Even such a mind and such a man as the doctor, seemed to her to suffer by comparison with the only one.
Walpurga was quite uneasy on account of the second change of residence, and complained to Irma that it was a fearful life. "Why, it's nothing but living in carriages. You never get a chance to feel settled anywhere. It don't seem right to go and come in this way. Of course, they drive the cattle away from the mountain-meadows when the grass is gone, but cattle aren't human beings. I can't help pitying my poor prince, for there's nothing in his youth worth remembering. When he gets older, he won't be able to say: 'I used to be at home here, and saw these trees blossom and bear fruit; and then the snow covered them, and, after that, the spring came'--and if the poor child hasn't that, where'll it ever have a home?"
At breakfast, Irma repeated Walpurga's words, and found much that was affecting and poetical in this identifying one's-self with nature, and in this attachment to lifeless objects. The ladies and gentlemen in the breakfast-room could not understand where the poetry lay, for to them, it seemed narrow-mindedness. Baron Schoning interposed, and reminded them that this attachment to the soil possessed its advantages; for it was thus alone that solitary heights and valleys were inhabited. He maintained that the common people could only be governed by the force of habit; that man, as a free agent, must rid himself of such restraint; and that the true poetic idea was that of Pegasus resting on the earth, but yet able to wing his flight aloft.
Schoning looked about him as if he expected applause for his profound remark. It failed, however, to produce an impression. He had so constantly ministered to the amusement of the court, that all his attempts to be serious were failures, suggesting the success with which a well-known comedian or country bumpkin would undertake a tragic rôle, Schoning imagined that Irma understood him better than any of the others, but even she was not in a humor to assent that day. Gunther was the first to take up the conversation, saying that the present desire for incessant travel constituted a new impulse in the history of mankind, and one which no former age had known to the same extent. The generation which, even in its cradle, had heard the whistle of the locomotive, must, of necessity, be different from its predecessors. But yet poetry would never die, for every mother would teach her child to sing, and time, the everlasting mother, would teach unto the children of a new generation, new songs, different from those of the past but none the less full of beauty and feeling.
The queen nodded to Gunther, and her face was mantled with blushes, while she said that she agreed with Walpurga, and would rather remain in one place and become settled there.
The gentlemen and ladies of the court were loud in their praise of the queen's beautiful and feeling remarks, while, in their hearts, many considered them just as foolish as Walpurga's.
When they had left the table, the queen said to Irma:
"Dear Countess, you shouldn't say such things at table, or in the presence of company. Let me assure you, they are out of place there. Walpurga's thoughts are like fresh wild-flowers, which, when plucked and bound into a bouquet, soon wither and die. It is only artificially cultivated flowers that are adapted for the salon, and the best of all are those made of tulle and gauze. Hereafter, confide such things to me alone."
Irma was delighted with this agreement; but when, at noon, the queen told Walpurga what she had heard about her, the latter was angry at Irma. It won't do, thought she, to repeat everything you hear. She felt ashamed of herself, and became shy and reserved in Irma's presence. It was only when she was alone with the prince, that she whispered: "Yes, my little wanderer; after this, you shall be the only one to whom I'll tell everything. You're the cleverest in the whole house, and the only one who holds his tongue. You won't say a word to any one, will you?"
Walpurga was quite troubled by the idea of leaving, and Baum was the only one who knew how to pacify her. He said: