Reisebilder

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Title:     Reisebilder
Author: Heinrich Heine [More Titles by Heine]

IDEAS, OR THE BOOK LE GRAND.

[The Ideas, of which the chief portion is here presented, was published in 1826 in the second volume of the Reisebilder, or Travel-Pictures. The German title has been retained, as Heine himself retained it in the French translation. The translation here given is founded on Mr. Leland's; it has been carefully revised.]

CHAPTER I.

She was lovable, and he loved her. But he was not lovable, and she did not love him.--Old Play.

Madame, do you know the old play? It is quite an extraordinary play, only a little too melancholy. I once played the leading part in it myself, so that all the ladies wept; only one did not weep, not even a single tear, and that was the point of the play, the whole catastrophe.

Oh, that single tear! it still torments my thoughts. When Satan wishes to ruin my soul, he hums in my ear a ballad of that unwept tear, a deadly song with a more deadly tune. Ah! such a tune is only heard in Hell!

You can readily form an idea, Madame, of what life is like in Heaven, the more readily as you are married. There people amuse themselves altogether superbly, every sort of entertainment is provided, and one lives in mere desire and delight. One eats from morning to night, and the cookery is as good as Jagor's; roast geese fly round with gravy-boats in their bills, and feel flattered if any one eats them; tarts gleaming with butter grow wild like sunflowers; everywhere there are brooks of bouillon and champagne, everywhere trees on which napkins flutter, and you eat and wipe your lips and eat again without injury to your stomach; you sing psalms, or flirt and joke with the dear, delicate little angels, or take a walk on the green Hallelujah-Meadow, and your white flowing garments fit very comfortably, and nothing disturbs the feeling of blessedness, no pain, no vexation--even when one accidentally treads on another's corns and exclaims, "Excusez!" he smiles as if enraptured, and assures, "Thy foot, brother, did not hurt in the least, quite au contraire, a deeper thrill of heavenly rapture shoots through my heart!"

But of Hell, Madame, you have no idea. Of all the devils you know, perhaps, only the little Amor, the pretty Croupier of Hell, Beelzebub, and you know him only from Don Juan, and doubtless think that for such a betrayer of innocence Hell can never be made hot enough, though our praiseworthy theatre directors spend upon him as much flame, fiery rain, powder, and colophonium as any Christian could desire in Hell.

But things in Hell look much worse than our theatre directors know, or they would not bring out so many bad plays. For in Hell it is infernally hot, and when I was there, in the dog-days, it was past endurance. Madame, you can have no idea of Hell! We have very few official returns from that place. Still, it is rank calumny to say that down there all the poor souls are compelled to read, the whole day long, all the dull sermons that are printed on earth. Bad as Hell is, it has not come to that; Satan will never invent such refinements of torture. On the other hand, Dante's description is too mild on the whole, too poetic. Hell appeared to me like a great kitchen, with an endlessly long stove, on which stood three rows of iron pots, and in these sat the damned, and were cooked. In one row were placed Christian sinners, and, incredible as it may seem, their number was anything but small, and the devils poked the fire up under them with especial good-will. In the next row were Jews, who continually screamed and cried, and were occasionally mocked by the fiends, which sometimes seemed very amusing, as, for instance, when a fat, wheezy old pawnbroker complained of the heat, and a little devil poured several buckets of cold water on his head, that he might realise what a refreshing benefit baptism was. In the third row sat the heathen, who, like the Jews, could take no part in salvation, and must burn forever. I heard one of these, as a burly devil put fresh coals under his kettle, cry out from his pot, "Spare me! I was Socrates, the wisest of mortals. I taught Truth and Justice, and sacrificed my life for Virtue." But the stupid, burly devil went on with his work, and grumbled, "Oh, shut up, there! All heathens must burn, and we can't make an exception for the sake of a single man." I assure you, Madame, the heat was terrible, with such a screaming, sighing, groaning, quacking, grunting, squealing--and through all these terrible sounds rang distinctly the deadly tune of the song of the unwept tear.


CHAPTER II.

"She was lovable, and he loved her. But he was not lovable, and she did not love him."--Old Play.

Madame! that old play is a tragedy, though the hero in it is neither killed nor commits suicide. The eyes of the heroine are beautiful--very beautiful--Madame, do you smell the perfume of violets?--very beautiful, and yet so piercing that they struck like poignards of glass through my heart and probably came out through my back--and yet I was not killed by those treacherous, murderous eyes. The voice of the heroine was also sweet--Madame, did you hear a nightingale just then?--a soft, silken voice, a sweet web of the sunniest tones, and my soul was entangled in it, and choked and tormented itself. I myself--it is the Count of Ganges who now speaks, and the story goes on in Venice--I myself soon had enough of these tortures, and had thoughts of putting an end to the play in the first act, and of shooting myself through the head, fool's-cap and all. I went to a fancy shop in the Via Burstah, where I saw a pair of beautiful pistols in a case--I remember them perfectly well--near them stood many pleasant playthings of mother-of-pearl and gold, steel hearts on gilt chains, porcelain cups with delicate devices, and snuff-boxes with pretty pictures, such as the divine history of Susannah, the Swan Song of Leda, the Rape of the Sabines, Lucretia, a fat, virtuous creature, with naked bosom, in which she was lazily sticking a dagger; the late Bethmann, la belle Ferronière--all enrapturing faces--but I bought the pistols without much ado, and then I bought balls, then powder, and then I went to the restaurant of Signor Somebody, and ordered oysters and a glass of Hock.

I could eat nothing, and still less could I drink. The warm tears fell in the glass, and in that glass I saw my dear home, the holy, blue Ganges, the ever-gleaming Himalaya, the giant banyan woods, amid whose broad arcades calmly wandered wise elephants and white-robed pilgrims, strange dream-like flowers gazed on me with meaning glance, wondrous golden birds sang wildly, flashing sun-rays and the sweet, silly chatter of monkeys pleasantly mocked me, from far pagodas sounded the pious prayers of priests, and amid all rang the melting, wailing voice of the Sultana of Delhi--she ran impetuously around in her carpeted chamber, she tore her silver veil, with her peacock fan she struck the black slave to the ground, she wept, she raged, she cried. I could not, however, hear what she said; the restaurant of Signor Somebody is three thousand miles distant from the Harem of Delhi, besides the fair Sultana had been dead three thousand years--and I quickly drank up the wine, the clear, joy-giving wine, and yet my soul grew darker and sadder--I was condemned to death.

As I left the restaurant I heard the "bell of poor sinners" ring, a crowd of people swept by me; but I placed myself at the corner of the Strada San Giovanni, and recited the following monologue:--


"In ancient tales they tell of golden castles,
Where harps are sounding, lovely ladies dance,
And gay attendants gleam, and jessamine,
Myrtle, and roses spread their soft perfume--
And yet a single word of sad enchantment
Sweeps all the glory of the scene to naught,
And there remain but ruins old and grey,
And screaming birds of night and foul morass.
Even so have I, with but a single word,
Enchanted Nature's blooming loveliness.
There lies she now, lifeless and cold and pale,
Just like a monarch's corse laid out in state,
The royal deathly cheeks fresh stained with rouge,
And in his hand the kingly sceptre laid,
Yet still his lips are yellow and most changed,
For they forgot to dye them, as they should,
And mice are jumping o'er the monarch's nose,
And mock the golden sceptre in his grasp."


It is everywhere agreed, Madame, that one should deliver a soliloquy before shooting himself. Most men, on such occasions, use Hamlet's "To be, or not to be." It is an excellent passage, and I would gladly have quoted it--but charity begins at home, and when a man has written tragedies himself, in which such farewell-to-life speeches occur, as, for instance, in my immortal Almansor, it is very natural that one should prefer his own words even to Shakespeare's. At any rate, the delivery of such speeches is a very useful custom; one gains at least a little time. And so it came to pass that I remained a rather long time standing at the corner of the Strada San Giovanni--and as I stood there like a condemned criminal awaiting death, I raised my eyes, and suddenly beheld her.

She wore her blue silk dress and rose-red hat, and her eyes looked at me so mildly, so death-conqueringly, so life-givingly--Madame, you well know, out of Roman history, that when the vestals in ancient Rome met on their way a malefactor led to death, they had the right to pardon him, and the poor rogue lived. With a single glance she saved me from death, and I stood before her revived, and dazzled by the sunbeams of her beauty, and she passed on--and left me alive.


CHAPTER III.


And she left me alive, and I live, which is the main point.

Others may, if they choose, enjoy the good fortune of having their lady-love adorn their graves with garlands and water them with the tears of fidelity. Oh, women! hate me, laugh at me, jilt me--but let me live! Life is all too laughably sweet, and the world too delightfully bewildered; it is the dream of an intoxicated god, who has taken French leave of the carousing multitude of immortals, and has laid himself down to sleep in a solitary star, and knows not himself that he creates all that he dreams--and the dream images form themselves in such a mad variegated fashion, and often so harmoniously reasonable--the Iliad, Plato, the battle of Marathon, Moses, Medician Venus, Strasburg Cathedral, the French Revolution, Hegel, the steamboat, etc., etc., are single good thoughts in this divine dream--but it will not last long, and the god awakes and rubs his sleepy eyes, and smiles--and our world has run to nothing--yes, has never been.

No matter! I live. If I am but a shadowy image in a dream, still this is better than the cold, black, void annihilation of Death. Life is the greatest good and death the worst evil. Berlin lieutenants of the guard may sneer and call it cowardice, because the Prince of Homburg shudders when he beholds his open grave. Henry Kleist[4] had, however, as much courage as his high-breasted, tightly-laced colleagues, and has, alas! proved it. But all strong men love life. Goethe's Egmont does not part willingly from "the cheerful wont of being and working." Immermann's Edwin clings to life "like a little child to its mother's breast," and though he finds it hard to live by stranger mercy, he still begs for mercy: "For life and breath is still the highest."

When Odysseus in the under-world sees Achilles as the leader of dead heroes, and extols his renown among the living, and his glory even among the dead, Achilles answers:--


"No more discourse of death, consolingly, noble Odysseus!
Rather would I in the field as daily labourer be toiling,
Slave to the meanest of men, a pauper and lacking possessions,
Than mid the infinite host of long-vanished mortals be ruler."


Yes, when Major Duvent challenged the great Israel Lyon to fight with pistols and said to him, "If you do not meet me, Mr. Lyon, you are a dog;" the latter replied, "I would rather be a live dog than a dead lion!" and he was right. I have fought often enough, Madame, to dare to say this--God be praised! I live! Red life pulses in my veins, earth yields beneath my feet, in the glow of love I embrace trees and statues, and they live in my embrace. Every woman is to me the gift of a world. I revel in the melody of her countenance, and with a single glance of my eye I can enjoy more than others with their every limb through all their lives. Every instant is to me an eternity. I do not measure time with the ell of Brabant or of Hamburg, and I need no priest to promise me a second life, for I can live enough in this life, when I live backwards in the life of those who have gone before me, and win myself an eternity in the realm of the past.

And I live! The great pulsation of nature beats too in my breast, and when I carol aloud, I am answered by a thousand-fold echo. I hear a thousand nightingales. Spring has sent them to awaken Earth from her morning slumber, and Earth trembles with ecstasy; her flowers are hymns, which she sings in inspiration to the sun--the sun moves far too slowly; I would fain lash on his steeds that they might advance more rapidly. But when he sinks hissing in the sea, and the night rises with her great passionate eyes, oh! then true pleasure first thrills through me, the evening breezes lie like flattering maidens on my wild heart, and the stars wink to me, and I rise and sweep over the little earth and the little thoughts of men.


CHAPTER IV.


But a day will come when the fire in my veins will be quenched, when winter will dwell in my heart, when his snow flakes will whiten my locks, and his mists will dim my eyes. Then my friends will lie in their lonely graves, and I alone shall remain like a solitary stalk forgotten by the reaper. A new race will have sprung up with new desires and new ideas; full of wonder I shall hear new names and listen to new songs, for the old names will be forgotten, and I myself forgotten, perhaps still honoured by a few, scorned by many and loved by none! And then the rosy-cheeked boys will spring around me and place the old harp in my trembling hand, and say, laughing, "You have been long silent, you greybeard; sing us again songs of your youthful dreams!"

Then I will grasp the harp, and my old joys and sorrows will awake, tears will again spring from my dead eyes; there will be Spring again in my breast, sweet tones of sorrow will tremble on the harpstrings, I shall see again the blue stream and the marble palaces and the lovely faces of women and girls--and I will sing a song of the flowers of Brenta.

It will be my last song; the stars will gaze on me as in the nights of my youth, the loving moonlight will once more kiss my cheeks, the spirit chorus of nightingales long dead will sound from afar, my sleep-drunken eyes will close, my soul will echo with the notes of my harp; I shall smell the flowers of Brenta.

A tree will shadow my grave. I would gladly have it a palm, but that tree will not grow in the North. It will be a linden, and on summer evenings lovers will sit there and caress; the green-finch, who rocks himself on the branches, will be listening silently, and my linden will rustle tenderly over the heads of the happy ones, who will be so happy that they will have no time to read what is written on the white tombstone. But when later the lover has lost his love, then he will come again to the well-known linden, and sigh, and weep, and gaze long and oft upon the stone, and read the inscription--"He loved the flowers of Brenta."


CHAPTER V.


Madame! I have deceived you. I am not the Count of the Ganges. Never in my life have I seen the holy stream, nor the lotus flowers which are mirrored in its sacred waves. Never did I lie dreaming under Indian palms, nor in prayer before the Diamond Deity Juggernaut, who with his diamonds might have easily aided me out of my difficulties. I have no more been in Calcutta than the turkey, of which I ate yesterday at dinner, had ever been in the realms of the Grand Turk. Yet my ancestors came from Hindostan, and therefore I feel so much at my ease in the great forest of song of Valmiki. The heroic sorrows of the divine Ramo move my heart like familiar griefs; from the flower lays of Kalidasa the sweetest memories bloom; and when a few years ago a gentle lady in Berlin showed me the beautiful pictures which her father, who had been Governor in India, had brought from thence, the delicately-painted, holy, calm faces seemed as familiar to me as though I were gazing at my own family gallery.

Franz Bopp--Madame, you have of course read his Nalus and his System of Sanscrit Conjugations--gave me much information relative to my ancestry, and I now know with certainty that I am descended from Brahma's head, and not from his corns. I have also good reason to believe that the entire Mahabarata, with its two hundred thousand verses, is merely an allegorical love-letter which my first fore-father wrote to my first fore-mother. Oh! they loved dearly, their souls kissed, they kissed with their eyes, they were both but one single kiss.

An enchanted nightingale sits on a red coral bough in the silent sea, and sings a song of the love of my ancestors; the pearls gaze eagerly from their shells, the wonderful water-flowers tremble with sorrow, the cunning sea-snails, bearing on their backs many-coloured porcelain towers, come creeping onwards, the ocean-roses blush with shame, the yellow, sharp-pointed starfish, and the thousand-hued glassy jelly-fish quiver and stretch, and all swarm and listen.

Unfortunately, Madame, this nightingale song is far too long to be set down here; it is as long as the world itself, even its dedication to Anangas, the God of Love, is as long as all Scott's novels, and there is a passage referring to it in Aristophanes, which in German[5] reads thus:--


"Tiotio, tiotio, tiotinx,
Totototo totototo tototinx."

(Voss's Translation.)


No, I was not born in India. I first beheld the light of the world on the shores of that beautiful stream, in whose green hills folly grows and is plucked in Autumn, laid away in cellars, poured into barrels, and exported to foreign lands. In fact, only yesterday I heard some one speaking a piece of folly which, in the year 1811, was imprisoned in a bunch of grapes, which I myself then saw growing on the Johannisburg. But much folly is also consumed at home, and men are the same there as everywhere: they are born, eat, drink, sleep, laugh, cry, slander each other, are greatly troubled about the propagation of their race, try to seem what they are not and to do what they cannot, never shave until they have a beard, and often have beards before they get discretion, and when they at last have discretion, they drink it away in white and red folly.

Mon dieu! if I had faith, so that I could remove mountains--the Johannisburg would be just the mountain which I would carry with me everywhere. But as my faith is not strong enough, imagination must aid me, and she quickly sets me by the beautiful Rhine.

Oh, that is a fair land, full of loveliness and sunshine. In the blue stream are mirrored the mountain shores, with their ruined towers, and woods, and ancient towns. There, before the house-door, sit the good townspeople, of a summer evening, and drink out of great cans, and gossip confidentially about how the wine--the Lord be praised!--thrives, and how justice should be free from all secrecy, and how Marie Antoinette's being guillotined is none of our business, and how dear the tobacco tax makes tobacco, and how all mankind are equal, and what a glorious fellow Goerres is.

I have never troubled myself about such conversation, and sat rather with the maidens in the arched window, and laughed at their laughter, and let them throw flowers in my face, and pretended to be ill-natured until they told me their secrets, or some other important stories. Fair Gertrude was half wild with delight when I sat by her. She was a girl like a flaming rose, and once, as she fell on my neck, I thought that she would burn away into perfume in my arms. Fair Katharine flamed into sweet music when she talked with me, and her eyes were of a pure, internal blue, which I have never seen in men or animals, and very seldom in flowers--one gazed so gladly into them, and could then think such sweet things. But the beautiful Hedwig loved me, for when I came to her she bowed her head till her black curls fell down over her blushing face, and her bright eyes shone like stars from the dark heaven. Her bashful lips spoke not a word, and I too could say nothing to her. I coughed and she trembled. She often begged me, through her sisters, not to climb the rocks so rashly, or to bathe in the Rhine when I was hot with running or drinking wine. Once I overheard her pious prayer before the Virgin Mary, which she had adorned with gold leaf and illuminated with a lamp, and which stood in a corner at the entrance. I plainly heard her pray to the Mother of God to keep him from climbing, drinking, and bathing. I should certainly have been desperately in love with her if she had been indifferent to me, and I was indifferent to her because I knew that she loved me.--Madame, to win my love, I must be treated en canaille.

Johanna was the cousin of the three sisters, and I was glad to be with her. She knew the most beautiful old legends, and when she pointed with her white hand through the window out to the mountains where all had happened which she narrated, I became enchanted; the old knights rose visibly from the ruined castles and hewed away at each other's iron clothes, the Lorely sat again on the mountain summit, singing a-down her sweet, seductive song, and the Rhine rippled so reasonably soothing--and yet so mockingly horrible--and the fair Johanna looked at me so strangely, with such enigmatic tenderness, that she seemed herself one with the legend that she told. She was a slender, pale girl, sickly and musing, her eyes were clear as truth itself, her lips piously arched, in her face lay a great story--was it a love legend? I know not, and I never had the courage to ask. When I looked at her long, I grew calm and cheerful--it seemed to me as though it was Sunday in my heart and the angels held service there.

In such happy hours I told her tales of my childhood, and she listened earnestly, and, strangely, when I could not think of the names she remembered them. When I then asked her with wonder how she knew the names, she would answer with a smile that she had learned it of the birds that had built a nest on the sill of her window--and she tried to make me believe that these were the same birds which I once bought with my pocket-money from a hard-hearted peasant boy, and then let fly away. But I believed that she knew everything because she was so pale, and really soon died. She knew, too, when she would die, and wished that I would leave Andernach the day before. When I bade her farewell she gave me both her hands--they were white, sweet hands, and pure as the Host--and she said, You are very good, and when you are not, think of the little dead Veronica.

Did the chattering birds also tell her this name? Often in hours of remembrance I had wearied my brain in trying to think of that dear name, but could not.

And now that I have it again, my earliest infancy shall bloom into memory again--and I am again a child, and play with other children in the Castle Court at Düsseldorf on the Rhine.


CHAPTER VI.


Yes, Madame, there was I born, and I am particular in calling attention to the fact, lest after my death seven cities--those of Schilda, Krähwinkel, Polkwitz, Bockum, Dülken, Göttingen, and Schöppenstadt[6]--should contend for the honour of being my birthplace. Düsseldorf is a town on the Rhine; sixteen thousand people live there, and many hundred thousands besides are buried there. And among them are many of whom my mother says it were better if they were still alive--for example, my grand-father and my uncle, the old Herr von Geldern, and the young Herr von Geldern, who were both such celebrated doctors, and saved the lives of so many men, and yet must both die themselves. And pious Ursula, who carried me as a child in her arms, also lies buried there, and a rose-bush grows over her grave--she loved rose-perfume so much in her life, and her heart was all rose-perfume and goodness. And the shrewd old Canonicus also lies there buried. Lord, how miserable he looked when I last saw him! He consisted of nothing but soul and plasters, and yet he studied night and day as though he feared lest the worms might find a few ideas missing in his head. Little William also lies there--and that is my fault. We were schoolmates in the Franciscan cloister, and were one day playing on that side of the building where the Düssel flows between stone walls, and I said, "William, do get the kitten out, which has just fallen in!" and he cheerfully climbed out on the board which stretched over the brook, and pulled the cat out of the water, but fell in himself, and when they took him out he was cold and dead. The kitten lived to a good old age.

The town of Düsseldorf is very beautiful, and if you think of it when in foreign lands, and happen at the same time to have been born there, strange feelings come over the soul. I was born there, and feel as if I must go directly home. And when I say home, I mean the Volkerstrasse and the house where I was born. This house will be some day very remarkable, and I have sent word to the old lady who owns it, that she must not for her life sell it. For the whole house she would now hardly get as much as the present which the green-veiled distinguished English ladies will give the servant when she shows them the room where I was born, and the hen-house wherein my father generally imprisoned me for stealing grapes, and also the brown door on which my mother taught me to write with chalk. Ah me! should I ever become a famous author, it has cost my poor mother trouble enough.

But my fame still slumbers in the marble quarries of Carrara; the waste paper laurel with which they have bedecked my brow has not yet spread its perfume through the wide world, and when the green-veiled distinguished English ladies visit Düsseldorf, they leave the celebrated house unvisited, and go direct to the Market Place, and there gaze on the colossal black equestrian statue which stands in its midst. This represents the Prince Elector, Jan Wilhelm. He wears black armour and a long, hanging wig. When a boy, I was told that the artist who made this statue observed with terror while it was being cast that he had not metal enough, and then all the citizens of the town came running with all their silver spoons, and threw them in to fill the mould; and I often stood for hours before the statue puzzling my head as to how many spoons were sticking in it, and how many apple-tarts all that silver would buy. Apple-tarts were then my passion--now it is love, truth, freedom, and crab-soup--and not far from the statue of the Prince Elector, at the theatre corner, generally stood a curiously constructed sabre-legged rascal with a white apron, and a basket girt around him full of smoking apple-tarts, which he knew how to praise with an irresistible treble voice. "Apple tarts! quite fresh! so delicious!" Truly, whenever in my later years the Evil One sought to win me, he always cried in just such an enticing treble, and I should certainly have never remained twelve hours by the Signora Giulietta, if she had not thrilled me with her sweet, fragrant, apple-tart-tones. And, in fact, the apple-tarts would never have so enticed me, if the crooked Hermann had not covered them up so mysteriously with his white apron--and it is aprons, you know, which--but I wander from the subject. I was speaking of the equestrian statue which has so many silver spoons in its body and no soup, and which represents the Prince Elector, Jan Wilhelm.

He must have been a brave gentleman, very fond of art, and skilful himself. He founded the picture gallery in Düsseldorf, and in the observatory there they show a very artistic piece of woodwork, which he, himself, had carved in his leisure hours, of which latter he had every day four-and-twenty.

In those days princes were not the persecuted wretches which they now are; the crowns grew firmly on their heads, and at night they drew their night-caps over it and slept peacefully, and their people slumbered peacefully at their feet, and when they awoke in the morning they said, "Good morning, father!" and he replied, "Good morning, dear children!"

But there came a sudden change over all this. One morning when we awoke in Düsseldorf and would say, "Good morning, father!" the father had travelled away, and in the whole town there was nothing but dumb sorrow. Everywhere there was a funeral-like expression, and people slipped silently to the market and read the long paper on the door of the Town Hall. It was bad weather, yet the lean tailor Kilian stood in his nankeen jacket, which he generally wore only at home, and his blue woollen stockings hung down so that his little bare legs peeped out in a troubled way, and his thin lips quivered as he murmured the placard. An old invalid soldier from the Palatine read it rather louder, and at some words a clear tear ran down his white honourable old moustache. I stood near him, crying too, and asked why we were crying? And he replied "The Prince Elector has abdicated." And then he read further, and at the words, "for the long manifested fidelity of my subjects," "and hereby release you from allegiance," he wept still more. It is a strange sight to see, when an old man, in faded uniform, and scarred veteran's face, suddenly bursts into tears. While we read, the Princely Electoral coat of arms was being taken down from the Town Hall, and everything began to appear as anxiously dreary as though we were waiting for an eclipse of the sun. The town councillors went about at an abdicating, wearisome gait; even the omnipotent beadle looked as though he had no more commands to give, and stood calmly indifferent, although the crazy Aloysius stood upon one leg and chattered the names of French generals with foolish grimaces, while the tipsy, crooked Gumpertz rolled around in the gutter, singing _ça ira! ça ira!

But I went home crying and lamenting, "The Prince Elector has abdicated." My mother might do what she would, I knew what I knew, and went crying to bed, and in the night dreamed that the world had come to an end--the fair flower gardens and green meadows of the world were taken up and rolled away like carpets from the floor, the beadle climbed up on a high ladder and took down the sun, and the tailor Kilian stood by and said to himself, "I must go home and dress myself neatly, for I am dead and am to be buried this afternoon." And it grew darker and darker--a few stars glimmered on high, and even these fell down like yellow leaves in autumn, men gradually vanished, and I, poor child, wandered in anguish around, until before the willow fence of a deserted farm-house I saw a man digging up the earth with a spade, and near him an ugly, spiteful-looking woman, who held something in her apron like a human head, but it was the moon, and she laid it carefully in the open grave--and behind me stood the Palatine soldier sobbing, and spelling, "The Prince Elector has abdicated."

When I awoke the sun shone as usual through the window, there was a sound of drums in the street, and as I entered our sitting-room and wished my father--who sat in his white dressing-gown--good morning, I heard the little light-footed barber, as he made up his hair, narrate very minutely that homage would that morning be offered at the Town Hall to the Arch Duke Joachim. I heard, too, that the new ruler was of excellent family, that he had married the sister of the Emperor Napoleon, and was really a very respectable man, that he wore his beautiful black hair in curls, that he would shortly enter the town, and would certainly please all the ladies. Meanwhile, the drumming in the streets continued, and I stood before the house-door and looked at the French troops marching, those joyous and famous people who swept over the world, singing and playing, the merry, serious faces of the grenadiers, the bearskin shakoes, the tri-coloured cockades, the glittering bayonets, the voltigeurs full of vivacity and point d'honneur, and the giant-like silver-laced Tambour Major, who cast his bâton with the gilded head as high as the first storey, and his eyes to the second, where pretty girls gazed from the windows. I was so glad that soldiers were to be quartered in our house--my mother was not glad--and I hastened to the market-place. There everything looked changed; it was as though the world had been new whitewashed. A new coat of arms was placed on the Town Hall, its iron balconies were hung with embroidered velvet drapery, French grenadiers stood as sentinels, the old town councillors had put on new faces and Sunday coats, and looked at each other French fashion, and said, "Bon jour!" ladies peeped from every window, inquisitive citizens and soldiers filled the square, and I, with other boys, climbed on the shining Prince Elector's great bronze horse, and looked down on the motley crowd.

Neighbour Peter and Long Conrad nearly broke their necks on this occasion, and that would have been well, for the one afterwards ran away from his parents, enlisted as a soldier, deserted, and was finally shot in Mayence, while the other, having made geographical researches in strange pockets, became a working member of a public tread-mill institute. But having broken the iron bands which bound him to his fatherland, he passed safely beyond sea, and eventually died in London, in consequence of wearing a much too long cravat, one end of which happened to be firmly attached to something, just as a royal official removed a plank from beneath his feet.

Long Conrad told us there was no school to-day on account of the homage. We had to wait a long time till this was over. At last the balcony of the Council House was filled with gay gentlemen, flags and trumpets, and our burgomaster, in his celebrated red coat, delivered an oration, which stretched out like India rubber, or like a night-cap into which one has thrown a stone--only that it was not the stone of wisdom--and I could distinctly understand many of his phrases, for instance, that "we are now to be made happy"--and at the last words the trumpets and drums sounded, and the flags waved, and the people cried Hurrah!--and as I myself cried Hurrah! I held fast to the old Prince Elector. And that was necessary, for I began to grow giddy; it seemed to me that the people were standing on their heads while the world whizzed around, and the Prince Elector, with his long wig, nodded and whispered, "Hold fast to me!"--and not till the cannon re-echoed along the wall did I become sobered, and climbed slowly down from the great bronze horse.

As I went home I saw crazy Aloysius again dancing on one leg, while he chattered the names of French generals, and crooked Gumpertz was rolling in the gutter drunk, and growling _ça ira, ça ira--and I said to my mother that we were all to be made happy, and so there was no school to-day.


CHAPTER VII.


The next day the world was again all in order, and we had school as before, and things were got by heart as before--the Roman kings, chronology--the nomina in im, the verba irregularia--Greek, Hebrew, geography, German, mental arithmetic--Lord! my head is still giddy with it!--all must be learnt by heart. And much of it was eventually to my advantage. For had I not learnt the Roman kings by heart, it would subsequently have been a matter of perfect indifference to me whether Niebuhr had or had not proved that they never really existed. And had I not learnt chronology, how could I ever, in later years, have found out anyone in Berlin, where one house is as like another as drops of water, or as grenadiers, and where it is impossible to find a friend unless you have the number of his house in your head. Therefore I associated with every friend some historical event which had happened in a year corresponding to the number of his house, so that the one recalled the other, and some curious point in history always occurred to me whenever I met an acquaintance. For instance, when I met my tailor I at once thought of the Battle of Marathon; if I saw the well-dressed banker, Christian Gumpel, I remembered the destruction of Jerusalem; if a Portuguese friend, deeply in debt, of the flight of Mahomet; if the University Judge, a man whose probity is well known, of the death of Haman; and if Wadzeck, I was at once reminded of Cleopatra.--Ach, lieber Himmel! the poor creature is dead now, our tears are dry, and we may say of her, with Hamlet, "Take her for all in all, she was a hag--we oft shall look upon her like again!" As I said, chronology is necessary. I know men who have nothing in their heads but a few years, yet who know exactly where to look for the right houses, and are, moreover, regular professors. But oh, the trouble I had at school with dates!--and it went even worse with arithmetic. I understood subtraction best, and for this I had a very practical rule--"Four from three won't go, I must borrow one"--but I advise everyone, in such a case, to borrow a few extra shillings, for one never knows.

But as for the Latin, Madame, you can really have no idea how muddled it is. The Romans would never have found time to conquer the world if they had been obliged first to learn Latin. Those happy people knew in their cradles the nouns with an accusative in im. I, on the contrary, had to learn them by heart, in the sweat of my brow, but still it is well that I knew them. For if, for example, when I publicly disputed in Latin, in the College Hall of Göttingen, on the 20th of July 1825--Madame, it was well worth while to hear it--if, I say, I had said sinapem instead of sinapim, the blunder would have been evident to the Freshmen, and an endless shame for me. Vis, buris, sitis, tussis, cucumis, amussis, cannabis, sinapis--these words, which have attracted so much attention in the world, effected this, because they belonged to a determined class, and yet were exceptions; on that account I value them highly, and the fact that I have them ready at my finger's ends when I perhaps need them in a hurry affords me in many dark hours of life much internal tranquillity and consolation. But, Madame, the verba irregularia--they are distinguished from the verbis regularibus by the fact that in learning them one gets more whippings--are terribly difficult. In the damp arches of the Franciscan cloister near our school-room there hung a large crucified Christ of grey wood, a dismal image, that even yet at times marches through my dreams and gazes sorrowfully on me with fixed bleeding eyes--before this image I often stood and prayed, "Oh thou poor and equally tormented God, if it be possible for thee, see that I get by heart the irregular verbs!"

I will say nothing of Greek; I should irritate myself too much. The monks of the Middle Ages were not so very much in the wrong when they asserted that Greek was an invention of the Devil. Lord knows what I suffered through it. It went better with Hebrew, for I always had a great predilection for the Jews, although they to this very hour have crucified my good name; but I never could get so far in Hebrew as my watch, which had an intimate intercourse with pawnbrokers, and in consequence acquired many Jewish habits--for instance, it would not go on Saturday--and learned the holy language, and was subsequently occupied with its grammar, for often when sleepless in the night I have to my amazement heard it industriously repeating: katal, katalta, katalki--kittel, kittalta, kittalti--pokat, pokadeti--pikat--pik--pik.

Meanwhile I learned much more German, and that is not such child's play. For we poor Germans, who have already been sufficiently plagued with soldiers quartered on us, military duties, poll-taxes, and a thousand other exactions, must needs, over and above all this, torment each other with accusatives and datives. I learned much German from the old Rector Schallmeyer, a brave, clerical gentleman, whose protégé I was from childhood. Something of the matter I also learned from Professor Schramm, a man who had written a book on Eternal Peace, and in whose class my school-fellows fought with especial vigour.

And while thus dashing on in a breath, and thinking of everything, I have unexpectedly found myself back among old school stories, and I avail myself of this opportunity to show you, Madame, that it was not my fault if I learned so little geography, that later in life I could not make my way in the world. For in those days the French had deranged all boundaries, every day countries were recoloured; those which were once blue suddenly became green, many even blood-red; the old established rules were so confused and confounded that no Devil would recognise them. The products of the country also changed, chickory and beets now grew where only hares and hunters running after them were once to be seen; even the characters of different races changed--the Germans became pliant, the French paid compliments no longer, the English ceased making ducks and drakes of their money, and the Venetians were not subtle enough; there was promotion among princes, old kings obtained new uniforms, new kingdoms were cooked up and sold like hot cakes, many potentates, on the other hand, were chased from house and home, and had to find some new way of earning their bread, while others went at once at a trade, and manufactured, for instance, sealing-wax, or--Madame, this sentence must be brought to an end, or I shall be out of breath--in short, it is impossible in such times to advance far in geography.

I succeeded better in natural history, for there we find fewer changes, and we always have standard engravings of apes, kangaroos, zebras, rhinoceroses, etc. And having many such pictures in my memory, it often happens that at first sight many mortals appear to me like old acquaintances.

I did well in mythology; I took real delight in the mob of gods and goddesses who ruled the world in joyous nakedness. I do not believe that there was a schoolboy in ancient Rome who knew the chief articles of his catechism--that is, the loves of Venus--better than I. To tell the truth, it seems to me that if we must learn all the heathen gods by heart, we might as well have kept them from the first, and we have not perhaps made so much out of our New Roman Trinity or even our Jewish monotheism. Perhaps that mythology was not in reality so immoral as we imagine, and it was, for example, a very decent thought of Homer's to give the much-loved Venus a husband.

But I succeeded best of all in the French class of the Abbé d'Aulnoi, a French emigré who had written a number of grammars, and wore a red wig, and jumped about very nervously when he recited his Art poétique, and his Histoire Allemande. He was the only one in the whole gymnasium who taught German history. Still French has its difficulties, and to learn it there must be much quartering of troops, much drumming in, much apprendre par coeur, and above all, no one should be a bête allemande. Thus many bitter words came in. I remember still, as though it happened yesterday, the scrapes I got into through la réligion. Six times came the question:--"Henry, what is the French for 'the faith?'" And six times, ever more tearfully, I replied, "It is called le crédit." And at the seventh question, with a deep cherry-red face, my furious examiner cried, "It is called la réligion"--and there was a rain of blows, and all my school-fellows laughed. Madame!--since that day I can never hear the word réligion but my back turns pale with terror, and my cheeks red with shame. And to speak truly, le crédit has during my life stood me in better stead than la réligion. It occurs to me at this moment that I still owe the landlord of the Lion, in Bologna, five thalers. And I pledge you my word of honour that I would owe him five thalers more if I could only be certain that I should never again hear that unlucky word, la réligion.

Parbleu, Madame! I have succeeded well in French! I understand not only patois, but even aristocratic nurse-maid French. Not long ago, when in noble society, I understood full one-half of the conversation of two German countesses, each of whom could count at least sixty-four years, and as many ancestors. Yes, in the Café Royal, at Berlin, I once heard Monsieur Hans Michel Martens talking French, and understood every word, though there was no understanding in it. We must know the spirit of a language, and this is best learned by drumming. Parbleu! how much do I not owe to the French Drummer who was so long quartered in our house, who looked like a Devil, and yet had the heart of an angel, and who drummed so excellently.

He was a little, nervous figure, with a terrible black moustache, beneath which the red lips turned suddenly outwards, while his fiery eyes glanced around.

I, a youngster, stuck to him like a burr, and helped him to rub his military buttons like mirrors, and to pipe-clay his vest--for Monsieur Le Grand liked to look well--and I followed him to the watch, to the roll-call, to the parade--in those times there was nothing but the gleam of weapons and merriment--les jours de fête sont passés! Monsieur Le Grand knew only a little broken German, only the chief expressions--"Bread," "Kiss," "Honour"--but he could make himself very intelligible with his drum. For instance, if I did not know what the word liberté meant, he drummed the Marseillaise--and I understood him. If I did not understand the word egalité, he drummed the march, "Ca ira, ... les aristocrats à la lanterne!" and I understood him. If I did not know what bêtise meant, he drummed the Dessauer March, which we Germans, as Goethe also declares, have drummed in Champagne--and I understood him. He once wanted to explain to me the word l'Allemagne, and he drummed the all too simple primeval melody, which on market days is played to dancing dogs--namely, dum--dum--dum.[7] I was vexed, but I understood him.

In the same way he taught me modern history. I did not understand the words, it is true, but as he constantly drummed while speaking, I knew what he meant. At bottom this is the best method. The history of the storming of the Bastille, of the Tuilleries, and the like, we understand first when we know how the drumming was done. In our school compendiums of history we merely read: "Their excellencies, the Baron and Count, with the most noble spouses of the aforesaid, were beheaded. Their highnesses the Dukes, and Princes, with the most noble spouses of the aforesaid, were beheaded. His Majesty the King, with his most sublime spouse, the Queen, was beheaded." But when you hear the red guillotine march drummed, you understand it correctly, for the first time, and you know the how and the why. Madame, that is indeed a wonderful march! It thrilled through marrow and bone when I first heard it, and I was glad that I forgot it. One forgets so much as one grows older, and a young man has now-a-days so much other knowledge to keep in his head--whist, Boston, genealogical tables, parliamentary data, dramaturgy, the liturgy, carving--and yet, notwithstanding all jogging up of my brain, I could not for a long time recall that tremendous tune! But, only think, Madame! not long ago I sat at table with a whole menagerie of Counts, Princes, Princesses, Chamberlains, Court-marshallesses, Seneschals, Upper Court Mistresses, Court-keepers-of-the-royal-plate, Court-hunters' wives, and whatever else these aristocratic domestics are termed, and their under-domestics ran about behind their chairs and shoved full plates before their mouths--but I, who was passed by and neglected, sat without the least occupation for my jaws, and I kneaded little bread-balls, and drummed for ennui with my fingers--and, to my astonishment, I suddenly drummed the red, long-forgotten guillotine march!

"And what happened?" Madame, the good people were not disturbed in their eating, nor did they know that other people, when they have nothing to eat, suddenly begin to drum, and that, too, very queer marches, which people thought long forgotten.

Is drumming, now, an inborn talent, or was it early developed in me?--enough, it lies in my limbs, in my hands, in my feet, and often manifests itself involuntarily. I once sat at Berlin in the lecture-room of the Privy Councillor Schmaltz, a man who had saved the state by his book on the "Red and Black Coat Danger."--You remember, perhaps, Madame, out of Pausanias, that by the braying of an ass an equally dangerous plot was once discovered, and you also know from Livy, or from Becker's History of the World, that geese once saved the capitol, and you must certainly know from Sallust that a loquacious putain, the Lady Livia, brought the terrible conspiracy of Cataline to light. But to return to the mutton aforesaid. I listened to international law in the lecture-room of the Herr Privy Councillor Schmaltz, and it was a sleepy summer afternoon, and I sat on the bench and heard less and less--my head had gone to sleep--when all at once I was wakened by the noise of my own feet, which had stayed awake, and had probably observed that the exact opposite of international law and constitutional tendencies was being preached, and my feet which, with the little eyes of their corns, had seen more of how things go in the world than the Privy Councillor with his Juno-eyes--these poor dumb feet, incapable of expressing their immeasurable meaning by words, strove to make themselves intelligible by drumming, and they drummed so loudly, that I thereby nearly came to grief.

Cursed, unreflecting feet! They once played me a similar trick, when I on a time in Göttengen sponged without subscribing on the lectures of Professor Saalfeld, and as, with his angular activity, he jumped about here and there in his pulpit, and heated himself in order to curse the Emperor Napoleon in regular set style,--no, my poor feet, I cannot blame you for drumming then; indeed, I would not have blamed you if in your dumb naïveté you had expressed yourselves by still more energetic movements. How could I, the scholar of Le Grand, hear the Emperor cursed? The Emperor! the Emperor! the great Emperor!

When I think of the great Emperor, my thoughts again grow summer-green and golden; a long avenue of lindens rises blooming around, on the leafy twigs sit singing nightingales, the water-fall rustles, flowers are growing from full round beds, dreamily nodding their fair heads--I was once wondrously intimate with them; the rouged tulips, proud as beggars, condescendingly greeted me, the nervous sick lilies nodded with melancholy tenderness, the drunken red roses laughed at me from afar, the night-violets sighed--with the myrtles and laurels I was not then acquainted, for they did not entice with a shining bloom, but the mignonette, with whom I now stand so badly, was very intimate. I am speaking of the court garden of Düsseldorf, where I often lay upon the bank, and piously listened while Monsieur Le Grand told of the warlike feats of the great Emperor, beating meanwhile the marches which were drummed during the deeds, so that I saw and heard all to the life. I saw the passage over the Simplon--the Emperor in advance and his brave grenadiers climbing on behind him, while the scream of frightened birds of prey sounded around, and avalanches thundered in the distance--I saw the Emperor with flag in hand on the bridge of Lodi--I saw the Emperor in his grey cloak at Marengo--I saw the Emperor mounted in the battle of the Pyramids--naught around save powder-smoke and Mamelukes--I saw the Emperor in the battle of Austerlitz--ha! how the bullets whistled over the smooth, icy road!--I saw, I heard the battle of Jena--dum, dum, dum.--I saw, I heard the battles of Eylau, of Wagram---- ah, I could hardly bear it! Monsieur Le Grand drummed so that the drums of my ears nearly burst.


CHAPTER VIII.


But what were my feelings when I saw with my own highly-graced eyes himself? Hosannah! the Emperor!

It was in that very avenue of the Court Garden at Düsseldorf. As I pressed through the gaping crowd, thinking of the doughty deeds and battles which Monsieur Le Grand had drummed to me, my heart beat the "general march"--yet at the same time I thought of the police regulation, that no one should dare ride through the avenue under penalty of a fine of five thalers. And the Emperor with his retinue rode directly down the avenue. The trembling trees bowed towards him as he advanced, the sunbeams quivered, frightened, yet curious, through the green leaves, and in the blue heaven above there swam visibly a golden star. The Emperor wore his invisible-green uniform and the little world-renowned hat. He rode a white steed, which stepped with such calm pride, so confidently, so nobly--had I then been Crown Prince of Prussia I would have envied that steed. Carelessly, almost lazily, sat the Emperor, holding his rein with one hand, and with the other good-naturedly patting the horse's neck. It was a sunny, marble hand, a mighty hand--one of those two hands which bound fast the many-headed monster of anarchy, and ordered the war of races--and it good-naturedly patted the horse's neck. Even the face had that hue which we find in the marble of Greek and Roman busts; the traits were as nobly cut as in the antique, and on that face was written, "Thou shalt have no Gods before me." A smile, which warmed and soothed every heart, flitted over the lips--and yet all knew that those lips needed but to whistle--et la Prusse n'existait plus--those lips needed but to whistle--and the entire clergy would have stopped their ringing and singing--those lips needed but to whistle--and the entire holy Roman empire would have danced. And those lips smiled and the eye smiled too. It was an eye clear as Heaven; it could read the hearts of men, it saw at a glance all the things of this world, while we others see them only one by one and by their coloured shadows. The brow was not so clear, the phantoms of future battles were nestling there; there was a quiver which swept over that brow, and those were the creative thoughts, the great seven-mile-boot thoughts, wherewith the spirit of the Emperor strode invisibly over the world--and I believe that every one of those thoughts would have given to a German author full material wherewith to write, all the days of his life.

The Emperor rode quietly straight through the avenue. No policeman opposed him; proudly, on snorting horses and laden with gold and jewels, rode his retinue; the drums were beating, the trumpets were sounding; close to me the wild Aloysius was muttering his general's name; not far away the drunken Gumpertz was grumbling, and the people shouted with a thousand voices, "Long live the Emperor!"


CHAPTER IX.


The Emperor is dead. On a waste island in the Atlantic ocean is his lonely grave, and he for whom the world was too narrow lies quietly under a little hillock, where five weeping willows hang their green heads, and a little brook, murmuring sorrowfully, ripples by. There is no inscription on his tomb; but Clio, with a just pen, has written thereon, invisible words, which will resound, like spirit-tones, through thousands of years.

Britannia! the sea is thine. But the sea has not water enough to wash away the shame with which the death of that Mighty One has covered thee. Not thy windy Sir Hudson--no, thou thyself wert the Sicilian bravo with whom perjured kings bargained, that they might revenge on the man of the people that which the people had once inflicted on one of themselves.--And he was thy guest, and had seated himself by thy hearth.

Until far ages the boys of France will sing and tell of the terrible hospitality of the Bellerophon, and when those songs of mockery and tears resound across the Channel, the cheeks of every honourable Briton will blush. Some day, however, this song will ring thither, and Britannia will be no more; the people of pride will be humbled to the earth, Westminster's monuments will be broken, and the royal dust which they enclosed forgotten.--And St. Helena is the Holy Grave, whither the races of the East and of the West will make their pilgrimage in ships with flags of many a colour, and their hearts will grow strong with great memories of the deeds of the worldly Saviour, who suffered and died under Hudson Lowe, as it is written in the evangelists, Las Cases, O'Meara, and Autommarchi.

Strange! A terrible destiny has already overtaken the three greatest enemies of the Emperor. Londonderry has cut his throat, Louis XVIII. has rotted away on his throne, and Professor Saalfeld is still Professor in Göttingen.


CHAPTER X.


On a clear, frosty autumn morning, a young man of student-like appearance slowly loitered through the avenue of the Düsseldorf Court Garden, often, with childlike pleasure, kicking aside the leaves which covered the ground, and often sorrowfully gazing towards the bare trees, on which a few golden-hued leaves still hung. As he thus gazed up, he thought on the words of Glaucus--


"Like the leaves in the forests, so are the races of mortals;
Leaves are blown down to the earth by the wind, while others are shooting
Again in the green budding wood, when fresh up-liveth the spring-tide;
So are the races of man--this grows and the other departeth."


In earlier days the youth had gazed with far different eyes on the same trees. He was then a boy, and sought birds' nests or summer insects, which delighted him as they merrily hummed around, and were glad in the beautiful world, and contented with a sap-green leaf and a drop of water, with a warm sunbeam and the sweet perfumes of the grass. In those times the boy's heart was as gay as the fluttering insects. But now his heart had grown older, its little sunbeams were quenched, all its flowers had faded, even its beautiful dream of love had grown dim; in that poor heart was nothing but pride and care, and, saddest of all, it was my heart.

I had returned that day to my old father-town, but I would not remain there over night, and I longed for Godesberg, that I might sit at the feet of my girl-friend and tell of the little Veronica. I had visited the dear graves. Of all my living friends I had found but an uncle and an aunt. Even when I met once known forms in the street they knew me no more, and the town itself gazed on me with strange glances. Many houses were coloured anew, strange faces gazed on me through the window-panes, worn-out old sparrows hopped on the old chimneys, everything looked dead and yet fresh, like a salad growing in a graveyard; where French was once spoken I now heard Prussian; even a little Prussian court had taken up its retired dwelling there, and the people bore court titles. My mother's old hair dresser had now become the Court Hair dresser, and there were Court-Tailors, Court-Shoemakers, Court-Bed-Bug-Destroyers, Court-Grog-Shops--the whole town seemed to be a Court-Asylum for Court-lunatics. Only the old Prince Elector knew me, he still stood in the same old place; but he seemed to have grown thinner. For just because he stood in the Market Place, he had had a full view of all the miseries of the time, and people seldom grow fat on such sights. I was in a dream, and thought of the legend of the enchanted city, and hastened out of the gate, lest I should awake too soon. I missed many a tree in the Court Garden, and many had grown crooked with age, and the four great poplars, which once seemed to me like green giants, had become smaller. Pretty girls were walking here and there, dressed as gaily as wandering tulips. And I had known these tulips when they were but little buds; for ah! they were the neighbours' children with whom I had once played "Princes in the Tower." But the fair maidens, whom I had once known as blooming roses, were now faded roses, and in many a high brow whose pride had once thrilled my heart, Saturn had cut deep wrinkles with his scythe. And now for the first time, and alas! too late, I understood what those glances meant, which they had once cast on the adolescent boy; for I had meanwhile in other lands fathomed the meaning of similar glances in other lovely eyes. I was deeply moved by the humble bow of a man whom I had once known as wealthy and respectable, and who had since become a beggar. Everywhere in the world we see that men when they once begin to fall, do so according to Newton's law, ever faster and faster as they descend to misery. One, however, who did not seem to be in the least changed was the little baron, who tripped merrily as of old through the Court Garden, holding with one hand his left coat-skirt on high, and with the other swinging hither and thither his light cane;--he still had the same genial face as of old, its rosy bloom now somewhat concentrated towards the nose, but he had the same comical hat and the same old queue behind, only that the hairs which peeped from it were now white instead of black. But merry as the old baron seemed, it was still evident that he had suffered much sorrow--his face would fain conceal it, but the white hairs of his queue betrayed him behind his back. Yet the queue itself seemed striving to lie, so merrily did it shake.

I was not weary, but a fancy seized me to sit once more on the wooden bench, on which I had once carved the name of my love. I could hardly discover it there, so many new names were cut around. Ah! once I slept upon this bench, and dreamed of happiness and love. "Dreams are foam." And the old games of childhood came again to my memory, and with them old and beautiful stories; but a new treacherous game, and a new terrible tale ever resounded through them, and it was the story of two poor souls who were untrue to each other, and went so far in their untruth, that they were at last untrue to the dear God himself. It is a sad story, and when one has nothing better to do, one can weep over it. Oh, Lord! once the world was so beautiful, and the birds sang thy eternal praise, and little Veronica looked at me with silent eyes, and we sat by the marble statue before the castle court; on one side lies an old ruined castle, wherein ghosts wander, and at night a headless lady in long, trailing black-silken garments sweeps around, and on the other side is a high, white dwelling, in whose upper rooms gay pictures gleamed beautifully in their golden frames, while below stood thousands of mighty books, which Veronica and I beheld with longing when the good Ursula lifted us up to the window. In later years, when I had become a great boy, I climbed every day to the very top of the library ladder, and brought down the topmost books, and read in them so long, that finally I feared nothing--least of all ladies without heads--and became so wise that I forgot all the old games and stories and pictures and little Veronica, even her name.

But while I sat upon the old bench in the Court Garden, and dreamed my way back into the past, there was a sound behind me of the confused voices of men lamenting the ill-fortune of the poor French soldiers, who, having been taken prisoners in the Russian war and sent to Siberia, had there been kept prisoners for many a long year, though peace had been re-established, and who now were returning home. As I looked up, I beheld in reality these orphan children of Fame. Through their tattered uniforms peeped naked misery, deep sorrowing eyes were couched in their desolate faces, and though mangled, weary, and mostly lame, something of the military manner was still visible in their mien. Singularly enough, they were preceded by a drummer who tottered along with a drum, and I shuddered as I recalled the old legend of soldiers, who had fallen in battle, and who by night rising again from their graves on the battle-field, and with the drummer at their head, marched back to their native city. And of them the old ballad sings thus--


"He beat on the drum with might and main,
To their old night-quarters they go again;
Through the lighted street they come;
Trallerie--trallerei--trallera,
They march before Sweetheart's home.

And their bones lie there at break of day,
As white as tombstones in cold array,
And the drummer he goes before;
Trallerie--trallerei--trallera,
And we see them come no more."


Truly the poor French drummer seemed to have risen but half repaired from the grave. He was but a little shadow in a dirty patched grey capote, a dead yellow countenance, with a great moustache which hung down sorrowfully over his faded lips, his eyes were like burnt-out tinder, in which but a few sparks still gleamed, and yet by one of those sparks I recognised Monsieur Le Grand.

He too recognised me and drew me to the turf, and we sat down together as of old, when he taught me French and Modern History on the drum. He had still the well-known old drum, and I could not sufficiently wonder how he had preserved it from Russian plunderers. And he drummed again as of old, but without speaking a word. But though his lips were firmly pressed together, his eyes spoke all the more, flashing fiercely and victoriously as he drummed the old marches. The poplars near us trembled, as he again thundered forth the red guillotine march. And he drummed as before the old war of freedom, the old battles, the deeds of the Emperor, and it seemed as though the drum itself were a living creature which rejoiced to speak out its inner soul. I heard once more the thunder of cannon, the whistling of balls, the riot of battle; I saw once more the death rage of the Guards,--the waving flags, again, the Emperor on his steed--but little by little there fell a sad tone in amid the most stirring confusion, sounds rang from the drum, in which the wildest hurrahs and the most fearful grief were mysteriously mingled; it seemed a march of victory and a march of death. Le Grand's eyes opened spirit-like and wide, and I saw in them nothing but a broad white field of ice covered with corpses--it was the battle of Moscow.

I had never thought that the hard old drum could give forth such wailing sounds as Monsieur Le Grand had drawn from it. They were tears which he drummed, and they sounded ever softer and softer, and, like a troubled echo, deep sighs broke from Le Grand's breast. And he became ever more languid and ghost-like, his dry hands trembled, as if from frost, he sat as in a dream, and stirred with his drum-stick nothing but the air, and seemed listening to voices far away, and at last he gazed on me with a deep, entreating glance--I understood him--and then his head sank down on the drum.

In this life Monsieur Le Grand never drummed more. And his drum never gave forth another sound; it was not destined to serve the enemies of liberty for their servile roll calls. I had well understood Le Grand's last entreating glance, and at once drew the sword from my cane, and pierced the drum.


CHAPTER XI.


Du sublime au ridicule il n'y a qu'un pas, Madame!

But life is in reality so terribly serious, that it would be insupportable without such union of the pathetic and the comic; as our poets well know. The most harrowing forms of human madness Aristophanes exhibits only in the laughing mirror of wit; Goethe only presumes to set forth the fearful pain of thought comprehending its own nothingness in the doggerel of a puppet show; and Shakespeare puts the most deadly lamentation over the misery of the world into the mouth of a fool, who rattles his cap and bells in agony.

They have all learned from the great First Poet, who, in his World Tragedy in thousands of acts, knows how to carry humour to the highest point, as we see every day. After the departure of the heroes, the clowns and graciosos enter with their baubles and wooden swords, and after the bloody scenes of the Revolution there came waddling on the stage the fat Bourbons, with their stale jokes and tender "legitimate" bon mots, and the old noblesse with their starved laughter hopped merrily before them, while behind all swept the pious Capuchins with candles, cross, and banners of the Church. Yes, even in the highest pathos of the World Tragedy, bits of fun slip in. The desperate republican, who, like Brutus, plunged a knife to his heart, perhaps smelt it first to see whether some one had not split a herring with it--and on this great stage of the world all passes exactly the same as on our beggarly boards. On it, too, there are tipsy heroes, kings who forget their part, scenes which obstinately stay up in the air, prompters' voices sounding above everything, danseuses who create astonishing effects with the poetry of their legs, and costumes which are the main thing. And high in Heaven, in the first row of the boxes, sit the dear little angels, and keep their lorgnettes on us comedians here down below, and the blessed Lord himself sits seriously in his great box, and, perhaps, finds it dull, or calculates that this theatre cannot be kept up much longer because this one gets too high a salary, and that one too little, and that they all play much too badly.

Du sublime au ridicule il n'y a qu'un pas, Madame! As I ended the last chapter, narrating to you how Monsieur Le Grand died, and how I conscientiously executed the testamentum militaire which lay in his last glance, some one knocked at my door, and there entered a poor old lady, who asked if I were not a Doctor. And as I assented, she kindly asked me to go home with her and cut her husband's corns.


LAST WORDS (REISEBILDER).

Written 29th November 1830.

It was a depressed, an arrested time in Germany when I wrote the second volume of the Reisebilder, and had it printed as I wrote. But before it appeared something was whispered about it; it was said that my book would awaken and encourage the cowed spirit of freedom, and that measures were being taken to suppress it. When such rumours were afloat, it was advisable to advance the book as quickly as possible, and drive it through the press. As it was necessary, too, that it should contain a certain number of leaves, to escape the requisitions of the estimable censorship, I followed the example of Benvenuto Cellini, who, in founding his Perseas, was short of bronze, and to fill up the mould threw into the molten metal all the tin plates he could lay his hands on. It was certainly easy to distinguish between the tin--especially the tin termination of the book--and the better bronze; anyone, however, who understands the craft will not betray the workman.

But as everything in this world is liable to turn up again, so it came to pass that, in this very volume, I found myself again in the same scrape, and I have been obliged to again throw some tin into the mould--let me hope that this renewed melting of baser metal will simply be attributed to the pressure of the times.

Alas! the whole book sprang from the pressure of the times, as well as the earlier writings of similar tendency. The more intimate friends of the writer, who are acquainted with his private circumstances, know well how little his own vanity forced him to the tribune, and how great were the sacrifices which he was obliged to make for every independent word which he has spoken since then and--if God will!--which he still means to speak. Now-a-days, a word is a deed whose consequences cannot be measured, and no one knows whether he may not in the end appear as witness to his words in blood.

For many years I have waited in vain for the words of those bold orators, who once in the meetings of the German Burschenschaft so often claimed a hearing, who so often overwhelmed me with their rhetorical talent, and spoke a language spoken so oft before; they were then so forward in noise--they are now so backward in silence. How they then reviled the French and the foreign Babel, and the un-German frivolous betrayers of the Fatherland, who praised French-dom. That praise verified itself in the great week!

Ah, the great week of Paris! The spirit of freedom, which was wafted thence over Germany, has certainly upset the night-lamps here and there, so that the red curtains of several thrones took fire, and golden crowns grew hot under blazing night-caps; but the old catch-polls, in whom the royal police trusted, are already bringing out the fire-buckets, and now scent around all the more suspiciously, and forge all the more firmly their secret chains, and I mark well that a still thicker prison vault is being invisibly arched over the German people.

Poor imprisoned people! be not cast down in your need. Oh, that I could speak catapults! Oh, that I could shoot falarica from my heart!

The distinguished ice-rind of reserve melts from my heart, a strange sorrow steals over me--is it love, and love for the German people? Or is it sickness?--my soul quivers and my eyes burn, and that is an unfortunate occurrence for a writer, who should command his material, and remain charmingly objective, as the art school requires, and as Goethe has done--he has grown to be eighty years old in so doing, and a minister, and portly--poor German people! that is thy greatest man!

I still have a few octavo pages to fill, and I will therefore tell a story--it has been floating in my head since yesterday--a story from the life of Charles the Fifth.[8] But it is now a long time since I heard it, and I no longer remember its details exactly. Such things are easily forgotten, if one does not receive a regular salary for reading them every half-year from his lecture books. But what does it matter if places and dates are forgotten, so long as one holds their significance, their moral meaning, in his memory. It is this which stirs my soul and moves me even to tears. I fear I am getting ill.

The poor emperor was taken prisoner by his enemies, and lay in stern imprisonment. I believe it was in Tyrol. There he sat in solitary sorrow, forsaken by all his knights and courtiers, and no one came to his help. I know not if he had even in those days that cheese-yellow complexion with which Holbein painted him. But the misanthropic under-lip certainly protruded, even more then than in his portraits. He must have despised the people who fawned around him in the sunshine of prosperity, and who left him alone in his bitter need. Suddenly the prison door opened, and there entered a man wrapped in a cloak, and as he cast it aside, the emperor recognised his trusty Kunz von der Rosen, the court-fool. One brought him consolation and counsel--and it was the court-fool.

O, German Fatherland! dear German people! I am thy Kunz von der Rosen. The man whose real office was pastime, and who should only make thee merry in happy days, forces his way into thy prison, in time of need; here, beneath my mantle, I bring thee thy strong sceptre and the beautiful crown--dost thou not remember me, my emperor? If I cannot free thee, I will at least console thee, and thou shalt have some one by thee who will talk with thee about thy most pressing oppressions, and will speak courage to thee, and who loves thee, and whose best jokes and best blood are ever at thy service. For thou, my people, art the true emperor, the true lord of the land--thy will is sovereign and more legitimate than that purple Tel est notre plaisir, which grounds itself upon divine right, without any better guarantee than the quackery of shaven jugglers--thy will, my people, is the only righteous source of all power. Even though thou liest down there in fetters, thy good right will arise in the end, the day of freedom draws near, a new time begins--my emperor, the night is over, and the dawn shines outside.

"Kunz von der Rosen, my Fool, thou errest. Thou hast perhaps mistaken a bright axe for the sun, and the dawn is nothing but blood."

"No, my Emperor, it is the sun, though it rises in the west--for six thousand years men have always seen it rise in the east--it is high time that it for once made a change in its course."

"Kunz von der Rosen, my Fool, thou hast lost the bells from thy red cap, and it now has such a strange look, that red cap!"

"Ah, my Emperor, I have shaken my head in such mad earnest over your distress that the fool's bell fell from my cap; but it is none the worse for that!"

"Kunz von der Rosen, my Fool, what is that breaking and cracking outside there?"

"Hush! it is the saw and the carpenter's axe; the doors of your prison will soon be broken in, and you will be free, my Emperor!"

"Am I then really Emperor? Alas! it is only the Fool who tells me so!"

"Oh, do not sigh, my dear lord, it is the air of the dungeon which so dispirits you; when you have once regained your power, you will feel the bold imperial blood in your veins, and you will be proud as an emperor, and arrogant, and gracious, and unjust, and smiling, and ungrateful as princes are."

"Kunz von der Rosen, my Fool, when I am free again, what wilt thou be doing?"

"I will sew new bells on my cap."

"And how shall I reward thy fidelity?"

"Ah! dear master--do not let me be put to death!"

[The end]
Heinrich Heine's essay: Reisebilder

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