glass that the art of the flea-tamer developed itself in its full
extent; for then first appeared the splendour and grace of the vessels,
the fine workmanship of the arms, the glitter and neatness of the
uniforms, all of which excited the profoundest admiration. It was quite
impossible to imagine what instruments the flea-tamer could have used
in making neatly and proportionately certain little collaterals, such
as spurs and buttons, compared to which that matter seemed to be a very
trifling task, which else had passed for a master-piece of the tailor,
namely, the fitting a flea with a pair of breeches; though, indeed, in
this the most difficult part must have been the measuring.
The flea-tamer had abundance of visitors. Throughout the whole day the
hall was never free from the curious, who were not deterred by the
high price of admission. In the evening, too, the company was numerous,
nay almost more numerous, as then even those people, who cared little
about such trickeries, came to admire a work which gave the flea-tamer
quite another character, and acquired for him the real esteem of
the philosopher. This work was a night-microscope, that, as the
sun-microscope by day, like a magic lantern, flung the object, brightly
lit up, upon a white ground, with a sharpness and distinctness which left
nothing more to be wished. Moreover, the flea-tamer carried on a
traffic with the finest microscopes that could be, and which were
readily bought at a great price.
It chanced that a young man, called George Pepusch,--the kind reader
will soon be better acquainted with him,--took a fancy to visit the
flea-tamer late in the evening. Already, upon the stairs, he heard the
clamour of a dispute, that grew louder and louder with every moment,
and at last became a perfect tempest. Just as he was about to enter,
the door of the hall was violently flung open, and the multitude rushed
out in a heap upon him, their faces pale with terror.
"The cursed wizard!--the Satan's-brood! I'll denounce him to the
supreme court!--He shall out of the city, the false juggler!"
Such were the confused cries of the multitude, as, urged by fear and
terror, they sought to get out of the house as quickly as possible.
A glance into the hall at once betrayed to the young Pepusch the cause
of this horror, which had driven away the people. All within was alive,
and a loathsome medley of the most hideous creatures filled the whole
room. The race of beetles, spiders, leeches, gnats, magnified to
excess, stretched out their probosces, crawled upon their long hairy
legs, or fluttered their long wings. A more hideous spectacle Pepusch
had never seen. He was even beginning to be sensible himself of horror,
when something rough suddenly flew in his face, and he saw himself
enveloped in a thick cloud of meal dust. His terror immediately left
him, for he at once perceived that the rough thing could be nothing
else than the round powdered wig of the flea-tamer--which, in fact, it
was.
By the time Pepusch had rubbed the powder from his eyes, the disgusting
population of insects had vanished. The flea-tamer sate in his arm-chair
quite exhausted.
"Leuwenhock!"--exclaimed Pepusch to him--"Leuwenhock, do you see now
what comes of your trickeries? You have again been forced to have
recourse to your vassals to keep the people's hands off you--Is it not
so?"
"Is it you?" said the naturalist, in a faint voice--"Is it you, good
Pepusch?--Ah! it is all over with me--clean over with me--I am a lost
man! Pepusch, I begin to believe that you really meant it well with me,
and that I have not done wisely in making light of your warnings."
Upon Pepusch's quietly asking what had happened, the flea-tamer turned
himself round with his arm-chair to the wall, held both his hands
before his face, and cried out piteously to Pepusch to take up a glass
and examine the marble slab. Already, with the naked eye, Pepusch
observed that the little soldiers, &c. lay there as if dead,--that
nothing stirred any longer. The dexterous fleas appeared also to have
taken another shape. But now, by means of the glass, Pepusch soon
discovered that not a single flea was there, but what he had taken for
them were nothing more than black pepper-corns and fruit-seeds that
stood in their uniforms.
"I know not," began the flea-tamer, quite melancholy and overwhelmed,--
"I know not what evil spirit struck me with blindness, that I did not
perceive the desertion of my army till the people were at the table and
prepared for the spectacle. You may imagine, Pepusch, how, on seeing
themselves deceived, the visitors first murmured, and then blazed out
into fury. They accused me of the vilest deceit, and, as they grew
hotter and hotter, and would no longer listen to any excuses, they were
falling upon me to take their own revenge. What could I do better, to
shun a load of blows, than immediately set the great microscope into
motion, and envelope the people in a cloud of insects, at which they
were terrified, as is natural to them?"
"But," said Pepusch, "tell me how it could possibly happen that your
well-disciplined troop, which had shown so much fidelity to you, could
so suddenly take themselves off, without your perceiving it at once?"
"Oh!" cried the flea-tamer, "O, Pepusch! HE has deserted me!--HE by
whom alone I was master--HE it is to whose treachery I ascribe all my
blindness, all my misery!"
"Have I not," said Pepusch, "have I not long ago warned you not to
place your reliance upon tricks which you cannot execute without the
possession of the MASTER? and on how ticklish a point rests that
possession, notwithstanding all your care, you have just now
experienced."
Pepusch farther gave the flea-tamer to understand, that he could not at
all comprehend how his being forced to give up these tricks could so
much disturb his life, as the invention of the microscope, and his
general dexterity in the preparation of microscopic glasses, had long
ago established him. But the flea-tamer, on the other hand, maintained,
that very different things lay hid in these subtleties, and that he
could not give them up without giving up his whole existence. Pepusch
interrupted him by asking, "Where is Doertje Elverdink?"
"Where is she?" screamed Leuwenhock, wringing his hands--"where is
Doertje Elverdink?--Gone!--gone into the wide world!--vanished!--But
strike me dead at once, Pepusch, for I see your wrath growing: make
short work of it with me!"
"There you see now," said Pepusch, with a gloomy look--"you see now
what comes of your folly, of your absurd proceedings. Who gave you a
right to confine the poor Doertje like a slave, and then again, merely
for the sake of alluring people, to make a show of her like some wonder
of natural history? Why did you put a force upon her inclinations, and
not allow her to give me her hand, when you must have seen how dearly
we loved each other?--Fled, is she? Well then, she is no longer in your
power; and although I do not at this moment know where to seek for her,
yet am I convinced that I shall find her. There, Leuwenhock, put on
your wig again, and submit to your destiny; that is the best thing you
can do."
The flea-tamer arranged his wig on his bald head with his left hand,
while with his right he caught Pepusch by the arm, exclaiming--
"Pepusch, you are my real friend, for you are the only man in the whole
city of Frankfort, who know that I lie buried in the old church at
Delft, since the year seventeen hundred and twenty-five, and yet have
not betrayed it to any one,--even when you were angry with me on
account of Doertje Elverdink. If at times I cannot exactly get it into
my head that I am actually that Anton van Leuwenhock, who lies buried
at Delft, yet again I must believe it, when I consider my works, and
reflect upon my life; and on that account it is very agreeable to me
that it is not at all spoken of. I now see, my dear Pepusch, that, in
regard to Doertje Elverdink, I have not acted rightly, although in a
very different way from what you may well imagine--that is, I was right
in pronouncing your suit to be an idle struggle,--wrong, in not being
open with you, in not telling you the real circumstances of Doertje
Elverdink; you would then have seen how praiseworthy it was to talk you
out of wishes, the accomplishment of which could not be other than
destructive. Pepusch, sit down by me, and hear a wonderful history."
"That I am likely to do," replied Pepusch with a malicious glance,
sitting down in an armchair, opposite the flea-tamer, who thus began:
"As you are well versed, my dear friend, in history, you know, beyond
doubt, that King Sekakis lived for many years in intimate intercourse
with the Flower-Queen, and that the beautiful Princess Gamaheh was the
fruit of this passion. But it is not so well known, nor can I tell you,
in what way the Princess Gamaheh came to Famagusta. Many maintain, and
not without reason, that the princess wished to conceal herself there
from the odious Leech-Prince, the sworn enemy of the Flower-Queen. Be
this as it may,--it happened once in Famagusta, that the princess was
walking in the cool freshness of the evening, and chanced upon a
pleasant cypress-grove. Allured by the delightful sighings of the
evening breeze, the murmurs of a brook, and the soft music of the
birds, she stretched herself upon the moss, and quickly fell into a
sound slumber. At this moment, the very enemy whom she had been so
anxious to escape lifted his head out of the marshes, beheld the
princess, and became so violently enamoured of the fair sleeper, that
he could not resist an inclination to kiss her; and, creeping forward,
he kissed her under the left ear. Now you know, friend Pepusch, that,
when the Leech-Prince sets about kissing a fair one, she is lost, for
he is the vilest bloodsucker in the world. So it happened on this
occasion: the Leech-Prince kissed the poor Gamaheh so long, that all
life left her, when he fell back gorged and intoxicated upon the moss,
and was forced to be carried home by his servants, who hastily rolled
out of their marshes. In vain the root mandragora toiled out of the
earth, and laid itself upon the wound inflicted by the treacherous
kisses of the Leech-Prince; in vain all the other flowers arose and
joined in his lamentations: she was dead. Just then it happened that
the genius, Thetel, was passing, and he too was deeply moved by
Gamaheh's beauty and her unlucky end. He took her in his arms, pressed
her to his breast, and endeavoured to breathe new life into her; but
still she awoke not from the sleep of death. Now, too, the genius
perceived the odious prince,--who was so drunk and unwieldly that his
servants had not been able to get him into his palace,--fell into a
violent rage, and threw a whole handful of rock-salt upon him, at which
he poured forth again all the purple blood which he had drawn from the
princess, and then gave up his spirit in a wretched manner, amidst the
most violent convulsions. All the flowers that stood around dipped
their vestments in this ichor, and stained them, in perpetual
remembrance of the murdered princess, with so bright a purple, that no
painter on earth can imitate it. You know, Pepusch, that the most
beautiful pinks and hyacinths grow in that cypress-grove where the
Leech-Prince kissed to death the fair Gamaheh.
"The genius, Thetel, now thought of departing, as he had much to do at
Samarcand before night, and cast a farewell look at the princess, when
he seemed as if fixed by magic to the spot, and gazed on the fair one
with deep emotion. Suddenly a thought struck him. Instead of going on
farther, he took the princess in his arms, and rose with her high into
the air; at which time two philosophers,--one of whom it should be said
was myself,--were observing the course of the stars from the gallery of
a lofty tower. They perceived high above them the genius, Thetel, with
the fair Gamaheh, and at the same moment there fell upon one,--but that
is nothing to the present matter. Both magicians had recognised the
genius, but not the princess, and exhausted themselves in all manner of
conjectures as to the meaning of this appearance, without being able to
get at any thing certain, or even probable. Soon after this the unhappy
fate of the princess became generally known in Famagusta, and now the
magicians knew how to interpret the vision of the genius with the
maiden in his arms. Both imagined that the genius must certainly have
found some means of recalling the princess into life, and resolved to
make inquiries in Samarcand, where, according to their observations, he
had manifestly directed his flight. But in Samarcand all were silent
about the princess; no one knew a word.
"Many years had passed; the two magicians had quarrelled, as it will
happen with learned men,--and the more learned the oftener,--and they
only imparted to each other their most important discoveries from the
iron force of custom--You have not forgotten, Pepusch, that I myself am
one of these magicians--Well, I was not a little surprised at a
communication from my colleague, which contained the most wonderful,
and at the same time the happiest, intelligence of the princess that
could be imagined. The matter was thus:--by means of a scientific
friend in Samarcand, my colleague had obtained the loveliest and rarest
tulips, and as perfectly fresh as if they had been just cut from the
stalk. His chief object was the microscopic examination of the interior
portions, and, in fact, of the petal. It was with this view that he was
dissecting a beautiful tulip, and discovered in the cup a strange
little kernel that struck him prodigiously; but how great was his
astonishment when, on applying his glass, he perceived that the little
kernel was nothing else than the Princess Gamaheh, who, pillowed in the
petal of the tulip, seemed to slumber softly and calmly.
"However great the distance that separated me from my colleague, yet I
set off immediately, and hastened to him. He had in the meantime put
off all operations, to allow me the pleasure of a sight first; and
perhaps, too, from the fear of spoiling something if he acted entirely
from himself. I soon convinced myself of the perfect correctness of my
colleague's observations; and, like him, firmly believed that it was
possible to snatch the princess from her sleep, and give her again her
original form. The sublime spirit, dwelling within us, soon let us find
the proper method; but as you, friend Pepusch, know very little,--in
fact nothing at all,--of our art, it would be quite superfluous to
describe to you the different operations which we went through to
attain our object. It is sufficient if I tell you that by the dexterous
use of various glasses--for the most part prepared by myself--we
succeeded not only in drawing the princess uninjured from the flower,
but in forwarding her growth, so that she soon attained her natural
dimensions. Now, indeed, life was wanting; and this depended on the
last and most difficult operations. We reflected her image by means of
one of the best solar microscopes, and loosened it dexterously from the
white wall, without the least injury. As soon as the shadow floated
freely, it shot like lightning into the glass, which broke into a
thousand shivers. The princess stood before us full of life and
freshness. We shouted for joy; but so much the greater was our horror,
on perceiving that the circulation of the blood stopped precisely there
where the Leech-Prince had fastened himself. She was just on the point
of swooning, when we perceived on the very spot behind the left ear a
little black dot, that quickly appeared and as quickly disappeared.
Immediately the stagnation of the blood ceased, the princess revived,
and our work had succeeded.
"Each of us,--that is, I and my colleague,--knew full well how
invaluable was the possession of the princess, and each struggled for
it, imagining that he had more right to it than the other. My colleague
affirmed that the tulip, in which he had found the princess, was his
property; and that he had made the first discovery, which he had
imparted to me; and that I could only be deemed an assistant, who had
no right to demand, as a reward of his labour, the work itself at which
he had assisted. I, on the other hand, brought forward my invention of
the last and most difficult process, which had restored the princess to
life, and in the execution of which my colleague had only helped;
so that, if he had any claims of propriety upon the embryo in the
flower-petal, yet the living person belonged to me. On this ground we
quarrelled for many hours, till, having screamed ourselves hoarse, we
at last came to a compromise. My colleague consigned the princess to
me, in return for which I gave him an important glass, and this very
glass is the cause of our present determined hostility. He affirms that
I have treacherously purloined it--an impudent falsehood--and although
I really know that the glass was lost in the transferring, yet I can
declare, upon my honour and conscience, that I am not the cause of it,
nor have I any idea how it could have happened. In fact, the glass is
so small, that a grain of sand is about ten times larger. See, friend
Pepusch; now I have told you all in confidence, and now you know that
Doertje Elverdink is no other than the revivified Princess Gamaheh, and
must perceive that to such a high mysterious alliance a plain young man
like you can have no----."
"Stop!" interrupted George Pepusch, with a smile that was something
satanic:--"stop! one confidence is worth another, and, therefore,
I, on my side, will confide to you that I knew all that you have been
telling me much earlier and much better than you did. I cannot laugh
enough at your bigotry and your foolish pretensions. Know,--what you
might have known long ago if your knowledge had not been confined to
glass-grinding,--that I myself am the thistle, Zeherit, who stood where
the princess had laid her head, and of whom you have thought fit to be
silent through your whole history."
"Pepusch!" cried the flea-tamer, "are you in your senses? The thistle,
Zeherit, blooms in the distant Indies, in the beautiful valley, closed
in by lofty rocks, where at times the wisest magi of the earth are wont
to assemble: Lindhorst, the keeper of the records, can best inform you
about it. And you, whom I have seen running about half starved with
study and hunger, you pretend to be the thistle, Zeherit?"
"What a wise man you are, Leuwenhock!" said Pepusch, laughing: "Well,
think of my person what you will, but do not be absurd enough to deny
that, in the moment of the thistle Zeherit's feeling the sweet breath
of Gamaheh, he bloomed in glowing love and passion; and that, when he
touched the temples of the sleeping princess, she too dreamt sweetly of
love. Too late the Thistle perceived the Leech-Prince, whom he else had
killed with his thorns in a moment; but yet, with the help of the root,
Mandragora, he would have succeeded in recalling the princess to life,
if the stupid genius, Thetel, had not interfered with his awkward
remedies. It is true that, in his passion, the genius put his hand into
the saltbox, which he is used to carry at his girdle when he travels,
like Pantagruel, and flung a good handful at the Leech-Prince; but it
is quite false that he killed him in so doing. All the salt fell into
the marsh; not a single grain hit the prince, whom the thistle,
Zeherit, slew with his thorns; and, having thus avenged the murder of
Gamaheh, devoted himself to death. It is the genius only,--who
interfered in matters not concerning him,--that is the cause of the
princess lying so long in the sleep of flowers; the Thistle awoke much
earlier; for the death of both was but the same sleep, from which they
revived, although in other forms. You will have completed the measure
of your gross blunders, if you suppose that the Princess Gamaheh was
formed exactly as Doertje Elverdink now is, and that it is you who
restored her to life. It happened to you, my good Leuwenhock, as it did
to the awkward servant in the remarkable story of the Three
Pomegranates; he freed two maidens from the fruit, without having first
assured himself of the means of keeping them in life, and in
consequence saw them perish miserably before his eyes. Not you, but
_he_, who has escaped from you, whose loss you so deeply feel and
lament;--he it was who completed the work, which you began so
awkwardly."
"Ha!" cried the flea-tamer, quite beside himself--"ha! 'twas so I
suspected!--But you, Pepusch, you, to whom I have shown so much
kindness, you are my worst enemy: I see it well now. Instead of
advising me, instead of assisting me in my misfortunes, you amuse me
with all manner of nonsensical stories."
"Nonsense yourself!" cried Pepusch, quite indignant: "you'll rue
your folly too late, you dreaming charlatan! I go to seek Doertje
Elverdink--but that you may no longer mislead honest people----"
He grasped at the screw which set all the microscopic machinery in
motion----
"Take my life at the same time!" roared the flea-tamer; but at the
instant all crashed together, and he fell senseless to the ground.--
"How is it," said George Pepusch to himself, when he had got into the
street,--"how is it that one, who has the command of a nice warm
chamber and a well-stuffed bed, wanders through the streets at night in
the rain and storm?--Because he has forgotten the house key, and he is
driven moreover by love."
He could answer himself no otherwise, and indeed his whole conduct
seemed silly in his own estimation. He remembered the moment when
he saw Doertje Elverdink for the first time. Some years before the
Flea-tamer had exhibited his arts in Berlin, and had found no slight
audiences as long as the thing was new. Soon, however, people had seen
enough of the educated and well-disciplined fleas; and even the
paraphernalia of the diminutive race began not to be thought so very
wonderful, although at first attributed almost to magic, and Leuwenhock
seemed to have fallen into total oblivion. On a sudden a report was
spread that a niece of the artist, who had not appeared before, now
attended the exhibitions--a beautiful, lovely little maiden, and withal
so strangely attired as to baffle description. The world of
fashionables, who, like leaders in a concert, are accustomed to give
the time and tune to society, now poured in; and, as in this world
every thing is in extremes, the niece excited unparalleled
astonishment. It soon became the mode to frequent the flea-tamer; he,
who had not seen his niece, could not join in the common talk; and thus
the artist was saved in his distress. As to the rest, no one could
comprehend the name "_Doertje_;" and as at this time a celebrated
actress was displaying, in the part of the Queen of Golconda, all those
high yet soft attractions which are peculiar to the sex, they called
the fair Hollander by the royal name, Alina.
When George Pepusch came to Berlin, Leuwenhock's fair niece was the
talk of the day; and hence at the table of the hotel, where he lodged,
scarcely any thing else was spoken of but the little wonder that
delighted all the men, young and old, and even the women themselves.
Every one pressed the new-comer to place himself on the pinnacle of the
existing mode at Berlin, and see the Hollandress. Pepusch had an
irritable, melancholy temperament; in every enjoyment he found too much
of the bitter after-taste, which, indeed, comes from the Stygian brook
that runs through our whole life, and this made him gloomy and often
unjust to all about him. It may be easily supposed, that in this mood
he was little inclined to run about after pretty girls; but he went
nevertheless to the flea-tamer's, less on account of the dangerous
wonder, than to confirm his preconceived opinion that here too, as so
often in life, a strange madness was predominating. He found the
Hollandress fair, indeed, and agreeable; but in considering her, he
could not help smiling with self-satisfaction at his own sagacity, by
the help of which he had already guessed that the heads, which the
little-one had so perfectly turned, must have been tolerably crazy
before they left home.