On the Heights Part 141

This visit has satisfied me that there is a large share of vanity still remaining in Walpurga. She could not help gradually directing the conversation to the subject, and, at last, told the stranger that she had been the crown prince's nurse, and had lived at the palace nearly a year. There is something in her that reminds me of the man who has many orders of merit, and who, like a general in citizen's dress, goes about without his medals and decorations. He modestly deprecates being addressed as "your excellency," but nevertheless enjoys it. The one year spent in the atmosphere of the court, has not been without its effect upon Walpurga.

Hansei, who felt kindly toward the stranger, and evinced great pity for him, was evidently annoyed by his wife's ostentation; but, with his usual great self-command, refrained from expressing his annoyance. But to-day, when they were going to church, Hansei asked:

"Wouldn't you like to have a ribbon around your neck and wear a picture of yourself and the crown prince, so that no one may ever forget what you once were?"

I do not think that Walpurga will ever again allude to her brilliant past.

The grandmother's death and funeral afforded me an opportunity to become better acquainted with the village schoolmaster. He has a tolerably fair education, but delights in making a display of it, and is fond of using big words, in order to impress the listener and to imply: "You don't quite understand me, after all." But the hearty feeling with which he entered into our grief, has raised him in my esteem, and I have frankly let him know as much. And so one day he said to me: "Your skill in wood carving is as good as a marriage portion.

You can earn much money by it." I had no idea what he meant by the remark.

Last Sunday, however, I was enlightened.

He came here, dressed in a black coat and white cotton gloves, and made me a formal offer of marriage.

He could not be induced to believe that I would never marry, and he urgently repeated his offer, saying that he would only desist if I really loved another.

Walpurga fortunately came to the rescue. The good man seemed as if utterly crushed by his rejection, and went away. Why must I fill yet another heart with pain? Of my own, I do not care to speak.

I have not yet done with the schoolmaster's suit.

Walpurga asked me why I wished to remain so lonely. As long as I did not care to return to the great world, I might as well make this good man happy, and would be able to do much good to the children and the poor of the village. I have thus come to know myself anew. I am not made for beneficence. I am not a sister of mercy. I cannot visit the sick, unless I know and love them. I could nurse the grandmother, but no one else. I dislike peasant rooms, and the dull, heavy atmosphere of these abodes of simplicity. I am not a beneficent fairy. My senses are too easily offended. I do not care to make myself better than I am; that is, I should like to make myself better, but all one can do is to improve the good traits that already exist, and that one good trait I do not possess. I must be honest about the matter. I could find it easier to live in a convent. This confession does not make me unhappy, but melancholy. The desire to enjoy life, and to commune with myself is so strong.

Franz, Gundel's betrothed, had been summoned to join his regiment.

My little pitchman has just returned from the town, and brings me news that "there'll be war with the French." He tells me, too, that our business will become poor, that the people do not care to buy, and that our employer offers only half the usual price; and so I will be working for stock.--I, too, must help to bear the world's burden.

How strange it seems that I no longer know anything about my country and the age in which we live. One consolation is left me. In such warlike times, they will not seek the lost one.

We are all, unconsciously, on heights from which the graves of our beloved dead are invisible. Were they ever present, there would be neither work nor song in this world.

Self-oblivion or self-knowledge--about this, everything revolves.

Even in hottest summer, I can always see the snowcapped mountains before me. I do not know how to express it, but they always inspire me with strange and confused emotions. I pay no regard to the date or the seasons, for I have them all at once.

In my heart there is also a spot on which rest eternal snows.

I have now been here between two and three years. I have formed a resolve which it will be difficult to carry out. I shall go out into the world once more. I must again behold the scenes of my past life. I have tested myself severely.

May it not be a love of adventure, that genteel yet vulgar desire to undertake what is unusual or fraught with peril. Or is it a morbid desire to wander through the world after having died, as it were?

No; far from it. What can it be? An intense longing to roam again, if it be only for a few days. I must kill the desire, lest it kill me.

Whence arises this sudden longing?

Every tool that I use while at work, burns my hand.

I must go.

I shall obey the impulse, without worrying myself with speculations as to its cause. I am subject to the rules of no order. My will is my only law. I harm no one by obeying it. I feel myself free; the world has no power over me.

I dreaded informing Walpurga of my intention. When I did so, her tone, her words, her whole manner, and the fact that she, for the first time, called me "child," made it seem as if her mother were still speaking to me.

"Child," said she, "you're right! Go! It'll do you good. I believe that you'll come back and will stay with us, but if you don't, and another life opens up to you--your expiation has been a bitter one, far heavier than your sin."

Uncle Peter was quite happy when he learned that we were to be gone from one Sunday to the Sunday following. When I asked him whether he was curious as to where we were going, he replied:

"It's all one to me. I'd travel over the whole world with you, wherever you'd care to go; and if you were to drive me away, I'd follow you like a dog and find you again."

I shall take my journal with me, and will note down every day.

(By the lake.)--I find it difficult to write a word. The threshold I am obliged to cross, in order to go out into the world, is my own gravestone.

I am equal to it.

How pleasant it was to descend toward the valley. Uncle Peter sang, and melodies suggested themselves to me, but I did not sing. Suddenly he interrupted himself and said:

"In the inns, you'll be my niece, won't you?"

"Yes."

"But you must call me 'uncle' when we're there?"

"Of course, dear uncle."

He kept nodding to himself, for the rest of the way, and was quite happy.

We reached the inn at the landing. He drank, and I drank, too, from the same gla.s.s.

"Where are you going?" asked the hostess.

"To the capital," said he, although I had not said a word to him about it. Then, in a whisper, he said to me:

"If you intend to go elsewhere, the people needn't know everything."