The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Volume 06

Beautiful Sara expressed thanks for this information, whereupon Schnapper-Elle proceeded to narrate in detail how she had once been in Amsterdam, how she had been subjected to the advances of men on account of her beauty, how she had come to Frankfort three days before Whit-suntide and married Schnapper, how he had died, and what touching things he had finally said on his deathbed, and how hard it was to carry on the restaurant business and keep one's hands nice. Several times she glanced aside with a contemptuous air, apparently at some giggling girls, who seemed to be eyeing her clothes. And the latter were indeed remarkable enough—a very loose skirt of white satin, on which all the animals of Noah's Ark were embroidered in gaudy colors; a jacket of gold cloth, like a cuirass, with sleeves of red velvet, yellow slashed; a very high cap on her head, with a mighty ruff of stiff white linen around her neck, which also had around it a silver chain hung with all kinds of coins, cameos, and curiosities, among them a large picture of the city of Amsterdam, which rested on her bosom.

But the dresses of the other women were no less remarkable. They consisted of a variety of fashions of different ages, and many a woman there was so covered with gold and diamonds as to look like a wandering jeweler's shop. It is true that there was at that time a fashion of dress prescribed by law to the Frankfort Jews, and to distinguish them from Christians the men had to wear yellow rings on their cloaks, and the women very stiff, blue-striped veils on their caps. However, in the Jewish quarter the law was little observed, and there, in the synagogue, especially on festival days, the women put on as much magnificent apparel as they could—partly to arouse envy of others, and partly to advertise the wealth and credit of their husbands.

While passages from the Books of Moses are being read on the lower floor of the synagogue, the devotion is usually somewhat lulled. Many make themselves comfortable and sit down, whispering perhaps business affairs with a friend, or go out into the court to get a little fresh air. Small boys take the liberty of visiting their mothers in the women's balcony; and here worship is still more loosely observed, as there is gossiping, chattering, and laughing, while, as always happens, the young quizz the old, and the latter censure the light-headedness of the girls and the general degeneracy of the age.

And just as there was a choir-leader on the floor below, so was there a gossip-leader in the balcony above. This was Puppy Reiss, a vulgar, greenish woman, who found out about everybody's troubles, and always had a scandal on her tongue. The usual butt of her pointed sayings was poor Schnapper-Elle, and she could mock right well the affected genteel airs and languishing manner with which the latter accepted the insincere compliments of young men.

"Do you know," cried Puppy Reiss, "Schnapper-Elle said yesterday, 'If I were not beautiful and clever, and beloved, I had rather not be alive.'"

Then there was loud tittering, and Schnapper-Elle, who was not far distant, noting that this was all at her expense, lifted her nose in scorn, and sailed away, like a proud galley, to some remote corner. Then Birdie Ochs, a plump and somewhat awkward lady, remarked compassionately that Schnapper-Elle might be a little vain and small of mind, but that she was an honest, generous soul, and did much good to many folk in need.

"Particularly to Nose Star," snapped Puppy Reiss. And all who knew of this tender relation laughed all the louder.

"Don't you know," added Puppy spitefully, "that Nose Star now sleeps in Schnapper-Elle's house! But just look at Susy Flörsheim down there, wearing the necklace which Daniel Fläsch pawned to her husband! Fläsch's wife is vexed about it—that is plain. And now she is talking to Mrs. Flörsheim. How amiably they shake hands!—and hate each other like Midian and Moab! How sweetly they smile on each other! Oh, you dear souls, don't eat each other up out of pure love! I'll just steal up and listen to them!"

And so, like a sneaking wildcat, Puppy Reiss crept up and listened to the two women bewailing to each other how they had worked all the past week to clean up the house and scour the kitchen things, and complaining about all they had to do before Passover, so that not a crumb of leavened bread should stick to anything. And such troubles as they had baking the unleavened bread! Mrs. Fläsch had special cause for complaint—for she had had no end of trouble over it in the public bakery, where, according to the ticket she drew, she could not bake till the afternoon of the very last day, just before Passover Eve; and then old Hannah had kneaded the dough badly, and the maids had rolled it too thin, and half of it was scorched in baking, and worst of all, rain came pouring through the bake-house roof; and so, wet and weary, they had had to work till late in the night.

"And, my dear Mrs. Flörsheim," said Mrs. Fläsch, with gracious friendliness most insincere, "you were a little to blame for that, because you did not send your people to help me in baking."

"Ah! pardon," replied the other. "My servants were so busy—the goods for the fair had to be packed—my husband"—

"Yes, I know," interrupted Mrs. Fläsch, with cutting irony in her speech. "I know that you have much to do—many pledges and a good business, and necklaces"—

And a bitter word was just about to slip from the lips of the speaker, and Dame Flörsheim had turned as red as a lobster, when Puppy Reiss cried out loudly, "For God's sake!—the strange lady lies dying—water! water!"

Beautiful Sara lay in a faint, as pale as death, while a swarm of excited women crowded around her, one holding her head, another her arm, while some old women sprinkled her with the glasses of water which hung behind their prayer desks for washing the hands in case they should by accident touch their own bodies. Others held under her nose an old lemon full of spices, which was left over from the last feast-day, when it had served for smelling and strengthening the nerves. Exhausted and sighing deeply, Beautiful Sara at last opened her eyes, and with mute glances thanked them for their kind care. But now the eighteen-prayer, which no one dared neglect, was being solemnly chanted below, and the busy women hurried back to their places and offered the prayer as the rite ordains, that is, standing up with their faces turned toward the east, which is that part of the heavens where Jerusalem lies. Birdie Ochs, Schnapper-Elle, and Puppy Reiss stayed to the last with Beautiful Sara—the first two to aid her as much as possible, the other two to find out why she had fainted so suddenly.

Beautiful Sara had swooned from a singular cause. It is a custom in the synagogue that any one who has escaped a great danger shall, after the reading of the extracts from the Law, appear in public and return thanks for his divine deliverance. As Rabbi Abraham rose to his feet to make his prayer, and Beautiful Sara recognized her husband's voice, she noticed that his voice gradually subsided into the mournful murmur of a prayer for the dead. She heard the names of her dear kinsfolk, accompanied by the words which convey the blessing on the departed; and the last hope vanished from her soul, for it was torn by the certainty that those dear ones had really been slain, that her little niece was dead, that her little cousins Posy and Birdy were dead, that little Gottschalk too was dead—all murdered and dead! And she, too, would have succumbed to the agony of this realization, had not a kind swoon poured forgetfulness over her senses.

CHAPTER III

When Beautiful Sara, after divine service was ended, went down into the courtyard of the synagogue, the Rabbi stood there waiting for her. He nodded to her with a cheerful expression, and accompanied her out into the street, where there was no longer silence but a noisy multitude. It was like a swarm of ants—bearded men in black coats, women gleaming and fluttering like gold-chafers, boys in new clothes carrying prayer-books after their parents, young girls who, because they could not enter the synagogue, now came bounding to their parents, bowing their curly heads to receive their blessing—all gay and merry, and walking up and down the street in the happy anticipation of a good dinner, the savory odor of which—causing their mouths to water—rose from many black pots, marked with chalk, and carried by smiling girls from the large community kitchens.

In this multitude particularly conspicuous was the form of a Spanish cavalier, whose youthful features bore that fascinating pallor which ladies generally attribute to an unfortunate—and men, on the contrary, to a very fortunate—love affair. His gait, although naturally carefree, had in it, however, a somewhat affected daintiness. The feathers in his cap were agitated more by the aristocratic motion of his head than by the wind; and his golden spurs, and the jeweled hilt of his sword, which he bore on his arm, rattled rather more than was necessary. A white cavalier's cloak enveloped his slender limbs in an apparently careless manner, but, in reality, betrayed the most careful arrangement of the folds. Passing and repassing, partly with curiosity, partly with an air of a connoisseur, he approached the women walking by, looked calmly at them, paused when he thought a face was worth the trouble, gave to many a pretty girl a passing compliment, and went his way heedless as to its effect. He had met Beautiful Sara more than once, but every time had seemed to be repelled by her commanding look, or else by the enigmatical smile of her husband. Finally, however, proudly conquering all diffidence, he boldly faced both, and with foppish confidence made, in a tenderly gallant tone, the following speech: "Señora!—list to me!—I swear—by the roses of both the kingdoms of Castile, by the Aragonese hyacinths and the pomegranate blossoms of Andalusia! by the sun which illumines all Spain, with its flowers, onions, pea-soups, forests, mountains, mules, he-goats, and Old Christians! by the canopy of heaven, on which this sun is merely a golden tassel! and by the God who abides in heaven and meditates day and night over the creation of new forms of lovely women!—I swear that you, Señora, are the fairest dame whom I have seen in all the German realm, and if you please to accept my service, then I pray of you the favor, grace, and leave to call myself your knight and bear your colors henceforth in jest or earnest!"

A flush of pain rose in the face of Beautiful Sara, and with one of those glances which cut the deeper when they come from gentle eyes, and with a tone such as is bitterest coming from a beautiful voice, the lady answered, as one deeply hurt:

"My noble lord, if you will be my knight you must fight whole races, and in the battle there will be little thanks to win and less honor; and if you will wear my colors, then you must sew yellow rings on your cloak, or bind yourself with a blue-striped scarf, for such are my colors—the colors of my house, the House of Israel, which is wretched indeed, one mocked in the streets by the sons of fortune."

A sudden purple red shot into the cheeks of the Spaniard; an inexpressible confusion seemed to have seized him as he stammered—

"Señora, you misunderstood me—an innocent jest—but, by God, no mockery, no scorn of Israel. I myself am sprung from that house; my grandfather was a Jew, perhaps even my father."

"And it is very certain, Señor, that your uncle is one," suddenly exclaimed the Rabbi, who had calmly witnessed this scene; and with a merry, quizzical glance, he added, "And I myself will vouch that Don Isaac Abarbanel, nephew of the great Rabbi, is sprung from the best blood of Israel, if not from the royal race of David!"

The chain of the sword rattled under the Spaniard's cloak, his cheeks became deadly white, his upper lip twitched as with scorn in which there was pain, and angry death grinned in his eyes, as in an utterly changed, ice-cold, keen voice he said:

"Señor Rabbi, you know me. Well, then, you know also who I am. And if the fox knows that I belong to the blood of the lion, let him beware and not bring his fox-beard into danger of death, nor provoke my anger. Only he who feels like the lion can understand his weakness."

"Oh, I understand it well," answered the Rabbi, and a melancholy seriousness came over his brow. "I understand it well, how the proud lion, out of pride, casts aside his princely coat and goes about disguised in the scaly armor of the crocodile, because it is the fashion to be a grinning, cunning, greedy crocodile! What can you expect the lesser beasts to be when the lion denies his nature? But beware, Don Isaac, thou wert not made for the element of the crocodile. For water—thou knowest well what I mean—is thy evil fortune, and thou shalt drown. Water is not thy element; the weakest trout can live in it better than the king of the forest. Hast thou forgotten how the current of the Tagus was about to draw thee under—?"

Bursting into loud laughter, Don Isaac suddenly threw his arms round the Rabbi's neck, covered his mouth with kisses, leapt with jingling spurs high into the air, so that the passing Jews shrank back in alarm, and in his own natural hearty and joyous voice cried—

"Truly thou art Abraham of Bacharach! And it was a good joke, and more than that, a friendly act, when thou, in Toledo, didst leap from the Alcantara bridge into the water, and grasp by the hair thy friend, who could drink better than he could swim, and drew him to dry land. I came very near making a really deep investigation as to whether there is actually gold in the bed of the Tagus, and whether the Romans were right in calling it the golden river. I assure you that I shiver even now at the mere thought of that water-party."

Saying this the Spaniard made a gesture as if he were shaking water from his garments. The countenance of the Rabbi expressed great joy as he again and again pressed his friend's hand, saying every time—

"I am indeed glad."

"And so, indeed, am I," answered the other. "It is seven years now since we met, and when we parted I was as yet a mere greenhorn, and thou—thou wert already a staid and serious man. But whatever became of the beautiful Doña who in those days cost thee so many sighs, which thou didst accompany with the lute?"

"Hush, hush! the Doña hears us—she is my wife, and thou thyself hast given her today proof of thy taste and poetic skill."

It was not without some trace of his former embarrassment that the Spaniard greeted the beautiful lady, who amiably regretted that she, by expressing herself so plainly, had pained a friend of her husband.

"Ah, Señora," replied Don Isaac, "he who grasps too clumsily at a rose must not complain if the thorns scratch. When the star of evening reflects its golden light in the azure flood"—

"I beg of you!" interrupted the Rabbi, "to cease! If we wait till the star of evening reflects its golden light in the azure flood, my wife will starve, for she has eaten nothing since yesterday, and suffered much in the mean-while."

"Well, then, I will take you to the best restaurant of Israel," said Don Isaac, "to the house of my friend Schnapper-Elle, which is not far away. I already smell the savory odors from the kitchen! Oh, didst thou but know, O Abraham, how this odor appeals to me. This it is which, since I have dwelt in this city, has so often lured me to the tents of Jacob. Intercourse with God's people is not a hobby of mine, and truly it is not to pray, but to eat, that I visit the Jews' Street."

"Thou hast never loved us, Don Isaac."

"Well," continued the Spaniard, "I like your food much better than your creed—which wants the right sauce. I never could rightly digest you. Even in your best days, under the rule of my ancestor David, who was king over Judah and Israel, I never could have held out, and certainly I should some fine morning have run away from Mount Zion and emigrated to Phoenicia or Babylon, where the joys of life foamed in the temple of the gods."

"Thou blasphemest, Isaac, blasphemest the one God," murmured the Rabbi grimly. "Thou art much worse than a Christian—thou art a heathen, a servant of idols."

"Yes, I am a heathen, and the melancholy, self-tormenting Nazarenes are quite as little to my taste as the dry and joyless Hebrews. May our dear Lady of Sidon, holy Astarte, forgive me, that I kneel before the many sorrowed Mother of the Crucified and pray. Only my knee and my tongue worship death—my heart remains true to life. But do not look so sourly," continued the Spaniard, as he saw what little gratification his words seemed to give the Rabbi. "Do not look at me with disdain. My nose is not a renegade. When once by chance I came into this street at dinner time, and the well-known savory odors of the Jewish kitchen rose to my nose, I was seized with the same yearning which our fathers felt for the fleshpots of Egypt—pleasant tasting memories of youth came back to me. In imagination I saw again the carp with brown raisin sauce which my aunt prepared so sustainingly for Friday eve; I saw once more the steamed mutton with garlic and horseradish, which might have raised the dead, and the soup with dreamily swimming dumplings in it—and my soul melted like the notes of an enamored nightingale—and since then I have been eating in the restaurant of my friend Doña Schnapper-Elle."

Meanwhile they had arrived at this highly lauded place, where Schnapper-Elle stood at the door cordially greeting the strangers who had come to the fair, and who, led by hunger, were now streaming in. Behind her, sticking his head out over her shoulder, was the tall Nose Star, anxiously and inquisitively observing them. Don Isaac with an exaggerated air of dignity approached the landlady, who returned his satirical reverence with endless curtsies. Thereupon he drew the glove from his right hand, wrapped it, the hand, in the fold of his cloak, and grasping Schnapper-Elle's hand, slowly drew it over his moustache, saying:

"Señora! your eyes rival the brilliancy of the sun! But as eggs, the longer they are boiled the harder they become, so vice versa my heart grows softer the longer it is cooked in the flaming flashes of your eyes. From the yolk of my heart flies up the winged god Amor and seeks a confiding nest in your bosom. And oh, Señora, wherewith shall I compare that bosom? For in all the world there is no flower, no fruit, which is like to it! It is the one thing of its kind! Though the wind tears away the leaves from the tenderest rose, your bosom is still a winter rose which defies all storms. Though the sour lemon, the older it grows the yellower and more wrinkled it becomes, your bosom rivals in color and softness the sweetest pineapple. Oh, Señora, if the city of Amsterdam be as beautiful as you told me yesterday, and the day before, and every day, the ground on which it rests is far lovelier still."

The cavalier spoke these last words with affected earnestness, and squinted longingly at the large medallion which hung from Schnapper-Elle's neck. Nose Star looked down with inquisitive eyes, and the much-bepraised bosom heaved so that the whole city of Amsterdam rocked from side to side.

"Ah!" sighed Schnapper-Elle, "virtue is worth more than beauty. What use is my beauty to me? My youth is passing away, and since Schnapper is gone—anyhow, he had handsome hands—what avails beauty?"

With that she sighed again, and like an echo, all but inaudible, Nose Star sighed behind her. "Of what avail is your beauty?" cried Don Isaac. "Oh, Dona Schnapper-Elle, do not sin against the goodness of creative Nature! Do not scorn her most charming gifts, or she will reap most terrible revenge. Those blessed, blessing eyes will become glassy balls, those winsome lips grow flat and unattractive, that chaste and charming form be changed into an unwieldy barrel of tallow, and the city of Amsterdam at last rest on a spongy bog." Thus he sketched piece by piece the appearance of Schnapper-Elle, so that the poor woman was bewildered, and sought to escape the uncanny compliments of the cavalier. She was delighted to see Beautiful Sara appear at this instant, as it gave her an opportunity to inquire whether she had quite recovered from her swoon. Thereupon she plunged into lively chatter, in which she fully developed her sham gentility, mingled with real kindness of heart, and related with more prolixity than discretion the awful story of how she herself had almost fainted with horror when she, as innocent and inexperienced as could be, arrived in a canal boat at Amsterdam, and the rascally porter, who carried her trunk, led her—not to a respectable hotel, but oh, horrors!—to an infamous brothel! She could tell what it was the moment she entered, by the brandy-drinking, and by the immoral sights! And she would, as she said, really have swooned, if it had not been that during the six weeks she stayed in the disorderly house she only once ventured to close her eyes.

"I dared not," she added, "on account of my virtue. And all that was owing to my beauty! But virtue will stay—when good looks pass away."

Don Isaac was on the point of throwing some critical light on the details of this story when, fortunately, Squinting Aaron Hirschkuh from Homburg-on-the-Lahn came with a white napkin on his arm, and bitterly bewailed that the soup was already served, and that the boarders were seated at table, but that the landlady was missing.

(The conclusion and the chapters which follow are lost, not from any fault of the author.)

THE LIFE OF FRANZ GRILLPARZER

BY WILLIAM GUILD HOWARD, A.MAssistant Professor of German, Harvard University

Franz Grillparzer is the greatest poet and dramatist among the Austrians. Corresponding to the Goethe Society at Weimar, the Grillparzer Society at Vienna holds its meetings and issues its annual; and the edition of Goethe's works instituted by the Grand Duchess Sophie of Weimar is paralleled by an edition of Grillparzer's works now in process of publication by the city of Vienna. Not without a sense of local pride and jealousy do the Viennese extol their fellow-countryman and hold him up to their kinsmen of the north as worthy to stand beside Goethe and Schiller. They would be ungrateful if they did not cherish the memory of a man who during his life-time was wont to prefer them, with all their imperfections upon their heads, to the keener and more enterprising North Germans, and who on many occasions sang the praises of their sociability, their wholesome naturalness, and their sound instinct. But even from the point of view of the critical North German or of the non-German foreigner, Grillparzer abundantly deserves his local fame—and more than local fame; for a dozen dramas of the first class, two eminently characteristic short stories, numerous lyrical poems, and innumerable studies and autobiographical papers are a man's work entitling their author to a high place in European, not merely German, literature.

It is, however, as an Austrian that Grillparzer is primarily to be judged. Again and again he insisted upon his national quality as a man and as a poet, upon the Viennese atmosphere of his plays and his poems. He was never happy when away from his native city, and though his pieces are now acceptably performed wherever German is spoken, they are most successful in Vienna, and some of them are to be seen only on the Viennese stage.

What are, then, the distinguishing features of the Austrians, and of Grillparzer as one of them? Grillparzer said these features are an open heart and a single mind, good sense and reliable intuition, frankness, naïveté, generosity, modest contentment with being while others are up and doing. The Austrians are of mixed blood, and partake of South European characteristics less prominent among the purer blooded Teutons of the north. They have life on easier terms, are less intellectual, are more sensuous, emotional, more fanciful, fonder of artistic enjoyment, more sensitive to color and to those effects called "color," by contrast to form, in other arts than that of painting. The art of music is most germane to the Austrian spirit; and we have a ready key to the peculiarities of the Austrian disposition in the difference between Haydn, Mozart, Schubert, and Johann Strauss, on the one hand, and Händel, Beethoven, Schumann, and Wagner on the other. Moreover, the Austrians are in all respects conservative, in literary taste no less than in politics and religion. The pseudo-classicism of Gottsched maintained its authority in Austria not merely after the time of Lessing, but also after the time of Schiller. Wieland was a favorite long before Goethe began to be appreciated; and as to the romantic movement, only the gentle tendencies of such a congenial spirit as Eichendorff found a sympathetic echo on the shores of the Danube. Romance influences, however, more particularly Spanish, were manifest there even before the time when they became strong upon Grillparzer.