Hyperion Part 9

These words were addressed to a pale, quiet-looking person, who sat opposite, and was busy in making a wretched, shaved poodle sit on his hind legs in a chair, by his master's side, and hold a short clay pipe in his mouth,--a performance to which the poodle seemed no wise inclined.

"Thou art challenged!" replied the pale Student, turning from his dog, who dropped the pipe from his mouth and leaped under the table.

Seconds were chosen on the spot; and the arms ordered; namely, six mighty goblets, or Ba.s.sglaser, filled to the brim with foaming beer. Three were placed before each duellist.

"Take your weapons!" cried one of the seconds, and each of the combatants seized a goblet in his hand.

"Strike!"

And the gla.s.ses rang, with a salutation like the crossing of swords.

"Set to!"

Each set the goblet to his lips.

"Out!"

And each poured the contents down his throat, as if he were pouring them through a tunnel into a beer-barrel. The other two gla.s.ses followed in quick succession, hardly a long breath drawn between. The pale Student was victorious. He was first to drain the third goblet. He held it for a moment inverted, to let the last drops fall out, and then placing it quietly on the table, looked his antagonist in the face, and said;

"Hit!"

Then, with the greatest coolness, he looked under the table and whistled for his dog. His antagonist stopped midway in his third gla.s.s. Every vein in his forehead seemed bursting; his eyes were wild and bloodshot, his hand gradually loosened its hold upon the table, and he sank and rolled together like a sheet of lead. He was drunk.

At this moment a majestic figure came stalking down the table, ghost-like, through the dim, smoky atmosphere. His coat was off, his neck bare, his hair wild, his eyes wide open, and looking right before him, as if he saw some beckoning hand in the air, that others could not see. His left hand was upon his hip, and in his right he held a drawn sword extended, and pointing downward. Regardless of every one, erect, and with a martial stride he marched directly along the centre of the table, crus.h.i.+ng gla.s.ses and overthrowing bottles at everystep. The students shrunk back at his approach; till at length one more drunk, or more courageous, than the rest, dashed a gla.s.s full of beer into his face. A general tumult ensued, and the student with the sword leaped to the floor. It was Von Kleist. He was renowning it. In the midst of the uproar could be distinguished the offensive words;

"Arrogant! Absurd! Impertinent! Dummer Junge!"

Von Kleist went home that night with no less than six duels on his hands. He fought them all out in as many days; and came off with only a gash through his upper lip and another through his right eyelid from a dexterous Suabian Schlaeger.

CHAPTER V. THE WHITE LADY'S SLIPPER AND THE Pa.s.sION-FLOWER.

That night Emma of Ilmenau went to her chamber with a heavy heart, and her dusky eyes were troubled with tears. She was one of those gentle beings, who seem created only to love and to be loved.

A shade of melancholy softened her character. She shunned the glare of daylight and of society, and wished to be alone. Like the evening primrose, her heart opened only after sunset; but bloomed through the dark night with sweet fragrance. Her mother, on the contrary, flaunted in the garish light of society. There was no sympathy between them. Their souls never approached, never understood each other, and words were often spoken which wounded deeply. And therefore Emma of Ilmenau went to her chamber that night with tears in her eyes.

She was followed by her French chamber-maid, Madeleine, a native of Stra.s.sburg, who had grown old in the family. In her youth, she had been poor,--and virtuous because she had never been tempted; and, now that she had grown old, and seen no immediate reward for her virtue, as is usual with weak minds, she despaired of Providence, and regretted she had never been tempted. Whilst this unfortunate personage was lighting the wax tapers on the toilet, and drawing the bed-curtains, and tattling about the room, Emma threw herself into an arm-chair, and, crossing her hands in her lap, and letting her head fall upon her bosom, seemed lost in a dream.

"Why have these gentle feelings been given me!" said she in her heart. "Why have I been born with all these warm affections,--these ardent longings after what is good, if they lead only to sorrow and disappointment? I would love some one;--love him once and forever;--devote myselfto him alone,--live for him,--die for him,-- exist alone in him! But alas! in all this wide world there is none to love me, as I would be loved,--none whom I may love, as I am capable of loving. How empty, how desolate, seems the world about me! Why has Heaven given me these affections, only to fall and fade!"

Alas! poor child! thou too must learn like others, that the sublime mystery of Providence goes on in silence, and gives no explanation of itself,--no answer to our impatient questionings!

"Bless me, child, what ails you?" exclaimed Madeleine, perceiving that Emma paid no attention to her idle gossip. "When I was of your age--"

"Do not talk to me now, good Madeleine. Leave me, I wish to be alone?"

"Well, here is something," continued the maid, taking a billet from her bosom, "which I hope will enliven you. When I was of your age--"

"Hus.h.!.+ hus.h.!.+" said Emma, taking the billetfrom the hard hand of Madeleine. "Once more I beg you, leave me! I wish to be alone!"

Madeleine took the lamp and retired slowly, wis.h.i.+ng her young mistress many good nights and rosy dreams. Emma broke the seal of the note. As she read, her face became deadly pale, and then, as quick as thought, a crimson blush gleamed on her cheek, and her hands trembled. Tenderness, pity, love, offended pride, the weakness and dignity of woman, were all mingled in her look, changing and pa.s.sing over her fine countenance like cloud-shadows. She sunk back in her chair, covering her face with her hands, as if she would hide it from herself and Heaven.

"He loves me!" said she to herself; "loves me; and is married to another, whom he loves not! and dares to tell me this! O, never,-- never,--never! And yet he is so friendless and alone in this unsympathizing world,--and an exile, and homeless! I can but pity him;--yet I hate him, and will see him no more!"

This short reverie of love and hate was brokenby the sound of a clear, mellow voice, which, in the universal stillness of the hour, seemed almost like the voice of a spirit. It was a voice, without the accompaniment of any instrument, singing those sweet lines of Goethe;

"Under the tree-tops is quiet now!

In all the woodlands hearest thou

Not a sound!

The little birds are asleep in the trees,

Wait! wait! and soon like these,

Sleepest thou!"

Emma knew the voice and started. She rushed to the window to close it. It was a beautiful night, and the stars were s.h.i.+ning peacefully over the mountain of All-Saints. The sound of the Neckar was soft and low, and nightingales were singing among the brown shadows of the woods. The large red moon shone, like a ruby, in the horizon's ample ring; and golden threads of light seemed braided together with the rippling current of the river. Tall and spectral stood the white statues on the bridge. The outline of thehills, the castle, the arches of the bridge, and the spires and roofs of the town were as strongly marked as if cut out of pasteboard. Amid this fairy scene, a little boat was floating silently down the stream.

Emma closed the window hastily, and drew the curtains close.

"I hate him; and yet I will pray for him," said she, as she laid her weary head upon that pillow, from which, but a few months before, she thought she should never raise it again. "O, that I had died then! I dare not love him, but I will pray for him!"

Sweet child! If the face of the deceiver comes so often between thee and Heaven, I tremble for thy fate! The plant that sprang from Helen's tears destroyed serpents;--would that from thine might spring up heart's-ease;--some plant, at least, to destroy the serpents in thy bosom. Believe me, upon the margin of celestial streams alone, those simples grow, which cure the heartache!

And this the silent stars beheld, looking downfrom heaven, and told it not again. This, likewise, the Frau Himmelhahn beheld, looking from her chamber-window, and was not so discreet as the silent stars.

CHAPTER VI. GLIMPSES INTO CLOUD-LAND.

"There are many things, which, having no corporeal evidence, can be perceived and comprehended only by the discursive energies of reason. Hence the ambiguous nature of matter can be comprehended only by adulterated opinion. Matter is the principle of all bodies, and is stamped with the impression of forms. Fire, air, and water derive their origin and principle from the scalene triangle. But the earth was created from right-angled triangles, of which two of the sides are equal. The sphere and the pyramid contain in themselves the figure of fire; but the octaedron was destined to be the figure of air, and the icosaedron of water. The right-angled isosceles triangle produces from itself a square, andthe square generates from itself the cube, which is the figure peculiar to earth. But the figure of a beautiful and perfect sphere was imparted to the most beautiful and perfect world, that it might be indigent of nothing, but contain all things, embracing and comprehending them in itself, and thus might be excellent and admirable, similar to and in concord with itself, ever moving musically and melodiously. If I use a novel language, excuse me. As Apuleius says, pardon must be granted to novelty of words, when it serves to ill.u.s.trate the obscurity of things."

These words came from the lips of the lion-like philosopher, who has been noticed before in these pages. He was sitting with Flemming, smoking a long pipe. As the Baron said, he was indeed a strange owl; for the owl is a grave bird; a monk, who chants midnight ma.s.s in the great temple of Nature;--an anchorite,--a pillar saint,--the very Simeon Stylites of his neighbourhood. Such, likewise, was the philosophical Professor. Solitary, but with a mighty current, flowed the river of his life, like the Nile, without a tributary stream, and making fertile only a single strip in the vast desert. His temperament had been in youth a joyous one; and now, amid all his sorrows and privations, for he had many, he looked upon the world as a glad, bright, glorious world. On the many joys of life he gazed still with the eyes of childhood, from the far-gone Past upward, trusting, hoping;--and upon its sorrows with the eyes of age, from the distant Future, downward, triumphant, not despairing. He loved solitude, and silence, and candle-light, and the deep midnight. "For," said he, "if the morning hours are the wings of the day, I only fold them about me to sleep more sweetly; knowing that, at its other extremity, the day, like the fowls of the air, has an epicurean morsel,--a parson's nose; and on this oily midnight my spirit revels and is glad."

Such was the Professor, who had been talking in a half-intelligible strain for two hours or more. The Baron had fallen fast asleep in his chair; but Flemming sat listening with excited imagination, and the Professor continued in the following words, which, to the best of his listener's memory, seemed gleaned here and there from Fichte's Destiny of Man, and Shubert's History of the Soul.

"Life is one, and universal; its forms many and individual.

Throughout this beautiful and wonderful creation there is never-ceasing motion, without rest by night or day, ever weaving to and fro. Swifter than a weaver's shuttle it flies from Birth to Death, from Death to Birth; from the beginning seeks the end, and finds it not, for the seeming end is only a dim beginning of a new out-going and endeavour after the end. As the ice upon the mountain, when the warm breath of the summer sun breathes upon it, melts, and divides into drops, each of which reflects an image of the sun; so life, in the smile of G.o.d's love, divides itself into separate forms, each bearing in it and reflecting an image of G.o.d's love. Of all these forms the highest and most perfect inits G.o.d-likeness is the human soul. The vast cathedral of Nature is full of holy scriptures, and shapes of deep, mysterious meaning; but all is solitary and silent there; no bending knee, no uplifted eye, no lip adoring, praying. Into this vast cathedral comes the human soul, seeking its Creator; and the universal silence is changed to sound, and the sound is harmonious, and has a meaning, and is comprehended and felt. It was an ancient saying of the Persians, that the waters rush from the mountains and hurry forth into all the lands to find the Lord of the Earth; and the flame of the Fire, when it awakes, gazes no more upon the ground, but mounts heavenward to seek the Lord of Heaven; and here and there the Earth has built the great watch-towers of the mountains, and they lift their heads far up into the sky, and gaze ever upward and around, to see if the Judge of the World comes not! Thus in Nature herself, without man, there lies a waiting, and hoping, a looking and yearning, after an unknown somewhat. Yes; when, above there, where the mountain lifts its head over all others, that it may be alone with the clouds and storms of heaven, the lonely eagle looks forth into the gray dawn, to see if the day comes not! when, by the mountain torrent, the brooding raven listens to hear if the chamois is returning from his nightly pasture in the valley; and when the soon uprising sun calls out the spicy odors of the thousand flowers, the Alpine flowers, with heaven's deep blue and the blush of sunset on their leaves;--then there awakes in Nature, and the soul of man can see and comprehend it, an expectation and a longing for a future revelation of G.o.d's majesty.

It awakens, also, when in the fulness of life, field and forest rest at noon, and through the stillness is heard only the song of the gra.s.shopper and the hum of the bee; and when at evening the singing lark, up from the sweet-smelling vineyards rises, or in the later hours of night Orion puts on his s.h.i.+ning armour, to walk forth in the fields of heaven. But in the soul of man alone is this longing changed to certainty and fulfilled. For lo! thelight of the sun and the stars s.h.i.+nes through the air, and is nowhere visible and seen; the planets hasten with more than the speed of the storm through infinite s.p.a.ce, and their footsteps are not heard, but where the sunlight strikes the firm surface of the planets, where the stormwind smites the wall of the mountain cliff, there is the one seen and the other heard. Thus is the glory of G.o.d made visible, and may be seen, where in the soul of man it meets its likeness changeless and firm-standing. Thus, then, stands Man;--a mountain on the boundary between two worlds;--its foot in one, its summit far-rising into the other. From this summit the manifold landscape of life is visible, the way of the Past and Perishable, which we have left behind us; and, as we evermore ascend, bright glimpses of the daybreak of Eternity beyond us!"

Flemming would fain have interrupted this discourse at times, to answer and inquire, but the Professor went on, warming and glowing more andmore. At length, there was a short pause, and Flemming said;