your being unfortunate. Is that your gratitude for my benefits? Who
bade you wish so foolishly? A glass-manufacturer you wished to be, and
you did not know where to sell your glass! Did I not tell you to be
cautious in what you wished? Common sense, Peter, and prudence, you
wanted.”
“A fig for your sense and prudence,” cried Peter; “I am as shrewd a
fellow as any one, and will prove it to you, glass-mannikin,” seizing
him rudely by the collar as he spoke these words, and crying, “have I
now got you, Schatzhauser? Now I will tell you my third wish, which
you shall grant me. I’ll have instantly, on the spot, two hundred
thousand hard thalers and a house. Woe is me!” he cried, suddenly
shaking his hand, for the little man of the wood had changed himself
into red-hot glass, and burned in his hand like bright fire. Nothing
more was to be seen of him.
For several days his swollen hand reminded him of his ingratitude and
folly. Soon, however, he silenced his conscience, saying: “Should they
sell my glass, manufactory and all, still fat Hezekiel is certain to
me; and as long as he has money on a Sunday, I cannot want.”
“Very true, Peter! But, if he has none?” And so it happened one day,
and it proved a singular example in arithmetic. For he came one Sunday
in his chaise to the inn, and at once all the people popped their heads
out of the windows, one saying, “There comes gambling Peter;” a second
saying, “Yes, there is the emperor of the ball-room, the wealthy
glass-manufacturer;” while a third shook his head, saying, “It is all
very well with his wealth, but people talk a great deal about his
debts, and somebody in town has said that the bailiff will not wait
much longer before he distrains upon him.”
At this moment the wealthy Peter saluted the guests at the windows, in
a haughty and grave manner, descended from his chaise, and cried: “Good
evening, mine Host of the Sun. Is fat Hezekiel here?”
To this question a deep voice answered from within: “Only come in,
Peter; your place is kept for you, we are all here, at the cards
already.”
Peter entering the parlour, immediately put his hand into his pocket,
and perceived, by its being quite full, that Hezekiel must be
plentifully supplied. He sat down at the table among the others and
played, losing and winning alternately; thus they kept playing till
night, when all sober people went home. After having continued for
some time by candle-light, two of the gamblers said: “Now it is enough,
and we must go home to our wives and children.”
But Peter challenged Hezekiel to remain. The latter was unwilling, but
said, after a while, “Be it as you wish; I will count my money, and
then we’ll play dice at five florins the stake, for any thing lower is,
after all, but child’s play.” He drew his purse, and, after counting,
found he had a hundred florins left; now Peter knew how much he himself
had left, without counting first. But if Hezekiel had before won, he
now lost stake after stake, and swore most awfully. If he cast a
_pasch_, Peter immediately cast one likewise, and always two points
higher. At length he put down the last five florins on the table,
saying, “Once more; and if I lose this stake also, yet I will not leave
off; you will then lend me some of the money you have won now, Peter;
one honest fellow helps the other.”
“As much as you like, even if it were a hundred florins,” replied
Peter, joyful at his gain, and fat Hezekiel rattled the dice and threw
up fifteen; “Pasch!” he exclaimed, “now we’ll see!” But Peter threw up
eighteen, and, at this moment, a hoarse, well-known voice said behind
him, “So! that was the last.”
He looked round, and behind him stood the gigantic figure of Michel the
Dutchman. Terrified, he dropped the money he had already taken up.
But fat Hezekiel, not seeing Michel, demanded that Peter should advance
him ten florins for playing. As if in a dream Peter hastily put his
hand into his pocket, but there was no money; he searched in the other
pocket, but in vain; he turned his coat inside out, not a farthing,
however, fell out; and at this instant he first recollected his first
wish; viz., to have always as much money in his pocket as fat Hezekiel.
All had now vanished like smoke.
The host and Hezekiel looked at him with astonishment as he still
searched for and could not find his money; they would not believe that
he had no more left; but when they at length searched his pockets,
without finding any thing, they were enraged, swearing that gambling
Peter was an evil wizard, and had wished away all the money he had won
home to his own house. Peter defended himself stoutly, but appearances
were against him. Hezekiel protested he would tell this shocking story
to all the people in the Schwarzwald, and the host vowed he would, the
following morning early go into the town and inform against Peter as a
sorcerer, adding that he had no doubt of his being burnt alive. Upon
this they fell furiously upon him, tore off his coat, and kicked him
out of doors.
Not one star was twinkling in the sky to lighten Peter’s way as he
sneaked sadly towards his home, but still he could distinctly recognise
a dark form striding by his side, which at length said, “It is all over
with you, Peter Munk; all your splendour is at an end, and this I could
have foretold you even at the time when you would not listen to me, but
rather ran to the silly glass dwarf. You now see to what you have come
by disregarding my advice. But try your fortune with me this time, I
have compassion on your fate. No one ever yet repented of applying to
me, and if you don’t mind the walk to the Tannenbühl, I shall be there
all day to-morrow and you may speak to me, if you will call.” Peter
now very clearly perceived who was speaking to him, but feeling a
sensation of awe, he made no answer and ran towards home.
When, on the Monday morning, he came to his factory, he not only found
his workmen, but also other people whom no one likes to see; viz., the
bailiff and three beadles. The bailiff wished Peter good morning,
asked him how he had slept, and then took from his pocket a long list
of Peter’s creditors, saying, with a stern look, “Can you pay or not?
Be short, for I have no time to lose, and you know it is full three
leagues to the prison.” Peter in despair confessed he had nothing
left, telling the bailiff he might value all the premises, horses, and
carts. But while they went about examining and valuing the things,
Peter said to himself, “Well, it is but a short way to the Tannenbühl,
and as the _little_ man has not helped me, I will now try for once the
_big_ man.” He ran towards the Tannenbühl as fast as if the beadles
were at his heels. On passing the spot where the glass-mannikin had
first spoken to him, he felt as if an invisible hand were stopping him,
but he tore himself away and ran onwards till he came to the boundary
which he had well marked. Scarcely had he, almost out of breath,
called, “Dutch Michel, Mr. Dutch Michel!” than suddenly the gigantic
raftsman with his pole stood before him.
“Have you come then?” said the latter, laughing. “Were they going to
fleece you and sell you to your creditors? Well, be easy, all your
sorrow comes, as I have always said, from the little glass-mannikin,
the Separatist and Pietist. When one gives, one ought to give right
plentifully and not like that skinflint. But come,” he continued,
turning towards the forest, “follow me to my house, there we’ll see
whether we can strike a bargain.”
“Strike a bargain?” thought Peter. “What can he want of me, what can I
sell to him? Am I perhaps to serve him, or what is it that he can
want?” They went at first up-hill over a steep forest path, when all
at once they stopped at a dark, deep, and almost perpendicular ravine.
Michel leaped down as easily as he would go down marble steps; but
Peter almost fell into a fit when he saw him below, rising up like a
church steeple reaching him an arm as long as a scaffolding pole with a
hand at the end as broad as the table in the ale house, and calling in
a voice which sounded like the deep tones of a death bell, “Set
yourself boldly on my hand, hold fast by the fingers and you will not
fall off.” Peter, trembling, did as he was ordered, sat down upon his
hand and held himself fast by the thumb of the giant.
They now went down a long way and very deep, yet, to Peter’s
astonishment, it did not grow darker; on the contrary, the daylight
seemed rather to increase in the chasm, and it was sometime before
Peter’s eyes could bear it. Michel’s stature became smaller as Peter
came lower down, and he stood now in his former size before a house
just like those of the wealthy peasants of the Schwarzwald. The room
into which Peter was led differed in nothing but its appearance of
solitariness from those of other people. The wooden clock, the stove
of Dutch tiles, the broad benches and utensils on the shelves were the
same as anywhere else. Michel told him to sit down at the large table,
then went out of the room and returned with a pitcher of wine and
glasses. Having filled these, they now began a conversation, and Dutch
Michel expatiated on the pleasures of the world, talked of foreign
countries, fine cities and rivers, so that Peter, at length, feeling a
yearning after such sights, candidly told Michel his wish.
“If you had courage and strength in your body to undertake any thing,
could a few palpitations of your stupid heart make you tremble; and the
offences against honor, or misfortunes, why should a rational fellow
care, for either? Did you feel it in your head when they but lately
called you a cheat and a scoundrel? Or did it give you a pain in your
stomach, when the bailiff came to eject you from your house? Tell me,
where was it you felt pain?”
“In my heart,” replied Peter, putting his hand on his beating breast,
for he felt as if his heart was anxiously turning within him.
“Excuse me for saying so, but you have thrown away many hundred florins
on vile beggars and other rabble; what has it profited you? They have
wished you blessings and health for it; well, have you grown the
healthier for that? For half that money you might have kept a
physician. A blessing, a fine blessing forsooth, when one is
distrained upon and ejected! And what was it that urged you to put
your hand into your pocket, as often as a beggar held out his broken
hat?--Why your heart again, and ever your heart, neither your eyes, nor
your tongue, nor your arms, nor your legs, but your heart; you have, as
the proverb truly says, taken too much to heart.”
“But how can we accustom ourselves to act otherwise? I take, at this
moment, every possible pains to suppress it, and yet my heart
palpitates and pains me.”
“You, indeed, poor fellow!” cried Michel, laughing; “you can do nothing
against it; but give me this scarcely palpitating thing, and you will
see how comfortable you will then feel.”
“My heart to you?” cried Peter, horrified. “Why, then, I must die on
the spot! Never!”
“Yes, if one of your surgeons would operate upon you and take out your
heart, you must indeed die; but with me it is a different thing; just
come in here and convince yourself.”
Rising at these words, he opened the door of a chamber and took Peter
in. On stepping over the threshold, his heart contracted convulsively,
but he minded it not, for the sight that presented itself was singular
and surprising. On several shelves glasses were standing, filled with
a transparent liquid, and each contained a heart. All were labelled
with names which Peter read with curiosity; there was the heart of the
bailiff in F., that of fat Hezekiel, that of the “king of the
ball-room,” that of the ranger; there were the hearts of six usurious
corn-merchants, of eight recruiting officers, of three money-brokers;
in short, it was a collection of the most respectable hearts twenty
leagues around.
“Look!” said Dutch Michel, “all these have shaken off the anxieties and
cares of life; none of these hearts any longer beat anxiously and
uneasily, and their former owners feel happy now they have got rid of
the troublesome guest.”
“But what do they now carry in their breasts instead?” asked Peter,
whose head was nearly swimming at what he beheld.
“_This_,” replied he, taking out of a small drawer, and presenting to
him--a heart of stone.
“Indeed!” said Peter, who could not prevent a cold shuddering coming
over him. “A heart of marble? But, tell me, Mr. Michel, such a heart
must be very cold in one’s breast.”
“True, but very agreeably cool. Why should a heart be warm? For in
winter its warmth is of little use, and good strong Kirschwasser does
more than a warm heart, and in summer when all is hot and sultry, you
can’t think how cooling such a heart is. And, as before said, such a
heart feels neither anxiety nor terror, neither foolish compassion nor
other grief.”
“And that is all you can offer me,” asked Peter, indignantly, “I looked
for money and you are going to give me a stone.”
“Well! an hundred thousand florins, methinks, would suffice you for the
present. If you employ it properly, you may soon make it a million.”
“An hundred thousand!” exclaimed the poor coal-burner, joyfully.
“Well, don’t beat so vehemently in my bosom, we shall soon have done
with one another. Agreed, Michel, give me the stone, and the money,
and the alarum you may take out of its case.”
“I always thought you were a reasonable fellow,” replied Michel, with a
friendly smile; “come, let us drink another glass, and then I will pay
you the money.”
They went back to the room and sat down again to the wine, drinking one
glass after another till Peter fell into a profound sleep.
He was awakened by the cheerful blast of a post-boy’s bugle, and found
himself sitting in a handsome carriage, driving along on a wide road.
On putting his head out he saw in the airy distance the Schwarzwald
lying behind him. At first he could scarcely believe that it was his
own self sitting in the carriage, for even his clothes were different
from those he had worn the day before; but still he had such a distinct
recollection that, giving up at length all these reflections, he
exclaimed, “I am Peter and no other, that is certain.”
He was astonished that he could no longer, in the slightest degree,
feel melancholy now he for the first time departed from his quiet home
and the forests where he had lived so long. He could not even press a
tear out of his eyes or utter a sigh, when he thought of his mother,
who must now feel helpless and wretched; for he was indifferent to
every thing: “Well,” he said, “tears and sighs, yearning for home and
sadness proceed indeed from the heart, but thanks to Dutch Michel, mine
is of stone and cold.” Putting his hand upon his breast, he felt all
quiet and no emotion. “If Michel,” said he, beginning to search the
carriage, “keeps his word as well with respect to the hundred thousand
florins as he does with the heart, I shall be very glad.” In his
search he found articles of dress of every description he could wish,
but no money. At length, however, he discovered a pocket containing
many thousand thalers in gold, and bills on large houses in all the
great cities. “Now I have what I want,” thought he, squeezed himself
into the corner of the carriage and went into the wide world.
For two years he travelled about in the world, looked from his carriage
to the right and left up the houses, but whenever he alighted he looked
at nothing except the sign of the hotel, and then ran about the town to
see the finest curiosities. But nothing gladdened him, no pictures, no
building, no music, no dancing, nor any thing else had any interest
for, or excited his stone heart; his eyes and ears were blunted for
every thing beautiful. No enjoyment was left him but that which he
felt in eating and drinking and sleep; and thus he lived running
through the world without any object, eating for amusement and sleeping
from _ennui_. From time to time he indeed remembered that he had been
more cheerful and happier, when he was poor and obliged to work for a
livelihood. Then he was delighted by every beautiful prospect in the
valley, by music and song, then he had for hours looked in joyful
expectation towards the frugal meal which his mother was to bring him
to the kiln.
When thus reflecting on the past, it seemed very strange to him, that
now he could not even laugh, while formerly he had laughed at the
slightest joke. When others laughed, he only distorted his mouth out
of politeness, but his heart did not sympathise with the smile. He
felt he was indeed exceedingly tranquil, but yet not contented. It was
not a yearning after home, nor was it sadness, but a void, desolate
feeling, satiety and a joyless life that at last urged him to his home.
When, after leaving Strasburg, he beheld the dark forest of his native
country; when for the first time he again saw the robust figures, the
friendly and open countenances of the Schwarzwälder; when the homely,
strong, and deep, but harmonious sounds struck upon his ear, he quickly
put his hand upon his heart, for his blood flowed faster, thinking he
must rejoice and weep at the same time; but how could he be so foolish?
he had a heart of stone, and stones are dead and can neither smile nor
weep.
His first walk was to Michel who received him with his former kindness.
“Michel,” said he, “I have now travelled and seen every thing, but all
is dull stuff and I have only found _ennui_. The stone I carry about
with me in my breast, protects me against many things; I never get
angry, am never sad, but neither do I ever feel joyful, and it seems as
if I was only half alive. Can you not infuse a little more life into
my stone heart, or rather, give me back my former heart? During
five-and-twenty years I had become quite accustomed to it, and though
it sometimes did a foolish thing, yet it was, after all, a merry and
cheerful heart.”
The sylvan spirit laughed grimly and sarcastically at this, answering,
“When once you are dead, Peter Munk, it shall not be withheld; then you
shall have back your soft, susceptible heart, and may then feel
whatever comes, whether joy or sorrow. But here, on this side of the
grave, it can never be yours again. Travelled you have indeed, Peter,
but in the way you lived, your travelling could afford you no
satisfaction. Settle now somewhere in the world, build a house, marry,
and employ your capital; you wanted nothing but occupation; being idle,
you felt _ennui_, and now you lay all the blame to this innocent
heart.” Peter saw that Michel was right with respect to idleness, and
therefore proposed to himself to become richer and richer. Michel gave
him another hundred thousand florins, and they parted as good friends.
The report soon spread in Schwarzwald that “Coal Peter,” or “gambling
Peter” had returned, and was much richer than before. It was here as
it always is. When he was a beggar he was kicked out of the inn, but
now he had come back wealthy, all shook him by the hand when he entered
on the Sunday afternoon, praised his horse, asked about his journey,
and when he began playing for hard dollars with fat Hezekiel, he stood
as high in their estimation as ever before. He no longer followed the
trade of glass manufacturer, but the timber trade, though that only in
appearance, his chief business being in corn and money transactions.
Half the people of the Schwarzwald became by degrees his debtors, and
he lent money only at ten per cent., or sold corn to the poor who, not
being able to pay ready money, had to purchase it at three times its
value. With the bailiff he now stood on a footing of the closest
friendship, and if any one failed paying Mr. Peter Munk on the very day
the money was due, the bailiff with his beadles came, valued house and
property, sold all instantly, and drove father, mother, and child, out
into the forest. This became at first rather troublesome to Peter, for
the poor outcasts besieged his doors in troops, the men imploring
indulgence, the women trying to move his stony heart, and the children
moaning for a piece of bread. But getting a couple of large mastiffs,
he soon put an end to this cat’s music, as he used to call it, for he
whistled and set them on the beggars, who dispersed screaming. But the
most troublesome person to him was “the old woman,” who, however, was
no other than Frau Munk, Peter’s mother. She had been reduced to great
poverty and distress, when her house and all was sold, and her son, on
returning wealthy, had troubled himself no more about her. So she came
sometimes before his house, supporting herself on a stick, as she was
aged, weak, and infirm; but she no more ventured to go in, as he had on
one occasion driven her out; and she was much grieved at being obliged
to prolong her existence by the bounties of other people, while her own
son might have prepared for her a comfortable old age. But his cold
heart never was moved by the sight of the pale face and well known
features, by the imploring looks, outstretched withered hands and
decaying frame. If on a Saturday she knocked at the door, he put his
hand grumbling into his pocket for a six-batzen-piece, wrapped it in a
bit of paper and sent it out by a servant. He heard her tremulous
voice when she thanked him, and wished him a blessing in this world, he
heard her crawl away coughing from the door, but he thought of nothing,
except that he had again spent six-batzen for nothing.
At length Peter took it into his head to marry. He knew that every
father in the Schwarzwald would gladly give him his daughter, but he
was fastidious in his choice, for he wished that every body should
praise his good fortune and understanding in matrimony as well as in
other matters. He therefore rode about the whole forest, looking out
in every direction, but none of the pretty Schwarzwülder girls seemed
beautiful enough for him. Having finally looked out in vain for the
most beautiful at all the dancing-rooms, he was one day told the most
beautiful and most virtuous girl in the whole forest was the daughter
of a poor wood-cutter. He heard she lived quiet and retired, was
industrious and managed her father’s household well, and that she was
never seen at a dancing-room, not even at Whitsuntide or the
Kirchweihfest.[2] When Peter heard of this wonder of the Schwarzwald,
he determined to court her, and, having inquired where the hut was,
rode there. The father of the beautiful Elizabeth received the great
gentleman with astonishment, but was still more amazed when he heard it
was the rich Herr Peter who wished to become his son-in-law. Thinking
all his cares and poverty would now be at an end, he did not hesitate
long in giving his consent, without even asking the beautiful
Elizabeth, and the good child was so dutiful that she became Frau Peter
Munk without opposition.