CHAPTER V.
This is not the place to decide whether the year 1848 brought most good or evil into the world. Let everyone give his verdict as he thinks best, I will not be drawn into expressing an opinion one way or the other, and will only describe how it affected the people about whom I am writing, for if I did not do that, the end of my book would be rather incomprehensible to my readers.
When the February explosion took place in Paris, the Mecklenburgers imagined that it would affect them as little as if it had taken place in Turkey, or some such distant country, and most people thought it a good joke that anything so exciting should still be possible in the world. The good folk of Rahnstädt began to take much more interest in politics than they had ever done before, and the post-master said that if matters remained as they were, the thing would have to be enquired into. He had been obliged to order eleven new newspapers, four of which were the "Hamburg Correspondent," and seven were numbers of the "Tante Voss." He regarded this preponderance in favour of the latter paper as a very bad sign, for the "Tante Voss" inculcated the necessity of overthrowing the existing order of things; perhaps the editor meant no harm by it, but he did it all the same. Thus we see that forty-four politicians were provided with the latest news, for every four of them took a paper amongst them which they each read in turn, and the olive-branches of the various subscribers might be seen running with the newspapers to the different houses at which they were due, looking as if their parents thought it well to bring up their children to be post-men. But what were eleven newspapers in a town like Rahnstädt? The artisans were still unprovided for, that had to be seen to; and it was done before long.
"Where are you going, John?" asked Jack Bank's wife.--"Well, Dora, I'm going to Grammelin's."--"You're going much too often to the public-house. I don't like it."--"Oh, Dora, I only drink one glass of beer. Lawyer Rein is going to read the newspaper aloud there this evening, and one likes to know what's going on in the world."--So Jack Bank and about fifty other artisans went to the ale-house.
Lawyer Rein seated himself at the head of the table, newspaper in hand, glanced down the table to see that there was a good audience, and then coughed twice. "Silence!"--"Silence!"--"Bring me another glass of beer, Grammelin."--"Hold your tongue, Charles, he's going to begin."--"Hang it! Surely I may order a glass of beer first."--"Hush! Do be quiet!"--The lawyer now began to read. He read about Lyons, Milan and Munich. The revolution had broken out at all of these places, the whole world seemed to be going mad. "Here's something more," he said. "Faröe islands 5th. The country is in an uproar, because the meridian, which we have had in our island for the last three hundred years, is to be removed to Greenwich, England. There is a strong feeling of hostility against the English. The people are getting under arms, and both of our hussar-regiments are ordered out for the defence of the meridian."--"Well, well; very soon all of them will be at it."--"Ah yes, lad. This isn't by any means a small matter. When one has had a thing for three hundred years, one do'n't like having to give it up."--"I say, lad, do you know what a meridian is?"--"What can it be? It seems to be something that the English like to have. Now, then, you wouldn't believe me when I told you yesterday that the English were at the bottom of all the mischief, and you see that I was right."--Lawyer Rein laid the newspaper down on the table and said: "Things are getting very bad, and one can't help feeling rather anxious when one reads the news."--"Why, what is it?"--"Has anything worse happened?"--"Just listen. North-pole, 27th February. A very dangerous and extensive revolution has broken out amongst the Eskimos. These people obstinately refuse to turn the axis of the world any longer, and give as a reason, the want of train oil for greasing the machinery, which is caused by the failure of the whale fisheries last year. The consequences of this revolt will be indescribably disastrous to the rest of the world."--"Heaven preserve us! What does all that mean? Where is the mischief to stop?"--"Surely the government will do something."--"The gentry won't allow that."--"I don't believe it," said Jack Bank.--"You don't believe it? Well, being a shoemaker you ought to know. Has the price of train-oil risen since last year?"--"Well, lads," said Wimmersdorf the tailor, "it looks very bad to me."--"I don't care," cried another. "When the sky falls the sparrows will all die. But I will say this. We must all work hard, and yet those cursed dogs at the North-pole are sitting with their hands folded in their laps doing nothing. Another glass of beer, Grammelin."
Three things are to be remarked from this scene at the ale-house. Firstly, that Lawyer Rein trusted as much to his invention, as to the newspaper, for the information he gave the people. Secondly that the Rahnstädt artisans were not quite well enough educated for newspapers to be properly understood by them, and thirdly, that people are apt to be rather indifferent to that which does not come home to their own stomachs.
But it was to come nearer them now. One day the post from Berlin did not arrive, so the Rahnstädters crowded round the post-office, and asked each other what it meant. The grooms who had come to fetch the letter-bags for the country places wondered whether they ought to wait or not. In fact the only man who was perfectly satisfied with the state of affairs was the post-master, who was standing at his own door, twirling his thumbs. He said that during the thirty years he had held the office of post-master he had never had such a pleasant time of leisure at that hour as he was then enjoying. Next day, instead of the little boys, the subscribers to the newspapers came themselves, and instead of the grooms, the squires rode into Rahnstädt to ask for their letters; but that did not help them much, for the post did not arrive that day either, and it began to be whispered that Berlin had also risen. One man told one story and another gave a different version, each vouching for the truth of his own. Old Düsing, the potter, said that he had heard the distant roar of cannon all morning, and everyone believed him although Berlin was nearly a hundred and twenty miles from Rahnstädt. His neighbour Hagen the carpenter was the only man who doubted, and he said: "I made the noise of cannon, for I was hacking up some wood in my yard all morning."--The post arrived on the third day, but not from Berlin; it only came from Oranienburg, and with it a man who could tell them all they wanted to know, as he had just come from Berlin. The only pity was that he had talked so hard the whole time he had been travelling that he had no voice left when he reached Rahnstädt. He was a candidate for the ministry, and was born in the neighbourhood, so the Rahnstädters plied him with egg-flip in hopes of making him speak. He drank a great deal of the flip, but all in vain, he could only touch his throat and chest, and shake his head sadly. He then tried to go away. Now that was a stupid thing of him to do, for the Rahnstädters had not come to the post-office to look about them and hear no news. They would not let him pass, and he had to make up his mind to describe the revolution in Berlin as best he could, helping himself out by means of signs. He showed them that barricades were erected in the streets, naturally only by signs, otherwise the police would have been down upon him. He shouldered his stick like a musket, and showed how the barricades were stormed. He rushed into the midst of the Rahnstädt crowd to show them how the dragoons came up at a hand-gallop, and then he imitated the roar of cannon by saying "boom," that being the only word he had uttered, and it was said with infinite difficulty.
That was how the Rahnstädters learnt what a revolution was like, and how it ought to be conducted. They sat in the public-house, and while they drank beer, they disputed about politics. The state of affairs had now become so grave that Lawyer Rein no longer dared to read despatches from the North-pole. The gentlemen who subscribed for the newspapers also began to frequent the ale-house, in order that they might make themselves known to, and liked by the artisans in case there should be a revolt here also. Such a consummation would have surprised nobody.
There were advanced thinkers in Rahnstädt as elsewhere, and if the town as a whole had no particular grievance, a great many individuals amongst its inhabitants had small wrongs which might be magnified by discontent into instances of gross injustice. One man had this, another that, and Kurz had the town-jail. So it came to pass that all were of one mind in thinking that the present state of things might be altered with advantage to the community, and that in order to improve their affairs they must needs have a revolution like their neighbours; but still they thought that in their case a small one would be sufficient.
Thus the meeting of ignorant men for reading the papers was changed into a Reform-club with a chairman and a bell, and the former irregular attendance was changed to a regular attendance. The members of the society adjourned every evening from the bar of the public-house to a private room where they deliberated, but unfortunately they always carried the fumes of the beer they had drunk with them. Everything was done decently and in order, and this was a circumstance worthy of the greater admiration that the whole company was composed of discontented people, with the sole exception of Grammelin the landlord. Speeches were made at the meeting. At first whoever had anything to say spoke from his seat, but after a time that was all changed. Thiel the cabinet-maker made a sort of pulpit, and the first speech delivered from it, was when Dreier the cooper accused Thiel of having taken the work out of his hands, for in his opinion he ought to have made the pulpit and not the cabinet-maker. He concluded by begging the meeting to uphold his rights. He gained nothing by his appeal, although it was apparent to every eye, that the pulpit was exactly like a vat belonging to a brandy-making establishment, and not like a pulpit at all. Mr. Wredow, the fat old baker, moved that the pulpit should be made over again, for it did not allow a man sufficient room to turn; but Wimmersdorf, the tailor, said that such things were made large enough for ordinary mortals, and that no one was expected to make them to suit the fancy of people who chose to smother themselves in fat. So the matter was settled much to the satisfaction of the thin members, while the fat ones were so disgusted that they ceased to attend the meeting, and this the others maintained was no great loss. But it was a mistake on their part, for they thus got rid of the "calming element"--as it was called--which would have kept the meeting in check, and instead of it, the vacant places were all filled by labourers, so the revolution might begin at any moment. The only two stout people who were still members of the Reform-club, were uncle Bräsig and Shulz the carpenter.
No one was more satisfied with the unsettled state of affairs than uncle Bräsig; he was always ready; he was like a bee, or rather--like a bumble-bee, and looked upon every house-door and every window in Rahnstädt as a flower from which he might extract news. When he had gathered enough he would make his way home and feed his friend Charles with the bees-bread he had collected.--"I say, Charles, they've chased away Louis Philippe."--"Is that in the newspaper?"--"I've just read it there myself. What a cowardly old humbug he must be, Charles. How can a king allow himself to be turned out?"--"Ah, Bräsig, such things have happened before. Don't you remember Gustavus of Sweden? When a nation unites against him, what can the king do? He stands alone."--"That's all very true, Charles, but still I'd never run away in such a case. Hang it! I'd seat myself upon my throne, put my crown on my head and hit out with arms and legs at any one who attacked me."
Another time he came, and said: "The Berlin post hasn't come to-day either, Charles, and I saw your young squire galloping through the streets to the post-office to ask why it hadn't come, but I'm sorry he did so, for some of the artisans collected in a crowd and asked each other whether they were bound to stand a nobleman galloping through their streets any longer. He rode from the post-office to Moses' house, and got the worst of it there. I also had something to say to Moses, and so I followed him. Just as I got to the door, Mr. von Rambow came out, and looked at me as he passed, but did not seem to know who I was. I didn't take it ill of him, for he appeared to be full of his own thoughts. I heard Moses say: 'What I have said, I have said: I never lend money to a gambler.' Moses is coming here this afternoon."
Moses came as he had promised: "Hawermann," he said, "it's quite true; it's quite true about Berlin."--"What? Has the revolution broken out there also?"--"Yes," he answered, "but don't repeat what I tell you. The son of Manasseh came to me this morning from Berlin. He travelled by post to get here sooner, for he wants to do business with some flints he has had since the year--15."--"What on earth does he expect to get for his flints," cried Bräsig, "everyone uses percussion-caps now."--"How can I tell?" said Moses. "I know a great deal, and I know nothing. He means that if the revolution spreads all the old muskets for which flints were used will be brought into requisition again. He tells me that the soldiers in Berlin fired upon the people with muskets, pistols and cannon, and hewed them down with their sabres. The fighting lasted for a whole long night. The soldiers fired on the populace, who returned their fire from the windows and from behind the barricades. They also made use of stones. It's horrible, very horrible, But don't speak of it on any account."--"Then there was a regular canonnade?" cried Bräsig.--"Merciful Heaven!" exclaimed Hawermann, "what times we're living in, what dreadful times!"--"What do you mean by that. The times are always bad to stupid people; the wise find all times good. These wouldn't be good times for me, if I didn't make sure of getting my money paid up here and there. I, who am an old man, find the times very good."--"But, Moses, do you never feel anxious when you see everything going topsy-turvy? You are said to be a rich man."--"No, I'm not a bit afraid. Flora came to me whimpering and David came trembling. He said: 'Father, where are we to go with our money?'--'We'll just remain where we are,' I said. 'We'll lend where we have good security and we'll make money where we can; we'll be on the side of the people if it's required of us. And David, let your beard grow,' I said, 'the times are in favour of a beard.'--'Well, and if the times change?' he asked.--'Then cut off your beard,' I said, 'the times will no longer require you to wear it.'"
They now began to discuss Alick, his difficulties, and the fact that neither money nor credit were to be had. They found much to say on that score, for when credit goes the estate must go too, and many a landowner would be unable to save his estate the times were so bad. After Moses went away the two old bailiffs went down-stairs and spent the evening with Mrs. Behrens. They talked together sadly, and Mrs. Behrens every now and then clasped her hands and exclaimed at the wickedness of the world, for the first time thanking God for having taken her pastor to himself before these evil days had come upon the land, and for having thus prevented him seeing the unchristian actions which were now ruling the world. Hawermann felt like a man who had given up some dearly loved occupation, only to see his work brought to nought by his successor. Bräsig alone took things easily, he held his head in the air, and said: that the restlessness which had come into the world was not only owing to man, but that God had helped to cause it, or at least had allowed it, and it was a well known fact that a storm cleared the air. "And, Charles," he added,--"I'm not talking about you, Mrs. Behrens--but if I might advise you, Charles, you'd come to Grammelin's with me to-morrow evening, for we ar'n't rebels, I assure you. And do you know what it feels like to me? Just the same as a thunderstorm. It's dreadful when one looks at it from outside, but it's a very small affair, when one's in it."
That was how Bräsig came to join the Reform-club, and every evening when he returned home, he told his friends all that had happened. One evening he came back later than usual, and said: "It was a mad meeting to-night, Charles, and I have consumed a couple of glasses more beer than usual because of the greater importance of our proceedings. You must know that a number of labourers have become members of our club, and why shouldn't they, we're all brothers. And the confounded rascals have voted that all the land in the Rahnstädt district should be redistributed, so that everyone living within the district should have an equal portion of land. Then as to the town-woods, they want to give everyone the right of cutting down a fine old beech-tree every autumn for his firewood during the winter. After that the people who owned the land near Rahnstädt got up and opposed the motion; they approved of equality as much as the labourers did, but still they wanted to keep their land. Kurz got up and made a long speech about arable fields and meadows, of course ending with the town-jail, and when he was done they all called him an aristocrat and turned him out of the room. Then Wimmersdorf, the tailor, rose and preached about free-trade. No sooner had he done that than the other tailors fell upon him and thrashed him unmercifully: they all wanted equality, but still their guild must be kept up. Whereupon a young man came forward and asked sarcastically: What about the seamstresses, must the guild be maintained amongst them likewise? Then it was said that the seamstresses should be admitted into the tailor's union, but others opposed it, and there was a great row in which the old tailors got the worst of it. Meanwhile rector Baldrian was making a long, long speech in the body of the hall, in which he talked a great deal about the emancipalation--or some such long word--of women, and said that if the tailors wouldn't admit the seamstresses into their guild, the latter were quite able to set up one of their own, for they were human beings and sisters like the rest of us. So the motion was carried and the seamstresses are now admitted into the guild; and it was arranged before I left that all the seamstresses should dress themselves in white the day after to-morrow--you remember the yellow faced old maid who passes this house regularly, Charles? Well, she's one of them; they always call her 'auntie'--and go and thank the rector, and give him a woollen jersey and a pair of drawers on a cushion in token of their gratitude."--"Bräsig, Bräsig," remonstrated Hawermann, "how can you talk such nonsense. You're all acting as if there were no lawful authority remaining, and as if you could each do what is right in your own eyes."--"Why not, Charles? Who wants us to do otherwise. We pass our resolutions to the best of our knowledge, and if nothing comes of them, why nothing comes of them. As far as I can see, nothing can possibly come of them, for everyone wants to gain something, and no one will give up anything that he has."--"That's just as well, Zachariah, and I don't think for my own part that this little town will do much mischief to anyone with its speechifying, for parties are very equally divided. But just fancy if the labourers throughout the country were to take it into their heads to divide the estates of their masters amongst them! What a dreadful thing it would be!"--"Oh, they'll never do it, Charles."--"It's one of the deepest desires of human nature, Bräsig, to wish to call a bit, however small, of the earth one's own, and those ar'n't the worst men who try to gain some of it for themselves. Just look round you. When an artisan has made a little money, does he not at once lay it out on a small garden or field? and is not his pleasure in his purchase as great as his gain? The town labourer does the same, for he has the power to do so, and that's the reason that I don't think the discontent of the Rahnstädt labourers will ever rise to a dangerous height. But it's utterly different with the country people, they have no property and can never even by the greatest economy and diligence attain to any. If these new opinions should happen to take root amongst them, and if they are egged on by demagogues, there is no telling what harm may come of it. Yes," he exclaimed, "the bad masters will suffer first, but what assurance have we that the good masters will not be attacked next?"--"Well, Charles, you may be right, for Kurz said to me this evening--that's to say before he was turned out--that two Gürlitz labourers were talking very strangely in his shop last Sunday."--"Well," said Hawermann, taking up his candle to go to bed, "I don't wish anyone harm, although some people have perhaps deserved it, but the pity of it to my mind is, that the innocent will suffer as well as the guilty, and that the whole country will share the fate of the few, who by their misconduct have brought all the misery upon themselves."--He then went away and Bräsig said to himself: "Charles, may be right after all, and dreadful things may happen out in the country, so I must go and see what young Joseph and parson Godfrey are about. However young Joseph's in no danger, for he has never angered his labourers in any way, and so they'll let him alone. George at the parsonage isn't a rebel either, I'm sure of that."
Hawermann knew the nature of the people amongst whom he had worked for so many years. A feeling of uneasiness was spreading like a fever throughout the land. Reasonable complaints together with the most unreasonable and insane demands flew from mouth to mouth; what at first had been only whispered, was soon to be spoken of openly. The landowners were most to blame for that. They had lost their heads. Each of them acted as it seemed good to him, selfishly worked for his own safety regardless of others, and as long as he was at peace with his own people cared nought for his neighbour's fate. Instead of meeting their people honestly and straightforwardly, and showing them the real state of the case, some of the squires granted every demand their labourers chose to make in their folly and ignorance, while others, getting on horseback, wanted to reduce their labourers to order with swords and pistols, and I know several landowners who never went out to drive in their own grounds without taking a couple of loaded muskets in the carriage with them. And why was this? Because their conscience pricked them for their former conduct, and because there was no kindly human sympathy between them and their dependents. Of course that was not the case with all the masters.
Alick was one of those landowners who had never ill-treated his people. He was not hard on them generally speaking, but he could be hard if he thought his position was becoming insecure. During that time of political and social excitement the hidden qualities of all men were clearly revealed, and he who could look calmly on the march of events, and do what had to be done with quiet circumspection, who could distinguish good from evil, and steer his ship through the breakers which threatened to engulf it, was a wise and far-seeing man. That was not Alick's character. He was surrounded by his discontented vassals, and tried now this way, and now that way, of stemming the rising tide of insubordination, so it came to pass that he made two of the mistakes we have before alluded to; at one time he would foolishly submit to the villagers' demands, and at another, he would return to the ideas of a cavalry-officer and threaten his people with fire and sword. The peasantry also were changed, and it was his own fault that this was the case. He had taken from them little customs to which they were attached from use and wont, and at other times he had, in his good-nature, given them all kinds of injudicious liberties, that had only made them greedy of more, for he did not understand human nature as a whole, nor did he understand the peasantry at his gates. He had praised the people when they were idle, and he had scolded them when they were working hard, for he didn't know their capabilities. In short his actions were not guided by right and justice, but by his impulses, and as he had been rather low spirited of late, the discontent of the labourers was increasing, and threatened soon to break out into a blaze.
There was a hotbed of disaffection close to where Alick lived, and that was Gürlitz. It had once been as quiet and well doing a place as any in the country side, but in spite of the efforts parson Behrens had made for many years to keep it so, matters had gradually been growing worse and worse. Each of the new owners into whose hands it had passed had helped to bring about this state of things, and that old wretch Pomuchelskopp rejoiced when he saw it, for--dreadful as it is to say--there are some people who would rather see their labourers badly off than happy and comfortable, for they think that when their people are suffering from want, they will be the better able to rule them autocratically. Pomuchelskopp did not remember that when revolutions are the order of the day a half starved peasantry may be easily induced to revolt altogether, while those who are well off have not the same inducement to go so far. The neighbouring gentry who had long seen that the Gürlitz labourers were growing disaffected, never thought that the fire which Pomuchelskopp had fanned--without understanding its force--for his own ends, might spread throughout the district. The Gürlitz labourers had become accustomed to the taste of brandy, for there was a brandy-distillery up at the manor, and what they drank there was deducted from their wages. So in course of time they became beggars, and every penny they made, over and above what they spent at the still, was expended in the Rahnstädt public houses, where they soon learnt how the world was wagging. The waiters at the spirit shops told them what was going on throughout the country, and when they came home with their heads muddled with the brandy they had been drinking, they began 111 their besotted ignorance to add their unreasonable desires to the tale of their real wrongs, and so added to the miserable complication. Their starving wives and children stood about them looking like ghosts; the only way they could get a morsel of food was by begging; thus they carried story of their wretchedness through the country-side written on their famished faces, and sparks of the revolutionary fire were kindled everywhere.
Nothing was as yet ripe for revolt, there was still too much to be made in other ways, and the people were also restrained by the well meant advice of kindly souls, who understood and felt for them. Another thing that kept them from open revolt was the old feeling of loyalty to their masters, and the remembrance of former benefits received from them, to say nothing of the eternal sense of right and law which survives wonderfully long even in men who are led astray. These things all combined to keep the fire from bursting forth, even with the Gürlitz villagers. If they had been able to read what was going on in the heart of their master, they would perhaps have risen at once, for hardness and cowardice were striving for the mastery in his soul. His conscience had died long ago, and he had no need to accuse himself of any kindly action to an inferior. At one moment he would exclaim in a rage: "Oh those wretches! If I only.... The law must be changed! What's the use of a government which possesses soldiers, and yet doesn't march them out? Why, my property's in danger; and it's the duty of my government to protect my property." Next moment he would perhaps call Gustavus to come to him out of the yard, and would say: "What a fool you are Gus, why are you running after the threshers; let them thresh what they like, I won't have a row with my people." On one such occasion he turned to his wife immediately after saying this, and seeing her sitting on her chair as stiff and unbending as a poker, looking at him contemptuously with her pointed nose and sharp eyes, he added: "I know what you're thinking, Henny. You want me to go out and show myself a man; but that would never do. It really wouldn't do, Chuck. We must temporise, we must temporise, and we may perhaps get the better of them by judicious temperamentation." Henny expressed no opinion upon this proposal of her husband's, but she looked as if she had no intention of acting in accordance with it, and Pomuchelskopp then said to Mally and Sally: "Children, let me beg you not to repeat what I have just said. Especially take care not to tell any of the servants. Be as kind to them as you can, and try to induce your dear Mama to be kind to them also. I am always in favour of kindness, for my own part." Then Mally and Sally went to their mother, and said: "You don't know what dreadful things have happened Mama. John Joseph told the servants this morning that the work-women of the X. estate have whipped squire Z. with nettles. We must give way, Mama, we must give way, there's no help for it."--"How silly you all are," cried Henny, rising to leave the room. "Do you think that I'm afraid of such people?" she asked scornfully as she closed the door. But she was alone in her unnatural heroism, and got no sympathy from anyone, for Muchel was not to be sneered out of his fear of stormy weather, and the other members of that "quiet family" for once agreed with their father. "Children," cried Pomuchelskopp, "treat everyone kindly. The confounded rascals! Who would have thought of this three months ago? Now Phil and Tony remember this. I won't have you beat the village children or paint an ass' head on the back of old Brinkmann's smock-frock. The ragamuffins! I'm sure that they're egged on by the Reform club at Rahnstädt, and by the Jews and shopmen. Just wait a bit ...!"--"Yes, father," said Sally, "did you know that Rührdanz the weaver has become a member of the Reform club and that the other villagers want to join it also? It's a bad look out, isn't it?"--"Bless me! you don't mean to say so! But wait, I must join it too. I'll get myself elected."--"You!" cried both his daughters in a breath, looking as much astonished as if their father had just announced his intention of setting fire to his own house. "I must, I must. It'll make the artisans like me, and will prevent them setting my people against me. I'll pay up all my bills, at once, that's the first step--it's a horrid thing to do, but it's necessary in order to check-mate my labourers."--Mally and Sally were frightened, they had never before seen their father in such a state; but they were still more startled when he added: "I've got another thing to say to you, and that is, be sure that you're polite to the parson and his wife--for mercy sake remember that--your mother won't--Oh Henny, Henny what misery you cause me! The parsonage people may be very useful to us or very hurtful as the case may be. A squire and a parson can do what they like, if they only hold together! We must invite Mr. and Mrs. Godfrey Baldrian to dine here some day, and then afterwards when times are better, we can break off the acquaintance if we find them unpleasant people."
This was done! A few days after this conversation parson Godfrey and his wife received a note of invitation from Mr. and Mrs. Pomuchelskopp,--for good old Henny had given in to her husband in this point--, they presented their compliments and hoped to have the pleasure of their company at dinner, and concluded by saying that the maid was waiting for an answer. Bräsig had just arrived at the parsonage to see how everything was going on. When Godfrey had read the note of invitation, he looked as thunderstruck as if he had just received a summons to attend a meeting of Consistory because of teaching false doctrine, or leading an immoral life. "Well!" he exclaimed. "Here's an invitation to dine at the squire's! Where's Lina? Lina," he shouted putting his head out at the parlour door. Lina came. She read the letter and stared at Godfrey, who stood before her not knowing what to do. She looked at Bräsig, who was sitting in the sofa corner grinning at her like a fox at Whitsuntide. "No," she said at last, "we wont go there."--"Dear wife," said parson Godfrey, for he always called her "dear wife" when he was going to put his clerical dignity in the scales against her opinion, at other times he contented himself by saying "Lina," "dear wife, it is wrong to thrust away the hand one of our brethren extends to us in kindness."--"But Godfrey," answered Lina, "this isn't a hand, it's a dinner, and besides that, this brother's name is Pomuchelskopp. Am I not right, Bräsig?" Bräsig made no reply except by a grin. He sat there like David the son of Moses when he was engaged in weighing a Louis d'or, for he wanted to see which would turn the scale, Godfrey's clerical dignity or Lina's sound common sense. "Dear wife," said Godfrey, "it is written: 'Let not the sun go down upon your wrath,' and 'if any man strike thee on thy right cheek ....'"--"That's got nothing to do with it, Godfrey. We are'n't angry, and as for the slap on the face, I agree with Bräsig about that. May God forgive me if it's a sin! It may have been different in those old times; but I know that if it were the fashion to do that now-a-days, there would be a great deal more fighting than there is, and all the world would be running about with swelled faces."--"But, dear wife ..."--"You know, Godfrey that I never interfere with your management of clerical affairs, but a dinner-party is a worldly matter, and when it's at the Pomuchelskopps it's even more than that. And then you forget that we have a visitor. Isn't uncle Bräsig here? And wouldn't you much rather eat pea soup and pig's ears here with uncle Bräsig, than dine at the Pomuchelskopps? Besides that they hav'n't invited Mina," she added as her sister came into the room, "and yet they know that Mina is staying with us." All this had a great effect upon Godfrey. He was very fond of pea soup, and pig's ears pickled at home were his favourite dish; then I may add that he had a real affection for uncle Bräsig, and was very grateful to him for the help he had given him; indeed one of his greatest puzzles was how a man like Bräsig, who was so honest and true in all his dealings could be so poor a Christian and churchman. He therefore excused himself and his wife from dining at the manor. But unfortunately whilst they were at dinner, Bräsig was so far left to himself as to mention that he had really become a member of the Reform club in Rahnstädt, and Godfrey, pig's ears or no pig's ears, sprang to his feet, and spoke strongly of the evil influence exercised by that society. Lina tried to pull him back into his chair by his coat tails several times, for the soup was growing cold, but Godfrey would not stop. "Yes," he cried, "the scourge of the Lord has come upon the world; but woe to the man whom God shall choose as His scourge!" As he was not in church this time, Bräsig interrupted the clergyman, and asked who was the scourge to be chosen by God. "That is in the hands of the Lord," cried Godfrey, "He may choose me, or Lina, or you."--"Neither Lina nor I will be chosen," answered Bräsig, wiping his mouth, "for Lina fed the poor in the year '47, and last week I voted for equality and fraternity at the Reform club. I am not a scourge, for I do no one any harm; but if I could only get hold of Samuel Pomuchelskopp for one moment--then ...." Godfrey was too much taken up with the importance of what he had been saying to allow Bräsig to finish his sentence: "Oh!" he said. "The devil is going about the world like a roaring lion, and every platform erected at these Reform meetings is an altar on which men offer him sacrifice. I will oppose all such altars by another. I will preach in God's house against these burnt offerings made to the Devil, against these reform meetings, against these false Gods and their altars." He then sat down and eat a couple of spoonfuls of pea soup. Bräsig watched him for some time in silence, and as soon as he saw that the reverend gentleman had got over his excitement, and was beginning to enjoy the pig's ears, he said: "You're quite right in one respect, parson, the place where the speeches are made at our Rahnstädt meeting looks just like one of the devil's altars, that's to say, it's shaped like a vat such as are used in a brandy-distillery. Still I can't say that any one sacrifices to the devil at our meetings. If any one does, it must be Wimmersdorf, the tailor, or Kurz, or perhaps your own father, for he makes the longest speeches of the whole--now hush--I only want to say that from my knowledge of the devil, and I've been acquainted with him for many a long year, I'll answer for it that he'll have nothing to do with the Rahnstädt Reform club, he isn't such a fool."--"You know Godfrey," said Lina, "that I never interfere with your management of clerical matters, but surely you will never mention such a secular thing as a Reform club in the pulpit." Godfrey answered that that was just what he intended to do. "All right then, do," said Bräsig, "but it'll only prove that people are wrong in saying that the clergy understand their own advantage better than any other class of men, for instead of preaching your church full, you'll preach out everyone who goes to hear you."--Uncle Bräsig was right, for after Godfrey had preached one Sunday with great zeal and fervour against the spirit of the times--which, let it be remarked in passing, he understood as little as a new born child--and, against all reform meetings, concluding by saying that he would finish what he had to say on that subject on the following Sunday, he found that Lina, Mina and the beadle were his only audience when he got into the pulpit, for he did not count a few old women who had only come to church for the soup Lina always gave them after service. So he went home with his sermon and his womankind, followed by the old women with their soup cans, and the beadle locked up the church. Godfrey felt like a soldier who, carried away by military ardour, has gone too far, and finds himself surrounded by the enemy.
Everything was going wrong throughout the land, and every man's hand was against his neighbour. The world had been turned topsy-turvy, and those men who had formerly made themselves of much account were now unheeded, while those who had nothing, thrust themselves forward. The men who used to be accounted wise, were now looked upon as foolish, and those who had been called foolish, were supposed to have grown wise in the course of a single night. The great were abased; the nobles gave up their titles, and the labourers wanted to be called Mr. so and so. But two threads ran straight through the maze of cowardice and impudent self-assertion, and served to comfort and cheer humanity. The first of these was parti-coloured, and anyone who could free himself from the general fear, and general greed of moneymaking, sufficiently to follow its course, might enjoy many a quiet laugh at the oddity of human nature. The second thread was of a rosy hue, and on it depended all that made the happiness of mankind; pity and compassion, sound judgment and reason, honest service and self-sacrifice, and the name of this thread was love, pure human love, which made its way right through the tangled web of selfishness, showing the truth of God's decree that love is to remain unimpaired by misery, so that it may in the end change even the dull grey of the web of selfishness into its own rose colour, for--God be thanked!--that thread is never cut.