leaves._
_MIELE and EDWARD clear the table. HOFFMANN has arisen and comes to
the foreground. He has a toothpick in his mouth. LOTH follows him._
HOFFMANN
Well, you see, that's the way women are.
LOTH
I can't say that I understand what it was about.
HOFFMANN
It isn't worth mentioning. Things like that happen in the most refined
families. It mustn't keep you from spending a few days with us....
LOTH
I should like to have made your wife's acquaintance. Why doesn't she
appear at all?
HOFFMANN
[_Cutting off the end of a fresh cigar._] Well, in her condition, you
understand ... women won't abandon their vanity. Come, let's go and take
a few turns in the garden.--Edward, serve coffee in the arbour!
EDWARD
Very well, sir.
[_HOFFMANN and LOTH disappear by way of the conservatory. EDWARD
leaves by way of the middle door and MIELE, immediately thereafter,
goes out, carrying a tray of dishes, by the same door. For a few
seconds the room is empty. Then enters_
HELEN
[_Wrought up, with tear-stained eyes, holding her handkerchief against
her mouth. From the middle door, by which she has entered, she takes a
few hasty steps to the left and listens at the door of HOFFMANN'S room._]
Oh, don't go! [_Hearing nothing there, she hastens over to the door of
the conservatory, where she also listens for a few moments with tense
expression. Folding her hands and in a tone of impassioned beseeching._]
Oh, don't go! Don't go!
THE CURTAIN FALLS
THE SECOND ACT
_It is about four o'clock in the morning. The windows in the inn are
still lit. Through the gateway comes in the twilight of a pallid dawn
which, in the course of the action, develops into a ruddy glow, and
this, in its turn, gradually melts into bright daylight. Under the
gateway, on the ground, sits BEIPST and sharpens his scythe. As the
curtain rises, little more is visible than his dark outline which is
defined against the morning sky, but one hears the monotonous,
uninterrupted and regular beat of the scythe hammer on the anvil. For
some minutes this is the only sound audible. Then follows the solemn
silence of the morning, broken by the cries of roysterers who are
leaving the inn. The inn-door is slammed with a crash. The lights in
the windows go out. A distant barking of dogs is heard and a loud,
confused crowing of cocks. On the path from the inn to the house a
dark figure becomes visible which reels in zigzag lines toward the
farmyard. It is FARMER KRAUSE, who, as always, has been the last to
leave the inn._
FARMER KRAUSE
[_Has reeled against the fence, clings to it for support with both hands,
and roars with a somewhat nasal, drunken voice back at the inn._] The
garden'sh mine ... the inn'sh mi-ine ... ash of a' inn-keeper! Hi-hee!
[_After mumbling and growling unintelligibly he frees himself from the
fence and staggers into the yard, where, luckily, he gets hold of the
handles of a plough._] The farm'sh mi'ine. [_He drivels, half singing._]
Drink ... o ... lil' brother, drink ... o ... lil' brother ... brandy'sh
good t' give courash. Hi-hee--[_roaring aloud_]--ain' I a han'some man
... Ain' I got a han'some wife?... Ain' I got a couple o' han'some gals?
HELEN
[_Comes swiftly from the house. It is plain that she has only slipped on
such garments as, in her hurry, she could find._] Papa!... dear papa!! Do
come in! [_She supports him by one arm, tries to lead him and draw him
toward the house._] Oh, do come ... do please come ... quick ... quick
... Come, oh, do, _do_ come!
FARMER KRAUSE
[_Has straightened himself up and tries to stand erect. Fumbling with
both hands he succeeds, with great pains, in extracting from his
breeches-pocket a purse bursting with coins. As the morning brightens, it
is possible to see the shabby garb of KRAUSE, which is in no respects
better than that of the commonest field labourer. He is about fifty years
old. His head is bare, his thin, grey hair is uncombed and matted. His
dirty shirt is open down to his waist. His leathern breeches, tied at the
ankles, were once yellow but are now shiny with dirt. They are held up by
a single embroidered suspender. On his naked feet he wears a pair of
embroidered bedroom slippers, the embroidery on which seems to be quite
new. He wears neither coat nor waist-coat and his shirtsleeves are
unbuttoned. After he has finally succeeded in extracting the purse, he
holds it in his right hand and brings it down repeatedly on the palm of
his left so that the coins ring and clatter, At the same time he fixes a
lascivious look on his daughter._] Hi-hee! The money'sh mi-ine! Hey?
How'd y' like couple o' crownsh?
HELEN
Oh, merciful God! [_She makes repeated efforts to drag him with her. At
one of these efforts he embraces her with the clumsiness of a gorilla and
makes several indecent gestures. HELEN utters suppressed cries for
help._] Let go! This minute! Let go-o!! Oh, please, papa, Oh-o!! [_She
weeps, then suddenly cries out in an extremity of fear, loathing and
rage:_] Beast! Swine!
[_She pushes him from her and KRAUSE falls to his full length on the
ground. BEIPST comes limping up from his seat under the gateway. He
and HELEN set about lifting KRAUSE._
FARMER KRAUSE
[_Stammers._] Drink ... o ... lil' brothersh ... drrr ...
[_KRAUSE is half-lifted up and tumbles into the house, dragging
BEIPST and HELEN with him. For a moment the stage remains empty. In
the house voices are heard and the slamming of doors. A single window
is lit, upon which BEIPST comes out of the house again. He strikes a
match against his leathern breeches in order to light the short pipe
that rarely leaves his mouth. While he is thus employed, KAHL is seen
slinking out of the house. He is in his stocking feet, but has slung
his coat loosely over his left arm and holds his bedroom slippers in
his left hand. In his right hand he holds his hat and his collar in
his teeth. When he has reached the middle of the yard, he sees the
face of BEIPST turned upon him. For a moment he seems undecided; then
he manages to grasp his hat and collar also with his left hand, dives
into his breeches' pocket and going up to BEIPST presses a coin into
the latter's hand._
KAHL
There, you got a crown ... but shut yer mouth!
[_He hastens across the yard and climbs over the picket fence at the
right._
[_BEIPST has lit his pipe with a fresh match. He limps to the gate,
sits down and begins sharpening his scythe anew. Again nothing is
heard for a time but the monotonous hammer blows and the groans of
the old man, which he interrupts by short oaths when his work will
not go to his liking. It has grown considerably lighter._
LOTH
[_Steps out of the house door, stands still, stretches himself, and
breathes deeply several times._] Ah! The morning air. [_Slowly he goes
toward the background until he reaches the gateway. To BEIPST._] Good
morning! Up so early?
BEIPST
[_Squinting at LOTH suspiciously. In a surly tone._] 'Mornin'. [_A brief
pause, whereupon BEIPST addresses his scythe which he pulls to and fro in
his indignation._] Crooked beast! Well, are ye goin' to? Eksch! Well,
well, I'll be ...
[_He continues to sharpen it._
LOTH
[_Has taken a seat between the handles of a cultivator._] I suppose
there's hay harvesting to-day?
BEIPST
[_Roughly._] Dam' fools go a-cuttin' hay this time o' year.
LOTH
Well, but you're sharpening a scythe?
BEIPST
[_To the scythe._] Eksch! You ol'...!
[_A brief pause._]
LOTH
Won't you tell me, though, why you are sharpening your scythe if it is
not time for the hay harvest?
BEIPST
Eh? Don't you need a scythe to cut fodder?
LOTH
So that's it. You're going to cut fodder?
BEIPST
Well, what else?
LOTH
And is it cut every morning?
BEIPST
Well, d' you want the beasts to starve?
LOTH
You must show me a little forbearance. You see, I'm a city man; and it
isn't possible for me to know things about farming very exactly.
BEIPST
City folks! Eksh! All of 'em I ever saw thought they knew it
all--better'n country folks.
LOTH
That isn't the case with me.--Can you explain to me, for instance, what
kind of an implement this is? I have seen one like it before, to be sure,
but the name--
BEIPST
That thing that ye're sittin' on? Why, they calls that a cultivator.
LOTH
To be sure--a cultivator. Is it used here?
BEIPST
Naw; more's the pity. He lets everything go to hell ... all the land ...
lets it go, the farmer does. A poor man would like to have a bit o'
land--you can't have grain growin' in your beard, you know. But no! He'd
rather let it go to the devil! Nothin' grows excep' weeds an' thistles.
LOTH
Well, but you can get those out with the cultivator, too. I know that the
Icarians had them, too, in order to weed thoroughly the land that had
been cleared.
BEIPST
Where's them I-ca ... what d'you, call 'em?
LOTH
The Icarians? In America.
BEIPST
They've got things like that there, too?
LOTH
Certainly.
BEIPST
What kind of people is them I-I-ca...?
LOTH
The Icarians? They are not a special people at all, but men of all
nations who have united for a common purpose. They own a considerable
tract of land in America which they cultivate together. They share both
the work and the profits equally. None of them is poor and there are no
poor people among them.
BEIPST
[_Whose expression had become a little more friendly, assumes, during
LOTH'S last speech, his former hostile and suspicious look. Without
taking further notice of LOTH he has, during the last few moments, given
his exclusive attention to his work._] Beast of a scythe!
[_LOTH, still seated, first observes the old man with a quiet smile
and then looks out into the awakening morning._
_Through the gateway are visible far stretches of clover field and
meadow. Between them meanders a brook whose course is marked by
alders and willows. A single mountain peak towers on the horizon. All
about, larks have begun their song, and their uninterrupted trilling
floats, now from near, now from far, into the farm yard._
LOTH
[_Getting up._] One ought to take a walk. The morning is magnificent.
[_The clatter of wooden shoes is heard. Some one is rapidly coming
down the stairs that lead from the stable loft. It is GUSTE._
GUSTE
[_A rather stout maid-servant. Her neck is bare, as are her arms and legs
below the knee. Her naked feet are stuck in wooden shoes. She carries a
burning lantern._] Good morning father Beipst!
[_BEIPST growls._]
GUSTE
[_Shading her eyes with her hand looks after LOTH through the gate._]
What kind of a feller is that?
BEIPST
[_Embittered._] He can make fools o' beggars ... He can lie like a parson
... Jus' let him tell you his stories. [_He gets up._] Get the
wheelbarrows ready, girl!
GUSTE
[_Who has been washing her legs at the well gets through before
disappearing into the cow stable._] Right away, father Beipst.
LOTH
[_Returns and gives BEIPST a tip._] There's something for you. A man can
always use that.
BEIPST
[_Thawing at once, quite changed and with sincere companionableness._]
Yes, yes, you're right there, and I thank ye kindly.--I suppose you're
the company of the son-in-law over there? [_Suddenly very voluble._] You
know, if you want to go walkin' out there, you know, toward the hill,
then you want to keep to the left, real close to the left, because to the
right, there's clefts. My son, he used to say, the reason of it was, he
used to say, was because they didn't board the place up right, the miners
didn't. They gets too little pay, he used to say, and then folks does
things just hit or miss, in the shafts you know.--You see? Over yonder?
Always to the left! There's holes on t'other side. It wasn't but only
last year and a butter woman, just as she was, sudden, sunk down in the
earth, I don't know how many fathoms down. Nobody knew whereto. So I'm
tellin' you--go to the left, to the left and you'll be safe.
[_A shot is heard. BEIPST starts up as though he had been struck and
limps out a few paces into the open._
LOTH
Who, do you think, is shooting so early?
BEIPST
Who would it be excep' that rascal of a boy?
LOTH
What boy?
BEIPST
Will Kahl--our neighbour's son here ... You just wait, you! I've seen
him, I tell you. He shoots larks.
LOTH
Why, you limp!
BEIPST
Yes, the Lord pity me. [_He shakes a threatening fist toward the
fields._] Eh, wait, you ... you...!
LOTH
What happened to your leg?
BEIPST
My leg?
LOTH
Yes.
BEIPST
Eh? Somethin' got into it.
LOTH
Do you suffer pain?
BEIPST
[_Grasping his leg._] There's a tugging pain in it, a confounded pain.
LOTH
Do you see a doctor about it?
BEIPST
Doctors? Eh, you know, they're all monkeys--one like another. Only our
doctor here--he's a mighty good man.
LOTH
And did he help you?
BEIPST
A little, maybe, when all's said. He kneaded my leg, you see, he squeezed
it, an' he punched it. But no,'t'ain't on that account. He is ... well, I
tell you, he's got compassion on a human bein', that's it. He buys the
medicine an' asks nothin'. An' he'll come to you any time ...
LOTH
Still, you must have come by that trouble somehow. Or did you always
limp?
BEIPST
Not a bit of it!
LOTH
Then I don't think I quite understand. There must have been some cause
...
BEIPST
How do I know? [_Once more he raises a menacing fist._] You jus' wait,
you--with your rattling!
KAHL
[_Appears within his own garden. In his right hand he carries a rifle by
the barrel, his left hand is closed. He calls across._] Good mornin',
Doctor!
_LOTH walks diagonally across the yard up to KAHL. In the meantime
GUSTE as well as another maid-servant named LIESE have each made
ready a wheel-barrow on which lie rakes and pitch-forks. They trundle
their wheel-barrows past BEIPST out into the fields. The latter,
sending menacing glances toward KAHL and making furtive gestures of
rage, shoulders his scythe and limps after them. BEIPST and the maids
disappear._
LOTH
[_To KAHL._] Good morning.
KAHL
D'you want for to see somethin' fine?
[_He stretches his closed hand across the fence._
LOTH
[_Going nearer._] What have you there?
KAHL
Guess!
[_He opens his hand at once._
LOTH
What? Is it really true--you shoot the larks. You good for nothing! Do
you know that you deserve to be beaten for such mischief?
KAHL
[_Stares at LOTH for some seconds in stupid amazement. Then, clenching
his fist furtively he says:_] You son of a...!
[_And swinging around, disappears toward the right._
[_For some moments the yard remains empty._]
_HELEN steps from the house door. She wears a light-coloured summer
dress and a large garden hat. She looks all around her, walks a few
paces toward the gate-way, stands still and gazes out. Hereupon she
saunters across the yard toward the right and turns into the path
that leads to the inn. Great bundles of various tea-herbs are slung
across the fence to dry. She stops to inhale their odours. She also
bends downward the lower boughs of fruit trees and admires the low
hanging, red-cheeked apples. When she observes LOTH coming toward her
from the inn, a yet greater restlessness comes over her, so that she
finally turns around and reaches the farm yard before LOTH. Here she
notices that the dove-cote is still closed and goes thither through
the little gate that leads into the orchard. While she is still busy
pulling down the cord which, blown about by the wind, has become
entangled somewhere, she is addressed by LOTH, who has come up in the
meantime._
LOTH
Good morning, Miss Krause.
HELEN
Good morning. See, the wind has blown the cord up there!
LOTH
Let me help you.
[_He also passes through the little gate, gets the cord down and
opens the dove-cote. The pigeons flutter out._
HELEN
Thank you so much!
LOTH
[_Has passed out by the little gate once more and stands there, leaning
against the fence. HELEN is on the other side of it. After a brief
pause._] Do you make a habit of rising so early?
HELEN
I was just going to ask you the same thing.
LOTH
I? Oh, no! But after the first night in a strange place it usually
happens so.
HELEN
Why does that happen?
LOTH
I have never thought about it. To what end?
HELEN
Oh, wouldn't it serve some end?
LOTH
None, at least, that is apparent and practical.
HELEN
And so everything that you do or think must have some practical end in
view.
LOTH
Exactly. Furthermore ...
HELEN
I would not have thought that of you.
LOTH
What, Miss Krause?
HELEN
It was with those very words that, day before yesterday, my stepmother
snatched "The Sorrows of Werther" from my hand.
LOTH
It is a foolish book.
HELEN
Oh, don't say that.
LOTH
Indeed, I must repeat it, Miss Krause. It is a book for weaklings.
HELEN
That may well be.
LOTH
How do you come across just that book? Do you quite understand it?
HELEN
I hope I do--at least, in part. It rests me to read it. [_After a
pause._] But if it _is_ a foolish book, as you say, could you recommend
me a better one?
LOTH
Read ... well, let me see ... do you know Dahn's "Fight for Rome"?
HELEN
No, but I'll buy the book now. Does it serve a practical end?
LOTH
No, but a rational one. It depicts men not as they are but such as, some
day, they ought to be. Thus it sets up an ideal for our imitation.
HELEN
[_Deeply convinced._] Ah, that is noble. [_A brief pause._] But perhaps
you can tell me something else. The papers talk so much about Zola and
Ibsen. Are they great authors?
LOTH
In the sense of being artists they are not authors at all, Miss Krause.
They are necessary evils. I have a genuine thirst for the beautiful and I
demand of art a clear, refreshing draught.--I am not ill; and what Zola
and Ibsen offer me is medicine.
HELEN
[_Quite involuntarily._] Ah, then perhaps, they might help me.
LOTH
[_Who has become gradually absorbed in his vision of the dewy orchard and
who now yields to it wholly._] How very lovely it is here. Look, how the
sun emerges from behind the mountain peak.--And you have so many apples
in your garden--a rich harvest.
HELEN
Three-fourths of them will be stolen this year just as last. There is
such great poverty hereabouts.
LOTH
I can scarcely tell you how deeply I love the country. Alas, the greater
part of _my_ harvest must be sought in cities. But I must try to enjoy
this country holiday thoroughly. A man like myself needs a bit of
sunshine and refreshment more than most people.
HELEN
[_Sighing._] More than others ... In what respect?
LOTH
It is because I am in the midst of a hard conflict, the end of which I
will not live to see.
HELEN
But are we not all engaged in such a conflict?
LOTH
No.
HELEN
Surely we are all engaged in some conflict?
LOTH
Naturally, but in one that may end.
HELEN
It _may_. Yon are right. But why cannot the other end--I mean the one in
which you are engaged, Mr. Loth?
LOTH
Your conflict, after all, can only be one for your personal happiness.
And, so far as is humanly speaking possible, the individual can attain
this. My struggle is a struggle for the happiness of all men. The
condition of my happiness would be the happiness of all; nothing could
content me until I saw an end of sickness and poverty, of servitude and
spiritual meanness. I could take my place at the banquet table of life
only as the last of its guests.
HELEN
[_With deep conviction._] Ah, then you are a truly, truly good, man!
LOTH
[_Somewhat embarrassed._] There is no merit in my attitude: it is an
inborn one. And I must also confess that my struggle in the interest of
progress affords me the highest satisfaction. And the kind of happiness I
thus win is one that I estimate far more highly than the happiness which
contents the ordinary self-seeker.
HELEN
Still there are very few people in whom such a taste is inborn.
LOTH
Perhaps it isn't wholly inborn. I think that we are constrained to it by
the essential wrongness of the conditions of life. Of course, one must
have a sense for that wrongness. There is the point. Now if one has that
sense and suffers consciously under the wrongness of the conditions in
question--why, then one becomes, necessarily, just what I am.
HELEN
Oh, if it were only clearer to me ... Tell me, what conditions, for
instance, do you call wrong?
LOTH
Well, it is wrong, for instance, that he who toils in the sweat of his
brow suffers want while the sluggard lives in luxury. It is wrong to
punish murder in times of peace and reward it in times of war. It is
wrong to despise the hangman and yet, as soldiers do, to bear proudly at
one's side a murderous weapon whether it be rapier or sabre. If the
hangman displayed his axe thus he would doubtless be stoned. It is wrong,
finally, to support as a state religion the faith of Christ which teaches
long-suffering, forgiveness and love, and, on the other hand, to train
whole nations to be destroyers of their own kind. These are but a few
among millions of absurdities. It costs an effort to penetrate to the
true nature of all these things: one must begin early.
HELEN
But how did you succeed in thinking of all this? It seems so simple and
yet one never thinks of it.
LOTH
In various ways: the course of my own personal development, conversation
with friends, reading and independent thinking. I found out the first
absurdity when I was a little boy. I once told a rather flagrant lie and
my father flogged me most soundly. Shortly thereafter I took a railroad
journey with my father and I discovered that my father lied, too, and
seemed to take the action quite as a matter of course. I was five years
old at that time and my father told the conductor that I was not yet four
in order to secure free transportation for me. Again, our teacher said to
us: be industrious, be honourable and you will invariably prosper in
life. But the man had uttered folly, and I discovered that soon enough.
My father was honourable, honest, and thoroughly upright, and yet a
scoundrel who is alive and rich to-day cheated him of his last few
thousands. And my father, driven by want, had to take employment under
this very scoundrel who owned a large soap factory.
HELEN
People like myself hardly dare think of such a thing as wrong. At most
one feels it to be so in silence. Indeed, one feels it often--and then--a
kind of despair takes hold of one.
LOTH
I recall one absurdity which presented itself to me as such with especial
clearness. I had always believed that murder is punished as a crime under
whatever circumstances. After the incident in question, however, it grew
to be clear to me that only the milder forms of murder are unlawful.
HELEN
How is that possible?
LOTH
My father was a boilermaster. We lived hard by the factory and our
windows gave on the factory yard. I saw a good many things there. There
was a workingman, for instance, who had worked in the factory for five
years. He began to have a violent cough and to lose flesh ... I recall
how my father told us about the man at table. His name was Burmeister and
he was threatened with pulmonary consumption if he worked much longer in
the soap factory. The doctor had told him so. But the man had eight
children and, weak and emaciated as he was, he couldn't find other work
anywhere. And so he _had_ to stay In the soap factory and his employer
was quite self-righteous because he kept him. He seemed to himself an
extraordinarily humane person.--One August afternoon--the heat was
frightful--Burmeister dragged himself across the yard with a wheelbarrow
full of lime. I was just looking out of the window when I noticed him
stop, stop again, and finally pitch over headlong on the cobblestones. I
ran up to him--my father came, other workingmen came up, but he could
barely gasp and his month was filled with blood. I helped carry him into
the house. He was a mass of limy rags, reeking with all kinds of
chemicals. Before we had gotten him into the house, he was dead.
HELEN
Ah, that is terrible.
LOTH
Scarcely a week later we pulled his wife out of the river into which the
waste lye of our factory was drained. And, my dear young lady, when one
knows things of that kind as I know them now--believe me--one can find no
rest. A simple little piece of soap, which makes no one else in the world
think of any harm, even a pair of clean, well-cared-for hands are enough
to embitter one thoroughly.
HELEN
I saw something like that once. And oh, it was frightful, frightful!
LOTH
What was that?
HELEN
The son of a workingman was carried in here half-dead. It's about--three
years ago.
LOTH
Had he been injured?
HELEN
Yes, over there in the Bear shaft.
LOTH
So it was a miner?
HELEN
Oh, yes. Most of the young men around here go to work in the mines.
Another son of the same man was also a trammer and also met with an
accident.
LOTH
And were they both killed?
HELEN