The very remarkable, scarcely credible effect of this occurrence on the two lovers very soon made itself perceptible. Fräulein Aennchen took a dislike to touching a spade, and she did really reign like a queen over the vegetable world, inasmuch as, though taking care that her vassals were properly supervised and attended to, she set no hand to the work herself, but entrusted it to maids in whom she had confidence.
Herr Amandus, for his part, saw now that everything he had ever written in the shape of verses was wretched, miserable trash, and, burying himself in the works of the real poets, both of ancient and modern times, his being was soon so filled with a beneficent enthusiasm that no room was left for any consideration of himself. He arrived at the conviction that a real poem has got to be something other than a confused jumble of words shaken together under the influence of a crude, jejeune delirium, and threw all his own (so-called) poetry, of which he had had such a tremendous opinion, into the fire, becoming once more quite the sensible young gentleman, clear and open in heart and mind, which he had been originally.
And one morning Herr Dapsul did actually come down from his astronomical tower to go to church with Fräulein Aennchen and Herr Amandus von Nebelstern on the occasion of their marriage.
They led an exceedingly happy wedded life. But as to whether Herr Dapsul's union with the Sylphide Nehabilah ever actually came to anything the Chronicle of Dapsulheim is silent.
During the reading of this the Friends had laughed a good deal, and they were unanimously of opinion that, though there was not a great deal in the plot, yet that the details were so humorous and droll that, as a whole, the tale was a success.
"As to the plot," Vincenz said, "there is rather a curious circumstance connected with that. Not long since, happening to be dining at the table of a certain lady of princely rank, there was a lady present who had on a gold ring with a beautiful topaz, of which the remarkably antique-looking form and workmanship attracted universal attention. We thought it had been some precious heirloom, and were astonished to hear that it had been found sticking on a carrot dug up on her property a few years previously. Probably it had been lying pretty deep in the ground, and had been brought towards the surface when the land was trenched, so that the carrot had grown through it.
"The Princess pointed out what a good idea for a story this suggested, and wished that I should set to work to write one at once on the subject. So, you see, I hadn't far to go for the idea of the 'Vegetable King and his People,' and I claim the invention of them for myself, for there isn't a trace of him to be found in Gabalis or any other book of the kind."
"Now," said Lothair, "I think we may say that on none of our former Serapion evenings has our fare been of a more various character than to-night. And it is good that we have managed to emerge from that gruesome darkness into which we had wandered somehow--I am sure it is hard to tell why--into the clear, brightsome light of day, although, no doubt, a serious, careful person might, with some reason, say that all the fantastic matter which we have so long been going on spinning and accumulating might have a considerable tendency to induce confusion of head, if not headache and feverishness."
"We should all do the best we can," said Theodore. "But let no one deem that his own particular qualities and powers constitute the norm of what the human understanding is to have laid before it. For there are people--good sensible folks enough in other respects--who are so easily made giddy in their heads that they think the rapid flight of an awakened imagination is the result of an unsound condition of mind. So that such people say, of this or the other writer, that he only writes when he is under the influence of intoxicating drinks, and attribute his imaginative writings to over-excited nerves, and a certain amount of deliriousness thence arising. But everybody knows that although a condition of mind raising from either of those causes can give rise to a happy thought, or fortunate idea, it is impossible that it can yield perfect and finished work, because that demands the very quietest study and consideration."
On this evening Theodore had set before his friends some remarkably superior wine sent to him by a friend on the Rhine. He poured what remained of it into the glasses, and said:--