Kitabı oku: «Villa Eden: The Country-House on the Rhine», sayfa 94

I stood by when Roland and Lilian met; they must have some secret sign of recognition, for their first word was "Pebble." Yes, in love affairs some secret understanding is always formed. They merely held each other by the hand, and then went out together. Children live here in great independence.

Things go on beautifully at Dr. Fritz's, only nobody has any time.

I now understand the American saying, 'Time is money.' There is an extraordinary restlessness everywhere.

Here is war – war! Most people think it will soon be over, but Dr. Fritz says that the obstinacy of the Southern States is great, and that they are the better armed.

What is to become of me? you ask. Dr. Fritz thinks it strange that I still wish, in earnest, to become a teacher of negroes, especially as I do not yet speak the language with ease. He gives me hope, however, of being able to carry out my plan, by-and-by. And my thoughts go even further. A Normal School must be founded for negro youths; I shall keep this in view. Meantime I am giving music lessons here, and it seems so strange, when I come out of a house where we have been practising, to hear in the street the noisy roll of the drum.

Adams is in despair; the President will not yet permit any blacks to enlist. Adams has been told to work on the fortifications, but this he will not do.

Young Fassbender will have nothing to do with the bird-trade which Claus wanted to draw him into with his brother; he has undertaken to furnish supplies for the army. I hope he will behave honorably, for, sad to say, I hear that a great deal of cheating and embezzlement is carried on even in this Republic.

[Knopf to Fassbender.]

… and tell me, did I ever meet at your house a teacher by the name of Runzler? It is very important to me to know, this, for he was my father-in-law.

I think he was at your house, and took snuff out of a large box.

Yes, it is so. I have just, asked my Rosalie. Her father used to take snuff from a big beech-wood box. So my idea was correct. Memory is a whimsical thing. We ought, professionally, to take it into consideration far more than we do. I remember actually nothing but the beech-wood snuff-box; but I beg you to tell me what we talked about at that time. You recollect, or rather I remind you, that I was at that time much saddened by the childish prank which Roland had played off upon me. I was so troubled, that I cannot remember any thing that passed. So write me all about it, and you will be doing me a great favor. You will soon receive a card inscribed thus:

EMIL KNOPF,

Rosalie Knopf, née Runzler,

Married

I tell you the world is full of romances; the whole of life is but a romance.

The philosopher Schelling is right; poetry, art, government, religion, everything, had their origin in myths.

My good Roland has described to me his visit to Abraham Lincoln, and I have a good poem about it in my head. Unfortunately I have as yet only the title; but it is a beautiful one, for the piece is to be called: 'In Abraham's bosom.' Think how much can be included under such a heading!

Your son is an extremely practical man, you will have much satisfaction in him.

If your under-master chooses to come here, I can procure him much employment in piano lessons. We have teachers enough in Germany to export some.

[Roland to the Professorin.]

Pardon me if I no longer venture to call you mother. It seems to me like an injustice to my dead mother that I ever did so. I entreat you to have her grave carefully attended to, and to keep it strewn with her favorite flowers, ericas and pinks.

Now that is off my mind, I will write of other things.

When I think of the green cottage, it always seems to me as if it were floating on the sea, and must come hither to us.

Eric and Manna have, of course, described our voyage to you. While at sea, I learned tolerably well how the ship was managed, and I should have liked best to enlist in the navy; but Eric would not hear of it.

It is probable that my father is fighting against us by sea, so it is better for me to be in the army.

I have seen Lilian again. I can say to you alone that we are engaged. Do not say that I am but seventeen, and she but fourteen years old. Events have made us older. Why, Franklin wanted to marry Miss Read, when he was only eighteen. We have vowed to belong to one another when the war is over.

Please let these lines be seen by no eyes but yours.

We have been at Washington; I have seen the Acropolis of the New World. I wished first to make a pilgrimage to Franklin's grave, but it was better for me that I could first see one of his greatest successors, Abraham Lincoln.

I have seen, for the first time, a man of immortal glory. Face to face with him, I have uttered the name which will be handed down to posterity. Those lips, whose words now resound throughout the world of to-day, and shall be reëchoed by future ages, have pronounced my name. I have looked on greatness, and how simple it is!

It was at Carlsbad, in the course of that memorable conversation, – I do not remember much of it, but this struck me, – that some one, the Cabinetsrath, I think, said: "He who has walked through a portrait gallery of his ancestors, traverses the whole of life accompanied, as it were, by those eyes." Oh, from Lincoln's eyes the spirit of Socrates and Aristides, the spirit of Moses, of Washington, of Franklin, gazed upon me. And then I felt those to be the forefathers whom every one can earn for himself by honorable labor, by loyalty and self-sacrifice. I have the loftiest ancestry, and I will be worthy of it.

I enclose a photograph of Lincoln. He resembles Weidmann, not in appearance, but in the impression he makes on one. I told him about Adams, and how unhappy the negro was that he could not enter the army, but could only be employed on fortifications. Lincoln told me to trust mature discretion, and not to forget, in the exuberance of youth, that we must use all means in our power to bring about an understanding, in order to be justified before our own conscience and before God, if obliged to go further, saying that this was a fraternal strife, a war, not of annihilation, but of reconciliation.

I should like to enter a negro regiment, and told him so. He was silent, and only laid his broad, powerful hand on my head. Manna remains at Dr. Fritz's. Eric has probably already told you of his entering the army with the rank of Major. I have a comrade, Hermann; Lilian's brother, who bears a strong resemblance to Rudolph Weidmann, and is of the same age, but much older in character. Here, one is much older at eighteen than with us. He talks very little; but what he says, is so sensible and decided! Ah, he has had a beautiful youth! – but I will say no more of that. I left Griffin behind, in Lilian's care. We are in the cavalry. If we only had our Villa Eden horses here! Tell the Major to write me word who has bought them. My heart aches if I think of Villa Eden.

Just now, having written that word, I was obliged to stop. Have patience with me: you shall see that your great goodness to me has not been thrown away. You shall hear of manly behaviour on the part of

Your

Roland Dournay.

I have taken the name of Dournay here. You will understand why.

[Manna to the Professorin.]

… I long to throw myself upon your breast, and there to say, "Mother!" and nothing more. The pen trembles in my hand, but I hear you say, "Be strong." I will. I dare not think how it will be when we are again with you. You are our home. We must wait, who knows how long? Who knows with what sacrifices? I dare, not think that Eric may be taken from me – from us.

It seemed like a dream to me, when we trod the soil of this continent – of my native land. I would gladly have floated on with the ship forever. I am living in the house of Dr. Fritz. Eric and Roland have to-day gone to Washington to see Lincoln. I do not realize that Eric is not with me, and yet I must soon let him go, how differently! We will not be afraid, will we, mother? A wonderful destiny has brought us together and preserved us together; it will remain true to us.

I should like to tell you much of the home where I dwell, and of all the good, intellectually wide-awake people, and often, when I hear the wife and children talking and see them acting, I want to say, "That you get from Eric's mother, from my mother." There exists, over the whole earth, a common fund of noble thought, as every one finds who bears a portion of it within himself. This is, to me, the meaning of the words, "Seek and ye shall find, knock and it shall be opened unto you." You have given me the power of seeking, of knocking, and I find that it is opened unto me. Oh, mother! Why must it be by means of such tremendous events, poised so narrowly between life and death, that the greatness and goodness, the readiness for martyrdom of the human heart, must be developed? Why not in peace, in love, in quiet cares?

That will be the millennium, you have often said, when the best qualities will no longer unfold in struggle, but in beauty and peacefulness. You, my mother, are a messenger and a witness from the paradise-world beyond the strife. Rejoice, as we rejoice, that you are this messenger, this witness. I will become like you, I am and will be your daughter, and will grow ever more truly so.

It is well that I was interrupted in this. Lilian has a fresh voice, and our friend Knopf's betrothed sings beautifully. We have practised pieces in which I accompany Lilian's singing on the harp. Oh, if we could send some of those tones over the sea! In the midst of the uproar of life around us, here we sit and sing by the hour together. Now I understand anew that saying, that art is a redeemer; – that saying of father's.

Why is the word father so harrowing to my soul? How happy it was for my mother to be snatched away as she was! When I fall into this train of thought, I always feel as if entering a desert, far, far away; nowhere anything cheering to the eye or refreshing to the soul. We must bear it.

I see with sorrow that I am writing confusedly; but you know and believe me, when I say that I am really calm, and, above all, you are to know that I never burden our Eric with these heavy thoughts. It is less from intention than – no, as soon as he comes, all dread and grief vanish; everything is light, sunshine, day.

Three days later.

Eric has returned with Roland from Washington. They have much to tell, and Roland is in a state of enthusiasm which you can easily picture to yourself.

Have I already told you that our friend Knopf has found a charming little wife? She is full of intelligence, modesty, and energy. She, too, has had religious conflicts to undergo, as I have, not so severe; but then she has had a hard fight with herself. Lilian, too, young as she is, is far riper than her years, on account of her zeal for making converts.

She was sent to Germany, and our friend Knopf there accomplished a good work. Lillian has become a sister to me, and we talk much of how she shall go with us to the Rhine. She thinks, however, that Eric and I will remain here; but that will never be. Our home is there. You are our home. I kiss your eyes, cheeks, mouth, hands. Ah, let me kiss you once more, once more! You are my – ah! you do not know at all what you are; but you know that I am

Your daughter,

Manna Dournay.

P.S. Dear Aunt Claudine, send me a great deal more good music, some soprano songs with harp accompaniment, and send them soon. At every tone I will think of you, and my naughty little finger, which you took so much trouble to train, is now perfectly obedient.

[Eric to Weidmann.]

When I stood before Abraham Lincoln, I thought of you, my revered friend. And because I have known, in my short life, what purely noble men breathe the same air with me, I was unembarrassed and at my ease. My lot is an exalted one: I can look in the faces of the best men of my age. And if wiseacres ever again tell me, condescendingly, that I am an idealist, I can reply to them, "I must be one, for I have met some of the noblest of men on my life-road; I not only believe in the elevation of pure humanity – I know it."

I will only give one incident of our interview.

We heard the opinion expressed, among those who surrounded Lincoln, that the negroes ought not to be set free, because they would do no work unless forced.

Roland said to me in a low voice: —

"Do the slaveholders work without being forced?"

Lincoln noticed that the boy was saying something to me, and encouraged him to speak without reserve. Roland repeated his question quietly but earnestly. You, who have helped me to awaken this young spirit, will sympathize in my pleasure.

And now I will tell you about your nephew.

Oh, our blessed German life! In old times travellers took with them into foreign countries the images of their saints. We Germans carry our poets, our philosophers and musicians over the face of the whole globe; and your nephew's pleasant, comfortable, free home is the abode of true culture. Here, in the midst of the tumult of political and private life, reign immortal spirits, who bring a devotion, a serenity, a holy quiet, of a peculiar sort.

Your nephew has done well in always telling me not to believe, with most people here, that this war will be over in a few months. I now think not of the end, but only of the next day.

And, in the midst of this growth and change of historic movement, I feel that the individual is like the single cell in a tree, or else that we are like boys on the school-bench. We do not know the entire educational plan. We do not know the end to which all this leads. We must learn our lessons; and cell is built upon cell, knowledge is added to knowledge, until – who knows the end?

In the first great struggle, in the New World's war of independence, there were Germans sold by German princes, to fight for the English against the Americans, and but few of our countrymen, towering up among them like Steuben and Kalb, did battle for the Republic. At that period the French – Lafayette's name rings out clear among them – stood foremost among the New World's champions of freedom. To-day the Union army contains thousands of Germans, witnesses who have emigrated or been exiled. Why are there no Frenchmen? I know the reason, and so do you.

I see the poet of the future draw near. The great drama of our epoch, the strife between Cæsarism and self-government, is presented to his gaze in dimensions such as no past age could know; he will compress the struggle within narrow limits.

The Republic of the United States has not yet existed a century. Oh, how different is the aspect of things here from what we had pictured to ourselves! I have found many who doubt the continuance of the Union; cultivated clergymen even told me that there was certainly more power of endurance in the monarchical form of government. That is the feeling of dejection and despair: but it is, I believe, only to be met with in single instances.

How often I am obliged to hear myself called a philosophical idealist! And they tell me I shall soon be converted. Your nephew, whose comprehensive glance sees all sides of a subject, has solved this enigma for me. The people here have lived so long for their own ease alone, feeling their claims of the State only occasionally, as voters. They must now pass through the school of military discipline, of staking their lives for the life of the nation – only as an education, of course, to be free again afterwards.

The so-called slavery question is not so nearly decided, by a great deal, as we supposed.

Your nephew thinks the complete abolition of slavery will become a necessary war measure of vital importance to the continued existence of the nation; that patriotism must be wedded to humanity – that the pure ideal must give place to utilitarianism and necessity – that the logic of events will bring about a decision not to be effected by the logic of thought. There is still a strong party here in the North who do not wish to proceed to the one extreme measure, as they call the absolute abolition of slavery; but hope to subdue the South by war instead.

We hope they will not succeed. The words "necessity of State," so often misused by tyrants, will now, we trust lead to Liberty.

How much one is obliged to hear against the negroes in this country!

That the four million slaves represent twenty hundred million dollars, is, of course, the point first mentioned; then that the blacks have many vices, as though a perfect model of virtue were to be expected from a down-trodden race. Any nation, so long held in bondage, tortured, martyred, condemned to ignorance, would have been just what they are. Moreover, tyranny has, in all ages, proclaimed the oppressed to be low beings, ignoring, of course, the fact that if they have some base tendencies, it is the oppression that has prepared the soil and implanted them.

I have made the acquaintance here of a distinguished negro, whose oration on the present situation and the future of his race I had heard. There was a touch of Demosthenes in it. He was a slave twenty-two years, and has acquired a complete scientific education.

Sometimes there is in his voice a quivering tone of lament, as of one drooping under a weight of sorrow, and I admire him for suppressing an avengeful anger. If a single man can do much for his race, this man, or one like him, might become an historic character.

But the heroic age is past, entirely and forever; now we must depend on community of action.

We are transported into the midst of an historical or logical unfolding of events. The attempts at peaceful reconciliation have been of no avail. In spite of the cry "No coërcion!" an army had to be raised, and now the cry is, "No confiscation of property!" That means, no abolition of slavery, and yet this must be the second result, since it could not be the first.

The moral debt, neither noted down nor paid interest on, nor cancelled on change, is now becoming a great national debt of the Union, which the country will be obliged to liquidate with money and blood.

[Manna to the Mother.]

… What a small matter was that night-riot made by men with blackened faces! I have lived through a pro-slavery riot. Doctor Fritz says it arose from the bitter opposition to the conscription. Many blacks were murdered, our friend Knopf's school was laid in ruins, and the negro orphan asylum burned to the ground, the poor black children rolling crying on the pavement. We have much to do. The world has much to make amends for.

[Eric to the Banker.]

… I perfectly understand your sorrow over the fact that there are some Jews among the Secessionists. General Twiggs, commanding in Texas, who went over to the rebels with his army, fortress, and munitions of war, was a Jew.

And that speculators on change also lend assistance to the defenders of slavery! Why should they less than the professedly pious English?

Why do you require all the Jews, collectively and individually, to stand on the side of moral principle? They have the right of equality, even in ill-doing. They are, if one may be permitted to say so, equally justified in crime with other men. It must be shown, it is now being shown, that no religion has the monopoly of morality.

You complain that the passion for enjoyment has invaded even your innermost circle of friends.

That belongs under the heading above indicated. The more I think over your letter, the more surely I arrive at this conclusion; the Jews, so long and so cruelly excluded from participation in national affairs, and condemned to a sad cosmopolitism, will now, in their days of liberation, behave like natives of the different communities in which it is their lot to be, and will, above all, remain patriotic.

Moreover, I can assure you that many Jews are here among us, fighting with valor and self-sacrifice.

The young physician equipped by you is exceedingly able.

The money which you sent over is being conscientiously expended.

I hope yet to sing with your daughter-in-law, to whom please present my kind regards.

My wife joins me in cordial remembrances of you.

[The Professorin to Eric and Manna.]

All is well. Would that I, could send you some of the spring fragrance and beauty which surround us here. No tree bears blossoms as countless as the blessings which go out from my heart to you. Here we sit in peace, and you are out there in the battle. We can do nothing for you, only I say to you, my son, and to you, my daughter: whatever may come, abide quietly in the assurance, that having followed the leadings of the spirit, we must silently recognize and bear our part. I have been in the next village; it must be like a recent settlement in America.

It is a beautiful and great thing to be able to help so many human beings to a cheerful and active existence.

My son, why do you not write whether you have inquired for Uncle Alphonso? Do not delay doing so. If he is yet living, tell him that I have never judged him unkindly, though he has been so hard upon us; and tell him that your father always preserved a brotherly feeling for him. But ah, I do not know whether he is still alive. Do not delay to get some positive information.

Our friend Einsiedel is busy in arranging your father's papers.

Our good Major wants to have a room built in the hot-house, and, next winter, live there all day long among the plants, breathing in their fragrance; then, he asserts, he should live to be a hundred years old.

[Claudine to Manna.]

If you feel overwhelmed by the hard experiences which you must bear, do not forget to keep up your study of astronomy; it takes us out of all our small troubles.

You will have to make new applications of your astronomical knowledge to new conditions in America.

[Lina to Manna.]

To-morrow I give my first large coffee-party; look upon me with respect. I spread fine damask table-cloths, and have my own gilt-edged cups. Ah, why can you not be here? People say that my voice is much stronger now that I am a mother. O Manna, the most beautiful song is that which one sings to her child. I hope it won't be long before you know it.

Pranken and his wife have come back, but they are not to remain with us. He is to be ambassador somewhere on the Lower Danube, near Turkey; I don't know the name of the country.

I have thought of a beautiful plan for you. When you come home, you must establish a special singing-club of all the matrons and maidens in the neighborhood, and we'll sing in your garden, and in the beautiful music-room, and in the pretty boats on the river, and on the flat-roofs, and everywhere. Ah, that will be life! If to-morrow were only here!

[Einsiedel to Eric.]

Elevating thoughts are in these papers which your father left behind him. It is much to be regretted that one of them has not been given to the world before this. He foresaw this war in America quite clearly. Connected and logical thought is a kind of prophecy. I shall publish the sheets with my positive assurance that they were written by a noble recluse many years before the events foretold.

[Weidmann to Eric.]

We are in the midst of all sorts of work. You wanderers took much of our peace away with you, but now all is in its habitual order again.

Thank you, dear Dournay, for your letter. My nephew always sends me the newspapers regularly. Do not allow yourself to be distracted by thoughts of Europe, and by too great a variety of interests; you are stationed at a post where you must keep only the next duty before your eyes. Forgive me for permitting myself to admonish you thus. It was high time that this disgrace should be wiped out from the consciousness of our age, for it had begun to appear that long habit was weakening the keen and bitter sense of its sin and shame.

I am finding surprising confirmation of this opinion. Herr Sonnenkamp corrupted our district more than he knew; people now speak well of him. "Ah, only a slave-trader!" "Nothing worse!" may be heard on all sides.

There is always something commanding in heroism; the bold scoundrel is more attractive than the unobtrusively virtuous man. Not only the frivolous, but quite sober-minded men think that the Prince was unnecessarily scrupulous in refusing to ennoble Herr Sonnenkamp.

A plant has become common in Europe which is called the water-pest: you may have read of it; it came from Canada, probably attached to some vessel, and has almost choked the Thames with its roots and entangled stems; it has crept far into the continent, and has now reached us, but we will conquer it. Such a water-pest spreads too in spiritual matters.

[Doctor Richard to Eric.]

All the others have no doubt written most edifying and sentimental letters; I have something better for you. First, let me tell you to rejoice that you have something to do, and have done with speculating.

And now for a fine story: —

Otto von Pranken – for whom I always had a sympathy, like all the rest of the profane world; he is no paragon of virtue, but there's a good deal in him – has beaten the black-coats in shrewdness; he got himself recommended to Rome by them and there he has played a smart trick. He entered the Papal army with the rank of Major, but got into some difficulty, on purpose, as I believe. He wrote a letter full of dissatisfaction over the organization of the army, and this gave him an excuse for resigning, and marrying the young widow, the daughter of Herr von Endlich. When you come home you will have some new neighbors. They say, though, that Pranken is to enter on a diplomatic career, and I think he has talent for it.

Have you seen or heard nothing of Frau Bella?

[The Majorin Grassler late Fräulein Milch, to Knopf.]

You can fancy how your letter rejoiced us. My good husband was cheered up by it into better spirits than he has had for a long time. I am sorry to say that since you all went off, he has been full of trouble. For months he has not been able to get rid of the thought why he was not younger, so that he could have gone with you. And then, don't laugh at us, we have a real family trial, for our Laadi has grown blind, and no physician can help her. People laughed at us for tending the dog so carefully: they want us to have her shot, but that we can't do, and so we take care of poor Laadi. My husband sits for hours by her, talking to her, and even takes her out for a little walk every day. Why must the dog grow blind? Ah, but I'm asking stupid questions; one has to be careful not to grow sentimental; Mother Nature is a hard mother.

I knew the father of your Rosalie; he was once at our house with the school-master Fassbender.

[Eric to Weidmann.]

Adams was ordered to work in the trenches, and a great number of negroes with him, but he would not take the pick in his hand; then Roland did what I once dissuaded him from doing, when he wanted to labor among the workmen at the castle. I think I told you about it. Now he joined the negroes and used his pick with them, and when I went to him once, as he wiped the perspiration from his forehead, I saw a light in the youth's eye, which said that the crown of human honor rests on the brow from which runs the sweat of toil.

Beginning this letter to you composes me, in the midst of the constant excitement of camp-life.

There is much discontent in the army; men are blaming Lincoln for maintaining a vacillating, uncertain policy, or, to say the least, for his extreme slowness.

I must leave it to Dr. Fritz, or rather to time, to prove the truth of his words when he says, Lincoln is not a genius, an individual towering above the mass; he is an average man, the exact exponent of the spirit of the people at its present stage of progress. He is not remarkably distinguished, but a man of just the right stamp.

Perhaps that is true, and it is much to say. This is not greatness in the old sense of the word, and we may have entered upon an age which has outgrown the heroic, and those representatives of heroism around whom all others seemed grouped as minor figures.

Opposed to the Monarchic, the Aristocratic, and the Monotheistic, stand the Republican, the Democratic, and the Pantheistic: they are only three different names for three unfoldings of the same principle.

[Roland to the Professorin.]

My first lines from camp shall be to you, dear Frau Professorin. I thank you for the motto which you once gave me; I feel as if I were not the same person to whom all that happened. I promise you, and this is a new oath of allegiance, to be true to your motto.

Ah, why do you not know Lilian? she deserves that you should know her.

I have told her a great deal about you; she thinks she should stand in awe of any one so wise and learned, but I tell her she need not.

And oh, Dr. Fritz is such a noble man. He told me that he was a pupil of your husband, and it must make you happy that your husband's spirit lives on in such a man, here in the New World.

I must try not to think too much of you and of the past: I ought now to give my thoughts only to what we have before us; and I am tired out. I have had a very fatiguing drill.

Eric is held in great respect here. All is still; in camp it is said that to-morrow we shall come under fire for the first time.

Morning.

The battle is beginning; I hope to do my duty.

Evening.

I have been promoted on the field.

[Eric to Weidmann.]

In Camp.

We have fought a battle; we have been defeated. Roland has distinguished himself, and been promoted. I have to use all my influence to restrain his daring.

The coolness and deliberation of your grand-nephew Hermann are a great help to me.

The hardest thing in this war is, that thousands must necessarily be sacrificed in order to teach the officers the art of war. There is a deficiency of experienced and tried leaders; and it is no small thing that the army, wholly without any confidence in the military skill of its generals, maintains itself so bravely. They must learn how to fight by fighting; and in this particular the Southern States have the advantage.

I have very great doubts whether our opponents fight with the hope of triumph; I mean, whether they honestly believe, that if they conquer, their principle can be permanently established.