Gustav Freytag

“ Anton hurried off to the ante-room, whence he could hear Ehrenthal's loudly-raised voice.
The appearance of the usurer shocked him. His hat pushed half off his head, his pale face swelled as if by drinking, his glazed eyes red with tears, Ehrenthal stood before him, calling in broken sentences for the baron, wailing and cursing alternately. "He must come! he must come at once!" cried he; "the wicked man! A nobleman, indeed! he is a vagabond, after whom I will send the police. Where is my money? Where is my security? I want my mortgage from this man who is not at home." ”

“ Anton, friend of my youth, what a mystery it is that, on the very first day free from care that I have known for years, we must part. The estate is sold, and I breathe again. What a life it has been of late years! always anxious, oppressed, humbled by friend and foe; always in debt, either for money or services: it was fearful. Not as far as you were concerned, Wohlfart. You are my childhood's friend; and if you were in trouble of any kind, it would be happiness to me if you would call me, and say, 'Now I want you; now come to me, wild Lenore.' I will be wild no longer. ”

“ The woman who goes through life at your side should be your equal in intellect and power, and should feel reliant in her own province; but I am an uncultivated, helpless girl. In my foolish love I let it appear that I could do for your sake what no woman should. You find nothing in me to respect. You would kiss me and—endure me." Lenore's hand clenched, and her eyes flashed as she spoke.
"Does it then repent you so much that for my sake you sent a bullet into that villain's shoulder?" said Fink. "What I now see looks less like love than hatred." ”

“ Lenore started, and the hare bounded away. Yonder there were men fighting; yonder, blood was being poured out on the dark ground. A scream was heard—a fierce, ominous scream, then all was still. "Was he in danger?" she asked herself; yet she felt no fear, and shook her head under her plaid, sure that, even if he were, no danger would reach him: the gun aimed at him would strike some broken branch, the knife drawn against him would break like a splinter before it struck him, the man who rushed on him would stumble and fall before he could touch that haughty head. ”

“ Yesterday he was taken prisoner to Rosmin."
"Ay!" said the forester; "a bullet does a fellow like him no harm; he aims higher than that;" and he laid his own hand on his throat with a significant gesture.
"This has weighed on me day and night," whispered Lenore to Anton; "I have looked on myself as one under a curse. I have had the most fearful dreams and visions of the man as he fell, hands clenched, and the blood gushing from his shoulder. Oh, Wohlfart, what have we gone through!" ”

“ Disease lurked in the family like canker in a flower. Since the dark hour when the dying son had been carried into his father's presence, the baron had never left his room. His small measure of remaining strength had been broken; grief consumed mind and body. He would sit silently brooding throughout the livelong day, and neither the entreaties of Lenore nor the companionship of his wife availed to rouse him. When the fatal tidings were first communicated to the baroness, Anton had feared that the fragile thread that bound her to the earth would burst, and for weeks Lenore never left her side ”

“ Anton alone was dissatisfied with his friend, and he told him so as they walked home.
"Why, you sat there like a stock," replied Fink; "I entertained the good people, and what more would you have? Change yourself into a mouse, creep into the decked-out room, and hear how they are singing my praises. What more can be wanted than that our behavior to people should be what they themselves find pleasant?"
"I think," said Anton, "that our aim should rather be to behave in a manner worthy of ourselves. You went on like a frivolous nobleman who meant to ask a loan from old Ehrenthal on the morrow." ”

“ Why do you disturb me during my business hours?"
"Your business hours, you young gosling, with your shell still hanging about you!" cried Hippus, still more irate, and threw himself on the sofa. "Your business hours!" he continued, with infinite contempt; "any hours are good enough for your business."
"You are drunk again, Hippus," answered Veitel, thoroughly roused. "How often have I told you that I will have nothing to do with you when you come out of the spirit-shop?"
"Indeed!" cried Hippus; "you son of a witch, my visit is at all times an honor to you. I drunk!" ”

“ Fink's strange bearing made Anton feel anxious.
"Why have you been so long away, and where have you been?" said he.
"Not to the wine-shop, as your wisdom seems to surmise. If a man be refused, he has surely a good right to be melancholy for a couple of hours or so. I have done what any one would in such desperate circumstances. I have walked about and philosophized. I have quarreled with the world—that is to say, with the black-haired and myself—and then ended by standing still before a lamp-lit stall, and buying three oranges." ”

“ Its complicated structure impressed Anton a good deal, but he was somewhat amazed at Bernhard exclaiming, "Beautiful! is it not? I mean the thought, for I am unable to give the beauty of language;" and he looked inspired, like a man who drinks Schiraz wine, and kisses his Zuleika all day long.
"But must one drink in order to love?" said Anton; "with us the one is very possible without the other."
"With us, life is very commonplace." ”

“ You are a gentleman, who keeps to his own house, and does not go to strangers for what he can have from his own people. You want money? My Karl is bailiff at your father the baron's; my Karl has some money, so it is all right. How much do you want? A hundred dollars? Two hundred dollars? The money is there."
"I can hardly take courage, Mr. Sturm, to tell you the amount of the sum," said Eugene, embarrassed; "it is nineteen hundred dollars."
"Nineteen hundred dollars!" repeated the giant, in amazement; "that's a capital; that's a firm; that's what people call a fortune." ”

“ Again Itzig stood before him, and the baron, looking askance at the bent figure, said, "Young Ehrenthal has offered to make up my difference with his father."
Veitel leaped up suddenly as if he had been shot. "Bernhard!" said he.
"That is his name, I dare say; he is an invalid."
"He will die," replied Veitel.
"When?" asked the baron, occupied with his own thoughts; but, recovering himself, he added, "What is the matter with him?"
"It is here," said Itzig, laying his hand on his chest; "it labors like a pair of bellows: when a hole is once torn, the breath ceases." ”

“ I have met with much that would have delighted you, because it was poetical and soul-stirring, but disappointment was largely mingled with it all."
"It is the same all over the earth," said Bernhard. "When a mighty feeling shakes the heart, and seeks to impel onward, the world stains and tarnishes it, and fair things die, and lofty aims become ridiculous. So it is no better with others than with us."
"That is our old bone of contention," said Anton, cheerily; "are you not converted, you skeptic?"
Bernhard looked down embarrassed. "Perhaps I am, Wohlfart." ”

“ Anton cried out in amazement, "Tinkeles, is it really you?" and went up to him. Tinkeles collapsed as if struck by a thunderbolt, and stared with wide-opened eyes at Anton, an image of horror and alarm.
"God of justice!" were the only words that escaped his white lips.
"What is the matter with you, Tinkeles? you look a most miserable sinner. What are you doing in this place, and what in the world leads you to this house, of all others?"
"I can not help being here," answered the trader, still half unconscious. "I can not help our principal being so unfortunate. ”

“ It was market-day again at Rosmin, and Anton drove thither, accompanied by a servant. It was one of the first spring days, and the sun shone brightly, reminding him how gay the gardens must now be with early flowers, and that he and the ladies in the castle would see none this year, save a few, perhaps, from the little farm garden behind the barn. But, indeed, it was no time to care much for flowers; everywhere men's hearts were restless and excited, and much that had stood firm for years now seemed to totter. ”

“ He loves his horse, as you all know, not as the sum of five hundred dollars represented by so many hundred weight of flesh, and covered by a glossy skin—he loves it as a friend."
"Because he amuses me," said Fink.
"Of course," said Anton; "and thus table-linen amuses our housewives, so that is even. And then his pair of condor wings, his pistols, riding-whips, red drinking-glasses, are all trifles that he values, just as a German emigrant does his birdcages; and, in short, he is, in point of fact, nothing more than a poor-spirited German, like the rest of us." ”

“ Between ourselves, there is no use in a doctor. They may know what is the matter with many men, that I don't deny; but how should they know what is the matter with us? Not one of them can lift a barrel."
"If you have no doctor, my good Mr. Sturm," cried Anton, throwing open the window, "let me begin at once to play a doctor's part. If your breathing be oppressed, this close atmosphere is poison to you; and if you suffer from your feet, you ought not to go on drinking." ”

“ God willing, Anton, I'll take the court-yard side—you the front."
"It seems to me impossible," cried Anton, "that we should be beaten. I have never had so good a hope as in this very hour."
"Hope of relief!" said Fink, shrugging his shoulders, and pointing through the window at the enemy. "If it comes in an hour's time it comes too late. Since Rebecca's cannon exploded, we are in the hands of the foe as soon as they choose to storm in earnest. And they will choose. One must not indulge in illusions that glow no longer than a cigar. ”

“ The pale lady from a foreign land has died in the night, and the blind man who is lying in his daughter's arms has but one consolation, that of knowing that he shall soon follow her to her endless rest. And the ill-omened birds scream out to the winds that the old Slavonic curse has fallen on the castle, and the doom has lighted on the foreign settlers too.
But little cares the man who now holds sway within the castle walls whether a raven croak or a lark sing, and if a curse lie on his property, he will laughingly blow it away. ”

“ Anton bowed, and turned to go.
Just then there flew out from the paralyzed circle a brilliant form, and taking both his hands in hers, Lenore looked at him with tearful eyes, and said, in a broken voice, "Farewell!" The door closed, and all was over.
When life returned in the room he had left, the first words audible were the baroness's whisper to her daughter, "Lenore, you have forgotten yourself."
"Do not blame her," said the baron, aloud, with great presence of mind; "the daughter only did what the father should have done. The young man has behaved admirably, and we can not but esteem him." ”

“ I honor the man who lets neither his passions nor his destiny overpower him, but who, even if he have erred, can tear himself away and regain his liberty."
"But how if it be too late, and if the force of circumstances be stronger than he?"
"I am not willing to believe in such force of circumstances," replied Anton. "I imagine that, however sore pressed a man may be, if he sets himself to work in earnest, he may hew his way out. True, he will bear the scars of such an encounter, but, like a soldier's, there will be honor in them. ”