Men are not always what they seem.—LESSING.
Our tale is no creation of fancy; it is the reality in which we live; bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh. Our own time and the men of our own age we shall see. But not alone will we occupy ourselves with every-day life, with the moss on the surface; the whole tree, from the roots to the fragrant leaves, will we observe. The heavy earth shall press the roots, the moss and bark of every-day life adhere to the stern, the strong boughs with flowers and leaves spread themselves out, whilst the sun of poetry shall shine among them, and show the colors, odor, and singing-birds. But the tree of reality cannot shoot up so soon as that of fancy, like the enchantment in Tieck’s “Elves.” We must seek our type in nature. Often may there be an appearance of cessation; but that is not the case. It is even so with our story; whilst our characters, by mutual discourse, make themselves worthy of contemplation, there arises, as with the individual branches of the tree, an unseen connection. The branch which shoots high up in the air, as though it would separate itself from the mother-stem, only presses forward to form the crown, to lend uniformity to the whole tree. The lines which diverge from the general centre are precisely those which produce the harmony.
We shall, therefore, soon see, though these scenes out of every-day life are no digression from the principal events, nothing episodical which one may pass over. In order still sooner to arrive at a clear perception of this assertion, we will yet tarry a few moments in the house of Mr. Berger, the merchant; but in the mean time we have advanced three weeks. Wilhelm and Otto had happily passed their examen philosophicum. The latter had paid several visits, and was already regarded as an old friend of the family. The lover already addressed him with his droll “Good day, Mr. Petersen;” and Grethe was witty about his melancholy glance, which he was not always able to conquer. She called it “making faces,” and besought him to appear so on the day of her funeral.
The object of the five sisters’ first Platonic love had been their brother. They had overwhelmed him with caresses and tenderness, had admired and worshipped him. “The dear little man!” they called him; they had no other. But Hans Peter was so impolite and teasing toward the dear sisters, that they were found to resign him so soon as one of them had a lover. Upon this lover they all clung. Each one seemed to have a piece of him. He was Grethe’s bridegroom, would be their brother-in-law. They might address him with the confidential thou, and even give him a little kiss.
Otto’s appearance in the family caused these rays to change their direction. Otto was handsome, and possessed of fortune; either of which often suffices to bow a female heart. Beauty bribes the thoughtless; riches, the prudent.
Maren, or as she was here called, Maja, had arrived. The young ladies had already pulled off some of her bows, arranged her hair differently, and made one of her silk handkerchiefs into an apron; but, spite of all this finesse, she still remained the lady from Lemvig. They could remove no bows from her pronunciation. She had been the first at home; here she could not take that rank. This evening she was to see in the theatre, for the first time, the ballet of the “Somnambule.”
“It is French!” said Hans Peter; “and frivolous, like everything that we have from them.”
“Yes, the scene in the second act, where she steps out of the window,” said the merchant; “that is very instructive for youth!”
“But the last act is sweet!” cried the lady. “The second act is certainly, as Hans Peter very justly observed, somewhat French. Good heavens! he gets quite red, the sweet lad!” She extended her hand to him, and nodded, smiling, whereupon Hans Peter spoke very prettily about the immorality on the stage. The father also made some striking observation.
“Yes,” said the lady, “were all husbands like thee, and all young men like Hans Peter, they would speak in another tone on the stage, and dress in another manner. In dancing it is abominable; the dresses are so short and indecent, just as though they had nothing on! Yet, after all, we must say that the ‘Somnambule’ is beautiful. And, really, it is quite innocent!”
They now entered still deeper into the moral: the conversation lasted till coffee came.
Maren’s heart beat even quicker, partly in expectation of the play, through hearing of the corruptions of this Copenhagen Sodom. She heard Otto defend this French piece; heard him speak of affectation. Was he then corrupted? How gladly would she have heard him discourse upon propriety, as Hans Peter had done. “Poor Otto!” thought she; “this is having no relations, but being forced to struggle on in the world alone.”
The merchant now rose. He could not go to the theatre. First, he had business to attend to; and then he must go to his club, where he had yesterday changed his hat.
“Nay, then, it has happened to thee as to Hans Peter!” said the lady. “Yesterday, in the lecture-room, he also got a strange hat. But, there, thou hast his hat!” she suddenly exclaimed, as her eye fell upon the hat which her husband held in his hand. “That is Hans Peter’s hat! Now, we shall certainly find that he has thine! You have exchanged them here at home. You do not know each other’s hats, and therefore you fancy this occurred from home.”
One of the sisters now brought the hat which Hans Peter had got in mistake. Yes, it was certainly the father’s. Thus an exchange in the house, a little intermezzo, which naturally, from its insignificance, was momentarily forgotten by all except the parties concerned, for to them it was an important moment in their lives; and to us also, as we shall see, an event of importance, which has occasioned us to linger thus long in this circle. In an adjoining room will we, unseen spirits, watch the father and son. They are alone; the family is already in the theatre. We may, indeed, watch them—they are true moralists. It is only a moral drawn from a hat.
But the father’s eyes rolled, his cheeks glowed, his words were sword-strokes, and must make an impression on any disposition as gentle as his son’s; but the son stood quiet, with a firm look and with a smile on his lips, such as the moral bestows. “You were in the adjoining room!” said he. “Where it is proper for you to be there may I also come.”
“Boy!” cried the father, and named the place, but we know it not; neither know we its inhabitants. Victor Hugo includes them in his “Children’s Prayer,” in his beautiful poem, “La Prière pour Tous.” The child prays for all, even “for those who sell the sweet name of love.”
[Note: “Prie!... Pour les femmes échevelées Qui vendentle doux nom d’amour!”]
“Let us be silent with each other!” said the son. “I am acquainted with many histories. I know another of the pretty Eva!”—
“Eva!” repeated the father.
We will hear no more! It is not proper to listen. We see the father and son extend their hands. It appeared a scene of reconciliation. They parted: the father goes to his business, and Hans Peter to the theatre, to anger himself over the immorality in the second act of the “Somnambule.”
“L’amour est pour les coeurs,Ce que l’aurore est pour les fleurs,Et le printemps pour la nature.”—VIGUE.“Love is a childish disease and like the small-pox. Somedie, some become deformed, others are more or less scarred,while upon others the disease does not leave any visibletrace.”—The Alchemist, by C. HAUCH.
“Be candid, Otto!” said Wilhelm, as he one day visited his friend. “You cannot make up your mind to say thou to me; therefore let it be. We are, after all, good friends. It is only a form; although you must grant that in this respect you are really a great fool.”
Otto now explained what an extraordinary aversion he had felt, what a painful feeling had seized upon him, and made it impossible to him.
“There you were playing the martyr!” said Wilhelm, laughing. “Could you not immediately tell me how you were constituted? So are most men. When they have no trouble, they generally hatch one themselves; they will rather stand in the cold shadow than in the warm sunshine, and yet the choice stands open to us. Dear friend, reflect; now we are both of us on the stream: we shall soon be put into the great business-bottles, where we shall, like little devils, stretch and strain ourselves without ever getting out, until life withdraws from us!” He laid his arm confidentially upon Otto’s shoulder. “Often have I wished to speak with you upon one point! Yes, I do not desire that you should confess every word, every thought to me. I already know that I shall be able to prove to you that the thing lies in a region where it cannot have the power which you ascribe to it. In the cold zones a venomous bite does not operate as dangerously as in warmer ones; a sorrow in childhood cannot overpower us as it does in riper age. Whatever misfortune may have happened to you when a child, if in your wildness—you yourself say that you were wild—whatsoever you may have then done, it cannot, it ought not to influence your whole life: your understanding could tell you this better than I. At our age we find ourselves in the land of joy, or we never enter it!”
“You are a happy man!” exclaimed Otto, and gazed sorrowfully before him. “Your childhood afforded you only joy and hope! Only think of the solitude in which mine was passed. Among the sand-hills of the west coast my days glided away: my grandfather was gloomy and passionate; our old preacher lived only in a past time which I knew not, and Rosalie regarded the world through the spectacles of sorrow. Such an environment might well cast a shadow upon my life-joy. Even in dress, one is strangely remarkable when one comes from afar province to the capital; first this receives another cut, and one gradually becomes like those around one. The same thing happens in a spiritual relation, but one’s being and ideas one does not change so quickly as one’s clothes. I have only been a short time among strangers, and who knows?” added he, with a melancholy smile, “perhaps I shall come into equilibrium when some really great misfortune happens to me and very much overpowers me, and then I may show the same carelessness, the same phlegm as the multitude.”
“A really great misfortune!” repeated Wilhelm. “You do, indeed, say something. That would be a very original means of cure, but you are an original being. Perhaps lay this means you might really be healed. ‘Make no cable out of cobweb!’ said a celebrated poet whose name does not occur to me at this moment. But the thought is good, you should have it embroidered upon your waistcoat, so that you might have it before your eyes when you droop your head. Do not look so grave; we are friends, are we not? Among all my young acquaintance you are the dearest to me, although there are moments when I know not how it stands with us. I could confide every secret to you, but I am not sure that you would be equally open with me. Do not be angry, my dear friend! There are secrets of so delicate a nature, that one may not confide them even to the dearest friend. So long as we preserveoursecret it is our prisoner; it is quite the contrary, however, so soon as we have let it escape us. And yet, Otto, you are so dear to me, that I believe in you as in my own heart. This, even now, bears a secret which penetrates me with joy and love of life! I must speak cut. But you must enter into my joy, partake in it, or say nothing about it; you have then heard nothing—nothing! Otto, I love! therefore am I happy, therefore is there sunshine in my heart, life joy in my veins! I love Eva, the beautiful lovely Eva!”
Otto pressed his hand, but preserved silence.
“No, not so!” cried Wilhelm. “Only speak a word! Do you I’m in a conception of the world which has opened before me?”
“Eva is beautiful! very beautiful!” said Otto, slowly. “She is innocent and good. What can one wish for more? I can imagine how she fills your whole heart! But will she do so always? She will not always remain young, always lovely! Has she, then, mind sufficient to be everything to you? Will this momentary happiness which you prepare for her and yourself be great enough to outweigh—I will not say the sorrow, but the discontent which this union will bring forth in your family? For God’s sake, think of everything!”
“My dear fellow!” said Wilhelm, “your old preacher now really speaks out of you! But enough: I can bear the confession. I answer, ‘Yes, yes!’ with all my heart, ‘yes!’ Wherefore will you now bring me out of my sunshine into shade? Wherefore, in my joy over the beauty of the rose should I be reminded that the perfume and color will vanish, that the leaves will fall? It is the course of life! but must one, therefore, think of the grave, of the finale, when the act begins?”
“Love is a kind of monomania,” said Otto; “it may be combated: it depends merely upon our own will.”
“Ah, you know this not at all!” said Wilhelm. “But it will come in due time, and then you will be far more violent than others! Who knows? perhaps this is the sorrow of which you spoke, the misfortune which should bring your whole being into equipoise! That was also a kind of search after the sorrowful. I will sincerely wish that your heart may be filled with love as mine is; then will the influence of the sand-hills vanish, and you will speak with me as you ought to do, and as my confidence deserves!”
“That will I!” replied Otto. “You make the poor girl miserable! Now you love Eva, but then you will no longer be able. The distance between you and her is too great, and I cannot conceive how the beauty of her countenance can thus fill your whole being. A waiting-girl! yes, I repeat the name which offends your ear: a waiting-girl! Everywhere will it be repeated. And you? No one can respect nobility less than I do—that nobility which is only conferred by birth; it is nothing, and a time will come when this will not be prized at all, when the nobility of the soul will be the only nobility. I openly say this to you, who are a nobleman yourself. The more development of mind, the more ancestors! But Eva has nothing, can have nothing, except a pretty face, and this is what has enchained you; you are become the servant of a servant, and that is degrading yourself and your nobility of mind!”
“Mr. Thostrup!” exclaimed Wilhelm, “you wound me! This is truly not the first time, but now I am weary of it. I have shown too much good nature, and that is the most unfortunate failing a man can be cursed with!”
He seated himself at the piano, and hammered away.
Otto was silent a moment, his checks glowed, but he was soon again calm, and in a joking tone said: “Do not expend your anger upon that poor instrument because we disagree in our views. You are playing only dissonances, which offend my ear more than your anger!”
“Dissonances!” repeated Wilhelm. “Cannot you hear that they are harmonies? There are many things for which you have a bad ear!”
Otto knew how to lead his anger to different points regarding which they had formerly been at variance, but he spoke with such mildness that Wilhelm’s anger rather abated than increased.
They were again friends, but regarding Eva not one word more was said.
“I should not be an honest and true friend to him, were I to let him be swallowed up by this whirlpool!” said Otto to himself, when he was alone. “At present he is innocent and good but at his age, with his gay disposition!—I must warn Eva! soon! soon! The snow which has once been trodden is no longer pure! Wilhelm will scarcely forgive me! But I must!”
On the morrow it was impossible for him to travel to Roeskelde, but the following day he really would and must hasten thither.
Still, in the early morning hour, Eva occupied his thoughts; she busied Wilhelm’s also, but in a different way: but they agreed in the purity of their intentions. There was still a third, whose blood was put in motion at the mention of her name, who said: “The pretty Eva is a servant there! One must speak with her. The family can make an excursion there!”
“You sweet children!” said the merchant’s wife, “the autumn is charming, far pleasanter than the whole summer! The father, should the weather remain good, will make an excursion with us to Lethraborg the day after to-morrow. We will then walk in the beautiful valley of the Hertha, and pass the night at Roeskelde. Those will be two delightful days! What an excellent father you have! But shall we not invite Mr. Thostrup to go with us? We are so many ladies, and it looks well to have a few young gentlemen with us. Grethe, thou must write an invitation; thou canst write thy father’s name underneath.”
“These poetical letters are so similar to those of Baggesen,that we could be almost tempted to consider the news of hisdeath as false, although so well affirmed that we mustacknowledge it.”—Monthly Journal of Literature.“She is as slender as the poplar-willow, as fleet as thehastening waters. A Mayflower odorous and sweet.”—H. P.HOLST.“Ah, where is the rose?”—Lulu, by GUNTELBURG.
The evening before Otto was to travel with the merchant’s family to Roeskelde he called upon the family where Miss Sophie was staying. Her dear mamma had left three days before. Wilhelm had wished to accompany him to Roeskelde, but the mother did not desire it.
“We have had a pleasure to-day,” said Sophie, “a pleasure from which we shall long have enjoyment. Have you seen the new book, the ‘Letters of a Wandering Ghost?’ It is Baggesen himself in his most perfect beauty, a music which I never believed could have been given in words. This is a poet! He has made July days in the poetry of Denmark. Natural thoughts are so strikingly, and yet so simply expressed; one has the idea that one could write such verses one’s self, they fall so lightly.”
“They are like prose,” said the lady, “and yet the most beautifully perfect verse I know. You must read the book, Mr. Thostrup!”
“Perhaps you will read to us this evening?” said Sophie. “I should very much like to hear it again.”
“In a second reading one shall enter better into the individual beauties,” said the lady of the house.
“I will remain and listen,” said the host.
“This must be a masterpiece!” exclaimed Otto,”—a true masterpiece, since all are so delighted with it.”
“It is Baggesen himself; and truly as he must sing in that world where everything mortal is ennobled.”
“‘Meadows all fragrance, the strongholds of pleasure,Heaven blue streamlets,
That speed through the green woods in musical measure,’” began Otto, and the spiritual battle-piece with beauty and tone developed itself more and more; they found themselves in the midst of the winter camp of the Muses, where the poet with
...“lyre on his shoulder and sword at....
Hastened to fight with the foes of the Muses.” Otto’s gloomy look won during the perusal a more animated expression. “Excellent!” exclaimed he; “this is what I myself have thought and felt, but, alas! have been unable to express.”
“I am a strange girl,” said Sophie; “whenever I read a new poet of distinguished talent, I consider that he is the greatest. It was so with Byron and Victor Hugo. ‘Cain’ overwhelmed me, ‘Notre Dame’ carried me away with it. Once I could imagine no greater poet than Walter Scott, and yet I forget him over Oehlenschläger; yes, I remember a time when Heiberg’s vaudevilles took almost the first place among my chosen favorites. Thus I know myself and my changeable disposition, and yet I firmly believe that I shall make an exception with this work. Other poets showed me the objects of the outer world, this one shows me my own mind: my own thoughts, my own being he presents before me, and therefore I shall always take the same interest in the Ghost’s Letters.”
“They are true food for the mind,” said Otto; “they are as words in season; there must be movement in the lake, otherwise it will become a bog.”
“The author is severe toward those whom he has introduced,” said the lady; “but he carries, so to say, a sweet knife. A wound from a sharp sword-blade is not so painful as that from a rusty, notched knife.”
“But who may the author be?” said Sophie.
“May we never learn!” replied Otto. “Uncertainty gives the book something piquant. In such a small country as ours it is good for the author to be unknown. Here we almost tread upon each other, and look into each other’s garments. Here the personal conditions of the author have much to do with success; and then there are the newspapers, where either friend or enemy has an assistant, whereas the being anonymous gives it the patent of nobility. It is well never to know an author. What does his person matter to us, if his book is only good?
“‘Crush and confound the rabble dissolute That desecrate thy poet’s grave?’” read Otto, and the musical poem was at an end. All were enchanted with it. Otto alone made some small objections: “The Muses ought not to come with ‘trumpets and drums,’ and so many expressions similar to ‘give a blow on the chaps,’ etc., ought not to appear.”
“But if the poet will attack what is coarse,” said Sophie, “he must call things by their proper names. He presents us with a specimen of the prosaic filth, but in a soap-bubble. We may see it, but not seize upon it. I consider that you are wrong!”
“The conception of idea and form,” said Otto, “does not seem to be sufficiently presented to one; both dissolve into one. Even prose is a form.”
“But the form itself is the most important,” said the lady of the house; “with poetry as with sculpture, it is the form which gives the meaning.”
“No, pardon me!” said Otto; “poetry is like the tree which God allows to grow. The inward power expresses itself in the form; both are equally important, but I consider the internal as the most holy. This is here the poet’s thought. The opinion which he expresses affects us as much as the beautiful dress in which he has presented it.”
Now commenced a contest upon form and material, such as was afterward maintained throughout the whole of Copenhagen.
“I shall always admire the ‘Letters of a Wandering Ghost,’” said Sophie,—“always rave about these poems. To-night I shall dream of nothing but this work of art.”
How little men can do that which they desire, did this very moment teach.
When we regard the fixed star through a telescope and lose ourselves in contemplation, a little hair can conceal the mighty body, a grain of dust lead us from these sublime thoughts. A letter came for Miss Sophie; a traveller brought it from her mother: she was already in Funen, and announced her safe arrival.
“And the news?” said the hostess.
“Mamma has hired a new maid, or, rather, she has taken to be with her an amiable young girl—the pretty Eva in Roeskelde. Mr. Thostrup and Wilhelm related to us this summer several things about her which make her interesting. We saw her on our journey hither, when mamma was prepossessed by her well-bred appearance. Upon her return, the young girl has quite won her heart. It really were a pity if such a pretty, respectable girl remained in a public-house. She is very pretty; is she not, Mr. Thostrup?”
“Very pretty!” answered Otto, becoming crimson, for Sophie said this with an emphasis which was not without meaning.
The following day, at an early hour, Otto found himself at the merchant’s.
Spite of the changeable weather of our climate, all the ladies were in their best dresses. Three persons must sit upon each seat. Hans Peter and the lover had their place beside the coachman. It was a long time before the cold meat, the provision for several days, was packed up, and the whole company were seated. At length, when they had got out of the city, Christiane recollected that they had forgotten the umbrellas, and that, after all, it would be good to have them. The coachman must go back for them, and meantime the carriage drew up before the Column of Liberty. The poor sentinel must now become an object of Miss Grethe’s interest. Several times the soldier glanced down upon his regimentals. He was a Krähwinkler, who had an eye to his own advantage. A man who rode past upon a load of straw occupied a high position. That was very interesting.
Otto endeavored to give the conversation another direction. “Have not you seen the new poem which has just appeared, the ‘Letters of a Wandering Ghost?’” asked he, and sketched out their beauty and tendency.
“Doubtless, very heavy blows are dealt!” said Mr. Berger, “the man must be witty—Baggesen to the very letter.”
“The ‘Copenhagen Post’ is called the pump!” said Hans Peter.
“That is superb!” cried Grethe. “Who does it attack besides?”
“Folks in Soroe, and this ‘Holy Andersen,’ as they call him.”
“Does he get something?” said Laide. “That I will grant him for his milk and water. He was so impolite toward the ladies!”
“I like them to quarrel in this way!” said the merchant’s lady. “Heiberg will doubtless get his share also, and then he will reply in something merry.”
“Yes,” said Mr. Berger, “he always knows how to twist things in such a manner that one must laugh, and then it is all one to us whether he is right or not.”
“This book is entirely for Heiberg,” said Otto. “The author is anonymous, and a clever man.”
“Good Heavens! you are not the author, Mr. Thostrup?” cried Julle, and looked at him with a penetrating gaze. “You can manage such things so secretly! You think so highly of Heiberg: I remember well all the beautiful things you said of his ‘Walter the Potter’ and his ‘Psyche.’”
Otto assured her that he could not confess to this honor.
They reached Roeskelde in the forenoon, but Eva did not receive them. The excursion to Lethraborg was arranged; toward evening they should again return to the inn, and then Eva would certainly appear.
The company walked in the garden at Lethraborg: the prospect from the terrace was beautiful; they looked through the windows of the castle, and at length came to the conclusion that it would be best to go in.
“There are such beautiful paintings, people say!” remarked the lover.
“We must see them,” cried all the ladies.
“Do you often visit the picture-gallery of the Christiansborg?” inquired Otto.
“I cannot say that we do!” returned Mrs. Berger. “You well know that what is near one seldom sees, unless one makes a downright earnest attempt, and that we have not yet done. Besides, not many people go up: that wandering about the great halls is so wearying.”
“There are splendid pieces by Ruysdal!” said Otto.
“Salvator Rosa’s glorious ‘Jonas’ is well worth looking at!”
“Yes, we really must go at once, whilst our little Maja is here. It does not cost more than the Exhibition, and we were there three times last year. The view from the castle windows toward the canal, as well as toward the ramparts, is so beautiful, they say.”
The company now viewed the interior of Lethraborg, and then wandered through the garden and in the wood. The trees had their autumnal coloring, but the whole presented a variety of tints far richer than one finds in summer. The dark fir-trees, the yellow beeches and oaks, whose outermost branches had sent forth light green shoots, presented a most picturesque effect, and formed a splendid foreground to the view over old Leire, the royal city, now a small village, and across the bay to the splendid cathedral.
“That resembles a scene in a theatre!” cried Mrs. Berger, and immediately the company were deep in dramatic affairs.
“Such a decoration they should have in the royal theatre!” said Hans Peter.
“Yes, they should have many such!” said Grethe. “They should have some other pieces than those they have. I know not how it is with our poets; they have no inventive power. Relate the droll idea which thou hadst the other day for a new piece!” said she to her lover, and stroked his cheeks.
“O,” said he, and affected a kind of indifference, “that was only an idea such as one has very often. But it might become a very nice piece. When the curtain is drawn up, one should see close upon the lamps the gable-ends of two houses. The steep roofs must go down to the stage, so that it is only half a yard wide, and this is to represent a watercourse between the two houses. In each garret a poor but interesting family should dwell, and these should step forth into the watercourse, and there the whole piece should be played.”
“But what should then happen?” asked Otto.
“Yes,” said the lover, “I have not thought about that; but see, there is the idea! I am no poet, and have too much to do at the counting-house, otherwise one might write a little piece.”
“Heavens! Heiberg ought to have the idea!” said Grethe.
“No, then it would be a vaudeville,” said the lover, “and I cannot bear them.”
“O, it might be made charming!” cried Grethe. “I see the whole piece! how they clamber about the roofs! The idea is original, thou sweet friend!”
By evening the family were again in Roeskelde.
The merchant sought for Eva. Otto inquired after her, so did Hans Peter also, and all three received the same answer.
“She is no longer here.”
“I wish I was air, that I could beat my wings, could chasethe clouds, and try to fly over the mountain summits: thatwould be life.”—F. RÜCKERT.
The first evening after Otto’s return to Copenhagen he spent with Sophie, and the conversation turned upon his little journey. “The pretty Eva has vanished!” said he.
“You had rejoiced in the prospect of this meeting, had you not?” asked Sophie.
“No, not in the least!” answered Otto.
“And you wish to make me believe that? She is really pretty, and has something so unspeakably refined, that a young gentleman might well be attracted by her. With my brother it is not all quite right in this respect; but, candidly speaking, I am in great fear on your account, Mr. Thostrup. Still waters—you know the proverb? I might have spared you the trouble. The letter which I received a few evenings ago informed me of her departure. Mamma has taken her with her. It seemed to her a sin to leave that sweet, innocent girl in a public-house. The host and hostess were born upon our estate, and look very much up to my mother; and as Eva will certainly gain by the change, the whole affair was soon settled. It is well that she is come under mamma’s oversight.”
“The girl is almost indifferent to me!” said Otto.
“Almost!” repeated Sophie. “But this almost, how many degrees of warmth does it contain? ‘O Vérité! Où sont les autels et tes prêtres?’” added she, and smiling raised her finger.
“Time will show how much you are in error!” answered Otto with much calmness.
The lady of the house now entered, she had made various calls; everywhere the Ghost’s Letters were the subject of conversation, and now the conversation took the same direction.
It was often renewed. Otto was a very frequent guest at the house. The ladies sat at their embroidery frames and embroidered splendid pieces of work, and Otto must again read the “Letters of the Wandering Ghost;” after this they began “Calderon,” in whom Sophie found something resembling the anonymous author. The world of poetry afforded subjects for discourse, and every-day life intermingled its light, gay scenes; if Wilhelm joined them, he must give them music, and all remarked that his fantasies were become far richer, far softer. He had gained his touch from Weyse, said they. No one thought how much one may learn from one’s own heart. With this exception he was the same joyous youth as ever. No one thought of him and Eva together. Since that evening when the friends had almost quarreled, he had never mentioned her name; but Otto had remarked how when any female figure met them, Wilhelm’s eyes flashed, and how, in society, he singled out the most beautiful. Otto said jokingly to him, that he was getting oriental thoughts. Oehlenschläger’s “Helge,” and Goethe’s Italian sonnets were now Wilhelm’s favorite reading. The voluptuous spirit of these poems agreed with the dreams which his warm feelings engendered. It was Eva’s beauty—her beauty alone which had awoke this feeling in him; the modesty and poverty of the poor girl had captivated him still more, and caused him to forget rank and condition. At the moment when he would approach her, she was gone. The poison was now in his blood. If is gay and happy spirit did not meanwhile let him sink into melancholy and meditation; his feeling for beauty was excited, as he himself expressed it. In thought he pressed beauty to his heart, but only in thought—but even this is sin, says the Gospel.
Otto, on the contrary, moved in the lists of philosophy and poetry. Here his soul conceived beauty—inspired, he expressed it; and Sophie’s eyes flashed, and rested with pleasure on him. This flattered him and increased his inspirations. For many years no winter had been to him so pleasant, had passed away so rich in change as this; he caught at the fluttering joy and yet there were moments when the though pressed upon him—“Life is hastening away, and I do not enjoy it.” In the midst of his greatest happiness he experienced a strange yearning after the changing life of travel. Paris glanced before his eyes like a star of fortune.
“Out into the bustling world!” said he so often to Wilhelm, that the same thought was excited in him. “In the spring we will travel!” Now were plans formed; circumstances were favorable. Thus in the coming spring, in April, the still happier days should begin.
“We will fly to Paris!” said Wilhelm; “to joy and pleasure!”
Joy and pleasure were to be found at home, and were found: we will introduce the evening which brought them; perhaps we shall also find something more than joy and pleasure.
“A midsummer day’s entertainment—but how? In February? Yea,some here and behold it!”—DR. BALFUNGO.
With us the students form no Burschenschafts, have no colors. The professors do not alone in the chair come into connection with them; the only difference is that which exists between young and old scholars. Thus they come in contact with each other, thus they participate in their mutual pleasures. We will spend an evening of this kind in the Students’ Club, and then see for ourselves whether Miss Sophie were right when she wished she were a man, merely that she might be a student and member of this club. We choose one evening in particular, not only that we may seek a brilliant moment, but because this evening can afford us more than a description.
An excursion to the park had often been discussed in the club. They wished to hire the Caledonia steam-packet. But during the summer months the number of members is less; the majority are gone to the provinces to visit their relations. Winter, on the contrary, assembles them all. This time, also, is the best for great undertakings. The long talked of excursion to the park was therefore fixed for Carnival Monday, the 14th of February, 1831. Thus ran the invitations to the professors and older members. “It will be too cold for me,” replied one. “Must one take a carriage for one’s self?” asked mother. No, the park was removed to Copenhagen. In the Students’ Club itself, in the Boldhuus Street, No. 225, was the park-hill with its green trees, its swings, and amusements. See, only the scholars of the Black School could have such ideas!
The evening of the 114th of February drew near. The guests assembled in the rooms on the first floor. Meanwhile all was arranged in the second story. Those who represented jugglers were in their places. A thundering cracker was the steamboat signal, and now people hastened to the park, rushing up-stairs, where two large rooms had, with great taste and humor, been converted into the park-hill. Large fir-trees concealed the walls—you found yourself in a complete wood. The doors which connected the two rooms were decorated with sheets, so that it looked as if you were going through a tent. Hand-organs played, drums and trumpets roared, and from tents and stages the hawkers shouted one against the other. It was a noise such as is heard in the real park when the hubbub has reached its height. The most brilliant requisites of the real park were found here, and they were not imitated; they were the things themselves. Master Jakel’s own puppets had been hired; a student, distinguished by his complete imitation of the first actors, represented them by the puppets. The fortress of Frederiksteen was the same which we have already seen in the park. “The whole cavalry and infantry,—here a fellow without a bayonet, there a bayonet without a fellow!” The old Jew sat under his tree where he announced his fiftieth park jubilee: here a student ate flax, there another exhibited a bear; Polignac stood as a wax figure outside a cabinet. The Magdalene convent exhibited its little boxes, the drum-major beat most lustily, and from a near booth came the real odor of warm wafer-cakes. The spring even, which presented itself in the outer room, was full of significance. Certainly it was only represented by a tea-urn concealed between moss and stones, but the water was real water, brought from the well in Christiansborg. Astounding and full of effect was the multitude of sweet young girls who showed themselves. Many of the youngest students who had feminine features were dressed as ladies; some of them might even be called pretty. Who that then saw the fair one with the tambourine can have forgotten her? The company crowded round the ladies. The professors paid court to them with all propriety, and, what was best of all, some ladies who were less successful became jealous of the others. Otto was much excited; the noise, the bustle, the variety of people, were almost strikingly given. Then came the master of the fire-engines, with his wife and little granddaughter; then three pretty peasant girls; then the whole Botanical Society, with their real professor at their head. Otto seated himself in a swing; an itinerant flute-player and a drummer deafened him with dissonances. A young lady, one of the beauties, in a white dress, and with a thin handkerchief over her shoulders, approached and threw herself into his arms. It was Wilhelm! but Otto found his likeness to Sophie stronger than he had ever before noticed it to be; and therefore the blood rushed to his cheeks when the fair one threw her arms around him, and laid her cheek upon his: he perceived more of Sophie than of Wilhelm in this form. Certainly Wilhelm’s features were coarser—his whole figure larger than Sophie’s; but still Otto fancied he saw Sophie, and therefore these marked gestures, this reeling about with the other students, offended his eyes. When Wilhelm seated himself on his knee, and pressed his cheek to his, Otto felt his heart beat as in fever; it sent a stream of fire through his blood: he thrust him away, but the fair one continued to overwhelm him with caresses.
There now commenced, in a so-called Krähwinkel theatre, the comedy, in which were given the then popular witticisms of Kellerman.
The lady clung fast to Otto, and flew dancing with him through the crowd. The heat, the noise, and, above all, the exaggerated lacing, affected Wilhelm; he felt unwell. Otto led him to a bench and would have unfastened his dress, but all the young ladies, true to their part, sprang forward, pushed Otto aside, surrounded their sick companion and concealed her, whilst they tore up the dress behind so that she might have air: but, God forbid! no gentleman might see it.
Toward evening a song was commenced, a shot was heard, and the last verse announced:—