Produced by Charles Bowen, from page scans provided by the Web Archive
Transcriber's Notes:
1. Page scan source:
http://www.archive.org/details/chiefjusticenove00franiala
2. The diphthong oe is represented by [oe].
Heinemann's International Library.
EDITOR'S NOTE.
There is nothing in which the Anglo-Saxon world differs more from the
world of the Continent of Europe than in its fiction. English readers
are accustomed to satisfy their curiosity with English novels, and it
is rarely indeed that we turn aside to learn something of the interior
life of those other countries the exterior scenery of which is often so
familiar to us. We climb the Alps, but are content to know nothing of
the pastoral romances of Switzerland. We steam in and out of the
picturesque fjords of Norway, but never guess what deep speculation
into life and morals is made by the novelists of that sparsely peopled
but richly endowed nation. We stroll across the courts of the Alhambra,
we are listlessly rowed upon Venetian canals and Lombard lakes, we
hasten by night through the roaring factories of Belgium; but we never
pause to inquire whether there is now flourishing a Spanish, an
Italian, a Flemish school of fiction. Of Russian novels we have lately
been taught to become partly aware, but we do not ask ourselves whether
Poland may not possess a Dostoieffsky and Portugal a Tolstoi.
Yet, as a matter of fact, there is no European country that has
not, within the last half-century, felt the dew of revival on the
threshing-floor of its worn-out schools of romance. Everywhere there
has been shown by young men, endowed with a talent for narrative, a
vigorous determination to devote themselves to a vivid and sympathetic
interpretation of nature and of man. In almost every language, too,
this movement has tended to display itself more and more in the
direction of what is reported and less of what is created. Fancy has
seemed to these young novelists a poorer thing than observation; the
world of dreams fainter than the world of men. They have not been
occupied mainly with what might be or what should be, but with what is,
and, in spite of all their shortcomings, they have combined to produce
a series of pictures of existing society in each of their several
countries such as cannot fail to form an archive of documents
invaluable to futurity.
But to us they should be still more valuable. To travel in a foreign
country is but to touch its surface. Under the guidance of a novelist
of genius we penetrate to the secrets of a nation, and talk the very
language of its citizens. We may go to Normandy summer after summer and
know less of the manner of life that proceeds under those gnarled
orchards of apple-blossom than we learn from one tale of Guy de
Maupassant's. The present series is intended to be a guide to the inner
geography of Europe. It presents to our readers a series of spiritual
Baedekers and Murrays. It will endeavour to keep pace with every truly
characteristic and vigorous expression of the novelist's art in each of
the principal European countries, presenting what is quite new if it is
also good, side by side with what is old, if it has not hitherto been
presented to our public. That will be selected which gives with most
freshness and variety the different aspects of continental feeling, the
only limits of selection being that a book shall be, on the one hand,
amusing, and, on the other, wholesome.
One difficulty which must be frankly faced is that of subject. Life is
now treated in fiction by every race but our own with singular candour.
The novelists of the Lutheran North are not more fully emancipated from
prejudice in this respect than the novelists of the Catholic South.
Everywhere in Europe a novel is looked upon now as an impersonal work,
from which the writer, as a mere observer, stands aloof, neither
blaming nor applauding. Continental fiction has learned to exclude, in
the main, from among the subjects of its attention, all but those facts
which are of common experience, and thus the novelists have determined
to disdain nothing and to repudiate nothing which is common to
humanity; much is freely discussed, even in the novels of Holland and
of Denmark, which our race is apt to treat with a much more gingerly
discretion. It is not difficult, however, we believe--it is certainly
not impossible--to discard all which may justly give offence, and yet
to offer to an English public as many of the masterpieces of European
fiction as we can ever hope to see included in this library. It will be
the endeavour of the editor to search on all hands and in all languages
for such books as combine the greatest literary value with the most
curious and amusing qualities of manner and matter.
EDMUND GOSSE.
THE CHIEF JUSTICE
THE
Chief Justice
A NOVEL
BY
EMIL FRANZOS
TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN
BY
MILES CORBET
LONDON
WILLIAM HEINEMANN
1890
[_All rights reserved_]
INTRODUCTION.
The remote Austrian province of Galicia has, in our generation,
produced two of the most original of modern novelists, Leopold von
Sacher-Masoch and Karl Emil Franzos. The latter, who is the author of
the volume here presented to English readers, was born on the 25th of
October 1848, just over the frontier, in a ranger's house in the midst
of one of the vast forests of Russian Podolia. His father, a Polish
Jew, was the district doctor of the town of Czorskow, in Galicia, where
the boy received his first lessons in literature from his German
mother. In 1858 Franzos was sent, on the death of his father, to the
German College at Czernowitz; at the age of fourteen, according to the
published accounts of his life, he was left entirely to his own
resources, and gained a precarious livelihood by teaching. After
various attempts at making a path for himself in science and in law,
and finding that his being a Jew stood in the way of a professional
career, he turned, as so many German Israelites have done before and
since, to journalism, first in Vienna, then at Pesth, then in Vienna
again, where he still continues to reside.
In 1876 Franzos published his first book, two volumes entitled _Aus
Halb-Asia_ ("From Semi-Asia"), a series of ethnological studies on the
peoples of Galicia, Bukowina, South Russia, and Roumania, whom he
described as in a twilight of semi-barbaric darkness, not wholly in the
sunshine of Europe. This was followed in 1878 by _Vom Don zur Donau_
("From the Don to the Danube"), a similar series of studies in
ethnography. Meanwhile, in _Die Juden von Barnow_ ("The Jews of
Barnow"), 1877, he had published his first collection of tales drawn
from his early experience. He followed it in 1879 by _Junge Liebe_
("Young Love"), two short stories, "Brown Rosa" and "Brandenegg's
Cousins," extremely romantic in character, and written in an elaborate
and somewhat extravagant style. These volumes achieved a great and
instant success.
The succeeding novels of Franzos have been numerous, and unequal in
value. _Moschko von Parma_, 1880, was a pathetic study of the
vicissitudes of a young Jewish soldier in the wars. In the same year
Franzos published _Die Hexe_ ("The Witch"). The best known of his
writings in this country is _Ein Kampf um's Recht_ ("A Battle for the
Right"), 1882, which was published in English, with an Introduction by
Mr. George MacDonald, and attracted the favourable, and even
enthusiastic, notice of Mr. Gladstone. _Der Praesident_, which is here
translated, appeared in Germany in 1884.
EDMUND GOSSE.
THE CHIEF JUSTICE.
CHAPTER I.
In the Higher Court of Bolosch, an important Germano-Slavonic town of
northern Austria, there sat as Chief Justice some thirty years ago, one
of the bravest and best of those men on whom true justice might
hopefully rely in that sorely tried land.
Charles Victor, Baron von Sendlingen, as he may be called in this
record of his fate, was the last descendant of a very ancient and
meritorious race which could trace its origin to a collateral branch of
the Franconian Emperors, and which had once upon a time possessed rich
lands and mines on the shores of the Woerther See: now indeed by reason
of an adverse fate and the love of splendour of some of its scions,
there had gradually come to be nothing left of all this save a series
of high sounding titles. But the decline of fame and influence had not
kept pace with the loss of lands and wealth; the Sendlingens had
entered the service of the Hapsburgs and in the last two hundred years
had given the Austrian Hereditary Dominions not only several brave
generals, but an almost unbroken line of administrators and guardians
of Justice. And so, although they were entirely dependent on their
slender official salaries, they were reckoned with good reason among
the first families of the Empire, and a Sendlingen might from his
cradle count upon the office of Chief Justice of one of the Higher
Courts. Even unkind envy, to say nothing of honest report, was obliged
to admit that these hereditary patricians of Justice had always shown
themselves worthy of their sacred office, and just as they regularly
inherited certain physical characteristics--great stature, bright eyes
and coal-black curly hair--so also gifted intellects, iron industry and
a sense of duty which often enough bordered on self-denial, were always
theirs. "The majesty of the Law is the most sacred majesty on earth."
Thus spake the first of this family who had entered the service of the
Imperial Courts of Justice, the Baron Victor Amadeus, Chief Judge of
the Vienna Senate, in answer to an irregular demand of Ferdinand the
Catholic, and his descendants held fast to the maxim in good days and
evil, even in those worst days when Themis threatened, in this country
also, to sink to the level of the venal mistress of Princes. The
greatest of the Hapsburgs, Joseph II., knew how to value this at its
right worth, and although he much disliked hereditary offices, he on
this account appointed the Baron Charles Victor, in spite of his youth,
as his father's successor in one of the most important offices of the
State.
This was the grandfather of that Sendlingen whose story is to be told
here, a powerful man of unusual strength of will who had again raised
the reputation of the family to a most flourishing condition. But
although everything went so well with him, the dearest wish of his
heart was not to be realized: he was not to transmit office and
reputation to his son. This son, Franz Victor, our hero's father, had
to pass his life wretchedly in an insignificant position, the only one
among the Sendlingens who went to his grave in mature years, unrenowned
and indeed despised.
This fate had not overtaken him through lack of ability or industry. He
too proved himself a true son of this admirable race; gifted,
persevering, thorough, devoted heart and soul to his studies and his
official duties. But a youthful escapade had embroiled him in the
beginning of his career with father and relations: a girl of the lower
orders, the daughter of the concierge at the Courts where his father
presided, had become dear to him and in a moment of passion he had
betrayed her. When the girl could no longer conceal the consequences of
her fault, she went and threw herself at the feet of the Chief Justice
imploring him to protect her from her parent's wrath. The old man could
hardly contain his agony of indignation, but he summoned his son and
having heard from his lips the truth of the accusation, he resolved the
matter by saying: "The wedding will take place next Sunday. A
Sendlingen may be thoughtless, he must never be a scoundrel." They were
married without show and in complete secresy, and at once started for a
little spot in the Tyrolean mountains whither Baron von Sendlingen had
caused his son and heir to be transferred.
This event made a tremendous sensation. For the first time a Sendlingen
had married out of his rank, the daughter of a menial too, and
constrained to it by his father! People hardly knew how to decide which
of the two, father or son, had sinned most against the dignity of the
family; similar affairs were usually settled by the nobles of the land
in all secresy and without leaving a stain on their genealogical tree.
Even Kaiser Franz, although his opinions about morality were so rigid,
once signified something of the kind to the honourable old judge, but
he received the same answer as was given to his son. The embittered old
man was indeed equally steadfast in maintaining a complete severance of
the bonds between him and his only son; the letters which every mail
from the Tyrol brought, were left unopened, and even in his last
illness he would not suffer the outcast to be recalled.
After the death of the Judge, his son came to be completely forgotten:
only occasionally his aristocratic relations used to recount with a
shrug of the shoulders, that they had again been obliged to return a
letter of this insolent fellow to the place where it came from.
Nevertheless they learnt the contents of these letters from a
good-natured old aunt: they told of the death of his first child, then
of the birth of a boy whom he had called after his grandfather, and
while he obstinately kept silence about the happiness or unhappiness of
his marriage, he more and more urgently begged for deliverance from the
God-forsaken corner of the globe in which he languished and for
promotion to a worthier post.
Although the only person who read these letters was, with all her pity,
unable to help him, he never grew weary of writing. The tone of his
letters became year by year more bitter and despairing, and whereas he
had at first asked for special favours, he now fiercely demanded the
cessation of these hostile intrigues. Perhaps the embittered man was
unjust to his relations in making this reproach,--they seemed in no
way to concern themselves about him whether to his interest or his
injury--, but he really was badly treated, and leaving out the
influence of his name, he was not even able to obtain what he might
have expected according to the regulations of the service. An excellent
judge of exemplary industry, he was forced to continue for years in
this Tyrolean wilderness until at length, one day, he was promoted to a
judgeship on the Klagenfurth Circuit. But he was not long able to enjoy
his improved position: bitter repentance and the struggle with
wretchedness had prematurely undermined his strength. He died, soon
after his wife, and his last concern on earth was an imploring prayer
to his relations to adopt his boy.
This prayer would perhaps not have been necessary to secure the orphan
that sympathy which his much-to-be-pitied father had in vain sought to
obtain for himself. Charles Victor, now fourteen years of age, was
carried off in a sort of triumph and brought to Vienna: even the
Emperor gratefully remembered the faithful services which this noble
house had for centuries rendered to his throne, and he caused its last
surviving male to be educated at his expense in the Academy of Maria
Theresa.
The beautiful, slender boy won the sympathies of his natural guardians
by his mere appearance, the serious expression peculiar to his family
and his surprising resemblance to his grandfather; excellent gifts, a
quiet, steady love of work and a self-contained, manly sweetness of
disposition, made him dear to both his masters and his comrades. He was
the best scholar at the Academy, and he justified the hopes which he
had aroused by the brilliant success of his legal studies. But his
eagerness to obtain a knowledge of the world and to see foreign
countries was equally great, and the modest fortune left him by his
grandfather made the fulfilment of these desires possible. When, being
of age, he returned to Austria and entered on his legal duties, it
needed no particular insight to prophesy a rapid advancement in his
career.
In fact after a brief term of office as judge-advocate in the Eastern
provinces, he was transferred to Bohemia, and shortly afterwards
married a beautiful, proud girl who had been much sought after, a
daughter of one of the most important Counts of the Empire. Nobody was
surprised that the lucky man had also this good luck, but the marriage
remained childless. This only served to unite the stately pair more
closely to one another, and this wedded love and the judge's triumphs
on the Bench and in the world of letters, sufficed to fully occupy his
life. His treatises on criminal law were among the best of the kind,
and the practical nature of his judgments obtained for him the
reputation of one of the most thorough and sagacious judges of Austria.
And so it was more owing to his services than to the influence attached
to the name and associations of this remarkable man, that he succeeded
in scaling by leaps and bounds that ladder of advancement on the lowest
rung of which, his unfortunate father had remained in life-long
torture. As early as in his fortieth year he had obtained the important
and honourable position of Chief Justice of Bolosch.
The stormy times in which he lived served as a good test of his
character and abilities. The fierce flames of 1848 had been
extinguished and from the ruins rose the exhalation of countless
political trials. Those were sad days, making the strongest demands on
the independence of a Judge, and many an honest but weak man became the
compliant servant of the Authorities. The Chief Justice von Sendlingen,
a member of the oldest nobility, bound to the Imperial House by ties of
personal gratitude, related by marriage to the leaders of the reaction,
was nevertheless not one of the weak and cowardly judges; just as in
that stormy year he had boldly confessed his loyalty to the Emperor, so
now he showed that Justice was not to be abased to an instrument of
political revenge. This boldness was indeed not without danger; his
brother-in-law stormed, his wife was in tears; first warnings, then
threats, rained in upon him, but he kept his course unmoved, acting as
his sense of justice bade him. If those in authority did not actually
interfere with him, he owed this entirely to his past services, which
had made him almost indispensable. The methods of administering justice
were constantly changed, juries were empanelled and then dismissed, the
regulations of the Courts were repeatedly altered: everywhere there
were cases in arrear, and confusion and uncertainty.
The Bolosch Circuit was one of the few exceptions. The Chief Justice
remained unmolested by the ministry, and the citizens honoured him as
the embodiment of Justice, and lawyers as the ornament of their
profession.
Respected throughout the whole Empire, he was in his immediate circle
the object of almost idolatrous love. And certainly the personal
characteristics of this stately and serious man with his almost
youthful beauty, were enough to justify this feeling. He was gentle but
determined; dignified but affectionate: faithful in the extreme to
duty, and yet no stickler for forms.
When his wife died suddenly in 1850, the sympathetic love and
veneration of all were manifested in the most touching manner. He felt
the loss keenly, but only his best friend, Dr. George Berger, learnt
how deep was the wound. This Dr. Berger was one of the most respected
barristers of the town, and in spite of the difference of their
political convictions--Berger was a Radical--he enjoyed an almost
fraternal intimacy with Sendlingen. This faithful friend did what he
could for the lonely Judge; and his best helper in the work of sympathy
was his sense of duty which forbade a weak surrender to sorrow. He
gradually became quiet and composed again, and some premature grey
hairs at the temples alone showed how exceedingly he had suffered.
In the midst of the regular work of his profession--it was in May,
1850--he was surprised by a laconic command from the Minister of
Justice ordering him forthwith to surrender the conduct of his Court to
the Judge next him in position, von Werner, and to be in Vienna within
three days. This news caused general amazement; the reactionary party
was growing stronger, and it was thought that this sudden call might
mean the commencement of an inquiry into the conduct of this true but
independent Judge. He himself was prepared for the worst, but his
friend Berger took a more hopeful view; rudeness, he said, had become
the fashion again in Vienna, and perhaps something good was in store
for him.
This supposition proved correct; the Minister wished the assistance of
the learned specialist in drawing up a new Statute for the
administration of Justice. The Commission of Inquiry, originally called
for two months, continued its deliberations till the autumn. It was not
till the beginning of November that Sendlingen started for home, having
received as a mark of the Minister's gratitude the nomination as Chief
Justice of the Higher Court at Pfalicz, a post which he was to enter
upon in four months.
This was a brilliant and unexampled appointment for one of his years,
but the thought of leaving the much-loved circle of his labours made
him sorrowful. And this feeling was increased when the citizens
testified by a public reception at the station, how greatly they were
rejoiced at his return. His lonely dwelling too had been decorated by a
friendly hand, as also the Courts of Justice. He found it difficult to
announce his departure in answer to the speech of welcome delivered by
his Deputy. And indeed his announcement was received with exclamations
of regret and amazement, and it was only by degrees that his auditors
sufficiently recovered themselves to congratulate their beloved chief.
Only one of them did so with a really happy heart, his Deputy, von
Werner, an old, industrious if not very gifted official, who now
likewise saw a certain hope of promotion. With a pleased smile, the
little weazened man followed Sendlingen into his chambers in order to
give him an account of the judicial proceedings of the last six months.
Herr von Werner was a sworn enemy of all oral reports, and had
therefore not only prepared two beautifully drawn-up lists of the civil
and criminal trials, but had written a memorial which he now read out
by way of introduction.
Sendlingen listened patiently to this lengthy document. But when Werner
was going to take up the lists with the same intention, the Chief
Justice with a pleasant smile anticipated him.
"We will look through them together," he said, and began with the
criminal list. It contained the name, age and calling of the accused,
the date of their gaol-delivery, their crime, as well as the present
position of the trial.
"There are more arrears than I expected," he said with some surprise.
"But the number of crimes has unfortunately greatly increased,"
objected Herr von Werner, zealously. "Especially the cases of
child-murder."
"You are right." Sendlingen glanced through the columns specifying the
crimes and then remained plunged in deep thought.
"The number is nearly double," he resumed. "And it is not only here,
but in the whole Empire, that this horrible phenomenon is evident! The
Minister of Justice complained of it to me with much concern."
"But what else could one expect?" cried old Werner. "This accursed
Revolution has undermined all discipline, morals and religion! And then
the leniency with which these inhuman women are treated--why it is
years since the death-sentence has been carried out in a case of
child-murder."
"That will unfortunately soon be changed," answered Sendlingen in a
troubled tone. "The Minister of Justice thinks as you do, and would
like an immediate example to be made. It is unfortunate, I repeat, and
not only because, from principle, I am an opponent of the theory of
deterring by fear. Of all social evils this can least of all be cured
by the hangman. And if it is so rank nowadays, I do not think the
reason is to be found where you and His Excellency seek it, but in the
sudden impoverishment, the uncertainty of circumstances and the
brutality which, everywhere and always, follow upon a great war. The
true physicians are the political economist, the priest and the
schoolmaster!... Or have you ever perhaps known of a case among
educated people?"
"Oh certainly!" answered Herr von Werner importantly. "I have, as it
happens, to preside to-morrow,--that is to say unless you will take the
case--at the conclusion of a trial against a criminal of that class; at
least she must be well-educated as she was governess in the house of a
Countess. See here--Case No. 19 on the list." He pointed with his
finger to the place.
Then a dreadful thing happened. Hardly had Sendlingen glanced at the
name which Werner indicated, than he uttered a hollow choking cry, a
cry of deadly anguish. His face was livid, his features were distorted
by an expression of unutterable terror, his eyes started out of their
sockets and stared in a sort of fascination at the list before him.
"Great Heavens!" cried Werner, himself much alarmed, as he seized his
chief's hand. "What is the matter with you? Do you know this girl?"
Sendlingen made no reply. He closed his eyes, rested both arms on the
table and tried to rise. But his limbs refused to support him, and he
sank down in his chair like one in a faint.
"Water! Help!" cried Werner, making for the bell.
A movement of Sendlingen's stopped him. "It is nothing," he gasped with
white lips and parched throat. "An attack of my heart disease. It has
lately--become--much worse."
"Oh!" cried Werner with genuine sympathy. "I never even suspected this
before. Everybody thought you were in the best of health. What do the
doctors say?"
Again there was no answer. Breathing with difficulty, livid, his head
sunk on his breast, his eyes closed, Sendlingen lay back in his chair.
And when he raised his eyelids Werner met such a hopeless, despairing
look, that the old gentleman involuntarily started back.
"May I," he began timidly, "call a doctor----"
"No!" Sendlingen's refusal was almost angry. Again he attempted to rise
and this time he succeeded.
"Thank you," he said feebly. "I must have frightened you. I am better
now and shall soon be quite well."
"But you are going home?"
"Why should I? I will rest in this comfortable chair for half an hour
and then, my dear colleague, I shall be quite at your service again."
The old gentleman departed but not without hesitation: even he was
really attached to Sendlingen. The other officials also received the
news of this attack with genuine regret, especially as Werner several
times repeated in his important manner:
"Any external cause is quite out of the question, gentlemen, quite out
of the question. We were just quietly talking about judicial matters.
Ah, heart disease is treacherous, gentlemen, very treacherous."
Hardly had the door closed, when Sendlingen sank down in his chair,
drew the lists towards him and again stared at that particular spot
with a look on his face as if his sentence of death was written there.
The entry read thus: "Victorine Lippert. Born 25th January 1834 at
Radautz in the Bukowina. Governess. Child-murder. Transferred here from
the District Court at Goelotz on the 17th June 1852. Confessed. Trial to
be concluded 8th November 1852."
The column headed "sentence" was still empty.
"Death!" he muttered. "Death!" he repeated, loud and shrill, and a
shudder ran through his every fibre.
He sank back and hid his face which had suddenly become wasted.
"O my God!" he groaned. "I dare not let her die--her blood would cry
out against me, against me only."
And he drew the paper towards him again and stared at the entry,
piteously and beseechingly, as though he expected a miracle from
Heaven, as though the letters must change beneath the intensity of his
gaze.
The mid-day bells of the neighbouring cathedral aroused him from his
gloomy brooding. He rose, smoothed his disarranged hair, forced on his
accustomed look of quiet, and betook himself to Werner's room.
"You see," he said. "I have kept my word and am all right again. Are
there any pressing matters to be rid of?"
"Only one," answered Werner. "The Committee of Discipline has waited
your return, as it did not wish to decide an important case without
you."
"Good, summon the Committee for five o'clock today."
He now went the round of the other offices, answered the anxious
inquiries with the assurance that he was quite well again, and then
went down a long corridor to his own quarters which were in another
wing of the large building.
His step was still elastic, his face pale but almost cheerful. Not
until he had given his servant orders to admit nobody, not even his
friend Berger, and until he had bolted his study-door, did he sink down
and then give himself up, without restraint, to the fury of a wild,
despairing agony.