GRANDMAMMA
I cannot rightly remember any of my grandparents, for grandmamma, as we
all called her, whom I learnt to know and love in my childhood, was in
reality only my mother’s stepmother, my grandfather, the Duke of
Nassau’s second wife. She was a daughter of the terrible Prince Paul of
Wurtemberg, so notorious for the violence of his temper, and her mother
was one of the lovely Princesses of Altenburg, another of whom had been
my grandfather’s first wife, and died in giving birth to my mother, her
eighth child. As their mother was a Princess of Mecklenburg, sister to
Queen Louisa of Prussia, my grandmother and the old Emperor William were
first cousins.
Five years had passed since the death of his first wife, before my
grandfather could be persuaded to think of marrying again, so deeply did
he regret this good and amiable woman, and so happy had he been with
her. But then, hearing so much said in praise of this young niece of
hers, he suddenly determined to see and judge for himself, whether the
good looks and other good qualities with which she was credited, should
seem sufficient to compensate for the slight deafness from which she
suffered. So he set off for Stuttgart incognito, even taking the
precaution to disguise himself and muffle up his face, and watching his
opportunity, he followed the young princess home from church, and
taking up his stand under her window, listened to her conversation with
her companions, in order to find out whether her infirmity prevented her
taking part in it to advantage. Her beauty and grace so enchanted him,
his mind was made up at once, and throwing off the muffler that
concealed his features, he stepped forth in full view of the astonished
little group. There was a cry of--“Uncle Wilhelm!” from some of the
young people, and then the next moment the intruder had vanished, as
quickly as he came, only to re-appear a little later with all due
formality, in the character of suitor for the hand of the fair young
girl, whom he carried off as his bride. It was no such easy matter for
her, the scarce eighteen-year-old wife, to enter her new home and take
up her position there, in the house in which, but a short time since,
she the young cousin had played, a child herself, with the other
children. Three of these were about her own age; the two elder sons,
Adolphus and Maurice, now almost grown up, and Thérèse, the eldest
daughter, although only fifteen, very much spoilt and very independent,
and too much accustomed to play the part of mistress of the house and
have her own way in everything, to feel disposed to part with these
privileges in favour of anyone else. It was therefore the very greatest
comfort to the youthful stepmother to find herself warmly welcomed by
the youngest member of the family, a real child still, my mother, then a
little girl of five with her long fair hair falling in curls below her
waist. The very warmest affection sprang up at once between them, and
lasted throughout their whole lives.
Grandmamma’s own life had been anything but smooth and untroubled from
her earliest years, and it is no wonder that when she one day later on
sat down to write her recollections, she should have done so under the
title--_Histoire de mes Peines_. Her parents’ married life had been
excessively unhappy; her father having even, in order to rid himself of
a wife he detested, gone to the length on one occasion of actually
hiding a man in her bedroom, and then bursting in upon her followed by
the whole Court, in the hope that his unsuspecting victim’s confusion
might lend her an appearance of guilt! But his diabolical plot fell
through, for, all helpless and defenceless as she was, the poor lady’s
innocence was perfectly evident, and her accuser’s character only too
well known for anyone to put faith in anything he said. It was shortly
after this charming exploit that Prince Paul determined to send his
daughters to school in France. I am not sure when it was exactly,
whether at an earlier or later date, that he gave them into the care of
such an ill-natured governess, that they had to suffer for the rest of
their lives from the effects of her petty tyranny, grandmamma’s deafness
having been caused, she always believed, from her having been forced by
her tormentor to stand sometimes for a couple of hours at a time,
barefoot in her nightdress on the cold stone floor, whilst her sister
Charlotte’s digestion was ruined by her never being allowed to satisfy
the cravings of her healthy young appetite. They were no better off
during their schooldays in France. In the establishment in which their
father placed them, the spirit of the Revolution still prevailed to such
an extent, that everyone of aristocratic birth was looked upon with
suspicion, and as for the title of princess, to bear that was little
less than a crime! So that the poor little Wurtemberg princesses had a
hard time of it, mistrusted and shunned by their schoolfellows, who
refused even to let them join in their games, and played all sorts of
mischievous tricks on them, whilst the governesses for their part vented
their dislike in imposing on them the most unsuitable tasks--even of a
menial description. Not only from grandmamma herself, but also from her
sister, afterwards the Grand Duchess Hélène of Russia, with whom much of
my own girlhood was spent, did I hear all about this. It was she who
told me how often in her sadness and loneliness she would seat herself
on the stairs, to watch the movements of the hands of the big clock
opposite, as if that were her only friend and companion, listening
through the long dreary hours to its melancholy ticking, and counting
the slow monotonous swinging of the pendulum backwards and forwards.
When the sisters returned to the Wurtemberg Court, they were as lonely
as ever, for they had become strangers to everyone, including the King
and Queen, during their exile. But soon, the Emperor Nicholas having
seen the one, asked for her hand in marriage for his brother Michael;
and thus it was that the Princess Charlotte was sent to Russia in
charge of a governess--for she was only fourteen years old--to finish
her education and be received under the name of Hélène into the Orthodox
Church as a preliminary to the wedding.
And so grandmamma was left alone and but for the occasional society of
her two brothers, more forsaken and disconsolate than ever. It was when
she was eighteen, as I have said, that a change came into her life also,
with her marriage. But the husband with whom she entered her new home
was no young man, he was the widower of her aunt, and she had been
accustomed to regard him in the light of an uncle,--one of the older
generation, rather to be respected and looked up to than to be treated
as an equal. So that my grandfather need have been at no pains to
inspire her with awe for his person and frighten her into
submissiveness. However, that there might be no mistake at all as to the
position he intended to assume, the wedding-ceremony was no sooner over,
and the newly-married couple alone in their travelling carriage, than he
proceeded to light his pipe, and closing the windows, smoked hard in her
face for a few hours, just to see if she would venture to remonstrate or
complain! Needless to say, she was too well broken in by a long course
of severity, to dare to utter a word of protest, and it seems to me that
had her husband but known how joyless her youth had hitherto been, he
must have tried rather to cheer her and raise her spirits, than to crush
her still more by the assumption of so brutal an attitude. Unfortunately
in Germany the custom still prevails, of trying to keep women in
subjection. A foolish notion survives among us, that women ought to keep
silence, and thus, while our wiser French neighbours demand of their
women-folk to take the lead in all conversation, which they enliven and
stimulate with their wit and brilliancy, the German on the other hand
expects members of the other sex to be content to listen in silent
admiration, needle in hand, while he holds forth ponderously on whatever
subject he pleases. The natural reaction from this absurd tyranny is a
sort of revolt of womankind, attended by exaggeration in the opposite
direction--a tendency that certainly deprives its adherents of much of
their former grace and charm, whilst it is to be questioned whether
there be any compensating gain in strength. In all this we have
undoubtedly fallen behind our ancestors, for in the old Germanic tribes
not only was the entire rule and management of the household given up to
women, but our rude forefathers also reverenced in them their best
friends and counsellors, priestesses of the hearth and altar, superior
beings in fact. It was only when Roman institutions had the supremacy,
that the contrary opinion came into force, and was carried to the utmost
extremes, it being found convenient to ascribe inferior brain-power to
those who were to be reduced to subjection. I wonder if it never struck
any of the wiseacres who propounded this ludicrous theory, that as the
propagation of the human race can only be carried on by the co-operation
of the female portion, it must, if the latter be in reality so wofully
inferior, necessarily in course of time deteriorate altogether! Surely,
if they were not blinded by their own vanity, each one of these superior
beings must be aware that his first youthful health and physical vigour,
together probably with much of the mental and moral force on which he
prides himself, were in the first instance derived from one of the sex
he so looks down upon, and imbibed with his mother’s milk! What is
strangest of all is that women should so long have put up with being
treated in this manner. Was it that they did not think it worth their
while to protest, that for all these centuries they have smilingly seen
through the unwarrantable pretensions of their husbands, brothers and
sons, calm and confident in their own quiet strength, which must, if
they but chose to put it forth, prevail against irrational blustering?
To me, in any case, it would appear rather a confession of weakness on
the part of some of my sisters, when I hear them clamouring for their
so-called rights. Which of the old Roman legislators was it, who in
helping to frame the laws which press so hardly on our sex, gave it as
his reason, that unless women were firmly kept down, they would soon get
the upper-hand altogether, being, as he had the courage and honesty to
confess--“so much stronger and cleverer than men!”
My mother has very often told me of her joy at the arrival of the pretty
new mamma, who looked so sweet, and took her in her arms so kindly, as
if she felt it a real comfort to find this little one prepared to love
her, and to whom she might try to be a real mother. Not quite as she
would have wished though, as she soon found out, for that would not
have fallen in with my grandfather’s views. He wanted his wife for
himself, and expected her to be constantly in her own rooms awaiting his
good will and pleasure, and not that he should perhaps be told if he
went to look for her there, that she had gone upstairs to the schoolroom
or nursery. It was for this reason that my mother in her turn had to
continue leading a lonely life in her childhood, only seeing her parents
at stated hours, and ever in the greatest dread of her father, who, if
he were annoyed at anything, generally, I regret to say, laid about him
with his riding-whip pretty freely. Such energetic modes of enforcing
obedience or expressing disapproval were already somewhat going out of
fashion in my childhood, and I am glad to think how many children there
now are who have never received a blow, and are wholly free from the
terrorising influences under which earlier generations grew up.
My mother’s first impression of her stepmother was, as I have said, one
of pure enthusiasm. She was old enough to feel the charm of a pretty
face, and to observe the pride her father took in his young wife’s
beauty, and the intense satisfaction he felt in witnessing the
admiration she excited. He was rather fond of teasing his little
daughter with the prospect of very soon finding a husband for her, to
which the little girl would reply quite gravely--“No, I do not mean ever
to get married!” And her father would cast an enquiring glance at his
wife, as if wondering whether she had the air of a victim of the
marriage yoke, to be however promptly reassured by her smile of
unaffected amusement at the child’s ingenuousness. Grandmamma’s first
baby did not live, but she had in course of time four other children,
who were to the little elder sister a source of unfailing delight. She
would amuse them for hours, telling them the most wonderful stories,
which she made up herself, and the little ones simply adored her. For
her own elder brothers my mother had, as I shall have occasion to
relate, an almost passionate attachment. I must speak of them in their
own place, but in this sort of family history, the lives are all so
mixed up together, and have so many points of contact, one must from
time to time let a side-light fall on some, whose turn to be treated at
length has not yet come.
The occasional visits which the terrible Prince Paul paid his daughter
were rather like the explosion of a bomb in the household. As an
instance of the alarm which his presence inspired, my mother used to
relate with amusement the story of her step-mother’s consternation at
finding her one day alone with him for a few minutes, imitating the tone
of commiseration with which she said to her:--“What, all alone, poor
child! Go upstairs and rest!” It was the only time that she ever heard
grandmamma say a word that could imply the slightest dislike to her
father. Her manner towards him was always perfect, and she never
criticised his conduct.
My mother was just fourteen, grandmamma therefore only twenty-seven,
when my grandfather suddenly died. Grandmamma was so inconsolable, that
for the first week she shut herself up in her own room, refusing to see
anyone, and shedding floods of tears. And yet her married life cannot
have been a very cheerful one. What dreary evenings those must have
been, on which her husband came home tired from his shooting, and fell
asleep on the sofa directly after dinner, his wife and daughters not
daring to speak a word, for fear of disturbing his slumbers! Nor was it
perhaps much better, to have at other times to stand the whole evening
beside the billiard-table, looking on at the interminable games he
played with his chamberlains. As for the visits from other Courts, these
were mostly terribly stiff and formal affairs, and if, as was sometimes
the case, the Rhine-steamers bringing the expected guests were delayed,
then it meant several hours of tedious waiting. Standing about waiting
was part of the daily business of Court life, and children were not
spared, they had to do just like the rest. As for asking them if they
were tired or bored, that occurred to nobody; it was the proper thing
and had to be done, and that was enough.
It was only much later that I could at all appreciate what infinite tact
must have been requisite on grandmamma’s part, to enable her, the young
widow with her little children, to take up exactly the right position
towards her stepson, now Duke of Nassau, so little younger than herself.
But her innate sense of the fitness of things pointed out to her exactly
the right line of conduct, and it was with the most perfect womanly
dignity and grace that she settled down at once into the part of the
middle-aged, one might say the elderly woman, which she had decided
should henceforth be hers. She had a stately way of receiving visitors,
nearly always standing, and with the doors on all sides thrown wide
open. Even her doctor was accustomed to stand and talk to her, or else
would walk up and down with her, hat in hand, through the rooms with
their big folding-doors opening one into the other. All this perpetual
living on view as it were, this lack of privacy, seemed to us then
perfectly natural--one is always inclined to take the difficulties in
the lives of others as a matter of course, especially if they themselves
accept them unmurmuringly. So that it never even occurred to me how
frightfully dull and monotonous was the life grandmamma led--just the
same little round of duties and occupations day by day, a drive to the
same spot at the same hour, varied only by a little walk while the
carriage waited for her, and just the same set of people received in
audience over and over again. There could of course never be any
pleasure to her in receiving visitors, on account of her deafness, but
she never let this interfere with the enjoyment of others, and nothing
pleased her so much as to sit, smiling and serene, in the midst of a
crowd of gay and laughing young people, whose words she could not hear,
but whose bright laughing faces enabled her to share in their mirth. It
is in looking back on them now, that such details throw fresh light for
me on the inner meaning of that beautiful and serene, yet in reality
solitary existence, and I reflect on the amount of silent endurance, the
long practice in self-restraint and self-sacrifice, all the
disappointments and disenchantments, by which in the end that appearance
of placid content, of sweet and smiling resignation, had been acquired.
My own happiest hours were those spent with grandmamma. Oh! how we loved
everything about her!--her house,--that pretty house, standing on a hill
covered with rose-trees, so that it was a perfect bower of roses during
the summer months, and inside fragrant the whole year round with the
perfume of the flowers that filled it everywhere! She had at first taken
another house in Wiesbaden, for she insisted on moving from Biebrich
directly after her husband’s death, in order to give up the Castle to
his eldest son, who then had this house built on purpose for her, and in
it she lived the whole of her widowed life. It was called after her the
“Paulinenpalais,” and bore that name still for many years after her
death. But now it has been sold, has passed into other hands, and
retains nothing of the charm that belonged to it in grandmamma’s time.
How well I remember every nook and corner of it, each one endeared to me
by some special association, and with grandmamma’s presence pervading it
all,--the drawing-room we thought so lovely, with its oriental
decorations, in imitation of the Alhambra, and her dear little boudoir,
with its soft blue hangings, and the delicately scented note-paper on
her writing-table, of the special pale green tint she always used, for
the sake of her somewhat weak eyes.
And what lovely fine crochet-work was done by those beautiful hands of
hers, gloved or ungloved. One wore gloves much more in those days, it
was considered a duty to take care of one’s hands, and would have been
condemned as a mark of excessive ill-breeding, to hold out a hand that
was not beautifully cared for, for others to kiss. Very rarely though
did one give one’s hand at all. It is very different now-a-days, when
young princes content themselves with a silent shake of the hand, and
young princesses too find nothing to say, and put it on the ground of
their shyness. My mother knew what it meant to suffer from shyness, she
hardly ever entered the drawing-room in her youth without having shed
tears beforehand, so terrible an ordeal was it to her, but she knew what
would have awaited her had she not at once gone round the circle of
guests speaking to each in turn. Nor did grandmamma’s deafness ever
prevent her from entering into conversation with each person presented
to her, finding the right thing to say to each one, whilst only her
heightened colour betrayed to those who knew her well, the torture it
was to her to go on talking thus, without hearing more than a chance
word here and there of the other’s replies. It was in her drawing-room
that I took unconsciously my first lessons in deportment, her way of
holding a reception seeming to me so gracious and so natural, I felt
that no better model could be found. To me she was invariably of the
most exquisite kindness, but I should never have taken it into my head
to be otherwise than extremely respectful towards her. I was never
happier than when sitting at her feet, playing with the tips of her
delicate tapering fingers, which she left in my clasp, whilst she went
on conversing with the others. Sometimes she took me out for a drive,
and I felt very proud at being alone with her in the carriage. “Sit very
upright,” she used to say, “and then people will think you are
grown-up!”
But the greatest delight of all was to be allowed to be present at
grandmamma’s toilet, to watch her hair being dressed, and see her
arrange her curls, as she always did herself, with her own hands. Her
hair was coiled round at the back, and a piece of black lace hung over
it, and then in the front the mass of soft little curls shaded her
forehead most becomingly, after the fashion of her youth, to which she
always clung. Nor did she ever change the style of her dress, during all
the years of her widowhood. Her dressing-room seemed to me quite a
little sanctuary, so dainty and sweet, with the delicious smell of the
rose-water she used to bathe her eyes, and all the beautiful
glass-stoppered bottles set out on the toilet-table, and yet there were
no toilet arts or mysteries at all, nothing that need be concealed from
a child’s gaze.
Grandmamma often stayed with us for months together, for my mother and
she were intensely fond of one another, and there was even a great
likeness between them, which was not surprising, as they were first
cousins. She wrote a great deal, had a special facility with her pen,
and many a document for the use of her stepson was drawn up by her.
French she wrote with perhaps even greater ease, always employing that
language for any notes she made for her own reference, for it was of
course the language of her youth, being spoken exclusively at the
German Courts in the old days. My mother also spoke it before she could
speak German, hardly knowing a word of the latter language at the time
of her father’s second marriage.
The year 1848, so full of unrest throughout Europe, did not pass unfelt
in Nassau. My uncle, the Duke, was absent when the revolution broke out,
and an angry mob collected round grandmamma’s palace in Wiesbaden, and
even began piling faggots at every corner, with the evident intention of
setting it on fire. Then when popular excitement was at the highest
pitch, two or three delegates of the revolutionary party came up to
demand of any members of the ducal family the signing of the new
constitution. There was no time for reflection; grandmamma had to sign
the paper herself, and let her son Nicholas, a boy of fourteen, do the
same, and then she took up her stand on the balcony, with what outward
calm she might, but in her heart longing for her stepson to return and
restore order. At last, to her relief, she perceived the plumes of his
helmet on the other side of the square, and soon could recognise him, in
full uniform, making his way quietly on foot through the thickest of the
crowd. He had heard the news of the revolution at Frankfort, and jumping
on the first railway-engine that left, came back with all speed. In her
joy grandmamma waved her handkerchief as a signal, and in a moment, from
all the houses round, whose inmates had been watching the course of
events behind closed windows, countless handkerchiefs were waving also,
notwithstanding the danger of thus attracting to oneself a shot from the
insurgents. There was an anxious pause whilst the Duke came forward to
the edge of the balcony, and leaning over, called down into the crowd
below, in a clear and decided if not very well-pleased tone of
voice,--“The engagement my mother and brother have entered into for me,
I will fulfil!” The last syllable echoing across the square with cutting
emphasis, as I have often been told by those who were present at the
scene.
Nassau was a gem among the states of Germany. There was an alliterative
saying about the sources of the country’s wealth: from _water_, in the
first place, for besides the Rhine flowing through it, there were all
the magnificent mineral and medicinal springs; then its _wine_, the very
best in Germany, and in the whole world! Next, the _woods_, of such
splendid and luxuriant growth, and the home of innumerable _wild_
creatures,--feathered and four-footed game of all sorts! As for _wheat_,
there were corn-fields in abundance, enclosed by fruit trees, whose
branches were drooping with their load; and last, though not least, the
_ways_, those roads for which the land was famous,--the so-called
vicinal ways,--were as good as the finest highways elsewhere. With all
this, rates and taxes were things unknown, in that fortunate country, in
those halcyon days. The state was prosperous, the reigning family
wealthy, and any deficit in the revenue was supplied by the
gaming-tables at Wiesbaden. As these were only open to foreigners,
neither the townspeople nor the innocent countryfolk around were ever
exposed to the temptations and dangers so eloquently set forth in
certain pamphlets. There, the misery of the peasantry is depicted in
moving terms,--honest families reduced to the direst poverty after
losing their little all in the gambling-saloons! But it so happened that
no peasant was ever admitted inside the doors, or had he succeeded in
gaining entrance, he would very speedily have been turned out, before he
had time even to watch the play, much less stake his own money! An
officer in the army seen there would have been immediately cashiered,
nor was access to the tables granted to any magistrate or functionary,
or to anyone belonging to the territory. It is not that I wish to
undertake the defence of gambling, but, apart from the question of its
intrinsic immorality, so much that is erroneous has been written on the
subject and has come to my own notice, that I cannot refrain from
stating here the facts of the case, as they are known to me. For Nassau
it may emphatically be said, that the institution only benefited the
country, very materially adding to its prosperity, without doing it any
harm at all.
On rainy days, our favourite walk was under the arcades, where we
wandered up and down, looking in at the shop windows, that seemed to me
an Eldorado, with all the treasures they displayed. And never shall I
forget my sensations, the day that for the first time I possessed a
whole thaler of my own, to spend as I liked! I drove with grandmamma to
the Arcade, and we got out there, that I might make my purchase. Now I
had long since set my heart on the loveliest little basket, lined with
pink silk, which I had often gazed at with longing eyes, thinking it
quite an unattainable object. “That costs a gulden,” said the
shopkeeper, in answer to my somewhat embarrassed question, for it seemed
to me rather an indelicate thing to ask the price of anything, a feeling
I have not altogether got over to this day. A gulden! my spirits sank.
“Ah! I have only a thaler!” “But that is a great deal too much,” replied
the friendly shopman, with whom I was delighted, as in addition to my
purchase, he handed me back numberless little coins, with which I at
once bought several other charming knicknacks. For I could not tolerate
the idea of taking a single pfennig home with me. To have money in one’s
pocket seemed to me already then a real misfortune, and I have never
changed in that respect. How should one change? Does one not remain the
same from the cradle to the grave? And what a number of pretty little
things I had for my money! Some of them I have to this day, for I could
not bear to part with them, and brought them with me to Roumania.
The year 1856 saw us for the last time all assembled round grandmamma,
in the month of February, to celebrate her forty-fifth birthday. I was
just twelve years old, but already so familiar with the outward signs of
ill-health and sickness, that the change in her appearance at once
astonished and even disquieted me. It was the strange bright patch of
red on each cheek that struck me especially. Her complexion had always
remained brilliant, and her cheeks rosy, but now they were much redder,
and seemed to be encircled by a hard line that made the skin around look
whiter than ever. I think she had also a little dry hacking cough. It
soon became evident that her lungs were attacked, her fits of coughing
were accompanied by hemorrhage, and the doctors pronounced her to be in
a decline. We saw but little of my mother that spring and summer, as she
was constantly in Wiesbaden, the invalid always asking for her, and
liking no other nursing so well as hers. Already early in July it was
announced that there was no longer any hope, and my mother, whose
perpetual dread it was that my naturally impulsive nature should gain
more and more the upper hand, counting on the solemn impressions of such
a scene to sober me for life, resolved to take me with her to the
death-bed.
Such an experience was indeed well calculated to damp a child’s high
spirits, and it remains with me as the most vivid recollection of my
youth. For accustomed as I was to sickness and suffering, death I was
yet unacquainted with. And now, all at once, I was to see someone die!
But what a radiant, blissful death that was! The evening before she
passed away, grandmamma seemed positively transfigured. A rapturous
expression was on her face, as she lay there stretching out her arms
towards something that was seen by her alone, and repeating with marked
emphasis the words “at four o’clock!” For many hours we all sat or knelt
round her bed, until at last my mother sent me away to get a little
sleep, promising to have me awakened when the end approached. I stopped
to press my lips once more to the dear wasted hand, and at that
grandmamma opened her eyes, looked at me and smiled, and her lips shaped
themselves as if to give me a kiss. My eyes were running over with
tears, as I stooped over her for that last kiss. Even then, almost in
her death-agony, her natural sweetness and affability never deserted her
for a moment, and as with her failing eyes she caught sight of a doctor
who had been summoned in haste, with one of her own peculiarly graceful
gestures she pointed to a chair by her bedside, begging him to be
seated.
Meanwhile, in the next room, still, in my little dressing-gown I had
thrown myself on a camp-bedstead that had been placed there for anyone
able to snatch a few minutes’ rest, and had fallen into an uneasy sleep,
until a little before four o’clock my mother woke me, everyone thinking
that the end must come then.
In these few hours I found that a great change had taken place,--still
the same hot flush on the cheeks, but the eyes sunken, and without the
slightest look of consciousness, and her breath coming in short quick
gasps. I trembled all over. Through the door open into the boudoir
beyond, I could see the old clergyman, Pastor Dilthey, who had
officiated both at my mother’s confirmation and at her marriage, sitting
there in his full canonicals, grave and imposing, waiting to perform the
last solemn rites. The room was left in darkness, only the first rays of
morning stealing in through the closed shutters flickered strangely here
and there, and fell over the old pastor’s silvery hair, making his pale
serious face look still more grave and pale. I watched him from the
doorway, but felt in too great awe to go up and speak to him, so I stole
up quietly to grandmamma’s writing-table, and looked once more at all
the little articles standing on it, with which I had sometimes been
allowed to play and all of which had the scent of the filagree
vinaigrettes she kept among them. The hands of the little clock there
already pointed to four,--when she suddenly began to breathe a little
more freely, and the danger seemed no longer so imminent. We knelt round
her bed, without a sound, except when one or other of her daughters,
unable to control her sobs, was immediately called to order by my mother
lest the calm of the death-bed should be disturbed.
And so the hours passed. I grew more and more tired. Then, between one
and two o’clock that afternoon, a terrific storm broke out. The open
windows banged to and fro, the rain splashed and dashed against the
window-panes, the thunder rolled, and grandmamma’s breath came in fitful
gasps. She could no longer swallow even the few drops of water that were
held to her lips. So the storm raged on, and her breathing grew more
painful and irregular, and I knelt on like the rest at her bedside, when
suddenly I knew no more, all grew dark before my eyes, and I had fallen
forward, my dark curls streaming across my mother’s feet, fast asleep.
Or was it perhaps in reality faintness that had overcome me, and that
then passed into the sound sleep of childhood, worn out as I was with
the unwonted hours of watching and fasting I had gone through? It is
very possible, for I had eaten nothing for the last four-and-twenty
hours, and was exhausted with kneeling and with all the tears I had
shed. When I came to myself again, the storm had spent its fury, the
flashes of lightning were less frequent, the thunder only went on
rumbling in the distance, the rain had stopped, and a ray of sunshine
streamed into the room and right across the face of the dying woman,
whose breathing was still slower and feebler. At last, as the big belfry
clocks in the town began to strike the hour, one after the other, there
were still longer pauses between the gasps for breath. I saw then for
the first time what it means to smile from sheer despair. Good old Dr.
Fritze, who had attended grandmamma all her life, and who literally
idolised her, had seated himself on the bed and lifted her in his arms,
to try to ease her breathing a little. When the clocks began striking,
he smiled, and said aloud,--“one more breath!” and then,--“one more!”
And again:--“and just one more!” And after that there was a deathly
silence, whilst the old Black Forest clock above her head struck four.
Her daughters hid their faces in the pillows to stifle their sobs, and
the deep rich voice of the old pastor rang out in words of solemn
prayer. Then the head of the family, the Duke of Nassau, rose to his
feet, and stretching out his hand across the sleeping form, called on
his brother and sisters to unite with him in the vow, that her dear
memory should hold them together in all things henceforth, just as if
she were still living in their midst. Their tears fell fast over the
still white face, so unmoved in death, as they joined hands with him in
answer to his appeal. The one daughter, the Princess of Waldeck, was so
beside herself with grief, that it took all my mother’s firmness to
enable her to regain her composure, the latter being indeed a tower of
strength to them all in that sad hour.
After a little while we were all sent away, in order that the laying out
of the corpse might be attended to, before too great rigidity should
have set in, and once more I became sadly conscious of the shortcomings
of human nature, at least in my own person, as the pangs of hunger began
to assert themselves, after this prolonged fast. It was perhaps not very
astonishing, considering my youth, that I should have been able to enjoy
even at such a moment the repast which was now provided for me, but I
felt terribly ashamed of myself, above all that the servants waiting on
me should see me eating with such hearty appetite, and I wondered if
everyone thought me very hard-hearted! Had I not fallen asleep just at
the wrong moment too? I felt thoroughly small, and there was no one to
comfort me with the assurance that it was not my heart that was in
fault, but only my poor little body demanding its rights!
In the one drawing-room, that which was known as the “sisters’-room,” as
it had specially belonged to my aunts, three beds were put up, and here
my mother and I were to sleep together with her youngest sister, for the
house was so overfull that proper accommodation was wanting, the
dining-room, the largest room of all, being converted into a _chapelle
ardente_. Of this last detail I knew nothing. I had been so simply
brought up, the ways of a Court were unfamiliar and even quite
distasteful to me. Next morning I was up betimes, and without disturbing
anyone I crept out into the garden, taking with me the first tablecloth
that came to hand, and this I filled with all the roses I could gather,
fresh fragrant roses, still wet with dew, to take to grandmamma. Without
a word to anyone, I made my way upstairs very softly to her room, and
began placing my roses in a big garland round her. I did not feel at all
afraid at first, but in course of time the intense stillness began to
affect me, so that I was quite glad when Fräulein von Preen,
grandmamma’s lady-in-waiting, came into the room with one or two of the
maids and helped me to arrange my flowers. The day passed slowly,
chiefly taken up with giving orders for mourning, bonnets of the correct
shape, with the point coming very low down on the forehead, and long
crape veils, falling right over the heavy folds of the black woollen
dresses with their long trains. I too was to have a little black woollen
dress, and that made me sadder than ever, it seemed to me such a
melancholy garb. The following morning I again got up as early as
possible, feeling rather impatient to see my aunt go on sleeping so
soundly, for she was never an early riser, and had not yet made up for
the rest she had lost. But I hardly knew what to do with myself, having
been told that I could not go to see grandmamma to-day, and I turned and
twisted about restlessly in the room. All at once I caught sight of a
sheet of grandmamma’s own special pale green note-paper, with something
written on it in her hand-writing, lying on a table. Young as I was, I
quite understood that one must not read every paper one sees lying
about, my mother never even opened a letter addressed to me, so as to
set me the example of the respect due to private correspondence. But
this paper lay spread wide open for every one to see, and was evidently
not a letter at all, that much was clear to me, notwithstanding my
short-sight. It was certainly allowable, I told myself, to look at dear
grandmamma’s hand-writing once more. It turned out to be a translation
of some English verses,--a poem of Longfellow’s, which is known to
everybody, but with which I first made acquaintance then, through the
medium of grandmamma’s German version. The first verse of the original
runs:
The day is cold, and dark, and dreary,
It rains, and the rain is never weary;
The vine still clings to the mouldering wall,
And at every gust the dead leaves fall,
And the day is dark and dreary.
Quick as thought I had made a copy of the verses, and leaving the paper
where I found it, I was reading my treasure through once more when my
aunt awoke and called her sister, and it was only then that I noticed
that my mother must have been up and dressed before me, as she had
already left the room. Thrusting my beloved verses back in my pocket, I
softly approached my aunt’s bedside, wishing her good morning.--“Good
morning!” she replied, continuing with a sigh:--“to-day is my
birthday!”--“Oh!” I said, and could find no more to say. I felt
perfectly well how unkind and unfeeling I must appear, I quite
understood how tragic it was for her, to celebrate her eighteenth
birthday beside her mother’s open coffin, I was simply choking with
affection and sympathy--but I could not get out a single word to express
what I felt. And what indeed could a small child say to help and
console! Myself I had just found great comfort in those beautiful
verses, and I longed to show her these, but was not quite sure whether I
had done right in copying them, and so my poor aunt and I just went on
looking at one another in silence, when fortunately my mother came in,
breaking the ice with the warmth of her presence, and, finding exactly
the right thing to say, in the fewest words possible, as she folded her
sister in her arms. I withdrew, very quietly, leaving them together, and
that was perhaps the only sensible thing that I did, or could have done,
under the circumstances.
The next few days were the most gloomy and depressing of all, with the
lying in state in the _chapelle ardente_, in which grandmamma seemed to
have become something so distant and removed from me, all shrouded in
lace, and with tapers burning round her, high up and scarcely to be seen
from the steps of the catafalque on which we could only kneel and
pray--no longer my own dear grandmamma round whom I might strew roses,
but something cold and strange, and far-off, at which crowds came to
stare--a mere show! I wanted to think of her still as I had seen her
the evening before her death, glorified, as it were, and already
belonging to that other and better world, on the threshold of which she
stood; it was on this picture my thoughts loved to dwell, and on the
memory of her last kiss, and of the magnificent storm which raged while
she was drawing her last breath. Everything that had come afterwards was
dull and commonplace in comparison--a pageant, out of which the
loftiness and sanctification had departed! Out of this chilling
atmosphere I withdrew then more and more into myself, cherishing these
sacred recollections, and above all musing over my priceless treasure,
the poem I had discovered, and which seemed to me like a message from
grandmamma herself; so much must the words have meant to her, I fancied
I could hear her voice speaking through them; and so little heed did I
in consequence pay to what was going on around me, that of the actual
funeral ceremonies, at some portion of which in any case I must have
been present, I have no remembrance at all. I must have passed through
it all as if in a dream, and there is altogether a blank in my mind
concerning it.
Aunt Sophie, the youngest sister of my mother, returned with us to
Monrepos, and took up her abode with us for a time. She became
betrothed, still in her deep mourning, to the Prince of Sweden, who
suddenly made his appearance in our midst, I could not at all make out
why. And I was just as much puzzled to know why, one evening when my
aunt and Fräulein von Bunsen were playing Haydn’s “Seven Words from the
Cross,” as arranged by Neukomm for piano and organ, the prince should
so persistently have kept his eyes fixed on my aunt, who was only
playing the piano, whilst as everyone knows, the organ, which Fräulein
von Bunsen was playing, is the far more important part! He, however,
never took his gaze off my aunt, who certainly looked very interesting
with her well cut profile thrown up by the long black veil. Later on I
understood a little better what it meant, after I had heard him sing
“Adelaïde” to my aunt’s accompaniment, with all the power of his fine
tenor voice, and with a fervour of expression which I have never heard
since.
Life seemed to go on again then just as before, only dear grandmamma’s
place was empty. I remember too, being present when the question of her
tombstone was being discussed. It had been her especial desire, not to
be put inside a vault, but to be buried under the open sky, and it
seemed to me that it was a very poor way of carrying out her wish, if
after all a great heavy stone monument were to be raised above her, on
which no flowers could ever grow, nor the sunshine and the rains of
heaven penetrate it. Only of course my opinion was not asked, and I kept
it to myself, not at all convinced by the explanation given, that the
grave, if left open to the sky, and not covered by any sort of
tombstone, would in course of time look very neglected and uncared for.
What a much better plan it were, to keep the houses, or at any rate the
rooms, which people have lived in, sacred to their memory, by leaving
them just as they were when they inhabited them, filled with the spirit
of the past! That would be a true and living monument, and would speak
with far greater eloquence than all the epitaphs and inscriptions, so
soon effaced and forgotten.
With regard to myself, my mother had certainly accomplished the purpose
she had in view, perhaps even more fully than she had intended, my
natural tendency to melancholy, which seldom showed itself on the
surface, being fostered and encouraged by events of such gravity. The
poetic impulse grew stronger, but was kept just as secret as all the
rest of my inner life. I was always writing verses, trying my hand even
at a novel, and now to all the old ideals stirring confusedly within me,
new visions from without came flashing across my brain, suggested by the
scenes of death and mourning I had just passed through. I saw again the
dimly lighted chamber, the first rays of dawn stealing through upon the
silvery hair and motionless form of the old pastor, and playing over all
the inanimate objects, that seemed to take no part in what was going on.
And yet--had not her own little clock stood still at the hour of four?
_That_ then had known and understood! But I told no one my impressions
and sensations, my deepest and strongest feelings I had ever been
accustomed to keep to myself, it being impossible to me to overcome the
reserve that, unfortunately for me, accompanied so highly-strung and
impulsive a temperament. The effort to unlock my soul would have cost me
too much, and I felt instinctively that to impart its tumult, even had I
been able to do so, would have been by no means a welcome proceeding to
those around me. It was all too strong, too wild, too violent. So I
shut myself up as before, and went on living in a world of my own, very
much more true and real, it seemed to me, than the outer world, in which
most of my fellow-creatures were content to live.
Before the year was over, my father’s mother was also dead. But I had
never known her,--her mind had been affected for many years, and none of
us ever saw her. So that I could not mourn for her, as for the
grandmamma I had known and loved, and it was to the latter my thoughts
flew back once more, as I knelt beside the coffin of her who had once
ruled, as wife and mother, in the home to which she now only returned
for her last long slumber. It was for her I wept again, rather than for
this unknown grandmother, sorrow for whom was also somewhat crushed by
the funeral pomp and ceremony. It left me merely a little sadder and
more thoughtful than before, as having had yet another lesson in the
vanity of all earthly things.