in any other head-dress except a neat little Erlangen hood.
However objectionable it was to Master Wacht that Jonathan was to
belong to a class which he hated, he did not by any means make the boy,
or later the youth, feel the consequences of his displeasure. Rather he
was always very pleased to see the good quiet Jonathan look in after
his day's work was done, to spend the evening with his daughters and
old Barbara. But then Jonathan also wrote the finest hand that could be
seen anywhere; and it afforded Master Wacht no little joy, for he was
uncommonly fond of good handwriting, when his Nanni, whose writing-
master Jonathan had installed himself to be, began gradually after a
time to write the same elegant hand as her master.
In the evening Master Wacht himself was either busy in his own work-
room, or, as was often the case, he visited a beer-house, where he met
with his fellow-craftsmen and the gentlemen of the council, and in his
way enlivened the company with his own rare wit. Meanwhile in the house
at home Barbara busily kept her distaff on the whirl and whizz, whilst
Rettel balanced the house-keeping accounts, or thought out the
preparation of new and hitherto unheard-of dishes, or related again to
the old woman, mingled with a good deal of loud laughter, what she had
learned in confidence from her various gossips in the town.
And the youth Jonathan? He sat at the table with Nanni; and she also
wrote and drew, of course under his guidance. And yet to sit writing
and drawing the whole evening through is a downright tiring piece of
business; hence it was no unfrequent occurrence for Jonathan to draw
some neatly-bound book out of his pocket and read it to pretty,
sensitive Nanni in a low softly-whispering tone.
Through old Eichheimer's influence Jonathan had won the patronage of
the minor canon, who designated Master Wacht a real Verrina. The canon,
Count von Kösel, a man of genius, lived and revelled in Goethe's and
Schiller's works, which were just at that time beginning to rise like
bright streaming meteors, overtopping all others, above the horizon of
the literary sky. He thought, and rightly, that he discerned a similar
tendency in his attorney's young clerk, and took a special delight not
only in lending him the works in question, but in reading them in
common with him, and so helping him to thoroughly digest them.
But Jonathan won his way to the Count's heart in an especial way,
because he expressed a very favourable opinion of the verses which the
Count patched together out of high-sounding phrases in the sweat of his
own brow, and because he was, to the Count's unspeakable satisfaction,
edified and touched by them to the proper pitch. Nevertheless it is a
fact that Jonathan's taste in æsthetic matters was really greatly
improved by his intercourse with the intellectual, though somewhat
euphuistic, Count.
My kind reader now knows what class of books Jonathan used to take out
of his pocket and read to pretty Nanni, and can form a just conception
of the way in which this kind of writings would inevitably excite a
girl mentally organised as Nanni was. "O star of the gloaming eve!"
Would not Nanni's tears flow when her attractive writing-master began
in this low and solemn fashion?
It is a fact of common experience that young people who are in the
habit of singing tender love-duets together very easily put themselves
in the places of the fictitious characters of the song, and come to
look upon the duets in question as giving both the melody and the text
for the whole of life; so also the youth who reads a love romance to a
maiden very readily becomes the hero of the story, whilst the girl
dreams herself into the role of the heroine. In the case of such fitly
adapted spirits as Jonathan and Nanni such incitement as this even was
not required to provoke them to love each other. They were one heart
and one soul; the maiden and the youth were, so to speak, but one
brightly burning flame of love, pure and inextinguishable. Of his
daughter's tender passion Father Wacht had not the slightest inkling;
but he was soon to learn all.
Through unwearied industry and genuine talent Jonathan succeeded in a
brief space of time in completing his legal studies and qualifying for
admission to the grade of advocate; and, as a matter of fact, his
admission soon followed. He intended one Sunday to surprise Master
Wacht with this glad news, which established him upon a secure footing
for life. But imagine how he trembled with dismay when Wacht bent his
eyes upon him, blazing with anger; he had never seen him look so
passionately wrathful. "What!" cried Wacht, in a tone that made the
walls ring again, "what! you miserable good-for-nothing fellow! Nature
has neglected your body, but richly endowed you with splendid
intellectual gifts, and these you are intending to abuse in a shameless
way, like a bad crafty knave, and so putting your knife at your own
mother's throat? You mean to say you are going to traffic in justice as
in some cheap paltry ware in the public market, and weigh it out with
false scales to the poor peasants and the oppressed burgher, who in
vain utter their plaintive cries before the soft-cushioned seat of the
inexorable judge, and going to get yourself paid with blood-stained
pence which the poor man hands to you whilst bathed in tears? Will you
fill your brains with lying laws of man's contriving, and practise
knavish tricks and schemes, and make a lucrative business of it to
fatten yourself upon? Is all your father's virtue, tell me, vanished
from your heart? Your father--your name is Engelbrecht--no! when I hear
you called so I will not believe that it is the name of my comrade, who
was a pattern of virtue and honesty, but I must believe that it is
Satan, who in the apish mockery of Hell is shouting the name across his
grave, and so beguiling men to take the young lying lawyer's cub for
the real son of that excellent carpenter Gottfried Engelbrecht. Begone!
you are no longer my foster-son! You are a serpent whom I will pluck
from my bosom, whom I will disown"----
At this point Nanni rushed in and threw herself at Master Wacht's feet
with a piercing heart-rending cry of distress. "Father!" she cried,
completely overcome by her incontrollable anguish and unbridled
despair, "father, if you disown him, you will disown me also--me, your
own favourite daughter; he is mine, my Jonathan; I can never, never
part with him in this world."
The poor child fell down in a swoon and struck her head against the
closet-door, so that the drops of blood trickled down her delicate
white forehead. Barbara and Rettel ran in and carried the insensible
girl to the sofa. Jonathan stood like a statue, as if thunderstruck,
incapable of the slightest movement. It would be difficult to describe
the inner emotions which revealed themselves on Wacht's countenance.
His face, instead of being flushed with the redness of anger, was now
pale as a corpse's; there only remained a dark fire gleaming in his
fixed set eyes; the cold perspiration of death appeared to be standing
on his forehead. After gazing unchangeably before him for some minutes
without speaking, he relieved his labouring breast by saying in a
significant tone, "So that was it!" then he strode slowly towards the
door, where he again stood still, and turning half round towards the
women, cried, "Dont' spare _eau de Cologne_, and this foolery will soon
be over."
Shortly afterwards the Master was seen to leave the house at a quick
pace and bend his steps towards the hills. It may be conceived in what
great trouble and distress the family was plunged. Rettel and Barbara
could not for the life of them imagine what terrible thing had
happened; but when the Master did not return to dinner, but stayed out
till late at night--a thing he had never done before--they were greatly
agitated with anxiety and fear. At length they heard him coming, heard
him open the street-door, bang it violently to, ascend the stairs with
strong firm footsteps, and lock himself in his own chamber.
Poor Nanni soon recovered herself again and wept quietly to herself.
But Jonathan did not stop short of wild outbreaks of inconsolable
despair, and several times spoke of shooting himself. It is a fortunate
thing that pistols are articles which do not necessarily belong to the
furniture of sentimental young lawyers; or at least, if they are to be
found amongst their effects, they generally have no lock or else won't
go off.
After he had run through certain streets like a madman, Jonathan's
course led him instinctively to his noble patron, to whom he lamented
all his unheard-of misery in outbreaks of the most violent passion. It
need hardly be added, it is so self-evident a thing, that the young
love-smitten advocate was, according to his own desperate assertions,
the first and only individual in all the wide world whom such a
terrible fate had befallen, wherefore he reproached destiny and all the
powers of enmity as having conspired together against him.
The canon listened to him calmly and with a certain share of interest;
but nevertheless he did not appear to appreciate the full extent of the
trouble which the young lawyer imagined he felt "My dear young friend,"
said the canon, taking the advocate by the hand in a friendly way, and
leading him to a seat, "my dear young friend, hitherto I have looked
upon our carpenter Herr Johannes Wacht as a great man in his way, but I
now perceive that he is also a very great fool. Great fools are like
jibbing horses; it's hard to make them move; but once they have been
got to move, they trot merrily along the way they are wanted to go. In
spite of the old man's senseless anger you ought not by any means to
give up your beautiful Nanni in consequence of the unpleasant scene of
today. But before proceeding to talk further about your love-affair,
which is indeed very charming and romantic, let us turn to and discuss
a little breakfast. It was noon when you went to old Wacht, and I don't
dine until four o'clock in Seehof."9
A very appetising breakfast indeed was served up on the little table at
which they both sat--the canon and the advocate--Bayonne hams,
garnished round about with slices of Portuguese onions, a cold larded
partridge of the red kind and a foreigner to boot, truffles cooked in
red wine, a dish of Strasburg _pâtés de foie gras_, finally a plate of
genuine Strachino10 and another with butter, as yellow and shining as
lilies of the valley.
The indulgent reader who loves such dainty butter, and ever goes to
Bamberg, will be pleased at getting there the finest and best, but will
also at the same time be annoyed when he learns that the inhabitants,
from mistaken notions of housekeeping, melt it down to a grease, which
generally tastes rancid and spoils all the food.
Besides, good dry champagne was sending up its pearly sparkles in a
beautifully-cut crystal decanter. The canon had not unloosed the napkin
from his neck, but had let it stay where it was when he had received
the young lawyer; and, after the footman had quickly supplied a second
cover, he proceeded to place the choicest morsels before the despairing
lover and to pour out wine for him; and then he set to work heartily
himself. Some one once had the hardihood to maintain that the stomach
is equivalent to all the other physical and intellectual parts of man
put together. That is a profane and abominable doctrine; but this much
is certain, that the stomach is like a despotic tyrant or ironical
mystifier, and often carries through its own will. And this was the
case in the present instance. For instinctively, without being clearly
conscious of what he was about, the young lawyer had in a few minutes
devoured a huge piece of Bayonne ham, created terrible devastation
amongst the Portuguese garniture, put out of sight half a partridge, no
inconsiderable quantity of trufles, and also more Strasburg _pâtés_
than was exactly becoming in a young advocate full of trouble.
Moreover, they both relished the champagne so much that the footman
soon had to fill up the crystal decanter a second time.
The advocate felt a pleasant and beneficial degree of warmth penetrate
his vitals, and all he experienced of his trouble was a singular sort
of shiver, which exactly resembled electric shocks, causing pain but
doing good. He proved himself susceptible to the consolations of his
patron, who, after comfortably sipping up his last glass of wine and
elegantly wiping his mouth, settled himself into position and began as
follows:--
"In the first place, my dear good friend, you must not be so foolish as
to imagine that you are the only man on earth to whom a father has
refused the hand of his daughter. But that's nothing to do with the
present case. As I have already told you, the old fool's reason for
hating you is so preposterously absurd that it cannot last long; and
whether it appear to you at this moment nonsensical or not, I can
hardly bear the thought of all ending in a tame commonplace wedding, so
that the whole thing may be summed up in the few words,--Peter has
wooed Grete,11 and Peter and Grete are man and wife.
"The situation is, however, so far new and grand in that it is merely
hatred against a class to which the beloved foster-son belongs that can
furnish the sole lever for setting a new and special tragic development
in motion; but to the real matter at issue! You are a poet, my friend,
and that alters everything. Your love, your trouble, ought to appear in
your eyes as something magnificent, in the full splendours of the
sacred art of poesy. You will hear the strains of the lyre struck by
the muse who is nearest akin to you, and in the divine gush of
inspiration you will receive the winged words in which to express your
love and your unhappiness. As a poet you might be called at this moment
the happiest man on the earth, since, your heart having been really
wounded as deep as it can be wounded, your heart's blood is now gushing
out. You require, therefore, no artificial incitement to allure you to
a poetic mood; and mark my words, this period of trouble will enable
you to produce something great and admirable.
"I must draw your attention to the fact that in these first moments of
your unhappiness there will be mingled with it a peculiar and very
unpleasant feeling which cannot be woven into any poetry; but it is a
feeling which soon vanishes away. Let me make you understand. For
example, after the unfortunate lover has had a good sound drubbing from
the enraged father, and has been kicked out of the house, and the
outraged mamma has locked the young lady in her chamber, and repelled
the attempted storming on the part of the desperate lover by the armed
domestics of the house, and when plebeian fists have even entertained
no shyness of the very finest cloth" (here the canon sighed somewhat),
"then this fermented prose of miserable vulgarity must evaporate in
order that the pure poetic unhappiness of love may settle as sediment
You have been fearfully scolded, my dear young friend, this was the
bitter prose that had to be surmounted; you have surmounted it, and so
now give yourself up entirely to poetry. Here--here are Petrarch's _
Sonnets_ and Ovid's _Elegies_; take them, read them, write yourself,
and come and read to me what you have written. Perhaps in the meantime
I also may experience a disappointment in love, of which I am not
altogether deprived of hopes, since I shall in all likelihood fall in
love with a stranger lady who has stopped at the 'White Lamb' in the
Steinweg,12 and whom Count Nesselstädt maintains to be a paragon of
beauty and grace, albeit he has only caught a fugitive glimpse of her
at the window. Then, my friend, like the Dioscuri, we will travel the
same bright path of poetry and disappointed love. Note, my good fellow,
what a great advantage my station in life gives me, for every affection
which I conceive, being a longing and hoping which can never be
gratified, rises to tragic intensity. But now, my friend, out, out,
away into the woods as you ought to."
It would doubtless be very wearisome to my kind reader, if not
unbearable, were I to describe here at length, in detail and with all
sorts of over-choice and exquisite words and phrases, all that Jonathan
and Nanni did in their trouble. Such things may be found in any
indifferent romance; and it is often amusing enough to see into what
postures the struggling author throws himself, merely in order to
appear original. On the other hand, it seems to be of great importance
to follow Master Wacht on his walks, or rather in his mental
journeyings.
It must appear very remarkable that a man of such strong self-reliant
spirit as Master Wacht, who had borne with unshaken courage and
unbending steadfastness the most terrible misfortunes that had befallen
him, and that would have crushed many less stouthearted spirits, could
be thus put beside himself with passion at an occurrence which any
other father of a family would have regarded as an ordinary event and
one easy to remedy, and would in fact have set about remedying it in
some way or other, good or bad. Of course the indulgent reader is well
aware that this behaviour of Wacht's must be traced to some good
psychological reason. The thought that poor Nanni's love for innocent
Jonathan was a misfortune which would exercise a pernicious influence
upon the whole course of his subsequent life was only due to the
perverse discord in Wacht's soul. But the very fact that this discord
was able to go on making itself heard in the otherwise harmonical
character of this thoroughly noble man, embraced the impossibility of
smothering it or reducing it completely to silence.
Wacht had made his acquaintance with the feminine character in one who
possessed it in a simple but also at the same time grand and noble
form. His own wife had enabled him to see into the depths of the real
woman's nature, as in a bright mirror-like lake. He saw in her the true
heroine who fought with weapons that were constantly unconquerable. His
orphan wife had forfeited the inheritance of an immensely rich aunt,
she had forfeited the love of all her relatives, and she had opposed
with unshaken courage the persistent efforts of the Church, which
embittered her life with many a hard trial, when, though herself
trained up in the Catholic religion, she had married the Protestant
Wacht, and shortly before had gone over to this faith in Augsburg,
impelled thereto by the pure enthusiasm of conviction. All this now
passed through Master Wacht's mind; and as he thought upon the
sentiments he had felt when he led the maiden to the altar, the warm
tears ran down his cheeks. Nanni was her mother over again; Wacht loved
the child with an intensity of affection that was quite unparalleled,
and this fact was of itself more than enough to make him reject as
abominable, nay, as fiendishly cruel, any attempt to separate the
lovers that appeared in the remotest degree to savour of violence.
When, on the other hand, he reflected upon the whole course of
Jonathan's previous life, he was obliged to admit that all the virtues
of a good, industrious, and modest youth could not easily be so happily
united in another as they were in Jonathan, albeit his handsome
expressive face bore the impress of traits which were perhaps a little
too soft, and almost effeminate, and his diminutive and weak but
elegant bodily frame bespoke a tender intellectual spirit. When he
reflected further that the two children had always been together, and
how evident had been their mutual liking for each other, he was really
puzzled to understand how it was that he had not expected beforehand
what had now really happened, and so could have taken precautions in
time. Now it was too late.
He was urged on through the hills by a mood of mind which set his whole
being in a turmoil of distraction; such a state as this he had hitherto
never experienced, and he was inclined to take it for a seduction of
Satan, since several thoughts arose in his mind which in the very next
minute he could not help regarding as diabolical. He could not recover
his self-composure, still less form any decisive plan of action. The
sun was beginning to set when he reached the village of Buch;13 turning
into the hotel, he ordered something good to eat and a bottle of
excellent beer from the rock.14
"Ah! a very fine evening! Ah! what a remarkable occurrence to see our
good Master Wacht here in beautiful Buch, on this glorious Sunday
evening. To tell you the truth, I can hardly believe my eyes. Your
respected family is, I presume, somewhere else in the country." Thus
was Master Wacht addressed by some one with a shrill, squeaking voice.
The man who thus interrupted his meditations was no less a personage
than Herr Pickard Leberfink, a decorator and gilder by trade, and one
of the drollest men in the world.
Leberfink's exterior struck everybody's eye as something eccentric and
extraordinary. He was of small size, thick and stumpy, with a body too
long, and with short bowed legs; his face was not at all ugly, but
good-natured, with round red little cheeks and small grey eyes that
were by no means wanting in vivacity. Pursuant to an old obsolete
French fashion, he was elaborately curled and powdered every day; but
it was on Sundays that his costume was especially striking. For then he
wore, to take one example, a striped silk coat of a lilac and canary-
yellow colour with immense silver-plated buttons, a waistcoat
embroidered in gay tints, satin hose of a brilliant green, white and
light-blue silk stockings, delicately striped, and shining black
polished shoes, upon which glittered large buckles set with precious
stones. If to this we add that his gait was the elegant gait of a
dancing master, that he had a certain cat-like suppleness of body, and
that his little legs had a strange knack of knocking the heels together
on fitting occasions,--for instance, when leaping across a gutter,--it
could not fail but that the little decorator got himself singled out
everywhere as an extraordinary creature. With other aspects of his
character my kindly reader will make an acquaintance presently.
Master Wacht was not altogether displeased at having his painful
meditations interrupted in this way. Herr, or better Monsieur Pickard
Leberfink, decorator and gilder, was a great fop, but at the same time
the most honest and faithful soul in the world; he was a very liberal-
minded man, was generous to the poor, and always ready to serve his
friends. He only practised his calling now and again, merely out of
love for it, since he had no need of business. He was rich; his father
had left him some landed property, having a magnificent rock-cellar,
which was only separated from Master Wacht's premises by a large
garden. Master Wacht was fond of the droll little Leberfink on account
of his downright genuineness, and also because he was a member of the
small Protestant community which was permitted to exercise the rites of
its faith in Bamberg. With conspicuous alacrity and willingness
Leberfink accepted Wacht's invitation to join him at his table, and
drink another bottle of beer from the rock along with him. He began the
conversation by saying that for a long time he had been wanting to call
upon Master Wacht at his own house, since he had two things he wished
to talk to him about, one of which was almost making his heart burst.
Wacht made answer, he thought Leberfink knew him, and must be aware
that anybody who had anything to say to him, no matter what it was,
might speak out his thoughts frankly. Leberfink now imparted to the
Master in confidence that the wine-dealer who owned the beautiful
garden, with the massive pavilion, which lay between their two
properties, had privately offered to sell it to him. He thought he
recollected having heard Wacht once express a wish how very much he
should like to own this garden; if now the opportunity was come to
satisfy this wish, he (Leberfink) offered his services as negotiator,
and expressed his willingness to settle everything for him.