mourning. "You need not go to school, if you don't want to," said
his father. "If you don't want"--that was acknowledgment that he had
a will of his own. Then came aunts, cousins, relations, nurses, old
servants, and all called down blessings on the dead. All offered their
help in making the mourning clothes--there were four small and three
elder children. Young girls sat by the sickly light that fell through
the sheeted windows and sewed, while they conversed in undertones. That
was melancholy, and the period of mourning brought a whole chain of
peculiar experiences with it. Never had the boy been the object of so
much sympathy, never had he felt so many warm hands stretched out, nor
heard so many friendly words.
On the next Sunday his father read a sermon of Wallin's on the text
"Our friend is not dead, but she sleeps." With what extraordinary faith
he took these words literally, and how well he understood how to open
the wounds and heal them again! "She is not dead, but she sleeps,"
he repeated cheerfully. The mother really slept there in the cold
anteroom, and no one expected to see her awake.
The time of burial approached; the place for the grave was bought.
His father's sister-in-law helped to sew the suits of mourning; she
sewed and sewed, the old mother of seven penniless children, the once
rich burgher's wife, sewed for the children of the marriage which her
husband had cursed.
One day she stood up and asked her brother-in-law to speak with her
privately. She whispered with him in a corner of the room. The two old
people embraced each other and wept. Then John's father told them that
their mother would be laid in their uncle's family grave. This was a
much-admired monument in the new churchyard, which consisted of an iron
pillar surmounted by an urn. The boys knew that this was an honour for
their mother, but they did not understand that by her burial there a
family quarrel had been extinguished, and justice done after her death
to a good and conscientious woman who had been despised because she
became a mother before her marriage.
Now all was peace and reconciliation in the house, and they vied with
one another in acts of friendliness. They looked frankly at each other,
avoided anything that might cause disturbance, and anticipated each
other's wishes.
Then came the day of the funeral. When the coffin had been screwed
down and was carried through the hall, which was filled with mourners
dressed in black, one of John's little sisters began to cry and flung
herself in his arms. He took her up and pressed her to himself, as
though he were her mother and wished to protect her. When he felt how
her trembling little body clung close to him, he grew conscious of a
strength which he had not felt for a long time. Comfortless himself he
could bestow comfort, and as he quieted the child he himself grew calm.
The black coffin and the crowd of people had frightened her--that was
all; for the smaller children hardly missed their mother; they did
not weep for her, and had soon forgotten her. The tie between mother
and child is not formed so quickly, but only through long personal
acquaintance. John's real sense of loss hardly lasted for a quarter
of a year. He mourned for her indeed a long time, but that was more
because he wished to continue in that mood, though it was only an
expression of his natural melancholy, which had taken the special form
of mourning for his mother.
After the funeral there followed a long summer of leisure and freedom.
John occupied two rooms with his eldest brother, who did not return
from business till the evening. His father was out the whole day,
and when they met they were silent. They had laid aside enmity, but
intimacy was impossible. John was now his own master; he came and
went, and did what he liked. His father's housekeeper was sympathetic
with him, and they never quarrelled. He avoided intercourse with his
school-fellows, shut himself in his room, smoked, read, and meditated.
He had always heard that knowledge was the best thing, a capital fund
which could not be lost, and which afforded a footing, however low
one might sink in the social scale. He had a mania for explaining
and knowing everything. He had seen his eldest brother's drawings and
heard them praised. In school he had drawn only geometrical figures.
Accordingly, he wished to draw, and in the Christmas holidays he copied
with furious diligence all his brother's drawings. The last in the
collection was a horse. When he had finished it, and saw that it was
unsatisfactory, he had done with drawing.
All the children except John could play some instrument. He heard
scales and practising on the piano, violin, and violoncello, so that
music was spoiled for him and became a nuisance, like the church-bells
had formerly been. He would have gladly played, but he did not wish
to practise scales. He took pieces of music when no one was looking
and played them--as might be supposed--very badly, but it pleased him.
As a compensation for his vanity, he determined to learn technically
the pieces which his sisters played, so that he surpassed them in the
knowledge of musical technique. Once they wanted someone to copy the
music of the _Zauberflöte_ arranged for a quartette. John offered to do
so.
"Can you copy notes?" he was asked.
"I'll try," he said.
He practised copying for a couple of days, and then copied out the four
parts. It was a long, tedious piece of work, and he nearly gave it up,
but finally completed it. His copy was certainly inaccurate in places,
but it was usable. He had no rest till he had learned to know all the
varieties of plants included in the Stockholm Flora. When he had done
so he dropped the subject. A botanical excursion afforded him no more
interest; roamings through the country showed him nothing new. He could
not find any plant which he did not know. He also knew the few minerals
which were to be found, and had an entomological collection. He could
distinguish birds by their notes, their feathers, and their eggs. But
all these were only outward phenomena, mere names for things, which
soon lost their interest. He wanted to reach what lay behind them. He
used to be blamed for his destructiveness, for he broke toys, watches,
and everything that fell into his hands. Accidently he heard in the
Academy of Sciences a lecture on Chemistry and Physics, accompanied by
experiments. The unusual instruments and apparatus fascinated him. The
Professor was a magician, but one who explained how the miracles took
place. This was a novelty for him, and he wished himself to penetrate
these secrets.
He talked with his father about his new hobby, and the latter, who
had himself studied electricity in his youth, lent him books from
his bookcase--Fock's _Physics_, Girardin's _Chemistry_, Figuier's
_Discoveries and Inventions_, and the _Chemical Technology_ of Nyblæus.
In the attic was also a galvanic battery constructed on the old
Daniellian copper and zinc system. This he got hold of when he was
twelve years old, and made so many experiments with sulphuric acid as
to ruin handkerchiefs, napkins, and clothes. After he had galvanised
everything which seemed a suitable object, he laid this hobby also
aside. During the summer he took up privately the study of chemistry
with enthusiasm. But he did not wish to carry out the experiments
described in the text-book; he wished to make discoveries. He had
neither money nor any chemical apparatus, but that did not hinder him.
He had a temperament which must carry out its projects in spite of
every difficulty, and on the spot. This was still more the case, since
he had become his own master, after his mother's death. When he played
chess, he directed his plan of campaign against his opponent's king.
He went on recklessly, without thinking of defending himself, sometimes
gained the victory by sheer recklessness, but frequently also lost the
game.
"If I had had one move more, you would have been checkmated," he said
on such occasions.
"Yes, but you hadn't, and therefore _you_ are checkmated," was the
answer.
When he wished to open a locked drawer, and the key was not at hand, he
took the tongs and broke the lock, so that, together with its screws,
it came loose from the wood.
"Why did you break the lock?" they asked.
"Because I wished to get at the drawer."
This impetuosity revealed a certain pertinacity, but the latter only
lasted while the fit was on him. For example: On one occasion he wished
to make an electric machine. In the attic he found a spinning-wheel.
From it he broke off whatever he did not need, and wanted to replace
the wheel with a round pane of glass. He found a double window, and
with a splinter of quartz cut a pane out. But it had to be round and
have a whole in the middle. With a key he knocked off one splinter of
glass after another, each not larger than a grain of sand, this took
him several days, but at last he had made the pane round. But how was
he to make a hole in it? He contrived a bow-drill. In order to get
the bow, he broke an umbrella, took a piece of whale-bone out, and
with that and a violin-string made his bow. Then he rubbed the glass
with the splinter of quartz, wetted it with turpentine, and bored. But
he saw no result. Then he lost patience and reflection, and tried to
finish the job with a piece of cracking-coal. The pane of glass split
in two. Then he threw himself, weak, exhausted, hopeless, on the bed.
His vexation was intensified by a consciousness of poverty. If he had
only had money. He walked up and down before Spolander's shop in the
Vesterlanggata and looked at the various sets of chemical apparatus
there displayed. He would have gladly ascertained their price, but
dared not go in. What would have been the good? His father gave him no
money.
When he had recovered from this failure, he wanted to make what no one
has made hitherto, and no one can make--a machine to exhibit "perpetual
motion." His father had told him that for a long time past a reward
had been offered to anyone who should invent this impossibility. This
tempted him. He constructed a waterfall with a "Hero's fountain,"[1]
which worked a pump; the waterfall was to set the pump in motion, and
the pump was to draw up the water again out of the "Hero's fountain."
He had again to make a raid on the attic. After he had broken
everything possible in order to collect material, he began his work. A
coffee-making machine had to serve as a pipe; a soda-water machine as a
reservoir; a chest of drawers furnished planks and wood; a bird-cage,
iron wire; and so on. The day of testing it came. Then the housekeeper
asked him if he would go with his brothers and sisters to their
mother's grave. "No," he said, "he had no time." Whether his conscience
now smote him, and spoiled his work, or whether he was nervous--anyhow,
it was a failure. Then he took the whole apparatus, without trying to
put right what was wrong in it, and hurled it against the tiled stove.
There lay the work, on which so many useful things had been wasted, and
a good while later on the ruin was discovered in the attic. He received
a reproof, but that had no longer an effect on him.
In order to have his revenge at home, where he was despised on
account of his unfortunate experiments, he made some explosions with
detonating gas, and contrived a Leyden jar. For this he took the skin
of a dead black cat which he had found on the Observatory Hill and
brought home in his pocket-handkerchief. One night, when his eldest
brother and he came home from a concert, they could find no matches,
and did not wish to wake anyone. John hunted up some sulphuric acid and
zinc, produced hydrogen, procured a flame by means of the electricity
conductor, and lighted the lamp. This established his reputation as a
scientific chemist. He also manufactured matches like those made at
Jönkoping. Then he laid chemistry aside for a time.
His father's bookshelves contained a small collection of books which
were now at his disposal. Here, besides the above-mentioned works on
chemistry and physics, he found books on gardening, an illustrated
natural history, Meyer's _Universum_, a German anatomical treatise with
plates, an illustrated German history of Napoleon, Wallin's, Franzen's,
and Tegner's poems, _Don Quixote_, Frederika Bremer's romances, etc.
Besides books about Indians and the _Thousand and One Nights_, John
had hitherto no acquaintance with pure literature. He had looked into
some romances and found them tedious, especially as they had no
illustrations. But after he had floundered about chemistry and natural
science, he one day paid a visit to the bookcase. He looked into the
poets; here he felt as though he were floating in the air and did not
know where he was. He did not understand it. Then he took Frederika
Bremer's _Pictures from Daily Life._ Here he found domesticity and
didacticism, and put them back. Then he seized hold of a collection
of tales and fairy stories called _Der Jungfrauenturm_. These dealt
with unhappy love, and moved him. But most important of all was the
circumstance that he felt himself an adult with these adult characters.
He understood what they said, and observed that he was no longer a
child. He, too, had been unhappy in love, had suffered and fought, but
he was kept back in the prison of childhood. And now he first became
aware that his soul was in prison. It had long been fledged, but they
had clipped its wings and put it in a cage. Now he sought his father
and wished to talk with him as a comrade, but his father was reserved
and brooded over his sorrow.
In the autumn there came a new throw-back and check for him. He was
ripe for the highest class, but was kept back in the school because
he was too young. He was infuriated. For the second time he was held
fast by the coat when he wished to jump. He felt like an omnibus-horse
continually pressing forward and being as constantly held back. This
lacerated his nerves, weakened his will-power, and laid the foundation
for lack of courage in the future. He never dared to wish anything very
keenly, for he had seen how often his wishes were checked. He wanted to
be industrious and press on, but industry did not help him; he was too
young. No, the school course was too long. It showed the goal in the
distance, but set obstacles in the way of the runners. He had reckoned
on being a student when he was fifteen, but had to wait till he was
eighteen. In his last year, when he saw escape from his prison so near,
another year of punishment was imposed upon him by a rule being passed
that they were to remain in the highest class for two years.
His childhood and youth had been extremely painful; the whole of life
was spoiled for him, and he sought comfort in heaven.
[1] An artificial fountain of water, worked by pressure of air.
VI.
THE SCHOOL OF THE CROSS
Sorrow has the fortunate peculiarity that it preys upon itself. It dies
of starvation. Since it is essentially an interruption of habits, it
can be replaced by new habits. Constituting, as it does, a void, it is
soon filled up by a real "horror vacui."
A twenty-years' marriage had come to an end. A comrade in the battle
against the difficulties of life was lost; a wife, at whose side her
husband had lived, had gone and left behind an old celibate; the
manager of the house had quitted her post. Everything was in confusion.
The small, black-dressed creatures, who moved everywhere like dark
blots in the rooms and in the garden, kept the feeling of loss fresh.
Their father thought they felt forlorn and believed them defenceless.
He often came home from his work in the afternoon and sat alone in a
lime-tree arbour, which looked towards the street. He had his eldest
daughter, a child of seven, on his knee, and the others played at his
feet. John often watched the grey-haired man, with his melancholy,
handsome features, sitting in the green twilight of the arbour. He
could not comfort him, and did not seek his company any more. He
saw the softening of the old man's nature, which he would not have
thought possible before. He watched how his fixed gaze lingered on his
little daughter as though in the childish lines of her face he would
reconstruct in imagination the features of the dead. From his window
John often watched this picture between the stems of the trees down the
long vista of the avenue; it touched him deeply, but he began to fear
for his father, who no longer seemed to be himself.
Six months had passed, when his father one autumn evening came home
with a stranger. He was an elderly man of unusually cheerful aspect.
He joked good-naturedly, was friendly and kindly towards children and
servants, and had an irresistible way of making people laugh. He was
an accountant, had been a school friend of John's father, and was now
discovered to be living in a house close by. The two old men talked
of their youthful recollections, which afforded material to fill the
painful void John's father felt. His stern, set features relaxed, as he
was obliged to laugh at his friend's witty and humorous remarks. After
a week he and the whole family were laughing as only those can who have
wept for a long time. Their friend was a wit of the first water, and
more, could play the violin and guitar, and sing Bellman's[1] songs. A
new atmosphere seemed to pervade the house, new views of things sprang
up, and the melancholy phantoms of the mourning period were dissipated.
The accountant had also known trouble; he had lost his betrothed, and
since then remained a bachelor. Life had not been child's play for him,
but he had taken things as they came.
Soon after John's brother Gustav returned from Paris in uniform, mixing
French words with Swedish in his talk, brisk and cheerful. His father
received him with a kiss on the forehead, and was somewhat depressed
again by the recollection that this son had not been at his mother's
death-bed. But he soon cheered up again and the house grew lively.
Gustav entered his father's business, and the latter had someone now
with whom he could talk on matters which interested him.
One evening, late in autumn, after supper, when the accountant was
present and the company sat together, John's father stood up and
signified his wish to say a few words: "My boys and my friend," he
began, and then announced his intention of giving his little children a
new mother, adding that the time of youthful passion was past for him,
and that only thoughts for the children had led to the resolve to make
Fräulein--his wife.
She was the housekeeper. He made the announcement in a somewhat
authoritative tone, as though he would say, "You have really nothing to
do with it; however, I let you know." Then the housekeeper was fetched
to receive their congratulations, which were hearty on the part of the
accountant, but of a somewhat mixed nature on the part of the three
boys. Two of them had rather an uncomfortable conscience on the matter,
for they had strongly but innocently admired her; but the third,
John, had latterly been on bad terms with her. Which of them was most
embarrassed would be difficult to decide.
There ensued a long pause, during which the youths examined themselves,
mentally settled their accounts, and thought of the possible
consequences of this unexpected event. John must have been the first to
realise what the situation demanded, for he went the same evening into
the nursery straight to the housekeeper. It seemed dark before his eyes
as he repeated the following speech, which he had hastily composed and
learned by heart in his father's fashion:
"Since our relations with each other will hence-forward be on a
different footing," he said, "allow me to ask you to forget the past
and to be friends." This was a prudent utterance, sincerely meant, and
had no _arrière pensée_ behind it. It was also a balancing of accounts
with his father, and the expression of a wish to live harmoniously
together for the future. At noon the next day John's father came up to
his room, thanked him for his kindness towards the housekeeper, and, as
a token of his pleasure at it, gave him a small present, but one which
he had long desired. It was a chemical apparatus. John felt ashamed to
take the present, and made little of his kindness. It was a natural
result of his father's announcement, and a prudent thing to do, but
his father and the housekeeper must have seen in it a good augury for
their wedded happiness. They soon discovered their mistake, which was
naturally laid at the boy's door.
There is no doubt that the old man married again for his children's
sake, but it is also certain that he loved the young woman. And why
should he not? It is nobody's affair except that of the persons
concerned, but it is a fact of constant occurrence, both that widowers
marry again, however galling the bonds of matrimony may have been, and
that they also feel they are committing a breach of trust against the
dead. Dying wives are generally tormented with the thought that the
survivor will marry again.
The two elder brothers took the affair lightly, and accommodated
themselves to it. They regarded their father with veneration, and never
doubted the rightness of what he did. They had never considered that
fatherhood is an accident which may happen to anyone.
But John doubted. He fell into endless disputes with his brothers, and
criticised his father for becoming engaged before the expiration of the
year of mourning. He conjured up his mother's shade, prophesied misery
and ruin, and let himself go to unreasonable lengths.
The brothers' argument was: "We have nothing to do with father's
acts." "It was true," retorted John, "that it was not their business to
judge; still, it concerned them deeply." "Word-catcher!" they replied,
not seeing the distinction.
One evening, when John had come home from school, he saw the house lit
up and heard music and talking. He went to his room in order to study.
The servant came up and said that his father wished him to come down as
there were guests present.
"Who?" asked John.
"The new relations."
John replied that he had no time. Then one of his brothers appeared. He
first abused John, then he begged him to come, saying that he ought to
for his father's sake, even if it were only for a moment; he could soon
go up again.
John said he would consider the matter.
At last he went down; he saw the room full of ladies and gentlemen:
three aunts, a new grandmother, an uncle, a grandfather. The aunts
were young girls. He made a bow in the centre of the room politely but
stiffly.
His father was vexed, but did not wish to show it. He asked John
whether he would have a glass of punch. John took it. Then the old man
asked ironically whether he had really so much work for the school.
John said "Yes," and returned to his room. Here it was cold and dark,
and he could not work when the noise of music and dancing ascended to
him. Then the cook came up to fetch him to supper. He would not have
any. Hungry and angry he paced up and down the room. At intervals he
wanted to go down where it was warm, light, and cheerful, and several
times took hold of the door-handle. But he turned back again, for he
was shy. Timid as he was by nature, this last solitary summer had made
him still more uncivilised. So he went hungry to bed, and considered
himself the most unfortunate creature in the world.
The next day his father came to his room and told him he had not been
honest when he had asked the housekeeper's pardon.
"Pardon!" exclaimed John, "he had nothing to ask pardon for." But
now his father wanted to humble him. "Let him try," thought John to
himself. For a time no obvious attempts were made in that direction,
but John stiffened himself to meet them, when they should come.
One evening his brother was reading by the lamp in the room upstairs.
John asked, "What are you reading?" His brother showed him the title
on the cover; there stood in old black-letter type on a yellow cover
the famous title: _Warning of a Friend of Youth against the most
Dangerous Enemy of Youth_.
"Have you read it?" asked Gustav.
John answered "Yes," and drew back. After Gustav had done reading, he
put the book in his drawer and went downstairs. John opened the drawer
and took out the mysterious work. His eyes glanced over the pages
without venturing to fix on any particular spot. His knees trembled,
his face became bloodless, his pulses froze. He was, then, condemned
to death or lunacy at the age of twenty-five! His spinal marrow and
his brain would disappear, his hair would fall out, his hands would
tremble--it was horrible! And the cure was--Christ! But Christ could
not heal the body, only the soul. The body was condemned to death
at five-and-twenty; the only thing left was to save the soul from
everlasting damnation.