Part 16

"Most of these articles were in their cases. At that moment the Countess appeared on the threshold of her boudoir and rushed towards me. I do not remember what she exclaimed; fear for the consequences, and anxiety to prevent the Countess from making a noise and calling assistance, and thereby obtaining my arrest, prevailed in my mind, and I thought only how I might save myself. I grasped her by the neck, and pressed my thumbs into her throat. She struggled desperately. I was obliged to use all my strength to hold her. After a wrestle of between five and seven minutes, her eyes closed, her face became purple, and I felt her limbs relax.

"When I saw she was dead I was overcome with terror. I let the body fall, whereby the head struck the corner of the left side of the secretaire, and this made a wound which began to bleed. Then I ran and locked both the doors, hid what I had taken in my bed, and left the house. On my way to the palace, I stepped into Frey's tavern and drank three glasses of wine. I was afraid I should arrive too late at the palace, where I appeared, however, at half-past five. The Count did not return till half-past six, as dinner that day lasted rather longer than usual.

"When the Count went upstairs to see his wife and take her something good he had brought away with him from table, I was not uneasy at all, for I knew that he would knock and come away if he met with no response. So he did. He came down without being discomposed, and remarked that he fancied the Countess had gone out. At half-past seven he left the house. In the mean time I had been considering what to do, and had formed my plan. Now my opportunity had arrived, and I hastened to put it into execution. My plan was to efface every trace of my deed by fire, and to commit suicide if interrupted.

"As the weather was chilly, the Count had some fire in his stove. I fetched the still glowing charcoal, collected splinters of firwood and other combustibles, and matches, and went upstairs with them. Only the wine sustained me through what I carried out. I took up the body. I put a chair before the open desk, seated the corpse on it, placed one arm on the desk, laid the head on the arm, so that the body reposed in a position of sleep, leaning on the flap of the desk. I threw the red hot charcoal down under the head, heaped matches, paper, and wood splinters over them; took one of the blazing bits of wood and threw it on the divan in the boudoir; locked both doors, and flung away the keys.

"Then I went to my own room and lighted a fire in the stove, and put the jewel cases on the fire. The fire would not burn well, and thick smoke came into the room. Then I saw that the damper was closed. I opened that, and the smoke flew up the chimney; this is what Colonel von Stockhausen saw. There were a lot of empty match-boxes also in the stove, and these burnt with the rest."

Such was the confession of Stauff. How far true, it is impossible to say. He said nothing about the bell-pull being torn down, nothing about the holes burnt in the sofa of the sitting-room. According to the opinion of some experimentalists, the way in which he pretended to have burnt the Countess would not account for the appearance of the corpse.

His object was to represent himself as the victim of an over-mastering temptation--to show that the crime was wholly unpremeditated.

This was the sole plea on which he could appeal for sympathy, and expect a relaxation of his sentence.

That sentence was relaxed.

In 1872 he obtained a free pardon from the Grand-Duke, on condition that he left the country and settled in America. Including his imprisonment before his trial, he had, therefore, undergone twenty-five years of incarceration.

When released he went to America, where he probably still is.

A War-and-Honey-Moon.

In the history of Selenography, John Henry Maedler holds a distinguished place. He was the very first to publish a large map of the lunar surface; and his map was a good one, very accurate, and beautifully executed, in four sheets (1834-6). For elucidation of this map he wrote a book concerning the moon, entitled "The Universal Selenography." Not content with this, he published a second map of the moon in 1837, embodying fresh discoveries. Indeed as an astronomer, Maedler was a specialist. Lord Dufferin when in Iceland met a German naturalist who had gone to that inclement island to look for one moth. It is of the nature of Teutonic scientific men not to diffuse their interests over many branches of natural history or other pursuits, but to focus them on a single point. Maedler was comparatively indifferent to the planets, cold towards the comets, and callous to the attractions of the nebulæ. On the subject of the moon, he was a sheer lunatic.

He died at Hanover in 1874 at the age of eighty, a moon gazer to the last. Indeed, he appeared before the public as the historian of that science in a work published at Brunswick, the year previous to his death. The study of astronomy, more than any other,--even than theology--detaches a man from the world and its interests. Indeed theology as a study has a tendency to ruffle a man, and make him bark and snap at his fellow men who use other telescopes than himself; it is not so with astronomy. This science exercises a soothing influence on those who make it their study, so that an Adams and a Le Verrier can simultaneously discover a Neptune without flying at each other's noses.

Astronomy is certainly an alluring science; set an astronomer before a telescope, and an overwhelming attraction draws his soul away through the tube up into heaven, and leaves his body without mundane interests. An astronomer is necessarily a mathematician, and mathematics are the hardest and most petrifying of studies. The "humane letters," as classic studies are called, draw out the human interests, they necessarily carry men among men, but mathematics draw men away from all the interests of their fellows. The last man one expects to find in love, the last man in whose life one looks for a romantic episode, is a mathematician and astronomer. But as even Cæsar nods, so an astronomer may lapse into spooning. The life of Professor Maedler does not contain much of animated interest; but it had its poetic incident. The curious story of his courtship and marriage may be related without indiscretion, now that the old Selenographer is no more.

Even the most prosaic of men have their time of poetry. The swan is said to sing only once--just before it dies. The man of business--the stockbroker, the insurance-company manager, the solicitor, banker, the ironmonger, butcher, greengrocer, postman, have all passed through a "moment," as Hegel would call it, when the soul burst through its rind of common-place and vulgar routine, sang its nightingale song, and then was hushed for ever after. It is said that there are certain flowers which take many years coming to the point of bloom, they open, exhale a flood of incense, and in an hour wither. It is so with many. Even the astronomer has his blooming time. Then, after the honeymoon, the flower withers, the song ceases, the sunshine fades, and folds of the fog of common-place settle deeper than before.

Ivan Turgenieff, the Russian novelist, says of love, "It is not an emotion, it is a malady, attacking soul and body. It is developed without rule, it cannot be reckoned with, it cannot be overreached. It lays hold of a man, without asking leave, like a fever or the cholera. It seizes on its prey as a falcon on a dove, and carries it, where it wills. There is no equality in love. The so-termed free inclination of souls towards each other is an idle dream of German professors, who have never loved. No! of two who love, one is the slave, the other is the lord, and not inaccurately have the poets told of the chains of love."

But love when it does lay hold of a man assumes some features congruent to his natural habit. It is hardly tempestuous in a phlegmatic temperament, nor is a man of sanguine nature liable to be much influenced by calculations of material advantages. That calculations should form a constituent portion of the multiform web of a mathematician's passion is what we might anticipate.

It will be interesting to see in a German professor devoted to the severest, most abstract and super-mundane of studies, the appearance, course, and dying away of the "malady" of love. We almost believe that this case is so easy of analysis that the very _bacillus_ may be discovered.

Before, however, we come to the story of Professor Maedler's love episode, we must say a word about his previous history.

Maedler was born at Berlin on May 29th, 1794, in the very month of love, though at its extreme end. He began life as a schoolmaster, but soared in his leisure hours into a purer atmosphere than that of the schoolroom; he began to study the stars, and found them brighter and more interesting than the heads of his pupils.

In 1828 William Beer, the Berlin banker, brother of the great composer, Meyerbeer, a Jew, built a small observatory in the suburbs of Berlin. He had made the acquaintance of Maedler, they had the same love of the stars, and they became close friends.

The Beers were a gifted family, running out in different directions. Michael, a third brother, was a poet, and wrote tragedies, one or two of which occasionally reappear on the boards.

The result of the nightly star gazings was an article on Mars when in opposition, with a drawing of the surface as it appeared to Beer and Maedler, through the telescope of the former.

But Mars did not admit of much further scrutiny, it presented no more problems they were capable of solving, so they devoted themselves to the moon. A gourmand exists from dinner to dinner, that meal is the climax of his vitality, that past he lapses into inertness, indifference, quiescence. Full moon was the exciting moment of the periods in Maedler's life, which was divided, not like a gourmand's day, into periods of twenty-four hours, but into lunar months. When the moon began to show, Maedler began to live; his interest, the pulses of his life quickened as full moon approached, then declined and went to sleep when there was no lunar disc in the sky. From 1834 to 1836 he issued his great map of the moon, and so made his name. But beyond that, in the summer of 1833 he was employed by the Russian Government on a chronometrical expedition in the Baltic.

When his map came out, he was at once secured by the Prussian Government as assistant astronomer to the observatory at Berlin, recently erected. In 1840 he became a professor, and was summoned to take charge of the observatory, and lecture on astronomy, in the Russian University of Dorpat. There he spent six uneventful years. He was unmarried, indifferent to female society, and as cold as his beloved moon. He was as solitary, as far removed from the ideas of love and matrimony, as the Man in the Moon.

At last, one vacation time, he paid a long deferred visit to a friend, a Selenologist, at Gröningen, the University of the Kingdom of Hanover. Whilst smoking, drinking beer, and talking over the craters and luminous streaks in the moon, with his friend, who was also a professor, that gentleman drew his pipe from his mouth, blew a long spiral from between his lips, and then said slowly, "By the way, professor, are you aware that we have here, in this kingdom, not, indeed, in Gröningen, but in the town of Hanover, a lady, the wife of the Herr Councillor Witte, who is, like yourself, devoted to the moon; a lady, who spends entire nights on the roof of her house peering at the face of the moon through one end--the smaller--of her telescope, observing all the prominences, measuring their altitudes, and sounding all the cavities. Indeed, it is asserted that she studies the face and changes of the moon much more closely than the features and moods of her husband. Also, it is asserted, that when the moon is shining, the household duties are neglected, the dinners are bad, the maids--"

"O dinners! maids! you need not consider them; there are always dinners and maids," said the Dorpat astronomer contemptuously, "but the moon is seen so comparatively rarely. The moon must be made much of when she shows. Everything must then be sacrificed to her."

Dr. Maedler did not call the moon _she_, but _he_; however, we are writing in English, not in German, so we change the gender.

The Astronomer Royal of the University of Gröningen went on, without noticing the interruption: "Frau von Witte has spent a good deal of her husband's money in getting the largest procurable telescope, and has built an observatory for it with a dome that revolves on cannon balls, on the top of her house. Whilst Herr von Witte slumbers and snores beneath, like a Philistine, his enlightened lady is aloft, studying the moon. The Frau Councilloress has done more than observe Luna, she has done more than you and Beer together, with your maps--she has modelled it."

"Modelled it!--modelled the moon!--in what?"

"In white wax."

Professor Maedler's countenance fell. He had gained great renown, not in Germany only, but throughout Europe by his maps of the moon. Here was an unknown lady, as enthusiastic a devotee to the satellite as himself, who had surpassed him. "You see," continued the Hanoverian professor, "the idea is superb, the undertaking colossal. You have a fixed strong light, you make the wax moon to revolve on its axis, and you reproduce in the most surprising and exact manner, all the phases of the moon itself."

This was indeed an idea. Maedler looked at his hands, his fingers. Would they be capable of modelling such a globe? Hardly, he had very broad coarse hands, and thick flat fingers, like paddles. He suddenly stood up.

"What is the matter? Whither are you going?" asked his friend.

"To Hanover, to Frau Witte, to see the wax moon." No persuasion would restrain him, he was in a selenological fever, he could not sleep, he could not eat, he could not read, he must see the wax moon.

And now, pray observe the craft of Cupid. The professor was aged fifty-two. In vain had the damsels of Berlin and Dorpat set their caps at him. Not a blonde beauty of Saxon race with blue eyes had caught his fancy, not a dark Russian with large hazel eyes and thick black hair, had arrested his attention. His heart had been given to the cold, chaste Diana. It was, with him, the reverse of the tale of Endymion.

He had written a treatise on the occultation of Mars, he had described the belts of Saturn, he had even measured his waist. Venus he had neglected, and now Cupid was about to avenge the slight passed on his mother. There was but one avenue by which access might be had to the professor's heart. The God of Love knew it, and resolved to storm the citadel through this avenue. Dr. Maedler packed his trunk himself in the way in which unmarried men and abstract thinkers do pack their portmanteaus. He bundled all his clothes in together, higglety-pigglety. The only bit of prudence he showed was to put the pomatum pot into a stocking. His collars he curled up in the legs of his boots. Copies of his astronomical pamphlets for presentation, lay in layers between his shirts. Then as the trunk would not close, the Professor of Astronomy sat down heavily on it, stood up, then sharply sat down on it again, and repeated this operation, till coats, trousers, linen, pamphlets, brushes and combs had been crushed together into one cohesive mass, and so the lock would fasten.

No sooner was Dr. Maedler arrived at his inn in Hanover, and had dusted the collar of his coat, and revolved before the _garçon_ who went over him with a clothes brush, revolved like the moon he loved, than he sallied forth in quest of the house of the Wittes. There was no mistaking it--with the domed observatory on the roof.

Dr. Maedler stood in the square, looking up at it. The sight of an observatory touched him; and now, hard and dry as he was, moisture came into his eyes, as he thought that there, on that elevated station, an admirable woman spent her nights in the contemplation of the moon. What was Moses on Pisgah, viewing the Promised Land, what was Simeon Stylites braving storm and cold, to this spectacle?

Never before had the astronomer met with one of the weaker sex who cared a button for the moon, _qua_ moon, and not as a convenience for illumining lovers' meetings, or for an allusion in a valentine. Here was an heroic soul which surged, positively surged above the frivolities of her sex, one who aspired to be the rival of man in intelligence and love of scientific research.

Professor Maedler sent in his card, and a letter of introduction from his friend at Gröningen, and was at once admitted. He had formed an ideal picture of the Selenographic lady, tall, worn with night watching, with an arched brow, large, clear eyes. He found her a fat little woman, with a face as round and as flat as that of the moon, not by any means pale, but red as the moon in a fog.

The lady was delighted to make the acquaintance of so renowned an astronomer. She made him pretty speeches about his map, at the same time letting him understand that a map was all very well, but she knew of something better. Then she launched out into a criticism of his pamphlets on Mars and Saturn, on which, as it happened, he was then sitting. He had put a crumpled copy in each of his tail-coat pockets for an offering, and was now doubly crumpling them. Then she asked his opinion about the revolution and orbit of Biela's comet, which had been seen the preceding year. Next she carried him to Hencke's recently discovered planet, Astræa; after that she dashed away, away with him to the nebulæ, and sought to resolve them with his aid. Then down they whirled together through space to the sun, and the luminous red protuberances observable at an eclipse. Another step, and they were plunging down to earth, had reached it in safety, and were discussing Lord Rosse's recently erected telescope. It was like Dante and Beatrix, with this difference, that Maedler was not a poet, and Frau Witte was a married woman.

The Professor was uneasy. Charming as is a telescope, delightful as is the sun, fascinating as Astræa may be, still, the moon, the moon was what he had come to discuss, and wax moon what he had come to see.

So he exercised all his skill, and with great dialectic ability conducted his Beatrix away on another round. They gave the fixed stars a wide berth, dived in and out among the circling planets and planetoids without encountering one, avoided the comets, kept their feet off nebulous matter, and at last he planted his companion firmly on the moon, and when there, there he held her.

To her words of commendation of his lunar map, he replied by expressing his astonishment at her knowledge of the several craters and so-called seas. Presently Frau Witte rose with a smile, and said, "Herr Professor, I may, perhaps, be allowed to exhibit a trifle on which I have been engaged for many years:--an independent work that I have compared with, but not copied from, your excellent selenic map."

The doctor's heart fluttered; his eyes brightened; a hectic flush came into his cheeks.

Frau Witte took a key and led the way to her study, where she threw open a mahogany cupboard, and exposed to view something very much like a meat cover. This also she removed, it was composed of the finest silk stretched on a frame, and exposed to view--the wax moon.

The globe was composed of the purest white beeswax, it stood upon a steel needle that passed through it, and rested on pivots, so that the globe was held up and held firm, and could be easily made to revolve. Frau Witte closed the shutters, leaving open only one orifice through which the light could penetrate and fall on the wax ball.

The doctor raised his hands in admiration. Never had he seen anything that so delighted him. The globe's surface had been most delicately manipulated. The mountains were pinched into peaks, the hollows indented to the requisite depth, the craters were rendered with extraordinary precision, the striæ being indicated by insertions of other tinted wax. A shadow hung sombre over the mysterious Sea of Storms.

Professor Maedler returned to his hotel a prey to emotion. He inquired the address of a certain Rollmann, whom he had known in former years at Berlin, and who was now professor in the Polytechnic school at Hanover. Then he rushed off in quest of Rollmann. The Polytechnic Professor was delighted to see his friend, but disturbed at the condition of mind in which he found him.

"What has brought you to Hanover, dear Professor?" he asked.

"The moon! the moon! I have come after the moon."

"The moon! How can that be? She shines over Dorpat as surely as over our roofs in Hanover."

"I've just seen her."

"Impossible. The moon is new. Besides, it is broad daylight."

"New! of course she is new. Only made lately."

Professor Rollman was puzzled.

"The moon is certainly as old as the world, and even if we give the world so limited an age as four thousand years--"

"I was not allowed to touch her, scarcely to breathe near her," interrupted Maedler.

"My dear colleague, what is the matter with you? You are--what do you say, seen, touched, breathed on the moon? The distance of the moon from the earth is two hundred and forty thousand miles."

"Not the old moon--I mean the other."

"There is no other, that is, not another satellite to this world. I am well aware that Jupiter has four moons, two of which are smaller than the planet Mars. I know also that Mars--"

"My dear Rollman, there is another--here in Hanover."

"I give it up, I cannot understand."

"Happy Hanover to possess such an unique treasure," continued the excited Maedler, "and such a woman as Frau Witte."

"Oh! her wax moon!" said Rollmann, with a sigh of relief.

"Of what else could I speak?"

"So you have seen that. The old lady is very proud of her performance."

"She has cause to be proud of it. It is simply superb."

"And the sight of it has nearly sent you off your head!"

"Rollmann! what will become of that model? Frau Councilloress Witte will not live for ever. She is old, puffy, and red, and might have apoplexy any day. Is her husband an astronomer?"

"O dear no! he regards astronomy as as unprofitable a study as astrology. It is quite as expensive a pursuit, he says."

"Merciful heavens! Suppose she were to predecease--he would have the moon, and be unable to appreciate it. He might let it get dusty, have the craters and seas choked; perhaps the mountain-tops knocked off. He must not have it."

"It cannot be helped. The moon must take its chance."

"It must not be. She _must_ outlive the Councillor."

"If you can manage that--well."

"But--supposing she does outlive him, she is not immortal. Some day she must die. Who will have the moon then?"

"I suppose, her daughter."

"What will the daughter do with it?"

"Melt it up for waxing the floors."

Professor Maedler uttered a cry of dismay.

"The object is one of incalculable scientific value. Has the daughter no husband, a man of intelligence, to stay her hand?"

"The daughter is unmarried. There was some talk of a theological candidate--"

"A theological candidate! An embryo pastor! Just powers! These men are all obscurantists. He will melt up the moon thinking thereby to establish the authority of Moses."

"That came to nothing. She is disengaged."

Professor Maedler paced the room. Perspiration bedewed his brow. He wiped his forehead, more drops formed. Suddenly he stood still. "Rollmann," he said, in a hollow voice, "I must--I will have that moon, even if I have to marry the daughter to secure it."

"By all means. Minna is a pleasant young lady."

"Minna! Minna! is that her name?" asked the distracted professor; then, more coolly, "I do not care a rush what her name is. I want, not her, but the moon."