I endeavor to arm myself against a knowledge of this fact.”
“No, you are a great and enviable man,” exclaimed Streicher, with enthusiasm. “Of that we are all assured, and you also shall become convinced of it. You are ascending the mountain which leads to renown, and, although now enveloped in a cloud, you will at last attain the heights above, and be surrounded with a halo of sunshine and glory.”
“I wish, my friend,” said Schiller, pointing with a sad smile to the ashes in the stove, “I wish we had some of this sunshine now, and were not compelled to warm the room with such expensive coals. But patience, patience! You are right, Andrew, I am ascending a mountain, and am now in a cloud, and therefore it is not surprising that I feel chilly and uncomfortable. But better times are coming, and my health will improve, and this bad cough and fever will no longer retard my footsteps, and I will be able to mount aloft to the abode of the gods with more rapid strides. Farewell, my friends! My writing-table seems to regard me with astonishment, as if asking why I have not brought it my customary ovation.”
“Let it look and inquire,” said Streicher. “You must make no reply, but must first break your fast, as any other honest man would do. Come and breakfast with us at the inn, Frederick. A man must eat, and, although I unfortunately have not enough money to satisfy this Cerberus of a creditor, I have at least enough to pay for a breakfast and a glass of wine for us three. Come, Frederick, get yourself ready quickly, and let us tread the earth with manly footsteps, and compel it to recognize us as its lords.”
“No, you good, thoughtless man of the world,” said Schiller, smiling; “no, I must remain here! I must work on at ‘Don Carlos,’ who gives my mind no rest by day or night, and insists on being completed!”
“But promise me, at least, Fritz, that you will breakfast before you go to work?”
“I promise you! Now go, Andrew, for the good Schwelm is already holding the door open, and waiting for you.”
CHAPTER III.
HENRIETTA VON WOLZOGEN.
“Breakfast,” murmured Schiller, after his two friends had taken leave of him. “Oh, yes, it were certainly no bad idea to indulge in a hot cup of coffee and fresh sweet rolls. But it costs too much, and one must be contented if one can only have a cup of fresh water and a piece of bread.”
He stood up and returned to the chamber, to complete the toilet so hastily made before, to adjust his hair, and put on the sober, well-worn suit which constituted alike his work-day and holiday attire.
After having finished his toilet, Schiller took the pitcher, which stood on a tin waiter by the side of a glass, and bounded gayly down the stairway into the large courtyard and to the fountain, to fill his pitcher at the mouth of the tragic mask from which a stream of water constantly gushed.
This was Schiller’s first morning errand. Every morning the people in the house could see the pale, thin young man go to the fountain with his pitcher; and it amused them to watch him as he walked up and down the yard with long strides, looking heavenward, his head thrown back, and his chest expanded with the fresh morning air, which he inhaled in long draughts. Then, when he had stretched and exercised his limbs, breathed the air, and looked at the heavens, he returned to the fountain, took up his pitcher, running over with water, ran into the house, up the stairway, and re-entered his dingy little room.
But he brought the heavens and the fresh morning air with him, and his soul was gladdened and strengthened for his poetic labors.
To-day the fresh air had done him much good; and, after he had drunk his first glass of water, and eaten his bread and butter, which he took from a closet in the wall, he looked pleased and comfortable; a smile glided over his features, and his eyes brightened.
“How rich is he who has few wants,” he said softly to himself, “and how freely the spirit soars when its wings are unencumbered with the vanities of life! Come, ye Muses and Graces, keep a loving watch around my table, and guide my hand that I may write nothing that does not please you!”
He threw himself on the chair before the table, took up his pen, rapidly read what he had last written, and with a few strokes finished the last great scene of the third act of his new tragedy, “Don Carlos.”
“Und jetzt verlaszt mich!”[2] recited Schiller, as his pen flew over the paper; and then he continued, in a changed voice: “Kann ich es mit einer erfüllten Hoffnung—dann ist dieser Tag der schönste meines Lebens!” And then he added, in the first voice: “Er ist kein verlorener in dem meinigem!”
“Yes,” exclaimed Schiller, in a loud voice, as he threw his pen aside, “and it is not a lost one in mine. At some future day I will think of this hour with joy and satisfaction—of the hour in which I wrote the closing scene of the third act of a tragedy, a dramatist’s greatest and most difficult task. Oh, ye Muses and Graces, whom I invoked, were you near me, blessing my labors? I laid my human sacrifice of pain and suffering on your altar this morning, and my poor head once more received the baptism of tears. Bless me with your favor, ye Muses and Graces, and let me hope that the tears of the man were the baptism of the poet! Yes, my soul persuades me that I am a poet; and this new work will attest it before the world and mankind, and—”
A cry of surprise and dismay escaped his lips, and he stared toward the door which had just been opened, and in which a lady appeared who was completely wrapped up in furs, and whose face was entirely shaded by a hood.
“Madame von Wolzogen,” he exclaimed, rising quickly. “Is it possible? Can it be you?” He rushed forward and seized her hand, and when he encountered her mournful gaze he sank on his knees and wept bitterly.
“Oh, my friend, my mother, that we should meet under such circumstances! That I should be compelled to throw myself at your feet in shame and penitence!”
“And why, Schiller?” asked Madame von Wolzogen, in her soft, kindly voice. “Why must you throw yourself at my feet, and why this penitence? Be still. Do not reply yet, my poor child. First, hear me! My only reason in coming here was to see you. It seemed impossible, unnatural, that I should pass through Mannheim without seeing my friend, my son, my Frederick Schiller! My sister, who lives in Meiningen, has suddenly fallen ill, and has called me to her bedside. Well, I am answering her call; for no one has ever appealed to Henrietta von Wolzogen in vain. I have ridden all night, and will soon resume my journey. The carriage is waiting for me at the corner. I inquired my way to Schiller’s dwelling; and here I am, and I wish to know, Frederick Schiller, what this silence means, and why you have not written to me for so long a time? That I must know; and I am only here for the purpose of putting this one question: Schiller, have you forgotten your friends in Bauerbach? have you forgotten me, who was your friend and your mother?”
“No, no,” he cried, rising and throwing his arms tenderly around Madame von Wolzogen’s neck, and pressing her to his heart. “No, how could I forget your goodness, your generosity, and friendship? But can you not comprehend, my friend, why your arrival could have a terrible effect on me—could bring me to the verge of despair?”
“Only see how the poetic flame bursts forth when we prosaic people ask a practical question—when we have to remind poets that, unfortunately, we are not fed upon ambrosia falling from heaven! But I imagined that my wild boy would be once more tearing his own flesh, and terribly dissatisfied with his destiny. And I am here, Schiller, to tell you that you must think better of me and
