CHAPTER XIV.
ONE'S FELLOW-MAN.
Again the days flowed quietly on in work and recreation. One day Claus came and asked Roland to keep his promise of showing him the whole villa from top to bottom.
"Why do you want to see it?" asked Eric.
"I should like for once to see all the things which rich people have, to know what they do with all their money."
A knavish glance shot from the huntsman's eye, as he spoke. Eric gave the requested permission; he would have preferred to send a servant, but he went himself with the man, of whom he felt a sort of dread, not liking to leave him alone with Roland. He could scarcely give a reason for his uneasiness, except that the manner in which the huntsman dwelt upon the rich and poor might confuse Roland's mind.
They went through all the stories of the house, and Claus, who hardly dared to put his foot down, kept saying,—
"Yes, yes, all this can be had for money! what can't be got for money?"
In the great music-hall, he stood on the platform, and called to Eric and Roland:
"Herr Captain, may I ask a question?"
"If I can answer it, why shouldn't you?"
"Tell me fairly and honestly, what would you do, if you—you are a liberal-minded man and a friend of humanity—what would you do, if you were the owner of this house and so many millions?"
The huntsman's loud voice resounded through, the great hall with a discordant echo, which seemed as if it would never cease.
"What would you do?" he repeated. "Do you know no answer?"
"It is not necessary for me to give you one."
"All right; I knew you couldn't."
He came down from the platform, saying, "I am field-guard, and as I wander about at night, it seems to me as if I were possessed of an evil spirit, which I can't get rid of. I can't help thinking all the time, what would you do if you had many millions? It drives me almost crazy; I can't get away from it, and it appears that you can't answer the question, either."
"What would you do?" asked Eric.
"Have you no idea?"
"If I had much money," answered Claus, laughing maliciously, "first of all I'd cudgel the Landrath to a jelly, even if it cost a thousand gulden; it's worth the money."
"But then?"
"Yes, then—that I don't know."
Eric looked at Roland, who looked back at him with dull, troubled eyes, and compressed lips. The unconsciousness of wealth to which Knopf had alluded seemed destroyed, suddenly and unseasonably uprooted. Roland could never be led back to it, and yet was not mature enough to see his way forward.
Eric said to Roland in English, that, he would clear up the matter for him, but that it was impossible to find an answer fit for an ignorant man.
"Would an ignorant man have asked the question?" answered Roland in the same language.
Eric remained silent, for he could not disturb and spoil the clear preception of his pupil, even to relieve and set him at rest.
"Ha, ha!" laughed the huntsman scornfully, "now I'm rid of it, now, you've got it. Wherever you go or rest you will hear what I've been asking myself in all the passages and all the rounds. Very well! if you ever find the answer, let me have the benefit of it."
He put on his hat and went away. It was impossible to fix Roland's attention upon anything throughout that day; he sat alone in his room; late at night, after Eric had been asleep, he heard him go into the library to get something.
Eric let him take his own course, then going into the library, he saw that it was the Bible which he had taken; he was probably reading the passage concerning the rich young man; the seed, which had until now lain dormant, was beginning to sprout. Eric had pursued his work of quiet preparation until now, when an outside influence had come in, and with rude grasp had awakened what should have slept on. What is all our teaching and preparation for? It is the same in external nature; the buds swell quietly till a wild tempest bursts them suddenly open. Now the wild tempest had swept over Roland, and Eric could not shelter him.
Very early the next morning Roland came to Eric's room, saying,—
"I have a favor to ask."
"Tell me what it is. I will grant it if I can."
"You can. Let us forget all our books to-day, and come with me to the castle."
"Now?"
"Yes; I have a plan. I want to see myself how it is. Let me, just this one day."
"Let you do what?"
"I want to work like the masons' apprentices up there. I don't want to eat and drink anything except what they do, and I want to carry loads up and down like them."
Eric went to the castle with Roland, but on the way, he said,—
"Roland, your purpose is good, and your wish pleases me, but now consider. You are not undertaking the same work as the men yonder, but work much harder, for you are not accustomed to it; this one day would bring ten times as much fatigue to you as to them, for you come to it from different circumstances. What is habit to them is new to you, and doubly difficult; and, moreover, you are not like them, for you have been tenderly and carefully nurtured; your bed is wholly unlike theirs; you have tender hands; it is quite a different sort of strength which you possess. So you would not learn what poor people feel, who have nothing but their native energy to help them support life."
Roland stood still, and there was an echo of what he had read in the night in the question, as he asked with a troubled voice, "What shall I do then, to make my own the life of my fellow-men?"
Eric was struck by his tone, and by the form of his question; he could not tell Roland how happy he felt, but he was sure at this moment that a soul, which bore and cherished such desires within it, could never go far astray, nor lose the sense of the union and mutual dependence of mankind. He restrained himself from expressing his feeling, however, and said,—
"Dear Roland"—he had never before said dear Roland—"the world is a great labor-association; the same task is not laid upon all of us, but it is enjoined on every one to feel himself the brother of his fellow-men, and to know that he is the guardian of himself and of his brothers. What we can do is, to prepare ourselves and hold ourselves ready to stand by our brother's side, and reach out a hand to him as often as the call may come. The work which will one day be yours is different from that of the laborers yonder, who carry stone and mortar; your work is greater, and more productive of happiness. Come, the time has arrived for you to see into many things."