As Freytag solves the problem in
'Soll und Haben,' it is the man who works, the man of the indus-
trial classes alone, to whom the victory belongs in the modern social
struggle, be his antecedents bourgeois or aristocratic.
'Soll und Haben,' it is the man who works, the man of the indus-
trial classes alone, to whom the victory belongs in the modern social
struggle, be his antecedents bourgeois or aristocratic.
Warner - World's Best Literature - v10 - Emp to Fro
The jury however acquitted him, and he at once assumed
the management of the New Rhenish Gazette at Cologne.
It is a curious fact that during this agitated time Freiligrath
wrote some of his tenderest poetry. In the collection which appeared
in 1849 with the title 'Zwischen den Garben' (Between the Sheaves),
was included that exquisite hymn to love: 'Oh, Love So Long as Love
Thou Canst,' perhaps the most perfect of all his lyrical productions,
and certainly evidence that the poet could touch the strings to deep
emotions. In the following year both volumes of his 'New Political
and Social Poems' were ready. Once more he prudently retired to
London; his fears were confirmed by the immediate confiscation of
these new volumes, and by the publication of a letter of apprehen-
sion. By way of reprisal he wrote his poem 'The Revolution,' which
was published in London.
In 1867 the Swiss bank with which Freiligrath was connected
closed its London branch, and the poet again faced an uncertain
future. His friends on the Rhine, hearing of his difficulties, raised a
generous subscription, and taking advantage of a general amnesty, he
returned to the fatherland and became associated with the Stuttgart
Illustrated Magazine. In 1870 appeared a complete collection of his
## p. 6004 (#594) ###########################################
6004
FERDINAND FREILIGRATH
poems; in 1876, 'New Poems'; and in the latter year, on March 18th,
he died at Cannstatt in Würtemburg.
The question which Freiligrath asks the emigrants in his early
poem of that name, 'O say, why seek ye other lands? — was des-
tined to find frequent and bitter answer in his own checkered career;
but he never swerved from the liberal principles which he had pub-
licly announced. His political poems were among the most powerful
influences of his time, and they have a permanent value as the
expression of the spirit of freedom. His translations are marvels of
fidelity and beauty. His Hiawatha' and 'The Ancient Mariner,'
together with his versions of Victor Hugo, are perhaps the best ex-
amples of his surpassing skill. His own works have been for the
most part excellently translated into English. His daughter published
during her father's lifetime a volume of his poems, in which were
collected all the best English translations then available. The exotic
subjects of his early poems make them seem the most original, as
for example 'Der Mohrenfürst' (The Moorish Prince) and 'Der
Blumen Rache' (The Revenge of the Flowers); the unusual rhymes
hold the attention, and the sonorous melody of the verse delights the
ear: but it is in a few of his superb love lyrics that he touches the
highest point of his genius, although his fame continues to rest upon
his impassioned songs of freedom and his name to be associated with
the rich imagery of the Orient.
THE EMIGRANTS
CANNOT take my eyes away
I
From you, ye busy, bustling band,
Your little all to see you lay
Each in the waiting boatman's hand.
Ye men, that from your necks set down
Your heavy baskets on the earth,
Of bread, from German corn baked brown
By German wives on German hearth,-
And you, with braided tresses neat,
Black-Forest maidens, slim and brown,
How careful on the sloop's green seat
You set your pails and pitchers down!
Ah! oft have home's cool shady tanks
Those pails and pitchers filled for you;
## p. 6005 (#595) ###########################################
FERDINAND FREILIGRATH
6005
By far Missouri's silent banks
Shall these the scenes of home renew,-
-
The stone-rimmed fount in village street
Where oft ye stooped to chat and draw,-
The hearth, and each familiar seat,-
The pictured tiles your childhood saw.
Soon, in the far and wooded West
Shall log-house walls therewith be graced;
Soon many a tired tawny guest
Shall sweet refreshment from them taste.
From them shall drink the Cherokee,
Faint with the hot and dusty chase;
No more from German vintage, ye
Shall bear them home, in leaf-crowned grace.
O say, why seek ye other lands?
The Neckar's vale hath wine and corn;
Full of dark firs the Schwarzwald stands;
In Spessart rings the Alp-herd's horn.
Ah, in strange forests you will yearn
For the green mountains of your home,-
To Deutschland's yellow wheat-fields turn,—
In spirit o'er her vine-hills roam.
How will the form of days grown pale
In golden dreams float softly by,
Like some old legendary tale,
Before fond memory's moistened eye!
The boatman calls,-go hence in peace!
God bless you,- wife, and child, and sire!
Bless all your fields with rich increase,
And crown each faithful heart's desire!
Translation of C. T. Brooks.
## p. 6006 (#596) ###########################################
6006
FERDINAND FREILIGRATH
WHA
THE LION'S RIDE
WHAT! wilt thou bind him fast with a chain?
Wilt bind the king of the cloudy sands?
Idiot fool! he has burst from thy hands and bands,
And speeds like Storm through his far domain.
See! he crouches down in the sedge,
By the water's edge,
Making the startled sycamore boughs to quiver!
Gazelle and giraffe, I think, will shun that river.
Not so! The curtain of evening falls,
And the Caffre, mooring his light canoe
To the shore, glides down through the hushed karroo,
And the watch-fires burn in the Hottentot kraals,
And the antelope seeks a bed in the bush
Till dawn shall blush,
And the zebra stretches his limbs by the tinkling fountain,
And the changeful signals fade from the Table Mountain.
Now look through the dusk! What seest thou now?
Seest such a tall giraffe! She stalks,
All majesty, through the desert walks,-
In search of water to cool her tongue and brow.
From tract to tract of the limitless waste
Behold her haste!
Till, bowing her long neck down, she buries her face in
The reeds, and kneeling, drinks from the river's basin.
But look again! look! see once more
Those globe-eyes glare! The gigantic reeds
Lie cloven and trampled like puniest weeds,—
The lion leaps on the drinker's neck with a roar!
Oh, what a racer' Can any behold,
'Mid the housings of gold
In the stables of kings, dyes half so splendid
As those on the brindled hide of yon wild animal
blended?
Greedily fleshes the lion his teeth
In the breast of his writhing prey; around
Her neck his loose brown mane is wound.
## p. 6007 (#597) ###########################################
FERDINAND FREILIGRATH
6007
Hark, that hollow cry! She springs up from beneath
And in agony flies over plains and heights.
See, how she unites,
Even under such monstrous and torturing trammel,
With the grace of the leopard, the speed of the camel!
She reaches the central moon-lighted plain,
That spreadeth around all bare and wide;
Meanwhile, adown her spotted side
The dusky blood-gouts rush like rain-
And her woeful eyeballs, how they stare
On the void of air!
Yet on she flies-on, on; for her there is no retreating;
And the desert can hear the heart of the doomed one beat-
ing!
And lo! A stupendous column of sand,
A sand-spout out of that sandy ocean, upcurls
Behind the pair in eddies and whirls;
Most like some colossal brand,
Or wandering spirit of wrath
On his blasted path,
Or the dreadful pillar that lighted the warriors and women
Of Israel's land through the wilderness of Yemen.
And the vulture, scenting a coming carouse,
Sails, hoarsely screaming, down the sky;
The bloody hyena, be sure, is nigh,—
Fierce pillager, he, of the charnel-house!
The panther, too, who strangles the Cape-Town sheep
As they lie asleep,
Athirst for his share in the slaughter, follows;
While the gore of their victim spreads like a pool in the
sandy hollows!
She reels, but the king of the brutes bestrides
His tottering throne to the last: with might
He plunges his terrible claws in the bright
And delicate cushions of her sides.
Yet hold! -fair play! - she rallies again!
In vain, in vain!
Her struggles but help to drain her life-blood faster;
She staggers, gasps, and sinks at the feet of her slayer
and master!
## p. 6008 (#598) ###########################################
6008
FERDINAND FREILIGRATH
She staggers, she falls; she shall struggle no more!
The death-rattle slightly convulses her throat;
Mayest look thy last on that mangled coat,
Besprent with sand, and foam, and gore!
Adieu! The orient glimmers afar,
And the morning-star
Anon will rise over Madagascar brightly. —
So rides the lion in Afric's deserts nightly.
REST IN THE BELOVED
(RUHE IN DER GELIEBTEN)
From Lyrics and Ballads of Heine and Other German Poets. Copyright
1892, by Frances Hellman. Reprinted by permission of G. P. Putnam's
Sons, publishers, New York.
H, HERE forever let me stay, love!
Here let my resting-place e'er be;
And both thy tender palms then lay, love,
OH.
Upon my hot brow soothingly.
Here at thy feet, before thee kneeling,
In heavenly rapture let me rest,
And close my eyes, bliss o'er me stealing,
Within thine arms, upon thy breast.
I'll open them but to the glances
That from thine own in radiance fall;
The look that my whole soul entrances,
O thou who art my life, my all!
I'll open them but at the flowing
Of burning tears that upward swell,
And joyously, without my knowing,
From under drooping lashes well.
Thus am I meek, and kind, and lowly,
And good and gentle evermore;
I have thee-now I'm blessed wholly;
I have thee-now my yearning's o'er.
By thy sweet love intoxicated,
Within thine arms I'm lulled to rest,
And every breath of thine is freighted
With slumber songs that soothe my breast.
## p. 6009 (#599) ###########################################
FERDINAND FREILIGRATH
6009
A life renewed each seems bestowing;
Oh, thus to lie day after day,
And hearken with a blissful glowing
To what each other's heart-beats say!
Lost in our love, entranced, enraptured,
We disappear from time and space;
We rest and dream; our souls lie captured
Within oblivion's sweet embrace.
Ο
OH, LOVE SO LONG AS LOVE THOU CANST
H, LOVE So long as love thou canst!
Oh, love so long thy soul have need!
The hour will come, the hour will come,
When by the grave thy heart shall bleed!
And let thy heart forever glow
And throb with love, and hold love's heat,
So long on earth another heart
Shall echo to its yearning beat.
And who to thee his heart shall show,
Oh raise it up and make it glad!
Oh make his every moment blithe,
And not a moment make him sad!
Guard well thy tongue; a bitter word
Soon from the mouth of anger leaps.
O God! it was not meant to wound,-
But ah! the other goes and weeps.
Oh, love so long as love thou canst!
Oh, love so long thy soul have need!
The hour will come, the hour will come,
When by the grave thy heart shall bleed!
Thou kneelest down upon the grave,
And sink'st in agony thine eyes,-
They never more the dead shall see,—
The silent church-yard hears thy sighs.
―
Thou mourn'st: "Oh, look upon this heart,
That here doth weep upon this mound!
Forgive me if I caused thee pain,-
O God, it was not meant to wound! "
-
## p. 6010 (#600) ###########################################
6010
FERDINAND FREILIGRATH
But he, he sees and hears thee not;
He comes not, he can never know:
The mouth that kissed thee once says not,
"Friend, I forgave thee long ago! "
He did forgive thee long ago,
Though many a hot tear bitter fell
For thee and for thy angry word;
But still he slumbers soft and well!
Oh, love so long as love thou canst!
Oh, love so long thy soul have need!
The hour will come, the hour will come,
When by the grave thy heart shall bleed!
Translation of Dr. Edward Breck.
## p. 6010 (#601) ###########################################
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## p. 6010 (#602) ###########################################
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GUSTAV FREYTAG.
## p. 6011 (#605) ###########################################
6011
GUSTAV FREYTAG
(1816-1895)
USTAV FREYTAG, one of the foremost of German novelists, was
born July 13th, 1816, in Kreuzburg, Silesia, where his father
was a physician. He studied alternately at Breslau and Ber-
lin, at which latter university he was given the degree of a doctor
of philosophy in 1838. In 1839 he settled as a privatdocent at the
University of Breslau, where he lectured on the German language
and literature until 1844, when he resigned his position to devote
himself to literature. He removed to Leipzig in 1846, and the fol-
lowing year to Dresden, where he married. In 1848 he returned to
Leipzig to edit with Julian Schmidt the weekly journal Die Grenz-
boten, which he conducted until 1861, and again from 1869 to 1870.
In 1867 he became Liberal member for Erfurt in the North German
Reichstag. In 1870, on the breaking out of the Franco-Prussian war,
he was attached to the staff of the Crown Prince, later the German
Emperor Frederick III. , and remained in service until after the bat-
tle of Sedan. Subsequently to 1870 his journalistic work was chiefly
for the newly established weekly periodical Im Neuen Reich. In
1879 he retired from public life and afterward lived in Wiesbaden,
except for the summer months, which he spent on his estate Sieble-
ben near Gotha. He died at Wiesbaden, April 30th, 1895.
All of Freytag's earliest work, with the single exception of a vol-
ume of poems published in 1845 under the title 'In Breslau,' is dra-
matic. His first production was a comedy, 'Die Brautfahrt' (The
Wedding Journey), published in 1844, which although it was awarded
a prize offered by the Royal Theatre in Berlin, found but indifferent
popular favor, as did its successor, the one-act tragedy Die Ge-
lehrte (The Scholar). With his next play, 'Die Valentine' (1846),
Freytag however was signally successful. This was followed the
year after by Graf Waldemar. ' He attained his highest dramatic
success with the comedy Die Journalisten' (The Journalists), which
appeared in 1853, and since its first production in 1854 has main-
tained its place as one of the most popular plays on the German
stage. But one other play followed, the tragedy 'Die Fabier' (The
Fabii), which appeared in 1859.
He had begun in the mean time his career as a novelist with his
most famous novel, 'Soll und Haben' (Debit and Credit), which was
## p. 6012 (#606) ###########################################
6012
GUSTAV FREYTAG
published in 1855 and met with an immediate and unbounded suc-
cess. The appearance of this first novel, furthermore, was most
significant, for it marked at the same time an era both in German
literature and in its author's own career, in that it introduced into
the one in its most recent phase one of the profoundest problems of
modern life in Germany, and unmistakably pointed out, in the other,
the direction which he was subsequently to follow. This latter state-
ment has a twofold bearing. It is not only that as a writer of novels
Freytag did his most important and lasting work, but that the whole
of this work was in a manner the development of a similar tendency.
Although as different as need be in environment, all of his subsequent
novels embody inherently the characteristics of 'Debit and Credit,'
for like it, they are all well-defined attempts to depict the typical
social conditions of the period in which they move, and their char-
acters are the carefully considered types of their time. Freytag,
with a philosophic seriousness of purpose perhaps characteristically
German, is writing not only novels but the history of civilization, in
his early work. Later on, the didactic purpose to a certain extent
overshadows the rest; and although he never loses his power of tell-
ing a story, it is the history in the end that is paramount.
'Debit and Credit' is a novel of the century, and it takes up the
great problem of the century, the position of modern industrialism in
the social life of the day. Its principal centre of action is the busi-
ness house of the wholesale grocer T. O. Schröter, who is an admira-
ble embodiment of the careful, industrious, and successful merchant.
In sharp contradistinction to him is the Baron von Rothsattel, the
representative of earlier conditions in the organization of the State,
which made the nobleman pre-eminently a social force. Freytag's
polemic is not only the dignity of labor under present conditions.
but the absolute effeteness of the old order of things that despised
it.
The real hero of the story is Anten Wohlfahrt, who begins his
commercial career as a youth in the house of T. O. Schröter, and
ends, after some vicissitudes, as a member of the firm. Mercantile
life has nowhere been better described in its monotony, its interests,
and its aspirations, as the story is developed; and although at first
sight no field could be more barren in literary interest, there is in
reality no lack of incident and action, whose inevitable sequence makes
the plot. Anton's career in the house of Schröter is interrupted by
his connection with the Baron von Rothsattel, who has, through his
want of a business training and his lack of a knowledge of men,
fallen into the hands of a Jew money-lender; by whom he is per-
suaded to mortgage his land in order to embark in a business under-
taking which it is presumed will increase his fortune. His mill fails,
however, and he is involved in difficulties from which he is unable
## p. 6013 (#607) ###########################################
GUSTAV FREYTAG
6013
to extricate himself. Anton, the intimate friend of the family, is
therefore persuaded by the Baroness to undertake the management
of matters, and after vainly endeavoring to induce his principal to
interest himself in the affair, sacrifices his position to accompany the
family to their dilapidated estate in a distant province. The Baron
will tolerate no interference, however, and Anton finally returns to
the house of Schröter and is reinstated in the business. Lenore, the
Baron's daughter, the first cause of Anton's interest, meantime becomes
engaged to the young nobleman Fink; who has been an associate of
Anton's in the office of T. O. Schröter, has but recently returned
from the United States, and who first advances funds for the improve-
ment of the estate and ultimately purchases it.
Fink acts his part in the author's philosophy as a contrast to the
Baron von Rothsattel. Although a nobleman, he has adapted himself
to the conditions of the century, and is free from any hallucinations
of his hereditary rank, even while he is perfectly awake to its tradi-
tions. He has entered upon a commercial career not from choice, but
from necessity; but he has accepted his fate and has made successful
use of his opportunities. Anton marries the sister of T. O. Schröter,
and becomes a partner in the business. Fink is however really the
one who gains the princess in this modern tale, and is plainly to
have the more important share as an actual social force in the future.
The old feudal nobility has played its part on the stage of the world;
and being so picturesque, and full of romantic opportunity, its loss
is doubtless to be regretted. The tamer realities of the modern in-
dustrial state have succeeded it.
As Freytag solves the problem in
'Soll und Haben,' it is the man who works, the man of the indus-
trial classes alone, to whom the victory belongs in the modern social
struggle, be his antecedents bourgeois or aristocratic.
Freytag's second great novel, 'Die Verlorene Handschrift' (The
Lost Manuscript), which appeared in 1864, concerns itself with another
phase of the same problem. This time, however, instead of the mer-
chant and man of affairs, it is the scholar about whom the action
centres. Felix Werner, professor of philology, has come upon unmis-
takable traces of the lost books of Tacitus, whose recovery is the
object of his life. In his search for the manuscript in an old house
in the country he finds his future wife Ilse, one of the finest types in
all German literature of the true German woman, both while at home
a maid in her father's house and subsequently as the professor's wife
in the university town. Werner, in his scholarly absorption, unwit-
tingly neglects his wife, whose beauty has attracted the attention of
the prince; and there is a series of intrigues which threaten seriously
to involve the innocent Ilse, until the prince's evil intentions become
evident even to the unsuspecting Werner. The covers of the lost
manuscript are actually discovered at last, but the book itself has
## p. 6014 (#608) ###########################################
6014
GUSTAV FREYTAG
vanished. In this second novel Freytag displays a most genial
humor, unsuspected in the author of 'Debit and Credit,' but apparent
enough in The Journalists. ' The professorial life is admirably
drawn with all its lights and shadows; and its motives and ambi-
tions, its peculiar struggles and strivings, have never been more
understandingly treated. The story, however, even more than 'Debit
and Credit,' displays the author's weaknesses of construction. The
plot is so confused by digressions that the main thread is sometimes
lost sight of, and the tendency to philosophical generalization, which
as a German is to some extent the author's birthright, reaches in
these pages an appalling exemplification. What had been an extraor-
dinary novel pruned of these defects, is still not an ordinary novel
with them; and as a picture of German university life from the point
of view of the professor, The Lost Manuscript' stands unrivaled in
literature. Again the thesis in this second novel is the dignity of
labor, and the nobleman fares no better at the author's hands than
in the mercantile environment of the first.
These two novels, which outside of Germany are Freytag's best
claim to attention, were followed by the four volumes of 'Bilder aus
der Deutschen Vergangenheit (Pictures from the German Past: 1859-
62), a series of studies of German life from different epochs of its
history, intended to illustrate the evolution of modern conditions
through their successive stages from the remote past. Freytag's early
work as a university docent had particularly fitted him for this sort of
writing, and some of his best is contained in these books.
More important still, however, was his next great work, the long
series of historical novels 'Die Ahnen' (The Ancestors: 1872-80), an
ambitious plan, born of the stirring events of the Franco-Prussian
War and the resultant awakening of the new spirit of nationality, to
trace the development of the German people from the earliest time
down to the present day. To carry out this purpose he accordingly
selects a typical German family, which he describes under the char-
acteristic conditions of each period, with the most conscientious at-
tention to manners and customs and social environment. The same
family thus appears from generation to generation under the changing
conditions of the different epochs of German history, and the whole
forms together the consecutive Culturgeschichte of the nation.
This whole long series of 'The Ancestors' stands as a monument
of careful research into the most minute factors of German life in
their time of action. Freytag's antiquarianism is not of the dilet-
tante kind that is content to masquerade modern motives in ancient
garb and setting. He was fully conscious of all the elements of his
problem, and he sought to reproduce the intellectual point of view
of his actors, and to account for their motives of action, as well
as to picture accurately their material environment. It is in his
## p. 6015 (#609) ###########################################
GUSTAV FREYTAG
6015
super-conscientiousness in these directions that the inherent weakness
of the novels of this series lies.
They are too palpably reconstructions
with a purpose.
Their didacticism is wrapped around them like a
garment; and much of the time, that is all that is visible upon the
surface. As the series advances this fault grows upon them. They
are in reality of very unequal interest. 'Ingo' and 'Ingraban are
the sprightliest in action, and have been as a consequence the
most widely read of these later works, many of which are, in part at
least, far too serious of purpose to play their part conspicuously well
as novels.
The novels of The Ancestors' are a culmination of Freytag's
literary evolution. As a playwright he will no doubt be forgotten ex-
cept for The Journalists'; in which he has, however, left an imper-
ishable play which German critics have not hesitated to call the best
comedy of the century. The two novels of modern life from his
middle period form together his greatest work, although here, and
particularly in The Lost Manuscript,' he has overweighted his ma-
terial with abstract discussion, in which his perspective has some-
times all but disappeared. Subsequently, both the 'Bilder' and 'Die
Ahnen' show his decided predilection for historical studies. The
struggle in his own case was between the scholar and the man of
letters, in which the scholar eventually won possession of the field.
Freytag's other work includes-'Die Technik des Dramas (The
Technique of the Drama: 1863), a consideration of the principles of
dramatic construction; the life of his friend Karl Malthy, 1870; and
'Der Kronprinz und die Deutsche Kaiserkrone' (The Crown Prince and
the German Imperial Crown: 1889), written after the death of Fred-
erick III. , with whom Freytag had had personal relations. To accom-
pany the collected edition of his works (1887-88), he wrote a short
autobiography, 'Erinnerungen aus Meinem Leben' (Recollections from
My Life).
PR
THE GERMAN PROFESSOR
From The Lost Manuscript>
ROFESSORS wives
also have trouble with their husbands.
Sometimes when Ilse was seated in company with her
intimate friends with Madame Raschke, Madame Struve-
lius, or little Madame Günther - at one of those confidential
coffee parties which they did not altogether despise, many things
would come to light.
The conversation with these intellectual women was certainly
very interesting. It is true the talk sometimes passed lightly
-
-
## p. 6016 (#610) ###########################################
6016
GUSTAV FREYTAG
over the heads of the servants, and sometimes housekeeping
troubles ventured out of the pond of pleasant talk like croaking
frogs. To Ilse's surprise, she found that even Flaminia Struvelius
could discourse seriously about preserving little gherkins, and
that she sought closely for the marks of youth in a plucked
goose. The merry Madame Günther aroused horror and laughter
in more experienced married women, when she asserted that she
could not endure the crying of little children, and that from the
very first she would force her child (which she had not yet got)
to proper silence by chastisement. Thus conversation sometimes
left greater subjects to stray into this domain. And when un-
important subjects were reviewed, it naturally came about that the
men were honored by a quiet discussion. At such times it was
evident that although the subject under consideration was men in
general, each of the wives was thinking of her own husband, and
that each silently carried about a secret bundle of cares, and
justified the conclusion of her hearers that that husband too
must be difficult to manage.
Madame Raschke's troubles could not be concealed; the whole
town knew them. It was notorious that one market day her hus-
band had gone to the university in his dressing-gown-in a
brilliant dressing-gown, blue and orange, with a Turkish pattern.
His students, who loved him dearly and were well aware of his
habits, could not succeed in suppressing a loud laugh; and
Raschke had calmly hung the dressing-gown over his pulpit,
held his lecture in his shirt-sleeves, and returned home in one of
the students' overcoats. Since that time Madame Raschke never
let her husband go out without herself inspecting him. It also
appeared that all these ten years he had not been able to learn
his way about the town, and she dared not change her residence,
because she was quite sure that her professor would never re-
member it, and always return to his old home. Struvelius also
occasioned much anxiety. Ilse knew about the last and greatest
cause; but it also came to light that he expected his wife to
read Latin proof-sheets, as she knew something of that language.
Besides, he was quite incapable of refusing commissions to amia-
ble wine merchants. At her marriage Madame Struvelius had
found a whole cellar full of large and small wine casks, none of
which had been drawn off, while he complained bitterly that no
wine was ever brought into his cellar. Even little Madame
Günther related that her husband could not give up night work;
## p. 6017 (#611) ###########################################
GUSTAV FREYTAG
6017
and that once, when he wandered with a lamp among his books,
he came too near the curtain, which caught fire. He tore it off,
and in so doing burnt his hands, and burst into the bedroom
with blackened fingers in great alarm, and resembling Othello
more than a mineralogist.
Raschke was wandering about in the ante-room. Here too
was confusion. Gabriel had not yet returned from his distant
errand; the cook had left the remains of the meal standing on a
side-table till his return; and Raschke had to find his greatcoat
by himself. He rummaged among the clothes, and seized hold
of a coat and a hat. As he was not so absent-minded as usual
to-day, a glance at the despised supper reminded him just in
time that he was to eat a fowl; so he seized hold of the news-
paper which Gabriel had laid ready for his master, hastily took
one of the chickens out of the dish, wrapped it in the journal,
and thrust it in his pocket, agreeably surprised at the depth and
capaciousness it revealed. Then he rushed past the astonished
cook, and out of the house. When he opened the door of the
étage he stumbled against something that was crouching on the
threshold. He heard a horrible growling behind him, and stormed
down the stairs and out of doors.
The words of the friend whom he had left now came into his
mind. Werner's whole bearing was very characteristic; and there
was something fine about it. It was strange that in a moment
of anger Werner's face had acquired a sudden resemblance to a
bull-dog's. Here the direct chain of the philosopher's contempla-
tions was crossed by the remembrance of the conversation on
animals' souls.
"It is really a pity that it is still so difficult to determine an
animal's expression of soul. If we could succeed in that, science
would gain. For if we could compare in all their minutiæ the
expression and gestures of human beings and higher animals, we
might make most interesting deductions from their common pecul-
iarities and their particular differences. In this way the natural
origin of their dramatic movements, and perhaps some new laws,
would be discovered. "
While the philosopher was pondering thus, he felt a con-
tinued pulling at his coat-tails. As his wife was in the habit of
giving him a gentle pull when he was walking next her absorbed
in thought and they met some acquaintance, he took no further
notice of it, but took off his hat, and bowing politely towards
the railing of the bridge, said "Good-evening. "
X-377
## p. 6018 (#612) ###########################################
6018
GUSTAV FREYTAG
"These common and original elements in the mimic expres-
sion of human beings and higher animals might, if rightly under-
stood, even open out new vistas into the great mystery of life. "
Another pull. Raschke mechanically took off his hat. Another
pull. "Thank you, dear Aurelia, I did bow. " As he spoke, the
thought crossed his mind that his wife would not pull at his coat
so low down. It was not she, but his little daughter Bertha who
was pulling; for she often walked gravely next him, and like her
mother, pulled at the bell for bows. "That will do, my dear,"
said he, as Bertha continued to snatch and pull at his coat-tails.
"Come here, you little rogue! " and he absently put his hand
behind him to seize the little tease. He seized hold of something
round and shaggy; he felt sharp teeth on his fingers, and turned
with a start. There he saw in the lamplight a reddish monster
with a big head, shaggy hair, and a little tassel that fell back
into its hind legs in lieu of a tail. His wife and daughter were
horribly transformed; and he gazed in surprise on this indistinct
creature which seated itself before him, and glared at him in
silence.
"A strange adventure! " exclaimed Raschke.
"What are you,
unknown creature? Presumably a dog. Away with you! " The
animal retreated a few steps. Raschke continued his meditations:
"If we trace back the expression and gestures of the affections
to their original forms in this manner, one of the most active
laws would certainly prove to be the endeavor to attract or repel
the extraneous. It would be instructive to distinguish, by means
of these involuntary movements of men and animals, what is
essential and what conventional. Away, dog! Do me a favor
and go home. What does he want with me? Evidently he be-
longs to Werner's domain. The poor creature will assuredly lose
itself in the town under the dominion of an idée fixe. "
Meantime Speihahn's attacks were becoming more violent; and
now he was marching in a quite unnatural and purely conven-
tional manner on his hind legs, while his fore paws were leaning
against the professor's back, and his teeth were actually biting
into the coat.
A belated shoemaker's boy stood still and beat his leathern
apron. "Is not the master ashamed to let his poor apprentice
push him along like that? " In truth, the dog behind the man
looked like a dwarf pushing a giant along the ice.
Raschke's interest in the dog's thoughts increased. He stood
still near a lantern, examined and felt his coat. This coat had
## p. 6019 (#613) ###########################################
GUSTAV FREYTAG
6019
developed a velvet collar and very long sleeves, advantages that
the philosopher had never yet remarked in his greatcoat. Now
the matter became clear to him: absorbed in thought, he had
chosen a wrong coat, and the worthy dog insisted on saving his
master's garment, and making the thief aware that there was
something wrong. Raschke was so pleased with this sagacity
that he turned round, addressed some kind words to Speihahn,
and made an attempt to stroke his shaggy hair. The dog again
snapped at his hand. "You are quite right to be angry with
me,” replied Raschke; "I will prove to you that I acknowledge
my fault. " He took off the coat and hung it over his arm.
«< Yes, it is much heavier than my own. " He walked on cheer-
fully in his thin coat, and observed with satisfaction that the dog
abandoned the attacks on his back. But instead, Speihahn sprang
upon
his side, and again bit at the coat and the hand, and
growled unpleasantly.
The professor got angry with the dog, and when he came to
a bench on the promenade he laid down the coat, intending to
face the dog seriously and drive him home. In this manner he
got rid of the dog, but also of the coat. For Speihahn sprang
upon the bench with a mighty bound, placed himself astride the
coat, and met the professor, who tried to drive him away, with
hideous growling and snarling.
"It is Werner's coat," said the professor, "and it is Werner's
dog: it would be wrong to beat the poor creature because it is
becoming violent in its fidelity, and it would be wrong to leave
the dog and the coat. " So he remained standing before the dog
and speaking kindly to him: but Speihahn no longer took any
notice of the professor; he turned against the coat itself, which
he scratched, rummaged, and bit. Raschke saw that the coat
could not long endure such rage. "He is frantic or mad," said
he suspiciously. "I shall have to use force against you after all,
poor creature;" and he considered whether he should also jump
upon the seat and push the mad creature by a violent kick into
the water, or whether it would be better to open the inevitable
attack from below. He resolved on the latter course, and looked
round to see whether he could anywhere discover a stone or
stick to throw at the raging beast. As he looked, he observed
the trees and the dark sky above him, and the place seemed quite
unfamiliar. "Has magic been at work here? " he exclaimed, with
amusement. He turned politely to a solitary wanderer who was
## p. 6020 (#614) ###########################################
6020
GUSTAV FREYTAG
passing that way:
the town we are?
a moment? "
"Indeed," angrily replied the person addressed, "those are
very suspicious questions. I want my stick myself at night. Who
are you, sir ? » The stranger approached the professor mena-
cingly.
"I am peaceable," replied Raschke, "and by no means inclined
to violent attacks. A quarrel has arisen between me and the
animal on this seat for the possession of a coat, and I should be
much obliged to you if you would drive the dog away from the
coat. But I beg you not to hurt the animal any more than is
absolutely necessary. "
"Is that your coat there? " asked the man.
"Unfortunately I cannot give you an affirmative answer," re-
plied Raschke conscientiously.
"Would you kindly tell me in what part of
And could you perhaps lend me your stick for
"There must be something wrong here," exclaimed the
stranger, again eyeing the professor suspiciously.
"There is, indeed," replied Raschke. "The dog is out of his
mind; the coat is exchanged, and I do not know where we are. "
"Close to the valley gate, Professor Raschke," answered the
voice of Gabriel, who hastily joined the group. "Excuse me, but
what brings you here? "
"Capital! " exclaimed Raschke joyously. "Pray take charge of
this coat and this dog. "
Gabriel gazed in amazement at Speihahn, who was now lying
on the coat and bending his head before his friend. Gabriel
threw down the dog and seized the coat. "Why, that is our
greatcoat! " exclaimed he.
"Yes, Gabriel," said the professor, "that was my mistake, and
the dog has shown marvelous fidelity to the coat. "
"Fidelity! " exclaimed Gabriel indignantly, as he drew a par-
cel out of the coat pocket. "It was greedy selfishness, sir; there
must be some food in this pocket. "
"Yes, true," exclaimed Raschke; "it is all the chicken's fault.
Give me the parcel, Gabriel; I must eat the fowl myself; and
we might bid each other good-night now with mutual satisfac-
tion, if you would just show me my way a little among these
trees. "
"But you must not go home in the night air without an over-
coat," said Gabriel considerately. "We are not far from our
## p. 6021 (#615) ###########################################
GUSTAV FREYTAG
6021
house; the best way would really be for you to come back with
me, sir. "
Raschke considered and laughed.
"You are right, Gabriel; my departure was awkward; and to-
day an animal's soul has restored a man's soul to order. "
"If you mean this dog," said Gabriel, "it would be the first
time he ever did anything good. I see he must have followed
you from our door; for I put little bones there for him of an
evening. "
"Just now he seemed not to be quite in his right mind," said
the professor.
"He is cunning enough when he pleases," continued Gabriel
mysteriously; "but if I were to speak of my experiences with this
dog -»
"Do speak, Gabriel," eagerly exclaimed the
the philosopher.
"There is nothing so valuable concerning animals as a truthful
statement from those who have carefully observed them. "
"I may say that I have done so," confirmed Gabriel, with
satisfaction; "and if you want to know exactly what he is, I can
assure you that he is possessed of the devil, he is a thief, he is
embittered, and he hates all mankind. "
"Ah, indeed! " replied the professor, somewhat disconcerted.
"I see it is much more difficult to look into a dog's heart than
into a professor's. "
Speihahn crept along silent and suppressed, and listened to the
praises that fell to his lot; while Professor Raschke, conducted by
Gabriel, returned to the house by the park. Gabriel opened the
sitting-room door, and announced-
"Professor Raschke. "
Ilse extended both her hands to him.
"Welcome, welcome, dear Professor Raschke! " and led him to
her husband's study.
"Here I am again," said Raschke cheerfully, "after wander-
ing as in a fairy tale. What has brought me back were two
animals, who showed me the right way,-a roast fowl and an
embittered dog. "
Felix sprang up; the men greeted one another warmly, shak-
ing hands, and after all misadventures, spent a happy evening.
When Raschke had gone home late, Gabriel said sadly to his
mistress, "This was the new coat; the fowl and the dog have put
it in a horrible plight. "
## p. 6022 (#616) ###########################################
6022
FRIEDRICH FROEBEL
(1782-1852)
BY NORA ARCHIBALD SMITH
T WAS Froebel who said, "The clearer the thread that runs
through our lives backward to our childhood, the clearer
will be our onward glance to the goal;" and in the frag-
ment of autobiography he has left us, he illustrates forcibly the
truth of his own saying. The motherless baby who plays alone in
the village pastor's quiet house, the dreamy child who wanders soli-
tary in the high-walled garden; the thoughtful lad, neglected, mis-
understood, who forgets the harsh realities of life in pondering the
mysteries of the flowers, the contradictions
of existence, and the dogmas of orthodox
theology; who decides in early boyhood
that the pleasures of the senses are with-
out enduring influence and therefore on no
account to be eagerly pursued; these pre-
sentments of himself, which he summons
up for us from the past, show the vivid-
ness of his early recollections and indicate
the course which the stream of his life is
to run.
FRIEDRICH FROEBEL
The coldness and injustice of the new
mother who assumed control of the house-
hold when he was four years old, his isola-
tion from other children, the merely casual
notice he received from the busy father absorbed in his parish work,
all tended to turn inward the tide of his mental and spiritual life.
He studied himself, not only because it was the bent of his nature,
but because he lacked outside objects of interest; and to this early
habit of introspection we owe many of the valuable features of his
educational philosophy. Whoever has learned thoroughly to under-
stand one child, has conquered a spot of firm ground on which to
rest while he studies the world of children; and because the great
teacher realized this truth, because he longed to give to others the
means of development denied to himself, he turns for us the heart-
leaves of his boyhood.
## p. 6023 (#617) ###########################################
FRIEDRICH FROEBEL
6023
It would appear that Froebel's characteristics were strongly marked
and unusual from the beginning. Called by every one «< a moon-struck
child" in Oberweissbach, the village of his birth, he was just as
unanimously considered "an old fool" when, crowned with the ex-
perience of seventy years, he played with the village children on the
green hills of Thuringia. The intensity of his inward life, the white
heat of his convictions, his absolute blindness to any selfish idea or
aim, his enthusiasm, the exaltation of his spiritual nature, all furnish
so many cogent reasons why the people of any day or of any com-
munity should have failed to understand him, and scorned what they
could not comprehend. It is the old story of the seers and the
prophets repeated as many times as they appear; for "these colossal
souls," as Emerson said, "require a long focal distance to be seen. "
At ten years old the sensitive boy was fortunately removed from
the uncongenial atmosphere of the parental household; and in his
uncle's home he spent five free and happy years, being apprenticed
at the end of this time to a forester in his native Thuringian
woods. Then followed a year's course in the University of Jena, and
four years spent in the study of farming, in clerical work of various
kinds, and in land-surveying. All these employments, however, Froe-
bel himself felt to be merely provisional; for like the hazel wand in
the diviner's hand, his instinct was blindly seeking through these
restless years the well-spring of his life.
In Frankfort, where he had gone intending to study architecture,
Destiny touched him on the shoulder, and he turned and knew her.
the management of the New Rhenish Gazette at Cologne.
It is a curious fact that during this agitated time Freiligrath
wrote some of his tenderest poetry. In the collection which appeared
in 1849 with the title 'Zwischen den Garben' (Between the Sheaves),
was included that exquisite hymn to love: 'Oh, Love So Long as Love
Thou Canst,' perhaps the most perfect of all his lyrical productions,
and certainly evidence that the poet could touch the strings to deep
emotions. In the following year both volumes of his 'New Political
and Social Poems' were ready. Once more he prudently retired to
London; his fears were confirmed by the immediate confiscation of
these new volumes, and by the publication of a letter of apprehen-
sion. By way of reprisal he wrote his poem 'The Revolution,' which
was published in London.
In 1867 the Swiss bank with which Freiligrath was connected
closed its London branch, and the poet again faced an uncertain
future. His friends on the Rhine, hearing of his difficulties, raised a
generous subscription, and taking advantage of a general amnesty, he
returned to the fatherland and became associated with the Stuttgart
Illustrated Magazine. In 1870 appeared a complete collection of his
## p. 6004 (#594) ###########################################
6004
FERDINAND FREILIGRATH
poems; in 1876, 'New Poems'; and in the latter year, on March 18th,
he died at Cannstatt in Würtemburg.
The question which Freiligrath asks the emigrants in his early
poem of that name, 'O say, why seek ye other lands? — was des-
tined to find frequent and bitter answer in his own checkered career;
but he never swerved from the liberal principles which he had pub-
licly announced. His political poems were among the most powerful
influences of his time, and they have a permanent value as the
expression of the spirit of freedom. His translations are marvels of
fidelity and beauty. His Hiawatha' and 'The Ancient Mariner,'
together with his versions of Victor Hugo, are perhaps the best ex-
amples of his surpassing skill. His own works have been for the
most part excellently translated into English. His daughter published
during her father's lifetime a volume of his poems, in which were
collected all the best English translations then available. The exotic
subjects of his early poems make them seem the most original, as
for example 'Der Mohrenfürst' (The Moorish Prince) and 'Der
Blumen Rache' (The Revenge of the Flowers); the unusual rhymes
hold the attention, and the sonorous melody of the verse delights the
ear: but it is in a few of his superb love lyrics that he touches the
highest point of his genius, although his fame continues to rest upon
his impassioned songs of freedom and his name to be associated with
the rich imagery of the Orient.
THE EMIGRANTS
CANNOT take my eyes away
I
From you, ye busy, bustling band,
Your little all to see you lay
Each in the waiting boatman's hand.
Ye men, that from your necks set down
Your heavy baskets on the earth,
Of bread, from German corn baked brown
By German wives on German hearth,-
And you, with braided tresses neat,
Black-Forest maidens, slim and brown,
How careful on the sloop's green seat
You set your pails and pitchers down!
Ah! oft have home's cool shady tanks
Those pails and pitchers filled for you;
## p. 6005 (#595) ###########################################
FERDINAND FREILIGRATH
6005
By far Missouri's silent banks
Shall these the scenes of home renew,-
-
The stone-rimmed fount in village street
Where oft ye stooped to chat and draw,-
The hearth, and each familiar seat,-
The pictured tiles your childhood saw.
Soon, in the far and wooded West
Shall log-house walls therewith be graced;
Soon many a tired tawny guest
Shall sweet refreshment from them taste.
From them shall drink the Cherokee,
Faint with the hot and dusty chase;
No more from German vintage, ye
Shall bear them home, in leaf-crowned grace.
O say, why seek ye other lands?
The Neckar's vale hath wine and corn;
Full of dark firs the Schwarzwald stands;
In Spessart rings the Alp-herd's horn.
Ah, in strange forests you will yearn
For the green mountains of your home,-
To Deutschland's yellow wheat-fields turn,—
In spirit o'er her vine-hills roam.
How will the form of days grown pale
In golden dreams float softly by,
Like some old legendary tale,
Before fond memory's moistened eye!
The boatman calls,-go hence in peace!
God bless you,- wife, and child, and sire!
Bless all your fields with rich increase,
And crown each faithful heart's desire!
Translation of C. T. Brooks.
## p. 6006 (#596) ###########################################
6006
FERDINAND FREILIGRATH
WHA
THE LION'S RIDE
WHAT! wilt thou bind him fast with a chain?
Wilt bind the king of the cloudy sands?
Idiot fool! he has burst from thy hands and bands,
And speeds like Storm through his far domain.
See! he crouches down in the sedge,
By the water's edge,
Making the startled sycamore boughs to quiver!
Gazelle and giraffe, I think, will shun that river.
Not so! The curtain of evening falls,
And the Caffre, mooring his light canoe
To the shore, glides down through the hushed karroo,
And the watch-fires burn in the Hottentot kraals,
And the antelope seeks a bed in the bush
Till dawn shall blush,
And the zebra stretches his limbs by the tinkling fountain,
And the changeful signals fade from the Table Mountain.
Now look through the dusk! What seest thou now?
Seest such a tall giraffe! She stalks,
All majesty, through the desert walks,-
In search of water to cool her tongue and brow.
From tract to tract of the limitless waste
Behold her haste!
Till, bowing her long neck down, she buries her face in
The reeds, and kneeling, drinks from the river's basin.
But look again! look! see once more
Those globe-eyes glare! The gigantic reeds
Lie cloven and trampled like puniest weeds,—
The lion leaps on the drinker's neck with a roar!
Oh, what a racer' Can any behold,
'Mid the housings of gold
In the stables of kings, dyes half so splendid
As those on the brindled hide of yon wild animal
blended?
Greedily fleshes the lion his teeth
In the breast of his writhing prey; around
Her neck his loose brown mane is wound.
## p. 6007 (#597) ###########################################
FERDINAND FREILIGRATH
6007
Hark, that hollow cry! She springs up from beneath
And in agony flies over plains and heights.
See, how she unites,
Even under such monstrous and torturing trammel,
With the grace of the leopard, the speed of the camel!
She reaches the central moon-lighted plain,
That spreadeth around all bare and wide;
Meanwhile, adown her spotted side
The dusky blood-gouts rush like rain-
And her woeful eyeballs, how they stare
On the void of air!
Yet on she flies-on, on; for her there is no retreating;
And the desert can hear the heart of the doomed one beat-
ing!
And lo! A stupendous column of sand,
A sand-spout out of that sandy ocean, upcurls
Behind the pair in eddies and whirls;
Most like some colossal brand,
Or wandering spirit of wrath
On his blasted path,
Or the dreadful pillar that lighted the warriors and women
Of Israel's land through the wilderness of Yemen.
And the vulture, scenting a coming carouse,
Sails, hoarsely screaming, down the sky;
The bloody hyena, be sure, is nigh,—
Fierce pillager, he, of the charnel-house!
The panther, too, who strangles the Cape-Town sheep
As they lie asleep,
Athirst for his share in the slaughter, follows;
While the gore of their victim spreads like a pool in the
sandy hollows!
She reels, but the king of the brutes bestrides
His tottering throne to the last: with might
He plunges his terrible claws in the bright
And delicate cushions of her sides.
Yet hold! -fair play! - she rallies again!
In vain, in vain!
Her struggles but help to drain her life-blood faster;
She staggers, gasps, and sinks at the feet of her slayer
and master!
## p. 6008 (#598) ###########################################
6008
FERDINAND FREILIGRATH
She staggers, she falls; she shall struggle no more!
The death-rattle slightly convulses her throat;
Mayest look thy last on that mangled coat,
Besprent with sand, and foam, and gore!
Adieu! The orient glimmers afar,
And the morning-star
Anon will rise over Madagascar brightly. —
So rides the lion in Afric's deserts nightly.
REST IN THE BELOVED
(RUHE IN DER GELIEBTEN)
From Lyrics and Ballads of Heine and Other German Poets. Copyright
1892, by Frances Hellman. Reprinted by permission of G. P. Putnam's
Sons, publishers, New York.
H, HERE forever let me stay, love!
Here let my resting-place e'er be;
And both thy tender palms then lay, love,
OH.
Upon my hot brow soothingly.
Here at thy feet, before thee kneeling,
In heavenly rapture let me rest,
And close my eyes, bliss o'er me stealing,
Within thine arms, upon thy breast.
I'll open them but to the glances
That from thine own in radiance fall;
The look that my whole soul entrances,
O thou who art my life, my all!
I'll open them but at the flowing
Of burning tears that upward swell,
And joyously, without my knowing,
From under drooping lashes well.
Thus am I meek, and kind, and lowly,
And good and gentle evermore;
I have thee-now I'm blessed wholly;
I have thee-now my yearning's o'er.
By thy sweet love intoxicated,
Within thine arms I'm lulled to rest,
And every breath of thine is freighted
With slumber songs that soothe my breast.
## p. 6009 (#599) ###########################################
FERDINAND FREILIGRATH
6009
A life renewed each seems bestowing;
Oh, thus to lie day after day,
And hearken with a blissful glowing
To what each other's heart-beats say!
Lost in our love, entranced, enraptured,
We disappear from time and space;
We rest and dream; our souls lie captured
Within oblivion's sweet embrace.
Ο
OH, LOVE SO LONG AS LOVE THOU CANST
H, LOVE So long as love thou canst!
Oh, love so long thy soul have need!
The hour will come, the hour will come,
When by the grave thy heart shall bleed!
And let thy heart forever glow
And throb with love, and hold love's heat,
So long on earth another heart
Shall echo to its yearning beat.
And who to thee his heart shall show,
Oh raise it up and make it glad!
Oh make his every moment blithe,
And not a moment make him sad!
Guard well thy tongue; a bitter word
Soon from the mouth of anger leaps.
O God! it was not meant to wound,-
But ah! the other goes and weeps.
Oh, love so long as love thou canst!
Oh, love so long thy soul have need!
The hour will come, the hour will come,
When by the grave thy heart shall bleed!
Thou kneelest down upon the grave,
And sink'st in agony thine eyes,-
They never more the dead shall see,—
The silent church-yard hears thy sighs.
―
Thou mourn'st: "Oh, look upon this heart,
That here doth weep upon this mound!
Forgive me if I caused thee pain,-
O God, it was not meant to wound! "
-
## p. 6010 (#600) ###########################################
6010
FERDINAND FREILIGRATH
But he, he sees and hears thee not;
He comes not, he can never know:
The mouth that kissed thee once says not,
"Friend, I forgave thee long ago! "
He did forgive thee long ago,
Though many a hot tear bitter fell
For thee and for thy angry word;
But still he slumbers soft and well!
Oh, love so long as love thou canst!
Oh, love so long thy soul have need!
The hour will come, the hour will come,
When by the grave thy heart shall bleed!
Translation of Dr. Edward Breck.
## p. 6010 (#601) ###########################################
Co
## p. 6010 (#602) ###########################################
MCRICKE
GUSTAV FREYTAG.
Jump to
OLED TO
## p. 6010 (#603) ###########################################
6511
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## p. 6010 (#604) ###########################################
܂
GUSTAV FREYTAG.
## p. 6011 (#605) ###########################################
6011
GUSTAV FREYTAG
(1816-1895)
USTAV FREYTAG, one of the foremost of German novelists, was
born July 13th, 1816, in Kreuzburg, Silesia, where his father
was a physician. He studied alternately at Breslau and Ber-
lin, at which latter university he was given the degree of a doctor
of philosophy in 1838. In 1839 he settled as a privatdocent at the
University of Breslau, where he lectured on the German language
and literature until 1844, when he resigned his position to devote
himself to literature. He removed to Leipzig in 1846, and the fol-
lowing year to Dresden, where he married. In 1848 he returned to
Leipzig to edit with Julian Schmidt the weekly journal Die Grenz-
boten, which he conducted until 1861, and again from 1869 to 1870.
In 1867 he became Liberal member for Erfurt in the North German
Reichstag. In 1870, on the breaking out of the Franco-Prussian war,
he was attached to the staff of the Crown Prince, later the German
Emperor Frederick III. , and remained in service until after the bat-
tle of Sedan. Subsequently to 1870 his journalistic work was chiefly
for the newly established weekly periodical Im Neuen Reich. In
1879 he retired from public life and afterward lived in Wiesbaden,
except for the summer months, which he spent on his estate Sieble-
ben near Gotha. He died at Wiesbaden, April 30th, 1895.
All of Freytag's earliest work, with the single exception of a vol-
ume of poems published in 1845 under the title 'In Breslau,' is dra-
matic. His first production was a comedy, 'Die Brautfahrt' (The
Wedding Journey), published in 1844, which although it was awarded
a prize offered by the Royal Theatre in Berlin, found but indifferent
popular favor, as did its successor, the one-act tragedy Die Ge-
lehrte (The Scholar). With his next play, 'Die Valentine' (1846),
Freytag however was signally successful. This was followed the
year after by Graf Waldemar. ' He attained his highest dramatic
success with the comedy Die Journalisten' (The Journalists), which
appeared in 1853, and since its first production in 1854 has main-
tained its place as one of the most popular plays on the German
stage. But one other play followed, the tragedy 'Die Fabier' (The
Fabii), which appeared in 1859.
He had begun in the mean time his career as a novelist with his
most famous novel, 'Soll und Haben' (Debit and Credit), which was
## p. 6012 (#606) ###########################################
6012
GUSTAV FREYTAG
published in 1855 and met with an immediate and unbounded suc-
cess. The appearance of this first novel, furthermore, was most
significant, for it marked at the same time an era both in German
literature and in its author's own career, in that it introduced into
the one in its most recent phase one of the profoundest problems of
modern life in Germany, and unmistakably pointed out, in the other,
the direction which he was subsequently to follow. This latter state-
ment has a twofold bearing. It is not only that as a writer of novels
Freytag did his most important and lasting work, but that the whole
of this work was in a manner the development of a similar tendency.
Although as different as need be in environment, all of his subsequent
novels embody inherently the characteristics of 'Debit and Credit,'
for like it, they are all well-defined attempts to depict the typical
social conditions of the period in which they move, and their char-
acters are the carefully considered types of their time. Freytag,
with a philosophic seriousness of purpose perhaps characteristically
German, is writing not only novels but the history of civilization, in
his early work. Later on, the didactic purpose to a certain extent
overshadows the rest; and although he never loses his power of tell-
ing a story, it is the history in the end that is paramount.
'Debit and Credit' is a novel of the century, and it takes up the
great problem of the century, the position of modern industrialism in
the social life of the day. Its principal centre of action is the busi-
ness house of the wholesale grocer T. O. Schröter, who is an admira-
ble embodiment of the careful, industrious, and successful merchant.
In sharp contradistinction to him is the Baron von Rothsattel, the
representative of earlier conditions in the organization of the State,
which made the nobleman pre-eminently a social force. Freytag's
polemic is not only the dignity of labor under present conditions.
but the absolute effeteness of the old order of things that despised
it.
The real hero of the story is Anten Wohlfahrt, who begins his
commercial career as a youth in the house of T. O. Schröter, and
ends, after some vicissitudes, as a member of the firm. Mercantile
life has nowhere been better described in its monotony, its interests,
and its aspirations, as the story is developed; and although at first
sight no field could be more barren in literary interest, there is in
reality no lack of incident and action, whose inevitable sequence makes
the plot. Anton's career in the house of Schröter is interrupted by
his connection with the Baron von Rothsattel, who has, through his
want of a business training and his lack of a knowledge of men,
fallen into the hands of a Jew money-lender; by whom he is per-
suaded to mortgage his land in order to embark in a business under-
taking which it is presumed will increase his fortune. His mill fails,
however, and he is involved in difficulties from which he is unable
## p. 6013 (#607) ###########################################
GUSTAV FREYTAG
6013
to extricate himself. Anton, the intimate friend of the family, is
therefore persuaded by the Baroness to undertake the management
of matters, and after vainly endeavoring to induce his principal to
interest himself in the affair, sacrifices his position to accompany the
family to their dilapidated estate in a distant province. The Baron
will tolerate no interference, however, and Anton finally returns to
the house of Schröter and is reinstated in the business. Lenore, the
Baron's daughter, the first cause of Anton's interest, meantime becomes
engaged to the young nobleman Fink; who has been an associate of
Anton's in the office of T. O. Schröter, has but recently returned
from the United States, and who first advances funds for the improve-
ment of the estate and ultimately purchases it.
Fink acts his part in the author's philosophy as a contrast to the
Baron von Rothsattel. Although a nobleman, he has adapted himself
to the conditions of the century, and is free from any hallucinations
of his hereditary rank, even while he is perfectly awake to its tradi-
tions. He has entered upon a commercial career not from choice, but
from necessity; but he has accepted his fate and has made successful
use of his opportunities. Anton marries the sister of T. O. Schröter,
and becomes a partner in the business. Fink is however really the
one who gains the princess in this modern tale, and is plainly to
have the more important share as an actual social force in the future.
The old feudal nobility has played its part on the stage of the world;
and being so picturesque, and full of romantic opportunity, its loss
is doubtless to be regretted. The tamer realities of the modern in-
dustrial state have succeeded it.
As Freytag solves the problem in
'Soll und Haben,' it is the man who works, the man of the indus-
trial classes alone, to whom the victory belongs in the modern social
struggle, be his antecedents bourgeois or aristocratic.
Freytag's second great novel, 'Die Verlorene Handschrift' (The
Lost Manuscript), which appeared in 1864, concerns itself with another
phase of the same problem. This time, however, instead of the mer-
chant and man of affairs, it is the scholar about whom the action
centres. Felix Werner, professor of philology, has come upon unmis-
takable traces of the lost books of Tacitus, whose recovery is the
object of his life. In his search for the manuscript in an old house
in the country he finds his future wife Ilse, one of the finest types in
all German literature of the true German woman, both while at home
a maid in her father's house and subsequently as the professor's wife
in the university town. Werner, in his scholarly absorption, unwit-
tingly neglects his wife, whose beauty has attracted the attention of
the prince; and there is a series of intrigues which threaten seriously
to involve the innocent Ilse, until the prince's evil intentions become
evident even to the unsuspecting Werner. The covers of the lost
manuscript are actually discovered at last, but the book itself has
## p. 6014 (#608) ###########################################
6014
GUSTAV FREYTAG
vanished. In this second novel Freytag displays a most genial
humor, unsuspected in the author of 'Debit and Credit,' but apparent
enough in The Journalists. ' The professorial life is admirably
drawn with all its lights and shadows; and its motives and ambi-
tions, its peculiar struggles and strivings, have never been more
understandingly treated. The story, however, even more than 'Debit
and Credit,' displays the author's weaknesses of construction. The
plot is so confused by digressions that the main thread is sometimes
lost sight of, and the tendency to philosophical generalization, which
as a German is to some extent the author's birthright, reaches in
these pages an appalling exemplification. What had been an extraor-
dinary novel pruned of these defects, is still not an ordinary novel
with them; and as a picture of German university life from the point
of view of the professor, The Lost Manuscript' stands unrivaled in
literature. Again the thesis in this second novel is the dignity of
labor, and the nobleman fares no better at the author's hands than
in the mercantile environment of the first.
These two novels, which outside of Germany are Freytag's best
claim to attention, were followed by the four volumes of 'Bilder aus
der Deutschen Vergangenheit (Pictures from the German Past: 1859-
62), a series of studies of German life from different epochs of its
history, intended to illustrate the evolution of modern conditions
through their successive stages from the remote past. Freytag's early
work as a university docent had particularly fitted him for this sort of
writing, and some of his best is contained in these books.
More important still, however, was his next great work, the long
series of historical novels 'Die Ahnen' (The Ancestors: 1872-80), an
ambitious plan, born of the stirring events of the Franco-Prussian
War and the resultant awakening of the new spirit of nationality, to
trace the development of the German people from the earliest time
down to the present day. To carry out this purpose he accordingly
selects a typical German family, which he describes under the char-
acteristic conditions of each period, with the most conscientious at-
tention to manners and customs and social environment. The same
family thus appears from generation to generation under the changing
conditions of the different epochs of German history, and the whole
forms together the consecutive Culturgeschichte of the nation.
This whole long series of 'The Ancestors' stands as a monument
of careful research into the most minute factors of German life in
their time of action. Freytag's antiquarianism is not of the dilet-
tante kind that is content to masquerade modern motives in ancient
garb and setting. He was fully conscious of all the elements of his
problem, and he sought to reproduce the intellectual point of view
of his actors, and to account for their motives of action, as well
as to picture accurately their material environment. It is in his
## p. 6015 (#609) ###########################################
GUSTAV FREYTAG
6015
super-conscientiousness in these directions that the inherent weakness
of the novels of this series lies.
They are too palpably reconstructions
with a purpose.
Their didacticism is wrapped around them like a
garment; and much of the time, that is all that is visible upon the
surface. As the series advances this fault grows upon them. They
are in reality of very unequal interest. 'Ingo' and 'Ingraban are
the sprightliest in action, and have been as a consequence the
most widely read of these later works, many of which are, in part at
least, far too serious of purpose to play their part conspicuously well
as novels.
The novels of The Ancestors' are a culmination of Freytag's
literary evolution. As a playwright he will no doubt be forgotten ex-
cept for The Journalists'; in which he has, however, left an imper-
ishable play which German critics have not hesitated to call the best
comedy of the century. The two novels of modern life from his
middle period form together his greatest work, although here, and
particularly in The Lost Manuscript,' he has overweighted his ma-
terial with abstract discussion, in which his perspective has some-
times all but disappeared. Subsequently, both the 'Bilder' and 'Die
Ahnen' show his decided predilection for historical studies. The
struggle in his own case was between the scholar and the man of
letters, in which the scholar eventually won possession of the field.
Freytag's other work includes-'Die Technik des Dramas (The
Technique of the Drama: 1863), a consideration of the principles of
dramatic construction; the life of his friend Karl Malthy, 1870; and
'Der Kronprinz und die Deutsche Kaiserkrone' (The Crown Prince and
the German Imperial Crown: 1889), written after the death of Fred-
erick III. , with whom Freytag had had personal relations. To accom-
pany the collected edition of his works (1887-88), he wrote a short
autobiography, 'Erinnerungen aus Meinem Leben' (Recollections from
My Life).
PR
THE GERMAN PROFESSOR
From The Lost Manuscript>
ROFESSORS wives
also have trouble with their husbands.
Sometimes when Ilse was seated in company with her
intimate friends with Madame Raschke, Madame Struve-
lius, or little Madame Günther - at one of those confidential
coffee parties which they did not altogether despise, many things
would come to light.
The conversation with these intellectual women was certainly
very interesting. It is true the talk sometimes passed lightly
-
-
## p. 6016 (#610) ###########################################
6016
GUSTAV FREYTAG
over the heads of the servants, and sometimes housekeeping
troubles ventured out of the pond of pleasant talk like croaking
frogs. To Ilse's surprise, she found that even Flaminia Struvelius
could discourse seriously about preserving little gherkins, and
that she sought closely for the marks of youth in a plucked
goose. The merry Madame Günther aroused horror and laughter
in more experienced married women, when she asserted that she
could not endure the crying of little children, and that from the
very first she would force her child (which she had not yet got)
to proper silence by chastisement. Thus conversation sometimes
left greater subjects to stray into this domain. And when un-
important subjects were reviewed, it naturally came about that the
men were honored by a quiet discussion. At such times it was
evident that although the subject under consideration was men in
general, each of the wives was thinking of her own husband, and
that each silently carried about a secret bundle of cares, and
justified the conclusion of her hearers that that husband too
must be difficult to manage.
Madame Raschke's troubles could not be concealed; the whole
town knew them. It was notorious that one market day her hus-
band had gone to the university in his dressing-gown-in a
brilliant dressing-gown, blue and orange, with a Turkish pattern.
His students, who loved him dearly and were well aware of his
habits, could not succeed in suppressing a loud laugh; and
Raschke had calmly hung the dressing-gown over his pulpit,
held his lecture in his shirt-sleeves, and returned home in one of
the students' overcoats. Since that time Madame Raschke never
let her husband go out without herself inspecting him. It also
appeared that all these ten years he had not been able to learn
his way about the town, and she dared not change her residence,
because she was quite sure that her professor would never re-
member it, and always return to his old home. Struvelius also
occasioned much anxiety. Ilse knew about the last and greatest
cause; but it also came to light that he expected his wife to
read Latin proof-sheets, as she knew something of that language.
Besides, he was quite incapable of refusing commissions to amia-
ble wine merchants. At her marriage Madame Struvelius had
found a whole cellar full of large and small wine casks, none of
which had been drawn off, while he complained bitterly that no
wine was ever brought into his cellar. Even little Madame
Günther related that her husband could not give up night work;
## p. 6017 (#611) ###########################################
GUSTAV FREYTAG
6017
and that once, when he wandered with a lamp among his books,
he came too near the curtain, which caught fire. He tore it off,
and in so doing burnt his hands, and burst into the bedroom
with blackened fingers in great alarm, and resembling Othello
more than a mineralogist.
Raschke was wandering about in the ante-room. Here too
was confusion. Gabriel had not yet returned from his distant
errand; the cook had left the remains of the meal standing on a
side-table till his return; and Raschke had to find his greatcoat
by himself. He rummaged among the clothes, and seized hold
of a coat and a hat. As he was not so absent-minded as usual
to-day, a glance at the despised supper reminded him just in
time that he was to eat a fowl; so he seized hold of the news-
paper which Gabriel had laid ready for his master, hastily took
one of the chickens out of the dish, wrapped it in the journal,
and thrust it in his pocket, agreeably surprised at the depth and
capaciousness it revealed. Then he rushed past the astonished
cook, and out of the house. When he opened the door of the
étage he stumbled against something that was crouching on the
threshold. He heard a horrible growling behind him, and stormed
down the stairs and out of doors.
The words of the friend whom he had left now came into his
mind. Werner's whole bearing was very characteristic; and there
was something fine about it. It was strange that in a moment
of anger Werner's face had acquired a sudden resemblance to a
bull-dog's. Here the direct chain of the philosopher's contempla-
tions was crossed by the remembrance of the conversation on
animals' souls.
"It is really a pity that it is still so difficult to determine an
animal's expression of soul. If we could succeed in that, science
would gain. For if we could compare in all their minutiæ the
expression and gestures of human beings and higher animals, we
might make most interesting deductions from their common pecul-
iarities and their particular differences. In this way the natural
origin of their dramatic movements, and perhaps some new laws,
would be discovered. "
While the philosopher was pondering thus, he felt a con-
tinued pulling at his coat-tails. As his wife was in the habit of
giving him a gentle pull when he was walking next her absorbed
in thought and they met some acquaintance, he took no further
notice of it, but took off his hat, and bowing politely towards
the railing of the bridge, said "Good-evening. "
X-377
## p. 6018 (#612) ###########################################
6018
GUSTAV FREYTAG
"These common and original elements in the mimic expres-
sion of human beings and higher animals might, if rightly under-
stood, even open out new vistas into the great mystery of life. "
Another pull. Raschke mechanically took off his hat. Another
pull. "Thank you, dear Aurelia, I did bow. " As he spoke, the
thought crossed his mind that his wife would not pull at his coat
so low down. It was not she, but his little daughter Bertha who
was pulling; for she often walked gravely next him, and like her
mother, pulled at the bell for bows. "That will do, my dear,"
said he, as Bertha continued to snatch and pull at his coat-tails.
"Come here, you little rogue! " and he absently put his hand
behind him to seize the little tease. He seized hold of something
round and shaggy; he felt sharp teeth on his fingers, and turned
with a start. There he saw in the lamplight a reddish monster
with a big head, shaggy hair, and a little tassel that fell back
into its hind legs in lieu of a tail. His wife and daughter were
horribly transformed; and he gazed in surprise on this indistinct
creature which seated itself before him, and glared at him in
silence.
"A strange adventure! " exclaimed Raschke.
"What are you,
unknown creature? Presumably a dog. Away with you! " The
animal retreated a few steps. Raschke continued his meditations:
"If we trace back the expression and gestures of the affections
to their original forms in this manner, one of the most active
laws would certainly prove to be the endeavor to attract or repel
the extraneous. It would be instructive to distinguish, by means
of these involuntary movements of men and animals, what is
essential and what conventional. Away, dog! Do me a favor
and go home. What does he want with me? Evidently he be-
longs to Werner's domain. The poor creature will assuredly lose
itself in the town under the dominion of an idée fixe. "
Meantime Speihahn's attacks were becoming more violent; and
now he was marching in a quite unnatural and purely conven-
tional manner on his hind legs, while his fore paws were leaning
against the professor's back, and his teeth were actually biting
into the coat.
A belated shoemaker's boy stood still and beat his leathern
apron. "Is not the master ashamed to let his poor apprentice
push him along like that? " In truth, the dog behind the man
looked like a dwarf pushing a giant along the ice.
Raschke's interest in the dog's thoughts increased. He stood
still near a lantern, examined and felt his coat. This coat had
## p. 6019 (#613) ###########################################
GUSTAV FREYTAG
6019
developed a velvet collar and very long sleeves, advantages that
the philosopher had never yet remarked in his greatcoat. Now
the matter became clear to him: absorbed in thought, he had
chosen a wrong coat, and the worthy dog insisted on saving his
master's garment, and making the thief aware that there was
something wrong. Raschke was so pleased with this sagacity
that he turned round, addressed some kind words to Speihahn,
and made an attempt to stroke his shaggy hair. The dog again
snapped at his hand. "You are quite right to be angry with
me,” replied Raschke; "I will prove to you that I acknowledge
my fault. " He took off the coat and hung it over his arm.
«< Yes, it is much heavier than my own. " He walked on cheer-
fully in his thin coat, and observed with satisfaction that the dog
abandoned the attacks on his back. But instead, Speihahn sprang
upon
his side, and again bit at the coat and the hand, and
growled unpleasantly.
The professor got angry with the dog, and when he came to
a bench on the promenade he laid down the coat, intending to
face the dog seriously and drive him home. In this manner he
got rid of the dog, but also of the coat. For Speihahn sprang
upon the bench with a mighty bound, placed himself astride the
coat, and met the professor, who tried to drive him away, with
hideous growling and snarling.
"It is Werner's coat," said the professor, "and it is Werner's
dog: it would be wrong to beat the poor creature because it is
becoming violent in its fidelity, and it would be wrong to leave
the dog and the coat. " So he remained standing before the dog
and speaking kindly to him: but Speihahn no longer took any
notice of the professor; he turned against the coat itself, which
he scratched, rummaged, and bit. Raschke saw that the coat
could not long endure such rage. "He is frantic or mad," said
he suspiciously. "I shall have to use force against you after all,
poor creature;" and he considered whether he should also jump
upon the seat and push the mad creature by a violent kick into
the water, or whether it would be better to open the inevitable
attack from below. He resolved on the latter course, and looked
round to see whether he could anywhere discover a stone or
stick to throw at the raging beast. As he looked, he observed
the trees and the dark sky above him, and the place seemed quite
unfamiliar. "Has magic been at work here? " he exclaimed, with
amusement. He turned politely to a solitary wanderer who was
## p. 6020 (#614) ###########################################
6020
GUSTAV FREYTAG
passing that way:
the town we are?
a moment? "
"Indeed," angrily replied the person addressed, "those are
very suspicious questions. I want my stick myself at night. Who
are you, sir ? » The stranger approached the professor mena-
cingly.
"I am peaceable," replied Raschke, "and by no means inclined
to violent attacks. A quarrel has arisen between me and the
animal on this seat for the possession of a coat, and I should be
much obliged to you if you would drive the dog away from the
coat. But I beg you not to hurt the animal any more than is
absolutely necessary. "
"Is that your coat there? " asked the man.
"Unfortunately I cannot give you an affirmative answer," re-
plied Raschke conscientiously.
"Would you kindly tell me in what part of
And could you perhaps lend me your stick for
"There must be something wrong here," exclaimed the
stranger, again eyeing the professor suspiciously.
"There is, indeed," replied Raschke. "The dog is out of his
mind; the coat is exchanged, and I do not know where we are. "
"Close to the valley gate, Professor Raschke," answered the
voice of Gabriel, who hastily joined the group. "Excuse me, but
what brings you here? "
"Capital! " exclaimed Raschke joyously. "Pray take charge of
this coat and this dog. "
Gabriel gazed in amazement at Speihahn, who was now lying
on the coat and bending his head before his friend. Gabriel
threw down the dog and seized the coat. "Why, that is our
greatcoat! " exclaimed he.
"Yes, Gabriel," said the professor, "that was my mistake, and
the dog has shown marvelous fidelity to the coat. "
"Fidelity! " exclaimed Gabriel indignantly, as he drew a par-
cel out of the coat pocket. "It was greedy selfishness, sir; there
must be some food in this pocket. "
"Yes, true," exclaimed Raschke; "it is all the chicken's fault.
Give me the parcel, Gabriel; I must eat the fowl myself; and
we might bid each other good-night now with mutual satisfac-
tion, if you would just show me my way a little among these
trees. "
"But you must not go home in the night air without an over-
coat," said Gabriel considerately. "We are not far from our
## p. 6021 (#615) ###########################################
GUSTAV FREYTAG
6021
house; the best way would really be for you to come back with
me, sir. "
Raschke considered and laughed.
"You are right, Gabriel; my departure was awkward; and to-
day an animal's soul has restored a man's soul to order. "
"If you mean this dog," said Gabriel, "it would be the first
time he ever did anything good. I see he must have followed
you from our door; for I put little bones there for him of an
evening. "
"Just now he seemed not to be quite in his right mind," said
the professor.
"He is cunning enough when he pleases," continued Gabriel
mysteriously; "but if I were to speak of my experiences with this
dog -»
"Do speak, Gabriel," eagerly exclaimed the
the philosopher.
"There is nothing so valuable concerning animals as a truthful
statement from those who have carefully observed them. "
"I may say that I have done so," confirmed Gabriel, with
satisfaction; "and if you want to know exactly what he is, I can
assure you that he is possessed of the devil, he is a thief, he is
embittered, and he hates all mankind. "
"Ah, indeed! " replied the professor, somewhat disconcerted.
"I see it is much more difficult to look into a dog's heart than
into a professor's. "
Speihahn crept along silent and suppressed, and listened to the
praises that fell to his lot; while Professor Raschke, conducted by
Gabriel, returned to the house by the park. Gabriel opened the
sitting-room door, and announced-
"Professor Raschke. "
Ilse extended both her hands to him.
"Welcome, welcome, dear Professor Raschke! " and led him to
her husband's study.
"Here I am again," said Raschke cheerfully, "after wander-
ing as in a fairy tale. What has brought me back were two
animals, who showed me the right way,-a roast fowl and an
embittered dog. "
Felix sprang up; the men greeted one another warmly, shak-
ing hands, and after all misadventures, spent a happy evening.
When Raschke had gone home late, Gabriel said sadly to his
mistress, "This was the new coat; the fowl and the dog have put
it in a horrible plight. "
## p. 6022 (#616) ###########################################
6022
FRIEDRICH FROEBEL
(1782-1852)
BY NORA ARCHIBALD SMITH
T WAS Froebel who said, "The clearer the thread that runs
through our lives backward to our childhood, the clearer
will be our onward glance to the goal;" and in the frag-
ment of autobiography he has left us, he illustrates forcibly the
truth of his own saying. The motherless baby who plays alone in
the village pastor's quiet house, the dreamy child who wanders soli-
tary in the high-walled garden; the thoughtful lad, neglected, mis-
understood, who forgets the harsh realities of life in pondering the
mysteries of the flowers, the contradictions
of existence, and the dogmas of orthodox
theology; who decides in early boyhood
that the pleasures of the senses are with-
out enduring influence and therefore on no
account to be eagerly pursued; these pre-
sentments of himself, which he summons
up for us from the past, show the vivid-
ness of his early recollections and indicate
the course which the stream of his life is
to run.
FRIEDRICH FROEBEL
The coldness and injustice of the new
mother who assumed control of the house-
hold when he was four years old, his isola-
tion from other children, the merely casual
notice he received from the busy father absorbed in his parish work,
all tended to turn inward the tide of his mental and spiritual life.
He studied himself, not only because it was the bent of his nature,
but because he lacked outside objects of interest; and to this early
habit of introspection we owe many of the valuable features of his
educational philosophy. Whoever has learned thoroughly to under-
stand one child, has conquered a spot of firm ground on which to
rest while he studies the world of children; and because the great
teacher realized this truth, because he longed to give to others the
means of development denied to himself, he turns for us the heart-
leaves of his boyhood.
## p. 6023 (#617) ###########################################
FRIEDRICH FROEBEL
6023
It would appear that Froebel's characteristics were strongly marked
and unusual from the beginning. Called by every one «< a moon-struck
child" in Oberweissbach, the village of his birth, he was just as
unanimously considered "an old fool" when, crowned with the ex-
perience of seventy years, he played with the village children on the
green hills of Thuringia. The intensity of his inward life, the white
heat of his convictions, his absolute blindness to any selfish idea or
aim, his enthusiasm, the exaltation of his spiritual nature, all furnish
so many cogent reasons why the people of any day or of any com-
munity should have failed to understand him, and scorned what they
could not comprehend. It is the old story of the seers and the
prophets repeated as many times as they appear; for "these colossal
souls," as Emerson said, "require a long focal distance to be seen. "
At ten years old the sensitive boy was fortunately removed from
the uncongenial atmosphere of the parental household; and in his
uncle's home he spent five free and happy years, being apprenticed
at the end of this time to a forester in his native Thuringian
woods. Then followed a year's course in the University of Jena, and
four years spent in the study of farming, in clerical work of various
kinds, and in land-surveying. All these employments, however, Froe-
bel himself felt to be merely provisional; for like the hazel wand in
the diviner's hand, his instinct was blindly seeking through these
restless years the well-spring of his life.
In Frankfort, where he had gone intending to study architecture,
Destiny touched him on the shoulder, and he turned and knew her.
