The Mysterious Sketch

Copyright (C) 2011 by Michael John Wooff
The mysterious sketch
by Emile Erckmann (1822-1899) and Alexandre Chatrian (1826-1890)
Opposite the Saint Sebaldus Chapel in Nuremberg rises up a little inn, tall and narrow, with a jagged gable, dusty windows and a plaster cast of Our Lady on top of its roof. It was here that I spent the unhappiest days of my life. I had gone to Nuremberg to study the old German masters, but, due to a lack of liquidity, I had to paint portraits…and what portraits they were! Fat purveyors of tittle-tattle with a cat on their knees, aldermen in wigs, burgomasters wearing a three-cornered hat and the whole thing set off by luminous ochre and cinnabar by the bucketful.
From portraits I descended to sketches and from sketches to outlines.
Nothing can be worse, believe me, than to constantly have on your back a head steward, tight-lipped, shrill, impudent-looking, who comes to you every day with: So then! How soon will you be paying, sir? Have you any idea how much your bill is now? No. It doesn't bother you, does it?… Sir eats, drinks and sleeps as he pleases… Does not our heavenly Father feed even the birds of the air? Sir's bill comes to four hundred schillings and ten kreuzer… It's hardly worth mentioning, I know.
Those who have not heard this scale being sung can have no concept of it - love of art, imagination, a sacred passion for the beautiful all dry up under the withering breath of such a browbeater… You grow gauche and timid, all your energy dissipated along with any feeling of personal dignity.
One night, penniless as usual, and threatened with debtor's prison by that worthy steward Rap, I decided I would thwart his hopes of payment by slitting my throat. With this pleasant thought in mind, sitting on my truckle bed opposite the window, I gave myself up to a thousand philosophical reflexions of varying degrees of cheerfulness. I did not dare to open my razor for fear that the irresistible force of my reasoning might well instil in me sufficient courage to do away with myself once and for all. Having argued with myself in this way, I blew out my candle, deferring the conclusion to this line of thought to the morrow.