closed. The Schröder girl was a treasure, and when my mother came home
six weeks later she said: "You did well to take her, Louis; disfigured
as she is, her eyes have been spared, and they tell one that she is
faithful and reliable. And she is safe from love affairs, and we with
her. With her we shall have only pleasant experiences."

And so it proved. So long as we remained in Swinemünde the Schröder
girl remained in our house, loved and respected by old and young, not
least of all by my father, who gave her particular credit for her
sense of justice and her candor, in spite of the fact that he
occasionally had to suffer severely because of these two qualities.
She was always waging war against him. In the first place, out of love
for my mother, for whom she came to be an eloquent advocate, in spite
of the fact that my mother was thoroughly able to defend herself, in
accordance with her maxim, "The best defense is a blow." In the second
place, she was the mistress of the pantry, which was intrusted to her
with most plenary powers, and my father was always undertaking
pillaging expeditions against it, not only to satisfy his own personal
wants, which she might have tolerated, even though he was capable of
consuming half a veal roast for his breakfast, without thinking
anything about it; but she objected strenuously to his raids for the
benefit of his pet chickens, dogs, and cats. We had two cats, Peter
and Petrine. Peter, also called Peter the Great, who might have been
mistaken for a young jaguar, was his special pet, and when this
beautiful animal followed him, purring, into the pantry, and he always
followed, there was no end to the dainty morsels given him. The best
was none too good. This wanton waste made the Schröder girl, faithful
soul that she was, fly into a rage, for she often saw her plans for
dinner completely upset.

In the house she was indeed a treasure, but for us children,
especially me, she was even more than that, she was a real blessing.
The training we received from our parents advanced by fits and starts;
sometimes there was training and again there was none, and never any
thought of continuity. But the Schröder girl supplied the continuity.
She had no favorites, never allowed herself to be outwitted, and knew
just how to handle each one of us. As for me, she knew that I was
good-natured, but sensitive, proud, and under the control of a certain
degree of megalomania. These bad inclinations she wished to hold in
check, and so said to me times without number: "Yes, you think you are
a marvelous fellow, but you are only a childish boy, just like the
rest of them, only at times a bit worse. You always want to play the
young gentleman, but young gentlemen don't lick honey from their
plates, or at least don't deny it if they have done so, in fact they
never tell lies. Not long ago I heard you prating about honor, but I
want to tell you, _that_ doesn't look to me like honor." She insisted
upon truthfulness, treated boasting with fine ridicule, and was chary
of compliments. But when she did praise it was effective. She did me
many a good turn, and not until late in life, when I was past fifty,
did I meet another woman, this time an elderly lady, who exerted such
an educational influence upon me. Even now I am still taking lessons
and learn from people who are young enough to be my grandchildren.

Thus much about the good Schröder girl, and after this digression in
memory of her I ask once more: "Well, how did we live?" I propose to
show how we lived, by means of a series of pictures, and in order to
introduce order and clarity into the description it will be well to
divide our life as we lived it into two halves, a summer life and a
winter life.

First, then, there was the summer life. About the middle of June we
regularly had the house full of visitors; for my mother, in accordance
with the old custom, still kept in touch with her relatives, a trait
which we children only very imperfectly inherited from her. But let it
be understood, she kept in touch with her relatives, not to derive
advantages from them, but to bestow advantages. She was incredibly
generous, and there were times when we, after we had grown up, asked
ourselves the question, which passion really threatened us most, the
gaming passion of our father, or the giving and presenting passion of
our mother. But we finally discovered the answer to the question. What
our father did was simply money thrown away, whereas the excessive
amounts given away by our mother were always unselfishly given and
carried with them a quiet blessing. No doubt a certain desire to be,
so far as possible, a _grande dame_, if only in a very small degree,
had something to do with it, but then all our doings show some
elements of human weakness. Later in life, when we talked with her
about these things, she said: "Certainly, I might have refrained from
doing many things. We spent far more than our income. But I said to
myself: 'What there is will be spent anyhow, and so it is better for
it to go my way than the other.'"

These summer months, from the middle of June on, were often made
especially charming by the numbers of visitors in our home, mostly
young women relatives from Berlin, who were both cheerful and
talkative. The household was then completely changed, for weeks at a
time, and, the hatchet being temporarily buried, merriment and playing
of sly tricks, with occasional boisterous pranks, became the order of
the day. The most brilliant performer in the fun-making competitions
that frequently arose was always my father himself. He was, as
handsome men often are, the absolute opposite of Don Juan, and proud
of his virtue. But by as much as he was unlike Don Juan, he was
charming as a Gascon, when it came to a spirited discussion of pert
and often most daring themes, with young ladies, of whom he made but
one requirement, that they be handsome, otherwise it was not worth his
while. I inherited from him this inclination to enter into subtle
discussions with ladies, in a jesting tone; indeed I have ever carried
this inclination over into my style of writing, and when I read
corresponding scenes in my novels and short stories it once in awhile
seems to me as though I heard my father speaking. Except with this
difference, that I fall far short of his felicitousness, as people who
had known him in his prime often told me, when he was over severity
and I was correspondingly along in years. I have frequently been
addressed in some such way as this: "Now see here, you do very well,
when you have your good days, but you can't compete with your father."
And that was certainly true. His small talk, born of bonhomie and at
the same time enlivened with fantastic lawyerly artifice, was simply
irresistible, even when dealing with business matters, in which as a
rule heartiness has no place. And yet his remarks on money matters had
a lasting effect, so that none of us children ever cherished the
slightest feeling of bitterness on account of his most remarkable
financial operations. My mother, however, was of too different a
nature to be easily converted or carried away by his social graces.
These matters were to her most repugnant when treated lightly and
jestingly. "Whatever is serious is not funny, that's all." But she
never disputed the fact that, as a happy humorist, he always succeeded
in drawing people over to his side, though she never failed to add:
"unfortunately."

And now let us return to the summer visitors in our home. At times it
was rather difficult to furnish continual rounds of entertainment for
the young women, and would perhaps have proved impossible, if it had
not been for the horses. Almost every afternoon, when the weather was
good, the carriage drove up to our door, and such days during the
bathing season, when we were often almost completely overwhelmed with
visitors, were probably the only times when my mother, without in the
least sacrificing her fundamental convictions, was temporarily
reconciled to the existence of horse and carriage. Whoever knows
Swinemünde, and there are many who do know the place, is aware of the
fact that one is never embarrassed there for a beautiful spot to visit
on afternoon drives, and even in those days this was as true as it is
today. There was the trip along the beach to Heringsdorf, or, on the
other side, out to the moles; but the most popular drives, because
they afforded protection from the sun, were those back into the
country, either through the dense beech forest toward Corswant, or
better still to the village of Camminke, situated near the Haff of
Stettin and the Golm (mountain). There was a much frequented
skittle-alley there, where women played as well as men. I myself liked
to stand by the splintery lath trough, in which the skittle-boy rolled
back the balls. My only reason for choosing this position was because
I had heard a short time before that one of the players at this very
alley, in catching a ball as it rolled to him, had run a long lath
splinter under the nail of his index finger. That had made such an
impression on me that I always stood there shuddering for fear of a
repetition of the accident, which fortunately did not occur. When I
finally grew tired of waiting I stepped through a lattice gate, always
hanging aslant and always creaky, into a garden plot running along
close by the skittle-alley and parallel with it. It was a genuine
peasant's garden, with touch-me-nots and mignonette in bloom, and in
one place the mallows grew so tall that they formed a lane. Then when
the sun went down behind the forest the Golm, which lay to the west,
was bathed in red light, and the metal ball on its tall pillar looked
down, like a sphere of gold, upon the village and the skittle-garden.
Myriads of mosquitoes hung in the air, and the bumble bees flew back
and forth between the box-edged beds.

Our visitors usually left at the beginning of August, and when
September came the last of the hotel guests departed from the city.
If anybody chose to remain longer it was inconvenient for the
landlords, in which connection the following scene occurred. A man, a
Berliner of course, on returning to his hotel, after accompanying some
departing friends to their steamer, sat down leisurely by his host and
hostess, rubbed his hands together, and said: "Well, Hoppensack, at
last the Berliners are all gone, or at least nearly all of them; now
we shall have a good time, now it will be cozy." He expected, of
course, that the host and hostess would agree with him most heartily.
But instead of that he found himself looking into long faces. Finally
he screwed up his courage and asked why they were so indifferent.
"Why, good heavens, Mr. Schünemann," said Hoppensack, "a recorder and
his wife came to us the last of May and now it is almost the middle of
September. We want to be alone again, you see." As Mrs. Hoppensack
nodded approvingly, there was nothing left for Schünemann to do but to
depart himself the next day.

Not long after the last summer guests had gone the equinoctial storms
set in, and, if it was a bad year, they lasted on into November. First
the chestnuts fell, then the tiles rattled down from the roof, and
from the eaves-troughs, always placed with their outlets close by
bedroom windows, the rain splashed noisily down into the yard. In the
course of time, scattered clouds sailed across the clearing sky and
the air turned cold. Everybody felt the chilliness, and all day long
there was an old woodchopper at work in the shed. My father would
often go down to see him, take the ax and split wood for him a
half-hour at a time.

Social activities were at a standstill during these late autumn days.
People were recovering from the strain of the summer season and
storing up strength for winter entertainments. Before these began
there was an interregnum of several weeks, the slaughtering and baking
times, the latter coinciding with the Christmas period. First came
the slaughtering of geese. A regular household without a goose-killing
time could hardly have been thought of. Many things had to be taken
into account. First of all, perhaps, were the feathers to make new
beds, which were always needed for guest chambers; but the chief
concern were the smoked goose-breasts, almost as important articles as
the hams and sides of bacon hanging in the chimney. Shortly before St.
Martin's day, if enough geese had been collected to supply the needs,
they were penned up for fattening, in the court, which gave rise to a
horrible cackling, well calculated to rob us of our night's rest for a
whole week. But a day was straightway set for the beginning of the
feast, about the middle of November. In the court, in a lean-to built
near the end of the house, and, strange to say, with a dove-cote over
it, was the servants' room, in which, beside the cook, two house-maids
slept, provided always they did any sleeping. The coachman was
supposed, according to a rule of the house, to occupy the straw-loft,
but was happy to forego the independence of these quarters, which went
with his position, preferring by his presence to crowd still worse the
already crowded space of the servants' room, in full accord with
Schiller's lines,

  "Room is in the smallest hovel
  For a happy, loving pair."

But when goose-killing time came it meant a very considerable further
overcrowding, for on the evening that the massacring was to begin
there was added to the number of persons usually quartered in the
servants' room a special force of old women, four or five in number,
who at other times earned a living at washing or weeding.

Then the sacrificial festivities began, always late in the evening.
Through the wide-open door--open, because otherwise it would not have
been possible to endure the stifling air--the stars shone into the
smoky room, which was dimly lighted by a tallow candle, with always a
thief in the candle. Near the door stood in a semi-circle the five
slaughter priestesses, each with a goose between her knees, and as
they bored holes through the skullcaps of the poor fowls, with sharp
kitchen knives--a procedure, the necessity of which I have never
understood--they sang all sorts of folk-songs, the text of which
formed a strange contrast, as well to the murderous act as to the
mournful melody. At least one had to suppose this to be the case, for
the maids, who sat on the edge of the bed with their guest from the
straw-loft between them, followed the folksongs with never-ending
merriment, and at the passages that sounded specially mournful they
even burst into cheers. Both my parents were morally strict, and they
often discussed the question, whether there were not some way to put a
stop to this insolent conduct, but they finally gave it up. My father
had a lurking suspicion that such a custom had existed in antiquity,
and, after he-had looked the matter up, said: "It is a repetition of
ancient conditions, the Roman saturnalia, or, what amounts to the same
thing, a case where the servants temporarily lord it over the
so-called lords." When he had thus classified the occurrence
historically he was satisfied, the more so as the maids always amused
him the following morning by lowering their eyes in a most unusually
modest fashion. Then he would make fantastically extravagant remarks,
as though _Gil Blas_ had been his favorite book. That was not the
case, however. He read Walter Scott exclusively, for which I am
grateful to him even to this day, since, even then, a few crumbs fell
from his table for me. His favorite among all the works was _Quintin
Durward_, probably on account of its French subject.

I have here further to add that the terrors of this goose-killing time
were by no means ended with the slaughter night and the mournful
melodies. On the contrary, they lasted at least three or four days
longer, for the slaughtering time was also the time when the giblets
dressed with goose-blood were served daily at our table, a dish which,
according to the Pomeranian view, stands unrivaled in the realm of
cookery. Furthermore my father considered it his duty to support the
view peculiar to this region, and, when the great steaming platter
appeared, would say: "Ah, that is fine! Just eat some of this; it is
the black soup of the Spartans, full of strength and stamina." But I
observed that he, along with the rest of us, picked out the dried
fruit and almond dumplings, leaving the nourishing gravy for the
servants outside, above all for the slaughtering and mourning women,
who by their boring operations had established the most legitimate
claim to it.

About a fortnight later came the pig-killing, toward which my feeling
remained exactly the same as on that occasion when, hardly seven
years of age, I had fled from the city toward Alt-Ruppin, in
order to escape, not only the spectacle, but a whole gamut of
ear-and-heart-rending sounds. But I had meanwhile grown out of
childhood into boyhood, and a boy, whether he will or no, feels
honor-bound manfully to take everything that comes along, even if his
own deepest nature revolts against it. That the prospect of rice
pudding with raisins in it was a contributing factor in this comedy of
bravery, I am unable to say, for fond as I am of good things to eat, I
was always, during the weeks just preceding Christmas, half upset by
the smell of hot grease that drifted through the house. At least I
never had what could be called a really good appetite during this
period, despite the fact that it would have been particularly worth
while just then. Especially would such have been the case when, as
usually happened about the first of December, a stag was sent in from
the chief forester's and was hung up, eviscerated, as game usually is,
against the gable end of the servants' house. Day after day the cook
would go to this horrible gable ornament and cut out, first the
haunch, then the shoulders and legs, with the result that we always
heaved a sigh of relief when the glory of this venison was a thing of
the past.

A far happier time was the baking week, which began with spice-nuts
and sugar cookies, and ended with bretzels, wreath-cakes, and cakes
baked on tins. Not only were we admitted to the bakeroom, where there
was a most alluring odor of bitter almonds and grated lemons; we also
received, as a foretaste of Christmas, a bountiful supply of little
cake-rolls, baked especially for us children. "I know," said my
mother, "that the children will upset their stomachs eating them, but
even that is better than that they should be restricted to too low a
diet. They shall have joyful holiday feeling during all these days,
and nothing can give it to them better than holiday cakes." There is
something in that view, and it may be absolutely right if the children
are thoroughly robust. But we were not so robust that the principle
could be applied to us without modification. And so, about Christmas
time, I was always much given to crying.

On New Year's Eve there was a club ball, which I, being the oldest
child, was allowed to witness. I took my position in one corner of the
hall and looked on with vacillating feelings. When the dancing couples
whirled past me I was happy, on the one hand, because I was permitted
to stand there as a sort of guest and share in the pleasure with my
eyes, and yet, on the other hand, I was unhappy, because I was merely
an onlooker instead of a participator in the dance. My personal
insignificance weighed heavy upon me, doubly heavy because of the
gastric condition I was regularly in at this reason, and it continued
so until the nightwatchman, wrapped in his long blue cloak, came into
the hall at midnight and, after blowing a preliminary signal on his
horn, wished everybody a happy New Year. Then, as if by magic, my
feeling of sentimentality vanished entirely, and I was carried away by
the comic grotesqueness of the scene, and soon regained my freedom and
buoyancy of spirit.

Just about this time social activities began, taking the form of a
series of weekly feasts, many of which resembled that of Belshazzar,
in so far as a spirit hand was at the very time writing the bankruptcy
of the host upon the wall. However, my knowledge of the details of
these feasts was derived only from hearsay. But any special banquets,
whether great or small, that fell to the lot of our own house I saw
with my own eyes and it is about these that I now propose to tell.

When it came our turn to entertain, the whole house was pervaded with
a feeling of solemnity, which had a certain similarity to the feeling
at the time of a wedding. Furthermore, a parallel to the tripartite
division into wedding-eve celebration, wedding day, and the day after,
appeared in the form of preparation day, real feast-day, and eating of
the remnants. Which of these three days deserved the prize may remain
an open question, but I am inclined to believe I liked the first the
best. To be sure, it was unepicurean and called for much
self-restraint, but it was rich in anticipation of glorious things to
come.

On this day of preparation the widow Gaster, a celebrated cook, came
to our house, as she did to all other houses on similar occasions. Her
personal appearance united complacence with dignity, and by virtue of
this latter quality she was received with respect and unlimited
confidence. Because of a dislike, easily understood, for all the
things she had to prepare day in and day out, especially sweets, she
lived-almost exclusively on red wine, deriving the little other
sustenance she needed from the vapors of hot grease, with which she
was continually surrounded. Her arrival at our house was always a
signal for me to plant myself near the kitchen, where everything that
took place could be observed and, incidentally, admired. It was always
her first task to bake a tree-cake on a spit. She kept a record of all
the tree-cakes she baked, and when the number reached a thousand the
housewives of Swinemünde gave her a well-deserved feast in celebration
of the achievement. To be sure, tree-cakes are to be had even today,
but they are degenerations, weak, spongy, and pale-cheeked, whereas in
those days they had a happy firmness, which in the most successful
specimens rose to crispness, accompanied by a scale of colors running
from the darkest ocher to the brightest yellow. It always gave me
great pleasure to watch a tree-cake come into being. Toward the back
wall of a huge fireplace stood a low half-dome, built of bricks, the
top projecting forward like a roof, the bottom slanting toward the
back. Along this slanting part was built a narrow charcoal fire about
four feet long and by it were placed two small iron supports, upon
which a roasting spit was laid, with a contrivance for turning it.
However, the spit resting upon the supports proved to be something
more than a mere rod. In fact the spit itself was run lengthwise
through a hollow wooden cone, which had a covering of greased paper
over its outer surface, and the purpose of which was to form a core
for the tree-cake. Then, with a tin spoon fastened upon a long stick,
the cook began to pour on a thin batter, which at first dripped off in
a way that made the method of application appear futile, and this
continued for a considerable length of time. But from the moment that
the batter became more consistent, and the dripping slower, hope began
to revive, and in a few hours the splendidly browned and copiously
jagged tree-cake was taken off the wooden cone. All this had a
symbolical significance. The successful completion of this _pièce de
résistance_ inspired confidence in the success of the feast itself.
The tree-cake cast the horoscope, so to speak, of the whole affair.

I shall pass over the kitchen activities on the day of the
entertainment and describe instead the feast itself. Along extension
table was moved into my mother's parlor--the only room available for
the purpose--and soon stood well set in front of the moire sofa with
the three hundred silver studs. The guests were not seated at the
table till the candles were lit. The man who presided over the banquet
always sat with his back toward the Schinkel mirror, whereas all the
other guests could, with little or no inconvenience, observe
themselves in the glass.

So far as I can recall they were always gentlemen's dinner parties,
with twelve or fourteen persons, and only on rare occasions did my
mother appear at the table, then usually accompanied by her sister,
who often visited us for months at a time in the winter season and was
in those days still very young and handsome. It was always a specially
difficult matter to assign her a suitable place, and only when old Mr.
von Flemming and Privy Councillor Kind were present was she in any
degree safe from extremely ardent attentions. It was almost impossible
to protect her from such attentions. The men had respect for virtue,
perhaps, though I have my doubts even about that, but virtuous airs
were considered in bad taste, and where was the line to be drawn
between reality and appearance? That the ladies retired from the table
toward the end of the meal and appeared again only for a brief quarter
of an hour to do the honors at coffee, goes without saying.

I have spoken above of the culinary art of good Mrs. Gaster, but in
spite of that art the bill of fare was really simple, especially in
comparison with the luxury prevalent nowadays at dinner parties.
Simple, I say, and yet stable. No man was willing to fall behind a set
standard, nor did he care to go beyond it. The soup was followed by a
fish course, and that, without fail, by French turnips and smoked
goose-breast. Then came a huge roast, and finally a sweet dish, with
fruits, spice-cakes, and Königsberg marchpane. An almost greater
simplicity prevailed with respect to the wines. After the soup sherry
was passed. Then a red wine of moderate price and moderate quality
gained the ascendant and held sway till coffee was served. So the
peculiar feature of these festivities did not lie in the materials
consumed, but, strange to say, in a certain spiritual element, in the
tone that prevailed. This varied considerably, when we take into
account the beginning and the end. The beginning was marked by toasts
in fine style, and occasionally, especially if the feast was at the
same time a family party--a birthday celebration or something of the
sort--there were even verses, which from the point of view of
regularity of form and cleverness of ideas left nothing to be desired.
Only recently I found among my father's papers some of these literary
efforts and was astonished to see how good they were. Humor, wit, and
playing on words were never lacking. There were special occasions when
even deep emotion, was expressed and then those who were farthest from
having a proper feeling, but nearest to a state of delirium, arose
regularly from their seats and marched up to the speaker to embrace
and kiss him. This kissing scene always denoted the beginning of the
second half of the feast. The further the dinner advanced the freer
became the conversation, and, when it had reached the stage where all
feeling of restraint was cast aside, the most insolent and often the
rudest badgering was indulged in, or, if for any reason this was not
allowed, the company began to rally certain individuals, or, as we
might say, began to poke fun at them. One of the choicest victims of
this favorite occupation of the whole round table was my papa. It had
long been known that when it was a question of conversation he had
three hobbies, viz., personal ranks and decorations in the Prussian
State, the population of all cities and hamlets according to the
latest census, and the names and ducal titles of the French marshals,
including an unlimited number of Napoleonic anecdotes, the latter
usually in the original. Occasionally this original version was
disputed from the point of view of sentence structure and grammar,
whereupon my father, when driven into a corner, would reply with
imperturbable repose: "My French feeling tells me that it must be
thus, thus and not otherwise," a declaration which naturally served
but to increase the hilarity.

Yes, indeed, Napoleon and his marshals! My father's knowledge in this
field was simply stupendous, and I wager there was not in that day a
single historian, nor is there any now, who, so far as French war
stories and personal anecdotes of the period from Marengo to Waterloo
are concerned, would have been in any sense of the word qualified to
enter into competition with him. Where he got all his material is an
enigma to me. The only explanation I can offer is that he had in his
memory a pigeonhole, into which fell naturally everything he found
that appealed to his passion, in his constant reading of journals and
miscellanies.

When we had been safely lodged, at Midsummer, 1827, in the house with
the gigantic roof and the wooden eavestrough, into which my father
could easily lay his hand, this question immediately presented itself:
"What is to become of the children now? To what school shall we send
them?" If my mother had been there a solution of the problem would
doubtless have been found, one that would have had due regard for what
was befitting our station, at least, if not for what we should learn.
But since my mama, as already stated, had remained in Berlin to
receive treatment for her nerves, the decision rested with my father,
and he settled the matter in short order, presumably after some such
characteristic soliloquy as follows: "The city has only one school,
the city school, and as the city school is the only one, it is
consequently the best." No sooner thought than done. Before a week was
passed I was a pupil of the city school. About the school I remember
very little, only that there was a large room with a blackboard,
stifling air in spite of the fact that the windows were always open,
and an endless number of boys in baize and linen jackets, unkempt and
barefoot, or in wooden shoes, which made a fearful noise. It was very
sad. But even then, as unfortunately in later years, I had so few
pleasing illusions about going to school that the conditions
previously described to me did not appear specially dreadful when I
became personally acquainted with them. I simply supposed that things
had to be thus. But toward autumn, when my mother arrived on the scene
and saw me coming home from school with the wooden-shoe boys, she was
beside herself and cast an anxious glance at my hair, which she
doubtless thought she could not well trust in such company. She then
had one of her heart-to-heart talks with my father, who was probably
told that he had again taken only himself into consideration. That
same day my withdrawal from school was announced to Rector Beda, who
lived diagonally across the street from us. He was not angry at the
announcement, declared, on the contrary, to my mother that "he had
really been surprised. * * *" Thus far all was well. Just criticism
had been exercised and action had been taken in accord with it. But
now that it was necessary to find something better to substitute for
the school, even my mother was at her wits' end. Teachers seemed to
be, or were in fact, lacking, and as it had been impossible in so
short a time to establish relations to the good families of the city,
it was decided for the present to let me grow up wild and calmly to
wait till something turned up. But to prevent my lapsing into dense
ignorance I was to read an hour daily to my mother and learn some
Latin and French words from my father, in addition to geography and
history.

"Will you be equal to that, Louis?" my mother had asked.

"Equal to? What do you mean by 'equal to?' Of course I am equal to it.
Your same old lack of confidence in me."

"Not twenty-four hours ago you yourself were full of doubt about it."

"I presume the plan did not appeal to me then. But if it must be, I
understand the Prussian pharmacopoeia as well as anybody, and in my
parents' house French was spoken. As for the rest, to speak of it
would be ridiculous. You know that in such things I am more than a
match for ten graduates."

As a matter of fact he really gave me lessons, which, I may say in
advance, were kept up even after the need of them no longer existed,
and, peculiar as these lessons were, I learned more from them than
from many a famous teacher. My father picked out quite arbitrarily the
things he had long known by heart or, perhaps, had just read the same
day, and vitalized geography with history, always, of course, in such
a way that in the end his favorite themes were given due prominence.
For example:

"Do you know about East and West Prussia?"

"Yes, papa; that is the country after which Prussia is called Prussia
and after which we are all called Prussians."

"Very good, very good; a little too much Prussia, but that doesn't
matter. And do you also know the capitals of the two provinces?"

"Yes, papa; Königsberg and Danzig."

"Very good. I myself have been in Danzig, and came near going to
Königsberg, too, but something intervened. Have you ever heard
perchance who it was that finally captured Danzig after the brave
defense of our General Kalckreuth?"

"No, papa."

"Well, it is not to be expected. Very few people do know it, and the
so-called higher educated never know it. Well, it was General Lefèvre,
a man of rare bravery, upon whom Napoleon later bestowed the title of
_Duc de Dantzic_, spelled with a final c, in which regard the
languages differ. That was in the year 1807."

"After the battle of Jena?"

"Yes, it may be put that way; but only in the same sense as if you
were to say, it was after the Seven Years' War."

"I don't understand, papa."

"Doesn't matter. I mean, Jena was too long ago. But one might say it
was after the battle of Prussian Eylau, a fearfully bloody battle, in
which the Russian Guard was almost annihilated, and in which Napoleon,
before surrendering, said to his favorite Duroc: 'Duroc, today I have
made the acquaintance of the sixth great power of Europe, _la boue_.'"

"What does that mean?"

"_La boue_ means the mud. But one can express it more strongly in
German, and I am inclined to think that Napoleon, who, when he felt
like it, had something cynical about him, really meant this stronger
expression."

"What is cynical?"

"Cynical--hm, cynical--it is a word often used, and one might say,
cynical is the same as rough or brutal. But I presume it may be
defined more accurately. We will look it up later in the encyclopedia.
It is well to be informed about such things, but one does not need to
know everything on the spur of the moment."

Such was the character of the geography lessons, always ending with
historical anecdotes. But he preferred to begin at once with history,
or what seemed to him history. And here I must mention his pronounced
fondness for all the events and the persons concerned in them between
the siege of Toulon and the imprisonment on the island of St. Helena.
He was always reverting to these persons and things. I have elsewhere
named his favorites, with Ney and Lannes at the head of the list, but
in that enumeration I forgot to mention one man, who stood perhaps
nearer to his heart than these, namely, Latour d'Auvergne, of whom he
had told me any number of anecdotes back in our Ruppin days. These
were now repeated. According to the new stories Latour d'Auvergne bore
the title of the "First Grenadier of France," because in spite of his
rank of general he always stood in the rank and file, next to the
right file-leader of the Old Guard. Then when he fell, in the battle
of Neuburg, Napoleon gave orders that the heart of the "First
Grenadier" be placed in an urn and carried along with the troop, and
that his name, Latour d'Auvergne, be regularly called at every
roll-call, and the soldier serving as file-leader be instructed to
answer in his stead and tell where he was. This was about what I had
long ago learned by heart from my father's stories; but his fondness
for this hero was so great that, whenever it was at all possible, he
returned to him and asked the same questions. Or, to be more accurate,
the same scene was enacted, for it was a scene.

"Do you know Latour d'Auvergne?" he usually began.

"Certainly. He was the First Grenadier of France."

"Good. And do you also know how he was honored after he was dead?"

"Certainly."

"Then tell me how it was."

"Very well; but you must first stand up, papa, and be file-leader, or
I can't do it."

Then he would actually rise from his seat on the sofa and in true
military fashion take his position before me as file-leader of the Old
Guard, while I myself, little stick-in-the-mud that I was, assumed the
part of the roll-calling officer. Then I began to call the names:

"Latour d'Auvergne!"

"He is not here," answered my father in a basso profundo voice.

"Where is he, pray?"

"He died on the field of honor."

Once in awhile my mother attended these peculiar lessons--the one
about Latour, however, was never ventured in her presence--and she did
not fail to give us to understand, by her looks, that she considered
this whole method, which my father with an inimitable expression of
countenance called his "Socratic method," exceedingly dubious. But
she, by nature wholly conventional, not only in this particular, but
in others, was absolutely wrong, for, to repeat, I owe in fact to
these lessons, and the similar conversations growing out of them, all
the best things, at least all the most practical things, I know. Of
all that my father was able to teach me nothing has been forgotten and
nothing has proved useless for my purposes. Not only have these
stories been of hundredfold benefit to me socially throughout my long
life, they have also, in my writing, been ever at hand as a Golden
Treasury, and if I were asked, to what teacher I felt most deeply
indebted, I should have to reply: to my father, my father, who knew
nothing at all, so to speak, but, with his wealth of anecdotes picked
up from newspapers and magazines, and covering every variety of theme,
gave me infinitely more help than all my _Gymnasium_ and _Realschule_
teachers put together. What information these men offered me, even if
it was good, has been for the most part forgotten; but the stories of
Ney and Rapp have remained fresh in my memory to the present hour.

My father's method, which, much as I feel indebted to it, was after
all somewhat peculiar and utterly devoid of logic and consistency,
would in all probability have led to violent quarrels between my
parents, if my critical mother, who saw only its weaknesses and none
of its virtues, had attached any special significance to it in
general. But that was not the case. She only felt that my father's way
of teaching was totally different from the usual way, in that it would
not lead to many practical results, i.e., would not give me much
preparation for an examination, and in this respect she was perfectly
right. However, as she herself attached so little value to knowledge
in general, she contented herself with smiling at the "Socratic
method," as she saw no reason for becoming seriously wrought up over
it. According to her honest conviction there were other things in life
of far greater importance than knowledge, to say nothing of erudition,
and these other things were: a good appearance and good manners. That
her children should all present a good appearance was with her an
article of faith, so to speak, and she considered it a natural
consequence of their good appearance that they either already had or
would acquire good manners. So the only essential was to present a
good appearance. Serious studies seemed to her not a help, but, on the
contrary, a hindrance to happiness, that is to say, real happiness,
which she looked upon as inseparable from money and property. A
hundred-thousand-dollar man _was_ something, and she respected, even
honored him, whereas chief judges and councillors of the chancery
commanded very little respect from her, and would have commanded even
less, if the State, which she did respect, had not stood behind them.
She was incapable of bowing in good faith to any so-called spiritual
authority, not because she cherished too exalted an opinion of
herself--she was, on the contrary, entirely without vanity and
arrogance--but solely because, constituted as she was, she could not
recognize an authority of knowledge, much less of erudition, in a
practical field of life--and with her the non-practical fields never
entered into consideration.

I still remember the time, some twenty years after the events just
narrated, when my parents were thinking of separating and of
eventually being divorced. A separation actually came about, the
divorce idea was dropped. But the latter was for a time considered in
all seriousness, and a friend of our family, Pastor Schultz, the then
preacher at Bethany, who made a specialty of divorce questions--it was
in the reign of Frederick William IV., when such problems were treated
with revived dogmatic severity--Pastor Schultz, I say, opposed the
plan, as soon as he heard of it, with all his power and eloquence. My
mother had a great deal of admiration for him and knew, besides, the
respect he enjoyed of "those highest in authority," and "those highest
in authority" meant something to her; nevertheless his severe
presentation of the matter made not the slightest impression upon her;
in fact his argument was so fruitless that, as soon as he finished,
she said with a reposeful air of superiority: "My dear Schultz, you
understand this question thoroughly; but whether or not I have a right
to secure a divorce is a question which no human being in the whole
world can answer so well as I myself." With that she closed the
conversation.

She was similarly skeptical of every kind of authority, and had no
confidence whatever in the ability of the three university faculties.
For example, since patriarchal conditions were her ideal, she
questioned whether mankind derived any material advantages from
jurisprudence. It settled everything, as she thought, by favoritism or
personal advantage, or at least in a mechanical way. Riches, property,
especially landed property, accompanied if possible by the airs of a
legation attaché--_that_ was something that unlocked the world and
the hearts of men, that was real power. Everything else was comedy,
illusion, a soap-bubble, that threatened to burst any moment. And then
nothing was left. One can readily understand why my mother, with such
views, insisted upon taking me out of the barefoot school, and did not
consider an interim, with no regular school instruction, any special
misfortune. The evil in it was that it violated the rule. As for the
rest, the little bit of learning lost could be made up at any time.
And if not, then not....

It is a pretty saying that every child has its angel, and one does not
need to be very credulous to believe it. For the little tots this
angel is a fairy, enveloped in a long white lily veil, which stands
smiling at the foot of a cradle and either wards off danger or helps
out of it when it is really at hand. That is the fairy for the little
ones. But when one has outgrown the cradle or crib, and has begun to
sleep in a regular bed, in other words, when one has become a robust
boy, one still needs his angel just the same, indeed the need is all
the greater. But instead of the lily angel it needs to be a sort of
archangel, a strong, manly angel, with shield and spear, otherwise his
strength will not suffice for his growing tasks.

As a matter of fact, I was not wild and venturesome, and all my
escapades that were attributed to me as of such a nature were always
undertaken after a wise estimate of my strength. Nevertheless I have,
with respect to that period, a feeling that I was constantly being
rescued, a feeling in which I can hardly be in error. When I left home
at the age of twelve, the age at which, as a usual thing, real dangers
begin, there was doubtless a sudden change in my case, for it now
seems to me as though my angel had had a vacation from that time on.
All dangers ceased entirely or shrank into such insignificance that
they left no impression upon me. In view of the fact that the two
periods were so close together, there must have been this difference,
otherwise I should not have retained such entirely different feelings
about them.

It was one of our chief sports to fire off so-called shooting-keys.
That the children of large cities know anything about shooting-keys is
hardly probable, hence I may be permitted to describe them here. They
were hollow keys with very thin walls, consequently of enormous bore,
so to speak, and were used to lock trunks, especially the trunks of
servant girls. It was our constant endeavor to gain possession of such
keys and at times our expeditions were nothing short of piracy. Woe be
unto the poor servant girl who forgot to take a key out of its lock!
She never saw it again. We took possession of it, and the simple
procedure of filing out a touchhole produced a finished firearm. As
these keys were always rusty, and occasionally split, it not
infrequently happened that they burst; but we always escaped injury.
The angel helped.

Much more dangerous was the art of making fireworks, which I was
always practicing. With the help of sulphur and saltpeter, which we
kept in a convenient place in the apothecary's shop, I had made of
myself a full-fledged pyrotechnician, in which process I was very
materially aided by my skill in the manipulation of cardboard and
paste. All sorts of shells were easily made, and so I produced
Catherine-wheels, revolving suns, and flower-pots. Often these
creations refused to perform the duty expected of them, and then we
piled them up and, by means of a sulphurated match, touched off the
whole heap of miscarried glory and waited to see what it would do.
This was all done with comparatively little danger. Fraught with all
the more danger for us was the thing which was considered the simplest
and lowest product of the art of pyrotechnics, and was so rated by us,
viz., the serpent. Very often the serpents I made would not burn
properly, because I had not used the right mixture, no doubt, and that
always vexed me greatly. When a Catherine-wheel refused to turn, that
could at least be tolerated, for a Catherine-wheel is a comparatively
difficult thing to make. A serpent, on the other hand, could not well
help burning, and when, for all that, one simply would not burn, that
was a humiliation that could not be suffered. So I would bend over the
shells as they stuck in the pile of sand and begin to blow, in order
to give new life to the dying tinder fire. When it went out entirely,
that was really the best thing for me. But if it went off suddenly, my
hair was singed or my forehead burned. Nothing worse ever happened,
for the angel was protecting me with his shield.

That was the element of fire. But we also came in contact with water,
which was not to be wondered at in a seaport.

In the autumn of 1831 a Berlin relative made me a present of a cannon,
not just an ordinary child's plaything, such as can be bought of any
coppersmith or tinner, but a so-called pattern-cannon, such as is seen
only in arsenals,--a splendid specimen, of great beauty and elegance,
the carriage firm and neat, the barrel highly polished and about a
foot and a half long. I was more than delighted, and determined to
proceed at once to a bombardment of Swinemünde. Two boys of my age and
my younger brother climbed with me into a boat lying at Klempin's
Clapper, and we rowed down-stream, with the cannon in the bow. When we
were about opposite the Society House I considered that the time had
arrived for the beginning of the bombardment, and fired three shots,
waiting after each shot to see whether the people on the "Bulwark"
took notice of us, and whether they showed due respect for the
seriousness of our actions. But neither of these things happened. A
thing that did happen, however, was that we meanwhile got out into the
current, were caught by it and carried away, and when we suddenly saw
ourselves between the embankments of the moles, I was suddenly seized
with a terrible fright. I realized that, if we kept on in this way, in
ten minutes more we should be out at sea and might drift away toward
Bornholm and the Swedish coast. It was a desperate situation, and we
finally resorted to the least brave, but most sensible, means
imaginable, and began to scream with all our might, all the time
beckoning and waving various objects, showing on the whole
considerable cleverness in the invention of distress signals. At last
we attracted the attention of some pilots standing on the West mole,
who shook their fingers threateningly at us, but finally, with smiling
countenances, threw us a rope. That rescued us from danger. One of the
pilots knew me; his son was one of my playmates. This doubtless
accounts for the fact that the seamen dismissed us with a few
epithets, which might have been worse. I took my cannon under my arm,
but not without having the satisfaction of seeing it admired. Then I
went home, after promising to send out Hans Ketelböter, a lusty
sailor-boy who lived quite near our home, to row back the boat, which
was meanwhile moored to a pile.

This was the most unique among my adventures with water, but by no
means the most dangerous. The most dangerous was at the same time the
most ordinary, because it recurred every time I went swimming in the
sea. Any one who knows the Baltic seaside resorts, knows the so-called
"reffs." By "reffs" are meant the sandbanks running parallel to the
beach, out a hundred or two hundred paces, and often with very little
water washing over them. Upon these the swimmers can stand and rest,
when, they have crossed the deep places lying between them and the
shore. In order that they may know exactly where these shallow places
are, little red banners are hoisted over the sandbanks. Here lay for
me a daily temptation. When the sea was calm and everything normal, my
skill as a swimmer was just sufficient to carry me safely over the
deep places to the nearest sandbank. But if the conditions were less
favorable, or if by chance I let myself down too soon, so that I had
no solid ground beneath my feet, I was frightened, sometimes almost to
death. Luckily I always managed to get out, though not by myself.
Strength and help came from some other source.

Another danger of water which I was destined to undergo had no
connection with the sea, but occurred on the river, close by the
"Bulwark," not five hundred paces from our house. I shall tell about
it later; but first I wish to insert here another little occurrence,
in which no help of an angel was needed.

I was not good at swimming, nor at steering or rowing; but one of the
things I could do well, very well indeed, was walking on stilts.
According to our family tradition we came from the region of
Montpelier, whereas I personally ought by rights to be able, in view
of my virtuosity as a stilt-walker, to trace my ancestry back to the
Landes, where the inhabitants are, so to speak, grown fast to their
stilts, and hardly take them off when they go to bed. To make a long
story short, I was a brilliant stilt-walker, and in comparison with
those of the western Garonne region, the home of the very low stilts,
I had the advantage that I could not get my buskins high enough to
suit me, for the little blocks of wood fastened on the inner side of
my stilts were some three feet high. By taking a quick start and
running the ends of the two poles slantingly into the ground I was
able to swing myself without fail upon the stilt-blocks and to begin
immediately my giant stride. Ordinarily this was an unremunerative
art, but on a few occasions I derived real profit from it, when my
stilts enabled me to escape storms that were about to break over my
head. That was in the days just after Captain Ferber, who had served
out his time with the "Neufchâtellers," retired on a pension and moved
to Swinemünde. Ferber, whom the Swinemünders called Teinturier, the
French translation of his name, because of his relation to Neufchâtel,
came of a very good family, was, if I mistake not, the son of a high
official in the ministry of finance, who could boast of long-standing
relations to the Berlin Court, dating back to the war times of the
year 1813. This was no doubt the reason why the son, in spite of the
fact that he did not belong to the nobility and was of German
extraction--the Neufchâtel officers were in those days still for the
most part French-Swiss--was permitted to serve with the élite
battalion, where he was well liked, because he was clever, a good
comrade, and an author besides. He wrote novelettes after the fashions
then in vogue. But in spite of his popularity he could not hold his
position, because his fondness for coffee and cognac, which soon
became restricted to the latter, grew upon him so rapidly that he was
forced to retire. His removal to Swinemünde was doubtless due to the
fact that seaports are better suited for such passions than are inland
cities. Fondness for cognac attracts less attention.

Whatever his reason may have been, however, Ferber was soon as popular
in his new place of residence as previously in Berlin, for he had that
kindliness of character which is the "dearest child of the
dram-bottle." He was very fond of my father, who reciprocated the
sentiment. But this friendship did not spring up at the very beginning
of their acquaintance. In fact it developed out of a little
controversy between them, that is to say, a defeat sustained by my
father, one of whose amiable peculiarities it was, within twenty-four
hours at the latest to convert his anger at being put to flight, into
approbation bordering on homage for the victor.

His defeat came about thus. One day the assertion was made by Ferber,
that, whether we liked it or not, a German must be looked upon as the
"father of the French Revolution," for Minister Necker, though born in
Geneva, was the son or grandson of a Küstrin postmaster. This seemed
to my father a perfectly preposterous assertion, and he combated it
with a rather supercilious mien, till it was finally shown to be
substantially correct. Then my father's arrogance, growing out of a
conviction of his superior knowledge, was transformed first into
respect and later into friendship, and even twenty years after,
whenever we drove from our Oderbruch village to the neighboring city
of Küstrin, he never had much to say about Crown Prince Fritz, or
Katte's decapitation, but regularly remarked: "Oh yes, Necker, who may
be called the father of the French Revolution, traced his ancestry
back to this city of Küstrin. I owe the information to Ferber, Captain
Ferber, whom we called Teinturier. It is a pity he could not give up
his _aqua vitæ_. At times it was pitiable."

Yes, pitiable it was, but not to us children, who, on the contrary,
always broke out into cheers whenever the captain, usually in rather
desolate costume, came staggering up the Great Church Street to find a
place to continue his breakfast. We used to follow close behind him
and tease and taunt him till he would try to catch and thrash one or
the other of us. Occasionally he succeeded; but I always escaped with
ease, because I chose for my teasings only days when it had rained a
short time before. Then there stood in the street between our house
and the church on the other side a huge pool of water, which became my
harbor of refuge. Holding my stilts at the proper angle, I sprang
quickly upon them as soon as I saw that Teinturier, in spite of his
condition, was close on my heels, and then I marched triumphantly into
the pool of water. There I stood like a stork on one stilt and
presented arms with the other, as I continued scoffing at him. Cursing
and threatening he marched away, the poor captain. But he took care
not to make good his threats, because in his good moments he did not
like to be reminded of the bad ones.

We had several playgrounds. The one we liked best perhaps was along
the "Bulwark," at the point where the side street branched off from
our house. The whole surroundings were very picturesque, especially in
the winter time, when the ships, stripped of their topmasts, lay at
their moorings, often in three rows, the last pretty far out in the
river. We were allowed to play along the "Bulwark" and practice our
rope-walking art on the stretched hawsers as far as they hung close to
the ground. Only one thing was prohibited. We were not allowed to go
on board the ships, much less to climb the rope ladders to the
mastheads. A very sensible prohibition. But the more sensible it was,
the greater was our desire to disregard it, and in the game of "robber
and wayfarer," of which we were all very fond, disregarding of this
prohibition was almost a matter of course. Furthermore, discovery lay
beyond the range of probability; our parents were either at their
"party" or invited to dine out. "So let's go ahead. If anybody tells
on us, he will be worse off than we."

So we thought one Sunday in April, 1831. It must have been about that
time of year, for I can still recall the clear, cold tone of the
atmosphere. On the ship there was not a sign of life, and on the
"Bulwark" not a human soul to be seen, which further proves to me that
it was a Sunday.

I, being the oldest and strongest, was the robber, of course. Of the
eight or ten smaller boys only one was in any measure able to compete
with me. That was an illegitimate child, called Fritz Ehrlich
(Honorable), as though to compensate him for his birth. These boys had
set out from the Church Square, the usual starting-point of the chase,
and were already close after me. I arrived at the "Bulwark" exhausted,
and, as there was no other way of escape, ran over a firm broad plank
walk toward the nearest ship, with the whole pack after me. This
naturally forced me to go on from the first ship to the second and
from the second to the third. There was no going any further, and if I
wished, in spite of this dilemma, to escape my enemies, there was
nothing left for me but to seek a hiding-place on the ship itself, or
at least a spot difficult of access. I found such a place and climbed
up about the height of a man to the top of the superstructure near the
cabin. In this superstructure was usually to be found, among other
rooms, the ship's cuisine. My climbing was facilitated by steps built
in the perpendicular wall. And there I stood then, temporarily safe,
gazing down as a victor at my pursuers. But the sense of victory did
not last long; the steps were there for others as well as for me, and
an instant later Fritz Ehrlich was also on the roof. Now I was indeed
lost if I foiled to find another way of escape. So, summoning all my
strength, I took as long a running start as the narrow space would
permit and sprang from the roof of the kitchen over the intervening
strip of water back to the second ship and then ran for the shore, as
though chased by all the furies. When I had reached the shore it was
nothing to run to the base in front of our house and be free. But I
was destined not to enjoy my happiness very long, for almost the very
moment I once more had solid ground beneath my feet I heard cries of
distress coming from the third and second ships, and my name called
repeatedly, which made me think something must have happened. Swiftly
as I had made for the shore over the noisy plank walk, I now hastened
back over it. There was no time to lose. Fritz Ehrlich had tried to
imitate my leap from the kitchen, but, failing to equal my distance,
had fallen into the water between the ships. And there the poor boy
was, digging his nails into the cracks in the ship's hull. Swimming
was out of the question, even if he knew anything about it. Besides,
the water was icy cold. To reach him from the deck with the means at
hand was impossible. So I grasped a piece of rope hanging from a rope
ladder and, letting myself down the side of the ship, tried every way
I could think of to lengthen my body as much as possible, till finally
Fritz was barely able to catch hold of my left foot, which reached
furthest down, while I held on above with my right hand. "Take hold,
Fritz!" But the doughty fellow, who may have realized that we should
both be lost if he really took a firm hold, contented himself with
laying his hand lightly upon the toe of my boot, and little as that
was, it nevertheless sufficed to keep his head above water. To be
sure, he may have been by natural endowment a "water treader," as they
are called; or he may have had the traditional luck of the
illegitimate, which seems to me on second thought more probable. In
any case he kept afloat till some people came from the shore and
reached a punt-pole down to him, while some others untied a boat
lying at Hannemann's Clapper and rowed it into the space between the
ships to fish him out. The moment that the saving punt-pole arrived
some man unknown to me reached down from the ladder, seized me by the
collar, and with a vigorous jerk hoisted me back on deck.

On this occasion not a word of reproach was uttered, though I could
not say as much of any other occasion of the kind. The people took
Fritz Ehrlich, drenched and freezing, to a house in the immediate
neighborhood, while the rest of us started home in a very humble frame
of mind. To be sure, I had also a feeling of elation, despite the fact
that my prospects for the future were not of the pleasantest. But my
fears were not realized. Quite the contrary. The following morning, as
I was starting to school, my father met me in the hall and stopped me.
Neighbor Pietzker, the good man with the nightcap, had been tattling
again, though with better intentions than usual.

"I've heard the whole business," said my father. "Why, in the name of
heaven, can't you be obedient! But we'll let it pass, since you
acquitted yourself so well. I know all the details. Pietzker across
the street ..."

Hereupon I was allowed to go to school.

SIR RIBBECK OF RIBBECK[3]

By THEODOR FONTANE

  Sir Ribbeck of Ribbeck in Havelland--
  A pear-tree in his yard did stand,
  And in the golden autumn-tide,
  When pears were shining far and wide,
  Sir Ribbeck, when barely the bells struck noon,
  Would stuff both his pockets with pears right soon.
  If a boy in clogs would come his way,
  He would call: "My boy, have a pear today?"
  To a girl he'd call: "Little maid over there,
  Now come here to me, and I'll give you a pear."
  And thus he did ever, as years went by,
  Till Sir Ribbeck of Ribbeck came to die.
  He felt his end coming, 'twas autumn-tide,
  And the pears were laughing, far and wide,
  Then spoke Sir Ribbeck: "And now I must die.
  Lay a pear in my grave, beside me to lie!"
  From the double-roofed house in three days more,
  Sir Ribbeck to his grave they bore.
  All the peasants and cotters with solemn face,
  Did sing: "Lord Jesus, in Thy Grace"--
  And the children moaned with hearts of lead:
  "Who will give us a pear? Now he is dead."
  Thus moaned the children--that was not good--
  Not knowing old Ribbeck as they should.
  The new, to be sure, is a miser hard;
  Over park and pear-tree he keeps stern guard.
  But the old, who this doubtless could foretell,
  Distrusting his son, he knew right well
  What he was about when he bade them lay
  A pear in his grave, on his dying day:

  Out of his silent haunt, in the third year,
  A little pear-tree shoot did soon appear.
  And many a year now comes and goes,
  But a pear-tree on the grave there grows,
  And in the golden autumn-tide,
  The pears are shining far and wide.
  When a boy o'er the grave-yard wends his way,
  The tree whispers: "Boy, have a pear today?"
  To a girl it says: "Little maid over there,
  Come here to me and I'll give you a pear."
     So there are blessings still from the hand
     Of Sir Ribbeck of Ribbeck in Havelland.

[Footnote 3: Translator: Margarete Münsterberg.]

THE BRIDGE BY THE TAY[4] (1879)

/#
"_When shall we three meet again_".--Macbeth
#/

  "When shall we three meet again?"
     "The dam of the bridge at seven attain!"
         "By the pier in the middle. I'll put out amain
  "The flames."
         "I too."
                   "I'll come from the north."
  "And I from the south."
                   "From the sea I'll soar forth."

  "Ha, that will be a merry-go-round,
   The bridge must sink into the ground."
  "And with the train what shall we do
   That crosses the bridge at seven?"
                       "That too."
  "That must go too!"
                       "A bawble, a naught,
   What the hand of man hath wrought!"

   The bridgekeeper's house that stands in the north--
   All windows to the south look forth,
   And the inmates there without peace or rest
   Are gazing southward with anxious zest;
   They gaze and wait a light to spy
   That over the water "I'm coming!" should cry,
  "I'm coming--night and storm are vain--
   I from Edinburg the train!"

   And the bridgekeeper says: "I see a gleam
   On the other shore. That's it, I deem.
   Now mother, away with bad dreams, for see,
   Our Johnnie is coming--he'll want his tree,
   And what is left of candles, light
   As if it were on Christmas night.
   Twice we shall have our Christmas cheer--
   In eleven minutes he must be here."

   It is the train, with the gale it vies
   And panting by the south tower flies.
   "There's the bridge still," says Johnnie. "But that's all right,
   We'll make it surely out of spite!
   A solid boiler and double steam
   Should win in such a fight, 'twould seem,
   Let it rave and rage and run at its bent,
   We'll put it down: this element!

   And our bridge is our pride. I must laugh always
   When I think back of the olden days,
   And all the trouble and misery
   That with the wretched boat would be;
   And many cheerful Christmas nights
   I spent at the ferryman's house--the lights
   From our windows I'd watch and count them o'er,
   And could not reach the other shore."

   The bridgekeeper's house that stands in the north--
   All windows to the south look forth,
   And the inmates there without peace or rest
   Are gazing southward with anxious zest:
   More furious grew the winds' wild games,
   And now, as if the sky poured flames,
   Comes shooting down a radiance bright
   O'er the water below.--Now again all is night.

  "When shall we three meet again?"
  "At midnight the top of the mountain attain!"
  "By the alder-stem on the high moorland plain!"
  "I'll come."
            "And I too."
                      "And the number I'll tell."
  "And I the names."
                      "I the torture right well."
  "Whoo!
            Like splinters the woodwork crashed in two."
                      "A bawble,--a naught,
   What the hand of man hath wrought!"

[Footnote 4: Translator: Margarete Münsterberg.]