Kellermann

“ H'm!--love never dies, they say. Ah, the captain was no saint, I can tell you!
Frau Mulbridge.
What do you know about it?
Kellermann.
Oh, well, there's a lot of talk about the veiled figures that used to go in and out of here at twilight. And if these mirrors could speak--! That reminds me--I'd almost forgotten--we must cover the mirrors. (Daisy appears in front of the curtain. She is staring into space.)
Frau Mulbridge.
But since the casket is to be taken away in less than an hour--what's the use?
Kellermann.
That doesn't make any difference. The mirrors have got to be draped. ”

“ For his conduct that day Kellermann was named a marshal of the Empire and duke of Valmy; but the whole world was aware that the event was due to the brain of the man in the background. When the French had lost 300 men without wavering, the Prussians ceased firing, and broke off the engagement. Their loss was only 184. Yet this third-rate and mediocre action is counted, with Waterloo and Gettysburg, among the decisive battles of history; and Goethe was not the only man there who knew that the scene before him was the beginning of a new epoch for mankind. ”

“ Men of party seldom escape the fate they have made others undergo.
The executive council, directed, as to military operations by general Servan, advanced the newly-levied battalions towards the frontier. As a man of judgment, he was desirous of placing a general at the threatened point; but the choice was difficult. Among the generals who had declared in favour of the late political events, Kellermann seemed only adapted for a subordinate command, and the authorities had therefore merely placed him in the room of the vacillative and incompetent Luckner. ”

“ Kellermann.
Yes, that's the way with these fine folks. They fall upon one another like highwaymen. Your honour or your life! The man who survives can laugh. The man who falls--well, he falls into my arms. But, see here, getting into a duel with that fellow, that Baron Renoir--why it was nothing short of suicide! I tell you, where that man goes, no grass grows! On the turf, at the card-table, with the women--always the same story. That man shot him down like a rabbit. Oh, of course, it's always a fine thing to lay down your life for a woman. That's a phrase that---- ”

“ Now comes one of the crucial moments of the fight; you must come out here upon the battle-field!"
Cousin Hans at once rose from the bench and took the position the captain pointed out to him.
"Now you are Wellington!" Cousin Hans drew himself up. "You are standing there on the plain with the greater part of the English infantry. Here comes the whole of the French cavalry rushing down upon you; Milhaud has joined Kellermann; they form an illimitable multitude of horses, breast-plates, plumes, and shining weapons. Surround yourself with a square!" ”

“ But it is rather a caricature [Pg xlviii] of the present than a Utopia of the future, and the idea of the novel is lost in the abundance of individual motifs. It is to be hoped that this alienation is not symptomatic in the development either of the gifted author or of German literature as a whole. National questions will in the coming years summon Germany from fantastic world problems back to consciousness of herself.
The technical possibility of the Atlantic tunnel, upon which Kellermann has founded his novel, is questioned by engineering experts. ”

“ Both as a man and as an author, Keller is distinctly a lover of fresh air, and for that reason he keeps all genuine townsmen at a suitable distance. It is true that they snuffle round him and become intoxicated with the strong scent of the woods and meadows, but it is just this exaggerated enthusiasm which forms as it were a Chinese wall between him and them. Keller needs to be passively enjoyed, in a waking sleep, like the peasant following his plough, or a person wandering in the mid-day sunshine, or a child resting in the arms of its mother. ”

“ It is to the effect that one should never underestimate an antagonist.”
“Oh, I shan’t. I’ll cool down presently, and then I’ll be as cold-blooded and calculating as anybody. But right now I—I want to—stamp on his pudgy toes.”
The telephone interrupted and Evan Pell put the receiver to his ear. “... Yes, this is the Free Press.... Please repeat that.... In Boston last night?... Who saw him? Who is speaking?” Then his face assumed that blank, exasperated look which nothing can bring in such perfection as to have the receiver at the other end of the line hung up in one’s ear. He turned to Carmel. ”

“ The district electors of Arcis-sur-Aube kept him in the legislature during that long period. Francois Keller had, by his marriage with Mademoiselle de Gondreville, one son, Charles, who died before his parents in the spring of 1839. As deputy, Francois Keller became one of the most noted orators of the Left Centre. He shone as a member of the opposition, especially from 1819 to 1825. Adroitly he drew about himself the robe of philanthropy. Politics never turned his attention from finance. ”

“ Keller will find his keys,” said Janet, as she got out her doll with the shoe-button eyes. “And maybe his wife will find her ring. I hope so.”
“I hope so, too,” said Mrs. Martin.
“Why is Mr. Keller so worried about his keys?” asked Ted. “Would that man he works for discharge him just for losing a bunch of keys?”
“I’m afraid so, my dear,” answered his mother. “Mrs. Keller told me something about this Mr. Narr. He is very rich, it seems, and owns a summer home on one of the islands in the bay. Being very rich, he thinks, I suppose, that he can have nearly everything his own way. ”

“ Mrs. Martin answered. “Mr. Keller is quite an elderly gentleman. It would be hard for him to look for a new place—to learn new ways. Many persons will not hire an old man. Mr. Keller is not rich—he needs the money Mr. Narr pays him—and if Mr. Narr were to discharge him for losing the keys, then it would go hard with Mr. Keller.”
“Then we must help him find the keys!” exclaimed Ted.
“And help Mrs. Keller find her wedding ring,” added Janet.
“Yes, my dears, it would be wonderful if you could find the things lost in the sand,” remarked their mother.
“I wish I could find a nellifunt!” ”

“ Suppose you should be recalled to the fatherland and ennobled, eh? Made a count, let us say? You have the wealth to support the position.”
“Uh!” grunted von Essen.
“But to wear honors one must earn them. You have been picked because you are the right man. We do not make mistakes. We need you.”
“No,” said von Essen, stubbornly.
“Listen, Herr von Essen,” said the stranger, his voice changing its tone from silkiness to something bordering on arrogance. “Last Thursday you rode to the city in your limousine with Mr. Bradley. I can repeat to you every word of your conversation. ”

“ We were quite gay at supper; the visit to the theater had roused the spirits of the two partners, by means of a wholesome break in the monotony of their lives. I had seldom seen Mr. Keller so easy and so cheerful. Always an abstemious man, he exercised his usual moderation in eating and drinking; and he was the first to go to bed. But, while he was with us, he was, in the best sense of the word, a delightful companion; and he looked forward to the next opera night with the glee of a schoolboy looking forward to a holiday. ”

“ I made the rest of the journey in a fog of sullen misery, and emerged, at its end, from the Pennsylvania station a morose and hopeless man. As a taxicab bore me to my club I felt a tremendous suspense. Doubtless there was a message there. If Keller's memory had flashed back to him, as memory sometimes does, the name in which I was so vitally interested, information should have arrived before me in New York. Since it had not intercepted me in San Francisco I judged that the blank had not, up to that time been filled. ”

“ But Keller was no idealist when he depicted peasant and burgher life. His people speak as they think and they think as they speak, and they do both as Keller knew them to do it in everyday life. Theirs was the inestimable benefit of democratic government and democratic culture. A compact nationality, self-educated to the duties and privileges of citizenship, leaders in the widest possible dissemination of knowledge as the best guaranty of civic progress and justice--could Keller, a Swiss, depict the life of this people as anything else than a civic and intellectual democracy? ”

“ Keller stood aside and watched Dixon mount. The hillman took his spleen out on the horse, finding that the safest vent for his anger. He jerked its head angrily, cursed it, and drove in the spurs cruelly. With a leap, the cow pony was off. In fifty strides it reached the top of the hill and disappeared.
Keller laughed grimly, and spoke aloud to himself, after the manner of one who lives much alone.
"There's a nice young man—yellow clear through. Queer thing she could ever have fancied him. But I don't know, either. He's a right good looker, and has lots of cheek ”

“ Gottfried Keller (1819–1890) , on the other hand, a native of Zürich, was a modern Romanticist of a robuster type; his magnificent autobiographical novel, Der grüne Heinrich (1854–1855) , might be described as the last in the great line of Romantic fiction that had begun with Wilhelm Meister, and the short stories, Die Leute von Seldwyla (1856–1874) and Züricher Novellen (1878) are masterpieces of the first rank.
In the dramatic literature of these decades, at least as it was reflected in the repertories of the German theatres, there was little promise. ”

“ Keller briefly explained his theory then pushed on at once to his plans.
"I'm going to make straight for the Mimbres Pass while you go back and rustle help. I'll try to keep them from getting through the Pass until you close in on them behind."
"That don't look good to me. How do I know how long it will be before I can gather the boys together or find Jim and his outfit? You might be massacred before I got back."
"A man has to take his fighting chance." ”

“ If we cannot understand what manner of man Kelley was, it is through no fault of his, for in his voluminous writings his personality is reflected with all the clear outlines of reality. We see him first as a serious- minded boy of studious and pious habits of thought ”

“ KELLER, ALBERT (1845– ) , German painter, was born at Gais, in Switzerland; he studied at the Munich Academy under Lenbach and Ramberg, and must be counted among the leading colourists of the modern German school. Travels in Italy, France, England and Holland, and a prolonged sojourn in Paris, helped to develop his style, which is marked by a sense of elegance and refinement all too rare in German art. ”

“ She has talked about nothing but the circus ever since."
So far there is nothing in this case very material to the purpose of this Introduction. The story of Helen Keller is really the story of the triumph of Miss Sullivan, showing how, with infinite patience and resource, she presently brought a naturally keen and versatile mind out of bondage and finally led it, despite all obstacles, to the full attainment of its originally endowed powers. But the last resort of the blind—some of them—is the undeterminate quality to which the expression "sixth sense" has often been applied. ”

“ We would not have got the lease so quick only that Twisden, before coming to London, had put the thing in train. The Minister for Iceland was a friend of his, and a friend at Court like this greases the bureaucratic wheels wonderfully.
As we left the Mines Office, whom should we meet but Kellerman. I never saw a man so taken aback as Kellerman was when he saw Twisden. ”

“ Miss Keller stands forth as a shining example of overcoming almost insurmountable obstacles. To-day she is a well-educated, keen-minded, cultured woman, equally enthusiastic over a walk in the woods or a sail on the water as over the treasures of Homer and Shakespeare. ”

“ Keller entered the office. Jack possessed the dog's enviable faculty of distinguishing correctly between the people who are, and the people who are not, their true friends. Mr. Keller privately disliked the idea of having a person about him who had come out of a madhouse. Jack's instincts warned him to leave a room when Mr. Keller entered it. He left the office now.
"Is it possible that you trust that crazy creature with the key of your desk?" said Mr. Keller. "Even your bitterest enemy, Mrs. Wagner, would not believe you could be guilty of such an act of rashness." ”

“ Out of the tail of his eye he saw Keller saddling a horse at the stables.
"Think I'll beat you out of that ride with the schoolmarm to-day, my friend. A steady diet of rides like that is liable to intoxicate a man," he told himself, with his grim smile. In plain sight of all, he turned the head of his horse toward the road that led to the schoolhouse. ”

“ In that Keller is quite old-fashioned. All other writers, at home and abroad, are anxious to change their skin, and complain bitterly because they cannot. Keller stretched himself in his with an expression of well-being that was positively annoying, and declared that it was a very good skin. He was still more old-fashioned in that he never sought for a problem, and never made anything of one, although he produced them by the bushel and left the precious gems lying scattered throughout his novels. ”

“ Richard.
Tell me what happened, Michael.
Kellinghausen.
There isn't much to tell. My lawyer had a talk with him. He says his only object is to bring out the facts.
Richard (after a short pause) .
Well--let him bring them out.
Kellinghausen.
Let him? You should have heard Brachtmann. The man was beside himself. He began with the old story of the Frenchman who said that if he were accused of stealing the towers of Notre Dame he would take the first train for the frontier. "No matter how blameless you all are, the lie will stick to you," he said. ”