Chapter 1

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VOL. I.

THE PATRICIANS.

_From the German of_

C. F. VAN DER VELDE.

SPECIMENS

OF

GERMAN ROMANCE.

SELECTED AND TRANSLATED FROM VARIOUS AUTHORS.

IN THREE VOLUMES.

VOL. I.

LONDON: PRINTED FOR GEO. B. WHITTAKER, AVE-MARIA-LANE.

MDCCCXXVI.

THE PATRICIANS.

It was in the year 1568, on the 17th of May, old style, that Althea, the widow of Netz of Bogendorf, sate in her apartments at Schweidnitz. The mourning veil still flowed about her pale beautiful face, while her blue eyes gazed through their tears with melancholy tenderness on the only pledge of a brief yet happy union, the four years' old Henry, who sate upon her knees, and in childish sport was trying to pull the golden locks of his mother from under her widows' cap. Before her stood her old uncle, Seifried von Schindel, and, while he held the full goblet in his hand, exhausted himself in consolations to lessen the anguish of his beloved niece. With good-humoured rebuke he exclaimed, "It is, no doubt, praise-worthy in your zeal to grieve for the loss of your husband; I myself can't bear those widows, who, like green wood, weep at one end, and burn at the other; but even good may be carried to excess, and this utter surrender of yourself to grief is as contrary to reason as it is to the word of God."

"How can I help it?" said Althea, with calm; and patient sorrow: "How can I help it, when all that surrounds me is an inexhaustible source of tears? Do I see my husband's sword hanging against the wall, I must weep--do I hear his war-horse neighing in the stable, I must weep--does my sight fall upon this fatherless child alas!"--tears stifled her words.

"A child who will soon be motherless too," exclaimed her uncle, "if you go on thus destroying your health by such unchristian want of fortitude. Every thing has its season; your year of widowhood is past, and as you are no longer entitled to wear black, so your mind too must cast off the mourning in which it has been too closely enveloped, and you must begin again to live for the world, to which, after all, you belong. If you were a papist, you might bury your grief in a cloister, for ought I should care; but that won't do now; and, besides, you have important and sacred duties upon you. The property that you have to preserve for the son of a beloved husband requires a stout protector in these stormy times. A woman's bringing up, too, will not be sufficient for him, and you'll not like to let him go from you so soon; therefore you must give him a father who, with all love and earnestness, will make an honourable knight out of him. In a word, you must marry again."

"Spare me such language, uncle," cried Althea, rising and putting down the child.

But with gentle violence he forced her back into the chair again, saying, "It becomes youth to listen to the well-meant admonitions of age, even though it should not happen to relish them: I keep to my position. You least of all have occasion to complain of the want of wooers. There is Hans Hund of Ingersdorf, Adam von Schweinicher of Wenigmoknau; then there is your own cousin: all of whom would with pleasure break their necks for a kind look from you, and are besides brave knights and in good circumstances."

"How can you, even in jest, propose to sacrifice me to these rude companions, who have no enjoyment except in hunting, gambling, drinking, and quarrelling; and who would only make me miss so much the more painfully the mild pious disposition of my Henry?"

"Why to be sure our knights are somewhat tough and knotty, but so are our oaks, and they afford a glorious wood for lasting. Mill-wheels are not to be cut out of poplars. For the rest, a shrewd handsome woman must know how to tame a rake, and every one will respect the female slipper when it is wielded merely for a man's benefit."

"God deliver me from such a castigatory office; I should soon sink under it."

--"Or if you long for a great fortune, you have but to give the sign: I have observed how Christopher Friend, whom you have drawn hither, circles about you at a distance. He is a brisk widower, who was rich from the first, and to that has inherited much from his late wife, the Lauterbachin from Jauer. You would be able to bury yourself under your gold bags."

"Shame on me if that could ever determine my choice!"

"Nor has honour any thing to say against it. Christopher's father is burgomaster of Schweidnitz, where he rules it bravely, almost like a little king. The Friends belong to the Patricians of the city, and are therefore nearly as good as half nobles; in Augsburg or Nuremberg they would be reckoned nobles, and admissible to the tournay; moreover they are already allied to the family of Schindel by marriage."

"If you love me, uncle; cease to speak for the sycophant. If, to save my son's life, I were compelled to choose between this Christopher and his brother the wild Francis, by heavens I would choose the latter! I do indeed fear the bear that roars and rushes on me with uplifted paws, but the gliding serpent is a horror to my inmost soul."

"Well, the comparison is not particularly flattering to either of the brothers," exclaimed Schindel, laughing. But on the sudden he was silent, for there was a knocking at the door, and the two Friends entered the apartment.

"We come in our father's service, noble lady," said Christopher, with a courteous inclination: "He gives a ball and banquet the day after tomorrow, and most kindly requests you to grace the festival with your presence."

"I have not yet put off the mourning weeds for my husband; at the same time I set as much value by the intended honour as if it had been in my power to accept it."

"Your year of widowhood is already over, and my father would deem it a very worthy proof of his kinswoman's friendship, if out of regard to him she were to lay aside her mourning. Much as it may become you, it is still only a useless remembrance of a loss, the greatness of which you feel but too deeply without that."

"My brother is in the right," roared Francis: "Throw the black rags into the store-chest, and trim yourself up again in the colours that suit you so well. You must not think of leaving life yet; 'twould be pity of such a handsome thing. Nor would we Schweidnitzers allow it, and you are within our walls now, and under our jurisdiction. Come along, then, to the dance. We'll waltz it bravely with each other; and if your cap should happen to get awry in it, and point to the widower, there may be a remedy for that too. My house-plague, besides, is always ill; and if she loves heaven better than I do, there may chance to be a pair of you and me."

"Your mouth is a sluice," exclaimed the old Schindel, wrathfully, "which, once opened, overwhelms every thing with its mire."

"Good God, Frank! how can you indulge in such unseemly language?" cried Christopher; while Althea bent down to her child as if she had heard nothing; Francis turned upon his brother.

"Don't you play the governor, Kit! In your heart you mean just as I do, only you go winding about the porridge: but that's not my way, and therefore I say plainly, Cousin Althea, I am horribly thirsty with you."

"There stand the flask and goblet," replied Althea, shortly--"help yourself;" and she turned away with her boy to the window.

"You don't stand on much ceremony with your kinsfolk," muttered Francis, going to the table and filling up a bumper, while Christopher went up to the widow.

"I hope you will not make me suffer for my brother's rashness, but will give me a favourable answer."

"I have already told you the reason why I must decline the invitation."

"And you really, then, will put off my father with this poor excuse?"

"Agree to go," whispered the uncle: "It is a family festival, and all the Schindels of the neighbourhood are invited. It is better not to be singular and offend any one."

"I will come," said Althea, after a moment's hesitation.

"I have to thank you, Schindel, for this _yes_," returned Christopher, mortified: "The former _no_ was intended for me alone; which cannot but grieve me, however handsome the lips that pronounced it."

He went; and Francis, filling the goblet for the third time, cried out after him, "The wine is good; I shall stop a little longer."

There was now a clattering on the stairs, as if a whole troop were coming up, and in rushed Althea's brother-in-law, Anselm of Netz, with his Pylades, Frederick of Reichenbach, surnamed Bieler.

"God be with you, fair sister-in-law," exclaimed the wild Netz, shaking Althea's white hand with no very gentle cordiality.

"What brings you so soon again to the city?" returned Althea displeasedly, and drew back her hand.

"Rasselwitz treats us to-day with a dozen flasks of old Hungary, at Barthel Wallach's," replied Netz: "You know that when once I get into the old den I can't set off again without having seen you. God forgive you, lady, but you must have bewitched me; and I shall yet denounce you to the council of Schweidnitz."

"How willingly would I undo the spell of which you complain! Truly, it gives me no pleasure."

"Tush! you are not in earnest. We all know that women like to be courted, that their value may be the greater."

Here he began to whistle and clatter up and down the room, when his eyes suddenly fell upon Francis, who had not yet been able to separate himself from the goblet.

"The devil! you too, Friend! What wind has blown you hither?"

"If any one should ask you," said Francis roughly, "tell him you don't know."

"And how is it with your lucky horse-swop?" asked Netz, in a mocking tone: "Have you settled with Rasselwitz?"

"Long ago," replied Francis, dryly, and poured out the drainings of the flask.

"It must be allowed," exclaimed Netz, with a loud laugh--"you know how to manage things admirably. He has got the bay, then?"

"If I were an ass! I was drunk at the time I made the bargain, and therefore am bound to nothing."

"Rasselwitz will show you that, my fine fellow! You have had his horse, and must keep your word."

"He may fetch his mare, then, from the hangman. The beast fell down with me at the Bresslauer gate. I should deserve to be breeched if I suffered myself to be cheated in this manner."

"You'll have a stout tussle of it with him. In such matters he does not jest, and least of all with you."

"Let him come, then, and fight it out with me. I have already shown the Turks in Hungary that I am not afraid. When I have got my cold iron at my side, I am a match for a whole stable-full of such younkers."

And with this he emptied the last goblet and drained it, while Netz bit his lips, and drawing Bieler aside, asked in a whisper, "If they should not throw the braggart out of window?" To this the other replied by a friendly nod of assent; but Althea, who had overheard the question, exclaimed, "For God's sake do not trouble the quiet of this widowed house!"

"And think, besides," said the old Schindel, warningly, "that you are at Schweidnitz, in his father's jurisdiction." At the same time he went up to Francis, and observed, "I have yet a visit to make to the old doctor Heidenreich, who has removed, and I do not know his present quarters. Will you have the kindness, cousin Friend, to show me the way thither?"

"Why not?" said Francis, seizing his cap; "though I well know whence the request comes. You want me away, that I may not get into a row with these nobles here. Isn't it so? Ay, ay, Frank may be a wild companion, but he is no fool. Well, you are a good old gentleman, and for this time I'll comply with your wishes. Good morning, lady Althea."

He went with the old Schindel to the door, and then turned back again--"What I have said of Rasselwitz you may boldly repeat to him; I stand to my words."

The two went away together. Netz looked indignantly after Francis, and exclaimed, "That such a fellow should give himself so many airs, merely because he is rich and his father is a burgomaster!"

"You should not have irritated him," replied Althea, with mild rebuke: "Why do you meddle with him, if he does not please you?"

"You do not understand it, cousin. 'Tis in the blood of me, I cannot let him rest in quiet. Nothing is more delightful than jeering a cit, who would fain play the noble, and has not the stuff for it in him."

"Then you ought not to complain if he pays you in your own coin. I cannot comprehend, either, what satisfaction you men can find in fleering and flouting at any one who, in your opinion, is beneath you. If the person so mocked is patient enough to bear it, your victory is easy and inglorious; if he parries the attack with similar weapons, then there arise unnecessary quarrels: and in any case it shows an unchristian want of charity, to hunt out the foibles of a neighbour only to ridicule them for your amusement."

"The most lovely preacher that I ever heard," said Bieler, gallantly.

"You defend the rascal most nobly," muttered Netz. "If he were single I should suspect something; but as it is, I believe you do it merely that you may always contradict me."

"To what subterfuges will the consciousness of injustice turn itself rather than confess to truth she is in the right!"

She was interrupted by a gentle knocking at the door, and went hastily herself to open it, when there entered a tall stately man, about thirty years of age, in a plain knightly costume, and decorated with the sable scarf of Austria. Black locks hung about his clear forehead, while power and gentleness spoke out from his large dark eyes, that sparkled with friendly glances at the handsome widow.

"Am I so fortunate as to greet in you the wife of Henry von Netz?" he asked, with a dignified inclination to all present, which forced a similar courtesy from the two wild nobles.

"I was so," replied Althea; and a tear forced itself from her eye.

"Was!" said the stranger,--"and this habit! You are a widow, then? Heavens! So early has my good Henry gone! and, as the appearance teaches me, from the bosom of a most happy marriage. That does, indeed, grieve me!"

"You knew my husband?" asked Althea, drying her eyes.

"Knew him?" rejoined the stranger, in the enthusiasm of recollection--"We made our first essay in arms together. Has he never talked to you of Caspar the Sparrenberger, surnamed Tausdorf?"

"Often, and with warm friendship. But he deemed you dead."

"I joined the campaign against the Turks, and lay dangerously wounded in Transylvania.----That is your son?" he asked, in sudden emotion; and lifting up the little Henry, he kissed him heartily--"His true eye betrays the father--."

He set the boy down again, and paced hastily up and down the room to collect himself.

"We are both too much agitated," he resumed, "to carry on this conversation any longer. Permit me now to deliver a letter to you, which your friend Sternberg, of Gitschin, requested me to take with me, when she understood that I was going to Schweidnitz."

"You know my Thekla, then?"

"We are near neighbours and good friends. My father lives at Tirschkokrig, not far from Gitschin, and I was frequently with the Sternberg family. The lady Thekla has talked so much of you, and so much in your praise, that I knew, before I saw, you."

"I doubt whether she has shown me truly, for friendship is a partial painter."

"Forgive me if I contradict you. Such, as you now stand before me, has your beautiful and friendly form long floated before my imagination."

Althea cast down her eyes in confusion; but the little Henry relieved her from the answer to this embarrassing discourse. He had grown as weary of the conversation as the two gaping nobles, and now began to twitch his mother's gown, and teaze for his evening meal; upon which she said, "Excuse me if I retire for a moment; I will but satisfy the little tormentor here, and read through my Thekla's letter, while, in the meantime, my brother-in-law, Netz, will be happy to grow more intimately acquainted with you. Hereafter I will at leisure welcome you to Schweidnitz, and you shall tell me all about our friends at Gitschin."

She left the room with her son. Tausdorf looked after for awhile, and then seemed lost in thought. After a short pause, Netz renewed the conversation by saying, "You are a native of Bohemia, then?"

Tausdorf courteously replied, "My father settled some years ago in the hereditary domains of Austria as an imperial feodatory. I have the honour to be a native of Silesia."

"Does any business call you back to your native land?" asked Netz, with increasing cordiality: "If I can serve you in any thing, you have only to say so; I know from my brother's own mouth that you were his very good friend."

"I thank you for your kind proffers. For the present I have only to commend myself to your neighbourly good-will, for I think of settling shortly in the vicinity of Schweidnitz."

"You will be heartily welcome to us, though you will find but sorry comfort now in this country."

Tausdorf was astonished.--"How so?"

"Oh, the burghers have got the upper hand of us nobles. Their wealth, their absurd privileges, have made them arrogant. A pitiful burgomaster of Schweidnitz will think himself greater than the emperor; and as to us, the whole mob of them look upon us with contempt. They need us not, they fear us not, and where they can do us any annoyance, they do it with delight."

"The purse-pride of the citizens is, no doubt, particularly disgusting; but to be candid, we should not too severely judge the industrious mechanic, the clever merchant, the dexterous artist, or the man of learning, even though the consciousness and the satisfaction of their hardly-earned property should lead them too far. Our pride of birth, when carried to excess, is also a hateful vice; and we have much less to advance in its defence, because that on which we pride ourselves is only _inherited_, and not _earned_. For the rest, I have always thought that in these eternal feuds between the nobles and the citizens, the wrong was to be found on both sides; the right is always in the middle, and both parties can attain it only by mutual forbearance."

"There you judge wrongly of these Silesian pedlers," exclaimed the wild Bieler: "If a noble were only to yield a finger to them, they would seize the whole man, and clap him into a pepper-bag. No, no, you must keep a tight hand over the people, and hardly let them breathe, or there will one day be an end of our old customs and sacred privileges."

"So thought the nobles before the unlucky war of the peasants," said Tausdorf, "and Germany was turned into a desert by it."

"Don't take it ill, Tausdorf," returned Netz; "in other respects you may be a brave knight; but if we were to follow your maxims, we should all be forced to fly the cities."

Tausdorf shrugged up his shoulders at their incorrigible stubbornness, when Rasselwitz burst into the room, his face glowing with rage, and asked furiously, "Is not Francis Friend here?"

"He was here a quarter of an hour ago," replied Netz; "perhaps you may yet find him at doctor Heidenreich's."

"I am in no humour to hunt after the rascal any longer," roared Rasselwitz. "This is the day whereon he promised to give up the horse to me. I have already beat up his quarters, but found him abroad, and the stable locked."

"He does not intend to give up the horse to you. He has openly and loudly declared as much here."

"We'll soon see that," cried Rasselwitz furiously. "I'll ask his wife for the stable-key, and if she refuses it, I'll break the door open, and fetch out the animal by force. Will you join me?"

"Of course," replied Netz and Bieler.

"And you, Herr von Tausdorf?" said Netz. "A brave companion like you, will you not run the hazard with us?"

"I do not like such disputes," replied Tausdorf, gravely: "they too often degenerate into frays, wherein more honour is to be lost than gained. Besides, it seems to me that the right is not on your side. If you really have any well-grounded pretensions to the horse, an appeal to the courts would be a better way of proceeding than this forcible violation of another's property, which sets you in the class of feud-makers and agitators."

"To the courts?" shouted Rasselwitz, with a wild laugh--"And the burgomaster is the father of the perjured rascal that I am to complain of! He would do me admirable justice, no doubt! No! no! we shall get on much better with our hands. Come, comrades; there's still enough of us for these pedlers."

They rushed out; and Tausdorf, shaking his head, exclaimed, "It is an evil spirit that is prevailing in this country."

After a short time Althea returned with her uncle, and presented the two guests to each other, when the old man said, "I have already heard so much worthy talk of you, Herr von Tausdorf, that I heartily rejoice in your more intimate acquaintance. You are in the imperial service?"

"Captain in the emperor's life-guard," replied Tausdorf, with military dignity.

"As the Frau von Sternberg informs my niece, you intend settling in our good Silesia. I am glad to hear it, and whatever I can do for you, either in act or counsel, I offer you with great sincerity; but it surprises me that you should think of leaving Bohemia. I understand you are in favour with the emperor, and, since the imperial diet at Prague has given independence to the protestants, it must be comfortable living for them in the Bohemian territory."

"This favour little profits us Utraquists. In reality the bull of Pius the Fourth is already recalled. Strict catholics still hold us for sectaries and half heretics: add to this, the new society of Jesuits already lifts up its serpent-head, and hisses out its threats at us. Our religious freedom has almost come to an end."

"Yes, the Jesuits! the Jesuits!" exclaimed Schindel, and for a while was silent; then looking sadly at Tausdorf, he continued--"So, you are no thorough-paced Lutheran, Herr von Tausdorf?--only a Utraquist?"

The latter bowed assentingly, and Schindel added, as if to soften his first expression, "The Utraquists too are honourable people."

"I hope so," replied Tausdorf, smiling at the intolerance which lurked in the well-intended affirmation.

"But keep that a secret here as long as it can be done; at least till the people know you better. The town, as well as the whole country, is zealously Lutheran."

"Pardon me; in the field I have learnt neither simulation nor dissimulation, and I deem them besides contrary to my honour as a knight. He who, on account of the Utraquist, overlooks the man in me, is only an object of my pity, and I set little value on his opinion."

A tumult in the street interrupted this conversation.

"What is the matter below?" said Schindel to the servant, who just then brought in a fresh flask of wine.

"A violent fray," he replied, "in the house of the widow Fox, in the market-place. Francis Friend quarrelled with Rasselwitz about a bay horse, and from words they drew their swords upon each other. The police have already interfered to put an end to the tumult."

"Gracious heavens!" cried Schindel, clasping his hands, "will this disorder never have an end?"

"The crime," returned Tausdorf, "was settled in this room by the violent young nobles. I immediately suspected the evil that would come of it, and warned them, but in vain."

"God reward you for the good intent," said Schindel, and he proffered his hand to him with unfeigned cordiality: "There is, indeed, a necessity for rational people interfering in these mad affairs, which are now unceasing between the nobles and the citizens; one fray always creates a multitude, and in the end both parties will be ruined by them."