall  now  introduce  it,  and  set  it  up.  I  believe  this 
humanity  clock  of  mine  was  suggested  to  me  by  Linnaeus' 
flower  clock  at  Upsal,  whose  wheels  were  the  earth  and 
the  sun,  and  the  figures  on  its  dial  were  flowers,  whereof 
one  always  awoke  and  opened  later  than  another.  I  was 
living  at  the  time  in  Scheerau,  in  the  middle  of  the  market- 
place, and  had  two  rooms.  From  the  front  room  I  was 
able  to  see  all  the  market-place  and  the  palace  buildings, 
while  my  back  room  looked  into  the  Botanical  Gardens. 
Whoever  maybe  living  in  these  rooms  now  is  in  possession 
of  a  delightful,  ready-tuned  harmony  between  the  flower 
clock  in  the  garden  and  the  mankind  clock  in  the  market- 
place. 

At  3  a.m.  the  yellow  meadow  goatsbeard  awakes — also 
brides— and  then,  too,  the  stable-boy  begins  rattling  and 
feeding  the  horses  under  the  lodger.  At  4  (on  Sundays) 
awake  the  little  hawksweed,  and  ladies  who  are  going  to 
the  Holy  Communion  (chiming  clocks  these  may  be  called) 
and  the  bakers.  At  5,  kitchen-maids  and  dairy-maids 
awake,  and  buttercups ;  at  6,  sowthistles  and  cooks.  By  7, 
a  good  many  of  the  wardrobe  women  of  the  palace,  and  the 
salad  in  the  Botanical  Gardens,  are  awake,  as  well  as  several 
tradeswomen.  At  8,  all  their  daughters  and  the  little 
yellow  mouse-ear — all  the  colleges  and  the  leaves  of  flowers, 
piecrust,  and  law-papers,  are  open.  At  9,  the  female  aris- 
tocracy begin  to  stir,  and  the  marygolds,  to  say  nothing  of 
a  number  of  young  ladies  from  the  country,  in  town  on  a 
visit,  glance  out  of  their  windows.  At  10  and  11,  the 
Court  ladies,  the  whole  staff  of  lords  of  the  bedchamber, 


380  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  III. 

the  green  colewort  and  pippau  of  the  Alps,  and  the  Prin- 
cesses' reader,  arouse  themselves  from  their  morning  slum- 
ber ;  and  (so  brightly  is  the  morning  sun  breaking  in 
through  the  many-tinted  silken  curtains)  the  whole  Court 
curtails  a  morsel  or  so  of  its  sleep.  At  12,  the  Prince; 
at  1,  his  consort,  and  the  carnation  in  her  flower-vase — 
have  their  eyes  open.  What  gets  up  at  later  hours  in  the 
afternoon — about  4  o'clock,  say — is  nothing  but  the  red 
hawksweed  and  the  night  watchman  (a  cuckoo  clock),  and 
these  two  are  but  evening  dials,  or  moon  clocks.  From  the 
hot  eyes  of  the  poor  devil  who  opens  them  only  at  5  (with 
the  jnlap),  we  turn  our  own  away  in  sorrow ;  he  is  a  sick 
man,  who  has  taken  some  of  it  (the  jalap),  and  only  passes 
from  fever-fancies  of  being  griped  with  hot  pincers  to 
genuine,  waking  spasms. 

I  could  never  tell  when  it  was  2  o'clock,  because  I,  and 
a  thousand  other  stout  gentlemen  and  the  yellow  mouse- 
ear,  were  always  asleep  at  that  hour ;  though  I  awoke,  with 
the  regularity  of  an  accurate  repeater,  at  3  in  the  afternoon 
and  at  3  in  the  morning. 

Thus  may  we  human  creatures  serve  as  flower  clocks  to 
higher  intelligences  when  our  petals  close  upon  our  last 
bed,  or  as  sand-glasses  when  our  sands  of  life  are  run  so 
far  out  that  they  are  turned  over  into  the  other  world. 
On  such  occasions,  when  seventy  of  man's  years  have  ended 
and  passed  away,  these  higher  intelligences  may  say, 
"  Another  hour  already !     Good  God  !  how  time  flies !" 

And  this  digression  reminds  me  that  it  really  does  fly  ! 
Firmian  and  Heinrich  lived  on  in  great  cheerfulness  of 
spirit  towards  the  jocund  morning  which  was  so  close  at 
hand,  though  the  former  could  b}'  no  means  take  root  upon 
any  chair  or  room-floor  all  the  forenoon ;  for,  in  his  mind's 
eye,  the  curtain  kept  always  rising  upon  the  opera  buffa 
e  seria  of  his  mock  death,  and  displaying  its  burlesque 
situations.  And  at  present  (as  was  always  the  case,  in- 
deed) the  presence  and  example  of  Leibgeber  heightened 
his  sense  of  humour  and  power  of  expressing  the  same. 
Leibgeber,  who  had  gone  through  all  the  stage-business 
and  scene-shifting  of  the  sham  death  in  an  exhaustive 
manner  weeks  ago  (in  fancy),  was  thinking  little  about  it 
now.     The  problem  occupying  him  at  present  was  how  to 


i 


CHAP.  XIII. J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      381 

extract  the  wick  (that  is  to  say,  the  bride)  out  cf  Eosa's 
wedding-torch,  all  painted  and  moulded  as  it  was.  Hein- 
jich  was  at  all  times  forcible,  free,  and  bold,  furious  and 
implacable  as  regards  anything  unjust;  and  his  righteous 
indignation  often  had  much  the  appearance  of  vengeance, 
us  here  in  Rosa's  case,  and  in  that  of  Blaise.  Firmian  was 
more  kindly ;  he  spared  and  pardoned,  often,  indeed,  at 
the  (apparent)  expense  of  honour.  He  could  never  have 
plucked  Nathalie's  epistolary  lover  out  of  her  bleeding  heart 
with  Leibgeber's  forceps  and  knife.  His  friend,  at  leaving 
fur  Fantaisie  that  day,  had  to  promise  the  gentlest  of 
behaviour,  and,  for  a  time,  silence  on  the  subject  of  the 
Eoyal  Prussian  Widows'  Fund.  It  would,  of  course,  have 
made  a  terrific,  bleeding  wound  in  Nathalie's  feeling  of 
rectitude  had  the  most  distant  hint  been  Tittered  of  such  a 
matter  as  metallic  compensation  for  a  spiritual  loss  such 
as  that  involved  in  her  separation  on  moral  grounds  from 
the  immoral  Venner.  She  deserved  to  conquer  (and  was 
well  able  to  do  so),  with  the  prospect  of  her  victory 
:  educing  her  to  poverty. 

Heinrich  did  not  come  back  till  it  was  somewhat  late, 
and  his  face  was  a  little  troubled,  though  it  was  a  happy 
face  too.  Bosa  was  discarded,  and  Nathalie  pained.  The 
English  lady  was  at  Anspach  with  Lady  Craven,  eating 
her  butter — (for  she  made  butter  as  well  as  books).  When 
he  had  read  out  to  Nathalie  all  that  was  written  on  Eosa's 
black  board  and  sin-register  (which  he  did  gravely,  but 
perhaps  louder  than  was  necessary,  and  with  scrupulous 
truth),  she  rose  up  with  that  grand  grace  which  is  a  cha- 
racteristic of  enthusiasm  of  self-sacrifice :  "  If  you  are  your- 
self deceived  in  this  as  little  as  you  are  capable  of  deceiving, 
and  if  I  may  believe  your  friend  as  I  do  you,  I  give  you 
my  sacred  word  that  I  will  not  allow  myself  to  be  per- 
suaded, or  constrained,  to  anything.  But  the  subject  of 
this  conversation  will  be  here  himself  in  a  few  days,  and 
I  owe  it  to  him  as  well  as  to  my  own  honour,  to  hear  him, 
as  I  have  given  my  letters  into  his  hands.  Oh !  it  is 
hard  to  have  to  speak  so  coldly  !  "  As  the  moments  pas.sed, 
the  rose  red  of  her  cheek  paled  to  rose-white.  She  leant 
it  on  her  hand,  and  as  her  eyes  grew  fuller,  and  tears 
dropped  at  last,  she  said,  strongly  and  firmly,   "  Be  in 


382  JEAN  PAUL  PRIEDRICH  EICHTER.         [BOOK  III. 

no  anxiety,  I  shall  keep  my  word ;  and  then,  cost  what 
it  may,  I  will  tear  myself  from  my  friend,  and  go  hack  to 
my  poor  people  in  Schraplau.  i  have  lived  quite  long 
enough  in  the  great  world,  though  not  too  long." 

Heinrich's  unusual  seriousness  had  overpowered  her. 
Her  confidence  in  his  truth  was  immovable,  and  that 
(strange  reason!)  just  because  he  had  never  seemed  to 
fall  in  love  with  her,  or  to  pass  beyond  the  condition  of 
friendship,  and  so  did  not  measure  her  affection  by  his 
own.  Perhaps  she  would  have  been  angry  with  her 
bridegroom's  married  attorney  (i.e.  Firmian),  had  he  not 
had  three  or  four  of  the  best  possible  excuses  ;  to  wit,  his 
general  mental  resemblance  to  Leibgeber,  and  his  phy- 
siognomical resemblance  to  him  (which  his  paleness  puri- 
fied and  refined  at  this  juncture). 

Her  yesterday's  request  to  Leibgeber  to  bring  Siebenlsges 
with  him  in  the  evening  was  now  repeated  (to  the  former's 
joy),  though  her  heart  was  aching  in  every  corner.  But 
let  none  take  umbrage  at  her  half-mourning  for  the 
Venner  (now  setting  and  near  the  horizon),  or  her  erro- 
neous estimate  of  him ;  for  we  all  know  that  women 
(Heaven  bless  them !)  often  think  sentiment  and  integrity, 
letters  and  actions,  tears  and  honest  warm  blood,  to  be 
equivalent  one  to  another. 

In  the  afternoon  Leibgeber  took  Siebenkses  to  her  as  a 
sort  of  syllogistic  figure  in  support  of  his  argument,  or 
set  of  rationes  decidendi  (for  the  Venner  was  a  collection  of 
rationes  dubitandi).  Aquiliana  received  Siebenkses  with  a 
blush,  which  came  and  went  in  an  instant;  and  then  with 
the  least  dash  of  hauteur  (result  of  modesty !),  yet  with  all 
the  kindness  and  good-will  which  she  owed  to  his  interest 
in  her  future.  She  lived  in  the  English  lady's  rooms. 
The  flowery  valley  lay  without,  like  a  world  before  its 
sun.  One  advantage  connected  with  a  rich  pleasure- 
garden  of  this  sort  is  that  a  stranger  advocate  finds  that 
he  can  attach  the  floating  spider-threads  of  his  talk  to 
the  branches  of  it,  until  they  have  been  woven  into  the 
finished  art-work  of  a  glittering  web,  which  can  float  in 
the  free  air.  Firmian  could  never  emulate  these  clever 
men  of  the  world,  who  only  need  a  listener  to  be  able  to 
begin  spinning  a  conversation ;  who,  like  the  tree-frogs, 


CHAP.  XIII.  J    FLO  WEE,  FRUIT,  AND  THOEN  PIECES.      383 

can  cling  firmly  to  anything  they  chance  to  hop  on  to, 
however  smooth  and  polished  it  may  be;  yea,  who  can 
even  keep  afloat  in  a  space  devoid  of  air,  and  all  objects 
whatever  (which  a  tree-frog  cannot).  A  man  of  Siebenkaes' 
free  and  independent  soul  cannot,  however,  long  remain 
embarrassed  by  his  unfamiliarity  with  his  surroundings ; 
he  must  speedily  recover  his  freedom  by  virtue  of  his 
innate  superiority  to  chance,  external  circumstances ;  and 
his  unassumed  and  unassuming  simpleness  soon  amply 
compensates  for  his  lack  of  the  great  world's  artificial  and 
assuming  simplicity. 

Yesterday  he  had  seen  this  Nathalie  in  the  happy 
exercise  and  enjoyment  of  all  her  powers,  and  of  nature 
and  friendship,  smiling  and  enchanting,  and  crowning  the 
delightful  evening  with  an  act  of  brave  self-devotion. 
Alas!  how  little  remained  to-day  of  all  these  joys,  so 
tender  and  so  bright.  In  no  hour  is  a  lovely  face  lovelier 
than  at  that  immediately  succeeding  the  bitter  one,  when 
tears  for  the  loss  of  a  heart  have  passed  over  it;  for  the 
sight  of  the  loveliness  in  its  sorrow,  during  that  hour  itself, 
would  be  too  sad  to  bear.  For  this  beautiful  creature, 
who  hid  the  sacrificial  knife  deep  m  her  heart,  where  it 
had  been  plunged,  and  gladly  let  it  smart  there,  that  but 
the  wound's  bleeding  might  be  delayed,  Siebenkaes  would 
gladly  have  died — in  a  way  more  serious  than  had  been 
intended — could  it  have  been  of  any  service  to  her.  Is  it 
a  thing  so  strange  that  the  bond  between  them  grew  closer 
and  stronger  as  the  sand  run  down  in  the  hourglass,  when 
we  consider  that,  swayed  by  an  unwonted  three-sided 
seriousness  (for  even  Leibgeber  was  overtaken  by  this 
feeling),  their  hearts,  at  sight  of  the  gala-beauty  of  the 
spring,  were  filled  with  tender,  longing  wishes? — that 
Siebenkaes,  with  his  pale  face,  worn,  and  stamped  with  all 
the  traces  and  marks  and  signs  of  recent,  bygone,  trouble 
and  pain,  shone,  this  day,  with  a  soft  and  pleasing  sheen, 
as  of  evening  sunlight,  on  her  sight,  all  weakened  by  her 
tears? — that  she  thought  with  pleasure  on  his  (rather 
singular)  merit  of  having,  at  all  events,  embittered  some 
of  her  faithless  suitor's  infidelities — and  that  every  note 
be  touched  was  in  the  minor  mode  of  his  tender  nature, 
because  he  was.  seeking  to  atone  for,  and  cast  into  shade, 


384  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  EICHTER.        L300K  III 

the  circumstance  that  it  had  fallen  to  his  lot  to  lay  waste 
at  one  fell  stroke  so  many  of  this  innocent,  unknown 
creature's  hopes  and  joys — that  even  his  greater  share  of 
modest,  respectful  reserve,  became  him,  and  set  him  off  bj 
contrast  with  his  counterpart,  the  bolder  and  more  out- 
spoken Heinrich?  With  all  these  charms  of  accidental 
circumstance  (which  win  the  female  world  far  sooner  than 
charms  of  a  bodily  kind),  Firmian  was  endowed  in  Nathalie's 
eyes.  In  his  eyes  she  had  attractions  greater  still,  and 
altogether  new  to  him  :  her  cultivation  and  acquirements  ; 
her  manly  enthusiasm,  her  delicate  refinement;  her  (most 
flattering)  way  of  treating  Mm — (none  of  her  sex  had  ever 
before  glorified  him  with  anything  like  it,  and  this  par- 
ticular species  of  charm  plunges  many  a  man  who  is  un- 
used to  female  companionship,  not  only  into  rapture,  but 
into  matrimony), — and  (two  crowning  delights)  the  facta 
that  the  whole  affair  was  fortuitous  and  out  of  the  common, 
and  that  Lenette  was  the  exact  antipodes  of  her  in  each 
and  every  respect. 

Alas !  poor  starved,  hungering  Firmian.  There  are 
always  a  gallows,  and  a  notice-board  marked  "No  tho- 
roughfare," on  the  banks  of  the  streamlet  of  your  life,  even 
now  that  it  has  become  a  pearl-bearing  brook.  Your 
marriage  ring  must  have  pinched  you  a  good  deal,  and 
felt  very  tight  in  a  warm  temperature  like  this,  as,  in- 
deed all  rings  feel  tight  in  a  warm  bath,  and  loose  in  a 
cold  one. 

But  either  some  naiad  of  a  diabolical  turn  of  mind,  or 
fome  ocean  god  who  loved  a  jest,  took  always  the  greatest 
delight  in  perturbing  and  disturbing  the  sea  of  Firrnian's 
life,  and  stirring  up  the  sand  at  the  bottom  of  it  just  when 
its  waters  were  sparkling  and  glowing  enchantingly  with 
phosphorescent  sea  creatures,  or  some  electric  matter  or 
other,  and  his  ship  leaving  a  long  shining  wake  behind 
her  in  it.  For  just  as  the  glory  and  the  beauty  of  the 
garden  outside  were  growing  moment  by  moment,  and 
embarrassment  vanishing  away  with  equal  rapidity,  the 
painful  memory  of  the  late  bereavement  fading  out  of 
remembrance;  just  when  the  pianoforte  (or,  say,  the 
pianissimo  fortissimo),  and  the  songs,  duets,  and  trios 
were  being  opened  and  got  ready ;    in  line,  just  as  the 


CHAP.  XIII.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  TIECES.       385 

honey-cells  of  their  orangery  of  happiness,  their  permitted 
flesh-pots  of  Egypt,  and  deep  communion  cup  of  love  were 
all  ready  to  their  lips,  who  came  with  a  pop  into  the 
room  but  a  certain  bluebottle  fly  on  two  legs,  who  had 
often  flown  into  Firmian's  cup  of  joy  before  now. 

The  Venner,  Rosa  von  Meyern,  made  his  appearance  on 
the  scene,  lovelily  attired  in  saffron  silk,  to  pay  his  bride 
his  privileged  ambassadorial  visit. 

N^ver  in  all  his  career  did  this  young  gentleman  arrive 
otherwise  than  too  soon  or  too  late ;  just  as  he  was  never 
serious,  but  either  lachrymose  or  jocular.  The  three 
faces  were  now  each  a  long  duodecimo  edition  of  them- 
selves ;  Leibgeber's  was  the  only  one  which  was  not 
stretched  on  the  wire-drawing  press,  but  it  was  dyed  a 
fine  red  by  his  inborn  detestation  of  fops  and  maiden- 
hawks  of  every  kind.  Everard  had  come  primed  with 
one  idea  (taken  from  Stolberg's  '  Homer'),  which  was,  to 
ask  Nathalie,  on  his  entrance,  whether  she  were  a  goddess 
or  a  mortal  (in  the  manner  of  Homer's  heroes),  since  he 
could  only  pretend  to  contend  with  the  latter  race.  But 
at  sight  of  the  masculine  pair  whom  the  Devil  levelled 
at  his  head  like  a  double-barrelled  gun,  everything  inside 
it  turned  to  cheese  and  curd,  immobile  ;  twenty  kisses 
wouldn't  have  enabled  him  to  get  his  great  idea  a-flow 
again.  It  was  five  days  before  he  got  what  little  there 
was  inside  the  bones  of  his  head  into  such  a  fair  way 
of  recovery  as  to  make  shift  to  deliver  himself  of  this 
idea  to  a  distant  relation  of  my  own  (how  else  should 
I  have  known  anything  about  it  ?)  in  a  tolerable  degree 
of  preservation.  At  all  times  nothing  so  paralysed  him 
in  female  society  as  the  presence  of  a  man ;  he  would 
have  stormed  an  entire  convent  of  women  sooner  than  have 
laid  siege  to  a  single  couple  of  novices  (to  say  nothing  of 
a  canoness),  had  but  a  single  wretched  man  been  alongside 
them. 

A  standing  troupe  of  players,  such  as  I  now  see  before 
ray  pencil,  never  performed  in  Fantaisie.  Nathalie  was  lost 
in  amazement  (little  polite),  and  in  a  quiet  comparison 
of  this  original  edition  with  her  epistolary  ideal.  The 
Venner,  who  took  for  granted  that  the  result  of  her  observa- 

u.  2  c 


386  JEAN  PAUL  PEIEDRICH  EICHTER.       [BOOK  IIL 

tions  was  just  the  opposite  of  what  it  really  was,  would  have 
been  delighted  had  he  had  it  in  his  power  to  be  a  manifest 
contradiction,  an  antipodes  to  himself.  I  mean,  he  would 
fain  have  shown  himself  both  cold  and  angry  at  finding 
her  in  the  society  of  this  couple,  and  also  confidential  and 
tender,  so  that  this  beggarly  pair  might  be  filled  with 
envy  and  vexation  at  the  isight  of  his  harvest  and  vintage. 
And  inasmuch  as  he  was  quite  as  greatly  (only  much 
more  agreeably)  struck  with,  and  surprised  at  her  ap- 
pearance, as  she  with  his,  and  as  he  had  time  enough 
before  him  for  revenge  and  punishment,  he  chose  rather 
to  adopt  the  line  of  bragging  and  vaunting  with  the 
view  of  seasoning  and  blessing  the  visit  of  these  two 
lawyer  fellows  with  a  good  spice  of  envy.  Moreover,  he 
had  the  advantage  of  them  in  possessing  a  light  horse- 
artillery  body,  and  he  could  mobilise  his  army  of  physical 
charms  quicker  than  they  could.  Siebenkses  was  thinking 
of  nothing  nearer  at  hand  than — his  wife.  Before  Bosa's 
arrival  he  had  been  browsing  on  the  idea  of  her  as  on  a 
meadow  of  bitter  herbs,  for  the  rough,  chapped  bark  of  the 
conjugal  hand  was  by  no  means  capable  of  touching  his 
self-love  with  the  delicate,  etherial,  gentle,  snail-antennm 
touch  of  this  unmated  beauty's  eiderdown  fingers.  But 
now  the  idea  of  Lenette  became  a  pasture  of  sweet  and 
succulent  verdure ;  for  his  jealousy  of  Bosa  (domiciled  in 
two  different  quarters)  was  less  awakened  by  Lenette's 
behaviour  to  him  than  by  Nathalie's  relations  with  him. 
The  grimness  of  Heinrich's  glances  increased  amain  ;  they 
wandered  up  and  down  over  Bosa's  summer  hare-skin  of 
yellow  silk  with  a  jaundiced  glare.  In  an  irritable  impulse 
to  be  doing  something  or  other,  he  fumbled  in  his  waist- 
coat pocket,  and  got  hold  of  the  profile  of  Herr  von  Blaise 
which  he  had  clipped  out  (as  we  may  remember)  on  the 
occasion  when  he  stamped  the  glass  wig  to  pieces  (and  with 
respect  to  which  profile  the  only  thing  which  had  been 
distressing  him  for  a  twelvemonth  past  was  that  it  was 
in  his  pocket,  and  not  affixed  to  the  gallows,  where  he 
could  have  stuck  it  with  a  hairpin  the  evening  he  went 
away).  He  pulled  it  out,  and  tousling  it  between  his 
fingers,  he  glided  nimbly  backwards  and  forwards  between 


CHAP.  XIII.]    PLOWEE,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       387 

Nathalie  and  Eosa,  murmuring  to  Siebenkees  (with  his  eyes 
fixed  on  the  Venner),  "  A  la  silhouette."  * 

Everard's  self-love  divined  these  flattering  (and  involun- 
tary) sacrifices  of  the  self-love  of  the  other  two,  and  he  went 
on  firing  off  at  the  embarrassed  girl  (with  ever-growing 
superciliousness,  directed  to  Siebenkses's  address)  frag- 
ments from  the  story  of  his  travels,  messages  from  his 
friends,  and  questions  concerning  the  arrival  of  his  letters. 
The  brethren.  Siebenkass  and  Leibgeber,  sounded  a  retreat, 
but  did  so  like  true  males ;  for  they  were  the  least  bit 
annoyed  with  poor,  innocent  Nathalie,  just  as  though  she 
could  have  marched  up  to  this  sponsus  and  letter  bridegroom 
of  hers  the  moment  he  came  into  the  room,  with  a  saluta- 
tation  such  as,  "  Sir,  you  can  never  be  lord  of  mine,  even 
were  you  nothing  worse  than  a  scoundrel,  idiot,  fright, 
prig,  man-milliner,"  &c.  But  must  we  not,  all  of  us  (for 
I  don't  consider  myself  an  exception),  smite  upon  our  bony, 
sinful  breasts,  and  confess  that  we  spit  fire  the  moment 
modest  girls  refrain  from  spitting  it  instantty  at  those 
whom  we  may  have  nigrified  or  excommunicated  in  their 
presence ;  that  further  we  insist  upon  their  discarding 
wicked  squires  instantaneously,  although  they  may  not 
be  in  such  a  hurry  to  receive  them — that  they  should  care 
as  little  what  forced  marches  and  honourable  retreats  their 
cottiers  and  dependents  may  have  to  make,  as  we  fief- 
holders  do  ourselves ;  and  that  we  are  offended  with  them 
when  they  have  an  innocent  opportunity  of  being  false; 
even  when  they  do  not  avail  themselves  of  it?  May 
Heaven  improve  the  class  of  persons  of  whom  I  have  just 
been  treating. 

Firmian  and  Heinrich  roamed  for  an  hour  or  two  about 
the  enchanted  valley ;  it  was  full  of  magic  flutes,  magic 
zithers,  and  magic  mirrors.  But  they  had  neither  ears 
nor  eyes.  What  they  found  to  say  concerning  events 
heated  their  heads  to  the  temperature  of  balloon  furnaces, 
and  Leibgeber  blew  a  fanfare  of  mere  satiric  insults  out  of 
the  reverse  end  of  Fame's  trumpet  at  every  female  Bay- 
reuthian  he  met  taking  her  evening  walk.     He  announced 

*  The  Silhouette  took  its  name  from  the  Controller-General  hc 
called.  In  Paris,  an  empty,  blank  physiognomy  is  called  a  face  "  a  la 
silhouette." 

2c2 


388  JEAN  PAUL  FRTEDRICH  EICHTER.       [BOOK  HI. 

it  as  his  opinion  that  women  were  the  unsafest  ships  in 
which  a  man  could  embark  on  the  great  open  ocean  of  life 
— slaveship8  in  fact,  or  bucentaurs  (or  shuttles  *  which  the 
Devil  weaves  his  nets  and  gins  with) — and  the  more  so 
that,  like  other  ships  of  war,  they  are  so  often  and  so 
scrupulously  washed,  sheathed  on  the  outside  with  poisonous 
copper,  and  have  about  the  same  amount  of  bunting  and 
tarry  tackle  (ribbons)  flying  about  them.  Heinrich  had  gone 
to  Nathalie's,  indulging  the  (highly  improbable)  anticipa- 
tion that  she  would  at  once  unhesitatingly  accept  and  act 
npon  his  friend's  deposition  of  evidence  in  his  capacity  of  an 
eye-  and  ear-witness  concerning  Rosa's  canonical  impedi- 
menta (or  ecclesiastical  marriage  disabilities),  and  it  was 
his  disappointment  on  this  score  which  was  so  gnawing 
upon  his  mind. 

But  just  as  Firmian  was  discussing  and  expatiating 
apon  the  Venner's  lisping  and  indistinct  mode  of  speaking 
(his  words  seemed  to  curl  about  the  top  of  his  tongue  with  no 
power  of  expression  in  them),  Heinrich  cried  out,  "  Hallo  ! 
there  the  dirt-fly  goes  !  "  It  was  the  Venner,  floundering 
as  a  pike  does  in  the  net  he  has  been  brought  to  market 
in.  As  the  woodpecker  (naturalists  call  most  gaudy-plu- 
maged  birds  woodpeckers)  winged  his  flight  closer  by  them, 
they  saw,  as  he  passed  them,  that  his  face  was  a-glow  with 
anger.  Doubtless  the  cement  which  had  attached  him  to 
Nathalie  was  broken  and  dissolved. 

The  two  friends  waited  a  little  while  longer  in  the 
shady  walk,  hoping  that  they  might  meet  her ;  but  at 
length  they  made  their  way  back  to  town,  meeting,  as  they 
went,  a  maid  of  hers,  who  was  taking  the  following  letter 
to  Leibgeber : — 

"  You  and  your  friend  were,  alas  !  quite  right,  and  all 
is  now  at  an  end.  Please  to  let  me  rest,  and  reflect  for  a 
time  in  solitude  over  the  ruins  of  my  little  future.  When 
people's  lips  are  wounded  and  stitched,  they  are  not  allowed 
to  talk,  although  it  is  not  my  lips  but  my  heart  that  bleeds, 
and  that  for  your  sex.  Ah  !  I  blush  when  I  think  of  all 
the  letters  I  have  written,  which  it  has  been  such  happiness 
to  me  to  write — and,#alas  I  under  such  a  delusion! — yet  I 

*  Which  are  called  "  weavers'  ships  "  in  German. 


CHAP.  XIII.  j    FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       389 

have  no  real  reason  to  do  so  after  all.  You  have  yourself 
said  that  innocent  pleasures  should  give  us  as  little  cause 
to  be  ashamed  as  blackberries,  although,  when  the  en- 
joyment is  past,  there  may  be  a  black  stain  on  the  lips. 
But,  at  all  events,  1  thank  you  from  my  heart.  As  I  must 
have  been  disenchanted  one  day,  it  was  kind  that  it  was 
not  done  by  the  wicked  sorcerer  himself,  but  by  you  and 
your  most  honest  and  truthful  friend,  to  whom  please  to 
offer  my  very  kind  regards  and  remembrances. 

"  Yours, 

"  A.  Nathalie." 

Heinrich  had  expected  the  letter  to  be  one  of  invitation, 
"  for  "  (said  he)  "  her  empty  heart  must  feel  a  cold  void, 
like  a  finger  with  its  nail  cut  too  short."  Firmian,  whom 
matrimony  had  taught,  and  furnished  with  barometer 
scales  and  meteorological  tables  for  observance  of  women, 
knew  enough  to  be  of  opinion  that  a  woman  must,  in  the 
very  hour  when  she  had  dismissed  one  lover  (on  purely 
moral  grounds)  be  a  little  over-cool  towards  the  person 
who  has  persuaded  her  thereto,  even  were  he  her  second 
lover.  And  (I  take  leave  here  to  add,  myself)  for  the  very- 
same  reasons  she  will  exceed  in  warmth  towards  this  second 
immediately  afterwards. 

"  Ah  !  poor  ^Nathalie  !  "  Firmian  wished  unceasingly — 
"  May  the  flowers  and  blossoms  be  court-plaister  for  the 
wounds  of  your  heart;  may  the  soft  aether  of  spring  be 
a  milk-cure  for  your  oppressed  panting  bosom."  It  seemed 
unspeakably  sad  to  him  that  an  innocent  creature  like 
this  should  be  thus  tried  and  punished,  as  though  she  were 
guilty,  and  be  compelled  to  draw  the  purifying  air  of  her 
life  from  poison  plants,  and  not  from  wholesome  ones. 

The  next  day  all  Siebenkaes  did  was  to  write  a  letter 
(in  which  he  signed  himself  Leibgeber),  informing  the 
Count  von  Vaduz  that  he  was  unwell  and  as  grey  and 
yellow  as  a  Swiss  cheese.  Heinrich  had  left  him  no 
peace  until  he  did  this.  "  The  count,"  said  he,  "  is 
accustomed,  in  my  person,  to  a  fine,  blooming,  sturdy  In- 
spector ;  but,  if  he  is  properly  prepared  for  the  thing  by 
a  letter,  he  will  really  believe  you  to  be  me.  Luckily  we 
are  neither  of  us  men  who  would  be  asked  to  unbutton 


390  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  III. 

in  any  custom-house  ;  nobody  would  fancy  there  was  any- 
thing inside  our  waistcoats  but  skin  and  bone."  * 

On  the  Thursday  Siebenkses,  standing  at  the  hotel-door, 
saw  the  Venner,  in  an  Electoral  habit,  with  a  full-dress 
parade  head,  and  a  whole  Barth's  vineyard  in  his  face, 
driving  to  the  Hermitage  between  two  young  ladies.  When 
he  carried  this  news  upstairs,  Leibgeber  swore — (and  also 
cursed) — to  the  effect  that  the  scoundrel  wasn't  worthy  of 
the  society  of  any  young  lady,  unless  her  head  was  a 
Golgotha  and  her  heart  a  gorge  (or  cut)  tie  Paris.  He  was 
quite  bent  on  going  to  see  [Nathalie  then  and  there,  and 
telling  her  the  news,  but  Firmian  prevented  him  by  main 
force. 

On  the  Friday  she  herself  wrote  to  Heinrich  as  follows  : — 
"  I  have  mustered  up  courage  to  revoke  my  prohibition, 
and  beg  that  you  and  your  friend  will  come  to-morrow  to 
beautiful  Fantaisie,  when  (it  being  Saturday)  it  will  he 
depopulated.  I  keep  my  arms  about  Nature  and  Friend- 
ship ;  there  is  no  room  in  them  for  anything  besides.  Do 
you  know,  I  dreamt  last  night  that  1  saw  you  both  in  one 
coffin — there  was  a  white  butterfly  fluttering  above  you, 
and  it  grew  larger  and  larger  till  its  wings  were  like 
great  white  shrouds ;  and  then  it  covered  you  both  over 
and  hid  you  with  them,  and  there  was  no  motion  beneath. 
My  dear,  dear  friend  arrives  the  day  after  to-morrow — and 
to-morrow,  you.     And  then,  I  must  bid  you  all  adieu. 

"N.  A." 

The  Saturday  in  question  occupies  the  whole  of  the  next 
chapter,  and  I  can  form  some  sort  of  idea  of  the  reader's 
eagerness  to  be  at  it  from  my  own ;  and  all  the  better, 
seeing  that  I  have  read  (to  say  nothing  about  writing) 
the  said  chapter  already,  which  he  has  not. 

*  In  Engelhardszell,  for  instance,  the  Austrian  custom-house  olB-eri 
unbutton  paunches  to  see  whether  they  be  fat  or — cloth. 


CHAP.  XIV.]    FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      391 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

A  LOVER'S  DISMISSAL — FANTAISIE — THE  CHILI)  WITH  THE 
BOUQUET — THE  EDEN  OF  THE  NIGHT,  AND  THE  ANGEL  AT 
THE   GATE    OF   PARADISE. 

It  was  not  the  deeper  blue  of  the  sky  (which,  on  the 
Saturday,  was  as  rich  and  pure  as  in  winter,  or  by  night) 
— nor  the  thought  of  actually  standing  in  the  very  pre- 
sence of  the  sorrowing  soul  whom  he  had  driven  from 
Paradise  with  the  Sodom  apple  of  the  serpent  (Venner) 
— nor  his  own  feeble  health — nor  memories  of  his  own 
domestic  life ; — it  was  none  of  these  matters  taken  singly, 
but  the  combination  of  all  these  semitones  and  minor 
intervals  together  which  attuned  our  Firmian  to  a  melting 
maestoso,  and  gave  to  his  looks  and  thoughts  (for  his  after- 
noon visit)  much  such  a  kind  and  degree  of  tenderness  as 
he  expected  he  should  find  in  Nathalie's. 

What  he  did  find  was  precisely  the  reverse.  In  and 
about  Nathalie  there  reigned  such  a  noble  cold,  serene 
gladsomeness  as  you  may  find  upon  the  loftiest  mountain 
peaks  ;  the  cloud  and  the  storm  are  beneath,  while  around 
there  rests  a  purer,  colder  air,  but  a  deeper  blue,  too,  and 
a  paler  sunlight. 

It  cannot,  of  course,  surprise  me  that  you  are  on  the 
tenter-hooks  of  anxiety  to  hear  the  account  she  is  going 
to  give  of  her  rupture  with  Everard.  But  her  account  of 
it  was  so  brief — it  might  have  been  written  round  a  Prus- 
sian dollar  —  so  that  I  must  supplement  it  with  mine, 
which  I  have  taken  from  Rosa's  own  written  record  of  it. 
The  fact  is,  the  Venner,  five  years  afterwards,  wrote  a 
very  passable  novel  (if  we  may  credit  the  praise  bestowed 
upon  it  in  the  '  Universal  German  Library  '),  into  which 
he  artfully  built  the  whole  of  the  rupture  with  Nathalie — 
(that  severance  between  soul  and  body) ;  at  all  events, 
this  is  the  conclusion  to  which  sundry  hints  of  Nathalie's 
would  point  us.  The  said  novel,  accordingly,  is  my 
fountain  of  Vaucluse.  Emasculate  intelligences,  such  as 
Rosa's,  can  only  reproduce  experiences;  their  poetic fwtu&eg 
are  nothing  but  adopted  children  of  the  actual. 


3Uli  JEAN  PAUL  FEIEDEICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

To  be  brief,  what  took  place  was  as  follows.  Scarce 
were  Firmian  and  Heinrich  gone  out  among  the  trees, 
when  the  Venner  brought  up  his  reserve  of  vengeance, 
and  asked  Nathalie,  in  a  tetchy  manner,  how  it  was  that 
she  could  tolerate  visitors  of  such  a  poor  and  plebeian 
sort.  The  haste  and  the  coldness  of  the  departed  pair 
had  already  set  Nathalie  on  fire,  and  this  address  made  her 
blaze  forth  in  a  flame  upon  her  yellow-silken  questioner. 
"  A  question  such  as  that,"  she  answered,  "  is  very  little 
short  of  an  insult;"  and  she  immediately  added  one  of 
her  own — for  she  was  too  warm  and  too  proud  to  dissem- 
ble in  the  slightest,  or  to  hold  other  than  the  straightest 
course  with  him.  "You  call  at  Mr.  Siebenksas's  pretty 
often  yourself,  do  you  not  ? "  "  Oh !"  said  this  empty 
braggart,  "  I  call  on  his  wife  (to  speak  the  simple  truth) ; 
he  is  merely  my  pretext."  "Really,"  said  she,  making  her 
syllables  last  as  long  as  her  look  of  scorn.  Meyern,  amazed 
at  this  behavour,  so  very  unlike  the  tone  of  the  antecedent 
epistolary  correspondence  (he  gave  the  twin  cronies  the 
credit  of  it) — Meyern,  whom  her  beauty,  his  own  money, 
and  her  poverty  and  dependence  upon  Blaise  (to  say 
nothing  of  his  position  of  betrothed  bridegroom),  had  now 
inspired  with  the  utmost  audacity — Meyern,  this  brave  and 
courageous  lion,  undertook,  without  a  moment's  hesitation, 
a  task  which  nobody  else  would  have  ventured  upon, 
namely,  that  of  humiliating  and  bringing  to  her  proper 
senses  this  irate  Aphrodite,  by  reading  to  her  the  cata- 
logue of  his  Cicisbean  appointments,  and,  in  general 
terms,  unfolding  before  her  the  long  perspective  of  the 
hundreds  of  gynsecoea  and  jointure-houses  open  to  him. 
"  It  is  such  an  easy  matter  to  worship  false  goddesses  and 
open  their  temple  doors,  that  I  am  charmed  to  be  restored 
to  the  worship  of  the  true  feminine  godhead,  through  my 
Babylonish  captivity  to  you." 

All  her  crushed  heart  sighed  forth,  "  Ah  !  then  it  is  all 
true — he  is  a  wicked  wretch,  and  I  am  miserable  indeed." 
But  she  kept  silence,  outwardly,  and  went  and  looked  out 
of  the  window,  in  anger.  Her  soul  was  one  of  those  whose 
seats  are  the  knight's  upper  dais  of  womankind ;  it  was 
ever  eager  to  do  rare,  heroic  acts  of  self-devotion  and  self- 
sacrifice  ;  indeed,  a  fondness  for  remarkable  and  out-of- 


CHAP.  XIV.J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      393 

the-way  greatness  was  the  only  littleness  about  it.  And 
now,  when  the  Venner  tried  to  make  amends  for  his  brag- 
gadocio by  a  sudden  jump  into  a  light  and  sportive  tone 
(a  tone  which,  in  minor  warfares  with  the  ordinary  fair 
sex,  heals  breaches  much  quicker  and  better  than  a  more 
serious  one) — and  proposed  a  walk  in  the  prettj'-  park  to 
her,  as  being  a  spot  better  adapted  for  a  reconciliation — 
.this  noble  soul  of  hers  spread  wide  its  pure  white  pinions 
and  soared  away  from  out  the  foul  heart  of  this  crooked 
pike  with  his  silver  scales  for  ever!  And  she  drew  near 
to  him  and  said  (all  a-glow,  but  dry-eyed  wholly),  "  Mr. 
von  Meyern,  I  have  quite  decided  - —  we  are  parted  for 
ever.  We  have  never  known  each  other,  and  our  acquaint- 
ance is  at  an  end.  I  will  send  you  back  your  letters 
to-morrow,  and  you  will  have  the  goodness  to  return  mine 
to  me."  Had  he  employed  a  more  serious  tone,  he  might 
have  kept  hold  of  this  strong  soul  for  some  days — perhaps 
weeks — longer.  Without  looking  at  him  anymore,  she 
opened  a  casket  and  began  arranging  letters.  He  tried, 
in  a  hundred  speeches,  to  flatter  and  pacify  her;  she 
answered  never  a  word.  His  heart  boiled  within  him,  fi/i 
he  gave  the  two  advocates  the  blame  for  all  this.  At 
length  he  thought  he  would  humble  this  deaf  mute  (as 
well  as  make  her  alter  her  determination),  by  saying,  as  he 
now  did,  "  I  don't  know  what  your  uncle  in  Kuhschnappel 
will  say  to  all  this.  He  appears  to  me  to  set  a  much 
greater  value  upon  my  sentiments  towards  you  than  you 
do  yourself;  indeed,  he  seems  to  consider  our  marriage  as 
essential  to  your  happiness  as  I  think  it  to  mine."  This 
was  a  burden  heavier  than  her  back,  so  sore  bent  down 
by  Fate,  could  bear.  She  shut  up  the  casket  hurriedly, 
sat  down,  and  rested  her  bewildered  head  upon  her  trem- 
bling arms,  shedding  burning  tears,  which  her  hands 
strove  in  vain  to  hide.  A  reproach  of  our  poverty  uttered 
by  lips  we  have  loved,  darts  like  red-hot  iron  into  the 
heart,  and  scorches  it  dry  with  fire.  Rosa,  whose  ven- 
geance, now  wreaked,  gave  place  to  the  most  eager  love, 
(in  hopes  that  her  feelings  were  of  the  same  selfish  type  as 
his  own),  threw  himself  on  his  knees  before  her,  crying, 
"  Oh !  forget  it  all !  What  are  we  breaking  with  one 
another  for,  if  we  *conie  really  to  think  about  it  ?    Your 


394  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

precious  tear-drops  wash  it  all  away.  I  mingle  mine  with 
them  is  rich  abundance." 

She  arose  with  haughty  port,  leaving  him  on  his  knees. 
"  My  tears,"  she  said,  "  have  not  the  smallest  reference  to 
anything  connected  with  you.  I  am  poor,  and  I  would 
not  be  rich.  After  the  base,  ignoble  insult  you  have  put 
upon  me,  you  shall  not  stay  and  see  me  weep.  Have  the 
goodness  to  leave  the  room."  So  that  he  retired ;  and — 
when  one  considers  the  weight  of  the  sacks  he  had  to  carry 
— sacks  of  every  kind  (including  one  full  of  muzzles) — 
he  really  did  it  in  a  surprisingly  brisk  and  lively  manner, 
holding  his  head  pretty  high.  His  command  of  his  temper 
and  his  apparent  good  humour  strike  one  the  more  (for 
I  may  give  him  what  praise  he  deserves),  that  lie  retained 
them  and  took  them  home  with  him,  and  this  on  an  after- 
noon when,  with  the  two  finest  and  longest  levers  in  all 
his  collection  he  had  utterly  failed  in  touching  the  smallest 
point  in  Nathalie's  heart,  or  the  auricles  thereof.  One  of 
these  levers  was  his  old  one,  which  he  had  tried  upon 
Lenette — that  of  gradually  twisting  himself  in,  corkscrew 
fashion,  in  spiral  serpentine  lines  of  petty  advances,  ap- 
proaches, attentions  and  illusions ;  but  Nathalie  was  neither 
weak  nor  light  enough  to  be  penetrated  thus.  The  other 
lever  was  one  from  which  something  might  really  have 
been  expected  in  the  way  of  effect — though  it  actually  had 
less  than  even  the  first.  It  consisted  in  showing  his  old 
scars  (like  an  old  warrior),  and  rejuvenating  them  into 
wounds ;  in  this  manner  he  bared  his  suffering  heart, 
pierced  by  so  many  a  false  love,  and  which  (like  a  dollar 
with  a  hole  in  it),  had  hung  as  a  votive  offering  upon  so 
many  a  shrine.  His  soul  put  on  Court  mourning  (of 
sorrow)  of  all  degrees,  whole  and  half,  in  hopes  of  being, 
like  a  widow,  more  enchanting  in  black.  The  friend  of  a 
Leibgeber,  however,  could  be  softened  by  manly  sorrows 
only — the  womanly  sort  could  but  harden  her. 

Meanwhile  (as  we  have  said),  he  left  his  fiancee  without 
any  pity  for  her  self-sacrifice  indeed,  and  equally  with- 
out the  slightest  indignation  at  her  refusal  of  him.  He 
merely  thought,  "  She  may  go  to  the  devil ;"  and  he  could 
scarce  sufficiently  congratulate  himself  that  he  had  so 
easily  escaped  the  incalculable  annoyance   of  having  to 


CHAP.  XIV.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      395 

endure  life  with  a  creature  of  the  kind  from  one  year's 
end  to  another,  and  to  pay  her  the  necessary  respect  through- 
out an  infernal,  long  matrimonial  life.  On  the  other  hand, 
his  bile  was  mightily  stirred  against  Leibgeber,  but  more 
particularly  against  Siebenkaes  (whom  he  suspected  of 
being  the  real  judge  of  his  Divorce  Court),  and  he  laid 
the  foundation  of  several  gall-stones  in  his  gall-bladder, 
and  of  a  slight  bilious  yellow  tint  in  his  eyes,  with  hating 
the  advocate,  which  he  could  not  do  enough. 

We  return  to  the  Saturday.  Nathalie  deiived  her  calm- 
ness and  serenity  partly  from  her  own  strength  of  mind, 
but  also  in  good  measure  from  the  pair  of  horses  (and  of 
rose  maidens)  with  whom  Kosa  had  been  seen  driving 
to  the  Hermitage.  A  woman's  jealousy  is  always  a  day 
or  two  older  than  her  love.  Moreover,  I  know  of  no 
excellence,  no  weakness,  shortcoming,  virtue,  womanliness, 
manliness,  in  a  woman  which  does  not  tend  rather  to  en- 
kindle than  to  appease  jealousy. 

Kot  only  Siebenkses,  but  even  Leibgeber  (anxious  to 
breathe  some  warmth  upon  her  freezing  soul,  all  stripped 
of  its  warm  plumage),  was  this  afternoon  serious  and 
cordial,  not  (as  he  usually  did)  dressing  his  rewards  and 
punishments  up  in  irony.  Perhaps,  too,  her  gratifying 
(and  flattering)  readiness  to  obey  him  tamed  him  down 
to  some  extent.  Firmian  had,  in  addition  to  the  reasons 
above  set  forth,  the  more  powerful  ones— that  the  English 
lady  was  expected  home  the  next  day  but  one,  and  her 
coming  would  put  a  stop  to  all  this  garden  pleasure,  or 
interfere  with  it  at  all  events — that  he  who  knew  well, 
from  his  own  experience,  what  the  wounds  of  a  lost  love 
were,  had  a  boundless  compassion  for  hers,  and  would 
gladly  have  given  his  own  heart's  blood  to  make  up  for 
the  loss  of  hers — moreover,  accustomed  all  his  life  to  bare, 
mean  and  empty  rooms,  he  felt  a  keen  enjoyment  in  being 
in  the  richly-furnished,  bright  and  tasteful  chamber  he 
was  now  in,  and  naturally  carried  over  a  portion  of  this  to 
the  account  of  their  inhabitant  and  hermit. 

The  maid-servant,  whom  we  have  seen  this  week 
already,  came  in  just  then,  with  tears  in  her  eyes,  falter- 
ing out  that  she  was  going  to  confession,  and  hoped  she 
had  done  nothing  to  displease  her,  &c,  &c.     "  Anything 


396  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

to  displease  me  ?"  cried  Nathalie;  "  most  certainly  not— 
and  1  know  I  can  say  the  same  in  your  mistress's  name  ;" 
and  went  out  of  the  room  with  her  and  kissed  her,  unseen, 
like  some  good  genius.  How  beautiful  are  pity  and  kind- 
ness to  distress,  in  a  soul  which  has  just  risen  up  in  might 
to  resist  oppression. 

Leibgeber  took  a  volume  of  '  Tristram  Shandy '  from  the 
English  lady's  library,  and  lay  down  with  it  on  the  lawn 
under  the  nearest  tree,  with  the  view  of  making  over  to 
his  friend  the  undivided  fruition  of  this  anise,  marchpane 
and  honeycomb  of  an  afternoon  of  talk,  which  to  him  was 
merely  so  much  every-day  household  fare.  Moreover,  all 
that  day  when  he  made  any  sign  of  jesting,  Nathalie's  eyes 
would  implore  him,  "  Please  do  not,  for  just  this  one  day. 
Do  not  take  pains  to  point  out  every  pock-pit  which  Fate 
has  left  upon  my  inner  soul  to  him — spare  me  for  this  once." 
And  lastly  (which  was  his  principal  reason),  it  would  be 
much  easier  for  Firmian  to  tell  this  sensitive  Nathalie  (now 
upon  one-eighth  pay)  all  his  project  of  making  her  his 
appanaged  widow,  his  heiress  in  jest — to  tell  it  to  her 
wrapped  in  a  triple  shroud,  written  in  distorted  characters. 

Siebenkaas  looked  upon  this  undertaking  as  a  sort  of 
day's  work  at  fortification  making,  a  journey  across  the 
Alps — round  the  globe — into  the  grotto  of  Antiparos,  a 
discovery  of  the  longitude ;  he  had  not  the  slightest  notion 
how  even  to  begin  to  set  about  it.  Indeed,  he  had  pre- 
viously told  Leibgeber  that,  if  his  death  were  but  a  real 
one,  nobody  would  be  more  ready  to  talk  to  her  about  it, 
but  that  for  a  sham  death,  he  really  could  not  sadden  her; 
so  that  she  would  have  to  consent,  altogether  by  some 
chance,  and  unconditionally,  to  become  his  widow.  "  And 
is  my  death  a  thing  so  very  improbable  after  all  ? "  he 
said.  "  Of  course  it  is,"  answered  Leibgeber.  "  If  it 
were  not,  what  would  become  of  our  death  in  jest.  The 
lady  will  e'en  have  to  make  the  best  of  it."  It  would 
appear  that  he  dealt  with  women's  hearts  in  a  fashion 
somewhat  colder  and  harder  than  Siebenkass,  in  whose 
opinion  (hermit  connoisseur  as  he  was  of  rarities  in  the 
shape  of  strong  female  souls)  a  delicate,  suffering  one  like 
this  could  not  'be  too  tenderly  treated.  However,  I  dc 
not  set  up  to  judge  between  the  two  friends. 


OHAP.  XIV.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      897 

When  Leibgeber  had  gone  out  with  Yorick,  Sieben- 
kees  went  and  stood  before  a  fresco  representing  the  said 
Yorick,  and  poor  Maria  with  her  flute  and  her  goat.  For 
the  chambers  of  the  great  are  picture-bibles,  and  an 
orbis  pictus, — they  sit,  eat  and  walk  in  picture  exhibitions, 
which  makes  it  all  the  harder  a  matter  for  them  that  two, 
at  least,  of  the  greatest  expanses  in  nature — the  sky  and 
the  sea — cannot  be  painted  over  for  them.  Nathalie  went 
up  to  him,  and  at  once  cried  out,  "  What  is  there  to  see  in 
that  to-day  ?  Away  from  it !"  She  was  just  as  open  and 
unconstrained  in  her  manner  with  him  as  he  could  not 
manage  to  be  with  her.  She  displayed  the  warmth  and 
beauty  of  her  soul  in  that  wherein  we  (unconsciously) 
unveil,  or  unmask  (as  the  case  may  be),  ourselves  more 
completely  than  in  anything — namel}',  her  mode  of  be- 
stowing praise.  The  illuminated  triumphal  arch  which 
she  erected  over  the  head  of  her  English  lady-friend, 
elevated  her  own  soul  so  that  she  stood  at  that  gate  of 
honour  as  conqueror,  in  laurel  wreath,  and  glittering 
collar  of  the  Order  of  Goodness  and  Worth.  Her  praises 
were  the  double  chorus  and  echo  of  the  other's  excellence  ; 
she  was  so  warm  and  so  earnest !  Ah  !  maidens,  fairer  are 
ye  a  thousand  times  when  ye  twine  bridal-wreaths  and 
laurel  garlands  for  your  companions  than  when  ye  plait 
them  crowns  of  straw,  and  bend  them  collars  of  iron. 

She  told  him  how  fond  she  was  of  British  men  and 
women,  both  in  and  out  of  print,  although  she  had  never 
seen  any  until  the  previous  winter.  "  Unless,"  she  said, 
with  a  smile,  "our  friend  outside  may  be  considered 
one." 

Leibgeber,  out  on  his  grass  mattress,  raised  his  head 
and  saw  the  couple  looking  down  at  him  with  faces  of 
regard ;  and  the  shimmer  of  love  shone  forth  in  three  pairs 
of  eyes.  One  single  moment  of  time  thus  clasped  three 
sister  souls  together  in  one  tender  embrace. 

The  maid  coming  back  from  confession  about  this  junc- 
ture in  her  white  dress — ('twas  heavy-wing  cases  rather 
than  light  butterfly  wings  to  her) — with  a  trifle  of  pretty- 
tinted  ribbon  about  it  here  and  there  ;  Firmian  looked  at 
this  absolved  one  for  a  minute  or  two,  and  then  took  up 
her  black  and  gold  hymn-book,  which  she  had  laid  down 


398  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDEICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  III. 

in  her  haste,  finding  inside  it  a  whole  pattern-card  of  silks, 
besides  peacock's  feathers.  Nathalie,  who  saw  a  satirical 
expression  dawning  on  his  face,  drove  it  away  in  an 
instant.  "  Your  sex  attaches  just  as  much  value  to  adorn- 
ment as  ours.  Look  at  your  Court  dresses,  the  Coronation 
robes  at  Frankfort,  and  uniforms  and  official  costumes  of 
all  kinds.  Then,  the  peacock  was  the  bird  of  the  old 
knights  and  poets,  and  if  you  make  vows  upon  his 
feathers,  or  wear  garlands  of  them,  we  may  surely  wear 
them,  or  at  all  events  mark  (if  not  reward)  songs  with 
them."  Every  now  and  then  a  barely  polite  expression  of 
astonishment  at  what  she  knew  escaped  the  advocate  in 
spite  of  himself.  He  turned  over  the  leaves  of  the  festival 
hymns,  and  came  upon  gilt  figures  of  Our  Lady,  and  found 
a  picture  wherein  were  two  parti-coloured  blotches  (sup- 
posed to  represent  two  lovers),  and  a  phosphorescent  heart, 
which  the  male  blotch  was  offering  to  the  female  with  the 
words: 

"  And  is  to  thee  my  fond  love  all  unknown  ! 
How  my  heart  burns  is  here  full  plainly  shown  " 

— the  whole  surrounded  by  a  tracery  of  leafwork.  Firmian 
loved  family  and  society  miniature  pictures  when  (as  in 
this  case)  they  were  exceedingly  poor  as  works  of  art. 
Nathalie  saw  and  read  this ;  she  took  the  book  in  haste, 
snapped  the  clasp  to,  and  then,  when  she  had  done  so, 
said,  "  You  have  no  objection,  have  you  ?" 

Courage  towards  women  is  not  inborn,  but  acquired. 
Firmian  had  had  familiar  experience  of  very  few ;  where- 
fore this  natural  awe  made  him  look  upon  every  feminine 
body — particularly  if  of  any  standing  in  society — as  a 
kind  of  sacred  Ark  of  the  Covenant  whereon  no  finger 
might  be  laid ;  (for  though  it  is  proper  to  rise  superior  to 
considerations  of  rank  where  men  are  concerned,  it  is  other- 
wise with  women),  and  upon  every  female  foot  as  that  on 
which  a  Queen  of  Spain  stands,  and  every  female  finger  as 
a  Franklin  point  emitting  electric  sparks.  If  in  love  with 
him,  I  might  have  likened  her  to  an  electrified  person, 
feeling  all  the  sparks  and  mock  pains  she  emitted.  At 
the  same  time,  nothing  could  be  more  natural  than  that 
his  reverent  timidity  should  diminish  as  time  went  on, 


CHAP.  XIV.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     399 

and  that  at  length  (at  a  moment  when  she  was  looking 
the  other  way)  he  should  take  courage  to  deftly  snatch 
hold  of  the  end  of  one  of  the  ribbons  in  her  hair  between 
his  fingers — and  she  never  be  aware  of  it.  It  may  have 
been  by  way  of  preliminary  studies  towards  the  execution 
of  this  feat  that  he  had  previously  once  or  twice  tried  the 
effect  of  taking  up  into  his  hands  things  which  had  been  a 
good  deal  in  hers — such  as  her  English  scissors,  a  broken 
pincushion,  and  a  pencil-case. 

Taking  heart  of  grace  hereupon,  he  thought  he  would 
venture  to  take  up  a  bunch  of  wax  grapes  (which  he 
imagined  to  be  made  of  stone,  like  those  upon  butter- 
boats). He  gripped  them,  accordingly,  in  his  fist  as  in 
a  wine-press,  crushed  two  or  three  of  them  to  pieces,  and 
then  proffered  as  many  petitions  for  mercy  and  pardon  as  if 
he  had  knocked  over  and  broken  the  porcelain  Pagoda  of 
Nanking.  "  There's  no  harm  done,"  she  said,  laughing. 
**  We  all  find  plenty  such  berries  in  life  —with  fine  ripe  skins 
— no  intoxicating  juice — and  as  easily  broken — or  easier." 

He  was  in  terrible  dread  lest  this  glorious,  many-tinted 
rainbow  of  happiness  of  his  should  melt  away  into  even- 
ing dew,  and  it  disconcerted  him  that  he  no  longer  saw 
Leibgeber  reading  upon  the  flowery  turf.  Outside,  the 
world  was  brightened  into  a  land  of  the  sun — every  tree 
was  a  rich,  firm-rooted  joy-flower — the  valley  a  condensed 
universe,  ringing  with  music  of  the  spheres.  Never- 
theless he  had  not  the  courage  to  proffer  his  arm  to  this 
Venus  for  a  stroll  through  the  sun,  i.e.  the  sunny  Fan- 
taisie ;  the  Venner's  fate,  and  the  fact  that  there  was  a 
late  harvest  of  a  few  visitors  still  walking  about  the  gar- 
dens, rendered  him  bashful  and  mute.  Of  a  sudden 
Leibgeber  knocked  at  the  window  with  the  agate-head  ot 
his  stick,  crying,  "  Come  over  to  dinner.  My  stick-head 
is  the  Vienna  lantern.*  We  are  sure  not  to  get  home 
before  midnight.''  He  had  ordered  a  dinner  in  the  cie. 
Presently  he  cried  out,  "There  is  a  pretty  child  here 
asking  for  you."     Siebenkaes  hurried  out,  and  found  it 

*  We  have  all  read  in  the  newspapers  that  at  the  Vienna  balli  a 
paper  lantern  is  carried  through  the  rooms,  with  the  inscription 
"  Supper  ready."    This  may  be  called  Vienna  lanteraing. 


400  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  III. 

was  the  very  child  into  whose  hand  he  had  pressed  his 
flowers  on  the  evening  when,  after  the  great  feast-eve  at 
the  Hermitage,  he  had  been  soaring  along  on  the  wiugs 
of  fancy  through  the  village  of  Johannis.  "  Where  is 
your  wife,  sir  ? "  asked  the  child ;  "  the  lady  who  took 
me  out  of  the  water  the  day  before  yesterday  ?  I  have 
some  beautiful  flowers  here  that  my  godpapa  cent  me  to 
give  her.  Mother  will  come  and  give  her  best  thanks, 
too,  as  soon  as  she  can,  but  just  now  she's  in  bed  very 
unwell." 

Nathalie,  who  had  heard  what  the  child  said,  came  down, 
and  said,  with  a  blush,  "  Is  it  I,  darling?  Give  me  your 
flowers,  then."  The  child,  recognising  her,  kissed  her 
hand,  the  hem  of  her  dress,  and,  lastly,  her  lips,  and 
would  have  recommenced  this  round  of  kisses,  when  Na- 
thalie, in  turning  the  flowers  over,  came  upon  three  silken 
counterfeits  amidst  its  living  forget-me-nots  and  red  and 
white  roses.  To  Nathalie's  questions  as  to  whence  these 
costly  flowers  came,  the  child  answered,  "  Give  me  a 
kreuzer  or  two,  and  I'll  tell  you."  This  was  done,  and 
she  added,  "I  got  them  from  my  godpapa,  and  he  is  a 
very,  very  grand  gentleman ;"  then  ran  away  among  the 
bushes. 

This  bouquet  was  a  veritable  Turkish  Selam-and- Flower 
riddle  to  them  all.  Leibgeber  accounted  with  ease  for 
the  child's  sudden  marriage  of  Nathalie  and  Siebenkass,  by 
the  circumstance  that  the  advocate  h««d  been  standing 
beside  her  at  the  water-side,  and  people,  who  had  seen 
no  one  so  constantl)'  with  her  as  himself,  had  been  mis- 
led by  the  bodily  likeness  between  them. 

Siebenkass's  mind,  however,  ran  more  on  the  machine- 
master,  Eosa  (so  fond  of  setting  his  patchwork  life-scenes 
tor  every  woman  to  play  her  part  before),  and  the  re- 
semblance these  silk  flowers  bare  to  those  which  the 
Venner  had  once  redeemed  from  pawn  for  Lennette  in 
Kuhschnappel  struck  him  at  once ;  yet  how  could  he 
sadden  this  gladsome  time,  and  spoil  the  pleasure  of  re- 
ceiving these  votive  flowers,  by  giving  words  to  his  sus- 
picions ?  Nathalie  insisted  upon  a  distribution  of  this  floral 
inheritance,  inasmuch  as  each  of  the  three  had  taken  part 
in  the  rescue,  and  Siebenkaes  and  Leibgeber  had,  at  all 


CHAP.  XIV.J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      401 

events,  rescued  the  rescuer.  She  kept  the  white  silk 
roses  for  herself,  allotted  the  red  ones  to  Leihgeber  (who 
would  not  have  them,  but  asked  for  a  proper,  real,  living 
rose  instead,  which  he  immediately  put  in  his  mouth) ;  to 
Siebenkaes  she  gave  the  silken  forget-me-nots,  and  one  or 
two  living,  perfume-breatliing  ones  as  well  (souls,  as  it 
were,  of  the  artificial  ones).  He  took  them  with  rapture, 
aud  said  the  tender  real  ones  should  never  wither  for  him. 
Nathalie  here  took  a  brief  temporary  leave  of  the  pair,  but 
Firmian  could  not  find  words  to  express  all  his  gratitude 
to  his  friend  for  the  means  he  had  adopted  to  prolong  this 
little  day  of  grace  which  orbed  his  whole  life  round  with 
a  new  heaven  and  a  new  earth. 

No  King  of  Spain  ever  took  as  little  out  of  some  six, 
or  so  (at  the  outside),  of  the  hundred  dishes  which,  by  the 
laws  of  the  realm,  are  daily  served  at  his  table,  than 
Siebenkaes  did  that  day  out  of  one.  Historians,  worthy  of 
credence,  inform  us,  however,  that  he  managed  to  drink  a 
very  little — a  little  wine  it  was — and  that  in  a  considerable 
hurry — for  he  could  not  be  happy  enough  that  day  to 
satisfy  Leibgeber.  The  latter,  not  apt  to  be  easily  swayed 
by  heart  and  feeling,  was  all  the  more  delighted  that  his 
beloved  Firmian  should  at  last  have  a  pole  star  of  happi- 
ness shining  in  the  zenith  point  of  the  heavens  above  his 
head,  beaming  down  genial  warmth  upon  the  blossoming 
time  of  his  few  scattered  flowers. 

The  rapid  rate  at  which  his  duplex  enjoyment  kept  on 
moving  enabled  him  to  steal  a  march  upon  the  sun,  and 
he  arrived  once  more  at  the  villa,  whose  walls  were  now 
tinted  red  by  his  beams,  while  the  glory  of  evening  was 
gilding  its  windows  into  fire.  Nathalie,  on  the  balcony, 
was  like  some  sunlit  soul,  just  ready  to  take  wing  after 
the  departing  sun,  hanging  with  her  great  eyes  upon  the 
shiuing,  quivering  world  rotunda  all  full  of  church-music 
— and  on  the  sun  flying  downward  from  this  temple,  like 
some  angel — and  at  the  holy,  luminous  tomb  of  nignt  into 
which  earth  was  sinking. 

When  they  came  under  the  balcony  (Nathalie  becsoning 
♦hem  to  come  up  to  her)  Heinrich  handed  him  his  suck, 
saying,   "  Keep  that  for  me.     I  have  enough    to    carry 
without  it — if  you  want  me,  blow  the  whistle.'     As  ra- 
il 2d 


402  JRAN  PAUL  FRIEDR1CH  RICHTER.       |  BOOK  IIJ. 

gai  ded  his  morale  and  physique,  our  good  Henry  had  the 
kindest  and  softest  of  human  hearts  within  his  shaggy, 
Bruin  breast. 

Ah !  happy  Firmian,  happy  in  spite  of  all  your  troubles. 
When  now  you  pass  through  the  door  of  glass  and  on  to 
the  floor  of  iron,  the  sun  confronts  you,  and  sets  for  a 
second  time.  Earth  closes  her  great  eye,  like  some  dying 
goddess !  Then  the  hills  smoke  like  altars — choruses  call 
from  the  woods — shadows,  the  veils  of  day,  float  about 
the  enkindled,  translucent  tree-tops  and  rest  upon  their 
many-tinted  breast-pins  (of  flowers),  and  the  gold-leaf  of 
the  evening  sky  throws  a  dead-gilt  gleam  towards  the 
enst,  and  touches  with  a  rosy  ray  the  vibrating  breast  of 
the  hovering  lark,  far  up  evening  bell  of  Nature.  Ah ! 
happy  Firmian,  should  some  glorious  spirit  from  realms 
afar  wing  its  flight  athwart  earth  and  her  spring  tide,  and, 
as  he  passes,  a  thousand  lovely  evenings  be  concentrated 
into  one  burning  one — it  would  not  be  more  Elysian  than 
this,  whereof  the  glow  is  now  dying  out  around  you  as 
the  moments  fly. 

When  the  flames  of  the  windows  paled,  and  the  moon 
was  rising  heavily  behind  the  earth,  thev  both  went  back 
into  the  twilight  room,  silent,  and  with  full  hearts.  Firmian 
opened  the  pianoforte  and,  in  musio,  went  through  his 
evening  once  more.  The  trembling  strings  were  as 
tongues  of  fire  to  his  full  heart ;  the  flower-ashes  of  his 
youth  were  blown  away,  and  two  or  three  youthful  minutes 
bloomed  back  into  life. 

But  as  the  music  poured  its  warm  life-balsam  upon 
Nathalie's  swollen  heart  in  all  its  constraint  (for  its  wounds 
were  only  closed,  not  healed),  it  melted  and  gave  way, 
the  heavy  tears  which  had  been  burning  within  it  flowed 
forth,  and  it  grew  weak  and  tender,  but  light.  Firmian, 
who  saw  she  was  passing  once  more  through  the  gate  of 
sacrifice  towards  the  sacrificial  knife,  stopped  the  sacrificial 
music,  and  tried  to  lead  her  away  from  the  altar.  Just 
then  the  first  beam  of  the  moon  alighted,  like  a  swan's 
wing,  upon  the  waxen  grapes.  He  asked  her  to  come 
out  into  the  silent,  misty,  after-summer  cf  the  day,  the 
moonlit  evening.  She  plaoed  her  arm  in  his  without 
saying  yes. 


CHAP.  XIV.J     FLOWEH,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      403 

What  a  sparkling,  gleaming  world !  Through  the 
branches,  through  the  fountains,  over  the  hills  and  over 
the  woodlands,  the  flashing  molten  silver  was  flowing, 
which  the  moon  was  fining  from  out  the  dross  of  night, 
Swiftly  shot  her  glance  of  silver  athwart  the  rippling 
wavelet,  and  the  glossy,  shining,  gently-trembling  apple- 
leaves,  pausing  to  rest  upon  the  marble  pillars  and  birch-tree 
stems.  Nathalie  and  Firmian  paused  upon  the  threshold 
of  the  magic  valley  (it  gleamed  like  some  enchanted  cavern, 
where  night  and  light  were  playing,  and  all  the  founts  of 
being— which  by  day  cast  up  sweet  odour,  melody  of  songs 
and  voices,  feathery  wings,  translucent  pinions — seemed 
sunk  in  voiceless  slumber  deep  into  some  silent  chasm). 
They  looked  up  to  the  mountain,  the  Sophienberg,  with 
its  summit  flattened  as  by  the  weight  of  years ;  a  great 
mist  Colossus  was  veiling  all  its  Alp-like  peak ;  next  at 
the  pale-green  world,  lying  asleep  beneath  the  shimmering 
radiance  of  the  far-off  silent  suns,  gleaming  depths  of 
silver  star-dust,  flowing  faint  and  far  before  the  ever- 
brightening  rising  moon ;  and  then  at  one  another,  with 
hearts  lull  to  the  brim  of  holy  friendship,  such  a  gaze  as 
only  two  blest  angels,  new  created,  free  and  gladsome, 
bend  in  rapture  on  each  other.  "  Are  you  as  happy  as 
I  ?"  he  asked.  "  No,"  she  answered,  involuntarily  pressing 
his  arm,  "  that  I  am  not ;  for,  on  a  night  like  this  should 
follow,  not  a  day,  but  something  far  lovelier  and  richer — 
something  that  should  satisfy  the  heart's  thirst,  and  staunch 
its  bleeding  for  ever."  "And  what  should  that  be?"  he 
asked.  "  Death,"  was  her  answer.  She  lifted  her  streaming 
eyes  to  his  and  said,  "You  think  so,  too,  do  you  not? 
Death  for  me."  "  No,  no,"  he  added  quickly,  "  for  me,  if 
you  will,  not  for  you."  To  break  the  course  of  this  over- 
powering moment,  she  added  hurriedly,  "  Shall  we  go 
down  to  the  place  where  we  first  met,  and  where,  two 
days  too  soon,  J  became  your  friend ;  *  and  yet  it  was  not 
too  soon.     Shall  we?" 

He  obe3red  her;  but  his  soul  was  still  a-swim  among 
his  precious  thoughts,  and  as  they  went  down  the  long, 
hollow,   gravel-way,  besprent  with  the   shadows  of  the 

*  Alas !  that  the  English  word  "  friend  "  is  such  a  poor  representative 
of  the  German  original.    Yet  I  cannot  hit  upon  any  other. — Tr. 

2d2 


404  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

FhrnKs,  and  moonlight  rippling  over  its  white  bed  (flecked 
with  shadows  for  stones),  he  said,  "Yes,  in  an  hour  like 
this,  when  death  and  sleep  send  forth  their  brothers  to  us, 
a  soul  like  yours  may  think  of  death.*  But  I  have  more 
cause  than  you,  for  I  am  happier.  Oh !  of  all  guests  at 
Joy's  festival-banquet,  Death  is  the  one  whom  she  loves 
best  to  see ;  for  he  is  himself  a  joy,  the  last  and  highest 
rapture  upon  earth.  None  but  the  common  herd  can  asso- 
ciate humanity's  lofty  flight  of  migration  into  the  distant 
land  of  spring  with  ghosts  and  corpses  here  below  on 
earth  ;  as  when  they  hear  the  owls'  voices  when  they  are 
going  away  to  warmer  countries  they  take  them  for  the 
cries  of  goblins.  But,  oh  !  dear,  dear,  Nathalie,  I  cannot 
and  will  not  bear  to  think  of  what  you  say  as  in  any  shape 
connected  with  you.  No,  no,  so  rich  a  soul  must  come 
into  full  bloom  in  a  far  nearer,  earlier  spring  than  that 
beyond  this  life !  Oh,  God  !  it  must  /"  They  had  reached 
a  wall  of  rock  over  which  a  broad  cascade  of  moonlight 
was  falling;  against  it  leant  a  trellis  of  roses,  whence 
Natalie  gathered  a  spray,  all  green  and  tender,  with  two 
young  rose-buds  just  beginning  to  swell,  and,  saying  "  You 
will  never  blow,"  she  placed  it  on  her  heart,  and  said 
(looking  at  him  with  a  strange  expression),  "  While  they 
are  young  they  scarcely  prick  at  all." 

And  when  they  got  down  to  the  stone  water-basin — the 
sacred  spot  where  they  first  met — and  could  as  yet  find  no 
words  to  utter  what  was  in  their  hearts,  they  saw  some 
one  come  up  out  of  the  dry  basin.  Though  they  smiled, 
it  was  a  smile  full  of  emotion— in  all  three  cases — for  this 
was  their  Leibgeber,  who  had  been  lying  in  wait  for  them 
in  hiding,  with  a  bottle  of  wine,  among  the  imaged  water- 
gods.  A  certain  something  there  had  been  in  his  troubled 
eyes,  but  it  had  been  poured  out  by  way  of  libation  to  this 
spring  night  from  our  cup  of  joy.  "  This  port  and  haven 
of  your  first  landing  here,"  said  he,  "must  be  properly 
consecrated,  and  you  (to  Nathalie)  must  join  in  the  pledge. 
I  swear  by  Heaven  that  there  is  more  fruit  hanging  on  its 
blue  dome  to-night  within  reach  than  ever  hung  on  any 
green  one."    They  took  three  glasses,  pledged  one  another, 

•  Death  sends  sleep,  Heaven  the  dream. 


CHAP.  XIV.J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      405 

and  said  (some  of  them,  I  imagine,  in  somewhat  subdued 
tones).  "To  friendship!  may  it  live  for  ever.'  may  the 
spot  where  it  commenced  be  always  green !  May  every 
place  blossom  where  it  has  grown,  and,  though  all  its 
flowers  ma}r  fade,  and  its  leaves  fall  and  wither,  may  it 
live  on  for  ever  and  for  evermore ! "  Nathalie  was  obliged  to 
turn  her  eyes  away.  Heinrich  laid  a  hand  upon  the  agate 
head  of  I  lis  stick  (but  only  because  his  friend's  hand  which 
was  holding  it  was  over  the  top  of  it.  that  he  might  give 
the  latter  a  warm  and  hearty  pressure),  and  said,  "  Give  it 
me ;  you  shall  have  no  clouds  in  your  hand  to-night ; " 
for  nature  had  graven  cloud-streaks  on  the  agate  in  her 
subterranean  studio.  Any  heart — not  Nathalies  only — 
must  have  been  touched  by  this  bashful  cloaking  of  the 
warm  token  of  friendship.  "Are  you  not  going  to  stay 
with  us?"  she  asked  somewhat  faintly,  as  he  was  leaving 
them.  "  I'm  going  up  to  the  landlord,"  he  said,  "  to  see  if 
I  can  get  hold  of  a  flute  or  a  horn,  and  if  1  do  1  shall  come 
out  and  musicise  over  the  valley,  and  play  the  spring- 
time in." 

When  he  was  gone  his  friend  felt  as  if  his  youth  had 
gone  with  him.  Suddenly  he  saw,  high  above  the  whirling 
may-beetles  and  the  breeze-born  night-buttei flies,  and 
their  arrow-swift  pursuers,  the  bats,  a  great  train  of  birds 
of  passage  winging  their  way  through  the  blue,  like  some 
broken  cloud,  coming  back  to  our  spring.  Then  flashed 
upon  his  open  heart  the  memory  of  his  lodgings  in  the 
market-town,  and  the  time  when  he  saw  a  similar  flight 
of  (earlier)  birds  of  passage,  and  thought  that  his  life 
would  soon  be  at  an  end.  These  recollections,  with  all 
their  tears,  brought  back  the  belief  that  he  was  soon  to 
die;  and  this  he  must  tell  Nathalie.  He  saw  the  wide 
expanse  of  night  stretched  over  the  world  like  some  great 
corpse  but  her  shadowy  limbs  quiver  under  the  moonlit- 
branches  at  the  first  touches  of  the  morning  breeze  awaking 
in  the  east.  She  rises  towards  the  coming  sun  as  a  di.>- 
solving  vapour,  an  all-embracing  cloud,  and  man  says 
"It  is  day."  Two  crape-covered  thoughts,  like  hideous 
spectres,  fought  within  I'irmian's  soul.  The  one  said,  "  He 
is  going  to  die  of  apoplexy,  so  he  never  can  see  her  more." 
And  the  other  said,  "  He  is  going  through  the  farce  of  a 


406  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDKICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  III. 

pretended  death,  and  then  he  never  must  see  her  more." 
Overborne  by  the  past  as  well  as  by  the  present,  he  took 
Nathalie's  hand,  and  said,  "  You  must  pardon  ray  being  so 
deeply  moved  to-night.  I  shall  never  see  you  more.  You 
are  the  noblest  of  your  sex  that  I  have  ever  met,  but  we 
shall  never  meet  again.  "Very  soon  you  must  hear  that 
I  am  dead,  or  that  nry  name,  from  one  cause  or  other  has 
passed  away,  but  my  heart  will  still  be  yours,  be  thine. 
Oli !  that  the  present,  with  its  mountain-chains  of  grave- 
hillocks,  but  lay  behind  me,  and  the  future  were  come, 
with  all  its  open  graves,  and  I  stood  on  the  brink  of  my 
own!  For  1  would  look  once  more  on  thee,  then  throw 
myself  into  it  in  bliss." 

Nathalie  answered  not  a  word.  She  faltered  suddenly  in 
her  walk,  her  arm  trembled,  her  breath  came  thick  and 
fast.  She  stopped,  and,  with  a  face  as  pale  as  death,  said, 
in  trembling  accents,  "Stay  here  on  this  spot;  let  me 
sit  alone  f<»r  a  minute  on  that  turf-bank.  Ah!  I  am  so 
headlong!"  He  saw  her  move  trembling  away.  She 
hank,  as  if  overwhelmed  with  some  burden,  down  upon  a 
bank  of  turf.  She  fixed  her  blinded  eyes  upon  the  moon 
(the  blue  sky  around  it  seemed  a  night,  the  earth  a 
vapour) ;  her  ami  lay  rigid  on  her  lap  ;  she  did  not  move, 
except  that  a  spasm,  distantly  resembling  a  smile,  played 
about  her  lip  ;  her  eyes  were  tearless.  But  to  her  friend, 
life  at  that  moment  seemed  a  realm  of  shadows,  whose 
outlines  were  floating  and  blending  in  endless  changes  of 
confusion;  a  tract  all  hollow,  sunken  mine-shafts  full  of 
mists  in  the  likeness  of  mountain-spirits,  with  but  one 
bingle  opening  of  outlet  to  the  heavens,  the  free  air,  the 
spring,  the  light  of  day ;  and  that  outlet  so  narrow,  so 
remote,  and  far  above  his  head. 

There  sat  Nathalie  in  the  white  crystal  shimmer,  like 
some  angel  upon  an  infant's  grave ;  and,  suddenly,  the 
tones  of  Heinrich's  music  broke  in,  like  bells  pealing  in 
a  storm,  upon  their  souls  as  they  paused,  all  stunned  (like 
Nature  before  the  thunder  breaks),  and  the  warm  river  of 
melody  bore  away  their  hearts,  dissolving  them  the  while. 
Nathalie  made  an  affirmative  sign  with  her  head,  as  if  she 
had  come  to  some  conclusion  :  she  rose  and  came  forward 
from   th*>  green,   flowery   grave   like  some  enfranchised, 


CHAP.  XIV.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORU  PIECES.      407 

glorified  spirit ;  she  opened  her  arms  wide,  and  came 
towards  him.  Tear  after  tear  came  coursing  down  her 
blushing  face,  but  as  yet  her  heart  could  find  no  words ; 
sinking  under  the  world  which  was  in  her  heart,  she 
could  totter  no  further,  and  he  flew  to  meet  her.  She 
held  him  back  that  she  might  speak  the  first,  her  tears 
flowing  faster  and  faster,  but  when  she  had  cried,  "  My 
first  friend,  and  my  last — for  the  first  and  las4  time,"  she 
grew  breathless  and  dumb,  and,  overburdened  with  sor- 
row, sank  into  his  arms,  upon  his  lips,  upon  his  heart. 

"  No !  no  ! "  she  murmured ;  "  Oh !  Heaven,  give  me  but 
the  power  to  speak.  Firmian !  my  Firmian  !  Take  all 
my  happiness  away  with  you — all  that  I  have  on  earth. 
But  never,  by  all  you  hold  most  sacred,  never  see  me 
more  in  this  world.  Now  "  (she  added  very  softly),  "  you 
must  ewear  this  to  me."  She  drew  her  head  back,  and  the 
tones  of  Heinrich's  music  flowed  between  and  around  them 
like  the  voice  of  sorrow.  She  gazed  at  him,  and  his  pale 
care-worn  face  wrung  her  heart  with  agony;  with  eyes 
dim  with  tears,  she  implored  him  to  swear  that  he  would 
never  see  her  more. 

"  Yes,  noble,  glorious  soul,"  he  answered,  in  trembling 
tones ;  "  yes,  then,  I  swear  to  thee  I  will  never  see  thee 
more."  Mute  and  motionless,  as  if  smitten  by  the  hand 
of  death,  she  sank  with  drooping  head  upon  his  breast ; 
and  once  again,  like  one  dying,  he  said,  "  I  will  never 
see  thee  more."  Then,  beaming  like  some  angel,  she  raised 
her  face,  worn  with  emotion  to  him,  saying,  "  All  is  over 
now  ;  take  the  death  kiss,  and  speak  no  more."  He  took 
it,  and  she  gently  disengaged  herself  from  his  arms.  But 
as  she  turned  away,  she  put  back  her  hand  and  gave  him 
the  green  rosebuds  with  the  tender  thorns,  and  saying, 
"  Think  of  to-night,"  went  resolutely  away  (trembling, 
nevertheless),  and  was  soon  lost  in  the  dark-green  alleys, 
where  but  few  beams  of  light  struck  through. 

And  the  end  of  this  night  every  soul  that  has  loved  can 
picture  for  itself  without  the  aid  of  any  words  of  mins. 


408  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDBICH  RICHTEE.     [BOOK  III. 


FIBST  FRUIT  PIECE. 

LETTER  OF  DR.  VICTOR  TO  CATO  THE  ELDER,  ON  THE  CONVERSION 
OF  I  INTO  THOU,  HE,  SHE,  TE,  AND  THEY;  OR,  THE  FEAST  OF 
KINDNESS  OF  THE  20fH  MARCH. 

Flachsenfingen,  1st  April,  1795. 

My  dear  Cato  the  Elder, 

A  breaker  of  his  word  like  you — who  made  such  a 
6olemn  promise  to  come  to  rny  feast,  and  yet  did  not  come 
— will  have  to  be  punished  by  having  his  mouth — not 
stitched  up  (which  is  what  savages  do  to  word-breakers,) 
for  that  would  be  a  loss  only  to  your  hearers — but  made 
to  water.  When  I  shall  have  painted  a  full  and  faithful 
picture  of  our  peace-festival  of  the  soul  for  you,  I  shall 
stop  both  my  ears  against  the  curses  which  you  will 
pour  out  on  your  evil  genius.  At  this  feast  we  all  philo- 
sophised, and  we  were  all  converted,  except  me,  who  could 
not  be  reckoned  a  convert,  inasmuch  as  I  was  myself  the 
converter  of  the  heathen. 

Our  flotilla  of  three  boats — (the  third  we  were  obliged 
to  take  in  deference  to  the  timidity  of  the  ladies)— got. 
under  way  about  one  o'clock  in  the  afternoon  of  the  20th  of 
March,  ran  into  the  stream,  gained  the  open  water,  and 
soon  after  one  we  were  well  in  sight  of  the  very  anther- 
filaments  and  spider's-webs  on  the  island.  At  a  quarter-past 
two  we  landed — the  professor,  his  wife,  and  a  girl  and  boy 
— Melchior — Jean  Paul — the  Government  Counsellor,  Fla- 
min — the  lovely  Luna — (off  goes  the  first  of  your  curses 
here !) — the  undersigned,  and  his  wife. 

Some  Burgundy  was  then  disembarked.  At  the  com- 
mencement of  spring  (which  was  to  take  place  that  day  at 
38  minutes  past  3  o'clock)  we  meant  to  enter  upon  a 
"  stream  of  life,"  coloured  and  sweetened  after  a  most 
superlative  sort.  With  the  island,  Cato,  many  of  us  were 
quite  enraptured,  and  nearly  all  of  us  wished  we  had  paid 
a  visit  to  this  beautiful  bowling-green  in  the  Rhine — thin 
pleasure  camp  amid  tLe  waves — long  before.  Luna,  elder 
Cato — if*  I  mistake  nut  thou  hast  seen,  certainly  once  at 


CKAF.  XIV.J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      409 

the  very  least,  that  tender  soul,  which  ought  to  dwell  in 
(and  heighten  the  tint  of)  a  white  rose  in  place  of  a 
body — Luna  shed  tears,  half  of  delight  (for  they  were 
half  of  sorrow  for  everybody  who  was  not  there),  half  of 
delight  not  so  much  at  the  families  of  alders  upon  the 
rounded  bank,  or  the  Lombardy  poplars  lying  trembling 
in  intoxication  of  bliss  in  the  gentle  air  which  breathed 
about  them,  or  the  sunny  green  paths,  as  at  all  this 
together  (in  the  first  place),  and  at  the  spring  sky  and 
the  Khine  (which  was  showing  that  sky  a  picture,  as  it 
were,  of  its  antipodean  sky  somewhere  over  America),  and 
at  the  peace  and  gladness  of  her  soul — but  (above  all)  at 
the  Alp  in  the  centre  of  the  island. 

The  Alp  will  be  sketched,  if  an  opportunity  offers,  in 
this  letter.  I  at  once  a!>ked  Luna  where  you  were,  £jhe 
said,  "  At  the  Frankfort  Fair."     Was  she  light? 

When  a  party  arrives  at  a  place  it  is  not,  like  the  Anguis 
Fragilis,  to  be  broken  into  ten  twitching  fragments  by 
every  touch  of  chance.  Even  the  ladies  kept  with  us,  for 
I  had  deprived  them  of  all  opportunity  of  doing  anything 
in  the  shape  of  household  labour,  by  the  arrangements  1 
had  made  for  the  dinner.  This  Barataria  Island  was  going 
to  be  an  intellectual  Place  d'Armes  and  theatre  of  wai 
that  day.  I  love  disputation.  Intellectual  bickerings 
further  and  heighten  the  happiness  of  congenial  society, 
just  as  lovers'  quarrels  are  a  renewal  of  love,  and  fisticuffs 
a  necessity  of  Marionette  operas.  Certain  people  are  like 
the  Moravians,  among  whom  the  confessor  and  penitent 
change  places,  each  laying  a  picture  of  his  soul  before  the 
other,  his  own  police-notice  of  an  absconded  criminal — his 
own  advertisement  in  the  "  Hue  and  Cry  "  ;  and  I  am  like 
them.  Any  blemish  or  shortcoming  which  I  discover  in 
myself  or  other  people  I  immediately  publish  over  halt' 
the  town  in  a  universal  German  gazette,  as  ladies  do  the 
witnesses'  depositions  of  evidence  concerning  strangers. 
For  the  last  three  weeks,  dear  Cato,  my  soul  has  been 
glowing  in  the  brightest  sunlight  of  peace  and  love,  cast 
upon  me  by  the  deceased  chief  Piqueur  (a  man  who  had 
not  a  trace  of  either  the  one  or  the  other  about  him) — and 
now  1  cannot  rest  till  1  entail  this  precious  legaoy  upon 
all  of  you. 


410  JEAN  PAUL  FR1EDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

As  Lieutenant  de  Police  of  the  island,  I  possessed  the 
power  of  issuing  police  regulations  with  respect  to  the 
conversation  permissible  thereon,  and  I  directed  the  thread 
of  our  talk  towards  the  Piqueur  in  question.  But  the 
wasps  came  buzzing  out  of  their  nests ;  the  first  of  them 
being  your  brother,  Melchior,  who  drove  his  sting  into 
the  Piqueur  8  avarice,  saying  that  people  who  didn't  bestow 
their  plunder  upun  the  poor  till  they  were  in  their  own 
coffins,  were  like  pikes  who  eject  their  (swallowed)  prey 
when  caught  themselves  ;  they  should  rather  do  as  Judas 
Iscariot  did — cast  their  pieces  of  silver  into  the  church 
before  their  hanging.  The  next  wasp  was  your  second 
brother,  Jean  Paul,  who  said,  "  Misers  are  the  only  people 
who  haven't  had  enough  of  life  when  they  die.  Even 
when  they  are  in  the  very  grip  of  Death's  hand,  they 
would  fain  grasp  hold  of  money  with  their  own.  Like 
cap-mushrooms,  when  they  are  broken  off,  they  cling  ter- 
ribly to  the  earth's  surface  with  their  bleeding  moiety." 

"  Ah ! "  said  I,  "  everyone  is  a  thorough  miser  as  re- 
gards something  or  other,  I  am  sorry  to  say.  I  cannot 
now  be  so  hard  upon  a  man  who  confines  himself  to  morti- 
fying and  chastening  himself  as  I  used  to  be.  Where  is  the 
extraordinary  difference  between  one  of  your  learned  anti- 
quary mint-assayers  who  distils,  evaporates,  and  injects 
all  the  pleasures  of  his  life  into  the  rust  of  a  collection  of 
coins — and  a  miser  who  counts  and  weighs  the  specimens 
in  his  cabinet  like  so  many  votes  at  an  election?  Not, 
in  reality,  so  great  a  difference  as  there  is  between  our 
opinions  of  the  two."  I  thought  I  had  a  fine  chance  of 
turning  deftly  to  the  subject  of  the  Piqueur  at  this  point, 
but  the  entire  company  called  out  to  me  to  tell  them 
what  o'clock  it  was.  In  my  capacity  of  Viceroy,  I  had 
disarmed  all  the  islanders  of  their  watches  at  the  landing- 
place  (as  if  they  had  been  so  many  swords),  that  they 
might  pass  their  day  in  a  blissful  eternity,  where  time  was 
not.  The  only  one  allowed  to  keep  his  was  Paul — and 
this  was  because  it  was  one  of  the  new  Geneva  sort,  whose 
hands  always  point  to  12  o'clock,  only  telling  the  real 
time  when  one  touches  a  spring. 

It  was  now  past  three.  In  thirty-eight  minutes,  spring, 
that  pre-heaven  upon  earth — that  second  paradise — would 


CHAP.  XIV.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       411 

make  her  grand  processional  progress  over  the  ruins  of 
the  first.  Already  the  clouds  were  all  cleared  away  from 
the  sky,  spring  breezes  played  coolingly  about  the  sun, 
burning  in  the  blue;  on  a  vine-clad  hill  by  the  Rhine 
bhore,  a  solo-singer  from  the  great  choir  of  spring  —  a 
nightingale — sent  on  in  advance  of  her — was  pouring  out 
her  song  in  a  smooth-grown  thicket  of  pruned  cherry- 
trees  ;  through  the  open  trellis  -work  of  the  boughs 
we  could  see  the  notes  vibrate  in  the  feathers  of  her 
throat. 

We  climbed  up  the  artificial  Mount  St.  Gothard.  It  was 
set  round  with  turf- banks  and  leafy  niches  ;  an  oak  stood 
on  its  summit  by  way  of  crown.  Man  (day-fly,  as  he  is, 
playing  above  a  ripple  of  time)  cannot  do  without 
watches  and  date-indicators  on  the  banks  of  the  time- 
stream.  Although  every  day  is  a  birthday  and  a  new 
year's  day,  he  must  have  one  of  his  own  into  the  bargain. 
Thirty-eight  minutes  struck  in  us.  And  down  from  the 
waves  of  throbbing  blue  above  us  came  floating  a  broad 
breath  of  breeze,  rocking  tha  swelling  grapes  and  the  bare 
grafts,  the  delicate  young  branchlets,  and  the  strong, 
sharp-pointed  winter-corn,  and  lilting  the  soaring  pigeons 
higher  in  their  flight.  The  sun,  above  Switzerland, 
looked,  in  blissful  intoxication,  at  his  own  face  reflected 
in  the  sublime  glittering  ice-mirror  of  Mont  Blanc,  part- 
ing (unaware)  day  and  night  into  equal  halves,  as  if  with 
two  arms  of  fate,  and  throwing  down  equal  portions  to 
every  land  and  every  eye.  We  sang  Goethe's  ';  Hymn  to 
the  Spring."  The  sun  sent  us  down  (like  dew)  from 
the  hill-top  to  the  valley — the  earth  swelling  loose  fell 
rustling  at  our  feet ;  and  wine  (Lethe  of  life)  hid  from  our 
sight  the  misty  banks  within  which  it  rolled  its  way — 
mirroring  only  heaven  and  flowers.  Clotilda  s  tid  (not  to 
us,  but  to  her  Luna) — (and  here,  dear  Cato,  I  am  drunk 
with  remembering ;  and  I  beg,  accordingly,  to  invite  you, 
at  once,  for  the  10th  of  April),  "  Ah  !  dearest,  how  beautiful 
the  world  is  sometimes.  We  ought  not  to  think  so 
poorly  of  it.  Are  we  not  like  Orestes  in  the  'Iphigenia' — 
fancying  we  are  in  exile,  though  we  really  are  in  our  own 
native  land." 

With  every  downward  step  from  the  hill  we  sank  back 


412  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDEICH  R1CHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

into  the  workaday  marsh-meadow  of  life.  '•  What  the 
better  are  we,''  cried  Melchior,  quite  angrily,  "  for  all  this 
splendour  in  and  around  us,  when  to-morrow  a  single 
passionate  earthquake  may  hurl  down  an  av  danche  of 
snow-masses  upon  all  that  is  warm  and  blooming  in  us  ? 
it  is  the  April  of  the  human  heart — not  the  April  of  the 
universe — that  causes  me  such  vexation.  We  are  always 
at  our  hardest  just  after  an  attendrissement — and  moved  to 
tears  just  after  some  murderojs  rage — as  earthquakes  set 
warm  springs  flowing.  Now  I  know  quite  well  that, 
to-morrow,  at  the  sitting  of  the  council,  I  shall  attack  and 
oppose  everybody  and  everything.  Pitiable !  pitiable ! 
And  you  are  not  a  whit  better,  Flamin." 

"  Not  a  whit,"  said  Flamin,  with  touching  candour. 
Luna  and  my  wife  took  the  Professor's  wife  between  them 
(each  taking  one  of  her  children  in  her  lap),  and  bat  down 
upon  the  green  nether  slope  of  the  hill,  on  the  sunny  side 
of  the  nightingale.  We,  however,  were  too  restless  to  sit 
down.  "  Alas ! "  (said  Jean  Paul,  walking  up  and  down, 
with  his  hands  folded  and  hanging,  and  his  hat  thrown 
away,  so  that  his  eyes,  at  all  events,  might  be  higher  and 
freer).  "  Alas  !  is  any  one  a  whit  better  ?  We  take  a  vow 
of  universal  love  to  our  fellow  men  whenever  we  are  deeply 
touched — when  we  have  buried  some  one,  or  have  been 
thoroughly  happy,  or  have  committed  some  grand  trans- 
gression, or  looked  long  and  closely  at  Nature,  or  are  in- 
toxicated with  love,  or  some  earthly  form  of  intoxication  : 
but  we  are  really  only  perjurers,  not  philanthropists,  as  we 
fancy  ourselves.  We  long  and  thirst  for  the  love  of  others 
— but  it  is  like  mercury,  it  feels  and  looks  like  fountain 
water,  and  flows  and  glitters  like  it — but  it  is  cold,  dry, 
and  heavy  in  reality.  It  is  just  those  very  people  upon 
whom  Nature  has  bestowed  most  gifts  (and  who,  conse- 
quently, should  not  covet  other  people's,  but  be  content 
with  distributing  their  own),  who,  like  princes,  demand  the 
more  from  their  fellow  men  the  more  they  have  to  give 
them,  and  the  less  they  do  give  them.  Dissensions  are  the 
more  bitterly  painful,  the  more  alike  the  souls  are  between 
whom  they  take  place,  just  as  discords  are  harsher  the 
nearer  they  approach  the  unison.  \\  e  forgive  without 
reason  because  we  have  found  fault  without  reason,  for  a 


CHAP.  XIV.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      413 

rightful  and  righteous  anger  must,  of  necessity,  he  ever- 
lasting. M  othing  is  a  stronger  evidence  of  the  miserable 
subordination  of  our  reason  to  our  ruling  passion  than  the 
fact  that  we  place  such  a  flat  every-day  matter  as  time 
among  the  cures  for  hate,  grief,  love,  &c. ;  our  impul-es 
are  to  forget  to  conquer,  or  to  grow  tired  of  doing  so — our 
wounds  are  to  be  sanded  over  with  the  Margrave's  sympa- 
thetic powder  of  drift-sand  out  of  Time's  sand-glass !  Too 
miserable  a  business  altogether  !  But  can  anything  make 
a  better  of  it?  Certainly,  least  of  all  my  complaints  of  it !  " 

"The  fact  is,"  said  the  serene,  gentle,  Professor  (who 
only  uses  a  very  few  pedantic  tints  in  his  style  of  painting), 
"feelings  of  love  to  our  fellow  men  *  are  useless  without 
reasons."     "  Saare  reasons  without  feelings,"  said  Paul. 

"  Consequently,"  continued  the  Professor  (for  I  could 
riot  manage  to  get  my  Piqueur  brought  to  bear  anyhow, 
but  had  to  keep  him  idly  in  reserve),  "  the  two  have  to  be 
combined  like  genius  and  criticism — of  which  the  former 
can  produce  only  master-pieces  and  scholar-pieces,  the 
latter  only  something  of  an  everyday  sort  between  the  two. 
What  I  think  is,  that  our  lack  of  love  arises,  not  from  our 
coldness,  but  from  a  conviction  that  others  do  not  deserve 
it.  The  coldest  of  men  would  acquire  a  greater  warmth  of 
feeling  for  their  fellows  if  they  acquired  a  higher  opinion 
of  them." 

"  But,"  asked  Clotilda,  "  must  we  not  forgive  even  the 
wrong  done  by  our  enemies  ?  The  right  is  not  matter  for 
forgiveness." 

M  Of  eourse  it  is  not,"  he  answered,  but  would  let  him- 
self be  no  further  diverted  from  his  point.  "  The  only 
ugliness  and  hatefulness  which  we  can  truly  experience 
hatred  for  is  that  of  a  moral  sort." 

*  In  all  this  discussion  what  we  are  talking  of  is  not  that  practical 
love  of  our  fellow  men,  and  of  our  enemies,  which  expresses  itself  in 
action,  and  in  refraining  from  revenge  (and  which  must  be  easy  to 
every  properly  constituted  person),  but  that  feeling  of  misanthropy,  or 
of  philanthropy  (as  the  case  may  be),  over  which  the  moral  sense  has 
but  little  power — of  inward  love,  as  distinct  from  actions;  of  secret 
indignation  with  sinners  and  fools.  It  is  easier  to  sacrifice  one's  self 
for  people  than  to  love  them — easier  to  do  good  to  our  enemies  th  .n  t  > 
forgive  them.  The  lonjring  of  love,  as  well  as  its  seldomne&s,  have  had 
but  one  painter — F.  Jakobi :  we  do  not  need  a  st  cond. 


414  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  KICHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

"  In  opposition  to  that,  view  of  the  question,"  said  Jean 
Paul,  "I  might  adduce  the  fierce  combats  of  animals,  and 
nurseries  in  a  state  of  war ;  for  in  neither  of  the.se  cases  is 
there  any  idea  of  immorality  of  the  enemy,  although  hatred 
of  him  exists.  But  were  I  to  adduce  these  cases,  I  could 
answer  m\  self— at  least,  so  so.  If  we  directed  our  hatred 
against  things  other  than  the  immoral,  we  should  be  just  as 
angry  with  the  hanging  branch  which  strikes  us  in  the  face 
as  wiih  the  person  who  broke  it  so  that  it  should  be  so  placed 
as  to  do  so.  The  rage  of  a  chastised  child  is  quite  a  different 
thing  from  the  alarmed  instinct  of  self-conservancy — the 
feeling  of  avoidance  of  nitric  acid,  or  of  bodily  hurt.  The 
former  has  in  it  a  duplex  sense  of  dislike,  the  two  com- 
ponents of  which  are  most  dissimilar — the  one  referring  to 
the  cause,  the  other  to  the  effect.  We  must  distinguish 
between  beings  which  are  capable  of  morality,  and  such 
as  are  not,  in  kind — not  in  degree;  those  incapable  of 
morality  can  never  be  made  capable  of  it  by  the  mere 
lapse  of  time,  or  step  by  step.  Whence,  if  children  at  any 
period  of  their  age  were  utterly  non-moral  beings,  it  would 
follow  that  they  could  never,  at  any  period,  begin  to  become 
moral  beings.  In  brief,  their  anger  is  nothing  other  than 
a  dim  sense  of  other  people's  injustice.  As  to  the  animals, 
I  don't  know  what  else  to  say  than  that  there  must  be  in 
them  something  analogous  to  our  moral  sense.  Those  who 
(like  us)  believe  them  to  have  immortal  souls,  must,  as  a 
matter  of  course,  concede  them  some  beginnings — some 
pre-existent  germs  of  morality — although  these  may  be 
overpowered  and  kept  in  the  background  by  their  animal 
natures  even  to  a  greater  extent  than  (for  instance)  con- 
science is  in  sleep,  drunkenness,  or  insanity.  But  alas ! 
all  this  is  night  within  night!  And  I  hope  this  obscu- 
rity will  be  considered  some  excuse,  Professor,  for  the 
manner  in  which  I  have  obstructed  and  built  out  your 
light." 

"  Now,"  he  went  on,  "  since  hatred  only  concerns  itself 
with  moral  defects,  how  strange  it  is  that  we  never  hate 
ourselves,  even  for  the  gravest  moral  defects." 

"  I"  think,"  said  Flamin,  that  one  does  sometimes  feel  the 
deadliest  hatred  of  one's  self,  for  over-haste." 

M  And  then,"  said  Jean  Paul,  "  your  argument  would 


CHAP.  XIV.J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      415 

apply  just  as  well  to  love — at  least  it  would  half  apply. 
Coine,  let's  hear  what  you've  got  to  say  to  that?" 

"  We  never  hate  ourselves,"  I  said.  "  We  despise  and 
pity  ourselves,  when  we  have  done  wrong.  Although — I 
must  add  this — we  hate  all  men,  our  ownselves  excepted, 
for  vices.  Can  this  be  right?"  "  Self-hatred/'  went  on 
the  Professor,  "is  not  possible,  for  hatred  is  nothing  but 
the  wishing  of  evil  to  the  object  of  it — t.  e.,  a  desire  to 
punish,  not  for  bettering 's  sake,  but  for  punishing's.  But  the 
most  repentant  of  sinners  never  can  wish  himself  made  the 
subject  of  a  chastening  of  this  kind  ;  and  even  if  he  could, 
such  a  wish  would  be  merely  a  disguised  desire  for  bettering 
— i.  e.,  for  greater  happiness.  But  to  a  transgressor  other 
than  ourselves  we  hardly  can  concede  rapidity  of  conversion, 
not,  at  all  events,  until  he  has  gone  through  a  proper  ex- 
piation. What  distinguishes  our  feeling  concerning  other 
people's  errors  from  our  feeling  concerning  our  own  is  a 
sham  self-love.  The  very  minutest  particle  of  hatred 
desires  the  unhappiness  of  its  object ;  that  is  what  I  have 
got  to  prove  now." 

His  own  wife  here  interrupted  him  with  the  words, 
"My  heart  tells  me,  as  plainly  as  possible,  that  I  could 
never  wish  any  serious  misfortune  to  happen  to  my 
bitterest  enemy — such  as  money  troubles,  or  anything 
about  her  children.  I  could  not  bear  even  the  idea  of  a 
tear  being  brought  to  her  eyes  on  my  account." 

"  No,  I  suppose  not,"  he  went  on.  "  The  better  nature 
within  us  never  wishes  its  antipode  a  broken  leg,  would 
not  leave  him  without  a  strip  of  lint,  or  a  wish  for  his 
recovery.  But  I  know  that  that  same  '  better  nature '  does 
take  a  delight  in  his  minor  skin-wounds — his  being  put  to 
confusion,  his  sleigh  slipping  down  hill  backwards,  his 
losing  his  hair.  The  gentlest  of  souls  hides,  at  the  back  of 
its  tender  sympathy  with  great  troubles,  its  untender  satis- 
faction with  small  ones,  such  as  call  for  condolence  (a 
smaller  thing  than  sympathy).  The  tenderest  of  people, 
people  incapable  of  inflicting  the  smallest  wound  imagin- 
able on  their  enemy's  skin,  are  delighted  to  make  a  thousand 
deep  ones  in  his  heart."  "  Ah  1 "  said  Luna,  "  how  can 
that  be  possible ? "  "I  don't  think  it  would  be  pos- 
sible," Clotilda  answered  her,   "if  the  pain  of  the  sota 


416  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICn  RICIITER.       [BOOK  III. 

had  as  definite  a  physiognomy,  and  as  real  tears,  as  that  of 
the  body." 

"Exactly,"  said  the  Professor;  "that  is  just  where  it  in. 
To  make  ourselves  feel  more  gently  towards  the  wicked 
we  have  only  to  think  of  them  as  delivered  wholly  over 
into  our  hands.  For  what  harm  would  one  do  them  then  ? 
The  moment  they  acknowledged  their  fault  we  would  stay 
the  rack,  and  bid  the  torture  cease.  What  redoubles  our 
indignation,  and  renders  it  everlasting,  is  the  very  im- 
possibility of  inflicting  any  punishment." 

"  Yes,  that  is  quite  true,"  said  Melchior.  "  The  oftener 
I  read  of  these  two  live  guillotines  of  their  age,  Alba  and 
Philip  (whose  lips  were  shears  of  the  Parcse),  or  of  those 
two  other  mowers  of  mankind,  Marat  and  Robespierre,  the 
deeper  does  the  aquafortis  of  anger  etch  their  condemna- 
tion into  my  heart,  although  death  has  drawn  up  their 
Acts  of  Amnesty." 

"  And  yet,  after  all,"  I  put  in  (leaving  the  Piqueur  in 
the  rear  for  the  present),  "  if  anybody  would  deliver  over 
the  King  and  the  Duke  to  you  and  me  here  this  afternoon, 
and  a  couple  of  caldrons  of  boiling  oil  into  the  bargain, 
I  feel  quite  certain  I  couldn't  throw  one  of  them  in — at 
any  rate  till  the  oil  had  stood  a  long  time  in  the  cold.  I 
should  let  them  oft'  with  a  good  flogging — say  100  lashes, 
or  so.  Ah  1  what  a  cast-iron  sort  of  fellow  were  he  who 
should  not  soothe,  and  comfort  with  cooling,  healing 
touch  (had  he  the  power)  a  heart  breaking  with  anguish, 
a  face  whereon  the  worm  of  suffering  was  ploughing  its 
tortuous  track !  At  the  same  time  (I  continued,  rapidly ; 
for  I  was  determined  to  bring  in  my  Piqueur  somehow  or 
other),  where  emotion  is  concerned,  the  memory  of  past 
errors  is  not  the  smallest  safeguard  against  new  ones." 

"  You  see,  you  won't  allow  me  to  speak,"  the  Professor 
broke  in.  "  I  still  owe  you  a  tremendous  number  of 
proofs,  and  I  am  most  anxious  to  acquit  the  debt.  Our 
hatred,  being  an  emotion,  always  turns  every  action  into  a 
whole  life;  every  attribute  inlo  a  personality  (or,  to  speak 
more  accurately,  because  our  only  mode  of  seeing  any  per- 
sonality is  by  its  reflection  in  the  mirror  of  its  attributes) 
converts  one  attribute  into  the  sum  of  them.  It  is  only  in 
the  case  of  liking — of  friendship — that  we  find  it  easy  to 


OHAr.  XIV.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      417 

separate  the  attribute  from  the  personality.  Hatred  can 
not  do  it.  Nay,  in  the  case  of  liking,  the  converse  trans- 
formation takes  place  —  that  of  the  personality  into  the 
attribute.  We  hate  as  if  the  object  of  our  hatred  had 
never  possessed  any  virtues,  or  inclination  to  them — 
neither  pity  nor  truthfulness,  love  of  the  young,  one 
single  good  hour,  anything  whatever.  In  brief,  since  it 
is  with  the  individuality  of  the  person  whose  punishment 
we  are  decreeing  that  we  are  angry  (not  with  its  character- 
istic of  the  moment),  we  make  him  out  to  be  a  wholly 
wicked  being.  Yet  such  a  being  is  not  conceivable.  The 
voice  of  conscience  speaking  in  that  being  would  be  of 
itself  one  goodness  in  him,  even  though  it  spoke  in  vain ; 
the  pain  of  that  conscience  would  be  another ;  each  joy 
and  each  impulse  of  his  life  another." 

"  Ah  !  how  delightful,"  said  Luna,  "  that  there  is  nobody 
so  utterly  bad;  nobody  whom  one  would  have  to  hate 
altogether." 

"  You  see,"  he  continued,  "  it  cannot  be  the  me  of  a 
person  that  jve  hate ;  for  the  me  is  still  the  same  me  when 
it  improves,  and  wins  our  regard." 

In  the  warmth  of  our  discussion  we  were  losing  sight 
altogether  of  one  of  the  two  concave  mirrors  which  distort 
other  people's  moral  distortions  for  us  even  more  wildly 
than  they  are  distorted  to  begin  with — I  mean,  our  own 
egotism.  Often,  when  I  have  seen  and  heard  women 
squabbling  in  the  market-place  (women  of  whom  one  was 
just  as  good  as  the  other,  and  with  just  as  good  an  opinion 
of  herself),  and  one  hurling  her  invectives  with  delight, 
like  a  red-hot  stone,  at  the  other's  head,  which  seethed 
and  swelled  in  waves  of  anger  around  that  stone,  while 
a  third  woman  kept  calm  and  cool  in  the  midway-path 
between,  I  have  been  ashamed  of  the  human  race — 
ashamed  that  the  self-same  reproach,  or  immorality, 
which  ought  to  produce  exactly  the  same  effect  upon  all 
the  three,  should  make  too  strong  an  impression  on  the 
one,  too  weak  a  one  on  the  other,  none  whatever  on 
the  third. 

Paul  pointed  to  the  second  of  these  distorting  mirrors — 
oar  Dodily  senses.  For  these  render  the  vinegar  of  hatred 
doubly  bitter  by  throwing  into  its  fermenting- vat  these 

IL  2B 


418  JEAN  PAUL  FIUEDK1CH  BICHTEB.      [BOOK  III, 

parts  of  the  enemy  which  they  take  cognizance  of — his 
clothes,  movements,  gestures,  tones,  &c. 

Here  we  reached  the  Gordian  knot  which  only  I  could 
cut  with  the  Piqueur.  "  Who  is  to  save  us  from  these 
bodily  senses?"  I  inquired  (with  a  certain  amount  of 
hopeful  expectancy).  Mclchior  answered,  "  I  do  not  allow 
them  to  influence  my  philanthropy,  at  all  events.  They 
are  the  straw  which  feeds  the  flame  under  that  ascending 
windbag  balloon,  the  heart." 

Jean  Paul  thrust  me  back  from  the  Gordian  knot.  "  I," 
he  said,  "  have  an  admirable  sweetener  at  all  times  in 
readiness  to  apply  when  a  dinner  embitters  my  senses.  I 
take  him,  and  (like  a  victorious  enemy)  strip  all  the 
clothes  off  him,  not  leaving  him  so  much  as  his  hat  or  his 
wig.  When  once  I've  got  him  standing  there  before  me, 
cold  and  wretched  as  any  corpse  (I  mean,  of  course,  in 
imagination),  I  begin  to  feel  sorry  for  the  scoundrel.  But 
this  is  not  enough.  I  have  got  to  sweeten  myself  a  good 
deal  more  than  this ;  so  I  proceed  to  slit  him  up  with  a 
long,  slicing  cut  from  top  to  bottom  into  three  cavities  (as 
if  he  were  a  carp),  so  that  I  can  see  his  heart  and  brain 
pulsating.  The  mere  sight  of  a  red  human  heart  (Dauaid's 
bucket  for  happiness — safe  storehouse  of  so  many  a  sorrow) 
makes  my  own  soft  and  heavy  ;  and  I  have  often  not  for- 
given a  street  robber  till  the  Professor  has  been  shewing 
us  his  heart  and  brain  in  the  anatomical  theatre.  '  Thou 
unhappy,  sorrowful  heart,'  I  have  always  found  myself 
thinking,  with  deep,  sympathetic  emotion,  '  how  many  a 
blood-billow  has  gone  surging  through  thee,  glowing  and 
freezing  in  the  same  moment.'  But  if  all  this  process 
failed  to  have  its  effect,  1  should  proceed  to  extremities, 
and  smite  my  enemy  dead  ;  then  take  the  naked,  fluttering, 
trembling  soul— like  an  evening  moth -out  of  its  brain- 
chamber  chrysalis,  and.  holding  up  the  quivering  night- 
creature  between  my  forefinger  and  thumb,  gaze  at  it 
without  a  trace  of  rancour  left  in  me." 

"  To  picture  one's  enemy  to  one's  pelf  as  unclothed,  or 
disembodied,"  said  I,  "so  as  to  be  aide  to  put  up  with 
him,  as  though  he  were  dead  (perhaps  that  is  the  chief 
reason  why  we  love  the  dead),  is  just  the  operation  1 
perform  too.     I  often  try  to  soften  the  unpleasant  effect 


CHAP.  XIV.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      419 

which  some  repulsive  physiognomy  produces  upon  me  by 
thinking  of  it  as  scalped,  and  with  its  skin  folded  hack." 

And  now  I  determined,  seriously  and  in  earnest,  that 
the  sceptre  and  throne  insignia  of  the  conversation,  should 
no  more  depart  from  my  hands.  Wherefore  I  commenced 
as  follows :  "  But  who  is  to  provide  us  with  the  time  and 
the  power,  n<t  only  to  remember,  hut  to  act  upon,  this 
precious  and  reliable  principle,  or  rule  of  conduct,  right  in 
the  thick  of  this  world's  Pyrrhic  war-dance,  and  the  rapid 
evolutions  of  our  emotions  ?  Who  is  to  stoke  the  rether- 
flame  of  philanthropy  with  a  sufficient  supply  of  com- 
bustible matter,  seeing  that  there  are  such  hosts  of  people 
continually  drowning  it  out,  smothering  it  up,  and  build- 
ing it  in !  Who  is  to  make  up  to  us  for  the  lack  of  a 
gentle,  quiet  temperament?    Who,  or  what?" 

Just  as  I  was  going  to  fix  the  Piqueur  on  to  this  lance- 
shaft  by  way  of  point,  the  cold  dinner  was  brought,  and 
the  Professor's  wife  went  to  fetch  her  children.  For  the 
dinner  had  to  be  over  before  sunset ;  because,  like  a  fresh 
supply  of  green  firewood,  it  would  drown  out  the  flame  of 
enthusiasm  for  a  time,  and  break  the  unity  of  its  vertical, 
purple  fire  pyramid.  The  company,  therefore,  waited  in 
vain  for  me  to  go  on  with  what  I  had  to  say.  I  shook  my 
head,  expressing,  by  nods,  that  I  should  do  so  when  wo 
were  all  together  again,  and  sitting  down. 

While  we  were  at  dinner  I  was  able  to  set  up  my  speak- 
ing machine,  and  set  it  a-going  at  my  ease. 

"  I  asked  you  once  or  twice  before  dinner,"  I  com- 
menced, *'  who  can  invigorate  and  quicken  our  principles 
of  love  to  our  fellows,  and  set  them  fully  to  work?  I 
answer,  the  chief  Piqueur  can  ;  only  I'm  afraid  I've  made 
8"  many  false  starts,  and  baulked  in  so  many  of  my  runs 
before  making  this  grand  jump  of  mine,  that  I  have  led 
you  to  entertain  far  greater  expectations  concerning  it 
than  it  (or  I)  may  be  able  to  fulfil.  A  day  or  two  before 
the  stump-end  of  the  chief  Piqueur's  life-candle  fell 
down  and  went  guttering  out  in  its  candlestick-socket,  he 
sent  for  me  to  the  side  of  his  bed  of  suffering  and  begged 
me — not  to  prescribe  for  him,  but — to  make  a  thorough 
inspection  of  his  house.  He  drew  my  head  down  close  to 
ilia  wretched  pillow,  and  said,  '  You  see,  doctor,  Death  haa 

2  e2 


420  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.      [B   OK  III. 

got  his  hunting-knife  at  my  throat.  Btit  I'm  not  Borry  to 
go,  and  what  little  I  leave  behind  me  in  the  shape  of 
worldly  gear  goes  all  to  the  poor.  It's  but  little  that  I 
have  ever  thought  of  scraping  together  for  myself,  and  that 
is  a  comfort  to  think  or>  now.  It's  for  the  poor  that  I 
have  screwed  and  saved,  pinched  and  pared  ;  and  when  a 
man  has  done  that  it's  a  pleasure  to  him  to  make  his  will ; 
lie  knows  it  will  be  paid  back  again  elsewhere.  But  there's 
one  hard  stone  at  my  heart  still.  You  see  I  have  neither 
chick  nor  child  belonging  to  me,  and  when  the  breath  is 
out  of  my  body,  the  old  woman  who  keeps  my  room  in 
order  will  be  in  the  house  by  herself.  She's  an  honest 
body  enough,  but  as  poor  as  a  church  mouse,  and  pretty 
sure  to  help  herself  to  something  before  the  seals  are  put 
on  my  effects.  Now,  doctor,  you  are  a  man  who  are  just 
as  good  to  the  poor  as  I  am  myself;  you  often  prescribe 
for  them  gratis ;  I  want  to  ask  you  to  go  through  the  house 
with  the  notary  (I  don't  trust  him  a  bit  more  than  I  do 
the  old  woman),  take  an  inventory  of  what  there  is,  and 
have  a  regular  notarial  instrument  drawn  up  concerning 
my  property.  I've  left  the  whole  of  it  to  the  Poor-house 
and  the  Institution  for  Destitute  Gamekeepers.  The 
notary  must  begin  with  my  breeches  under  the  pillow 
here,  because  my  purse  is  there.' 

"  A  man  whose  stubble  Death  is  in  the  very  act  of  turn- 
ing up  with  his  plough,  has,  upon  me,  a  more  powerful 
claim  than  that  of  the  first  request — that  of  the  last.  I 
came  the  next  day,  bringing  with  me  the  notary,  and  also 
my  dislike  to  the  dying  man  and  his  distrustful  suspicions. 
"With  gay  indifference  I  helped  to  protocol  the  effects  in  the 
sick-room — his  shooting-jacket,  worn  into  shining  patches 
by  his  Did  game-bag — his  old  guns  and  knives — even  such 
matters  as  a  leather  over-shoe  for  his  thumb,  and  a  long 
mummy  bandage  for  his  nose,  which  he  had  worn  on 
occasions  when  he  had  hurt  himself  in  these  members 
with  his  gun. 

"  As  we  went  through  the  other  silent  chambers  — 
empty  snail-shells  of  his  shrivelled,  dried -up  life— my 
frozen  blood  began  to  thaw  within  me,  and  to  move  in 
warm,  light  mercury-globules.  But  when  I  came  to  the 
lumber-room,  with  the  notary,  and  tuned  over  the  rag- 


CHAP.  XIV.  j     FLOWEK,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      421 

fair  of  his  old  nightshirts — (caterpillar  cases  and  blood- 
shirts  of  his  feverish  nights,  in  which  I  seemed  still  to  see 
him  groaning  and  thirsting) — and  his  Pathebrief*  and  his 
name  copied  from  thence  with  all  its  flourishes  on  to  his 
pointer's  collar — and  the  picture  of  his  pretty  mother 
with  him  as  a  smiling  infant  in  her  lap — and  his  wife's 
bridal  garland  of  wire,  covered  with  green  silk — (Oh  !  for 
goodness'  sake  do  not  interrupt  me  with  talk — I've  had 
enough  of  that,  Heaven  knows).  When  I  took  in  my 
hands  these  opera-costumes,  these  theatrical  properties, 
in  which  the  sick  player  down-stairs  had  performed  his 
probe-rolle  f  of  a  Harpaxus  for  the  benefit  of  the  poor — not 
only  did  the  poor  fellow's  moral  emptiness  of  treasury,  and 
miserable  rate  of  monthly  salary,  strike  me  with  pain,  but, 
moreover,  I  wished  him  no  heavier  suffering,  no  severer 
punishment,  than  he  would  wish  for  himself,  were  he  really  to 
repent  in  good  earnest  before  his  plunge  into  the  depths  of  the . 
s<nl.  No,  not  so  much,  for  the  matter  of  that.  Therefore, 
my  dislike  to  him  was  gone.  For  I  put  myself  in  his 
place — not  outwardly  only,  as  people  generally  do,  fancy- 
ing themselves  in  another  person's  physical  place  with 
their  own  souls,  their  own  wishes,  habitudes,  &c.  —  but 
inwardly  —  in  his  mind,  his  youth,  wishes,  sufferings, 
thoughts. 

"  '  Poor  Piqweur,'  I  said,  as  I  went  down-stairs  ;  '  I  have 
no  more  satiric  pleasure  now  over  your  gnawing  suspicion, 
your  errors,  your  self-shooting  covetousness,  your  hungry 
avarice.  You  have  got  to  live  through  a  long  eternity 
with  that  self,  that  "mo  "  of  yours,  the  best  way  you  can, 
just  as  I  have  with  mine.  You  have  got  to  rise  with  that 
self  of  yours  at  the  Resurrection,  and  go  about  with  it,  and 
look  after  it,  and  care  for  its  welfare.  And,  of  course,  you 
can't  but  be  fond  of  yourself,  just  as  I  am  of  myself  and  put 
up  with  all  that  selfs  defects  and  shortcomings  whether 
you  will  or  not.  Go  in  peace  then  into  the  other  world, 
where  the  broken  glasses  of  your  harmonica  of  life  will  be 
replaced  with  fresh-tuned  ones — in  the  great  home  of  all 
the  spirits ! ' 

*  A  paper,  printed  with  symbols,  &c,  iu  which  the  present  for  a 
godchild  is  wrapped. 
t  Part  which  a  player  selects  as  a  specimen  of  his  powers. 


422  JEAN  PAUL  FMEDRICH  RICHTER.      [BOOK  III. 

"  The  old  woman  met  us  on  the  stairs  crying  out  that 
the  man  was  dying.  I  went  to  his  bed-wide,  looked  upon 
his  cold,  yellow,  senseless  form,  and  saw  that  he  would 
very  soon  throw  off  his  last,  stage-dress,  his  body.  Next. 
day  the  tolling  bell  announced  that  he  had  returned  to  the 
dust — gone  back  into  the  ground — that  stage  dressing-room 
of  souls  and  flowers.  (And  we  are  rung  off  and  on  to  that 
stage,  as  well  as  others.) 

"Meanwhile  1  made  an  experiment  with  my  modified 
and  mildened  system  of  treatment,  upon  the  poor  notary 
devil;  the  day  after  I  tried  it  on  the  jurists  who  came 
from  the  college.  (Jean  Paul !  communicate  your  idea  to 
us  by-and-bye— do  not  interrupt  me  just  now) — I  did  this, 
I  say,  and  found  that  I  was  able  to  establish  a  heart-peace 
even  with  the  plebeians  among  them  —  who  dishonour 
their  calling — the  only  really  free  one  in  all  the  body 
•politic.  For  in  the  cases  of  these  lawyers,  and  those  of  my 
own  medical  colleagues  fioiu  whose  breasts  I  have  been 
so  ofren  in  such  a  hurry  to  cut  off,  and  melt,  down,  the 
medals  of  honour  which  they  have  cast  for  themselves,  1 
have  had  merely  to  take  away  the  roof  from  over  their 
heads,  lift  the  rafters  from  their  walls,  and  bare  their 
houses  to  the  four  winds  of  heaven.  Then  I  could  look 
in  and  see  everything  there — their  housekeeping,  their 
unoffending  wives,  their  sleep  (i.  e.,  mock-death),  sick- 
nesses, sorrows,  birth-da3Ts,  and  funeral-days,  aid  this 
reconciled  me  to  them!  Of  a  truth,  to  love  a  man,  I  have 
only  to  think  of  his  children,  his  parents — the  love  he 
feels  and  inspires.  One  can  easily  perform  this  philan- 
thropic transmigration  of  soul  at  any  moment,  without 
help  of  the  balloon  of  phantasy,  or  the  diving-bell  of  pro- 
found reflection.  Good  heavens !  it  does  seem  hard  (and  a 
shame  and  disgrace  into  the  bargain)  that  it  should  have 
taken  me  thirty  years  of  my  life  to  understand  properly 
what  it  is  that  self-love  is  really  driving  at — my  own  and 
everybody  else's — what  it  wants  is,  to  be  surrounded  with 
mere  repetitions  of  its  own  'me.'  It  insists  upon  every 
infant  on  earth  being  a  parson's  son  (as  I  am) — that 
everybody  shall  have  lost,  and  gained,  noble  friends — that 
everybody  shall  be  an  m.d.,  and  have  studied  at  G6tti^g<n 
--that  his  name  shall   be  Sebastian,  and  that  he  shall  be 


CHAP.  XIV.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES       423 

an  overseer  of  mines,  and  write  his  life  in  forty-five  dog- 
post-days — in  brief,  that  this  world  shall  contain  a  thou- 
sand million  Victors  instead  of  one.  1  beg  that  everybody 
may  send  spies  into  his  soul,  to  look  carefully  about  them 
and  see  whether  it  be  not  the  case  that  there  are  thousands 
of  instances  in  which  what  we  hate  a  man  for  ib,  either 
that  he  is  as  fat  as  a  prize  pig,  or  as  lean  as  a  stick  of 
vermicelli  — or  that  he  is  a  district  secretary,  or  a  Eoman 
Catholic  watchman  in  Augspurg,  and  wears  a  coat  white 
on  the  one  side,  and  green  on  the  other — or  that  he  eats 
his  veal  with  melted  butter  ;*  (or,  at  all  events,  hate  them 
more  for  these  reasons ;  for  when  we  are  indifferent  to 
people,  all  their  external  characteristics,  beautiful  or  ugly, 
merely  increase  our  indifference).  People  are  so  deep  sunk 
in  their  dear  selves  that  everybody  yawns  at  the  menu 
of  everybody  else's  favourite  dishes,  but  expects  them  to  be 
interested  when  he  reads  out  his  to  them." 

That  feathered  echo,  the-  nightingale,  was  singing  to 
us  phrases  of  the  music  of  the  spheres,  to  us  inaudible 
until  thus  repeated  to  us  by  her.  But  I  had  my  rapid 
descent  from  my  Mont  Cenis  to  finish,  and  could  but  give 
utterance  to  my  applause  (of  the  bird  and  her  music)  by  a 
hasty  nod.  "  Heavenly  !  Elysian  !  I've  been  hearing  it 
every  now  and  then.  But,  one  thing  more.  Since  my 
sentimental  journey  in  other  people's  souls,  I  have  been 
happier  and  fatter  than  I  used  to  be,  in  ball-rooms,  ante- 
rooms, and  large  assemblages  (hot  lark-spits  which  roasted 
all  the  fat  out  of  a  Swift).  This  enduring  of  transgressors 
includes  a  greater  enduring  still  of  fools  and  dunces, 
although  the  great  world  makes  war  on  these  three 
tolerated  sects  in  just  the  contrary  ratio. 

"  The  amnesty  thus  granted  to  humanity  makes  the 
duty  of  loving  more  easy  to  perform ;  moreover,  it  renders 
the  deep  blisstulness  of  friendship  and  love  more  justi- 
fiable ;  for  the  glow,  the  fire  of  the  latter  often  vitrifies 
and  calcines  the  heart  towards  the  rest  of  mankind.  And 
this  is  the  reason  why  the  last  and  best  fruit.  .  .  ." 

Clotilda  looked  inquiringly  here,  as  if  begging  to  be 

*  A  Frenchman  vowed  he  could  not  abide  the  English :  "  Parce 
qu'iLj  versent  du  beurre  fondu  eur  leur  veau  ioti." 


424  JEAN  PAUL  FBIEDB1CH  EICHTEB.      [BOOK  III. 

allowed  one  word  of  remonstrance  with  me  for  forgetting 
to  put  myself  in  the  place  of  those  whose  transformation 
•1  Was  thus  extolling.  I  reddened,  and  paused.  "This," 
observed  Jean  Paul,  "is  the  reason  why  a  concert-room 
audience  cries  out  the  loudest  against  noise  or  disturb- 
ance just  during  the  loveliest  adagios — when  people  are 
most  deeply  touched — and  swear  and  weep  at  the  same 
time. 

"I  cannot  help  being  ashamed  of  an  experience  of  my 
own,"  said  Clotilda.  "  The  other  day  I  cried  so  at  reading 
Silly's  letters  (in  Allwill's  Papers)  that  I  was  obliged  to 
put  the  book  down.  Then  I  went  to  the  casino  with 
my  head  full  of  what  I  had  been  reading — and  I  daro 
not  tell  you  what  hard  opinions  I  entertained,  several 
times  that  very  evening,  of  several  people  of  my  ac- 
quaintance. I  expected  of  them  that  they  should  all  be 
in  exactly  the  tame  mood  of  mind  as  myself — although, 
of  course,  they  had  not  just  come  from  reading  Silly's 
letters." 

"  That  is  exactly  what  I  was  coming  to,"  concluded  I. 
"  The  last  and  best  fruit,  which  ripens  late  in  a  soul  ever 
warm,  is  tenderness  towards  the  hard — patience  with  the 
impatient  —  kindly  feeling  for  the  selfish — and  philan- 
thropy towards  the  misanthropic." 

It  is  a  very  odd  thing,  beloved  Cato,  but  Jean  Paul 
has  just  come  and  told  me  a  murder- tale  of  human  ini- 
quity, which  goes  hissing  through  my  heart  like  a  red-hot 
iron.  All  my  theories  stand  blight  and  clear  as  stare  around 
my  soul,  but  I  can  do  nothing  save  look  inactively  down 
upon  the  billows  in  which  my  blood  is  foaming,  heated  by 
this  subterranean  earth-fire,  and  wait  until  they  cool 
down  and  subside.  Alas !  we  poor,  poor  mortals !  Jean 
Paul,  who  knew  the  story  the  day  before  yesterday,  and 
had  consequently  all  that  time  to  put  the  cooling  process 
in  practice  in  advance  of  me,  is  going  to  take  charge  ot 
the  picture  exhibition  of  our  insular  flower-pieces  in  my 
stead,  and  add  a  postscript  to  this.  Which  is  well,  for 
to-day  I  really  could  not  do  it.  By  the  10th  of  April  the 
air  will  have  cooled ;  then  you  are  sure  to  be  coming,  as 
the  French  election  meetings  begin  then.  We  must  keep 
the  "  settling  -weeks"  of  your  great  feast  and  fairtide  here 


CH\P.  Xrv.J      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      425 

Alas !  in  what  a  disquiet  condition  have  I  to  stop  writing 
to  you.     You  will  go  on  reading,  but  not 

*  8  Your  ^Mttjb 


POSTSCRIPT  BY  JEAN  PAUL. 

Dear  Brother.  {$*  vt  tl  f  (  0 

Our  Victor's  virtuous  indignation  will  soon  be  over 
and  past.  The  reason  why  he,  and  I  too,  now,  have  made 
a  written  confession  of  the  cure  of  our  disposition  to  cen- 
sure our  fellows,  is,  that  we  maybe  compelled  to  be  exces- 
sively ashamed  of  ourselves  if  ever  we  chide  for  more  than 
a  minute,  or  hate  for  more  than  a  moment.  This  all 
embracing  love  demands  a  sacrifice,  which  is  made  with 
greater  hesitation  than  one  would  expect — the  sacrifice  of 
the  pleasure  of  being  satisfied  with  one's  self — which 
anger  adds  to  the  contemplation  of  other  people's  faults 
(and  satire  to  the  contemplation  of  other  people's  follies) — 
by  way  of  a  sweetening  ingredient,  and  whose  place  is 
taken  by  a  pure  and  unalloyed  regret  at  the  frequency 
with  which  the  disease  shifts  its  seat,  and  at  the  chioni- 
city  of  the  bleeding  of  the  wounds  and  scars  of  helpless 
man. 

However,  for  the  present,  what  I  would  fain  do  is  to  steer 
our  floating  island,  and  its  blessed  twilight,  close  up  to 
your  view. 

The  sun  was  sinking  towards  the  cloud  Alps,  and  glowing 
white  over  France  in  the  west  as  if  it  should  shortly  drop 
down  on  its  plains  as  a  gleaming  shield  of  freedom,  or  fall 
into  its  billowy  ocean  as  a  wedding-ring  between  heaven 
and  earth.  The  shades  of  evening  were  already  overflow- 
ing the  first  two  steps  of  the  hill,  and  the  darkening  Ehine 
seemed  to  be  passing  an  arm  of  night  around  the  earih. 
We  ascended  our  little  steps  as  the  sun  descended  his  great 
ones,  seeming,  as  we  ascended,  to  rise  from  his  burning 
grave  with  the  face  of  a  saint  at  the  Kesurrection.  The 
hill  lifted  up  our  eyes  and  our  souls.  Remembering  my 
shortcomings  I  took  Victor's  hand,  and  said,  "  Ah  !  dear 
Victor !  could  it  but  come  to  pass  that  one  could  make  a 


426  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  P.ICHTER.     JBOOK  III. 

treaty  of  peace  with  all  mankind,  and  with  one's  own  self — 
if  one's  shattered  heart  could  absorb  and  retain,  from  out  the 
leaven  of  the  hating  and  hated  world,  nothing  but  the 
sweet,  mild,  life-sap  of  love— as  the  oyster,  amid  mud  and 
slime,  takes  nothing  save  bright  pure  water  into  his  house. 
Ah !  if  one  but  knew  that  such  an  event  were  about  to 
come  to  pass  of  a  truth,  an  evening  of  happiness  such  as 
this  would  refresh  and  fill  one's  thirsting  breast,  (all  cracked 
with  thirst  and  dryness) — would  still  the  everlast:ng  sigh." 
Victor  answered  (not  looking  round,  but  keeping  his  glow- 
ing and  beglowed  face — which  his  loving  heart  suffused 
with  a  brighter  tint — turned  to  the  sun,  now  burning 
half  sunk  in  the  earth),  "  Perhaps,''  he  said,  "  that  time 
may  come ;  a  time  when  we  shall  all  be  happy  when  a 
human  being  smiles — even  should  he  not  deserve  it — when 
we  shall  speak  kindly  to  every  one — not  by  way  of  a 
mere  sacrifice  to  the  laws  of  polite  society,  but  for  very 
love — and  there  will  be  no  difficulties,  no  complications, 
for  hearts  which  will  no  longer  have  any  inward  annoy- 
ance to  conceal.  To-day  the  spring  sun  rests  upon  the 
world  like  the  eye  of  a  mother,  and  shines  warm  upon 
every  heart,  the  wicked  as  well  as  the  good.  Yes,  thou 
Eternal  One,  we  here  now  give  our  hands  and  our  hearts 
to  thy  whole  creation,  and  no  longer  hate  anything  which 
thou  hast  made."  We  were  overpowered,  and  we  em- 
braced with  tears,  and  no  words,  in  the  first  darkening  of 
the  night.  Over  the  sun's  burial  place  stood  the  zodiacal 
light,  a  red  grave  pyramid,  flaming  unmoved  up  into  the 
silent  deep  of  blu  v 

The  City  of  God  which  hangs  displayed  on  high  above 
our  earth,  built  on  the  arch  of  the  Milky  Way,  appeared 
from  out  the  endless  distances  with  all  its  shining  sun- 
lights. 

We  came  down  from  the  hill — each  spot  of  earth  was  a 
hill  just  then  ;  an  unseen  hand  lifted  our  souls  on  high 
ahove  the  dark  vapour-circle,  and  they  looked  down  as  if 
from  alps,  seeing  nothing  save  gleaming  peaks  of  other 
mountain  ranges — for  all  the  mean,  all  that  was  not  the 
high,  all  graves,  petty  goals,  and  life  careers  of  humanity, 
were  veiled  in  heavy  mist. 

We  lost  each  other  amongst  the  paths,  but  in  our  hearts 


CHAP.  XIV.]      FLOWER.  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      427 

we  were  all  together.  We  met  again,  but  the  silence  in 
our  souls  was  not  broken,  for  each  heart  beat  just  as  did 
nil  the  others,  and  there  was  no  difference,  save  the  being 
alone,  between  a  prayer  and  an  embrace. 

The  scattered  flames  of  our  emotion  had  gradually 
merged  into  one  glowing  sun  sphere,  as  the  ancients 
believed  that  the  fluttering  after-midnight  fires  thickened 
ere  morning  into  a  sun.  * 

But  1,  a  stranger,  alas !  in  this  paradise  stood  beneath 
the  leafless  branches,  sad,  and  alone,  beside  the  dark-blue 
[Rhine  stream  where  the  stars  were  mirrored — it  glided, 
with  gently  heaving  wavelets,  over  the  German  soil, 
binding  two  great  republics  f  together,  like  some  heavenly 
band ;  and  to  me  it  seemed  as  though  the  thirst,  the 
fire,  of  a  breast  no  broader  even  than  mine  could  be 
quenched  with  nothing  les  than  the  waters  of  this  great 
river.  Alas!  we  are  all  like  this.  In  the  transient  clasp 
of  our  little  grandeurs  and  blisses,  we  long  to  rest,  and  die, 
upon  something  great.  We  long  to  cast  ourselves  into  the 
depths  of  the  heavens  when  we  see  them  glitter  and  sparkle 
above  us — or  down  upon  the  many-tinted  earth,  when  her 
flowers  and  grasses  wave — or  into  the  endless  river,  flowing 
jis  if  from  out  the  past  onwards  into  the  future. 

Our  ladies  and  the  children  had  gone  away  — departing 
in  silence  from  this  anchorage  of  hours  so  happy — I  saw 
them  as  they  floated  over  the  wavelets,  singing  like  swans, 
and  dropping  spring  flowers  into  the  ripples,  that  they 
might  float  back  as  souvenirs  to  us  upon  our  island  shore. 
The  children  were  sleeping  softly  in  their  arms,  between 
the  glories  of  the  heaven  and  of  the  earth,  lulled  by  the 
aims,  the  songs,  and  the  ripples. 

When  it  was  12  o'clock,  and  the  first  morning  of  spring 
was  come,  Victor  summoned  us  all  to  the  hill,  we  knew 
not  wherefore.  All  around  and  beneath  us  was  the  music 
of  the  rush  of  the  Rhine,  and  through  it,  came  gliding  clear 
the  bright  spring-melody  of  the  nightingale  ;  the  stars  of 
the  twelffh  hour  sank,  drop  by  drop,  into  the  darkened 
grave  of  the  sun,  and  went  paling  out  among  the  grey 
ashes  of  the  western  clouds.    Suddenly  a  straight,  beautiful 

*  '  Pomp.  Mel.  de  S.  O."  i.  18.  f  Switzerland  ami  Holland. 


428  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTEB.        [BOOK  III, 

flame  shot  up  in  the  west,  and  music  came  palpitating 
through  the  darkness. 

"  Do  you  not  think  of  your  France,"  said  Victor,  "  the 
first  hour  of  day  is  breaking  for  her  this  21st  of  March — 
the  day  when  the  six  thousand  primary  assemblies  form 
themselves,  like  stars,  into  one  constellation,  that  one  law- 
may  brrst  into  being  from  out  a  million  hearts." 

As  I  looked  up  to  the  sky,  the  Milky  Way  struck  me 
as  being  the  beam  of  the  balance  of  hidden  destiny,  in 
whose  weighing-pans  (which  are  worlds)  the  broken, 
shattered,  bleeding  nations  are  weighed  out  for  eternity. 
These  destiny  scales  waver  up  and  down  as  yet,  because 
it  was  only  a  century  or  two  ago  that  the  weights  were 
put  into  them. 

\\'e  drew  closer  together,  and  (inspired  by  the  night 
and  the  music)  said,  "  Thou,  poor  country  !  may  thy  sun 
and  thy  day  rise  higher  ere  long,  and  cast  away  the  blood- 
shirt  of  its  morning  red.  May  the  higher  genius  wipe 
away  the  blood  from  thy  hands,  and  the  tears  from  thine 
eyes!  Oh!  may  that  genius  build,  support,  and  guard 
for  ever  the  Grand  Freedom  Temple  which  is  vaulted  over 
thee  like  a  second  heaven  :  but  also  comfort  every  mother 
and  every  father,  every  child  and  every  wife — and  dry  all 
eyes  which  weep  for  the  beloved,  crushed  hearts  which 
have  bled  and  fallen,  and  now  lie  under  that  temple  as 
basement  stones." 

What  I  am  going  to  say  now  can  only  be  said  to  my 
brother,  for  nobody  else  wouid  pardon  it.  Victor  and  I 
got  into  a  boat,  which  was  made  fast  with  a  rope  to  the 
b.mk,  and  which  was  drifting  about  with  the  current. 
We  worked  ourselves  back  to  the  bank,  and  then  let  the 
boat  drift,  northwards  again  upon  the  ripples.  In  our 
souls  (as  in  the  world  without,  us)  sadness  and  exaltation 
were  strangely  blent:  the  music  on  the  bank  came  and 
went — tones  and  stars  rose  and  fell.  The  vault  of  heaven 
showed  in  the  Rhine  like  some  shattered  bell,  and  up 
above  us  the  dome  of  the  temple  wherein  dwelleth  Eternity 
lay  in  calm  and  motionless  rest,  with  all  its  unchanging 
suns.  From  the  eastward  the  spring  breathed  upon  us, 
and  the  tree  skeletons  in  the  churchyard  of  the  winter 
felt  the   presage  of  a  near  resurrection.      Of  a   sudden 


CHAP.  XIV.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORX  PIECES.      429 

Victor  said — "It  feels  to  me  as  though  the  river  here 
were  the  stream  of  Time — our  fluctuating  life  is  cariied 
along  upon  the  waves  of  both  towards  the  midnight." 
Here  my  brother  called  to  me  from  the  island,  "  Bro'hfr, 
come  into  harbour  and  sleep ;  it  is  between  one  and  two 
o'clock.' 

This  fraternal  voice,  coming  to  me  athwart  the  music 
of  the  wavelets,  suddenly  brought  a  new  world — perhaps 
the  under-world — into  my  open  soul.  For  a  lightning 
flash  of  memory  gleamed  in  a  moment  over  all  my  dim 
being,  reminding  me  that  it  was  on  this  very  night  two- 
and-thirty  years  ago  that  I  had  made  my  entry  upon  this 
overclouded  earth,  shrouded  with  daily  nights — and  that 
this  hour,  between  one  and  two  o'clock,  in  which  my 
brother  was  calling  me  into  haven  and  to  sleep,  was  the 
hour  of  my  birth  (which  so  often  deprives  man  of  both). 

There  come  to  us  moments  of  twilight  in  which  it 
seems  as  though  day  and  night  were  in  the  act  of  dividing 
— as  if  we  were  in  the  very  process  of  being  created  or 
annihilated;  the  stage  of  life  and  the  spectators  fly  back 
out  of  view,  our  part  is  played  out,  we  stand  far  off, 
in  darkness  and  alone,  but  we  have  still  got  on  our  theatre 
dress,  and  we  look  at  ourselves  in  it,  and  ask,  "  What  is 
it  that  thou  art,  now,  my  me  !  "  When  we  thus  ask  our- 
selves this,  there  is,  beyond  ourselves,  nothing  of  great  or 
of  firm — everything  has  turned  to  an  endless  cloud  of 
night  (with  rare  and  feeble  gleams  within  it),  which 
keeps  falling  lower  and  lower,  and  heavier  with  drops. 
Only  high  up  above  the  cloud  shines  a  resplendence — 
and  that  is  God;  and  far  beneath  it  a  minute  speck  of 
light — and  that  is  a  human  "  Me"! 

The  heart  is  made  of  heavy  earth,  and  therefore  it 
cannot  long  endure  such  moments.  I  passed  on  to  those 
sweeter  seasons  in  which  the  full,  tear-intoxicated  hoart 
neither  can,  nor  will,  do  aught  but  simply  weep.  1 
had  not  the  courage  to  drag  my  dear  Victor  Jown  from 
the  sublime  region  in  which  he  was  to  my  trifling  petti- 
nesses— but  I  asked  him  to  remain  beside  me  for  a  little 
time  in  this  stillness  which  lay  so  silently  upon  the  dark 
stream  as  it  went  flowing  toward  midnight  and  the  south, 
Then  I  leant  and  pressed  myself  fondly  to  his  side — and 


430  JEAN  PAUL  FIUEDRICH  RICHTEK.      [BCOK  III. 

my  little  tears  fell  unseen  into  the  great  river — as  though 
it  had  been  ihe  great  stream  of  Time  itself,  into  which 
all  eyes  drop  their  tears,  and  so  many  thousand  hearts 
their  blood-drops — for  all  which  it  neither  swells  nor 
flows  the  faster. 

1  thought  as  I  gazed  at  the  Rhine,  "  And  thus,  too,  the 
dancing,  billowy  current  of  Life  goes  flowing  on  its  course 
from  out  its  source — hidden  like  the  Nile's.  How  little, 
as  yet,  have  I  done,  or  enjoyed !  Our  deserts,  and  o»r 
enjoyments,  what  petty  things  they  are  !  Our  metamorphoses 
are  greater ;  our  heads  and  our  hearts  go  into  the  ground 
irrecognisahle— altered  a  thousandfold — like  the  head  of 
the  man  with  the  iron  mask.*  Ay !  and  did  we  but 
change!  but  we  change  so  little  in  the  earth,  or  even  in 
ourselves.  Every  moment  is  to  us  the  goal  of  all  that 
have  come  before  it.  V\  e  take  the  seed  of  life  for  the 
harvest  of  it — the  honey-dew  on  the  ears  for  the  sweet 
fruit — and  we  chew  the  flowers,  like  cattle !  Ah !  thou 
great  God  !  what  a  night  lieth  around  our  sleep  !  we  fall 
and  rise  with  closed  eyelids,  and  fly  about  blind,  and  in 
a  deep  slumber."  f 

My  hand  was  hanging  into  the  water,  and  the  cool 
ripples  buoyed  it  up  and  down.  I  thought,  "  How  straight 
and  immovable  the  little  light  within  us  burns,  amid  the 
blasts  of  Nature's  storm!  Everything  around  me  con- 
tends and  clashes  together  with  gigantic  might.  The 
stream  seizes  upon  the  islands  and  the  cliffs — the  night- 
wind  comes  upon  the  river,  and  stalks  across  it,  thrusting 
ite  wavelets  back,  and  wages  its  strife  with  the  forests — 
even  up  there  in  the  tranquil  blue,  worlds  are  working 
against  worlds — the  eternal,  endless  mights  flowing  and 
rushing,  like  rivers,  one  against  another,  they  come 
together  in  whirl  and  roar — and  on  the  face  of  that  eternal 
whirl  the  little  worlds  float  eddying  round  the  sun-vortex  ; 
nay,  those  shimmering  constellations  themselves  rising 
zenithwards  with  that  grand  and  gentle  peace  and  calm — 

*  Which  was  so  altered  in  appearance  after  hie  death  by  innume- 
rable wounds,  that  they  masked  it  as  effectually  as  the  iron  one  hatf 
done. 

t  There  is  a  kind  of  sea-bird  which  sleeps  on  the  wing,  or  floats  up 
and  down ;  and  the  motion  of  the  sea  is  often  what  awakes  it. 


CIIaP.  xiv.J    flower,  fruit,  and  thorn  pieces.     431 

what  are  they  but  mountain  ranges  of  raging  sun-vol- 
canoes, stretching  into  infinity  be^onf.  the  reach  of  mind 
to  follow.  And  yet  the  human  spirit  lies  at  rest  amid 
this  storm,  peaceful  as  a  quiet  moon  above  a  windy  night. 
In  me,  at  this  moment,  all  is  gentle  peace.  I  see  my  own 
little  life-brook  running  by  me,  falling,  with  all  the  rest, 
into  the  river  of  Time.  The  clear-eyed  soul  looks  through 
the  racing  blood-rivers  which  are  flowing  round  it,  and 
through  the  storms  which  darken  and  obscure  it,  and 
sees,  beyond  them  all,  quiet  meadows,  gentle,  peaceful 
waters,  moon-shimmer,  and  a  lovely,  beautiful,  tranquil, 
placid,  peaceful  angel  slowly  wandering  there."  Yes, 
yes ;  within  my  soul  there  was  a  quiet  Good  Friday — 
wind-still,  rain-free,  and  mild — neither  cold  nor  over- 
warm — though  shrouded  in  a  tender  cloud. 

But  a  clear  consciousness  of  rest  is  speedily  the  undoing 
thereof.  I  saw,  floating  near  the  island,  three  hyacinths 
which  Clotilda  had  dropped  into  the  wavelets  as  she  went 
away.  "  Now,  in  this,  thy  birth-hour,"  I  said  to  myself, 
"  the  ocean  of  eternity  is  washing  thousands  of  little  hearts 
on  to  the  stony  shore  of  this  world;  how  will  it  be  with 
them  one  day  when  their  birthday  feast  comes  round? 
And  what  are  your  countless  brothers  who,  with  you,  came 
thirty-two  years  ago  into  this  vapour-ball,  thinking  now? 
Perhaps  some  terrible  sorrow  makes  them  think  with  bitter- 
ness of  their  first  hour.  Perhaps  they  sleep  now — as  I  have 
slept — and  must  again — only  deeper,  deeper."  And  then 
all  my  younger  and  older  friends,  now  sleeping  that  deeper 
sleep,  fell  heavy  upon  my  broken  breast. 

"  I  know,  I  think,"  my  Victor  said,  "  what  you  are 
reflecting  on  so  silently,  and  regretting  so  mutely."  I 
answered  "  No,"  and  then  I  told  him  all. 

Then  we  went  quickly  back,  and  I  put  my  arms  about 
my  other  brother,  and  my  heart  went  out  in  longing 
towards  thee.  At  length  we  took  our  departure  from  this 
building-place  of  a  more  peaceful  system  of  doctrine  for 
our  hearts — this  quiet  island  ;  and  the  lofty  hill — grand 
pedestal  of  the  vases  of  our  joy-flowers,  chancel  of  the 
great  temple,  light-house  tower  in  our  haven  of  rest — 
seemed  to  gaze  long  after  us,  the  hanging  garden  of  our 
souls  lying  upon  it  in  starry  light. 


432  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  KICHTER.       [BOOK  III. 

And  as  we  came  to  the  shore,  Hesperas,  as  star  of  the 
morning  (spark  which  springs  and  shines  so  near  the 
sun),  rose  up  above  the  morning  mists,  and  earlier  than 
even  the  Aurora  of  morning,  proclaimed  his  sire's  approach. 
And  as  we  thought  that  he  shines,  too,  as  the  star  of  evening 
upon  our  nights  here  below,  and  yet  adorns  the  east,  and 
the  after-midnight  hours  with  the  first  of  the  glittering 
pearls  of  dew,  each  said  to  his  gladsome  heart,  "  And  so 
shall  all  the  evening  stars  of  this  our  life  shine  upon  us  as 
stars  of  morning  at  a  future  day." 

Think  thou,  too,  of  morning,  my  brother,  when  thou  art 
looking  upon  the  even  ;  and  when  a  sun  is  setting  for 
thee,  turn  thee  about  and  thou  may  est  see  a  moon  rising 
in  the  east.  The  moon  gives  warrant  that  the  sun  is 
shining  still — as  Hope  says,  there  still  is  happiness.  But 
come  now  soon  to  thy  Victor — and  to 

Thy  Brother, 

J.  P. 


rare  of  book  in. 


BOOK  IV. 


CHAPTEE  XV. 

B03A  VON  MEYERN — TONE-ECHOES  AND  AFTER  BREEZES  FROM 
THE  LOVELIEST  OF  ALL  NIGHTS — LETTERS  OF  NATHALIE  AND 
FIRMIAN — TABLE-TALK  BY  LEiBGKBER. 

If  on  some  dewy,  warm  and  starry  night  of  spring  the 
miners  in  some  salt  mine  were  to  have  their  great  pent- 
house-roof of  earth  lifted  away  from  over  their  heads,  and 
find  themselves  thus,  of  a  sudden,  brought  out  from  their 
confined,  candle-lit  cellar  into  the  wide,  dim,  sleeping-hall 
of  nature — out  of  their  subterranean  stillness  in  among  the 
breezes,  the  perfumes,  the  whisperings  of  the  spring — these 
miners  would  be  exactly  in  Firmian's  case,  whose  here- 
tofore prisoned,  silent,  and  serene  soul  the  night  just  past 
had  driven  out  of  its  prison  with  might,  darkening  it  with 
new  sorrows  and  joys,  and  a  whole  new  world.  Heinrich 
maintained  a  most  speaking  silence  concerning  the  night 
in  question,  and,  on  the  other  hand,  Firmian  betrayed  a 
mute  hunting  after  speech.  Strive  as  he  might  to  fold 
those  wings  of  his  (which  had  been  stretched  all  moist  from 
under  their  wing-covers  on  that  foregoing  night  for  a 
first  time),  they  would  not  fold  quite  short  enough  to  go 
back  under  them  again.  Matters  got  to  feel  very  oppres- 
sive and  sultry  for  Leibgeber  after  a  time.  On  that 
previous  night  they  had  come  back  in  perfect  silence  to 
Bayreuth  and  to  bed,  and  he  wearied  at  the  thought  of  all 
the  demi -shades  and  demi-tints  which  would  have  to  be 
got  ready  on  the  palette  before  so  much  as  four  bold  touches 
could  be  given  to  the  picture  of  the  night. 

Perhaps  there  is  nothing  more  regrettable  than  that  we 
do  not  all  have  the  hooping-cough  at  one  and  the  same 
time — or  are  not  all  suffering  the  sorrows  of  Werther — or 
are  not  all  twenty-one.  or  sixty-one — or  have  not  all  hypo 

n.  2f 


434  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  IV. 

ehondria — or  are  not  all  spending  our  honeymoons — or 
indulging  in  games  of  banter.  How  charming  it  would 
be  (were  we  all  choristers  singing  in  the  same  coughing- 
tutti)  to  find  everybody  else  in  just  the  same  oondition  as 
ourselves— and  put  up  with  them  therefore,  and  fin-give 
in  them  that  in  which  they  were  just  like  us!  But  as 
things  really  are — now  when  the  one  coughs  to-day,  and 
the  other  not  till  to-morrow  (the  simultaneous  company- 
coughing  in  church  always  excepted);  when  one  has  to 
be  taking  dancing-lessons  while  another  is  saying  his 
prayers  in  the  conventicle;  when  one  father's  daughter 
is  being  held  up  at  the  font  while  the  other's  son  is  being 
lowered  into  his  little  grave ; — now,  when  destiny  is  always 
striking  on  the  hearts  about  us  chords  quite  unrelated  to 
the  key  of  our  own,  or,  at  any  rate,  superfluous  sixths, 
major  sevenths,  minor  seconds; — now,  as  things  are,  in 
this  universal  lack  of  unison  and  harmony,  what  can  be 
expected  but  a  screeching  cat-charivari — and,  if  we  can't 
have  a  little  melody,  we  must  be  content  with  a  little 
arpeggio-ing  up  and  down. 

By  way  of  a  fever  for  conversation,  or  pump-handle 
wherewith  to  force  a  drop  or  two  up  from  the  heart,  Leib- 
geber  caught  hold  of  Firmian's  hand,  and  embraced  it 
softly  and  warmly  with  all  his  fingers.  He  put  one  or 
two  unimportant  questions  concerning  what  walks  and 
expeditions  they  should  think  of  for  the  day.  But  he  had 
not  foreseen  that  this  hand-clasp  would  be  the  means  of 
landing  him  in  deeper  difficulties  of  embarrassment, — for 
he  found  that  it  was  now  incumbent  on  him  to  keep  a 
control  on  his  hand  as  well  as  on  his  tongue — and  he 
couldn't  let  Firmian's  hand  drop  all  in  a  moment,  like  a 
hot  potato,  but  found  it  necessary  to  let  it  out  of  his  clasp 
by  a  gradual  diminuendo.  This  species  of  careful  watch 
over  his  feelings  was  a  process  which  made  Leibgeber 
blush  with  shame,  and  drove  him  nearly  frantic ;  and, 
indeed,  he  would  have  thrown  even  this  description  of 
mine  of  it  into  the  fire.  I  am  given  to  understand  that  he 
never  could  bring  himself  to  utter  the  word  "  heart"  even 
to  women — who  always  have  their  heart  (namely  the  word) 
on  their  tongues,  like  a  kind  of  globus  hystericus.  He  said, 
•'It  is  the  bullet-screw  of  their  real  hearts, — the  button 


CHAP.  XV.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        435 

on  their  fanfoil ;  and,  to  me,  it  is  a  poison  bolus,  a  pitch- 
ball  for  the  Bel  of  Babel." 

So  his  hand  escaped,  on  a  sudden,  from  its  close  arrest ; 
he  seized  his  hat  and  stick,  and  cried :  "  I  see  you  are  just 
as  great  a  goose  as  I  am  myself:  imtanter,  imtantius, 
imtantimme,  in  three  words,  did  you  talk  to  her  about  the 
Widows'  Fund  ?  Yes  or  no — not  another  syllable.  I  go 
Out  at  that  door  this  instant !"  Siebenkaes  brought  out  all 
his  items  of  news  on  this  subject  as  rapidly  as  possible,  so 
as  to  be  quit  of  each  and  all  of  them  for  ever.  "  She  is 
certain  to  agree  to  it.  I  said  nothing  to  her  about  it. 
I  can  not.  But  you  can  quite  easily.  And  you  must.  I 
am  going  no  more  to  Fantasie.  And  we  shall  have  a  grand 
time  of  it  this  afternoon,  Heinrich !  The  music  of  our 
lives  shall  be  of  a  sounding  sort.  The  pedals  of  the  joy- 
notes  are  all  ready  on  our  harps  to  be  pressed  down  ;  and 
we'll  press  them !"  Heinrich,  partly  recovering  his  equa- 
nimity, said,  as  he  went  out,  "  The  Cremona  strings  of 
the  human  instrument  are  made  of  living  membrane,  the 
breast  is  only  the  sounding  board — and  the  head  is  the 
damper." 

Solitude  lay  around  our  friend  like  some  beautiful 
country — all  the  echoes,  diiven  away  from  him,  and 
wandering,  lost  and  astray,  could  find  their  way  back  to 
him  now  athwart  it.  And  on  the  crape-veil,  woven  of  the 
twelve  past  hours,  which  had  laid  itself  over  his  life's 
loveliest  historical  picture,  he  could  tremblingly  trace  that 
picture's  lines  with  crayon-pencil,  and  trace,  and  trace 
them  over  again,  a  thousand  and  a  thousand  times  !  But 
a  visit  to  the  beautiful  Fantasie — blooming  richer  and 
fairer  as  the  hours  went  by — this  he  must  deny  himself; 
for  he  must  not  be  a  living  hedge,  to  fence  and  bar  Nathalie 
from  that  Valley  of  Blossom.  He  must  pay  for  bliss  with 
privation.  The  charms  of  the  town  and  neighbourhood 
had  still  their  bright,  many-tinted  skins — but  their  sweet 
kernels  were  gone.  Everything  was  to  him  as  some  dessert 
dish  which  had,  in  the  older  time,  had  coloured  sugar 
sprinkled  over  it,  which  was  now,  somehow,  turned  to 
coloured  sand.  All  his  hopes — all  the  flowers  and  fruit  oi 
his  life  (as  is  the  case  with  our  higher  ones) — now  grew 
and  matured  beneath  the  ground,  like  those  of  the  sub- 

2f2 


4;56  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  IV. 

terranean  vetch;  *  I  mean,  in  the  sham  grave  into  which 
he  was  going.  How  little  he  had — and  yet,  how  much  ! 
His  feet  were  upon  prickly  rose  hranches,  and  all  round 
the  Elysian  fields  of  his  future  he  saw  thorny  hushes, 
bristly  undergrowth,  and  a  wall  built,  beginning  at  his 
grave.  His  Leipzig  rose  valley  was  dwindled  into  the 
one  green  rosebud-twig,  which  had  been  transplanted, 
unblown,  from  Nathalie's  heart  to  his.  And  yet,  how 
much  he  had.  A  forget-me-not,  from  Nathalie,  for  all  his 
life  to  come  (the  silken  ones  she  gave  him  were  but  the 
hulls  of  that  whose  blossom  was  immortal  and  eternal)  ;  a 
springtime  in  his  soul  at  last,  at  last  after  all  these  many 
springs — to  be  so  beloved,  for  the  first  time  by  a  woman  as 
an  hundred  dreams  and  poets  had  pictured  to  him  that  men 
might  be  beloved.  To  puss,  in  an  instant,  at  a  single  step, 
from  his  dingy  lumber  room  of  old  law  papers  and  books 
into  the  fresh,  green,  flowery,  golden  age  of  love, — for  the 
first  time,  not  only  to  gain  a  rare  and  priceless  love  like 
this,  but  to  take  away  with  him  such  a  parting  kiss,  like  a 
sun  into  all  his  coming  life,  to  light  and  warm  it  through 
and  through  for  eve)- !  This  was  bliss  for  one  who  had  had 
his  cross  to  bear  in  former  days.  But,  more  than  this,  he 
was  free  to  let  himself  be  borne  along  upon  the  beauteous 
waves  of  this  river  of  Eden  without  care  or  constraint, 
inasmuch  as  Nathalie  never  could  be  his,  nor  should  he 
ever  see  her  more.  In  Lenette  he  had  loved  no  Nathalie 
as  in  the  latter  no  Lenette.  His  wedded  love  was  a  prosaic 
summer  day  of  sultry  hay-making,  but  this  was  a  poetic 
spring  night  of  starlight  and  flowers,  and  his  new  world 
was  like  the  name  of  the  spot  where  it.  was  created — 
Fantaisie.  He  did  not  deceive  himself  as  to  the  fact  that, 
as  he  was  going  to  die  before  Nathalie,  he  was  loving,  in 
her,  merely  a  departed  spirit,  and  that  as  a  departed  spirit 
— nay,  while  yet  in  this  life,  of  a  truth,  for  him,  a  pure  and 
glorified  risen  soul;  and  he  freely  put  the  question  to 
himself  whether  there  were  any  reason  why  he  should  not 
love  this  Nathalie  (thus  departed  into  the  past,  for  him) 
as  truly  and  fondly  as  any  other,  departed  long  since  into 
a  yet  remoter  past — the  Heloise  of  an  Abelard  or  St.  Preux, 

*  This  vetch  has  some  of  its  flowers  and  fruit  above  ground,  but  most 
of  them  under  it;  though  the  latter  are  white. — Linn-eus. 


CHAP.  XV.J      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THOrtN  IMECES.      437 

or  a  poet's  Laura,  or  a  Werther's  Lotte  for  whom  his  dying 
was  not  even  to  be  as  real  as  Werther's. 

With  all  his  efforts,  he  could  not  manage  to  say  more  to 
Leibgeber  than,  "  She  must  have  been  very,  very  fond  of 
you,  this  rare,  exceptional  soul — for  it  is  only  to  my  re- 
semblance to  you  that  I  can  ascribe  her  heaventy  kindness 
to  me — who  am  so  little  like  other  men — and  have  never 
been  cared  fur  by  women."  Leibgeber — and  he  himself 
as  soon  as  he  said  it — laughed  at  this  almost  idiotic  state- 
ment ;  but  what  is  any  and  every  lover,  during  his  May 
month,  but  a  dear,  genuine,  simple  sbeep? 

Leibgeber  soon  came  back  to  the  hotel  with  the  news 
that  he  had  seen  the  English  lady  on  ber  way  to  Fantaisie. 
Firmian  was  very  glad  of  it.  She  rendered  his  resolve 
to  shut  himself  out  of  the  entire  circle  of  delight  easier  to 
execute.  For  she  was  the  Count  von  Vaduz's  daughter, 
and  consequently  must  not  see  him  (Siebenkses)  at  present, 
having  to  believe  him  hereafter  to  be  Leibgeber.  Hein- 
rich  botanised,  however,  the  whole  day  on  the  flowery 
slope  of  Fantaisie,  with  the  view  of  discovering  and  ob- 
serving the  flower  goddess,  rather  than  the  flowers,  with  his 
botanical  glasses  (to  wit,  his  eyes).  But  no  goddess  ap- 
peared. Alas!  our  poor  wounded  Nathalie  had  so  many 
reasons  for  keeping  aloof  from  the  ruins  of  her  loveliest 
hours — for  fleeing  the  scene  of  conflagration  (now  over- 
grown with  flowers)  where  she  might  encounter  him  whom 
she  meant  to  meet  no  more. 

A  few  days  after  this,  the  Venner  Kosa  von  Meyern 
honoured  the  company  at  the  table  d'hote  in  the  '  Sun' 
with  his  ....  If  the  author's  calculations  as  to  dates  do 
not  wholly  mislead  him,  he  was  at  dinner  there  on  that 
occasion  himself.  But  I  have  only  an  indistinct  recollec- 
tion of  the  two  advocates,  and  none  at  all  of  the  Venner — 
because  coxcombs  of  his  description  are  an  uninteresting 
species  of  animals,  and  there  are  whole  game-preserves 
and  zoological  gardens  full  of  them  to  be  met  with  at  all 
times.  I  have  more  than  once  met  with  characters,  in  the 
body,  whom  I  have  subsequently  taken  careful  wax  casts 
of  from  the  crowns  of  their  heads  to  the  soles  of  their  boots, 
and  then  exhibited  them  about  the  country  in  my  col- 
lection of  wax-work  figures.     But  I  wish  I  always  knew 


438  JEAN  PAUL  TKIEDRICH  EICHTER.        [BOOK  IV. 

beforehand  exactly  which  of  the  people  whom  I  happen  to 
be  dining  or  travelling  with  chances  to  be  the  one  who  is 
going  to  have  his  portrait  painted  in  this  way.  I  should 
note  down,  and  store  up  a  thousand  trifling,  minute  pecu- 
liarities, and  lay  them  down  in  my  epistolary  cellais.  As 
it  is,  I  hometimes  find  myself  obliged  (and  I  confess  it 
freely)  to  set  to  work  and  coolly  lie  a  number  of  matters  of 
minor  importance — for  instance,  that  a  thing  takes  place 
about  six  o'clock,  or  abont  seven — if  I  happen  to  he  wholly 
without  documentary  evidence  on  the  point.  Wherefore 
it.  is  a  moral  certainty  that  if  three  other  authors  had  sat 
down,  on  the  same  morning  with  me,  to  give  the  world  an 
account  of  Siebenkaes's  wedded  life  derived  from  the  same 
historical  sources  as  mine,  that  we  four,  however  great 
our  devotion  to  truth,  would  have  produced  family  histories 
containing  much  the  same  amount,  and  description  of  in- 
accuracy as  we  find  in  those  which  the  four  Evangelists 
have  given  us;  so  that  our  tetrachord  would  have  stood 
in  need  of  a  good  tuning  with  a  tuning-pipe  in  the  shape 
of  a  "  Harmony  "  of  our  Gospels. 

Meyern  dined  at  the  •  Sun,'  as  we  have  said.  He  told 
Siebenkaas  with  a  triumph,  which  was  not  without  a  dash 
of  menace,  that  he  was  going  back  to  Kuhschnappel  next 
day.  He  was  vainer  than  ever — probably  he  had  offered 
his  hand  to  some  fifty  of  the  fair  sex  of  Bayreuth,  as  though 
he  had  been  the  giant  Briareus,  with  fifty  wedding-rings 
on  his  hundred  hands.  He  was  as  greedy  of  the  fair  sex 
as  cats  are  of  marum  verum ;  which  is  why  both  are  sur- 
rounded with  metallic  guards  by  their  possessors.  When  the 
clergy  rivet  poachers  of  this  description,  alive,  to  one  par- 
ticular animal  of  their  chase  by  means  of  a  strong  wedding- 
ring,  and  the  animal  of  the  chase  in  question  drags  them 
through  every  thicket  till  they  are  scratched  and  bled  to 
death,  philanthropic  weekly -papers  would  say  that  it  is  too 
severe  a  punishment ;  and  it  is  so,  no  doubt,  for  the  poor 
animal  of  the  chase. 

Or  the  following  day  Kosa  really  did  send  to  ask  whether 
Siebenkses  had  any  message  to  send  to  his  wife,  as  he  was 
going  back  to  see  her. 

Nathalie  was  invisible  still.  All  that  Firmian  saw  of 
her  was  a  letter  for  her  which  he  saw  shaken  out  of  the 


CHAP.  XV. J        FLOWER,  FRUIT.  AND  THOItN  PIECES.      439 

post-bag  when  he  went  (as  he  did  every  day)  to  see  if 
there  was  one  from  his  wife.  Lenette  did  not  require  more 
hours  to  write  a  letter  than  Isoc  rates  did  years  for  a  pane- 
gyric on  the  Athenians — no  more,  but  just  the  same  number, 
namely  about  ten.  Judging  by  the  handwriting  and  the 
seal,  the  letter  for  Nathalie  was  from  the  (step)  father  of 
his  country,  Herr  von  Blaise.  "  Thou  darling  girl," 
thought  Firmian,  "  with  what  deliberation  he  will  pass 
the  burning  focus  of  his  burning-glass  (formed  of  the  ice 
of  his  heart)  over  every  wound  of  thy  soul !  How  many 
secret,  tears  wilt  thou  weep — and  no  one  to  count  them ; 
and  thou  hast  no  hand  now  to  dry  them  and  hide  them, 
except  thine  own !" 

One  exquisite,  blue  afternoon  he  went  alone  to  the  only 
pleasure  garden  which  was  not  barred  against  him — the 
Hermitage.  Memories  met  him  every  where — all  painfully 
sweet  memories.  At  every  spot  he  had  lost,  or  renounced, 
something  of  life  or  heart — had  become  a  hermit,  in  ac- 
cordance with  the  place's  name.  Could  he  forget  the  great, 
dim  glade  where,  beside  his  kneeling  friend,  and  before 
the  setting  sun,  he  had  sworn  to  die,  and  part  from  his 
wife  and  from  all  the  world  he  knew  ? 

He  left  the  joy-place,  turned  his  face  to  the  setting  sun 
(which  almost  hid,  in  its  brightness,  the  prospect  from  his 
sight),  and  strolled  in  circles  round  the  town.  With  a 
deeply  moved  heart  he  gazed  after  the  gently  radiant 
luminary  as  it  sank,  amid  the  glowing  cloud-embers,  towards 
that  distant  spot  where  bis  widowed  Lenette  would  be 
standing  in  her  silent  room,  with  her  face  lighted  up  by 
the  evening  red.  "  Ah !  dear,  good  Lenette,"  the  voice 
within  him  cried,  "why  can  I  not  press  thee  to  this  full, 
tender  heart,  here  in  this  paradise,  in  bliss  ?  I  should  love 
thee  better  here,  and  forgive  thee  easier." 

Yes,  of  a  truth,  it  is  thou,  kind  Nature — never  ending 
Love,  who  changest,  in  us,  distance  of  body  into  nearness 
of  soul.  It  is  thou  who,  when  we  are  utterly  happy  in 
some  distant  spot,  bringest  to  us  from  afar,  in  fancy,  the 
beloved  forms  of  those  whom  we  have  had  to  leave — they 
come  like  beautiful  music,  or  like  happy  years  — and  we 
stretch  out  our  arms  to  the  clouds  that  go  soaring  over  the 
hills  beyond  which  lie  the  dwellings  of  those  whom  we 


440  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  KICIITER.       [BOOK  IT. 

love  the  best.  Our  severed  hearts  open  to  those  distant 
ones  as  the  flowers  which  open  to  the  sun  unfold  their 
petals  even  on  days  when  there  are  clouds  between  them. 

The  splendour  died  away,  leaving  the  blood-like  track 
of  the  sunken  sun  in  the  blue ;  the  earth  with  her  gardens 
seemed  to  stand  out  brighter  and  clearer.  Then  suddenly 
Firmian  came  on  the  green  Tempe  Vale  of  Fantaisie,  lying 
before  him  all  loveliness  of  sight  and  of  sound,  tinted  with 
the  red  of  the  evening  clouds  and  with  the  white  of 
blossoming  boughs.  But  over  it  stood  an  angel  with  a 
gleaming  cloud  streak  for  sword,  saying,  "  Here  enter 
thou  not !  Knowest  thou  not  the  Eden  from  whence  thou 
hast  gone  out  ?" 

Firmian  tinned  him  about,  and  there,  in  the  gloaming 
of  spring,  leaned  upon  the  wall  of  the  first  of  the  Bay- 
reuth  houses  he  reached  on  his  homeward  way ;  so  that 
the  wounds  of  his  eyes  might  have  a  chance  to  grow 
whole — that  he  might  not  meet  his  friend  bearing  scars 
which  would  have  to  be  "  explained."  Leibgeber  was  not 
in,  however,  but  there  was  something  there  of  a  very 
unexpected  kind — a  letter  from  Nathalie  to  him. 

Ye  who  have  keenly  felt — or  deeply  regretted — that 
there  is  a  Moses-veil,  an  altar-railing,  a  prison-grating, 
made  both  of  body  and  earth — stretched  out  for  ever  and 
aye,  between  one  soul  and  another — ye  cannot  well  blame 
this  poor,  deop-touched,  solitary  firend,  that  he  took  up 
the  cold  paper  unseen,  and  pressed  it  to  his  burning  lips, 
and  to  his  trembling  heart.  For  of  a  truth,  every  body — 
even  the  human  body,  is,  from  the  soul's  point  of  view, 
merely  the  sacred  reliquiae  of  an  invisible  spirit ;  and  not 
only  the  letter,  which  you  kiss,  but  the  hand  which  wrote 
it,  too,  is,  like  the  lips,  whose  kiss  you  think,  assures  you — 
(but  it  is  a  deceptive  assurance)— -of  the  closeness  of  your 
union,  your  flowing  or  fusing  into  one,  only  the  sacred  out- 
ward and  visible  sign  of  a  something  higher  and  dearer ; 
and  these  deceptions  diifer  only  in  their  sweetness. 

Leibgeber  came  in,  opened  the  letter,  and  read  it  aloud : 

"  To-morrow  morning  at  five  o'clock,  I  shall  be  turning 
my  back  upon  your  beautiful  town.  I  am  going  to  Schrap- 
lau.  But  I  cannot  leave  this  lovely  valley,  oh  dear  friend, 
without  once  again  giving  you  the  ass\Trance  of  my  un- 


CHAP.  XV.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      441 

changing  friendship,  and  conveying  to  you  my  thanks 
aud  wishes  for  yours.  I  should  so  have  liked  to  say 
good-bye  to  you  in  a  more  living  manner ;  but  my  long 
leave-taking  from  my  English  friend  is  not  yet  over,  and 
I  have  now  her  wishes  to  combat  (as  I  had  my  men  before) 
before  I  can  bury  myself  in,  or  rather,  wing  my  flight  to 
my  village  solitude.  This  beautiful  spring  has  sorely 
wounded  me,  and  that  with  joys  as  well  as  with  sorrows. 
But  (if  I  may  go  so  far  afield  for  a  comparison),  my  heart, 
like  Cranmer's,  is  left  for  those  I  love,  unconsumed  amid 
the  ashes  of  my  funereal  pyre.  May  all  go  well !  well ! 
with  you— better  than  can  ever  be  the  case  with  me,  a 
woman.  Fate  cannot  take  much  from  you,  nay,  nor  give 
you  much  either.  There  are  smiling  eternal  rainbows 
playing  around  all  the  waterfalls  for  you ;  but  the  rain- 
clouds  of  a  woman's  heart  must  drop  for  many  a  long  day 
ere  they  are  brightened  by  the  sad,  yet  cheering  tints  of 
the  Iris  which  memory  ca«ts  upon  them  at  length.  Your 
friend  is  with  you  still,  no  doubt.  Press  him  warmly  to 
your  heart,  and  tell  him,  all  that  yours  wishes,  and  gives 
him,  mine  wishes  him ;  and  never  will  he,  or  you,  whom 
he  loves,  be  forgotten  by  me.     Always 

"  Your        Nathalie." 

During  the  reading  of  this,  Firmian  stood  with  his  face 
pressed  to  the  window,  and  lifted  towards  the  evening 
sky.  Heinrich,  with  a  true  friend's  delicacy  of  perception, 
took  the  answer  out  of  his  lips,  and  said,  looking  to  him, 
"  Yes,  this  Nathalie  is  good  and  kind,  in  very  truth,  and 
a  thousand  times  better  than  thousands  of  other  people 
are ;  but  I  will  let  myself  be  driven  over  by  her  carriage, 
and  crushed  beneath  the  wheels  of  it,  if  I  don't  wait  for  her 
at  four  o'clock  in  the  morning,  get  into  the  carriage,  and  sit 
down  beside  her.  Ay,  verily  !  I  will  get  her  to  lend  me  both 
her  ears,  and  I  will  fill  them  full — or  my  own  are  longer 
than  any  elephant's,  though  he  does  use  his  for  fly-flappers." 

"  Yes,  do,  dear  Henry,"  said  Firmian,  in  the  most  cheer- 
ful tones  he  could  force  from  his  oppressed  throat.  "  I 
shall  give  you  thre6  lines  to  take  in  your  hand,  just  that 
you  may  have  something  to  give  her,  since  I  am  never  to 
tee  her  again." 


442  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  EICHTEE.        [BOOK  IV. 

There  is  a  certain  lyric  intoxication  of  heart,  during 
which  people  never  ought  to  write  letters,  because,  in  the 
course  of  fifty  years  or  so  they  may,  perhaps  fall  into 
the  hands  of  people  who  are  without  either  the  heart 
or  the  intoxication.  However,  Firmian  wrote,  and  did  not 
seal  ;  and  Leibgeber  did  not  read. 

"  I  bid  you  farewell,  too !  But  I  cannot  say  '  Don't  for- 
get me.'  Ah  !  forget  me !  But  leave  me  the  forget-me- 
not  which  you  gave  me — to  keep  for  evermore.  Though 
Heaven  is  past  and  over,  death  has  yet  to  come.  And 
mine  is  now  very  near,  and  it  is  for  this  reason  alcne  that 
I,  and  my  dear  Leibgeber  even  more  urgently,  have  a 
favour  to  beg  of  you  ;  but  such  a  strange  favour.  Nathalie, 
do  not  refuse.  Your  soul's  sphere  is  far,  far  above  that  of 
the  feminine  souls  which  are  shocked  and  frightened  at 
everything  out  of  the  commonplace  track.  You  can  dare, 
and  can  venture,  nor  need  you  fear  to  risk  that  great  heart 
of  yours  (and  happiness)  on  any  cast.  And  now,  as  I 
spoke  to  you  on  that  night,  for  the  last  time,  this  is  the 
last  time  I  shall  write  to  you. 

"  But  Eternity  remains  for  thee  and  me  ! 

"  F.  S." 

His  sleep  was  nothing  but  dreams  all  night,  that  he 
might  be  sure  to  awaken  Leibgeber  in  the  morning.  But 
as  early  as  three  o'clock,  the  latter,  in  his  capacity  of 
letter-carrier,  and  Maitre  des  Bequetes,  was  posted  under 
a  great  linden-tree,  whose  hanging  beds,  thronged  with  a 
sleeping  world  of  inhabitants,  overhung  the  alley  by  which 
Nathalie  was  to  come.  Firmian,  in  bed,  enacted  Henry's 
part  along  with  him,  in  fancy,  thinking  to  himself,  "  Now 
she  is  bidding  the  English  lady  good-bye  ;  now  she  is 
getting  into  the  cairiage;  now  she  is  passing  the  tree, 
and  he  is  taking  her  horses  by  the  bridle."  He  phan- 
tnsised  himself  into  dreams  which  stabbed  his  heart 
with  pictures  of  her  repeated  refusals  of  his  petition. 
What  a  quantity  of  dark  and  cloudy  weather  is  born  of 
one  single,  bright,  starry  night,  in  the  physical  world 
as  well  as  in  the  moral.  At  last  he  dreamed  that  she 
sti etched  her  hand  to  him,  from  her  carriage,  with  tears  in 
her  eyes,  and  the  green  rose-twig  on  her  breast,  and  said, 


CHAP.  XV.]       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      443 

in  low  sweet  tones,  "  I  must  my  no  !  Could  I  live  long, 
if  you  were  dead  ?  "  She  pressed  his  hand  so  warmly  that 
he  awoke.  The  pressure  was  there,  and  lasted,  and  before 
hiru  was  the  beaming  daylight,  and  his  beaming  friend, 
who  said,  "  She  has  agreed,  while  jou've  been  snoring  here." 
He  had  been  within  a  hair's  breadth  of  missing  her. 
She  had  not  taken  so  much  time  to  dress  and  depart  as 
others  do  to  undress  and  arrive.  A  rose-branch,  wet  with 
dew,  whose  leaves  pricked  sharper  than  its  thorns,  was 
on  her  heart,  and  the  long  parting  had  tinted  her  lids  with 
red.  She  was  delighted  to  see  him.  though  a  little 
frightened,  and  anxious  to  hear.  He  gave  her  Firmian's 
open  letter,  to  begin  with,  by  way  of  credential.  Her 
eager  eyes  shone  out  once  more  through  two  teir-drops, 
and  she  asked,  "What  am  I  to  do?"  "Nothing,"  said 
Leibgeber,  in  an  artful  manner,  half  jest,  half  earnest, 
"  except  allow  the  Prussian  Treasury  to  remind  you  of 
his  death  twice  a-year,  as  if  you  were  his  widow."  She 
answered,  "No!"  pronouncedly,  on  one  note,  behind 
which,  however,  there  was  only  a  comma,  not  a  full  stop. 
He  once  more  went  through  his  petitions,  and  his  reasons, 
adding,  "  Do  it,  at  least,  for  my  sake,  if  for  no  other 
reason.  I  can't  bear  to  see  him  baulked  of  a  wish,  or  dis- 
appointed in  a  hope.  He  is  a  bear  whom  that  bear- 
leader, the  State,  keeps  dancing  all  the  winter,  without  a 
wink  of  winter  sleep,  whereas  I  seldom  take  my  paw  out 
of  my  mouth,  but  suck  away  continually.  He  kept 
awake  all  last  night,  s  >  as  to  make  sure  of  calling  me  in 
time,  and  he  is  counting  the  moments  anxiously  at  home 
now."  She  read  the  letter  again,  syllable  by  syllable. 
He  did  not  ask  for  a  final  answer,  but  spun  out  a  talk  on 
other  subjects— the  morning,  her  journey,  the  village  of 
Schraplau.  The  morning  had  already  raised  her  pillar 
of  fire  beyond  Bayreuth,  the  town  kept  adding  pillars  of 
smoke;  in  a  few  minutes  he  must  out  of  the  carriage  and 
back.  "  And  so,  fare  you  well,"  he  said,  in  the  softest  of 
tones,  with  one  foot  on  the  carriage-step;  "may  your 
future  grow  brighter  and  brighter,  like  the  day  about,  us. 
And  now,  what  last  word  am  T  to  carry  to  my  good,  dear 
beloved  Firmian  ?  "  (I  shall  make  a  remark  in  a  minute 
ur  two.)     She  lowered  her  travelling-veil  like  the  drop 


444  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IV 

curtain  of  a  drama  which  is  done,  and  said  in  low  and 
6tifled  accents,  "If  I  must,  I  must;  so  let  this  be,  also, 
hut  you  are  giving  me  another  great  sorrow  to  take  with 
me  on  my  way."  Here  he  jumped  down,  and  the  carriage, 
V>earing  this  poor  soul — poor  now  in  so  many  ways — 
rolled  on  with  her  over  the  shattered  ruins  of  her  youthful 
life. 

If  he  had  got  a  "  No  "  instead  of  this  hard  wrung-out 
"  Yes,"  he  would  have  caught  her  again  on  the  oiher  side 
of  the  town,  and  been  her  fellow-traveller  for  another 
fragment  of  her  journey. 

1  said  above,  that  I  should  "make  a  remark;"  it  is 
this  :  that  the  friendship  op  love  which  a  woman  has  for  a 
man  is  fed  by  that  which  she  sees  existing  between  him 
and  his  friends,  and  grows  visibly  in  consequence— con- 
verting it,  polyp -fashion,  into  its  own  substance.  It  was 
for  this  reason  that  Leibgeber,  by  instinct,  had  given 
such  warm  expression  to  his.  Jn  the  case  of  us,  masculine 
lovers,  again,  this  sort  of  electric  coating,  or  magnetic 
armature  of  our  love  with  the  friendship  of  our  beloved 
object  with  other  women  is  most  uncommon.  What 
pleases  us,  is  to  see  her  shrinking  from  everybody  ehe, 
growing  hard  and  frozen  to  them  on  our  account,  handing 
them  nothing  but  ices  and  cold  pudding,  but  serving  us 
with  glowing  goblets  of  love.  This  process  of  making  the 
heart,  like  wine,  more  fiery  and  strong,  and  generous,  by 
fi  eezing  it  at  the  boiling-point,  may  please  a  short-sighted 
selfish  soul ;  but  never  a  clear-seeing,  kindly,  loving  one. 
At  all  events,  the  author  declares  that,  whenever  he  has 
caught  a  glimpse — in  a  minor  or  in  water — of  the  reverse 
side  of  the  Janus-head,  of  which  the  other  side  has  been 
smiling  in  love  upon  him,  frowning  in  dislike  upon  the 
rest  of  the  world,  he  has  made  a  face  or  two  of  the  same 
disliking  sort  on  the  spot— at  the  Janus-head.  For  the 
mere  contrast's  sake,  a  girl  should  never  slander,  find  fault, 
or  dislike,  at  all  events,  while  she  is  a  lover;  when  she  is 
a  married  woman,  the  mistress  of  a  house,  and  has  chil- 
dren, and  cows,  and  servants,  <>f  course  no  reasonable  man 
or  husband,  can  possibly  object  to  a  moderate  amount  oi 
bad  temper,  and  a  little  scolding  now  and  then. 

Nathalie  had  acceded  to  the  strange  proposal  for  many 


CHAP.  XV.]       FLOWED,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      445 

reasons ;  just  "because  it  was  a  strange  ore ;  and  then  the 
word  "widow"  would,  to  her  romantic  heart,  be  con- 
stantly weaving  a  mourning-band  of  sorrow,  binding  her 
and  Firmian  together,  and  winding  in  charming  and 
fanciful  wreaths  round  the  events,  and  the  vows,  of  the 
night  of  their  good-bye.  Besides,  to-day,  she  had  been 
gradually  ascending  from  one  emotion  to  another,  and  had 
reached  a  height  where  her  head  began  to  reel.  More- 
over, she  was  boundlessly  unselfish,  and  consequently 
never  troubld  herseelf  to  think  whether  a  thing  had  the 
appearance  of  selfishness  or  not.  And,  lastty,  she  cared 
less  about  appearances  in  general,  and  the  conclusions 
people  drew  from  them  than,  perhaps,  a  young  lady  should 
care. 

Leibgeber,  now  that  all  his  goals  were  reached,  emitted 
a  long,  gladsome  zodiacal  light ;  and  Firmian  did  not 
darken  it  with  the  full  depth  of  his  mourning  night  - 
shadow,  but  only  with  the  half-tints  thereof.  At  th'e 
same  time,  he  felt  he  could  not  visit  either  of  Bay- 
reuth's  pleasure-places,  Eremitage  or  Fantaisie,  which 
were  Herculaneum  and  Portici  to  him  now.  Yet  he  must 
pass  by  the  latter  on  his  homeward  way,  and  disinter 
many  things  that  were  buiied.  He  did  not  care  to  delay 
his  return  much  longer  ;  not  only  was  the  moon  set  now, 
which  had  shed  a  new  silvery  radiance  upon  all  the  white 
flowers  and  blossoms  of  the  spring,  but  Leibgeber,  be- 
sides, was  a  death's  head  memento  mori,  always  saying, 
in  the  most  unmistakable  manner — though  with  neither 
lips  nor  tongue — "It  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  thou 
hast  got  to  die,  in  Kuhschnappel,  in  jest."  Leibgeber's 
heart  burned  for  the  world  without,  the  flames  of  his 
forest-conflagration  were  eager  to  dart  and  play  uncon- 
trolled over  alps,  islands,  capital  cities;  the  Vaduz  water 
reservoir  of  acts  of  parliament — paper  lit-de-parade  and 
lit-de-justice — would  have  been  to  Mm  a  heavy,  suffocat- 
ing, feather-bed,  such  as  people  in  a  hopeless  state  of 
hydrophobia  used  to  be  smothered  by  out  of  compassion. 
In  fact,  a  small  town  could  as  little  endure  him  as  he 
could  endure  a  small  town.  Indeed,  even  in  Bayreuth — 
a  larger  place — there  were  sundry  Commissaires  de  Justice 
at  the  table  d'hote  at  the  '  Sun '  Hotel,  who  told  me  with 


446  JEAN  PAUL  FUIEDIUCH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  IV 

their  ovvn  lips,  that  when  Leibgeber  spoke  his  table- 
speech  (reported  in  Chapter  XII.)  <»n  the  subject  of  Crown 
Princes,  they  thought  it  was  a  deliberate  satire  on  a  par- 
ticular Margrave  then  reigning ;  whereas  all  his  satires 
were  really  directed  against  the  human  race  in  general, 
not  against  individuals.  Again,  how  thoughtlessly  he  con- 
ducted himself  during  the  poor  eight  days  which  he  spent 
in  our  good  town  of  Hof  im  Voigtlande.  Are  there  not 
credible  "  Varisker "  (as  according  to  some  authorities 
the  inhabitants  of  Voigtland  were  called  in  Ceesar's  time 
— though  others  consider  "  Narisker  "  to  have  been  the 
word),  who  have  assured  me  that  he  bought  bergamot 
pears  in  the  open  market-place,  near  the  court-house, 
and  cakes  at  a  baker's  stall,  in  his  best  suit  of  Sunday 
clothes?  And  are  there  not  Nariskers  of  the  fair  sex, 
who,  having  observed  his  proceedings  thereafter,  are 
ready  to  depose  that,  though  stall-feeding  is  a  matter  of 
universal  enjoinment,  he  nevertheless  ate  this  food-offer- 
ing in  the  open  air  like  a  prince,  and  on  the  march,  like 
a  Eoman  army  ?  There  are  witnesses,  who  waltzed  with 
him,  to  testify  that  he  went  to  masked  balls  in  a  robe 
de  chambre  and  a  cocfced-hat  and  feathers,  and  that  he 
had  worn  both  all  the  previous  day  in  earnest,  before 
putting  them  on  in  the  evening  in  jest.  A  Narisker  not 
without  some  brains,  and  possessing  a  good  memory,  who 
was  not  aware  that  I  had  the  fellow  under  my  historical 
hands,  repeated  the  following  somewhat  audacious  utter- 
ances of  Leibgeber's. 

"  Every  man  is  a  bora  pedant.  There  are  very  few 
who  are  hung  in  chains  after  they  are  dead  :  but  almost 
every  one  is  hung,  in  most  accursed  chains,  before  death  ; 
and,  therefore,  in  most  countries,  '  Freeman '  means  pro- 
vost-marshal, or  hangman.  Jest,  as  such,  ought  to  be 
serious;  therefore,  as  long  as  one  is  only  in  jest,  it  is 
wrong  to  jest  in  the  slightest  degree.  He  held,  that 
the  spirit  which  brooded,  creating,  over  the  ink  of  colleges 
was  (as  many  Fathers  of  the  Church  held  that  to  be  which, 
according  to  Moses,  moved  upon  the  face  of  the  waters) 
wind.  In  his  eyes,  worshipful  councils,  conferences,  depu- 
tations, sessions,  processions,  &c,  were  not,  at  bottom, 
wholly  without  a  spice  of  comic  salt,  looked  upon  as  grave 


CHAP.  XV.]       FLOWER,  FiIUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECE-'.      447 

parodies  of  stiff  and  empty  seriousness,  more  especially  as 
in  general  there  was  but  one  member  of  the  conclave  (or 
perhaps  his  wife)  who  really  voted,  decided,  or  ruled,  the 
mystic  corpus  itself,  sitting  at  the  green  table,  chiefty  for 
the  joke  of  the  thing;  just  as,  in  flute  clocks,  though 
there  is  a  flute-player  screwed  on  outside  whose  fingers 
work  up  and  down  upon  the  flute,  which  grows  out  of 
his  mouth,  and  children  are  beyond  themselves  with  de- 
light at  the  talent  of  the  wooden  imposition,  every  clock- 
maker  knows  that  it  is  inside  that  the  wheels  are  which 
act  on  the  hidden  pipes  with  their  pinions."  I  answered 
that  these  sayings  showed  that  Leibgeber  was  of  a  rather 
audacious  and  ironical  turn  of  mind.  It  is,  perhaps,  to  be 
desired,  that  everybody  were  in  a  position  to  do  what 
the  author  does  in  this  place,  namely,  beg  all  Nariskerg 
to  have  the  goodness  to  point  to  any  single  word  or  deed 
of  his  which  can  be  called  satirical,  or  not  exactly  adapted 
to  fit  on  to  the  cap-block  of  a  pays  coutumier.  If  he  is  not 
speaking  the  truth,  he  begs  that  he  may  be  contradicted 
without  the  slightest  hesitation. 

The  winno wing-fan  which  blew  Siebenkaes  out  of  Bay- 
reuth  on  the  following  day,  was  a  letter  from  the  Count 
von  Vaduz,  in  which  he  expressed  his  friendly  regret  on 
account  of  Leibgeber's  cold-fever  and  tallowy  appearance, 
at  the  same  time  begging  him  to  hasten  his  entry  upon 
the  duties  of  his  office.  This  letter  was  to  Siebenkaes 
as  a  wing-membrane  wherewith  to  hasten  his  flight  to  his 
seeming  cocoon-grave,  in  order  to  issue  forth  from  it  a 
young  full-fledged  inspector.  In  our  next  chapter  he 
turns  him  about,  and  quits  the  beautiful  town.  In  what 
remains  of  this,  he  is  taking  private  lessons  in  silhouette 
clipping  from  Leibgeber,  whose  role  he  is  to  succeed  to 
by  dying.  The  master-cutter,  and  scissorial-mentor  did 
nothing,  in  this  connection,  worthy  of  being  handed 
down  to  posterity  by  me  save  one  thing,  as  to  which  I 
do  not  find  a  word  in  my  documents,  which  was  told  me 
by  Mr.  Feldmann,  the  keeper  of  the  hotel,  who  was  carv- 
ing at  table  when  it  occurred.  It  was  only  that  a  stranger 
who  was  dining  there  clipped  out  a  profile  of  Leibgeber, 
among  others;  while  Leibgeber,  seeing  what  he  was 
•bout,  clipped  out,  under  cover  of  the   table-cloth,  a  sil- 


448  JEAN  PAuL  FRIEDRIOH  RICHTEU.        [BOOK  IV. 

houette  of  this  supernumerary  copyist's  own  head  and 
shoulders,  and  when  the  latter  handed  him  his,  Leibgeber 
returned  the  compliment,  saying  "aZ  Pari!"  thus  paying 
him  in  his  own  coin.  This  stranger  made  airs  of  various 
kinds,  as  well  as  silhouettes,  but  succeeded  best  with  the 
phlogistic  sort,  which  he  made  with  his  lungs,  without  any 
difficulty  to  speak  of,  and  in  which  he  throve  and  took  on 
colour,  as  plants  do  ;  this  sort  of  air  can  be  breathed,  and 
is  designated  by  the  name  of  "wind,"  to  distinguish  it 
from  the  other  phlogistic  gases  which  can  not  be  inhaled. 
"When  this  phlogistic  wind-maker  (who  gave  admirable 
lectures  from  town  to  town,  on  the  other  gases,  from  that 
portable  professorial  chair,  his  body)  had  departed  with 
his  cutter's  wages,  Heinrich  contented  himself  with  the 
following  remarks. 

"  Thousands  of  people  ought  to  travel  and  teach  both  at 
once.  He  who  limits  himself  to  three  days  can  certainly 
(as  a  species  of  private  tutor  extraordinary  J  in  that  time 
read  excellent  lectures  on  eveiy  kind  of  subject  which  he 
knows  little  or  nothing  about.  Thus  much  I  see  already, 
that  there  are  brilliant  comets — shining  wandering  stars 
— revolving  round  me  and  others,  and  throwing  flying 
lights  upon  us  concerning  electricity,  gases,  magnetism,  in 
short  natural  science  in  general ;  but  this  is  but  a  small 
matter.  May  this  duck's  wing  choke  me  if  these  rostrum 
carriers,  and  travelling  professors  (travelling  scholars  they 
are  not),  might  not  lecture  upon  science  of  every  kind, 
with  great  advantage,  at  all  events,  upon  the  minuter 
branches.  Could  not  one,  for  instance,  travel  and  read 
lectures  upon  the  first  century  after  Christ's  birth,  or  the 
first  millenary  before  it  (which  is  no  longer),  I  mean,  tell 
ladies  and  gentlemen  all  about  it  in  a  lecture  or  two, 
a  second  undertaking  the  second,  a  third  the  third,  an 
eighteenth  our  own?  I  can  quite  imagine  travelling 
medicine-chests  for  the  soul  of  this  kind.  But  as  far  as  I 
am  concerned,  I  should  by  no  means  stop  at  this  point 
— I  should  advertise  myself  as  a  peripatetic  private 
tutor  in  branches  of  the  minutest  possible  order ;  e.  g., 
in  electoral  courts,  I  should  give  lessons  concerning  the 
obligations  to  be  entered  into  b}r  the  nominees  to  govern- 
ment appo"'ntments  ;  in  all  and  every  place  I  should 
give  exegetical  instruction  concerning   the   first  verse  ot 


CHAP.  XV.]        FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      449 

the  first  book  of  Moses — the  Icrahen,  the  devil  (who  may, 
perhaps,  be  more  or  less  the  same  as  the  other),  on 
Hogarth's  tail-piece,  in  connection  with  Vandyke'*  head- 
pieces, on  coins  and  in  portraits ;  on  the  true  distinction 
between  the  Hippocentanr,  and  the  Onocentaur,  which  is 
more  like  that  between  genius  and  German  criticism  than 
anything  else ;  on  the  first  paragraph  of  Wolf,  or  even  of 
Putter;  on  the  funeral  bier  of  Louis  (XIV.)  the  be-gran- 
dised,  and  the  public  rejoicings  under  it ;  on  the  academic 
licences  which  a  passing  lecturer  may  allow  himself  tc 
take,  in  addition  to  that  of  pocketing  his  fee — the  greatest 
of  which  is  often  that  of  shutting  the  lecture-room  door, 
(to  make  a  long  story  short)  on  everything,  in  fact.  If  we 
go  on  in  this  way  (I  can't  help  being  struck),  that  when 
circulating  high  schools  have  got  to  be  as  common  as 
village  schools — when  savants  ply  backwards  and  forwards 
ike  live  shuttles  between  the  towns  (and  they  have 
begun  to  do  so  already),  attaching  Ariadne  threads  (of 
talk,  at  all  events;  everywhere,  to  everything,  with  the 
view  of  weaving  them  into  something  or  other — if  we  go 
on  on  this  road,  I  say,  when  each  sun  of  a  professor — on 
the  Ptolemaic  system,  moves  about  among  the  dark  orbs 
(fixed  upon  necks),  which  surround  him,  and  casts  his  light 
upon  each  in  turn  (a  state  of  things  wholly  opposed  to  the 
Copemican  system,  according  to  which  the  sun  stands 
still  on  the  professorial  rostrum  in  the  centre  of  the  orbits 
of  the  revolving  planets  or  students) — if  we  go  on  (I  say 
once  more,  on  this  road),  one  may  be  pretty  sure  that 
the  world  will  really  come  to  be  something  at  last;  a 
learned  world,  at  the  very  least  and  lowest — philosophers 
will  obtain  the  true  philosopher's  stone  —  gold ;  what 
fools  will  obtain  will  be  the  philosophers,  and  know- 
ledge of  every  kind  :  and  moreover  the  restorers  of  science 
will  get  set  upon  their  legs.  All  soil  would  then  be 
classic  soil — so  that  people  would  of  necessity  have  to 
plough,  and  fight  on,  classic  soil.  Every  gallows  hill 
would  be  a  Pindus,  every  prince's  throne  an  oracle-cave  of 
Delphi — and  I  should  be  obliged  to  anyone  who  should 
show  me  such  a  thing  as  a  single  ass  in  the  whole  of  Ger- 
many, then.  This  is  what  would  necessarily  happen  if  all 
the  world  were  to  set  out  upon  learned,  and  instructive, 
ix.  2  o 


450  JEAN  PAUL  TKIEDRICH  EICHTER.      [BOOK  IV. 

journeys — that  portion  of  it  being,  of  course,  necessarily 
excepted  which  would  be  obliged  to  stay  at  home  if  there 
were  to  be  anybody  to  listen  and  pay  (like  the  point  de 
vue,  in  military  '  evolutions,'  for  which  the  adjutant  is 
generally  told  off)." 

Here  he  suddenly  jumped  up,  and  cried,  "  I  wish  to 
Heaven  I  could  go  to  Bruckenau  ;  *  there,  on  the  bath  tubs, 
should  be  my  professorial  chair,  and  seat  of  the  Muses. 
The  tradesman's,  the  country  gentleman's  wife  or  daugh- 
ter should  lie,  like  a  shell  fish,  in  her  closed  basin  and 
relic-casquet,  with  nothing  sticking  out  but  her  head  (just 
as  is  the  case  in  her  ordinary  costume),  her  head  which  it 
would  be  my  business  to  instruct.  What  discourses,  a  la 
St.  Anthony  of  Padua,  should  I  not  hold  with  these  tender 
tench — or  sirens— though  they  might  better  be  described 
as  fortresses  protected  by  moats,  or  wet  ditches.  I  should 
sit  lecturing  and  teaching  upon  the  wooden  holsters  ot 
their  glowing  charms  (phosphorus-like,  kept  in  water !) 
But  this  would  be  nothing  compared  to  the  benefits  I 
should  bestow  upon  society  were  J  to  have  myself  cooped 
into  an  etui,  or  scabbard  of  the  kind,  and  then  be  set 
a-going  like  a  water-organ,  and,  like  some  water-god, 
devote  my  pedagogical  talents  to  the  edification  of  the 
class  of  students  sitting  on  my  tub-lid  !  True,  I  should 
have  to  make  my  illustrative  gestures  under  the  warm 
water,  because  the  only  part  of  me  out  of  my  sheath  would 
be  my  bead  (like  the  hilt  of  a  dagger),  with  my  master'a 
cap  on  it.  But  the  loveliest  of  doctrine, — luxuriant  rice- 
ears,  and  succulent  aquatic  plants  sprouting  in  the  water 
— a  play  of  philosophic  water- works,  and  so  forth,  should 
be  emitted  from  the  bath,  and  send  away  all  the  beauties 

*  At  page  163  of  the '  Pocket-Book  for  Watering  Places,  and  Visitors 
to  them,'  it  is  stated  that  while  the  ladies  are  lying  bolted  into  their 
baths,  young  gentlemen  sit  on  the  covers  and  entertain  them  while  they 
are  under  water.  Against  which  arrangement  Reason  certainly  can 
urge  no  valid  objection,  for  the  wood  of  tho  baths  is  quite  as  thick  as 
silk  j  and  when  all  is  said,  Everybody  is,  if  covered  at  all,  always  in 
some  covering  inside  of  which  he  or  she  is  altogether  devoid  of  cover- 
ing— though  perhaps  Fancy,  and  Imagination  may  urge  this  objection, 
that  a  bed-quilt  a  quarter  of  a  yard  thick  would  not  be  quite  so  becoming, 
or  close-fitting  a  ball-dress  as  a  gauze.  If  once  the  Innocence  of  th« 
imagination  be  offended,  there  is  no  other  to  spare;  the  senses  cut 
neither  be  innocent  nor  the  contrary. 


CHAP.  XVI."]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      451 

(whom,  in  fan<y,  I  see  thronging  round  my  quaker's  and 
Diogenes'  tub)  besprinkled  with  learning  and  instruction 
of  tbe  most  superlative  description.  By  Heaven!  I  ought 
to  be  off  to  Bruckenau  this  instant,  not  so  much  as  a 
watering-place  guest  as  in  the  capacity  of  a  private  tutor." 


CHAPTER  XVI. 

THE  HOMEWARD  JOURNEY,    WITH   ALL  ITS  PLEASURES — THE 
ARRIVAL   AT   HOME. 

Firmian  took  his  departure.  He  was  sorry  to  leave  the 
hotel,  which  had  been  a  royal  "  Sans  Souci  "  and  "  mon 
repos  "  to  him,  and  turn  his  face  away  from  its  comfortable 
chambers  towards  his  own  bare  comfortless  rooms.  To 
him  who  had  never  known  any  of  the  comforts — the  soft 
paddings,  so  to  speak,  of  this  hard  life  of  ours — who  had 
never  had  any  other  Jack  but  the  boot-jack,  it  had  been 
an  enormous  pleasure  and  enjoyment  to  have  the  power  of 
ringing  that  leading  actor,  John  the  waiter,  up  from  his 
coulisses  with  such  facility,  and  that  too  with  plates  and 
glasses  in  his  hand,  out  of  which  said  actor  enjoyed 
nothing,  only  Siebenkses  and  the  public  so  doing.  Just 
at  the  door  of  the  hotel,  he  made  to  Mr.  Feldmann,  the 
landlord,  the  following  eulogistic  address,  which  shall 
be  made  him  once  more  in  print  by  me,  by  way  of  an 
additional  blazon  to  his  coat  of  arms,  the  moment  it  gets 
through  the  press.  "  There  is  only  one  thing  which  your 
guests  have  to  desire,  that  they  have  not  got,  and  that  is 
the  most  important  of  all  things — time.  May  your  sun 
reach  the  sign  of  the  crab,  and  remain  in  it."  Several 
Bayreuthians  who  were  standing  by  thought  this  was  a 
miserable  satire. 

Henry  went  with  Firmian  some  thirty  paces  beyond 
the  Reformation  church,  as  far  as  the  church-yard,  and 
tore  himself  away  from  him  with  less  difficulty  than  usual, 
for  he  expected  to  Bee  him  again  in  a  few  weeks'  time — on 
his  death-bed.  He  would  not  go  as  far  as  Fantaisie  with 
him,  wishing  to  allow  him  to  sink,  in  silence  and  un- 
disturbed, and  lose  himself  in  the  enjoyment  of  the  magic 

2  a  2 


452  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDBICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IV. 

echoes  of  the  spirit-harmonies  of  that  night  of  hliss  where- 
with all  the  garden  would  he  vocal. 

Alone,  then,  Firmian  entered  into  the  valley  as  into 
some  holy  temple,  all  sacredness  and  awe.  Every  thicket 
seemed,  to  his  eyes,  glorified  with  super-earthly  light,  the 
stream,  a  stream  flowing  out  of  Arcadia,  and  the  whole 
valley  a  Vale  of  Tempe,  transported  thither  and  unveiled 
to  view.  And  when  he  came  to  the  dear  and  holy  spot 
where  Nathalie  had  prayed  him  to  "  think  of  that  night," 
it  seemed  to  him  that  the  sun  was  shedding  a  heavenlier 
brightness  ;  and  that  the  hum  of  bees  in  the  blossoms  was 
music  of  spirit-voices  wafted  on  the  air,  and  that  he  must 
needs  prostrate  himself  and  press  his  heart  upon  the 
dewy  sward.  Upon  this  trembling  sound-board  he  once 
more  retraced  the  old  path  by  which  he  had  walked  with 
Nathalie,  and,  now  in  a  rose  espalier,  now  from  some  stream- 
let, now  from  the  balcony,  now  from  some  leafy  nook  or 
trembling  stem,  string  after  string,  breaking  from  silence, 
gave  forth  once  more  its  old  lovely  tone.  His  enraptured 
heart  swelled,  even  to  pain  ;  a  moist  transparent  shimmer 
was  over  his  eyes,  and  dissolved  into  a  great  tear-drop,  rl  is 
eyes,  drunken  with  weeping,  distinguished  nothing  save 
the  brightness  of  the  morning  and  the  whiteness  of  the 
flowers ;  details  were  hid  by  the  flowery  vail  of  dreaming, 
in  whose  lily  perfume  his  soul  sank  down,  soothed  to  a 
restful  sleep.  It  was  as  if  hitherto,  in  the  enjoyment  of 
being  with  his  Leibgeber  he  had  only  felt  half  the  real 
strength  of  his  love  for  Nathalie ;  with  such  a  new  might 
and  breeze  of  heaven  did  that  love  come  breathing  upon 
him  in  this  solitude  with  ethereal  fire.  A  world  all  youth 
burst  into  blossom  in  his  heart. 

Of  a  sudden  the  bells  of  Bayreuth  came  ringing  into  this 
world,  striking  for  him  the  hour  of  his  farewell  to  it ;  and 
there  fell  on  him  that  anxious  sadness  with  which  we 
linger,  too  long,  beside  a  place  where  we  have  been  happy, 
when  the  time  has  come  when  we  must  say  Adieu.  He 
went  upon  his  way. 

What  a  brightness  fell  upon  all  the  hills  and  meadows, 
with  the  thought  of  Nathalie,  and  that  imperishable  kiss ! 
The  green  world,  which  had  been  but  a  series  of  pictures 
for  him,  as  he  came,  was  now  all  speech  and  language. 


CHAP.  XYI.  |      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       453 

There  was  a  light-magnet  of  happiness  all  day  long  in  the 
dimmest  corner  of  his  being ;  and  when,  in  the  thick  of 
distractions,  conversations  and  the  like,  en  route,  he  cast 
a  sudden  glance  into  himself,  he  found  a  continual  sense  of 
blissfulness  within  him. 

How  often  he  turned  back  to  the  Bayreuth  hills,  beyond 
which  he  had  lived  real  days  of  youth,  for  the  first  time 
in  his  existence !  Behind  him  Nathalie  was  journeying 
on  towards  the  east,  and  breezes  from  that  quarter — airs 
which  had  breathed  gently  around  the  distant,  lonely  one 
— came  wafting  back  to  him,  and  he  drunk  the  aether- 
stream  like  the  breath  of  one  beloved. 

The  hills  sunk  low  on  the  horizon;  his  paradise  was 
whelmed  in  the  blue  of  heaven.  His  west  and  Nathalie's 
east  flowed  asunder,  and  parted  wider,  faster  and  faster  as 
the  moments  sped.  One  beautiful  plain  receded,  flying 
behind  him,  after  another ;  and  he  hastened  past  the  flower- 
decked  limbs  of  Spring  as  she  lay  outstretched  on  earth, 
alternating  between  looking  and  enjoying,  as  in  early  days 
gune  by. 

Thus  he  came  at  evening  to  the  village  in  the  valley 
by  the  Jaxt,  where  on  his  journey  to  Bayreuth,  he  bad 
passed  in  review,  with  tears,  his  loveless  days  ;  but  he 
came  with  a  new  heart,  full  to  the  brim  with  love  and 
happiness ;  and  tears  flowed  this  time  too.  Here  where, 
amid  the  melting  magic  lights  of  evening,  he  had  asked 
himself,  "  What  womanly  soul  has  ever  loved  you  as  3'our 
old  dreams  have  so  often  pictured  to  your  heart  you  might. 
be  loved  by  one,"  and  had  given  himself  so  sad  an  answer ; 
here  he  could  think  on  that  Bayreuth  night,  and  say, 
"  Yes !  Nathalie  has  loved  me ! "  And  then  the  old 
sorrow  rose  again,  but  glorified,  from  the  dead.  He  had 
made  to  her  a  vow  of  invisibility  here  on  earth ;  he  was 
now  journeying  on  towards  his  own  death  ;  he  was  to 
die,  and  never  see  her  more.  She  was  gone  before  him — 
had  died  first,  as  it  were;  she  had  merely  taken  away  with 
her  into  the  long,  dim,  coming  years  of  her  life  the  grief 
of  having  loved  and  lost,  twice.  ''And  I  look  into  my  own 
life  here,  and  weep,  away  from  her,"  he  said,  wearily,  and 
closed  his  eyes  undried. 

Another  world  altogether  opened  upon  him  in  the  morn* 


454  JEAN  PAUL  FEIELBICH  EICHTER.       [BOOK  IV. 

ing — not  a  new  world  by  any  means — the  old,  old  familiar 
one.  Just  as  if  the  concentric  magic  circles  which  sur- 
rounded Nathalie  and  Leibgeber  reached  no  further  than 
the  little  Valley  of  Longing  on  the  Jaxt,  and  could  include 
nothing  beyond  it.  Every  step  towards  home  translated 
the  poetry  which  had  come  into  his  life  to  poetic  prose. 
The  Imperial  market-town  (that  frigid  zone  of  his  life) 
was  nearer  to  him  ;  his  torrid  zone,  over  which  the  faded 
petals  of  his  ephemeral  joy -flowers  were  fluttering  still, 
was  far  away  behind  him. 

But,  on  the  other  hand,  the  pictured  imagery  of  his 
domestic  life  kept  growing  clearer  and  brighter,  taking  the 
form  of  a  picture-bible,  while  the  paintings  of  his  month  of 
bliss  died  away  into  a  dark  picture  gallery.  I  think  the 
weather,  which  was  rainy,  had.  some  connection  with  this. 

Towards  the  end  of  the  week  the  weather,  as  well  as 
penitents  and  churchgoers,  puts  on  other  shirts  and 
clothes. 

It  was  Saturday,  and  cloudy.  Damp  weather  affects  the 
walls  of  our  brains  as  it  does  the  walls  of  our  rooms ;  the 
paperings  of  both  imbibe  the  moisture,  and  get  curled  up 
into  clouds,  until  the  next  dry  day  smooths  both  out 
again.  Under  a  blue  sky,  I  long  for  eagles'  pinions ; 
under  a  cloudy  one,  I  only  want  a  goose's  wing  to  write 
with.  In  the  former  case  we  are  eager  to  be  off  and  out. 
into  the  wide  world;  in  the  latter,  all  we  want  is  to  sit 
comfortably  down  in  our  arm-chair.  In  short,  clouds, 
when  they  drop,  make  us  domestic,  citizenish,  and  hungry, 
while  blue  skies  make  us  thirsty,  and  citizens  of  the  world. 

These  clouds  of  this  Saturday  formed  a  kind  of  palisade 
about  the  Eden  of  Bayreuth.  Every  big  drop  which  fell 
on  the  leaves  made  him  think  longingly  of  the  wifely, 
wedded  heart,  which  was  his  lawful  property  (and  which 
he  was  soon  to  lose),  and  of  his  poor  little  lodging.  At  last 
when  the  ice-floes  of  the  rugged-  clouds  melted  into  grey 
foam,  and  the  setting  sun  was  drawn  like  a  sluice,  out  of 
this  suspended  mill-pond,  and  it  poured  down  in  con- 
sequence, Kuhschnappel  came  in  sight. 

Discordant,  jarring  fancies  clanged  in  contention  with- 
in him.  The  commonplace,  narrow-minded,  provincial 
town,  seemed,  when  contrasted  with  freer  and  more  liberal 


CHAP.  XVI.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  TH011N  PIECES.      455 

places  and  societies,  so  crowded  and  crushed  together,  so 
official  in  style,  and  full  of  Troglodytes — with  doggrel, 
and  table-ver>es  by  way  of  poetry — that  he  felt  it  would 
be  a  satisfaction  to  drag  out  his  green  trellis-bed  into  the 
market-place  in  broad  daylight,  and  go  to  sleep  beneath 
the  very  windows  of  the  local  "  quality,"  without  minding 
a  brass- farthing  what  the  upper  council  might  think,  01 
the  lower  councd  either.  The  nearer  he  came  to  the  stage 
he  was  to  die  upon,  the  more  difficult  did  this  first  role 
of  his  (and  last  but  one)  appear  to  him. 

Away  from  home  we  are  bold  and  daring :  we  resolve, 
and  undertake;  at  home,  we  pause  and  hesitate,  and  delay. 

Yes.  and  the  smoke  and  smells  of  the  mean  streets  gnawed 
into  him,  matters  which,  of  themselves  unaided,  so  sorely 
affect  and  depress  us  that  there  are  very  few  indeed  who 
can  raise  their  heads  wholly  beyond  these  effluvia.  For 
in  man  there  nestles  an  accursed  tendency  towards  still- 
sitting  ease  and  comfort;  like  a  big  dog  he  lets  himself 
be  poked  and  pinched  a  thousand  times  before  he  takes 
the  trouble  to  get  up,  rather  than  growl.  Once  fairly 
on  his  legs,  however,  he  is  not  in  a  hurry  to  lie  down 
again.  The  first  heroic  deed  (like  the  first  earned  dollar, 
according  to  Eousseau)  costs  more  than  the  next  thousand. 
The  prospect  of  the  long,  difficult,  tedious  and  risky 
financial  and  surgical  operation  of  a  stage  death  stung 
our  Siebenkaes  on  the  domestic  bolster. 

But  the  nearer  he  drew  to  the  gallows-hill  (that  mouse- 
tower  of  his  old,  narrow  life),  the  quicker  and  the  clearer 
did  the  thoughts  of  the  heart-oppressing  stamp  ng-mills 
of  past  days,  and  of  his  approaching  salvation,  vibrate  in 
alternation  in  his  mind.  He  kept  thinking  that  he  would 
have  to  suffer  care,  anxiety,  and  struggle  of  all  sorts,  as  of 
old,  because  he  kept  losing  sight  of  the  open  sky  of  his 
future,  just  as  we  go  on  suffering  the  pain  and  fear  of  a 
painful  dream  for  some  time  after  we  have  awakened 
from  it. 

But  when  he  saw  the  house  where  dwelt  his  Lenetto, 
whose  voice  he  had  not  heard  for  so  many  a  day,  the  pain 
ali  vanished  from  his  heart,  the  trouble  from  his  eyes, 
nothing  being  left  in  them  but  affection  and  its  warmest 
teurs. 


456  JEAN  PAUL  FLIEDEICH  EICHTER.       [BOOK  IV. 

"  Ah  !  am  I  not  going  to  tear  myself,  so  soon,  from  her 
for  ever,  and  make  tier  shedteais  of  delusion,  and  wound 
her  with  the  terrible  wounds  of  a  funeral  and  mourning? 
and  then,  poor  darling  soul,  we  shall  see  each  other  no 
more ! "  he  thought. 

He  quickened  his  pace.  He  squeezed  close  past  the 
shop  windows  of  his  co-commandant,  Meerbitzer,  with  his 
head  thrown  back,  and  his  eyes  fixed  upon  the  up-staiis 
windows.  Meerbitzer  was  in  the  hoube,  splitting  the 
Sunday  wood  ;  and  Firmian  signed  to  him  not  to  give 
note  of  his  presence  by  any  sort  of  sentry-challenge.  The 
old  associate- czar  signed  back  to  him,  with  outstretched 
fingers,  that  Lenette  was  alone  in  the  room  up-stairs.  The 
old  familiar  ripieno  voices  of  the  house,  the  querulous 
scolding  of  the  book-binder's  wife,  the  damper-pedal  effect 
of  the  eternal  prayer  and  curser,  Fecht,  met  him  like  so 
much  sweet  provender,  as  he  climbed  the  stairs.  The 
waning  moon  of  his  movable  pewter  property  shone 
silvery  and  glorious  upon  him  from  the  kitchen,  every- 
thing fresh  from  its  font  of  regeneration ;  a  copper  fish- 
kettle,  which  poisoned  no  vinegar  as  long  as  it  was  un- 
mended,  glowed  upon  him  through  the  kitchen  smoke  like 
the  sun  in  a  November  fog.  He  opeued  the  door  of  the 
sitting-room  gently ;  he  saw  no  one  in  it,  but  heard 
Lenette  making  the  bed  in  the  bed-room.  With  a  whole 
iron  foundry  hammering  in  his  breast,  he  made  a  long, 
noiseless  stride  into  the  room,  which  was  all  in  apple-pie 
order,  with  its  Sunday  shirt  of  white  sand  on  already 
'£u.pon>  which  the  bed-making  river  goddess  and  water 
t  ,nymn]iuhad  expended  all  her  aquatic  arts  in  the  produc- 
.  tion.of  a- highly-finished  masterpiece).  Ah!  everything 
way. so  full  of  rest  and  peace,  so  tranquilly  reposing  after 
';  ..''^j^(..whirl  and  turmoil  of  the  week.  The  rain  stars  had 
"  ^ risen  'upon  everything,  except  his  ink  bottle,  which  was 
"■'*'   qttite  dry. 

His  writing-table  was,  so  to  speak,  manned  by  two  or 
three  large  heads,  which,  being  cap-blocks,  had  on  their 
Sunday  bonnets,  already,  which  would  be  transferred  from 
ihem  in  their  capacity  of  Curatores  Sexus,  next  morning,  to 
the  heads  of  the  ladies  of  the  members  of  council. 

He  pushed  the  bed-room   door  wider  open,  and  there* 


CHAP.  XVII.]    FLOWEE,  FKUIT,  AND  THOEN  PIECES.      457 

after  this  long  separation,  he  saw  his  dear  wife,  standing 
with  her  back  to  him. 

Just  then  he  fancied  he  recognised  Stiefel's  fulling-mill 
steps  coining  up  stairs ;  and,  that  he  might  pass  his  first 
minute  on  her  heart  unseen  by  a  stranger  eye,  he  said 
twice,  softly,  "  Lenette  !" 

She  started  round,  crying  "Oh  good  gracious!  is  it 
you  ?"  He  had  clasped  her  in  his  arms,  before  she  got 
these  words  out,  and  rested  on  her  kiss,  saying,  "  Good 
evening,  good  evening,  and  how  are  you,  and  how  have 
you  been  ?" 

His  lips  stifled  the  answers.  But  suddenly  she  pushed 
him  back  and  struggled  out  of  his  arms,  while  two  other 
arms  clasped  him  swiftly,  and  a  bass  voice  said,  "Here  am 
I  as  well ;  you  are  welcome  back,  praise  and  thanks  be  to 
God."     It  was  the  Schulrath. 

Poor,  fevered  human  creatures  that  we  are !  driven  back 
and  repulsed  asunder  by  our  own  lackings,  and  those  c* 
others,  yet  continually  drawn  together  again  by  never- 
ct-asing  longings,  in  whom  one  hope  of  finding  love  fall  i 
away  to  dust  after  another,  whose  wishes  come  to  nothing 
but,  memories.  Our  feeble  hearts  are  at  all  events  glowing 
and  right  full  of  love  in  that  hour  when  we  come  back  and 
meet  again ;  and  in  that  other  hour  when  we  part, 
disconsolate, — as  every  star  seems  milder,  larger,  and 
lovelier  when  it  is  rising,  than  when  it  is  overhead.  Bu- 
te souls  which  always  love,  and  are  never  angry,  these  tw. . 
twilights  (when  the  morning  star  of  meeting,  and  the 
evening  star  of  parting  shine)  are  too  sad  to  be*rftjblv£ 
them  they  seem  like  nights.  *>» 


CHAPTER  XVII.  (tftxt&Xih 


THE   BUTTERFLY   ROSA  IN  THE   FORM   OF   MINING   CATERPILLAR 

THORN-CROWNS,   AND   THISTLE-HEAUS   OF   JEALOUSY. 

The  last  chapter  was  as  brief  as  our  delusions.  It  was 
one  itself,  alas!  poor  Firmian.  After  the  first  stormy 
mutual   catechisings,   and  particularly,  after  the  giving 


458  JEAN  PAUL  FEIEDKICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IV. 

and  roceiving  of  all  the  mutual  news,  he  saw  more  and 
more  clearly  that  Lenette's  invisible  church,  in  which 
Stiefel  filled  the  part  of  soul's  bridegroom,  was  become 
very  much  of  a  visible  one.  It  was  as  if  the  earthquake  of 
the  recent  happiness  had  rent  in  twain  the  veil  of  the 
Holy  of  Holies,  the  inmost  sanctuary,  wherein  Stiefel's  head 
fluttered  by  way  of  cherub.  But,  to  speak  the  truth,  I  am 
telling  a  lie  here,  because  it  was  Lenette's  special  object  to 
show  and  display  a  particular  liking  for  the  Schulrath,  who, 
in  his  delight  thereat,  went  fluttering  on  from  Arcadia  to 
Otaheite,  and  from  thence  to  Eldorado,  and  from  thence 
to  Walhalla,  which  was  a  certain  indication,  that,  up  to 
this  point,  his  good  fortune,  during  Firmian's  absence,  had 
been  less.  He  related  thai,  "  Eosa  had  broken  with  the 
Heimlicher ;  that  the  Venner,  whom  the  latter  had  wanted 
to  utilise  as  a  spinning  machine,  had  turned  into  an  engine 
of  war  against  him.  The  cause  of  all  this  had  been  the 
niece  in  Bayreuth,  whose  engagement  the  Venner  had 
broken  off,  because  he  had  caught  her  being  kissed  by 
a  gentleman  there." 

Firmian.  grew  red  as  fire,  and  cried  "  Miserable  cock- 
roach !  It  was  she  who  broke  off  her  engagement  with 
that  wretched  lying  scoundrel,  not  he  who  broke  off  his 
with  her.  Ah  !  Herr  Schulrath,  be  that  poor  lady's  true 
knight  and  champion,  and  ran  this  wretched  abortion  «f 
a  lie  through  and  through  wherever  you  came  across  it. 
From  whom  did  you  get  hold  of  this  evil  weed?"  Stiefel 
pointed  calmly  to  Lenette,  saying,  "  From  her  !  "  "  And 
where  did  you  get  hold  of  it  ?"  Firmian  cried  to  her  in 
amazement.  "  Mr.  Von.  Meyern,"  she  answered,  with  her 
face  all  glowing  red,  "  was  here  calling,  and  told  it  me 
himself."  "  But  I  was  fetched  immediately,"  Stiefel  in- 
terrupted, "  and  I  skilfully  sent  him  about  his  business." 
Stiefel  then  asked  for  a  correct  version  of  what  had 
happened.  Firmian  thereupon,  timidly,  and  with  many 
changes  of  tone,  made  »  highly  favourable  report  of  the 
rose-maiden  and  her  conduct  of  the  matter  ("rose- 
inaiden"  in  a  threefold  sense,  on  account  of  the  roses  in 
her  cheeks,  of  her  victorious  virtue,  and  the  green  rose- 
buds she  had  given  to  him).  But  on  Lenette's  account  he 
awarded  her  zproxima  accessit  only,  not  the  gold  medal. 


CHAP.  XVII.]     FLOWEK,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      459 

He  had  to  bind  the  Venner,  by  way  of  sacrificial  ram, 
to  the  horns  of  the  altar  in  place  of  Nathalie,  or,  at 
all  events,  harness  him  by  way  of  saddle-horse  to  her 
triumphal  car,  and  relate  without  disguise  how  Leibgeber 
had  been  the  person  who  broke  off  the  engagement,  and, 
as  it  were,  dragged  her  back  by  the  sleeve,  as  she  was 
making  the  first  step  into  the  Minotaur's  cave — by  means 
of  his  satiric  sketches  of  Meyern. 

"  But  it  was  you,  of  course,"  said  Lenette,  without  any 
tone  of  interrogation,  "  who  told  Leibgeber  all  about  him, 
to  begin  with." 

"  Yes,"  said  he. 

We  of  the  human  race  give  to  words  of  one  syllable,  to 
"Yes,"  and  "No,"  at  all  events,  more 'intonations,  and 
shades  of  intonations,  than  the  Chinese  themselves.  The 
yes  in  question  was  a  rapid,  toneless,  cold  yes,  being 
merely  meant  for  a  "  What  then,"  or  "  Suppose  I  did." 
She  interrupted  a  digressive  speech  of  Stiefel's  with  a 
point-blank,  target,  bull's-eye  question  : 

"  When  had  you  been  with  her  V" 

At  last  Firmian,  with  his  battle-telescope,  6aw  hostile 
movements  of  all  kinds  going  on  in  her  heart ;  he  made  a 
playful  diversion,  and  said,  "  Herr  Schulrath,  when  did 
you  come  to  see  Lenette  ?" 

"Three  times  every  week  at  least,  and,  very  often, 
oftener  than  that ;  always  about  this  time  of  the  evening," 
he  answered. 

"  Very  well,"  said  Firmian,  in  a  kindly  and  playful 
fashion.  "  I'm  not  going  to  be  jealous,  but  be  good 
enough  to  remark — and  my  Lenette  will  please  to  do  so 
too — that  I  was  with  Nathalie,  along  with  Leibgeber,  twice 
in  all ;  once  in  the  afternoon,  once  in  the  evening,  walking 
about  the  grounds  of  Fantaisie. 

"Well,  Lenette?" 

She  parted  her  cherry  lips,  and  her  eyes  were  like  Volta'a 
electric  condensers. 

Stiefel  went  away,  and  Lenette  (from  a  countenance  on 
which  there  seemed  two  fires  burning,  the  fire  of  anger  and 
a  lovelier  fire)  flashed  after  him  a  spark  of  eye  love,  cal- 
culated to  blow  up  the  whole  powder-mill  of  a  jealous 
husband.     The  married  pair  were  scaioe  alone,  when,  by 


460  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  IV. 

way  of  propitiating  her,  he  asked  her  if  that  confounde< 
Venner  had  been  plagu  ing  her  again  ;  and  then  the  firework 
which  had  been  fixed  ready  on  the  scaffold  of  her  face,  wen 
hissing  off. 

"  Oh  I  of  course  you  can't  endure  him.  You  are  jealou 
of  him,  on  account  of  this  beautiful,  learned,  intellectual, 
Nathalie  of  yours.  Do  you  suppose  I  don't  know  quite 
well  about  you  and  her  going  abuut  a  whole  niglit  among 
the  trees — and  hugging  and  kissing  !  A  pretty  story  Ah 
fie!  I  never  would  have  believed  it  of  you.  No  wonder 
Mr.  Meyern  said  '  Good  morning '  to  her,  learning  and  all. 
Oh  yes !  you'll  excuse  yourself,  no  doubt." 

"  I  should  have  talked  to  you  about  all  that  most  innocent 
affair,"  answered  Firniian,  tranquilly,  "  while  Stiefel  was 
here,  if  I  had  not  seen  quite  well  that  you  knew  of  it.  Am 
I  annoyed  because  he  kissed  you  while  I  was  away?  " 

This  iiritated  her  still  more;  firstly,  because  it  was 
impossible  that  Firmian  could  know  of  a  certainty  that  it 
was  true  —  (and  it  was  /), — and  secondly,  because  she 
thought  "  You  can  forgive  it  very  easily  now  that,  you  care 
more  for  another  woman  than  you  do  for  me."  But  then, 
for  the  self-same  reason  (inasmuch  as  she  cared  more  for 
another  man  than  she  did  for  him),  she,  of  course,  ought  to 
have  found  no  difficulty  in  forgiving  him  too.  But,  as 
usual,  instead  of  answering  his  question,  she  put  one 
herself:  "  Did  J  ever  give  anybody  silk  forget-me-nots,  as 
somebody  did  to  somebody  ?  Thank  goodness  !  mine  are  sti'1 
in  my  drawer." 

Here  two  hearts  contended  within  him  -  a  tender  heart 
which  was  pierced  by  this  unintentional  association  ol 
forget-me-nots  so  dissimilar — and  a  man's  heart,  which  was 
powerfully  stirred  and  stung  by  this  detestable  defensive 
and  offensive  alliance  with  the  fellow  who,  as  was  evident 
now,  had  sent  the  innocent  child,  whom  Nathalie  had 
rescued,  to  Fantaisie  by  way  of  a  stalking-horse,  behind 
which  to  conceal  and  mask  himself,  and  the  toils  he  had 
6pun.  As  Siebenkses  now,  with  an  outburst  of  anger,  con- 
verted his  judgment-seat  into  a  stool  of  repentance  for  the 
Venner,  whom  he  stigmatised  as  a  canker-worm  of  feminine 
buds,  a  sparrowhawk,  a  housebreaker  as  regarded  matri- 
monial treasures,  and  a  crimp,  trepanner,  and  soulstealer 


CHAP.  XVII.]    FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      461 

of  mated  souls — vowing  with  the  utmost  warmth  that  it 
was  Nathalie  who  had  scornfully  sent  Rosa  to  the  right- 
about, not  Eosa  who  had  rejected  her :  and  as,  of  course, 
he  interdicted  her  in  the  most  peremptory  terms  from 
everything  in  the  nature  of  dissemination  or  repetition  of 
the  Vernier's  lying  demi-romance,  he  turned  his  unfortu- 
nate wife  into  a  sour,  pungent,  Erfurt  radish,  from  head 
to  foot. 

Let  us  not  fix  our  eyes  too  long,  or  too  magisterially, 
upon  this  heat-rash  or  purulent  fever  of  poor  Lenette's. 
For  my  part,  I  am  going  to  leave  her  alone,  but  make  an 
onslaught  on  her  entire  sex  at  once.  I  shall  be  doing  so, 
I  trust,  when  I  assert  that  women  never  paint  with  more 
caustic  colours  (Swift's  black  art  is  but  weak  water-colour 
in  comparison)  than  when  they  have  to  portray  the  bodily 
unlovelinesses  of  other  women.  Further,  that  the  prettiest 
of  faces  roughens  and  bristles  into  an  ugly  one,  when  it 
expresses  anger  with  the  feminine  recruiting  officer  more 
than  pity  for  the  deserter.  To  speak  accurately :  Every 
woman  is  jealous  of  all  other  women,  because — not,  per- 
haps, her  own  husband  (or  lover,  as  the  case  may  be),  but — 
all  other  men  are  attracted  by  them,  and  are  consequently 
not  true  to  her.  Therefore  every  woman  takes  the  same  vow 
concerning  these  vice-queens  of  this  earth  that  Hannibal 
took  concerning  the  Komans,  and  keeps  it  just  as  religiously. 
For  which  reason  every  woman  has  the  power  which 
Fordyce  says  all  animal  bodies  possess — that  of  making  all 
others  cold ;  and,  indeed,  every  woman  must  of  necessity 
be  an  enemy  and  persecutor  of  a  sex  which  consists 
entirely  of  rivals.  And  it  is  probable  that  many — for 
instance,  nuns  in  their  convents,  and  Moravians — call  each 
other  sisters,  or  sister-souls,  with  the  view  of  giving  some 
sort  of  expression  to  the  nature  of  their  sentiments  for  each 
other ;  since  sisters  are  just  the  very  people  who  quarrel 
the  most.  This  is  why  Madame  Bouillon's  parties  quarrees 
consisted  of  three  men  and  only  one  woman.  It  may  be 
that  it  led  St.  Athanasius,  Basilius,  Scotus,  and  other 
teachers  of  the  Church  to  entertain  the  belief  that,  with 
the  single  exception  of  the  Virgin  Mary,  ill  women  would 
rise  as  men  at  the  Day  of  Judgment,  in  order  that  there 
may  be  no  anger,  or  envy,  or  bickerings  in  heaven.     There 


462  JEAN  PAUL  FBIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IV. 

is  but  one  queen  who  is  beloved,  nourished  and  cherished 
by  many  thousands  of  her  own  sex — the  queen-bee  of  the 
workeis  (who  are  of  the  feminine  gender,  according  to  the 
most  recent  observations. 

I  shall  close  this  chapter  with  a  sort  of  preliminary 
word  for  Lenette.  The  foul  fiend  Eosa,  by  way  of  giving 
like  for  like  (or  rather  worse  for  like)  had  emptied  whole 
basketsful  of  the  seed  of  evil-weeds  into  Lenette's  open 
heart,  and  unpacked  compliments,  to  commence  with,  and 
news  of  her  husband ;  then,  afterwards,  disparaging  matter. 
She  had  believed  him  all  the  more  readily  because  it  was 
a  clever,  learned,  and  intellectual  woman  whom  he  was 
nigrifying,  breaking  with,  and  offering  up  as  a  sacrifice. 
What  she  most  hated  in  Nathalie  was  her  cleverness,  her 
learning,  and  intellectualness ;  for  it  was  the  want  of 
those  that  had  brought  herself  to  such  shame.  Like 
many  women,  she  thought  that  the  heads  of  Venuses  were 
not  "  the  true  article  "  (as  some  connoisseurs  think  is  the 
case  with  the  Venus  de  Medici).  What  provoked  her  most 
of  all  was  that  Firmian  should  take  another  woman's  part 
more  than  his  own  wife's — nay,  at  his  own  wife's  expense  ; 
and  that  Nathalie,  in  her  conceit  and  pride,  had  got  ready  a 
sack  to  give  such  a  nice,  rich  gentleman,  instead  of  weaving 
a  net  to  hold  him  with.  She  was  also  very  much  annoyed 
that  her  husband  had  admitted  everything,  as  she  con- 
sidered his  candour  was  only  lordly  indifference  as  to  what 
she  might  feel  on  the  subject. 

What  did  Firmian  do?  He  forgave.  His  two  reasons 
for  doing  so  were  good  ones — "  Bayreuth  "  and  "  the 
grave."  The  former  had  parted  him  from  her  so  long ;  the 
latter  was  soon  to  part  him  from  her  for  ever.  A  third 
reason  might  perhaps  be  this :  Lenette,  as  regarded  his 
love  for  Nathalie,  was  not  so  very  utterly  the  reverse  of 
right. 


CHAP.  XVIII.]   FLOWEK,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.    463 

CHAPTER  XVIII. 

AFTER  StJMMER  OF   MARRIAGE —PREPARATIONS   FOR   DEATH. 

Although  Sunday  was  come,  and  the  Vicar's  eyes  were  no 
more  open  than  his  congregation's  (because,  like  many  of 
the  clergy,  he  kept  his  physical  eyes  shut  while  preaching), 
my  hero  went  to  him  to  get  his  certificate  of  birth,  because 
this  was  wanted  for  the  Brandenburg  Widows'  Fund. 

Leibgeber  had  charged  himself  with  the  rest.  Enough 
of  the  subject — for  I  don't  care  to  say  mote  about  it  than 
I  can  help ;  because  some  years  ago — long  after  all  Sie- 
benkaes's  pecuniary  affairs  had  been  settled  up  to  the  last 
farthing,  and  his  debt  to  the  Fund  duly  paid. — the  *  Im- 
perial Gazette '  publicly  accused  me  of  bringing  discredit 
upon  Integrity  and  Widows'  Funds  by  the  last  book  of 
this  story  of  mine,  and  considered  it  to  be  its  (the  '  Ga- 
zette's ')  duty  to  take  me  pretty  severely  to  task  on  the 
subject,  according  to  its  measure  of  ability.  But  are  the 
advocate  and  I  the  same  person  ?  Does  not  everybody 
know  that  my  proceedings  as  regards  my  married  life  in 
general,  and  the  Prussian  Widows'  Fund  in  particular, 
have  been  quite  unlike  those  of  Siebenkaes  in  every 
respect,  and  that  to  this  very  hour  I  have  never  departed 
this  life,  either  in  jest  or  in  earnest,  in  all  these  years 
during  which  I  have  regularly  paid  a  considerable  annual 
contribution  to  the  institution  in  question?  Nay,  do  I  not 
mean — (and  I  need  have  no  hesitation  in  saying  so) — to 
go  on  paying  my  yearly  quotum  for  as  many  more  years  as 
I  can — so  that,  when  I  die,  the  fund  may  have  got  more 
out  of  me  than  out  of  any  other  contributor? 

These  are  my  views  on  the  subject ;  but  I  must  do 
Siebenkaes  the  simple  justice  to  state  (to  his  credit)  that 
the  views  by  which  he  was  actuated  differed  very,  very 
little  from  my  own.  The  only  thing  was,  that,  in  Bay- 
reuth,  he  had  immolated  his  own  truthful  heart  to  the 
stormy  urgency  of  his  friend,  Leibgeber,  which  had  imbued 
and  intoxicated  him,  in  a  moment  of  enthusiasm,  with  that 
cosmopolitan  spirit  of  his  which,  in  the  boundless  soul- 
transmigrations  which,  in  the  course  of  his  never  ending 


464  JEAN   PALI-   FMEDRICH   RICHTER.        [l.'OOK  IV. 

journeyings  he  passed  through,  had  come  to  look  upon  life 
too  much  as  a  mere  game  at  cards,  and  stage-play — as  a 
Chicken -hazard,  and  Opera  Buffa  and  Seria  combined.  And 
as,  besides,  he  knew  Leibgeber's  pecuniary  circumstances, 
and  his  contempt  for  money  (and  his  own  into  the  bargain), 
he  had  undertaken  a  role  which  was  anything  but  well 
suited  to  him,  and  as  to  which  he  had  as  little  foreseen  the 
torture  of  difficulty  which  it  would  cost  him  to  act  it,  as 
the  ]»enitential  sermon  which  was  to  bo  preached  from 
Gotha  concerning  it. 

At  the  same  time  it  was  a  great  piece  of  good  luck  that 
it  was  only  Becker's  '  Gazette '  that  found  out  about  Na- 
thalie's straw-widowhood,  and  not  Lenette !  Heavens,  if 
the  latter,  with  her  silk  "  Forget-me  "  (for  the  "  not  "  had 
altogether  disappeared  from  it),  in  her  hand,  had  got  wind 
of  Firmian's  adoptive  marriage  !  I  neither  desiie  to  judge 
the  fair  sex,  nor  to  be  judged  by  them.  But  at  this  point 
I  would  fain  put  to  all  my  lady  readers  (and  most  parti- 
cularly to  one  of  them),  two  rather  weighty  and  impurtant 
questions. 

"  Would  you  not  bend  down  from  your  judge's  seat  and 
hand  my  hero,  if  not  a  flower- wreath,  an  oak-wreath,  at  all 
events,  for  his  good  and  kind  behaviour  to  this  feminine 
couple  ?  Or  (inasmuch  as  there  are  four  female  hands 
playing  a  duet  sonata  on  his  heart),  a  bouquet  for  his 
button-hole  at  the  very  least  ? "  Dearest  lady  readers, 
you  could  not  possibly  have  given  a  better  verdict — although 
my  surprise  at  it  is  not  so  great  as  my  gratification.  My 
second  question  nobody  shall  put  to  you  but  yourselves. 
Let  each  of  you  ask  herself,  "  Suppose  you  had  this  fourth 
book  of  my  story  put  into  your  hands,  and  icere  Lenette  her 
very  self,  and  consequently  knew  to  a  hair  all  about  the 
whole  business  from  beginning  to  end ;  what  would  you 
think  of  your  husband  Siebenkses'  proceedings  ?  What 
would  you  do  ? 

1  will  answer  the  question  for  you :  "  Weep,  storm,* 
chide,  be  very  angry,  not  speak  a  word,  break  things,  &c." 
So  terribly  does  selfishness  falsify,  corrupt  and  degrade 

*  The  white-flowering  sort  would  weep — the  red-flowering  sort 
would  storm,  as  the  pale  moon  indicates  rainy  weather,  and  the  red 
juoon  high  wind.    {Pallida  luna  pluit,  rubicunda  flat.) 


CHAP.    XVIII.]   FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.    465 

the  most  delicate  moral  feelings,  coercing  them  into  the 
giving  of  two  totally  diverse  verdicts  upon  one  and  the 
same  case.  Whenever  I  am  wavering,  or  in  any  hesita- 
tion, concerning  the  worth  of  a  character,  or  conclusion,  I 
always  find  it  helps  me  to  come  to  a  decision  in  a  moment 
if  I  represent  it  to  my  niind's-eye  as  coming  wet  from  the 
press  in  a  novel  or  biography.  If  it  seems  right  then,  it  is 
certain  to  be  right. 

It  was  far  better,  and  more  becoming,  for  Graces  to 
dwell  hidden  in  the  Satyrs  of  old,  and  in  Socrates,  than  to 
reverse  the  process,  so  that  Satyrs  should  dwell  hidden 
within  Graces.  The  Satyr  who  possessed  Lenette  butted 
about  him  in  all  directions  with  horns  of  very  consider 
able  sharpness.  Her  unreciprocated  anger  began  to  take 
the  shape  of  sneering  banter,  for  her  husband's  present 
meekness  and  gentleness  were  so  strikingly  in  contrast 
with  his  former  Job's-disputations,  that  she  came  to  the 
conclusion  that  his  heart  was  frozen  altogether.  In  old 
times  he  had  wanted  to  be  served  by  mutes  (like  a  Sultan), 
until  his  satirical  foetus,  his  book,  should  be  brought 
to  the  light  of  day  by  help  of  the  Roonhuysian  lever  and 
Caesarian  operation  of  the  penknife;  even  as  Zacharias 
was  dumb  until  the  child  ceased  to  be  so,  and  was  born, 
and  cried  simultaneously  with  him.  Formerly,  their  mar- 
ried life  had  been  like  most  other  people's ;  for  the  majority 
of  wedded  pairs  are  like  those  twin-daughters,*  grown 
Together  as  to  their  backs,  but  continually  quarrelling 
(though  they  could  never  look  each  other  in  the  face),  and 
always  trying  to  go  towards  opposite  quarters  of  the  globe, 
till  the  one  succeeded  in  forcing  the  other  in  the  direc- 
tion in  which  she  wanted  to  go.  Now,  on  the  contrary, 
Firinian  allowed  all  Lenette's  discords  to  jar  on  as  long 
as  they  pleased,  without  the  slightest  trace  of  irritation. 
A  soft,  peaceful  light  now  fell  upon  all  her  angles,  upon 
her  works  of  supererogation  in  washing,  on  the  water- 
sproutlings  of  her  tongue;  and  the  tint  of  the  shadow 
which  her  heart  (made  of  dark  earth,  like  everybody 
else's)  cast,  as  a  matter  of  course,  was  very  much  lost  in 
the  blue  of  heaven,  as  shadows  cast  in  starlight  are  (ac- 

*  In  the  neighbourhood  of  Comorn  (Windisch's  'Geography  of 
Hungary ').     Buchau  mentions  a  similar  twin-birth  in  Scotland. 
».  2    H 


406  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  IV. 

oording  to  Mariette)  as  blue  as  the  sky  overhead.  And 
was  there  not  always  a  grand,  blue,  starry  sky  spread  out 
above  his  soul,  in  the  shape  of  death  ?  Every  morning, 
every  evening,  he  said  to  himself,  "  Wiry  should  I  not  go 
on  always  forgiving  everything !  We  have  such  a  xery 
little  while  to  be  together  now."  Every  opportunity  of 
forgiving  did  something  to  sweeten  the  bitterness  of  his 
voluntary  farewell ;  and,  as  those  who  are  going  away,  or 
going  to  die,  are  eager  to  pardon, — the  deep,  warm  spring 
and  fount  of  love  in  his  heart  was  never  chilled  from 
morning  till  night.  He  was  lain  to  pass  along  the  brief, 
dark,  alley  of  weeping  willows,  which  led  from  his  home 
to  his  empty  grave  (a  full  one,  alas  1  as  regarded  his  love), 
leaning  only  on  beloved  arms ;  and  to  rest  on  the  mossy 
banks  by  its  side,  between  his  friend  and  his  wife,  with  a 
beloved  hand  in  each  of  his  own.  Thus  it  is  that  death 
not  only  beautifies  our  bodies  when  the  soul  has  fled  (as 
Lavater  points  out),  but  even  in  life  the  thought  of  death 
gives  new  beauty  to  our  lineaments,  and  new  strength  to 
the  heart,  as  rosemary  both  winds  as  a  garland  about  the 
dead,  and  revives  the  fainting  by  its  cordial  essence. 

"  There  is  nothing  surprising  to  me  in  this,"  quoth  the 
reader.  "Everybody  in  Firmian's  position  would  have 
felt  just  as  he  did ;  at  all  events,  I  should."  But,  dear 
reader,  are  we  not  all  in  Firmian's  position?  Does  the 
nearness  or  the  remoteness  of  o\ir  everlasting  good-bye 
make  any  difference?  Ah!  inasmuch  as,  here  below,  we 
are  nothing  but  images,  delusively  firm,  and  red  of  colour, 
standing  on  the  edges  of  our  holes,  into  which  (like  the 
ancient  princes)  we  totter,  crumbling  to  dust,  when  the 
unknown  hand  gives  the  mouldering  images  a  shake — why 
do  we  not  say  (like  Firmian),  "  Why  should  I  not  forgive  ? 
We  have  so  short  a  time  to  be  together."  We  should 
have  four  better  fast-days,  and  prayer-  and  penitence- 
days,  than  we  usually  have  if  we  had  but  four  days  of 
bitter,  hopeless  sickness  to  go  through,  one  after  the  other, 
every  year ;  because  we  should  look  down  from  our  sick 
bed  (that  ice-region  of  life  beside  the  crater)  with  loftier  and 
sublimer  glance  upon  the  pleasure-gardens  and  pleasure- 
forests  of  life  as  they  shrunk  and  shrivelled  away ;  because 
there  our  wretched  racecourses  would  seem  shorter,  and 


CHAP.  XVII i. J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  TIECES.    467 

only  the  people  larger,  and  we  should  there  love  nothing 
but  hearts,  magnify  and  detect  no  other  faults  but  our 
own,  and  because  we  leave  our  sick  beds  with  better  reso- 
lutions than  we  take  to  them  with.  For  the  first  day 
of  convalescence  of  the  body,  after  its  winter  of  sickness, 
is  the  blossoming  time  of  a  lovelier  soul,  which  issues 
forth  as  if  transfigured  from  the  earth's  cold  crust  into  a 
mild  warm  Eden;  longing  to  press  all  things  to  her 
breast  (feeble  yet,  and  short  of  breath) — mankind,  and 
flowers,  and  spring  breezes,  and  every  other  bosom  which 
has  sighed  for  her  upon  her  hed  of  pain.  Like  all  the 
newly  risen  from  death,  she  longs  to  love  all  things  through- 
out an  eternity ;  and  the  whole  heart  is  a  warm  and  dewy 
spring-time,  rich  in  buds,  beneath  a  youthful  sun. 

How  Firmian  would  have  loved  his  Lenette,  had  she  not 
constrained  him  to  be  always  pardoning,  instead  of  petting 
and  caressing  her !  Ah !  she  would  have  rendered  his 
approaching  death  a  terribly  difficult  task  for  him  if  she 
had  been  like  what  she  was  in  their  honeymoon  days ! 

But  their  byegone  Paradise  was  now  yielding  a  harvest 
of  ripe  Grains  of  Paradise  (the  old  name  for  peppercorns). 
Lenette  piled  fuel  on  the  fire  of  her  hell's  ante-chamber 
of  jealousy,  brewing  there,  for  him,  the  draught  of  the 
coming  heaven  of  Vaduz.  A  jealous  woman  can  be  cured 
by  no  kind  of  speech  or  treatment ;  she  is  like  the  kettle- 
drums, which  are  the  most  difficult  of  all  instruments  to 
tune,  and  the  quickest  to  get  out  of  tune  when  tuned. 
A  loving,  tender  look  was,  to  Lenette,  a  blister;  for  he 
had  looked  at  Nathalie  with  one  like  it.  If  he  seemed 
happy  and  glad,  it  was  evident  he  was  thinking  of  the 
past.  If  he  looked  unhappy  and  sad,  he  was  thinking  ot 
the  past  too,  but  with  longing.  He  had  to  consider  his 
face  in  the  light  of  an  open  warrant  of  caption,  or  bill- 
poster and  placard,  of  the  thoughts  which  were  behind  it. 
In  short,  her  husband  merely  served  her  as  fiddle  rosin  to 
roughen  her  horse-hair  with,  in  order  to  bow  her  viole 
d'amour  with  it  from  morning  till  night.  He  dare  not 
allow  himself  more  than  an  occasional  word  about  Bay- 
reuth,  scarce  so  much  as  the  name  of  it ;  for  if  he  did,  she 
knew  whom  he  was  thinking  of.  Nay,  he  could  not  say 
anything  at  all  strong  in  disparagement  of  Kuhschnappel 

2  h  2 


Ib'8  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDEICH  RIC11TER.       [BOOK  IV. 

without  raising  a  suspicion  that  he  was  comparing  it  with 
Bayreuth,  and  thinking  the  latter  much  the  better  place 
(for  reasons  well  known  to  her).  Wherefore  (and  whether 
in  earnest,  or  from  consideration  for  her,  1  really  do  not 
know)  he  restricted  his  laudations  of  Bayreuth  merely  to 
the  buildings  there,  not  venturing  to  extend  them  to  their 
inhabitants. 

There  was  only  one  object  of  praise  concerning  the 
praising,  whereof  he  ignored  every  idea  of  difficulty  and 
miscomprehension,  and  this  was  Leibgeber,  his  friend. 
But — thanks  to  Bosa's  calumnies,  and  the  fact  of  his 
having  aided  and  abetted  in  affairs  at  Fantaisie — it  so 
chanced  that  Leibgeber  had  come  to  be  more  unendurable 
by  her  now  than  he  had  been  in  the  old  days,  by  reason 
of  his  indecorous  conduct,  and  his  great  dog.  Slie  knew, 
moreover,  that  Stiefel  had  several  times  expressed  grave 
disapproval  of  him  and  his  doings. 

"  My  dear  Henry  will  be  here  very  soon  now,  Lenette," 
said  Firmian. 

"  And  that  hoirible  brute  with  him,  I  suppose,  of 
course  ?  "  she  asked. 

"  I  do  think,"  he  answered,  "  you  might  like  my  friend 
a  little  better  than  you  do ;  if  not  because  he  is  so  very 
like  myself,  at  any  rate,  on  account  of  the  faithfulness  of 
his  friendship.  If  you  did,  you  wouldn't  be  so  terribly 
set  against  his  dog;  you  used  not  to  mind  mine  when 
I  had  one.  He  must  have  some  faithful  creature  to  follow 
him  about  on  his  everlasting  journeys ;  through  thick  and 
thin,  through  good  times  and  bad,  as  Saufinder  does. 
And  he  looks  upon  me  as  just  such  another  faithful 
creature,  and  is  every  bit  as  fond  of  me.  But  for  that 
matter,  the  whole  faithful  trio  of  us  are  not  likely  to 
trouble  Kuhschnappel  very  long." 

Meanwhile,  no  amount  of  love  enabled  him  to  gain  his 
suit  for  love.  It  here  strikes  me  that  this  was  only  a 
most  natural  matter,  and  that  the  recent  warm  proximity 
of  the  Schulrath  had  raised  Lenette's  temperature  (of 
love)  to  such  a  point  that  her  husband's  felt  like  a  blast  of 
cold  wind  by  comparison.  The  jealousy  of  hatred  pro- 
ceeds just  like  the  jealousy  of  love.  There  is  but  one 
sign  for  the  cypher  of  nothing  and  the  circle  of  infinity. 


CHAP.  XVIII.]     FLOWER,  FKUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.   469 

The  time  had  arrived  when  Siebenkees  had  to  pave  the 
way,  and  give  a  colour  to,  his  sham  death,  hy  a  feigned 
sickness  of  some  sort ;  but  this  voluntary  bending  over  the 
grave,  and  drooping  towards  it,  gave  his  conscience  a 
pretext  for  trying  to  win  back  Lenette's  embittered  heart. 
Thus  it  is  that  deceived,  and  deceiving,  man  always  mag- 
nifies and  elevates  his  false  shows,  his  cheateries,  and 
deceptions  either  into  less  ones  than  they  really  are,  or  into 
beneficently  intended  ones. 

The  Greek  and  Roman  lawgivers  invented  dreams  and 
prophecies,  which  contained  the  ground-plans  and  eleva- 
tions of  their  projects,  as  well  as  the  building-conditions, 
and  building-materials  of  them.  For  instance,  Alcibiades 
lied  forth  a  prophecy  of  the  conquest  of  Sicily.  Firmian 
imitated  this  process,  with  alterations  suitable  to  the  cir- 
cumstances of  his  case.  He  often  said,  in  Stiefel's  presence 
(for  Stiefel  took  a  deep  and  tender  interest  in  everything, 
and,  consequently,  so  did  she),  that  he  should  soon  be  going 
away  for  ever — that  he  should  soon  be  playing  in  a  game 
at  hide-and-seek,  and  hide  himself  so  effectually  that  no 
friendly  eye  should  be  able  to  find  him  again — that  he 
would  soon  slip  behind  the  bed-curtain  of  the  coffin-pall, 
and  vanish.  He  told  them  a  dream  (which,  perhaps,  was 
no  invention).  He  said,  "  The  Schulrath  and  Lenette  were 
looking  at  a  room  in  which  a  scythe  was  moving  of  its  own 
accord  ;*  then,  in  a  while,  Firmian's  clothes  were  walking 
about  in  the  room,  empty,  without  any  body  in  them.  '  He 
must  have  other  clothes  on,'  they  both  said.  Then  all  at 
once  the  churchyard  passed  along  the  street,  with  a  fresh 
grave  in  it,  no  grass  on  it  as  yet.  But  a  voice  cried, '  Seek 
him  not  there ;  it  is  over  and  past  now.'  And  a  second 
(softer)  voice  cried,  Rest — rest — thou  art  worn  and  weary. 
And  a  third  said, '  Weep  not,  if  ye  love  him.'  But  a  fourth 
cried  out,  in  terrible  tones,  'Jest — jest — all  human  life  and 
death.'  "  Firmian  was  the  first  to  shed  tears ;  his  friend 
was  the  next,  and  his  angry  spouse  wept,  with  the  latter. 

But  now  he  looked  with  eager  longing  for  the  coming 
of  Leibgeber,  whose  hand  would  lead  him  quicker  and 
more  pleasantly  through  the  dark  foreground,  and  the  hot, 

*  There  was  a  superstition  that  the  Headsman's  sword  moved,  of 
iteelf,  before  cutting  off  somebody's  head. 


470      JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  EICHTEE.    [  BOOK  IV. 

reeking,  sultry,  breathless,  forehell  of  his  artificial  death. 
For  he  himself  was  now  too  feeble  and  too  tender  to  pass 
through  them  alone. 

And  upon  one  particular,  unusually  lovely,  August 
evening  he  was  so,  more  than  ever  before.  There  played 
and  rested  on  his  face  that  glorified  and  celestial  bliss  of 
self-devotion — that  tearless  depth  of  emotion  and  smiling 
gentleness,  which  sometimes  come  to  us  when  pain  and 
sorrow  are — weary  for  the  time,  rather  than  over  and  past — 
something  like  the  blue  sky  when  the  brightness  of  the 
rainbow  falls  in  light  athwart  its  radiant  beauty.  He 
resolved  to  bid  good-bye,  in  solitude,  that  day  to  all  the 
beautiful  country  which  lay  around  the  town. 

The  face  of  Nature  was  veiled  (but  not  for  his  eyes,  for 
his  soul  only),  in  a  thin,  soft  mist,  which  went  hovering 
before  the  breeze  in  ever-changing  wreaths,  like  the  tender 
vapouriness — not  amounting  to  a  shrouding — which  Ber- 
ghem's  and  Wouvertnanns'  pencils  have  cast  upon  their 
landscapes.  As  though  to  say  farewell,  he  went  and 
touched,  and  gazed  upon,  every  leafy  tree  beneath  whose 
branches  he  had  been  wont  to  read — each  little  darkling 
brooklet,  purling  on  its  way  beneath  its  thickets  of  forest- 
roots,  laved  bare  of  earth  by  its  ripples — each  rocky  crag, 
all  green  and  sweet  of  scent  with  moss  and  flowers — each 
stair-way  of  rising  hillocks  which,  in  the  days  gone  by,  he 
had  climbed  to  see  the  sun  set  (or  gone  down  to  watch  his 
risings)  many  times  instead  of  once — and  every  spot  where 
wide  creation  had  brought  tears  of  rapture  from  his  happy 
heart.  But  everywhere— amid  the  long  harvest  corn-ears, 
amid  Creation's  oft-repeated  tale  in  Nature's  brooding-oven 
with  all  its  swarming  life,  in  the  seed-nursery  of  the  ripe 
and  endless  garden — a  hollow,  broken  voice  cried  out,  in 
long-drawn  tones  which  mingled  with,  and  sounded  clea- 
above,  the  bright,  rejoicing,  trumpet-clang  of  Nature's 
'  Alexander's  Feast,'  "  What,  are  these  dead  men's  bones 
that  move  about  amid  this  life  of  mine,  defiling  all  my 
blossoms?"  And  to  him  it  seemed  as  if,  from  out  the 
glory  of  the  red  West  sky,  a  something  sang  to  him, 
"Wandering  skeleton!  with  strings  of  nerves  clasped  in 
thy  bony  hand,  thou  ph«yest  not  on  thyself.  The  breath 
of  endless  life  is  breathiti»;  on  the  ^Jolian  harp,  which 


CHAP.  XIX.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      471 

answers  back  in  music,  and  thou  art  played  upon."  But 
Boon  this  mournful  error  fell  away  from  him,  and  he  thought 
thus :  *  I  am  both  playing  and  answering  back  in  music. 
I  both  think  and  am  thought.  It  is  not  the  green  bark  that 
holds  my  Dryad,  my  spiritus  rector  (the  soul).  The  latter 
holds  the  former.  The  life  of  the  body  depends  as  inti- 
mately on  the  life  of  the  soul,  as  that  of  the  latter  on  that 
of  the  former.  Life  and  force  are  at  work,  with  power, 
everywhere.  The  grave  hillock  and  the  mouldering  body 
are  each  a  world  of  powers  at  work.  We  change  our  stage, 
but  do  not  retire  from  it." 

When  he  got  home,  he  found  the  following  letter  from 
Leibgeber  for  him  : — 

"  1  am  on  my  way ;  set  out  on  yours. — L." 


CHAPTER  XIX. 


THE  APPARITION — HOMECOMING  OF  THE  STORMS  IN  AUGUST, 
OR  THE  LAST  QUAKREL — THE  RAIMENT  OF  THE  CHILDREN 
OF   ISRAEL. 

One  night,  at  about  eleven  o'clock,  a  tremendous  blow 
was  heard  to  strike  the  roof- tree,  as  if  two  or  three  hundred- 
weights of  Alps  had  come  down  upon  it.  Lenette  went 
upstairs  with  Sophia  to  see  whether  it  was  the  devil,  or 
only  a  cat.  They  came  back  with  wintry  faces,  the 
colour  of  flour,  and  as  long  as  one's  arm ;  and  Sophia  cried 
out,  "  Oh !  it's  the  Poor's  Advocate  (may  the  Lord  have 
a  care  of  him!) — he's  lying  up  yonder  on  the  camp-bed, 
like  a  corpse."  The  live  Poor's  Advocate,  to  whom  this 
tale  was  being  told,  was  sitting  in  his  room.  He  said 
it  could  not  be  true,  or  he  would  have  heard  the  noise 
as  well  as  the  others.  From  this  deafness  of  his,  all  the 
women  at  once  inferred  what  the  occurrence  really  por- 
tended—to wit,  his  death.  The  cobbler  Fecht  (who,  by 
right  of  royal  succession,  was  night-watchman  regnant  that 
night),  glad  of  an  opportunity  of  showing  the  pluck  that 
was  in  him,  armed  himself  with  the  watchman's  spear- 
staff  (his  entire  avtilleiy-park),  but,  when  nobody  wan 
looking,  stuck  a  black  leather  hymn-book  in  his  pocket — 


472  JEAN  PAUL  FEIEDKICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IV. 

by  way  of  a  species  of  saintly  host — in  case  it  should  turn 
out  that  it  wag  the  devil  that  was  upstairs.  On  his 
way  up  he  repeated  a  good  many  fragments  of  the  Even- 
ing Service,  which  was  more  than  could,  perhaps,  have 
been  required  of  him  on  that  evening  when,  as  Archon 
of  the  Watch,  his  calling  of  the  hours  was,  in  fact,  a 
species  of  expanded  Evening  Prayer,  distributed  in  small 
modicums  about  the  streets.  He  was  marching  bravely 
up  to  the  camp-bed,  when,  alas  !  he  too  saw  the  white 
powdery  face  before  him,  and,  behind  the  bed,  a  hell-hound 
with  eyes  of  fire,  watching  the  corpse  in  a  grim  and 
ferocious  fashion.  He  stood  still  instantaneously,  as  if 
petrified — like  a  watchman  carved  out  of  alabaster,  hard 
boiled  (so  to  speak),  in  a  perspiration  of  terror,  with  his 
weapon  held  out  before  him.  He  foresaw,  beyond  the 
shadow  of  a  doubt,  that  the  moment  he  turned  his  back 
to  go  flying  down  the  stairs,  the  thing  would  clasp  its  arms 
about  him  from  behind,  saddle  him,  and  ride  him  down. 
By  the  greatest  good  luck,  a  voice  from  downstairs  here 
fell  into  his  heart  like  a  cordial  or  courage-water,  and  he 
heaved  up  his  boar-spear  with  the  view  of  striking  the 
thing  dead,  or,  at  all  events,  gauging  the  cubic  contents  of 
it.  But  when,  at  this  juncture,  the  snowy-looking  thing 
began  to  rise  slowly  up,  as  if  growing — his  head  began  to 
feel  as  if  he  had  on  a  bonnet  of  pitch,  and  somebody  were 
screwing  this  cap,  and  the  hair  inside  it,  tighter  and 
tighter  every  moment;  and  he  could  not  keep  hold  of  his 
eel-spear  because  the  top  of  it  felt  as  heavy  as  if  his 
biggest  journeyman  was  hanging  to  it.  So  he  let  his 
sticking-iron  go,  and  flew  bravely  from  the  topmost,  three- 
ledger-lined  octave  of  the  stair,  like  a  flash  of  lightning, 
down  to  the  double-bass  key  or  step. 

When  he  got  down,  he  swore,  in  presence  of  the  master 
of  the  house  and  all  the  lodgers  assembled,  that,  he  was 
going  to  do  his  watohman's  duty  without  his  halberd,  for 
the  ghost  had  got  hold  of  that ;  and.  in  fact,  he  quivered 
like  an  aspen-leaf  and  his  blood  ran  cold  in  his  veins, 
every  time  his  eye  so  much  as  rested  for  a  moment  on  the 
Advocate's  face.  Firmian  was  the  only  one  of  the  com- 
pany who  had  the  courage  to  go  upstairs  for  the  weapon. 
When  he  got  upstairs  he  ibund  what  he  had  expected  to  find, 


CHAP.' XIX.]   FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.        4"3 

namely,  his  friend  Leibgeber,  who  had  whitened  himself 
with  the  powder  out  of  an  old  wig  by  way  of  gradually 
paving  the  way  and  preparing  people's  minds  for  Sie- 
benkass's  artificial  death.  They  quietly  embraced,  and 
Henry  said  he  would  come  upstairs,  in  an  orthodox  fashion, 
next  day. 

When  Firmian  returned  to  his  room,  he  said  there 
was  nothing  upstairs  but  an  old  wig ;  here  was  the  swift- 
footed  spearman's  spear,  and  he  counted  here  before  him 
two  timid  hares  of  the  female  sex  and  one  of  the  male. 
But  the  entire  conventicle  knew  as  well  as  possible  what 
all  this  meant.  Nobody,  with  as  many  brains  as  a  turnip 
in  his  head,  would  give  a  halfpenny  for  Siebenkaes'  life  ; 
and  these  ghost-seers  thanked  Heaven  most  devoutly  that 
they  were  thus  frightened  to  death,  since  it  was  a  proof 
that  their  own  lives  were  in  no  immediate  danger.  Lenette 
could  not  bring  herself  to  sit  up  in  bed  all  night,  for  fear 
she  should  see  her  husband's  likeness. 

When  morning  came,  Henry  mounted  the  stair  (with 
his  dog),  in  dusty  boots.  Siebenkaes  felt  as  though  his  hat 
and  his  pockets  must  be  full  of  flowers  from  the  Bayreuth 
Eden  ;  he  was  like  a  garden  statue  from  the  lost  garden. 
To  Lenette,  just  for  this  very  reason,  this  palm-tree  from 
Firmian's  East  India  possessions  at  Bayreuth  (we  shall  say 
nothing  of  Saufinder),  was  nothing  but  a  prickly  holly- 
bush,  and  never  less  than  now  could  she  take  any  pleasure 
in  such  a  gooseberry-bush,  such  a  thistle-head — beautiful 
as  if  fresh  from  Hamilton's  pencil.*  I  must  admit,  how- 
ever (and  I  say  it  right  out,  without  going  about  the  bush), 
that  his  affection  for  Firmian  made  his  mode  of  treating 
Lenette  (who  was  in  the  wrong  and  in  the  right  in  about 
equal  proportions)  a  little  too  reseiwed  and  cool.  We 
never  hate  a  woman  so  heartily  as  when  she  is  torturing 
somebody  who  is  very  dear  to  us ;  just  as,  on  the  other 
hand,  a  woman  is  so  grim  to  nobody  as  to  the  tormentor 
of  her  pet  female  friend. 

The  scene  which  I  have  now  got  to  describe  in  a  minute 
or  two  makes  me  feel,  in  the  keenest  degree,  sensible  of 
the  depth  of  the  chasm  which  lies  between  the  novel-writer 

*  Who  distinguished  himself  by  painting  thistles  as  much  ai  Swift 
by  writing  them. 


474  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  IV. 

(who  can  skip  annoying  matters,  and  sugar  up  anything 
he  wishes  for  himself,  his  hero,  or  his  readers)  and  the 
mere  biographer,  or  writer  of  actual  history,  like  myself, 
who  has  to  dish  up  everything  in  a  strictly  historical 
form,  without  asking  whether  it  has  got  to  be  sugared  or 
salted.  If  I  formerly,  then,  excised  and  omitted  the  scene 
in  question  altogether,  I  was  perhaps  to  blame :  but  there 
was  nothing  surprising  in  my  doing  so,  seeing  that  in 
these  days  I  preferred  delighting  my  readers  to  instruct- 
ing them,  and  thought  more  about  pretty  colouring  than 
truthful  drawing. 

Leibgeber  (and  all  belonging  to  him)  had  for  some 
time  been  wholly  unendurable  in  Lenette's  eyes,  chiefly 
for  this  reason  (amongst  others)  that  he,  a  man  without 
anything  in  the  shape  of  an  official  title  or  appoint- 
ment of  any  sort,  should  be  on  such  very  familiar  and 
intimate  terms  with  her  husband — a  man  who  had  held 
the  post  of  "  Poor's  Advocate "  of  Kuhschnappel  for  a 
considerable  time.  Also  that,  like  her  said  husband  (by 
him  misled  and  perverted),  he  went  about  without  a  pigtail, 
so  that  people  pointed  at  the  pair  of  them,  and  cried, 
"  Ey !  look  it  that  nice  couple  ! "  or  "  Par  nobile  fratrum." 
These  sayings,  and  worse  besides,  Lenette  could  draw 
from  the  most  authentic  of  all  sources  of  history.  Of 
course,  it  is  true  that,  novo-a-days,  it  requires  about  as  much 
courage  to  pit  on  a  tail  as  it  then  did  to  take  it  off.  A 
canon  of  a  cathedral  does  not,  now-a-days  (as  he  did  in 
bygone  times),  find  it  incumbent  on  him  to  make  himself 
a  pigtail,  and  pleasant  society  by  help  of  it ;  consequently 
he  has  not  got  to  cast  it  twice  a  year  (as  peacocks  do  their 
tails)  that  he  may  legally  earn  his  salary  of  two  thousand 
florins  by  appearing  in  the  choir  at  vespers  with  close- 
cropped  hair;  the  latter  he  wears  at  the  card-table  now,  as 
well  as  in  the  pulpit.  In  the  few  countries  where  the  pigtail 
still  obtains,  it  is  more  in  the  nature  of  a  duty-pendulum 
and  state-perpendicular  than  anything  else  ;  and  long  hair 
(which  formed  part  of  the  royal  insignia  of  the  Frank 
kings)  is  a  badge  of  servitude  in  the  case  of  soldiers,  no 
long  as  it  worn  tied  up  with  a  pigtail-ribbon,  and  not 
flying  unbound  and  loose.  The  Frieslanders  weje  long 
in  the  hatit  of  taking  hold  of  the  pigtail  when  swearing 


CHAP.  XIX.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      475 

an  oath — calling  this  "  the  Boedel  Oath  :"  and  to  this  day 
in  many  countries  the  military  or  standard  oath  presup- 
poses the  existence  of  a  quexxe.  And  as  among  the  ancient 
Germans  a  pigtail  carried  on  a  pole  represented  a  parish, 
of  course  a  company  or  regiment  (of  which  each  soldier 
has  his  own  tail  at  the  back  of  nis  head)  must  be  con- 
sidered to  represent  a  company-queue  of  patriotic  union 
and  of  German  nationality. 

Lenette  now  made  little  secret  of  it  to  her  husband  (and 
Stiefel  stood  by  her  in  the  background),  that  she  was  very 
little  pleased,  on  the  whole,  with  Leibgeber  and  his  on- 
goings. "My  dear  poor  father"  (she  said,  in  Leibgeber's 
presence),  "was  copyist  to  the  Council, but  he  was  always 
just  like  other  people  in  his  dress,  and  everything  else." 

"  Well,  dear !"  Siebenkass  answered,  "  as  he  was  a  copyist, 
of  course  he  had  always  to  be  copying,  with  pens,  or  coats, 
as  the  case  might  be.  But  my  father  loaded  guns  for 
princes,  and  did  not  trouble  his  head  about  what  else 
might  happen  or  not  happen."  Ere  this,  when  opportunity 
had  offered,  she  had  held  up  and  measured  the  copying 
clerk  as  against  the  gun-charger,  distantly  suggesting,  as 
it  were,  that  Siebenkaes  had  not  had  anything  like  so  great 
and  distinguished  a  father  as  she  had,  and,  as  a  conse- 
quence, had  not  received  the  sort  of  superior  education 
which  teaches  people  manners,  and  how  they  ought  to 
behave.  This  preposterous  and  ludicrous  looking  down 
upon  his  genealogical  tree  so  annoyed  him  always  that  he 
often  laughed  at  himself.  At  the  same  time,  the  little 
by-blow  at  Leibgeber  did  not  surprise  him  so  much  as  her 
remarkable  bodily  repugnance  and  antipathy  to  him.  No- 
thing would  induce  her  to  shake  hands  with  him  :  "And 
I'm  sure,"  she  said,  "  if  he  were  ever  to  kiss  me,  it  would 
be  my  death."  With  all  his  laborious  urgency  and  ques- 
tions as  to  the  reason  of  this,  he  could  get  no  answer  out 
of  her  but  that  she  "  would  tell  him  after  Leibgeber  was 
g'>ne."  Unfortunately,  by  that  time  he  would  be  gone 
himself,  too,  and  in  his  coffin,  i.e.  on  the  road  to  Vaduz. 

And  even  this  extraordinary  obstinacy  (as  of  an  un- 
yielding bonnet- block)  he  could  endure  at  a  time  when 
one  of  his  eyes  warmed  itself  at  his  friend,  while  the  otl  er 
cooled  itself  at  his  grave. 


476  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDETCH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IV. 

At  last  something  was  superadded  ;  and  as  I  am  sure 
that  nobody  can  narrate  it  more  faithfully  than  I,  I  beg 
that  I  may  be  believed.  It  was  in  the  evening,  before 
Leibgeber  went  back  to  his  hotel  (the  Lizard,  if  I  re- 
member), and  the  deep  black,  half-orb  of  a  thunder-cloud 
had  gathered  silently  in  the  West,  shrouding  the  sun,  and 
mounting  higher,  and  hanging  more  and  more  threaten- 
ingly over  the  expectant  world.  The  two  friends  were 
talking  of  what  a  glorious  thing  a  thunderstorm  was,  and 
of  the  espousals  of  heaven  and  earth — the  highest  with 
the  lowest — of  the  "  descent  of  heaven  to  earth "  (as 
Leibgeber  put  it) ;  and  Siebenkaes  remarked  how,  properly 
speaking,  it  was  only  one's  "  Fantasy  "  which  pictured  the 
storm,  and  "  Fantasy  "  only  which  brought  about  the  union 
of  the  highest  and  the  lowest.  I  wish  he  had  followed 
the  advice  of  Cainpe  and  Kolbe,  and  used  the  home-grown 
word  "  Fancy"  (or  "  Imagination  "),  instead  of  the  foreign 
word  "  Fantasy  ;"  for  that  word-purist  Lenette  pricked  up 
her  ears  as  soon  as  ever  it  passed  his  lips.  She  who  had 
nothing  in  her  breast  but  jealousy,  and  nothing  in  her 
head  but  the  "  Fantaisie  "  (at  Bayreuth),  put  down  to  the 
score  of  the  latter  every  word  that  the  two  men  were  say- 
ing in  eulogy  of  u  Fantasy  "  in  man ;  for  instance,  how  it 
(namely,  "the  Markgrave's  Fantaisie,"  thought  Lenette) 
blessed  us  through  the  beauty  of  its  sublime  creations — how, 
but  for  the  enjoyment  of  its  lovelinesses,  a  Kuhschnappel 
could  not  be  borne  with  for  a  moment  (of  course,  because 
he  thinks  of  that  Nathalie  of  his,  thought  she) ;  how  it 
clothes  and  adorns  the  bare  spots  of  life  with  its  beautiful 
flowers  "  two  or  three  silk  forget-me-nots,"  said  Lenette 
to  herself;  and  how  it  (the  Bayreuth  Fantaisie)  gilds  not 
only  the  pills  of  life,  but  also  the  nuts,  nay,  the  Paris  apples 
of  beauty  themselves. 

Heavens !  what  double  meanings  in  every  coiner,  and 
on  every  side !  For  how  triumphantly  Siebenkass  could 
have  refuted  the  error  of  confounding  Fantasy  with 
Fantaisie,  if  he  had  merely  shown  how  little  of  the  poetic 
Fantasy  there  was  in  the  Fantaisie  at  Bayreuth,  and  how 
(in  the  latter)  French  "  taste  "  had  trimmed,  behung,  and 
begarlanded  the  lovely,  romantic  hills  and  valleys  of 
Nature's    inventing    with    rhetoric    edifices    of    flowers, 


CHAP.  XIX.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     477 

periods,  and  antithesis;  and  that  what  Leibgeber  said 
about  Fantasy's  gilding  the  Paris  apples  of  life,  applied  in 
quite  another  sense  to  the  Bayreuth  Fantaisie,  because 
there  the  French  Christmas  silver-foil  would  have  to  bo 
scraped  off  from  Nature's  apples  before  they  could  be 
bitten. 

Scarce  was  Leibgeber  gone  out  from  the  house,  and  off 
into  the  storm  (which,  according  to  his  custom,  he  enjoyed 
in  the  open  air),  when  Lenette's  storm  broke,  ere  the  atmo- 
spherical one  did.  "  There,  you  see,  I  heard  with  my  very 
own  ears,"  she  said,  "  how  that  Unbeliever  and  Kill-joy 
there  goes  about  coupling  and  marrying  you  in  the  Fan- 
taisie at  Bayreuth ;  and  this  is  the  fellow  an  honest  woman 
is  expected  to  shake  hands  with,  or  touch  with  the  tip  of 
one  of  her  fingers."  She  let  a  few  more  peals  of  thunder 
roll — but  it  is  my  duty  to  the  poor  woman  (turned  into  a 
fermenting  vat  by  the  addition  to  her  of  such  a  quantity 
of  mash)  not  to  give  too  accurate  a  record  of  all  her 
fiothings.  Meantime,  all  the  acid  matter  in  her  husband 
began  to  effervesce  in  its  turn.  To  find  fault  with  his 
friend  to  his  face,  no  matter  what  misunderstanding  this 
might  arise  from  (and  he  did  not  trouble  himself  to  ask 
what  the  misunderstanding  was,  inasmuch  as  none  could 
be  any  excuse) — was,  in  his  eyes,  a  sin  against  the  Holy 
Ghost  of  his  friendship.  Accordingly,  he  thundered  most 
roundly  in  reply.  It  i  some  excuse  for  the  husband,  and 
for  the  wife,  too,  for  that  matter,  that  the  storm  in  the  air 
fanned  the  fuel  in  his  head  into  a  brighter  blaze,  so  that  he 
strode  up  and  down  the  room  like  a  man  demented,  and  in- 
stantly, and  on  the  spot,  blew  to  the  four  winds  of  heaven 
his  resolve  not  to  be  put  out  with  anything  Lenette  might 
do  till  after  he  was  dead ;  for  he  would  not,  and  could  not, 
suffer  that  "  his  last  friend  in  life  and  death  should  be 
wrongfully  accused  by  the  inheritress  of  his  name,  either 
in  his  sayings  or  in  his  doings."  It  will  give  some  idea  of 
the  violence  of  his  volcanic  eruptions  (all  of  which,  for  his 
Bdke,  I  mean  to  pass  by  in  silence),  if  I  say  that,  vieing  in 
loudness  of  thundering  with  the  sky  itself,  he  shouted — 

"Such  a  man  as  he!"  and  with  the  words,  "you  are 
a  female  head,  too,  curse  you!"  administered  a  ringing 
box  on  the  ear  to  a  bonnet-block,  which  had  a  grand  hat, 


478  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IV. 

with  feathers  upon  it.  As  this  head  was  Lenette's  favourite 
Sultana  of  all  the  blocks — one  which  she  often  tondled — 
nothing  was  to  be  expected  but  an  outbreak  as  violent  as 
if  he  had  given  the  box  to  her  very  self,  just  as  Siebenkses 
stormed  at  the  insult  to  his  friend).  Nothing  came,  how- 
ever, but  a  gentle  shower  of  bitter  tears.  "  Oh  !  good 
heavens!  don't  you  hear  what  a  terrible  storm?"  was  all 
she  said.  "Thunder  here,  thunder  there!"  cried  Sie- 
benkaas  (who,  once  set  rolling  down  from  the  lofty  peak 
where  he  had  been  reposing,  went  on,  according  to  both 
the  moral  and  the  physical  laws  of  falling  bodies,  increas- 
ing in  velocity  and  momentum,  until  he  reached  the 
bottom).  "  I  wish  the  lightning  would  shatter  all  the 
rag-tag  and  bob-tail  in  Kuhschnappel  that  dare  to  say 
a  syllable  against  my  Henry." 

As  the  storm  grew  fiercer  she  spoke  more  and  more 
gently,  saying,  "  Ah  !  gracious,  what  a  peal !  Oh.  please 
repent !  Suppose  it  were  to  strike  you  in  your  sin  ?  "  "  My 
Henry  is  out  in  it,"  he  said.  "  Oh  that  the  lightning  would 
strike  us  both  dead,  him  and  me,  with  the  same  flash  !  I 
should  be  spared  all  this  miserable  business  of  dying,  and 
we  should  always  be  together  then.'' 

His  wife  had  never  seen  him  so  angry,  or  so  contemp- 
tuous of  life  and  religion,  and  consequently,  could  only 
expect  the  lightning  to  fall  on  the  Merbitzer's  hou>e,  and 
strike  both  him  and  her  dead,  by  way  of  an  "  example." 

And  at  this  moment,  a  flash  of  such  brilliance  illumined 
the  heavens,  and  such  a  shattering  peal  of  thunder  followed 
close  upon  it,  that,  stretching  out  her  hand  to  him,  she 
said,  "  1  will  do  anything  and  everything  you  wish  me  to 
do ;  only,  for  Heaven's  sake,  be  a  God-fearing  man  again  I 
I  will  even  give  Leibgeber  my  hand ;  yes,  and  a  kiss  too, 
if  I  must — no  matter  whether  he  has  washed  his  face  after 
the  dog's  licking  it,  or  not — and  I  shall  neither  listen,  nor 
mind,  when  you  say  what  a  delightful,  beautiful  place  the 
silvery,  flowery  Bayreuth  Fantaisie  is." 

Heavens!  how  this  lightning-flash  illumined  the  depths 
of  two  of  Lenette's  labyrinths  for  him,  letting  him  see  her 
innocent  confounding  of  Fantasy  and  Fantaisie  (already 
noticed),  and  his  own  confounding  of  her  strong,  personal, 
idiosyncratic  repugnance  to  (what  she  considered)  unclean- 


CHAP.  XIX. J      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     479 

ness,  with  real  dislike.  The  lattor  was  on  this  wise. 
Inasmuch  as  her  feminine  proclivity  for  excessive  cleanness 
and  beautifying  and  polishing  were  more  akin  to  the  feline 
race  than  to  the  canine  (which  cares  little  about  either, 
or  about  the  feline  race,  for  that  matter),  Leibgeber's 
hand,  after  Saufinder's  tongue  had  touched  it,  was  to  her 
as  a  thumbscrew,  and  Esau's  hand  all  Chiragra.  Her 
sense  of  cleanliness  shrunk  from  touching  it ;  and  as  for 
Henry's  lips !  though  ten  days  had  elapsed  since  the  dog 
had  jumped  up  to  them  with  his,  they  would  have  been 
considered  the  most  fearful  bugbears,  and  scarecrows, 
which  abhorrence  could  set  up  for  her.  Even  time  itself 
was  no  lipsalve  in  her  eyes.* 

This  time,  however,  the  discovery  of  the  error  did  not 
bring  about  peace  (as  it  used  to  do  in  former  times),  but 
only  a  renewal  of  the  decree  of  separation.  Tears  came  to 
his  eyes,  indeed,  and  he  gave  her  his  hand,  saying,  "  For- 
give me !  It  is  the  last  time !  As  the  proverb  says,  '  The 
storms  come  home  in  August.' "  But  he  could  neither 
otter  nor  receive  a  kiss  of  reconciliation.  This,  his  latest 
falling  away  from  his  warm  resolves  to  be  patient,  irre- 
vocably proclaimed  how  wide  their  inner  separation  had 
become.  What  is  the  use  of  seeing  one's  errors,  when  the 
causes  of  them  are  still  in  force?  What  is  the  good  of 
clipping  a  ripple  or  two  away  from  the  ocean,  when  there 
are  still  clouds  and  billows?  The  crime  against  the 
bonnet-block  was  what  rankled  most  in  his  breast;  it 
became  a  Gorgon's  head  to  him,  continually  threatening 
and  avenging. 

He  sought  his  friend  with  a  renewal  of  affection,  for  he 

*  There  is  nothing  more  unreasonable,  uncontrollable,  and  inexpli- 
cable, than  this  feeling  of  repugnance  to  the  unclean — this  inconsistent 
alliance  between  the  will  and  the  coats  of  the  stomach.  Cicero  says, 
"  the  modest  do  not  willingly  use  the  word  '  modesty '  (a  transcendental 
form  of  disgust  with  the  impure) — and  those  who  feel  the  repugnance 
in  question  deal  with  it  in  a  similar  manner,  particularly  as  bodily  and 
moral  purity  are  neighbours  (which  the  chaste  and  cleanly  Swift 
exemplified  in  his  own  person).  Even  physical  loathing  (of  which  the 
subject-matter  is  mental,  more  than  physical;,  affects  the  moral  sense 
more  than  is  supposed.  Cross  the  street  with  undigested  food,  or  anti- 
monial  wine,  in  your  stomach,  and  you  will  feel  a  stronger  distaste  to 
a  score  of  faces  (and  for  more  books  when  you  come  home)  than  at 
ordinary  times. 


480  JEAN  PAUL   FRIEDREICH   RICHTER.         [BOOK  IV, 

had  suffered  for  him ;  and  with  new  eagerness,  that  lie 
might  arrange  the  place  for  his  death  with  him. 

"  Of  what  dangerous  malady  do  you  think  you  would 
prefer  to  give  Tip  the  ghost,"  said  Henry,  commencing  the 
medical  consultation.  "  Would  inflammation  of  the  lungs 
be  to  your  taste  ?  or  inflammation  of  the  bowels,  or  of  the 
uvula ;  or  would  -phrenitis  be  more  in  your  line,  or  bron- 
chitis ;  or  would  you  prefer  a  quinsy,  a  colic,  the  devil 
and  his  grandmother?  We  have  got  all  the  requisite 
miasmata  and  materia  epidemica  ready  to  our  hands ;  and 
when  we  throw  in  the  month  of  August — harvest-month 
of  reapers  and  doctors — by  way  of  poison-powder,  you 
certainly  never  can  get  over  it  all."  Firmian  answered  : 
"  You  are  a  sort  of  master-beggar  with  all  kinds  of  ailments 
for  sale  ;•  blindness,  palsy,  aud  the  rest.  But  for  my  part, 
I  am  for  apoplexy,  that  volti  subito,  that  extra  post  of 
death.  I  have  had  more  than  my  share  of  legal  prolixities, 
verbosities,  and  delays  of  all  sorts."  "  Well,"  said  Leib- 
geber,  "  apoplexy  probably  is  the  summarissimum  of  death. 
At  the  same  time,  we  must  be  guided  by  the  best  patho- 
logical works,  and  make  up  our  minds  for  three  attacks  of 
it.  We  can't  go  by  Nature  here,  we  must  be  guided  by 
the  laws  of  medicine ;  and  by  them,  death  has  to  forward  a 
set  of  three  bills  of  exchange  before  one  of  them  is  accepted 
and  honoured  in  the  next  world.  He  knocks  three  times 
with  his  auctioneer's  hammer.  I  know  too  well,  the 
doctors  are  not  the  men  to  listen  to  reason  on  this  point ; 
you  will  have  to  make  up  your  mind  to  the  three  apoplectic 
strokes."  "  But  what  the  deuce ! "  said  Siebenkaes,  with 
comic  warmth,  "  If  apoplexy  gives  me  two  pretty  power- 
ful strokes,  what  more  can  a  doctor  desire?  The  only 
thing  is,  I  can't  be  attacked  for  the  next  three  or  four 
days,  because  I  must  wait  for  a  cheaper  coffin-builder." 
The  right  of  coffin-building  (it  should  perhaps  be  ex- 
plained) goes  its  round  in  a  migratory  manner  among  the 
carpenters,  and  one  has  got  to  pay  these  shipwrights  of  our 
last  ark  whatever  they  demand,  because  the  property  we 
leave  behind  us  at  death  has  to  be  given  over  as  plunder 

*  A  beggar  in  England  who  keeps  a  shop  full  of  crutches,  eye« 
plaster,  fake  legs,  &c,  which  every  one  who  wants  to  be  lame,  blind, 
Ac,  must  be  supplied  with.    '  Britt.  Annal. 


CHA.P.  XIX.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      481 

by  our  executors  and  administrators,  to  the  undertaker, 
(that  excise  officer  of  death)  like  the  palace  of  a  dead  doge 
or  pope. 

"  There  may  be  another  advantage  in  this  short  reprieve, 
too,"  said  Leibgeber.  "  I  have  an  old  collection  of  family 
sermons  here,  which  I  bought  for  somewhere  about  half 
ihe  amount  of  a  police-court  fine.  I  do  not  know  any- 
where else  but  in  this  work  where  such  impressive 
sermons  are  delivered — it  is  more  especially  in  the  binding 
that  they  are  preached.  The  binding  is  wood,  you  perceive, 
and  there  is  a  live  preacher  in  there,  preaching  as  finely  as 
any  preacher  that  can  be  found  in  a  pulpit."  This  preacher 
in  the  wooden  boards  of  the  old  book  in  question,  was  the 
beetle  which  goes  by  the  name  of  the  death-watch,  wood- 
borer,  or  Ptinus  pertinaz,  because  when  he  is  touched  he 
keeps  up  the  appearance  of  a  sham  death,  torture  him  as 
you  will — and  because  the  little  blows  he  strikes,  which 
are  nothing  but  knocks  at  his  sweetheart's  door,  are 
supposed  to  be  Death's  knocks  at  ours.  For  which  reason 
any  piece  of  furniture  in  which  he  was  wont  to  knock 
used  to  be  thought  a  valuable  article  of  commerce,  cr 
heirloom. 

Leibgeber  added  that,  as  there  was  nothing  he  so  de- 
tested as  a  man  who  tried  to  outwit  God  and  the  Devil 
(from  fear  of  death)  by  a  sudden  repentance,  he  was  fond 
of  hiding  this  sermon-book  amongst  the  furniture  of  a 
hell-fearing  individual  of  this  description,  so  as  to  give 
him  a  good  sound  terrifying  with  the  beetle's  funeral 
sermons  (although  the  insect,  for  his  part,  was,  in  fact, 
thinking  solely  of  mundane  matters  during  his  preaching 
— like  many  other  preachers).  "  So,  could  I  not  put  the 
sermon-book,  with  its  funeral  preacher,  in  amongst  your 
books,  that  your  wife  might  hear  him,  and  think  of  death 
— of  yours,  that  is  to  say  —and  so  get  more  used  to  the 
idea  of  it?" 

"  No,  no,"  said  Tinman,  "  she  shall  not  suffer  so  much 
for  me  before  her  time.  She  has  suffered  quite  enough 
already." 

"  Just  as  you  please,"  said  Henry  ;  "  but  my  beetle  and 
you  would  have  gone  together  capitally.  You  are  going 
to  simulate  death,  just  as  the  Ptinus  pertinax  does. 

11.  2  I 


4S2  JEAN   PAUL   FRIEDRICH   RICHTEE.        [BOOK  IV 

For  the  rest,  he  was  delighted  that  everything  had 
worked  together  so  well,  and  that  it  was  just  a  year  since 
he  had  stamped  upon  Blaise's  glass  periwig,  and  insulted, 
or  blackguarded,  him.  Because  (as  we  have  seen)  libels 
of  this  sort  are  not  actionable  after  the  lapse  of  a  year, 
except  libels  by  a  critic — which  (like  the  Rector  in  Ragusa) 
only  reign  for  a  month — that  is  to  say,  the  t;me  during 
which  the  journal  in  which  they  appear  circulates  in  the 
reading  society.  And  a  book — which  may  be  siid  to  hold 
the  rank  of  dictator  in  the  realm  of  letters — cannot  reign, 
with  all  its  influence,  more  than  a  Roman  dictator,  namely, 
six  months — that  is  to  say,  from  its  birth-fair  to  its  death- 
fair — and,  like  Grub  Street  scribblers,  it  dies  either  in 
spring  or  in  autumn. 

They  went  back  into  a  new-dressed,  freshly-arranged 
room.  Lenette  did  what  she  could  to  paint  the  cracks  of 
her  housekeeping  over  with  flowers  (like  the  flaws  in  porce- 
lain), and  always  opened  pieces  of  music  in  which  that 
particular  stiing  (of  an  article  of  furniture),  which  chanced 
to  be  broken,  did  not  require  to  be  touched.  Firmian,  on 
this  occasion,  sacrificed  a  greater  number  of  the  good  and 
entertaining  ideas  (which  struck  him)  than  usual  to  her 
efforts  to  place  Spanish  screens  between  the  company  and 
the  steppes  and  fallow-fields  of  her  poverty  ;  and  more 
than  Henry  did  even  then.  All  women — even  those  with- 
out brains — are  the  sharpest  and  most  delicately-observant 
of  augurs  and  clairvoyante  prophetesses  concerning  matters 
which  closely  concern  themselves.  Lenette  was  an  in- 
stance. S'iefel  was  there  in  the  evening — a  good  deal  of 
argument  was  going  on,  and  Stiefel  openly  declared  that 
he  (with  Salvian  and  other  able  theologians)  was  of 
opinion  that  the  children  of  Israel  (whose  garments  never 
wore  into  the  minutest  hole  during  all  the  forty  years  they 
passed  in  the  wilderness)  alwaj's  continued  of  exactly  the 
same  size  (so  as  always  to  fit  their  clothes  exactly)  with 
the  exception  of  children,  in  whose  cases  the  clothes,  which 
had  been  cut  to  fit  them  out  of  the  wardrobes  of  the 
dead,  grew  with  their  bodies  in  length  and  breadth.  "  In 
this  way,"  he  added,  "all  the  difficulties  of  the  great 
miracle  are  got  over  easily,  by  means  of  lesser  accessory- 
miracles." 


CHAP.  XIX.J      FLOWER,  FRCIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      483 

Leibgeber  answered  (with  sparkling  eyes),  "  I  knew 
that  while  I  was  yet  in  my  mother's  womb.  There  was 
not  a  hole  in  all  the  hosts  of  Israel,  except  those  which 
they  brought  with  them  out  of  Egypt — and  these  never 
got  any  bigger.  Even  suppose  anybody  made  a  hole  in  his 
cheek,  or  in  his  coat,  when  he  was  mourning — these  holes 
stitched  themselves  together  in  a  trice,  of  their  own 
accord.  What  a  shameful  and  deplorable  thing  it  is, 
though,  that  the  host  of  Israel  should  have  been  the  first, 
and  the  last,  army  whose  uniform  was  a  sort  of  delightful 
over-bod)-,  which  grew  with  the  soul  it  enveloped — and 
where  the  frock-coat  developed  into  an  electoral  mantle, 
and  from  a  Microvestis  to  a  Macrovestis  I  I  see  that  eating 
was  cloth  manufacturing  (in  the  wilderness),  manna  was 
English  wool,  and  the  stomach  the  loom.  An  Israelite 
who  fed  himself  up  to  the  proper  pitch  was,  by  so  doing, 
yielding  the  produce  of  the  land,  and  of  the  wilderness. 
If  I  had  been  in  the  recruiting-service  in  those  days,  I 
should  simply  have  hung  the  recruit's  jackets  on  to  the 
recruit's  measure.  But  how  go  matters  in  our  wildevne>s 
here — which  leads  to  Egypt,  not  to  the  promised  land  ? 
In  our  regiments,  the  privates  grow  every  year,  but  the 
coats  do  not.  Kay,  the  uniforms  are  made  for  dry 
seasons  only,  and  for  lean  men — in  wet  j'ears  the  clothes 
contract  like  hygrometers,  and  perspiration  steals  more 
doth  than  the  tailor  does,  or  even  the  contractor.  A 
commanding  officer  who  should  expect  his  uniforms  to 
stretch — who  should  reckon  upon  a  Periphrasis  of  them — 
going  by  the  example,  not  only  of  the  Israelites,  but  like- 
wise of  the  clothes-moths,  and  the  snails  (who  do  not  ex- 
pand to  suit  their  shells,  but  whose  shells  expand  to  suit 
them) — this  commanding  officer,  I  say,  would  go  out  of  his 
mind — for  his  men  would  be  fighting  in  the  condition  of 
the  athletes  of  old — and  the  men  themselves  would  be  in 
a  nice  frame  of  mind  on  the  subject." 

This  innocuous  sermon  (wholly  addressed  to  the  account 
of  Stiefel's  piece  of  exegetic  absurdity)  Lenette  supposed 
was  directed  against  her  wardrobe.  She  was  like  the 
Germans  in  general,  who  search  after  some  special  satiric 
Kernel  hidden  in  every  rocket  and  firework  serpent  of 
humour.      Wherefore  Siebenkaas   begged   him  to  pardon 

2  i  2 


484  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  IT. 

his  poor  wife  of  his  (over  whose  heart  so  many  a  sharp 
sorrow  besides  was  strewn)  the  inevitable  and  invincible 
ignorance  of  her  exegesis — or  ralher,  to  spare  her  the  know 
ledge  of  -t  altogether. 

At  length  a  Ktihschnappel  bath-keeper  departed  this 
life,  and  fell  under  the  plane  of  the  costly  carpenter.  "I 
have  not  a  minute  to  waste  over  my  apoplexy  now,"  said 
Firmian,  in  Latin  ;  "who  is  to  be  my  warrant  that  nobody 
shall  die  before  I  do,  and  so  the  cheap  carpenter  slip 
through  my  fingers  ?  "  So  it  was  arranged  that  he  should 
be  taken  ill  the  following  evening. 


CHAPTEE  XX. 


APOPLEXY —  THE  PRESIDENT  OF  THE  BOARD  OF  HEALTH — THE 
NOTARY-PUBLIC  —  THE  LAST  WILL  AND  TESTAMENT  —  THE 
KNIGHT'S  MOVE  —  REVEL,  THE  MORNING  PREACHER —  THE 
SECOND   APOPLECTIC   ATTACK. 

In  the  evening  Henry  drew  up  the  curtain  upon  this 
tragedy  (full  of  comic  gravedigger  business),  and  discovei  ed 
Firmian  lying  on  his  bed  speechless,  with  apoplectic  head, 
and  all  his  right  side  paralysed.  The  only  mode  in  which 
the  patient  could  bring  himself  to  endure  the  torture  of 
the  deception,  and  of  the  pain  he  was  causing  Lenette, 
was  by  making  a  mental  vow  to  send  her  the  half  of  his 
yearly  income  as  inspector  at  Vaduz,  anonymously,  and  by 
remembering  that  by  his  death  she  would  obtain  happiness, 
freedom,  and  her  lover.  The  occupants  of  the  house  formed 
a  circle  about  the  apoplectic  patient,  but  Leibgeber  drove 
them  out  of  the  room,  saying,  "  the  sufferer  must  have 
quietness  and  rest."  It  delighted  him  beyond  expression 
lo  be  able  to  go  on  uttering  humourous  lies  without,  ces- 
sation. He  assumed  the  office  of  Imperial  Hereditary 
Doorkeeper,  and  shut  the  door  in  the  doctor's  face  (whom 
people  insisted  upon  prescribing).  "  I  am  going  to  pre- 
scribe a  little  prescription  for  the  patient  myself,"  he  said, 
"  but,  little  as  it  is,  it  will  restore  his  speech  for  a  time. 
These  cursed  death-rivers,  doctors'  potions,  Mr.  Schulrath/ 


CHAP.  XX.J       FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  TIECES.       485 

(for  that  gentleman  had  been  fetched  immediately)  "are 
like  those  rivers  which  demand  a  dead  body  every  year." 
So  he  wrote  a  recipe  for  a  simple  sedative  powder,  as  fol- 
lows, reading  aloud  as  he  wrote ; — 

R    Conch :  Citrate  Sirup :  j. 
Nitri  Crystallisate  gr.  x. 

D.6.  "The  Sedative  Powder." 

"  But  above  all  things,"  he  added,  in  the  most  imperative 
tones,  "  we  must  place  the  patient's  feet  in  warm  water." 

However,  everybody  in  the  house  knew  well  enough 
that  nothing  would  be  of  the  slightest  avail,  as  his  death 
had  been  but  too  unmistakably  foretold  by  the  floury  face ; 
and  Fecht  felt  a  kind  of  sympathising  satisfaction  that  he 
had  hit  the  mark. 

Scarcely  had  the  sick  man  swallowed  the  powder,  than, 
to  the  astonishment  of  the  Death- Assurance  Association  in 
bis  bedroom,  he  found  himself  able  to  speak,  intelligibly, 
if  not  very  loud.  The  domestic  Vehmgericht  was  not, 
perhaps,  altogether  pleased  with  this.  But  our  good 
Henry  had  a  pretext  now  for  resuming  his  cheerful  mien 
He  comforted  Lenette  by  reminding  her  that  "  here  below 
pain  was  but  an  initiation  ceremony  to  something  higher 
— the  box-on-the  ear,  or  sword-accolade  whereby  a  man  is 
dubbed  a  knight." 

The  patient  had  a  very  fair  night  after  big  sedative 
powder,  and  began  to  have  some  slight  hopes  of  himself. 
Henry  would  not  allow  Lenette  (whose  eyes  were  heavy 
with  tears  and  sleep)  to  sit  up  by  his  bed  during  the  night. 
He  said  he  would  prefer  to  be  at  hand  himself,  in  case 
there  should  be  any  danger ;  of  which,  however,  there 
was  no  great  risk,  as  they  made  their  agreement  together 
(doing  so  in  Latin,  like  princes)  that  Death,  the  fifth  act  of 
this  tragic  interlude,  (only  one  of  the  scenes  of  the  tragedy 
of  Life,)  should  take  place  on  the  evening  of  the  following 
day.  "  Even  till  to-morrow,"  said  Firmian,  "  is  too  long 
to  wait.  I  am  so  unspeakably  grieved  for  my  poor  Lenette's 
sorrow.  Like  David,  alas !  I  have  to  make  a  melancholy 
choice  between  famine,  war,  and  pestilence,  and  have  no 
way  out  of  it  but  his.  You,  dear  brother,  are  my  Cain, 
and  send  me  on  my  journey,  and  believe  iu  the  world  to 


486  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHER.  [BOOK  IV, 

which  you  despatch  me  not  a  hit  more  than  he  did.* 
Before  you  prescribed  the  sedative  power  which  obliged  me 
to  talk,  I  was  really  wishing,  in  my  silent  gloom,  that  the 
jest  might  become  earnest.  For  I  must  one  day  pass 
through  that  underground  portal  which  opens  into  the 
fortress  of  futurity,  in  which  we  shall  be  safe.  Ah  \  it  is 
not  the  dying  that  is  painful,  it  is  the  parting — I  mean  from 
those  we  love."  Henry  said,  in  reply,  "  Nature  holds  a 
broad  Achilles-shield  before  us  to  protect  us  from  that  final 
bayonet-thrust  of  life.  On  our  death-beds  we  grow  cold 
morally  before  we  do  so  phj'sically,  a  strange  courtier-like 
indifference  towards  all  we  are  leaving  creeps  frostily 
through  the  dying  nerves.  Sapient  spectators  say,  '  See, 
nobody  but  a  Christian  can  die  with  such  resignation  and 
trust.'  Never  mind,  dear  Firmian;  the  two  or  three  painful 
burning  minutes  which  you  have  to  bear  till  to-morrow 
arrives  are  a  capital  warm  bath  of  Aix  water  for  the  sick 
spirit.  It  has  an  infernal  smell  of  rotten  eggs  now,  no 
doubt,  but  that  will  go  away  completely  as  the  bath 
grows  cool." 

Next  day  Henry  eulogised  him  as  follows.  "  As  Cato  the 
younger  slept  quietly  the  night  before  his  death,  (history 
heard  him  snore,)  so  you  appear  to  have  afforded  these 
debilitated,  unnerved,  and  degenerate  days  a  fresh  example 
of  a  similar  magnanimity.  If  I  were  your  Plutarch  I 
should  record  the  circumstance." 

"  In  sober  seriousness,  though,"  answered  Firmian,  "  I 
should  be  rather  pleased  if,  several  years  hence,  when 
Death  has  presented  his  second  of  exchange,  some  literary 
West,  the  historical  painter,  should  honour  this  odd  first 
death  of  mine  by  describing  it  for  the  press."  This,  we 
6ee  a  biographical  West  has  now  actually  done,  but  I  beg 
to  be  permitted  to  confess,  without  hesitation,  that  it  has 
afforded  me  sincere  gratification  to  find  among  the  docu- 
ments this  death-bed  speech  and  wish,  which  I  am  so 
completely  carrying  out.  Leibgeber  answered,  "  The 
Jesuits  in  Lowen  once  published  a  little  book  in  which 

*  The  Rabbis  maintain  that  Cair  killed  his  brother  because  the 
latter  disagreed  with  him  when  he  (Cain)  denied  the  immortality  of 
the  soul.  So  that  the  first  murder  was  an  auto-da-fi,  and  the  first  war 
a  religions  one. 


CHAP.  XX.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      487 

the  terrible  end  of  Luther  was  minutely  described  in 
Latin.  Old  Luther  got  hold  of  the  bouk  and  translated  it, 
as  he  did  the  Bible,  merely  adding  at  the  end,  'I,  Dr.  M. 
Luther,  have  read  and  translated  this  narrative  myself.' 
If  I  were  you,  when  I  translated  my  death  into  English, 
I  should  write  that  at  the  end  of  it  too."  Do  please  write 
it,  dear  Siebenkaes,  as  you  are  still  in  life — but  translate 
me,  at  all  events. 

Morning  brings  refreshing  to  the  laid  corn  of  humanity, 
whether  it  be  laid  upon  the  hard  bed  of  sickness,  or  on  the 
softer  mattress  of  ordinary  health;  its  breezes  lift  the 
bowed  heads  of  both  flowers  and  men :  but  our  sick  man 
remained  prostrate.  Things  seemed  distinctly  worse  with 
him — he  could  not  disguise  from  himself  that  he  was 
losing  ground ;  at  all  events  he  resolved  to  "  set  his  house 
in  order."  This  first  quarter  of  the  hour  of  death  which 
the  Heath  bell  tolled,  smote  like  a  sharp  and  heavy  bell- 
hammer  upon  Lenette's  heart,  whence  the  warm  stream  of 
the  old  love  burst  forth  in  bitter  tears.  Firmian  could  not 
bear  the  sight  of  this  disconsolate  weeping ;  he  stretched 
his  arms  beseechingly,  and  the  suffering  creature  laid 
herself  between  them  in  gentle  obedience,  on  to  his  breast, 
their  tears,  their  sighs,  and  their  hearts  mingled  in  the 
warmest  affection,  and  thus  they  rested  in  happiness 
(though  only  upon  wounds)  at  this  brief  distance  from  the 
boundary-hill  of  parting. 

For  this  poor  soul's  sake,  then,  he  grew  visibly  better. 
Another  improvement  in  his  condition  was  necessary, 
moreover,  to  account  for  the  happy  frame  of  mind  in 
which  he  executed  his  last  will  and  testament.  Leibgeber 
expressed  satisfaction  that  the  patient  was  able  to  take 
some  dinner  on  the  table-cloth  of  the  bed-quilt,  and  swal- 
low the  contents  of  a  sick  man's  soup-dish  about  the  size 
of  a  pond.  "  The  good  spirits,"  said  Leibgeber  to  Peltz- 
stiefel,  "  which  our  invalid  is  beginning  to  exhibit  again, 
give  me  very  considerable  hopes  indeed ;  though  it  was 
evidently  only  to  please  his  wife  that  he  took  the  soup." 

Nobody  was  fonder  of  lying,  or  lied  oftener,  out  of  satire 
or  humour,  than  Leibgeber  •  and  no  one  more  utterly  de- 
tested serious  untruthfulness  than  he.  He  could  tell  a 
thousand  lies  in   fun,  but  not  two  in  a  case  of  serious 


488  JEAN  PAUL  FBIEDRICH  RICHTEB.        [BOOK  IV. 

necessity.  For  the  former  he  had  at  his  finger's  end  every 
possible  deceptive  trick  of  face  and  language ;  for  the  latter 
not  one. 

In  the  forenoon  the  Schulrath  and  Merbitzer,  the  land- 
lord, were  summoned  to  the  bedside.  "  Gentlemen,"  began 
the  sick  man,  "  I  am  thinking  of  having  my  last  will  this 
afternoon — of  declaring,  at  Nature's  place  of  execution,  the 
three  things  which  I  desire — as  the  condemned  in  Athens 
were  allowed  to  do;  but  what  I  wish  to  do  at  the  present 
moment  is  to  open  one  of  my  testaments  before  1  make 
my  second,  or  (to  speak  more  accurately)  the  codicil  of  my 
first.  I  wish  my  friend  Leibgeber  to  pack  up,  and  keep 
possession  of,  all  my  scribblings  as  soon  as  I  myself  am 
stuck  into  my  last  addressed  envelope.  Further  (and  in 
this  I  follow  the  precedent  of  the  Danish  Kings,  the  old 
Dukes  of  Austria,  and  the  noble  Spaniards  —of  whom  the 
first  were  interred  in  their  armour,  the  second  in  lion's 
skins,  the  third  in  miserable  Capuchins'  gowns) — I  will 
and  ordain  that  there  shall  be  no  hesitation  about  planting 
me  in  the  bed  of  the  next  world  in  the  very  self-same  old 
pod  and  shell  in  which  I  have  vegetated  in  this  ;  in  brief, 
exactly  as  I  am  while  now  testating.  This  injunction 
necessitates  my  making  my  third — that  the  woman  who 
comes  to  lay  me  out  shall  be  paid,  and  at  once  sent  about 
her  business,  because  all  my  life  through  I  have  had  a  most 
special  antipathy  to  two  women — the  woman  who  washes 
us  into  life,  and  the  woman  who  washes  us  oui  of  it  (though 
in  a  bigger  bath-tub) — the  midwife  and  the  woman  who 
lays  out  the  corpse.  She  is  not  to  lay  a  finger  upon  me, 
nor  is  anybody  except  my  Henry  there."  His  hatred  of 
these  servants  of  life  and  death  may  probably  have  pro- 
ceeded from  the  same  causes  as  my  own,  namely  the  impe- 
rious and  rapacious  nature  of  the  controlling  power  which 
these  she-planters  and  caterers  for  the  cradle  and  the  bier 
exercise  in  squeezing  us  just  in  the  two  unarmed  and 
weaponless  hours  of  our  deepest  gladness  and  our  deepest 
sorrow. 

"  I  further  will  that  as  soon  as  my  face  has  made  the 
signal  of  adieu,  Henry  shall  roof  it  over  and  shield 
it  for  ever  with  our  long-necked  mask,  whioh  I  brought 
down  from  the  box  upstairs.     I  also  desire  that,  when  I 


CHAP.  XX.J        FLOWER,  FKUIT,  AND  THOEN  PIECES.      489 

take  my  departure  from  all  the  fields  and  plains  of  my 
youthful  days,  and  hear  nothing  behind  me  but  the  rustle 
of  the  haycocks  of  the  aftermath,  I  may,  at  all  events, 
have  my  wife's  silken  garland  laid  upon  my  breast,  by  way 
of  game-counter  to  mark  the  joys  1  have  lost.  A  man 
can't  go  more  suitably  than  with  mock  insignia,  such  as 
that,  out  of  a  life  which  has  dished  him  up  such  a  number 
of  pasteboard  pasties  full  of  nothing  but  wind.  Lastly, 
I  will  that,  when  I  am  gone  on  my  journey,  nobody  shall 
clang  after  me  from  the  church-steeple  (like  the  people  of 
Carlsbad),  for  we  sick  and  transient  watering-place  visitors 
of  life  (like  those  of  Carlsbad)  are  received  and  sent  on 
our  way  with  music  from  the  steeples,  especially  as  the 
Church's  servants  are  more  expensive  than  the  Carlsbad 
steeple-man,  who  only  asks  three  pieces  for  blowing  people 
in  and  out." 

At  this  point  he  asked  that  Lenette's  profile-portrait 
might  be  given  him  in  bed,  and  he  said,  in  a  faltering  voice, 
"  I  should  like  my  dear  Henry  and  the  landlord  to  leave  the 
room  for  a  minute,  and  let  me  be  alone  with  the  Schulrath 
and  my  wife." 

When  this  was  done  he  gazed  fondly,  a  long  while,  in 
silence,  upon  the  little  likeness.  His  eyes  ran  over  with 
sorrow  like  a  broken  river-bank.  He  gave  the  picture  to 
the  Schulrath,  paused,  overcome  by  emotion,  and  said  at 
length :  M  To  you,  my  faithful  friend,  and  to  you  alone, 
can  I  give  this  beloved  portrait :  you  are  her  friend,  as 
well  as  mine.  Oh  God  !  there  is  not  a  soul  in  the  great, 
wide  world  that  will  take  care  of  my  dear  Lenette  if  you 
forsake  her.  Don't  ory  so  bitterly,  my  darling ;  he  will  be 
everything  to  you.  Ah  !  dearest  of  friends,  this  helpless, 
innocent  heart  will  break  in  desolate  loneliness  of  sorrow 
unless  you  protect  it  and  console  it.  Oh !  never  abandon 
it,  as  I  am  doing  !  " 

The  Schulrath  swore  by  the  Almighty  that  he  would 
never  leave  her,  and  he  took  her  hand  and  pressed  it 
(without  looking  at  her)  as  she  wept,  and  hung,  with  eyes 
raining  down  with  tears,  upon  the  face  of  his  friend,  whose 
voice  was  so  soon  to  be  mute  for  ever.  But  Lenette  forced 
him  away  from  her  husband's  breast,  and  liberated  her 
hand,  and  sunk  down  upon  the  lips  which  had  so  deeply 


490  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICil  RICHTER.         [BOOK  IV 

touched  her  heart.  Firmian  clasped  her  with  his  left  arm, 
and  stretched  his  right  hand  to  his  friend — thus  holding 
to  his  oppressed  hosom  the  two  things  on  earth  that  are 
nearest  heaven,  friendship  and  love. 

And  it  is  even  this  very  matter  which  is  an  endless 
source  of  comfort  and  delight  to  me  in  you  deluded  and 
disagreeing  mortals — that  you  all  love  one  another  heartily 
and  utterly  when  you  only  get  a  chance  of  seeing  one 
another  divested  of  coverings  and  fogs — that  when  we  fear 
we  are  growing  blind  we  are  only  growing  cold — and  that, 
as  soon  as  ever  Death  has  raised  our  brothers  and  sisters 
up  clear  of  the  clouds  of  our  own  enrors,  our  hearts  melt 
into  bliss  and  love  when  we  see  them  soaring  as  beautiful 
human  creatures,  no  longer  distorted  by  the  mists  and 
concave  mirrors  of  this  world,  up  in  the  translucent  aether ; 
and  cannot  but  sigh  forth,  "  Ah !  I  should  never  have  mis- 
understood you#if  I  had  always  seen  you  thus"  This  is 
why  every  loving  soul  stretches  its  arms  out  to  those 
whom  poets  exhibit  to  our  low-placed  eyes,  as  geniuses, 
in  their  cloud-built  heaven ,  though,  could  he  let  them  sink 
down  upon  our  breasts,  they  would  lose  their  beauteous 
transfiguration  in  a  few  short  days  upon  the  dirty  earth  of 
our  necessities  and  mistakes :  as  the  crystal  glacier- water 
which  refreshes,  without  chilling,  must  be  caught  in  the 
air  as  it  drips  from  its  ice-diamond,  because  it  is  made 
impure  by  the  air  the  moment  it  touches  the  earth.* 

The  Schulrath  went  out,  but  only  to  the  doctor.  This 
distinguished  Generalissimo  of  Friend  Death  (who  did  not 
bear  the  title  of  "  Councillor  of  the  Supreme  Board  of 
Health  "  for  nothing,  but  for  money)  was  very  willing  to 
come  and  see  the  patient :  firstly,  because  the  Schulrath 
was  a  man  of  means  and  consideration ;  and,  secondly, 
because  Siebenkaes  in  his  capacity  of  a  member  of  the 
Corpse  Lottery  (of  which  the  doctor  also  was  a  correspond- 
ing member  and  frere  servant),  ought  not  to  be  allowed  to 
die.  For  this  burial-fund  was,  in  one  of  its  more  import- 
ant aspects,  a  species  of  Government  Savings'  Bank,  or 
Imperial  Treasury  for  members  of  the  better  classes.  The 
sight  of  this  Supreme  Councillor  of  Health,  advancing  in 

*  Aocordinsj  to  de  Luc,  in  the  third  volume  of  hia  '  Little  Journeys 
for  Amateur  Travellers.' 


CHAP.  XX.]       FLOWER.  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       491', 

battle-array,  terrified  Leibgeber  to  death.  He  could  not 
but  fear  that  the  advent  of  the  doctor  might  make  matters 
take  a  more  serious  turn,  so  that  Siebenkaes  might  transmit 
to  posterity  a  celebrity  like  that  of  Moliere,  who  died  on 
the  stage  while  performing  the  part  of  the  'Malade  I  magi  - 
naire.'  The  relation  between  doctor  and  patient  seemed 
to  him  as  indeterminate  as  that  between  woodpeckers,  or 
bark-beetles,  and  trees ;  inasmuch  as  it  is  still  a  moot 
question  whether  the  trees  wither  in  consequence  of  these 
creatures  boring  into  them,  and  laying  their  eggs  in  them, 
or  if  (on  the  contrary)  it  is  because  the  bark  is  worm-eaten 
and  the  trunk  dead,  that  the  beetles  come  flying  to  the 
trees.  My  opinion  as  regards  beetles  and  woodpeckers 
(and  doctors  as  well)  is  that  each  is  alternately  cause  and 
effect ;  and  that  there  is  no  such  thing  as  a  living  creature 
whose  existence  can  possibly  be  taken  as  pre-supposing 
decay,  because,  if  so,  at  the  creation  of  the  world  there 
would  have  had  to  be  a  dead  horse  created  for  the  blue- 
bottles, and  a  rotten  cheese  for  the  mites. 

Well,  Dr.  CElhafen  (of  the  Supreme  Board  of  Health) 
marched  straight  up  to  the  sick  man  (shooting  past  the  one 
who  was  not  sick,  with  angry  rudeness),  and  instantly 
swooped  upon  life's  seconds'-hand,  the  medical  divining- 
rod,  the  pulse.  Leibgeber  set  the  plough  of  satirical  anger 
into  the  soil  of  his  face,  ploughed  crooked  furrows,  and 
determined  upon  a  course  of  deep  subsoil-ploughing. 

'•  This,"  said  the  professor  of  the  healing  art,  "  is  a 
case  of  genuine  nervous  apoplexy,  supervening  on  an  un- 
due determination  of  blood  to  the  head,  and  a  plethora  of 
the  vessels.  There  ought  to  have  been  medical  attend- 
ance at  a  much  earlier  stage  of  the  case ;  the  full,  hard 
pulse  threatens  a  repetition  of  the  attack.  An  emetic 
powder,  which  I  shall  prescribe,  will,  in  the  circumstances, 
produce  the  best  possible  effect."  And  with  this  he  pulled 
out  some  emetic  billets-doux,  wrapped  up  like  bonbons.  This 
preparation  was  one  which  he  kept  for  sale  himself,  hawk- 
ing it  about  from  house  to  house  like  a  Jew  pedlar.  There 
were  few  diseases  to  which  he  did  not  apply  these  emetics 
of  his  by  way  of  "  means  of  grace,"  screwjacks,  pump 
handles,  and  purgatorial  fire ;  but  he  worked  them  most 
assiduously  of  all  in  apoplexy   chest-inflammation,  head- 


492  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       LB00K  *▼■ 

ache,  and  bilious  fever.  What  he  said  was  that  he  "  began 
by  clearing  the  principal  passages,"  and  in  so  doing  he 
occasionally  cleared  the  proprietor  of  said  principal  passages 
out  of  this  world,  so  that  he  found  himself  passing  through 
the  final  "  passage  "  of  all  flesh. 

Leibgeber  kneaded  his  odd  visage  into  a  new  form,  and 
said,  "  There  seems  nothing,  Doctor  OElhafen  (my  colleague 
and  protomedicus),  to  prevent  our  holding  our  concilium,  or 
consilium,  or  collegium  medicum,  here  where  we  stand.  I 
cannot  but  think  that  my  sedative  powder  had  a  good 
effect,  seeing  that  it  restored  apoplectico  there  the  power  of 
speech,  yesterday."  The  protomedicus  took  Leibgeber  for 
some  quack,  and  without  so  much  as  letting  his  eyes  touch 
his  colleague,  said  to  Peltzstiefel,  "  Will  you  get  them  to 
bring  some  warm  water,  and  I  will  give  him  the  powder 
myself."  "  He  and  I  will  take  it  both  together,"  burst  in 
Leibgeber,  in  anger ;  "  both  our  gall-bladders  are  acting  at 
present ;  the  patient  shan't,  won't,  and  mustn't." 

"  Are  you  a  regular  practitioner,  Sir?"  asked  the  Coun- 
cillor of  the  Supreme  Board  of  Health,  with  contempt. 

"  I  am  a  Jubilee  Doctor,  or  Doctor  Jubilant,  and  have 
been  so  ever  since  I  ceased  being  a  fool.  You  no  doubt 
remember  in  Haller  the  case  of  the  fool  who  thought  his 
head  was  off,  until  they  cured  him  by  putting  a  lead  hat 
on  to  him.  A  head  roofed  and  insulated  with  lead  has 
about  as  distinct  a  sense  of  individuality  as  one  cast  in 
that  metal.  I  was  very  nearly  in  the  same  boat  with  that 
fool  myself,  brother  colleague.  I  had  inflammation  of  the 
brain,  and  did  not  find  out  so  soon  as  I  should  have  done 
that  it  had  been  put  out,  and  .cured.  To  make  a  long  tale 
6hort,  I  fancied  that  my  head  had  peeled  away  (or  shall  I 
call  it  '  exfoliated,'  or  '  desquamated '),  just  as  one's  feet 
moulder  and  drop  off,  like  crab's  claws,  when  one  takes 
too  much  ergot.  When  the  barber  came  in,  and  threw 
down  his  purple  tool-bag,  or  quiver,  I  said,  'My  dear 
Surgeon-General  Spoerl,  it  may  be  porfectly  true  that  flies, 
tortoises,  and  adders  have  been  known  to  go  on  living  after 
their  heads  were  off,  as  I  do,  but  there  wasn't  much  on 
them  to  shave.  A  man  of  your  sense  must  see  that  it  is  as 
impossible  to  shave  me  as  to  shave  the  Torso  at  Rome— 
where  were  you  thinking  of  soaping  me,  Mr.   Spoerl? 


CHAP.  XX.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       493 

Scarce  was  he  out  of  the  door  when  in  came  the  wig-maker. 
4  Another  time,  Mr.  Peisser,'  said  J,  'unless  you  propose  to 
curl  the  circumambient  air  around  me,  or  the  hair  oti  my 
chest,  you  can  put  your  combs  back  into  your  waistcoat 
pocket.  Since  twelve  o'clock  last  night  I  have  been 
carrying  on  existence  without  either  frieze  or  cornice,  and, 
like  the  tower  of  Babel,  I  have  no  cupola.  But  if  you 
will  go  and  see  whether  you  can  find  my  head  in  the  next 
room  there,  and  put  a  queue  and  a  toupee  on  to  that  caput 
mortuum  of  mine,  I  should  have  no  objection  to  that,  and  I 
don't  mind  wearing  the  head  by  a  way  of  a  queue-wig? 
By  good  luck  in  came  the  Rector  Magnificus.  He  was  a 
doctor,  and  saw  what  distress  I  was  in,  when  I  smote  my 
hands  together  and  cried,  '  Where  are  my  four  brain  cham- 
bers and  my  corpus  callosum,  my  anus  cerebri,  and  my 
uniform  centrum  (which,  according  to  Glaser,  is  the  seat 
of  the  imagination)  ?  How  can  a  Rump  Parliament  wear 
spectacles,  or  use  ear  trumpets?  The  reasons  are  obvious. 
Is  it  come  to  this  with  the  monsecius  head  of  the  world, 
that  it  has  no  head  left  for  a  seed-vessel  ? '  But  the  Rector 
Magnificus  sent  to  the  University  wardrobe  for  an  old, 
tight-fitting,  doctor's  hat;  he  put  it  on  me  with  a  gentle 
push,  and  said,  '  The  faculty  never  places  a  doctor's  hat  on 
anything  but  a  head  ;  it  could  not  possibly  put  it  on  to  a 
nothing.'  And  this  hat  made  a  new  head  grow  on  to  my 
imagination,  like  a  decapitated  snail's.  And  ever  since  I 
was  cured  myself.  I  have  taken  to  cxiring  other  people." 

The  Board  of  Health  councillor  turned  a  basilisk's  eye- 
ball away  from  Leibgeber,  and  lowered  himself  downstairs 
by  the  ribbon  of  his  cane  like  a  bale  of  merchandize, 
omitting  to  pocket  his  emetic  permit  for  the  world  to 
come,  which  the  patient  had,  consequently,  to  pay  for. 

But  our  good  Henry  had  another  war  to  wage  with 
Stiefel  and  Lenette,  until  Firmian  threw  himself  between 
them  as  mediator,  with  the  assurance  that  he  would  have 
sent  the  powder  packing  in  any  case,  because  it  would 
have  been  anything  btit  good  for  an  old  pain  in  his  heart 
(alas !  he  spoke  figuratively),  and  two  or  three  Gordian* 
knots  in  his  lungs  (the  "knots  of  the  plot  of  his  earthly 
drama  "). 

But  all  this  time,  however  good  a  face  he  might  put  on 


494       JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.   I  BOOK  IV. 

matters,  there  was  no  concealing  the  fact  that  he  was 
steadily  growing  worse.  The  ricochet  of  the  apoplectic 
shot  was  clearly  imminent,  and  to  be  looked  for  at  any 
moment.  "It  is  time  I  made  my  will,"  he  said.  "  I  long 
ardently  for  the  Notary  Public."  This  functionary,  as  is 
well  known,  has  the  drawing  up  of  all  last  wills  and 
testaments,  according  to  the  laws  of  Kuhschnappel.  At 
length  he  arrived,  Ba;rstel  by  name,  a  shrivelled  and  dried- 
up  snail  of  a  man,  with  a  round,  shy,  listening  button-face, 
all  hunger,  anxiety,  and  attention.  Many  people  thought 
his  flesh  was  merely  smeared  over  his  bones,  like  the  new 
Swedish  carton  pierre.  *'  What  is  it  your  pleasure  to  have 
written  to-day,  Sir  ?  "  began  Bssrstel.  "  One  of  my  pretty 
little  codicils,"  said  Siebenkaes.  "But  before  we  begin 
hadn't  you  better  try  me  with  a  catch-question  or  two,  as 
is  usually  done  with  testators,  to  find  out  ("without  letting 
me  know  what  you  are  at,  you  understand)  whether  1  am 
all  right  in  my  head  ?"  "  Do  you  know  who  I  am,  Sir  ?  " 
said  Baerstel.  "  You  are  Mr.  Basrstel,  Notary  Public," 
answered  the  patient.  '•  Not  only  is  that  quite  correct," 
answered  Basrstel,  "but  it  renders  it  quite  clear  that  you 
are  wandering  very  little,  if  at  all,  and  we  may  proceed  at 
once  to  draw  up  your  testament." 

LAST   WILL   AND   TESTAMENT   OF   SIEBENK.ES, 
I'OOR'S   ADVOCATE. 

"  The  undersigned,  now  yellowing  and  falling  from  the 
tree  with  the  rest  of  the  August  apples,  desires,  being  thus 
nigh  to  death,  which  looses  the  spirit  from  the  thraldom 
cf  the  body,  to  execute  a  few  more  merry  back-steps,  side- 
steps, and  Sir-Roger-de  Coverleys,  three  minutes  before  the 
Basle  dance  of  Death  begins." 

The  notary  paused,  and  asked  in  amazement,  "Am  I  to 
put  this  stuff,  and  more  like  it,  down  upon  paper  ?  " 

"  Imprimis,  I,  Firmian  Siebenkres,  alias  Heinrich  Leib- 
geber,  do  hereby  will  and  ordain  that  my  guardian  the 
Heimlicher  von  Blaise  shall  (and  must)  pay  over,  within  a 
year  and  day  after  my  decease,  to  my  friend,  Mr.  Leibgeber, 
inspector  in  Vaduz,*  the   12,000  florins  of  trust   money 

*  That  is,  to  himself.  He  wishes  his  inheritance  to  be  paid  to  him- 
■elf,  and  not  to  his  wife,  because  she  might  have  married  a  rich  husband 


CHAP.  XX.]    FLOWER,    FRUIT,   AND   THORN  PIECES.     495 

whereof  he  has  godlessty  defrauded  me,  his  ward  :  the  said 
Mr.  Leibgeber  making  over  the  same  hereafter  faithfully  to 
my  beloved  wife.  In  the  event  of  the  said  Heir  von  Blaise 
declining  so  to  do,  I  here  lift  up  my  hand  and  swear,  upon 
my  dying  bed,  that  after  I  have  departed  this  life  I  will 
pursue  him,  not  legally,  but  spiritually,  and  will  terrify 
him  by  appearing  to  him,  either  as  the  devil  or  as  a  tall 
white  man,  or  by  my  voice  merely,  according  as  my  cir- 
cumstances, after  my  decease,  may  permit." 

The  notary's  feathered  arm  hovered  in  air,  and  he  ceased 
not  to  shrink  and  shudder  with  terror.  "  All  I  am  afraid 
of,"  he  said,  "  is  that  if  I  write  down  things  of  this  kind, 
the  Heimlicher  will  get  hold  of  me."  But  Leibgeber,  with 
face  and  body,  barred  his  retreat  through  that  hell-gate, 
the  door  of  the  room. 

"  Further,  as  reigning  sovereign  of  the  shooter's  com- 
pany, I  will  and  ordain  that  no  war  of  succession  shall 
convert  my  testament  into  a  powder  of  succession  for 
innocent  people.  Further,  that  the  republic  of  Kuhschnap- 
pel  (into  the  office  of  Gonfaloniere  and  Doge  whereof  I  was 
balloted  with  rifle  bullets)  shall  wage  no  defensive  war, 
seeing  that  it  cannot  defend  itself  if  it  does — but  offensive 
wars  only,  with  the  object  of  enlarging  the  boundaries 
of  its  territories,  they  not  being  easy  to  protect.  And 
that  its  members  may,  in  their  generation,  be  as  wood- 
economising  as  their  country  and  royal  burgh's  father  has 
been  in  his.  Now-a-days,  when  forests  are  burned'  to 
charcoal  faster  than  they  grow  again,  the  only  thing  to  be 
done  is  to  warm  the  climate  a  good  deal,  and  turn  it  into 
a  great  brooding-oven,  kiln,  and  field-oven,  so  as  to  save 
the  trouble,  and  obviate  the  necessity,  of  having  stoves  in 
the  houses.  And  this  has  been  in  some  measure  attended 
to  by  careful  Comnii.-  si  oners  of  Woods  and  Forests,  who 
have  cleared  away  the  forests  as  much  as  they  could,  they 
being  full  of  late  winter.  When  one  thinks  how  very  beauti- 
fully modern  Germany  contrasts  with  that  which  Tacitus 
mapped,  warmed  as  it  is  by  the  mere  cutting  down  of 
the  forests,  we  have  little  difficulty  in  feeling  convinced 

in  the  interval ;  besides,  he  would  have  less  trouble  in  knowing  whether 
or  not  the  Heimlicher  did  what  he  told  him,  and  could,  if  necessary, 
carry  out  the  threat  which  he  is  about  to  make. 


496  JEAN   PAUL   FEIEDRICH  EICHTER.       [BOOK  IV. 

that  a  time  will  come  when,  there  being  no  more  timber  at 
all,  we  shall  arrive  at  such  a  temperature  that  the  atmo- 
sphere itself  shall  be  our  fur  pelisse.  The  reason  the  present 
superfluity  is  burnt  to  ashes  as  rapidly  as  possible  is,  that 
the  price  of  raft- wood  may  be  raised,  just  as  a  million  livres  ' 
worth  of  nutmegs  were  publicly  burnt  at  Amsterdam  in 
1760,  to  prevent  the  price  from  falling. 

"Moreover,  as  King  of  the  Kuhschnappelian  Jerusalem, 
it  is  my  desire  that  the  senate  and  people  thereof  (senatus, 
populusque  Kuhschnappeliensis)  be  not  damned,  but  con- 
trariwise blessed,  particularly  in  this  present  world. 
Further,  that  the  town  magnates  may  not  devour  the 
Kuhschnappelian  nests  (houses)  as  they  do  the  Indian 
ones,  and  that  the  taxes,  though  they  have  to  pass  through 
the  four  stomachs  of  the  tax-gatherers,*  may  nevertheless 
issue  thence  converted  from  milky  chyle  into  red  blood 
(from  silver  into  gold),  and  after  circulating  through  the 
lacteal s  and  the  thoracic  duct,  be  impelled  in  due  course 
into  the  veins  of  the  body  politic.  Further,  I  will  and 
appoint  that  the  greater  and  the  lesser  council " 

The  notary  would  fain  have  stopped  here,  and  shook  his 
head  most  energetically,  but  Leibgeber  was  playing  with 
the  rifle  with  which  the  testator  had  elevated  himself  to 
the  throne  of  the  marksman  (whereas  it  is  upon  leaping- 
poles  consisting  of  other  mens  ramrods  that  thrones  are 
usually  attained  to),  and  Bserstel  wrote  on  in  the  sweat  of 
his  brow. 

"That  the  mayor,  the  treasurer,  the  Heimlicher,  the 
eight  members  of  council,  and  the  serjeant  of  court,  may 
listen  to  reason,  and  reward  no  merit  but  that  of  other 
people.  And  that  the  rascal  Blaise,  and  the  scoundrel 
Meyern  may  daily  lay  castigatory  hands  upon  each  other, 
as  relations,  so  that  there  may  at  all  events  always  be  one 
to  punish  the  other." 

Here  the  notary  jumped  up.  declared  it  took  his  breath 
away,  and  went  to  the  window  to  get  a  little  air.  And  as 
he  saw  that  there  was  a  pile  of  tanner's  bark  within  easy 
shot  of  the  window-sill,  his  terror,  shoving  at  him  from 

*  Here  follow,  in  the  original,  puns  on  the  (German)  medical  names 
of  the  four  stomachs  of  the  Ruminantia,  for  which  I  am  unequal  to 
finding  equivalents. — Tbans. 


CHAP.  XX.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       497 

behind,  impelled  him  up  on  to  the  sill  in  question. 
Having  taken  this  first  step,  before  a  testament  witness 
could  seize  him  by  the  coat-tails,  he  made  a  second  (and 
long)  one  out  into  the  open  air,  so  as  to  be  in  a  position  to 
reach  that  modelling-table  the  heap  of  bark.  Being  thus 
a  falling  artist  (not  a  rising  one),  he  could  do  no  better  on 
his  arrival  there  than  make  use  of  his  face  as  a  graving- 
tool,  plastic  "form,"  and  copying  machine,  and  execute 
therewith  a  faint  bas-relief  impression  of  himself  upon  the 
heap  of  tan.  His  fingers  worked  busily  as  graving-tools, 
making  copies  of  themselves,  whilst,  as  a  matter  of  pure 
accident,  he  countersigned  this,  his  report  of  the  incident, 
with  hi?  notarial  seal,  which  he  had  taken  with  him  in  his 
descent.  So  easy  is  it  for  one  notary  to  create  another, 
like  a  Count  Palatine.  But  Baerstel  left  his  co-notary  and 
the  entire  lusus  natures,  behind  him,  thinking  on  his  home- 
ward way  of  matters  of  a  wholly  different  kind.  Stiefel 
and  Leibgeber,  again,  looked  out  of  window,  and  (the 
notary  having  vanished,  bag  and  baggage,)  gazed  upon  his 
second  outward,  man  as  it  lay  outstretched  before  them  upon 
its  anatomical  theatre,  smelling  of  Russia  leather.  Con- 
cerning which  the  author  will  not  add  another  word  of 
his  own,  but  only  these  of  Henry's. 

"  The  notary  wished  to  seal  the  testament  with  a  larger 
seal  than  usual — one  which  nobody  might  forge — so  he 
sealed  it  with  his  own  body,  and  there  we  see  the  sphra- 
gistic  impression  all  complete." 

The  will,  such  as  it  was,  was  duly  subscribed  by  the 
witnesses  and  by  the  testator,  and  anything  but  a  demi- 
military  testament  of  this  kind  was  scarcely  to  be  expected 
in  the  circumstances.  Evening  was  now  drawing  on, — 
the  time  when  sick  and  sorry  man  turns  him  from  the  sun 
(as  does  the  earth  he  dwells  on),  and  towards  the  twilight 
evening  star  of  the  other  world, — when  the  sick  pass  away 
to  the  latter,  and  the  well  gaze  at  the  former — and  when 
Firmian  thought  to  give  his  wife  the  long  kiss  of  parting, 
and  then  begin  slowly  sinking.  But  unfortunately  Deacon 
Bevel  (the  assistant  preacher)  came  rustling  in  in  an 
electrically  stormy  fashion.  He  came  arrayed  in  his 
ecclesiastical  armour,  gorget,  sash,  and  all,  to  administer 
a  befitting  rebuke  to  the  invalid  (round  whose  neck  he 

II.  2  K 


498  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDKICH  RICHTEK.  [BOOK  IV. 

had  tied  the  band  of  matrimony  in  a  double  knot)  for 
trying  to  evade  payment  of  the  confession  fee — that  toll 
for  the  communion  of  the  sick  and  sound  on  the  high- 
way between  heaven  and  hell.  As  (on  the  authority  of 
Linnaeus)  the  ancient  botanists — a  Croll,  Porta,  Helvetius, 
Fabriciu8— thought  that  certain  plants  which  had  more 
or  less  resemblance  to  particular  illnesses  were  remedies 
for  these  complaints,  prescribing  yellow  plants,  such  as 
saffron  and  turmeric,  for  jaundice,  dragon's-blood  and 
catechu  for  dysentery,  cabbage-heads  for  headache  (as 
well  as  prickly  things,  such  as  fish-bones,  for  stitches  in  the 
side),  so,  in  the  hands  of  able  Gospel  ministers,  the  spiritual 
materia  medica,  such  as  sermons  and  admonitions,  assume 
the  appearance  of  the  spiritual  maladies  for  whose  cure 
they  are  administered — anger,  pride,  avarice,  and  so  on. 
Thus  there  is  often  no  difference,  but  one  of  condition, 
between  the  bed-ridden  patient  and  his  physician.  This 
was  the  case  with  Bevel.  One  of  his  great  objects  in  life 
was,  in  an  age  when  people  are  so  prone  to  defame  the 
Lutheran  clergy  by  calling  them  mere  Jesuits  in  disguise, 
or  monks,  to  give  the  most  unmistakable  proof,  more  by 
deeds  than  by  words,  that  he  was,  at  all  events,  none  of 
the  latter  (who  call  nothing  their  own,  and  are  not  allowed 
to  possess  property),  and  for  that  reason  to  be  at  all  times 
on  the  hunt,  and  on  the  snatch,  after  worldly  possessions. 
Hoseas  Leibgeber  did  his  best  to  make  himself  a  barrier- 
rope  and  turnstile  for  the  parson,  and  stopped  him  on  the 
threshold,  saying,  "  I  fear  it  won't  be  of  much  use ;  I  tried 
my  own  hand  yesterday  at  converting  and  recoining  him 
flying,  (if  I  may  use  the  expression,)  post-haste,  volti  subito 
citissime,  but  all  that  came  of  it  was  that  he  threw  it  in  my 
teeth  that  I  wasn't  converted  myself—  and  no  more  I  am. 
There  are  whole  flocks  of  heretical  singing-birds  pecking 
away  at  the  summer  rape-seed  of  my  opinions."  Revel 
answered  (vacillating  between  a  major  mode  and  a  minor), 
"A  servant  of  the  Lord  bides  his  time,  keeps  diligent 
watch,  and  does  the  duty  of  his  sacred  calling,  striving  to 
save  souls — from  atheism,  as  well  as  from  other  sin.  The 
event  concerns  the  sinner,  and  the  sinner  oniy." 

So  this  black   storm  cloud,   charged  to  the  brim  with 
Sinai-lightnings,  rolled  on  into  the  dim-lit  chamber;  the 


CHAP.  XX.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       499 

parson  waved  his  great,  flapping  gown-sleeve,  like  a 
standard  of  spiritual  healing  and  rehabilitation,  over  the 
atheist  (as  he  thought  him)  stretched  on  his  bed,  and 
told  him  in  a  "  sick-bed  exhortation "  (which  is  gene- 
rally the  very  antipodes  of  a  funeral  sermon)  —  in  a 
"  sick-bed  exhortation  "  (I  say)  such  as  may  one  day  over- 
take me  and  my  reader  under  our  last  bed-cover,  and 
which  I  shall  therefore  avoid  sending  all  the  way  from 
Bayreuth  to  Heidelberg  to  be  put  in  type,  since  it  may 
be  heard  en  route  going  on  in  any  sick-chamber.  At  the 
same  time  he  told  him,  in  the  said  sick-bed  exhorta- 
tion to  his  face,  like  a  plain-speaking,  straight-forward 
man,  that  he  was  a  roast  for  the  devil's  table,  just  done  to 
a  turn,  and  ready  to  be  dished  and  served.  The  roast 
(thus  pronounced  to  be  done  to  a  turn),  closed  his  eyes, 
and  endured  it.  But  Henry,  whom  it  pained  to  see  the 
parson  pinching  the  ears  and  the  heart  whom  he  loved 
with  red-hot  pincers,  and  who  was  furious  at  the  thought 
that  it  was  done  solely  to  frighten  the  sick  man  into  the 
Confessional — Henry  seized  his  waving  arm,  and  gently 
reminded  him — 

"  I  did  not  think  it  would  have  been  very  polite,  Mr. 
Revel,  to  mention  it  before — but  the  patient's  hearing  is 
a  good  deal  impaired.  You  will  find  you  will  be  obliged 
to  scream.  He  has  not  heard  a  syllable  you  have  said  up 
to  this  point.  Mr.  Siebenkses,  do  you  know  who  this  is  1 
You  see  how  little  he  hears.  Set  to  work  now  at  convert- 
ing me,  over  a  glass  of  beer — I  should  prefer  that  very 
much,  and  I  hear  a  great  deal  better.  I'm  very  mucli 
afraid  he  has  a  touch  of  delirium,  and,  if  he  sees  you  at  all, 
thinks  you  are  the  devil — for  it  is  with  him  that  the  dying 
have  to  fence  their  last  bout.  It's  a  pity  he  didn't  know 
what  you  were  saying.  He  would  have  been  very  angry 
and  annoyed — (for  confess  he  will  not) — and  on  the 
authority  of  Haller,  in  the  8th  volume  of  his  '  Physiology, 
a  proper  amount  of  annoyance  and  vexation  has  often 
been  known  to  add  weeks  to  a  dying  person's  life.  But, 
after  all,  he  is  a  kind  of  a  true  Christian,  after  a  fashion, 
when  all's  said,  although  he  no  more  dreams  of  confessing 
than  any  of  the  Apostles  did,  or  the  fathers  either.  When 
he  is  gone,  you  shall  hear  from  my  own  lips  how  peace- 

2  K  2 


500  JEAN   PAUL  FRIEDRICH   RICHTER.      [BOOK  IV. 

fully  a  true  Christian  passes  away — no  convulsions — no 
contortions — no  agonies  of  death.  He  is  as  completely  at 
home  in  the  world  of  spirits  as  the  screech-owl  is  in  the 
village  steeple — and  just  as  the  owl  sits  in  the  belfry 
while  the  bells  are  ringing,  I  will  be  bound  that  our 
Advocate  will  never  stir  when  the  death-bell  tolls  for  him 
— for  he  has  acquired,  from  your  sermons,  the  conviction 
that  he  will  go  on  living  after  he  dies." 

In  the  above  speech  there  was  some  pretty  hard  hitting, 
in  the  shape  of  jest,  at  Firmian's  mock  death,  as  well  as 
at  his  faith  in  immortality ;  such  jests,  in  fact,  as  none 
but  a  Firmian  could  both  understand  and  pardon.  But 
Leihgeber  was,  at  the  same  time,  making  an  attack,  in  all 
seriousness,  on  those  good  people  who  believe  accidental, 
physical  tranquillity  in  dying  to  be  tranquillity  of  soul, 
and  bodily  struggles  to  be  storms  of  conscience. 

Eevel  contented  himself  with  replying,  "  You  are  of 
those  who  sit  in  the  seat  of  the  scorner — whom  the  Lord 
will  find.  I  have  washed  my  hands."  But  as  he  would 
have  infinitely  preferred  filling  them,  and,  moreover,  could 
not  succeed  in  transforming  this  child  of  the  devil  into  a 
confessing  penitent,  he  took  his  departure,  red  and  silent, 
escorted  downstairs  by  Lenette  and  Stiefel  with  many 
deferential  curtseys  and  bows. 

Let  us  not  make  out  Henry's  gall-bladder  (which  is 
likewise  his  swimming-bladder,  and,  alas !  often  his  as- 
cending globus  hystericus)  to  be  any  bigger  than  it  really 
is.  Let  us  form  a  judgment,  all  the  more  favourable,  of 
this  natural  foible  of  his  from  considering  than  Henry  had, 
in  the  course  of  his  previous  career,  seen  spiritual  freres 
terribles,  and  gallows  preachers  of  this  sort,  strewing  salt 
upon  the  faint,  withered  hearts  on  so  many  deathbeds ; 
and  because  it  was  his  belief  (as  it  is  mine)  that  of  all  the 
hours  of  a  man's  life  his  last  must  be  the  most  indifferent 
as  regards  religion,  inasmuch  as  it  the  most  unfruitful, 
and  no  seed  can  sprout  in  it  which  will  bear  any  fruit 
of  action. 

During  the  brief  absence  of  the  courteous  couple,  Firmian 
said,  "  Oh !  I  am  sick,  sick,  and  weary  of  it  all.  I  cannot 
carry  on  the  joke  any  longer.  In  ten  minutes  more  I 
intend  to  lie  my  last  lie,  and  die — and  would  to  God  it 


CHAP.  XX.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       501 

were  not  a  lie.  Don't  let  them  bring  in  any  lights,  but 
cover  me  up  at  once  with  the  mask,  for  I  see  very  plainly 
that  I  shall  not  be  able  to  control  these  eyes  of  mine,  and 
when  the  mask  is  on,  I  shall,  at  all  events,  be  able  to  let 
them  weep  as  much  as  they  like.  Ah  !  Henry,  my  good, 
kind  friend!" 

The  infusory  chaos  of  Revel's  exhortation  had  made  this 
weary  figurant  and  miniicker  of  Death  tender  and  grave. 
Henry — out  of  his  delicate  and  loving  solicitude — had 
undertaken  all  the  lying  parts  of  the  role,  and  enacted 
those  himself.  He  therefore  (as  the  couple  were  coming 
back  into  the  room),  cried  out,  in  a  loud,  anxious  voice, 
"  Firmian,  how  do  you  feel  now  ? "  "  Better,"  said 
Firmian,  in  a  voice  of  emotion.  "  There  are  stars  shining 
in  this  world's  night,  though  I,  alas  !  am  clamped  to  th6 
dust,  and  cannot  soar  up  to  them.  The  bank  of  the  lovely 
spring-time  of  eternity  is  steep,  and,  close  as  we  day-flies 
are  swimming  to  the  shore  of  Life's  Dead  Sea,  we  have 
not  got  our  wings  yet."  Yes !  Death — sublime  and  glorious 
after  sunset-sky  of  our  St.  Thomas's  Day — grand  amen 
of  our  hope,  spoken  to  our  ears  from  the  other  world — 
would  come  to  our  beds  in  the  likeness  of  a  beautiful 
giant,  with  a  garland  on  his  brow,  and  lift  us  gently  up 
into  the  aether,  and  rock  us  there  to  rest,  were  it  not  that 
we  go  to  him  only  as  maimed,  stunned  creatures,  who 
are  thrown  into  his  giant  arms.  What  robs  Death  of 
his  glory  is  sickness ;  the  pinions  of  the  soul  when  it 
rises  on  its  heavenward  flight  are  heavy,  and  stained  with 
blood,  and  tears,  and  mire.  The  only  time  when  death  is 
a  flight — not  a  fall — is  when  Borne  hero  is  smitten  by  one, 
single,  mortal  wound,  when,  as  he  stands  like  a  spring- 
world,  all  new  blossom,  and  old  fruit,  the  next  world 
suddenly  flashes  by  him,  like  some  comet,  bearing  him 
(miniature  world  as  he  is)  all  unwithered,  along  with  it 
in  its  flight,  to  soar  with  it  beyond  the  sun. 

But  this  mental  exaltation  of  Firmian's  would  have 
been  an  indication  of  reviving  strength  and  returning 
health  to  sharper  eyes  than  Stiefel's.  It  is  upon  the 
looker-on  only — not  upon  the  victim  who  is  smitten  down 
— that  the  battle-axe  of  Death  casts  a  flash  of  light.  It 
is  with  the  death-bell  as  with  other  bells ;   it  is  those 


502  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICE  RICHTER.        [BOOK  IV 

who  are  at  a  distance  who  hear  the  solemn,  inspiring 
boom  and  music — not  those  who  are  within  the  sounding 
hemisphere.  And  as  every  bosom  grows  more  sincere  and 
more  transparent  in  the  hour  of  death — like  the  Siberian 
glass-apple,  the  kernel  of  which,  when  ripe,  is  covered 
only  by  a  crystal  case  formed  of  sweet,  transparent  flesh — 
so  Firmian,  in  this  dithyrambic  hour — near  as  he  was  to 
the  bare  edge  of  Death's  sickle — could  have  gladly  sacri- 
ficed (that  is,  discovered)  all  the  mystery  and  blossom  of 
his  future,  but  that  by  so  doing  he  would  have  broken 
his  word  and  grieved  his  friend.  But  nothing  was  left 
him  now,  save  a  patient  heart,  dumb  lips,  and  weeping 
eyes. 

Alas!  and  were  not  all  his  ostensible  farewells  real 
ones  after  all  ?  As  he  drew  his  Henry  and  the  Schulrath 
to  his  heart  with  trembling  hands,  was  that  heart  not 
oppressed  by  the  mournful  certainty  of  losing  the  Schul- 
rath on  the  morrow,  and  Henry  in  a  week's  time,  for  ever  ? 
So  that  the  following  address  which  he  made  to  them  was 
nothing  but  the  plain  truth,  mournful  though  it  was. 
M  Alas !  we  shall  be  scattered  asunder  by  the  four  winds  of 
heaven  in  a  very,  very  little  time.  Ah !  human  arms  are 
rotten  bands.  How  short  a  time  they  hold !  May  all  be 
well  with  you — and  better  than  I  ever  deserved  it  might  be 
with  me.  May  the  chaotic  stone-heaps  of  your  lives  never 
come  rolling  down  about  your  feet,  or  about  your  ears 
— may  spring  overspread  the  crags  and  cliffs  around  you 
with  berries,  and  the  freshest  green!  Good  night  for 
ever,  dearly  loved  Schulrath,  and  you,  my  Henry ! "  He 
pressed  the  latter  to  his  heart  in  silence,  thinking  how 
noar  the  veritable  parting  was. 

But  he  should  have  avoided  stimulating  his  heart  into 
feverish  excitement  by  these  pricks  and  stings  of  fare- 
well, for  he  heard  Lenette  mourning  out  of  sight  behind 
the  bed,  and  (with  a  deep  death-wound  in  his  overflowing 
heart)  said,  "  Come,  my  beloved  Lenette,  and  bid  me 
good-bye;"  and  stretched  out  his  arms  in  a  wild  manner 
to  receive  her.  She  came  tottering,  and  sank  into  them, 
and  on  to  his  heart,  while  he  was  speechless  under  the 
crushing  weight  of  his  emotions;  till  at  length,  as  she 
lay  there  trembling,  he  said,  in  a  low  voice,  "  Ah !  pror. 


CHAP.  XX.  J      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       503 

patient,  faithful,  tortured  soul!  how  constantly  and  un- 
ceasingly have  I  caused  you  sorrow!  Will  you  forgive 
me?  Will  you  forget  me?"  (A  spasm  of  sorrow  clasped 
her  closer  to  him.)  "  Ah  !  do  but  forget  me,  and  forget 
me  quite ;  for  heaven  knows  you  have  never  been  happy 
with  me!"  Their  voices  were  lost  in  sobs,  only  their 
tears  could  flow.  A  drawing,  thirsting  grief  was  grind- 
ing at  his  weary  heart,  and  he  went  on :  "  No,  no ;  with 
me  you  have  truly  had  nothing,  nothing  but  tears ;  but 
there  are  happy  days  coming  for  you,  when  I  shall  be 
gone  from  you."  He  gave  her  his  parting  kiss,  saying, 
"  Live  happy  now,  and  let  me  be  gone ! "  "  But  you  are 
not  going  to  die,"  she  cried  again  and  again,  with  a 
thousand  tears.  He  put  his  arms  about  her,  he  gently 
raised  her  fainting  form  from  his  breast,  and  said,  very 
solemnly,  "  It  is  over  now.  Fate  has  sundered  us  ;  it  is 
over  and.  past." 

Henry  gently  led  her  weeping  away ;  and  he  cried  him- 
self, too ;  and  cursed  his  plot ;  and  signed  to  the  Schulrath, 
saying,  "  Firmian  needs  rest  now."  The  latter  turned  his 
face,  swollen  and  drawn  with  pain,  to  the  wall.  Lenette 
and  Stiefel  were  mourning  together  in  the  other  room. 
Henry  waited  till  the  greater  billows  had  subsided  some- 
what, and  then  quietly  put  the  question  :  "  Now?"  Fir- 
mian gave  the  signal,  and  Henry  yelled  out,  "  Oh !  he  is 
gone!"  like  a  man  beside  himself;  and  threw  himself 
down  upon  the  motionless  body  (to  prevent  anybody  from 
touching  it),  with  genuine,  bitter  tears  at  the  thought  of 
the  nearness  of  parting.  An  inconsolable  couple  came 
bursting  from  the  next  room.  Lenette  would  have  thrown 
herself  upon  her  husband  (whose  face  was  turned  away), 
and  she  cried,  in  agony,  "I  must  see  him;  I  must  bid 
my  husband  good-bye  once  more."  But  Henry  told  the 
Schulrath  (confidentially)  to  take  hold  of  her,  and  support 
her,  and  get  her  away  out  of  the  room.  The  two  former 
things  he  was  able  to  accomplish  (although  his  own  self- 
control  was  only  an  artificial  one,  assumed  with  the  view 
of  demonstrating  the  victory  of  religion  over  philosophy), 
but  get  her  out  of  the  room  he  could  not.  When  she  saw 
Henry  take  up  the  mask  of  death,  "  No,  no,"  she  cried ; 
**I  insist  upon  being  allowed  to  see  my  husband  once 


504  JEAN  PAUL  PRIEDRICH  BICHTER.         [BOOK  IV. 

more."  But  Henry  took  the  mask,  gently  turned  Fir 
mian's  face  (on  which  the  tears  of  parting  were  scarce  yet 
dry),  and  covered  it  up,  thus  hiding  it  for  ever  from 
his  wife's  weeping  eyes.  This  grand  scene  lifted  up  his 
heart ;  he  gazed  upon  the  mask  and  said,  "  Death  lays  a 
mask  like  this  over  all  our  faces ;  and  a  time  will  come 
when  J  shall  stretch  me  out  in  death's  midnight  sleep  as 
lie  has  done,  and  grow  longer  and  heavier.  Ah  !  poor 
Firmian!  has  that  war  game  of  yours  heen  worth  the 
candles  and  the  trouble?  We  are  not  the  -players,  it  is 
true ;  we  are  the  things  played  with  :  and  old  Death  sends 
our  heads  and  hearts  rolling  like  balls  over  the  green 
billiard-table,  and  pockets  them  in  his  corpse-sack;  and 
every  time  one  of  us  is  pocketed  there,  the  death-bell 
gives  a  toll.  It  is  true  you  go  on  living  in  a  sense*  (if 
the  frescoes  of  ideas  can  be  detached  from  the  walls  of 
the  body),  and  oh !  may  you  be  happier  in  that  postscript 
life  than  in  this.  But  what  is  it,  this  postscript  life,  after 
all  ?  It  will  go  out  too ;  every  life,  on  every  world-ball, 
will  burn  out  one  day.  The  planets  are  licensed  only  to 
retail  liquor  to  be  drunk  on  the  premises.  They  can't 
board  and  lodge  us ;  they  merely  pour  us  out  a  glass  of 
quince-wine,  currant-juice,  spirits ;  but  for  the  most  part 
gargles  of  good  wine  (which  we  must  not  swallow),  or  else 
sympathetic  ink  (i.e.  liquor  probatoriw),  sleeping-draughts, 
and  acids;  and  then,  on  we  go,  from  one  planet-inn  to 
another ;  and  so  from  millennium  to  millennium.  Oh ! 
thou  kind  heaven  ;  and  whither,  whither,  whither  ? 

"However,  this  earth  is  the  wretchedest  village  tap- 
room of  the  lot ;  a  place  where  mostly  beggars,  rogues, 
and  deserters  turn  in,  and  which  we  have  always  to  go 
five  steps  away  from  to  enjoy  our  best  pleasures ;  that  is  to 
say,  either  into  memory  or  into  imagination. 

"  Ah !  peaceful  being  there  at  rest,  may  it  fare  better 
with  you  in  other  taverns  than  here;  and  may  some 
restaurateur  of  life  open  the  door  of  a  wine-cellar  for  you 
in  lieu  of  this  vinegar-cellar ! " 

*  Leibgeber  means,  at  onoe,  the  second  life  (in  which  he  doea  not 
believe),  and  Firmian's  continuation  of  his  pre$ent  life  in  Vaduz. 


CHAP.  XXI.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  ANT  THORN  PIECES.      505 


CHAPTER  XXI. 

DR.  OELHAFEN  AND  MEDICAL  BOOT  AND  SHOEMAKING — THE 
BURIAL  SOCIETY — A  DEATH'S  HEAD  IN  THE  SADDLE — FRE- 
DERICK II.  AND  HIS  FUNERAL  ORATION. 

As  a  step  preliminary  to  everything  else,  Leibgeber 
quartered  tbe  sorrowing  widow  down  stairs  with  the 
hairdresser,  with  the  view  of  rendering  the  intermediate 
state  after  death  easier  to  the  dead  man.  "  Yon  must 
emigrate,"  he  told  her,  "  and  keep  out  of  the  sight  of  these 
ead  memorials  round  us  here,  until  he  has  been  taken  away.'J 
Superstitious  terror  made  her  consent,  so  that  he  had  nc 
difficulty  in  giving  the  dear  departed  his  food  and  drink. 
He  compared  him  to  a  walled-up  vestal,  finding  in  her 
cell  a  lamp,  bread,  water,  milk,  and»  oil  (according  to 
Plutarch,  in  '  Numa ') ;  and  added,  "  Unless  you  are  more 
like  the  earwig,  which,  when  cut  in  two,  turns  about  and 
devours  its  own  remains."  By  jokes  like  these  he  bright- 
ened (or,  at  all  events,  strove  to  brighten)  the  cloudy 
and  autumnal  soul  of  his  dear  friend,  who  could  see 
nothing  all  around  him  save  ruins  of  his  bygone  life, 
from  the  widowed  Lenette's  clothes  to  her  work.  The 
bonnet-block,  which  he  had  struck  on  the  day  of  the 
thunder-storm,  had  to  be  put  away  in  a  corner  out  of  his 
eight,  because  he  said  it  made  Gorgon  faces  at  him. 

Next  day,  our  good  corpse-watcher,  Leibgeber,  had  to 
perform  the  labours  of  a  Hercules,  an  Ixion,  and  a  Sisy- 
phus combined.  Congress  after  congress,  picket  after 
picket,  came  to  see  the  dead  man  and  speak  well  of  him — 
for  it  is  not  until  they  make  their  exit  that  we  applaud  men 
and  actors,  and  we  think  people  are  morally  beautified  by 
death  as  Lavater  thought  they  were  physically.  But 
Leibgeber  drove  everybody  away  from  the  death-chamber, 
saying  it  had  been  one  of  his  friend's  last  requests  that  he 
should  do  so. 

Then  came  the  woman  to  lay  out  the  corpse  (Death's 
Abigail),  and  wanted  to  begin  washing  and  dressing 
it.  Henry  tussled  with  her,  paid  her,  and  banished 
her.    Then  (in  presence  of  the  widow  and  Peltzstiefel),  he 


506  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IV. 

had  to  pretend  to  be  pretending  to  hide  a  Weeding  heart 
behind  outward  resignation.  "  But  I  see  through  him," 
said  Stiefel,  "  without  the  slightest  trouble.  It  is  because 
he  is  not  a  Christian  that  he  is  striving  to  play  the  Stoic 
and  the  Philosopher."  Stiefel  was  here  alluding  to  that 
specious,  empty,  and  frivolous  hardness  which  is  exhi- 
bited by  Zenos  of  the  world  and  of  the  court,  who  are  like 
those  wooden  figures  which  are  made  to  look  like  stone 
statues  and  pillars  by  being  smeared  over  with  a  coating 
of  stone-dust.  Also  the  share,  or  dividend,  of  the  burial- 
fund  was  got  together  ("by  being  collected  on  a  plate 
from  the  members  of  that  body),  and  this  led  to  its  coming 
to  the  knowledge  of  our  old  acquaintance  Dr.  (Elhafen, 
who  was  one  of  the  paying  members.  He  took  occasion, 
on  his  morning  round  of  visits,  to  drop  in  at  the  house 
of  mourning,  with  the  view  of  provoking  his  brother  in 
science  to  as  great^an  extent  as  he  could.  He  therefore 
affected  not  to  have  heard  a  word  about  the  death,  and 
began  by  asking  how  the  invalid  was  getting  on.  "  Ac- 
cording to  the  latest  bulletins,"  said  Henry,  "  he  is  not 
getting  on  at  all — he  has  got  on ;  in  a  word,  Herr  Proto- 
medicus  (Elhafen,  he  is  gone.  August,  March,  and  De- 
cember are  months  when  Death  sends  out  his  pressgang 
and  gathers  in  his  vintage." 

"  That  lowering  powder  of  yours,"  said  the  vindictive 
Doctor,  "  seems  to  have  lowered  his  temperature  pretty 
effectively;  he's  cool  enough  now,  eh?"  This  pained 
Leibgeber,  and  he  answered,  "  I  am  sorry  to  say,  he  is. 
However,  we  did  our  best  with  him.  We  yot  your  emetic 
down  his  throat,  but  the  only  thing  he  got  rid  of  was  that 
most  terribly  morbific  of  all  matters  in  man — his  souL 
You,  Mr.  Protomedicus,  are  judge  in  a  criminal  court, 
having  the  power  of  life  and  death ;  whereas,  you  see,  I 
am  only  an  advocate,  and  possessed  of  a  jurisdiction  so  far 
inferior  that  I  didn't  dare  meddle  with  anything,  least  of 
all  the  fellow's  life;  a  nice  face  he  would  have  made  if 
I  had." 

"  Well,  so  he  has  made  a  face  at  it,  and  a  long  face,  too 
— the  hippocratic  face,"  answered  the  Doctor,  not  wholly 
without  wit.  "  I  can't  but  believe  you,"  answered  Leib- 
geber, in  a  gentle  manner  i  "  I  hava  not  the  least  doubt 


CHAP.  XXI.]      FLOWEE,  FEUIT,  AND  THOEN  PIECES.      507 

you  are  perfectly  right.  We  laymen,  you  see,  have  so 
few  opportunities  of  seeing  those  faces,  whereas  doctors 
can  study  the  hippocratic  countenance  in  their  patients 
every  day  of  their  lives.  And,  of  course,  an  experienced 
doctor  is  always  distinguished  by  a  quickness  of  eye  which 
enables  him  to  tell  at  a  glance  if  a  patient  be  going  to 
die — which  is  an  impossibility  to  other  people,  who,  not 
being  doctors  in  practice,  have  not  many  opportunities  of 
seeing  people  depart  this  life." 

"  A  medical  connoisseur  of  your  cultivation  and  experi- 
ence as  a  matter  of  course  put  mustard  poultices  to  the 
patient's  feet  ?  Only,  I  presume,  it  was  too  late  for  them 
to  be  of  any  use,  was  it?" 

"  I  did  manage  to  hit  upon  the  notion  of  trying  that 
trick  of  soling  my  poor  friend's  feet  with  mustard  and 
vinegar  "  (answered  Leibgeber),  "  and  paper-hanging  the 
calves  of  his  legs  with  blisters;  but  the  patient  (at  all 
times  rather  fond  of  his  joke,  as  you  know),  called  that 
sort  of  thing  '  medical  boot  and  shoemaking,'  and  called  us 
doctors  '  Death's  shoemakers,'  who,  when  Nature  has  cried 
to  a  poor  fellow  '  Look  out !  Mind  your  head ! '  go  and  put 
Spanish  flies  on  to  him  by  way  of  Spanish  boots,  mustard- 
plasters  by  way  of  Cothurni,  and  cupping-glasses  by  way 
of  leg-irons :  as  if  a  man  could  not  make  his  appearance 
in  the  next  world  without  red  heels  consisting  of  mustard- 
blister  marks,  and  red  cardinal  stockings  of  plaster  blisters. 
And  so  saying,  the  deceased  aimed  a  skilful  kick  at  my 
face  and  the  plaster,  and  said  the  connoisseurs  were  like 
stinging-flies,  which  always  fasten  upon  the  legs." 

"  He  wasn't  far  wrong,  I  suspect,  as  regarded  you.  A 
•shoemaker  of  Death'  might  perhaps  put  something  on 
just  under  that  caput  tribus  imanabile  of  yours  which 
wouldn't  fit  so  badly,"  said  the  Doctor,  and  made  off  as 
fast  as  he  could. 

I  have  already  said  a  few  words  concerning  those 
emetic  powders  of  his,  and  I  now  wish  to  add  what  follows. 
If  he  does  send  people  to  their  long  homes  by  means  of 
them,  the  chief  difference  between  him  and  a  fox  *  is  that 
(according  to  the  ancient  naturalist),  the  latter  imitates 
the  distant  sound  of  a  man  being  sick  to  make  the  dogs  run 
*  Plin.  H.  N,  viii.  30. 


508  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IV 

to  him,  that  he  may  attack  them.  At  the  same  time  even 
those  whose  opinion  of  the  members  of  the  medical  pro- 
fession is  the  highest  conceivable  must  admit  that  there 
are  certain  limits  to  their  criminal  jurisdiction.  As  by 
European  International  Law,  no  army  can  shoot  down 
another  with  glass  bullets,  or  poisoned  ones,  but  only  with 
leaden  ones — further,  as  no  nation  may  put  poison  into 
the  enemies'  food,  or  wells,  but  only  dirt — so,  although 
the  medical  police  allow  a  practising  physician  (of  the 
higher  jurisdiction)  the  utmost  freedom  in  the  administra- 
tion of  narcotics,  drastics,  emetics,  diuretics,  and  the 
whole  pharmacopoeia,  in  a  word  (so  that  it  would  be  a 
breach  of  the  police  regulations  to  attempt  to  prevent  him), 
yet  were  the  most  celebrated  of  doctors,  town  or  country, 
within  the  limits  of  his  jurisdiction  to  set  to  work  and 
give  people  poison-balls  in  place  of  pills,  or  ratsbane  by 
way  of  a  strong  emetic,  the  upper  courts  of  justice  would 
take  a  pretty  serious  view  of  the  matter — unless  it  were 
for  ague  that  he  prescribed  the  mouse-poison.  Nay,  I 
suspect  that  an  entire  medical  collegium  would  scarce  es- 
cape some  judicial  inquiry  if  it  were  to  take  a  sword  and 
run  a  man  through  with  it  (though  it  might  open  his  veins 
with  a  lancet  at  any  hour  of  the  day  or  night  if  it  pleased), 
or  if  it  were  to  knock  him  down  with  a  warlike  but  non- 
surgical instrument.  Thus  we  find  in  the  criminal  re- 
cords that  doctors  who  threw  people  into  the  water  from 
bridges  have  by  no  means  got  clear  off — that  being  a  dif- 
ferent affair  altogether  from  putting  them  into  a  smaller 
bath,  mineral  or  otherwise. 

When  the  hairdresser  heard  that  the  corpse-lottery 
money  had  safely  arrived  in  its  harbour  of  refuge,  he 
came  upstairs  and  offered  to  curl  his  deceased  lodger's 
hair,  make  him  a  pigtail,  and  let  his  comb  and  pomatum 
accompany  him  under  the  sod.  Leibgeber  was  obliged 
to  be  economical  on  the  poor  widow's  account,  for  more 
than  half  her  feathers  were  plucked  out  of  her  already  by 
the  innumerable  insect-feelers,  vultures'-talons,  and  boars'- 
tusks  of  the  domestics  of  death,  and  he  said  the  most  he 
could  do  was  to  buy  the  comb  and  put  it  in  the  deceased's 
waistcoat-pocket,  so  that  he  might  do  it  himself  after  his 
own  taste.    He  said  the  same  to  the  barber,  and  added 


CHAP.  XXI.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      509 

that,  of  course,  as  hair  goes  on  growing  in  the  grave,  the 
whole  secret  society  (and  fruit-bearing  society)  therein  is 
adorned  with  fine  beards,  like  Swiss  of  the  age  of  sixty. 
These  two  collaborateurs  in  hair  (who  revolve  round  the 
same  central-sphere  like  two  of  the  satellites  of  Uranus) 
went  off  with  abbreviated  hopes,  and  elongated  faces  and 
purses,  the  one  wishing,  in  the  excess  of  his  gratitude, 
that  he  had  at  that  moment  the  shaving  of  the  undertaker 
Henry,  the  other  wishing  he  had  the  cutting  of  his  hair. 
On  the  stairs  they  grumbled  out,  "  It  would  be  no  wonder 
if  the  dead  man  should  not  be  able  to  rest  in  his  grave, 
but  went  about  frightening  people." 

Leibgeber  thought  of  the  risk  there  was  of  losing  the 
reward  of  all  this  long  process  of  deception,  should  any- 
body go  to  have  a  look  at  the  deceased  gentleman  while 
he  was  in  the  next  room  (for  whenever  he  was  going  further 
he  locked  the  door).  So  he  went  to  the  churchyard,  took 
a  skull  out  of  the  charnel-house,  and  brought  it  home 
under  his  coat.  He  handed  it  to  Siebenkses,  saying,  "  If 
we  were  to  shove  this  head  in  beneath  the  green  trellis- 
bed  whereon  defunctus  is  lying,  and  keep  it  connected 
with  his  hand  by  means  of  a  green-silk  thread,  it  might 
be  brought  into  play  (in  the  dark,  at  all  events),  as  a 
species  of  Belidor's  globe  of  compression,  or  jawbone  of  an 
ass  as  against  Philistines,  who  have  got  to  be  frightened 
away  if  they  come  disturbing  the  repose  of  the  warm 
dead."  To  be  sure  (had  the  most  extreme  necessity  to  do 
so  arisen)  Siebenkaas  would  have  come  to  himself,  revived 
out  of  his  prolonged  insensibility,  and  repeated  his  apo- 
plectic seizure  for  the  third  time — much  to  the  gratification 
of  medical  systems  of  theory.  However,  the  death's  head 
was  better  than  the  fit.  The  sight  of  this  garret-lodging 
of  a  soul,  this  cold  hatching-oven  of  a  spirit,  made  Siebenkass 
sad.  He  said,  "  No  doubt  the  wall-creeper  finds  a  quieter 
and  safer  nest  here  than  did  the  bird-of-paradise,*  which 
has  flown  away  from  it." 

Leibgeber  now  chaffered  with  the  servants  of  the  Church 
and  School,  and  (with  whispered  curses)  paid  the  necessary 
surplice-fees  and  bridge-tolls,  saying,  "  The  day  after  to- 
morrow we  will  lay  the  deceased  to  rest  as  quietly  as  we 
*  Which,  like  a  greater  Psyche,  makes  its  nest  in  skulls. 


510  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOR  IV. 

may,  without  fuss  or  ceremony."  It  was  a  matter  of  in- 
difference to  them  ;  all  they  cared  about  being  the  pocketing 
of  the  postage  which  franks  people  into  the  next  world, 
which  they  were  all  glad  enough  to  do — all  except  one  old 
and  poor  School-servant,  who  said  he  thought  it  a  sin  to 
take  a  farthing  from  the  poor  widow,  for  he  knew  what 
poverty  was.  But  this  was  exactly  what  the  rich  could 
not  know. 

In  the  morning,  Henry  went  down  to  the  hairdresser 
and  Lenette,  leaving  the  key  in  the  door — for,  since  the 
recent  ghost  story,  the  lodgers  who  lived  upstairs  were 
too  frightened  to  put  so  much  as  their  heads  out  of  their 
own  doors.  The  hairdresser,  who  was  still  annoyed  that 
he  had  not  been  allowed  to  curl  the  deceased's  hair,  be- 
thought him  that  it  would  at  least  be  something  if  he 
were  to  slip  upstairs,  and  cut  and  carry  off  the  entire  hair- 
forest.  The  demand  for  hair  and  firewood  is  in  excess  of  the 
supply  (now  that  the  former  is  made  into  rings  and  twisted 
into  letters),  and  we  should  never  leave  any  dead  person 
a  coffin  or  a  single  hair.  Even  the  ancients  sheared  off 
the  latter  for  the  altars  of  the  subterranean  gods;  so 
Meerbitzer  crept  on  tiptoe  into  the  room,  and  opened  his 
scissor-feelers.  Siebenkses  could  easily  look  askew  into 
the  room  through  the  eye-holes  of  the  mask,  and  from  the 
scissors  and  general  aspect  of  his  landlord,  he  divined  the 
impending  misfortune  and  ■  Rape  of  the  Lock.'  He  saw 
that  in  his  strait  he  could  reckon  more  upon  the  bare  head 
under  the  bed  than  upon  his  own.  The  landlord,  who,  in 
his  timidity,  had  carefully  left  the  door  wide  open  behind 
him  to  secure  his  retreat,  drew  near  to  the  plantation  of 
human  pot-plants,  with  intent  to  play  the  part  of  reaper 
in  the  harvest-month — to  combine  the  roles  of  beard-shearer 
and  hair- curler,  and  avenge  them  both.  Siebenkass  wound 
up  the  thread  as  well  as  he  could  upon  his  covered  fingers, 
so  as  to  roll  out  the  skull ;  but  as  the  latter  came  much 
too  slowly,  and  Meerbitzer  far  too  quickly,  he  was  obliged 
to  come  to  his  own  assistance  in  the  meantime  (and  this 
because  evil  spirits  so  often  breathe  upon  men,  or  inspire 
them)  by  breathing  out  of  the  mouth-hole  of  his  mask  a 
long  night-breeze  upon  the  landlord.  Meerbitzer  could 
not  explain  to  himself  this  most  suspicious  blast,  which 


CHAP.  XXI.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.       511 

blew  real  azote,  and  a  deadly  simoom-wind,  upon  him ; 
and  all  his  warm  constituent  principles  began  to  shoot  into 
icicles.  But,  unluckily,  tbe  dead  man  had  soon  shot  all 
his  breath  away,  and  was  obliged  to  re-load  his  air-gun 
6lowly.  This  suspension  of  hostilities  brought  the  lock- 
raper  to  himself,  and  to  his  legs  again ;  so  that  he  made 
fresh  preparations  to  take  hold  of  the  nightcap-tassel,  and 
remove  that  gossamer  (said  nightcap)  from  the  field  of 
hair.  But  just  as  he  was  in  the  act  of  taking  hold  of  it, 
he  became  aware  that  a  something  was  beginning  to  move 
under  the  bed ;  he  paused,  and  waited  quietly  (for  it 
might  be  a  rat)  to  see  what  this  noise  would  turn  out  to 
be  caused  by.  But,  as  he  thus  waited,  it  was  all  of  a  sud- 
den borne  in  upon  his  mind  that  a  round  tiling  was  rolling 
up  his  legs,  and  coming  higher  and  higher.  In  one  instant 
he  made  a  clutch  at  it  with  his  empty  hand  (the  other 
held  the  scissors),  and,  powerlessly  as  a  pair  of  callipers, 
that  hand  rested  on  the  ascending,  slippery  ball,  which 
kept  pressing  it  up  and  up.  Meerbitzer  grew  visibly  stiff 
in  the  legs,  and  his  blood  ran  cold ;  but  a  fresh  upward 
shove  of  his  hand,  and  a  glance  at  the  ascending  head, 
administered  to  him  (ere  he  was  felled  to  earth,  wholly 
curdled  to  cheese),  such  a  kick  of  terror  that  he  flew  like  a 
feather  across  the  floor,  and  out  of  the  door  like  a  cannon- 
ball  shot  straight  at  the  bull's  eye  by  the  cannon-powder 
of  fear.  He  landed  in  the  room  downstairs  with  the  open 
scissors  in  his  hand,  his  mouth  and  eyes  wide  open,  and  a 
pallid  spot  on  his  face,  compared  to  which  his  hair-powder 
and  his  shirt  were  court-mourning.  Nevertheless,  in  this 
novel  situation  (I  am  glad  to  say  it  to  his  honour)  he  had 
the  presence  of  mind  not  to  say  a  word  about  what  had 
happened ;  partly  because  ghost-stories  cannot  be  related 
till  nine  days  are  over  without  the  greatest  danger  to  the 
narrator,  partly  because  he  could  not  well  talk  about  his 
hair-shearing  and  privateering  on  any  day  at  all. 

At  one  in  the  morning,  Firmian  told  this  tale  to  his 
friend  with  the  same  fidelity  as  I  have  endeavoured  to 
observe  in  recounting  it  to  the  reader.  This  gave  Leib- 
geber  a  useful  hint  to  set  a  trusty  body-guard,  over  the 
noble  corpse ;  and  to  this  office,  in  the  absence  of  chamber* 


512  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IV. 

lains  and  other  court  officials,  he  could  appoint  no  other 
than  Saufinder. 

On  the  last  morning,  which  was  to  give  our  Siebenkeea 
"  Notice  to  quit,"  arrived  the  casa  santa  of  mankind,  our 
chanibre  garnie,  our  last  seed  capsule — the  coffin — for  which 
we  have  to  pay  whatever  is  demanded.  "  This  is  the  last 
building  grant  of  life,"  said  Henry,  "  the  carpenter's  final 
piece  of  cheatery." 

At  half  an  hour  after  midnight — when  neither  bat  nor 
night-watchman,  nor  beer-guest  from  the  public-house,  nor 
night-light  was  any  longer  to  be  seen ;  and  only  a  field- 
cricket  here  and  there  could  be  heard  in  the  sheaves,  and 
a  mouse  or  two  in  the  houses — Leibgeber  said  to  his  sad 
and  anxious  friend,  "  March,  now !  Since  you  shuffled  off 
this  mortal  coil,  and  entered  into  eternity,  you  have  not 
known  a  moment  of  happiness  or  peace.  All  the  rest  is 
my  affair.  Wait  for  me  at  Hof  on  the  Saale.  We  must 
see  each  other  yet  once  more  after  death."  Firmian  fell 
in  silence  on  his  burning  face,  and  wept.  In  this  twilight 
hour  he  once  more  revisited  all  the  flowery  places  of  the 
past,  behind  which  he  was  sinking  as  into  a  grave.  His 
softened  heart  took  delight  in  depositing  a  parting  tear 
upon  every  piece  of  dress  belonging  to  his  sorrowing,  be- 
reaved Lenette — on  every  piece  of  her  work — on  every 
trace  of  her  housewifely  hand.  He  pressed  her  betrothal 
wreath  of  roses  and  forget-me-nots  hard  to  his  burning 
bosom,  and  placed  Nathalie's  rosebuds  in  his  pocket.  And 
thus — mute,  oppressed,  with  stifled  sobs,  and  like  one  cast 
out  by  an  earthquake  from  this  earth  on  to  the  icy  coasts 
of  a  strange  world — he  crept  down  the  steps  after  his 
friend ;  pressed  his  helping  hand  once  more  at  the  door ; 
and  then  night  built  the  funeral  vault  of  her  gigantic 
shadow  all  over  him.  Leibgeber  wept  heartily  as  soon  as 
he  was  lost  to  view.  Tears  fell  on  every  stone  which  he 
pocketed,  and  upon  the  old  block  which  he  took  in  his 
arms,  to  imbed  in  the  coffin-shell  so  as  to  give  it  the  due 
weight  of  a  corpse.  He  filled  up  that  haven  of  our  bodies, 
and  closed  that  ark  of  the  covenant,  hanging  the  coffin- 
key,  like  a  black  cross,  upon  his  breast.  And  now  for  the 
'irst  time  he  slept  in  peace  in  the  house  of  mourning.  All 
was  done. 


CHAP.  XXI.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      513 

In  the  morning  he  made  no  secret  of  it,  before  the 
bearers  and  Lenette,  that  he  had  placed  the  body  in  the 
coffin  with  his  own  two  arms,  and  not  without  consider- 
able effort.  She  sighed  to  see  her  departed  husband  once 
again,  but  Henry  had  thrown  away  the  door-key  of  the 
painted  house  in  the  darkness.  He  helped  most  diligently 
in  the  search  for  it  (he  had  it  about  him  all  the  time),  but 
it  was  in  vain,  and  many  of  the  bystanders  soon  guessed 
that  Henry  was  only  deceiving,  anxious  to  spare  the 
widow's  weeping  eyes  any  further  sight  of  the  cause  of 
her  sorrow.  So  they  went  forth,  with  the  mock  passen- 
ger in  the  quasi  coffin,  to  the  churchyard  which  lay 
glistening  in  clew  beneath  the  fresh  blue  sky.  An  icy 
thrill  crept  to  Henry's  heart  as  he  read  the  words  on  the 
gravestone.  It  had  been  lifted  from  off  the  flat,  Moravian- 
like grave  of  Siebenkaes's  great-grandfather,  and  turned 
over,  and  on  the  smooth  side  glittered  the  newly-graven 
inscription — 

"  STAN  :   FIRMIAN   SIEBENKfiS, 

Departed  this  life,  24th  August,  1786." 

This  name  had  once  been  Henry's  own,  and  on  the 
reverse  side  of  the  monument  was  his  present  name,  Leib- 
geber.  Henry  reflected  that  in  a  few  days  he  would  fall 
(with  his  name  cast  away  from  him)  as  a  little  brook  into 
the  world's  great  ocean,  and  flow  there  without  shores,  and 
be  lost  amongst  strange  and  unknown  billows.  He  felt  as 
though  he  himself  with  his  old  name,  and  his  new,  were 
going  down  to  the  grave.  So  strangely  mingled  were  his 
feelings  that  he  seemed  to  himself  as  if  he  were  sticking 
fast  in  the  frozen  stream  of  life,  while  overhead  a  burning 
sun  was  beating  upon  the  ice-field,  and  he  was  lying  be- 
tween the  glow  and  the  frost.  In  addition  to  this,  the 
Schulrath  just  then  came  running  (with  his  handkerchief 
to  his  eyes  and  nose),  and,  in  stammering  accents  of  sor- 
row, imparted  the  news  which  had  just  reached  the  town 
— that  the  old  King  of  Prussia  had  died  on  the  17th  of  the 
month. 

The  first  thing  that  Leibgeber  did  was  to  look  up  to  the 
morning  sun,  as  though  Frederick's  eye  was  beaming 
morning  fire  from  it  over  the  earth.     It  is  easier  to  be 

II.  2  L 


514  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICfl  RICHTER.        [BOOK  IV. 

a  great  king  than  a  just  one;  it  is  easier  to  be  ad- 
mired than  justified.  A  king  lays  his  little  finger  upon 
the  long  arm  of  the  monstrous  lever,  and,  like  Archimedes, 
lifts  ships  and  countries  with  the  muscles  of  his  fingers  ; 
but  it  is  only  the  machine  that  is  great — and  the  machinist, 
Fate — not  he  who  works  it.  The  voice  of  a  king  re-echoes 
like  a  peal  of  thunder  amongst  the  numberless  valleys 
around  him ;  and  every  gentle  ray  he  emits  is  reflected  in 
the  form  of  a  burning  beam  condensed  into  a  focus,  from 
the  countless  plane-mirrors  which  are  upon  his  throne. 
But  Frederick  could,  at  most,  only  be  lowered  by  a  throne, 
by  having  to  sit  upon  it.  His  head  would  only  have  been 
greater  without  the  close-binding  crown  (its  crown  of  thorns) 
and  magic  circle.  And  happy,  thou  great  spirit,  could st 
thou  still  less  become  !  For,  although  thou  hadst  broken 
down  within  thee  the  Bastilles  and  the  prison-walls  of 
all  ignoble  passions — although  thou  hadst  given  thy  spirit 
what  Franklin  gave  to  earth,  namely,  lightning-conductors, 
musical  glasses,  and  freedom — although  no  kingdom  was  to 
thee  so  lovely  as  that  of  truth,  and  there  was  none  which 
thou  so  lovedst  to  enlarge — although  thou  didst  permit 
the  emasculate  philosophy  of  French  encyclopaedists  to 
hide  from  thee  eternity  only,  but  not  divinity,  only  the 
belief  in  virtue,  but  not  thine  own — yet  did  thy  loving 
bosom  accept  nothing  from  friendship  and  humanity  but 
the  echoes  of  their  sighs — the  flute.  And  thy  spirit,  which, 
with  its  great  roots  like  the  mahogany-tree,  often  shivered 
the  rocks  it  grew  upon — thy  spirit,  in  the  fell  battle  ot 
thy  wishes  with  thy  doubts,  in  the  contest  of  thy  ideal 
world  with  the  real  one,  and  the  one  in  which  thou  didst 
believe,  felt  a  painful  discord  which  no  mild  faith  in  a 
second  softened  to  harmony.  And  therefore  there  was  upon 
thy  throne  no  place  of  rest  but  that  which  thou  hast  now 
attained. 

Some  men  bring  all  hnmanity  before  our  eyes  at  a 
glance,  as  certain  events  bring  our  whole  lives.  There  fell 
upon  Henry's  breast  strong  splinters  of  the  fallen  moun- 
tain whose  crash  he  heard. 

He  placed  himself  before  the  open  grave,  and  delivered 
this  speech  more  to  invisible  than  to  visible  hearers  : — 

"  So,  then,  the  epitaph  on  the  tomb  is  vereio  interlineario 


CHAP.  XXII.]    FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     515 

of  this  small,  small  printed  life  of  ours.  The  heart  does 
not  rest  until,  like  the  head,  it  is  set  in  gold.*  Thou  hidden 
Infinite  one !  make,  for  me,  the  grave  a  prompter's  tube, 
and  tell  me  what  I  am  to  think  of  the  whole  theatre. 
Indeed,  what  is  there  in  the  grave  ?  Some  ashes,  a  few 
worms,  coldness,  and  night — by  Heaven  !  there  is  nothing 
better  above  it  either,  except  that  one  feels  it.  Mr.  Schul- 
rath,  Time  sits  behind  us,  and  reads  the  calendar  of  life  so 
cursorily,  and  turns  over  the  page  of  month  after  month 
at  such  a  rate,  that  I  can  fancy  this  grave — this  moat 
here  about  our  castles  in  the  air — this  fortress  trench — . 
lengthening  out  and  extending  till  it  reaches  my  bed,  and 
I  am  shaken  out  of  the  bedclothes  into  this  cooking-hole, 
like  a  heap  of  Spanish  flies.  '  Go  on,'  1  would  say,  •  Go 
on.  I  shall  come  either  to  old  Fritz,  or  to  his  worms — and 
therewith  Basta  ! '  By  Heaven !  one  is  ashamed  of  life 
when  the  greatest  of  men  no  longer  possess  it.  And  so 
hollar' 


CHAPTER  XXII. 

JOURNEY  THROUGH  FANTAISIE — RE-UNION  ON  THE  BINDLOCHER 
MOUNTAIN — BERNECK — MAN-DOUBLING — GEFREES — EXCHANGE 
OF  CLOTHES  —  MUNCHBERG  —  SOLO-WHI STLING  —  H0F  —  THE 
STONE  OF   GLADNKSS   AND   DOUBLE-PARTING. 

Henry  now  plied  more  wings  than  any  seraph,  that  he 
might  fly  up  with  his  friend  as  soon  as  possible.  He 
packed  up  the  latter's  manuscripts  in  haste,  and  addressed 
them  to  Vaduz.  The  sealed  will  and  testament  was  lodged 
with  the  proper  authorities,  from  whom,  also,  the  neces- 
sary certificate  of  death  was  obtained  to  show  the  Prussian 
Widows'  Fund  that  it  was  not  being  defrauded.  And  then 
he  got  fairly  afloat,  and  pushed  off,  havirfg  first  bestowed 
some  weighty  grounds  for  consolation — as  well  as  some 
weighty  ducats — upon  the  downcast  straw-widow,  who 
mourned  in  the  striped  calico-dress,  as  was  right  and 
proper. 

*  King's  hearts  arc  enshrined  in  golden  cases. 

2  l  2 


516  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDBIUH  BICHTER.        [BOOK  IV. 

Let  us  now  overtake  and  accompany  his  departed  friend, 
even  before  lie  himself  does  so.     During  the  first  honr  of  his 
night-journey,  vague  and  disordered  pictures  of  the  past 
and  of  the  future  struggled  in  Firmian's  heart ;   and  it 
seemed  to  him  as  if,  for  Mm,  there  were  no  such  thing  as 
a  present,  hut  that  a  wilderness  stretched  between  the 
past  and  the  future-.     But  the  fresh,  rich  harvest  month 
of  August  soon  gave  him  back  the  life  he  had  (so  to  speak) 
played  away ;  and  when  the  gleaming  morning  was  come 
in  earnest,  the  earth  was  lying  all  lighted  up  with  a  new- 
fallen  thunderstorm,  now  emitting  lovely  lightning  only 
from  drops  hanging  on  the  corn-ears,  as  if  over-silvered  by 
tne  moon.     It  was  a  new  earth ;  he  was  a  new  creature, 
just  burst,  with  ripened  pinions,  through  the  egg-shell  of 
the  coffin.     Oh !  a  broad,  marshy,  overshadowed  desert- 
waste,  where  a  long,  long  troubled  dream  had  kept  driving 
him  to  and  fro,  had  vanished  with  that  dream,  and  he  whs 
awake,  and  gazing  deep  into  Eden.     The  last  week  (and 
that  last  week  especially)  had  stretched  out  to  enormous 
length  those  twisted  convolutions  of  suffering  which  give 
to  our  brief  lives  a  false  appearance  of  being  much  too 
long  (as  we  make  the  short  walks  of  a  garden  seem  longer 
by  laying  them  out  in  curves  and  sweeps).     On  the  other 
hand,  his  lightened  breast,  now  free  from  all  its  old  bur- 
dens, was  heaved  by  a  great  sigh,  which  was  partly  both 
sorrow  and  joy.     He  had  been  too  far  into  the  Trophonius 
cave  of  the  tomb — had  looked  death  too  closely  in  the  face 
— and  it  seemed  to  him  that  all  our  country  mansions,  our 
pleasure-castles  and  vineyards,  were  built  and  laid  out  upon 
the  verge  of  the  crater  of  the  volcano  of  the  grave-hillock, 
and  that  the  next  night  they  would  be  shaken  into  dust.    He 
felt  alone,  upheaved,  a  dead  man  come  back  to  life,  but 
scarce  alive  ;  wherefore  every  human  face  he  met  beamed 
upon  him  like  that  of  a  new-found  brother.     "These  are 
my  brethren  whom  I  left  on  earth,"  said  his  heart ;  and  a 
fruit-bearing  love,  warm  like  the  spring,  expanded  all  its 
veins  and  fibres  ;  and  it  crept  and  grew  round  every  oilier 
heart  with  tender,  clinging,  ivy-like  filaments.     But  the 
one  he  loved  best  was  still — too  long — away ;  and  he  went 
on  as  slowly  as  he  could,  that  so  Leibgeber  (of  whom  he 
was  in  advance  both  in  distance  and  time)  might  overtake 


CHAP.  XXII.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      517 

him  before  lie  got  to  Hof.  A  hundred  times,  on  his 
journey,  he  almost  involuntarily  looked  round  for  this 
overtaking,  as  if  it  were  already  a  thing  to  be  actually 
seen. 

At  length  he  came  to  the  Fantaisie  of  Bayreuth,  on 
a  morning  when  the  whole  world  gleamed  and  glittered 
from  the  drops  of  dew  up  to  the  little  silver  cloudlets, 
But  stillness  was  over  all.  The  breezes  were  asleep  ;  nor 
had  August,  in  air  or  in  thicket,  one  single  songster  left. 
It  seemed  to  him  as  though,  having  left  this  mortal  life, 
he  was  wandering  in  a  second,  transfigured  world,  where 
the  form  of  his  Nathalie  might  move  by  his  side,  with  love 
in  her  eyes — and,  in  words  straight  from  the  soul,  no 
longer  fettered  by  earthly  bonds,  say  to  him,  "  Here  you 
looked  up  in  gratitude  to  the  starry  night ;  here  I  gave 
you  my  wounded  heart ;  here  we  spoke  our  earthly  parting- 
vow;  and  here  I  came,  often,  alone,  and  thought  of  the 
brief,  bright  vision."  "  And  this  is  the  spot,"  he  said  to 
himself,  when  he  came  to  the  chateau,  "  where  she  wept 
her  last  tears  when  she  said  farewell  to  her  lady-friend." 

And  now,  again,  it  seemed  that  only  she  was  the  one 
transfigured.  (He  seemed  to  his  fancy  to  be  the  one  left 
behind.)  He  felt  that  he  should  never  see  her  more  on 
earth ;  "  but "  (he  said)  "  people  must  be  able  to  love,  though 
they  cannot  meet  or  see  each  other."  All  his  meagre  future 
was  to  be  illuminated  by  transfigured  and  glorified  dream- 
pictures  only.  But  as  the  tree  (according  to  Bonnet)  is 
planted  as  much  in  the  air  above  it  as  it  is  in  the  earth 
beneath  it,  and  derives  nourishment  quite  as  much  from 
the  one  as  from  the  other,  so  it  is  with  every  true 
human-creature.  And  thus  Firmian  lived  in  the  future 
with  more  vivid  life  than  in  the  past — only  with  fewer 
of  his  root-fibres  in  the  visible  ground.  The  whole  tree, 
top-shoot,  branches,  and  all,  stood  under  the  open  sky, 
drinking  the  free  breeze  of  heaven  with  its  every  blossom 
— where  all  he  had  to  invigorate  and  cheer  him  were  two 
invisible  friends — the  one  a  woman,  the  other  a  man. 

At  length  the  thin,  beautiful  vapour  of  his  dreams 
thickened  to  a  fog.  Nathalie's  sorrow  for  his  death  came 
hovering  over  him,  and  his  lonesomeness  struck  heavy  on 
his  heart,  which  longed  unutterably  for  some  living  being 


518  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RIOHTER.        [BOOK  IV. 

which  should  stand  there  and  love  him  with  all  its  heart. 
But  this  being  was  still  behind  him,  doing  its  best  to  over- 
take him — Henry,  to  wit. 

"  Mr.  Leibgeber,"  the  voice  of  some  one  coming  up 
after  him  suddenly  cried,  "  stop  a  moment,  please.  Here 
is  your  handkerchief;  I  picked  it  up  down  below  there." 

He  looked  round,  and  there  was  the  girl  whom  Nathalie 
had  helped  out  of  the  water,  coming  running  up  with  a 
white  handkerchief.  But  as  he  had  his  own  in  his  pocket, 
and  the  girl,  gazing  at  him  in  astonishment,  said  he  had 
dropped  it  near  the  basin  about  an  hour  before  (though  he 
had  not  then  had  so  long  a  coat  on) — a  gush  of  gladness 
streamed  into  his  heart.  Leibgeber  had  arrived,  and  had 
been  down  by  the  basin. 

He  hastened  to  Bayreuth  as  fast  as  he  could,  all  in 
a  whirl,  with  the  handkerchief  in  his  hand.  It  was  moist, 
as  if  his  friend's  weeping  eyes  had  rested  on  it.  He 
pressed  it  warmly  to  his  own,  but  it  would  not  dry  them, 
for  he  thought  how  Henry  parsed  his  life  in  solitude,  ex- 
emplifying the  truth  of  his  own  saying,  "He  who  spares 
his  feelings,  and  puts  armour  upon  them,  keeps  them  most 
delicately  sensitive — just  as  the  skin  under  the  nails  is  the 
easiest  hurt  of  all."  At  the  Sun  Hotel,  Firmian  learned 
from  John  the  waiter  that  Leibgeber  had  actually  arrived, 
and  was  gone  on  about  half-an-hour  ago.  Firmian  ran  off 
after  him,  up  and  down  the  streets  of  Hof,  blind  and  deaf, 
in  such  tempestuous  pursuit  of  his  friend  that  he  forgot 
all  about  the  moist  handkerchief. 

After  a  long  while,  he  caught  sight  of  him  climbing  the 
long  hill  behind  the  village  of  Bindloch,  a  mountain-road, 
in  the  true  sense  of  the  words,  not  to  be  either  ascended  or 
descended  at  any  great  speed.  Leibgeber  was  straining  up 
it  as  fast  as  he  could,  however,  with  the  view  of  unex- 
pectedly overtaking  Firmian  before  he  got  to  Hof,  perhaps 
in  Miinchberg,  or  in  Gefrees,  if  not  in  Berneck  itself  (which 
is  at  no  very  great  distance  from  Bayreuth). 

But  was  not  everything  destined  to  turn  out  ten  times 
better?  Did  not  Siebenkaes,  at  the  bottom  of  the  hill, 
at  last  catch  sight  of  him  near  the  level  place  on  the  sum- 
mit, and  call  out  his  name — which  he  did  not  hear  ?  Did 
not  Siebenkaes  then  run  at  an  extraordinary  pace  after  his 


CHAP.  XXII.J      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.    519 

ascending  friend  (with  the  handkerchief  in  his  hand),  and 
did  not  the  latter  chance  to  turn  round,  by  accident,  to 
have  a  glance  at  the  sunny  landscape,  and  see  all  Bayrenth, 
and — at  long  and  at  last — his  friend  hastening  after  him  ? 
And  finally,  did  they  not  rush  together,  the  one  down  the 
hill,  the  other  up  (not  like  two  hostile  armies,  however* 
but  like  two  wreathed  and  foaming  goblets  of  joy  and 
friendship)  ? 

Henry  speedily  perceived  that  in  his  friend's  breast  there 
was  much  of  a  powerful  and  dissolvent  kind — belonging 
both  to  past  and  to  future  times — at  work,  wherefore  he 
sought  to  appease  and  calm  all  the  "  Naiads  of  the  rivers  of 
tears." 

"  Everything  went  off  divinely,  he  said,  "  and  every- 
body is  well.  Now  you  are  as  free  as  I  am.  Your  chains 
are  off — the  world  is  before  you — so  in  you  plunge  into  it, 
fresh  and  merry,  like  me,  and  begin  to  live  your  real  life, 
for  the  first  time  in  your  life."  "  You  are  right,"  said 
Firmian,  •'  this  is  like  meeting  you  again  after  death. 
Heaven  is  above  us,  peaceful  and  quiet,  gladsome,  serene, 
and  warm.''  For  that  very  reason,  he  had  not  the  courage 
to  ask  after  those  he  had  left  behind,  particularly  his 
widow.  Leibgeber  expressed  great  joy  that  he  had  caught 
him  up  four  post-stations  on  that  side  of  Hof,  and  all  the 
more  that,  this  being  so,  they  could  be  together  for  a  good 
long  while  before  they  must  part  in  Hof  (which  latter  was 
the  very  point  which  he  was  anxious  to  establish  and 
emphasise). 

He  now  commenced  a  series  of  jokes  on  the  subject  of 
dying  (with  the  view  of  preventing  anything  in  the  shape 
of  an  expression  of  the  emotions  which  they  both  felt),  and 
these  jokes  recuired  like  milestones,  or  stone- benches,  all 
along  the  turnpike-road  to  Hof;  we  have  no  way  of 
escaping  them  on  the  journey,  unless  we  turn  back.  He 
asked  him  if  the  diet  had  been  sufficient  which  he  had 
given  him,  as  the  old  Germans,  Eomans,  and  Egyptians  did 
to  their  dead.  He  said  that  Firmian  must  be  excessively 
pious,  inasmuch  as  he  had  risen  from  the  dead  when  he 
had  barely  shuffled  off  this  mortal  coil,  confirming  Lavater's 
doctrine  that  there  are  two  resurrections,  a  first  for  the 
good,  and  a  later  one  for  the  bad.     He  said,  further,  that 


520  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IV. 

he  could  not  have  had  a  better  Archimimus  *  after  his 
departure  from  this  life  than  himself.  Leibgeber's  spirit 
and  body  sprang  rather  than  walked.  "  I  am  always  in 
high  spirits,  and  free,  while  I  am  in  the  open  air.  Beneath 
the  clouds,  I  have  no  clouds.  When  we  are  young,  the 
raw  north  wind  of  life  whistles  only  on  our  backs,  and,  by 
Heaven !  I  am  younger  than  any  reviewer." 

They  passed  the  night  in  Berneck,  between  the  lofty 
bridge-piers  of  mountains,  through  which  once  streamed 
those  seas  which  have  overspread  our  globe  with  fields. 
Time  and  Nature — grand  and  almighty — were  reposing 
side  by  side  on  the  oonfines  of  two  kingdoms — between  the 
steep,  lofty,  memorial-pillars  of  creation — amongst  firm 
mountains,  empty  castles  crumbling  into  ruin,  rock-barriers 
and  stone-tumuli  lying  about  the  rounded  green  hills,  like 
broken  tables  of  the  law  of  earth's  first  creation. 

When  they  arrived  here,  Henry  said, "  The  clergy  between 
this  and  Vaduz  must  not  find  out  that  you  have  exchanged 
time  for  eternity,  or  they  will  ask  you  for  the  surplice  fees 
which  every  corpse  has  to  pay  in  each  parish  which  it  passes 
through.  If  we  were  in  old  Rome  (and  not  in  Berneck)," 
said  he,  before  the  inn,  "  the  landlord  would  never  let  you 
into  his  house  except  down  the  chimney.  And  if  we  were 
in  Athens,  you  would  be  obliged  to  creep  through  a  hoop- 
petticoat  just  as  if  you  were  going  into  holy  orders."  f  On 
an  ocoasion  of  this  sort,  he  never  could  cease  from  his  wit- 
ticisms, in  which  he  differed  (to  his  disadvantage)  from 
me;  and  he  said  that  metaphors  and  similes  were  like 
gold  pieces,  of  which  Rousseau  says  that  the  first  is  harder 
to  get  than  the  next  thousand. 

Therefore  it  was  beyond  his  power  not  to  be  struck  with 
an  idea  when,  in  the  evening,  he  saw  Firmian  paring  his 
nails.  "  I  can't  understand,"  he  said  "  (now  that  I  see  it 
in  your  case),  why  Katherine  Bieri — whose  nails  had  to 
be  cut  250  years  after  she  was  dead — couldn't  have  done 
it  just  as  well  herself  as  you  do  after  having  given  up  the 
ghost."     And  when  he  saw  him  turn  over  on  his  left  side 

*  The  actor  (among  the  Romans)  -who  mimioked  the  deceased  in  alJ 
his  gestures  and  movements  at  bis  funeral. 

t  People  who  had  been  taken  to  be  dead,  and  honoured  with  a 
funeral,  bad  to  go  through  these  ceromonies. — Potter. 


CHAR  XXII. J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.    521 

in  bed,  he  simply  observed  that  he  made  his  bed-quilt 
rise  and  fall  in  the  same  manner  as  St.  John  the  Evan- 
gelist does  his  earthen  one — the  grave — to  the  present 
hour.* 

In  the  morning,  it  rained  a  little  upon  these  flowers  of 
humour.  As  Leibgeber  was  laving  that  lion's  breast  of 
his  with  cold  water,  Firmian  noticed  that  he  pushed  aside 
a  little  key,  and  asked  what  it  opened.  "  It  unfastens 
•  nothing,"  he  said ;  "  but  it  fastened  the  leaden  ceno- 
{ i  taphium."  f  Firmian  was  obliged  to  lean  out  of  window 
with  his  eyes,  and  dry  them  unobserved.  Then  (with  his 
head  still  outside)  he  said,  "  Give  me  the  key.  It  is  the 
wax-impression  of  a  future  one.  I  want  to  make  it  the 
music-key  of  my  inner  music.  I  shall  hang  it  up,  and  look 
at  it  every  day ;  and  if  ever  my  resolution  to  be  better 
should  run  down,  I  shall  wind  it  up  again  with  this  watch- 
key."  He  got  it.  Then  Leibgeber  chanced  to  look  into 
the  mirror ;  and  he  cried,  "  I  seem  almost  to  see  myself 
double,  not  to  say  triple.  One  of  me  must  be  dead,  the 
one  in  there  or  the  one  out  here.  Which  of  us  in  this 
room  is  it  that  is  the  real  dead  man  appearing  to  the  other  ? 
Or  are  we  only  appearing  to  ourselves  ?  Heh !  you  my 
three  me'a,  what  say  you  to  the  fourth  ?  " — he  asked,  and 
turned  to  the  two-reflected  images,  then  to  Firmian — and 
said,  "  Here  I  am,  too !  " 

There  was  something  in  these  sayings  calculated  to 
cause  a  shudder  for  his  future.  Firmian,  whose  calmer 
reason  made  him  dread  a  dangerous  growth  of  this  meta- 
morphio  self-reflecting  during  the  solitude  of  Leibgeber's 
wanderings,  said,  with  tender  anxiety,  "  My  dear  Henry, 
if  you  are  going  to  be  always  so  much  alone  upon  your 
eternal  journeys,  I  can't  help  fearing  it  will  do  you  harm. 
God  himself  is  not  alone.  He  beholds  His  universe."  "  I 
can  always  triple  myself,  in  the  profoundest  solitude,  not 
excepting  that  of  the  universe  itself,"  answered  Leibgeber, 
strangely  moved  by  the  coffin-key — and  he  went  to  the 
looking-glass,  and  pressed  his  eyeball  sideways  with  his 

•  Augustin,  Oommentar.  ad  Johann.  xxi.  23. 

t  This  name,  or  that  of  Tumulus  Honorarius,  was  given  to  the 
empty  monument  which  friends  erected  to  a  dead  person  whose  body 
was  not  to  oe  found. 


522  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  IV. 

finger,  so  as  to  see  his  reflection  double ;  "  but  you  can't 
see  the  third  person  there."  Then  he  went  on  in  a  merrier 
tone,  with  the  view  of  cheering  Firmian  (who  was  not 
much  cheered  by  what  he  said,  nevertheless),  leading  him 
to  the  window.  "  But  it  is  a  far  finer  affair  as  regards  the 
street.  I  have  a  much  larger  company  there.  I  put  my 
finger  to  my  eye,  and  produce  the  twin  of  everybody,  be 
he  who  he  may ;  double  the  landlord,  as  well  as  his  chalk- 
score.  Not  a  president  on  his  way  to  his  meeting  but 
'finds  his  fellow'  and  meets  his  match.  I  provide  him 
with  his  Orang  Utang,  and  the  pair  of  them  march  past 
me,  tete-a-tete.  Does  a  genius  want  an  imitator?  I  take 
my  finger — and  hey !  presto ! — a  living  facsimile  of  him  on 
the  spot.  Every  learned  collaborator  has  a  collaborator 
collaborating  with  him.  Associates  have  ass  ciates  asso- 
ciated with  them.  Only  sons  are  made  out  in  duplicate, 
because,  as  you  see,  I  cany  my  plastic  nature,  author,  and 
embossing-instrument — my  finger  to  wit — always  about 
with  me.  And  I  seldom  let  a  solo-dancer  caper  with  fewer 
than  four  legs  ;  he  has  to  hang  in  air  as  a  pair  of  men.  But 
it  would  amaze  you  to  see  how  much  I  can  make  out  of  a 
single  fellow  and  his  limbs  by  this  sort  of  grouping.  Try 
to  form  some  idea  (by  way  of  wind-up)  of  the  crowds  and 
masses  of  people  I  have  when  I  double  such  things  as 
funerals  and  other  processions,  with  doppelgdnger,  and 
strengthen  every  regiment  with  an  entire  regiment  of 
flugelmen,  repeating  and  imitating  everything.  For  (as 
we  have  been  saying),  like  a  grasshopper,  I  have  my  ovi- 
positing instrument — my  finger — always  with  me.  From 
all  which,  Firmian,  you  may  at  all  events  draw  the  conso- 
lation that  I  enjoy  more  society  than  any  of  you — just  as 
much  again,  in  fact.  And,  moreover,  it  consists  entirely  of 
people  who  afford  me  endless  amusement  without  trouble 
or  inconvenience,  by  aping  their  own  gestures  and  pro- 
ceedings." 

Hereupon  they  looked  each  other  in  the  face,  full  of 
joyful  affection,  and  wholly  freed  from  any  unpleasant 
traces  of  their  recent  wilder  mode  of  jesting.  A  third 
person  would  have  been  almost  terrified  at  their  bodily 
resemblance  in  this  hour,  for  each  was  a  plaster -of-Paria 
cast  of  the  other ;  but  their  affection  for  each  other  made 


3HAP.  XXII.]    FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      523 

their  faces  seem  unlike  to  themselves.  Each  saw  in  the 
other  only  that  which  he  liked,  because  it  was  not  in 
himself;  and  it  was  with  their  features,  as  with  good 
deeds,  which  inspire  us  with  emotion  and  admiration  in 
others,  but  not  in  ourselves. 

When  they  were  out  in  the  air  again,  and  on  their  way  to 
Gefrees,  and  the  coffin-key,  as  well  as  their  recent  conver- 
sation, continually  brought  to  mind  their  parting  (whose 
death  sickle  bent  closer  around  them  with  every  milestone 
on  their  road),  Henry  endeavoured  10  cast  a  rosy  beam 
or  two  into  Firmian's  mist  by  putting  into  his  hands  an 
accurate  protocol  of  everything  he  had  arranged  and 
agreed  upon  with  the  Count  von  Vaduz  concerning  his 
duties.  "  The  Count,"  he  said,  "  would  of  course  think 
you  had  merely  forgotten  the  conversation ;  but  it  is 
better  thus.  Like  a  negro  slave,  you  have  killed  yourself 
to  obtain  your  freedom  and  reach  the  Gold  Coast  of  your 
silver  coast ;  and  it  would  be  damnable,  indeed,  if  you 
were  to  be  damned  now  after  your  decease."  "  I  can 
never  thank  you  enough,  you  dear  friend,"  said  Firmian  ; 
"but  you  should  not  make  things  harder  for  me  than  they 
are,  and  draw  yourself  back  like  a  hand  from  the  clouds 
the  moment  you  have  emptied  yourself.  Why  is  it  that  I 
am  not  to  see  you  again  after  we  have  said  good-bye  ? 
Tell  me."  "  First,"  he  answered,  "  because  people — the 
Count,  the  Widow's  Fund,  your  widow — might  find  out 
that  I  was  extant  in  two  editions,  and  that  would  be  an 
accursed  misfortune  in  a  world  where  a  fellow  can  hardly 
be  allowed  to  sit  and  sleep  in  peace  in  his  first  original 
edition.  Secondly,  I  intend  to  make  my  appearance  in 
several  of  the  broad  comedy  characters  which  there  are  so 
many  of  to  be  played  on  this  ship  of  fools  of  an  earth ; 
and  as  long  as  not  a  single  devil  among  the  audience 
knows  me,  1  shall  not  be  ashamed  of  my  parts.  Ah !  I 
could  give  you  plenty  more  reasons  into  the  bargain. 
Besides,  it  delights  me  to  come  down  with  a  flop,  as  if  out 
of  the  moon  on  to  this  earth ;  and  in  among  mankind,  un- 
known, uprooted,  untrammelled ;  a  lusus  naturce,  a  diabolua 
ex  machina,  a  monstrous  moon-lithopcedium.  Firmian,  it 
is  a  settled  thing.  Perhaps  in  a  few  years'  time  I  may 
send  you  a  letter  now  and  then,  more  particularly  as  the 


524  JEAN  TAUL  FRIEDEICH  BIOHTEB.        [BOOK  IV. 

Galatians*  placed  upon  the  funeral  pyre  letters  directed 
to  the  dead,  as  they  might  have  put  them  in  a  post-office. 
But  it  really  is  a  settled  thing  now — positively."  "  I 
should  not  give  in  to  all  this  so  quietly,"  said  Siebenkses, 
"  if  I  did  not  feel  convinced  that  I  shall  very  soon  see 
you  again.  I  am  not  like  you.  I  look  forward  to  two 
meetings  with  you — one  here  below,  one  there  above. 
And  would  to  God  that  I  could  bring  you  to  die  as  you 
did  me,  and  we  met  afterwards  on  a  Bindloch  hill,  but 
were  going  to  be  longer  together." 

If  these  wishes  chance  to  remind  the  readers  of  Schoppe 
in  Titan,  they  may  consider  in  what  sense  Fate  often  inter- 
prets and  fulfils  our  wishes.  Leibgeber  merely  answered, 
M  People  must  love,  though  they  may  not  be  able  to  see 
each  other ;  and,  when  all's  done,  it  is  only  Love  that  we 
can  love  after  all,  and  that  we  can  each  see  in  the  other 
every  day." 

In  Gefrees,  Leibgeber  proposed  that,  as  there  was  such 
ample  leisure  (there  being  nothing  to  see  in,  or  out  of,  the 
one  street  of  the  town),  they  should  exchange  clothes,  and 
that  particularly  in  order  that  the  Count  of  Vaduz  (who  had 
not  for  years  seen  him  in  any  other  dress  than  the  one  he 
now  wore)  should  not  find  anything  to  be  struck  with 
about  Siebenkaes,  but  that  everything  about  him  should 
be  exactly  as  it  always  had  been,  even  to  the  nails  on  the 
heels  of  his  shoes.  The  thought  of  being,  in  future,  em- 
braced (so  to  speak)  by  Henry's  sleeves,  and  clasped  and 
warmed  by  all  his  external  reliquia,  fell  like  a  broad  ray 
of  warm  February  sun  on  Siebenkass's  breast.  Leibgeber 
went  into  the  next  room,  and,  to  begin  with,  threw  his 
short  green  jacket  through  the  half-open  door,  crying, 
"  Come  in,  coat  with  skirts ! "  then  followed  up  with 
necktie  and  waistcoat,  and  long  trousers  with  leather 
stripes,  saying,  "  Come  in,  breeches ! "  and  ended  up  with 
his  shirt,  and  the  words,  "  Here  with  the  winding-sheet ! " 

The  shirt  thus  thrown  in  was,  to  Siebenkaas,  as  an  astro- 
loger (or  interpreter  of  signs),  with  respect  to  Leibgeber. 
He  saw  that  he  had  a  higher  motive  in  view  in  this 
bodily  transmigration  into  clothes  than  mere  dressing  for 

*  Alexand.  ab  Alex,  iii.  7. 


CHAP.  XXII.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.    525 

a  certain  character  at  Vaduz ;  to  wit,  the  taking  up  of 
his  abode  in  the  shell,  or  cocoon,  which  had  contained  his 
friend.  Not  in  a  whole  volume  of  Gellert's  or  Klopstock's 
'Letters  on  Friendship,'  not  in  a  whole  week  of  Leibge- 
berian  days  of  self-sacrifice,  did  there  seem  anything  so 
beloved  and  delicious  as  in  thus  falling  heir  to  his  clothes. 
He  would  not  profane  this  surmise  which  made  him  so 
happy  by  alluding  to  it  in  words,  but  he  was  confirmed 
in  it  when  Leibgeber  came  out  transformed  into  a  Sie- 
benkaes,  looked  at  himself  in  a  satisfied  manner  in  the 
mirror,  and  then  laid  his  three  fingers,  in  silence,  on 
Firmian's  forehead.  This  was  his  highest  token  of  love  ; 
wherefore,  to  my  own  and  Firmian's  great  joy,  I  mention, 
that  he  repeated  this  sign  more  than  three  times  during 
dinner  (the  conversation  running  on  wholly  indifferent 
subjects).  What  different  and  interminable  jokes  would 
he  not  have  made  upon  this  moulting  at  another  time,  and 
under  the  influence  of  other  feelings !  Merely  to  guess 
at  a  few.  How  much  he  would  have  made  of  the  rebinding 
of  their  two  folio  volumes,  so  as  to  involve  Herr  Loch- 
m  tiller  (the  landlord  at  Gefrees)  in  the  deepest  and  most 
diverting  embarrassment,  which  that  polite  gentleman 
could  by  no  means  have  extricated  himself  from  one 
minute  before  this,  my  fourth  book,  came  to  his  aid,  which 
at  this  moment  is  only  in  Bayreuth,  and  not  even  gone  to 
press !  But  Leibgeber  did  nothing  of  all  this ;  and  even 
of  witticisms  he  only  delivered  himself  of  a  few  weak 
ones ;  about  their  being  changelings,  about  the  sudden 
French  transition  of  people  en  longue  robe  into  people  en 
robe  courte.  And  he  said  he  would  uo  longer  call  Sie- 
benkees  a  transfigured  being  in  boots,  but  one  in  shoes, 
which  was  more  befitting,  as  well  as  sounding  somewhat 
more  suhlime.  It  was  with  particular  pleasure  that  lie 
saw  how  his  dog,  Saufinder — between  the  old  bodies  and 
the  new  clothes,  as  if  between  two  fires  of  luve — could  not 
properly  make  out  the  matter  in  the  least  degree,  and 
often  went  from  one  to  the  other  with  a  most  uneasy  face. 
The  concordat  between  the  two  parties — the  shortening  of 
the  one,  and  the  lengthening  of  the  other — puzzled  the 
creature,  and  he  could  make  neither  head  nor  tail  of  it  all. 
**I  like  him  twice  as  much  *s  I  did,"  said  Leibgeber;" 


526  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRIOH  BICHTER.        [BOOK  IV. 

believe  me.  If  be  is  faithful  to  you,  that  is  not  being 
unfaithful  to  me."  He  could  not  possibly  have  said  any- 
thing more  complimentary  than  this. 

All  the  bleak  way  from  Gefrees  to  Muenchberg,  Firmian, 
from  gratitude,  took  the  greatest  pains  to  reflect  back  on 
Leibgeber  that  sunshine  of  cheerfulness  into  which  Henry 
was  continually  trying  to  lead  him.  It  was  no  easy 
matter,  especially  when  he  saw  him  striding  after  him  in 
the  long  coat.  He  concentrated  himself  to  an  extreme 
effort  in  Muenchberg,  the  last  post-station  before  Hof, 
where  the  corporeal  arms  with  which  they  clasped  each 
other  were,  so  to  speak,  to  be  cut  off  by  a  long  separation. 

As  they  were  going  along  the  road  to  Hof,  more  silent 
than  before,  Leibgeber  being  first,  and  feeling  refreshed 
by  the  pine-covered  mountain  on  his  right,  began  (as  he 
usually  did  on  his  journeys)  to  whistle  national  airs,  both 
merry  and  sad,  for  the  most  part  in  minor  keys.  He  said 
he  thought  there  were  many  worse  town-and-street-fifers, 
and  that  he  performed  on  the  foot-passenger's  post-horn 
which  Nature  had  given  him  in  a  manner  deserving  of 
some  applause.  To  Firmian,  however  (now  that  their 
parting  was  so  near),  these  tones,  which  seemed  to  come 
echoing  back  from  Henry's  long  journeys  of  the  past,  and 
forward  from  his  coming  lonely  ones  as  well,  were  as  a 
kind  of  Swiss  Banz  des  Vaches,  which  went  to  his  very 
heart ;  and  it  was  well  he  was  walking  last,  for  he  could 
scarce  restrain  his  tears.  Ah!  take  music  away  when 
the  heart  is  full  and  must  not  overflow ! 

At  length  he  brought  his  voice  sufficiently  under  com- 
mand to  be  able  to  say,  without  any  apparent  emotion, 
**  Are  you  fond  of  whistling  as  you  go,  and  do  you  do  it 
often?"  In  the  tone  of  this  question  there  was  a  some- 
thing as  if  the  fluting  was  not  quite  so  much  of  an  enjoy- 
ment to  him  as  to  the  musician  himself.  *•  Always," 
answered  Leibgeber.  "  I  whistle  *  away  life,  and  the 
world's  stage,  and  all  there  is  upon  it — and  all  that  sort 
of  thing — a  great  many  matters  in  the  past ;  and,  like  a 
steeple-warder  at  Carlsbad,  I  whistle  in  the  future.     Do 

*  There  is  a  pun  here  in  the  original,  where  this  expression  moar 
also  "  to  hiss  off "  (  e.g.  an  actor  from  the  stage). — Tkans. 


CHAP.  XXII.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.    527 

you  dislike  it?  Is  my  fuguing  incorrect,  or  my  whistling 
a  breach  of  the  rules  of  pure  composition?"  "  Oh!  only 
too  beautiful,"  answered  Siebenkaes. 

And  then  Leibgeber  began  again,  but  with  tenfold 
power,  and  performed  such  a  lovely  and  melting  mouth- 
organ  voluntary,  that  Siebenkaes  came  up  to  him  with  four 
long  strides,  and,  putting  his  handkerchief  to  his  eyes 
with  his  left  hand,  while  he  laid  his  right  gently  on 
Henry's  lips,  he  said  in  broken  accents,  "  Heniy,  spare 
me !  I  don't  know  why,  but  every  note  of  music  moves 
me  too  deeply  to-day."  The  musician  looked  at  him — 
Leibgeber's  whole  inner  world  was  in  his  eyes — then 
nodded  in  a  decided  manner,  and  strode  rapidly  onwards 
in  silence,  without  looking  round  or  letting  his  face  be 
seen.  But  his  hands,  perhaps  involuntarily,  went  on 
making  little  movements,  beating  time  in  continuation 
of  the  melody. 

At  length  they  arrived,  oppressed  and  anxious,  at  the 
Grub-street  or  Mint-city  where  I  am  now  seated,  pasting 
and  colouring  these  assignats — this  paper-money  for  half 
the  world — namely,  Hof.*  It  is  by  no  means  in  my 
favour,  indeed,  that  at  that  time  I  knew  nothing  what- 
ever of  all  these  matters  which  half  Europe  is  now  being 
made  acquainted  with  through  me.  I  was  a  good  deal 
younger  then  —  sitting  alone  at  home  like  a  cabbage- 
lertuce,  with  the  best  will  in  the  world  to  close  to  a 
head  —  which  process  of  closing,  in  men  as  well  as  in 
lettuces,  is  hindered  by  nothing  so  much  as  by  the  contact 
of  the  neighbouring  salad-plants.  It  is  easier,  pleasanter, 
and  more  advantageous,  for  a  youngster  to  go  from  solitude 
into  society  (from  the  seed-bed  into  the  garden),  than  the 
converse — from  the  market-place  into  the  corner.  Unmi- 
tigated solitude  and  unmitigated  soci  sty  are  both  bad : 
and,  with  the  exception  of  their  order  of  succession,  nothing 
is  so  important  as  their  succession. 

In  Hof,  Siebenkaes  engaged  two  rooms  at  the  inn, 
thinking  Leibgeber  would  not  part  from  him  till  the 
morning.  However,  Tie  (whom  his  own  pre-determination 
to  say  good-bye,  and  his  dread  of  saying  it,  had  fretted 
and  annoyed  immensely   for  a  considerable   time)    had 

«*  *  I  speak  of  1796. 


528      JEAN  PAUL  PRIEDRICH  RICHTER.   [BOOK  IV 

taken  a  mental  vow  that  their  two  spirits  should  he  torn 
asunder  that  day,  and  that,  immediately  theroupon,  he 
should  be  off  into  Saxony  as  hard  as  he  could,  though  it 
should  want  but  a  quarter  of  an  hour  to  midnight ;  but, 
at  all  events,  before  that  particular  day  should  cume  to  a 
close.  He  went  into  his  room,  smiling  and  pleasant,  and 
thought  of  the  airs  he  had  been  whistling  (which  were 
still  running  in  both  their  heads,  if  not  in  their  hearts). 
But  he  soon  enticed  him  out  of  that  empty  deaf-mute  of  a 
room  into  the  diverting  tumult  and  stir  of  the  coffee- 
room — not  remaining  long  there,  however,  either — but  as 
the  moon,  in  her  first  quarter,  was  standing  like  a  lighted 
lamp  just  above  a  post  in  the  market-place,  he  asked  him 
to  go  fur  a  cruise  round  the  town  with  him.  So  they 
went,  and  climbed  up  the  avenue,  and  looked  down  at  the 
gardens  in  the  city-moat  (which,  perhaps,  deserve  to  take 
the  pas  over  other  artificial  meadows,  inasmuch  as  they 
are  more  specially  sown  for  cattle  than  others).  I  pre- 
sume this  was  the  reason  why  Leibgeber  (who  had  been 
in  Switzerland)  remarked  late  at  night  (when  the  country, 
adorned  and  adopted  by  Nature,  but  disinherited  by  Art, 
lay  extended  before  him)  that  the  people  of  Hof  were  like 
the  Swiss,  whose  whole  country  was  a  garden,  except  the 
few  gardens  in  it. 

The  pair  went  on  drawing  wider  and  wider  parallels 
around  the  town.  They  crossed  a  bridge,  from  which  they 
saw  a  gallows-hill  overgrown  with  grass,  which  reminded 
them  of  that  other  ice-region,  with  its  crater,  where, 
exactly  a  year  ago,  they  had  bidden  each  other  good-bye 
at  night,  but  with  the  sweeter  hope  of  an  earlier  meeting. 
Two  friends  such  as  they  are  always  struck  with  the  same 
ideas  in  the  same  circumstances.  Each  is — if  not  the 
unison — at  all  events  the  octave,  fifth,  or  fourth  to  the 
other.  Henry  tried  to  rekindle  a  little  light  in  his  friend's 
dark  house  of  sorrow  and  mourning  by  aid  of  the  bird- 
pole,  which  stood  like  a  commandant's  flag-staff,  or  a 
burning  stake,  not  far  from  the  Supreme  Criminal  Court's 
place  of  judicature.  He  said,  "A  shooter-king  has  his 
Sinai,  where  he  can  both  promulgate  his  laws  and  vin- 
dicate them,  close  at  his  hand  here,  in  a  delightful  manner, 
beside  his  lever  and  leaping-pole,  such  as  you  heaved  your- 


CHAP.  XXII.]    FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      529 

self  up  by  to  the  dignity  of  Great  Negus  and  Grand  Mogul 
of  Kuhschnappel.  Button's  law — that  every  elevation  has 
another  of  equal  height  and  similar  composition  opposite 
to  it— applies  to  a  great  number  of  eminences  which  cor- 
respond to  one  another ;  gallows-hills  and  thrones,  for 
instance,  in  this  case  ;  the  two  sides  of  the  choir  in 
churches  ;  the  fifth  story  and  Pindus :  show-booths,  and 
the  Chairs  of  Professors  Extraordinary." 

As  Firmian  did  not  speak,  but  remained  sunk  in  sadder 
similes,  Henry,  too,  held  his  peace.  He  led  him  towards 
another  stone  (for  he  was  intimately  acquainted  with  the 
whole  country),  one  with  a  prettier  name,  the  "  Stone  of 
Joy."  At  last,  while  they  were  toiling  up  the  hill  towards 
this  stoue,  Firmian  took  heart  and  said,  "  Tell  me  right 
out  —  I  am  quite  prepared  —  tell  me  at  once,  on  your 
honour,  when  are  you  going  away  from  me  for  ever?" 
44  Now,"  answered  Henry.  On  the  pretence  of  its  being 
easier  so  to  climb  the  hill-side,  all  flowers  and  perfumed 
mountain-plants,  they  were  holding  each  othev  by  the 
hand,  and  as  they  went  they  pressed  hands  sometimes,  as 
if  from  accidents  of  mechanical  motion.  But  pain  struck 
great  roots  that  waxed  amain  into  Firmian's  heart,  roots 
that  split  it  asunder  as  the  roots  of  trees  split  rocks.  Fir- 
mian laid  himself  down  on  the  grey  projecting  rock,  which 
divided  the  green  slope  like  a  boundary-stone,  and  he  drew 
his  departing  friend  down  to  his  breast.  44  Sit  down  very 
close  beside  me  this  once  more,"  he  said.  As  the  manner 
of  friends  is,  each  pointed  out  to  the  other  everything  he 
saw.  Henry  showed  him  the  camp  of  the  town  pitched  all 
about  the  foot  of  the  hill,  and  looking  as  if  fallen  into  a 
deep  sleep,  nothing  moving  in  it  but  some  flickering  lights. 
The  river  went  coiling  along  beneath  the  moon  round 
the  town  like  a  great  serpent  with  a  sparkling  back, 
then  stretched  itself  out  through  two  bridges.  The  half- 
shimmer  of  the  moon,  and  the  white  transparent  vapour  of 
the  night,  lifted  the  hills,  the  woods,  and  the  earth,  up  to 
the  heavens;  and  the  water  on  the  earth  was  spangled 
with  stars  like  the  blue  night  above,  and  the  Earth,  like 
Uranus,  had  a  doubled  moon,  as  it  wore  a  child  in  either 
hand. 
44  In  reality,"  Leibgeber  began,  "  we  can  both  always  see 
n.  2  n 


530  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IT. 

each  other  whenever  we  please.  All  we  have  to  do  ia 
to  look  into  a  looking-glass.  That  is  our  moon-mirror."  * 
"  No,"  said  Firmian,  "  we  will  fix  on  a  time  when  we  will 
think  of  each  other — on  our  birthdays — and  on  the  day  of 
my  pantomime  death,  and  on  this."  "  Very  well,"  said 
Leibgeber,  "  these  6hall  be  our  four  quarter-days." 

Of  a  sudden,  the  hand  of  the  latter  rested  upon  a  dead 
lark,  which  had  probably  been  shot.  He  clasped  Firmian's 
shoulders,  and,  raising  him  from  the  ground,  said,  "  Stand 
up;  we  are  men.  What  is  all  this  fuss  about ?  Fare  you 
well !  If  ever  I  let  you  out  of  my  head,  or  out  of  my 
heart,  may  God  dash  me  to  atoms  with  a  thousand  thunder- 
bolts. You  are  and  shall  be  for  ever  in  my  bosom  as 
warmly  as  my  own  living  heart.  And  so,  good-bye,  and 
all  good  attend  you  ;  and  in  all  the  Berghem  Seapiece  of 
your  life  may  there  not  be  a  single  wave  the  size  of  a  tear. 
Farewell !  "  They  clung  together,  and  wept  heartily,  and 
Firmian  did  not  answer  as  yet.  His  fingers  stroked  and 
pressed  his  Henry's  hair.  At  last  he  leaned  his  cheek 
against  the  beloved  eyes ;  before  his  own  eyes  the  wide 
abyss  of  night  shimmered,  and  his  lips  uttered  (but  with 
no  cadence  in  the  tone),  "  '  Fare  you  well,'  do  you  say  to 
me  ?  Ah !  that  I  cannot,  when  I  have  lost  my  truest,  my 
oldest  friend.  The  earth  will  always  be  as  dark  to  me 
as  it  is  now  around  us  here.  It  will  be  hard  for  me  when 
I  am  dying,  and,  in  my  feverish  fancy,  think  I  am  only 
pretending  to  die  again,  and  stretch  out  my  hand  in  the 
darkness  to  feel  for  you,  and  say,  "  Henry,  close  my  eyes 
again,  I  cannot  die  without  you ! "  Henry  whispered, 
"  Tell  me  what  else  to  say  to  you,  and  then  may  God 
punish  me  if  I  utter  another  syllable."  Firmian  stammered, 
"  Will  you  always  like  me,  and  shall  I  see  you  soon  again  ?" 
"  Not  soon ;  not  for  a  long  time."  he  answered,  "  and  I 
shall  never  cease  to  love  you."  As  he  was  starting  to  go, 
Firmian  held  him  back.  "  We  will  look  at  each  other  once 
more,"  he  said.   And  they  bent  back,  their  faces  channelled 

*  Whatever  Pythagoras  wrote  with  bean-juice  on  a  certain  mirror 
could  be  read  on  the  moon. — '  Call.  Rhodogin,'  ix.  13.  When  Charles  V. 
and  Francis  I.  were  fighting  near  Milan,  everything  that  happened  by 
day  at  Milan  could  be  read  at  night  on  the  moon  in  Paris  by  means  of 
a  mirror  of  this  sort. — '  Agrippa  de  Occ.  Philos.'  ii.  6. 


CHAP.  XXII.]    FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      531 

by  streams  of  emotion,  and  looked  at  each  other  for  the 
last  time,  while  the  night-wind,  like  the  arm  of  a  stream, 
mingled  with  the  deep  river,  and  then  rushed  on  united 
with  it  in  deeper  billows,  while  the  great  mountain-range 
of  creation  trembled  before  the  tearful  eyes.  But  Henry 
tore  himself  away,  made  a  sign  with  his  hand  as  if  to  say 
all  was  over,  and  took  his  flight  down  the  hill. 

After  a  little,  Firmian  was  impelled  after  him — not 
knowing  why — by  the  goad  of  pain  and  sorrow.  His 
inner  man,  compre.*sed  by  the  tourniquet  into  insensibility, 
did  not  feel  the  amputation  of  his  limb  just  then.  They 
both  hurried  along  the  same  road,  though  separated  by  hills 
and  valleys.  Whenever  Henry  stopped  and  looked  back, 
so  did  Firmian.  Alas  !  after  a  sultry  storm,  such  as  this, 
the  waves  all  freeze  to  spikes  of  ice,  and  the  heart  lies 
upon  them  transfixed.  As  Firmian  went  on  broken- 
hearted, by  unknown,  darkling  paths,  it  seemed  to  him  as 
if  all  the  death-bells  on  earth  were  toiling  behind  him,  as 
if  the  stream  of  life  were  running  dry  before  him  fast ;  and 
when  he  saw  the  blue  of  the  sky  cut  across  by  a  black 
storm-tree  *  which  lay  upon  the  stars  like  the  bier  of  the 
future,  a  voice  seemed  to  cry,  "With  this  foot-rule  of 
vapour,  Fate  is  measuring  you,  your  world,  and  your  love, 
for  your  last  coffin." 

From  the  circumstance  that  the  distance  between  him  and 
the  other  figure  kept  always  the  same,  Henry  at  last  became 
aware  that  it  was  following  him,  and  halted  only  when 
he  halted.  So  he  made  up  his  mind  that  he  would  lie  in 
wait  in  the  next  village  for  the  coming  up  of  this  form 
which  was  creeping  after  him.  In  the  next  village  then, 
Topen  (which  lies  deep  in  a  valley),  he  awaited,  in  the 
broad  shadow  of  a  gleaming  church,  the  arrival  of  this 
unknown  being  which  was  on  his  track.  Firmian  came 
hastening  along  the  broad  white  street,  dazed  with  sorrow 
— blind  in  the  moonlight — and  stopped,  as  if  frozen,  close 
by  Henry  from  whom  he  had  so  recently  been  severed. 
There  they  stood  facing  each  other,  like  two  spirits  above 
their  corpses,  each  taking  the  other  for  a  ghost  (just  as 
the  superstitious  think   the  noises  made  by  the  buried- 

*  A  long  cloud,  with  branch-like  streaks,  which  bodes  a  storm. 

2  M  2 


532  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RIOHTER.        [BOOK  IT. 

alive  are  caused  by  spirits).  Firmian  trembled  lest 
Leibgebt-r  sbould  be  vexed  with  him,  and  opened  his  arms 
and  stammered  out,  "It  is  1,  Henry,"  and  went  to  him. 
Henry  gave  a  cry  of  pain,  and  threw  himself  upon  the 
faithful  breast ;  but  his  vow  sealed  his  lips.  And  thus 
these  two  miserable,  or  blessed  beings,  speechless,  blind 
and  weeping,  pressed  their  beating  hearts  olose  together 
once  more.  And  when  this  moment — wordless,  full  of 
torture,  full  of  bliss — was  over  and  past,  an  iron,  cold 
one,  tore  them  asunder,  and  Fate  seized  them  with  two 
almighty  arms,  and  hurled  the  one  bleeding  heart  to  the 
south,  and  the  other  to  the  north ;  while  the  dejected, 
bleeding    corpses    passed    slowly   and   alone,   along  the 

widening  path  of  parting,  in  the  night. 

****** 

And  why  is  it  that  my  own  heart  breaks  in  twain  with 
such  a  pang  ?  Why  should  it  be  that,  long  ere  I  came  to 
their  parting,  I  could  not  keep  my  own  tears  back  ?  Ah ! 
my  dear  Christian,  is  it  not  because  in  this  church  those 
who  once  lay  upon  your  heart  and  mine  are  mouldering 
into  dust  ?  No,  no,  I  am  used  to  it  now ;  in  the  black 
magic  of  our  lives  to  see  skeletons  suddenly  start  up  in 
our  friends'  places ;  that  of  eveiy  two  who  put  their  arms 
about  each  other  one  has  to  die ;  *  that  an  unknown  breath 
blows  the  brittle  glass  which  we  call  a  human  breast,  and 
a  cry,  which  we  know  not  of,  shatters  it  in  a  moment.  It 
does  not  pain  me  now  so  much  as  of  old,  ye  two  brothers 
sleeping  in  the  church,  that  the  hard,  cold  hand  of  death 
struck  you  away  so  soon  from  the  honey-dew  of  life, 
and  that  ye  stretched  your  wings  and  have  vanished 
away.  Oh !  either  your  sleep  is  sounder  than  ours,  or  your 
dreams  are  happier,  or  your  awaking  is  blither.  But 
what  agonises  us  in  every  grave-hillock  is  this  thought. 
"  Alas  !  beloved  heart,  how  I  would  have  loved  you  had  I 
kn  >wn  you  were  going  to  die  I" 

But,  since  none  of  us  can  take  a  corpse's  hand  and  say, 
"  Pale  one !  at  at  all  events  I  have  sweetened  thy  transitory 
life  a  Utile;  I  have,  at  any  rate,  never  given  that  faded 
heart  of  thine  anything  but  love  and  happiness ; "  and  as 

*  There  ia  a  superstition  that  when  two  children  kiss  without  being 
able  to  apeak,  one  of  them  must  die. 


CHAP.  XXIII.]    FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.    533 

when  time,  sorrow,  and  the  loveless  winter  of  life  have 
beautified  our  hearts,  at  length  we  must  all  go  up,  wirh 
unavailing  sighs,  to  the  overthrown  forms  which  are  lyinu; 
beneath  the  landslip  of  the  grave,  and  say  to  them,  "  Oh  ! 
that,  now  that  I  am  better  and  gentler,  I  have  thee  wirh 
me  no  longer,  and  can  no  longer  love  thee !  Oh  !  that  the 
beloved  breast  is  transparent  and  broken  in  and  no  heart 
in  it  which  I  would  love  more  fondly,  and  gladden  as  i 
never  did  before."  What  have  we  left  but  an  unavail- 
ing sorrow,  a  dumb  repentance,  and  never-ending  bitter 
tears? 

Yes,  my  Christian,  we  have  something  better  left  still — 
a  warmer,  truer,  lovelier,  love  for  every  soul  which  we 
have  not  yet  lost. 


CHAPTEK  XXIII. 


DAYS   IN   VADUZ — NATHALIE  S   LETTER — A   NEW  YEAR  S   WISH — 
WILDERNESS   OF   DESTINY   AND   THE   HEART. 

We  next  meet  our  Firmian  (promoted  to  higher  rank  on 
his  retirement  from  the  world,  as  officers  are  on  theirs 
from  the  service,  to  that  of  Inspector,  namely)  in  the  In- 
spector's quarters  at  Vaduz.  He  found  he  had  to  twist 
his  way  through  so  many  thickets  of  prickly-pear  and 
impenetrable  thorn  -  hedges,  that,  amid  his  labours,  he 
almost  forgot  that  he  was  alone — so  utterly  alone — in  the 
world.  No  one  could  endure  and  overcome  solitude,  if 
it  were  not  for  the  hope  of  companionship  in  the  future, 
or  for  the  belief  in  invisible  companionship  in  the  present. 
With  the  Count  he  had  only  to  seem  to  be  what  he 
really  was,  and  then  he  was  most  like  the  unconventional 
Leibgeber.  He  found  the  Count  to  be  an  old  man  of  the 
world,  living  alone,  with  neither  wife,  sons,  nor  female 
servants — a  man  who  tilled  up  and  adorned  his  grey  years 
with  the  arts  and  sciences,  the  last,  and  most  lasting, 
enjoyments  of  a  life  enjoyed  to  the  end — and  who  cared 
for  nothing  on  earth  (saving  always  the  amusement  ot 
jesting   upon   it)  except  his  daughter,  who  (as  we  are 


534  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        [BOOK  IV. 

aware)  had  been  Nathalie's  greatest  friend  in  the  starry 
and  flower}7  days  of  youth. 

As  he  had  devoted  all  his  powers  of  body  and  soul,  in 
early  life,  to  climbing  to  the  tops  of  all  the  slipperiest  mats 
de  cocagne  of  pleasure,  and  carrying  off  the  prizes  from 
tneni,  he  had  come  down  to  earth  with  both  sides  of  his 
being  a  little  wearied.  His  mental  life  was  now  a  kind 
of  nursing,  and  lying  in  a  tepid  bath,  which  it  required 
a  shower  of  cold  water  to  make  him  raise  himself  from, 
and  into  which  fresh  warm  water  had  to  be  constantly 
being  poured.  The  point  of  honour  of  keeping  his  word, 
and  the  greatest  possible  happiness  for  his  daughter,  were 
the  only  unbroken  reins  by  which  moral  laws  had  ever 
restrained  him ;  for  he  looked  upon  all  their  other  cove- 
nants more  in  the  light  of  flower-chains,  or  strings  of 
pearls — matters  which  a  man  of  the  world  breaks  and 
mends  often  enough  in  his  career. 

As  it  is  easier  to  imitate  lameness  than  straight  walking, 
it  was  not  difficult  for  Siebenkees  to  enact  the  part  of  his 
beloved  Diable  Boiteux.  The  Count  was  somewhat  struck 
with  his  white-painted  face  (which  was  natural  to  him), 
and  with  his  melancholy,  and  a  heap  of  nameless  diver- 
gences (variations  and  aberrations)  from  Leibgeber.  But 
the  Inspector  accounted  for  these  to  his  patron  by  saying 
that  he  was  so  changed  that  he  scarce  recognised  himself 
— that  he  seemed  to  have  become  the  changeling  of  his 
former  self  since  his  illness,  and  since  he  had  seen  his  col- 
lege friend  Siebenkses  depart  this  life  in  Kuhschnappel. 
In  brief,  the  Count  could  not  but  believe  what  he  was 
told ;  who  would  think  of  such  an  absurd  story  as  the  one  I 
am  telling  here  ?  And  if  the  reader  had  been  present  in 
the  room  himself,  I  am  sure  he  would  have  believed  the 
Inspeotor  in  preference  to  me,  if  it  were  for  no  other 
reason  than  that  he  remembered  more  of  his  old  conver- 
sations with  the  Count  than  the  latter  did  himself.  ('Tis 
true  he  got  this  knowledge  out  of  Leibgeber's  diary  .^ 

At  the  same  time,  as  he  had  to  speak,  and  act,  in  the 
capacity  of  charge-d'affaires,  or  resident  consul,  and  proxy 
of  his  beloved  Leibgeber,  there  were  two  things  which 
he  was,  in  a  high  degree,  constrained  to  be — cheerful 
and  kindly.    Leibgeber's  humour  had  a  greatei  power  of 


CHAP.  XXIII.]  FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      535 

colour,  a  greater  freedom  of  drawing,  and  a  more  poetic 
and  citizen-of-the-world-ish,  and  ideal  compass  and  range, 
than  Firmian's  own  *  and  this  assumed  brightness  of  temper 
by  and  by  became  genuine.  Moreover,  his  delicacy  of 
feeling,  and  his  friendship,  kept  constantly  before  his  mental 
vision,  as  on  a  Moses-cloudy-pi  ilar  on  his  path  of  life,  a 
shining,  magnified  image  of  Henry  with  a  glory,  and 
a  crown  of  laurel  on  his  brow — and  every  thought  within 
him  cried,  "  Be  glorious,  be  godlike,  be  a  Socrates,  to  do 
honour  to  the  spirit  whose  ambassador  you  are."  And 
which  of  us  could  assume  the  name  of  a  beloved  person, 
and  go  and  act  unworthily  ? 

Nothing  on  earth  is  so  often  deceived  —  not  even 
women  or  princes — as  the  conscience.  Our  Inspector 
tried  to  make  his  believe  that  his  name  had  really  been 
Leibgeber  in  early  days — just  as  he  signed  it  now — and 
that  he  really  was  helping  the  Count  in  his  work.  More- 
over, who  could  be  more  ready  than  he  to  make  a  perfectly 
clean  breast  of  the  whole  story  to  the  Count  as  soon  as 
ever  the  proper  time  came?  It  was  easy  to  see  that  a 
humourous,  juristic  forgery,  and  pictorial  illusion  of  this 
sort  would  please  him  better  than  any  amount  of  truths 
founded  upon  reason,  or  responsa  prudentum — to  say  nothing 
of  his  gratification  at  finding  he  could  have  his  friend, 
humorist,  and  jurist,  with  two  heads,  two  hearts,  four  legs 
and  arms — in  duplicate,  in  short.  Besides,  the  fact  must 
not  be  lost  sight  of  that  the  lies  he  told  were  more  un- 
avoidable lies  than  lies  for  the  amusement  of  the  thing — 
inasmuch  as  he  touched   as    seldom  as   he  could   upon 

*  "Therefore  I  foresee  that  Leibgeber's  Pastoral  Letters  in  these 
4  Flower  Pieces '  will,  for  most  of  my  readers,  be  insufferable  letters  of 
denunciation  or  defiance.  Most  Germans  do  understand  a  joke — it 
cannot  be  denied  of  them — but  they  do  not  all  understand  badinage — 
and  few  understand  humour — least  of  all  the  Leibgeber  sort.  There- 
fore, at  first — because  it  is  easier  to  alter  a  .ook  than  a  public — I 
thought  of  falsifying  all  his  letters,  and  substituting  pleasanter-flavoured 
ones.  However  it  can  always  be  arranged  tnat,  in  the  second  edition, 
the  falsified  letters  shall  be  inserted  in  the  body  of  the  work,  and  the 
genuine  ones  given  at  the  end  as  an  Appendix." 

This  has  not  been  found  necessary.  Heavens  !  how  can  first  editions 
make  such  mistakes,  and  misunderstand  such  a  number  of  readers — to 
whom  second  editions  afterwards  offer  the  warmest  and  sincereat 
apologies. 


536  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDEICH  EICHTEB.  [BOOK  IV. 

Leibgeber's  previous  conversations  and  relations,  and  as 
much  as  possible  on  his  own,  which  involved  no  breaches 
of  truth. 

Thus  it  is  with — not  our  Inspector  only — but  man  in 
general.  He  has  an  indescribable  fondness  for  halves, 
perhaps  because  he  is  a  colossus  and  demi-god  standing, 
with  out-stretched  legs,  upon  two  worlds.  He  parti- 
cularly delights  in  half-romances,  half-postage  of  sel- 
fishness, half-proofs,  half-scholars  (smatterers  in  know- 
ledge), half-holidays,  half-spheres  —  and  (consequently) 
better  halves. 

Siebenkses's  new  labours  of  various  kinds  concealed  his 
own  pains  and  sufferings  from  him  for  the  first  few  weeks 
(at  all  events,  when  the  sun  was  not  shining).  But  what 
gave  him  his  largest  extra-ration  of  pleasure  was  the 
Count's  satisfaction  with  his  legal  knowledge,  and  careful 
and  accurate  style  of  doing  his  work.  Once,  when  the 
Count  said  to  him,  "  Friend  Leibgeber,  you  are  keeping 
your  promise  like  a  man.  Your  ability  and  accuracy 
over  your  work  are  deserving  of  all  praise,  and  I  do  not 
conceal  from  you  that  I  felt  just  the  slightest  shade  of 
a  misgiving  on  this  very  head,  notwithstanding  my  high 
opinion  of  your  other  talents.  For,  like  your  Frederick  II., 
I  consider  talk  and  work  to  be  two  wholly  distinct  things  ; 
and  as  regards  the  latter,  I  look  for  the  most  accurate  and 
methodical  attention  to  all  its  details  in  every  one  I  have 
to  deal  with."  Firmian  rejoiced  within  himself,  as  he 
thought,  "  At  all  events  I  have  turned  aside  some  little 
matter  of  blame  from  my  dear  Henry,  and  gained  a  little 
modicum  of  praise  for  him ;  though  he  could  have  done  it 
all  much  better  himself,  if  he  had  chosen." 

After  a  pleasure  of  self-sacrifice  such  as  this,  one  always 
wants  to  go  on  enjoying  fresh  pleasures  of  self-sacrifice, 
and  making  new  sacrifices,  just  as  children,  who,  whenever 
they  are  given  anything,  cannot  cease  giving.  He  brought 
out  his  '  Selections  from  the  Devil's  Papers,'  gave  them  to 
the  Count,  and  told  him  plainly  and  openly  that  they  were 
his  own  work.  "  This  is  not  a  deception  in  the  slightest," 
he  thought ;  "  though  he  supposes  they  are  by  Leibgeber ; 
I  have  no  other  name  now."  The  Count  never  wearied  of 
reading  and  praising  these  papers,  and  what  particularly 


CHAP.  XXIII.]   FLOWEK,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      537 

pleased  him  was,  that,  in  the  path  of  satire,  he  followed 
the  guidance  of  his  own  two  compatriots,  the  British 
Castor  and  Pollux  of  humour,  Swift  and  Sterne.  Siebenkaea 
listened  to  the  encomiums  on  his  book  with  such  delight 
that  he  seemed  exactly  like  a  conceited  author — whereas, 
in  reality,  he  was  nothing  but  a  lover  of  his  Henry,  who 
had  managed  to  conjure  a  few  extra  laurel-crowns  on  to 
his  image  in  tbe  Count's  mind. 

This  single  mjoyment  of  his  was,  of  a  truth,  necessary 
to  him  by  way  of  consolation  and  cordial  for  a  life  which 
was  flowing  on,  beshaded  and  chilled  between  two  steep 
banks  of  legal  business,  week  after  week,  month  after 
month.  Alas !  with  the  exception  of  the  good  Count's 
talk  (whose  extraordinary  kindness  to  him  would  have 
made  his  heart  beat  even  more  warmly  than  it  did,  could 
he  have  thanked  him  for  it  in  another's  name  as  well  as 
his  own), — he  heard  nothing  better  than  an  occasional 
murmur  of  the  waves  of  his  life.  He  found  himself,  every 
day,  in  his  old,  disagreeable  post  of  a  critic,  compelled  to 
read  what  he  had  to  give  judgment  upon.  Formerly  it  had 
been  books — now  it  was  lawyers.  He  saw  into  so  many 
empty  heads,  into  so  many  empty  hearts— saw  such  dark- 
ness in  the  former,  such  blackness  in  the  latter.  Ke  saw 
how  very  much  the  common-herd  (when  it  comes  to  the 
Egeria-fountain  of  the  juristic  ink-bottle  to  benefit  its  cal- 
culi), is  like  Carlsbad  bath- guests,  in  whose  case  the  hot- 
springs  bring  all  diseased  matter  to  the  surface  of  the  skin. 
He  saw  that  most  of  the  oldest,  and  worst,  members  of  the 
legal  profession  are,  in  only  one  beautiful  respect,  like 
poisonous  plants — namely,  that  they  are  not  half  so  poi- 
sonous, but  more  innocuous,  while  they  are  young.  He 
saw  that  a  just  judgment  often  did  as  much  harm  as  an 
unjust  one,  and  that  the  one  was  appealed  against  just  as 
much  as  the  other.  He  saw  that  it  was  easier,  and,  at  the 
same  time,  more  distasteful,  to  be  a  judge  than  an  advocate  ; 
although  neither  of  them  loses  anything  by  an  injustice — 
for  a  judge  is  paid  for  a  judgment  reversed  on  appeal,  just 
as  an  advocate  is  for  a  case  which  he  loses.  He  saw  that, 
in  dealing  with  defendants,  the  principle  of  grooms  is 
applied  (who  look  upon  the  currycomb  as  a  good  half  of 
the  forage).     And,  finally,  he  saw  that  nobody  fares  worse 


538  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  IV. 

in  the  affair  than  he  who  sees  it,  and  that  the  devil  is  the 
very  last  of  all  things  that  the  devil  takes. 

Amid  labours  and  views  such  as  these,  the  tender  fibres 
of  the  heart  contract,  and  the  open  arms  of  the  inner  man 
are  paralysed — the  overweighted  soul  scarce  has  the  strength 
to  love,  let  alone  the  time.  When  we  love,  and  seek  after 
things,  it  must  be  at  the  expense  of  persons.  If  we  work 
too  much,  we  must  love  too  little.  There  was  but  one  place 
where  poor  Firinian  gave  vent,  once  in  the  twenty-four 
hours,  to  the  longings  and  prayers  of  his  tender  soul — 
namely,  his  pillow ;  and  its  cover  was  the  white  handker- 
chief waiting  for  his  weeping  eyes.  A  deluge  (made  of 
tears)  was  over  all  his  former  world — nothing  floating  on 
its  surface  but  the  two  withered  funeral-garlands  of  de- 
parted days — the  flowers  which  Lenette  and  Nathalie  had 
worn  on  their  breasts,  like  petrified  medicine-flowers  of  his 
sick  soul. 

Living  so  far  away,  and  so  wholly  outside  the  elliptical 
vault,  he  could  hear  as  little  of  Kuhschnappel  as  of 
Schraplau — of  Lenette  and  Nathalie  not  a  word.  He 
merely  learned,  from  the  'Messenger  of  the  Gods  and 
Advertiser  of  German  Programmes,'  that  he  was  dead,  and 
that  the  critical  profession  was  thereby  deprived  of  one  of 
its  ablest  and  most  zealous  members.  Thus  our  Inspector 
was  honoured  by  the  necrologium  sooner  than  any  other 
German  scholar  ever  was — as  soon,  in  fact,  as  the  Olympic 
conqueror  Euthymus,*  to  whom,  by  a  decree  of  the  Delphic 
Oracle,  sacrifice  and  divine  worship  was  adjudged  during 
his  lifetime.  I  do  not  know  which  kind  of  ears — long  ears 
or  deaf — the  German  trump  of  fame  prefers  to  blow  to. 

And  yet,  in  the  depths  of  this  ice-month  of  his  love- 
imploring  heart,  and  in  the  wilderness  of  his  loneliness, 
Firmian  still  had  one  living,  resplendent  flower — and  that 
was  Nathalie's  parting- kiss.  Ah !  ye  who  waste  and  pine 
because  of  our  insatiableness,  did  ye  but  know  how  a  kiss, 
which  is  a  first  and  a  last,  blossoms  and  blooms  throughout 
a  life — imperishable  double-rose  of  speechless  lips  and  burn- 
ing souls — ye  would  search  for  bliss  more  enduring — aye, 
and  find  it  too  1     That  kiss  sealed,  in  Firmian,  and  con- 

•  Plin.  H.  N.  vii.  48. 


CHAP.  XXIII.]  FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      539 

firmed  the  spirit-bond  immortalising  and  eternising  love 
at  its  loveliest  and  brightest  hour  of  bloom.  The  speech- 
less lips  were  still  eloquent,  to  him.  The  spirit  breathed 
between  them  as  of  old ;  and  often  as  he  saw,  by  night, 
behind  the  veil  of  his  closed,  tearful  eyelids,  Nathalie 
going  away  from  him,  with  all  her  sacred  sorrows,  and 
vanishing  down  the  darkling  path — he  never  had  enough 
of  the  parting,  the  anguish,  and  the  love. 

At  last,  when  six  months  had  passed,  one  beautiful 
winter  morning,  when  the  white  hills  with  their  snow- 
crystal  woods  lay  bathed  in  the  rose-blood  of  the  sun,  and 
Aurora  was  stretching  her  pinions  more  widely  as  she 
gently  laid  them  down  upon  the  glittering  earth — there 
flew  a  letter  into  Firmian's  empty  hand,  as  if  borne  upon 
the  morning-breeze  of  a  spring  as  yet  among  the  things  to 
be.  It  was  from  Nathalie,  who,  like  the  rest  of  the  world, 
supposed  him  to  be  the  Henry  of  former  days. 

"  Dear  Leibgeber, — I  can  restrain  or  control  my  heart 
no  longer.  Every  day  it  longs  to  break  in  pieces  before 
yours,  and  show  you  all  its  wounds.  You  were  once  my 
friend,  I  know ;  am  I  quite  forgotten  ?  Have  I  lost  you 
too  ?  Ah  !  surely  not ;  it  is  only  that  you  cannot  speak  to 
me  for  sorrow,  since  your  Firmian  died  upon  your  breast, 
and  still  rests,  vanishing  into  the  frost  of  death,  upon  the 
aching  spot.  Ah !  why  did  you  persuade  me  to  accept  the 
fruit  that  grows  upon  his  grave — and,  as  it  were,  open  that 
grave  anew  every  year  ?  *  The  first  day  I  received  this 
fruit  was  bitter — bitterer  than  any  other.  You  will  see  from 
a  little  New  Year's  Greeting,  which  I  addressed  to  myself 
(and  which  I  enclose),  how  I  sometimes  feel.  One  passage  in 
it  refers  to  a  white  rose  in  my  room,  from  which  I  managed 
to  gather  a  flower  or  two  in  December.  My  friend,  now 
grant  me  a  request,  the  making  of  which  is  really  my 
object  in  writing  this  letter — my  most  earnest  prayer  for 
sorrow,  a  bitterer  sorrow  than  is  mine  even  now — for  this 
will  give  me  consolation.  Tell  me — for  there  is  no  one 
else  who  can — and  I  know  no  other — tell  me  everything 
about  our  dear  one's  last  hours  and  moments ;  what  he  said 

*  Sbe  refers  to  the  widow's  pension. 


540  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDEICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  IV. 

and  what  he  suffered ;  how  his  eyes  closed,  and  how  his 
life  ended?  All  this,  everything,  though  it  will  pierce 
my  heart,  I  must  be  told.  What  can  it  cost  you  and  me  but 
tears  ? — and  tears  soothe  suffering  eyes. 

"  I  remain,  your  friend, 

"  Nathalie  A. 

"  P.S. — If  there  were  not  so  many  causes  to  prevent  me, 
I  would  go  myself  to  his  resting-place  and  gather  relics 
for  my  soul ;  but,  if  you  keep  silence,  I  do  not  answer  for 
anything.  I  send  you  my  congratulations  on  your  new 
appointment,  and  I  hope  I  may  be  able  to  wish  you  joy 
some  day  by  word  of  mouth  ;  my  heart  may  become  so  far 
whole  once  more  that  I  shall  be  able  to  come  and  pav 
my  dear  friend  a  visit  at  her  father's,  and  see  you  without 
dying  of  sorrow,  at  the  likeness  you  bear  to  your  buried 
friend,  unlike  you  now." 

***** 

I  venture  to  translate  *  the  pretty  poem  as  follows  : — 

"My  New  Year's  Greeting  to  Myself. 

"The  New  Year's  gates  are  open,  and  Fate,  standing 
between  the  sun  and  the  burning  morning  clouds  upon  the 
mound  of  ashes  of  the  year  which  has  fallen  to  dust, 
deals  out  the  days  according  to  their  lot.  What  dost  thou 
pray  for,  Nathalie  ? 

"  Not  for  joy.  Alas !  all  the  joys  which  have  been  in 
my  heart  have  left  but  black  thorns  there ;  their  rose-juice 
soon  was  gone.  The  heavy  thunder-cloud  grows  as  the 
sun-gleam  brightens — and  what  shines  upon  us  is  the  ray 
reflected  from  the  sword  which  the  coming  day  will  hold 
to  our  happy  hearts.  No,  no ;  I  pray  not  for  joys  ;  they 
make  the  thirsting  heart  so  void.  It  is  but  sorrow  that 
can  fill  it  full. 

"  Fate  deals  the  days  according  to  their  lot.  What  dost 
thou  long  for,  Nathalie  ? 

"  Not  love.  Oh  !  those  who  press  the  thorny  white  rose 
of  love  to  their  hearts  draw  blood  from  out  them ;  the 
warm  tears  of  bliss  which  fall  into  the  blossom  soon  grow 

•  Because  it  was  supposed  to  be  in  English  verse.— Trans. 


CHAP.  XXIII.]  FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     541 

chill,  and  are  dried  up  amain.  Love,  all  gleam  and  bloom, 
bangs  on  the  morning  sky  of  life,  like  some  great  rose-red 
Aurora  in  the  heavens.  Ah  !  do  not  enter  that  bright 
glittering  cloud — it  is  but  mist  and  tears.  No,  no ;  long 
not  for  love ;  die  of  a  lovelier  sorrow.  Sink  into  the 
chill  of  death  under  a  nobler  poison-tree  than  is  the  lovely 
myrtle. 

"  Thou  art  kneeling  at  the  feet  of  Destiny,  Nathalie ; 
tell  him  thy  desire  ! 

"Neither  do  I  desire  more  friends.  No;  we  stand  all, 
side  by  side,  on  undermined  graves — and  when  we  have 
80  long  held  each  other  so  fondly  by  the  hand,  and  so  long 
suffered  together,  our  friend  8  empty  mound  breaks  in,  and 
he  turns  pale,  and  sinks — and  I  am  left  alone,  my  life  all 
frozen,  beside  the  filled-up  grave.  No,  no  :  but  when  at 
last  there  comes  the  hour  when  the  heart  will  die  no  more, 
but  has  put  on  immortal  being — and  when  friends  stand 
side  by  side  in  the  eternal  world — then  let  the  firmer 
breast  beat  warm  and  high,  then  let  the  eye,  which  is  to 
beam  fur  ever,  weep  blissful  tears,  then  let  the  lips,  which 
never  more  grow  pale,  murmur  in  rapture,  '  Now  come 
to  me,  beloved  soul,  we  will  love  now,  for  we  shall  nevei 
have  to  part  again.' 

"  Oh !  thou  bereaved  and  widowed  Nathalie !  what 
would'st  thou  have  on  earth  ? 

"A  grave,  and  patience;  nothing  else  beside.  But 
these  deny  me  not,  thou  silence-keeping  Fate  !  Dry  thou 
mine  eyes,  then  close  them !  Still  my  heart,  then  break 
itl — Yes,  one  day,  when  the  free  spirit  spreads  her  wings 
in  a  fairer  heaven,  and  when  the  New  Year  breaks  upon  a 
purer  world — when  we  all  meet,  and  love,  again — then 
shall  I  lay  my  longings,  prayers,  and  wishes  at  thy  feet. 

But  none  for  me  ;  for  /shall  be  too  blest." 

***** 

In  what  words  could  I  depict  the  inward  speechlessness 
and  motionlessness  of  her  friend,  when  he  had  read  the 
paper,  and  still  held  and  gazed  at  it,  although  he  could  no 
longer  either  see  or  think.  Oh  !  the  ice-floes  of  the  glacier 
of  death  spread  wider  and  wider,  and  filled  up  one  warm 
Tempe  valley  after  another.  The  only  bond  by  which  om- 
solitary  Firmian  now  held  to  humanity  was  the  o<>rd  of  his 


542  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  IV. 

death-bell  and  coffin — his  bed  was  but  a  broader  bier — and 
every  joy  seemed  a  theft  from  the  withered,  leaf-stripped 
heart  of  another.  And  thus  the  stem  of  his  life,  like  that 
of  many  flowers,*  went  deeper  and  deeper  down,  its  top 
becoming  its  hidden  root. 

The  abyss  of  a  difficulty  yawned  on  every  side,  and  to 
do  anything  was  just  as  perilous  as  to  do  nothing.  I  shall 
lay  the  difficulties,  or  resolutions,  in  their  order  as  they 
struck  his  mind,  before  the  reader.  In  man,  the  devil  flies 
up  always  sooner  than  the  angel, — the  evil  intention  comes 
before  the  good  one.f  Hie  first  was  non-moral,  namely, 
that  he  should  answer  Nathalie,  and  tell  her  what  she 
wished  to  hear — that  is,  should  lie  to  her.  We  find  the 
black  mourning  coat  as  becoming,  when  others  wear  it  for 
us,  as  warm  when  we  wear  it  for  others.  "  But  I  shall  melt 
her  heart "  (said  his)  "  into  fresh  anguish  with  a  continu- 
ation of  wound  and  lie;  ah!  not  even  my  actual  death 
would  be  worth  such  pain  and  sorrow.  Therefore  I  shall 
keep  utter  silence."  But  then,  she  must  think  Henry  an- 
noyed, and  that  she  has  lost  this  friend  too ;  nay,  she 
might,  in  this  case,  travel  to  Kuhschnappel,  and  go  to  his 
grave,  and  bear  it  as  an  additional  burden  upon  her 
oppressed  and  trembling  soul.  In  both  these  cases  there 
was  the  risk  of  the  third  danger — that  she  should  come 
to  Vaduz,  and  that  he  should  then  have  to  convert  the 
written  lies,  which  he  had  spared  her,  into  spoken  ones. 
There  was  but  one  way  of  escape  that  he  could  see — the 
most  virtuous,  but  the  steepest — he  could  tell  her  the 
truth.  But  with  what  danger  to  every  relation  of  his  life 
this  confession  was  fraught,  even  if  Nathalie  kept  counsel 
— also,  a  yellow,  cross  light  would  fall  upon  Henry  in 
Nathalie's  eyes,  especially  as  she  had  no  means  of  know- 

*  In  the  ranunculus,  brown  wort,  the  lower  part  of  the  stalk  sinka 
deeper  into  the  ground  every  year,  to  replace  the  root  as  it  rots  away. 

t  In  enthusiasm,  the  converse  order  of  things  prevails.  To  learn  to 
know  what  your  firmly  established  principles  of  morality  are,  with  more 
certainty  than  you  can  from  your  resolves  and  actions,  you  have  only 
1o  notice  the  joy  or  the  sorrow  which  a  moral  claim,  a  piece  of  news,  a 
disappointment,  calls  up  in  you  with  lightning  speed,  but  which  dis- 
appears again  at  once  under  the  influence  of  reflection  and  self-control. 
What  great,  rotting  pieces  of  the  old  Adam  one  finds  about  one  ■till, 
now  and  then ! 


CHAP.  XXIY,^   FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     543 

ing  anything  as  to  the  nobleness  and  generosity  of  his 
aims  and  deceptions.  On  the  whole,  there  was  least  for 
his  heart  to  suffer  on  the  precarious  path  of  truth,  and 
ultimately  he  resolved  to  go  by  it. 


CHAPTER  XXIV. 


NEWS    FROM    KUHSCHNAPPEL — WOMAN'S    ANTICLIMAX — OPENING 
OF   THE   SEVENTH   SEAL. 

It  is  a  matter  which  often  quite  puts  me  beyond  myself 
that,  althoxtgh  we  do,  in  the  end,  duly  accept  and  honour 
the  bills  which  Virtue  draws  upon  us,  we  only  pay  them 
after  such  a  vast  number  of  da}'S  of  grace  and  double- 
usances — although  neither  the  devil  nor  Constantinople 
will  hear  of  either  the  one  or  the  other.  Firmian  urged 
no  further  pleas  of  objection,  except  for  delay.  He  merely 
postponed  his  confession,  thinking  that  as  Apollo  is  the  best 
consoler  (Paraclete)  of  man,  and  as  Nathalie  had  shown 
the  basilisk  of  sorrow  its  own  image  in  the  mirror  of 
poetry,  the  sight  of  itself  would  be  sufficient  to  kill  it, 
Thus  it  is  that  all  virtuous  motions  in  us  are  weakened  by 
the  friction  of  time  and  of  our  inclinations. 

One  single  letter,  however,  sent  all  the  scenery  of  his 
theatre  into  confusion  again.  It  came  from  Schulrath 
Stiefel : — 

"Honoured  Sir, — You  doubtless  remember  more  than 
too  well  the  testamentaiy  instruction  which  our  mutual 
friend,  the  late  lamented  Poor's  Advocate,  Siebenkses,  left 
behind  him,  to  the  effect  that  Herr  von  Blaise  should  make 
payment  of  the  trust-funds  in  his  hands — and,  indeed  (as 
you  are  aware),  to  your  respected  self  in  order  that  you 
might  remit  it  to  the  widow — which  failing,  it  was  the 
testator's  avowed  intention  to  appear  as  a  ghost.  Be  this 
as  it  may,  thus  much  is  matter  of  notoriety  in  this  town 
and  neighbourhood,  that,  for  some  weeks  past,  a  ghost,  in 
the  likeness  of  our  lamented  friend,  has  pursued  the  Herr 
Heimlicher  everywhere,  who  has,  in  consequence,  become 


514  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDBICH  RICHTER.       [BOOK  IV 

bo  ill  and  bedridden,  that  he  has  taken  the  Holy  Sacrament, 
and  made  up  his  mind  to  pay  over  the  above-mentioned 
moneys  in  good  earnest.  1  now  beg  to  inquire  of  you 
whether  you  would  wish  to  receive  them  in  the  first  in- 
stance, or  whether  (as  would  be  almost  more  natural)  they 
shall  be  paid  at  once  to  the  widow.  I  have  yet  to  mention 
that — in  accordance  with  the  desire  of  the  testator — I 
sometime  since  married  the  former  Mrs.  Siebenkaes,  and 
that  I  expect  very  soon  to  be  the  happiest  of  fathers.  She 
is  a  most  admirable  wife  and  housekeeper.  She  is  by  no 
means  a  Thalaea,*  and  would  lay  down  her  life  for  her 
husband  as  gladly  as  he  would  lay  down  his  for  her ;  and 
I  often  have  nothing  left  to  desire,  but  that  my  predeces- 
sor, her  good,  never-to-be-forgotten  first  husband  Siebenkaas 
(who  had  his  little  whims  and  eccentricities  at  times),  could 
be  a  spectator  of  tha  happiness  in  which  his  beloved  Lenette 
is  now  bathed.  She  weeps  for  him  every  Sunday  as  she 
goes  through  the  churchyard,  but  at  the  same  time  she 
confesses  that  she  is  happier  now  than  in  former  times. 
It  grieves  me  much  that  it  is  only  now  that  I  have  learnt, 
from  my  wife,  in  what  miserable  circumstances  the  dear 
departed  found  himself,  as  regarded  his  purse.  How 
eagerly,  had  1  been  aware  of  this,  I  should  have  taken 
him  and  his  wife  by  the  arms,  and  assisted  them  as  be- 
comes a  Christian  1  If  the  deceased,  who  now  possesses 
more  than  any,  or  all,  of  us,  can,  in  his  glory,  look  down 
upon  us,  I  am  sure  he  will  forgive  me.  I  would  respect- 
fully beg  for  an  early  reply  to  this  letter.  One  cause  of 
the  restitution  of  the  trust-funds  may  also  be,  that  the 
Heimlicher  (who  is  an  honest  enough  man  upon  the 
whole)  is  now  no  longer  influenced  by  Herr  von  Meyern. 
They  have  completely  fallen  out,  as  all  the  town  knows,  and 
the  latter  has  broken  off  engagements  with  five  ladies  in 
Bayreuth,  and  is  about  to  enter  into  the  state  of  holy 
matrimony  with  a  native  of  KuhschnappeL 

*  The  wife  of  Pinarius,  under  the  government  of  Tarquinius 
Superbus,  was  the  first  woman  to  quarrel  with  her  mother-in-law 
(Plut.  in  Numa).  German  hiBtory  will,  perhaps,  some  day  make 
honourable  mention  of  the  first  married  woman  who  did  not  quarrel 
with  her  mother-in-law ;  at  least  a  German  Plutarch  should  set  about 
hunting  her  out. 


OHAP.  XXIV.J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.    545 

"  My  wife  is  as  bitter  against  him  as  Christian  love 
permits,  and  sa}"S  that  when  she  meets  him  she  feels  like 
a  hunter  who  encounters  an  old  woman  in  his  path  of  a 
morning ;  for  he  was  the  cause  of  much  needless  vexation 
between  her  and  her  husband,  and  she  often  tells  me  with 
pleasure  how  cleverly  you,  esteemed  Mr.  Inspector,  often 
set  this  dangerous  fellow  down,  and  kept  him  in  his  place. 
However,  he  does  not  dare  to  set  foot  in  my  house.  I  defer, 
for  the  present,  a  more  detailed  request — as  to  whether 
you  would  not  feel  inclined  to  fill  our  departed  friend's 
vacant  place  as  Collaborateur  in  the  '  God's  Messenger  of 
German  Programmes,'  which  (I  may  say  without  undue 
boasting)  is  taken  in,  and  looked  upon  with  approval  in 
Gymnasia  and  Lycaea,  from  Swabia  as  far  as  Niimberg, 
Bayreuth,  and  Hof.  There  is  rather  a  superfluity  than  a 
lack  of  miserable  Programme-scribblers ;  and  (let  me  say 
it  without  flattery)  you  are  the  very  man  to  wield  the 
satiric  scourge  over  the  heads  of  these  frog-spawn  in  the 
Castalian  springs,  as  few  others  could.  But  of  this  more 
on  another  occasion.  My  wife  desires  to  add  her  most 
cordial  remembrances  to  her  departed  husband's  highly- 
esteemed  friend ;  and,  hoping  for  a  speedy  answer, 

"  I  remain,  your  most  obedient  humble  servant, 

"  S.  E.  Stiefel,  Schulrath." 


The  human  heart  is  shielded  by  great  sorrows  from  the 
impact  of  small  ones — by  the  waterfall  from  the  rain.* 
Firmian  forgot  everything  in  remembering,  suffering,  and 
crying  out  to  himself,  "  Thus  1  have  lost  thee  for  ever, 
wholly.  Oh !  thou  wert  good  always,  it  was  i"  who  was 
not.  Be  happier  than  thy  solitary  friend  whom  thou 
mournest  justly  every  Sunday."  He  now  cast  all  the  blame 
of  his  bygone  matrimonial  lawsuits  upon  his  own  satirical 
whimsies,  and  ascribed  the  failure  of  his  crop  of  happiness 
to  his  own  ungenial  climate. 

But  in  this  he  was  doing  himself  greater  injustice  than 

*  Allusion  to  a  certain  waterfall  which  dashes  from  its  rock  with  a 
sweep  so  wide  that  one  can  walk  under  it,  and  tins  be  protected  from 
ruin. — '  An  Artist's  Journey  in  the  Alps.' 

u.  2s 


5±6  JEAN  PAUL  FEIEDRICH  RICHTEB.  [BOOK  IV. 

he  had  formerly  done  Lenette.  I  mean  to  make  the  world 
a  present  of  my  thoughts  on  this  subject,  on  the  spot.  Love 
is  the  Perihelion  of  the  fair  sex ;  nay,  it  is  the  transit  of 
every  one  of  those  Venuses  over  the  sun  of  the  ideal  world. 
At  the  epoch  of  this  "  higher  style  "  of  their  souls,  they  love 
everything  that  we  love,  even  the  sciences,  and  the  whole 
best  world  within  the  breast — and  they  despise  what  we 
despise,  even  clothes  and  news.  In  this  spring  of  theirs 
these  nightingales  go  on  singing  until  the  summer  solstice ; 
the  wedding-day  is  their  longest  day.  Then  the  devil  runs 
away  with — not  exactly  everything,  but  something  every 
day.  The  bast-band  of  wedlock  binds  the  poetic  wings, 
and  the  bridal-bed  is  (for  the  imagination,  the  phantasy), 
an  Engelsburg,  and  prison-cell,  with  bread  and  water. 
During  the  honeymoon  I  have  often  followed  these  poor  birds 
of  paradise,  or  peacocks  of  Psyche,  and  in  this  moulting- 
season  of  theirs  picked  up  the  glorious  wing  and  tail- 
feathers  which  they  have  dropped ;  and  then,  when  a  hus- 
band has  fancied  he  has  married  a  naked  crow,  I  have  held 
out  the  bunch  of  feathers  to  him.  Why  is  this  ?  For  this 
reason :  marriage  overlays  the  poetical  world  with  the 
rind  of  the  actual ;  as  (according  to  Descartes)  our  earthly 
sphere  is  a  sun  covered  over  with  a  dirty  crust,  or  bark. 
The  hands  of  everyday  labour  are  unwieldy,  hard,  and  full 
of  indurations,  and  find  much  difficulty  in  going  on  hold- 
ing, or  drawing  the  delicate  threads  of  the  woof  of  the 
ideal.  Hence  it  is  that  among  the  upper  classes  (where, 
instead  of  work-rooms  there  are  only  little  work-baskets,  and 
where  the  little  spinning-wheels  are  turned  on  the  lap  with 
the  finger,  and  where  love  still  endures  after  marriage — 
often  even  for  the  husband)  the  wedding-ring  is  not  so  often, 
as  among  the  lower  orders,  a  GygeB-ring,  which  renders 
books  and  the  arts  of  music,  poetry,  painting,  and  dancing 
— invisible.  Upon  high  places  plants  of  all  sorts,  and 
particularly  female  plants,  have  more  vigour  and  aroma. 
A  woman  has  not,  as  a  man  has,  the  power  of  protecting 
the  outer  side  of  her  inner  air-and- magic-castles  against 
rough  weather.  What  then  is  she  to  hold  to?  Her  hus- 
band. He  ought  always  to  stand  beside  the  liquid  silver 
of  the  female  spirit  with  a  spoon,  and  keep  skimming  off 
the  scum  which  gathers  on  it,  that  the  silver-glitteiing 


CHAP.  XXIV.]    FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     547 

sheen  of  the  ideal  may  always  keep  bright  and  shining. 
Bat  then  there  are  two  sorts  of  husbands — Arcadians,  or 
lyric-poets  of  life,  who  love  for  ever,  like  Rousseau,  when 
their  hair  is  grey — and  these  are  not  to  be  controlled  or 
comforted  when  they  can  no  longer  see  any  gold  on  the 
feminine  anthology  (bound  with  gilt  edges)  because  they 
have  turned  the  leaves  of  the  little  book  over  one  by  one, 
(as  is  the  case  with  all  gilt-edged  books).  Secondly,  there 
are  shepherd -hinds  and  sheep-smearers,  I  mean  master- 
singers  by  profession,  men-of-business,  who  thank  God 
when  the  enchantress  turns,  at  last,  like  other  witches,  into 
a  grumbling  house-cat,  keeping  down  the  vermin. 

Nobody  has  to  suffer  more  anxiety  and  alarm,  combined 
with  tedium  and  ennui  (and  therefore  I  intend  some  daj'  to 
awaken  the  pity  of  my  readers  for  this  very  condition,  in 
a  comic  biography)  than  a  portly,  onergetic,  pushing,  pom- 
pous, ponderous  Basso  of  a  "  business-man,"  who  finds 
himself  (like  the  elephants  in  Eome  of  old)  constrained  to 
dance  on  the  slack-rope  of  love ;  and  whose  deportment 
and  plaj7  of  feature,  in  the  circumstances,  I  think  more 
like  those  of  a  marmot  than  anything  else,  when  the 
warmth  of  a  room  has  awakened  him  from  his  winter's 
sleep,  and  he  finds  he  can't  get  properly  into  the  knack 
of  moving.  It  is  only  with  widows  (who  wish  less  to  be 
loved  than  to  be  married)  that  a  weighty  office-holder  of 
this  sort  can  begin  his  romance  at  the  place  where  all  the 
novel-writers  leave  theirs  off — namely,  at  the  altar-steps. 
A  man,  built  after  this  simplest  of  styles,  would  find  a  great 
weight  lifted  from  his  heart  if  anybody  would  only  love 
his  shepherdess  for  him  till  such  time  as  he  should  have 
nothing  to  do  but  go  and  be  married ;  and  no  one  would 
have  greater  pleasure  in  taking  up  this  burden,  or  cross, 
from  them  than  myself.  I  have  often  thought  of  announ- 
cing in  the  public  newspapers  (except  that  I  was  afraid  it 
would  be  looked  upon  as  a  joke)  that  I  was  prepared  to 
swear  Platonic,  eternal  love  to  any  number  of  endurable 
girls  (whom  men  of  business  might  not  even  have  time  to 
love),  and  make  them  all  the  necessary  love- declarations 
as  plenipotentiary  of  the  bridegroom-elect— in  a  word,  to 
lead  them  on  my  arm,  as  substitutus  sine  spe  succedendi,  or 
cavalier  de  aociete,  athwart  the  whole  of  the  unlevel  land  of 

2  5  2 


5!8  JEAN   PAUL   FRIEDRICH    PJCHTER.  LB00K  IV« 

love,  till,  on  the  frontier,  I  should  hand  over  my  charge, 
duly  prepared,  to  the  bridegroom  ;  which  would  be  love- 
making,  rather  than  marrying,  by  ambassador.  If,  accord- 
ing to  this  systema  assisfantice,  there  should  be  any  one  who 
would  care  to  employ  the  writer  even  dining  the  honey- 
moon (when  a  certain  amount  of  love  may  still  be  expected 
to  crop  up),  he  must  take  care  to  establish  all  the  necessary 
conditions  in  good  time,  beforehand. 

In  Siebenkaas's  Lenette  (from  no  fault  of  his)  the  ideal 
isle  of  the  blest  had  sunk  away,  miles  deep,  in  an  instant, 
at  the  very  marriage  altar.  The  husband  could  in  nowise 
either  help  or  hinder  this.  On  the  whole,  dear  Mr.  Educa- 
tion-Counsellor Campe,  you  really  should  not  strike  so  hard 
upon  your  writing-desk  with  your  school  birch-rod  when- 
ever a  solitary  she- frog  croaks  out  something  or  other  out 
of  the  nearest  marsh,  which  is  capable  of  being  sent  to  an 
almanack.  Ah  me !  don't  tear  away  from  the  good  crea- 
tures (who  do  put  the  loveliest  dreams,  all  full  of  fantasy- 
flowers,  into  this  empty  life  of  ours)  the  terribly  short 
dream  of  a  delicate,  sentimental  love.  They  will  be 
awakened  to  reality  only  too  soon  without  that,  and  neither 
you  nor  I  will  be  able  to  put  them  to  sleep  again,  let  us 
write  as  much  as  we  choose. 

Siebenkaes  wrote  off  that  day  a  brief  and  hurried  reply 
to  the  Schulrath,  saying  "  he  was  extremely  glad  that  he 
had  stood  to  the  will,  and  the  laws,  and  enclosed  him  a 
power  of  attorney  to  enable  him  to  draw  the  money.  Only 
he  entreated  him,  as  a  great  scholar  and  man  of  letters 
(one  of  a  class  who  often,  perhaps,  suppose  they  understand 
matters  of  business  better  than  they  really  do),  to  put  the 
whole  affair  into  a  lawyer's  hands  to  be  transacted,  inas- 
much as  Jus  is  of  little  use  without  jurists — nay,  often  not 
of  very  much  even  with  them.  To  review  '  Programmes '  he 
had  no  time,  let  alone  to  read  them  ;  and  he  sent  his  kind 
regards  to  his  wife." 

It  is  not  displeasing  to  me  that  (as  I  perceive)  my 
readers  have  all  discovered  of  themselves  that  the  ghost,  or 
supernatural  bow-wow,  and  mumbo-jumbo,'*  who  had  got 

*  A  bugbear,  nine  feet  high,  made  of  bark  and  straw,  with  which  th« 
Mandingoes  terrify  and  better  their  wiv<  s. 


CHAP.  XXIV.]    FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     549 

the  trust  money  out  of  the  Heimlicher's  clutches  more 
effectually  than  the  whole  pos3e-comitatus  of  the  Court  of 
Exchequer,  was  none  other  than  Heinricli  Leibgeber,  who 
had  availed  himself  of  his  resemblance  to  the  departed 
Siebenkajs  to  play  the  part  of  Bevenant.  I  need  not,  there- 
fore, tell  the  reader  what  he  knows  already. 

When  one  has  at  last  managed  to  creep  up  a  steep  Alp 
with  the  hands  of  a  tree-frog,  one  very  often  finds  that,  what 
one  looks  down  at  from  the  summit  is  a  fresh  yawning  abyss. 
Firmian  saw  a  new  one  under  his  feet;  he  had  to  aban- 
don the  resolution  he  had  taken.  I  mean,  he  did  not  now 
dare  to  say  a  woid  to  Nathalie  about  his  resurrection  from 
the  charnel-house— his  immortality  after  death.  Alas!  the 
happiness  of  his  Lenette,  who  (in  the  utmost  innocence) 
had  two  husbands,  would  then  be  hanging  on  the  tip  of  a 
tongue.  The  blame  would  be  his,  the  mi>ery  Lenette's. 
No,  no  (he  said)  ;  Time  will,  by  slow  degrees,  lay  dust 
upon  my  pale  image  in  Nathalie's  kind  heart,  and  draw 
the  colours  out  of  it. 

In  brief,  he  kept  silence.  The  proud  Nathalie  kept 
silence  also.  In  this  terrible  position  of  matters,  face  to 
face  with  the  hard,  eternal  knot  of  the  drama,  he  passed 
his  anxious  hours  upon  the  stage.  The  raven-flight  of 
cares  and  sorrows  cast  their  flitting  shadows  over  every 
charm  and  beauty  of  the  spring,  and  poisonous  dreams  fell 
upon  his  sleep  like  mildew.  Every  dream-night  cut  the 
falling  planetary-knot,  and  his  heart  along  with  it.  How 
would  Fate  rescue  and  recover  him  from  this  poison- 
vapour,  this  azote-gas,  of  anguish  and  anxiety?  How 
would  it  cure  the  finger-worm  in  his  ring  finger  ?  By 
taking  his  arm  off.  One  evening,  to  wit,  shortly  before 
bedtime,  the  Count  was  as  confidential  with  him  as  a  man 
of  the  world  can  ever  be.  He  had  something  very  plea- 
sant to  tell  him,  he  said  ;  only  he  must  be  allowed  to  say 
something  beforehand,  by  way  of  a  preface  or  introduc- 
tion. It  struck  him — he  went  on  to  say,  that,  now  that 
his  Inspector  had  entered  upon  his  duties,  he  was  no 
longer  quite  so  gay  and  full  of  humour  as  he  had  found 
him  to  be  of  old,  but  rather  (if  he  might  speak  openly) 
downcast  at  times,  and  over-sentimental.  Yet  he  had 
formerly  said  himself  (but  this  was  the  other  Leibgeber) 


,550  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.        {BOOK  IV. 

that  he  would  rather  hear  a  man  swear  at  a  mischance 
than  lament  over  it ;  and  that  one  might  have  his  feet 
sticking  in  the  winter,  and  his  nose  in  the  spring,  and 
•smell  a  flower,  though  in  the  midst  of  snow.  "  1  forgive 
it  at  once,  for  perhaps  I  guess  the  reason  of  it,"  he  added. 
But  his  forgiveness  was  really  not  quite  genuine.  For, 
like  all  the  great,  to  him  strength  of  feeling,  even  of  a 
loving  sort — but  still  more,  of  a  sorrowful — was  an  annoy- 
ance ;  and  a  strong  handclasp  of  friendship  was  almost  as  bad 
as  a  crunch  en  the  toes.  He  demanded  of  pain  that  it  should 
pass  before  him  with  a  smile — of  wickedness  and  evil,  that 
they  should  pass  him  by  laughing,  or,  at  all  events,  laughed 
at — as,  indeed,  the  coldest  men  of  the  world  are  like  the 
physical  man,  whose  highest  temperature  is  about  the 
region  of  the  diaphragm.*  Consequently,  the  previous 
Leibgeber — that  storm-windy,  but,  at  the  same  time,  serene 
blue  sky — naturally  suited  the  Count  better  than  this  so- 
called  Leibgeber.  But  how  differently  from  us  who  read 
this  little  reproach  quietly,  did  Siebenkaes  listen  to  it ! 
These  solar  eclipses  of  his  Leibgeber  (which  really  were  not 
even  so  much  as  sun  spots  belonging  to  him,  but  merely  appa- 
rent shadows  cast  on  him  by  Siebenkaes,  by  reason  of 
the  position  he  chanced  to  occupy)  the  latter  reproached 
himself  with  as  so  many  deadly  sins  against  his  friend, 
which  he  felt  it  absolutely  necessary  to  confess  and  do 
penance  for. 

As  the  Count  now  went  on  to  say,  "  This  melancholy  of 
yours  can  scarcely  be  caused  altogether  by  grief  at  the 
Joss  of  your  friend  Siebenkaes,  because  since  his  death  you 
have  never  spoken  to  me  of  him  with  such  warmth  as 
when  he  was  alive.  Pardon  me  this  frankness," — a  fresh 
pang  at  this  shadowing  of  Leibgeber  cut  across  his  brow, 
and  it  was  with  difficulty  that  he  could  allow  his  patron 
to  finish  his  explanation.  "  But  this  is  not  a  shortcoming 
in  my  eyes,  dear  Leibgeber :  on  the  contrary,  it  is  an  ex- 
cellence. We  ought  not  to  go  on  eternally  mourning  for 
the  dead  ;  if  we  grieve  at  all,  it  should  be  for  the  living. 
And  even  the  latter  species  of  grief  may  come  to  an  end 
vith  you  next  week,  for  then  I  expect  my  daughter,  and  " 
(he  spoke  here  very  deliberately)  "  her  friend  Nathalie  with 
*  Walter's '  Physiology.' 


CHAP.  XXIV.]   FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     551 

her.  They  have  met  en  route."  Siebenkaes  sprang  hastily  up, 
stood  speechless  and  motionless,  held  his  hand  before  his 
eyes,  not  to  hide  them,  but  to  keep  the  light  out  of  them, 
so  that  he  might  look  through,  and  follow  the  course  of, 
the  cloud-masses  of  thought  which  were  piled  one  over 
another  and  rolling  in  all  directions,  ere  he  should  give 
his  answer. 

But  the  Count — misconstruing  him  (as  Leibgeber)  in  all 
points,  and  ascribing  his  sentimental  metamorphosis  to 
Nathalie's  account,  and  the  fact  of  his  being  deprived  of 
her — begged  him  merely  to  hear  him  out  before  speaking, 
and  to  accept  his  assurance  that  he  would  be  delighted  to 
do  everything  in  his  power  to  retain  his  daughter's  lovely 
friend  always  in  the  neighbourhood.  Heavens !  what 
thousandfold  entanglement  the  Count  made  of  a  matter 
so  wholly  simple ! 

Here  Siebenkaes,  stormed  at  from  fresh  points  of  the  com- 
pass, had  to  beg  for  a  moment  to  think — for  there  were  now 
three  souls  at  stake — but  he  had  scarcely  taken  one  or  two 
hasty  steps  across  the  room,  when  he  stood  firm  again,  and 
said  to  the  Count,  and  to  himself,  "  Yes,  I  shall  do  what  is 
right."  Then  he  begged  the  Count  to  give  his  word  of 
honour  that  he  would  keep  inviolate  a  secret  which  he 
would  confide  to  him,  and  which  neither  related  to,  nor 
would  injure,  himself  or  his  daughter  in  the  slightest 
degree.  "  In  that  case  why  should  I  not  ? "  answered 
the  Count,  to  whom  the  discovery  of  a  secret  was  as  the 
clearing  away  of  a  thick  woodland  before  a  fine  view. 

Then  Firmian  opened  his  heart,  his  life,  and  everything, 
like  a  stream  let  loose  and  dashing  into  a  new  channel,  not 
yet  to  be  measured  with  a  glance.  The  Count  several 
times  detained  him  by  fresh  misunderstandings,  because 
he  had  only  preassumed,  out  of  his  own  imagination,  a  love 
on  Nathalie's  part  for  the  real  Leibgeber,  and  had  never 
heard  from  any  one  of  her  real  love  for  Siebenkaes. 

And  now  the  astonished  Count,  in  his  turn,  astonished 
the  Advocate ;  and,  of  all  the  many  faces  which  in  such  a 
case  he  might  have  put  on — faces  offended,  angry,  startled, 
embarrassed,  delighted,  cold — he  only  showed  the  Inspector 
an  exceedingly  contented  one.  It  only  particularly  pleased 
him,  he  said,  that  he  had  observed  so  many  little  matters 


552  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  EICHTER.        [BOOK  IV. 

which  rather  vexed  him,  and  that  in  certain  points  he  had 
not  thought  over-highly  of  Leibgeber ;  but  what  delighted 
him  most  was  his  good  fortune  at  possessing,  in  this  manner, 
a  double  Leibgeber,  and  the  knowledge  that  the  absent  one 
was  not  sorrowing  for  a  dead  friend. 

Let  no  one  be  surprised  at  the  Count's  maintaining  his 
good-humour  and  serenity  who  has  seen  a  bright  order- 
star  sparkle  on  an  aged,  and  extinguished,  breast.  \\  hen 
our  old  man  of  the  world  beheld  the  little  shuttle  of  this 
chain  of  friends  flying  to  and  fro  between  love  and  sacrifice 
on  either  side ;  when  he  held  in  his  hand  the  bright 
Raphael-tapestry  of  friendship  which  it  wove,  and  looked 
at  it  closely,  there  came  to  him  the  enjoyment  of  something 
new,  for  the  first  time  for  many  years.  So  that,  up  to  this 
point,  he  had  been  sitting  in  his  front  box  before  a  living 
comic-historical  drama,  of  which  he  himself  unravelled  the 
plot,  and  which  could  be  performed  all  over  again  in  his 
head  at  any  given  moment.  Moreover,  his  Inspector  had 
become  a  new  being  for  him,  full  of  fresh  entertainment, 
inasmuch  as  he  had  gone  off  the  stage,  changed  his  dress 
and  re-entered  as  the  pseudo  -  deceased  Siebenkses ;  and 
could,  in  the  future,  tell  him  as  much  as  he  pleased  of  the 
narrator.  In  this  way  both  the  friends  had  become  flat- 
teringly-precious to  him,  by  reason  of  the  dependent  interest 
in  him  with  which  they  had  interwoven  the  bond  which 
bound  their  souls. 

He  who  has  tasted  the  bliss  of  sticking  to  the  truth  can 
understand  the  new  delight  with  which  Siebenkses  could 
now  pour  himself  out  unrestrained  concerning  everything 
— himself  and  Henry  and  Nathalie — inasmuch  as  it  was 
not  till  now  that  he  felt  the  full  weight  of  the  burden  he 
had  got  relieved  of — that  of  working  the  light,  jest-falsehood 
of  a  moment  into  a  yearly  comedy,  in  365  acts.  With  what 
ease  he  explained  to  the  Count  that,  before  Nathalie's 
arrival  (whom  he  could  neither  undeceive,  nor  go  on 
deceiving),  he  must  fly,  and  that  straight  to  Kuhschnappel. 
As  the  Count  listened,  he  told  him  all  the  reasons  urging 
him  to  go ;  longing  to  see  his  tombstone,  and  unhallowed 
grave,  so  as  to  do  penitence  and  expiation  ;  longing  to  see 
Lenette,  unseen,  from  afar,  perhaps  her  child  near  ;  longing 
to  hear  from  eye-witnesses  a  minute  account  of  her  happy 


CHAP.  XXV.J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      553 

married  life  with  Stiefel  (for  Stiefel's  letter  had  wafted  the 
flower  ashes  of  bygone  days  into  his  eyes,  and  opened  the 
leaves  of  the  sleeping-flower  of  his  conjugal  love)  ;  longing 
to  wander,  romantically  (erect  now,  and  with  his  burden 
off),  about  the  scenes  of  his  old  oppressed  life ;  longing  to 
hear,  in  the  market-town,  something  of  his  Leibgeber,  who 
had  been  there  so  recently ;  longing  to  celebrate  August, 
the  month  of  his  death,  in  solitude — the  month  when  it 
had  been  with  him  as  with  the  vine,  whose  leaves  are  taken 
off  in  August,  that  the  sun  may  shine  more  warmly  on  the 
grapes. 

In  three  words,  for  why  give  many  reasons — since  when 
once  there  is  a  will,  there  can  never  be  any  lack  of  reasons 
— he  set  off. 


CHAPTEK  XXV.,  AND  LAST. 

THE  JOURNEY — THE  CHURCHYARD — THE  SPECTRE — THE  END  OF 
THE  TROUBLE,  AND  OF  THE  BOOK. 

I  see  more  clearly  every  day  that  I  and  the  other  999,999,999 
human  beings,*  are  nothing  but  so  much  skin-and-bone 
stuffed  (like  cooked  chickens),  full  of  a  mass  of  incon- 
gruities, contradictions,  inconsistencies,  irremediable  in- 
sufficiencies, and  resolves,  of  which  every  one  has  its 
antagonist  muscle  (muse,  antagonista).  We  do  not  contra- 
dict other  people  half  as  often  as  ourselves.  This  last 
Chapter  is  a  fresh  proof  of  it.  Up  to  this  point,  the  reader 
and  I  have  been  labouring  together  with  the  sole  object  of 
finihhing  this  Book,  and  now  that  we  see  the  shore,  and 
have  all  but  reached  it,  we  are  both  sorry  for  it.  I  shall, 
at  all  events,  be  doing  something — the  most  that  I  can — if 
I  conceal,  and  hide  away  (so  to  speak)  the  end  of  it,  as 
we  do  the  end  of  a  garden,  and  say  several  things  which 
will  help  to  lengthen  out  the  work  a  little. 

The  Inspector  sprang  out  into  the  open  country,  among 
the  corn-ears,  fortified  with  a  muscular,  full  breast — the 

•  There  are  one  thousand  millions  of  us  crawling  on  this  sphere. 


554  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTEE.         [BOOK  IV. 

Alp  of  silence  and  deception  no  longer  weighed  upon  him 
as  it  had  done.  The  avalanche  which  had  overwhelmed 
his  life  had  melted  to  a  third  of  its  original  size  under  the 
sun  of  his  present  fair  fortune.  His  electric  Leyden-jar 
coating  with  a  better  income,  and  even  the  fact  of  his 
having  a  great  deal  more  to  do,  had  charged  him  with  fire 
and  courage.  His  appointment  was  a  mountain  permeated 
by  so  many  veins  of  silver  and  gold,  that  even  in  this  first 
year  of  it  he  had  found  he  was  enabled  to  send  sundry 
anonymous  contributions  to  the  Prussian  Widows'  Fund,  so 
as  to  make  amends  for  a  good  half  of  his  fraud  upon  it, 
and  see  his  way  to  finally  clearing  it  off  altogether.  I 
should  not  lay  this  act  of  duty  before  the  public  gaze 
were  it  not  that  Kritter,  in  Gottingen — who  reckons  that 
this  fund  will  be  exhausted  in  the  year  1804 — or  even 
calculators  more  moderate  in  their  results,  who  think  its 
extreme  unction  will  be  received  in  1825,  might  take 
occasion,  from  these  Flower-pieces  of  mine,  to  lay  its 
death  wholly  at  the  Inspector's  door.  If  this  should  prove 
to  be  the  case,  I  should  very  deeply  regret  having  alluded 
to  the  subject,  in  the  remotest  manner,  in  my  Flower- 
pieces. 

He  did  not  take  his  way  by  Hof  or  Bayreuth,  or  any  of  the 
old  romantic  journey-roads.  He  dreaded  lest  the  hand  of 
Fate  (which  sows  behind  the  clouds)  might  bring  his  phan- 
tom-body before  Kathalie's  eyes.  And  yet  he  hoped  a  little 
that  this  said  hand  might  bring  him  just  the  least  bit  in 
contact  with  his  Leibgeber,  since  he  had  been  so  recently 
cruising  in  these  waters.  As  a  matter  of  course,  he  had 
embodied  himself,  en  route,  in  the  said  Leibgeber's  shirt, 
Jacket,  and  complete  exterior — the  same  which  he  had 
swopped  with  him  in  the  inn  at  Gefrees — and  this  costume 
was  a  mirror  which  continually  showed  him  the  absent 
one's  image.  A  "  Saufinder,"  like  Leibgeber's,  who  lifted 
his  head  up  to  him  in  a  forest-cottage,  sent  a  throb  of  joy 
through  his  heart ;  but  the  dog's  nose  knew  him  as  little 
as  did  the  dog's  master. 

And  yet,  the  nearer  he  drew  to  the  hills  and  woods, 
behind  whose  Chinese  churchyard-wall  stood  his  two 
empty  houses — his  grave  and  his  old  lodging — the  tighter 
did  Anxiety  draw  her  drag-net  about  his  heart.     It  was 


CHAP.  XXV.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIE  ES.    555 

not  the  fear  of  being  recognised ;  this,  by  reason  of  his 
resemblance  to  Leibgeber  (particularly  in  his  present 
dress),  was  an  impossibility  Kay,  people  would  sooner 
have  taken  him  for  his  own  wraith  and  Prophet  Samuel 
than  for  Siebenkass  still  in  the  body.  But,  besides  love 
and  anticipation,  there  was  a  something  which  made  him 
anxious— a  something  which  once  hemmed  in  and  op- 
pressed myself  when  1  came  back  among  the  Herculanean 
antiquities  of  my  own  childhood.  There  clasped  them- 
selves once  more  around  my  breast  the  iron  bands  and 
rings  which  had  crushed  it  in  my  childhood — a  time  when 
the  little  human  creature  is  still  tremblingly  helpless  and 
comfortless  in  presence  of  the  sorrows  and  sufferings  of 
life  and  death — when  we  stand  between  the  footstool  we 
have  cast  away,  the  handcuffs  and  ankle-chains  which  we 
have  burst  asunder,  and  the  great  sighing  and  singing 
tree  of  philosophy  which  is  to  guide  us  to  the  free,  open 
battle-arena  and  coronation  cit}r  of  this  earth.  In  every 
thicket  round  which  Firmian  had  wandered  in  his  poverty- 
stricken,  miserable  winter-autumn,  he  saw  the  cast-off 
skins  of  the  snakes  sticking,  which  in  former  days  had 
twined  themselves  about  his  feet.  Remembrance  (that 
after-winter  of  his  hard,  cruel  days)  fell  into  this  lovelier 
time  of  his  life,  and  the  combination  of  these  dissimilar 
feelings — the  clasp  of  the  old  fetters,  and  the  breeze  of 
freedom  of  the  present  —  generated  a  third  sensation, 
which  was  bitter-sweet,  as  well  as  anxious  and  uneasy. 

When  it  was  twilight,  he  walked  slowly  and  observantly 
through  the  streets,  which  were  strewn  with  scattered 
ears  of  corn.  Every  child  he  met  going  home  with  the 
supper-beer,  every  familiar  dog,  and  every  well-remem- 
bered cling  of  a  bell,  was  full  of  fossil-impressions  cf  joy- 
roses  and  passion-flowers,  the  originals  of  which  were  all 
fallen  to  dust.  As  he  passed  the  house  where  he  used  tc 
live,  he  heard  two  stocking-looms  clattering  and  rattling 
there. 

He  took  up  his  quarters  in  the  Lizard  Inn,  whioh  cannot 
have  been  the  grandest  hotel  in  the  town,  inasmuch  as  the 
Advocate  ate  his  beef  on  a  pewter-platter,  which  (to  judge 
by  the  marks  and  stigmata  of  a  facsimile  of  his  own  knife 
which  it  bore),  seemed  to  have  once  been  enrolled  as  a 


556  JEAN  TAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.  "BOOK  IV. 

soldier  of  his  own  pawned-plate-militia  regiment.  How- 
ever, the  inn  had  this  advantage — that  Firmian  could 
occupy  the  little  room,  number  seven,  on  the  third  story, 
and  there  establish  a  star-observatory,  or  mast-haad  crow's- 
nest,  which  commanded  Stiefel's  study  just  opposite,  at  a 
somewhat  lower  elevation.  But  his  Lenette  never  came 
to  the  window.  Ah !  if  he  had  seen  her,  he  would  have 
knelt  on  the  floor  for  sheer  sorrow.  Not  till  it  was  quite 
dark  did  he  see  his  old  friend  Stiefel,  who  came  and  held 
a  printed  sheet — probably  a  proof  of  the  '  German  Pro- 
gramme Advertiser ' — against  the  red  western  sky,  it>  being 
too  dark  to  see  it  inside.  He  was  surprised  to  see  the 
Schulrath  look  so  worn  and  bowed— and  he  had  a  crape  on 
his  arm  too.  "  Can  my  Lenette's  poor  baby  be  dead  ?"  he 
thought. 

When  it  was  quite  late  he  crept,  all  trembling,  to  that 
garden,  whence  we  do  not  all  return,  and  which  is  bounded 
by  the  hanging  Eden-Garden  of  the  second  life.  In  the 
churchyard  he  was  safe  from  the  approach  of  spectators, 
thanks  to  the  ghost-stories  by  means  of  which  Leibgeber 
had  forced  his  inheritance  out  of  his  guardian's  clutches. 
On  his  way  to  his  own  vacant,  subterranean  bed,  he  passed 
by  the  grave  on  which  (while  it  was  black,  it  was  grass- 
grown  now)  he  had  placed  the  flower-garland  which  he 
had  meant  to  give  Lenette  a  pleasant  surprise  with,  though 
it  did  only  cause  her  an  unexpected  sorrow.  At  last  he 
came  to  the  bed-curtains  of  that  grave-siesta,  his  own 
tombstone,  and  he  read  the  inscription  with  a  cold 
shudder.  "  Suppose  this  stone  trap-door  were  lj'ing  upon 
your  face,"  he  said  to  himself,  "building  you  in  from  the 
wide  heavens ! " — and  he  thought  what  clouds,  what  cold- 
ness, and  night,  reign  around  the  two  poles  of  life,  as 
about  the  poles  of  our  earth — about  the  beginning  and  the 
end  of  man.  He  considered  it  a  very  wicked  thing  to 
have  aped  the  last  hour — the  crape- streamer  of  a  long, 
dark  cloud  was  over  the  moon,  his  heart  was  tender  and 
anxious ;  when  suddenly  a  something  with  colour  in  it, 
near  his  grave,  seized  his  attention,  and  caused  a  revulsion 
in  his  soul. 

For  there,  close  beside  it,  was  a  fresh  grave,  quite  recently 
covered  in,  surrounded  by  a  painted  wooden-frame,  not 


CHAP.  XXV.]      FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     557 

unlike  a  bedstead.  And  upon  these  painted  boards  Firniian 
(as  long  as  his  streaming  eyes  allowed  him)  read  what 
follows : — 

•'  Here  reposes  in  God,  Wendeline  Lenette  Stiefel,  born 
Engelkraut  of  Augspurg.  Her  first  husband  was  the 
lamented  Poor's  Advocate,  F.  St.  Siebenkajs.  On  the 
20th  of  October,  1786,  she  entered,  for  the  second  time, 
into  holy  matrimony  with  the  Sclrulrath  Stiefel,  of  this 
place,  and  alter  three-quarters  of  a  year  of  a  peaceful 
union  with  him,  she  fell  asleep  in  childbed,  on  the  22nd  of 
Jul}',  1787,  and  lies  here,  with  her  little  still-born  daughter, 
awaiting  a  joyful  resurrection." 

"  Oh  !  poor  creature,  poor  creature  ! "  More  he  could 
not  think.  Now — now  that  her  day  of  life  was  better  and 
warmer,  the  earth  must  swallow  her,  and  she  take  nothing 
with  her  but  a  hand  roughened  by  labour,  a  face  furrowed 
with  the  death-bed  sickness,  and  a  contented,  but  empty 
heart,  which,  hemmed  down  among  the  hollow-ways  and 
mine-shafts  of  this  world,  had  seen  scarcely  any  Btars  or 
flowery  meadows.  Her  troubles  had  gradually  clouded 
over  her  life  so  thickly  and  darkly,  that  no  picturing 
fancy  could  brighten  and  purify  them  by  the  colour-play 
of  poesy,  just  as  no  rainbow  is  possible  when  the  whole 
sky  is  black  with  rain.  "Why  did  I  vex  you  so  often, 
and  pain  y<u,  even  by  my  death,  and  be  so  unforgiving  to 
all  your  little  innocent  crotchets?"  he  said,  weeping  bit- 
terly. An  earth-worm  came  twining  out  of  the  grave, 
and  he  threw  it  forcibly  away,  as  though  it  had  come 
straight  from  the  beloved  cold  heart ;  although  that  which 
satiates  this  creature  is  what  satiates  us  also  at  last — 
Earth.  He  thought  of  the  child  (mouldering  to  dust) 
which  laid  its  thin,  withered  arms  about  his  soul,  as  if  it 
had  been  his  own,  and  to  which  Death  had  given  as  much 
as  a  God  gave  to  Endymion — sleep,  eternal  youth,  and 
immortality.  At  length  he  tottered  away  from  this  place 
of  mourning  with  his  heart  wearied,  not  lightened,  by 
his  tears. 

W  hen  he  went  back  to  the  inn,  a  woman  with  a  harp 
was  singing  in  the  public  room  (a  boy  accompanying  her 
on  a  flute)  a  song,  of  which  the  ritournelle  was,  "  dead  is 
dead,  and  gone  is  gone."     It  was  the  same  woman  who 


553  JEAN  PAUL  PRTEDRICH  RTCCTTER.        [HOOK  IV. 

had  been  playing  and  singing  on  the  New  Year's  eve 
when  his  Lenette,  now  departed  and  at  peace,  had  buried 
her  face  in  the  handkerchief,  weeping  and  desolate.  Oh ! 
the  burning  arrows  of  these  music-tones  went  hissing 
through  his  heart— the  poor  soul  had  no  shield.  "I  tor- 
tured her  terribly  in  these  days  "  (he  went  on  constantly 
saying).  "  How  she  sighed !  How  she  kept  silence  !  Ah ! 
if  you  could  but  see  me  now  from  on  high,  now  that  you 
are  happier !  If  you  could  but  behold  this  bleeding  soul  of 
mine— not  that  you  should  forgive  me,  no,  only  that  I 
might  have  the  consolation  of  suffering  something  for  your 
sake!     Oh  !  how  different  would  I  be  to  you  note !" 

And  this  is  what  we  all  say  when  we  bur)'  some  one 
whom  we  have  tortured ;  but  on  that  very  same  evening  of 
mourning  we  go  and  dart  the  javelin  deep  into  some  other 
breast  which  is  still  warm.  Oh !  weaklings  that  we  are, 
strong  only  in  resolves  !  If  that  form,  now  resolved  into 
its  elements,  whose  mouldering  wounds  (which  we  our- 
selves inflicted)  we  expiate  with  tears  of  penitence  and 
warm  resolves  to  do  better,  were  to  come  back  to  us  to-day, 
new-created,  and  in  the  brightest  bioom  of  youth,  it  would 
be  but  for  the  first  week  that  we  should  clasp  the  new- 
found soul,  more  fondly  loved  than  ever,  to  our  hearts ; 
and  then  we  should  apply  the  old  martyrdom  instruments 
to  it  again,  just  as  of  old.  That  we  should  do  this,  even 
to  our  beloved  dead,  I  deduce  from  the  fact  (to  say  nothing 
of  our  rude  unkindness  to  the  living)  that,  in  our  dreams, 
when  those  whom  we  have  lost  revisit  us  again,  we  act 
over  again  everything  which  we  now  repent.  I  do  not 
say  this  to  deprive  any  mourner  of  the  consolation  of 
repentance,  or  of  the  thought,  that  his  love  for  the  lost  one 
is  purer  and  fonder  than  before,  but  to  lessen  the  pride 
which  may  be  grounded  upon  the  repentance  and  the  class 
of  feelings. 

Later  in  the  night,  when  Firmian  saw  the  fice  (gnawed 
and  sunken  with  sorrow)  of  his  old  friend  (who  had  now 
so  little  left  to  him),  looking  up  to  heaven,  as  if  seeking 
there  among  the  stars  his  friend  of  whom  he  was  be- 
reaved, sorrow  pressed  the  last  tear  from  Ids  anguished 
heart,  and  in  the  madness  of  grief  he  cast  the  blame  upon 
himself  of  his  friend's  sorrow ;  juat  as  if  the  latter  had  not 


CHAP.  XXV.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      559 

a  great  deal  to  thank  him  for  in  the  first  instance,  before 
setting  about  pardoning  him. 

He  awoke  in  all  the  exhaustion  of  sorrow,  i.e.  in  that 
bled-away  condition  of  the  feelings  which  at  last  resolves 
itself  into  a  sweet  melting-away  and  longing  for  death. 
For  he  had  lost  everything — even  what  was  not  buried. 
He  dared  not  go  to  the  Schulrath  for  fear  of  being  recog- 
nised, or,  at  the  very  lowest,  staking  upon  a  most  dan- 
gerous chance  the  peace  of  mind  of  that  most  innocent 
creature,  who  would  never  be  able  to  reconcile  it  to  either 
his  conscience  or  his  sense  of  honour,  that  he  had  married 
a  woman  whose  husband  was  still  alive. 

But  he  could  go  and  see  Meerbitzer,  the  hairdresser,  with 
less  danger  of  discovering  himself,  and  could  carry  away 
from  him  a  great  dowry  of  news.  Moreover,  the  sickle  of 
Death  had  cut  through  all  his  other  chains  and  knots, 
together  with  his  bonds  of  love.  He  would  be  doing  no 
injury  to  any  one  but  himself  if  he  took  off  his  mask  of 
death,  and  showed  himself  unmouldered  to  other  people, 
nay,  even  to  the  sorrowing  Nathalie ;  particularly  as  on 
very  beautiful  evenings,  and  whenever  he  did  any  good 
action,  his  conscience  claimed  the  arrear-interest  of  the 
unpaid  debt  of  truth,  refusing  to  grant  any  further  letters 
of  respite.  Also  his  soul  swore,  as  a  God  swears  to  his 
own  self,  that  he  would  only  stay  there  this  one  day,  and 
then  never  come  back. 

The  Friseur  knew  in  a  moment,  from  the  lameness,  that 
he  could  be  nobody  but  the  Vaduz  Inspector,  Leibgeber. 
Like  posterity,  he  decked  his  own  lodger,  Sichsnkses, 
with  the  richest  of  rosemary-garlands,  and  declared  that 
these  ragamuffins  of  stocking- weavers  whom  he  had  got 
upstairs  now  were  not  to  be  spoken  of  in  the  same  day 
with  poor  lamented  Mr.  Siebenkaes.  The  whole  house 
creaked  when  they  rattled  and  stamped  in  their  upstairs- 
room.  He  then  called  attention  to  the  circumstance  that 
the  departed  had  taken  his  wife  away  to  him  within  the 
space  of  a  year  and  day ;  and  dwelt  on  the  fact  that  she 
had  never  forgotten  the  Meerbitzer's  house,  but  had  often 
looked  in  of  an  evening  in  her  widow's  weeds  (which  she 
had  been  buried  in  according  to  her  desire),  and  spoken 
with  them  about  all  her  various  vicissitudes,  and  about 


560  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDBICH  RICBTER.       [BOOK  IT. 

her  new  life.  "  Thoy  lived  together  just  like  two  children," 
the  hairdresser  said,  "  Stiefel  and  she."  This  conversa- 
tion, the  house,  and  his  old  rooms,  so  noisy  now,  were  all 
so  many  waste  places  of  his  ruined  Jerusalem.  A  stocking- 
loom  now  stood  where  his  writing- table  used  to  be,  and  so 
on.  All  his  questions  about  the  past  were  so  many  con- 
flagration-relics, collected  for  the  fresh  building  of  his 
burnt-down  pleasure  -  chateaux  from  out  their  Phoenix 
ashes.  Hope  is  the  morning  Aurora  of  joy,  and  memory  its 
Ted  evening  sky ;  but  the  latter  is  terribly  apt  to  drop 
down  in  grey  dew  or  rain,  with  no  colour  left  in  it.  The 
blue  day,  which  the  red  sky  gives  promise  of,  does,  indeed, 
break  in  brightness;  but  it  is  in  another  world,  where 
there  is  another  sun.  Meerbitzer  unknowingly  cleft,  deep 
and  wide,  the  split  into  which  he  grafted  the  sundered, 
flower-twigs  of  the  bygone  days  on  to  Firmian's  heart ; 
and  when,  finally,  his  wife  related  how,  when  Lenette  had 
taken  the  Communion  of  the  Sick,  she  said  to  the  evening 
preacher,  "  I  shall  go  to  my  Firmian  when  I  am  dead,  shall 
1  not?"  Firmian  averted  his  breast  from  this  blind  dagger- 
thrust,  and  hurried  out  into  the  open  air,  that  he  might 
not  encounter  any  one  to  whom  he  should  be  constrained 
to  lie. 

Yet  he  could  not  but  long  for  some  human  creature, 
even  were  one  to  be  found  nowhere  else  but  beneath  his 
lowliest  roof  of  all — in  the  churchyard.  The  electrically- 
charged  atmosphere  of  the  evening  brooded  and  hatched 
melancholy  longings  of  every  kind ;  the  sky  was  over- 
spread with  scattered  unripe  fragments  of  a  thunder-cloud, 
and  in  the  west  horizon  a  muttering  storm  had  begun, 
scattering  its  lighted  pitch-rings  and  full-charged  clouds 
down  upon  unknown  lands.  He  went  home;  <ut  as  he 
passed  by  the  tall  railings  of  Blaise's  garden,  he  fancied 
he  saw  a  figure  like  Nathalie,  dressed  in  black,  glide  into 
the  arbour.  And  then,  for  the  first  time,  he  turned  his 
mind  to  something  which  Meerbitzer  had  said  about  a 
lady  in  mourning,  who  had  come  a  few  days  before,  and 
wished  to  be  shown  all  over  the  house,  lingering  par- 
ticularly in  Siebenkses's  old  rooms,  and  making  a  great 
many  inquiries.  That  she  should  have  come  out  of  her 
road  on  her  way  to  Vaduz  was  by  no  means  unlikely; 


CHAP.  XXV.J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      561 

indeed,  it  was  very  consistent  with  her  romantic  turn  of 
mind,  particularly  as  she  had  never  seen  Siebenkees's  former 
home,  and  the  Inspector  had  not  answered  her  letter — as 
Rosa  was  married,  and  Blaise  reconciled  to  her  (*inco 
he  had  seen  the  ghost) — and  the  month  of  Firmian's  death 
would  naturally  suggest  to  her  a  visit  to  his  last  resting- 
place. 

So  that  her  friend  could  not  but  dwell  all  this  evening 
with  feelings  of  painful  fondness  upon  her  memory — the 
one  unclouded  star  which  beamed  on  him  from  the  ove r- 
cast  heaven  of  his  bygone  days.  It  was  deep  in  the 
gloaming  now,  a  cooler  air  was  stirring.  A  storm  had 
spent  its  force  in  other  regions,  and  there  remained  only 
some  broken,  lurid  clouds,  piled  in  the  sky  like  glow- 
ing, half-burned  firebrands.  He  betook  himself,  for  a  last 
time,  to  the  place  where  death  had  planted  the  red  carna- 
tion, with  its  little  buds  snapped  so  untimely  from  its  stem. 
But  within  his  soul,  as  without  him,  the  air  breathed  less 
sultrily  now,  and  fresher;  tears  had  blunted  the  sharp 
edge  of  the  first  bitterness  of  his  sorrow.  He  felt,  with 
far  more  of  gentleness,  that  the  earth  is  only  our  car- 
penter's yard,  not  our  building-ground.  In  the  East, 
where  the  stars  were  rising,  a  long  blue  streak  shone 
above  the  sunken  thunder-clouds.  The  moon  (light-magnet 
of  the  sky)  was  lying,  like  a  fount  of  light,  upon  the  foil 
of  a  cleft  cloud,  and  the  wide  vaporous  veil  was  melting 
motionlessly  away. 

When  Firmian,  approaching  the  beloved  grave,  raised 
up  his  downcast  head,  he  saw  a  dark  form  resting  there. 
He  stopped  short,  and  gazed  more  piercingly.  The  form 
was  a  woman's.  Her  face,  frozen  into  the  ice  of  death, 
was  fixed  on  him.  As  he  drew  nearer,  he  saw  his  dearest 
Nathalie  leaning  overpowered  against  the  painted  railing 
of  the  grave.  The  autumnal  breath  of  death  had  tinted 
her  lips  and  cheeks  with  white;  her  wide  eyes  were  sight- 
less, and  nothing  but  the  tear-drops  which  hung  on  her 
lashes  gave  proof  that  she  was  in  life,  and  had  taken  him 
for  the  apparition  of  which  she  had  heard  so  much.  In  the 
excess  of  her  romantic  sorrow  at  his  grave  she  had  longed, 
in  the  strength  and  loneliness  of  her  heart,  that  his  spirit 
might  appear  to  her ;  and  when  she  saw  him  approaching, 

II  2  0 


562  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  IV. 

she  thought  Heaven  had  granted  her  prayer.  And  then 
the  iron  hand  of  chill  terror  turned  this  red  rose  to  a 
white  one.  But  ah  her  friend  was  the  more  wretched 
of  the  two.  His  tender,  unshielded  heart  was  crushed 
motionless  between  the  impact  of  two  worlds  which  rushed 
crashing  together.  In  tones  of  utter  distress  he  cried  out, 
"  Nathalie  !  Nathalie  !"  Her  lips  quivered  spasmodically, 
and  a  breath  of  life  gave  back  a  shade  of  brightness  to 
her  glance ;  but  the  spirit  was  still  there  before  her,  and 
she  closed  her  eyes  again,  and  said,  with  a  shudder,  "  Oh 
God!"  It  was  in  vain  that  his  voice  called  her  back  to 
life  ;  when  she  looked  up  at  the  apparition  her  heart  failed 
her  again,  and  she  could  only  cry  "  Oh  God ! "  Firmian 
seizing  her  hand,  cried,  "  Angel  of  heaven,  I  am  not  dead  ! 
only  look  at  me !  Nathalie,  don't  you  know  me  ?  Oh  ! 
merciful  God,  don't  punish  me  so  terribly,  don't  let  me  be 
the  cause  of  her  death!"  At  length  she  slowly  lifted  her 
heavy  eyelids,  and  saw  her  old  friend  trembling  beside 
her,  with  tears  of  anxiety  and  terror.  His  tears  were 
happier,  but  more  abundant,  and  he  smiled  sorrowfully 
upon  her  as  she  still  kept  her  eyes  open,  and  said,  "  Na- 
thalie, I  am  still  upon  this  earth,  in  very  truth,  and  suffer 
as  you  do  yourself;  don't  you  see  how  I  tremble  on  your 
account?  Take  my  warm,  living  hand.  Are  you  still 
afraid  ?"  "  No,"  she  answered  faintly ;  but  she  still  looked 
at  him  in  an  awe-stricken  fashion,  as  at  a  super- earthly 
being,  and  had  not  courage  to  ask  for  an  explanation  of 
the  riddle.  He  helped  her  to  rise  (gently  weeping),  and 
said,  "  But,  dear  innocent  one,  come  away  from  this  place 
of  sorrow,  where  so  many  tears  have  been  shed  already. 
For  your  heart  mine  has  no  secrets  now.  Ah !  I  can  tell 
you  everything,  and  1  will  tell  you  everything."  He  led 
her  out,  above  the  quiet  dead,  through  the  back  gate  of 
the  churchyard.  She  leaned  on  his  arm  heavily  and 
languidly,  shuddering  again  often  as  they  climbed  the 
little  height,  and  only  the  tears  which  joy,  relief  from 
terror,  grief,  and  exhaustion  combined,  had  brought  to  her 
eyes,  fell  like  warm  balsam  upon  her  chilled  and  wounded 
heart. 

When  they  reached  the  top  of  the  height  she  sat  down 
to  rest,  and  the  black  night-woods,  railed  round  by  white 


CHAP.  XXV.]     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.     563 

harvests,  and  cut  across  by  the  moon's  silent  sea  of  light, 
lay  before  them.  Nature  had  drawn  out  the  "  pianissimo 
lute  "  organ-stop  of  midnight,  and  by  Nathalie's  side  stood 
one  of  her  beloved  dead,  new-risen  from  the  grave.  He 
told  her  now  all  about  Leibgeber's  entreaties;  the  short 
Btory  of  his  mock-death ;  his  residence  with  the  Co7:nt ; 
all  the  longings  and  tears  of  his  long  solitude ;  his  firm 
determination  rather  to  fly  from  her  than  to  deceive  or 
•wound  her  beloved  heart,  either  by  speech  or  in  writing  ; 
and  the  disclosures  he  had  made  to  her  friend's  father. 
She  sobbed  at  the  account  of  his  last  moments  and  parting 
from  Lenette,  as  if  it  had  all  been  real.  She  thought  on 
many  things  as  she  merely  said,  "Ah!  it  was  only  for 
other  people's  happiness  that  you  sacrificed  yourself.  But 
you  will  be  able  to  have  done  with  all  this  deception  now, 
and  to  make  amends  for  it,  will  you  not?"  "I  shall," 
he  said,  "to  the  very  utmost  of  nvy  power;  and  my  heart 
and  my  conscience  shall  be  free  and  clear  once  more. 
Have  I  not  even  kept  the  vow  I  made  to  you — that  I 
should  not  see  you  again  till  after  my  death?"  She  smiled 
gently. 

They  both  sunk  into  a  dreamy  and  blissful  silence.  At 
last,  seeing  her  lay  a  mourning-cloak  butterfly  *  (disabled 
by  the  night-dew)  down  upon  her  lap,  the  fact  that  she 
•was  in  mourning  herself  struck  him  for  the  first  time,  and 
he  hastily  asked,  "  You  are  not  in  mourning  for  any  one, 
are  you  ?"  Alas  !  she  had  put  it  on  for  him.  "  Not  now" 
Nathalie  answered,  and,  looking  at  the  butterfly,  she 
paid  pityingly,  "  a  few  drops  and  a  little  chilliness  have 
benumbed  the  poor  thing."  Her  friend  reflected  how 
easily  Fate  might  have  punished  his  temerity  by  benumbing 
the  even  more  beautiful,  black-attired  creature  by  his  side, 
who  had,  moreover,  had  her  full  share  already  of  shivering 
in  the  night-frosts  of  life  and  the  night-dew  of  tears.  But 
he  could  not  answer  her  for  love  and  pain. 

They  kept  silence  now,  reading  each  other's  thoughts, 
lost,  half  in  their  hearts,  half  in  the  grandeur  of  nighr. 
The  wide  sether  had  absorbed  all  the  clouds  (only  those  of 
the  sky,  alas !) ;  Luna  bent  down,  with  her  saintly  halo, 
like  a  glorified  Madonna,  from  the  tranquil  blue,  to  greet 
*  Vanessa  Antiopa  gets  this  name  in  Germany. — Trans. 


564  JEAN  PAUL  FRIEDRICH  RICHTER.         [BOOK  IV. 

her  pale  sister  of  the  earth.  The  voice  of  the  stream  was 
heard,  as  it  flowed  on  its  course  unseen,  hidden  by  a  light 
mist — like  the  stream  of  time,  hidden  from  sight  by  the 
haze  of  countries  and  nations.  Behind  them  the  night- 
breeze  had  laid  itself  to  rest  upon  a  swelling,  rushing  bed 
of  corn,  bestreaked  with  blue  corn-flowers ;  and  before 
them  lay  the  reaped  harvest  of  the  world  to  come — 
precious  stones  (as  it  were)  in  their  coffin-settings,  cold  and 
heavy  in  death.*  The  pious  and  humble  ones  (forming  an 
antithesis  to  the  sunflower  and  the  mote  in  the  sunbeam) 
turned  as  moon-flowers  to  the  moon,  and  played  as  moon- 
beam-motes in  her  cool  rays,  feeling  that  there  is  nothing 
under  the  starry  sky  so  great  as  hope. 

Nathalie  leant  on  Firmian's  hand,  that  he  might  help 
her  to  rise,  and  said,  "  I  feel  quite  able  to  go  home  now." 
He  kept  hold  of  her  hand,  but  did  not  rise  nor  speak.  He 
was  gazing  at  the  dry,  prickly  stalk  of  the  old  rose-twig 
which  she  had  given  him.  Unwittingly,  and  without 
feeling  what  he  was  doing,  he  pressed  the  thorns  into  his 
fingers.  His  laden  bosom  heaved  with  deeper,  warmer 
sighs;  burning  tears  stood  in  his  eyes,  and  the  moon's 
light  trembled  before  them  like  a  shower  of  falling  light. 
A  whole  universe  lay  upon  his  soul  and  upon  his  tongue, 
and  kept  both  motionless.    , 

"  Firmian,"  said  Nathalie,  "what  would  you  have?" 
He  bent  his  fixed  eyes  widely  opened  upon  her  gentle 
form,  and  pointed  down  to  his  grave  in  the  valley.  "  My 
house  down  there,"  he  answered,  "  which  has  been  empty 
no  long.  For  the  bed  on  which  we  dream  this  dream  of 
life  is  terribly  hard." 

lie  lost  command  of  himself,  for  she  wept  so  terribly — 
and  her  face,  all  heavenly  kindness,  was  so  near — and  he 
burst  forth,  with  the  bitterest  and  strongest  emotion,  "  Are 
not  all  my  loved  ones  gone,  and  are  not  you  going  too? 
Ah!  why  has  torturing  destiny  laid  the  waxen  image  of 
an  angel  upon  all  our  breasts.f  and  lowered  us  into  the 
chill  life  ?  Oh !  the  soft  image  melts  away,  and  there 
is  no  angel.     Yes,  you  have  appeared  to  me,  it  is  true, 

•  The  purer  precious  stones  are  colder  and  heavier  than  the  less 
perfect 

t  Waxen  angels  used  to  be  put  into  the  grave  with  the  de&d. 


CHAP.  XXV.J     FLOWER,  FRUIT,  AND  THORN  PIECES.      565 

but  you  disappear,  and  time  will  crush  to  atoms  your 
image  ou  my  heart,  ay,  and  my  heart  with  it.  For  when 
I  have  lost  you,  I  shall  be  alone  in  earnest.  But,  fare  you 
well !  I  shall  actually  die  one  day,  and  then  I  shall  appear 
to  you ;  but  not  as  I  have  done  to-night.  Ah !  nowhere 
but  in  eternity,  and  then  I  shall  say  to  you, '  Oh !  Nathalie, 
I  loved  you  there  below  with  infinite,  unending  grief  and 
sorrow ;  make  amends  to  me  here  I ' "  She  strove  to  answer, 
but  her  voice  broke  and  failed  her.  She  raised  her  great 
eyes  to  the  starry  sky,  but  they  were  full  of  tears.  She 
tried  to  rise,  but  her  friend  held  her,  with  his  hand 
all  thorns  and  blood,  and  said,  "  Can  you  leave  me, 
Nathalie?" 

She  arose  here,  sublime  and  grand,  bent  her  head  back, 
looking  upward  to  the  sky,  rapidly  swept  away  the  tears 
from  her  eyes  ;  her  soaring  soul  found  words,  and,  clasping 
her  hands  in  prayer,  she  said,  "  Oh !  Thou  who  art  all 
love,  aud  lovest  All,  he  has  been  lost  to  me,  I  have  found 
him  again;  eternity  is  here  on  earth;  make  Thou  him 
happy  through  me!"  And  her  head  sank  down  on  his, 
tenderly  and  languidly,  and  she  said, 

"  We  are  going  to  be  always  together." 

"  Oh  God  ! "  stammered  Firmian  ;  "  Oh  angel !  you 
are  going  to  be  always  with  me — in  this  world  and  the 
next!" 

'•For  ever,  Firmian!"  said  Nathalie,  softly.  And  our 
friend's  troubles  were  over  and  past. 


XH2  EJSD. 


LONDON  : 

PKINTED    BY    WILLIAM    CLOWES    AND   SONS,    LIMITED, 

STAMFORD   STREET   AND  CUAftlKG   CROSS. 


AN 


ALPHABETICAL   LIST 

OF  BOOKS  CONTAINED   IN 

BOHN'S    LIBRARIES. 


Detailed  Catalogue^  arranged  according  to  the  various 
Libraries,  will  be  sent  on  application. 


ADDISON'S  Works.  With  the 
Notes  of  Bishop  Hurd,  Portrait, 
and  8  Plates  of  Medals  and  Coins. 
Edited  by  H.  G.  Bohn.  6  vols. 
3^.  6d.  each. 

JESCHYLTJS,   The  Dramas  of. 

Translated  into  English  Verse  by 
Anna  Swanwick.  4th  Edition, 
revised.     51. 

The  Tragedies  of.     Newly 

translated  from  a  revised  text  by 
Walter  Headlam,  Litt.D.,  and 
C.  E.  S.  Headlam,  M.A.     5* 

The  Tragedies  of.  Trans- 
lated into  Prose  by  T.  A.  Buckley, 
B.A.     3J.  6d. 

ALLEN'S  (Joseph,  R.  N.)  Battles 
of  the  British  Navy.  Revised 
Edition,  with  57  Steel  Engravings. 
2  vols.     5-f.  each. 

AMMIANTJS  MARCELLINUS. 
History  of  Roms  during  the 
Reigns  of  Constantius,  Julian, 
Tovianus,  Valentinian  and  Valens. 
Translated  by  Prof.  C.  D.  Yonge, 
M.A.     7*.  6d. 


ANDERSEN'S  Danish  Legends 
and  Fairy  Tales.  Translated 
by  Caroline  Peachey.  With  120 
Wood  Engravings.     5*. 

ANTONINUS  (M.  Aurelius),  The 
Thoughts  of.  Trans,  literally, 
with  Notes  and  Introduction  by 
George  Long,  M.A.     31.  6d. 

APOLLONITJS  RHODITJS. 
'The  Argonautioa.'  Translated 
by  E.  P.  Coleridge,  B.A    5s. 

APPIAN'S  Roman  History. 
Translated  by  Horace  White, 
M.A.,  LL.D.  With  Maps  and 
Illustrations.     2  vols.    6s.  each. 

APTJLEITJS,  The  Works  of 
Comprising  the  Golden  Ass,  God 
of  Socrates,  Florida,  and  Dis- 
course of  Magic.     5*. 

ARIOSTO'S  Orlando  Furioso. 
Translated  into  English  Verse  by 
W.  S.  Rose.  With  Portrait,  and  24 
Steel  Engravings.  2  vols.  5^.  each. 

ARISTOPHANES'  Comedies. 
Translated  by  W.  J.  Hickie.  2 
vols.    5j.  each. 


An  Alphabetical  List  of  Books 


ARISTOTLE'S  Nioomachean 
Ethics.  Translated,  with  Intro- 
duction and  Notes,  by  the  Vener- 
able Archdeacon  Browne.     5*. 

Politics      and   Economics. 

Translated  by  E.  Walford,  M.A., 
with  Introduction  by  Dr.  Gillies. 

5»« 

Metaphysics.  Translated  by 

the    Rev.   John   H.    M'Mahon, 
M.A.    5*- 

History  of  Animals.    Trans. 

by  Richard  Cresswell,  M.A.    55. 

Organon;  or,  Logical  Trea- 
tises, and  the  Introduction  of 
Porphyry.  Translated  by  the 
Rev.  O.  F.  Owen,  M.A.  2  vols. 
35.  bd.  each. 

Rhetoric    and    Poetios. 

Trans,  by  T.  Buckley,  B.A.     $s. 

ARRIAN'S  Anabasis  of  Alex- 
ander, together  with  the  Indica. 
Translated  by  E.  J.  Chinnock, 
M.A.,  LL.D.  With  Maps  and 
Plans.     $s. 

ATHENiEUS.  The  Deipnoeo- 
phists;  or,  the  Banquet  of  the 
Learned.  Trans,  by  Prof.  C.  D. 
Yonge,  M.A.    3  vols.     5-r.  each. 

BACON'S  Moral  and  Historical 
Works,  including  the  Essays, 
Apophthegms,  Wisdom  of  the 
Ancients,  New  Atlantis,  Henry 
VII.,  Henry  VIII.,  Elizabeth, 
Henry  Prince  of  Wales,  History 
of  Great  Britain,  Julius  Caesar, 
and  Augustus  Caesar.  Edited  by 
J.  Devey,  MA.     3s.  6d. 

Novum  Organum  and  Ad- 
vancement of  Learning.  Edited 
by  J.  Devey,  M.A.     $s. 

BASS'S  Lexicon  to  the  Greek 
Testament.    2s, 


BAX'S  Manual  of  the  History 
of  Philosophy,  for  the  use  of 
Students.   By  E.  Beifcrt  Eax.    5*. 

BEAUMONT  and  FLETCHER, 
their  finest  Scenes,  Lyrics,  and 
other  Beauties,  selected  from  the 
whole  of  their  works,  and  edited 
by  Leigh  Hunt.     3*,  6d, 

BECHSTEIN'S  Cage  and 
Chamber  Birds,  their  Natural 
History,  Habits,  Food,  Diseases, 
and  Modes  of  Capture.  Translated, 
with  considerable  additions  on 
Structure,  Migration,  and  Eco- 
nomy, by  H.  G.  Adams.  Together 
with  Sweet  British  Warblers. 
With  43  coloured  Plates  and 
Woodcut  Illustrations.     $s. 

BEDE'S  (Venerable)  Ecclesias- 
tical History  of  England.    To- 
gether with    the  Anglo-Saxon 
Chronicle.      Edited  by  I.  A.  ■ 
Giles,  D.C.L.     With  Map. "  5*. 

BELL  (Sir  Charlss).  The  Ana- 
tomy and  Philosophy  of  Ex- 
pression, as  connected  wttis 
the  Fine  Arts.  By  Sir  Charles 
Bell,  K.H.  7th  edition,  revised. 
$»• 

BERKELEY  (George),  Bishop 
of  Cloyne,  The  Works  of. 
Edited  by  George  Sampson.  With 
Biographical  Introduction  by  the 
Right  Hon.  A.  J.  Balfour,  M.P. 
3  vols.    $s.  each. 

BION.    See  Theocritus. 

B  JOHNSON'S  Arne  and  the 
Fisher  Lassie.  Translated  by 
W.  H.  Low,  M.A.     3*.  6d. 

BLAIR'S  Chronological  Tables 
Revised  and  Enlarged.  Compre- 
hending the  Chronology  and  His- 
tory of  the  World,from  the  Earliest 
Times  to  the  Russian  Treaty  of 
Peace,  April  1856.  By  J.  Wil- 
loughby  Rosse.    Double  vol.  iaf. 


Contained  in  Bonn's  Libraries. 


BLEEK,  Introduction  to  the 
Old  Testament.  By  P'riedrich 
Bleek.  Edited  by  Johann  Bleek 
and  Adolf  Kamphausen.  Trans- 
lated by  G.  H.  Venables,  under 
the  supervision  of  the  Rev.  Canon 
Venables.     2  vols.     5*.  each. 

BOETHIUS'S  Consolation  of 
Philosophy.  KingAIfred'sAnglo- 
Saxon  Version  of.  With  a  literal 
English  Translation  on  opposite 
pages,  Notes,  Introduction,  and 
Glossary,  by  Rev.  S.  Fox,  M.A. 
5*. 

BOHN'S  Dictionary  of  Poetical 
Quotations.    4th  edition.     6s. 

BOHN'S  Handbooks  of  Games. 
New  edition.  In  2  vols.,  with 
numerous  Illustrations  3*.  6d. 
each. 

Vol.  I.— Table  Games  :— Bil- 
liards, Chess,  Draughts,  Back- 
gammon, Dominoes,  Solitaire, 
Reversi,  Go-Bang,  Rouge  et  Noir, 
Roulette,  E.O.,  Hazard,  Faro. 

Vol.  II —  Card  Games  :  — 
Whist,  Solo  Whist,  Poker,  Piquet, 
Ecarte,  Euchre,  Bezique,  Crib- 
bage,  Loo,  Vingt-et-un,  Napoleon, 
Newmarket,  Pope  Joan,  Specula- 
tion, &c,  &c. 

BOND'S  A  Handy  Book  of  Rules 
and  Tables  for  verifying  Dates 
with  the  Christian  Era,  &c.  Giving 
an  account  of  the  Chief  Eras  and 
Systems  used  by  various  Nations  ; 
with  the  easy  Methods  for  deter- 
mining the  Corresponding  Dates. 
By  J.  J.  Bond.     5*. 

BONOMI'S  Nineveh  and  its 
Palaces.  7  Plates  and  294  Wood- 
cut Illustrations.     5*. 

BOSWELL'S  Life  of  Johnson, 
with  the  Tour  in  the  Hebrides 
and  Johnsoniana.  Edited  by 
the  Rev.  A.  Napier,  M.A.  With 
Frontispiece  to  each  vol.  6  vols. 
3-r.  6d.  each. 


BRAND'S  Popular  Antiquities 
of  England,  Scotland,  and  Ire- 
land. Arranged,  revised,  and 
greatly  enlarged,  by  Sir  Henry 
Ellis,  K.H.,  F.R.S.,  &c,  &c.  3 
vols.     $s.  each. 

BREMER'S  (Frederlka)  Work  3. 
Translated  by  Mary  Howitt.  4 
vols.     3J.  6d.  each. 

BRIDGWATER   TREATISES. 

Bell  (Sir  Charles)  on  the  Hand. 

With  numerous  Woodcuts.     5.?. 

Kirby  en  the  History,  Habits, 
and  Instincts  of  Animals. 
Edited  by  T.  Rymer  Jones. 
With  upwards  of  100  Woodcuts. 
2  vols.     $s.  each. 

Kidd  on  the  Adaptation  of  '.Ex- 
ternal Nature  to  the  Physical 
Condition  of  Man.    35.  6d. 

Chalmers  on  the  Adaptation 
of  External  Nature  to  the 
Moral  and  Intellectual  Con- 
stitution of  Man.    5 j. 

BRINK  (B.  ten)  Early  English 
Literature.  By  Bernhard  ten 
Brink.  Vol.1.  ToWyclif.  Trans- 
lated by  Horace  M.  Kennedy. 
3-r.  6d. 

Vol.  II.  Wyclif,  Chaucer,  Ear- 
liest Drama  Renaissance.  Trans- 
lated by  W.  Clarke  Robinson, 
Ph.D.     3*.  6d. 

Vol.  III.  From  the  Fourteenth 
Century  to  the  Death  of  Surrey. 
Edited  by  Dr.  Alois  Brandl. 
Trans,  by  L.  Dora  Schroitz. 
3-r.  6d. 

Five  Lectures  on  Shake- 
speare. Trans,  by  Julia  Franklir.. 
3*.  6d. 

BROWNE'S  (Sir  Thomas) Works 
Edited  by  Simon  Wilkin.  3  vols. 
3-r.  6c/.  each. 


An  Alphabetical  List  of  Books 


BURKE'S  Works.    8  vols.    $s.  6d. 
each. 
I. — Vindication   of  Natural  So- 
ciety— Essay  on  the  Sub- 
lime and   Beautiful,   and 
various    Political    Miscel- 
lanies. 
II. — Reflections   on    the   French 
Revolution  —  Letters  re- 
lating to  the  Bristol  Elec- 
tion —  Speech    on   Fox's 
East  India  Bill,  &c. 

III. — Appeal  from  .the  New  to  the 
Old  Whigs— On  the  Na- 
bob of  Arcot's  Debts — 
The  Catholic  Claims,  &c. 

IV. — Report  on  the  Affairs  of 
India,  and  Articles  of 
Charge  against  Warren 
Hastings. 
V. — Conclusion  of  the  Articles  of 
Charge  against  Warren 
Hastings — Political  Let- 
ters on  the  American  War, 
on  a  Regicide  Peace,  to 
the  Empress  of  Russia. 

VI. — Miscellaneous  Speeches  — 
Letters  and  Fragments — 
Abridgments  of  English 
History,  &c.  With  a 
General  Index. 
VII.  &  VIII.— Speeches  on  the  Im- 
peachment of  Warren 
Hastings ;  and  Letters. 
With  Index.  2  vols. 
3*.  6d.  each. 

Life.     By  Sir  J.  Prior.  3*.  6d. 

BURNEY.  The  Early  Diary 
of  Fanny  Burney  (Madame 
D'Arblay),  1768-1778.  With 
a  selection  from  her  Correspond- 
ence and  from  the  Journals  of 
her  sisters,  Susan  and  Charlotte 
Burney.  Edited  by  Annie  Raine 
Ellis.     2  vols.     3 s.  6d.  each. 

Evelina.     By  Frances  Burney 

(Mme.  D'Arblay).  With  an  In- 
troduction and  Notes  by  A.  R. 
Ellis.     3J.  6d. 


BURNEY'S  Ceoilia.  With  an  In- 
troduction and  Notes  by  A.  R. 
Ellis.     2  vols.     3*.  6J.  each. 

BURN  (R)  Ancient  Rome  and 
its  Neighbourhood.  An  Illus- 
trated Handbook  to  the  Ruins  in 
the  City  and  the  Campagna,  for 
the  use  of  Travellers.  By  Robert 
Burn,  M.A.  With  numerous 
Illustrations,  Maps,  and  Plans. 
7*.  6d. 

BURNS  (Robert),  Life  of.  By 
J.  G.  Lockhart,  D.C.L.  A 
new  and  enlarged  Edition.  Re- 
vised by  William  Scott  Douglas. 
y.  6d. 

BURTON'S  (Robert)  Anatomy  of 
Melancholy.  Edited  by  the  Rev. 
A.  R.  Shilleto,  M.A.  With  In- 
troduction by  A.  H.  Bullen,  and 
full  Index.     3  vols.    $s.  6d.  each. 

BURTON  (Sir  R.  P.)  Personal 
Narrative  of  a  Pilgrimage  to 
Al-Madinah  and  Meooah.  By 
Captain  Sir  Richard  F.  Burton, 
K.C.M.G.  With  an  Introduction 
by  Stanley  Lane-Poole,  and  all 
the  original  Illustrations.  2  vols. 
3s.  6d.  each. 

%*  This  is  the  copyright  edi- 
tion, containing  the  author's  latest 
notes. 

BUTLER'S  (Bishop)  Analogy  01 
Religion,  Natural  and  Revealed, 
to  the  Constitution  and  Course  of 
Nature ;  together  with  two  Dis- 
sertations on  Personal  Identity  and 
on  the  Nature  of  Virtue,  and 
Fifteen  Sermons.     3*.  6d. 

BUTLER'S  (Samuel)  Hudibras. 
With  Variorum  Notes,  a  Bio- 
graphy, Portrait,  and  28  Illus- 
trations.    5;. 

or,  further  Illustrated  with  60 

Outline   Portraits.      2  vols.      5*. 


Contained  in  Boftn's  Libraries. 


5 


C22SAR.  Commentaries  on  the 
Gallio  and  Civil  Wars,  Trans- 
lated by  W.  A.  McDevitte,  B.A. 
5*- 

CAMOENS'  Lusiad  ;  or,  the  Dis- 
covery of  India.  An  Epic  Poem. 
Translated  by  W.  J.  Mickle.  5th 
Edition,  revised  by  E.  R.  Hodges, 
M.C.P.    3s.  6d. 

CARAFAS  (The)  of  Maddaloni. 

Naples  under  Spanish  Dominion. 
Translated  from  the  German  of 
Alfred  de  Reumont.     3*.  6d, 

CARLYLE'S  French  Revolution. 
Edited  by  J.  Holland  Rose, 
Litt.D.     Ulus.    3  vols.     5-r.  each. 

Sartor  Resartus.     With   75 

Illustrations  by  Edmund  J.  Sul- 
livan.    5*. 

CARPENTERS     (Dr.    W.    B.) 

Zoology.      Revised   Edition,   by 

W.  S.  Dallas,  F.  L.  S.     With  very 

numerous  Woodcuts.     Vol.  I.  6s. 

[  Vol.  II.  out  of  print. 

CARPENTER'S  Mechanical 
Philosophy.  Astronomy,  and 
Horology.     181  Woodcuts.     5*. 

Vegetable  Physiology    and 

Systematio  Botany.  Revised 
Edition,  by  E.  Lankester,  M.D., 
&c.  With  very  numerous  Wood- 
cuts,   dr. 

Animal  Physiology.   Revised 

Edition.  With  upwards  of  300 
Woodcuts.     6s. 

CASTLE  (E.)  Schools  and 
Masters  of  Fence,  from  the 
Middle  Ages  to  the  End  of  the 
Eighteenth  Century.  By  Egerton 
Castle,  M.A.,  F.S.A.  With  a 
Complete  Bibliography.  Illus- 
trated with  140  Reproductions  of 
Old  Engravings  arid  6  Plates  of 
Swords,  showing  114  Examples. 
6s. 


OATTERMOLE'S  Evenings  at 
Haddon  Hall.  With  24  En- 
gravings on  Steel  from  designs  by 
Catiermole,  the  Letterpress  by  the 
Baroness  de  Carabella.     5-r. 

CATULLUS,  Tibullus,  ard  tha 
Vigil  of  Venu3.  A  Literal  Prose 
Translation.     5*. 

CELLINI  (Benvenuto).  Me- 
moirs of,  written  by  Himself. 
Translated  by  Thomas  Roscoe. 
3-r.  6d. 

CERVANTES'  Don  Quixote  de 
la  Mancha.  Motteaux's  Trans- 
lation revised.  2  vols.  Zs.  6d. 
each. 

G-alatea.  A  Pastoral  Ro- 
mance. Translated  by  G.  W.  J. 
Gyll.     3*-  &/. 

Exemplary  Novels.  Trans- 
lated by  Walter  K.  Kelly,  y.  6d. 

CHAUCER'S  Poetical  Works. 
Edited  by  Robert  Bell.  Revised 
Edition,  wilh  a  Preliminary  Essay 
by  Prof.  W.  W.  Skeat,  M.A.  4 
vols.     3s.  6d.  each. 

CHESS   CONGRESS  of  1862. 

A  Collection  of  the  Games  played. 
Edited  by  J.  Lowenthal.     $s, 

CHEVREUL  on  Colour.  Trans- 
lated from  the  French  by  Charles 
Martel.  Third  Edition,  with 
Plates,  5*. ;  or  with  an  additional 
series  of  16  Plates  in  Colours, 
Js.  6d. 

CHINA,  Pictorial,  Descriptive, 
and  Historical.  With  Map  and 
nearly  100  Illustrations.     5*. 

CHRONICLES  OF  THE  CRU- 
SADES. Contemporary  Narra- 
tives of  the  Crusade  of  Richard 
Coeur  de  Lion,  by  Richard  of 
Devizes  and  Geoffrey  de  Vinsauf; 
and  of  the  Crusade  at  St.  Louis, 
by  Lor.l  John  de  loinville.     $s. 


An  Alphabetical  List  of  Books 


CICERO'S  Orations.  Translated 
by  Prof.  C  D.  Yonge,  M.A.  4 
vols.     5*.  each. 

Letters.  Translated  by  Evelyn 

S.  Shuckburgh.   4  vols.    5*.  each. 

On    Oratory   and    Orators. 

With  Letters  to  Quintus  and 
Brutus.  Translated  by  the  Rev. 
J.  S.  Watson,  M.A.     $s. 

On  the  Nature  of  the  Gods, 

Divination,  Fate,  Laws,  a  Re- 
public, Consulship.  Translated 
by  Prof.  C.  D.  Yonge,  M.A.,  and 
Francis  Barhara.     5J« 

. Academics,  De  Finibus,  and 

Tusculan  Questions.  By  Prof. 
C.  D.  Yonge,  M.A.     5*. 

Offioes  ;    or,   Moral   Duties. 

Cato  Major,  an  Essay  on  Old 
Age ;  Laelius,  an  Essay  on  Friend- 
ship; Scipio's Dream ;  Paradoxes; 
Letter  to  Quintus  on  Magistrates. 
Translated  by  C.  R.  Edmonds. 
31.  6d. 

CORNELIUS    NEPOS.—  See 

Justin. 

CLARK'S  (Hugh)  Introduction 
to  Heraldry.  iSth  Edition,  Re- 
vised and  Enlarged  by  J.  R. 
Planch^,  Rouge  Croix.  With 
nearly  iooo  Illustrations.  5^.  Or 
with  the  Illustrations   Coloured, 


CLASSIC  TALES,  containing 
Rasselas,  Vicar  of  Wakefield, 
Gulliver's  Travels,  and  The  Senti- 
mental Journey.    3*.  6d. 

COLERIDGE'S  (S.  T.)  Friend. 

.     A  Series  of   Essays  on   Morals, 

Politics,  and  Religion.     3*.  6d. 

Aids  to  Reflection,  and  the 

Confessions  of  an  Inquiring 
Spirit,  to  which  are  added  the 
Essays  on  Faith  and  the  Book 
of  Common  Prayer,    y.  6d. 


COLERIDGE'S  Leotures  and 
Notes  on  Shakespeare  and 
other  English  Poets.  Edited 
by  T.  Ashe.     3s.  6d. 

Biographia  Literaria  ;  to- 
gether with  Two  Lay  Sermons. 
3*.  6d. 

Table- Talk  and    Omniana. 

Edited  by  T.  Ashe,  B.A.     3*.  6d. 

Miscellanies,  iEsthetio  and 

Literary;  to  which  is  added, 
The  Theory  of  Life.  Col- 
lected and  arranged  by  T.  Ashe, 
B.A.    3*.  6d. 

COMTE'S  Positive  Philosophy. 
Translated  and  condensed  by 
Harriet  Martineau.  With  Intro- 
duction by  Frederic  Harrison. 
3  vols.     Ss'  each. 

COMTE'S  Philosophy  of  the 
Sciences,  being  an  Exposition  of 
the  Principles  of  the  Cours  de 
Philosophie  Positive.  By  G.  H. 
Lewes.    $s. 

GONDES  History  of  the  Dc- 
minion  of  the  Arabs  in  Spain. 
Translated  by  Mrs.  Foster.  3 
vols.     3.T.  6d.  each. 

COOPER'S  Biographical  Dic- 
tionary. Containing  Concise 
Notices  (upwards  of  15,000)  of 
Eminent  Persons  of  all  Ages  and 
Countries.  By  Thompson  Cooper, 
F.S.A.      With    a    Supplement, 

.  bringing  the  work  down  to  1S83. 
2  vols.     5^.  each. 

COXE'S  Memoirs  of  the  Duke  of 
Marlborough.  With  his  original 
Correspondence.  By  W.  Coxe, 
M.A.,  F.R.S.  Revised  edition 
by  John  Wade.  3  vols.  3*.  6d. 
each. 

History   of   the   House   of 

Austria  (1218-1792).  With  a 
Continuation  from  the  Accession 
of  Francis  I.  to  the  Revolution  of 
1848.     4  vols,     3;,  6a.  each. 


Contained  in  Bohn's  Libraries. 


ORAIK'B  (G.  L.)  Pursuit  of  Know- 
ledge under  Difficulties.  Illus- 
trated by  Anecdotes  and  Memoirs. 
Revised  edition,  with  numerous 
Woodcut  Portraits  and  Plates.   5 s. 

CUNNINGHAM'S  Lives  of  the 
Moat  Eminent  British  Painters. 
A  New  Edition,  with  Notes  and 
Sixteen  fresh  Lives.  By  Mrs. 
Heaton.     3  vols.     3.?.  6d.  each. 

DANTE.  Divine  Comedy.  Trans- 
lated by  the  Rev.  H.  F.  Cary, 
M.A.     3*.  6d. 

Translated  into  English  Verse 

by  I.  C  Wright,  M.A.  3rd  Edi- 
tion, revised.  With  Portrait,  and 
34  Illustrations  on  Steel,  after 
T-laxman. 

DANTE.  The  Inferno.  A  Literal 
Prose  Translation,  with  the  Text 
of  the  Original  printed  on  the  same 
page.   By  John  A.  Carlyle,  M.D. 

$s. 

DS  COMMINES  (Philip),  Me- 
moirs of.  Containing  the  Histories 
of  Louis  XI.  and  Charles  VIII., 
Kings  of  France,  and  Charles 
the  Bold,  Duke  of  Burgundy. 
Together  with  the  Scandalous 
Chronicle,  or  Secret  History  of 
Loms  XI.,  by  Jean  de  Troyes, 
Translated  by  Andrew  R.  Scoble. 
With  Portraits.  2  vols.  3.1.  6d. 
each. 

DEFOE'S  Novels  and  Miscel- 
laneous Works.  With  Prefaces 
and  Notes,  including  those  attri- 
buted to  Sir  W.  Sco:t.  7  vols. 
3 j.  6d.  each. 

I. — Captain    Singleton,    and 
Colonel  Jack. 

II. — Memoirs  of  a  Cavalier, 
Captain  Carleton, 
Dickory  Cronke,  &c. 

III.— Moll   Flanders,    and    the 
History  of  the  Devil. 


Defoe's  Novels  and  Miscel- 
laneous Works— continued. 

IV. — Roxana,  and  Life  of  Mrs, 
Christian  Davies. 

V. — History  of  the  Great  Plague 
of  London,  1665  ;  The 
Storm  (1703) ;  and  the 
True-born  Englishman. 

VI. — Duncan  Campbell,  New 
Voyage  round  the 
World,  and  Political 
Tracts. 

VII. — Robinson  Crusoe. 

DEMMIN'S  History  of  Arms 
and  ArmouTi  from  the  Earliest 
Period.  By  Auguste  Demmin. 
Translated  by  C.  C.  Black,  M.A. 
With  nearly  2000  Illustrations. 
7^.  6d. 

DEMOSTHENES1  Orations. 
Translated  by  C.  Rann  Kennedy. 
5  vols.  Vol.  I.,  3j.  6d.;  Vols. 
II.-V.,  5-r.  each. 

DE  STAEL'S  Ccrinice  or  Italy. 
By  Madame  de  Stae'l.  Trans- 
lated by  Emily  Baldwin  and 
Paulina  Driver.     3-r.  6d. 

DICTIONARY  of  Latin  and 
Greek  Quotations ;  including 
Proverbs,  Maxims,  Mottoes,  Law 
Terms  and  Phrases.  With  all  the 
Quantities  marked,  and  English 
Translations.  With  Index  Ver- 
borum  (622  pages).     5*. 

DICTIONARY  of  Obsolete  and 
Provincial  English.  Compiled 
by  Thomas  Wright,  M.A.,  F.S  A., 
&c.     2  vols.    5 s.  each. 

DID  RON'S  Christian  Icono- 
graphy :  a  History  of  Christian 
Art  in  the  Middle  Ages.  Trans- 
lated by  E.  J.  Millington  and 
completed  by  Margaret  Stokes. 
With  240  Illustrations.  2  vols. 
5>.  each. 


8 


An  Alphabetical  List  of  Books 


DIOGENES  LAERTITJ3.  Lives 
and  Opinions  of  the  Anolent 
Philosophers.  Translated  by 
Prof.  C.  D.  Yonge,  M.A.    5*. 

DOBREE'S  Adversaria.  Edited 
by  the  late  Prof.  Wagner.  2  vols. 
5x.  each. 

D  O  D  D '  S  Epigrammatists.  A 
Selection  from  the  Epigrammatic 
Literature  of  Ancient,  Mediaeval, 
and  Modern  Times.  By  the  Rev. 
Henry  Philip  Dodd,  M.A.  Ox- 
ford. 2nd  Edition,  revised  and 
enlarged.    6s. 

DONALDSON'S  The  Theatre  of 
the  Greeks.  A  Treatise  on  the 
History  and  Exhibition  of  the 
Greek  Drama.  With  numerous 
Illustrations  and  3  Plans.  By  John 
William  Donaldson,  D.D.     5*. 

DRAPER'S  History  of  the 
Intellectual  Development  of 
Europe.  By  John  William  Draper, 
M.D.,  LL.D.    2  vols.    $s.  each. 

DUNLOP'S  History  of  Fiction. 
A  new  Edition.  Revised  by 
Henry  Wilson.    2  vols.    5-r.  each. 

DYER'S  History  of  Modern  Eu- 
rope, from  the  Fall  of  Constan- 
tinople. 3rd  edition,  revised  and 
continued  to  the  end  of  the  Nine- 
teenth Century.  By  Arthur  Has- 
sall,  M.A.    6  vols.    $s.  6d  each, 

DYER'S  (Dr.  T.  H.)  Pompeii :  its 

Buildings  and  Antiquities.  By 
V.  H.  Dyer,  LL.D.  With  nearly 
300  Wood  Engravings,  a  large 
Map,  and  a  Plan  of  the  Forum. 
7s.  6d. 

DYER  (T.  P.  T.)  British  Popular 
Customs,  Present  and  Past. 
An  Account  of  the  various  Games 
and  Customs  associated  with  Dif- 
ferent Days  of  the  Year  in  the 
British  Isles,  arranged  according 
to  the  Calendar.  By  the  Rev. 
T.  F.  Thiselton  Dyer,  M.A.    5*. 


EBERS'  Egyptian  Princess.  An 
Historical  Novel.  By  George 
Ebers.  Translated  by  E.  S. 
Buchheim.     3*.  6d. 

EDGEWORTH'S  Stories  for 
Children.  With  8  Illustrations 
by  L.  Speed.     31.  bd. 

ELZE'S  William  Shakespeare. 
— See  Shakespeare. 

EMERSON'S    Works.      5   vols. 
35.  6d.  each. 

I. — Essays   and   Representative 

Men. 
II. — English  Traits,  Nature,  and 
Conduct  of  Life. 
III. — Society  and  Solitude — Letters 
and    Social     Aims  —  Ad- 
dresses. 
VI. — Miscellaneous  Pieces. 
V. — Poems. 

EPICTETUS,  The  Discourses  of. 
With  the  Encheiridion  and 
Fragments.  Translated  by  George 
Long,  M.A.    $s. 

EURIPIDES.  A  New  Literal 
Translation  in  Prose.  By  E  P. 
Coleridge,  M.A.   2  vols.   5*.  each. 

ETJTROPIUS.— See  Jdstin. 

EUSEBITJS  PAMPHILUS, 
Ecclesiastical  History  of.  Trans- 
lated by  Rev.  C.F.Cruse,M.A.  5*. 

EVELYN'S  Diary  and  Corre- 
spondendencs.  Edited  from  the 
Original  MSS.  by  W.  Bray, 
F.A.S.  With  45  engravings.  4 
vols.  5*.  each. 

FAIRHOLT'S  Costume  In  Eng- 
land. A  History  of  Dress  to  the 
end  of  the  Eighteenth  Century. 
3rd  Edition,  revised,  by  Viscount 
Dillon,  V.P.S.A.  Illustrated  with 
above  700  Engravings.  2  vols. 
5j.  each. 


Contained  in  Bo/m's  Libraries. 


FIELDING'S  Adventures  ot 
Joseph  Andrews  and.  his  Friend 
Mr.  Abraham  Adams.  With 
Cruikshank's  Illustrations.  %s.  6d. 

History  of  Tom   Jones,    a 

Foundling.  With  Cruikshank's 
Illustrations.  2  vols.  $s.  6d.  each. 

Amelia.    With    Cruikshank's 

Illustrations.     $s. 

FLAXMAN'S  Lectures  on  Sculp- 
ture. Ey  John  Flaxman,  R.A. 
With  Portrait  and  53  Plates.     6s. 

FOSTER'S  (John)  Essays :  on 
Decision  of  Character  ;  on  a 
Man's  writing  Memoirs  of  Him- 
self ;  on  the  epithet  Romantic  ; 
on  the  aversion  of  Men  of  Taste 
to  Evangelical  Religion.     3s.  6d. 

Essays  on  the  Evils  of  Popular 

Ignorance  ;  to  which  is  added,  a 
Discourse  on  the  Propagation  of 
Christianity  in  India.     3*.  6d. 

Essays  on  the  Improvement 

of  Time.  With  Notes  of  Ser- 
mons and  other  Pieces.     3^.  6d. 

GASPARY'S  History  of  Italian 
Literature.  Translated  by  Her- 
man Oelsner,  M.A.,  Ph.D. 
Vol.  I.     3s.  6d. 

GEOFFREY  OF  MONMOUTH, 
Chronicle  of. — See  Old  English 
Chronicles. 

GESTA  ROMANORUM,  or  En- 
tertaining Moral  Stories  invented 
by  the  Monks.  Translated  by  the 
Rev.  Charles  Swan.  Revised 
Edition,  by  Wynnard  Hooper, 
B.A.     5*. 

GILDA3,  Chronicles  of.— See  Old 
English  Chronicles. 

GiBBON'S  Deoiine  and  Fall  of 
the  Roman  Empire.  Complete 
and  Unabridged,   with  Variorum 


Notes.  Edited  by  an  English 
Churchman.  With  2  Maps  and 
Portrait.     7  vols.     3*.  6d.  each. 

GILBART'S  History,  Principles, 
and  Practice  of  Banking.  By 
the  late  J.  W.  Gilbart,  F.R.S. 
New  Edition  (1907),  revised  by 
Ernest  Sykes.     2  vols.     10s. 

GIL  BLAS,  The  Adventures  of. 
Translated  from  the  French  of 
Lesage  by  Smollett.  With  24 
Engravings  on  Steel,  after  Smirke, 
and  10  Etchings  by  George  Cruik- 
shank.     6s. 

GIRALDUS  CAMBRENSIS' 
Historical  Works.  Translated 
by  Th.  Forester,  M.A.,  and  Sir 
R.  Colt  Hoare.  Revised  Edition, 
Edited  by  Thomas  Wright,  MA., 
F.S.A.     Sj. 

GOETHE'S  Faust.  Part  I.  Ger- 
man Text  with  Hayward's  Prose 
Translation  and  Notes.  Revised 
by  C.  A.  Buchheim,  Ph.D.     55. 

GOETHE'S  Works.  Translated 
into  English  by  various  hands. 
14  vols.     3j.  6d.  each. 

I.  and  II.— Poetry    and    Truth 
from  My  Own  Life.     New 
and  revised  edition. 
III. —  Faust.     Two    Parts,    com- 
plete.    (Swan  wick-.) 
IV. — Novels  and  Tales. 
V. — Wilhelm  Meister's  Appren- 
ticeship. 
VI.  —  Conversations    with   Ecker- 
mann  and  Soret. 
VIII. — Dramatic  Works. 
IX.— Wilhelm  Meister's  Travels. 
X. — Tour  in  Italy,  and  Second 
Residence  in  Rome. 
XI. — Miscellaneous  Travels. 
XII. — Early     and     Miscellaneous 

Letters. 
XIV. — Reineke  Fox,  West-Eastern 
Divan  and  Achilleid. 


10 


An  Alpliabetical  List  of  Books 


GOLDSMITH'S  Works.  A  new 
Edition,  by  J.  W.  M.  Gibbs.  5 
vols.     3*.  bd.  each. 

GRAMMONT'3  Memoirs  of  the 
Court  of  Charles  II.  Edited  by 
Sir  Walter  Scott.  Together  with 
the  Boscobel  Tracts,  including 
two  not  before  published,  &c. 
New  Edition.     5*. 

GRAY'S  Letters.  Including  the 
Correspondence  of  Gray  and 
Mason.  Edited  by  the  Rev. 
D.  C.  Tovey,  M.A.  Vols.  I. 
and  II.  y.  6d.  each. 

GREEK  ANTHOLOGY.  Trans- 
lated  by  George    Burges,   M.A. 

GREEK  ROMANCES  of  Helio- 
dorus,  Longus,  and  Achilles 
Tatius — viz.,  The  Adventures  of 
Theagenes  &  Chariclea ;  Amours 
of  Daphnis  and  Chlce  ;  and  Loves 
of  Clitopho  and  Leucippe.  Trans- 
lated by  Rev.   R.   Smith,  M.A. 

GREGORY'S  Letters  on  the 
Evidences,  Doctrines,  &  Duties 
of  the  Christian  Religion.  By 
Dr.  Olinthus  Gregory.     3*.  6d. 

GREENE,  MARLOWE,  and 
BEN  JONSON.  Poems  of. 
Edited  by  Robert  Bell.     3s.  6d. 

GRIMM'S  TALES.  With  the 
Notes  of  the  Original.  Translated 
by  Mrs.  A.  Hunt.  With  Intro- 
duction by  Andrew  Lang,  M.A. 
2  vols.    3*.  6d.  each. 

Gammer  Grethel;  or,  Ger- 
man Fairy  Tales  and  Popular 
Stories.  Containing  42  Fairy 
Tales.  Trans,  by  Edgar  Taylor. 
With  numerous  Woodcuts  after 
George  Cruikshank  and  Ludwig 
Grimm.     3*.  6d. 


GROSSI'S  Marco  Visoontl. 
Translated  by  A.  F.  D.  The 
Ballads  rendered  into  English 
Verse  by  C.  M.  P.     3*.  6d. 

GUIZOT'S  History  of  the 
English  Revolution  of  1640. 
From  the  Accession  of  Charles 
I.  to  his  Death.  Translated  by 
William  Hazlitt.     3*.  6d. 

History  of  Civilisation,  from 

the  Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire  to 
the  French  Revolution.  Trans- 
lated by  William  Hazlitt.  3  vols. 
35.  6d.  each. 

HALL'S  (Rev.  Robert)  Miscel- 
laneous Work3  and  Remains. 
3s.  6d. 

HAMPTON  COURT:  A  Short 
History  of  the  Manor  and 
Palace.  By  Ernest  Law,  B.A. 
With  numerous  Illustrations.    $s. 

HARDWICK'S  History  of  the 
Articles  of  Religion.  By  the  late 
C.  Hardwick.  Revised  by  the 
Rev.  Francis  Procter,  M.A.    $s. 

HATJFT'S  Tales.  The  Caravan— 
The  Sheik  of  Alexandria — The 
Inn  in  the  Spessart.  Trans,  firosa 
the  German  by  S.  Mendel,  p.  b-i. 

HAWTHORNE'S  Tales.  4  vols. 
3 j.  6d.  each. 

I.— Twice-told   Tales,   and   the 
Snow  Image. 

II. — Scarlet  Letter,  and  the  House 
with  the  Seven  Gables. 

III. — Transformation  [The  Marble 
Faun],  and  Blithed-ile  Ro- 
mance. 

IV. — Mosses  from  an  Old  Manse. 

HAZLITT'S  Table-talk.  Essays 
on  Men  and  Manners.  By  W. 
Hazlitt.     $s.  6d. 


Contained  in  Bo/iu's  Libraries. 


II 


HAZLITT'S  Lectures  on  the 
Literature  of  the  Age  of  Eliza- 
beth and  on  Characters  of  Shake- 
speare's Plays.     3-r.  6d. 

Lectures    on    the   English 

Poets,  and  on  the  English  Comic 
Writers.     3;.  6a. 

The  Plain  Speaker.  Opinions 

on  Books,  Men,  and  Things.  $s.6d. 

Round  Table.    3*.  6d. 

Sketches    and   Essays. 

3s.  6d. 

The  Spirit  of  the  Age ;   or, 

Contemporary  Portraits.  Edited 
by  W.  Carew  Haziitt.     3*.  6d. 

View  of  the  English  Stage. 

Edited  by  W.  Spencer  Jackson. 
y.  bd. 

HEATON'S  Concise  History  of 
Painting.  New  Edition,  revised 
by  Cosmo  Monkhouse.     $s. 

KEGEL'S  Lectures  on  the  Philo- 
sophy of  History.  Translated  by 
J.  Sibree,  M.A. 

HEINE'S  Poems,  Complete 
Translated  by  Edgar  A.  Bowring, 
C.B.     3s.  6d. 

Travel-Pictures,  including  the 

Tour  in  the  Harz,  Norderney,  and 
Book  of  Ideas,  together  with  the 
Romantic  School.  Translated  by 
Francis  Storr.  A  New  Edition, 
revised  throughout.  With  Appen- 
dices and  Maps.     31.  6a. 

HELP'S  Life  of  Christopher 
Columbus,  the  Discoverer  of 
America.  By  Sir  Arthur  Helps, 
K.C.B.     y.  6d. 

Life   of  Hernando    Cortes, 

and  the  Conquest  of  Mexico.  2 
vols.     3*.  6d.  each. 

Life  of  Fizarro.    3*.  6d. 

Life  of  Las  Ca3aa  the  Apostle 

of  the  Indies.     3*.  6d. 


HENDERSON  (E.)  Seleot  His- 
torical Documents  of  the  Middle 
Ages,  including  the  most  famous 
Charters  relating  to  England,  the 
Empire,  the  Church,  &c,  from 
the  6th  to  the  14th  Centuries. 
Translated  from  the  Latin  and 
edited  by  Ernest  F.  Henderson, 
A.B.,  A.M.,  Ph.D.     ss- 

HENFREY'S  Guide  to  English 
Coins,  from  the  Conquest  to  the 
present  time.  New  and  revised 
Edition  by  C.  F.  Keary,  M.A., 
F.S.A.     6s. 

HENRY  OF  HUNTINGDON'S 
History  of  the  English.  Trans- 
lated by  T.  Forester,  M.A.     is. 

HENRY'S  (Matthew)  Exposition 
of  the  Book  of  the  Psalms.     55. 

HELIODORUS.  Theagenes  and 
Caariolea.  —  See  Greek  Ro- 
mances. 

HERODOTUS.  Translated  by  the 
Rev.  Henry  Cary,  M.A.     3.;.  6d. 

Analysis  and  Summary  of 

By  J.  T.Wheeler.     55. 

HESIOD,  CALLIMACHUS,  and 
THEOGNIS.  Translated  by  the 
Rev.  J.  Banks,  M.A.     5*. 

HOFFMANN'S  (3£.T.  W.)  The 
Serapion  Brethren.  Translated 
from  the  German  by  Lt. -Col.  Alex. 
Ewing.     2  vols.     3J.  6d.  each. 

HOLBEIN'S  Dance  of  Death 
and  Bible  Cuts.  Upwards  of  150 
Subjects,  engraved  in  facsimile, 
with  Introduction  and  Descrip- 
tions by  Francis  Douce  and  Dr. 
Thomas  Frognall  Dibden.     55. 

HOMER'S  Iliad.  A  new  trans- 
lation by  E.  II.  Blakeney,  M.A. 
Vol.  I.  containing  Books  I -XII. 

5* 

Translated  into  English  Prose 

by  T.  A.  Buckley,  B.A.     $s- 


12 


An  Alphabetical  List  of  Books 


HOMER'S  Odyssey.  Hymns, 
Epigrams,  and  Battle  of  the  Frogs 
and  Mice.  Translated  into  Eng- 
lish Prose  by  T.  A.  Buckley,  B.A. 
5'- 

See  also  Pope. 

HOOPER'S  (Or.)  Waterloo :  The 
Downfall  of  the  First  Napo- 
leon :  a  History  of  the  Campaign 
of  1815.  By  George  Hooper. 
With  Maps  and  Plans.     3*.  6d. 

The  Campaign  of  Sedan : 

The  Downfall  of  the  Second  Em- 
pire, August  -  September,  1870. 
With  General  Map  and  Six  Plans 
of  Battle.     3J.  6d. 

HORACE.  A  new  literal  Prose 
translation,  by  A.  Hamilton  Bryce, 
LL.D.     3;.  6d. 

HUGO'S  (Victor)  Dramatio 
Works.  Hernani— Ruy  Bias — 
The  King's  Diversion.  Translated 
by  Mrs.  Newton  Crosland  and 
F.  L.  Slous.     3*.  6d. 

Poems,  chiefly  Lyrical.  Trans- 
lated by  various  Writers,  now  first 
collected  by  J.  H.  L.  Williams. 
2s.6d. 

HUMBOLDT'S  Cosmos.  Trans- 
lated by  E.  C.  Ottd,  B.  H.  Paul, 
and  W.  S.  Dallas,  F.L.S.  5  vols. 
3.?.  6d.  each,  excepting  Vol.  V.  $s. 

Personal   Narrative    of  his 

Travels  to  the  Equinoctial  Re- 
gions of  America  during  the  years 
1 799- 1 804.  Translated  by  T. 
Ross.    3  vols.     Sj.  each. 

Views  of  Nature.  Translated 

by  E.  C.  CMe"  and  H.  G.  Bohn. 
5'- 

HUMPHREYS'  Coin  Collector's 
Manual.  By  H.  N.  Humphreys. 
with  upwards  of  140  Illustrations 
on  Wood  and  Steel.  2  vols.  5/. 
each. 


HUNGARY :  its  History  and  Re- 
volution, together  with  a  copious 
Memoir  of  Kossuth.     35.  6d. 

HUTCHINSON  (Colonel).  Me- 
moirs of  the  Life  of.  By  his 
Widow,  Lucy  :  together  with  hei 
Autobiography,  and  an  Account 
of  the  Siege  of  Lathom  House. 
3j.  6d. 

HUNT'S  Poetry  of  Science.  By 
Richard  Hunt.  3rd  Edition,  re- 
vised and  enlarged.     5*. 

INGULPH'S  Chronicles  of  the 
Abbey  of  Croyland,  with  the 
Continuation  by  Peter  of  Blois 
and  other  Writers.  Translated  by 
H.  T.  Riley,  M.A.     5*. 

IRVING'S    (Washington)  Com- 
plete Works.  15  vols.  With  Por- 
traits, &c.     3J.  6d.  each. 
I. — Salmagundi,      Knicker- 
bocker's History  of  New 
York. 
II.— The  Sketch-Book,  and  the 
Life  of  Oliver  Goldsmith. 
III.— Bracebridge  Hall,   Abbots- 
ford  and  Newstead  Abbey. 
IV.— The  Alhambra,  Tales  of  a 
Traveller. 
V. — Chronicle  of  the   Conquest 
of  Granada,    Legends  of 
the  Conquest  of  Spain. 
VI.  &  VII.— Life    and    Voyages  of 
Columbus,  together  with 
the  Voyages  of  his  Com- 
panions. 
VIII.— Astoria,    A    Tour    on    the 
Prairies. 
IX. — Life  of  Mahomet,  Livesof  the 

Successors  of  Mahomet. 
X. — Adventures  of  Captain  Bon- 
neville, U.S.A.,  Wolfert's 
Roost. 
XI. — Biographies   and    Miscella- 
neous Papers. 
XII.-XV.— Life  of  George  Wash- 
ington.    4  vols. 


Contained  in  Bo/m's  Libraries. 


13 


IRVING'S  (Washington)  Life 
and  Letters.  By  his  Nephew, 
Pierre  E.  Irving.  2  vols.  3s.  6d. 
each. 

ISOCRATES,  The  Orations  of. 
Translated  by  J.  H.  Freese,  M.A. 
Vol.  I.     5 j. 

JAMES'S  (G.  P.  R.)  Life  of 
Richard  Cceur  de  Lion.  2  vols. 
3 s.  6d.  each. 

JAMESON'S  (Mrs.)  Shake- 
speares  Heroines.  Character- 
istics of  Women:  Moral,  Poetical, 
and  Historical.  By  Mrs.  Jameson. 
3*.  6d. 

JESSE'S  (E.)  Anecdotes  of  Dogs. 
With  40  Woodcuts  and  34  Steel 
Engravings.     $s. 

JESSE'S  (J.  H.)  Memoirs  of  the 
Court  of  England  during  the 
Reign  of  the  Stuarts,  including 
the  Protectorate.  3  vols.  With 
42  Portraits.     5-r.  each. 

Memoirs  of  the  Pretenders 

and  their  Adherents.     With  6 
Portraits.     5*. 

JOHNSONS  Lives  of  the  Poets. 
Edited  by  Mrs.  Alexander  Napier, 
with  Introduction  by  Professor 
Hales.     3  vols.     3;.  6d.  each. 

JOSEPHUS  (Flavius),  The  Works 
of.  Whiston's  Translation,  re- 
vised by  Rev.  A.  R.  Shilleto,  M.A 
With  Topographical  and  Geo. 
graphical  Notes  by  Colonel  Sir 
C.  W.  Wilson,  K.C.B.  5  vols. 
3;.  6d.  each. 

JULIAN,  the  Emperor.  Contain- 
ing Gregory  Nazianzen's  Two  In- 
vectives and  Libanus'  Monody, 
with  Julian's  extant  Theosophical 
Works,  Translated  by  C.  W. 
King,  M.A.     5*. 


JUNIUS'S  Letters.  With  all  the 
Notes  of  Woodfall's  Edition,  and 
important  Additions.  2  vols. 
3.?.  6d.  each. 

JUSTIN,  CORNELIUS  NEPOS, 
and  EUTROPIUS.  Translated 
by  the  Rev.  J.  S.  Watson,  M.A. 
5*. 

JUVENAL,  PERSIUS,  SUL- 
PICIA  and  LUCILIUS.  Trans- 
lated by  L.  Evans,  M.A.     55. 

KANT'S  Critique  of  Pure  Reason. 
Translated  by  J.  M.  D.  Meikle- 
john.     5-r. 

Prolegomena  and  Meta- 
physical Foundations  ofNatural 
Science.  Translated  byE.  Belfort 
Bax.     5>r. 

KEIGHTLEY'S  (Thomas)  My- 
thology of  Ancient  Greece  and 
Italy.  4th  Edition,  revised  by 
Leonard  Schmitz,  Ph.D.,  LL.D. 
With  12  Plates  from  the  Antique. 
5'- 

KEIGHTLEY'S  Fairy  Mytho- 
logy, illustrative  of  the  Romance 
and  Superstition  of  Various  Coun- 
tries. Revised  Edition,  with 
Frontispiece  by  Cruikshank.     5.1. 

LA  FONTAINE'S  Fables.  Trans- 
lated into  English  Verse  by  Elizur 
Wright.  New  Edition,  with  Notes 
by  J.  W.  M.  Gibbs.    3*.  6d. 

LAMARTINE'S  History  of  the 
Girondists.  Translated  by  H.  T. 
Ryde.      3  vols.     3s.  6<t.  each. 

— 1—  History  of  the  Restoration 
of  Monarohy  In  France  (a  Sequel 
to  the  History  of  the  Girondists). 
4  vols.     3*.  6d.  each. 

History  of  the  French  Re- 
volution of  1848.     y.  6d. 

LAMB'S  (Charles)  Essays  of  Ella 
and  Eliana.  Complete  Edition. 
3*.  6d. 


14 


An  Alphabetical  List  of  Books 


LAMB'S  (Charles)  Specimens  of 
English  Dramatic  Poets  of  the 
Time  of  Elizabeth.     3*.  6d. 

Memorials   and  Letters   of 

Charles  Lamb.  By  Serjeant 
Talfourd.  New  Edition,  revised, 
by  W.  Carew  Hazlitt.  2  vols. 
3.?.  dd.  each. 

Tales    from     Shakespeare. 

With  Illustrations  by  Byam  Shaw. 
3*.  6d. 

LANE'S  Arabian  Nights'  Enter- 
tainments. Edited  by  Stanley 
Lane-Poole,  M.A.,  LittD.  4 
vols.     3*.  6d.  each. 

LAPPENBERG'S  History  of 
England  under  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  Kings.  Translated  by 
B.  Thorpe,  F.S.A.  New  edition, 
revised  by  E.  C.  Otte.  2  vols. 
35.  6d.  each. 

LEONARDO  DA  VINCI'S 
Treatise  on  Painting.  Trans- 
lated by  J.  F.  Rigaud,  R.A., 
With  a  Life  of  Leonardo  by  John 
William  Brown.  With  numerous 
Plates.     $s. 

LEPSIUS'S  Letters  from  Egypt, 
Ethiopia,  and  the  Peninsula  of 
Sinai.  Translated  by  L.  and 
J.  B.  Horner.    With  Maps.     5*. 

LESSING'S  Dramatio  Works, 
Complete.  Edited  by  Ernest  Bell, 
M.A.  With  Memoir  of  Lessing 
by  Helen  Zimmem.  2  vols. 
3*.  6d.  each. 

Laokoon,  Dramatio  Notes, 

and  the  Representation  ol 
Death  by  the  Ancients.  Trans- 
lated by  E.  C.  Beasley  and  Helen 
Zimmern.  Edited  by  Edward 
Bell,  M.A.  With  a  Frontispiece 
of  the  Laokoon  group.     3*.  6d. 

LILLY'S  Introduction  to  Astro- 
logy. With  a  Grammar  of 
Astrology  and  Tables  for  Cal- 
culating Nativities,  by  Zadkiel.  $s. 


LIVY'S  History  of  Rome.  Trans- 
lated by  Dr.  Spillan,  C.  Edmonds, 
and  others.     4  vols.     5s.  each. 

LOCKE'S  Philosophical  Works. 
Edited  by  J.  A.  St.  Tohn.  2  vols. 
3-r.  6d.  each. 

LOCKHART  (J.  G.)— See  Burns. 

LODGE'S  Portraits  of  Illustrious 
Personages  of  Great  Britain, 
with  Biographical  and  Historical 
Memoirs.  240  Portraits  engraved 
on  Steel,  with  the  respective  Bio- 
graphies unabridged.  8  vols.  $s. 
each. 
[  Vols.  IV.  and  VII.  out  of  print. 

LOUDON'S  (Mrs.)  Natural 
History.  Revised  edition,  by 
W.  S.  Dallas,  F.L.S.  With 
numerous  Woodcut  Illus.     5-r. 

LOWNDES'  Bibliographer's 
Manual  of  English  Literature. 
Enlarged  Edition.  By  H.  G. 
Bohn.  6  vols,  cloth,  $s.  each. 
Or  4  vols,  half  morocco,  2/.  2s. 

LONGUS.  Daphnis  and  Chloe. 
— See  Greek  Romances. 

LUCAN'S  Pharsalia.  Translated 
by  H.  T.  Riley,  M.A.     5*. 

LUC  IAN' S  Dialogues  of  the 
Gods,  of  the  Sea  Gods,  and 
of  the  Dead.  Translated  by 
Howard  Williams,  M.A.     5*. 

LUCRETIUS.  A  Prose  Trans- 
lation. By  II.  A.  J.  Munro. 
Reprinted  from  the  Finil  (4th) 
Edition.  With  an  Introduction 
by  J.  D.  Duff,  M.A.     p. 

LUTHER'S  Table-Talk.  Trans- 
lated and.  Edited  by  William 
Hazlitt.     3s.  6d. 

Autobiography.  —  See 

Mickelet. 


Contained  in  Bokn's  Libraries. 


15 


MACHIAVELLI'S  History  of 
Florence,  together  with  the 
Prince,  Savonarola,  various  His- 
torical Tracts,  and  a  Memoir  of 
Machiavelli.     3 J.  6d. 

MALLET'S  Northern  Antiqui- 
ties, or  an  Historical  Account  of 
the  Manners,  Customs,  Religions 
and  Laws,  Maritime  Expeditions 
and  Discoveries,  Language  and 
Literature,  of  the  Ancient  Scandi- 
navians. Translated  by  Bishop 
Percy.  Revised  and  Enlarged 
Edition,  with  a  Translation  of  the 
Prose  Edda,  by  J.  A.  Black- 
well.     5r. 

MANZONI.  The  Betrothed : 
being  a  Translation  of  '  I  Pro- 
messi  Sposi.'  By  Alessandro 
Manzoni.  With  numerous  Wood- 
cuts.    5  s. 

MARCO    POLO'S    Travels;  the 

Translation  of  Marsden  revised 
by  T.  Wright,  M.A.,  F.S.A.     51. 

MARRYAT'S  (Capt.  R.N.) 
Masterman  Ready.  With  93 
Woodcuts.     3*.  6d. 

Mission ;  or,  Scenes  in  Africa. 

Illustrated  by  Gilbert  and  Dalziel. 
y.  6d. 

Pirate  and  Three  Cutters. 

With  8  Steel  Engravings,  from 
Drawings  by  Clarkson  Stanfield, 
R.A.    3s.  td. 

Privateersman.  8  Engrav- 
ings on  Steel.     3-r.  6a 

Settlers  in  Canada.  10  En- 
gravings by  Gilbert  and  Dalziel. 
3s,  6d. 

Poor  Jack.  With  16  Illus- 
trations after  Clarkson  Stansfield, 
R.A.    3 s.  6 J. 

Peter  Simple.  With  8  full- 
page  Illustrations.     3*.  6d. 


MARTIAL'S  Epigrams,  complete. 
Translated  into  Prose,  each  ac- 
companied by  one  or  more  Verse 
Translations  selected  from  the 
Works  of  English  Poets,  and 
other  sources.     7s.  6d. 

MA.RTINEAUS  (Harriet)  His- 
tory of  England,  from  1800- 
1815.     3s.  6d. 

History  of  the  Thirty  Years' 

Peace,  a.d.    1815-46.      4  vols. 
3*.  6d.  each. 

See  Comte's  Positive  Philosophy. 

MATTHEW  OP  WESTMIN. 
STER'S  Flowers  of  History, 
from  the  beginning  of  the  World 
to  A.D.  1307.  Translated  by  C.  D. 
Yonge,  M.A.     2  vols.     $s.  each. 

MAXWELL'S  Victories  of  Wel- 
ington  and  the  British  Armies. 
Frontispiece  and  5  Portraits.     5*. 

MENZEL'S  History  of  Germany, 
from  the  Earliest  Period  to  1842. 
3  vols,     y,  6d.  each. 

MICHAEL  ANGELO  AND 
RAPHAEL,  their  Lives  and 
Works.  By  Duppa  aud  Quatre- 
rnere  de  Quincy.  With  Portraits, 
and  Engravings  on  Steel.     5*. 

MICHELET'S  Luther's  Auto- 
biography. Trans,  by  William 
Hazlitt.  With  an  Appendix  (no 
pages)  of  Notes.    3.?.  6d. 

History  of  the  French  Revo- 
lution from  its  earliest  indications 
to  the  flight  of  the  King  in  1791. 
3*.  6d. 

MIGNET'SHlstory  of  theFrench 
Revolution,  from  1789  to  18 14. 
3s.  6d.     New  edition  reset. 

MILL  (J.  S.).  Early  Essays  by 
John  Stuart  Mill.  Collected  from 
various  sources  by  J.  W.  M.  Gibbs. 
3s.  6d. 


i6 


An  Alphabetical  List  of  Books 


MILLER  (Professor).  History 
Philosophically  Illustrated.from 
the  Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire  to 
the  French  Revolution.  4  vols. 
35.  6d.  each. 

MILTON'S  Prose  Works.  Edited 
by  J.  A.  St.  John.  5  vols.  3*.  6d. 
each. 

Poetical  Works,  with  a  Me- 
moir and  Critical  Remarks  by 
James  Montgomery,  an  Index  to 
Paradise  Lost,  Todd's  Verbal  Index 
to  all  the  Poems,  and  a  Selection 
of  Explanatory  Notes  by  Henry 
G.  Bohn.  Illustrated  with  120 
Wood  Engravings  from  Drawings 
by  W.  Harvey.  2  vols.  3;.  6d. 
each. 

MITFORD'S  (Miss)  Our  Village 
Sketches  of  Rural  Character  and 
Scenery.  With  2  Engravings  on 
Steel.    2  vols.    35.  6d.  each. 

MOLIERE'S  Dramatio  Works. 
A  new  Translation  in  English 
Prose,  by  C.  H.  Wall.  3  vols. 
3*.  6d.  each. 

MONTAGU.  The  Letters  and 
Works  of  Lady  Mary  Wortley 
Montagu.  Edited  by  her  great 
grandson,  Lord  Wharncliffe's  Edi 
tion,  and  revised  by  W.  Moy 
Thomas.  New  Edition,  revised 
with  5  Portraits.  2  vols.  5*.  each 

MONTAIGNE'S  Essays.  Cotton': 
Translation,  revised  by  W.  C 
Hazlitt.  New  Edition.  3  vols, 
3*.  6d.  each. 

MONTESQUIEU'S  Spirit  ot 
Laws.  New  Edition,  revised  and 
corrected.  By  J.  V.  Pritchard, 
A.M.    2  vols.     2s'  &d'  each. 

MO  RE'S  Utopia.  Robinson's 
translation,  with  Roper's  '  Life 
of  Sir  Thomas  More,'  and  More's 
Letters  to  Margaret  Roper  and 
others.  Edited,  with  Introduc- 
tion and  Notes,  by  George 
Sampson.     $s- 


MORPHY'S  Games  of  Chess. 
Being  the  Matches  and  best  Games 
played  by  theAmerican  Champion, 
with  Explanatory  and  Analytical 
Notes  by  J.  Lowenthal.     $s. 

MOTLEY  (J.  L.).  The  Rise  of 
the  Dutch  Republic  A  History. 
By  John  Lothrop  Motley.  New 
Edition,  with  Biographical  Intro- 
duction by  Moncure  D.  Conway. 
3  vols.    3J.  6d.  each. 

MUDIE'S  British  Birds ;  or,  His- 
tory of  the  Feathered  Tribes  of  the 
British  Islands.  Revised  by  W. 
C.  L.  Martin.  With  52  Figures 
of  Birds  and  7  Coloured  Plates  of 
Eggs.     2  vols. 

NEANDER  (Dr.  A.).  History 
of  the  Christian  Religion  and 
Church.  Trans,  from  the  German 
byJ.Torrey.    10 vols.  $s.6d.  each. 

[  Vols.  VI.  and  X.  out  of  print. 

Life  of  Jesus  Christ.  Trans- 
lated by  J.  McClintock  and  C. 
Blumenthal.     y.  6d. 

History  of  the  Planting  and 

Training  of  the  Christian 
Church  by  the  Apostles. 
Translated  by  J.  E.  Ryland. 
2  vols.     3 s.  6d.  each. 

Memorials  of  Christian  Life 

in  the  Early  and  Middle  Ages  ; 
including  Light  in  Dark  Places. 
Trans,  by  J.  E.  Ryland.     3^.  6d. 

NIBELUNGEN  LIED.  The 
Lay  of  the  Nibelungs,  metriccliy 
translated  from  the  old  German 
text  by  Alice  Horton,  and  edited 
by  Edward  Bell,  M.A.  To  which 
is  prefixed  the  Essay  on  the  Nibe- 
lungen  Lied  by  Thomas  Carlyle. 

NEW  TESTAMENT  (The)  in 
Greek.  Griesbach's  Text,  with 
various  Readings  at  the  foot  of 
the  page  and  Parallel  References 
in   the  margin  ;    also   a   Critical 


Contained  in  Bohris  Libraries. 


17 


Introduction  and  Chronological 
Tables.  By  an  eminent  Scholar, 
with  a  Greek  and  English  Lexicon. 
3rd  Edition,  revised  and  corrected. 
Two  Facsimiles  of  Greek  Manu- 
scripts.    900  pages.     5*. 

The  Lexicon  may  be  had  sepa- 
rately, price  Zf. 

NICOLINI'S  History  of  the 
Jesuits :  their  Origin,  Progress, 
Doctrines,  and  Designs.  With  8 
Portraits.     5*. 

NORTH  (R.)  Lives  of  the  Right 
Hon.  Francis  North,  Baron  Guild- 
ford, the  Hon.  Sir  Dudley  North, 
and  the  Hon.  and  Rev.  Dr.  John 
North.  By  the  Hon.  Roger 
North.  Together  with  the  Auto- 
biography of  the  Author.  Edited 
by  Augustus  Jessopp,  D.D.  3  vols. 
3-f.  6d.  each. 

NTJGENT'S  (Lord)  Memorials 
of  Hampden,  his  Party  and 
Times.  With  a  Memoir  of  the 
Author,  an  Autograph  Letter,  and 
Portrait.    5s. 

OLD  ENGLISH  CHRON- 
ICLES, including  Ethelwerd's 
Chronicle,  Asser's  Life  of  Alfred, 
Geoffrey  of  Monmouth's  British 
History,  Gildas,  Nennius,  and  the 
spurious  chronicle  of  Richard  of 
Cirencester.  Edited  by  J.  A. 
Giles,  D.CL.     5*. 

OMAN  (J.  C.)  The  Great  Indian 
Epics :  the  Stories  of  the  Rama- 
yana  and  the  Mahabharata. 
By  John  Campbell  Oman,  Prin- 
cipal of  Khalsa  College,  Amritsar. 
With  Notes,  Appendices,  and 
Illustrations.     31.  6d. 

ORDERICUS  VITALIS'  Eccle- 
siastical History  of  England 
and  Normandy.  Translated  by 
T.  Forester,  M.A.  To  which  is 
added  the  Chronicle  of  St. 
Evroult.  4  vols.  $s.  each. 
[Vols.  II.  and  IV.  out  of  print. 


OVID'S  Works,  complete.  Literally 
translated  into  Prose.  3  vols. 
5 s.  each. 

PASCAL'S  Thoughts.  Translated 
from  the  Text  of  M.  Auguste 
Molinier  by  C.  Kegan  Paul.  3rd 
Edition.    3s.  6d. 

PAULI'S  (Dr.  R.)  Life  of  Allred 
the  Great.  Translated  from  the 
German.  To  which  is  appended 
Alfred's  Anglo-Saxon  Version 
OF  Orosius.  With  a  literal 
Translation  interpaged,  Notes, 
and  an  Anglo-Saxon  Grammar 
and  Glossary,  by  B.  Thorpe.  51. 

PATJSANIAS'  Description  of 
Greece.  Newly  translated  by  A.  R. 
Shilleto,  M.A.    2  vols.    5*.  each. 

PEARSON'S  Exposition  of  the 
Creed.  Edited  by  E.  Walford, 
M.A.     5*. 

PEPYS'  Diary  and  Correspond- 
ence. Deciphered  by  the  Rev. 
J.  Smith,  M.A.,  from  the  original 
Shorthand  MS.  in  the  Pepysian 
Library.  Edited  by  Lord  Briy- 
brooke.  4  vols.  With  31  En- 
gravings.    $s.  each. 

PERCY'S  Reliques  of  Anc'ent 
English  Poetry.  With  an  Essay 
on  Ancient  Minstrels  and  a  Glos- 
sary. Edited  by  J.  V.  Pritchard, 
A.M.     2  vols.     3 s.  6d.  each. 

PERSIUS.— See  Juvenal. 

PETRARCH'S  Sonnets,  Tri- 
umphs, and  other  Poems. 
Translated  into  English  Verse  by 
various  Hands.  With  a  Life  of 
the  Poet  by  Thomas  Campbell. 
With  Portrait  and  15  Steel  En- 
gravings.    $s. 

PICKERING'S  History  of  the 
Races  of  Man.  and  their  Geo- 
graphical Distribution.    With  An 


18 


An  Alphabetical  LUt  of  Books 


Analytical  Synopsis  of  thk 
Natural  History  of  Man  by 
Dr.  Hall.  With  a  Map  of  the 
World  and  12  coloured  Plates.  5*. 

PINDAR.  Translated  into  Prose 
by  Dawson  W.  Turner.  To  which 
is  added  the  Metrical  Version  by 
Abraham  Moore.     $s. 

PLANCEE.  History  of  British 
Costume,  from  the  Earliest  Time 
to  the  Close  of  the  Eighteenth 
Century.  By  J.  R.  Planch^, 
Somerset  Herald.  With  upwards 
of  400  Illustrations.     5*. 

PLATO'S  Works.   Literally  trans- 
lated,    with     Introduction     and 
Notes.    6  vols.     $s.  each. 
I. — The   Apology  of   Socrates, 
Crito,  Phsedo,  Gor^ias,  Pro- 
tagoras, Phaedrus,  Theastetus, 
Euthyphron,  Lysis.      Trans- 
lated by  the  Rev.  H.  Carey. 
II. — The  Republic,    Timseus,   and 
Critias.  Translated  by  Henry 
Davis. 

III. — Meno,  Euthydemus,  The 
Sophist,  Statesman,  Cratylus, 
Parmenides,  and  the  Banquet. 
Translated  by  G.  Burges. 

IV. — Philebus,  Charmides,  Laches, 
Menexenus,  Hippias,  Ion, 
The  Two  Alcibiades,  The- 
ages,  Rivals,  Hipparchus, 
Minos,  Clitopho,  Epistles. 
Translated  by  G.  Burges. 
V. — The  Laws.  Translated  by 
G.  Burges. 

VI.— The  Doubtful  Works.  Trans- 
lated by  G.  Burges. 

Summary  and  Analysis  of 

the  Dialogues.  With  Analytical 
Index.     By  A.  Day,  LL.D.     5s. 

PLAUTUS'S  Comedies.  Trans- 
lated by  H.  T.  Riley,  M.A.  2 
vols.     5 s.  each. 

PUNY.  The  Letters  of  Pliny 
the  Younger.  Melmoth's  trans- 
lation, revised  by  the  Rev.  F.  C. 
T.  Bosanquet,  M.A.     51. 


PLOTINUS,  Select  Works  of. 
Translated  by  Thomas  Taylor. 
With  an  Introduction  containing 
the  substance  of  Porphyry's  Pio- 
tinus.  Edited  by  G.  R.  S.  Mead, 
B.A.,  M.R.A.S.     5*. 

PLUTARCH'S  Lives.  Translated 
by  A.  Stewart,  M.A.,  and  George 
Long,  M.A.    4  vols.   3*.  6d.  each. 

Morals.  Theosophical  Essays. 

Translated  by  C.  W.  King,  M.A. 

s*. 

Morals.      Ethical    Essays. 

Translated  by  the  Rev.  A.  R. 
Shilleto,  M.A.     $s. 

POETRY  OP  AMERICA.  Se- 
lections from  One  Hundred 
American  Poets,  from  1776  to 
1876.     By  W.  J.  Linton,     y.  6d. 

POLITICAL  CYCLOPEDIA. 
A  Dictionary  of  Political,  Con- 
stitutional, Statistical,  and  Fo- 
rensic Knowledge ;  forming  a 
Work  of  Reference  on  subjects  of 
Civil  Administration,  Political 
Economy,  Finance,  Commerce, 
Laws,  and  Social  Relations.  4 
vols.     3s.  6d.  each. 

[  Vol.  I.  out  of  print. 

POPE'S  Poetical  Works.  Edited, 
with  copious  Notes,  by  Robert 
Carruthers.  With  numerous  Illus- 
trations.    2  vols.     $s.  each. 

[  Vol.  I.  out  of  print. 

Homer's  Iliad.      Edited    by 

the  Rev.  J.  S.  Watson,  M.A. 
Illustrated  by  the  entire  Series  of 
Flaxman's  Designs.     $s. 

Homer's  Odyasey,  with  the 

Battle  of  Frogs  and  Mice,  Hymns, 
&c,  by  other  translators.  Edited 
by  the  Rev.  J.  S.  Watson,  M.A. 
With  the  entire  Series  of  Flax- 
man's  Designs.    $s. 

Life,   including   many   of  his 

Letters.  By  Robert  Carruthers. 
With  numerous  Illustrations.     $s. 


Contained  in  Bohns  Libraries. 


19 


POTJSHHIN'S  Prose  Tales:  The 
Captain's  Daughter — Doubrovsky 
—  The  Queen  of  Spades  —  An 
Amateur  Peasant  Girl — The  Shot 
— The  Snow  Storm — The  Post- 
master —  The  CofEn  Maker  — 
Kirdjali— The  Egyptian  Nights- 
Peter  the  Great's  Negro.  Trans- 
lated by  T,  Kcane.     3^.  6./. 

PRE  SCOTT'S  Conquest  of 
Meadoo.  Copyright  edition,  with 
the  notes  by  John  Foster  Kirk, 
and  an  introduction  by  G.  P. 
Winship.     3  vols.     3*.  6d.  each. 

Conquest  of  Peru.  Copyright 

edition,  with  the  notes  of  John 
Foster  Kirk.    2  vols.    31.  6d.  each. 

— —  Re'gn  of  Ferdinand  and 
Isabella.  Copyright  edition, 
with  the  notes  of  John  Foster 
Kirk.     3  vols.     31.  6d.  each. 

PROPERTIUS.  Translated  by 
Rev.  P.  J.  F.  Gantillon,  M.A., 
and  accompanied  by  Poetical 
Versions,  from  various  sources. 
p.  6d. 

PROVERBS,  Handbook  of.  Con- 
taining an  entire  Republication 
of  Ray's  Collection  of  English 
Proverbs,  with  his  additions  from 
Foreign  Languages  and  a  com- 
plete Alphabetical  Index;  in  which 
are  introduced  large  additions  as 
well  of  Proverbs  as  of  Sayings, 
Sentences,  Maxims,  and  Phrases, 
collected  by  II.  G.  Bohn.     5*. 

POTTERY  AND  PORCELAIN, 
and  other  Objects  of  Vertu.  Com- 
prising an  Illustrated  Catalogue  of 
the  Bernal  Collection  of  Works 
of  Art,  with  the  prices  at  which 
they  were  sold  by  auction,  and 
names  of  the  possessors.  To  which 
are  added,  an  Introductory  Lecture 
on  Pottery  and  Porcelain,  and  an 
Engraved  List  of  all  the  known 
Marks  and  Monograms.  By  Henry 
G.  Bohn.  With  numerous  Wood 
Engravings,  5*. ;  or  with  Coloured 
Illustrations,  10s.  6d. 


PROTJT'S  (Father)  Reliques.  Col- 
lected and  arranged  by  Rev.  F. 
Mahony.  New  issue,  with  21 
Etchings  by  D.  Maclise,  R.A. 
Nearly  600  pages.     $s. 

QTJINTILIAN'S  Institutes  of 
Oratory,  or  Education  of  an 
Orator.  Translated  by  the  Rev. 
J.  S.  Watson,  M.A.  2  vols.  5?. 
each. 

RACINE'S  (Jean)  Dramatic 
Works.  A  metrical  English  ver- 
sion. By R.  Bruce  Boswel!,  M.A. 
Oxon.     2  vols.     3.1. 6d.  each. 

RANKES  History  of  th<j  Popes, 
during  the  Last  Four  Centuries. 
Translated  by  E.  Foster.  Mrs. 
Foster's  translation  revised,  with 
considerable  additions,  by  G.  R. 
Dennis,  B.A.  3  vols.  3*.  6d.  each. 

History  of  Serria  and  the 

Servian  Resolution.  With  an 
Account  of  the  Insurrection  in 
Bosnia.  Translated  by  Mrs.  Kerr. 
3i.  6d. 

RECREATIONS  in  SHOOTING. 
By '  Craven.'  With  62  Engravings 
on  Wood  after  Harvey,  and  9 
Engravings  on  Steel,  chiefly  after 
A.  Cooper,  R.A.     $r; 

RENNIE'S  Insect  Architecture. 
Revised  and  enlarged  bv  Rev. 
J.  G.  Wood,  M.A.  With  1 86 
"Woodcut  Illustrations.     5.1. 

REYNOLDS'  (Sir  J.)  Literary 
Works.  Edited  by  H.  W.  Beecby. 
2  vols.     3*.  6d.  each. 

RICARDO  on  the  Principles  of 
Political  Economy  and  Taxa- 
tion. Edited  by  E.  C.  K.  Gonner, 
M.A.     5*. 

RICKTER  (Jean  Paul  Friedrich). 
Levana,  a  Treatise  on  Education: 
together  with  the  Autobiography 
(a  Fragment),  and  a  short  Pre- 
fatory Memoir.     3*.  &?. 


20 


Art  Alphabetical  List  of  Books 


RICHTER  (Jean  Paul  Friedrich). 
Flower,  Frvdt,  and  Thorn 
Pieces,  or  the  Wedded  Life,  Death, 
and  Marriage  of  Firmian  Stanis- 
laus Siebenkaes,  Parish  Advocate 
in  the  Parish  of  Kuhschnapptel. 
Newly  translated  by  Lt.  -Col.  Alex. 
Ewing.     3'.  6i. 

ROGER  DE  HOVEDEN'S  An- 
nals of  English  History,  com- 
prising the  History  of  England 
and  of  other  Countries  of  Europe 
from  A.  D.  732  to  A.  D.  1201. 
Translated  by  H.  T.  Riley,  M.A. 
2  vols.     5*.  each. 

ROGER  OF  WENDOVER'S 
Flowers  of  History,  comprising 
the  History  of  England  from  the 
Descent  of  the  Saxons  to  a.d. 
1235,  formerly  ascribed  to  Matthew 
Paris.  Translated  by  J.  A.  Giles, 
D.C.L.     2  vols.     5i.  each. 

[  Vol.  II.  out  of  print. 

ROME  In  the  NINETEENTH 
CENTURY.  Containing  a  com- 
plete Account  of  the  Ruins  of  the 
Ancient  City,  the  Remains  of  the 
Middle  Ages,  and  the  Monuments 
of  Modern  Times.  By  C.  A.  Eaton. 
With  34  Steel  Engravings.  2  vols. 
5 s.  each. 

See  Burn. 

ROSCOE'S  (W.)  Life  and  Ponti- 
noate  of  Leo  X.  Final  edition, 
revised  by  Thomas  Roscoe.  2 
vols.     3.;.  6(/.  each. 

Life  of  Lorenzo  de'  Medici, 

called  *  the  Magnificent.'  With 
his  poems,  letters,  <fec.  10th 
Edition,  revised,  with  Memoir  of 
Roscoe  by  his  Son.     3*.  6d. 

RUSSIA.  History  of,  from  the 
earliest  Period,  compiled  from 
the  most  authentic  sources  bv 
Walter  K.  Kelly.  With  Portraits'. 
2  vols.     2s-  &f.  each. 

SALLUST,  FLORUS.  and  VEL- 
LEIUS  PATERCULUS. 
Trans,  by  J.  S.Watson,  M.A    $s. 


SCHILLER'S  Works.  Translated 
by  various  hands.  7  vols.  35.  td. 
each : — 

I.— History  of  the  Thirty  Years' 

War. 
II. — History  of  the  Revolt  in  the 
Netherlands,  the  Trials  of 
Counts  Egmont  and  Horn, 
the  Siege  of  Antwerp,  and 
the  Disturbances  in  France 
preceding  the  Reign  of 
Henry  IV. 

III. — Don  Carlos,  Mary  Stuart, 
Maid  of  Orleans,  Bride  of 
Messina,  together  with  the 
Use  of  the  Chorus  in 
Tragedy  (a  short  Essay). 
These  Dramas  are  all 
translated  in  metre. 

IV.— Robbers  ( with  Schiller's 
original  Preface),  Fiesco, 
Love  and  Intrigue,  De- 
metrius, Ghost  Seer,  Sport 
of  Divinity. 

The    Dramas    in    this 
volume  are  translated  into 
Prose. 
V. — Poems. 

VI. — Essays,  i^Isthetical  and  Philo- 
sophical 
VII. — Wallenstein's    Camp,    Pic- 
colomini   and    Death    of 
Wallenstein,  William  Tell. 

SCHILLER  and  GOETHE. 
Correspondence  between,  from 
a.d.  1794-1805.  Translated  by 
L.  Dora  Schmitz.  2  vols.  y.  6d. 
each. 

SCHLEGEL'S  (F.)  Lectures  on 
the  Philosophy  of  Life  and  the 
Philosophy  of  Language.  Trans- 
lated by  the  Rev.  A.  J.  W.  Mor- 
rison, M.A.     3s.  6d. 

Lectures  on  the  History  of 

Literature,  Ancient  and  Modern. 
Translated  from  the  German.  31.6a. 

Lectures  on  the  Philosophy 

of  History.    Translated  by  J.  B. 
Robertson.     3;.  6d. 


Contained  in  BoJiris  Libraries. 


21 


SCHLE  GEL'S  Lectures  on 
Modern  History,  together  with 
the  Lectures  entitled  Csesar  and 
Alexander,  and  The  Beginning  of 
our  History.  Translated  by  L. 
Purcell  and  R.  II.  Whitetock. 
y.  6rf. 

./Esthetic  and  Miscellaneous 

Works.      Translated    by   E.    J. 
Millington.     3J.  6d. 

SCHLE  GEL'S  (A.  W.)  Lectures 
on  Dramatic  Art  and  Litera- 
ture. Translated  by  J.  Black. 
Revised  Edition,  by  the  Rev. 
A.  J.  W.  Morrison,  M.A.  3*.  6d. 

SCHOPENHAUER  on  the  Four- 
fold Root  of  the  Principle  of 
Sufficient  Reason,  and  On  the 
Will  in  Nature.  Translated  by 
Madame  Hillebrand.     5*. 

Essays.  Selected  and  Trans- 
lated. With  a  Biographical  Intro- 
duction and  Sketch  of  his  Philo- 
sophy, by  E.  Belfort  Bax.     55. 

SCHOTJW'S  Earth,  Plants,  and 
Man.  Translated  by  A.  Henfrey. 
With  coloured  Map  of  the  Geo- 
graphy of  Plants.     5*. 

SCHUMANN  (Robert).  His  Life 
and  Works,  by  August  Reissmann. 
Translated  by  A.  L.  Alger.   3*.  6d. 

Early  Letters.  Originally  pub- 
lished by  his  Wife.  Translated 
by  May  Herbert.  With  a  Preface 
by  Sir  George  Grove,  D.C.L. 
3*.  fcf. 

SENECA  on  Benefits.  Newly 
translated  by  A.  Stewart,  M.A. 
y.  6d. 

Minor  Essays  and  On  Clem- 
ency. Translated  by  A.  Stewart, 
M.A.     5*. 

SHAKESPEARE  DOCU- 
MENTS. Arranged  by  D.  H. 
Lambert,  B.A.     $s.  6d. 


SHAKESPEARE'S  Dramatio 
Art.  The  History  and  Character 
of  Shakespeare's  Plays.  By  Dr. 
Hermann  Ulrici.  Translated  by 
L.  Dora  Schmitz.  2  vols.  3*.  6d. 
each, 

SHAKESPEARE  (William).  A 
Literary  Biography  by  Karl  Elze, 
Ph.D.,  LL.D.  Translated  by 
L.  Dora  Schmitz.     $s. 

SHARPE  (S.)  The  History  of 
Egypt,  from  the  Earliest  Times 
till  the  Conquest  by  the  Arabs, 
A.D.  640.  By  Samuel  Sharpe, 
2  Maps  and  upwards  of  400  Illus- 
trative Woodcuts.  2  vols.  5*.  each. 

SHERDDAN'S  Dramatic  Works, 
Complete.  With  Life  by  G.  G.  S. 
y.6d. 

SISMONDI'S  History  of  the 
Literature  of  the  South  01 
Europe.  Translated  by  Thomas 
Roscoe.     2  vols.     3*.  6d.  each. 

SMITH'S  Synonyms  and  An- 
tonyms, or  Kindred  Words  and 
their  Opposites.  Revised  Edi- 
tion.    5*. 

Synonyms    Discriminated. 

A  Dictionary  of  Synonymous 
Words  in  the  English  Language, 
showing  the  Accurate  signification 
of  words  of  similar  meaning. 
Edited  by  the  Rev.  H.  Percy 
Smith,  M.A.     6s. 

SMITH'S  (Adam)  The  Wealth  of 
Nations.  Edited  by  E.  Belfort 
Bax.    2  vols.     35.  6d.  each. 

Theory  of  Moral  Sentiments. 

With  a  Memoir  of  the  Author  by 
Dugald  Stewart.     3s.  6d. 

SMYTH'S  (Professor)  Lectures 
on  Modern  History.  2  vols. 
31.  6J.  each. 

Lectures    on    the    French 

Revolution.   2  vols.   3*.  6d.  each. 

[  Vol  I.  out  of  print. 


22 


An  Alphabetical  List  of  Books 


SMITH'S  (  Pye )  Geology  and 
Scripture.     2nd  Edition.     5*. 

SMOLLETT'S  Adventures  01 
Roderick  Random.  With  short 
Memoir  and  Bibliography,  and 
Cruikshank's  Illustrations.    $s.6-J. 

Adventures    of    Peregrine 

Plokle.  With  Biblicgrr.phy  and 
Cruikshank's  Illustrations.  2  vols. 
3*.  6d.  each. 

The  Expedition  of  Hum- 
phry Clinker.  With  Bibliography 
and  Cruikshank's  Illustrations. 
y.6d. 

SOCRATES  (surnamed  'Scholas- 
ticus ').  The  Ecclesiastical  His- 
tory of  (a.  d.  305-445).  Translated 
from  the  Greek.     55. 

SOPHOCLES,  The  Tragedies  01. 
A  New  Prose  Translation,  with 
Memoir,  Notes,  &c,  by  E.  P. 
Coleridge,  M.A.     51. 

SOUTH EYS  Life  of  Nelson. 
With  Portraits,  Plans,  and  up- 
wards of  50  Engravings  on  Steel 
and  Wood.     $s. 

Life  of  Wesley,  and  the  Rise 

and  Progress  of  Methodism.     5*. 

Robert  Southey.    The  Story 

of  his  Life  written  in  his  Letters. 
Edited  by  John  Dennis.     31. 6d. 

SOZOMEN'S  Ecclesiastical  His- 
tory. Translated  from  the  Greek. 
Together  with  the  Ecclesiasti- 
cal History  of  Philostor- 
<;ius,  as  epitomised  by  Photius. 
Translated  by  Rev.  E.  Walford, 
M.A.     5.. 

SPINOZA'S  Chief  Works.  Trans- 
lated, with  Introduction, by  R.II.M. 
Elwes.     2  vols.     5-r.  each. 

STANLEY'S  Classified  Synopsis 
of  the  Principal  Painters  of  the 
Dutoh  and  Flemish  Schools. 
By  George  Stanley.     5*. 


STAUNTON'S  Chess  -  Player's 
Handbook.    $s. 

Chess  Praxis.    A  Supplement 

to  the  Chess-player's  Handbook. 
5i. 

Chess -player's  Companion. 

Comprising  a  Treatise  on  Odds, 
Collection  of  Match  Games,  and 
a  Selection  of  Original  Problems. 
5* 

Chess  Tournament  of  1851. 

With  Introduction  and  Notes.   $s. 

STOCKHARDT'S  Experimental 
Chemistry.  Edited  by  C.  W. 
Heaton,  F.C.S.     5*. 

STOWE  (Mrs.H.B.)  Uncle  Tom's 
Cabin.    Illustrated,     p.  6d. 

STRABO'S  Geography.  Trans- 
lated by  W.  Falconer,  M.A., 
and  II.  C.  Hamilton.  3  vols. 
5*.  each. 

STRICKLAND'S  (Agnes)  Lives 
of  the  Queens  of  England,  from 
the  Norman  Conquest.  Revised 
Edition.  With  6  Portraits,  6  vols. 
5.r.  each. 

Life  of  Mary  Queen  of  Scots. 

2  vols.     5 j.  each. 

Lives  of  the  Tudor  and  Stuart 

Princesses.    With  Portraits.     5*. 

STUART  and  REVETT'S  Anti- 
quities of  Athens,  and  other 
Monuments  of  Greece.  With  71 
Plates  engraved  on  Steel,  and 
numerous  Woodcut  Capitals.     $s. 

SUETONIUS'  Lives  of  theTwelve 
Caesars  and  Lives  of  the  Gram- 
marians. Thomson's  translation, 
revised  by  T.  Forester.     5*. 

SWIFT'S  Prose  Works.  Edited 
by  Temple  Scott.  With  a  Bio- 
graphical Introduction  by  the  Right 
Hon.   W.    E.    H.   Lecky,    M.P. 


Contained  in  Bohris  Libraries. 


23 


With    Portraits    and    Facsimiles. 
12  vols.     $s.  each. 
I.— A  Tale  of  a  Tub,  The  Battle 
of  the  Books,  and  other 
early  works.      Edited  by 
Temple   Scott.      With   a 
Biographical  Introduction 
by  W.  E.  H.  Lecky. 
II.— The Journalto  Stella.  Edited 
by  Frederick  Ryland,M.  A. 
With  2  Portraits  and  Fac- 
simile. 
III.&  IV. — Writings  on  Religion  and 
the  Church. 
V. — Historical   and     Political 

Tracts  (English). 
VI.— The  Drapier's   Letters. 
With  facsimiles  of  Wood's 
Coinage,  &c. 
VII.— Historical      and       Political 
Tracts  (Irish). 
VIII.— Gulliver's  Travels.      Edited 
by  G.   R.   Dennis,.  B.  A. 
With  Portrait  and  Maps. 
IX.  — Contributions  to  Periodicals. 
X. — Historical  Writings. 
XI. — Literary  Essays. 
XII.— Full     Index     and     Biblio- 
graphy,  with    Essays    on 
the  Portraits  of  Swift  by 
Sir    Frederick    Falkiner, 
and  on  the  Relations  be- 
ween    Swift    and    Stella 
by  the  Very   Rev.  Dean 
Bernard. 

TACITUS.  The  Works  of.  Liter- 
ally translated.     2  vols.    $s.  each. 

TASSO'3  Jerusalem  Delivered. 
Translated  into  English  Spenserian 
Verse  by  J.  H.  Wiffen.  With  8 
Engravings  on  Steel  and  24  Wood- 
cuts by  Thurston.     55. 

TAYLOR'S  (Bishop  Jeremy) 
Holy  Living  and  Dying.   3.5.  6d. 

TEN  BRINK.— See  Brink. 

TERENCE  and  PH7EDRUS. 
Literally  translated  by  H.  T.  Riley, 
M.A.  To  which  is  added,  Smart's 
Metrical  Version  of  Phcedrus.    $s, 


THEOCRITUS,  BION,  MOS- 
CHUS,  and  TYRTiEUS.  Liter- 
ally translated  by  the  Rev.  J. 
Banks,  M.A.  To  which  r,re  ap- 
pended the  Metrical  Versions  of 
Chapman.     $s. 

THEODORET  and  EVAGRIUS. 
Histories  of  the  Church  from  A.  D. 
332  to  A.D.  427  ;  and  from  A.D. 
431  to  A.D.  544.    Translated.     $s. 

THIERRY'S  History  of  the 
Conquest  of  England  by  the 
Normans.  Translated  by  Wil- 
liam Hazlitt.  2  vols.  3*.  6d.  each. 

THUCYDIDES.  The  Felopon- 
nesian  War.  Literally  translated 
by  the  Rev.  II.  Dale.  2  vols. 
3*.  6d.  each. 

An  Analysis  and  Summary 

of.     By  J.  T.  Wheeler.     $s- 

THUDICHUM  (J.  L.  W.)  A  Trea- 
tise on  Wines.    Illustrated.    $s. 

URE'S  (Dr.  A.)  Cotton  Manufac- 
ture of  Great  Britain.  Edited 
by  P.  L.  Simmonds.  2  vols.  5*. 
each. 

Philosophy  of  Manufactures. 

Edited  by  P.  L.  Simmonds.  Js.  6d. 

VASARI'S  Lives  of  the  most 
Eminent  Painters,  Sculptors, 
and  Architects.  Translated  by 
Mrs.  J.  Foster,  with  a  Commen- 
tary by  J.  P.  Richter,  Ph.D.  6 
vols.     3J.  6d.  each, 

VIRGIL.  A  Literal  Prose  Trans- 
lation by  A.  Hamilton  Bryce, 
LL.D.     With  Portrait.     35.  6.7. 

VOLTAIRE'S  Tales.  Translated 
by  R.  B.  Boswell.  Containing 
Bebouc,  Memnon,  Candide,  L'ln- 
g£nu,  and  other  Tales.     3.1.  67. 

WALTON'S  Complete  Angler. 
Edited  by  Edward  Jesse.  With 
Portrait  and  203  Engravings  on 
Wood  and  26  Engravings  on 
Steel.     5*. 


24 


An  Alphabetical  List  of  Books. 


WALTON'S  Lives  of  Donne, 
Hoofeer,  &o.  New  Edition  re- 
vised by  A.  H.  Bullen,  with  a 
Memoir  of  Izaak  Walton  by  Wm. 
Dowling.  With  numerous  Illus- 
trations.    5*. 

WELLINGTON,  Life  of.  By 'An 
Old  Soldier.'  From  the  materials 
of  Maxwell.  With  Index  and  18 
S'eel  Engravings.      5*. 

Victories  of.    See  Maxwell. 

WERNER'S  Templars  In 
Cyprus.  Translated  by  E. A.M. 
Lewis.     3-r.  6d. 

WESTROPP  (H.  M.)  A  Hand- 
book of  Archaeology,  Egyptian, 
Greek,  Etruscan,  Roman.  Illus- 
trated.    Sj. 

WHEATLEY'S  A  Rational  Illus- 
tration of  the  Book  of  Common 
Prayer.     3*.  dd. 

WHITE'S  Natural  History  ox 
Selborne.  With  Notes  by  Sir 
William  Jardine.  Edited  by  Ed- 
ward Jesse.  With  40  Portraits 
and  coloured  Plates.     $s. 


WIESELER'S  Chronological 
Synopsis  of  the  Four  Gospels. 
Translated  by  the  Rev.  Canon 
Venables.     3.1.  6J. 

WILLI  AM  of  MALME  SBURY  S 
Chronicle  of  the  Kings  of  Eng- 
land. Translated  by  the  Rev.  J. 
Sharpe.  Edited  by  J.  A.  Giles, 
D.C.L.     5*. 

XENOPHON'S  Works.  Trans- 
lated by  the  Rev.  J.  S.  Watson, 
M.A.,  and  the  Rev.  H.  Dale.  In 
3  vols.     $s.  each. 

YOUNG  (Arthur).  Travels  in 
France  during  the  years  1787, 
1788,  and  1789.  Edited  by 
M.  Betham  Edwards.     3-f.  6d. 

Tour  in  Ireland,  with 

General  Observations  on  the  state 
of  the  country  during  the  years 
1776  -  79.  Edited  by  A.  W. 
Hutton.  With  Complete  Biblio- 
graphy by  J.  P.  Anderson,  and 
Map.     2  vols.     3*.  6</.  each. 

YULE-TIDE  STORIES.  A  Col- 
lection of  Scandinavian  and  North- 
German  Popular  Tales  and  Tra- 
ditions.   Edited  by  B.  Thorpe.  5*. 


BOHN'S  LIBRARIES. 


A  SPECIAL  OFFER. 

MESSRS.  BELL  have  made  arrangements  to  supply  selections 
of  100  or  50  volumes  from  these  famous  Libraries,  for  ^11  11s.  or 
£(}  C>s.  net  respectively.  The  volumes  may  be  selected  without 
any  restriction  from  the  full  List  of  the  Libraries,  now  numbering 
nearly  800  volumes. 

WRITE   FOR  FULL   PARTICULARS. 


THE  YORK    LIBRARY 

A  NEW  SERIES  OF  REPRINTS  ON  THIN  PAPER. 

With  specially  designed  title-pages,  binding,  and  endpapers. 

Fcap.  8vo.  in  cloth,  2S.  net  ; 
In  leather,  3s.  net. 

'  The  York  Library  is  noticeable  by  reason  of  the  wisdom  and  intelli- 
gence displayed  in  the  choice  of  unhackneyed  classics.  ...  A  most 
attractive  series  of  reprints.  .  .  .  The  size  and  style  of  the  volumes  are 
exactly  what  they  should  be.' — Bookman. 

The  following  volumes  are  now  ready  : 

CHARLOTTE  BRONTE'S  JANE  EYRE. 

BURNEY'S  EVELINA.  Edited,  with  an  Introduction  and 
Notes,  by  Annie  Raine  Ellis. 

BURNEY'S  CECILIA.    Edited  by  Annie  Raine  Ellis.  2  vols. 

BURTON'S  ANATOMY  OF  MELANCHOLY.  Edited  by  the 
Rev.  A.  R.  Shilleto,  M.A.,  with  Introduction  by  A.  H.  Bullen.  3  vols. 

BURTON'S  (SIR  RICHARD)  PILGRIMAGE  TO  AL- 
MADINAH  AND  MECCAH.     With  Introduction  by  Stanley  Lane- 

POOLE.       2  VOlS. 

CALVERLEY.     THE   IDYLLS   OF  THEOCRITUS,  with  the 

Eclogues  of  Virgil.     Translated  into  English  Verse  by  C.  S.  Calverley. 
With  an  Introduction  by  R.  Y.  Tyrrell,  Litt.D. 

CERVANTES'  DON  QUIXOTE.  Motteux's  Translation,  re- 
vised.   With  Lockhart's  Life  and  Notes.     2  vols. 

CLASSIC  TALES  :  Johnson's  Rasselas,  Goldsmith's  Vicar 
of  Wakefield,  Sterne's  Sentimental  Journey,  Walpole's 
Castle  of  Otranto.     With  Introduction  by  C.  S.  Fearenside,  M.A. 

COLERIDGE'S  AIDS  TO  REFLECTION,  and  the  Confessions 

of  an  Inquiring  Spirit. 

COLERIDGE'S  FRIEND.  A  series  of  Essays  on  Morals, 
Politics,  and  Religion. 

COLERIDGE'S  TABLE  TALK  AND  OMNIANA.  Arranged 
and  Edited  by  T.  Ashe,  B.A. 

COLERIDGE'S  LECTURES  AND  NOTES  ON  SHAKE- 
SPEARE, and  other  English  Poets.     Edited  by  T.  ASHtt,  B.A. 

DRAPER'S  HISTORY  OF  THE  INTELLECTUAL  DE- 
VELOPMENT OF  EUROPE.    2  vols. 

EBERS'  AN  EGYPTIAN  PRINCESS.  Translated  by  E.  S. 
Buchheim. 

GEORGE  ELIOT'S  ADAM  BEDE. 

EMERSON'S  WORKS.  A  new  edition  in  5  volumes,  with  the 
Text  edited  and  collated  by  George  Sampson. 

FIELDING'S  TOM  JONES  (2  vols.),  AMELIA  (1  vol.),  JOSEPH 

ANDREWS  ( 1  vol.). 

GASKELL'S  SYLVIA'S  LOVERS. 


The  York  Library— continued, 

GESTA  ROMANORUM,  or  Entertaining  Moral  Stories  in- 
vented by  the  Monks.  Translated  from  the  Latin  by  the  Rev.  Charles 
SWAN.     Revised  edition,  by  Wynnard  Hooper,  M.A. 

GOETHE'S  FAUST.  Translated  by  Anna  Swanwick,  LL.D. 
Revised  edition,  with  an  Introduction  and  Bibliography  by  Karl  Breul, 
Litt.D.,  Ph.D. 

GOETHE'S  POETRY  AND  TRUTH  FROM  MY  OWN  LIFE. 
Translated  by  M.  Steele-Smith,  with  Introduction  and  Bibliography  by 
Karl  Breul,  Litt.D. 

HAWTHORNE'S  TRANSFORMATION  (The  Marble  Faun). 

HOOPER'S  WATERLOO  :  THE  DOWNFALL  OF  THE 
FIRST  NAPOLEON.     With  Maps  and  Plans. 

IRVING'S  SKETCH  BOOK. 

IRVING'S  BRACEBRIDGE  HALL,  OR  THE  HUMOURISTS. 

JAMESON'S    SHAKESPEARE'S    HEROINES. 

LAMB'S  ESSAYS.  Including  the  Essays  of  Elia,  Last  Essays 
of  Elia,  and  Eliana. 

MARCUS   AURELIUS    ANTONINUS,   THE    THOUGHTS 

OF.      Translated  by  George  Long,   M.A.      With  an  Essay  on  Marcus 
Aurelius  by  Matthew  Arnold. 

MARRYATS  MR.  MIDSHIPMAN  EASY.  With  8  Illustra- 
trations.     i  vol.     PETER  SIMPLE.     With  8  Illustrations,     i  vol. 

MIGNETS  HISTORY  OF  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION, 
from  1789  to  1814. 

MONTAIGNE'S  ESSAYS.  Cotton's  translation.  Revised  by 
W.  C.  Hazlitt.     3  vols. 

MOTLEYS  RISE  OF  THE  DUTCH  REPUBLIC.  With  a 
Biographical  Introduction  by  Moncure  D.  Conway.    3  vols. 

PASCAL'S  THOUGHTS.  Translated  from  the  Text  of  M. 
Auguste  Molinier  by  C.  Kegan  Paul.     Third  edition. 

PLUTARCH'S  LIVES.  Translated,  with  Notes  and  a  Life  by 
Aubrey  Stewart,  M.A.,  and  George  Long,  M.A.    4  vols. 

RANKE'S  HISTORY  OF  THE  POPES,  during  the  Last  Four 
Centuries.     Mrs.  Foster's  translation.    Revised  by  G.  R.  Dennis.    3  vols. 

SWIFT'S  GULLIVER'S  TRAVELS.  Edited,  with  Introduction 
and  Notes,  by  G.  R.  Dennis,  with  facsimiles  of  the  original  illustrations. 

SWIFT'S  JOURNAL  TO  STELLA.  Edited,  with  Introduction 
and  Notes,  by  F.  Ryland,  M.A. 

TROLLOPE'S  BARSETSHIRE  NOVELS.— THE  WARDEN 
(1  vol.),  BARCHESTER  TOWERS  (1  vol.),  DR.  THORNE  (1  vol.), 
FRAMLEY  PARSONAGE  (1  vol.),  SMALL  HOUSE  AT  ALLING- 
TON  (2  vols.),  LAST  CHRONICLE  OF  BARSET  (2  vols.). 

VOLTAIRE'S  ZADIG  AND  OTHER  TALES.  Translated  by 
R.  Bruce  Boswell. 

ARTHUR  YOUNG'S  TRAVELS  IN  FRANCE,  during  the 
years  1787,  1788,  and  1789.  Edited  with  Introduction  and  Notes,  by  M. 
Betham  Edwards. 

Othet  Volumes  are  in  Preparation. 


MASTERS 

OF 

LITERATURE 

Croivn  8vo.  $s.  6d.  net. 


THIS  Series  aims  at  giving  in  a  handy  volume  the 
finest  passages  from  the  writings  of  the  greatest  authors. 
Each  volume  is  edited  by  a  well-known  scholar,  and 
contains  representative  selections  connected  by  editorial 
comments.  The  Editor  also  contributes  a  lengthy 
Introduction,  biographical  and  literary.  A  Portrait 
will  be  included  in  each  volume. 


First  List  of  Volumes  : 
SCOTT.     By  Professor  A.  J.   Grant. 
THACKERAY.     By  G.   K.  Chesterton. 
FIELDING.     By  Professor  Saintsbury. 
CARLYLE.     By  the  Rev.  A.   W.  Evans. 
DEFOE.     By  John  Masefield. 
DICKENS.     By  Thomas  Seccombe. 
DE  QUINCEY.     By  Sidney  Low. 
EMERSON.     By  G.   H.   Perris. 
HAZLITT.     By  E.  V.  Lucas. 
STERNE.     By  Dr.  Sidney  Lee. 


BELL'S   HANDBOOKS 


OF 


THE    GREAT    MASTERS 

IN   PAINTING  AND  SCULPTURE. 

Edited  by  G.  C.  WILLIAMSON,  Litt.D. 

NEW  AND  CHEAPER  REISSUE. 

Post  8vo.  With  40  Illustrations  and  Photogravure  Frontispiece.  3*.  6d.  net  each. 


TTie  following  Volumes  have  been  issued  : 
BOTTICELLI.     By  A.  Streeter.    2nd  Edition. 
BRUNELLESCHI.    By  Leader  Scott. 
CORREGGIO.     By  Selwyn  Brinton,  M.A.     2nd  Edition. 
CARLO    CRIVELLI.      By  G.  McNeil  Rushforth,  M.A. 
DELLA  ROBBIA.     By  the  Marchesa  Burlamacchi.    2nd  Edition. 
ANDREA  DEL  SARTO.     By  H.  Guinness.    2nd  Edition. 
DONATELLO.    By  Hope  Rea.     2nd  Edition. 
GERARD  DOU.     By  Dr.  W.  Martin.     Translated  by  Clara  Bell. 
GAUDENZIO  FERRARI.     By  Ethel  Halsey. 
FRANCIA.     By  George  C.  Williamson,  Litt.D. 
GIORGIONE.    By  Herbebt  Cook,  M.A. 
GIOTTO.    By  F.  Mason  Perkins. 
FRANS  HALS.     By  Gerald  S.  Davies,  M.A. 

BERNARDINO  LUINI.  By  George  C.  Williamson,  Litt.D.   3rd  Edition. 
LEONARDO  DA  VINCI.     By  Edward  McCurdy,  M.A. 
MANTEGNA.     By  Maud  Cruttwell. 
MEMLINC.    By  W.  H.  James  Weale. 
MICHEL  ANGELO.     By  Lord  Ronald  Sutherland  Gower,   M.A., 

F.S.A. 
PERUGItfO.    By  G  C.  Williamson,  Litt.D.    2nd  Edition. 
PIERO  DELLA  FRANCESCA.     By  W.  G.  Waters,  M.A. 
PINTORICCHIO.    By  Evelyn  March  Phillipps. 
RAPHAEL.    By  H.  Strachey.    2nd  Edition. 
REMBRANDT.     By  Malcolm  Bell.    2nd  Edition. 
RUBENS.     By  Hope  Rea. 

LUCA  SIGNORELLI.    By  Maud  Cruttwell.    2nd  Edition. 
SODOMA.    By  the  Contessa  Lorenzo  Priuli-Bon. 
TINTORETTO.    By  J.  B.  Stoughton  Holborn,  M.A. 
VAN  DYCK.     By  Lionel  Cust,  M.V.O.,  F.S.A. 
VELASQUEZ.    By  R.  A.  M.  Stevenson.    3rd  Edition. 
WATTEAU.     By  Edgcumbe  Staley,  B.A. 
WILKIE.    By  Lord  Ronald  Sutherland  Gower,  M.A.,  F.S.A. 
Write  for  Illustrated  Prosfecfus. 


29 


New  Editions,  foap.  8vo.  2*.  &d.  each  net. 

THE    ALDINE    EDITION 

OF   THB 

BRITISH     POETS. 

'This  excellent  edition  of  the  English  classics,  with  their  complete  texts  and 
scholarly  introductions,  are  something  very  different  from  the  cheap  volumes  of 
extracts  which  aro  just  now  so  much  too  common.' — St.  James's  Gazette. 

'  An  excellent  series.    Small,  handy,  and  complote.'— Saturday  Beview. 


Blake.    Edited  by  W.  M.  Rossetti. 

Burns.  Edited  by  G.  A.  Aitken. 
3  vols. 

Butler.    Edited  by  R.  B.  Johnson. 

2  vols. 

Campbell.  Edited  by  His  Son- 
in-law,  the  Rev.  A.  W.  Hill.  With 
Memoir  by  W.  Allingham. 

Ohatterton.  Edited  by  the  Rev. 
W.  W.  Bkeat,  M.A.    2  vols. 

Chaucer.  Edited  by  Dr.  R.  Morris, 
with  Memoir  by  Sir  H.  Nicolas.  6  vols. 

Churchill.  Edited  by  Jas,  Hannay. 

2  vols. 

Coleridge.     Edited  by    T.  Ashe, 

B.A.    2  vols. 

Collins.       Edited    by    W.    Moy 

Thomas. 

Cowper.    Edited  by  John  Brace, 

F.S.A.    3  vols. 

Dry  den.    Edited  by  the  Rev.  R. 

Hooper,  M.A.    5  vols. 

Goldsmith.  Revised  Edition  by 
Austin  Dobson.    With  Portrait, 

Gray.     Edited  by  J.  Bradshsw, 

LL.D. 

Herbert.    Edited  by  the  Rev.  A.  B. 

Orosart. 

Herrlok.       Edited    by     George 

Saintsbury.    2  vols. 

Keats.    Edited  by  the  late  Lord 

Houghton. 

Kirke    White.      Edited,    with    a 

Mamoir,  by  Sir  H.  Nicolas. 


Milton.  Edited  by  Dr.  Bradshaw. 
2  vols. 

Parnell.    Edited  by  G.  A.  Aitken. 

Pope.     Edited  by  G.  R.  Dennis. 

With  Memoir  by  John  Dennis.    3  vols. 

Prior.    Edited  by  R.  B.  Johnson. 

2  vols. 

Raleigh  and  Wotton.  With  Se- 
lections from  the  Writings  of  other 
COURTLY  POETS  from  1540  to  1650. 
Edited  by  Ven.  Archdeacon  Hannah, 
D.O.L. 

Rogers.    Edited  by  Edward  Bell, 

M.A. 

Scott.  Edited  by  John  Dennis. 
5  rols. 

Shakespeare's  Poems.    Edited  by 

Rev.  A.  Dyce. 

Shelley.  Edited  by  H.  Buxton 
Forman.    5  vols. 

Spenser.  Edited  by  J.  Payne  Col- 
lier.   5  vols. 

Surrey.    Edited  by  J.  Yeowell. 

Swift  Edited  by  the  Rev.  J. 
Mitford.    3  vols. 

Thomson.    Edited  by  the  Rev.  D. 

C.  Tovoy.    2  vols. 
V  a  u  g  h  a  n.    Sacred  Poems  and 

Pious  Ejaculations.      Edited   by  the 

Rev.  H.Lyte. 

Wordsworth.      Edited    by  Prof. 

Dowden.    7  vols. 

Wyatt.    Edited  by  J.  Yeowell. 

Young  2  vols.  Edited  by  the 
Rev.  J.  Mitford, 


THE    ALL-ENGLAND    SERIES. 

HANDBOOKS  OF  ATHLETIC   GAMES. 

•  The  best  instruction  on  games  and  sports  by  the  best  authorities,  at  the  lowest 
prices.' — Oxford  Magazine. 

Small  8vo.  cloth,  Illustrated.    Price  Is.  each. 

Cricket.    By  Fred  C.  Holland.       [  Fencing.    By  H.A.  Colmorz  Dusn. 

Cricket.    By  the  Hon.  and  Bev.  |  Cycling.  ByH.H.  Grotto, L.A.C., 


E.  LYTTEirroir. 
Croquet.    By  Lient.-Col.  the  Hon. 

H.  C.  Needham. 
Lawn    Tennis.      By    H.  W.   W. 

Wilberforce.     With  a  Chapter  tor 

Ladies,  by  Mrs.  Hillyard. 
Squash  Tennis.    Ey  Eusiace  H. 

Miles.    Double  vol.    2s. 
Tennis  and  Rackets  and  Fives. 

By  Julian  Marshall,  Major  J.  Spews, 

and  Rev.  J.  A.  Ark  aw  Tait. 
Golf.      By    H.    S.    C.    Everard. 

Double  vol.    2s. 
Rowing  and  Sculling.     By  Got 

Rixos. 
Rowing  and  Sculling.    By  W.  B. 

WOODSATE. 

Sailing.  By  E .  F.  Knioht,  dbl.vol.  2». 
Swimming.    By  Martin  and  J. 

Racsteb  Cobbett. 
Camping  out.    By  A.  A.  Macdon- 

ell.    Double  vol.    2s. 
Canoeing.    By  Dr.  J.  D.  Haywabd. 

Double  vol.    2s. 
Mountaineering.     By  Dr.  Claude 

Wilson.    Double  vol.    2s. 
Athletics.    By  H.  H.  Griffin. 
Riding.     By   W.  A.  Kerr,    V.C. 

Double  vol.    2s. 
Ladies' Riding.  By  W. A. Kerr, V.C. 
Boxina.   By  R.  G.  Allanson-Winn. 
With  Prefatory  Note  by  Bat  Mullins. 


N.C.U.,    O.T.C.    With  a  Chapter  for 
Ladies,  by  MiBs  Agses  Wood.   Double 
vol.    2s. 
Wrestling.     By  Walter  Arm- 

strong.    New  Edition. 

Broadsword     and     Singlestick. 

By  R.  G.  Allanson-Winn  and  C.  Phil- 

LIPPS-WOLLBY. 

Gymnastics.     By  A.  F.  Jenkin. 

Double  vol.  2s. 

Gymnastlo  Competition  and  Dis- 

play  Exercises.     Compiled  by 

F.  Graf. 
Indian  Clubs.    By  G.  T.  B.  Cob- 
bett and  A.  F.  Jenkin. 
Dumb-be31s.    By  F.  Graf. 
Football  —  Rugby    Game.      By 

Harry  Vassall. 
Football — Association  Game.  By 

0.  W.  Alcock.    Revised  Edition. 
Hookey.      By    F.    S.    Creswell. 

New  Edition. 
Skating.     By     Douglas     Adams. 

With  a  Chapter  for  Ladies,  by  Miss  L. 

Cheetham,  and  a  Chapter  on  Speed 

Skating,  by  a  Fen  8kater.   Dbl.  vol.  2s. 
Baseball.    By  Newton  Crane. 
Rounders,  Fleldball,  Bowls, 

Quoits,   Curling,  Skittles,    &o. 

By  J.  M.  Walker  and  0.  0.  Mora. 
Dancing.      By   Edward   Scott. 

Double  vol.    2s. 


THE    CLUB    SERIES    OF    CARD    AND    TABLE    GAMES'. 
'  No  well-regulated  club  or  country  house  should  be  without  this  useful  series  of 


books.' — Globe. 


Small  8vo.  cloth,  Illustrated.     Price  Is.  each. 


Bridge.    By 'Templar.' 
Whist.    By  Dr.  Wm.  Pole,  F.B.S. 
Solo  Whist.  By  Robert  F.  Green. 
Billiards.     By  Major-Gen.  A.  W. 

Dratson,  F.R.A.S.     With  a  Preface 

by  W.  J.  Peall. 

Hints    on   Billiards.      By  J.  P. 

Buchanan".    Double  vol.    2s. 
Chess.    By  Robert  F.  Green, 
The  Two-Move  Chess  Problem. 

By  B.  G.  Laws. 
Chess  Openings.  By  I.  Gunsbebo. 
Draughts  and  Backgammon. 

By  '  Br.RKEir.Y.* 
Reversi  and  Go  Bang. 

By  '  BxXEX 


Dominoes  and  Solitaire. 

By  '  Berkeley. ' 
Besique  and  Cribbage. 

By '  Berkeley.' 
Ecarte  and  Euohre. 

By '  Berkeley.' 
Piquet  and  Rubicon  Piquet. 

By  '  Berkeley.' 
Skat.     By  Louis  Diehl. 

***  A  Skat  Scoring-book.    Is. 

Round  Games,  including  Poker, 
Napoleon,  Loo,  Vingt-et-un,  &c.  By 
Baxter-  Wray. 

Parlour  and  Playground  G  arasa. 
By  Mr?.  LArr.SNCK  Gojjxs. 


BELL'S   CATHEDRAL  SERIES. 

Profusely  Illustrated,  cloth,  crown  Zvo.   is.  6d.  net  each. 

ENGLISH  CATHEDRALS.  An  Itinerary  and  Description.  Compiled  by  James  G. 
Gilchrist,  A.M.,  M.D.  Revised  and  edited  with  an  Introduction  on  Cathedral 
Architecture  by  the  Rev.  T.  Perkins,  M.A.,  F.R.A.S. 

BANGOR.    By  P.  B.  Ironside  Bax. 

BRISTOL.    By  H.  J.  L.  J.  Ma<=se,  M.A. 

CANTERBURY.     By  Hartley  Withers.    5th  Edition. 

CARLISLE.    By  C.  King  Eley. 

CHESTER.     By  Charles  Hiatt.     3rd  Edition. 

CHICHESTER.     By  H.  C.  Corlette,  A.R.I.B.A.     2nd  Edition. 

DURHAM.    By  J.  E.  Bygate,  A.R.CA.    3rd  Edition. 

ELY.     By  Rev.  W.  D.  Swketing,  M.A.     2nd  Edition. 

EXETER.     By  Percy  Addleskaw,  B.A.     2nd  Edition,  revised. 

GLOUCESTER.     By  H.  J.  L.  J.  Masse,  M.A.     3rd  Edition. 

HEREFORD.     By  A.  Hugh  Fifher,  A.R.E.     2nd  Edition,  revised. 

LICHFIELD.     By  A.  B.  Clifton.    2nd  Edition. 

LINCOLN.     By  A.  F.  Kendrick,  B.A.     3rd  Edition. 

LLANDAFF.     By  E.  C.  Morgan  Wii.lmott,  A.R.I  B.A. 

MANCHESTER.     By  Rev.  T.  Perkins,  M.A. 

NORWICH.     By  C.  H.  B.  Qcennell.     2nd  Edition. 

OXFORD.     By  Rev.  Percy  Dearmer,  M.A.     2nd  Edition,  revised. 

PETERBOROUGH.     By  Rev.  W.  D.  Sweeting.    2nd  Edition,  revised. 

RIPON.     By  Cecil  Hallett,  B.A. 

ROCHESTER.     By  G.  H.  Palmer,  B.A.    2nd  Edition,  revised. 

ST.  ALBANS.    By  Rev.  T.  Perkins,  M.A. 

ST.  ASAPH.     By  P.  B.  Ironside  Bax. 

ST.  DAVID'S.     By  Philip  Robson,  A.R.I.B.A. 

ST.  PATRICK'S,  DUBLIN.    By  Rev.  J.  H.  Bernard,  M.A.,  D.D.    2nd  Edition. 

ST.  PAUL'S.     By  Rev.  Arthu-r  Dimock,  M.A.     3rd  Edition,  revised. 

ST.  SAVIOUR'S,  SOUTHWARK.    By  George  Worley. 

SALISBURY.    By  Gleeson  White.    3rd  Edition,  revised. 

SOUTHWELL.    By  Rev.  Arthur  Dimock,  M.A.    2nd  Edition,  revised. 

WELLS.    By  Rev.  Percy  Dearmer,  M.A.    3rd  Edition. 

WINCHESTER.     By  P.  W.  Sergeant.     3rd  Edition. 

WORCESTER.     By  E.  F.  Strange,    and  Edition. 

YORK.    By  A.  Clutton-Brock,  M.A.    3rd  Edition. 

Uniform  with  above  Series.    Now  ready,     is.  6d.  net  each. 
ST.    MARTIN'S    CHURCH,    CANTERBURY.      By  the   Rev.   Canon    Routledgb. 

M.A.,  F.S.A. 
BEVERLEY  MINSTER.      By  Charles  Hiatt. 
WIMBORNE    MINSTER    and    CHRISTCHURCH    PRIORY.      By    the    Rev.   T. 

Perkins,  M.A. 
TEWKESBURY  ABBEY  AND  DEERHURST  PRIORY.   By  H.  J.  L.  J.  Masse,  M.A. 
BATH  ABBEY,  MALMESBURY  ABBEY,  and  BRADFORD-ON-AVON  CHURCH. 

By  Rev.  T.  Perkins,  M.A. 
WESTMINSTER  ABBEY.    Bv  Charles  Hiatt. 
THE  TEMPLE  CHURCH.     By  George  Worley. 
ST.  BARTHOLOMEWS,  SMITHFIELD.     By  George  Worley. 
STRATFORD-ON-AVON  CHURCH.     By  Harold  Baker. 

BELL'S    HANDBOOKS    TO    CONTINENTAL    CHURCHES. 

Profusely  Illustrated.     Crown  8vo,  clot  A,  2s.  6d.  net  each. 
AMIENS.    By  the  Rev.  T.  Perkins,  M.A. 
BAYEUX.     By  the  Rev.  R.  S.  Mylne. 

CHARTRES  :  The  Cathedral  and  Other  Churches.    By  H.  J.  L.  J.  Massk,  M.A. 
MONT  ST.  MICHEL.    By  H.  J.  L.  J.  Masse,  M.A. 
PARIS  (NOTRE-DAME).    By  Charles  Hiatt. 
ROUEN  :  The  Cathedral  and  Other  Churches.  By  the  Rev.  T.  Perk::.-- 


The  Best  Practical  Working  Dictionary  of  the 
English  Language. 

WEBSTER'S 

INTERNATIONAL 

DICTIONARY. 

2348  PAGES.       5000  ILLUSTRATIONS. 

NEW  EDITION,  REVISED  THROUGHOUT  WITH  A 

NEW  SUPPLEMENT  OF  25,000  ADDITIONAL 

WORDS  AND  PHRASES. 


The  Appendices  comprise  a  Pronouncing' Gazetteer  of  the  World, 
Vocabularies  of  Scripture,  Greek,  Latin,  and  English  Proper  Names, 
a  Dictionary  of  the  Noted  Names  of  Fiction,  a  Brief  History  of  the 
English  Language,  a  Dictionary  of  Foreign  Quotations,  Words,  Phrases, 
Proverbs,  &c,  a  Biographical  Dictionary  with  1 0,000  names,  &c,  &c. 


Dr.  MURRAY,  Editor  of  tlu  '  Oxford  English  Dictionary,!  says  :— '  In  this  its 
latest  form,  and  with  its  large  Supplement  and  numerous  appendices,  it  is  a  wonderful 
volume,  which  well  maintains  its  ground  against  all  rivals  on  its  own  lines.  The  '  defini- 
tions,' or  more  properly,  '  explanations  of  meaning '  in  '  Webster'  have  always  struck  me 
as  particularly  terse  and  well-put ;  and  it  is  hard  to  see  how  anything  better  could  be 
done  within  the  limits.' 

Professor  JOSEPH  WRIGHT,  M.A.,  Ph.D.,  D.C.L.,  LL.D.,  Editor  of 
the  '  English  Dialed  Dictionary,'  says  : — '  The  new  edition  of  "  Webster's  International 
Dictionary  "  is  undoubtedly  the  most  useful  and  reliable  work  of  its  kind  in  any  country. 
No  one  who  has  not  examined  the  work  carefully  would  believe  that  such  a  vast  amount 
of  lexicographical  information  could  possibly  be  found  within  so  small  a  compass." 

Rev.  JOSEPH  WOOD,  D.D.,  Head  Master  of  Harrow,  says  :— '  I  have  always 
thought  very  highly  of  its  merits.  Indeed,  I  consider  it  to  be  far  the  most  accurate 
Knelish  Dictionary  in  existence,  and  much  more  reliable  than  the  "Century."  For 
daily  and  hourly  reference,  "  Webster  "  seems  to  me  unrivalled." 

Prospectuses,  with  Prices  and  Specimen  Pages,  on  Application. 


WEBSTER'S  COLLEGIATE   DICTIONARY. 

The  Largest  and  Latest  Abridgment  of  'The  International. 
Full  particulars  on  application. 


LONDON  :  GEORGE  BELL  <5r*  SONS,  YORK  HOUSE, 

PORTUGAL  STREET,  W.C. 

50,000.  S.  &  S.  7.09. 


\  X       WAY 

25 

■1981 

V 


PLEASE  DO  NOT  REMOVE 
CARDS  OR  SLIPS  FROM  THIS  POCKET 

UNIVERSITY  OF  TORONTO  LIBRARY