The Crisis — Complete

by Winston Churchill

  CHAPTER X. RICHTER'S SCAR

  This was the summer when Mr. Stephen Brice began to make his appearancein public. The very first was rather encouraging than otherwise,although they were not all so. It was at a little town on the outskirtsof the city where those who had come to scoff and jeer remained tolisten.

  In writing that speech Stephen had striven to bear in mind a piece ofadvice which Mr. Lincoln had given him. "Speak so that the lowest mayunderstand, and the rest will have no trouble." And it had worked. Atthe halting lameness of the beginning an egg was thrown,--fortunatelywide of the mark. After this incident Stephen fairly astonished hisaudience,--especially an elderly gentleman who sat on a cracker-box inthe rear, out of sight of the stand. This may have been Judge Whipple,although we have no proof of the fact.

  Stephen himself would not have claimed originality for that speech. Helaughs now when it is spoken of, and calls it a boyish effort, which itwas. I have no doubt that many of the master's phrases slipped in, asyoung Mr. Brice could repeat most of the Debates, and the Cooper Unionspeech by heart. He had caught more than the phrasing, however. Soimbued was he with the spirit of Abraham Lincoln that his hearers caughtit; and that was the end of the rotten eggs and the cabbages. The eventis to be especially noted because they crowded around him afterward toask questions. For one thing, he had not mentioned abolition. Wasn't ittrue, then, that this Lincoln wished to tear the negro from his master,give him a vote and a subsidy, and set him up as the equal of the manthat owned him? "Slavery may stay where it is," cried the young orator."If it is content there, so are we content. What we say is that it shallnot go one step farther. No, not one inch into a northern territory."

  On the next occasion Mr. Brice was one of the orators at a much largermeeting in a garden in South St. Louis. The audience was mostly German.And this was even a happier event, inasmuch as Mr. Brice was able totrace with some skill the history of the Fatherland from the Napoleonicwars to its Revolution. Incidentally he told them why they had emigratedto this great and free country. And when in an inspired moment hecoupled the names of Abraham Lincoln and Father Jahn, the very leaves ofthe trees above them trembled at their cheers.

  And afterwards there was a long-remembered supper in the moonlit grovewith Richter and a party of his college friends from Jena. There wasHerr Tiefel with the little Dresden-blue eyes, red and round and jolly;and Hauptmann, long and thin and sallow; and Korner, redbearded andponderous; and Konig, a little clean-cut man with a blond mustachethat pointed upward. They clattered their steins on the table and sangwonderful Jena songs, while Stephen was lifted up and his soul carriedoff to far-away Saxony,--to the clean little University town withits towers and crooked streets. And when they sang the Trolksmelodie,"Bemooster Bursche zieh' ich aus,--Ade!" a big tear rolled down the scaron Richter's cheek.

  "Fahrt wohl, ihr Strassen grad and krumm Ich zieh' nicht mehr in euch herum, Durchton euch nicht mehr mit Gesang, Mit Larm nicht mehr and Sporenklang."

  As the deep tones died away, the soft night was steeped in the sadnessof that farewell song. It was Richter who brought the full force of ithome to Stephen.

  "Do you recall the day you left your Harvard, and your Boston, myfriend?" he asked.

  Stephen only nodded. He had never spoken of the bitterness of that, evento his mother. And here was the difference between the Saxon and theAnglo-Saxon.

  Richter smoked his pipe 'mid dreamy silence, the tear still wet upon hisface.

  "Tiefel and I were at the University together," he said at length. "Heremembers the day I left Jena for good and all. Ah, Stephen, that isthe most pathetic thing in life, next to leaving the Fatherland. Wedine with our student club for the last time at the Burg Keller, a dingylittle tavern under a grim old house, but very dear to us. We swear forthe last time to be clean and honorable and patriotic, and to die forthe Fatherland, if God so wills. And then we march at the head of a slowprocession out of the old West Gate, two and two, old members first,then the fox major and the foxes."

  "The foxes?" Stephen interrupted.

  "The youngsters--the freshmen, you call them," answered Richter,smiling.

  "And after the foxes," said Herr Tiefel, taking up the story, "after thefoxes comes the empty carriage, with its gay postilion and four. It islike a long funeral. And every man is chanting that song. And so we goslowly until we; come to the Oil Mill Tavern, where we have had manya schlager-bout with the aristocrats. And the president of our societymakes his farewell speech under the vines, and we drink to you with allthe honors. And we drank to you, Carl, renowned swordsman!" And HerrTiefel, carried away by the recollection, rose to his feet.

  The others caught fire, and stood up with their mugs high in the air,shouting:

  "Lebe wohl, Carl! Lebe wohl! Salamander, salamander, salamander! Ein istein, zwei ist zwei, drei ist drei! Lebe wohl!"

  And so they toasted every man present, even Stephen himself, whom theycomplimented on his speech. And he soon learned to cry Salamander,and to rub his mug on the table, German fashion. He was not long indiscovering that Richter was not merely a prime favorite with hiscompanions, but likewise a person of some political importance in SouthSt. Louis. In the very midst of their merriment an elderly man whomStephen recognized as one of the German leaders (he afterwards became aUnited States general) came and stood smiling by the table and joined inthe singing. But presently he carried Richter away with him.

  "What a patriot he would have made, had our country been spared to us!"exclaimed Herr Konig. "I think he was the best man with the Schlagerthat Jena ever saw. Even Korner likes not to stand against him in maskand fencing hat, all padded. Eh, Rudolph?"

  Herr Korner gave a good-natured growl of assent.

  "I have still a welt that he gave me a month since," he said. "He hasleft his mark on many an aristocrat."

  "And why did you always fight the aristocrats?" Stephen asked.

  They all tried to tell him at once, but Tiefel prevailed.

  "Because they were for making our country Austrian, my friend," hecried. "Because they were overbearing, and ground the poor. Because themost of them were immoral like the French, and we knew that it must beby morality and pure living that our 'Vaterland' was to be rescued. Andso we formed our guilds in opposition to theirs. We swore to live by thestandards of the great Jahn, of whom you spoke. We swore to strive forthe freedom of Germany with manly courage. And when we were not duellingwith the nobles, we had Schlager-bouts among ourselves."

  "Broadswords?" exclaimed Stephen, in amazement.

  "Ja wohl," answered Korner, puffing heavily. The slit in his nose wasplain even in the moonlight. "To keep our hands in, as you would say.You Americans are a brave people--without the Schlager. But we foughtthat we might not become effete."

  It was then that Stephen ventured to ask a question that, had been longburning within him.

  "See here, Mr. Korner," said he, "how did Richter come by that scar? Healways gets red when I mention it. He will never tell me."

  "Ah, I can well believe that," answered Korner. "I will recount thatmatter,--if you do not tell Carl, lieber Freund. He would not forgiveme. I was there in Berlin at the time. It was a famous time. Tiefel willbear me out."

  "Ja, ja!" said Tiefel, eagerly.

  "Mr. Brice," Herr Korner continued, "has never heard of the Count vonKalbach. No, of course. We at Jena had, and all Germany. Many of us ofthe Burschenschaft will bear to the grave the marks of his Schlager. VonKalbach went to Bonn, that university of the aristocrats, where he wasworshipped. When he came to Berlin with his sister, crowds would gatherto look at them. They were like Wodan and Freya. 'Donner'!" exclaimedHerr Korner, "there is something in blood, when all is said. He was asstraight and strong as an oak of the Black Forest, and she as fair as apoplar. It is so with the Pomeranians.

  "It was in the year '47, when Carl Richter was gone home to Berlinbefore his last semester, to see his father: One fine morning vonKalbach rode in at the Brandenburg gate on a great bl
ack stallion. Heboasted openly that day that none of the despised 'Burschenschaft' darestand before him. And Carl Richter took up the challenge. Before nightall Berlin had heard of the temerity of the young Liberal of the Jena'Burschenschaft'. To our shame be it said, we who knew and loved Carllikewise feared for him.

  "Carl chose for his second Ebhardt, a man of our own Germanian Club atJena, since killed in the Breite Strasse. And if you will believe me,my friend. I tell you that Richter came to the glade at daybreaksmoking his pipe. The place was filled, the nobles on one side andthe Burschenschaft on the other, and the sun coming up over the trees.Richter would not listen to any of us, not even the surgeon. He wouldnot have the silk wound on his arm, nor the padded breeches, nor theneck covering--Nothing! So Ebhardt put on his gauntlets and peaked cap,and his apron with the device of the Germanians.

  "There stood the Count in his white shirt in the pose of a statue. Andwhen it was seen that Richter likewise had no protection, but was calmlysmoking the little short pipe, with a charred bowl, a hush fell uponall. At the sight of the pipe von Kalbach ground his heel in the turf,and when the word was given he rushed at Richter like a wild beast. You,my friend, who have never heard the whistle of sharp Schlager cannotknow the song which a skilled arm draws from the blade. It was musicthat morning: You should have seen the noble's mighty strokes--'Prim undSecond und Terz und Quart'. You would have marked how Richter met himat every blow. Von Kalbach never once took his eyes from the blue smokefrom the bowl. He was terrible in his fury, and I shiver now to thinkhow we of the Burschenschaft trembled when we saw that our champion wasdriven back a step, and then another. You must know that it is a lastingdisgrace to be forced over one's own line. It seemed as if we could notbear the agony. And then, while we counted out the last seconds of thehalf, came a snap like that of a whip's lash, and the bowl of Richter'spipe lay smouldering on the grass. The noble had cut the stem as cleanas it were sapling twig, and there stood Richter with the piece stillclenched in his teeth, his eyes ablaze, and his cheek running blood. Hepushed the surgeon away when he came forward with his needles. The Countwas smiling as he put up his sword, his friends crowding aroundhim, when Ebhardt cried out that his man could fight the secondmensur,--though the wound was three needles long. Then Kalbach criedaloud that he would kill him. But he had not seen Carl's eyes. Somethingwas in them that made us think as we washed the cut. But when we spoketo him he said nothing. Nor could we force the pipe stems from histeeth.

  "Donner Schock!" exclaimed Herr Korner, but reverently, "if I live to ahundred I never hope to see such a sight as that 'Mensur'. The word wasgiven. The Schlager flew so fast that we only saw the light and heardthe ring alone. Before we of the Burschenschaft knew what had happenedthe Count von Kalbach was over his line and had flung his Schlager intoa great tree, and was striding from the place with his head hung and thetears streamin down his face."

  Amid a silence, Herr Korner lifted his great mug and emptied it slowly.A wind was rising, bearing with it song and laughter from distantgroups,--Teutonic song and, laughter. The moonlight trembled through theshifting leaves. And Stephen was filled with a sense of the marvelous.It was as if this fierce duel, so full of national significance to aGerman, had been fought in another existence, It was incredible to himthat the unassuming lawyer he knew, so wholly Americanized, had been thehero of it. Strange, indeed, that the striving life of these leaders ofEuropean Revolution had been suddenly cut off in its vigor. Therecame to Stephen a flash of that world-comprehension which marks greatstatesmen. Was it not with a divine purpose that this measureless forceof patriotism and high ideal had been given to this youngest of thenations, that its high mission might be fulfilled?

  Miss Russell heard of Stephen's speeches. She and her brothers and JackBrinsmade used to banter him when he came a-visiting in BellefontaineRoad. The time was not yet come when neighbor stared coldly uponneighbor, when friends of long standing passed each other with avertedlooks. It was not even a wild dream that white-trash Lincoln would beelected. And so Mr. Jack, who made speeches for Breckenridge in the faceof Mr. Brinsmade's Union leanings, laughed at Stephen when he came tospend the night. He joined forces with Puss in making clever fun of thebooby Dutch, which Stephen was wise enough to take good-naturedly. Butonce or twice when he met Clarence Colfax at these houses he was awareof a decided change in the attitude of that young gentleman. Thistroubled him more than he cared to admit. For he liked Clarence, whoreminded him of Virginia--at once a pleasure and a pain.

  It is no harm to admit (for the benefit of the Society for PsychicalResearch) that Stephen still dreamed of her. He would go about his workabsently all the morning with the dream still in his head, and the girlso vividly near him that he could not believe her to be travelling inEngland, as Miss Russell said. Puss and Anne were careful to keep himinformed as to her whereabouts. Stephen set this down as a most naturalsupposition on their part that all young men must have an interest inVirginia Carvel.

  How needless to add that Virginia in her correspondence never mentionedStephen, although Puss in her letters took pains to record the factevery time that he addressed a Black Republican meeting: Miss Carvelpaid no attention to this part of the communications. Her concern forJudge Whipple Virginia did not hide. Anne wrote of him. How he stood therigors of that campaign were a mystery to friend and foe alike.