Anna’s Disappointment.--Dritzhn’s Regrets.--Comfort for Anna.--
Gutenberg’s Progress described.--The Great Enlightener.--
Advantages of Movable Type.--Another Book.--Obstacles.--
Criticisms.--Invention.--A Press contrived.--New Cause of
Disquiet.
As for Anna, usually so hopeful, she was much disquieted when her
husband told her that block-printing was only suited to small books,
and that some other method must be sought out, or he could not issue
large works. She had her heart on retrieving their affairs by the sale
of books, and was bitterly disappointed that the new art could not at
once, if ever, bring the hoped for prosperity.
Dritzhn’s life was embittered with vain regrets; each hour of the day
was vocal with his murmurs and forebodings. Under these circumstances,
Gutenberg did not feel free to take his rightful share of the small
profits, and, in consequence, the allowance for family expenses was
not sufficient to furnish his home with comforts and keep Want, the
gaunt wolf, away. And so it came about that one day Anna sat sewing in
her dwelling, the picture of grief, and bitterly reproaching herself
for the advice she had given her husband to turn aside from the sure
returns of the artisan to the uncertainties of invention. The garment
she was making fell from her hands, and she exclaimed,--
“Alas! I am the foolish woman that plucketh her house down with her
hands! I had not the wisdom to give my husband good counsel!” Thus she
bewailed herself with bitter tears and reproaches till evening, when,
hearing Gutenberg’s step as he returned from St. Arbogast, she quickly
wiped away her tears, and strove to meet him with composure.
“Why, Anna!” he cried, as he beheld her woe-begone face, “art thou ill?
Are our friends dead? Speak, and tell me!” And as she revealed the
source of her disquiet, he said cheerily,--
“My Anna, thou must take a juster view of things. Brighter days are in
store for us. Thou dost not know what I have discovered!”
“But I know too well what _I_ have discovered,” she rejoined; “it is
that we are beggars. There is no food in the house, and I can go no
more to the provision merchants until they are paid. It is dreadful to
think how we have spent our money!” To such an extremity of speech was
poor Anna brought in her trial.
“O Anna! Anna!” exclaimed Gutenberg, distressed for her, “dost thou see
these bits of wood? I have cut a letter on the end of each. I fasten
them together thus;” and he held up the type of the word _bonus_.
“I ink them, and press them on paper thus. See how beautifully they
print;” and he showed the word impressed in clear characters.
“But is it not presumption to trust longer to uncertainties?” cried
Anna; “they cannot bring food into the house. We are poor.”
“My Anna,” soothingly said the kind husband, “dost thou forget that I
have conceived a great invention, and that thou art really as rich as a
queen?”
“O, the wild dream!” returned Anna, smiling through her tears,
comforted by his sympathy, “I shall trust it when it pays our debts,
and feeds and clothes us. We are verily poor, and I see not how vain
imaginings can help us.”
“But, dear, my patrimony is not all gone. I have land still unsold at
Mentz; and as I cannot realize money from these immediately, I promise
thee that if this invention does not help our affairs in a month, I
will relinquish it for the present, and return to polishing gems for a
livelihood.”
It was a rough and thorny way that the inventor trod, reaching after
that great gift which God held out to man, and no wonder that Anna, in
this time of trial, pleaded with him to turn back, watering his path
with her tears.
Gutenberg slept little the night of the revelation of movable type. He
deemed the invention most important; and before his mind, stimulated to
unusual action, some of the great changes which would ensue from his
discovery, were dimly portrayed. Like the prophets who understood not
the full import of their own utterances, but inquired diligently to
know what the spirit which was in them did signify, so the discoverer
of the wonderful art could only hope that it was the introduction of
something glorious; and that hope was thenceforth his guiding star
amid the darkness of his earthly lot. With the first ray of morning he
was at his work, to test more fully the new types. Setting them up, he
fastened them together, and printed the same words as before. _Bonus
homo_ shone with the halo of _eureka_ to Gutenberg’s eye. “I have found
it!” he exclaimed, and, starting off to market, brought home food for
the day.