What a universal joy of the people could now ring and roar, for a space
of eight days, from one frontier of the land to the other! For so long
was the public sorrow suspended; the bells sounded for something better
than a march to the grave; music was again allowed to all musical
clocks and people; all theatres would have been opened, had there been
one there, or had the court been shut up, which was a continual
play-house; and now one could walk and visit and promulgate decrees in
high places, without the black border. By and by, when this refreshing
interlude was over, during which one enjoyed orchestra, punch, and
cakes, they were to go back again with the more zest to weeping and
tragedies.
On the morning of the tedious procession of carriages going forth to
form the escort, the Prince rode out beforehand over the limits, with
Bouverot and Albano,--all three as being the only people in the land
who were independent and uninterested in the festival. Poor Luigi! I
have already very distinctly stated, in the first volume of "Titan,"
that the princely bridegroom who to-day mounts the bridal bed can only
be a father of his _country_, not father of a family. Under the heaven
of his princely throne, as on the first row of the chess-field, all is
to be made and regenerated,--officers, even the queen of chess, but not
the Schach[2] himself. It were to be wished, since the circumstance
makes the festival shade into the ridiculous, that the bridegroom could
only, by way of shaming many _old_ families that laugh at him,--old so
often, even in the heraldic and medical sense at once,--show them some
dozen of the princes ranged around the nuptial altar, whom he has
seated in Calabria, Wales, Asturia, in _Dauphiny_,--all Europe was a
Dauphiny to him,--in short, in so many _active_[3] hereditary
lands,--that is, the heirs, not heirlooms, of foreign princes. Could he
do that, then would he look more contentedly into this day's
congratulations, because some dozen fulfilments would be already
standing by, and awaiting his nod. But as the Marchioness of Exeter can
transform the bed of the Marquis in London, which costs three thousand
pounds, into a throne, so must the Princess also do with hers, without
being able, like her, to reverse the transformation.
I will therefore introduce and lead him out on the dancing-floor of
to-day's joy, not at all as bridegroom, but, in every instance,--just
as we speak of the crown without the crowned head,--merely as
Bridegroom's-coat, so as not to make him ridiculous. Albano rode along
with a breast full of indignation, scorn, and pity beside this victim
of dark state policy, and simply could not comprehend how it was that
Luigi did not send the German gentleman, that hired axe and uprooter of
his family tree, with one kick far behind him howling. Good youth! a
prince more easily sets himself free from men whom he loves, than from
such as he has full long hated; for his fear is stronger than his love.
The great-hearted, never narrow-chested, always broad-breasted youth
found to-day, in his solemn, painful frame of mind, everything
tragical, noble and ignoble, greater than it was. He showed, indeed,
only a fiery eye and animated countenance, because he was too young and
modest to make a display of personal grief; but beneath the eye, which
was fixed on the spot of blue in the heavens where his dark clouds were
this day to break away or fall upon him, stood the glistening
tear-drop. The coming evening, into which he had so often looked as
into a hell, and full as often as into a heaven, stood now, as a
confused medium between the two, so near,--ah, hard by him! A throng of
kindred feelings attended him to the (in his opinion unhappy) bride
of--his father and this prince.
A quarter of a mile the other side of Hohenfliess might already be seen
jogging on her _Gibbon_, well known among all natural historians--not
among the politicians--by the long arms which this owner of the
Moluccas and Ape notoriously carries. "Where is my Gibbon?" the
Princess usually asked (even supposing she had in her hand, at the
moment, the English namesake,--the historian with long nails and short
sentences against the Christians) when she wanted her Longimanus.
At last she came prancing along--all plumed and in riding-habit--on the
finest English steed,--a tall, majestic figure, who, indifferent to her
court-retinue, although freighted with relatives, would much rather
have looked a welcome to the blue morning sun behind a rearing horse's
and swan's neck. She gave the Bridegroom's-coat with propriety greeting
and kiss, but neither with emotion nor dissimulation nor embarrassment,
but freely and frankly and cordially, too far exalted above the
ridiculousness of her genealogical disproportion to do otherwise; yes,
even above every thought of that disproportion which necessity or
tyranny created. In her otherwise fairly built--rather than finely
drawn--face, her nose alone was not so, but angularly cut and
presenting more bones than cartilage in contrast to the commonplace
character of regents. With women, marked, irregular noses, e. g. with
deep indenture of the bridge, or with concave or convex archings, or
with _facettes_ at the knob, &c., signify far more for talent than with
men; and--except in the case of a few whom I myself have seen--beauty
must always sacrifice something to genius, although not so much as
afterward the genius of others sacrifices to beauty, as we men in
general have, unfortunately perhaps, done.
The Count was presented to the Princess; she had not known
him,--although she had heard of him and seen his father so long,--but
had rather fancied him to resemble the Bridegroom's-coat. The coat
could not--or should not--have failed to be flattered by this blooming
likeness. The likeness entirely explains the beautiful interest which
she now must needs take in both, because it always takes a couple of
people to make a resemblance.
She spoke with the son without any embarrassment about the Knight of
the Fleece having been presented by her and her Court with a (flower-)
basket,[4] and extolled his knowledge of art. "Art," said she, "makes
in the end all lands alike and agreeable. When that is once had, one
thinks of nothing further. At Dresden, in the inner gallery, I really
believed I was in joyous Italy. Yes, if one should go to Italy itself,
one would forget even Italy in the midst of all that one finds there."
Albano answered, "I know, I too shall one day intoxicate myself with
the old wine of art, and glow under it; but for the present it is to me
merely a beautiful, blooming vineyard, whose powers I certainly know
beforehand, without as yet feeling them." The Princess won his esteem
so exceedingly, that he put the question to her, when the Prince, a few
steps onward, was surveying from the window the swelling flood of the
Pestitz escort, how the German ceremonies of her rank struck her
artistic taste. "Tell me," said she, lightly, "what station among us
has not full as many, and where, in the whole range of situations, do
not priests and advocates play their part? Just look for once at the
marriages of the imperial cities. The Germans are herein no better nor
worse than any other nation, old or new, wild or polished. Think of
Louis Fourteenth. Once for all, such is man; but I do not, of course,
respect him for that."
The Prince reminded them now of the hour of march; and the Princess
mustered together, by way of attiring herself for the grand _entrée_,
more, dressing-maids and toilet-boxes than Albano, according to her
words, or we, according to the cartilages of her nose,--which seemed
spiritual wing-bones,--should have expected. Her hurrying people
followed her with more dread than reverence for her rank or character;
and some, who occasionally ran by out of the dressing-chamber, had
downcast faces.
At last she appeared again, but much fairer than before. There must
surely belong to the manliest woman more charming womanliness than we
think, since such a one gains by female finery, by which the most
effeminate man would only lose. "Rank," said she to Albano, showing a
great candor in opinions, which easily consists with a quite as great
reserve in emotions, "oppresses and confines a great soul oftentimes
less than sex." Her calling herself a great soul could not but strike
the Count, because he now saw before him the first example--another man
knows innumerable examples--of the fact, that distinguished women
praise themselves outright, and far more than distinguished men.
The grand movement began. On a boundary bridge, which, like the
printer's hyphen, was at once sign of separation and of connection
between the two principalities, half Hohenfliess already sat halting in
carriages and on horseback, until an upset, shabby old vehicle, with
village comedians, could be raised again on the fourth wheel, and the
mythological household furniture which they had in hand packed in. But
when the Princess made her way by main force on to the bridge, suddenly
passengers and packers converted themselves into muses, gods of music,
gods of love, and a pretty little Hymen, and, in theatrical decoration
and apparatus, flooded the encircled bride with their poetic effusions,
representing the war of the other gods against the virgin-stealer
Hymen. The son of the muses who had versified the matter acted a part
himself, as father of the muses. I dare say that this original
invention of the Minister was very favorably received, as well by
Haarhaar as by Hohenfliess.
Froulay, all prinked and powdered, as if he were stretching himself out
on the bed of state between funeral-gueridons,[5] marched out before
her as spokesman of the country, which wished to testify its happy
participation in her marriage to the Bridegroom's-coat. The Princess
abridged and clipped short all festal lying with a fine pair of ladies'
scissors.
Froulay had, among other carriages, brought with him also one
containing several trumpeters and kettle-drummers, levied from all
quarters, in which, for joke's sake, Schoppe stood, too, who did not
often stay away from great processions of men, for this reason, because
men never looked more ridiculous than when they did anything in mass
and multitude. By way of bringing salt to the solemnities, he set up in
his carriage the hypothesis that they were doing all this merely, with
the best intention, for the sake of driving the bride back again to
where she had come from, partly by way of sparing her the sham- and
stage-marriage, partly by way of sparing the land the new court-state.
Her ear, he assumed, when the cannon drawn up on the surrounding hills
mingled with the trumpeting of his thunder-car, and three postmasters,
with fifteen postilions, who had not been posted there _for nothing_,
with their best horns and lungs, blew their horns at the same
moment,--her ear must be very much tortured, and she somewhat repelled,
by such a welcome. Hence they even send empty state-coaches with the
rest, just for the sake of the rattling, even as, in the province of
Anspach, the farmer, merely by frightful screaming, without ammunition
or dogs, drives the stags from his crops.[6] As ships do in the fog by
lanterns and drums, so would states fain keep themselves apart by
illumination and firing.
She still, however, I see, moves onward, said he, on the
way,--sometimes taking into his hands with profit the diphthong of the
kettle-drum,--and we must all accordingly follow after; but perhaps her
ear is already dead, and she is now only to be come at through the eye.
In this hope he was exceedingly delighted with the dapple uniform of
the assembled officers and feather scarecrows of the court-liveries.
Now there is still to come, he predicted, joyfully, the gold-spangled,
triumphal arch, with vases and pipers, through which she must directly
pass; and do not people scare away sparrows from the cherry trees,
then, with gold leaf and Selzer pitchers?
O, thought he, when she was through, if that Gothic tyrant suffered
himself to be led back from his plundering expedition into holy Rome by
the suppliant procession of the Pope that came to meet him, then
certainly it must prevail with her, when the orphan children in the
suburbs come imploringly to meet her with their foster-father, then
the schoolmasters with their pages, then the gymnasium and the
university,--all which, however, to be sure, is only a skirmish with
the outposts; for the gate is occupied with infantry, the whole market
with citizens capable of bearing arms, the cathedral is guarded by the
clergy, the council-house by the magistracy, all ready, if she does not
turn back, to march after her at a certain distance, as police-patrol
and choirs of observation; and are there not seven bridal couples
stationed at the palace-gate, as seven prayers and penitential psalms?
and do they not bring to meet her--upon a pillory of satin, quite
unconscious of the effect--a dismal Pereat-Carmen[7] composed by
myself, a decree of the 19th June?
All right! said he, when the whole train, by way of affording an
easier inspection to the powers and principalities clustered at the
palace-windows, rode twice through the palace-yard; this double dose
must take hold. Schoppe's hopes were farthest from falling when he
found that, because it was gala, they kept themselves up-stairs long
concealed and silent; and at length the Prince, as victor, but
exhausted, was brought down by court-cavaliers into the chapel, in
order publicly to give thanks for the retreat of the hostile forces.
Nay, when presently the bride, too, pressed after, held back, however,
by the arms of chamberlains,--even drawn back by her court-dames
holding her train,--then could the Librarian easily afford to dismiss
all anxiety.
Albano's tossing soul imaged the confused court world as still more
wild and misshapen than it was. He heard the princely cousins, even the
future successor to chair and throne, wish their cousin Luigi health, a
happy marriage, and sequel thereto, although they, through their
friend,--a living succession-poison,[8]--had caused so much of these
three things to be taken away from him that they could assign him
precisely their cold-blooded kinswoman as crown-guard of their next
succession. He heard the same marriage-songs from all court Pestitzers,
who, like a muscle, manifested a special effort to make themselves
short. He saw how lightly, coldly, and with what malicious pleasure,
the Prince, although with the feeling that he should soon drown in his
dropsy, his water or fat in the limbs, carried off all the lies. O,
must not princes themselves lie, because they are eternally cheated?
themselves learn to flatter, because they are forever flattered? He
himself could not bring himself to cast so much as the smallest mite of
a lying congratulation into the general treasury of lies.
The Princess flung the Count--as often as it would do, and almost
oftener--two or three looks or words; for this blooming one, among the
throne-coasters, from whom one more easily hears an echo than an
answer, was reminded only of his powerful father. The Captain--who,
like all enthusiasts, and like moths and crickets, loved _warmth_ and
shunned _light_, and because all people of mere understanding were
tedious to him--complained several times to Albano, that the Princess
displeased him with her cold, witty understanding; but the Count--out
of regard for the beloved of his father, and out of hatred toward her
sacrificial priests and butchers--could only pity a being, who perhaps
must hate now, because her greatest love had set. How many noble women,
who would otherwise have held it a higher thing to admire than to be
admired, have become powerful, rich in knowledge, almost great, but
unhappy and coquettish and cold, because they found only a pair of
arms, but no heart between them, and because their ardently devoted
souls met with no likeness of themselves, by which a woman means an
unlike image, namely one higher than her own! Then the tree with its
frozen blossoms stands there in autumn high, broad, green, and fresh,
and dark with foliage, but with empty, fruitless twigs.
At last they came out of the sweltry dining-halls into the fresh
evening of Lilar, into the open air and freedom. Half indignant, half
bewildered with love, Albano went to meet a veiled hour, in which so
many a riddle and his dearest one were to be solved. What does man see
before him, when with the thread in his hand he steps out of the
subterranean labyrinth? Nothing but the open entrances into other
labyrinths, and the choice among them is his only wish.