Specimens of German Romance Volume I Part 18

"In G.o.d's name!" cried Tausdorf angrily, "how should I, who have been devoted to arms from my youth, teach you what you are to say for me before the tribunal? The little Latin which I learnt at Gitschin is of no use here. But you are a studied man, well informed in the law, and must best know what will conduce to my advantage."

"It will all be of no use," muttered the procurator; "but relate the tale to me circ.u.mstantially, that I may thoroughly comprehend it."

Again poor Tausdorf undertook the sad labour of narrating the tale of blood. The procurator listened to him, gaping, and then briefly repeated what he had heard to the tribunal, concluding with, "You have now heard Tausdorf's statement of the affair, gentlemen, and I submit it to your decision."

"Is that your whole defence?" cried the knight indignantly, while this statement was being protocolled. "May our Saviour one day speak for your sins before the judgment-seat of G.o.d, as you have spoken for me in this hour before the tribunal of man!"

"Have you any thing else to advance?" said the judge to the accused and his defender; and as they were silent, he rang the bell, saying, "The audit is closed.--Let the knight be conveyed back again to the Hildebrand," he added to the serjeant, who then entered.

"Gentlemen," said Tausdorf, with manly firmness, "I do not believe that you have a right to p.r.o.nounce judgment on me; but if you do hold yourselves so empowered, I warn you honestly, when you give your votes, to keep your conscience and your dying hour before your eyes. It is an easy thing for you to slay me, for I am in your power; but innocent blood cries with a thousand voices to Heaven, and G.o.d is just."

He went away with his guard, followed by his model of a defender, and the judges laid their heads together in anxious whisperings.

In the meantime the day had fully broken, and a bright July sun shone upon the overwatched faces of the council, who were still collected in the Sessions'-chamber, and had reclined themselves against the windows to prevent their going to sleep. The iron old Erasmus alone sat at the green table with bright wakeful eyes, and played with the golden medal appended to his chain of honour. By his side stood the vice-consul, Christopher Drescher, behind a chair, which he rocked to and fro impatiently.

"The judges must have come to a decision by this time," said Erasmus, as if to himself.

"If they only come to a right one," replied Drescher emphatically.

"No fear of that; although parties may at times run high amongst ourselves, yet against the outward enemy we all stand as one man; and if----Then we are at the goal, brother."

"I only wish you had not forced poor Reimann to defend him. If he should happen to bring forward things which we can't answer?"

"Some defender Tausdorf could not but have; the forms of the law demanded so much, and to forms we must strictly adhere on this occasion. Between ourselves, too, could you in all Schweidnitz have hunted out a worse advocate than this Reimann?"

"You have seen farther than I have," cried the vice-consul, after a pause: "_Concedo_."

A servant now brought in a letter to the burgomaster, which he opened and read--

"An _Intercessionale_ in favour of the prisoner by the Herr von Schindel, resident of this place, and now laid up with the gout," said Erasmus to the council. "The pet.i.tioner presumes to defend the accused, uncalled for, and to impugn the competency of our tribunal. _Ad acta!_"

"The Frau von Netz, too, waits below in great trouble," added the servitor, "and implores, in Heaven's name, a secret audience of your excellency."

"The proud n.o.bles can now stoop themselves to entreaties," exclaimed the burgomaster triumphantly; "but it's all of no use."

He went out. The poor Althea stood there, her face in a veil wet with tears, and she approached him with clasped and uplifted hands.

"Will it please you to walk in?" asked Erasmus with cold politeness, and opened the door of the little audience-chamber.

She tottered after him. He placed a chair f motioned to her to sit down, and placed himself opposite.

"What is your pleasure, n.o.ble lady?" he asked, after a short time, during which she was unable to speak from sobbing. "Our time is peculiarly valuable to-day."

"Mercy!" at length cried the poor pet.i.tioner in the most moving tones of anguish; "Mercy for my intended husband!"

"That is with G.o.d!" replied Erasmus. "In my weighty office I recognize but the duty of justice. If such a crime were to remain unpunished, I should have to account hereafter to the Highest for the innocent victims, which might in future be sacrificed to the arrogance of the n.o.bles."

"I do not pray for the absolution of the unfortunate one; I only pray that the business may be brought before the bishop or the emperor, and I offer to be his security till then with my whole property."

"The murder has been committed within our jurisdiction, and must be punished by our tribunal."

"And do you call it a murder that Tausdorf, to defend his own life, slew your son against his will?"

"It is not for us two to decide upon this point, Frau von Netz; for I am the father of the murdered, and you are the intended of the murderer. The judges will settle it upon their oaths."

"Mr. Burgomaster, we are alone; I would not--by Heavens I would not, offend you; but the terrors of death give me courage for the question; can money save Tausdorf? My uncle, von Schindel, is rich; we have friends amongst the n.o.bles of the country. Fix the sum."

"If you were not a woman," exclaimed the burgomaster furiously; "if you were not a woman, you should fare ill with this twofold insult,--to the dignity of my office, and to my heart as a father. Gold for blood! That is one of the maxims of you n.o.bles, when the question, is of a citizen's life. But the Polish times are over, when the high-born murderer had only to fling the price of blood upon the corse of the murdered, and thus remain free from all retribution. When the n.o.bleman of Siegwitz shot the citizen's daughter, his drinking companions thought that such a girl might well be paid for; but the council there did not think so, and the head of the a.s.sa.s.sin fell."

"Oh my heart!" sighed Althea, and stood for a time struck with grief and horror at these words of wrath; then on a sudden, collecting her spirits, she flung herself before the burgomaster and embraced his knees.

"Mercy!" she cried, and lifted up her beautiful blue eyes to the inexorable one with so much fervour, that in spite of his iron resolution an unpleasant feeling oppressed his heart, and he was leaning down to her with pity, when the marshal entered to announce that the judges had presented themselves to the council and waited for the worshipful burgomaster. At this the old evil spirit returned in him. He started up with vehemence, and sought to disengage Althea's hands from his knees.

"For Heaven's sake, what will you do?" cried the unhappy victim.

"My duty!" replied the man of the stony heart, and walked away with firm and echoing steps.

The sufferer breathed a deep and piercing sigh, as if in that moment the tender thread of her life was broken, and her head fell in a kind swoon upon the seat of the chair before which she had been kneeling.

The criminal court had laid its sentence before the council. Its adoption and immediate execution were unanimously resolved upon, the judges were again collected in their sessions' chamber, and the pale, fettered Tausdorf stood before them with his guard, while the chief of the court read thus:--

"As the n.o.ble and honourable Kaspar Sparrenberger, surnamed Tausdorf, hath stabbed, and thus brought from life to death the in like manner n.o.ble and honourable Francis Friend,--and as this deed is open and manifest,--and he himself cannot, and does not, deny it,--therefore the imperial town-court of Schweidnitz adjudges that Tausdorf, notwithstanding his defence, has forfeited his life for such murder, and consequently, according to the law and custom of the land, shall be executed with the sword."

With this the provost took up a white-peeled willow wand which lay before him on the table, broke it in two, and throwing the pieces at the feet of the condemned, cried,

"The sentence is spoken, The staff is broken."

"You must die, and the Lord have mercy on your soul!" exclaimed the provosts, and overturned their seats with a heavy clatter.

"I appeal from this unjust sentence to the prince palatine of Silesia and the emperor," cried Tausdorf in a loud voice unshaken by this horrid ceremony.

"Such appeal cannot be made according to our privileges and customs,"

replied the chief provost. "The execution follows here upon the heels of the sentence."

"Then I appeal to the tribunal of G.o.d," said Tausdorf, without losing his presence of mind--"to the tribunal of G.o.d, before which we must one day all meet again. When am I to die?"

"In two hours."

"You are very quick, you gentlemen of Schweidnitz. But I suppose I may see my bride again?"

"The council has forbidden it, as well on account of the loss of time connected with it as of the unavoidable lamentation and disturbance."

"Ay, indeed! You gentlemen have true hangmen's hearts, with room therein for barbarity as well as injustice. Yet I hope the time will be just sufficient to prepare me fittingly for my departure. I wish to confess first, and receive the holy sacrament. Have the goodness to send me a priest of my persuasion, and afterwards a notary to draw up my last will."