When the last parting came, she was just seventeen, and so sweet and pure, she looked fit for Heaven indeed, as she waited patiently for the summons. Her eyes grew brighter every day, her nostrils, transparent as alabaster, dilated and quivered with every breath she drew, and the smile of unearthly sweetness on her lips was like a perpetual leave-taking. Earlier in that very year, my poor brother’s sufferings had at last ended, and now, with the knowledge that my father’s days were numbered also, I must lose my one, my best-beloved friend!
Could I but have been with her to the last! But it has so often been my lot to be condemned by circumstances to go from the side of those whom I loved best on earth, with the full consciousness that I should see them here no more. Then for the first time that bitter experience was mine. My father was ordered to a milder climate for his health, so in October we all set out for Baden-Baden, to pass the winter there. Once more, before we parted, Marie and I resolved to be photographed together. I held her fast by the hand, as if by so doing I could hold her back, for the whole time while the photograph was being taken, my eyes were fixed on her, and saw the ominous quivering of the nostrils, that betokened how great the effort. Quite exhausted by it, she lay down again, and I sat by her side for a while, until my mother fetched me. We said goodbye; and then—“You will turn round, will you not,” she said, “my Lisi, at the door, and look back at me once more!” And I did turn round, and look back at her smiling, though my heart was like to break, and once outside, I had to lean against the wall to steady myself, so shaken was I by choking sobs. And there stood her poor mother, and looked at me, with tearless eyes. Such silent misery I have never seen in any other countenance. This was the fourth of her children whom Frau von Bibra must see pass away, and since the death of Max she had been an invalid herself. She might have been another Niobe, white as marble, with all the life and light spent in her big dark eyes, of a velvety softness, like rich brown pansies. Both parents were heroic, but whilst the unhappy mother bore each fresh blow in perfect silence, the father’s resignation even took the form of outer cheerfulness, that did not fail him now, when Marie, his darling, was being torn from him. “Death,” Herr von Bibra was accustomed to say, “should be a dear friend to me; he has been such a frequent visitor in my house!”
All through that winter I wrote each day to my dear Marie. Then towards the end of February came worse news, that she was suffering from frightful headaches, ending in delirium. This lasted a whole fortnight, during which she was always fancying she saw me, and calling me by name. “Ah! she was there, my Lisi!” she would cry; “if we could but die, all of us, together, and fly up to heaven where the others are waiting for us!” And the gates of Paradise seemed to be already open to her, for she told of all the wonders she saw, its undimmed glories, and the flowers that never fade—and these raptures were reflected in her face. The last thing I sent her was a little night-lamp in biscuit-china, like a tiny chapel, so delicate and fragile. And one night Baron Bibra wrote me these words:—“The little lamp, whose soft light seems to plunge our souls in an atmosphere of prayer and holiness, sheds its gentle rays over my child’s pale still face, as if whispering to her the loving thoughts of her who sent it!” The tears rise once more to my eyes, as I write this. As if the five-and-forty years that have passed since that day counted for nothing! It was a heartbreaking meeting with the poor father, when shortly after this he came to see us in Baden; and terrible again was the return to Neuwied, to find their house desolate, and the poor bereaved mother, more Niobe-like than ever, and her big velvety eyes still strained and tearless! Meantime—hardest ordeal of all I went through—during that winter of anxiety and anguish I had been obliged to go to my first ball, in order that my father should for once see me dance. It was with endless care and precautions that the short journey to Karlsruhe was undertaken, and once there, everything that friendship could do for him was done, by those truest and best of friends, the Grand Duke and Grand Duchess of Baden. Notwithstanding all their care, he of course coughed for the rest of the night—but—he had had his wish—he had seen his daughter at her first ball! And my feet felt like lead—were as heavy as my heart, which ached so that I knew not how to smile and look well pleased, and enter fittingly into the amiable small-talk of my partners. How unhappy I was, and how the old unhappiness comes over me once more, as I write this! For grief and joy are both eternal, but grief so much more violent in its nature, that did we but rightly consider it, our one aim should be, to bring some joy into each other’s lives, to sweeten the bitterness that must needs be the portion of all. It was the very violence of my grief that helped me through the next few months, for I plunged headlong into work—there was no other way for me—studying, practising—seven hours in the day sometimes—till I was tired out—anything so as not to have to think! But now I can look back with gratitude on the sympathy shown me by so many friends, and remember the kind and feeling words of Monsieur de Bacourt, Talleyrand’s former secretary, when he learnt the death of the friend and companion of my youth:—“C’est bien dur de ne plus pouvoir dire—te rappelles-tu?”
Next year, death was again busy in our midst. This time it was my father who was called away. And now at last Baron Bibra’s fortitude gave way. He who had seen with almost stoical endurance his children go before him to the tomb, broke down completely after taking his last farewell of the friend of a lifetime. To that long unbroken friendship, a striking testimony was furnished in recent years by the simple perusal of all the documents signed by both during Bibra’s tenure of office in my father’s lifetime. From studying the contents of these dry deeds, my brother’s steward, Baron von der Recke, had been able to gather an intimate knowledge of his predecessor’s character, as also of my father’s, and of their mutual affection and regard for one another. I marvelled indeed when he imparted to me the result of his researches, and some of the conclusions he had drawn, so correct were they in many minutest particulars. I learnt from this, the truth that even archives may contain, with their record of dull dry facts, and of the poetry that may sometimes lurk in a stiffly worded deed!
CHAPTER XVII
[MY BROTHER OTTO]
In telling the story of my brother’s short life, I cannot do better than employ in the first place the simple words of his faithful attendant, Mary Barnes, who for seven years watched over him devotedly night and day, by her untiring care doing much to alleviate the pain he suffered from his birth. Her notes begin thus:—
“Friday, 22nd November, 1850, the anxiously expected treasure entered this valley of sorrow. The event can be forgotten by none who were present on that day. For some time past but small hopes had been entertained of the child coming into the world alive, and we therefore rejoiced the more, when after many hours of pain and danger, a fine boy was born. New life, new hope sprang up; but the joy was of short duration, to be transformed only too soon into lasting sorrow. Very shortly after his birth, the poor infant’s laboured breathing showed that all was not well with him, and this led to the discovery of a serious organic defect. At first the doctors believed that this could be remedied by a slight operation, and an eminent surgeon was sent for. Unfortunately he arrived too late to operate that day, and the night that followed was a terrible one. I did not think it possible for the poor babe to last till morning; it was blue in the face, as I held it, all night long, upright in my arms, to prevent it being suffocated. At last morning came, and after due examination, the operation was fixed for eleven o’clock. We moistened the poor child’s lips with a few drops of milk, as it had not sufficient strength to take the breast. The malformation was more serious, and the operation in consequence attended with far greater difficulty, than the doctors had foreseen. It lasted so long, and left the tiny patient so exhausted, we hardly thought he would survive it many seconds. His whole appearance was changed; the skin had taken a dull yellowish hue, and the little limbs were so cold, we resorted to every possible means of restoring a little warmth. This state of utter exhaustion lasted for twenty-four hours, during which we kept moistening the lips with milk and with a few drops of a resuscitating medicine, it being the opinion of the doctors that could we but succeed in prolonging life for a few hours, all might be well in the end.
“When at last the feeble flame of life seemed to burn a little more steadily, I was indeed shocked to see, in performing the little sufferer’s toilet, the awful change wrought in his poor little tortured body. He seemed to have dwindled away, to have grown so small, so fragile, that one feared that the lightest touch must hurt him. He did succeed in getting a little sleep, but his sufferings were indescribable, and caused him, when awake, to scream incessantly night and day, till the little voice, worn out, became weak and hoarse, and the cry ended in a feeble moan, whilst the baby face twitched with pain. Early on the morning of the tenth day he
