puckered up into a thousand folds, like a wet glove, and then
stretching out his arm he pointed to the building, which might be seen
behind the wood, upon a gentle declivity, and said, “Yonder, in the
castle!” Without waiting for what Paul might have to prattle further,
Albert struck into the path that led from the high road, and hurried on
in a rapid trot. After the little that he has said, honest Paul
Talkebarth must appear to the gracious reader as an odd sort of fellow.
We have only to say, that he being an heir-loom of the family, served
Colonel Victor von S---- from the moment when the latter first put on
his officer’s sword, after having been the intendent-general and
_maître des plaisirs_ of all the sports and mad pranks of his
childhood. An old and very odd _magister_, who had been tutor to the
family through two generations, completed, with the amount of education
which he allowed to flow to honest Paul, those happy talents for
extraordinary confusion and strange _Eulenspiegelei_[1] with which
nature had by no means scantily endued him. At the same time he was
the most faithful soul that could possibly exist. Ready every moment
to sacrifice his life for his master, neither his advanced age nor any
other consideration could prevent the good Paul from following him to
the field in the year 1813. His own nature rendered him superior to
every hardship; but less strong than his corporeal was his spiritual
nature, which seemed to have received a strange shock, or at any rate
some extraordinary impulse during his residence in France, especially
in Paris. Then, for the first time, did he properly feel that Magister
Spreugepileus had been perfectly right when he called him a great
light, that would one day shine forth brightly. This shining quality
Paul had discovered by the aptness with which he had accommodated
himself to the manners of a foreign people, and had learned their
language. Therefore, he boasted not a little, and ascribed it to his
extraordinary talent alone, that he could often, in respect to quarters
and provisions, obtain that which seemed unattainable. Talkebarth’s
fine French phrases, the gentle reader has already been made acquainted
with some pleasant curses--were current, if not through the whole army,
at any rate through the corps to which his master was attached. Every
trooper who came to quarters in a village, cried to the peasant with
Paul’s words, “Pisang! de lavendel pur di schevals!” (_Paysan, de
l’avoine pour les chevaux_.)
Paul, as is generally the case with eccentric natures, did not like
things to happen in the ordinary manner. He was particularly fond of
surprises, and sought to prepare them in every possible manner for his
master, who was certainly often surprised, though in quite another
manner than was designed by honest Talkebarth, whose happy schemes
generally failed in their execution. Thus, he now entreated
Lieutenant-colonel von B----, when the latter was riding straight up to
the principal entrance of the house, to take a circuitous course and
enter the court-yard by the back way, that his master might not see him
before he entered the room. To meet this view, Albert was obliged to
ride over a marshy meadow, where he was grievously splashed by the mud,
and then he had to go over a fragile bridge on a ditch. Paul
Talkebarth wished to show off his horsemanship by jumping cleverly
over; but he fell in with his horse up to the belly, and was with
difficulty brought back to firm ground by Albert’s groom. Now, in high
spirits, he put spurs to his horse, and with a wild huzza leaped into
the court-yard. As all the geese, ducks, turkeys, and poultry of the
household were gathered together here to rest; while from the one side
a flock of sheep, and from the other side a flock of pigs, had been
driven in, we may easily imagine that Paul Talkebarth, who not being
perfect master of his horse, galloped about the court in large circles,
without any will of his own, produced no little devastation in the
domestic economy. Amid the fearful noise of squeaking, cackling,
bleating, grunting animals, the barking of the dogs, and the scolding
of the servants, Albert made his glorious entrance, wishing honest Paul
Talkebarth at all the devils, with his project of surprise.
At last Albert leaped from his horse, and entered the house, which,
without any claim to beauty or elegance, looked roomy and convenient
enough. On the steps he was met by a well-fed, not very tall man, in a
short, gray, hunting-jacket, who, with a half-sour smile, said:
“Quartered?” By the tone in which the man asked this question, Albert
perceived at once that the master of the house, Baron von E---- (as he
had learned from Paul) was before him. He assured him that he was not
quartered, but merely purposed to visit his intimate friend, Colonel
Victor von S----, who was, he was told, residing there, and that he
only required the baron’s hospitality for that evening and the night,
as he intended to start very early on the following morning.
The baron’s face visibly cleared up, and the full sun-shine, which
ordinarily seemed to play upon his good-humoured, but somewhat too
broad, countenance, returned completely, when Albert as he ascended the
stairs with him remarked, that in all probability no division of the
army now marching would touch this spot.
The baron opened a door, Albert entered a cheerful-looking parlour, and
perceived Victor, who sat with his back towards him. At the sound of
his entrance Victor turned round, and with a loud exclamation of joy
fell into the arms of the lieutenant. “Is it not true, Albert, you
thought of me last night? I knew it, my inner sense told me that you
were in Liège at the very moment when you first entered the place. I
fixed all my thoughts upon you, my spiritual arms embraced you; you
could not escape me.”
Albert confessed that--as the gentle reader already knows--dark dreams
which came to no clear shape had driven him from Liège.
“Yes,” cried Victor, with transport, “yes, it is no fancy, no idle
notion; the divine power is given to us, which, ruling space and time,
manifests the supersensual in the world of sense.”
Albert did not know what Victor meant. Indeed the whole behaviour of
his friend, so different from his usual manner, seemed to denote an
over-excited state. In the meanwhile the lady, who had been sitting
before the fire near Victor, arose and approached the stranger. Albert
bowed to her, casting an inquiring glance at Victor. “This is the
Baroness Aurora von E----,” said Victor, “my hospitable hostess, who
tends me ever carefully and faithfully in sickness and in trouble!”
Albert as he looked at the baroness felt quite convinced that the
little plump woman had not yet attained her fortieth year, and that she
would have been very well made had not the nutritious food of the
country, together with much sunshine, caused her shape to deviate a
little from the line of beauty. This counteracted the favourable
effect of her pretty, fresh-coloured face, the dark blue eyes of which
might otherwise have beamed somewhat dangerously for the heart. Albert
considered the attire of the baroness almost too homely, for the
material of her dress, which was of a dazzling whiteness, while it
showed the excellence of the washing and bleaching department, also
showed the great distance at which the domestic spinning and weaving
stood from perfection. A cotton kerchief, of a very glaring pattern,
thrown negligently about the neck, so that its whiteness was visible
enough, did not at all increase the brilliant effect of the costume.
The oddest thing of all was, that the baroness wore on her little feet
the most elegant silken shoes, and on her head the most charming lace
cap, after the newest Parisian fashion. This head-dress, it is true,
reminded the lieutenant-colonel of a pretty grisette, with whom chance
had made him acquainted at Paris, but for this very reason a quantity
of uncommonly gallant things flowed from his lips, while he apologised
for his sudden appearance. The baroness did not fail to reply to these
prettinesses in the proper style, and having once opened her mouth the
stream of her discourse flowed on uninterruptedly, till she at last
went so far as to say, that it would be impossible to show sufficient
attention to such an amiable guest, the friend of the colonel, who was
so dear to the family. At the sudden ring of the bell, and the shrill
cry: “Mariane, Mariane!” a peevish old woman made her appearance, who,
by the bunch of keys which hung from her waist, seemed to be the
housekeeper. A consultation was now held with this lady and the
husband, as to what nice things could be got ready. It was soon found,
however, that all the delicacies, such as venison and the like, were
either already consumed, or could only be got the next day. Albert,
with difficulty suppressing his displeasure, said, that they would
force him to quit immediately in the night, if on his account they
disturbed the arrangements of the house in the slightest degree. A
little cold meat, nay, some bread and butter, would be sufficient for
his supper. The baroness replied by protesting that it was impossible
for the lieutenant-colonel to do without something warm, after his ride
in the rough, bleak weather, and after a long consultation with
Mariane, the preparation of some mulled wine was found to be possible
and decided on. Mariane vanished through the door-way, rattling as she
went, but at the very moment when they were about to take their seats,
the baroness was called out by an amazed maid-servant. Albert
overheard that the baroness was being informed at the door of the
frightful devastations of Paul Talkebarth, with a list--no
inconsiderable one--of the dead, wounded, and missing. The baron ran
out after his wife, and while she was scolding he was wishing honest
Paul Talkebarth at Jericho, and the servants were uttering general
lamentations. Albert briefly told his friend of Paul’s exploit in the
yard. “That old Eulenspiegel is always playing such tricks,” said
Victor, angrily, “and yet the rascal means so well from the very bottom
of his heart, that one cannot attack him.”
At that moment all became quiet without; the chief maid-servant had
brought the glad intelligence that Hans Gucklick had been frightened
indeed, but had come off free from other harm, and was now eating with
a good appetite.
The baron entered with a cheerful mien, and repeated, in a tone of
satisfaction, that Hans Gucklick had been spared from that wild,
life-disregarding Paul Talkebarth. At the same time he took occasion
to expatiate at great length, and from an agricultural point of view,
the utility of extending the breeding of poultry. This Hans Gucklick,
who had only been very frightened, and had not been otherwise hurt, was
the old cock, who was highly prized, and had been for years the pride
and ornament of the whole poultry-yard.
The baroness now made her re-appearance, but it was only to arm herself
with a great bunch of keys, which she took out of a cupboard. Quickly
she hurried off, and Albert could hear both her and the housekeeper
clattering and rattling up stairs and down stairs, accompanied by the
shrill voices of the maid-servants who were called, and the pleasant
music of pestles and mortars and graters, which ascended from the
kitchen. “Good heavens!” thought Albert. “If the general had marched
in with the whole of the head-quarters, there could not have been more
noise than has been occasioned by my unlucky cup of mulled wine.”
The baron, who had wandered from the breeding of poultry to hunting,
had not quite got to the end of a very complicated story of a fine deer
which he had seen, and had not shot, when the baroness entered the
room, followed by no less a person than Paul Talkebarth, who bore the
mulled wine in a handsome porcelain vessel. “Bring it all here, good
Paul,” said the baroness, very kindly. Whereupon Paul replied, with an
indescribably sweet, “A fu zerpir (_à vous servir_), madame.” The
manes of the victims in the yard seemed to be appeased, and all seemed
forgiven.
Now, at last, they all sat down quietly together. The baroness, after
she had handed the cup to the visiter, began to knit a monstrous
worsted stocking, and the baron took occasion to enlarge upon the
species of knitting which was designed to be worn while hunting.
During his discourse he seized the vessel, that he also might take a
cup. “Ernest!” cried the baroness to him, in an angry tone. He at
once desisted from his purpose, and slunk to the cupboard, where he
quietly refreshed himself with a glass of Schnapps. Albert availed
himself of the moment to put a stop to the baron’s tedious
disquisitions, by urgently asking his friend how he was going on.
Victor was of opinion that there was plenty of time to say, in two
words, what had happened to him since their separation, and that he
could not expect to hear from Albert’s lips all the mighty occurrences
of the late portentous period. The baroness assured him, with a smile,
that there was nothing prettier than tales of war and murder; while the
baron, who had rejoined the party, said that he liked amazingly to hear
of battles, when they were very bloody, as they always reminded him of
his hunting-parties. He was upon the point of returning to the story
of the stag that he did not shoot, but Albert cut him short, and
laughing out loud, though with increased displeasure, remarked that,
though there was, to be sure, some smart shooting in the chase, it was
a comfortable arrangement that the stags, hares, &c., whose blood was
at stake, could not return the fire.
Albert felt thoroughly warmed by the beverage which he had drunk, and
which he found was excellently made of splendid wine, and his
comfortable state of body had a good effect on his mind, completely
overcoming the ill-humour which had taken possession of him in this
uncomfortable society. He unfolded before Victor’s eyes the whole
sublime and fearful picture of the awful battle, that at once
annihilated all the hopes of the fancied ruler of the world. With the
most glowing imagination, he described the invincible, lion-like
courage of those battalions who at last stormed the village of
Planchenoit, and concluded with the words: “Oh! Victor, Victor! would
you had been there, and fought with me!”
Victor had moved close to the baroness’s chair, and having picked up
the large ball of worsted, which had rolled down from her lap, was
playing with it in his hands, so that the industrious knitter was
compelled to draw the threads through his fingers, and often could not
avoid touching his arm with her long needle.
At the words, which Albert uttered with an elevated voice, Victor
appeared suddenly to wake as from a dream. He eyed his friend with a
singular smile, and said, in a half-suppressed tone: “Yes, dear Albert,
what you say is but too true! Man often implicates himself early in
snares, the gordian knot of which death alone forcibly sunders! As for
what concerns the raising of the devil in general, the audacious
invocation of one’s own fearful spirit is the most perilous thing
possible. But here every thing sleeps!”
Victor’s dark, unintelligible words were a sufficient proof that he had
not heard a syllable of all that Albert had said, but had been occupied
all the time with dreams, which must have been of a very singular kind.
Albert, as may be supposed, was dumb with amazement. Looking around
him he perceived, for the first time, that the master of the house, who
with hands folded before him, had sunk against the back of a chair, had
dropped his weary head upon his breast, and that the baroness with
closed eyes continued to knit mechanically like a piece of clock-work
wound up.
Albert sprung up quickly, making a noise as he rose, but at the very
same moment the baroness rose also, and approached him with an air, so
free, noble, and graceful, that he saw no more of the little, plump,
almost comical figure, but thought that the baroness was transformed to
another creature. “Pardon the housewife who is employed from break of
day, lieutenant-colonel,” said she, in a sweet voice, as she grasped
Albert’s hand, “if in the evening she is unable to resist the effects
of fatigue, even though she hears the greatest events recorded in the
finest manner. This you must also pardon in the active sportsman. You
must certainly be anxious to be alone with your friend and to open your
heart to him, and under such circumstances every witness is an
incumberance. It will certainly be agreeable to you to take, alone
with your friend, the supper which I have served in his apartment.”
No proposal could have been more opportune to Albert. He immediately
in the most courteous language, wished a good night to his kind
hostess, whom he now heartily forgave for the bunch of keys, and the
grief about frightened Hans Gucklick, as well as for the
stocking-knitting and the nodding.
“Dear Ernest!” cried the baroness, as the friends wished to bid good
night to the baron; but as the latter, instead of answering only cried
out very plainly: “Huss! Huss! Tyrus! Waldmann! Allons!” and let
his head hang on the other side, they tried no more to arouse him from
his pleasant dreams.
“Now,” said Albert, finding himself alone with Victor for the first
time, “tell me how you have fared. But, however, first let us eat a
bit, for I am very hungry, and it appears there is something more here
than the bread and butter.”
The lieutenant-colonel was right, for he found a table elegantly set
out with the choicest cold delicacies, the chief ornament of which was
a Bayonne ham, and a pasty of red partridges. Paul Talkebarth, when
Albert expressed his satisfaction, said, waggishly smiling, that if he
had not been present, and had not given Mariane a hint of what it was
that the lieutenant-colonel liked, as suppenfink (_super-fine_)--but
that, nevertheless, he could not forget his aunt Lizzy, who had burned
the rice-pudding on his wedding-day, and that he had now been a widower
for thirty years, and one could not tell, since marriages were made in
heaven, and that Mariane--but that it was the gracious baroness who had
given him the best herself, namely, a whole basket of celery for the
gentleman. Albert did not know why such an unreasonable quantity of
vegetable food should be served, and was highly delighted, when Paul
Talkebarth brought the basket, which contained--not celery--but six
bottles of the finest _vin de Sillery_.
While Albert was enjoying himself, Victor narrated how he had come to
the estate of the Baron von E----.
The fatigues of the first campaign (1813), which had often proved too
much for the strongest constitutions, had ruined Victor’s health. The
waters at Aix-la-Chapelle would, he hoped, restore him, and he was
residing there when Bonaparte’s flight from Elba gave the signal for a
new and sanguinary contest. When preparations were making for the
campaign, Victor received orders from the _Residence_ to join the army
on the Lower Rhine, if his health permitted; but fate allowed him no
more than a ride of four or five leagues. Just before the gate of the
house in which the friends now were, Victor’s horse, which had usually
been the surest and most fearless animal in the world, and had been
tried in the wildest tumults of battle, suddenly took fright, and
reared, and Victor fell--to use his own words--like a schoolboy who has
mounted a horse for the first time. He lay insensible, while the blood
flowed from a severe wound in his head, which he had struck against a
sharp stone. He was carried into the house, and here, as removal
seemed dangerous, he was forced to remain till the time of his
recovery, which did not yet seem complete, since, although the wound
had been long healed, he was weakened by the attacks of fever. Victor
spoke of the care and attention which the baroness had bestowed upon
him in terms of the warmest gratitude.
“Well,” cried Albert, laughing aloud, “for this I was not prepared. I
thought you were going to tell me something very extraordinary, and
now, lo, and behold--don’t be offended--the whole affair seems to turn
out a silly sort of story, like those that have been so worn out in a
hundred stupid novels, that nobody with decency can have any thing to
do with such adventures. The wounded knight is borne into the castle,
the mistress of the house tends him, and he becomes a tender _Amoroso_.
For, Victor, that you, in spite of your good taste hitherto, in spite
of your whole mode of life, should all of a sudden fall in love with a
plump elderly woman, who is homely and domestic to the last degree,
that you should play the pining lack-a-daisical youth, who, as somebody
says, ‘sighs like an oven, and makes songs on his mistress’s
tears,’--that, I say, I can only look upon as a sort of disease! The
only thing that could excuse you in any way, and put you in a poetical
light, would be the Spanish Infanta in the ‘Physician of his
Honour,’[2] who, meeting a fate similar to yours, fell upon his nose
before Donna Menzia’s gate, and at last found the beloved one, who
unconsciously--”
“Stop!” interrupted Victor, “stop! Don’t you think that I see clearly
enough, that you take me for a silly dolt? No, no, there is something
else--something more mysterious at work. Let us drink!”
The wine, and Albert’s lively talk, had produced a wholesome excitement
in Victor, who seemed aroused from a gloomy dream. But when, at last,
Albert, raising his full glass, said, “Now, Victor, my dear Infanta,
here’s a health to Donna Menzia, and may she look like our little pet
hostess.”--Victor cried, laughing, “No, no, I cannot bear that you
should take me for a fool. I feel quite cheerful, and ready to make a
confession to you of every thing! You must, however, submit to hear an
entire youthful period of my life, and it is possible that half the
night will be taken up by the narrative.”
“Begin!” replied Albert, “for I see we have enough wine to cheer up our
somewhat sinking spirits. I only wish it was not so confoundedly cold,
nor a crime to wake up the good folks of the house.”