Pictures of German Life in the XVIIIth and XIXth Centuries Volume Ii Part 5

"At five years old we began to learn Latin. Jettchen translated glibly Cornelius and Phaedrus, and also the French New Testament. We boys learnt a.s.siduously from Langen's and Raussendorf's grammar, and I had long written what we called 'small exercises,' before I clearly knew what I was about. I remember distinctly that it was as if scales fell from my eyes when, at six years old, I discovered that we were learning the language of the ancient Romans." (Thus was instruction almost universally carried on at that time!)

"Nevertheless, in many points of view, I have reason to thank this teacher. He taught us to read well, and by the frequent recitation of good verses--he did not write bad poetry himself--we imbibed early a taste for melody and harmony. We learnt many, very many songs and fables by heart. Learning by heart!--a now very antique expression; it was then very frequent in the plan of lessons, and it was by this that my memory became so strong. We were exercised in committing to memory whole pages in a quarter of an hour, and later I often learnt off at once eight, ten, or twelve strophes. In short, taken on the whole, according to the standard of that time, the pedagogue, with all his deficiencies, did not do ill by us. The soul, also, was not unattended to. Feddersen's 'Life of Jesus' was our favourite reading. Feder's 'Compendium' was used for our religious instruction, a book which is still highly estimated. Our feeling for the beautiful was also awakened and trained in another way. Weiss's Operettes, set to Hiller's music, then made a great sensation. Kretzschmar played the harpsichord well, and the violin still better. My sister Jettchen played very tolerably at sight. Thus by degrees all Weiss's operas were played and sung, and we young ones joined in the lighter airs by ear. My father listened, and sometimes joined, with pleasure.

"Thus did many autumn and winter evenings pa.s.s. Dear scenes of home, what have become of you in most families? You are superseded by trashy reading, casino, and play!

"The poetry we learnt we recited in the evening, before our father and _Muhme_,--nay, in case of need before the maid. Pa.s.sages which had been explained to us, we then explained again. All this suggested to me the first idea and wish to consecrate my studies to religion and become a preacher.

"We had many playfellows. It was a common custom for children to visit one another on Sundays. We were allowed to remain to dinner, and accustomed to be well-behaved with grown-up persons. I, as being the least, was usually placed by the side of the father and mother of the family. Everywhere there was hearty friendliness. This custom, also,--at least in this form,--has almost pa.s.sed away. We might not sometimes, perhaps, be quite agreeable to the elders, but this was rare. My father was much pleased when children, even as many as six or eight, came to us. The old people gladly gave a supper to the merry little folk, and they also played with them. Then on Monday we looked forward with pleasure to the following Sunday. Is it surprising that we still look back with pleasure to those happy days, the remembrance of which is wafted to me like the perfume of living flowers?

"With all my youthful gaiety I was still very earnest-minded. Our mother, who had been dead only three years, was often spoken of; we had learnt a quant.i.ty of funeral hymns, and at six years old I certainly thought more frequently of death and immortality than many youths, or even men. What was to become of animals after death, I had not thought of till I was five years old. Then I happened to see a dead dog in the city moat, and asked our teacher about it. 'There is no immortality for dogs,' he answered, which made me indescribably sorrowful. It was a Sunday evening. I told it to my nurse, and wept bitterly.

"At Easter, in 1780, our new teacher came. He had considerable knowledge, and lived very quiet and retired, as he secretly reckoned himself one of the Moravian brothers. We clung to him with deep love, for he devoted himself entirely to us. With no other man did we prefer walking; and all his conversation was instructive, for the most part religious. His endeavours to conceal from us his inclination for that sect which my father hated, gave an air of mystery to his words. We gained much in serious feeling through him. He accustomed us not to speak lightly of G.o.d or Jesus; and on his departure, at the end of two years, we were so well grounded in this that months pa.s.sed without our once falling into this error, and when it did happen we sorrowed secretly with deep repentance; we left our most amusing game and prayed right heartily; we were, indeed, ourselves at last inclined to Pietism, for all worldly pleasures were condemned, or looked upon as injurious dissipations. So-called books of amus.e.m.e.nt, bordering upon novels, were considered good for nothing; even Gellert's dramas were reckoned among his youthful sins; places of amus.e.m.e.nt--b.a.l.l.s, worldly concerts--were workshops of the devil! Only oratorios were bearable. Comedies were undoubted sins against the Holy Ghost. On my brother, who was naturally inclined for melancholy, these opinions took far deeper hold; he wept often in secret over his sins, as he called them. I envied him for this, considering myself as a reprobate and him as a child of G.o.d; but with all my endeavours I could not succeed in being so correct! I continually rejoiced at the sorrowful emotions which often overcame my soft heart.

"Still, still do I consecrate to thee my thanks, thou good and righteous teacher! Thou wast the most faithful shepherd of thy little flock! He lives still, near eighty years of age. For thirty years I have only once seen him, but last year, when my brother died, he wrote me a letter, full of faith and piety. In a dream--he attached much importance to dreams--he had visited our house on the day of the death of my brother, his Ernst. It is touching to read his a.s.surances that his convictions were the same as they had been forty years before.

"There is one blessed hour I bear in memory. He went with us to walk in the city, and the evening star glanced kindly down upon us. 'What are the people above there doing?' said the teacher. This was a new idea to us! We were moved with joyful astonishment when he said to us: 'It is possible, even probable, that G.o.d's goodness has a.s.signed other planets as a dwelling-place for living, thinking, and worshipping creatures.'

Delighted, elevated, and comforted, we turned back. It was the counterpoise to that sorrow which fell upon me when I heard that there was no future for animals!

"On Christmas Eve, 1780, our dear sister Jettchen died, in her fourteenth year; nine days before we were playing merrily, when she was suddenly seized with a pain in her stomach. The doctor thought lightly of it, and probably mistook the real cause. After seven days she became visibly worse, was weak and pale as death; she left her couch for the last time in order to reach us our writing books. Yet no one seemed to antic.i.p.ate her death. Alas! it followed that Christmas Eve, early; about four o'clock they awoke us to see her once more. Weeping loudly we rushed up to her. She did not know us. 'Good night! Jettchen!' we exclaimed, and my father prayed, tearfully. Our teacher stood by the death-bed and prayed: 'Now take my heart, and take me as I am to thee, thou dear Jesus!' (From the Kottbus hymn-book.)

"She departed amidst these prayers, and lay there in heavenly serenity.

My little sister Rieckchen, three years and a half old, came up and said to the sick-nurse: 'When I die, lay me out in just such a white cloth as my Jettel.' And seventeen years afterwards the same woman did it!

"Before this, in the evening, we had to give our Christmas greetings.

My brother and Jettchen exchanged greetings--very beautiful--in writing. 'She who was your chief is absent,' said my father, weeping.

On the third day of the feast she was buried. She lay in a white dress with pale pink ribbons, a garland on her brown hair, and a small crucifix in her hand. 'Sleep well!' exclaimed our old nurse, 'till thy Saviour wakes thee!' We could not speak, we only sobbed. Often did my dearly beloved Jettchen appear to me in dreams, always lovely, quiet, and serious. Once she offered me a wreath; this was considered as a sign that I was to die, as I was soon after seriously ill. But since my childhood I have not been so fortunate as to dream once of her. She loved me tenderly! I may say very particularly so!

"Our sorrow was a little alleviated by our thoughts being distracted by a new building of my father's, a new garden-house; he had long wished for an extension and entire transformation of the garden. In less than two years all was finished, and now we pa.s.sed most of our summer evenings there. The garden had ever been our place for exercise, and now it was enlarged. What pleasure it was to us, on the finishing of the new building, for the first time to eat our supper in the open air!

And then we were allowed to remain out till ten o'clock, and go about under the starry heaven; and my father discharged small fireworks for us!

"In May, 1782, our good teacher left us, having received the rectorship at Seidenberg. Our sorrow was great, very great! He blessed us: 'Keep steadfastly to the instructions I have given you! Fear G.o.d, and all will go well with you!' These were his parting words. I threw myself on my bed and wept upon my pillow.

"My father was a strict, upright, honourable man. He had raised himself from bitter poverty to wealth, by his own exertions. With unremitting activity he only thought of maintaining and extending his business; of giving employment to many hundred manufacturers, and to securing an independence for us, his children. He worked daily ten and often eleven hours, only his garden drew him sometimes away; otherwise nothing else in the world. He was born to be a merchant, but in the highest sense; small accidental gains he despised, and I believe it would have been impossible for him to have been a retail dealer. He never made use of the frequent opportunities of becoming rich by bankruptcies; he walked steadily in the straight path, and was angry if his servants, in his absence at the fair, overcharged the purchasers. His external life was as simple as his inward principles. His furniture remained almost unchanged: the inherited plate kept its form; he only attached value to fine linen and good Rhine wine. His table was frugal; with the exception of high festival days, he had usually only one dish; of an evening frequently only potatoes or radishes. Wine only on Sundays, except on a summer evening in the garden. About once a year he gave an entertainment, then father Haupt would not do the thing shabbily.

Champagne he could not bear; this, therefore, came very seldom. But he delighted in old Rhine and Hungarian wine, and bishop made of Burgundy.

On Sunday evenings he walked in the fields, and now and then his life was diversified by a drive. He was, moreover, hospitable; very often foreign commercial friends came, and he frequently took his favourite clerks from the writing-room to dine with him. He was fond of talking politics, and often took correct views of the future. Though he was grave, he could be very cheerful, and often joked with us. He was open-handed to the highest degree; gave much to the poor, and gladly supported industrious people. Sometimes a great disinclination to the literary cla.s.s came over him; therefore he frequently declaimed against the alb.u.ms of the scholars; yet he never gave less than one thaler eight n. gr., often double, nay, three and four fold. All boasting was foreign to him, and he hated all ostentation of riches. If he heard that any members of his guild showed such ostentation, he only laughed most satirically; but when the boaster made himself too ridiculous he would say, 'We have not seen the end of it;' or, 'What wonderful things that man has;' or, at all events, at the utmost he said, 'I am not a n.o.body, either.' He was strictly religious, yet without superst.i.tion, against which, as well as against Popery, priestly pride, and hypocrisy, he would loudly declaim. He thought clearly on the most important subjects, as he himself knew, and was indeed almost alarmed, if he took, as he thought, too free views. It was touching to me; when once at Leipzig, during my studies there, he expressed himself freely upon confession, and then, drawing back with great modesty, said, 'Yet I am saying too much, Fritz, for I know that I am no deep thinking man.' He had, as a youth, read part of Wolf's philosophical works; but they were too dry for him. In his judgments of men he struck, as they say, the right nail on the head; yet he was, like all upright minds, often caustic, sharp, and bitter. If he had once said, 'The fellow is good for nothing!' he adhered to it.

"From his over-extensive business, in which he had no intelligent men, but only mere machines to a.s.sist him, we saw but little of him. He was obliged to intrust us to the tutor and the woman-kind; the result was that we felt more reverence than confidential tenderness for him. Yet we loved him from the bottom of our hearts, and his principles, his teaching, and his simple life worked upon us beneficially.

"Our aunt had, it is true, her good days, yet she never succeeded in entirely gaining our love. Her quarrels with the maids were more repugnant to us from the contrast of the familiarity with which it alternated; she managed to make use of my father's moments of vexation to gain her objects. But all this did not turn our hearts from her, as she did us no injury, and often even took our part against the ill-treatment of our new tutor. It was only that she was not fitted to captivate childish hearts. From this she took a great aversion to our nurse, to whom we clung with our whole souls, as she had brought up us four motherless orphans without any a.s.sistance. Belonging to a better cla.s.s--her husband had rented a large property at Wernigerode--she had become impoverished by war, plunder, and a succession of misfortunes, her husband had died, and her children had partly gone out into the world and partly been brought up by relations. She had an excellent woman's head, a clear understanding, endless good-humour, cheerfulness, and suitable wit. If it is true that I have sometimes humorous ideas, a certain share in the development of this quality belongs to her. I well remember that I have gone on for a whole half-hour with her making bon-mots and allegories. 'With you I can joke.' With this good opinion I was often rewarded. Besides this she was skilful in a thousand things, and could always give advice. She was not disinclined to the '_Stillen im Lande_,' which from her great sufferings the cup of which she had drained to the dregs, could be easily understood. Her heart was pure and pious, and she maintained in us the impression of our former tutor's admonitions, when his successor would almost have exterminated them by his teaching and course of life. Many of her relations, and also her son-in-law had become surgeons, and she had, as a maiden, given medical a.s.sistance. Therefore she possessed more than usual knowledge, and astonished a surgeon when she skilfully set my brother's foot, which he had dislocated. She understood osteology perfectly; perhaps indeed she sometimes had too much confidence in herself, but her remedies healed very quickly; and when the surgeon for four months vainly endeavoured to cure my brother's foot, and spoke of the bone being rotten, she shook her head; he was sent away, and in a month the foot was healed.

"The public even believed that she dealt in the black art, but we knew better. 'I have sworn to my lady,' (our mother), 'to give my life for you, if it can be of use to you, and I will keep what I vowed on her deathbed!' Peace be to her ashes! her wish to repose near 'her lady' has been fulfilled. 'Children! when I die, I have only one request,--lay me near your mother; ah! if I am only under the ledge of her tomb, I shall be content.'

"Such was the state of things in our house when the new tutor came--he was in every respect the contrary of his predecessor. The one simple, straightforward, and just, avoiding even the appearance of evil; the other a frivolous, flighty dandy, who--it was then a matter of importance--played with a lorgnette, and wore stiff polished boots even when he preached; in knowledge below his predecessor; in faith not knowing himself what he wished. The former weighed his words, this one often swore, and his pupils soon followed his example. He danced, rode, played at cards, &c. In short, quite a common-place master. Pa.s.sionate, tyrannical, and severe upon our faults, or rather--for he did not concern himself much with our morals--harsh upon slight mistakes in the school-room. And yet we learned everything well, and knew more than all our playfellows; of that I am very certain.

"He very nearly disgusted me with study, treating me with special harshness, from not understanding my ardent mind; meanwhile from this bitter my nature drew forth honey. I had often suffered injustice, from hence arose the feeling of justice in my soul. 'It is better to suffer wrong than to do it!' often said our nurse to me. And out of this sprang forth my zeal against oppression, violence, and injustice of all kinds. The very depths of my soul were stirred when, being innocent, I was ill-treated; suffering seemed more deeply-wounding when inflicted by unfeeling arrogance. My brother and I respected the guilty, if they repented. Thus it was wholesome to bear undeserved severity! And yet,--so forgiving is the pure soul of childhood--that we only hated the man for the moment. A friendly word, or one of praise from him, and all was forgotten.

"As the Pietism of the other had not quite suited my father, the new tutor, in the beginning, was more thought of by him. But he soon learnt to know his man; and G.o.d knows how my father himself could for five long years have borne the misconduct of this man, for he wrote him insolent letters if he ever ventured to blame anything. We never dared complain, for our father did not stand in very confidential relations with us. So we suffered in silence, and often not a little. Often have I, in the truest sense of the words, eaten my bread with bitter tears.

"I must here mention, that my first resolution to become a preacher was extinguished by this man. 'Law, law,' he often exclaimed to me. What that meant was very mysterious to me. At last, however, when I heard that there were law professors, I understood it. It was now settled; but what attracted me in the Professorship was the opportunity of speaking in public. If there was a vocation that suited me it was this.

"Thus pa.s.sed the years from 1782 to 1786. In the beginning of 1787, my brother, still not fourteen years old, was put into a counting-house at Chemnitz. Inexpressibly sorrowful was our parting. We loved each other as brothers, and if we had small quarrels, in which I was more to blame than he, we never let the sun set without being reconciled. But now follows an important chapter in my juvenile life.

"The picture of a perfect tutor is indeed charming. More than father and mother can do, can be effected by a n.o.ble, pious teacher, of simple life, full of judgment and moral power; only that scarcely one out of a hundred can be found to realise this ideal.'

"A heavy load was lifted from my breast when I felt myself free from this tutor's discipline! A feeling I had never experienced before stirred in me! I was already half-grown up! Was it an impulse to unrestrained roving? or a longing for dissipation? or youthful presumption which fancied it needed no guide? In truth no thoughts of this kind entered my mind! It was the pure consciousness of having suffered injustice; it was the honest feeling that I was not so bad, as he in his frantic humour had often said I was; it was the glad prospect of being able to strive independently; it was the desire to show that I no longer needed leading-strings. Still do I remember the evening of the 5th of April, 1787,--Maunday Thursday,--how beautiful the sunset was, and I spoke with open heart to my playfellows of the new life that was opening to me.

"My father put me under the teaching of the Conrector Muller, and his old friend the Subrector Jary, and in this he did well.

"To the Conrector Muller I owe most thanks. I pa.s.sed from tyrannical oppression to his liberal intellectual sway. His kindliness and his n.o.ble open countenance, speaking of pure goodness of heart, attracted me to him when first we spoke together. He understood how to elevate my feeling for learning. He knew everything thoroughly. He was strong in Latin, not unversed in Greek; the history of the German Empire, and political history--but above all, literary history,--together with geography, were his favourite studies. He had not one enemy.

"Jary was not born to be a teacher, but he was not without knowledge, which he had acquired by industry. His method was defective, but he meant to deal faithfully by his scholars, and looked after them. His religious opinions were strictly orthodox; and I wept when he expressed doubts as to the eternal happiness of Cicero! Yet I owe him also thanks; he treated me with earnest kindness, and when he dismissed me in 1791, the old man said weeping: 'Fare you well! I shall not see you again; fare you well, you are almost the only one who has not vexed me!'

"In August, 1788, I partook for the first time of the Lord's Supper. I looked up fervently and repeated to myself Kretzschmar's ode: 'Let us rejoicing fill the holy vaults of thy temple with hymns of praise.

Invisibly though perceptibly, does G.o.d's grace hover round us!'

Joyfully, with heaven in my heart, did I approach the altar!

Nevertheless, when in the afternoon I examined myself during a solitary walk, I was dissatisfied with myself. What I had been taught concerning the merits of Christ, appeared to me unintelligible; my groping in the dark about this, weakened the impression of that day. I worried myself with the idea of the atonement by death, and no ray of light entered my soul. Besides I loved the old heathens, Cicero, Pliny, Socrates, &c., more than many Christians, together with the Apostles, more than all the Jews of the Old Testament, as the people of G.o.d did not particularly please me. And yet it was doubtful whether G.o.d would receive Socrates as a child of light. How in the world, I thought, could my poor Socrates help not having been born later, not having lived in Judea?

"Thus I troubled myself, and was more sorrowful than cheerful.

"At Michaelmas, 1788, my father took me with him to Leipzig, where my brother also was to come. Oh, the pleasure of meeting again! No language can describe it! My brother's Princ.i.p.al allowed him leave every afternoon and also many mornings; so we could have plenty of talk. I soon became aware that my brother had read many freethinking works upon religion, especially many of Bahrdt's. His own inquiries led him still further. This occasioned me much sorrow, for Jary's strict orthodoxy had laid hold of me. But I was the happiest. Soon after, I attained to clear views in a scientific way, while my brother, left to himself, wavered to and fro, which was still perceptible, even in his old age. The insoluble question--why reason was reason?--gave unspeakable suffering to my poor brother. Undoubtedly my lighter tone of mind, my fancy, which gave me a poetic feeling, and especially my disposition to give up groping over difficult pa.s.sages, were a help to me. With my brother reason prevailed too much.

"We pa.s.sed three blessed weeks. To me the Academy was to some extent a great pleasure; the Zittauer students took pains to make my residence agreeable to me. The theatre we visited a.s.siduously, we loved plays pa.s.sionately, and when the actors were at Zittau, we had learnt under the guidance of the last tutor, to criticise with judgment Don Carlos was given, Agnes Bernaner, and Kaspar der Thorringer; deep was the impression left upon me, and I confessed secretly to myself, that I should not find it disagreeable to be an actor. Even in this the idea of public speaking exercised its charm upon me. A hundred times, perhaps, did we act plays in that year, frequently extempore. It was singular that the old _roles_, as we called them, were particularly suitable to me. But comic parts I could not manage, which, strange as it may appear, my brother frequently chose, although he had qualifications for the more serious ones, and, according to my judgment, he often failed in the comic parts. A friend played the military _roles_, to which I had a great aversion.

"How great the advantage of public instruction! It may sometimes have its defects, and unfortunately schools are often laboratories of temptation. But how true are Quintilian's words, that children often carry to school faults from home! Great is the advantage that public inst.i.tutions are open to inspection, and that freedom of mind prospers there more than in private education, and emulation awakens and nourishes the power of self-exertion.

"These hours of enjoyment with my brother came to an end. On the Monday after _oculi_ I was introduced, after a successful examination, by Director Sintenis. I became immediately 'sixth form boy' at the third table. This excited great envy and caused me many bitter hours. I, who without falsehood and malice, meant well by every one, did not understand what many of the seniors meant. Finally, however, my good behaviour got the better of them, I remained just the same, and bore much with patience. It was long before I could conceive what envy was, for I had no touch of it in my disposition. My more acute brother, to whom I made my lamentations, wrote to me, 'Read Gustav Lindau, or, the man who can bear no envy,' by Meissner. He was right, and yet it was not till I was thirty-five, that I saw it in its true light.

"When this period of envy had pa.s.sed away, and Muller said, 'You sit in the place that is due to you, but mind you maintain your place,' a succession of happier days opened to me.

"Easter drew near; I examined myself and found that I had been very industrious. With Muller especially, I had in the last year done much.

I was behindhand only in Greek, as almost all were; yet I could get on.

In the Imperial and Saxon history I was well up, and in the knowledge of literature very strong for one who was not seventeen. In the geography of countries beyond Europe I was deficient. Latin I knew best. The most ready amongst us could translate whole pages off hand, without a fault, in two or three minutes; it was here and there improved in elegance and then read aloud. I owe to these exercises my facility in speaking Latin, which I was obliged to acquire at the University.

"The time for my departure from the academy was come.

"With all my liveliness, I had also many serious, even melancholy hours. The separation from my sisters, whom I dearly loved, disposed me often to be sorrowful; I especially loved the youngest, Friederike, who clung to me. Especially the last winter we were inseparable, it was as if she antic.i.p.ated that we should soon be parted for ever.

"My heart was pure, untouched by the allurements to which I well knew my fellow scholars yielded. I had already determined to continue in the same course; this I may affirm now at the end of thirty years. My chief fault was hasty anger, which even led me to the verge of giving blows; and violent pa.s.sion is still the dark side of my character! Besides this, I was bitter in my censure of the faults of others. Faithful self-examination told me all this and more; but I was always forgiving, and any feeling of revenge would have been impossible to me.

"My heart glowed with friendship; ingrat.i.tude appeared to me, as it still does, a black vice. Finally, I must say one word of my feelings as a youth; to maiden charms I was very sensitive, but never did a faithless word pa.s.s my lips. The loves of the scholars were repugnant to me, but I will not deny having entertained secretly a hope that some female heart might be gracious to me; but pale and thin as I was, I often seriously doubted the possibility of it.

"The expression of quiet melancholy in the eyes of L. v. D. attracted me early; I had the greatest pleasure in talking to her, and she was the only one of my sisters' playfellows with whom I walked, when we rambled about the garden. But she left Zittau soon, and never did a word escape my lips--and how could it? In 1788, I saw her again once; after that time never again.

"My first school occupations drove away all such thoughts, although I was teased as well as others, when I had danced more with one maiden than another at the school b.a.l.l.s. Sometimes undoubtedly there were moments, when from braggadocio, I made it appear as if there was something in question, where certainly there was nothing.

"But shortly before my departure--at a school ball--I met with Lorchen L., who was destined by my stars, to be the companion of my life, and entered into conversation with her. Even then I was much charmed with her! and danced oftener and with greater pleasure, than with any other maiden. It made me uneasy to feel that in some months I should be away.

The impression upon me was not concealed from my cla.s.s, and they bantered me; and I looked gloomy. Even during more than six years'

absence, her image ever rose before me. If there are inward voices, this was one for me!