Читать книгу Problematic Characters - Spielhagen Friedrich - Страница 38

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The village of Fashwitz is an experiment made at the expense of the government. Originally the estate had been, like the whole larger part of the island, the property of a noble family, and had lapsed back into the possession of the crown when that family had become extinct. The government, desirous to obtain a nucleus of small landowners or independent farmers, which are here almost entirely wanting, had established here and on other estates genuine farmers' colonies, by laying them out in small parcels and selling these to all who chose to buy for merely nominal prices. The community at Fashwitz had a church built for them, and a minister was sent there; it was surely not the fault of the government if the good people of Fashwitz did not prosper.

It seemed, however, highly desirable that they should avail themselves of their other privileges and prerogatives a little more zealously than they seemed to do of the opportunity to obtain spiritual food on Sundays. For when Oswald obtained admittance to the church through a side-door--the great door was locked--he found that the devout listeners consisted of a few Sunday-school children, who were there ex officio, a handful of old women, faithful to the old traditions of their youth, and the families of some landowners in the neighborhood who tried to set their tenants and dependents a good example. The interior of the church formed a large, well-lighted hall, with a flat ceiling, in which pulpit, altar, and benches were discreetly arranged--everything bran new, perfectly practical, and very unattractive. There were no small stained window-panes, no pictures on the walls or over the altar, no angels of wood or bronze blowing their trumpets with swelling cheeks, no votive tablets, no faded wreaths, in fine, none of those means by which the Catholic, to whom the church is but the antechamber to heaven, gives expression to his longings for a higher life. The only poetical feature in the church were the shadows cast by the linden-trees before the windows, which waved to and fro on the bright wall opposite, and the broad bands of light which fell diagonally across the building, and formed so many golden bridges on which the thoughts could escape from the unattractive interior to the summer morning, which, outside, lay warm and fragrant on meadows, fields, and forests. No one in the audience, however, seemed to stand in need of such a road, or to find it at all practicable, except, perhaps, a pretty little girl about ten years old, with long golden curls, who seemed to have a strong longing after the bright flowers and white butterflies in the garden of her father, a stout old gentleman nodding devoutly by her side, and who, on that account, was frequently admonished by her governess to sit still and behave herself properly. The majority of the people looked as if they had left their minds carefully at home, and a few bore the infliction with the resignation of well-bred men.

And, indeed, it would have been strange if the congregation could have been edified by such a sermon and such a minister. Oswald, who had found a seat opposite the pulpit, and behind the pew of the great nobleman, discovered at the first glance at the preacher, and after a few words of his sermon, that there was about as much sympathy between the minister and the congregation as between a learned missionary and a tribe of good-natured savages. The minister, a small, lean man of about forty, with his dried-up, withered face, seemed to feel this himself very clearly, for he had scarcely seen Oswald when he began to address himself to him almost exclusively, as the only one capable of appreciating the precious pearls which an unwise government forced him to cast here before the swine.

"Oh, my devout brethren," he exclaimed, fixing his eyes through his spectacles upon Oswald, who tried to hide as well as he could behind the golden curls of the little girl, "Oh, my devout hearers, you see how weak our reason is in face of these momentous questions. And yet, and yet, oh, much beloved, there are misguided brethren and sisters who still rely on the dim rushlight of reason long after the sun has risen for them also. Alas! this little stump of a farthing candle seems to them bright enough in the days of feasting, frolicking, and jubileeing, but not so in the days of old age with its solemn thoughts and grave anxieties. Therefore, abandon your faith in reason, and hold fast on faith! Abandon your idle trust in sound common-sense, as you call it! Oh, my devout hearers, this sound common-sense is a sick, very sick sense, is a device of the devil's, and a will-o'-the-wisp which leads you inevitably into the pool of perdition."

Oswald was strangely, but by no means pleasantly affected by this sermon, which continued for half an hour more, richly larded with quotations from Holy Writ. He was deeply impressed with the contrast between the simple, childlike submission of the old woman to the great, eternal laws of nature, and her modest but solemn way of stating them, and the arrogant self-assurance with which the man in the pulpit decided on the most solemn questions, and condemned every sound sentiment and natural impulse of our heart as empty show and deceitful delusion. The unadorned wisdom of the matron was fresh and fragrant, like a flower on the heath; the boastful knowledge of the preacher, like a plant grown in the hot, oppressive air of a greenhouse, luxuriant in leaves and stalk, but without sap and strength and flowers. Oswald was glad when the learned preacher came at last to say amen! after having once more denounced the morality and anathematized the souls of all who thought differently from himself.

"That is most assuredly not so," he said to himself, as he tried on tiptoe to reach the little side-door by which he had come in. And when, outside, the blue sky once more rose high above him, and the fragrance of the linden greeted him, he breathed deeply, like one who comes from the hot, stifling atmosphere of a sick-room into the balsamic air of a garden.

"I shall not make this man's acquaintance if I can help it," he continued his monologue, making his way down the little hill on which the church stood, and past several grand carriages, which had in the mean while overtaken him, till he reached the village. "What have I in common with him? His thoughts are not my thoughts, and his language is not my language. We would never understand each other. I do not believe in that vague humanity, which is on good terms with everybody and rejects no one; nor do I believe in that philosophy of the beetles, which hum around all flowers in the hope of finding somewhere the hidden treasure of sweet honey. The wise merchant sails past the coast which is too poor for barter, and the great words, 'Who is not with me is against me,' fell from the same holy lips which taught that love is the first duty of man."

Oswald had, as was his wont, given way to his thoughts with such utter forgetfulness of everything around him, that he wandered for some time about in the unknown village, where houses and barns and stables, walls and gardens, lay in inextricable confusion by each other, and presented to the stranger a perfect labyrinth. He was just leaving a narrow alley by the side of a large house, in order to get into a wider street, when the minister met him, coming from church. He could not possibly avoid the meeting, and his attempt to pass by with a polite bow was a total failure, for the minister had no sooner seen him than he stepped literally in his way and addressed him at once with these words:

"Ah! I surely have the pleasure and the honor to see before me Doctor Stein? How kind in you to come and see me! To tell the truth, I have expected you for several days. When I was last at Grenwitz, to pay my respects to the baroness, I learned, to my regret, that you were out on a walk with your two pupils; otherwise I should not have denied myself the pleasure of calling on you at your room. My wife will be delighted to welcome you at our humble home. Pray, this way! Pray come without ceremony!"

"No escaping this," thought Oswald, and for the sake of politeness, that ape of humanity, he allowed himself to be forced to accept a hospitality which he had determined, only a minute ago, to decline under all circumstances!

"Gustava! Gusty! Gusty!" called the minister, as he entered. The desired lady was, however, not willing to give up the vantage-ground of her position behind the curtained window in the kitchen-door, from which she reconnoitred in security the appearance of the stranger and the purpose of his visit. The minister, therefore, showed the way into his study, where he begged Oswald to allow him to take off his gown, and then to inform his Gustava of the honor that his house was receiving.

The reverend gentleman's study was a large room with two windows; a few book-shelves, some pictures of saints on the wall, a hard sofa covered with black horse-hair, a round centre-table littered with books, and a desk with a chair, which turned on a screw, near the window, formed the simple furniture; the atmosphere was heavy with tobacco-smoke. Oswald was so oppressed by this perfume that he had to open a window, and in doing this he felt a strong temptation to jump from the low casement upon the street and to make his escape.

The attempt to seek safety in flight was, however, defeated by the return of his host. The reverend gentleman appeared now in a summer costume of black shining material. He begged Oswald to remain a few minutes in his "cell," since "Gustava was ruling still in the kitchen."

Oswald, who had abandoned all hope of escape, had not even the heart to decline an invitation to dinner.

"You will find, it is true, nothing but the paternum mensa tenui salinum, the ancestral furniture on the simple table," said the minister, desirous to show his guest that he had not forgotten his Latin; "but you know: vivitur parvo bene: we can live well upon a little. May I offer you a cigar till dinner is ready?"

Oswald declined, as he did not smoke.

"Oh! an excellent habit! a classic habit!" said the minister, laughing at his own wit; "the ancients did not smoke, and Goethe, whom a frivolous but witty author calls 'the great pagan,' was a bitter enemy to pipes and cigars. You permit me to remain faithful to my habit of smoking a light cigar after my sermon?"

"I pray you will do so."

"Don't you find"--puff! puff!--"that smoking"--puff! puff!--"is a thoroughly Germanic, I might almost say, a thoroughly Christo-Germanic element?" said the minister, who was determined to show his cleverness.

"You would certainly furnish a new weapon to the scoffers at our religion, if you really thought so," said Oswald, dryly.

"How so, my dear sir?"

"Said scoffers might reply that to show them only smoke, and no fire, was essentially a Germanic, a Christo-Germanic characteristic."

The minister cast at Oswald a quick, watchful glance over his glasses, as if he would have liked to see how far he might safely trust his guest. But as he considered it unsuitable for a man of classic tastes not to enter at once into a joke, even when it bordered very closely upon a frivolity, he replied with a bitter-sweet smile: "Not so bad! not so bad! But who is safe against scoffers? To be sure we might reply: Ex fumo lucem! ex fumo lucem! light out of smoke! But let us sit down, dear friend, let us sit down! How is our dear good baron, and how is the excellent baroness? Ah! you are a happy man, my dear sir, to live in such a house, with such admirable people, who unite to native nobility the nobility of the soul--especially the baroness, a pious and high-bred lady who wants to know everything ex fundamento. She is now reading Schleiermacher's discourses on religion." ...

"Do you think she really understands them?" observed Oswald.

The minister looked again at Oswald with that peculiar glance over his glasses, as if he must take a close look at the man who had the courage so openly to utter a view which he entertained himself, but only in greatest secrecy. He contented himself, however, with a gesture, he drew down the corners of his mouth, he shrugged his shoulders and raised his eyebrows--a gesture which might mean either "All vanity, dear friend!" or "The capacities of that good lady are beyond all measure!"

"You will, of course, miss Grunwald; especially your intimacy with a man of such vast erudition as Professor Berger. But I am in the same sad condition. I also can say: Barbarus hic ego sum, quia nulli intelligor. I pass here for an original, because no one understands me. Our great landowners are certainly excellent, worthy men, who fear God and serve the king; but, between us be it said, culture they have not; I mean, of course, scientific culture. Ah, if these gentlemen could have enjoyed in their youth the advantages of a genuine rational education, like young Malte ..."

"You are too kind, sir, although only the smallest part of that compliment would belong to me. I only wished the ratio would show itself for once in Master Malte, for until now he appears to me a most irrational small quantity."

"Is it possible you are disappointed in the young baron?" said the minister, in a tone as if he heard something entirely incredible and unexpected. "Ah! I understand, I understand. Certainly nature has endowed Bruno in many respects far more richly, although he is not very accessible to the great truths of our religion, as I have noticed when I was honored with the duty to prepare the two young gentlemen for their confirmation. But non omnia possumus omnes--omnes," repeated the minister, not knowing exactly how to continue. "Yes, as I said, but then Malte is heir to a magnificent estate."

"All the more desirable, it seems to me, that he should be a man in the full sense of the word. But is the Grenwitz estate really so magnificent?"

"Why, my dear friend," exclaimed the minister, in a tone of gentle reproach that Oswald should display such deplorable ignorance in such all-important matters, "is it magnificent? There are in this neighborhood alone five, no--with Stantow and Baerwalde, which to be sure are not entailed, there are seven large estates belonging to it. And in other parts of the island--let me see--there are one, two, three more. That is a capital of at least a million and a half. A million and a half!" he repeated, as if his mind could not part easily with such a lofty conception.

"And the estate is entailed?"

"Why, certainly. With the exception, of course, of two of the finest estates, which the last baron, the cousin of the present baron, inherited from his mother, and which he tied up in a very peculiar manner. Just imagine, my dear friend: the late baron, who, between us be it said, was a prodigiously wild and dissipated man, left these two estates to the son of one of his mistresses?"

"But did you not just now count the two estates as part of the family fortune?"

"Well, between us we can do so, I think," said the minister, in a low voice, coming up closely to Oswald. "Nobody knows, you see, where the boy is, nay, whether he is at all alive, nay, they do not even know if it is a boy or a girl."

"Why, that is a curious story," said Oswald, laughing.

"A very curious story," said the reverend gentleman, "a ridiculous story, you might say. Just think: Baron Harald,--they have all of them odd names in the family--that wild fellow, who ought to have lived somewhere in the middle ages, fell in love with a poor girl, the daughter of a mechanic, a case which no doubt was of frequent occurrence in his life, but never had such disastrous consequences. He carried her off, almost by force, and brought her here to his château. Half a year later she escapes in the middle of the night. No one knows to this day whether she ran away to live in obscurity, or to hide her shame in one of our dark moors. The baron was furious, beside himself. He searched through the whole island. Then, in order to drown his grief and his remorse, he drank and gambled and led a life even worse than before, so that he died in delirium a few weeks later. When they open his testament, they find that he has left the income derived from those two superb estates to the mother, and the estates themselves to the child of his lady-love, whether it be a girl or a boy, provided only it be born within a given period. He had evidently had a fit of penitence before dying, or, it may be, it was a mere caprice. What do you say to that?"

"The story certainly is rather tragic than comic," said Oswald; "and have they never found any trace of the mother or her child?"

"Never! and yet they publish every year--it is a terrible disgrace, and I pity the poor baroness with all my heart--an advertisement in all the papers of the province, inviting the lost one to come forward and claim her rights."

"How long has that being going on?"

"Some twenty years or more."

"Then it is hardly probable that the poor woman is still alive?"

"Certainly not; and nobody thinks of it," laughed the minister. "They would make a pretty face at Grenwitz, if all of a sudden a young vagabond should present himself there, claiming to be the most obedient nephew of the baron, and demand the two farms, with the interest for twenty years! It would not suit the baroness, I can tell you; for she has not a farthing of her own, and, as the whole estate is entailed, she and her daughter would, after the baron's death, be as poor as she was before she married."

"You seem to be a great advocate of entails?"

"Certainly, I am. I consider it fortunate that such large estates cannot be parcelled away by subdivision, and that thus an aristocracy of wealthy landowners is formed, which serves as a kind of ballast for the ship of state in times of peril--which God, I pray, may long avert from our beloved land."

"Well," said Oswald, "there are two sides to that question, as to most questions."