"Would one not suppose," said Lothair, when Theodore had ended, "that you were a man who knew all about gambling, and were great at all those games yourself, though perhaps your conscience might now and then give you a slap in the face? and yet I know very well that you never touch a card."
"That is quite the case," said Theodore. "And yet I derived much assistance, in my story, from a strange experience which I had myself once."
"It would be the bestfinaleto your tale," said Ottmar, "to tell us this said experience of yours."
"You know," said Theodore, "that when I was finishing my education I lived for some time with an old uncle of mine in G----. There was a certain friend of this uncle's who, though our ages were very different, took a great pleasure in my society, chiefly, perhaps, because at that time I was always filled with a brilliant vein of humour, sometimes amounting to the mischievous. This gentleman was, I can assure you, one of the most extraordinary characters I ever came across. Mean in all the relationships of life, ill-tempered, grumbling, sulky, with a great tendency to miserliness, he had the utmost appreciation for everything in the shape of fun and amusement. To use a French expression, he was in the highest degreeamusable, but not in the leastamusant. At the same time he was excessively vain, and one form of his vanity was that he was always dressed in the utmost extremity of the prevailing fashion, almost to a ludicrous extent. And there was a similar absurdity about his manner of hunting after every species of enjoyment in the very sweat of his brow, so to speak--striving, with a comic eagerness, to gulp down as much of it as he possibly could grasp. I remember so well three particular instances of this vanity and struggle for enjoyment of his that I must tell them to you. Picture to yourselves this man, being at a place among the hills, and invited by some people (ladies being among them), to go on a walking expedition to see some waterfalls in the neighbourhood, dressing himself for the occasion in a bran new silk coat, never worn before, with beautiful shining steel buttons, and white silk stockings, shoes with steel buckles, and his finest rings on his fingers. In the thickest part of the pine forest which had to be passed through, a tremendous thunderstorm came on; the rain fell in torrents, the brooks, swollen by the rain, came rushing over the paths. You can well imagine the state my poor friend found himself in very soon.
"It chanced that the tower of the Dominican Church at G---- was one night struck by lightning. My friend was in raptures with the grand fire-pillar which arose in the darkness, magically illuminating all the country round; but he soon came to the conclusion that to get the real picturesque effect of it in all its perfection, it would be the right thing to go and look at it from a certain rising ground just outside the town. So he set off as quickly as his carefulness in such matters would permit him, not forgetting to put a packet of macaroons and a flask of wine into certain of his pockets, or to carry a beautiful bouquet of flowers in his hand, and a camp stool under his arm. Thus equipped, he paced calmly out of the city gate and up on to the eminence, where he sat himself down to enjoy the spectacle, smelling at his bouquet, munching a macaroon, washing that down with a mouthful of wine, in the most complete, beatific, quiescent state of enjoyment. Really this fellow was--taking him all round----"
"Stop! stop!" cried Lothair, "you were going to tell us the adventure of your own which helped you in writing your 'Gamester's Fortune,' and you cannot get away from a fellow who seems to have been as ludicrous as repulsive to every ordinarily constituted person's feelings."
"You must not blame me," said Theodore, "for lingering over this personage who was so intimately brought into connection with my life. But, to business!--this man whom I have been describing to you invited me to make a trip with him to a certain watering place, and, although I saw quite clearly that I was to play therôleof soother, calmer, tranquilizer, andmaítre-de-plaisírsto him, I was quite satisfied to make this charming excursion amongst the mountains at his expense. At the watering-place there was some high play going on--a bank of several thousand thalers. My companion eyed the heaps of gold with greedy simpers, paced up and down the room, circled nearer and nearer to the play table, dived into his pockets, brought out a Friedrich-d'or between his finger and thumb, dropped it back again--in a word, lusted for money. Only too glad would he have been to pocket a little haul from that heaped-up treasure, but he had no belief in his star. At last he put an end to this droll contest between his longings and his fears, which brought the perspiration in drops on to his forehead, by begging me to stake for him, to which end he put five or six Friedrichs-d'or into my hand. However, I would have nothing to do with the arrangement until he assured me that he had not the least belief that he would have any luck whatever, but looked upon the sum which he staked as so much lost cash. What happened was what I did not in the least degree expect. To me, the unpractised, inexperienced player, fortune was propitious. I won for my friend in a very short time something like thirty Friedrichs-d'or, which he put in his pocket with much glee. Next evening he wanted me to play for him again, but to this hour I cannot explain how the idea came into my head that I should then play on my own account. I had not had the slightest intention of playing any more, nay, rather, I was on the very point of going away, out of the room, to take a walk outside, when my friend came up to me with his request. When I had plainly told him in set terms that I meant to play on my own account (but not till then), I walked calmly up to the table and pulled out of my little waistcoat pocket two Friedrichs-d'or, the only two which I possessed. If fortune had been propitious to me the night before, this time it seemed as if some Spirit of Might, at whose command luck stood, was in covenant with me. Whatever I did, whatever I staked upon, everything turned up in my favour---in fact, just as I said in my story, what happened at first to Baron Siegfried happened to me. My brain reeled! When a fresh haul of money was handed over to me I often felt as if I were in a dream, and should be sure to wake up just as I was pocketing my winnings. When the clock struck two the game came to an end as usual.
"Just as I was leaving the room, an old officer took me by the shoulder, and said, transfixing me with a grave, powerful eye:
"'Young man, if you had known what you were about, you would have broken the banque. But if ever you do know about it, no doubt you will go to the devil, like all the rest.' He left me, without waiting for my answer.
"The day was breaking when I got to my room, and emptied the money out of all my pockets on to the table. Picture to yourselves the feelings of a mere boy, entirely dependent on his relatives, restricted to a miserable mite of an allowance of weekly pocket-money, who suddenly, as if at the wave of a magic wand, finds himself in possession of a sum which is, at all events, considerable enough to appear, in his eyes, a fortune! But, as I gazed at the heaps of coin, all my mind was suddenly filled with an anxiety, a strange, alarmed uneasiness, which put me into a cold perspiration. The words of the old officer came back to me, as they had not struck me before, in the most terrible significance. I felt as though the coin which was blinking at me there on the table was the earnest money of a bargain whereby I had sold my soul to the powers of darkness, so that there was no escape more for it possible, and it was destroyed for evermore. The blossoms of my life seemed to be gnawed upon by a hidden worm, and I sank into inconsolable despair. The morning dawn was flaming up behind the eastern hills. I lay down in the window-seat. I gazed, with the most intense longing, for the rising of the sun which should drive away the darksome spirits of night; and when the woods and plains shone forth in his golden glory, it was day in my soul once more, and there came to me the most inspiriting sense of a power to resist all temptation, and shield my life from that demoniacal impulse, which was full of the power of--somehow and somewhere--impelling it to utter destruction. I made then a most sacred vow that I would never touch a card again, and that vow I have kept most strictly. And the first use I made of my money was to part from my friend, to his immense surprise, and set out on that excursion to Dresden, Prague, and Vienna, of which I have told you."
"I can well imagine," said Sylvester, "the impression which your unexpected, equivocal, most questionable luck must have made upon you. It was greatly to your credit that you resisted the temptation, and that you recognized how it was that the threatening danger lay in the very luck itself. But, allow me to say, your own tale, the manner in which you have, with such accuracy, characterized the real gambler in it, must make it plain to yourself that you never had within you the true love of gambling, and that, if you had, the courage which you displayed would have been very difficult, perhaps impossible. Vincent, who, I believe, knows a great deal more about such matters than the rest of us, will agree with me here, I think."
"As for me," said Vincent, "I was scarcely attending to Theodore's account of his luck at the faro-table, because my mind was so full of that delicious fellow who walked about the hills in silk stockings, and admired burning buildings as if they were so many pictures, enjoying his wine, his macaroons, and his bouquets all the time. In fact, it was a pleasure and satisfaction to me to see one entertaining character at last emerging out of the dark, dreadful background of the stories of this evening, and I should have liked to have seen him as the hero of some comic drama."
"Ought not the mere suggestion of him to have been enough for us?" said Lothair. "We Serapion Brethren ought always to remember that it is our duty to set up, for each other's entertainment and refreshment, unique characters which we may have come across in life, as a means of refreshing us after the tales which may have strained our attention."
"A good idea," said Vincent, "and I thoroughly agree with it. Rough sketches of that description ought to serve as studies for more finished pictures, which whoever chooses may elaborate after his liking. Also, they may be considered as being charitable contributions to the general fund of Serapionish fantasy. And to show that I am in earnest, I shall at once proceed to describe to you a very great 'Curio' of a man whom I came across in the south of Germany. One day, in B----, I chanced to be walking in a wood near the town, when I came upon a number of countrymen hard at work in cutting down a quantity of thick underwood, and snipping off the branches from the trees on either side of it. I do not know what made me inquire of them if they were making a new road, or what. They laughed, and told me that, if I went on my way, I should find, outside the trees, upon a little rising ground, a little gentleman who would answer my questions, and, accordingly, I came there upon a little elderly gentleman, of pale complexion, in a great-coat, and with a travelling-cap on his head and a game-bag at his back, who was gazing fixedly through a telescope in the direction of the men who were cutting down the trees. When he saw me he shut up his telescope in a hurry, and said, eagerly, 'You have come through the wood, sir? Have you observed how the work is getting on?' I told him what I had seen. 'That's right, that's right,' he said; 'I've been here ever since three in the morning, and I was beginning to be afraid that those asses (and I pay them well, too) were leaving me in the lurch. But I have some hopes, now, that the view will come into sight at the expected time.' He drew out his telescope again, and gazed through it towards the wood. After a few minutes, some large branches came rustling down, and, as at the stroke of a magic wand, there opened up a prospect of distant mountains, a beautiful prospect, with the ruins of an old castle glowing in the beams of the setting sun. The gentleman gave expression to his extreme delight and gratification in one or two detached broken phrases; but when he had enjoyed the prospect for a good quarter of an hour, he put away his telescope and set off as fast as he could, without bidding me goodbye or taking the slightest notice of me. I afterwards heard that he was the Baron von B----, one of the most extraordinary fellows in existence, who, like the well-known Baron Grotthus, has been on a continual walking tour for several years, and has a mania for hunting after beautiful views. When he arrives at a place where, to get at a view, he thinks it is necessary to have trees cut down, or openings made in woodlands, he spares no cost to arrange matters with the proprietors, or to employ labourers. In fact, it is said that he once tried his utmost to have a set of farm buildings burned down, because he thought they interfered with the beauty of a prospect, and interrupted the view of the distance. He did not succeed in this particular undertaking. But whenever he did attain his object, he would gaze at his newly-arranged view for half an hour or so, at the outside, and then set off at such a pace that nothing could stop him, never coming back to the place again."
The friends were of one mind in the opinion that there is no possibility of imagining anything more marvellous or out of the common than that which comes before us in actual life, of its own accord.
"I am wonderfully delighted," said Cyprian, "that it chances to be in my power to add to your two oddities a third character, of whom I was told a short time ago by a well-known violinist, whom we all of us know very well. This third character of mine is none other than the Baron von B----, a man who lived in Berlin about the years 1789 and 1790, and was acknowledged to be one of the most extraordinary phenomenons ever met with in the world of music. For the sake of greater vividness, I will tell you the tale in the first person, as if I were the violinist concerned in it, and I hope my worthy Serapion brother Theodore won't take it amiss that I encroach, on this occasion, into his peculiar province.
"At the time when the Baron was living in Berlin," the violinist said, "I was a very young fellow, scarcely sixteen, and absorbed in the most zealous study of my instrument, to which I was devoted with all the powers and faculties of my body and soul. My worthy master, Concert-Meister Haak, who was excessively strict with me, was much content with my progress. He lauded the finish of my bowing, the correctness of my intonation, and he allowed me to play in the orchestra of the opera, and even in the King's chamber-concerts. On those occasions I often heard Haak talking with young Duport, with Ritter, and other great artists belonging to the orchestra, about the musical evenings which Baron von B---- was in the habit of having in his house. Such was the research and the taste connected with those evenings that the King himself often deigned to take part in them. Mention was made of magnificent works of the old, nearly forgotten masters, which were nowhere else to be heard than at the Baron's, who, as regarded music for stringed instruments, possessed, probably, the most complete collection from the most ancient times down to the present day, in existence. Then they spoke of the marvellous hospitality which the Baron extended to artists, and they were all unanimous in concluding that he was the most bright and shining star which had ever risen in the musical horizon of Berlin.
"All this excited my curiosity, and made my teeth water; and all the more that, during these conversations, the artists drew their heads nearer together, and I gathered, from mysterious whispers and detached words and phrases, that there was talk of tuition in music, of giving of lessons. I fancied that, on Duport's face especially, there appeared a sarcastic smile, and that they all attacked Concert-Meister Haak with some piece of chaff, and that he, for his part, only feebly defending himself, could scarcely suppress a smile, until at last, turning quickly away, and taking up his violin to tune, he cried out, 'All the same, he is a first-rate fellow!'
"All this was more than I could withstand, and although I was told, in a pretty decided manner, to mind my own business, I begged Haak to allow me, if in any manner possible, to go with him to the Baron's and play in his concerts.
"Haak surveyed me with great eyes, and I feared that a little thunderstorm was going to burst out upon me. But his seriousness melted into a strange smile, and he said:
"'Well, well; perhaps you're right. There's a great deal to be picked up at the Baron's. I'll talk to him about you, and I think it very likely that he will accord youles entrées. He is very much interested in young musicians.'
"A short time afterwards, I had been playing some very difficult duetts with Haak. As he laid his fiddle down, he said, 'Now, Carl, put your Sunday coat on to-night, and your silk stockings. We will go together to the Baron's. There won't be many there, and it will be a good opportunity to introduce you to him.'
"My heart throbbed with delight, for I expected to meet with things unheard-of and extraordinary, though I did not know why this was my expectation.
"We arrived there. The Baron, a rather small gentleman, advanced in age, wearing an old Frankish embroidered gala dress, came to meet us as we entered the room, and shook my master cordially by the hand. Never had I felt, at the sight of a man of rank, more sincere reverence, a more infelt, sincere, pleasant attraction. His face expressed the most genuine kindliness, whilst from his eyes flashed that darksome fire which so often indicates the artist who is, in verity, penetrated by his art. All that diffidence with which I, as an inexperienced neophyte, would otherwise have had to contend, fled from me instantly.
"'How are you, my dear Haak?' the Baron said. 'How are you getting on? Have you been having a right good study at my concerto? Good, good; we shall hear tomorrow. Oh, I suppose this is the young virtuoso you were telling me about?'
"I cast my eyes down bashfully. I felt that I blushed over and over again.
"Haak mentioned my name, praised my natural talent, and lauded the rapid progress which I had made in a short time.
"'And so you have chosen the violin as your instrument,' said the Baron. 'Have you considered, my son, that the violin is the most difficult of all instruments ever invented, and that it is one which, whilst it seems, in its extreme simplicity, to comprehend in itself the most luxuriant richness of music, is, in reality, an extraordinary mystery, which only discloses itself to a rare few, specially organized by nature to comprehend it? Do you know of a certainty, does your spirit tell you with distinctness, that you will be the master of that marvellous mystery? Many a one has thought this, and has remained a miserable bungler all his days. I should not wish, my son, that you should swell the ranks of those wretched creatures. However, at all events, you can play me something, and then I will tell you what you are like, what state you are in as regards this matter, and you will follow my counsel. Perhaps it is with you as it was with Carl Staunitz, who thought he was going to turn out a marvellous virtuoso. When I opened his eyes, he threw his fiddle behind the stove, and took to the Tenor and Viol d'Amour, and a very good job he made of them. On them he could stamp about with those broad stretching fingers of his, and play quite fairly well. But, however, just now I want to hearyou, my little son.'
"This first somewhat extraordinary speech of the Baron's to me was calculated to render me somewhat anxious and abashed. What he said went deep into my soul, and I felt, not without inward sorrow, that in devoting my life to the most difficult of all instruments I had, perhaps undertaken a task beyond my powers.
"Just then, four of the artists then present sat down to play the last three quartettes of Haydn, which had just appeared in print. My master took his violin out of its case; but scarcely had he passed his bow over the strings, in tuning, when the Baron, stopping his ears with both hands, cried out, like a man possessed, 'Haak, Haak, tell me, for God's sake! how can you annihilate all your skill in playing by making use of a miserable screaking, caterwauling fiddle like that?'
"Now it happened that my master's violin was one of the most splendid and glorious ever to be met with. It was a genuine Antonio Stradivari, and nothing could enrage him more than when any one failed to render due homage to this darling of his. However, knowing pretty well what was going to happen, he put it back into its case with a smile.
"Just as he was taking the key out of the lock of his fiddle-case, the Baron, who had left the room for a moment, came in, bearing in both arms (as if it had been a babe going to be baptized) a violin-case, covered with scarlet velvet, and bound with gold cords.
"'I wish to do you an honour, Haak,' he said; 'tonight you shall play on my oldest, most precious violin. This is a genuine Granuelo. Your Stradivarius, his pupil, is only a bungler in comparison with him. Tartini would never put his fingers on any violin but a Granuelo. So please to collect yourself, and pull yourself together, so that the Granuelo may be pleased to allow itself to unfold all the gloriousness which dwells within it.'
"The Baron opened the violin-case, and I beheld an instrument whose build bore witness to its immense antiquity. Beside it lay a most marvellous-looking bow, whose exaggerated curvature seemed to indicate rather that it was intended for shooting arrows from than for bringing tone out of violin strings. With solemn carefulness the Baron took the instrument out of its case and handed it to my master, who received it with equal solemnity.
"'I'm not going to give you the bow,' said the Baron, tapping my master on the shoulder with a pleasant smile, 'you haven't the slightest idea how to manage it; and that is why you will never, in all your life, attain to a proper style of bowing.
"'This was the sort of bow,' continued the Baron, taking it from the case, and contemplating it with a gleaming glance of inspiration, 'which the grand, immortal Tartini made use of; and now that he is gone there are only two of his pupils left in the whole wide world who were fortunate enough to possess themselves of the secret of his magnificent, marrowy, toneful manner of bowing, which affects the whole being of people, and can only be accomplished with a bow of this kind. One of those pupils is Narbini, who is now an old man of seventy, capable only of inward music; and the other, as I think, gentlemen, you are aware, is myself. Consequently, I am now the sole individual in whom the true art of violin-playing survives; and my zealous endeavours will, I trust and believe, not fail to perpetuate that art which found its creator in Tartini. However, let us set to work, gentlemen.'
"The Haydn quartettes were then played through, and with a degree of perfection which, it need not be said, left nothing to be desired. The Baron sat with closed eyes, swaying backwards and forwards; occasionally he would get up from his chair, go closer to the players, peer at the music with wrinkled brow, and then go very gently back to his seat, lean his head on his hand, sigh, groan--
"'Stop, stop!' he cried suddenly at a melodious passage in one of the adagios, 'by all the gods! that was Tartini-ish melody, or I know nothing about it. Play it again, please.'
"And the masters, smiling, repeated the passage, with a more sostenuto and cantabile effect of bowing, while the Baron wept and sobbed like a child.
"When the quartettes were ended, the Baron said, 'A heavenly fellow, this Haydn; he knows how to touch the heart; but he has not an idea of writing for the violin. Perhaps he does not wish to do it; for if he did, and wrote in the only true manner, as Tartini did, you would never be able to play it.'
"It was now my turn to play some variations which Haak had written for me.
"The Baron stood close behind me, looking at the notes. You may imagine the agitation with which I commenced, having this severe critic at my elbow. Presently, however, a stirring allegro movement carried me away. I forgot all about the Baron, and managed to move about with all freedom within the sphere of skill and power which stood then at my command.
"When I had finished, the Baron patted me on the shoulder, and said, 'You may stick to the violin, my son; but as yet you have not an idea of bowing or expression, probably because, up to this time, you haven't had a proper master.'
"We then sat down to table, in another room, where there was a repast laid out and served, which, especially as regarded the rare and marvellous wines, was to be characterized as very extravagant. The musicians dipped deeply into everything set before them. The talk, which waxed more and more animated, was almost entirely on the subject of music. The Baron emitted complete treasures of the most marvellous information. His opinions and views, most keen and penetrating, proved him to be not only the most instructed of connoisseurs, but also the most accomplished, talented, and tasteful of artists. What was specially striking to me was a sort of portrait gallery of violinists which he went through to us in description. So much of it as I remember I will tell you.
"'Corelli,' said the Baron, 'was the first to break out the path. His compositions can only be played in the real Tartini manner, and that is sufficient to prove how well he knew the true art of violin-playing. Pugnani is a passable player. He has tone, and plenty of brains, but, although he has a tolerable amount of appogiamento, his bowing is too feeble altogether. What have not people told me of Geminiani! and yet, when I heard him last, some thirty years ago in Paris, he played like a somnambulist striding about in a dream, and one felt as if one were in a dream one's self. It was all mere tempo rubato; no sort of style or delivery. That infernal tempo rubato is the ruin of the very best players; they neglect their bowing over it. I played him my sonatas; he saw his error, and asked me to give him some lessons, which I was very glad to do. But he was too far sunk into his old method. He had grown too old in it--he was ninety-one. May God forgive Giardini, and not punish him for it in eternity; but he it was who first ate the apple of the tree of knowledge, and brought sin upon all subsequent players. He was the first of your tremolandoists and flourishers. All he thinks about is his left hand, and those fingers of his that have the power of jumping hither and thither. He has no idea of the important fact that it is in therighthand that the soul of melody lies--that from every throb of its pulses stream forth the powers that awaken the feelings of the heart. Oh! that every one of those "flourishers" had a stout old Jomelli at his elbow to rouse him out of his craziness by a good sound box on the ear--as Jomelli actually did--when Giardini, in his presence, spoilt a glorious passage of melody by jumps, trills, and "mordenti." Lulli, too, conducts himself in a preposterous way. He is one of your damnable perpetrators of jumps. An adagio he can't play, and his sole quality is that for which ignoramuses, without sense or understanding, admire him with their stupid mouths agape. I say it again: with Narbini and me will die the true art of the violinist. Young Viotti is a fine fellow, full of promise. He is indebted to me for what he knows, for he was a most industrious pupil of mine. But what does it all amount to? No endurance! No patience! He wouldn't go on studying with me. Now, Kreutzer I still hope to get hold of and make something of. He has availed himself assiduously of my lessons, and will again, when I get back to Paris. That concerto of mine which you are studying, Haak, he played not at all badly a short time since. But he hasn't the hand, yet, to wield my bow. Giarnovichi shall never cross my doorstep again. There's a stupid coxcomb for you! A fellow who has the effrontery to turn up his nose at the grand Tartini--master of all masters--and despises my lessons. What I should like to know is, what that boy Rhode will turn out after he has had lessons from me? He promises well, and I have an idea that he will master my bow.'
"The Baron turned to me, saying, 'He is about your age, little son, but of a more serious, deep-thoughted nature. You appear to me--don't take it ill if I say so--to be a little bit of a--well, I mean, you lack purpose. However, no matter. Now you, dear Haak, I have great hopes of. Since I have been teaching you you have become quite another man. Keep up your unresting zeal and industry. Never waste a single hour. You know that is what distresses me.'
"I was turned to stone with amazement and admiration at what I heard. I could not wait the necessary time to ask the concert-meister if it was all true---if the Baron was, really, the greatest violinist of the day--if he, my master himself, did actually take lessons from him.
"'Undoubtedly,' Haak said, 'he had no hesitation in accepting the profitable instruction which the Baron placed at his disposal; and he told me that I should do well if I went, some morning, to him myself, and asked him to let me have some lessons from him too.'
"To all the questions which I then put to him concerning the Baron and his artistic talent, Haak would give me no direct reply, but kept on telling me that I ought to do as he advised me, and I should then find out all about it myself.
"The peculiar smile which passed over Haak's face as he said this did not escape me. I did not understand the meaning of it, and it excited my curiosity to the highest point.
"When I bashfully made my request to the Baron, assuring him that the most unbounded zeal, the most glowing enthusiasm for my art inspired me, he looked at me seriously and fixedly. But soon his face put on an expression of the most benevolent kindliness. 'Little son! little son!' he said, 'that you have betaken yourself to me--the only real violin-player now living--proves that you possess the true artistic spirit, and that the ideal of the genuine violin-player has come into existence within you. I should be delighted to give you lessons; but the time--the time! where to find it? Haak occupies me a great deal, and then I have got this young man Durand here just now, he wants to be heard in public, and knows that he need not try that till he has had a good course of lessons from me. However, wait a moment, between breakfast and lunch, or at lunch time--yes. I have still an hour at liberty then. Little son, come to me at twelve exactly every day, and I will fiddle with you for an hour until one; then Durand comes.'
"You can imagine how I hastened, with a throbbing heart, to the Baron's the next forenoon at the appointed hour.
"He would not let me play a single note on my own violin, which I had brought with me, but placed in my hands a very old instrument by Antonio Amati. Never had I had any experience of a violin like this. The celestial tone which streamed from its strings altogether inspired me. I let myself go, and abandoned myself to a stream of ingenious 'passages,' suffering the river of music to surge and swell, higher and higher, in mighty waves and billows of sound, and then die down and expire in murmuring whispers. My own belief is that I was playing exceedingly well; much better than I often did afterwards.
"When I had done, the Baron shook his head impatiently, and said: 'My little son! my little son! you must forget all that. In the first place, you hold your bow most abominably,' and he showed to me, practically, how the bow ought to be held, according to the manner of Tartini. I thought I should never be able to bring out a single tone whilst so holding it; but great was my astonishment when I found that, on repeating my 'passages' at the Baron's desire, the amazing advantage of holding the bow as he told me to hold it was strikingly manifest, after two or three seconds.
"'Good!' said the Baron. 'Little son, let us begin the lesson. Commence upon the note G, above the line, and hold out that note as long as you can possibly hold it. Economize your bow; make the very utmost of it that you possibly can. What the breath is to the singer, the bow is to the violinist.'
"I did as I was directed, and was greatly delighted to find that, in this manner of dealing with matters, I was enabled to bring out a tone of exceptional powerfulness; to swell it out to a marvellous fortissimo, and make it die down to a very soft pianissimo, with an excessively long stroke of the bow.
"'You see, do you not, little son?' cried the Baron. 'You can play all kinds of "passages," jumps, and new-fangled nonsense of that sort, but you can't properly sustain a note as it ought to be done.'
"He took the instrument from my hands, and laid the bow across the strings, near the bridge--and the simple truth is, that words completely fail me to describe to you what then came to pass.
"Laying that trembling bow of his close to the bridge, he went sliding with it up and down on the strings, as it quivered in his hands, jarringly, whistlingly, squeakingly, mewingly; the tone he produced was to be likened to that of some old woman, with spectacles on nose, vainly attempting to hit the tune of a hymn.
"And all the time he raised enraptured eyes to heaven, like a man lost in the most celestial blissfulness; and when at length he left off scraping with his bow up and down between the bridge and the finger-board, and laid the violin down, his eyes were shining, and he said, in deep emotion: 'That is tone! that is tone!'
"I felt in a most extraordinary condition: although the inward impulse to laugh was present with me, it was killed by the aspect of that venerable man, glorified by his inspiration. At the same time the whole affair had a most eery effect upon me, and I felt very much affected by it, and could not utter a syllable.
"'Don't you find, little son,' asked the Baron, 'that that goes to your heart? Had you ever any idea that such magic could be conjured out of that little thing there, with its four simple strings? Well, well! take a glass of wine, little son.' He poured me out a glass of Madeira. I had to drink it, and also to take some of the pastry and cakes which were upon the table. Just then the clock struck one.
"'This will have to do for to-day,' said the Baron. 'Go, go, little son! Here, here! put that in your pocket.'
"And he placed in my hand a little paper packet, in which I found a beautiful, shining ducat.
"In my amazement I ran to the concert-meister and told him all that had happened. He, however, laughed aloud, and said: 'Now you know all about our Baron and his violin lessons. He looks upon you as a mere beginner, so that you only get a ducat per lesson; but as the mastership, in his opinion, increases, so does the pay. He gives me a Louis, and I think Durand gets a couple of ducats.'
"I could not help expressing my opinion that it was anything but an honourable style of going to work, to mystify this kind gentleman in such a fashion, and pocket his money into the bargain.
"'You ought to be told,' said Haak, 'that his whole enjoyment consists in giving lessons--in the way which you now comprehend; and that if I and the other artists were to show any symptoms of under-valuing him or his lessons, he would proclaim to the whole artistic world, in which he is looked upon as a most competent and valuable critic, that we were nothing but a set of wretched scrapers; that, in fact, apart from his craze of being a marvellous player, the Baron is a man whose vast knowledge of music, and most cultivated judgment thereon, are matters from which even a master can derive great benefit. So judge for yourself whether I am to be blamed if I hold on to him, and now and then pocket a few of his Louis. I advise you to go to him as often as you can. Don't listen to the cracky nonsense he talks about his own execution; but do listen to, and profit by, what this man--who is most exceptionally versed in the musical art, and has immense and valuable experience in it--has to say about it. It will be greatly to your advantage to do so.'
"I took his advice; but it was often hard to repress laughter when the Baron would tap about with his fingers upon the belly of the fiddle instead of on the finger-board, stroking his bow diagonally over the strings the while, and asseverating that he was playing the most beautiful of all Tartini's solos, and that he was the only person in the world who could play it.
"But soon he would lay the violin down, and pour forth sayings which enriched me with the profoundest knowledge, and enflamed my heart towards the most glorious of all arts.
"If I then played something from one of his concertos with my utmostverve, and happened to interpret this or the other passage of it better than usual, the Baron would look round with a smile of complacence, or of pride, and say: 'The boy has to thank me for that; me, pupil of the great Tartini!'
"Thus, you perceive, I derived both profit and pleasure from the Baron's lessons; and from his ducats into the bargain."
"Well, really," said Theodore, laughing, "I should think that the greater part of the virtuosos of the present day--although they do consider themselves far beyond any description of instruction or advice--would be glad enough to have a few lessons such as the Baron von S---- was in the habit of giving."
"I render thanks to Heaven," said Vincenz, "that this meeting of our Club has ended so happily. I never dared to hope that it would; and I would fain entreat my worthy Serapion Brethren to see that proper measures are taken, in future, that there be a due alternation between the terrifying and the entertaining, which on this occasion has by no means been the case."
"This admonition of yours," Ottmar said, "is right and proper; but it rested with yourself to rectify the error into which we have fallen to-night by contributing something of your own, in your special style of humour."
"The truth is," said Lothair, "that you, my very fine fellow--and at the same time my very lazy-as-to-writing fellow--have never yet paid your entrance-money into the Serapion Guild, and the only mode of payment is a Serapiontic story."
"Hush!" cried Vincenz. "You don't know what has come glowing forth from my heart, and is nestling in this breast-pocket of mine here; a quite remarkable little creature of a story, which I specially commend to the favour of our Lothair. I should have read it to you to-night. But don't you see the landlord's pale face peeping in at the window every now and then, just in the style in which the uncle Kuehleborn, in Fouqué's 'Undine,' used to 'keek' in at the window of the fisherman's hut. Haven't you noticed the irritated 'Oh, Jemini!' countenance of the waiter? Was there not written on his forehead, legibly and distinctly (when he snuffed the candles), 'Are you going to sit here for ever? Are you never going to let an honest man get to his well-earned bed?' Those people are right. It is past twelve: our parting hour has struck some time ago."
The friends agreed to have another Serapiontic meeting at an early date, and dispersed.
The dreary late autumn had arrived, and Theodore was sitting in his room beside the crackling fire, waiting for the worthy Serapion Brethren, who came dropping in, one by one, at the appointed hour.
"What diabolical weather!" cried Cyprian, entering the last. "In spite of my cloak I am nearly wet through, and a gust of wind all but carried away my hat."
"And it won't be better very soon," said Ottmar; "for our meteorologist, who lives in the same street with me, has prognosticated very fine weather at the end of this autumn."
"Right; you are perfectly right, my friend Ottmar," Vincenz said. "Whenever our great prophet consoles his neighbours with the announcement that the winter is not going to be at all severe, but principally of a southerly character, everybody rushes away in alarm, and buys all the wood he can cram into his cellar. The weather-prophet is a wise and highly-gifted man, whom we can thoroughly trust, so long as we expect the exact reverse of what he predicts."
"Those autumnal storms always make me thoroughly wretched," said Sylvester; "I always feel depressed and ill whilst they are going on; and I think you feel the same, Theodore."
"Oh, indeed I do," answered Theodore; "this sort of weather always makes----"
"Splendid!--delightful beginning of a meeting of the Serapion Club!" intercalated Lothair. "We set to work to discuss the weather, like a parcel of old women round the coffee-table."
"I don't see," said Ottmar, "why we should not talk about the weather; the only reason you can object to it is that talking about it seems to be an observance of a kind of rather slovenly old custom, which has resulted from a necessity to say something or other when there happens to be nothing else in people's minds to talk about. What I think is that a few words about the weather and the wind make a very good beginning of a conversation, whatsoever its nature may turn out to be, and that the very universality of the applicability of this as the beginning of a conversation prove how natural it really is."
"As far as I am concerned," said Theodore, "I don't think it matters a farthing how a conversation commences. But there is one thing certain--that, if one wants to make some very striking and clever beginning, that is enough to kill all the freedom and unconstraint which may be termed the very soul of conversation. I know a young man--I think he is known to you all, as well--who is by no means deficient in that mobility of intellect which is absolutely necessary for good conversation; but he is so tormented, particularly when ladies are present, by that kind of eagerness to burst out with something brilliant and striking at the very outset of a talk, that he walks restlessly about the room; makes the most extraordinary faces in the keenness of his inward torment; opens his lips, and--cannot manage to utter a syllable."
"Cease, cease, base wretch!" Cyprian cried, with comic pathos, "do not, with murderous hand, tear open wounds which are barely healed. He is speaking of me," he continued, laughing, "and he doesn't know that, a few weeks ago, when I insisted on restraining that tendency of mine, which I see the absurdity of, and falling into a conversation in the ordinary style of other people, I had to pay for it by complete annihilation. I prefer telling you all about this myself to letting Ottmar do it, and add witty comments of his own. At a tea-party where Ottmar and I were, there was present a certain pretty and clever lady, as to whom you are in the habit of maintaining that she interests me more than is right and proper. I went to talk to her, and I admit that I was a little at a loss how exactly to begin, and she was wicked enough to gaze at me with questioning eyes. I burst out with 'The new moon has brought a nice change of weather.' She answered, very quietly: 'Oh, are you writing the Almanac this season?'"
The friends laughed heartily.
"On the other hand," said Ottmar, "I know another young man--and you all know him--who, particularly with ladies, is never at a loss for the first word of a talk; in fact, my belief is that he has severely thought out, in private, a regular system, of the most comprehensive kind, as to conversation with ladies, which is by no means likely ever to find him left in the lurch. For instance, one of his dodges is to go to the prettiest--one who scarce ventures to dip a sweet biscuit in her tea; who, at the utmost, whispers into the ear of her who is sitting next to her: 'It is very warm, dear;' to which the latter answers with equal softness into her ear: 'Dreadfully, my love;' whose communication goeth not beyond 'Yea, yea,' and 'Nay, nay,'--to go up to such an one, I say, and, in an artful manner, startle her out of her wits, and thereby so utterly revolutionize her very being, in such a sudden manner, that she seems to herself to be no longer the same person: 'Good heavens! how very pale you are looking!' he cried out, recently, to a pretty creature, as silent as a church, just in the act of beginning a stitch of silver thread at a purse which she was working. The young lady let her work fall on her lap in terror, said she was feeling a little feverish that day. Feverish!--my friend was thoroughly at home on that subject; could talk upon it in the most interesting way, like a man who knows his ground; inquired minutely into all the symptoms; gave advice, gave warnings,--and behold! there was a delightful, interesting, confidential conversation spun out in a few minutes."
"I am much obliged to you," said Theodore, "for having so carefully observed that talent of mine, and given it its due meed of approval."
The friends laughed again at this.
"There is no doubt," said Sylvester, "that society talk is, altogether, a rather curious thing. The French say that a certain heaviness in our nature always prevents us from hitting the precise tact and tone necessary for it; and they may be right, to a certain extent, but I must declare that the much-belaudedlégèretéand lightsomeness of French Society puts me out of temper, and makes me feel stupid and uncomfortable, and that I cannot look upon thosebon motsandcalemboursof theirs, which are continually being fired off in all directions, as coming under the class of that 'Society wit' which gives out constantly fresh sparks of new life of conversation. Moreover, that peculiar style of wit to which the genuine French 'wit' belongs is, to me, in the highest degree disagreeable."
"That opinion," said Cyprian, "comes from the very depths of your quiet, friendly spirit, my dearest Sylvester: but you are forgetting that, besides the (generally utterly empty and insipid)bon mots, the 'Society wit' of the French is, in a great degree, founded on a mutual contempt of, and jeering and scoffing at, each other (such as at the present time we call 'chaff,' although it is less good-humoured than that), which soon passes the bounds of what we consider courtesy and consideration, and consequently would speedily deprive our intercourse of all pleasure. Then the French have not the very slightest comprehension of that wit whose basis is real humour, and it is almost incomprehensible how often the point of some not very profound, but superficially funny, little story escapes them."
"Don't forget," said Ottmar, "that the point of a story is very often completely untranslatable."
"Or is badly translated," said Vincenz. "It so happens that I just think of a very amusing thing which happened quite recently, and which I will tell you, if you care to hear it."
"Tell us, tell us! delightful fabulist! valued anecdotist!" cried the friends.
"A young man," related Vincenz, "whom nature had endowed with a splendid bass voice, and who had gone upon the operatic stage, was making his first appearance as Sarastro, in the 'Magic Flute.' As he was mounting the car, in which he first comes on, he was seized with such a terrible attack of stage-fright that he trembled and shook--nay, when the car got into motion to come forward, he shrunk into himself, and all the manager's efforts to induce him to reassure himself, and, at all events, stand upright, were useless. Just then it happened that one of the wheels got entangled in the long mantle which Sarastro wears, so that the further he got on to the stage, the more this mantle dragged him backwards; whilst he, struggling against this, and keeping his feet firm, appeared in the centre of the stage with the nether portion of his body projecting forwards, and his head and shoulders held tremendously far back. The audience were immensely pleased at this most regal attitude and appearance of the inexperienced neophyte, and the manager offered him, and concluded with him, an engagement on very liberal terms. Now, this simple little story was being told, lately, in a company where there was a French lady who did not understand a word of German. When everybody laughed, at the end of the story, she wanted to know what the laughter was about, and our worthy D. (who, when he speaks French, gives a most admirable, and very close, imitation of the tones and actions of French people, but is continually at a loss for the words) undertook to translate the story to her. When he came to the wheel which had got entangled with Sarastro's cloak, constraining him to his regal attitude, he called it 'Le rat,' instead of 'La roue.' The French lady's brow clouded, her eyebrows drew together, and in her face was plainly to be read the terror which the story had produced in her, whereto conduced the circumstance that D. had 'let on' upon his face the full power of tragi-comic muscular play which it was capable of. When, at the end, we all laughed more than before at this amusing misunderstanding (which we all took good care not to explain), she murmured to herself, 'Ah! les barbares!' The good lady not unnaturally looked upon us as barbarians for thinking it so amusing that an abominable rat should have frightened the poor young man almost to death, at the very commencement of his stage-career, by holding on to his cloak."
When the friends had done laughing, Vincenz said: "Suppose we now bid adieu to the subject of French conversation, with all itsbon mots,calembours, and other ingredients, and come to the conclusion that it really is an immense pleasure when, amongst intellectual Germans, a conversation, inspired by their humour, rushes up skyward like a coruscating firework, in a thousand hissing light-balls, crackling serpents, and lightning-like rockets."
"But it must be remembered," said Theodore, "that this pleasure is possible only when the friends in question, besides being intellectual and endowed with humour, possess the talent not only of talking, but of listening, the principal ingredient of real conversation."
"Of course," said Lothair; "those people who constitute themselves 'spokesmen' destroy all conversation--and so, in a lesser degree, do the 'witty' folk, who go from one company to another with anecdotes, crammed full of all sorts of shallow sayings; a kind of self-constituted 'Society clowns.' I knew a man who, being clever and witty, and at the same time a terribly talkative fellow, was invited everywhere to amuse the company; so that, the moment he came into a room, everybody looked in his face, waiting till he came out with something witty. The wretch was compelled to put himself to the torture, in order to fulfil the expectations entertained of him as well as he could, so that he could not avoid soon becoming flat and commonplace; and then he was thrown aside by every one, like a used-up utensil. He now creeps about, spiritless and sad, and seems to be like that dandy in Abener's 'Dream of Departed Souls,' who, brilliant as he was in this life, is sorrowful and valueless in the other, because, on his sudden and unexpected departure, he left behind him his snuff-box of Spanish snuff, which was an integral part of him."
"Then, too," said Ottmar, "there are certain extraordinary people who, when entertaining company, keep up an unceasing stream of talk; not from conceit in themselves, but from a strange, mistaken well-meaningness, for fear that people shouldn't be enjoying themselves; and keep asking if people are not 'finding it dull,' and so forth, thereby nipping every description of enjoyment in the bud in a moment."'
"That is the very surest way to weary people," said Theodore, "and I once saw it employed with the most brilliant success by my old humourist of an uncle, who, I think, from what I have told you of him, you know pretty intimately by this time. An old schoolfellow of his had turned up--a man who was utterly tedious and unendurably wearisome in all his works and ways--and he came to my uncle's house every forenoon, disturbed him at his work, worried him to death, and then sat down to dinner without being invited. My uncle was grumpy, snappish, silent, giving his visitor most unmistakably to understand that his calls were anything but a pleasure to him; but it was all of no use. Once, when the old gentleman was complaining to me (in strong enough language, as his manner was) on the subject of this schoolfellow, I said I thought he should simply show him the door and have done with it. 'That wouldn't do, boy,' said my uncle, puckering his face into a rather pleased smile. 'You see, he is an old schoolfellow of mine, after all; but there is another way of getting rid of him which I shall try; and that will do it.' I was not a little surprised when, the next morning, my uncle received the schoolfellow with open arms and talked to him unceasingly, saying how delighted he was to see him, and go back over the old days with him. All the old school-day stories which the schoolfellow was incessantly in the habit of repeating, and re-repeating, till they became intolerable to listen to, now poured from my uncle's lips in a resistless cataract, no that the visitor could not escape them. And all the while my uncle kept asking him, 'What is the matter with you to-day? You don't seem happy. You are so monosyllabic. Do be jolly! Let us have a regular feast of old stories to-day.' But the moment the schoolfellow opened his lips to speak my uncle would cut him short with some interminable tale. At last the affair became so unendurable to him that he wanted to cut and run. But my uncle so pressed him to stay to lunch and dinner, that, unable to resist the temptation of the good dishes, and better wine, he did stay. But scarce had he swallowed a mouthful of soup when my uncle, in extreme indignation, cried, 'What in the devil's name is this infernal mess? Don't touch any more of it, brother, I beg you; there's something better to come. Take those plates away, John!' Like a flash of lightning the plate was swept away from under the school-friend's nose. It was the same thing with all the dishes and courses, though they were of a nature sufficiently to excite the appetite, till the 'something better to come' resolved itself into Cheshire cheese, which of all cheeses the school-friend hated the most, although he disliked all cheese. From an apparently ardent endeavour to set before him an unusually good dinner he had not been suffered to swallow two mouthfuls; and it was much the same with the wine. Scarce had he put a glass to his lips when my uncle cried, 'Old fellow, you're making a wry face. Quite right, that isn't wine, it's vinegar. John, a better tap!' And one kind after another came, French wines, Rhine wines, and still the cry was, 'You don't care about that wine,' &c., till, when the Cheshire cheese put the finishing stroke on things, the school-friend jumped up from his chair in a fury. 'Dear old friend!' said my uncle in the kindliest of tones, 'you are not at all like your usual self. Come, as we are together here, let us crack a bottle of the real old "care-killer."' The school-friend plumped into his chair again. The hundred years' old Rhine wine pearled glorious and clear in the two glasses which my uncle filled to the brim. 'The devil,' he cried, holding his glass to the light, 'this wine has got muddy, on my hands. Don't you see? No, no; I can't set that before anybody,' and he swallowed the contents of both glasses himself, with evident delight. The school-friend popped up again, and plumped into his chair once more on my uncle's crying, 'John, Tokay!' The Tokay was brought, my uncle poured it out, and handed the schoolfellow a glass, saying, 'There, my boy, you shall be satisfied at last, in good earnest. That is nectar!' But scarce had the school-friend set the glass to his lips when my uncle cried, 'Thunder! there's been a cockroach at this bottle.' At this the school-friend, in utter fury, dashed the glass into a thousand pieces against the wall, ran out of the house like one possessed, and never showed his face across the threshold again."
"With all respect for your uncle's grim humour," said Sylvester, "I think there was rather a systematic perseverance in the course of mystification involved in such a process of getting rid of a troublesome person. I should have much preferred to show him the door and have done with it; though I admit that it was quite according to your uncle's peculiar vein of humour to prearrange a theatrical scene of this sort in place of the perhaps troublesome and unpleasant consequences which might have arisen if he had kicked him out. I can vividly picture to myself the old parasite as he suffered the torments of Tantalus, as your uncle kept continually awakening fresh hopes in his mind and instantly dashing them to the ground; and how, at last, utter desperation took possession of him."
"You can introduce the scene into your next comedy," said Theodore.
"It reminds me," said Vincenz, "of that delightful meal in Katzenberger'sBadereise, and of the poor exciseman who has almost to choke himself with the bites of food which are slid to him over the 'Trumpeter's muscle,' the Buccinator, although that scene would not be of much service to Sylvester for a new piece."
"The great Kazenberger," said Theodore, "whom women do not like on account of the robustness of his cynicism, I formerly knew very well. He was intimate with my uncle, and I could, at some future time, tell you many delightful things concerning him."
Cyprian had been sitting in profound thought, and seemed to have been scarcely attending to what the others had been saying. Theodore tried to arouse his attention and direct it to the hot punch which he had brewed as the best corrective of the evil influence of the weather.
"Beyond a doubt," said Cyprian, "this is the germ of insanity, if it is not actually insanity itself."
The friends looked questionably at each other.
"Ha!" cried Cyprian, getting up from his chair and looking round him with a smile, "I find I have spoken out, aloud, the conclusion of the mental process which has been going on within me in silence. After I have emptied this glass of punch and duly lauded Theodore's art of preparing that liquid after its mystic proportions, and due relations of the hot, strong and sweet, I will simply point out that there is a certain amount of insanity, a certain dose of crackiness, so deeply rooted in human nature, that there is no better mode of getting at the knowledge of it than by carefully studying it in those madmen and eccentrics whom we by no means have to go to madhouses to come across, but whom we may meet with every hour of the day in our daily course; and, in fact, best of all in the study of our own selves, in each of whom these is present a sufficient quantum of that 'precipitate resulting from the chemical process of life.'"
"What has brought you back to the subject of insanity and the insane?" asked Lothair, in a tone of vexation.
"Do not lose your temper, dear Lothair," said Cyprian, "we were talking on the subject of society conversation; and then I thought of two mutually antagonistic classes of characters which are often fatal to social talking. There are people who find it impossible to get away from ideas which have come to occupy their minds; who go on repeating the same things over and over again, for hours, no matter what turn the conversation may have taken. All efforts to carry them along with the stream of the conversation are vain; when one at last flatters oneself that one has got them into the current of the talk, lo and behold, they returnà leurs moutonsagain, just as before, and consequently dam up the beautiful, rushing stream of conversation. In contradistinction to them are those who forget one second what they said in the immediately preceding one; who ask a question, and, without waiting for an answer, introduce something completely irrelevant and heterogeneous; to whom everything suggests everything else, and consequently nothing which has any connection with the subject of the talk--who, in a few words, throw together a many-tinted lumber of ideas in which nothing that can be called distinct is discoverable. Those latter destroy everything like agreeable conversation and drive us to a state of despair, and the former produce intolerable tedium and annoyance. But, don't you think there lies in those people the germ of real insanity in the one case, and in the other offolie, whose character is very much, if not exactly, what the psychological doctors term 'looseness' or 'incoherence' of ideas?"
"There is no doubt," said Theodore, "that I should like to say a great deal concerning the art ofrelatingin society, for there is much which is mysterious about it, depending, as it does, on place, time, and individual relationships, and difficult to be ranged under special heads. But it seems to me that this matter might carry us too far, and be opposed to the real tendency of the Serapion Club."
"Most certainly," said Lothair. "We want to tranquillise ourselves with the thought that we--neither madmen nor fools--are, on the contrary, the most delightful companions to each other; who not only can talk, but can listen; more than that, each of us can listen quite patiently when another reads aloud, and that is saying a good deal. Friend Ottmar told me a day or two ago that he had written a story in which the celebrated poet-painter Salvator Rosa played a leading part. I hope he will read it to us now."
"I am a little afraid," said Ottmar, as he took the manuscript from his pocket, "that you won't think my story Serapiontic. I had it in mind to imitate that ease and genial liberty of breadth which predominates in the 'Novelli' of the old Italians, particularly of Boccaccio; and over this endeavour I acknowledge that I have grown prolix. Also you will say, with justice, that it is only here and there that I have hit upon the true 'Novella' tone--perhaps only in the headings of the chapters. After this noble and candid confession I am sure you will not deal too hardly with me, but think chiefly of anything which you may find entertaining and lively."
"What prefaces!" cried Lothair. "An unnecessaryCapitatio Benevolentiae; read us your Novella, my good friend Ottmar, and if you succeed in vividly portraying to us your Salvator Rosa in verisimilitude before our eyes, we will recognise you as a true Serapion brother, and leave everything else to the grumbling, fault-finding critics. Shall it not be so, my eminent Serapion Brethren?"
The friends acquiesced, and Ottmar began.