“Yes, I can’t understand why it shouldn’t be this very autumn,” exclaimed the elder Miss Ludvigsen, who was an enthusiast for ideal love.
“Oh, yes!” cried Miss Louisa, who was certain to be one of the bridesmaids.
“But Sören says he can’t afford it,” answered the bride elect, somewhat timidly.
“Can’t afford it!” repeated Miss Ludvigsen. “To think of a young girl using such an expression! If you’re going to let your new-born love be overgrown with prosaic calculations, what will be left of the ideal halo which love alone can cast over life? That a man should be alive to these considerations I can more or less understand—it’s in a way his duty; but for a sensitive, womanly heart, in the heyday of sentiment!—No, no, Marie; for heaven’s sake, don’t let these sordid money-questions darken your happiness.”
“Oh, no!” cried Miss Louisa.
“And, besides,” Mrs. Olsen chimed in, “yourfiancéis by no means so badly off. My husband and I began life on much less.—I know you’ll say that times were different then. Good heavens, we all know that! What I can’t understand is that you don’t get tired of telling us so. Don’t you think that we old people, who have gone through the transition period, have the best means of comparing the requirements of to-day with those of our youth? You can surely understand that with my experience of house-keeping, I’m not likely to disregard the altered conditions of life; and yet I assure you that the salary your intended receives from my husband, with what he can easily earn by extra work, is quite sufficient to set up house upon.”
Mrs. Olsen had become quite eager in her argument, though no one thought of contradicting her. She had so often, in conversations of this sort, been irritated to hear people, and especially young married women, enlarging on the ridiculous cheapness of everything thirty years ago. She felt as though they wanted to make light of the exemplary fashion in which she had conducted her household.
This conversation made a deep impression on thefiancée, for she had great confidence in Mrs. Olsen’s shrewdness and experience. Since Marie had become engaged to the Sheriff’s clerk, the Sheriff’s wife had taken a keen interest in her. She was an energetic woman, and, as her own children were already grown up and married, she found a welcome outlet for her activity in busying herself with the concerns of the young couple.
Marie’s mother, on the other hand, was a very retiring woman. Her husband, a subordinate government official, had died so early that her pension extremely scanty. She came of a good family, and had learned nothing in her girlhood except to Play the piano. This accomplishment she had long ceased to practise, and in the course of time had become exceedingly religious.——“Look here, now, my dear fellow, aren’t you thinking of getting married?” asked the Sheriff, in his genial way.
“Oh yes,” answered Sören, with some hesitation, “when I can afford it.
“Afford it!” the Sheriff repeated; “Why, you’re by no means so badly off. I know you have something laid by—”
“A trifle,” Sören put in.
“Well, so be it; but it shows, at any rate, that you have an idea of economy, and that’s as good as money in your pocket. You came out high in your examination; and, with your family influence and other advantages at headquarters, you needn’t wait long before applying for some minor appointment; and once in the way of promotion, you know, you go ahead in spite of yourself.”
Sören bit his pen and looked interested.
“Let us assume,” continued his principal, “that, thanks to your economy, you can set up house without getting into any debt worth speaking of. Then you’ll have your salary clear, and whatever you can earn in addition by extra work. It would be strange, indeed, if a man of your ability could note find employment for his leisure time in a rising commercial centre like ours.”
Sören reflected all forenoon on what the Sheriff had said. He saw, more and more clearly, that he had over-estimated the financial obstacles to his marriage; and, after all, it was true that he had a good deal of time on his hands out of office hours.
He was engaged to dine with his principal; and his intended, too, was to be there. On the whole, the young people perhaps met quite as often at the Sheriff’s as at Marie’s home. For the peculiar knack which Mrs. Möller, Marie’s mother, had acquired, of giving every conversation a religious turn, was not particularly attractive to them.
There was much talk at table of a lovely little house which Mrs. Olsen had discovered; “A perfect nest for a newly married couple,” as she expressed herself. Sören inquired, in passing, as to the financial conditions, and thought them reasonable enough, if the place answered to his hostess’s description.—Mrs. Olsen’s anxiety to see this marriage hurried on was due in the first place, as above hinted, to her desire for mere occupation, and, in the second place, to a vague longing for some event, of whatever nature, to happen—a psychological phenomenon by no means rare in energetic natures, living narrow and monotonous lives.
The Sheriff worked in the same direction, partly in obedience to his wife’s orders, and partly because he thought that Sören’s marriage to Marie, who owed so much to his family, would form another tie to bind him to the office—for the Sheriff was pleased with his clerk.
After dinner the young couple strolled about the garden. They conversed in an odd, short-winded fashion, until at last Sören, in a tone which was meant to be careless, threw out the suggestion: “What should you say to getting married this autumn?”
Marie forgot to express surprise. The same thought had been running in her own head; so she answered, looking to the ground: “Well, if you think you can afford it, I can have no objection.”
“Suppose we reckon the thing out,” said Sören, and drew her towards the summer-house.
Half an hour afterwards they came out, arm-in-arm, into the sunshine. They, too, seemed to radiate light—the glow of a spirited resolution, formed after ripe thought and serious counting of the cost.
Some people might, perhaps, allege that it would be rash to assume the absolute correctness of a calculation merely from the fact that two lovers have arrived at exactly the same total; especially when the problem happens to bear upon the choice between renunciation and the supremest bliss.
In the course of the calculation Sören had not been without misgivings. He remembered how, in his student days, he had spoken largely of our duty towards posterity; how he had philosophically demonstrated the egoistic element in love, and propounded the ludicrous question whether people had a right, in pure heedlessness as it were, to bring children into the world.
But time and practical life had, fortunately, cured him of all taste for these idle and dangerous mental gymnastics. And, besides, he was far too proper and well-bred to shock his innocent lady-love by taking into account so indelicate a possibility as that of their having a large family. Is it not one of the charms of young love that it should leave such matters as these to heaven and the stork? [Note: The stork, according to common nursery legends, brings babies under its wing.]
There was great jubilation at the Sheriff’s, and not there alone. Almost the whole town was thrown into a sort of fever by the intelligence that the Sheriff’s clerk was to be married in the autumn. Those who were sure of an invitation to the wedding were already looking forward to it; those who could not hope to be invited fretted and said spiteful things; while those whose case was doubtful were half crazy with suspense. And all emotions have their value in a stagnant little town.—Mrs. Olsen was a woman of courage; yet her heart beat as she set forth to call upon Mrs. Möller. It is no light matter to ask a mother to let her daughter be married from your house. But she might have spared herself all anxiety.
For Mrs. Möller shrank from every sort of exertion almost as much as she shrank from sin in all its forms. Therefore she was much relieved by Mrs. Olsen’s proposition, introduced with a delicacy which did not always characterize that lady’s proceedings. However, it was not Mrs. Möller’s way to make any show of pleasure or satisfaction. Since everything, in one way or another, was a “cross” to be borne, she did not fail, even in this case, to make it appear that her long-suffering was proof against every trial.
Mrs. Olsen returned home beaming. She would have been balked of half her pleasure in this marriage if she had not been allowed to give the wedding party; for wedding-parties were Mrs. Olsen’s specialty. On such occasions she put her economy aside, and the satisfaction she felt in finding, an opening for all her energies made her positively amiable. After all, the Sheriff’s post was a good one, and the Olsens had always had a little property besides, which, however, they never talked about. —So the wedding came off, and a splendid wedding it was. Miss Ludvigsen had written an unrhymed song about true love, which was sung at the feast, and Louisa eclipsed all the other bridesmaids.
The newly-married couple took up their quarters in the nest discovered by Mrs. Olsen, and plunged into that half-conscious existence of festal felicity which the English call the “honeymoon,” because it is too sweet; the Germans, “Flitterwochen,” because its glory departs so quickly; and we “the wheat-bread days” because we know that there is coarser fare to follow.
But in Sören’s cottage the wheat-bread days lasted long; and when heaven sent them a little angel with golden locks, their happiness was as great as we can by any means expect in this weary world.
As for the incomings—well, they were fairly adequate, though Sören had, unfortunately, not succeeded in making a start without getting into debt; but that would, no doubt, come right in time.—Yes, in time! The years passed, and with each of them heaven sent Sören a little golden-locked angel. After six years of marriage they had exactly five children. The quiet little town was unchanged, Sören was still the Sheriff’s clerk, and the Sheriff’s household was as of old; but Sören himself was scarcely to be recognized.
They tell of sorrows and heavy blows of fate which can turn a man’s hair gray in a night. Such afflictions had not fallen to Sören’s lot. The sorrows that had sprinkled his hair with gray, rounded his shoulders, and made him old before his time, were of a lingering and vulgar type. They were bread-sorrows.
Bread-sorrows are to other sorrows as toothache to other disorders. A simple pain can be conquered in open fight; a nervous fever, or any other “regular” illness, goes through a normal development and comes to a crisis. But while toothache has the long-drawn sameness of the tape-worm, bread-sorrows envelop their victim like a grimy cloud: he puts them on every morning with his threadbare clothes, and he seldom sleeps so deeply as to forget them.
It was in the long fight against encroaching poverty that Sören had worn himself out; and yet he was great at economy.
But there are two sorts of economy: the active and the passive. Passive economy thinks day and night of the way to save a half-penny; active economy broods no less intently on the way to earn a dollar. The first sort of economy, the passive, prevails among us; the active in the great nations—chiefly in America.
Sören’s strength lay in the passive direction. He devoted all his spare time and some of his office-hours to thinking out schemes for saving and retrenchment. But whether it was that the luck was against him, or, more probably, that his income was really too small to support a wife and five children—in any case, his financial position went from bad to worse.
Every place in life seems filled to the uttermost, and yet there are people who make their way everywhere. Sören did not belong to this class. He sought in vain for the extra work on which he and Marie had reckoned as a vague but ample source of income. Nor had his good connections availed him aught. There are always plenty of people ready to help young men of promise who can help themselves; but the needy father of a family is never welcome.
Sören had been a man of many friends. It could not be said that they had drawn back from him, but he seemed somehow to have disappeared from their view. When they happened to meet, there was a certain embarrassment on both sides. Sören no longer cared for the things that interested them, and they were bored when he held forth upon the severity of his daily grind, and the expensiveness of living.
And if, now and then, one of his old friends invited him to a bachelor-party, he did as people are apt to do whose every-day fare is extremely frugal: he ate and drank too much. The lively but well-bred and circumspect Sören declined into a sort of butt, who made rambling speeches, and around whom the young whelps of the party would gather after dinner to make sport for themselves. But what impressed his friends most painfully of all, was his utter neglect of his personal appearance.
For he had once been extremely particular in his dress; in his student days he had been called “the exquisite Sören.” And even after his marriage he had for some time contrived to wear his modest attire with a certain air. But after bitter necessity had forced him to keep every garment in use an unnaturally long time, his vanity had at last given way. And when once a man’s sense of personal neatness is impaired, he is apt to lose it utterly. When a new coat became absolutely necessary, it was his wife that had to awaken him to the fact; and when his collars became quite too ragged at the edges, he trimmed them with a pair of scissors.
He had other things to think about, poor fellow. But when people came into the office, or when he was entering another person’s house, he had a purely mechanical habit of moistening his fingers at his lips, and rubbing the lapels of his coat. This was the sole relic of “the exquisite Sören’s” exquisiteness—like one of the rudimentary organs, dwindled through lack of use, which zoologists find in certain animals.—
Sören’s worst enemy, however, dwelt within him. In his youth he had dabbled in philosophy, and this baneful passion for thinking would now attack him from time to time, crushing all resistance, and, in the end, turning everything topsy-turvy.
It was when he thought about his children that this befell him.
When he regarded these little creatures, who, as he could not conceal from himself, became more and more neglected as time went on, he found it impossible to place them under the category of golden-locked angels had sent him by heaven. He had to admit that heaven does not send us these gifts without a certain inducement on our side; and then Sören asked himself: “Had you any right to do this?” He thought of his own life, which had begun under fortunate conditions. His family had been in easy circumstances; his father, a government official, had given him the best education to be had in the country; he had gone forth to the battle of life fully equipped—and what had come of it all?
And how could he equip his children for the fight into which he was sending them? They had begun their life in need and penury, which had, as far as possible, to be concealed; they had early learned the bitter lesson of the disparity between inward expectations and demands and outward circumstances; and from their slovenly home they would take with them the most crushing inheritance, perhaps, under which a man can toil through life; to wit, poverty with pretensions.
Sören tried to tell himself that heaven would take care of them. But he was ashamed to do so, for he felt it was only a phrase of self-excuse, designed to allay the qualms of conscience.
These thoughts were his worst torment; but, truth to tell, they did not often attack him, for Sören had sunk into apathy. That was the Sheriff’s view of his case. “My clerk was quite a clever fellow in his time,” he used to say. “But, you know, his hasty marriage, his large family, and all that—in short, he has almost done for himself.”
Badly dressed and badly fed, beset with debts and cares, he was worn out and weary before he had accomplished anything. And life went its way, and Sören dragged himself along in its train. He seemed to be forgotten by all save heaven, which, as aforesaid, sent him year by year a little angel with locks of gold—
Sören’s young wife had clung faithfully to her husband through these six years, and she, too, had reached the same point.
The first year of her married life had glided away like a dream of dizzy bliss. When she held up the little golden-locked angel for the admiration of her lady friends, she was beautiful with the beauty of perfect maternal happiness; and Miss Ludvigsen said: “Here is love in its ideal form.”
But Mrs. Olsen’s “nest” soon became too small; the family increased while the income stood still.
She was daily confronted by new claims, new cares, and new duties. Marie set staunchly to work, for she was a courageous and sensible woman.
It is not one of the so-called elevating employments to have charge of a houseful of little children, with no means of satisfying even moderate requirements in respect of comfort and well-being. In addition to this, she was never thoroughly robust; she oscillated perpetually between having just had, and being just about to have, a child. As she toiled from morning to night, she lost her buoyancy of spirit, and her mind became bitter. She sometimes asked herself: “What is the meaning of it all?”
She saw the eagerness of young girls to be married, and the air of self-complacency with which young men offer to marry them; she thought of her own experience, and felt as though she had been befooled.
But it was not right of Marie to think thus, for she had been excellently brought up.
The view of life to which she had from the first been habituated, was the only beautiful one, the only one that could enable her to preserve her ideals intact. No unlovely and prosaic theory of existence had ever cast its shadow over her development; she knew that love is the most beautiful thing on earth, that it transcends reason and is consummated in marriage; as to children, she had learned to blush when they were mentioned.
A strict watch had always been kept upon her reading. She had read many earnest volumes on the duties of woman; she knew that her happiness lies in being loved by a man, and that her mission is to be his wife. She knew how evil-disposed people will often place obstacles between two lovers, but she knew, too, that true love will at last emerge victorious from the fight. When people met with disaster in the battle of life, it was because they were false to the ideal. She had faith in the ideal, although she did not know what it was.
She knew and loved those poets whom she was allowed to read. Much of their erotics she only half understood, but that made it all the more lovely. She knew that marriage was a serious, a very serious thing, for which a clergyman was indispensable; and she understood that marriages are made in heaven, as engagements are made in the ballroom. But when, in these youthful days, she pictured to herself this serious institution, she seemed to be looking into an enchanted grove, with Cupids weaving garlands, and storks bringing little golden-locked angels under their wings; while before a little cabin in the background, which yet was large enough to contain all the bliss in the world, sat the ideal married couple, gazing into the depths of each other’s eyes.
No one had ever been so ill-bred as to say to her: “Excuse me, young lady, would you not like to come with me to a different point of view, and look at the matter from the other side? How if it should turn out to be a mere set-scene of painted pasteboard?”
Sören’s young wife had now had ample opportunities of studying the set-scene from the other side.
Mrs. Olsen had at first come about her early and late, and overwhelmed her with advice and criticism. Both Sören and his wife were many a time heartily tired of her; but they owed the Olsens so much.
Little by little, however, the old lady’s zeal cooled down. When the young people’s house was no longer so clean, so orderly, and so exemplary that she could plume herself upon her work, she gradually withdrew; and when Sören’s wife once in a while came to ask her for advice or assistance, the Sheriff’s lady would mount her high horse, until Marie ceased to trouble her. But if, in society, conversation happened to fall upon the Sheriff’s clerk, and any one expressed compassion for his poor wife, with her many children and her miserable income, Mrs. Olsen would not fail to put in her word with great decision: “I can assure you it would be just the same if Marie had twice as much to live on and no children at all. You see, she’s—” and Mrs. Olsen made a motion with her hands, as if she were squandering something abroad, to right and left.
Marie seldom went to parties, and if she did appear, in her at least ten-times-altered marriage dress, it was generally to sit alone in a corner, or to carry on a tedious conversation with a similarly situated housewife about the dearness of the times and the unreasonableness of servant-girls.
And the young ladies who had gathered the gentlemen around them, either in the middle of the room or wherever they found the most comfortable chairs to stretch themselves in, whispered to each other: “How tiresome it is that young married women can never talk about anything but housekeeping and the nursery.”
In the early days, Marie had often had visits from her many friends. They were enchanted with her charming house, and the little golden-locked angel had positively to be protected from their greedy admiration. But when one of them now chanced to stray in her direction, it was quite a different affair. There was no longer any golden-locked angel to be exhibited in a clean, embroidered frock with red ribbons. The children, who were never presentable without warning, were huddled hastily away—dropping their toys about the floor, forgetting to pick up half-eaten pieces of bread-and-butter from the chairs, and leaving behind them that peculiar atmosphere which one can, at most, endure in one’s own children.
Day after day her life dragged on in ceaseless toil. Many a time, when she heard her husband bemoaning the drudgery of his lot, she thought to herself with a sort of defiance: “I wonder which of us two has the harder work?”
In one respect she was happier than her husband. Philosophy did not enter into her dreams, and when she could steal a quiet moment for reflection; her thoughts were very different from the cogitations of the poor philosopher.
She had no silver plate to polish, no jewelry to take out and deck herself with. But, in the inmost recess of her heart, she treasured all the memories of the first year of her marriage, that year of romantic bliss; and these memories she would furbish and furbish afresh, till they shone brighter with every year that passed.
But when the weary and despondent housewife, in all secrecy, decked herself out with these jewels of memory, they did not succeed in shedding any brightness over her life in the present. She was scarcely conscious of any connection between the golden-locked angel with the red ribbons and the five-year-old boy who lay grubbing in the dark back yard. These moments snatched her quite away from reality; they were like opium dreams.
Then some one would call for her from an adjoining room, or one of the children would be brought in howling from the street, with a great bump on its forehead. Hastily she would hide away her treasures, resume her customary air of hopeless weariness, and plunge once more into her labyrinth of duties and cares.—Thus had this marriage fared, and thus did this couple toil onward. They both dragged at the same heavy load; but did they drag in unison? It is sad, but it is true: when the manger is empty, the horses bite each other.——There was a great chocolate-party at the Misses Ludvigsen’s—all maiden ladies.
“For married women are so prosaic,” said the elder Miss Ludvigsen.
“Uh, yes!” cried Louisa.
Every one was in the most vivacious humor, as is generally the case in such company and on such an occasion; and, as the gossip went the round of the town, it arrived in time at Sören’s door. All were agreed that it was a most unhappy marriage, and a miserable home; some pitied, others condemned.
Then the elder Miss Ludvigsen, with a certain solemnity, expressed herself as follows: “I can tell you what was at fault in that marriage, for I know the circumstances thoroughly. Even before her marriage there was something calculating, something almost prosaic in Marie’s nature, which is entirely foreign to true, ideal love. This fault has since taken the upperhand, and is avenging itself cruelly upon both of them. Of course their means are not great, but what could that matter to two people who truly loved each other? for we know that happiness is not dependent on wealth. Is it not precisely in the humble home that the omnipotence of love is most beautifully made manifest?—And, besides, who can call these two poor? Has not heaven richly blessed them with healthy, sturdy children? These—these are their true wealth! And if their hearts had been filled with true, ideal love, then—then—”
Miss Ludvigsen came to a momentary standstill.
“What then?” asked a courageous young lady.
“Then,” continued Miss Ludvigsen, loftily, “then we should certainly have seen a very different lot in life assigned to them.”
The courageous young lady felt ashamed of herself.
There was a pause, during which Miss Ludvigsen’s words sank deep into all hearts. They all felt that this was the truth; any doubt and uneasiness that might perhaps have lurked here and there vanished away. All were confirmed in their steadfast and beautiful faith in true, ideal love; for they were all maiden ladies.
Youmaytire of looking at a single painting, but youmusttire of looking at many. That is why the eyelids grow so heavy in the great galleries, and the seats are as closely packed as an omnibus on Sunday.
Happy he who has resolution enough to select from the great multitude a small number of pictures, to which he can return every day.
In this way you can appropriate—undetected by the custodians—a little private gallery of your own, distributed through the great halls. Everything which does not belong to this private collection sinks into mere canvas and gilding, a decoration you glance at in passing, but which does not fatigue the eye.
It happens now and then that you discover a picture, hitherto overlooked, which now, after thorough examination, is admitted as one of the select few. The assortment thus steadily increases, and it is even conceivable that by systematically following this method you might make a whole picture-gallery, in this sense, your private property.
But as a rule there is no time for that. You must rapidly take your bearings, putting a cross in the catalogue against the pictures you think of annexing, just as a forester marks his trees as he goes through the wood.
These private collections, as a matter of course, are of many different kinds. One may often search them in vain for the great, recognized masterpieces, while one may find a little, unconsidered picture in the place of honor; and in order to understand the odd arrangement of many of these small collections, one must take as one’s cicerone the person whose choice they represent. Here, now, is a picture from a private gallery.—
There hung in a corner of the Salon of 1878 a picture by the English painter Mr. Everton Sainsbury. It made no sensation whatever. It was neither large enough nor small enough to arouse idle curiosity, nor was there a trace of modern extravagance either in composition or in color.
As people passed they gave it a sympathetic glance, for it made a harmonious impression, and the subject was familiar and easily understood.
It represented two lovers who had slightly fallen out, and people smiled as each in his own mind thought of those charming little quarrels which are so vehement and so short, which arise from the most improbable and most varied causes, but invariably end in a kiss.
And yet this picture attracted to itself its own special public; you could see that it was adopted into several private collections.
As you made your way towards the well-known corner, you would often find the place occupied by a solitary person standing lost in contemplation. At different times, you would come upon all sorts of different people thus absorbed; but they all had the same peculiar expression before that picture, as if it cast a faded, yellowish reflection.
If you approached, the gazer would probably move away; it seemed as though only one person at a time could enjoy that work of art—as though one must be entirely alone with it.—
In a corner of the garden, right against the high wall, stands an open summer-house. It is quite simply built of green lattice-work, which forms a large arch backed by the wall. The whole summer-house is covered with a wild vine, which twines itself from the left side over the arched roof, and droops its slender branches on the right.
It is late autumn. The summer-house has already lost its thick roof of foliage. Only the youngest and most delicate tendrils of the wild vine have any leaves left. Before they fall, departing summer lavishes on them all the color it has left; like light sprays of red and yellow flowers, they hang yet a while to enrich the garden with autumn’s melancholy splendor.
The fallen leaves are scattered all around, and right before the summer-house the wind has with great diligence whirled the loveliest of them together, into a neat little round cairn.
The trees are already leafless, and on a naked branch sits the little garden-warbler with its rust-brown breast—like a withered leaf left hanging—and repeats untiringly a little fragment which it remembers of its spring-song.
The only thriving thing in the whole picture is the ivy; for ivy, like sorrow, is fresh both summer and winter.
It comes creeping along with its soft feelers, it thrusts itself into the tiniest chinks, it forces its way through the minutest crannies; and not until it has waxed wide and strong do we realize that it can no longer be rooted up, but will inexorably strangle whatever it has laid its clutches on.
Ivy, however, is like well-bred sorrow; it cloaks its devastations with fair and glossy leaves. Thus people wear a glossy mask of smiles, feigning to be unaware of the ivy-clad ruins among which their lot is cast.—
In the middle of the open summer-house sits a young girl on a rush chair; both hands rest in her lap. She is sitting with bent head and a strange expression in her beautiful face. It is not vexation or anger, still less is it commonplace sulkiness, that utters itself in her features; it is rather bitter and crushing disappointment. She looks as if she were on the point of letting something slip away from her which she has not the strength to hold fast—as if something were withering between her hands.
The man who is leaning with one hand upon her chair is beginning to understand that the situation is graver than he thought. He has done all he can to get the quarrel, so trivial in its origin, adjusted and forgotten; he has talked reason, he has tried playfulness; he has besought forgiveness, and humbled himself—perhaps more than he intended—but all in vain. Nothing avails to arouse her out of the listless mood into which she has sunk.
Thus it is with an expression of anxiety that he bends down towards her: “But you know that at heart we love each other so much.”
“Then why do we quarrel so easily, and why do we speak so bitterly and unkindly to each other?”
“Why, my dear! the whole thing was the merest trifle from the first.”
“That’s just it! Do you remember what we said to each other? How we vied with each other in trying to find the word we knew would be most wounding? Oh, to think that we used our knowledge of each other’s heart to find out the tenderest points, where an unkind word could strike home! And this we call love!”
“My dear, don’t take it so solemnly,” he answered, trying a lighter tone. “People may be ever so fond of each other, and yet disagree a little at times; it can’t be otherwise.”
“Yes, yes!” she cried, “there must be a love for which discord is impossible, or else—or else I have been mistaken, and what we call love is nothing but—”
“Have no doubts of love!” he interrupted her, eagerly; and he depicted in warm and eloquent words the feeling which ennobles humanity in teaching us to bear with each other’s weaknesses; which confers upon us the highest bliss, since, in spite of all petty disagreements, it unites us by the fairest ties.
She had only half listened to him. Her eyes had wandered over the fading garden, she had inhaled the heavy atmosphere of dying vegetation—and she had been thinking of the spring-time, of hope, of that all-powerful love which was now dying like an autumn flower.
“Withered leaves,” said she, quietly; and rising, she scattered with her foot all the beautiful leaves which the wind had taken such pains to heap together.
She went up the avenue leading to the house; he followed close behind her. He was silent, for he found not a word to say. A drowsy feeling of uneasy languor came over him; he asked himself whether he could overtake her, or whether she were a hundred miles away.
She walked with her head bent, looking down at the flower-beds. There stood the asters like torn paper flowers upon withered potato-shaws; the dahlias hung their stupid, crinkled heads upon their broken stems, and the hollyhocks showed small stunted buds at the top, and great wet, rotting flowers clustering down their stalks.
And disappointment and bitterness cut deep into the young heart. As the flowers were dying, she was ripening for the winter of life.
So they disappeared up the avenue. But the empty chair remained standing in the half-withered summer-house, while the wind busied itself afresh in piling up the leaves in a little cairn.
And in the course of time we all come—each in his turn—to seat ourselves on the empty chair in a corner of the garden and gaze on a little cairn of withered leaves.—
Since it is not only entertaining in itself, but also consonant with use and wont, to be in love; and since in our innocent and moral society, one can so much the more safely indulge in these amatory diversions as one runs no risk of being disturbed either by vigilant fathers or pugnacious brothers; and, finally, since one can as easily get out of as get into our peculiarly Norwegian form of betrothal—a half-way house between marriage and free board in a good family—all these things considered I say, it was not wonderful that Cousin Hans felt profoundly unhappy. For he was not in the least in love.
He had long lived in expectation of being seized by a kind of delirious ecstasy, which, if experienced people are to be trusted, is the infallible symptom of true love. But as nothing of the sort had happened, although he was already in his second year at college, he said to himself: “After all, love is a lottery if you want to win, you must at least table your stake. ‘Lend Fortune a helping hand,’ as they say in the lottery advertisements.”
He looked about him diligently, and closely observed his own heart.
Like a fisher who sits with his line around his forefinger, watching for the least jerk, and wondering when the bite will come, so Cousin Hans held his breath whenever he saw a young lady, wondering whether he was now to feel that peculiar jerk which is well known to be inseparable from true love—that jerk which suddenly makes all the blood rush to the heart, and then sends it just as suddenly up into the head, and makes your face flush red to the very roots of your hair.
But never a bite came. His hair had long ago flushed red to the roots, for Cousin Hans’s hair could not be called brown; but his face remained as pale and as long as ever.
The poor fisherman was growing quite weary, when he one day strolled down to the esplanade. He seated himself on a bench and observed, with a contemptuous air, a squad of soldiers engaged in the invigorating exercise of standing on one leg in the full sunshine, and wriggling their bodies so as to be roasted on both sides.
“Nonsense!” [Note: The English word is used in the original] said Cousin Hans, indignantly; “it’s certainly too dear a joke for a little country like ours to maintain acrobats of that sort. Didn’t I see the other day that this so-called army requires 1500 boxes of shoe-blacking, 600 curry-combs, 3000 yards of gold-lace and 8640 brass buttons?—It would be better if we saved what we spend in gold-lace and brass buttons, and devoted our half-pence to popular enlightenment,” said Cousin Hans.
For he was infected by the modern ideas, which are unfortunately beginning to make way among us, and which will infallibly end in overthrowing the whole existing fabric of society.
“Good-bye, then, for the present,” said a lady’s voice close behind him.
“Good-bye for the present, my dear,” answered a deep, masculine voice.
Cousin Hans turned slowly, for it was a warm day. He discovered a military-looking old man in a close-buttoned black coat, with an order at his buttonhole, a neck-cloth twisted an incredible number of times around his throat, a well-brushed hat, and light trousers. The gentleman nodded to a young lady, who went off towards the town, and then continued his walk along the ramparts.
Weary of waiting as he was, Cousin Hans could not help following the young girl with his eyes as she hastened away. She was small and trim, and he observed with interest that she was one of the few women who do not make a little inward turn with the left foot as they lift it from the ground.
This was a great merit in the young man’s eyes; for Cousin Hans was one of those sensitive, observant natures who are alone fitted really to appreciate a woman at her full value.
After a few steps the lady turned, no doubt in order to nod once again to the old officer; but by the merest chance her eyes met those of Cousin Hans.
At last occurred what he had so long been expecting: he felt the bite! His blood rushed about just in the proper way, he lost his breath, his head became hot, a cold shiver ran down his back, and he grew moist between the fingers. In short, all the symptoms supervened which, according to the testimony of poets and experienced prose-writers, betoken real, true, genuine love.
There was, indeed, no time to be lost. He hastily snatched up his gloves, his stick, and his student’s cap, which he had laid upon the bench, and set off after the lady across the esplanade and towards the town.
In the great, corrupt communities abroad this sort of thing is not allowable. There the conditions of life are so impure that a well-bred young man would never think of following a reputable woman. And the few reputable women there are in those nations, would be much discomposed to find themselves followed.
But in our pure and moral atmosphere we can, fortunately, permit our young people somewhat greater latitude, just on account of the strict propriety of our habits.
Cousin Hans, therefore, did not hesitate a moment in obeying the voice of his heart; and the young lady, who soon observed what havoc she had made with the glance designed for the old soldier, felt the situation piquant and not unpleasing.
The passers-by, who, of course, at once saw what was going on (be it observed that this is one of the few scenes of life in which the leading actors are quite unconscious of their audience), thought, for the most part, that the comedy was amusing to witness. They looked round and smiled to themselves; for they all knew that either it would lead to nothing, in which case it was only the most innocent of youthful amusements; or it would lead to an engagement, and an engagement is the most delightful thing in the world.
While they thus pursued their course at a fitting distance, now on the same sidewalk and now on opposite sides of the street, Cousin Hans had ample time for reflection.
As to the fact of his being in love he was quite clear. The symptoms were all there; he knew that he was in for it, in for real, true, genuine, love; and he was happy in the knowledge. Yes, so happy was Cousin Hans that he, who at other times was apt to stand upon his rights, accepted with a quiet, complacent smile all the jostlings and shoves, the smothered objurgations and other unpleasantnesses, which inevitably befall any one who rushes hastily along a crowded street, keeping his eyes fixed upon an object in front of him.
No—the love was obvious, indubitable. That settled, he tried to picture to himself the beloved one’s, the heavenly creature’s, mundane circumstances. And there was no great difficulty in that; she had been walking with her old father, had suddenly discovered that it was past twelve o’clock, and had hastily said good-bye for the present, in order to go home and see to the dinner. For she was doubtless domestic, this sweet creature, and evidently motherless.
The last conjecture was, perhaps, a result of the dread of mothers-in-law inculcated by all reputable authors; but it was none the less confident on that account. And now it only remained for Cousin Hans to discover, in the first place, where she lived, in the second place who she was, and in the third place how he could make her acquaintance.
Where she lived he would soon learn, for was she not on her way home? Who she was, he could easily find out from the neighbors. And as for making her acquaintance—good heavens! is not a little difficulty an indispensable part of a genuine romance?
Just as the chase was at its height, the quarry disappeared into a gate-way; and it was really high time, for, truth to tell, the hunter was rather exhausted.
He read with a certain relief the number, “34,” over the gate, then went a few steps farther on, in order to throw any possible observer off the scent, and stopped beside a street-lamp to recover his breath. It was, as aforesaid, a warm day; and this, combined with his violent emotion, had thrown Hans into a strong perspiration. His toilet, too, had been disarranged by the reckless eagerness with which he had hurled himself into the chase.
He could not help smiling at himself, as he stood and wiped his face and neck, adjusted his necktie, and felt his collar, which had melted on the sunny side. But it was a blissful smile, he was in that frame of mind in which one sees, or at any rate apprehends, nothing of the external world; and he said to himself, half aloud, “Love endures everything, accepts everything.”
“And perspires freely,” said a fat little gentleman whose white waistcoat suddenly came within Cousin Hans’s range of vision.
“Oh, is that you, uncle?” he said, a little abashed.
“Of course it is,” answered Uncle Frederick. “I’ve left the shady side of the street expressly to save you from being roasted. Come along with me.”
Thereupon he tried to drag his nephew with him, but Hans resisted. “Do you know who lives at No. 34, uncle?”
“Not in the least; but do let us get into the shade,” said Uncle Frederick; for there were two things he could not endure: heat and laughter—the first on account of his corpulence, and the second on account of what he himself called “his apoplectic tendencies.”
“By-the-bye,” he said, when they reached the cool side of the street, and he had taken his nephew by the arm, “now that I think of it, I do know, quite well, who lives in No. 34; it’s old Captain Schrappe.”
“Do you know him?” asked Cousin Hans, anxiously.
“Yes, a little, just as half the town knows him, from having seen him on the esplanade, where he walks every day.”
“Yes, that was just where I saw him,” said his nephew. “What an interesting old gentleman he looks. I should like so much to have a talk with him.”
“That wish you can easily gratify,” answered Uncle Frederick. “You need only place yourself anywhere on the ramparts and begin drawing lines in the sand, then he’ll come to you.”
“Come to you?” said Cousin Hans.
“Yes, he’ll come and talk to you. But you must be careful: he’s dangerous.”
“Eh?” said Cousin Hans.
“He was once very nearly the end of me.”
“Ah!” said Cousin Hans.
“Yes, with his talk, you understand.”
“Oh?” said Cousin Hans.
“You see, he has two stories,” continued Uncle Frederick, “the one, about a sham fight in Sweden, is a good half-hour long. But the other, the battle of Waterloo, generally lasts from an hour and a half to two hours. I have heard it three times.” And Uncle Frederick sighed deeply.
“Are they so very tedious, then, these stories? asked Cousin Hans.
“Oh, they’re well enough for once in a way,” answered his uncle, “and if you should get into conversation with the captain, mark what I tell you: If you get off with the short story, the Swedish one, you have nothing to do but alternately to nod and shake your head. You’ll soon pick up the lay of the land.”
“The lay of the land?” said Cousin Hans.
“Yes, you must know that he draws the whole manoeuvre for you in the sand; but it’s easy enough to understand if only you keep your eye on A and B. There’s only one point where you must be careful not to put your foot in it.”
“Does he get impatient, then, if you don’t understand?” asked Cousin Hans.
“No, quite the contrary; but if you show that you’re not following, he begins at the beginning again, you see! The crucial point in the sham fight,” continued his uncle, “is the movement made by the captain himself, in spite of the general’s orders, which equally embarrassed both friends and foes. It was this stroke of genius, between ourselves, which forced them to give him the Order of the Sword, to induce him to retire. So when you come to this point, you must nod violently, and say: ‘Of course—the only reasonable move—the key to the position.’ Remember that—the key.”
“The key,” repeated Cousin Hans.
“But,” said his uncle, looking at him with anticipatory compassion, “if, in your youthful love of adventure, you should bring on yourself the long story, the one about Waterloo, you must either keep quite silent or have all your wits about you. I once had to swallow the whole description over again, only because, in my eagerness to show how thoroughly I understood the situation, I happened to move Kellermann’s dragoons instead of Milhaud’s cuirassiers!”
“What do you mean by moving the dragoons, uncle?” asked Cousin Hans.
“Oh, you’ll understand well enough, if you come in for the long one. But,” added Uncle Frederick, in a solemn tone, “beware, I warn you, beware of Blücher!”
“Blücher?” said Cousin Hans.
“I won’t say anything more. But what makes you wish to know about this old original? What on earth do you want with him.”
“Does he walk there every forenoon?” asked Hans.
“Every forenoon, from eleven to one, and every afternoon, from five to seven. But what interest—?”
“Has he many children?” interrupted Hans.
“Only one daughter; but what the deuce—?”
“Good-bye, uncle! I must get home to my books.”
“Stop a bit! Aren’t you going to Aunt Maren’s this evening? She asked me to invite you.”
“No, thanks, I haven’t time,” shouted Cousin Hans, who was already several paces away.
“There’s to be a ladies’ party—young ladies!” bawled Uncle Frederick; for he did not know what had come over his nephew.
But Hans shook his head with a peculiar energetic contempt, and disappeared round the corner.
“The deuce is in it,” thought Uncle Frederick, “the boy is crazy, or—oh, I have it!—he’s in love! He was standing here, babbling about love, when I found him—outside No. 34. And then his interest in old Schrappe! Can he be in love with Miss Betty? Oh, no,” thought Uncle Frederick, shaking his head, as he, too, continued on his way, “I don’t believe he has sense enough for that.”
II.
Cousin Hans did not eat much dinner that day. People in love never eat much, and, besides, he did not care for rissoles.
At last five o’clock struck. He had already taken up his position on the ramparts, whence he could survey the whole esplanade. Quite right: there came the black frock-coat, the light trousers, and the well-brushed hat.
Cousin Hans felt his heart palpitate a little. At first he attributed this to a sense of shame in thus craftily setting a trap for the good old captain. But he soon discovered that it was the sight of the beloved one’s father that set his blood in a ferment. Thus reassured, he began, in accordance with Uncle Frederick’s advice, to draw strokes and angles in the sand, attentively fixing his eyes, from time to time, upon the Castle of Akerhuus.
The whole esplanade was quiet and deserted. Cousin Hans could hear the captain’s firm steps approaching; they came right up to him and stopped. Hans did not look up; the captain advanced two more paces and coughed. Hans drew a long and profoundly significant stroke with his stick, and then the old fellow could contain himself no longer.
“Aha, young gentleman,” he said, in a friendly tone, taking off his hat, “are you making a plan of our fortifications?”
Cousin Hans assumed the look of one who is awakened from deep contemplation, and, bowing politely, he answered with some embarrassment: “No, it’s only a sort of habit I have of trying to take my bearings wherever I may be.”
“An excellent habit, a most excellent habit,” the captain exclaimed with warmth.
“It strengthens the memory,” Cousin Hans remarked, modestly.
“Certainly, certainly, sir!” answered the captain, who was beginning to be much pleased by this modest young man.
“Especially in situations of any complexity,” continued the modest young man, rubbing out his strokes with his foot.
“Just what I was going to say!” exclaimed the captain, delighted. “And, as you may well believe, drawings and plans are especially indispensable in military science. Look at a battle-field, for example.”
“Ah, battles are altogether too intricate for me,” Cousin Hans interrupted, with a smile of humility.
“Don’t say that, sir!” answered the kindly old man. “When once you have a bird’s-eye view of the ground and of the positions of the armies, even a tolerably complicated battle can be made quite comprehensible.—This sand, now, that we have before us here, could very well be made to give us an idea, in miniature, of, for example, the battle of Waterloo.”
“I have come in for the long one,” thought Cousin Hans, “but never mind! [Note: In English in the original.] I love her.”
“Be so good as to take a seat on the bench here,” continued the captain, whose heart was rejoiced at the thought of so intelligent a hearer, “and I shall try to give you in short outline a picture of that momentous and remarkable battle—if it interests you?”
“Many thanks, sir,” answered Cousin Hans, “nothing could interest me more. But I’m afraid you’ll find it terribly hard work to make it clear to a poor, ignorant civilian.”
“By no means; the whole thing is quite simple and easy, if only you are first familiar with the lay of the land,” the amiable old gentleman assured him, as he took his seat at Hans’s side, and cast an inquiring glance around.
While they were thus seated, Cousin Hans examined the captain more closely, and he could not but admit that in spite of his sixty years, Captain Schrappe was still a handsome man. He wore his short, iron-gray mustaches a little turned up at the ends, which gave him a certain air of youthfulness. On the whole, he bore a strong resemblance to King Oscar the First on the old sixpenny-pieces.
And as the captain rose and began his dissertation, Cousin Hans decided in his own mind that he had every reason to be satisfied with his future father-in-law’s exterior.
The captain took up a position in a corner of the ramparts, a few paces from the bench, whence he could point all around him with a stick. Cousin Hans followed what he said, closely, and took all possible trouble to ingratiate himself with his future father-in-law.
“We will suppose, then, that I am standing here at the farm of Belle-Alliance, where the Emperor has his headquarters; and to the north-fourteen miles from Waterloo—we have Brussels, that is to say, just about at the corner of the gymnastic-school.
“The road there along the rampart is the highway leading to Brussels, and here,” the captain rushed over the plain of Waterloo, “here in the grass we have the Forest of Soignies. On the highway to Brussels, and in front of the forest, the English are stationed—you must imagine the northern part of the battle-field somewhat higher than it is here. On Wellington’s left wing, that is to say, to the eastward—here in the grass—we have the Château of Hougoumont; that must be marked,” said the captain, looking about him.
The serviceable Cousin Hans at once found a stick, which was fixed in the ground at this important point.
“Excellent!” cried the captain, who saw that he had found an interested and imaginative listener. “You see it’s from this side that we have to expect the Prussians.”
Cousin Hans noticed that the captain picked up a stone and placed it in the grass with an air of mystery.
“Here at Hougoumont,” the old man continued, “the battle began. It was Jerome who made the first attack. He took the wood; but the château held out, garrisoned by Wellington’s best troops.
“In the mean time Napoleon, here at Belle-Alliance, was on the point of giving Marshal Ney orders to commence the main attack upon Wellington’s centre, when he observed a column of troops approaching from the east, behind the bench, over there by tree.”
Cousin Hans looked round, and began to feel uneasy: could Blücher be here already?
“Blü—Blü—” he murmured, tentatively.
“It was Bülow,” the captain fortunately went on, “who approached with thirty thousand Prussians. Napoleon made his arrangements hastily to meet this new enemy, never doubting that Grouchy, at any rate, was following close on the Prussians’ heels.
“You see, the Emperor had on the previous day detached Marshal Grouchy with the whole right wing of the army, about fifty thousand men, to hold Blücher and Bülow in check. But Grouchy—but of course all this is familiar to you—” the captain broke off.
Cousin Hans nodded reassuringly.
“Ney, accordingly, began the attack with his usual intrepidity. But the English cavalry hurled themselves upon the Frenchmen, broke their ranks, and forced them back with the loss of two eagles and several cannons. Milhaud rushes to the rescue with his cuirassiers, and the Emperor himself, seeing the danger, puts spurs to his horse and gallops down the incline of Belle-Alliance.”
Away rushed the captain, prancing like a horse, in his eagerness to show how the Emperor rode through thick and thin, rallied Ney’s troops, and sent them forward to a fresh attack.
Whether it was that there lurked a bit of the poet in Cousin Hans, or that the captain’s representation was really very vivid, or that—and this is probably the true explanation—he was in love with the captain’s daughter, certain it is that Cousin Hans was quite carried away by the situation.
He no longer saw a queer old captain prancing sideways; he saw, through the cloud of smoke, the Emperor himself on his white horse with the black eyes, as we know it from the engravings. He tore away over hedge and ditch, over meadow and garden, his staff with difficulty keeping up with him. Cool and calm, he sat firmly in his saddle, with his half-unbuttoned gray coat, his white breeches, and his little hat, crosswise on his head. His face expressed neither weariness nor anxiety; smooth and pale as marble, it gave to the whole figure in the simple uniform on the white horse an exalted, almost a spectral, aspect.
Thus he swept on his course, this sanguinary little monster, who in three days had fought three battles. All hastened to clear the way for him, flying peasants, troops in reserve or advancing—aye, even the wounded and dying dragged themselves aside, and looked up at him with a mixture of terror and admiration, as he tore past them like a cold thunderbolt.
Scarcely had he shown himself among the soldiers before they all fell into order as though by magic, and a moment afterwards the undaunted Ney could once more vault into the saddle to renew the attack. And this time he bore down the English and established himself in the farm-house of La Haie-Sainte.
Napoleon is once more at Belle-Alliance.
“And now here comes Bülow from the east—under the bench here, you see—and the Emperor sends General Mouton to meet him. At half-past four (the battle had begun at one o’clock) Wellington attempts to drive Ney out of La Haie-Sainte. But Ney, who now saw that everything depended on obtaining possession of the ground in front of the wood—the sand here by the border of the grass,” the captain threw his glove over to the spot indicated, “Ney, you see, calls up the reserve brigade of Milhaud’s cuirassiers and hurls himself at the enemy.
“Presently his men were seen upon the heights, and already the people around the Emperor were shouting ‘Victoire!’
“‘It is an hour too late,’ answered Napoleon.
“As he now saw that the Marshal in his new position was suffering much from the enemy’s fire, he determined to go to his assistance, and, at the same time, to try to crush Wellington at one blow. He chose for the execution of this plan, Kellermann’s famous dragoons and the heavy cavalry of the guard. Now comes one of the crucial moments of the fight; you must come out here upon the battle-field!”
Cousin Hans at once rose from the bench and took the position the captain pointed out to him.
“Now you are Wellington!” Cousin Hans drew himself up. “You are standing there on the plain with the greater part of the English infantry. Here comes the whole of the French cavalry rushing down upon you. Milhaud has joined Kellermann; they form an illimitable multitude of horses, breastplates, plumes and shining weapons. Surround yourself with a square!”
Cousin Hans stood for a moment bewildered; but presently he understood the captain’s meaning. He hastily drew a square of deep strokes around him in the sand.
“Right!” cried the captain, beaming, “Now the Frenchmen cut into the square; the ranks break, but join again, the cavalry wheels away and gathers for a fresh attack. Wellington has at every moment to surround himself with a new square.
“The French cavalry fight like lions: the proud memories of the Emperor’s campaigns fill them with that confidence of victory which made his armies invincible. They fight for victory, for glory, for the French eagles, and for the little cold man who, they know, stands on the height behind them; whose eye follows every single man, who sees all, and forgets nothing.
“But to-day they have an enemy who is not easy to deal with. They stand where they stand, these Englishmen, and if they are forced a step backwards, they regain their position the next moment. They have no eagles and no Emperor; when they fight they think neither of military glory nor of revenge; but they think of home. The thought of never seeing again the oak-trees of Old England is the most melancholy an Englishman knows. Ah, no, there is one which is still worse: that of coming home dishonored. And when they think that the proud fleet, which they know is lying to the northward waiting for them, would deny them the honor of a salute, and that Old England would not recognize her sons—then they grip their muskets tighter, they forget their wounds and their flowing blood; silent and grim, they clinch their teeth, and hold their post, and die like men.”
Twenty times were the squares broken and reformed, and twelve thousand brave Englishmen fell. Cousin Hans could understand how Wellington wept, when he said, “Night or Blücher!”
The captain had in the mean time left Belle-Alliance, and was spying around in the grass behind the bench, while he continued his exposition which grew more and more vivid: “Wellington was now in reality beaten and a total defeat was inevitable,” cried the captain, in a sombre voice, “when this fellow appeared on the scene!” And as he said this, he kicked the stone which Cousin Hans had seen him concealing, so that it rolled in upon the field of battle.
“Now or never,” thought Cousin Hans.
“Blücher!” he cried.
“Exactly!” answered the captain, “it’s the old werewolf Blücher, who comes marching upon the field with his Prussians.”
So Grouchy never came; there was Napoleon, deprived of his whole right wing, and facing 150,000 men. But with never failing coolness he gives his orders for a great change of front.
But it was too late, and the odds were too vast.
Wellington, who, by Blücher’s arrival, was enabled to bring his reserve into play, now ordered his whole army to advance. And yet once more the Allies were forced to pause for a moment by a furious charge led by Ney—the lion of the day.
“Do you see him there!” cried the captain, his eyes flashing.
And Cousin Hans saw him, the romantic hero, Duke of Elchingen, Prince of Moskwa, son of a cooper in Saarlouis, Marshal and Peer of France. He saw him rush onward at the head of his battalions—five horses had been shot under him with his sword in his hand, his uniform torn to shreds, hatless, and with the blood streaming down his face.
And the battalions rallied and swept ahead; they followed their Prince of Moskwa, their savior at the Beresina, into the hopeless struggle for the Emperor and for France. Little did they dream that, six months later, the King of France would have their dear prince shot as a traitor to his country in the gardens of the Luxembourg.