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LEISURE HOUR SERIES

What The Swallow Sang

A NOVEL

BY

FRIEDRICH SPIELHAGEN

TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN

BY

MS.

TRANSLATOR OF

"By His Own Might," "A Twofold Life," etc.

NEW YORK
HOLT & WILLIAMS
1873

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873, by
HENRY HOLT,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.

Poole & Maclauchlan, Printers,
205-213 East 12th St.,
NEW YORK.

What The Swallow Sang.

CHAPTER I.

"I won't give you any farther trouble, I can find what I want myself."

The sexton's wife looked at the gentleman in some little surprise, and then glanced at the bunch of huge keys which hung in the door she had just opened for the stranger.

"That's right; you need not be uneasy, I shall not stay long, and here is something for your trouble."

He pressed a piece of money into her hand, and turned towards the door.

"The Herr Pastor has strictly forbidden it," said the woman.

"He will have no objection," replied the stranger. "I will leave a few words for him."

He took his note-book and wrote a few lines. When he tore out the leaf he perceived on the other side a little sketch which he had dashed off that afternoon with a few hasty strokes, while his carriage stopped before a village inn.

A smile flitted over his grave features.

"That won't do," he murmured. "And here again, everything is filled with scrawls. Well," he added aloud, as he thrust the note-book back into his pocket, "I will write from P----. Please tell him so; farewell, my good woman."

The sexton's wife did not venture to make any reply, and turned away. The stranger looked after her retreating figure a few minutes. "Strange," he murmured, "it seems as if it would be committing a sacrilege to utter my name aloud in this place! It was really a relief to my mind that the woman did not know me. How we are all under the ban of gloomy feelings which we should be ashamed to confess to others! To be sure it is not strange that these emotions should almost overpower me here; here, in this spot which should be my home, where my cradle stood, and yet where I was not allowed to return until the grave had closed over him to whom I owe my life."

He had taken a few noiseless steps within the church, and now pausing, gazed around the narrow space. The sun, already low in the horizon, cast through the round, leaden-cased panes of the lofty narrow windows a mysterious light, which brightened or faded as the soft breeze raised or lowered the branches of the ancient linden-trees outside the walls. And thus, now clear now dim, but always sorrowful, the memories of his early years swept through the stranger's mind as he stood motionless, his eyes wandering over the massive white-washed walls, the few dusky pictures hung here and there at far too great a height, the little oaken font black with age, the altar with its two large brass sconces, and the pulpit, whose desk was covered with a tattered cloth. Everything was just as it used to be; he even remembered the holes in the cover, only it was all very much smaller, more poverty-stricken and tasteless than memory had pictured it. Yet this was the most favorable light,--what must it be in the broad glare of day! And his gloomy, sorrowful childhood,--what was it when he extinguished the magical light of memory, when he saw it as it really was, as a cold fanatical father had made it to the child so early bereft of a mother's love.

The traveller started from his revery as a sharp sound suddenly echoed through the quiet church as if something had burst asunder. It was the clock, which had just begun to strike. He passed his hand over his brow, mechanically counted the strokes and listened to the rumbling echo till the last sound died away. "Seven o' clock," said he; "it is time for me to set out again."

He walked around behind the benches, up a side aisle, on the right of the pulpit, until he reached the large iron door of the crypt. It was fastened, but on both sides, affixed to the wall, were the mural tablets of the pastors of Rammin, who had preached the gospel over the coffins of their predecessors whom they were some day to join. He went to the last stone and read the inscription, that here rested in God, Gotthold Ephraim Weber, D.D., installed in 1805 as Pastor of St. Mary's church in Rammin, born August 3d, 1780, died June 15th, 1833.

"Gotthold Ephraim Weber," murmured the stranger, "that is my name too, and I am also a Doctor of Theology. That I would not remain where my father placed me, but insisted upon taking the profession for which, according to my best knowledge and belief, I was born, separated him who now lies here from me forever. No, no, not that, at least that was not the true cause! I never understood in your sense what is written here: 'Blessed are those who die in the Lord.' We were never one, had been separated long before we parted. Well, father, at least let there be peace between us now. I wish with all my heart that you may have the bliss in which you believed; and say: 'blessed are the--dead,' so you certainly have the happiness in which I believe."

Gotthold made a gesture like one who holds out his hand in reconciliation. "Let us have peace now," he repeated.

A little bird, which had perched for a moment in one of the openings above the window, twittered so loudly that the sweet clear tones filled the silent empty church.

"I will take it as an answer," said Gotthold.

He left the building as slowly as he had entered it, and went down the broad path in the churchyard to a spot where, at a large iron cross, which also bore the inscription, "Blessed are those who die in the Lord," a narrow walk branched off towards the wall. Scarcely anything had been altered in this older portion of the cemetery; he still remembered every mound, every cross, every stone, and every epitaph; there at last was what he was seeking--the grave with the low wooden railing, the stunted weeping willow, the little slanting cross, neglected as ever, or perhaps even more so--his mother's grave.

He had lost her so very young, when he was only four or five years old, that he had scarcely the faintest shadow of personal remembrance; he had never seen a picture of her, and his father only mentioned her name when he said angrily: "You are just like your mother," yet perhaps for this very reason his fancy had always busied itself very frequently with this dead mother, who had been like him, and would certainly have loved him as he loved her dear shadow, until it almost assumed a bodily form. A dear, dream-like form, which came unbidden, and disappeared when he would so gladly have detained it longer.

He plucked a few leaves from the willow, but scattered them over the grave again.

"We need no mementos," he said; "we understand each other without any outward tokens, and it shall remain as it is, decay silently and gradually, as time wills. Who would be benefited by the most superb monument I could order from Thorwaldsen's master hand? Not you--what do the shades in Nirwana care for such earthly vanities--and not I. I shall never stand upon this spot again, and to others the stone would be only a stone. No, it is better so; it is in harmony with the place."

He looked up, and his artist's eye wandered over the graves, upon whose long grass, swaying in the soft breeze, the setting sun scattered rosy hues, to the ancient church, whose rude square tower still glowed in the purple light, while the main building was already in deep shadow.

"This scene and hour would make a beautiful picture," said Gotthold, "but I shall not paint it. That would efface it from my mind, and I wish to hold it fast there forever."

He closed his eyes a moment, and when he opened them did not look around again as he walked slowly, with his hands behind his back, through the narrow path to the gate. Suddenly he paused and involuntarily extended his hand towards two little graves close beside the path, whose inscriptions had caught his eye in passing. "Cecilia Brandow," "Caroline Brandow." The date of the birth and death of the children was also added in tiny characters, as small as the mounds themselves.

A strange emotion thrilled his frame. He had thought this was over, utterly effaced from his life, and that he could take the journey to the bedside of his dying father, which had become a pilgrimage to his parents' graves, without being disturbed by the vicinity of his early love. Nay, just now when he came out of the church door, he had gazed from this lofty stand-point over the wide landscape to the park of Dahlitz, through whose dusky trees gleamed the white gables of the mansion, and the past had remained mute. Now it flooded his soul like a torrent which has suddenly burst its bounds. Her children--and she herself was then scarcely more than a child! Her children. One, the eldest, had borne her name--the name which ever since those days had always had a peculiar, sacred association, so that he could never hear or read it without a strange thrill. Cecilia! Her children! Strange! Incomprehensibly strange! Incomprehensible as the death to which they had so soon fallen victims! She had wept and knelt at these graves with her husband beside her, the husband whose name was also inscribed in gilt letters upon these tablets, and who asserted his paternal rights in the Christian name of the younger: "Carl Brandow"! Did he too shed tears for his children? It was impossible to think of Carl Brandow's sharp, hard features wet with tears.

How the face of Gotthold's enemy--the only one he had ever had--rose in almost tangible outlines before his mind, while a sharp pang ran through the deep scar which, beginning under his hair, passed over the right temple, across the cheek, and even divided the heavy beard, the scar on whose account the sexton's wife, mindful of the words that marked people should be avoided, had been so unwilling to leave the stately stranger alone in the church. Was the wound going to bleed again--the wound that man's hand had dealt when both were schoolboys? Would it have been any miracle at that moment, when his heart was throbbing so violently, as if to say: The wound I have been struck is newer by some years, and much fresher and deeper, yet you see it is not healed as you supposed, and never will be!

"Never," said Gotthold, "never! Well, at least I will not touch it. And--the innocent children are not to blame, if there is blame anywhere. I wish. I could call them back to life for you, poor Cecilia, and may Heaven preserve those who I trust have been given you in their place!"

A figure clad in black, with a low broad-brimmed hat and white neck-tie, approached the churchyard from the parsonage. It was doubtless his father's successor, the new Pastor, who had returned from examining the school earlier than the sexton's wife expected, and come in search of the stranger who had inquired for him, and then ordered the church to be unlocked. In his present excited frame of mind Gotthold would gladly have avoided this meeting; but the reverend gentleman appeared to have seen him already, for he quickened his steps, and, as Gotthold now approached him, held out both hands, exclaiming: "Must we meet again under such sorrowful circumstances?"

Gotthold cast a puzzled glance at the beardless, plump white face of the man who now stood before him, clasping and pressing his hands; his watery blue eyes winking perpetually, either from emotion or because the setting sun was shining into them.

"Don't you know me, my dear brother?" asked the reverend gentleman; "didn't they tell you my name? August Semmel--"

"Surnamed Kloss,"[^[1]] said Gotthold with an involuntary laugh. "I beg your pardon, I really had not heard your name, and then I have never seen you lately except in uniform, with a military cap on one side of your head, and your face covered with a beard; it is really an excellent mask."

Pastor Semmel dropped Gotthold's hands and hastily turned away, so that he placed himself in shadow.

"A mask," he said, rolling up his eyes piously; "yes indeed! and, as I now think, a very vain, not to say sinful one. I often scolded you then because you would not enter our corps, although you sometimes did not disdain to go to an ale--to amuse yourself with us, I mean; now I envy you for having had the power of self-renunciation I lacked."

"So Saul has now become Paul," replied Gotthold smiling, "while my journey to Damascus is still delayed."

"Yes, yes," said the Pastor. "Who would have thought it! The most industrious of us all at school, the most indefatigable at the university; always held up as a pattern by teachers and professors; when in the fourth session already cram--preparing us older ones for the examination, passing your own with great distinction, and all this--"

"For Hecuba! No, dear Semmel, you must not revile my art, although I freely admit I am but a poor artist as yet. But I can assure you of one thing: it is easier to pass a creditable examination in theology than to paint a good picture. I speak from experience; besides if I had remained a theological student, who knows whether the son might not have stepped into his father's place instead of you? That is to be considered too."

"There would have been a terrible competition," said Herr Semmel, "although on the other hand a prophet has little honor in his own country; and to be frank, when I was a candidate here--after I left Halle I spent four years in Lower Pomerania as a tutor in Count Zerneckow's family, and afterwards came to Neuenkirchen to relieve the old man, who had grown very garrulous, so that I thought I was positively settled--but he has entirely recovered his powers again, and so it happened very opportunely--what was I going to say? yes--when I applied for this place a month ago, and thought it would be an advantage to present myself as an intimate school and university friend of my predecessor's son, I found the recommendation was not satisfactory everywhere. Herr Otto von Plüggen of Plüggenhof--"

Gotthold could not help laughing. "I suppose so," said he, "I have often punched his stupid head when he went to school in P."

"You know I was in the first class, while you were still in the second," continued the Pastor in an apologetic tone, "and had entirely forgotten that you must have known each other; but when, warned by my experience with von Plüggen, I mentioned you more cautiously to several others, I found a certain, what shall I term it? hostility would be unchristian, but--"

"Let us drop the subject," said Gotthold somewhat impatiently.

"Certainly, certainly," replied the Pastor, "although you will be glad to hear that I took advantage of this very opportunity to speak of your generous gift to the poor of our parish, which--"

"But why did you do that when I particularly requested that my name should not be mentioned?"

"Because it is written: 'Thou shalt not hide thy light under a bushel;' and because it was the only way to silence the injurious report that had become associated with your name."

"Injurious report?" asked Gotthold.

"Why yes, because people knew that for the last seven years, ever since your uncle's death, you have been in possession of a large fortune, and yet your father--"

"Good Heavens! what could I do," cried Gotthold, "if my father obstinately refused all my offers? but I really cannot discuss this matter any farther. Besides, it is high time for me to set out, if I wish to reach P. in good season. Has Herr Wollnow arranged everything my father left according to your wishes? Unfortunately, I could not attend to it myself, since, as you have probably learned from him, I fell sick on my journey, and was forced to remain several weeks in Milan; but I wrote to him from there to carry out the wishes of my father's successor in every respect."

"Without knowing who that successor was!" exclaimed Herr Semmel; "yes, that's the way with you artists. Well, I have not been grasping. True, there were many valuable books on theology in your father's library which I would gladly have retained, and as you gave the purchaser permission to set his own price--"

"That is all right, my dear Semmel, and now don't come a step farther."

"Only to your carriage, which I saw standing at the door of the inn."

"Not another step, I beg of you."

They were standing at the churchyard gate, which opened into the village-street; but the Pastor seemed unable to release Gotthold's hand.

"For your own comfort, and the honor of your old schoolmates, I must add one remark in connection with our former subject of conversation. All were not guilty of such uncharitableness--I may surely be permitted to give it that name without being uncharitable myself. Some of them spoke very warmly in your praise; no one more so than Carl Brandow."

"Brandow! Carl Brandow!" exclaimed Gotthold; "it is certainly--"

"Certainly only his duty, if he tries to make amends to you for an offence committed in youthful thoughtlessness by everywhere asserting the truth, and declaring that the demon of avarice is the very last that could obtain dominion over you; and if your father died as poor as he had lived, it was undoubtedly--"

"Farewell!" said Gotthold, extending his hand across the low door to the Pastor.

"May God bless and keep you!" said the Pastor. "You ought to spare another hour to spend with an old friend."

Gotthold said no more. He had withdrawn his hand with almost uncourteous haste, and was now walking rapidly down the village-street, with his hat pulled far over his brows. Herr Semmel looked after him with a contemptuous smile on his fat face.

"The enthusiast!" said he; "it seems as if the ill-luck he has had has turned his brain. But no matter. People must cling to the rich. Carl Brandow is a sly fellow. He probably knows why, from the moment he heard he was coming back, he took a new key, and cannot say enough in praise of the man whom he once abused like a reed-sparrow. Perhaps he wants to try to borrow of him. Well, he certainly needs a loan. Plüggen says he is making his last shifts. He will be at Plüggenhof to-morrow. My news will make quite an excitement."

CHAPTER II.

The long village-street was empty. Here and there an old woman appeared in the doorway of one of the low straw-roofed huts, or a few half-naked children played behind the tangled hedges in the neglected gardens; every one else had gone to the fields, for this was the first day of the rye-harvest.

The village-street was empty, and the swallows had free course. Up and down they moved in their arrowlike flight, now on the ground, now rising in graceful circles, straight lines, or zig-zag course, chirping, twittering, and unweariedly fluttering their slender wings.

Gotthold paused, pushed back his hat, which he had drawn over his eyes, and gazed as if absorbed in thought at the graceful little creatures, which he had loved from his earliest childhood. While he stood watching them, the angry displeasure roused by the Pastor's words gradually yielded to a strange melancholy.

"What the swallow sang, what the swallow sang," he murmured. "Yes, yes, it echoes through the village just as it did then:--

When I went away, when I went away,

I left well-filled chests behind,

But returning to-day, but returning to-day,

Naught I find.

"I thought I understood it--but I had only read it with my eyes, not my heart, the heart of a lonely man, who after an absence of ten years returns to the sacred scenes of his youth to find what I have found to-day--the most painful memory of that which was once mine."

Up and down flew the swallows, now close to the earth, and now in a lofty curve over a loaded harvest-wagon which had turned into the principal street from an adjoining lane, and disappeared in a barn.

"How does it go on," said Gotthold:--

Back the swallows dart, back the swallows dart,

And the chests again run o'er;

But an empty heart, but an empty heart,

Fills no more.

He passed his hand over his eyes to brush away the tears which constantly sprang into them, while a mournful smile played around his lips.

"It would be an amusing spectacle to my Roman friends if they could see me standing here crying like a schoolboy; and what would you say, Julia? The same thing that you did when I translated the song: That is all nonsense, my dear friend. How can a heart be empty? My heart has never been empty since I knew I had one, and now it is full of love for you, as yours is for me, you German dreamer. Then you stroked the hair from my brow, and kissed me as only you can kiss. And yet, and yet! If I loved you, Julia, it was only a feeble semblance of the passion I once felt, as the pale East just gleamed with rosy light from the reflection of the sunset glow in the western sky. I have parted from you, and my heart did not quiver as it did just now when I read on her children's gravestones the name of one now dead to me."

He extended his hands as if in benediction.

"Sing on your sweet sad song, innocent swallows! Go and return, bringing Spring to the barren fields and empty human hearts! May Heaven watch over you, my dear native meadows and beloved birthplace! In spite of all, you are as sacred to me as the memories of my youth!"

The carriage was waiting at the door of the village-inn. The coachman had merely loosened the curbs on the horses' necks, that they might eat the bread chopped into little squares more easily. He now pushed aside the movable crib, hastily gave them a drink from the half-emptied pail, and when Gotthold came up was already standing with the reins in his hand beside the door, which he opened with a friendly grin.

It was the first time he had shown his passenger such an attention. They had passed over the long road across the island--Gotthold, contrary to his usual custom, absorbed in gloomy thoughts, and by no means dissatisfied with the taciturnity of the driver, who sat motionless before him, hour after hour, his broad shoulders covered with a blue linen coat, somewhat white in the seams, stooping carelessly, and smoking a short pipe, which Gotthold did not forbid, unpleasant as the sickly odor of the weed often was.

He might therefore have some reason to be surprised when, just after they had left the village and were driving slowly along between the cornfields, on the narrow by-way that led to the main road, the broad-shouldered man suddenly turned, and showing his large white teeth, said in his Platt Deutsch accent:

"Don't you know me, Herr Gotthold?"

"No," said Gotthold, laughing, as he looked into the smiling face of the driver, "but you seem to be better acquainted with me."

"I've been thinking all the way whether it was you or not," said the man; "sometimes I thought it was, and then again that it wasn't."

"You might have asked."

"Yes, you may well say so, but I didn't think of it; that would certainly have been the simplest way. Well, it don't matter now; I know you--by that!" said the driver, drawing the handle of his whip over his face to mark the course of Gotthold's scar. "You ought to have been known by it this morning, for one don't see such things every day; but it's a long time ago, and such things often happen in war; besides, with your thick beard and brown, face, you look just exactly as if you had come from Spain, where no doubt they are fighting again; but when you stopped just now in Rammin, and went up to the parsonage without even asking a question, I said at once, 'Yes, it's certainly he.'"

"And you are--you are Jochen--Jochen Prebrow!" exclaimed Gotthold, cordially extending his hand, which Jochen, turning half-round on his seat, clasped no less heartily in his huge palm.

"To be sure," said he, "and you really didn't know me."

"How could I," replied Gotthold. "You have grown so tall and stout, although indeed in this respect you have only fulfilled the promise of your boyhood."

"Yes, that's so," replied Jochen, "but my sergeant in Berlin always said it was no vice."

Jochen Prebrow turned back to his horses. He had established the identity between his stately passenger and the slender playfellow of his childhood, upon which he had been reflecting all day, and was perfectly satisfied. Gotthold too was silent; it moved him deeply to think he could have travelled nearly all day with worthy Jochen, as if he had been a total stranger.

Jochen Prebrow, the son of the Dollan blacksmith! The pleasant days again rose before him when he left P. with Curt Wenhof for the holidays, which must always be spent in Dollan, and Jochen stood on the moor where the road branched off from the highway, waiting for them, and waving his cap; Jochen, who was well aware that his good times were coming with the pair, times of catching fish and snaring birds under the care of old Cousin Boslaf, to say nothing of a thousand wild, thoughtless pranks on land and sea for which Curt always undertook to be answerable to his good-natured father.

"And the young master is dead too," said Jochen Prebrow, again turning half-round on his seat, in token that having settled the principal matter, he was now ready to proceed to details.

Gotthold nodded.

"Drowned sailing on the Spree," continued Jochen, "and yet he was skilful as any sailor, and could swim like a fish; it was very queer, but he told me that he should come to such an end some day." He filled his pipe afresh.

"When did he tell you so?"

"He had come from Gr. to his sister's wedding, and afterwards was to go to Berlin and show whether he had learned his lessons, and he would probably have come off badly, for our young master was never fond of study. So he told me about it when we came back from P., where the wedding took place. I drove the carriage because old Christian was sick, and then we went at full speed to Dollan, where a great breakfast was served, and our young master had probably been drinking a little too much when he came out to the stable, threw himself down on the straw, and began to sob pitifully.

"What's the matter, young master?" said I.

"Ah! Jochen," he answered, "it's all up. I begged my father to let me be a farmer, for he would never make a lawyer of me; but he says we have nothing, nothing at all; he can't even pay my sister's dowry."

"Well, young master," said I, "that's not so very bad; you have a rich brother-in-law now who can certainly give you some money."

"But he started up, sprang upon me, seized me by the throat, and shook me till I was afraid for my life, crying: If you ever say another word about that,--well, it was an ugly word for a man to call his brother-in-law, especially our young master, who had always been so good-natured, but I said to myself, He's been drinking too much; for he wanted me to upset them when I drove them to Dahlitz; you know the place, Herr Gotthold, just before you get to the smithy, when the moor lies below you on the left, as you come down the hill. It's very easy to upset a carriage there so that the people inside will never get up again; but it's pretty queer business to upset your master's daughter on her wedding-day, and even if I'd wanted to do it I didn't drive them, after all, for Herr Brandow had ordered his own carriage with four horses; and Hinrich Scheel, who was his coachman then and is now, wouldn't upset them, for nobody can deny that he knows how to drive and ride."

Jochen Prebrow cracked his whip, and the horses, which had been advancing along the narrow by-way at a walk, trotted rapidly over the smooth broad high-road.

A short distance on the left appeared Dahlitz, the fine estate once the property of the ancient noble family to which Cecilia's mother belonged, but which had long since passed into the possession of the plebeian Brandow, and was now Carl Brandow's inheritance.

The highway, as Gotthold remembered, led directly through the estate, and for a considerable distance farther ran close by the wall of the park. His heart began to beat violently; his eyes wandered timidly towards the house, whose white front was already partially visible between the out-buildings. To pass so near her home, to let the only opportunity he might ever be offered escape thus, never, never to see her more!

Gotthold leaned back in the corner of the carriage, drawing the broad brim of his hat farther over his eyes; he would fain have ordered Jochen to turn back again. Meantime Jochen was driving on at a slow trot; it would soon be over. But just as they were passing the gates an empty harvest wagon came out so rapidly that the horses almost struck Jochen's. The latter swore, the farm hand swore, and some one standing in the courtyard swore also, Gotthold could not understand whether at his own man or the strange coachman--probably at both; but it was not Carl Brandow's clear voice, and the coarse fat man in top boots, who strode heavily forward to the gate, certainly bore no resemblance to Carl Brandow's slight, elastic figure.

Then Jochen again had a free passage for his frightened horses, which he reined in with considerable difficulty as they passed at full gallop by the low park wall, over which now and then one could obtain through the trees and shrubs a view of the pleasure-grounds, and even distinguish a broad handsome lawn which lay on one side of the mansion. On this piece of turf was a swing, in which two little girls were just being carefully pushed to and fro by their nurse, while a half-dozen other children of all ages gambolled upon the grass, their fresh voices ringing merrily on the quiet evening air. A stately lady moved among the group, with a little man dressed in black beside her, apparently the boys' tutor.

The picture was only visible a few seconds, but Gotthold's keen eye had seized it down to the smallest detail, and it was still in his mind when the carriage moved more slowly along the broad highway. His heart had trembled causelessly; she no longer lived here. Where was she now? He had not heard a word from home for so long--was she dead? She was to him, of course, and yet, and yet--

"That Redebas is a coarse fellow," said Jochen taking the reins in his left hand, "but he understands his business; he'll come out all right."

"So Dahlitz does not belong to Herr Brandow?" said Gotthold.

"Well, I declare," replied Jochen, pointing back with the handle of his whip into the gathering twilight, "didn't you hear anything yonder about what has been happening in this neighborhood?"

"Nothing, nothing at all, my dear Jochen. Who was to tell me?"

"To be sure," said Jochen, "writing isn't everybody's business, not mine for instance, and where you have been I suppose there were very few mails, and not much opportunity. My sergeant--he was one of the old soldiers--was in Spain too in 1807 and"--

"But I have never been in Spain," said Gotthold, "I was in Italy."

This objection was both unexpected and unwelcome to Jochen. He had fully made up his mind during the long hours that he had been reflecting whether his passenger was the son of the Pastor at Rammin or not, that if so, he must at any rate have come straight from Spain; for he had heard that Gotthold had given up "preaching" and was now living in a foreign country, and Spain was the only foreign country of which he had ever heard. So he sank into a profound revery, puffing huge clouds of smoke from his short pipe, and Gotthold, difficult as it was for him to do so, was compelled to repeat his question, as to where Herr Brandow was now living, several times.

"Why, where should he live except in Dollan?" said Jochen at last. "He has come down from a horse to a donkey, but that's always so when people want to sit so high in their saddles."

"And--and--his wife?"

It must be asked; but Gotthold's lips quivered as he put the question.

"Our poor young lady," said Jochen; "yes, when I drove her with four horses to P. for the wedding, she didn't dream the splendor would so soon be over. Yes, she is now in the old place again, and our old master and the young master are both dead, and her two oldest children too; she has only one left."

So she still lived, and lived in Dollan again, dear Dollan, the forest-girdled, sea-washed spot where he had spent the happiest and most wretched hours of his youth, the sacred and yet accursed place to which his dreams had so often led him in joy or sorrow, so that he woke with a happy smile on his lips, and also so often with tears in his eyes! For a moment it seemed as if she had been restored to him, as if the old days had returned. He saw the slender figure gliding through the shrubs in the garden at twilight, while he stood at the little gable window with a throbbing heart, hearing Curt repeat "mi" till he threw the grammar on the table, declaring that he should never understand the stuff, and they had better go down to the garden with Cecilia. Gotthold passed his hand over his brow and eyes. Had he spoken the loved name aloud? Had Jochen, who had resumed his interrupted story in the old monotonous tone, mentioned her name? Jochen did not know exactly how it had all happened, for he had been in Berlin with the army when Herr Wenhof died, and young Herr Brandow came in possession of Dollan in addition to his own estate of Dahlitz: then when Jochen was released from military duty, as his father and older brother were enough to attend to the business of the smithy, he took service as a groom with Peter the innkeeper at Altefähr, and only left the place when he drove travellers to Stubbenkammer or some other part of the island, which did not occur very often. Besides, it had never happened that his way led to Dollan, or very near it, for what stranger would want to travel so far away from the main road? He had not seen even the smithy since, and if his brother had not come to Altefähr once or twice, would have known nothing about how things were now going in Dollan. True, now he came to think the matter over, his brother had not told him much more than he had already learned from others; for Herr Brandow was famous for having the finest horses in all Rugen and Upper Pomerania, and came every autumn to the races at Str.; the noblemen would have hard work to beat him if he was only a plain citizen; and he would be sure to win the prize among all the gentlemen riders this year; for Hinrich had trained a horse for him whose match could not be found. One thing was certain, Hinrich knew more about horse-flesh than all the English trainers who cost the other gentlemen so much money put together, while others hinted that there was something not quite right about the matter, and Hinrich's squint eyes could make horses do anything he pleased. That there were such things, he being a blacksmith's son, knew very well; but it made a great difference whether they were honest arts, such as his father understood for instance, or whether another person he would not mention more plainly had a finger in the pie. People don't cross mountains with him; he makes them pay too dear for his extra horses. It had already cost Herr Brandow his fine estate, and they said he could not even keep Dollan much longer, and that the devil's horses were eating the hair from his head. Did Herr Gotthold believe in such things?

"No, no, no," said Gotthold, starting from his corner and sitting erect.

Jochen was obliged to fill his pipe, in order to think over quietly an answer so different from what he had expected. Gotthold did not disturb his meditations, but sat in silence, absorbed in thought, dreaming of what was, what might have been and never would be! Never? Yes, but not because fate does not will it; it is because human beings bring on this destiny, because they prepare it for themselves, because in dreams which thicken into realities, in wishes which become acts, they mould their own fate. Did she not, on the evening when she, her father, Curt, and himself, had made an excursion from Dollan to Dahlitz, return home with the wish to become mistress of the place her mother's family had so long possessed; How silently she walked through the stately apartments, while her large sparkling eyes wandered thoughtfully over the dark pictures on walls hung with faded silken tapestry, and the numerous carved ornaments on the chimney-piece, which seemed to her unaccustomed eyes a marvel of costliness! How softly she passed her hand over the damask curtains in the sleeping-rooms, how she buried her glowing face again and again among the flowers in the hot-house, as if intoxicated by the heavy perfume. With what interest she listened to that squint-eyed Hinrich, as he expatiated upon the merits of the noble horses whose light chain halters clanked against the marble cribs, and said it was such a pity for the young master to waste his time at the agricultural school, when he could employ it to so much better advantage here! And how indignantly she looked at the friend who fancied himself so dear to her, when with jealous malice he observed that Carl Brandow might come back all the sooner, since from all accounts he showed the same industry at the college as he had formerly done at school! Afterwards she had haughtily bantered the two friends as they stood on the lawn, but when she sat down in the large wooden swing--the same one where he had just seen the children--resting her beautiful head on one hand, while she carelessly played with the scarlet ribbons on her white dress with the other, and Gotthold approached to put it in motion, she started up and said, laughing, that such an ignorant girl ought not to trouble so learned a gentleman. He did not suspect what bitter earnest was concealed under the jest, and the next morning, when he was obliged to return with Curt to their institution of learning, he slipped under her chamber-door a bit of paper, on which he had written a free translation of one of Anacreon's odes:--

Skittish foal, I prithee why,
Flashing fear from thy large eye,
Cruel, dost thou mocking flee?
"Fool! he nothing is to me."

Know for thee I soon shall bring
And about thy proud neck fling
The bridle, and with firm, tight rein,
Swift-racing, spur thee o'er the plain.

Tarry now 'mid pasture-ground,
Gayly frolic, lightly bound;
But, my skittish foal, take heed!
Thy right rider comes with speed.

The right rider! Alas! ere six weeks had passed, the right rider came!

It was a dark evening late in Autumn, like the present one. Men, women, boys and girls were all out of doors, for it was Saturday night, and the great wheat-field must if possible be mowed, the sheaves bound up and piled in heaps. They had paused to rest for half an hour, while waiting for the rising moon to disperse the dense clouds of mist and enable them to resume their interrupted task. Curt and he had busily helped the laborers, and even Cecilia tied up a few sheaves; then they carried the people the beer Cousin Boslaf had drawn from the huge cask. There had been shouting, singing, and jesting among the youths and maidens, but all had now become silent, and Herr Wenhof thought if they did not begin again soon the whole company would fall asleep, and then he should like to see the person who could get them on their feet again. But Cousin Boslaf said they must wait ten minutes longer until the moon shone clear, and Cousin Boslaf knew best. It grew more and more quiet, so quiet that the partridges thought every one had gone, and began to call loudly for their scattered families; so quiet that Gotthold fancied he could hear the beating of his own heart, as his eyes rested on the graceful figure that sat close beside him on a sheaf, so near that his hand might have touched her light dress, gazing up at the moon, whose white light made her face look strangely pale. But the dark eyes often flashed brightly from the pallid countenance, and a strange emotion thrilled the youth, as if a ray from the spirit-world had fallen upon him. Yes, from the spirit-world, where he hovered with his beloved, far above all earthly tumult, far as the pure fancy of a youth whose heart is full of a great, sacred love can soar. Oh! God, how immeasurably he loved her! How his whole being was bound up in this affection! How all his thoughts, feelings, emotions were merged into, carried away by, this passion! How every drop of blood that flowed through his throbbing heart glowed with this love! How every breath that passed over his fevered lips ever murmured: I love you, I love you!

And at this moment, when the heavens opened before his enraptured eyes and he gazed into the region of the blest--at this moment the blow was to fall, which closed the gates of the Paradise of his youth forever, and destroyed for years his faith in the sacred feeling that dwells securely in the human breast. "Some one is coming on horseback," old Boslaf said, approaching the group, and pointing towards the forest. No one else perceived anything; but that proved nothing, for the old man could hear the grass grow. Cecilia started up, went forward a few steps, and paused to listen, and Gotthold saw her press her hand upon her heart. His own stood still.

He and Curt had not been to Dollan during the weeks before the examination, now successfully passed, and he had heard nothing of all that had happened there except that one day Curt casually mentioned that Carl Brandow had returned; but now he knew everything. The horse, whose rapid hoof-beats he also distinguished, was not bearing Carl Brandow over the miles that intervened between Dollan and Dahlitz for the first time. Now he knew what the altered expression of her features, which had attracted his attention that day, meant--the dreamy softness that suddenly yielded to a strange excitement; he knew all, all,--that his temple was ruined, his sanctuary profaned. He stood apart, unable to move, while the others surrounded the rider, who had swung himself from his horse,--the slender rider, who now disengaged himself from the group--but not alone! They passed close by without noticing him, he with his arm thrown around her waist, bending down and whispering to her, she nestling to his side, every line in their figures clearly relieved against the bright moonlight; then he saw and heard nothing more, and afterwards could only remember that he lay long in a dull, terrible despair, in a place far from that spot, on the edge of the dark forest, and then started up and staggered through the silent, sultry woods as if in a horrible dream, sometimes crying aloud like a tortured animal, until he at last emerged from them upon the shore of the sea, which stretched before him in a vast, boundless expanse in the shimmering moonlight. Here he again threw himself down on the sand, but now tears came to his relief--burning tears which, however, flowed more and more gently, as if the lapping of the waves was a lullaby to the poor quivering heart. At last he rose to his knees, extended his arms, and in a long, fervent prayer, to which the roaring of the sea murmured an accompaniment, told the universal mother, who will never desert her child, that he would always love her with boundless affection. Just then old Boslaf suddenly stood beside him,--he had not heard his approach, nor did the old man say anything,--and they walked silently along the strand until they reached the old man's lonely little house among the downs. There he made him a rude couch carefully and silently, and mutely smoothed his damp hair with his hand, when he lay down to rest for an hour and looked at the moonlight which shone through the low window on the wall and glimmered upon the weapons, stuffed birds, nets, and fishing-rods, until the rustling of the treetops on the shore and the low murmur of the sea lulled him to sleep.

Gotthold awoke from his dream. The carriage was standing still, and the horses were snorting as they looked into the forest, through which the road led for a short distance. It was perfectly dark, save that here and there a ray from the moon, which had just risen, trembled through the dense foliage of the beeches.

"Why, what's the matter with the cursed jades?" said Jochen.

There was a rustling and crackling in the thick underbrush on the right-hand side of the road; the noise grew louder, approached nearer and nearer, until, like a hurricane, a dark, compact, moving mass burst through the bushes and crashed into the undergrowth on the other side. It was scarcely seen before it disappeared, while the horses, in frantic terror, reared in the harness and swerved aside, so that it was only by the most violent efforts that the two men, who had sprung from the carriage, could control them.

"The confounded wretches," said Jochen, "the same thing happened to me once before in this very spot. The Prince ought to do something about it; but it gets worse every year, and if old Boslaf didn't often thin them out a little it would be unbearable. There, hark!"

The report of a musket rang through the forest at some distance on their left, whither the wolves had taken their flight.

"That was he," said Jochen, in a low tone; "he only needs to whistle and they run straight within reach of his gun. Yes, yes, Herr Gotthold, you said just now that there was nothing of the kind; but you'll make an exception of old Boslaf. He can do more than one trick which no honest Christian can imitate."

"So the old man is still alive?" asked Gotthold as they drove cautiously on through the forest.

"Yes, why shouldn't he be?" replied Jochen, "they say he can live as long as he likes. Well, I don't believe that; his end will probably come some day, though I may not be here; but this I do know, that people who knew him fifty years ago say that he looked just the same then as he does now."

"And he still lives in the house on the beach?"

"Where else should he live?" asked Jochen. They had emerged from the forest and moorland upon the beautiful smooth highway, which, lined with huge poplars, announced to the weary traveller the vicinity of the capital. It was still an hour's journey, but the road sloped gradually downward, and the horses, well aware that their long day's work was over and their cribs close at hand, collected all their strength and trotted briskly onward. The crescent of an increasing moon floated in the deep blue sky, shedding a pure radiance; here and there a flickering reddish light in the dark landscape marked the situation of some mansion house or lonely peasant hut. And now a brighter glow shimmered from the hill up which the road led. Stately houses gleamed forth from amid the dark foliage of the trees and bushes, the horses' hoofs rang upon a stone pavement, and a few moments after the carriage stopped before the "Fürstenhof," whose host welcomed the late arrival with northern cordiality.

CHAPTER III.

Gotthold had expected to reach P. at an early hour; it was now nearly ten o'clock, too late to pay the visit he had promised Herr Wollnow by letter, yet in spite of the time the gentleman might perhaps be waiting, and what he had to settle with him could be despatched in a few minutes. Then the minor object of his journey would be accomplished and he could set out again early the next morning; he would have preferred to go on that night.

The ground seemed to be burning under his feet. The events of the last few hours, the meeting with the playmate of his youth, and his communications, had roused the greatest agitation in his mind. As he passed down the quiet street towards the house of his business acquaintance, he paused several times under the dark trees, gasping for breath, and made a defiant gesture, as if he could thus repel the ghostly throng of memories that hovered around him.

"Thank God that now at least you are sure not to meet an old acquaintance again," he said to himself, as he rang the bell at the door of one of the handsomest houses upon the market-place.

"Herr Wollnow is at home," said the pretty young servant-maid, "and--"

"Bids you a most hearty welcome," interrupted Herr Wollnow, who at that moment came out of his counting-room, and extended a broad, powerful hand to his guest. "I am very glad to make your acquaintance at last, though I deeply regret that the occasion should be so sorrowful. Have you supped this evening? No? Why, that is capital; neither have I. To be sure, you must be contented with my company, at least for the present; my wife has a meeting of her great society to-day. She did not want to go, for she is very anxious to renew her acquaintance with you, or rather make it, as I say; for you will hardly remember her. She promised to be back again at ten o'clock; but I know what that means,--we shall have an hour to ourselves."

Gotthold apologized for his late arrival, but said that he had thought it better to come late than not at all, especially as he intended to set out again early the next morning, if possible.

"I think you will allow us to keep you with us a few days," replied Herr Wollnow; "yet time is money, as Englishmen say, so we will devote the time Stine needs to prepare supper to money matters. I have set everything right." Herr Wollnow invited Gotthold to take a seat upon the sofa in the little private office, and sat down beside him in a leather-covered arm-chair at the round table, on which various papers lay arranged in the most methodical order.

"Here are the documents that concern your late father's legacies," he continued. "I have had wonderfully little trouble in executing the orders you sent me from Milan. The ready money amounted only to a few thalers, and as to furniture and other household appurtenances, the hermits of the Theban wilderness could not have possessed much less than satisfied your father during the latter years of his life. The only really valuable portion of his property was the library, and here I took the liberty of deviating a little from your commands. You had intended that the whole profit derived from the sale should be given to the poor of the parish, and also that your father's successor should be permitted to set his own price upon the books that pleased him, undoubtedly in the supposition that the gentleman would make a proper use of this favor. But that was not the case with Pastor Semmel. He believed in making hay while the sun shone; he not only wanted all the best, but wished to take advantage of the opportunity, and if possible get them for nothing. In a word, your two intentions could not be reconciled, and as I doubtless rightly supposed that the poor people would be nearer your heart than the Pastor, although he made a great ado about the intimacy that had existed between you at the university, and I believe even at school, I offered everything, with the exception of a few insignificant trifles I was obliged to leave with him, to a respectable firm which dealt in secondhand books, and after considerable bargaining came to an understanding with them. We obtained a large sum, as I wrote you, and if you are as well satisfied as the poor people in Rammin, I need not be ashamed of the way in which I carried out your command."

An amused smile flashed from Herr Wollnow's dark eyes as Gotthold warmly pressed his hand.

"I repeat, it was very little trouble," said he, "and I would have taken a hundred times as much with pleasure for a man to whom I am so greatly indebted."

"You so greatly indebted? To me?"

"To you, certainly. If, when you entered into the possession of your property five years ago, you had withdrawn the ten thousand thalers invested in my business, as I earnestly advised you to do, I might not now be in the pleasant situation of being able to return the money to you with my warmest thanks."

"For Heaven's sake," cried Gotthold, pushing back Herr Wollnow's hand, which was extended towards a larger package fastened with an India-rubber band.

"I have put aside the money at any rate," replied Herr Wollnow, "in cash and in good bonds."

"But I don't want it now, any more than I did then."

"Well," said Herr Wollnow, "I cannot persuade you to take it as earnestly as I did five years ago. To-day--I may venture to say it confidently--the money is perfectly safe, and I can give you the highest rate of interest. Then, when I was establishing a new business here under very peculiar circumstances, and in consequence of the impossibility of relying upon my business associates,--I mean the capitalists of this place--a crisis might occur at any moment, I only did my duty when I advised you to intrust your money, if not to more honest, to safer hands. Well, you would not hear of it; would have me keep the money; nay, I even believe I might have had it without interest."

"You will admit, Herr Wollnow, that in so doing I carried out my uncle's views."

"I don't know," replied the merchant. "Your uncle had a personal interest in leaving the money in my hands. The great profits which accrued to the business in Stettin through the new connections I formed, and I may say created here, were so important that they far outweighed the risk of a possible loss. But when your uncle gave you the free disposal of the property by will, he acknowledged that an artist's interests are and must be different from those of a business man."

"Why yes, the interests of his art," replied Gotthold earnestly; "I never had and never shall have any others. In this feeling, and this alone, after I had recovered from my first astonishment, I joyfully welcomed the rich inheritance that fell to my lot so unexpectedly."

"I know it," replied Herr Wollnow; "the assistance I have given from your property to that poor deserving Brüggberg during the last three years proves it, and he will not be your only pensioner."

"It has proved as fortunate for him as for me that help came in time," replied Gotthold.

He supported his head on his left hand, and mechanically drew arabesques on a sheet of paper that lay before him, while he continued in a lower tone:

"And it was also quite time for me. For two years in Munich I had already devoted every hour and moment I could spare from the labor of earning a livelihood, to art, beloved art, which is so infinitely coy to a tyro, especially one who is compelled to begin after his one-and-twentieth year. My strength was almost exhausted; I had seen the last star of hope disappear; nothing bound me to life except a sort of defiance of a fate which I thought I had not deserved, and the shame of appearing to rush out of this world like a simpleton, in the eyes of those who had aided me to live. How distinctly I remember the hour! I had returned to my little attic room towards nightfall, from the studio of a famous artist to which an acquaintance had procured me admittance, with a soul filled to overflowing with the mighty impressions produced by works of the greatest genius, and yet utterly exhausted, for I had resolved a few days before to give up no more lessons, even if I starved, and I was almost starving. I placed myself before my easel, but the colors blended into one confused mass. The palette fell from my hand; I staggered to the table to pour out a glass of water, and--there lay the letter which informed me that I had been made the heir of a relative whom I had never seen, and was the possessor of a fortune which, at a casual estimation, amounted to more than a hundred thousand thalers. What was more natural than that in this wonderful moment I should make the vow: this shall belong to Art, and to you only so far as you are an artist."

"Nothing is more natural and simple," said Herr Wollnow; "but that you should have kept the oath, and I know you have done so, is--as we children of Adam are now constituted--not quite so natural and simple. But now, as the business matters are settled, we will, if agreeable to you, talk more comfortably over a glass of wine."

Herr Wollnow opened the door of a spacious apartment handsomely furnished as a half dining, half sitting room, and invited his guest to take a seat at the table, which was covered with a snow-white cloth, and furnished with all sorts of dainties served in valuable china, and several bottles of wine. As Gotthold sat down, his eyes wandered over several large and small oil paintings which were skilfuly arranged upon the walls.

"Pardon an artist's curiosity," said he.

"I understand little or nothing of your beautiful art," replied Herr Wollnow, as he fastened a napkin under his fat chin; "but my wife is a great amateur, and, as she sometimes persuades herself, a connoisseur. You must give her the pleasure of showing you her treasures. I am afraid the little collection will not find much favor in your eyes, with the exception of one picture, which I also consider a masterpiece, and which is greatly admired by all who see it."

Gotthold would gladly have gone nearer to the paintings; one of them which hung at some little distance, seemed strangely familiar, but Herr Wollnow had already filled the green glasses with odorous Rhine wine, and a robust elderly woman came noisily in with a platter of freshly broiled fish in her red hands.

"Stine says that you were always particularly fond of flounders," said Herr Wollnow, "and so she would not give up the pleasure of offering you your favorite dish herself."

Gotthold looked up at the stout figure, and instantly recognized good Stine Lachmund, who, during his boyhood, had almost kept the house at Dollan in the place of its invalid mistress, and after her death managed affairs entirely alone, yet had always maintained a good understanding with the boys and all the world, in spite of the many difficulties of her position.

He held out his hand to his old friend, who, after putting the platter on the table, and wiping her red fingers on her apron in a most unnecessary manner, grasped it eagerly.

"I was sure you would know me again," said she, her fat face beaming with delight. "But goodness gracious, how you have altered! What a handsome man you have grown! I should never have known you again!"

"So I used to be desperately ugly, Stine?" asked Gotthold, smiling.

"Why," replied Stine, with a grave, questioning glance, "you had handsome blue eyes, it is true; but they always looked so large and sorrowful that it made one feel badly, and then your little thin face was divided by a scar from there to there--it looked terribly; such a good boy, too, it was too outrageous--"

"All that has been forgotten long ago," said Gotthold.

"And a big beard has grown over it," added Stine.

"Yen can tell Line to bring in a bottle of the red seal," said Herr Wollnow, who thought he perceived that his guest wished to cut short this recognition scene. "You must pardon me," he continued, turning to Gotthold, when Stine had gone out after again shaking hands, and the pretty young maid-servant, who moved noiselessly to and fro, began to wait upon the gentlemen, "you must pardon me for being unable to spare you this little scene. The good woman was so delighted to hear of your coming, and a man who returns home must make up his mind to meet familiar faces at every step."

"I have experienced that to-day," replied Gotthold; "your wife, too, you said--"

"Is proud of having known you when you were not a famous artist, but a diffident boy about thirteen years old, who obstinately refused to take part in a dance which some aristocratic mammas had arranged with difficulty, and then joined it when he heard that no one else would dance with little Ottilie Blaustein. She has never forgotten your magnanimity."

"And she--Fraulein Ottilie--"

"Has been my wife for six years," said Herr Wollnow. "You look at me with discreet astonishment; you have quickly calculated that the little dancer of those days cannot now be much more than twenty-five, and you set me down very correctly at some years over fifty--we will say fifty-six. But we Jews--"

"Are you a Jew?" asked Gotthold.

"Of the purest descent," replied Herr Wollnow; "didn't you perceive that, when I locked your money up in my desk so quickly just now? Of the purest Polish descent, although out of love for my wife, who declared that she had suffered enough from Judaism, and also from business motives, I have taken the step, a very easy one for me, from one positive religion which was indifferent to me, to another that was no less so. But I was going to say that we Jews, or we men who are educated in the Jewish faith, are as unromantic in regard to marriage as everything else, but we keep to the law; I mean by that the law of nature, which is not at all romantic, but very sober, and consequently all the more logical."

"Then you think that a great difference between the ages of the husband and wife is one of the laws of nature which should be strictly observed?"

"By no means, only that under certain circumstances it is no impediment."

"Certainly not, but--"

"Allow me to explain my opinion by some statistics. I am descended from a very long-lived family. My grandfather--he could not tell either the place or time of his birth positively--must have been more than a hundred years old when he died, blind and crippled, it is true, but with his mental powers almost entirely unimpaired. My father was ninety. I, who no longer needed to toil and moil for myself, was able six years ago, when in my fiftieth year, to marry, and thus I have the expectation of seeing my little family, even if an addition should be bestowed upon us, grow up to maturity, supposing that I attain my eightieth year, to which, as you will admit, I have on the father's side the most well-founded title."

Herr Wollnow rested his broad shoulders comfortably against the back of his chair, and passed his hands over his high forehead and thick black hair, in which Gotthold could not yet perceive the smallest thread of gray. "That is," said he, "if I understand you rightly, marriage ought to be in the first place arranged for the welfare of the children, and therefore it is only necessary to consider the signs of the times in and for which the children are born."

"Certainly," replied Herr Wollnow; "in the first place, I might almost say in the first and last."

"And the husband and wife?"

"Ought and will find their pleasure in their love for their children, their joy in the new fresh world which surrounds them, as well as a sufficient compensation for all lost illusions, and a reward for the anxieties and deprivations which necessarily spring from this love and joy."

"And their own love, the love which brought them together, which induced them to make this particular choice out of the countless multitude of possibilities--the love which ever increases and must continue to increase until it finally illumines every thought, heightens every feeling, warms every drop of blood--would you take this from marriage, or consider it as something which may or may not exist? Never! 'Love is everywhere, except in hell,' says Wolfram von Eschenbach. I know not whether he is right, but I do know that a marriage where there is no love, nay, where love does not exist as I understand it, is in my eyes a hell."

Gotthold had spoken with a passion which, eagerly as he strove to suppress it, had not escaped the keen ears of his host.

"Let us change the subject," he said kindly, "and try another upon which we shall certainly find it easier to agree."

"No, let us keep to this," replied Gotthold; "upon so important a subject I am anxious to hear the opinion of a man whose judgment and character I prize so highly--the full opinion; for I am sure you have still much to say."

"Certainly," replied Herr Wollnow hesitatingly; "a great deal, but I fear very little that will please you, as you now think of marriage. I say as you now think, and beg you not to misunderstand me; for you, who have grown up among romantic traditions, and, as an artist, are perhaps especially disposed to take an ideal view of human affairs, can probably not be induced to give up your preconceived opinion except by your own experience. But no matter; I should need to be far less firmly convinced of the justice of my own opinion than I am, or to esteem my opponent less than I do if I allowed your last proposition to pass without contradiction. You said that without love, as you so eloquently described it, marriage would be a hell; I assert that this very love, or rather the unrealized dream of this love, makes a hell of many, far too many marriages."

"Unrealized," said Gotthold; "oh! yes, that is just what causes the unhappiness."

"An unavoidable one, or at least in many cases not to be avoided. You will admit that most marriages must commence with this illusion, which is more or less vivid according to the nature and imaginative power of the dreamer. There are so few persons who do not desire to be specially rewarded for paying their debts to nature and society. When they perceive that the question of marriage concerns a very different object from the realization of their dreams, and that this object is the more easily attained the less they give themselves up to fancies, the majority, of course, will at first rub their eyes in some little perplexity, but no longer take the affair tragically, but as it is; and these are the marriages which I--with all due respect for humanity, which certainly consists of average mortals--call average marriages, and which in Germany, England, America, nay, even in France and Italy, wherever I have wandered in the civilized world, I have always found as much alike as two eggs. It is, take it all in all, very dry, but very healthful prose; there is much modest quiet happiness, and of course also much, very much sorrow; but none which would not befall a human being as such. I mean the frail, easily injured creature at last doomed to death--and very little which results from the marriage. But this misery is found in overwhelming measure when people wish to realize, nay to transform into a still more brilliant reality, the dream they have enjoyed as lovers. How many heart-breaking conflicts, how many vain struggles, how much strength wasted which was greatly needed for far more important purposes, how much senseless and useless cruelty towards one's self and others! You see I speak only of those who take life earnestly, not of the multitudes of stupid people who are incapable of any moral idea, nor of the, if possible, still greater number of frivolous natures; who snap their fingers at all morality."

"I know it," replied Gotthold; "but why should not earnest, honorable human beings, when they become conscious of their mistakes, seek to cast out the errors that have crept into the score of their lives while there is time?"

"In what way?"

"By restoring each other's freedom."

"Freedom? What freedom? The liberty of chaining themselves again as soon as possible, of making another choice at once if, as is usually the case, they have not previously done so; a new choice which will probably prove no wiser, no more circumspect, than the first? Consider, we are speaking of earnest, honorable human beings! Well, they doubtless went earnestly and honorably to work in making their first choice, and if, in spite of all their earnestness, they went astray where they could choose freely and without embarrassment, they certainly would the second time, when burdened by the weight of self-created suffering, blinded by a treacherous passion. If a new clerk begins the first calculation I allow him to make on an entirely false principle, I may not send him away, but I never intrust any important matter to him again without watching him. And--while there is time--did you say? When is there time? Perhaps never, if two people have belonged to each other body and soul--for earnest, honorable people will give their souls to each other--perhaps never, and certainly not after; and here I come back to the point from whence I started--after the bond which thereby becomes a hallowed one has been blessed with children. Believe me, I could make many other remarks upon this subject: the chasm that severs the parents goes through the hearts of the children; they will feel the gulf painfully sooner or later, and never wholly cease to suffer from it, if--which to be sure is not always the case--they have hearts."

"And will not a child's heart be torn," cried Gotthold, painfully agitated, "will it not bleed at the thought of its parents who have lived together in torment, and wasted away in this torture?"

"They would not have wasted away," replied Herr Wollnow, "if they had come to an understanding with each other in my acceptation of the term; if they had always said to each other, and kept faithfully in their hearts the thought: for our children's sakes we must not despond, must bear our sorrows, must sacredly keep the ledger of our lives, and, if any error has actually crept in, calculate and calculate until we have found it. Who in the world should be responsible for the result except the person to whom the book was intrusted? And then there is also a bankruptcy from which the unfortunate sufferer comes forth impoverished, perhaps a beggar, with nothing to cover his nakedness except the consciousness: you have done your duty, met your obligations. Woe to him who cannot think this of his parents: well for him who can think and say so; who by their graves can weep sorrowful but sweet tears, and pass on in peace."

Gotthold's head was resting on his hand. Let us have peace, he had said to his father's shade, and sorrowful but sweet tears had fallen from his eyes upon his mother's grave. Would they have been less sweet if she had left the father who could not make her happy, if she had sought and perhaps found joy in another's arms?

Herr Wollnow's dark eyes rested upon his guest's noble features, now shadowed by gloom and doubt, with an expression of mingled compassion and severity. Had he said too much, or not enough? Should he be silent, or ought he to say more, and tell the young man who so closely resembled his mother, and yet had so much of his father's character, the history of his parents?

Just then the door-bell rang, and at the same moment his wife's voice sounded from the entry. She was a woman to quickly inspire other and gayer thoughts in men's minds, even if the conversation had taken a grave and critical turn.

CHAPTER IV.

"I beg you to excuse me a thousand, thousand times," cried Fran Wollnow from the threshold of the door.

"That makes two thousand," said her husband, who with his guest had risen to meet her.

"You shan't always reckon up everything, you bad man."

"But take no notice of anything--"

"And you shan't always interrupt me and spoil my prettiest speeches. I had thought of the most charming things to say to our guest."

"Perhaps they begin with good evening?"

"Why, of course; good evening, and welcome, you are most heartily welcome," said Frau Wollnow, extending two plump little hands to Gotthold, and looking up into his face with the most eager curiosity in her brown eyes. "Dear me, how you have grown, and how much you have improved!"

Gotthold could not return the compliment. Ottilie Blaustein seemed to him to have grown much stouter, but neither taller nor handsomer than when he last saw her. Nevertheless the plump, somewhat flushed face beamed with mirth and good-nature, and it was by no means difficult for him to respond to the cordial greeting of his old acquaintance with no less warmth. She begged the gentlemen to sit down again; she would, with their permission, take a seat with them, and beg for a glass of wine, for she had been obliged to talk so much that evening that she was very thirsty. Then she instantly started up again, and asked her husband in a half whisper whether he had already showed it to him, in reply to which mysterious question Herr Wollnow smilingly shook his stately head. "I would not spoil your pleasure," said he.

"You good Emil!" she exclaimed, hastily kissing her husband on the forehead, and then turned to Gotthold. "Come, I must give you a proof that you obliged no ungrateful person when you enabled the little Jewish girl to join the dance. See, I bought this in remembrance of you, and would have purchased it if it had been as worthless as it is valuable, and as dear as the price for which I obtained my treasure was nominal."

She had seized a candle, and now led Gotthold to the landscape which had already attracted his attention, even across the room. The latter started, and with difficulty suppressed an exclamation of surprise and pain.

"It is Dollan, isn't it?" said Ottilie.

Gotthold made no reply; he took the candle from the lady's hand, and held it so that the light fell upon the picture, which was hung rather too high. Yes, it was the very one into which he had painted his love and anguish, the picture of which he had just spoken to Herr Wollnow, that had been upon his easel on the evening which had made such a wonderful change in his life. To prove to himself that he had irrevocably broken all ties with his past, and must now begin a new phase of his life and struggles, he gave away the sketch and did not destroy the picture, but very prosaically presented it to an exhibition, from which it went to another, then to a third and fourth, and was finally sold, he did not know where or to whom, nor did he wish to know; it should disappear to him. And yet during all this time he had been unable to shake off the recollection of this picture. He could have painted it again from memory, but it would not have been the one hallowed by so much suffering. And he must find it again, here and now, when his soul was already so full of the magic fragrance which everything he saw and heard bore to him from the days when every breath that swept across »his brow or fanned his cheek, exhaled the odor of pine trees, of the ocean, and of love.

"And how do you suppose I obtained it?" said Frau Wollnow; "and especially how do you suppose I found out it was yours; for you know we do not judge from the style, or at least I did not at that time. But when people are to have a piece of good fortune! So I said to Cecilia Brandow, whom I--it is now six years ago, and I had just been married--met at the wool market in Sundin, I had almost said; but of course only the gentlemen went there, and we drove in with them on account of the exhibition, where I met her. We had so much to say, like any two friends who had not seen each other since they left boarding-school--you perhaps do not remember that Cecilia and I were in the same boarding-school at Sundin--or at least I had a great deal to say, for I found Cecilia very quiet. I believe she had lost her second child only a short time before. We were separated by the crowd, and I at last found her again in one of the most out-of-the-way rooms, standing alone before this picture with her eyes full of tears, which, as I came up, she tried to conceal."

"Good Heavens!" said I; "isn't that--"

"Yes," she replied; "and it is by him."

"By whom?"

"In a word, she had recognized it instantly, and would not admit that she was mistaken when I told her the 'G. W.' in the corner might be Heaven knows whom. You see I didn't understand much about pictures then--now when I--but your hand trembles, you cannot hold the candlestick any longer."

"Let me have the picture," said Gotthold; then perceiving that the husband and wife were looking at him in surprise, he added calmly, replacing the candlestick upon the table: "The painting is really not worthy to be hung among your other pictures, which are excellent. It is the work of a pupil, and moreover was painted from memory after a very hasty sketch, I will promise you another and better one of the same place, which I will make on the spot if you will--"

"Oh! that would be delightful, that would be splendid," exclaimed Frau Wollnow. "I will hold you to your promise: another, not a better one, you can't make it better, that is impossible; but to have a picture painted on the spot by the most celebrated landscape painter of the day will be a triumph of which I can boast all the rest of my life. Give me your hand upon it!" She held out both hands to Gotthold.

"Well," said Herr Wollnow, "the bargain is made, and now according to the good old custom we will seal it with a drink. You see, Herr Gotthold Weber, woman's wit surpasses priestly cunning. I might have preached a long time to induce you to remain here; my wife comes, and the timid bird is caught. Well, I am glad of it, heartily glad."

"And how delighted Cecilia will be," cried Frau Wollnow. "My poor Cecilia! she really needs something to divert her thoughts a little, and this will be so pleasant." Gotthold turned pale. When he made his over-hasty promise, the thought of thus creating a convenient pretext for seeing Cecilia again had certainly been farthest from his mind.

"I think we can spare our friend the trouble of the journey," said Herr Wollnow, "and you will be perfectly well satisfied with a copy."

"You certainly know that we are not talking about a copy, but a new, entirely new picture," exclaimed Ottilie. "But you understand nothing about it, my dear Emil, or he doesn't want to understand."

"I only do not want to send our friend away again immediately, but to keep him with us."

"Tell the truth, Emil, tell the truth," said Frau Wollnow, shaking her finger at him. "The fact, Herr Weber, is simply that he can't bear Brandow, Heaven knows why. To be sure I can't either, and have no reason for it except that he always teased me at the dancing lessons in his malicious way. But I care nothing about him, only his angelic wife."

"And since husband and wife are one--"

"If everybody thought as you do, dear Emil--and I too, of course; but there is no rule without an exception, and the Brandow marriage is one so thoroughly bad and unfortunate that I really do not see why we--"

"Should talk so much about it," said Herr Wollnow; "and it is all the more unnecessary, as our guest can probably take no special interest in the subject."

"No interest," cried Ottilie, clasping her hands; "no interest. Pray, Herr Gotthold--how I keep falling into the old habit--excuse me--but do tell this man, who thinks Goethe's 'Elective Affinities' in bad taste--"

"Pardon me, I said immoral--"

"No, in bad taste; the evening of the day before yesterday, when we were talking about it at the Herr Conrector's, and you made the unprecedented assertion that Goethe had committed a perfidy--yes, you said perfidy--when he made the only person in the whole novel who uttered anything truthful about marriage-the mediator--a half simpleton."

"But what do you want with your elective affinities!" exclaimed Wollnow almost angrily.

"He don't believe in them," said Ottilie triumphantly, "and says that, like ghosts, they only haunt the brains of fools. But the fact is, he only pretends to think so, and secretly believes in them more than many other people; and now he is troubled, as a child is afraid of ghosts, at the thought that you will go to Dollan and see your old friend again."

"How absurdly you talk," said Herr Wollnow, scarcely concealing his painful embarrassment by a forced smile.

"Why, we have talked of nothing else all the evening in our little society," cried Ottilie. "You must know, Herr Gotthold, that there are three members of our dancing class here besides myself--all married now: Pauline Ellis--well, she perhaps will not interest you; Louise Palm, the girl with the brown eyes--we always called her Zingarella; and Hermine Sandberg--you know, that handsome girl, it is a pity that she was a little cross-eyed and stammered. We knew everything, everything down to the smallest particulars, especially your duel with Carl Brandow--"

"At which, however, so far as I can remember, none of the ladies you have mentioned were present," said Gotthold.

"Good!" exclaimed Herr Wollnow.

"No, it isn't good," said Ottilie pouting; "it isn't at all good or kind in Herr Gotthold to make fun of the faithful friendship people have kept for him for so many years."

"That was very far from my intention," replied Gotthold. "On the contrary, I feel highly honored and greatly flattered that my humble self furnished such charming ladies with a subject for conversation, even for a few moments."

"Go on with your jibes."

"I assure you once more that I am perfectly sincere."

"Will you give me a proof of it?"

"Certainly, if I can."

"Well then," said Ottilie with a deep blush, "tell me how the duel chanced to take place, for I will confess that one said one thing, and another another, and at last we found out that nobody knew. Will you?"

"Very willingly," said Gotthold.

He had noticed Herr Wollnow's repeated attempts to give the conversation another turn, and thought he could perceive that his host's former remarks had not been so entirely unpremeditated as they had at first seemed. Had Frau Wollnow told her husband a romance to suit her own fancy, and made him play Heaven knows what ridiculous part? He must try to put an end to such rumors, and believed that the very best way of doing so would be to fulfil Frau Wollnow's wish, and tell the story with the utmost possible frankness, as if it concerned a third person.

These thoughts passed rapidly through his mind as he slowly raised the glass of wine to his lips. He sipped a little of it, and then said, turning to Frau Wollnow with a smile:--

"How gladly, honored lady, would I begin my story with the words of Schiller: 'Oh! queen, you wake the unspeakably torturing smart of the old wound, but it won't do, it won't do. True, when there is any sudden change of weather I have a twinge in the wound, but it is by no means unspeakably painful; and at all events at this moment I feel nothing at all, except the profound truth of the old saying, that young people will be young people, and will play youthful pranks, oftentimes very foolish ones. To this latter category undoubtedly belongs my combat with Carl Brandow, which did not, however, as you suppose, originate in the dancing lessons, but was only brought to a decisive issue there, after it had long been glowing under the ashes, and even threatened once before to break out into light flames. The first cause was this. In our fifth form it was an old custom, most sacredly observed, that an open space should be reserved between the first bench and the lecturer's chair for the 'old boys,' which no 'new boy' was permitted to enter before the close of the first term, on pain of a severe thrashing. Carl Brandow, it is true, belonged to the 'old boys,' indeed the very old boys; for he had been in the fifth form three years, but was still on the last bench, although if I remember rightly, he had already passed his eighteenth birthday. I was one of the 'new boys,' one of the latest comers indeed; for I had just entered at Michaelmas, a lad of fourteen, to the no small annoyance of my father, who had prepared me himself, and expected I should be at once enrolled among the first classes. It was not without reason, for when at the end of the first week, according to custom, the rank of the different scholars was assigned from the result of certain exercises we called extemporalia, mine proved to be without fault, and I was transferred to my well-earned dignity of Primus omnium with a certain degree of ceremony. And yet I was not even now to be permitted to cross the space before the first bench! From the first moment I had felt this prohibition as an outrage; now I openly declared it to be one, and said that I would never submit to it, but on the contrary demanded the abolition of the brutal rule, not only for myself but all the new boys, whose champion I considered myself.

"In thus wording my demand I had really been guided only by my own intuitive sense of justice, without being actuated by any other motive; but the result proved that I could not have done better if I had been the most crafty demagogue. Standing alone, I should have had no chance of accomplishing my bold innovation; but now my cause was the cause of all, that is of all the 'new boys,' and chance willed that our numbers were exactly the same as those of the other party. Even in regard to bodily strength, which boys so well know how to rate according to age, we might probably have compared tolerably with them, and the little that was wanting would have been well supplied by the enthusiasm for the good cause which I unceasingly labored to arouse--if it had not been for Carl Brandow. Who could withstand this eighteen-years-old hero, slender and strong as a young pine? He would rage among us like Achilles among the Trojans, and strew the field--a retired open space in a little wood behind the school-house--with the bodies of the enemies he had hurled to the ground; for it was agreed that whoever in struggling should touch the earth with his back was to be considered conquered, and desist from the battle, which was to be decided in this manner before the eyes of six honorable members of the first class, who accepted the office of umpires with a readiness deserving of acknowledgment.

"Yet there was no retreat, even if we, which was not the case, had thought of making one. The hour arrived--one Saturday afternoon, on which we had contrived to evade the watchfulness of the teacher--and I do not believe that soldiers ordered to assault a battery vomiting death and destruction can feel more solemn and earnest than did we. I may say, especially I. I had caused the struggle; I had involved all the brave boys in it; I felt responsible for the result, and for the disgrace in case of defeat--an event which seemed more probable every moment. That I was determined to do my utmost and strain every nerve is a matter of course. I hoped and prayed the gods that Carl Brandow might fall to me--for the antagonists were to be drawn by lot, and only he who had conquered his opponent was permitted to choose from among those who had vanquished theirs until all was decided. I do not remember whether the senior boys, who devised these ingenious rules, had copied from Sir Walter Scott; I only know I have never read the famous description of the tournament at Ashby, in Ivanhoe, without being reminded of that Saturday afternoon--the shady forest glade, and the boyish faces glowing with courage and ardor for the combat.

"And, as in the tournament of Ashby, a wholly unforeseen accident in the person of the Black Knight, the Noir Fainéant, saved the hero's otherwise hopelessly lost cause, so it was here.

"Among the new boys was a lad of sixteen, with a frank honest face, which would have been handsome if it had possessed a little more animation, and the large earnest blue eyes had been a shade less dreamy. Although not tall, he was powerfully built, and we should perhaps have reckoned upon his assistance had not his indolence seemed to us to be very much greater than the strength he might possess, for he had never given any proof of it; and in reply to our eager questions about how he rated himself, merely shrugged his broad shoulders in silence."