Still wittier is the parody of King Ludwig's poetical style, in the inscription above the resting-place of Atta Troll in the Bavarian Walhalla:
"Atta Troll, Tendenzbär, sittlich—
Religiös; als Gatte brünstig;
Durch Verfuhrtsein von dem Zeitgeist
Waldursprünglich Sansculotte;
Sehr schlecht tanzend, doch Gesinnung
Tragend in der zott'gen Hochbrust
Manchmal auch gestunken habend;
Kein Talent, doch ein Charakter!"[5]
[5] Atta Troll, a bear of impulse;
Devotee; a loving husband;
Full of sans-culottic notions,
Thanks to the prevailing fashion.
Wretched dancer; strong opinions
Bearing in his shaggy bosom;
Often stinking very badly;
Talentless, a character!
(BOWRING)
The harshness and the strained participial construction both remind us of the style of the royal effusions which any visitor to Munich may study for himself below the frescoes on the walls of the arcades.
This is merely personal satire of crowned heads; but Heine's satire, like that of Aristophanes, is frequently directed against existing political, social, and literary conditions, and it is then that he is obliged to call the dream to his aid. With its help he descends into the depth of the earth, or mounts to a fantastic world above the clouds.
This, as already mentioned, happens more especially in Deutschland. Observe with what care and skill Heine prepares for the fantastic description of Barbarossa's subterranean dwelling-place in the Kyffhäuser. First he introduces the refrain of an old legendary ballad: "Sonne, du klagende Flamme!" (Sun, thou accusing flame!) with a sketch of the legend which tells how the sun acted as the accuser of the murderer of a young maiden; then he describes the good old nurse who sang this ballad and told many an entrancing tale—the tale of the princess disguised as a goose-herd, the tale of the emperor who lived deep down in the earth below the mountain; this second he relates at length—and presently all else is forgotten; we see Barbarossa with his mail-clad followers, we hear him call them to horse, to arms, to battle, to avenge the wrong which the murderers have done to the golden-haired Germania. Then we return to the mood of the nursery ballad, and to its refrain: "Sonne! du klagende Flamme!" now chanted with enthusiasm and rejoicing. There is an Aristophanic verve in this poetic description of the old arsenal, the empty suits of armour, the faded flags, the sleeping soldiers, and then the sudden revulsion, the appeal to awakening power, the supplication that the Middle Ages may return again, as being infinitely preferable to the sanctimonious Prussia of the day, with her mixture of Gothic folly and modern falsehood. The two following cantos, which contain a further description of the interior of the mountain, and conversations with Barbarossa, take the form of an account of a dream which the poet had while travelling at night in the stage-coach.
The anti-Prussian rhapsody in the inn at Minden is prepared for in the same manner. Heine wants to summon forth the Prussian eagle, and to pluck him and shoot him. If Aristophanes had had the same designs, he would have introduced the eagle without more ado. Heine goes to work in his roundabout way. In the act of falling asleep he dreams that the red bed-curtain tassel above his head turns into an eagle with feathers and claws, which threatens to tear the liver out of his breast, and which he taunts with bitter hatred.
In a few single instances Heine's artistic procedure is bolder, more like that of the great Greek. One of these is the splendid harangue to the wolves at night in the Teutoburgerwald. At midnight the traveller hears them howling round his carriage, which has lost a wheel. He comes out and makes a speech to the savage brutes:
"Mitwölfe, ich bin glücklich, heut'
In eurer Mitte zu weilen,
Wo so viel' edle Gemüther mir
Mit Liebe entgegen heulen."[6]
[6] Brother wolves! it gives me great pleasure to-day
To tarry awhile midst your growling,
Where so many noble spirits have met,
Around me lovingly howling.
(BOWRING)