O. T., A Danish Romance Part 2

"And a lovely melody!" added Otto.

"Yes, but they sing falsely!" answered Wilhelm: "one sings half a tone too low, the other half a tone too high!"

"Now, thank G.o.d that I cannot hear that!" said Otto. "It sounds sweetly, and the little one might become a singer. Poor child!" added he gravely: "bare feet, wet to the very skin; and then the elder one will certainly lead him to brandy drinking! Within a month, perhaps, the voice will be gone! Then is the nightingale dead!" He quickly threw down some skillings, wrapped in paper.

"Come up!" cried Wilhelm, and beckoned. The eldest of the boys flew up like an arrow; Wilhelm, however, said it was the youngest who was meant.

The others remained standing before the door; the youngest stepped in.

"Whose son art thou?" asked Wilhelm. The boy was silent, and cast down his eyes in an embarra.s.sed manner. "Now, don't be bashful! Thou art of a good family--that one can see from thy appearance! Art not thou thy mother's son? I will give thee stockings and--the deuce! here is a pair of boots which are too small for me; if thou dost not get drowned in them they shall be thy property: but now thou must sing." And he seated himself at the piano-forte and struck the keys. "Now, where art thou?"

he cried, rather displeased. The little one gazed upon the ground.

"How! dost thou weep; or is it the rain which hangs in thy black eyelashes?" said Otto, and raised his head: "we only wish to do thee a kindness. There--thou hast another skilling from me."

The little one still remained somewhat laconic. All that they learned was that he was named Jonas, and that his grandmother thought so much of him.

"Here thou hast the stockings!" said Wilhelm; "and see here! a coat with a velvet collar, a much-to-be-prized keepsake! The boots! Thou canst certainly stick both legs into one boot! See! that is as good as having two pairs to change about with! Let us see!"

The boy's eyes sparkled with joy; the boots he drew on, the stockings went into his pocket, and the bundle he took under his arm.

"But thou must sing us a little song!" said Wilhelm, and the little one commenced the old song out of the "Woman-hater," "Cupid never can be trusted!"

The lively expression in the dark eyes, the boy himself in his wet, wretched clothes and big boots, with the bundle under his arm; nay, the whole had something so characteristic in it, that had it been painted, and had the painter called the picture "Cupid on his Wanderings," every one would have found the little G.o.d strikingly excellent, although he were not blind.

"Something might be made of the boy and of his voice!" said Wilhelm, when little Jonas, in a joyous mood, had left the house with the other lads.

"The poor child!" sighed Otto. "I have fairly lost my good spirits through all this. It seizes upon me so strangely when I see misery and genius mated. Once there came to our estate in Jutland a man who played the Pandean-pipes, and at the same time beat the drum and cymbals: near him stood a little girl, and struck the triangle. I was forced to weep over this spectacle; without understanding how it was, I felt the misery of the poor child. I was myself yet a mere boy."

"He looked so comic in the big boots that I became quite merry, and not grave," said Wilhelm. "Nevertheless what a pity it is that such gentle blood, which at the first glance one perceives he is, that such a pretty child should become a rude fellow, and his beautiful voice change into a howl, like that with which the other tall Laban saluted us. Who knows whether little Jonas might not become the first singer on the Danish stage? Yes, if he received education of mind and voice, who knows? I could really have, pleasure in attempting it, and help every one on in the world, before I myself am rightly in the way!"

"If he is born to a beggar's estate," said Otto, "let him as beggar live and die, and learn nothing higher. That is better, that is more to be desired!"

Wilhelm seated himself at the piano-forte, and played some of his own compositions. "That is difficult," said he; "every one cannot play that."

"The simpler the sweeter!" replied Otto.

"You must not speak about music!" returned the friend "upon that you know not how to pa.s.s judgment. Light Italian operas are not difficult to write."

In the evening the friends separated. Whilst Otto took his hat, there was a low knock at the door. Wilhelm opened it. Without stood a poor old woman, with pale sharp features; by the hand she led a little boy--it was Jonas: thus then it was a visit from him and his grandmother.

The other boys had sold the boots and shoes which had been given him.

They ought to have a share, they maintained. This atrocious injustice had induced the old grandmother to go immediately with little Jonas to the two good gentlemen, and relate how little the poor lad had received of flint which they had a.s.signed to him alone.

Wilhelm spoke of the boy's sweet voice, and thought that by might make his fortune at the theatre; but then he ought not now to be left running about with bare feet in the wind and rain.

"But by this means he brings a skilling home," said the old woman.

"That's what his father and mother look to, and the skilling they can always employ. Nevertheless she had herself already thought of bringing him out at the theatre,--but that was to have been in dancing, for they got shoes and stockings to dance in, and with these they might also run home; and that would be an advantage."

"I will teach the boy music!" said Wilhelm; "he can come to me sometimes."

"And then he will, perhaps, get a little cast-off clothing, good sir,"

said the grandmother; "a s.h.i.+rt, or a waistcoat, just as it happens?"

"Become a tailor, or shoemaker," said Otto, gravely, and laid his hand upon the boy's head.

"He shall be a genius!" said Wilhelm.

CHAPTER IV

"Christmas-tide, When in the wood the snow s.h.i.+nes bright."

OEHLENSCHLaGER'S Helge

We again let several weeks pa.s.s by; it was Christmas Eve, which brings us the beautiful Christmas festival. We find the two friends taking a walk.

Describe to an inhabitant of the south a country where the earth appears covered with the purest Carrara marble, where the tree twigs resemble white branches of coral sprinkled with diamonds, and above a sky as blue as that belonging to the south, and he will say that is a fairy land.

Couldst thou suddenly remove him from his dark cypresses and olive-trees to the north, where the fresh snow lies upon the earth, where the white h.o.a.r-frost has powdered the trees over, and the sun s.h.i.+nes down from the blue heaven, then would he recognize the description and call the north a fairy land.

This was the splendor which the friends admired. The large trees upon the fortification-walls appeared crystallized when seen against the blue sky. The Sound was not yet frozen over; vessels, illuminated by the red evening sun, glided past with spread sails. The Swedish coast seemed to have approached nearer; one might see individual houses in Landskrona.

It was lovely, and on this account there were many promenaders upon the walls and the Langelinie.

"Sweden seems so near that one might swim over to it!" said Wilhelm.

"The distance would be too far," answered Otto; "but I should love to plunge among the deep blue waters yonder."

"How refres.h.i.+ng it is," said Wilhelm, "when the water plays about one's cheeks! Whilst I was at home, I always swam in the Great Belt. Yes, you are certainly half a fish when you come into the water."

"I!" repeated Otto, and was silent; but immediately added, with a kind of embarra.s.sment which was at other times quite foreign to him, and from which one might infer how unpleasant confessing any imperfection was to him, "I do not swim."

"That must be learned in summer!" said Wilhelm.

"There is so much to learn," answered Otto; "swimming will certainly be the last thing." He now suddenly turned toward the fortress, and stood still. "Only see how melancholy and quiet!" said he, and led the conversation again to the surrounding scenery. "The sentinel before the prison paces so quietly up and down, the sun s.h.i.+nes upon his bayonet!

How this reminds me of a sweet little poem of Heine's; it is just as though he described this fortress and this soldier, but in the warmth of summer: one sees the picture livingly before one, as here; the weapon glances in the sun, and the part ends so touchingly,--'Ich wollt', er schosse mich todt!' It is here so romantically beautiful! on the right the animated promenade, and the view over the Sund; on the left, the desolate square, where the military criminals are shot, and close upon it the prison with its beam-fence. The sun scarcely s.h.i.+nes through those windows. Yet, without doubt, the prisoner can see us walking here upon the wall."

"And envy our golden freedom!" said Wilhelm.

"Perhaps he derides it," answered Otto. "He is confined to his chamber and the small courts behind the beam-lattice; we are confined to the coast; we cannot fly forth with the s.h.i.+ps into the mighty, glorious world. We are also fastened with a chain, only ours is somewhat longer than that of the prisoner. But we will not think of this; let us go down to where the beautiful ladies are walking."

"To see and to be seen," cried Wilhelm. "'Spectatum veniunt; veniunt spectentur ut ipsae,' as Ovid says."

The friends quitted the wall.

"There comes my scholar, little Jonas!" cried Wilhelm. "The boy was better dressed than at his last appearance; quickly he pulled his little cap off and stood still: a young girl in a wretched garb held him by the hand.

"Good day, my clever lad!" said Wilhelm, and his glance rested on the girl: she was of a singularly elegant form; had she only carried herself better she would have been a perfect beauty. It was Psyche herself who stood beside Cupid. She smiled in a friendly manner; the little lad had certainly told her who the gentlemen were; but she became crimson, and cast down her eyes when Wilhelm looked back after her: he beckoned to Jonas, who immediately came to him. The girl was his sister, he said, and was called Eva. Wilhelm nodded to her, and the friends went on.

"That was a beautiful girl!" said Wilhelm, and looked back once more. "A rosebud that one could kiss until it became a full blown rose!"

"During the experiment the rosebud might easily be broken!" answered Otto; "at least such is the case with the real flower. But do not look back again, that is a sin!"