CHAPTER VI.
A DAY WITHOUT PEN OR TYPE.
Eric stood on the shore gazing after the boat, from which Roland waswaving at a distance his white handkerchief. To see a person soattached to us flitting away from us in a vessel, seems as if oneshould love a bird which soars freely up into the air where it cannotbe reached; and yet it is different. Human love connects by invisibleties, and this signalizing from afar is a sign of a thought incommon, of communication of feeling and participation of interest,notwithstanding all separation by space.
When the boat had disappeared, and only a light streak of vapor floatedalong the vine-covered slopes, Eric remained standing upon the hill,and as the faint mists hovered in the air, so hovered in his soul thelast words of Roland's farewell,--"You and the house do not move fromyour place."
What a commotion, what an upheaving and swelling, there is in the soulof youth, until it comes to some expression, like an opening blossom!
But that which is closed and wrapped up in the bud has an equal beautyand depth of sentiment, but it is not manifest to us, and does notbreathe upon us with such a fragrant and charming loveliness.
So thought Eric as he looked at an acacia-tree, whose buds were yetunopened, and which had put forth not even a green leaf.
Eric was now alone at the villa. He inhaled the quiet, the peace, andthe stillness in full draughts, as if, after long days and nights oftravel upon the noisy steam-cars, he should suddenly come into thesilent woods; yes, as if he were lying deep down at the bottom of theriver, and over him were gently rippling the cooling waves. He did notread, he did not write, he enjoyed only an unfathomable rest.
He did not mean to comply with Clodwig's invitation to visit him, untilthe next day. Eric was certainly removed from all selfishness, but thefreedom of living for a whole day without being called upon to talk,and of being entirely by himself, had a charm for him as if he had now,for the first time, escaped out of the captivity of servitude, andacquired the disposal of himself. The thought came over him at onetime, that Clodwig was expecting him but he said almost aloud,--
"I cannot!--I must not!" He wished to pass a single day withoutspeaking or being spoken to, to be by himself, alone, speechless,solitary, referring to no one, and no one referring to him.
He thought, for one moment, of writing to his mother, but he dismissedthe idea. No one was to have anything of him, he would have all ofhimself. This perpetual obligation to think for others, this strivingfor them and love to them, seemed to him a painful and keen suffering;there was now, in the depths of his soul, a call for solitude. For asingle day only would he be an egoist, live in absolute rest, and letno book, no relation of life, no longing, no endeavor, deprive him ofaught of this entire loneliness.
This villa was called Eden, and he would, for one day, be the first manalone in Eden. He looked at a tree and nodded to it. Fixed thus,abiding in himself, like this tree, would he live for just a singleday.
He lay down in the park under a spreading beech-tree, and dreamed awaythe day. There is a low, gladsome rippling of being and of feeling,without definite thought or volition, which is the inmost desire ofthose harassed with restless thought and anxious care. Eric lay thus,happy in himself, contemplating and breathing alone, so that the stepof a gardener upon the grating gravel aroused him as from a dream. Thegardener began to rake the path; it was a strangely harsh sound. Ericwould have liked to bid him keep still, but he forbore, and said tohimself, smiling,--
"Thou art just such a raker of the paths."
He looked into the branches of the trees, and as the gentle breezemoved them to and fro, so he allowed his thoughts to be swayed hitherand thither, with no desire, no conscious endeavor,--simply living. Allwas peaceful and silent within him. How long, ever since its firstshooting forth, has such a leaf been moved by the wind the whole summerlong, until it drops, and then--well, then?
A smile passed over his countenance. We are no longer alone,because there is a second self, and one is conscious of his ownunconsciousness. And the thought proceeded farther. Yes, solitude,this is the rest upon the mother-earth, this is the story of Antaeus,who is inspired with fresh strength from the ever-present energies ofmother-earth, as soon as he touches her. We are raised from the groundby our constant thinking, and so are rendered powerless. And fartheryet went his dreaming and meditation. This is one trouble of wealth,this is its curse, that it does not enter into the heavens, cannotagain be immersed in the primitive might of earthly being, for wealthpossesses everything except this, a deliverance from the world, a beingalone with one's self. Ballast! ballast! too much ballast!
The doctor's word came into his mind, and the word ballast again andagain recurred to his thoughts, just as the finch in the tree over hishead continually repeated the same notes.
In the midst of this dreaming and unlimited contemplation, he fellasleep, and when he waked up, he was invigorated and full of a freshlife; for the first time, since a long period, he felt at home withinhimself. He smiled, for a new thought occurred to him, and, as it were,shone through him. Adam slept in Paradise, and when he waked, he sawhis wife by his side; a world is his, and also another who is to becomeone with him.
It was one of those days and hours in which all the past and thepresent, all that humanity has ever dreamed and ever obtained foritself by toil, bright with a reflected glory, and gleaming in its ownsplendor, stands before the eyes. All riddles seem solved. All ispeaceful, harmonious, and divine.
So must it be to the thoughtful man when he awakens from the sleep ofdeath, and the eternal life opens to his view.
But the struggle must be entered upon anew, in order to maintain thebattle of life.
Eric went into the park and around the house, and took in all withnewly opened eyes; he had forgotten how all looked, it had been put faraway, and now he surveyed everything like a man newly awakened andendowed with fresh strength.
It is well that the world abides, and is always ready in its place whenwe return to it again from the sphere of unconscious forgetfulness.
A whole day passed, in which Eric read nothing and wrote nothing.
The next morning, ordering his horse to be saddled, he mounted and rodetowards Clodwig's house.
He had scarcely been riding fifteen minutes, when a boy called to him,and brought him a letter. He read it, nodded, and rode in good spiritsto the village.
Das landhaus am Rhein. English Page 61