The days before the opening of our Congress were devoted to
preparatory labors and to confidential communications. The French,
English, and Italians wanted to bring before the Congress a discussion
of the Alsace-Lorraine affair, which had been tabooed by the
Interparliamentarians; but we Austrians succeeded in persuading our
foreign colleagues not to touch upon this ticklish theme. It would
make the Germans too shy to be handled; they would be afraid of being
regarded at home as guilty of high treason should they permit the
result of the Frankfurt treaty to be treated as a “question” in their
presence. The peace movement was as yet a very tender plant; it must
be kept away from any over-chilly draft. In the confidential session
there was utterance of various views, but not the slightest discord.
All alike felt themselves comrades, fellow-combatants for a great
object which promised a blessing equally to all nations. The two great
peace veterans Frédéric Passy and Hodgson Pratt had the gift of
spreading around them an atmosphere of confidence and devotion; it was
felt that the fundamental trait in their nature was greatness of soul.
And Ruggero Bonghi made a third. The chairmanship of the Congress was
put into his hands.
We also met the Grelix couple—that is, Grete and Felix Moscheles. Grete
looked as if she were Felix’s daughter, a dainty little Sèvres figure;
blond hair, done up with the touch of genius and framing her face as
with a mist of gold; a delicately cut and amusing visage—amusing because
it was animated by mischievous dimples and sparkling eyes, and because
the mouth, opening a trifle awry in speaking, disclosed among her white
teeth an especially comical, conical eye-tooth. At the same time this
little woman with the scintillating wit always wore, in opulent variety,
toilets in the height of style and yet arranged to suit her own artistic
taste—Grete is a painter. Always costly ornaments suited to her gown;
but an enthusiastic socialist—the two things are quite compatible, it
seems.
Baron Pirquet, who had taken part in the Conference as a member of the
Reichsrat, now came into the Congress in his quality as a director of
the Austrian Peace Society. This man of peace had, like General Türr,
begun his career in the military service. The son of an Austrian general
of Belgian extraction, he had been in the campaign of 1859 against
Sardinia as a lieutenant of dragoons; and then for many long years was
connected with the diplomatic service. Very distinguished in his
appearance, with a classically handsome head and most delightful
manners—such was the man outwardly. The inner man I learned to value in
after years as a true friend and as a zealous worker in the cause of
peace. He remained at the head of the Austrian group of the
Interparliamentary Union until he was taken ill; and he prepared the way
for, and brilliantly organized, the Conference of 1903, which was held
in Vienna.
Great and deep were the impressions which I brought away from those
meetings in Rome. In later times I have been present at many other Peace
Congresses which were not less magnificent; but that one was the first I
had attended, and we know how everything which is experienced for the
first time is felt as a tenfold intensified experience.
First the opening session on the Capitol. The very approach of the
delegates was spectacular. When they got out of their carriages on the
square before the Capitol, a military band played the march from
_Lohengrin_, and a double lane of guards in gala uniform stood on the
terrace, on the steps, and before the entrance of the great hall where
the meeting was to be held. In the hall itself, the walls of which were
decorated with the flags of all the nations represented, stood the
president’s table, in the background on a platform; on the right and
left, in seats arranged like those in an amphitheater, a numerous
public; and in front of these seats, on each side, a row of curule
chairs reserved for the leaders of the various delegations (just imagine
with what pride I took my place there: _sella curulis_—once the seat of
honor for the kings, and later for the magistrates); at the directors’
table Minister-President Biancheri, who delivered the address of
welcome. After he had finished, the delegates of the peace societies
were to speak, one for each country. They were called up in alphabetical
order: “Angleterre” was the first. Hodgson Pratt left his curule chair
and mounted the platform. When he had ended his words, “Autriche” was
called, and, as I was the presiding officer of the Austrian group, I as
their spokesman had now to repair to the chairman’s table.
Stage fright ... that was a condition from which I had suffered
distressfully all my life. When I was to sing at the Duprez recitals, or
later at concerts, or even before two or three expert critics, the demon
_trac_ would always, even after long familiarity with the experience,
clutch me by the throat and deprive me of half my powers amid
unspeakable moral anguish. And here, for the first time in my life, at a
world’s congress, in the presence of statesmen, in such a solemn
assembly, in such a place—the Capitol!—I was to deliver a public
address, the words of which would be taken down stenographically and
sent off by telegraph by the newspaper correspondents of all countries.
One would have supposed that the aforesaid demon must now pounce upon me
and throttle me lamentably. Nothing of the sort. Quite calmly,
unconcernedly, in glad exaltation, I said what I had to say, and a storm
of applause followed my words. This is the way I explain the matter:
stage fright is an accompaniment of vanity, a trembling question
addressed to Fate: How shall _I_ please? with the whole accent on the
word “I.” Here at the Capitol, among the servants and interpreters of a
world cause, _I_ was an incidental! I had something to say which seemed
to me important, and which I knew would be a welcome and joyous message
to the like-minded persons who surrounded me. Who was going to say it,
and what personal impression my insignificant person would produce, was
a thought that did not come to my consciousness at all; and so I spoke
without any uneasiness, with the assurance of an ambassador who has
definite and good tidings to communicate. I could tell them that in a
country of Central Europe where no Peace Society existed till six weeks
ago, to-day, at the first summons of a powerless woman who had no other
claim than having written an honest book, two thousand people had
already banded together that they might be represented in Rome; and if
in a few days two thousand fellow-combatants had offered themselves,
then at the next Congress there would be twenty thousand members of the
Austrian group to be represented. In conclusion I laid on the chairman’s
table some of the most enthusiastic letters of approval, signed by
illustrious names—Tolstoi, Haeckel, the Duke of Oldenburg, and others.
I was mistaken in my prophecy that during the following year the
membership of the Union would be increased tenfold. The New does not
march forward so rapidly. When it first makes its appearance it
powerfully attracts all who were already quietly cherishing similar
ideas. The rest of the world now gives ear in surprise, but means to
wait and see if the New is successful; and if that does not come to pass
immediately, then they turn away again and decide that the matter has no
vitality. Meantime it germinates and sprouts and ramifies quietly until
it reveals itself once more to the contemporary world with a new
impulse.
So my début as a Peace-Congresswoman came off with great success, and I
confess I was rather proud that I had spoken—think of it! on the
Capitol; the only woman in history to whom such a thing had happened.
But this pride was somewhat taken down when there came to my notice a
newspaper item which told of the occurrence and added that “it was not
the first time that one of the sisterhood had quacked on this spot, and
this time it was not even a matter of saving the Capitol—”
On the next day the deliberations began. Ruggero Bonghi presided. The
vivacious little man acquitted himself of that duty with humor and
rigor, to the delight of all. He was easily enraged, and then he pounded
heavily on the table with his fist; and universal applause followed this
gesture, for it always emphasized an energetic preservation of order.
Famous savant and philanthropist that he was, he enjoyed Queen
Margherita’s especial confidence. She intrusted him with the management
of her charities, and frequently enjoyed his gift of conversation.
I jotted down at that time some weighty passages of his introductory
discourse:
The question is often raised whether these unions are working toward a
goal that can be attained; but this question comes from men who have
incorrectly understood the teachings of history and do not see that
the progressive development which lies behind us is a guaranty for
what is going to be.
The system of arbitration has already been repeatedly put in operation
for the settlement of controversies; and what we demand is nothing
further than that this principle should unfurl its banner and call to
humanity, “Here I am. Change your course and I will give you peace.”
It is said that the armies and fleets, that this monstrous expenditure
of men and money, is for the purpose of preserving peace. It would
follow that our opponents pursue the same object as we do—with the
difference that we pursue that end with means corresponding to the
cause, while they proceed in a manner diametrically contrary to it.
It is certain that we have before us a lofty ideal; and those that
ridicule the ideal and its adherents are like men who should maintain
that it were idle to take a torch when one had to go through a dark
passageway.
Every nation should contribute its quota to the general good of
humanity. In this way the human race would move toward an increasing
perfection, which, sustained by intelligence and philanthropy, will
awaken the energy for greater and greater performances.
At this Congress it was determined to found a central bureau at Bern.
The plan for this was suggested by Frédéric Bajer, and he and Hodgson
Pratt made the proposal. Although attacked in certain quarters—is not
every positive new thing always attacked?—the motion was carried, and
Élie Ducommun, the Swiss delegate, was commissioned to take charge of
the preliminary arrangements. The privilege of starting the first fund
in the treasury of the Bern bureau was mine by virtue of the
circumstance that the proprietor of the Roman daily _Fanfulla_, the
Marquis Alfieri, asked my authorization to publish an Italian
translation of my novel _Die Waffen nieder_ in the feuilleton of his
paper, to which I agreed on condition that the honorarium—fifteen
hundred francs—should be paid over to the treasury of the Bern bureau
when it should be founded.
In order to give a picture of those days and of the impression that they
made on my mind at that time, I insert here what I wrote about them in
the first number of my monthly, _Die Waffen nieder_, in January, 1892:
_Echoes of the Peace Congress_
So, then, the beautiful days at Rome and Naples have now rushed past
us like the rest!...
But this does not mean that all that filled those days has
vanished—that is to say, that the words are stilled, the thoughts
dispelled, the pictures obliterated.... We know that every slight
motion of the hand, by disturbing the surrounding air, operates to
immeasurable distances, and in the same way we know also how through
unreckonable time the movement of spirits sets the surrounding and
succeeding world of spirit in vibration.
“Never-to-be-forgotten” is the word ordinarily employed for days so
richly filled. But it is not the correct word, for ultimately
everything is forgotten; even should all those who shared the
experience preserve to the end of life their recollections of what
they experienced, yet there comes the time in which they themselves
are forgotten, in which their ashes are scattered to the winds, their
archives buried in ruins. So we will not call the contents of these
days of the Congress never-to-be-forgotten, but rather ineradicable.
And be it said that this event cannot be compared with a slight
motion. The echo which the Congress and Conference this time awakened
in the public could hardly have been wished louder. When it is
realized how the Peace Congresses of 1889 and 1890 passed almost
unnoticed, and what general attention was attracted to the one this
year, it is fair to hope that in like progression one of the next will
become an event that stirs the world. And to bring this to pass would
take nothing more than either an avalanche-like spread of the
announced will of the nations for peace, or the resolve of the
governments themselves to come together in a High Council of Peace to
plan the bases of arbitration treaties.
Such confidence in the simple and probable realization (most likely
within our lifetime) of the ideal set before us should fill the hearts
of those that are fighting for this. Let the skepticism that wisely
balances difficulties be left to those that stand aside. “Let us keep
ever before our eyes the sacred purpose which we have set before us,”
said Bonghi in his concluding address; “let us work with such fiery
zeal as if the attainment of this depended wholly on us and as if we
could attain it even to-morrow. If others hinder us, then it is not
our fault. Let us scorn those that jeer at us and pity those that do
not understand us. What we desire is the noble, the just, the
beneficent; and if there be any one who believes that these things are
forever denied to men, then for God’s sake and for man’s let him hold
his tongue, for life would be altogether too sad if we all had to
think as he does.”
“Words, words!” say our opponents in derisive tones. This objection
also Bonghi meets with that genial humor which frequently flashes
through his style. “You reproach us for putting forth nothing but
words; did we ever claim to be cannon?” And in saying this he gave
that short chuckle of his which stimulated his hearers to irresistible
laughter.
Truly it would be nothing to deplore if the purpose of these
congresses and conferences—the international reign of law—received
valid realization by their pronouncements; rather, it is to be
deplored that doubters and scoffers exert themselves to retard such
realizations, and that those who have the power of decision are not
already coming together for united work, but are contenting
themselves—each in isolation—with avowing their own peace purposes in
words—words—meanwhile augmenting the preparation for war by their
uninterrupted action.
It is only mutual mistrust that keeps up this inner contradiction. But
fair dealing will put this mistrust to rout; the lust for war
perpetually attributed to “the others” will prove itself to be a
phantom; the suspicion that the governments are not willing to
renounce war, that the peoples are not willing, will disappear, and
thereby the renunciation will have become a reality, the word an act.
What accelerative effect the congresses are producing in this respect,
cannot be determined by any measurement. The opponents of the
movement, indeed,—the indifferent or the so-called “practical,”—stick
at the lack of immediate validity in the resolutions, at the
difficulties, misunderstandings, and blunders which must inevitably
come up in the deliberations of a multitudinous (and also polyglot)
body of men.
“That such an unwonted instrument of will must work imperfectly for a
time is obvious,” remarked a member of the German Reichstag, Dr.
Barth, in speaking of the Conference, “and it takes just about the
intellectual superiority of Frau Wilhelmine Buchholz and her (very
widely scattered) kin to see nothing more behind this natural
imperfection. On the other hand, whoever has any understanding for the
imponderable things in the life of nations, and can separate the
appearance from the actuality, will recognize in this as yet clumsily
working Conference a very notable stir of the humanitarian sense of
solidarity.”
It is to be desired that Congress and Conference may in future be held
simultaneously, that is to say in alternate sessions, so that the
participants of the one may be able to attend the other; for the
representatives who meet in the Interparliamentary Conference are for
the most part also members of the peace societies of their respective
countries; their voices should therefore not be wanting in the
deliberations of the Congress. And especially should all share
unitedly in the festivities, the receptions, the gala performances and
excursions which the city where the Congress is held offers to its
peace guests. Too much is demanded of the people when they are
expected to divide their enthusiasm between two successive occasions
dedicated to the same object. Two opening ceremonies on the Capitol,
two gala representations of _Amico Fritz_, two special trains to
Naples and Pompeii, two illuminations of the Forum and the Colosseum
in the course of a fortnight; it was a serious tax. And yet the Roman
Committee, the authorities, and the generous-hearted southern populace
managed to entertain in equally brilliant fashion first the
Parliamentarians and immediately afterwards the delegates of the Peace
Unions.
The two bodies are really at bottom only two different forms of the
same movement, closely connected, the one an outgrowth of the other;
the upper and lower house of the same parliament, so to speak. The
unconstrained intercourse in an exalted frame of mind, plus the
joyous acclamations of the populace, the waving of banners, the
bands of music,—all this brings on fraternization and mutual
understanding more, almost, than the deliberative work that precedes
it. Besides, what can be produced by the congresses does not consist
in effective paragraphs of law; it is only a fundamental thought
that is to be championed—a great, shining, heart-warming fundamental
thought—the principle of the solidarity of nations, the
fellowship[34] of all the civilized peoples. Of such a fellowship
void of enmity we surely have a joyous foretaste when we—the
representatives of seventeen different nations—banquet around a
flower-decorated table (the word PAX in white camellias on a green
background) or take a jolly excursion in a special train furnished
by the government, are greeted on our arrival by a crowd shouting
evviva and received with official manifestations of respect, and
take our places in the waiting landaus or banner-hung boats—and all
this under the gracious ensign of harmony; they were intoxicating
moments full of blessed inspiration. We forgot that what we had come
to battle for there is not yet attained, that the world outside is
still in the sign of Hate; at all events the world that we were just
then in the midst of was unanimously inspired by the same faith, the
same ideal. Yes, they were—I had almost said—“never-to-be-forgotten”
hours!
There such images and impressions were imprinted on our minds as could
be received only in such circumstances. It is one thing for a solitary
tourist to wander through the streets of Pompeii, another thing for a
happy pair on their wedding journey; still another for the assembled
participants in a Peace Congress. All thoughts converge to the same
paramount center. The view of Vesuvius, for example, whose summit was
enveloped in clouds of smoke, could only on this occasion have
suggested to a traveling politician the following observation which I
heard from the lips of our Austrian delegate, Baron von Pirquet:
“How the old volcano hides his face in a veil of fog—apparently he is
ashamed, in presence of us friends of peace, of the destruction which
he has poured out upon the poor city and its wretched inhabitants. And
yet what is the petty mischief that he has on his conscience compared
to the devastation and scenes of horror that were spread over this
very same region by the martial legions!... How infinitesimal are the
crimes of such a mountain against mankind in comparison with the
crimes against mankind which men perpetrate; it is for us to be
ashamed.”
And when we all stood in the great arena listening to the explanations
of the professor who was detailed by the government to guide us, that
the gladiatorial contests were counted “the indispensable” for the
Romans, we could not but say to each other, “And yet people have
learned to dispense with them and to abhor them.” So if to-day many
still count war indispensable, what does that prove? Or, again, many
of us might make this observation: at bottom it was an innocent
gratification to look on and see how a few dozen wrestlers—criminals
at that, condemned to death—stretch each other on the sand or are
killed by wild beasts, compared to that other custom of drilling
millions of innocent men for the giant arena in which they are to be
mangled and dashed to pieces not by lions and tigers but by artificial
murdermachines....
In one of the little Pompeian houses an ancient inscription was still
perceptible on the wall; our professor of archæology read it off:
A WOE TO HIM WHO CANNOT LOVE
A DOUBLE WOE TO HIM WHO WOULD PROHIBIT LOVE.
Then the thought thrilled through me:
O ye who would hinder us from working at the weaving of the band that
is to gird all nations together in concord, ye who scoff at us because
we would choke out hereditary hate, because we would fan the flame of
the love of humanity—“a double woe to you!”
The monthly from which the above extract is taken was published for
eight years until the end of the century, when it was replaced by the
_Friedenswarte_. The idea of issuing a periodical did not come from me.
After the newspapers had spread the tidings of the founding of a Peace
Society in Vienna and the part which it was to take in the approaching
Congress, a young publisher in Berlin wrote me an enthusiastic letter in
which he suggested the establishment of an organ for the new movement;
he would publish it, I was asked to be editor in chief and to put my
name on it as such. An eager devotee of the idea of peace since his
earliest years, since he had for the first time seen the Vereshchágin
pictures, he now desired to dedicate all his powers as a publicist to
the cause of peace. His letter was burningly written, and I consented.
From that day to this A. H. Fried has been my most zealous
fellow-combatant.
So then I stood in the midst of the young movement; I had a new Union to
preside over, a review to edit, a regular correspondence to carry on
with the colleagues whom I had gained in Rome, and once more my life and
activities were filled with something which I recognized as “the one
important thing.”
PART SEVEN
1892–1898
XXXII
HOME AND FRIENDS
We two · Business troubles · Deaths · Family life at Castle Stockern ·
Home theater · The twelfth of June · Visit of Prince André Dadiani
These pages have of late been very full of Union reports and “movement”
news, and it looks as if we both had been immersed in political life and
sadly taken up with league-breeding. But when I look back to those days,
there rise in my memory a multitude of other recollections connected
with our private life, with the family and social life that we led, and
especially with our cloudlessly happy married union. The outside world
with its mediæval darkness and its pitiable conditions caused us much
annoyance, and we took the field against these as well as we could; we
found much satisfaction, too, in the battle itself; but our chief joy,
our wealth, our fullest gratification, was each other. We had lost
nothing of our gayety, of our frivolous childishness, nothing of our
deep, fully confiding love. We swam in it as fishes in the sea; and,
whatever made us gasp and suffocate when we ventured out on the beach
sands, we could always dive back again into the vivifying currents of
our happiness.
A filigrain happiness, a miniature happiness. It did not consist of
soaring emotions and boisterous enjoyments. The everyday was its
territory; the everyday with the petty sweetnesses of comfort and humor.
We were not lost in astonishment, in admiration, in worship of each
other; better than anything of that kind, we loved each other,—loved
with all our weaknesses and faults. To lay one’s self out to be of
assistance, to procure a better existence for our fellow-men now and in
the future, is all very fine. Yet the best and first of duties is to
give as much joy as possible to one’s partner in life, and at the same
time to be joyful one’s self. To what end do we want to free mankind
from persecution, from disease, from oppression, from violent killing,
if not to provide mankind with the possibility of enjoying life? So that
is the chief end. But we ourselves, and those who stand nearest to us,
have the same claim; why should this claim be left unrecognized, when it
is the easiest of all to satisfy? If in a circle of ten each sacrifices
himself for the welfare of the other nine, who of the circle gets the
intended welfare? Well, we two _did_ fare “cannibalistically well,” if
not _wie fünfmalhunderttausend Säuen_, “like half a million swine,” as
the well-known student song has it, yet like two jolly little pigs.
And it was not all a bed of roses at Harmannsdorf either. The business
of the estate would not go right, the quarry least of all. They changed
superintendents, changed managers, negotiated with agents for contracts,
but there was no improvement. On the contrary, the enterprises planned,
ever arousing new hopes, led to risks, and when they ended in smoke we
were a bit worse off than before, but ready to come up to the next hope
all the more trustfully. And, since a modicum of volatility was
characteristic of the whole house of Suttner, we shook off the worry and
took from the day whatever of good the day brought.
All these long days had also brought something of sorrow. My Own’s
oldest brother Karl was suddenly attacked by pneumonia, which carried
him off in a week. My sister-in-law Lotti, the Countess Sizzo by
marriage, lost her husband. The bereavement was not very severe. It had
not been a wretched marriage, but not a happy one either; the two were
incompatible and lived for the most part separated,—he in his home in
Southern Tirol, she at Harmannsdorf. Karl’s daughter Mizzi, who was then
sixteen, after his death came to live in her grandparents’ house and was
always with us thenceforth. Her uncle Artur, whom she genuinely
worshiped, had to take her father’s place.
The liveliest intercourse was kept up with the neighboring castle of
Stockern. There lived (and still live) my husband’s older brother
Richard, nicknamed _Igel_, “hedgehog”; his wife Pauline, called _Das
Weib_, née Ponz von Engelshofen, châtelaine of Stockern and mother of
five children,—one daughter and four sons, the eldest of the sons born
in 1871, the youngest in 1886, so that there was much fresh, gay youth;
and, in addition, governesses, tutors, aunts, cousins, and other guests.
Lively times were always going on there. Very often the whole train
would come to Harmannsdorf, especially on occasion of birthdays, patron
saints’ days, hunts, vintages, and harvest-homes; still more frequently
we drove over to Stockern, or both families would join in excursions to
near-by Rosenburg or some other place of resort.
“Das Weib” was the last survivor of several brothers and sisters who in
the war year of 1866 had fallen victims to the epidemic of cholera which
had broken out in the country. The stories of that time when nine
persons in the family and service of Stockern were carried off by the
destroying angel in six days served as the basis for the episode “The
Cholera Week” in my novel _Die Waffen nieder_.
Now grass had grown over all that tragedy. Man’s memory is so terribly
short. Stockern was now full of happy people, and we two contributed our
mite to the gayeties. Uncle Artur was his young nephews’ favorite
comrade, and “Tante Boulotte” was no spoil-feast either.
I recall among other things a tragi-comedy entitled “Cleopatra,” which
was performed on the domestic stage. My Own had written the text, in
gory doggerel, and composed the music for it as well. The rôle of the
Egyptian queen was intrusted to my hands. The eldest son of the house,
at that time already a lieutenant of dragoons, appeared as a helmeted
officer of the Roman Guards; a neighboring proprietor played Antony; the
young girls of the family had to enact the part of slaves, and the
author of the masterpiece mimicked an old wandering prophet who knew all
things in advance, from the Queen’s death of snake-bite up to the latest
events in the Vienna city council. The governess at Stockern, a
wonderfully pretty young English lady, had to play the part of
Cleopatra’s maid, whose most important function it was to groom her
mistress’s pet snake. Miss Pratt’s English accent had a monstrously
comical effect. As she knew no German, her part had been hammered into
her only with the greatest difficulty. In a soliloquy she had to
apostrophize the snake intrusted to her care with the words _o du
elendes Mistvieh_—“O you wretched dung-brute” (from that specimen of the
text may be got some idea of the loftiness of the poem), but she
declaimed it _o du ellen Mittwoch_! From that day, when people at
Stockern wanted to be rude they called each other _Mittwoch_,
“Wednesday.”
To us two the greatest festival of the year was always the twelfth of
June, the anniversary of our marriage. But we never cared to celebrate
it with more company than ourselves, and so it came to pass that if we
were at Harmannsdorf at that date we left for parts unknown early in the
morning and were gone at least twenty-four hours. Having run away on our
real wedding day, we did so on the anniversaries too. Of all things, no
congratulations and toasts on that day; we wanted to be alone—in
devotion. We would drive down to the railway, take tickets to any
station; arriving there, we would hunt up the local hotel to order a
dinner, and then go out into the fields and woods. June, you know, is
the happy month when everything is in full bloom, when roses grow rank
and the cuckoo calls, when all nature is a wedding celebration. We would
wander about for a few hours and then come to our dinner with a glorious
appetite; we would have it served under an arbor in the hotel garden.
And then out to the woods again. There we would seek out a shady or
perchance a sunny place—we were not afraid of the sun, but had a
lizard-like predilection for its caressing glow—and there other hours of
hallowed dialogue would pass: hours which were prolonged till the
setting of the sun, till the rising of the moon, till the blowing of the
evening breezes. Then back to the inn, where supper was awaiting us in a
neat room. And our material for conversation was still not
exhausted—from year to year it grew richer; for what we said to each
other on those days was the manifold variation of the now cheerful, now
melancholy, but always sweet, theme, “Do you remember?” All that we had
experienced together, seen together, learned together, we passed in
review, and when we took out and rearranged our memories and conceptions
it was as if we were counting treasures,—the joy of wealth obsessed us.
Rich we were in remarkable memories that were common to both, rich in
accordant ideas, and superlatively rich in intertwining feelings of
never-cooling affection, of never-failing confidence.
And on the next day we would go back among men again—as if nothing had
happened.
We had kept up a correspondence with our friends in the Caucasus. The
Murats were still in Zugdidi; Prince Niko was living for the most part
in St. Petersburg. One day there came from Prince André Dadiani a letter
postmarked at Vienna, to say that he was passing through the city and
ask if he might call. We, too, had to be in Vienna—for a festival
meeting of the Peace Union, at which, among other things, Peter Rosegger
and the court actor Lewinsky made addresses. Accordingly I wrote the
prince to come to the meeting, and he did so. After the addresses the
company stayed to supper, and our Caucasian friend stayed with us. All
this may possibly have been Greek to the Russian officer who had fought
at Kars, but he expressed himself as quite in sympathy with my aims and
endeavors; whether from politeness or conviction, I will not undertake
to say. On the following day we took him with us to Harmannsdorf, where
he remained for some time as our guest.
XXXIII
LETTERS FROM ALFRED NOBEL
I kept up a regular correspondence with Alfred Nobel. I will quote here
some of his letters[35]:
Dear Baroness:
If I have not replied sooner to your kind and courteous letter, it is
because I was in hopes of bringing you my answer _de vive-voix_, my
respects _de vif-cœur_.
Here I am in Vienna, but you are not, and I am told that you do not
often come. On the other hand, if I should go to Harmannsdorf I should
be greatly afraid of causing you trouble, and in this respect I am as
timid as the most sensitive woman.
How happy I am to know that you are happy and contented, back at last
in a land which you love, and rested from struggles of which my
sympathy can measure the extent.
What shall I tell you of myself—a shipwreck of youth, of joy, of hope?
An empty heart, whose inventory is a white—or gray—page.
Pray remember me cordially to your husband, and accept, dear Madame,
the assurance of my best sentiments founded on profound respect and
genuine devotion.