WHEREIN THE READER LEARNS WHAT THE DĀ-LĚS IS: ALSO HOW THE
GOLDSMITH SAVES THE CLERK OF THE PRIVY CHANCERY FROM A MISERABLE
DEATH, AND CONSOLES THE DESPAIRING COMMISSIONSRATH.
Bosswinkel was utterly shaken; more by Manasseh's curse than by
the wild piece of spookery which, as he saw, the Goldsmith had been
carrying on. And indeed it was a terrible curse, for it set the
Dā-lěs on to him.
Dear reader, I don't know if you are aware what the Dā-lěs of the
Jews is.
One of the Talmudists says that the wife of a certain poor Jew, one day
on coming into her house, found a weazened, emaciated, naked stranger
there, who begged her to give him the shelter of her roof, and food and
drink. Being afraid, she went to her husband, and told him, in tones of
complaint: "A naked, starving man has come in, asking for food and
shelter. How are we to help him, when it is all we can do to keep body
and soul together ourselves?" The husband said: "I will go to this
stranger, and see how I can get him out of the house."
"Why," he said to him, "hast thou come hither, I being so poor and
unable to help thee? Begone! Betake thee to the house of Riches, where
the cattle are fat, and the guests bidden to the feast!"
"How," said the stranger, "canst thou drive me from this shelter which
I have found? Thou seest that I am bare and naked: how can I go to the
house of Riches? Have clothing made for me that shall be fitting, and I
will leave thee." "Better," thought the master of the house, "better
were it for me to spend all I possess in getting rid of him, than that
he should stay, and consume whatever I earn in the time to come, as
well." So he killed his last calf, on which he and his wife had thought
to live for many days; sold the meat, and with the price provided good
clothing for the stranger. But when he took the clothing to him,
behold! the stranger, who had before been lean, and short of stature,
was become tall and stout, so that the clothing was everywhere too
short for him and too narrow. At this the poor Jew was much afraid. But
the stranger said: "Give up the foolish idea of getting me out of thy
house. Know that I am the Dā-lěs!" At this the poor Jew wrung his
hands and lamented, crying: "God of my fathers! I am scourged with the
rod of Thine anger, and poverty-smitten for ever and ever! For if thou
art the Dā-lěs, thou wilt never leave us, but consume all that we
have, and always grow bigger and stronger. For the Dā-lěs is
Poverty; which, when once it takes up its abode in a house, never
departs from it, but ever increases more and more."
If, then, the Commissionsrath was terrified that Manasseh, by his
curse, had brought poverty into his house, on the other hand, he stood
in the utmost dread of Leonhard, who, to say nothing of the
extraordinary magical powers at his command, had a certain something
about him which created a decided sense of awe. The Commissionsrath
could not but feel that there was nothing (with respect to the two of
them) which one could "do;" and thus the full brunt of his anger was
discharged upon Edmund Lehsen, upon whom he laid all the blame of all
the "unpleasantness" which had come about. Over and above all this,
Albertine came to the front, and declared, of her own motion, having
evidently completely made up her mind on the subject--declared, we say,
with the utmost distinctness, that she loved Edmund more than words
could express, and would never marry either that insufferable and
unendurable old pedant of a Tussmann, or that equally not-to-be-heard-of
beast of a Baron Benjamin. So that the Commissionsrath got into the
most tremendous rage imaginable, and wished Edmund at (ahem!) Hong
Kong, or Jericho, or, to speak idiomatically, "where the pepper grows."
But inasmuch as he could not carry this wish into effect, as the late
French Government did (which actually _did_ send objectionable persons
to the place "where the pepper grows"), he had to be content with
writing Edmund a nice little note, into which he poured all the gall
and venom which was in him at the time (and that was not a little), and
which ended by telling him that if ever he crossed his, the
Commissionsrath's, threshold again, he had better--look out for
squalls.
Of course we all know the state of inconsolable despair in which
Leonhard found Edmund, when he went to see him, at the fall of the
twilight, according to his wont.
"What have _I_ to thank you for?" Edmund cried, indignantly. "Of what
service have your protection and all your efforts been to _me_? Your
attempts to send this cursed rival of mine out of my way--what has been
the result of them? Those damnable conjuring tricks of yours--all
that _they_ have done has been to send everybody into a state of
higgledy-piggledy, where nobody knows what to think of anything! Even
that darling girl of mine is in the same boat with all the rest of them.
It's just this stupid, nonsensical bosh of yours--that, and nothing
else,--which is blocking up _my_ way, and so I tell you. Oh Lord! the
only thing which I can see that I can do is to be off to Rome at once,
and, I can assure you, I mean to do it, too."
"Just so," the Goldsmith said: "that is exactly what I want you to do.
Be good enough to remember what I said to you when you first told me
you were in love with Albertine. I said my idea was that a young artist
was right to be in love, but that he should not go and marry, all at
once, because that was most inadvisable. When I said that to you, I
brought to your mind, half in jest, the case of Sternbald; but now I
tell you, in the utmost seriousness, that, if you really wish to become
a great painter, you must put all ideas of marrying out of your head.
Go you away, free and glad, into the Father-land of Art; study, in the
most enthusiastic manner that ever you can, the inner-being of that
world of Art; and then, and only then, will the technical and practical
skill (which you might pick up here) be of the slightest real use to
you."
"Good gracious!" Edmund cried, "what an idiot I was to say anything to
you about my love affairs. I see, now, that it was you--you, on whom I
relied for advice and help in them--who have been purposely throwing
difficulties in the way, playing Old Harry with my most special heart's
desires, out of mere nastiness and unkindness."
"My good young sir!" the Goldsmith said, "just be good enough to keep a
rather quieter tongue in your head. Don't be quite so forcible in your
expressions. Please to remember that you have got one or two things to
learn, still, before you can quite see through _me_. _I_ can excuse
you, of course. I know very well what has upset your temper. This
insane spooniness of yours."
"As regards Art," Edmund said, "I really can't see why I should not go
to Rome and study, though I do stand in this intimate relation with
Albertine. You say yourself that I have a certain amount of 'turn' for
painting, and some practical skill, already. What I was thinking of
was, that, as soon as I was quite sure that Albertine would be mine,
one day, I should be off to Italy; spend a year there, and then come
back to my darling girl, having some real knowledge of my work."
"What, Edmund?" the Goldsmith cried; "was this really your idea,
arrived at after proper consideration?"
"Yes," Edmund answered: "deeply as I love Albertine, my heart burns for
that grand country which is the home of my Art."
"Will you give me your sacred word," the Goldsmith asked, "that if you
are sure that Albertine is yours you will be off at once to Italy?"
"Why shouldn't I?" Edmund replied, "inasmuch as it is my firm
determination to do so? It always has been so, and would be so--if she
were to be mine (I have my doubts as to whether she over will or not").
"Well, Edmund," the Goldsmith said, "be of good courage. This firm
resolve of yours has gained you your sweetheart. I give you my word of
honour that in a very few days Albertine will be your affianced wife.
And you know well enough that you need have no doubt as to my having
the power to keep my word."
Joy and rapture beamed from Edmund's eyes; and the mysterious Goldsmith
went quickly away, leaving him to all the sweet hopes and dreams which
had been awakened in his heart.
In an out-of-the-way corner of the Thiergarten, under a shady tree, the
Clerk of the Privy Chancery, Mr. Tussmann, was lying "like a dropped
acorn," as Celia, in 'As You Like It,' expresses it, or like a wounded
knight, pouring forth his heart's complainings to the perfidious autumn
breeze.
"Oh, God of justice!" he lamented. "Unhappy, pitiable Clerk of the
Privy Chancery that you are! how did you ever come to deserve all the
misery which has fallen to your share? Thomasius says that the estate
of matrimony in no wise hinders the acquisition of wisdom. And yet,
though you have only been _thinking_ of entering into that estate, you
have nearly lost that proportion of understanding (and it was not so
very small, neither,) which originally fell to your share. Whence comes
the aversion which dear Miss Bosswinkel displays towards your--not
particularly striking, but still, fairly well endowed--personality? Are
you a politician, who ought not to take a wife (as some have laid
down), or an expert in the laws, who (according to Cleobolus) ought to
give his wife a licking if she misbehaves herself? Am I either of
those, that this beautiful creature should be warranted in entertaining
some certain quantum of bashful repugnance to me? Why, oh, why, dearest
Clerk of the Privy Chancery, Tussmann, must you go and get mixed up
with a lot of horrible wizards, and raging painters, who took your face
for a stretched canvas, and painted a Salvator Rosa picture on it
without saying with your leave or by your leave? Aye! that's the worst
of the business! I put all my trust in my friend, Herr Seccius, whose
knowledge of chemistry is so extensive and so profound, and who can
help people out of every difficulty. But all in vain! The more I rub my
face with the liquid he gave me, the greener I get! though the green
does take on the most extraordinary variety of different tints and
shades that anybody could imagine. My face has been a face of spring,
of summer, and of autumn. Ah, yes! it's this greenness which is driving
me to my destruction. And if I don't attain to the whiteness of winter
(the proper colour for me), I shall run desperate, pitch myself into
this frog-pond here, and die a green death!"
It was no wonder that Tussmann complained most bitterly, for the colour
of his countenance was a very great annoyance to him. It was not like
any ordinary oil-colour, but as if it were some cleverly compounded
tincture or dye, sunk into his skin, and not to be obliterated by any
human means. In the day-time the poor wretch dared not go about except
with his hat down over his eyes, and a pocket-handkerchief before his
face. And even when night came on he could only venture to go flitting
through the more out-of-the-way streets at a gallop. He dreaded the
street-boys, and he also was afraid that he might come across somebody
belonging to his office, as he had reported himself sick.
We often feel any trouble that has befallen us more keenly in the
silent hours of night than during the more stirring daylight. And
so--as the clouds rolled blacker and blacker over the sky, as the
shadows of the trees fell deeper, and the autumn wind soughed louder
and louder through the branches--Tussmann, as he pondered over all his
wretchedness, got into a state of the profoundest despair.
The terrible idea of jumping into the green frog-pond, and so
terminating a baffled career, assailed his mind so irresistibly that he
looked on it as an unmistakable hint of destiny, which he was bound to
obey.
"Yes!" he cried, getting up from the grass, where he had been lying;
"yes!" he shouted; "it's all over with you, Clerk of the Privy
Chancery! Despair and die, good Tussmann; Thomasius can't help you! On,
to a green death! Farewell, terrible Miss Albertine Bosswinkel! Your
husband, that was to have been--whom you despised so cruelly--you will
never see again! Here he goes, into the frog-pond!"
Like a mad creature he rushed to the edge of the basin (in the darkness
it looked like a fine, smooth, broad road, with trees on each side of
it), and there he remained standing for a time.
Doubtless the notion of the nearness of death affected his mind; for he
sang, in a high-pitched, penetrating voice, that Scotch song, which has
the refrain--
"Green grow the rashes, oh!
Green grow the rashes!"
And he shied the 'Diplomatic Acumen,' and the 'Handbook for Court and
City,' and also 'Hufeland, on the Art of Prolonging Life,' into the
water, and was in the very act of jumping after them, when he felt
himself seized from behind by a pair of powerful arms.
He at once recognized the well-known voice of the necromantic
Goldsmith. It said--"Tussmann, what are you after? I beg you not to
make an ass of yourself; don't go playing idiotic tricks of this sort."
Tussmann strove with all his might to get out of the Goldsmith's grasp,
while, scarcely capable of utterance, he croaked out--
"Herr Professor! I am in a state of desperation, and all ordinary
considerations are in abeyance. Herr Professor, I sincerely trust
you will not take it ill if a Clerk of the Privy Chancery, who is
(as we have said) in a state of desperation, and who (in ordinary
circumstances) is well versed in the _convenances_ of official
etiquette--I say, I hope you won't take it ill, Herr Professor, if I
assert, openly and unceremoniously, that (under all the circumstances
of the case) I wish to heaven that you and all your magic tricks were
at the devil! along with your unendurable familiarity, your 'Tussmann!
Tussmann!' never giving me my official title!----there!"
The Goldsmith let him go, and he tumbled down, exhausted, in the long,
wet grass.
Believing himself to be in the basin, he cried out, "Oh, cold death!
oh, green rashes! oh, meadows! I bid ye farewell. I leave you my
kindest wishes, dearest Miss Albertine Bosswinkel. Commissionsrath,
good-bye! The unfortunate 'intended' is lying amongst the frogs that
praise God in the summer time."
"Tussmann," cried the Goldsmith, in a powerful voice, "don't you see
that you're out of your senses, and worn out and wretched into the
bargain? You want to send me to the devil! What if I _were_ the Devil,
and should set to and twist that neck of yours, here on this spot,
where you think you're lying in the water?"
Tussmann sighed, groaned, and shuddered as if in the most violent ague.
"But I mean you kindly, Tussmann," the Goldsmith said; "and your
desperate condition excuses everything. Get up, and come along with
me." And he helped him to get on his legs.
Tussmann, completely exhausted, said, in a whisper--
"I am completely in your power, most honoured Herr Professor. Do what
you will with my miserable body; but I most humbly beg you to spare my
immortal soul."
"Do not talk such absurd nonsense," the Goldsmith said, "but come along
with me as fast as you can." He took hold of Tussmann by the arm, and
led him away. But when they came to where the walk which leads to the
Zelten crosses at right angles, he pulled up, and said--
"Wait a moment, Tussmann. You're wet through, and look like I don't
know what. Just let me wipe your face, at all events."
The Goldsmith took a handkerchief of dazzling whiteness out of his
pocket, and wiped Tussmann's face with it.
The bright lights of the Weberschen Zelt were visible, shining brightly
through the trees. Tussmann cried out, in alarm--
"For God's sake, Herr Professor, where are you taking me? Not into
town? not to my own lodgings? not (oh, heavens!) into society, amongst
my fellow-men? Good heavens! I can't be seen. Wherever I go I give rise
to unpleasantness--create a _scandalum_."
"Tussmann," said the Goldsmith, "I cannot understand that ridiculous
shyness of yours. What do you mean by it? Don't be an ass. What you
want is a drop of something pretty strong. I should say a tumbler of
hot punch, else we shall be having you laid up with a feverish cold.
Come on!"
Tussmann kept on lamenting as to his greenness, and his Salvator Rosa
face; but the Goldsmith paid not the slightest attention to him, merely
hurrying him along with him at a rapid rate.
When they got into the brightly lighted coffee-room, Tussmann hid his
face in his handkerchief, as there were still some people there.
"What's the matter with you, Tussmann?" the Goldsmith asked. "Why do
you keep hiding that good-looking face of yours, eh?"
"Oh, dearest Herr Professor, you know all about this awful face of
mine," Tussmann answered. "You know how that terrible, passionate
painter young gentleman went and daubed it all over with green paint?"
"Nonsense," said the Goldsmith, taking the Clerk of the Privy Chancery
by the shoulders and placing him right in front of the big mirror
at the top of the room, while he threw a strong light on to him
from a branched candlestick which he had taken up. Tussmann forced
himself--much against the grain--to look. He could not restrain a loud
cry of "Gracious heavens!"
For not only had the terrible green tint of his face disappeared, but
he had a much more beautiful complexion than he ever had had in his
life, and was looking several years younger. In the excess of his
delight he jumped up and down with both feet together, and cried, in a
voice of sweet emotion--"Oh, just Heaven! what do I see? what do I
contemplate? Most honoured Herr Professor, I have no doubt that it is
to you that I am indebted for this great happiness!--to you alone! Ah!
now I feel little doubt that Miss Albertine Bosswinkel--for whose dear
sake I was so very nearly jumping into the frog-pond--won't make much
difficulty about accepting me. Really, dearest Professor, you have
rescued me from the very profoundest depths of misery. There is no
doubt that I did feel a certain sense of relief and well-being when you
were so kind as to pass that snow-white handkerchief of yours over my
face. You really were my benefactor, were you not?"
"I won't deny, Tussmann," the Goldsmith answered, "that I wiped the
green colour away from your face; and, from that, you may gather that I
am not by any means so much your enemy as you have supposed me to be.
What I can't bear to think of is this ridiculous notion of yours (which
you have allowed the Commissionsrath to put in your head) that you are
going to go and marry a splendid young creature, bursting with life and
love. It is this, I say, which I can't bear to think about. And even
now--though you have scarcely got clear of the little trick which has
been played on you--you see, you go and begin at once to think about
this marriage again. I feel inclined to take away your appetite for it
in a very effectual style; and I could do so if I chose, without the
slightest difficulty. However, I don't want to go so far as that. But
what my advice to you would be is--that you should keep as quiet, and
as much out of the way as ever you can till Sunday next, at twelve
o'clock at noon, and then you will see more into things. If you dare to
go and see Albertine before that time, I will make you go on dancing in
her presence till your breath and senses abandon you. Then I will
transform you into the very greenest of frogs, and chuck you into the
basin of the Thiergarten, or into the River Spree itself, where you'll
go on croaking till the end of your days. Good-bye! I have something to
do in town which obliges me to get back there as quickly as possible.
You won't be able to follow me, or keep up with me. Good-bye!"
The Goldsmith was right in saying that it would not be possible for
Tussmann, or anybody else, to keep up with him, for he was off through
the door and out of sight, as if he had Schlemihl's seven-leagued boots
on.
Perhaps this was why, the next minute after he had disappeared from
Tussmann, he appeared suddenly, like a ghost, in the Commissionsrath's
room, and bade him good evening in a rough tone.
The Commissionsrath was very frightened, but he pulled himself
together, and asked the Goldsmith, with some warmth, what he meant by
coming in at that time of the night, adding that he wished he would
take himself off, and not bother him any more with any of those
conjuring tricks of his, as he presumed he was about to do.
"Ah!" said the Goldsmith very calmly, "that is how people are,
particularly Commissionsraths. Just the very people who come to them,
wishing to do them a service, into whose arms they ought to throw
themselves with a confident heart--just those are the people whom they
want to kick out of the door. My good Herr Commissionsrath, you are a
poor unfortunate man, a real object of pity and commiseration. I have
come here--I have _hastened_ here--at this late hour of the night, to
consult with you as to how this terrible blow which is hanging over you
may be averted--if averted it can be--and you----"
"Oh, God," the Commissionsrath cried, "another bankruptcy in Hamburg, I
suppose, or in Bremen, or London, to ruin me out and out! That was all
that was wanted. Oh, I'm a ruined man!"
"No," the Goldsmith said, "it's an affair of a different kind
altogether; you say that you won't allow young Edmund Lehsen to marry
Albertine, do you not?"
"What's the good of talking about such a piece of absurdity?" the
Commissionsrath replied. "I to give my daughter to this beggar of a
penciller."
"Well," said the Goldsmith, "he has painted a couple of magnificent
portraits of you and her."
"Oh, oh," cried Bosswinkel, "a fine piece of business it would be to
hand over my daughter for a couple of daubs on canvas; I've sent the
trash back to him."
"If you don't let Edmund have your daughter," the Goldsmith continued,
"he will have his revenge."
"Pretty story!" answered Bosswinkel. "What revenge is this little bit
of a beggar, who dribbles paints on to canvas, and hasn't a farthing to
bless himself with, going to take upon Commissionsrath Melchior
Bosswinkel, I should like to know?"
"I'll tell you that in a moment," said the Goldsmith. "Edmund is going
to alter your portrait in a way which you thoroughly deserve. The
kindly, smiling face he is going to turn into a sour, grumpy one, with
lowering brow, bleary eyes, and hanging lips. He will deepen the
wrinkles on the brow and cheeks, and he won't omit to indicate, in
proper colour, those grey hairs which the powder is intended to hide.
Before you, instead of the pleasant news about the lottery prize, he
will write, very legibly, the most unpleasant purport of the letter
which came to you the day before yesterday, telling you that Campbell
and Co. of London had stopped payment, addressed on the envelope to the
'Bankrupt Commissionsrath,' &c., &c. From the torn pockets of your
waistcoat he will show ducats, thalers, and treasury bills falling, to
indicate the losses you have had, and this picture will be put in the
window of the picture dealer next door to the bank in Hunter Street."
"The demon, the blackguard," the Commissionsrath cried; "he shan't do
that, I'll send for the police, I'll appeal to the courts for an
interim interdict!"
The Goldsmith said, with much tranquillity, "As soon as even fifty
people have seen this picture, that is to say, after it has been in the
window for a brief quarter of an hour, the tale will be all over the
town, with every description of addition and exaggeration. Every thing
in the least degree ridiculous which has ever been said about you, or
is being said now, will be brought up again, dressed in fresh and more
brilliant colours. Every one you meet will laugh in your face, and,
what is the worst of all, everybody will talk about your losses in the
Campbell bankruptcy, so your credit will be gone."
"Oh, Lord," said Bosswinkel, "but he must let me have the picture back,
the scoundrel? Ay; that he must, the first thing in the morning."
"And if he were to agree to do so," the Goldsmith said, ("of which I
have great doubts) how much the better would you be? He's making a
copper etching of you, as I have just described you. He'll have several
hundred copies thrown off, touch them up himself _con amore_, and send
them all over the world--to Hamburg, Bremen, Lübeck, London even."
"Stop, stop," Bosswinkel cried; "go, as fast as you can, to this
terrible fellow; offer him fifty, yes, offer him a hundred thalers if
he will let this business about my portrait remain in _statu quo_."
"Ha! ha! ha!" laughed the Goldsmith; "you forget that Lehsen doesn't
care a fiddlestick about money. His people are well off. His
grand-aunt, Miss Lehsen, who lives in Broad Street, is going to leave
him all her money, £12,000 at the very least."
"What," the Commissionsrath cried, pale with the suddenness of his
amazement, "£12,000. I tell you what it is. I believe Albertine is
crazy about young Lehsen, and I'm not a bad-hearted fellow. I am an
affectionate father; can't bear crying, and all that sort of thing.
When she sets her heart on a thing, I can't refuse her. Besides, I like
the fellow; he's a first-rate painter, you know; and where Art is
concerned I'm a perfect gaby. There are a great many capital points
about Lehsen. £12,000. I'll tell you what it is, Leonhard, just out of
mere goodheartedness, I shall let this nice young fellow have my
daughter."
"Hm!" said the Goldsmith, "there's something queer, too, which I want
to speak to you about. I was at the Thiergarten just before I came
here, and I found your old friend and schoolfellow, Tussmann, going to
jump into the water because Albertine wouldn't have anything to say to
him. I had the greatest difficulty in preventing him from doing it; and
it was only by telling him that you would be quite certain to keep your
word, and make her marry him, that I did succeed in preventing him.
Now, if this is not so, if she doesn't marry him, and if you give her
to young Lehsen, there cannot be a doubt that the Clerk of the Privy
Chancery will carry out his idea of jumping into that basin. Think what
a sensation the suicide of a person of Tussmann's 'respectability' will
create. Everybody will consider that you, and no other, are responsible
for his death. You will be looked upon with horror and contempt. Nobody
will ask you to dinner, and if you go to a café to see what's in the
papers, you will be shown to the door, or kicked downstairs; and more
than that, Tussmann bears the very highest character in his profession.
All his superiors have a very high opinion of him; the Government
departments think him a most valuable official. If you are supposed to
be answerable for his death, you know that you need never expect to
find a single member of the Privy Legation, or of the Upper Chamber of
Finance, in when you go to see them. None of the offices which your
business affairs require you to be _en rapport_ with will have a word
to say to you. Your title of Commissionsrath will be taken from you,
blow will follow upon blow, your credit will be gone, your income will
fall away, things will go from bad to worse, till at last, in poverty,
misery and contempt, you will--"
"For God's sake stop!" cried the Commissionsrath, "you are putting me
to a regular martyrdom. Who would have thought that Tussmann would have
been such a goose at his time of life? But you are quite right;
whatever happens, I must keep my word to him, or I'm a ruined man. Yes,
it is so ordained, Tussmann must marry Albertine."
"You're forgetting all about Baron Dümmerl," said the Goldsmith, "and
Manasseh's terrible curse. In him, if you reject Baron Benjie, you have
the most fearful enemy. He will oppose you in all your speculations;
will stick at no means of injuring your credit, take every possible
opportunity of doing you an ill turn, and never rest till he has
brought you to shame and disgrace; till the Dā-lěs, which he laid
upon you along with his curse, has actually taken up its abode in your
house; so that, you see, whatever you do with Albertine, to whichsoever
of her wooers you give her, you get into trouble, and that is why I
said at the beginning, that you are a poor, unfortunate man, an object
of pity and commiseration."
Bosswinkel ran up and down the room like a lunatic, crying over and
over again, "It's all over with me; I am a miserable man, a ruined
Commissionsrath. O Lord, if I only could get the girl off my shoulders;
the devil take the whole lot of them, Lehsen, and Benjie, and my old
Tussmann into the bargain."
"Now," said the Goldsmith, "there is one way of getting out of all this
mess."
"What is it?" said Bosswinkel; "I'll adopt it, whatever it is."
Leonhard said, "Did you ever see the play of 'The Merchant of Venice'?"
"That's the piece," answered Bosswinkel, "where Devrient plays a
bloody-minded Jew of the name of Shylock, who wants a pound of a
merchant's flesh. Of course I've seen it, but what has that to do with
the matter?"
"You will remember," the Goldsmith said, "that there is a certain
wealthy young lady in it of the name of Portia, whose father so
arranged matters in his will that her hand is made a species of prize
in a kind of lottery. Three caskets are set out, of which her wooers
have each to choose one, and open it. The one who finds Portia's
portrait in the casket which he chooses obtains her hand. Now do you,
Commissionsrath, as a living father, do what her dead father did. Tell
the three wooers that, inasmuch as one of them is exactly the same to
you as another, they must allow chance to decide between them. Set up
three caskets for them to choose amongst, and let the one who finds her
portrait in his casket be her husband."
"What an extraordinary idea," said the Commissionsrath; "and even if I
were to go in for it, do you suppose, dear Mr. Leonhard, that I should
be one bit better off? When chance did decide the matter, I should
still have to deal with the rage and hatred of the unsuccessful two."
"Wait a moment," the Goldsmith said; "it is just there that the
important part of the business lies. I promise that I will order and
arrange the affair of the caskets so that it shall turn out happily and
satisfactorily for all parties. The two who make mistakes shall find in
their caskets, not a scornful dismissal, like the Princes of Morocco
and Arragon, but something which shall so greatly please and delight
them that they will think no more of marrying Albertine, but will look
upon you as the author of unhoped, undreamt of happiness to them."
"Oh, can it be possible!" the Commissionsrath cried.
"Not only is it possible," the Goldsmith answered, "but it will, it
must happen, exactly as I have said it will; I give you my word for
it."
The Commissionsrath made no further objection, and they arranged that
the Goldsmith's plan should be put in execution on the next Sunday at
noon. Leonhard undertook to provide the three caskets, all ready.