[Image not available: Prince Otto zu Wied.]Prince Otto zu Wied
seemed so near death, that the ceremony of christening was gone through in haste. The name of Otto Nicholas was given him. All day long we thought every breath must be his last; and yet again he rallied, and was able after a few days to be nursed, which was the greatest comfort, as it often soothed him to sleep.
“But when the pain was too violent, nothing was of the slightest avail, and the fits of screaming it occasioned had other ill results. And so the days passed; in alternations of more or less violent pain, for he was seldom altogether free from it; and this of course retarded his growth and prevented him from gaining strength. He remained very, very small, with a sweet little pale face, and big blue eyes, full of expression. In the spring I was able to take him out, and hoped that might strengthen him. By the beginning of May we moved to Bonn, for him to be under the observation of the surgeon who had performed the operation; and there his condition became so far satisfactory, that he seemed to begin at last to grow and develop in a normal manner. The terrible fits of pain still continued, for although everything that could be was done to alleviate them, they were of a nature that rendered all human succour unavailing. When out of pain, he lay perfectly still; one never heard him laugh or coo like other babies. And, although he began to lift himself up and take notice of things, his growth was very slow, and the cutting of each tooth almost cost him his life. When he had to be weaned, there were fresh dangers, and a journey to England, undertaken togive him the benefit of the sea air, very nearly proved fatal. In London a celebrated physician was consulted, whose opinion absolutely coincided with that of the doctor in Bonn, both affirming that the child could never live to grow up, human skill being powerless to aid in such a case. The asses’ milk, however, prescribed by the London doctor, proved very beneficial, and for some time this with arrowroot formed his diet. He remained a very small baby, and only took his first few steps on his second birthday, having also made no attempt at all to speak up to that time. But he was a dear sweet child, with eyes that looked at one so pitifully, it was as if they were imploring help. There was something in him quite different to all other children. It must have been the fearful attacks of pain, in which several hours of each night and day were passed, that gave him this heavenly expression. In the summer of 1853, we went to Paris; and again the poor little thing was at death’s door in a teething crisis. He was not yet three years old, but the delirium was hardly over, when he insisted, as he lay exhausted on his bed, that all the servants should come in to see him for a moment, and it was touching to see him stretch out his tiny little thin hand to each in turn, telling them how ill he had been, but that he was getting better! It took some time after this for him to recover his strength sufficiently to be able to walk again.”
I have followed thus far the narrative of our good Barnes, giving in her own simple language an account of the first three years of the life over whichshe watched so faithfully. It was at about the time when these notes stop, that the letter of a friend staying with us in Paris, describes the poor child in these words:—“Little Otto seems to grow smaller and smaller, and he is always suffering. You cannot think what a dear child it is,—much too good for this world!” And a little later she wrote:—“Otto is marvellously precocious, his mental development is quite extraordinary, he is altogether an ethereal little being!” On his third birthday we had sent out a little table with all his presents, and stood round it, eager to witness the expression of his delight. But he could only say—“Is all that for me?” as he looked at each thing in turn with big wondering eyes, and it was only a month later, that, looking out from the window at the children walking and running happily in the Champs Elysées, he asked:—“And have those little children really no pain?” And when he heard that they had not:—“Oh! how glad I am!” he exclaimed.
When he was four years old, a little white rabbit was given him, which became his greatest pet, his constant companion, following his little master about everywhere like a dog, and licking his face and hands. The only time I ever saw Otto give way to a real fit of despair, was on one occasion when he believed that his dear Bunny had burnt itself. The poor little fellow flung himself on the ground, with piercing screams, tearing at his hair, and his heart still went on thumping like a hammer, long after he had convinced himself that his beloved playfellowhad really met with no harm. The faithful little creature outlived its master just a year.
Quite early the poor boy had begun to practise most marvellous self-control. After a sleepless night, he would walk up and down in his room, with his little fists clenched, saying from time to time—“now I am ready—now I can go in!”—until he felt that he was sufficiently prepared to appear among the rest of us at the breakfast-table, where he would take his place, pale as death, but apparently quite calm. When he was five years old, he began learning to read, and also to join Wilhelm and myself in reciting poetry, as was our custom every Sunday. In this he soon gave evidence of quite exceptional talent; from simple rhymes and fables in verse passing on quickly to the ballads of Schiller and Bürger, and these he declaimed with so much spirit and such a rare sense of humour, that it was a treat to see and hear him.
In a friend’s letter of April, 1855, I find the following passage:—“Otto is really touching; all day yesterday, after the doctor had gone, he kept repeating—‘the good doctor says that if I ate no bread, I should have less pain; how kind of him, to think of what would be good for me!’—This is what he finds to say, instead of a word of complaint at being deprived of the food he likes best.”
He very soon began to take the greatest pleasure in his lessons—history and botany above all. His tiny fingers were very skilful in arranging and pasting in an album the specimens of plants he collected. In this as in everything else his keensense of order was shown; everything belonging to him had its right place, and was kept in perfect order. He was very fond of flowers, and they flourished under his care; the fuchsias that stood in his window were literally covered with blossoms. He began Greek when he was seven years old, and Latin the next year. Greek, however, always remained his favourite study, and he loved to recite verses in that language. One day a lady asked him to let her hear him say a Greek fable. “Why?” he asked rather drily. “You would not understand it if I did!” “That is quite true, but I like to hear the sound.” “Ah! that is another matter!” and he began reciting without more ado.
In the autumn of the year 1858, we went for a little tour in Switzerland and Northern Italy. Otto’s delight at all the wonders he saw was unbounded, and his manner of expressing it caused general amazement. “That cannot be a child!” people said, when they heard him reciting verses of the “Diver” by the Falls of the Rhine, and again quoting appropriate lines of Gœthe and Bürger in the valley of the Rhine, at that moment still ravaged by recent floods. Everywhere guides and cicerones turned to him with their chief explanations, his eager questions and intelligent little face with the big bright eyes showing the deep interest he felt. In Milan his enthusiasm was aroused by the life of S. Charles Borromeo. Noticing this, the priest who was guiding us round the cathedral, and who could speak a little English, took Otto by the hand, and addressed all his remarks to him. Such examples of humangrandeur always excited his passionate admiration, and it was his constant dream, one day to leave his mark in the world.
On our return to Germany that same year, we spent a month at Freiburg, and it is from here that are dated some of my brother’s most characteristic letters, to a little friend of his own age—simple, childlike letters, by no means free from mistakes, but showing a most remarkable depth of thought and precocious intelligence on the part of a child who had not yet quite accomplished his eighth year.
The next year, up to the autumn of 1859, was the very best and happiest of his short life, and during the summer we soon began to hope once more that he might after all perhaps get well. He was much out of doors, able to work in his own little garden, and the healthy exercise, the life in the open air gave him for the moment quite a blooming appearance that might well delude us with false hopes. None who saw him trot about, with his gardening tools flung across his shoulder, his little face flushed and glowing, beneath the straw hat perched jauntily on his fair curls,—no one who saw him thus could have guessed what his sufferings had hitherto been, nor have suspected how soon he was again to be their victim. For that short period his appetite improved, and he seemed able to satisfy it without becoming a prey to the agonising pains with which the digestive process had for so long been almost invariably accompanied. During the harvesting he was in his glory; sometimes out in the fields for hours, taking an active part in the proceedings, andso lively, and joyous, and full of fun, it did everyone good to see him.
Thus the summer went by, but all at once in October Otto was seized with an attack of pain, even more violent and spasmodic than any of the preceding ones, and this being repeated and becoming of very frequent recurrence, a great specialist was consulted, who declared that an operation was necessary. This, although attended with considerable danger, was successfully performed in March, 1860, the long and painful examinations that preceded it, and that were not always carried out under anæsthetics, having been most heroically borne. But the results were not such as had been anticipated. Hardly had the little patient left his bed, before the attacks of pain began again with redoubled violence, to the consternation of the doctors, who felt their skill completely baffled by this unexpected occurrence.
The sympathy shown by the good townspeople at the time of the operation was most touching. Sometimes there was quite a little throng gathered all day in front of the iron railings before the Castle, to hear the latest tidings.
I have told of the deep interest the dear boy took in my confirmation, which took place that same summer. In the little volume of the “Imitation,” which he gave me on that day, I asked him to write a few words, and without a moment’s pause, he took his pen, and wrote in his firm clear characters:—“Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as soundingbrass, or a tinkling cymbal.”—Otto. The gospel of Love had passed into his flesh and blood, had become part of his inmost being.
Directly it was possible, his lessons had begun again, for that was indeed the best, the only means of abstracting his thoughts, diverting them entirely from his own condition. The letters that I have from him, during a few weeks’ absence from home about this time, point to the extraordinary self-command he had attained, whilst they also display most remarkable and varied intellectual interests. In some he tells me of his botanical studies and the experiments in horticulture that already so deeply interested him, in others, he spoke of the lectures on Art and Literature, which it had been arranged for different professors to give for his benefit. But Nature and her works he loved best of all, and I treasure the tiny little album he gave me about this time, in which specimens of various mosses were most beautifully arranged, together with a charming little essay, “My Love for the Leaves,” a complete dissertation on all his favourite plants and trees, carefully enumerated, and their foliage described in every detail.
But his sufferings grew worse, the attacks of pain succeeding one another more frequently, and on Ascension Day of that same year every faint hope of his ultimate recovery was taken from us. The surgeon, by whom the last operation had been performed, discovered, on examining him again, in addition to the original organic trouble, the existence of a very large internal tumour, and pronounced thatin his opinion Otto could not possibly last another year. At the same time, my father’s lungs were subjected to thorough examination, with the alarming result that in his case also the doctor declared no hope of recovery to exist, and that he could hardly be expected to live more than two years longer. Oh! that terrible Ascension Day! what a blight was cast over all our hearts! And the fearful attacks of pain went on, increasing in duration and in intensity, and giving the poor child an opportunity of displaying almost superhuman courage and endurance, above all in his constant and heroic efforts to hide some part of his sufferings from his beloved mother, whose anguish was indeed almost unendurable. But between the paroxysms, ever the same sweet serenity, even cheerfulness, and an immediate resumption of the study or occupation interrupted just before. His activity and energy were unbounded; he was always at work, either carving, pasting or cutting out; his hands were never at rest.
That summer brought one great joy to the poor little invalid, the return of his idolised elder brother, whose course of study had caused him to absent himself from home for some years, and who had meanwhile developed from a mere schoolboy into a tall youth. Otto’s excitement was so great, that for the time being he felt no pain. Once more his laughter resounded through the house, and even out into the woods, where we lingered till quite late in those long, lovely summer days. Once more it was quite a gay, lively, youthful party that collected round the tea-table, and our merriment was so infectious that ourelders would often pause in their serious conversation to listen to the nonsense we talked, and join in our peals of laughter. An exhibition of celebrated pictures had just been opened in Cologne, and we all went over there one day to see them. The cartoons by Cornelius attracted Otto’s attention more than all the rest, and he stood for a long time contemplating the one, concerning whose subject the rest of our party—although there were several scholars and artists with us—could not be agreed. To their astonishment, when the boy at last took his eyes off the picture, he said very quietly—“I know what it is!” and proceeded to describe in every detail the scene from the Odyssey, which it did indeed depict.
So long as his brother was in the house, Otto would not stir from his side. His admiration for the big elder brother, for his health and strength, was most touching, and it was refreshing to hear his generous outburst of indignation at any remark he considered in the slightest degree disparaging to his idol. Were there but the faintest hint of criticism, he would blaze up: “Wilhelm has beautiful eyes and splendid teeth, and is very, very clever!” In the warmth and sincerity of his heart, he could understand no grudging affection, no measured qualified praise. And this warm-heartedness was probably his greatest source of happiness, providing him with more glad hours than might well have been deemed possible in an existence so fraught with pain.
Very great pleasure he derived from the littlefarmhouse, built in the style of a Swiss chalet, which my mother had originally planned as a present to him, on his coming of age. We had passed many happy hours there, but in the autumn of 1861, he was no longer able to ride or go thither on foot, and soon even the movement of the little donkey-carriage, in which for a time he drove there daily, also became unbearable, and one evening we had to pull up in the middle of the wood and wait till a litter was brought on which to carry him home. It was a pitiable sight; the little motionless body, worn out with suffering, stretched on the litter and borne along by grave silent men, while the flickering moon-beams darting through the branches shed an unearthly light over the small white face, and overhead night-hawks and screech-owls, circling round the sad little procession, filled the air with their jarring cries.
From the following October he could not walk at all, and was carried about everywhere in a little arm-chair, which was fastened on a litter. In this manner he was brought to table or taken out into the woods, where he would lie for hours, resting on his right side, with the dead leaves falling thickly round him. After this he was never again able to lie either on his back or on the left side. The course of his illness after this I find described in my letters to my absent brother Wilhelm, a few extracts from which I give here.... “Otto suffered frightfully yesterday all day long, and was almost beside himself at the slightest movement in the room.... Sleep can only be obtained by means oflaudanum.... He seems to grow more and more loving towards us all; I have never seen such depth of feeling in another; there is a strange depth in the big serious eyes, that appear to be untouched by the sufferings of the frail body. The other day, as I sat beside him in the wood, he said many such touching things, winding up with accusing himself of cowardice, in taking laudanum to procure relief from pain. I could only comfort him by reminding him that it was not of his own free will he took it, but to please others.... For the last two days Otto has stayed in bed altogether.... The agony he has suffered is indescribable; it wrings one’s heart to witness it.... Mamma has been letting him know the truth about his condition, thinking that it must comfort him to know that his suffering will soon be over. But at first he wept at the thought of parting with her, saying that he could not bear it. Then he grew calmer and discussed the matter quite quietly. He told mamma yesterday that he wished to be buried in Monrepos, under the old trees, with a white cross at the head of his grave, and quantities of flowers planted on it. Then he went on to ask, if in the life beyond he should see all the great men of antiquity, and Socrates above all—and also if he should still see mamma—sitting in her chair, just as she was then!—“I hope so, my child!” she told him.... Papa is a little better. He came down yesterday for the first time for three weeks. The meeting was a touching one; papa himself, worn to a shadow, looking down so anxiously on the poor little pale face, that was gazingwith rapture up in his.... Otto suffers more and more. He begins to have hallucinations, sees himself surrounded by hideous faces that threaten him.... He seems to have reached a degree of pain, beyond which it is impossible to go. His sufferings are indescribable. A little time ago, he said he had to pray each day that he might welcome death, for the thought of the parting was still too terrible to him; but now he begins to comfort himself with the thought that there is no real separation, and to rejoice that he may at last rest and be free from pain. And he has been giving all his instructions, telling us his wishes, and always coming back to the provision to be made for his own two special attendants.... Each new day is worse than the last.... Once he cried out:—“I cannot bear it!” but when mamma said:—“Yes, we will bear it together!” he grew quieter and murmured—“Father, Thy will be done!” ... Although the doses of laudanum are constantly being increased, he sleeps very little, the pain is too agonising.... Of mamma I say nothing. What she suffers, she keeps to herself; she says sometimes she feels as if a saw were at her heart, being slowly drawn backwards and forwards.”
Otto had always taken special pleasure in following the mental development of the lives he read about. He found satisfaction in the thought that the activity of the spirit can neither be blighted nor repressed. Every fact or occurrence that seemed to bear on this theory interested him; the story of Kasper Hauser was a case in point, and delightedhim greatly, whilst the inactive life of the poor young Duke of Reichstadt was simply incomprehensible to him—“To live to be twenty-two,—and havedonenothing!” he would exclaim, almost impatiently.
There seemed at one moment to be danger of his being too severe in his judgment of others, but directly my mother pointed this out to him, he saw his mistake and took pains to avoid it.
To the last his spirit remained active, and in the intervals of pain he was always busily employed. Close beside his pillow, near the little Testament that never left him, lay a case of the different instruments he used for painting and carving, and with them he fabricated all sorts of pretty things for us all. His strong sense of the beautiful, of grace and harmony, never deserted him, neither did the humour with which he had so often enlivened us. After the fiercest attack of pain, whilst all around him were still overcome by witnessing his struggles, he would suddenly make some witty remark, and would not rest content till he had brought us all to join in his laughter.
But the pain grew worse and worse, and he was so weakened by it, that on his eleventh birthday we dared to hope, that before the day was over, he would be keeping it in Paradise. We had brought him flowers, and some of them we strewed over his bed, and wreathed around his pillow, and it might have been in his last slumber that he was lying there, so silent and still, and the sheets no whiter than his wan white face. But that mercy was notyet granted him; there was still much more suffering in store. A month later came my eighteenth birthday, and directly I came to see him in the morning, he pulled out from under his pillow a tiny marble slab, on which notwithstanding the awkward position in which he lay, he had contrived to paint in water-colours the words: “God is love.” When he gave it me, we could only throw our arms round one another and cry together. The night before he had made the remark, that whatever presents he now gave must be of a lasting nature.
For an account of the last few dreadful weeks, during which his illness made rapid strides, I turn to letters written by me at the time, and copy a few pages.
“December, 1861.—Our preparations of Christmas are being made with more than usual care, so that the festival may be kept with all due solemnity,—for the last time, as we well know, that we shall all celebrate it together on earth.... Papa is very weak, and the fits of coughing are almost intermittent. With him, as with Otto, it is only a question of time.... Christmas Eve was very solemn and peaceful and beautiful: the few days preceding it had been exceptionally good and free from pain, so that Otto could be wheeled into the room where the Christmas-trees stood ready, and it was touching to see his little face, beaming with happiness, when the trees were lighted up, and the Christmas hymn sung as usual, by the whole household, led by me from my accustomed place at the organ.... But since then he has had two very disturbed nights,and the dreadful attacks of pain have begun again.... ‘Keep calm!’ he called to mamma, after one of these,—‘it is only the body that suffers, nothing of this can hurt the soul!’
“January, 1862.—Yesterday he thought he was dying, and took leave of us all, but when he saw mamma’s tears, he again found strength to comfort her. The night that followed was a dreadful one; the sensation of suffocation so intense that, exhausted as he was, he sometimes stood upright in bed in the effort to breathe.... And through it all his patience and resignation are inexhaustible, and his affection for mamma and each one of us seems only to grow stronger.... The fits of pain are now so frequent, even mamma no longer keeps count of them. Last night she had to give him twenty-one drops of laudanum.... We pray that the end may be near. To-day his eyes are quite dim, and he can only bear that we speak in whispers.... But his first thought is still for mamma, and he says she is much more to be pitied than he.... It was her birthday yesterday, and Otto was in a great state of excitement. He gave her a flower-stand and a little casket, which he had himself designed. One could see the efforts he made to appear cheerful, whilst hardly for one moment free from pain. (He gave orders at the time for another present, for a surprise to his mother on her next birthday. She received it eleven months after his death!)....
“February.—His strength seems to be ebbing.... His one prayer is that he may die in fullconsciousness. Another respite.... Then a new and worse pain. The poor child is being slowly tortured to death.... Sometimes, in his agony, cries of despair are forced from him, and then again he can talk with the utmost composure of the blessedness awaiting him when the last struggle is over.... We had a visit from Professor Perthes, who sat for some hours in Otto’s room, talking to him and Uncle Nicholas. The Professor was so much struck by the invalid’s keen interest in the subject being discussed, and his clear-headed practical suggestions, that he exclaimed on coming away from him:—“That boy is not going to die yet;—he thinks and feels like a grown-up man!” But a little later, after witnessing one of the cruel paroxysms of pain, our friend also was convinced that this matured intelligence he had just been admiring, only betokened that the soul, purified and ennobled by suffering, was already ripe for a better world.... The weakness increased. All day yesterday and all night long, he lay with his hands clasped in prayer, murmuring feebly:—“When will the hour of release come? when will the Angel of Peace appear, to bear me away?” His piety and resignation never fail him for one moment.... His hands are cold as ice, his brow like marble, his eyes sunken, but still bright with intelligence.... One evening he complained that he could no longer rightly distinguish our faces. Over his poor little wasted face the shadow of death is already creeping, but he is strangely beautiful with it.... Yesterday, Monday, as we sat as usual round him, he slowlystretched out his poor feeble arms, exclaiming joyfully:—“Well, then, if this is to be the end, farewell to you all!” And his expression was rapturous, as he bade us each good-night, and prayed for blessings on us.... But even then it was not over....”
The agony lasted two days longer. He seemed to sleep, but woke from time to time with a cry of anguish. He could no longer speak, though he still saw and heard everything, and gave signs that he understood. Then, at the very last, after a few broken accents, came the rattle in his throat, and the one word “Help!” loud and clear. And then a deathly silence. And mamma bent over him and murmured—“Thanks be to God! His name be praised for evermore!”
The struggle was over. Peace and heavenly calm spread themselves over the tired features, and a sweet smile played about his lips—the deep line across the high forehead alone showing how dearly this peace had been purchased.
Our dear Otto looked like an angel sleeping there; we could scarce tear ourselves away from him. My mother kept saying—“How quietly he rests!” and if anyone sobbed on coming into the room—“Hush! hush!” she said, “do not disturb my child!” With our own hands we placed him in his last little bed, and covered him over. The old clergyman from Biebrich, by whom the benediction had been spoken at my parents’ marriage, now pronounced the last blessing over their beloved child.
Otto’s best epitaph is contained in a letter from my father to an intimate friend, which concluded thus: “ ...On a little rising-ground not far from Monrepos, he sleeps his last sleep in the shade of the old linden trees. But he lives on forever in our memory, and this living remembrance, this communion with the dead, is our last best heritage, by which in the midst of the heavy loss, we are yet made rich sempiternally.”