"One of the most curious occurrences of the kind that ever I heard of," said Beauchamp, "was told me by a German gentleman to whom it happened. It was the case of a man seeing his own spirit, and although we are continually told we ought to know ourselves, few men have ever had such an opportunity of doing so as this gentleman."
"Oh do tell us the whole story, Mr. Beauchamp," cried Isabella, eagerly, "I must beg and entreat that you would not tantalise us with a mere glimpse of such a delightful vision, and then let fall the curtain again."
"My dear Bella, you are tantalising him," exclaimed her father. "Don't you see that you are preventing him from eating his dinner; at all events, we will have a glass of wine first; shall it be Hermitage, Mr. Beauchamp? I have some of 1808, the year before that rascal, Napoleon, mixed all the vintages together."
The wine was drunk, but immediately this was accomplished, Isabella renewed her attack, calling upon Mr. Beauchamp for the story, and in her eagerness laying one round taper finger upon his arm as he sat beside her, to impress more fully her commands upon him, as she said, "I must and will have the story, Mr. Beauchamp."
"Assuredly," he replied, in his usual quiet tone, "but first of all, I must premise one or two things, that you may give it all the weight it deserves. The gentleman who told it to me was, at the time of my acquaintance with him, a man of about seventy years of age, very simple in his manners, and, however excitable his fancy might have been in youth, he was at the time I speak of, as unimaginative a person as it is possible to conceive. He assured me most solemnly, as an old man upon the verge of eternity, that every word he spoke was truth, and now I will tell it as nearly in his own language as I can, and my memory is a very retentive one. You must remember, however, that it is he who is speaking, and not I; and fancy us sitting together, the old man and the young one, warming ourselves by a stove on a winter's night, in the fine old town of Nuremberg."
BEAUCHAMP'S STORY.
"I am of an Italian family," said my friend, "but my father and my grandfather were both born in Germany; exceedingly good people in their way, but by no means very wealthy. My elder brother was being educated for a physician, and had just finished his course of study, when my father, having given me as good an education as he could in Nuremberg, thought fit to send me to Hamburg, that I might pursue my studies there, and take advantage of any opportunity that might occur for advancing myself in life. My stock of all kinds was exceedingly small when I set out; my purse contained the closely-estimated expenses of my journey, and the allowance made for my maintenance during six months, which did not admit the slightest idea of luxury of any kind. I was grateful, however, for what was given, for I knew that my father could afford no more, and I had no hope of another 'heller' till my half year was out. I had my ordinary travelling dress, and my mother gave me six new shirts, which she had spun with her own hands; besides these, my portmanteau contained one complete black suit, two pair of shoes, and a pair of silver buckles, which my father took off his own feet and bestowed them upon me with his benediction. My elder brother always loved me, and was kind to me; and when my going was first talked of, he regretted deeply that he had nothing to give me; but my little preparations occupied a fortnight, and during that time good luck befriended him and me, and he treated and killed his first patient. Thus he obtained the means of making me a sumptuous present for my journey, which consisted of a straight-cut blue mantle, with a square collar. Let me dwell upon the mantle, for it is important. It was in the Nuremberg fashion, which had gone out of vogue over all Germany for at last thirty years, and when I first put it on, I felt very proud of it, thinking that I looked like one of the cavaliers in the great picture in the town-hall. However, there was not another mantle like it in all Germany, except in Nuremberg--sky-blue, falling three inches below the knee, with a square-cut collar. I will pass over my journey to Hamburg, till my arrival in a little common inn, in the old part of the town. Not having a pfennig to spare, I set out early the next morning to look out for a lodging, and saw several that would have suited myself very well, but which did not suit my finances. At length, seeing the wife of a grocer standing at the door, with a good-humoured countenance, in a narrow and dark street, containing some large, fine houses, which had seen the splendours of former times, I walked up to her and asked if she could recommend a lodging to a young man who was not over rich. After thinking for a moment, she pointed over the way, to a house with a decorated front, which had become as black as ink with age. The lower story was entirely occupied by an iron-warehouse; but she said that up above on the first floor I should find Widow Gentner, who let one room, and who had, she believed, no lodger at the time. I thanked her many times for her civility, and walking across the street to the point she indicated, I looked up at the cornices and other ornaments which were displayed upon the facade. Dirty they were beyond all doubt. A pair of stone ladies with baskets in their hands, which had probably been once as white as snow, now displayed long dripping lines of black upon their garments; their noses had disappeared, but the balls of the eyes were of the deepest brown, though above the centre appeared a white spot, which seemed to show the presence of cataract. The fruit in the baskets, however, consisted apparently of black cherries, and a dingy cornucopia, which stood by the side of each, vomited forth swarthy fruit and flowers of a very uninviting quality. I gazed in surprise and admiration, and asked myself if it ever would be my fate to live in so fine a mansion. Taking courage, however, I inquired at the ironmonger's which was the door of Widow Gentner, and of the three which opened into the lower part of the house, I was directed to the second. On the first floor I found a tidy little maid, who introduced me to the presence of her mistress, a quiet, dry old lady, who was seated in a room which had apparently formed part of a magnificent saloon--I say formed part, for it was evident that the size of the chamber had been much curtailed. On the ceiling, which was of the most magnificent stucco work I ever saw, appeared various groups of angels and cherubs in high relief, as large as life, and seated amidst clouds and bunches of flowers as big as feather-beds. But that ceiling betrayed the dismemberment of the room; for all along the side where ran the wall behind the good lady were seen angels' legs without the heads and bodies, baskets of flowers cut in two, and cherubs with not above one-half of the members even, which sculptors have left them. This was soon explained: the widow informed me that she had divided her chamber into three, of which she reserved one for herself, another for her little maid, and let the third, which had a staircase to itself opening from the street. She had done so with a good wall, she said, to support the plafond, so that if I wanted to see the room she had to let, I must go down again with her and mount the other stairs, as there was no door of communication. I admired her prudence, and accompanied her at once to a small room, arrived at by a small staircase with its own street-door; and there I found on the ceiling above my head the lost legs and wings of the angels on the other side, besides a very solid pair of cherubims of my own. It contained a little narrow bed, a table, a scanty proportion of chairs and other things necessary for the existence of a student; and though an unpleasant feeling of solitude crept over me as I thought of inhabiting an apartment so entirely cut off from all human proximity, yet as the widow's rent was small, I closed the bargain at once, and soon was installed in my new abode. The good lady was very kind and attentive, and did all she could to make me comfortable, inquiring, amongst other things, what letters of introduction I had in Hamburg. I had but one which I considered of any value, which was addressed, with many of those flourishes which you know are common amongst us, to Mr. S., a famous man in his day, both as a philosopher and literary man, and who was also a man of sense of the world, and what is more than ali, of a kind and benevolent heart. I went to deliver it that very day, and met with a most kind and friendly reception from a good-looking old gentleman, of perhaps sixty-three or four, who at once made me feel myself at home with him, treating me with that parental air which inspired both respect and confidence. He asked several questions about my journey, where I lodged, how I intended to employ my time, and last, what was the state of my finances. I told him all exactly as it was, and when I rose to depart, he laid his hand on my arm with the most benevolent air in the world, saying, 'You will dine with me to-morrow at twelve o'clock, and I shall expect to see you at dinner three days in the week as long as you stay. From eight to ten at night I am always at home, and whenever you have nothing else to do, come in and spend those hours with us.' I will not pretend to say I was not quite well aware that the place thus granted me at his dinner-table was offered from a knowledge of the limited state of my finances; but pride in my case was out of the question, and I was exceedingly grateful for the act of kindness, which saved me a considerable sum in my housekeeping, and enabled me to indulge in a few little luxuries which I could not otherwise have commanded.
"It was the autumn of the year when I arrived at Hamburg, but the time passed very pleasantly. All the day I was engaged in my studies; at twelve o'clock I dined, either at my own chamber or at worthy Mr. S.'s, and almost every evening was spent at his house, where he failed not to regale me, either with a cup of fine coffee, or sometimes as a great treat, with a cup of tea, according to your English mode. In short, I became his nightly guest, and as the evenings grew dark and sometimes foggy, I bought a little lantern to light myself through the long and lonely streets which I had to pass from his house to my own. On these occasions, too, as the weather grew intensely cold, my blue cloak with the square collar proved a most serviceable friend, and every night at ten o'clock I might be seen in precisely the same attire, with my black suit, in great part covered by the azure mantle, and the small lantern in my hand, finding my way homeward to my solitary abode. Mr. S. lived in the fine new part of the town, where he had a handsome house, with two maid-servants and his coachman, but the latter slept at the stables. I lived, as I have before said, in the old part of the town, well-nigh a mile distant; thus, in coming and going, I got exercise at night, if I did not in the day, and I mark it particularly, that I used to enjoy my walk to his house and back, and used to look forward to it with pleasure during my hours of study, in order that you may see, that on the occasion of which I am about to speak, I was affected by no fantastical melancholy.
"At length, one night in the winter of 17--, after passing the evening at the house of Mr. S., where I had taken nothing but a cup of coffee and a slice of brown bread-and-butter, I took leave of my friend, put on my blue mantle with a square collar, lighted my lantern at the housemaid's candle, and having safely shut the glass, set out on my walk home. It was about a quarter-past ten, and the night was clear and very dark; the sky, indeed, was full of stars, which looked peculiarly bright as I gazed up at them, between the tall houses, as if from the bottom of a well, and I felt a sort of exhilarating freshness in the air that raised my spirits rather than otherwise. I walked along to the end of the first street with a light step, turned into the second, and was just entering the third, when I saw a figure some thirty or forty paces before me, standing in a corner as if waiting for some one. Although the streets, in the good old days of Hamburg, were generally by that time of night quite deserted, yet there was nothing extraordinary in my meeting one or two persons as I went home, so that I took little or no notice of this figure, till I had advanced to within about twenty paces, when it turned itself full towards me, and at the same time the light of my lantern fell direct upon it. Guess my surprise when I saw a being, so exactly like myself, that I could have imagined I was looking in a glass. There were the black legs, the shoes and silver buckles, the blue mantle with the square-cut collar, and the little lantern with the handle at the back, held just as I held mine. I stopped suddenly, and rubbed my eyes with my left hand; but the figure immediately turned round and walked away before me. At the same time my heart beat violently, and a sort of strange dreamy sensation of horror came over me, like that which takes possession of one sometimes when labouring under the nightmare. An instant's reflection made me ashamed of what I felt, and saying to myself, 'I'll look a little closer at this gentleman,' I walked on, hurrying my pace. The figure, however, quickened its steps in the same proportion. I did not like to run, but I was always a quick walker, and I hastened as fast as ever I could; but it had no effect; the figure, without the least apparent effort, kept always at the same distance, and every moment I felt the sort of superstitious dread which had taken possession of me increasing, and struggling against the efforts of resolution. Resolution conquered, however, and determined to see who this was that was so like me, without showing him too plainly that I was chasing him, I stopped at a corner where a street wound round, and entered again the one that I was pursuing at some distance, and then taking to my heels, I ran as hard as I could to get before my friend in the blue mantle. When I entered the other street again, though I must have gained two or three minutes at least, instead of seeing the figure coming from the side where I had left it, there it was, walking on deliberately in the direction I usually followed towards my own house. We were now within three streets of Widow Gentner's, and though they were all of them narrow enough, I generally took those which were most open. There was a lane, however, to the left, which, passing by the grocer's I have mentioned, cut off at least a quarter of the way, and as I was now overpowered by feelings I cannot describe, I resolved to take the shortest path, and run as hard as I could, in order to get home, and shut myself in before the figure in the blue mantle reached the spot. Off I set then down the narrow lane like lightning, but when I came to the grocer's corner, my horror was complete, on beholding the same figure walking along past the closed windows of the iron-shop, and I stopped with my heart beating as if it would have burst through my ribs. With eyes almost starting from my head, and the light of the lantern turned full upon it, I gazed at its proceedings, when behold, it walked quietly up to my door, stopped, turned round towards the house, put the right-hand in its pocket, and seemed feeling for my key. The key was produced, and stooping down, just as I should have done, after a little searching for the keyhole, the door was opened, the figure went in, and instantly the door closed again.
"If you had given me the empire of a world, I could not have made up my mind to go in after it, and setting off more like a madman than any thing else, I returned to the house of Mr. S., with the intention of telling him what had occurred. The bell was answered quickly enough by the housemaid, who gazed at my wild and scared appearance with some surprise. She told me, however, that the old gentleman had gone to bed, and that she could not think of waking him on any account; and resolved not to go home, and yet not liking to walk the streets of Hamburg all night, I persuaded her with some difficulty to let me sit in the saloon till I could speak with Mr. S. in the morning. I will not detain you by describing how I passed the night; but when my friend came down the next day, I related to him all that occurred, with many excuses for the liberty I had taken. He listened gravely, and his first question naturally was, if I were quite sure I had gone straight homeward, without entering any of those places where strong drinks were sold. I assured him most solemnly that the only thing that had entered my lips that night was the cup of coffee which I had taken at his house.