Das landhaus am Rhein. English

by Berthold Auerbach

  CHAPTER VI.

  ANOTHER SPIRE BUILT.

  The Mother was the only one who suspected that any change was going onin Eric; he became peculiarly reserved, even shy. Instead of his formercommunicativeness, he was now very careful of what he said, especiallyin Manna's presence, as if he felt himself near one whose serenity mustnot be troubled.

  But this change in Eric's demeanor soon attracted the notice of anotherobserver who kept a keener watch. Bella came to call upon her futuresister-in-law. She was very confidential towards Manna; she had thehabit of putting her arm round the waist of girls whom she liked, andtowards whom she desired to be gracious, and promenading with them inthis affectionate way; but whenever she attempted this with Manna, thelatter always made a movement as if she would shake her off, andfinally told her, in so many words, that she disliked it. Bella smiled,but she was inwardly vexed. In this house, in this garden, she mustencounter such rebuffs as she had never believed possible. Butoutwardly there was no trace that her feelings were hurt, although itrequired her utmost exertion to remain composed.

  With an easy turn of the conversation, she asked Eric if he now hadanother pupil.

  Eric answered her in the same light tone, that Manna had alreadycompleted her education.

  Bella nodded pleasantly.

  The formal visit to Manna was now over; and when she excused herselffor not returning it, saying that it was her purpose to visit nowhere,Bella made a friendly call upon the Mother and the Aunt. She went backto Wolfsgarten with the resolution to give, hereafter, the go-by tothis house and all its inmates. Otto wanted to marry a wife from it,and that was his affair; but she believed that she ought to call hisattention to the fact, that in the mutual reserve of Manna and Ericthere was the germ of a deeper feeling. Pranken replied with a spice ofmaliciousness, that the family tutor was not half so dangerous as heappeared to his sister, especially not to one whose character wasgrounded in religious conviction.

  Pranken made frequent visits to Villa Eden, and always enlivened itsinmates. But it did not escape Manna's penetrating observation, that hewas an artisan, but not an artist; he displayed much clever ingenuity,but had no productive genius, and was unstable and impulsive. This wasespecially noticeable when Eric was present.

  Pranken was never at a loss in uttering some pointed remark, but hecould not carry on a discussion; novel propositions bewildered him, andhe had no pertinent observations to bring forward, whilst Eric becamemore inspirited and more original by the presentation of opposingthoughts and new statements.

  Eric was always the same from morning to night, while Pranken was adifferent being in the evening from what he was in the morning. Inthe morning he was obliged to rouse himself; he was tired, heavy,low-spirited; at evening he was lively, dashing, and full of energy. Heoften seemed languid and spiritless; and being aware of this, he wasstimulated to exertion. There was always an element of disquiet inintercourse with him, and under an appearance of friendliness there wasalmost always a latent bitter hostility. He thought now, too, that hecould discover an understanding between Eric and Manna.

  Both Manna and Eric thought more of the universal, of the purely ideal,than they did of the personal; in her, this proceeded from thereligious, and in him, from the philosophical element. In thebeginning, Manna had held herself aloof from him with a sort ofdefiance, even with a positive antagonism; but gradually she came toperceive the inviolable truthfulness of his whole being. When Prankenwas engaged in argument, he asserted what he had to say as if it wereincontrovertible; while Eric, on the other hand, often replied:--

  "I should like to be allowed first to state the question; for the bestthing we can do in order to arrive at some actual result, is, to statethe question sharply and definitely." "And," he added, laughing, "theold philosopher, Epictetus, has designated 'asking the right questionsand exercising forbearance' as the very essence of philosophy."

  "Who is Epictetus?" Manna would ask; and while Eric briefly gave anaccount of the life of this stoic, a slave, who had become aphilosopher and taught after the manner of Socrates, adding somereflections of his own. Manna was alarmed to see how fully she agreedwith him; her gods were different, but their devotional spirit was thesame.

  Pranken was jealous when he saw Manna deeply interested in Eric'sexpositions, and often tried to make him expose his hereticalsentiments, so that he might become abhorrent to Manna.

  There was frequently a sort of tournament in which they took part, andManna sat, as it were, upon a dais to crown the victor. In such a stateof feeling, if easily happens that insignificant circumstances becomethe starting point of a life and death contest. And this was the caseone day, when Pranken related in a merry way that to-day was a bonafide pilgrimage of the whole country to the railroad station, for theywere expecting, by the evening train, the list of those who had drawnprizes in the Cathedral lottery; and all the poor people, the servants,male and female, the vine-dressers, the quarrymen, and the boatmen,were each one of them hoping to get the first prize. Manna had it onher lips to say that she had given money to Claus in order to redeemhis ticket, but, before she could do it, Eric, unable to restrainhimself, cried out:--

  "This lottery is an atrocity, a disgrace to our age."

  "What's that? What do you say?"

  "I beg your pardon, I was hasty," said Eric, trying to divert thesubject.

  But Manna asked:--

  "May we not know what your objection is?"

  "I would rather not state it."

  Manna's face flushed. This man, she thought, is also a heretic inregard to social institutions! But she quickly composed herself, andcontinued quietly:--

  "It ought not to be a matter of indifference to you to be regarded asopen to the charge of being unjust."

  "Herr Captain," Pranken said, coming to her help, "would you favor usso far as to give us your view? It would be very kind of you if youwould instruct us, and give us at length your objections." Then turningto Manna, he said in a low tone:--

  "Take notice, this will be the order of his discourse. First, hedeclines to speak, like a singer who is urged to sing in company; thenhe asks pardon for his novel views; next comes a condescendingdefinition; after that a citation from Professor Hamlet, to besucceeded by a moral burst of indignation, and every one who thinksotherwise is an idiot or a knave; and finally, when you think now isthe grand finale, he adds something else, and winds up with a trill."

  Eric perceived that he was to be irritated and goaded on, but he hadself-control enough to say to himself: I will not be driven over thebarriers. With quiet deliberation he proceeded to say:--

  "First of all, I beg you would remember that Catholic as well asProtestant cathedrals are to be completed by this horrible and nolonger unusual means."

  "And why so horrible?" asked Manna.

  "Yes, go on, go on!" urged Pranken, as if he were flourishing hishorse-whip.

  "Allow me to take more time," answered Eric; "I must take a longerspring."

  "Proceed! proceed!" said Pranken sharply, twirling the ends of hismoustache.

  "The largest cathedrals," Eric began by saying, "are unfinished; quietin the lap of earth rest thousands and tens of thousand hands whichdevotion once moved to dig the stone, to raise, and lay, and chiselthem. Careless and thoughtless enough, undoubtedly, were the workmen,but they were set in motion by devout feeling, the feeling of those whopoured out the money, and those who superintended the work, desiring tobuild a house of God. But listen to the cry now: You servant-man, youservant-girl, you journeyman, come here! here's a lottery ticket--onlyone dollar to pay--you can make so much by it, and help build a churchbesides! How can the holy Word be devoutly proclaimed in a buildingerected by an appeal to the covetousness of men? You smile. You think,perhaps, that it does no harm to the servant-man and servant-girl tolose the dollar; but I ask if it's no harm to their souls to be hopingfor prizes in the lottery? And suppose a schedule of the lottery werelaid in the corner-st
one of the new building. Future generations wouldhave harder work to decipher these figures, than we with the remains ofthe lake-dwellers. What sort of a race was this, they would say, whichbuilt a church with the profits of a lottery? Tetzel's hawking ofindulgences was far less objectionable, for then they paid money forthe pardon of their sins; the motive was a moral one, however much theymay have been in error. But here----"

  "I had thought," Sonnenkamp interrupted, "that you considered beauty,the completion of the beautiful structure, as a sufficiently moralmotive, just as any pagan would."

  "I thank you for this suggestion, for it brings me to the point, tostate it briefly, that it is a contradiction to make use of unholymeans for a holy end, and nothing incongruous is truly beautiful."

  Sonnenkamp was exceedingly charmed with this exposition, but Pranken,who saw that his prophecy in regard to the way in which Eric wouldproceed was altogether falsified, held his moustache thoughtfullybetween his fingers, and contracted his brows. He was stirred up, anddoubly so, when he saw that Manna looked very attentive and serious. Hewould have been beside himself if he could have imagined what were herthoughts.

  This heretic, Eric, would not have been able to reach a single dogma ofher belief, with all his philosophy, for this was no lever with whichto move the solid rock; but in this assault upon an apparentlyincidental matter, her confidence was shaken in the perfect moralbeauty of the measures of those who were the representatives of theSpirit in the world. Everything which concerned religion was in herview fixed and unalterable, and just this thing troubled Manna, thisinsignificant trifle, that their object was money. She despised money,she regarded it as a dangerous enemy, and "money--money!" echoed andre-echoed within her. "Is gold the temptation?"

  Pranken hastily summoned up his energies to say:--

  "It strikes me as inconsiderate or immodest--excuse me if I do not usejust the right word--I mean, he who is an unbeliever should not attackanother's belief."

  "Should we not?" replied Eric. "And still we are attacked. Humility isa virtue. Very true; and it is the virtue of a state of siege. We stillstammer at the word of salvation. But is the child who cannot yetspeak, on that account not to make known his wishes by cries? Lofty andnoble to us is the religion of love, but love cannot be commanded, loveis the genius of the heart; on the other hand, kindness, regard, activehelp can be commanded and guided; love, never. The great command, Lovethy neighbor as thyself, has become hypocrisy; it is said, I love myneighbor, but I have nothing to do for him. Our doctrine says, Help thyneighbor as thyself. Love is a sort of musical susceptibility which canbe counterfeited, but help cannot be. Therefore we apply more broadlythe command, and say, Help thy neighbor as thyself. And you must do ityourself; for we stand upon the fundamental principle that there is nosubstitution in the realm of moral activity, and here it is the primallaw that every one shall do guard-duty for himself."

  "You've said that once before," Pranken interposed.

  "True, and I shall often repeat it. I think that we have as good aright as our opponents, who are not always uttering some new truth. Thesunlight of to-day is like that of yesterday----"

  Here Roland burst in breathless, crying: "Eric, you must come at once,the field-guard is here; he is like a crazy man, and he says that youonly can decide, and you alone shall decide."

  "What has happened?"

  "Sevenpiper has drawn the grand prize, and Claus says that the moneybelongs to him. Come, he's like one raving mad."

  Eric went down to the courtyard.

  There sat Claus upon a dog-kennel, and looked dolefully up at Eric andRoland. He spoke so thick and confusedly, that they could not make outdistinctly what he meant; this only was plain, that Sevenpiper haddrawn the prize, and Claus asserted that it belonged to him.

  Sonnenkamp, Pranken, and Manna also made their appearance on the steps,and now Claus screamed out that Manna must bear testimony to havinggiven him the money for the ticket, and he had simply forgotten toredeem it.

  Eric quieted Claus, and promised to go with him to Sevenpiper. He askedpermission of Sonnenkamp to have the horses harnessed. Roland wasurgent to accompany him. Claus took a seat with the coachman on thebox, and so they drove to the village to Sevenpiper's house.

  They met the cooper in front of the house, and he told Eric thatSevenpiper had just turned him out of it. He said that he was in lovewith Sevenpiper's oldest daughter, and that this attachment had met theapproval of the parents on both sides; but now Sevenpiper had shown himthe door, saying that he could obtain a better match for his daughter,and that most assuredly he would not marry her to the son of Claus, whowanted to claim his property before the world.

  "Is't true, father, that the prize belonged to you?"

  "Yes, indeed; and it belongs to me still."

  "So! Now I understand all about it," said the cooper, taking hisdeparture.

  In the house of Sevenpiper the newcomers found everything in confusion;the oldest daughter was weeping, and the other children were runningover one another.

  They became quieted at last, and Sevenpiper said that he was not goingto allow himself to be driven out of his wits; anyhow he would nolonger be a day-laborer in the vineyard; he would just do nothing for ayear, and then he would see what he would take hold of. The childrenscreamed and shouted in all sorts of ways, and Sevenpiper tried to makethem sing, but not one of them was willing; all that was past and goneforever.

  Eric had induced Claus to wait outside the house; he now told them whatthe field-guard wanted.

  As soon as he made known this desire, Sevenpiper raised the window andcried out to his former comrade standing in the road:--

  "If you don't clear out from here, and if you claim a single red centfrom me, I'll break every bone in your carcass. Now you know what toexpect! Off with you!"

  No appeal was of any use; Sevenpiper insisted upon it, that he wouldnot give Claus as much as he could put into his eye.

  Roland and Eric went away exceedingly cast down. They came to the houseof Claus, who was asleep on the bench. His wife lamented that he hadcome home very drunk, and that the cooper was half-crazed.

  Neither could Eric and Roland be of any assistance here.

  On the way home, Roland seized Eric's hand and said:--

  "Money! money! How speedily it can ruin people!" Eric made no reply,and Roland continued:--"I never heard that there were any lotteries inAmerica. You see, Eric, this is something that we have wholly toourselves."

  In silence, inwardly disturbed, they reached the villa. There seemed tobe some ghost stalking abroad, for they could not shake off theremembrance that the demon of sudden riches had ruined two families;and immediately on waking the next morning, Roland said:--

  "I should like to know how Claus and Sevenpiper will feel this morning,when they wake up."

  A messenger was sent to the village, and they were gratified to hearthat the two families were getting along comfortably again; but theeldest daughter of Sevenpiper had left her parents' house, and had goneto the field-guard's.