Villa Eden Part 18

"I regard it as a matter of no consequence," Eric replied, "whether my ancestors belonged to the gentry or not; they were engaged in the common occupations of business and trade, and my immediate ancestors were goldsmiths. The resemblance of the Jews with the Huguenots, however, I must maintain. Every community exiled on account of its religion, and scattered abroad, incurs thereby a double obligation: first, to keep in view, over and above all nationality, the oneness of humanity; and second, to contend against all fanaticism and all exclusiveness. There is no one religion in which alone salvation is to be found, and no one nationality comprising in itself all excellence."

Pranken and Fraulein Perini looked at each other in astonishment. Frau Ceres was at a loss to comprehend what all this meant, and Sonnenkamp shook his head over this sermon-like style of his guest, who intermingled his world-wide historical views with the light table-talk; and yet he could not get rid of the impression that there was before him a nature that had its permanent abode in the region of pure thought.

"You must unfold that to me yet more definitely at some other time," he said, seeking to divert the conversation.

And Roland said:--

"Louis the fourteenth, who exiled your ancestors, is he the one who destroyed the castles here on the Rhine?"

"The same."

It seemed difficult to draw the conversation away from a subject which made it drag heavily, but it was suddenly diverted, for just then a highly seasoned dish was brought in, of which Roland desired to eat.

His father would not permit it. His mother, perceiving it, cried out in a shrill voice, "Do let him eat what he likes."

A glance from Eric met Roland's eye, and the boy laid down the morsel that he was about putting into his mouth, saying, "I would rather not eat it."

Sonnenkamp made a sign to the servant to re-fill Eric's gla.s.s with Rauenthaler. This appeared to be his way of expressing his grat.i.tude for the glance of Eric.

No new topics for light conversation came up. Pranken was silent, and it was uncertain whether he had exhausted his material, or whether he wished to make Eric conscious by this reticence how pedantically, and at the same time ostentatiously, he had disturbed the cordial good feeling of the table.

The cloth was removed. Fraulein Perini again repeated a prayer in a low tone, all stood motionless, and the servants having quickly drawn back the chairs, they repaired to the veranda, where coffee was served in very small cups.

Frau Ceres gave a biscuit to a snow-white parrot, and the parrot called out, "G.o.d bless you, ma.s.sa." Then she sank down into an easy-chair, and Pranken placed himself near her on a low tabouret, sitting almost at her feet.

Fraulein Perini selected a seat sufficiently near, if she wished to take part in the conversation, and yet far enough off to allow Pranken to speak with Frau Ceres alone.

Sonnenkamp beckoned to Eric to go with him into the garden. Roland accompanied them without being asked.

The servant came to inform them that the huntsman Claus was with the puppies, and begged that the young gentleman would come to him.

"I give you permission to go," the father said.

"But I would prefer to remain with you here," Roland replied.

There was an expression of childlike fondness in the tone and gesture, as he grasped Eric's hand.

"If your father says that you may go, you should go," Eric quietly answered.

Roland departed with lingering steps, halting at intervals, but still he went.

CHAPTER VII.

AN EXAMINATION THAT ENDS WITH A LAUGH.

For some time, the two walked silently side by side. Eric was dissatisfied with himself; he lived too exclusively in himself, and in the longing to arrange everything according to his own mental laws, and to express each truth in the most comprehensive way, throwing himself into it in the excitement of the moment with perfect freedom and naivete, yet not unconscious of his intellectual riches.

Hence the hearers felt that, what he said was not only inopportune, but was presented with a sort of zealous importunity. Eric acknowledged this and was conscious of it immediately afterward, when he had divested himself of himself; yet he was continually making the same mistake, which caused him to appear in an ambiguous light, and as if he were out of his appropriate place. Eric had a sort of clairvoyant perception how all this was affecting Sonnenkamp, but he could not discern the peculiar triumph that it afforded him over the visionary, as he smiled to himself at the green youth who served up such freshly-cooked dishes of soph.o.m.oric learning. He knows what it is, he has pa.s.sed through it all. People settle themselves down there in the little university-town, and coming in contact with no one else, they live in a fantastic world of humanity, and appear to themselves to be personages of the greatest consequence, whom an ungrateful lack of appreciation hinders from manifesting their efficiency in actual life.

And this captain-doctor now before him had only a small company of ideas under his command.

Sonnenkamp whistled to himself,--whistled so low that n.o.body but himself could hear the tune; he even knew how to set his lips so that n.o.body perceived him to be whistling.

He placed himself in a chair on a little eminence, and showed Eric also a seat.

"You must have noticed," he said at last, "that Fraulein Perini is a very strict Catholic, and all our household belong to the Church; may I ask, then, why you rang the changes so loudly upon your Huguenot descent?"

"Because I wish to show my colors, and nail them to the mast; for no one must ever take me for what I am not."

Sonnenkamp was silent for some time, and then he said, leaning back in his seat,--

"I am master in this house, and I tell you that your confession shall be no hindrance. But now"--he bent himself down, putting both hands on his knees and looking straight at Eric--"but now--I came very near falling from my horse to-day, which has never happened to me before, because I was deeply engaged, while riding, in reflection upon what you said to me--in brief--the main point of our conversation. How do you think that a boy who is to engage in no business and who is to come into possession of a million--or rather say, of millions--how do you think that such a boy is to be educated?"

"I can give a precise answer to that question."

"Can you? I am listening."

"The answer is simple. He cannot be educated at all."

"What! not at all?"

"That is what I affirm. The great mysterious Destiny alone can educate him. All that we can do is, to work with him, and to help him rule over and apply whatever strength he has."

"To rule over and to apply," Sonnenkamp murmured to himself; "that sounds well, and I must say that you confirm an impression which has often before this been made upon me. Only a soldier, only a man who has developed and trained his own inborn courageous energies, only such an one can accomplish anything great in our time; nothing can be done by sermons and books, for they cannot overcome the old, nor create the new age."

In a changed, almost cringingly humble tone, Sonnenkamp continued,--

"It may appear in the highest degree strange, that I, a man of little knowledge, who have not had time in the active business of life to learn anything rightly,--that I should seem to subject you to examination; but you must be convinced that I do it for my own instruction. I see, already, that I have even more to learn from you than Roland has.

"I pray you then to tell me what training--imagine yourself a father in my circ.u.mstances--what training you would give your own son."

"I believe," Eric answered, "that fantasy can call up all sorts of pictures, but a relation which is one of the mysteries of nature can only be known through experience, and cannot be apprehended by any stretch of the imagination. Permit me then to answer from my own outside point of view."

"Very well."

"My father was the educator of a prince, and I think his task was the easier one."

"You would then place wealth above sovereignty?"

"Not at all; but in a prince the sense of duty is very early awakened.

Not only pride but duty is a means, every moment, of inducing him to conduct himself as a prince. The formal a.s.sumption of state dignity, in which those in the highest rank are so accomplished, appears from a very early age as an essential feature of their position, as a duty, and becomes a second nature. Taste becomes connoisseurship. Pardon my scholastic ways," Eric laughingly said, breaking in upon his exposition.

"Don't stop--to me it is in the highest degree interesting."

Sonnenkamp leaned back in his seat, and gave himself up to the enjoyment of Eric's discourse, as if it were some choice tid-bit: very well for this man to go off into the regions of speculation, who in the meanwhile could not call his own the chair on which he sat, nor the spot of earth on which he stood, whilst he; Sonnenkamp, could proudly call his all that was around him, and could obtain possession, if he wished, of all that was within reach of his sight, and, as the keeper said, buy up the whole of the Rhinegau.