The Lost Manuscript: A Novel

CHAPTER XVIII.

CLOUDLETS.

A Professor's wife has much to bear with her husband. When Ilse found herself seated with her friends, the wives of Professors Raschke, Struvelius, and Günther, over a cozy cup of coffee, which was by no means slighted, all manner of things came to light.

Conversation with these cultured ladies was indeed delightful. It first touched lightly on the subject of servants, and the troubles of housekeeping called forth a volubility of chatter, like the croaking of frogs in a pond, and Ilse wondered that even Flamina Struvelius should express herself so earnestly on the subject of pickling gherkins, and that she should anxiously inquire as to the marks of age on a plucked goose. Merry Mrs. Gunther shocked the ladies of greater experience and at the same time made them laugh, when she told them she could not bear the cry of little children, and that as to her own--of which she had none yet--she would from the beginning train them to quiet habits with the rod. As has been said, the conversation rambled from greater matters to small talk like this. And amidst other trivial remarks it naturally happened that men were quietly discussed, and it was evident that, although the remarks were made as to men in general, each thought of her own husband, and each, without expressing it, thought of the secret load of cares she had to bear, and each one convinced her hearers that her own individual husband was also difficult to manage. The lot of Mrs. Raschke was indeed not to be concealed, as it was notorious throughout the whole town. It was well known that one market-day her husband went to the lecture-room in a brilliant orange and blue dressing-gown, of a Turkish pattern. And the collegians, who loved him dearly and knew his habits well, could not suppress a loud laugh, while Raschke hung his dressing-gown quietly over the reading-desk and began to lecture in his shirt sleeves, and returned home in the great-coat of a student. Since then Mrs. Raschke never let him go out without looking after him herself. It also transpired that after living ten years in the town he constantly lost his way, and she did not dare to change her residence, being convinced that if she did, the Professor would always be going back to his old abode. Struvelius also gave trouble. The last affair of importance had come to Ilse's personal knowledge; but it was also known that he required his wife to correct the proof-sheets of his Latin writings, as she had a slight knowledge of the language--and that he could not resist giving orders to traveling wine merchants. Mrs. Struvelius, after her marriage, found her cellar full of large and small casks of wine, which had as yet not been bottled, while he himself complained bitterly that he could not replenish his stock. And even little Mrs. Günther related that her husband could not give up working at night; and that on one occasion, poking about with a lamp amongst the books, he came too close to a curtain, which caught fire, and on pulling it down he burnt his hands, and rushed into the bedroom with his fingers black as coals, more like an Othello than a mineralogist.

Ilse related nothing of her short career, but she had also had some experience. True, her husband was very good about working at night, was very discreet over his wine, though on great occasions he drank his glass bravely, as became a German Professor. But as to his eating, matters were very unsatisfactory. Certainly it does not do to care too much about food, especially for a Professor, but not to be able to distinguish a duck from a goose is rather discouraging for her who has striven to procure him a dainty. As for carving he was useless. The tough Stymphalian birds which Hercules destroyed, and the ungenial Phœnix, mentioned with such respect by his Tacitus, were much better known to him than the form of a turkey. Ilse was not one of those women who delight to spend the whole day in the kitchen, but she understood cooking, and prided herself on giving a dinner worthy of her husband. But all was in vain. He sometimes tried to praise the dishes, but Ilse clearly saw that he was not sincere. Once when she set a splendid pheasant before him, he saw by her expression that she expected some remark, so he praised the cook for having secured such a fine chicken. Ilse sighed and tried to make him understand the difference, but had to be content with Gabriel's sympathizing remark: "It's all useless. I know my master; he can't tell one thing from another!" Since then, Ilse had to rest content with the compliments that the gentlemen invited to tea paid her at the table. But this was no compensation. The Doctor also was not remarkable for his acquirements in this direction. It was lamentable and humiliating to see the two gentlemen over a brace of snipes which her father had sent them from the country.

The Professor, however, looked up to the Doctor as a thoroughly practical man, because he had had some experience in buying and managing, and the former was accustomed to call in his friend as an adviser on many little daily occurrences. The tailor brought samples of cloth for a new coat. The Professor looked at the various colors of the samples in a distracted manner. "Ilse, send for the Doctor to help me make a choice!" Ilse sent, but unwillingly; no Doctor was needed, she thought, to select a coat, and if her dear husband could not make up his mind, was not she there? But that was of no avail; the Doctor selected the coat, waistcoat, and the rest of the Professor's wardrobe. Ilse listened to the orders in silence, but she was really angry with the Doctor, and even a little with her husband. She quietly determined that things should not continue so. She hastily calculated her pocket-money, called the tailor into her room, and ordered a second suit for her husband, with the injunction to make this one first. When the tailor brought the clothes home, she asked her husband how he liked the new suit. He praised it. Then she said: "To please you I make myself as nice-looking as I can: for my sake wear what I have made for you. If I have succeeded this time, I hope that I may in future choose and be responsible for your wardrobe."

But the Doctor looked quite amazed when he met the Professor in a different suit. It so happened, however, that he had nothing to find fault with; and when Ilse was sitting alone with the Doctor, she began--"Both of us love my husband; therefore let us come to some agreement about him. You have the greatest right to be the confidant of his labors, and I should never venture to place myself on an equality with you respecting them. But where my judgment is sufficient I may at least be useful to him, and what little I can, dear Doctor, pray allow me to do."

She said this with a smile; but the Doctor walked gravely up to her.

"You are expressing what I have long felt. I have lived with him for many years, and have often lived for him, and that was a time of real happiness to me; but now I fully recognize that it is you who have the best claim to him. I shall have to endeavor to control myself in many things; it will be hard for me, but it is better it should be so."

"My words were not so intended," said Ilse, disturbed.

"I well understand what you meant; and I know also that you are perfectly right. Your task is not alone to make his life comfortable. I see how earnestly you strive to become his confidant. Believe me, the warmest wish of my heart is that in time you should succeed."

He left with an earnest farewell, and Ilse saw how deeply moved he was. The Doctor had touched a chord, the vibration of which, midst all her happiness, she felt with pain. Her household affairs gave her little trouble, and all went so smoothly that she took no credit to herself for her management. But still it pained her to see how little her work was appreciated by her husband, and she thought to herself, "What I am able to do for him makes no impression on him, and when I cannot elevate my mind to his, he probably feels the want of a soul that can understand him better."

These were transient clouds which swept over the sunny landscape, but they came again and again as Ilse sat brooding alone in her room.

One evening, Professor Raschke having looked in late, showed himself disposed to pass the evening with them, and Felix sent the servant to the Professor's wife, to set her mind at rest as to the absence of her husband. As Raschke, among all her husband's colleagues, was Ilse's favorite, she took pains to order something that would please him. This order doomed to death some chickens that shortly before had been brought in alive. The gentlemen were sitting in Ilse's room when a dreadful scream and clamor issued from the kitchen, and the cook, pale as death, opened the door and appealed to her mistress. It appeared that the girl's heart failed her in attempting to kill the fowls and as Gabriel, who had hitherto performed all such necessary slaughter, was absent, she did not know what to do, so Ilse herself had to perform the indispensable act. When she returned, Felix unfortunately asked why she had left the room, and Ilse told him what had occurred.

The chickens were placed upon the table and did the cook no discredit. Ilse carved and served them, but her husband pushed back his plate, whilst Raschke, out of politeness, picked at the breast, but forbore to eat a morsel. Ilse regarded the two gentlemen with astonishment.

"You do not eat anything, Professor?" she at last said to her guest, anxiously.

"It is only a morbid weakness," replied Raschke, "and it's very foolish indeed, but the screams of the poor bird still linger in my ear."

"And in yours, too, Felix?" asked Ilse, with increasing wonderment.

"Yes," rejoined he. "Is it not possible to have these things done quietly?"

"Not always," answered Ilse, mortified, "when the house is so small, and the kitchen so near." She rang and ordered the ill-fated dish to be taken away. "Those who can't bear things to be killed should eat no meat."

"You are quite right," replied Raschke, submissively, "and our sensitiveness has but little justification. We find the preparations unpleasant, yet as a rule we are well satisfied with the result. But when one is accustomed to observe animal life with sympathy, he is necessarily shocked at the sudden termination of an organism for his own selfish purposes, when it is done in a way to which he is not accustomed. For the whole life of an animal is full of mystery to us. The same vital power which we observe in ourselves, is fundamentally at work with them, only limited by a less complicated, and, on the whole, less complete organization."

"How can you compare their souls with that of man's?" asked Ilse; "the irrational with the rational; the transitory with the eternal?"

"As to irrational, my dear lady, it is a word to which in this case one does not attach a very clear meaning. What the difference may be between man and beast is difficult to decide, and on this subject a little modesty becomes us. We know but little of animals, even of those who pass their lives among us. And I confess that the attempt to fathom this unknown problem fills me with awe and reverence, which occasionally rises into fear. I cannot bear that any one who belongs to me should grow fond of an animal. This arises from a weakness of feeling which I own is sentimental. But the influence of the human mind on animals has always seemed to me wonderful and weird; phases of their life are developed, which in certain directions make them very similar to man. Their affectionate devotion to us has something so touching in it, that we are disposed to bestow much more love on them than is good either for them or us."

"Still an animal remains what it was from the creation," said Ilse; "unchanged in its habits and inclinations. We can train a bird, and make a dog fetch and carry what he would rather eat, but that is only an outward compulsion. If let to themselves, their nature and manners remain unaltered, and what we call culture they lack utterly."

"Even upon that point we are by no means sure," rejoined Raschke. "We do not know but that each race of animals has a history and an evolution which extends from the earliest generation to the present. It is not at all impossible that acquirements and knowledge of the world, so far as they may exist in animals, have acted among them, though in a narrower sphere, just as with men. It is quite an assumption that birds sang just the same way a thousand years ago as they do now. I believe that the wolf and the lynx, in cultivated regions, stand on the same footing in the struggle for life as do the remnants of the red Indians among the whites; whilst those animals that live in comparative peace with man, like sparrows and other small creatures, and bees especially, improve in their mode of work, and in the course of time make progress--progress which we in some cases surmise, but which our science has not yet been able to describe."

"Our forester would quite agree with you in this," said Ilse, quietly; "as he complains bitterly that the bullfinches of our neighborhood have, within his memory, quite deteriorated in their singing, because all the good singers have been caught, and the young birds have no one to teach them."

"Exactly," said Raschke; "among animals of every species there are clever and stupid individuals, and it must follow that to some of them is assigned a definite spiritual mission which extends far beyond their own life. And the experience of an old raven, or the enchanting notes of a melodious nightingale, are not lost on the future generations of their race, but influence them continuously. In this sense we may well speak of culture and continued improvement among animals. But as regards the cooking, I admit that we exhibited our sympathies at the wrong time and place, and I hope you are not angry with us, dear friend."

"It shall all be forgotten now," replied Ilse, "I will give you boiled eggs the next time; they will involve no scruples."

"The egg, too, has its story," answered Raschke; "but for the present, I may fitly waive discussing this. What has brought me here," addressing Felix, earnestly, "was neither fowls nor eggs, but our colleague, Struvelius. I am seeking forgiveness for him."

Felix drew himself up stiffly. "Has he commissioned you to come?"

"Not exactly; but it is the wish of some of our colleagues. You know that next year we require an energetic Rector. Some of our acquaintance are speaking of you. Struvelius will probably be Deacon, and for this reason we wish to bring you into friendly relations; and still more for the sake of peace at the University. We regret exceedingly to see our classicists at variance."

"What the man has done to me," replied the Professor, proudly, "I can easily forgive, although his mean and underhand conduct has deeply offended me. I feel much more seriously the effect of his foolish work upon himself and our University. What separates me from him is the dishonesty of spirit that has actuated his conduct."

"The expression is too strong," cried Raschke.

"It applies to his behavior exactly," returned the Professor. "When the forgery was pointed out to him, his fear of humiliation was greater than his love of truth, and he lied in order to deceive others--conduct unworthy of a German professor, and I can never forgive it."

"Again you are too severe," replied Raschke; "he has frankly and loyally admitted his error."

"He did so only when Magister Knips and others clearly proved the forgery that had been committed in the manuscript, and so made any further evasion impossible."

"Human feelings are not so easy to analyze as numbers are," rejoined Raschke; "and only he who judges charitably, judges rightly. He struggled with wounded pride perhaps too long, but he gave in at last."

"I tolerate no unknown quantity in the sense of honor of a scientist; the question here was: Black or white? Truth or falsehood?"

"You have, nevertheless," said Ilse, "shown the Magister much greater leniency, and I have seen him with you since, more than once."

"The Magister was less to blame in the matter," her husband replied. "When the question was clearly before him, he employed his acuteness to some purpose."

"He took money for it," said Ilse.

"He is a poor devil, accustomed, as a broker, to take his profits on any exchange of antiquities, and no one would expect in such a transaction that he should act like a gentleman. So far as his oppressed spirit belongs to science, it is not without a sort of manly pride; and I have the warmest sympathy for a nature of that kind. His life on the whole is a continual martyrdom to the interests of others; and when I employ such a man, I know exactly how far to trust him."

"Do not deceive yourself in that!" cried Raschke.

"I shall take the risk and the responsibility," replied the Professor. "But have done with the Magister--it is not he who is in question. When I compare his offense with that of Struvelius, there is no doubt in my mind as to who has shown the greater deficiency in sense of honor.

"This again is so unjust," cried Raschke, "that I cannot listen to such expressions in the absence of my colleague. It is with deep regret that I miss in you the candor and dispassionate impartiality which I consider to be unreservedly demanded in judging a fellow-professor."

"You yourself told me," replied Felix, more quietly, "that he promised silence to the trader, because the latter had held out the prospect of obtaining other secret parchments. How can you, after such an exhibition of selfishness, find a word to say in his defense?"

"It is true he did so," replied Raschke, "and therein was his weakness?"

"Therein was his dishonesty," said the Professor, "and that I shall never condone. Whoever thinks otherwise, may shake his hand in approbation of his conduct."

Raschke rose. "If your words mean that he who grasps the hand of Struvelius in pardon for what he has done, has lost in character and self-respect, I reply to you that I am the man, and that this act of mine has never lessened my sense of dignity nor humiliated me in my own eyes. I entertain the highest respect for your pure and manly feelings, which I have ever deemed exemplary; but I must now tell you, that I am not satisfied with you. If this obduracy has come upon you merely because Struvelius has personally offended you, you are violating the standard which we are ever in duty bound to observe in judging our fellow men."

"Let it not be observed then!" exclaimed the Professor. "I recognize no standard of leniency when I have to do with the demands which I make upon the sense of honor and propriety in my personal acquaintances. It affects me deeply that you are opposed to me in this way of thinking; but such as I am, an erring and imperfect mortal, I cannot moderate these claims upon those about me.

"Let me hope then," broke in Raschke, "that it will never be your misfortune to have to confess to others that you have been deceived by an impostor in the very matter wherein your consciousness of self-reliance has been so strongly aroused. For he who judges others so proudly, would suffer no small affliction in the confession of his own shortsightedness."

"Yes, that would be fearful for me," said Felix, "to involve others in error and falsehood against my will. But trust me, to atone for such a wrong I would use all my life and strength. Meanwhile, between that man and me the gulf will remain as dark as ever."

Raschke shoved back his chair. "I must go, then, for our discussion has so excited me that I should make a very unentertaining companion. It is the first time, my dear lady, that I have ever left this house with any feeling of unpleasantness; and it is not my least annoyance, that my untimely advocacy of the existence of souls in poultry made me bristle up my crest against you also."

Ilse regarded the excited countenance of the worthy man with pain, and, in order to soothe him and restore the old friendly relations, she said to him, coaxingly: "But you shall not escape the poor chicken, you'll have to eat it, and I shall take care that your wife gives it to you to-morrow morning for breakfast."

Raschke pressed her hand, and rushed out through the door. The Professor walked up and down the room in agitation, and then stopping before his wife said, abruptly, "Was I in the wrong?"

"I don't know," replied Ilse, hesitating; "but when our friend spoke to you, all my feelings went with him, and I felt that he was right."

"You, too!" said the Professor, moodily. He turned on his heel and went into his study.

Ilse once more sat alone with a heavy heart, and she murmured, "In many things he looks on life very differently from what I do. Towards animals he is kinder, and towards men sometimes harsher than I am. Strive as I may, I shall always be to him an awkward country lass. He was kind to Madam Rollmaus, and will be so towards me; but he will ever have to make allowances for me."

She sprung from her chair with a burning face.

In the meantime Raschke was roving about in the anteroom; there too disorder prevailed. Gabriel had not returned from his distant errand, and the cook had put all the dinner things upon a side-table till his return, and Raschke had to look for his own great-coat. He groped among the clothes and seized a coat and a hat. As to-day he was not as absent-minded as usual, a glance at the rejected meal reminded him of the fact that he had to eat a chicken, as enjoined by Ilse. He, therefore, seized a newspaper which Gabriel had carefully laid out for his master, took the chicken from the dish, wrapped it up in the paper, and deposited it in his pocket, the depth and capacity of which agreeably surprised him. Rushing past the astonished cook he left the house. On opening the front door he stumbled over something on the threshold, and heard a fearful growl behind him as he hurried down the steps into the open air.

The words of the friend whose house he had just left, still rung in his ear. Werner's whole bearing had been very characteristic, and his nature was a strong one. Strange, that in a moment of anger his face had suddenly assumed a likeness to that of a Danish dog. Here the philosopher's chain of ideas was broken by the sudden recollection of the talk about animal souls.

"It is indeed to be deplored that it is still so difficult to determine the significance of expression as revealing the animal soul. If success attended our efforts here, science too would gain by it. If the expressions and gestures exhibited in moments of passion by man and the higher animals could be compared and collated in every detail, important and interesting inferences might be drawn, both from that which they manifested in common and from that wherein they differed. For, in this way, the true nature and purport of their dramatic actions, and probably new laws governing the same, might be ascertained."

Whilst the philosopher was thus meditating, he felt a repeated tugging at the end of his overcoat. As his wife was accustomed, when he was wrapt in thought, to nudge him gently if he met a friend, he paid no attention, but took off his hat politely to the post on the bridge, and said, "Good evening."

"The common character and origin of mimical expression in man and the higher animals might, perhaps, if fully known, give us glimpses into the great secret of life." Again something pulled him. Raschke mechanically lifted his hat. Another tug. "No more, dear Aurelia, I have taken my hat off." It then occurred to him that it could not be his wife who was pulling so low down at his coat. It must be his little daughter Bertha, who occasionally walked with him, and, just like her mother, would also nudge him gently when he had to bow to any one. "Very well, dear child," said he, as Bertha kept continually pulling at his hind coat pocket, and he put his hand behind him to catch the little teazer. He caught hold of something round and shaggy, and at once felt the sharp edges of teeth in his fingers, which made him turn round with a start. He then saw, by the lamplight, a red, brindled monster, with a great head and bristly hair, and a tuft instead of a tail. It was an awful transformation of wife and daughter, and he stared with amazement at this mysterious being, that stood opposite to him, likewise regarding him in silence.

"A remarkable meeting," cried Raschke. "What art thou, unknown beast--presumably a dog? Get away with thee!" The animal slunk back a few paces, and Raschke pursued his inquiry further. "If the facial expression and the gesticulation attendant upon emotion could be thus referred and traced back to original and common forms, the instinctive tendency to appropriate and to adapt what is foreign would undoubtedly result as one of the most universal and effective of laws. It would be instructive from the involuntary actions of men and animals to ascertain that which naturally belonged to each species and that which each had acquired. Get away, dog;--home with you, I say! What is he after, anyway? He is apparently one of Werner's people. The poor brute is possessed of some overpowering idea and will lose his way running about the city!"

In the meantime, Spitehahn's attacks had become more violent, and he at last dropped into a ludicrous march upon his hind legs, while, placing his forefeet on the Professor's back, he buried his nose in the latter's coat-pocket.

Raschke's interest in the thoughts of the dog increased. He stopped by a lamp-post and carefully examined his overcoat. He found that it possessed a cape and long sleeves, which the philosopher had never observed before on his own coat. The matter was now clear: he had thoughtlessly taken the wrong coat, and the honest dog meant to preserve his master's wardrobe, and to make the thief restore it. Raschke was so pleased with the dog's cleverness, that he turned round and spoke coaxingly to Spitehahn, trying to stroke his bristly coat. The dog snapped at his hand. "You are quite right," said Raschke, "in being angry with me. I will show you that I confess I am in the wrong." So he took the coat off, and hung it over his arm. "It is, indeed, much heavier than my own." He marched briskly on in his light coat, and saw with satisfaction that the dog made no more attacks on his skirts. On the other hand, Spitehahn seized the greatcoat, and began biting at it, snapping at the Professor's hand and growling furiously.

The Professor got angry with the dog, and as he came to a bench in the Promenade, he laid the coat down on it, in order to deal with the animal in earnest, and drive him home. By this means he got rid of the dog and, what was more, of the coat too; for Spitehahn, jumping up eagerly on the bench with a mighty leap, seized the coat, and kept the Professor at bay. "It is Werner's coat," said the Professor, "and it is Werner's dog, and it would be unjustifiable to beat the poor animal because in his fidelity he has become excited, and it would be also wrong to leave both dog and coat." So he remained with the dog, trying to coax him; the animal, however, took no further notice of the Professor; on the contrary, he devoted himself to the coat, which he turned over and over again, scraping and gnawing at it. Raschke perceived that the coat would not long stand such treatment. "The dog must be mad," he said to himself, suspiciously, "and I shall have to resort to violence after all towards the poor creature;" and he considered whether it were better to jump up on the bench and drive the mad dog off with a good kick, or to make the unavoidable attack from below. He decided on the latter, and searched about for a stone or stick to arm himself for the encounter. He then looked up at the trees and the dark sky, and could not in the least tell where he was. "Is this witchcraft?" he said to himself, amused. "Pray tell me," addressing a solitary passer-by, "in what part of the town we are; and will you have the goodness to lend me your stick for a moment?"

"These are strange questions," replied the stranger, in a surly tone. "I want my stick myself at this time of night. And who are you, sir, I should like to know?" And he approached the Professor menacingly.

"I am a peaceable man," replied the Professor, "and little inclined to violent courses. But a struggle has commenced between that dog on the bench and me about an overcoat, and I should be extremely obliged to you if you would rescue the coat from the dog. But pray do no more harm to him than is absolutely necessary."

"Is it your coat?" asked the man.

"Unfortunately, I cannot say it is," replied Raschke, conscientiously.

"There is something wrong here," cried the stranger, again looking with suspicion at the Professor.

"Something, indeed," replied Raschke; "the dog is mad, the coat has been changed, and I don't know where we are."

"Close to the Valley Gate, Professor Raschke," answered the voice of Gabriel, who rapidly joined the group. "But, pardon me, how came you here?"

"How opportune," cried Raschke, delighted; "just take charge of the coat and the dog."

With astonishment Gabriel saw his friend Spitehahn, who was now sitting on the coat, quite abashed and chapfallen at the sight of his master. Gabriel drove the dog off, and seized the coat. "It is my own overcoat!" he said.

"Yes, Gabriel," rejoined the Professor, "that was my mistake, and the dog has displayed a wonderful fidelity in guarding it."

"Fidelity!" said Gabriel, indignantly, as he pulled a parcel out of the pocket; "it was greedy selfishness. There must be something to eat in here."

"Ah! I recollect now," cried Raschke; "it is the fowl that's to blame. Give me the parcel, Gabriel; I must eat it myself. And we may now wish one another good-night in peace, unless you will go with me a little way to show me the road amongst these trees."

"But you can't go in this night air without an overcoat," said the tender-hearted Gabriel. "We are not far from our house, and it would be better for you to return with me to the Professor's."

Raschke paused a while, and laughed. "You are quite right, my good Gabriel: my sudden departure was all wrong, and the soul of an animal has this day given a lesson to a human soul."

"If you mean this dog," replied Gabriel, "it is the first time in his life he has given anybody a lesson. I suppose that he followed you from our door, for I put bones there for him every evening."

"At one time I thought he was quite mad," said the Professor.

"He is a sly one when he chooses," replied Gabriel, with an air of mystery; "but if I were to tell all my experiences with him to this day----"

"Do tell me, Gabriel," cried the Professor, quite excited. "Nothing is so valuable with respect to animals as authentic anecdotes, collected by those who have observed them closely."

"I can vouch for my experience," said Gabriel, with an air of confidence; "and if you really wish to know what he is, I can tell you he is possessed--he is a devil--he's a depraved brute--and bears a grudge against the whole human race!"

"Hum!--is that so?" murmured the philosopher. "I believe it is much easier to look into the heart of a Professor than that of a dog."

Spitehahn crept along quietly but depressed, with his tail between his legs, listening to the praise bestowed on him, whilst Raschke, accompanied by Gabriel, returned through the park to the house. Gabriel flung open the parlor door, and announced "Professor Raschke."

Ilse stretched out both hands, "Welcome--welcome, dear Professor!" and led him in to her husband's study.

"Here I am again," said Raschke, in a cheerful tone, "after an adventure like a fairy tale. I have been brought back by two animals who have shown me the right path--a roast fowl and a perverted dog."

Felix sprang to his feet, the two friends shook hands cordially, and, after all misunderstanding, the evening passed off most pleasantly.

When Raschke at length withdrew, Gabriel said sorrowfully to his mistress: "It was the new coat; the chicken and the dog have ruined it beyond all recognition."

CHAPTER XIX.

THE ILLNESS.

It was the first burst of spring in the wood and gardens adjoining the city. The buds and the caterpillars had slumbered together in quiet winter dreams; now the leaves expanded, and the grubs crawled over the young green shoots. Under the bright rays of the sun in its higher course, the struggle of life began,--the blooming and withering, the rich colors, and the frost under which they were to fade, the bright green leaves and the caterpillars that gnawed them; the eternal strife began anew in buds and blossoms just as in the heart of man.

Ilse, in her hours of instruction, was now reading Herodotus; he, too, was a harbinger of spring for the human race; hovering above the borderland between dreamy poetry and unclouded reality, the glad proclaimer of a time in which the people of the earth rejoiced in their own beauty and perfection, and first began to seek seriously truth and knowledge. Again Ilse read with passionate excitement the pages which brought a shattered world before her eyes with such vivid reality. But there was not the same serene and exalted pleasure in the narrative as in the works of the great poet who so directed the fate and deeds of his heroes as to produce a pleasing impression upon the mind, even when they excited sorrow and fear. For it is the privilege of human invention to form the world as the tender heart of man desires it; with alternations and fitting proportions of happiness and sorrow, the recognition of each individual according to his powers and actions, and due compensation. But the mind which here delineated the life of the past, did so in a superhuman manner, life crowded life, so that one devastated the other, destruction mercilessly overtook them, good and bad alike; here too, there was retribution; here, too, there was a curse, but their effect was incomprehensible and cruel. What was good ceased to be good, and evil gained the victory. What was first a blessing afterwards became ruin; what was now beneficent greatness and dominion, afterwards became a disease, which destroyed the state. The individual heroes were of little importance; if a great human power rose and dominated for a moment. Ilse soon saw it disappear in the whirling stream of events. Crœsus, the over-confident, good-hearted king, fell; the powerful Cyrus passed away, and Xerxes was beaten. But nations also sank, the blooming flower of Egypt withered, the golden realm of Lydia was shattered, and mighty Persia first corrupted others and then itself. In the young Hellenic people, that rose with such heroic strength, she already saw busily at work violence, evil deeds, and enmities, through which the most beautiful picture of antiquity, after short prosperity, was to pass away.

Ilse and Laura were sitting opposite each other, with an open book lying between them. Laura, indeed, was not admitted to the private lessons of the Professor, but her soul faithfully accompanied Ilse on the path of learning. Ilse imparted the acquisitions of her hours of instructions to her, and enjoyed the sweet pleasure of infusing new ideas into the mind of her friend.

"I felt great indignation at this Xerxes," cried Laura, "even from what I read in the primer:

I long thought that Xantippe was his wife, and I wish he had had her. On the other hand, look at the three hundred Spartans who sent the others home and encircled themselves with wreaths, anointed themselves, and put on the festive garb to march to death. That elevates the heart; they were men. If I could show my veneration for their memory by means of my stupid head and weak hands, I would work for it till my fingers ached. But what can a poor creature like me do? At the utmost, embroider traveling-bags for their journey to the lower world, and these would come two thousand years too late. We women are pitiable creatures," she exclaimed, with vexation.

"There were others in the battle," said Ilse, "who affected me more than the three hundred Spartans. These were the Thespians, who fought and died with them. The Spartans were impelled by their proud hearts and the strict discipline and commands of their rulers. But the Thespians died willingly. They were a small people, and they well knew that the greatest honor would attach to their distinguished neighbors. But they were faithful in their humble position, and that was far more self-sacrificing and noble. Ah! it was easy for all of them," she continued, sorrowfully; "but for those who remained behind, their poor parents, wives and children at home, what destruction of happiness and unspeakable misery!"

"Misery!" cried Laura; "if they thought as I do, they were proud of the death of their loved ones, and like them wore garlands in their sorrow. What is the purpose of our life if we cannot rejoice in giving ourselves up for higher things?"

"For higher things?" asked Ilse. "What men value higher than wife and child, is that higher for us also? Our duty is to devote our whole hearts to them, our children, and our home. When, therefore, they are taken from us, our whole lives are desolated and nothing remains but endless sorrow. It is natural for us to view their vocation differently than they do themselves."

"I would like to be a man," cried Laura. "Are we then so weak in mind and spirit, that we must have less enthusiasm, less feeling of honor, and less love for our Fatherland than they? It is a fearful thought to be one's whole life long only the waiting-maid of a master who is no stronger or better than oneself, and who wears overshoes, that his feet may not get wet, and a woollen muffler the moment a breath of cold air blows."

"They do wear these things here in the town," replied Ilse, laughing.

"Yes, nearly all of them do," said Laura, evasively; "but believe me, Frau Ilse, these men have no right to expect us to devote our whole heart and lives to them. It is just the most thorough of them that do not give us their full heart. And how should they? We are good enough to entertain them, and darn their stockings, and perhaps become their confidants, if they should accidentally be at a loss what to do; but the best of them look beyond us to the great All, and in that is their special life. What is right for them should also be fitting for us."

"And have we not enough in what they give us of their life?" asked Ilse. "If it is only a portion it makes us happy."

"Is it happiness never to experience the highest of emotions?" exclaimed Laura. "Can we die like Leonidas?"

Ilse pointed to the door of her husband's room. "My Hellas sits there within and works, and my heart beats when I hear his step, or only the scratching of his pen. To live or die for the man one loves is also an elevating idea, and makes one happy. Ah, happy only if one knows that one is a source of happiness to him also!"

Laura threw herself at the feet of her friend, and looked entreatingly into her anxious face. "I have made you serious with my prattling, and that was wrong of me; for I would gladly conjure a smile to your lips every hour, and always see a friendly light in those soft eyes. But do bear with me; I am a strange, unaccountable girl, and often discontented with myself and others, and frequently without knowing why. But Xerxes was a good for nothing fellow, to that I stick; and if I had him here I could box his ears every day."

"At all events he received his due," replied Ilse.

Laura started suddenly. "Was that a proper retribution for the wretch who had destroyed or made miserable hundreds of thousands, to return home without a scratch? No punishment would be severe enough for such a wicked king. But I know right well how he became so; his mother and father spoiled him; he had always lived at home, had grown up in luxury and all men were subject to him. And so he treated all with contempt. It would be the same with others if they were in the same position. I can well imagine myself such a monster, and many of my acquaintances too."

"My husband?" asked Ilse.

"No, he is more like Cyrus or Cambyses," replied Laura.

Ilse laughed. "That is not true. But how would it be with the Doctor over there?"

Laura raised her hand threateningly towards the neighboring house. "He would be Xerxes, just as he is in the book, if one could think of him without spectacles, in a golden dressing-gown, with a sceptre in his hand, without his good heart (for Fritz Hahn undoubtedly has that); somewhat less clever than he is, and still more spoilt, as a man also who has written no book, and learnt nothing but to treat others badly; he would then be Xerxes out and out. I see him sitting before me on a throne, by a brook, striking the water with a whip because it made his boots wet. He might have become a very dangerous fellow if he had not been born here close to the city park."

"I think so too," replied Ilse. In the evening, in the course of her hour of study. Ilse said to her husband: "When Leonidas died with his heroes, he saved his countrymen from the rule of foreign barbarians; but after him many thousands of these glorious men fell in the civil wars of the cities. In these quarrels the people became deteriorated, and before long other strangers came and deprived their descendants of their freedom. For what end did these many thousands die?--of what use was all the hatred, and enthusiasm, and party zeal?--it was all in vain, it was all a token of decay. Man is here like a grain of sand that is trodden down into the earth. I find myself facing a terrible mystery and I am afraid of life."

"I will endeavour to give you a solution," replied her husband, seriously; "but the words which I am now about to speak to you are like the key to the chambers of the wicked Bluebeard: do not open every room too hastily, for in some of them you will discover what, in your present frame of mind, may raise anew your fears."

"I am your wife," cried Ilse, "and if you have any answer for the questions which torment me I demand it of you."

"My answer is no secret to you," said the Professor. "You are not only what you consider yourself--a human being born to joy and sorrow, united to individuals by nature, love, and faith--but you are bound body and soul to an earthly power, of which you think but little, but which, nevertheless, guides you from the first breath you drew to the last gasp of life. When I tell you that you are a child of your people, and a child of the human race, the expression will come so naturally to you that you will not assign any deep meaning to it. Yet this is your highest earthly relation. We are too much accustomed from childhood on to cherish in our hearts only the individuals to whom we are bound by nature or choice, and we seldom stop to think that our nation is the ancestor from whom our parents are descended, that has produced our language, laws, manners, that has given us all we possess, given us everything that constitutes our life, and almost all that determines our fortunes, and elevates our hearts. Yet not our nation alone has accomplished this; the peoples of the earth stand to one another as brothers and sisters, and one nation helps to decide the life and fate of others. All have lived, suffered, and worked together, in order that you may live, enjoy, and do your part in life."

Ilse smiled. "The bad king Cambyses, and his Persian also?"

"They also," replied the Professor; "for the great net of which your life is one of the meshes, is woven from an infinite number of threads, and if one had been lost the web would be imperfect. Take first a simple illustration. You are indebted to the people of a period, of which every record is now wanting, for the table by which you sit, the needle which you hold in your hand, and the rings on your fingers and in your ears; the shuttle was invented by an unknown people in order that your dress might be woven, and a similar palm-leaf pattern to that which you wear, was devised in the manufactory of a Phœnician."

"Good," said Ilse; "that pleases me; it is a charming thought that antiquity has provided so considerately for my comfort."

"Not that alone," continued the scholar. "What you know, and believe also, and much that occupies your heart, has been delivered to you through your nation from its own and foreign sources. Every word that you speak has been transmitted and remodelled through hundreds of generations, to receive thereby that sound and significance which you now so easily command. It was for this object that our ancestors came into the country from Asia, and that Arminius struggled with the Romans for the preservation of our language, that you might be able to give Gabriel an order which both could understand. It was for you the poets lived, who, in the youth of the Hellenic people, invented the powerful rhythm of the epic verse, which it gives me such pleasure to hear from your lips. Furthermore, that you may believe, as you do, it was necessary that three hundred years ago there should take place in your Fatherland a great and mighty struggle of opinion; and again, more than a thousand years earlier, a mighty conflict of the soul in a small people of Asia; and again, fifty generations earlier still, venerated commandments given under the tents of a wandering people. You have to thank a past which begins with the first life of man on earth for most that you have and are, and in this sense the whole human race has lived in order that you might be able to live."

Ilse looked excitedly at her husband. "The thought is elevating," she exclaimed, "and is calculated to make man proud. But how does that agree with this same man being a nonentity, and crushed like a worm in the great events of history?"

"As you are the child of your nation, and of the human race, so has every individual been in every age; and as he has to thank that greater human fabric, of which he is a portion, for his life and nearly all its content, so is his fortune linked to the greater fortune of his nation and to the destiny of mankind. Your people and your race have given you much, and they require as much from you. They have preserved your body and formed your mind, and they demand in return your body and mind. However lightly and freely you move about as an individual, you are answerable to these creditors for the use of your freedom. Whether, as mild masters, they allow you to pass your life in peace, or at some period demand it of you, your duty is the same; whilst you think that you live and die for yourself, you live and die for them. Contemplated in this way, the individual life is immeasurably small compared with the great whole. To us, the individual man who has passed away can only be discerned in so far as he has influenced others; it is only in connection with those who preceded him, and those who come after him, that he is of importance. But in this sense great and little are both of value. For every one of us who brings up his children, or governs the State, or in any way increases the welfare, comfort, and culture of his race, performs a duty towards his people. Countless numbers do this without any personal record of them remaining; they are like drops of water, which, closely united with others, run on as one great stream, not distinguishable by later eyes. But they have not on that account lived in vain; and, as countless insignificant individuals are preservers of culture, and workers for the duration of national strength, so the highest of powers in individuals--the greatest heroes and the noblest reformers--only represent in their lives a small portion of that national strength. Whilst man struggles for himself and his own ends, he unconsciously influences his own time, and his own people for all futurity. By ennobling the ideals and duties of future generations, he pays his own debt to life. You see, my beloved, how death vanishes from history in such a conception. The result of life becomes more important than life itself; beyond the man is the nation--beyond the nation is mankind; every human being that has moved upon earth has lived, not only for himself, but for all others, and for us also; thus our life has been benefited by him. As the Greeks grew up in noble freedom and passed away, and as their thoughts and labors have benefited later generations of men, so our life, though it moves in a small circle, will not be useless to future generations."

"Ah!" cried Ilse, "that is a view of earthly life which is only possible to those who do great things, and in whom later times will take an interest; my blood runs cold at the thought. Are men, then, only like flowers and weeds, and a nation like a great meadow, and what remains, when they are mowed down by time, only useful hay, for later generations? Surely all that once existed and all existing at present have lived also for themselves, and for those whom they have loved, for wife and children and friends, and they were something more than ciphers among millions; something more than leaves on an enormous tree. Though their existence is so insignificant and useless that you can perceive no trace of their work, yet the life and the soul of the beggar and the life and the soul of my poor invalid in the village are guarded by a power which is greater than your great net that is woven of the souls of men."

She arose and gazed anxiously into her husband's face. "Bow your human pride before a power that you do not understand."

The scholar looked at his wife with deep solicitude. "I do bow humbly before the thought that the great unity of human beings on this earth is not the highest power of life. The only difference between you and me is, that my mind is accustomed to hold intercourse With the higher powers of earth. They are to me revelations so holy and worthy of reverence, that I best love to seek the Eternal and Incomprehensible by this path. You are accustomed to find the inscrutable in the conceptions which have been impressed on your mind through pious traditions; and I again repeat what I before said, your faith and yearnings arise from the same source as mine, and we seek the same light, though in different ways. What the Gods, and also the Angels and Archangels were to the faith of earlier generations--higher powers which, as messengers of the Highest, hovered about and influenced the lives of men--the great intellectual unity of nations and mankind are in another sense to us, personalities which endure and yet pass away, though according to different laws from what individual men do. My endeavour to understand these laws is one form of my piety. You yourself will gradually learn to appreciate the modest and elevating conceptions of the holy sphere in which I live. You also will gradually discover that your faith and mine are about the same."

"No," cried Ilse, "I see only one thing, a great gulf which divides my thoughts from yours. Oh, deliver me from the anguish which tortures me in my concern for your soul."

"I cannot do it, nor can it be done in a day. It can only be done by our own lives, by thousands of impressions and by thousands of days, in which you will become accustomed to look upon the world as I do."

He drew his wife, who was standing as if transfixed, nearer to him. "Think of the text: 'In my father's house are many mansions.' He who so spoke knew that man and wife are one through the strongest of earthly feelings, which bears all and suffers all."

"But what can I be to you to whom the individual is so little?" asked Ilse, faintly.

"The highest and dearest being on earth, the flower of my nation, a child of my race in whom I love and honour what was before and will survive us."

Ilse stood alone among the strange books; without, the wind howled round the walls, the clouds flitted across the face of the moon; soon the room became dark, and then was lighted up by a pale glimmer. In the flickering light the walls seemed to spread and rise to an immeasurable height; strange figures rose from among the books, they glided by the walls, and were suspended from the ceiling, an army of grey shadows, which by day were banished to the bookshelves, now came trooping towards her, and the dead who continued to live as spirits on earth stretched out their arms to her and demanded her soul for themselves.

Ilse, with head erect, raised her hands on high, and called to her aid the beautiful images, which from her childhood had surrounded her life with blessing, white figures with shining countenances. She bent her head and prayed: "O guard the peace of my soul."

When Ilse entered her room she found a letter from her father on her table; she opened it hastily, and, after reading the first lines, sank down sobbing.

Her father had informed her of the death of an old friend. The good pastor had been borne away from the narrow valley to the place of rest, which he had chosen in the churchyard, near his wife. He had never recovered from the disquiet which the departure of Ilse had caused him; he had passed the winter in lingering illness, and one warm spring evening death came upon him while sitting before his peach-tree in the garden. There the faithful servant found him, and ran with the terrible news to the manor. A few hours before he had requested Clara to write to his dear child in the city, that all was well with him.

Ilse had often been anxious about the life of her friend during the winter, so the account was not a surprise to her. Yet now she felt his loss as a terrible misfortune; it was a life which had been firmly and faithfully devoted to her; she well knew that in later years she had become almost exclusively the object of his thoughts and fond affections. She had abandoned one who had been part of her life, impelled by a stronger feeling, and it now appeared as if she had done wrong in parting from him. She saw the staff broken which had bound her firmly to the feelings of her childhood. It seemed as if the ground tottered beneath her, as if all had become insecure, the heart of her husband, and her own future.

The Professor found her dissolved in tears and bending over the letter; her grief moved him, and he anxiously begged her to think of herself. He spoke to her tenderly, and at last she raised her eyes to him and promised to be composed.

But it was in vain. After a few hours he was obliged to carry her to bed.

It was a dangerous illness. There were days in which she lay unconscious in death-like weakness. When, at times, she opened her weary eyes, she looked into the careworn countenance of her husband, and saw Laura's curly head tenderly bending over her; then all would vanish again in vague insensibility.

It was a long struggle between life and death, but life was victorious. Her first impression, when she awoke as from a painless slumber, was the rustling of a black dress, and the large curl of Mrs. Struvelius, who had popped her head through the closed curtains, and was gazing sorrowfully on her with her great grey eyes. She gently called her husband by name, and the next moment he was kneeling by her bed, covering her hand with kisses; and the strong man had so completely lost all self-control that he wept convulsively. She laid her hand on his head, stroked the matted hair, and said to him, gently: "Felix, my love, I will live."

There followed now a time of great weakness and slow convalescence; she had many an hour of helpless depression, but withal a faint smile would play at times over her thin, pale lips.

Spring had come. The buds had not all been destroyed by the frost of the previous night, and the birds twittered before her windows. Ilse was deeply moved to see what a good nurse her husband was,--how adroitly he gave her medicine and food, and would scarcely suffer anyone to take his place by her bedside; he stubbornly refused to take a few hours' sleep in the night, till she herself begged him to do so, and then he could not resist. She learned from Laura that he had been in great distress of mind, and when she was at the worst had been quite distracted and moody, and angry with every one. He had sat day and night by her bedside, so that it was wonderful how he had been able to endure it. "The physician was unable to manage him," said Laura; "but I found the right way, for I threatened him seriously that I would complain to you of his obstinacy. Then he consented to my taking his place for a few hours, and at last Mrs. Struvelius also, but unwillingly, because he maintained that her dress rustled too much."

Laura herself showed how devoted was her love; she was always on the spot, hovering noiselessly about the sick-bed like a bird; she would sit motionless for hours, and when Ilse opened her eyes, and her strength was a little restored, she had always something pleasant to tell her. She informed her that Mrs. Struvelius had come on the second day, and, after making a little speech to the Professor, in which she solemnly claimed the right of a friend, she seated herself on the other side of the bed. He, however, had not listened to what she said, and had suddenly started and asked who she was, and what she wanted there. She had answered him quietly that she was Flaminia Struvelius, and that her heart gave her a right to be there; thereupon she repeated her argument, and at last he gave in. "Her husband, too, has been here," added Laura, cautiously. "Just when you were at the worst, he rushed up to your husband, who shook hands with him, but, between ourselves, I do not think he knew him. Then," related Laura, "that absurd fellow, the Doctor, came the very first evening, with a blanket and a tin coffee-machine, and declared he would watch also. As he could not be allowed in the sick-room, he placed himself with his tin apparatus in the Professor's room; the Professor took care of you, and the Doctor took care of the Professor." Ilse drew Laura's head down to her, and whispered in her ear, "and sister Laura took care of the Doctor." Upon this Laura kissed her, but shook her head vehemently. "He was not troublesome, at any rate," she continued; "he kept very quiet, and he was useful as a Cerberus to keep away the visitors and dismiss the many inquirers. This he did faithfully. If it were possible for you to see him, I believe it would give him great pleasure."

Ilse nodded. "Let him come in." The Doctor came; Ilse stretched out her hand towards him; and felt from the warm pressure, and from the emotion on his countenance, that the learned confidant of her beloved husband, on whose approbation she had not always counted, was a true friend. Ilse found also that other gentlemen pressed to her bedside.

"If the wife of my colleague will give me audience, I beg to apply for admittance," said a cheerful voice, outside.

"Come in, Professor Raschke," cried Ilse, from her bed.

"There she is," exclaimed he, louder than is usual in a sick-room, "returned to the glad light after a dangerous crisis."

"What are the souls of animals doing, dear Professor?" asked Ilse.

"They are eating the leaves in the adjacent woods," answered Raschke; "there have been numerous ladybirds this year; see, there is one flying about the medicine bottle; I fear it has used me as a stage-coach to come in to visit you. The trees stand like brooms, and the poultry are so fat that all prejudices concerning the enjoyment of these fellow-creatures are quite set aside. I count the days until the happy moment arrives when my friend will follow me to give evidence of my improvement."

It was a slow recovery, but accompanied by abundant feelings of comfort; for fate grants to convalescents, as a compensation for danger and suffering, to see all around them, free from the dust of the work-a-day world, in pure outlines and fresh brilliancy. Ilse now felt this mild poetry of the sick-bed, when she held out her hand to the honest Gabriel, which he kissed, holding his handkerchief to his eyes, whilst the Professor extolled his devoted service. She felt this pleasure also when going down into the garden, supported by Laura's arm. Mr. Hummel advanced to her respectfully, in his best coat, with his hair brushed down and his defiant eyes softened almost into a mild expression, and behind him followed slowly his dog Spitehahn, his head also bent in unwilling respect. When Mr. Hummel had offered his homage, he said, sympathisingly: "If you should ever wish for a little quiet exercise, I beg of you to make use of my boat at your pleasure." This was the greatest favor that Mr. Hummel could show, for he did not credit the inhabitants of the neighborhood in which he lived with any of the qualifications which are necessary to make aquatic excursions. He was undoubtedly right when he called a voyage in his boat a quiet amusement; for this season the boat had mostly rested upon bottom on account of the shallowness of the water and the greatest amusement that it could offer was to stretch out the hands to both banks, and tear up a tuft of grass with each.

When Ilse could sit in her room again, it often happened that the door opened gently, her husband entered, kissed her, and then returned with a light heart to his books. When she saw his tender anxiety, and his happiness in her recovery, and in again having her near him, she no longer doubted his love, and felt that she ought no longer to be anxious about what he thought of the life and passing away of individuals and of nations.