The door was again lockt, and the servant was ordered not to interrupt

their conversation on any account. "I feel," Herr Balthasar then

began, "that I am growing old; I must take thought and provide for the

future, as I know not whether I am doomed to die a slow lingering

death, or a sudden unforeseen one. If I draw up no settlement of my

property, if I die without a will, that spendthrift in my native town,

who has made the beloved of my youth so unhappy, will be my next

natural heir: and verily it appalls me to think that my large fortune

may hereafter be misused to maintain that despicable glutton in his

rioting. All my poor people, all the hands now actively employed in

this spot, would again pine away and be condemned to beggary and

sloth. It is a sacred duty to forestall this. What are your views, my

young friend, for your future life?"

Edward was a good deal embarrast by this address. Some time back

indeed he had formed certain plans, and had even meant to speak to the

old man about them, in the hope of profiting by his experience: but

since his lovely foster-daughter had appeared to him in so different a

light, since he had felt so strongly attracted toward her, he was no

longer equally forward and confident. He could not make up his mind

whether to declare or conceal his affection; for notwithstanding the

familiarity with which Balthasar treated him, by many of the old man's

feelings and views he found himself estranged and perplext.

"You are hesitating," said the old man after a while; "you have not

enough reliance in me, because you do not know me. I look upon it as

one of my duties to provide as a father for you: you are honest,

sensible, diligent, and kind-hearted; you are perfectly verst in the

various branches of my business; and I feel a confidence in you such

as I have seldom been able to put in anybody. Your exertions for me

and my establishments, your prudence and integrity, everything obliges

me, even though I entertained no affection for you, to leave you well

and very richly provided, since I have so much to thank you for. But I

should be glad to know, and I beg you to be perfectly candid to me,

whether you could be prevailed upon by the possession of a large

fortune to fix your abode in this country, in this house, or perhaps

would prefer settling after my death as a rich man in the neighbouring

town, engaging in some other occupation, and marrying, or, it may be,

travelling about in search of the home which you may like the best.

Tell me your thoughts on this subject now with entire sincerity: since

you have a claim, which I will take care shall be a valid one, to a

third of my property, I cannot well make my final arrangements till I

have learnt your intentions: for my establishments here and up the

mountains, my manufactories, machines, mines, and various

institutions, I also look upon as my children, and they must not be

left orphans at my death."

Edward sank still deeper in thought. Never could he have expected this

generosity and fatherly love from the old man; never had it occurred

to him that this friend might one day make him rich and independent.

This speech had changed the footing on which he stood with Herr

Balthasar; he thought he should now be better able to confess boldly

what for some days had been busying and disquieting his mind. He led

the way by an assurance of his gratitude, saying that what the old man

meant to do for him was far too much, that his relations after all had

still a title to his affection, and that a great deal less would make

him happy and as rich as he could desire.

"I am aware of all that you can urge to me on this score," said the

old man interrupting him: "these relations of mine, even the

scapegrace son and the good-for-nothing father, will be taken care of,

so that they shall not have any reasonable ground of complaint. But I

know that you have sacrificed the best years of your youth and

strength to me. To a gay spirit like yours, to a person of your lively

friendly temper, your long residence amid these joyless mountains must

have been anything but pleasant. You many years since bade adieu to

every sort of merriment and amusement: everything that charms youth,

music, dancing, even society, plays, travelling, the literature of the

day, you have given up for my sake; because you resolved, as I well

markt, and that too very early, to suit yourself entirely to my

inclinations. Scarce one man in a thousand could have done this; and

you were this one: you have done it too without losing anything of

your good nature, and kindly obliging disposition. If therefore you

would like to settle elsewhere hereafter and in a totally different

line of life, I cannot have the slightest objection to it, nor will it

occasion the least curtailment of your fortune. But you must tell me

your determination frankly, if you have already made up your mind, or

can make it up on the instant: for in case you choose to remain here

and carry on my business, I must secure you the means of exerting

yourself usefully, by a number of arrangements and explicit

incontrovertible injunctions in my will; therefore speak."

Edward replied with emotion: "Heaven grant you may long remain as a

father amongst us! Whether however I am to look on this country as my

home or no, depends solely upon you: a word from you, and I can

immediately resolve to spend the whole of my life here, even if you

should be spared to us many years longer. But if you cannot or will

not speak that word, I must sooner or later seek out another home; and

I fear that in that case even your noble bequest will fail to procure

me that happiness, which I must needs value higher than riches."

"I don't understand you, my young friend," answered Balthasar; "your

words are a riddle to me."

"Your generosity," continued Edward, "and your affectionate

benevolence have brought up a poor orphan girl; you have behaved like

a father to her; and her fate must therefore be decided by you and

none else. Give me that dear maiden, give me Rose for my wife, and I

will live and die on this mountain, without a wish beyond it."

The old man's face suddenly darkened and put on an expression which

might be called terrific. He started up hastily, walkt several times

up and down the room, then sat down again sighing, and began in a

bitter tone: "So! this is it! You are in love! Is it not so? I am

doomed again to hear this ill-omened, this calamitous word! I am

doomed to witness this frenzy, this dark, heart-rending, heart-sickening

absurdity, even in you, in a man of your sense! And all, all that one

might otherwise esteem, and look upon as reasonable, is swallowed up

in this whirlpool, in which horrour, madness, wild passions, carnal

lust, and capricious folly are frothing and boiling all at once. This

marriage however, Edward, can never, never be."

"I have said too much," answered Edward calmly, "to be satisfied with

a bare refusal. Tell me what are your plans for the dear girl, and I

shall learn to bear them with resignation."

"And she, the little fool!" interposed the old man hastily, "has she

too tumbled in love with you? Has the luckless word already past to

and fro betwixt you?"

"No," replied Edward; "her pure youth is still hovering in that happy

state of simplicity, which only desires that tomorrow may be just like

today and yesterday. She has no wishes but the simple ones of a

child."

"So much the better," said Balthasar; "she will be ready to act

rationally then, and will not throw any hinderance in the way of my

plan. Surely you, who are tolerably well acquainted with me, ought to

have perceived long ago that I had designed the child for Eleazar. I

mean her to marry, to live in sober wedlock, not to dream away and

dote in what you call love."

"And will she," askt Edward, "be happy with him for her husband?"

"Happy!" cried the old man, bursting into a kind of loud laugh;

"happy! What is a man to think of when he hears that word? There is no

happiness; there is no unhappiness; only pain, which we are to welcome

to our arms, only self-contempt, beneath which we must bow our necks,

only hopelessness, which we must make the partner of our table and of

our bed. Everything else is a lie and a trick. Life is a spectre,

before which, whenever I pause to look upon it, I stand shuddering:

and nothing but toil and activity, and straining all my faculties, can

enable me to endure and to despise it. I could envy the loom and the

spinning-jenny, if such a feeling, such a wish had any sense in it:

for what is our consciousness but a consciousness of misery? what is

our existence but an unveiling of the madness, the frenzy of all life?

to which we either abandon ourselves in chill patience, or weep and

struggle against it convulsively, or play through a caricature of

happiness and joy, while in our dreary heart we are fully aware that

it is all a wanton lie."

"Neither then must I ask you," continued Edward quietly and

sorrowfully, "whether you love Eleazar as a friend, whether he is

truly worthy of friendship and esteem; for all freedom of will, every

movement of feeling is crusht by these dark thoughts."

"As if I had not felt," said Balthasar, "and wept and laught, like

other men. The difference is only, that I soon stript truth naked, and

that I acknowledged and felt my own baseness, and that of all mankind,

of the world, and everything in it. Eleazar! he and you! If we are to

make use of such words, my friend, I love you; all the fibres of my

heart twine fast around you; awake and in my dreams you stand before

me: your being miserable might reduce me to despair. And this

raw-boned, loathsome Eleazar! If I am to give a name to this folly of

my nature, I hate him; he is quite nauseous to me, whenever he stands

before my eye or before my imagination: the bile which has tainted his

eyes and face, his squinting glances, the twitches of his nose when he

is speaking, while his long teeth stare out as if he were grinning,

his shrugging up his shoulders at every word, whereby his odious

snuff-coloured coat is every moment dragged upward and lays bare the

skinny bones of his wrists, all this, his way of drawing in his

breath, his hissing voice, is so revolting to my bodily senses, and

always excites my wrath so strongly, so painfully, that no other

created being ever gave me the same torment; and for this very reason,

because there is so much I have to make amends to him for, because

heaven and nature have so utterly neglected him, must he become my

chief heir, my son. Besides he has long known of it, and is pleased

with the prospect of this union."

"I only half understand you," answered Edward: "you are fighting

against your own feelings, you are wilfully putting yourself on the

rack. I am not arguing now against your promise, since you have

already given it to that man: but why do you cling to this image of

life, that harasses and tortures you? Why not open your mind to those

joyous feelings, to those sunny thoughts, which lie just as near, nay

nearer?"

"As you please," said the old man,--"for you, but not for me. Day

after day has taught me that very few men really live. Most of them

are in a state of ceaseless dissipation: nay what they call thought

and reflexion is itself the very same thing, a mere attempt to raise a

mist around the nature and inborn feelings of their hearts, and to

keep themselves from discerning them. And arrogance starts up, the

consciousness of their dignity and strength goads and spurs them on,

till they rave with ungovernable pride. This too I have known in my

youth, and outlived it. Then I loved, as I deemed. How clear and

rosy-hued, how bright and smiling the world lay before me! My heart

too was as it were bathed in pure ether, blue, boundless, with sweet

hope, like morning clouds, floating and scattering freshness through

it. And the primary stock of this love, what is it? Silliness, animal

passion, which intertwines itself with our seemingly tender feelings,

which tricks itself out with blossoms, and then eats canker-like into

them, to make them too shed their leaves, to trample that, which it

called heavenly, in the mire, and--far worse than the comparatively

innocent beasts of the field, that are driven by a blind instinct

without anything of volition--to deface and spoil everything which but

now it worshipt as holy. From this conflagration then shoot forth ever

and anon those disasterous sparks, which again grow into children, and

again awaken to the consciousness of woe, if not of sin. And so the

wheel goes evermore round and round, through a measureless viewless

eternity. And the charm, the beauty of the world! the fresh bloom of

its appearances! Is not everything here again grounded upon that which

nature teaches me to loathe and abhor? It is perhaps by this feeling

alone, as an invisible inward prompter, that I understand what people

mean by beauty. This, wheresoever it is found, in flower or tree, in

human being, animal, or plant, takes its rise always out of filth and

abominations. The lily and the rose falls to pieces in your hand, your

touch withers it, and it leaves only rottenness behind: the youth's,

the virgin's beauty and loveliness--look at it without any

self-imposed illusion, without the brutish sting of the senses--is

horrour and putridity and everything we revolt from! a few hours of

death, a corpse dug out of its tomb, make this woe manifest to

all.--And I myself! what is there within me but death? a ghost and a

skeleton! the stench of my own corpse haunts me; and in all my

feelings there is madness, in all my thoughts despair."

"Cannot religion then," replied Edward, "cannot philosophy, cannot the

sight of the happiness you spread around you, lighten this gloomy

mood, this melancholy, which is wasting your life away?"

"Alas, my dear good friend," continued the old man, "I assure you that

all I have read of those christian anchorets and self-tormentors, who

out of overheated zeal transformed their life into a never-ending

martyrdom, for the sake of stifling every impulse and thought save the

highest of all, is less, far less, than what I have practist on myself

since I became conscious of the cheerlessness of my existence. I too

had once found a home for my whole soul in those regions in which the

faithful feel the presence and the love of the deity, full of

confidence and a blessed serenity. My spirit was transfigured; all my

feelings were purified; my whole nature seemed as it were unfolding

itself in a single blossom; all within me was bliss and calm; and in

this heavenly tranquillity there was a sweet impulse to new

contemplations, a ravishing excitement to plunge yet deeper into the

flood of joy. And what was the end of it?"

"Pray go on," said Edward.

"I discovered,"--thus the old man after a pause resumed his

speech--"that here too sensuality, delusion, and folly, had again made

me their captive. Those voluptuous tears which I often shed in my

seemingly fervent devotion, which I took for the purest gush from my

heart, even they sprang only out of sensuality and a state of bodily

intoxication. My animal impulses had put on the mask of spirit; and

the deliciousness of those tears soon seduced me into endeavouring to

stir up such emotions artificially, into abusing this mysterious close

relation to infinite love as a stimulus of the most refined sensual

excitement, which I then extinguisht in a rapture of tears. I was

appalled by this lie in my soul, when I detected and could no more

deny it; and the fearfullest desolation of despair, the dismallest

solitude of death closed round me again, when the deception had been

broken, and the vision would no more descend among the apish toys of

my imagination. When after this I wisht to pursue my inquiries beneath

the light of truth, horrour itself met me in the very spot where but

now, like a scene-painting, my rapture had been standing. I no longer

felt doubt, for even in this there is still joy; I had no certainty,

for even in the most terrible there is life; but the dead blank of the

uttermost indifference, a barren enmity to everything holy, a scorn of

all emotion, as being sheer foppishness and silliness, lay like a large

field of snow in the wildernesses of my soul.--'Soul! spirit!'--thus

I often cried to myself laughing, and even now I cannot refrain from

laughter,--'can there be anything else? And if this be so, in what

does spirit differ from matter? where is the party wall between life

and death?' In the spectral phantom of life, in the sphinx-born riddle

of being, in that terrific fiat out of which the worlds sprang forth,

to roll convulsively onward and evermore onward, till they can drop

back into rest and nothingness--in this all contradictions and

contrarieties are mixt up and confounded, to petrify into an

indissoluble curse."

Edward was silent at first for a while: then not without emotion he

spake the following words: "I cannot understand what you say except in

part; for the bent of your thoughts and feelings I am an utter

stranger to. Whatever sorrows I have undergone, whatever unprofitable

or cheerless meditations I have indulged in, still I have never

strayed into these deserts, which lie, it would seem, at the horizon

of all such as abandon themselves with too passionate intensity to

captious inquiries. I have heard and read of strong minds, who in the

recklessness of passion, or in the extravagancies of love, strove to

burst the bolts of nature and of life, in order to become one with the

universe and to possess it. Despair, self-loathing, hatred of God,

have often been the doom and the unhappy lot of men thus under the

mastery of their impulses. We feel no doubt that reason is not

absolutely sufficient to reveal all that we wish to understand, to

reconcile all that we wish to see in harmony with the workings of the

deity. But it may be dangerous to seek for help in the regions of our

feelings and imagination, to give ear to our visionary forebodings.

They try to set up their own supremacy, and may easily fall out with

reason, though at the outset they seem to uphold her. If they gain

their aim, and this noble mediatorial power, which seated in the

centre of all our spiritual powers, irradiating and swaying them,

first converts them into true powers, is overthrown and cast into

chains by them, then each of our higher impulses begets a giant as its

son, that will war against God. For doubt, wit, unbelief, and scoffing

are not the only faculties that fight against God: our imagination,

our feelings, our enthusiasm do the same, though at first they seem to

supply faith with so safe and mysterious an asylum. Consequently, my

dear, my honoured friend, since our life is surrounded on all sides by

these dizzying precipices, and every path, whatever course it takes,

leads to them, what remains for us to do, except to trust with a

certain kind of light-heartedness, which perhaps is also one among the

noblest powers of our nature, with cheerfulness, gaiety, and humility,

in the existence and the love of that infinite inexhaustible love, of

that supreme wisdom, which puts on every shape, and can weave into its

woof even what to us seems worthless and incongruous? so as to bear

our life safely and easily, to take pleasure in our task-work, and to

be happy, which we cannot else be, in the midst of affluence itself,

making others happy as far as we are able. Is not this too piety and

religion? I for my part have never met with them under any other

form."

"All this might be so," answered the old man breaking off the

discussion, "if the root of life sprang out of love."

"Does not every flower tell us so?" cried Edward, "every smile of a

child, the meek thankful eye of the sufferer whom we relieve, the

glance of the bride----"

He stopt short suddenly; for Rose's bright childly glance beamed at

these words with all its might through his soul. When he lookt up

again, he was greatly surprised to see his old friend's eyes wet with

tears.

"Edward," said he greatly moved, "you shall know all. Rose is no

adopted child; she is my own daughter, my own blood. Alas! this again

is another deplorable story of human weakness and vanity. While I was

living here alone, a young beautiful girl came as a maid-servant into

my house. Her parents were exceedingly poor, but she had been well and

religiously brought up. She was honest and virtuous. She was so fond

of solitude that, when she had done her work, she used to withdraw

from all society, especially from that of the young. In a very

singular manner she attacht herself to me; her devotion or love had

almost a superstitious character. She revered me, wretch as I am, like

a supernatural being. Never yet had my passions been moved by any

girl, and least of all were they so by her, beautiful as she was: I

was an old man, and fancied I loved her like a father, and thought of

looking out a husband for her. How it happened, I should not be able

to tell you; everything might seem so untrue. She became pregnant. I

had already long felt dismay at my own weakness and meanness. Shame,

despair, dread of the world, waged war within my soul, and made me

their recreant slave. I sent her away in my distress, provided for

her, richly, prodigally; but my heart was turned to stone. Grief,

sadness, doubts in herself and in God, bitter mortification that she

had forfeited my love, or was unworthy of it, while she burst into

fearful accusations against herself, as the most innocent are the

readiest to do, snapt the thread of her life. Had I seduced her? Did I

not really love her? No, a miserable seducer I was not; but I had not

the courage to acknowledge my sin, and to reward the love of her

innocent heart. And thus I was a base wretch. She died, and I regarded

myself with still more hopeless scorn. The poor creature's parents,

whom I placed in comfortable circumstances, blest me, old villain as I

was, for not punishing their daughter's shame, and for bringing up her

child in my house. This child, this fair girl, whom I love, beyond

perhaps what is allowable--for her happiness is my thought day and

night--will now perchance also be sacrificed to woe; for a destiny

stronger than I constrains me to give her to Eleazar as his wife. Go

now to him; he is to be my son-in-law; tell him the wedding will take

place in a week; and if you cannot stay with me afterward, my dearest

Edward, whom I also love as my own son, the fortune I designed for you

shall be paid to you ... and we too shall never meet again. Go now."

* * * * *

He sobbed so violently that he could not say more; and Edward went

away in a most strange state of feeling, to look for Eleazar, who

lived in a house by himself lower down in a narrow valley, carrying on

his favorite pursuits there.

Eleazar was sitting in a loose flame-coloured bed-gown before a small

furnace with a still. The room was but dimly lighted; the curtains had

been let halfway down, and the lower panes were blockt up with large

books. Everything was in the utmost disorder, so that Edward could

scarcely find a place to sit down in. Vials and retorts, crucibles,

pans, hooks, cylinders, and all sorts of chemical instruments were

standing and lying about. A strange vapour from the fire filled the

room. With a surly air Eleazar put down the bellows, and came out of

his corner. He only half heard what Edward had to tell him, and said

at length with his croaking voice: "In a week? so soon? I shall never

have finisht my great work by that time. Could not the old fellow wait

patiently for another month or two? Why the silly child has not even a

notion yet what marriage means."

Edward was utterly disgusted with these peevish words, and with the

heartless ingratitude displayed in them. He called to mind how much

Balthasar had been saying to him about madness as the real groundwork

and substance of life; and it seemed to him as if this were actually

the foundation on which both father and son-in-law were about to erect

their melancholy dwelling. The fate of the innocent girl cut him to

the heart.

"Only lay your request before our master," he said indignantly, "and

no doubt he will allow you to enjoy your freedom some time longer. If

you were to be very pressing, perchance he might even give up the plan

of the marriage altogether; for it seems to me, you have no very

mighty anxiety about Rose's hand."

"Softly!" said Eleazar, throwing off his bed-gown and putting on his

coat very much at his ease; "softly!" He seated himself again before

the furnace, and tasted the liquour while he clarified it: "Be it so;

for then his fortune will all keep together, and thus I shall be able

at length to carry on my operations on a grand scale. But the old man

will never listen to what anybody says; what he has once determined

and pronounced must be fulfilled, though reason itself were to go to

the bottom. Still this should not annoy me a jot, unless that

outlandish raggamuffin had put me out of all patience, and made my

choler boil over. One ought to have the right of knocking such

mischievous scoundrels on the head."

"What is the matter with you?" askt Edward somewhat surprised.

"Have you already forgotten that miserable vagabond," continued

Eleazar with a ferocious look, "who played off his stupid trick upon

us the other day at the forge? I am to die soon. This was the only

thing wanting to set all our affairs in the most dismal confusion. But

here, here at this furnace, I have it already preparing, the only sure

safeguard against all such idle fears; and as I have succeeded with

the help of wisdom in turning unsightly things into gold, so I shall

not fail in producing that elixir for which so many mighty minds have

heretofore sought and laboured, and often in vain."

Edward went nearer to him. "In truth," he exclaimed, "you amaze me.

You talk about these mysterious matters with such a careless security,

as I have never yet met with; and it perplexes me the more since my

reason tells me that your pursuit is a mere chimera, and the discovery

of such an art a fable."

"Reason!" cried the little man, drawing up his withered face into

numberless wrinkles. "This reason methinks is the true chimera, and

never spawned anything but fables. Take these gold bars, which I cast

in this form yesterday, after extracting the metal last week from some

lead: there lies a touchstone; scratch it; and then tell me whether it

is not true genuine gold."

Edward took up the bars, put them to the test, and found them genuine.

"You must either fancy," continued the alchemist, "that I begin by

getting a heap of ducats, and then melt them down like a fool, or else

you cannot have another word to say. Will you keep these two bars as a

remembrance? I make you a present of them."

Edward lookt at the stunted figure with astonishment, then laid down

the bars on the table again, and said: "No, I won't rob you; the

present would be much too valuable. But you should not let these vast

treasures lie about here at random thus mixt up with all the rest of

your things: it is holding out a lure to thieves and robbers."

"Nobody will look for gold in my house," answered the other, busying

himself again at his furnace: "nobody will recognize gold under this

ungainly form. Besides there are means after all for keeping off

thieves and house-breakers, which none of you have ever yet dreamt of.

If however you still doubt me, bring me a dollar next time, make a

secret mark on it, and I will give it you back turned into gold. But

the matter must not go further. And then you will no longer question

my chance of discovering the elixir of life. Only I should like to

punish that beggarly vagrant, that rascally herb-culler, and pitiful

conjuror, as he deserves. Let him only come for once into my quarters!

With all his contemptible jugglery, I would astound him! I am so

enraged with the fellow, the blood runs into my head at the very

thought of him."

"How," interposed Edward, "came that paltry jest to make so deep an

impression upon you?"

"Jest!" screamed Eleazar; "Heavens! is it a jest that I have ever

since been a prey all over to these hellish tortures, this ghastly

fear of death? My own skeleton, my own rotting carcase is standing

perpetually before my eyes. Old Conrad too over yonder has fallen

sick, and is bewailing the loss of his reputation. Such a knave as

this stranger is just as bad as a murderer: nay worse: for he pours

the poison down ones throat in the midst of a large party without

himself risking life or limb." He jumpt up.--"Hark you!" he cried and

threw his arms round Edward: "Yes! the old man is right; the wedding

must be very soon, as soon as possible, tomorrow, aftertomorrow, to

make all safe. I can go on discovering my life-preserving elixir after

the marriage: can't I? One shall not die all at once in a moment,

friend Ned; flesh and bone still keep pretty tightly together."

He laught so loud that he shook with it, and the writhings of his face

squeezed the tears out of his goggle eyes. Edward who had never yet

seen the sullen creature laugh, shuddered at the sight. When the old

man grew calmer, he told him that he could not possibly now

communicate this wish of his to Herr Balthasar; and that the affair

would probably proceed in the way already settled. He felt glad, when

he had left the room and house behind him, and could again breathe in

the open air. His determination to quit the place was stronger than

ever; he even resolved, if it would hasten his journey, to forgo the

great reward which Herr Balthasar intended for him.

* * * * *

After a restless and almost sleepless night, Edward next morning found

the lovely charming girl on the grass plot before the house. She was

very talkative, but he was in no mood to carry on a conversation.

"O dear mister Edward," said Rose at length; "you don't seem to like

me a morsel any more, you are making such sour faces at me."

"I shall soon be forced to leave you and this country," answered the

young man; "and that makes me so sorrowful."

"You be forced! you leave us!" exclaimed Rose in dismay: "Can there be

anything that should force you? Good heavens! it never yet struck me

that such a thing could be possible. I always thought you belonged to

us, just like the great house in which we live, or the steep green

hill facing us."

"I have now heard from your father also, what I could not have

believed, that you are to marry Herr Eleazar, and that very soon."

"Did not I tell you so?" answered Rose: "Ay, ay, that is to be my

fate, and I only wish I could make the crabbed man a little merrier.

Time will pass away terribly slowly with him. But perhaps I shall then

be able to go to the town some time or other, see a bit of the world,

hear some music and have a dance; for I think at all events an old

husband must do something now and then to please his young wife. And

for all these matters I had counted very much upon you."

"No, my child," said Edward gravely and gloomily; "I am the very last

person you must count upon; for to say the truth, this marriage of

yours is the chief reason that forces me to quit the neighbourhood. It

would break my heart to stay here."

Edward repented of having been hurried so far by his passion, as

thoughtlessly to allow these words to escape his lips; the more so,

when he saw the lovely girl go away from him, starting back as if in

affright, and then relieve her opprest heart by a flood of tears. He

tried to take hold of her hand and comfort her; but she pusht his

angrily back, and then said after a while, when she had got the better

of her violent sobbing and was able to speak again: "No, leave me

alone, for we are now separated from each other for ever. I could

never have thought that you would have behaved to me so ill; for you

had always been so kind to me. Oh God! how forlorn I am now! Yes I

meant to love my husband Eleazar with all my heart, and to do

everything to please him; for heaven must grant him thus much, since

he is hated and shunned by all mankind just like a leper or an evil

spirit. I too can't bear him, if I were merely to follow my own

feelings; for he is a thoroughly utterly odious creature. But for his

sake, and out of love to my father, and for your sake too, Edward, I

had made up my mind so peaceably to all this; and therefore I thought

that you too would perhaps be very willing to stay here now, or might

even do so a little for my sake, in case everything was not just as

you wisht it."

"How so, Rose? is it partly for my sake that you have come to this

determination?" askt Edward in amazement.

"O yes!" answered the child, and her eyes had recovered their kind

look; "but now I clearly see that I had reckoned without my host. You

don't deserve it, indeed you don't like that I should be so fond of

you. And now if you are really going away, it will then be indeed a

shocking thing that I am to marry Eleazar: for in this lonely place,

without you to help me and stand by me, he would seem just like a

ghost."

"But how is it possible?"--said Edward interrupting her--

"Let me finish my speech!" exclaimed Rose hastily; "and then I will go

away and cry again; for that will very often be the case now. I

thought thus: if Eleazar is so cross, Edward is so goodnatured; and

now I shall never be a day without seeing him, and he will talk to me,

and perhaps give me books; for my father, people tell me, won't have

so much authority over me when once I am married. In this way I might

be better able to forget my woful husband, and might always think of

you when you were away, and be glad and happy as soon as you came back

to me. For thus do people live, and the parsons all order us to do so,

with our hearts half in heaven, and the other half on this bad earth.

Thus I should have kept my strength and spirits, so as even to make my

unhappy Eleazar more cheerful at times; but if you go away ... then ... oh

where shall I find any comfort! Then I shall soon die ... or only wish

that my father ... or my plague of a husband would make haste and die.

Alas! now that you don't love me any more, I am very very unhappy."

She began crying anew, and still more violently than before. Edward

eyed her for a long time with a searching glance, and lost himself in

a maze of thought. Whenever men, thus he mused to himself, give

themselves up to dark phantoms, and make caprices and extravagancies

the main stock of their life, mishap and horrour will spring up of

their own accord under their feet. Life is so tender and mysterious,

so pliant and volatile, and so easily takes every shape, that there is

no seed it will not readily receive. Evil sprouts up and runs wild in

it; and brings up the intoxicating grape from the nether world, and

the wine of horrour. Here in this childish innocence and simplicity

are already slumbering the germs of the most fearful events and

feelings, if time and opportunity should but forward and ripen them;

and close at my side stands the fiend tempting me to become the

gardener in this beauteous garden of the deadliest fruits.

He awoke from his study and said mournfully; "Dear child, thou dost

not yet understand thyself, thy destiny, or the world. I am not

frivolous enough to enter into thy plans, or to encourage thee in them

in the innocency of thy youth. What thou wishest cannot, must not be;

and in another year, or less perhaps, thou wilt see thyself how

impossible it is. We should both become wretched, and to deepen our

misery should despise each other. May heaven guide thy steps: but I

love and prize thee so much, that I cannot ruin thee. Pray to God: he

will support thee."

"He talks for all the world just like my father!" cried Rose, and

walkt away, half in sorrow, half in anger; while Edward went musing to

his room.

"Is Balthasar right then after all?" he said to himself; "is human

nature so utterly depraved? or is it not rather the business of

energy, resolution, and reason, to transform those very qualities in

us as in all other things into virtues and excellencies, which else if

they are neglected would become malignant and base?"

He then wrote a long letter to Herr Balthasar, and once more told him

positively that he must quit his house and the country, if the

marriage of Eleazar and Rose was irrevocably fixt; and that he would

readily forgo his promist fortune, if Balthasar would only afford him

some degree of support in his plans for his future life. He again

however called upon him as a father to consider the unsuitable, nay

the shocking nature of the projected match. He conjured him to look at

the happiness of his child with a steadier, more impartial eye. At the

same time he begged for another, a last interview, and said he had a

request which the old man must needs grant him, if he would have him

leave the mountains with honour, with peace of mind, and without

repenting of the years he had past there.

* * * * *

It was with a very heavy heart that Edward went to his old master. The

whole destiny of mankind lay darkly and with a crushing weight upon

his breast. Anguishing was the conviction he felt, that in the very

sweetest and purest innocence all the roots of evil and sin were

already lurking, and that there needed only chance and caprice to

foster their growth, for them to put forth their calamitous fruits.

His situation was so completely changed, his chief wish was that the

house which had so long been his home, the country he was become so

fond of, were but far behind him, that gradually and with a steady

hand he might eraze all the recollections of the time he had spent

there. He was resolved that at all events he would not be a witness of

the disasters to which, he was persuaded, the dark spirits brooding

there must infallibly give birth; that he would not stay to behold

them; for he did not feel sure of being so firm, that his own passion

and frailty might not lend a hand in bringing down the impending ruin.

Heartily as at this moment he abhorred such a thought, he yet knew

full well from observation and experience that no man is always the

same, and that even the best are not braced with the same strength at

all hours: he knew how the sophistry of our passions will come athwart

all our good feelings and resolves, and that the more secure they feel

the more easily it trips them up and overthrows them.

He found the old man in a serious mood, but without the agitation he

had feared. "Come and shake hands with me," cried Balthasar as he

entered, "although you choose to leave me. How I shall support your

absence I cannot yet conceive, anymore than I should know how I could

live without light and warmth: but nevertheless I shall be forced to

learn this lesson, if nothing can alter or upset your determination."

"My fatherly friend," Edward began, "can you then persist in your

determination, which to me is so utterly incomprehensible? Is it quite

impossible for you to consent to what alone will make me happy, and

assuredly will make your daughter so too?"

"I had hoped, my dear friend," answered the old man very mildly, "you

would not have toucht on this string again, which thrills far too

painfully through my whole frame. Pray convince yourself that this

long-formed resolution, which you if you please may term a whim, I

cannot possibly revoke; it is much too firmly intertwined with my

whole being. What we do from conviction as we call it, from pondering

about a matter and balancing it first in one scale and then in the

other, over and over again, is seldom worth much. Whatever is

permanent, characteristic, genuine in our nature, is instinct,

prejudice, call it superstition;--a conclusion without question or

inquiry, an act because one cannot help it. Such is this of mine! You

may look upon it as a vow, a solemn oath which I have sworn to myself,

and which I cannot violate without the most atrocious perjury against

my own heart. I owe my poor good Eleazar much amends for having let my

soul entertain and cherish disgust, bitterness, and aversion toward

him for so many years.--And as to the happiness of the pair!--on this

point my opinion is just the reverse of yours. He is wise, sensible,

virtuous; he is happy already, and will keep so, whether he marry or

not. It is an act of condescension in a person of his grave character

to take up with my daughter. A man who has got the philosopher's stone

can never be harmed by any of earth's paltry troubles. And my Rose! O

my dear friend, the truly dreadful thing would be, if I were to give

her to you to wife: this being, this child, that I cannot help loving

so dearly, that I fold up with remorse and sorrow in my heart, would

go to wreck like others amid the pleasures of the world, in self-will

and frivolity, in dissipation and recklessness. You would indulge her

out of love in all sorts of follies, and so make her and yourself

miserable. No, it cannot be on any terms; and you yourself will thank

me hereafter for my reasonable refusal. And now not a word more,

dearest Edward, on this subject: let us come to your other request,

which I can safely promise to grant you."

Edward began, with a cheerless spirit, to reckon up the damage his

master had sustained from the robberies that were carried on in such

an inexplicable manner, and urged the absolute necessity that, before

he left the country, effective measures should at length be taken to

get some trace of the thief. The old man wanted to break off the

discussion; but Edward reminded him of his promise. Above all was

Balthasar averse to a proposal made by his young friend, to set a

spring-gun secretly in the warehouse, whereby the audacious robber

might at length be caught and punisht. The old man regarded such a

measure as impious, unlawful, and nearly akin to wilful murder.

Edward tried to refute these notions, and at last said: "You owe it to

yourself and to me to adopt this plan, which I too am far from

approving unconditionally, but which in the present instance is the

only remedy. I need not again state the amount of the sums which have

been stolen from you time after time during the last three years and

more; they would make a large fortune, so large a one that many a

wealthy man would have been ruined by such losses. It is your

unaccountable indifference that has thus emboldened the thief, who, it

is clear, must be accurately acquainted with all our goings on.

Whenever a watch has been set, nothing has happened. But as soon as we

were off our guard again, no bolts, no bars however strong, no

precautions however well-judged, availed us. William, and many other

persons equally innocent, we have eyed with misdoubt. You cannot deny

it; your suspicion must needs have lighted on everybody about you in

turn. How can a heart so noble as yours hold fellowship with such a

hateful feeling as to imagine now and then, for moments, that those on

whom you bestow your friendship and esteem, may be capable of the most

scandalous baseness? You are guilty of the most glaring injustice to

hundreds of honest and honorable men, for the sake of screening a

single villain with an indulgence which I cannot but call weakness,

and a weakness under these circumstances quite unpardonable. In a few

days I shall leave you. It is possible that the thief may not find any

favorable opportunities hereafter, that another overseer may be more

successful, that he may induce you to take stronger measures, and so

to intimidate the offender: the robberies may cease: may not malicious

persons, may not the offender himself perhaps, to secure himself

against all chance of detection, and to frustrate every inquiry,

spread a rumour that I am the heinous thief? Nay, might not such a

report carry with it a very great show of probability, since assuredly

no one could have got at your goods with so little risk as I? What

will it profit me when far away, though you endeavour to vindicate me

and to silence such a calumny? Will not your unwonted lenity, your

present preposterous supineness, make the detestable rumour wear a

look of the utmost speciousness, nay, of irrefragable truth? How, by

what means, shall I then be able to clear myself? And, my loved, my

honoured friend, who do nothing but good to mankind, and think nothing

but evil of them, may not the same suspicion start up even in you, and

strike deep root in the dark places of your soul, and by little and

little grow into a conviction that I am the person?"

Balthasar gazed at him, and walkt several times silently up and down

the room. He was evidently struggling with himself, and seemed totally

lost in thought.

"You are not mistaken," he said after a long pause; "or rather you are

perfectly right. You know my notions about wealth and property. I look

on them with terrour. It seemed to me to be quite right, and to be a

kind of slight amends to destiny for my incomprehensible luck, that

what was flowing in so abundantly upon me from every side should at

least have one outlet by which a part of it might run off. At times I

have fancied that such a person or such another was thus making his

fortune, who wanted it, and in a manner deserved it by his cleverness

and sagacity in getting it. I took up a superstitious resolution to

remain purposely in the dark, that I might not dissipate this strange

dream and be deprived of this vague feeling. It gave me pain that I

had to misdoubt so many of my people, nay all of them; but at the same

time it was a pleasure that I could not feel certain about any. Yes,

my friend, you too, you too have I wronged. You now know me pretty

well, and I entreat your forgiveness. I have oftentimes thought in

secret, without however feeling the least anger against you: 'Well, he

is taking beforehand what he has richly earned, by labour, by

sleepless nights, by diligence of every kind ... he cannot know for

certain whether death may not snatch me away suddenly ... peradventure

he has some poor relations ... he may wish to marry and set up with a

handsome establishment ... he may perhaps have the same notions about

property as I myself.' This has been the main ground of my lenity and

weakness, as you call it; more especially when after the removal of

William and several other doubtful characters all still went on just

as before. Even your great anxiety, Edward, your indignation, even

this turned my surmises against you. I have said to myself: 'Why does

he talk so much about it, and make such a piece of work? I have given

him the fullest powers in the matter: did he really take it so much to

heart, he would have got hold of some clew long ago in one way or

other by craft or by force. I could not possibly do otherwise than

approve of whatever steps he took for my good.'"

An overpowering pain seized on Edward during this speech; he felt on

the point of fainting. With a look of utter despondency he threw

himself into a chair, hid his face with his hands, and bent it down

upon the table, till at length a flood of tears that streamed from his

burning eyes, and a loud fit of convulsive sobbing a little relieved

his heart, which seemed about to break.

The old man was astonisht to see so great and unlookt for an effect

produced by a speech which he had uttered with perfect calmness, and

even with kindliness. He endeavoured to comfort and pacify his young

friend, lifted up his head, and wiped the tears from his face, which

still stared at him with an expression of the deepest grief and

despair. He embraced him, he sought after words to heal the wound he

had inflicted, to lull the storm he had called up.

"O my heavens!" he at length cried, when he saw that all his efforts

were in vain, "what shall I do? Edward! I did not really mean any ill.

I only think of others what I believe of myself. I love thee in truth,

young man, above anybody I have ever known; thou art to me as a son:

hence my perverse supineness under my unjust suspicions: thou must

forgive me all, all, dearest Edward. I will do everything, everything

you ask of me."

When Edward at length was somewhat recovered, he said with a broken

voice, which was often checkt by violent sobs: "No, no, noblest, most

upright of mankind, never, never could you have sunk down into a

miserable thief! No want, not even hunger and nakedness, no

opportunity however tempting, could have degraded your lofty mind so

low. You only say it to quiet me. O heavens! this man, who treated me

with the warmest affection and with unbounded confidence, who placed

large sums in my hands, without ever inquiring about them, that I

might become the dispenser of his bounty in feeding the hungry and

taking care of the sick, this same friend could at the very same time

deem me capable of such infamous wickedness. Observe now, observe what

a dangerous thing it is, to admit such dark spirits and phantoms into

ones soul, from which in time they utterly drive out all truth and

love, and strength and faith. O thou bright pure form of Truth! O thou

spotless beauty of Virtue! How changed does this man seem to me since

that calamitous word, how changed am I myself! how fearfully, how

dismally has the relation between us changed! It seems to me as though

the very belief in the possibility of anything like what this man has

believed possible of me, had cast a shade of vice and depravity over

my whole life: for this noble being has hitherto been the mirror of my

own worth, by looking at which I became conscious of my own

well-meaning and integrity. Can everything, everything in our heart be

thus transformed in a single moment? Yes, my dear, my fatherly friend,

I shall evermore honour and love you; I admire you while I mourn over

you; but even without any further cause this conversation would have

parted us; this alone, without regard to my happiness or unhappiness,

must drive me from you into the wide world."

"So then we are now finally severed," said the old man very

sorrowfully, "by destiny, not by my fault. One may master everything,

except ones own innermost self. Suspicion in me is not that bad thing

into which your overstrained sense of honour, such as I never saw in

any man before, converts it by the meaning you assign to it. But, my

dearest friend, without whom my life will long be a mere blank, you

will stay at least a few days, until you can take away the papers that

will secure your fortune to you. For this compensation you must accept

from me as from a father, unless you would quite overwhelm me with

shame."

They embraced, and the old man gave Edward an unlimited permission to

take whatever steps he thought proper for the sake of detecting and

punishing the thief. Edward had regained his self-possession; and the

old man was all kindness and gentleness. They talkt about other

affairs; and Edward took some accountbooks under his arm to look over

and correct.

"Embrace me once more with all your heart," said the old man, "and

forgive me too with all your heart."

Edward turned back, and after embracing him said: "My dearest friend,

what have I to forgive you for, thinking as you do? It is not the

right word. What I have just endured I can never forget; and this

shock will thrill through me to the latest day of my life. The human

heart and soul, man and God, seem to have become totally different in

my eyes since that terrific flash of lightning. Thinking as you do

too, you cannot be angry with me, if I now say half in jest, that, had

you not allowed me to take my measures, I might have fancied after I

was gone that you had been thus ingeniously and cunningly robbing

yourself, who knows with what subtle views, perchance for the very

sake of throwing suspicion on some one or other."

"You are not altogether in the wrong," said Balthasar. Edward was

again standing at the door. "Wait another moment, young man!" cried

his master. Edward once more turned back. But when he drew nearer to

the old man, he was astonisht to find how totally his countenance and

the expression of his eyes were changed. A quick firy glance was

sparkling restlessly upon him.

"You are fully convinced, I well know," the old man began, "of the

truths of the Christian religion; you read your bible diligently and

devoutly. You also believe in the historical parts of it, and regard

the whole as an actual revelation: the rational, and allegorical, and

learned philological interpretations do not satisfy your mind. Is it

not so? you are a true Christian with all your heart and soul."

"Certainly," answered Edward.

"The story," continued the old man, "how the Saviour was tempted in

the wilderness by the Evil One, is not in your opinion a parable, or

an allegory, or mythical legend, without any substance? but you

believe that this event actually befell Jesus Christ, the Son of God,

along with the various circumstances and questions and answers

recorded?"

"What are you aiming at?" askt Edward hesitatingly after a pause.

"Yes, I believe this story like a sincere and orthodox Christian."

"Well!" the old man went on, while his pale closed lips wrinkled into

a strange smile: "I have a double aim, though I should hardly need to

say more, if you had ever thought deeply about this incident. In the

first place, if our Saviour himself had to bear such things, if it was

possible for him to be suspected though but by the Evil One, surely

you might forgive me with all your heart, if with half or a quarter of

mine I have now and then half misdoubted you. Meseems, this

mysterious, marvellous story with its fathomless, untold meanings does

not downrightly condemn my views of human nature. They are not mere

spectres that have taken possession of my soul, unless indeed they

belong to one and the same family with spirits. In the second place,

do your eyes see much meaning in this wondrous story, if the success

of the temptation was totally and absolutely impossible?--Now then

what say you? appalling are the feelings that seize on one of us, and

you too cannot escape them, when all this is brought home to the heart

and mind.--There is still a third remark that I would close

with:--what would have become of the world and of mankind, of heaven

and earth, if the tempter had won the day? if love had faltered and

been beguiled?--O young man, the doors are not closed in every place

where we see them put to. You fancy you have made out everything, when

you have hardly counted up to five.--I too believed, I too inquired,

was absorbed in love and devotion, beheld love in my own soul and in

the souls of my brethren, and this is the very delusion the breaking

up of which snap my heart and life asunder, never, never to revive and

reunite. Cast away your pride in your feelings, think not to soar on

the wings of your imagination; but crawl along the ground like worms,

and eat dust; for that is what befits you."

The old man squeezed Edward's hand, and then with a bitter smile, and

a sudden laugh that scared him, tore himself away. For a while Edward

continued fixt in a stupour, and when at length he lifted up his eyes,

Balthasar was again immerst in deep thought, and standing at his

writing table with the gloomy suffering look which he usually wore.

Edward felt as if he was leaving a dying man when he went away, and

shut the heavy oaken door slowly and carefully after him.

* * * * *

Edward had taken his measures with no less secrecy than judgement.

None of the servants, foremen, or even of the overseers knew that he

was doing anything out in the warehouse. Every interruption had been

guarded against. He was quite alone, nor did anybody even know of his

having left the house, when he made his arrangements; and it was dark

before he came back. He could not tell whether a fresh robbery might

not be committed on that very night, or not till a future one. All the

watchmen had been removed from the warehouse in such a manner as not

to excite suspicion.

And now amid the solitude of the night he sat down to the account

books, for the sake of bringing all his thoughts to bear on a single

point, and thereby recovering from the agitation he had lately

undergone. It was of importance to have these matters perfectly

arranged before he went away. At length he succeeded in banishing what

had happened from his thoughts for the time; and he became so much

engaged in his employment, he forgot that these very hours might be

unravelling that unpleasant affair, which had given them so much

annoyance for years.

When he had finisht and was turning over the leaves of an old book

that he had taken up along with the rest, some written papers fell out

of it: they were in Balthasar's hand, and had evidently been written

many years. He read the following fragments.

Yes in truth weeping is a wonder, and, as they say, a gift sent

from heaven. A bliss spreads through our soul, as soon as our

flowing tears come, like the waters of a river, sweeping away

black sorrow, and disquietude, and trembling doubts. Ye are all

given back to me, ye spirits that once were mine, and that a cruel

destiny afterward severed from me.

For the sake of this, people will woo tears, and try to lure them

with coaxing when they will not come. Our day's work is over, and

now, as the rich man and the glutton will wind up his multifarious

meal with sweetmeats, so after our toil, after closing our

accounts, we court devotional thoughts and pathetical emotions, we

meditate on the dead, in order to entice this lifes-wine of tears

into our voluptuous eyes and our luxurious brain. Now a

sentimental melancholy inhaloes every ordinary object around us;

and amid the meek abasht feelings of a pining anguish and remorse,

suddenly starts up nauseous arrogance, vaunting the grandeur of a

spoilt capricious heart. O what poor wretches our fellow creatures

now seem to us in their commonplaceness, who yet all, as the

patient children and drudges of mother earth, are better than we.

But laughter! This earthquake which invisible powers heave up out

of the knotty entanglement of our dark enigmatical being! which in

boisterous senseless noises announces that within, in the unseen

world, the soul neither recks of nor knows truth or falsehood, and

has just been murdering the innocent herald who was bringing these

phantasms before it! These rude unmeaning sounds which will for a

long time distort even the best face, the most mechanically

regular mask!

How men long after this loathsome convulsion! While tears lie and

cheat by aping heavenly feelings, laughter is awkwardly trying to

let the craziness of evil demons skulk behind it, hides itself

from vulgarity for the sake of being seen, feigns terrour when our

unsubdued struggling feelings are detected, and saunters about in

the midst of whatever is disgusting and impure, perpetually

clapperclawing with some outcast among the rabble or other: one

moment our intelligent, and higher faculties, as they call them,

get the upper hand; the next they are beaten down and trod upon by

something base and profligate: and thus veering to and fro, now

toying now scolding, laughter clatters down the steps of idiocy,

which crumble with the decay of our bodily strength ... and man

grins, and is happy.

Blessed time, when there was a real existence, a life in life!

when the vast whole of eternity, being sufficient to itself, had

not splintered itself out into time! when the spirit did not need

a succession, measured out by the atoms of time and space, to

become conscious of its power and of its being! What a portentous

event was it, when eternity and life parted fellowship!--when the

band by which spirits were bound in one, burst, and that strange

creature, Death, rusht in through the chasm to domineer over all.

Now that which is firm, stedfast, enduring, has concentrated

itself in the depths of its own being, and has put on the

unvarying aspect of solid meditation. Stones, rocks, metals, bid

defiance to decay with their cold looks, and would make believe

that they know not of change. Drops of water dancing like tiny

elves along them, the sightless legions of the air, wherever they

spread, are eating into the limbs of the rigid haughty giant; the

dwarf, man, digs into his bones, and, if his strength were equal

to his fury, would reduce him to fleeting sand. May it not

peradventure be the same with the eternal stars? A little acid,

and the monster sneezes sillily, and roars, and yawns, and for the

moment remembers its spiritual nature.

And thou with thy butterfly wings in thy light summer garment,

thou that hoverest aloft, and flittest over the mountains, and

sweepest along the earth! from the airy changeling of the

caterpillar, up or down to the lion and to man, ye all of you,

fostering a brief momentary spark in you, like the glance from the

flint and steel ... gone is the red bubbling up of the spark ...

and again a mere slough is lying before us, after its short dream

of life and love, dust upon dust, rottenness upon decay ... the

great-grandfather beside his mouldering great-grandchild ... and

neither knows the other, neither has ever heard of the other.

The plants around you prick up their ears at you in a thousand

forms; the flowers smile roguishly and sadly, in the midst of the

masquerade; and dream mingles with dream, when the lover plucks

the rose, and blushing himself holds out the blushing blossom to

his blushing maiden.

* * * * *

The beating of the pulse is not only a sign of life, it is life

itself. No feeling, no thought, no sight or hearing, no taste or

sensation flows along with a rushing stream, but all comes

skipping, wave upon wave, drop upon drop, and this is its being.

One thought is cast out by another; our feelings are only felt as

they shift between life and death: the kiss only thrills on our

lips when a chill void has already spread over them; our delight

in a picture, in music, merely gushes through us; one moment it

entrances us, the next it has vanisht. Thus the sea breathes in

its ebb and flow, time in its days and nights, its winters and

summers. If I do not forget myself this moment, I cannot recollect

myself the next.--And death....

Is this revulsion of the pulse, this alteration of strain, this

change of tune a prelude, a transition to a new piece of music?

Every living creature exists to be devoured by another; man alone

has apparently eluded these barrack-regulations, this military

duty, and fattens himself up for the earth, that shattered chaos

of stones and mould.

In love, in misfortune, in joy, in despondency, in labour and

rest, death has always been my uppermost, I might rather say my

only thought. Suicide in me would have been of all human actions

the most natural. I have never felt that any indescribable fear,

any overpowering shudder draws us back, and flings the knife from

our hands. If poor naked Joy, that is so meanly clad, she is

ashamed to walk about the earth, were once to enter our doors,

then the stab of the bright dagger would only be the last

glittering pinnacle of our joyous transport. For after that brief

pulsation is over, how bald is the earth, how black is life! It is

because I know not whither I am going, or whether I am going, or

whether there be a whither, that the act is so alluring. Only men

will not confess this, but give the name of cowardice and of

courage to what is neither the one nor the other. In dissipation,

in thoughtlessness, in indifference, the poor wretches lose both

life and death.

* * * * *

A strange dream, that is to say, a dream, has visited me. The

commonest thing is quite as strange as the uncommonest, only habit

blunts our sense.

I was dead. I knew it distinctly; and yet I lived on in my

consciousness. All my forlorn doubts, my stiff-neckedness that

would not bow to the yoke, my hard heart that closed itself so

early against love, had shut me out, so my conscience told me,

from the place to which the good hope to go. The state in which I

found myself, and numberless others along with me, was one the

common ordinariness, the dull triviality of which was quite

appalling. I was utterly unable to recollect my friends and those

whom I had loved, however intensely I strained my memory and put

it to the rack. A longing, like that of one pining with thirst

after a stream of fresh clear water, tormented me, to call up the

forms and the ideas of those beloved beings in my imagination; I

felt a yearning after them like a heavy weight that was crushing

me in the hidden places of my heart. Just as little could I bring

back those actions which during my life I might have called good.

Every thing in this region of my thoughts was like a bare parcht

waste. But everything evil rolled in whirling circles wearyingly

and dizzyingly before my inward eye. My vices and errours, all the

faults and misdeeds of my life, every wretched moment of my

temporal existence gathered round me as it were with the cries and

croaking of fierce hungry birds of prey. O these sins how hugely

and gigantically they swelled out! How horrible it was to see

their consequences unfolding themselves far, far away in the

realms of the future! how they took root and grew up riotously in

after-generations! nothing but looks of anguish, of reproach, of

pain, of bitter despair was turned upon me from thence. In like

manner I easily called to mind all the persons who had ever been

objects of my hatred or dislike; every tedious hour, the

recollection of which tortured me afresh; all the folly and

absurdity that I had ever uttered myself, or heard from others.

In the numerous vast halls countless swarms of men were sitting,

standing, or walking about, all in the same state of deplorable

woe. And no variety, no division of time, no hour, no sun or night

disturbed or changed this melancholy monotonousness. One solitary

amusement was there. Now and then some one reminded us of our

former faith, how during our lives we had feared and worshipt a

God. Then a loud burst of laughter, as at a most portentous

absurdity, pealed through the hall. Afterward they all grew grave,

and I strove with all my faculties to call back the reverence, the

sanctity of my human feelings, but in vain.

* * * * *

Edward had not observed that the morning was already dawning, so

completely had he been wrapt up in these singular papers. Without

doubt too he would have gone on reading much longer, unless he had now

been interrupted by loud cries and a violent knocking at his door. He

went to see what it was, and Conrad rusht into the room, heated,

panting, and with a ferocious look.

"Now we have him!" cried the miner furiously: "did not I say long ago

that this vagabond is wickedness itself? Only let him instantly be

bound, master overseer, hand and foot in the heaviest chains you can

get, and then have the dog flogged till he is cut to pieces, that his

life and his infernal soul may crawl out of him by inches."

"What is the matter with you?" askt Edward. "I am afraid you must be

in a fever, and are stark raving."

"Hurrah!" screamed Conrad; "now my cruel illness will soon be gone,

now that the miscreant has been caught at his wicked tricks. He will

never carry me down again now into their rubbishy straw."

"Whom are you talking of?" Edward again began: "surely not of the

Hungarian miner?"

"The very person," answered Conrad: "the monster has been stealing,

and is in league with a whole gang of thieves. Hark you, to cut the

matter short, I could not sleep last night, and so roamed about the

woods, in part to get myself some herbs to cure my ailing. It was just

beginning to dawn, when I heard something like wheels down below,

along the lonely lane in the thick of the wood, and at the same time

there was a moaning and groaning; for at night one hears and makes out

every thing much plainlier. Off I ran. Two fellows were drawing a cart

in great tribulation and fear, and the pale rascal was walking

alongside, and driving them on. 'Scoundrels!' I shouted in their

faces! and the word was hardly out of my throat, when the two thieves

had already scampered off; but the pale skinny mountebank I held fast;

the cart with the stolen goods is standing in the wood. They will soon

bring it after me however; for I met a couple of workmen whom I sent

for it; and the Hungarian waivode I have dragged hither with my own

hand."

Meanwhile the whole house was in an uprore. The stranger was sitting

handcufft at the door; and miners, spinners, and weavers came

crowding; others flockt from the mills; and all were shouting, all

were staring with wonder at each other; everybody wanted to tell his

story, and nobody seemed to know what it was that had happened; so

that Edward and Conrad began with much perplexity and annoyance to

question one after another, until the miner cried out with his

thundering voice: "Hold your jaws all of you. Not a soul shall speak

another word, except he whom your young master shall ask."

One-eyed Michael was standing near them, and, as Edward turned to him,

he said: "It may have been about three in the morning when I set off

from the forge to deliver a message betimes at the smelting house up

in the mountains. I was walking along the path through the wood,

thinking no harm, save that when I got pretty near to the warehouse

all the nightly robberies came across me which have been going on this

many a long day there. 'I'd give the world to catch the rogue,' I said

to myself, when all at once a gun went off. A gun! what ho! that put

me to my wits. 'There are never any sportsmen hereabout,' I said, and

began marching and bustling on with a little more haste and speed. In

a few moments I hear cries and yells and shouts, and a pothering and

squabbling. All this methinks can never be right. I get to the top,

and now I see the whole business. The warehouse is open, several

barrows and men are before it, they are piling up the goods: a short

figure that I could not make out in the dark, panting and whining,

screaming and grumbling, is shuffling and tumbling about. I make up to

the fellows with the stolen goods. Then some of them seized me fast

and prest down my eyes. The noise lessens, I can't cry out, nor would

it do me much good. When they let me loose again, there was nothing to

be seen. Even the limper, in spite of all my search, had got off and

was not to be found. When I came nearer the houses I awoke every body

with my shouts, telling them to go and watch the warehouse, and scour

after the rogues."

"And I," cried Conrad, "have lugged the commander in chief of the

cutpurses by the throat, that sapient soothsayer that was playing off

his pranks with his match the other day at your forge."

Then they all set off again telling their stories, shouting and

screaming, just as noisily as before. Edward however gave orders what

all were to do; the stranger was to be watcht, the stolen goods to be

taken into the house, and everybody was to be quiet, not to disturb

their old master's rest, should he be still asleep. He himself

hastened with a few others to the warehouse, to arrange matters there,

and, if possible, to find out more about the thieves.

* * * * *

Edward found marks of blood in the warehouse and on the ground

without, and he and his companions followed them. Anon they lost sight

of them, then discovered them again in a thicket on one side, and a

little after in one of the bypaths. Edward walkt on with anxious

feelings; a boding prest upon his heart; he was unwilling to confess

his misgivings even to himself. Ere long however they turned to

certainty; for the traces led to the house of Eleazar, which lay on a

green slope. When they got up to it they found all the neighbours

already in motion; people were coming from the town; the priest of the

parish was just passing through the door. Within everything was in

confusion, and a physician and surgeon were busy upstairs.

Edward left his companions without, and with a beating heart opened

the chamber door. Eleazar was lying pale and with ghastly features in

his bed. His wound had just been examined, and a bandage placed on it.

Everybody in the room, the physician, surgeon, priest, and servants

lookt frightened and distrest; for there was something in this

accident so mysterious and terrible that no one could help being

struck with awe by it.

The surgeon, whom Edward took aside, shook his head, and assured him

that all assistance was in vain; the patient would hardly live through

the day. Eleazar now raised himself out of his stupour, lookt round,

and perceived Edward. "Aha!" he cried with a strained and faint voice,

"You too are already there! Well! You have at last got the better of

me. This is what you have been driving at this long time. I am now

lying here, and all is over, all is found out; there are no more

questions and answers, no more todays and tomorrows. How it will fare

with you remains to be seen hereafter. Not well most undoubtedly. So

don't triumph in your imaginary virtue."

He beckoned and made the priest bring him a paper that was lying in

the window. "Give this to the old man of the mountain," he then went

on; "he will see from it how I loved him; for it is my will."

The priest now said a few words, begging to be left alone with the

sick man. Edward was glad to leave the room and refresh himself in the

open air. Here Conrad again ran up to him out of breath, and cried ...

"Confusion worse confounded! Only think what he has been doing, our

virtuous Eleazar! his last loaf has already been baked for him. Look

you, this fellow, this lord and master of the country, this son-in-law

of the old man of the mountain, is a scurvy thief ... Now I will

forgive that white-faced Hungarian wretch for serving me as he did the

other day; for what is all the reputation in the earth, all the honour

in the world come to?"

The whole neighbourhood, town and country, was in consternation at

this event. The most incredible thing in the world had taken place, a

crime that could neither be denied nor concealed, committed by a man

whom all had been forced to regard with respect, whom all had lookt

upon as their future master and protector; and they could not recover

from their astonishment, or fall back into their ordinary occupations;

for their minds in this turmoil had for a while lost every standard by

which a man measures himself.

The old man amid the general tumult had already learnt the whole

story, in spite of the pains Edward had taken to prevent it. He had

lockt himself up in his room and let nobody in.

Edward now interrogated the stranger. This man had for a long time had

dealings with Eleazar; he lived in a town a good many miles off, and

had often sent agents up the mountains and helpt in selling the stolen

goods. A tradesman in another small town was also a party in the

affair. The Hungarian had quarelled with Eleazar, and had come up into

these parts with a view of going to old Balthasar, sounding him, and,

if he found him inclined to pay well for it, disclosing the whole

history of the abominable transaction. But as the old man had not

shewn any mind to have recourse to superstitious devices, still less

to give ear to his covert hints, so that the stranger might have

brought his own neck into the noose if he had betrayed too much, he

drew off and remained faithful to his confederate Eleazar, who had

quieted him with a sum of money, along with large promises for the

future.

The old man's great bell now rang, and Edward took up his papers and

went to him. "You have lookt over and corrected all my accounts, my

dear friend?" he began with outward calmness. Edward said yes, as he

set down the books; but he hesitated and knew not whether to give in

Eleazar's will along with them. The old man however took it himself

out of his hand and cast his eyes over it.

"It is now three months," he began, "since he made me heir to all he

has, in case he should die before me. He has drawn up a list of all

his effects, and points out where each thing may be found. The chief

article is a number of gold bars, which he says are of his own making.

Read it."

Edward took the papers with some embarrassment. "Is it not true?" said

the old man after some time, "does any thing but madness animate and

rule the whole world? Can you understand this man and his character in

any other way? To be sure this word itself does not help us to

understand it. O young man, young man, do you not feel now how

thoroughly right I was? I trusted this man unlimitedly, because he was

not girt round with any delusive deceitful show; because nothing in my

heart sallied forth to meet him, and I did not lie to myself in his

behalf for the sake of pampering my own vanity. Ay, my friend, now

everything is detected and noised abroad; he is going ... and in this

will he gives me back what the lawyers would call my property. His

will! Now forsooth it must also be time to make mine, and a different

one from what I intended. Now your nice feelings of honour will no

doubt condescend to stay with me a little longer ... and my child, my

Rose! alas, how fearful it is that this darling of my heart is also a

human being!"

"At such an hour as this," answered Edward, "which must needs strike

you with horrour, I will not again declare the wishes of my heart to

you; you yourself have toucht upon them, or I should have refrained

even from these words. But undoubtedly I must now stay with you:

destiny compells me to do so, and imposes it as a sacred duty upon

me."

"Destiny with a vengeance!" said the old man with his bitter smile:

"you take a fancy to Rose; you hear she is already engaged; this

drives you away from me; but before you take leave, your honour must

be cleared and furbisht up; and as a remembrance you shoot my most

intimate friend, the man after my own soul, and tear him from my side.

Now Rose is at liberty, you are your own master, your rival is got rid

of; and destiny has managed the whole matter admirably. But whether

this shot has not pierced through my heart, whether it has not rent

and burst asunder the innermost sanctuary of my soul ... these

questions are never thought of. There is as it were a huge chasm

yawning in my spirit ... confidence, faith ... everything ... did not

I say so? good is the only real evil ... Edward! don't look so sad ...

methinks I am talking quite wildly."

He took the young man's hand. "Bring me the mayor this evening, and

the priest and bailiff as witnesses. You are now my son, and this is

the spirit I shall now make my will in. I feel it is high time; for it

would be horrible if Helbach were to fling all my fortune to the dogs.

O if I could but totally forget this shot and Eleazar! if such wild

thoughts did not keep rushing about in my brain! Now you and Rose will

stay with me."

Edward withdrew. He went to look for Rose in her room. She burst out

a-crying, jumpt up from her chair, and threw herself into the young

man's arms with an expression of the fondest affection. "Alas Edward!"

she cried sobbing, and hid her face on his breast: "only look now at

what I have to go through in my youth. This was never sung over me in

my cradle, that I should lose my husband in so shocking a manner, and

even before our wedding. And the last thing I should have thought of

was that you were to shoot him dead, you, the dearest and kindest of

all men.--Alas! poor, poor Eleazar! when he came from nature's hands,

such an odious misshapen abortion of a man! And now into the bargain

to steal, to lie, and to cheat! to rob my good father, who meant to

give him everything! What will become of his poor soul now? Oh yes, he

has perisht still more cruelly, he is much more unhappy than my cat

with her kittens, that he shot so barbarously on the orange tree. Alas

Edward! are you then in real truth such a good creature, as I have

always believed you? or are you perchance very wicked too? You did not

mean it, did you? that Eleazar should die so?"

Edward took pains to explain the nature of the whole affair to her.

"Be composed," he continued; "the course of our lives here has suddenly

undergone a violent change; we must all overcome this shock, to get

back again into the path of our ordinary duty. A few days since you

were sorry that I was going away; if it can give you any comfort, let

me assure you that for the present at least I shall and must stay

here. Do you still wish that I should?"

She gazed at him affectionately and seemed comforted. "So then that is

settled now!" she exclaimed: "ah yes, I always thought you would stay;

for I can't live without you; and my father can't live without you;

and all our poor workmen and spinners, our good miners, for whom you

are always saying and doing something, and who, when they come for

their wages or for relief, look with their whole souls into your kind

eyes, these above all can never live without you."

"This calamity," said Edward, "may hereafter make you, your father,

me, and all of us happy. The discovery was inevitable; and perhaps, if

it had not taken place now, it would have come at a time when it would

have plunged us all in misery."

"If my father now," said Rose, "were to have no objection, I might

perhaps in time accustom myself to look upon you as my future husband.

If I could but feel a little more respect and awe for you! If you

would behave very roughly to me now and then, not always so kindly,

but angrily and savagely at times, I might by and by grow reconciled

to it."

Edward went to his business. The uprore had ceast, and the whole house

was now quiet and silent: it seemed as if people were afraid of even

breathing: all walkt about softly and on tiptoe. News came that

Eleazar was dead.

Toward evening Edward went with the mayor and witnesses into old

Balthasar's room. He was surprised to find him in bed. On being spoken

to by his visitors he lifted himself up, stared fixedly at them, and

seemed to know no one. "Aha! reverend Sir," he cried out after a

while, "you are come to fetch away a second poor sinner today. It is a

busy time in your vocation. Is master Eleazar come with you?"

He beckoned to Edward. "Thou yellow blockhead!" he whispered to him;

"what am I to do with thy gold bars that thou hast left me? don't

thrust thy stupid cheat into men's eyes so ... it is far too glaring.

But beware of Edward, he is wise and good. If he should ever suspect

thee, thou art lost."

He talkt to the others, but still quite at random, and was taken up

with the phantoms of his own brain. The mayor and witnesses retired,

and Edward went after the physician. The business of drawing up the

will was put off, until the sick man should have recovered and be

restored to his perfect consciousness.

The physician found the patient's state very alarming. Edward was

called up in the night; but when he entered the room Herr Balthasar

had already breathed his last.

The dismay, the sorrow was universal. The mayor sent to have

everything sealed up. In the midst of this confusion, it seemed a

matter of very little moment that the Hungarian had found means to

escape from his prison.

* * * * *

In the town where the extravagant counsellor Helbach lived, there was

a great feast at which all the epicures famous for their love of good

eating and their knowledge of good dishes were assembled. The

counsellor himself was the soul of such parties: his word was law in

them; and he it was that had managed the present banquet.

The dinner was nearly over; some of the guests, who had business to

call them away, were gone: the company had grown quieter; and it was

only at the upper end of the table, where the counsellor and some of

the scientific eaters were sitting, that the conversation was carried

on with any spirit.

"Believe me, my friends," said the counsellor with great earnestness,

"the art of eating, the skill men may attain in it, has its epochs,

its classical ages, and its decline, corruption, and dark ages, just

as much as every other art; and it seems to me that we are now again

verging to a kind of barbarism in it. Luxury, profusion, rarities, new

dishes, overpeppering, overspicing, all these, my good sirs, are the

artifices now commonly made use of to obtain admiration for a dinner;

and yet these are the very things from which a thinking eater will

turn away with contemptuous slight. In the whole of this department

indeed much still remains to be done; and the stories we read of the

old gormandizer, Heliogabalus, and others who lived during the

decrepitude of the Roman empire, stories at which many men stare with

stupid astonishment, ought only to excite our pity."

"It must always be difficult no doubt," said one of the guests, "to

frame any distinct conception of the dishes and the delicacies of a

former age. If we dress them by such receits as remain, the result

will always have something absurd in it, like the dinner which

Smollett describes so humourously in his _Peregrine Pickle_."

"That tact on which after all everything depends," answered the

counsellor, "is sure to be wanting, that nice knowledge of the exact

limit between too much and too little which nothing but instinct can

bestow; and even this instinct must be cultivated by studying the

properties of fire, the culinary powers of which can never be

described, and which a cook can only make himself master of by long

experience, judgement, and observation, nor even then unless he was

born a cook. The main point however is, that our tongue and palate

have been trained and fashioned from our childhood to particular

tastes, likings, and antipathies; so that often the very best, most

judicious, and admirable thing, if it come across us on a sudden as a

novelty, as something we have never set tooth on, and thus give a

shock to all our prepossessions, will be disregarded and abused; until

at length in course of time on our becoming familiar with the

stranger's merits, he is naturalized: and then the new knowledge we

have acquired will often exercise the most salutary influence and

throw much light on other dishes, both old and lately invented ones,

so that our palate is as it were strung with a new chord, which sends

forth a variety of delicious notes. Moreover the ages that are gone

and the ideas that prevailed among our forefathers are still acting

upon this _tastature_ of mankind, as a race made to relish, to discern,

and to enjoy; and as in philosophy and science, in politics and

government, so here too there is an unbroken chain; the accumulated

experience of centuries moulded us to be just such as we are; and this

state of our taste can and must only be modified by degrees; nor could

anything be more ruinous than a sudden revolution which should throw

everything topsy turvy. In every field of human action history is

man's best master."

"You yourself," said the guest, "should write a history of the

articles of food, the art of eating, and the progress of the human

mind in it."

"When one is oneself a practical artist," answered the counsellor,

"and so devoted a one as I am, so diligent in working at my art, and

so ready to try every new experiment in it, one must leave such

matters to people of an idler and more contemplative turn. If you aim

at doing everything, you will never do anything well and thoroughly."

"Why," resumed the other, "do we hear this perpetual abuse of

sensuality? why will men so seldom confess, and even then but

reluctantly, the pleasure they take in eating and drinking?"

"Because," said counsellor Helbach, "they never know what they are

really at. It has always struck me as very remarkable and singular

that, in the little round box in which all our finer senses are ranged

and stored up, and in the top of which moreover our thinking powers,

and all the noblest intellectual products of our soul are deposited,

we should find that red-lined drawer close beneath, with the delicate

little bosses set like jewels over the tremulous vocal tongue and

palate, garnisht in front with teeth that toil and cut, and closed by

the graceful mouth. Eating is only another mode of thinking. Thus this

box is a coppel in which the essences of all created things, the

finest and the grossest, vapours and juices, the soft soothing oils,

the bitternesses and tartnesses which at first seem grating, the

flavour which evaporates in a momentary enjoyment, are put to the

test. First the teeth begin chopping and grinding; the tongue, at

other times so talkative, silently and busily rolls about and makes

much of the morsels it receives, presses them affectionately and

benevolently against the palate, to double its pleasure by sharing it;

and when this tender dalliance has been sufficiently indulged in, at

length pushes them back almost unwillingly to its friend that swallows

them down, and that indeed has the real enjoyment of them, the highest

of all, though but for a moment, and then with heroic self-sacrifice

makes them over to another power. Straightway the same game is

repeated a second, a third, a thousandth time. I never yet heard it

said that any self-tormenting anchoret had courage enough altogether

to forgo the pleasure of eating, even though he stinted himself to

bread. Indeed kind Nature has taken such good care of her children,

that it is next to impossible."

"A very just and profound remark!" exclaimed his neighbour.

"We see too," continued the dissertator, "what high importance nature

has attacht to these processes of devouring, eating, chewing, and

swallowing, and how in every sphere of existence they have been her

main end and aim. What would become of all the animals upon the earth,

of all the birds that roam through the air, and all the swarms of

greater and lesser creatures that people the waters and the sea,

unless every one of them had received a bill, payable at sight, upon

his neighbour. What would they live on, if they did not live on one

another? or where forsooth would they find room to live? Is not the

world perpetually oscillating between the two great works of producing

and of devouring? The king of the creation, man, stands at the summit,

as the crown and the final object of all these multiform guests. Those

his subalterns, who have an assignment either one upon the other, or

upon the vegetable world, look up to him with reverential awe: for it

is not merely one thing or another, not merely beasts or vegetables,

not merely fishes or birds, no, almost everything without exception

he turns into food, making all classes of his subjects the sources of

his happiness. It is only from his own kind, and from a few which

serve him as his immediate vassals, or the flesh of which, whether

from prejudice or in reality, does not taste agreeably, that he

abstains. By means of fire, that performs his bidding, out of strong

essences, butter, oil, and spices, vegetables and flesh, all artfully

mingled and chemically prepared, he concocts the most extraordinary

combinations to please his palate. While the eye is weeping at top,

and the brain above it is brooding over touching thoughts, or kindling

itself and the heart with inspiring ones, while the nose inhaling

hyacinthine odours awakens visions of sweet desire in the imagination,

the mouth below is already lusting and licking its lips after the

venison or the liver pasty that is carried by. The sentimental young

lady feeds her pigeons with pathetical grace; and the very mouth which

lisps the prettiest verses and most moving idyls to them, will swallow

the same innocent creatures by and by with exquisite relish. Could

animals make observations as we do, and were a poet some day to rise

up amongst them, in what strange colours would he represent man!"

"Truly," said his friend, "such a jest, thus retorted upon mankind,

would be extremely amusing."

"We are fond of boasting of our universality," counsellor Helbach went

on, "and yet in the very art in which Nature herself has so manifestly

intended us to be universal, I mean in that of eating, many people

scorn to become so, and fancy it is more dignified to treat this whole

branch of knowledge with contempt. And yet the flocks of birds of

passage, the shoals of wandering fishes, come from distant regions,

flying and swimming into our nets, for the mere pleasure of our

palates; and the fruits of every climate, of every soil, of every

quarter of the globe, blend into enjoyment within us. Who does not

perceive in an oyster, if at least he is gifted with a true sense for

it, the might and the freshness of the sea! O asparagus, he that has

not the wit to enjoy thee, can know nothing of the mysteries which the

dreaming world of plants reveals to us! Can one understand anything of

the history of the world or of poetry, if one is a stranger to all

these natural elementary feelings, and incapable of doing justice to

the worth of a snipe, or even of a turbot?"

The other guests had already retired; the dinner was quite over; and

only counsellor Helbach and his two nearest and most intimate friends

were still sitting engaged in this and the like conversation.

"I am quite surprised," one of them began, "at the buoyant youthful

spirit which you still retain, at your jovial animation, your lively

poetical playfulness. All the rest of us have grown so old, and the

weight of years presses so heavily upon us, while you are still

jesting, and pleasure has lost none of its freshness or charms with

you."

"We are all alone now," said the counsellor, "and I may therefore

speak more from my heart to such old friends. It is true, this sensual

enjoyment gives me pleasure, and will console me at times for the want

of much: but I am not the frivolous person you take me for, perhaps

never was so. Almost everybody has a mask; and this is mine. I move

about in it lightly and with ease, and so most people take it for my

real character. My youth was a very sad one: my parents displayed all

their weaknesses, their extravagance and ostentation, so glaringly to

me and to all the world, that I could not look upon them with esteem;

and this to a young man is of all feelings the most terrible. Poverty

and distress, privations of every kind may be borne much more easily:

but a calamity like mine crushes the heart before it is yet grown up.

I had to play the part of a rich man, to squander money, to give

myself airs. When one puts on the semblance of anything for a time, it

will soon become a portion of our nature. Imitate a stutterer for a

while, and you will have to keep diligent watch over yourself not to

stammer in earnest. I fell in love, and was on the point of changing

into a totally different person; for my passion was sincere and

ardent. But new distress. The noble being who soon became my wife,

could never give me her heart. The strongest passion must die away

when it finds no return; and in such a case a man has done enough, if

this finest feeling of his nature do not turn into hatred and malice.

For myself I was thrown back by this into my apparent frivolity: and

not to make a show of my unhappiness, like my wife, who, though

otherwise admirable, gave way too much to this weakness, I abandoned

myself to riotous conviviality, turbulent pleasures, and unprofitable

society. There is often a spirit of defiance in us, having something

of nobleness in it, and not utterly condemnable, which withholds

strong characters from reforming and improving, notwithstanding all

the admonitions of conscience. The more unhappy I felt myself, the

more I acted happiness. After my son was born, my wife began to shun

me altogether, and would often wilfully misunderstand me. She devoted

all her affection and care to her child, lived only for him, and

brought him up to be so capricious and headstrong, that she herself

was the greatest sufferer by his faults, and yet had not strength of

mind enough to eradicate the fatal perverseness, which she herself had

first fostered in him. My advice was not listened to: it had been

taken for granted that I could no more love the child, than appreciate

and esteem the mother. My heart bled; and yet I could not interfere

authoritatively, unless I would consent to be regarded by her and by

the whole world as a monster, being already called a tyrant,

unfeeling, and frivolous, and having been so long wont to give up the

point that I often lookt on myself as such. Thus my son was bred up as

a stranger to me, with all his feelings purposely and studiously

alienated from me: but his over-weak, too passionately fond mother was

no gainer thereby; for she likewise lost his depraved heart, over

which, when the boy was grown up, she had not the slightest influence.

How reckless and unmanageable he has been, you well know; how wretched

his mother has become, is notorious; but my life too, my friends, is a

lost one."

A servant came hastily in, and told the counsellor he must go home

immediately: for something of great importance had happened.

* * * * *

The wife of counsellor Helbach was sitting in her bedroom, which only

let in a faint dim light from the court. Her tear-worn eyes were

stedfastly fixt on an open gospel; she read devoutly, and prayed.

Suddenly she heard a noise; her servant was pusht forcibly back by

some one whom he was trying to keep away; the door was thrust open,

and a young man threw himself impetuously at her feet, seized her hand

in her fright and covered it with kisses, while a hot flood of tears

gusht from his eyes. It was not till after a while that the mother

recognized the son whom she had deemed lost. Her strong emotions

overcame her: she askt: "Whence comest thou?... stand up ... my

unhappy child come to my arms...." More she could not say.

"You do not cast me off, you do not abhor me?" cried the youth in a

trance of grief: "Oh God! have I deserved that a single spark of love

for me should yet linger in this noble heart! Am I worthy of a single

look from her!"

They continued long closely embraced, and quite unable to speak. "But

mother," the young man said at length, "can you hold the monster in

your arms, to your heart, who, when he last saw you--"

"No, my son, my beloved son, do not call back that horrible moment,

which we must forget;" so the mother stammered out. "I too know now

that I did you injustice then; the girl you loved is worthy of your

love, as has been proved since. I myself had not taught you

sufficiently to controul your passions. Let that hour vanish for ever

like a painful dream from our lives. But whence comest thou? where

hast thou been living all this time?"

They sat down; they both tried to regain their self-possession and

calmness in this sudden change from sorrow to joy. The young man

related--while from time to time he again embraced his beloved mother,

or kist her hands--how after that fearful moment he had roamed about

in despair without any plan or view; how, when he was destitute of all

means of subsistence, finding himself near the mountains, he had made

up his mind to apply to Herr Balthasar, in the chance of obtaining

support from him. Hearing however of his singular peculiarities, and

how difficult it was to gain admittance to him, he had altered his

plan, formed an acquaintance with his overseer, Edward, under the

assumed name of William Lorenz, and been taken into the house as

secretary. To see his beloved, who was travelling in the

neighbourhood, he had left his post, returned, and again gone away on

being alarmed by hearing that his mother was coming to visit her

kinsman.

"This very day," he concluded, "I met a traveller, a Hungarian, who

was come in haste from the mountains, and who told me a very important

piece of news. I was on my way hither to throw myself at your feet,

whether you would forgive me or no, when I met him in the next town.

Do not be too much shockt ... Herr Balthasar is no more ... he died

suddenly in a fit, without having made a will, as the stranger said he

knew for certain. The house, the little town, the whole neighbourhood

are in the utmost confusion. O my mother, we may all be happy, we may

all live affectionately together, if you will believe in my repentance

and reformation, if we can persuade my father to assent to the plan I

have to propose to him. I know you will now no longer refuse your

consent to my marriage with Caroline: the objection that we were both

of us so poor, is now done away: we are become too rich, far too much

so, to trust ourselves with all this wealth."

When their spirits were grown calm, and every thing had been

explained, a servant was sent after the counsellor, who came home in a

more serious and susceptible mood than was his wont. How great was his

astonishment at having to embrace his lost son, reformed and become a

reasonable being! He was quite unprepared for so joyful a shock. His

wife too received him with more confidence and affection: the death of

the beloved of her youth had affected her deeply.

Thus for the first time this family was united and happy, and amid

their sorrow felt a pure joy in the prospect of a comfortable and

prosperous future. The old man, who resolved to amend after the

example of his son, and to pass the remainder of his life more

decorously, agreed, even without any persuasion, to make over the

uncontrouled management of the property legally to his son, who was

now of age. It was settled that the mother and son should go first to

their new estate, to arrange every thing, and that Caroline should

follow soon after, and become his bride: the counsellor himself

preferred living still in his native town, and merely visiting his

family occasionally in the summer.

"Thus," he concluded, "we may still restore a household that was

almost lost, and raise it above what it ever was by mutual affection

and unity. My annuity is more than enough to support me; and should it

fall short, as I think can hardly happen, my son will assist me with a

small contribution."

* * * * *

Up in the mountains everything was now quiet. Balthasar, as well as

his treacherous old friend, was in his grave. William, as he had

formerly been called, arrived there with his mother to take possession

of the estate. The mayor and Edward gave everything up to him; and

when the surrender was completed, and Edward was left alone with the

mother and son, William thus interrupted their silent meditations:

"Now we are all among friends, my dear Edward, and I may talk with

perfect frankness to you, and shew my gratitude, if you choose so to

call it, for your former kindness. One night, when I was here, and had

been copying papers till very late, I was lockt into the anteroom; the

door had been fastened on the outside, and I did not like to make a

noise and call up the servants, more especially as Herr Balthasar used

to be much annoyed and worried by any disturbance. During the night,

while I kept perfectly still, I heard the unhappy old man walking to

and fro in his room, sometimes sighing heavily, sometimes moaning and

wailing as he talkt to himself. They were not merely broken sounds and

exclamations; but it seemed to be his custom to talk over sundry

events of his life, as if he was speaking to some invisible person.

Thus I heard the story of his youth, of his intolerable woes, but at

the same time of his love for Edward, and what part of his fortune he

meant to leave him. The chief thing however, and what toucht me most,

was to learn that Rose was not his adopted, but his real daughter. His

self-reproaches, his lamentations over her deceast mother, his bursts

of pity for Rose, were heart-rending. Now then, my beloved mother and

my dear Edward, what remains for us to do? Our conscience, if we

consult it honestly, declares that Rose is his true rightful heir, and

ought to have the largest part of his fortune."

After this declaration his mother treated the lovely girl as a beloved

daughter; and on the same day on which William celebrated his wedding,

Edward had also the happiness of receiving Rose as his bride. The

fortune was divided; Edward continued to manage all the most important

affairs; and a happy joyful family inhabited and enlivened the old

house, which lost its gloomy character, and often resounded with

music, songs, and dancing, to the delight of all the inhabitants of

the little town.