A Tramp's Wallet Part 17

CAUSE AND EFFECT.

One September evening we rode into Carlsruhe. We made our entry in a crazy hackney cab behind a lazy horse that had been dragging us for a long time with cheerless industry between a double file of trees, along a road without a bend in it; a long, lanky, Quaker road, heavily drab-coated with dust; a tight-rope of a road that comes from Manheim, and is hooked on to the capital of Baden. Out of that _allee_ we were dragged into the square-cut capital itself, which had evidently been planned by the genius of a ruler-not a prince, but the wooden measure.

The horse stopped at the City of Pfortzheim, and as his decision on the subject of our halting-place appeared to be irrevocable, we got out.

At the capital of a grand dukedom, except Weimar, it is better to sleep (it is the only thing to be done there) and pa.s.s on; but it so happened that on that particular evening Carlsruhe was in a ferment: there was something brewing. I heard talk of a procession and of certain names, particularly the names Kugelblitz and Thalermacher. Never having heard those names before, and caring therefore nothing in the world about them, I tumbled into bed. To my delight, when I got up in the morning, I found the little town turned upside down. Landlord, boots, and chambermaid, overwhelmed me with exclamations, surmises, and incoherent summaries of the night's news. There had been an outbreak. _Lieber Herr_, a revolution! One entire house razed to the ground. "Hep! hep!" that is the old cry, "Down with the Jews!" All their bones would be made powder of. Tremendous funeral of Kugelblitz. Students on their way in a body from Heidelberg. Thalermacher the rich Jew, soldiers, the entire court, Meinheer, all in despair; a regular sack. Not only Kugelblitz, but Demboffsky, the Russian officer, killed. O hep! hep! a lamentable tragedy. "For they were two such fine-looking young men," mourned the chambermaid, "especially Demboffsky." "You had better," said the landlord, "stay in Carlsruhe till to-morrow."

Roused by the incoherent tidings, I hurried to the centre of the tumult.

The house of the firm of Thalermacher and Company was situated in the High Street; and though, certainly, it had a doleful look, it was there situated still: it held its ground. Not a brick was displaced; but-gaunt and windowless, disfigured with great blotches of ink and dirt, its little shop rent from the wall and split up into f.a.ggots-it looked like a house out of which all life had been knocked; but there was the carcase.

In the street before the house, there were by that time a few splinters of furniture remaining; the rest had been broken up or hidden by kind and cunning neighbours. The shop had been cobbled together with the broken shutters; and half-a-dozen soldiers, quite at their ease, were lounging pleasantly about the broken door.

The outbreak, I was told by the bystanders, was quite unpremeditated. A few stragglers had halted before the house at about eight o'clock on the preceding evening, and had been discussing there the dreadful tale connected with its owner. One gossip, in a sudden burst of anger, hurled a bottle of ink-then by chance in his hand-at the Jew's house. The idea was taken up with such good will that a hard rain of stones, bottles, and other missiles was soon pelting against Thalermacher's walls. Where all are unanimous it is not difficult to come to a conclusion. An hour's labour, lightened by yells and shouts of "Hep, hep!" was enough; and, the zeal of the people burning like a fire, soon left of the house nothing but its sh.e.l.l.

The authorities in Germany, usually so watchful and so prompt to interfere, were either taken completely off their guard, or tacitly permitted the rude work of vengeance; for, although there was a guard-post in the immediate vicinity, the whole efforts of the military were confined to conducting Thalermacher and his family into a place of safety. The protection Thalermacher received was of a peculiar kind.

Under the plea of insuring him against public attack, he was conducted under escort, to the fortress of Rastadt, and there held a close prisoner, until the whole affair could be investigated.

The funeral procession of Lieutenant Kugelblitz was not a thing to be missed. I went, therefore, to the other end of the city, whence the procession was to start. The scene was impressive. Not merely his brothers-in-arms of the artillery, but the general-staff-all the officers of distinction in the Baden army, whose duties allowed them to be present-and even the Russian companions of his antagonist Demboffsky, acted as mourners.

As the procession came before the house of Thalermacher, I observed that a strong guard had been posted there for its protection. The funeral pa.s.sed by without any demonstration whatever. Presently we turned up a narrow pa.s.sage, leading from the high street towards the cemetery, and our progress became tediously slow as we moved with the close ma.s.s of people. At the burial-place every mound and stone was occupied. Flowers were trampled under foot, shrubs broken or uprooted, and the gra.s.s all stamped into the mould. The whole crowd listened to the impressive tone-only a few could hear the words-of the funeral harangue, and to the solemn hymn which followed. The service closed with the military honour of musketry fired over the soldier's grave. That over, I was sucked back by the retreating tide of citizens into the main street of Carlsruhe.

The crowd instantly dispersed; and, as I wandered through the side streets, I soon saw that the authorities had come to life. My attention was first called to an official announcement freshly posted, which warned all persons from a.s.sembling in the public street in knots or cl.u.s.ters, even of three or four, on pain of being instantly dispersed by the military. Another placard fulminated an injunction to parents, masters, and burghers to restrain and confine all persons under their charge-such as workmen, servants, and children-within their respective houses; because, for any offence committed by them against the public peace, such masters or parents would be held responsible. I began to fancy myself in a state of siege. Wandering again into the main street I was met by a strong division of dusty dragoons, in full equipment of war, which came sweeping and clas.h.i.+ng along from adjacent parts of the country, evidently under urgent orders. Another and another followed. Troops of infantry tramped hastily along the side streets. The very few civilians I met in the streets seemed to be hurrying to shelter from a coming storm. Was there really any social tempest in the wind? Or were all these precautions but a locking of the stable door after the steed was stolen?

Having roamed by chance into a sequestered beer-house, I was surprised to find myself in the midst of a large party of students; probably from Heidelberg. They were well-grown youths, with silken blond beards; and in their behaviour, half-swaggerers, half-gentlemen. These were, perhaps, the enemies of order against whom the tremendous military preparations had been made.

As the day wore on it became evident that the authorities were ready to brave the most overwhelming revolution that ever burst forth. Troop after troop of cavalry galloped in; every soldier, indeed, of whatever arm stationed within an available distance of Carlsruhe, was brought within its walls. By eight o'clock in the evening the military preparations were completed: a picket of infantry was stationed at every street corner; and, from that hour to the break of day, parties of dragoons swept the main thoroughfares, clas.h.i.+ng and clattering over the paved road with a din that kept me awake all night. Intercourse between one street and another, except on urgent business, was interdicted; and the humblest pedestrian found abroad without an urgent errand was conducted home with drums beating, colours flying, and all the honours of war. The display of force answered its purpose in preventing a second attack of Christians on Jews. The pale ghost of insubordination was laid and dared not walk abroad-especially at night.

I must say I felt a little relieved when it was ascertained for certain that the city was safe. I am no friend to despotism nor to political thraldom of any kind; but really it is impossible not to feel for the solemn aristocracies of German Grand-Duchies (who, if they be despots, are extremely amiable) when, poor people, they are in the least put out of their way: they are so dreadfully fussy, so fearfully piteous, so distraught, so inconsolable. I was glad therefore that, the revolution being put down, they could retire in peace to their coffee, their picquet, and their metaphysics. Doubtless Thalermacher (some Hebrew millionaire, perhaps) and Kugelblitz (a fire-eater, for certain) had headed a frightful band of anarchists; who, but for the indomitable energy of the authorities, would peradventure have changed the destiny of the entire Duchy, of Germany, of Europe itself! Nothing but so illimitable an apprehension could have been the cause of such a siege-like effect. What else could have occasioned the entire blockade of Carlsruhe?

I had, however, exaggerated the cause as well as the danger; and I will now relate the real circ.u.mstances which had led to all these awful results; for the facts were afterwards made known in the Carlsruhe and Baden-Baden public journals of the day.

Early in the month of August, eighteen hundred and forty-three, the inhabitants of Baden-Baden gave a ball in honour of the Grand-Princess Helene of Baden, and the d.u.c.h.ess of Na.s.sau. Among the names on the subscription-list stood that of Herr h.e.l.ler von Thalermacher. Some unexplained animosity existed between this gentleman and Lieutenant Kugelblitz, who was also one of the subscribers.

Baron Donner von Kugelblitz, chief lieutenant of the Baden artillery, although only in his twenty-ninth year, had already spent fourteen years in military service, and was highly esteemed for his soldierly qualities and straightforward bearing. He was tall, remarkably handsome, of an impetuous temperament, and his natural strength had been well developed by constant practice in manly and athletic exercises. Herr h.e.l.ler von Thalermacher, or rather the firm of which he was the prominent member, was distinguished for qualities far different, but equally deserving of goodwill. The banking-house of Thalermacher was one of the most responsible in South Germany; and, at great expense and sacrifice, had introduced into the grand, but by no means affluent, duchy of Baden several branches of industry, which had enriched the ducal treasury, and furnished employment for thousands of industrious subjects. It had revived the almost extinguished mining interest; had introduced extensive spinning machinery; and had established a factory for the manufacture of beetroot sugar.

Lieutenant Kugelblitz, to whose opinion deference was due, expressed himself in such offensive terms with respect to Herr von Thalermacher, in relation to the ball, that the gentlemen who had prepared the subscription-list at once erased the objectionable name: Herr von Thalermacher at once demanded satisfaction from his accuser, but this Lieutenant Kugelblitz refused, on the ground that the banker was not respectable enough for powder and shot. Hereupon two courts of honour were formed, one composed of gentlemen civilians in Baden-Baden, and the other of the officers in Carlsruhe. Both appeared to have been called together at the wish of Lieutenant Kugelblitz, to inquire into and p.r.o.nounce upon the point at issue. The civilians came to no decision.

The military court of honour put the result of its deliberations in the _Carlsruhe Zeitung_, as a public advertis.e.m.e.nt, couched in these terms: "The Herr von Kugelblitz may not fight with the Herr von Thalermacher."

Thus posted as a scamp, Thalermacher advertised back his own defence; and, by public circulars and bills, declared the accusation of Kugelblitz to be false and malicious, and his behaviour dishonourable and cowardly.

At the same time, a Russian officer of good family,-Demboffsky-who had acted throughout as negotiator and friend on the part of Thalermacher, and who felt himself deeply compromised by the imputations put forth against his princ.i.p.al, declared publicly that the military court which had condemned the Herr von Thalermacher, after hearing only his accuser, was a one-sided and absurd tribunal, and that it was not competent to give any decision.

The result of this declaration was a challenge from Lieutenant Kugelblitz. Demboffsky said that he was quite willing to give his challenger the satisfaction he demanded, on condition that he should first arrange his quarrel with Herr Thalermacher, as became a gentleman.

On the night of the first of September (at the beginning of our English shooting season), the Russian being on a visit to his friend Thalermacher, in his apartments, a.s.sured him in the most positive terms that he would keep promise, and would make no hostile arrangement with Lieutenant Kugelblitz. Prince Trubetzkoi and other friends then present completely coincided in this mode of action. At half-past eleven at night, Demboffsky quitted his friend, and hastened homewards. Be had advanced only a few steps on the road, when suddenly two figures strode up to him, and stayed his progress. He at once recognised Kugelblitz, and a Spaniard named Manillo, who had lived for many years in Germany.

"Will you fight with me?" shouted Kugelblitz in a pa.s.sion.

The Russian, although taken completely by surprise, replied that he would do as he had already said. He would fight with Senor Manillo at once if it were thought desirable; but he would engage in no hostilities with Kugelblitz, until the quarrel with Thalermacher was adjusted. Great was the wrath of Kugelblitz. He clenched his fist, shook it in the face of Demboffsky, and demanded furiously that he should give his word of honour to fight him in the morning. The Russian, who expected bodily violence, then said that since the insult had been pushed so far, there remained no other course open to him, than to accept the challenge; which he accordingly did, pledging himself to meet Kugelblitz on the morrow. He then hastened back to his friend Thalermacher, and related the occurrence to him.

On the following day the duel took place. It happened that Lieutenant Kugelblitz was under orders to mark out the artillery practice-ground at Hardwald, near Rastadt, and as he could not leave his post, the meeting took place in its neighbourhood. The two officers stood forward in deadly opposition with a measured distance of ten paces only.

Nevertheless, the first fire was without result; but, at the second fire, Kugelblitz was struck in the breast; yet he still held his weapon undischarged. He pressed his left hand on the wound as he pulled the trigger with his right. The pistol missed fire. Another cap was placed upon the nipple, but it also failed. The second of Demboffsky then handed another weapon to the dying man; who, with quiet resolution, still closing his wound with his fingers, drew for the third time upon his opponent, and with such effect, that, uttering a wild cry, and the words "_Je suis mort_!" "I am dead!" the Russian leapt up into the air, and then rolled upon the ground a corpse. Kugelblitz, exhausted by the efforts he had made to die like a gentleman, sank into the arms of his second, Manillo, and was carried insensible to Carlsruhe. He died at noon on the second day after the duel.

Thereupon the discerning and indignant public, a little bia.s.sed-as it too often has been in Germany-against the Jews in general, gutted the house of Herr von Thalermacher.

The state also fell in with the common notion; and, under the plea of sheltering an injured man, lodged him in prison for eleven days. Seals were also placed upon his papers and apartments. The State then set about ascertaining privately in how far the victim of mob law had been guilty of the mischief which by general acclamation was imputed to him.

After a hunt through the banker's desk, and an inspection of his drawers, the decision of the court tribunal of Rastadt was delivered. It was ordered that the Herr h.e.l.ler von Thalermacher be forthwith liberated from the fortress of Rastadt, free and untainted. Further: that the seals be removed from his apartments and papers, seeing that nothing among them had been found which could cast the faintest shadow upon his reputation.

We had all been yelling at the wrong man. Kugelblitz was, after all, the author of the tragedy.

CHAPTER XXIII.

GREECE AND HER DELIVERER.

Four happy tramps in company, we pa.s.sed the frontiers of Austria and Bavaria, near Berchtesgaden, in the hazy s.h.i.+mmering of an autumn morning sun. We came from the lakes and mountain regions of Upper Austria, and already yearned towards Munich, the Bavarian capital, as our next station and brief resting place. The sun seemed to have melted into the air, for we walked through it rather than beneath it, and sought in vain for coolness and shelter among the plum trees which lined the public road.

Halting as the night closed in at the frontier town, Reichenhall, with its quaint old streets, and its distant fortress, casting a lengthened protective shadow over the place, we felt the indescribable luxury of the foot-traveller's rest; as readily enjoyed at such times on a litter of straw in the common room of an alehouse as between the c.u.mbersome comforts of two German feather beds. Both the ale and the feather beds were at our service at Reichenhall, and we did not neglect them.

In the morning our road lay by sombre, romantic Traunstein, and what was better still, by the glistening waters of the lake of Chiem, whose broad surface was so unruffled, that the wide expanse seemed to lie in a hollow, and a delicious coolness whispered rather than blew across its tranquil waves. The day was waning as we made a half circuit round the edge of the lake, and the deepening night only stayed our steps and drove us to rest, after a march of twenty-four miles, in the village of Seebruck. At Rosenheim we were challenged by the Bavarian sentinel, who held post on a stone bridge leading to the town, but it was rather in kindliness than suspicion; and with some useful information as to our route, and a cheering valediction, we pursued our way. The villages of Weisham and Aibling lay before us, and must be pa.s.sed before night; and it was in the immediate neighbourhood of these places, although I confess to some indistinctness as to the precise locality, that we came upon an object which at once surprised and delighted us.

By the side of the road, on a slight elevation, stood a beautiful stone monument, of the purest Grecian architecture, and of the most delicate workmans.h.i.+p. It was fresh and sharp from the chisel of the sculptor, and looked so stately and graceful in the midst of the level landscape and simple village scenery that we halted spontaneously to examine it. "Can it be the memorial of some battle?" exclaimed one. "Or a devotional shrine?" "Or a tomb?" Not any one of these. Its purpose was as singular as the sentiment it expressed would have been beautiful and touching, but for its presumption. Graven deeply into the stone were words in the German language to this effect: "This monument is raised in remembrance of the parting of Louis, King of Bavaria, with his second son Otho, who here left his bereaved father to become the Deliverer of Greece." As we stood and read these words the vision of the fond father and proud king, taking his last farewell of the son whom he fondly believed destined to fulfil so great a mission, floated before us, to be replaced the next instant by the no less eloquent picture of the court of the then King Otho, a German colony in the midst of the Greek people, living upon its blood, and wantoning with its treasure; and of this same Greek people, driven at length into fury by the rapacity of the hated Tudesca, who filled every position of authority and grasped at every office of emolument, and hunting them like a routed army out of the land.

Still there was a depth of paternal affection in the words upon the monument, which impressed us with respect, as the miniature temple, with its delicate columns and cla.s.sical proportions, had inspired us with admiration.

We pursued our way along the dull road, now halting a moment to cool our fevered feet, now restlessly s.h.i.+fting our knapsacks in the vain hope of lightening the burden, when, being in the immediate neighbourhood of the village of Aibling, we came upon a second monument equally cla.s.sical in form, though of less pretensions than the first. A twice-told tale, uttered this time in a woman's accents; for the block of stone repeated the same story in almost identical words.

"Here the Queen of Bavaria parted with her beloved second son Otho, only comforted in her affliction by the knowledge that he has left her to become the Deliverer of Greece."

The hopes of the King and Queen of Bavaria, thus unluckily commemorated by these monuments, were no less at that time the hopes and the belief of all Europe-with what little of prophetic spirit full twenty years of experience has shown. Greece, swarming with Bavarian adventurers, till goaded to the utmost she drove them from her bosom; Greece, bankrupt, apathetic, and ungrateful; a Greek port blockaded by the s.h.i.+ps of her first defender, and her vessels held in p.a.w.n for the payment of a miserable debt; Greece, piratical, dissembling, and rebellious, aiding in her weak and greedy ambition the worst enemy of Europe-so runs the story-but Greek deliverance not yet. Her joint occupation by French and English forces, and the possible imposition of a provisional government, may indeed lead to the unprophesied consummation-her deliverance-from King Otho.

No doubt, those monuments of mingled weakness and arrogance still whiten in the air; as for us, we continued our march towards the Bavarian capital, slept at a pilgrimage church that night, and on the following morning made a bargain with the driver of a country cart who had overtaken us, and seated on the rough timber which formed his load, jolted into Munich.

King Louis then reigned in Bavaria, but being so indifferent a prophet could not foresee his own speedy abdication.

CHAPTER XXIV.

THE FRENCH WORKMAN.

The original stuff out of which a French workman is made, is a street boy of fourteen years old, or, perhaps, twelve. That young _gamin de Paris_ can sing as many love ditties and drinking songs as there are hairs upon his head, before he knows how much is nine times seven. He prefers always the agreeable to the useful: he knows how to dance all the quadrilles: he knows how to make grimaces of ten thousand sorts one after the other without stopping, and at the rate of twenty in a minute. Of his other attainments, I say little. It is possible that he may have been to one of the elementary schools set up by the Government; or, it may be that he knows not how to read; although, by Article 10 of a law pa.s.sed in eighteen hundred and thirty-three, it was determined that no chief town of a department, or chief place of a commune, containing more than six thousand inhabitants, should be without at least one elementary school for public instruction.

Such as the boy may be, he is made an apprentice. He needs no act, or, as you say in England, indenture. His contract has to be attested at the Prefecture of Police, Bureau of Pa.s.sports, Section of Livrets. Formerly, it was the custom in France for the apprentice to be both fed and lodged by his master; but, as the patron seldom received money with him, he was mainly fed on cuffs. Apprentices.h.i.+p in Paris, which is France, begins at ages differing according to the nature of the trade. If strength be wanted, the youth is apprenticed at eighteen, but otherwise, perhaps, at fourteen. There are in Paris nineteen thousand apprentices dispersed among two hundred and seventy branches of trade.

Of all the apprentices whose number has been just named, only one in five is bound by a written agreement with his master. The rest have a verbal understanding. The youths commonly are restless; and, since they are apt to change their minds, the business of the master is not so much to teach them as to obtain value for himself as soon as he can out of their labour. It is the apprentice who is sent out to take orders in the town, and to play the part of messenger. In consequence of the looseness of the tie, it often happens that a thoughtless parent, when his son is able to earn wages, tells the youth that his master is sucking him and fattening upon his unpaid labour; that he might earn money for the house at home. The youth is glad to earn, and throws up his apprentices.h.i.+p for independent work. It soon occurs to him that his parents are sucking him, and that his earnings ought to be for himself, and not for them. He then throws up his home dependence, as he had thrown up dependence on his master, takes a lodging, falls into careless company, and works on, a half-skilled labourer, receiving all his life a less income than he could have a.s.sured to himself by a few years of early perseverance.