In 1890, on his eightieth birthday, Frankl published a large volume of able poetry; during his long life he has been an unusually productive poet and writer of biography; he has been presented with the freedom of Vienna and of three other European and Asiatic towns; but this song, of which in course of time at least a hundred thousand copies were printed, was what founded his reputation.
It was not, however, really the first poem printed after the abolition of the censorship, for on the previous night Castelli had written his song of the Garde-National. In the German language alone there are three or four poems which lay claim to the same distinction. One of these is the song of the Vienna student brigade, Erwacht, erwacht o Brüder! Ein grosser Morgen tagt ("Awake, awake, O brothers! a great morning is dawning"), and another is Fr. Gerhard's Die freie Presse, which begins:
"Die Presse frei! Die Glocken lasst ertönen
Und läutet Jubel überall!
Und ruft's hinaus zu Deutschlands fernsten Söhnen
Die Presse frei, erstürmt der Freiheit Wall![4]
Simultaneously with these poems, which express such an innocent, exuberant delight at being able to speak and write without restraint, there appeared others full of the most childish gratitude to the weak-minded Emperor. In them he is "the good Emperor," "our good Ferdinand," &c., &c. People were ready to forget immediately that every single concession had been, not granted, but forcibly extorted, or else they believed naïvely that this was the way to make their late oppressors forget it. In one of the many songs in praise of the Emperor we read:
"Heil dir, mein Kaiser! in all der Lust
Zu der sich dein Volk ermannt hat,
Sei Dir vor Allen ein Heil gebracht,
Den es immer als edel erkannt hat."[5]
On the 16th of March the Hungarian deputation, 150 magnates with Kossuth at their head, rode into Vienna, through the Prater, welcomed with deafening cheers and showers of flowers. That day the number of armed citizens had risen to 60,000. In the afternoon a herald appeared on the balcony of the Castle and read the following proclamation: "We, Ferdinand the First, by the grace of God Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary and Bohemia, of Lombardy and Venice, of Dalmatia, Croatia, Slavonia, Galicia, Illyria, &c., have now, in agreement with the wishes of our faithful people, decided to take certain steps." On this introduction follows the announcement of the liberty of the press, the formation of the National Guard, and the convention of an assembly of deputies for the purpose of drafting "that constitution which we have determined to bestow on our country."
Saphir sang:
"Schwert aus der Scheid, aus dem Herzen das Lied!
Stimmt an das Lied der Lieder!
Jauchzend ertön' es durch Reihe und Glied,
Jauchzend durch jubelnde Brüder!
Blank wie die Waffe und hell wie der Stahl
Klinge das Lied von der Garde-National."[6]
Even the mocking-birds, we see, on this occasion ceased from mocking and found voice to join in the universal chorus. In the persistent employment of the French word, Garde Nationale, we have an example of the importation and imitation which so largely characterised the movement.
In turning over the pages of a collection of the German political poems, several thousand in number, which were published in 1848 in Vienna alone, we come upon many unknown names, but also upon almost all that were well known at that time and on many that were destined to become famous. We are struck by a poem of Bauernfeld's, Wien an die Provinzen, weak from a literary point of view, but significant from its indication of the first sign of reaction, namely, an attempt made in the provinces to shake off what was called the tyranny of the capital; in other words, to counteract the influence of the example set by victorious, free Vienna. Friedrich Uhl, at a later period editor of the Wiener Abendpost, the official organ of the Government, writes a lament for the fallen revolutionary heroes: