The condition of the working-classes in this country is a subject of
intense interest to all thinking men; but it is profitable as well as
amusing to transfer our attention sometimes to the same portions of
society in other countries. In Germany, for instance, the people are
as busy as we are with their 'hand-workers,' and the questions of
freedom of industry and general instruction are as warmly discussed as
at home. We have now before us a little volume by the philosopher and
historian, Zschokke, which, in the form of a fictitious narrative,
treats very fully of the status of the mechanic in Fatherland; and we
are tempted to cull a few extracts which may afford the reader
materials for perhaps an interesting comparison.[3]
The real hero of the story is Hand-labour, and his progress is
described throughout three generations of men. He is the Thought of
the book, illustrated by adventure and vicissitude; living when the
human agents die in succession; and leaving a distinct and continuous
track in the reader's mind, when the names and persons fade or
conglomerate in his memory. And yet some of these names and persons
are not feebly individualised. The father, the son, and the grandson
stand well out upon the canvas; and while the family likeness is
strictly preserved from generation to generation, the men are seen
independent and alone, each in his own special development. The
patriarch was a travelling tinker, who wheeled his wares about the
country in a barrow; and then, rising in the world, attained the
dignity of a hawker, with a cart of goods, drawn by a little gray ass.
His son Jonas trotted on foot beside him in all his journeys, dining
like his father on bread and water, and sleeping in barns or stables.
But when the boy was old enough, he was turned off to pick up his own
subsistence like the redbreasts, the sparrows, and the woodpeckers.
'Listen, my lad,' quoth Daddy Thaddaeus; 'this is the spring. Look for
sloes and elderberries, rose-leaves and others for ointment; marjoram,
spurge, and thyme, wherever thou mayst and canst. These we will sell
to the apothecaries. In summer, gather basketfuls of strawberries,
bilberries, and raspberries; carry them to the houses: they will yield
money. In winter, let us gather and dry locks of wool, for the
saddlers and tapestry-makers, and withes for the basket and mat
manufacturers. From the table of the bountiful God, a thousand crumbs
are falling for us: these we will pick up. They will give thee cheese
to thy bread, and a piece of meat to thy potatoes. Only get to work! I
will give thee a little barrow, and a belt for thy shoulders.'
This was his first essay in business on his own account, and he worked
hard and throve well. His separation from his father taught him how to
stand on his own legs--an important piece of knowledge in a world that
is as full of leave-takings as of meetings; and when they did come
together, and the boy counted out his kreutzers, and the father patted
him approvingly on the cheek, that boy would have changed places with
no prince that ever sat on a throne. Jonas was at length apprenticed
to a girdler, or worker in metals; and the old tinker in due time
died, leaving his son the parting advice, to 'work, save, and pray,'
and a box containing a thousand guilders.
Jonas's apprenticeship passed on pretty much according to universal
rule; that is, he did the drudgery of the house as well as learned the
trade, and received kicks and cuffs from the journeymen. But in five
years his servitude was out, and he was a journeyman himself. He was
now, by the rules of his guild, obliged to travel for improvement; he
spent five or six years in going to and fro upon the earth, and then
came back to Altenheim an accomplished girdler. To become a master, it
was necessary to prepare his 'master-piece,' as a specimen of what he
could do; and the task allotted to him was to engrave on copper,
without rule or compass, the prince's family-crest, and then to gild
the work richly. This accomplished, he was received into the guild of
masters with much pomp, strange ceremonies, and old-fashioned
feasting--all at the charge of the poor beginner. 'Without reckoning
the heavy expenses of his mastership, or of clothing, linen, and
furniture, in the hired lodgings and workshops, no small sum was
requisite for the purchase of different kinds of tools--a lathe, an
anvil, crucibles, dies, graving-implements, steel pins, hammers,
chisels, tongs, scissors, &c.; and also for the purchase of brass and
pinchbeck ware, copper, silver, lead, quicksilver, varnish, brimstone,
borax, and other things indispensable for labour. He had also taken,
without premium, an apprentice, the child of very poor people, to help
him. He would have been very glad to put the rest of his money out to
interest again; but he had to provide the means of subsistence for at
least one year in advance, for he had to begin with neither wares nor
customers.'
Jonas now appears in the character of a lover, and his wooing is one
of the most beautiful pictures in the book. His choice has fallen upon
a servant-girl, whom he had known in boyhood.
'One morning, Master Jordan sent his apprentice with a message: "Miss
Fenchel was to come to him directly: he had found a good place for
her." Martha hastened thither gladly.
'"Hast thou found a place for me, dear Jonas?" asked she, giving him
her hand gracefully. "Thank God! I began to fear becoming troublesome
to our kind friends. Come, tell me where?"
'He looked anxiously into her joyous blue eyes; then, in confusion,
down to the ground; then again upwards to the roof of the room, and
round the four sides, as though he were seeking something lost.
'"Come, tell me, then?" repeated she. "Why art thou silent?"
'He collected himself, and began, hesitating: "It is--but Martha--thou
must not be angry with me."
'In surprise, she smiled. "Angry with thee, Jonas! If I would be, and
should be, could I be?"
'"Listen, Martha; I will shew thee--I must tell thee--I know a man
anxious to have thy heart and hand--who--even who"----
'"O Jonas, reproach me rather, but do not make mockery of me, a poor
maiden!" exclaimed she, shocked or hurt, while her face lost all its
colour, and she turned from him.
'"Martha, look at me. He is assuredly no bad man. I will bring him to
thee; I will give him to thee myself."
'"No, Jonas! no! From thee, least of all, can I receive a lover."
'"From me, least of all!" asked he with visible emotion. "From me,
least of all! And if--I don't know--if I would give thee myself--Look
at me, Martha! Tell me."
'Here silence ensued. She stood before him with downcast eyes and
glowing cheeks, and played with her apron-string. Then, as if still
doubting, she looked up again, her eyes swimming with tears, and said,
with trembling lips: "What must I say, then?"
'Jonas took courage, and whispered, half aloud: "Dost thou love me
with all thy heart?"
'Half aloud, Martha whispered back: "Thy heart knows it."
'"Canst thou be satisfied with dry bread and salt?"
'"Rather salt from thee than tears from me!"
'"Martha, I will work for thee; wilt thou save for me?"
'"I will be sparing in everything, except my own pains!"
'"Well then, darling, here is my hand! Take it. Wilt thou be mine?"
'"Was I not thine eight years ago and more? Even as a child? Yet no!
It ought not to be, Jonas."
'Alarmed, he looked in her face, and asked: "Not be? and why?"
'"Think well over it, Jonas! Do thyself no injustice. I am a poor
creature, without portion or property. Any other burgher's daughter in
the town would be glad to give thee her hand and heart, and a good
dowry beside. Thou mightst live much better."
'"Say nothing about that," cried Jonas, stretching out both his hands
imploringly. "Be still: I shall feel that I am but beginning to live,
if thou wilt promise to live with me."
'"Live, then!" said she, in blushing embarrassment, and gave him her
hand.
'He took her hand, and at the same time clasped his bride to his
bosom, that heaved with unwonted emotion. She wept on his breast in
silent joy.'
We would fain, if we had room, add to this the marriage sermon,
preached by the bridegroom, and well preached too; for Jonas had
knowledge, although, as he said himself, he never found half so much
in books as is lying everywhere about the road.
Martha was just the wife for the honest, sensible hand-worker; and as
it frequently happens with such characters, his affairs prospered
from the date of his marriage. He took a larger house in a
better situation for trade; and having presented the useless
'master-piece'--which nobody would buy--to the prince, he was rewarded
by the dignity of 'Master-girdler to the Court.' But still 'uprightly
and hardily the court-girdler lived with his wife, just as before;
active in the workshop and warehouse, at markets and at fairs. Year
after year fled, though, before the last guilder could be paid off, of
the debt on the house. Days of joy and of sorrow succeeded each other
in turn. They were all received with gratitude to God--these as well
as those.'
We now come hastily to the third generation; for Jonas had a son
called Veit, who was first apprenticed to his father, and then sent to
travel as a journeyman. The patriarch had had no education at all;
Jonas had snatched at his just as opportunities permitted; but Veit
went regularly through the brief and practical curriculum fitted for a
tradesman's son. He was, consequently, better informed and more
refined than either his father or grandfather; and spent so much time
in gaining a thorough insight into the branches connected with his own
business, that honest Jonas was quite puzzled. 'Where did the boy get
all these notions?' said he. 'He did not get them from me, I'm sure.'
Veit had a bad opinion of the travelling custom, and for these
reasons: 'How should these men, most of them badly brought up, attain
to any greater perfection in their business, if they have left home
and school without any preparation for it? No one can understand, if
his understanding has not been developed. From one publican they go to
another, and from one workshop to another; everywhere they find the
old common track--the mechanical, mindless life of labour, just as in
the very first place to which they were sent to learn their trade. At
most, they acquire dexterity by practice. Now and then they learn a
trick from a master, or get a receipt, which had been cautiously kept
secret; when possessed of this, they think something of themselves.
Even the character of these ramblers is not seldom destroyed by
intercourse with their fellows. They learn drinking and rioting,
gambling and licentiousness, caballing and debating. Many are ruined
before they return to their native place. Believe me, dearest father,
the time of travel is to very few a true school for life; one in
which, through frequent change of good and evil days, the head
acquires experience, the thoughts strength and clearness, the heart
courage, and reliance on God. Very few, even of those who bring a
scientific education with them, can gain much of value for their
calling in life; extend their views, transfer and apply to their own
line of business the inventions and discoveries that have been made in
other departments of art and industry.'
Jonas understood little of the refinements of his son, but he opened
his eyes when Veit obtained a lucrative appointment in a large
metallic manufactory, first in London and then in Paris. In a letter
informing his parents of this good-fortune, were enclosed the whole of
the savings from his salary. 'Master Jordan shook his head at this
passage, and cried out, deeply moved, yet as though vexed, while a
tear of motherly tenderness stole down Martha's cheek: "No! no! by no
means! What is the fool thinking of? He'll want the money himself--a
simpleton. Let him wait till he comes to the master-piece. What
pleases me most in the story, is his contentment and his humility. He
is not ashamed of his old silver watch yet. It is not everybody that
could act so. There must be strong legs to support such extraordinary
good-luck. These the bursch has!"'
After years of absence, the young man at last walks suddenly into the
paternal home, on his father's birthday, and makes them all scream and
weep with joy. '"Hark ye, bursch!" exclaimed Jonas, who regarded him
with fatherly delight, "thou seem'st to me almost too learned, too
refined, and too elegant for Veit Jordan. What turner has cut so neat
a piece of furniture out of so coarse a piece of timber?"' His stay,
however, was short. M. and Mme Bellarme (his employer at Paris) 'had
been loth, almost afraid, to let him go. The feeble state of health of
the former began to be so serious, that he durst not engage in the
bulk of his affairs. In the space of a year, both felt so complete
confidence in Veit's knowledge of business, and in his honour, that
they had taken him as a partner in trade, and in the foundry.
Henceforth, M. Bellarme contributed his capital only; Veit his
knowledge, care, and industry.'
The reform of the guilds, and the establishment of a technological
school for the young hand-workers--both through the instrumentality of
Jonas--we have no room to touch; for we must say a parting word on the
reunion of the family by Veit's return permanently from abroad.
Notwithstanding the prosperity of the now old couple, 'everything, ay,
everything, was as he had left it years ago--as he had known it from
childhood--only Christiane not. There stood yet the two well-scoured
old deal-tables, wrinkled, though, from the protruding fibres of the
wood; there were the straw-bottomed stools still; and at the window,
Mother Martha's arm-chair, before which, as a child, he had repeated
his lessons; there still hung the same little glass between the
windows; and the wall-clock above the stove sent forth its tic-tac as
fastly as ever. Father Jonas, in his enlarged workshop, with more
journeymen and apprentices, smelted and hammered, filed and formed
still, from morning to night, as before. The noble housewife flew
about yet busy as a bee: she had managed the housekeeping without a
servant since Christiane had been grown up. And Veit came back with
the same cheerful disposition that he had ever shewn. In the
simply-furnished rooms which Martha had fitted up for him, in the
upper storey of the house, he forgot the splendid halls, the boudoirs,
and antechambers of London, Paris, and the Bellarme estate; the
Gobelin tapestry, the gold-framed pictures; the convenience of elegant
furniture, and the artificial delicacies of the table on
silver-plate.' Assisted by the patronage of the prince, he established
a great foundry in his native town, of ball and cannon, bronze and
brass; and on his marriage with the aforesaid Christiane, the
sovereign made him a handsome present, in a handsome manner, 'as a
small token of his gratitude to a family that had been so useful to
the country.'
In addition to the hand-workers' school, there now arose, under the
auspices of this family, a training-school for teachers, a
labour-school for females, and other establishments. The town was
embellished; the land in the neighbourhood rose in value;
uncleanliness and barbarism in food, clothing and houses, disappeared.
'Only old men and women, grown rusty in the habits and the ignorance
of many years, complain that the times are worse; at the sight of a
higher civilisation, they complain of "the luxury and the pride of the
world now-a-days;" as superstition dies out, they complain of "human
incredulity, and the downfall of religion." "The day of judgment," say
they, "is at hand."
'But Master Jonas, when seventy years had silvered his hair, stood
almost equal to a strong man of thirty, happy, indeed, by the side of
the pious Martha, in a circle of his children and children's children,
honoured by his fellow-citizens, and honoured by his prince. He often
told the story of his boyhood, how he used to go about hawking with
Father Thaddaeus the tinker; and his face glowed with inward
satisfaction, when he compared the former period with present changes,
in the production of which he could never have imagined he was to have
so considerable a share. Then he used to exclaim: "Have I not always
said it? Clear understanding only in the head, love to one's
neighbour in the heart, frugality in the stomach, and industry in the
fingers--then: HAND-WORK STANDS ON GOLDEN FEET."'