It was now midnight; the moon looked
fitfully
through the
breaks of the driving clouds.
breaks of the driving clouds.
Warner - World's Best Literature - v25 - Tas to Tur
30; but
it is his friend, and not the commonwealth, that is uppermost in his
thoughts. Messala bore a gallant part at Actium; but Tibullus, alone
of the poets of the day, has nothing to say of the significance of
that struggle. Once he does indeed speak of the glorious destiny
of Rome, the "name fatal to nations"; but his interest even here is
roused by the induction of Messalinus, his friend's son, into a priest-
hood!
This apparent incivism may be explained in part by the fact that
Messala and his entire circle held themselves aloof from the policy
of the empire. And in part it may be only the artist's pose, not the
attitude of the man. We know little of him save the narrow range
of feelings which he considered appropriate to his poetry. Horace
in his epistles has sketched another picture of his friend, living
upon his small estate, with riches, health, fame, and beauty to make
him happy,—a picture which many find it difficult to reconcile with
the melancholy and pensive Tibullus of the elegies. Yet there is no
*The sixteen poems which are undoubtedly his workmanship tell us little
save the vicissitudes of his passion for Delia, Nemesis, and even less worthy
objects of affection.
## p. 14934 (#518) ##########################################
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
14934
good reason to doubt their identity. Tibullus has chosen to limit
himself to a narrow range, and his art gains by the restrictions im-
posed upon it. His loves, his friendships, his longing for the serene
and peaceful life of the country, his regard for the simple deities
and religious rites of his forefathers, - these are the materials of
which with fine skill he constructs his poems. The tasteless learn-
ing of his Alexandrian predecessors he never imitates; nor does
he degenerate into that sensuality which is the reproach of ancient
erotic poetry. If he never startles, as Propertius occasionally does,
by some powerful line, some striking image, he lacks too the fre-
quent obscurity and the harshness of phrase which mar that poet's
work. Ovid's more fluent style and more romantic themes have won
for him a wider circle of readers; he has wit and brilliancy, and the
charm of his work is apparent on the surface. But Tibullus, while
equally smooth and polished in his versification, possesses a grace
and a refinement of sentiment that are his alone.
As his art is the most harmonious, so his personality is by far the
most attractive of the three. Especially does he reveal a delicacy
of feeling which is all too rare among ancient writers when deal-
ing with the sentiment of love. Delia and Nemesis may have found
their portraits shadowy beside the vivid figures of Clodia, Cynthia,
and the other charmers who rejoiced to "flourish more illustrious
than Roman Ilia"; but there was at least a unique generosity, an
unwonted self-abnegation, in the artist whom they inspired. It is
easy to believe that there were many traits in his gentle and win-
ning character which recalled the greatest and purest of his contem-
poraries; and it was more than the chance coincidence of their death
in the same year which led a later poet to associate Tibullus, in the
Elysian fields, with the mightier shade of Virgil.
Under the name of Tibullus, four books of elegies are extant; but
the greater number of scholars now believe that the last two are the
work of Lygdamus, Sulpicia, and perhaps other writers of Messala's
coterie. Their characteristics are not essentially different from those
ascribed to the undoubted work of Tibullus.
Among the complete editions with critical notes are those of
Lachman (Berlin, 1829), Hiller (Leipzig, 1885), and Dissen (Göttingen,
1835). There are in English only selections readily accessible: the
most recent in Ramsay's 'Selections from Propertius and Tibullus. '
Sellar's 'Roman Poets of the Augustan Age' contains an admirable
survey of the Latin elegiac school, though the chapter on Ovid is
but a fragment. The best verse translation is by Cranstoun (Lon-
don, 1872).
D. M. Whicher
G.
## p. 14935 (#519) ##########################################
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
ON THE PLEASURES OF A COUNTRY LIFE
HEIR piles of golden ore let others heap,
THE
And hold their countless roods of cultured soil,
Whom neighboring foes in constant terror keep,—
The weary victims of unceasing toil.
Let clang of drums and trumpet's blast dispel
The balmy sleep their hearts in vain desire:
At home in poverty and ease I'd dwell,
My hearth aye gleaming with a cheerful fire.
In season due I'd plant the pliant vine,
With skillful hand my swelling apples rear;
Nor fail, blest Hope! but still to me consign
Rich fruits, and vats abrim with rosy cheer.
For the lone stump afield I still revere,
Or ancient stone, whence flowery garlands nod,
In cross-roads set: the first-fruits of the year
I duly offer to the peasant's god.
O fair-haired Ceres! let the spiky crown,
Culled from my field, adorn thy shrine-door aye;
Amid my orchards red Priapus frown,
And with his threatening bill the birds dismay.
Guards of a wealthy once, now poor domain,
Ye Lares! still my gift your wardship cheers:
A fatted calf did then your altars stain,
To purify innumerable steers.
14935
A lambkin now,- a meagre* offering,-
From the few fields that still I reckon mine,
Shall fall for you, while rustic voices sing,
"Oh, grant the harvests, grant the generous wine! "
Now I can live content on scanty fare,
Nor for long travels do I bear the will:
'Neath some tree's shade I'd shun the Dog's fierce glare,
Beside the waters of a running rill.
Nor let me blush the while to wield the rake,
Or with the lash the laggard oxen ply;
The struggling lamb within my bosom take,
Or kid, by heedless dam left lone to die.
*Parva; other texts magna.
## p. 14936 (#520) ##########################################
14936
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
Spare my small flock, ye thieves and wolves! Away
Where wealthier cotes an ampler beauty hold:
I for my swain lustrations yearly pay,
And soothe with milk the goddess of the fold.
Then smile, ye gods! nor view with high disdain
The frugal gifts clean earthen bowls convey:
Such earthen vessels erst the ancient swain
Molded and fashioned from the plastic clay.
The wealth and harvest stores my sires possessed
I covet not: few sheaves will yield me bread;
Enough, reclining on my couch to rest,
And stretch my limbs upon the wonted bed.
How sweet to lie and hear the wild winds roar,
While to our breast the lovèd one we strain;
Or when the cold South's sleety torrents pour,
To sleep secure, lulled by the plashing rain!
This lot be mine: let him be rich, 'tis fair,
Who braves the wrathful sea and tempests drear;
Oh, rather perish gold and gems than e'er
One fair one for my absence shed a tear.
Dauntless, Messala, scour the earth and main,
To deck thy home with warfare's spoils; 'tis well:
Me here a lovely maiden's bonds enchain,
At her hard door a sleepless sentinel.
Delia, I court not praise, if mine thou be;
Let men cry lout and clown, I'll bear the brand;
In my last moments let me gaze on thee,
And dying, clasp thee with my faltering hand.
Thou'lt weep to see me laid upon the bier,
That will too soon the flames' mad fury feel;
Thou'lt mingle kisses with the bitter tear,
For thine no heart of stone, no breast of steel.
Nor only thou wilt weep; no youth, no maid,
With tearless eye will from my tomb repair:
But, Delia, vex not thou thy lover's shade;
Thy tender cheeks, thy streaming tresses spare!
Love's joys be ours while still the Fates allow:
Soon death will come with darkly mantled head;
## p. 14937 (#521) ##########################################
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
14937
Dull age creeps on, and love-cup or love-vow
Becomes no forehead when its snows are shed.
Then let us worship Venus while we may;
With brow unblushing, burst the bolted door
And join with rapture in the midnight fray,
Your leader I-Love's soldier proved of yore.
Hence, flags and trumpets! Me ye'll never lure;
Bear wounds and wealth to warriors bent on gain:
I, in my humble competence secure,
Shall wealth and poverty alike disdain.
WRITTEN IN SICKNESS AT CORCYRA
THOU
HOU'LT cross the Ægean waves, but not with me,
Messala; yet by thee and all thy band
I pray that I may still remembered be,
Lingering on lone Phæacia's foreign strand.
Spare me, fell Death! no mother have I here
My charred bones in sorrow's lap to lay:
Oh, spare! for here I have no sister dear
To shower Assyrian odors o'er my clay,
Or to my tomb with locks disheveled come,
And pour the tear of tender piety;
Nor Delia, who, ere yet I quitted Rome,
'Tis said consulted all the gods on high.
Thrice from the boy the sacred lots she drew,
Thrice from the streets he brought her omens sure.
All smiled: but tears would still her cheeks bedew;
Naught could her thoughts from that sad journey lure.
I blent sweet comfort with my parting words,
Yet anxiously I yearned for more delay.
Dire omens now, now inauspicious birds,
Detained me, now old Saturn's baleful day.
How oft I said, ere yet I left the town,
My awkward feet had stumbled at the door!
Enough: if lover heed not Cupid's frown,
His headstrong ways he'll bitterly deplore.
## p. 14938 (#522) ##########################################
14938
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
Where is thine Isis? What avail thee now
Her brazen sistra clashed so oft by thee?
What, while thou didst before her altars bow,
Thy pure lavations and thy chastity?
Great Isis, help! for in thy fanes displayed
Full many a tablet proves thy power to heal;
So Delia shall, in linen robes arrayed,
Her vows before thy holy threshold seal.
And morn and eve, loose-tressed, thy praise to our,
'Mid Pharian crowds conspicuous she'll return;
But let me still my father's gods adore,
And to the old Lar his monthly incense burn.
How blest men lived when good old Saturn reigned,
Ere roads had intersected hill and dale!
No pine had then the azure wave disdained,
Or spread the swelling canvas to the gale.
No roving mariner, on wealth intent,
From foreign climes a cargo homeward bore;
No sturdy steer beneath the yoke had bent,
No galling bit the conquered courser wore.
No house had doors, no pillar on the wold
Was reared to mark the limits of the plain;
The oaks ran honey, and all uncontrolled
The fleecy ewes brought milk to glad the swain.
Rage, broils, the curse of war, were all unknown;
The cruel smith had never forged the spear:
Now Jove is King,- the seeds of bale are sown,
Scars, wounds, and shipwrecks, thousand deaths loom
near.
Spare me, great Jove! No perjuries, I ween,
Distract my heart with agonizing woe;
No impious words by me have uttered been,
Against the gods above or gods below.
But if my thread of life be wholly run,
-
Upon my stone these lines engraven be: —
"HERE BY FELL FATE TIBULLUS LIES UNDONE,
WHOM DEAR MESSALA LED O'ER LAND AND SEA,"
But me, the facile child of tender Love,
Will Venus waft to blest Elysium's plains,
## p. 14939 (#523) ##########################################
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
14939
Where dance and song resound, and every grove
Rings with clear-throated warblers' dulcet strains.
Here lands untilled their richest treasures yield;
Here sweetest cassia all untended grows;
With lavish lap the earth, in every field,
Outpours the blossom of the fragrant rose.
Here bands of youths and tender maidens chime
In love's sweet lures, and pay the untiring vow;
Here reigns the lover, slain in youthhood's prime,
With myrtle garland round his honored brow.
But wrapt in ebon gloom, the torture-hell
Low lies, and pitchy rivers round it roar;
There serpent-haired Tisiphone doth yell,
And lash the damnéd crew from shore to shore.
Mark in the gate the snake-tongued sable hound,
Whose hideous howls the brazen portals close;
There lewd Ixion, Juno's tempter, bound,
Spins round his wheel in endless unrepose.
O'er nine broad acres stretched base Tityos lies,
On whose black entrails vultures ever prey;
And Tantalus is there, 'mid waves that rise
To mock his misery, and rush away.
The Danaïds, who soiled Love's lovely shrine,
Fill on, and bear their pierced pails in vain
There writhe the wretch who's wronged a love of mine,
And wished me absent on a long campaign!
—
Be chaste, my love: and let thine old nurse e'er,
To shield thy maiden fame, around thee tread,
Tell thee sweet tales, and by the lamp's bright glare
From the full distaff draw the lengthening thread.
And when thy maidens, spinning round thy knee,
Sleep-worn, by slow degrees their work lay by,
Oh, let me speed unheralded to thee,
Like an immortal rushing down the sky!
Then all undrest, with ruffled locks astream,
And feet unsandaled, meet me on my way!
Aurora, goddess of the morning beam,
Bear, on thy rosy steeds, that happy day!
## p. 14940 (#524) ##########################################
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
14940
THE RURAL DEITIES
THE
HE fields and rural gods are now my theme,
Who made our sires for acorns cease to roam,
Taught them to build their log-huts beam by beam,
And thatch with leafy boughs their humble home.
They trained the steer the bended yoke to bear,
Placed wheels beneath the cart, and by degrees
Weaned man primeval from his savage fare,
And bade the orchards smile with fruitful trees.
Then fertile gardens drank the watering wave;
Then first the purple fruitage of the vine,
Pressed by fair feet, immortal nectar gave;
Then water first was blent with generous wine.
The fields bear harvests, when the Dog-star's heat
Bids earth each year her golden honors shed;
And in spring's lap bees gather honey sweet,
And fill their combs from many a floral bed.
Returning from the plow, the weary swain
First sang his rustic lays in measured tread,
And supper o'er, tried on oat-pipe some strain
To play before his gods brow-chapleted.
He, vermil-stained, great Bacchus! first made bold
To lead the, untutored chorus on the floor,
And (valued prize! ) from forth a numerous fold
Received a goat to swell his household store.
Young hands first strung spring flow'rets in the fields,
And with a wreath the ancient gods arrayed;
Here its soft fleece the tender lambkin yields,
To form a task for many a tender maid.
Hence wool and distaffs fill the housewife's room,
And nimble thumbs deft spindles keep in play;
Hence maidens sing and ply the busy loom,
Hence rings the web beneath the driven lay.
## p. 14941 (#525) ##########################################
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
LOVE IN THE COUNTRY
Α
COT, Cerinthus, now my love detains:
Iron were he who'd bear the city now;
For Venus's self has sought the happy plains,
And Love is taking lessons at the plow.
Could I but see my darling once so kind,
How stoutly would I turn the fertile soil
With heavy rake - yea, like the poorest hind,
I'd drive the crooked plow and bless the toil,
What time the sterile oxen till the ground;
Nor would I ever of my lot complain,
Though scorching suns my slender limbs should wound,
And o'er my soft hands rise the bursting blain.
The fair Apollo fed Admetus's steers,
Nor aught availed his lyre and locks unshorn;
No herbs could soothe his soul or dry his tears,-
The powers of medicine were all outworn.
14941
He drove the cattle forth at morn and even,
Curdled the milk, and when his task was done,
Of pliant osiers wove the wicker sieve,
Leaving chance holes through which the whey might
run.
How oft pale Dian blushed and felt a pang,
To see him bear a calf across the plain!
How oft as in the deepening dell he sang,
The lowing oxen broke the hallowed strain!
Oft princes sought responses in despair;
Crowds thronged his fanes,-unanswered all retired;
Oft Leto mourned his wild disordered hair,
Which once his jealous stepdame had admired.
Loose were thy locks, O Phoebus! wan thy brow:
Who would have dreamt those tresses e'er were thine?
Where's Delos? Where is Delphic Pytho now?
Love dooms thee in a lowly cot to pine.
Blest time when Venus might untrammeled rove,
And gods all unashamed obeyed her nod!
Now love's a jest, but he who's thrall to love
Would be a jest before a loveless god.
## p. 14942 (#526) ##########################################
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
14942
TO CERINTHUS, ON HIS BIRTHDAY
Co
OME, speak fair words before the natal fane:
Or man or woman come, let silence reign,
Let incense burn, and odors fill the air
Such as the rich Arabian pastures bear;
Oh, let thy Genius view his honors now,
With flowing garlands round his holy brow;
On every tress let purest spikenard shine;
Haste, bring the cake, and crown the bowl with wine!
Beloved Cerinthus! may he hear thy vow!
Breathe it; why linger? pray, he beckons now!
Methinks thou'lt ask a wife's unchanging love;
Ah, yes! thy thoughts have reached the gods above!
To thee, compared with this, were sorry cheer
The wide world's plains upturned by brawny steer,
Or costliest gems from wealthy India drawn,
Where Ocean colors at the kiss of dawn.
Thy vows are ratified. On quivering wing,
Dear Love! the golden bonds of wedlock bring,-
Bonds that will last till age with laggard pace
Silvers thy locks and wrinkles all thy face;
And may thy natal god send children sweet,
To sport with happy gambols round thy feet!
## p. 14943 (#527) ##########################################
14943
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
(1773-1853)
MONG the poets of the romantic movement in German liter-
ature, idealists who sought the blue flower, and reviving
the native literary past, found their inspiration in mediæval
mysticism or Catholicism, or in the airy fields of pure imagination,
-Ludwig Tieck occupies an honorable place. Indeed, he is often.
referred to as the father of the older romanticism in Germany,- that
of the first quarter of our century. Certainly he was foremost in
developing and applying principles earlier laid down by Goethe and
Schiller. His many-sided literary and intel-
lectual activity was remarkable. As poet,
story-teller, translator, critic, essayist, and
editor, he did work all of which was able
and interesting, and some of it of rare and
high merit. Tieck was a scholar with a
touch of genius; a poet, as Carlyle said of
him long ago, "born as well as made. " He
belonged in the circle of which Novalis,
Brentano, and the brothers Schlegel were
other members, and his position in it is not
far from the centre.
—
Johann Ludwig Tieck was the son of a
rope-maker, and was born at Berlin, May JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
31st, 1773. He attended a good gymnasium,
and prosecuted his studies further in Halle, Göttingen, and Erlangen;
giving special attention to history, philology, and literature, ancient
and modern. He then returned to Berlin, and began his career as a
writer, first publishing tales and romances which showed the influence
of the Storm and Stress atmosphere: 'Peter Lebrecht' (1795) and
'William Lovell (1795-6) are novels typical of this phase, which does
not stand for Tieck's most representative work. This found its ex-
pression in his use of the medieval legends and fairy tales. In this
genre he was pre-eminently successful: however light and fantastic,
the conception is poetical; and delicate fancy mingles with playful
irony to make his prose stories delightful reading. A wonder-tale
like 'The Fair-haired Eckbert' is a little masterpiece. The unfinished
'Sternbald's Travels,' the 'Blue Beard,' and the 'Puss in Boots,' are
## p. 14944 (#528) ##########################################
14944
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
further well-known examples of his adaptation or rehabilitation of
popular traditions. The old märchen becomes another but a very
beautiful thing in his hands. In the Phantasus' (1812-17) are gath-
ered tales, sketches, and plays, mostly of this sort, but with less
of mysticism and more of satiric intent. Tieck's revival of folk
traditions pleased the public, while it revealed his own romantic
tendencies; he was hailed as a leader of that movement, and with
over-generous laudation, compared favorably with Goethe himself.
Tieck resided in Jena from 1799 to 1800, on terms of friendship
with the brothers Schlegel, Novalis, Brentano, Fichte, and Schelling,
making the acquaintance too of the literary gods, Goethe and Schiller.
In 1801, in company with Frederick von Schlegel, he moved to Dres-
den; but the next year settled on a friend's estate near Frankfort-
on-the-Oder. He made many journeys to Italy, as he did to various
German cities, in order to consult the libraries. Poetry, translation,
fiction, criticism, and drama, came from him rapidly. His services as
a translator were conspicuous. He made a masterly rendering of
'Don Quixote' in 1799-1801, translated the Minnesongs' in 1803, and
in his Old English Theatre' in 1811 gave a German version of the
plays doubtfully ascribed to Shakespeare, who was a lifelong object
of Tieck's devoted study. In the same year appeared the Schlegel-
Tieck translation of the dramas of the greatest of English poets,
Tieck editing and completing the mighty work done by August von
Schlegel; the version remains the standard one in that tongue, and
puts all German lovers of Shakespeare under a lasting obligation to
the collaborating authors. It is now known, however, that much of
the actual translating of the dramas not done by Schlegel was the
work of Tieck's gifted daughter, Dorothea. But his name will always
be associated with this great Shakespeare version.
Tieck left his country residence in 1819, settling in Dresden; where
he became a director of the court theatre, and drew around him a
group of admirers who swore by his views, and were antagonized by
a counter party. His literary activity during the Dresden sojourn
was constant and fruitful, many of his strongest novels and most
alluring tales being composed between the date of his arrival and his
removal to Berlin in 1841, on the invitation of King William IV.
Such productions as 'The Pictures, The Betrothal,' 'The Travel-
ers,' 'Luck Brings Brains,' 'The Old Book,' 'The Scarecrow,' 'The
Revolt in the Cevennes,' Witch's Sabbath,' and 'Vittoria Accorom-
bona,' are prominent among them; and several volumes of critical
studies and a sort of biography of Shakespeare swell the list. Tieck's
collected poems appeared in 1821: they contain many charming lyrics,
but as a rule they are reflective and cultivated rather than creative.
He was in his prose fairy tales in the broad sense a poet; that is, a
(
## p. 14945 (#529) ##########################################
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
14945
writer of imaginative literature (what the Germans call dichter), and
found in those tales his truest medium. The faults of Tieck's idyls
and fantasies are those of construction: he lacked condensation and
the sense of plastic form. His work as editor, in rehabilitating the
literary past, or in introducing comparatively unknown figures, con-
tinued to be vigorous, - one of his main services being the editing of
the complete works of the great dramatist Heinrich von Kleist. Tieck
was one of the most fecund and polydextrous writers of his time.
He lost his wife (who was the child of a clergyman) in 1837, his
daughter Dorothea in 1840; and for the remaining dozen years lived
in dignified retirement, confined much through illness but surrounded
with comforts and honors. It was during his residence in Dresden
that Tieck's fine dramatic powers as a reader were revealed to select
circles: when he went on a visit to Weimar, Goethe listened en-
chanted to his recitations. Tieck's death occurred at Berlin on April
28th, 1853. A twenty-volume edition of his works was published
there, 1828-46: a valuable and reliable biography is that by Köpke
(1855).
Thomas Carlyle in 1827 made Tieck and other German literary
leaders known to the English public by publishing his 'German
Romance. ' The poet's sister, Sophie von Knorring, was a literary
woman of repute; and his brother, Christian Frederic, a distinguished
sculptor.
Ludwig Tieck's was a complex nature, that felt keenly, and in
turn affected, the thought tendencies of his time. Owing to this
sensitiveness to the varied culture to which he subjected himself,
he differed much at different points in his development: now he is
rationalistic and skeptical, now sentimental and rhapsodical. He
played a considerable rôle in that most interesting romantic revival
in German, which was only a part of the larger European return to
romanticism in reaction from the classicism, narrow formality, and
prosing, of the eighteenth century. His most lasting contribution
to the literature of the fatherland will be found in his noble trans-
lations, and the fantasies he wove out of the raw stuff of the old
traditions and folk legends.
THE FAIR-HAIRED ECKBERT
IN
NA district of the Harz dwelt a knight, whose common des-
ignation in that quarter was the Fair-haired Eckbert. He
was about forty years of age, scarcely of middle stature; and
short, light-colored locks lay close and sleek round his pale and
XXV-935
1
## p. 14946 (#530) ##########################################
14946
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
sunken countenance. He led a retired life, had never interfered
in the feuds of his neighbors; indeed, beyond the outer wall of
his castle he was seldom to be seen. His wife loved solitude as
much as he; both seemed heartily attached to one another; only
now and then they would lament that Heaven had not blessed
their marriage with children.
Few came to visit Eckbert; and when guests did happen.
to be with him, their presence made but little alteration in his
customary way of life: Temperance abode in his household,
and Frugality herself appeared to be the mistress of the enter
tainment. On these occasions, Eckbert was always cheerful and
lively; but when he was alone, you might observe in him a cer-
tain mild reserve a still, retiring melancholy.
His most frequent guest was Philip Walther; a man to whom
he had attached himself, from having found in him a way of
thinking like his own. Walther's residence was in Franconia; but
he would often stay for half a year in Eckbert's neighborhood,
gathering plants and minerals and then sorting and arranging
them. He lived on a small independency, and was connected
with no one. Eckbert frequently attended him in his sequest-
ered walks; year after year, a closer friendship grew betwixt
them.
•
-
It was late in the autumn, when Eckbert, one cloudy even-
ing, was sitting with his friend and his wife Bertha, by the
parlor fire. The flame cast a red glimmer through the room,
and sported on the ceiling; the night looked sullenly in through
the windows, and the trees without rustled in wet coldness.
Walther complained of the long road he had to travel; and
Eckbert proposed to him to stay where he was, to while away
half of the night in friendly talk, and then to take a bed in the
house till morning. Walther agreed, and the whole was speedily
arranged; by-and-by wine and supper were brought in; fresh
wood was laid upon the fire; the talk grew livelier and more
confidential.
The cloth being removed, and the servants gone, Eckbert
took his friend's hand, and said to him: "Now you must let my
wife tell you the history of her youth; it is curious enough, and
you should know it. " "With all my heart," said Walther; and
the party again drew round the hearth.
It was now midnight; the moon looked fitfully through the
breaks of the driving clouds. "You must not reckon me
a
-
## p. 14947 (#531) ##########################################
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
14947
babbler," began the lady. "My husband says you have so gen-
erous a mind that it is not right in us to hide aught from you.
Only do not take my narrative for a fable, however strangely it
may sound.
"I was born in a little village; my father was a poor herds-
man. Our circumstances were not of the best: often we knew
not where to find our daily bread. But what grieved me more
than this were the quarrels which my father and mother often
had about their poverty, and the bitter reproaches they cast on
one another. Of myself too I heard nothing said but ill: they
were forever telling me I was a silly, stupid child, that I could
not do the simplest turn of work; and in truth I was extremely
inexpert and helpless: I let things fall, I neither learned to sew
nor spin, I could be of no use to my parents; only their straits
I understood too well. Often I would sit in a corner and fill
my little heart with dreams how I would help them if I should
all at once grow rich; how I would overflow them with silver
and gold, and feast myself on their amazement; and then spirits
came hovering up, and showed me buried treasures, or gave me
little pebbles which changed into precious stones. In short, the
strangest fancies occupied me; and when I had to rise and help
with anything, my inexpertness was still greater, as my head was
giddy with these motley visions.
"My father in particular was always very cross to me: he
scolded me for being such a burden to the house; indeed he
often used me rather cruelly, and it was very seldom that I got
a friendly word from him. In this way I had struggled on to
near the end of my eighth year; and now it was seriously fixed
that I should begin to do or learn something. My father still
maintained that it was nothing but caprice in me, or a lazy wish
to pass my days in idleness; accordingly he set upon me with
furious threats, and as these made no improvement, he one day
gave me a most cruel chastisement, and added that the same
should be repeated day after day, since I was nothing but a use-
less sluggard.
"That whole night I wept abundantly: I felt myself so utterly
forsaken; I had such a sympathy with myself that I even longed
to die. I dreaded the break of day; I knew not on earth what
I was to do or try. I wished from my very heart to be clever,
and could not understand how I should be worse than the other
children of the place. I was on the border of despair.
## p. 14948 (#532) ##########################################
14948
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
"At the dawn of day I rose, and scarcely knowing what I
did, unfastened the door of our little hut. I stept upon the
open field; next minute I was in a wood, where the light of the
morning had yet hardly penetrated. I ran along, not looking
round; for I felt no fatigue, and I still thought my father would
catch me, and in his anger at my flight, would beat me worse
than ever.
"I had reached the other side of the forest, and the sun was
risen a considerable way; I saw something dim lying before me,
and a thick fog resting over it. Ere long my path began to
mount, as one time I was climbing hills, at another wending
among rocks; and I now guessed that I must be among the
neighboring mountains,—a thought that made me shudder in my
loneliness. For, living in the plain country, I had never seen a
hill; and the very word mountains, when I heard talk of them,
had been a sound of terror to my young ear. I had not the
heart to go back,- my fear itself drove me on; often I looked
round affrighted when the breezes rustled over me among the
trees, or the stroke of some distant woodman sounded far through
the still morning. And when I began to meet with charcoal-
men and miners, and heard their foreign way of speech, I had
nearly fainted for terror.
"I passed through several villages: begging now and then,
for I felt hungry and thirsty; and fashioning my answers as I
best could when questions were put to me. In this manner I
had wandered on some four days, when I came upon a little
footpath, which led me farther and farther from the highway.
The rocks about me now assumed a different and far stranger
form. They were cliffs so piled on one another that it looked as
if the first gust of wind would hurl them all this way and that.
I knew not whether to go on or stop. Till now I had slept by
night in the woods,- for it was the finest season of the year,-
or in some remote shepherd's hut; but here I saw no human
dwelling at all, and could not hope to find one in this wilder-
The crags grew more and more frightful; I had many a
time to glide along by the very edge of dreadful abysses; by
degrees my foot-path became fainter, and at last all traces of it
vanished from beneath me. I was utterly comfortless: I wept
and screamed; and my voice came echoing back from the rocky
valleys with a sound that terrified me. The night now came on,
and I sought out a mossy nook to lie down in. I could not
ness.
## p. 14949 (#533) ##########################################
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
14949
sleep: in the darkness I heard the strangest noises; sometimes I
took them to proceed from wild beasts, sometimes from wind
moaning through the rocks, sometimes from unknown birds. I
prayed; and did not sleep till towards morning.
«< When the light came upon my face I awoke. Before me
was a steep rock; I clomb up, in the hope of discovering some
outlet from the waste, perhaps of seeing houses or men. But
when I reached the top there was nothing still, as far as my eye
could reach, but a wilderness of crags and precipices: all was
covered with a dim haze; the day was gray and troubled, and
no tree, no meadow, not even a bush could I find,—only a few
shrubs shooting up stunted and solitary in the narrow clefts of
the rocks. I cannot utter what a longing I felt but to see one
human creature, any living mortal, even though I had been afraid
of hurt from him. At the same time I was tortured by a gnaw-
ing hunger; I sat down, and made up my mind to die. After a
while, however, the desire of living gained the mastery; I roused
myself, and wandered forward amid tears and broken sobs all
day: in the end I hardly knew what I was doing; I was tired
and spent, I scarcely wished to live, and yet I feared to die.
"Towards night the country seemed to grow a little kindlier;
my thoughts, my desires revived, the wish for life awoke in all
my veins. I thought I heard the rushing of a mill afar off; I
redoubled my steps; and how glad, how light of heart was I,
when at last I actually gained the limits of the barren rocks,
and saw woods and meadows lying before me, with soft green
hills in the distance! I felt as if I had stept out of a hell into
a paradise; my loneliness and helplessness no longer frightened
me.
"Instead of the hoped-for mill, I came upon a waterfall,
which in truth considerably damped my joy. I was lifting a
drink from it in the hollow of my hand, when all at once I
thought I heard a slight cough some little way from me. Never
in my life was I so joyfully surprised as at this moment; I
went near, and at the border of the wood I saw an old woman
sitting resting on the ground. She was dressed almost wholly in
black; a black hood covered her head, and the greater part of
her face; and in her hand she held a crutch.
"I came up to her and begged for help; she made me sit by
her, and gave me bread and a little wine. While I ate, she sang
## p. 14950 (#534) ##########################################
14950
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
in a screeching tone some kind of spiritual song. When she
had done, she told me I might follow her.
"The offer charmed me, strange as the old woman's voice
and look appeared. With her crutch she limped away pretty
fast, and at every step she twisted her face so oddly that at first
I was like to laugh. The wild rocks retired behind us more
and more; I never shall forget the aspect and the feeling of that
evening. All things were as molten into the softest golden red;
the trees were standing with their tops in the glow of the sun-
set; on the fields lay a mild brightness; the woods and the leaves
of the trees were standing motionless; the pure sky looked out
like an opened paradise; and the gushing of the brooks, and
from time to time the rustling of the trees, resounded through
the serene stillness as in pensive joy. My young soul was here
first taken with a forethought of the world and its vicissitudes.
I forgot myself and my conductress: my spirit and my eyes were
wandering among the shining clouds.
"We now mounted an eminence planted with birch-trees:
from the top we looked into a green valley, likewise full of
birches; and down below, in the middle of them, was a little hut.
A glad barking reached us, and immediately a little nimble dog
came springing round the old woman, fawned on her, and wagged
its tail; it next came to me, viewed me on all sides, and then
turned back with a friendly look to its old mistress.
"On reaching the bottom of the hill, I heard the strangest
song, as if coming from the hut, and sung by some bird. It ran
thus:
―
'Alone in wood so gay
'Tis good to stay,
Morrow like to-day,
For ever and aye;
Oh, I do love to stay,
Alone in wood so gay. '
"These few words were continually repeated; and to describe
the sound, it was as if you heard forest horns and shalms sounded
together from a far distance.
"My curiosity was wonderfully on the stretch; without waiting
for the old woman's orders, I stept into the hut. It was already
dusk: here all was neatly swept and trimmed; some bowls were
## p. 14951 (#535) ##########################################
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
14951
standing in a cupboard, some strange-looking casks or pots on a
table; in a glittering cage, hanging by the window, was a bird,
and this in fact proved to be the singer. The old woman
coughed and panted; it seemed as if she never would get over
her fatigue: she patted the little dog, she talked with the bird,
which only answered her with its accustomed song; and for me,
she did not seem to recollect that I was there at all. Looking
at her so, many qualms and fears came over me, for her face
was in perpetual motion; and besides, her head shook from old
age, so that for my life I could not understand what sort of
countenance she had.
"Having gathered strength again she lit a candle, covered a
small table, and brought out supper. She now looked round for
me, and bade me take a little cane chair. I was thus sitting
close fronting her, with the light between us. She folded her
bony hands, and prayed aloud, still twisting her countenance, so
that I was once more on the point of laughing; but I took strict
care that I might not make her angry.
"After supper she again prayed, then showed me a bed in a
low, narrow closet; she herself slept in the room. I did not
watch long, for I was half stupefied; but in the night I now and
then awoke, and heard the old woman coughing, and between
whiles talking with her dog and her bird,-which last seemed
dreaming, and replied with only one or two words of its rhyme.
This with the birches rustling before the window, and the song.
of a distant nightingale, made such a wondrous combination that
I never fairly thought I was awake, but only falling out of one
dream into another still stranger.
"The old woman awoke me in the morning, and soon after
gave me work. I was put to spin, which I now learned very
easily; I had likewise to take charge of the dog and the bird. I
soon learned my business in the house: I now felt as if it all
must be so; I never once remembered that the old woman had
so many singularities, that her dwelling was mysterious and lay
apart from all men, and that the bird must be a very strange
creature. His beauty, indeed, always struck me: for his feathers
glittered with all possible colors, the fairest deep blue and the
most burning red alternated about his neck and body; and when
singing, he blew himself proudly out, so that his feathers looked
still finer.
## p. 14952 (#536) ##########################################
14952
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
"My old mistress often went abroad, and did not come again
till night; on these occasions I went out to meet her with the
dog, and she used to call me child, and daughter. In the end I
grew to like her heartily; as our mind, especially in childhood,
will become accustomed and attached to anything. In the even-
ings she taught me to read; and this was afterwards a source of
boundless satisfaction to me in my solitude, for she had several
ancient-written books, that contained the strangest stories.
"The recollection of the life I then led is still singular to me:
visited by no human creature, secluded in the circle of so small
a family; for the dog and the bird made the same impression
on me which in other cases long-known friends produce.
I am
surprised that I have never since been able to recall the dog's
name,- a very odd one,- often as I then pronounced it.
――
"Four years I had passed in this way (I must now have been
nearly twelve), when my old dame began to put more trust in
me, and at length told me a secret. The bird, I found, laid every
day an egg, in which there was a pearl or a jewel. I had already
noticed that she often went to fettle privately about the cage,
but I had never troubled myself farther on the subject. She
now gave me charge of gathering these eggs in her absence, and
carefully storing them up in the strange-looking pots. She would
leave me food, and sometimes stay away longer,- for weeks, for
months. My little wheel kept humming round, the dog barked,
the bird sang; and withal there was such a stillness in the neigh-
borhood that I do not recollect of any storm or foul weather all
the time I staid there. No one wandered thither; no wild beast
came near our dwelling: I was satisfied, and worked along in
peace from day to day. One would perhaps be very happy could
he pass his life so undisturbedly to the end.
"From the little that I read, I formed quite marvelous no-
tions of the world and its people; all taken from myself and my
society. When I read of witty persons, I could not figure them
but like the little shock; great ladies, I conceived, were like the
bird; all old women, like my mistress. I had read somewhat of
love too; and often in fancy I would play strange stories with
myself. I figured out the fairest knight on earth; adorned him
with all perfections, without knowing rightly, after all my labor,
how he looked: but I could feel a hearty pity for myself when
he ceased to love me; I would then, in thought, make long
## p. 14953 (#537) ##########################################
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
14953
melting speeches, or perhaps aloud, to try if I could win him
back. You smile! These young days are in truth far away
from us all.
"I now liked better to be left alone, for I was then sole mis-
tress of the house. The dog loved me, and did all I wanted;
the bird replied to all my questions with his rhyme; my wheel
kept briskly turning, and at bottom I had never any wish for
change. When my dame returned from her long wanderings, she
would praise my diligence; she said her house, since I belonged
to it, was managed far more perfectly; she took a pleasure in my
growth and healthy looks: in short, she treated me in all points
like her daughter.
"Thou art a good girl, child,' said she once to me, in her
creaking tone; if thou continuest so, it will be well with thee:
but none ever prospers when he leaves the straight path; pun-
ishment will overtake him, though it may be late. ' I gave little
heed to this remark of hers at the time, for in all my temper
and movements I was very lively; but by night it occurred to
me again, and I could not understand what she meant by it. I
considered all the words attentively; I had read of riches, and at
last it struck me that her pearls and jewels might perhaps be
something precious. Ere long this thought grew clearer to me.
But the straight path, and leaving it? What could she mean by
this?
"I was now fourteen: it is the misery of man that he arrives
at understanding through the loss of innocence. I now saw well
enough that it lay with me to take the jewels and the bird in
the old woman's absence, and go forth with them and see the
world I had read of. Perhaps too it would then be possible that
I might meet the fairest of all knights, who forever dwelt in my
memory.
"At first this thought was nothing more than any other
thought: but when I used to be sitting at my wheel, it still
returned to me against my will; and I sometimes followed it so
far, that I already saw myself adorned in splendid attire, with
princes and knights around me. On awakening from these dreams,
I would feel a sadness when I looked up and found myself still
in the little cottage. For the rest, if I went through my duties,
the old woman troubled herself little about what I thought or
felt.
## p. 14954 (#538) ##########################################
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
"One day she went out again, telling me that she should be
away on this occasion longer than usual; that I must take strict
charge of everything, and not let the time hang heavy on my
hands. I had a sort of fear on taking leave of her, for I felt as
if I should not see her any more. I looked long after her, and
knew not why I felt so sad: it was almost as if my purpose had
already stood before me, without myself being conscious of it.
"Never did I tend the dog and the bird with such diligence
as now: they were nearer to my heart than formerly. The old
woman had been gone some days, when I rose one morning in
the firm mind to leave the cottage, and set out with the bird to
see this world they talked so much of. I felt pressed and ham-
pered in my heart: I wished to stay where I was, and yet the
thought of that afflicted me; there was a strange contention in
my soul, as if between two discordant spirits. One moment my
peaceful solitude would seem to me most beautiful; the next
the image of a new world, with its many wonders, would again
enchant me.
14954
"I knew not what to make of it: the dog leaped up continu-
ally about me; the sunshine spread abroad over the fields; the
green birch-trees glittered: I kept feeling as if I had something I
must do in haste; so I caught the little dog, tied him up in the
room, and took the cage with the bird under my arm.
The dog
writhed and whined at this unusual treatment; he looked at me
with begging eyes, but I feared to have him with me. I also
took one pot of jewels, and concealed it by me; the rest I left.
"The bird turned its head very strangely when I crossed the
threshold; the dog tugged at his cord to follow me, but he was
forced to stay.
"I did not take the road to the wild rocks, but went in the
opposite direction. The dog still whined and barked, and it
touched me to the heart to hear him: the bird tried once or
twice to sing; but as I was carrying him, the shaking put him
out.
"The farther I went, the fainter grew the barking, and at
last it altogether ceased. I wept, and had almost turned back;
but the longing to see something new still hindered me.
"I had got across the hills, and through some forests, when
the night came on, and I was forced to turn aside into a village.
I blushed exceedingly on entering the inn: they showed me to a
## p. 14955 (#539) ##########################################
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
J4955
room and bed; I slept pretty quietly, only that I dreamed of the
old woman, and her threatening me.
"My journey had not much variety. The further I went, the
more I was afflicted by the recollection of my old mistress and
the little dog; I considered that in all likelihood the poor shock
would die of hunger, and often in the woods I thought my dame
would suddenly meet me. Thus amid tears and sobs I went
along; when I stopped to rest, and put the cage on the ground,
the bird struck up his song, and brought but too keenly to my
mind the fair habitation I had left. As human nature is forget-
ful, I imagined that my former journey, in my childhood, had
not been so sad and woeful as the present; I wished to be as I
was then.
"I had some jewels; and now, after wandering on for several
days, I reached a village. At the very entrance I was struck
with something strange: I felt terrified, and knew not why; but
I soon bethought myself, for it was the village where I was
born! How amazed was I! How the tears ran down my cheeks
for gladness, for a thousand singular remembrances! Many things
were changed: new houses had been built; some, just raised
when I went away, were now fallen, and had marks of fire on
them; everything was far smaller and more confined than I had
fancied. It rejoiced my very heart that I should see my parents
once more after such an absence: I found their little cottage, the
well-known threshold; the door-latch was standing as of old — it
seemed to me as if I had shut it only yesternight. My heart
beat violently, I hastily lifted the latch; but faces I had never
seen before looked up and gazed at me. I asked for the shep-
herd Martin: they told me that his wife and he were dead three
years ago. I drew back quickly, and left the village weeping
-
aloud.
"I had figured out so beautifully how I would surprise them
with my riches: by the strangest chance, what I had only
dreamed in childhood was become reality; and now it was all in
vain, they could not rejoice with me, and that which had been
my first hope in life was lost forever.
—
"In a pleasant town I hired a small house and garden, and
took myself a maid. The world, in truth, proved not so won-
derful as I had painted it; but I forgot the old woman and my
former way of life more and more, and on the whole I was con-
tented.
## p. 14956 (#540) ##########################################
14956
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
"For a long while the bird ceased to sing; I was therefore
not a little frightened when one night he suddenly began again,
with a different rhyme. He sang:-
'Alone in wood so gay,
Ah, far away!
But thou wilt say
Some other day,
'Twere best to stay
Alone in wood so gay. '
"Throughout the night I could not close an eye: all things
again occurred to my remembrance; and I felt more than ever
that I had not acted rightly. When I rose, the aspect of the
bird distressed me greatly; he looked at me continually, and his
presence did me ill. There was now no end to his song; he
sang it louder and more shrilly than he had been wont. The
more I looked at him, the more he pained and frightened me: at
last I opened the cage, put in my hand, and grasped his neck;
I squeezed my fingers hard together; he looked at me: I slack-
ened them; but he was dead. I buried him in the garden.
"After this there came a fear over me for my maid: I looked
back upon myself, and fancied she might rob or murder me.
For a long while I had been acquainted with a young knight,
whom I altogether liked. I bestowed on him my hand. — And
with this, Sir Walther, ends my story. "
"Ay, you should have seen her then," said Eckbert warmly;
"seen her youth, her loveliness, and what a charm her lonely
way of life had given her. I had no fortune; it was through
her love these riches came to me: we moved hither, and our
marriage has at no time brought us anything but good. "
"But with our tattling," added Bertha, "it is growing very
late; we must go to sleep. "
She rose, and proceeded to her chamber; Walther, with a kiss.
of her hand, wished her good night, saying: "Many thanks, noble
lady; I can well figure you beside your singing bird, and how
you fed poor little Strohmian. »
Walther likewise went to sleep; Eckbert alone still walked in
a restless humor up and down the room. "Are not men fools? "
said he at last. "I myself occasioned this recital of my wife's
history, and now such confidence appears to me improper! Will
he not abuse it? Will he not communicate the secret to others?
## p. 14957 (#541) ##########################################
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
14957
Will he not-for such is human nature-cast unblessed thoughts
on our jewels, and form pretext and lay plans to get possession
of them? "
It now occurred to his mind that Walther had not taken
leave of him so cordially as might have been expected after
such a mark of trust. The soul once set upon suspicion finds
in every trifle something to confirm it. Eckbert, on the other
hand, reproached himself for such ignoble feelings to his worthy
friend; yet still he could not cast them out. All night he
plagued himself with such uneasy thoughts, and got very little
sleep.
Bertha was unwell next day, and could not come to breakfast;
Walther did not seem to trouble himself much about her illness,
but left her husband also rather coolly. Eckbert could not com-
prehend such conduct. He went to see his wife, and found her
in a feverish state; she said her last night's story must have
agitated her.
From that day Walther visited the castle of his friend but
seldom; and when he did appear, it was but to say a few un-
meaning words and then depart. Eckbert was exceedingly dis-
tressed by this demeanor: to Bertha or Walther he indeed said
nothing of it; but to any person his internal disquietude was vis-
ible enough.
Bertha's sickness wore an aspect more and more serious; the
doctor grew alarmed: the red had vanished from his patient's
cheeks, and her eyes were becoming more and more inflamed.
One morning she sent for her husband to her bedside; the
nurses were ordered to withdraw.
"Dear Eckbert," she began, "I must disclose a secret to thee,
which has almost taken away my senses, which is ruining my
health, unimportant trifle as it may appear. Thou mayest re-
member, often as I talked of my childhood, I could never call
to mind the name of the dog that was so long beside me; now,
that night on taking leave, Walther all at once said to me: 'I
can well figure you, and how you fed poor little Strohmian. ' Is
it chance? Did he guess the name? Did he know it, and speak
it on purpose ? If so, how stands this man connected with my
destiny? At times I struggled with myself, as if I but imagined
this mysterious business; but alas! it is certain, too certain.
felt a shudder that a stranger should help me to recall the mem-
ory of my secrets.
it is his friend, and not the commonwealth, that is uppermost in his
thoughts. Messala bore a gallant part at Actium; but Tibullus, alone
of the poets of the day, has nothing to say of the significance of
that struggle. Once he does indeed speak of the glorious destiny
of Rome, the "name fatal to nations"; but his interest even here is
roused by the induction of Messalinus, his friend's son, into a priest-
hood!
This apparent incivism may be explained in part by the fact that
Messala and his entire circle held themselves aloof from the policy
of the empire. And in part it may be only the artist's pose, not the
attitude of the man. We know little of him save the narrow range
of feelings which he considered appropriate to his poetry. Horace
in his epistles has sketched another picture of his friend, living
upon his small estate, with riches, health, fame, and beauty to make
him happy,—a picture which many find it difficult to reconcile with
the melancholy and pensive Tibullus of the elegies. Yet there is no
*The sixteen poems which are undoubtedly his workmanship tell us little
save the vicissitudes of his passion for Delia, Nemesis, and even less worthy
objects of affection.
## p. 14934 (#518) ##########################################
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
14934
good reason to doubt their identity. Tibullus has chosen to limit
himself to a narrow range, and his art gains by the restrictions im-
posed upon it. His loves, his friendships, his longing for the serene
and peaceful life of the country, his regard for the simple deities
and religious rites of his forefathers, - these are the materials of
which with fine skill he constructs his poems. The tasteless learn-
ing of his Alexandrian predecessors he never imitates; nor does
he degenerate into that sensuality which is the reproach of ancient
erotic poetry. If he never startles, as Propertius occasionally does,
by some powerful line, some striking image, he lacks too the fre-
quent obscurity and the harshness of phrase which mar that poet's
work. Ovid's more fluent style and more romantic themes have won
for him a wider circle of readers; he has wit and brilliancy, and the
charm of his work is apparent on the surface. But Tibullus, while
equally smooth and polished in his versification, possesses a grace
and a refinement of sentiment that are his alone.
As his art is the most harmonious, so his personality is by far the
most attractive of the three. Especially does he reveal a delicacy
of feeling which is all too rare among ancient writers when deal-
ing with the sentiment of love. Delia and Nemesis may have found
their portraits shadowy beside the vivid figures of Clodia, Cynthia,
and the other charmers who rejoiced to "flourish more illustrious
than Roman Ilia"; but there was at least a unique generosity, an
unwonted self-abnegation, in the artist whom they inspired. It is
easy to believe that there were many traits in his gentle and win-
ning character which recalled the greatest and purest of his contem-
poraries; and it was more than the chance coincidence of their death
in the same year which led a later poet to associate Tibullus, in the
Elysian fields, with the mightier shade of Virgil.
Under the name of Tibullus, four books of elegies are extant; but
the greater number of scholars now believe that the last two are the
work of Lygdamus, Sulpicia, and perhaps other writers of Messala's
coterie. Their characteristics are not essentially different from those
ascribed to the undoubted work of Tibullus.
Among the complete editions with critical notes are those of
Lachman (Berlin, 1829), Hiller (Leipzig, 1885), and Dissen (Göttingen,
1835). There are in English only selections readily accessible: the
most recent in Ramsay's 'Selections from Propertius and Tibullus. '
Sellar's 'Roman Poets of the Augustan Age' contains an admirable
survey of the Latin elegiac school, though the chapter on Ovid is
but a fragment. The best verse translation is by Cranstoun (Lon-
don, 1872).
D. M. Whicher
G.
## p. 14935 (#519) ##########################################
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
ON THE PLEASURES OF A COUNTRY LIFE
HEIR piles of golden ore let others heap,
THE
And hold their countless roods of cultured soil,
Whom neighboring foes in constant terror keep,—
The weary victims of unceasing toil.
Let clang of drums and trumpet's blast dispel
The balmy sleep their hearts in vain desire:
At home in poverty and ease I'd dwell,
My hearth aye gleaming with a cheerful fire.
In season due I'd plant the pliant vine,
With skillful hand my swelling apples rear;
Nor fail, blest Hope! but still to me consign
Rich fruits, and vats abrim with rosy cheer.
For the lone stump afield I still revere,
Or ancient stone, whence flowery garlands nod,
In cross-roads set: the first-fruits of the year
I duly offer to the peasant's god.
O fair-haired Ceres! let the spiky crown,
Culled from my field, adorn thy shrine-door aye;
Amid my orchards red Priapus frown,
And with his threatening bill the birds dismay.
Guards of a wealthy once, now poor domain,
Ye Lares! still my gift your wardship cheers:
A fatted calf did then your altars stain,
To purify innumerable steers.
14935
A lambkin now,- a meagre* offering,-
From the few fields that still I reckon mine,
Shall fall for you, while rustic voices sing,
"Oh, grant the harvests, grant the generous wine! "
Now I can live content on scanty fare,
Nor for long travels do I bear the will:
'Neath some tree's shade I'd shun the Dog's fierce glare,
Beside the waters of a running rill.
Nor let me blush the while to wield the rake,
Or with the lash the laggard oxen ply;
The struggling lamb within my bosom take,
Or kid, by heedless dam left lone to die.
*Parva; other texts magna.
## p. 14936 (#520) ##########################################
14936
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
Spare my small flock, ye thieves and wolves! Away
Where wealthier cotes an ampler beauty hold:
I for my swain lustrations yearly pay,
And soothe with milk the goddess of the fold.
Then smile, ye gods! nor view with high disdain
The frugal gifts clean earthen bowls convey:
Such earthen vessels erst the ancient swain
Molded and fashioned from the plastic clay.
The wealth and harvest stores my sires possessed
I covet not: few sheaves will yield me bread;
Enough, reclining on my couch to rest,
And stretch my limbs upon the wonted bed.
How sweet to lie and hear the wild winds roar,
While to our breast the lovèd one we strain;
Or when the cold South's sleety torrents pour,
To sleep secure, lulled by the plashing rain!
This lot be mine: let him be rich, 'tis fair,
Who braves the wrathful sea and tempests drear;
Oh, rather perish gold and gems than e'er
One fair one for my absence shed a tear.
Dauntless, Messala, scour the earth and main,
To deck thy home with warfare's spoils; 'tis well:
Me here a lovely maiden's bonds enchain,
At her hard door a sleepless sentinel.
Delia, I court not praise, if mine thou be;
Let men cry lout and clown, I'll bear the brand;
In my last moments let me gaze on thee,
And dying, clasp thee with my faltering hand.
Thou'lt weep to see me laid upon the bier,
That will too soon the flames' mad fury feel;
Thou'lt mingle kisses with the bitter tear,
For thine no heart of stone, no breast of steel.
Nor only thou wilt weep; no youth, no maid,
With tearless eye will from my tomb repair:
But, Delia, vex not thou thy lover's shade;
Thy tender cheeks, thy streaming tresses spare!
Love's joys be ours while still the Fates allow:
Soon death will come with darkly mantled head;
## p. 14937 (#521) ##########################################
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
14937
Dull age creeps on, and love-cup or love-vow
Becomes no forehead when its snows are shed.
Then let us worship Venus while we may;
With brow unblushing, burst the bolted door
And join with rapture in the midnight fray,
Your leader I-Love's soldier proved of yore.
Hence, flags and trumpets! Me ye'll never lure;
Bear wounds and wealth to warriors bent on gain:
I, in my humble competence secure,
Shall wealth and poverty alike disdain.
WRITTEN IN SICKNESS AT CORCYRA
THOU
HOU'LT cross the Ægean waves, but not with me,
Messala; yet by thee and all thy band
I pray that I may still remembered be,
Lingering on lone Phæacia's foreign strand.
Spare me, fell Death! no mother have I here
My charred bones in sorrow's lap to lay:
Oh, spare! for here I have no sister dear
To shower Assyrian odors o'er my clay,
Or to my tomb with locks disheveled come,
And pour the tear of tender piety;
Nor Delia, who, ere yet I quitted Rome,
'Tis said consulted all the gods on high.
Thrice from the boy the sacred lots she drew,
Thrice from the streets he brought her omens sure.
All smiled: but tears would still her cheeks bedew;
Naught could her thoughts from that sad journey lure.
I blent sweet comfort with my parting words,
Yet anxiously I yearned for more delay.
Dire omens now, now inauspicious birds,
Detained me, now old Saturn's baleful day.
How oft I said, ere yet I left the town,
My awkward feet had stumbled at the door!
Enough: if lover heed not Cupid's frown,
His headstrong ways he'll bitterly deplore.
## p. 14938 (#522) ##########################################
14938
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
Where is thine Isis? What avail thee now
Her brazen sistra clashed so oft by thee?
What, while thou didst before her altars bow,
Thy pure lavations and thy chastity?
Great Isis, help! for in thy fanes displayed
Full many a tablet proves thy power to heal;
So Delia shall, in linen robes arrayed,
Her vows before thy holy threshold seal.
And morn and eve, loose-tressed, thy praise to our,
'Mid Pharian crowds conspicuous she'll return;
But let me still my father's gods adore,
And to the old Lar his monthly incense burn.
How blest men lived when good old Saturn reigned,
Ere roads had intersected hill and dale!
No pine had then the azure wave disdained,
Or spread the swelling canvas to the gale.
No roving mariner, on wealth intent,
From foreign climes a cargo homeward bore;
No sturdy steer beneath the yoke had bent,
No galling bit the conquered courser wore.
No house had doors, no pillar on the wold
Was reared to mark the limits of the plain;
The oaks ran honey, and all uncontrolled
The fleecy ewes brought milk to glad the swain.
Rage, broils, the curse of war, were all unknown;
The cruel smith had never forged the spear:
Now Jove is King,- the seeds of bale are sown,
Scars, wounds, and shipwrecks, thousand deaths loom
near.
Spare me, great Jove! No perjuries, I ween,
Distract my heart with agonizing woe;
No impious words by me have uttered been,
Against the gods above or gods below.
But if my thread of life be wholly run,
-
Upon my stone these lines engraven be: —
"HERE BY FELL FATE TIBULLUS LIES UNDONE,
WHOM DEAR MESSALA LED O'ER LAND AND SEA,"
But me, the facile child of tender Love,
Will Venus waft to blest Elysium's plains,
## p. 14939 (#523) ##########################################
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
14939
Where dance and song resound, and every grove
Rings with clear-throated warblers' dulcet strains.
Here lands untilled their richest treasures yield;
Here sweetest cassia all untended grows;
With lavish lap the earth, in every field,
Outpours the blossom of the fragrant rose.
Here bands of youths and tender maidens chime
In love's sweet lures, and pay the untiring vow;
Here reigns the lover, slain in youthhood's prime,
With myrtle garland round his honored brow.
But wrapt in ebon gloom, the torture-hell
Low lies, and pitchy rivers round it roar;
There serpent-haired Tisiphone doth yell,
And lash the damnéd crew from shore to shore.
Mark in the gate the snake-tongued sable hound,
Whose hideous howls the brazen portals close;
There lewd Ixion, Juno's tempter, bound,
Spins round his wheel in endless unrepose.
O'er nine broad acres stretched base Tityos lies,
On whose black entrails vultures ever prey;
And Tantalus is there, 'mid waves that rise
To mock his misery, and rush away.
The Danaïds, who soiled Love's lovely shrine,
Fill on, and bear their pierced pails in vain
There writhe the wretch who's wronged a love of mine,
And wished me absent on a long campaign!
—
Be chaste, my love: and let thine old nurse e'er,
To shield thy maiden fame, around thee tread,
Tell thee sweet tales, and by the lamp's bright glare
From the full distaff draw the lengthening thread.
And when thy maidens, spinning round thy knee,
Sleep-worn, by slow degrees their work lay by,
Oh, let me speed unheralded to thee,
Like an immortal rushing down the sky!
Then all undrest, with ruffled locks astream,
And feet unsandaled, meet me on my way!
Aurora, goddess of the morning beam,
Bear, on thy rosy steeds, that happy day!
## p. 14940 (#524) ##########################################
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
14940
THE RURAL DEITIES
THE
HE fields and rural gods are now my theme,
Who made our sires for acorns cease to roam,
Taught them to build their log-huts beam by beam,
And thatch with leafy boughs their humble home.
They trained the steer the bended yoke to bear,
Placed wheels beneath the cart, and by degrees
Weaned man primeval from his savage fare,
And bade the orchards smile with fruitful trees.
Then fertile gardens drank the watering wave;
Then first the purple fruitage of the vine,
Pressed by fair feet, immortal nectar gave;
Then water first was blent with generous wine.
The fields bear harvests, when the Dog-star's heat
Bids earth each year her golden honors shed;
And in spring's lap bees gather honey sweet,
And fill their combs from many a floral bed.
Returning from the plow, the weary swain
First sang his rustic lays in measured tread,
And supper o'er, tried on oat-pipe some strain
To play before his gods brow-chapleted.
He, vermil-stained, great Bacchus! first made bold
To lead the, untutored chorus on the floor,
And (valued prize! ) from forth a numerous fold
Received a goat to swell his household store.
Young hands first strung spring flow'rets in the fields,
And with a wreath the ancient gods arrayed;
Here its soft fleece the tender lambkin yields,
To form a task for many a tender maid.
Hence wool and distaffs fill the housewife's room,
And nimble thumbs deft spindles keep in play;
Hence maidens sing and ply the busy loom,
Hence rings the web beneath the driven lay.
## p. 14941 (#525) ##########################################
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
LOVE IN THE COUNTRY
Α
COT, Cerinthus, now my love detains:
Iron were he who'd bear the city now;
For Venus's self has sought the happy plains,
And Love is taking lessons at the plow.
Could I but see my darling once so kind,
How stoutly would I turn the fertile soil
With heavy rake - yea, like the poorest hind,
I'd drive the crooked plow and bless the toil,
What time the sterile oxen till the ground;
Nor would I ever of my lot complain,
Though scorching suns my slender limbs should wound,
And o'er my soft hands rise the bursting blain.
The fair Apollo fed Admetus's steers,
Nor aught availed his lyre and locks unshorn;
No herbs could soothe his soul or dry his tears,-
The powers of medicine were all outworn.
14941
He drove the cattle forth at morn and even,
Curdled the milk, and when his task was done,
Of pliant osiers wove the wicker sieve,
Leaving chance holes through which the whey might
run.
How oft pale Dian blushed and felt a pang,
To see him bear a calf across the plain!
How oft as in the deepening dell he sang,
The lowing oxen broke the hallowed strain!
Oft princes sought responses in despair;
Crowds thronged his fanes,-unanswered all retired;
Oft Leto mourned his wild disordered hair,
Which once his jealous stepdame had admired.
Loose were thy locks, O Phoebus! wan thy brow:
Who would have dreamt those tresses e'er were thine?
Where's Delos? Where is Delphic Pytho now?
Love dooms thee in a lowly cot to pine.
Blest time when Venus might untrammeled rove,
And gods all unashamed obeyed her nod!
Now love's a jest, but he who's thrall to love
Would be a jest before a loveless god.
## p. 14942 (#526) ##########################################
ALBIUS TIBULLUS
14942
TO CERINTHUS, ON HIS BIRTHDAY
Co
OME, speak fair words before the natal fane:
Or man or woman come, let silence reign,
Let incense burn, and odors fill the air
Such as the rich Arabian pastures bear;
Oh, let thy Genius view his honors now,
With flowing garlands round his holy brow;
On every tress let purest spikenard shine;
Haste, bring the cake, and crown the bowl with wine!
Beloved Cerinthus! may he hear thy vow!
Breathe it; why linger? pray, he beckons now!
Methinks thou'lt ask a wife's unchanging love;
Ah, yes! thy thoughts have reached the gods above!
To thee, compared with this, were sorry cheer
The wide world's plains upturned by brawny steer,
Or costliest gems from wealthy India drawn,
Where Ocean colors at the kiss of dawn.
Thy vows are ratified. On quivering wing,
Dear Love! the golden bonds of wedlock bring,-
Bonds that will last till age with laggard pace
Silvers thy locks and wrinkles all thy face;
And may thy natal god send children sweet,
To sport with happy gambols round thy feet!
## p. 14943 (#527) ##########################################
14943
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
(1773-1853)
MONG the poets of the romantic movement in German liter-
ature, idealists who sought the blue flower, and reviving
the native literary past, found their inspiration in mediæval
mysticism or Catholicism, or in the airy fields of pure imagination,
-Ludwig Tieck occupies an honorable place. Indeed, he is often.
referred to as the father of the older romanticism in Germany,- that
of the first quarter of our century. Certainly he was foremost in
developing and applying principles earlier laid down by Goethe and
Schiller. His many-sided literary and intel-
lectual activity was remarkable. As poet,
story-teller, translator, critic, essayist, and
editor, he did work all of which was able
and interesting, and some of it of rare and
high merit. Tieck was a scholar with a
touch of genius; a poet, as Carlyle said of
him long ago, "born as well as made. " He
belonged in the circle of which Novalis,
Brentano, and the brothers Schlegel were
other members, and his position in it is not
far from the centre.
—
Johann Ludwig Tieck was the son of a
rope-maker, and was born at Berlin, May JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
31st, 1773. He attended a good gymnasium,
and prosecuted his studies further in Halle, Göttingen, and Erlangen;
giving special attention to history, philology, and literature, ancient
and modern. He then returned to Berlin, and began his career as a
writer, first publishing tales and romances which showed the influence
of the Storm and Stress atmosphere: 'Peter Lebrecht' (1795) and
'William Lovell (1795-6) are novels typical of this phase, which does
not stand for Tieck's most representative work. This found its ex-
pression in his use of the medieval legends and fairy tales. In this
genre he was pre-eminently successful: however light and fantastic,
the conception is poetical; and delicate fancy mingles with playful
irony to make his prose stories delightful reading. A wonder-tale
like 'The Fair-haired Eckbert' is a little masterpiece. The unfinished
'Sternbald's Travels,' the 'Blue Beard,' and the 'Puss in Boots,' are
## p. 14944 (#528) ##########################################
14944
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
further well-known examples of his adaptation or rehabilitation of
popular traditions. The old märchen becomes another but a very
beautiful thing in his hands. In the Phantasus' (1812-17) are gath-
ered tales, sketches, and plays, mostly of this sort, but with less
of mysticism and more of satiric intent. Tieck's revival of folk
traditions pleased the public, while it revealed his own romantic
tendencies; he was hailed as a leader of that movement, and with
over-generous laudation, compared favorably with Goethe himself.
Tieck resided in Jena from 1799 to 1800, on terms of friendship
with the brothers Schlegel, Novalis, Brentano, Fichte, and Schelling,
making the acquaintance too of the literary gods, Goethe and Schiller.
In 1801, in company with Frederick von Schlegel, he moved to Dres-
den; but the next year settled on a friend's estate near Frankfort-
on-the-Oder. He made many journeys to Italy, as he did to various
German cities, in order to consult the libraries. Poetry, translation,
fiction, criticism, and drama, came from him rapidly. His services as
a translator were conspicuous. He made a masterly rendering of
'Don Quixote' in 1799-1801, translated the Minnesongs' in 1803, and
in his Old English Theatre' in 1811 gave a German version of the
plays doubtfully ascribed to Shakespeare, who was a lifelong object
of Tieck's devoted study. In the same year appeared the Schlegel-
Tieck translation of the dramas of the greatest of English poets,
Tieck editing and completing the mighty work done by August von
Schlegel; the version remains the standard one in that tongue, and
puts all German lovers of Shakespeare under a lasting obligation to
the collaborating authors. It is now known, however, that much of
the actual translating of the dramas not done by Schlegel was the
work of Tieck's gifted daughter, Dorothea. But his name will always
be associated with this great Shakespeare version.
Tieck left his country residence in 1819, settling in Dresden; where
he became a director of the court theatre, and drew around him a
group of admirers who swore by his views, and were antagonized by
a counter party. His literary activity during the Dresden sojourn
was constant and fruitful, many of his strongest novels and most
alluring tales being composed between the date of his arrival and his
removal to Berlin in 1841, on the invitation of King William IV.
Such productions as 'The Pictures, The Betrothal,' 'The Travel-
ers,' 'Luck Brings Brains,' 'The Old Book,' 'The Scarecrow,' 'The
Revolt in the Cevennes,' Witch's Sabbath,' and 'Vittoria Accorom-
bona,' are prominent among them; and several volumes of critical
studies and a sort of biography of Shakespeare swell the list. Tieck's
collected poems appeared in 1821: they contain many charming lyrics,
but as a rule they are reflective and cultivated rather than creative.
He was in his prose fairy tales in the broad sense a poet; that is, a
(
## p. 14945 (#529) ##########################################
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
14945
writer of imaginative literature (what the Germans call dichter), and
found in those tales his truest medium. The faults of Tieck's idyls
and fantasies are those of construction: he lacked condensation and
the sense of plastic form. His work as editor, in rehabilitating the
literary past, or in introducing comparatively unknown figures, con-
tinued to be vigorous, - one of his main services being the editing of
the complete works of the great dramatist Heinrich von Kleist. Tieck
was one of the most fecund and polydextrous writers of his time.
He lost his wife (who was the child of a clergyman) in 1837, his
daughter Dorothea in 1840; and for the remaining dozen years lived
in dignified retirement, confined much through illness but surrounded
with comforts and honors. It was during his residence in Dresden
that Tieck's fine dramatic powers as a reader were revealed to select
circles: when he went on a visit to Weimar, Goethe listened en-
chanted to his recitations. Tieck's death occurred at Berlin on April
28th, 1853. A twenty-volume edition of his works was published
there, 1828-46: a valuable and reliable biography is that by Köpke
(1855).
Thomas Carlyle in 1827 made Tieck and other German literary
leaders known to the English public by publishing his 'German
Romance. ' The poet's sister, Sophie von Knorring, was a literary
woman of repute; and his brother, Christian Frederic, a distinguished
sculptor.
Ludwig Tieck's was a complex nature, that felt keenly, and in
turn affected, the thought tendencies of his time. Owing to this
sensitiveness to the varied culture to which he subjected himself,
he differed much at different points in his development: now he is
rationalistic and skeptical, now sentimental and rhapsodical. He
played a considerable rôle in that most interesting romantic revival
in German, which was only a part of the larger European return to
romanticism in reaction from the classicism, narrow formality, and
prosing, of the eighteenth century. His most lasting contribution
to the literature of the fatherland will be found in his noble trans-
lations, and the fantasies he wove out of the raw stuff of the old
traditions and folk legends.
THE FAIR-HAIRED ECKBERT
IN
NA district of the Harz dwelt a knight, whose common des-
ignation in that quarter was the Fair-haired Eckbert. He
was about forty years of age, scarcely of middle stature; and
short, light-colored locks lay close and sleek round his pale and
XXV-935
1
## p. 14946 (#530) ##########################################
14946
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
sunken countenance. He led a retired life, had never interfered
in the feuds of his neighbors; indeed, beyond the outer wall of
his castle he was seldom to be seen. His wife loved solitude as
much as he; both seemed heartily attached to one another; only
now and then they would lament that Heaven had not blessed
their marriage with children.
Few came to visit Eckbert; and when guests did happen.
to be with him, their presence made but little alteration in his
customary way of life: Temperance abode in his household,
and Frugality herself appeared to be the mistress of the enter
tainment. On these occasions, Eckbert was always cheerful and
lively; but when he was alone, you might observe in him a cer-
tain mild reserve a still, retiring melancholy.
His most frequent guest was Philip Walther; a man to whom
he had attached himself, from having found in him a way of
thinking like his own. Walther's residence was in Franconia; but
he would often stay for half a year in Eckbert's neighborhood,
gathering plants and minerals and then sorting and arranging
them. He lived on a small independency, and was connected
with no one. Eckbert frequently attended him in his sequest-
ered walks; year after year, a closer friendship grew betwixt
them.
•
-
It was late in the autumn, when Eckbert, one cloudy even-
ing, was sitting with his friend and his wife Bertha, by the
parlor fire. The flame cast a red glimmer through the room,
and sported on the ceiling; the night looked sullenly in through
the windows, and the trees without rustled in wet coldness.
Walther complained of the long road he had to travel; and
Eckbert proposed to him to stay where he was, to while away
half of the night in friendly talk, and then to take a bed in the
house till morning. Walther agreed, and the whole was speedily
arranged; by-and-by wine and supper were brought in; fresh
wood was laid upon the fire; the talk grew livelier and more
confidential.
The cloth being removed, and the servants gone, Eckbert
took his friend's hand, and said to him: "Now you must let my
wife tell you the history of her youth; it is curious enough, and
you should know it. " "With all my heart," said Walther; and
the party again drew round the hearth.
It was now midnight; the moon looked fitfully through the
breaks of the driving clouds. "You must not reckon me
a
-
## p. 14947 (#531) ##########################################
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
14947
babbler," began the lady. "My husband says you have so gen-
erous a mind that it is not right in us to hide aught from you.
Only do not take my narrative for a fable, however strangely it
may sound.
"I was born in a little village; my father was a poor herds-
man. Our circumstances were not of the best: often we knew
not where to find our daily bread. But what grieved me more
than this were the quarrels which my father and mother often
had about their poverty, and the bitter reproaches they cast on
one another. Of myself too I heard nothing said but ill: they
were forever telling me I was a silly, stupid child, that I could
not do the simplest turn of work; and in truth I was extremely
inexpert and helpless: I let things fall, I neither learned to sew
nor spin, I could be of no use to my parents; only their straits
I understood too well. Often I would sit in a corner and fill
my little heart with dreams how I would help them if I should
all at once grow rich; how I would overflow them with silver
and gold, and feast myself on their amazement; and then spirits
came hovering up, and showed me buried treasures, or gave me
little pebbles which changed into precious stones. In short, the
strangest fancies occupied me; and when I had to rise and help
with anything, my inexpertness was still greater, as my head was
giddy with these motley visions.
"My father in particular was always very cross to me: he
scolded me for being such a burden to the house; indeed he
often used me rather cruelly, and it was very seldom that I got
a friendly word from him. In this way I had struggled on to
near the end of my eighth year; and now it was seriously fixed
that I should begin to do or learn something. My father still
maintained that it was nothing but caprice in me, or a lazy wish
to pass my days in idleness; accordingly he set upon me with
furious threats, and as these made no improvement, he one day
gave me a most cruel chastisement, and added that the same
should be repeated day after day, since I was nothing but a use-
less sluggard.
"That whole night I wept abundantly: I felt myself so utterly
forsaken; I had such a sympathy with myself that I even longed
to die. I dreaded the break of day; I knew not on earth what
I was to do or try. I wished from my very heart to be clever,
and could not understand how I should be worse than the other
children of the place. I was on the border of despair.
## p. 14948 (#532) ##########################################
14948
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
"At the dawn of day I rose, and scarcely knowing what I
did, unfastened the door of our little hut. I stept upon the
open field; next minute I was in a wood, where the light of the
morning had yet hardly penetrated. I ran along, not looking
round; for I felt no fatigue, and I still thought my father would
catch me, and in his anger at my flight, would beat me worse
than ever.
"I had reached the other side of the forest, and the sun was
risen a considerable way; I saw something dim lying before me,
and a thick fog resting over it. Ere long my path began to
mount, as one time I was climbing hills, at another wending
among rocks; and I now guessed that I must be among the
neighboring mountains,—a thought that made me shudder in my
loneliness. For, living in the plain country, I had never seen a
hill; and the very word mountains, when I heard talk of them,
had been a sound of terror to my young ear. I had not the
heart to go back,- my fear itself drove me on; often I looked
round affrighted when the breezes rustled over me among the
trees, or the stroke of some distant woodman sounded far through
the still morning. And when I began to meet with charcoal-
men and miners, and heard their foreign way of speech, I had
nearly fainted for terror.
"I passed through several villages: begging now and then,
for I felt hungry and thirsty; and fashioning my answers as I
best could when questions were put to me. In this manner I
had wandered on some four days, when I came upon a little
footpath, which led me farther and farther from the highway.
The rocks about me now assumed a different and far stranger
form. They were cliffs so piled on one another that it looked as
if the first gust of wind would hurl them all this way and that.
I knew not whether to go on or stop. Till now I had slept by
night in the woods,- for it was the finest season of the year,-
or in some remote shepherd's hut; but here I saw no human
dwelling at all, and could not hope to find one in this wilder-
The crags grew more and more frightful; I had many a
time to glide along by the very edge of dreadful abysses; by
degrees my foot-path became fainter, and at last all traces of it
vanished from beneath me. I was utterly comfortless: I wept
and screamed; and my voice came echoing back from the rocky
valleys with a sound that terrified me. The night now came on,
and I sought out a mossy nook to lie down in. I could not
ness.
## p. 14949 (#533) ##########################################
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
14949
sleep: in the darkness I heard the strangest noises; sometimes I
took them to proceed from wild beasts, sometimes from wind
moaning through the rocks, sometimes from unknown birds. I
prayed; and did not sleep till towards morning.
«< When the light came upon my face I awoke. Before me
was a steep rock; I clomb up, in the hope of discovering some
outlet from the waste, perhaps of seeing houses or men. But
when I reached the top there was nothing still, as far as my eye
could reach, but a wilderness of crags and precipices: all was
covered with a dim haze; the day was gray and troubled, and
no tree, no meadow, not even a bush could I find,—only a few
shrubs shooting up stunted and solitary in the narrow clefts of
the rocks. I cannot utter what a longing I felt but to see one
human creature, any living mortal, even though I had been afraid
of hurt from him. At the same time I was tortured by a gnaw-
ing hunger; I sat down, and made up my mind to die. After a
while, however, the desire of living gained the mastery; I roused
myself, and wandered forward amid tears and broken sobs all
day: in the end I hardly knew what I was doing; I was tired
and spent, I scarcely wished to live, and yet I feared to die.
"Towards night the country seemed to grow a little kindlier;
my thoughts, my desires revived, the wish for life awoke in all
my veins. I thought I heard the rushing of a mill afar off; I
redoubled my steps; and how glad, how light of heart was I,
when at last I actually gained the limits of the barren rocks,
and saw woods and meadows lying before me, with soft green
hills in the distance! I felt as if I had stept out of a hell into
a paradise; my loneliness and helplessness no longer frightened
me.
"Instead of the hoped-for mill, I came upon a waterfall,
which in truth considerably damped my joy. I was lifting a
drink from it in the hollow of my hand, when all at once I
thought I heard a slight cough some little way from me. Never
in my life was I so joyfully surprised as at this moment; I
went near, and at the border of the wood I saw an old woman
sitting resting on the ground. She was dressed almost wholly in
black; a black hood covered her head, and the greater part of
her face; and in her hand she held a crutch.
"I came up to her and begged for help; she made me sit by
her, and gave me bread and a little wine. While I ate, she sang
## p. 14950 (#534) ##########################################
14950
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
in a screeching tone some kind of spiritual song. When she
had done, she told me I might follow her.
"The offer charmed me, strange as the old woman's voice
and look appeared. With her crutch she limped away pretty
fast, and at every step she twisted her face so oddly that at first
I was like to laugh. The wild rocks retired behind us more
and more; I never shall forget the aspect and the feeling of that
evening. All things were as molten into the softest golden red;
the trees were standing with their tops in the glow of the sun-
set; on the fields lay a mild brightness; the woods and the leaves
of the trees were standing motionless; the pure sky looked out
like an opened paradise; and the gushing of the brooks, and
from time to time the rustling of the trees, resounded through
the serene stillness as in pensive joy. My young soul was here
first taken with a forethought of the world and its vicissitudes.
I forgot myself and my conductress: my spirit and my eyes were
wandering among the shining clouds.
"We now mounted an eminence planted with birch-trees:
from the top we looked into a green valley, likewise full of
birches; and down below, in the middle of them, was a little hut.
A glad barking reached us, and immediately a little nimble dog
came springing round the old woman, fawned on her, and wagged
its tail; it next came to me, viewed me on all sides, and then
turned back with a friendly look to its old mistress.
"On reaching the bottom of the hill, I heard the strangest
song, as if coming from the hut, and sung by some bird. It ran
thus:
―
'Alone in wood so gay
'Tis good to stay,
Morrow like to-day,
For ever and aye;
Oh, I do love to stay,
Alone in wood so gay. '
"These few words were continually repeated; and to describe
the sound, it was as if you heard forest horns and shalms sounded
together from a far distance.
"My curiosity was wonderfully on the stretch; without waiting
for the old woman's orders, I stept into the hut. It was already
dusk: here all was neatly swept and trimmed; some bowls were
## p. 14951 (#535) ##########################################
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
14951
standing in a cupboard, some strange-looking casks or pots on a
table; in a glittering cage, hanging by the window, was a bird,
and this in fact proved to be the singer. The old woman
coughed and panted; it seemed as if she never would get over
her fatigue: she patted the little dog, she talked with the bird,
which only answered her with its accustomed song; and for me,
she did not seem to recollect that I was there at all. Looking
at her so, many qualms and fears came over me, for her face
was in perpetual motion; and besides, her head shook from old
age, so that for my life I could not understand what sort of
countenance she had.
"Having gathered strength again she lit a candle, covered a
small table, and brought out supper. She now looked round for
me, and bade me take a little cane chair. I was thus sitting
close fronting her, with the light between us. She folded her
bony hands, and prayed aloud, still twisting her countenance, so
that I was once more on the point of laughing; but I took strict
care that I might not make her angry.
"After supper she again prayed, then showed me a bed in a
low, narrow closet; she herself slept in the room. I did not
watch long, for I was half stupefied; but in the night I now and
then awoke, and heard the old woman coughing, and between
whiles talking with her dog and her bird,-which last seemed
dreaming, and replied with only one or two words of its rhyme.
This with the birches rustling before the window, and the song.
of a distant nightingale, made such a wondrous combination that
I never fairly thought I was awake, but only falling out of one
dream into another still stranger.
"The old woman awoke me in the morning, and soon after
gave me work. I was put to spin, which I now learned very
easily; I had likewise to take charge of the dog and the bird. I
soon learned my business in the house: I now felt as if it all
must be so; I never once remembered that the old woman had
so many singularities, that her dwelling was mysterious and lay
apart from all men, and that the bird must be a very strange
creature. His beauty, indeed, always struck me: for his feathers
glittered with all possible colors, the fairest deep blue and the
most burning red alternated about his neck and body; and when
singing, he blew himself proudly out, so that his feathers looked
still finer.
## p. 14952 (#536) ##########################################
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JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
"My old mistress often went abroad, and did not come again
till night; on these occasions I went out to meet her with the
dog, and she used to call me child, and daughter. In the end I
grew to like her heartily; as our mind, especially in childhood,
will become accustomed and attached to anything. In the even-
ings she taught me to read; and this was afterwards a source of
boundless satisfaction to me in my solitude, for she had several
ancient-written books, that contained the strangest stories.
"The recollection of the life I then led is still singular to me:
visited by no human creature, secluded in the circle of so small
a family; for the dog and the bird made the same impression
on me which in other cases long-known friends produce.
I am
surprised that I have never since been able to recall the dog's
name,- a very odd one,- often as I then pronounced it.
――
"Four years I had passed in this way (I must now have been
nearly twelve), when my old dame began to put more trust in
me, and at length told me a secret. The bird, I found, laid every
day an egg, in which there was a pearl or a jewel. I had already
noticed that she often went to fettle privately about the cage,
but I had never troubled myself farther on the subject. She
now gave me charge of gathering these eggs in her absence, and
carefully storing them up in the strange-looking pots. She would
leave me food, and sometimes stay away longer,- for weeks, for
months. My little wheel kept humming round, the dog barked,
the bird sang; and withal there was such a stillness in the neigh-
borhood that I do not recollect of any storm or foul weather all
the time I staid there. No one wandered thither; no wild beast
came near our dwelling: I was satisfied, and worked along in
peace from day to day. One would perhaps be very happy could
he pass his life so undisturbedly to the end.
"From the little that I read, I formed quite marvelous no-
tions of the world and its people; all taken from myself and my
society. When I read of witty persons, I could not figure them
but like the little shock; great ladies, I conceived, were like the
bird; all old women, like my mistress. I had read somewhat of
love too; and often in fancy I would play strange stories with
myself. I figured out the fairest knight on earth; adorned him
with all perfections, without knowing rightly, after all my labor,
how he looked: but I could feel a hearty pity for myself when
he ceased to love me; I would then, in thought, make long
## p. 14953 (#537) ##########################################
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
14953
melting speeches, or perhaps aloud, to try if I could win him
back. You smile! These young days are in truth far away
from us all.
"I now liked better to be left alone, for I was then sole mis-
tress of the house. The dog loved me, and did all I wanted;
the bird replied to all my questions with his rhyme; my wheel
kept briskly turning, and at bottom I had never any wish for
change. When my dame returned from her long wanderings, she
would praise my diligence; she said her house, since I belonged
to it, was managed far more perfectly; she took a pleasure in my
growth and healthy looks: in short, she treated me in all points
like her daughter.
"Thou art a good girl, child,' said she once to me, in her
creaking tone; if thou continuest so, it will be well with thee:
but none ever prospers when he leaves the straight path; pun-
ishment will overtake him, though it may be late. ' I gave little
heed to this remark of hers at the time, for in all my temper
and movements I was very lively; but by night it occurred to
me again, and I could not understand what she meant by it. I
considered all the words attentively; I had read of riches, and at
last it struck me that her pearls and jewels might perhaps be
something precious. Ere long this thought grew clearer to me.
But the straight path, and leaving it? What could she mean by
this?
"I was now fourteen: it is the misery of man that he arrives
at understanding through the loss of innocence. I now saw well
enough that it lay with me to take the jewels and the bird in
the old woman's absence, and go forth with them and see the
world I had read of. Perhaps too it would then be possible that
I might meet the fairest of all knights, who forever dwelt in my
memory.
"At first this thought was nothing more than any other
thought: but when I used to be sitting at my wheel, it still
returned to me against my will; and I sometimes followed it so
far, that I already saw myself adorned in splendid attire, with
princes and knights around me. On awakening from these dreams,
I would feel a sadness when I looked up and found myself still
in the little cottage. For the rest, if I went through my duties,
the old woman troubled herself little about what I thought or
felt.
## p. 14954 (#538) ##########################################
JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
"One day she went out again, telling me that she should be
away on this occasion longer than usual; that I must take strict
charge of everything, and not let the time hang heavy on my
hands. I had a sort of fear on taking leave of her, for I felt as
if I should not see her any more. I looked long after her, and
knew not why I felt so sad: it was almost as if my purpose had
already stood before me, without myself being conscious of it.
"Never did I tend the dog and the bird with such diligence
as now: they were nearer to my heart than formerly. The old
woman had been gone some days, when I rose one morning in
the firm mind to leave the cottage, and set out with the bird to
see this world they talked so much of. I felt pressed and ham-
pered in my heart: I wished to stay where I was, and yet the
thought of that afflicted me; there was a strange contention in
my soul, as if between two discordant spirits. One moment my
peaceful solitude would seem to me most beautiful; the next
the image of a new world, with its many wonders, would again
enchant me.
14954
"I knew not what to make of it: the dog leaped up continu-
ally about me; the sunshine spread abroad over the fields; the
green birch-trees glittered: I kept feeling as if I had something I
must do in haste; so I caught the little dog, tied him up in the
room, and took the cage with the bird under my arm.
The dog
writhed and whined at this unusual treatment; he looked at me
with begging eyes, but I feared to have him with me. I also
took one pot of jewels, and concealed it by me; the rest I left.
"The bird turned its head very strangely when I crossed the
threshold; the dog tugged at his cord to follow me, but he was
forced to stay.
"I did not take the road to the wild rocks, but went in the
opposite direction. The dog still whined and barked, and it
touched me to the heart to hear him: the bird tried once or
twice to sing; but as I was carrying him, the shaking put him
out.
"The farther I went, the fainter grew the barking, and at
last it altogether ceased. I wept, and had almost turned back;
but the longing to see something new still hindered me.
"I had got across the hills, and through some forests, when
the night came on, and I was forced to turn aside into a village.
I blushed exceedingly on entering the inn: they showed me to a
## p. 14955 (#539) ##########################################
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J4955
room and bed; I slept pretty quietly, only that I dreamed of the
old woman, and her threatening me.
"My journey had not much variety. The further I went, the
more I was afflicted by the recollection of my old mistress and
the little dog; I considered that in all likelihood the poor shock
would die of hunger, and often in the woods I thought my dame
would suddenly meet me. Thus amid tears and sobs I went
along; when I stopped to rest, and put the cage on the ground,
the bird struck up his song, and brought but too keenly to my
mind the fair habitation I had left. As human nature is forget-
ful, I imagined that my former journey, in my childhood, had
not been so sad and woeful as the present; I wished to be as I
was then.
"I had some jewels; and now, after wandering on for several
days, I reached a village. At the very entrance I was struck
with something strange: I felt terrified, and knew not why; but
I soon bethought myself, for it was the village where I was
born! How amazed was I! How the tears ran down my cheeks
for gladness, for a thousand singular remembrances! Many things
were changed: new houses had been built; some, just raised
when I went away, were now fallen, and had marks of fire on
them; everything was far smaller and more confined than I had
fancied. It rejoiced my very heart that I should see my parents
once more after such an absence: I found their little cottage, the
well-known threshold; the door-latch was standing as of old — it
seemed to me as if I had shut it only yesternight. My heart
beat violently, I hastily lifted the latch; but faces I had never
seen before looked up and gazed at me. I asked for the shep-
herd Martin: they told me that his wife and he were dead three
years ago. I drew back quickly, and left the village weeping
-
aloud.
"I had figured out so beautifully how I would surprise them
with my riches: by the strangest chance, what I had only
dreamed in childhood was become reality; and now it was all in
vain, they could not rejoice with me, and that which had been
my first hope in life was lost forever.
—
"In a pleasant town I hired a small house and garden, and
took myself a maid. The world, in truth, proved not so won-
derful as I had painted it; but I forgot the old woman and my
former way of life more and more, and on the whole I was con-
tented.
## p. 14956 (#540) ##########################################
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JOHANN LUDWIG TIECK
"For a long while the bird ceased to sing; I was therefore
not a little frightened when one night he suddenly began again,
with a different rhyme. He sang:-
'Alone in wood so gay,
Ah, far away!
But thou wilt say
Some other day,
'Twere best to stay
Alone in wood so gay. '
"Throughout the night I could not close an eye: all things
again occurred to my remembrance; and I felt more than ever
that I had not acted rightly. When I rose, the aspect of the
bird distressed me greatly; he looked at me continually, and his
presence did me ill. There was now no end to his song; he
sang it louder and more shrilly than he had been wont. The
more I looked at him, the more he pained and frightened me: at
last I opened the cage, put in my hand, and grasped his neck;
I squeezed my fingers hard together; he looked at me: I slack-
ened them; but he was dead. I buried him in the garden.
"After this there came a fear over me for my maid: I looked
back upon myself, and fancied she might rob or murder me.
For a long while I had been acquainted with a young knight,
whom I altogether liked. I bestowed on him my hand. — And
with this, Sir Walther, ends my story. "
"Ay, you should have seen her then," said Eckbert warmly;
"seen her youth, her loveliness, and what a charm her lonely
way of life had given her. I had no fortune; it was through
her love these riches came to me: we moved hither, and our
marriage has at no time brought us anything but good. "
"But with our tattling," added Bertha, "it is growing very
late; we must go to sleep. "
She rose, and proceeded to her chamber; Walther, with a kiss.
of her hand, wished her good night, saying: "Many thanks, noble
lady; I can well figure you beside your singing bird, and how
you fed poor little Strohmian. »
Walther likewise went to sleep; Eckbert alone still walked in
a restless humor up and down the room. "Are not men fools? "
said he at last. "I myself occasioned this recital of my wife's
history, and now such confidence appears to me improper! Will
he not abuse it? Will he not communicate the secret to others?
## p. 14957 (#541) ##########################################
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14957
Will he not-for such is human nature-cast unblessed thoughts
on our jewels, and form pretext and lay plans to get possession
of them? "
It now occurred to his mind that Walther had not taken
leave of him so cordially as might have been expected after
such a mark of trust. The soul once set upon suspicion finds
in every trifle something to confirm it. Eckbert, on the other
hand, reproached himself for such ignoble feelings to his worthy
friend; yet still he could not cast them out. All night he
plagued himself with such uneasy thoughts, and got very little
sleep.
Bertha was unwell next day, and could not come to breakfast;
Walther did not seem to trouble himself much about her illness,
but left her husband also rather coolly. Eckbert could not com-
prehend such conduct. He went to see his wife, and found her
in a feverish state; she said her last night's story must have
agitated her.
From that day Walther visited the castle of his friend but
seldom; and when he did appear, it was but to say a few un-
meaning words and then depart. Eckbert was exceedingly dis-
tressed by this demeanor: to Bertha or Walther he indeed said
nothing of it; but to any person his internal disquietude was vis-
ible enough.
Bertha's sickness wore an aspect more and more serious; the
doctor grew alarmed: the red had vanished from his patient's
cheeks, and her eyes were becoming more and more inflamed.
One morning she sent for her husband to her bedside; the
nurses were ordered to withdraw.
"Dear Eckbert," she began, "I must disclose a secret to thee,
which has almost taken away my senses, which is ruining my
health, unimportant trifle as it may appear. Thou mayest re-
member, often as I talked of my childhood, I could never call
to mind the name of the dog that was so long beside me; now,
that night on taking leave, Walther all at once said to me: 'I
can well figure you, and how you fed poor little Strohmian. ' Is
it chance? Did he guess the name? Did he know it, and speak
it on purpose ? If so, how stands this man connected with my
destiny? At times I struggled with myself, as if I but imagined
this mysterious business; but alas! it is certain, too certain.
felt a shudder that a stranger should help me to recall the mem-
ory of my secrets.
